#and then I'm hit with this really vivid memory of. at their funeral I had a small bouquet and one of the leaves fell off.

[jorvikzelda]

see I like to say I don't believe in ghosts. BUT. Maybe I do a little, sometimes

[rcsplendent]

othello  can  feel  his  left  eye  twitch  involuntarily  at  her  comment  about  lichtenstein's  prosperity,  his  alcohol-addled  brain  working  overtime  to  figure  out  if  the  words  were  supposed  to  be  as  pointed  as  they  felt  (  and  failing  miserably,  in  the  end  ). she's  too  quick,  though  —  brushing  past  it before  it  can  even  really  register  in  his  brain,  and  he  snaps  back  into  the  present  just  as  she  utters  i'm  sorry  for  your  loss.  he  offers  a  tight-lipped  smile  at  that,  all  he's  able  to  truly  offer  at  this  point  —  he's  heard  that  same  phrase  probably  one-thousand  times  by  now,  and  he's  long  run  out  of  options  for  responses.      ❝  a  contract?  ❞  he  asks,  a  little  dumbly,  but  also  out  of  mild  incredulity. he  can't  really  believe  his  luck  at  this  point  —  his  first  attempt  at  an  alliance  is  already  coming  to  fruition,  and  it's  not  even  like  he's  put  in  that  much  effort  so  far.  in  fact,  he  more  so  feels  like  he's  hanging  on  to  her  words  for  dear  life,  nodding  his  way  through  the  conversation  while  she  talks  shop,  the  terms  and  conditions  of  this  contract  flying  high  over  his  head.  ❝  yes,  yes,  that's  —  that's  true.  the  agricultural  sector  was  hit  the  hardest.  ❞  he  grimaces  slightly  at  the  visual  memories  that  flash  behind  his  eyelids  —  bodies sprawled  out  amongst  hay  bales;  rows  and  rows  of  funeral  pyres, an  attempt  to  burn  away  the  sickness;  a  mother  of  five  children  on  their  deathbeds  clawing  at  his  arm  as  he  passed  by  with  his  advisors,  begging  him  to  help;  she'd  mentioned  their  names,  why  can't  he  remember  their  names?  — he  blinks  the  all-too-vivid  images  away,  his  thin  face  paling.  he  doesn't  notice  how  his  hand  has  curled  a  little  tighter  around  her  wrist,  anxious  and  scared  of  the  images  his  brain  had  produced  —  an  eidetic  memory  is  only  a  blessing  so  long  as  the  memories  are  pleasant.  

❝  yes,  that  sounds  agreeable,  ❞  he  mutters,  still  in  a  daze.  he  hadn't  even  heard  the  final  terms.  he  vaguely  recalls  hearing  seventy  percent,  but  in  reference  to  what  exactly,  he  couldn't  say.  he  swallows  hard,  lifting  his  sorrowful  eyes  to  meet  hers  and  offering  his  best,  pitiful  attempt  at  a  smile. ❝  i  —  i  will  have  my  advisors  draw  up  a  written  agreement.  i  suppose  i  should,  erm,  meet  with  your  betrothed,  as  well ... to  finalize  things ... ❞   he  trails  off,  mind  elsewhere  —  the  charm  he'd  managed  to  muster  up  draining  out  of  him.  he  clears  his  throat,  giving  his  head  an  insistent  little  shake  as  if  it'll  reset  something  inside  his  skull,  trying  to  drag  his  own  brain  out  of  the  mud  of  his  own  memories.   ❝  thank  you,  milady,  for  your  generosity.  i ... i  truly  appreciate  it. as will the people of bavaria. ❞

Gentleman or lady, royalty or nobility... Araminta has always flourished in arenas like this. The act of sifting through ledgers with a privy council? Tiresome. The idea of dazzling with her physicality, to inspire fealty? Mundane. But the game of social strategy, of moves and countermoves? Now that, is an exhilarating feat. One that her, if not elevated, but newfound position as future Duchess affords her. The Princess tilts her head, watching the nervous twitch in the Lord's expression. It is likely that the illness that befell Bavaria still leaves him worse for wear. Taking pity on the man, she beams at the perfunctory words. "Thank you, my Lord. It is a most joyous time. Work to be done, to be sure. But Liechtenstein is healthy and prosperous." A backhanded dig, handed with a smile. Because what is Bavaria, if not ailing and impoverished?

"Yes, the news reached English shores. I am..." she inhales, a mark of true humanity amidst their sacred dance. "I am sorry for your loss." She does not know a loss as rapid and brutal as the Lord Hassinger's. But she knows the loss of her father, too young to pass and too mighty to be considered mortal. And so she knows, that Othello is but a shell of a Duke. His propriety encapsulated in appearance only. But within? He is sure to be in tattered pieces. "Please, do not fret." Araminta excuses, offering a gentle squeeze to his wrist. "It is a most difficult thing, for a Duchy to mourn a terrible loss." An emphatic smile, and a ginger twist of her head. "Then allow me to do the honorable thing, and extend a neighborly contract your way." Keeping their arms intertwined, Araminta begins to lead away from the post and on a glacial pace about the room. "I assume a fair amount of land is unattended to, after the plague?" Araminta asks, knowing the answer with eachstep. "It would be a costly endeavor to re-sew those farms, and maintain it with less manpower at your disposal." She tees up, as if in thought. "Why don't you allow us to lease the land? Our coiffers can fund its renewal, and you enhance your supply of grain and livestock. Of course," she cants her head. "It would be an expensive endeavor... I should think seventy percent of the profits, and a three year easement on rent would be fair. Don't you?"

[memes-saved-me]

You and I, we come from the same star

Reincarnation soulmate AU, where as one of them dies they get the memories of their past lives together.

Except its meant to comfort the still living half until their death soon after, its meant for old age and times of life threatening situations not two teenagers who never got to even realise what they were. 

TW: Death, mentioned abuse, heavy angst

~~~

Soulmates never made sense to Steve until he watched Billy's body hit the floor of the Starcourt Mall and his mind filled with images he didn't know the origin of. Memories of him lying next to Billy in a room he didn't recorgnise, his smile on a beach, his smile in the woods and all these places he'd never been but it was this sudden feeling that almost knocked him off his feet.

This sudden heartache that ran through his entire being leaving him with tears in his eyes and a tightness in his chest that wouldn't let go. It was as if the air had been sucked out of his lungs as he gripped whatever was close to keep himself steady. He needed a moment to come back to reality but he didn't have a moment, he didn't have even a minute to register what was going on but when he looked to Billy lying on the tiles of the ground floor, Max leant over him he moved without his mind telling him to. 

He ran, ran so quickly and so clumsily that he slipped at one point but that didn't stop him from getting to the dying boy. "Billy", he cried so softly he could barely hear himself say it over the noise of the situation. "No, no, no, no, no. Don't leave". 

Max moved out of the way slightly with a look of confusion under her tears and watched as Steve sobbed over Billy's blood covered torso.

"See you on the next go round", Billy managed to say but it was so quiet only Steve heard it. His lips curled at the corners as he looked at Steve but he didn't move, not that he could because no matter how badly he wanted to touch Steve one last time, his arms were numb and his body was going cold and then he was gone. 

"Billy", Steve whispered mainly to himself because he knew, he knew he wasn't going to respond. "I'm sorry". Were the final words he said to the body of the boy he never got to love, never got to hold because after that all he could do in that moment was sit beside him as he watched Max curled into El. He couldn't do anything except feel everything all at once.

Soon after, Billy was buried in Hawkins cemetery, no funeral or service. He was just put in the ground as Max watched him be lowered. It became very clear very fast that his father didn't care, that the only people who did were himself and Max. So, he wandered through the graves in nothing fancy, no suit or tie just his everyday clothes for a while until the place was empty and then walked over to the headstone. It simply read: 'William Hargrove'. Nothing more. 

As he stood staring at the engraved letters he felt a hint of anger run through him. He was angry at the fact Billy Hargrove was no longer the asshole step brother of one of his kids, he was no longer the loud, intense boy from California that got into his head last year. No, now he was everything and everywhere all at once. He was in his dreams, or were they memories of a time passed. He couldn't tell.

It was in that moment a very vivid memory ran through his mind. Green. All he could see was green; trees, grass and hills surrounded him and then there was Billy. Except, he was older. Not old but his hair was greying and his eyes wore wrinkles of happy times, laughter and smiles. Steve didn't know where or when this was but he knew for sure that was Billy. Not his Billy but a version that he got to be with for many years. 

He could feel their fingers interlock and the warmth of the sun on his legs and the breeze run through his hair as they sat under the tree. Billy turned to him, a soft look in his blue eyes, those piercing eyes that made his own fill with tears and he smiled at Steve. "I'll never stop loving you, darling", he had said. "Not when the earth stops spinning or when I'm in the ground. I love you with my entire soul and I don't care what people think. Let them take me away because I'd rather die than live without you, my love". 

"I'll love you forever", Steve had said back, except he subconsciously said it out loud to nothing but a piece of granite with the name of someone he never got to know, not really. 

➡️Continue reading on AO3⬅️

[rndyounghowze]

Black Noses And My Personal History With White Supremacy

I finally got the courage to talk about something that Dana has been challenging me to post about for a while. #blm #stopwhiteterrorism

By Ricky and Dana Young-Howze

Mays Landing, NJ

Venmo: @rndyounghowze

I have a very vivid memory of being teased on the school bus in elementary school for having “a black nose and lips”. Until I got glasses and was diagnosed with Tourettes it was the common theme of my playground bullying. My biggest role model at the time was our bus driver Mr. Garland (I think that was his name) because he defended me. I remember trying to make up some story about how I got plastic surgery and they messed up my nose. He looked me dead in the eye and said “we have to be proud of what we look like. We are beautiful inside and out. They’re ugly on the inside. That’s what makes us better”.

I lived with my grandmother during the week and my parents on the weekends. My mom and dad lived in one of the first “projects” in the US and at that time they were one of two white families living there. I would be playing with the kids in the playground and a Black mom who would be watching us would tell me to come up to them and she would hold my chin in her hand and turn my head for inspection to the other mothers sitting there smoking cigarettes. She would tell me “I don’t care what your mom and dad told you” and would let me go back and play. I never really knew what she meant.

Flash forward to high school. I decided that I wanted to dive into my family history. I was in a play about the Confederate Flag and I remembered that I had family on both sides of the war. I had enough info about my family to join the Sons of Confederate Veterans. I also knew that my family up In Kentucky had fought in the Union. I was proud to have “heritage” on both sides.

I was rooting through photo albums in my Dad’s mom’s house. I came upon a family bible that was really old. It had to be old enough to be owned by the parts of the family that lived in the Appalachian Mountains in the 1800’s. Family bibles used to have these front pages that listed weddings and births. Listed in the middle is a marriage between a woman with the last name Jung and a man named Richard with no last name. This would not have meant anything except that after his name they took the time to list him as “a n*****r”. They then spent a paragraph talking about how he fought in the Civil War and saved lives in a battle by shooting a superior officer and allowing the company to retreat. So he was a n*****r but he was a “good n*****r”.

I knew that the story was that our family had changed our last name from Jung to Young to avoid discrimination. My Dad’s side of the family has an outstanding military history and I know they were worried about appearing to have German ties in the war. I eventually went across the street and asked my great grandfather about this. The only thing he ever told me was “marry a girl with the Irish in her. It’s the best thing you could do.” My great grandfather passed away while I was in Highschool. My grandfather passed away in college. After the funeral I went to the house and looked for the family Bible. I had held it in my hand four times in three years. It was gone. I have never found it again. My Dad has special needs, his mom has dementia. The rest of my Dad’s family has never spoken to me after the funeral. It may be because I married a Black person. Maybe not. I will never know.

One time while driving through my mom’s side of the family’s hometown I saw a church sign that had the family name on it. I asked why we never went there and she just casually said “that must belong to the Black families that live here that share our last name”. I was floored by this. We had a black side of the family? What!? She was quick to tell me that they were in no way related. It was just that the family was as old as we were and had lived in that town as long as we had. My family has lived there and owned land there since before the Civil War. I have been digging into the genealogy based on what she has told me and after two or three generations the family line with our last name seems to disappear. Two white branches of the family go back eight or so generations and seem to have married into the family three generations or so back but there don’t seem to be any birth or death records in their town that support her story that the family had been there for a very long time. There is no not-slave-owning explanation for this. To this day my grandmother refuses to talk about it. She leans into the Scots-Irish side of the story.

In grad school when I first met Dana they made sure to do two things: Tell a very wrong Obama joke and then ask me what I was mixed with. The joke was to see if I reacted to the joke in a ”white way” (their words). If I did they would never feel comfortable being alone with me ever much less date me. The second question is because they saw what every other Black person I know saw. I told them what I knew about the probable Black man on my Dad’s side and my theory about my Mom's side. They kinda looked flabbergasted. Like they were surprised I admitted it.

Dana and I fell hard in love and spent three years trying to do the long-distance relationship thing. We had very long talks about race and whiteness. We had to have massive discussions about privilege and culture. I had reading lists and albums and homework that I had to do and Dana readily admits that in a lot of ways I already ”got it”. However, it was never enough. They wanted me to make a conscious decision to marry into a black family and know what I was getting into.

In August of 2014, I had just gotten back from spending a summer with Dana and I was using my hour before work to buy an engagement ring. I had two months to move to NJ so that we could start a job together. I heard on the news that Michael Brown was shot by a white cop in Ferguson. It hit me like a ton of bricks. It was the first time that the weight of what I was doing rang home in the deepest parts of me. I was marrying a Black person. At the time I wanted to bring children into this world. It finally dawned on me that those children were going to be Black. Just as the math in my childhood was Black nose+white skin=white guy the calculus done in a cop’s head was not going to add up well for our children. I worked at a church so I went to the altar and prayed. I prayed for a whole hour. I got the ring and moved to NJ. Dana and I were married five months later. I never looked back.

Why am I saying this now? Because white supremacy is the scourge of American Theatre. It's the reason why our Asian American artists are afraid to walk the streets at night. It's the reason why our Black artists are having to stand up and form their coalitions to get work done without a ”white yes”. It's the reason why even though I have photographic proof that the Cis males in my family have slowly gotten paler with every generation and that I know with absolute certainty that there is a Black contribution to my heritage somewhere that they locked it down and hid it from me like it was a crime (and it was until Loving V. Virginia, the very state my Dad's side of the family hails from). They appear to have bred as much of it out of me as possible by marrying women with ”Irish” in them. I feel like I was force-fed the blue pill and sidelined from my culture. I will never be black. I’m not even trying to be. I am just sickened that something that every Black person I’ve met can see may or may not come from a heritage that was stolen from me and hidden so well I can probably only prove it with a DNA test.

Whiteness is not a culture, it is an allergic reaction to the existence of BIPOC contributions to American life. It is cancer in our American Theatre and we have predominantly white institutions that are standing out like tumors in our cultural landscape. I am singularly focused on rooting them out not just because I'm married to a BIPOC artist. I'm rooting them out so that I can claim all of my cultures so that I can make reparations for the harm that has happened in my personal history. To create me BIPOC heritage may have had to be bred out and hidden and I may never be able to prove it. The sheer insinuation is enough to sicken me. I will uncover it and amplify my ancestors’ stories if I can find them. I will create a culture where this doesn't have to happen again. It ends with me.

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