#coyote flats

[bigmoon-is-bigwife]

I didn't even notice earlier, Sneeg was collecting stuff for the faction quests but upon seeing Ros had switched out of Yellow he stopped and asked to talk Ros. He wanted to be sure that Yellow faction was worth contributing to or if they had done something bad. Before Ros had even said anything to him he was already on her side and suspicious that something had happened. Ros was so worried that he would be upset at her for leaving the faction but he was immediately ready to watch the faction burn if it had wronged Ros. LOSA is definitely sticking together with or without Yellow faction.

[multyashka-sweet]

Fishing

[aralyre]

Hello! Thank you for stay here, I hope you like my arts, take care 💜 Who's your favorite girl? Yote girl? Yeen girl? These two cuties belong to @Readerno31142 in their first colored design! Thanks a ton for commissioning me, little bee! 🥰💕🐝

I won’t be active but will try to answer your messages, just in case, please send me your questions on Twitter or via Discord!

🐝💐 Also, check out my Patreon/Buy me a coffee and become a member! Many surprises wait for you! https://www.patreon.com/aralyre and  https://www.buymeacoffee.com/aralyre 💐🐝

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[theotherside-oftherain]

inexplicable pain? In my joints? It's more likely that you think!

[abyssee]

Old coyote Folly & her life companion Peabrain. One's filled with mange, the other is going through her seasonal molt. They share -3 braincells when they are together (but Peabrain possesses a strong 2 when she's alone !).

This is a new version of this character! Folly was the first character I designed for Wildstories, back in 2020, before we even knew how we wanted the art style to look like. Not that we've - I've - settled on anything definitive yet, but I wanted to make her design a bit more readable ; give more the impression of brittle fur and molt vestiges ; and approximate coyote markings (especially in the reddish brown legs and ears). I've also done more research on mange, so I wanted to target the right areas and thing about where it originated from.

Between her naked spots, various bite marks, and disheveled fur, her design remains a bit more complex than what @louaseau does for his own characters, but I'm super happy on how she turned out and she's very fun to draw c:

[ace-sailor-uranus]

im not saying i spent several hours painstakingly recreating two of my non-work pairs of black leather boots from a free template in mspaint, but i am saying it *was* 5 o'clock, and now it is 8:30ish, so take from that what you will.

[alnilaem]

coyote head and the body of a man — (e)

ghost/fem reader There's a killer on the loose. But your logging town is small and quaint and doesn't even appear on maps, so you know you're safe. That all changes when a gruff, big, taciturn man shows up at your workplace one day. Or; Simon is a fugitive serial killer, and you're the housekeeping girl that caught his eye.

cw for explicit content, graphic violence, possessive behaviour, size difference, cunnilingus, stalking

pinterest board | ao3 | for @spidehpig <3

You believe you were born in the centre of an exploding star. 

Born on the crest of death and fated for a bleak life. Dead, before you even had a chance.

The universe sweeps before you. Infinite. Expansive. Hungry. You float at the mouth of the galaxy and it swallows you whole, but doesn’t seem to like the taste of you—too bland, too trite—so it spits you back out and sends you tailspinning. 

You land with a lack of courtesy. Tossed between trees and dropped in a basin. You find yourself in nowhere, Oregon. In a town flecked by a lake inlet and a clement fjord, where the moose population outnumbers the people population. It has a maritime allure but strangely enough, isn’t commercial enough to be a tourist hub. It’s too hidden in the thicket. Too deep in a borehole.

Every day here is the same. It's an abyss that yawns before you with no end in sight, lacking undue entertainment and vividness and excitement. There’s no light pollution so far off the beaten track, so oftentimes, you’ll wish upon shooting stars for someone to come for your deliverance. 

There’s a reason they say be careful what you wish for.

The day isn’t even halfway over and your bone tips already ache with hard work. 

It isn’t to say your workplace is busy. In fact, it’s the exact opposite. A cut-rate motel with more vacancies than residents found far-removed from the highway, taking only cash, no card, which is good for deterring paper trails and welcoming the transient but is bad for providing records when the police come knocking. 

You’ll get the occasional trucker, the sparse backpacker. In any case, folks stay here when they don’t want to be bothered. They’ll drive past the splintery welcome sign and stop at the diner for earthy, full-bodied coffee and a slice of famous rhubarb pie. They’ll recuperate in the motel and leave before sunrise, and you’ll be there to clean up what they leave behind, scrubbing the memory out of the fibreglass bathtub for whoever’s next. 

It’s a place where time fleets away. Hallucinatory. Where people pay their due and you hang your head because after all, you’re nothing more than the housekeeping girl. Cottony pinafore and a black dress. Mary Jane flats. Fingers desquamating from years of bleach and vinegar stuck in your nail beds. You get handed dog-eared tips and in return, you don’t ask questions. But maybe you should have.

You’re sliding the window cleaner back into its compartment on the cleaning cart just as your boss scales the veranda. He’s grinning and sporting sweat stains across his armpits. A patchy beard. A loose tie. 

Your nerves lock up tight when he grasps your shoulders. His razorous fingers and the pinchbeck of his wedding band saws under your skin. The dregs of his afternoon drinking knocks into you, and you try not to let your body betray you. Despite that, your eyes water and your nose crinkles. You white-knuckle your dress and almost pop the fabric of your pinafore. 

“How’s my favourite employee?” he grins. “Is she workin’ hard?”

There’s an irreverent innuendo somewhere in his smile. You ignore it and opt for a stale smile.

“I’m working,” you eke out. “I've got to restock the bathroom, then I’m done.”

“That’s good, peach. Real good,” he watches you collect toiletry essentials, then tacks on, “there’s a man in the lobby.”

You falter. The travel-sized shampoo bottle almost slips between your forefinger and thumb. 

“An outsider.”

It’s an observation, not a question. If the man in the lobby were a local, Phillip would have given you a name because in this town, everybody knows everybody. The fact that a name was bereft tells you your new guest came from elsewhere. Maybe he’s cutting through the main road on his way to Yachats for your town’s cascade mountains and bigleaf maple, or for the diner’s famous rhubarb pie. In any case, he's in need of a rest stop. 

“Mh. I’m gonna check him in. Just wanted to let you know I’m givin’ him this room, so try to hurry it up, okay peach?”

You blink slowly. This motel holds twelve rooms—there’s never been a need for any more—and currently, nine of those are occupied. That leaves three. There’s no reason for your boss to put up the new guest in Room 11, especially when you’re still cleaning it.

Phillip reads the question in the bend of your eyebrow. He smiles knowingly and pats your head. “He requested a room on the higher level. Room 9’s aircon is busted and Room 6 shares a wall with the Pettie’s. They’re loud.”

You sigh. “Ah.”

“Sorry peach,” he smiles like he’s apologetic, but you don’t think that’s the case. “Just get it done, alright? And add some extra coffee packets."

You furrow your lips. Displeasure flutters over you but you wash it away with a smile, refusing to irk him. You nod and pivot, bones bending against your skin for an escape as his hand whispers against your bum in an encouraging caress.

Anger simmers in your marrow. Phillip simply chuckles, disparaging.

“That’s a sweet peach.”

His voice gets muted by the tinny, rattling radiator as you make it to the bathroom. You stock it up dutifully—perhaps taking extra long to ensure he's not waiting outside for you—and spritz air freshener around the room when you finish. It’s a flaky, expired bottle of Platinum Ice which barely masks the town’s deep-seated smell of old-growth forest, petrichor and woody debris. You hope the new guest doesn’t have a sharp nose. 

You make sure to stuff the coffee station with extra packets before stepping out of the room. Off the mysteriously stained carpet, onto the veranda. You putter around with your large keyring, thumbing through the nickel-brass since you also have a key to the elementary school, post office, and city hall (aptly titled shitty hall by locals, since this town isn’t much of a city and the building’s roof is held together by nothing but rusty rivets and tassels of sprig collected in the corners). You’ve got so many keys because again, everybody knows everybody, and it isn’t rare to see the housekeeping girl at the motor lodge supplementing her income as a part-time teaching aid. 

Finally, you find the master key. You lock the room and roll the cleaning cart into the utility room before locking that too. Your wrist drags across your forehead, wiping away sweat, and you tug on your dress because perspiration has pasted it onto the pert curve of your breasts, the squish of your thighs. You furtively glance down your bodice and watch how the sweat pocks your skin, knotting your nipples against your cheap bra. Lament catches you in regards to your shower after work—it’s going to be freezing since the heating system here is so fickle—and in the paroxysm of your grief, the sound of heavy breathing eludes you. 

You don’t hear his footsteps. He’s an ambush predator. Stalking and shadowing in the tall grass, waiting for the moment your hackles melt to bite into your neck like an unripe stone fruit. You don’t see him, but you feel him. His breath tickling down your neck. The erogenous zone behind your ear. 

A gasp parts your lips and you whip around, coming face-to-face with a paunchy chest plated by moth-eaten flannel. You heft your head up, exercising the hinge in your neck. Paling at the sight that greets you.

He has a Cabela’s cap on. It’s pulled over his eyes, but a few blonde curls peek out from under the crown of his hat. He has a damaged, blistered face. A cauliflower ear. Nicks on his cheeks that distend from his skin and have turned pallid with time, rippling like seafoam petticoats on waves as he flickers his jaw. He wears jeans and mud-clogged boots and holds a duffel bag. 

His gaze unties you. You slowly find words, fitting them in an orderly queue in your mind as you avert your gaze and stare at the floor. Squirming. Preening. Sweltering.

“Welcome to Sockeye Inn, mister…” 

Silence. He lets your words awkwardly trail off. Doesn’t do anything to belay the discomfort in your belly. The man simply stares at you with brown eyes. 

Humiliation crawls up your spine and settles on your cheeks. It burns through your skin, withering you away, to which you fidget with your fingers and baldly nod towards the door.

“Your room is ready,” you murmur. “Enjoy your stay, sir. Uh– if you need anything just give us a shout. Phone’s on the bedside table.” 

Foolishly, you wait for a response again. Nothing. He towers over you, owlishly blinking, one slower than the other because he seems to have a lazy eye. You clench your skirt and softly shoulder past him, heading for the stairs as you hear him putter with the keyhole. 

You’ve halfway scaled it when a rasp distorted by what seems to be years of cigarettes stops you dead in your tracks. 

“Bring me a BLT and root beer.” 

You burn up at the muscle in his voice. The drag. Just as you’re about to reply, his room door slams shut and rocks across the veranda. 

Your dress is stickier than it was before. Perhaps an ice cold shower isn’t so bad after all.

The end of your shift slowly arrogates. 

After delivering food to Simon Riley—you glinted at the logbook while waiting for his order, reading his name—you left his room as soon as possible. You set the food down and found yourself plugging your nose. The Platinum Ice you sprayed before didn’t accost you— instead, it was pomade. Lucky Strike cigarettes. Decaying heartwood. Bleach. 

You pointedly breathed through your mouth. It didn’t actually help though, since you could taste it then. The ethanol in the air drizzled over your pockmarked tongue and glided down your throat. Collected in your stomach. 

You almost retched it back up at the sight of him.

Through the foggy shower wall, the colour of his hazy contour was striking. It seemed to be a tight fit for him, hemming in his lumberjack build. The shampoo bottle looked like a damn accessory in his large hands and his chased shoulder blades pressed soap against the glass pane, sudsy. 

Your curiosity pulled your gaze lower. Down to the heavy mass between his thighs, thick and fat. Bulbous. 

His spine suddenly went erect, straightening like a chary animal. As if by the agitated pappus of his skin, his chin lifted in your direction, and that’s when the earth collapsed under your feet and you beetled for the door. 

You distract yourself in the kitchen. Emptying the dishwasher. Taking the garbage to the bear-proof receptacles. Putting the oven on steam clean. Kate, the kitchen supervisor, stares at you oddly under her hairnet but she isn’t going to reject a set of helping hands. 

You scrub at a pan hoping it will erase the image burned into your mind. Hoping that the steel wool will have the same effect on your temporal lobe as it does on the pan. You don’t realize your hands are chafing and the pan is flaking, not until Kate is passionately complaining beside you, her spit dashing onto the side of your face.

“—fuckin’ freeloaders. They drain our taxes but can’t even do their damn jobs. Wait until one of their family gets butchered, you’ll see, that’s when they’ll start taking this seriously.”

She waves a newspaper in your face. The paper stack fans in front of you, blowing you with cool air. You’re just barely able to read the big, blocky headline. 

Connection Made Between Ventura, Gilroy and Eugene Serial Killer — Aptly Coined the Ghost.

“Eugene!” Kate slaps the newspaper, frazzled. “Not even three hours from us!”

You scarcely listen to her, her voice ripening into white noise as you scrutinize the police sketch on the newspaper’s margin. The offender is drawn with an overripe balaclava and probing eyes. Dark brown, as if his corneal opacity has laid claim before death. His eyelids have no tension, but a furl of crow's feet gather at the corners. It’s uncanny. Eerie. And even though he’s pressed on paper, you can’t help the unease welling inside you. 

A part of you waits for the other shoe to drop. For him to manifest and crawl out of the paper, dripping ink and viscous tar, ruining your Mary Jane flats and the floor you’d just mopped.

Hemlock hits the back of your throat. Lemony, sedgy. Your eyes fixate on the information detailing his crimes. Spines broken and necks snapped with inhumane strength. Pieces of flesh carved with the precision of either a surgeon or a butcher. Rigour mortis locking the victims in a scream, nail beds caked with skin which implies a struggle, but leads nowhere since the Ghost’s DNA hasn’t been found on any database.

(He’s as elusive as his name suggests. Investigators say he could be foreign, or that he has a clean record. The latter seems unlikely for the violent calibre of his crimes.)

There’s also his modus operandi—slicing off his victim’s ring finger, taking it with him. A cruel reward. 

“They say he’s taking Route 101,” Kate tacks on. “That he’s a long-hauler. How the hell will they catch a long-hauler?”

You shake your head, shrugging. Your tongue is too heavy and your gums rub against the round of your cheeks when you try speaking. The sentence gets snagged on your molars, and all that comes out are sparse words, lamely falling to the floor with how out of breath you are. 

“…They’ll catch him.”

“They better,” she shortly huffs. “I don’t want this town making the paper for all the wrong reasons.” 

Death comes to you in a cornfield. 

You’re sprinting through the crop, barefoot and scantily clad and pricked by thorns. Your clothing catches on thistle and corn husk, slowing you down, but the quick-footed trampling at your tail keeps your pace steady and stable.

Your lungs burn. Your bones rasp. Your eyes well up with how fast you’re moving, with how your retinas strain to see more in the pitch black than just reflective corn silk and the crescent moon. 

The midnight sky is close to swallowing you whole, but at this point that would be an act of mercy. The whistle of his cleaver slicing through the air and the stomp of his boots are promptly catching up, heckling you, barely whispering against the flowy cotton of your dress.

By a cruel twist of fate your foot catches on a tiller and sends you flying. Your nose softens the impact, the crack of cartilage reverberating through your skull, glutinous red spurting down your chin as you try scrambling to your feet.

But true to his name, Ghost, he slips through matter and suddenly, he’s standing in front of you.

Black, sweaty tank top. Freshly sharpened meat cleaver. Stout arms. Predatory eyes. Rotting balaclava—which at this point, you’re starting to believe was grafted onto his face, fitting him like skin. 

You raise your hands for mercy. 

But you should know dead stars have exhausted all their luminosity—that after death, they hold no power. That space is a graveyard. That’s why the Ghost poises his cleaver behind him. That’s why the last thing you see is his cleaver handle swinging towards you, about to collide with and shatter your cheekbone into a million pieces—

—but daylight strikes you with no clear trajectory. 

It’s your alarm that rings, waking you up from a nightmare, telling you to brush your teeth and scrub yourself down and pop your supplements before biking to work. You do so sluggishly, standing under the shower spray as you massage your cheekbone. Burning your toast as you scour the news for developing details on the Ghost case. Ordering a cup of coffee from the local diner and gulping it down behind the motel lest Phillip catches you.  

Your nightmare—omen, prophecy, portent of death?—pursues you like the persistent stench of fish on an angler’s hands all morning. You flinch at the slightest noise while scrubbing toilets, you constantly look over your shoulder while sweeping floors.

Malaise builds in your blood vessels like creosote. It doesn’t thin into fluid, flowing in and out of your appendages and around your sex until you situate yourself in front of Room 11. Fluffing up your skirt and puffing out your chest.

You announce your presence and rap the door with your Mary Jane flat because your hands are occupied with new bed sheets. Your knuckles blanch around the linen, quivering, struggling to keep it in your grip. The sheets almost flutter to your feet when a voice penetrates the door, abrasive and husky. Rough. Grating against your spine and shaving down the vertebrae. 

“Door’s open.”

You wait a few seconds before contorting yourself against the threshold. You try the handle and lo and behold, it’s unlocked, swinging open when you press your weight onto it. 

You step inside and toe off your flats. Next to Simon’s boots, they look fit for a doll, and a dizzy spell ricochets through you at the size difference. At the stark reminder that he’s as big and packed as a thick tree stump.

You walk inside and heed the CRT television playing the news. 

It does nothing to soften the scream that rips out of you as you round the corner.

Simon is in bed, pulling on a cigarette. His pudgy tummy and bristly chest are bared, the steel wool of his happy trail disappearing into the bed sheets furled around his hips. The flat sheet is thin enough to outline something stirring. Something thick and pressed against his inner thigh. 

He stares at you, eyes of Argus. It’s so intense you’re sure he can sense the slick running down your back. The dew that settles in the gusset of your panties. 

You stutter. “I can come back later.”

Simon sits up with a groan. It rattles you. His joints must be fettered with age, or hard work, but in any case your head goes cottony with the picture of him splitting wood and hauling heavy bovine flanks. 

You swallow thick as he shakes his head. “It’s no problem, sugar. I’m not even here.”

The pet name makes you squirm. You sure do feel like it—sugar, that is—with the way you could melt on his tongue, wedge yourself between his teeth. Turn syrupy and sappy at the back of his throat.  

He takes another drag of his cigarette. You watch raptly as his jaw feathers around it, lips proffering another plume of smoke. 

He blinks. “Well?”

You eke out an apology and fiddle with your hands. 

“I’ll have to, um, change your bedsheets first.”

Simon shakes his head. He taps the ashy casualties off the tip of his cigarette and you watch as it sinks onto the bed sheet, almost burning through the floral motif. “No need.”

“Well,” you cough, forcing your eyes away from him, “if I don’t, my boss…”

Simon pricks up. The hind of his spine straightens the same way a dog would sit straight and plumb after hearing rustling in a bush. His muscles tighten, thick, and his face twists into a sneer. The bed sheet around him falls and you lock up tight lest it bare his pubic bone. 

“Is he a minger?”

“I’m sorry?”

He huffs. “‘s he a bully?”

“Oh, no,” you blandly laugh. “Mister Graves isn’t a bully. He just…”

“Makes you uncomfortable?”

There’s a lapse between acknowledging his question and spitting out an answer that makes you kick yourself. Simon already looks dubious. You hug the sheets closer to your chest and smile, your cheeks feathering like beeswax.

“He’s a kind man.”

“Not wha’ I asked,” he says. The bed creaks as he leans forward, the sheets slipping lower, scarcely covering his sex. “I asked if he does stuff he shouldn’t be doin’.”

Your heartbeat quickens. Briefly, you wonder if he can hear it. He probably can, albeit softly, due to his lumpy cauliflower ear.

“He’s a married man,” you mumble. “He doesn’t touch me if that’s what you mean. Not like that.”

“There’s only one way to touch someone,” Simon grunts. His chest starts churning a little, as if he’s agitated. “Does he put his hands on you?”

Your skin burns, remembering. A phantom scar runs through you, long and creeping, mapping all the places in which Phillip’s pinchbeck wedding ring has burned you. The suture of your spine, the pappy flesh of your neck, the rise of your hips where his palm has melted through your dress and smarted your skin.  

Your silence makes Simon grunt. 

Panic surges up your throat. You feel the need to defend Phillip, in some approximation of gratitude and fear since you’re on his payroll and you don’t want to reap the consequences should you rat on him and he find out. 

“No!” you hurry. “Mister Graves isn’t like that. He’s a good man. Honest.”

Simon’s eyes push against your skin. He scrutinizes you, tests you. Waits to see if you’ll fidget too much and flake away and sink into the carpet. 

He growls. “You fancy him, is tha’ it?”

Answering yes is the only way to shake him off your leg. You do so archly, so it seems as though the thought of your boss has you flushing when really it’s Simon. He’s fully upright, and now you can see the girthy base of his cock. Stirring, twitching. You suppress a moan.

“Yeah…” you murmur. You can feel your makeup turning blotchy, running down your cheeks. “It’s just a bit…embarrassing, is all.”

He lapses into it again. Staring at you. Razoring his way into your head and thumbing through your consciousness, searching for an Achilles’ heel. A crack he can break into a hole because he has the size for it—barrel-chested, stupidly thick fingers. 

Simon slips out of bed and disturbs the coiled aches of the mattress. He holds a washcloth over his crotch. It’s crusty and keeps shape and covers almost nothing, confirming your inkling. 

His bulbous cockhead winks at you from under the hem. It’s heavy. Leaky. Dripping precum that laves down his legs and gets caught in the wiry hair of his thigh. 

Anxiety pools in your armpits and around your groin. Or maybe that’s just arousal. Brackish and sticky, rubbing your pussy lips together, hugging your clit. 

Simon pulls on his cigarette once more and then folds it into the bedside table. You should scold him. You should tell him that he’ll have to pay for damages even though the wood is already degraded and mouldy. You should scuttle out of the room and call for Phillip, but that would be a crueler fate. Instead you stay fixed to the carpet as Simon steps forward. Cock swinging between his legs, tummy jiggling. 

You don’t know whether he’s going to pull you in for a kiss or rip off your dress or—and you’re unsure why you think of this—take you by your skull and smash it against the television stand. He has the muscle to, surely, but somehow you know he won’t. And the thought of that makes your skin hot.

You’re at his mercy.

You gird yourself for his lips or for your dress to be torn off, but your preparations flux away as Simon steps close and crowds you against the television stand. The stench of Lucky Strike cigarettes and gamey meat impair you, as he reaches behind you and increases the television volume. You want to say something but cotton fills your mouth and the news report floods your ears. It’s fragmentary—you can only heed oddments of the news anchor’s latest updates. 

The Ghost is still at large. Corpses keep popping up around California and Oregon, each with their ring fingers sliced off. The tipline has been leading investigators nowhere, shepherding them to the end of the earth and over the edge, floating, where they’ll move through molasses and will never be able to catch him. 

White male. 6’4”. 196 centimetres. Brown eyes. Heavyset. Likely military background. Likely a surgeon, or a butcher. A dangerous, ruthless individual. 

If spotted, do not approach. 

Simon’s breath fans against your neck, rousing the bristles of your warm cheeks. He turns off the television and steps back. An ether opens up in the pit of your stomach as your gaze falls on his bulging pelvis, on the purplish veins and webbing muscle, sitting like a tuft under his navel, disappearing behind the washcloth where his cock stirs. 

Simon tuts. “World’s goin’ to shite.”

You nod.

“You shouldn’t be out here anyway,” he tacks on. “Should be at home takin’ care of your man’s house. Keepin’ safe.”

You flash your naked ring finger embarrassingly fast. “I-It’s just me…and my cat.”

His eyes darken. His head tilts down at you. He purrs. 

“Better get started on mine then,” he breathes. “Put yourself to good use.”

You shyly get to cleaning his room. 

You try to ignore his hand disappearing behind the washcloth, pumping his cock. You can’t ignore the silk ruining your panties. Scarcely, you manage to ignore the caution creeping up your back. Your lower instinct that screams at you as you feel his stare tracking you across the room, burning. Smouldering. Warning. 

Daylight scissors into you.

It melts the sleep in the corners of your eyes. It clears the haze in your head. It interrupts the sultry dream you were having. Your flesh is still pocked and your clit is still peaked, as you rehash the contents of it. 

You can still feel Simon’s weight on top of you, sweat compressioning you, the sheets gathering under your slick back. Your underwear had dangled from one of your ankles, flapping and swaying as Simon pounded into you. Your head bobbed over the lip of the mattress. Your tits bounced, nipples caught between his gnashers. Your slick ran down your cunt and over your asshole, pooling onto the floral bed sheets. You just quit your job. You didn’t care about the sheets. Or the Pettie’s down the veranda. Phillip was on the other side of the door too, and he could hear everything. Your moans. Simon’s balls dragging over your furled hole. His groans—

—And the sudden tearing of cartilage and skin stretching, rubbery, as Simon shifted into something else above you. Something larger. Deadlier. His drool dripped onto your chest, and his cock was suddenly too big for your pussy, popping back out until only his tip managed to squeeze inside your puffy hole. He snarled down at you, but it got covered by a creeping balaclava. You still reached your orgasm, quivering around his cockhead. Watching him go spotty and graphite-like in your vision, as if he were a composite sketch.

You get out of bed and wash the absurd dream away under the shower. The nozzle hits your clit weakly, and you never reach your high. You show up to work pigeon-toed and sweaty. Pent-up. You scrub harder at bathtubs and almost snap at Phillip when he swats your bum. Almost. Simon is watching from the dining hall, and he makes you skittish.

The day rolls by sluggishly. There’s a Do Not Disturb sign dangling from Simon’s door, so you don’t get the chance to see him in his room. You huff and puff at the Pettie’s and give Kate attitude. It’s the peak of afternoon when you’re sent home, shoulders stiff because Phillip squeezed them and tacked on, ”I can always help out if you’re stressed, peach,” before shepherding you out the door.  

You bike into town. Indulge in the diner’s famous rhubarb pie because the motel’s cherry pie is nowhere near as good, though you’ll never tell Kate that. You polish off your treat then ride to the beach (which is more of a graveyard for birds and braided, washed ashore sea meadow), and prop your bike against the wooden bollards.

The beach is familiar with you. It sees you when you're overwhelmed by the monotonous colour of your life. You never worry about meddling kids or loud teenagers or anything, because the stench of fish usually keeps them away anyway. It's your own Shangri-La. Your little Eden. Albeit overcast and greyscale, with an ocean spray that gets into your hair and dries out your mouth.

You slip out of your Mary Jane flats and wade through the sand dunes, breathing in salt and sulfur and tasting it on your lips. You maneuver around seawrack and driftwood and eventually find yourself seated behind a tussock of seaoats, watching as the waves lazily beat against the shore.

It's easy for you to lie down and get comfortable among the scent of iodine and the feel of pillowy granules. It's also easy to let your eyes flutter shut, lulled into limbo by the ebbing tide and murmuring waves.

You stir awake with flaccid lungs.

Presentiment hangs in the air, thick, like a blanket of smog. It interrupts your breathing pattern and makes you light-headed. Vertiginous. Makes you see things that aren't there…

…Such as the off-white scleras and twists of dilated blood vessels that stare at you from the foreshore.

They approach you eerily. Two pieces of driftwood floating over the waves, jolting slightly as it hits the sand, splintery and mossy and heavy.

The man feathers toward you from the blue glow of the beach. You squint through the darkness, because maybe it's the sheriff, but you know he walks with a drunken gait and he…strides like a bear on its hind legs.

The way he lurches for you says otherwise. Perhaps he's rather a panther or a coyote, or some crude backyard breed of all three.

A large palm splits itself over your mouth. An arm lays beside you and secretes a musk of sweat and iron. A knee digs into the plush of your cunt, agitating your clit, as a warm breath fans over your pulse point.

"Waited for me, didn't you?" he rasps against your neck.

In your stupor, you brace your hands against his shoulders. A sticky substance coats his skin, too viscous to be sweat.

Nausea knots in your throat. Tremors wash over your body. You dig your nails into his flesh, and when your hands don't fall through it like you hoped, you gravely realize he's made of muscle and skin instead of your drunken, sleep-inspired imagination.

You experience a cruel loss of equilibruim. If you weren't already lying down, you'd collapse to the ground. You go limp in the sand, thawing into his hands which you unwillingly notice are caked with that sticky substance too.

"There's dangerous folk 'round here," he grunts. "What if someone else followed you? A big, bad man?"

A chord of recognition stirs in your brain at his voice. That brash accent.

"Simon…?"

He chuckles. "It's me, sugar."

You squeeze your thighs together but it's abortive. He pries them apart anyway, and cups your pussy through your panties.

He rubs you through the gauze, knuckling your soft lips. Through the darkness you barely see the misshapen silhouette of his mouth. That snarl, curling off him as if he suffers from some chronic wasting disease, slowly atrophying and turning into some vestigal cadaver.

He kisses down your sternum. Grips your hand and forces it over his crotch. Your fingers brush over the solid mass. It's hard due to both stiffened denim and his thickening cock.

"All for you," he mumbles. "Take it out, sugar."

You fumble with the metal teeth of his zipper. You pull him out with both hands and your mouth goes dry. Tongue sticking to the roof of your mouth. Deadly nightshade hitting the back of your throat. Despite you, your thighs squish together, and a rumbling chuckle slips through the seam of his lips.

He's huge. Fat and heavy, so much so you need both fingers to wrap around him.

"Give it a kiss, yeah?" he coos. "Like a sweet girl."

You spread your lips against his cockhead. You pull away and a string of precum chases you, but Simon is pushing your head back down and bucking his bristly pubic bone into to your nose.

"There it is," he grumbles. "Such a big girl, aren't you?"

You look up at him with wide, wet eyes.

The stiffs of hair on his pubic bone tickle your nose. You smell sweat and iron, but you can't tilt your head away, because the stout muscle of his arms keep you in place.

Fighting is futile. His cockhead hits the back of your throat like oleander and he holds your jaw in place, dimpling your cheeks with his rough fingers, letting his balls slap against your chin.

Just as you're getting used to his size, he pulls out, breaking the strands of saliva and precum between you.

"Take off y'panties, sugar."

You pull them off and squirm at the way the gusset clings to your pussy lips a little while longer. Simon takes it against his nose and sniffs it, running his fingers through your pussy, spreading your slick.

You don't get a warning before he's curling one of his fingers into you. Massaging your walls. Scissoring you open. Thumbing your clit.

He adds another and twists them deeper—meaner—into you. He swallows your whimpers but spits them back into your mouth when he empties his saliva down your throat. He keeps stroking the inside of your pussy, your sticky walls, and rubbing your clit.

He squeezes your cheeks together and gives you a big kiss. He coos condescendingly into your lips, and licks away your fresh track of tears. "It's supposed to hurt, baby. Don't be mad, alright? It'll feel good soon."

He gets deeper and deeper. Knuckle-deep, when he curls his fingers inside you. You lock up tight and thrust your hips through the bulk of your orgasm, trembling and quivering around him.

Your lips quiver around a plea when he pulls his fingers out. It's a lapse of judgement on your part—you know it—but you can't help it anymore.

"Please what?" He grins. It's ugly. Like a truss of stitching falling off his face, mangled and chewed up.

"Can you g-go…" you squirm when he rolls his tumb over your clit, agonizingly slow. "Can you go–"

"C'mon baby," he whispers against your lips, "spit it out. Big girls use their words."

"Canyougodownonme?" you gasp and grip onto him, bucking your cunt into his palm.

He chuckles against your mouth. He kisses down your chest. He crinkles his nose against the husk of your pussy. He deeply inhales and vibrates at your scent. He darts his tongue out and flattens it against your dewy folds, licking a stripe up your slit.

You writhe but he holds you in place with those big, thickened hands of his. They're wet but at this point you can't tell if it's your arousal or that mysterious substance on him. You can't even think about it, not with your thoughts melting away, escaping you like the humming waves.

Simon's a bit too aggressive in how he eats you out. It doesn't come from a juvenile attempt influenced by sex-on-screen with undue emphasis, but rather his tongue spelling devotion into the fat of your cunt.

Your fingers flex into his blonde head of hair. It's closely cropped, but you still manage to pull him closer, grinding yourself down on the bumpy bridge his nose. You pull on his hair and he growls and sends a quake up your spine. He wraps his lips around your clit and swirls his tongue further into you, softly suckling your juices out.

The waves fold over each other, beating against the shore. They crest and crash and just as they race up the sand dune, teasing your flexing toes, your second orgasm crashes into you too. You twist and twirl Simon's hair in your grip and almost miss the feel of something cold being slipped onto your finger.

You're shaking, trembling, as you raise your hand. You're hazy and the moonlight is shrouded by clouds. It makes the mystery object look smeared across your vision, blotchy and spotty.

You hold it a little closer to your face, examining the twinkle as Simon massages your thighs to ease the quiver.

You turn your hand over and whisper your thumb over its curve.

You bristle when you realize what it is. It hangs off you a little loosely, burning your knuckle.

A pinchbeck wedding ring.

Stained with red, and still warm from the body it was pulled from.

Bile gathers in your throat and burns your mouth. Tears gather in your eyes. A small gasp parts your lips, billowing out of you like the mushroom-head of a flare just as realization fully commits itself to you.

You shiver. Both through realization, and your orgasm. "…What did you do to him?"

"Took care of him," Simon grunts, caressing your hair. "I'm supposed to handle the monsters under your bed, ain't I?"

You spare him a glance. You heed the white of his teeth and a smudge of—you know it's blood—across his cheek. His eyes, hidden in the shadowy canopy. His nose, bent out of shape and speckled with blood.

"You're not going to hurt me."

He brushes your hair back. "No."

You pant into him when he captures you for a kiss. "…Why?"

"I'm supposed to take care of ya," he grunts. "That's what couples do, no?"

He pushes something in your grasp—a folding knife. Your thumb slips over the two initials engraved into the handle—your initials.

"How do y'feel about Kate?" he asks.

Your coworker flashes into your mind. "I like her"

Simon—the Ghost—grunts. "And what about that bloke at the diner? What's his name?"

"I– Franklin?"

"Hn. Does he bother you?"

You thumb through your memory. Perhaps what you say is an embellishment, giddy of what Simon's going for.

"He did steal my bike once…" you mumble.

Simon pricks up. His chest puffs out and squishes against your arm. "He married?"

"Yeah, um," you swallow, "for about ten years."

"You want his pretty ring? Or his wife's?" Simon asks, then kisses you. "Anythin' you want."

Your lips stretch into a smile.

Simon cups your cheek, blood rubbing off on you. For the first time ever, you feel exhilarated at the thought of the future. At the thought of being taken care of. Doted on.

Suddenly the town doesn't feel so cold anymore. It doesn't feel like an invisible barricade is hemming you in. Simon is your ticket out of here, and a ticket to your new life.

You can abandon your pinafore and Mary Jane flats and maybe he'll spoil you with frilly socks and a cute sundress. Maybe he'll fuck you in his truck or in gas station bathrooms as the corpse of a man who wronged you rots in the truckbed. Maybe you'll get caught but at least you'll be together and at least your name will finally be known.

Not as the housekeeper girl, but Mrs Riley.

[inbabylontheywept]

go to the caverns, the kartchner caverns, roughly an hour southeast of tucson

in the throne room you shall encounter the great yuan

you must fight him, for it is your destiny

cross the fields of soda-straws and fried-eggs and shields. unleash your fury upon him. there will be those who try to hold you back. they will speak gibberish about your disruption of the delicate balance of the great yuan's domain. you must pay them no heed. you must destroy the great yuan.

we depend on you.

The first time I traveled to Tucson I was in a car full of zooted children. I would've preferred being one of those children, but alas, any medication that makes me sleep also makes me sleepwalk, and after an incident where I tried to climb out of the car while it was still going sixty (thank God for seatbelts) I was condemned to a childhood of car trip sobriety.

(You may think that's not such a terrible fate, but you've probably never experienced anything else. Ambien, used correctly, is time travel. And time travel is awesome.) 

Still, involuntary consciousness had its perks. It meant I alone got to spend some extra quality time with my dad, which was always something in short supply growing up. Until third grade or so he worked in the ER, which gave him an absolutely hellish amount of hours. He'd mostly just come home and sleep, which meant that I personally did not know him that well, but my mom hyped him up so much that I always really wanted to. 

So days like that were always kind of exciting to me. A chance to meet the myth. 

I can't remember exactly what me and my dad were talking about - something to do with our final destination in Mexico. But at some point, we awoke my little brother. 

(Waking people up when they're on ambien is always trouble.)

I remember starting when I felt one of his small cold hands reach up to grab my shoulder. The dad did the same, and it jerked the car a little bit - startling someone whose hands are on the steering wheel has its risks. We both turned to look at him, but he wasn't even looking at us. He was leaning over the console, staring into the red and purple sunset ahead, watching the rolling skyline of Tucson like it was drowning in dreams. Like he was drowning in dreams. 

We waited for him to speak. It took a while. Normal social conventions don't apply to people when they're unconscious. The fact that he could talk was just some broken line code in the fabric of the world. 

"Wow," he said at long last. 

"Beautiful, isn't it?" my dad replied. And my little brother shook his head like he just heard the silliest thing in the world. 

"It's terrible," he said."Awful. Is Mexico always like this?" 

"We're still in America" my dad said back. 

My little brother squinted into the sunset, doubt and derision etched into his face. After a few seconds, both emotions softened, and he nodded in wonder. 

"Eagle feathers," he said, chuckling softly. Like he'd just solved some clever little riddle. Then he fell like an angel into something deeper than sleep. 

---

(There is a word for angels that fall.)

---

The second time I went to Tucson, I hid from the sun. 

You'd be surprised how easy it is to do down there. Society accommodates it in ways you just won't find anywhere else. When it's 109 outside with single digit humidity, of course you stay indoors. Of course the outdoor markets open at 6 pm, and of course they don't close until 11. Of course. You make the sun mean enough, and everyone becomes a vampire. 

So I roamed the streets at night, kicking up red gravel, watching coyotes wander in between the sea of strip malls. Strip malls are such an Arizonan atrocity. Nobody builds up. The reason the city isn't walkable isn't sidewalks. It's the sun. And you can't solve the sun, so you might as well lean into driving. Mash the whole city flat and crawl through the dust like rattlers. 

(I met a man once, by the canals, that said the strip malls were some sort of American curse for our ancestors including Johnny Appleseed. There's one God in this world, he said, and it's the god of don't-eat-apples. But then we invented apple pie and gave it to everyone. So this is our hell.)

Still. It made the days long down there. Lurking at night and hiding all day gives you something like cabin fever. I needed something to do outside. Something that was outside, but also, somehow, inside. What's inside and outside at the same time? What kind of klein-flask ouroboros nonsense fits that bill?

Kartchner caverns. 

---

I wouldn't say the caves were like walking into Dante's hell - more like finishing the journey. At some point in my life, I'd blown past limbo, lust, gluttony, greed, and anger. I'd spent two decades plus change living in the fires of heresy. Every layer past would only get colder. 

And each step into that cave did. 

My tour guide and metaphorical psychopomp guide was a friendly old man. Familiar in the way that all old people feel familiar to me. I view the world more as a pile of metaphors. He viewed it primarily as water-soluble minerals. 

It was a good work dynamic. 

"These here," he said, gesturing to a long, slender series of impossibly frail stalactites, "are called soda straws."

"Hot damn," I said, and he nodded good naturedly. 

"They're pretty fun aren't they?"

I wasn't sure if fun was the word that made the most sense for it. But I was charmed, and we went further, and he pointed out more formations. 

"Behold!" he said. "Fried eggs!" 

And there were fried eggs. 

"Behold!" he said. "A shield!"

And lo, there was a shield. 

We kept walking, deeper, and deeper into the cave. At the surface, it had been hot enough for my sweat to dry into a stinging white powder. Down here it was cold enough to see my breath. The feeling of descending into hell was replaced with the feeling of being swallowed by some ancient, fossilized serpent. 

And then that began to show up in the formations. 

"We call this serpent-stone," he said, gesturing to an expanse of wall. 

And all I could see was the snake that was swallowing me. 

I don't know why or how that broke the spell. But it did. I'd been walking for hours in the dark, following that man. I'd recognized him many times. It just took that moment for that recognition to be allowed. 

"I've met you before," I said. "I met you on the canals once. Johnny Appleseed." 

He looked at me, and I saw what my little brother saw that first time. Something trapped here, in the dark. A feathered serpent ten miles long. Dead and alive, the same way my brother was dreaming but awake. The first apple-eater. Something more afraid of the sun than I was. 

"You are so close," he said. "It's only a few miles further." 

"Close to what?" I said, and he grinned teeth too sharp for a human mouth. 

"To being like us," he said. "To sleepwalking forever." 

Nothing good comes from waking the dreamer once they're asleep. At best, the dream ends. At worst, it doesn't. 

Running away would've required turning my back on it, and I knew - I knew - that my vision was the only thing locking it in place. I made it real by looking. I made it real by seeing. As long as my eyes were open, it was my dream. 

So I did not run. 

I grabbed the man. I looked him in the eyes, and my hands wrapped around his neck, and he fought like a beast. His teeth flashed as somewhere just out of reach, the flashright rolled, and his tongue stuck out, forked like a snakes, and where a normal man would've turned redder, and redder, and redder, he turned greener, and greener and greener. His neck narrowed and he stretched and wound and twisted until the hands beating against my arms were wings, and the man was a snake and I did not blink once until it stopped moving. Then, and only then, did I take my eyes off the thing and run, shivering, back to the light. 

---

I hadn't seen it before. But the cave was a dead thing. Inert. Like the sloughed off skins I'd find on hikes. A memory of something scary, but not the thing itself. I thought I'd be safe when I made it to the top. But the first thing I saw when I stepped into the light, the first thing I saw looking across the long, flat run of desert - was the other half of what I saw in the caves. 

I'd killed the body. But I hadn't killed the soul. That still danced in the sky. The dead part of quetzalcoatl lay in the dark, dreaming it was alive. And the living part flew in the sky, burning and bright and deadly. A fire unending. 

The month after that, I moved to Utah. And I've never looked back. 

[wheelsgoroundincircles]

Coyote

The car from Hardcastle and McCormick. A few differing origin stories about how and when it was built made it hard to pin down stats. The most common stats attached to it is a custom built tube frame and chassis, a flat six Porsche 2.0 engine and 4 speed transmission. The Franklin Auto Company made the original Coyote 2 seat roadster, 1909-1910, 2 were made. Ford Motor Company attached the name to an engine. And then of course there's the Roadrunner issue.

[unfinishedslurs]

eddie's flat ass (steddie)

Dustin whips around as soon as they’re alone. “Steve!”

“I’m Eddie.”

“No, I mean you and Steve. You like him.”

“Of course I like him, Henderson,” Eddie says flatly, pressing a little harder on the gas in hopes of getting to Dustin’s house before he admits something he regrets. “We’re friends. Best buds. A couple of dudes being bros.”

“You’re full of shit,” Dustin says. “I’m not stupid. I saw that. I wish I hadn’t, but I saw it. You’re, like, stupidly into him. I don’t know how I didn’t see it before.”

“Jesus Christ,” Eddie mutters. His street can’t come soon enough. 

Dustin pushes through. “When are you gonna ask him out?”

“Uh, never?”

“What?!”

“Close your mouth, you’ll catch flies,” Eddie rolls his eyes. “Nothings going to happen, Henderson. Yeah, I’ve got a stupid fucking crush on your babysitter, it doesn’t mean that Steve’s interested in me. He likes girls, Dustin, did you miss that part in the dossier? He thinks we’re a couple of straight guys horsing around, if he found out I was flirting with him I could be thrown into Hunt the Freak 2: the thrilling sequel.”

Dustin’s mouth snaps shut, and he laughs nervously. “Right,” he agrees. “He likes girls. But, uh, hypothetically, if he was into guys…”

They roll to a stop sign, and Eddie turns away from the road to tell the little shit off. But Dustin’s fidgeting, staring steadfast at the road and refusing to meet his eye. 

“You know something,” he realizes. 

“Uh…”

Eddie’s about to shake it out of him. “You’re hiding something, you little shit. What is it? Tell me.”

“I’m not,” he squeaks. 

“Bull-shit you aren’t. What is it? Is it about Steve?” Eddie pales. “Shit, does he know about me?”

“Well…”

“What the hell?!”

“I didn’t tell him!” Dustin yelps. “If you didn’t want him to know, maybe you shouldn’t have been so obvious!”

“Check your tone,” he snaps, hand shaking as he pulls on his hair. “Shit, shit, shit, okay, it’s fine, I just need to flee the country—“

“Why?”

Eddie is this close to throttling the kid. “What do you mean why?”

“Why is this such a big deal?”

“It could get me killed!” He shouts, banging a hand against the steering wheel. “He could—he could fucking tell somebody, and—“

“He wouldn’t do that!”

“How the fuck am I supposed to know that? You think someone’s a good guy until you’re interested in them, and then it’s all ‘You’re fucking disgusting,’ or ‘Freak,’ or ‘Don’t touch me, you fa—‘“

“Stop!” Dustin shouts, white knuckling the armrest. “Eddie, stop. He’s not going to tell anyone. It’s gonna be okay. It’s fine.”

“It’s not.”

“It’s fine,” Dustin stresses. “Steve doesn’t care if you’re gay. He definitely doesn’t mind you flirting with him.”

“You don’t know that,” Eddie says. 

“Yeah I do.”

“How?”

There’s that deer in headlights look again. Then Dustin takes a deep breath, and his expression turns guilty. 

“I know you’re not supposed to tell people this,” he says, “but you’re freaking out really bad and I’m, like, 99% sure Steve thinks you already know.”

“Steve thinks I know what?”

Dustin tells him. 

Two hours later, he’s still laying on the floor in the trailer, looking up at the ceiling. 

Bisexual. Steve Harrington, the man Eddie’s always hailed as the patron saint of heterosexuality, likes men. 

Might like Eddie. 

“Are you flirting with me?” Eddie blurts out, and immediately tries to bolt. 

He runs face first into a wall and ends up on the ground, wishing the demobats had just killed him. 

Steve appears in his line of vision, standing over his sprawled body. Eddie is treated to a wonderful view, eyes moving from his long, athletic legs to his crotch to his chest and broad shoulders, and finally reaches his face. His very amused face. 

Eddie’s entire body lights on fire. 

“What the hell was that?” Steve asks, laughing. 

“Uh…”

“Wile E Coyote over here. Seriously, man, that was some Loony Toons shit. I’m embarrassed for you.”

“Oh my God, shut up,” he groans. “Just let me die.”

“No way in hell. Sorry, Munson, I put too much work into saving your flat ass to throw it away like that.” Steve grins, holding a hand out for Eddie to take. He ignores it, rolling over so Steve can’t see how red his face is. 

“My ass isn’t flat,” he mumbles into the carpet. 

“Oh, it is,” Steve says cheerfully, nudging said ass with his foot, because he’s a bastard. Eddie doesn’t know why he likes him so much. Everything he does is catastrophically bad for his continued survival. “It’s cute though. I like it.”

“Henderson said, uh, that you were…umm…maybeflirtingwithme?” Eddie finishes in a rush. 

“What?”

Steve’s face is open, automatically tilting his right ear towards Eddie. Eddie doesn’t know if he’s aware that’s something he does. Robin says it’s because of all the concussions, his left ear just isn’t what it used to be. 

Eddie sags, unable to lie to his wide-eyed confusion. “Dustin said you're flirting with me.”

Steve stares at him. 

Eddie fidgets under his incredulous gaze, growing more anxious by the minute. Oh God, Dustin was wrong. Dustin was wrong about everything. Steve probably doesn’t even actually like boys, Jesus. The whole thing is obviously a bust. Eddie needs to cut and run, maybe make some bullshit excuse about his uncle needing him home even though Steve knows Wayne’s working right now—

“You needed Henderson to tell you that?”

[miraculan-draws]

I know I've said this before but I cannot make myself vibe with "cured" Astarion stuff. It falls a little flat for me—like there's a spark missing. There's like a bit of silly mischief that I read from being a "creature of the night," like foxes and cats and coyotes, something dark but with a shameless whimsy that I very heavily associate with him. He's a vampire elf. What a fun vibe!! You'd think it would be entirely contradictory, but it isn't! BeCAUSE of his personality.

That's the whole point of him is to subvert a lot of the moody broody vampire tropes! We watch him BREAK FREE of those implications. And if I had to guess, he was probably a ghoulish little freak (affectionate) when he was alive too. I don't think Astarion HAS vampirism, I think he IS a vampire. I think a guy named after a starry sky can absolutely thrive at night. He's having FUN he said so himself.

Like all his dialogue about blood is even delivered like a little gremlin. He is a raccoon sniffing around for snacks. He lets you dump nasty old blood on him flash dance style and he doesn't even startle he's like "it would be better if it was fresh".

I don't know maybe I'm thinking too deep into it. But Astarion being a nasty little creechur is important to me.

[ms-demeanor]

Why do you like the desert?

good smells, good sounds, good animals. I like how dry the air is and I like sandstorms. I really really love it when it rains in the desert and the whole world smells like creosote and all the flowers open up in the morning. I like how clear the skies are and I like big tall stacks of thunderclouds and I like how bright the moonlight is and I like how many stars you can see. I like red rocks and sand dunes and the big cracks in dry lakebeds. I like lizards and roadrunners and big rangy hares and rattlesnakes and owls. I like going out on moonless nights to look for scorpions, because there are more of them out when the moon is down because it lets them hunt better and you can look for them with a black light and watch them glow. I like random people on ATVs buzzing past and letting the air out of the tires a little bit to get through the canyon. I like finding cabins that are getting eaten by the wind and are full of rat's nests and old books with the words weathered away. I like the way the line between the sky and the earth turns pink and blue at the beginning and the end of the day. I like seeing the milky way and watching meteors and hearing echoes and hearing nothing and hearing cicadas cicadas cicadas.

When my Uncle died, I drew these two pieces because locating him in my memory took me to these two places; a backyard with a fence between us and the coyotes as we looked up at the stars and a red rock canyon quiet and full of dark shadows.

The thing that I didn't draw is a man standing in a sandy flat surrounded by creosote bushes holding a kite-string in his teeth teeth and splicing it with his fishing line so that I could fly my little pink kite higher in the big blue sky than it was really meant to go.

goddamn do i love the desert and miss my family.

[ragingbookdragon]

“You know,” she started, watching the oil flame flicker in the lantern. “When you said you wanted to go camping, I thought you meant like…a cabin on a lake. You know, glamping.”

Tyler chuckled as he adjusted the length of the wick in the lantern. “Where’s the fun in staying in a cabin when you can sleep under the stars in a tent.”

“Well, my back would appreciate a bed,” she replied sarcastically.

“Laying on flat ground actually alleviates back pain and also helps blood circulation.”

“You’re just a plethora of knowledge when it comes to proving a point, aren’t you?”

He smiled as the flame flickered lowly and he laid back down pulling the blanket up to his chest as he rested his head on his arm. “You’re having a good time,” he said. “You know you are.”

“It’s possible,” she retorted, inching closer to him; he shifted his other arm, wrapping it around her waist.

“Hmm…possible?” Tyler mused. “After I made you a steak and potatoes in a cast iron skillet and then helped you roast marshmallows and chocolate covered strawberries?”

“Fine,” she said, wrapping her arm around his waist. “I’m having a good time. Being outside at night gives me the heebie jeebies though.”

“Why?” he snorted.

“Coyotes, wolves, bears, any wild animal that could eat me,” she deadpanned.

Tyler huffed humoredly through his nose and pulled her closer. “The truck is parked nearby, and I have a rifle with me. We’re fine.”

“Hmm…”

He turned his head, nuzzling her temple, gently pressing his lips to her skin. “I’m not going to let anything happen to you, darlin’. I’ll keep you safe, I promise.” He lowered his hand, trailing it up beneath his undershirt that she wore, fingers brushing against her warm skin. “And have I ever broken a promise to you?”

She smiled softly, cuddling close. “…no.”

Tyler nodded. “Because I keep ‘em.” He reached up, pulling the flap on top of the tent open, the stars blinking back at them. “Now, you look up at those pretty stars and wonder just how jealous they are of you.”

“Tyler,” she laughed, and he hummed.

“Prettier than any star to grace the face of this earth,” he murmured. “And I’m the lucky man who gets to hold her heart.”

She shifted her gaze to his face. “Tyler…”

He looked down at her, eyes soft and warm, voice gentle and full of love. “I love you.”

She swallowed, feeling her cheeks warm. “I love you too,” she whispered, and his fingers brushed up her skin again; she laid her head back down on his chest, listening to his heart beat beneath her ear. “Tyler?”

“Hmm?”

“Thank you for bringing me out here.”

“Anytime, darlin’,” he murmured.

[mutant-distraction]

Highway in Death Valley National Park,

Death Valley National Park, located in eastern California and partially extending into Nevada, is known for its extreme landscapes and unique geological features. It covers an area of about 3.4 million acres (13,650 square kilometers) within the Mojave Desert. Key features include dramatic terrain like salt flats, sand dunes, badlands, canyons, and mountain ranges. It is home to Badwater Basin, the lowest point in North America at 282 feet (86 meters) below sea level. The park experiences extremely hot summers and mild winters, with temperatures reaching record highs. Major attractions include Badwater Basin, Zabriskie Point, Mesquite Flat Sand Dunes, Devil's Golf Course, and diverse desert wildlife such as bighorn sheep, coyotes, and kit foxes.

source: First Alert Weather

[supacutiepie]

SPEAKING ABOUT THE RANDOM TOP GUN PHASE I JUST GOT OUT OF: My on going theory about Rooster and Hangman's beef is that there is no secret third party involved it is entirely personal. Hangman, trying to make a tease at what happened that day-- falls flat on his ass because uh oh, Rooster is still red hot about it--

Rooster claps back with full vitriol, Hangman still trying to defuse the moment, everyone around them who knows what happened is looking hella uncomfortable: Coyote and Phoenix especially cringing back because "Seriously? One minute into seeing each other again and their at it AGAIN--" I think, full send: Hangman shot Rooster out of the sky LMAO. Whatever happened on that hop? Whatever scuffle they got into, it ended up with Rooster hesitating, and Hangman going in too hot. He takes out the enemy and gets that "first air kill" of his generation...and promptly shoots Rooster out of the gods damn air. OBVIOUSLY Rooster would be pissed?? I wonder if that's where the scars come from, him having to GTFO of his jet after his best friend fucking shot him down-- Hangman feels like shit for it, and it gets him his callsign which sucks ass to constantly be reminded of the time he almost killed his best friend. Rooster feels like shit because he's grateful Hangman saved his ass at all, but he shot Rooster out of the sky !! So his pride is so damn bruised. He knows he fucked up by hesitating, he got into his head and missed his chance and it ended up with him getting in the way of Hangman's shot. His own dman fault he got shot down right but.. But then he's free falling. He's become his Dad, he's terrified of the canopy opening and he's terrified because Mav was right and it's terrifying-- But he makes it out, scarred up for it, and he's so damn angry and traumatized by it he can't tolerate Hangman's attempts to apologize. And pride begets pride, so Hangman, so literally hung up on his guilt for almost killing his best friend, shoots off the hip with his own anger and bruised pride and trauma (watching Rooster go down, jet smoking from HIS bullets and he already knows he killed one man today don't make it two don't make it HIM--) Two damn prideful to apologize, or accept one. No matter how fucking bad they both want one. So Hangman picks a song he knows will tease Rooster the moment he walks into the bar, and Rooster says he's "You look good, Hangman" because he knows exactly what nerve that's gonna hit (guilt guilt guilt) and Hangman instinctively lashes back with that snarky ass "I am good, Rooster. I'm very good." and its just downhill from there... But it's Hangman himself who backs down. It doesn't come off that way, but what he says isn't as scathing as Rooster calling him by that damn name: he just calls him out for being to slow, but implies he could still be better. And dammit, Rooster clocks that shit?? Like we know by now Hangman goes for the throat when he wants to, but he let that shit slide and joked about the song - (he has songs picked out for Rooster, he still has songs for them what the fuck) So, Rooster backs down and annoys him back by playing the piano instead, which for Hangman isn't?? A fucking loss?? He gets to hear Rooster playing and singing how is he losing LMAO. (And even while literally toe to toe, the first thing Bradley does it glance down at this man's lips???) (( Hangman literally pulling pigtails because he can't be brave enough to just fucking apologize because he feels bad enough he almost killed the guy he's in fucking love with LMAOOOO))

[almacambiondaughterofsaleos]

Miss Heed Is A Better Example Of An Abusive Female Character Than Stella

I know I have made several Helluva Boss and Villainous comparisons, but I do think that Heed is a better representation of a female abuser than Stella is. The biggest thing is Heed doesn't feel like a plot device for poor sympathy but instead feels like her own character and even her own reasons that leads her to abusing people. Stella on the other hand was made abusive just to justify Stolitz as a ship and not give Stolas any accountability for letting an affair break his home life.

I also think what makes Heed a better representation is that she shows how subtle and insidious abuse is. Stella is more of a Lifetime movie stereotype that plays into so many cliches that it is borderline nonsensical. Miss Heed on the other hand she represents herself as a respective person who on the surface seems to want to better the world in reality she uses and manipulates those around her. As best can be seen with Flug and those like Coyote and Omega, where she uses terms of affection on them but it's really to mask how she really sees them as tools for her uses. With Flug, that abuse is seen the most where she time and again uses his trust/love for her to get what she wants from him and discard him when she gets it.

Otherwise, Stella just is just openly cartoonishly evil and has no life outside of making Stolas miserable which makes her abuse feel so flat. Her status as a mother is just so minimal and even then it's just to hammer how "evil" she is to an annoying degree. It also doesn't help that the situation she is in reeks of double standards where Stolas is given the babying treatment for how he was forced into an arranged marriage while she's treated like a the devil when she's in the same predicament. The show took the coward's way out and didn't try to make her equally sympathetic so that Stolas could be a multifaceted character rather than a babied creator's pet. She doesn't have to be babied but at least given some sympathy that she is devoid of because the narrative got too attached to the owl.

Even though Miss Heed is a straight up abuser, the show gives enough sympathy that you can understand how she can become like this but still not excuse what a trashy person she is. I can't imagine Vivziepop doing something like this for Stella because it would go out of her comfort zone of giving actual depth to characters she has demonized to better her ship. In other words, the show builds up who Heed is outside of that abuse and alongside her instagram account. It what makes me take seriously how she wronged Flug over whatever Vivziepop puts with Stella.