#I’ve moved in and everything!!! still without money and missing my best friend but I’m out of my bum ass suburb and closer to the city

[jutsuuu]

I am no longer experiencing

[sinnabee]

hey guys! i’ve got a bit of a (big) life update for y’all.

unfortunately, i’m having to figure out a new living situation pretty unexpectedly. my roommate and i talked, and basically he’s wanting to live on his own again. so i’ve got about two months to get moved out of here and find a new place. (i’m working on it! luckily i recently reconnected with a friend who’s a real estate agent, so who knows - maybe i’ll get my own damn house >:D)

for anybody that follows me on ko-fi, you might have seen the update i put there. this is a more detailed version of that.

basically, this means (and i am so so so SO sorry about this) it’s going to be a while before i can get a lot of these charm orders out.

i’m going to try my best to get out what i can in-between packing, but don’t be surprised if your order takes several months to ship. again, i’m so sorry - i know it took me ages to even get them listed.

one of the other things this is going to effect may be sticker orders and new stickers.

sticker orders:

i try to include free doodles with my sticker orders, and i am going to continue to try and do that, but some of you may not receive a doodle, and for that i’m sorry.

if you would rather get your stickers sooner, and don’t mind missing out on the doodle, please message me, either through tumblr or through ko-fi. (ko-fi will help me keep track of who’s who a bit better.)

if you REALLY want a doodle, and don’t mind waiting, then let me know and i’ll move yours to the back of my list. this way, i can prioritize anyone who doesn’t mind going without a doodle and start cutting down on my workload.

if you don’t message me either way, i’ll try and get your doodle done, but there’s a chance i may just go ahead and send it without one. luck of the draw.

some of you have ordered stickers AND charms! (omg, what the heck! y’all are amazing!) despite being in the same order, i may try and at least get you your sticker orders, unless otherwise requested. (i have a few people that have already spoken to me about having their items shipped together, so no worries if we’ve already talked.) for anyone that ordered stickers + charms, i wasn’t going to do a doodle anyway, since the main reason i have those is to do something with the cardstock i use to keep the envelopes flat. this way y’all will at least get something sooner! (again, message me if you’d rather i’d send it all together. don’t worry about shipping if i send them separately, i’m not gonna apply a charge for that, it’s fine.)

new stickers:

i had intended to start printing and eventually list my new halloween dca sticker design by october first at the absolute latest. but with the whole “ideally be moved out within two months at the latest, earlier if possible,” thing, that may not be happening.

i’m still gonna try, though!!!!! i’ll try and save my sticker making things for later in the packing process, and maybe try and get that stuff figured out before the end of this month. we’ll see if i can juggle it with everything else - i really think it’s dependent on me catching up on my other orders, first.

in addition to all of this, i’m still out of work on FMLA for my back problems. on the bright side - my appointment is FINALLY coming up!!! yippee!!! but that also means i have to take a lot of breaks from packing and working on stickers because… back hurty. but it ALSO means i have the time to do all this stuff, breaks included, because i’m not working. so…silver linings, am i right? :D

also just wanna say thank you to everybody again - i have made SO many friends in this fandom, and i’ve had a blast being able to make stickers and finally charms!!!! half the reason i’ve been able to bounce back so quick after getting this news the other day is because i’ve already had some of my pals who saw my kofi post messaging me and wishing me well. and the money from the charm orders is gonna help ease the moving/shopping process a lot, so - thank you all so much!!!!

again, i’m sorry everything is so delayed. but i WILL get it out to you eventually, once things settle down a bit. but y’all are amazing, and i appreciate you lots, k???? don’t forget it!!! <3

[munsonownsmyass]

Michael Kinsella x reader

Authors note: I have been through the emotional ringer lately and after listening to a Hozier song today, I just felt I needed to put this down on paper.

Sometimes life is hard, but it's important not to lose hope.

Thank you to @e-dubbc11 for ensuring me that the first thing I've written in almost two months aren't shit. Love you hun ❤️

Warnings: Angsty, bad self image, a hopeless romantic feeling anything but love, hopeful endings, a smidge of fluff.

Words: 1.1K

I never really thought I was worth anything and so far, life hasn’t really showed me anything to prove me wrong. This is not a sob story where I go into detail about how my parents didn’t have time for me or how I didn’t have any friends growing up. I won’t force you to sit through pages upon pages of me telling you about my countless wrecked relationships, how I’ve been ghosted more than a haunted house or about all the times I’ve thought to myself ‘This is it. I’ve found it.’, just to be proven wrong again. To once again have my heart shattered.

I know deep down that the problem might be me. I mean, all these things do have me in common. Maybe I’m just not worth it? Maybe I should just move to a cabin in the woods, get a bunch of dogs and live happily ever after as an author, alone and content… Given that my books could even sell, that is…

You see, my problem is that I’ve always believed in true love. Happily ever after. That one day I’d look into the eyes of another and find the missing piece of my soul and finally feel like I belong somewhere for the first time in my life. But I’m starting to believe that true love only exists in fairytales and that it’s never going to happen to me. I remain hopeful, but I wouldn’t bet any money on me finding my one true love.

You know that one person you’d want to look at every night before you go to sleep and can’t wait to see again in the morning as the sun shines through the blinds, falling perfectly on their face. Don’t we all want that all-consuming ‘can’t live without each other’ love? I certainly do and I remain hopeful… Or I try to.

Cause what is life without hope? Would it even be worth getting up in the morning? I go to bed some nights not sure if I even want to wake up the next day, but I still wake each morning, lying to myself that it will get better. That today might be the day that everything changes.

Okay, before I start sounding like I’m a depressed little person, I would want to say you’ve caught me at a bad time. Just got ditched again after thinking he was the right guy. I had already started mentally moving into a little cottage where we could grow old together, but alas… I was again proven that some men are just dicks or that I’m the problem… And I really don’t want to think about the last one.

So yes. Right now, I could curse every single man to hell, but who am I kidding? Give me 5 minutes and I will look into the eyes of a new stranger and fall a little again. As Hozier sings ‘I fall in love just a little bit every day with someone new’, cause I’m weird like that. I always see the best in people, and I always imagine how they might be like, what kind of music they might listen and if they are a cat or dog person.

This is my fault, I’m sure. If I really have to think about it. I fall too easily. So I’ll try to stop. This time I’ve promised myself I will not even look at another guy again. I’m better of alone.

---

So… It only lasted two days. I actually did manage to not even respond to that random dude who sled into the dm’s on my social media or the flirty guy at the counter as I hand him his coffee. I remained strong until he came in.

He’d been coming into the coffee shop for two months now, always the same solemn expression on his face. He’s always lost in thought, like there’s a million things going on in his mind. Whenever he comes in, I want to ask him what he’s thinking. What have caused him to have those haunted eyes so full of unspoken emotions. But I never do.

Today his pattern changes. He comes in, gives me that slight smile as he places his order and waits patiently for it go get done, but instead of going, he sits down in the corner. He’s always so quick to leave again, like he doesn’t want anyone to see him, yet today he sits there by the window, looking out.

He looks lost somehow, like he has the weight of the world on his shoulders. Like life hasn’t exactly treated him kindly either. He looks… almost like me. I know I should leave him alone, but I wonder if a small act of kindness from a stranger could lift that veil of sadness. If maybe I could make him smile. I bet he has a beautiful smile.

Damn. I’m doing it again. I should have learned by now not to fall so easily. Cursing under my breath, I try to work and not look at him, which proves hard. He is just so beautiful. Those expressive hazel eyes, his plump lips encircled by that full beard and the tattoos on his arms. And he probably has a nice body under that shirt, considering how it clings to- No… I got to stop this. This is the kind of thinking that always gets me in trouble.

As he gets up from his seat, I already start looking forward to the next time he comes in. Maybe he’ll stay again the next time? Maybe even stay a little longer, so I could conjure up some courage to talk to him? But to my surprise, he doesn’t walk to the door, but comes back to the counter.

“I-” He starts but stops again. His eyes find mine and I feel my heart skip a beat, like it always does when he looks at me. “I’ve been trying to get the courage to ask you out for over a month now.”

The small smile grows into a nervous one, but all I can think is what this man has to be nervous about. Surely, he must know I’d say yes in a heartbeat. Which was almost exactly what I blurt out. Thankfully it makes him smile wider and I was right. A very beautiful smile indeed. ´

“Fine, then. Tomorrow at 8.” He says with a smile and for the first time, it reaches his eyes. The small wrinkles and the shine in his hazel orbs make it impossible not to smile too.

“Tomorrow.” I confirm with a giggle, barely able to speak without stumbling over my words. On his way out he turns to me, giving me a little wave with the smile still adorning his beautiful face. Once he is out the door, it takes several minutes before my breathing is back to normal and my heart is done making backflips.

I have a date. A date with Michael. And in that moment, I don’t even care if he turns out like the others and leaves me broken. But something tells me he isn’t like the others. That this time it will be different, because… We have to keep hoping, right?

Maybe I could fall again… Just a little bit?

Tagging: @mindidjarin @itwasthereaminuteago @idrinkcoffeeandobsess @mattmurdocksscars @theradioactivespidergwen @chvoswxtch @pedrito-friskito @yarrystyleeza @murdock-and-the-sea @saintmurd0ck @boliv-jenta

[winterfireice]

I'm pretty happy with how this came out hope you enjoy this Sophiana fic with some angst

Tag List: @amandayetagain @the-one-and-only-aroace @synonymroll648 @frizzle-mcshizzle This is me realizing that I know the list is longer but I need to actually write down who to tag

full fic below here

I can’t sleep. It's not uncommon, most of the time half of my night is spent staring at my ceiling or listening to the wind flow through my curtains. Tonight I’m not at home though, Keefe had an idea for a night off at one of his father’s extra houses. Turns out that sleeping in one of your best friend's awful parent's house is not a better place resting place than my comfortable bed in my safe and comforting home. 

Keefe’s idea wasn't the worst he’s ever had and the day was actually pretty fun. Almost the entire group was able to take the day off with minimal arguments from the council and our parents. Dex was even able to find a game of Monopoly with some of his mom’s human stuff that had most of its pieces. It was missing about seven houses but Biana was able to find some jewelry of hers to stand in. My friends also took a lot less time learning the rules of the game than I thought they would need and only Keefe had stolen money from the bank after Fitz was declared our banker.

But after our very long game had finished and we were full of baked goods and elvish drinks almost everyone had fallen asleep in their makeshift beds curled around fluffy pillows and near suffocating because of the absurd amount of blankets. 

The group had decided against splitting up into different rooms and had just created nests on the floor in the living room. 

I am currently trying to figure out how a room can lack so much personality but still be so comfortable. Even after living in the lost cities for multiple years, I am still so surprised and confused by how well-made everything is, the beds feel like a cloud and the food is so flavorful that it made me sick when I first moved here. 

But even with the cloud-like comforters and pillows I still can’t fall asleep. I could blame it on Keefe’s snoring, which he insists he doesn't do, or the tree branch that keeps banging against the side of the house in the wind. But in reality, I knew that I probably was not going to get any sleep. I don’t most nights but after about an hour I usually give up and get up to do either school work or black swan work, sometimes even nobility work if I’m bored enough. 

Tonight though I’m sandwiched between Biana and Dex and know that if I move I will wake them up. Some of my friends may have an easier time falling asleep than me but after all the near-death experiences they have all become pretty light sleepers and I don’t want to mess up any possible sleep schedules they have. 

I'm also not super sure I want to sleep right now because I know that if I do manage to fall asleep my mind is just going to be filled with nightmares. Sometimes I’m able to go the whole night without the dreams but it's rare and never when I’m in a new place or surrounded by half of my loved ones. 

I know that if I fall asleep my mind is just going to be filled with images of my friends dying in different awful ways while I have to stand there watching. I don’t know about most people but that does not sound like a fun way to spend a night to me, especially since I’ve done just that before, both in my dreams and in reality.

While I’m thinking about this I feel one of the blankets slide off me as Biana rolls over to her side. I take this opening to slowly stand up and wander through the darkness in the direction of the kitchen trying to be careful not to knock into anything. I’m almost all the way there without any accidents but I hit into the side of a table and knock off some weird glass bowl. Luckily it doesn't shatter or make too much noise as it falls onto a rug. 

In the kitchen, I realize that I don’t have any plans for what to do here. I could get a snack but when all of us first got here we realized the fridge hadn't been stocked with any food other than an elvish version of protein bars and loose greens. Keefe and Fitz had brought some snacks with them but we either ate them or had eaten so much they made us sick. 

One of the only things on the kitchen table is a bunch of gummies that taste disgusting that Keefe tried (and succeeded) to trick us with. 

“Hey, you ok?” Biana sleepy asks from behind me,

“Oh my go-!” I shriek, “Where did you come from,” 

“Um, the living room. Isn't that where you came from too? I feel the need to repeat my earlier question, are you ok?”

“Yeah, you just scared me. Sorry did I wake you up?” I ask, trying to steady my breathing,

“Kind of but it's ok I’m a pretty light sleeper, plus I’m pretty sure I could hear Keefe snoring even while I was asleep,” She laughs a little while adjusting her pajama shirt so it’s more centered and not falling off her shoulder, which is something I definitely didn't notice and wasn't focusing on in my sleep deprived state. 

“I’ve told him like ten times to go see Elwin about that but he refuses to admit it,” 

“You have got to be kidding me, all it takes is like one elixir every couple of weeks for the problem to go away,” 

“Oh wow, in the hu- forbidden cities there's this machine thing that you wear when you sleep, I don't know too much about how it works but my mom used to have one, back when I lived there,” 

“That sounds terrifying, sometimes I’m surprised by how different the elves and humans treat medical stuff. We have it pretty lucky here that most stuff can be solved with an elixir or lotion,” Biana says the last part while rubbing her arms and I notice a few of her scars peaking through the neckline of her shirt. 

Ever since Vesperna attacked her she has done an amazing job of acting like it doesn't matter or that she’s fine but as someone who also constantly pretends that nothing is wrong I can see the pressure she puts on herself to be okay. 

“Can I ask you a question?” She asks, coming closer and sitting down at the kitchen island in front of me,

“Wasn't that one?” I joke, earning a glare from Biana, “But of course, what do you want to know?” 

“Do you ever miss the forbidden cities? I know that you love it here but does it ever feel weird knowing so much about a world no one else does?” 

“Yeah, I guess. To be honest I try not to think about it that much, if it doesn't have to do with the Neverseen or Amy, it hurts less to try to push it to the back of my mind,” I don’t tell people that usually since it makes me sound awful and makes me feel horrible but something about the only light in the room being from the moon and the only sounds are our voices makes it easier to talk about deeper things.

“Can I ask you one? A question I mean,” I ask after some silence, 

“Always, and by the way I get it, well I don’t because I’m not you but I understand the pushing everything away thing and it makes sense,” Something about tonight is making me notice just how often Biana fiddles with her hands,

“Do you ever wish you never joined the Black Swan?” 

“I have told you almost a thousand times that you are not responsible for my decisions,” she states annoyed,

“I know, that's not what I mean. It’s just that being involved in all of this,” I wave my hands around my body as I say this as if the room is responsible for our trauma, “has hurt us so much.  I know we have been able to help so many people too and I wouldn't change it now but sometimes I think about how our lives would be different if the Black Swan weren't a part of it,” 

“Well for one if the Black Swan wasn't a part of my life I would have never met you,” Biana whispers, “And that would really suck, especially since you probably wouldn't exist,” 

“I guess I don't usually think about it that way, I try to avoid thinking about how I came into existence and what animals were a part of the process,” I laugh while Biana chuckles with her eyes closed. The two of us don’t mention the fact that Mr. Forkle used inspiration from horses to create me.

“Ok, I don’t bring it up a lot because I know it creeps you out that Alicorns were a part of the research that created you but I find it hilarious. Back when I was a really small kid I would go over to the Heks’ place on the weekends and look at all the unicorns with Stina, it was without a doubt my favorite part of the week,” she says as she gets up and checks the fridge for something to eat, “Wow this is disappointing, I expected better snacks in Keefe’s house,” 

“You are not the only one, I was looking for food before you came in here,”

“And you didn't warn me? I feel betrayed Sophie,” she turns away from the fridge and jumps up onto the island so her feet are swinging back and forth, her face is turned to me in deep thought, 

“This seems like the night for a game,” She declares,

“Oh, really? What game?” I ask, jumping up beside her,

“A new one, we take turns asking each other questions, and if we don't answer we have to take a bite of something in this kitchen,” 

“Isn't that just a conversation with an unappetizing meal?” I respond, “What makes it a game?” 

“Uhh, it's almost two a.m.? We’re in the dark? Oo maybe that could be the game’s name? Questions in the Dark,” Biana whispers the last part and brings her hands up to her face, wiggling her fingers as if she is telling a scary campfire story,

“Ok,” I laugh for some strange reason, “I’m in, You should go first I don’t have any good ideas yet?”

“Deal. Why are you awake at two a.m. and don’t tell me you just woke up, I’ve known you for years I know when you aren't sleeping,” She rapidly fires out her words, almost like she is worried I’m about to interrupt her,

“I’m starting to feel like you had a motive when you created this game,” I say after a moment. Any other day I would probably avoid the topic and distract her or lie, pretend that I was simply having a bad night, and move on, but the way she’s looking at me like she just wants to know what’s happening inside of my head at this very moment makes me start talking,

“I can’t sleep when I’m not home, I can hardly sleep when I am in my own bed and I don’t even know if I tried to fall asleep tonight because I know if I do then I’ll just have nightmares the whole night,” the words tumble out of me, “I know we all make jokes about my awful sleep schedule but is it just me? Am I the only one who’s scared to fall asleep? I,” 

Biana pulls her legs up to the table so she can be fully facing me and slides closer to me so that her knees are bumping against one of my legs and she doesn't have to twist her neck to look at me, “I want to have some magic response to fix everything for you but I don’t think those words exist, I can tell you that I haven't had a dream since Vesperna attacked me. At least not one that I can remember, my nightmares always happen while I’m awake,” Biana tells me, her eyes never leaving mine,

I feel tears well up in my eyes and try to look away but I feel her soft hands against my cheek not forcing it to stay in place but an invitation to keep looking at her and her eyes that seem to be searching for an answer to all of our problems.

“I get flashbacks all the time and can hardly look at a mirror without having a panic attack and hearing that awful woman’s voice. When I go to sleep it's the only time my brain is silent,” she adds, the warmth of her hand still lingering against my skin.

I don’t know what is happening at the moment other than her words and her hands, if I try to think about the meaning behind either of them my head starts to swim and this floating feeling turns to sinking. 

“I hate that you have to go through that,” I say, my eyes never leaving hers “It’s not fair you don’t get to be able to be awake without everything wearing down on your shoulders,” 

“It’s not fair you don’t get to sleep,” 

“I guess a lot about our lives isn't fair,” I whisper, 

“You’re definitely right about that,” She responds in the same hushed tone,

“This feels pretty fair though,” I tell her as I bring my arm up to hers, briefly brushing over it,

“Again I agree with you,” Biana says, her eyes lower for a moment before tracking back up my face to my eyes, I feel myself leaning in and Biana’s other hand reaching up to the other side of my face, wrapping around my hair,

“Hmm, why are you guys up?” Keefe groans from the doorway, still wiping the sleep out of his eyes and leaning against the doorframe for support.

In this moment I am both so annoyed that Keefe interrupted whatever was about to happen and so happy that Keefe takes forever to wake up fully. Biana’s hands drop down to her sides as she slides onto the floor,

“We got hungry,” She says in a tone that asks why else we would be in the kitchen,

“Oh, I don't think I put anything in here it’s still all in the living room,” with that Keefe turns back around and goes back into the living room, probably to go continue snoring, “You guys coming?” 

“Yeah we're right behind you,” Biana says, I slip off the island and she takes my hand in hers as we walk back into the living room.

She holds my hand the rest of the night and while I don’t sleep well, I sleep a lot better than I thought I would.

[brooklynbrunette]

Hey blog,

It’s been a while. Months, actually. I don’t know where to start the recap, but long story short: I’ve never felt more lost with the direction of my life than I do right at this very moment. In fact, it’s as if I’m moving blindly, without taking notice to what’s going well, what isn’t. What’s working, what isn’t. Who’s helping me, who’s hurting me. Who wants best for me—and who can’t fucking wait to see me fail.

It’s been a full year since I’ve graduated college. And that alone was supposed to be a momentous occasion, accomplishment that gave me time to think about the things that I want. I skipped that. All of it. I went straight for what was working at the time, and I fell in love with the money I was making, the public stature I was building. I felt like I was finally beginning to own who I am, and lately, I’ve just been getting ripped apart.

That’s actually a lie. Maybe I don’t own who I am fully— I still keep the fact that I started my own business under wraps because I fear failure, I still believe it’s a phase, or I believe that once I’m all in, I’ll actually hate the commitment that brings. I fear people knowing all about me and the things I do because I think they’ll laugh, talk shit about me, wish upon my downfall, all of it. I don’t want any negative attention on me, but it’s just been everywhere, and all at once.

One thing that inspires me to do better, and commit to this was the powerful women I work with. Seeing their successes, their failures, the whole build up to the moment they said, “I made it.” Or how they still sometimes feel like they aren’t enough. I’m like a sponge in their presence, because I want to figure everything out before, or if, it even happens to me.

I used to love what I did because it gave me creative freedom, and I didn’t realize how important that was for me to find life enjoyable. To just be happy. To be content. It’s what I love about reading, writing, all of those silly little hobbies I gave up for the sake of taking on more and more fucking work. And it’s paying well… but not paying off.

Lately, I feel like I’m being treated like a machine—do this, do that. No don’t do that, I want it this way and this way only. Replicate what I want. DO what I want. Why won’t you do it this way. No. No. NO. Are you doing this? I need you on this. I need your help with this. Can you help me? Can you help them? Do you have the time? Make the time. Do it. Just fucking do it.

And I can’t fucking do it anymore. I cannot appease everyone, because it’s costing me my wellbeing. It’s taking the girl who graduated with the strongest sense of self-confidence, and ripping her apart. It’s creating dark circles under her eyes, lackluster hair, and pale skin. It’s giving her heart palpitations, a stomach screaming at her to eat, a headache knocking at her brain like an alarm. It’s eating her alive, and no one can really see it, not even her.

Sometimes I wonder it that’s my path—to chase success at any cost, to refuse failure, and to try and do anything and everything because I get anxiety over any missed opportunity for growth. And it’s still all I feel. Again, I’m like a sponge—except I soaked in so much information that I became too heavy to move. Paralyzed by my obsession to grow.

I’m starting to face the music. One year out, and I’m not playing with the idea of having my own business anymore. Neither are the people that I work for. The second I took my job seriously and acquired one client after the next, fought for a higher price, and connecting business deals, the less I was worried about having to be taken seriously so much as having to worry about being seen as a power hungry ambitious female that has to be given barking orders in order to be tamed.

I’m seeing changes in my professional life all across the board. The people I looked up to and the ones I could come to for advice are now the ones seeing me as a threat. I’ve already lost the friends I’ve had in my life prior to this career change. Did I really fuck up so bad I had to lose the respect I carried for my mentors as well? Life’s just unfair that way. My only guiding light, again, dimmed by my ambitions to grow.

It feels like I’m running a marathon I’ve never signed up for, with no end in sight. But I do see the path, the long stretch. Some days it’s foggy, but it’s still there. I just can’t stop running. It feels like a fate worse than death.

I’ve come to learn the most expensive thing in this life is time. Sometimes I feel like there’s an abundance of it, other days I’m truly reminded what a scarcity it is. I’m forgetting I’m only 23. It’s just the beginning! But I’m also 23… a quarter of my life is gone. What am I supposed to do with that information? Freak out, get married, raise kids?

When I was graduating college, I felt this magic— like anything is possible. And I can’t lie, even on my worst days, I feel it still. I admire the world around me, even as I rush about my day. I may even take some time to envy those I watch, because they seem less worried, less anxious. More free.

I’m grateful for where I am right now, even though I’m not content. I want more. I want it all. Is that too big of an ask? It shouldn’t be. Not for me.

My goal in life is to level up. It sounds silly when I put it that way, but I’ve always thought that we as humans are given trials and tribulations to overcome for the sake of leveling up. Growing. Changing. When you treat life like a game, you become so much more motivated to win.

So yes, as I’ve said, I can’t do it anymore. I cannot care what people think. I cannot live one foot in and one foot out of taking my business seriously. I cannot trust anyone around me— including those I’ve admired and leaned on for mentorship. Because just like we can outgrow friends, and outgrow lovers, we sure as hell can outgrow the fucking people we used to admire. It happens when you grow. When you level up.

Whatever I want, I will get. I want to be successful. I will be in control of that success. I will unlock my complete potential. And I want to do it now.

I want people to look me in the eyes and realize I am in a league of my own. There’s no competition—I will work hard enough that I overcome it. I do not want to feel the jealousy, the envy, and all of the other ugly emotions that come with moving on. Moving up.

I know I am smart, I am strong-willed, and I am capable. Even on my weakest days, I need to remind myself if there’s one thing that drives me, it’s spite. I like surprising those who underestimate, undervalue, and under-appreciate me. And I will continue to do so, every single damn day.

This one’s for future me— today you canceled an event because you felt jealousy that you even got an invite to attend. You felt worthless, beneath someone. Never do it again. You can cry and bitch about it, but at the end of the day, you wipe your tears, fix your makeup, and show the fuck up. We’re still learning as we go, but never again. You’re so much better than the worth you place on yourself through the opinions of others.

Lately, you’ve been taking everything personally. Because you feel that you are the work you do. Work is work, and you are you. Stop measuring success on likability. Not everyone will love everything you do. Just like not everyone will love you. The only thing you can do is adapt your methods, overcome the issue, and pose a solution. Stop waiting for direction, for orders. Stop sitting stagnant. Take control. And if you lost it, take it the fuck back.

Your feelings and opinions are valid, do not convince yourself otherwise.

Take what you’re feeling today and use it. Use it to learn, use it to grow. Use it as evidence that not everyone wishes the best for you. Be mindful of that.

Until next time, blog. <3

[free-for-all-fics]

Part 6/7 💜📸📝

“Hello, Mrs. Skeffington. I’m Dr. David Jaquith. I’m not sure if you remember me, your husband was the one who sought out my services, so we only met briefly in person once, but I was your daughter’s doctor when she was a girl. I got to know her very well while she was at Cascade.”

That Jaquith should come to her help in the difficult was the last thing she had expected. True, Fanny had written him, but there was a part of her that believed he wouldn’t or couldn’t come on such short notice.

“Of course I remember you, Doctor. Come in, come in. Do you still keep in contact with my daughter?”

“The occasional letter here and there. Other than that, Christmas cards and such.”

“Oh…and uh, did she…did she ever mention me in any of those letters and cards?”

Such a simple yes or no question on the surface. But, to Dr. Jaquith, its utterance brought with it memories of one of the more recent and lengthier letters you wrote to him, and the equally lengthy letter he wrote and sent you in response. There was so much you wanted to say, you could never hope to fit it all onto sheets of paper, no matter how many you filled with your writing. The doctor himself faced the same problem, and he wondered if maybe a phone call would’ve been better suited. But there again came the problem of time and always seeming to be short on it, on both your end and his.

November 1939

Dear Dr. Jaquith,

Spring, summer, now autumn again. I won’t say time flies, but it doesn’t crawl as it used to. I’ve been enjoying my time abroad. There’s a man here who’s been nice to me, a man I’ve known and traveled with for almost four years now. A man I can confidently call my best friend. In fact, he’s proposed to me. “Let us settle down,” he said, “For you own a part of my soul as I own a part of yours. That was settled the moment we met, the transfer happening by the hand of fate. I love you. I can live without you, yet every day there would be that pain of a piece missing, the piece I gave to you. It is a loss of part of the self, yet the greatest victory there can be. We won this spiritual lottery. We are free and bound. That is the way real love is. The bond forms and then we learn how to treat one another well, to bring happiness and health, to nurture and be strong in all weathers, protective and kind.” After hearing a proposal so moving, there are no arguments I can think of why I shouldn’t marry him. His name is Jim Masters. He may not have much in way of name, status, or wealth, but he is a fine man. He had a previous wife and has four grown daughters that he’s estranged from. It’s a long and complicated story, but I ask you to trust my judgment of his character. I know what I’m doing. By the time I receive your letter, I will no longer be Miss Skeffington. I will officially and legally be Mrs. Masters. Jim will be my husband, and I will be his wife. We’ve moved. More than once. For work stuff, for money stuff...you know how it goes. Don’t worry, we are still living together and everything is going well! I have a lot of friends here with me. They’re all real nice, and they’re always willing and trying to help.

I don’t know why I tell you this except I tell you almost everything. That’s why I feel I can confide in you about what’s been troubling me as of late. It’s about my family. More specifically, my mother. I wasn’t ready or willing to talk about it before, but I am now. It’s a long story, but with all stories, it’s probably best to start from where we last left off: When I left Cascade and went to Europe at the age of eleven, going on twelve…Mom and Dad…they did it for years…day…after day…after day. All lies… I have nothing against lies. I grew up around lies. Jim is a professional journalist now, more specifically, a travel writer. Making up lies to fit the facts… It’s what he does. It’s what all journalists do, to varying degrees. But now it’s time for the truth to come out, finally… And to do that, I want to tell you a story.

There was an invisible girl. Like everyone, she just wanted to run on the grass, ride a bike, swim in the lake in the summer. But her mother… Oh, her mother had other plans for her. What a beautiful shadow of her mother she had become, in her dark world made of silence and prayer. There shone only two stars: her…wonderful sister, Fanny, and her darling father, Job. Heavenly creatures who told her what a free and strong woman she would become one day. And they were both right. She was like that: Free and strong. At the time, the other kids and even the teachers didn’t understand her dyslexia…she didn’t understand what retard or kike meant…that’s what the other kids called her at school. Her sister, Fanny, wanted to protect her. But she couldn’t. She could hear her cry at night, could hear the bed creak from her father trying to hush and console her sister through whispered words of encouragement.

~

“Is there anything I could say to make it better?”

“No.” You sat up and your father sat next to you on the bed. You looked at your sister. You didn’t want her to see you like this. “Oh, just go. I mean it, go!”

“Perhaps you should go, darling.”

Fanny, though hesitant, left.

You flopped back on the bed with a new bout of tears. “Oh, Daddy.”

Your father leaned over you and covered your hands with his own as you sobbed. “You are being tested. And do you know what they say, my darling? Being tested only makes you stronger. It’s not theory on my part. I’ve been through it. I know everything you’re feeling. Every pain. But be fair to yourself.”

You squeezed his hands as hard as you could as you sniffled. “I don’t think it’s working with me.”

“Give yourself time. You’ll come through it.”

“Just as…just as you came through, Daddy?”

“Yes, darling. Just as I came through.”

“Here’s hoping I’m made of the same stuff you are.”

~

She and her sister used to worry about their looks too...when they were thirteen and all arms and legs. Her sister used to hate that brace she had on her teeth. She hated the acne on her face. But their father would always comfort them. “A woman is beautiful only when she's loved,” he’d say. One day, the invisible girl grew into a woman, a beautiful, luminous creature. And she met someone. A human being that saw her, for real. The beauty he saw in her was the beauty she forgot to see in herself. And what a beautiful reminder, that love was what would see them all through. Yes. And her sister, Fanny, instead became the invisible witness of what happened. A love, simply a love…nothing more…nothing less. But that love was too much and it would be punished. Who paid for that love? They did. We did. Dr. Jaquith— I mean, David, (Can I call you David? It feels so odd to address you by your first name but, since I haven’t been your patient for over ten years, it feels right.) I beseech you for your insight, your guidance. You know my history, you understand me, but I’m asking for your help and your opinion not just as my doctor, but as my friend. We’re still friends, aren’t we? I would hope that we’re close friends now. I know you’re a very busy man, but if you could find it in your schedule to hear me out and write back to me, it would be greatly appreciated. I’m once again at a fork in the road and I’m confused. I need you to show me which path to take.

Your friend,

Miss Skeffington (soon to be Mrs. Masters!) ooo

By the time he responded to your letter and mailed it out, Dr. Jaquith received a card with your wedding announcement. He could only assume you sent the same exact card to your sister and her husband.

December 1939

To our dearest friends and family,

Because your love and friendship have made us who we are, we are very happy to share the news with love in our hearts. We exchanged marriage vows in a private ceremony in Switzerland. While Switzerland wasn’t a complete bust the last time we were there, it was disappointing due to the unexpected storms. But now, getting married in the same country where we first met feels right, like everything has come full circle. As we have given and pledged our troth, each to the other, and have declared the same by giving and receiving a ring and by joining hands, the officiant pronounced that we are man and wife in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost. Amen. Afterwards, we held a small “reception” for ourselves at the inn. It was just us and dinner with cake and champagne. It felt too quiet, so Jim thought up a song and played it on the piano for me. I forget how it went but it was pretty. I am lucky to have him for a husband. Although we decided to celebrate our love only in the company of each other and you were not there in person, please know that you were there in our thoughts and forever will be in our hearts. We hope you’ll be there to celebrate with us when we renew our vows in the States at a later date.

With love,

Mr. and Mrs. Masters

December 1939

Dear Mrs. Masters (née Miss Skeffington),

I write on what I imagine must be a joyous occasion. Per your last letter, am I right to assume that you are newly married to a wonderful man and have taken his name? I have had more than a little time during my long days and nights at Cascade to consider your past and your family. Since you left for Europe with your father and sister, my thoughts have often lingered on your development and welfare in the ten or so years since we last met. Your marriage gives me much reassurance in this regard. I wish you and your new husband many happy years together. You are always welcome here at Cascade or to visit me and Charlotte in our home in Vermont, though I will understand of course if you cannot accept this open invitation. Now, to address what you spoke to me about in your last letter…

Now, I could tell you that perhaps restlessness has a genetic component. If so, emigrants would be expected to establish populations with more wanderlust in their DNA than those back at home. Scientists have identified one particular allele, called 7R, of our DRD4 gene that may fit this description; it has been linked to attention deficit disorder and attraction to novelty, earning its nickname: the risk gene. Research has documented that people with the 7R allele take 25 percent more financial risk than those without it. Tellingly, the allele tends to be more concentrated in recently established populations (in terms of historic human expansion): Most people in the Americas have it, a few in Europe do, and it is rare in parts of Asia. People with this “wanderlust gene” may be literally hardwired to seek new experiences. I could tell you that maybe you’re one of those very unique individuals. But I won’t bore you with textbook theories.

Sometimes the world around us and everyone and everything in it can move so fast, it feels impossible to keep up. It gives us whiplash. Our senses are overloaded and our brains can’t decide what to focus on. You can’t read a map, but you’re not lost. Consulting maps can diminish the wanderlust that they awaken, as the act of looking at them can replace the act of travel. But looking at maps is much more than an act of aesthetic replacement. Anyone who opens an atlas wants everything at once, without limits—the whole world. This longing will always be great, far greater than any satisfaction to be had by attaining what is desired. You’d rather be given an atlas over a guidebook any day. You’re pulled in all kinds of directions, always eager for the next discovery, the next adventure, the next landmark, that your brain and your body can’t agree on where to go next. But you’re intuitive, and you know that you must go. Somewhere. You often can’t describe the place you’re thinking of, because it’s intangible, but when you get to where you want to be, you’ll just know. But no sooner than that. You were born with full potential to become a great person of integrity. I know this as a psychiatrist. What any of your relations are, or were, means nothing about who you can be. We are built of our choices, tiny decisions in tiny moments. So wherever you are now is only the beginning.

Your mother would’ve accepted any plan that would’ve relieved her of the child who had always been a thorn in her flesh, though the lady would strongly protest if she heard me say so. And your father’s attitude was sympathetic and protective, possibly too protective for your good. Result? Resentment felt by your mother. Your absence from the home became desirable for all concerned. I was highly recommended to your father by a friend of his, so your father placed you in my care and I brought you to Cascade after one too many incidents of violent, emotional outbursts. At the time of your arrival, you had been isolated for sometime. You couldn’t see friends, nor reach out to your family for help as once you could have. If I’m honest, you had so many panic attacks at first, yet, over time, they grew further apart and disappeared. In isolation it was lonely, yet there was an art to surviving it in the best shape possible. Anger from your eyes showed the scared child within, the girl who was taught to fight and starved of the love she craved. I could see the pain beneath it and your soul drowning in this persona you’d carved to fit a world of indifference. But I couldn’t help someone like that, not unless the tears came and you realized what was really going on. And I couldn’t fight it. I wouldn’t. It would’ve taken such a toll on both you and me to do so. The best I could offer you was a void, to let you sulk, brood, meditate, or sleep in your shadow box until you craved the sunlight. When you weren’t picking at your plate, you were picking a fight. Your temper was the knife, a sword you’d fashioned in that wild childhood a part of you had never escaped. Your parents, peers, teachers, and nurses all said you had a temper, but not a soul ever asked why it had developed or what it protected you from. You were so sick of getting stabbed. You were sorry for becoming part of that sick cycle, for stepping into shoes you should have rejected. You could count on one hand the people that you’d lay down your arms for because they were worth it, worth trusting: Your sister, your Uncle George, your father, myself, and, now, Jim.

But eventually, you left your shadow box and came into the light. You found a new joy in nature, in the little things, reveling in bird song and the simple pleasure of warm sunlight upon the skin. It was so very challenging, yet you grew strong. You found that if you could be conscious of your choices and emotions, you could start to ask yourself to make more healthy choices for yourself and those you love. You could choose to dance to music instead of simply sit, or do some exercise instead of simply sleep. You found that if you baked bread rather than just bought it, it felt as if there was more love in your house - that you had a new hobby and the house had the aroma of a bookshop, so homey. Childhood ambitions are the rocket fuel for the rest of our lives when they come from our own curiosity and drive. They are the seeds of a passion that creates a life well-lived. The weird and novel weavings of childhood ambitions and interests, especially when they are a mismatch of glorious nonsense, are the very seeds of genius and invention. They are how our species specializes and discovers entirely new pathways. They are a needed part of a healthy brain. With it comes a healthy self that can make healthy relationships within a community that will come to need the skills they develop, even if they cannot see how at the time. It is these childhood ambitions that are our guide to the path that is ours to explore. Every lifetime comes with an adventure that is our lifeline, and our compass is built of curiosity and love. It is when the unknown becomes alluring and work becomes play. It is how a challenge becomes welcome and the resolve to achieve it arrives as if it were a prompt and well-scheduled train. So when we learn to trust these childhood ambitions and see them as the seeds of greatness, we grow and change.

Yet in all of that, in the seeking of positivity, it was equally important to acknowledge the lonely feelings you experienced, to walk the line between seeing them, feeling them, letting them flood in when necessary, yet then returning to affirmative actions. By learning how to do this, you became a blessing to others and you felt more mature, more self-confident. It was challenging though, very challenging. But by overcoming those challenges, you have reaped many rewards. It is challenging in the darkness to shine a light of your own, yet you have such a light. Your father told me you were born with it, and I’ve seen it for myself many times over since the day you first came to me.

When society functions well our own light is warmed by the lights of others, we are a happy flicker that is part of a communal flame. When society is broken that search for another spark of love isn’t easy at all. If your emotions feel as if they are a roller coaster, the best thing you can do is hang out with someone truly boring who loves you very deeply. In time your brain and body will correlate to their calmness and you will have the cure to your emotional pain. You will become stable, able to reach for emotional highs when you want to, yet in truth, happier because you can access the normal kind of “happy” that humans evolved for. So, love, in these times burns not brightly yet soft and mellow. You told me that you occasionally struggled with intense feelings, or that your once-burning flame of wanderlust was beginning to die down to a flicker. And when adventure begins to lose its appeal, it starts to feel more like adversity. So try to sit back. Wait for someone who shows you real love, the kind that is dependable, endurable, sustainable and - above all - kind. Then you can let your spark burn brighter, because they are truly supporting you, because they bring their own inner fire with which to love you.

Rather than add gasoline to a world in flames, let us together be in the water for a few moments. Imagine a pathway of light glitters out across the waves, from the boat’s prow to the red-orange sun, as it sinks below the world’s edge. The clouds are coral-pink in a darkening sky. Water ripples gently, and that is the only sound. You are taking this bath in life, as you see, floating in infinity, and you are at peace. Let’s just float in the water and look up at the sky above us. In our sessions, you often told me of your fears and anxieties. You expressed concern for how you were living your life, afraid you were somehow doing it wrong. “I don’t know. I think maybe I’ve been wasting my time, just doing nothing. My life is nothing but a repetition of waking up with nothing to live for. Not even a false hope to look forward to this time,” you said. And do you remember what I told you in response? I told you, “I don’t think so. When you find your quest, the reason for your birth - when the song of creation that calls directly to your heart and soul - your journey becomes your source of happiness rather than any destination. That’s the place to get to—nowhere.” One wants to wander away from the world’s somewheres, into our own nowhere. A certain kind of wanderlust can only be assuaged by the acts of the body itself in motion, not the motion of the car, boat, train, or plane. While you were in transit, being unattached was exhilarating, but the moment you stopped, so did the high. You started to feel the withdrawals right then and there. You’d replaced wanderlust with a human. You’d thought that was a terrible mistake. But it’s important to stand still sometimes. Think of it as a little rest in the long journey of your life. This is your harbor, and your boat is just dropping anchor here for a little while. After you’re well-rested, you can set sail again and go onwards feeling refreshed.

Don’t think of standing still as being grounded. Think of it as finding the perfect compromise between standing still and flying. There’s no shame in just taking the time to breathe, to rest, to float. The emotions ebb and flow, thus when they rush in we feel motivated and inspired. The opposite occurs when they recede, as they naturally will. So learn how to sit upon your own beach and watch that emotional tide from a little distance. Close your eyes, breathe deep, focus on what you hear, what you smell. It is a contentment that will come to you simply in the observance of nature, a song, or the chance to dance. You can hear so much more. Things that are great distances away and things that are very, very small, like a mouse’s heartbeat or the wings of a moth, the woosh of passing cars, or the trickle of a stream. Yes, it can be quite overwhelming at first, I must admit. All those sounds are coming at you from everywhere, but that’s perfectly fine. You will get used to that over time. It can be just what you need to keep yourself from going stir-crazy. Be okay with calmness and observing the mayhem others engage in. For in that slight perspective shift exists the ability for true endurance, still feeling your emotions yet knowing what they are and that your reality remains the same.

There is a compromise between passion and directed studying that gets easier as one ages. You were, and still are, largely driven by your own creative passions and curiosities. However, there can be things you need to have a solid comprehension of that fall outside of your “passion drive”. This is when self-control becomes more important. There are times that doing the right thing is the harder thing to do. You needed to be able to sit yourself down and learn a subject even though it felt more like work than play. This was all part of growing up, sure. Yet it was also part of becoming a master at what you do - building in supporting knowledge that is more peripheral to your central aim. So, while it is negative to let directed study suppress your innate passions and creativity - it is also a negative to let your creativity rule the roost and not inform it with study. Balance is key, as ever.

I can now say you’re so much more psychologically mature, that those brutal times built you into who you are today. You can reject hate. You can reject fear. You can accept chances to create loving bonds. You can learn how to see things from the perspectives of others, even those who are very different to yourself. In this, you can become a person of peace and begin to create the kind of world you deserved yet did not inherit. I know it hardly feels that can be true when you’re curled up on the bathroom floor with your heart beating a million miles per hour, but with time, with inner reflection, with the art of emptying the thoughts, even if for just a few moments at a time - a new self emerges. In isolation you will feel at times as if you caught on fire, yet after this, regardless of how broken you feel, I promise you that the phoenix stage will shine from inside your headlamps. So keep on driving. Tina once said to me that she used to take off her glasses while her father would drive on a highway and all the lights would go soft and smudged, a trail of amber behind her like a quiet afterthought. Imagine that, and keep being the best version of you for yourself. I hope you know that you are not alone, and in those hours when you feel that you are, just know there are other people out there - singing the same melodies of wanderlust, climbing over mountains in the dark, and waking in the night to stare at the moon, thinking of this large world and dreaming - just like you.

I hope that these words encourage you to find the best version of yourself and to have the courage to reject the shrill and tempestuous voices of a broken world. The world needs good people. People like you. I hope that in these words, dear one, that you find the encouragement you need, the kind that builds great mountains from pebbles over a lifespan. I hope these words encourage you in a way that is realistic, that helps you towards a sustainable emotional life and protects you from those who lost their spark and would seek to extinguish yours for little more than a toxic ego trip. Protect your flame, keep your inner light safe. If there’s anything else I can say or do to help you, please let me know. If anything urgent comes up and the post is too slow or you need to reach me as soon as possible, I’m just a phone call away.

Your friend,

David

“Yes, but we’ll get to that later. Shall we sit down and get started right away? I hope you don’t mind me saying so, Mrs. Skeffington, but you don’t look very good right now.”

“It’s because I haven’t slept all night,” she hastily explained, trying to hide that she minded.

What she didn’t say, was that she ended up being jostled awake in the middle of the night by you. You had a strange expression on your face, and were wearing a backpack over your shoulders. You were pushing your childhood stuffed toy into her hands, and speaking to her...but of course, Fanny couldn’t hear you. You must have realized that, though. Because you looked like you laughed a little to yourself, and then handed her a slip of paper that said: ‘I promise to write.’ Then you got up, walked out, and closed the door to her room.

“You see how important quiet nights are for women of your age,” he said.

“And for everybody, I imagine,” said Fanny haughtily.

“That is, if you don’t want to be an eyesore.”

An eyesore? Was he suggesting that she was an eyesore? She, Fanny Skeffington, for years almost the most beautiful person everywhere, and for about thirty or so glorious years quite the most beautiful person anywhere? She? When the faces of the very strangers she passed in the street lit up when they saw her coming? She, noble, lovely little Fanny, as poor Jim Conderley used to say, gazing at her fondly—quoting, she supposed; and nobody quoted things like that to eyesores. True, Jim had quoted a good while ago; and it was also true, now that she came to think of it—let her be honest—that people passing in the street had seemed to look at her lately with surprise rather than admiration.

“Will you have a cup of tea?”

“No, thank you. I had coffee on my way here.”

“Well, you see, Doctor—”

“One moment please.” Dr. Jaquith got up to open a nearby window.

“What is the meaning of that?”

“I have sensitive sinuses, and your perfume is a bit heavy for me, that’s all.”

Although she was sure Dr. Jaquith meant nothing by it, Fanny felt slighted. She was reminded of when she paid a visit to Dr. Byles. That odious doctor. His consulting room was fragrant—he called it reeking,—with over-perfumed women. “Oh, my God,” he would mutter under his breath, when a specially scented one came in. Because of the creatures, though, he was growing very rich, and it was worth putting up with their scents and their silliness to be well on the way to the top of his profession at thirty-eight. And every day, when his work was over, he would fling the window open to purge his consulting room of scent, and exclaim: “God, these women!”

“Get your head out of your ass, Mother. You already reek of hypocrisy, so why add notes to the fragrance? I think there’s a word for people like you, a hypocrissist: A narcissist who has their head so far up their ass they can’t hear the hypocrisy coming out of their mouth,” you interjected.

Of course, you weren’t really there. Just a hallucination. But a vivid one. Almost corporeal. If Fanny hadn’t known any better, she would’ve believed you were really there, in the flesh. In the beginning, for Dr. Jaquith to fully comprehend her predicament, she felt she had to tell him all about her illness, and Job, and her visit to Byles, and her fears for the future. She was as natural as it was possible to be with somebody whom one still, when one looked at him, didn’t seem to know very well. But this could’ve been circumvented by not looking at him; she could’ve been altogether natural when she simply listened to his kind voice. And he felt almost exactly the same about her, the difference being that when she looked at him she was sorry, and when he looked at her he was shocked.

“When you wrote to me, you said you’ve been having trouble sleeping, but you went further to explain that your case is not the usual insomnia, nightmares, or sleep paralysis. You believe there’s something else going on.” As Dr. Jaquith pointed out, “significant dreams are the ones you can’t forget—the ones you remember in great detail even after years pass. But beyond that, it really goes back to what you believe and feel is significant. This is one of those ways dreamwork often shows up in therapy: A client has a dream that leaves them feeling distress or confusion in such a way they need help unpacking the feeling. We can find out whether a dream is significant or not when we are deciphering meaning by exploring and unpacking our feelings around the event or image. So, even if at the end of the day, you decide the dream means nothing, you’re still processing the feelings that surround it. But ultimately, I believe that dreams are about what we make of them, the meaning we assign to them, and the attendant feelings that arise along with that meaning. It’s no secret that of the many dreams you may have throughout the night, you’ll typically only remember one or two, if any. Have you ever wondered why you keep dreaming about your daughter, someone you haven’t spoken to for nearly four years? Usually the context of the dream will give you more clues.” Dr. Jaquith took out a notepad and pen. “So, Mrs. Skeffington, can you describe to me the dreams you’ve been having?”

“Yes, Doctor. The beginning is sometimes different, but they usually end the same way. Just last night, my dream began with my daughters in their bedroom. I was just about to send for them, when I overheard their conversation…”

~

“I see why they gave you a scholarship.”

“Yeah, it’s a real tragedy, isn’t it?”

“Yeah, it is. You can be cold to Mother, that’s fine. But I didn’t do anything to you.”

“Won’t you admit that you did something?”

“I admit, according to you, I did something, sure.”

“You dimed me out.”

“I did not dime you out. When the sheriffs asked where you got the car, I said I didn’t know. I didn’t even know it was stolen. You’re blaming that on me?”

“You could have covered for me, huh?”

“You get caught stealing, it’s my fault. You’re resisting arrest, and it’s the cop’s fault.”

“He took a swing at me.”

“Get suspended from school, it’s the principal’s fault. Mother kicks you out of the house, it’s her fault. You can’t keep a job for two weeks, it’s every manager’s fault.”

“I’m surrounded by idiots.”

“So why did you come back? To piss Mother off?”

“Don’t you get it? You’re the good twin. I’m the evil one.”

“Grow up. You are so afraid to take things seriously. And suppose they telephone Mother?”

“Uncle George promised he’ll cover for me.”

“I feel quite nervous and I’m not even going. We must choose the clothes carefully, so you can take them on and off without any help.”

“Well, I’ll have his help.”

“Honestly, sister. You’d better hope I never write my memoirs.”

“There is one thing I’ve got to ask you, Fanny. I’m really sorry, but I must.”

“Go on.”

“I have to be sure there aren’t any...consequences.”

“What sort of consequences?”

“Well, you know.”

“No, I don’t… Oh. Oh, my God. I mean, I beg your pardon, sister.”

“But you see, I can’t just go into a shop and buy something. What if I were recognized?”

“But I wouldn’t know what to buy.”

“I’ve thought of that. I have a copy of Marie Stopes’ book. It tells you everything.”

“Well, won’t he take care of it?”

“I don’t think one should rely on a man in that department, do you?”

“But suppose I’m recognized?”

“But you won’t be. And even if you are, you’re married, with a living husband. Why shouldn’t you buy one?”

The scene did not change but fast forwarded, as if time had passed around Fanny in a blurry whirl while she stood still, unheard and unseen.

“I think I’ve put everything in. Your packet’s here, sister.”

“Thank you.”

“I don’t think there’s anything too difficult to fasten.”

“Jim can always help.”

“For the last time, are you certain you know what you’re doing?”

“I believe so. Fanny, the way things are going, life will be lived in much closer quarters in future. Our parents lived in vast rooms, surrounded by staff. If they disagreed, they’d hardly have known it. But it won’t be like that for Jim and I. I must be sure I’m right to want this man, as my companion, as my friend, as my lover.”

“But not your husband?”

“No. The point is I don’t want to marry, because I absolutely don’t want to divorce. I witnessed - and so did you - so many things a child shouldn’t when our parents were married and when they divorced. They only stayed together as long as they had for our sakes, but I don’t want the same for myself.”

“Well, I think it’s a big risk.”

“Please. I can’t be lectured this evening.”

“Well, I wish you luck, sister.”

The scene changed. Fanny was putting on her glove, headed outside to the car waiting for the chauffeur to take her to a lunch date or something equally innocuous when she spied you and your sister talking in hushed tones in the garden out of the corner of her eye. Instead of getting in the car, she approached, but only far enough to eavesdrop without being noticed by either of her daughters…

“Well?”

“I couldn’t. There’s no point in freaking him out right now.”

“As opposed to when you find out you are pregnant?”

“Fanny, I’m not sure, okay?”

“I think you should have a conversation with him.”

“He’s been looking forward to this trip for months. I don't want to ruin it by starting a fight.”

“Darling, he’s not going to marry you. Mother won’t let him.”

“Who says I want to get married? Besides, I’ve been late before. When I know for sure, I promise to talk to him, okay?”

~

“It sounds to me like you’re afraid she and Jim are sexually active. That she’ll become pregnant and he’ll abandon her the same way he did his wife and daughters. Am I correct in thinking that?”

“Yes. I’m deathly afraid that’ll be what befalls her sooner or later.”

“It could be that your dreams are manifesting your fears as imaginary conversations between your daughters because they feel safe and comfortable enough to confide in one another. They trust and respect each other, and you want to be treated with that same level of trust and respect. But trust and respect aren’t things freely given between a child and their parent. They’re built. You’re her mother, yes, but if you wanted your daughter to trust and respect you, you had to put in the work, the time, and the effort, just like anybody else. Fanny put the work in to get her sister to trust her. Her father and I did the same. It wasn’t easy. It was a long process that often felt monotonous at times. Sometimes it felt as if every time we took one step forward, she took two steps back. But, although we couldn’t always see it or feel it, we were making progress. Good progress. So we kept at it. We worked and we worked hard to get her to trust us, and she worked hard to get us to trust her. We never gave up on her, even when she wanted to give up on herself. You? You never put that work in. Instead you were impatient, entitled. Instead of asking her any of the millions of questions swimming around in your mind, instead of opening up a discourse with her or inviting her to a civil conversation where you could be open and honest with each other, instead of letting her come to you in her own time, you went behind her back and read her diary. You suddenly decided you wanted to try to act as her mother after she was an independent adult already past her twentieth year. In doing so, You violated her privacy and betrayed her trust. If she had any in you to begin with, it’s completely broken now.”

One should trust more, Fanny thought to herself. One shouldn’t, as she had been doing lately, be in such a hurry to despair. But astonished as she was at the ways of providence, she was very nearly as much astonished at the ways of Dr. Jaquith. Who would have thought, she asked herself, that he could doubt her decency to the point of being in what he called a blue funk?

“You see, trust and respect have to go both ways or else there’s no stable foundation in the relationship and the entire thing falls apart. She had to be careful of you. You were the one person in her life who let ‘do as I say, not as I do’ seep into your character and, as she predicted, correctly, that you would, you almost certainly corrupted the trust she granted you. When was the last time your daughter came to you and said, ‘I need you’? When she threw her arms around you, wiping her tears on the shoulder of your blouse, and gave you a sincere ‘thank you’ through her sobs? Or perhaps a better question to ask is: When was the first time?”

“Doctor, I know what you must be thinking, but I did try to talk to her! Many times I tried to have a conversation with her, but she was never receptive to my efforts. She never had anything to say that wasn’t insults. I tried to get her to listen, to understand what I was feeling, especially when she said those hurtful things, but she was so angry and so stubborn that she wouldn’t listen. She shut herself off from me at every turn and wouldn’t let me in. No matter how much I approached her, no matter how I tried to get her to budge, she stood like a brick wall. Firm, unwavering, unrelenting.”

“She wouldn’t let you in, Fanny, because you never let her in. She’s seen that you are of those she can’t love because you don’t respect her and, in return, she doesn’t respect you. If you wanted your daughters to confide in you, to come to you whenever they were nervous, afraid, unsure, or otherwise needed help, you had to be transparent. You were always hiding behind layers and layers of makeup and a mirror. Maybe a part of you wanted to be involved, but you were held back by something or someone at the time. It could’ve been any number of things that acted as obstacles and barriers between you and your daughters. Your reputation, your beauty, your friends, your lovers and admirers, your neighbors, propriety, your upbringing, your beliefs, expectations made by others or yourself… that’s why you’re always the eavesdropper, the uninvited guest, kept at a distance and separated from your daughters, kept out of the loop of what’s going on in their lives. And now, when they seemingly no longer need you because they’ve outgrown you, you suddenly say you need them now more than ever!”

“What more could I have done?”

“I’m not entirely sure yet. I��ll tell you once I know more. For now, Let’s move on. Can you describe to me anything else from your dreams? Spare no detail. Anything you remember, even if it seems irrelevant and insignificant, could be important.”

“Yes, Doctor. In my dreams there are lights, too many to count, dancing on an ocean too vast to envisage. Each one is brilliant, each one unique. I want to look at each one for the marvel it is, for no matter how many there are, no two colors are the same. The light that comes from within is more pure than gold, more light than air - each one a small piece of Heaven. I try to reach out to them - who wouldn’t want to touch something so pure? - but the lights recoil in fright, they don’t even know who they are. They chant that they feel ugly on the outside and worse on the inside. I can’t understand until I take a look at the water, it looks fine but smells like something I wouldn’t want to drink. But they’re swimming in it, bobbing in it like it’s a fine day at the beach. I want to tell them it’s poison but they’ll never listen. They laugh and carry on just as before, each one just as beautiful as the last but disconnected even from their inner light and beauty…”

~

As Fanny recounted to Dr. Jaquith her dreams, she swore she could feel the salt on her lips and the roughness of rope in her hand, hear the loose flapping of a sail. The sail was as a sole that had journeyed upwards to many mountain peaks, worn and dirty, yet all the more beautiful for its travels and ready to ride the brine once more. Into the storm marched the sail in its own silent way, as if by catching the prevailing wind, by being captured within its own serenity, it contained a form of eternal hope. It made such progress atop of the dancing waves, amid the gay sea foam, that every fraction of every moment was the boldest of photographs. The ocean held so many memories for Fanny. It was where she sought solace after her brother’s passing, where she found peace during the devastating years of the last war and the current one. The wind had changed, and she had to turn and head to the shore before the storm came, the nets empty. She was back on the very same boat she was on when she went sailing with Johnny Mitchell. The very same boat where she contracted diphtheria.

“Johnny and I have a date to go sailing. You know, Johnny, if we’re going sailing, we’d better get started. It'’s over an hour’s drive to the sound.”

“Do we have to go? I mean, do you think we ought to? It gets chilly in the afternoon.”

“Chilly? Why, Johnny, you talk as if you were forty... fifty years old or something. But I love sailing. Certainly, we’re going sailing.”

“Hey, Fanny! Fanny! Come on back here. You’ll get soaked up there.”

“I’m loving this.”

“But listen...you’ll catch your death of cold.”

“Don’t you worry about me, Johnny.”

“Well, I do worry about you. Well, I’m heading for home, anyway. Fanny!”

And then Johnny was gone and, in his place, Jim was the one at the wheel, steering. Instead of asking him to explain his unpardonable intrusion of her sailing trip with Johnny Mitchell, all Fanny found she could do was to falter, “J-Jim?”

But he wasn’t looking at her. To him, it was as if she wasn’t even there.

Was it possible—she caught her breath—that he didn’t know who she was? That he, of them all, hadn’t an idea? Shaken by this dreadful suspicion, she didn’t know what else to do other than meekly call out once more, “Jim?”

Finally, mercifully, he turned his head towards her and acknowledged her presence. “Well, if it isn’t Mrs. Skeffington. I didn’t think you’d come. She mentioned her old man and a sister, but she didn’t say anything about her old lady. How come she didn’t mention you? She ashamed of you?”

“Who?”

“That’s funny. I forgot her name. It must be one of your daughters.”

“I have two of them.”

“Well, um… This one, if you stretched the point, you could call cute.”

“They’re both cute.”

“They both photographers and artists?”

“Oh, you must mean...”

“Now that’s the one. Chat her up.”

“Now, Jim, you are a little late. She’s out dancing with some young man who had no trouble remembering her name.”

“There’s a dame for you. Out dancing when she could’ve been with me.“

“Come to think of it, she did mention you. She said she had a sort of a date with a sort of a person.”

“Is that all she said about me?”

“That’s all I remember.”

“Sure she didn’t go into detail?”

“One sentence was all she devoted to. How long have you been here? How long have you been waiting for her?”

“Since we set sail. Well, no harm done. The night is still young. I’ll keep sailing onward and pick me up a mermaid yet. The truth is, I’ll stay in New York until she wants to run away with me.”

“Don’t be ridiculous.”

“You’re too scared to admit it, but your daughter is in love with me.”

“I don’t understand. Why are you here? Why are you on the boat?”

“Because you want me here. When we are lost in emotional seas, we all need a steady captain and a lighthouse to guide our way home. We need outstretched arms to welcome us to the safety of rock so we can bid farewell to stormy waters. You’re lost, Fanny. I’m here to help you navigate these choppy and turbulent waters and find your way back… I will calm the waters back to temperate levels and this boat will provide shelter in your most distressing times, if you’ll let it. Listen. Do you hear that? The foghorn.”

“Yes, I hear it. But what does it mean? What does any of this mean?”

“That is me, your subconscious, trying to reach out. I’m signaling for you to pay attention. Will you? Or will you turn away again?”

By the time Fanny reached the beach, the moon was hovering high in the night sky, casting swathes of silver light across all of the open water. Its reflection wavered on the surface of the beach as Jim’s keen eyes were no longer looking at Fanny. Instead they searched for something else. Or someone else. He spotted you, gliding through the water, every stroke disrupting the liquid mirror around you. The ocean appeared to envelop your form, encompassing you almost lovingly. After a silence which seemed to last forever, the voice she hadn’t heard for nearly four years answered from behind her, very slowly and gently, as though groping its way down the long hull.

“I’m here.”

He was looking at you, and once more she was invisible, a ghost, a silent observer. You were bathed in moonlight, a silver gloss draping elegantly over your skin. Tonight, you appeared to Fanny like an ethereal ghost, distant and untouchable, a curiously beautiful and captivating goddess. Like the moon delivered you to her and had come back this night to steal you away. There were a million words and they were all in Jim’s eyes, for this was a story told at a deeper level. His eyes were filled with so much love that Fanny’s stomach lurched as if she was going to be sick and hurl over the railing. But this wasn’t seasickness. No. This was something far worse. The sickness that came with knowing she was wrong. Guilt. Regret. Stricken, Fanny stood motionless, leaning against the railing, pressed for support against the boat. You swiftly jumped from rock to rock through the water, desperate to reach Jim. Fanny looked back as you hopped your way over the last pile, your heavy-booted feet sinking into a narrow stretch of sand before starting over the next rock bed. Jim grabbed your hand so you wouldn’t slip and fall back into the water as you picked your way over a tricky stretch of kelp-covered rock as you climbed aboard, not seeming to have noticed her yet.

“Sorry I’m late, darling. I took a stroll down the beach and lost track of time. I swam here as quick as I could. It was good luck you weren’t very far out. Just like a foreign watch to stop when you need it the most. Can’t you tell time by the moon? A good sailor ought to.”

“It’s the sun you tell the time by. The moon’s just an ornament. Take the wheel for a minute, sweetheart.”

As soon as your hands were on the wheel, Jim let go and walked over a few paces and lowered the anchor so you wouldn’t drift aimlessly in the water from wind or current. He wrapped a fluffy towel around your shoulders like a shawl so you wouldn’t catch your death of cold and then took your hands in his own and pulled you towards him until your chest was flush with his, then you both lowered yourselves to your knees, then to laying down, leaning against the side of the boat. “You know, seeing you this way, natural face of the time, you look pretty good. Of course, it may be the moon that’s hitting you just at the right angle.”

“No. If the moon won’t tell you the time, it certainly won’t go out of its way to make a girl look beautiful.”

“Whatever it is, you look beautiful.” For a moment, you gazed into each other’s eyes. You both seemed to be thinking about something. The same thing. Jim leaned toward you and looked down at your lips. Surprised to see his resolve waning, you waited for him to give in, but he stopped himself and pulled back. ���Ah, I wish I knew another story.”

You sighed disappointedly, “Oh no. You’re not gonna change the subject on me now.”

“What’s the idea?”

“If you’ll kiss me now, we’ll save a lot of time.”

He could take no more. Jim crashed his lips onto yours, feverish and desperate. You draped your arms over his shoulders, and pressed yourself tightly to him. Perhaps the gracious moon would allow the two of you to merge, to live out the remainders of your lives as one being, one body, one soul. Your form bathed in silver moonlight, you were glorious, mesmerizing. A bright star, fallen to earth so that Jim might marvel at your beauty, your mystery, before you ascended to your place carved out in the heavens once again.

You and Jim leaned in to share another kiss, and Fanny had to turn and look away. Although the kiss itself was brief and in no way improper, although none of what was happening was real and just a manifestation of her imagination, she felt it was a private moment between lovers and she would be intruding upon it if she had watched. Fanny began to wonder how different “real” love was from her imaginary affair. In any relationship there was both reality and the perception of reality. As long as she saw the other person as smart or sexy or handsome or good and as long as she could hang onto the feeling of loving and being loved then it was real. But somehow she was able to hang onto those feelings and beliefs even when objective reality diverged. Actions didn’t necessarily alter beliefs and beliefs mattered more. Before you fall in love you begin to imagine the other person. You create your lover by extrapolating on reality and dusting him or her with gold. You embellish to the point of perfection and then fall hard for the image you’ve made. Can one live up to their own expectations? Or are we all fated for hypocrisy? With all your traveling you may have spent more time imagining than others. But a huge amount of all love takes place in the head. In the middle of any relationship we can spend more time hour for hour thinking about the other person than we spend in his presence. And after any breakup there’s no telling how long we might pine for someone. Love itself is in the mind’s eye.

“You know, as you were telling that story, you didn’t impress me one bit. In fact, I wasn’t even listening.”

“It’s true, just the same.”

“Is it? Is it really?”

“Well…maybe I did exaggerate a little. C’mon, help me pull the net up, will you?”

Together, you and Jim climbed on your hands and knees to the large fishing net.

“Boy, Mother must be worried.”

“Why? Doesn’t she know you’re out with me?”

“No.”

“Well, why didn’t you tell her?”

“Mother likes you, but not as a companion for her daughter.”

“Well, Mother knows best.”

“Not her. She doesn’t know a thing about me, let alone what’s best.”

“Who would’ve thought I could make friends with the meanest croc alive with little more than a smile and a laugh. You made me work hard for your friendship, but it was worth it in the end.”

“Did you just compare me to a mean old croc?” you asked, the thread of amusement back in your tone.

“If the tough hide fits,” he said, but not unkindly.

You nodded and gave him a considering look. “True that,” you said, “but you must be misremembering. It was you who made me work for your friendship.” You then added, “Maybe I was trying to save my sister from her own friendly nature.”

“Out four hours. One underaged fish.” Jim held the small, slimy fish in his right hand.

“Oh, he’s cute.”

“Well, at least it’ll show I put the net in the water.”

“Oh, Jim, throw him back. Please.”

“Why?”

“Well, look at him. Doesn’t he seem to be appealing to you personally?”

“He’s barking up the wrong tree.”

“Well, it’d be different if you caught thousands of them, but one poor little fish. Why you snatched him away from his family and friends.”

“All right. Go back to Papa and Mama’s, stinker.” Jim threw the small and skinny fish back into the water with a splash.

“Thanks. Jim, look at us, how we naturally set sail and seek the wind to take us onward to new and pleasant shores. Jim, why don’t we just keep sailing onwards? We can dock someplace far away from here, leave the boat, and then just go from there.”

“Really? If we could sail off today, where would we go?”

You rung out excess water from your hair as you thought about his question. Your face took on a dreamy quality, and your answer, when it came, did not surprise him. “I would go everywhere. Oh, Jim, why do we stay in New York?”

“Your mother seems to think I’m too old for you, darling.”

“That’s the silliest thing I ever heard of.”

“Good. Then you’ll run away with me tonight.”

“I think you mean it.”

“I do. What you want, and what I want, it sounds like a beautiful dream, darling. But it’s not enough to wish, dream, hope. Even children know this. We must set sail into the sea of uncertainty. We must meet fear face-to-face. We must take our dreams as maps for a greater journey. Dreams, to come true, need a good story. So let’s go live one. I will not accept that all we’re meant to be are star-crossed lovers,” Jim stated passionately, his tone filled with a steady resolve. “I cannot accept it. Aren’t we more than just crossing tides?”

You contemplated this for a moment, before leaning your forehead against his. Beneath the cool sheen of water on your skin, Jim felt the heat of your blood flowing strong through your veins. Your strength, your poise in this painful time served as an example to him. He was always put together. You let him fall apart, without judgment. Jim could feel his composure fracture at your next words.

“I think we come from the same ancient waters,” you began, your hands coming to rest on either side of his face. “In some primordial sea, we rode the same tides. Perhaps someday, we shall again. But maybe this time around, we are only meant to flow together briefly, before we part.”

“This cannot be,” Jim whispered, voice wavering and tears beginning to roll down his cheekbones, “I feel your spirit ebb and flow inside of me. You inhabit me in a way that no one else ever has.”

“The sea will carry us to one another,” you began, tears trickling down your cheeks. “Time and again. I will find you, where our tides will be one and the same. I am with you, always. My soul is woven into every fiber of your being. And yours, mine.” With your exhale, warm tears flowed from your bright eyes. “Jim, I love you, body and soul.”

Jim leaned his forehead against yours, allowing his tears to fall freely. “My heart belongs to you, always,” he breathed. “You reside in me, sheltered and safe.”

“You will always find a home in my heart.” You pressed one final kiss to his lips. Your hand lingered in his for a moment, before it slipped from his grasp.

“When I drop you off at home, you go upstairs, pack your prettiest things. I’ll pick you up in fifteen minutes. Now let’s be sentimental about it. We’ll stop by our secret hideout where we made our secret promise. Where I pledged myself to you, and you to me. And then we’ll keep driving, just like you want.”

Fanny was pulled from that painful thought when you turned your gaze away from him and looked off to the side. Your eyes widened and you suddenly scrambled to sit upright, having finally noticed her lingering there. She was somewhat apprehensive, but collected herself. Once Jim realized what - or more specifically, who - you were looking at, he followed your lead as you both stood up.

“How did you find us? How did you know?”

“Never mind that. At least nothing’s happened, thank God.”

“What do you mean ‘nothing’s happened’?” Jim looked at you as you spoke, worried and confused about what Fanny was implying. “I’ve decided to marry Jim, and your coming after me won’t change that.”

That was news to Fanny, news that washed waves of vertigo and anxiety over her. They threatened to drown her, pummel her into the silt and sand until she was nothing more than a smoothed over shell, tossed about in the surf. Fanny steadied herself, taking a deep breath, using your familiar scent, your warmth as an anchor to that moment. “This isn’t the way. Of course I will hate it—”

Jim stepped up beside you confidently. “Why should you?”

“Oh, pipe down. Darling, can’t you let me get used to the idea? Take your stand and refuse to budge, but allow me time. That way you won’t have to break up the family.”

“You would never give permission.”

“You don’t need permission, you’re in your twenties. But you do need my forgiveness if you’re not to start your new life under a black shadow.”

“Don’t listen. She’s pretending to be reasonable to get you home again.”

“Even if I am, even if I think this is mad, I know it would be better to do it in broad daylight than to sneak off like a thief in the night.”

“Better for me or for you? I knew I was going to leave. You all did. No point in breaking hearts.” You held her gaze more directly now, turning back slightly to look at her full on. “I might be a tough old croc, but I’m not heartless, unlike you.”

“I didn’t say—”

“You didn’t have to.” You opened your mouth, closed it again, then took in a slow, steadying breath, letting the deep salt tang tickle the back of your throat and the tart brine of the sea fill your senses. Anything to keep her unbearably strong perfume scent from doing that instead. “I have broken rules I don’t agree with all my life. But, as a rule, I don’t do goodbyes well. I know that about myself. I also know that I have the attention span of a sand fly. A well-intentioned sand fly,” you added, trying to inject a bit of humor, and mostly failing, judging by the unwavering look in your mother’s eyes. “So, given my wanderlusting, nomadic life, I learned early on to keep things friendly and light. Easy, breezy. I’ve made friends all over the world, but none so close that—”

“That missing them causes a pang,” Jim added. “Here maybe,” he said, pointing at his own head. “But not here.” He pointed at his chest, more specifically at his heart.

This was how you were, how you’d been from the start. Finishing each other’s sentences, following each other’s train of thought, even when the exchange of words was a bare minimum. You glanced up into Jim’s steady gaze and thought of when there’d been no words at all. That was why you’d worked so well together. And also why you’d had a tough time keeping your feelings for Jim strictly professional. You’d forgotten how threatening it felt, to have someone read you so easily. Most folks never look past the surface. Fanny—hell, the entire population of Charles Street—hadn’t even blinked at surface you before barreling right on past all of your well-honed, automatically erected barriers.

“Like I said,” you went on, “I don’t do goodbyes well.” You continued walking down the boat deck then, running your hand across the railing of the boat, clinging to it as you gazed up at the distant, twinkling stars above. Crickets chirped in harmony with the nearby ribbits of hot-footed frogs, hiding stealthily amongst the scattered lily pads near the shore. You knew you were avoiding continued eye contact, but it was unnerving enough that she was there, in your personal orbit, in your world. Your home world. Wasn’t that invasive enough?

“Would a postcard or two have killed you?” your mother finally asked your retreating back. “Not for me. I never expected one.”

You didn’t glance back at that, but just as you knew her too well, she knew you the same way. You heard that little hint of disappointment, of long-held hope. Of course the very fact that she was there, on your beach, was proof enough that she’d had hopes where you were concerned. And in that moment, you thought, to hell with this, and stopped. Running halfway around the world apparently hadn’t been far enough to leave her and all of what had transpired between you behind. So why did you think you could escape it along the span of one low-tide beach? “The sea breeze feels nice, doesn’t it? If nothing matters…then all the pain and guilt you feel for making nothing of your life…it goes away. You see it all, don’t you? You can see how everything is just a random rearrangement of particles in a vibrating superposition. But you see how everything we do gets washed away in a sea of every other possibility? You’re everywhere. You’re like me.”

“Please, I don’t care about the money. I don’t care about the engagement. I only care about my daughter. Give me back my daughter and I’ll leave you alone forever.”

“Sorry! No can do.”

“Why not?”

“I am your daughter. Your daughter is me. You can’t separate us. We are two halves of the whole.”

“No.”

“I have felt everything your daughter has felt. And I know the joy and the pain of having you as my mother.”

“Then you know I would do… Only do the right thing for her, for you.”

“‘Right’ is a tiny box invented by people who are afraid and I know what it feels like to be trapped inside that box.”

“No, it’s not like that.”

“You don’t have to hide behind a mirror anymore. You should feel relieved. I - we - will show you the true nature of things. You’ll be free from that box, just like me.”

“No, no. I’m not like you. You’re young and your mind is always changing. I still know who I am.”

“You have no idea what you’ve done. You’re stuck like this forever.”

“No, I’m going back with my daughter, to my family, to live my life. A happy life.”

You scoffed, “Okay. Good luck with that. I was just looking for someone who could see what I see. Feel what I feel. And that someone…is you.”

Jim intervened and put his hand on your shoulder. “Sweetheart, Go. Go.”

“But—” You stared directly at your mother, then looked between her and Jim.

Fanny’s cheeks were flushed and, when she opened her eyes once again, you could tell that she had been crying, though she shed no tears in front of you. She wanted to beg you to stay, to beseech the moon above and bargain that you might grace her just a little longer with your presence. What would it take for the heavenly bodies to allow her just a few hours longer with you? Fanny wondered if this would be the last time she was ever going to see you, a thought that pierced her heart like a vicious barb. She couldn’t help but notice the pile of bags and personal items that you left in the cargo hold, like you were prepared to travel a great distance.

“Go. I’ll take over and handle this from here. You’re beautiful and everything.”

“Okay. I love you and everything.” Jim held your hand and helped you as you stood up on the railing of the boat, very much in a position that looked as if you were going to jump. “Fuck.”

“What’s wrong?” Fanny asked. If she moved towards you, you’d lose your footing and fall. If she stayed rooted to her spot, you’d purposefully jump.

“I’ve been trapped like this for so long…experiencing everything…I was hoping you would see something I didn’t…that you would convince me there was another way.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Do you know why I actually painted those disturbing things when I was a child? Why I appear in your dreams? It wasn’t to destroy everything. It was to destroy myself. I wanted to see if I went into an almost trance-like state, if I dissociated hard enough, could I finally escape? Like, die, in a way. But not actually die. To experience death without the commitment. The closest thing we have to that is sleep. At least this way… I don’t have to do it alone.”

Fanny watched your form grow smaller and smaller on the horizon, before it disappeared behind the cliff sides as you let yourself fall over the edge of the boat and into the water. And like that, you were gone. She was left alone with Jim once again.

“I’ll tell her.”

“About my ex-wife and daughters, you mean? Go ahead. See where it gets you. You’re confident you can bring her around, aren’t you?”

“Fairly. I’ll certainly try.” She wondered if she’d reach you in time before the moon summoned you home again. Fanny turned to leave, but paused when Jim spoke again.

“It’ll be light soon, so I’ll say goodnight. But I can promise you one thing. Tomorrow morning nothing will have changed. Not between her and me, anyway. But her relationship with you? Perhaps, somewhere, someday, our paths may cross each other but aeons of separation would have altered us so much that, we may not recognize each other but just gaze upon each other as strangers. Our next encounter may resemble two ships passing in the night, momentarily sharing the same vast expanse, yet destined for separate destinations. My words no doubt seem strange to you, but they’re true. You won’t believe it yourself come tomorrow morning, until the illusion of dream relinquishes its grasp on your mind and body, instead replacing it with the embrace of reality. It will take hold as you awaken from your slumber and come to, and as you open your eyes, it’ll set in for you once more that your daughter is gone, and it’s all your fault.” Jim climbed up on the railing of the boat and, without looking back, jumped.

When Fanny rushed over to look over the railing, she could see nothing. Just the impenetrable blackness of the waves as the boat rocked gently, held in place by the anchor Jim was considerate enough to drop earlier. You and Jim would follow each other anywhere, even if it meant your bodies became lost in the sea’s endless depths. Fanny would always wake up, gasping for air and drenched in a thin layer of sheen sweat, her heart pounding, her alarm clock ringing in her ears with the intensity matching a foghorn, and the corners of her eyes stinging with unshed tears that tasted vaguely of the sea.

~

If ever a woman was adrift, Dr. Jaquith was afraid poor Fanny was. And she had always been adrift, he now saw, refusing to have anything to do with the innumerable anchors offered her, including—and with what entreaties!—his own. Paradise was always over there, a day’s sail away. But there came a moment when an anchor was essential to a woman’s comfort; he wouldn’t say happiness, because he wasn’t sure happiness existed in that very moment, but comfort. So long as she was young, she might toss about gaily enough on the crest of her popularity. But she wasn’t young anymore and her popularity had waned to practically nothing. It’s a funny thing, escapism. We can dream throughout both the day and the night, we can go far and wide and we can keep moving on and on through places and years, but we never escape our own lives.

“I have woken up from the dream many times, my heart pounding rapidly, and my vision turned into a hazy fog devoid of guiding light. I always wake feeling wretched for my mistakes, only for the blessed relief to come that I didn’t really do those things, it was just a dream. Then, though my heart feels wretched, at least I can face the day. When the dream ends, I’m never elated, just cozy, happy to stay at home. I don’t fear the dream, but… The dream comes often and only a few details change. But the outcome is always the same. I never win and always lose. I lose my daughter.”

“You lose because instead of staying true to the ones who love you and the ones you love back, you betrayed the love and trust of someone you love more than yourself. You may plainly perceive Jim as the traitor through his mask. He is well known everywhere in his true colors; his rolling eyes and his honeyed tones impose only on those who do not know him. People are aware that this low-bred fellow, who deserves to be pilloried in your eyes, has, by the dirtiest jobs, made his way in the world; and that the splendid position he has acquired makes merit repine and virtue blush. Yet whatever dishonorable epithets may be launched against him everywhere, nobody defends his wretched honor. Call him a rogue, an infamous wretch, a confounded scoundrel if you like, all the world will say “yeah,” and no one will contradict you. But for all that, his bowing and scraping are welcome everywhere; he is received, smiled upon, and wriggles himself into all kinds of society; and, if any appointment is to be secured by intriguing, he will carry the day over a man of the greatest worth. Zounds! These are mortal stabs to him, to see vice parleyed with; and sometimes your daughter feels suddenly inclined to fly into a wilderness far from the approach of other men. Even when the dream is bad you should welcome the message it brings. There’s a reason you chose that moment, the moment you contracted diphtheria in particular, to be the setting. Let’s delve deeper into it, discuss its significance. Dreams are symbolic of the self, so if you’re dreaming about your daughter and it seems rather random, then it’s likely that she’s representing some part of you. So ask yourself: What aspects of your daughter’s personality are you currently at odds or resonating with?”

“I don’t understand. What are you asking?”

“What he means, Mother, is that you’ve been dreaming about her on a near daily basis, so there’s likely a situation going on between you two that I, your subconscious, and Dr. Jaquith are trying to help you navigate. I’m not actually here. I’m not your daughter. She’s off galavanting across the world with her husband. I’ve merely taken her form because, whether you know it or not, you want me to. I’m you, a piece of your mind. I’m a fragment of memory, a reminder of an experience you had with your daughter or even a quality she possessed.”

“Well, understood through a more traditional psychotherapy lens,” as Dr. Jaquith put it, “a dream is a conversation between your conscious and unconscious minds—an opportunity to explore fears and the forbidden. Often, this happens when there are unresolved emotions or dialogues that need to be explored. In other words, It means there is unfinished or future business with her, your daughter—”

“—Since you’ve been unable to do this when you’re awake, the dream state, that’s me, has bled into your waking reality and has been stepping in to help you express yourself, resolve conflict, or release emotional baggage. The dream’s purpose, my purpose, has been to motivate you to get closer to her. Whether she is thinking about you or not is difficult to prove, but your confidence should be in the fact that your soul sees pursuit of your daughter as nourishing, to one or both of you. So there’s a good chance that if she’s not thinking about you, she might start thinking about you, if you reach out to her. So, Mother, are we going to sit down and finally have a civil conversation? A chance to explore our fears and feelings?”

Fanny, not realizing she was speaking aloud in front of Dr. Jaquith, turned to look at you. “Oh, Darling. Oh, God, Darling. To see your face again… How could you leave me like that? How could you do this to me? Why didn’t you tell me? Why didn’t you tell me what a bitch I was being?”

Dr. Jaquith sat quietly and watched, letting the scene play out a little longer before he intervened. She needed this.

“But I did, didn’t I, Mother? You didn’t listen. ‘I know you to be a nasty, jealous, scheming bitch! You’re a bitch! Not content with ruining your own life, you’re determined to ruin mine! Go fuck yourself, you judgmental, self-righteous bitch.’”

“Well… I’m listening now, darling. In my dreams, Jim said something about reaching out. I have reached out, many times. All of my letters went unanswered and returned to sender.”

“It was uncharacteristic of me, wasn’t it? I mean, we’ve had fights before, haven’t we?”

“Yes. I just…in the first and last letter you wrote to me after you left home, you told me you were sick of it. Sick of me.”

“And I was. I was so sick of you. And now that sickness has polluted the seawaters in your dreams. Only we can purify them.”

Dr. Jaquith’s voice brought Fanny back to the present moment and she turned to look at him as he spoke. “Am I correct to assume you were talking with your daughter just then, Mrs. Skeffington?”

“Yes. She’s just there, by the window. But you see, Doctor— I’m not crazy, it’s just that—”

“I never said you were. But in your letter, you said you’ve been having hallucinations again, that this happened once before. Before your husband came home, you had hallucinations of him. Now you’re having hallucinations of your daughter. When did these begin, Mrs. Skeffington?”

“I didn’t start to experience hallucinations of her specifically until after Fanny wrote to me, telling me of her sister’s nuptials. Since then, I’ve been most distressed about my daughter. On the same night I read Fanny’s letter, when I shut my eyes, my other daughter suddenly appeared. Then as time went on, even if I didn’t shut my eyes, she appeared. Standing beside me or in front of me, sitting around all day, staring at me...with those soulful eyes of hers. But not just staring like Job did. She’d talk to me, admonish me. She’d say the meanest, vilest things. Dr. Jaquith, I wish you’d write to my daughter and ask her to stop. I find it very disconcerting.”

Light quickly dawned on Dr. Jaquith. Mrs. Skeffington’s husband was home, they had reconciled, made amends. But she was still being haunted. She had you, her daughter on her conscience, and you were behind the new onslaught of hauntings. She couldn’t get you out of her mind because of doubts, and thoroughly well-founded ones, in his professional opinion, as to whether she hadn’t been too hard on you once upon a time. So she had been, and for entirely discreditable reasons. It wasn’t, Dr. Jaquith was sure, from any strictness of principle or wounded love that she had divorced Job, but simply because the opportunity was too good to be missed for getting rid of her little Jew. Then another opportunity came, an opportunity to marry off her vagabond daughter, but that plan backfired horrifically for her. Now she was being punished. Now her conscience, awake at last in a life grown suddenly empty, was gnawing at her. Fanny was soft. Nobody who was hard had a conscience which gnawed. Anyone could see that this woman was living a nightmare. Except that she went through her daily life wide awake, knowing that she could relive her mistakes at any moment.

“I see. You see, Mrs. Skeffington, when the dreaming brain struggles to solve the problems it needs to process it expands its ‘department’ into areas of consciousness, hence the hallucinations. Thus the most logical longterm treatment is a world of less stress, be it auditory, visual, or both. But first, we must get to the source of your stress. How is your daughter? Have you heard from her?”

“No. I mean, I don’t know. She ran away that night, I’m not sure to where. And I never saw her again. I haven’t seen her for years and I’m worried about her. I’ve written her many letters with no answer. At first, I thought maybe she couldn’t possibly have had time to write, that she’s been too busy traveling the world, that she has befriended a French captain or Spanish ambassador or Greek criminal. No doubt Jim is showing her the ways of the world. But now… She does write, as she promised she would, just not to me. If it wasn’t for her frequent correspondence with Fanny, and occasional letter or postcard to George, I would’ve assumed she was dead months ago. This time I have a bad feeling. I’m almost sure my daughter’s dying.”

“Is she sick?”

“She won’t speak to me, so I don’t know. You know that my daughter can be a bit…unpredictable.”

True, you had been home to welcome her when she came back from the rest home after recovering from her illness, and dined with her—once only, though, now that Fanny came to think of it. The first and last time you actually sat down with her at the dinner table was the very night when she told you about your engagement and dismissed Jim from the house. Since then, you always had a tray sent up to your room. And then you broke your engagement and there was that horrible display upstairs in your room as you and she had the row of the century. You left and, since then, she hadn’t once set eyes on you or heard your voice, your excuse being that she was well again and you saw no reason to delay your travels anymore. And now there was always something keeping you away from home, away from her. Art exhibitions, your Uncle Fred, teaching children to paint and draw, the war. Or—her thoughts, before Dr. Jaquith’s fixed and coldly appraising eye, hesitated—was it really all those things that were keeping you away?

“It’s the worst, isn’t it? The not knowing,” Dr. Jaquith’s voice interjected. “Now that Johnny Mitchell and Fanny are married, she has two families who support her life choices now, you know, regardless of their own wants or desires or opinions. She has Fanny and Johnny’s family, and her and Jim’s family. She’s with that husband of hers now and, no matter what anyone says, two people are enough to make up a family. She’s left your life and you’ve been left to wonder about her. Where do she and Jim live? What are they doing? Are they happy? And these kinds of dreams can be the answer to those questions because they give you a snapshot of your daughter, the person you once knew, and insight on how her life is going. The very nature of wondering about her can mean that you feel guilty or miss her… Do you miss your daughter, Fanny?”

“How can you miss someone who’s right beside you?” you said sarcastically.

“Does her leaving hurt you?”

“You hurt me so fucking bad, Mother. You reached into every single insecurity, every single wound you know I have, and poked the fuck around. Sorry, sorry. I shouldn’t use such language. I’ve just grown so used to hating you lately. Those times, just before John and I broke our engagement, and our last conversation we had before I left, you were so hurtful. So hateful. You weren’t the only one left with a broken heart when I left. All of those things I said… They needed to be said. But still, saying them… Leaving the house, leaving you that way… It killed me inside.”

“And our falling out killed me too, darling. Was this all because I made a mistake? A mistake we could’ve so easily rectified?”

“Of course, the saddest thing about the mistakes of one’s youth...is that they can never be rectified. Or can they? It must all be so confusing.”

“I…I wasn’t prepared for all this. I thought I’d led a simple life. I thought this would be easy.”

“It’s never easy. Everyone has secrets. Even John. You’d think he’d be the most boring guy in existence, but he had a lot of skeletons in his closet, let me tell you.”

“And what about John?”

“I’m not here to talk to you about John. Dr. Jaquith and I are here to talk about your favorite person: Yourself.”

“It’s been a sort of a long-distance love, hasn’t it, Mrs. Skeffington? Not dissimilar to how it was during her childhood.”

“That’s not kind of you, Doctor. I never wanted my daughters to leave me. The court even said a child should stay with its mother.”

“Never mind what the court said. What did you say?”

“Well, I thought a child should. It was just that…Well, it was just that...It was just that... Well, they weren’t going to be very happy staying with me. They loved their father so much more. We knew perfectly well that if either of the girls were miserable, I would be miserable too.”

Dr. Jaquith didn’t speak for a while then, well aware that he’d added to the guilt and fear Fanny was already feeling. She supposed, if he were being brutally honest, she’d earned a bit of the guilt where it concerned not staying in touch with you or Fanny as she’d promised, but the rest… Well, it was all water under the bridge now. Or so she thought. He glanced uneasily across, not so much at her as at the chair she was sunk in. It seemed to have grown. Always big enough for two, it now seemed big enough for three. When last he saw her, muffled up in fur, he hadn’t realized how little of her there was left. Poor Fanny, he thought, unable, whenever his eyes rested on this wraith-like parody of the past, to prevent a slight shrinking away, she is like a painted ghost. Was it fair, he asked himself, while again she watched him, her head on one side,—was it fair to give anyone who looked so exactly like an invalid a shock? Hadn’t he better wait till she fattened up a bit? Or at least till she didn’t just happen to have had what she told him was a trying day? No, what he had come for couldn’t wait; what he was doing was, anyhow, so outrageous that there was nothing for it but to plunge ahead and see it through.

“Don’t play the innocent with me.”

“I don’t know what you mean.”

“Yes, you do. You know exactly what I mean. Your reasonings for your actions may seem all very logical and selfless if anyone who doesn’t really know you were listening, but I know you, and I know my field of expertise. My dear lady, the entire basis of psychoanalysis is truth, so don’t lie. Not to me. You can lie to yourself, but not to me. I usually make a show of these things, but if you still insist on playing the fool, I’ll just come right out and tell you what your trouble is. You can’t stop ruining things! For your daughter, for yourself! You’d pull in the sky if you could! Anything to make you feel less frightened and alone!”

“You don’t want to understand me—”

“You all but ruined her life that day!”

“I didn’t mean t—”

“How many lives are you going to wreck just to smother your own misery?”

And then she was on her feet, standing quite close to him, rather like a little girl forced to say a difficult lesson not yet really learned, to a judge she knows will be severe. What she had done seemed to her now, alone with Dr. Jaquith, wholly unpardonable. But then, when she thought of you— Having gulped down the tea, watched by Dr. Jaquith curiously while she gulped, she went on quickly. “I refuse to listen! Is this the tone you encourage? Dr. Jaquith, my constitution simply will not stand this sort of thing.”

“You asked for it.”

“How?”

“Sit down and I’ll tell you.”

“I’ve a dreadful headache, Doctor. This isn’t what I wanted to discuss with you at all. I find all this very distasteful.”

“I’m sorry, Mrs. Skeffington, but your daughter and I have headaches too and I think ours precede yours by quite a few years.”

Fanny turned to look at you, as if gaging how she should respond based on your reaction to Dr. Jaquith’s words. You were leaned against the wall, not looking at her or the doctor. Your eyes didn’t even glance up from the newspaper you were “reading”. “Reading” was an understatement. You were too busy looking at the comics section like you always used to do when you lived in the house. It was the only section of the newspaper you ever bothered with. You didn’t say anything, but you made a hum that couldn’t be interpreted as anything but agreement.

“From the look in your eyes, I can tell you probably want nothing more than to have the pleasure of throwing me out, but I haven’t earned my fee yet.”

“What could you possibly have to say after that?”

“Oh, he has a great deal to say, Mother. You should hear him out. He only wants to help you in the same way he helped me. It shouldn’t be too difficult for you. You should be accustomed to just sitting and listening to men say their piece by now.”

“What I have to offer you is sound advice, and you’ll be grateful for it. Did you want to consult a gentleman or a doctor?”

“You know, there’s a female in this opus who is really not entirely unlike yourself,” you remarked, pointing at the comic, though she couldn’t see it.

She needed a true friend’s advice so badly. Who could give it better than Dr. Jaquith, one of her daughter’s oldest and, certainly for the last three or four years, quite one of her dearest friends?

“All right, I’ll listen quietly. What do you want to discuss with me?”

“Well, for instance,” he said after a moment, diffidently, “this business about your poor daughter.”

You, poor? You, that expert in traversing the great world, seeing and experiencing new and exciting things every single day? Really, she couldn’t believe it. You might be relatively poor money-wise, especially compared with what you used to be, but not actually— Silence. She, trying to believe it. She, struggling with a thought which, if she did believe it, would have an instant effect on her own future. You, poor? That was hard to believe. But Dr. Jaquith wouldn’t lie. Then, that being so, it must be true that you were in a bad way. Fanny sat trying to take it in.

“Why ‘poor’?”

“I expect by now it might fairly describe her. When she first came to me, her heart was an injured thing, pain covered her like skin. She didn’t trust this world or anyone in it. She was completely turned in on herself and, like all of her hound, had to go on living in the strange limbo of an increasing detachment and isolation. I wondered if she had come to know more about herself and shrank, consequently, from association with you, her mother, the It Girl of New York. She couldn’t have been anything but lonely when she was a child. Often the stronger the maternal bond the harder the teenage years are for a daughter, but that wasn’t true for her. What you didn’t understand was, she always felt like a bird in a cage. There were times when you clipped her wings to the point where she was at a serious social and developmental disadvantage. If we were meant to stay in one place, we would have roots instead of feet. She wanted to be without roots. A person does not grow from the ground like a vine or a tree, one is not part of a plot of land. Mankind has legs so it can wander. What a funny old world you once lived in, thinking you could cage her, and make her fear her future.”

“I didn’t want to cage her or make her fearful for her future, I wanted to protect her and keep her safe from—”

“Regardless of intent, I’m afraid that’s exactly what you ended up doing. She sought to break free, to prove who she is, that she is her own person and no replica of you, her mother. And as she grew older, that separation was a trauma she hid within animosity, misread as teenage angst. She leaned toward Mr. Skeffington, the father. Separated by gender there was no danger of confusion between who is who. You may have lost her nearly four years ago, Fanny, but she lost you long before you and Job ever divorced. She rattled around this huge house, growing more and more used to being on her own, resenting your presence and that of whichever gentleman you permitted into the house on any given day more and more, even if they only came back for the weekends or while your husband was away, she felt like you and your lovers were invading her space. Under your own roof, your own nose, you became like strangers, ships that pass in the night, not able to agree on anything, not having any common ground. In time the rift should’ve healed, when she was confident, when she was truly an adult. Then she might’ve returned to you, her mother, and you would’ve become more than any two friends could ever be, the love returning to the surface for each of you. But that hasn’t happened, has it?”

“No. I thought her leaving would be temporary, that maybe if I gave her time, gave her space to blow off some steam, she’d come to her senses and come back home. But months went by, then a year, then…”

“Apparently you didn’t know her well enough. This house was never a home to her. It was a cage. A cage that gave her wings to fly, and she flew the nest the first chance she got. Now she has Jim and is surrounded by people every day, but she can’t be anything but lonely at her age, considering the circumstances of her departure, having lost her family and been barred from her childhood house all in one day. Leaving a house is easy, but leaving a home is so very, very hard.”

“Does no one want to know the truth here, Mother? The real loneliness is living among all these kind people who only ask one to pretend!”

“It must be noted that she is a sympathetic character: You, her mother, were biased and ineffective, which left her alone. She went largely ignored by you, which might be why you put so much effort in trying to impress people. After your divorce, she was forced into the company of others because her father could not leave her or her sister alone in Mexico or Europe. It was frightening, but it was liberating, because she no longer had to suffer the comparisons between your beauty and her own. She began to enjoy herself and moralized over every morning.”

“You speak with such eloquence for a psychiatrist. Maybe you should’ve been a poet instead, Doctor.”

“Don’t try to change the subject.”

“But you make an already dreadful situation sound even worse and I find it even more dreadful to listen to you. I hope you’re not going to suggest—”

“I’m going to suggest many things about your daughter, I’m afraid. My concern is not just for you, but for her as well. It’s all wrong that you should be seeing her in this way.”

“It’s dreadfully wrong, and most upsetting.”

“It shows your nerves are in a very bad state.”

“Yes, Dr. Jaquith. Just what I’ve been suspecting myself.”

“And perhaps a complete change of scene—”

“Well, I did go to Claridge’s.”

The ghost of a giggle, the faintest little sound of rather wry mirth, rose to her lips at the pictures that flashed into her mind; though indeed all this was very serious for her. Adorers had played a highly important part in her life; the most important part by far, really, giving it color, and warmth and poetry. How very arid it was without them. True, they had also caused her a good deal of distress when, after a bit, they accused her of having led them on. Each time one of them said that, and each in his turn did say it, she was freshly astonished. Led them on? It seemed to her that, far from having to be led, they came; and came impetuously, while she, for her part, simply sat still and did nothing. Apparently snug and enviable in her rosy, cozy cave, she lay thinking about those adorers, so as not to think of you.

“Fanny, you must be serious.”

“Good heavens, do you suppose I’m not? I went there to visit my cousin, Martha, and her family and I was…searching for something.”

“Searching for what?”

“I don’t…know exactly. But I found…something. I can’t make heads or tails of it.”

“Then will you listen while I tell you what I really think?”

“Oh, all right. But I can assure you, she’s had many very good reasons for being grateful,” said Fanny, more doubtfully; for to be one of a crowd of miserables, each thinking he was the very man to help her with her particular daughter, and taking up his time, didn’t seem so good. “And Doctor—” she frowned—“I’m not poor and suffering, and I’m quite well off.”

At this he paused. Beneath a lamp he paused in order to face her. “Well off, Fanny?” he inquired. “You think yourself well off? Let me tell you,” he solemnly assured her, “that you are positively poverty-stricken. All of those beautiful things, those pretty presents you gave your daughters… Material possessions could never amount to a mother’s love, which is all they ever wanted from you. But love was something which couldn’t be bought, so you didn’t know how to give it to them. Everything you ever gave them came with strings. And I don’t just mean pretty ribbons and bows.”

But even this only pleased her. How very understanding of him, she was thinking. He wasn’t, after all, completely padded inside. By poverty-stricken he meant her starving soul, and her uneasy, groping mind, and her heart that was well on the way to becoming a skeleton now that you had gone—all the parts of one that begin, evidently, to give trouble after fifty. He had guessed this. He knew it instinctively. Living sexlessly before his marriage to Charlotte, she reflected, he had probably developed feminine intuitions. Pleased, she smiled at him, the light from the lamp overhead glaring down pitilessly on her face.

“I’m so glad,” she said.

“Glad?” he repeated, surprised. “Do you in the least know what I mean?”

“Yes. That I’m a poor, drifting, more or less lost soul” —curious, he thought, how much women liked to be told their souls are poor and lost— “and so you’re going to help me. You can, you know, David. It’s my daughter. She’s worrying me to death. She badly needs something done about her.”

“Mrs. Skeffington, everything that needed to be done about your daughter has already been done at Cascade, with success. I’ve known your daughter since she was nine. I know things about her that even you don’t know. And I know things about you that you don’t know I know.”

“Like what?”

“Like how happy, how relieved you were to be free of the encumbrance of your two children and your Jewish husband. When you discovered your husband’s infidelity, you seized the excuse to divorce him, conveniently ignoring your own behavior. You were a hypocrite, Mrs. Skeffington. Hypocrisy often begins at home.”

As much as she hated hearing it, Dr. Jaquith’s words rung true. Fanny well knew that her reactions to Mr. Skeffington’s infidelities weren’t at all the proper ones, but she couldn’t help that. She was perfectly aware she ought to have gone on growing angrier and angrier, and more and more miserable; and instead, things happened this way: Obliged to forgive the first typist, such was his penitence and such his shame, the second one, though humiliating, didn’t distress her quite so acutely. Over the third she was almost calm. The fourth made her merely wonder there should be so many young persons liking him enough for that sort of thing, but she supposed it must be his money. She went out and bought some new hats. The fifth, Miss Morris, she earnestly inquired of the alarmed and shrinking creature what she saw in him. And after Miss Morris, Job left. Left, and never came back. Left, and she beheld him no more till they faced each other in the Divorce Court. Since then she hadn’t set eyes on Mr. Skeffington, except once, not long after the final kicking free, when her car—his car, really, if you looked at it dispassionately—was held up in Pall Mall at the very moment when he, walking to his club, chanced to be passing. There she sat, such a lovely thing, delicately fair in the dark frame of the car, obviously someone everybody would long to be allowed to love, the enormous hat of the early summer of 1914 perched on hair whose soft abundance he had often, in happier days, luxuriously stroked, and was so completely already uninterested in him that she hardly bothered to turn her head. Wasn’t this hard? Now, wasn’t this terribly hard? Mr. Skeffington asked himself, his whole being one impassioned protest. But Fanny, sideways through her eyelashes, did see him, saw how he hesitated and half stopped, saw how red he grew, thought: Poor Job, I believe he’s still in love with me, and idly mused, as she was driven on up St. James’s Street in the direction of her attractive house—his attractive house really, if you looked at it dispassionately—on the evident capacity of men to be in love with several women at once. For she was sure there were several women in Job’s background at the very moment he was hesitating on the pavement, and turning red for love of her. He couldn’t do, she now thoroughly well knew, without several—one in his home, and one in his office, and one God knew where else; perhaps at Brighton, whither he was so fond of going for a breath, he used to explain, of sea air.

So that when he offered her those repeated chances of honorably getting rid of him, though she began by being outraged she ended by being pleased. How angry those typists had made her, till it dawned on her that what they really were were gates to freedom. When at last she saw them in their true light, as so many bolts shot back and doors flung open, she left off being angry, and began instead—strictly speaking, she did’'t suppose she ought to have to rejoice. No, she oughtn’t to have rejoiced; but how difficult it was not to like being without Mr. Skeffington. And she asked herself, as she went into her flower-filled library—the quantity of flowers that arrived for Fanny every day at this period had to be seen to be believed—and found Jim Conderley of Upswich, an elderly (she thought him old, but he was, in fact, under fifty) and impassioned admirer, waiting to take her out to lunch—she asked herself what other woman would have been such an angel of forbearance. Or was it, really, not so much forbearance as that she didn’t care? Yes, thought Fanny, who was an honest girl, and liked to see things straight, it wasn’t being an angel; it was because, after the third lapse, she simply hadn’t cared. Being an upright girl, who believed in sticking to her marriage vows and giving as good as she got. She, too, had been very kind. Her heart, however, hadn’t been in it. At no time had she enjoyed her marriage. She was very sorry, but really she hadn’t.

A marriage, she found, with someone of a different breed is fruitful of small rubs. Among other things, he was a Jew, and she wasn’t. Not that that would have mattered, since she was without prejudices, if he hadn’t happened to look so exactly like a Jew. It wasn’t a bit necessary that he should. Lots of people she knew had married Jews, and none of them looked so exactly like one as Job (Mr. Skeffington’s name was Job, a name, everybody agreed, impossible to regard as other than unfortunate). Still, he couldn’t help that, and certainly he had been very kind. And she, who was a believer in one thing at a time, fell to considering her patience, her positively angelic patience, over his lapses. Five lapses, before she did anything about them. Why, she might have divorced him, completely justified even in her mother’s eyes, who was all for wives sticking to their husbands, after the second lapse, and started on her delicious career of independence at thirty-seven instead of forty-two. Then she would have had five whole years more of it, with everybody bent on making up for his shameful treatment of her, and for what it was imagined she must have suffered. Five years her patience had cost her; five years of happiness. But that was a long while ago. It didn’t seem long, but it was. Then she was forty-two. Now she had just turned fifty-four. A generation had passed, indeed had flashed by, since she saw Mr. Skeffington that morning on the pavement of Pall Mall, and where were they now? In the parlor where she and Dr. Jaquith sat across from each other, reappeared the flowers, perhaps, or grass that had been eaten by sheep, sheep that could be found in Scotland. Scotland, where you and Jim were. Everything, looking back, had dispersed and vanished, to reappear as something else - This new onslaught of hallucinations. though, had only happened in the last few months, and she was sure would soon, like when she was quite strong again after her illness, pass.

You threw your head back and laughed. Not a charming little ghostly giggle, but a guttural guffaw that broke her out of her concentration. “Hypocrite? Ha! Yes, of course you’re a hypocrite, but then there are two of you. There’s your conscious mind with its high ideals and your subconscious that just wants to ensure the survival of me and you. I pity those who aren’t hypocrites, because all they hear is the screaming of their conscious minds day and night, survive, eat, fear, danger. They have no range of morals to be hypocritical about.”

Fanny looked at you for a few seconds, hands in her skirts. It wasn’t the response she’d been hoping for. She wanted you to walk back your talk and instead you were set on carrying on just the same as those without your insights. One more sheep in the paddock. Or maybe you just saw too much, and how can anyone fix all that?

“You weren’t sure your daughters wouldn’t be a hindrance to you, so when they expressed a desire to live with their father who they loved so much and who were loved by him so much in return, you seized that opportunity too, to be rid of them. After all, you were still young and beautiful. You had a difficult choice to make. You couldn’t be both a beauty and a mother. And every summer, one letter, half a page dedicated to meaningless apologies for not being able - no, not being willing - to see your daughters, hollow declarations of loving and missing them, was all you committed to.”

You began to recite your mother’s letters back to her, making a show of impersonating her as if you were a vaudeville actress. “Scene: The summer of 1929. ‘My darling daughters, I’m terribly sorry that Mother will be unable to see you this summer, but...’ Scene: The summer of 1931. ‘My darling daughters…where does the time go? I thought I could surely see you this summer.’ Scene: The summer of 1933. ‘My darling daughters, it is terrifying to think...that so many years have passed and we still haven’t seen each other...but Mother misses you, and...’”

“You were more than capable of seeing them. You just didn’t want to. You had much better things to fill your days with. As soon as that letter was sealed in its envelope to be mailed, you spared no more thought to your daughters until the next year. Your daughter didn’t listen to you because no matter what you preached, your preaching became hypocrisy. If you are still unhappy now, I dare say you have only yourself to thank.”

“Unhappy? How can you be? What richness! Why, this is a palace! Oh, it’s marvelous! So roomy and so full of things! Oh, and look at the flowers. They’re lovely, absolutely lovely. I call this splendor, I really do! Mother, you ought to be the happiest creature alive!”

“Well, it just looks like a room to me, and it certainly doesn’t make me happy. Don’t be insulting. It isn’t fair.”

“‘It isn’t fair’, ‘it isn’t fair’. You say that so often, Mother. I wonder what your basis for comparison is. Three, almost four years and you still haven’t grown up? Really?”

“If anything in life isn’t fair, Mrs. Skeffington, you must put the work in to make them fair. Justice and fairness didn’t mean much to you before, but they mean a great deal to you now, don’t they? I know of only two alternatives to hypocrisy: perfection or honesty. You must envy your daughter.”

“How do you figure envy?”

“The liberty she has with her thoughts. However misshapen they may be, she has no shame in sharing them. When faced with the choice between perfection and honesty, you chose perfection every time, either because you couldn’t or wouldn’t choose the latter. Your daughter, in contrast, chose honesty every time, no matter how ugly it was. You were pedantic and conceited. You gave up on your daughters quite early on. With their father, however, it was a different story. From the day she and Fanny were born, their father doted on them, far more than he ever doted on you. He read to them, bought them books, games, but he also talked to them, listened to them, played with them, treated them like independent people capable of developing their own thoughts, instead of interchangeable decorative objects or extensions of you or himself… truth be told, you were a bit jealous of all the attention he was lathering on them. You know, Mrs. Skeffington, envy is often a sign of insecurity, yes, but so is longing to be envied.”

“Are you saying I am insecure? That I have shame?”

“How else do you explain your jealousy and need for attention?”

“Maybe I knew... I knew that Jim took an interest in her because she was just like him. But jealousy is a strong creature. It quickly devoured my mind. Soon, anger took control of me. And I just needed someone to be mad at other than myself. Even after she left, anger stayed. It devoured me whole. I envied her happiness. I envied his happiness. I envied Fanny for marrying Johnny Mitchell. I hated Jim Masters. If Manby had a lover, I would’ve despised him too.”

“And the lies you told about not being able to see your daughters when you so very easily could’ve. In nearly ten years, you never once shed a tear while your daughters were living with their father in Europe, yet you were a wet mess, nearly inconsolable and suffocating from your crying when both of your daughters left home again after only living here for a few months. Why hide that from them? Dishonesty breeds dishonesty.”

“They sit in judgment. My daughters were the only ones to say it to my face, but I know Job and George thought it, too. The Trellis wealth was a legend, but it became a myth when my father died nearly thirty years ago. He did leave a considerable estate...but, you see, Trippy insisted on managing it and, within four months of my father’s death, he ran it into a swamp. Trippy and I were stone broke. He went through our fortune and was starting in on Job’s. The house, servants… Everyone was under the same impression... Even the creditors. There was no chance of the money being returned. if I didn’t do something, Trippy would’ve been prosecuted by the DA and we would’ve lost the house and everything in it and—”

“You don’t need to defend yourself to me, Fanny. I know what you went through to keep your family ignorant in their comfort. But seeing your daughter comes out of a subconscious desire to see her. A need for her.”

It was she this time who interrupted abruptly, stung too badly to remember discretion. “And how, pray,” she inquired, flushing and lifting her chin— a gesture which instantly fixed his cold eye on those parts which Henri had said could be enormously helped, “how, pray, do you know? How do you know I’m not relieved to be free of her at this very moment?” For after all, you would come flying to New York any moment, husband or no husband, if she simply lifted a finger. Or—once more her thoughts faltered before that steady eye—wouldn’t you? “What you say is ridiculous. I have no desire to see my daughter. And I’m sure she has no desire to see me.”

“Oh, my poor lady,” was all Dr. Jaquith said to that. He looked as if he wanted to say more, but he stopped himself short and waited.

Then there was silence, while they stared at each other, he with his clean-shaven lips sardonic, and his fingertips neatly fitted together, she too badly stung to speak. Outraged, she stared at this dreadful Jaquith who was daring to pity her, but even while she stared her doubts were beginning to grow more insistent, and crept, like the cold fog outside, into her heart. Suppose now, just let her for a moment suppose, she said to herself, trying to face things sensibly—that the man was right, and she was indeed simply a poor lady deluding herself. Suppose everything that had made life so warm and happy was soon going to be over for her, was perhaps already over; what then? What did a woman do then?

“Well, Dr. Jaquith?” pressed Fanny. “What were you going to say?”

“That you should go off and travel for six months.”

“What? Be put to flight by my daughter? Never.”

“It seems to me she has put you to flight already. Ousted you from your home.”

“Claridge’s isn’t flight. I can go back at any minute.”

“The world is full of travelers. Once in a year go to someplace you have never been before. You will meet confused seekers, hopeful wanderers, enthusiastic storytellers, happy families. Look into their eyes and stuff your own eyes with wonder, live as if you’d drop dead any moment. Look at the world. It’s more beautiful than any dream you’d have ever seen. Make the most beautiful travel diary and open it up for your daughters someday, so you will all understand each other in ways you’ve failed to in the past. If you dislike that idea, I’m rather inclined to agree with—”

“Not with Byles? Don’t tell me you agree with Byles? That man, that Byles man, whose every word was like a slap in the face?” she exclaimed, standing still and facing him.

“If your daughter is behaving like a ghost, she should be laid,” Dr. Jaquith said with decision.

“Laid?” she repeated. “But that’s what Byles said, about Job.”

“Well, he wasn’t far out, I think, when he suggested it,” said Dr. Jaquith, his voice chilling because she was facing him, and he had to look at her. Really she shouldn’t, he thought; really she should not paint so much. “Nevertheless, what I say is true. Talk to her. Ask her to come over for the wedding.”

“No, I can’t. She’s in California, in the countryside somewhere. That’s a six-day train trip. She’d say I was imposing.”

“Ask her to come back, even if it’s just for the day. You can size her up, and she can size you up. It’s obvious you know nothing about your daughter at all. Talking is the foundation for every relationship. If you don’t talk, you drift apart. There’s so much to say when you don’t have a lot of time to say it. So talk to her. It’s your only hope.”

“But, David—” she protested. And staring at him, and at his dark eyebrows, and changed sunken face, she asked herself what right he had to give her advice; any advice; and especially fantastically silly advice. Byles. George. Job. Jim, and now David. The pack of them were being idiotic about you, that castaway daughter of hers. Still, when Fanny thought of what she had done, and where you were at that moment, tact and prudence seemed poor things compared with courage, and out kept coming those damned beads on her forehead. She certainly seemed to be perspiring a good deal. She had positively perspired with fear lest she should fail you. “What ought I to do? Things like that are simply not done,” she said.

“My dear, after a certain age everything is done. There’s no ought about what you should do,” he answered.

“Yes, I forgot. I keep on forgetting how old I am. How old Job and I both are.”

She thought how very disturbing it was if being older, besides its many other drawbacks, included freedom to do what one used to be protected from by the proprieties. For Fanny one thing was true: The heat of summer was not nearly as stifling as the formality of her life. With every passing day the feeling grew stronger. At Dr. Jaquith’s provocations, she was coming closer to the end of something and moving towards the beginning of something new. Change was in the air. It was only a question of when. If what Dr. Jaquith was saying held any shred of truth, she could, then, if she liked, go off alone now with anybody who wanted her to, to Paris or the other places one went off to, just as you had done, and nobody would say a word.

“I keep forgetting she’s gone. I see things in the paper that would make her laugh. I come inside to tell her that her favorite flower is in bloom and then, suddenly...” Fanny had to stop, in order to swallow. Her throat felt all dry and choky. She could hear the clanging of the teacups as she stretched across the table, seized the teapot, and poured herself out some more tea.

Why, what a cold, naked world, with no fences left. How miserable everything was. It had been bad enough for your figment to pervade her life, upsetting her nerves almost into fits, but what was a figment compared to an actual body? The decent impulse she had had of repentance, of asking for forgiveness, went curdled within her. Dr. Jaquith wanted her to make it a warm thing. To make it a kind thing. To talk it over with you. According to him, she had to see you herself, in the flesh. But how could she?

“Say that to your daughter. Please.”

“She doesn’t want to hear it from me.”

“If you don’t, you're a coward, Mrs. Skeffington. Like all bullies, you’re a coward. Knowing the truth is so minuscule compared to having the nerve to say it…and even more to live it. I’m sorry to have to be so uncharacteristically blunt, Mrs. Skeffington. Really, I hate to do it. But I must. You’re most seriously ill, Mrs. Skeffington.”

“Do you hear that? The doctor says you’re sick, Mother. What with? A bad case of Sitzenlust. Chronic. The opposite of wanderlust. Wanderlust is like itchy feet. It’s when you can’t settle down. But Wanderlove is much deeper than that. it’s a compulsion. It’s the difference between lust and love. It’s a diagnosis often shared between at least two people.”

“And she is most seriously distraught.”

“My daughter is?”

“Thanks to you.”

“Did you say—”

“My dear Mrs. Skeffington, if you had deliberately and maliciously planned to destroy your daughter’s life, you couldn’t have done it more completely.”

“How? By exercising a mother’s rights?”

“A mother’s rights? Twaddle. A child has rights. A person has rights to discover her own mistakes, to make her own way, to grow and blossom in her own particular soil.”

“Are we getting into botany, doctor? Are we flowers?”

“No. But if we were, you would be the rose, and your daughter would be the thorn in your flesh. And vice versa, if I were to ask your daughter how she feels towards you.”

“I am the rose and you the thorn, so I bear these scratches and you smell of perfume. After all, we grew together of the same roots, part of the same blessed garden. Yet as the seasons shift and I grow taller and blossom, we both heal, you and I,” you said as you picked at your fingernails and sucked on your thumb, as if soothing the sting of getting pricked.

“If you’re only here to reprimand me about my daughter, please stop. I’ve already torn myself into strips.”

“Why did you do it?”

“I don’t know. She was so… I never meant to—”

“Yes, you did. Who do you think you’re talking to? One of your suitors? Your maid?”

“How was I to know she w—? Anyway, I’m sorry now.”

“You should be.”

“With her, I just say things and then they can’t be unsaid.”

“She believed you were unhappy. That’s why you lashed out as you did. As much as you’d like to believe otherwise, she’s not the only one who inherited remnants of Trippy’s temperament.”

“Look, if this is about Jim Masters, you should be clear he hasn’t much to offer. Sir John Talbot was a loss, but not Jim. He isn’t well-born, and there’s little money and no position. He grew up in the city in Sacramento.”

“He shoots.”

“Yes, he shoots. Like every social-climbing banker shoots.”

“Well, let’s leave his credentials to one side for a moment and concentrate on what’s important.”

“Which is?”

“She says that he is in love with her, and that she is in love with him.”

“Do you believe her?”

“Do you deny it?”

“Oh, for you of all people to talk as if Jim’s qualifications don’t matter. I don't mean to sound snobbish, but I didn’t want my daughter to marry down.”

“That doesn’t sound stiff or grand at all,” Dr. Jaquith remarked sarcastically.

“I didn’t want my daughter to be grander than her husband. Or richer. If you’re really here to help me, you’d agree with me.“

“It may surprise you, but I agree it’s important to be balanced, that one should not be far stronger than the other. I just don’t think it has much to do with money or position. Was it serious? Was Sir John so very special in that way?”

“He was the owner to Talbot Castle and the surrounding acres of land, and a prominent and well-loved member of his community, he was attractive and nice, and—”

“What I’m hearing is that Sir John Talbot had all that you could wish - birth, money, looks - but he didn’t suit her.”

“No.”

“No, he wasn’t clever enough. He wasn’t strong enough. Jim Masters is both. You see, Mrs. Skeffington, there is no such thing as ‘marrying down’. When you love someone, really love someone, you see them as ‘the one,’ the greatest person you ever met, a divine blessing, a person to cherish for always. Thus, any sense of superiority is a poison to the relationship and there should be no marriage in such cases…because that isn’t love, that’s vanity, ego, pride…that’s vice. I’m not saying everything will be easy for them, but who has a life where everything is easy? Not us. And God knows not her. We simply can’t abandon ship every time we encounter a storm in our marriage. Real love is about weathering the storms of life together. After all, what’s love without a few tribulations?”

As he spoke, her eyes focused on his hands and, for the first time since he’d arrived, she saw the ring that adorned his left hand. Of course, she knew that he was married. She knew it when he first came to the house all those years ago. But it wasn’t until that very moment that she really saw it, and not just with her eyes. Upon his finger was a simple wedding band, an elegant platinum thing. Dr. Jaquith’s wedding ring was the perfect blend of elegance and craftsmanship. But Fanny thought to herself that he probably would be a marvelous lover and husband, and Mrs. Jaquith, whoever she was, was very lucky in love to have him. So his advice wasn’t just coming from textbooks. He was speaking from his heart, from his own personal experiences as a married man.

“Is that how she feels about Jim?”

“To you, she has everything and he has nothing. She’s the great lady, and he’s the man without a home, the man who drove the cars. Even if you never said so before, you immediately thought Jim and your daughter wouldn’t have a lot to talk about, wouldn’t have a lot in common. But that isn’t true for them. She obtained nothing higher because she didn’t think she could do better than Jim. She’s content to be the wife of a former chauffeur and nomad, and to be considered a star in the society of the wayfaring strangers. And that’s what matters. Listen, Mrs. Skeffington, isn’t it about time we started talking a little sense? What is it exactly that’s bothering you?”

“All right, it’s not his poverty. It’s not even his past.”

“Then ask yourself: What’s the issue? Is there some sort of disagreement between you two? If that’s the case, well then, ask yourself: Is there something you’re angry about in regards to your daughter or your relationship with her?”

“You hid your deepest feelings so well you forgot where you placed them. And again, It’s time to wake up, Mother...”

Oh, so boring; oh, so senseless. Should she go in for good works? Or attend lectures? Or learn languages? Or interest herself in the European situation? Bleak, bleak. But wasn’t the alternative even more bleak, indeed grisly, to dribble idly into old age by slow stages of increasing depression and discontent, punctuated—what fun!—by things like rheumatism and being deaf? And she pictured herself turning gradually into her own caricature, an unkind caricature—more than unkind, a highly malicious parody of what she used to be—still going to parties because she couldn’t bear to be alone, and when she got to them hardly able to keep her eyes open, still snatching at invitations and ordering new frocks; an old woman who would be explained to the indifferent young ones as somebody who once was much more beautiful than they could ever hope to be.

“Difficult as it is to imagine,” she could hear the explainer saying, “that old lady over there in the corner, Lady Frances Skeffington—yes, the old lady with the stick, whose head won’t keep still—used to be a celebrated beauty.”

Beauty; beauty. What was the good of beauty, once it was over? It left nothing behind it but acid regrets, and no heart at all to start fresh.

“I couldn’t be alone. I couldn’t. I couldn’t do it. I’d always hoped Job would give me a divorce. But then when it happened… After my illness, all my suitors, all my friends, people who I thought loved me left me without so much as a phone call or goodbye note. People that I surrounded myself with for years, who I thought were loyal to me… They all just dropped out of my life and moved on as if I were nothing. They were never my friends. They only loved what I looked like, never me at all. But you know what I say? It’s called unlovable bitches like me…make the world go ‘round.”

“That’s not true. You’re not unlovable.”

“What are you talking about?”

“There is always something to love.”

“I feel nothing. I…I feel…I feel…”

Doctor Melton had assured George that Fanny was unconscious of the change in her face, that women never did know when their beauty left them, that it was a great pity, and that someone ought to tell her about it; and he had believed him, and taken comfort in the belief that his darling cousin was at least spared what must, to any woman once so beautiful, be a torment. Now, to Dr. Jaquith, it appeared that she hadn’t been spared, and that she was perfectly aware of what had happened to her. Pity washed away the last traces of his anger. She knew all about her darling face. Then Fanny was really angry. She’d been seeing some of the others, some of the ones who used to think they loved her agonizingly too. It should’ve been nice to get all her old friends together at the party that night, for them all to come back after almost twenty years and carry on just like the good old days. But none of them could figure out why she got them together. And when they saw her standing on the stairs…they one and all recoiled. Every man-jack of them. Had she changed much? That is, very much? Her past paramours, they all played dumb and tried to dodge answering the question. But they knew perfectly well in what way, knew perfectly well what she meant. So she pushed for them to answer, claiming that it was so difficult to see oneself as others saw one. Still, they danced around the question, stalled for as long as they could so they could come up with something to say that wouldn’t hurt her too much or put them in the wrong.

“Well, Fanny, you mustn’t forget you were still almost a girl when we were friends. And, of course, since then you’ve grown up,” they said. So they thought she changed. But she knew that already. So she expressed her wish for them to tell her what they really thought. But when they did, all they said was, “You always were and always will be...enshrined in my memory...as the nearest thing to perfect loveliness that I have ever known.”

As if it came from a poet’s pen, it sounded pretty, but very hollow. It was pure vanity. A desire in these waning days of hers to feel the assurance of beauty again. But she found one should never look for admirers...while at the same time one was falling to bits. Her friends were as vapid as the winter snow was cold. An unpleasant nest of nasty, materialistic and aggressive people, careless of the rights of others, imperfectly democratic at home though quick to see the minor slaveries of others, and greedy without end. Their love extended only as far as a telegram, stopping abruptly at the front door of the house. “She used to be so beautiful,” “Simple case of wrong diet,” they said behind her back when they thought she was out of earshot. Their smiles of yellow teeth matched their little yellow faces, and they stopped coming whenever her world fell apart, which was often. From their announcements, their lives were one constant party, wine and meals in fancy establishments. Every newspaper article fed her loneliness, hacked at the tenuous emotional connections she nursed. She remembered a version of herself untrammeled by expectation, unimpeded by ego. She had suffered in the many years since then, seeking to return to that original self, if, in fact, it ever existed. And yet, she was helpless but to regard that unmistakable fear that gripped her in her dream as a sign that her unevenness lent her now to utter incongruity with this specter of past. She used to only feel the cruel bite of isolation in crowds, now it followed her home, an ever present reminder that she was a failure on every front. She had enough of recoilers. She wasn’t going to add you, her poor daughter, to them. After all, you deserved a little extra consideration. That was the only reason she wouldn’t see you— Simply because, if she saw you, you would at the same time see her. And despise her.

“Job was gone and I was afraid that if she left, Fanny would follow suit and I’d lose both of my daughters. Then I’d have no one. I’d have no one. I’d have nothing. I’d have nothing.”

“So you were still afraid Fanny would want to start acting like her, just as you feared when they were nine. Does she know this?”

“I was afraid to tell her. I’m still afraid. If I tell her now, then she’d feel she should give it up, but I don’t want that. She’d resent me.”

And now, Dr. Jaquith realized, they came down to the root of Fanny’s dreams. She dreamed of a boat, of sailing, not just because it was the setting of where she lost her beauty, but because she envisioned her worst fears: You on the rocks, and she with power to rescue you, but you refusing so much as a handout from the likes of her, even if it was a life preserver. She wanted to be kind, and warm, and personal with you, her poor shipwrecked daughter, and she couldn’t, she couldn’t, because it was unbearable to her that you, who had so abjectly despised her, much like the men who once worshipped her beauty, and the women who envied it, should see her as she was now. She was afraid because you hadn’t seen her face for nearly four years. But that didn’t matter.

“You are the only woman I know who likes to think herself cold, and selfish and grand when most of us spend our lives trying to hide it.”

“Oh, please don’t lecture me anymore on sentimental virtues. I don’t think I can stomach another pretty speech, winding up with a bow.”

“I’m sorry if all of that hurt and confused you. But it needed to be said, for your sake as well as your daughter’s. In order for you to get better, Fanny, I must do whatever it takes to make it so. I didn’t say all of that just to make you feel bad.”

“I know,” she said. “But I do, all the same.” She shifted in her seat so she was angled more toward him. “Oh, Dr. Jaquith, I didn’t mind really. Whatever happens between us, I’d like it if— Do you think she’d still want to hear from me?”

He nodded immediately. “She's got a huge heart, as you know, and she misses you greatly. She may not be over the moon, but she’d be hesitantly optimistic. And don’t worry, don’t worry, I believe in rules, and traditions and playing our part. Well, there is something else.”

“And what is that?”

“I believe in love. I mean, brilliant careers, rich lives, are seldom lived without just an element of love.”

“Oh, David, you do surprise me.”

“Oh, I am glad. So my trip wasn’t wasted? I’ve come to address a most pressing matter, but our time is running short so I’ll speak as plainly as I can, foreswearing accustomed frills that decorate my speech. You know where you went wrong, Fanny. We needn’t dwell on that here and now. But even so, you’ve been given a chance of redemption.”

“My daughter would consider…forgiveness?”

“She would consider what she considers to be forgiveness. The repentance of a hypocrite is itself hypocrisy, but it’s a vice that can be forgiven like any other. I would only say this: First, make peace with your daughter and her husband. And then, make peace with yourself. Do you remember that morning during our first meeting, I referred to a poem, remember?”

“Oh, yes, Robert W. Service’s.”

“I had it looked up and typed out on a slip of paper for you. If old Robert didn’t have you and your daughter in mind when he wrote this, he had lots of others like the two of you. He’s put into words what I’d like to say to the both of you now, and far better than I could ever express it. Read it. Bye.”

Jaquith was certainly, from what she had heard, a highly pleasant person, and equally certainly he had broken the ground by that suggestion about reaching out to you, so all she had to do was to feel her way along those same lines with tact and prudence. She found his manner most refreshing. After the sleek, soft ways of the doctors she used to go to, he was infinitely bracing. She loved going to see him. She came away feeling incredibly brisked up, and ready for anything. As hard and taut as prize-fighters she felt, after a two hours’ scrap with Dr. Jaquith. Divine, she agreed, not to be mewed over, but given a clean, straight sock—her very language, after being with him, was virile on the jaw. After Dr. Jaquith said his goodbyes and left, Fanny looked at the crisp white card stock he had given her, and read aloud the poem printed on it in bold black lettering.

There’s a race of men that don’t fit in,

A race that can’t sit still;

So they break the hearts of kith and kin,

And they roam the world at will.

They range the field and rove the flood,

And they climb the mountain’s crest;

Their’s is the curse of the gypsy blood,

And they don’t know how to rest…

Fanny walked slowly down the hallways, headed for Job’s study. Like the Kingdom of Heaven, she wasn’t going to be taken by violence. So justly angry with herself was she, so rightly revolted by her manner, that as she hurried upstairs, it was not till she reached the last step did she remember that she couldn’t possibly show herself to him as she was now, and pulling up short was on the point of turning around and going downstairs again. When she stood in the doorway, she watched as Job gave Miss Cartwright an envelope to mail out.

“Would you to see to it that the postman gets this? Place it directly in his hands if you have to.”

“Certainly, Mr. Skeffington.”

“Thank you, Miss Cartwright.” While Miss Cartwright left, Fanny entered. Job had become attuned to the sound of her footsteps and could recognize them immediately. “Did you and Dr. Jaquith have a productive session?”

“Yes, during his visit, there were lots of things he said that— Well, I won’t go into detail, but he offered me plenty of things to chew on. The most important being that I need to work things out with our wayfaring daughter.”

“So what are you going to do about our wayfaring daughter?”

“That’s still a hard task. Dr. Jaquith said I should invite her to the wedding, ask her to come back even if it’s only for the day. I’ve been objecting her relationship with Jim for a long time. Too long. In doing so, she has been avoiding me. I haven’t been a good mother, but I want to be there whenever she needs me from now on. I’ve been resisting change for so long, but now… I don’t want things to go back the way they were. I’m ready to say I’m sorry. But why should she want to forgive me?”

Soon after that she began to wonder at herself for having behaved so badly like that, and a few miles farther on had arrived at the stage of being thoroughly ashamed. By the time Dr. Jaquith left she was quite overwhelmed by compunction, and decided that never in her life had she heard of conduct more disgraceful. Talk of being inhuman and numb! It was she who had been inhuman, and utterly numb to the feelings of others, only intent on getting away and not caring how many lies she told. Just because she was bored and tired; just because, having stupidly said something bound to rouse you, she felt she couldn’t go through any resulting scene. She was glad Job couldn’t see the look on her face, for she had been thinking, how on Earth had he managed to be so fond of me all these years if the whole time, in his heart, he had never been sure I would behave honorably when put to the test? Doubly astonished, her breath quite taken away by these sudden revelations, she stood looking at Job, unable to say a word, listening in a silence she took as boding no good to what she began telling him about you. The only remaining string your bow would come in, and she would appeal to your pity; and if that was no good, then…then… She didn’t know.

With the help of his cane, Job got up, went around his desk to her, leaned on the edge of it, and put his arm around her. He bent down and kissed the top of her head. This was not only to show he loved her and sympathized with her, but also so that he might have a second or two to think what he ought to say next. She was in great stress of mind. Fanny was still his darling wife, and he was worried about her. “Although it’s painful, you do have a point there, Fanny. Our daughter is well within her rights to never forgive you. But I also agree that she won’t respond to or even read any letter written and sent by you. That’s why, while you and Dr. Jaquith were talking, Miss Cartwright was helping me to write a letter to our daughter. We finished it just before Dr. Jaquith left. Miss Cartwright has just gone to send it out. If she won’t listen to you, hopefully she’ll listen to me and be here for our wedding.”

“Oh, Job. Thank you. Thank you s—”

“Don’t thank me just yet, Fanny. I’ve only done the first step for you, but I can’t help you any more beyond that. The rest you’ll need to do yourself. If she comes, she’ll undoubtedly bring Jim with her, and it’ll be up to you to begin the process of repenting for your past mistakes and making amends with the both of them. It may not be as easy as an apology. It may be a long road. It’s my hope, and your hope too, that she and Jim will forgive you. But you’ll have to be ready for anything, and I do mean anything.”

April 1940

My darling daughter,

I remember a time when I was seventeen and going with Trippy and our parents to my Great Aunt Sophie’s house, someplace where I had never been, and the question of what to wear was a weighty one. I knew it was in the mountains, but was it really cold or just cold for New York? On the other hand, the drive up would probably be on the warm side. What to put on? I finally settled for an olive-green gabardine dress. Once the choice had been made, I considered it inspired and went happily off to the train station and, from there, we were to assemble and be driven up to her house by her chauffeur, who she had waiting for us. Alas, my complacency was short-lived. For as long as I could remember, no matter how pleased I may be with my clothes when I am ordering them, no matter how successfully I may feel they have turned out the day they come home from the shop and are lifted from their boxes, I have only to walk into a restaurant or the theater or a friend’s house to be instantly convinced that every woman there is more appropriately and becomingly dressed than I. That day at my Great Aunt’s house was no exception. I arrived in my gabardine, Great Aunt Sophie was in distinguished tweeds, and my heart sank. Of course, I thought, tweed. Even I, dope that I am, should have known enough for that. Correct and smart. Naturally. And far better cut than this sacking I was draped in. I spent the entire first day in the mountains plunged in gloom and self-disgust. Later that afternoon, Great Aunt Sophie asked me to have a drink with her and her much younger husband. In the course of the visit, I remarked that I liked her dress and that it was the perfect thing for a grand house in the Rocky Mountains. She looked at me in pleased disbelief. “You think so?” she asked. To which I answered, “Yes, of course. I only wish I had one to wear up here.”

She burst into the unrestrained laughter which was characteristic of her. “My God,” she said, “that’s funny. I’d been debating what to wear and I finally settled for this, then you walked in. I took one look at you and thought, of course, Fanny’s no fool. Gabardine. That’s what I should have on! I damn near went back up to my room to change.”

Another celebrated woman who suffered from clothes insecurity was Miss Gretchen Lesnicki, the daughter of one of my Great Aunt’s neighbors, and I got to know her. Miss Lesnicki, to the innocent beholder, was smart as all get out, but she, too, apparently viewed her own reflection with a soured eye, once she had spied the other entrants in the social arena. Moreover, she was harassed by a further ailment common to the fashion-conscious. She had only to see an outfit she had sold or given away worn by someone else to be instantly aware of its outstanding chic and to be moved by a strong impulse to kick herself for having got rid of such a becoming and durable garment. I knew what she went through. During the rest of our stay at Great Aunt Sophie’s house, the clothes problem no longer troubled either Miss Lesnicki or myself, for we were wearing dresses designed for us by “the best of the best” (in Great Aunt Sophie’s words). We had several days of radiant weather, and when not engaged in a ball, dinner party, or any other important outing or social obligation, I used to lie on the grass in her garden and look up through the glittering leaves of the trees or through the dark gleaming needles of the pines, deep up into the sky where the little clouds drifted. I was trying to apply a lesson I knew well but which was hard to put into practice, and that is not to let personal unhappiness blunt for us the loveliness of the external world. When we do, we are a little less civilized. Unhappiness spreads a scar tissue over our perceptions and we rob ourselves of our most intimate wealth, the awareness of nature. Love was my trouble and my woe was unconfined. An emotional orgy is momentarily gratifying to the emoter, but it is sterile and any performance is the more impressive as well as more sincere if there is evidence of intellect. Besides, this sort of sentimental suicide is futile; since we will survive anyhow; we will not induce love where love does not exist and we cheat ourselves out of countless delights by coddling our misery. All this I knew.

Putting it into practice I found virtually impossible, yet my sense of degradation was partially alleviated by the kindly understanding of Dr. Jaquith. Seeing me tearful, he asked what was the matter. Between laughing and crying I told him I was ashamed of myself but that I waited for word which didn’t come. I waited without humor and without courage. I knew I was behaving with self-indulgence and with a marked lack of common sense, with my experience and at my age... I continued to castigate myself, but faster fell the tears. Dr. Jaquith laughed, but his laughter was gentle. “My dear,” he said, “I am many years older than you but I am still capable of disappointment if a letter I am hoping for doesn’t come. Don’t count on age to get you over that one. Realize that when your feelings do not dull you are the more alive. It’s painful but it’s worth it.” Dr. Jaquith is a nice man. I was at Great Aunt Sophie’s only a few days and it was in the season of my discontent, but owing, in large part, to his understanding, I remember with delight the sky and the water and the dark, strong color of the pine trees like a canvas freshly painted. When I was seventeen, for the first time, I saw the world as you see it. It had been so long…so many years passed between the first and last time I went to her house… I had forgotten…what it felt like.

Love,

Your mother

Weeks passed. The wedding was tomorrow, yet not a word was heard from you. Not a letter, a phone call, a postcard, nothing. You hadn’t said anything to your sister either, which was most unusual, since you told her almost everything. Fanny was much happier to marry Job this time around than she was twenty odd years ago, but she was still down in the mouth about your silence. She really hoped Job’s letter would’ve been moving enough for you to break your vow of no-contact. She was really hoping to hear from you, even if it was to tell her of your decision to decline attending the wedding.

“Why so glum?”

“I could use some sleep. I’m not glum, Manby. Just tired. Even a woman of my amazing energy…”

“Go ahead and go to bed. We want you to look beautiful tomorrow. Anybody who says you aren’t, we’ll fight ‘em.”

“I like to think of myself as distinguished looking rather than just beautiful. Goodnight.”

[myloversgone]

Welcome, 2023

A/N: This a very long and personal post. It’s not a fluffy, smutty fic, unfortunately (even though I have lots of those in my WIPs folder). Soon, I’m hoping to be able to fully come back to this space I love and cherish so much. I just felt like I needed to organize my thoughts and feelings first, and tumblr is a safe space for me to do that. If you read it, thank you. If you don’t, no worries, I don’t expect someone to do so. This post is more for myself anyways.

2022 was the craziest year of my life.

And I’m not prone to craziness. I don’t seek adventure, I’m very practical and safe. Boring, if you will. 

So all the challenges (except for one), came to me without my agreement. I was sure I was in control of everything, and the past year showed me I’m definitely not.

At the beginning of the year, I went through major changes at work, including a new boss, and it required me to change my own behavior, completely against my will, in order to keep my job. It was hard and it went against my principles, but I didn’t have a choice at the moment.

Then I got sick and, after a long and exhausting period of going through tests and doctors, I had to go through surgery. It was supposed to be a very simple procedure, but it ended up in a series of complications that crushed me, physically and emotionally.

In the meantime, my family was (and still is) facing financial problems, and, because of that, their quality of life took a big step back, which was very frustrating to me, and even more for my mom and dad.

While all of that was happening, I was trying to prepare for the challenge I’ve chosen to go through: moving to another country, something I wished and dreamed about for as long as I can remember. For that, I had the unfailing support of my wonderful family, my previous boss, and my closest friends. But that decision was major, a long-term one, and I made it thinking about a future that is still way far ahead.

My country couldn’t offer me better job opportunities, mostly for political (Bolsonaro can go fuck himself and die) and economic reasons, and I was very unhappy in my uncomfortable confort zone. So, thinking about a better future for myself and for my parents, I moved not only to a different country, but to a different continent.

It was so hard. By the time I thought I would be organizing myself for the change, I was recovering from my disease, and, at a certain point, I thought I wouldn’t even be able to move, because nor me or the doctors had a precise answer for how long it would take for me to feel better. But I managed to recover, slowly.

After a very bumpy and complicated arrival at this new place, for the first month or so, all I could do was think I’ve made the wrong decision and wished to go back home. I would cry every single day, punishing myself for not being able to overcome this and live the dream I always worked so hard to accomplish.

Then, as if things weren’t hard enough, one of my dogs got sick and died. My dogs are the most precious things in my life. I love them unconditionally and with my entire heart. To be completely honest with you, sometimes I miss them more than I miss my parents. 

When I heard the news about my dog passing, the first thing I did (after crying my eyes out) was search for plane tickets to go back home. My dad was suffering a lot, because the dog who died was his favorite, his best friend for the past 9 years. He rescued her and took care of her when she got sick, so the impact on him was huge. And, for me, not being able to be there for him was incredibly difficult. 

But I realized there was nothing I could do. Going back home wouldn’t bring her back, and I didn’t want to give my dad another reason to worry about me. 

So I stayed. Despite money issues, language barriers, insecurities, loneliness, I stayed. I doubted I would be able to do that (I still do), and I felt like nobody here liked me or wanted me around. The last  time I had this need of belonging, I think it was during elementary school. I was afraid I would be alone for the holidays.

But then, I found a group of people that are in the same situation. They also have doubts and fears, they feel lonely and homesick too. And we bonded and celebrated Christmas and the New Year together. 

Well, now 2022 is finally over. Major changes came, for me personally, for the people around me, for my country - fortunately. I feel like things are finally starting to get better (even to write that makes me afraid and doubtful). I still search for stability, for connection, and for the means to be able to come back to my old self. 

I wish 2023 can bring me some of that. I’m trying.

Happy New Year everyone! Love to you all!

[izel-01]

Still haven’t been able to find a job, been applying and even reapplying hoping someone would contact me but nothing and I cant stand the idea of calling and getting rejected

So obviously I had to cancel some luxuries that I’ve once had and one of those being Spotify premium, I had the family plan, but with the price change and having no income I can’t have that luxury rn

So I canceled and my younger sister is acting like it’s the end of the world like? I already explained to her that it’s not a necessity sure it’s really nice to have it but if I can’t afford it I have to cancel it and when she woke up to the subscription being canceled she was not happy

She offered to pay, I kept declining bc I don’t think it’s fair that she would pay for something that I originally was paying for and last payment I asked our “ mother “ for to lend me some money ( I’m keeping track how much I owe her it’s not much but still I hate feeling like I owe people money )

Anyways our mother said we’ll talk later about it, my sister and her did talk about it without me ( which idc ) but they kept making “jokes” saying shit like “too bad for those without Spotify premium having to listen to ads” and honestly it was annoying but I ignored them not giving them the time of day

But it hurts cause like I know I can’t afford these luxuries but at least I have a roof over my head and a comfy bed to sleep but it was nice and I miss it but it’s not a necessity and I have having to depend on her for money even though I try not to ask for anything especially since she has to save money for that stupid parasite she’s gonna have but that’s for another day

It just sucks bc I’m the eldest I’m supposed to be the example but I can’t even get a fucking job - I refuse to go back to food service it is not worth my mental health and the pay was not enough - the second oldest doesn’t want a job which imo is fine bc she literally raised the youngest 3 but she doesn’t want to cook, do chores, or learn to drive. And it fucking pisses me off sometimes bc at least she has a purpose living here unlike me

I’m in the way and I know it even if this stupid bitches say I’m not I know I am bc my sister, my best friend, says to “just move out already” , “it’s not that hard”, “nobody wants you here”, etc and ofc it hurts cause the one person who has been through everything with me, who made me suffer (not her fault when we were little but now she should know better), the one who I consider my best friend/my other half is saying this stuff to me in my face

It usually happens when she gets really irritated or when she just snaps at me for any reason which happens almost everyday and I know I may be a bit too much (tough playing with the little ones or “butting” in stuff) but it’s how I show my appreciation and love and concern but she says it’s not my “business” or sum other shit calling me names

One time a while ago around Dec 2021 I’m pretty sure after we had another argument she said something along the lines of “if I was tired then I would not get up cause nobody expects anything from you” and that really hurt I don’t remember the context of what was said I just wrote it down in my notes just her saying that

What do I say to that? How do I move on from that? I obviously didn’t forget but I’ve not forgiven her either. I cook for her I clean after her I try to help her in any way I can I defended and still do to this day from our “mother”- I remember once around middle/high school when our mother was yelling and was about to hit her and I stood out in between them saying she’ll never hit her again and this bitch (the mother) laughed and called me a hypocrite I’ll never forget that and to this day she says she doesn’t remember funny how the most terrible moments of my life she claims of having no memory of and ok my brain is shit cause I physically can’t remember shit at all but I remember that clearly tears in my eyes, scared to death of standing up to her, scared of her but I knew I had to protect my little sister

Anyways it just sucks that I already know I’m a miserable example of the eldest child, but for them to keep reminding me like i don’t know already doesn’t make it better and I can’t tell my supposed best friend bc she is part of the reason why I’m slowly losing my will to do anything and I’m pushing myself everyday trying to cook more help with chores even more to show that I do appreciate them letting me stay here bc according to my mum I’m “ no longer her obligation”

Like I stopped being her child once I turned 15… but she would never dream of doing this to the younger 4 but it’s fine bc at least they have a fighting chance in this cruel world I really want the best for them bc they didn’t asked to be here but it must be nice to not have to suffer what I did

Me and the second oldest like to joke saying we were the free trial and the youngest three have it easy, and jokes aside they do. Like in that show “Good Place” when the main character said sum about her mum sum along the lines of “ if she could’ve been a better mum for ____ then that means she could always change but I wasn’t enough for her to change” and that fucking hit me like a train… cause she did change not for her, not for us, but for them her 3 precious angels (about to be 4) and that “loving husband” of hers, don’t get me wrong that’s a good thing but it hurts seeing them be treated how I deserved to be treated to get that “family” I will always yearn for, it’s still not good tho but hey it’s wayyyy better than my childhood at least I hope it is bc then it would all have been for nothing

[marischimmer]

Vignar - Chapter 1, Part 2

– You are...? –

– Princess Lisette, of course! –

– Princess? You have kingdom? –

– No... –

– Then we make one! –

She woke up, hating herself for dreaming about that stupid girl again. Why should she keep seeing her in her sleep, when she was nothing but some disloyal subject? Yes, she may have been one of her first friends, and she may have waited for her to come back for months, but that had nothing to do with this! She was a nobody, a really annoying nobody.

She started her makeup routine, still complaining. Who was she kidding? Of course she’d dream about her, she used to be her best friend. Deep down inside, she hoped nothing bad happened to her. Maybe she just moved away without notice, or something. It didn’t matter. She shouldn’t give it any further thought, she concluded, brushing her shiny, black hair. After some minutes of choosing what to wear, she headed to the canteen, wanting to have breakfast before the students started showing up. She should go to the town later to get her own food, so she didn’t have to eat that commoner food.

Gosh, she could be so arrogant sometimes.

Shaking the thought off her head, she avoided every single person until she got in and out of the dining room. The juice and the cupcakes weren’t that bad anyways.

Back at the dorm, she decided to tidy everything before the new girl showed up. She couldn’t understand why she had to share the room, she specifically said she wouldn’t accept it back when she enrolled in the school. Well, at least they were sensible enough to pair her with another girl; that weird genderless policy wasn’t for her. But anyways, if she was going to have a roommate, at least she should give a good first impression, even if she didn’t plan to talk to her just for the sake of it, less being friends.

It didn’t take much time. Her room was always spotless after all. Soon she was out again, headphones on, straight to town. It was too small for her; she could run into other students too easily, it was annoying. Still, it was good enough for the main purposes: shopping the basics, hanging around and escaping school. Probably the best thing to do would be to stay the whole day there, window shopping and walking at snail pace. Just to avoid going back to the dorms.

But just as she was reaching the main avenue, a familiar, friendly face ran into her.

– Up so early? – she asked as a greeting, smiling, headphones off. The purple haired boy chuckled, rolling his eyes.

– Nope, I ain’t slept at all. I’ve been working, y’know, I always work Fridays and Saturdays’ nights, remember? That guy’s probably ending up in my pros’ list tho, he wasn’t bad at all – he joked, knowing there was nothing to fear in talking freely with her.

– How much this time? –

– Enough to pay for the next three lunches – he beamed, and she let out a chuckle – This one’s been a good one. Bet the purple suits me, ain’t it? But anyways, what are you doing here? Escaping the common subjects? –

– What else would I be doing here? –

– Enjoying life for once, maybe? Oh, right, too simple for your majesty –

– Very funny, Damon, very funny… If you stop fooling around, I’ll have breakfast with you; my treat, of course –

– Royal breakfast? Sweet! I’d never miss one! –

– Especially if it’s for free… – she joked, teasingly. Damon surely ate a lot, but she didn’t mind it. He was her only friend after all; she had to accept him as he was. And if that meant buying food all the time, then why not? She had enough money to afford it. Who said money didn’t buy friendship?

– Princess, are you listenin’? –

– Oh, sorry. What were you saying? –

– The new classmate. Word says you’re sharing rooms with her. They must be crazy if they thought pairing a haphephobic, kindness-needed girl with you was a good idea –

– You say that as if I were-! Wait, how do you know that? –

– Tracy is my roommate –

– Oh. Right. Still, I’m not a monster –

– Well, I guess you ain’t one. My bad. I apologize, your highness – he teased, messing her hair up – Where are we going to anyways? –

– You know where –

– Palazzo? Sweet –

– Damon… Do you… Do you think she’s gonna hate me? – she asked, worry eating her. There it was, her real voice. Not the fake, arrogant one. For once, he gave it deep thought before answering.

– Well…  That depends a lot on what she’s like. But I don’t hate you, right? She may as well see you ain’t just an arrogant piece of shit, like everyone thinks you are. But we can’t know till we meet her, so don’t worry about that, ‘kay? It’s gonna be fine, promise – he reassured her, striking her hair slowly to calm her down – And if she ain’t nice to you, I’ll get one of my guys to make her –

– …Thanks, Dei –

– Heh, what are friends for? You’re welcome –

Having breakfast with him was nice. Damon usually ate so much she just took bits from his plate. They kept on rambling about random things until they decided two hours in a café was more than enough and left, heading back to school.

– Very well, princess, I’m off to the canteen. Can’t go without my third breakfast! You’ll be okay by yourself, right? –

– Yes, it is not a problem, you can go, Cookie Monster – 

– Sweet. See you later, princess – he chuckled, patting her head, far from getting annoyed for the nickname.

Now that she was back at school, it wouldn’t be a bad idea to go back to her room to load her phone’s battery, maybe even start doing that awful Math homework; it would take her years to finish it, anyways.

Headphones on again, she headed to the dorms, glaring at anyone who looked in her direction. Common subjects didn’t deserve to. 

There it was, the arrogant princess again. She should work on that. Some time. Not today.

Soon she was opening her door… and closing it again to check the number. Yes, it was the 216. She opened it again and looked carefully at her roommate’s side, for she obviously had already arrived.

Anything slim enough to tie something around it was covered with branches. Branches. The bed frame, the desk, even the curtain bar looked like trees. And that wasn’t all, oh, no, it wasn’t. Both the bed cover and the curtains were green. Leaf-patterned. Bet the sheets were, too. Were those stones on top of her drawer?? Just what kind of girl could this be, turning her room into some kind of forest?

And why did it look so good?

She stormed out of the room. Her phone didn’t need charging anyways. And she could do the homework in the library. She suppressed the tears trying to take over her eyes.

Of all the people she could have as a roommate, it had to be a nature-lover. 

[thinktosee]

MERYLL’S UNIVERSITY GRADUATION

Aunt Melet and Me

By

MERYLL MARRON DOMINGUEZ 

BACHELOR OF SECONDARY EDUCATION 

MAJOR IN ENGLISH 

CLASS 2023 

Four years of restless days and sleepless nights boiled down to this. It has to end eventually, but it’s a bittersweet feeling that I’ve come to the tail end of that journey. I’ll never miss the papers, activities, and quizzes, but I’ll definitely miss the feeling of crying through the pain and laughing once I’m done with everything. 

Learning at this academic institution was a roller coaster ride that was far from easy. But I will never forget the folks who believed in me and who supported me all the way through my college education. Looking back, it pushed me to keep fighting for my dreams despite the obstacles that arose, since there were and are many in my corner, who hope and continue to believe that I can overcome every adversity in my life. I knew this would be a test of my ability and patience to see how far I could go and to endure everything to achieve my diploma.

When I was young, I never thought that I will be the woman I am today, in view of the fact that I am from poverty and a broken family, I experienced so many things in life, and I can proudly say that “I SURVIVED.”  

Way back when I was in Elementary, I was nine years old at the time when I started to work and to earn money; my work place was a farm (namiss ko lang and proud ako doon). I travelled there every weekend to work. There were times when I preferred this work than go to school because I needed the money to survive, while thinking that I had dreams and goals in life. I also got bullied back then because of my/our situation, but GOD IS GOOD! He gives us hope by sending his instruments to help us to become the best version of ourselves today. (I’m referring to my two siblings my Eldest Brother, Denmark and Sister, Julie Ann).  

So this is it, I’m going to take this opportunity to say THANK YOU to My Auntie Melet who came back here to the Philippines from Singapore to attend my graduation ceremony. I would describe her as a generous, kind, loving daughter ever since (when Mommy and Lolo were still alive), loving sister to her siblings, Loving Auntie to her nieces and nephews. WORDS HONESTLY ARE NOT ENOUGH TO EXPRESS HOW GRATEFUL AND LUCKY I AM TO BE YOUR AMPON NGA PALANGGA MONG PAMANGKIN (without char). Thank you, Tita! because you are always there to support me in every endeavor since when I was in Elementary School right through to College. Also, in school matters, you always say “OKAY” “HOW MUCH IT COSTS?” without hesitation. I appreciate your sacrifices and HUMILITY, Tita Mom of 15 (Pamangkings) plus 6 (Siblings).   

To my Parents THANK YOU FOR MY LIFE. Although your relationship didn't last forever, I hope this achievement of mine will make you proud as your youngest daughter.  

To my Brother, Denmark and Sister, Julie Ann, and also to their partners. And to the Singh Family too. THANK YOU for your love and support throughout. Indeed, I can’t imagine this day and the future without your loving grace.

Left to right : Krizzia, Denmark, Julie Ann, me and Melet.

To my friends, and to all, thank you for making me laugh despite the stress and problems that I kept hidden deep within me. You always encouraged me to keep fighting for my dreams and moving forward to get my degree. Thank you for assuring me that you had my back anytime I was dissatisfied or concerned. All of your time spent with me and your attempts to assist me are so much appreciated. 

To my thesis buddies, thank you so much for all your help. Imagine we only had three months to finish our entire paper, but we never stopped and never got weary of finishing it. Praise God, we are the first runner-up in the Best Research Paper category. So, a BIG Thank You! 

To all of my teachers, professors, mentors, and coaches, thank you for all of your advice and input. The many captivating and life’s lessons that you taught will always be there with me, and I will go on applying them as I commence building a better future for myself and my family. Indeed, thank you for being very supportive of me. 

To everyone who cheered for me, supported me, and helped me for the past four years—and even those who doubted me—your cheers (and jeers) have all been heard, and I am eternally grateful. 

Most notably, to our Almighty Father, who helped and guided me throughout my college career. Despite all of my difficulties and troubles, you provided me with strength and health along my path. Thank you, Lord, for allowing me to finish strong until the end of my college years. Thank you so much, Lord! 

It's been a long, arduous, and frantic ride, but I'm finally on my way down the hill. Thank you, Notre Dame of Tacurong College. I know that the Almighty Father will still be there for me as I embark on the most incredible chapter of my life. 

"All of our dreams can come true if we have the courage to pursue them."  

To God be the Glory!

- Meryll

- May 29th, 2023

Dad and me

Editor’s note : On 16th April 2017, we featured Meryll’s graduation from Junior High School. I was most privileged to be invited by the Dominguez Family to the JHS graduation ceremony in Mindanao. It was also an enormous pleasure to witness the spectacular event and just as importantly, to observe the notably quiet pride with which Meryll and her Family presented at the event.

Two years later, Meryll successfully graduated from Senior High School (see our post which is dated 8th May, 2019).

Over the years, Sara and I kept in touch with Meryll, through her Aunt Melet. Her academic and personal progress was clearly evident and remains a source of joy and pride within her family. If there is anything which Meryll typifies, it is of a vivaciously confident, caring and intelligent woman who trusts God and places her faith in Him, without equivocation. For her, everything good flows from that.

Meryll is the third in her immediate Family to graduate with a coveted Bachelor’s Degree. She follows Denmark and Julie Ann. All three children of Juan and Magdalena Dominguez have done very well for themselves. Each an inspiration to all of us.

Congratulations, Meryll.

[returntosaturn271995]

Sunday, March 26th and every day before that: My love

There was a time I belonged to no one.

I was skinny and awkward and my heart bled in to the street. Women hated me and men found me annoying. My friends never saw me even as our inside jokes tightened against the chill. My loneliness pierced me like a needle through fabric, every action was threaded with a certain kind of sadness. 

Then she saw me. She was cool with dark brown hair, she was fabulous with olive skin and smirk that revealed nothing but calm and full lips. That outsiders could see, anyway. Her eyes were round, large, and a the kind of honeyed mahogany that made you want to cry. She saw things the way I did, I knew it. I fell in love with Alexa the first time I met her. 

Not in the gay way. Well a little, but mostly I was raised to love beautiful women. My father said that before his stroke. “My lot in life was to be surrounded by beautiful women”. He’d be ashamed of the way I treated you when I was sad, burnt everything down when I was angry. Unable to be touched, fucking over the people I promised to protect. 

I lied. I hid. I thought I would drown in a lake where my body floated suspended.  I was wrong; but finally alone in the solitude. I was peaceful without a mirror. 

It took me months to think about you. How I hurt you. You were my best friend for eight years. You absorbed everything. My siblings’ sexual abuse, my emptiness, my need to feel safe in your living room. I never took care of you in the same way. I never really said thank you. I couldn’t face saying sorry. You loved me more than my family, because you knew me. 

I used to think about giving you money. To pay off your loans. I’d ask my parents, even though I knew it was bitchy to mention when your parents couldn’t do the same. Why did I do that? Why did I need to do that?

I never gave you the money because you were the only person who loved me for me. And if I gave it to you, that wouldn’t be true anymore. You wouldn’t be the person who saw me gross, empty, nasty. 

Money is how I keep people away. I wanted you close. But I wanted to give to you at the same time. But I was also jealous of how beautiful and how well-liked you were. You never lied. You’re so fucking fantastic. Sometimes when I had suicidal days, what kept me sane was knowing you were my best fucking friend. 

Of anyone in my life: our platonic love has been more epic than the men I’ve dated, the family I’ve forgiven. Your monotone voice, they way you knew what exact shit was lame as fuck, your personal style, your fear of outside ingredients, the am/fm radio frequency that we both reverberate on. 

I’m so sorry.  I’m different now. I’m exactly the same. I drink less, my dad moves around less, I started yoga, I’m in love with a guy, it’s not as good as a best friend. I was angry then. I’m not now. I miss you. Sometimes weeks I go without thinking of you. Then I see two obvious best friends, and I crack open. I want to roll my eyes and murmur. I want to cackle quietly and pointedly. 

My only way of moving forward is setting things on fire. Not giving myself the chance of backward glances. Still, you saved my life. I miss you. You don’t make any more childhood best friends. You loved me when I was no one. You’ll always be one of the most beautiful women I’ve ever met. I’ll always be rooting for you. 

She’s a rental,

So much love,

Erin

[stuckonvenus]

Letters to Love

You know, I still wait at the edge of town Praying straight to God that maybe you'll come back around I cry every day and the bottles make it worse 'Cause you were the only one I was never scared to tell I hurt And I found photographs of our school, on the day we met I thought that you were so beautiful, it was love, I guess And you might never come back home, and I may never sleep at night But God, I just hope you're doing fine out there, I just pray that you're alright.

Dear Love,

I don’t remember the last time I wrote someone a letter. Maybe it was my ma. She’s always asking for me to write more, but I never know what to tell her. She wouldn’t understand any of what’s happened since I moved out West, and if she tried she still wouldn’t like it very much. I’m glad I have you around in that way; you understand, and you don’t judge me for the way I am. I wish everyone were like you. I hope soon you can read my letters on your own. That way we can properly talk shit about the people in our lives. I’m just kidding. Mostly. Have Cody write back soon. California’s lonely without you.

Yours, Riley

Dear Love,

I can’t believe you’ve got a baby now. Maybe when I get back from Kansas City, Rue and Jae can be best friends like the two of us. Tell Mikael I said congratulations. I’ll bring you back some of my pa’s good wine to celebrate! 

Yours, Riley

Dear Love,

Sorry it’s taken me this long to draft a reply. My pa came down with a fever the night before I was meant to hop on a train back. He’s doing better now, but ma was worried he wouldn’t last til the end of winter, so I’m staying here a little longer to take care of him. How’s little Jae doing? I’m sending a photograph with this postcard. Rue drooled on it some but it’s otherwise in perfect condition. You can look at it when you miss us too much. If you can, take a photo of you and Jae so I can do the same. I’m not sure when exactly I’ll see you again.

Yours, Riley

Dear Love,

I hope this letter finds you well. I miss you and Rue and Jae. I’m worried I won’t make it home for the birth, but I’m hoping for the best. Thankfully Colorado isn’t too far. The boys are giving me a run for my money, I think I might fall insane before we see each other again. Pray for me, would you? Your prayers always seem to work the best. 

P.S. If it’s a girl, I like the name Zelda. 

Your cowboy, Ridley

Dear Love,

It’s raining out and I’ve been stuck in my tent all day, so I thought I’d write you a letter. I know you said we’d talk when I got home, but you still seemed awfully mad, and to be honest I’m a little afraid of you. You’re a force of nature when you’re pissed, especially at me, and especially when I deserve it the most. I wish things didn’t have to be this way. I wish I could stay home with you and the boys and Zelda. But don’t you see? My work is what gives us our home. I’m worried if I quit, it’ll have all been for nothing. Just know that everything I do is for our family. Our life. And if you ever doubt that, just read this letter. Because I love you, and that’ll never change, no matter how mad you are. I think that makes me love you more.

Your cowboy, Ridley

[allthingsfangirl101]

Secret Birthday–Joe Keery

When you work on a big Hollywood set, things are crazy and constantly busy. There isn't much time to celebrate a CGI artist's birthday.

Being an only child, my parents always made a big deal about my birthday. Breakfast in bed, a shopping trip with my mom, visiting my dad for lunch, and a fancy dinner where we go to my favorite restaurant all dressed up.

When I went to college, I was so busy with school, projects, and work that I didn't have time to celebrate my birthday. My parents still tried to celebrate it though. They'd call me and wish me a happy birthday. My dad always sent me money to go to dinner and my mom always sent more money for to me go shopping. They'd make sure to send my gift the day before so I'd have something to open on my birthday.

Today, I had to work on my birthday and it really bothered my mom.

"I don't understand why you couldn't take the time off," she sighed into the phone.

"We're in the middle of the season," I chuckled.

"So? One day is not going to kill them." I heard my mom sigh before she added, "I feel bad that your father and I didn't come visit you. Now you're stuck at work all day."

"You came down last year," I tried to reassure her. "And besides, you and Dad live five and a half hours away. You can't drive down on a Tuesday to take me to dinner."

"But it's your birthday," Mom sighed.

I let out a small laugh. "Besides, I can't just take a day off because it's my birthday. The special effects we're working on are insanely difficult."

"At least tell me you're going to go to a fancy restaurant all dressed up."

"Going to a restaurant in a fancy dress by myself is kinda pathetic, don't you think?"

"What are the kids saying these days?" She asked with a giggle. "Treat yourself!"

"Mom!" I laughed. "Look, I will pick up some cupcakes from Albertsons on my way home."

"No," she said quickly. "I want you to go to a nice bakery and get yourself a whole cake! Splurge and get you an ice cream cake from Baskin Robbins."

"How about I get both?" I teased.

"I'll have Dad send some extra money to pay for them."

"You don't have to do that," I sighed. "I was kidding about the two cakes, Mom."

"Honey, my little girl is living in a big city by herself and doesn't have anyone to celebrate her birthday with. Of course we're sending you money."

"Love you, Mom."

"Love you too, sweetheart. Happy birthday."

"It's your birthday?"

I turned around to see Joe standing in my office doorway.

"It is," I said, slightly clearing my throat.

"Why didn't you say anything?"

"I didn't think it was a big deal," I shrugged.

"Y/N, we've been friends since season 1," Joe sighed as he walked in and sat on the edge of my desk. "How could I not know today was your birthday? You know when mine is."

"It's really not a big deal, Joe. I don't celebrate my birthday."

"Why not?"

"I don't know," I sighed. "I'm an only child and my parents live in Arizona. With my birthday being on a Tuesday, my dad couldn't miss work just so they can take me to dinner. They can't drop everything and drive the five and a half hours."

"You don't go out with friends or. . . or a boyfriend?"

I wasn't sure why he paused before adding "boyfriend", but I shrugged.

"No one knows," I said, suddenly realizing how sad this sounded.

"Well," Joe hesitated, "why don't we all go out tonight?"

"No," I probably said too quickly. "It's really not necessary, Joe. I'm sure everyone wouldn't. . ."

"Wouldn't what?" He chuckled. "Want to go out dancing or to dinner? It would be fun. We could get dinner and I know a club that doesn't sell alcohol so the kids could come without it causing a problem."

"Joe," I cut him off. "We don't need to make a big deal out of this."

"You're my best friend, Y/N. I feel horrible that I've never celebrated it with you. Or even wondered about it. Wow, I'm a shitty friend."

"No, you're not," I said quickly. "You've been an amazing best friend, Joe. When I first moved here, I was scared and alone. You instantly became my friend. You don't realize this, but you saved me."

"How?" He asked with a cheeky smile slowly forming.

"Before I started working on Stranger Things, I was really depressed. I was new to the city. I was alone. And I was about to give up on my dream when you complimented my doodle at Starbucks. You got me the job that saved my career and saved me."

Joe smiled. He opened his mouth to say something but he was called to set. His face dropped but I sent him a reassuring smile.

"You should go," I said, nodding towards set. "They need Steve Harrington, Hawkins Best Babysitter."

"We're not done talking about this," he said trying to sound angry but it came off jokingly. I folded my arms over my chest, unable to calm the raging zoo in my stomach.

"How about this," he said slowly as he turned back toward me, "why don't I take you to a restaurant? We can even get all dressed up. That's what you and your parents would do, right?"

"We'll, us but. . ."

"Then it's settled! I'll pick you up a little before 6 tonight."

"Joe, I appreciate what you're trying to do, but you don't need to go out of your way," I sighed.

I wrapped my arms around myself, slightly starting to feel uncomfortable. Joe has been my best friend since the first day of Stranger Things. A little piece of me couldn't understand why he wanted to be my friend. And now, a bigger piece of me couldn't understand why he wanted to make such a big deal about my birthday.

"Y/N," he said with his smile that I could never say no to. "It's your birthday. We're going to dinner."

                                * * * * *

"I'm so happy you aren't sitting at home," Mom sighed almost dreamily.

As soon as I texted my mom that Joe and I were going to dinner, she called me. She's been talking to me about it the whole time I've been getting ready.

"It's just dinner," I stuttered nervously.

"I've always liked Joe," she giggled. "He's sweet and funny and cute."

"He's just a friend," I cut her off.

"Really?" Mom laughed. "Because with how you talk about him, it doesn't sound like it."

Before I could defend myself in a way that neither my mom nor I believed, there was a knock at the door.

"I gotta go, Mom. Joe's here."

"Yay!" She cheered. "Call me after your date and tell me everything!"

"It's not a date," I mumbled even though she had already hung up. I put my phone in my purse and fixed my dress. I shook off as many of the nerves as I could before answering the door.

"Hey, birthday girl," Joe smiled. "You ready? I found this new Italian restaurant not too far from set."

I smiled, my stomach doing crazy flips as Joe held out his arm for me. I could feel my face burning as I looped my arm through his. I felt like I was shaking as Joe led us down my driveway.

The ride to the restaurant wasn't full of conversation. We sat in a comfortable silence as the radio softly played. Once we parked, I started to open my door but Joe reached across me and closed it.

"What are you doing?" I chuckled.

"It's called chivalry," he smirked.

I laughed and started nervously chewing on my bottom lip as he got out of the car, walked around to my side, and opened the door for me. Before I could get out, he reached his hand out for me to take. I intertwined our hands and he helped me out of the car.

"Chivalry isn't dead," I teased.

We walked into the restaurant, the hostess's face brightening up.

"Oh my gosh!" She giggled.

An older male, who looked like her manager, walked over and cleared his throat. He leaned in and whispered something to her. Her face immediately dropped and she walked away.

"I apologize for that, Mr. Keery," the gentleman sighed. "I told my staff and told them you were coming. They were supposed to be on their best behavior."

"That's alright, Marcus," Joe smiled.

"Let me make sure your table is ready."

As he went into the back, I turned toward Joe. "I thought you said this place was new. Have you been here before?"

"The head chef, Louis, is a friend of my father's," Joe explained. "He just opened the place. I called him to see if we could get a table at short notice and he set everything up. He told me that he'd talk to the staff and make sure none of them made a big deal about us."

"You mean you," I smirked at him.

"I didn't want to have to worry about fans or pictures during your birthday dinner," he said, looking away. I squeezed his arm, making him look back at me.

"That's really sweet of you," I whispered as Marcus walked back.

"Right this way, you two."

                                * * * * *

The waiter had just brought our drinks when Joe broke the silence. "Okay," he sighed. "I have to know. Tonight we have been more awkward than we have been in our entire friendship. If you're really uncomfortable, I can take you home. I didn't mean to drag you here."

"You didn't drag me," I said with a small chuckle. "You convinced me."

"I don't know if that sounds any better," he joked half-heartedly.

"Joe," I said, trying to sound reassuring. "If I hadn't wanted to come, I wouldn't have. It's just. . ."

"What?" Joe asked as he reached over and grabbed my hand.

"I don't know," I stuttered, my voice dropping. "I can't be the only one. . . I mean, am I the only one who feels a little awkward?"

"No," Joe smiled as he readjusted his grip on my hand. "You aren't the only one. My entire drive to pick you up I kept wondering if this was a mistake."

"Really?"

"Really," he said gently. "I have to admit something to you, Y/N."

"Okay," I said softly.

"Ever since we've met, I've had. . . Well, I've been. . . I started to. . ." He looked up at me and suddenly got embarrassed. He let out a small laugh as he reached up and ran his fingers through his hair.

"I may or may not have a tiny or a gigantic crush on you," he admitted. I smiled when he started chewing his bottom lip as he waited for me to respond.

"Well," I said, clearing my throat as I looked down at our intertwined hands. "That's interesting because I may or may not have a tiny or gigantic crush on you too."

I blushed as Joe tried to stop himself from smiling. He opened his mouth to say something, but our waiter brought our entrees. We sent each other shy smiles as we started eating. A few minutes into our pasta, Joe reached across the table and grabbed my hand.

We spent the night talking about work, our families, and our lives before we met. By the end of the night, I felt closer to Joe than ever before. As we left the restaurant, Joe instantly took my hand and we walked to the car.

This time as we drove to my apartment, we continued our conversation. When we got to my apartment, I started to get out of the car but smiled when Joe got out too. I waited for him to open my door. As soon as I was out of the car, Joe grabbed my hand. We walked up to my door in silence.

I was about to unlock my door, but Joe pulled on my hand. The second I was facing him, he leaned in and pressed his lips to mine. I instantly let go of his hands and wrapped my arms around his neck as I kissed him back.

The kiss was gentle yet said so much. The butterflies in my stomach officially turned into a zoo as Joe and I kissed. We broke the kiss when neither one of us could breathe. I leaned back, looking into Joe's eyes as we caught our breaths. For some reason, I had the courage to ask a question I'd never asked a guy before.

"Would you like to come in for a nightcap?"

[thefreakymunson]

Anywhere But Here, Chapter 10

Taglist: @rockautumnviking @hazzaismyreligion @iratetourist @xcatnapsx @haylaansmi @iamaslutforcoffee @tlclick73 @eclipseeetop @lullaapots @benztrip @micheledawn1975 @fuckmeupeds @edsforehead @livasaurasrex @prozacandnicotine @fuckmeupeds @shinydixon @hellfirefiend @anaisweird @spookygally @morganamoonstone @leather-n-velvet @harringtonfan4 A/N: We're getting closer to the end of the fic...how do you think it should end? Open for suggestions even though i know where it's headed! Anywhere But Here Masterlist

“Holy shit,” he said breathlessly as he looked up at you, “You serious?”

“Eddie, we haven’t used protection.” You shrugged, moving to sit beside of him on the couch, “...there’s been three chances...and I’m two days late on my period now.”

“Well take it,” he said, “There’s no sense in waiting, right?”

“Everything I’ve read says to wait a week from a missed period. Things could change...I could start. It could be the stress of everything that’s happened, the stress of the job...it could be anything.” You shrugged.

“Or a baby.”

“Or a baby.” You nodded, “It’s best to wait I think. I damned near had a panic attack buying this one. I don’t want to go through that again. It’s still early and it could give us a false reading either way.”

“Shit,” he breathed heavily as he stood up from the couch.

You watched as he paced back and forth in the small living area, a hand over his mouth as the other hand rested on his hip. You wrapped your arms around yourself as you stared down at the floor, feeling stupid for even telling him, the embarrassment tinging your face.

“You’re mad,” you whispered softly.

“Mad?” He laughed, “No. Shocked? Absolutely.”

“Why shocked?” You shrugged, “You know as well as I do what makes babies.”

“You’re right,” he sighed, “But fuck...I didn’t expect this to happen.”

“I didn’t either,” you frowned, “I’m scared, Eddie.”

“Don’t be scared,” he said as he walked over closer to you, “We’ll figure something out either way, right?”

“I – I don’t expect you to stick around if I am. I’ve got a good job, I’ve got money saved up...I can take care of it on my own, ya know? I’ve got family and I’ve got friends to help. I won’t ask anything of you-”

“Stop,” he said, softly bending down and pressing a kiss to your lips, “You don’t have to go through any of this alone, Y/N. I know it’s scary...there’s a possibility this could go either way, ya know?”

“I’m just saying, if it is – if I am you know, I can raise it on my own. I’m not going to be some menace like Stacy is-”

“Y/N, I wanted Madison as soon as I found out she was pregnant. I wanted to be a dad, but Stacy wouldn’t let me. She was jealous of Madison, I think. Every time I would try to take Madison out to the park with it just being me and Madison, she would start a fight. I couldn’t do anything for my own daughter without catching hell for it for weeks after it.” Eddie frowned, “I could never be a dad to her because Stacy wouldn’t let me. I regret leaving her there every single day. Yeah, it’s terrifying having another life to be responsible for, but...you’re not going to have to be a single parent...just don’t push me away when I try. That’s all I ask.”

You nodded, eyes teary as you looked up at him. His thumb gently brushed away the tear that threatened to fall as he leaned forward and pressed another soft kiss to your lips.

“If you are...you know there’s options.”

“I know,” you whispered.

You felt the tears prick your eyes, but you willed them away. You didn’t want his pity. You would give him an out. While you couldn’t see yourself raising a baby alone, you wouldn’t force this on him. You cleared your throat and started again,

“I don’t want you to think that you have to stay with me if I am pregnant. I’ve got a good job, I can do this on my own.” You quickly glanced over at him, “I mean...given the history, I don’t expect you to want to stay with me or be involved in this in any way possible.”

“Stop,” he said exasperatingly, “How many more times do I have to say you don’t have to do this alone, Y/N?”

“Stacy said she’d take you to court for adultery and custody when she was here earlier,” you frowned, “If I’m pregnant...that’s only further proof that you committed adultery.”

“I don’t care what she does, Y/N. I don’t give a fuck about her anymore. I don’t think I ever truly did. She was just someone who kept me loaded, ya know?” He snorted, “She’s still using. I found the baggie in her purse the other night. She’s just trying to get into your head and play mind games. Y/N, she has nothing anymore. She’s either sold it all or lost it to debt collectors. When I get back, the divorce will be finalized, and this will all be a thing of the past just like her.”

Taking a deep raggedy breath in, you leaned forward and kissed him again as your arms wrapped around his neck, pulling him down against you. You needed something – anything to make this all feel real. You needed him.

You laid flat down on the couch, pulling him down against you. His mouth slotted against yours as you ran your hands under his shirt, fingernails gently scratching his skin. A soft moan escaped his mouth, muffled by your kiss, as your hands wrapped around the back of his head, pulling him down further against you.

“C’mon,” he mumbled, pushing himself back up off the couch. He gripped your hand and pulled you up from the couch, walking backwards towards the back of the RV. You managed to slide the door shut in case Sam was to come back in. Once the door was shut, you turned back to him only to see him stripping his shirt off and tossing it to the side. Your hands quickly rid yourself of your clothes. Once you got to your bra, his hands stopped you and you looked up at him skeptically.

“Don’t,” he said as he bit his bottom lip, “That’s my favorite part.”

A chill ran through your body at the look in his eye as he drank in the sight of you standing in front of him in only your underwear. His lips found yours as his warm hands trailed over your back, heating your chilly skin, down over the plush of your ass, his grip squeezing and pulling you into his touch. The first time in three days, you felt your skin flush against his, his arms around your waist. He rested his forehead against yours, sighing softly as he nuzzled his nose against yours.

“Missed you, princess.” He whispered, tucking a stray strand of hair behind your ear as the two of you swayed to some imaginary song playing, “Missed this.”

“Missed you more,” you mumbled softly, standing on your tip toes to press another kiss to his lips.

He walked you backwards until your legs found the bed and he gently pushed you backwards, both of you giggling as you landed in the middle of the bed. His fingers trailed up over your thighs as he moved closer, your legs parting as you reached for his belt and tugged him down. Soft, slow kisses left over your chest as you arched into him, fingernails digging into heated skin as you felt him grind himself against your clothed cunt.

You were quick to unfasten his belt, sitting up just enough to hurriedly undo his jeans as his lips devoured yours in a rushed kiss.

“Need you,” he panted against your lips as his fingers threaded through your hair, bringing you up into a fully seated position, chests flush together.

He was on his knees in front of you as you shoved his jeans down, your hand immediately wrapping over his hard cock, thumb brushing over his tip as his lips moved feverishly against yours. His moan was needy as his hips thrust into your stroking hand.

“Fuck,” he said softly, throwing his head back as you squeezed a bit tighter, his thumb ghosting over your bottom lip.

A soft whine escaped his mouth when you pulled your hand away from him, bringing his head back straight to watch as you moved to your knees in the center of the bed, head resting on the pillows, your ass tantalizing as you swayed back and forth, teasingly perched in the air. His fingers dipped into the waist band, pulling them down your thighs to your knees. He looked down at you, watching as your hand teased yourself, sliding through your folds as he slowly stroked himself.

“Please, Eds.” You whimpered unashamedly, “Need it.”

He’d never get over the gasp you uttered when he first pressed into you and you’d never get over that familiar slight burning stretch. It was a heady feeling, once that made you push back against him for more. His warm, calloused hand drifted down the middle of your back as he gave you both a second to just enjoy the feeling. Together, reconnected, warmth. Feelings you only associated with him. How fast you came undone underneath him had to be an embarrassing record breaking time, his fingers rubbing quick circles over your clit sent you tumbling over the edge more than three times in the time it took for him to get off.

As you were laying there, looking over at him as he caught his breath, your hand reached over and stroked his cheek, you realized the depths of his words from earlier. He could’ve freaked out, having been through this before and having an awful outcome, but...he didn’t. No matter how many times the words that Stacy said swirled in your brain, he was here proving that she was a liar through and through.

“Thank you,” you said softly.

“For what?”

“For not freaking out,” you whispered, “For not...running, ya know? I mean, I know there’s nowhere to run to, but...it eases my mind a bit to know that if I am...i don’t have to do it alone.”

“Of course you don’t have to,” he said as he kissed the inside of your wrist, “I don’t want you to think I’m going to force you to do all of this alone. It’s scary, I know, but...I’m here, Y/N. No matter what.”

You watched as his eyes got heavier with each swipe of your fingers across his slightly stubble covered cheek.

“Sleep,” you said softly, “I’ll make sure you’re awake in time for the show.”

“Love you,” He said, voice barely above a whisper.

“I know,” you whispered with a soft smile.

-

You were standing just behind the curtain, listening to the crowd chant the bands name for an encore as they always did. Eddie walked off stage with his guitar draped around the back of him, his body covered in a sheen of sweat. He gave it his all, as he always did, but he seemed extra energized tonight. You handed them towels and water bottles as they walked past the curtain, all four panting and exhausted. Just as you were sitting down in one of the chairs, you caught the sight of Gareth and Eddie slipping a bit further back into the dark curtains. They were gone for a few minutes, and when they reemerged, Eddie was wiping his face with the towel, paying extra attention to his nose. He downed half the bottle of water, tossed it onto the table, and then the four of them shared a quick glance.

Off stage, Eddie played the opening chords to one of their heaviest songs – the song everyone came to listen to them play live, and the crowd erupted in cheers and chants. It was a long, drawn out, deep chord as they all walked back out on stage under the blanket of darkness that surrounded the stage.

Eddie was the last to walk out, as usual, and just as he was turning to leave, you gripped his arm and stared up at him in slight disbelief. Did you really just see what you thought you did?

“What?” Eddie looked at you skeptically.

“What was that?” You nodded back to the curtain.

“It’s nothing,” he said, turning to walk away from you.

“Hey!” You shouted, gripping his arm again and forcing him to look at you.

“Let go of me,” Eddie shook his head as he jerked his arm out of your grasp, “I’ve got to get back out.”

You dropped your hand and nodded, taking a deep breath as you watched him play the chord again. The crowd only cheered louder, and you saw the smile on his face widen. He bent down and kissed your forehead quickly before he ran out onstage and the band soared into the last song of the night.

You watched him intently, and even though you couldn’t see a change, something was nagging at your stomach. They had never disappeared like that in that small space of time like that and it just screamed suspicious.

‘It’s just Stacy’s bullshit’ you told yourself, swallowing down the nauseated feeling that accompanied the thought.

-

You were sitting out on the loading dock, watching as the crew loaded up the trucks. You had to make sure everything was accounted for on your checklist and it was the most tedious task of your job. The lights, the risers, the curtains – everything down to the microphone cords had to be accounted for.

“There you are,” Eddie said, seeing you shiver slightly in the cool air.

“Here I am,” you said softly, checking off the last big item – the screen.

“You okay? You kinda weirded me out earlier before the encore.” He nudged you with his shoulder, “What was that about?”

“You weirded me out,” you shot back at him.

“Why? What did I do?”

“Are you using again, Eddie?” You just decided to get it out on the line.

“What are you talking about?”

“The few minutes you and Gareth snuck off, what were you doing?”

“Why does it matter?”

“Because it does, Eddie.” You sighed, “You know where we’re headed tomorrow?”

“Indiana,” he nodded, “My hometown.”

“That doesn’t make you feel guilty?”

“Guilty of what?” He snorted, “What are you getting at, Y/N?”

“Did you and Gareth bump while you were behind the curtains?” You sat the checklist down as you looked up at him.

“Why does it matter?”

“Why can’t you just answer my question?”

“Why are you questioning me?” He laughed in disbelief, “Jesus, what is this, Y/N? Is this a tour or is this NA?”

“It’s both if it’s needed,” you glared at him, “You told me about your past habits. That’s concerning, Eddie.”

“I’m just trying to have a little fun,” Eddie shrugged, “It’s not like I’m an addict anymore. I just need help energy wise sometimes.”

“Well if having sex before a show zaps your energy that bad, then we’ll just refrain from now.” You shrugged, “I’d rather wait to fuck you than to see you use and get addicted all over again.”

“Jesus, Y/N.” Eddie snorted, “You worry too much. It’s not a big deal.”

“It is a big deal, Eddie. You have a two day home stay to see your kid and your family. Maybe going home high isn’t the best idea.”

“I’m not high,” he shrugged, “I’m fine, Y/N. I just needed a little hit. That’s it.”

“Needed?”

“You know what I mean,” he sighed, “Why are you freaking out over this?”

‘He’s going to get you addicted to the same thing he’s on. He’s going to use you and leave you a single parent in this fucked up world.’ Stacy’s words screamed at you as you stared at him hopelessly.

“Because I love you and I worry over you.” You said calmly, “That’s all.”

“Then love me enough to realize that I’m fine.” He said, brushing your hair back, “It gave me a bit of a rush to get through the last song and that’s all I needed.”

He pressed a kiss to your lips as he stood in between your legs, nose bumping against yours. You wanted to believe him. You wanted to trust and believe every word he said, but that nagging feeling was back in the pit of your stomach.

“I love you,” you said softly, “I don’t want anything to happen to you.”

“I swear to you,” he said, “I’m not going anywhere.”

[mariaofdoranelle]

Empty Nested

Rowaelin Month day 9: Single Parent AU

Long story short, life happened and I won’t be able to keep up with my original plan of posting for every prompt. However, I managed to finish this WIP and here it is! It’s 11:48 pm where I live so I guess it still counts as day 9 lol I hope you like it!!

Warnings: language, NSFW

Word count: 3,1k

Edit: This fic ended up becoming a whole thing so here’s a masterlist

~~~~~占~~~ _/||\°/||\。.:*・

To-do list

Read gardening book

Improve garden

Master’s degree pros and cons list

Find out which liquor bottles Maisie drank in secret and watered down

Enroll in Old Language classes

Rowan sighed. He was sat on his porch, trying to figure out what to do on the third weekend without Maisie driving him insane. His life’s purpose revolved around his only daughter for the last eighteen years, and now that he just dropped her off at college, he felt lonely. Mostly bored.

Coming home to an empty house felt hollow enough, the real tears about her moving only came when he arrived and saw her bike sitting on the porch. Three weeks later, he hadn’t moved it. Instead, he was gazing at it as he scrambled his mind for something to do.

Some movement on the street caught his attention, and Rowan noticed two men in an uniform carrying a massive piano inside Aelin Galathynius’s house. As tamed as he was, it was impossible not to notice how beautifully her golden hair shined below the midday sun, or how little that pale blue dress did to hide the curves underneath. Something like that would drive Rowan insane when she first moved into their street, but now he was a lot more used to his drop dead gorgeous neighbor. When Rowan realized what he was doing, he focused his gaze on her garden’s Kingsflower and swallowed. That woman raised Maisie’s best friend. She deserved more than a creepy old neighbor.

“Need any help?” Rowan asked as he got closer to the home.

Aelin turned around and smiled brightly at him. “Not really, but come on in!” And gestured for him to come inside. Good. If she gave Rowan a task to do, it meant he had one less thing to add to his to-do list.

He and Aelin were in that weird parent limbo where they’re not exactly friends, but they’ve been chatting here and there for years because their kids are close.

“How’s Finn?” he asked after the piano matter was settled, while she made coffee for them.

She sighed affectionately. “He’s in love with college and everything is amazing, you know how the freshman year goes. It’s so cute. And he’s there with his girlfriend, so he’s loving it.”

“Yeah, same for Maisie.” He chuckled. “Except for the relationship part. She’s merciless with her girls.”

“And you have no idea where she got that from?” Aelin teased.

His eyes went wide. “I really don’t. I spent years telling her to avoid the ladies’ man type, but apparently she misunderstood the lessons and ended up becoming one.”

Aelin cackled, but sighed again after. “God, I really miss those troublemakers.”

He sent her a watery smile. “Me too. I’ve been trying to get busy, but apparently that’s not a problem for you?”

“I used to play it everyday before Finn was born.”

Rowan looked between Aelin and her new piano, astounded. “You knew how to play that beast at sixteen?”

Grinning, she nodded. “I even used to teach it for extra money before having a full-time job.”

He just blinked, amazed. “Sometimes I forget not every teenager is a dipshit. I have absolutely no useful hobbies to revive.” In fact, Maisie was who made him learn real responsibility. Caring for a newborn in college without the mother was no joke.

“I’m sure this isn’t the case.”

With a raised eyebrow, he challenged, “Unless you call partying a hobby.”

Aelin went still, her eyes wide. “I have a boat party later today, you should come!”

“What?” he screeched.

“Come on!”

Rowan blinked, thinking hard on it. “I’m not sure.” He never left the house on the weekends because, as independent as Maisie tried to be, she always got in trouble at parties, so Rowan liked to be available for her.

“It’s my friend’s birthday, it’ll be fun.”

Well, as alarming as the thought was, Rowan couldn’t be physically there for his little girl. And he didn’t need to think about the to-do list if he wasn’t at home. Reluctantly, he finally answered, “Okay. You sure your friend won’t mind?”

Aelin grinned wickedly. “When you meet Fenrys, you’ll be sure of it.”

~~

Rowan endured two chapters of his new gardening book before readying himself early for the party. When it was finally time, to reach Aelin, he crossed the street to find his neighbor wearing gentle waves on her hair and a pleased grin.

She was wearing a golden, metallic dress that was... flattering. Maybe way too flattering. It had a V-neckline that made Rowan’s eyes go too south before he snapped it back up, flushing, to meet Aelin’s smirking face.

Rowan’s mouth opened and closed while he scrambled his mind for something respectful to say that would do her justice, but his flustered face seemed to be response enough by her ever-growing grin.

“We should catch an uber. I’m making us drink tonight,” she said, putting him out of his misery.

Rowan cleared his throat and nodded. “Let me.” He gave his phone to Aelin so she could type which part of the Florine River they were supposed to be at, and the ride ended up being pretty uneventful.

When Aelin invited him, Rowan was expecting a small get together at the marina. However, he found himself inside a tri-deck yatch with a DJ and a infinity pool.

Fenrys, just like Aelin predicted, didn’t mind his unadvised presence in the slightest. There was absolutely no way a singular, regular person knew all this people, but Aelin didn’t seem surprised by how packed the place was. She just greeted everyone she knew and introduced Rowan as they beelined to the nearest bar. In the meanwhile, he tried not to notice the amused glances Aelin’s friends darted between the two of them.

The bar was a little crowded, but Rowan managed to get some whiskey while she intently watched the preparation of her dessert cocktail.

“We should hit the dancefloor.”

Rowan’s body froze. “I can’t dance.”

Grinning, she answered, “Good. I can’t either.”

For the first time in years, Rowan was led to a small crowd under strobe lights. Aelin looked like a living flame with that dress, but she didn’t seem to realize it, carelessly dancing whichever pop music was playing. He tried not to embarrass himself by doing some sort of manly dance, but she wouldn’t have it.

His heartbeat picked up when Aelin put two hands on his chest and leaned closer to his face, but she just neared his ear and said, “Come on! You can do better than a straight guy dance.”

Rowan laughed brightly at this, little did she know he was just trying to not embarrass himself. He took Aelin’s arm and twirled her just before allowing his limbs to do their own thing, accompanying his dance partner’s uncoordinated moves, just letting loose on the dancefloor. And it felt good. Freeing. Their dancing must’ve looked borderline quirky from anyone looking from the outside, but he felt lighter than ever.

Feeling a little bold, he placed both hands on her hips, still swaying together. After a few minutes, she led him to the bar again, holding hands.

After sipping on the same drinks again, he mentioned to ask Aelin what she wanted to do, but her eyes were already on him. She led him out of the crowded part, and then trapped Rowan against the glass wall with her two hands. The only signs of her desire were her quick breaths and hypnotizing parted lips, so Rowan put his years-long self-control aside and placed a unsteady hand on Aelin’s nape, his thumb running her neck up and down.

He didn’t know who initiated it, but what started tentative soon became an open-mouthed, fervent kiss. Every inch of Aelin’s front was pressed against his, and she didn’t seem to mind Rowan’s greedy hands on her sides by the way she yanked his hair, leading his mouth to her neck.

Swapping places, he pressed Aelin against the wall. “Tell me you didn’t put that golden dress on purpose,” Rowan hissed on her ear, in charge of her body.

“I can’t,” she smirked.

Rowan kissed her again. Picking Aelin up, he sneaked his hands a bit under her dress, hoping his eager grip wouldn’t bruise her. In response, she pressed herself against him, her ridden-up dress allowing the friction between his bulge and her underwear’s the flimsy fabric. She was going to be the death of him.

“You’re such a cocktease.” Rowan didn’t mean to say this out loud, but he was too immersed in her to chastise himself. However, Aelin’s whole body shivered, and she arched her hips against this. Just as greedy, he decided to continue, “And you love it, don’t you? I bet you’re loving to make my blood boil right now.” She moaned, and Rowan moved one hand that was already under her dress to run his thumb against her wet underwear. He could feel Aelin’s knees buckling on his side, but he stilled. It had been a while since he’d been with a woman, and at least a decade since doing it at a part. And it wasn’t just a woman, it was Aelin. Perhaps he was going too fast and—

“Please,” Aelin’s soft whimper snapped him out of his thoughts.

Well, it was hard to deny her anything with those bewitching little whimpers and flushed cheeks. Their position made it hard for anyone to notice Rowan’s hand under her dress, so he sneaked his thumb under the lacy fabric and started massaging Aelin’s clit. She cried out when he first applied pressure, but Rowan started kissing her to swallow her moans, and they soon settled into a rhythm.

For all the restrained movements he had by using one arm to carry Aelin and the other hand pleasure her, she made up by touching him everywhere. Rowan felt sly hands running across his chest, back, redirecting his face from Aelin’s mouth to her neck, making his desire grow each touch.

She gripped his shirt with impressive strength when her body went still around him, then she relaxed completely on his arms. Rowan pressed their foreheads together, both of them panting when he felt a bit smug by noticing her trademark lavender smell was now mixed with sweat.

“You alright?” he asked.

His answer was a lazy, blissful smile. “Perfect. We might need a napkin to your face, though.” Rowan leaned a little to the side to see his reflection on the glass wall and, yes, his face was smudged with Aelin’s lipstick. A lot.

After getting down from his embrace and making sure her legs were firm enough to walk in high heels again, they decided to look for anything able to clean his face—napkin, tissue, toilet paper—they couldn’t afford to be picky.

The birthday boy, was Henrys his name? was filming the whole party, and soon the blinding flashlight from his phone landed on them.

“Say cheese!” he screamed, way too cheerful to be sober.

A dark-haired version of Henrys yanked him away. “I’m cutting off your booze.” Then he turned his head towards everyone in the room and quickly yelled, “Sorry!”

Aelin chuckled, and they soon found an empty bathroom with tissues. She mentioned for him to seat on top of the toilet’s closed lid while grabbing what she needed, but then stopped.

“You know?” she started with a sultry voice, “I kinda like that look on you. And I like that I was the one to kiss you all over.”

“You like your men looking like the Joker?” Rowan teased.

She giggled, losing the seductress act for a minute. Aelin sat on his lap, rubbing a wet tissue against his neck. He instantly held her hips and pulled her closer, baring her thighs on the way. Aelin took it as a cue and started rubbing herself against his bulge, and in this position Rowan was free to cup her breasts. One hand was gripping her hair, helping him lead the kiss, and the other holding Aelin’s breast as his thumb flicked a nipple through the dress. They were in a frenzy, giving and taking pleasure however they could, when Rowan heard a hissing sound. Aelin unzipping her dress.

Deciding to gently stop her, he managed to cup her hand somewhere between her hand and her hips.

Breaking the kiss, Aelin leaned away from him a little. “Did I do something wrong?”

Why in hell would she think that? Putting a strand of golden hair behind her ear, he whispered, “Of course not.”

She arched an eyebrow. “So...”

Even if he was turned on like he haven’t been in years, it didn’t feel right. 18-year-old Rowan wouldn’t think twice before fucking a long-time crush in a party bathroom. 38-year-old Rowan? Not so much. Not only because he wanted to do right by Aelin, but also because adulthood back pains were no joke. Even with daily exercises, the only counter he allowed himself to bend over was his own, to cook dinner.

“I have better plans,” he said in a playful voice, trying to not upset her.

Aelin crossed her arms. “I highly doubt that.”

“We go back to the party and finish the night with our clothes on—“

“How is that better?”

He chuckled and kissed her adorable pout. “Then I’ll show up in your porch tomorrow and ask you on a date, and I’m pretty sure you’ll say yes because I’ll bribe you with chocolate. After I buy you dinner, if you feel like it, I’ll take you somewhere and ravish you whole until the morning because we have no kids to gross out with our love lives”

Aelin wrapped both arms around Rowan’s neck, sending him a sly smile. “I really like your plans…” He raised an eyebrow, knowing she wasn’t finished. “But the ravishing me whole part only appears once, and at the end.”

Grinning at her, he teased, “So you want the old man, but not the old-fashioned manners?”

That was enough to make her crack up. “You’re four years older! There’s barely an age gap.”

“Aelin, you have a TikTok account.”

“And?” she cried out.

“You’re young.”

She cackled and got herself up, pulling him too. “Come on, old man, I’m hungry.”

There wasn’t a proper table, but they managed to find a seat near the catering and snatch some food. Aelin was sat on his lap, eagerly eating some pan-fried trout he convinced her to try after a lot of pouting and grimacing. Before she could force him to eat chocolate, Rowan’s phone pinged once. And again. When he saw it was Maisie, he unlocked the phone and briefly apologized to Aelin—who didn’t seem to mind in the slightest, too focused on her fish.

Mais: DAD

His daughter sent him a picture of him walking side by side with Aelin, one hand on her waist. It was a little blurred, probably a screenshot from a video, but it was clear Rowan’s face and neck had some smudged lipstick on, his eyes were sparkling, and he just now noticed that he hadn’t felt lighthearted like this in a long while. Still, his kid’s reaction made him a bit uneasy. He had always put Maisie before any romantic interest without a second thought, and he didn’t want to change it just because she wasn’t at home.

Rowan: How in hell did you get this

Mais: Finn saw on Instagram and sent to me

Mais: We made sibling vows by text and everything

He zoomed in on the top of the picture, and it seemed like some fmoonbeam person has posted it.

Rowan: Do you think it’s weird?

Mais: NO!!

Mais: I mean I’m completely horrified

Mais: But in a good way

Mais: I’m happily retreating from the competition

Rowan: ??

Mais: Dad she’s a MILF

That was more than enough to make him flush. Aelin looked confused, and when he showed her the text thread, she cackled.

“Sounds like we have our kid’s permission,” she pointed out.

He beamed at that. For eighteen years, Rowan struggled with finding someone who he liked and Maisie might like, besides living the anxiety of trying to not catch feelings before he had it figured out. And long after Rowan gave up on dating, his neighbor swept him off his feet and checked all boxes in one night. And he was so relaxed tonight he didn’t even overanalyze every sentence she said to figure out if she’d be a good stepmom.

Rowan texted a quick Night, Mais. Behave. and turned his attention back to Aelin. Her smile was intoxicating, he noted as he grinned back, and it made him want to get closer and live immersed in it for days on end.

But then she straightened her posture and looked him in the face. “So...”

“So?”

“I just want you to clarify something for me, so I can know what to expect.” Aelin started fiddling with her fingers. “We’ve known each other for years, and this happened just now...” Rowan tilted his head, not getting where she was going, and she ran a frustrated hand through her head. “I just want to know if this is a thing thing or if we’re just getting together because we’re empty nested and bored.

Giving her a loose hug around the waist, he smiled and said, “No, definitely a thing thing to me.”

Sighing in relief, all of her features relaxed as she explained herself. “Good. I was just asking because,” Aelin bit her lip. “Finn’s a shy kid, so going for his best friend’s dad was a risky move, but I definitely… noticed you.”

Grinning like Hellas, Rowan scooted her closer and whispered on her ear, “Oh, I’ve noticed you too.”

“Yeah?” she breathed.

“Sure. You think I’ve never noticed your tiny little weekend sundresses, Aelin?” he said while brushing his thumb against her bottom lip. “You don’t think I notice the tight pencil skirts you go to work with?”

“So you’ve noticed me too?” she asked.

“Very much.”

“Wanna notice me in the bathroom again?”

Rowan cackled, breaking the spell. “I told you I’d notice you after asking you out and buying dinner, I never said we can’t do it all in one day.”

Humming, she bit her lip to stifle a smile. “Tomorrow?”

“If you accept my official wooing then, Milady.”

Aelin rolled her eyes in mock annoyance, but the grin she wore was fooling no one. She got up and pulled Rowan by the arm, and he didn’t fight it when she led him to the dancefloor again.

TAG LIST

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[dancingazaleas]

eren yeager | best friend’s brother (smut)

ok i’m sure this is kind of surprising since i don’t really speak of eren

also no i don’t want to talk about how this is based off of victorious

warnings/notes: cursing, mikasa and eren are brother and sister, drummer!eren, modern au, secret relationship, everyone is 19, nsfw, eventual smut, slight dubcon, slight vouyerism, spanking, clit slapping, degradation, slight praise, choking, tummy bulge, edging, overstimulation, breeding kink, minors dni with this post pls, tell me if i missed anything

you know exactly who’s all going to be home whenever you call mikasa. but you still ask, like you always have, in order to lessen suspicion.

“it’s just me, eren, and zeke. i think zeke has pieck over tonight,” she sighs in slight annoyance, “wanna watch a movie when you come over?”

you tell her yes just as you turn on mikasa’s street. you both hang up with a goodbye, and you feel excitement bubbling in your gut as your car drives you closer and closer to eren. you practically jump out of your car whenever it’s parked on the curb of mikasa’s house.

you squeal while skipping up to the front door, punching in the numbers on the keypad lock without looking. you shut the door quietly after you enter the home, taking in the multiple smells from all three siblings living in the house.

you’ve got to hand it to zeke, he’s got amazing taste. whenever grisha and his mother died, he inherited a lot of money from them and decided to buy himself a home. however, it changed when he found out eren’s mother died and that eren and their adoptive sister, mikasa, would be going into foster care. and with zeke being 19, a legal adult, he managed to fit the roll as a guardian for the two of them. they’ve all lived together for a couple of years now, and you’ve come to enjoy the dynamic between them all whenever you’re staying there for a while.

“oh hey, (name). when’d you get here,” zeke asks whenever you walk into the kitchen, he’s probably getting himself those finger sandwiches he buys himself.

“just now. mikasa in her room,” you stretch and peek over zeke’s shoulder to see what the fridge contains.

“should be. can you get out of my fridge,” he nudges you back with his elbow, which you ignore.

“do you have any baby belle cheese,” you shove him aside with your hip.

“yeah, we do,” you turn to look over your shoulder to see eren walking into the kitchen.

you have to stop yourself from running into his arms, instead starting to rummage through the drawers of the big refrigerator. zeke leaves the kitchen, but you only know that because eren’s front his pressing against your back and warm arms wrap around your waist and his head head rests on your shoulder to whisper in your ear.

“didn’t tell me you were coming over tonight,” he mocks disappointment while you take a baby bell cheese.

“wanted it to be a surprise,” you smile, stepping away from the fridge and opening the packaging of the cheese. eren still clings to you.

“it was a nice surprise,” he kisses at the back of your ear while he squeezes you tight.

you turn your head to look at eren, puckering your lips for a sweet kiss.

eren, not being able to say no to you, obliges and gives you a sweet and lingering kiss on your lips. he pouts whenever you pull away and plop the cheese in your mouth, moving away from him to throw away the wrappings.

“ask mikasa to watch a movie with me,” he requests—more like demands.

“sure,” you nod, “i’ll see you in a few minutes.”

you trudge out of the kitchen and up the stairs, barging into mikasa’s dark room. you watch her jump in her bed, obviously frightened with the abrupt entrance.

“hi hi,” you chant while closing the door behind you, jumping onto her bed next to her.

“you scared me.”

“i know,” you roll your eyes, “wanna watch a movie downstairs?”

“depends... what movie?”

you hum, “maybe the addams family, something like that.”

“yeah, if it’s the addams family then i’ll watch,” she says, scrolling through instagram.

“wanna see if eren will watch,” she asks you while she likes a post by sasha on her phone. the picture was of her, jean, and connie.

“sure, i’ll text him,” you pull out your phone, immediately pulling up eren’s contact and messaging him.

luckily, you’re able to hide the lovey dovey messages sent from eren. you text that mikasa does want to watch a movie and to be downstairs in three minutes.

“he said yea,” eren hadn’t even replied yet.

mikasa and you get off of her bed, making your way down the hallway and down the stairs while talking.

“popcorn?”

“yea, sounds so good right now,” you sigh happily, “we gonna cuddle?”

mikasa snickers at your question, “of course.”

you laugh a little before pushing her in the direction of the kitchen, settling yourself down in the middle on the long sofa. you pull up the addams family on the tv, smiling gently whenever eren comes in the room with his phone in his hands.

“sit at my feet, i’m cuddling with mikasa,” he scoffs at the claim, but puts your legs in his lap.

mikasa comes back into the room with a bowl of popcorn in her hand and some sodas in her hands. she manages to flip the light switch off in the living room while on her way to put everything on the coffee table in front of you. mikasa sits down when you lift your head, welcoming the weight of your head coming down her clothed thighs.

before you start the movie, mikasa asks eren, “do you have rehearsal tomorrow?”

“yeah. jean and annie’ll be here at like 11,” he sighs in slight frustration just as you start the movie.

“sucks for you,” you snort absentmindedly, pulling the bowl of popcorn into your body on top of your stomach.

eren flicks your leg with his fingers while mikasa ignores the both of you and continues to watch the movie.

during the movie, you notice a text from eren that asks you to stay with him after his rehearsal tomorrow, claiming that mikasa and zeke should be out of the house.

you turn off your phone with a giddy smile. you have a good feeling about tomorrow.

————

you’re laying in eren’s bed while he practices his drumming with his band in a few rooms over. you text mikasa the whole time, who’s telling you about some drama between zeke and her cousin, levi. well, it’s not really drama, levi and zeke just have a love-hate friendship. it makes you laugh, especially since the usually cocky and narcissistic man known as zeke was usually getting his ass chewed out by levi.

“i’m so horny,” eren groans while he walks into the room. menace.

you roll your eyes at him, continuing to text mikasa. eren’s pouting as he flops down next to you, face pressing against your neck.

“didn’t you just get out rehearsal? how do you have energy after drumming for an hour and a half,” you ignore the nipping of eren.

“‘dunno,” he sighs against your skin, sending chills up and down your spine.

you shut off your phone, throwing it to the side and pulling eren from your neck. you kiss him, to which he reciprocates happily, while he goes to straddle your waist.

his hands are already groping at your chest and his breath is already heavy against your mouth.

you pull away, “have you been horny since the beginning of rehearsal??”

he grumbles out a yes while he bites and sucks at your neck. your laughter is interrupted by a gasp when eren bites particularly hard on your neck. his hands creep up under your shirt, only to find a surprise.

“you’re not wearing a bra,” he asks, pushing the shirt up over your boobs.

“didn’t feel the need to,” you mumble with embarrassment as eren’s eyes stare at your chest.

without a second thought, his lips are attached to one tit, sucking hickies onto the skin around your areola. you whimper when he punches and twists a nipple with his fingers, chest slightly bucking up and burying his face further into your tits. eren feels like he’s in heaven.

when eren pulls away, he takes a moment to admire your tits. bruised and abused, glistening with his saliva under the lights in his room.

“pretty,” he mumbles, finally pushing your shirt entirely off of your body.

you wiggle your hips as a signal that eren takes. he’s ridding himself of his shirt and pants before he takes off your own pants. his fingers just barely swipe across the outsides of your thighs, giving you goosebumps.

eren’s spreading your legs apart, staring at the wet stain on your panties. you try to push your hips in his face, but eren swings his left arm around your hips to hold them down. his right hand is teasingly stroking your clit through the thin fabric of your underwear. each swipe of his thumb has your whole body tensing, something that has him smirking.

“please,” you bite your lip while you stare into his eyes.

instead of indulging in your desires, he’s pulling his body away from the spot between your legs. only to take off your underwear, and then settle between your legs again.

“you’re all wet and i’ve barely done anything,” he comments, running a fingertip against your slit.

you whimper whenever eren shoves two of his fingers inside of you unexpectedly. he doesn’t give you time to adjust to his fingers, immediately setting himself a tempo as he fucks you with his fingers.

moaning and acting without thinking, your hand tugs at his long hair. he almost immediately pulls his fingers outside of you, fingertips slapping at your needy clit. your hips buck while you apologize.

“pull my hair like that again and you won’t get to cum,” he resumes his finger fucking, slightly smiling at how your hands immediately go to grip at the sheets now. he’s trained you so well.

“do you hear that,” he snickers while curling his finger, squelch sounds following after.

“cumming! cumming,” you pant a few moments later, eyes squeezing shut.

eren immediately pulls his fingers out of you, resulting in a cry from you. he laughs sadistically as he repeats the process over and over and over again, so much that you’ve lost count, tears now running down your cheeks. he lets you come this time, admiring the blissed out look on your face as you moan wantonly.

but his hand moves to your clit now, listening to your pleading that you’re too sensitive.

“shut up and take it,” he stops his maneuvers on your clit to slap your clit again.

you yelp and buck your hips, starting to open your mouth to plead until he starts rubbing your clit again. you orgasm quickly, back arching against eren’s mattress.

“eren,” you whimper, legs shaking while eren pulls his hand away.

“what do you want, pretty girl,” he sits on his knees, looking down at your crying face.

“more,” you sniffle, small hand reaching out for him.

“more of what,” he raises a taunting eyebrow, catching your wrist in his hand, “c’mon, use your words, you’re a big girl.”

“you... more of you.”

“that’s not an answer,” he reaches down to wipe away a tear.

“want you inside me,” you pout and wiggle your hips again.

“you want it or need it?” he smirks while tilting his head.

you whine, “need it. need you here, ‘ren.”

you guide his hand to your tummy while you speak and eren feels his cock throb in his boxers.

“fuck,” he groans, roughly flipping you over to lay on your stomach.

you yelp, reaching out to hold onto the pillow your head was just laying on. he’s forcing you to arch your back, and the way he forces you to do it is almost unrealistic. he’s tossing his boxers across the room for him to search for later, reaching down to pump his cock in his hand.

his hands lay heavy on your ass, spreading your plump cheeks apart to get a better view.

your cheek squishes against the pillow as you stare at him over your shoulder, needy pout on your face. he chuckles at your eyes closing whenever he finally shoves his huge cock inside of you.

“so big,” you sob, “so big, ren.”

he ignores you, pulling him cock out of you until the tip before slamming his hips against your ass. you yelp as soon as eren starts to thrust in and out of you ruthlessly. so hard that you’re sure you’ll have bruises on the back of your thighs for a few days.

however, his hips still whenever he hears the front door of the house creaking open and a voice calling out.

“eren! i’m home,” mikasa calls out while she shuts the door behind her.

you reach your hand back to shove eren off of you, not wanting to risk the chance of mikasa even hearing you. eren grabs your wrist with one hand while the other slaps your asscheek harshly.

“okay, i’m about to take a nap,” he replies to mikasa, knowing full well she’s already making her way up the stairs.

“okay,” she replies, going into her room. her room that’s right next to eren’s.

“eren,” you whisper, “she’s gonna hear.”

“don’t act so innocent,” he growls, “i bet you want mikasa to hear. to hear just how you’re getting fucked like the slut you are.”

you whimper, “no... no.”

“want her to hear how good you’re feeling,” eren smiles sadistically as you turn your head to bury your face in the pillow.

he hears your whining faintly whenever he starts to thrust his hips again. your moans are being muffled by his pillow, and even so, you’re sure that mikasa knows what’s going on by the sound of eren’s skin slapping against your own.

he puts his hands onto your shoulders, leaning his weight onto you as he speeds up his thrusts. you’re almost screaming in his pillow now, nails clawing at the sheets under you.

“gonna come,” he groans breathily, “you gonna come when mikasa’s in the next room over?”

he watches you nod your head, which makes him bite his lips while releasing a groan.

he whispers in your ear, spitting out a command for you, “go ahead. go ahead and cum like the slut you are. give mikasa a show.”

you moan loudly into his pillow, pussy fluttering around his fat cock as you orgasm.

he fucks you through it, not slowing down his fast and vigorous thrusting.

“hurts,” you cry.

“don’t care,” he says, reaching a hand around your body to grip onto your neck.

he’s pulling you up with him, back flushed against his front as he thrusts wildly. you look like a mess, saliva dripping down your chin along with your tears, eyes glossed over.

your hand touches against your tummy gently, whimpering at the feeling of the bulge that is eren.

“feel you,” you mewl quietly, “feel you here, ‘rennie.”

he presses the hand not wrapped around your neck against your tummy, groaning out. his thrusts speed up at full speed, something he does not do often, but eren’s eager to fuck his seed inside of you.

“gonna cum, gonna fuck my kids into your slutty pussy,” he grumbles, slapping a hand over your mouth whenever it opens to moan.

“you want that, huh? w-want me to fuck a kid into you? maybe then mikasa’ll get the hint,” his voice is shaky when he feels you tighten around him.

he snickers, “fuckin’ slut. tightening around me whenever i spew that shit. you want her to hear you being fucked stupid, huh?”

you shake your head while you shut your eyes again. another orgasm is approaching, and you’re not sure that you can handle holding it in.

eren notices and decides to take pity on you.

“go ahead, cum,” and you do. you gush all over his cock and sheets, hands scratching at his wrist as you scream into the palm of his hand.

“fuck,” he hisses whenever he feels his balls tighten.

he comes not too long after you, finally slowing his pace down to a grind. he lets you drop onto the bed on your tummy, spreading your legs open to admire how his cum leaks out of you.

you’re absolutely sure that mikasa heard, but you’re too fucked out to care. she’ll confront you if she knows, and that’s when you’ll worry.

but then again, your best friend’s brother is irresistible.