#and then i remembered that there is at least one good fucking version of persephone out there.

[screambirdscreaming]

so finding things on the internet is hell these days but can anyone help me find that one actually good interpretation of the myth of persephone I've ever seen?

the one with "i am married / i am buried / i am mourned" and "to marry a girl you need only her father's permission / not her mother's / not even the bride's."

it's a black and white comic/poem, posted here on tumblr..... years ago now.

[shipcestuous]

If people are looking for a good, incestuous webcomic about Greek Mythology, I can't recommend Theia Mania by A-gnosis enough. It's kind of an anthology series, with different stories about different gods, but it's currently in it's Hymn to Demeter arc, so right now there's a lot of focus on the Hades/Persephone relationship going on.

I love it because it's very well-thought-out and well researched, and the author's love for Ancient Greek literature, and history shines through every page. Plus, in it the gods are a big, messy family where everyone's flawed but (while I do have my preferences and it's easy for me to like/sympathize with some characters but not others) no one is a complete monster or a one-dimensional caricature of a villain. There is some incest-negative talk here and there, granted, but I feel it's always very justified by who's saying what and in which circumstances.

At one point, Athena fears (though that's not actually what's happening) that Zeus is going to try and come onto her because... well, I don't want to spoil it because I think the way the author went about the whole "Zeus ate Metis and then Athena came out of his head" thing is really interesting. But anyway, to me that moment feels like it's more about "I thought we were becoming close because you genuinely cared about me as a person and a family member, but now I think you might just you see me as a way to get my mom back, like I don't matter and only she does" or even "I thought you really respected me and cared about me in the platonic way I care about you, but now I suspect for you I might just be another woman to seduce and either discard or keep as a dirty little secret," plus Athena is asexual in a culture where she doesn't really have any tools or resources to help her understand what that means, so at times she's just generally uncomfortable with the way most other gods seem (from her perspective) to be constantly going on about sex and doing crazy, stupid things to get it.

Later on, Persephone is also outraged and upset with Zeus for seducing her and says that's just proof of how fucked-up their family really is... but, again trying not to spoil anything, Zeus deceived her by hiding his identity, thus taking away from her the choice of having sex with *him* or not, and then he kept disrespecting her autonomy and her ability to make her own decisions even while putting her in a very, very tough spot. Which is clearly something that has overall a bigger impact on Persephone than just the idea of having had sex with her dad.

And that's it, really, at least from what I remember. So, in conclusion, the problem is not incest so much as... Zeus.

... okay, no, that was just a joke. XD Zeus does have his good sides, too, and it's not like he's completely incapable of caring about other people, in the end. But the problem is not incest so much as men who treat women like objects, lie to them and hide things from them then expect their trust anyway, think that just because women are open about liking sex or otherwise "not respectable" in some way then they should also be "available" to them specifically, or otherwise disrespect their right to make their own decisions. Which is a point I think the entire comics makes really well, as it doesn't shy away from the problems that come with being a woman in an historical setting like this while at the same time also having plenty of nuanced, flawed female characters who never feel like they're supposed to be perfect little victims just there to show how tragic their suffering is and never have a moment of happiness or fun.

And honestly, I think that's part of what makes A-gnosis' version of Hades/Persephone just so good and engaging. They're uncle and niece, but Persephone isn't uncomfortable with that (unlike with the whole thing with Zeus) because she gets along really well with Hades, they get each other and also each other's perspectives on life, and they respect each other both when it comes to sex (which is also an interesting element on its own, as Persephone is allosexual with a high libido and generally just loves doing it, and feeling sexy, too, while Hades is demisexual and has struggled with understanding what that means to him while feeling like the odd one out among his siblings) and other things. Hades abducts her to take her as his wife after asking permission from Zeus but not her and Demeter, but he doesn't actually want to force her into anything and has a hidden motivation that he discloses right away to Persephone because it involves something that's happening to her that they have previously discussed and they're both worried about, but she's also rightfully angry at him for a bit and bluntly points out to him that he could have tried to find a better way to bring her to the Underworld and work on the problem without other people sticking their noses in their business. They have their own problems but they work through them as two people who care for and are coming to love each other, and on top of that they have very compatible personalities and even sense of humor, and it's so good to see!

Also, he's a grumpy nerd who usually gets along better with the dead (whom he's actually fiercely protective of and cares a great deal about) than the living (who he often doesn't understand, leading him to act dismissive, overly strict, or unapproachable towards them, and who don't usually offer him much understanding and compassion in return) and she's a loner with a noncomformist streak and a punk vibes. Which is an interpretation I'd never really seen before (well, not punk loner Persephone, at least) but now I'm in love with it!

Uh, and also, have you ever wished for an Hades/Persephone romance that treats Demeter as a good mother who dearly loves her daughter instead of an harpy who purposefully keeps her isolated and naive and prevents her from spreading her wings for her own gain? Well, Theia Mania's Demeter is amazing. The comic doesn't go to the opposite extreme of making her the Perfect Mom whose only personality trait is being a mother, either (if I had a nickel for every time I've seen anti Hades/Persephone people clamoring for that while somehow thinking themselves so much more progressive than the Demeter bashers... let's just say, I'd have way more than just two nickels, lol!) and so she ends up as one of the most sympathetic characters in it. She has issues and flaws and she's traumatized (and not just by the Poseidon thing I mentioned above) and, as much as she loves her, she doesn't always really get her daughter, but she's never just an annoying obstacle on the road to Hades/Persephone realizing they want to stay together, she has her own story going on that obviously intersects with theirs but is very much about her. And I just want her to clear up all the misunderstandings between her and Persephone, hopefully reconcile with Hades (she's not okay with him right now both because of his recent actions and because of something else that happened between them in the past), and be happy with her girlfriend (and I mean that in the canonical sense, btw) Hekate!

Sorry for the rant but Theia Mania is the best modern adaptation of Greek Mythology I've read in a while, and I couldn't help but spread the love!!

... er, Theia Mania anon, here again! Just realized I accidentally erase da line in my ask and forgot to rewrite it before sending! I wanted to say there's also a flashback Poseidon/Demeter thing that could maybe also be interpreted as incest-negative, as he... well, let's just say he really doesn't care about her consent, and leave it at that. She understandably feels very violated by this, but because there was a certain chemistry between them at the time and *he* interpreted it as romantic/sexual, he claims she was leading him on/only saying no out loud to protect her honor as an unmarried woman while "really" she wanted him to go on. But again, the point there is not that they're brother and sister, even if personally I got the vibe she *only* saw him as a brother she got along very well with. The point is still that he shouldn't have just taken what he wanted, he should have actually treated her as an equal and respected her wishes, without making up excuses about "what women do" and "what women really think." So, yeah, that's what I was referencing in my comment about Demeter!

How exciting to have something well written to enjoy! I love the sound of all of the nuanced characters and the complicated relationships.

Thanks so much for this detailed rec.

[alatismeni-theitsa]

anti LO anon opinions

I am sorry for the delay. There were too many asks and too little time. 16 messages below the cut. Enjoy!

1) I like to mention that metis isn’t the mother Hera Demeter or Hestia rather she created them

2) Why is Metis being made into a fertility goddess? She's associated with wisdom and good counsel, she has no relation to fertility or agriculture. If RS wanted to be consistent with the fertility goddess=victory thing, then Hera fits that role just fine because she is literally a goddess of childbirth and motherhood!

3) The fertility plotline is already stupid by its own but also Metis who is the mother OF HERA DEMETER AND HESTIA( and not Athena because fuck it i guess) was already  very stupid and but nowZeus ATE the mother of Hera and Hera still  married  him in the comic?????!?!?!?!

Just whyyyyyyyy

Why rachel

Whyyyyyyyyyyy!!!???

4) Let me get this straight... Zeus ate Metis to help him overthrow Kronos because she's a "fertility" goddess? How does a goddess of wisdom suddenly become a fertility goddess?? Also, for a comic that preaches "feminine power" all the time, there is absolutely no power for women when they are being consumed just for the sole purpose of defeating a tyrant.

5) One of many things that bugs me about lo leto is that not only she looks identical to hera(besides of eyes) she dress in same colors as her and same clothes style. In episode that leto was in they give hera more blue collors but that doesnt change that hera dont wear blue so often.

6) Apparently, Metis isn't their ( Hera, Demeter and Hestia) mother in LO. Which doesn't make any sense because if she isn't their mom, then where did they come from? Just because they were created doesn't mean that's not their parent.

By this logic, Demeter and Persephone aren't related in LO. This just seems like a poor way of avoiding incest.

(The evidence is that Rachel changed the sisters to friends in episode 119 and said that they weren't related herself (can't find this one tho)).

7) I remember seeing a instagram post criticizing LO for making Apollo rape Persephone someone in the comments said “Well zeus rape persephone in the original mythology so It only makes sense that Rachel made Apollo do it” ???Like???Sis What???

8) Probably unpopular opinion : I don't like when people criticizes Lore olympus by saying " It is bad because in the original myth * insert female figure in Greek mythology*  is RAPED!!" because  most of the time, even if exception exist but the great majority of the examples used in these arguments came from ROMAN version!!

So if someone want to criticize Lore olympus its should at least use exemples/argurments based from GREEK mythology not from the Roman version(which cames much later) and it is pretty easy to do that.

9) Off topic but the fact that Hecate in LO looks so generic in recent chapters (a nod to the recent anti LO anon submission posts and one person says Hecate looks badly drawn(, that there's actually an instagram art account who plays art of withe fanart or original content, and their OC Nadia looks more like LO Hecate than LO Hecate. Link

10) Hekate in those panels (where she is talking with Demeter in ep. 145) looks like LEGO figurine.

11) Now in lo besides of all this unneeded plot about persephones trail, apollo trying to overthrown zeus now Smythe thought that this romance comic didnt have enough action so now she add Kronos coming back and possible another war with him! This supposed to be romance comic not some action one, and this bigger plots fell so much unnecessary and like some 14yearold fanfiction that wich each chapter self insert marysue have more unreal things to do Thats why pilot lo was better it was just romance

12) Why couldn't zeus be the villain of LO? In the myth, everything is very explicitly his fault. He tells hades to kidnap persephone and he never tells demeter that he married off her daughter until she starts going on an agricultural strike and blights the earth. No more of this evil demeter/apollo/thetis/thanatos/hestia bullshit! I want the mother/daughter duo to beat zeus to the ground dammit!

13) The age gap in LO is weird because persephone's age isn't specified in the myth, her supposed youth is a product of modern interpretation due to her kore epithet and status as demeter's daughter. She could've went the route of young hades if she wanted a young protagonist, but we could've also had old persephone, which has worked multiple times.

14) Oh god, lore olympus is gonna become the new twilight/50 shades of grey.

15) one thing i don't understand about metis in LO - wasn't she an oceanid?? why is she brown w wings? 

16) I personally don’t think RS has the majority of this planned, because if she did there wouldn’t be so much retconned stuff and these apparently major plot points wouldn’t be popped now, almost 150 episodes in! Like you said, they had to be built up and hinted at well before this to make sense. It’s either on the editor not helping her tighten up the story, or she, as she’s told us before, just writes it as it goes, and that seems far more likely. More so, let’s not forget the other plot lines that must be dealt with: Eros and Psyche, Semele and Dionysus, Leto now?, Persephone’s schooling (?), Minthe, Apollo, Thanatos, and Daphne (🙄), Hermes lying to hades, Zeus finding out about Hera/Hades, Persephone coming to justice, Thetis, Echo, Persephone even finding out about her powers (yes, almost 209 Eos in), HxP even getting together and married (+possible babies), and the ACTUAL myth with Demeter at a standoff! At current rate, it’ll need at least several more years to wrap up, unless most of those are dropped, in which case also proves she didn’t plan ahead, or else she wouldn’t have included them to begin with. How do you turn such a cut and dry story into such a convoluted mess. I’d be impressed if it wasn’t so aggravating.  

[mythologyfolklore]

101 Greek Mythology head-canons that have little to nothing to do with the “canon”

(These headcanons merely involve my own interpretation of G.M. and the way it’s depicted in my story. It’s okay, if you don’t like them, but please do refrain from nagging into my ears about it, because these are headcanons!)

1. Ares is both Zeus’ oldest and his only legitimate son (Hephaistos is Hera’s son alone, so he doesn’t count). Sometimes he rubs it into his half-siblings’ faces out of spite. The only ones excluded are the Horai (Eunomia, Dike and Eirene) and Athena, because they're (kind of) older and have been born (or conceived) in wedlock.

2. Ares and Zeus have kind of a parental love-hate relationship. Because ... well, it’s Zeus.

3. Athena has a bitter rivalry with both Ares and Poseidon going on. But they do get along sometimes.

4. The Kronides (Hestia, Hades, Demeter, Poseidon, Hera and Zeus) have a feeling of reverence towards Athena’s mother Metis. It’s one of the reasons why she’s Zeus’ favourite child.

5. I went with Hesiod’s Theogony on their family tree, so Aphrodite is the sole daughter of the sky Ouranos (or more specifically of his privy parts). That makes her the half-sister of the Titanes and aunt to the 1st-generation-Olympians. Thus she’s the oldest member of the Olympian Twelve (the Dodekatheoi).

6. Aphrodite dresses in pink or red most of the time, but her favourite colour is actually blue. Only Ares, Hephaistos and Athena know this.

7. Every time a god/dess is born, the Moirai (the Fates) and the Protogenoi (primordial gods) come to attend the birth, determine their later life and tasks and grant them the powers required. Most of the Protogenoi typically attend births invisibly, so that only Zeus, Hades and Hekatê can see them.

8. Hera and Zeus have a cold love for each other. They’re still married, because he needs a queen and no one else wants to be. And Hera can watch over the family better this way.

9. Hera is in retirement from being a jealous psycho wife. Now she just gives hell to Zeus, as annoying him is fun, if you can get away with it. Nowadays she’s a bitch for other reasons.

10. Poseidon isn’t the wisest of the three brothers, but he often mediates between Hades and Zeus, when things get bad between them. Over time he has gotten really good at it.

11. The Olympians have three collective no-goes: violation of the laws of hospitality, family murder and cannibalism. For obvious reasons.

12. Hephaistos, Ares and Aphrodite have long moved on from the golden net incident. Hephaistos has divorced Aphrodite and remarried. The three have a platonic affection for each other and joke about the shipwreck that’s Hephaistos’ and Aphrodite’s failed marriage.

13. Aphrodite is secretly a badass. She also has a more of her father in her than anyone could imagine. She keeps it from everyone, because she’s too afraid of what Zeus might do, if he finds out. The only ones who have a hunch are Hephaistos, Ares and Athena.

14. Ares was actually supposed to become a god of vegetation and fertility, when he was born. But no thanks to a curse from Gaia, he got bound to become a god of war instead. He does have green fingers though and secretly likes gardening.

15. Aphrodite had no serious relationship with any other than Ares, but Adonis came pretty close. Ares killed the poor guy out of jealousy, which obviously made Aphrodite upset.

16. Metis still exists. She lives on inside Zeus’ subconsciousness and has born the prophesied son that is destined to surpass Zeus. But they can’t get out, because Zeus placed a seal on his mind, after Athena broke out of his head.

17. Demeter wasn’t actually upset about Persephone marrying Hades. She was angry that it happened without her consent; she’s Persephone’s mother after all. But since things have been cleared up, she gets along with Hades comparatively well.

18. If you make Hestia, Hebe or Harmonia upset, the Olympians will collectively hunt you down and fuck you up.

19. The Greek pantheon is in contact with other panthea. Zeus does most of the international politics.

20. Dionysos once wanted to make it rain wine during Athena’s birthday party. But he messed up the spell and it rained pineapples instead.

21. Ares is possessed by a demon. To be specific by Polemos, the personification and spirit of war itself. It’s one of the reasons why he’s so crazy, but he has learned to deal with it. To him, Polemos is mostly that annoying voice in his head. He can allow the Daimon to take over, but rarely does, because he doesn’t want anyone to know about him and because he fears, that Polemos might harm his loved ones.

22. Hephaistos likes to set people’s hair on fire, if they piss him off.

23. Hermes is a kleptomaniac. Nobody likes this.

24. Ares and Demeter had a one-night-stand once. Their offspring was two serpentine dragons and a warrior, because that’s how hardcore they are. Ares loved his monster babies and was very upset, when they got killed.

25. Hades and Persephone have one of the most functional marriages in the pantheon. Persephone is the boss.

26. Ares’ daughter Harmonia is the only goddess, who has given up her immortality for a mortal husband. She was cursed by Hephaistos, who wanted to get back at Aphrodite, and lived a miserable life, before she and her husband were turned into snakes (in my version it was Ares, who transformed them both). They were sent to the Elysion after finally passing on. Hades allows Ares and Aphrodite to visit their daughter from time to time.

27. Despite being brash and loud, Ares is one of the few gods, who actually get along with Hades. He earned a few points with the King of the Underworld by getting along famously with Kerberos and by increasing his number of subjects more quickly.

28. Artemis is asexual, but in a romantic relationship with Eileithyia, the goddess of childbirth and oldest daughter of Hera. Hera only tolerates it for Elileithyia’s sake, as she and Artemis really dislike each other.

29. Apollon used to have a one-sided crush on his twin. It was nothing sexual (he takes her virginity very seriously), but more than brotherly. Artemis knows and was really freaked out at first, but forgave him after learning, that he didn’t want to get creepy. When Zeus found out, he helped him to get rid of that love, and his affection for Artemis returned to being healthy brotherly love.

30. Hermes and Dionysos once tried to prank Hephaistos. His wife Aglaia caught them. They never tried again afterwards.

31. Zeus' mental state alone can affect the atmosphere and weather. If he’s calm or composed, so is the weather. If he’s furious, it’s like a hurricane, even if he tries to keep his temper - the weather just gives away, what he’s feeling. Zeus finds this really damn annoying.

32. Zeus, Poseidon and Hades didn’t draw lots to get their domains. They didn’t even choose them. Their domains chose them.

33. The Protogenoi, aka the Primordials, are to the gods, what the gods are to the humans, although the gods don’t worship the Protogenoi. However, the gods respect some more than others. Like the gods, each Protogenos has epithets given to them by the gods.

34. Each race of deities (Protogenoi, Titanes, gods, Daimones, Nymphai, etc.), has their own language. Only a few of the gods are fluent in all of them. Especially the language of the Protogenoi is often hard to decipher.

35. Aphrodite really hates her father Ouranos. Then again, everyone does.

36. Each one of the Olympians has their own mental issues.

37. Hephaistos was born with one deformed leg, but otherwise would have been able to walk. But after falling off Olympos, his left leg was hopelessly damaged and he needed a crutch. Then Zeus threw him off the mountain in a fit and he’s needed a wheelchair ever since, as crashing into an island has left him paraplegic.

38. Dionysos often gets called “baby of the family”, as he’s the youngest Olympian by far. It irritates him a lot.

39. Persephone wasn’t kidnapped. She went into the underworld by herself, because she was sick of everything and wanted to be alone. And as the underworld is really huge, Hades only found her months later by accident. She stayed with him for a while, they fell for each other and got impulse-married. But when Hermes showed up and explained what was going on in the upperworld, Hades decided, that she had to go back at least for a while. They had a dispute with Demeter and Zeus, arrangements were made, they got officially married and ever since then Persephone spent half the year up and half the year down-under.

40. As the goddess of spring, Persephone brings it wherever she goes. So when she leaves the upperworld, she brings spring to the underworld. However, as the queen of the dead, she also has the tendency of taking the influence of the underworld to wherever she goes in the upperworld. Persephone tans easily and is therefore very dark, when she goes down to the underworld. But the lack of sunlight in the underworld makes her grow pale quickly. Then she goes back up and the cycle starts again.

41. Persephone wears her hair short, because she liked it on Ares, when they first met. When she found out, that mortal women had the custom of shearing their hair as a sign of mourning, she was like: Huh ... what a coincidence. Demeter needed a while to get used to her new hair style.

42. Ares remembers the birthdays of all of his (half-)siblings, even those he hates. It’s one of the few nice things he does for them.

43. Aphrodite usually appears to someone as the type of person they find most desirable (x1000). That applies to mortals and used to apply to the Olympians too, until Athena asked her to choose a fixed shape for the gods, because she and the other virgin goddesses couldn’t see her. Aphrodite found this hilarious, but complied.

44. Hephaistos once grew a beard, hoping he’d would look less boyish and less like his mother Hera, but shaved it off again, because he was sick of it catching fire and sparks.

45. Out of all marriages in the Greek pantheon, Zeus’ and Hera’s marriage is only the third most dysfunctional; it’s surpassed by that of Kronos and Rheia and that of Ouranos and Gaia. Most other divine couples have more or less functional relationships.

46. At some point Aphrodite asked Ares to marry her, but he only knew the disaster that is his parents’ marriage and refused.

47. Poseidon has a tendency to make sexist jokes. Athena finds it really unfunny (so do the other goddesses, but they’re not subject of his bad jokes often, so they grin and bear it). Ares also takes offense at sexist jokes, which pleasantly surprised Athena and Artemis, when they found out.

48. Literally every member of the Olympians is LGBTQ+ in some way (even Ares; he’s heterosexual, but demiromantic).

49. Aphrodite loves pinching Hephaistos’ cheeks. He finds this really annoying, but tolerates it, because resistance is futile.

50. Hekatê is powerful and knowledgeable even for a Titan. The Protogenoi blessed her even before she was born. The premature blessing, plus her father being the Titan of destruction caused a mutation. Her eyes are not on her face, but she has several dozens of them magically floating around her head, like an ever-shifting halo. She also ages throughout the night (she’s a child in the evening and an old woman in the morning) and regresses during the day.

61. It doesn’t matter how much at odds the Olympians are, they will stand up for each other and stick together, when push comes to shove.

62. Apart from the 3 top tier taboos (violation of hospitality, cannibalism & family murder), each Olympian has at least one thing they would never do. Be it because they have suffered it first hand or just because they think it’s wrong and it’s below their standards.

63. Zeus is an early bird. The only others on Olympos are Apollon, Ares and Hermes. The others are either night owls or just constantly sleep-deprived/hungover.

64. Ares has a twin sister named Enyo. She’s been banished from Olympos after the Gigantomakhia for remaining neutral instead of supporting her kin. She’s crashing at his home in Thrace and mostly accompanies him into battle, together with Eris.

65. If Hephaistos was able to stand up, he’d be as tall as Artemis (she’s the third tallest goddess).

66. Hera couldn’t handle Ares, when he was a baby and asked Eris to be his nurse. Eris agreed and became his nurse under the fake identity of Thero. A few years later , he was kidnapped by Titanes at the age of seven. Hera gave him back to Eris to protect him, appointing the goddess of strife to be Ares’ guardian. When he was ten, he heard, that he had now a little sister (Eileithyia) and wanted to go back to Olympos. By that time the war was over, so Eris allowed it.

67. Eris sees the bonds between people as golden strings. She carries a sickle on herself. To damage a bond, she grazes it with the sickle, to destroy it completely, she cuts it. The stronger the string, the harder it is to cut.

68. The duty of Harmonia (Eris’ opposite) is to repair the bonds Eris has cut or damaged. She performs that duty even in Elysion.

69. Hera and Aphrodite have one thing in common: They both look like Japanese horror movie ghosts, before their morning coffee. Zeus and Ares both make sure that it’s ready, when they get up. Zeus because his wife creeps him out like that, Ares because he loves his girlfriend.

70. The Moirai, or the Fates, are daughters of Nyx. Klotho (Spinner) has a childlike appearance, Lakhesis (Alotter) is a matron and Atropos (Inevitable) is an old hag. Atropos is mute and speaks sign language, while her sisters translate what she says. Klotho is paraplegic and wheelchair-bound. Lakhesis is the caretaker of both. They’re usually incorruptible and pitiless in doing their duty, but sometimes a god manages to elicit a favour from them (for a price, of course). The thread of life of each living being is a glowing string coming from Klotho’s white hair. A mortal’s life thread is white, a semi-divine thread is silvery, a divine thread is golden.

71. Zeus never really cheated fate, when he absorbed Metis. He’s fully aware, that one day his reign will end and has everything planned out. He simply doesn’t want to step down just yet. Not even he can go against the Moirai and they never spared him his fate - they only accommodated him by giving him more time.

72. Only the Protogenoi have the power to really alter someone else’s fate, but it comes at a hefty price. For example, Gaia changed the fate of Ares, when she sealed Polemos inside of him and cursed him to become the destructive god of terrible war. This led to the child being captured and tortured by Kronos, who hoped to make the personification of war bend to his will (because he’s evil!). The irate Moirai retaliated by granting the original Olympians and their allies a devastating victory over Kronos and sentenced him and his allies to everlasting torment in Tartaros.

73. The Titanomakhia lasted for ten Olympian years, which by mortal standards is a century. By the time it began, Zeus was already married to Metis, so his siblings got to meet both of their saviors. But when he found out that she was pregnant, he panicked and absorbed her. Shortly after the war began, he married Thémis, the Titanis of divine justice and heavenly order, who had joined his side immediately. Together they had the Horai, but broke up, when she learned of Metis’ fate (i.e. Thémis got outta there, while she still could). Afterwards Zeus married Hera, so their first child Ares was born a few mortal decades before the end of the war.

74. Zeus and Hera are a complicated set of parents: one day they don’t give a crap about their children and the next day they would tear the universe apart to keep them save. The feeling is mutual.

75. Apollon isn’t actually that unlucky in love. His failed attempts at romance are just more well-known.

76. Ares is actually quite intelligent. The problem is, that he’s extremely emotional and volatile, has no impulse control and is really hostile as a result of his unpopularity and the things he has gone through.

77. The four virgin goddesses (Athena, Artemis, Hestia and Hekatê) are all asexual, but Athena and Artemis are demiromantic, while Hestia and Hekatê are aromantic.

78. Although Athena is demiromantic, she has never been in love as in she has never formed an emotional attachment other than Storge (familiar love) or Philia (deep friendship). She would, however be capable of Agape (unconditional, selfless love) or Pragma (enduring, grounded love). What she isn’t capable of is Eros (passionate, physical love), Ludus (playful love) and Mania (obsessive love).

88. The incident with Medusa getting raped by Poseidon inside Athena’s temple never happened. I went with the version in Hesiod’s Theogony: Medusa was a Gorgon from birth and together with her sisters a daughter of Phorkys and Keto, two ancient marine deities. She was the only mortal Gorgon, probably because of a mutation. Her affair with Poseidon was consensual. The rape account is a late one and comes from Ovid, a Roman writer, who wrote his Metamorphoses as a jab against the authorities (the Metamorphoses portrait all mortals as hapless victims and the gods as bigger dicks than the Greeks themselves saw their gods).

89. Most of the gods have lived for ten thousands of years. So even though to us it looks like they have one tryst after another, for them there can be centuries between each affair and the next. Of course, a century is almost nothing to them, but you get the idea.

90. The Olympians are very hypocritical. Nothing new here.

91. Hermes is closer to humans than all of the other Olympians. He is also the fondest of them.

92. Ares on the other hand is extremely misanthropic. Which is unsurprising, because he presides over the darker aspects of war and gets to see the worst side of humanity all the time. He considers it a kindness to make them kill each other.

93. Since Ares is Zeus’ only legitimate son and therefore his heir, he has to perform a lot of duties outside of his function as god of terrible war. The duty he hates most is going through his father’s mail, because nobody likes paper stuff. The upside is the confidential information he gets out of it. The other gods are unaware, how much he knows about his father or how much Zeus actually trusts his son with.

94. Zeus threatens his family to send them to Tartaros every time they piss him off too much. But he would never actually do it, because that would mean locking them up together with the defeated Titanes. And despite everything, he loves his family too much to do this and he hasn’t forgot, what they did to his son.

95. Though he has no qualms doing this with his demigod children, if they murder their sons and serve them to the gods for dinner (you know who I mean), or with trouble-makers, who kill their guests and capture Death itself, or people who harass his wife and children.

96. Aphrodite is fiercely protective of her boyfriend and children.

97. Once Aphrodite and Athena had a yelling contest. It was so terrifying, that the others (except for Zeus, who does this with Hera all the time) hid under the table and huddled together in fear. The two women only stopped screaming at each other, when Zeus told them to calm down.

98. Persephone and Hades have no children, mostly because she only likes children, if they’re dead (because they’re quiet). The only reason she agreed to raise Adonis together with Hades was that she doesn’t trust Aphrodite as far as she can throw her.

99. The scythe Demeter uses to reap her corn is the very same one Kronos used to castrate Ouranos. But the only thing that would prompt Demeter to use it as a weapon is, if her family was threatened (like in the Gigantomakhia).

100. Hera and Herakles buried their strife years before Herakles’ deification; when he helped the gods against the Gigantes and saved her from being assaulted by one of them. This is why she agreed to let him marry her daughter Hebe, after he became a god himself.

101. There is one deity the gods hold more sacred than all the others: Kháos, the Primordial Mist. Ze is the most hallowed of the Protogenoi, the Void that predates creation itself. Zir presence is felt in the invisible air we breathe and seen in the gloom of fog and mist. Ze is the atmosphere encircling the earth.

[whorphydice]

Platform

first of all i fucking tried to post this on safari and the new tumblr is fucking dumb and wouldnt let me scroll to hit post i am so fucking livid i hate this website. 

second of all I dont usually post fics in the middle of the night but I wanted to post this before @rollingthunder06 woke up so they could see it in the morning. Love you rt! This is short im so sorry. also shoutout to @meetthefatess who read the original version of this like 2 days ago!

The ride up top was anything but peaceful. There had been so many questions.  Yes, he had waited the six months that he promised. But was it too long? Had she found renewed love in the sunlight, where she would never want to return to their dark underground kingdom together. 

Hades could not stop fidgeting- taking his glasses off and on. Folding and refolding a newspaper. Checking the clock to see how much longer until the truth was revealed. They were planning to try again..but would it be too late?

As they neared the platform, he settled his glasses over his eyes, and slipped that long leather trench coat over his shoulders. 

He took a deep breath, ready to step off the train and go searching for his wife. What he wasn’t expecting was to see her there, sitting on the suitcase, ready to go. 

Persephone sat on the edge of an old leather trunk, a straw sunhat on her head as she fanned herself. Her coat rested on her shoulders, and she flashed him a brilliant smile. 

“About damn time! I was worried you forgot about me!” Persephone stood, grabbing her bag with one hand and reaching out to him in the other. “Thought those six months might have shown you something you liked better-”

“No time away from you is a good time.” Hades took her hand and brought it to his lips, kissing her knuckles. “You waited for me.”

“I’ll always wait for you.” She promises, bringing her hand to rest on his cheek gently. “Six months is longer than I remember.”

“Why ya think I always came for ya sooner?” Hades lowers his glasses and looks around the empty platform, the cool nip of soon to be autumn air catching his cheeks. “Wheres everyone at? I thought the boy at least-”

“He’s not doin well. Told him to stay in. I’ll see him in the springtime. Or...maybe sooner, i’m not sure.” Persephone swallows, eyes averting to the ground before she adjusted her fur around her shoulders. “Been a long time since I needed this coat before you got me. It’s gettin’ a lot of use up here.”

“It’ll be cooler at home now, too. I shut down some of the factories. It’s darker and cooler but-”

“Just how I like it.” Persephone places her bag on the ground again, putting her free hand in the pocket of her fur. “Mama hates this coat, I think that makes me like it more..”

He pauses, running a hand on the back of his neck, his whole air about him exuding tension. “Seph..the girl..She’s-”

“Don’t tell me. Please. Orpheus is already so broken, I can’t hear about the pieces of Eurydice. I’ll see soon enough.” Persephone just shook her head, offering a sad smile. “I don’t want to talk about stories that have unhappy endings.”

Hades just nods, holding his arm out again, this time a smile creeps onto his face. He is sure and he is excited. Six months of anxiety wipe away in this moment. She waited for him. He waited for her. They were ready to try again, to set the world spinning again. “ready?”

Persephone wraps both arms around his shoulders, resting her cheek on his shoulder as she inhaled deeply. Soot and the metallic smell of the earth was permeated in his clothes, and he smelled indescribably like home. 

“Mmhmm...take me home.”

[at-the-exd-of-everythixg]

][All questions for otp meme for Sal + Rhys][

@blind-mutant

Coffee shop AU: Who is the barista, and who frequents the coffee shop?

Sal's at the coffee shop...what? Every night? It always feels a little different and a little bit the same each time. Sometimes Sal appears in suits and a slick charm while other times he's there in luxury dresses and patiently putting on makeup while Rhys rushes to get his over sweetened drink ready. Rhys never really says anything about the fact that Sal's lazy flirts make his stomach flip, or the fact that Sal usually calls him Moonie so sweetly.

And Sal's just as drawn to the pretty little drink maker, who always gives him extra whipped cream. How could he not want to flirt with the beautiful man? The one who smiled so sweetly whenever Sal got there and felt like the only person who seemed to really listen to him. Sweet drinks and sweet men are all Sal wants in life.

Highschool/College AU: Who is the straight-A student, and who’s the backrow slacker?

Sal doesn't exactly want to be a good grade student. It fucking sucks and the stress piles on more and more, but he knows that even failing for a moment would result in Giles yanking him away from other people and back to the same little house where he and his siblings would just be hurt more and more. It means everything to Sal to work hard, and it isn't like Rhys Brennan helps any.

What makes it worse? Rhys is...aware of it, in a way. He can hear the stress and pressure in Sal's voice and maybe he likes to flirt and tease the smaller man, just to have he pleasure of Sal snapping back and even occasionally when Sal joins him. He wants to know more about Sal, wants to know why he's so odd and so...not human. And Rhys has always, unashamedly, been drawn to secret and rude little men.

Rivals to loves AU: Who takes their rivalry seriously, and who is half in it just to push the other’s buttons?

Rhys came into Eden's Fruit, eager to impress and find his place at a workplace where he could be appreciated. And maybe Rhys does want to be the best, because the best always have the most trusted positions and the best always get assured of their worth. Instead, Rhys has Sal, who wishes to snark and play rivals, who thinks it's funny how much Rhys seems to care about being the best.

Its funny to tease and watch the taller man grow frustrated, funny as shit to flirt shamelessly while Rhys flushes and scowls. The other man doesn't seem to have that same sense of fun that Sal had beaten into him. Rhys just needs a good kiss and a shove off the highest balcony so Sal can rip that sense of terror away and not remember the fact that he shared it so strongly once.

Enemies to lovers AU: Which one switches sides? 

Aspherane and Earth come to a clash and it's something everyone should have seen coming. Sal knows it's his part to leave Earth and go to the one place that won't one day kill him, just as Rhys knows that he should stay in Krakoa, the mystical island where everything should be safe and fine. Really, it's for the best that they stay apart and in their own separate world of shifting darkness and varied powers. The heavens and Earths were never really meant to mix.

So why do they still meet up? Like some sort of fucked up version of Romeo and Juliet in Sal's opinion, but it isn't like he can even think of not meeting up with Rhys in secret. Aspherane and Krakoa are meant to be their paradise and yet Sal won't ever stop thinking about simply meeting up with Rhys again and being able to kiss the other man. He considers trying to find a way to escape all of it, whether its beyond the stars or unde the Earth, where hell and demons reign strong.

Soulmate AU: Who is eager to meet their soulmate? Who absolutely does not want to meet their soulmate? 

Rhys used to want to meet his soulmate. Key word used to. Years of being locked away shut down those thoughts. Better to not care about any soulmate than to hurt himself with facing someone who won't think he's good enough for them. It's a big difference from Sal, who looked over himself every day, hoping to find any mark or symptom of a Soulmate, to prove that he was human enough and to prove that maybe he was still good enough to at least have one.

And then he meets Rhys and the taller man us everything Sal wants, he bares the mark of the soul that can only mean he belongs to Sal, only...he's spoken before about how much he didn't want a soulmate. Rhys wanted Sal, not whoever was supposedly written up for him by fucking fate of all things and now they're both stuck in an awkard position really; Rhys wants Sal and doesn't want a supposed soulmate while Sal wants Rhys but now thinks the man he loves doesn't want him. They don't even deserve to be called himbos.

Single parent AU: Which one is the single parent? (Alt. if they’re both single parents: Which one is open to starting a new relationship from the start? Which one is never planning on finding love again… Until they meet the other and are instantly smitten?)

Sal is...more than aware of the fact that maybe he should have told Rhys about his child before inviting him to come live with him. But then again, why should he have to tell Rhys? If Moonie likes him so much, then Moonie can deal with his Starling. The rules are simple and it definitely helps keep a barrier up in case things go to shit.

Unfortunately, Sal didn't account for the fact that Rhys adores him enough to adore his Starling, the only other part Sal has that's enough like his own and how could Rhys resist wanting to protect someone just like Sal? Ugh, he became a dilf though emotions and Sal isn't happy about his newfound attraction for the fact that Rhys is the only one who can seemingly handle a half alien and a quarter alien child, but damn if he doesn't get buzzy when watching Rhys interact with the brat.

Doctor AU: Which one is the longsuffering doctor? Which one is the patient? 

Rhys isn't...entirely sure what to make of the new patient in his institute, but Sal's angry scremaing and the way he quietly clings to Rhys at times means more to him than he would ever let on when trapped in such a dangerous place. Still, he tries to enjoy the brief moments he has between Blue and Sal while he can still get them.

And eventually they all get out. Blue dies and Rhys is grief torn and everyone leaves. Everyone except Sal, who was on his way to dying himself from the constant fluorescent lights. Rhys's constant darkness pulls him through though and now? Now Rhys is all he has and he saved him in more ways than one. Sal won't ever be Blue and that stings constantly, but the very least he could do is keep his feelings behind his teeth while doing what he can to keep him and Rhys alive.

Bodyguard AU: Who is the bodyguard? Who are they protecting? Which one is secretly pining for the other? 

Rhys is...not entirely sure how to deal with the little brat he's been assigned to guarding. Sal is apparently some fancy alien...explorer? Ambassador? All Rhys knows it that Sal tends to use more than just his words to charm high assed men of Earth and never seems to fully realise the danger he puts himself in. It doesn't help the fact that Sal is...exceptionally cute and often expects Rhys to do certain customs that fluster him terribly and Sal has no idea why.

And really, what's so odd about asking your bodyguard to get in the bath with you? To help with your safety and self care? Sal knows that maybe it's a little odd, but how can he trust someone with his life if they haven't seen him when vulnerable? It's so dumb and that's exactly why he's fine of sleeping in the same bed as Rhys ans eating together. Not to mention that his bodyguard is....very fucking cute in his suits and the way his voice sounds rougher in the early mornings.

Pirate AU: Who is the pirate? Who is the member of the royal family who did not sign up for this? 

I uh. Since were already doing this......Persephone and Hades au instead???

Rhys is....aware that his parents hated him, thought him to be evil and even he sees the irony of being a reborn Greek god of death when he's Irish. Getting out of the asylum was easier though and Rhys is grateful thay he cannot be held down as Kronos once did to him. Now Rhys travels looking for his reborn queen, whether she stays as she is or decides to be his husband or monarch of life.

And just as, Sal knows he was reborn oddly. Knows that flowers and Greek summers run through and that was enough for his Demeter to cast him out into the wild winters. Sal knows he should find his Hades, knows that a part of him aches for blooming spring and being able to kiss the person he loves primally. But Sal knows he bares the name from Maiden to Chaos Weaver and then it is his task to take, to perhaps hide from Hades and to save this reborn form of his husband from having to he stuck with him.

Then Rhys moves in and uh. Sal's kinda fucked, you know?

Childhood best friends AU: Which one was super obviously in love with the other the whole time? Who was oblivious until they were older?

How can Sal NOT be smitten with Rhys? The older boy is pretty and speaks funny and he always looks happy to see Sal, which is great because Sal likes his brother and sister, but he likes Rhys differently, like how Pap an' Mamné do. Rhys likes Sal too, but he doesn't ever seen to be aware of the way Sap clings to him and the manner of the kisses that get pressed to his cheeks, doesn't see the way Giles and his own parents narrow their eyes at it.

Then the institute happens and Sal's heart gets torn from him as Giles kicks him out. He's torn for years as he searches for Rhys and gets torn more when Cecil crushes and loves him sickly. By the time he finally meets Rhys...well, it's a big What If as to whether Rhys can truly stand someone whose been as ruined as he has, whose pale and scowls and flirts so horribly with anyone else but the reminder of his heart.

[callmearcturus]

in conclusion: marry me persephone

i just on a whim relistened to the entire original concept album and i think on some level it still trumps the 2017 live recording, though the delineation between Concept Album vs Musical is important to keep in mind.

some thoughts.

2010 “Hadestown” Concept Album

eurydice was always the real protagonist of the story, not orpheus, but at least in this version orpheus isn’t a kind of useless husband, which deeply annoys me in the expanded story. bon iver’s vocals sell the entire concept of “the boy who could sing so beautifully he softened the hearts of the gods of the underworld” more than any of the other orpheuses. i think i might just really dislike the much higher register they sing with.

i discovered “Hadestown” bc I was a baby gay and was going through my requisite ani difranco phase, and there is something about the way she sings, the way she pitches down at the end of certain words and lines, that is indelibly imprinted on my mind, and i love her. she is a very different persephone from the musical persephone, but i remember wearing the fuck OUT of “Our Lady of the Underground”, and i still think this version of the song is the definitive, superior version. probably because i’m gay.

the complexities of hades and persephone’s marriage hadn’t been written yet at this point and their relationship is the much more traditional, equanimous marriage from the good legends. that said, “How Long?” is incredibly good and sexy

ultimate strengths: better narrative structure without the Misplaced Focus of the later versions, Ani Difranco’s amazing whiskey cadence, the best orpheus

2017 “Hadestown” Live Off-Broadway Recording

having a full hermes helps the story immeasurably. it’s easy to tell a story with a narrator in place, and hermes is a fantastic one. there is enough personality there that he’s not just the space between the quotation marks, but not so much he unbalanced the narrative. which is good because uh

WOOF this is the issue i have with orpheus and with the hadestown musical, which is that it has this dissonance between orpheus as the protagonist vs literally everyone else. eurydice was a much stronger protagonist in the concept album, but here the Intro/Outro “Road to Hell” songs position Orpheus as the real hero of the tale, and he’s just...... not good at it, imo. eurydice’s conflict is by several leagues more sympathetic than his. i don’t give a shit about orpheus trying to take eurydice. i am super interested in her choices, her struggles, and how she navigates this world of gods and men. frankly i’m glad eurydice left orpheus because wtf was he doing, not helping with the winter? good for you eurydice, leaving him.

speaking of eurydice the Real Protagonist, the musical’s eurydice blows the original out of water. i adore her. she is so emotive and sympathetic and could have carried the whole thing herself.

back to the “wait who is our protagonist” problem: hades and persephone are the emotional core of this story and are more interesting by leaps and bounds. “Chant I” and “Chant II” are the best songs on the album, and “Wait for me?” “I will.” is the most compelling moment in the big finale, outside Hermes’ incredible singing. there is history and intrigue and complications to hades and persephone that orpheus just lacks. it leads to this narrative unbalance.

ALL THAT SAID I DON’T CARE BECAUSE I AM ACTUALLY JUST HERE FOR PERSEPHONE AND HADES. Persephone is infuckingcredible. yes my baby gay heart will always love ani difranco the most, but this persephone, this bitter passionate perma-drinking queen who spits fire and is allowed multiple times to sing UGLY AND VICIOUS, and who sounds like she’s slapping on that macy gray feel, she’s amazing. ten out of fucking ten, her rebuttal in “Chant II” with “that was in another time, that was in another world, whEN I WAS A YOUNG GIRL” hells fucking yesssss

hades, oh my god. i love hades. i though i wouldn’t because the musical takes hades from “vaguely bad guy” to full “disney villain hades is the Big Bad”. as a hades apologist, this would usually be a no sell for me, but hades is so delightful. he’s desperately in love with his wife, he’s a tyrant, he’s a workaholic, and his wife leaves for 6 months and he builds a factory because she is 90% of his impulse control, lololol. but the power behind hades is amazing. it’s hard to sell the shit he says in “Chant II” but he does through sheer booming bombastics.

i keep mentioning “Chant II” but listen. there’s a reason. it’s the best song on the album.

i do genuinely get verklempt at the end of “Road to Hell (Reprise)” when the music finally kicks in. also i love the detail where is sounds like Hermes is going “sigh. all right, all right,” and then gently blowing a wind to send eurydice back to hadestown. it’s very good.

ultimate strengths: EURYDICE, the “Chant” songs, hermes is here and good, hades is KILLER goddamn

2019 OBCR “Hadestown”

okay the hermes is great

otherwise why am i here

okay but for real there are just a lot of weird choices here that i don’t really understand, though i think i have a theory? to me, comparing the two and the changes made, what strikes me is that they added a LOT of extraneous stuff, like using a whole verse to say what two extremely well-written lines could have managed before. which might be needing to get that broadway length to the story, i guess. but just from an album listener standpoint, there is SO MUCH downtime where there wasn’t before, and i find it tedious.

also tedious: they seemed to have literally just slowed the tempo of a lot of songs, with sucks a lot of the energy out, especially when Orpheus Sings A Lalala Song interludes are still sooooooooooo slooooooow too, the balance feels off

SO HERE IS MY THEORY so they completely ruined “Chant II” in the OBCR like fucking took a hammer to it and wrecked it, and hades also sounds fucking awful in it, really BAD. my theory: they realized that the narrative was deeply unbalanced towards hades and persephone and eurydice, and instead of bolstering orpheus’ parts they instead reduced the others to compensate. which sure is A Choice To Make.

because look at those two points together. so they both slowed the entire musical down a bit while also cutting some of the best parts. instead, as a writer, my choice would have been to add shit to make orpheus more compelling and leave the tempo as is. so you get the runtime you want, get to keep the Good Good Shit, and get the orpheus you need.

and yet.

for real how the fuck do you remove Persephone’s rebuttal in “Chant II” i’m baffled. that song went from being the barn burner of the entire musical to being kind of pathetic.

for real, why are they rolling out the OBCR in waves? now that i’ve been kind of hideously disappointed by yesterday’s push i might just literally skip the rest and stick to the two other versions.

ultimate strengths: idk uh. i got nuthin.

oh they fixed how fucking ridiculous orpheus sounded at the start of “Wait For Me” in the 2017 version, with his “where is she? where is she? noooooooooo /cryface” and turned it into something listenable. kudos.

in conclusion: music is cool eh

[witchqueenofthemoon]

BODY AND SOUL Part 29 (Duncan Shepherd/Mackenzie Stone Millory AU)

BODY AND SOUL MASTERPOST

Author’s Note: Okay y’all...listen. I meant to get this part up yesterday, but the Met Gala ate my fucking soul. Billie and Cody finally together at an event since MONTHS AGO at Ryan Murphy’s Walk of Fame ceremony is a thing I have been waiting for...since then, which was back in November. NEEDLESS TO SAY I WAS KIND OF DISTRACTED. Cody looked like some kind of cerulean space prince, and Kenzie looked like a goddamn glitter princess barbie, and then they started screaming along to Cher together and I DIED and now I’m speaking to you from heaven. IT’S BEEN A HUNDRED YEARS SINCE WE GOT ANY COLLIE CONTENT. I was on cloud nine, and I still am. It’s the intense, magnetic chemistry between them that birthed Millory in the first place, and Millory, of course, birthed Duckenzie. The two of them so happy together after months of not seeing each other was just so incredibly wonderful, I feel so grateful to Leslie in particular. I still feel like I’m high off of all of it, but especially the two of them, who are just absolute royalty to me. AND NOW ON TO THE CHAPTER: This is a big one. I’ve been waiting for a long time to introduce Rosemary to all of you--who is (did you guess?) my Angela Basset/Marie Laveau AU. I’ve known for awhile that she was going to play an important role in this story, and it was as wonderful for me to meet her as it was for Duckenzie here. She’ll show up one more time before the end; and I might do a little one-shot eventually where they go to visit her in New Orleans. She makes a really mean gumbo. Her top is like this, her skirt like this, her headscarf, her boots, some of her necklaces: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5. A reminder that Kenzie’s dress in this part looks like this. The Fates, at least, my version of them (certainly based on the Moirai but also on the many incarnations of Hecate, as she bestows magical powers on Kenzie and Duncan, and on the witches in the AHS universe, and all witches in all universes, at least in my mythology), were always going to be the Triple Goddess, the Goddess many witchcraft practitioners (myself included) pay homage to: once again, the Divine Feminine energy that guides true goodness in the universe. Her mythology is partially my own invention (giving her a Heaven, making her the force of Light that fights against cosmic Darkness/the Devil, rather than a patriarchal god), partially in accordance to many witch beliefs. I loved that “god” appears to Michael in APOCALYPSE as a little girl; if anyone remembers that I put Ariana Grande’s GOD IS A WOMAN way back in Part 4 (cuz y’all, even then I had plans), you get a cookie. Duckenzie’s High Destiny has long been in the works in the grace notes of my story; it’s the cosmic energy of their union bringing a balance into their world. I’d need some weed to deal with the information they’re given, hence they smoke some weed. To finally have a chance to explain the way in which Duncan and Kenzie are Michael and Mallory was a big moment for me and for this fic; and to explain that she will always be his saving grace, too. I didn’t want to focus on sadness or despair regarding Duncan’s fate as Michael; rather the joy of the redemption of Duncan’s universe. I had to put WITCH-QUEEN OF NEW ORLEANS in this part as an homage to Rosemary being Marie Laveau in another life (also, it’s a fucking jam). Had to include a nod to Purity Ring’s BEGIN AGAIN in Duncan’s thoughts when he’s eating Kenzie out in this part, the most Millory song of all time to me. A reminder that this is the Demeter/Persephone illustration. This is the one of Selene looking down on Endymion. The excerpt Kenzie reads is indeed directly from the book. This chapter marks the closure of an important arc of my fic; from here on out, I’m moving forward into the last 1/3 of the story. As ever, your reblogs, comments, asks and edits (moodboards, playlists, aesthetics, everything) mean the world to me. If you’re reading, please take a minute to reblog the masterpost, thank you. 

The light was high when he finally woke; the day was half over, Duncan could tell immediately, before he even opened his eyes. We slept all morning. Oh god, that’s so fucking wonderful. I don’t remember the last time I slept all morning. Something had woken him, he knew with a vague knowledge. A loud sound.

His dream drifted off. I was in the woods, dirty, starving, tired, and a little girl was offering me an apple, but I wouldn’t take it for some reason...I was waiting for someone else...and he forgot it, moving up from sleep into the summer daylight. The room was balmy-warm, the golden sunlight past the window, coming from somewhere overhead, the wind drifting on the curtains again, the sound of a crow cawing outside somewhere over the lake. It was at least midday, but Duncan could smell the remnants of the hickory fire wafting through the window. It really was a good fire. And I made it. I pulled it out of my own heart, that fire.

There was a long, low buzzing--the doorbell, Duncan knew. Or rather, the bell for the front gate, the keypad and security feed downstairs beside the walnut-wood front door. Who the fuck could that possibly be. We didn’t tell anyone but Madeline where we were going. Maybe it is Madeline?

He stirred, his arm instinctively coming around Kenzie’s breast, his nose turning down into her hair; it smelled like the grass, the sun, her sweet sweat, and the residue of her rosy-jasmine shampoo. The bed was so wonderfully soft, the feel of her so exquisite--Duncan sent out jabs of resentment towards the sound that had woken him. How fucking dare you.

Kenzie stirred a little against him--he leaned up, brushing the hair from her cheek to kiss it. The buzz rang out again, low and insistent and bracing. Her eyes fluttered and she let out a little moan, turning her face up towards him.

“Dunny, what is that,” she murmured. “Turn it off.”

“It’s the buzzer for the gate, baby,” he replied, his own voice coming out in a groan. “Someone’s at the gate.”

Her eyes came open immediately at that. “What? Who?”

“I have no idea. Did we even tell anyone where the cabin is?”

“I didn’t. Did you?”

“No...I don’t think so…”

The buzzer rang again; Kenzie moaned, turning into him, burying her face in his bare chest. How fucking dare you, he thought again, bringing his face down, kissing beside the dip of her eye. How dare you make me get out of bed, away from her. Who could have possibly found us? He hesitated for a long moment, contemplating staying and letting whoever it was ring the buzzer until they got tired and went away--but no, he thought, with a twinge of precognition. It’s someone important. It’s someone we have to see. Oh god, I hope it isn’t Annette.

Duncan got up, pained to move away from her, sliding over the softness of the bed. He trod naked to his suitcase, feeling Kenzie’s eyes on him, her eyes falling down to the half-hardness of his sleepy cock, a pout around her mouth. We came out here to get away from everyone, and still, someone found us. Somehow. Fuck. He pulled on briefs and another pair of jersey shorts, these in dark black, and one of the plain black tee shirts, ruffling a hand through his hair, and yawned.

The buzzer. Again.

“Fuuuuck,” he breathed. “Who the fuck is that?”

“If it’s Annette, I’m going to freak out,” Kenzie said, and Duncan watched her affectionately as she kicked her legs under the soft covers in frustration. He glanced at an elaborate golden-framed clock, beside one of the laurels. It was 12:17 PM. Fuck, it’s past noon. We slept for a long time. Fuck it. We earned it. We had a perfect day yesterday, full of wonders, and a perfect, long sleep. And now what--now what.

“I’ll be right back, baby.” Duncan hesitated, then winked at her. Fuck it. I’ll move through space again. Why not. He closed his eyes and grinned as he heard Kenzie’s delighted hum towards him, felt her knowledge at what he was about to do. That’s it, Dunny, show me your magic. Then her laugh cut off--he ached at the loss of it--and before he opened his eyes again, he already knew he was downstairs, facing the inside of the front door.

There was a small iPad beside the door here, the intercom below it and remote buttons for opening and closing the gate. Duncan tapped the tablet with a finger, and the security camera feed came up, facing the outward side of the road. There was a red Toyota Camry parked there, and the woman in the front seat was pressing insistently at the buzzer--he heard it ring again through the house, heard the far-away sound of another exasperated groan from Kenzie upstairs. He couldn’t see the woman’s face very well from this angle, but he could see the chocolatey color of her skin as she extended an arm through the car window. Her nails were long and red.

Duncan switched the cameras; now the one on the feed was from straight above the outside buzzer the woman was pressing so incessantly. Now he could see into the driver’s seat clearly. He didn’t recognize the woman at all, but she was stunningly beautiful; she had sharp, slanting cheekbones, pursed in impatience, full lips in deep mauve, a dark silk titian-colored scarf wrapped around her head. Her eyes flashed out at him through the camera; they were dramatically intense and bright, brimming with secret knowledge. Her skin was warm cocoa-brown, and flawless. Duncan shivered.

Who are you?

He pressed the talk button on the program’s interface, puzzled, frowning.

“Can I help you?”

The woman started; Duncan saw her jerk back in her seat, surprised. Her expression shifted from frustration to one that seemed to be relief--it was difficult to tell on the feed, but she seemed tired, as though she’d been waiting for a long time, or had missed sleep, her expression drawn. As he watched her on the iPad screen, she pressed a hand between her eyes, then lifted her palms together skyward, as if in a silent prayer of thanks.Then she leaned over and spoke into the intercom.

“Praise be to Her, is this Duncan Shepherd?”

Duncan balked. Fuck. Shit. They found us. Someone found us.

“May I ask who you are and what your business here is?”

“I know that’s you, I can feel that it’s you, honey--and I can feel Mackenzie Stone here, too. I need you to let me in. I drove almost 17 hours with some very poor sleep in between to get here from New Orleans, pulled by the Will of the Goddess with a forceful hand, because She wants me to speak to you two and tell you what She told me, that the time is upon us. Now, if you would be so kind, I am starving and would appreciate some breakfast, and I need to park this car before I crash it into a tree, blue eyes.”

“How did you find us? We didn’t tell anyone where we were going. We’ve been here for a day--”

“Sugar, honey, listen, I told you. The Goddess. Sent. Me. She came to me and She told me where you were and She told me everything. It’s gonna take awhile to tell you everything, so you best let me in and make me some eggs and some black coffee and roll me a big joint of that strong blue weed I know you got.”

What the fuck.

“Who are you?”

The woman let out a long sigh, rolling her eyes, dipping her chin up, then turned back to the intercom, enunciating with a pointed impatience.

“I am Her Hand, and She sent me, and Her will is to reveal your High Destiny. My name is Rosemary Antigone Delacroix, and you, Duncan Malcolm Shepherd, best let me the fuck in.”

Her words came like a heavy weight against Duncan’s mind, a pressing hand squeezing on his heart. This woman was powerful; he could feel her power from here, surrounding him, pressing against him, running along the edges of his skin, brushing the sleep from his mind, stoking him wide awake. This woman is a seer, a priestess. She can see things that are happening, have happened, will happen. She’s the one who was coming--the thing on the horizon that we felt on its way. And now she’s here. It’s her destiny to come to us, it’s our destiny to receive and hear her. Okay, Fates. I get it. I’m picking it up, loud and clear. Shit.

Duncan double-tapped the button beside the intercom; OPEN GATE.

He watched the beautiful woman through the screen; she smiled, her teeth shining out from her face--he could see her eyes flash, marvelously clear despite the smallness of the iPad screen.

“Blessed be,” she said, pushing a pair of large dark sunglasses over her eyes. Then she laughed, and the laugh sent a shiver up Duncan’s spine; it was lit with a bright joy that seemed to descend from the top of his head down into every part of his body, a tingling, vibrating energy charged with prophecy. It’s here. She’s here. The thing that was coming has arrived.

He turned away from the intercom and ran up the stairs, taking them two at a time; his heart was hammering and he felt far too nervous, suddenly, to try to use his still-mysterious power once more.

“Kenz,” he called as he reached the landing, sprinting down the hall. Something was lifting him up now; kindling his excitement, pitching his nerves to a high place. “Baby--” He ran through the bedroom doorway, skidding to a stop, falling onto the bed on his knees. Kenzie was sitting up now, clutching the blanket against her naked torso, her chestnut-light hair tangled around her shoulders, staring at him with an apprehension in her sleepy eyes; then she saw his face, lit with that strange excitement building in his gut, and smiled at him, nervously.

“Dunny, what? Who was it? What is it?”

“Kenzie, it’s--I don’t know who she is, but it’s her. The one that was coming. The one we felt. You know? She’s the one. She’s beautiful, Kenzie. She’s a medium--or something, I can feel it. You know how we were talking about going to see a psychic? Well--I think she came to us. She felt us. Kenzie, she said she just drove here for 17 hours from New Orleans. She said her name is...Rosemary. Something. She said--fuck, Kenzie, she said The Goddess sent me, She told me where you were--”

His words were tumbling out at break-neck speed--he slid over the softness of the bed to grasp Kenzie’s (beautiful, tiny, beloved) hands, and he could see the uncertainty in her gaze bleeding out into the excitement he felt.

“Duncan--really?”

“Really, my love. Oh, fuck. Really.”

Kenzie let the blanket fall away from her, and Duncan couldn’t stop himself--he clutched at her, under the sweet roundness of her little breasts, pulled her against him, immediately devouring her mouth in a kiss that flooded his body with tingling energy. Her divinity washed over him--the tide of her. Mackenzie Stone. We’re here, at the doorway, our Fate is on the other side. I’m not afraid. You’re here with me.

“I found you,” he murmured into her lips. “I found you, I found you, we’re here, we’re here together, I’m ready--”

“Oh, baby--” and Kenzie was kissing him breathlessly, her smell the sweetest thing in all the world, roses crushing into him. Duncan leaned away to look at her; Kenzie’s eyes were gold-flecked and infinitely bright, and her beauty was iridescent in the noon sunlight winking through the curtains. Mackenzie Shepherd, angel of my life, the part of me that was cut away, the fixed, irrevocable light of my soul.

“She said she has a lot to tell us. She’s coming now, she’s probably almost at the door. I’m going to make us all some breakfast. She knew things, Kenz, I don’t fucking know--I feel like she knows everything about us. You’ll see. Even through the screen I could feel her power. It was coppery-purple, like a sheen all over her...come downstairs when you’re ready, okay, baby? Take your time. I can feel it, can you feel it?”

“Yes, baby, yes. I can feel it so much I can hardly breathe.” Tears were in her eyes; he kissed her again, and Kenzie clung to him, her softness overwhelming to him, and for a moment he wished he could throw her down into the bed, kiss every inch of her nakedness, every tiny secret place of her heart. Then they broke apart; Duncan knew as he could feel she did that the time was upon them, and his adorations would have to come later. 

The time when we find out who we really are.

Kenzie slid away from him towards the edge of the bed and he grasped her waist, helping her down--she stood there, naked and shivering in some phantom breeze, her golden hair falling down her back in a shimmering wave, then she kneeled to her suitcase, tucking the strands that fell into her eyes behind her ears, looking away from him, determined. Duncan gathered up the bag of weed, the lighter, his grinder and his gold pipe from one of the laurel mantels where they’d left it yesterday, then went to the door, looking back at her again for a moment, trailing a hand through the side of his hair.

“Kenzie, baby--”

“Dunny, I know. I know. Just go downstairs, okay? I’ll be there soon. I know. I feel it too.”

He nodded inside her gold-flecked gaze, then turned away, sniffing back the tears he felt coming, trying to stave them. I feel the hand of destiny, and oh Fate, it’s heavy. It’s fearsome to behold it, to contemplate its weight, this Thing, this knowledge we’re about to be given.

Duncan heard a sharp, determined knock on the door downstairs then, and his breath caught. He ran down the hall, throwing himself down the stairs; he reached the door, flipping the double turning locks in fumbling fingers, yanked at the long handle--as he pulled the door wide a burst of golden sunlight drifted over his eyes, caught in the dappled trees. He lifted a hand to shield his face, and saw the woman standing there, silhouetted in a golden shroud that was like a holy halo around her. A halo, like Kenzie’s, Duncan thought. And then he heard her laugh again--and her laugh was even more beautiful now that he was standing before her. A laugh the angels would sigh to hear.

She reached out for him--Duncan felt frozen inside her dark-bright eyes, intensely focused on him beneath arched, graceful brows, the sharpness of her cheeks glowing dark sienna in the sun. She was immediately imposing; regal, her posture graceful, her poise intimidating and unmistakable. Her mouth smiled that radiantly white smile he’d glimpsed through the iPad screen; his breath caught to see it in the flesh, struck by her majesty, the expression on her staggeringly beautiful features, knowing, wise, and expectant. Her burgundy-colored blouse had long, drifting sleeves that fluttered in the slight wind, and her long black skirt fell to her ankles with an intricate pattern of flowers and vines. On her feet were heeled knee-high boots in dark brown leather. Around her neck were what seemed to be a dozen necklaces, gold and silver chains mixed in with leather cords and multi-colored ropes of beads; a raven skull, the claws of unknown animals, the symbol of the waxing, full, and waning moons (like the one Kenzie has), the voluptuous shape of a woman, a huge pointed obsidian, and countless tiny quartz points.

“I see what she’s done to you, Evening Star,” she said, and Duncan felt his breath gasp, suddenly caught in his throat. That’s what Kenzie called me. Sword of the Evening Star. “Snatched you from the jaws of darkness in this world. And I am moved to see it. As I knew I would be. The time of your High Destiny has come.”

Her hand came around his; her touch was very warm and strong. As she stepped closer Duncan could smell myrrh and resin and musky vanilla. The urge of tears rose in him again--the woman clasped her other hand around his, so she was gripping it in both. Her face was about level to his chin in her heeled boots, and she looked up at him with an approving grace; she seems taller than me, though, he thought. The energy around her is so focused; so carefully, intricately controlled.

“What did you say your name was?” He asked, and heard the trembling in his voice.

“Rosemary Antigone Delacroix. High Priestess of Her Will. The Goddess, from whom all life in this universe flows; from whom the life in every universe flows. Mother of all, three-faced, infinite. Your mother, and mine, and the mother of the High Princess, the Hidden Sphere Herself, whom you are blessed to love. Infinitely blessed, sweet Prince, with whom you will heal this suffering world.”

Goosebumps broke out all over his skin, the tiny hairs on his arms and the back of his neck prickling instantly, wildly. I knew it. I felt it. That she’s divine. That she’s holy.

“Please, come in.”

Rosemary’s smile lingered as she stepped past him, scattering its light over him; she moved into the house, beyond the staircase, her steps determined, her movements refined, hands clasped together in front of her, through the front room and towards the kitchen. She seemed to know where it was without needing to ask him, and Duncan followed, mesmerized by her. As they reached the kitchen Rosemary sat at the wooden island, reaching out for his hand again--this time, he knew, for the one that held the weed. He passed it all off to her and she sighed; the sound of her voice was deeply lovely, but he could hear the tinge of tiredness.

“Make me some eggs, would you, sugar? I like ‘em a little runny, lots of butter. And some of that turkey bacon I know you have in the fridge there.” Duncan stared for a moment, blinking as she rolled a big bud in her fingers, then began to sprinkle it inside his grinder. She paused, looking up at him expectantly. “And a big-ass coffee. I’ll pack this bowl. All three of us are going to need some fortification for these revelations.  Don’t you worry, your seer is here. I know you’ve been waiting, I feel it in this house, you filled it with your hopes and dreams and your confusion as soon as you got here. I feel it on your skin. You two have power unlike any I’ve ever seen, but you haven’t learned how to control it yet, that’s for certain. It’s zooming around in this space like it’s been snorting cocaine.”

Duncan turned as if waking out of a dream to the fridge, pulling out the eggs, bacon, and a stick of butter, retrieving a frying pan from a line of them against the wall, listening to the smooth clarity of her voice. Her energy seemed to be settling into the kitchen--dusky purple, warm, steady. He could almost see it, the way he could see Kenzie’s gold sometimes. She was taking the edge off him--bringing him down to her calmness, her certainty.

“So...Rosemary. Who--what--how--” He went to the Keurig that sat on the counter, starting a cup, then brought a hand absently to his chin, looking back at her again. She was deftly packing the bowl to the brim, the smile still playing at the corners of her mouth. “How did you...what did She...”

The Goddess, triple-faced, infinite.

“Shhh, blue-eyed Prince. You need to take it slow. All of this--” she gestured around the kitchen, but Duncan knew she meant all of it--the cabin, the lake, the forest with the clearing of black oaks, the field open to the stars--”this place is potent, full of your power, like a power outlet for your magicks. It’s why they’ve been so strong since you got here. This is an in-between place, and anyone who has even a little bit of the power you two have can feel it. But for the High Princess and her sweet consort, it’s like being given an electric shock--one that goes on and on. It’s the reason your lusts have been so potent, too.”

Duncan blushed at that. Lately, mine always are.

She smiled at him, knowing, then lit the bowl and breathed deeply from it, blowing out in a satisfied stream, leaning back against the wooden island.

“Hoo, that’s some good rich people shit,” she hummed. “Ooph, that’s good. Just what I needed, Praise be to Her. Thank you, Mother.”

Duncan got to work on the eggs, carefully cracking two into the pan and slipping two sides of the bacon next to them, deftly pressing the edges of the egg whites with a steel spatula. The smell made his stomach immediately begin to rumble; she’s right, we definitely need to eat before we get into all of this. All...of what?

“You two.” He could hear Rosemary laughing a little now from where his back was turned. “You two have burst upon the world like a garden. The media was not prepared. The public was not prepared. The world is not prepared, but they will get prepared--real quick. The current of time has turned towards fortune. And that, my dear Prince, is a beautiful thing. Beautiful beyond words. That I have lived to see this time is a great blessing.”

“Rosemary, what do you mean? How did you find us here?”

“Wait for her. For the Princess. The little golden goddess. Then I’ll begin.”

Duncan pulled down a plate and slipped the eggs onto it, a little runny, glassy with butter as she had asked. He flipped the bacon to let it fry for a bit longer, and brought the plate over to Rosemary, who appraised him with power drifting in her gaze. She took it, her warm hand brushing against his again; he felt the current pass through them, felt her strength, the depths of her knowledge touch his mind.

“You’ve been manifesting powers here, have you? And before you got here, too.”

“Fuck, yes. Non-stop, practically. I’ve been--transporting myself with my mind. Teleporting? I don’t know what to call it.”

“Transmutation. Salire per spatium. The ability to move, magically, instantly, from one space to another, without physically occupying the space between.” Rosemary took another long puff from Duncan’s gold pipe, then sliced into an egg with her fork, dipping it between her very white teeth. “Mm, baby. Perfect. You can fry an egg for certain.”

“Yeah. Yes. And Pyrokinesis. That’s what it’s called, right? The ability to conjure fire.”

“Create, control, manipulate. All of it. You can do all of those, I guarantee it. Try it.” She nodded to the stovetop, which Duncan had turned on manually. The bacon was sizzling, done--Duncan took a deep breath, then drifted his fingers close to the element, concentrated. Go back now. Go back. The fire went low, blue-white, and then died--the stovetop began to cool instantly.

“Mm--mm-mm,” Rosemary hummed. “Lovely. I can do a little myself, but nothing so smooth as that. That’s lovely. And I can only imagine what she’s been doing.”

“It’s so beautiful, Rosemary. She is so beautiful. I can’t even tell you…”

“You’re biased, baby blue, but I’m sure you’re right. Any other things you’ve found out you can do?”

“She can sense my emotions over long distances...I found out something I hadn’t known the other day that really upset me, and she felt my emotions even though we were on opposite sides of the city. And...we can read each other’s thoughts. You’re the first person who knows that, and I don’t even know who you are. But...yeah. It’s like colors--she looks and feels like gold...she says mine is blue. I can kind of see mine, sometimes, if the emotion is really strong. Now that she’s here. I couldn’t...I couldn’t do any of this before. Before we met.”

Duncan brought the bacon over to Rosemary’s plate and slid it down from the pan. She immediately dipped a graceful hand to it, blowing on it, crunching it in her teeth. He brought her coffee over, starting one for Kenzie now. “I can hear little bits of other people’s thoughts now sometimes, when they’re really strong. I think Kenzie can do it almost all the time. And she can heal people--their bodies, their hearts, their anger. It looks like gold when she does that, too. She can sort of...press it into people, like she’s wrapping them in a blanket.”

He started more eggs in the pan, silent for a little while as Rosemary sipped her coffee. Then he went on.

“Two nights ago there was a Gala--”

“The Shepherd Freedom Foundation Gala, everyone knows that, honey,” Rosemary cut him off. “You two are on the front page of a lot of shit since yesterday.”

Duncan winced, plating the other eggs and getting to work on more bacon. “Really? We turned our phones off before we left. We really wanted to just get away for a few days. It’s been...really intense since Kenzie and I found each other. The scrutiny’s been intense.”

“I understand, Duncan. When my task is done--that is, to tell you your destiny--I’ll be gone, for I have many duties, and you will have a little more time to be alone together. But the Goddess told me what to do, so I’m doing it. When She speaks, everyone best listen. Let me give you a warning. When the two of you go back--back to DC, I mean--the world will have changed. As if time opened a new window. You are on the path now, one heading towards a bright future, not just for you and Mackenzie, but for this universe. There are many--universes, I mean. Not all of them are kind, or light, or good, some of them have no light, and some have a depth of both. This universe has much darkness, but like clouds parting from the sun, your union here will bring transcendent light. As there is a balance of greater darkness in other universes, this one will swing to the light. A major obstacle will have passed when you return, but there will be a new onslaught of attention focused on you and Mackenzie. You will need to be her sword at every turn; you will bow to her light and others will follow your example. So gather your strength.”

Duncan’s head was pounding. What does any of that even mean? Other universes?

“Are you talking about...quantum theory? Like, parallel universes?”

At that moment Duncan heard a soft sound in the doorway--he looked up to see Kenzie coming into the kitchen on bare feet. She was tucking her chestnut-golden hair behind her ear, her face nervously turned down, eyes huge, fingers at her mouth; she wore a floor-length white linen dress, covered in a print of pale pinkish roses, with a dipping neck and short, puffed sleeves. The Tiffany moon glinted at her throat; as she moved her arm the Cartier bracelet flashed there in gold and diamond. Rosemary had turned to her, and Kenzie’s eyes were wide on the other woman. God she’s so beautiful so beautiful so powerful I can feel her lovely power like a field of a thousand violets, like the water flowing out from the sea...Duncan could hear Kenzie’s thoughts falling out of her in a long stream.

Rosemary’s face was cast into an immediate affection--a curious wonder. Her mouth dipped open, away from the black coffee cup which had been poised at her mouth a moment before, and she sighed; the sigh of relief that comes after a long, anticipatory wait.

“Child. Sweet child of heaven.”

“Hi,” Kenzie whispered. She stopped in front of Rosemary, and the woman reached out her beautiful dark fingers. Kenzie slipped her small hands against Rosemary’s; Duncan felt speechless, his heart feeling crushed by the moment, his eyes immediately blurred by tears.

“I am Rosemary Delacroix, and I am a mouthpiece for Her, the three-headed, the absolute, the Goddess. She has many names. Time. The universe. God. Goddess. Fate. Destiny. But she is the one who brought all life to be, kindled it, nurtured it, tended to it. She is the one who remakes life, rebuilds it, cycles it through every age, in every place, in every aspect. She made me; she made you and your sweet blue-eyed Prince from the stars burning like these diamonds, many eons ago.” Rosemary’s finger drifted to the bracelet; her dark eyes glanced up at the one on Duncan’s wrist, knowingly, and he shivered. “She made the thread that tethered you together, Mackenzie Stone and Duncan Shepherd, long ago, before she made Time, because you, sweet High Princess, asked her to. You loved him; you asked to be together always. And she granted your wish. Because you were--you are--beloved in the sight of heaven. You are a High Princess of Her Body, and of the Garden. You are the Hidden Sphere.”

Long, aching tears fell from Kenzie’s cheeks--she glanced over to Duncan, biting her trembling lip, her thoughts crushed gold. I do love him. I do love you, Duncan, more than anything. I do love you. I love you. This woman knows--knows I’m divine, the way you said you knew. The way I can feel it, now, and I can’t find the words.

“It’s fine to cry, honey. It’s fine. You cry as much as you want, mmhm? Come sit with me, angel baby. You come sit with me and let me bask in your sweet light. I can feel it now, like taking a bath in a pool of gold. Goddess, praise be. That’s just fucking lovely. Praise be to Her. She made the masterpiece, sweet sugar, in you--that gold, like a waterfall. What a soul.”

“Duncan’s the one who looks like a masterpiece to me,” Kenzie was laughing a little through her tears, settling down on the bench next to Rosemary, who had dipped a long arm under Kenzie’s elbow to steady her. Duncan brought Kenzie’s breakfast over to her, trying to hide the tears on his cheek with a swift hand--she looked up at him, biting her lip, nodding. “Thanks baby,” she whispered. I love you so much, he heard her thought. I’m not afraid.

“What do you mean, asked to be together always?” Duncan said, his voice trembling. “Are you saying there’s a goddess...that controls the universe, and Kenzie is...what, her daughter?”

Rosemary looked at him for a long moment, her eyes staggering with depth. For a time Duncan felt lost, mesmerized inside them; like the whirling gold galaxies he’d seen in Kenzie’s eyes in the dream, or the blue nebulas she said she saw in his, he felt he could see violet supernovas, cascades of cosmic dust in Rosemary’s gaze for a moment. Something infinite and eternal. Something constant, and huge beyond imagining.

“Make yourself some breakfast first, Duncan. You’re going to need something in your stomach before we really begin. I want both of you to know right now--there is much to tell. It will take some time. My heart is full of all of it. I need your strength, my dear one, to help me tell you everything.” Rosemary pulled Kenzie’s hand into her lap again, gripping it with strong fingers. Kenzie was nodding--a silent, secret thought seemed to pass between them, one Duncan could not see or hear in his mind. He felt immediately frustrated to be cut off from them; then he heard Kenzie speak to him alone in gold waves: be patient, baby, beloved, be patient, okay? Take a breath, the kind you showed me after my nightmare, when you held me so sweetly.

Their eyes met; Rosemary’s gaze shifted between them. Okay baby, Duncan thought, breathing in through his nose, holding it, breathing out. He turned back to his eggs, his stomach in knots.

“To be near both of you gives me strength already.” Rosemary’s face clouded with emotion; she seemed close to tears, and raised the coffee cup to her face again to gather her composure. “The Goddess has made all things in perfect balance, the light and dark, the day and night, and both of you--the perfect balance of these things, the great duality of her creations. To be here with you is to behold her Wonders. Eat, child.” Rosemary gestured to Kenzie’s plate, and Kenzie nodded, picking up a piece of the bacon, biting into it. Duncan brought his own breakfast over to the island, and sat carefully, across from her, reaching out his hand. Kenzie took it, her eyes wildly bright.

My heart feels like it’s going to burst, Dunny, she thought.

Mine too, my sweet Kenzie. Oh, god. Goddess. Whoever is listening. The Fates who have been guiding us…

“Rosemary,” Duncan said, looking into the woman’s dark eyes. “Since we met, I keep going back to this one image, of the Fates, you know, like in mythology--Clotho, Lachesis, Atropos. I keep seeing them in my mind’s eye, seeing them weaving this thread for us, the one that brought us together. Does that mean something?”

Rosemary finished the food on her plate, sighed a little, contentedly, and brought his gold pipe up to her lips again, breathing deeply. She dipped a hand under her chin, her eyes taking on a serene expression.

“It’s Her. She is the Fates. The Goddess--She has three faces. Many know Her by them, and worship Her in these aspects, She has many names. She is three-headed in that way; She is never totally the same from one moment to the next. When She came to me this time, She was very young and beautiful--Her skin like the tanned sand under a long sun--Her eyes bright in unbroken joy, her body smooth. But She does not always appear this way. Her aspect is ever-changing, the color of Her skin, Her hair, Her eyes, Her face; when I see Her, I feel it is Her, for She never appears the same. Sometimes She is very old, and sometimes She is a mother, her belly swollen, and sometimes She is not a woman at all, not entirely--She is some other great thing, made of stars and strange matter. I’ve seen Her this way, in dreams.”

She passed the pipe to Kenzie, and Kenzie took it in her small hands, head dipping to breathe in from it. Kenzie was still crying--Duncan’s fingers slid over her palm, sending the strongest wave of comfort he could into her. I love you, baby, I love you, everything is okay, everything’s going to be okay, better than okay…

“The Fates are her aspects--all three are Her. You thought of them because you thought of Her--because you knew, you know it was She who brought the two of you together. Your destiny--the High Destiny, as it has been called--was written when the stars were new. Mackenzie Stone, you are the High Princess of her Heaven. You were an Angel, once, Exalted; there is no earthly word for what you were, but an Angel is the closest word to it. You were the most divine of all. You were loved above all by Her in her heaven; and you still are. I know you feel that, child. I know you know you were loved so. And that you are loved--so much. Her eyes have looked down on you from her heaven and thought Beloved, for millions of years.”

“Yes,” and Kenzie was crying earnestly, her lips trembling as she spoke, shoulders shaking, eyes awash in tears. “Yes, Rosemary, I know. I can feel it.” Duncan gripped her hand tightly, aching to hold her; her fingers clutched him, like he was her only tether in a vast ocean.

“Before conceivable time, you fell in love.” Rosemary nodded to Duncan. “You fell in love with him. Listen to me, Duncan: you too were an Exalted being, an Angel, like Mackenzie. They called you the Sword of the Evening Star, as She has told me. You were a Knight--like a Knight, a Prince in the service of Their holy protection--of Her Holy Court; the fairest of all of her Knights, who are very fair indeed, fair beyond earthly eyes. There is a great Darkness in the universe--in the pantheon of universes. It aches to snuff out the light of Her Heaven, the love that dwells there. Some call it the Devil; Satan; Lucifer. He--It--has many names. But It is mostly the Darkness; the energy that must juxtapose her Light. It wishes, eternally, to destroy Her. But her Knights hold it at bay; her fighters, her warriors, her faithful. In that age, you fought for Her Light, and prevailed many times. She loves you very much. She chose you from many to lead the protection of her Sphere; the Heaven she made, long ago. It is Hidden from that Darkness, made safe through the power of her Grace. Get me some water, Duncan, honey.”

Duncan stood, feeling dizzy, going to the fridge. A Knight for a Goddess. A Warrior Prince. He couldn’t even feel incredulous--he was beyond disbelief. Whatever Rosemary is saying is true, he knew. She knows everything--and she has to tell us. My inability to understand doesn’t make any of this impossible. It just makes my ability to conceive it inadequate.

“Each time you are reincarnated--yes, Mackenzie, reincarnated--” Rosemary said, as Kenzie let out a tiny gasp. “The Darkness, in His cunning, tries to get at you. Sometimes, He has succeeded. As there is Feminine energy in the universes, there is also Masculine energy; there is an endless battle of wills, balance of energies. Their duality is not fixed, rather it shifts and changes from universe to universe, age to age. Yes, Duncan, quantum theory, as it’s called--there are many parallel universes next to this one. Infinite universes, in fact, beyond our ability to conceive. A version of you--both of you--exists in each universe. And as there are many universes, there are many lives you have lived before this one, in this universe, as well. There is another life you have glimpsed here, a life you lived in the past--”

“The Mirror,” Kenzie said, softly. Her eyes were staring into Rosemary’s face, but Duncan could see that her thoughts were fixated on the vast golden Mirror he knew was resting silently in the penthouse bedroom, many miles away, a relic to a past that had been unknown to them until this moment. Frederick knew, he thought. He may not have totally understood, but he knew it was special, that it was magical, and that it was always ours.

“Yes, chickadee, sweet honey,” Rosemary sipped her coffee again, cradling it in her graceful red-nailed hands. “That Mirror belonged to you in another life--you were royalty then, a Viscountess, a powerful witch--that is, a seer for Her--at that time too, with many of the skills you are manifesting now. And in that time you found each other as well, but there was an accident; you both were murdered in the Revolution at that time, in the streets of Paris. And so time turned to another place, another page--and your spirits moved on. But the Mirror has magick. It’s no ordinary Mirror. There are strands of the Golden Sphere in it; strands of the divine instrument given to you by the Goddess, Mackenzie, when you were in her Heaven, in her embrace. A gift that symbolized her love, and her Heaven, which will always be your home. When you were cast to earth when the Law of Time was written, the Sphere fell with you, but it was mostly destroyed when the Darkness tried to rend it. What remained--the fragments left over--were made into the Mirror by one of her seers of old; a disciple of her Light, as I am. And so it will always find you in this world, too, for it cannot be destroyed until this world ends.”

Duncan was standing beside the fridge, still holding it open, the water glass poised in his hand, frozen in her words. Kenzie gaped at Rosemary with her mouth dipped open, her golden hair falling around her cheeks. Rosemary glanced between them, then beckoned to Duncan, and said.

“But that is the Law for the two of you. To exist, always, and find each other, always, into eternity, until the Law of Time is over, when you will return to the Sphere of her Grace. No one knows when that will be, or if it will ever be. That I do not know. I only see small bits and pieces of the future, and their shape is always strange to me.”

Duncan’s hand was shaking as he brought the glass he’d filled to Rosemary--but her hand was steady, and she smiled up at him, reassuringly. I think for now I just need to listen, and try to understand, he thought. I can’t even imagine anything to say. Just please hold my hand, baby.

Kenzie reached out again as he sat, twining her fingers through his tightly. She brought another slice of bacon to her lips, eating despite her tears. Duncan moved his fork to his plate, resolved to the same. They ate quietly as Rosemary went on. What else can we do.

“You met, as was meant to happen, in the Garden of All Delights, where the known universes were all born. It’s a very beautiful place--beautiful beyond all conceivable beauty to our pitiful human eyes. It’s made of colors--oh, colors you can’t imagine.”

Those colors I saw in my dreams.

“Like this universe, Duncan, when you laid eyes on Mackenzie there, the first time, you knew she was your love for all time. There you stayed together for eons by our measure of time. The Goddess saw, and She smiled to see your perfect happiness--the selflessness of your love for Her Princess, Her Joy, Her Golden Child, and Her selfless love for you, the perfect embodiment of Her Grace. Your Names, in that perfect state--there aren’t words for them. She didn’t tell them to me, and if She had I could not speak of them. But you know them, in your secret, hidden hearts. They are beyond all human language. I know She’s shown you the forms you had then in a dream--and so you know those forms are beyond human comprehension, nearly beyond description. Please know that those are your true forms. There is more time before you adopt them again, but someday you will return to them again. In some other age.”

Yes, Duncan thought; he knew. Kenzie with her white-gold hair with a thousand flowers, each one a universe. Her eyes like golden galaxies. Her clothing made of impossible geometry. Her wings inconceivable and more delicate than those of any beast on earth. He could feel Kenzie thinking similarly of what she had seen of him in her side of the dream; his long golden hair and eyes like blue nebulas floating in ether, his shining aegis, impossibly slender and delicate, the strange wonder of his own wings.

“When the laws of the universe, of Time, were written, it was dictated that you--you, Mackenzie, and you, Duncan, would always find each other. In every conceivable universe, and every conceivable age. The Goddess, infinite in Her wisdom and mercy, could not spare you from the Great Law--the law of pain, death, and rebirth--but She could ensure that as the cycle of all things goes on, you would find each other in perpetuity. That you would never long be parted from one another. And Her law has been proven true, as it ever was, in Her Grace. I promise you, in every time, in every age, in every universe, you’ve found each other; for the places in which you haven’t yet, you will. And each time either of you dies--for you have both died countless deaths, as I have, as every living soul has--the cycle begins anew. You cannot long be separated. The Old Law of your love--the Great Love, true as dawn--is known and honored for all time.”

“You mean--Rosemary, do you really mean--we’ll always find each other, no matter what?” Duncan clutched at Kenzie’s fingers as he spoke, looking between them.

“No matter what, I promise you. You were the first Soulmates; in your love was written the Law.”

Duncan took the golden pipe from Kenzie’s hands, which were shaking like leaves in caught in a strong wind--he could see his own shaking too, but felt strangely removed from them, lost in the incomprehensibility of Rosemary’s words. He lit the bowl, breathing deeply, holding the smoke inside his lungs for a long moment--it settled into them, and he breathed out, counting. 1, 2, 3, 4...he handed the bowl, still lit, to Kenzie, who breathed from it again. Her tears seemed to dissipate, soften, her shaking fading into calm stillness.

“Rosemary, can we go outside? There’s a gazebo out there--it’s lovely. We can look at the lake. I think Kenzie needs some fresh air.” Kenzie glanced at Duncan with eyes filled with overwhelming affection as he said this. Rosemary nodded, her aspect calming, soothing, and seemingly unbothered by the weight of her words. This is truly a woman of exquisite power. “You bring that bowl, honey.” She reached for Kenzie’s hand and helped her up.

They all made their way out onto the deck and down the stone path, to where the gazebo lay in the pleasing solitude of the early afternoon. Duncan could see a flock of ducks swimming on the surface of the middle of the lake, beyond where the canoe creaked with a pleasant rhythm; there were more clouds in the sky today than yesterday, but it was still bright and warm, the breeze present again. Rosemary helped Kenzie onto one end of the long couch; Kenzie’s face was pale and her hands still seemed to be trembling. Rosemary moved to the other end, and Duncan knew innately she was leaving them space. Space to be together; to hold each other. He felt a wave of gratitude wash out from him towards the beautiful seer, this woman who had appeared as if out of thin air, by magic, in a car that had driven for an entire day, from thousands of miles away, to tell them impossible truths. He felt Rosemary’s drifting indigo-violet energy come against his, and knew she acknowledged his secret power, and his gratitude, as he acknowledged hers.

He slid next to Kenzie, his arms coming around her tightly, his nose falling against her hair to breathe her in. Roses, vetiver, geranium. Her own underlying musk, the heady scent of her and her alone. Kenzie’s head fell against his chest, her arms gripping him at the waist. Kenzie, we’ll always find each other, no matter what. I could die, I could shout into the sky, I could cry and never stop crying. My heart is full of you. My happiness in this knowledge is absolute. Kenzie seemed beyond words, but the drift of her gold against him was so staggeringly lovely, so intense, he fought to breathe. My Persephone. Flower of the universe.

“Now. There’s a lot more She told me to tell you. Listen carefully, my sweet moon children,” and Duncan heard Kenzie’s thought, like a memory, two moon children in love--

“As I told you a little bit ago--there is a great Darkness in the universe, in the pantheon of universes. As She is older than Time, so is the Darkness. He--It--has a far-reaching hand. You know that Darkness in this world; but this world, unlike others, does not have the depth of power that allows it full sway. The magic in this universe is not as vast as it is in others; here it exists in the hidden aspects. Your coming together has brought some of that magic to life here, but it is finite, and it has limits. There are other universes where your power is stronger, but the Darkness is stronger in those universes, too.”

“We’ve been having these dreams...” Kenzie said in a small voice. The air seemed to be soothing her; the breeze ruffled her hair as Duncan’s hands drifted against its softness.

Rosemary was nodding. “The Darkness had you in its grip here, Duncan, and it was attempting to tighten that grip. Your family in this world, its notoriety, its intentions--they have long been conspiring with the Darkness, long been courting its gifts. Your adopted mother, your uncle; they have done terrible things in the name of their own desires, and they wished to drag you into the shadows with them. They almost succeeded; you were almost fooled. But the Old Law prevailed, as it always does, one way or another. That Law is Love; that Law is Mackenzie; that Law is your High Destiny. The Goddess knew that your love would defeat that Darkness every time. And it always will. The Law she wrote is strong and it will hold. But the means by which it holds is never clear until you meet.”

Rosemary had brought her water glass out with them, and sipped at it for a moment, pausing. Her face turned to the lake; as she gazed at it, she smiled, but her smile had some sadness threaded into it. It was a smile that knew the bittersweet taste of life--knew the balance was impregnable.

“There are universes where your ending is not a happy one, I’m afraid. Despite finding each other, you don’t always get to be together this way. You suffer acutely in some; you die. But the death is written too--the death comes at your own hands, or you die together. It’s the Law; if you cannot be together, you must begin again, which means you first must be taken out of that time, the obstacle therefore removed. Duncan, I must tell you; there are universes where the Darkness claims you. And in some of them, in some of those lives, you cannot be saved but through death.”

Duncan felt a heavy hand settle on his heart--felt the breath drift out of his body as he gasped for air. Kenzie held him closer, and he heard the tiny sound of her sob against him. Oh baby, sweet Kenzie, please don’t cry so. Don’t cry for me that way. I love you. Here, we’re together. Please don’t cry. It breaks my heart into a thousand pieces.

“Is that what the dreams mean?” he asked, cradling Kenzie’s shivering body against his. He felt the terrible heat of her tears soaking through his shirt, her face turned into him, hidden, overcome.

“Yes. They are another life. Another universe. One where your ending is not a happy one. One where Kenzie’s love saves you; as it did here, as it ever does; but not to such happy ends, I’m afraid. It’s just one example of the window of infinite lives you have lived, lives you are living as we speak, in other places, in other universes. That life, that universe, is particularly potent. The magick there is much stronger than the magick here. It encircles that world like a dense fog; it surrounds it and seeps into everything. There you have powers beyond imagining, both of you. The power to raise the dead. The power to turn time backwards. The power to change the shape of things; things that should otherwise be immutable. Or destroy them entirely, completely--utterly.”

“Blue butterflies out of rose petals,” Kenzie whispered. “You making snow, Duncan.”

“Yes,” he whispered against her hair. You, Kenzie, blood on your mouth, turning back time.

“The power to travel to Hell, even, Descensum; to the pit of Darkness. Because there, Duncan, you are a being of Darkness. In that world, you are Michael, the Son of Darkness--in that world, the Darkness claimed you when you were born into it, and the Goddess cannot reach you. There, you are a powerful conjurer, a warlock, and Kenzie--Mallory, as you are called there--you are a powerful witch, in fact, the most powerful of all witches in that world, more powerful than the witches of any other world. A Supreme. Kenzie does not save you in life in that world, however; but through your death. So it is written.”

Duncan felt unable to speak; I think I knew that. I think I knew, when I had that dream on the beach, the dream where I was dying, and grandma told me to go to Hell. And Kenzie was there, her hair dark on her shoulders, she was that other version of herself, the Mallory self, and she held me, and I died.

“My nightmare,” Kenzie burst into a sob again, the wail in her voice making Duncan bury his face, his eyes closing, against her hair, making his heart clench until he felt as though he would suffocate in the agony of her sadness. “My nightmare. That man with your face, Duncan--that man was you in that place, that man was you, consumed, that was real, oh, no, oh no, no--”

Duncan couldn’t think, couldn’t speak; could only hold her, his heart pressed down with the depth of her sadness, determined to hold her as long as she needed him to. Even for that other me, the depth of her grace is staggering. The immensity of her love. I feel lost inside it; it’s the greatest thing I’ve ever felt. Whatever darkness is in me, no matter where I am, who I am, it’s nothing next to her light. I know that. Absolutely. I’d die a thousand times for you, Mackenzie Stone, High Princess of Heaven. A million times. I’ll die for eternity to be with you for just a moment. That, I promise you. I swear it. I will worship and love you endlessly, as I promised to, when we were Exalted--as we will be again one day. I know I will always recognize your soul.

“Sweet golden child of Her Grace,” Rosemary said, staring at Kenzie with violet, soothing warmth. “Do not despair--there is no need for it. You save him in every world. Your love is what saves him. Reach out with your heart into every hidden place. You know it’s true. There is no place your love cannot reach him. And death is not the end. In her Will, it is never really the end. And here--” Rosemary gestured out onto the lake, to the sky beyond. “Here, in this world, in this life, you’ve been infinitely blessed. In this world, you get to be together; truly together. And not only that. Not only have you found each other, basked in each other, found a haven hidden from the eyes of the world in which to feed each other in power and affection. In this world you have been given even more, for the Goddess does not take away in one world what she doesn’t bestow again in another. Here, you have worldly riches, too, is that not so?”

Yes.

“Fuck,” Duncan whispered. “That was our destiny all along, too, wasn’t it?”

Rosemary gazed at him, and her expression was omniscient in the stretch of this moment; it kindled his spirit up, thrilling his nerves, achingly beautiful against his soul. Yes. That was the plan all along. That not only would you heal each other infinitely, here; you would, together, heal this world, and that, too, would be your happiness.

Kenzie had begun to quiet against him; she turned her tear-stained face up to him, and her eyes glittered unbearably in the afternoon light: gold, russet forest, green like growing leaves.

“The High Destiny,” she whispered. Duncan brought his hand up, wiping under her eyes, pressing the dampness into his shirt, cradling her face.

“Yes, sweet golden honey.” Rosemary was grinning; her face was effervescent in its beauty. She reached for the golden pipe again from where Duncan had set it on the low table beside the lantern, raising it languidly to her chin. “Praise be to Her, in whose eyes all is made clear and wondrous, three-faced, sweet as blessed wine. Your High Destiny is to bring a long peace into this world. And when others in this world behold you together, that is what they see. Your divinity, your goodness, and their redemption.” Duncan continued to look down at Kenzie--she stared at him with a dawning happiness spreading over her face that made him clutch her cheek, dip his mouth to kiss her, uncaring that Rosemary watched--Kenzie, my Kenzie, oh my Kenzie--

Rosemary breathed in another long drag of the gold pipe. Then she continued to speak, her legs crossed with ease, her hand drifting against her many necklaces, thumb trailing at the obsidian, the raven skull.

“I know what’s coming, what’s at the door; by the time you return to the Capital City, Bill Shepherd will have been dead for a day. Yesterday, he signed his Will, at Annette Shepherd’s behest. Duncan: you are now the sole heir of Shepherd Unlimited and all its holdings. Bill Shepherd, as is his way, has over $15 billion dollars in overseas assets that he hasn’t been filing with his taxes. Those assets will be yours in a few hours’ time. With Shepherd Unlimited LLC and the tools at its disposal, it is your High Destiny, Duncan and Mackenzie, to heal this world.”

“Fuck,” Duncan whispered.

“Holy shit,” he felt Kenzie grip his shirt with her little tear-stained hands. “Duncan, oh my goddess. We knew. We felt it all along. We felt our destiny.”

“And Praise be to Her,” Rosemary said, and then she laughed; she laughed long and low, and her voice was like honey, and it seemed to fall into Duncan’s mind like a crashing, heady wine. Her laugh rang out onto the lake, stirring the ducks to flight; as they flapped up from the water, the sun dappled in their water-flecked wings, turning to patterns of gold.

-------

It was late now, the light growing low as it had the night before, gradually then all at once, and Duncan had conjured another fire in the copper pit. This one, if anything, was even brighter and more beautiful than the one before; it was almost transparent, burning wildly high and hot, kindled in the euphoria of his mood. Now that he knew the powers they had were real, not only real, but destined, he felt confident in the ability to strengthen them; felt confident in their reality. I’ve been blessed, and so I’ll use my blessings. I can see the shape of these powers now, their outline like a lingering vision after a bright burst of light. I was destined to have them, and so I’ll use them as wisely as I can.

They had all smoked so much of the weed through the rest of the afternoon he had begun to feel untethered from his body, lost in the softness of Kenzie’s touch, the sweet smell of the space under her ear and along her neck. Rosemary didn’t seem to mind, skillfully ignoring them as they kissed again and again, drifted their hands along each other lazily through the rest of the afternoon. Duncan felt split between his gratitude towards Rosemary and the intensity of his desire for Kenzie--he had been fighting off the urge to slide his hand up her bare leg under the dress for hours, and as he sat in one of the wicker chairs by the fire, watching Kenzie and Rosemary dance a few paces away on the lawn amid the fireflies, the strains of Redbone’s Witch-queen of New Orleans pumping through the outdoor speakers, he sent out drifts of his deep need towards her. She was spinning in the long rosy dress, her chin tilted up and the diamond moon flashing on her neck, his black cardigan falling off one of her shoulders--her hair was tossed by wind and sweat glinted at her temples, and all he could think of was how radiantly lovely she was; High Princess of Heaven, Goddess of the Golden Bower, Angel of the Hidden Sphere, my High Destiny, forevermore, everlong, no worship is ever enough. And now you’re going to marry me. And I know what kind of ring I’m going to give you. A moonstone. My moon, everlasting.

She’ll put a spell on you, she’ll put a spell on you

He tried to contemplate the wonder of everything that had happened in the past two days; of the past few weeks. It’s truly only been a few weeks? It felt like years, and also like no time at all, like hours. He tried to contemplate the immensity of time they’d loved each other, and the smallness of the time they’d been able to love each other in this present--felt too lost in it, had to move his thoughts away. He tried to conjure up the image of the Fates in his mind, knowing now that it was Her, aspects of Her, the spectrum of Her face. Too stoned, sorry. Just wanna fuck my baby. So fucking much. Forgive me, Goddess. He grinned to himself, into his hand. I know you do. I can feel that you forgive me.

Tho' she'll never return all the Cajuns knew, a witch-queen never dies

Kenzie and Rosemary were gripping each other’s arms now, whirling in a circle, both laughing uproariously. Kenzie tumbled to the ground, throwing her head back and laughing up into the sky, bleeding out into blue darkness. Rosemary clutched her belly and laughed up at the sky too.

“Oh Goddess, to be alive,” she crowed. Duncan looked up to her from his seat, grinning. Rosemary had told them the story that afternoon of how she had found the Goddess when she was young--had gone into a cave in the swamps of New Orleans as a young girl, finding a bower of strange golden flowers growing there, had had a vision of Her, as an old woman, wizened with the ages and also inconceivable, told her of her power to conjure and to incite light in others, kindle their dreams and hopes, their destinies. Another Thin Place, he thought, like that balcony, or our circle of oaks. They had made more of the chicken and other vegetables in the cooker, a charcuterie spread out on the deck table, and had been nibbling at it for a hours between the weed and glasses of wine--now the day was hazy and drifting away, and Duncan felt lost in the happiness of it; absolutely found in it. Rosemary tumbled herself into one of the wicker chairs across from him, her feet dipping up over one of the arms. She gazed into the fire, a serene expression in her eyes.

“Evening Star, you sure can make one hell of a fire,” she murmured, her eyes drifting closed. “It smells so sweet and feels so nice on my poor aching bones, thank you very much. The Goddess knows I put the work in since yesterday to find y’all, now she’s giving me a break, and Blessed Be.”

“Thank you, Rosemary. Thank you for everything. Thank you for coming all this way--for telling us everything. Who we are. What we’re meant to do.” Kenzie had heaved herself up from the ground and was skipping over to him, throwing herself into his lap and lifting her mouth up to kiss him as he spoke. He cradled her little body against him; her eyes glittered, her thoughts achingly sweet. To be held by you, baby, is the sweetest and most beautiful of anything. My Evening Star. My Hades who I plucked from darkness. You owe me so many kisses.

Oh I do, do I-- He dipped his mouth down onto hers again; he could feel Rosemary’s eyes on them, slitted, an adoration and pride in her aspect that he could feel as though it were visible. He knew she thought they were infinitely beautiful--the thought was a feeling of warm violet that emanated out from her; and I agree, if only because being loved and loving her so much has made me beautiful from within, he thought. I can feel the beauty in everything because of her.

“Rosemary,” and Kenzie turned her face away, looking over at the other woman’s beautiful cocoa skin, shimmering like soft copper in the firelight.

“Yes, golden honey,” Rosemary murmured, turning her face up a little, her eyes closed from tiredness, peaceful in the quiet of the crackling fire.

“What do the thin places mean?”

“Thin places?” Rosemary’s eyes opened a little, meeting her eyes.

“In the woods there’s a clearing. It’s surrounded by these huge black oak trees, and they’re all growing together, in a weird, tight circle. Inside it are so many wildflowers,” Kenzie laid her head on Duncan’s chest, under his chin, “and they’re growing in a spiral, like, I dunno, like they mean something, time or the universe, something like that. We were there yesterday, and…”

Kenzie blushed, trailing off.

“You fucked there.”

“Yeah. And it was strange--I mean, it felt like--Dunny, how would you describe it--”

“Like we were untethered from the earth for a little while,” Duncan said, his hand drifting against Kenzie’s thigh, under her breast, holding her against him, gazing into the fire. “Like we were in some kind of between place. Between this world and another one.”

“Ah, yes. I suppose the Thin Places, as you say, have many names. I call them The Veil, because they aren’t really places as much as doorways, gateways, the between of one place and another. The Goddess has tethered every universe together with threads--energy that passes from one place to another, acting as a bridge--and sometimes the threads wear thin; I suppose Thin Place is a well-suited name. As you are so close to your divinity still, these places are more obvious to you than to other people.”

“The night we met, we were on this balcony, with all these roses, and I think it was one of those places,” Kenzie was murmuring, eyes glittering on him, close to tears again. “It was thin--I could see him, Rosemary. I could see into his soul. I knew how beautiful he was inside. It was like a lamp shining out of a lighthouse. He said hi and he was looking at me like he knew me, like he hadn’t seen me in a long time and had missed me. And my heart just--stopped. I felt like he had set me on fire, wonderful fire, like this.” She looked at the fire Duncan had made--made with my mind, my senses, my will, for you. His heart twinged, reached out for her.

“The heart knows what nothing else can tell you,” Rosemary murmured, her voice growing soft again in her sleepiness. “It was only a matter of time before you found each other again.”

“Sometimes I think I see a golden thread between us,” Duncan said softly.

“The Goddess has tethered you this way. Since you are so close to her--because she loves you both so dearly--you can see the innerworkings of her magicks sometimes. They are not conceivable to human eyes. You’re feeling them. For all her works speak to the inner self, the hidden senses.”

“Rosemary,” Kenzie started again, and then Duncan heard the tears in her voice, cutting her words off. Her face turned into the crook of his arm--he felt her cheek shuddering there.

“Shh, Kenz, it’s okay, Kenzie,” he whispered into her. She nodded.

“Rosemary, thank you.”

But Rosemary didn’t reply--she was sleeping softly now, her chest rising and falling slowly, her hand dipped under her jaw. She was magnificently beautiful in the glossy sheen of the firelight, her dark skin illuminated, her sunset-colored scarf glowing, her obsidian and quartz stones shimmering, feet bare now, and grass-stained; she looks like a painting, Duncan thought, oh that Waterhouse had painted her, Rosemary Antigone Delacroix, who has given us so much joy in so little time. Thank you, Rosemary. Thank you. Now, we’ll let you sleep. I only hope I can give you something in return--and soon. You and everyone who has surrounded us, helped us, comforted us, shielded us.

“Princess Kenzie, let’s go upstairs,” he murmured into her ear. Kenzie’s eyes turned up to him, her mouth dipping open. Her hair fell down behind his arm, a sheet of gold. He felt wildly awake; acutely aware of the softness and the scent of her. He pressed his mouth against her ear. “I want you so much. Take a bath with me, angel. Please?”

“Hmmm,” she hummed, a laugh playing at her mouth. “Okay, but I wanna read stories to each other after we fuck. You have to promise we can read stories after.”

“We can read stories for as long as you want, Mrs. Shepherd.”

“What should we do, baby--about everything? We already know what’s going to happen. Rosemary told us. When we go back--”

“Shhh,” and he pressed his mouth, shivering, aching, against hers, intent to worship her, pulling her chin up insistently to reach her, his hands falling against the sweet softness of the dress over her breast. “Tonight, let’s just think about how divine we are, and how lucky we are, and how beautiful the night is, and how beautiful everything is, the stars, the lake, and you--” and she was nodding into him, climbing up to straddle him, the firelight licking its shadows against her hair, over her skin. “And you, baby,” she whispered. “My Evening Star. Goddess, I love that--”

“I’m gonna find you the most beautiful garden house on earth, Princess Kenzie,” he was whispering into her throat, his tongue licking out to the sweet saltiness of her sun-kissed sweat there, and he knew he meant it, knew he wouldn’t stop until he found it, “and together we’re gonna plant the most beautiful garden and so many flowers you can use them for a bed, and I’ll get you as many horses as you want, and I’ll read to you every night, kiss you a thousand times every day in our bed of a hundred of the softest blankets on earth, Kenzie, my golden goddess--”

“I want so many flowers for our wedding, baby,” she was murmuring against his mouth, the supple feeling of her skin driving unbearable waves of heat into his cock now. “I want a hundred dark red roses to hang over our bed between all the wildflowers, flowers in our hair, please, baby, please?”

“Fuck, baby, a thousand flowers, as many as your heart desires, I love you, anything you want, my flower of the universe, my Princess of the Garden of All Delights--fuck, baby, I wanna see it, I wanna see that garden in heaven, where we used to love each other, for eons, Rosemary said, eons--”

Kenzie was laughing against the tickle of his mouth as he groaned into her, standing and gripping her to him under her thighs, his hands finally (fuck, finally, no offense Rosemary) on her bare skin there under the long dress. Kenzie wrapped her arms around his neck and he carried her up to the deck, eagerly turning his chin up to her where her face hovered above him, needy for her kisses.

“I never wanna leave,” Kenzie whispered into him, and he shuddered, pulling her closer, so close the pattering of her heartbeat was flush against his chest, her hair falling against his cheeks. “I wanna run away into the woods with you, into our secret circle of oaks, baby, let’s just stay here and fuck in the field and in the trees and throw away our clothes and worship the Goddess under the starlight until the world ends--”

“But She has shit for us to do, angel, we gotta save the world--” and he was laughing against her as he stumbled with her near the stairs. Kenzie slipped out of his arms (how does she do that) and ran up the stairs away from him before he could grab her wrist--”we gotta save the world, Miss Stone--”

The weed was sweet inside him still, and he thought, The Fates are the Goddess and the Goddess is the Fates, and even if I have darkness in me, so does everything, so does everyone--I know I’ve chosen the light now, and that’s all that matters, I know it was my choice all along--I’ve found my sweet Kenzie, and nothing can fucking hurt me, nothing, nothing can fuck with us, baby--I can’t wait to kiss you with a thousand roses around us and the evening light and the sweet sound of music, slip your moonstone on your little finger and kiss your sweet hands with the tattoo of all my love--

He ran through the bedroom, seeing the little slip of her shoulder, the wave of her hair, the flick of the hem of her long linen dress disappearing through the bathroom door. Kenzie slammed it behind her and he heard the lock click into place. He fell against it, groaning, jiggling the handle to no avail.

“Baby, fuck, ughhh, lemme in, please.”

He could hear her giggling, hear the copper tub’s faucet turn on, its sweet low drift and the sound of her little movements, her tiny laughter kindling a needle of heat into his groin. My angel of heaven. Have mercy.

“I just realized something, Kenzie.”

She fell silent behind the door, as if pausing--for a little while he only heard the faucet running. The bedroom was bathed in low, golden light, and his eyes fell on Cupid’s flower crown in the painting, the tenderness with which he kissed Psyche’s cheek.

“I’ve loved you for thousands of years.”

There was another long pause. He pressed his head against the door, closed his eyes. I have, haven’t I. I really have, When I saw you on the balcony that night, I felt the immensity of time. I knew that it had always been you.

The door opened suddenly and he stumbled through it; Kenzie was throwing her arms around him, making him stumble further, against her this time (oh thank Goddess), and then she was pressing him harshly into the bathroom wall, her hands insistent, demanding. He was leaning down to her, trying to wrap his arms around her, but she pressed them down, her hand drifting to his jaw, clenching there.

“You’d do anything for me, wouldn’t you.”

“Yes.”

“You’d die for me.”

“Fuck, yes.”

“Would you assassinate someone for me?” She laughed at this, her words hovering between facetiousness and seriousness, and her smile melted at his heart, made him desperate for her.

“If I had to, yes.” Duncan’s answer was serious, and they both knew it; he stared at her, his eyes unwavering, and saw her lips fall from the smile, saw that she could see the ache of him, insatiable, unending, for her.

“Look at the bruises you left on me.”

Kenzie lifted the linen dress up over her head, edging out of his reach as he tried to grip her. He realized she was naked underneath it and heard the tiny reverberation of his moan, following after her. She turned, flipping her hair over her shoulder, and Duncan groaned to see the dark bruises he’d left on her asscheeks, the product of his own hands. He kneeled, aching regret pressing on him, and cupped her at the top of her thighs, drifting his mouth down to the bruises, whispering against her.

“I’m sorry, baby, I’m so sorry, I love you so much--”

“I love them,” she whispered. “I love the marks you leave on me. I asked for them and I love them and I want more. I don’t care how long we’ve been together in the past, it still only feels like it’s been a few weeks now and I want more. The marks from your hands and your lips, your attention, your love--I want more, more, more--” Kenzie was leaning back into his hands now, against the wet, open dip of his mouth, her hair brushing along his head. She turned and his face hovered right over her cunt--Duncan dragged her against him, opening his lips further, cupping them into the lips of her sex, turning her hips under his hands and pressing her into the wall. Kenzie’s arms drifted above her, up the wall’s incline, hands reaching heavenward, her back arching, leaning into him; Duncan pulled her thigh up so her knee rested against his shoulder, and held his tongue to her shivering clit, eliciting a long, drifting moan from her mouth turned upward.

The scent of her was rich with summery sweat and the salty gathering of her arousal, and it made Duncan feel as though he were drifting out into some ether, unchained from the earth, as if they were back in the black oak circle, between worlds.

“Baby,” she was humming, “how are we gonna know what to do? To change the world? What are we supposed to do with the company? Like--how--unnnh--” her words bled out as he drifted his tongue back and forth between her clit and the opening of her cunt, urgent and concentrated. No more worrying tonight, Kenzie, just be here with me, let me worship you…

“Mmhmm, baby, uhhuh,” she whined, and he knew she’d heard him, felt the bluish drift of his comforting thought. I’ve missed tasting your sweetness here, angel, I wanna build an altar to your sweet cunt alone, its secret places, curves, hidden clefts, the rich singularity of its scent. I’m gonna eat you out every fucking day for the rest of our lives. He pulled his tongue back, pressing his lips around her clit, sucking carefully, strongly, looking up with languid patience to the shadow over her face as her head fell down, her hands drifting from where they had stretched along the wall to his cheeks, his forehead, the curves of his eyelids, through the sides of his hair, and Duncan had to close them now, for fear he would die inside her eyes--that his heart would simply stop with the glorious weight of her (you Kenzie you my universe and I turn around you, I am your moon spinning around your earth, and when we end we begin again, when we die, we are reborn to each other--).

“Fuck, Duncan,” and Kenzie was biting into her lip, eyes falling closed, her body smooth and hot and terribly soft under his long hands, the wetness at his mouth an insistent undoing, the telltale trembling beginning in her thighs, “I think I’m gonna come already, sorry, baby, I can’t, god, that feels so fucking good, you’re too beautiful, annhh--” and he was shaking his head, rebounding his tongue against her, hands clutching at the bruises along her ass, fingers digging against them so she gasped in the half-patina of pleasure and pain--come for me, come as soon as you want to, as much as you want, as constant, for I will worship you always and my devotion will not end, Mackenzie Stone, High Princess of Heaven, yours is the one true beauty, the gold that you hold in the center of your soul--then, with a pilling satisfaction that urged heat into his groin, he heard the high, lilting sound of her voice crying up in her ecstasy (“Dunny, fu-u-uck-k, my Pri-ince, Evening Star, my fucking baby, unnnnh--”), the sound of the water filling the copper tub crashing against her and drowning out her drawn whimpers, and he thought of Sirens, singing on rocks in the sea, mesmerizing to sailors, causing them to plunge to the depths with desire. My Kenzie, sing to me. Sing your pleasure out for my ears alone.

She quieted, her breath heaving, her legs shaking against him, her cunt twinging--he pressed another long, adoring lick between the lips, shivering with wetness from his mouth and her deep orgasm, then he stood, her hands drifting from his hair to his shoulders to his stomach, his height enveloping her, as it ever was. He brought his arms down around her and Kenzie began to work at his shirt, pushing his pants and briefs to the floor, his mouth, damp with her sex, tasting at hers with lazy need. He lowered his arms, reluctantly, letting his shirt drop to the floor, then swung them down around her shoulders and the back of her thighs, lifting her into his arms. Duncan carried her to the copper tub, the steaming water within almost having reached the rim--he lowered her into it and Kenzie sighed deeply, her eyes fluttering closed in an expression of deep, contented loveliness.

Duncan lifted away from her, turning off the faucet, balancing on the edge of it for a moment, naked; Kenzie’s hair had immediately begun to drift around her, and he thought again of Sirens in the sea, calling out to Odysseus.

“You look like a mermaid, Kenz,” he said, smiling down at her. She grinned, dipping her face under the water, blowing bubbles up to the surface, eyeing him coyly.

“Come, come to me, come to the sea and be drowned, wah-haha,” she laughed.

“By you, gladly.” Duncan stepped over the rim and settled down into the serenely hot water. The tub was quite large--larger than the claw-footed one in the penthouse, large enough that he could stretch his legs out entirely and crook them around her, drawing her into him, his cock, hardening, straining, brushing against the inside of her leg and stomach. She shivered and he moved his mouth down to her cheek, her jaw, pressing tiny kisses there.

“Remember when you put all those roses in the bathtub, baby,” Kenzie was whispering, lifting herself up to him, her nose nuzzling against his. The water felt almost unbearably warm now with her against him this way, and Duncan wanted to cry out against her hair, on her bare, flushed, damp skin. I fucking love you, my love is ever-hungry, ever-urgent, as if it wants to tear me into pieces so I can feed myself to you.

“How could I ever forget that,” he whispered. “You were so fucking beautiful that night. That dress, the half-moon around your neck. I think that’s the first time I knew--really knew--that you were divine.”

“I’m gonna ride you again like that now,” she murmured against his chin, her eyes glowing, and her little slender hand was grasping his cock, now terribly hard in her fingers, easing up and down its thickness with her hips under his fingers, her little tongue dipping out along his lower lip--Kenzie eased herself down onto him, a shuddering, high gasp falling out of her mouth into his, and he cried against her, the pitiful need in his voice ringing in his ears. She moved, slowly at first, then more pressingly, her hands coming up to dampen his hair with water that fell through it in a glistening trail.

“It feels like we woke up from another dream today,” she was whimpering into him, and Duncan was kissing her neck, his mouth tingling with her, lost in the tightness, the clenching, devouring space of her cunt around him, the water’s steam rising around them in droves. “Now we know, baby.”

“That you saved me--” he whined into the dip of her throat now, his voice shuddering as his orgasm inched closer, through his thighs and his groin. “You saved me, angel, you saved my soul from darkness here--that you save me, over and over--you are my miracle, fuck, Kenzie--”

“I am, aren’t I--” she laughed against him, then her laugh bled into a moan as she ground down onto him in the glorious heat of the water, her little hands drifting along his neck, through his curls, her head falling back, and his mouth was around her nipple, sucking with deep hunger, his heart already breaking for the moment he’d have to stop--then he felt himself, eyes blurring with heat and tears, his voice crying wordlessly to heaven (thank you Fates, who are Her), coming harshly up into the golden space of her, the depth of her, the absence of void--she was fullness, truth, reality, the essence of life, she was the beginning and end of all, the solace of his existence. My angel, my miracle, my savior, my Kenzie, for all time.

And for awhile after, they held each other in the blessed quiet and the wonderful heat of the water and the soothing feeling of one another, and he kissed the tiny tears from her eyes, and everything in all of that stretch of moments, small, brief, and somehow also infinite, was sublime.

-------

Kenzie was laying with her face towards the ceiling in the center of the golden bed, the delicate, hanging golden lamp there bowing down on her, kissing at the waves of her chestnut hair. She wore the little silken pink pyjamas and the silk black kimono, gifts from me, I want to shower you with gifts for the rest of our lives, my delight, my sweet love, and one of the downy pillows was propped under her head as she held D’aulaire’s Book of Greek Myths up to her face with her little hands. The other books were in a pile beside her on the silky spread; the ghost story books, Jane Eyre, The Golden Compass and the stargazing book from Duncan’s penthouse library. Duncan was propped up with a pillow on the headboard, facing her, wearing just a pair of black briefs, one of her tiny feet in his large hand; he rubbed it carefully, tenderly, fingers drifting back and forth along its graceful curve, over the rise of her little bones, eyes on her face as she read. The curtain was floating against the wall, and Duncan could smell the fire from the pit downstairs rising up. He wondered if he should go wake Rosemary so she could sleep in one of the guest rooms, but was loathe to move away from the bed, out of Kenzie’s warm sphere. In a little while, he thought. The night is warm and beautiful, besides, as beautiful as last night. It’s like we’re in our own little world here.

“I just love this picture so much,” Kenzie whispered, turning the book to him. The picture was the one of Persephone and Demeter rushing into each other’s arms in a golden field of flowers. “It really makes me think of me and Momby. She’s going to be so happy when we tell her. I keep imagining her face when you call her Momby,” and Kenzie’s grin clenched at his heart.

She turned the book back to herself, resting its edge on her belly, flipping through the pages. Duncan could hear the peepers out on the lake, the drift of the water obscured by them, the low crackle of the fire pit below. Kenzie stopped on a certain page, gazing at it intently, her little mouth pouting, eyes concentrated.

“What’s that page, baby,” Duncan murmured, switching to her other foot, kneading at her toes.

“Selene and Endymion,” she murmured.

“Read it to me?” he asked. I love your voice in the soft night. Singing, speaking, breathing sighs, the gasp of you when you come, the little crying sounds in your sleep.

Kenzie smiled, eyes whirling dark green at him, cleared her throat a little, and read in a clear, measured voice. Journalism major, he thought, brimming with happiness so full it was like a golden cup running over through his body.

“Selene, the moon, came out at night to light up the sky while her brother, Helios, was resting. Slowly she drove her milk-white horses across the sky, and her pale moonbeams fell gently on the sleeping earth where all was peace and quiet.”

Duncan tried to imagine what it must have been like to meet Kenzie for the first time--not on the balcony, he thought, but in that other place, the real first time, after I saw her on her throne, like that dream we had, the throne where she held the sceptre--the Hidden Sphere, the one Rosemary talked about. We met in the Garden, Rosemary said, the Garden of All Delights. Kenzie’s hair, white and shimmering, was full of galaxy-flowers. Her eyes were a golden universe. And her wings were like the vastness of heaven in an unbroken sunset.

“One night Selene’s soft light fell on Endymion, a young shepherd, who was sleeping beside his flock. She stopped to look at him. He was smiling in his sleep and was so young and handsome that she completely lost her heart to him,” and here Kenzie glanced up at Duncan, her face cast in a soft corona of light, her eyes held in the aureate bow of her lashes, and he felt her thought--that’s how I felt when I saw your smile, baby. “She drove through the night, but she could not get him out of her mind.”

Duncan was sliding down over the coverlet to her, his hands drifting up her thighs. Oh you did, did you. She smiled at him nervously, then her eyes fell back to the page and she read again.

“When her duties were over, she went to Zeus and asked him to grant Endymion eternal sleep so he would stay forever young and handsome...Zeus granted Selene’s wish and Endymion slept on and on, smiling in his sleep. He dreamed that he held the moon in his arms. But it was not a dream after all…”

Duncan was pulling her up to him, into his mouth, easily lifting her small weight against him, and the book fell from her fingers to the soft spread and her hair fell back, her eyes fluttering closed against him, the silken feeling of her all too much, and Duncan thought of her as the moon shining against him; as the goddess she once was, of what had felt like a dream, had seemed to be one in the nimbus of sleep, but hadn’t been, her, so wondrously, soul-shakingly real now, in his arms--

No, no. Not a dream after all.

[nocturnememory]

What did you mean when you wrote that Voldie still had all his ribs? Is it sth about his missing backbone? I‘m clearly not philosophical enough to understand this

Okay, I’ve actually gotten a few questions about this now, so I suppose I’ll try to explain some things as best I can without ruining anything

This is so Extra and so Long, but it was the best way I could think of to explain it all, under the cut because I ramble and I literally wrote an essay. :/

Myths and Ichor Explained

Okay, so, I have this problem where I show instead of tell a lot. Too much, probably. It’s a bad habit I have that I’m trying to find some sort of middle ground on lol.

So, I often to use myths, images, ideas or sometimes just like, a word to convey a meaning or an implication.

Sometimes, obviously, I am too vague or because I’m the one writing it and I’m using myths/idea/stories I know… I don’t really consider that readers might not understand the message behind the implication.

I’ve had a few questions about the rib thing, and I think it’ll help explain things if I explain how I use my…writing devices? Methods of storytelling, maybe.

So, you know when your watching a horror movie and the scene is dark and your eyes are peeled and your hearts thumping because the music is going and the character on the screen is scared and so are you because you know that something’s going to happen.

And then it does, and you jump or you laugh or duck and move on.

For me, the memorable part of that moment isn’t the jump scare, it’s the moments before, it’s watching the shadows and wanting to see something more, hoping to see something to know what’s coming.

The memorable parts aren’t always when the scary thing is revealed because maybe it’s corny or not what you wanted— but do you remember that face in the mirror? Or the furniture that moved on its own? All those hints and build up are what make that movie better.

For me, it’s the same thing in stories. It isn’t always about the destination, because maybe you won’t be happy with the end. I mean, look at Harry Potter, how few of us actually like the epilogue, how few of us view Cursed Child as canon. But, give us a boy in a cupboard, give us platform, a man with a misspelt birthday cake and we’re all a little bit wizards, aren’t we?

The memorable things, for me, are the smaller things. The ideas that drag through a narrative and come out at the end into something that makes you go, oh.

Like a snitch.

Or a cloak.

Or a boy who lived. Twice.

And that, for me, is part of how I write— trying to focus on the smaller things, the memorable things, so that hopefully, by the end, you’ll go, oh.

But, I don’t want to confuse you, I’m still learning, and I know I’m using myths/imagery that maybe not everyone knows.

So, this is kind of how I approach using myths or imagery in Ichor:

Hades and Persephone, I think is the most obvious one, due to the interludes.

Here’s a good place to read about them:

http://www.theoi.com/Khthonios/HaidesPersephone1.html

For the sake of argument, and to avoid an argument lol, I’ve always based my view on this myth on the source material. Which, if you follow that nifty link, contains the ancient Greek versions of the myth, sourcing the Homeric Hymn to Demeter, the Orphic Hymns, and Hesiod’s Theogony.

The basic idea of why this myth is so impactful on Ichor is, I hope, conveyed in the Interludes.

It’s about entitlement, about ownership, about claiming another person and viewing them as lesser, maybe not in a way you mean to be harmful, but anytime you believe you have a right to someone, you are, in essence making them lesser.

Voldemort views Harrie as a part of himself, and because of that view he believes he owns her. And because he owns her he has a right to her. And if he has a right to her then he has a right to use her.

And this is the same for Hades, he sees Persephone and he takes her. There’s a belief there, that owning is permission, that entitlement is somehow a reason, an explanation, an excuse.

But it’s not.

There’s a point to compare here, that both of these characters act out of selfishness, that they act physically because of it. Both characters operate on the belief that their desire outweighs the want of the other. And here, it’s important to note, that neither one truly believes that they’re right, they know they aren’t, they both, on some level, know they’re in the wrong. And most importantly, I think, is that both of them, before they act, seek validation.

Hades go to Zeus:

 Hades doesn’t need permission. Hades wants validation. Hades wants the deed and the title and a palm full of a declaration.

Voldemort knows he’s wrong but at the same time he feels so entitled to Harrie that he builds a contract and goes to Dumbledore for the sole purpose of validating himself.

Rape, forcing oneself onto another without concern for permission. But you gave me permission, didn’t you, Harrie. You signed that fucking contract.

The comparable parts of the myth don’t end there, I mean, Voldemort and Harrie aren’t ruling an underworld with a three-headed dog, but, the evolution into something more is still comparable.

It’s all about compromise, about understanding the damage you caused another person, about finding a way through that hurt and coming out stronger.

It’s a pretty good allegory, really. For finding strength, your voice, for being able say, you hurt me and I know you’re sorry, but that isn’t enough. About finding yourself, whether you’re an adult already or just a girl in a garden (or a cupboard, you know?)

The second major one, arguably more impactful one is The Rib Thing.

Also known as Adam and Eve, circa the Garden of Eden

Go here for further reading: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eve

Basic summary: Adam is lonely in the garden, God comes down, takes a rib from the poor boy’s side and from it, creates Eve.

Now this myth itself isn’t so much related to the characters in Ichor so much as the idea of it is. It isn’t about finding parallels in the narrative but rather offering a sort of physical representation to the whole Horcrux/soul thing.

When you’re talking/reading/thinking about something like souls, how do you convey the weight of them? How do you convey percentages without falling into the same sort of lackluster lines and ideas?

How do you, as a reader, or me as a writer, convey what a soul means?

It’s all so theoretical and… evasive, really.

I can say, Voldemort wants Harrie because she carries his soul, he wants her because she’s got half his soul, a seventh of his soul, two third of his soul. But what does that do for you? Nothing really, at least not for me.

It’s all just numbers on a page.

I can tell you about a soul all day long, but it’s just words, there’s nothing there to really see.

But for me, when you read about Voldemort equating Harrie/Horcrux to the myth of Adam and Eve:

He thinks about God reaching into Adam’s chest and pulling out a bloody, white rib; a consecrated voice not meant for mortal ears

She comes from you because she is for you.

Did you think this would be painless?    

And then having him carry that belief into something physical, his ribs…

A soul becomes something physical for you to weigh. It’s a part of something, it isn’t so theoretical anymore but something real to imagine. Anytime Voldemort touches his ribs, there’s a reason, an ache, an idea behind it.

What’s a soul to Voldemort, it’s an ache, a bone, a thing missing.

Except, it’s not.

He has all his ribs.

And this is where I have to toe the line on what I’m getting at in the narrative and why this means something; because so much of what enables Voldemort is his own belief in his ownership of Harrie and it’s all due to that one fucking rib (soul piece).

The idea of the rib and what it represents is more important than the bone itself, you know? There’s meaning behind the fact that its whole that I can’t really explain without sort of spoiling the build in the narrative, without ruining some of the things that will be coming up as Harrie and Voldemort really come together and learn about themselves and each other.

But I do want you to have something to be able to build on, to understand their connection in a more real sense, a sense that isn’t always one of them hurting, or emotion bleeding from one to the other because that’s so loud and obvious and I get the appeal of jump scares, I do, but sometimes I like the shadows more.

If his soul is something tangible for you to picture, a white bone stuck inside of him, when I say he has all of them, you think, a full rib cage, you think, is Harrie missing one? If he has all his ribs then how are they connected?

And that’s sort of the idea, really, giving you images and ideas and then building on them so that when I imply that he’s got a full soul, you aren’t just reading it, but imagining it as well.

That as I build on their connection and what the impact of souls and Horcruxes are…

It’s not just some ball of light, or whatever you picture a soul to be if you picture anything at all… but something real, something there, something that every time I mention Voldemort touching his ribs you go

Oh.

[danakin-skywalker]

ho ho ho!!!🎄☃️🎁

merry december 16th bestie!!!! i am so stoked for christmas for alllll the reasons. its such a fun and warm-vibed time of year 🎉

im with ya, werewolves and vampires are a stretch but then again im 100% like omg bigfoot omg mothman omg fleshpedestrians (see i cant say their names *cue the cold chills). meremaids i also think are one of those things like how would we know?!?! the ocean is terrifying and i Stand by that

i really appreciate how in depth your travel list is !!! i think all those places would be super cool greece and japan are on my lists for sure. i think a rose bouquet is very classic AND classy, also hibiscus are really cool ive always seen the little trees sold at the flea market but never gotten one. tattoo-wise, very cool. i also forget i have mine and then i see it like 🧍🏼‍♀️ oh hey. i really like the this too shall pass one - the meaning is awesome!

todayyyyyy my questions are lacking im so sorry but lets hit it!

1. building off the first question of my last message - do you have a favorite ghost/supernatural story?

2. do/have you watched any ghosthunting series on tv/youtube?

3. inspired by the headache im rockin with rn: how do you think danny would take care of you when youre sick or you feel unwell? (if you havent read “where the love light gleams” by maddie over @hearts-hunger i HIGHLY recommend it

as always, remember santa loves u !

🎅🏼

#26

oop ive started a countdown: 8 days !!!

Good morning santa!! Sorry todays response is delayed- I had to go and read that Danny fic you recommended and it was SO FUCKING CUTE I needed time to process.

Honestly, I don’t really know any ghost stories. Growing up ((((as a Percy Jackson/Harry Potter kid)))) I was more into mythology of all sorts. Admittedly biased toward Greek and Roman mythology, because while I was reading the books my brother was taking his first Latin classes so we both kind of hyperfixated on it together. My favorite story was the story of Persephone and the pomegranate seeds. I vividly remember first reading a version that was formatted into a children’s picture book, and I was blown away by the intricacy of the story. I also always really liked the idea of sirens, I forget what origin that myth is from but the idea of them exclusively appearing beautiful to lure men to their deaths always made me go “haha nice.”

I was never really into the ghost hunting shows. On one hand, they always made me super on edge because those kinds of shows rely on jump scares (or at least the ones my dad would watch). Now that I’m older, I don’t watch them because I feel like there’s a lot of pressure to fabricate an interesting story, so I’m a lot more skeptical of everything happening. I know about buzzfeed unsolved (formerly I know, I don’t know their new name) but I was always more of a Worth It gal myself.

This is such an appropriately timed question bc of the way I was rotting in bed on wednesday from my booster shot!!! I think @hearts-hunger does a great job of writing Danny as considerate and compassionate and an absolute angel seriously thanks again for that rec it was such a sweet way to start my morning. If I had Danny here after my booster I would absolutely be asking him to do things like fill my water bottle and turn on my essential oil diffuser. He would probably get on me over how I need to eat something, he’d probably put me on a movie and leave me to rest while he whipped me something up. I’d also just make him lie with me. The weirdest and strongest symptom I had from my booster was that my skin was like HYPER-SENSITIVE to touch- almost like I was sunburnt or bruised. But also I experienced a lot of back pain, so I’d ask him to rub my back or maybe even just lay on top of me. I’m a big weighted blanket gal so I feel like another person just laying on top of me sounds delightful. But yeah. Lots of naps, lots of movies. Probably a few bong rips to help with the pain since I really don’t love taking a bunch of painkillers.

I love u sm santa, I’m sorry if my first two answers are lame- I just honestly don’t consume a lot of ghost content. But you did make me giggle when I finally realized what you meant by fleshpedestrians

Have a lovely Friday (closes app briefly to make sure it is in fact friday) YES Friday have a lovely FRIDAY

[tcrmommabear]

Prompt ^__^ : "She narrowed her eyes and clenched her fist. Do not challenge me."

A.N. *rubs grubby hands together* GET READY FOR FEMINISMA.A.N I HIT CTRL W AND GUESS WHAT GUYS IT DELETES YOUR TAB THANK GOD I HAD COPIED MOST OF WHAT I HAD WRITTEN SOMEWHERE ELSE TO SHARE PROGRESS BUT AHHHH I LOST A LOT OF STUFF FUCK

****

There was strength in kindness.

When the world all but spat in your face, it was rare to see someone so calm. So patient, and damn near loving, towards someone or something that absolutely refused to make your life anything but hell. It was something instilled deeply into Haru’s being, making her a perfect candidate for the Bureau.

During times when her kindness wasn’t really the answer, Muta could step up with harsh words and strength. Or Toto, with cold rationale, or Baron with his disarming charm.

Baron had never seen her kindness fail her before, at least not in this sense.

He had been prepared for the usual antics of his rowdy Bureau. Whether it be the constant bickering between Toto and Muta, or the wickedly hot temper of his sister’s partner, he had a plan for all of it.

The day had started off so good. Toto and Muta had kept their comments to a minimum, most likely due to the fact that fist fights between a crow and a cat were acceptable, but between two “human” men in a shopping mall weren’t. Persephone and Louise were exceptionally loving towards each other, and while slightly embarrassing at times, mainly warmed his heart. His sister and him had been along for so long.

They needed to accept happiness in whatever form it came.

And Haru? His fetching human girlfriend walked with a relaxed confidence. Though still demure in her attitude to all but a keen observer, one could see the way she was settled into her skin. How comfortably she wore who she was. He had told her “Always believe in yourself”, and despite the occasional lapse, she took those words to the very center of her heart.

He supposes now that those words are what let to this moment.

They had been walking happily through the shopping mall, Haru bantering with Muta over some topic he wasn’t quite sure he understood. It was then, holding hands fiercely, that Louise and Persephone leaned in for a kiss.

Chaste, simple, abundantly sweet and loving.

The comments from the nearby table were vulgar. Ones he hadn’t the stomach to repeat to himself, safe in his thoughts, let alone in front of polite company.

The Bureau members found themselves frozen to the spot, the air thick with tension. Each debated their respective courses of action. Louise slung her arm around Persephone’s shoulders, her other hand taking Persephone’s tightly. Muta looked ready to fume, while Toto was desperately looking for a way to distract them all.

He hadn’t expected Haru, normally the one to push them along, to take action.

He also hadn’t expected such colorful language.

“Haru!” the group had exclaimed, nearly at once, but she paid them no mind. Instead stomping closer to the scoundrel who insulted her friends.

“Whatcha gonna do about it, girly? Maybe your lesbo friends over there should try a real man for size,” was the sneered response, the man staying seated even as his friends stood. Hoping to intimidate the smaller Haru.

If only they knew she had once punched a monster twice her size in the face.

Her eyes narrowed, her hand clenched. All warning signs to Baron that he should step in. He was still recovering from shock.

“Don’t challenge me.”

“What, are you some libtard feminazi? Think you can take a real man?”

“Yes. Yes I can.”

They had to do a lot of running from mall security. Muta would later remark what a mean right hook that had been. Louise would ask her if she was taking notes from Persephone’s book. Persephone herself would ask Haru for lessons.

“Why?” was all he would ask her, later. When the group had returned to their normal forms, hidden away in the Sanctuary. There was strength in Haru’s kindness, it was what he had grown to rely on. Haru always being the one to take pity. As the only “bleeding heart” in the Bureau for the longest time, it felt good to have someone just as unwavering in their mercy.

She gave a wry smile, watching the bandage wrap around her damaged hand. “I’d been talking with a friend, recently. This loud, violent girl at my school.”

“Is she the one encouraging you to punch people.”

“I won’t deny that she was in my head when I did.”

“You still haven’t answered my question. Why, Haru? I’ve seen you be so unflinchingly kind to those who haven’t deserved it. Offered mercy to those who tried to kill you, extend a hand when others have broken it. What’s changed?”

“Nothings changed, Baron. I’m still me.”

“Not if you’re attacking people before first extending a hand to them.”

“That girl at my school, she said something really interesting.”

He sighs, tying the ends of the bandage together and releasing her. As she toyed with the flexability of her hand, he rose and began making tea. He needed a moment to clear his head, to make sense of everything.

“She told me that, when she calls out someone for a racist remark, she’s not doing it to change the person’s mind. I mean, that’s the goal, but it never works. She’s doing it for the audience’s benefit.”

He paused. “What do you mean?”

“She does it so the audience knows they’re not what that person tries to make them out to be. That they’re wrong, or lesser, or damaged. That, someone, anyone, knows their true value and worth. That all souls are created equal. And that someone is willing to fight for them.”

“Haru…”

“I didn’t want to do it. I’ve got a busted up hand and a life-long ban from my favorite mall. But I looked at him. I saw that violent and angry man, raised wrong by society, but unwilling to realize that, and I just… I saw Persephone and Louise, strong but obviously hurt. I saw little kids just figuring themselves out thinking they’re broken. I saw a pair of boys, reaching to hold hands and quickly letting go.”

She gets up, cradling her hands together, staring at the stark white bandage angrily. Tearfully.

“I saw what he was doing. Asserting himself as better, as the proper thing. When the world isn’t proper, or normal, or clean cut. It’s messy, in shades of greys, and absolutely insane. And I saw people believing him. I wanted to do right, by everyone.”

“I wanted him, and all her bastard friends to know, “respect my existence, or expect my resistance”. I wanted that tattooed over their eyes, engraved into the broken shards of his nose. Was it right? No, absolutely not. I’m no better than him, or any other person who uses violence to get their way.”

Her eyes narrow, her hands clench. He sees the message, clear as day in her brown eyes.

‘Do not challenge me.’

“But change does not come cleanly, Baron. If a war comes again, I hope to be on the other side of it. The side that doesn’t promote the genocide of millions of innocents.”

He feels a chill in his stomach. One that settles too familiarly in his body at the mention of war. He remembers war all too well. He’s at her side quickly, taking her hands in his. Remembers his creator.

“I… I understand, Haru.”

She pressed his palm against her cheek. Meets his eyes, unwavering in her beliefs but… Kindness. Warmth. Violence wasn’t her answer. Anger wasn’t her nature. This was a first and a last. But he knew she wouldn’t stop fighting.

“Let’s get some rest. That’s enough fighting for one day.”

***

Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh

Personal opinions are lovely, aren’t theyyyyyyy

I’ll write another version of this at some point, but hot damn, am I proud of this

[writesbatty]

days 14-29

complete with unedited content notes from the facebook group i’m in

29/30

i love to rewrite the classics

to make persephone send hades running

(keep that 'rewriting the story of persephone as a love story’ shit several hundred miles from me, thanks.)

to give echo back her voice

to let arachne weave her tapestries once more

rewrite pride and prejudice so lydia bennet does not marry a rapist

get jane eyre out of her aunt's home sooner rather than later

find ophelia a therapist

remind everyone that tragedy can still have a happy ending

  28/30 content warning: mentions/discussions of sex and consent. this is very vulnerable and im uncomfortable and DOING IT ANYWAY rip

.

.

.

i tell my boyfriend i think we should start scheduling sex

but that this is not some indication of failure in our relationship

i know he worries that my complicated relationship with sex is some reflection of how attractive i find him

(it doesn't help that the past few years seem to have taken my ease of flattery away from me

i don't know when it got so hard to tell the love of my life he looks good in tank tops

and black jeans like the ones he wore when i met him)

but it's not that

it's that i don't think about it, the same way i don't notice i am hungry till i'm starving, don't notice i'm thirsty till my head aches and spins, don't notice i am anxious until i am already in the middle of panic

it's that i was in a relationship where i never thought about the word no, it never occurred to me as an option, and now i end up consumed with pointless worry that i do not really want this

i try to talk to my therapist about these things, but i never really know what to say

how to explain my ex never set out to hurt me and half of it was my fault, but i am still feeling the aftershocks years later

without sounding like i am making excuses

(maybe i am, i don't know, i have always had a hard time with blame, with holding others accountable)

but at the same time i never want to imply what happened was more serious than it was

nothing like a genuine violation, nothing that should label me victim or survivor

nothing like what others have gritted their teeth and fought through

maybe some of it is the meds

it's hard to tell

how much is the meds and how much is the trauma and how much is just me

and why has it been six years and i still can't

-casually tell my boyfriend he has a nice ass

-sit in my boyfriend's lap

-fearlessly messily uninhibitedly make out with my boyfriend

because some paranoid corner of my mind is afraid to say 'no'

(nothing would happen if i said no, because everything would stop happening, it's not fear that makes me question, it's the idea of disappointing someone i love, and that's all on me, not on him)

my boyfriend is an angel with a nice ass

(seriously, i am not overstating this, he has a very nice, round butt)

and when i tell him

i think we should start scheduling sex

he kisses the top of my head

and talks about how bob and linda on bob's burgers schedule sex, and they have like, the best marriage on television, so clearly we're in good company

and pulls me over to the couch to feed me ice cream and scratch my back

  27/30 warning for like. harry potter/jkr 'discourse' or something i guess?

listen, we all should have known jk rowling was going down in flames the moment she made harry james potter a fucking MAGICAL COP at the end of the series

i have a list of problems with the deathly hallows epilogue that is longer than the actual epilogue and this is at least three of them

will somebody cut harry a fucking break?

why on earth would someone punish this abused, traumatized, exhausted person by giving them a career that will repeatedly remind them of every bad thing that has ever happened, which is most things that have happened to harry potter

harry potter should have been the defense against the dark arts instructor

harry potter has intimately seen both sides, every inch of light and dark

and he saw them as a child, he grew in them like a weed in brackish water, an in between neither fresh nor salt

(but he chose good, he always chose good, and it was always a choice, and it wasn't always easy)

let him teach other children to protect themselves

let him eat lunch with neville longbottom so they can discuss their students and make sure no teacher ever treats kids the way snape treated his students

the way snape treated harry and neville

let harry spend his weekends in hogsmeade with friends both old and new remembering only the light spots in the dark days of his schooling

let him know the joy of helping a struggling student

(this is how he will carry on remus lupin's legacy; that and the bar of honeyduke's finest chocolate in his desk)

let harry potter retire and spoil the ever loving shit out of all of his grandchildren

let harry potter put the past behind him

consider the fact that we don't all want to devote our lives

to fighting the demons we met in childhood

  26/30

nightmare at 20,000 feet is the most terrifying episode of the twilight zone

and what an apt title

what an apt metaphor

because what could ever be more nightmare then knowing the worst is just outside the window

but no one else can see it

25/30 this ends like super abruptly but idk how to end it Properly and i need sleep so. shrug emoji.

it's like a bad joke, this harmless word that never stops following me

you know those tasteless reddit posts about trigger warnings? how there's 'no way' someone could be traumatized by something so normal

so small

that's me. i am that joke.

a man at the aquarium calls his young daughter pumpkin and i–

i swallow a wave of nausea

i try to ignore the way my skin begins to crawl

and my heart speeds up

and i can hear the sound of his voice

it's like time travel

it's like a curse

just say 'pumpkin' and i fly back in time and it's like my body does not know that he is dead

that he hasn't called me pumpkin in nearly a decade

you would think it would be the mocking, the insults, that would ring like shots through my echo chamber brain

but

it's that fucking petname

it's 'i'm sorry, pumpkin' in his voice and the look in his eyes as he digs the hole in my chest just a little bit deeper with another fake apology

an apology all for him

when he came to my high school graduation there were rules

-he could not drink

-he could not apologize

-he could not call me pumpkin

24/30

it's funny

this disconnect between the me i know and the me other people know

at home i pace the floor, building up the courage to call for a cab

at work they tell me i am good with people, that i am no nonsense

at home, i twist my hair in my fingers as i struggle to tell my partner of nearly six years i need something to eat

at school they called me confident, self assured

i wonder where this other me is when i need them most

where is this confident and self assured version of me when something actually happens?

when someone is in trouble?

when someone gropes me in the street?

when someone needs them?

when i need them?

23/30

weirdly specific sections i wish i could find at the bookstore:

unconventional sci written by women and queer people

dystopian fiction that ends hopefully

non-ableist romance novels with disabled protagonists written by disabled people

young adult romance novels about lesbians and magic with happy endings

poetry for queer girls who really like artemisia gentileschi's art

collections of personal essays about hospital waiting rooms

college kids from dysfunctional families getting their shit together and falling in love

narratives about found families of misfits

young adult novels about queer romance and theatre kids

the exact novels you needed to read at 15 when you were scared and alone and will still make you cathartically sob while reading in a public park

(this last section is real except it's just the francesca lia block shelves in the young adult section)

how to guides on how to be a person when your body and the world you live in are crumbling to pieces rapidly

advice on how to make your best friends move out of state to be closer to you

novels where the protagonist goes through hell but they come out the other side and are still an essentially good and optimistic person despite their trauma because the world is a terrifying place and we need fiction and narrative to remind us of the potential for hope

22/30

edit: i just word vomit typed this directly into the comment box and it got weirdly long so Be Aware

elle woods is my personal hero

i'm blonde

'yes sarah'

i'm sure you're thinking

'i know, i have seen you'

but it's more than that, okay? i am blonde on the inside. my heart and soul are blonde. i talk to people and they say 'i can't imagine you not blonde' because the concept of me any other way is absurd

maybe because its the one thing everyone always loved about me. when i was a kid, everyone wanted to play with my hair. i had barbie hair, disney princess hair. long blonde waves like strands of gold.

i grew up telling blonde jokes, so everyone would know i was Smart and Cool. i got teased for being a nerd and a four eyes and for awhile everyone called me 'dictionary' because i knew how to spell zombie. smart was more important to me than cool, but i still told blonde jokes. the blonde swims ninety percent of the way to the other shore, gets tired, and swims all the way back, and god if that isn't a metaphor for my life. god if i haven't spent 25 years fighting not to be the blonde who turned back.

when i almost failed math in my freshman year of high school my father told me i should give up and become a playboy bunny because i didn't have a future. a childhood friend asks when i will grow out of the color pink.

i am a blonde the way i am pink. spiteful. elle woods walking malibu barbie through the halls of harvard. elle woods taking notes in pink sparkling pen. elle woods handing in her scented resume printed on pink paper.

elle woods saying

'what, like it's hard?'

i tape my thesis pages to the wall with glitter tape and pin my blonde hair back with a flower clip and i wear baby pink leather heels with bows on them.

'what, like it's hard?'

21/30

why do the aliens always want to kill us?

why do we always build a giant weapon?

why can't the aliens come to earth to help us?

why aren't scifi movies about healing?

20/30

ode to vestibular stimming

i do not like metal music

i'm sorry, it's just not my thing

but good god do i understand why people head bang

and why people mosh

when i was a kid i loved jumping on the trampoline, and the way it made my heart and brain jump and soar and bounce

now i can't jump on trampolines anymore but

i can listen to british pop music in my living room and laugh and feel that soar and jump and bounce as i swing my head from side to side and up and down and sometimes, for extra fun, twist my torso around a little

like i am so much energy and so little body but finally it has somewhere to go as my hair swishes against my face and an unstoppable grin spreads across my face and

don't you ever wanna just let go?

don't you ever wanna shake your head until the dizzy chases everything else away?

19/30

i like to talk to the creatures in the tanks when i do my aquarium rounds

the old man of an octopus in the floor tank i call gramps

my favorite sea star, a purple velcro star in the touch tanks, i call zippy

mostly i just call everything 'buddy'

'hey buddy, how ya doing today?' or 'come on buddy, scootch down from the top of the glass'

i apologize to the anemones when they close up because people have touched them too much

and i apologize to the jellies when it takes me more than one try to scoop them out so i can change their water

in middle school i noticed a rip on my baby doll's neck so i made her a neck brace from the sash of a build a bear robe and propped her up on pillows every night, so she wouldn't rip anymore

i am nearly 25 and i still feel guilty when my stuffed animals fall to the ground

i am nearly 25 and i keep multiple stuffed animals in the bed i share with my boyfriend of nearly six years

a common misconception of autism and other similar social disorders is that people on the spectrum do not experience empathy

and in some cases this is true

but an often ignored aspect of these disorders is that anything you could lack, you can also have too much of

hyper-empathy is when you are so receptive to others feelings they become your own

they become so much your own it causes you physical distress

and everything

everything

has feelings

i once got sad about throwing away a pair of pants because i had them for just... so long

i once cried on an apartment balcony because my neighbors i had never met, never even SEEN, were fighting

today i watched a young boy scare simon, a seagull who hangs out by the aquarium, by screaming at him

and it broke my heart a little even though i not especially fond of birds and am, in fact, kind of afraid of them

sometimes i sit and think about the things my dad experienced and my aching too big heart thinks

maybe it was okay

maybe the things he said were okay, because of what happened to him

my aching too big heart always forgets

things happened to my mother, too

things happened to me, too

and neither of us turned out like that

articles on the internet talk about hyper-empathy like a super power

call it 'being an empath'

to me it has always felt more like a bruise

like my aching too big heart just can't stop pumping blood to the tender surface of my skin

18/30

a very angry letter to a lady who came into the aquarium yesterday. less poem and more just 'complaining' but wow, i am still mad like 36 hrs later

for the love of god, lady

what is your fucking problem?

you are a grown adult. you have multiple children, some of whom are teenagers, and this is how you behave, in public, in front of your family?

are you incapable of basic human decency? did no one ever teach you manners?

yes, there is a disabled person and their caretaker in this aquarium, and yes the person is making noise. people make noise. you are in a fucking public place. children scream in here literally all the time. the seals scream. parents scream. sometimes the people who work here scream, because it is the only way you can hear us over the damn seals.

so why, lady, do you feel the need to make some rude ass comment about a person you don't even know, and look at me like

you expect me to play along

i wish i could say something to you but i am an employee and that is not polite but

if i was just a person i would tell you to shove it

but i wish i could have been a staff member AND told you to shove it

so i could have told you, hey, lady

this person helping you, telling you all this information about sea stars, is also fucking disabled

and your rude as hell eye roll and 'oh great, here we go' and 'really?' and loud scoffing is not appreciated

and frankly you can kiss my autistic ass and get the fuck out

17/30

capitalism is broken

and the reason i know this is because of jurassic park

not the franchise but the canon, the universe it exists in

every time i complain about the jurassic park universe

demanding to know why, for the love of GOD, do people keep opening these parks full of dangerous dinosaurs

someone always tells me 'the money, obviously'

as if capitalism was a reasonable excuse for making a super t-rex that eats people

as if money were an excuse for making yet another death trap

yet another super dinosaur that's going to –inevitably– escape and eat and/or traumatize someone

the idea that the people who built jurassic world looked at the events of jurassic park and thought

the money is worth it

we won't fuck up this time

is completely fucking baffling to me

i suppose maybe i am meant to see this as a heartwarming representation of the american refusal to fail

if at first you don't succeed, try try again, after all!

but i think about the news article i read last night

about how insurance companies worry curing diseases is not profitable

and i think about all the lives lost and therapy needed because everyone in jurassic world refused to learn from john hammond's mistakes

and i don't think any of this is saying americans refuse to fail

it's just saying we don't care how many times we kill people if there's good money to be made

16/30, inspired by how affectionate the characters on new girl are with each other

all through high school i did theatre, and i don't know if this is a universal theatre kid thing, or just something we all did

but we were all about physical contact

we were a bunch of misfit touch starved pets

piling seven teenagers on one sofa, every part of you touching somebody, every part of you warm

and i miss that

all that platonic but physical affection

i am a very affectionate person, and i find myself fighting to seem 'normal' in social situations

reminding myself not to wrap my arms around people, or rest a hand on someone's leg, or call casual friends babe, or offer people bites of food

this is how i lived all of high school

sitting in laps, holding hands in the halls, kisses hello, shared drinks and forks

i miss it

i don't understand our desire as a society to deem intimate touch romantic

why shouldn't i kiss my best friend on the cheek? why shouldn't friends hold hands?

we are social creatures, after all

we don't start out like this

we sleep in heaps at slumber parties, we play doctor, we play house, we do each other's hair

why does all that stop because we get old enough to want to kiss people?

doesn't that seem silly?

15/30 write more love poems about your friends guys. love your friends tell people you love them. i love telling people i love them. i love u. all of u. here's a poem about my best friend aka the greatest human on earth, the guildenstern to my rosencrantz

so i've known my best friend since 9th grade

except

except actually i met her in 3rd grade and didn't know it until 10th grade

and she wasn't my best friend until college

except

except she was, i think, maybe the whole time and we just didn't know it

on my fifteenth birthday she came with me to get my nose pierced and gave me a hand drawn birthday card that quoted my favorite green day song

once we spent six hours on skype drawing bad caricatures of celebrities

and when i left to grab a snack she yelled after me

"don't you go where i can't follow"

our senior year we read "rosencrantz and guildenstern are dead" for ap english and we started calling each other rosencrantz and guildenstern

and when she gave her senior project speech on william faulkner she cried, not because she was nervous, but because she loves faulkner and she got emotional

she is exactly 12 days older than me, and a taurus, and she plays a bunch of different instruments and one day we're going to start a folk punk band called the rebel amish

last summer we went to the deyoung together and laid in a shag covered bean bag chair watching the light show in the summer of love exhibit for like an hour

and we took a selfie in some giant gold antique mirror

and when i picture my future, she is as much a part of it as my boyfriend

this other love of my life, this girl with the bright eyes and the once broken nose and who is always willing to sit and talk about books

or the shitty people we went to high school with

or weird titles for potential memoirs

this amazing person, who is the only person i would trust to drive me through marin county while eating a mcdonalds cheeseburger

it is a different kind of love, sure

but it is a love story

and it is ours

14/30 which i wrote but forgot to post because i was playing video games

i wish my own mysteries were this easy to solve

just look for the spot that glows

and unearth what's hiding

no crying

no years of therapy

no buried memories

just point and click

[shanedawsonfanfiction-blog]

But I Am Not A Superhero. Chapter 1.

Chapter One. November 19, 2017.

It was nearly four in the morning and I was laying in my bed, watching YouTube with my earbuds plugged in, actually one of his conspiracy videos, when the video suddenly paused and my phone started playing his ringtone, the intro of his hit song, ‘Superluv’.

Why is Shane calling me? I thought to myself as I looked at his number on my screen.

I bit my lower lip, listening to the ringtone start all over. I hadn’t heard from Shane since he started dating a Hilary Duff look-alike YouTuber called Lisa Schwartz, so it took me off-guard when I heard his ringtone.

The day that I actually got the guts to tell Shane that I liked him more than a friend was actually the day that he had huge news. So naturally I let him tell me the huge news first.

‘Stupid idiotic me.’

The huge news was that he was dating Lisa. So of course I didn’t tell him how I felt.

My thumb hovered over the red reject button, I really didn’t want to play catch up with him. I knew that it would really hurt because I still had feelings towards him. But something in the pit of my stomach made me answer Shane’s call. I pulled out the earbuds as I heaved a heavy sigh then hit the green button on my screen.

“Shane?” I asked, putting the phone to my ear, in utter shock, I moved so that I was sitting on the edge of my full sized bed, pulling the cord of my nightstand lamp.

I ran my thin fingers through my semi-long brown hair. It short of looked like the cut Shane had back in 2012. So it was kinda short, barely hitting my shoulders and covering my right eye.

‘Very emo and very not in style but I didn’t care. I like it.’

“Jess, hey.” Shane said softly then he cleared his throat, pulling away his phone slightly as he did so, “Did I wake you? I forgot about the three hour difference.”

“No, I was actually watching one of your videos, they are very creepy and well researched on your part.” I admitted softly, “You have changed just a little bit, still hilarious but more grown up. Though I can still see the nineteen year old Shane, sometimes.” I laid on my back in the middle of my bed, looking at my ceiling light that was shut off.

“Thank you, I am glad you still like my videos.” He said, it sounded like he was also laying down, probably on the brown leather couch in his office or the gray couch in the living room, “Do you actually think I have changed?”

“Yes, you have changed. I think I actually like the newer videos a bit more than your older videos. But I will always love your older videos, because... Well... They are a part of my younger adulthood.”

“I understand that, Jess. Thank you for saying that.” Shane said to me, “Are you still living with Momma Barnum and your sister, Sophia?”

‘Very odd question to ask.’

I wrinkled my forehead in confusion, I was surprised that he remembered my half-sister’s name, and just because it had been so long that we talked last.

Shane and I were the same age, had similar pasts, and had the same sort of shit to deal with. Like a single parent household, a father that we didn’t like, and having issues with bullies. So of course, we became very close. I remember thinking of him as my slightly older brother.

‘Well until those feelings changed into something more.’

I stood up and walked to my old oak desk, opening my laptop and logging into my Twitter, “I do still live at home. I actually tried to live in a group home for mentally disabled adults, as you know, it wasn’t a fit for me.” I went to his profile and liked a few of his tweets.

My biological father shook me when I was two months old. I had a brain bleed so some things were effected, like my speech, my balance and my fine motor skills. I was all there mentally. I got made fun of all the fucking time by my disability (even from a few family members, I’ll get to that a bit later) before most people got to know the real me.

As I grew up, in a way like Shane, I also had a persona. A better version of myself that I used online or when I met new people in real life. There were only a slim few who actually knew the real me. Shane was one of them, of course.

Shane and I actually met on a website called. We became best friends that way and once we were comfortable with each other, I finally told him about my disability and he didn’t judge me, and he actually supported me. Which utterly shocked the living crap out of me, even after him knowing I was half expecting him to go away and never contact me ever again.

“Because you are physically disabled, not mentally disabled.” He sounded like he was now walking around his house, “That was a horrible fit for you, no doubt. Why did you even try the group home? Knowing you and knowing that you are independent and whatnot, you just need some help, living there just for a few days would drive you fucking crazy.”

“My case manager wanted me to get a taste of living alone. I lasted like five days till I wanted to shoot my brains out. They treated me like a fucking four year old, I had to stay in my bedroom twenty-four/seven with a roommate who would look at me for hours on end, I had to stay in my pajamas, unless I had any visitors and they didn’t understand that I was vegan. I’m not vegan anymore, by the way. I love meat and other shit way too much.” I said, laughing a little at the end. Then I logged out of Twitter and went back on my bed and laid on my back.

He made a tutting noise over the phone call, “Jess.” He sighed. I bit my lower lip slightly, loving that he still cared even after all these years, “Well, at least you tried it and found out that a group home isn’t for you. Would you ever want to try to live alone or with a friend that you trust more than anything?”

I narrowed my brown eyes slightly, ‘Why is he asking me these kind of questions?’ I thought to myself as I saw the door open slightly and I heard a soft squeaky meow. It sounded more like a mouse but I knew that meow. It was my kitten’s meow, Persephone.

I shrugged as Persephone, my six month old kitten, who looked just like Shane’s cat Muffins, she climbed onto my chest and head-butted my left hand a few times, as if to say ‘Pet me, Momma. Please Momma, pet me.’ I gave in and petted her, “Sure, I mean I am almost thirty, just like you. I do not want to live with my family till I die, that would be just sad. And don’t get me started on my sex life. It sucks. Like ‘yup, I live with my overbearing mother, lets fuck while she isn’t home’.”

We both cracked up into a fit of laugher at that. It felt so good, laughing with Shane again.

“But I hardly get laid because when I finally tell them that I am disabled, they disappear like a puff of smoke. So my sex life is like yours when you were in high school.”

“That has to suck.” He said, “Now name three places you want to either live or visit.” He said to me. I stayed silent for a few moments, thinking hard, “Paris, Germany and California. Why are you asking?” I rubbed Persephone’s neck softly and she started to purr loudly.

“Just curious.” He said simply and I narrowed my eyes.

‘I know him better than anyone, he has a reason.’

I sat back up, making Persephone jump off of me, as she hissed at me angrily because she was comfortable on my chest, “Sorry, kitty.” I said softly, putting my feet on the hard iron bar that held up my mattress, “Shane Lee, I know you better than I know myself, so spill.” I put my elbows on my knees.

I only used his middle or real last name when I was sort of upset or mad at him. I really did know Shane better than myself and sometimes it scared me.

Shane was silent for a few moments then I heard him sigh, “Ryland and I broke up about a week ago.” I heard a cupboard door creek open over on his end, he was eating his feelings and that made me want to hug him and comfort him.

“Shane... I am so sorry. Do you want to talk about it?” Wait, of course you don’t, never mind. I said in a soft voice. I shook my head in disbelief. I was actually happy that he had found someone else that made him happy.

‘Lisa and now Ryland. People who I thought would stick with Shane till they die.’

“I am okay.” Shane said, his mouth full of whatever he opened in the cupboard and stuffed in his face. Knowing him it was probably a package of Reese’s cups or some other kind of chocolate.

“Shane...” I started to say, but he stopped me, “Jessa, I am okay. Really.”

“Okay, I’ll drop it.” I sighed, I knew when to not to push him to talk about things because he would just shut down and I didn’t want to stop talking to him quite yet.

“Thank you, Jess.” He said, I heard him walking through his house, “So I have another question for you.”

“You want to ask if I would be willing to visit you, aren’t you?” I asked, laying back down on my bed, playing with a strain of my hair with two fingers.

‘I wouldn’t mind keeping him company, he is not living with Momma Yaw anymore and he has his shit together now. Well, somewhat put together. We could take care of each other, I could help him heal and he could help me live on my own. It would be a win-win.’

“I was leading up to that question, but yes. Would you want to finally meet? Stay with me for a month or something. We can play by ear when you get here. What do you think about that?”

I rolled onto my stomach, “Well, now you are in a better headspace, you have your own place, and you are more than able to take care of me. I see no reasons why we can’t meet each other now.”

“Would Momma Barnum even let you travel across the country to see someone that you met over the Internet?” Shane asked then I heard him tell Uno ‘No.’ His dog was probably doing something bad.

“What is Uno doing?” I asked as I smiled a little.

“He was jumping on me. I am trying to teach him not to jump on people when he is excited about something. Anyway, do you think Teri will let you?” Shane had suddenly became serious because he would hardly ever use my mother’s real name.

I sat up on my knees, I grabbed a pillow and hugged it against my chest, “Maybe, if I tell her who you are and that you won’t rape me, murder me and chop my dead body in a dozen pieces and throw my body in the ocean or something.”

Besides watching his YouTube videos for hours on end, I had another bad habit of binge watching crime shows like ‘Deadly Women’, Wives with Knifes’ and some others. I actually took a course in high school about solving crimes and I of course, aced it.

I heard his laugh and it made my heart do a dozen or so backflips. I gripped my pillow a little tighter as I smiled softly, trying not to squeal.

“No I won’t do anything bad to you. If it makes you feel any better, Momma Yaw is actually going to be in Chicago in a few days, I could tell her to make a pit stop to Detroit and pick you up. So that you won’t be flying to California all alone. I remember you saying that you only flew once. Coming to the United States from Germany and you can’t even remember it because you were a baby.”

He was being serious!

“That would be better. For Momma Barnum’s nerves and mine. So I’d be with Momma Yaw on the plane, not all alone?” I asked chewing on my lower lip.

“Not all alone, not at all. I promise you that. She would be with you the whole way. Then when you land at LAX, I’ll pick you two women up, then depending on the time that your planes land, we could go out for food or just head home.”

This was a different Shane from the years beforehand, the last time we were trying to meet each other, we couldn’t form a plan to save our lives. But now, he had everything planned out.

See what happens in only a few years later.

“Well, Momma Barnum really can’t say no, I am not a kid anymore so all I have to do is to tell her what is going on, tell her that we have everything planned out.”

“Very true. Oh and you don’t need to bring any money. I am more than willing to buy you what you need when you get here.” I could hear him take a few gulps of something, then swallow, “Think of it as an all paid vacation.”

“Sounds wonderful.” I laughed a little, “But that would probably be the selling point for Momma Barnum. We are still struggling with money. We make ends meet and get everything paid. We just don’t have a lot of left over money after paying all the bills and getting food.” I slid off of my bed and walked to my closet door.

“Been there, so I understand. Not a fun time. So are you really thinking of visiting me?” Shane asked me seriously.

“I am, actually.” Grabbing my black over the shoulder suitcase, “Do you know that exact date that Momma Yaw will be in Chicago?”

“November 29th through December 6th I believe, not really sure. I will text you with the right dates after I call her.” Shane heaved a sigh as if he was sitting down on a couch.

I gently put the suitcase down on my bed and unzipped it, “Another question.” I said, finding Persephone laying on my desk chair.

“Yeah?” Shane asked me through the phone.

“Is Cheeto okay with other kitties? I don’t want to leave my little princess with my family. They hardly remember to give the pets water every day and clean the litter box. I don’t want to worry about her while I am gone.” I picked up Persephone and nuzzled her, she struggled out of my grip because she hated being held.

“Of course, bring your baby with you!” He sounded like he was smiling, “Cheeto will probably hiss at her for a day or two but after a while he will get used to her. Is your princess up to date on her shots and other things?”

“Yes, she is heathy, spayed and flea free.” I said then kissed her head, “You are going to hate the flight but it will be worth it, Persephone.” I told her as she jumped down and climbed onto my bed and laid on it.

“The princess of the Underworld, it is a cool name.” Shane said.

“Yeah, I wanted her to have a princess name but she is a butthead so I decided on Persephone. I tend to call her Seph for short. She kinda looks like she could be a sibling of Muffins or at least maybe a daughter of her.”

“You remember Muffins?” He sounded completely shocked.

‘How could I ever forget about Muffins and his other pets? They were always in his videos.’

“Of course, I see that Momma Yaw is keeping her fat and happy. I follow her on Twitter.” I sat down on my bed looking at my dresser debating on what to pack.

“So you guys are still having money troubles? You kinda hinted it before when talking about Momma Barnum letting you visit me.”

I opened my shirt drawer of my short chubby dresser and picked out seventeen shirts (I even grabbed a few Shane Dawson shirts just as a joke) and packed them in the suitcase, then I shut the drawer, “Yeah, we are. We were doing okay for a few years after the divorce from Steve, Sophia’s father and my first step-father. Then Momma Barnum met an I.T web designer guy for Ford on Match.com, and got hitched soon afterward. But he cheated on a twenty-three year old church lady who sings in the fucking choir only four years after getting married, and she looks like a freaking whale. Downgrade, I am telling you.”

“Oh, that must have been horrible. I am sorry about that. Is that why you practically jumped at coming to visit me?” Shane asked then he called Cheeto to him then said, “My freaking cat hates me. He literally walked away from me.”

I chewed on my lower lip, putting my folded clothes in my suitcase, “Partly, but mainly it’s because I wanna meet you and cheer you up.”  Then I sat on my desk chair, “And don’t fucking lie to me, I know that he loves you.”

“I understand that, meet you favorite older brother and get away from the stress of money issues.” He laughed a little as I opened my closet door and grabbed my four hoodies, one gray, one pink and two black. I folded them and put them in the suitcase, then I shut the closet door.

“What are you doing?” Shane asked, I guess he could hear me moving around my bedroom.

“Packing some stuff now, so I don’t wait last minute.” I said opening my jean drawer, then grabbing only nice skinny jeans. Seven pairs. Three in black, two in gray, one black with white strips and another single pair in dark blue.

“Always need to be ready, don’t ya?” he joked. He knew that I always had to be organized. Even more so when it came with trips.

I balanced my phone between my cheek and shoulder as I folded my jeans so that were folded in a smaller square, “Shut up.” Then I put the jeans in the suitcase.

I decided to pack my other clothes when the day came nearer, so I put my suitcase near my desk with a light ‘flop’.

“I’ll let you go for now, okay? I really need to edit some videos that I did in the past few days.” He said to me, “Don’t be a stranger, you can text me and call me whenever you want. I hardly ever asleep.”

“Okay. I’ll text you when I tell Momma Barnum about visiting you.” I said as I sat on my bed, “It was great to hear from you again.”

“It was, I am glad I decided to call you. Talk soon, okay?” He said.

“Okay, bye.” I said as I laid on my bed, smiling softly I plugged in my phone and rolled over to my left side.

“Bye Jess.” He said then he hung up.

I put my phone on my nightstand, plugged it into my charger and shut off my light. I covered myself with my bedsheets and decided to get a few hours of sleep before I had to take care of my mother’s dog for her while she went to work.

--

I heard my mother’s footsteps on the main floor, headed to the bathroom, I rolled over on my back and rubbed my eyes.

After I yawned, I looked at my phone, it was six in the morning and I had a text message waiting for me from Shane. I clicked on the message as I smiled.

Shane- I was right, Nov. 29 through Dec. 6. She said she could come and get you in the morning of the seventh.

I smiled at the text, I didn’t reply because I didn’t want to bother him while he edited his videos. I slid off my bed and grabbed my red wire rimmed glasses and putting them on then I made the way out of my bedroom and to the dining room. I sat down on a high back wooden chair, “Morning Mom.” I said as I saw her walk out of the bathroom.

My mother was fifty-two and looked a lot more like thirty-two. She also looked a lot like me but a tad older. She had long black wavy hair, big brown eyes and very pale skin. She was a little heavy set but she made it look good. She was in her dark blue nursing uniform.

“Hi, you are awake early.” She said as she walked to the kitchen to make us cups of coffee with the one cup brewer that we had.

“Do you remember Shane?” I asked, opening up the convocation.

She handed me my orange kitty coffee cup, the tail was the cup’s handle. The cat kind of reminded me of Cheeto. She nodded, “The guy from YouTube? Yeah I remember him. Was that who you were talking to earlier this morning? You weren’t quiet.”

I held my coffee cup with both hands and blew on the hot liquid, “Yes, he called me.” I glanced up at her and set my coffee cup down, “He asked me to visit him. I really want to, Mom. And before you ask me a dozen questions, we have it all set. His mother is going to pick me up on December seventh, he said I don’t have to buy anything or bring any money with me and...” I sighed shrugging, “I really want to see him, Mom.”

“He lives in California, correct? That is a long way from Michigan.” She glanced at me as she held up her green frog coffee cup, “Will you be on the plane all alone?”

‘I knew she would ask me a million of questions.’

“No, his mother is going to fly with me back to California.” I said the sipped my coffee, “She is going to be in Chicago and then she would come here to get me before going back home.”

“When are you coming back home?” She asked me, glancing at me.

I bit my lower lip, “He suggested a few weeks or a month, we don’t really know.” I admitted softly, looking at her, “maybe more than that. It depends on me I guess. If I like it, I might stay longer, but if I don’t I’ll come home sooner.”

She nodded, “Okay, are you taking your kitten with you?” She stood up and packed a lunch for herself.

“I asked and Shane seemed excited on having another cat in his house for a while.” I said, tapping my fingers on my coffee cup.

“Don’t forget your health care cards when you pack your I.D.” My mother said, “If you have a fall or something, you will be able to go to the E.R without any trouble.”

I snapped my head up to look at her, “You are letting me go? Like for real? You aren’t bull shiting me?”

This can’t be happening! I actually thought she’d say no!

“I am not bull shiting you. I know you always wanted to meet him and I also remember how heartbroken you were when he was dating his girlfriend. Lisa.” She walked to me and pushed back my hair, then kissed my forehead, “I won’t hold you back from meeting him.”

I wrapped my arms around her middle, “Thank you! Thank you!”

She patted my head, “No problem. I am off on the seventh so I can take you to the airport. I don’t want to have Sophia to drop you off all alone without me.”

I smiled and nodded, “Thank you again.”

She shook her head and sat back down to finish her coffee, “Just take a lot of pictures and send them to me, alright? I just want to know that you are having fun with him.”

I smiled brightly, “I will, I promise!”

Suddenly we heard noises from the basement and then I saw Tobias and Sophia. Tobias was Sophia’s very stupid, untrained dog.

“Morning…” Sophia muttered as she took her dog outside then walked to the bathroom.

“She has to take me to work, because her and her gang are going to the mall today.” Our mother explained to me.

I tried not to roll my eyes, when I was a kid while we were poor, I hardly went out to the mall with my friends. I went back to my coffee.

Sophia walked out, her long blue hair up on a messy bun. She walked to the living room and put on her black slip-on shoes while with one hand she was looking at her iPhone screen. Then she let in her stupid hound dog and fed him, without uttering anything else to us.

‘How she could do anything without actually looking at what she was doing, I never knew how she could do that. Crazy.’

Sophia was seventeen years old, slightly heavy set, hazel eyes that she always had dark eye liner around them and she always had her hair dyed a weird color, this month it was bright blue.

“I am ready whenever you are.” Sophia said to our mother, grabbing the car keys. We only had one car so they had to share it. I learned how to drive but I was terrified to actually drive so I never did.

“Okay.” She looked at me, “Your clothes are in the dryer so tell Sophia to bring it up later today so that you can pack.” Our mother said as she pointed at me, “You have your suitcase? I can tell Sophia to look for it for you in the basement.”

I nodded, “I got it. It was in my closet. I have some things packed in it already.” I said softly.

Our mother smiled and walked to the table, grabbing her coffee cup, “Of course you have. You are always prepared and always early for things.”

“You going somewhere?” Sophia asked as she looked at her iPhone screen, still in living room. Her eyes were almost always glued on the goddamned screen.

‘Could she do anything without looking on her phone screen? I swear.’

“Jess is going to visit Shane for a while.” Our mother said as she rinsed out her coffee cup in the sink.

Sophia walked into the dining room, “Shane? Shane Dawson? Seriously?” she rolled her hazel eyes at me, “He has been on YouTube for ten years. He had lost his humor, when he shaved his hair. To me, he is dead.”

I glared at her, “I think he got better over time, I mean he did grow up.” I raised an eye brow at her, “That’s what most people tend to do after they turn a certain age.” I glared at her.

“He is stupid. His content is lame and he steals ideas from other YouTubers.”

I rolled my eyes, “Actually, no he isn’t, unlike newer YouTubers he doesn’t need to beg for views or likes or buy for views. Now that is stupid. And for a fact, no he doesn’t ‘steal’ ideas and if he does, he tells us whose idea that he stole so he won’t get mean comments.”

I learned a while ago that some newer YouTubers actually bought themselves views or likes. How fucking sad.

‘Thankfully Shane never had to do that.’

Sophia glared at me and was about to open her mouth but our mother snapped her fingers at her, “Okay enough!” She looked to Sophia then to me, “Jess is going, so don’t make fun of him and don’t hold her back from packing. After you get home you go back downstairs and bring up her clothes before you hang out with your friends.” She kissed my cheek, “Bye honey.” Then she grabbed her nursing bag and her lunch bag, “Okay, I am ready, let’s go.”

“Bye Mom.” I said, holding my coffee cup with both hands.

As soon as I heard the front door shut, I walked back to my room, unplugged my phone and clicked on Shane’s contact, I decided to call him, hoping that I didn’t wake him up.

“Hey.” Shane’s voice answered after the third ring, “Did you tell Momma Barnum already? That was fast.”

“Yes and I can come visit you!” I said sitting back down at the dining room table after shooing Persephone from my coffee cup. My cat loved sneaking anything that I was drinking or eating.

“She is off work on the seventh so that is wonderful, I just know if Sophia had to drop me off she would just drop me off at the door and leave.” I explained to him.

“I knew she would let you.” Shane laughed, “Sophia sounds rude. She wouldn’t want to watch you take off?” He sounded upset.

I took a sip of my coffee then smiled, “She cares more about her friends then her own family. So our mother’s will meet.” I set my coffee cup down and pulled up my feet up on the chair then I put my pointed chin on my knees, “That will be neat.”

“That will be cool, take pictures of our mother’s meeting each other.” Shane said.

“Will do.” I said to him, then I quivered slightly, “Argh, it is getting cold here.”

“I think visiting me would be good for your tense muscles, I remember you saying that freezing cold weather makes your muscles tense up. Maybe staying in California will be way better for you. Get you away from your family and away from the snow.”

“I know, I am glad that you called while it’s getting colder here.” I said, getting up, making another cup of coffee, “Do you have any plans for when I get there?”

“Yeah, I do. I plan to take you around town, to see the sights, take you to my favorite restaurants and to meet a few of my friends Kate.” Kate was his longest best friend, I recalled, that made me smile, knowing that he was willing to let me meet people that he was very close with.

“Then Drew, he is interested in meeting you. Garret for sure because you two have a weird obsession with Harry Potter and Trisha wants to meet you. Lisa wants to meet you as well.” He finished.

‘Lisa? That doesn’t sound good.’ I thought to myself.

“Trisha wants to meet me?” I asked in udder shock. She was one of my other favorite YouTubers and Shane did a lot of videos with her and I listened to her songs on my music app sometimes, “And Lisa wants to meet me?” I asked in small voice.

“Yeah, I told Trisha about you.” Shane admitted softly, “I told her that you were my best friend that I had online, that we have similar lifestyles, and that I feel like I can tell you anything.” He said, “And sure, Lisa knows that we were close, so when I suggested on having you around for a while, she told me that she wanted to meet you.”

I knew that they were still friends, but they actually talked about me? I bit my lower lip, “I thought she hated me.” I muttered softly.

“Why would you think that?” Shane asked me.

After only weeks of dating Lisa, he had stopped talking to me completely, just like right out of the blue. I tried to reach out to him every so often, just to check in, but whenever I sent him messages or requested a Skype call he would not reply and reject my Skype calls. After only three weeks of no responses I thought if he really wanted to talk to me, that he would reach out to me. But he never did. Weeks turned into months and months turned into years. I finally gave up and thought that he didn’t really want to be my friend and just thought of him as ‘Shane Dawson, the YouTuber’, not ‘Shane Yaw, my friend’ and that broke my heart into a billion pieces.

“Never mind, it’s nothing.” I said bitterly, not really wanting to talk about anything else other than Lisa wanting to meeting me and I mean anything!

I still had no answers on why did what he did and I was too terrified to ask why because I didn’t want to ruin things right away, so I told myself that I would ask him about why he stopped being my friend after a few weeks into my visit.

Bella and Tobias followed me in the living room and Bella, Mom’s black and silver cockapoo laid next to me while Tobias laid on the blanket on the hard floor near the wide window.

Shane must’ve known he poked at a sore subject for me and he changed it, “Are you getting excited on meeting me?”

“I am, very excited and very nervous as hell.” I said then sipped my coffee as I heard the blue SUV pull up in our driveway and a car door shut and I groaned softly.

“I am glad, Jess. I am actually getting excited as well.” Shane said as Sophia walked in the door and kicked off her shoes as the two dogs jumped on her excitedly.

“Get the fuck off of me.” Sophia snapped at them, pushing them off of her, then she glared at me, “Talking to your gay boyfriend again?” She asked as she rolled her eyes.

“Umm, you shouldn’t gay-shame Shane because you are gay.” I cocked my head at her, “So you should keep your damn mouth shut.” I glared back at her, my anger raising slightly, “And you shouldn’t yell at the dogs, they are just excited to see you.” I snapped at her, shaking my head at her, “Honestly, stop yelling at them, you always yell at them, you hardly ever talk to them nicely.”

“Who are you yelling at?” Shane asked me through the phone laughing a little, “And thank you for sticking up for me, you didn’t really need to.”

Sophia walked to her bedroom, “Come on, Tobias.” Then she whistled for him to follow her and he ran to the basement stairs.

“Sophia. She yelled at our dogs while they were jumping on her and no problem, I don’t know why she hates you so much, she used to be obsessed with you for years.” I explained to Shane petting Bella after she jumped next to me and set her head on my lap,

“I gave your number to Momma Yaw so that she could get ahold to you when you get to the airport and tell you where to meet her.” Shane said and I heard him typing on his keyboard, so that meant he was in his office working on videos.

“Okay, sounds good, I wasn’t even thinking of that.” I heard clicking of a mouse or something, so that meant that he was most likely working on editing some videos, “Am I bothering you?” I asked softly, ashamed that I probably was.

“No, of course not.” Shane said, “I can multitask, don’t worry about bugging me. I like talking to you while I work. It makes it go by faster.”

I blushed slightly, “Okay, you are the boss.”

I could tell that he was smiling, “That I am.” I cracked up and nodded.

“Damn straight.” I said after my laughing fit then I sighed, “I need to tell Sophia to bring up my laundry. Hold on, I am putting the phone down for a bit.”

“Okay, I’ll be here when you get back.” Shane told me.

I quickly put the phone face down on the black wooden table near my spot, then stood up and walked to the stairs, “Did you forget what Mom told you to do for me before you waste money with your friends?” I hollered down the stairs, holding the baby gate at the landing, I had a shadow with me. Bella was sitting right next to my left leg.

“NO! I am doing it now.” Sophia yelled back up at me, obviously lying to me.

She didn’t remember, because I was listening carefully while I was talking with Shane and I didn’t hear her moving around downstairs or the noise of the dryer door opening.

“Yeah right, you were sitting on your bed tweeting or some other shit.” I muttered softly as I walked back to the living room with Bella following me, “Come on, pup.”

“What did you mutter?” Sophia yelled up at me.

I ignored her and sat back down on the couch and picked up the phone, “Back.”

“Welcome back.” Shane said, “Can you do stairs? I was wondering if I needed to put your room on the main floor, don’t want you falling.”

“I can do stairs, slowly but they aren’t trouble.” I said, smiling. He was trying to Jessa-proof his house for me, “Thank you for asking though.”

“No problem I just want to be sure before I make up your room.”

“I understand that completely, I have seen your house due to your videos and Snapchat. I know that your staircase has a railing, so I will be alright.” I explained to him, “I’ll just be slow on them, but slow is better than falling off them.” I petted Bella as I spoke.

“True. Okay, if you are sure.” He didn’t sound convinced but that was okay, I understood his fears of me falling while I was there, I even had that same fear but I knew how to not make it true.

Sophia came upstairs with a basket of my laundry and plopped it right next to my bare feet, almost on one if I didn’t move it in time, “There. Now can I get ready or do you have other shit for me to do?”

“Lose your fucking attitude, Mom told you to do this before you got ready and you of course planned on not doing it at all because you are a total selfish bitch.” I snapped at her, not caring that Shane could hear our discussion through the other line.

“Make me, retard.”  She half whispered as she got into my face.

Everyone who really knew me, knew that I absolutely loathed that word and if you ever used it around me that I would get extremely upset. So I knew that she was just pressing my buttons just because I was talking with Shane.

I shook my head sadly, “Shut your fucking mouth, right now.” I raised my eyebrows at her, “I don’t fucking care if I am on the phone. I will slap you silly.”

“You won’t be able to hit me, you are too fucking slow.” Sophia snapped at me.

I heard a noise on the other end of the call, like Shane uttered something but I missed it.

“Try me, bitch, you are poking the bull and you know it. I know why too, it’s all because I am talking to Shane. I think you are jealous. So get away from me or I will smack you.”

“I’m going back downstairs before I say something that I’ll regret later on.” She said as she walked back downstairs.

“Yeah, you do that.” I muttered softly as I comforted Bella for a moment before I started to fold my clothes.

“She honestly pulled attitude with you for doing something for you? What the flying fuck? I only know you strictly online and I know that you can’t do stairs while holding a huge fucking basket of laundry. What is her fucking deal? ” Shane said when it was silent for a few moments.

I smiled as I shook my head, “It is okay, Shane, really. I am so used to it. And we won’t be strictly online friends in a few.”

“You got a point, you are right, but still.” He said seriously, “Does she normally talk to you like that without your mom there with you guys?”

“Yeah, she does. Even with Mom home, she doesn’t stop her half of the time. She just let’s her. That really helps with my low self-esteem.”

“Seriously, I understand that. I might not let you go back home after your visit.” Shane said, “I mean Jesus Christ just hearing her is making me very pissed off that she treats you like shit all because you can’t so some things on your own. How fucking selfish.”

“If Mom dies before I get out on my own or at least live with a friend, I will have to be taken care by her.” I wrinkled my nose, shaking my head, “It’s just not how she treats me. It’s also how spoiled she is. She knows that we have money issues and she always gets two or three make-up boxes in the mail, per month. I checked how much they are each, they are around thirty dollars per box! That is around ninety dollars per month!”

“That is insane! No, I won’t let you live with her, she’d steal your government money and use it for herself.” He said.

“Then who would I live with?” I asked, smiling softly.

“With me. If you wanted after a few weeks.”

I was silent for a few moments, “Shane…I just couldn’t live with you…”

“Why not? We could be roommates, you had to pay rent of course, but it’d be dirt cheap. I’d give you the friends and family discount.”

I smiled faintly as I continued to fold my clothes, “The friends and family discount?”

“Yeah, dummy. You are a friend of mine.” He laughed a little.

‘Maybe seeing Shane will change my life for the better.’

[psychomoxxie]

Lust, Laughter, and the Land of Oz

Remember what things were like before COVID? Yeah? No? Because I do, just barrely.  Here’s something i wrote just before it hit, in February, just three months before i got sick -- i was feeling pretty good mentally, too.  Hadn’t had to take my anti-psychotic in about 4 months, and was still happily in my I’m-single-for-almost-four-years-and-don’t-want-to-change-it mode.   

I know i’ve been bitching pretty incessantly for the past few posts about this ”relationship” that ended recently, but the fact is, things never got the chance to get physical (COVID, hello) so i suppose technically, i never broke that 4-year streak.  ANYWAY. Here’s where my head was concerning sex, love, and all that nonsense before the shit hit the fan.  Since we can’t backdate things on here, i’m just copying it from my Wordpress blog and throwing it up here with a long-winded explanation before i move on to other subjects, and close the book on All Things Romantic for awhile.  I just wanted to post this to remind myself where i was coming from before things took a wrong turn, now that i’m feeling better; 

Which is that sex is perfectly good and fine and healthy, but i suck at the whole relationship thing, and i need to remember that before getting involved with anyone (particularly since my ASPD -- not so much my SZA -- crap tends to impede my judgement in that regard, let’s be honest. I am often attracted to unhealthy types, and that’s not good for me, as i’m working hard on getting better, not feeding the Beast).  

What this shows me -- and reminds me of, is that i’ve been attracted to happier, healthier types lately. And that’s really a good thing. While things may have ended on an unpleasant note with this last one, and he definitely wasn’t the healthiest guy in the world, he was FAR from abusive and horrible.  He was just immature and flighty and a host of other things, but not the usual fare i tend to go for (i.e., somewhere in the neighborhood of my diagnosis, but the evil, ultra-narcissistic, super fucked-up, unmedicated/untreated version; either that, or just a completely useless, quasi-depressed child with substance abuse issues. Take your pick. Now that i think of it, He might have fit into that 2nd category...). 

So, with no further ado...

Feb 5, 2020 - 

Sexual ambivalence when you’re single is such a useless, silly, obsessive state. Once you’re there, it’s so impossibly difficult to get out. Like when you’re a kid, at the bottom of the slide, trying to climb up to the top when you’re wearing only socks and have a case of the giggles. You’re just going to keep sliding back down again. And the thing of it is, you really don’t mind…except for the fact that you never get a really good slide in, because you never quite make it all the way to the top.

Are my metaphors getting too convoluted?

Bear with me, here…

It’s been nearly four years, with the exception of one ill-advised and poorly executed fumble into one-night stand territory two summers ago, since I’ve had sex; and I almost don’t count that time, since I was inebriated, didn’t come, and the guy was so tedious and odd in his behavior – what with his bemoaning the “perfect” ex-girlfriend one minute while we’re in bed, then telling me he can’t believe someone as beautiful as me would sleep with him the next (not to mention the consequent bizarre stalker-like behavior that continues to this day) that I almost feel like I can erase it from the board because the universal system of checks and balances surely indicates that I get to start from scratch when it comes to that one. Right?

Anyway, the point is it’s been a long time. Previous to that, I was in an abusive relationship, and the last time he fucked me, it was so angry that I felt like he was trying to exact some kind of bizarre, bad porno film-esque revenge on me, so that barely counts in my book either. So I’d say I’m about due for a toe-curling orgasm, or a hundred. Like, on a regular basis, from whomever the fuck I please, whenever I want, for the rest of the year. Or, month? How many orgasms are a reasonable amount to expect in a month’s time? I’ll be damned if I know – it’s been far too long since I’ve had that sort of sex life. Which is stupid, since that used to be my modus operandi.

I’ve always known how bad I am at relationships. I’ve been broken in that regard from the word Go. There are any number of reasons I’ve stayed single for the past three and a half years – and indeed, plan on staying that way. I could go into detail, which I have in previous posts, but the heart of the matter is a woeful lack of judgment and boundaries on my part. My taste in men is so bad, it’s actually notorious amongst my circle of friends. When I haven’t seen someone in awhile, a common question is;

“So, you’re not…dating anybody…are you?”, accompanied by a worried expression.

I truly am that bad at choosing men to be in relationships with. The more violent the nature, the more obsessive, and the longer the prison term the better has been my motto (and yes, there have been one or two exceptions. But literally, just…one or two). And so, I prefer to keep a safe distance from the whole mess. Over the years, in fact, I’ve come to realize that I’m much better off when I’m single. This has always been the case, all the way back when I was in my twenties, and ostensibly not yet jaded.

I’m OK with this. Because I’m not the type that needs to be in a relationship to be “complete”. I don’t get lonely, in that sense. I have friends. I might have done occasionally when I was younger, and made more wholeheartedly pathetic attempts at being in “real, grown up relationships” that would last, but anyone who’s known me for long knows I’ve always been happier single.

Sex was never really a problem – I got that whole thing sorted out early on. After some childhood trauma and a teenage rape, I set out to fix myself of the abject terror, pain, disassociation, and ultimate inability to feel a thing. I did that with a series of handpicked lovers (several of them one night stands). Sort of an immersion therapy deal. I figured out how to ask for what I needed, and how to get out quick if it was obvious the guy wasn’t interested in getting me off (or turned out to be dangerous). And now I love sex. Which has the unfortunate effect of making some men think you love them. I’m not sure how that works, but there it is. And fuck, is it annoying. The way some people confuse lust and love has always been astounding to me. I tried explaining this problem to some hippies I knew years ago, and they looked at me like I was some kind of evil succubus. I guess that whole peace and love thing didn’t allow for the finer points of fucking…

Anyway, I spent so much time figuring out how to be good at sex, but I hadn’t the first clue about being good at relating to men in the context of a relationship. How to draw boundaries. How to stay safe emotionally, and even physically. And time and again, it’s been disastrous.

But, as for male friends, I couldn’t ask for a better bunch of guys. I picked a group of really stand-up men. And with the exception of a couple whom I’d fuck on occasion, on and off over the years (because they didn’t ask anything more of me, or get things twisted), they weren’t guys I was crossing that line with (well, except for the one time I did, and that just ended up as you’d expect – disastrously. And that was my fault, because I was grieving my son, and was a huge mess). My guy friends are all intelligent, fun, cool, creative people who genuinely care about me. They call me on my bullshit, and regularly tell me how intelligent, talented, and beautiful I am, when I feel anything but.

So…why do I make such terrible choices when it comes to romantic relationships? Well, if I knew that, we wouldn’t be here now would we? Actually, I do have a pretty good idea why – and of course it’s all down to being brought up in a house full of mental illness, abuse, and the resulting lack of boundaries and high tolerance for chaos/ideas of what’s “normal” that skew my perceptions in the relationships department. And that’s a Hell of a lot harder to fix than sex.

So, I stick to sex.

Or, at least I did. But, things have been off for a few years now. Even before the abusive relationship 3 1/2 years ago, it’s been like I’ve been dead inside since all of the death and loss I’ve endured, really. Ever since then, I really just haven’t had the life force it takes to have a healthy libido. Which sucks. Losing such a huge part of who you are because you’ve lost people you love is like walking around with a huge hole in the center of your chest. And it’s a long, slow climb back to being a whole person again.

Then the real surprise is finding out that, after you’ve worked through all that grief, you aren’t at all the same person you used to be.

Fast forward to two weekends ago.

So there I am, sitting at a local haunt, listening to my girlfriend M tell me that the bartender is flirting with me (for the 47 millionth time) and aren’t I going to do anything about it?

M is my opposite in so many ways – the brunette with the wild sex life and raging libido, the Lonely Hearts Club girl just looking for love, to my misanthropic, stoic, cold, Blonde lce Queen that I’ve become. We make a great pair. She’s always got some guy waiting in the wings, whilst I’m forever fending off her offers to hook me up with “this great guy she knows”.

I tell her she needs to be less dependent on men for her sense of self worth; that there is joy in being alone and getting to know oneself. And she tells me I need to stop being so damn untrusting – that I need to let a little bit of fun and risk into my life, that I’m too young to be so frigid. We’re both right, of course.

For months, she has been the voice of my deadened, dormant sex drive – like the insistent little breath of spring to my boring, snow-bound, sexless, Persephone alter-ego — stuck underground with my shitty husband Hades (that’s how I anthropomorphise my sex drive for the past few years), who just wants to hang out with the souls of the Dead, watch football and drink mead.

But, this time, for some reason, I listen. This time…instead of rolling my eyes at her and commenting that he’s too young, or too skinny, or too shaggy, or too cheerful, or whatever, I instead notice he’s actually pretty cute, and that he’s looking at me with what can only be described as unmistakable desire as he approaches me with liquid brown eyes and a drink, and sets it down in front of me. Then he knocks M’s glass, spilling some of her water onto the bar, then immediately cracks the snappiest joke, which makes me laugh so hard I actually snort. Then he turns to me and asks if there’s anything else I want.

And it’s then I realize – my entire body has that tingly feeling I used to get as a kid from when people would play with my long hair, when he looked at me just now; I am like a cat, internally all langorous, and purring…

And I think, Yes, yes there it is. I want him.

And it may not ever happen – because I can’t think that definitively yet. But, yes. I want. Maybe it will happen with him, or maybe with someone else. The possibilities are…pretty much wide open. The point is, I actually, really, truly feel Lust for someone for the first time in years.

Over the summer, I wrote about that jerk I knew from my old bartending gig who walked me home, then grabbed me and kissed me – I wrote how it was actually a pretty great kiss, but there was no liquid melting of my insides, and I was drunk (actually not how I usually go about these things), he wanted me to invite him in but I was like fuck no…and then the next time I saw him he was a little shit to me because I wouldn’t fuck him that night. Well, that all flashed in front of my eyes for a moment as I sat there with this cute, scruffy guy staring at me with his big, doe eyes and then I remembered;

“Yeah, but you didn’t want to fuck that guy in the slightest…so your instincts were spot on”.

And suddenly it’s like that moment when Dorothy steps out of her house in Oz, and everything is in Technicolor after a lifetime of boring Sepia. I notice the curl of hair falling into his eyes as he watches my fingers wrap around the glass. I notice how his breath hitches a bit as I lean towards him and bring the scotch to my lips. I notice that I feel every muscle in my stomach and thighs when I shift my weight on the chair, and the slight burn of the liquid as it moves down my throat. Little things. Mostly I feel that sensual self awareness that comes from knowing someone’s eyes are on me – eyes that I actually want to be watching me.

“I’ll let you know,” I tell him.

“I’ll be right here,” he says, a kind of goofy lilt to his voice.

Which is perfect, because I don’t want this to feel like a big, serious moment; this reawakening of my finally, finally feeling sexy again after so long. It should be a little silly, a little lighthearted! In fact, that’s part of what does it for me. The few, rare times I viscerally connect with someone, it’s because they’ve made me laugh first. And I realize that’s why I’m attracted to this guy…because he did something completely goofy yet sharply funny (a woefully rare combo) earlier and made me laugh – like, really laugh, from down in my belly. Had, in fact, done so several times throughout the evening. He has, actually, this kind of upbeat, silly but witty, whipsmart vibe about him that just positively reeks of happiness. It is utterly charming, and so, so very sexy. And a far cry from the usual, darkly depressive brooding but witty types I usually go for.

And that told me something even more important – that I’ve finally come back enough from the dark where I can appreciate a person like that, who emits so much joy, can exude such a sense of life, and who can make me really, really laugh. Laugh without irony.

From there, all the rest follows. And maybe, there’s hope for me yet.

[starstuffandalotofcoffee]

WicDiv catchup

The music: Lorde’s Melodrama, at least until I finish the album in which case enjoy an update.

The comic: WicDiv

The last issue I tested? THE FUCKING 1831 EDITION LAST SEPTEMBER HOLY FUCK

Anyway here’s my update:

Issue 25: apparently read this, but don’t remember it and I don’t seem to have tested it so here we go. Looking back I think I didn’t cover the end of 2016 books of 23 and 24 either but read those so here’s the really quick coverage: 23 is the weird magazine one so not really a bechdel test deal, 24 passes with Amaterasu and Laura.

25 passes right away with Cassandra and Laura.

big mood

OK (spoilers here because this is all old and I’ve had some character deaths spoiled, which is my fault)

So Ananke’s dead, and a giant dark shape has stolen Minerva, great. Onto issue 26 which I think I also read? And then 27 and on are new to me.

26: Passes with Laura and Amaterasu again. For those who are caught up and for whom issue numbers don’t help, this is the one where Baal and Amaterasu talk about the great darkness with the rest, setting up the post-Ananke big bad, presumably, and Laura goes with the Anarchy option. Cassandra is still, as always, among my favorites though Baal has shot up the charts. Honestly they’re all pretty great.

As a reminder at this moment, 3 + Ananke of the original 12 are dead, and Persephone also exists.

27: 

I fucking love Cassandra

Anyway this is kind of a time passing issue (deliberately, with the whole imperial decline thing), but a pass with Sakhmet and Laura.

28: Pass again with Sakhmet and Laura who between all the nihilistic partying have a lot of philosophical discussions, really.

At some point I finished Melodrama so I switched to Spotify Young Wild and Free which is far too optimistic for this series, but I don’t have a better idea.

And...yeah way too optimistic Sakhmet just ate a bunch of people and the world is about to end. Prescient, Gillen. Prescient as fuck. Also I used to like Amaterasu but for fuck’s sake.

29: This is officially a Cassandra fan post

Also passes with Cassandra and Laura talking about Sakhmet.

30:

Not going to spoil this but it’s good and difficult. Pass with Sakhmet and Laura again.

31: Further no spoilers, but a pass with Sakhmet and Amaterasu.

32: Uh, also no spoilers because obviously shit’s gone down, but: pass with Laura and Cassandra.

Cassandra’s name is absolutely perfect (also yes I refer to Cassandra and Laura by their pre-god names consistently, deal with it). Like, it seems too on the nose, and yet no other name would work.

Oh and apparently there’s a year 455 version so uh, that? Does not pass the Bechdel test, and since I suck at ancient history, doesn’t entirely do it for me, but looking forward to the November issue!

[visceralcoma]

Ex-Saints Spooning

Agents of Mayhem & Saints Row

Pairing: Ji-hoon “Johnny” Gat/Female Boss

Tempest was warped up onto the bay of the Ark. The fresh coat of blood on her hands dripped as she looked up into Persephone. Her unhinged smile met Brimstone's cool and collected ones. An understanding passed between them. With a single nod, Brimstone left the bay, leaving Tempest to go clean off. Her gloves sent off to be broken down and recycled. The ark was always too bright and far too neat, clean, and organized for her liking. But she was just an agent. Just one of the many, easy to overlook, and easy to forget.  Or so she had hoped. Ji-hoon "Johnny" Gat was headed right for her. An angry scowl across his mug as he made eye contact.

Her heart thudded and she looked around, searching for an escape, anything. Everytime she spent anytime with Ji-hoon, her head filled with images of the other line. Memories of what could have been if things had been different.  It made her nervous to be around him because she might slip, might let out a Familiar "Johnny" and reference anything they may have known in that other line.  And then there would be problems, because of course there would be. 

There was nowhere really for her to run without looking like she was fleeing so she remained rooted. 

"You went down without any backup?" Ji-hoon snapped at her, his glasses did little to belie the angle of his head as he checked her over. 

Scoffing, she replied back "Yeah, what of it." She raised her chin, defiant at the way he all but barked at her. He took a step back, something softened in his expression. There was a soft moment like he recognized something. 

 "You shouldn't be going down there alone. Legion could be-" She's thus far chalked up his protectiveness as being her superior in the Agency,  but sometimes... she wondered. He couldn't remember could he? 

"I can take care of Legion just fine." She turned away, uncomfortable. "They ain't got shit compared to me."

"Still, you shouldn't go alone. Take me with you next time." Ji-hoon insisted. 

"It was my mission, I take who I want." 

"Yeah?" 

"Ff... yeah. Course." 

"Right, well next time I ain't giving you a choice. Tempest. I'm going. Someone's gotta watch your back."  He crossed his arms. 

"Oh what... so I can have a cop at my back ever second. Fuck that." She flipped him off and walked away. 

"Ya damn right. At least this way, you won't get into any trouble." 

"Trouble's my middle name, Jo-  Gat."  She nearly slipped up but ground her teeth. "And just cuz you my supe, don't mean I take orders from you. I take em from Brimstone." She spat and stormed off. 

Only the next time, he did accompany her. Not just him though. Kingpin too. Her fingers twitched and throat felt tight with those two at her back. It was uncomfortable only because of how achingly familiar it was. She could not help herself, falling into some odd muscle memory, back pressed against Ji-hoon and Pierce as they were surrounded by Legion. They were shooting nonstop that tempest didn't notice herself slipping. 

"Feels like old times." She let slip with a laugh, a laugh that had Ji-hoon stiff. Pierce on the other hand laughed.

"Feels like we're made to have each other's back." The Vice King's head nudged her shoulder, but Tempest was cold, her gaze on Ji-hoon as he nodded, shooting at a legion that almost got too close.

When all was said and done and they were walking out of the warp bay, Ji-hoon grabbed her arm, and halted her.  

"I need to fucking talk to you." 

"About what?"  She grumbled, shrugging his hand off.  She did not want to get her hopes up.  No, not now. Not after she'd been so careful. 

"Not anything. Just... I wanna talk with you." 

"What like shoot the shit or sunthin?" 

"Yeah. You could say that."  He gave a smile, an honest to god genuine smile. What defenses she had, were ruined with that look. 

"Aight." She shrugged. 

"My office." He gestured and led the way. They were supposed to debrief with Friday, but apparently it could wait. The office was exactly what she expected. A wall dedicated to every crook he'd taken down, and some pictures of people he'd helped save.  It was different from the Johnny of the other line.  They killed a lot cops in their day.  There was also a picture of a kid with a striking resemblance to Ji-hoon, down to the glasses and everything. Though this kid was darker.  She gaped at it.  In the other line, Johnny never had kids. 

"I didn't know you had a kid."  She couldn't help herself. Ji-hoon looked up and shrugged. "So uh...kid got a mom or sunthin?"

"Yeah." He didn't seem ready to give more answers.  Tempest glanced at his hands but saw no wedding ring, not even a hint of a lighter band.  "Divorced."  He answered the unspoken question. She nodded.  "And widowed. Twice."

"Ah... sorry."  She looked away. "Ah, it's fine. Never really talked about it with anyone before. This way." He gestured to another door in his office that he disappeared through.

Tempest followed and immediately stopped dead at seeing his bed. He had sat and was taking his shoes off without even looking. 

"Uhh Gat?"

"Close the door." 

"Ain’t there rules about this sorta shit happening with your superior?" She asked. 

Ji-hoon lowered his glasses for a moment, a gesture she had never seen. Not in the present line or in the otherline. It was intimate and left her breathless as she caught a glimpse of his eyes for the first time. She snapped her mouth shut and closed the door. She looked to the side, unsure of herself as she looked at everywhere but the bed. 

 "I know you remember." He said soft as the time passed. "I just..." He was quiet for a long time. 

"You ain't never been good with words." She muttered.

"Not like you." 

“Always a man of action." She shrugged. He gave that little chuckle, dark and smooth all at once. She remembered the last time she heard it. When she'd confessed to him. That was right before the whole kidnapped by Satan to Hell.

"Can we-" He asked while staring at the bed.

"Sex? I mean yeah. I guess... but.." 

"Spoon." He deadpanned. "Not that I'm opposed but, it's been awhile." 

"Since you had sex? Psh, it's like riding a bike." 

"No. Since I knew you. I gotta know if you...feel the same."  He rose, brows tight and body tense. 

"Oh Gat, I feel the same as always." 

"Yeah? then get on the bed." He growled.

It was a standoff. Tempest had never made the first move in this line but in the other, it was a different story.  Guess it was time to bring that version of herself back.  She kicked her heels off and climbed in the bed. Almost immediately he was beside her, his arms around her.  They were both fully clothed. It was heaven. His chest at her back and her head tucked under his chin.  Tension that she hadn't known released in her neck for a second. 

"Fuck." His voice had her tense. It was broken and warbled. She spun in his arms to see his glasses pushed up. He was pinching the bridge of his nose and she saw something glisten at his eyelashes. 

"Is Johnny Gat crying." 

“No." He grit out. 

"Aww, the Saints’ celebrity is crying." She cooed and he shivered and drew his hips back and away. 

"Don't, do that voice." He slid his glasses back on and she grinned.

She didn't mention it again but slid up on the bed and pulled him in her arms. Begrudgingly, he became the small spoon.  For a long time, he laid there, their breaths evened out until they lulled into a half asleep state.  Tempest was damn near on the edge of sleep. The smell of something so achingly familiar, she wanted to relish but all at the same time it felt like a lifetime since she's been next to him.

"- missed this. Missed you." Whispered words. She wasn't sure which of them said it, but it was true either way.