#is it morally/ethically wrong for him to wear snake skin?

[shrimpleasthat77]

Ok so you guys like my Kabuto redesign. That’s good. Here’s my rendition of my perfect beautiful amazing show stopping wife Orochimaru. I kinda struggled because I really don’t think there’s anything wrong with his base design. I guess the right word for this would be an elevation? Idk

[wisteria-lodge]

Character Analysis: Sorting The Old Guard

@sortinghatchats has a brilliant personality/character analysis system based on the four Hogwarts houses. At this point it’s become much more interesting and nuanced, which is part of why I’m moving away from using the names of the houses.

Here’s how it works. Everyone gets two houses – a Primary House and a Secondary House

YOUR PRIMARY IS YOUR MOTIVE. IT’S WHY YOU DO THINGS.

LION Primary’s sense of morality and ethics comes from inside. Things just feel right or they feel wrong.

BIRD Primary gets their morality and ethics from the world outside them. They decide what they think is right.

BADGER Primary is focused on the good of the group. Who cares if something is technically “moral” if people are getting hurt?

SNAKE Primary is a lot like Badger, but instead of protecting the group, their highest law is the well-being of the individual people they love.

YOUR SECONDARY IS YOUR METHOD. IT’S HOW YOU DO THINGS.

LION Secondary gets their power from being direct, honest, completely themselves. Their “plan” is just keep going until someone stops them. If they see a locked door, they kick it in.

BIRD Secondary collects tools and skills. They build things, find things, learn things. If they see a locked door, they go through their box of keys until they find the right one.

BADGER Secondary is fair, hardworking, and shows up. They’re good at getting people to trust them, and good at getting people to help them. If they see a locked door, they knock.

SNAKE Secondary knows the right mask to wear for each situation. They’re adaptive. They go in the back way. They find the third option.  They’re the ones who know how to pick the locks.

And now let’s talk about The Old Guard. Also, SPOILERS.

***

Nile Freeman is a bright Badger primary, defined by her groups. “I’ve got people who love me,” is the first thing she tells the team. And follows that up with, “I’m a Marine.” We meet her in uniform, part of a squad. Getting back to her family is her main motivation. (And it’s a “my family” thing - not a “my mom” or “my brother” thing.) Family continuity and family history mean everything to Nile, and that’s so Badger. Religion is also used as visual shorthand for “Badger” a lot, and Nile’s got her cross necklace. And she doesn’t want to kill people. Doesn’t matter if they’re the bad people who killed her, they’re still people. Badgers can’t ignore that.

Nile’s challenge is figuring out a way to separate from her family (and become an immortal commando) while still keeping her healthy, shining Badger intact. And she does it by expanding. It’s not just about protecting America and her family anymore. She looks at the wall outlining all the good the Old Guard has done, and her community expands to include them, and all of humanity.

She’s definitely got a Lion secondary. Yes, she’s willing to run into the villain’s stronghold with a bag of guns and not much plan - but this is an action movie, that stuff is kinda a given. I’m thinking more about when she has to lie and say her miraculous healing factor is an experimental skin graft – she hates doing it, she’s so bad at it, you can see her skin crawl. Nile is powerful when she is able to just lay out what she believes. People like Agent Copley and the Afghani women just feel the honesty and conviction bleeding off her, and come around to her way of thinking. 

Nile also has a Bird secondary model. Smashing down walls isn’t appropriate all the time, so a lot of Lion secondaries learn to use one of the mellower secondaries as backup. Nile’s Bird is subtle, but it’s there. She applies her anti-militant training to the situation, and thinks they should “follow the money.” She can identify a Rodin sculpture across a dark cave. And she spends a while trying to reason away the fact that she’s immortal (considering hypnosis, drug trips, all that fun stuff.)

Andromache the Scythian aka “Andy” is also a Badger primary. But a very old, very tired, very burnt one. She’s been protecting humanity for about ten thousand years, and she feels all the people she wasn’t able to save. Andy starts off the film doubting whether any of it mattered, if she was actually able to protect her community at all. Because she can’t protect everyone, she is forced to shrink that community down. She can protect Nile, Joe, Nicky, and Booker – and that has to be enough.

The situation with Quyhn is a good look at the sort of darkness that can live inside a Badger Primary. Because Andy stopped looking. She could have spent hundreds of years pouring money and time into finding Quyhn - and neglected the rest of her team, and by extension humanity. But Andy’s a Badger primary. That’s not a thing she can do.

(A Snake primary would never have stopped. Someone like Nicky would burn the world, if that’s what it took to get Joe back.)

If your preferred weapon is an ax or a hammer, then you’re a Lion secondary. That’s just how it works. You are too direct and too smashy to be anything else. Ms. “I always go first” Andy, leader of the group she thinks of as an army? Even when she’s discouraged and exhausted, her Lion secondary is still so loud. She has a bit of a Bird secondary model: she sets up rules like “we don’t do repeats, it’s too risky,” and establishes code words linked to specific maneuvers. But you can tell she’s a little uncomfortable with that kind of thinking. She wants to hit things with an ax and give inspirational speeches. And also threaten people.

Which means that Andy and Nile match perfectly. They are both Badger Lions with Bird secondary models. And that makes perfect sense. Nile was “born” at the same time Andy lost her immortality. They are both warriors. Nile is the one who will “go first,” when Andy isn’t able to anymore. She’s the one who gets Andy’s ax at the end. She’s the new Andy. Andy’s redemption comes with waking her Badger primary up, and training a replacement. Or as she puts it, “I think you showed up when I lost my immortality so I could remember what it was like (…) that there are people still worth fighting for.”

Nicolò di Genova aka “Nicky” fights for Joe. It really is that simple. His backstory tells you everything you need to know: he fought in the Crusades until he fell in love with a Muslim, and had to choose. On one hand - religion, country, job, society, security. On the other hand - the man he loves. For Nicky the answer is obvious. Because he is such a Snake primary.

As long as he’s with Joe, he’s fine. Agent Copley is trying to explain himself, Nicky doesn’t care. “I’m sure you’re bringing us to the person who paid for your betrayal. There’s a TV [on this plane] Joe!” The villains can talk all they want about the greater good and moral imperatives and changing the world. Nicky is just bored. “A fine justification. I’ve heard it so many times before.” None of that stuff matters to him.

His secondary is harder to spot, underneath the really loud primary and the really loud Lion secondary model. But I think I see a Badger secondary. Nicky’s a caretaker. He brings Andy her favorite candy, sets up Nile for the night and shows her where to sleep. Joe says that Nicky’s heart “overflows with a kindness of which this world is not worthy,” and I get that they’re in love, but that’s still some serious character testimony. I’m also going to throw in the fact that Nicky’s a sniper. Being a sniper is not like hitting things with an ax. It’s all about getting in place and being careful and patient. Badger secondary traits.

Yusuf Al-Kaysani aka “Joe” actually takes the time to lay out rules he lives by. Which is interesting, because the only other people in this film who do that are the villains. Those guys are not motivated by personal loyalty: they’re either Lion or Bird primaries motivated by “the greater good.” The Old Guard is a very Loyalist movie. When we get our big Theme Scene, the French shopgirl tells us, “Today I put this on your wound. Tomorrow you help someone up when they fall. We’re not meant to be alone.” That’s the ethos of the movie. It’s very Badger.

Joe gets how Badger Primaries work. He gets Andy, and the best example of this is when he comforts her by saying Quyhn “would be insane” by now. He’s basically saying, “you don’t have a responsibility to her the way you have to the rest of us, because she’s not really a person anymore.” It’s dark, but so is Andy, and that line of reasoning would make sense to a Badger primary.

Joe also understands Nicky’s Snake primary. He  knows he’s Nicky’s world, and he never stops demonstrating that. He has Nicky’s back when they fight (Nicky passes things over his shoulder without looking). He has Nicky’s back when they sleep (as the big spoon). He learned Italian for Nicky, and when Nicky is freaked, Joe just shows up with that “his kiss still thrills me, even after a millennia” speech. But that speech is also him explaining his worldview to the guards, the same way he bothers to tell them, “You shot Nicky. You shouldn’t have done that.”

When Nile asks, “Are you good guys or bad guys?” Joe responds, “Depends on the century.” He is interested in those large moral questions, and the answer he has decided on is a combination of Andy’s Badger morality, and Nicky’s Snake morality.

And to go with that really complicated Primary, I think Joe really is just a straightforward Lion secondary (another reason he gets Andy). I mean... he literally headbutts people. 

Sebastian “Booker” Le Livre, whose nickname is a very silly pun, is the most vaguely drawn character. I’m not sure if he turns Nicky and Joe over to Merrick because he wants to die, or because he wants to find a way to help Andy die. Or both. But either way, he is a very burnt Snake primary.

Booker seems to be the only one who kept up contact with his family after learning he was immortal. As a result, he got to watch his son die painfully with “hate and despair in [his] eyes,” blaming his father for not loving him enough to save him. It’s been about 150 years, but Booker is not over this.

That is a very Snake primary love, and when it comes down to it, Booker is a Snake with no people he can throw himself into loving the way he loved his son. (No wonder he drinks). He wants more emotional intimacy from Andy than she is able to give him - not in a romantic way, they have more of a sibling dynamic. But look at the betrayal in his eyes when he learns she’s lost her immortality: “Andy, look at me. Why didn’t you tell me?”

This is the exchange right after Booker betrays the team:

JOE: You selfish piece of shit. NICKY: Joe, leave it, please… BOOKER: What would you know of the weight of all these years alone? JOE: You’re a very pathetic man Booker. NICKY: Joe, stop. BOOKER: You and Nicky always had each other, right?

Nicky is sympathetic. He’s a Snake primary like Booker, he knows what living without a Person must be like, he knows exactly why Booker did what he did. Joe doesn’t. He only sees how Booker has failed to look at the big picture (like Joe would have, because he’s a Bird, that’s how he thinks) and that he made an objectively dumb call. Joe is angry at him for the rest of the movie. But the others, who know what it’s like motivated only by personal loyalty… they kind of get it.

To round things off, Booker is a Bird secondary. You can tell by the way he collects skills. He’s the operation coordinator, the quartermaster, the driver, and the tech guy. He’s also not afraid of a plan with steps. Nile calls him, “the brains of the operation” (although she’s probably being nice). Still, Booker is a good example of the way Bird secondaries aren’t always smart. His plan was pretty objectively terrible, but that was because his primary was so compromised.

tl;dr

Nile – Badger/Lion (Bird model)

Andy – Burnt Badger/Lion (Bird model)

Nicky – Snake/Badger (Lion model for fighting)

Joe – Bird who has built Nicky’s Snake morality, and Andy’s Badger morality into himself/Lion

Booker – Burnt Snake/Bird

[committoreality]

You are a snake, and so am I.

Everything we do, we do to validate a story about reality that is premised on a delusion. Our self concept is a series of fictions that we maintain to keep us more or less stable. 

1. I am in a loving and happy relationship. People respond to tones and actions of others in unique ways. As we get more familiar in our relationships, we learn the triggers of others. We learn what pushes their buttons, what makes them loving and soft, what makes them confident. We learn that our friends give us more attention when we’re in a crisis situation, when we’re confident and outgoing, when we’re listening attentively. We become very familiar with the behaviours that elicit certain emotions in those close to us. My boyfriend gives me most attention when I’m sad, maternal, or independent. My friend gives me most attention when I have an exciting new idea that is intellectually stimulating. My friend gives me most attention when I show sympathy and am deeply attentive. My boyfriend pushes me away when I’m needy, jealous, or stressed. 

We become deeply familiar with these dynamics. We amplify certain behaviours to elicit the desired response. We manipulate the people we’re close to. We want the reassurance that our relationships are a certain way, so we do things to validate those ideas. But it is manipulation to sustain a fiction. We want to bring out the qualities in others that will conform more or less to the version of reality that we subscribe to.

2. I had the idea that if I ate whatever I wanted when I wanted, and succumbed to any craving, that I would gain an exception amount of weight and be horribly unattractive. I sustained this fiction by conforming closely to what I believed I had to do stay the weight I wanted. Why did I want this weight? Because it fit into my self concept. I am healthy, fit, slim, and am generally the thinnest girl in most settings. This body image was deeply integrated into my self concept. I stopped conforming to those ideas. I eat whatever I want, eat a lot of pizza, chocolate, fried chicken, coffee with milk and sugar, and I can’t gain weight. I stay within this range. When we do challenge the behaviours we believe we need to sustain our self concept, it is not only enlightening, but baffling. When you have experiences that show that the stories you have been accepting are premised on complete fictions, this is humbling. Because we don’t know why we do the things we do.

3. I read a paper that references Ta’Nehisi Coats. From intellectuals I respect, I’ve come to accept that his ideas are radical, post modern, and conform to an intellectual tradition I do not like. Have I read anything by him? No. But I have this idea of myself, as a centrist. I am critical to a lot of post-modern thought, and I don’t respect the tradition because I reject the principles it is premised on. But to discredit a thinker on the basis that those who think like me discredit him is ridiculous. But I do so because I have a self concept that identifies with a specific intellectual tradition. Of course, self deception and simplification is useful because it means you don’t have to inquire into everything. This makes life easier. Dealing with complexity and dwelling in the unknown is challenging. Identification is comforting. It allows you to have trust. But it is dangerous.

4. I believed that men preferred thin and fit women. Because the men who I’ve been with have been attracted to me, I am thin and fit, therefore I accepted the premise that men like thin women.  My boyfriend likes big girls. I was so confused and baffled by this information, because it disconfirmed an idea I had latched onto my whole life. Again, this shattered my fiction, and shook my self concept as proximating an ideal. It made me consider, maybe I am not that attractive. 

5. I have a self concept about being pulled together, looking wealthy and clean. Whenever I have messy hair, when my skin is bad, when I’m dressed in ill fitting clothes- I have this deep discomfort. This isn’t me. This isn’t who I am. People will look at me and get the wrong idea of me. But what is the “right” idea? The fiction you tell yourself. This fiction is premised on inauthenticity. What about being altruistic? You pretend to care about justice, you display performative virtue, you attend public events that will validate this notion that you are committed to justice, to equality. You apologize for your ignorance. Why do you do this? It aligns well with the sense of moral superiority and virtue you associate with. But what is equality? Reality isn’t equal and it never will be. Some people are stronger, more intelligent, more beautiful, have a strong work ethic, are maternal and loving, are radiant. These qualities play into differential outcomes. Equality is an idea. It is an abstraction. It is an idea we associate with virtue and thus embody traits that we think are relevant to this ideal. It is a fiction. Moral superiority is a fiction.

6. We get mad when our partner flirts with someone else. When they consider someone else attractive, beautiful, whole, radiant. Why? Because their interest challenges the notion that we are special. That we are somehow deeply linked to this person. That we have security. That we are special and unique. It challenges the idea that our partner is deeply committed to us, and sees these unique traits. It is an emotion premised on insecurity. Premised on the fiction that we have security, that one person will exclusively love us. The fiction that our qualities are somehow unique. You’re not special. You cannot guarantee the loyalty of your partner. You cannot reduce the greatness of others. Nevertheless we allow ourselves to feel threatened based on the idea that your partner’s interest in others is somehow a threat to your relationship, and the fiction that their loyalty is in your power to control. So we manipulate. Through expressions of jealousy, demonization of the person your partner flirts with, amplifying the qualities you think your partner is attracted to, going out of your way to display your “amazing” qualities. You’re not special or any more valuable than anyone else. 

We believe that being genetically similar somehow makes connections deeper and more stable. That intimacy and vulnerability makes your connection with a person deeper. That sharing significant experiences makes your connection deeper. It doesn’t. This sense of depth in a relationship is premised on these fictions that these dimensions of shared experience somehow tie you deeply to someone else. They can still leave. They can still cheat. But so long as you mutually subscribe to this idea that you are intimately connected, then this fiction works as glue to the relationship. It’s a fiction.

What is a romantic relationship? My conclusion is that a romantic relationship is having a personal space invader. The person is allowed to get very close physically, even put themselves inside of you, lick the inside of your mouth, spend a lot of time in your dwelling, eat food within a meter of so of each other. This person invades your space and takes up your time more than any other person. What is romance? The idea that sharing fictions and emotions leads to deep love. What is love? Feeling like the other person invading your space means that they think your special. You like this a lot. You like having a space invader because it signals that you’re not so repulsive and intolerable. That’s a nice idea. What is a long term relationship, or a marriage? It’s a promise that you’ll continue to invade a person’s space, eliminate possibilities of not invading that person’s space for a long time.

My partner and I just signed a lease for a year. All that is is a promise that the owner of this house will give us 330 square feet of space, and this 330 square feet will function as the space we will mutually invade. We have decided that we will be each others space invaders for at least a year. We buy furniture together, keep things in a closet together, so that not only the space around our bodies is invaded frequently, but that our “belongings” will have to share a space as well. It means we will promise to link our lives together in such a way that not being each other’s space invader for the year will cause a lot of friction. 

What is a marriage? It’s a contract that you’ll space invade until death! And if you change your mind it will be costly in many ways. It is a fun little trap that you mutually accept. This contract is another fiction. You can’t be bound to another human, you can’t own another human, you can’t connect to another human. You connect more because we accept the premise that invading space and penetrating a person’s body is special and is a “bonding” experience. What about reading a book? You connect with these fictional people. What about being turned on by porn? You’re literally having a sexual experience with pixels on a screen. What about reading a self help book? You’re feeling vulnerable with words on a page written by someone you’ll probably never know. What about connecting with “God”, who is God? How do you know him/her? Does God invade your personal space? Or is God just a thought that you “connect” to?

We have these ideas and love to manipulate the world to keep these ideas alive. You can see delusion in others, but neglect the ways you are equally deluded. We put smoke detectors in our homes, locks on our door, wear helmets, don’t walk alone at night. But what if you get hit by a car? What is you have an aneurysm? What if you slip in the bath an hit your head and drown? We think we can reduce risks, but it’s just supporting this fiction that we can manipulate the world to give us a false sense of security. We will all die of mortality. The people we love will leave us or die. Our house might get burnt down, we might be struck by lightning. Safety is an idea. Security is an idea. 

It’s all a fiction. And you lie to yourself daily to support these fictions. You manipulate others and deceive yourself into believing these fictions. You’re a snake. You’re not above self delusions and neither am I. 

[jamesbvck]

New Rules | Young Falice

Type: Ficlet Rating: Teen Words: 2.4k Characters: FP Jones, Alice Cooper

No matter how hard she tried, Alice couldn’t get FP out of her head. She was hoping that scribbling out all her thoughts into a journal would clear her mind but no such luck. Her heart was stuck on a man that made her feel like she was one in a million, the only girl in the world. Yet at the same time, the damage he did on her would last a lifetime and leave severe impact.

Fuck.

FP was a drunk, he was inconstant and moody. Some days he loved her and others all he did was yell and cuss. It was blood ridden coursing through his entire body passed down from his great-grandfather onto him. So he couldn’t help it and Alice wanted to try and make him a better man. There was always of glimmer of hope in FP until he was four beers in and staggering in his own living room. His father was never home and his mother worked night shifts at the hospital. Alice was always there to pick up the pieces and the broken glass.

It was the same story every Friday night where he would end up at the Whyte Wyrm and call her from a payphone; sloppily drunk with a slur in his voice.

“Ali, come on… You know there’s no other girl but you for me.”

“It’s the same story every time, FP.” She leaned against the kitchen wall, twirling the phone cord around her fingers. “I can’t be with you like this. We’re going in circles.”

“But I– I love you.”

She sighed. “I know. That’s the problem.”

FP was the issue. But no matter how many times they went in circles, Alice would always fall back to him. She’d go to the Wyrm and pick him up in her old station wagon and bring him home. They kissed, he mumble into her ear the things he knew she loved and before she knew it was the morning after.

She’d kiss his cheek before slipping back on her shirt and her jeans, quietly leaving the trailer. Her forehead rested on the steering wheel, gripping it tightly. How much longer could she deal with the same cycle? It was tiresome and mentally exhausting.

How do you let someone go when you are their anchor?

“Don’t answer the phone.” Mary’s tone was stern. Alice eyes locked on the phone mounted against the wall as it rang and rang and rang. There was a twinge in her stomach that knew it was him. It was nearly midnight, the next Friday night. “You can’t fix him. He’s drunk, alone, broken.”

She stared until it stopped ringing. “He’ll call again.”

“I’ll gladly disconnect the phone.” Mary dipped back into pink the nail polish she was using for her toes.

Alice knew she shouldn’t have felt so guilty. She felt like she was leaving him stranded when she knew he’d be fine.

“You can’t keep letting him in, Alice. It’s only going to fester.” Mary carried on a moment later. “You have to let him go for your own sake. You have to get over him.”

Alice laid silent in bed until four in the morning. It was the first Friday night in months she wasn’t in FP’s bed and it felt beyond strange. His arm wasn’t strung over her hips, hugging her close to his chest in a protective manner. His breathing wasn’t on her neck and his scruff wasn’t tickling her soft skin. There wasn’t the smell of alcohol and cigarettes and more importantly, there was no body next to hers.

“I’d die for you, Ali.”

“Shut up, Junior.” Alice rolled her eyes, laying back down on his bed with one of his shirt draping over her body.

He pulled her over to him, nuzzling his face into her neck. “You don’t think so?”

“I know so. You’re also inebriated.”

“Mmm I love it when you use big words.”

She pushed his head away as he gave her a cheesy grin. FP was an idiot.

Alice grasped onto the snake pendent of the necklace she was wearing. It belonged to FP but she took ownership after he got her to fix the broken chain. She always had a part of him with her wherever she was. She took her journal off her desk, turning it to the last written in page.

New Rules:

1) Don’t pick up the phone.

2) Don’t let him in.

3) Don’t be his friend.

There was that twinge in her stomach again, she felt like she wanted to throw up. Her eyes slipped shut with a single tear running down her cheek. Alice did not cry, not unless it was completely necessary and in a understanding matter. She sure as hell wasn’t going to cry over a boy either. At least she thought she’d never would. However, practice made perfect and if she could somehow make it through the first night, she could make it through the rest.

“Don’t pick up the phone. Don’t let him in. Don’t be his friend.” Alice murmured to herself, shutting her journal and tossed it across the room. She curled into a ball of her side, the blankets up to her neck as she willed herself to sleep.

Relentless was an understatement. FP went above and beyond to get Alice’s attention. Somehow Alice had blocked him from her sights even if her moral compass was spinning out of control. Every part of her lead back to FP but she couldn’t submerge herself to that low anymore. She busied herself picking up more shifts at Pop’s. Pop was slightly suspicious but Alice was a tremendous worker and knew all the regulars.

“Are you okay, Alice? You haven’t taken your break yet.” Pop wiped down the counter as he looked at the young girl.

“I’m fine, Pop.” She replied, filling some glasses with sodas. “I can stay late tonight if you need extra hands.”

He chuckled wholeheartedly. “No, you’ve stayed late every shift these last two weeks. You deserve to go home on time.”

“I don’t mind.”

“I admire your work ethic, but I’m sure you have some party to go to with your friends.”

Alice half smiled out of politeness to Pop. She really wanted to kill another two hours so she didn’t have to be at home when the phone rang. At the same time, she knew Pop would keep badgering her to leave. When it hit eleven o’clock, Alice reluctantly punched out her timecard at Pop’s. There wasn’t even the chance of going to crash at Mary’s because she was having family in town that weekend.

She drove herself home, tossing her keys onto the kitchen table. There were leftovers she heated up in the microwave. Night Court was on with back-to-back episodes. Alice sat herself cross-legged, chowing down on her borderline cardboard tasting lasagne. A few bites in and there it was: the sound of the phone ringing. Her eyes slowly moved to focus on the phone. The ring sounded like sirens in her ears, blaring as loud as they could.

Don’t pick up the phone.

Her appetite was lost in the matter of seconds. Her fork clanged against the plate as it slipped from her fingertips. Every muscle in her body was holding her back from lunging off the couch. Four rings. Her teeth sunk into her bottom lip to inflict pain as a distraction. However her mind was more powerful, willing her way to her feet and raced over to answer the phone.

“Hello?”

There was a slight pant to her breath. Alice cupped the phone in her hands, pressing it firmly to her ear. There was a pad of silence.

“Ali.” FP’s voice rang out through the receiver. She could hear the music in the background and deep laughter from the older men of the Wyrm. “You picked up the phone.”

“What do you want, FP?”

“You know what I want.” He replied coldly, though his voice softened quickly. “You. Always you.”

“You’re drunk and you’re lonely. We can’t keep doing this.”

“I’m not drunk.” He retorted. “I’m not drunk, I swear.”

It was so hard to believe his words when the past was so prominent. She couldn’t trust him to be sober when this was routine. “I have to go.” She murmured.

“Ali–”

“– I can’t do this, FP.” The phone was slammed onto the base.

Her heart sunk. Her head was dizzy.

Alice dragged herself back to the couch. She shoved her plate onto the coffee table. She felt sick again, curling into a ball on the couch. Whatever was being said on the TV was muffled in her ears. If she couldn’t follow the first rule, at least she could stick to the others.

Three hard knocks banged against her front door an hour later. Alice nearly had a heart attack, jolting up from the couch. She hadn’t realized she had passed out. She knew he must have been her dad, he always forgot his keys. Her legs swung over to stand, pushing her hair bag as she went to unlock the door. Alice wasn’t sure why she was so optimistic. FP stood on her front porch disheveled, his hair falling in his face with his head tilted down.

Don’t let him in.

Neither of them said anything for several moments. Alice was staring but FP barely made eye contact with her.

She broke the silence. “You need to go.” His head lifted. The porch light casted along his face reveal a bad cut above his right eyebrow and a black eye. There was another small cut on his left cheek. “What the hell is wrong with you?!” Alice grabbed his jacket and yanked him inside.

FP had a cheesy grin on his lips. “I fell.”

“Fuck off you fell. What did you do?” Alice pushed him to sit on the couch as she went to find whatever she could to fix him up.

“I got into a fight.” FP kicked off his boots, putting his feet up on the table. “After you ever so politely hung up on me these assholes started talking about you. I didn’t like what they were saying to I put them in their place.”

Alice returned with a bowl of warm water, a cloth and an ice pack. She sat next to him, her head shaking. “I don’t care what people say about me in this damn town.” She dipped the cloth into the water, wringing it out before dabbing his eyebrow. He winced.

“Well I care. They were disrespecting my girl.” His eyes stayed on the TV but there was truth. “I’d rather something happen to me then to you.”

Alice didn’t reply, she took a closer look at his eyebrow after the blood was gone. “I don’t think you’ll have to go to the hospital to get it stitched up. Should be fine.”

“Thank you, nurse.”

His breath did smell like beer before it wasn’t as strong as usual. His eyes were more white than red. Maybe he wasn’t drunk but she still couldn’t have him here. She was severely failing following her rules. Alice set the bowl of water and the bloody cloth on the table.  

“You can’t stay here.” Alice told him.

“Why were you ignoring me?”

“I’m not ignoring you.”

FP was displeased, putting the ice pack to his eye. He sucked his teeth making a high pitched sound, briefly looking at her. “Don’t bullshit me.” He said. Alice’s blue eyes flickered downward as she turned her head away. FP caught her chin, gently swerving her head back in his direction. “What do I gotta do?”

Alice pushed his hand away, getting up. Her arms folded firmly over her chest as she distanced herself to the other side of the room. “Do you even care about me?”

“What the hell kind of question is that?”

“You’re drunk all the time and say all these things that sound special, but are they? Do you even mean them?”

FP tossed the ice pack onto the table, taking his feet off the table. His elbows rested on his knees with his hands running through his dark hair, bracing the back of his neck. “What do you want me to say, huh? Everything I tell you is always the truth.”

“When’s the last time you did something for me? Everything I do is for you.” Alice frowned, her eyes straining. “You call, I pick you up and drive your drunk ass home. I stay so you don’t do anything stupid. It happens every goddamn week and nothing. No thank yous, no nothing. I’ve tried to help you but there’s nothing I can do anymore.”

“You don’t think I try?”

Alice breathed a laugh, rolling her eyes to the ceiling. “No you don’t. You don’t want to try. I know things are fucked up, you’re fucked up but so many other things are too.”

FP got up. He crossed the room to her, who braced herself. There was anger and frustration in his tired eyes. He had never laid a hand on Alice, not once had it crossed his mind. His arms reached out and placed his rough hands on her velvet skin, carefully grasping her arms. His eye contact varied, trying to look at her but he couldn’t.

“I can’t… I can’t lose you. You’re all I have.”

Don’t be his friend.

Light rain pattered against the window. It was nearing six in the morning and Alice hadn’t slept. She had sat with FP until the early hours going back and forth about their situation and why things had to change. If he wasn’t willing to put in the effort then essentially they were doomed and one of them would be dead.

Through it all, she loved him. Through his flaws and his obscurities, there was a man underneath it all that wanted to be the best he could be. He wanted to be the best for her. Everything he said was truth, he loved her, he’d die for her, he’d married her if she didn’t constantly tell him he was an idiot (which he was).

He was going to change for her.

FP lied with his nose nestled to Alice’s neck, sleeping soundly like he usually did. His breathing quiet and his arm wrapped over her waist. Perhaps she’d never learn. The new rules were now old rules replaced by the will to commit, the will to be better.

She was never getting over him.