#got hired by the goodwill games

[chibrary]

https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZT8Kdaokx/

do you know if this is true? I know Charles and Max drove for the same team, but I thought there wasn’t any documentation saying max/jos recommended Charles for the seat.

First, Max never drove for GP3. He drove in the European Formula 3 Championship, which was combined with GP3 in 2019 to create Formula 3. Charles raced in both series, spending 2015 in European Formula 3 and 2016 in GP3. While they've been merged since, they were two different series back when Charles and Max were driving.

And... it's complicated. When I was trying to verify this for the Chrimer, someone sent me an old Dutch forum post that did imply that Jos suggested Charles to the Van Amersfoort seat but I've found no sources from anyone directly involved confirming this.

Van Amersfoort was asked directly about why he signed Charles in a 2015 interview and said the following:

CLF: When did you discover him and why did you hire him? FvA: "You know, we closely follow several championships including the Formula Renault 2.0 ALPS in which he participated last year. He was very good even though he was only in his first season. I have him so invited to come and do some tests with us and we fell in love with each other (laughs). That's when we started talking with Nicolas Todt."

He did speak extensively about Max and Charles in that same interview:

CLF: What are its strengths and weaknesses?FvA: "It's a very good question, especially when we see this weekend's performances! At the start of the season we often compared Charles to Max, but it seems difficult to me because they have different characters and personalities. completely different. That said, they both have a lot of talent and I think Charles, as much as Max, deserves a seat in F1. Coming back to your question, I think Charles is very good at feeling his car . He knows where he gains time and where he loses. It seems simple like that, but in reality it's very complicated, especially when we're talking about tenths of a second. He's also very good at braking and in games. fast but it is less so on the starts." CLF: Do they have any similarities in their work or their driving?FvA: "Not really. For us, working one-on-one with Charles is fantastic. When Max Verstappen was with us, we also had to work with his father, and it was very difficult because Jos put a lot of pressure on us. To summarize we can also say that Max is an extremely talented driver but we must not forget that he was very well prepared by his father, since he was very young. This is the difference with Charles who is very good but whose preparation is perhaps not at the level of Max's."

I think it would have been natural to bring up any referral for Charles from the Verstappens at either point in the interview. The fact that it wasn't mentioned makes me doubt it was a serious factor.

I did include the line in the 2015 Chrimer (identifying it as a rumor) because its 1. so prolific within fandom and 2. not easily disproven.

My theory is its probably true, but not to the extent that fans-- especially creators on Tiktok who just regurgitate other fan content-- would like it to be. I bet Van Amersfoort was looking at Charles, asked the Verstappens and got a positive answer re: his performance... at that time, Max was entering F1 and a former karting rival three or four series below was not a threat. It's not like putting in a good word was any threat to Max's future.

However, to act like any goodwill from the Verstappens aided Charles' career notably discounts Charles' personal success. This is a review of Charles' first year in single-seaters from before the move to Van Amsersfort happened:

After several starring years on the world karting scene, Leclerc’s car debut season was a long awaited one and it lived up to expectations. A non-score at the Imola opener aside, Leclerc delivered a superb rookie season, maturing and improving round after round, which culminated in a spectacular double victory at Monza and saw a further five podium appearances throughout the campaign. A protege of Nicolas Todt’s All Road Management firm, he has also been superb in his guest Eurocup outings and the chief 2.0 series appears to be a logical next step – one he’s more than ready for. In fact, it wouldn’t be a surprise to see him take a higher jump up the ladder than that. 

Charles had tested with three European F3 teams in the lead up to the 2015 season. There was serious interest. Any referral-- whether or not it existed-- was not the reason why he made it into European F3.

[lunarriviera]

another thrilling spirealm update

henlo my friends yes it's that time once again where i tell you what is happening on the bizarrely named drama "the spirealm," i am at episode 25 having shotgunned it all weekend and i have thoughts, opinions, and a gabillion screencaps of ruan nanzhu looking stricken, i finally had to stop taking them because he has the exact same face of devastated yearning in all of them and i was filling up my cloud drive. spoilers ahoy! [parts one and two are here if you even care]

as just mentioned, ruan nanzhu spends his time looking either 1) icily indifferent (when people who aren't qiushi are talking to him and/or dying in front of him, to his vast annoyance) or 2) torn asunder by pangs of desire (whenever he's staring at qiushi, who's babbling obliviously about science or clues or absolutely nothing of any importance whatsoever). here is a representative screencap but he has this look on his face pretty much continually, like he's just been hit by a car. a car of love.

it makes me put my head in my hands and scream quietly, i haven't seen a BL actor who understood the assignment this well since zhang xincheng or maybe even z1l. (who all clearly not only read the novel but underlined it, highlighted it, and stuck in colored post-it notes.) when not busy with adoration, he swans around being magnificent in a frockcoat like he's edward rochester, while lin qiushi trails behind him wearing a fit he got out of the goodwill box in his college dorm.

in spite of being besties with a literal fashion icon, at no point does it ever seem to occur to lingling "hm maybe i should dress a bit more formally for my imminent demise inside the doors"—no, instead he proudly wears his ratty sweatshirt with holes in it. which i sort of think might belong to huang junjie. idk maybe qiushi trusts it, and feels safe in it, hey look at that i made it sad.

massive power couple energy. also notice how their outfits are exact black-and-white negatives of each other, the harper's bazaar wedding photoshoot would have been so goddamn lit.

taking a brief moment for a shoutout to this guy. chen fei i don't even know what your fate will be but i already know you deserved better. not only do you patch everyone up with your veterinary knowledge, but i have seen your unrequited love. it did not go unobserved. you would have been a great partner, you're unimpressed by everything and drink your soy milk with chilling apathy. i'm real sorry the theatre gay didn't love you back. you're too similar i guess.

back to lin qiushi who has the worst case of main character energy since harry freaking potter. somehow the game is about him??? he has trauma??? none of this was in the novel and i'm just pretending it's not happening until it becomes impossible to ignore. in the meantime he continues to sympathize with door ghosts because he's just that nice of a guy. (EXCEPTION: nanzhu literally murdered two competitors bc they threatened his darling, and lin qiushi helped him cover it up. i was appalled for like 5 minutes then i shrugged. it's a cutthroat game, the doors change people. also it's like captain mal used to say: if someone tries to kill you, you kill 'em right back.) i have big Theories about what is fixing to happen but for now i will end by relating that lin qiushi has gone into a door alone, because he wants to butch up and be a better partner for ruan nanzhu. and that would be a great idea and super helpful except that nanzhu IMMEDIATELY WENT OUT OF HIS MIND WITH BLIND TERROR. outwardly of course he gives no signs of this (other than hiring someone to protect his fragile boyfriend, which, if lingling figures this out, ruan nanzhu will be sleeping on the sofa forever).

here he is pushing food around his plate miserably at lingling's funeral pre-solo-door party. everyone is having such a fun time.

and here he is standing in front of the door waiting like a dumb wounded animal. i have a feeling if lin qiushi doesn't emerge at 15 minutes on the dot, nanzhu will simply expire on the spot, like a wolf separated from its mate. maybe that's the end of the spirealm JUST KIDDING, we still haven't gotten to the part where they're on either side of a different door wailing at each other. i really need lin qiushi to stop being such a cheery equanimous little frat boy and START SUFFERING, can we get some mutual pining up in this bitch. (also i need his hair to change in the traditional BL post-wedding hairstyle alteration because i can't remember at this point if huang junjie even HAS a forehead under that vast curtain of bangs)

to sum up, we've had a) sexy handfeeding of lychees b) tender cat fur removal from face and c) stalking your pretty boyfriend aggressively against the wall so you can…offer him a packet of disinfectant. in the novel of course nanzhu bites him and yes xia zhiguang absolutely knows that's what he's supposed to be doing here, we love to see it.

oh and also d) "i'll protect you. i'll protect you forever."

SOON: THE THRILLING CONCLUSION. IT'LL BE SO FUCKING SAD. PS unrelated to any of this but the OST SLAPS and i sing along every time now, that opening song is an unskippable cut scene of a banger

PS gonna be sad when [redacted] dies, he's a real card. and that other person dies too. and that third person. shit it's about to get messy

[petoskeystones]

Happy (late) birthday Rickie!! Coincidentally I've been listening to your 19 and 91 playlists all day (I know nothing about hockey but they're really good) (and compelling...) (If you ever want to tell someone all about 19 and 91 I'm here 👀) <3

thank you for the birthday wishes bird!! you have no idea what you've just unleashed upon the dash, though. 19 and 91... everyone sit down for the abridged, but still way too long, version of the story of steve yzerman and sergei fedorov.

in 1983 the detroit red wings, formerly the greatest american hockey team of all time and the pride of the city, were very bad. they were called the dead wings. they had no money and no prospects and they were frightened. they had just been purchased, however, by a fellow named mike ilitch, who you may know as the founder and ceo of little caesars pizza, and he had hired a new general manager named jim devellano, and they wanted to turn things around. in that summer of 1983, with the fourth overall pick in the nhl draft, ilitch and devellano wanted to take pat lafontaine, a hometown boy and one of the best prospects of the year. but lafontaine went third, to the new york islanders, and they settled for a kid named steve yzerman instead.

in 1983, steve yzerman made the roster out of training camp. he scored 39 goals. he was the youngest nhl all-star ever. he finished second in voting for best rookie of the year. within two years, 20-year-old steve yzerman was the youngest captain in the history of the detroit red wings, with his coach stating that he practically had "the red wings crest tattooed on his chest". by the end of his career he would be one of the most beloved athletes in the history of detroit sports.

his legacy is for later though. in the 1980s we were still losing. so that wasn't great. by 1989, we hadn't seen the playoffs in over a decade, and jim devellano was in the hot seat, and so he decided to do something insane, which was use up one of his 1989 draft picks on a russian named sergei fedorov.

to try to put this into some context: in 1989 there was one single russian player in all of the nhl, alexander moligny, who had defected from the soviet union that year in order to play. soviet hockey was inextricably linked with the military during the cold war, with players for thee cska moscow team being considered army officers. they spent 11 months of the year playing hockey away from their families. they absolutely demolished the united states and canada at their own sport. jim devellano used his fourth-round draft pick on a soviet military asset that he would likely never get to see play in detroit.

why the hell did he do that? well, he had talked to steve yzerman beforehand, because steve had played against the soviet team in the hockey world championship.

and so they drafted sergei fedorov, and in the same draft, vladimir konstantinov, and everyone thought jim devellano was crazy for it. it took until june of 1990 for sergei fedorov to defect from the soviet union and fly, from the goodwill games in portland, to detroit, where they set him up in the wings' vice president jim lites' house in the suburbs and went about the business of teaching him english. why did he defect? well, other than the fact that he badly wanted to play nhl hockey, they gave him several things: a corvette, and $10,000, and an apartment on the river, and the same contract as steve yzerman. it was the last thing that eventually got sergei on the plane.

and so they had the second russian in the national hockey league, wearing number 91, chosen for being the inverse of steve's 19.

from 1990-1997 we acquired four more russian players (konstantinov, kozlov, larionov and fetisov), and the russian five unit revolutionized the hockey world. this not hyperbole, they are five of the most important players in hockey history, and sergei was arguably the most well-known of them. while steve was generally a quiet leader and not a particularly flashy player, sergei was a media darling and one of the most exciting players in the league. he's particularly well-known for his trademark white nike skates and all-star fastest skater record, but i also think about his love of sports cars, his fashion sense, the commercials, and his genuine love for being a detroit red wing, to start.

sergei became steve's alternate captain, although assistant captain might be more apt. when steve began to have knee problems, he would be put on a unit with sergei, who he would trust to carry the puck from end to end for him.

sergei, meanwhile, understood his job in detroit as making steve's job easier. “i could tell stevie was worried about a lot of things. i wasn’t sure what exactly i had to do. But i knew i had to help him as much as i can on the ice.”

the detroit red wings made the playoffs from 1990-2015, 13 of those years with steve and sergei. they won the stanley cup three times together, in 1997, 1998, and 2002. to call them the best hockey team of the 90s-00s is correct.

but good times come to an end. in 2003, sergei's contract with the red wings was up. he had previously had contract issues in 1998, forcing the ilitches to match a $38 million deal with the carolina hurricanes; in 2003, he signed a contract with the anaheim ducks that was worth $10 million less than what detroit was offering him. did he owe detroit, for everything they had done for him? the ilitches and devellano think so. detroit thought so, and booed him when he returned to play against his former team. he went back to russia in 2009, three years after steve retired as the longest-serving captain of any north american sports team in history— a very apt 19-season record that has never been broken. steve briefly worked for the tampa bay lightning; around that time, sergei's marriage ended, and he only asked for their florida beach house in the divorce.

anyways, it's 2024 now. the red wings have gone eight years without seeing the playoffs. steve yzerman's number was retired in 2007, and since 2019, he has served as the team's general manager. it has been a decade since sergei fedorov was in detroit, for his hockey hall of fame induction ceremony; the ilitch family and jim devellano will not retire sergei's jersey with steve's, but nobody has worn 91 since he left, and several players have actually changed their jersey numbers from 91 upon coming to play here. when asked his thoughts about retiring number 91, it took steve eleven seconds to come up with a response.

the red wings are the second-worst team in our conference right now. we need a new coach. there has never been a russian coach in the nhl. sergei is, as of this summer, retired from coaching in russia where he won two championships with his former team; he still spends summers in detroit.

sergei is over it. steve is over it. the only people who still think about 2003 are jim devellano and mike ilitch's widow marian. retire 91 and let him come home!

[sonic-spirit]

- AHHHH, shadowing Boss Lady at New Horsebackriding Instructor Job today!

- She ended up having me ride in the 10am lesson

- Was not mentally prepared, but tried to vibe with it

- They put me on an Arabian! Yay!

- Ohmigods I love him

- But holy hell he's super bumpy

- Chaos, I made a fool of myself all hour

- My seat was all over the place, I apparently have a bad habit of putting my weight into my toes and need to push my legs forward and get it into my heels, and I use my hands wrong! (I also didn't use my feet to steer the way I usually do, got too in my head, horse was way narrow, and then focusing on speed in the games part of the lesson)

- Chaos, I hope Boss Lady isn't having second thoughts about hiring me

- But whatever, got through it

- Sat on the sidelines and watched the 11am English, tried to focus so I could apply to my own teaching

- Then home for lunch

- I'm still having second thoughts/concerned whether this is a good move: Don't want to piss off Current Job Boss Lady, feeling like I'm being disloyal, and not sure whether I'm good enough/can handle it

- Fuck, I want to be good at this

- But trading one Saturday for a different Saturday doesn't seem like a good deal to me, especially in light of the "Burning goodwill at my other job," thing

- But fuuuck, won't I grow as a teacher more here?

- Either that or it'll be horrifically abusive...AGAIN

- Oh, abusive horse people? NEVER met THOSE before

- I'm scared

- In other news, no lessons in the books tomorrow, only feeding, soooo...

- Guess I'll try and make art tomorrow

[aceyanaheim]

Gordon Bombay’s character journey from d1 to game changers is just 

[ambienthousewife]

the complete list of official state affirmations

arkansas: your next door neighbor is not planning on blowing up your house. he is a nice man who makes ziti and has NO interest in arson nor personal revenge.

alaska: the wolves are NOT gossiping behind your back about your truck decals. they appreciate a fine piece of machinery such as your gmc

california: you WILL be able to get your celery juice morning fix before work today. inflation has NOT risen its price to $11

delaware: the irs has NO interest in investigating you for an illegal importing business. the package at your doorstep labeled "bosnia" IS discreet and out of sight

florida: there are CERTAINLY enough parking spots available at the event you are attending. the city planners have SPECIFICALLY had this in mind when designing the map

hawaii: jimmy buffett is GUARANTEED to suffer a horrific accident in his remaining lifetime. he WILL suffer a tragic demise

illinois: your local grocery has NOT started putting eyeballs in your food. they have NO interest in doing such a thing

iowa: the makeup you got from the dollar store DOES look good and not tacky. the cheapest mascara WILL serve you well today

louisiana: the ghost of don pardo IS benign and friendly. he has NO interest in causing misfortune upon your property

maryland: you WILL one day be able to do anal. with enough lube and practice, it is a CERTAINTY and nothing to worry about

massachusetts: the position open as a 'professional accordion player' on indeed is NOT a scam. this IS the position you have been waiting for your entire life

minnesota: super mario 64 is just a video game and is in NO WAY a manifestation of your worst childhood nightmares. please get some solid rest

mississippi: you WILL impress your colleagues at the work karaoke party. "everybody knows" by leonard cohen is a SUPERB choice of song for this occasion

nevada: NOBODY knows about the time you peed yourself at comic con. it was discreet and you are the ONLY person that knows such a thing happened. and it's not even that big of a deal

new jersey: no, your mom did NOT call you on the 10 year anniversary of the night her house burnt down. she survived but passed away 4 years ago from unrelated causes.

new mexico: santa claus WILL bring you all the toys you wanted for christmas this year. you are NOT on his naughty list

new york: all the kids that bullied you for wanting to marry simon le bon from duran duran are IRRELEVANT now. you can plan your own fictional wedding with simon le bon from duran duran and there is NOTHING anyone can do to stop it

ohio: the giraffe that tried to kill you as an 8 year old is NOT the same one that just escaped the zoo. that is a different giraffe. the one that tried to kill you PERISHED 13 years ago in a boating accident

oregon: one day you WILL be able to vape your estrogen. the world's top scientists are working on it right now.

rhode island: you will NOT fall for another 'joe mama' joke. you know the rules now and your mind is as SHARP as a tack today

south dakota: this goth girl on tinder FOR SURE wants to have sexual intercourse with you. the invader zim hoodie is a GREAT choice of outfit for a first date

texas: everybody LOVED your noise show performance. the circuit bended childrens keyboard from goodwill you made did an AMAZING job

utah: all the other moms thought your casserole was DELICIOUS. they are NOT saying mean things to you behind your back because your husband made chocolate chip pancakes once. that alone does not make a man too fruity

washington: this costco is where a panic attack will NOT be had today. you WILL be able to get your bulk groceries and not cry in the store. in the car is fine enough

wisconsin: the exterminator you hired is NOT an ant in disguise. that is IMPOSSIBLE. he is also NOT a sex offender you checked the records before hiring him.

wyoming: that copy of infinite jest you have on the shelf will be FULLY read one day. you will get around to finishing it one day SOON

[taotiegames]

Anyone else feel like Valve is overblown as a developer?

I mean they rarely publish games and when they do, the game winds up as more of a showcase for whatever element it’s supposed to be ‘revolutionizing.’ than it is a game in its own right.

Portal wound up being too focused on the portals themselves with little else to use to navigate the game.

2 did a much better job giving the player more to work with and as such was a better game, but still spent more time being impressed with its own mechanics than being a well-rounded experience; still being more focused on being a showcase than a game.

Left 4 Dead was actually pretty good from a mechanical perspective, pacing was good, weapons were easy to use, special infected shook things up fairly well, but outside of that not much to talk about, clearly its point was to be a fast-paced arcade shooter based around co-op.

I’m torn on L4D2. On the one hand, it’s a direct improvement in every way over L4D. On the other, it was a glorified expansion pack and ultimately failed in what a sequel should do: refine and expand what its predecessor did and cover new ground and new ideas. The fact it came out within a year of L4D only serves to highlight that.

Team Fortress 2 is both my most hated Valve game and the one I’ve spent the most time on. I’ve spent so much time on it because it’s one of my favorite kinds of games, an objective and class-based multiplayer shooter. I hate it because it refuses to grow in any real way. The game is old, quite old, and it has not meaningfully improved itself over the years. Yes, a game should not just follow trends, if it’s good then it’s good, but TF2 has ignored every opportunity to try anything new. They added new weapons and failed to do anything with them. The Demoknight build was cool, the fact that it was and is still the only (meaningfully) alternative play-style in the game is not cool.

New game modes and additional elements are relegated to the realm of player-made mods that are occasionally ‘made official’ with what boils down to a rubber stamp from the dev team.

Half-Life as a franchise exists solely for ‘revolutionizing’ purposes. 1st one gave FPSs a story, 2nd gave them a physics engine.

That’s it.

Notice that the only chatter involving HL only started happening when VR began taking off? They only pull Half-Life out of the mothballs when there is easily-covered new ground.

Because that maintains Valve’s image as an innovative and revolutionary development house.

Why do you think they have such a focus on the modding community?

Modders give Valve Indie points and are a source of ‘revolutionary’ ideas. Whether or not they are actually revolutionary isn’t important, Valve can package them as such.

Dota 2 is far from an early entry into the MOBA genre, but Valve got street cred because they hired the guy who made the original mod.

Artifact also made a late entry into the digital TCG genre but it couldn’t compete with Hearthstone and was unceremoniously shuffled offstage.

Underlords seems to exist solely to dominate a genre of which there are only 3 entries.

I have no real patience for Valve’s reputation farming.

The fact they are unwilling to meaningfully experiment with their games when they have this many resources and this much goodwill is nothing short of professional cowardice. If individuals and tiny development houses can try something new, a multi-billion dollar corporation that is the (mostly) undisputed king of digital distribution can most certainly risk a bit.

Valve is underwhelming as a developer. Both in quality and in scope.

[unpopularly-opinionated]

I don’t play WoW but I used to play Overwatch and Diablo and this touches on just the general issues that are inside of Activision Blizzard right now regarding the major decline of World of Warcraft and how they’re losing to Final Fantasy XIV, how if the latest WoW expansion or Overwatch 2 flop as they’re projected to do then Blizzard’s most definitely going to pivot almost entirely to mobile games, and how the differences in age demographics are actually dividing the company into multiple camps.

It’s important to note two things: 1) this could be fake but also 2) the link came from Grummz, a former team lead on WoW and producer on Diablo II and Starcraft. It still could be fake despite this, but if he’s sharing it then I feel like there’s at least some measure of truth in this.

Transcription below in case this gets deleted and/or you don’t wanna click the link. Warning, it’s fairly long.

“I’m dropping this here after getting chewed out for three hours over shit the chewee did at work so fuck it. Assume larp and let me vent.”

>Shadowlands is a shitshow. Critical response, Player drop off and just about every engagement metric outside of cash shop have been catastrophic. No higher up expected this because of their “we are too big to fail, if we built it they will come” mentality. They refuse to accept their focus on the world being a begrudged mechanic to funnel players to raiding is not appealing to the player base at large because it appeals to them. They have spent the last 4 months trying to course correct but there is no solid direction and the response to 9.1 has only made things worse.

>Sylvanas is planned to replace the Arbiter despite so many people in the company and god knows how many online saying this would be a total replication of Kerrigans storyline in Starcraft 2 that killed none competitive interest in the brand entirely and you can only go “no, no they WILL like it eventually” for so many real world years before its time to change course. Thus far that has not happened.

>The elephant in the room is FFXIV. To the people in charge they are acting like this came out of nowhere and don’t even seem to understand why its drawing players away in their tens of thousands. We have all tried to highlight things it is doing that are clearly appealing to an mmo audience and not, in my opinion, focussing more on mobile game style retention traps to keep MAU users and habit forming personalities logging in. Its not that they don’t care. They just seem so pig headed and digging their heels in with their fingers in their ears thinking all the problems will go away because WoW is “too big to fail”, there will never be real competition and “they will keep coming back”. But they aren’t coming back anymore. Not in the numbers they used to.

>The people making the spending choices know this. The new model for WoW is market the hell out of a expansion pack for a huge quarter then use 6 month lock ins to pad numbers for the quarters after that. Even if corona had not happened 9.1 still would have been dropping after the initial 6 month subs expired to “keep the chain holding”.

>The mood in the company is tense but also very much “its just a rough transition period”. Activision has been pushing hard for Blizzard to release more regular product and to generate more income per user. As far as i know this is going to be a transition over the next 5 years to a much larger mobile/tablet gaming focus. By all accounts not just WoW but Overwatch was intended to be the moneymaker in the interim but once again someone had the bright idea to kill a game casual players loved on the alter of e-sports hoping for another Brood War. From what i hear the “told you so’s” were loud and a lot of people walked beyond Kaplan.

>The sentiment that was shared quietly in private but being spoken more often is simply that the leadership at Blizzard are not bad people, nor incompetent people but people who had to fill seats left when the old guard jumped ship wether they were suited for it or not. Brack is a genuinely good man out of his depth, Ion is a fantastic raid designer put in charge of designing a virtual world he has no interest or real ideas for and so on. They have been taking form the roles they excel at to be put in positions where they get to do far less of that purely because there is nobody left with the experience to do so and the trickle down is a lack of concrete direction, ambition and focus.

>2021 has seen the playerbase, media and gaming at large “turn” on WoW to a degree i don’t think the leads in their “positivity dojo” bubble considered possible. Its gone from people going “This is how Blizz needs to fix WoW!” to “WoW is no longer salvageable, time for greener pastures” and i think on some level this was never considered as a possibility so there have never been any major plans beyond the usual “try and minimise player drop off by arranging releases around competitors launching updates/products”. The official forums being filled with talk of FFXIV and worse “why do we actually pay a sub?” hasn’t helped.

>There have been some testing the waters lately from certain higher ups if we can remove the line “No King Rules Forever”. Read into that what you will.

>There are still arguments going on about the Kael’thas Voice actor shitshow. I don’t know much about it but i know its heated, wouldn’t be the first time a knee jerk reaction only seemed to generate bad press. We lost a noticeable amount of pvp engagement after the Swifty thing.

>The Preach interview was treated as a disaster and there was talk of more strongly vetting interviewers for “bad actors” and only engaging with a list of questions Blizzard provides. Some pointed out that could just be used to create some form of Fireside Chat akin to the FFXIV “Live letters” but that fell on deaf ears.

>The two sentiments right now among the team are either “we really need a win” or “theres a dedicated cabal of internet trolls out to kill WoW”. Right now we are crunching hard to get 9.2 ready to wrap up the jailors storyline so we can get an expansion out early 2022. If that doesn’t happen there are talks of major shakeups coming down from Activision that have been threatened for a few  years now. Its an all hands on deck feeling thats been around to some degree since the “Is this an out of season April Fools Joke” Blizzcon. A make or break deadline is coming closer and things like Diablo 4 were not planned before then. Blizzard needs a significant win not just in initial profit but consumer goodwill. Nobody likes working at what the public now seems to see as “the bad guy” of the mmo industry.

>This has also made new hires decline. Not significantly but the “you WANT Blizzard on your resume” line doesn’t seem to have the appeal it used to. This has lead to more hiring via friend of a friend, to some rumblings about nepotism, and people severely lacking in experience “because they get great twitter optics”.

>On the topic of Twitter we are not being told to “disengage” from it. Multiple employees like Nervig and Holisky publicly attacking paying customers because they got too heated and couldn’t keep quiet is bad press that could have been avoided. A email reminder has gone around more than once lately stating “if you are not customer relations you should not be representing the company to customers, especially if you cannot remain professional”.

>Lastly the biggest elephant in the room is “yo’ boy” Asmongold. The newer hires cannot stand him. They have used terms like “toxic masculinity” and “dogwhistles to dangerous males” while some of the oldest crowd still remaining have called him “based” or “telling it like it is” which has lead to friction to put it mildly. People are told not to talk about him and the recent FFXIV stuff only made it all worse. The idea that an outside element can have such an effect on the product genuinely upsets people. Like Zach is engaging in some malicious act of cyberwarfare. Many of us have point out the now famous quotes by Naoki Yoshida about understanding that players will drift and we need to make something worth coming back to because they want to but some people for lack of a better word see out customers -or “consumers” as they refer to them nowadays- as some kind of antagonistic relationship where the goal is not being an entertainer putting on a show for a crowd but some kind of game hunter trying to trap a large, profitable kill. I wish i could blame Activision but this is a sentiment from more of the younger crowd than the “tech boomers”. Which personal opinion is probably why so many folks like Metzen and Morheim left.

>Before you ask, yes the topic of “wokeness” has shown up in group talks. Its not all some grand sjw conspiracy, people really do want to feel welcome and represented. However the “we need everything veto’ed by people not working on it to see if its inoffensive and bland enough” rubs some of us the wrong way. Like anything in life you can take something too far and lose sight of the core ideals and with everything gone on since Blitzchung it feels like people are forming little factions to pull people in different directions to decide “What Blizzards identity is now” and how to appeal to new players. There has been some drop offs with “go woke go broke” as the only answer in the survey when unsubbing but honestly we are losing subs in unforseen numbers anyway and still making more money than ever through cash shop “heavy users” so it honestly doesn’t make an impact.

>All in all things are rough right now. Blizzard doesn’t have the love of the customers anymore, is no longer treated as an industry giant and while D4,D2R and Immortal aren’t going to kill Diablo even if they fail the sentiment for World of Warcraft and Overwatch 2 are a lot more tense and stressful. The phrase “it might be good to brush up on your mobile development portfolio if we get another underperformer” has been doing the rounds a lot. If Shadowlands continues its stark decline and Overwatch 2 is looking to underperform like its current projections suggest i think the Blizzard of a few years from now will be imitating King a lot more than trying to learn any lessons from Square Enix’s mmo division.

[press-x-tojason]

Giant Bomb is dead, and I care way less than I thought I would. Probably because 83% of the people who I ever cared about had already left or died, or were already relegated to reduced content roles. 

Honestly, though, the writing’s been on the wall for a bit. They haven’t had anything worthy of paying for premium in several years, and, even though they’ve had well over a year to figure out a plan for the COVID era, they maybe made it a month with their plans to have a series of streams daily. I actually managed to forget I followed them on Twitch at all, for about 4 months, because they only streamed the podcasts and the occasional former Harmonix employee (who was literally paid to make content with their games while employed at Giant Bomb, which was funny because he blocked me on Twitter for making a post, addressing no one, back in 2014, which was asking about the legitimacy of the leaked list of “games “””””journalists”””””” who had taken money from publishers for positive reviews, a list which included him and multiple then-coworkers. I didn’t follow him, he didn’t follow me. He was manually searching the keywords, because he was, and is, a prick.) solo Rock Band stream in the last 8 months or so. Even when Jeff would manage to do one of his 20 streams from home a year, it would be on his own channel. There was just no content. And they’re surprised their “pay for our unique premium content!” model failed. They always “feigned” anger at Dan for “making” them do the Mario Party Parties, and literally never promoted his and Drew’s Metal Gear series after the first game... but I bet that, when only those, UPF, and the ad-free versions of the podcasts were premium features, those two series were keeping them afloat. Well, that and the remaining goodwill they miraculously managed to hold onto for a few years after Ryan died.  Shit, I follow several people who are GB staff-adjacent, and... I can’t think of the last time they mentioned anything that happened on-site. Even the people who’ve been directly supporting them for over 10 years were out. 

But yeah, the site is super dead. They pretended in the announcements like they’re going to make a go of it still, but... you’ve got like 4 content people left, and the only one people give a shit about is Jeff. You just saw 3/4 of the side of the site that was still trying these past several months jump ship in a 3 month span. One of those was, by nearly any definition, a founding member. Of which you had already lost one, and are losing another from the main side. Jeff’s been way less active until the last week or two, probably because he heard they were leaving and was like “oops, should probably check on the ship that’s been sinking for years!” Then you have Jason “The Human Mumble” Oestricher, the charisma vacuum, whose legitimate public-facing reaction to first hearing that all but one of his GB predecessors were going to be gone. was, and I quote, “Hoo Boy.” Ben and Jan are the definition of “fine”. They would have been great, as they are today, as secondary members 8-10 years ago. But carry the site, they cannot. They’re down to, what, 5 named members now? It hasn’t been that dire since the beginning of 2009, before they hired Drew, when they hadn’t even started the P4 endurance run. You know, that surprise massive, internet-changing thing that essentially popularized the Let’s Play concept, loosening its definition and making it something that could be as personality-driven as game-driven, made simply to give them something to put on the website, beyond the rare review and, slightly later, quick look. This kinda illustrates the problem with modern Giant Bomb. When they were figuring shit out, flying by the seats of their pants, they came up with great shit, and they gave enough of a shit to make it happen. 0.000% chance they do a 10 hour Thanksgiving Kinect stream if the Kinect was new today. 0.000% chance the core members would have done an endurance run in the last 10 years if CT and Shenmue (which I haven’t watched) weren’t driven by the younger members. And you could see it in the fact that they never made a real, true mobile app. The number one thing that would have made them indispensable this past decade, an app to integrate premium features, the podcast, their video player, etc. all in one place in a mobile-friendly package, that could sync with the website... and they never even raised the idea publicly. I wonder how much of the innovation was the group think-tank of the first 5 years. Beyond Dan’s couple major contributions, I don’t think they added a single new type of content after 2012, which... still means the last 6.5 years lacked any semblance of innovation. I guess that’s a big part of why I fell off tremendously quickly after late 2014. There was just nothing new, and believe me, I was looking. I wanted reasons to stay watching. I supported them with my dollar. I believed in those brave early days. And I went back yesterday to watch the DP endurance run from VJ again. I still miss that rapport. And really, that hurt, too. Vinny moving back east, less than a year after Ryan passed... short term, it was fine. You had more people than ever to cover the gaps. But the spark was gone. The chemistry made the site. When I think of Giant Bomb, I still think of Jeff, Vinny, and Ryan, first and foremost. Those early podcasts, the NintenDownloads, the crazy tangents that everyone could seamlessly follow up on(well, except Brad, because he essentially slept through most of the podcasts, unless he was talking about the thing he did that week), the weird high-concept GOTY stuff... it wasn’t perfect, but you were entertained. You laughed. You were engaged. It never felt like you were watching them working, even though you could see the work they put in. It felt like, when they released something, you were experiencing a group of legitimate friends doing what they wanted to do anyways.(And boy have I seen enough groups do everything they can to NOT be enjoying doing that, and break up as a result due to hating the jobs that they chose to do). 

Part of me would love to make it as simple as “Ryan died, and so did the original spirit”, and... to a degree, it’s true. If you go back to any retrospective they’ve done about the founding of the site, or the podcast they recorded after Ryan passed, you can’t help but recognize that Giant Bomb never happens if these core members don’t all quit their jobs, led by Ryan,  because they respect their boss/manager, Jeff, and know he’s doing the right things(for them, for the reader/viewer, etc.) ahead of what GameSpot management wants him to do. Jeff could have been left in the wilderness, trying find a spot elsewhere, with the rumor going around between executives that Jeff wasn’t going to help them promote anything, essentially killing their revenue. He would have been done in terms of getting employed by a major site. But Ryan first, and soon after, Vinny and Brad, gave up their jobs to make this fledgling little project go. As much as the ERs brought me in and gave the impression that Jeff and Vinny were the long-standing duo, no, it was Ryan who was Jeff’s partner in crime. And, 8 years later, I can comfortably say... Giant Bomb never recovered from losing him. 

But it was so much more. Everything that set them apart slowly went away,  in time. I don’t think they’ve posted reviews for games in consecutive MONTHS since 2017; 2018 at the latest. They have done one Endurance Run in 9 years. They have not had a meaningful live event in 6 years. Unprofessional Fridays were more formulaic and lesser in volume and frequency after the major players started moving east. The lack of coordination between coasts killed the camaraderie, to the point that I think one of the last 5 true gameplay crossovers was their series of 2016-2017 PUBG shitfests. I remember when Vinny starting GBEast was supposed to be the start of a new era of content, and... it was, but not in a positive way, like it sounded. When half of each side seemed to constantly have no interest in making anything, nothing got made. But I guess that’s what happens when your second in command in one of your headquarters is just a former marketing grunt with an attitude problem, and the guy with the biggest ego on the team is the one who refuses to move to join either side, and just pushes out the most self-important drivel as a header to what were literally just copy-pasted articles from other sites every week while sitting at his desk, dreaming of the days Gawker would pay him to plagiarize political drivel instead, because that’s what really gets the soulless clicks. One of your founding members becomes depressed due to losing his two closest work friends, one for real, one to a 3000 mile separation, within a year, while the other one who is left virtually stopped playing anything but DOTA 2 for 2 years. Suddenly your most prominent personalities are the 2 new guys(one the aforementioned charisma vacuum, the other a walking mark) and your previously-mostly-off-camera producer who is best known to the wider Internet for... blinking. So, yeah, lifeless. And NOW, all you’ve got is old melancholy dad, charisma vacuum dad, and the two ADHD kids whose defining trait is that they choose to exclusively refer to their partners as “my partner” in voices that make it sound like they are embarrassed to have partners, while also talking more about what their partners are doing than what they do.  It’s confounding.

But yeah, TL:DR: RIP zombie Giant Bomb. Glad you’re finally getting taken behind the shed. It took 3 years too long, minimum.

[slapshot-to-the-heart]

Flatbush & Atlantic: part i

Quick note: This is taking place in the 2020-21 season, as if the Islanders still play at Barclays; I know they won’t in actuality. In the story, I’m also going to be taking some liberties with what the duties of a team’s general counsel and legal team would actually be in charge of. My understanding, as a pre-law student, is that it’s more on the corporate angle, dealing with contracts and stuff — in addition to that, Cass will also be dealing with some more immigration and employment law as well. 

part i

October 1

“Adiós, mamá. Hablamos pronto. Te amo.” Cassidy hung up, breathing out a tense sigh and rubbing her temples with the heels of her hands. Talking to her mom usually helped to calm her down, bring her back to Earth, but for whatever reason it wasn’t taking. She took a brief glance at the casebook open on her dinged-up Ikea desk. Federal Indian Law. She liked the class, genuinely, but her day had started off bad and gotten worse pretty damn quickly. First she was out of her favorite tea, then her advisor cancelled their meeting, then it started raining as she walked back to her MTA stop, so she had missed the train. Another came fifteen minutes later, but the damage was already done. The only bright spot in the day, aside from calling her mom, had been the cute guy at the Polish deli down the street who had put extra peppers on her Philly cheesesteak. She unwrapped the sandwich, taking a moody bite out of the end. A caramelized onion dropped to the floor. Sighing, she leaned down to pick it up, hurtling it in the direction of the trashcan but only half-looking to see if it reached its target destination. Despite the name, Cass had never had a cheesesteak before she moved to New York, and it wasn’t even because she wasn’t a sandwich person. No, Cass loved a good sandwich, but between her proclivity towards a good BLT and her mom’s homemade Mexican food, she just hadn’t gotten around to it. 

Her laptop dinged with an email notification. What now? She swiped over to the mail page, taking another bite as she read the subject line. Experiential learning requirement - unmet. Her brow furrowed. Unmet? Clicking it open, she scanned the email, clearly something automated from the registrar’s office. Yet to complete Columbia’s experiential learning requirement...We suggest you connect with professors...You have until October 8 to submit...Cassidy never finished her sandwich. “Oh my God,” she muttered to herself, feeling her cheeks heat up. “How could you do this? How could you be so stupid, Cass?” She was normally so on top of everything, never missed a date, never forgot an assignment, so how could she have missed one of the only things left to do to graduate? Her law school required all of the graduates to complete some sort of experiential learning requirement — some kind of externship, clinic, summer associate position, anything to get them “out in the real world.” That’s when it hit her. She had coached her high school’s mock trial team the summer after her first year, and interned at the Hartford County DA’s the summer after. But they paid her. Her school had a weird ‘double-dip’ policy, where you weren’t allowed to take a position for class credit and get paid at the same time. It was a confusing rule, convoluted and bizarre and probably a little bit elitist, but it was a rule. As if the day couldn’t get any worse, and then somehow it did. 

Turning to her laptop, she started searching for just about anything that could possibly help her. The school’s website, the Manhattan District Attorney’s, state offices, NGOs, federal prosecutors, anyone that might have a lead. Frantically dragging over her resumé and throwing together a cover letter that probably (hopefully) looked way more interesting than it actually was, Cassidy fired off email after email after email. Two hours later, she had sent off some twenty-odd applications, hoping that at least one or two would end up panning out. Glancing at her watch, she let out an exasperated breath. 12:22 A.M. Her classes didn’t start until nine, but it took almost an hour and a subway connection to get to Columbia, and she had to eat and shower before. So, really, it meant getting up at about seven. She needed to go to bed. 

Stomach reeling and feeling more resigned than anything, Cass haphazardly brushed her teeth, flossed — it didn’t matter how tired she was, she’d never forget to floss — and clambered into bed, wearing a faded, way-too-big Rangers t-shirt. I’ll be okay. She took a deep breath. It’ll be okay. It has to be. Cassidy Cabrera Shaw was tough as nails and stubborn as hell, and she wasn’t going to let everything she had worked so hard for fall apart so easily. 

Whenever Cass was nervous, or anxious, or afraid, she was never able to sleep well. She ended up waking up at ten past six, sitting in her bed for fifteen minutes praying that she’d fall back asleep, and finally accepting her fate that sleep just wasn’t going to come. Rolling over, she grabbed her phone from where she had left it charging on the nightstand. Nightstand was maybe a generous term for it; technically, it was a wooden milk crate that she had spray painted white when she and the other girls had moved into the apartment two years prior. She had a little bit of money set aside from college, but every penny possible was going towards tuition and those ungodly-expensive books that she had to buy every semester. The mattress and frame were from Ikea, and Cass had brought some things like bedding and a desk from her old room. The rest of it — rugs, lighting, and decorations like her six-inch ceramic peacock (his name was Charles) had come from a combination of Goodwill runs and senior citizen yard sales. 

Wincing as she did so, Cass pulled up her email, bracing herself for the inevitable barrage of rejection. After scrolling past ten or so automated “no longer hiring” and “position has been filled” messages, one caught her eye. She had sent a few emails to professors of hers, not expecting to hear anything back for a few days. It wasn’t perfect by any means, but there certainly were advantages of going to school in a city as massive as New York. All of her professors knew someone and had some kind of connection from their own education, or days in the practice, or childhood summer trips to the Hamptons with someone who just so happened to be a judge on the Second Circuit Court — that last one was last year’s employment law professor. One particular subject line caught her eye. Thought you might be interested, Professor Murakami had written. David, as he preferred to be called, was her Sports Law professor from last year. She didn’t go into the class expecting to enjoy it all that much, if she was being honest. She had gotten a crappy registration time and most other classes were filled, so it had started out as a placeholder and nothing more. Over the semester, though, it had quickly become one of her favorites, combining pieces of everything else she had studied into one cohesive course. Cass also wasn’t in a position to be turning down any potential offers, so she opened the email and started reading. 

I got your email, Cassidy, and think I might be able to help. Okay, so far, so good. I happen to have a contact in the counsel’s office of one of the professional sports teams in the city. That’s exactly what Cass was talking about — where do these people meet each other? Is there some kind of exclusive speakeasy you’re given the password to as soon as you’re admitted to the state bar? Chris Cohen works for the Islanders, and I remember you talking about how interested in hockey you are. Okay, true, but the Islanders? She had practically been born with a Ranger’s jersey on. Beggars can’t be choosers, she thought. I gave him a heads-up that I’d likely be sending a promising candidate his way, so just let me know if this sounds like something you’d be interested in and I’ll send along your contact information. 

Cass couldn’t respond fast enough. Yes, please! 

---

Wednesdays were her ‘easy’ days, if you could say that. She had Environmental Law and Human Rights back-to-back, but anything after noon was pretty much fair game. That being said, it certainly didn’t mean that she was any less stressed. There were at least a hundred pages to read before class the next day, she had a sample essay due for bar prep, and her mind was still racing about the email. Grabbing a gyro from the cart outside of her last class of the day, Cass stress-ate with one hand while continually refreshing her inbox with the other.  Food wasn’t allowed in the library, so she ate the last few bites right outside the doors, throwing away the wrapper and squeezing past the hordes of clearly overwhelmed first-years running to get to class on time. 

Popping her Airpods out of their case and into her ears, Cass briskly made her way up the stairs to the third floor, crossing her fingers that her usual spot, a big blue chair over by the research desk, was open. She was in luck, pulling out a water bottle and laptop and getting to work on editing. Four hours later, she had reached some semblance of satisfaction with her work, shutting off her computer and making her way to the subway. There was about half an hour before she had to transfer to the line that would take her to the apartment; squeezing into one of the last free seats, she tugged out a textbook and a highlighter. Why her professor insisted on assigning the entire text of the United Nations charter was a mystery to her, but she’d rather jump off a cliff than be cold called on without an answer. Transferring at Grand Concourse took about ten minutes — it was rush hour, so the first train to come was entirely full — and another twenty or so minutes later, she was letting herself into her shared East Bronx apartment. 

Hanging up her denim jacket by the door and toeing off her sneakers, Cass let out a not-so-subtle exasperated sigh. 

“One of those days?” Alicia piped in from the kitchen. Alicia also lived in the apartment, one of the four sorority sisters-turned-roommates who had made the move from Connecticut down to New York after graduation. Cass padded into the kitchen, where she was greeted by Alicia in front of a skillet and rice cooker, intensely sautéeing some vegetables.

“You have no idea,” Cass said, hugging her from behind. “Whatcha making?” There were obviously some nights when not everyone was home — most often either Cass or Ryanne, who was in med school — but they always tried to have a few nights a week where someone would cook a meal for the whole house. 

“Japchae, it’s my mom’s recipe,” she replied. “I called her and asked how much sesame oil to use, and she just said ‘until it tastes right.’ Like, I love you, Mom, but that doesn’t really help my cause, does it?”

Cass snorted. “Oh for sure, it’s the same way with me. Do you remember the first time I made tamales down here?” Cass had grown up eating and making tamales with her mom and abuela, but she had never been allowed to really take the reins. She had the recipe, though, so the first night after they were moved in, she ventured down to the closest bodega, bought the ingredients, and decided to try her hand making them from scratch. The recipe, however, left out the key piece of exactly how much water to use for steaming — Cass didn’t know, and her mom had always just eyeballed it. So she had ended up putting in way too little and setting the stove way too hot, and to make a long story short, ended up setting off the fire alarm. The one saving grace was the extremely attractive police office that came to double-check the false alarm, but even he couldn’t wipe the mortified expression off of her face. 

“How could I forget?” Alicia responded with a grin. “Go put your shit down, it’ll be ready in a few.”

Cass playfully rolled her eyes, heading towards her room in the back. “Yes, mother.” Their apartment was a three bedroom; while obviously it would have been amazing for everyone to have their own, it was still New York City and none of them were exactly rolling in the dough. Cassidy and Ryanne were obviously still students, and while Alicia and Stella had actual jobs  — Stella worked international business down by Wall Street and Alicia did something with satellites in Queens — none of them were exactly inclined to set out on their own just yet. So Stella and Alicia shared a room, and she and Ryanne had their own. She shrugged off her jacket, slinging her backpack onto the bed before chugging the rest of her water bottle and checking her phone. Two new emails. A 20% off coupon to Lush, and one from Chris Cohen. Chris Cohen? It took her a minute to remember, but when she did, she couldn’t read it fast enough.

Honestly, Cass didn’t read the whole thing, but got enough information to know that she had an interview Friday afternoon at the office in Brooklyn, that Chris  — he had said to call him Chris — said she came with a stellar recommendation from Professor Murakami (an old law school buddy, figures) and that there was no way in hell she was going to fuck this up. She wouldn’t let herself. 

---

Cass was lucky her Thursdays were so packed; if she had any extra time to stress over her impending interview, she would have, but she couldn’t. She had two ‘free’ hours in between classes, but after she had scarfed down lunch (Alicia had, mercifully, made plenty of leftovers) it was the only stretch she had to hit the gym. Coupled with the time it took to walk there, change, and shower after, there really wasn’t much in the way of downtime. After classes was her bar prep group, and the day was so exhausting that it was pretty much all she could manage to take the train home, microwave dinosaur chicken nuggets, and stumble into bed. After flossing. 

---

If Cassidy lived in any other city, she would have felt wildly out of place on her morning commute. Who shows up to school wearing a suit? She wasn’t an absolute masochist, so her heels were in her bag. But for once in her life she didn’t feel so out of place among the presumably-highbrow, presumably-making-six-figures crowd surrounding her. The suit had been her first big purchase for herself  — she had scraped by without one in college, but invested as soon as she had a little saved up from her summer job at a boutique in town. Her mother had always told her that it was the woman who made the clothes, rather than the other way around, and Cass always did what her mom said. 

Samaira, one of her friends and another editor on the Columbia Law Review, caught up to her as they both left the twice-weekly morning meeting. “You seem kind of jumpy, Cass. What’s up?”

Cassidy wrung her hands and shrugged her shoulders. “I told you that I missed the internship requirement thing, right?” Samaira nodded. “Well, I have an internship in,” she paused to look at her watch, “two hours, and I’m so nervous I’m going to mess this up. I don’t know what I’m going to do if I don’t get it. There’s not time to look for something else, there’s no alternative, and I don’t know what to do if my own stupidity and forgetfulness is the only thing standing in between me and something I’ve worked so fucking hard for—”

Samaira cut her off. “I’m going to stop you there. That’s bull, Cass, and you know it. You are the furthest thing from a disappointment. You’re one of the kindest, sharpest, and most creative people I know, and you’re not going to let something as petty as a deadline stand in your way. Time gets away from all of us sometimes, and it’s nothing to beat yourself up over. I want you to be confident and have faith in yourself, because you deserve it, but if you don’t, it’s okay. I get it. I believe in you enough for the both of us.” She squeezed Cass’ hand. 

She managed a watery smile. “Thanks, Samaira.”

“Any time,” she replied easily. “I’ve got to run to class now, but I want to hear how it went the second you get out, okay?”

“I will.”

Samaira rolled her eyes. “I mean it. You’re going to crush this, Cass. Love you!” She added, waving goodbye as she turned the corner.

There was half an hour before Cass needed to head over to the interview, and before she knew it her feet had taken her to her favorite spot on the north side of Central Park. Grabbing a bagel, she thankfully found the bench empty. After finishing the bagel — she would have preferred cheese, but they were out, so cinnamon raisin it was — and the better part of her Hozier-dominated acoustic playlist, it was time to catch the train. She jumped on with barely a second to spare, grabbing a strap and trying to avoid bumping into anyone. 

A seat opened up about halfway to Brooklyn, and Cass took the opportunity to unceremoniously tug off her much more practical flats and switch into the much more professional ankle-strap heels that had been stuffed in her backpack all day. For a fleeting moment, she was worried what everyone around her would think; she was, after all, technically changing on public transportation. A man got on at the next stop who was dressed head-to-toe in neon orange while carrying a Pomeranian in his purse. Nobody batted an eye. She got over herself pretty quickly.

Getting off at the Barclays Center station, Cass pulled out her phone, opening up the camera to give herself a quick once-over. As much as she hated it, first impressions really were everything. Lipstick? Not smudged. Hair? Minimal flyaways. Teeth? No spinach to be seen. Triple-checking that she had the time right, Cass walked through the doors of the office building, Islanders logo emblazoned on the wall behind the secretary’s desk. 

“Hi,” she said tentatively, catching his attention. “I have an interview with Chris Cohen at 2?” 

The secretary nodded, smiling warmly at her. “No problem. I’m Josh, you can have a seat over there,” he nodded to the small waiting area off to the side, “and I’ll call you when he’s ready for you to be sent up.”

Cass didn’t wait for more than five minutes before Josh gave her the go-ahead, and she was soon headed up the elevator to Chris’ office. “Fourth door on the left. It should have his name on it,” Josh had added. 

She raised her fist, knocking quickly on the frosted glass. It swung open a second later, a kind-looking man with glasses and salt-and-pepper hair answering. “You must be Cassidy. I’m Chris Cohen, so nice to meet you. Come right in,” he said, ushering her through the room, where several other associates sat at desks, and into his office. 

“David’s always good at keeping an eye out for me in his courses, and I was happy he passed you along,” Chris said, pulling out her resumé. “And you’re a 3L, correct?” She nodded. “Good. So let’s dive right into it. What courses and work experience do you have that you feel best position you for success in this position?” Much though Cass was loath to admit it, if there was anything she was good at, it was talking herself up. There was a reason her high school superlative was “Most Likely to be Able to Talk Their Way Out of a Ticket.” She launched into a well-rehearsed response, making sure to lace in her love for hockey once or twice. If nothing else, it would hopefully at least get her some brownie points. He had a few questions about her resumé, asked about her work on the law review, a few hypotheticals about contract law. She was batting a thousand until he asked the dreaded final question. “Do you have any questions for me?” 

Cass was wracking her brain, trying to come up with some intelligent-sounding thing to ask, but nothing came. “Uh—” she started, but was saved by the bell. Or, rather, saved by a frantic door opening and a panicked-sounding Mat Barzal bursting into the room. “Chris, I’ve got a problem.”

[calacuspr]

Calacus Weekly Hit & Miss – Gregg Popovich & Leeds United

Every Monday we look at the best and worst communicators in the sports world from the previous week.

HIT – GREGG POPOVICH AND BECKY HAMMON

San Antonio Spurs assistant coach Becky Hammon made history by becoming the first woman to serve as a head coach in an NBA regular season game against Los Angeles Lakers on New Year’s Eve.

Hammon has been working with San Antonio since the 2014-15 season, but her in-game move to Head Coach – due to Gregg Popovich’s ejection – became national news with Vice President-elect Kamala Harris tweeting about it.

While Hammon deserves all of the credit for continuing to be a key role model for women throughout America in helping to remove gender barriers in sport, Popovich should also be praised for his comments on the topic which were a testament to the environment that he has created in his 25 years as head coach in San Antonio.

“As you all know, we’re very participatory. I like to have my coaches coach. The Lakers were her scout team. It made total sense for her to take over. That’s what we’ve done for decades. That’s nothing new,” Popovich said.

“But on the bigger question of her having taken over a NBA game, to me, it’s not a big surprise. To a lot of other people it meant a lot. I can understand that. She’s somebody who’s very skilled and could very easily fulfil the duties of a head coach in the NBA. That goes without saying.

“There are women in every other endeavour in the world, whether it’s government, science, technology, aviation, it doesn’t matter what it is. Women do the same jobs as well and better than men. That’s a fact. There’s no reason why somebody like Becky and other women can’t be coaches in the NBA.

“On a larger scale, that’s why it wasn’t a big deal to me — because I know her. And I know her skills, and I know her value and I know her future is very, very bright. I understand the attention it got, but in all honesty, I assumed that most people already knew that she was qualified to be a head coach in the NBA.

“We didn’t hire Becky to make history. She earned it. She is qualified. She’s wonderful at what she does. I wanted her on my staff because of the work that she does. And she happens to be a woman, which basically should be irrelevant but it’s not in our world, as we’ve seen as it’s been so difficult for women to obtain certain positions. It was business as usual for us.”

Popovich could’ve taken the chance to praise the organisation or even himself for providing Hammon with such an opportunity, but he was right to put all of the emphasis on her credentials and why she was so deserving.

As Popovich stated, the hope is that this story will cease to be news as more women are able to showcase their abilities in high-profile sports roles, but it’s important to shine a light on role models like Hammon to inspire the next generation of female athletes, coaches, and officials.

MISS – LEEDS UNITED PROVOKE PUNDIT PILE-ON

Official football club social media accounts have evolved from simply posting results and links to an official website to a two-way communications channel with fans.

Leeds United have won a lot of plaudits after returning to the top flight for the first time in 16 years this season, playing a dynamic form of football.

After beating West Bromwich Albion 5-0, TV pundit and former England international Karen Carney observed that the Leeds’ style and promotion owed something to the rest players had during lockdown.

She said: “They outrun everyone, and credit to them. My only concern would be, will they blow up at the end of the season like the last couple of seasons? I actually think they got promoted because of Covid in terms of it giving them a bit of respite. I don't know if they'd have got up if they didn't have that break.”

It was a fair comment and Carney’s opinion rather than being stated as a fact, but the Leeds official Twitter account then shared the clip, prompting thousands of trolls to target and abuse Carney.

Targeting an individual is never appropriate on social media, much less so when by an organisation, but sometimes, mistakes can be made.

The key, as with any sort of crisis, is to recognise the error and fix it quickly: in this case, that means deleting the tweet and offering a full apology for the consequences it provoked, which were obvious to anyone who has ever used social media, particularly in the public eye.

But Leeds owner Andrea Radrizzani, who has overseen such progress at the club since he took over in 2017, doubled down and endorsed the tweet.

“I take the responsibility of the Club tweet,” he said on Twitter. “I consider that comment completely unnecessary and disrespectful to our Club and particularly to the fantastic hard work of our players and coaches whom were understanding on the pitch for the last two championship seasons by all stats.”

The tweet and the club’s official response to it led to widespread outrage, with Women in Football echoing the sentiments of many when they said: “Whether you agree with the comment or not, singling out & ridiculing an individual on an official club account is not what we’re here for. Karen Carney is a well-informed pundit. This tweet is inciteful & inappropriate. Not a good look now, or at any time.”

The story has gone global, with USA Women’s World Cup winner Megan Rapinoe tweeting: “Shame. Shame. Shame. Thicken up that skin y’all. Also, don’t come for @karenjcarney she’s a National treasure.”

Leeds had many opportunities to realise the damaging consequences of their tweet, and they subsequently issued a statement – notably NOT on Twitter – in response to the abuse Carney has suffered: “Leeds United completely condemns any abuse received by Karen Carney on social media following last night’s Premier League game with West Bromwich Albion.

“Everyone at our club respects Karen greatly for all she has achieved in the game, as well as her work in the media and the charity work she undertakes.”

Given the abuse, it was too little, too late.

Carney, meanwhile, has deleted her Twitter account and the tweet remains live as of January 4, almost a week after it was first posted.

According to The Athletic, Leeds have spoken to Carney’s representatives and invited her do a TV report at their Thorp Arch training ground before their televised FA Cup third-round match against Crawley Town.

This situation is a case study in how a lack of empathy or understanding can create a crisis that affects reputations and individuals. Certainly Leeds have lost some goodwill as a consequence.

Rather than inviting her to their training ground, their staff, from the top down, need education into the daily challenges that women in football face to avert problems like this occurring again in future.

[eeveevie]

Salvation is a Last Minute Business (2/18)

Chapter 2: How to Be a Detective in 10 Easy Lessons

It’s a new year, and Madelyn is trying to stay busy. Hancock pays a visit to the Detective Agency with an olive branch in the guise of a case for Nick. On the beat, a former mercenary turns informant with more information about the mysterious Railroad. Nick and Madelyn track down their missing person while Eddie Winter makes his first deadly move.  

“Well, sure there is. It comes complete with diagrams, on page 47 of 'How to be a Detective in 10 Easy Lessons,' correspondence school text-book and, uh, your father offered me a drink.” - Philip Marlowe as played by Humphrey Bogart (The Big Sleep, 1946)

x - x

Without giving much away, this is a content warning for a minor character suicide that mirrors the canon in-game side quest.

[read on Ao3] ~ [chapter masterpost]

January 10th, 1958

Nick’s desk was covered in case files, whiskey and cigarette ash—an organized chaos was what he liked to call it, but all Madelyn saw was a fire hazard. This was the way Detective Valentine worked best, however, frazzled and hunched over his scattered notebooks, mumbling incoherently behind the wafting plumes of smoke. The agency was for many the one gleaming beacon of hope in an otherwise dark and dishonest world. Nick had proved his reputation with the people was well earned by helping the community the best he could with the limited resources he had, maintaining a network of clients that kept him in business over the years.

“Everybody deserves their fair chance,” Nick always said, so much so that Madelyn considered putting it on a plaque for his wall—if the walls weren’t covered in photos, wrinkled maps and scribbled handwritten notes.

She found it all admirable, part of the reason she agreed to work with him when initially assigned by the District Attorney’s office two years prior. She didn’t realize that by staying, she’d be forging one of her strongest friendships, discovering one of her most trusted of confidants. Yet, as Madelyn lingered in the doorway of his office, she found it difficult to find the right words to say. She wanted to tell Nick about the clandestine note she received on New Year’s Eve, tell him she felt paranoid about being followed and wanted another training session at the shooting range. Instead, she continued to worry at her bottom lip, awkwardly shuffling the small stack of papers in her hands.

“You can stand there lookin’ like a doll or you can come in here and help,” he spoke, not bothering to glance up at her. Still, she noted his little smirk, eyes lit up as he scrawled away on his notepad.

“I know you didn’t hire me to be a pretty face,” Madelyn bantered, knowing it was all in good, clean fun.  She crossed the small space, planting herself comfortably on the cushioned seat in front of his desk.  

Nick gave a small shrug of his shoulders. “I didn’t exactly hire you. You just showed up here on my doorstep like some kitten left out in the rain.”

She laughed, thinking back to the early days of their partnership. Providing legal aid to a private detective that didn’t always play by the rules—it wasn’t the easiest of jobs for Madelyn. It wasn’t until she realized Nick was forced into the unscrupulous position by the Boston Police Department, who saw his presence as interference rather than assistance, never giving the agency the insider access they desperately needed. Perhaps if they did, there wouldn’t be so many unsolved disappearances or murders plaguing the city. That being said, she made sure Nick stayed out of trouble, pulling in favors where she could, the two using their powers of persuasion to find answers to burning questions. It was easier to toe the line than cross it, but each day as the violence and corruption spread across the city, the line became harder to see.

“What’s on the docket for today?”

The question had barely left her lips when there was a commotion in the lobby, Ellie’s frantic voice calling out as her heels clicked across the wooden floors. “Sir, sir! You can’t just walk in there. You have to have an appointment and—"

“No worries, sister,” the familiar, dulcet voice approached. “They’ll be happy to see me.”

John McDonough—Hancock—strolled through the doorway like he owned the place, ignoring Ellie’s protests. The mayor’s younger brother looked considerably different than he did the night of the police gala—dressed in dark slacks and half-buttoned up shirt, a faded red jacket with golden, frilled trim more suited for Halloween than streetwear. He plopped into the empty armchair, hooking his knees over one side and glancing to Madelyn with a wink.

Nick’s demeanor immediately soured. He pointed at the other man. “Speak for yourself.”

“Hey, I wouldn’t have come all this way if it weren’t for nothing, Nicky boy,” Hancock grinned. “Can’t you bend an ear to an old friend?”

Madelyn focused on the detective’s expression, eyebrows knitted together in quiet contemplation as he rummaged for a cigarette before realizing he was fresh out. Hancock noticed, instantly reacting to produce a pack from his jacket pocket. He leaned forward to offer her first, but she declined with a silent wave, causing him to move to Nick. He hesitated, scrutinizing the gesture with narrow eyes before ultimately obliging.

“What are you doing here, John?” he asked, sounding more like the start of an interrogation as he struck a match.

Hancock appeared amused by Nick’s insistence on the name as he lounged back in the chair. “I have a peace offering for you. A case that the local police can’t be bothered with because of the victim’s so-called lifestyle.”

At Nick’s silence, Madelyn interjected. “What is it?”

“Missing person.”

Finally, Nick sighed, relenting. “Give us the details.”

As Hancock spoke, Madelyn wrote in her notepad, neat and succinct lines—they’d have more luck with her organization skills. The missing? Earl Sterling. Twenty-five-year-old bartender from the Fens who worked at the local sports bar across the street from Fenway Park. “Vadim, who owns the bar—close personal friend—came to me crying, thinking Earl had been snatched up by the boogeyman. But who would want to hurt Earl? He ain’t out to hurt nobody.”

Nick was nodding along, jaw clenched, clearly in frustration of another disappeared citizen. That would be thirteen—that they knew of. “And Boston P.D.? They think Earl was undeserving of a proper investigation?”

Hancock scoffed. “Friends in low places. Doesn’t matter that he’s squeaky clean. But since Vadim’s a Russian immigrant, a refugee that has had his run-ins with the law…”

“Of course,” Madelyn sighed, disheartened. It was a cruel underlying fact that not all Bostonians were keen to the changes the war brought. Most carried on with quiet discontent, but others were far more vocal to the point of outright bigotry. A child raised by virtuous parents, Madelyn knew better, ashamed of the city she had lived in all her life.

Nick could sense her stewing restlessness and spoke, nodding at Hancock. “We’ll take the case, track Earl down. One way or another.”

Curiosity got the better of Madelyn as she stared at the two men, sensing the lingering tension. Ever since Piper first mentioned the younger McDonough brother, Nick’s attitude had been uncharacteristically dismissive, and without explanation it was gnawing at her mind. “What’s the deal here?”

Hancock’s eyebrow arched high against his forehead. “Whatcha mean, sister?”

“The animosity in the air is thick enough that I could bottle it up and sell it as a fragrance,” she joked. “Might get rich enough that I could retire early. Buy that cabin up in Maine I always dreamed about.”

While Hancock bellowed out an impressed laugh, Nick sighed through his nose, lips set in a flat line as his cigarette dangled. Still, Madelyn knew he was amused, green eyes bright as he rolled them her way. Hancock’s entertainment settled as he crossed his arms over his chest with a final, breathless chuckle. “I’m surprised ol’ Nicky never told you about me and our time overseas.”

“You two served together?” she asked.

Nick reluctantly nodded, fingers tightening around the wrist of his prosthetic hand, the plastic-metal blend flexing. He didn’t like to talk about it—no matter how many years had passed between the end of the war and the present, it was still an open wound for many, including the detective. He balled his hand into a fist.

“London, during the Blitz,” he explained, in grim conciseness. “Was stationed in Kent in ‘41 during the bombsite recovery. As was John, though he was mostly preoccupied by the local…entertainment.”

Hancock hummed, with a faraway look in his eyes. “There’s something about the English accent, ya’ know?”

“You were disillusioned then, and you’re disillusioned now!” Nick suddenly snapped, hands smacked against the table as he stood up to loom over the other man. Hancock hardly looked intimidated, not even flinching as Madelyn did. “Sneaking off base to get your kicks in some back alley, coming back high as an Air Force bomber. No wonder you’re turned into a beatnik.”

“Better a beatnik than a dick,” Hancock murmured.

“Boys! Boys!” Madelyn stood up with a loud clap of her hands, garnering both of their attention as she stood. “Jesus Christ! Do I need to put you two in separate corners for time out like the curtain-climbers you are?”

Nick scrambled to sit back down, knowing it was a rare thing for her to use the lord’s name in vain, even lightly. Hancock snickered, but flinched when she whipped her head in his direction. “I think you owe Nick an apology, Mr. McDonough.”

He shifted uncomfortably like she had asked him to perform one of Houdini’s acts. “Sorry, Valentine.”

“We’re good, John,” Nick stood again, this time reaching over to extend his hand in some display of goodwill. Hancock took the offer, shaking it with a satisfied grin. “We’ll find out where Earl is.”

As the conversation came full-circle, Hancock tugged on the lapels of his coat and smoothed out the lines of his pleated slacks. He regarded Madelyn with a toothy smile, nodding his head once. “Miss Hardy.”  

She watched as he turned on his heel, slinking out the way he came. Ellie’s disapproving voice called out to him again in the lobby as the bell above the front door chimed, signaling his exit. Miss Perkins’ usual sunny disposition was marred as she leaned into the doorway of Nick’s office, bottom lip jutted out in a frown. “Who was that?”

“Sorry Ellie,” Nick sighed, moving to grab his faded trench coat from the nearby rack. Madelyn smirked, knowing Jenny had purchased him a new one over the holidays—one for Hanukah and Christmas—but there he was, slipping his arms into the same dusty rag. “Hopefully you won’t need to experience such indecency again.”

“Heading out?” Their secretary questioned, looking between the two of them with a shine of excitement in her features. She always liked when they were busy.

Madelyn gathered the case notes under her arm before quickly shuffling back to her own office, pulling on her cream-colored coat that was in much better condition than her partner’s. Purse and papers in hand, she met him and Ellie in the front room.

Nick was adjusting his hat. “Keep a light on for us, won’t you?”  

Ellie flashed a charming smile. “Always.”

Outside, there was a fresh blanket of snow on the sidewalk and a crisp chill in the air. Their destination was a short distance—only a few blocks east. She thought about what sparked their journey.

“Did you really mean that?” Madelyn questioned Nick as they walked in the direction of the Dugout Inn. He glanced at her, unsure of what she meant. “Disillusionment? Do you really not believe in Hancock’s cause?”

He made a sound, somewhere between a sigh and a groan as he rubbed at his chin. “I believe in results,” he answered, keeping his eyes focused on their path. “I’ll believe it when I see it.”

The Dugout Inn was a tiny hole-in-the-wall, located right on the corner of Boylston Street, opposite of Fenway Park. The clientele were mostly refugees, thanks to the owners, Vadim and Yefim Bobrov—immigrants from Russia who established the bar shortly after V-Day in 1945. Unassuming enough, though the two had their fair share of run-ins with Boston police over the years, mostly for expired liquor licenses or smuggling illicit moonshine. Never anything as serious as money laundering, tax evasion or murder. Mr. Bobrov’s good natured attitude had made him a valuable ally to Nick, perhaps even a friend, somebody the detective could turn to when searching for leads among the downtrodden and forgotten within the city.

Being a mid-morning Friday, it wasn’t surprising that the Dugout Inn was mostly devoid of patrons, save for Vadim’s twin brother and their lone waitress Scarlett who was dutifully sweeping near the back. There was one daytime drunkard, however, sleeping off his hangover in a faraway booth. Yefim was balancing the books at a nearby table, muttering about needing to pay the gas bill, barely acknowledging the passing duo with a wave. As they approached the bar, Vadim was beaming, wiping the countertop before them in earnest.

“Ah, my favorite gumshoe back to see old Vadim,” he set out two glasses, waggling his eyebrows suggestively. “Want to try the latest batch? May not have ripened yet, but…you always had a good sense of knowing!”

Nick softly chuckled, but shook his head as he removed his hat, placing it on the bar. “I’m not going to be your guinea pig again, Vadim.”

“And what about the lovely lady lawyer? My lapochka?”

Madelyn smiled at his flattery but waved her hand at his offering. “No, thank you.”

Vadim went to speak but hesitated, instead scrutinizing their appearance in his bar. Sudden realization dawned in his expression as he tightened his fist into the cleaning cloth. “Are you here about Earl?”

Nick had barely nodded before Vadim continued with a sagging hang of his head. “Oh, poor Earl. Gone, just like that. Such a good bartender. Good friend,” he trailed with a forlorn expression that morphed into one of slight amusement. “Terrible with the women, mind you.”

“Always in his cups about his face getting in the way,” he further explained. “I say, no mug is too ugly for any woman! What says you, Miss Hardy?”

She joined him in laughter, humoring the old flirt. “Oh, Mister Bobrov, if you were thirty years younger you might have a decent chance at making an honest woman of me…again!”

Even Nick snickered, shaking his head at the exchange. But they were here on business, not for a friendly exchange of words or a casual drink. They had a man to find, sooner, rather than later. At his signal, Madelyn pulled her notepad from her purse, pencil at the ready for any information they might gleam.

“See anybody from Winter’s gang around here lately?” Nick asked, eyes narrowed when Vadim quickly shook his head, coughing to clear his throat as the tone shifted. Nick quickly glanced to Madelyn who offered a quick shrug. Maybe zeroing in on Eddie Winter wasn’t the best idea. Would Vadim even know what a mobster type looked like?

“Oh!” The proprietor said excitedly, hands waving for emphasis. “A few days ago, there was this young mercenary type that I’d never seen before. Lingered about for a few days. Greaser kid that looked like he belonged to a bad crowd.”

“Did he and Earl speak?” Madelyn questioned.

Vadim shrugged, eyes glanced upwards as he remembered. “Yes? No. All I know is he looked suspicious. A—and I haven’t seen him since Earl disappeared!”

Nick was twisting his lips—a telltale sign he wasn’t entirely sure he liked the credibility of the information—but they had nothing else to go on. He tapped his finger against the counter impatiently. “Do you have a name? A location? Think carefully, Vadim. For Earl’s sake.”

A moment passed as the bartender mulled it over in his head. Vadim then straightened, clapping his hands together enthusiastically. “MacCready! That’s his name! Rum and cola. Overheard him mention a hotel near Scollay Square…”

“The Rexford?” Nick mused, more to Madelyn than Vadim.

She nodded. “The Rexford.” 

Scollay Square by 1958 was not the thriving center of Boston theatre and community it once was. Practically a ghost town, with most buildings boarded up after being destroyed by fire or looters, few businesses remained. The Old Howard Theatre—long shut down by the Boston vice squad stood at the epicenter like a shining reminder of the past. Always Something Doing—but not anymore. The area was now known colloquially as Goodneighbor, nicknamed after Mary Goodneighbor’s 1953 striptease that ended it all. Goodneighbor was a hive of sex work and drug runners, bootleggers and mobsters, all just out to make their living in the world—the perfect place for a person to disappear.

Nick decided the trip west warranted the use of his black Cadillac. They’d make better time, and even he wasn’t one to be caught walking through Boston Common—even armed—at any time of day with the increasing crime rates. As they pulled up outside the Hotel Rexford, they observed a disturbance on the sidewalk, snow flurries disrupting their view. Madelyn was exiting the vehicle before Nick could rush over to pull open the passenger door, ever the gentleman as he offered his hand to her. But she was more focused on the three men in a clear argument on the hotel steps, carefully observing the interaction as she hooked her elbow around Nick’s arm.

“Well, we’re outside now!” The scrawnier of the three shouted from the stoop.

On the sidewalk below, a man with wide shoulders and a crew cut snarled back. “Didn’t have to be like this, MacCready! We were just here to deliver a message!”

Madelyn and Nick exchanged knowing glances but refrained from interfering. While they had their lead identified, the situation was hardly any of their business. It didn’t mean that they weren’t going to eavesdrop and make it their business, gather information that might come in useful later on.

“It only took you six months to track me down,” MacCready spoke, taunting his aggressors. “Winlock and Barnes. You two always hold hands across Boston? Don’t you know I left your wannabe gang for good?”

The man Madelyn assumed as Winlock shook his head, irritated as ever. “Yet here you are, taking jobs where you shouldn’t be. Listen carefully, MacCready, it has to stop.”

“Like I have to take orders from you,” he laughed and for a split-second Madelyn wondered if there was going to be a firefight the way the third man’s hand flinched along his side, reaching under his jacket.

Instead, Winlock defused the situation with a curt nod, signaling to his partner Barnes to step back. “We aren’t going to kill you. Today. Wouldn’t want a war with Goodneighbor, or with Winter.”

Nick’s hand around Madelyn’s arm tightened at the mention. Whoever these people were, they weren’t affiliated with the mob organization terrorizing Boston. MacCready crossed his arms, seemingly bored with the conversation. “Are we done here?”

The two thugs traded steely looks—this wasn’t over—not by a long shot. “We’re done. For now.”

As Winlock and Barnes passed the Cadillac, they took one slow, up-and-down look at the pair of onlookers before disappearing down an alleyway. Madelyn looked after them, deeply unsettled, but snapped back to the present as Nick swiftly led them to the lone man left on the hotel stairs, pacing as he kicked at the snow with his sneakers.

“MacCready?”

“Look pal, I’m not looking for any friends,” he said with a wince, shaking his head.

Madelyn looked at their would-be suspect now that they were up-close. For Vadim to have called him suspicious was not wrong, but if anything, the man simply appeared to be down on his luck. Overall, he looked nonthreatening: faded, rolled up jeans, dark flannel shirt with an army bomber jacket and a matching cap atop his dusty brown hair. He was skinny, like he had missed a few meals, and it made her wonder if he was another veteran of the streets that had returned from the war with no home to return to.

“We aren’t here to make friends,” Nick’s tone was firm, signaling it was time to take the proverbial gloves off. The man was squirmy and would need the two of them to act fast if they wanted the right information. “Do you know anything about an Earl Sterling?”

MacCready didn’t take to intimidation lightly. He narrowed his eyes, looking over both of them. “What are you, some kind of cop? Can’t do his job without his lady wife?”

“Lawyer,” Madelyn corrected, removing her hand from Nick’s arm. She gestured in her partner’s direction. “Detective. Best not say anything that incriminates yourself.”

Nick laid it on thick. “We know you were at the Dugout Inn when Sterling disappeared, MacCready. So do us both a favor and tell us everything you know!”

The man held up his hands defensively, bewilderment spread across his features. “Jeez! Okay!”

“I was only there for two days, following up on…something. Yeah I saw Earl there. Nice guy, if not a bit ugly, but who am I to judge?” MacCready talked and the pair listened, Madelyn scribbling away in her notepad the important details. “He kept talking about needing to get out of town. At first it was innocent like…for a fresh start to meet the perfect woman, but the more drunk he got, the more it sounded like he was running from the wrong kind of people.”

“Who?” she followed up quickly.

“Heck if I know,” he responded.

Nick prodded further. “He didn’t mention the mob or a loan shark? The Railroad?”

The mention sent a shiver down Madelyn’s spine. Why, she wasn’t sure. For all of their digging in the last two weeks, the organization—if it even existed—was still shrouded in mystery. She stalled in her notetaking and tuned out most of Macready’s response. “…it’s just a myth.”

A familiar expression fell across Nick’s face as he mulled over MacCready’s words. Helpful? Hardly. It was more of the same of what Vadim had offered, leaving them at square one. Earl was still missing, and they were no closer to determining why beyond a vague threat of needing to get away.

“I might have something you can use,” MacCready voiced, shifting awkwardly down the snowy stairs so he was closer to them. “But if I’m gonna help you, you gotta help me.”

“What happened to ‘not looking for a friend’?” Nick remarked with a light smirk.

MacCready grumbled under his breath, clearly uncomfortable with the circumstances of their visit. He wasn’t having a good day, it seemed. “All bets are off when your life gets threatened in broad daylight.”

“Is that what that was all about?” Madelyn asked, motioning towards the alley where Winlock and Barnes had wandered off to. She flashed a teasing smile, hoping to get a rise out of the man. “Colleagues of yours?”

“Fu—heck no,” he answered, censoring himself. Odd. She chalked it up to a man not wanting to curse before a lady and rolled her eyes. “They are Gunners. Small town gang that operates out of Quincy. I—I uh, used to run with them about five years ago. When I was younger. Dumber. But then I wised up. Got married and had a kid. Gig like that doesn’t really pay the bills, you know?”

“You’re married?” Nick asked, the two seemed to simultaneously note the missing wedding band. He was trying a different, more sympathetic angle.  

MacCready gave a solemn shrug, but his eyebrows furrowed with annoyance. “I was. But that isn’t any of your business.”

“Excuse me,” Madelyn blinked, the math not adding up in her head. “How old are you?”

MacCready chuckled like he was asked the question every day. “Twenty-two.”

Both her and Nick made the same surprised sound, staring at their suspect-turned-dud in disbelief. There went her veteran theory.

“I have a son, Duncan. He’s five years old,” MacCready continued, the emotions he expressed sincere. “I’m just trying to do the best I can by him. Can’t do that if I’m dead.”

“How do we fit into this equation?” Nick asked, tone softer than before. Madelyn smiled, knowing he couldn’t resist a hardship tale.

MacCready tilted his head back and forth with a low hum. “Two hot shot detectives like yourselves need an informant on the streets, right? Let me help you, and in return…”

“Lawyer,” Madelyn corrected, again.

“Exactly!” he replied, far too excited. “Crime and Punishment that sh—stuff.”

She decided not to lecture him on Russian literature and its vast differences to her actual career, which in itself were completely separate than what services she provided for the Valentine Detective Agency. She exchanged a silent, somewhat amused look with Nick, who seemed just as bewildered by the person they had crossed paths with. Finally, the two nodded and the detective extended his hand.

“Nick Valentine, Valentine Detective Agency,” he formally greeted.

MacCready chuckled as they shook hands. “You couldn’t make that stuff up, could you?”

His handshake with Madelyn was much softer, less amused. If anything, he seemed genuinely impressed. “Madelyn Hardy, attorney at law.”

“Robert Joseph MacCready,” he grinned. “RJ, Mac, MacCready. Whatever’s cool.”

“You have something for us?” she reminded, and he quickly removed his hand from hers with a short, excited inhale. The two watched as he patted the front of his jacket before digging through his pockets, finally producing a small key on a golden chain. “Is that…”

“Earl’s key,” MacCready answered with a sheepish smile, shifting his eyes away. “Figured if he was going to be running away, it might come in handy later on. Lives in those apartments near the stadium.”

“I’m going to pretend I didn’t hear this,” Nick muttered, shaking his head.

Madelyn wasn’t pleased that their best lead was stolen property, but at this rate, it was their best chance of tracking Earl Sterling down. She snatched the key from him before he could change his mind, tucking it away into her purse along with her notepad.

MacCready regarded her with a stern expression. “Remember my offer!”

She would. But for now, she and Nick had more work to do. 

That wasn’t the first time Madelyn and Nick had backtracked across town, chasing a lead on a case. As they raced through the Fens past the stadium to the grouping of apartments that matched the name on Earl’s golden key, she was grateful that at least this time they hadn’t been sent to Quincy, or Concord. By the time they reached the Parkview Apartments, the sun was setting and the frosty chill from the morning had settled to a near freeze. She couldn’t explain it, but an eerie sense of dread settled in her gut, putting her on edge. Nick seemed to feel it as well, the two dashing up the flights of stairs to make it to Earl’s door.

“What do you think we’ll find?” she asked, nervous.

“Not sure, but we’re about to find out,” he answered, prompting her to unlock the door.

Madelyn was careful, quiet in her actions as she clicked open the lock, Nick taking the lead as he pushed open the door inch by inch. She followed closely behind, the two making their way blindly in the darkened room, the only guiding light the moon that shined in through a broken window shade.

“Mr. Sterling?” Nick called out in a low voice, scanning the area. It was a tiny, studio apartment, with a kitchen nook, a foldaway bed, a small closet and a door that led to the bathroom. From what Madelyn could tell, their missing person wasn’t there. Still, Nick called out again. “Earl? Are you here?”

“Nick, something doesn’t seem right,” she whispered, stepping away to inspect the foldaway bed. Even in the darkness she could see the mismatched stains in the carpet, an overturned nightstand and a few pieces of broken glass. She held her breath before tugging sharply on the release, jumping backwards as the bed—and Earl—came tumbling out. “Jesus, Mary and Joseph!”

Nick managed to turn on a lamp, revealing what she had found, rushing over to her side as she turned away from the horror, covering her nose and mouth as to not retch. He wrapped a comforting arm across her shoulders, exhaling a low, defeated sigh. Earl was dead, but more than that, he had been brutally murdered.

“This wasn’t Winter,” Nick mumbled, drawing a quick conclusion. Madelyn had to agree, even if they only had the scene to go by—Eddie’s men weren’t into butchering their victims. “We need to call—”

They both froze as a clattering sound echoed from beyond the closed bathroom door. Nick swiftly pulled his weapon from its side holster—a well-cared for .44 revolver—and motioned for Madelyn to move behind him. She followed his silent instructions, and reminded him that she too was armed, calmly removing the small pistol she carried from the purse on her arm. He glanced at her with a startled expression—she’d hear about this later—but kept moving closer towards the closed door.

“We know you’re in there!”

When the door creaked open, the two were faced with a familiar, but horrifying sight. Doctor Crocker, a local cosmetic surgeon stood with a wild and strung out look in his eyes—a far cry from the friendly face on the billboard ads plastered around town. He cackled out a laugh. “Naughty, naughty! You’re not supposed to be here! But that’s okay! I can fix that. I can fix anything!”

Madelyn resisted the urge to curse or to scream. For a brief moment, she wondered if she felt this terrified when held at gunpoint more than a year prior by a different madman. Doctor Crocker, however, appeared completely unhinged, dangerous and unpredictable. He hadn’t just shot somebody. He had cut them apart and used their blood as paint for the walls.

“Take it easy, doc,” Nick attempted, raising one hand in a calming gesture, all the while keeping his gun aimed towards the doorway. “Let’s talk.”

“I—I didn’t mean to do it! Doctor Crocker is a brilliant surgeon!”

Talking in the third person was never a good sign, she decided, thinking he had to be high on some kind of illicit drug. Mixed with the adrenaline, the doctor was teetering on the edge of outright disaster.

“He never makes mistakes or loses patients! Only happy patients for Doctor Crocker!” he announced, reaching back to grab what turned out to be his own pistol. Now, Madelyn was petrified. And yet, she didn’t scream, resolve getting the best of her.

“You made a mistake, Doctor Crocker,” she tried Nick’s brand of persuasion, even if it made her skin crawl. “Do the right thing. Just think it through. Come with us quietly.”

At first, her words seemed to have an effect, the daze lifting from his eyes as he glanced down at the red stains that covered his clothes and the state of disarray surrounding them. Doctor Crocker flicked his gaze back to Nick and Madelyn, and the panic returned. “Oh god! I killed a man! There’s so much blood! Blood! All over me!”

He was weeping now, loud and hysterically. Hesitantly, Nick stepped closer in a last-ditch effort to resolve the situation. The doctor lashed out, pushing him away. Madelyn’s heart skipped a beat, and she thought she would be reliving the past all over again. “No! No one can find out!”

But Doctor Crocker didn’t aim towards them. Instead, he turned the gun on himself, barrel pressed firm against his chest before firing. The action took less than a second, faster than Nick or Madelyn could react or intervene. His body collapsed in the bathroom doorway, clearly dead on impact.

“You should’ve seen that,” Nick hushed, his faded coat coming into view as he tucked her head close into his shoulder. She didn’t even realize she was trembling. “You shouldn’t have seen any of that.”

A voice, somewhere in the back of her head told her it was just the beginning. She would become tempered, experienced. Most of all, she would heal. But first, she would see so much more.  

Just like that, the Earl Sterling case was closed.

The Boston Police weren’t pleased with them, but then again, they never were. It wasn’t until past midnight when they were released from the scene, not without a scolding from Sergeant Danny Sullivan. It didn’t matter that they had tracked down Earl Sterling when Boston Police wouldn’t (or couldn’t) and had managed to hunt down a killer in the process. As the police saw it, because any blood was shed, it looked indecent on their behalf, and it all had to be handled very carefully. Nick and Madelyn feared that was codeword for coverup. But they weren’t threatened, or told to keep quiet, which further fed into the detective’s either hypothesis—that Winter had nothing to do with Earl’s death. What had started as a run of the mill case had left them with more questions than answers.

Madelyn and Nick were exhausted by the time they returned to the agency. Ellie had left her little glass lamp turned on, just as she promised, but the brunette was long gone. Instead, a different, familiar voice called to them from Valentine’s office.

“Rough night?”

Piper winced as soon as she saw them come through the door, clenching her teeth in a sharp hiss. It was likely obvious how ragged they appeared, and Madelyn was sure some of their clothes were splattered with blood from Earl’s apartment. Nick pulled off his coat with a groan, tossing his hat across his desk as he snatched up the fresh pack of cigarettes Ellie had left behind. Madelyn didn’t bother, practically collapsing into her favored armchair on the left and slinking down, no matter how undignified her posture appeared.

“That bad?” Piper asked.

“You don’t know the half of it,” Nick responded, puffing out smoke before taking in another deep inhale.

The reporter tapped the rolled-up newspaper she carried against her palm, shifting her gaze between the two of them. “Well, since we’re already swimming in it,” she half-heartedly joked before unfurling the newsprint, dumping it atop Nick’s desk so he could see. “Johnny Montrano Jr. is dead. They found his body in the Harbor this morning while you two were running around.”

Fury seemed to be fueling Nick now, who was already starting on his second cigarette. Madelyn perked up at the news, realizing what his reaction would be. “The bastard’s finally done it. He’s finally had him offed. Fed to the fishes.”

“Fishes didn’t really get to do their job though,” Piper mused, rolling her eyes when the two remained silent, too focused.

Madelyn looked to Nick. “He’s looking to take over the northern territories.”

“If he hasn’t already,” Nick replied in an ominous tone. “Nobody is safe anymore.”

Eddie Winter had just made his first deadly move.

[justhereforthefanfiction]

Subtle Induction: Matteo x Adele drabble/one-shot

Whatttt!!! Okay, I did say I didn’t have time to commit to a fanfic, but this scene popped into my head and I thought, heck. Fine. I can smash out a drabble. 

Famous last words, eh?

This was inspired by one of my Titanic prompts - Christmas (Modern/Urban) AU, but leans closer to a Workplace AU. Not chrismas-sy though :(

Subtle Induction | Titanic AU | Matteo x Adal

Click. Click. Click.

She stared at the spreadsheet despondently, figures swimming in front of her eyes.

NG-Organise? More like NG-bullshit. 

She sighed heavily.

48 hours. That was all it took for her world to come crushing down. 

Adal moved to London upon accepting a job offer that seemed too good to be true. A passionate activist of women's rights, Adal was currently putting herself through a political science degree by working tables at the local pub. One night, she overheard one of her patrons waxing lyrical about the emerging tech giant that was going to change the world. Immediately, she was enamoured. She looked up their careers directory and applied for a place on their PR team. 

To her surprise, what she thought would be a shot in the dark became a dream come true when she received an email invitation for an interview. Mr. Vasari had taken her interview, shown her around the workplace, and offered her a position. His deep baritone, steady gaze and fierce intellect made her feel safe and listened to, and she believed if this was any indication of the level of leadership she had to look forward to, the job would be a slice of heaven.

Little did she know she made a deal with the devil.

She huffed, rubbing the bridge of her nose tiredly. The hairs of her neck began to stand. Her eyes flicked over the barrier to the cubicle in the corner. 

He was looking at her again. 

Rolling her shoulders back, she met his inquisitive gaze heads on. He did not look away. Instead, he quirked one thick eyebrow up, an insufferable smirk tugging at the corner of his lips.

Matteo Vasari was a wolf in sheep’s clothing. But little did he know, she was no lamb. 

Adal scoffed. He had set her on this path. Convinced her that this was the exact progressive workplace she wanted to be in. That this was the job of a lifetime. Convinced her to move to London, quit her job, uproot herself and her sister to seize the opportunity to make a difference.

Within 2 days of starting, the facade of the dream came crashing down. 

James Eisler, the British division’s CEO had invited her and Matteo to discuss her role and responsibilities. She left that meeting white-knuckled, with her breath caught in her chest. It was evident that she was a token hire, a woman and person of colour that would raise the profile of their company to several key stakeholders they wanted to impress. And what better way than putting her in-charge of publicity. A public face for a public role. 

Immediately she saw what she didn’t see right there before. A predominantly anglo workplace. No women in managerial or senior positions. A white saviour mindset permeating throughout their work in various sectors. None of their practices took into account local expertise in the countries they assisted. It was shocking. A complete contrast to their current image. 

No wonder why they splash the big bucks on PR, Adal rolled her eyes.

Click. Click. Click.

She couldn’t just cut loose. Her apartment and Hileni’s new school placement was tied up with NGOrganise. They had offered it as part of their reloaction service, and Adal took them up. Now everything was at stake. 

Worse still, she was tasked to win over Zetta Serda, beloved Oscar-winning actress and UN Goodwill Ambassador for the past 5 years. To convince her to be part of their charade in spreading awareness and goodwill across the globe.

Scowling at her screen, she hears the rolling of a chair in the distance. Sharp footsteps pad towards her. Adal kept her eyes glued to the screen, her hand twitching in anticipation. Not long, the telltale strong, spicy scent of his pomade invaded her senses. A small cough. She reluctantly lifts her eyes. Matteo throws her a short, wry smile and nods towards her screen.

“Having trouble?”, he tucks his hands under his arms, his forearms exposed by crisp rolled-up sleeves. His wristwatch glistens under the fluorescent lighting. 11.45am. Gods, the day had barely begun.

“Trouble e-stalking a celebrity, tracking down her movements and formulating a false impression of our work for the campaign? Now why would you think that?”

He smirks, finding her candor refreshing.

“You look like you’ve been kicked by a horse”.

She gasps. His smirk deepens. 

“Well, I happen to have a lot on my mind.”

Matteo’s smirk fades and he nods, deep in thought.

“And how is your sister settling?”

Adal’s back stiffens. Matteo sees how it’s taken and immediately shakes his head, hands raised, cool demeanour gone.

“I meant, with school and everything. I understand it was a big move for her too.”

A beat passes, Adal’s face an inscrutable mask. 

“Great. We’re grateful to NGOrganise for putting her at St Rose’s Girls. Not an easy school to get into, from what we hear.”

The unspoken implication of the statement hangs heavily between them. It is known that girls that look like Hileni do not go to prestigious, high crust institutions like St Rose's.

Matteo nods. He hesitates over what he says next.

“Adal...we take care of our own here at NGO. You needn’t worry. You have every reason to believe that we have your best interests at heart. James is a man of his word.”

“And you?”

Adal sees his eyes flash for a split second, and then flicker with something heavy. She thinks calling it remorse would have been too generous.

His voice drops.

“I’m not your enemy. Look around you. People like us, we got to do whatever it takes to keep those doors open.”

Matteo falters. He takes a deep breath, but thinking better of it, stops himself. He steps towards the back of her chair. Alarmed, Adal’s breathing jumps. 

He bends over her shoulder, an arm at the back of her seat, his face and hers side-by-side, inches away from each other.

She tries to avoid it but she can’t. From the corner of her eye, she can see every line, every hair on his face. 

Belatedly, she registers that he is reviewing her work, his eyes fixed on her screen.

She thinks she can’t possibly hide her reaction to him, but hopes against hope that he hasn’t noticed his affect on her. His face is a passive mask, but the glint in his eye betrays him.

After a tortuous 15 seconds, he points to the screen and turns towards her, his breath shallowly wafting across her face. Their lips are inches apart.

“Add a column here for resources. As long as it is a prospecting expense, you may use it however you like”.

He straightens up to leave. Adal feels her face warm up. As he walks away, she releases her breath and hangs her head in annoyance and confusion. Or rather, annoyance at her confusion. Wasn’t he Enemy #1 a moment ago?

Before she could complete the thought, Matteo turns around, his eyes flicking to her screen.

“By the way, good job.”

She hesitantly smiles.

“I want it in my inbox before lunch time”.

She scowls as she watches him walk towards his desk, grab his laptop and head towards James Eisler’s office. 

Don’t look a gift horse in it’s mouth, is that what he is trying to tell me?

She shakes her head, her hand going for her mouse. 

Click. Click. Click.

Her eyes look for him across the room. 

No matter what he says, he had full knowledge I was a token hire. He encouraged me. Deceit is deceit.

Matteo strides into the boardroom, laptop in hand. Their eyes connect.

No matter how pretty his words are.

Determined, Adal looks at her screen and gathers her thoughts. She wasn’t going to be a pawn in someone else’s game. So what if she was a diversity hire? She knew her worth, and no amount of commiserating over shared experiences was going to stop her from being who she was. She was more than her race and gender. She needed to walk away from this unscathed, on her own terms, her own way. And she would.

Whatever it took.

---

Author's note: 

Hellooo Life 2.0 cameo! Doesn't Matteo come across a little like Jaime, in the sense they are both aware of the POC ceiling at their respective workplaces?

Also, leaning towards Mena Massoud as a face claim for Matteo. He is a little prettier, and his face is rounder, but look:

Kinda? Maybe?

Still trying to find the perfect face claim for Adele, but no luck. I do think Naomi Scott would do a kickarse job as her, if she was cast. 

There, the plot bunny is out of my head (for now).

[a-third-attempt]

Raising Bell (pt. 1)

 * * *

Defamation, Libel. 8 cts: First Presbyterian, Chittenden County &c. (see Appendix C)

 * * *

“We’ve got her”, I said.

“Jason. I’ve told you a million times not to barge in here after— Who?”

The boss’s desk is big, but he makes it look small. Tall and fat, he always wears a dark brown coat that somehow makes him an even more imposing presence. You'd never catch him during working hours without a cigar in his mouth, and even then you’d never catch him for more than a couple seconds at a time. He wasn't the easiest guy to get along with, but the only reason this operation was still in the black was because that man worked around the clock to make it go. At the moment he was busy with paperwork, a task that he never started until 7:00 at the earliest, because “the real work goes on when the sun is up, kid!”

“Dorothy,” I said.

“Dorothy McAdams?”

“Dorothy McAdams.”

His eyebrows raise and he offers a breathless “Dorothy McAdams...” in reply. “How the hell did you manage that?”

“She came to town because of her brother, and the word on the street is that she’s sticking around for a year or two. Besides that,” I smile broadly, “I suppose it’s just to your credit for hiring such a charming talent agent, that got her to call you back before St. Anthony.”

He grunts. That was a little too showy for any other day, but with Dorothy in my pocket he’d damn well better cut me some slack.

“How much did it cost me?”

“Well, sir...”

“Snap it out Jason, I haven’t got all night.”

“Sorry, sir. Salary isn’t worth writing home about, double what the other four-in-handers get. And no signing bonus, just a condition.” I pause. He removes the cigar from his mouth and waves it in a circle, annoyed that I'm talking so slow. “We have to take on a kid named Timothy Courtson.”

“Who the hell is Timothy Courtson?”

“Does it matter?” I say, confidently.

“It might,” he snaps back. I guess he's right. Could be an arsonist, he always says. That sure would be bad for business, you know. I glance down at the file in my hand, and swallow hard.

“It doesn’t.”

“He any good?”

I’m sure the millisecond of silence was answer enough, but I answered him. “He can play C and D4.”

He puts the cigar back in his mouth and smirks. “So, no.”

“Positively dire, sir. But it’s no bonus with the kid; 2.5 without.” A second of silence is all it takes to get the words spilling out of my mouth. I spent too much money on her and if I lost the cash back… “Look, we just double up Karen and shift down the bass. The kid can sound like a dying cat and nobody’s going to know the difference down there. Garrett can teach him to mart properly and he’ll get the rest in the extra lessons from Tanya.”

He waves away my explanation. “Yeah, yeah, Jason. You made the right call. Good work.”

I bow my head, and take the opportunity to collect myself, knowing that the goodwill won’t last long. “There— sorry, there’s another thing. Louis told me to give you this.”

I hold the file out to him, and he recoils. “Does it look like I've got the time to read this thing?”

“Please, boss. It's important.”

He snatches the file in one hand, and with the other he grabs a pair of comically undersized glasses. Plopping them on his nose, he opens it and starts reading. It takes about three seconds for the color to drain from his face and his mouth to twist into a bitter scowl.

“What the SAM HELL is this, Jason?” I shrug. Could have been worse, if we're being honest.

“Just a list of notes that Louis kept when he had her, and everything he could find about her past behavior.”

He starts to shout at me again, but thinks better of it and rubs his temples. “Jesus Christ.”

“Language.” It’s instinct, but I know it’s a bad idea from the instant the word comes out of my mouth.

“Jesus Christ have mercy on this woman’s soul,” he snaps back. “But judging by this rap sheet, there’s not much chance of that.”

“She’s a genius. Every genius has some quirks.”

“Hell with quirks, Jason. This is a problem.”

The words hang silently in the smokey air of his office. He tosses the folder to the side and turns away from me, looking out the window at the view of nothing, just a few yellow streetlamps and the broad side of the next concrete building.

“You still want her, though, right?”

He’s quiet, still facing away from me, but there’s no hesitation. “Yes.”

“We’ll just have to keep a tighter leash than Louis did.”

“Take your good-for-nothing file and get out of here,” he grunts softly, and I oblige. As frightening as Boss can be when he’s a swirling rage, I know he’s much scarier when he gets that quiet.

 * * *

A/N: As usual, you can see the entire writing process below the break.

==========

==========

Second Draft

See savefile-1 for suggested edits. I don’t think we need to do a full rewrite of this, but if you get inspired, this would be the draft to do it. I think the original was pretty inspired, though, and it went though a lot of revision with all the retellings.

 * * *

Okay, I’m just going to let this one go through on the second draft. It’s fine and I’m too drunk to do real edits. Maybe if I can stay sober for a whole night I’ll make it work, but fuck Coronavirus, amirite?

==========

First Thoughts

Okay, let’s do the first person thing.

What does Jason notice in their narration? They notice Boss, first and foremost. Boss is tempermental and demanding, so this is a survival mechanism. And with such sensitive information that he’s bringing, he needs to be hypervigilant. 

What does he miss? Emotions, for anyone except Boss— and even then, only as they’re written in his face and serve as tells toward his behavior in the immediate future, or things that he does(n’t) want to hear.

Also, it’s not that he misses it, but he’s not going to wax too poetic about the office; he works there, and he works long hours too.

From all these outbursts, especially with Boss— forgivable because of the situation, but not ideal— we can tell that Jason doesn’t have much impulse control. Even though I don’t like the ‘not even for’ line, this characterization might not quite come through without it. Play around.

Dropping the F bomb feels just a little off. It's not about the “Language” outbust (that's part of what makes the joke); it's just that Boss is someone who commands enough respect that they don’t have to lash out to get what they want. And yes, this McAdams’ rap sheet is pretty wild but it just seems like he would say it a tad more eloquently.

You should probably, at some point, actually draft this rap sheet. For the extended version I can easily see each chapter starting with an item from the sheet, when the chapter is about shenanigans in that regard.

If we’re going to call this Chap 1 instead of Prologue, I could easily see the line item here being:

Defamation, Libel. 8 cts: First Presbyterian, Chittenden County &c. (see Appendix C)

I mean obviously I’m making this citation style up wholesale, which is okay because the real citations are in the appendix, duhhhhh. Also obviously I don’t need it to be Chittenden County, Vermont; but wherever it is, is presumably where Louis runs his empire.

==========

First Draft (written over multiple sessions)

“We’ve got her”, I said.

“Jason I’ve told you a million times not to barge in here with— Who?”

[Exposition]

“Dorothy,” I said.

“Dorothy McAdams?”

“Dorothy McAdams.”

His eyebrows raise and he offers a breathless “Dorothy McAdams...” in reply. He looks up at nothing in particular, visions of fame and fortune surely filling his head. “How the hell did you manage that?”

“She came to town because of her brother, and the word on the street is that she’s sticking around for a year or two. Besides that,” I smile broadly, “I suppose it’s just to your credit for hiring such a charming talent agent, that got her to call you back before St. Anthony.”

He grunts. That was a little too showy for any other day, but with Dorothy in my pocket he’d damn well better cut me some slack.

“How much did it cost me?”

“Well, sir...”

“Snap it out Jason, I haven’t got all night.”

“Not even for Dorothy McAdams?” Probably shouldn’t have said that; my wit got the better of me. He glares.

“No.”

“Sorry, sir. Salary isn’t worth writing home about, double what the other 4-in-handers get. And no signing bonus, just a condition.” I pause. He removes the cigar from his mouth with his hand, that he then waves in a circle, annoyed at my slowness. “We have to take on a kid named Timothy Courtson.”

“Who the hell is Timothy Courtson?”

“Does it matter?” I say, knowingly.

“It might,” he snaps back. I guess he’s right. He always is.

“It doesn’t.”

“He any good?”

I’m sure the millisecond of silence was answer enough, but he’s clearly not in the mood for games. “He can play C and D4.”

He puts the cigar back in his mouth and smirks. “So, no.”

“Positively dire, sir. But it’s either 0 bucks with the kid, or 2.5 without.” He doesn’t answer, and my words start spilling out. “Look, we just double up Karen and shift down the bass. The kid can sound like a cat on meth and nobody’s going to know the difference down there. Garrett can teach him to mart properly and he’ll get the rest in the extra lessons from Tanya.”

He waves away my explanation. “Yeah, yeah, Jason. You made the right call. Good work.”

I swallow, knowing that the goodwill won’t last long. “There—there’s another thing. Louis told me to give you this.”

I pass over the file. He grabs a pair of comically undersized glasses, glaring sarcastically at me. Putting them on, he opens it and starts reading. It takes about three seconds for the color to drain from his face and his mouth to twist into a bitter scowl.

“What the SAM HELL is this, Jason?”

“Just a list of notes that Louis kept when he had her, and everything he could find about her past behavior.”

He starts to shout at me again, but thinks better of it and rubs his temples. “Jesus Christ.”

“Language.” It’s instinct, but I know it’s a bad idea from the instant I say it.

“Jesus Christ have mercy on this woman’s soul,” he snaps back. “But judging by this rap sheet, there’s not much chance of that.”

“She’s a genius. Every genius has some quirks.”

“These aren’t some fucking quirks, Jason.”

The words hang silently in the smokey air of his office. He tosses the folder to the side and turns away from me, looking out the window at the view of nothing, just a few yellow streetlamps and the broad side of the next concrete building. I look at him. He doesn’t move.

“You still want her, though, right?”

He’s quiet, but there’s no hesitation. “Yes.”

“We’ll just have to keep a tighter leash than Louis did.”

“Get the hell out of here,” he grunts softly, and I oblige. As frightening as Boss can be when he’s a swirling rage, I know he’s much scarier when he gets that quiet.

==========

Who needs Brainstorming or Freewriting?

What actually is happening here is that I wrote this almost four months ago so the writing process looks a lot different than I’m trying to do now. But I really wanted to get this polished up a bit, so I committed to posting it soon.

[movingforwardsf]

A Complete Guide to Moving Locally

Outline: 

Intro

Moving locally is still moving - there’s plenty to do, but it may look a little different

For one, packing can be a little less formal for certain items

You may also have no problem hauling plants and pets

However, there’s still a lot to consider. Don’t let the short commute to your new house fool you.

Ready to jump in? Here’s the checklist for moving locally

1 Month Out 

Name of the Game: Sort, Prep, and Take Inventory

At this stage you need an idea of everything you have:

-  Sort into donate, toss, sell, keep (gives tips on all of these).

Consider buying moving supplies

-  Reuse whatever you can - old electronics boxes, Costco boxes, garbage bags  you’re not going very far. 

-  Determine whether you will need a professional moving company. 

-  Figure out who will be helping you move. 

2 Weeks Out 

Donate

Inventory

Pack What you rarely use

Tell friends and family

Arrange moving day baby sitter / pet sitter

Need moving day parking? Arrange a permit (or hire professional movers).

1 Week Out 

Schedule utility end/start dates

Change addresses

Pack pack pack

Clean clean clean

A Few Days Out 

Figure out your first few days kit

Pack valuables separately

Final moving day plan

Take out cash (tips and random costs)

Moving day snacks and drinks

Finish packing the rest of your stuff

The Big Day 

Drop of kids and pets

Disassemble remaining appliances and furniture

Support and supervise movers

Load up your car

Final walk through

DRAFT: 

Moving locally is easier and less stressful than moving across the country. If you forget to pack that last house plant, you can always get it tomorrow. The clock strikes midnight, but you still have one last load? Tomorrow! Forgot to say so long to your neighbor? Yup, there’s always tomorrow. Before you start belting out the songs from Annie, don’t be fooled by that cute freckly red-head. Moving locally is still moving.  Unless you have the kind of money Daddy Warbucks had to buy a whole moving crew, get ready for a hard knock life of labor-intensive moving. Besides,this is not the 80s anymore. We’ve moved onto moving checklist 2019! Read on for some tips for moving locally that will make your tomorrow easier!

1 Month Out 

Just because you’re moving locally doesn’t mean you can throw everything in the car and be done. The first thing on your local moving checklist should be to make a game plan a month before your move so that it all gets done before tomorrow comes. 

Sort: Make a list of things that you want to donate, toss, sell and keep.

Donate: Goodwill is having a coat drive? Great time to donate all those dusty coats you inherited from Aunt Millie (may she rest in peace) that have just been taking up space.

Toss: Do you really need those DVDs from the early 2000s?

Sell: Got a whole dresser full of “when I’m skinny again, I’ll wear these” designer jeans? Take them down to your nearest clothing consignment shop and get some extra cash!

      2. Take Inventory: Before you start spending money on supplies,take a look at what you already have. Here are some self packing tips that may help save you time and money. 

Moving supplies: Reuse old shoe boxes, garbage bags and pillow cases as packing containers. Sheets, old newspapers and towels can be used to wrap fragile items.

Labor: Tap into your friends, family, co-workers and neighbors to see who would be willing to lend a hand. Heck! Consider putting an announcement on social media and bribe folks with pizza and beer!

      3. Prep: Now that you know what you have and don’t have, you can start planning for moving day. 

Professional Moving Company? At this point you should know whether or not you’ll need a professional moving company based on your inventory. If you do, start calling around for quotes.

Supplies: Make a list of the things you need to purchase for the move. Meals for moving day, supplies in case of bad or hot weather, packing materials. You don’t want to waste time on moving day on last minute tasks.

2 Weeks Out 

Once you have a solid plan, things should get easier from there. You can start doing the following two weeks prior to your moving date: 

Make donation runs to Goodwill

Pack What you rarely use

Tell friends and family about your move.

Make Arrangements for moving day: babysitter, pet sitter, a massage therapist for when your back starts to give out from all that heavy lifting.

Need moving day parking? Arrange for a permit

1 Week Out: At this point, schedule utility end/start dates, change addresses with the post office, your bills, credit card companies. This is also the time to kick the packing up a notch. Go room by room and pack all non-essentials in labeled boxes. As rooms start to empty, clean, clean, clean!

A Few Days Out: By now you should have most of your packing done. So what’s left? You should have a checklist for moving out that includes the following:

Pack clothes, toiletries, favorite pillow and anything else you’ll need for your first days moving kit.

Remember to pack your valuables separately. If you pack them all in one box and something happens to that box, you’ve lost everything.

Double and triple check your final moving day plan. Are there any last minute phone calls you need to make, supplies you need to get?

Take cash out. You may need it for tips and other random costs.

You will need energy and to stay hydrated on moving day so make sure to stock up on snacks and drinks for moving day.

Check the weather. If it’s snowing or raining, you may need waterproof supplies to protect your stuff. If there’s going to be a heat wave, you may need to change your moving plan. You don’t want your  plants baking in the sun for hours.

Finish packing so that all you have left to do on moving day is loading the truck.

The Big Day: When moving day finally arrives, these are some things you may have left to do:  

Drop off your kids and pets. You want to have full focus on your move to get it all done.

Disassemble and unplug remaining appliances so that they are easy to move. The same goes for any furniture that comes in pieces like your entertainment center or a sectional couch.

Whether you have hired professional movers or have friends and family helping you, make sure to let them in on the plan on what to move first and where to put it in your new home.

Once you’ve completed the last load, do a thorough walk through your old home to make sure you haven’t left anything behind.

Moving is tough even when it’s a short distance. If you need an extra set of hands, call the professional Palo Alto Movers at Moving Forward for a FREE quote today! You bet your bottom dollar, we would love to help you out!

[fauvester]

more modern au... the spirit moved me.....

This state ball really brought him back to the mid-recession crisis.  There wasn’t anything like 1990 Chateau de Mere and political company in the East Parlor to turn his thoughts to the good old days, or the end of the bad old days, maybe, when he got to watch Van Buren’s economy tilt and rip itself apart like a badly balanced centrifuge.  There were remnants of it all over the place if you had a keen eye for evaluating antiques, and he most certainly did.

Biddle blinked quickly in the dry air and looked over Maggie Bayard’s shoulder across the East Parlor entrance to where he last saw Thomas, circulating around with some of the First Husband’s old comrades.  It was awfully funny, in an awful way, that they were letting the nullies into the White House after everything they’d done.  John Calhoun got a grudging pass because he’d caught himself the leader of the free world, but that far and no further, by Biddle’s personal moral estimation.

Maggie looked back at him, her highball glass of seltzer hanging loosely from her fingers.  “He had a teaching job back in Philadelphia, didn’t he?”

“Ah, you have a good memory, don’t you. Penn State.  He’s on leave right now – I hope they let him stay off for another semester so he can stay down here. I guess I’ve gotten sort of fond of him. It’s very strange.”

“Husbands are like that, right? They just show up one day and hang around and you can’t get rid of them.”

“I know, who gives them the right.”  They smiled. He took another sip of wine. Thomas was still out of sight, probably in the next room somewhere, where the muted music from the string quartet rolled out from.  It was hardly an event that could be called a gala – he still remembered the parties of the Adams years, and even a few of the early Jackson affairs – but there were still enough people to lose someone in.  He licked his lips.  “So, who’d you think he’s going to pick for AG?”

“Oh, Stephens, definitely,” Maggie said quickly.

“Really!”

“That’s who he’s going to pick, at least.  I don’t think he’ll accept. Between you and me, he’s a real brass-tacks lifer.  It’ll be hard to get him out of the House.”

“Stephens, that’s the wiry little one with the overbite? Southern?”

“Georgia.”  She drank.  “An Old Fashioned Whig.  Seersucker, confederate flags.  He’s been in the House for, I think, two sessions?  Needs some southerners in the administration, you know. Not even Mr. John can hide the fact that his cabinet’s too top-heavy.”

Biddle got the sense that Maggie had had this conversation many times before, but didn’t mind having it again.  He’d had just gotten to DC that week to take his perfectly lovely new seat as the Secretary of the Treasury and had presently made up his mind to have as little to do with politics otherwise as possible, but the atmosphere made it hard to avoid it.  Clay had taken office a month ago and Van Buren’s attorney general had retired shortly thereafter.  Apparently he’d needed no strong urging – or if he did, the blackmail was handled masterfully.  He suspected Corwin and Hayne. The two of them working together, well!

“He’s got the great gift of post-nuptual goodwill from the media, I think he can stuff his cabinet with whatever he wants.  Stephens, I’m sure he’ll find a way to corner him into accepting.  He’s good at cowing people with his superior… his..?”

“Who’s what?”  Hayne interrupted, coming up behind the two of them to interrupt merrily.  He was smiling boyishly and holding a salmon roulette in each hand.

“President Clay’s je ne sais qouis,” Biddle said, smiling back at him and rolling his wine glass in his hand.

“Is he all we ever talk about here?  My god! Get some new material, darlings.”

“We’re in his house,” Maggie added. “Eating his canapés.”

Hayne wrinkled his nose in that charming little moue and ate them both in one go.

“Besides, compared to him, and you, Nick, we don’t lead very interesting lives,” she chuckled.  “Empty nester here.”

“Speak for yourself.  Besides, award-winning White House Press Secretary there,” Biddle added, and she smiled.  At least some of them were still in the honeymoon phase of it all.  He almost envied them their enjoyment of it. Some cruel new part of him hated them for it, too.

“Stop it, Nick, I have a husband to go back to,”

“Oh, he was asking where you were, by the way, your husband,” Hayne said, covering his mouth as he chewed.  “Something about the German Minister?  He’s in the State room last time I saw him.”

“Oh!  Thanks, Roby. I’m going to go find him.  Nice chatting with you,” She said as she brushed Hayne’s black-tie-tuxedo shoulder and gave Biddle a friendly nod.

“I’ll be seeing you soon,” he responded gamely as she left.  The two of them watched her shoulder through the crowd with the soft but stern direction of someone used to wrangling junior reporters for a living.

“You scared her off.”

“I’ve seen enough of her for right now,” Hayne responded, rubbing his fingers clean of crumbs.  “You know, you don’t just marry a person, you marry their family, and also their admin team, I swear to god.  We’ve been butting shoulders with Clay’s folks for weeks.”

“Trouble in paradise.  Young lovers...”

“Oh, /they’re/ fine.  Biting each other’s heads off all the time.  Sweet enough to give you cavities, ugh.” Hayne’s tone was tired but light.

“Where are they now?”

“Front parlor. Clay’s entertaining the Chinese ambassador with magic tricks.”

“Oh.”  Biddle shuddered.

Hayne reached over and took his mostly-empty wine glass and finished it off, placing it back in Biddle’s hand.  “Tastes like wine!”  He exclaimed brightly.

“I despair of you, Roby.  That was a good vintage.”

“Go get some more, hon, we’ve got plenty.”

“I might collect Mr. Cadwalader and head home, actually.  We spent all day unpacking and I think I’m ready to hibernate.”

“Hah!  Like you were doing any lifting.”  Hayne responded, giving Biddle a once-over.  Biddle sighed imperiously.  Since he had the disposable income to hire movers he didn’t see anything wrong with doing so. Stimulating the economy.  Besides, sorting through his books and paperwork /had/ been hard work, even though there wasn’t much actual legwork involved.

“Thomas couldn’t do much of that. His arm, of course, so I did most of the cleaning after the movers left.  John - my brother John - and his kids are coming over this weekend to finish unpacking.”

“Housewarming party?”

“Naturally. If you’re nice to me, I’ll even invite you.”

“That’s a steep price. We’ll have to see.”

Biddle spotted a familiar flash of sandy grey hair across the room and took Roby’s elbow.  Ooh, cashmere blend.  “I’m off.  Come over on Sunday dinner if Mr. and Mr. President don’t keep you, Thomas’s cooking.”

“He agreed to do Sunday dinner?”

“He will when I ask him,” Biddle responded, nodding across the room to his husband.  “Bring your Thomas too and we’ll make a night of it.”

“Oh, alright.  Send me an Outlook invite so I don’t forget.”

Roby waved his fingertips at him as he left.  A few years ago he would have stayed for the whole party, luxuriated in the glamour of good company and food, but now?  He looked up and around as he made his way to the other side of the parlor, to the wallpaper that was yellowed at the baseboard, the upholstery that was fading at the center, the whole subdued aura of the assembly, he felt a sick pain in the back of his throat.  The lingering taste of wine, sour, on his palette.   Four years, a whole incumbency, in the ignominious position of the most hated man in America.

I would take a thousand dinners with then-president Martin Van Buren, desperation leaking out from behind his polite façade, asking for help, to wash the taste form his mouth.  Nothing could make up for those years he lost, he thought, suddenly fierce and angry at a world that was trying to buy him off with a quiet comeback story.  He didn’t want vindication; he wanted nothing to have happened in the first place.

He met Thomas’ eyes as he brushed through two other cabinet ministers.  He didn’t smile, he rarely did, but he gave Biddle a slow catlike blink.  I know, he was saying.  Me too.

He didn’t have to say anything, just looped his arm under Thomas’ good one and patted the crook of his elbow with a thin, ‘well, that’s it then,’ smile.  Thomas looked up and out, past the stairwell where the sound of raucous conversation suggested the President was holding court, and then scanning over the crowd back to his husband with a nod of finality.  That’s it, then.  He squeezed Biddle’s hand against his side.

Together for a second, divorced from the warmth and excitement around them, and with the bittersweet air of pallbearers, the two left.