#another shit event

[hannahssimblr]

The marquee holds extraordinary heat. It reminds me of the family holiday I took with Maureen and her kids to Florida, that phenomenal, stupefying heat, and the air like soup. I felt too tired to do anything but swim around in the resort pool for those two weeks, but that was the whole point. We went to laze about. I bobbed on a big yellow pool floater while the others slept on the deck chairs until the sun dipped over Daytona Beach and it was bearable enough to move again. 

Here, light permeates through polyester walls, diffusing a blue hue, and the air is constrictive like a panic attack. It smells too, of hot plastic and grass, and all the people who didn’t queue for the showers this morning. 

“It’s gross in here,” I comment, bellowing already because every voice in the whole marquee bounces off the walls and raises the volume to incomparable levels. 

Joe laughs and makes fun of my accent for Kasper’s benefit. “Gross, man, totally freakin’ gross, my dude.���

“Do you want to stay or go?”

“It’s Crystal Castles!”

“Okay, so, stay?”

“Yeah, duh.” With a hand on my back, Joe propels me into the crowd, where we push through, closer and closer to the front. The atmosphere is so unpleasant, so hot, so stuffy, and even though I’ve been drinking all afternoon, my head still twists with unwanted thoughts. I feel my phone vibrate. 

It’s Jen, as expected. 

Where are you? We’re going to see Slash now. Also, Evie has asked where you are a few times. 

I shove it back into my shorts pocket, and something crinkles against my hand.

Ah. I had forgotten about this.

I subtly pull out the baggie from yesterday, the one from Weed Alison, and turn it over in my hand. I know I shouldn’t, that I tell everyone who asks me that don’t do any of this anymore, but these little pink pills lure me in like a siren. They hold promises of escapism, if only just for an hour.

And then, what didn’t even seem like an option yesterday seems almost sensible today.

“Hey, do you want one?” I ask Joe, “you and Kasper. I’ve three.”

He cranes his neck. “What’s that?” 

“Ket.”

“Oh, I’ve never done that.”

“You want to try it?”

He looks to Kasper for reassurance, and his friend shrugs noncommittally. “Well, what’s it like?”

“Pretty strange.”

“Okay,” he says. I tip two tablets into his palm and one, the last, into my mouth.

He winces as we dry-swallow. “Ugh, it’s disgusting.” 

I suppress a cough. “Did you expect gourmet?”

“I didn’t expect pure shite.”

“Well, it’s probably worth it.”

“Probably?”

As I watch the stage, I eagerly anticipate the moment my soul separates from my body while the roadies prepare. Once the gig starts, the ground begins to sway like a fairground ride. It’s the same thrill too, the same loss of control as when you’re floating through the air, when the floor gives way beneath your feet and you’re weightless, like something caught on the wind. 

“Woah.” Joe cries at one point, and I am viewing both him and Kasper through a fisheye lens. I just laugh, because everything is silly, and nothing matters the way it did this morning. Thoughts derail like train carriages tipped off the line, and my brain emerges from a pool of cool water, washed clean of every thought that has ever held significance in my whole life. 

I was sceptical of Ketamine once, back before I understood it, and clung tightly to the edgy, but familiar high I got from cocaine. It was Alison who gave me some at a house party last summer, my first bump, and with plasticine limbs we danced in the kitchen to someone’s dad’s CD collection, with a sense that we could do whatever we liked, and it wouldn’t be weird. I hadn’t felt that way since I was nine. 

Kaleidoscopic lights mesmerise me in the marquee. The music is strange, but perhaps it is supposed to be. All music is strange, if you think about it. Who decides which beats and melodies sound good, anyway? How do we know that? The singer decides to crowd surf and comes close enough for me to touch her boot. It would be funny if I took it off. This is a fact. I lank at the laces while Kasper laughs, this maniacal, unselfconscious laugh, and I join in. I don’t know what I’ll do with the boot once it’s off, but it’s the funniest possible thing to do. Maybe I’ll display it in my college apartment one day, say it belonged to Alice Glass, and have to argue with everyone that doesn’t believe me. 

“I feel weird.” Joe says. 

“That’s good.” 

“No, I think- I feel wrong.”

“It’s not wrong. Don’t make it wrong.”

“I feel wrong,” and I look at him, with his pitch black eyes panicked, and then he heaves.

And he bolts out of the crowd.

“Oh.” I look at Kasper, and him at me, and realise my teeth are sweating. “Do you think it’s bad ket?”

“I don’t know.” He says, and I'm suddenly aware that if I attempt any more words, I will throw them up. 

Throwing up in a crowd is not the ideal place to do it, I know this, but it is difficult to escape with legs that feel lead-weighted, when the earth is tilted so dramatically that I am scaling it. 

“I’m going to vom.” I announce, and a path clears so quickly that it feels biblical. 

I hit the back of the tent, and it goes everywhere. Everywhere. It splashes on my shoes and up the walls, and Joe is there too, my partner in crime, vomiting just as violently as I am. I wonder if I should pat him on the back, or give him a high five, or something.

By the time Kasper falls in line and completes our trio, security is already on us, and all that seemed so easy and funny before now fills me with unspeakable dread.

“Outside,” one barks, grabbing fistfuls of my t-shirt and hauling me toward the door. “You’re pissed.”

“No,” I protest hoarsely, “We’re fine.”

Kasper retches again, inspiring another wave of nausea within me.

“Fuck sake!” the bouncer cries as I get sick on his trousers. “Youse are a disgrace. Get out.”

And we find ourselves the grass, lying face up as the clouds drift by, and the world is still tilting, like it wants to slide us right off the face of it.

“Should we do something?” Joe manages. 

“Like what?”

“Get a doctor?”

“Don’t be so dramatic,” I say, before I roll over to the side and throw up in the soil. 

Neil, the volunteer nurse, is very kind and patient with me for the time I spend in his company. 

“I imagine it’s all out of your system now.” He tells me. “How do you feel?”

“Tired,” I sigh, staring up at the ceiling I spent the last hour getting to know. I haven’t been sick since I got here, it seems I yacked it all out on the field, but I have been so thoroughly prodded and poked that I’ve become irritable, bored, even, as time ticks on and the festival rages on outside the flimsy doors of the medical tent. I turn my head to him, in his blue scrubs and the stethoscope he used on me slung around his neck, and the fear of his judgement arrives. It’s how I know the ket is gone. “That’s never happened to me before, by the way. That reaction was a new thing.”

“You said you’ve taken ketamine before?”

“Yeah.”

“Well, at festivals like this, you just don’t know where it’s coming from. It’s everywhere, but it’s so hard to know what exactly you’re getting. Those pills could have been cut with anything.”

I smile weakly. “Are you telling me off?”

“Not really. I’m just letting you know.”

“Cut with what, exactly?”

“Anything.” He reiterates. “I’m talking talcum powder to heroin and everything in between.”

“Ouch.”

He folds his arms and leans against a table. “Do you want to get in touch with a parent or guardian?”

“Is that mandatory?”

“It’s not, but you might find the best thing for you to do now is to get home and rest. You might like to let a parent know what’s happened today.”

I laugh, the kind of hollow, death-rattle of a laugh that could have come from a sick, elderly man. “Tempting, but no thanks. I think I’ll stay.”

Neil’s mouth flattens into a line, and he gives me a nod. “Well, I’ll just advise you to take it easy, right? And if you feel off at any point, please come straight back here. We’re open all night.”

“But in your medical opinion, I’m fine, right?”

“Yes, I think you’re fine.”

“Oh, good.” I sit up in the trolley and plant shaky, stockinged feet on the floor. “Because there are a few more bands I really wanted to see.”

“I understand.” He says, though he looks as though he doesn’t. “But listen.”

I look up. 

“Be wise, Jude.”

I laugh and lace up my vomit-splattered shoes. “Neil, I’m always wise.”

Beginning // Prev // Next

[montanabohemian]

if i see a single one of you pissed that your faves canceled an event or a con appearance because they're striking for fair wages then imma come for you in your sleep 🔪🔪🔪

(direct that fury where it belongs: AMPTP and the execs)

[hood-ex]

Dick's crazy because if you're stuck in a room with him, and you're like, "How do we get out?" Dick will just be like, "One second." And he'll start banging on his chest, making choking and hacking noises, and he'll spit out a little laser into his palm, and he'll nonchalantly be like, "Here," while wiping his mouth with the back of his hand.

[kirbstarzz]

DOLPHIN WATCHINGGGG!!!!!!111111111111

[tradingjack]

nothing quite like hyperfixation for improvement huh

[lastoneout]

Well I still would have liked for Harris to pick Mark Kelly as her VP but this move leads me to believe she thinks she has Arizona on lock, which given voting trends in the last two elections and the fact that in 2020 even election workers here who were open and proud Trump supporters refused to bow down and try to steal the election for him, she's probably right.

Honestly I had and still have full confidence AZ will go blue again this year, we have a pretty decent movement of Never Trump republicans lead by John McCain's daughter, Kari Lake was the perfect Trump Clone and she lost so bad she still hasn't stopped complaining about it, we voted against voter ID laws last time, abortion rights are on the ballot which is bound to get more people motivated to vote, and more and more young people from California keep moving here which also pushes us farther left, so it makes sense for her to focus on getting leg up elsewhere.

Still, Mark Kelly would've been a really good VP imo.

[thevalleyoftriumph]

one last post before bed; its gonna get rough. but please god dont give up yet. dont give in. we are all we have left and we cant give those bastards the satisfaction of seeing us gone. please stay with us for the next four years. i know itll be hard but you need to keep fighting, you need to keep living, youve come this far already. remember to stick together and keep fighting for each other.

[bvckbiter]

me going into the rr crit tag lately: perhaps you would be happier writing your own books

[quackity1999]

what would you rule over if you were a patron saint?

oh, jesus. uh.

patron saint of legacy, probably. of working yourself past breaking point because you know higher numbers make you sound more appealing. of kissing the wrong people and the good people and maybe it's not about sucking it up and being pretty anymore. of freeflight, freefall, the tumble on your way down, of gathering up what's left of your bones and learning how to sew a proper stitch for once.

am i the patron of wealth or the patron of sacrifice? is there a difference? i line my pockets with whatever they’ll give me and tell myself it’s more than enough. ha. patron of self-destruction, surely. one day they’ll call me the god of resilience, or the god of reinvention, or maybe just the god of what the fuck is left when the dust clears. they’ll forget about the greed, the hunger, the desperate need to be enough, to be wanted.

there’s a lesson or something in there about the prodigal son coming home, but the father doesn’t wait at the door long enough this time. maybe i’m the god of hollow things. "its only pretty on the surface, i'm sorry i couldn't make it properly fleshed out its just that—", you ate the guts of someone who only knew how to rot, there's so many empty rooms and so many quiet spaces now; the echo that bounces back when you ask if anyone’s still there. i can't figure out when we all left, when we gave up, turned from the dinner table, disappeared without a farewell.

i’ve read the strategies and the gospels and every text that promised something brighter if you just get it right and keep staring at the bright light ontop of it all, but i’ve only ever found myself, trailing behind and unable to decide if staying lost or catching up is the better option. they never teach you how to hold onto hands like that.

or maybe they'll call me legacy, they'll call me an angry desperation who forced himself together one too many times, disfigured and nightmareish. they’ll call me passion. they'll call me cruel and terrible. they'll call me a beacon of safety. they'll call me an artistic overachiever. they'll call me wise, they’ll call me love. they'll call me worth it. i hope they’ll call me enough.

[masteroffakesmiles]

Twisted wonderland manga episode of heartslabyul spoilers

I just freaking realized something as I reread twisted wonderland episode of heartslabyul: when Riddle was eating a strawberry tart for the first time, he started eating the strawberry first. Only the damn strawberry. And it tasted like heaven to him. Like it’s the first time he’s had a damn strawberry.

Are you—

Are you telling me that witch of a mom of his didn’t even at least let him eat a certain fruit? A food that’s meant to be good for your diet??

[yoiku]

[averagecatdoodlesenjoyer]

Why did i make this

[jade-of-mourning]

they both deserve to lose their shit just a little bit -- which may not be the most effectively conveyed here, but my sentiment is there (i swear)

[crsssie]

happy 2.5k but it’s come to my attention that one of you shitheads have been sending hate asks to another creator while namedropping me please get a fucking life

[intotheelliwoods]

Little Sprout: what happened with big us?

Current Sprout: ................ *INCOHERENT SOBBING-*

yeahh- *sniffles*

[noisytenant]

Being reminded once again that a lot of people have fucking sleeper cell agent triggers that make them instantly fail to see the human being in front of them, regardless of any personal history they have or any rapport. instantly, that person is an Enemy that cannot be reasoned with. Permanent fight or flight.

And that instead of this being seen as, you know, a rather maladaptive attitude to bring to your relationships that will permanently strip you of the capacity to experience full love and companionship, there is a dominant strain of thinking that this is a reasonable, righteous, moral good.

That a "boundary" looks like building an impenetrable wall that nobody can see but you; That conversation, negotiation, and collaboration aren't just avoided--They're treated with contempt. The very notion of trying to understand why another human being that you care about may suddenly act in an unpleasant or even monstrous way is spat upon and trampled underfoot. Complete abandonment is considered a first line of defense rather than a last resort.

I think we all need to do our best to get over this kind of thinking. And I don't mean that we should be push-overs; In actuality, moving away from this kind of rigid "boundary" often means advocating for yourself and fighting for what you think is right. I think we all deserve friends and allies who can compassionately challenge us when we adopt ways of thinking and behaving that hurt others without immediately assuming the worst.