#episode TWO and this soon-to-be priest is thinking about her instead of praying

[vincentsleftear]

So. When do David and Kristin kiss. 😏.

[i-dont-want-your-hysteria]

The Hangover (Def Leppard x Reader)

(Happy birthday to my blog!! To celebrate 3 years of the place where I concentrate my insane Leppard obsession, I thought I’d celebrate by posting the FIRST Def Leppard fanfic I EVER wrote ((which I have NEVER posted anywhere before!)) I began writing this exactly 3 years ago today- the day I made this blog ((February 19th, 2018))- and officially finished it about a year later. This is not intended as a romantic/sexual fic, it’s simply just an x reader in which the reader is basically one of the guys. In other words, it’s on crack.)

((I am aware this is kind of cringe-worthy at times... but I still like a lot of things about it. While I revised it very slightly before queuing it,  I was still 16 when I started writing this, okay... gimme a break...))

(Illustration by @paper-sxn​)

Words: 8,684 Prompt: Dublin, 1984. You’re with the Leppards in their early pre-Hysteria era house. You all wake up with hangovers after a boozed-up night at home, and you each try to put the pieces of the previous night back together. Meanwhile, you’re praying that one particular piece won’t fit in anywhere... (partially inspired by the “Blitzgiving” and “The Pineapple Incident” episodes of How I Met Your Mother)

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Gently piercing white light made its way through the windows of the bedroom. It hit your eyelids, and it hit your brain, igniting a brief but killer headache. As your eyes clasped together more, you turned your face into the gloriously soft pillow. For a second you asked yourself why you would have a headache so early in the morning, but then…

You laughed quietly into the bed, recalling without warning some vague happenings from the night before. There wasn’t much you remembered, but you clearly saw the image of the guys flat out drunk at some point (you along with them). There were some blips of you all singing together, Sav hanging from a door frame, you chugging some scotch, Joe chugging some vodka, Steve’s hair being in pigtails, and you think Phil might’ve been giving you a lap dance... or vice versa. It was, all in all, hysterical (at least- that’s what you wanted to think).

 Other than those faint events, unfortunately, the night was gone. Still, you were thrilled that it happened. Crazy times with your boys were always good.

You rubbed your eyes, ready for more sleep to combat the pounding in your head. When you did, they opened a little, and you realized… this wasn't your room you were in. Squinting around, you noticed that you were sleeping in Phil’s room instead of yours.

Oh, it’s not that much of a problem, you mused, I’m sure he doesn’t mind. I’ve woken up to worse in this place.

You let your eyes close again easily, and you found peace as you began to fall under again. That is, until you felt someone move next to you.

When it happened, you became aware of the warmth coming from someone else in the bed. They only shifted in their sleep a little bit before going still again. Your eyes went wide, and you held your breath. You don’t remember getting into bed with someone (in fact, you don’t remember getting into bed at all). Turning your head, you looked to see what sort of stranger was in bed with you currently. Instead of a stranger, scraggly blonde hair over a kind and shy face met your sight, and you were instantly calmed upon realizing that it was just Steve. That was good, that was good, but why were you and Steve sleeping in Phil’s bed? You were sure you didn’t have sex last night- at least, not with Steve. This tiny moment of appeasement and confusion was cut short by the faint sound of guitar chords coming from downstairs. The music echoed to your ears, signaling that it had to be Phil, and that he was playing the opening to Bringin On the Heartbreak. Cautiously taking the covers off you- not wanting to wake Steve- you felt obliged to go to the other guitarist. When you stood up and began walking, you nearly fell forward from the sudden vertigo of your hangover. You had to hold onto the counter of Phil’s dresser for extra support, and that’s when your reflection in his mirror caught your eye. Not only that, but that’s when your outfit also caught your eye. One of the guys’ Union Jack tank tops had been slipped over you somehow, and two hand prints were on either side of your face in dried paint; one was blue, one was green. "What…?“ you whispered, touching your face and feeling the shirt on you. It seemed to fit you alright, which made you wonder whose it really was. You were also in black underwear, and nothing else. While eyeing yourself, you took notice of Steve in the reflection. You now saw a few big red lipstick stains on his face, untouched and unsmudged. It was pretty cute, you had to admit, but another thing that came to your attention was that it wasn’t you who was wearing the lipstick at the moment. So then who kissed Steve all over his face? You treaded carefully down the hallway, putting one foot in front of the other and dragging a hand on the wall for support. The melody of the distant guitar didn’t cease the whole time you trekked through the house to get to Phil. When the chords of the song dragged on to the part where the vocals should have begun, no vocals came. Everything in the house looked remarkably the same (despite everything you remember from last night). There were large, ripped pieces of cardboard in the middle of the hallway;  scattered out as if leaving a trail. Alongside that, there was a piece of paper labeled “pay 2 the orerr of Rick: one fuckin bendee straw” in what may have been Sav’s handwriting on top of the stairs, and blue paint smudged on the railing going downwards (guaranteeing that whoever did that eventually got to your face, too).

Step by step you descended as the scenery of the house teetered around you (a little too reminiscent of Me & My Wine, you would add). When you reached the bottom of the stairs and looked into the living room, sure enough, Phil was there, strumming away.

“But it’s easy come and easy go…” he hummed.

“You’re…” you mumbled, burped a little, and continued, “Awake. How?” He stopped playing and crossed his arms, quietly sassing you, “Ah, she rises again. You regrettin’ anything yet?” You blinked and rubbed your eyes, scratching a little bit of paint off of your face and inquiring in a scratchy, tired tone, “I guess so… but- how? You, how?” Phil took off his guitar and stood up with his hands in his pockets, “Because I barely drank at all last night, and I also sure as hell didn’t shag Steve in someone else’s bed!” “How do you mean- I didn’t- wait- and Steve- what?” you rubbed your head, getting dizzy, causing Phil to guide you to the couch. “I didn’t- I didn’t shag Steve last night,” you insisted. “Mm hmm,” the guitarist hummed disapprovingly, “Alright.” “What the hell are you on about?” Phil smirked evilly and laughed, “He carried you upstairs, we heard the door close, and then some rather happy noises were heard, so we all just assumed-!” “That’s not-” you swallowed and lay your head back on the couch, “-a valid assumption.” “Oh, you poor thing,” came the sarcastic remark, “You really don’t remember, do you?” “Well I figured if I ever fucked any one of you I would- you know- remember it!” you raised your voice at him, then rubbed your temples. “I’m touched, really. But I’ll fill you in a bit,” Phil yanked up his guitar he’d put down, placed himself next to you, and played the into to “Ballroom Blitz”. Then a bit of the night came back to you. “Oh... that’s what started it all, didn’t it?”

~The night before~ Rick began banging out a tune on his drum kit in the house with you, Sav, and Steve sitting close by, them being at the ready with their guitars. “You ready, Steve?” you mimicked the original lyrics. “Uh-huh,” he replied exactly like Steve Priest in the original song. “Savy?” you said next. “Yeah,” Sav bopped his head to the beat. “Rick?” “Okay.” “Alright, fellas,” you called out, “Let’s go!” The two guitarists let their instruments ring out around the house, playing the all-too-familar tune. As soon as they started this, the front door opened, and none other than Phil and Joe walked in. Joe was holding a bag that was weighed down by the mass inside it (a painfully obvious sign that there were a few bottles of booze). Although the two of them weren’t talking, they were physically hushed upon hearing the situation you and the others had created. “Oh life’s been getting so hard, living with the things you do to me…” you sang lowly and quietly along with the music being made, just to make sure the musicians knew their places. You noticed Phil run out of the room in excitement, and into the one where he keeps his guitars. Joe, on the other hand, stayed put and watched the rest of you from afar, fighting a smile. “My dreams are getting so strange, I’d like to tell you everything I see…” You stood up, and Joe began walking towards you when you called out the next line of the song, “Oh- I see a man in the back, as a matter of fact, his eyes are as red as a sun!” Joe chimed in without warning at the next line, putting an arm on your shoulder and pointing at you, “And the girl in the corner, let no one ignore her, ‘cos she thinks she’s the passionate one!” *** “It’s, it’s a ballroom blitz, it's, it's a ballroom blitz,” Phil sang the ending teasingly to you when he put his guitar back. It felt like he was rubbing his energy in your face (since you lacked it). Before Phil could continue, Joe suddenly appeared in the doorway. “Yeah! It’s a ballroom blitz!” he announced, throwing his arms into the air and taking a bow. He sounded a bit tipsy still. Joe was wearing his Union Jack shorts, but no shirt. Instead of a shirt, though, he had the words “PROPERTY OF DEF LEPPARD” sloppily painted across his chest in blue and green paint. Right over his nipples there were also two handprints, almost exactly matching the ones on your face. Joe stumbled in the doorway, falling to his knees and groaning in discomfort, “Ohh... probably should’ve stayed in bed.” Phil sluggishly trekked over to the singer and pulled him partially to his feet, yanking him towards the couch, “Oh yeah? And by ‘bed’, you mean-?” “Definitely not the bathtub.” Joe assured him, but winked at you. “No matter where you slept, it’s still not as bad as where she slept,” Phil pointed at you, “And what she did there.” “Why? What’d you do?” Joe’s tipsiness wore away in his sentence, making him sound genuinely concerned and curious. You rolled your eyes, knowing exactly what Phil was going to say, “Phil, I-” “It’s not what she did, it’s who she did- she shagged Steve in my bed!” the guitarist accused you again while pointing a finger. Immediately Joe exclaimed, “Nice!” and held up a hand to high-five you. “Joe!” you scolded him, surprised that he took this as good news. “Oh-uh, not… nice?” he took away the offer of a high-five and scratched the back of his head awkwardly instead, “Also, is that my shirt?” You took a look down at the Union Jack tank top you were wearing and back at Joe’s torso. Then something clicked in your head. “Ohh…” you continued staring at Joe’s chest, feeling yourself blush as old memories unraveled in your head, “I think... I think I remember something else that happened last night.” *** You were all drunk; it was no lie. After your quick jam session, there was a booze-filled music fest going on in the house. Joe had even put on his Union Jack outfit, pretending he was getting ready for a show. At one particular point of this “festival” you'd all created, records were being played, and you ended up dancing in front of Joe to REO Speedwagon’s “Take It On the Run”. “You’re bringing up your white lines, you’re pullin’ on a bedroom eyes, you say you’re going home, but I won’t say when,” you sang the wrong lyrics as you swayed and drunkingly made flirty faces at Joe on the couch. Sav, meanwhile, was playing with some old craft paint off in the corner. The blue and green substances were all over his hands (but somehow, one color managed to stay on each hand). “Yeah, you dance for him, Y/N!” Rick cheered you on from the kitchen as Steve and Phil sat on the couch. Phil was perfectly sober, and Steve was giggling and laying with his head on Phil’s lap. You, on the other hand, were now moving closer to the singer, almost like you were giving him a lap dance. “You take it on the run, baby,” you sang along, slowly taking Joe’s Union Jack tank top off of him (with no objections from below), “If that’s the way you wanna, baby...” In return to Joe being shirtless, you slowly took off your own shirt (triggering wolf-whistles and cheers from the guys) to replace it with Joe’s tank. “Sav, mark him up!” you ordered the painted bassist in the corner as you tried to dress yourself. He happily made his way over to you and questioned, “What should I mark him with?” A single hazy idea came to you, and you eagerly whispered it into Sav’s ear. He giggled in response, and proceeded to move over to Joe, drawing something on his chest in the paint. To keep Joe from looking at what it was, you went behind the chair and covered his eyes, ordering coyly, “No peeking!” “All done!” Sav announced and retreated back to whatever he was doing in the corner. “Now, wait, Sav!” you sped over to him, lifted his hands up, and double high-fived him, getting the paint on your hands as well. To finish off what Sav had started, you ran back over to Joe on the chair, and slapped your hands on his chest, right over his nipples. Laughter erupted from everyone in the room (including Joe) and you repeated Sav’s words. “All done!” Joe gazed down at the words “PROPERTY OF DEF LEPPARD” on his chest as you continued to dance to the song playing. “You’re mine, now! You take it on the run, baby... if that’s the way you want it, baby...” Joe tried to tell you in a sexy voice, “Am I your baby now?” “If that’s the way you want it baby,” you repeated the words from the song to him, “Now I’m done dancing for you! Somebody dance for me!” Steve began pointing at everyone individually, childishly suggesting, “It should be, eenie, meenie, miney, Phil!” “Why me?” Phil laughed in objection as you took a seat across the room. “Because you’re not wasted,” his terror twin argued, poking him on the nose. The sober guitarist looked over at you with happy anticipation, awaiting a comment, while all you did was wiggle your fingers at him with a goofy grin. After that, you returned the gesture to the man on his lap, giving Steve a sexy wink. *** “Oh my god...” you put your head in your hands shamefully as Phil and Joe giggled at the memory of the previous night, “I can’t believe I did all that...” “That was a treat!” Phil laughed, hugging you from the side and pulling you closer to him in consolation, “It was funny! We never get to see that side of you!” “There’s a certain reason why you don’t...” you moaned with embarrassment, then asked out of guilty curiosity, “How many times did I grab your ass during that lap dance...?" Phil thought for a bit before telling you, “Four. Well- four and a half...” You gave a loud groan of protest as Joe laughed and slumped back into the couch. “Oh, you only did those things because you weren’t thinking!” Phil consoled you, swayed back and forth with you in his arms. Joe chimed in, “Yeah, and see what happens when you don’t think? You do! Most importantly, you do Steve!” “I didn't do Steve!” you shot your head up and yelled at Joe. You received only laughs and snorts from both men in reply. Suddenly, Sav appeared on the staircase and began singing “Squeeze Box” by The Who with a tired yet cheeky smirk, “Mama’s got a squeeze box she wears on her chest, and when Stephen comes home, he never gets no rest-” Joe and Phil joined into his song with, “Cos' she’s playin’ all night, and the music’s alright! Mama’s got a squeeze box, Stephen never sleeps at night!” You just put your head back in your hands, trying not to accept your fate of being teased. You didn’t want to think that you possibly shagged Steve. He always seemed so innocent to you in a way, and you feared that this would kill your friendship. If everything the boys said was true, you would never hear the end of it, and you don’t even know what Steve would think of you from now on. Was it possible that he remembered anything about the night before? “It didn’t happen, it didn’t happen...” you repeated to yourself in a whisper as Phil unwrapped his arms from you. Sav came all the way down the stairs; his body language making him look grumpy with the world, but his tired grin signaling that he was pleased with seeing you. “Oh, it happened, sunshine!” the frizzy-haired bassist laughed, but quickly regretted it and rubbed his head with his still-painted hands, “Ah- yep, it happened. You could probably hear you two up the whole damn street.” As Sav wearily joined you all on the couch, Joe complained, “Sounds like that was a treat; I wish I remembered it!” Phil was caught off guard at the comment. His head turned to Joe in the blink of an eye and gasped, “Wait, you don’t remember hearing them?!” “I wish I could say I do, but there’s nothing there,” Joe stood up after he spoke, and quickly held onto the wall nearby. His hand went over his stomach as he whined, “Oh... fuck, Y/N, why did you make me race you last night?" “'Race me'?” you squinted as you inquired, “Race you with what?” Joe didn’t answer, but slowly took steps into the kitchen, using the wall as his guide. His answer came when you, Sav, and Phil all heard him throw up into the sink. You sighed, resting your hands over your eyes, trying to remember the cause of Joe’s sickness, “Oh no, was that really my idea?” *** “Look what I found!” you trotted into the room tipsily, holding two bottles; one of scotch, one of vodka, “Only half full! Who wants em?” While you weren’t full-on drunk, it was no secret that the title wasn’t that far away. After your little Ballroom Blitz, it was one beer after the next, then it was digging into the fancy liquors that Phil and Joe had just brought home. Your judgment was impaired, no doubt about it, and so was the judgment of all the guys. Joe even changed into his normal live-show-only Union Jack tank top, claiming that he was gonna "put on a show." The only one who was still sane and sober was Phil, who seemed to be staying away from your poison. Upon registering your sacred offer of alcohol, Rick ran forward, chanting, “Me! Me!” You lifted the bottles away from him, commanding, “Uh-uh! I get the scotch.” “Oh, bollocks, then you can keep the vodka,” the young drummer grumbled and turned away from you. Just as Rick rejected your offering, Joe sprung up and eagerly trotted over while shouting happily, “I’ll take it!” “Sold!” you handed the bottle over to him, “Betcha can’t finish before me!” “Betcha I can!” he sneered back before taking the cap off his bottle. There was no official “ready, set, go” for the race; you both just kind of went for it without any saying. While your throat and stomach were already protesting your actions (and you could almost sense that Joe’s were doing the same), you didn’t stop once; neither of you did. You held up your bottle and announced, “Done!” Looking over, you saw Joe was also finished. “I finished first!” “Nuh-uh!” you insisted, “It had to be me! Tell him, guys!” The four others hadn’t been paying attention to you and Joe’s little competition; they were instead focused on a box that Sav had pulled out from a cupboard. From the box they pulled out bottles of paint and various types of used makeup.

Joe scolded them all in a more sober manner, “Oh come on, you lot weren’t even watching!” “Yeah, yeah, it was probably a tie, anyways,” Rick chuckled, pulling out more items from the box. “This box is much more interesting, too," Phil protested, holding up a stick of lipstick as Sav held up two bottles of paint, "This is a box of makeup that I had for me and the lads in Girl! Just look at it all! Think we can have some fun with this?" "Oh, piss off," you threw the empty bottle onto the couch, "We need some music." Joe had slumped down onto a chair, and you stumbled your way over to the shelf with all the records on it, flipping through and eyeing them all as carefully as your body would let you. After only a few seconds of searching, your eyes lit up at a discovery. "Here's a good one!" you exclaimed as you pulled out a copy of Hi Infidelityby REO Speedwagon, "Let's give it a spin!" ***

Joe wandered back into the room and fell onto the empty couch with a grumble. “Sorry, Joe...” you muttered over to him, realizing that you pressured him into more consumption of the booze. “It was probably gonna happen anyway...” he admitted, wiping his hands over his face, “It’s was my stupid choice to go through with it.” “Woah,” Phil pointed out out of nowhere, looking at you with great surprise, “What’s that on your neck?” You felt your heart drop into your stomach. “What!?” you shot up from where you sat (bringing on more dizziness), and rushed over to a mirror. Once your dizziness subsided, and you could finally see your reflection, the pink shape of a hickey on the side of your neck was now clearly conspicuous. You wondered how you hadn't noticed it before. Joe exclaimed with a smug and proud grin, “Is that from Steve!?” You groaned angrily, feeling yourself become more and more defeated. “I can’t believe it,” you gasped, slapping a hand over the mark, “Something did happen between us-!” “Y/N,” Phil pointed out again, “There’s lipstick on your thigh...” Looking down at your legs, you saw that he was right. There was a single red symbol on your right thigh that marked a kiss from the night before. Upon seeing this, what you saw when you woke up popped into your head. “Looks like Steve went to town down there,” Sav smirked at you, only wanting to rub it in more. “Guys,” you softly noted, “That wasn’t Steve... he has lipstick marks all over his face from someone else...” The three men all exchanged confused looks with each other. There was a dead end to the story of the previous night. None of them knew how to solve the mystery of the lipstick. Not even Phil, who was as good as sober 12 hours ago, didn’t have any input. Sav suddenly blurted out, “Wait a minute, I know what happened- I think...” No one said anything, but eagerly leaned forward, ready to hear the tale the bassist had to tell. “You lot remember how we found that box of old makeup last night?” he began, “Well, I walked into the bathroom with you afterwards, Y/N...” *** Rick looked at himself in the mirror in the bathroom, carefully applying the makeup to his lips, and being extra careful to not get it on the blazer he was wearing. The drummer put on his best suit just to see how it would look with the makeup he was putting on. He thought he was doing a good job for the most part; he didn’t look half bad at all! It was far easier than he expected it to be, and wondered if he was good enough to help you with your makeup at times. Thinking of you seemed to have made you appear in the doorway next to him. Both of your hands were still covered in paint. “Sink,” was all you commanded of the drummer. He moved without a word and you began to wash your hands. At the same instant, Sav appeared nearby. He grabbed the doorframe and began to swing from it, leaving conspicuous handprints afterwards. “Aren’t you gonna wash up, too?” Rick crossed his arms to sass him. “Nah, I want the colors, they’re makin’ me feel- colorful...” Sav grinned, walking over to you at the sink, requesting, “C’mere.” You looked up, only to have your face taken in Sav’s paint-covered hands. He softly giggled as you squared your vision in on him with a sneer. “Rude,” you teased, then went back to washing your hands; paint now all over your face. “What’s really rude,” Rick pulled back the shower curtain and taking a step into the tub, “Is you two interrupting my makeup time! Good night!” He sat himself down in the tub and laid himself down as if he was going to sleep.

Before he had the chance to catch some shut-eye, you marched over to the tub and objected, “Rick, if you’re gonna sleep, I want a goodnight kiss first.” Without another word, Rick sat up and planted a kiss on your thigh (since it was closest to him). There was now a bright red imprint of his lips on your leg. “Thank you.” you smiled down at him, “Now goodnight.” “Don’t leave the water on, you hear?” Sav nagged him, pointing a colored finger, “You’ll drown." Rick chuckled with his eyes closed, “I’ll drink myself out. I'm in a drinkin mood, anyways." “Oh yeah? You haven’t got a straw or anything,” the intoxicated bassist continued to argue with him. “Then don’t let me drown! Get one!" “I’ll get you one later. I’ll just-“ Sav burped, and continued, “I’ll write a note or something.” “Sounds good, mate,” Rick slumped further into the tub and pulled the curtain closed, “Now you gonna stay here all night?” “Actually,” you noted out loud to yourself, different alcoholic emotions boiling up inside you, “I wanna go downstairs- I just need to see Steve- like right now...!" You turned on your heels, speeding past Sav and flying back down the stairs. *** “So that explains the paint on my face, and the paper in the hallway, and the lipstick, but what happened after that?” you asked Sav, as you were now slumped on top of Phil’s arm again. “Beats me,” Sav ran his still-painted hands through his hair, “That’s all I’ve got.” “But wait, if you said that Rick fell asleep in the bathtub...” Phil began his sentence, only for you and the other two men to exchange knowing looks with each other. All four of you immediately sprung up and rushed (as much as you could) up the stairs and into the bathroom. Upon getting there, Phil flung back the shower curtain to reveal a partially awake Rick, dressed in a suit, and still wearing the lipstick from the night before. “Mornin’,” he groaned as he stretched, then winced, “Ah, fuck- sleeping in here wasn’t the best idea for me neck.” Sav looked back at the paint on the doorframe and asked the drummer, “So then why did you sleep in here?” “Oh,” Rick looked around the tub, stating as-a-matter-of-factly, “The porcelain keeps the suit from wrinkling. I guess drunk me was very careful last night.” “I’ll say,” Joe complemented, “The lipstick’s still holding up pretty well.” Phil halted the conversation, “Wait, so you were in here when I went to the bathroom in the middle of the night?” Rick chuckled, “Yeah, and let me tell you, for a smaller guy, you’ve got a big bladder.” “Wait,” you slowly turned and pointed at Joe, “I thought you said you slept in the bathtub-?” He gave you a cocky smirk in return, “I told you, ‘definitely not the bathtub’...” Rick sleepily laughed and pointed at you, “Ha- Y/N, you look like Joe!” “Why, just because of the shirt?” you inquired, pointing at Joe’s tank top on you. “And the paint!” Rick corrected you, “I can’t believe you guys didn’t wash it off yet!” In a second, you felt a rush of worry upon realizing that Rick hadn’t said anything about you and Steve yet. It made you suddenly come to the possible conclusion that he may not know about it all. “Wait,” Phil snapped his fingers, “So you do remember some stuff from last night?” “Yeah, a bit, I think. Why?” “Philip Kenneth Collen, don’t you fucking dare....” you growled at him in an almost pleading manner, rubbing your temples and grinding your teeth. “What do you remember?” Phil asked him, not giving any sort of reaction to your begging. Rick thought for a few seconds, clearly as hungover as the rest of you. It didn’t take him long to list off some brief happenings he recalled. “Well, I remember us singing Sweet, there was a lap dance, I remember- uh, being denied a bottle of scotch, there was, uh... there was lipstick... and did I try to ice-skate on pieces of cardboard down the hall...?” “Is that why there’s cardboard all down the hallway?” you motioned towards the door. Rick gave you a big proud smile and a nod in response. “So...” Joe looked around, definitely looking eager, “What’s the last thing you remember before falling asleep?” Rick rested his head back on the tub again, thinking as hard as his hungover mind would let him. You hoped to every god there was that he didn’t say anything about Steve. “Just Phil comin’ in here and having a long piss, that’s all.” came the verdict. “You sure you didn’t hear-“ Phil anxiously began to ask him, but got a hand slapped over his mouth by you. “No!” you yelled on impulse, sending more daggers through your burned-out head. All eyes were now on you, and silence fell. For a few tense seconds, you stared into Phil’s eyes, sending him visual messages of both threats and desperate requests. “...what the hell happened last night?” Rick broke the silence in a tone of utter confusion, knowing that something more serious than what he remembered had taken place. You pulled your hand back from Phil’s face, “Yuck, Phil, come on!” “You licked her hand, didn’t you?” asked Sav. “Yes,” Phil confirmed, and continued without missing a beat, “And I’m glad you asked that, Rick, cos' I know what happened after Y/N and Sav paid you a visit last night.” “Phil, if you love me in any way, shape, or form, you will not tell Rick what happened,” you begged to him as you began to walk out the bathroom door, heading back downstairs to wallow in more of your shameful hangover, “I refuse to believe it happened until there’s hard proof.” “Well what more proof do you want? A positive pregnancy test?” Phil shrugged, but suddenly slapped his own hand over his mouth, realizing what he’d just said. You shot him an angry look. You were too tired to have it out with him, so you stumbled away. Right about now, you were ready to give up and accept the fact that you probably did shag Steve. Phil turned to Rick, gaping, and slowly began to speak again, "Right... so last night, after those two were in here, I think that’s when they came back downstairs..." *** "So why are you tying up my hair again?" a drunk Steve asked Phil, who was happily putting his hair into pigtails. "Because I knew you’d look pretty, and I knew you wouldn't object, either," the other guitarist laughed evilly as he finished tying the second bundle of golden locks together, "There, you're all done now." "Cool... I think," Steve tilted his head, staring at himself in the mirror on the wall as footsteps began pounding their way down the stairs. "I think you look pretty, Steve. Pretty, pretty, pretty," Joe giggled as he was flipped off by the pig-tailed guitarist. As this happened, you trampled the stairs in your descent, calling out, “Steve- Steve! Come here!” More than happy to be ripped away from Phil’s pigtailed plans, he let you run up to him as you belted out, “I’ve got an idea...!” He didn’t say anything, but he did let you whisper something in his ear. The second he heard your idea, his eyes lit up and an evil smirk crossed his face. Steve was always in the mood for causing terror. You pulled back and exchanged the same look of understanding with the guitarist. He stared at you with a sort of appreciation, and without another word, swept you off your feet, carrying you bridal style now. With a quick smooch to your lips, he began carrying you up the stairs as you giggled with some sort of glee. Phil’s jaw dropped, looking at Joe with astonishment in the process. The singer’s face mirrored the exact same expression. “I should’ve bloody known...” Phil gasped in astonishment, “She’s been eyeing him up real funny all night... I can’t fucking believe it!” Sav came down the stairs slowly, his life depending on the railing as he dragged his hand on it. He left a long streak of blue paint as he did so. “What’s gotten into their pants?” “Each other, apparently,” Joe scoffed, taking a sip of a beer he found, “Lord knows how the hell that happened.” *** You were all sitting back on the couches in the living room, all seemingly regretting the night before (you knew you most certainly were). Everyone knew that the end of Phil’s story was the true ending of the night. Now there was really a dead end to the whole tale. “I can’t believe it,” you whispered with sorrowful acceptance, “Me and Steve...? What happened next?” Joe scoffed, “Well that’s kind of a stupid question.” “That’s where it ends, Y/N. I went up to bed afterwards, only to hear-“ Phil cleared his throat to impersonate you and Steve, “‘Oh, Steve! Yes!’ coming from my room! So after an immense helping of disapproval, I slept in Rick’s room.” “No, no, that can’t be it!” you insisted, “Guys, what really happened next?” “Can’t say,” Joe mumbled, holding his head. “Sorry, mate,” Rick apologized. Sav remained silent, but looked apologetic. “That can’t be where it ends...!” you persisted, “Sav? Tell me I’m right!” Sav rolled in his lips, and darted his eyes away from you. You continued to stare at him suspiciously, but no one else thought anything of it. Phil tried to finalize your fate sympathetically, “Give it up, Y/N, at least it’s all over now.” “But it still happened! What am I gonna say to Steve when he wakes up? You know what- no. It didn’t happen, I refuse to believe that it did.” “How much more proof do you want?” Rick shrugged, pointing at Phil and Sav, trying to make you face the terrible truth, “They both heard ya, and Steve even gave you a hickey.” You hung your head, thinking you might just decide to cry out of shame. Yes, you loved Steve, just as you loved anyone else in the band, but you never had (or planned to have) any sort of sexual relationship with them. Even if you ever did, you were afraid it would ruin everything your friendship had stood for. “Sav, what’s wrong, mate?” Joe asked out of the blue. The bassist in question was still avoiding the conversation, staying eerily silent and weaving his hands together. At this point, you noticed that he was also blushing. “That wasn’t Steve.” he stated bluntly, still not looking at you. “What wasn’t Steve?” you asked as you stared at him dead on, your heart now pounding. “That hickey... that wasn’t Steve,” he paused, “That was me.” Immediately you gasped and slapped a hand over the mark on your neck. “What?!” the other three exclaimed. Joe and Rick immediately hissed at the searing pain their outbursts caused. “Sav, what the hell?!” you scolded him, finally happy that you weren’t the only one being called out for their mistakes. “Now before you say anything else,” he finally looked at you and held up a hand, “It was your idea.” Your face fell, softly asking him, “What do you mean?” “Well, after you and Steve-you know- and only Joe and I were downstairs, you actually came back down, too- wipe that smug look off your face, Joe. You’re not entirely innocent here, either.” *** You stumbled down the stairs, giggling to yourself. Your mission was now accomplished, and Steve was asleep upstairs. In a word, you were pleased. In two words, you were still drunk. Records were still being played when you returned to the living room, and Joe currently had his copy of Sheer Heart Attack on the turntable. “She Makes Me (Stormtrooper In Stilettos)”flowed softly from its speakers. “There’s our killer queen!” Joe cooed to you happily. He was now sprawled out on the couch, two empty beer bottles on the floor beside him. Sav wasn’t too far off. The paints on his hands were now dry, and he was reclined in a chair across the room, twiddling a bottle in his hand. They both looked ready for bed, and it made you wonder how they held out for this long. The singer slurred on with an interested smirk, “You two have fun?" Sav spoke up with a scoff-like laugh, “Sure sounded like it!" “Oh, you know it,” you gave them a wink, setting yourself down on the couch next to Joe, “Guess Phil finally ditched, huh?” “Yeah, the wanker went to bed- but you’ve lost your pants!” he gestured to your black underwear, made room for you to lay down with him, and took you in his arms like a teddy bear with a sigh of appeasement. You reached back and playfully poked at Joe’s dimple, “Steve's fault." “Well, that’s no good,” Sav objected, pushing the footrest of the chair in and returning to a sitting position. “What isn’t?” Joe asked him, "Steve gettin' into it with her?" “No, that cuddlin' you're doing- it’s boring. You stay like that, you’ll fall asleep on me!” He was certainly right about this. With you in Joe’s arms and his face nuzzling into your hair like some sort of animal, he was already falling asleep. “What do you want us to do?” you chuckled, thinking that Sav was only jealous of his friend. Joe mumbled happily into your hair, “How 'bout you just do me like Steve, and we’ll be good.” At this point, you noticed the feeling of something pressing lightly against the bottom of your back; a certain weight where Joe’s hips were, and a weight that wasn’t there at first. “Joe,” you whined at him, “You’re fucking gross.” He chuckled, then slowly moved his hips to lightly rub himself against you, a low quiet moan rising in his throat from the temporary pleasure it provided. “Ah- Joe!” you protested again, reaching back and hitting him as best as you could. You wiggled out of his embrace as he burst into giggles like he had just accomplished something. Sav, on the other hand, cringed and pinched the bridge of his nose. “You’re even hornier than when you’re sober!” you grabbed a pillow and whacked Joe with it. “You’re one to talk! You just shagged Steve!” he smirked evilly, "Why not me?" “Ha! The only way I’ll do you is by some miracle, or at least a dare,” you threw yourself onto the other couch, picking up a nearly empty beer bottle and pouring whatever was left into your mouth. Sav’s eyes finally lit up, “That’s what we oughta do- truth or dare!” “Ooh, sounds like terrible fun,” you turned yourself so you were sitting upside-down on the couch, “Sav, truth or dare?” “How come he gets to go first?” asked Joe, “I wanna get down to business!” “Dare,” Sav declared, ignoring the singer’s objections. Immediately, your intoxicated mind thought of a scheme. Despite the plan you and Steve had executed ever so perfectly, you were still a child seeking more terror. You knew Joe wanted you, and it was no secret either, so how exactly would you use Sav to reign terror over him? You wanted something to rub in Joe’s face- something that would leave a mark on him. “I dare you to-" you clumsily pointed to your neck, "Gimme a hickey.” Joe's jaw dropped with offense and jealousy; exactly as you had expected. Sav began to laugh rather loudly at the request, and stood up, now understanding your true intention of making Joe jealous. “C’mere,” he motioned with his hand. More than happy to obey the command, you strutted over to him and paused, waiting for him to make the first move. He took a step so your bodies were practically pressing together, moved your hair out of the way on your neck, and dove right in. You smiled with glee, taking in the feeling of Sav’s mouth and tongue moving over your skin (as well as Joe’s groans of protest coming from a few feet away). As the bassist sucked on your neck without hesitation, it only made you think of one thing: “Wow, there’s definitely gonna be a mark after this.” *** Rick and Phil were staring at Sav with their mouths open in shock. You kept a hand over the mark he left on your neck to prevent everyone from looking any more than they already had. “So, wait, if it was you who gave me this, why didn’t you say anything before when we said it was Steve?” you asked Sav, more suspicious than outraged now. “I- ah, didn’t... wanna say anything...” he looked away, beginning to blush again, “I guess I was too embarrassed." “I think the only person who should be embarrassed is you, Joe,” Rick turned his attention back to the singer, “You fuckin dry humped her!” Joe exclaimed in his own defense, “Yeah, and I don’t even remember it! It’s not my fault- I was drunk and horny!” “See! Just like me and Steve! I don’t remember shagging him, either! So I guess we’re even.” “Even Stephen,” Phil scoffed. You slumped into the couch more, staring blankly ahead and realizing, “So I pretty much got to second base with all of you last night...?” “I think you made it all the way home with Steve,” Rick pointed out. “Thanks, Rick,” you kept your head hung, “I feel like a slut.” “You mean you’re not?” Phil joked, only to be hit in the arm by Sav.

Just then, you all heard the sound of movement upstairs. Your heart stopped and your blood ran cold; Steve was awake now. Everyone's jaws hit the floor, and for a second, you thought they were all afraid of what you were fearing. "He's awake..." Rick announced in a sing-song voice, teasing you. “Oh no...” you gasped quietly, “Oh no, oh no! Oh god, what am I gonna do? What am I gonna say to him?!” “Hate to break it to ya, but this isn’t necessarily our problem!” Joe shrugged in a panic, hearing Steve’s footsteps get closer. “But guys! You’ve gotta help me! You’re his best friends! What should I say to him?!” “Just act like it didn’t happen! Maybe he doesn’t remember-?” Sav proposed. Rick suggested, “Just straight up ask him if he remembers anything!” “Just get out of here!” Phil made a swatting motion towards the other room. “None of those are gonna do me any good! It still happened!” you yelled at them in a whisper, “I have to live that with that fact, even if neither of us have any memory of it to live with!” It was too late for any salvation; Steve was already at the top of the stairs. The band members held their breath, and- without words or warning- all scrambled out of the living room. “No!” you whispered, “Guys- wait!” You caught Rick by the wrist when he stood up. “Rick, c’mon, please don’t leave me here!” you begged. He yanked out of your grip and apologetically condemned you, “Sorry, Y/N, but this is your business.” As the four of them retreated, you tried to bolt after them. As soon as you hit the doorway, however, Phil turned around and pushed you back on the couch nearby as slowly as he could. It was so sudden that you were on your back before you knew it, and they were all gone. “Hey!” you called out after them, “Assholes!” Steve’s voice suddenly came to your ears (rather closely, too), “What’s their problem?” You jumped, “Ah- Steve!” He had a silent step, and made it down the stairs and across the room without making a sound. He also looked just as he did a little while ago when you first woke up; scraggly hair, lipstick stains all over his face, but no visible evidence of a hangover. “Hey, wow,” you forced an awkward chuckle at him, “Nice- uh, nice- lipstick...” Steve slumped down onto a chair and grumbled, “Thanks. Who even did this to me? Doesn’t look like it was you.” “That was, that was Rick- I’m assuming... I don’t remember that happening and I don’t think he does, either. He’s still got the lipstick on, too.” He played off the remark with a tired smile, “Oh, nice... last night really was something, wasn’t it?” Heat rushed to your face, and you tried to look away without being conspicuous. “Ha ha... yeah... really something!” you faked your amusement for him, now wondering if he was implying anything about the previous night. Steve leaned forward and asked, “Do you remember Sav and the paint? That was pretty funny, wasn’t it?” Still blushing, you darted your eyes around the room and nodded in agreement, “Mm hmm, yeah... he was like a toddler or something.” He sunk back into the chair again and closed his eyes, reminiscing about the events of the previous night. For a second you thought you were in the clear, and that maybe he didn’t remember the specific event that Phil and Sav did.

That illusion was shattered when his eyes snapped open, whispering “Wait a minute”, and sitting back up. Immediately, your heart dropped into your stomach.

“How did our plan go?” he questioned quietly, figuring that the others were still somewhere nearby and listening. “P-plan?” you stuttered, partially afraid of what he meant, but partially caught off guard, “What plan?” “You know-” he whispered again, thinking you remembered, “It was your idea. Did they believe it? We were convincing enough?" You darted your eyes down to the floor, confused, but also embarrassed. 'Convincing'? What did that mean? "Oh come on, don’t tell me you don’t remember!” he smiled playfully. As you stared at him with fearful confusion in your eyes and redness on your cheeks, his smile was suddenly wiped away. He muttered under his breath as his face fell, "Oh... you don't remember... bloody hell, okay, this is gonna be hard to explain..." "Then explain it, because I'm really fucking confused..." your voice wavered with a sarcastic chuckle. Steve sighed and leaned forward, slowly weaving his hands together. He didn't know where to begin. "This is one of the few things I remember from last night..." he started off, "And there's no way to make this sound... good... in any way, but you came up with the idea of us pretending to shag- like making noises and shit like that- to trick the others into thinking we really did. For some reason I thought it was a great idea, and I'm pretty sure I carried you upstairs, too.” Instantly, a huge weight was lifted off your shoulders. It wasn't real; you didn't shag Steve, and he could even tell the guys himself! You blew out a big sigh of relief, and slumped back into the couch, closing your eyes. "Oh, god," you slowly panted, "What a huge relief- I suppose we were really convincing, then." "Why d'you say that?" You laughed tiredly, now feeling rather thankful for your raging hangover, "The guys are all convinced that we fucked last night. Only Phil and Sav seem to remember it, though. They've been hounding me about it all morning. I kept telling them it couldn't be true- and I was right!" "What, would it be so bad if we actually did?" he teased you in a hushed voice. "Well, I've had to live my day so far under the impression it did happen. I was teased, ridiculed, embarrassed, and felt guilty about it. I was afraid it'd ruin our friendship if it was true... I was kinda hoping you didn't remember so we could just forget..." The red in your face returned all over again. Steve, however, didn't seem bothered. "If you really want to, we can keep pretending it happened and steer into the act; give em' what they want." "What? No!" you laughed out loud, standing up, "You're crazy, Clark! I think I better go tell the others the bad news. They'll be disappointed-ha!" You walked across the room to go find the others and disclose unto them the "bad news", giving Steve a pat on the shoulder when you passed him. Once you were gone and out of sight, Steve also blew out a big sigh of relief. "She didn't remember anything," he thought to himself, "That was a close one." While he knew you two didn't go all the way the previous night, he figured if you didn't remember it, then it was for the best you didn't find out. It was nothing serious; just a bit of fooling around, really. Just a bit of drunked-up teasing, and nothing more. The guys had no proof that anything actually happened between you two, and you were about to tell them the partial truth anyway, so why say something to reignite the suspicion? After all, they were all hungover to begin with, so there wasn't much memory of the whole affair, either. "Thank god for these hangovers,"Steve thought, "Thank god. I couldnt've asked for anything more." ~Epilogue~ When you got to the top of the stairs, Steve put you on your feet and spun you around. "You ready?" he whispered, childish excitement in his voice. You nodded with equal excitement, "Take me away, Clark." The two of you began eagerly walking hand-in-hand to whatever room you pleased, but before either of you had the chance to pick one, the bathroom door opened, Rick popped his head out and commanded, "Stop right there!" Both you and Steve froze and looked at him. He still had his lipstick and his suit on, and a kind of serious look overtaking his face. A finger was kept in a pointing position at you, a few large pieces of cardboard were underneath his other arm, and he slowly took steps down the hall to meet you. Neither of you moved, but both of you waited. When Rick got to you, he didn't say a word, but did take Steve's face in his hands (dropping the cardboard in the process), and proceeded to the kiss the man all over his face.

Steve remained silent, and let Rick have his way until he decided to stop. When he did, there were several lipstick stains on various parts of the blonde's face.

"Thanks, mate," Steve muttered sarcastically as Rick kicked some of the cardboard pieces in different directions. He then stepped on two of them, trying to slide down the hall on them as if they were ice skates. When he got back to the bathroom, he went back inside and shut the door again.

Without another word, you turned Steve's face toward you, gave him a peck on the cheek as Rick had done, and kicked open the door behind you (which just so happened to be Phil's bedroom). You both fell back into the room, giggling with makeshift lust in your eyes.

After all, you had to make this authentic, right?

[kuningannasansa]

A musketeers rewatch (that nobody asked for) 1x07

Here we go, my least favorite episode of the whole show excluding season three which I didn’t watch! If you have even a passing fondness for Ninon, I suggest you look away :)

We start with a royal procession through the crowd and there are quite a lot of waving people there. If they can fill the streets with extras for scenes like that, why can those same extras not be used for the court scenes?

Priest whose name I have forgotten is being robbed. The musketeers rush in to help. 

Meanwhile, a crazy girl tries to get close to the queen and ends up being ran over by her carriage. If this is meant to be some Emily Davison analogy, it sucks!

The dead lunatic’s name is Therese and she wanted to give the Queen a note. Constance takes it and says “Fleur, what does this mean?” Am I supposed to take from that that she cannot read for herself? Cause a merchant’s wife definitely, definitely would know how to do that. 

Fleur is nowhere to be seen, however.

“This is an age of glorious discovery!” says Ninon. “Galileo observes the moons of Jupiter... But what is the role of women in this age of wonder?” - well, gee, i don’t know Ninon. Maybe you could have mentioned some female scientists of the era in addition to Galileo? Catherine de Parthenay, anyone? Or Marie Fouquet? Hell, Ninon de l'Enclos, my atheist queen, for whom this Ninon is doubtless named, was a notable woman in her own right! But no, we have to make women look more oppressed than they actually were to make this waste of space look more awesome. 

“My women of Paris, seek your own enlightenment!” - wrong era!

Therese, an orphan from a humble background, wanted to hand a petition to the queen about women’s education.  

“If she was an illiterate orphan she could not have written this. It is misguided but not unintelligent.” - says Richelieu. And indeed he turns out to be right. She didn’t write it. Which is fucking bizarre. 

Anne asks him if he doesn’t favor women’s education and he replies: “I admire learning wherever it is to be found, but this amounts to an attack on the authority of church and state.” Any French history buff know what the actual Richelieu’s thought of women’s education? @tatzelwyrm​? I’m gonna start a biography on him soon, but not until I’m done with this rewatch.

Ninon barges in past the guards and yells “stay out of my way, I will address the King!”. I’m sure this is meant to make her look badass, but she just comes across like a complete idiot who doesn’t understand that she would do better to follow court protocol, no matter how much she might dislike it, if she wants to achieve her goals.    

Luckily for her she’s pretty, so the king doesn’t mind.

“I want to know why this tragedy happened. If your guards are to blame I want them punished.” And then she gives Treville a dirty look! How dare you, you waste of skin and oxygen! Don’t you dare blame Treville for this mess! 

“You knew this lunatic?” - lmao, Richelieu!

Therese was the daughter of Ninon’s servant whom Ninon decided to educate. So she was educated, she COULD have written the petition herself. But she did not. Because when Richelieu says “she wrote this and was killed trying to give it to the Queen” Ninon screeches: “Don’t be ridiculous! She didn’t write it, I did!” And I mean, who exactly is looking down on servant girls here and saying it’s ridiculous to expect them to write something intelligent. It’s not Richelieu. 

But more importantly, WHY?? If Ninon wrote it, why couldn’t she hand it to the Queen? Why did this poor girl have to die? This is so, so stupid! I mean, okay, maybe Therese heard Ninon speak well of the queen and got the idea to hand her the petition on her own, without being told by Ninon to do so. But why did she have it in the first place, if it’s Ninon’s petition?

“Apparently the Comtesse de Laroque believes herself above the normal laws and conventions of society.” ´- well that’s an understatement.  

“The treasury is bankrupt and the country needs a new navy. Ninon has the wealth to provide it.” And that is why Richelieu sends Milady into the salon to find something to use against her. These two are so good in this, I love their scenes together! Pity about the rest of the episode. 

Richelieu is now freaking out about lesbians and Milady is just like “really, dude? really?”. I love her!

“Ninon must pay up or face destruction, I want every last penny from her!” - so it was not his intention to kill her, just to get the money. Interesting.

Fleur’s father is Bonacieux’s cousin. I love that, the commoners having family connections and support circles of their own.

The robbed priest is called Luca! Richelieu is “delighted to see him”, apparently, cause they’re old friends. And Louis isn’t, because he wrote a pamphlet arguing that Kings should bow down to the Pope’s authority. 

“We can’t have a comtesse abducting young women and spiriting them away to her boudoir!” - Oh, Richelieu! Do calm down.

It’s odd watching Richelieu try to use homosexuality to take Ninon down while shipping Trevilieu thou. 

Athos barges into Ninon’s salon, demanding to know where Fleur is and Milady very discreetly hides behind a pillar. Lol! 

And Ninon starts hitting on Athos immediately. She tells him that she’s often thought he’s handsome but the “melancholy aspect” to his looks is “probably only mental vacancy”. Who taught you how to flirt? Why must you be so abrasive and confrontational all the time? Like really, I get she’s meant to be a Strong Woman Who Don’t Take No Shit TM, but she just comes across like a loudmouth. 

Athos likes it thou!

“Forgive our intrusion-” “I will not forgive it!” - Jesus Ninon, it’s just a figure of speech, a polite gesture. People use these in conversation sometimes. She’s so unnecessarily rude smh.

Aramis says he “gladly acknowledges the superiority of the female sex” and I throw up in my mouth a little. That’s not feminism, that’s slimy!

D’artagnan: “If that wasn’t flirting, I don’t know what is.”  Porthos: “Rubbish! She can’t stand him.”  Aramis: “One day I’ll sit down and explain women to you.” - cause we’re all the same and no means yes, right writers?

Luca: “His holiness is concerned about the direction of French foreign policy.” Richelieu: “Well the pope is Spain’s performing monkey.” - he really is so funny! I know I keep saying that, but he is!

Also, YAY politics! Intelligent dialogue! I love this scene so much!

“In matters of religion I defer to Rome, in all else I am my country’s servant” - lol, Richelieu inventing the separation of church and state

Luca: “Is this your final word on the subject?” Richelieu: “It is.” - and that right there is where Luca decides to kill him. The actor plays it really well, knowing it’s coming I can see the briefest moment of regret in his eyes, but without hindsight I wouldn’t notice anything. And he gives Richelieu the poisoned gift. 

Also, isn't it the same guy who plays Margaret’s new man in Harlots? 

Athos says that Therese and Fleur were so far below Ninon in status that they were not in a position to make choices of their own free will. Which is fuckign stupid. But Ninon saying that she views all women as equal regardless of their birth is equally moronic. I mean, sure, they should be, but in reality they’re not and ignoring that doesn’t help anyone. And Athos does point out that Ninon’s money and position gives her certain privileges, but it sits wrong coming from him and not from Porthos or Milady or Constance, who are from poor/less wealthy backgrounds. That said, this is still one of the few semi intelligent scenes in this whole episode, so whatever. At least someone said it. 

Now she kisses him and invites him to dine! And he just looks sad.

Luca tells Richelieu to “deal with” Ninon “firmly”, cause the Pope is dying and Richelieu could be the next Pope if he shows himself a strong defender of the church against “heresy”. What heresy thou? Women learning to read? Lol, that’s so cartoonishly evil and ahistorical, but whatever. This at least explains where Richelieu’s desire to have her burned came from.

Richelieu: “I wouldn’t go so far as to call her a heretic.” Luca: “A woman who openly defies God's laws, what other word is there?” - what laws thou? what has she done, other than hold some salon meetings, as every other noblewoman was doing at the time?

Richelieu promises to consider his options and Luca tells him to pray to the poisoned bone for guidance, lol.

This right here is Richelieu letting personal feelings cloud his judgement, thou! Which he said he has learned no to do. But he allows himself to be carried away with visions of becoming Pope and honestly I don’t see how he can possibly believe that could happen with his foreign policy and how hated he is by the Vatican, as stated in this very scene.  

Milady and Ninon! I love that scene! Ninon clearly thinks she’s super special because she “takes the initiative” by kissing men instead of waiting to be kissed. She’s so damn smug about it! And Milady is just like “oh I could never be so bold” and I swear I can hear her laughing internally! 

And she very cleverly charms Fleur’s location out of Ninon!

Athos’s idea of a first date is the morgue. Charming.

Athos saying that Ninon is responsible for what happened to Therese because she gave a lowborn girl an education doesn’t sit well with me. Classist ass! But she is responsible for not thinking of Therese beyond how daring and adventurous and fun and positively scandalous it would be to educate a servant girl and then not bothering to care for her when she got bored. Cause if she had done, Therese could have come to her with her plan and she could have prevented her death. Because yes, regardless of her education, her background predisposed Therese to be naive about the King and Queen and how petitions work. Where was Ninon in all this, when a girl under her charge decided to do this foolish thing that cost her her life? Because if you want to be someone’s teacher you do have a duty of care. In short, Ninon is a classist ass as well! They’re perfect for each other!

So Luca’s stolen bag is in the morgue with the body of the thief who stole it. And Athos promises to send for it in the morning. I know it’s CSI: Musketeers and all, but why was it not delivered to Luca the moment it was found, lol? He’s a pretty important guest at the palace and it’s his property. 

Athos agrees with Ninon that marriage is a curse. LOL!

Ninon’s reason for not marrying is that she does not want a husband to own her wealth and body. Makes sense and that’s why many independently wealthy women chose to stay unmarried. Just pointing out the few things that make sense.

“You are a rebellious woman” - oh good, we managed to squeeze the title of the episode into the dialogue! 

Aramis just tossed a red guard out of Ninon’s house. Can’t tell if he’s dead or not, but certainly unconscious. 

There’s fighting. The red guards have swords, the musketeers have books. Athos screams “where is your authority for this!?!” - well, the Cardinal, I’d assume, since they are his guards. Oh bear of very little brain!

Fleur and some other runaway girls are found sleeping in a secret chamber and Ninon is arrested for abducting them.

Athos is all like “you said she wasn’t here” and Ninon tries to explain that Fleur did not want to be found and begs “make them stop” to which Athos replies “sorry, I can’t”, his voice and face making it very clear that he doesn’t want to. Because a woman lied to him! This is the worst crime! Really Ninon is lucky she’s being arrested right now, otherwise she’d end up swinging from a tree.

“Four young women! In their nightwear! I can only speculate as to the horrors they have endured!” - Richelieu really has a bee in his bonnet about lesbians. The days before p*rnhub must have been hard for a catholic cardinal. 

Luca is even worse thou! “Your majesty is joking but Satan is real! And his female familiars are everywhere amongst us.” Jesus christ guys, calm down! Have a wank or something!

“She had the girls, she lied, she brought her fate on herself.” - Oh shut up Athos! Not everything is about you and your relationship issues! As Aramis points out. Thank you, Aramis! And I never believed I’d ever say that.

Ninon/Aramis  > > > > > > > > > > Ninon/Athos

Aramis gives Ninon the cross Anne gave him. This is quite sweet!

“It’s not so easy when you don’t have money” Constance says and she is right. But it’s like the show is saying that the only way women can be independant is if they are independently wealthy like Ninon. But that’s not really true, Fleur could get a job such as a seamstress or pharmacist or grain merchant or actress or even as a secretary now that she knows latin and greek thanks to Ninon. Women did have jobs in 17th century France and even belonged to guilds etc. Not saying that Fleur would not be more financially secure still with a husband, but if she really doesn’t want that she has options and I don’t like how this supposed “feminist” episode constantly erases women’s actual history. 

Fleur’s father rages “what does she need an education for? She’ll be a seamstress until she’s married and then she’ll be a dutiful wife and mother.” But if he is Bonacieux’s cousin then they are in the same social class, that is to say, the merchant class. And merchant women had to keep their husbands’ shops when their husbands were away. They needed to know how to read and write and do sums. They needed this to be an attractive marriage prospect to a husband of their own social class! 

And the father wants to hit Fleur and D’artagnan all heroically threatens him. How boring!

Richelieu: “Many of our young women are educated. It’s not something we’re ashamed of.” Fleur: “Not just embroidery and sewing.”  Me: “WELL OF COURSE NOT!!!”

Then Fleur says Ninon taught them the “secrets of our bodies” and Richelieu is a hound on the scent!

“Be quiet or you’ll be gagged!” - Again Armand, this is neither the time nor the place to indulge your kinks. 

ENTER MILADY! 

She does such a brilliant job of her testimony! This is again her lying about rape and I talked about before why that is bad, but in this case I don’t mind cause it’s for state reasons and doesn’t in any way invalidate her own story the way the thing with D’artagnan does.

Athos completely LOSES HIS SHIT!! Not doing the defence any good there, buddy!

The look she gives him as she walks out is priceless!

Queen Anne to the rescue, bringing clemency from Louis! Clever girl, must have manipulated it out of him! Season 1 Anne was intelligent.

And Ninon ruins it by saying: “I have never consorted with the devil until this moment. I am looking at him.” To which Richelieu replies: “Condemned from her own mouth.” As any person with half a brain would. Jesus christ Ninon, you should have been gagged! For your own safety! 

And then Richelieu stops breathing! And we get Treville’s reaction to it, thank you camera people! Thou Treville mostly just looks confused, like “what is that drama queen doing now?” 

Now he’s twitching! And I’m sorry but it looks hilarious.

Aramis carries him to bed on his back and puts a hand over his mouth. I’m not sure that helps with the breathing issues... 

Louis pushes Aramis out of the way and cries “please don’t die! please don’t die!” aawwwwwwwwwww!

Aramis really saves his life here, huh.

Anne is briefly jealous about the cross and asks Aramis if Ninon is his lover. Lol! She never expected him to stalk her for the rest of her life, she fully expected him to keep lovers.  

Luca: “Satan turned his blood to acid at her command!” Porthos: “We’ll add Satan to the list of suspects.”

Fleur: “You think I poisoned him?” Constance: “That’s the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard even by musketeer standards.” - THANK YOU CONSTANCE!

Fleur is to be married to a 40 year old butcher. Poor girl!

“Was it you?” - LOL!

“Half the doctors say you’re doomed, the other half claim you’ll make a full recovery. There’s a lot of professional pride at stake.” - Milady is very funny too! But I’ve always known that! 

“Whatever happens to me, I want you to extract this confession from Ninon.” - translation: it doesn’t matter if I die, the main thing is that France gets that navy. For France, always. I’m amazed by how much he trusts Milady here thou.

Milady thinks the kneebone of St. Anthony is gross and “as much use as the doctors”. Bless her!

Constance very sweetly talks Fleur’s father out of forcing her to marry. Go Constance!

Ninon: “There is nothing worse than a woman who betrays her own sex” Milady: “I can think of a few things, but let’s not argue.” - THIS!! This is my favorite part of this whole miserable episode, because yes, with her background she can think of things Ninon couldn’t possibly imagine. It’s also a fuck you to that “don’t encourage girl on girl hate” line terfs and white feminists always hide behind when they get called out on their bullshit, though this wasn’t the point here. I love how she doesn’t even explain, too. Let’s not argue, cause what’s the point. You’ll never get it.

I do want to stress that Ninon is not wrong for educating other women and she has been unjustly condemned (althou I would argue that she might not have drawn Richelieu’s ire if she went about it in a more subtle, less smug way, for the safety of the girls she teaches if not for her own). But Milady is employed by the First Minister of France and is doing her job here, a job which she depends upon for her own independence and safety. As she says, Ninon didn’t do anything to her, she’s just a victim of circumstance. 

“If you don’t confess, the women of your salon will burn in your place. Surely you wish to save the lives of your accomplices in Satan?” - Milady does a good job of selling it, but if you think about it, that makes no sense. These women have already been publicly proclaimed Ninon’s victims. And if they have legal trouble with burning her alone, how would they manage a whole bunch of them, most of whom are also high ranking noblewomen?

Ninon falls for it thou. Fail!

Richelieu orders Ninon burned and Milady says that the Queen and King won’t like it. Richelieu replies that: “she’s irrelevant and a new navy will soothe his dismay.” He’s really underestimating season 1 Anne here. But season 2 will prove him right, sadly.

“The kingdom of heaven is a dream. Our only life is here.” - Go Milady!

Richelieu says he won’t burn her for heresy but to be careful cause “one day someone else might” and idk, but it comes across like pretty friendly advice, considering what he’s currently doing with Ninon. 

Now he worries he might go to hell! And Milady says he’s already there, lmaoo! I LOVE THIS SCENE!!

They go to the morgue to retrieve Luca’s bag and discover that the thief was poisoned in the same manner as the Cardinal. Thus the plot is uncovered.

“Open his mouth!” “You open his mouth!”

Luca kills a red guard and is about to kill Richelieu (who fights him with a fork!) when the musketeers burst in. And Richelieu curses them for being late!

Richelieu had apparently worked out that it was Luca who was trying to kill him at some point during the night. No idea how. 

Athos begs for Ninon’s life while the pire is already burning. And Richelieu agrees cause burning her is all very “dark ages”, like he said to begin with. He says he’s not a cruel man, just a practical one. But practicality sometimes requires cruelty. He’s not a sadist thou, that’s what he meant and that’s true. 

Athos drags Ninon off the burning pire. So the great feminist character got duped by Milady and then had to be rescued by her love interest. So good, much feminist. 

“As far as the world is concerned, Comtesse Ninon de Laroque died on that pire today.” Richelieu takes her lands, her property and her money and sends her into exile. Then he threatens to execute her if she ever tells anyone the truth of what happened.

“My voice will never be silenced, but I promise you will never hear it.” - the stupidest line of the whole episode and that’s saying something. Seriously, what does this mean? Your voice was silenced! Richelieu got your wealth which you could have used to educate more women. You were completely defeated. Like really, who is the idiot who wrote this? And what made them think this is in any way empowering or even just a satisfactory conclusion to Ninon’s acr?? Ughhhh!!

I do love Richelieu and Milady getting a rare victory thou! 

“Nothing, no person, no nation, no god will stand in my way.” - HOT!

Aramis gets his cross back lol. Otherwise it would have burned. 

Lmao, Richelieu sends Luca’s ashes to rome with a threat to the Pope.

And Capaldi pronounces “Richelieu” in a very strange way. 

Milady: “You do realise you’ll never be Pope?” Richelieu: “It’s an Italian club and largely a clerical position. I prefer something with a little more influence.” - L! O! L!

Ninon plans to open a school for poor girls and be a teacher. Well, idk, I hope she does a better job of it than she did with Therese.

Athos asks Ninon if “Madame de la Chapelle” ever told her anything about herself. And Ninon is like “so you did know her after all?” and he says “in another life” and she warns him to be careful because she has the cardinal’s protection so “a blow against her is a blow against him” and idk, does she realize that Milady was Athos’s wife here? Is that how I’m supposed to read it? He did tell her before that he used to be married.

Then she kisses him and tells him she could have loved a man like him. And she’s just way more into him than he is into her.

Lmaooo, Fleur is not forced to marry and can continue with her education and she’s “sure” that the woman who convinced her father was Ninon. And Constance doesn’t correct her and doesn’t even want the credit, but I’m mad lol, as if Ninon even remembers you exist Fleur!

D’artagnan gives Constance the credit, at least! And then comes his declaration of love, which is actually very sweet and I really liked them together in season 1! Constance is so beautiful in this scene too! It’s very well lit and she’s wearing that lovely dress!

Aaaaand we fade to black on some PG13 kissing and groping! Sorry, this was very long, but there was a lot to complain about.

In conclusion, awful! Like, the thing that bothers me the most is that this token girl power episode would not even have been radical in 1970, never mind today. The message is simply that women should have an education, which no sane person today would disagree with. It’s very safe and bland. And erases women’s real history in the process. It’s almost as if these male writers are congratulating themselves “weren’t things ever so bad Back Then, we are so much more progressive now”, instead of doing the truly radical thing and showing women’s real history, showing women in positions of power running their literary salons and not getting burned for it, showing women as independent businesswomen with an education! Why not give Bonacieux a female rival in the cloth business? Why not go deeper than “women are human beings” and give the episode a truly radical message that still resonates today. After all, we might be ever so educated now but it’s not like women have achieved equality. More on that in this old post: https://kuningannasansa.tumblr.com/post/126434697304/the-problem-of-ninon 

Anyway, I really hope the next episode will be better! 

Red Guards killed: 1 or 2, impossible to really tell

Ladies killed: Therese

Best Dressed: Ninon. She did have some pretty dresses. 

[comeondowntosouthparkrpg-blog]

Bradley Christian

out of character info

Name/Alias: Tots

Pronouns: she/her

Age: 19

Join Our Discord: yea why not lol mine is cursed bitch #0955

Timezone: EST

Activity: it honestly really depends- between 6-8 on a good day tho

Triggers: n/a

Password: Jimmy can fastpass my ass

Character that you’re applying for: Bradley(not THAT one. the one from season 11 episode 2 Cartman Sucks)

Favourite ships for your character: Bradley x Butters, Bradley x chemistry

in character info

Full name: Bradley David Christian

Birthday: December 25th

Sexuality, gender, pronouns: closeted homosexual, male, he/him

Age and grade: 18, senior

Appearance: Temporary face claim is Valter Torsleff. Bradley is a very nervous person and it shows in his nubby fingernails, in the way that his shirts are wrinkled from clutching at them, the dark circles under his eyes and the way they dart around. He’s tall but it’s difficult to tell from the way he hunches over in some attempt to try and hide himself. At his full height Bradley is six foot even. His body is pathetically scrawny making him look like you could easily snap him in two. Seriously, get this kid a fucking sandwich or something.

Bradley has pasty skin, blue-grey eyes and short curly golden blond hair that’s shaved at the sides. He’s always clean shaven and has a gaunt, oval shaped face with a pointy chin. He speaks quickly and mumbles frequently.

His clothing is well put together- mostly because his parents still choose his wardrobe for him. Button down shirts. Nice slacks and shoes. Business casual is the best way to describe his wardrobe. He has a few casual looking articles of clothing(t-shirts that are either plain or have some stupid cheesy christian slogan or a scripture on it, maybe cargo shorts or sweatpants) but he’s very seldom seen wearing these. Usually they’re reserved for when he’s lounging at home or if it’s a required part of a uniform.

Personality: Christianity is Bradley’s whole world. It’s what he sleeps, eats, drinks and breaths. He wants nothing more than for the holy spirit to get inside him( ;) ). He spends hours and hours pouring over the bible, devotionals and other forms of christian media to keep himself in check. Deep down however he’s disgusted by all this and loathes it all but his irrational fear of god and his parents keeps him going.

He’s an extraordinarily anxious and timid person with twitchy hands and is consistently easy to startle. He’s a closeted homosexual, having gone through conversion therapy and been considered cured. Bradley knows he’s gay and he hates this part of himself. He’s full of internalized homophobia. He’ll do whatever he has to in order to try and ‘fix’ this part of himself. So far nothing has worked.

Because of his heavy involvement with the church Bradley is repressed in the sense that he doesn’t know who he is or what he likes that isn’t involved with the church. Any hobbies he has, any personality traits, has to be somehow linked to christianity. It makes him a boring person since he has nothing else to talk about but God. He doesn’t know what else to talk about because he’s never been allowed to think about anything else. Because of this, most people brush him off and he’s used to that. However he has a hard time being as adamant to people about converting them then other people in his church, he’s more timid and is worried about upsetting other people.

History: Having grown up in a heavily conservative, christian home, Bradley David Christian has known nothing but religion his whole life. Within a week of his birth, he had gone to church for the first time and continued to go for the entirety of his life. His parents were completely and totally enthralled with christianity and wanted nothing more than for Bradley to be every bit as religious as them.

His relationship with his parents is… less than ideal to be putting it lightly. They’re controlling and invasive. They put everything under a microscope and leave him with little to no privacy. They choose his wardrobe, choose if he’s allowed to continue being friends with someone or not, go through his phone and social media accounts and so on and so forth. Bradley knows this isn’t normal but there isn’t really anything he can do about it seeing as he still lives with him and is too young to be on his own. So he just tries to appease them and keep them as happy as possible, working to be their wet dream of a child.

The church he went to was very conservative and pushed the ‘Fear the Lord’ mentality leading him to being constantly anxious about having any sort of sin weighing on his soul. The idea of hell is terrifying, and he would do anything to avoid being sent there. Convinced that the rapture could occur at any given moment he worked to have his soul constantly free of sin. His parents had successfully indoctrinated their son into their religion.

As Bradley grew older, he started to notice that he was developing an attraction to the same sex and that terrified him. He prayed to God to fix him and when that didn’t work, tried to hide it. But eventually his parents found out and sent him to Camp New Grace.

The camp didn’t change Bradley(There was a brief period of time where a certain boy with a cute smile and bubbly laugh that made him think maybe it was okay to be gay but that hope was quickly squashed). In fact it probably left him in a worse state than when he first entered. But he could certainly convince himself that it did. Thinking he was cured, he was sent home only to discover, much to his chagrin, that he was still plagued by these demons. But the very last thing that Bradley wanted was to be sent back to that place so from that day forwards he did everything in his power to hide and repress that part of himself. After all, Camp New Grace did always say that being straight, being NORMAL, was a choice. So he could just…. choose to be hetero. He would be his own accountabillibuddy and keep himself in check.

Bradley became an extremely active member of the church, had brief relationships with girls that always ended with frustration and tears, ran the christianity clubs at his school, maintained perfect grades and above all tried to keep his life as free from sin as possible. But deep down he still felt that gnawing guilt in his heart knowing that he really was. The reminder clung at the back of his mind like a tumor. Whispering to him that no matter what he did, he would never be rid of it. It kept him up at night, made his heart pound in his chest when the church talked about the sin that was homosexuality, made him sweat when he tried to deny just how much a boy’s laugh could make his stomach flip or a smile could make his face heat up. But if he could keep himself pure, maybe- just maybe God could overlook that and he wouldn’t be sent to burn in the fiery pits of hell.

A kid could hope.

Sample paragraph: A success story. That’s what they called him. A shining example of how homosexuality was a choice, that Bradley had been able to overcome his sinful urges and become a pure, gleaming light for the Lord Almighty.

The thought burned like acid in his throat, ate at his stomach, twisted his guts into painful knots. He was a liar and he knew it. He knew he was sinning every time his heart flipped when a handsome boy would call his name. Sinning when only thoughts of masculine voices could stir a fire in the pit of his stomach. Sinning every night when all he had was his own thoughts and fantasies.

It was ripping him apart, all the lies, the lust, the desires- he was an abomination wearing the skin of a holy man. Did that make him worse than the average sinner? He prayed, day and night, for forgiveness from a God he both feared and worshiped.

“Bradley, why don’t you share with the congregation how you were you able to overcome these desires?” the pastor asked, a smug gleam in his eye. Wasn’t pride a sin?

“W-well-” His hand twitched as Bradley had to remind himself to not lift his hand and chew at it. Instead he settled for rubbing the back of his neck, fingers catching on locks on the back of his head and anxiously tugging. Scriptures- scriptures- “As Matthew 26:41 says, ‘Watch and pray so that you will not fall into temptation. The spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak.’. So uh, I prayed. A lot. And the power of prayer… helped me overcome my temptations?"

The priest smiled like Bradley had gotten a correct answer on a test. His anxiety lessened for only a brief moment. The fear, the anxiety was always at the back of his mind. His hand pulled away from his hair to clutch tightly at his chair. This was humiliating. He didn’t want a soul to know about how he had struggled. How he was still struggling. But here Bradley was, in front of a group of kids lying to them about how they too could overcome temptations and sin to become pure in the eyes of God. He licked at his dry lips. “I’ve even uh, been able to have a few girlfriends.” His eyes darted at the kids and saw himself in their faces. “Anything is possible through the power of God.”

The way the priest smiled, his lips curling, made Bradley feel sick. Did he know what was going on in his head? Was he aware of the lies pouring from his lips or was he just proud of his ability to ‘fix’ people? Bradley wanted to vanish from here. Being near one of these conversion therapy places was the last thing he ever wanted but his parents insisted it would be ‘good’ for him to share his story. They’d arranged everything, written the emails for him and sent him here.

“Now, do you still experience those old…. Urges?”

Did the way his head shot up make him look guilty? “What? Uh- no- I mean uh-” Lying. He hated it. “Y-yeah. But I just pray to God in those moments. And he helps me.”

The priest’s face tightened, lips pressed into a thin line and a quick nod followed. Bradley felt like someone had stuck a knife into his stomach and twisted it. Should he have said something different? But the holy man laughed- “Well maybe you should come back and do our little program! Just kidding.” Bradley could taste metal in his mouth at the thought but forced out a laugh of his own.

“M-maybe!"

His limbs felt like tightly wound coils, ready to spring out of the chair and run from here. His muscles were tense and he couldn’t keep himself still. Hands gripping, twitching, leg bouncing, eyes darting. Did he look like a liar or just like someone with stage fright?

“Well, thank you for coming and speaking with us Bradley. God truly has blessed you.” Was it over? Relief washed over him. He smiled and lied once more.

“It was good to be here.”

Headcanons: nervous tick extraordinaire. He constantly tries(and fails) to break his finger biting habit through using fidget toys and fidgeting in other ways but always goes back to it. He has a tendency to pull at his hair as well as recite scriptures from the bible to keep himself in line. Part of why he’s so skinny is because he makes himself so nervous he gets sick and can’t eat or throws up whatever's in his stomach.

Anything else: I hope this meets the length requirements! Hope to hear from you dudes soon, constructive criticism is always welcomed and encouraged even if I’m not accepted!

[theincorrigiblemagpie]

Kasautii Zindagii Kay (2018) E01- Yo Momma So Bengali

25-9-2018

Long time no liveblog-first-few-episodes-of-a-new-show-before-giving-up-in-disgust, no?

It’s a big one this time, folks. I am here to watch the first episode of the KZK reboot with you all!

For those who have not spent a dissipated life watching Hindi TV and/or lack context: KZK was one of Balaji's 3 original 'K-soaps', that aired between 2001 and 2008 on Star Plus. It was the story of star-crossed lovers Prerna and Anurag (who was very unnecessarily Bengali). They had 30 million impediments to their relationship and literally never got together. No jokes. Spoiler alert but they tragically died at the end of those 8 years. One main impediment was the other dude in Prerna's life, Mr Bajaj (first name: Rishabh but always 'Mr Bajaj' to the world), whom she was married to for the most part. Another major impediment was the vampiest vamp that ever vamped-- Komolika. Between the 3 main protagonists, other partners of the 2 men, and from sundry side characters, we had eleventy five children who complicated matters further through several classic 'time leaps.' The only ones I cared about were Prem and Mukti but they also had a tragic end.

The first rule of fight club, even before you begin watching this reboot, is: NEVER ship anybody. Don’t say I didn’t warn you. Anyhoo, it’s time to begin.

Lots of establishing shots of Howrah Bridge, Hooghly river, Victoria Memorial and sundry Kolkata monuments so that everyone knows we’re in Kolkata.

Extreme family-function-after-a-long-time feelz as we're introduced to a dizzying cast of people (the Basu and Sharma clans) who are all...praying. Separately in their own homes, I mean. The Sharmas are a modest 'middle-class' family while the Basus are mansion-owning-wealthy. I sat and screencapped all of them for you.

Meet the Sharma parents and siblings.

Now, meet the Basu parents and siblings.

And finally, Anurag and Prerna.

Please note how the Basus get a little Durga next to their names and the Sharmas get a little Ganesh. This attention to detail is what I expect from the production house that will at some point vanish several characters with no explanation.

On a side note, I am generally pleased with Erica Fernandes as Prerna. And think Parth Samthaan as Anurag is fitting in that I always thought Cezanne Khan was also terribly lame and not hero material at all. 

It's been 23 minutes and we're still in the exposition stage. We have learned through tedious and boring conversations that Anurag is a little goody-two-shoes who is obsessively punctual and determined to carve a name for himself independent of his father's publishing empire.

He is also the college heartthrob (obv everyone goes to the same college) but he does not talk to any women (except Prerna) leading to speculation about whether he's gay. And he only talks to Prerna about the weather despite having known her for 10 years on account of their dads being friends/employer-employee/both.

Prerna shows dangerous Manic Pixie Dream Girl signs and her explanation for all nosey questions about why she doesn't try to hook Anurag is "I'm romantic and he's practical-- we're incompatible."

If I had a rupee for every romance I've read/watched where the heroine disses the hero for his lack of romantic spirit and then discovers that he is secretly not as unfeeling as she'd thought, I'd freelance without worry forever.

The writers couldn't wait for Durga Puja because it's already Durga Puja in this show's timeline. I must warn you, it's likely to be Durga Puja up until November, when it will suddenly be Diwali. 

Prerna's mom puts up a gift item stall at the big Basu puja pandal every year while her dad oversees a lot of the general admin. Mohini Basu, who is a Calcutta socialite, pretends not to recognise Prerna because she's too much of a peasant, apparently. I’m censoring several uncharitable and gross comments about the background socialites who cannot act to save their lives, and esp the girl who was supposedly Miss Calcutta the previous year.

My mom, watching over my shoulder, asked why random people were doing Durga's aarti (including Prerna and Anurag) instead of just the priests. If any of you also have this confusion, it's so that this can be a source of foreshadowing, premonition, drama and whatnot. In that vein, Anurag and Prerna accidentally ended up doing the aarti together for a bit, which only married couples do on TV.

Mohini is absolutely a let-them-eat-cake bitch but Moloy makes WhatsApp jokes about matrimony and his wife constantly so I'm feeling far more sympathetic toward her than I should.

I’m wondering how much longer they'll keep up the red and white sarees worn the SLB-Devdas way, the dhunuchi naach, and the Hindi-fied Bengali to establish Bengali-ness. Can't wait for them to forget and only revive on special occasions.

Prerna's feather-brained friend forces her to ask Anurag if he's into boys or girls which she haltingly does. Boring Anurag proves to have a strange sense of humour wherein he tells her he likes boys and pretends as though a friend is his boyfriend. LGBTQ ally Prerna says 'that's great, so glad it's legal now' and also apologizes for asking such a personal question. Ngl, Prerna has exhibited the MOST sense on this show so far (despite her occasional lapses into MPDG territory). I refer to a scene where several girls were peeking through the shutters into a locker room to ogle Anurag in a football jersey messily drinking Gatorade (yes, we had a brief Kukkad Kamaal Da moment). Prerna rolled her eyes, said "this is so embarrassing" and walked away.

Anyway, the final bit is where Prerna's brother Mahesh (who has been living under a rock all his life in Kolkata, I believe), asks the priest who the buff dude with curly hair being killed by Durga is. Priest immediately extemporizes a flowery essay on Mahishasur and Durga for our benefit. This is cut with scenes of the silhouette of a drunk man in shiny red shoes exiting a big car and smashing a bottle of whiskey and setting it on fire. He is presumably the Mahishasur to Prerna's Durga. We've also had plenty of anvil-sized hints comparing Prerna to Durga but they were tedious and I won't go into them. (But with those shoes, he could also be the Wicked Witch of the East. Idk.)

I'm hoping this one is Bajaj and he'll appear on the scene soon enough (and not be rapey, please god) so that this story can move faster.

Ok so that alcohol-fire was in an alley on the outside of this very pandal and the whole place is on fire now. In tonight's episode, Prerna and her friend will get caught in this fire and Anurag will play a Rohit Shetty hero.

I’m starting a red-dupatta count for all the separate moments a red dupatta flutters across the scene and over one or both leads, because that is an original Kasauti Thing.

In today’s episode, it happened 3 times.

[sutare-chan]

Ao Jumonji’s Roman, pt.4

a piece of Noël nr 7 Noël works in a bar now. He's very polite and responsible. He doesn't close the bar while there're still clients, even if they're too late (and not even start to tidy up before they leave). His chief doesn't get it: why wouldn't Noël want to end his workday earlier?.. Anyway, the chief himself isn't nearly as hardworking, so Noël additionally does have to close the doors (which is usually not the barman's task, but chief just leaves before him x3) and take the keys to the chief's house and drop them to his mailbox. With a boss like that the bar isn't doing very well, as you may assume =P Noël doesn't really have any ambitions there either, but he works properly. And, like, the bar is called Rapa Bar (after an island in the Pacific), and there's of course its special drink. Which is pretty shitty actually, but Noël secretly made his own recipe of the thing, a better one. Although when it's not Noël's shift the drink is still as bad as it used to be. That particular night Noël was getting the keys to his chief's house, as usual. When he was going back home it was nearly dawn already. Noël looked up in the grey sky and sighed, when suddenly a voice called him. That was Kurikigawa Kakehiro, his old school friend! My, my, what a meeting! Kurikigawa was going home after he was drinking booze with some of his acquaintances, when he suddenly spotted and recognized Noël (they haven't seen each other ever since the middle school). Kurikigawa's a bit drunk and more than happy to see Noël, while Noël seems sort or indifferent (or rather not really getting wtf is going on x3). Still, he follows Kurikigawa when he invites him to have a gyudon and a chat. We learn that Kurikigawa's working somewhere already, while Noël decided to go for a university (Kurikigawa says it's no wonder, since Noël always had brilliant scores in school, but apparently Noël doesn't remember that at all). Kurikigawa also asks how's it going with music. Noël doesn't play in a band, but Kurikigawa understands that at least he's still playing and that overfills him with joy. He also tells that Noël really shouldn't have played together with those less dedicated than himself: "You know, <...> I wouldn't have been surprised at all if you had started a professional career by now. Or would I?.. Yeah, I guess I would, like, wow! How can that be and such. You do have a talent, I've always believed that. And I would often think: "that guy's different". I don't have a talent, you see. Okay, maybe I do, but not for music, that's for sure. But I understand. I mean... see, if even I have goosebumps when I hear it, that guy must be a genius. I dunno. But I believe so. I mean, about you. That you're a genius. Geniuses are different, you see? You probably hated playing together with us. Like, why can't we understand such simple things. That's so easy, why are they so stupid? You couldn't understand that it was beyond us, could you? Nah, I dunno, really. At least it seemed so. I thought you were a genius. Like, already back then. What about you? Haven't you thought that?" "Not really". "I see." "The sound", - Noël touched his temple with a finger. "I can hear the sound. Over here. But no one else seems to hear it." "Well, of course not if it's inside your head." "But when I play it on instruments, they do." "Duh." "That's how it is." "Nah, I don't get it." "You don't?" "So what? Noël, that's no game for you, is it? Like hell. Hrm, how do I put it... That comes from your heart, right? You used to take this stuff very seriously. We weren't, for us that was just a way to look cool. Like, girls like that stuff. Fashion. <...> But you weren't like that. Were you?" "I wasn't". <end of quote!> When Kurikigawa gets sleepy, they go home, but Kurikigawa promises to come and visit Noël at the bar. When Noël comes home (he's renting a small flat for his own now) he doesn't go to sleep. Instead he turns his old PC on and opens a music-making program. And remembers Kurikigawa's words. Talent, he says, huh... 9. UTSUKUSHIKIMONO My problem with retelling this one is that it's mostly dialogues, which is fantastic, but hard to sum up x3 I'll try my best though. Ok, so it all starts with the small Monica asking her parents whenever is she going to meet the baby. It's when the spring comes. When comes the spring? It's when the almond tree blooms. What are almond flowers like? They're pink. What's pink? It's a color, brighter then red but not white. How's that even possible? Oh come on, Monica, you'll see it when the spring comes. When comes the spring? OH MONICA. Monice is, like, 3 years old (or turning three soon) and she can't wait. And one day the shit happens! Her mom suddenly feels bad (oh no!), her dad's all nervous and he says that they can only pray in the wait for the baby. Wait, is that the baby coming?.. Anyways, they do pray, and ah! Soon a servant is calling them to mom's room and there's the baby!!! OH WOW!!! In the following episodes we watch Monica and her little brother (I saw a beautiful assumption that he should be called Rolland, and that's how I'm going to call him) grow up step by step. In the beginning he's, like, still a baby, and in the next episode he's around 3 years old, while Monica is 6 (and it will be up to Monica's 13 or 14, I believe). He's asking why is it cold when autumn comes. She answers that's because winter is real soon. Is winter even more cold than autumn? It is. What comes next? It's spring - and then summer. Is it always repeating like that? It is! Why is it? No idea. How come you don't know, Monica? I dunno D= That must be God's doing. God is cool, isn't he... He is! Monica decides that next time she sees a priest she's going to ask how come seasons spin around and whether it's God's doing. And one more question: why is that her brother still can't walk? D= The next extract Monica's around seven, Rolland is about 4, I guess. She's going to school already and tells Rolland whatever they're doing there. Like, they're learning how to spell words. Rolland, do you know how to spell the word elephant? I don't, why? There's only one right way to do that, like they do in the books. Oh, I see - and what if you make a mistake? The teacher will scold you. And that's all? o.O You know how embarrassing it is to get scolded in front of your friends! No idea, it's not like I had any. How'bout me? O.o You're not my friend, you're my sister. Then they discuss what friendship is and how it differs from family. After a while Monica just says that when Rolland is old enough to go to school, she'll carry him on her back (spoiler: no, that's not happening). It gets nastier from the next episode on. The two are singing a funny French song, this one - https://youtu.be/aJVN8wHXz68 That's actually a song about a girl named Michele who's lost a cat. She cries and wants her cat back. And an old man Lustucru says he knows where the cat is. He asks, however, whatever his award will be. Michele promises him a kiss, but Lustucru doesn't want that and says he's sold her can to get himself a rabbit 8) Yes. That's an existing old French song about Michele and a cat. I thought it was SO cool that Jumonji-san actually managed to find it 8D So, as I said, the two were singing this song when suddenly Rolland started to cough. Apparently that was way too much of a stress for his lungs. He doesn't want to keep silent though and soon he asks what size cats are (he's never seen one). Monica tells a story about seeing a giant cat in the streets. Rolland doesn't really believe her, but tells that if she manages to draw it, he will trust the image. It's decided, then: Monica's asking their dad to buy her everything necessary to draw. Aren't just pencils enough? No they are not - Monica does want to make the picture credible!!! The next time Monica's found some new entertainment, which is a brand new (okay, not brand but rather new) instrument from Germany, a harmonica! She isn't playing too well yet, though, but Rolland is still fascinated. He also tries to play it a bit himself, but only a bit. After that he goes back to reading. He's in the middle of some new book, "Around the world in 80 days". Monica's never heard of that book, so she's asking what it’s about. She's really surprised by the plot and by the main character who basically made a rather meaningless bet for all of his fortune and tells that people like that can only be found in the books. To that Rolland notices that for him people in the books and real people outside the house are more or less the same. The children are growing little by little. In the next episode Monica and Rolland are discussing some of Monica's school fellows. There's that boy, Gerome, all so sassy and ready to fight. He seems clever though. Rolland says that the boy must feel lonely because no one really understands him, and even though he seems to have a lot of friends, none of them are as smart as he is, so he must feel really lonely (duh, no parallel with Noël, what are you talking about? x3). That seems right, and Monica's amazed how smart Rolland himself is. He knows so many things, and that's without really leaving home! That's because he's reading a lot of books apparently. As if his head had wings inside and was flying around, while his body was lying home. Now that's a creepy image... Speaking of creepy things, Monica tells that not a long ago their dad had a mysterious guest, who told his name was W. That W wanted their father to find a particular item, which is, in fact, a sculpture of the famous artist, Auguste Laurant. Funny enough, that statue, the so-called "Angel" is unknown. W has also asked to report it, if the father comes across a person with the name M... Remember Monica started to draw? Well, apparently that got more or less serious. She's making oil paintings, now. Her easel stands in Rolland's room, so she can draw there, while Rolland would read another book. Monica isn't completely sure though, whether she likes to draw or to play with the tools more (Auguste wouldn't have approved that for sure!). She's mostly drawing landscapes. That summer her father decided to go on a trip to the town of Étretat (that one is real, by the way!), and he took Monica, too. She didn't feel like going for more than a day, though, because she didn't want to leave Rolland behind (although Rolland wanted her to go see the world, too!). So, Monica did travel together with her dad after all (but only for one day!). She's always taking a sketchbook with her so that she could draw whatever she likes. There, in the town which is situated by the sea, she found a spectacular place to draw the landscape. Later her father told her that the famous artist Claude Monet used the same angles to picture that place [a series of paintings, google "claude monet etretat"]. Monica had never heard about that artist before so she actually felt offended that she unconsciously copied someone else's idea. She sighs about that even when she's sitting in front of her easel in Rolland's room, making oil-paintings out of those sketches. She says she doesn't want others' fame, she wants her own, even if it's a modest one x3 Rolland encourages her in a rather touching manner, which I'm too lazy to explain in detail. They go on with their business - Monica's drawing, Rolland's reading, when suddenly she notices he hasn't been turning pages in a while. At first she frightens that he doesn't move at all, but then she notices he's breathing after all, but he’s fallen asleep. She thinks about how she wants to do everything for him but how Rolland wouldn't appreciate that. She wakes him up and he wants to continue reading. He wanted to complete this book by evening. She tells him not to strain himself. He nods but goes on reading anyway. After that his health is going even worse. He can't sit anymore and he usually doesn't have the will to change his lying position. As the spring approaches, he's beginning to act a bit weird. Like, when the almond tree blooms, he has a talk with Monica, and he tells her about a similar tree that grows in Japan, which is sakura. "Japan is pretty far away" [Monica says] "People are good at getting far away." "You can sail very far on a ship. Papa told he's been to India!" "Some day..." Rolland's coughing was now really worrying Monica, and she started to caress her brother's back. He didn't like it when she was doing this. She knew that, yet she couldn't help doing it anyway. "...some day it will become possible to fly there on a plane." "No way." "But that's true!" "But why on plane and not on a flying balloon?" "I think people will be flying on planes in USA and Japan... Some day." "Tell whatever you like, I just can't imagine that." "Can't you?" "I can't." "I wish I could fly..." <end of quote> Seems like something's bothering Rolland a lot, and he seems very anxious, but he doesn't utter a word, he hesitates before even asking anything, and then he just asks Monica to play harmonica a bit. At summer he sees a dream. Of a clear sky, just like it is right now. How come he knows it was a dream? That's because he was walking there. Not really walking, because he wasn't moving his legs. More like moving along some path. Monica said that perhaps he was flying, just not very high up in the air. Rolland asks her to play harmonica again. She doesn't want to let off his hand, because it feels like letting go a small bird that will get away immediately. But she does, anyway. When autumn comes, they are lying together at night and watching up the starry sky. Rolland doesn't seem to like autumn, because it means that winter comes real soon. He's also afraid to sleep. Because he's afraid he wouldn't wake up again. Monika says it will be alright and she will always be there to wake him. "It's so silent..." "Should I play for you?" "But it's night" "It's fine, I'll be quiet" "Alright" "Rolland.." "What is it, Monica?" "All of the world is yours!" Rolland smiled, although only a bit. Monica didn't know as many words as Rolland did, and she wasn't good at composing poems, although she was trying her best. She felt she was unable to express what she meant to say. "Really!" she added before starting to play. To that Rolland only answered: "Is it?" In winter Monica was happy to see some first snow. But when she took a bit of it to show Rolland, he acted all indifferent. It seems like he's fighting something without showing a single sign. But he does suffer. He also feels that he's stealing everybody's time and doesn't even want everyone to celebrate Christmas with him. "Monica, leave me be. I'm fine!" "But I'm not. I don't wanna stay alone." "But I do. <...> Even without you, I know the world is full of beautiful things." "Yeah, I don't even doubt that. You know so much." "I close my eyes and I see beauty." "That means you can see something I can't" "I even like autumn!" "Haven't you told you didn't?" "I... don't hate it. You see, even those scarlet and golden leaves you are gathering are my treasure. I wish autumn would come again. <...>" "It's soon. But first it will have to become warmer, the hot summer will pass, and then it will get cooler again". "That's too long... <...> That's too long for me." Soon after that his condition gets even worse. His lips and nails get pale and dark. His voice almost disappears and he breathes heavily. He's asked Monica to bring all of her paintings, and they're now hanged on the walls. When he can keep his eyes opened, he looks at those. That wasn't for long though. When the almond blooms again, Rolland can't open his eyes anymore. His eyelids only tremble a bit from time to time, it feels like he's unconscious. A nurse is getting invited to the house, and that woman tells Monica that she can clearly see that her brother is delighted to hear her play harmonica. He certainly can hear it, even though he's unable to talk. Monica chats with him a lot, imagining what he would answer to her, and from his face she seems to see whether she guessed it right or wrong. Soon Rolland passes away. He clearly said "How beautiful" just before that. She doesn't call him but once. Because she knows he's on his way to other horizons in his search for beautiful things. This world was way too beautiful to spend all of his time fighting. So why distracting him by calling his name? She only kisses him silently at parting. And that was the last long story, I guess. a piece of Noël nr 8 Noël has successfully graduated and become a teacher. That was sort of lucky, because he's taking the place of a certain woman who suddenly took her maternity leave. We see Noël at his first day at school, how he's being presented to the children. And my, my, that's quite something XDDD He freezes seeing all the children faces, and an unknown melody starts to play in his head. He's delighted and he can't properly process his own thoughts at the moment. The teacher that was accompanying him tried to present him to the class, when Noël thought he was grown-up enough to do it himself, so he put a finger upon his lips and said: "shhhh!" to the teacher x3 After that he's getting acquaintanced with the class. "Noël... sensei?.." "What?" Noël answered, and then he realized it wasn't supposed to be phrased that way. "What is it?" "May I ask you something?" "You're welcome to. You may ask whatever you want. I will answer any question I can." "What about the questions you can't answer?" "I won't answer them" "Aah..." some of the pupils (three of them, to be exact) answered. <...> "I won't be answering questions that I cannot answer. But I promise I won't tell you a single lie" "You won't?" a girl asked seriously. She looked elder than her age, as if she was in the middle school already, and she didn't bother to stand up. Her voice sounded somewhat sassy, too (although that's no wonder if she had suffered from someone's lie). "I won't". "What if you do?" "I'll entrust you my life <...> And I'm not kidding. I mean it. I won't lie to you. I'm always keeping my promises. And I never give promises I can't keep". <end of the quote> He's being asked about his unusual eyes and hair color, and he answers that apparently one of his parents was a foreigner (but he's still a Japanese himself). Then he wins over the class when he's starting to ask their names and gives short commentary on everyone, and promises to remember every single name. But that's not all. After that follows another episode. Noël is visiting a person in a hospital. His grand-mother, to be exact. One and a half year before the described events he finally met her again. Unfortunately, she wasn't in the state to speak anymore. Actually, she's almost dead. She can't eat nor breathe on her own. Her brain-waves are almost extinct. Still he comes to visit her. At first it was very hard for him to not look away in disgust, but he's now used to it. He brought some oranges and, um, tries to let her smell them, hoping that perhaps she can feel something after all. He tells her about his job a bit. And thinks that his gran was always straining herself. Now she's locked herself away from the rest of the world and finally has the time to relax. When at hospital, he can't hear any sounds in his head for some reason. He also wonders if his gran really wants to get distracted by his visits. 10. TASOGARE NO KENJA A woman, Chloe, is walking around an old park. She's deep in her thoughts and not really paying attention to what she's doing. For instance, she's actually alone in a deserted park at night. That could be quite dangerous for a young woman. Yet she doesn't seem to think about that at all. All she does is sitting down a bench near a fountain and preparing herself to cry, muttering from time to time something like "What does it matter now..." She also seems to remember some young man, and that's where she's about to finally let her tears loose, when suddenly a voice interrupts the process: "Bonsoir, mademoiselle". The voice belongs to some mysterious man. I don't think I need to give you the description, but it's important that these clothes of his seem odd to the young Chloe, they seem out of date. His manner of speaking is quite weird, too. But since the language he's talking isn't her mother tongue, she isn't sure whether he has an accent or what. The man asks if he may sit with her. Uncomfortable as Chloe felt, she agreed (she always tends to do the opposite of what she's told, even if that's her voice of reason talking to her x3). The man talks to her and she's starting to suspect he's a stalker. Yet they do speak. The man sees that something is worrying her, but she only tells that she's a foreigner. The man notices that she speaks pretty fluently. That's actually surprising because she only started to study the language at university. Anyway, the only problem she gives away to have is that she has a hard time understanding her neighbours speaking. And feeling a bit lost in this country. Is that really a problem worth making 11 circles around the fountain? Apparently it is. Then the man starts to cite the song, confusing Chloe x3 In the end she does get the formula: 0 = nobody's here 1 = the man = Chloe = him = anyone 2 = the man + Chloe = 1+1 The man also tells his name's Savant. That's not his true name though. Well, she's Chloe. That's not her true name either, but her true name is apparently too difficult to pronounce. Then the two part. Chloe's living in a flat, not the smallest flat possible. Apparently she's a teacher, but since a while ago she doesn't work much. But she can't do anything at her spare time. She just either sits in the sofa or lies in her bed. She can't watch TV nor read books (she doesn't remember a word of what's written afterwards). Hating herself for doing nothing, she tries to compose a letter. But that one gets a mess and she throws it away. There are a lot of photos on the walls. Where the two are happy together... After a week she found herself in the very same park. She meets the man again. They talk. Savant cites the song again and Chloe's getting even more confused by it x3 After he ends the strophe with that "we're locking ourselves", or whatever was the precise quote from the English translation, Chloe thinks of how complicated the links between things are. She remembers how her mother taught her how to knit. Back then she thought it was the most boring thing ever: to interweave threads by always repeating the same movements... "Alright" Chloe nodded. "I'll try to explain". "You have my full attention" <...> "Here's me." "Yes, here's you". "Yup, right, me. And there's another person." "Me, I assume?" "No, not you", Chloe put her hands on her tummy. "Inside myself" "Hrm", Savant said, twisting his mustache. "In other words, your child?" "That's right, Savant. <...> Right. But there's no father" "Are you virgin Mary?" "Unfortunately not. Not that I had any issues with that. You see, the person that was supposed to become his father isn't here." "Isn't here anymore?" "He's gone forever" "That's sad" "It is. At least I'm very unhappy about that." "To give birth to a baby and raise it all alone. Well, that happens of course, but that's still rather troublesome." "That happens" "I guess so" "A lot, actually" "Yeah, you must be right." "I'm ill" <end of quote> She learned she had a disease after he was gone. And right now Chloe did burst into tears without even noticing it. Savant gives her a handkerchief and leaves. The next scene is taking place at a doctor's consulting room. Amara, Chloe's doctor, is telling her the situation, which's pretty nasty. She has cancer, stage III. There's still hope, but she will have to do an abortion. She asks for some more time to think about it. By the way he calls her by the real surname, which is Kuroeda. Soon after that she's having a conversation with Savant again. I don't really see the point in retelling this conversation in detail, really. I only have to mention that this reflects some motifs from Honoo (see above). They're talking in mathematical terms again. But Chloe thinks all those formulae aren't really applicable here. After all, 1+1 doesn't necessarily equal 2. It can be 0, if both she and the child die. But as the conversation goes on, she starts to realize that the truth is really hidden everywhere. Like, when it seemed like the time stopped in her conversation with Savant, she could still hear the fountain's sound. That means the time hasn't really stopped. The truth is, that even if the fountain steadily holds the same shape, the water is always different and the time never stops. It flows in one direction. We will all perish. 0+0=0, there's nothing. But if you accept the night when you have to go, the child will love the life too, right? No one else except her can give birth to this particular child, to whom she sort of addresses a monologue: "Even though a morning has come for you, there will inevitably be a night after that. Even if you see a light like a flame and stretch your hand to get a hold of a gem. Even if a windmill goes on spinning around on the windy hill by the place where you fall to the ground. Even though there will be stardust blinking above your head. Even if you manage to see an angel's smile. There might be days when you embrace happy and beautiful dreams, and days when you will be intoxicated by wine. Wandering, you will meet a wise man like I did [!!], and he will help you getting the true meaning of the message scattered all around the world... And in the end you'll set to the journey to the horizon. You're the same". Resolved, she stands up from the bench, she straightens her spine and goes away. <sudden twists incoming!!> Savant's still sitting on the bench and smiling, as if he's really-really pleased. Suddenly he can't hear the water noise anymore. That's because it's too late and the fountain got turned off. He knew and was expecting that. What he wasn't expecting though, is that there will suddenly appear a man with folds on his forehead and say in a weird voice: "I've been searching for you, Christophe". Yes. Christophe is M. That other man is W. They're opposite yet they're the same thing. They're like two shatters of the same poem. W has been chasing M for a long long time. W calls M 'metamorphos', in kanji - "shapeless". M calls W Wulfric, the 'wolf-ruler', and also 'the Winter one'. W wants to kill M. M only laughs, because Wulfric's too late again, anyway. While Wulfric wants to end everything, M knows there's no such thing as an "end". Even if W kills M, it doesn't really change anything. M hopes that W will get it one day. [The human lives]"Repeating the story, death and loss, revolving Paradise and Abyss! Boys keep on drawing romans even when they go. And that's the true essence of Roman!" [M says] "I can't agree with you" "Still I believe we will come to understand each other one day." "Well, you're free to believe that" said Wulfric, putting his finger on the trigger "if you can" <...> A shot banged, and the world continued to be there without any changes. The night passed and a new morning began. Morning and night continued to replace each other. a piece of Noël nr 9 (apparently the longest one of the pieces! oh, and I'll be citing a lot!) Noël's gran is dead and they're holding a funeral. Remember Nuiko, the woman Noël was living by when he was a child? She's also there, moreover, she was mostly in charge for arranging the funeral. Noël is sort of enraptured by how she managed to treat funeral services from the economical point of view (as if it was all about the money). But he also thinks how kind it is of her to process all the stuff for the person who wasn't her mother. She isn't all that heartless he guesses. Her family (i.e. Ryuuetsu and Norio, the other boy I haven't mentioned in the piece nr 3) is there too, along with her husband. That one is standing by the car, though, he isn't coming to the burial itself) and Noël are the only ones who actually made it to the cemetery. While all the others seem quite indifferent and/or bored, Noël's not: "Noël was looking at the gravestone and speaking without a sound: That's all, granny... No, he corrected himself in a second - baba [I don't remember how it was translated by Defade. you know, baba's somewhat ruder than obaa-chan]. That's all, baba. You were put silently to sleep, getting cut off all those pipes - that's no fun, huh? Not that you were any fun at all. Had you regained consciousness, you'd think you want someone to kill you already, no doubt. Although you hadn't. That wasn't really 'life', was it? Yet you were being kept 'alive'. And I was talking to you as if you had been alive. Although I knew it was a lie. Had I had at least a shatter of kindness, I'd get you cut off the artificial breath right off. You must know, I was actually thinking about it, but not that I was considering that seriously, like, weighting pros and cons and such. And I didn't want to, to tell you the truth. I haven't done anything for you. You died all alone. I let you die all alone. Baba. Granny. I'm not apologizing. But I will tell you from the bottom of my heart. I didn't hate you. You were stiff, you lived alone and you died alone, but I don't hate you. I'm proud of you and I have respect for you. And I feel lonely because of your death." <end of quote> Then the weather gets worse and the family decides to leave asap. They're not taking Noël though. Their ways part here. At parting Nuiko tells though that all of the old woman's belongings are in a storage now, and Noël gotta sort them out in the upcoming three days. Noël was rather planning to get rid of all of them, but the old man on the encounter advised him to take a look at least. And so Noël did. There weren't many things, but there were some. Some old drawer for example, but we'll come to that later. Noël spots a bag he can remember his gran wearing back in piece nr 1, He actually tries to copy her manner to walk with that bag. And thinks how it seemed so cool and so warlike, as if she were fighting the whole world. He thinks again that he didn't hate her. He doesn't have the right to say that he loved her, though, because he did nothing. Had he loved her, he would hug her and try to be her ally in this fight against the world. Well then, the drawer. Some meds in the upper shelves, no papers (Nuiko must've taken those already), an old kimono with a nostalgic scent he could remember from his childhood. Then finally the bottom shelf. Some photoalbums (Noël wants to take a closer look at the old photos and decides to take those), postcards from random people - nothing special. And finally three letters all written by the same person from different places. Two are just envelopes, but the last one still has the letter inside. Noël takes that one. Seems very old, and it's been reread so many times that it got really decrepit by the bends. It also seems as if it's been under a rain or something, the paper's all wavy. It's hardly readable though. Except for one last line. You know which. Following - a passage about how shitty is the world and how so many bad things are happening, and how life is not priceless but worthless, and how there die a lot of people every second. But no one wants to notice this. Because that's tough. People aren't allowed to be kind to other people or they'll break. "He was never creating illusions that anyone wanted his birth. He just couldn't imagine that. Because he had had such a miserable life. Because he was feeling lonely. Because he was feeling sad. Because he had pitied himself. He wanted to hate! To hate from the bottom of his heart, to be rude, to destroy. Then he would have forgotten how miserable he was. There would be no more loneliness or sadness. But, unfortunately, he pitied himself. Perhaps he was an unwanted child, yet he valued himself. And he wanted to think that it's fine that he's allowed to live. He wanted to believe. However miserable, lonely and sad his life was, but he was also living it sort of furious and with all his strength. He was grasping and clinging onto it. He tried to love the world. To forgive. And thus to deserve forgiveness. It's fine for me to live, isn't it? Of course it is - that's what he wanted to hear as an answer. At least little by little! Let the others acknowledge his right to live. He isn't bothering anyone. He isn't a threat to anyone. If left in peace, he never does anything bad to anyone. Isn't it fine if he just lives here?" Noël's drinking hard. And keeps remembering those enchanted words from the letter. He thinks that his life wasn't all that bad actually. Like, there's no devastating war. And he does live in a hi-tech country and he has Internet. How amazing is that?! He can upload the pieces of music that are roaming through his head for everyone to hear. Isn't that a salvation? He can't bear it when he's sober so he's drunk pretty constantly. He thinks that it's not like there's a door which one can only go through with a signed license from one's mother that he's allowed to live. No one will ever guess that a child is unwanted unless someone tells that. He's trying to think that his mother didn't mean it perhaps, that it was just a figure, because she felt upset or something... But then, when he tried to speak about that to some strangers, he got into a fight and ended up getting a little beaten and sitting in some side-street, looking at the stars with his lips bleeding. And thinking of how all the stars will vanish, and nothing can help. He can't find the meaning anymore. He thinks he needs to tell that to his pupils. And how much of a shit he was for wanting to use these children to find a meaning for himself. It's Christmas Eve. Noël's drunk again, he's standing in the street, looking at celebrating people. He's smiling and singing Christmas carols. Shit happened. The teacher, who had taken the maternity leave, came back to the school. Her baby didn't survive after all, and she wants to get back to work asap. Noël quits. He can't remember much after that, apparently he was drinking all along. Already drunk, he goes to some bar. It's full packed, and Noël can sort of hear some music there, but he doesn't even seem to realize it's inside his head. There he falls asleep, having ordered a whiskey. When he wakes up he discovers his wallet is gone, so he gets beaten up again by the other customers. He goes away after that and ends up sitting in some side-street, looking at the stars and the freezing white moon with his lips bleeding and a the feeling of deja-vu. He thinks he should just lock in himself and bear this shitty life until he's gone. Without hoping or believing. When suddenly he notices a black figure... After the fated line, "I have heard your music", Noël freaks out and can't understand how it’s possible to establish the link between those pieces he's uploaded and himself. And how come anyone could know he'd be here (he doesn't even know where he is himself). But you know the scenario and which book he's about to receive... The last thing Revo gets to say in this chapter is "Stream your song. You can do that, and you cannot do otherwise". 11. 11-MOJI NO DENGON Chloe-san's back! (she's named in the preface of the chapter with the list of characters, but I don't think her name is mentioned even once in the chapter itself). She's also back to Japan, btw. She's become much skinnier now, and her disease's pretty bad. Still, having put on her jacket which is now too big for her body, and putting on sun-glasses she wanders off from the hospital. Walking through the morning streets, she remembers her messy life. How she fell in love with a foreign student when she was 20, and how mad that love was, and how they didn't want to part for even one moment. At some point she reaches a park and there she sees a fountain with a bench not far from it. There she sits. Her thoughts are getting a bit messy, too. She can't feel much pain, though. Perhaps they should've tried a bit harder to pursue her mother to give them her blessing, but instead they decided to go to his motherland. His adoptive parents weren't really happy to see their boy gave up on his study for some Japanese girl. Moreover, they were in the middle of getting a divorce, too, so they hadn't really helped at all. It could still be pretty fine had she not become pregnant. After that her husband gave up on all the part-time jobs and went to some mining company. Soon enough there was rumored to have been some kind of an accident. She got reported that apparently he died, but no details had been revealed, and soon that company just disappeared in the thin air. Then the news about her illness. How would her life have changed if she had made other decisions? No idea, but at least there's one decision she doesn't doubt. That's giving birth to her child. She felt already pretty weak by that time and even fell unconscious soon after the birth. Well, at least she did manage to meet her mother and tell her the situation personally, and not in some messy letter (which she had sent earlier and which was just really messy). And for the first time in her life she saw her mother crying. She can remember her husband hearing the news. When it was confirmed she's pregnant and would give birth around December, he muttered something like "Winter... or maybe Christmas" - she's remembered both names but couldn't decide for one until she's given the birth to their baby. She would want to apologize personally when you grow up and blame her for leaving you right after you were born. What would you do then? You'd probably laugh. "You probably can laugh by now, can you? I wish I could hear you laugh. See your smile. <...> Say, you would be getting spoiled a bit, right? And loved. You'll come to meet different people. Some will become your friends, you'll fall in love with some others. But it's probably not going to be always just fun. There will be hard times, too. You would be betrayed and wounded sometimes, and you'll injure someone too, I guess. But that'll hit you as well. You'll be regretting it and think about that a lot, and you'll be failing some tasks. Sometimes you'll be in pain. You will be for sure. But you know what? When that pain becomes unbearable, you may just squat down. And feel like you want to run away a bit. But if you can, I would like you to face your hardships bravely. I think at times you really need courage to live a life. Never give up, alright? Whatever may be, never give up. Don't give up until your last day. Because that's a no go. Because that's your life. <...> Please don't ask me what kind of a life I wish you would have. Just live as you feel it. No, really, please do! You are born already, isn't that alone great? But I beg you. Please do live. I want you to live. Don't forget that. Remember. You are born because I really wanted you to be. I'm so glad I gave you life. I'm so glad I gave life to you. I miss you. I miss you so much. I wanted to come, but apparently that's too far. So far... I'm sorry. I can't really see anymore. I guess there's almost no time left. But I can still hear the fountain. So dark. You face... Laugh! Please. Laugh. I want to see you, but... I want to keep an eye on you, but... alas. Rin to ikinasai [sry x3] And I hope you... b-e-c-o-m-e-h-a-..." <end of the quote> We see "you" from the beginning again. You turn around to see a gate, and both Violette and Hortense are standing there, not uttering a single sound. They don't tell you what to do. Yet you step forward. a piece of Noël nr 10 Very unusual language-wise, but sorry, that's getting completely neglected x'3 We're in the beginning of a live. Noël's all excited. When will it finally begin? It's all dark, because the lights are off. Finally they go to the stage. Spectators can sort of feel and see by the little light they do have that the musicians are on the stage already, so they're getting overexcited. Noël just can't wait. He's putting a lot of effort not to grasp the microphone yet. And still... When they do begin playing, Noël suddenly doesn't sing 83 The music slowly ceases. Everyone's staring at him (Ichizo's panicking in the backstage). They've been having so many rehearsals. Everything should be fine. Yet there's something he has to do right here and right now. Noël does take the microphone and starts to hold a speech. Translating most of it below. "When we had just met, gurasan said something to me. That "musicians' souls are free". Musicians'. I was sitting there all down, and he suddenly called me a musician. He acknowledged me as an equal to himself. Well yeah. Apparently I am a musician. <...> I'm not a good talker, really, but I can tell everything I want with music. <...> Then why am I standing here and blabbering instead? Listen. Gurasan said that musicians' souls were free. But does that apply solely to musicians? You know what. Freedom isn't easy. You can't gain it just like that. You can't even feel it just like that, actually. But you know what. Just think. Close your eyes and think. Of whatever you want. Of whatever comes to your mind. Like, of your beloved being, for example. A reminiscence. Whatever. Got it? Were you free at that moment? The soul's freedom isn't something that only musicians have. You are all free <...> I am a musician. Gurasan's right, damn my poor destiny. It's been following me ever since I was a kid. That's my fate. If you're a musician you can't run away from that <...>. But even though I'm a musician, I'm also a human. Just like you guys. Our life is much like a journey. A long or a short one, that depends on a person, but we are all wandering. We are heading to another horizon. Some of us walk under the very same sky and see and hear the very same things. Our ways cross and part. We're all wanderers. You and I - we're all free wanderers. That's what I wanted to begin with. Not as a musician. That's where my free journey begins. I'm no different from you. At all. Yes, I'm standing at this place and I do mean it. Well okay, perhaps I can see a bit better from this spot up here on the stage. I can see every one of you, every face. And you're all staring at me. It feels so weird, you know. Why am I standing here? <telling short of his meeting with Revo and finding the musicians> What about yourselves? How come you're here? Huh? What? Who said that? Could you please repeat, I couldn't hear. Ah... by chance, you say? Because you were born in this country at this time? Thanks for giving me life, mother? I see. No, really, give my shitty thanks to your mom, please. That's how it is, isn't it? We all get born to begin with. Someone's giving us a life. There are different circumstances, and very complicated ones, too, I can't agree more. But we did end up getting born. Whatever may be, we're all here right now. We're different, yet we're the same if you think about it. Me, you, us, here and now. And that's the point. Have you experienced something fun lately? Or something sad perhaps? Something hard? It wasn't in vain. It's all our roman. What is your way like? Is it comfortable? Full of dead-ends? Do you have to reverse all the time? And then onwards, with the gas pedal down? You feel like your legs are all broken? You try your best? Ah, that one's nice. What? You can't hold anymore? Yes, that happens too. Listen, wanderers. Fellows. Friends. Like-minders. You may as well be me. We may be different but we have the same roots. One day I will cross a completely different horizon. And even if we're born in the same country and in one century, we still see different landscapes and experience things differently. <...> But we're here and now. Our horizons have linked. Having met you guys, I acknowledge the way that led me to this meeting. And I can't help valuing myself. And you too, obviously. Well then, wanderers. Soon we will take off again, but as for now - let your wings rest a bit. Listen to my song. Listen to our play. Feel it with your body. Our roman. Vanishing Starlight. Yodaka no Hoshi..." This blinking star will vanish one day, but me [ore], and me [boku] and you, and all of you, and we will continue our journey across the horizon where morning and night revolve. Because there's roman there. (the end.)

[declassroomedteach-blog]

Jailhouse Salvation 101

Jailhouse Salvation 101

(word count approx 1570)

By Gina Fournier

 The Merchant-Ivory movie adaptation of E. M. Forster’s A Room with a View features a poignant scene following a street fight that ends in murder.  Lucy (Helen Bonham Carter) comments that you witness something memorable and think you’ll never be the same, but then you forget and return to your old self.  I hope to do a better job holding onto my jailhouse conversion, from skeptical to convinced about the existence of God.  

 Disclaimer: My conviction has wavered intensely even before I finished editing this essay.

Thanks to my former employer and its bad actors, an institution I’ll call Land of Motown Community College, where I served as an English teacher, I’ve seen the best and the worst of pure Michigan humanity.  If God created humans, God sure must have a sense of humor.

Even a smattering of details from my story sound like a rollercoaster Lifetime movie no one wants to watch.  Since 2012, I’ve been sexist witch-hunted through an ongoing living nightmare that has included hack shrinks, illegal and involuntary lock up in a Catholic mental health ward and now incarceration for thirty-four days in a mid-Michigan county jail for a crime I did not commit. College administrators, union teachers, dirty cops, dirty doctors, dirty nuns and dirty priests, plus the state’s top most government officials, have participated in the protection of white collar criminals and encouraged my simultaneous downfall.   All this for me, so one man can prove his power over unions near union ground zero.

The U.S. Constitution’s first amendment makes clear that government is not to establish any official religion, not protect any particular religion from existing laws. Perhaps the founding fathers could foresee the distant future.  Nearly two hundred fifty years later, a female citizen has found cause to invert the phrase “God bless you” with blasphemy, attempting to redress grievances.  

I’ve never met the emergency room doctor who signed me into a Catholic looney bin for a week.  To my horror, I was held in a Catholic Siberia, it turns out, on campus with my all girl Catholic high school.  I was raised and violated by the same church, which now pretends it’s never met me.  Thirty five years ago, for Halloween, classmates mimicked the Robert Redford movie Brubaker to stage a failed, backboneless prison break.  These classmates, who have also turned away from my plight, dressed not in hospital gowns or orange as the new black, but plaid skirts and knee socks adorned temporarily with stripes. (Good girls, we stopped mock rioting when the nuns glared.)

Unfortunately, there is no law or principle governing the intersection of religion and families.   In my time of need, even my immediate and extended family has turned away, exponentially multiplying my distress.  My extended Catholic family has not advocated for me, though it would cost nothing except some skin.  The anger caused by this and so many betrayals envelops like nuclear explosion.

However, I realized something on day thirty-three of my lock up in the big house.  Because the ties between families and religion tend to act like strangleholds, my estranged Catholic mother is incapable of doing the one thing I want and need her most to do: to demand that Livonia Catholics honestly investigate me claims.  Because of my new found belief, I forgive my aging mother.  She’s only human and doing the best she can.  (Unfortunately, the damage done feels irreparable.  Forgiveness does not mean I can tolerate her presence.)

Through five solid years of loss, I have been cornered mentally and financially into a nearly impossible position.  But the kindest of strangers have helped me to survive.  Downstate, nice generous neighbors responded to my cries for help by giving. Up north, the same.   People have given money, food, house wares, helpful supplies such as wood, shoes, warm clothes, plus their time and honest well wishes.  I wish I would have kept better track of the names and faces of the many regular people who have been so kind, forming a lifeline, keeping me alive.

My fighting spirit has kept better track of my transgressors, including Fox News Detroit, which ran a sexist hack piece in 2015 cutting together footage I asked them not to shoot in order to make me look looser than loopy.  In search of more positive and helpful press, my creative and liberal mind encouraged me to tag my own, downstate old-ring suburban home with a metaphoric phrase that offended and confused.  “A religious figure criminally violated me!” Only my version was Twitter-short.  Basic sentence: subject, verb, object.  

Passersby assumed I was nutz.  I’m not. Unfortunately, the human resources’ labor attorney and architect of my nightmare is smart enough to know that once a crone-aged female is labeled crazy dangerous, most people won’t bother to parse the facts.  Just ask Hillary.  Voters elected a man without ethics, unwilling to practice stability, a sexual harasser, eager to “lock her up!”

I recreated my civil rights protest up north at a lake named after the largest city in New Brunswick. Maybe I watched too many episodes of Little House on the Prairie, after numerous rereadings of the Laura Ingalls Wilder books.  In middle age, without an income, I’ve been forced to gather wood and water for two years, for two winters, with a third approaching, in order to survive in my dead husband’s summer cabin, which is facing tax forfeiture, and soon.  In both iterations, I repainted my eye-catching sacrilegious phrase with “Act Peace.”  I’m not a bad person, or dangerous, or interested in spreading evil. But Fox News Detroit has been not interested in my actual story.  

While I was incarcerated, nasty locals ran down my mailbox to which my sign “Act Peace” was nailed, and then took the sign.  Two paintings espousing the Statue of Liberty have been stolen.  My sign about the connection between the dirty cop who put me in jail and Land of Motown Community College was stolen, I’d guess by the dirty cop.  My cries for “help!” with needed justice have been ignored.  Instead, community officials at this private lake community have bent the law with the help of dirty local county officials, who may try to re-arrest me over the care of my feces.  Yes, you read correctly.  My troubles continue.  Danger surrounds. This is not a pretty story.

(FYI. Please believe me. I’m still be getting my proverbial shit together, but I’ve always I properly and responsibly discarded my poop.)

Something wicked this way came, and stayed, but I pray to harness goodness and finally slay the beast on my back. I’ve been falsely accused of being suicidal and a danger to society within a country that has grown accustomed to men mass murdering and sexual harassing.  I know the pain of mental illness in the form of mental torture, so I feel very sympathetic to those, especially military veterans, who suffer from PTSD.  Mental pain is real.  And can be excruciating.  I realize no matter my idiosyncratic tendencies, finally winning a measure of justice will require the help of other people, and, well, by any name, I guess God.  I know that God may not intercede with my legal and financial problems but belief in a higher power does help with gratefulness and tranquility.

In jail, every day is a good day to die.  However, the smallest graces save a tattered soul and help a person carry on to the next long minute.   I want to thank the two women who ran Bible study every Tuesday.  Yes, you read correctly.  Unbeknownst to them, they gave me gold for a writer without means: a composition notebook, on my 54th birthday, which was an otherwise desolate milestone.  Moreover, these women of God showed me a respectable and inspirational version of Christianity.

On cable tv, my cellmates preferred back-to-back episodes of Cops, shows about zombies, the shallow high jinks of Jerry Springer, endless sci-fi.  (I prefer comedy and drama.)  The day I was eventually sprung from the slammer, my legal troubles abated but not erased, Unsolved Mysteries ran a segment on St. Pio, an Italian priest who was said to develop stigmata and miraculously heal.  Angered, under stress, I admit I acted out loudly like an ass (even by jail standards): “I hope they roast his nuts!”  

Many jail birds claim to accept Jesus as their savior, though none gave up their bottom bunk for the pregnant woman in our ranks.  Critically, I recognized around me the kind of souls who would have rejected Mary and Joseph. But I was forced to realize this was not a television segment that was going to uncover more Catholic dirt.  Although St. Pio may have self-inflicted his wounds, trapped in a county cell block, I dropped my bad attitude and truly felt in my body an undeniable wave of love.      

No surprise, in the short time since my release on PR bond, my nascent jailhouse conversion has been tested and wavered, fallen apart, and needing rebuilding.  Im not a saint.  My days are terrifying and unresolved.  But.  If I breathe calmly and deeply, and repeat my affirmations, what some call prayers, I recognize a connection between hope and light.    

House of Hope in Hersey, Michigan, offered me a composition notebook.  Any additional help readers may offer with legal defense, plumbing, back taxes, transportation, work or grace are appreciated. Thank you.  

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[declassroomedteach-blog]

Jailhouse Salvation 101

Jailhouse Salvation 101

(word count approx 1570)

By Gina Fournier

 The Merchant-Ivory movie adaptation of E. M. Forster’s A Room with a View features a poignant scene following a street fight that ends in murder.  Lucy (Helen Bonham Carter) comments that you witness something memorable and think you’ll never be the same, but then you forget and return to your old self.  I hope to do a better job holding onto my jailhouse conversion, from skeptical to convinced about the existence of God.  

 Disclaimer: My conviction has wavered intensely even before I finished editing this essay.

Thanks to my former employer and its bad actors, an institution I’ll call Land of Motown Community College, where I served as an English teacher, I’ve seen the best and the worst of pure Michigan humanity.  If God created humans, God sure must have a sense of humor.

Even a smattering of details from my story sound like a rollercoaster Lifetime movie no one wants to watch.  Since 2012, I’ve been sexist witch-hunted through an ongoing living nightmare that has included hack shrinks, illegal and involuntary lock up in a Catholic mental health ward and now incarceration for thirty-four days in a mid-Michigan county jail for a crime I did not commit. College administrators, union teachers, dirty cops, dirty doctors, dirty nuns and dirty priests, plus the state’s top most government officials, have participated in the protection of white collar criminals and encouraged my simultaneous downfall.   All this for me, so one man can prove his power over unions near union ground zero.

The U.S. Constitution’s first amendment makes clear that government is not to establish any official religion, not protect any particular religion from existing laws. Perhaps the founding fathers could foresee the distant future.  Nearly two hundred fifty years later, a female citizen has found cause to invert the phrase “God bless you” with blasphemy, attempting to redress grievances.  

I’ve never met the emergency room doctor who signed me into a Catholic looney bin for a week.  To my horror, I was held in a Catholic Siberia, it turns out, on campus with my all girl Catholic high school.  I was raised and violated by the same church, which now pretends it’s never met me.  Thirty five years ago, for Halloween, classmates mimicked the Robert Redford movie Brubaker to stage a failed, backboneless prison break.  These classmates, who have also turned away from my plight, dressed not in hospital gowns or orange as the new black, but plaid skirts and knee socks adorned temporarily with stripes. (Good girls, we stopped mock rioting when the nuns glared.)

Unfortunately, there is no law or principle governing the intersection of religion and families.   In my time of need, even my immediate and extended family has turned away, exponentially multiplying my distress.  My extended Catholic family has not advocated for me, though it would cost nothing except some skin.  The anger caused by this and so many betrayals envelops like nuclear explosion.

However, I realized something on day thirty-three of my lock up in the big house.  Because the ties between families and religion tend to act like strangleholds, my estranged Catholic mother is incapable of doing the one thing I want and need her most to do: to demand that Livonia Catholics honestly investigate me claims.  Because of my new found belief, I forgive my aging mother.  She’s only human and doing the best she can.  (Unfortunately, the damage done feels irreparable.  Forgiveness does not mean I can tolerate her presence.)

Through five solid years of loss, I have been cornered mentally and financially into a nearly impossible position.  But the kindest of strangers have helped me to survive.  Downstate, nice generous neighbors responded to my cries for help by giving. Up north, the same.   People have given money, food, house wares, helpful supplies such as wood, shoes, warm clothes, plus their time and honest well wishes.  I wish I would have kept better track of the names and faces of the many regular people who have been so kind, forming a lifeline, keeping me alive.

My fighting spirit has kept better track of my transgressors, including Fox News Detroit, which ran a sexist hack piece in 2015 cutting together footage I asked them not to shoot in order to make me look looser than loopy.  In search of more positive and helpful press, my creative and liberal mind encouraged me to tag my own, downstate old-ring suburban home with a metaphoric phrase that offended and confused.  “A religious figure criminally violated me!” Only my version was Twitter-short.  Basic sentence: subject, verb, object.  

Passersby assumed I was nutz.  I’m not. Unfortunately, the human resources’ labor attorney and architect of my nightmare is smart enough to know that once a crone-aged female is labeled crazy dangerous, most people won’t bother to parse the facts.  Just ask Hillary.  Voters elected a man without ethics, unwilling to practice stability, a sexual harasser, eager to “lock her up!”

I recreated my civil rights protest up north at a lake named after the largest city in New Brunswick. Maybe I watched too many episodes of Little House on the Prairie, after numerous rereadings of the Laura Ingalls Wilder books.  In middle age, without an income, I’ve been forced to gather wood and water for two years, for two winters, with a third approaching, in order to survive in my dead husband’s summer cabin, which is facing tax forfeiture, and soon.  In both iterations, I repainted my eye-catching sacrilegious phrase with “Act Peace.”  I’m not a bad person, or dangerous, or interested in spreading evil. But Fox News Detroit has been not interested in my actual story.  

While I was incarcerated, nasty locals ran down my mailbox to which my sign “Act Peace” was nailed, and then took the sign.  Two paintings espousing the Statue of Liberty have been stolen.  My sign about the connection between the dirty cop who put me in jail and Land of Motown Community College was stolen, I’d guess by the dirty cop.  My cries for “help!” with needed justice have been ignored.  Instead, community officials at this private lake community have bent the law with the help of dirty local county officials, who may try to re-arrest me over the care of my feces.  Yes, you read correctly.  My troubles continue.  Danger surrounds. This is not a pretty story.

(FYI. Please believe me. I’m still be getting my proverbial shit together, but I’ve always I properly and responsibly discarded my poop.)

Something wicked this way came, and stayed, but I pray to harness goodness and finally slay the beast on my back. I’ve been falsely accused of being suicidal and a danger to society within a country that has grown accustomed to men mass murdering and sexual harassing.  I know the pain of mental illness in the form of mental torture, so I feel very sympathetic to those, especially military veterans, who suffer from PTSD.  Mental pain is real.  And can be excruciating.  I realize no matter my idiosyncratic tendencies, finally winning a measure of justice will require the help of other people, and, well, by any name, I guess God.  I know that God may not intercede with my legal and financial problems but belief in a higher power does help with gratefulness and tranquility.

In jail, every day is a good day to die.  However, the smallest graces save a tattered soul and help a person carry on to the next long minute.   I want to thank the two women who ran Bible study every Tuesday.  Yes, you read correctly.  Unbeknownst to them, they gave me gold for a writer without means: a composition notebook, on my 54th birthday, which was an otherwise desolate milestone.  Moreover, these women of God showed me a respectable and inspirational version of Christianity.

On cable tv, my cellmates preferred back-to-back episodes of Cops, shows about zombies, the shallow high jinks of Jerry Springer, endless sci-fi.  (I prefer comedy and drama.)  The day I was eventually sprung from the slammer, my legal troubles abated but not erased, Unsolved Mysteries ran a segment on St. Pio, an Italian priest who was said to develop stigmata and miraculously heal.  Angered, under stress, I admit I acted out loudly like an ass (even by jail standards): “I hope they roast his nuts!”  

Many jail birds claim to accept Jesus as their savior, though none gave up their bottom bunk for the pregnant woman in our ranks.  Critically, I recognized around me the kind of souls who would have rejected Mary and Joseph. But I was forced to realize this was not a television segment that was going to uncover more Catholic dirt.  Although St. Pio may have self-inflicted his wounds, trapped in a county cell block, I dropped my bad attitude and truly felt in my body an undeniable wave of love.      

No surprise, in the short time since my release on PR bond, my nascent jailhouse conversion has been tested and wavered, fallen apart, and needing rebuilding.  Im not a saint.  My days are terrifying and unresolved.  But.  If I breathe calmly and deeply, and repeat my affirmations, what some call prayers, I recognize a connection between hope and light.    

House of Hope in Hersey, Michigan, offered me a composition notebook.  Any additional help readers may offer with legal defense, plumbing, back taxes, transportation, work or grace are appreciated. Thank you.  

   �!�-�`Pe��