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turnsoutnoonewasexaggerating · 7 years ago

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AU where Neil was dying all along

• Guys I thought of something angsty • So you’re all gonna have to share the pain with me • So what if Neil had some kind of terminal illness; found out about it too late for it to be anything but terminal from never going to the hospital when with his mother (this is like pre-Milport but post Mary’s death) • This is some kind of terminal illness that doesn’t actually effect him physically that much yet (let me have this; Andrew got magic meds so) • Neil has to break out of the hospital with his drugs after his diagnosis (who knows why he was there to start with) and runs, ending up in Milport • He only plans to stay a night but then he’s like ‘fuck it I’m gonna die anyway’ • And joins the Exy team • Events continue as canon until Kev, Wymack and Andrew come to meet him • Neil doesn’t run from Kev this time, which is lucky because if Andrew had hit him with the racquet he might have broken one of Neil’s weakening bones • Instead he straight up is like ‘huh you don’t remember me’ because he’s already a dead man walking and he doesn’t care so much about the truths spilling out of his mouth like rips in his duffel bag • 'what are you talking about’ • 'Nathaniel at your service’ (snarky bastard) oh and Kev remembers that name even if he doesn’t remember Neil’s face. Neil’s not surprised • Kev tries to persuade Wymack and Andrew to just leave, freaking out, while Hernandez is like 'I didn’t know your full name was Nathaniel???’ 'I prefer Neil’ • Andrew is curious. Kevin seems scared but Andrew’s pretty sure it’s for “Nathaniel” not because of him • Still, Andrew’s never had the luxury of accepting only being “pretty” sure • Course Wymack still persuades Neil to come to Palmetto, especially when Neil explains he knows Kev coz he played at the Nest when he was little until his parents split and he left with his mum • It’s basically the truth • When he arrives at Palmetto Kevin is shook • 'What the Hell are you doing your father is still looking for you-’ in angry French ofc • 'I know. I reckon I’ve got a good year or two before he gets out on parole and turns up to kill me’ • Kevin thinks he’s absolutely insane, but then he doesn’t know that Neil’s going to die long before his father turns up so it’s a fair assumption • Neil dissolves his declining amount of meds in his water bottles and that is all he drinks which makes it rather difficult for Andrew to drug him (good thing too, who knows whether dust would’ve reacted with his meds) • Neil eventually clocks on at the sixth drink Andrew tries to offer him, and says Andrew can have the truth without the drugs thanks • Andrew doesn’t care about being called out but if Neil starts yelling about it someone might be good enough to call the police and then he’ll be fucked • He agrees, and Neil offers him the same truths he does in canon basically • Andrew offers to protect Neil in return for him keeping Kevin here. Neil doesn’t need Andrew’s protection, but just in case his father gets out on early parole or something, he accepts the deal, knowing Andrew won’t let him help with Kevin if he thinks Neil is doing it for free • He knows him so well already • Continue as canon except it’s his medical bills Riko throws in his face instead of his names at the banquet. • Not explicit enough for anyone else to get it but Neil is panicked • He’s pretty sure he wouldn’t be allowed to play if they knew he was dying and Exy is the only thing he wants to live for (oh honey child you have no idea what’s going to hit you) • Again, continue as canon • Drake happens • Neil sees Andrew’s scars and wishes he had a choice about dying • Easthaven, and Neil goes to Evermore, and it’s only two weeks but it’s two weeks without his meds and Neil is ridiculously weak • He explains it away by trauma making your immune system weak but Abby takes one look at him and knows it’s bullshit • She diagnoses him correctly and is like Neil what the fuck • Neil explains to her that he was terminal long before the Foxes, and he just wants to play Exy as long as he can • Abby is heartbroken • She has to tell David because they have to decide whether it’s safe for him to keep playing, but at Neil’s request she doesn’t tell him that Neil’s terminal • She replenishes his meds from the hospital but you can’t just go off them without consequences and Neil’s lost a lot more than two weeks off his lifespan • Abby thinks, if he stays on the meds, he’ll make it till the end of the year, but probably not past the summer and no one knows how much of that he’ll be able to play for • Somewhere before Andrew comes back from Easthaven, Riko gets word to Kev about Neil’s condition • Predictably, Kev freaks out, talking about how it’s hopeless and he might as well just go back to the Nest • This is where Neil and him have the conversation about Kevin being afraid to take his future 'you have a future, why won’t you just take it’ • Kev is suitably ashamed • He also thinks Neil should tell Andrew. Neil, being oblivious, doesn’t know why • Continue as canon • Wymack asks Neil to be the vice-cap next year. He doesn’t know how cruel he’s being but Neil can’t breathe • That is all he wants, everything he can’t have • He calls Andrew, and that time on the roof Andrew kisses him but this time Neil actually fully means his yes, not having a mental breakdown, because knowing you’re going to be killed vs actively dying does wonders for Neil’s introspection • For the money for the car, Neil asks Andrew to stop smoking instead of getting rid of the cracker dust. Andrew refuses, but Neil just asks him to have less cigarettes then (I am not saying Andrew starts vaping because he does not because Andrew is actually cool but he does agree to cut his cigarette intake down to just the one a day he shares with Neil on the roof) • Kev is more protective of Neil, desperate that no accident is going to take Neil before his illness • Andrew notices, coz he’s not an idiot, but he doesn’t know how to ask about it. For all he knows it’s just companionship from both now knowing what being in the nest is like • Besides, it’s like every day that Neil grows weaker, Kevin grows stronger and more confident, so Neil’s holding up his end of the deal • As Neil starts getting the countdown, he also starts coughing up blood, which he thinks is very poetic • Abby tells Neil the game on the day he will get a 0 in his countdown is going to have to be his last • Neil realises Andrew’s going to think he didn’t protect him properly even if Neil dies of his illness not his father • Neil persuades Andrew to break their deal the night Kevin comes home with a new tattoo, the proof that Kev doesn’t need him anymore • Quietly, in French, Neil thanks Kev for doing this before he dies. He knows the Foxes are going to be OK now • Kevin is already drunk and Neil’s words tip him over into full misery • 'what did you say to him? Could be useful to shut him up’ Asks Andrew • Neil flinches and Andrew is Concerned • 'Neil I’m taking a turn.’ • Neil looks at his hands and he doesn’t want to answer but he’s not about to start lying to his greatest regret, his best mistake • 'I told him thank you. For proving that he doesn’t need me anymore. For doing this now.’ • 'You were desperate to break our deal. Why?’ • 'It’s not your turn.’ Neil says eventually, and thinks that tomorrow, after the game, he’ll tell Andrew why, and he’ll tell him that he’s leaving. He doesn’t want to drag the Foxes through his death when they’ll have already lost the season. He’ll just leave, and only Andrew, Kevin and Abby will know he’s never coming back • The game happens, and Neil and Kevin are crazed on the court, Neil the most, knowing this is his last of the game that had always meant more to him than surviving. He plays with every inch of his being, even though they don’t need a massive points difference because, they don’t know it yet, but they’ve already lost the season. He plays for the game that brought him to the people that taught him what it was to live, to feel alive, to have friends and a family • To have Andrew, kisses and trust and keys and honesty • The call comes when he’s in the lockerroom and Neil just wants just another ten minutes, please, just ten minutes to say goodbye • He thought he’d get to say goodbye • The riot and Lola and the dashboard lighter, a cleaver, his father’s smile, 'I didn’t want time to take you out peacefully after all the trouble you caused me’, gunshots and coughing up so much blood Stuart thought he’d been caught in the crossfire, weak weak weak but clinging on, clinging on to say goodbye • He can’t get out of bed but he makes Browning bring the Foxes to him because Browning knows he’s on borrowed time and if he wastes it with useless posturing, Nathaniel might not get the chance to testify against his father • Andrew’s first in through the door, a livid bruise on his face that matches the look in his eye • 'Terminally ill?’ Are his only words and Neil is confused even as the other Foxes trail in, trying to understand what the problem is • 'You hate me, remember? I’m nothing. I didn’t think you’d care’ • Andrew wants to kill him, Andrew wants to tear him apart. He is losing everything, nevermind nothing. Neil is the one candlelight in his dark corner, and it turns out the candle has been running out of wax all along • Kevin has a bruised throat and grief striken eyes but he’s been hardened to this outcome since January. Something Andrew will never forgive him for • Abby and Wymack fought on the bus journey over, Wymack sick to his stomach as he thinks of the look in Neil’s eyes when he’d offered him the vice-captaincy • In the end, it was Neil’s choice • The Moriyamas can’t kill Neil now, so Neil tells the Foxes and the FBI his full story, his voice becoming quieter and wracked with coughs the longer he talks • He signs a few documents for the FBI and even Browning isn’t enough of a dick to ask him further questions in the time he has left • Neil asks Browning for something quietly, out of earshot of the Foxes, and Browning agrees, and leaves the room • The Foxes crowd around his bed. Nicky is already sobbing, but it’s quiet in a way Nicky never is. He latches onto one of Neil’s hands and refuses to let go • Matt has silent, less frequent tears falling softly into Dan’s hair where she’s tucked against his side, standing vigil at the end of Neil’s bed • She’s the one to ask how long he’s got, but it’s Abby that answers because Neil’s saving the last of his energy for more important words • 'A couple of hours. They offered to overdose him to save him the pain, but Neil wanted to say goodbye’ • He smiles tiredly at them when these words get a heartbroken response • 'You got with Andrew knowing you were going to die what kind of sick bastard does that?!’ Aaron finally bursts out, and it takes a lot of effort for Neil to loll his head to look at him • Andrew, who’s been stood at the back of the room, leaning against a wall but not taking his eyes off Neil, stiffens as the others exclaim at this new information • 'This was nothing.’ Andrew says, coldly. 'I made it nothing.’ • 'I was supposed to have a couple of years.’ Neil explains. 'But with the Nest and now this,’ And God if that isn’t the last thing Andrew wants to hear, that Neil didn’t only get hurt for him, but willingly took years off his lifespan on a fool’s mission that didn’t change anything- • Andrew leaves the room. • 'Tell him about Katelyn’ is Neil’s parting advice as Aaron follows • 'I’d say I’d make a fashion line in your honour Josten but the irony would be too much’ Allison says • She’s the last person to make Neil Josten laugh. One of the first too • 'Look after them?’ Neil asks of Renee, and her face is pained as she nods. Neil raises his free hand to touch hers with visible effort as she stands to leave with Allison. 'Look after yourself too.’ • 'It has been an honour to be part of your family.’ She says in return, knowing he won’t want her prayers or acknowledgement of the afterlife, but that he’ll get the former anyway. • She leaves because she doesn’t think she can stand to watch another death yet, at least not one she hasn’t inflicted. Besides, she has a feeling she needs to convince a certain blond to return • 'I’m expecting the Exy team to be fucking good by the time I get up there.’ Dan says, finally, and Wymack nods his agreement gruffly. • 'Take them to the championships.’ Neil replies. • Abby breaks at this point. She starts apologising to Neil, telling him she should have taken him off the court earlier, given him more time, worked out his illness earlier • Neil waves her off. 'Taking me off the court would’ve killed me faster’ and if that’s not dramatic Josten he doesn’t know what is • It’s at this point that Browning comes back • He has the papers all prepared for Nathaniel Wesninski to legally change his name • They look at him questioningly but Neil can’t summon the strength to explain as he scrawl his name across the paper painstakingly slowly • 'He said he wanted to die as Neil Josten. And he’s also made sure that your team has to be under FBI protection by telling you the same information as us. Sneaky bastard; he knows we have to protect witnesses.’ • 'I don’t want you to go.’ Matt bursts out, honestly and brokenly, incapable of putting on a brave face because God fucking damn it 'It isn’t fair! You’re my best friend I can’t-’ he chokes off and Neil grins, all teeth, returning the sentiment even as he begins to feel death creep into the room • 'Tell him.’ Neil breathes out in French, eyes flickering to Wymack. Kevin pales but nods stoically. Crossing his arms and taking the same posture as Wymack, it’s clear to see they’re related • 'Next year, the pro league award for the best striker will be called the Josten Cup.’ Kevin replies in the same language. It’s so typically a Kevin comfort that Neil almost smiles. He must have called in a lot of strings for that. 'Renee and I are working on getting Jean out of the Nest. I will make a deal with Ichirou. I’m the better striker.’ He asserts, and then shudders. 'But I can only hope to half the man you are.’ He cuts himself off, frowns at the floor, and speaks again. It takes everyone a second to realise it’s because Kevin needed to compose himself. 'You would’ve been Court.’ • Andrew bursts in before anyone can respond to that, and the relief that floods his features when he sees Neil’s eyes are still open shows how out of control Andrew still is. His eyes burn as he takes everyone in • 'Get out.’ No-one wants to leave, Matt and Nicky plant their shoes to the floor until Neil shoots them a look. 'I’ll call you in when we’re done.’ Andrew gets out through gritted teeth and eventually they go. • Andrew doesn’t come closer to the bed • 'You stupid fucking junkie.’ He hisses and Neil smiles lazily. Andrew stalks forward, hands shaking even as they are curled into fists • 'Yes or no?’ he bites out when there’s only an inch between their faces • 'Yes.’ Neil breathes out, because he doesn’t think Andrew will appreciate the irony of saying always. Andrew’s hands are gentle round Neil’s wrists as he guides them into Andrew’s hair in a way his lips are not • Neil tastes like blood and death but there’s something that’s still solidly loudmouth runaway, loudmouth fox, fierce and bright and so fucking alive that Andrew almost forgets they’re on his death bed • 'I was going to tell you after the game.’ Neil says against his lips. Andrew doesn’t reply, but the shakes wrack his whole body now. Neil moves his fingers listlessly in Andrew’s hair because that’s all the movement he’s capable of. 'Thank you.’ • 'For nothing?’ • 'For nothing.’ Neil agrees • 'Just don’t die.’ The words burst past Andrew’s lips without his permission, his control so shot it might never have existed. 'Just don’t fucking die Neil. Just stay.’ He knows this is something he can’t ask for. Whatever you’re willing to give, Neil trusted him not to ask for anything Neil couldn’t give him but Andrew doesn’t want anything else. • 'I’m staying.’ Neil promises. 'I’m staying right here’ • The others trickle back in • Nicky doesn’t make it back to Neil’s bedside, his legs failing him when he sees Andrew has taken his place at Neil’s hand, he just wanted his cousin to be happy, he just wanted- • Matt and Dan clasp Neil’s free hand between them as he’s propped up on his pillows by a sobbing Abby and a humbled Kevin • Wymack places a fatherly hand on his shoulder, and squeezes lightly • Neil takes them all in. His Foxes, his family • His gaze rests on Andrew last • 'Staring.’ Andrew whispers • Neil smiles and dies, the sunrise lighting his hair like fire

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tinymixtapes · 7 years ago

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Music Review: Car Seat Headrest - Twin Fantasy

Car Seat Headrest Twin Fantasy [Matador; 2018] Rating: 4/5 The 2011 version of Car Seat Headrest’s Twin Fantasy begins with a variation of the iconic drum phrase from “Be My Baby.” Comprised of just a kick drum and two sticks clicking together, the album’s intro is a modest gesture. But gradually, “My Boy (Twin Fantasy),” the album’s inaugural song, grows more layered, culminating in a cacophony of messy, distorted guitars, clipping-prone drum tracks, and band autocrat Will Barnes’s quadruple-tracked vocals. That original Twin Fantasy (retroactively designated the “Mirror to Mirror” edition) showed that, like Phil Spector with his trademark Wall of Sound, Barnes was a maximalist. He favored elaborate multi-tracked arrangements and dynamic, lengthy song structures. Will Barnes, Car Seat’s sole creative force at the time, set out to prove himself as a bedroom pop auteur on the ur-Fantasy. That album, uploaded during Barnes’s sophomore year at William and Mary, was Car Seat Headrest’s seventh Bandcamp-exclusive release. Having conceived of the Headrest project less than two years prior, Barnes (who had swapped his surname with his mother’s maiden name for the nom de plume Will Toledo) found his artistic zenith in Fantasy amid a period of remarkable creative fecundity. It was a concept album, one that revolved around an imagined romance rife with “songs and hi-fives and weird sex” as well as the endlessly frustrating limitations of a theoretical relationship that could never be. Moving away from the unadorned aesthetics of lo-fi heroes like Guided by Voices and Moldy Peaches, Car Seat Headrest issued a pronouncement via Twin Fantasy that low tech need not encumber artistic ambition nor inhibit creative vision. At 19 years old, Will Toledo/Barnes was an undisputed wunderkind of indie rock’s SoundCloud generation. And it was obvious that sooner or later he’d grow bored with lo-fi. Twin Fantasy by Car Seat Headrest So now brandishing a Bachelor’s Degree, a full backing band, and a record deal with Matador, Will is choosing to revisit his juvenilia and give it the high-fidelity revamp he didn’t have the wherewithal to achieve as a teenager. Thus, we have Twin Fantasy (Face to Face). At times, the new Twin Fantasy feels like a simulacrum of its predecessor. Improving the album’s fidelity, the band sacrifice the ramshackle charm of certain songs; “Sober to Death,” with its now crystalline guitar lines, loses some of the original track’s frustrated verve that was imbued in its crackling, lo-fi sound. The updated “Bodys” similarly compromises the frenetic urgency of the 2011 version’s compressed drum beat, exchanging that driving force for a carefully programmed drum sound that one could expect on an LCD Soundsystem record. Danceable, sure, but incongruous with much of the rest of the album. By other turns, however, Will’s maturation as a songwriter and producer breathe crucial new life into the album’s weaker links. Dialing back the tremoring reverb in his vocal track, Barnes injects some much-needed clarity into the formerly diaphanous “High to Death.” “I fell over, I fell onto the ground/ I wish I was sober, I can’t get up off the ground,” he sings, and this time around, his delivery truly communicates the penitence and self-loathing of a kid who’s been overzealously drinking and who knows he has the rest of the night and an impending hangover to reckon with. The original “High to Death” featured an interpolation of Pink Floyd’s “Jugband Blues” (“And the sea isn’t green…”), which was elided from Face to Face presumably for legal reasons. Likewise, “Beach Life-in-Death” included the line “A book of Aubrey Beardsley art corrupted me in youth,” which has since been supplanted by lyrics from the band’s cover of Frank Ocean’s “Ivy.” These abrogated lines, along with the references that transferred over to the new Fantasy (They Might Be Giants’ “Ana Ng,” Leonard Cohen’s, “Let’s Sing Another Song, Boys”), illustrate Will’s cultural omnivorousness. He’s yet another node in the vast tissue of indie songwriters who bury furtive literary, musical, and psychological references in their music and color their lyrics with a panoply of cultural touchstones sometimes obvious, but often esoteric. As a lyricist, Barnes serves as a focalizer who is desperate to pronounce his contrition and malaise, yet at the same time needs to proffer an ostensibly unrelated reference point to dispel suspicions of lugubriousness. “I feel so empty trying to explain this/ His name is William Onyeabor, he’s from the 70s,” professes Will on “Not What I Needed” from 2016’s Teens of Denial. Rather than address his ennui and disaffection directly, Barnes makes a passing reference to his opaque feelings and then promptly redirects our attention to the Nigerian funk legend. Something similar happens on “Beach Life-in-Death:” “I pretended I was drunk when I came out to my friends […] then I laughed and I changed the subject.” The Toledo persona Barnes has constructed for Car Seat Headrest primarily functions as a carapace and an idealized self. Toledo is the façade that can get away with lines like, “I got so fucking romantic, I apologize. Let me light your cigarette.” He works to excuse some of Barnes’s histrionics while at the same time acting as an agent of catharsis. Toledo has the proper confidence (or maybe the maladjustment) to disseminate his grievances when Will Barnes is too diffident. As he explains on “Beast Monster Thing,” from the EP How to Leave Town, “I co-write my songs with myself/ He feels the feelings, I write the words.” Twin Fantasy by Car Seat Headrest And those words can be tautological and redundant. On “Sober to Death,” he sings “We have breakdowns and sometimes we don’t have breakdowns.” On “Famous Prophets,” he avers, “I’m not gonna end up a nervous wreck like the people I know who are nervous wrecks.” But these lines aren’t just pointedly banal pronouncements that emphasize the circuitousness of a relationship or internal dialogue caught in a stalemate; they’re the musings of a person who understands the paradoxical necessity and futility of articulating himself. Will’s lyrics now enjoy the undergirding of a backup band that he assembled upon moving to Seattle back in 2014. Lead guitarist Ethan Ives imbues into the album’s tracks a style of noodling that’s informed as much by late-60s acid rockers as it is by the casually virtuosic guitar heroes of 90s alternative rock. Andrew Katz’s drumming, with its dexterity on both a live kit and programmed pads, evinces a versatility imperative to the group’s protean sound. And Seth Dalby, as humble a bassist as there ever were, provides a seamless foundation for the group, adopting the restraint and self-effacement of a Tina Weymouth or Sean Yeaton of Parquet Courts. Although the album is still helmed by Barnes and his fastidious recording praxis, Dalby, Katz, and Ives serve as invaluable players, bringing nuance and energy to the updated Twin Fantasy. Twin Fantasy (Face to Face) will doubtlessly go down as the lesser of the two iterations. As a remake with markedly higher fidelity, the album is certain to aggravate Car Seat purists, just as Teens of Denial did two years ago. But to new(er) fans, Face to Face will satisfy the itch engendered by the gestation period between those two records and remind that Denial wasn’t Car Seat Headrest’s first sprawling opus. And while it may not carry the same intrigue of a college student self-recording a lo-fi opus between classes, this new Twin Fantasy elucidates the masterfulness of an incisive indie savant whose creative reach had, until recently, exceeded his grasp. Where Mirror to Mirror was the fervent murmuring of young artist discovering his potential, Face to Face is the throat clearing that snaps the world to attention. http://j.mp/2BwlnDH

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