#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)

[kirbstarzz]

DOLPHIN WATCHINGGGG!!!!!!111111111111

[eyepatchoflove]

lestat being both french and italian explains everything, because there is actually nothing wrong with him, he's just like that.

[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.

[yoiku]

[spookyaveragecatdoodlesenjoyer]

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)

[idyllcy]

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.

[vermillioncrown]

A-plot in the office: tracking the spicy inter-center arguments that will literally decide the future of spaceflight

B-plot: deducing who left the cans of colorful mt dew at my desk, which happen to match my lego decor and current hair

[rosefires20]

Since I've shared more of my reading interests on here lately, I thought I'd share my rant about the insanity of the book The Princess Bride by William Goldman. Yes. This is the book that is the same story as the popular older movie The Princess Bride.

I'll start this by saying I've never been so affronted by a book before. The closest would be the ending of the first Mortal Engines books (which if you know you know). That ending actually drove me nuts enough that I recall it quite often when thinking about insane books. However, the Princess Bride blows that chaos out of the water.

Not only is the book halted by a lot of extra nonsense that the author throws in of his own thoughts and opinions because part of the story is that he is retelling a book he read as a child and abridging it. The book in question doesn't exist so this is all made up and fantastical. I'm usually down for the silly and extra from writers. I've read Good Omens and plan to read some of the Discworld series sooner rather than later. I obviously recently finished the Hobbit and LoTR. But that is the fun silly that I love. Whatever the fuck is in the Princess Bride bridges on insanity.

The book is mostly the same as the movie EXCEPT for the ending. In the movie, it ends with Buttercup, Westley, Fezzik and Inigo riding off. In the book, it goes further. In to the most insane shit I've ever read in a published book. It's genuinely insane crack fic level material.

Like WHAT THE FUCK DO YOU MEAN THEY GET SAVED BY THE PIRATES FROM THE PRINCE'S SOLIDERS BUT HAVE TO LEAVE THE BOAT IN WHICH FEZZIK IS INCHARGE OF ROWING. HE ROWS THEM INTO A WHIRLPOOL WHICH IS WHEN WESTLEY SPEAKS UP AND SAYS THAT THEY HAVE TO SWIM THROUGH THE WHIRLPOOL TO GET TO AN INASSECIBLE ISLAND WHERE THE PRINCE CANT FOLLOW. THIS HAPPENS AND THEN BUTTERCUP WHILE THEY ARE CHILLING ESSENTIALLY TURNS TO WESTLEY AND SAYS LETS HAVE SEX FINALLY. THAT SEX GETS BUTTERCUP PREGNANT WHICH ENDS UP LEADING TO A BIRTH WHERE THE BABY IS BACKWARDS AND TANGLED AND POTENTIAL WILL DIE ONLY FOR FEZZIK IS GET FUCKING POSSESSED AND SHOW UP AND DELIVERY THE BABY SAFELY. THEN THERES A TIME JUMP TO WHERE FEZZIK IS SAVING THE BABY AFTER SHE WAS KIDNAPPED AND HE JUMPS OFF A CLIFF TO SAVE HER AND THANKFULLY THEY SURVIVE BUT THATS WHERE THE BOOK FUCKING ENDS.

WHAT THE GENUIENE ACTUAL FUCK IS THIS BOOK. WHAT THE FUCK

[jacksprostate]

Part 1 Part 2 Part 3

The five days Tyler's stolen my voice from me, I spend watching. The commons, group therapy. I visit my cave with my eyes open. Mills should get used to the cold. I've heard if it drops below 50 while your respiration is this depressed, you go to sleep and never wake up.

Valley of the Dogs.

An orderly with fresh bruises peppering his temple lets me take my walk in the same time Mills is carted around. This is how I must've looked for months. Glazed. Drooling. At this point they probably have to use elephant tranquilizers on me, the tolerance I've built.

God, his petty ass, we meet up for one on one and he says he has to give me some bad news.

No, it's not about Mills.

Tyler, whatever.

He is giving me the bad news, of the passing of one Marla Singer. Everyone seems to think this is bad news. Found dead in her apartment because she didn't pick up any Meals on Wheels for her neighbors for three weeks, and they worried about those little old ladies, up there all starving alone since their angel in black stopped showing up.

Her corpse was found, instead. I imagine it all waxy, tits rotted off just like she said, at some point you're so sick even the bacteria in your gut won't bother decomposing you. I imagine Marla's skin pulling back, fleeing, away from her eyes, her teeth, like a mummy. Dried out as all her collagen rots.

Paper clutched in her hand. A will, sort of hasty and half-assed.

Marla's many worldly possessions all fit on a hotel notepad.

Many other worthless things go to a small number of worthless people Marla has mentioned leaving behind in her life, and god says, Marla Singer has left me something.

That's the entire reason I get to know all of this.

If not, I would've never known.

The world could blow up, and you'd never know in here unless it was in someone's will to tell you.

Marla Singer left me her dildo.

Oh, Marla.

Addressed me in the will half the time as Tyler.

I wonder, did the cancer spread from her tits to her brain, like the cancer I didn't have. It's everywhere now. God says they're working out treatment. I wonder if it matters.

Without Tyler between us, I don't really know what connected me and Marla.

What kept her calling.

I liked her. Another psycho boyfriend in her stories. There will never be another, unless she's gone to Heaven, the real one, and they've got some sort of exchange program going on for her to have fun with.

I think Marla might deserve that. She deserved better than this.

I wonder if it was pills. There was no Tyler to save her, this time. No one to listen to her death rattle. I don't have the voice to ask.

I won't be getting her dildo, because you don't get possessions in a psych ward. It'll get dumped in some other landfill to persist for time immemorial with all the other plastic iconography of our stupid, stupid lives.

Released back out to pasture, I watch Mills. His wife was murdered. Murdered, you see, it's an action, and it's solvable. Mills solved it.

You can't solve the slow death. Not really.

I think about how empty Mills is.

Am I empty?

An unidentifiable amount of time ago, Marla called me again, and she told me all about what happens at the new support groups she goes to, since I ruined the old ones for her. They were willing to rally behind her for the whole blowing my brains out show, and she only would've had to wait them out for six months or so, but she decided to just find new ones. A new church, with new temptations like Living With Angels, a group for those caring for severe dementia patients, and Recovery Road: a program for those trying to rebuild their lives after a loved one blew them up. She said, when I got out, we could both go to that one, and I could talk about Tyler, and she could talk about me, and we could have fun getting kicked out together.

Marla was always talking about that. When I got out.

I wasn't ever hearing any of it.

Mills, they've let up on him, finally, you can see his eyeballs aren't floating with all they've juiced him up on. He's watching me, back.

I wonder if he knows about Marla.

Would Tyler care?

Tyler had said, don't call this love.

Does it need to be?

When I get my voice back, I bury my thoughts on the subject and Marla and everything in a relentless campaign to needle Mills until he looks like a voodoo doll in a shitty tourist trap.