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gender-trash · 7 months ago

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I would be very interested in hearing the museum design rant

by popular demand: Guy That Took One (1) Museum Studies Class Focused On Science Museums Rants About Art Museums. thank u for coming please have a seat

so. background. the concept of the "science museum" grew out of 1) the wunderkammer (cabinet of curiosities), also known as "hey check out all this weird cool shit i have", and 2) academic collections of natural history specimens (usually taxidermied) -- pre-photography these were super important for biological research (see also). early science museums usually grew out of university collections or bequests of some guy's Weird Shit Collection or both, and were focused on utility to researchers rather than educational value to the layperson (picture a room just, full of taxidermy birds with little labels on them and not a lot of curation outside that). eventually i guess they figured they could make more on admission by aiming for a mass audience? or maybe it was the cultural influence of all the world's fairs and shit (many of which also caused science museums to exist), which were aimed at a mass audience. or maybe it was because the research function became much more divorced from the museum function over time. i dunno. ANYWAY, science and technology museums nowadays have basically zero research function; the exhibits are designed more or less solely for educating the layperson (and very frequently the layperson is assumed to be a child, which does honestly irritate me, as an adult who likes to go to science museums). the collections are still there in case someone does need some DNA from one of the preserved bird skins, but items from the collections that are exhibited typically exist in service of the exhibit's conceptual message, rather than the other way around.

meanwhile at art museums they kind of haven't moved on from the "here is my pile of weird shit" paradigm, except it's "here is my pile of Fine Art". as far as i can tell, the thing that curators (and donors!) care about above all is The Collection. what artists are represented in The Collection? rich fucks derive personal prestige from donating their shit to The Collection. in big art museums usually something like 3-5% of the collection is ever on exhibit -- and sometimes they rotate stuff from the vault in and out, but let's be real, only a fraction of an art museum's square footage is temporary exhibits. they're not going to take the scream off display when it's like the only reason anyone who's not a giant nerd ever visits the norwegian national museum of art. most of the stuff in the vault just sits in the vault forever. like -- art museum curators, my dudes, do you think the general public gives a SINGLE FUCK what's in The Collection that isn't on display? no!! but i guarantee you it will never occur, ever, to an art museum curator that they could print-to-scale high-res images of artworks that are NOT in The Collection in order to contextualize the art in an exhibit, because items that are not in The Collection functionally do not exist to them. (and of course there's the deaccessioning discourse -- tumblr collectively has some level of awareness that repatriation is A Whole Kettle of Worms but even just garden-variety selling off parts of The Collection is a huge hairy fucking deal. check out deaccessioning and its discontents; it's a banger read if you're into This Kind Of Thing.)

with the contents of The Collection foregrounded like this, what you wind up with is art museum exhibits where the exhibit's message is kind of downstream of what shit you've got in the collection. often the message is just "here is some art from [century] [location]", or, if someone felt like doing a little exhibit design one fine morning, "here is some art from [century] [location] which is interesting for [reason]". the displays are SOOOOO bad by science museum standards -- if you're lucky you get a little explanatory placard in tiny font relating the art to an art movement or to its historical context or to the artist's career. if you're unlucky you get artist name, date, and medium. fucker most of the people who visit your museum know Jack Shit about art history why are you doing them dirty like this

(if you don't get it you're just not Cultured enough. fuck you, we're the art museum!)

i think i've talked about this before on this blog but the best-exhibited art exhibit i've ever been to was actually at the boston museum of science, in this traveling leonardo da vinci exhibit where they'd done a bunch of historical reconstructions of inventions out of his notebooks, and that was the main Thing, but also they had a whole little exhibit devoted to the mona lisa. obviously they didn't even have the real fucking mona lisa, but they went into a lot of detail on like -- here's some X-ray and UV photos of it, and here's how art experts interpret them. here's a (photo of a) contemporary study of the finished painting, which we've cleaned the yellowed varnish off of, so you can see what the colors looked like before the varnish yellowed. here's why we can't clean the varnish off the actual painting (da vinci used multiple varnish layers and thinned paints to translucency with varnish to create the illusion of depth, which means we now can't remove the yellowed varnish without stripping paint).

even if you don't go into that level of depth about every painting (and how could you? there absolutely wouldn't be space), you could at least talk a little about, like, pigment availability -- pigment availability is an INCREDIBLY useful lens for looking at historical paintings and, unbelievably, never once have i seen an art museum exhibit discuss it (and i've been to a lot of art museums). you know how medieval european religious paintings often have funky skin tones? THEY HADN'T INVENTED CADMIUM PIGMENTS YET. for red pigments you had like... red ochre (a muted earth-based pigment, like all ochres and umbers), vermilion (ESPENSIVE), alizarin crimson (aka madder -- this is one of my favorite reds, but it's cool-toned and NOT good for mixing most skintones), carmine/cochineal (ALSO ESPENSIVE, and purple-ish so you wouldn't want to use it for skintones anyway), red lead/minium (cheaper than vermilion), indian red/various other iron oxide reds, and apparently fucking realgar? sure. whatever. what the hell was i talking about.

oh yeah -- anyway, i'd kill for an art exhibit that's just, like, one or two oil paintings from each century for six centuries, with sample palettes of the pigments they used. but no! if an art museum curator has to put in any level of effort beyond writing up a little placard and maybe a room-level text block, they'll literally keel over and die. dude, every piece of art was made in a material context for a social purpose! it's completely deranged to divorce it from its material context and only mention the social purpose insofar as it matters to art history the field. for god's sake half the time the placard doesn't even tell you if the thing was a commission or not. there's a lot to be said about edo period woodblock prints and mass culture driven by the growing merchant class! the met has a fuckton of edo period prints; they could get a hell of an exhibit out of that!

or, tying back to an earlier thread -- the detroit institute of arts has got a solid like eight picasso paintings. when i went, they were kind of just... hanging out in a room. fuck it, let's make this an exhibit! picasso's an artist who pretty famously had Periods, right? why don't you group the paintings by period, and if you've only got one or two (or even zero!) from a particular period, pad it out with some decent life-size prints so i can compare them and get a better sense for the overarching similarities? and then arrange them all in a timeline, with little summaries of what each Period was ~about~? that'd teach me a hell of a lot more about picasso -- but you'd have to admit you don't have Every Cool Painting Ever in The Collection, which is illegalé.

also thinking about the mit museum temporary exhibit i saw briefly (sorry, i was only there for like 10 minutes because i arrived early for a meeting and didn't get a chance to go through it super thoroughly) of a bunch of ship technical drawings from the Hart nautical collection. if you handed this shit to an art museum curator they'd just stick it on the wall and tell you to stand around and look at it until you Understood. so anyway the mit museum had this enormous room-sized diorama of various hull shapes and how they sat in the water and their benefits and drawbacks, placed below the relevant technical drawings.

tbh i think the main problem is that art museum people and science museum people are completely different sets of people, trained in completely different curatorial traditions. it would not occur to an art museum curator to do anything like this because they're probably from the ~art world~ -- maybe they have experience working at an art gallery, or working as an art buyer for a rich collector, neither of which is in any way pedagogical. nobody thinks an exhibit of historical clothing should work like a clothing store but it's fine when it's art, i guess?

also the experience of going to an art museum is pretty user-hostile, i have to say. there's never enough benches, and if you want a backrest, fuck you. fuck you if going up stairs is painful; use our shitty elevator in the corner that we begrudgingly have for wheelchair accessibility, if you can find it. fuck you if you can't see very well, and need to be closer to the art. fuck you if you need to hydrate or eat food regularly; go to our stupid little overpriced cafeteria, and fuck you if we don't actually sell any food you can eat. (obviously you don't want someone accidentally spilling a smoothie on the art, but there's no reason you couldn't provide little Safe For Eating Rooms where people could just duck in and monch a protein bar, except that then you couldn't sell them a $30 salad at the cafe.) fuck you if you're overwhelmed by noise in echoing rooms with hard surfaces and a lot of people in them. fuck you if you are TOO SHORT and so our overhead illumination generates BRIGHT REFLECTIONS ON THE SHINY VARNISH. we're the art museum! we don't give a shit!!!

#so anyway i love going to art museums--#the trashcan speaks #long post

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gallusrostromegalus · 1 year ago

Text

The Van Has Officially Declared It Spooky Season

---

I've got my parent's van for the week and it seems determined to establish my status as The Local Cryptid by terrorizing an innocent 7-11 clerk.

...I might need to back up a bit.

My mother is an eminently sensible woman who knows herself well, and when The Plauge hit, she knew she'd need some sort of mentally and physically engaging craft project to keep herself from going insane and massacring the local zoning and water management boards (even if they have it coming). So she and Dad acquired a utility van and converted it into a camper van because while they love camping, they're past the age where their joints and immune systems will tolerate sleeping on the cold ground in a nylon tent.

They did a terrific job of it and my mom taught herself woodworking and carpentry and now the van has it's own cabinets, fold-away dining table, and removable queen-sized bed with memory foam mattress. My Dad was already a computer engineer, but he learned the dark magics of automotive software and electronics to install after-market backup cameras, a media player that would take a terabyte hard drive and a solar-powered battery and outlet so they could wake up and just turn on the kettle and griddle for breakfast without having to exit the van into a cold morning on an empty stomach.

Truly, the height of Camping Luxury.

My parents are both in their mid-seventies and my primary life goal is to be at least half as cool and hale as they are when I get old.

Anyway, they take it out at least a dozen times a year and it works fabulously, but, being as I am on good terms with my parents and also finishing the process of moving house, I've been borrowing it to move large and cumbersome objects that will not fit in the back of my equally lovely but minuscule Honda hatchback.

It's a Great Van. Very easy and comfortable to drive. Stunningly good MPG for it's size. The best cruise control I've ever had in a car.

It's just also. Quirky. Mischievous, even.

---

If this van has a fault its that it bears the unfortunate affliction that all lightly used white utility vans have in that the combination of an utter lack of branding features and the large dent/scrape I accidentally put on it while trying to escape a Denny's last Thanksgiving means that this vehicle is one addition of a Badly Spray-Painted "FREE CANDY" on the side away from being the sort of vehicle you see in an edgy horror movie.

It's got the same issue that Doberman Dogs have where they look like the sort of creature that likes to snack on toddler's faces whilst actually having personalities made of marshmallow fluff. This vehicle is unnecessarily menacing and I think nothing short of an airbrushed Epic Van Wizard will correct this. People see this van pull up and lean over and squint suspiciously at me when the driver's side door opens, and then look moderately confused when, instead of Charles Manson, a small, potato-shaped creature with neon purple hair and a statistically unlikely assortment of dogs emerges.

My own two dogs, Herschel the Hanukkah Goblin/Corgi and Charleston Chew The Taco Dumpster Dog, Do Not Like The Van. Even with the bed in it, they have a tendency to slide and roll around in the back, and both WILL chew through dog saftey belts or other attempts to secure them in there.

On the other hand, my house mate's dog, an exceptionally tall standard poodle whom we lovingly call "The Creature", loves the Van because SHE wears her doggy seat-belt with only mild complaining and gets to sit up in the passenger seat like A People.

Also like A People, The Creature likes to stand and walk around on her hind legs. It doesn't hurt her and it's entirely voluntary, but every so often I will feel a hand on my arm and instead of my husband or friend, it's a canine that's taller than I am on her hind legs who wants to stare at my face with soulful, concerned eyes. The Creature's favorite thing is that she is exactly the right height for me to hold her arm in Genteel Fashion and walk around the pet food or hardware store with her like I'm a count escorting a debutante around a royal ball.

---

As it stands, I am set to inherit this vehicle whenever my Honda gives up the ghost, and I fully intend to paint an Epic Van Wizard on it when that time comes.

The other peculiarity of The Van is that while Dad did manage to successfully install all his after-market electronics, not all the electronics get along. Sometimes, they fight for Dominance. The Terabyte Music Player and the Backup Camera have a particularly contentious relationship, and turning on the music has about a 25% chance of turning on the backup camera as well, and turning on the Backup Camera is equally likely to turn on the music.

Firthermore, The Van has a favorite song.

I am not kidding that Dad filled an entire terabyte hard drive with music and the software to sort it via the radio controls, but of all the Early Boomer Dad Rock (Kingston Trio over The Eagles) and Irish Folk and Symphonies and the entire discography of Weird Al Yankovic, The Van's favorite song- The one it picks to play as victory music every time it beats the Backup Camera at their weird electronic game of rock-paper-scissors -is The Liberty Bell March by John Phillip Sousa.

You all know this song already.

...but in case you've forgotten the tune:

youtube

Yeah.

The Van's favorite song is the goddamn Monty Python's Flying Circus Theme Music.

It does not play this song at a normal volume.

Every time I turn on the Backup Camera and it manages to turn the music player on as well, The Van insists on absolutely blasting this nonsense on at the maximum volume it's physically capable of producing, which I know is loud enough to be heard from the Denver International Airport's Pickup zone when they Van decided to start playing it from the economy lot about half a mile away.

Perhaps it's The Van's way of honoring the aesthetic sensibilities and sonic enthusiasm of Mr. Sousa.

...I can't help but wonder if the purpose of an Epic Van Wizard is to control this sort of faerie-like malarkey, and channel these chaotic energies into things like Spell of Don't Break Down In Nevada or Enchantment Of Always Have Good Parking.

---

So last Friday the 13th, I get a call from my friend and housemate, at said airport.

It's roughly 11PM at night, and I have already retired for the evening. I am in the exact minimum of clothing required to be a decent housemate and not scandalize the neighbors should I happen to walk by a window. My feet are up. There is a cat in my lap and fictional British people murdering each other in highly inventive fashion on the tv. -But my friend has returned from her friend's wedding,and either American or United Airlines has managed to lose her luggage, including, among other valuable possessions, the keys to her car. ...So she cannot just drive home as originally planned.

There are, as luck would have it, her spare set of keys not eight feet from me.

Being a good and decent person, I agree to bring the spare keys to her so she may get home before daybreak and not spend a semester's worth of tuition on an uber across the greater Denver traffic jam.

Being also that she Loves Activities, and it's her mom we're going to pick up, I elect to take along The Creature.

I am primarily focused on remembering how to get to the airport and not leaving my friend's spare keys on the counter, so I throw on a pair of flip-flops, step outside, remember that it's AUTUMN and my minimal evening attire is not sufficient thermal protection, step back in, grab the first coat in the closet I lay hands on, pull it on, check that I have her keys again and leave.

The trip to the airport is largely unremarkable, save that it becomes necessary for me to put on sunglasses to drive, despite it being nearly the witching hour and almost entirely darker than the inside of a cow.

It's necessary because this blissful darkness of night is violently punctured by a startling number of cars that seem to have installed miniaturized but no less powerful lighthouse bulbs in where their headlights ought to go so the oncoming traffic and sports cars that insist on tailgating me in the slow lane alike illuminate the road and my mirrors with the kind of radiance I'd normally associate with the arrival of a Seraphim.

I arrive at the distant highly discounted airport car lot where my housemate is waiting, deeply apologetic. It's nothing. I say. Once I see that your car starts up, I'm gonna go to that 7-11 across the way that I parked in front of, get a slurpee or something and I'll see you at home.

While she is retrieving her vehicle (an equally eccentric but much more stately Subaru that is old enough to be elected to congress) I rifle through the loose change in the glove box and discover that I have exactly $6.66 in small bills and coins. The Subaru, continuing it's long voyage into vehicular immortality, immediately starts up.

Upon her return, we all remember that my friend had all her camping gear in the backseat of the car and there is no room for The Creature to ride home with her parent, so I again assure her it's nothing, and will just take The Creature into the 7-11 with me. She is trained as a service animal and needs the practice after the plague.

I wave my friend off and turn to enter the 7-11.

I promptly trip over the jutting back bumper of The Van and fall, cartoonishly, face-first onto the sidewalk.

Fortunately, I have a lot of practice falling on my face, and have learned not to throw my hands out but instead cover my face, so my unexpected self-inflicted attempted curb-stomping lightly scrapes my hairline and nothing else -my sunglasses even stay in place- and I get up and resume my quest for a slurpee.

It's well known that the airport is a lawless place, and the 7-11 across from the discounted airport parking at the stroke of midnight is no exception.

I know it's the stroke of Midnight because there's one of those Audubon society bird-call clocks that makes bird noises, and my arrival is heralded by the twittering call of a Summer Tanager. I am almost charmed enough by the unusual choice of chronological device to excuse the exorbitant Airport-adjacent mark-up of Slurpee prices. I stand at the machine for some time, trying to decide on a size for the price and guess what the fuck "Blue Lighting Blast" is supposed to taste like.

The Creature is being Very Polite but is somewhat agitated, I assume because she *just* saw her mother for the first time in three days and then she LEFT with no explanation, so The Creature is on her hind legs, staring woefully into my eyes, asking to be escorted around the 7-11. Even though that's not what she's not supposed to be doing, there's nobody else in here, so I let her hang off my arm and discuss various Slurpee Flavor options with her.

We eventually decide on an experiment in which I try a Small Blue Lightning Blast, and discover it tastes a bit like licking a nintendo cartridge but in a pleasantly satisfying way.

I go up to pay and realize something is amiss.

The Cashier is a young man staring at me with wide eyes, one had over the register and the other wrapped up in his rosary.

I look down at myself.

In my haste to reunite my friend with her spare keys and service animal, I had left the house in the following accoutrements:

Flip Flops. Not matching. It's below freezing outside. That last part is not particularly odd footwear for the weather in for Colorado, but it's an important detail for the rest of the ensemble.

Assorted scrapes, bruises, cuts and welts on my arms and legs that come with doing outdoor work and living in a house with three dogs and a fully-clawed cat that all want to be in my lap all the time. It's cold out, so vasoconstriction has pulled the blood away from my skin, a trait that served my ancestors well during the last Ice Age, but leaves me with pale skin to contrast the various wounds and I look like a corpse that fell out of the back of a pickup truck.

The black Bootyshorts with "CRYPTID" painted in bright red gothic font across my ass, that @theshitpostcalligrapher gave me for my wedding present.

A peculiar but extremely comfortable garment that straddles the line between "Lacy Camisole" and "Industrial-Strength Sports Bra" like the Ever Given straddling the Suez Canal. It is also Bright Red. with black accents.

The Jacket I had grabbed out of the closet, which is in fact, a black Velour Dinner Jacket.

The Tokyo-Ghoul inspired reusable anti-covid mask a friend made me with the set of Coyote Teeth.

My sunglasses, which are shaped like a Halloween Bat. The lenses are the wings and the body is the nose bridge. It is ALSO bright red.

A Very Large and remarkably Humanoid Poodle that I have been audibly affectionately calling "Dear Creature" who is hanging off my arm like she's my Prom Date.

The Very Large and remarkably Humanoid Poodle is ALSO dressed up in a black Dog Sweater that has white bones printed on it to look like its an X-ray jacket showing off her skeleton.

I look like I am taking my Very Fancy Werewolf Girlfriend to a particularly casual Dinner Party for Vampires, but the thing that's really selling it and probably alarming the kid the most is the fun accessory I acquired in the parking lot not five minutes earlier:

The "Small Scrape At my Hairline" is actually a painless but PROFUSELY bleeding head wound that I had somehow entirely failed to notice covering my face, neck, decolletage and magnificent cleavage with blood like a Tarantino Film Extra.

This does explain why The Creature has been delicately trying to use her bodyweight to push me down onto the floor for the last ten minutes. So I don't injure myself while we wait for the paramedics she hoped this kid called to arrive, you see.

The Creature has such a High and Naive Opinion of humanity.

I decide this social situation is already fucked, and the only way out is through, and with haste, before I start dripping on the floor.

"Hi there!" I say cheerfully, to indicate this is a visually alarming but not terribly serious situation. "Just a Small Slurpee!"

The Cashier has entered the relevant code into the register before I finish the sentence. His gaze flicks off me just long enough to look at the total, and he grips his Rosary harder.

$6.66

"Oh cool! I have exact change!" I say, taking the money out of my as-yet-unsanguined pocket without looking and slap it down on the counter. "You have a good night and be safe out there!" I wave, leaving.

I get in The Van, mortified, buckle The Creature up, and as I make to leave, I have to put it in reverse, which automatically turns on the backup Camera.

It also turns on the music player.

I make eye contact with the cashier as the dulcet tones of John Phillip Sousa boom from the van hard enough to make the windshield and the windows of the 7-11 rattle for the nine-and-a-half seconds I have to wait to be able to turn the volume back down. Not knowing what else to to, I give him a thumbs up, and leave.

Anyway, now I know what my Future Van Wizard has got to be dressed like, and what their familiar is.

---

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#Family Lore #Dogs #It's Halloween babey #friday the 13th #blood mention #I hope that kid had a good night and at least one of his friends believed him #Long post #Video

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helaintoloki · 4 months ago

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May I request a five x reader where they are living domestically and just being happy and lovey dovey especially experiencing everything they did together while being in the apocalypse, the time commission, stoping the other apocalypses etc (five x Lila doesn’t exist five x Lila doesn’t exist five x Lilia doesn’t-)

a/n: this piece is basically a big fuck you to s4 so enjoy five being happy and domestic with reader and not his own brother’s wife. also five and reader are mentally older adults but physically in their twenties

warnings: language, fluff, mentions of pregnancy

summary: now that the timeline has been fixed and the world is no longer in danger, five can enjoy a peaceful life with you

The sunlight that bleeds through the curtains is almost blinding as Five begins to stir himself awake. Stretching out his limbs until he hears a satisfying pop, he lets out a sigh and moves to reach out for someone that isn’t there. Your spot in bed is still warm which means you haven’t been gone for long, but Five still rises with a sense of urgency when greeted with your absence. Call it muscle memory from dealing with multiple kidnapping ploys against you or an old habit that just won’t die off after having to remain vigilant when protecting you from the enemy, but the poor boy’s heart always skips a beat when you go missing.

He finds you in the kitchen brewing a fresh pot of coffee, your back to him as you hum along to the radio that plays on the counter and search for Five’s favorite cup in the cabinet. He has to pause and take a breath to remind himself that you’re not in danger, your life of protecting timelines and ending apocalypses is over, and the fresh start you’ve made for yourselves isn’t in any jeopardy. You’re real, you’re alive, and you’re his.

“Morning,” Five softly calls with a careful smile as he rests a hand on the small of your back and presses a tender kiss to your lips.

“Good morning,” you great cheerfully before handing him his cup of coffee. “I didn’t hear you get up. Did I wake you?”

“Not at all,” he assures you before taking a hearty gulp of the hot liquid. After years of being together you know how to make Five’s coffee just the way he likes it and could probably do so in your sleep if asked. Your thoughtfulness is just one of the many traits of yours that have him wrapped around your finger always.

“We need to go grocery shopping,” you note dutifully as you peek your head into the fridge in search of breakfast. Frowning, you announce, “We’re out of eggs, so I guess it’s frozen waffles for breakfast.”

“Why don’t we go out for breakfast today?” Five suggests with an innocent shrug.

“Really? But you hate breakfast places. They can never make your coffee right.”

“I also hate seeing you eat frozen waffles three days in a row,” he reminds you with a wry chuckle. Maneuvering you out of the way, Five closes the fridge shut and gives you a gentle nudge in the direction of your shared bedroom. “Go on, get dressed. You can wear that new dress you bought the other day.”

“You’re right!” You exclaim with an excited gasp and rush off to your room before Five can change his mind. Not that he would, of course. Five would do anything to see you happy after all the shit he’s put you through in your time together. Sometimes he still wonders why you ever agreed to marry him, perhaps a slip of sanity or lack of care for your own wellbeing, but he wasn’t one to complain. He liked living the quiet life with you, and he wouldn’t change it for the world.

~~~

The night air is cool against your bare shoulders as you sit comfortably upon the porch swing and listen to the cicadas sing their evening song. The sun has long since set, but the string of lights that hang above you are enough to allow you to see the pages of your color by numbers book. Beside you, Five sits with a book in one hand while the other rests atop of your legs strewn across his lap. He enjoys sitting in the silence of your company as you remain glued together despite partaking in your own hobbies separately.

“We’ve been married for thirty years,” you state simply, breaking the silence but never once breaking your focus from your coloring book.

“Sure have,” is Five’s thoughtful reply. Setting his book aside, your husband gives your calf a gentle squeeze and turns to look at your concentrated features.

“Not including your siblings, it’s always been just us. Together in the apocalypse, partners under the Commission, husband and wife.”

“Is that a bad thing?” He asks, not quite sure what point you’re trying to make. Are you rethinking the marriage? Are you finally starting to have regrets about marrying him? He watches with bated breath as you set your materials to the side and finally meet his anxious gaze.

“I want to start a family of our own,” you finally confess, nervously fidgeting with your wedding ring as you await his response with hopeful eyes. “I don’t want it to be just us anymore.”

Sighing, Five leans his head back and shuts his eyes as he processes your request. He can’t say he’s surprised by your question; he’s noticed the way you eye babies in public, how you linger just a little too long to admire the window display of the infant clothing store at the mall, how you’ll hold the twins for hours in your arms and refuse to give them back until Diego has to physically pry them from your grasp. It’s only natural for you to feel this way, but that’s not the problem. The problem is Five isn’t exactly sure how he feels about becoming a father.

“I don’t know,” he admits carefully, taking great caution when choosing his next words so as to not upset you. “Having a kid, becoming parents… it changes everything.”

“I know we couldn’t before because there was the Commission and then the multiple apocalypses, and that’s why I never asked. But Five,” you urge gently, shifting to sit yourself up on your knees so you can reach over and take both of his hands in your own, “all of that is done with. We fixed the timeline, and all that end of the world nonsense is over with for good. No one is coming after us anymore or trying to kill me to get to you. We can properly grow old now and have a simple life together, wasn’t that always the goal?”

The boy is silent as he mulls over your speech. You’re completely right; saving the world and resetting the timeline to its proper place in order to ensure you and his siblings could have the lives you deserved was always the end goal. But after spending his entire existence trying to complete that task, he finds it hard to adjust to his new life of normalcy. Perhaps he’s not exactly scared of becoming a parent, but scared of what a baby would mean in the grand scheme of things. It would be proof that his work is truly over now, that he can turn his survival mode off after having it set to fight for so many years, and that’s a big adjustment for someone like him.

But when he looks at your hopeful gaze and sees the way you anxiously worry your lip between your teeth, he realizes that he’ll do anything to give you the happy life you deserve. He brings one of your hands to his lips and holds it tight as he murmurs his answer into the skin of your palm.

“If you think we’re ready, then I’m in.”

“You mean it?” You gasp while doing your best to withhold your excitement. Your eyes are wide and full of hope as Five lets out a soft chuckle before giving you a reassuring kiss.

“We survived the end of the world several times, how scary could raising a baby really be?”

He isn’t given an answer to his hypothetical question as you fling yourself into his arms and assault his face with multiple kisses along his skin. It’s safe to say his answer has eased your anxieties, and the boy can only laugh as you express your gratitude.

“I’m so happy you agree!” You exclaim giddily, your hands coming to rest upon his chest to ground yourself as you then suggest to Five’s surprise, “Let’s start trying tonight!”

“What?”

~~~

“That has to be the tiniest Hargreeves I’ve ever seen,” Klaus gushes adoringly as he takes in the details of the ultrasound photo in front of him. “Look at the little peanut, isn’t it precious?”

“I can’t believe Five is actually going to be a dad,” Allison notes in astonishment as the three of you turn your gaze to see him arguing with Diego over the proper way to baby proof your home while Ben eggs them on and ruins Luther’s efforts at trying to keep the peace. You’re only two months along, but Five is anxious to ensure that everything is perfect for your child’s arrival.

“You know, you might just be the first 65 year-old woman to give birth,” Klaus points out cheekily. “You should be in a world records book or something.”

“Very funny,” you retort sarcastically before taking back the ultrasound photo to hang up on the fridge. You falter for a moment when your eyes remain stuck to photo and your brain works on overdrive to commit the image to memory as best as you can.

“Everything okay?” Viktor asks after noticing the sudden change in demeanor.

“I just can’t believe this is real,” you murmur quietly, blinking back tears that threaten to spill. “After everything we’ve been through and everything we’ve lost, I guess a part of me worries that one day I’ll wake up and this will all have been a dream.”

“I know how that feels,” Allison assures you with a comforting squeeze to your shoulder. “But I promise you this isn’t a dream, and whatever you need we’ll be there.”

“Because you’re family now,” Viktor adds on with a confident nod. “And we look out for family no matter what.”

“Even though at one point in our lives we’ve all thought about killing each other,” Klaus notes humorously before giving you a tight squeeze.

“Everything okay over here?” Five asks, appearing at your side and placing a comforting hand on your back as you all turn your gazes towards the fridge and admire the newest addition to the family.

“Everything is perfect.”

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