#anyway yes this is in response to that stupid fucking 'creative writing should be taught in school' post

[fuckdamn]

i am convinced of the merit of fanfiction as a genre/medium/space for expression. i more or less have a positive view of it (broadly speaking. i do not have a positive view of every single fanfiction, some of it’s gross, i hope that goes without saying) and i think that transformative fan activity has infinite potential to be cathartic, productive, interesting, unifying and fun. i don’t think it’s inherently worse than original fiction, it’s its own Thing with its own subtle and unique skill set, modalities, tropes, etc. i think the idea that it is inherently worse than original fiction is unfairly dismissive. hot take, i actually think fanfiction writing can be a great assignment when teaching students about adaptation studies--ofc adaptation and transformation are different, but they’re adjacent, and one of my favorite assignments in high school was adapting a shakespeare play. like, i think people could get a lot out of an assignment that was like “pick a moment that is implied to have happened offscreen, or pick a character dynamic you found interesting and wanted to see more of, or think of a plot event you wish you could have changed/added (even if you understand why it wasn’t changed or added) and write a scene that centers whatever you chose.” 

because ok, as a teaching assistant now the #1 most insidious thing i can tell my students have internalized is that they aren’t allowed to position their thoughts about a work as “real.” like i’ll be helping them develop their thesis for a paper, and then they’ll say something really fascinating, reasonably grounded in the text, and i can tell the gears are turning and then they’ll go “but am i allowed to write about that?” YES GIRL! OF COURSE YOU ARE! but unfortunately you’ve been taught for years that the text is only a riddle to be solved instead of a weird outpouring of humanity for you to explore and play around with. you’ve been taught that when you study literature (and by extension film, tv, music, etc) there is a right answer and a right reading and some magic words you can say to get a good grade. and then people hate literary studies because they think that their teacher or professor is looking for some kind of mythical Correct Take from them that they simply cannot find--well, if your teacher/professor wants that, they are teaching you wrong, and there is no such thing as a singular correct take. like, maybe there are some incorrect takes. but there are endless workable takes, endless juicy takes, endless thoughtful takes. and i think the aforementioned fanfiction assignment would teach kids that actually, you are allowed to have an unprecedented stance on the text. you’re allowed to say things!! you’re allowed to engage with the text on a personal level!! you’re allowed to mediate your understanding of it through your own pov!! you’re allowed to have fun and go apeshit!!!!

however. all that being said. why does everyone else who is optimistic about fanfic as a thing have to be optimistic about it in a way that is so fucking embarrassing and so far removed from any of its actual merits, or even anything innate to fanfiction as a genre/medium/space itself and not just the way it’s been capitalized upon. “oh fanfiction is good because the little text bubbles on ao3 make me feel like a badass for reading it so i’m gonna give them lots of $$$!!!!” “oh fanfiction is good because it lets me write about my most reprehensible desires in a place where minors can easily access it!!!!” “oh actually fanfiction is good because uhhhhh idk im a contrarian and i don’t actually enjoy reading anymore but i made being a book nerd too much a part of my identity as a kid so i have to staunchly assert that reading fic is a deeply intellectual and patrician activity!!!!” like fuck off. fuck off...!!!!!

[suntrastar]

abstract: chapter 1

chapter 2!!

Pairing: Bucky Barnes x Artist!Reader

Summary: Wait- Bucky Barnes attends your art class? And you didn’t even recognize him?

Word count: 7k (i am insane i know this!! you can also find this fic on ao3 !!)

Author’s note: hello! attempting to upload a fic on here for the first time ever! do i understand this website’s format. perhaps not. but am i going to try? perhaps yes! anyways hope you all like it :) likes and reblogs are very much appreciated!!! umm idk how this works if you wanna follow me you can?? do follows exist on tumblr dot com i think they do. hope they do. love you all. this is a long chapter buckle up (BUCKle up lmao i am not funny)!! enjoy ;o

“Hey, can you come look at this?”

You teach three classes a week- Mondays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays. The latter two are enjoyable in their own right, but Mondays are definitely your favorite. Instead of teaching kids, who are funny and creative but so messy, and so loud, you get to teach adults. People your own age or usually older, putting you in a position of authority, valuing your opinion, wanting you to come look at things.

It’s a delightful power trip.

You turn away from the window to see who’s speaking.

It’s Steve.

Of course it’s Steve, your star student, staring at you with a worn, weary intensity, wiping a paintbrush on a paper towel. He’s already pushed his sheet of paper across the table, bumpy with water and watercolor paint, cream-colored edges starting to curl. He leans away from it, reclining in a seat that’s adult-sized but dwarfed by his frame, looking so forlorn, like the paper just abandoned him, moved to the opposite side of the table by itself.

You stifle a laugh.

“Sure,” you say, and make your way over to his table.

Steve fidgets in his seat as you look at his painting. You try to keep your jaw in check.

It drops anyway.

As always, it’s beautiful. He’s painted a sky, swirling with purples and pinks, and careful clouds, flickering in and out between layers of paint, elegant and pale yellow-orange. And the sun- it’s off-center, and you’re sure it was unintentional, but that adds to the effect, because it’s hot red, and dazzling, and slowly seeping into the still-wet sky. Tendrils of red like real sunbeams, pushing through the clouds like a real sunset.

You don’t know why Steve even takes this class. Half the time, you feel like he should be the one teaching.

“It’s gorgeous,” you say eventually, once your words come back to you. “I love how you painted the sun- the red, oh my god. You’re seriously a natural.”

“Thank you,” Steve says, and you push the paper back towards him. He looks down at it, still tense, brow furrowed, and you almost laugh again, until he looks back up at you. “I wanted to know what you thought about it.”

Power trip.

“I love it,” you say, giving him a reassuring smile, which he hesitantly returns. You might be laying it on a little thick, but Steve still looks distressed, and you genuinely like the guy enough to try to help him.

When he walked in with his friend for the first class, you were floored. People like Steve don’t attend classes like this- classes like this are attended by regular people. Not people that walk like dancers, all grace and light steps, not people that are extraordinarily jacked, with jutting shoulders and rippling muscles, not people that have a weirdly authoritarian air around them, like a politician, but less shrewd.

Still, you welcomed them and made awkward small-talk and tried not to stare at their arms and hoped you came across as a somewhat decent person. It’s your first time teaching adults, you explained, and Steve gave you a smile so sincere and reassured you that you would do great, boosting your confidence to the point where you actually did.

Steve is lovely. He’s passionate about art and has a good eye, a better eye than you, really, and he always tries so hard with whatever he does, and he’s funny in a dorky way, and completely unaware of it. He always wears a baseball hat and tucks his shirts into his pants and called you ma’am once, and looked so surprised when you burst out laughing and told him to call you by your first name. With him, two classes have flown by, and now, during the third, he’s warmed up to you enough to talk to you like a friend.

The friend he brings with him, though?

A total douchebag.

The night to Steve’s day, the rain to his sunshine. It’s obvious that Steve brings him along as some sort of moral support, to make himself look less out of place, which is fine, except the guy always treats you like you’ve perpetually offended him.

And maybe you have, maybe one time you did something that’s worthy of his eternal dislike, but you wouldn’t know what it is, because he’s never brought it up, because he barely fucking talks.

You don’t think he’s a naturally quiet guy. He definitely looks like he has a lot to say, but no matter what, he only ever talks in single-syllable bursts, quiet enough that half the time you miss what he’s saying.

He doesn’t ignore you, either- he listens to everything you say and lets his judgement flicker over his face- which is way worse. A glare is a slight misstep, a shake of his head means that you’ve just said something that he finds stupid, a scowl is a catastrophe.

You don’t even know his name. He’s never introduced himself, and always writes his name in a shaky, illegible scrawl on the sign-in sheet, and by now you don’t care enough to look it up.

Still, you’re nice to him, polite. It’s okay if he doesn’t like you. You don’t need to be liked- being noticed is enough.

You shift away from Steve to his friend, sitting next to him at the table. He’s staring at you in a way that you can only describe as violent, and you flinch, and then plaster your smile back on.

“How’s it going?” You ask, expecting no response, stealing a glance at his paper. He’s painted the entire sheet a watered-down blue, and you want to congratulate him, for actually participating this time, but you don’t say anything. “The watercolors working out for you?”

Your heart goes out to the poor paintbrush in his hand. It’s barely been used, is steadily dripping water, and is being throttled in his gloved grip. He always wears one glove- it’s weird, but you’re not going to pry.

He catches you looking and a whole myriad of emotion plays over his face; irritation and shame, a creased brow and a scowl. You have the feeling that you’ve taken a massive overstep, even though you haven’t said anything else, even though you’re not looking at his hand anymore, just at him.

His hair hangs over his eyes, glossy and carelessly wavy, which you would find pretty, maybe, if he wasn’t looking at you the way he is. Like you’ve just done something terrible.

“Sure,” he says, and that’s it.

Even when you turn away, he’s glaring.

You hate it, so you pretend it’s not happening.

Steve gives you a sympathetic glance before you head back. You wave it off.

“Shonna,” you call, to the fiftysomething woman hunched over her painting a few tables down, “how’re the flowers looking?”

***

Thirty minutes before your fourth Monday class starts, you arrive at the studio to find Rina washing paintbrushes in the sink.

“Hey,” you call.

She turns to you and gives you a surprised grin. “Oh, hey! You’re here early- come help with these brushes.”

You set your bag on the counter by the wall and join her at the sink. You’ve known Rina for ages- ever since you were roommates in college. The class before yours is taught before, some advanced painting thing that she is extremely overqualified to teach.

She’s kind of famous. And kind of self-absorbed, and a little bit pretentious, but maybe that’s just what happens when you’re as successful in your field as she is. No matter what it is, you can’t complain- she’s the one that helped get you this job in the first place.

“A couple of people in my class like to get here early, so I just try to arrive before them,” you say. She passes you a clean paintbrush. You reach around her and tear off a paper towel from the dispenser. “Did you dye your hair? It looks so pretty.”

“Yes!” She shakes her head, letting her hair sway. Last time you met her, she had dyed it pink. Now it’s mahogany red, straight and sleek and falling just past her shoulders. She looks a little unreal. “How’s your class going? Are the people okay?”

“Yeah, most of them are pretty nice.”

She passes you another paintbrush to dry. You consider bringing up Steve’s friend, but decide against it.

“That’s good- and you’re welcome, by the way. But okay, listen. Do you remember that one guy I told you about a while back, Dustin? So yesterday I was just sitting at home, and then he texted me…”

With the formalities out of the way, she launches into a story about someone you definitely don’t remember. Still, you humor her, listen to what she has to say, chime in at the right parts and say “really?” and “no way!” too many times. The minutes tick by.

When all of the brushes are washed and dried, you take them, since you’re going to be the one using them next, and start setting up for the class. Rina walks away and grabs her stuff from the counter. She lingers by the doorway, door already propped open, aimlessly scrolling through something on her phone, hesitant to leave for a reason you don’t know. Maybe she has more to say- if that’s even, like, possible.

You set the brushes in a container at the center table, and head over to the shelves on the far wall to pull out more supplies. Unfortunately, today’s class is revolving around watercolor again. It’s drudgery, such a boring medium- dull, unsaturated, painstaking when it comes to detail. You bring out a stack of paper, the least-depressing palettes, and then mason jars for holding water.

You’re setting the last jar on the table when Rina shrieks.

It startles you, making your hand slip.

The jar wobbles over the edge of the table and then falls, shattering into cloudy glass pieces at your feet.

“Shit,” you curse, and look over at her. “Rina, what the hell?”

Standing across from her in the doorway, having arrived early for class as usual, are Steve and his friends, two shades more flustered than usual. Rina is gawking at them.

Okay, they’re attractive, but not that attractive.

Not shriek-worthy attractive.

You sigh loudly and carefully step over the glass, making your way over to them. “Hi, Steve,” you say, and he jolts, like a scared cat. He’s blushing, stepping back into the hallway, hands awkwardly dangling at his sides. His friend is staring at Rina like he’s about to murder her, and you’re staring at him like you’re about to ask him to pass you the broom behind the door.

Because you are.

“Sorry about… that. There’s a broom behind the door, could you pass it to me?”

He opens his mouth to say something, and you are desperate to hear him, even if he’s only going to utter a simple yes, but Rina buts in.

“You did not just ask the Winter Soldier to pass you a broom.”

Who?

“Girl, what?”

All three of you turn to her, cornering back into the wall. She looks even more unreal, eyes blown wide, red creeping up her neck, giving her hair a run for its money, still gawking. You resist the urge to reach out and pull her chin back up, to close her mouth.

She alternates between looking at Steve and at…  

“That’s the Winter Soldier,” she says slowly, like she’s trying to convince herself, or you, and then steps closer to Steve, who instinctively takes a step back. He’s fully in the hallway, now. “And you’re Captain America.”

Steve’s jaw clenches. He stays silent, and you feel bad for him, that’s all you can feel, really- you are confused beyond reason, halfway convinced that Rina is losing her shit, still awaiting the broom, still awaiting Steve’s friend’s words, racking your brain for any image of Captain America or the Winter Soldier that you might have- and coming up completely empty.

You don’t watch the news, like, ever.

Little details float back to you. Steve’s dressing sense, his manners, his muscles…

The baseball caps that both of them are always wearing...

His friend’s glove…

Oh, fuck.

“Are you?” You ask dumbly. The question is meant for both of them, but you only look at one of them while speaking. A glare meets you back- a slight misstep.

You can’t even see your feet, in this situation. You’re walking blind.

Steve crosses his arms and looks at you sternly. He doesn’t look angry, but as close as he can get. “Yes,” he says, completely guarded and unfriendly and not lovely at all. “I thought you knew that.”

You are so stupid- how did you not know that?

“I didn’t,” you say, and you don’t sound convincing at all. Not much fazes you, but you are absolutely, positively fazed right now, and starting to spiral out. “I had no idea- I thought you guys could have been, like, bodyguards, or something, not actual Avengers, oh my god. I’m so sorry, shit, thank you for your service?”

You’re going to end it all- this is so embarrassing.

Steve’s mouth twitches. Rina is scarlet-faced. The Winter Soldier, god, looks so tense, like he might shatter, too, into silent, grumpy pieces all over the floor.

“You’re welcome,” Steve says, and marginally relaxes. He stays in the hallway, the Winter Soldier by the door- you should have paid more attention in your tenth grade history class, what is the guy’s name?

Rina peels herself off the wall, and you start to get nervous. There’s a painful silence, with lots of staring, where you’re still trying to coax a few rational thoughts out of your brain, and only coming up with one- Rina needs to leave.  

You try to tell her that with your eyes, with a pointed look, but you’re not great at this whole communication-through-expressions thing, so she doesn’t get the hint, or does and just ignores it.

“So, let me get this straight,” she says, tearing the silence like a plastic seal, voice starting to rise, from wonder to excitement, from painless curiosity to danger, “there’s two Avengers taking your class? And you didn’t even recognize them?”

“Nope,” you say, looking away, at a stain on the wall, at the distant glass shards still unswept away on the floor.

“That’s…”

She trails off before she has the chance to call you stupid, because the Winter Soldier gives her a pointed look of his own. Low brows and dark eyelashes, blazing blue eyes- she has no choice but to listen. Your staring was irritating, but his is intimidating.

She scampers away, mumbling something you can’t catch and brushing against Steve as she leaves.

This whole thing is so unprofessional, but at least you can breathe again-

“Here,” the Winter Soldier says, and a broom handle comes into your view.

Just one word, but you’ll take it with open arms. You take the broom from him, give an unreturned, unfamiliarly sheepish smile and head back to the broken glass on the floor.

The broken glass is swept up and tossed in the trash. You avoid looking at the doorway, focusing on other useless tasks instead. Rearranging the supplies on the table, fiddling with the window blinds, chatting with the rest of the class attendees as they start to file in.

Then the class starts and you’re swept back into your demonstration, talking and teaching and showing off different techniques that can be done with different types of brushes. You only look in their direction once, right after showing off some technique you barely remember from art school with a fan brush- they sit at their table near the back, Steve paying attention as usual, his friend silently reacting, as usual.

So they decided to stay- that’s good. Great, even.

Until the next part of the class starts, when everyone gets to work on their own paintings, when you have to stop talking.

You mill around the room, searching for a conversation to join in on or a comment to make, but find none. Then you take a sheet of paper and hopelessly try to draw- search for a distraction and a spark up of an idea, something, anything, and come up completely empty. It’s just...

How famous are they? Like, A-list celebrity famous? Are they offended that you didn’t recognize them- should you start treating them differently? You don’t keep up with this stuff. You have an impossibly long list of other things to worry about- you don’t have the time to worry about this stuff. The Avengers aren’t something you think about ever, because why should you?

If you opened any newspaper or magazine you would find something about them- a charity gala they attended, some recent threat they neutralized, the latest gossip surrounding their personal lives. But those lives are so far detached from your own that you’ve never bothered to look.

You simply don’t care. You’re not a native New Yorker- it’s not like these people are your hometown heroes, that you grew up idolizing them. They save the world time and time again and society is forever indebted to them and all of that, but what are you supposed to do about it?

And most importantly, what is the Winter Soldier’s fucking name?

Enough of this chaos goes on in your mind to make your head hurt. Fuck it, you decide- you’ll face it. You straighten your shoulders as you stand, trying your best to look purposeful as you walk to their table, like you have reason to go over there. Yeah, they’re strong. Genetically enhanced and all of that, and they’re important: they’re Avengers.

But they’re taking your class.

You slide into the chair across from the Soldier without taking the time to gauge their reactions.

“Do other people here know?” You ask.

Steve startles, eyes widening, and then considers the question while swirling his brush in green paint. He’s working on a landscape today, you think. “Shonna might,” he says, not rudely. “But nobody else.”

So maybe not that famous. Or maybe the people here are just like you and don’t care.

But it still doesn’t make sense. “Then why did you think that I knew?”

“Because you talk a lot,” Steve says, like it’s the most obvious thing ever.

“Well, yeah, that’s part of the job-”

Steve cuts you off, and fuck, you hate getting interrupted. But he’s smiling, and you can’t bring yourself to get upset over it. “You talk a lot to us.”

Us?  

More like to him.

You take it in stride, don’t let your confidence slip. You’ve purposely angled your head away, and you know the Winter Soldier is staring at you- you can feel it on your cheek, on your shoulder, on every nerve in your face. You don’t look back at him. This revelation hasn’t made him any less unpleasant.

“Yeah,” you say, like it’s just as obvious, “because you’re a nice guy, Steve.”

Steve raises his eyebrows so high that they disappear under the brim of his hat. You smile at him as nicely as you can, sugar-sweet, until he can’t take anymore and drops his gaze back to his painting. You turn back to the nameless man across from you.

Winter Soldier.

“Hi,” you say, only to him, and prop your elbows up on the table, resting your face in your hands. “I love the little pattern you have going on with your painting.”

It’s random splotches of black paint- calling it a pattern is an exaggeration. But you carry on.

“This is probably a bad time to ask, and it’s kind of a dumb question, but, like, what’s your name?”

He just barely raises an eyebrow, allowing for a fraction of surprise, before schooling his expression back into his usual mix of anger and boredom, a casual glare and slight frown. For a moment, you wonder what he looks like when he’s happy.

“You don’t know his name?” Steve is in disbelief, and then he winces, and you think he’s been kicked under the table. Abruptly, you laugh.

It rings out. A few people turn and stare, but you brush it all off with another smile.

He’s still staring. You don’t mind it.

The paintbrush in his hand is suddenly unsteady.

“My name is Bucky,” he says, slowly and loudly enough for you to make out the sound of his voice, for the first time ever.

He is definitely bothered by you asking, his mouth drawn tight, and you can’t even take the time to appreciate how cutesy his name is compared to his demeanor, because oh hell. It’s going to be difficult to keep up this whole dislike thing, if his voice sounds like this, low and rough and gritty like sandpaper, pleasantly grating over you and your skin…

You have to consciously remind yourself to keep on smiling.

“Nice to meet you, Bucky.”

Things should feel different, but they don’t. Nobody really reacts- everything resumes as normal. Steve focuses on his panting, adding delicate brushstrokes to the branches of a tree. You linger for a moment, and then get up from the table and flutter off to someone else.

For every class, you wear this kitschy apron, paint-stained, with strings tied in a hasty bow against your back that Bucky always aches to even out. Someone tells you something, and you respond eagerly, fully phased out of the past incident.

He stares until he realizes he’s staring, and then drops his eyes back down to his paper.

Steve wanted to attend this class for a number of reasons- he was bored and wanted something to occupy his time, he wanted to revisit an old hobby, he wanted to learn from you- some hip, emerging artist he’s a fan of, whose work he’s been following for a while now, who is seriously talented, although you have yet to prove it. He wanted to go do something separated from the events of his regular life.

So much wanting. Bucky wants to know why you’re so indifferent.

He doesn’t know if it’s a good thing that you didn’t know his name, or that you didn’t flinch or gasp or accuse him of something, or pointedly look at his left arm. Should he be thankful? Steve is clearly thankful, already loosening up, freed of any lasting tension.

Bucky just feels wary. You’re unsettling.

You come back over to their table one more time. The sleeves of your shirt are pushed up, and there’s a smear of something dark on your forearm, ink or paint. On one wrist you’re wearing a  bracelet made of braided leather. On the other you wear a bulky digital watch.

Practical.

“Everything okay?” You ask, as if something not okay could potentially have happened, in your forty-five minute absence.

Steve fixes you with a friendly smile. Bucky can’t ever bring himself to do the same.

“Yep,” Steve says, and you nod your head, clearly relieved.

“Great!” You glance at him for a spare second, and turn away again.

Everyone he knows is so guarded, walls built high and doors barred shut. Except for you, if Bucky can say that he knows you, the perky art instructor, Steve’s favorite artist. You’re confident and flippant, and that should be a bad pairing, but somehow you can carry yourself within it just fine. Always purposeful in the space you occupy, not reacting to the knowledge of his and Steve’s major, momentous identities.

Bucky wonders, idly, as he blots water over what you so generously called a pattern, why you didn’t.

It’s not like he wants you to acknowledge it, wants you to call him a war criminal or a Rusisan spy. He just wants you to-

He doesn’t know.

The class goes on. An older couple sitting a few tables away have caught your attention, chattering on and on about their personal lives.They have a pet cat that their landlord doesn’t know about, and when they retire they want to move to the seaside in Italy, and in May their son is going to graduate high school.

“High school?” You gasp, loud for no reason. “I hated high school.”

Before the class ends, you take your position at the front of the studio, and talk some more. He knows it’s part of your job, but you are excessive.

There’s an art exhibition going on at some museum, and one of the featured artists is an acquaintance of yours, and on Saturday the admission fee is discounted, and if anybody is interested, you have a stack of flyers on the center table. And you hope that everyone has a good week.

You look at Bucky while finishing up your little monologue, giving a half-smile that’s for the whole class, but seemingly only directed at him. He blinks slowly, and when he opens his eyes again, you’re looking somewhere else.

***

“Morning, pal, you ready to go?”

Steve gives him a hopeful smile as he peels an orange.

Bucky’s hair is still wet from his shower, dripping water onto his shirt. It’s early, too early to go anywhere. He doesn’t even know why he’s awake- usually after his wake-of-dawn runs, he falls back asleep, or lies down and just stares at his ceiling, thinking, until he grows restless enough to get up and do something. But today, the restlessness came much sooner, so he got up much sooner, and it might already be a mistake.

He takes a seat at the kitchen island, next to Sam, trying to think of something that Steve might have had planned for today, and coming up completely empty. “Go where?”

Steve looks hurt, for a brief second. “The exhibition at the museum, remember?”

Oh.

That.

“I’m not going to that,” Bucky says, harshly enough for it to be dropped.

Steve does not drop it. “Hey, come on. Just look at it.”

From his back pocket, Steve pulls out a flyer, one of the flyers you had out on Monday, folded up in a neat square- when did Steve pick one of those up? He holds it out, and Bucky, wishing he was asleep again, takes it.

He unfolds it, and the words are written in tiny letters, and the few photos on the paper are in color but too grainy to make out, and it gives him a slight headache, but he pretends to look it over. Sam leans into him to see it, loudly crunching cereal in Bucky’s ear.

“Looks cool, Rogers,” Sam says, and Steve grins, and now Bucky is the bad guy in the situation, for not wanting to go, even though Sam isn’t going either.

Bucky passes the flyer back without reading a single word.

“I’m not going,” he says, again.

But Steve is relentless. He sets the orange peels aside and gives him a look, and Bucky can already feel his resolve starting to crumble, and it’s kind of pathetic, really. Does he not understand that Bucky is already doing as much as he can?

“Why not?”

He picks the easiest answer.

“I don’t want to.”

Steve’s brow furrows as he splits the orange into two, giving half to Bucky. Sam slurps the milk from his cereal bowl.

They’re all blissfully silent.

“Come on, Bucky,” Steve says suddenly, almost begging. “I really want to see it.”

“I don’t-” He falters, he’s losing the battle. “How many people are there gonna be?”

Steve lights up. Bucky tries to stay indignant, tries to keep his face twisted in dislike, but it’s difficult with Steve. He’s always so full of optimism, has so much of it that it spills out through the seams, rubs off onto whoever’s closest.

“Not that many,” Steve says, like a promise, shaking his head. “That’s why we should go now.”

“Will she be there?”

Sam perks up.

Steve frowns. “No? Or wait, maybe. It’s a public place- I don’t know. She could be.”

It’s miles off from the answer he wants, but again, for Steve, he’ll take it. Bucky ignores Sam leaning across the counter like an idiot and asking “who’s she?” and eats his orange slices in silence.

***

Huge, bulbous heads, and beady little eyes. The limbs are long and wavy and contorted in the weirdest positions, seas of arms and legs and joints, women twisted over each other in gnarled embraces, a man with his arms twirling over and over again around his own torso. And the colors- a complete eclectic mess of everything- blue, red, yellow, green, purple. Everything.

You walk through the museum floor one, two, three times. The paintings on display are unsettling and ugly, and you’re on the verge of tears.

They’re gorgeous. Pain thrown on a canvas, told through canvas. It’s overwhelming- you’re overwhelmed, and you can’t do anything else about it. The museum just opened and there’s barely any people around- you can wallow in your sadness as much as you want to, for now.

Or maybe you’ll wallow in your frustration, instead.

This… you want to create like this.  

But you don’t have it.  

It being an impossible, nearly unattainable type of pain, or misery or anger or any other emotion so strong and visceral that you could translate it into something like this, something that evokes something else from other people. From an audience.

You might have had something like that once, but that’s all too far behind you now. Forgettable. What you need right now is an idea, a spark of inspiration, a single coherent thought. A confirmation that you aren’t completely lost.

You wander back to a painting in a far corner, all alone in a small alcove. A red woman, with her head nestled in green grass and legs wrapping around the sun, quite literally head over heels for it. Her mouth is wide open, gaping, calling, wailing, maybe. She has a hooked nose and a mole on one of her arms, and her white dress has fallen down to pool on the grass, and her legs are lithe and unshaven, prickly like the grass, just like the yellow spikes of the sun, drawn almost comically.

How do you even- how do you even come up with things like this?

By living an interesting life, probably. Through not being boring.

You stay there for a while. Long enough that more people start to file in, pretentious art students wearing all black, eccentric people with awesome haircuts, tourists. They peer over your shoulders, awkwardly, waiting for you to move. When you don’t, they leave you to be, giving you a rude look or two that you pay no mind to. There’s space on either side of you, if they’re so desperate to see. Sidling up right against you is kind of weird, but you’ll excuse it, for this painting.

Eventually, you realize that you should probably get going.

You’ve been standing so long that your legs are starting to ache, and there’s countless other Saturday errands you have to run- doing your laundry, buying groceries, calling up your mom- boring Saturday things to do.

You leave the red woman, regrettably. The fabric of your sleeve comes back dry when you wipe your eyes, even though you feel fully washed away, feel like you’re floating as you drift over to the elevator.

The doors slide open and a few people file out, and then it’s empty, thankfully. You step inside, press the button for the ground floor, wait for the doors to fully close-

“Wait,” a voice calls.

You’re not rude- you press the button to hold open the door.

When it fully opens, Steve steps inside, followed by Bucky.

You’re still out of it. You don’t even realize who they are, not until the doors have slid shut and the floor jolts as the elevator starts its descent and they’ve been staring at you for a solid five seconds.

“Oh, hi,” you say, after too much silence. You need to get yourself together. “You guys came!”

Put a little pep in your step! And more joy in your voice- nobody wants to listen to someone so drained.

Steve shrugs. “I wanted to see it.”

Bucky just smolders, clearly saying with his silence, “I didn’t.”

“Did you like it?”

Steve considers your question. The elevator stops at another floor and the doors slide open, but there’s nobody waiting to step inside. You wait for Steve to gather his words together, sure that he’s trying to come up with a nice way to voice whatever he’s thinking, which is definitely not nice. There’s no way that he liked the art, not one chance.

“It was… intriguing,” he says, at last. Neither of them are wearing hats today, because the museum doesn’t allow it. Even in this artificial light, his hair shines, golden-blond. “Did you like it?”

“Yes,” you say, without wasting a second. “The one of the red woman- it’s probably the best thing I’ve seen all year.”

“It’s only January,” Bucky grumbles.

His voice shocks you, sends an ice-cold jolt up your spine that you definitely dislike.

Steve turns to him, peering over your shoulder, surprised and disappointed. The two of them have a silent conversation with their eyes and you stand in the midst of it, waiting for the goosebumps to settle back down, waiting for the chill to go away.

It’s difficult- he clearly doesn’t like you, either- and even if he has his own troubling little backstory, which you don’t care enough about to google, it’s not justified.

But…

It almost makes his aggression... amusing.

“It is January,” you say politely, dismissing him. “Great observation.”

The elevator reaches the ground floor and the doors side open. You exit in step with Steve, with Bucky right on your heels.

You all stand around in the museum lobby, a wide hallway down from the giftshop and a small cafe.

“Are you headed out?” Steve asks. He puts his hands in his pockets, feet planted wide.

Bucky crosses his arms. He’s wearing all black. If it were anyone else, you would make a joke- he could almost pass off as a pretentious art student, if the outlines of his body weren’t so visible through his clothes, all taut muscle and sharp angles. His hair curls over his shoulders, prettier than anything you’ve seen on any girl.

These guys are Avengers, you think, and proceed to push the thought away.

They look so… un-Avenger-y.

“Um.” You press a hand against your forehead, trying to formulate a response. Chores suddenly seem miles away, the last thing you should be doing. You have all of Sunday to complete them, anyway.

“I was going to get something to eat from the cafe first,” you say, nodding over in its direction. “You guys wanna join me?”

You don't know why you look at Bucky when you say it

“Sure!” Steve says, all cheery, still standing alongside you. He smiles and his teeth are pearly white.

Of course his teeth are pearly white. Dentists everywhere are probably cowering, clutching their little metal instruments for dear life.

Then he hesitates, and turns to Bucky. “If you have nothing else to do, I mean.”

Bucky pauses. You and Steve both stare him down.

“They have these raspberry-almond muffins that are to die for,” you say, like it’ll convince him.

He rolls his eyes. Bored and still gorgeous- if only.

“I’m free,” he says, and you don’t know why he looks at you when he says it.

You pay the bored teenager working the cash register with cash. He gives you your change, and when he turns away to prepare your order, you shove half of the bills and all of your coins into the tip jar.

Bucky sits at the farthest table with Steve. His knees can barely fit underneath it, and the tabletop is sticky, and he’s now willingly spending more time here, and with no disguise there is no way that he isn’t going to be recognized by someone, and he doesn’t know why he hasn’t fully booked it yet.

Because…

He doesn’t know.

Maybe because you’re not asking for anything from him, aren’t minding that he’s sullen or unapproachable or anything else- his presence seems to be enough for you, which is bothersome, and at the same time, mildly exciting.

“Are you having fun?” Steve asks, while you smile at the teenager handing you plates of muffins, little glasses of some milky-espresso-coffee drink.

“What do you think?” Bucky asks, while you start your journey back to the table, and Steve opens his mouth to respond, already bothered, and Bucky’s already guilty, but then Steve hops up to help you carry everything back.

You sit down laughing. Steve is laughing, too. The corners of your eyes crease and he can see all of your teeth, and you look at him for a split second, and then turn away before he can get a read on your expression.

He sits in silence, while you and Steve trade jokes and stories and easy banter, talking about art and local politics and all types of things he can’t bring himself to care about, things that Steve is relishing in. You’re witty, apparently, or at least quick enough to get a few quick laughs out of Steve, and Bucky would never say it, he’s barely thinking it, but he appreciates you for it.

And the muffin isn’t quite to die for, but it’s okay.

During a lull in the conversation, you break your attention away from Steve and turn back to Bucky. You look concerned, almost, still smiling but without showing all of your teeth, leaning towards him like you’re about to tell him a secret.

“I never apologized for before,” you say, and Bucky immediately sits up on edge.

Even Steve goes wary, eyes narrowing.

You suddenly give a long, weary sigh, and press a hand against the back of your neck, like whatever you’re about to say is going to be so tedious. “For my friend flipping out when she saw you guys- she’s literally crazy, she’s always doing too much- but on her behalf, I’m sorry.”

The silence following afterwards is deafening.

“It’s okay,” Steve says, after a long moment, while you’re still looking at Bucky- your eyes make his skin itch, and he doesn’t say anything else. “She’s not the worst that we’ve gotten.”

Bucky doesn’t say anything.

“Okay, great,” you say, and you slump back in your seat, looking away, back to your half-eaten muffin. You pick off an almond from the top and eat it. “Glad we got that out of the way. I just thought it would be weird if I didn’t say anything.”

“Thank you,” Steve says, so polite, even though you’ve done nothing to deserve his thanks. “Have you known her for a long time?”

“Yes, oh my god,” you say, and readjust yourself in your chair again, accidentally bumping your knee against Bucky’s, but not apologizing for it. He glances underneath the table, at your entire bare knee, visible through a rip in your jeans. “Rina- her name is Rina- was my college roommate for a while.”

“You went to college?” Steve asks.

“I have an art degree,” you say dryly, “which was… an okay decision, I guess. Sometimes I think I should have just dropped out and done, like, stand-up or something.”

You clearly don’t want to discuss it, leaving the last part as some sort of rhetorical joke. Steve takes the hint and nods, already closing the chapter, and you take a sip from your little glass, finally silent. The foam on the top of the drink sticks to your mouth until you lick it off. Bucky replies to it anyway.

“Why stand-up?”

You turn to him so fast that he almost misses you faltering, and give him a dazzling smile. He thinks of your bare knee under the table, and tries not to sweat. “Because I’m funny, Bucky.”

He doesn’t like how his name sounds when you say it. “Tell me a joke.”

“Oh, okay,” you say, and clasp your hands together. Steve is watching, rapt at attention. “Let me think real quick- oh, I have one. Which beverage has a black belt in karate?”

Bucky waits.

You wait, expecting something from him.

It’s Steve that has to say, “I don’t know, which beverage?”

“Fruit punch,” you say, exaggerating the last part, and Bucky just keeps on waiting.

Steve cracks a small smile.

“Let me tell you another,” you say. “What type of phone does a piece of fruit carry?”

Steve takes a few wild guesses. He’s enjoying this, and you are too, both of you feeding off of each other. “A phone-fruit. A fruit-phone. A frone?”

You shake your head. “A blackberry.”

Bucky doesn’t tell you that he has no idea what you’re talking about.

“Tough crowd,” you say, when he doesn’t react. “Don’t worry, I have more. Where do you go on red and stop on green?”

“Where?’ Steve asks, waiting, leaning forward in anticipation.

“When you’re eating a watermelon!”

It is not funny, it’s painfully unfunny, and maybe that’s why you and Steve burst out laughing. Bucky steals a glance at your watch, since he doesn’t wear one of his own. It’s nearing noon- how has so much time passed? Why is he still even here when he doesn’t even like you?

“Why are all of them about fruit?”

You look at him like his question is the dumbest thing you’ve ever heard. “What food is the best listener?”

Bucky just sits. All the foam in his little espresso thing has dissolved, having been left untouched. He doesn’t like the taste of coffee- too bitter, and caffeine doesn’t work on him, anyway. Maybe he should drink it, because you paid for it, and because you didn’t make a comment about old-fashioned manners or chivalry when Steve offered to at first, just shrugged and got in line.

He knows that you won’t care.

The drink sits on its own, glass beading with condensation.

“Corn is the best listener,” you say, without waiting for Steve to throw his questions or guesses at you, without waiting for Bucky to spit out another sentence. “Because it’s all ears.”

“That wasn’t funny,” he says, and glares at the spot beside your head.

You nod sympathetically, and he thinks again of the rips in your jeans. “I know. But it was about a vegetable.”

Oh.

You stare at him straight-faced, crossing your arms over your chest. Steve does the same, and then he realizes- the two of you are a bunch of kids, punks, juveniles- mocking his stature, pretending to be serious, somehow not offending him.

“Jesus Christ,” Bucky says. “You’re…”

He can’t even help it. He looks back at you  and his face works on its own. He gives a single, dry chuckle, but he’s smiling, and dragging his hand over his face, scrubbing it off just as fast, but you still see it, and smile back and gently nudge his knee again underneath the table, and then turn back away again, and he’s still staring at your hair while you take big bite out of your to-die-for raspberry-almond muffin, already back in conversation with Steve.

[aikainkauna]

Five things meme thing

Christ, I’m bored and probably suicidally stupid to post ANYTHING personal on this website but fuckit. Too bored. Here you go.

Five things in my bag:

This would be a rucksack.

-A red folder with all kinds of medical texts from my various illnesses, so I have them on hand if a doctor/nurse/disabled services social worker wants to look. They often do.

-Ginger candy (I prefer the Indonesian Ting Ting Jahe brand, the ones with the checquered ends on the wrappers). I'm not a candy person and extremely intolerant to carbs, but they're for nausea and one has only 3 g of carbs. Nausea happens often with my medications and also saves me from passing out if I have to have a blood test taken--I have a neurological glitch where I'm hypersensitive to touch and feel pain approximately 1392579515893 times more intensely than most people and I can go unconscious from pain with blood tests, gyn visits etc. so that stuff comes in handy. The touch sensitivity is only useful during sex...

-A packet of Amma's Rose incense sticks. As much as I want to support her charities, the incenses from her ashram aren't that great. They're not bad-smelling or anything, but not what I want from incense either; I've had better (usually prefer good old Auroshikha). The scent is pleasant when not burned, so I keep a packet in my rucksack for the fragrance.

-Splenda tablets, imported from the UK. You can't get sucralose here as tabletop sweetener for some reason (even if it can't be banned since I have seen it listed as a sweetener in squash etc.), and I way prefer it to the metallic-tasting Hermesetas that's usually the only available non-carby sweetener in cafes and restaurants. Or worse, fucking stevia (yeah, I really like that sickening aftertaste that lasts TWO DAYS from just one cup of coffee). Splenda is basically the only sweetener that doesn't taste awful to my mouth.

-Painkillers and benzos for emergencies.

Five things in my bedroom

-8 framed pictures/posters/prints of Conrad Veidt. Mostly Jaffar, but there's one Torsten, one Baroudi and that goddamn lounging-seductively-onna-sofa sex panther postcard. I still look at Jaffar's eyes every day and cry out "HOW?!?" and the Jaffar/Pwinzezz onna ship poster facing my bed is great for looking at during a fap if I have trouble focusing on the visuals of my fantasy.

-An old spice rack, probably Russian because it's too pretty to be Finnish, that now serves as a cabinet for my essential oils and attars. The rack has little colourful tealights and pictures of Shiva, the triple Devi, Krishna hugged by Yasoda, Kali's yantra blessed by Amma, and Ganesha on it (my proper altar is in the living room, but I like to keep my homies close) and a little red lantern dangling from it. Peacock feathers also dangle from it.

-Aromatherapy lamp/diffuser thing on my windowsill with more tealights and my most-used essential oil bottles (camphor, rosemary, patchouli, rose, jasmine, ylang ylang, eucalyptus, star anise) beside it because fuck getting them from the cabinet several times a day.

-Many pillows and cushions on the bed. I only sleep with one, but I use the rest for supporting my bent left leg when I'm wanking. Feels way better when I can keep at least one of my legs up-ish to add pressure/muscle tone to/tighten my vag. It's not that I'm loose down there (smaller than average, actually, which gives my gyn and my sex toy reviewing contact woman problems when we have to figure out how to and what can reach the deepest/best spots down there), but bloody hell, the pillow lift feels different. You wouldn't think it made much of a difference, but whenever I have to fap in a bed without support for at least one leg (or am being done by a guy!), I definitely notice it. ("What are you doing, building a pillow fort?" "Feels better for both of us if I get just one more cushion... hang on...")

-Noki's urn on my bedside table. It has a little holder for a tealight on the top, and I light a candle there for her every day. When I light the candle, I kiss the urn and say "Hello, Floofen." It's the phrase @versaphile always used whenever she saw Noki during our video chats, and when I first showed her the urn and was crying my eyes out (funnily enough, I am crying now), she just exclaimed "Hello, Floofen!" and it was just so warm and wonderful--and exactly what I needed to hear, then. So now I say it every time. And when the candle goes out, I say to myself and/or Dolores: "Noki's gone to sleep." (And Doli has just showed up. Sadly, I don't think she's one of those cats who picks up on human emotions and comes to comfort us when we're sad, though. She probably just wants noms or entertainment, as usual, but it's a nice coincidence anyway.)

Five things I've always wanted to do

Christ, thinking of these makes me depressed because these always involve... people and things that can go wrong. So I try not to have dreams about things, because it's nigh impossible for anything to feel perfect for me. And then I get deeply upset. My brain's just not wired for that kind of thing. But let's try.

-If not find a good male lover, at least afford a really fucking good daddy dom escort who can give me a proper hard thrashing and fucking. A really good, hard seeing-to from time to time. But to be perfect or even satisfying, he (and anyone else/everyone else sleeping with me) would have to be fucking psychic, so no can do. Jaffar's always going to be better. It's always Jaffar.

-Speaking of which, go visit Connie's urn again.

-...no, really, I just keep getting depressed. Therapy taught me not to do goals because of this kind of thing. I will keep my bar low so as not to slit my wrists. Like, I feel that even if I said "I want to have a nice cuppa in a minute," I'd break the mug and burn my legs from scalding tea. So let's move on.

Five things that make me happy

-Wanking. The fantasy worlds, when I really get going, are immensely complex and detailed and emotionally deeply satisfying and spiritual and wonderful. If I don't get to wank, I will lose all love, all happiness, all creativity. So that has to be the number one essential thing for not only my happiness but my sanity. And this is why I hate the (male-centric, body-centric) idea that wanking is just some pathetic rub to release pressure, or that sex=the physical act, with another person. When it's everything but that for women (biologically, not gender-essentialistily speaking) since our arousal is always dependant on the mental/emotional (which is why women read/write erotica rather than just watch porn because we want to be and need to be in the *mental* state of the characters, and that's only possible via text/imagination--and why it's fanfic in particular: we already have an emotional response to the characters. So this weird, deeply misguided trend to call that part of sexuality that’s between the ears, and all kinds of perfectly normal female sexuality "asexuality" is utter misogynist blasphemy for me--to call the *essence* of sex itself a lack of sex, just because nobody fucking asked how *women* processed sex, just some guy to whom it was all about dick in pussy! Jesus, the mental aspect is how vaginas *work!* And of course I prefer fic and wanking to “real” sex because the culture of masculinity tries to eradicate from men the very thing women need--emotional stimuli, sensitivity and empathy! How about we call the culture of defining sex through rub of flesh on flesh only not real sexuality at all because it omits emotion and humanity? How about that?)

So, yeah, wanking. It most definitely is the greatest mental, spiritual, creative pleasure for me. That's the life force, creation, poetry for me--there would not be fic, passion, fangirling for me. Take it away and I have nothing, and you will not have me.

-The whole wanking thing is so entwined with my writing that I feel like I shouldn’t mention writing separately? It’s the same creative process of the erotic. But I have so few things that make me happy that I guess I should say something like “being in full flow when the text just comes out and I’m swimming in happy OTP/unf/aaaahthespiritualinsights” feelings.

-Conrad Veidt. And his stupid fucking panther face. And his stupid fucking lady hips of infinite slink. And his eyes of vertignious skies. Etc. But that’s not separate from the above either.

-When people actually come and talk to me in my fic comments on Ao3. Honestly. Getting to have a good chat with someone who enjoyed my story basically makes my entire day. I might have woken up being completely miserable physically and/or mentally, but then checked my email and--A PERSON! ANOTHER HUMAN BEING! SOMEONE I HAVE TOUCHED THROUGH MY FIC! AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA! That sense of human connection (especially to someone who has no local friends and never gets out of the house) is wonderful. Especially when it’s through, well, the best and deepest and most essential part of myself--the creative/erotic/history-nerdy/spiritual/pervert/geek part. The outer world sees the frumpy gothy cat lady and doesn’t bother, but you’re talking straight to my soul there, meine sveet. So, yes, it is very happymaking indeed, and more than that. It tells me that I have indeed done something to make the world less shitty a place. 

-Honestly, there are so few things... IDK, the satisfaction of having sorted various RL things out, having Adulted successfully. Having enough money to get my prescriptions out, having a fridge full of food and having fed the cat and not being in too much pain, and being able to do something creative. If all those things happen during one day, it’s a supermega-rare day of awesomeness.

Five things I'm currently into

-Conrad Veidt

-Conrad Veidt

-Conrad Veidt

-Conrad Veidt

-Sleeping

Five things on my to-do list

-Have to nip down to the shops on my own today. In fact, it’s exactly why I am memeing--I am at once trying to wake up but also being avoidant. Aaaarrrgh. But it’s an emergency because I am running out of caffeinated beverages.

-Must send a list of synopses of all my programme items at Redemption ‘17 to Big Dave. No, I have not forgotten. Just been fucking knackered and avoidant and the con stress is crushing me. I really don’t envy those of you on the committee who are doing the REALLY hard work.

-Actually prep those programme items properly. A taste of what’s to come and why you all should come to the convention because it’s awesome:

Talk: Queering Up Het because of course you need the guy in a dress and with a strap-on up his arse while the chick goes down on another chick, talk: Villains as Liberators in fanfic, het romance in particular and what they can give to fangirls/the heroines because they’re the Other and as such, less patriarchally shitty, history item: reading out shittons of OLD PORN FROM HISTORY with @coolserpentina (she’s doing Aretino; I’m doing Abu Nuwas), panels: some swashbuckling/Old Hollywood stuff where Big Dave and I and hopefully @filmforfancy talk about OH as a slash fucking goldmine and also Basil Rathbone’s horsecock fencing skillz, and some other stuff which I’ve forgotten and my head’s exploding already.

-Remember to buy basil today. I am out of basil. I have to just, like, draw a huge conk on a piece of paper to remind me. I fucking know I’m going to forget the basil.

-Ring the damn Social Insurance Institute to find out what the fuck’s up with my disabled housing allowance. I think they’re closed down for today. And I’ll be asleep during office hours for the rest of the week. Fuck.

Five things people may not know about me

-I actually keep a list somewhere to answer THIS EXACT QUESTION on all these memes, because whenever I’m asked these, I always struggle to come up with weird random facts. And then I remember several when I’m not memeing. And guess what? I’ve lost the sodding note. *face in hands, groaning*

1. I own an oversized dildo called Ainley and used to own a big German vibrator called Heinrich (Strasser), but he died. I also have a buttplug called Claude Rains. He's very small but very powerful and leaves you gasping and very satisfied after his performances. But I think you might already know this about me.

2. Well, most of you on here probably won’t know what the fuck about my various illnesses, but Non-24 is one of the three most debilitating ones. You go to sleep one hour later each night and wake up one hour later (most people have the form where your day is a 25-hour one instead of 24 hours) and you basically cycle through an entire day in a month’s time (at the beginning of the month you woke up at 4 AM, then 5 AM, 6 AM etc. and once a month’s passed, you’re waking up at 4 AM again). There’s no way of fixing the ever-sliding sleeping rhythm, not even with the strongest of knockout pills they gave to psychosis sufferers and believe you me, N24 sufferers have *tried everything*. And you’re always in a state of extreme exhaustion and jet lag, comparable to the level of fatigue narcolepsy sufferers have. So it’s a major pain in the arse whenever I try to schedule anything, whether it’s doctors’ appointments or chats with friends, because I literally don’t know when I will be awake on Thursday next week (because forced awakenings to go out and do stuff combined with poor quality of sleep, sometimes only getting 3 hours of sleep a night, complicate the rhythm even further). And whenever it’s one of those miraculous days on which I’ve slept enough to process fic, I *will* be ficcing, lest I go fucking nuts, so I will most definitely not be sacrificing my rare chances to be happy and fulfilled to anything else. (Even Important Adult RL stuff, if it can be put off, because my sanity’s more important.) I might also actually have narcolepsy on top of that, but they haven’t prodded me enough to find out yet. So. Yeah. I’m always fucking knackered and that’s why my sense of humour and sex drive are what they are--they’re all linked in that one part of the frontal lobe, so you get a person who’s constantly fucking exhausted AND constantly getting cracky ideas brought on by sleep deprivation AND who’s constantly horny. Basically, I should have married an anaesthetist.

3. ...I think that this year, I will have been writing fanfic for 20 years (if calculated from the time I encountered actual fanficcing culture and started to take part in it). And I feel ancient. And still slip into fucking badfic. OTOH, I’ve only written longfic since 2012 or so. Thanks to that dead German arsehole.

4. I own only two pairs of what you could vaguely call trousers. One pair is made of leather and one is just a pair of slacks. Whenever I wear them, I feel like I'm in drag. I'm way more comfortable in big flouncy skirts because they don't bind my hips/thighs/legs or ride up my crotch. And several layers of skirts are much, much warmer in the winter than several layers of tights/leggings/jeans or something. And with my chronic pelvic/back pain and limited mobility, ease of movement is essential. Fuck trousers, basically.

5. There should probably be something more interesting here, but I do have to go to the shops and I’ll just leave you with this: I’m hypermobile, which makes me able to scratch my ear with my toes, but also means I sprain everything all the time, adding to all the other funky pains I’ve got all over anyway. I can tie myself into a knot even without regular yoga exercise (this is another superpower of suck that’s only useful during sex), but it also means motherfucking sciatica every time I leave the house. I sometimes even count the amount of steps I manage to take outside the house before something in my back goes *crunch* and the sciatic nerve gets trapped and each step on whatever foot’s side it happened on will be one lancing lash of pain. Yay!

So, you know. This is why I don’t meme often and publicly because it just becomes a list of my illnesses. And I find that annoying because often it just gets in the way of what people know about me--they just see the sick woman. So I’d much rather focus on what’s on the inside--the porning and the poetry and all the creative, *pleasant* stuff. I’ve got a lot to escape from, so that’s why I escape and fucking hard. So I hope that escapism in the form of fics and pics and godawful tags will help others escape as well. I know how you feel and all that.

And now I’ve got to go and buy that horseco--I mean basil.