#it started with wives and daughters in 2021

[fictionadventurer]

Elizabeth Gaskell has the kind of brilliance that makes you forget how brilliant she is until you come back to her work after reading inferior authors. Her type of talent is understated skill that does everything so well that it looks easy.

She has prose that's descriptive without being flowery. Plots that take their time but also keep pulling you along. She writes about everyday life in a way that makes it enthralling without over-romanticizing it. She can take what would be stock characters in the hands of other writers and explore their upbringing and history so thoroughly that they become real, nuanced individuals. And she does it all so simply that you barely even notice how much talent it takes to write like that.

[ooihcnoiwlerh]

Hello! I'm back with another chapter of my Feyd-Rautha/Reader arranged marriage series.

AO3 link here for full fic: And I Don't Want Your Heart - Chapter 5 - ooihcnoiwlerh - Dune (2021) [Archive of Our Own]

Side post that has some of my headcanons for how I interpret Feyd-Rautha's own relationship to his sexuality: Hello, Friend - So I've been working on a Feyd-Rautha/Reader... (tumblr.com)

This fic and this chapter are 18+ up only. Tags, content warning, and full chapter below the cut

Tags/CW list: rape/noncon; graphic depictions of violence; dubious consent; arranged marriage; forced pregnancy; nature versus nurture; implied/referenced child abuse; implied/referenced sexual assault; implied/referenced incest; first time; rough sex; oral sex; vaginal sex; vaginal fingering; blood kink; pain kink; sadomasochism; period sex; problematic smut; inappropriate misuse of BDSM; slow burn emotionally but the exact opposite of a slow burn phyiscally

CHAPTER FOUR: A BLOODY GASH

You're fertile.  You’ve never had any reason to believe otherwise.  This union is contingent on giving him children–at least one son, and as many attempts as necessary to get there ( and you desperately hope that you’ll only need that first one.  You don’t want to raise a daughter in this place, amongst these people .)

So you’re horrified when you wake up the following morning to blood smeared between your legs, staining your chemise that rode up to your hips when you were sleeping, and leaving a smear on the sheets below when you move.

No.  No.  You pull up the hem of your chemise and stare at your inner thighs as if just looking will change the outcome.  Feyd-Rautha came inside of you four times in two days for nothing .  He’ll be furious.  He’ll question your very biology.  He’ll have you examined as thoroughly and cruelly as possible.

You scramble, trying to cover yourself, wondering what you can even do next when Idrisa comes in with fresh water and coffee.

To her credit, she doesn't drop the tray when her eye line goes directly to your bleeding crotch for the few seconds it’s still visible.

“I knew my time for it was coming up, I just didn't think it would,” you say to yourself as much as her and come to meet her gaze.

She glances back down out of respect, but the awkward tension hangs between the two of you for a moment.

“Do you…” you start, embarrassment flushing your face and neck, “do you have anything for it?”  You have no idea how menstrual care even works on Geidi Prime.  You’d just assumed that it wouldn’t be an issue for another ten months.

She composes herself again immediately.  “Why yes, of course, Na-Baroness.  I apologize for my negligence.”  Before you can tell her there's nothing to apologize for, she adds, “I'll help you get cleaned up first.”

“That’s alright, I can do it,” you tell her as you wonder for a moment who she served before that she’d assume you want her to clean between your legs when you’re perfectly capable of doing it yourself.

She inclines her head further.  “Thank you, Na-Baroness.  I’ll be back in just a moment.”  

As soon as she’s out the door you’re up and walking briskly to the bathroom. 

You’ll need to have the sheets changed.

It’s only been two days, you think, washing between your legs.  This doesn’t mean anything bad .  When he asks for you, you can just explain the situation and try again in a few days.  Until then…until then…   For a moment you draw a blank, before remembering a conversation you had a few years ago with a slightly older friend when you asked her if husbands still desired their wives when their wives were bleeding.

“ They honestly just want something warm, soft, and wet to bury themselves in, ” she’d told you matter-of-factly.  “ So most men just use their wife’s mouths .”

“ What do you mean? ” you’d asked, fairly certain you had an idea what she was talking about but still more willing to briefly embarrass yourself by asking than remain ignorant.

“ You know what goes on between a man’s legs, right? ” she’d asked in turn.

“ Of course ,” you’d said, a little offended that she’d think you so naive. 

“ When you’re bleeding and he still wants you to please him, put your mouth there instead, ” she’d told you.  “ Like he’s burying himself inside your mouth instead of your canal.  You can’t make babies that way, of course, but they often don’t care about that .   You can’t really make babies during your monthly courses anyway. ”

You wonder how she reacted when she found out who you’d be marrying.  You never got the chance to ask and assume, like many young women and their parents, that she was relieved that she wasn’t the one hand-picked for him. 

You also haven’t done that to him yet, nor any other man, for that matter, and you’re sure your lack of skill will show.  How are you meant to take the entire thing in your mouth when you can barely fit it where it’s meant to go?  What are you supposed to do with your teeth?  It also just seems somehow more daunting and personal than just having inside of you in the traditional manner.  

He’ll be aggressive with it, like he is in everything else. 

You can’t stop thinking about it as you brush your teeth and hair and try to ignore the discomfort in your lower belly before you hear a click and the door to your quarters opening.

Idrisa’s back with a basket made of some kind of black synthetic material; it’s covered to protect its contents from passing view.  You could kiss her for that, you think, and she starts unpacking.

She pulls out what look like thick handkerchiefs, going to your bathroom to stack them neatly on the countertop.  She also hands you a canister that you open to find a handful of circular tablets.

“They’re not as strong as what I left for your wedding night,” she says, “and they won’t put you to sleep, but they should suffice if you need them.”

You’d chalked up your cramps to nerves but now that you have your answer the symptoms couldn’t have been more obvious.  “Thank you, I think I will,” you tell her as you think about how you’ll likely be expected to join your new family, if one could call them that, for breakfast again.  The thought makes you want to crawl back under the covers.

“Can you also please tell Feyd-Rautha that I apologize for missing breakfast but that I'm feeling unwell this morning and wouldn't want to be poor company in my condition?” you ask.

Idrisa hesitates, nervous.  You realize that she's thinking, You know that your husband finds me far more disposable than he finds you, right?  He could easily kill and replace me and no one would care.  You also realize that she can’t and won’t say no to you.  But just that look reminds you that as frightening as this fortress is to you, it’s much worse for her.  You haven’t seen Feyd-Rautha kill outside of the arena yet, but you also barely know him; killing people who displease him over minor inconveniences, especially if they’re low-born and low-ranking, could be a common occurrence for him.  The Harkonnens didn’t earn their reputation for nothing.

“Unless you think they won't notice if I’m even there,” you add, thinking.  The Baron couldn't care less if he never has a conversation with you again, and outside of the marriage bed, Feyd-Rautha doesn't appear to have any real plans for you.  “I could just…stay here and if Feyd-Rautha has any questions he can ask them.”

Idrisa’s shoulders had been locked and tense but appear to relax just a little at your words.  “I can make a plate for you and bring it back here,” she says, already knowing your preference.  Given Geidi Prime’s incredible wealth and lack of natural resources other than fuels and metals there are imported fruits that you’d never had before coming here that you’re certain you’ll never get sick of.

“Sounds perfect, thank you,” you tell her, and take advantage of the new medication when she leaves.

When she returns with another tray for you, she’s accompanied by two other girls holding a fresh arrangement of sheets; the hems and necklines of their garb are cut a little different from hers and they look younger, perhaps the same age as your little sister.  You wonder if the difference in the way they’re dressed suggests rank?  They keep their heads down and don’t acknowledge you other than a silent curtsy before stripping your old sheets and setting down a new spread.  You look at them for a moment, wondering if it’s at the Baron’s insistence that no staff ever look a Harkonnen royal in the eye or if this rule’s been going on for generations when Idrisa snaps you out of your thoughts.

“I have a tea prepared for you as well, Na-Baroness,” she says, gesturing towards the tray that she’s set on your end-table and removing the cloche covering your plate.  “It’s not medicine strictly speaking but it has soothing properties.”

You turn and look at her.  She doesn’t look much older than you, but the same can be said of most of the female slaves.  Are they banished to where they won’t be easily seen when they reach a certain age?  What’s the life expectancy?  It feels more than a little insensitive to ask right now, so you just let them work as you take a seat at your end-table and take a sip of your tea.

After breakfast is over and you’ve found a comfortable position sitting up in bed, propped up by the pillows and headboards, you read a bit more on the Harkonnen lineage.  The more you read, the more you understand why Father always insisted that Geidi Prime is no place for a woman.  Women in high places, you find, have in history been assassinated more often than the men, or kidnapped to use as collateral and tortured.  You wonder if that’s why you saw so few at the wedding and reception, why they seemed so hidden out of view even while accompanying their high-ranking husbands.

You’re reasonably certain that your new husband’s concerned enough with his image as heir to the Harkonnen throne not to tarnish the alliance your marriage has created, that even if he doesn’t really know you and may never love you–you’re reasonably certain that he’s incapable of feeling such an emotion–he’ll still make sure to protect what he sees as his.  His uncle will likely be another story.  

The door opens unannounced and you look up, expecting Idrisa only to find Feyd-Rautha letting himself in without a word and closing the door behind him.  He doesn’t speak at first, but everything in his demeanor tells you that he did in fact notice your absence and wants an explanation.

You compose yourself.  There’s no need to panic.  “Good afternoon, husband.  To what do I owe the pleasure?” you ask, tone as light and cool as the weather would be on your home planet right now. 

He leans against the door as he folds his arms across his chest and looks you over.  “I missed you at breakfast,” he says.

“Yes, my apologies.  I’m not feeling well,” you tell him.  

He clearly doesn’t believe you.  You don’t seem feverish , he seems to think with his unimpressed gaze.  You seem fine .  “Still getting adjusted to the atmosphere on Geidi Prime?” he asks, and for a foolish moment you hope that he’s giving you an excuse.  Maybe he thinks you’re avoiding him because of last night, and you’re content to let him think that.

“Yes, husband,” you tell him.  

“That’s a shame,” he says, crossing over to your bed and sitting at the edge of it.  “It occurred to me last night that whoever taught you close-range maneuvers didn’t do their job right.  You should’ve been able to evade me.”

You wrinkle your brow and don’t have it in you to hide your insulted glare; your House’s military is considered a force to be reckoned with and a slight against your training is a slight against your House and your father himself.  “Did you want me to evade you?” you ask.

He seems amused by your sudden sharpness, and you realize that he’d wanted to hit a nerve.  He knew what he was implying and got the precise reaction he’d been hoping for.  “That’s not the point, wife.  You said yourself that you were out of practice and as soon as you’re feeling better I intend to rectify that.  Your cute little boot-dagger won’t serve you any good if you can’t correctly use it.”  

He places his hand on your leg, trailing it along your thigh and stopping just shy of your apex, his thumb brushing against it through the fabric of your skirt.  You give a sharp inhale that makes him smile.  You start to close your legs but his hand, now cupping your inner thigh, holds one open enough for him to continue to fondle as he pleases.

His hand stays there for a moment, stays over the light material of your skirt even as you're sure the soft flesh of your inner thigh heats his palm, as flushed as you feel under his touch.  He leans in, inhales as he leans over you and sniffs your hair.  It’s not even the first time he’s done it.  You wonder if he finds your hair to be a sort of forbidden fruit; something he can’t say he likes because to do so would disrespect Harkonnen hairlessness, but still something he finds fascinating or even enviable.  You’re not sure yet whether his lack of it is down to genetics or grooming but you assume the former, if it affects everyone including those who wouldn’t have such prime access to constant shaving.

But then he fully brings his hand between your legs, fingertips rubbing up against you and you flinch.  

Now?  Is he going to try and fuck me right here and now?   You shift, trying to hide what you’re sure is a look of panic on your face, trying to scramble for an excuse as Feyd-Rautha rubs a whimper out of you.

In the moments he does and you freeze, he watches your face a moment longer and then something shifts in his eyes, and he pulls back.

“I’ll call on you soon,” he says.  There’s something satisfied, almost smug in his tone.  He doesn’t wait for a response from you before he gets up and leaves, and you wonder what caused his departure.

Idrisa comes in a minute later with more tea for you.  “The Na-Baron seems mollified,” she says.  “He’s taken the news well.”

“I didn’t tell him.”

You catch Idrisa furrowing her brow-line, incredulous even with her head bowed before she can smooth over her expression into one of polite indifference.

“He doesn’t need to know yet,” you tell her.  “He said he’d call on me later.”

“My apologies for speaking boldly, Na-Baroness,” she says, “but the Na-Baron will still take you to bed tonight or whenever he decides is convenient.  Harkonnen men expect their wives to always be available to them, no matter how they’re feeling.”

You suppose you already knew this.  It certainly doesn’t help the gnawing feeling in your stomach even as the medicine Idrisa gave you has soothed the cramps for now.  

“It appears I can hold him off until after dinner, at least,” you finally say.  There’s that; you also appreciate having another meal without the Baron’s presence.

You wish you had someone you could talk to about this in which it wouldn’t feel weird to ask.  You look over at Idrisa.  She’s the only friend you’ve managed to make so far and while you don’t see that changing anytime soon, you haven’t forgotten that she keeps you company out of obligation.  You can’t be certain as to whether or not she actually likes you, or if she only tolerates you due to her heightened position within the Harkonnen Fortress as your personal attendant.  Still, she’s certainly better than no one to ask.  She takes your old mug and heads for the door.

“Idrisa,” you start.  She turns.  “You’ve…have you been with men before?”

She inclines her head in a polite nod.  “When it’s required of me,” she says.

Your second question dies in your mouth.  Oh.  Right .  Yet again you’re disgusted but can’t say you’re all that surprised.

And instead of asking for advice you’re struck by another thought.  “Has the Na-Baron ever…?” you start and she immediately shakes her head.

“Never, Na-Baroness,” she assures you.  “He has never been known to satiate himself that way with slaves.”

Are you being honest or telling me what I want to hear? you almost ask but spare her the indignity.  You’re reasonably certain that if Feyd-Rautha had taken advantage of her, he’d have gloated to you about it.  “Thank you,” you tell her.  You don’t want to know how men on Geidi Prime have abused her mouth.  “I was just curious.”

“Not at all, Na-Baroness,” she says.

As the hours tick by you wish you'd just told Feyd-Rautha your situation and gotten whatever awkward ensuing conversation over with.

In the evening Idrisa brings you dinner, more tea, and a glass of wine.  “The Na-Baron has given you two hours before expecting you in his bedchambers.”

You sigh.  “Thank you, Idrisa,” you tell her, not quite willing to add, you were right .  You eat, you have your tea, you bathe and clean your hair.  And in the remaining time that you have before you need to leave, you sip your wine. You’d be foolish to assume that it will truly settle your nerves, but it tastes nice. 

“I guess it’s time,” you say finally, looking at the timepiece on your nightstand.  “How angry do you think he’ll be?”

“I’m afraid I don’t know, Na-Baroness,” Idrisa says as she opens the door to lead you to your husband.  “He’s never been married nor been instructed to sire an heir before.”

When you get to his bedroom he’s already standing in the middle of it, wearing only black pants with a relaxed fit that suggests leisure, maybe sleep.  And here you hadn’t taken him as the kind of man to own pajamas.

He looks over your shoulder at Idrisa, who seems just as surprised to see him as you are even as she immediately lowers her head in deference.

“Dismissed,” he tells her, and she curtsies and scurries out of the room, closing the door behind her, leaving the two of you alone and rather more dressed than you’ve been in this room.

You stand, awkwardly, playing with the sash to your robe as the two of you look at each other in silence.  Or rather, he stares at you and you look down, knowing what you’d rehearsed and still needing to force the words out.

“My apologies, husband, but it’s my time of month,” you finally manage.

“I know,” he says.  “I could smell it on you.  I could feel your rag in between your legs.”

Was that what he was doing?  You look up at his face and find nothing that you can really parse and pause, unsure what you could say to that, before you move on.

“I know it’s not ideal, but we can try again in a few days, and in the meantime,” you try to sound like you’re not as nervous as you are, fully aware that seduction was never something you learned, “I know that there are…other ways to satisfy you.”  A few days and we can resume trying to secure your firstborn .  

He gives a small smirk at the second part of your statement but comments only on the first.  “A few days?” he repeats, as if you’ve just said either the funniest or dumbest thing he’s heard all week.  “What makes you think I care to wait a few days?”

You’re not sure you heard him right.  “The blood,” you say slowly.  “I can’t control it.”

“You think a Harkonnen would be scared of a little blood?” he says.

You’re not sure what to say to that.  In hindsight, you’re not sure why you’d assumed that this man of all men would be too squeamish to fuck a bleeding woman.

“Strip down,” he says, after the seconds of silence that follow.  He sounds so casual as he says it, as if he just told you to have a seat.  You hesitate, still unsure if he’s being serious.

“Did you not understand me?” he prompts when seconds tick by and you haven’t moved.

“I do, husband,” say.  “But still, I have to warn you that it’ll make a mess.”

“Y/N,” he says, his tone somehow light.  There’s an element of danger to it.  “You’re not the one who’ll have to clean up afterwards.”

Nor you , you think.  “So you want me in this state.”  You don’t phrase it as a question but he can hear the confusion in your voice.

The smirk never quite left his face but returns in full as he crosses the few steps over to you that leaves you close enough that you can feel his breath.  He takes your wrist and presses your hand to his groin–it’s rapidly filling out.

“What do you think?” he says.

You gasp, almost giving an incredulous laugh as you glance between his face and back down to his groin.  Harkonnen men are built differently, you suppose.  

You pull away enough to unravel your robe and step out of your slippers.  He doesn’t object to your garments being left on his floor instead of neatly tucked on his dresser, so you keep going, pulling your chemise over your shoulders, pulling down your undergarment and letting it slide down your legs, until you’re bared entirely for him.

He looks down at the blood that gathered in the kerchief lining the gusset of your undergarment as it hits the floor and you step out of it, and then he looks back at you.

“Hold your arms out like this, wrists together,” he says, extending his own to demonstrate.

He still doesn’t seem angry, his tone suggesting patience that you know he doesn’t have, but you hesitate before mimicking him.

“Very nice,” he says, and you bristle at his condescension as he half-circles you before heading for his armoire.  You turn around to watch him open it, and your jaw drops when you see what’s inside.

It’s lined with whips, rope, chains, knives, scalpels, collars, and other items you’ve never seen before but if this is in his bedroom then it must serve one particular purpose, either on himself whoever has the misfortune of being with him when he wants to use any of these devices.  

He glances over his shoulder and looks if anything delighted by your stunned reaction, the growing sense of dread.  “I didn’t say you could drop your arms,” he says, and turns back to pick out a length of black rope.

You suppose you ought to be grateful that he didn’t pick out any chains.

You watch as he loops an intricate tie binding your wrists.  He does it with such practiced ease he looks directly into your eyes as he does it.  You manage to hold his gaze in defiance even as your heart hammers in your chest and you’re scared of what’s going to happen next.  You know that, like a true Harkonnen, he likes your fear, but it hasn’t occurred to either of you yet that he also appreciates your fire.

“Get on all fours on the bed, pet,” he says, tone light and playful as much as his gravely timbre can make it.

You try to keep your eyes on him as much as possible, making sure he’s never fully out of your sightline as you get on the bed, squirming but managing to maneuver the position he wants while your wrists are bound.  He knows that you don’t trust him, and if anything that seems to elevate his excitement.  

Good girl, he seems to be thinking.  He looks you over, turning and sauntering so he can take a moment to gaze first at your naked profile, then at your backside.

You have to keep reminding yourself that he won’t do anything that will risk you being able to give him children as he turns away and pads over to his armoire.  For a moment you’re not sure if he’s trying to decide what he’d like to use, or if he’s purposefully biding his time to make you more nervous.  His fingertips seem to dance over the whips, then the chains.  He briefly touches the handle to one of his knives.

Not the scalpel.  Please not the scalpel.

You see it–corded leather.  A black whip with multiple knotted tails.  He takes it down from his display but leaves the armoire doors open–undoubtedly to keep reminding you of what else he could be and very likely will be doing to you in the future.

You think about the Bene Gesserit Litany and try to repeat it in your head as you consider the tool? the weapon? clutched in his fist.  At first glance the whip looks like the cat-of-nine-tails your brother-in-law seems so fond of.  However, when you shut your eyes, take a breath, and think of the words– fear is the mind-killer –you realize when you open your eyes again that what Feyd-Rautha’s holding is a lot smaller than a proper cat-of-nine-tails and the tails thicker.  You have no doubt that this is going to hurt, but it doesn’t look like it will rip you apart.

“What, what is this?  A punishment for bleeding? ” you finally ask, unable to handle the silence anymore and because that’s the only explanation you can imagine.

And yet Feyd-Rautha looks amused that you’d suggest it.  “It’s because I want to use it on you,” he says, as if any further explanation would be silly.  “Ever since I first saw you, I wondered what that pretty ass of yours would look like after I’d taken this to it.”  He holds up the device for emphasis.  “I wondered what noises you’d make.  I wanted to know what you’d look like with your wrists bound, naked and helpless in my bed.  What you’d look like squirming and bleeding.

“ Yesterday was a punishment,” he adds.  “This is just fun.”

For you, perhaps, you think.  It’s no matter; you’ll just have to prove that you can take whatever he dishes out.  You just have to decide whether it’s better or worse that he’s not doing this out of anger. 

“Are you scared, pet?” he asks.

“ No, ” you lie in the most adamant and dignified tone you can muster, and once again he acts like what you’ve said is cute.  He clicks his tongue.

“You mustn’t lie to me in bed, pet,” he says, approaching the bed again, his free hand skimming over your ribcage, your side, your hip, as he finally stands beside the bed, and ever-so-slowly draws the corded whip up and down the backs of your thighs.  The tassels brush gently against your skin and it feels perverse, the anticipation he’s building within you.  On his second pass you inhale sharply, shutting your eyes, hips twitching away from the device, and Feyd-Rautha chuckles at that.

“Relax,” he says.

Fuck you.  You know I can’t.  Just do it and get it over with , you want to tell him with your sharp exhale, and one second later he draws his hand back and brings the whip down.

You cry out, rocking forward, your entire body clenching up as much from shock as pain.  Nothing could really prepare you for this; his hand from the first night had been easier, more personal.  The individual cords spread out like a fractal tree, like cracks in a block of ice fanning out. 

The second time is less sharp, more of a thud that reverberates through your body, the impact reverberating in your pulse.  Tears prick up at the corners of your eyes and for a moment you can’t breathe.  It would figure that this man has used this device often enough that he knows how to inflict different flavors of pain depending on whether he’s putting the movement in his wrist or his forearm.  You clench your fists, waiting for the next lash, and then the next.

Your nerves are on fire.  You can barely think, barely focus on anything but the exquisite pain on impact, the sharp sting of the air against your impacted flesh, the sweet moments you adjust, finding your breath, before he comes down again.  You don’t scream, not after the first blow, but the tears forming at the corners of your eyes start trickling down your face and then drop directly onto your forearms the covers below you when you bow your head.  

You don’t know how long he keeps going, don’t keep count.  The pain starts to dull but the intensity becomes overwhelming as he compounds on every lash.  Your ears are ringing.  You taste iron at the back of your throat.  The worst part is that you find, to your horror, your nipples feel stiff.  You start to feel wet.

It has to be a fear response.  This isn’t enjoyable .  It’s intense, it’s painful, and you can’t help but feel shame lance through you that your body would react this way.

Please.  I can’t take any more , you want to tell him, but opt instead to whimper through your clenched teeth.

At that moment the whip comes down and it sends you toppling forward, finally collapsing.  The covers are soft against your tear-stained cheek.  You shut your eyes, panting, waiting for him to haul you back up and continue the process.

But nothing happens.  You don’t try to look behind you and hope that he’s done.  You just take a rattling breath and listen for the sound of the whip and its tendrils slicing through air, and it doesn’t come.  

“You lasted longer than I thought you would,” Feyd-Rautha says, the first time he’s spoken in minutes, and you open your eyes and  turn your head to see him twist the coils of his whip and head over to the armoire.

“Come on,” he says over his shoulder.  “Back into position, pet.”  

You grit your teeth and force yourself back up on your hands and elbows.  “Good,” he adds softly, and it’s embarrassing how one single word of praise makes you flush, sends a pleasant tingle down your spine.  This shouldn’t have the effect on you that it does–maybe it’s because now that it’s over, you feel lighter, almost dazed.  All of your muscles had tightened into coils, but now you feel pliant to the point that your limbs feel rubbery.  You’re exhausted.  You’re hurt.  You don’t know what else he has on the agenda for you tonight but you just hope it doesn’t involve another one of his whips or ropes.

He sets the device back in the armoire and turns to face you.  He looks at your flushed, tear-stained face and smiles, mouth-closed before approaching the bed, his cock hard in his pants, and even though part of you wants nothing more than to melt into the bed and to get some relief for your stinging backside, you know he’s still going to chase his own pleasure.

‘He’ll want your mouth,’ you remember.  

You won’t wait for him to force it or grind your face into his privates.  If that’s what he wants, you’ll get there first, and so you drop your head and fumble as you reach with bound wrists for the fly of his pants.

You’re focused on what’s directly in your eyeline, so you don’t see his brief look of surprise, but you hear his voice, sounding pleased.  “Let me help you with that, pet,” he says, pulling away long enough to pull his pants down, stepping out of them.

It’s even more daunting when it’s this close to your face, but he steps back in, cradling your jaw, and you lean in and lick the tip of him.

For a few seconds that’s all you know to do, to lick around him, feeling the ridges and veins under your tongue.  It’s all the verification he could possibly need that you’ve never done this before, and that spurs him on, cradling your head in one large hand as the other guides himself past your lips and into your mouth.

It confirms what you suspected; he’s too big to take all the way and thankfully, doesn’t try to make you.  

Not yet, a part of you thinks.  You try to breathe, try not to get your teeth on him, try to relax and close your eyes as he controls the pace.  It’s easy enough at first; far from the rutting of the past couple of nights.  It doesn’t occur to you that, by his standards anyway, he’s being gentle with you.  Doesn’t occur to you to wonder why.  You just try to keep up as your backside and the backs of your thighs sting like hell and you hope Idrisa will have some sort of lotion for it when you get back to your quarters.

Feyd-Rautha appears to have yet another reason to like your hair, it seems, as he threads his fingers through it, guiding you onto him in slowly greater increments until he’s suddenly over halfway in and you freeze, nearly gagging, forgetting how to breathe.

He holds you in place for a moment, just long enough for your eyes to widen as you glance up at him and his heavy-lidded eyes and chest heaving with arousal.  He waits until you’re about to struggle and tear away from him before he relinquishes your hair and steps away, pulling out.  You take a deep breath, gulping the air down.  

“Stay right there,” he says, and settles in behind you, stroking your hindquarters like you’re a horse that he’s trying to calm down.  Will he put a saddle on you next?  You exhale hard through your nose, mouth pursing, waiting for what he’ll do next.  Will he mark up the stinging raw skin he’s already flogged with his hand?

Fine.  Fuck you again.  I can take whatever you’ve got.  I can handle it , you want to tell him out of spite.   You sense him shift, dipping his head, and despite your steeled nerves can’t help but gasp and feel something flutter in your core when you feel his breath against your lower back.

What exactly is he–? is all you have time to think before he dives in.

You jolt and wriggle in shock as he licks over one of your growing welts; you can’t quite tell but wouldn’t be surprised if he broke skin.  However, it’s how his tongue glides over your backside before shifting his weight to your folds that sends waves of shock, revulsion, and excitement as you cry out, stunned.

He’s licking my wounds .

You’re trying to wrap your head around how salacious it is that his lips and tongue alternate between licking the impacted skin on your buttocks and the backs of your thighs and dipping his tongue inside of you.  He has your hips firmly in place, which serves him well given that you’re torn between recoiling away from the heat of his mouth and wanting to press back against it.  You can feel him smirk at the sounds of your shocked moans.

He pulls away long enough to turn you on your back and you wince at the impact before you see him slide down along the bed and continue the onslaught.  You can hardly believe it as he grabs your still-stinging buttocks and buries his face against your bleeding pussy.

This is disgusting , part of you thinks.  Another part of you can hardly understand what’s happening.  In all your years you’ve never met a man who didn’t recoil hearing about monthly courses.  You’ve never heard of anyone wanting to taste a…a bloody gash .

Your wrists are still bound, and you grip onto the pillows above your head as he lifts your thighs to rest over his shoulders and dives back in, tongue pressing inside of you.  

It feels incredible.   You’d prefer it if it didn’t.  More than anything else, you don’t want to be enjoying this, wish the continuous whines and moans he’s drawing out of you were insincere, but he can feel as well as you do that you mean every sound.  You, Lady Y/N of the powerful and dignified house of Y/H, are getting your bloody pussy licked by the ruthless barbarian Feyd-Rautha Harkonnen and Great Mother and every forgotten old god, you’re enjoying every visceral and shocking moment of it.

He knows it, too, the smug bastard.  He probably feels even more powerful like this, on his belly and with his face between your legs, than he did when he was tanning your hide.

He raises one hand from your hip to your breast, giving one of your nipples a cruel pinch, smirking against your slit as you whimper in protest, and continues.  His nose presses and rubs against your bud in the onslaught and you finally admit to yourself that any last vestiges of resistance you might have had has caved when you squirm, rocking your hips upwards and desperately wishing that your wrists were free so you could press his face closer into you.

He keeps up his pace, bringing you as close to the edge as possible without reaching it until finally, mercifully, he shifts his mouth to your bud, his fingers replacing his tongue inside of you.  Your unrestrained cries fill the room, spurring him on, and then the force of it hits you as he brings you over the precipice for the first time.  It feels like it comes in shockwaves, especially as he keeps going through it all.

You’re still pulsing and squirming against his tongue when he stops, raising himself up and leaning over you.  Inky, sticky blood coats the lower part of his face, from his chin to his nostrils, and you’re a little surprised at how the sight doesn’t alarm you as much as it probably should, especially since that’s your blood covering his face.

There are far worse ways he could be smeared with your blood .  You gasp, still, at the striking color against the pallor of his face, reminded of seeing him in the arena. 

He presses damp, open-mouthed kisses against your stomach, your ribcage, your breasts and collarbone, as if to mark you with it.  Finally he sits up, bringing your legs over his as he guides himself into you with his bloodied fingers.

He stays upright as he pulls you onto him, and you watch his face as he looks down where you’re joined, his groan like a rumble in his chest as he sees himself pumping in and out of your bleeding pussy.  He won’t last long, you realize.  He’s been holding himself back from fucking you into the mattress since he visited you in your chambers hours ago. 

He curves in then, bracing one hand above your head to grip your still-bound wrists as his other hand grabs your hip to keep you stable.  You realize what he’s about to do a split second before it can happen.

He’s going to kiss you with that bloody mouth .

You tamp down on the revulsion of it and the coppery smell, again refusing to let him shock you or give you anything you can’t take and move in first, leaning up and capturing his mouth in a kiss.  

He groans into it, hips pumping, tongue invading your mouth as he speeds up, going hard, hips snapping into you.  He’s relentless; this would be agonizing if he hadn’t worked you open and pliant with his lips and tongue and even still, it veers on the edge of being overwhelming.  Your whimpers and cries only encourage him.

And then he finally comes, burying his face in the crux of your neck and biting down, not hard enough to draw blood but enough that it will leave a bruise later.

For a moment the two of you stay that way, then he releases your wrists and sinks down onto you, dropping his forehead onto your shoulder as he pulls out and takes a moment to catch his breath.  After a moment he raises himself back up on his forearms, pauses, and takes in the sight of your face and your lips stained red before reaching for your wrists again and untying the rope; once freed you notice that your skin’s been chafed rosy but still fully intact.  

He gets up, and you watch the lines of his legs, the slope and curve of his buttocks, the taper from his shoulders to his waist as he gets up and sets the rope back in the armoire before finally closing it shut.

Guess he’s done for the night .

But is he going to send me back right away? you wonder, turning to your side to watch the way he moves.  It takes some effort.  You feel as depleted as a rung-out damp rag.

He approaches the bed and wordlessly holds out his hand, and once you take it guides you to your feet and leads you into this bathroom.

Like his bedroom, it’s larger than yours.

He doesn’t let you wash your blood off your body; he wants it to remain on you until it dries and peels off on its own.  Instead he wipes his face, rinses and cleans out his mouth, and gives you a cup of water to do the same.  He wipes off in between his legs and then yours, quiet and strangely peaceful.  He takes another cloth and wets it, and then grabs a small bottle out of a drawer.  “Turn around, hands on the counter,” he says.

Fairly certain you know what he’s about to do, you acquiesce.  “Did you draw blood?” you ask over your shoulder.

He shakes his head.  “Not this time,” he says.  “Wasn’t trying to.”  And then he surprises you by getting down on one knee.

You give a small gasp.  It just seems…lewd?  Subservient?  And tired and sore as you are, you can’t help the twinge you feel in between your legs as he gingerly presses the cloth against your reddened skin.  You grip the countertop tighter as he opens the bottle of what you can only assume is ointment because after a moment his fingertips are smeared in a cool balm that offers such sweet relief you drop your head, trying to hold yourself together when your legs feel like they’re about to give out and you can feel Feyd-Rautha’s breath so close to the sensitive skin of your backside.

He seems to be applying the ointment to the worst of the welts, starting in silence and then adding, “You’re sensitive, but you have a decent pain tolerance.  I like that.”

You huff a laugh.  I bet you say that to all the girls, you almost tell him, and immediately think that that’s probably not true.  If it weren’t for the fact that he’s tending to your wounds you’d assume that he’d never do anything like this.  Something tells you that this small act of kindness isn’t to be taken lightly or for granted.

Once he seems satisfied with his work he gets back up, sneaking a glance of your face in the mirror.

Is he thinking about how much you’ve already changed since you’ve met? Since you’ve married?  When you see your reflection you don’t see the same person you did a week ago.  Of course he didn’t know you a week ago.  He barely knows you now.  Still, when your eyes meet in the mirror, he looks at you with something almost close to affection before he leaves the bathroom.

“Stay the night,” he says when you walk over to your abandoned clothes so you can gather them up, get dressed, and return to your chambers.

You look over at him.

“I’ll want to sample you again first thing in the morning,” he explains, “so it’s more convenient if you remain here.”

You huff, torn between incredulity and amusement.  “Taking advantage of the situation while we still can, are we?” you ask.

“I doubt it’ll come again for another ten months,” he says, and then strides, still naked, for the door.  He opens it, and a few words of battle-language later he shuts again.  He sees your confused expression and explains, “Your slave was still waiting for you.  I told her to go.”  He tilts his head in the direction of his bed, and after a moment you follow.  It appears that he doesn’t even want you to pull your undergarment back on.

As soon as you’re under the covers with him he tugs down your end of it to get one last look at your marked chest.  And after he’s looked his fill, he reaches for a switch that turns off the lights and even as the two of you can’t quite see each other, you still find yourselves on your sides facing one another.

“I wake up earlier than you’re probably used to and I’m a light sleeper.  Your slave assured me that you don’t snore,” he says.

“Not that I’m aware of,” you tell him.

“Once you stop bleeding I’m going to start having you train in my Halls,” he adds.  “I was serious earlier.”

“But for the next few days I’m chained to this bed.”

“That could be arranged,” he says.  “In any case you weren’t complaining when I was licking your cunt earlier.”

He won’t see your flush, but he must know that it’s there.  “So… is it safe to assume that none of this is…” you try to find the right words, “typical?  For a man, I mean.” And in quite possibly the biggest understatement you’ve ever made, “You’re not a normal man.”

You’ve adjusted enough to the dark to see his smirk.  “I think you've known that since before we met, Y/N,” he says.  And after a moment he lays his head, settling in and getting comfortable.  He doesn’t say another word to you that night, just closes his eyes and within a couple of minutes his breath slows.

It’s hard to imagine being able to let your guard down enough with this man to sleep beside him, even if he falls asleep first.  Like sleeping beside a wild animal.  

Sleep does come to you, though, after long minutes watching him sleep, waiting for him to wake up and scare you, lunge for you, and it doesn’t happen.

You turn to your other side, facing away from him then, and the only signal you get that he’s not entirely asleep is that as you start to drift off yourself, he reaches one arm to pull you in closer to him.

Tag list: @wo-ming-bai @blazeflays @richardslady121

Let me know if you'd also like to be tagged!

[bcofl0ve]

headcanon time! give us 5 of ur fave cora headcanons mollie!

[confused on what we’re talking about? check out my fic ‘invisible string’ in the masterpost found in my pinned post!]

surprise you’re getting 6 bc i started this and it ran away from me. cora and austin and mama/reader related. spoilers for yet to be published parts below the cut!

- being a dad and being your fiancé (and eventually husband) are the best parts of austin's life. he does not shut up about you or cora, ever. the week before you come to visit for christmas pre: actual permanent visas being approved he is telling everyone. the mail man, the checkout guy at the grocery store, his uber driver, etc. "my fiancée and my daughter are comin' home for christmas, it's my first christmas a dad," leaves his mouth just about every time he opens it.

- masters of the air films over the summer of 2021 in london and he brings the two of you with him. cora thinks the set is 'more boring' than the elvis set but still enjoys austin showing her around all the airplanes. when austin is busy the two of you play tourist with some of the other cast member's wives/girlfriends and it's a good time!

- you did your own pre-school thang at home with cora because of how uncertain things were with when you'd be moving, but come fall 2021 she starts kindergarten at a local school in anaheim. austin sheds more tears than you, and more than cora herself. there's layers to it- when he didn't get as much time with her before she started school as most parents do with their kids. and you know that when you're standing in the parking lot wiping his tears with your thumb. it's what plants the idea of another baby in the back of your mind, though the actual conversation doesn't happen for a couple more months.

- you don't really know how to go about it so you choose the path of ripping the bandaid off and blurt out "do want more kids?" when you're getting ready for bed. austin's eyes widen and he stutters a little, but the answer is a resounding "yeah- yes, i mean- if you do, do you?". that's around december 2021, and it isn't as easy a road as you hoped it would be but come may you realize you missed your period in the middle of cannes.

- you take a test, and aren't surpised it's postive, but put telling him on the shelf for a minute what with everything going on. except the more you put it off the more you realize if you wait till press calms down it's going to be another full month. you're in memphis the second week of june starting to realize you can't put if off much longer, espically when you aren't drinking at all the after parties. you're outside at graceland watching cora run around the yard, austin inside doing an interview, when prisicila gives you a long (gentle) look that you clock before the soft "so have you told him yet?" even leaves her mouth.

- you're making your way upstairs at your hotel that night, cora sleeping on austin's shoulder, when you realize you're telling him /now/. he lays cora into her bed, crouched on the ground stroking her little head saying his goodnights. and blame it on the hormones making you extra emotional but the sight makes you blurt out "i'm pregnant" faster than you can slow your roll. it takes austin a minute to process that, standing up and turning around with his mouth hanging open like a cod fish. there are tears when it does click in his head that he wasn’t just hearing things, after your little nod when he chokes out a watery “no way- are you really?”. and you cry too. ❤️‍🩹

[pinespittinink]

(this is just an ongoing note for myself to keep as a reading log, feel free to ignore)

📚 books i’ve read since i started reading again (summer 2021)

iron widow (dnf)

for the wolf (dnf)

the wolf and the woodsman

circe

the bear and the nightingale

jade city

the girl in the tower

the winter of the witch

jade war

juniper and thorn 

jade legacy

daughter of the moon goddess (dnf)

babel 

the moonday letters

glitterati

our wives under the sea

a dowry of blood 

this is how you lose the time war

a far wilder magic (dnf)

how to die in space (current)

📚 to read 

not good for maidens

the story of edgar sawtelle

house of leaves

piranesi

invisible cities

the genesis of misery

black leopard red wolf

the last tale of the flower bride

dead silence

helen of troy

the locked tomb series

wolf children

to sleep in a sea of stars

the spear cuts through water

the darkness outside us

what moves the dead 

senlin ascends

[alliluyevas]

3

What were your top five books of the year?

Oh, this is hard! I read a lot of really good books this year and also frankly the stuff I read in the last few months of 2021 versus the first months of 2022 run together so I had to look up and see what I actually read for the first time in 2022. This isn't in any particular order:

Joseph Smith and the Mormons: Noah van Sciver

This is a graphic novel that focuses on Joseph Smith's life and death and early Mormonism and I thought it was really successful! It was powerful and sympathetic but also historically accurate (with an extensive bibliography, lmfao). I thought it was really compelling in terms of both the art and inspiring feelings. This is a very cinematic story so the visual method worked very well.

A Knight of The Seven Kingdoms: George RR Martin

I've been an ASOIAF fan for ten years and I never read these! For some reason I just didn't find the sound of them appealing. I kind of wish I'd read them earlier because they're great but it was also really nice to have entirely new (to me) content in this universe!

I Who Have Never Known Men: Jacqueline Harpman

Post-apocalyptic novella about a group of women who are as far as they know the last people left alive in the world narrated by the youngest among them, who starts the story as a child and ends it as the last surviving member of the group. Incredibly beautiful writing, lovely and heartrending meditation on what it means to be human and what it means to be alive.

Women Talking: Miriam Toews

This is about sexual violence in an isolated Mennonite community, focusing on the debate between women from two interconnected families over whether to leave the community or not, narrated by the childhood friend of one of the women who is selected to take notes because none of the women can read or write and he's also the only person they know with experience in the outside world. It's actually really interesting putting it after I Who Have Never Known Men because there's some thematic overlap even though the circumstances are wholly different. Incredibly powerful, really thought provoking, and very unique narrative voice. I'm excited for the upcoming film adaptation :)

The Lonely Polygamist: Brady Udall

This was written in the early 2000s but is set in the 1970s, so it's a really interesting overlap between the historical and the contemporary. Primarily narrated by the rather hapless and pathetic Mormon fundamentalist titular character, with some cross-narration from the youngest of his four wives and his preteen son. I was surprised both by how funny this book was and how poignant it is. It's this really chaotic, sometimes uncomfortable portrayal of a large polygamist family where everyone is rubbing up against each other and somehow still feels alone. Also I think at heart this is a story about grief and loss and mourning (the death of a young daughter years prior to the start of the story but still very much affecting her family, the wife's history of miscarriage and stillbirth, and other death later in the book that I don't want to give away) and it was portrayed very effectively.

[d10nsaint]

I posted 1,576 times in 2022

That's 1,576 more posts than 2021!

880 posts created (56%)

696 posts reblogged (44%)

Blogs I reblogged the most:

@rouecentric

@that-one-pretty-bitch

@d10nsaint

@enishis

@sidra-29

I tagged 465 of my posts in 2022

#leigetalks - 152 posts

#manhwa - 146 posts

#saintspeaks - 136 posts

#leigewrites - 131 posts

#manhwa x reader - 117 posts

#x reader - 103 posts

#the way to protect the female lead's older brother - 77 posts

#dion agriche - 72 posts

#the way to save the older brother of the heroine - 68 posts

#dion agrece - 61 posts

Longest Tag: 106 characters

#tagging genshin because only people who dont go outside play that shit and we know how those people end up

My Top Posts in 2022:

#5

>REWRITE THE STARS

Timeline: Chapter 37. Spoilers for season 2!!

“Dion.”

Your voice slightly cracked.You weren’t sure what was about to happen. Maybe he would kill you? Maybe one of you would betray the others?

“Come here, darling.”

You beckoned your finger to him. Would he help Lant off of the floor, and discard of you and your son?

The sound of his boots echoed the halls.He lightly kissed your hand.The feeling of his warm lips against your glove still managed to reach your skin.

“I am at your mercy.”

Roxana looked down at the both of you; How did you manage to tame her murderous older brother? It was above her.

See the full post

474 notes - Posted July 13, 2022

#4

Dion with a very beautiful s/o?? Kind of like Cayena Hill beautiful. Everyone in their family immediately accepted her because of how beautiful and confident she is. She attracted attention everywhere she went because of her beauty!

>Lets say your parents were friends with Maria, and your mother had brought you with her to Agriche for one of Maria's tea parties. (Before Ashil's death.)

>Maria saw you, and you were almost sure you could see stars in her eyes.She started complimenting you for your beauty almost immediately.

>Of course, you couldn't attend Maria's tea party, so she had Dion show you around Agriche, as she wanted you to come over often and be comfortable.(At the time, you only saw Maria as a pretty socialite.)

>Dion shut you out and did the bare minimum of showing you around, then left you on your own.

>Fast forward a few months, and after talking to Dion a lot, you both became friends.Although he had weird hobbies (showing you knives, giving dead animals as gifts) he was a close friend of yours.

>Maria then saw how you both were close, and how could she give up such a pretty daughter-in-law?Your mother had almost instantly said yes to the marriage proposal, and had you live at Agriche.

>When you met lant, he only said, "she would make good children.Put her in classes with Roxana."

>And now, you were a 14 year old learning how to dominate a man!! wow!!

>Life was going smoothly: daily classes on how to have kids, learning how to handle gore, and training with dion was how you spent your days.

>You had only talked to Dion, only sparing a few words to roxana, who stared at you with awe in classes. (For context, when roxana was a kid, it was mentioned that she adored beautiful things.)

>Until..The incident.

>When ashil failed the special test, Lant had you follow Dion into the room with a mask on.

>In front of you, he had killed his own sibling.

You had learned how to handle gore, and had never spared a single word to Ashil, but you felt bad for Sierra when Ashil was killed; she looked so broken.Sad.

>Fast forward a few years, and you had everybody in the household fawning over you.

>When you were younger, it was "she's so cute!" now it's "shes so hot."

>You had won over every single sibling in Agriche, and even had the title , 'future duchess.'

>Meeting Fontaine was the worst thing that could have happened to you.He had flirted with you, and had even blushed when you sent him disgusted scorns about how dion was better than him.

>As the proud future lady of agriche, you had many followers, and had won the favor of all of Lants wives.

>Now, here is where you found out that Maria wasn't all dresses and tea.

>She had shown you a doll, while you struggled to keep a straight face.

>Dion still likes you quite alot, and loves touching you.He gives many gifts and dresses that he thinks will suit you.

>Handsome dangerous husband x sexy dangerous wife = Dion x you

>although you werent able to participate in monthly tests due to you not being a born Agriche, you still had a seat next to Lant due to how obedient of a child you were.

>And when agriche fell, you couldnt even imagine Dion not taking your side to run away.

>(recent chap spoilers) and Dion grew even more fond of you when you defended him from lant <3

521 notes - Posted August 28, 2022

#3

𝐅𝐀𝐍𝐓𝐀𝐒𝐘

&."𝖒𝖞 𝖉𝖊𝖊𝖕𝖊𝖘𝖙 𝖉𝖊𝖘𝖎𝖗𝖊𝖘" ... －𝐅𝐚𝐭𝐡𝐞𝐫,𝐢 𝐝𝐨𝐧𝐭 𝐰𝐚𝐧𝐭 𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐬 𝐦𝐚𝐫𝐫𝐢𝐚𝐠𝐞 𝐞𝐝𝐢𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧

𝑻𝑯𝑶𝑼𝑮𝑯𝑻𝑺 𝑶𝑵..

>Being Regis' wife. endless days with jubel, and endless nights with regis.

>Tea parties with baby Jubel.

>Wearing matching dresses with Jubel everywhere you go; from parties,to events, and even competitions.Its more like your married to Jubel than regis.

>Reading in the Libary and getting a back hug from regis.Big, warm hands wrapping around your waist, his big body leaning down to kiss your shoulder.

>Dancing with duke floyen at parties,stealing the stage.

>Reading books with Jubel to help her sleep.Her tiny hands hugging your body, seeking warmth in the cold night.

>Being trapped Laying down with regis in bed.

>Going on outings with Regis and Jubel, who are willing to buy you anything that you look at.

>Having long kisses with regis while dancing.

>Meeting Max when he was a child as the dukes wife, and being the only one who tries to comfort him.

>Meeting max again..but when he is the boyfriend of your beloved daughter, Jubel.

>Stopping regis from killing max tbh

>Helping regis with paperwork in his office, but he cant even take his eyes away from your lips as you talk to him about how he is spending too much money <3

>Regis buying a store because you like 3 things from that shop.

590 notes - Posted August 10, 2022

#2

"My dear husband."

You brushed your gloved finger against dions lips. Even through the glove, you felt the soft skin of your husbands lips.He was everything to you. Dion; your beloved, insane, rude, obsessive husband.You were sitting in his lap, legs around his waist facing him. Even though how he made sure you didnt get exposed to anything he deemed 'unruly' for you, as his sweet wife to see, or how he constantly killed any male who might have had the chance to become an intrest to you, your mind only went with the one thought:

"it's to protect me."

And every night, where he fucked you,bit you and cut you, your heart fluttered when he brought you closer to him. Just like tonight, actually.

"fuck." that was the only word your husband had said all night. He had ripped your dress, broken your corset, and smudged your lipstick. Your once pretty hair was now tangled and swayed with your movements on Dions lap. He had only been looking down at the way his cock slowly entered your slick-ridden cunt, and how you touched his face with the softest hands, as if you might break him.(who could break you with zero effort) He adored you.Wanted more of you.Without even realizing(realising) it himself, he pulled you closer, grabbed your hips making you go faster. You moaned at the change of position;his dick hitting your g-spot with rough thrusts.

.

Even after cleaning up, Dion still stuck by you.

If anything was to ever hurt you when he wasnt around, what would your dear husband do?

---------------------------------------------------------------Tag: @calesleftboob

596 notes - Posted July 21, 2022

My #1 post of 2022

𝐅𝐀𝐍𝐓𝐀𝐒𝐘

&."𝖒𝖞 𝖉𝖊𝖊𝖕𝖊𝖘𝖙 𝖉𝖊𝖘𝖎𝖗𝖊𝖘" ... －𝐫𝐨𝐱𝐚𝐧𝐚 𝐞𝐝𝐢𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧

𝑻𝑯𝑶𝑼𝑮𝑯𝑻𝑺 𝑶𝑵..

&-Being Dion Agriche's wife.

&-Being roxanas pet for her to use as she wills.

&-Having lovely maria agriche's favor;going with her on outings, being on showcases at tea parties,And maving maria's 'dolls' serve you.

&-Having a private Jeremy, all to yourself, to be your lovely attention-seeking puppy.

&-Jeremy hugging your waist so tightly you cant even move!

&-Dion being possesive over who gets close to you. not even letting a servant stare at you for longer than needed.

&-Roxana slowly seducing you, turning you to her side so you could support her.

&-Sierra comforting you after witnessing a death, her soft hold calming you down quickly.

&-Dancing with grizelda, the bones of guards cracking under your soles.

&-Jeremy putting his head onto your lap while ranting about things;like how Fontaine was hitting on roxana, or how dion is just so annoying.

&-Dion,coming home all bloody and seeking love from his darling wife.

&-Being an Agriche and taking care of lovely cassis, who groans when your chest gets too close to his face.

&-Having a touch starved cassis not let go of you when you try to leave-Broad arms trying to pull you back into his room so he couls be with you a little while longer.

&-Being 'friends' with roxana- touches lingering longer than they should, eyes looking into your being reading your mind, filled with desires.

636 notes - Posted August 6, 2022

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[myrefersofficial]

KL Rahul Weds Athiya Shetty: Another Bolly-Cricket Love Story 

People in India are obsessed with Bollywood and cricket, having a high degree of glitz and glamor. Fans will go to any lengths to take a picture with their favorite cricketer or Bollywood star, and they will do anything to have a sight of them or to take a picture with them. 

Bollywood and cricket are linked because the celebrities who work in both fields enjoy a strong connection with one another. There have been many affairs between Bollywood stars and cricketers, and most of those couples have gone on to get married after a romantic relationship. 

Some examples of these couples include Anushka Sharma and Virat Kohli, Geeta Basra and Harbhajan Singh, and many others. Most of these couples are enjoying a happy married life and the freshers to join the gang are the newly wed Athiya Shetty and KL Rahul. 

Read our blog on "Stunning Wives of Cricketers From the Bollywood & Entertainment Industry" to learn about such sassy couples. 

The Beginning Of Athiya And KL Rahul's Romance 

Reportedly beginning their relationship in 2019, cricketer KL Rahul and actor Athiya Shetty were introduced to one another by a mutual acquaintance. In December 2019, the pair shared their first Instagram post, which quickly garnered much attention. 

It was stated that the pair celebrated the arrival of the year 2020 in Thailand with some of their close friends. Fans kept wondering about the couple's relationship because they celebrated birthdays and vacations together. 

After that, Athiya and Rahul shared images of themselves on their social media accounts, which led to speculation that the two were dating. Although the pair never acknowledged their relationship in public, they also never denied that it existed.

As fresh photographs of the couple circulated on social media, speculation about their relationship intensified. After that, Athiya started traveling with Rahul on the international tours of Team India. In 2021, Rahul and Athiya collaborated for an endorsement. 

They were spotted advertising the luxury eyewear brand NUMI Paris. In December 2021, Rahul and Athiya made their first appearance in public during the film "Tadap" screening the following year. On the red carpet, they were seen walking hand in hand with one another.

When it was Athiya's 29th birthday, the couple made their relationship public when Rahul uploaded a post on social media that was specifically devoted to Athiya. Afterward, the couple can be seen posting their emotional images together on their respective social media accounts.

Shetty Anna's Reviews Regarding Daughter's Choice

Both Bollywood starlet Athiya Shetty, the daughter of actor Sunil Shetty, and cricketer K.L. Rahul have been dating for over three years. There have been multiple reports regarding the pair's wedding over the past few days, and it was reported that their wedding would take place soon.

Although the speculation about the wedding has been circulating on social media for the past few months, neither she nor Rahul has spoken. On the other hand, the actress's father, Sunil Shetty, has recently disclosed the actress's engagement to K.L. Rahul. 

He went on to say that at the moment, Rahul is scheduled to play in several tournaments, including the World Cup, the Asia Cup, the South African Tour, and the Australian Tour, and that the couple plans to be married as soon as they have a break from their responsibilities.

When rumors began to spread about the marriage, Athiya responded to them via her Instagram story by writing, "I hope I'm invited to this wedding that's taking place in three months, lol." However, her father recently disclosed that he approves of their intentions to wed.

Celebration Of KL Rahul and Athiya Shetty's Wedding

On January 21, the festivities surrounding KL Rahul and Athiya Shetty's wedding got underway. The wedding festivities were held with a low profile to protect the privacy of the newlyweds. Though, immediate family members and close friends attended the functions. 

Athiya and KL Rahul invited their guests for a sangeet the night before the wedding. During the celebrations, Suniel and his wife Mana, with Athiya's best friends Krishna Shroff and Akansha Ranjan, lit the dance floor on fire.

On the wedding day i.e. January 23, it was seen that the pair was color-coding their wedding attire. Anamika Khanna, a well-known Indian fashion designer, was responsible for the bridal attire of the couple. Athiya adored a chickankari lehenga in pink tones with embellishments.

She matched it with a full-sleeved blouse with a sweetheart neckline and an uneven hemline, and she topped it off with a semi-translucent dupatta. The actress finished off her ensemble with a maang tikka, a delicate kaleerey, and a hefty stone-studded choker with dangling earrings.

The newlyweds Athiya Shetty and KL Rahul appeared in front of the excited paparazzi waiting outside the venue. Following the conclusion of the ceremonies, the newlyweds made their way out of the restricted area to strike poses for the photographers.

KL Rahul was wearing an ivory sherwani to complement his new bride. The couple complimented each other exceptionally well and appeared to have a good time together. It has been reported that KL Rahul and Athiya Shetty will throw an extravagant after-party.

Rahul shared photos from the wedding and wrote, "'In your light, I learn how to love...' Today, with our most loved ones, we got married in the home that’s given us immense joy and serenity. With a heart full of gratitude and love, we seek your blessings on this journey of togetherness."

Kartik Aaryan, Alia Bhatt, Kiara Advani, Kriti Sanon, Parineeti Chopra, Ananya Panday, and Kareena Kapoor were among the numerous Bollywood superstars who were present to offer their wishes to the newlywed pair as they exchanged their vows. 

Many famous people rushed to their social media platforms to send well wishes to a recently married pair. Anushka and Virat Kohli both congratulated the couple on their social media accounts. There are showers of blessings from both communities. 

The newlywed couple will have a reception party in Mumbai for their pals in the industry and their buddies who play cricket for the Indian national team. The reception party will be attended by numerous relatives, close friends, and acquaintances.

Wrapping Up

MyRefers wishes the couple a very delightful married life and a serene bond of togetherness. Stay connected for more such trending news and articles entertaining you to the fullest and letting people get a sneak peek into the lives of your favorite celebrities.

[wheelscomedyandmore]

Hollywood is known for fleeting romances, but the love story of Sam Elliott and Katharine Ross stands as an exception. Their journey began in 1978 when they met on the set of 'The Legacy'. The two were cast as a couple in this horror film, and their on-screen pairing soon blossomed into a real-life connection. While filming in London, they quickly developed a bond. However, their story started years earlier, though they didn’t know it at the time. Nearly a decade earlier, they had both worked on 'Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid' (1969), but their paths hadn’t crossed during production.

Sam Elliott, who played a small role as a bar patron in 'Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid' (1969), recalled admiring Katharine Ross from afar but being too intimidated to approach her. In an interview with AARP, Elliott shared, “I didn’t dare try to talk to her then. She was the leading lady. I was a shadow on the wall, a glorified extra in a bar scene.” That experience stayed with him, and when they worked together on 'The Legacy' (1978), fate finally brought them together.

After 'The Legacy', their relationship deepened quickly. Despite the challenges of the entertainment industry, Sam and Katharine found a rhythm that worked for them. They married in 1984, marking the start of a lasting partnership that continues to thrive. Their wedding wasn’t a grand affair but rather an intimate celebration of their love, reflecting their preference for keeping personal matters private.

Their marriage has been noted as one of the rarest long-lasting Hollywood romances. Many have admired how they’ve balanced their careers and personal lives with grace, never allowing the spotlight to overshadow their love for one another. While Hollywood relationships are often scrutinized by the public eye, Sam and Katharine have successfully shielded their personal lives from that constant attention.

The couple welcomed their daughter, Cleo Rose Elliott, in the same year. Cleo followed in her parents’ artistic footsteps and became a musician. Though she grew up in a celebrity household, her parents made sure she had a grounded upbringing. Sam and Katharine managed to raise Cleo while balancing their busy careers, always ensuring family came first. In interviews, Sam has spoken about how much family means to him, stating that, no matter how busy their careers became, they always made time for each other. Katharine has shared similar sentiments, often reflecting on how they made their home life a priority despite their professional commitments.

Both have built impressive careers in Hollywood, but they’ve done so while maintaining a close family bond. Sam Elliott is known for his iconic roles in films like 'Tombstone' (1993), 'The Big Lebowski' (1998), and the TV series '1883' (2021), where his deep voice, rugged appearance, and cowboy persona have made him a beloved figure. His career spans decades, and his distinct screen presence has won him a dedicated fan base. Katharine Ross, on the other hand, is celebrated for her memorable performances in 'The Graduate' (1967), 'Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid' (1969), and 'The Stepford Wives' (1975). Despite their individual successes, they’ve never let their careers overshadow their marriage. Rather, their respect for each other’s work and their shared values have been key to their lasting bond.

In an interview, Sam highlighted the importance of respect in their marriage. “You’ve got to have a lot of love and a lot of respect,” he said. “It’s about the little things, just being there, supporting each other, listening when things get tough.” Katharine has echoed this, praising Sam’s dedication to their family and his down-to-earth nature. Both have emphasized that the key to their successful marriage has been mutual support and understanding, something that’s essential in an industry known for its unpredictability.

Over the years, there have been no scandals or rumors of divorce, just a quiet, enduring love. In an industry where relationships are often short-lived, Sam and Katharine have remained committed to each other, defying the odds and showing that true love can survive the pressures of Hollywood. Their marriage has become an example of what is possible when two people dedicate themselves to maintaining a healthy and respectful relationship.

Their daughter, Cleo Rose, has often spoken about how her parents’ relationship inspired her own views on love and commitment. Growing up with two successful parents who prioritized family, Cleo learned the importance of staying grounded despite fame. Cleo has gone on to pursue a successful career as a musician, and her parents have been there to support her along the way.

Sam Elliott and Katharine Ross have kept their personal lives relatively private. They don’t seek the spotlight and prefer to enjoy the simple pleasures of life together. Whether at home on their ranch or supporting each other at film premieres, their bond is evident through their quiet, consistent support for each other. Their ability to stay grounded and maintain their privacy has further solidified them as one of Hollywood's most admired couples.

After more than 38 years of marriage, Sam Elliott and Katharine Ross’s love story continues to serve as an example of what is possible when two people are committed to making a relationship work. Their partnership remains one of the rare, enduring romances in Hollywood, admired by many for its longevity and sincerity.

[playermagic23]

Kiran Rao reacts to rumours about her being the ‘reason’ for Aamir Khan and Reena Dutta’s divorce; clarifies saying, “It was not the fact”

In a recent interview, Kiran Rao revealed that she started dating him in 2004 and not in 2001, unlike what the rumours claim.

The unique family dynamics and the unlikely friendship between Reena Dutta and Kiran Rao became quite the talking point at the recently held wedding of Ira Khan, daughter of Aamir and his first wife Reena, with Nupur Shikhare. While many wondered about the camaraderie between both wives of Aamir, especially with rumours of Kiran being in a relationship with Khan as one of the likely reasons of for his divorce with Reena, Kiran decided to set the record straight.

While promoting her film Laapata Ladies, Kiran Rao opened up about her relationship with Reena Dutta wherein he she also asserted that she was not dating Khan before his divorce. In fact, the filmmaker asserted that she started dating him almost a couple of years after his separation. Speaking to Zoom she clarified on these rumours stating, “Lots of people think that Aamir and I connected on Lagaan (2001), we absolutely didn’t. Aamir and I got together during Swades (2004), he was going to shoot Mangal Pandey (2005) at the time.”

She went on to continue, “We had just shot a couple of commercials with Ashutosh Gowariker for Coke and that is where Aamir and I reconnected. 3-4 years after Lagaan. I wasn’t in touch with him. In fact, on Lagaan, I barely spoke to him. I was actually seeing somebody else during Lagaan. When Aamir and I started going out in 2004, everybody thought that this started when we were shooting for Lagaan and this caused the divorce, which was not the fact.”

In the same interview, Kiran also addressed her camaraderie with Reena and added, “Reena never left the family. It was very much the same when Aamir and Reena got divorced. The family was highly protective of Reena and when I got married, Reena was a part of the family and we became really good friends because she is an incredible human-being. I absolutely love her, she’s a dear friend.”

Kiran Rao and Aamir Khan tied the knot in 2005 but parted ways in 2021. However, they continue to share a cordial personal and professional relationship with the two of them also co-producing the recent release Laapata Ladies. The couple has a son named Azad born via surrogacy.

[howwelldoyouknowyourmoon]

The Dark Side of True World Foods

On April 11, 2006, The Chicago Tribune revealed the Moon’s True World Foods supplied most of the 9,000 sushi restaurants in the USA with fish. One member of the Unification Church and former employee of True World Foods goes into detail on how this major company had been abusive to members:

“I just read the article about payday at The Washington Times. This reminded me of pay day at at True World Foods. Once we received our pay checks we were told cash them at the book-keeping office. We never received our full pay only a stipend to live on. We lived 5-10 members in an apartment, shared a car. We had no free time we worked Monday-Saturday and were told we had to attend Sunday service. A mother had to have at least three children to be able to stay home with them. Otherwise the children were placed in the fish business nurseries. You had no say if you wanted to stay home with your children.

You see both my husband and I worked for True World Foods, if I wanted to stay home with my daughter then they would only give us half the stipend. There was group of western men who approached Mr. Yashiro, the head of Chicago fish house, about being able to keep their pay checks. One had a wife with health problems, one had a wife that wanted to stay home with the kids. Mr. Yashiro answer was to fire them. The brothers appealed to the Korean leader in Chicago and they were not fired. Then about three months later TWF changed their way of doing things and let the members keep their full amount from the pay checks. The reason? More of the single Japanese men were having their wives come and start families. They could no longer cram the single men into apartments, there was not enough jobs for the new wives, and I guess giving a stipend was just more expensive than just paying a check. Your amount for the stipend was determined by how many children and if you spouse worked for TWF also. They had a special term for the money from the pay checks, it was called B money.”

obayashi submitted this to howwelldoyouknowyourmoon

____________________________________

The Untold Story of Sushi in America – New York Times

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2021/11/05/magazine/sushi-us.html

____________________________________

Sun Myung Moon’s fish business had plans to corner the shark fin trade

Sushi and Rev. Moon – Chicago Tribune

Moon owned Sushi Company, True World Foods, Linked to Whaling


Jack White and his crew of five in the ‘Green Hope’ drowned off Alaska

FDA cites Elk Grove True World Foods seafood plant for unsanitary conditions

Shark finning: The cruelest cuts

International Seafoods of Alaska Inc., Owned by the Moons, Hauls in Big Fine


[sapphorarelyreads]

Indian WLW/NBLW movies/series

Let's start with the oldest wlw indian movie (i know of)

1. FIRE (Movie - 1996) : By Deepa Mehta; Sita and Radha are young Indian women whose husbands choose celibacy or mistresses over their wives. This leads them to form an intimate, passionate relationship amidst a close-minded society.

2. The Married Woman (Series - 2021- Zee5 and AltBalaji) : Astha sets out on a journey of self-discovery and meets Peeplika on the route. Astha sets herself free from the society pressures and boundaries when she finds an intense connection with Peeplika, something that she always longed for.

3. Ajeeb Daastaans (Short Film - 2021 - Netflix) : Geeli Puchi; The short film on Netflix anthology ‘Ajeeb Dastaan’ talks about caste, sexuality, privilege and patriarchy in a powerful way.

4. Sheer Qorma (Short Film - 2021) : This film by a Non - Binary director, Faraz Arif Ansari and starring a Non-binary character as a lead, is a romantic drama that showcases how love is judged in society based on gender and how people have preconceived notions about sexuality. It has Swara playing the role of a Pakistani-Canadian citizen who travels to India with her lover (Divya Dutta). But Dutta’s mother, played by Shabana Azmi, finds it difficult to come to terms with her daughter’s choices.

5. Margarita with a straw (Film - JioCinema - 2014) : A rebellious young woman with cerebral palsy leaves India to study in New York. On her journey of self-discovery, she unexpectedly falls in love.

6. Ek Ladkhi Ko Dekha Tho Aisa Laga (Movie - Netflix- 2019) : Sweety hides a secret about her true love and decides to marry a writer to please her father, Balbir Chaudhary. However, chaos ensues when she decides to fight her family and society to win her love.

7. Firsts Season 3 (FilterCopy - YouTube- 2020) : Ritu and Lavanya are two women in their twenties who start living together after their second date, finding themselves in a series of firsts as they navigate life, love and more during the lockdown.

8. The Other Love Story (Web series - 12 episodes - YouTube - 2016) : The plot, set in the late 1990s/early 2000s, revolves around the relationship between two girls in an era when there were no cell phones or internet.

9. Mismatched (Netflix - Series - 2020) : Has a plotline with a wlw character. Set in a college/university summer coding program.

10. Feels like Ishq - She loves me She loves me not (Netflix - 1 episode - 2021) : A closeted advertising associate falls for an out-and-proud colleague, but her subtle efforts to confess her feelings don't go quite as planned.

note : I copied the descriptions cause i was too tired and embarrassed to write my own, sorry.

@sapphicgems @absolutebl @shorthairedbrownqueer @sapphic-in @wlwmovieclub @raiko101 @desbianherstory @moonlightsapphic @crudesco @lesbianpetekao

[liuhsng]

☆彡 i like me better (on-hold)

an enhypen timeskip series in which we'll take a peek in the life of these global idols on how they live on a daily basis along with their wives, some with their fiances, and their children.

☆彡 statuses: prewriting, drafting, writing, revising, editing, and completed.

☆彡 note/s: the whole series was inspired from this heeseung timestamp i made.

☆彡 fami-lee time — lee heeseung (heeseung)

☆彡 status: completed

☆彡 summary: nobody said that it was that easy to be an idol, a husband, and a father at the same time. but with the help of his other members and the love coming from his fans when it came to supporting his family, it's looks like it wasn't that hard in lee heeseung's side. even he, himself openly admits that to the public.

☆彡 a day in the life — park jongseong (jay)

☆彡 status: editing

☆彡 summary: jay park was known for his outgoing and 'life of the party' personality, and that also applies to both his wife and daughter, never failing to make them smile and laugh even by the littlest things he does. with people still being curious on how he manages to spend his time with them, he guesses that it's now the right time to make a small vlog with his family.

☆彡 new addition — sim jaeyun (jake)

☆彡 status: writing

☆彡 summary: with a lovely pregnant wife, the fourth member of their little family that's about to arrive in a few months, and being able to manage his idol life, jake could say that he's living a nice life. the only thing he's left to deal with is his wife's constant food cravings and mood swings, he handled it perfectly once, will he be able to do it again?

☆彡 ice rinks and loud uncles — park sunghoon (sunghoon)

☆彡 status: writing

☆彡 summary: spending a day off along with his family and his members wasn't exactly a bad idea, and an ice rink was the first in sunghoon's list. how will their family trip go this time?

☆彡 new favorite — kim sunoo (sunoo)

☆彡 status: writing

☆彡 summary: when his wife went on a little business trip for work, sunoo happily told her that he'll be taking care of their son and even brought him to work to spend time with his uncles. the real question is, will kim sungjae be able to spend the day without causing trouble on his fathers' watch?

☆彡 starting line — yang jungwon (jungwon)

☆彡 status: writing

☆彡 summary: yang jungwon's status? newly married. he managed to take care of his other members without any trouble as a leader, but will he be able to do it the same way with his lovely wife? the good thing? his other members and especially his hyungs are there to help with their own experiences in getting married first.

☆彡 dinner disasters and rings (ni-ki)

☆彡 status: writing

☆彡 summary: ni-ki always dreamt of someone to spend his life with, why not spend it with the love of life who's always been with him since trainee days? but dropping the question and getting down on one knee isn't as easy as it looks when his hyungs help him in planning the perfect set-up.

© 2021 leeyangie

[puttingherinhistory]

“Covid has unleashed the most severe setback to women’s liberation in my lifetime. While watching this happen, I have started to think we are witnessing an outbreak of disaster patriarchy.

Naomi Klein was the first to identify “disaster capitalism”, when capitalists use a disaster to impose measures they couldn’t possibly get away with in normal times, generating more profit for themselves. Disaster patriarchy is a parallel and complementary process, where men exploit a crisis to reassert control and dominance, and rapidly erase hard-earned women’s rights. (The term “racialized disaster patriarchy” was used by Rachel E Luft in writing about an intersectional model for understanding disaster 10 years after Hurricane Katrina.) All over the world, patriarchy has taken full advantage of the virus to reclaim power – on the one hand, escalating the danger and violence to women, and on the other, stepping in as their supposed controller and protector.

I have spent months interviewing activists and grassroots leaders around the world, from Kenya to France to India, to find out how this process is affecting them, and how they are fighting back. In very different contexts, five key factors come up again and again. In disaster patriarchy, women lose their safety, their economic power, their autonomy, their education, and they are pushed on to the frontlines, unprotected, to be sacrificed. 

Part of me hesitates to use the word “patriarchy”, because some people feel confused by it, and others feel it’s archaic. I have tried to imagine a newer, more contemporary phrase for it, but I have watched how we keep changing language, updating and modernising our descriptions in an attempt to meet the horror of the moment. I think, for example, of all the names we have given to the act of women being beaten by their partner. First, it was battery, then domestic violence, then intimate partner violence, and most recently intimate terrorism. We are forever doing the painstaking work of refining and illuminating, rather than insisting the patriarchs work harder to deepen their understanding of a system that is eviscerating the planet. So, I’m sticking with the word. 

In this devastating time of Covid we have seen an explosion of violence towards women, whether they are cisgender or gender-diverse. Intimate terrorism in lockdown has turned the home into a kind of torture chamber for millions of women. We have seen the spread of revenge porn as lockdown has pushed the world online; such digital sexual abuse is now central to domestic violence as intimate partners threaten to share sexually explicit images without victims’ consent. 

The conditions of lockdown – confinement, economic insecurity, fear of illness, excess of alcohol – were a perfect storm for abuse. It is hard to determine what is more disturbing: the fact that in 2021 thousands of men still feel willing and entitled to control, torture and beat their wives, girlfriends and children, or that no government appears to have thought about this in their planning for lockdown. 

In Peru, hundreds of women and girls have gone missing since lockdown was imposed, and are feared dead. According to official figures reported by Al Jazeera, 606 girls and 309 women went missing between 16 March and 30 June last year. Worldwide, the closure of schools has increased the likelihood of various forms of violence. The US Rape Abuse and Incest National Network says its helpline for survivors of sexual assault has never been in such demand in its 26-year history, as children are locked in with abusers with no ability to alert their teachers or friends. In Italy, calls to the national anti-violence toll-free number increased by 73% between 1 March and 16 April 2020, according to the activist Luisa Rizzitelli. In Mexico, emergency call handlers received the highest number of calls in the country’s history, and the number of women who sought domestic violence shelters quadrupled. 

To add outrage to outrage, many governments reduced funding for these shelters at the exact moment they were most needed. This seems to be true throughout Europe. In the UK, providers told Human Rights Watch that the Covid-19 crisis has exacerbated a lack of access to services for migrant and Black, Asian and minority ethnic women. The organisations working with these communities say that persistent inequality leads to additional difficulties in accessing services such as education, healthcare and disaster relief remotely. 

In the US, more than 5 million women’s jobs were lost between the start of the pandemic and November 2020. Because much of women’s work requires physical contact with the public – restaurants, stores, childcare, healthcare settings – theirs were some of the first to go. Those who were able to keep their jobs were often frontline workers whose positions have put them in great danger; some 77% of hospital workers and 74% percent of school staff are women. Even then, the lack of childcare options left many women unable to return to their jobs. Having children does not have this effect for men. The rate of unemployment for Black and Latina women was higher before the virus, and now it is even worse. 

The situation is more severe for women in other parts of the world. Shabnam Hashmi, a leading women’s activist from India, tells me that by April 2020 a staggering 39.5% of women there had lost their jobs. “Work from home is very taxing on women as their personal space has disappeared, and workload increased threefold,” Hashmi says. In Italy, existing inequalities have been amplified by the health emergency. Rizzitelli points out that women already face lower employment, poorer salaries and more precarious contracts, and are rarely employed in “safe” corporate roles; they have been the first to suffer the effects of the crisis. “Pre-existing economic, social, racial and gender inequalities have been accentuated, and all of this risks having longer-term consequences than the virus itself,” Rizzitelli says. 

When women are put under greater financial pressure, their rights rapidly erode. With the economic crisis created by Covid, sex- and labour-trafficking are again on the rise. Young women who struggle to pay their rent are being preyed on by landlords, in a process known as “sextortion”. 

I don’t think we can overstate the level of exhaustion, anxiety and fear that women are suffering from taking care of families, with no break or time for themselves. It’s a subtle form of madness. As women take care of the sick, the needy and the dying, who takes care of them? Colani Hlatjwako, an activist leader from the Kingdom of Eswatini, sums it up: “Social norms that put a heavy caregiving burden on women and girls remain likely to make their physical and mental health suffer.” These structures also impede access to education, damage livelihoods, and strip away sources of support.

Unesco estimates that upward of 11 million girls may not return to school once the Covid pandemic subsides. The Malala Fund estimates an even bigger number: 20 million. Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka, from UN Women, says her organisation has been fighting for girls’ education since the Beijing UN women’s summit in 1995. “Girls make up the majority of the schoolchildren who are not going back,” she says. “We had been making progress – not perfect, but we were keeping them at school for longer. And now, to have these girls just dropping out in one year, is quite devastating.” 

Of all these setbacks, this will be the most significant. When girls are educated, they know their rights, and what to demand. They have the possibility of getting jobs and taking care of their families. When they can’t access education, they become a financial strain to their families and are often forced into early marriages. 

This has particular implications for female genital mutilation (FGM). Often, fathers will accept not subjecting their daughters to this process because their daughters can become breadwinners through being educated. If there is no education, then the traditional practices resume, so that daughters can be sold for dowries. As Agnes Pareyio, chairwoman of the Kenyan Anti-Female Genital Mutilation Board, tells me: “Covid closed our schools and brought our girls back home. No one knew what was going on in the houses. We know that if you educate a girl, FGM will not happen. And now, sadly the reverse is true.” 

In the early months of the pandemic, I had a front-row seat to the situation of nurses in the US, most of whom are women. I worked with National Nurses United, the biggest and most radical nurses’ union, and interviewed many nurses working on the frontline. I watched as for months they worked gruelling 12-hour shifts filled with agonising choices and trauma, acting as midwives to death. On their short lunch breaks, they had to protest over their own lack of personal protective equipment, which put them in even greater danger. In the same way that no one thought what it would mean to lock women and children in houses with abusers, no one thought what it would be like to send nurses into an extremely contagious pandemic without proper PPE. In some US hospitals, nurses were wearing garbage bags instead of gowns, and reusing single-use masks many times. They were being forced to stay on the job even if they had fevers.

The treatment of nurses who were risking their lives to save ours was a shocking kind of violence and disrespect. But there are many other areas of work where women have been left unprotected, from the warehouse workers who are packing and shipping our goods, to women who work in poultry and meat plants who are crammed together in dangerous proximity and forced to stay on the job even when they are sick. One of the more stunning developments has been with “tipped” restaurant workers in the US, already allowed to be paid the shockingly low wage of $2.13 (£1.50) an hour, which has remained the same for the past 22 years. Not only has work declined, tips have also declined greatly for those women, and now a new degradation called “maskular harassment” has emerged, where male customers insist waitresses take off their masks so they can determine if and how much to tip them based on their looks. 

Women farm workers in the US have seen their protections diminished while no one was looking. Mily Treviño-Sauceda, executive director of Alianza Nacional de Campesinas, tells me how pressures have increased on campesinas, or female farm workers: “There have been more incidents of pesticides poisonings, sexual abuse and heat stress issues, and there is less monitoring from governmental agencies or law enforcement due to Covid-19.” 

Covid has revealed the fact that we live with two incompatible ideas when it comes to women. The first is that women are essential to every aspect of life and our survival as a species. The second is that women can easily be violated, sacrificed and erased. This is the duality that patriarchy has slashed into the fabric of existence, and that Covid has laid bare. If we are to continue as a species, this contradiction needs to be healed and made whole. 

To be clear, the problem is not the lockdowns, but what the lockdowns, and the pandemic that required them, have made clear. Covid has revealed that patriarchy is alive and well; that it will reassert itself in times of crisis because it has never been truly deconstructed, and like an untreated virus it will return with a vengeance when the conditions are ripe. 

The truth is that unless the culture changes, unless patriarchy is dismantled, we will forever be spinning our wheels. Coming out of Covid, we need to be bold, daring, outrageous and to imagine a more radical way of existing on the Earth. We need to continue to build and spread activist movements. We need progressive grassroots women and women of colour in positions of power. We need a global initiative on the scale of a Marshall Plan or larger, to deconstruct and exorcise patriarchy – which is the root of so many other forms of oppression, from imperialism to racism, from transphobia to the denigration of the Earth. 

There would first be a public acknowledgment, and education, about the nature of patriarchy and an understanding that it is driving us to our end. There would be ongoing education, public forums and processes studying how patriarchy leads to various forms of oppression. Art would help expunge trauma, grief, aggression, sorrow and anger in the culture and help heal and make people whole. We would understand that a culture that has diabolical amnesia and refuses to address its past can only repeat its misfortunes and abuses. Community and religious centres would help members deal with trauma. We would study the high arts of listening and empathy. Reparations and apologies would be done in public forums and in private meetings. Learning the art of apology would be as important as prayer.

The feminist author Gerda Lerner wrote in 1986: “The system of patriarchy in a historic construct has a beginning and it will have an end. Its time seems to have nearly run its course. It no longer serves the needs of men and women, and its intractable linkage to militarism, hierarchy and racism has threatened the very existence of life on Earth.”

As powerful as patriarchy is, it’s just a story. As the post-pandemic era unfolds, can we imagine another system, one that is not based on hierarchy, violence, domination, colonialisation and occupation? Do we see the connection between the devaluing, harming and oppression of all women and the destruction of the Earth itself? What if we lived as if we were kin? What if we treated each person as sacred and essential to the unfolding story of humanity? 

What if rather than exploiting, dominating and hurting women and girls during a crisis, we designed a world that valued them, educated them, paid them, listened to them, cared for them and centred them?“

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

Early on Sunday morning I was heading to university for a class when a group of women came running out from the women’s dormitory. I asked what had happened and one of them told me the police were evacuating them because the Taliban had arrived in Kabul, and they will beat women who do not have a burqa.

We all wanted to get home, but we couldn’t use public transport. The drivers would not let us in their cars because they did not want to take responsibility for transporting a woman. It was even worse for the women from the dormitory, who are from outside Kabul and were scared and confused about where they should go.

Meanwhile, the men standing around were making fun of girls and women, laughing at our terror. “Go and put on your chadari [burqa],” one called out. “It is your last days of being out on the streets,” said another. “I will marry four of you in one day,” said a third.

With the government offices closed down, my sister ran for miles across town to get home. “I shut down the PC that helped to serve my people and community for four years with a lot of pain,” she said. “I left my desk with tearful eyes and said goodbye to my colleagues. I knew it was the last day of my job.”

I have nearly completed two simultaneous degrees from two of the best universities in Afghanistan. I should have graduated in November from the American University of Afghanistan and Kabul University, but this morning everything flashed before my eyes.

I worked for so many days and nights to become the person I am today, and this morning when I reached home, the very first thing my sisters and I did was hide our IDs, diplomas and certificates. It was devastating. Why should we hide the things that we should be proud of? In Afghanistan now we are not allowed to be known as the people we are.

As a woman, I feel like I am the victim of this political war that men started. I felt like I can no longer laugh out loud, I can no longer listen to my favourite songs, I can no longer meet my friends in our favourite cafe, I can no longer wear my favourite yellow dress or pink lipstick. And I can no longer go to my job or finish the university degree that I worked for years to achieve.

I loved doing my nails. Today, as I was on my way home, I glanced at the beauty salon where I used to go for manicures. The shop front, which had been decorated with beautiful pictures of girls, had been whitewashed overnight.

All I could see around me were the fearful and scared faces of women and ugly faces of men who hate women, who do not like women to get educated, work and have freedom. Most devastating to me were the ones who looked happy and made fun of women. Instead of standing by our side, they stand with the Taliban and give them even more power.

Afghan women sacrificed a lot for the little freedom they had. As an orphan I weaved carpets just to get an education. I faced a lot of financial challenges, but I had a lot of plans for my future. I did not expect everything to end up like this.

Now it looks like I have to burn everything I achieved in 24 years of my life. Having any ID card or awards from the American University is risky now; even if we keep them, we are not able to use them. There are no jobs for us in Afghanistan.

When the provinces collapsed one after another, I was thinking of my beautiful girlish dreams. My sisters and I could not sleep all night, remembering the stories my mother used to tell us about the Taliban era and the way they treated women.

I did not expect that we would be deprived of all our basic rights again and travel back to 20 years ago. That after 20 years of fighting for our rights and freedom, we should be hunting for burqas and hiding our identity.

During the last months, as the Taliban took control in the provinces, hundreds of people fled their houses and came to Kabul to save their girls and wives. They are living in parks or the open air. I was part of a group of American University students that tried to help them by collecting donations of cash, food and other necessities and distributing it to them.

I could not stop my tears when I heard the stories of some families. One had lost their son in the war and didn’t have any money to pay the taxi fare to Kabul, so they gave their daughter-in-law away in exchange for transportation. How can the value of a woman be equal to the cost of a journey?

Then today, when I heard that the Taliban had reached Kabul, I felt I was going to be a slave. They can play with my life any way they want.

I also worked as a teacher at an English-language education centre. I cannot bear to think that I can no longer stand in front of the class, teaching them to sing their ABCs. Every time I remember that my beautiful little girl students should stop their education and stay at their home, my tears fall.

A Kabul resident

[goldenraeofsun]

Day 27: Darkest Hour

November 12, 2020

I’ve dreamed about you every night for the past week. Just like last time. What kind of fucked up is it that I know what it’s like to love you and lose you twice?

Fuck this.

November 16, 2020

Sammy started going to a therapist, probably in some passive-aggressive attempt to get me to go along and talk about my feelings. Joke’s on him, though. It’s never going to fucking happen.

If Mia walked into the room looking like you, I’d probably stab her.

Then again, I stabbed you when we first met, and that didn’t turn out so bad.

Or maybe it did.

December 1, 2020

I told Claire what happened to you. It only took a month. She clocked me right in the face and then started crying. I’ve dealt with so many crying moms, daughters, wives of people I couldn’t save. I used to be so good at it, telling them it was alright, that we’d get the monster responsible, offering them tissues and listening to them babble on about the dead guy’s best attributes.

It was different with Claire. She had nothing nice to say about you, and it hurt.

I know she loved you - or else she wouldn’t be so goddamn angry.

December 3, 2020

I still dream about you.

Every fucking night, I save you. I fight the Empty until it gives up. I pull a spell out of my ass that banishes the Empty forever. I push you out of the way.

I’ve saved you 28 times now, except when it really counted.

How the hell is it worth it to “love” as much as I do if everyone I love leaves? I’d rather feel nothing at all. At least JD gets that.

December 5, 2020

Turns out, Sammy wasn’t going to therapy, the fucking liar. He was researching ways to get you out of the Empty.

He did the spell today and only told me hours later that it didn’t work. Obviously.

I never thought you’d come back before now. But, for a split second, as Sam was telling me about the spell, I thought you both pulled it off. That you were hiding just out the door, waiting for Sam’s signal to make your grand entrance because you’re both dramatic bastards sometimes.

I threw a beer bottle at Sam’s head.

Luckily he ducked, but he’s gone to live with Eileen. He said he’d call when he got there, so at least there’s that.

And then there was one.

December 18, 2020

I found the Christmas present I bought you. Why the fuck I was Christmas shopping in August I have no

Right, you weren’t the type to ever tell us about what you liked. I had to keep an ear to the ground instead, just in case you mentioned this game or that TV show. I got you a record player and a few Joni Mitchell vinyls. She came on the oldies station while we were in Harlan dealing with all those ghosts, and you turned the radio up.

Anyway, you always kept your trap shut about what you really wanted. It was so annoying.

God, if only I knew how true that was. If it was annoying then, it’s goddamn devastating now.

December 24, 2020

The Circle Game can go fuck itself.

I can’t believe I’m crying alone in my room, listening to Joni Mitchell, writing in my diary - or love letters to you. It doesn't matter how you spin it - on Christmas Eve.

If only Dad could see me now.

December 26, 2020

I spent Christmas with Sam at Eileen’s. I thought about giving him Joni, but swapped them out at the last second with some New York Times bestseller I picked up at the bookstore on the way there. I don’t think Sam noticed.

49 times I’ve saved you now.

1 time I failed.

Sam got me another notebook. I didn’t think he even noticed I was doing this.

Anyway, I’ve barely made a dent in this one. Who knows if I’ll even have enough to say to fill it all up. I don’t exactly have a lot of thoughts lately, except for one.

January 3, 2021

Sam just asked me what I wanted for my birthday. It was a solid minute before I could think of something that wasn’t you.

He’s still worried about me.

January 9, 2021

Would a crossroads demon even want my soul anymore?

January 11, 2021

Nobody showed. Big surprise.

January 17, 2021

Sam somehow found out about the deal and didn’t listen when I told him I was pretty certain it wasn’t going to work.

According to Sam, that wasn’t the point.

He locked me out of the goddamn Bunker. Said I should take a last road trip and use that time to say goodbye to you.

But what the fuck did he think I’ve been trying to do for the past three months?

And then there were none.

January 19, 2021

How the hell can I say goodbye when you’re always with me? Just waiting until I fall asleep - and you’re there, about to get sucked into an oblivion. Until I stop it.

And then I wake up in a shitty motel, and you’re stuck in the Empty.

January 21, 2021

I ran into Claire in St. Cloud taking out a ghost. She’s looking better. Gives all the credit to Kaia. They’re together, if you can believe it.

I told her I was proud of her for not waiting a solid decade and change to man up.

She said, “Thanks for your input, Roger Moore,” but I could tell she was pleased. Even the worst James Bond is a step up from Hasselhoff.

January 24, 2021

Florida in the middle of the winter is pretty damn awesome. The locals say it’s too cold, but it’s perfect. In the mornings and evenings, it’s cool enough for jeans, in the afternoon, boardshorts.

Sometimes it feels like I’m on vacation (not that I would know what that’s like), and you’ll still be at the Bunker when I make my way back.

And if I never phone home, you’ll always be there for waiting for me, right?

February 1, 2021

Texas barbeque is like Heaven - better than, actually. Did you know there’s a place that’ll comp your meal if you eat a whole rack of ribs, a 12 oz steak, half a bird, a plate of pulled pork, baked beans, and coleslaw?

I didn’t eat for the next day and a half, but it was totally worth it.

February 14, 2021

Happy unattached drifter Christmas.

Hard to believe the last time I was alone on the road was while Sam was at Stanford. Fifteen years ago.

God, I’m old.

February 26, 2021

I think I might be a horse whisperer. Jesse and Cesar say nobody’s ever taken that quickly to Mercury.

He’s standoffish and prickly, but goddamn if he isn’t the most magnificent horse on the whole damn ranch. He’ll warm up to me if I just keep trying.

Not like I have anything better to do with my time.

March 9, 2021

Luna had a foal! Kind of gross but not worse than any standard monster hunt.

Jesse let me name her. I was tempted by Blondie, but I went with Joni instead. I was going to fuck up their horse naming system anyway. Thought I might as well choose something you’d like.

March 12, 2021

It was time to move on.

They’re so happy retired together, I had to leave before I hit something.

It was fun at first, learning how to take care of the horses, making dinner for more than just one. But the way they touched each other, it just got to me. Jesse always has a smoke after dinner at the table. Cesar doesn’t like the weed smell, but every time he leaves, he squeezes Jesse on the shoulder on his way out.

Once, he kissed the top of Jesse’s head instead.

I took Mercury on an hour-long ride at ten o’clock at night just to get out of that room. But it’s like you were right there, at my heels, the whole time.

March 20, 2021

Alaska is fucking cold in March.

March 27, 2021

Call me sentimental, but I’m going to head back to that barn in Pontiac. Maybe if I say goodbye there, where we first met, it’ll stick.

We outsmarted the Empty for the 141st time last night, and then I woke up alone.

April 2, 2021

It was nice to save you in broad daylight for a change.

Thursday, April 15th

Dean gave me this journal, apparently a “regift” from Sam, to document my life acclimatizing to being human again.

I’ve never written anything before, but Dean says it will help. While I was in the Empty, he said he started keeping his own journal.

However, when I asked to see it, as an example of what kind of writing is appropriate, Dean just changed the subject and started singing “Big Yellow Taxi.”

I had no idea he liked Joni Mitchell.

[theycallmebecca]

hellooo hi, hope everything is good. can you please write something about this domestic prompt; “having a secret signal for parties that means “Let’s go home now” thank you v much 🧡

Oh this is a cute idea, nonny... especially if the signal were accidentally triggered...this is just a silly drabble but I had fun writing it so I hope you like it!

I’m accepting prompts thru July 4, 2021 for drabbles and moodboards. More information in this post.

Title: Secret Signal

Pairing: Andy Barber x reader

Rating: PG

Warnings: n/a

Disclaimer: This work of fiction is not to be reposted, used or translated without my permission.

“You remember the signal?” Andy asks as the two of you walk up the long driveway.

“Yes,” you reply with a small laugh. Pulling him to the side, you pretend to fix the collar of his suit as you reassure him, “It’s going to be fine tonight. You’ll impress the senior partners and I’ll dazzle their wives. There is no reason for them not to make you partner, you’re their best associate lawyer.”

“You’re good for my ego,” Andy says with a small shake of his head. “But the signal...”

“I don’t think we need it, but yes, I remember the signal,” you say, resisting the urge to roll your eyes. Letting go of the collar of his shirt, you lift your hand to his ear and tug it gently.

“Ok, good,” Andy replies. He nods his head and then he takes your hand. “Let’s do this.”

The first hour of the party goes perfectly, the two of you start together but slowly separate, making your rounds at the party.

In fact, the only thing that doesn’t go to plan is your stupid earrings. They had been a gift from Andy and you’d wanted to wear them because of that, but for whatever reason, they and your ears are not getting along. You try to be subtle in your discomfort as you mess with them, but you can’t get your hands away from them.

You’re talking with the wife of one of the partners when Andy appears at your side. The other woman greets him happily and draws him into the conversation for a few minutes before she gets called away.

“Are you ready to go then?” Andy asks, once the two of you are alone.

“No, not really,” you reply, confused. “Why?”

“You’ve been tugging on your ear for the last fifteen minutes,” Andy explains. “I would have been over sooner, but Mike was telling a story and I couldn’t get away without being rude.”

“It’s these earrings,” you admit, tugging at your ear again. “They’re bugging me.���

“Why don’t you just take them off?” Andy suggests. “I know you’re wearing them because they were a gift, but I don’t want you to wear them if they hurt.”

"I don’t have any place to put them,” you say, gesturing to your pocket-free dress.

“I can put them in my pocket,” Andy offers.

You take off the earrings and hand them over to.

"Shall we get something to eat?” Andy asks after tucking the earrings into the pocket of his slacks.

Before you can say yes, one of Andy’s bosses calls him over. Knowing he has to go, you kiss his cheek and send him on his way.

It’s another hour into the party and you’re listening to one of the women talking about her daughter’s upcoming wedding when you see something out of the corner of your eye. Under the guise of taking a sip of your drink, you turn your head and see Andy covertly tugging on his left ear.

Then he chances a glance in your direction and your eyes meet. It’s time to go.

As politely as possible, you excuse yourself from the wedding conversation and make your way to Andy’s side. Stepping up behind him, you slid your arm through his and smile when the other people he is talking to acknowledge you.

“I’m sorry,” you say to them all. “But I need to steal my husband.”

“He’s all yours,” one of them says. “It was nice meeting you, Andy.”

Andy bids a similar farewell.

“I am starving,” he mutters to you as two of you walk away. “Let’s get out of here and get some real food.”

“Sounds good to me,” you reply.

The two of you find the hosts and make your excuses before you leave the party.

A stop at your favorite fast food restaurant later, the two of you return to home and, still dressed in your party clothes, dropped onto the couch to eat dinner.

“This is so much better than stupid finger food,” Andy mutters as he shoves another french fry into his mouth.

“So much better,” you agree.