#it was so highly regulated someone must have noticed i just wonder if anyone cared lol

[spoonsandsporks]

Ancient Greek custom laws, you say? :D{

Ohhhhhhhhhhh you know not what you've wrought. (Long post warning)

SO. I can finally talk about this b/c the place has been and gone and my players follow my tumblr account. BUT I DM a Theros campaign for my friends every other saturday, which is a dnd 5e setting based on the mtg cards, that are inspired by ancient greek and roman mythology and history. I, a person with a degree in ancient history and a love for making more work for myself, took this as a challenge to make the setting not just more accurate to ancient greek mythology but to ancient greek society and history as well. This led to me needing to research athenian port cities as that was a location my players were going to visit. And thus I dived into the rabbit hole of ancient athenian custom laws and got very heated about it.

Which I'll now proceed to inflict on you b/c you asked about it. :))) You're welcome

So, first of all, Athens was a big port polis. Many ships stopped at Athens while on the way to other places. Which was important b/c the sea is dangerous! Ship travel was mostly via rowing with oars or maybe sail and big boats were expensive. Distance was an important risk factor to consider. Maritime trade was high risk and high stakes. Shipwrecks were very common! If you were travelling and shipping goods by boat and it was like a week's journey to your final destination port, and your options were travel for 3 days and stop at a nearby port before continuing onwards or travel the full week across the deep ocean and risk shipwreck you'd stop at as many ports as you can afford. And yeah, afford is the key word here.

e.g: 2 days travel to Port A selling at X price might be preferable than 4 days travel to Port B selling at XX price because you were more likely to arrive at Port A intact than risk the 2 extra days at sea.

Additionally, there were some goods that were considered higher quality or in higher demand than others. Such things as wine, pottery (amphora), wood (a luxury item for fuel), grain and olive oil (essential for gyms + personal hygiene) were expensive and paid well for. Grain was the big ticket item for athens, they often struggled with grain shortages. And while amphora were big you could use them to store other luxury goods, such as the aforementioned grain, olive oil and wine, saving you cargo space and money as you could sell the wine and the amphora that held it.

So, with all that set up, lets talk about athenian custom laws and how (maybe understandably) strict they were.

So, when boats arrived at port, they had to announce what goods they carried and how much you were bringing to shore. Once you announced these things, you could not change it once you declared it. If prices on shore were bad (ie not expensive enough) and you wanted to take back what you were going to sell and try and sell it at another port that may have better prices, you had to pay a very high export tax. Equally, if prices were good, you couldn't then go back to your boat and bring out the extra to sell, you had to lug those goods to the next port.

e.g: you have 100 measures of grain on your boat. you announce that you are bringing 60 measures ashore to sell in local markets or whatever. you get to the market and prices are bad, which means you're either forced to sell at a loss OR pay a tax that is worth more than double what your grain is normally worth to take it to another port that might have better prices. OR you have 100 measures of grain on your boat. you announce that you are bringing 60 measures ashore to sell in local markets or whatever. you get to the market and prices are great! you want to go get your extra 40 measures of grain to sell for profit. you are not allowed to do that. trying to is illegal and has consequences. you are forced to accept the profit you got from your 60 measures and leave port for the sea.

Remember how I mentioned grain was in high demand in Athens? Yeah, so, illegally taking grain out of athens territory was punishable by death and was considered a very serious issue. So if you didn't pay that export tax and tried to take your 60 measures of grain back onto your boat b/c prices are bad (like in the above example), that counted as illegally stealing grain from athens and you would be given the death sentence for it.

Ships were searched heavily when entering the port (in case of a trojan horse situation where men or weapons are being smuggled in to try and take the port lol) and tax was paid by any ship entering port in order to secure berth and protection in port. These checks meant that any ship entering or leaving was well tracked and any illegal activity would be noticed. Access to a port was NOT a right and could be revoked - bans were usually on a case-by-case basis so merchants were encouraged to behave themselves.

Merchants kind of had to hedge the amount of goods they'd bring ashore before knowing the state of the market and then weren't allowed to change their position upon discovery. They just had to guess and presume based on the reputation of that port and their markets. Lukily, maritime trade wasn't done in a vacuum and talking to other merchants for news wasn't illegal or anything, as long as they were willing to share their knowledge.

Any merchant funded by a specific polis - so their ship was paid for by a government official or something - had to by law sell their imports in that polis' port primarily. So that was a something merchants had to consider as well on top of the custom laws. Sometimes it benefitted to be loyal tho! Helping out a polis with a specific goods shortage could result in long term benefits or rewards. Such as favourable exceptions to future trading or a gift of land within the polis/port itself in exceptional circumstances.

The trading process was also heavily controlled by Athens in their ports. Once declared goods were unloaded, the marine merchant would head to the trading house in the harbour to negotiate sales with local retailers. The local retailers would then sell it at the marketplace to the local populace. The retailers and merchants would all be in the same room so it was very quick and easy to get an accurate picture of what a good price was. But only once you'd already declared your goods.

If there were shortages, the rules could become a little lax. A customs counter could give certain merchants a wink and a nudge if there were shortages to capitalise on, in theory (source dubious). But if there was a significant enough shortage that drove prices up prohibitively, supplies would be bought up by wealthy port officials at a fixed price and then sold in the local markets by the state at a loss. They tried hard to prevent mass starvation. These officials would oversee trade in the markets and trading house so they would know what a good price was and what was an exaggeration. The market was often so highly regulated that there wasn't much of a scope for a 'black market' of sorts without an official knowing about it (source dubious).

So yeah! Ancient greek custom laws were very strict. We of course don't know the scope of how rigidly these laws were adhered to nor the scale of possible corruption in these laws. Maritime trade was a big risk! But grain was so important and Athens had trouble growing their own to feed their people, they had to import it and export their own quality goods to fill the money deficit. Hence, while yes their laws seem a little wild, it's understandable considering the position they were in.

(but hey take all this with a pinch of salt, most of this was sourced from old uni notes and what i could remember off the top of my head. i am not an expert! i'm just a passionate blogger and researcher trying my best with limited resources. not to mention many of the og sources were written from the point of view of the higher echelons of society, so it's important to take all these biases into account. be critical of everything you read!)

Anyway thank you for the excuse to ramble about something that was TRULY WILD to me the first time i read about it. Now you can tell your friends about athenian custom laws and bore them to tears like i did my players :D

[ask-venom-and-eddie]

The Microwave Incident™

Fandom: Venom Movie (2018) Relationships: Eddie Brock/Venom Symbiote/Anne Weying/Dan Lewis Characters: Eddie Brock, Venom, Anne Weying, Dan Lewis AO3: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17297084 Additional Note: This primarily focuses on Dan and Eddie bonding*

Summary: In all of Dan’s years of life, he’d never quite expected to one day be cohabiting with both his girlfriend, his girlfriend’s partner and the symbiote that lived within said partner.

In all of Dan’s years of life, he’d never quite expected to one day be cohabiting with both his girlfriend, his girlfriend’s partner and the symbiote??? that lived within said partner. But as much of Life goes, nothing will ever be quite as planned and if there’s anything he’s learned to be good at by this point, it would be to go with natural progression. Things are much easier when one learns to acknowledge it and deal with whatever happens when it happens.

Besides, it’s not so bad. The total amount of time it takes to complete chores is effectively shortened down with proper delegation. There’s always someone present to take care of the cat, trips to retrieve groceries are shortened, household fees are equally split, and the amount of troublemakers around the area have mysteriously vanished....All things considered, Eddie is a pretty decent housemate. That is if one can get used to occasionally waking up to a black humanoid mass shoveling the contents of their fridge into their gaping maw, all the while making eye contact with them.

Okay so maybe Venom is a little bit as intimidating as they are fascinating to Dan.

But can anyone really blame him for that? Considering how their first meeting had resulted in Dan very nearly getting choked out by them...him?? How does the whole...symbiote thing work? Truth be told, he’s still not all too caught up with the details entirely. Of course, Anne had briefly explained Eddie’s situation after the whole... ‘Hospital thing’. The last he’s heard about Venom had been that the symbiote was presumed dead. And now, they’re alive again?

He still remembers the exact moment Anne had found out Venom was still very much alive and very much a part of Eddie. Boy, had that been quite the fiasco. Thankfully, things have more or less settled into a peaceful routine now. It’s clear that Anne and Eddie still have things to work out between the both of them and that is not up to Dan to fix. But the doctor is optimistic all the same that they’ll get there in their own time too.

For now, he’s content with the arrangement. Laughing together as they watch bad reruns on tv, dining out together at least once a week, watching Mr Belvedere and Venom get accustomed to one another, having fun and respectful debates with Eddie...it’s fun. It’s nice. Dan would even venture to call it comfortable.

With the occasional exceptions.

Namely now. Noticing the distinct smell of char and smoke wafting out of their shared apartment isn’t exactly something one looks forward to when returning home. Alarm converting into adrenaline, Dan breaks into a run, heart hammering under his chest. By the time he’s shouldered the door open and dropped his bags in favor of rushing inside, he finds a panic-stricken Eddie attempting to fan out the interior of the microwave that had erupted in flames with his hoodie.

“Eddie d-” He’s barely able to get a word of warning out before the ends of Eddie’s hoodie catches on fire too, leading to more panicked gasps from the other and a rushed attempt to stomp out the flames. Eddie probably would have succeeded if it weren’t for the fact that his frenzied attempts ensured that he got a little too close to the microwave that was still on fire and Dan could only watch in horror when he makes contact with it by the tip of his elbow and practically howls.

A little part of it might have been Venom’s doing too because Dan sees tendrils of black inky rope-like substance emerge, rapidly roping up Eddie’s elbow. Stray tendrils extended, attaching themselves beneath the kitchen table floor. Eddie is then bodily dragged underneath in an attempt to take cover. They’re protecting him. Dan dimly registers. But now isn't really the time to be making sense of things. He has a fire to put out.

Galvanised by determination, the doctor scrambles to put gloves on just in case. He takes a moment to ease his nerves before he slams the microwave oven door shut. Careful to keep a wide berth as he turns it off, Dan unplugs the power cord just in case. There’s very little one can do except to suffocate the flames, which is exactly what he attempts to do.

Eddie is still in the same location by the time Dan could safely declare that he has the situation contained. He’s hunched over in a futile attempt to fold himself in half, breathing erratically, the back of his hoodie sweat-drenched. An inky black substance, almost oily in sheen, oozes from his chest. Almost as if reflecting Eddie’s current state, the tendrils jitter, a seething mass twitching with agitation.

Whatever it was doing, if anything at all, captures Eddie’s attention enough and he’s just barely able to focus a wide-eyed gaze at Venom in a struggle not to hyperventilate. Shaky fingers grasped at the symbiote, tugging on them in an effort to pull him closer even as Eddie fought for air.

As Dan hurries his way forward, it’s becoming more and more apparent that the other is having trouble calming himself down. In retrospect, perhaps he shouldn’t have moved as quickly as he did because the sudden movement has Venom’s hackles raising and Dan is greeted with a furious bellow, fangs bared, claws extended. Oh boy oh boy.

“It’s okay, it’s okay!” His own heartbeat hammers in his ears when Dan raises his hands. Much like one would approach a skittish animal, the doctor slows his approach. Inch by gradual inch, Dan makes his way closer in what he hopes to be a non threatening manner.

“It’s okay, buddy. I’m-I’m not going to hurt him or you. I’m here to help. Let me help, Venom. Please.”

Pearlescent eyes narrowed into slits at his words and Dan resists the urge to gulp. Against his own wishes, he finds himself holding his breath when Venom appears to consider his offer. There’s something about finding yourself the sole focus of something so..otherworldly. Something powerful enough to snap your spine in one solid move if it thought to do so. It settles beneath his skin, all pins and needles.

It takes a while- Eddie may be the one looking worse for wear but Venom. Venom is a constantly shifting mass, shape inconsistent, as if it was compelled to stay close yet pull away at the same time. Dan might not understand the symbiote as much as Eddie or even Anne does, but it’s apparent even to him that Venom isn’t feeling all too good either.

There’s really no other way to describe the symbiote’s movements. But Dan would compare it to a drop of water against speakers playing at an unbearably loud volume. Nevertheless, a decision is finally made. With their last shudder, Venom oozes back. Whatever visible parts of it slithers back in quicker than Dan could blink. All that remains is a disembodied hand, fingers carefully interlaced with Eddie’s in a singular gesture that conveyed both a need for comfort and an effort to reassure.

Choosing to interpret that as assent, Dan wastes little time in shuffling underneath the table as well so that he would be seated next to Eddie’s hunched figure. “Eddie. Eddie, can you hear me?” It takes him a few tries before he’s able to get a response from his panicky companion. Eddie’s hands clenched into fists in a repeated pattern: squeeze, release, squeeze, release. Combating threats Dan can’t see, wisps of nightmares he doesn’t have access to. Not in the same way he does.

Eddie’s face is ruddy with exertion and emotional toil, breathing shaky and stilted. Dan watches as his companion thumps at the front of his chest in a manner that suggested he was attempting to dislodge something even though he knows nothing is there.

“Sorry.” Eddie’s voice cracks when he chokes out a coherent reply, pitched high and teetering on the edge of exhaustion. He scrubs at his face, still hunched up against himself. “I don’t-I don’t know what- What’s happening to me.”

And Dan could feel his heart break just a little.

“Experiencing emotional distress of sorts in highly stressful situations is a valid response, Eddie. Don’t apologise for that.” Though his reflex and instincts willed him to initiate contact as a means of comfort, the doctor hesitates and lifts away the hand that had been hovering near Eddie’s shoulder. Touch is grounding for some but it may not for others. The last thing Dan wants is for Eddie to feel even worse.

A little part of him wonders if it had been the fire or the fact that he’d failed to prevent it from catching fire that evoked such an intense response. Whichever it is, it’s not a question to be asking now. There’s always time to figure it out in the future. For now, what Eddie needs is the means to regulate his breathing and even out his physical reactions. Maybe get something for burns. That’s right-

“Eddie, may I?” By way of finishing his sentence, Dan gestured at his companion’s elbow only for Eddie to shake his head after comprehension dawns on him.

“No need.” Eddie manages to wheeze out with a measure of effort. “.Big guy’s...got it covered.”

“Oh.” A beat later. “He can do that?”

His surprise must have shown because the corners of Eddie’s mouth twitched upwards for the briefest of moments when he casts gaze on him. The edges of red-rimmed eyes may have crinkled just the tiniest bit with fondness.

“Yeah. He can-” An abortive gesture is made, aimless before Eddie sets his hand again the front of his chest, kneading. Probably uncomfortable from the amount of effort it took to keep breathing regularly. “He can do a lot.”

“Huh. Fascinating. What else can he do?” Maybe if they talked about Venom, it’d be enough of a distraction to ease his discomfort. “Uh. You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to, no pressure.” There’s virtually nothing Dan could, or would do, with that information anyways. Assuming the symbiote may be suspicious about that.

He’s met with yet another abortive gesture but Venom must not have minded much since Eddie answers him in halting sentences, pausing frequently to breathe deeper. They talk and Dan shares stories of his own when Eddie trails off: Teenage escapades, past pets, unfortunate haircuts, late night hospital antics with the staff, his ongoing struggles with the parking meter, stories that have Eddie looking less haunted. Eddie tells him about his investigative work, speaks jargon that goes over Dan’s head about motorbikes, captures his attention with descriptive details about the wild adventures he’d gotten into, reasons his opinions on current mysteries.

They don’t talk about the microwave and Eddie doesn’t come out from underneath the table when Dan excuses himself to answer a call.

But he makes space for him when Dan comes back with two cups of hot cocoa. Mr Belvedere slinks in to join them, shameless in the way they curled up in Eddie’s lap, purring louder than he’s ever heard. And Dan decides that Eddie’s a little bit like a cat himself when he slumps against his side, cheek warm against Dan’s shoulder, breathing finally even as he dozes.

They’re still there when Anne returns home. The question in her eyes were apparent when she finally catches sight of them. But she only nods when he mouths ‘I’ll tell you later’, eyes honey soft. Her lips are warm when she presses a kiss to his cheek and runs her fingers through Eddie’s hair, angling awkwardly just so she could press one against his temple.

Things are okay. They’re all okay.

Something in Dan relinquishes it’s hold with a soft sigh and he revels in it’s absence. He feels light, whole, good.

Yeah, they’ll be okay.

[hunterartemis]

The Assistant: Chapter 5: Travelogues and Other Matters

word count: 5771 (that might be equal to some short stories out there)

Summary: the assistant manages to land herself in an impossibly exciting task. And it requires extra level of skills.

Chapter theme: Ernst' s Grand Caprice, by Hilary Hahn: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UWNCbpwC-PQ

The next day, Maxine didn’t feel the need to walk in disguise anymore. She was exposed and Newt was okay with it. Any other man would have flipped, but Newt was different: he didn’t care for the petty things, as long one does what he is supposed to do with efficiency, it was okay for him. He liked Audrey and her efficiency, and if Maxine was Audrey then by default she will do everything that Audrey did without any exception.

As she walked in that Yellow brick tiny London flat of Newt’s she saw something very unusual. Newt was fully dressed and was sitting on his table with a strange looking paper in his hand. He briefly glanced at Maxine, who was ogling at Newt’s way. He smiled in an embarrassed manner and answered, “You must be wondering why in the world I am dressed so early?”

“Sorry for my impudence Mr. Scamander, but it doesn’t look very right” Maxine answered while placing her bag on a chair.

“I was rechecking your papers... obviously I was too hasty looking at it back then. And the more I looked the more I was puzzled...”

“I completely understand your bafflement, but giving to our circumstances you must--”

“Seven NEWTs, all outstanding, S-class diploma in French Ministry of Magic internship, and Grade 3 Magical Beast Handler Degree from Mahoutokoro Madoushi Gakuin? All in age 17...” Newt read through the papers and put it aside and gathered his palms under his chin.

“Miss Valois, this is no ordinary profile... with this kind of qualification you can work anywhere you like, and you are stuck here? With me? why?”

Maxine looked at the floor, her sharp black eyes troubled. And after a moment she spoke.

“Because I wanted to... anything wrong with that?” Maxine plopped on the side, “why does everything have to be according to or for a purpose...?  Can’t it be because I found that I get to bungle about wild, exotic, magical beasts under the supervision of the most admired and favourite author?” Maxine said coolly, “besides, you just said... with that kind of qualification I can work anywhere I wanted... so here I am.”

“That’s what I needed to hear Maxine.” Newt stood up, “because I cannot leave them just with any other person...”

“You’re leaving...” Maxine followed Newt and saw an opened envelope on the table that somehow escaped her notice before. Her eyes obviously veered towards it, and it caught Newt’s eye.

“Read it if you like... I am already finished with that...” Newt went inside his flat as Maxine opened the letter. In a thick greyish paper, someone hastily scrawled a few sentences.

Dear Newt,

We are in a bit of a pinch down here. The lizards are giving us grief, and after the big G everything is at chaos here. If that slick fellow stirs things up anymore, things will complicate. Won’t keep you longer than a week; come as quickly as you can.

J. W.

Things weren’t very clear in the letter. By her brief four years at Auror department, she could tell that someone in a great secrecy and a sense of urgency wrote that. Maxine read that letter a couple of times more, and then slowly put it down. Newt entered the room with a suitcase in his hand, and buttoning his mackintosh.

“You are going to Romania aren’t you, Newt?” Maxine turned towards him, her lower back supported on the rim of the table. Newt on the other hand, didn’t look surprised or baffled, but he looked like he was expecting her to get this.

“How did you know?” Newt asked,

“First of all, the paper is not from here. It’s rough, thick and greyish. People in the West do not use paper this thick anymore, and if you pull it in the light you can see three letters ghosting in the shadows, M, a small D and a large H. Indeed it is mark of the maker. Fortunately, I am familiar with the name, it is the company Moara de Hartie.* It’s a muggle company that supplies paper in the southern counties of Romania, and its headquarters are in Comana*. And why would a wizard use a muggle paper to write something so hastily from southern Romania? The answer is simple: Newt Scamander in needed in the Dragon Reservation in a matter of urgency.” Maxine deduced, “am I right?”

“On all accounts...” Newt said calmly, “and as you can see, that is why I am about to leave--”

“With all due respect Mr. Scamander... I can’t let you do that...” Maxine said with a determination “you see, you shouldn’t have told me that you are leaving for Romania... because it makes me desperate to come with you.” Maxine’s smug smile vanished and an imploring expression took over her face, “please Newt, all my life I have been waiting for a job where I could see magical beasts and now when I am this close to an opportunity where I can see the dragons, I can’t miss it!”

“It’s too dangerous... besides you just started working with me, and it is not a job for the novices.” Newt crossed her and started to grab his notebooks and papers from the table and shoving in his suitcase. Maxine on the other hand was not a woman who gives up easily.

“Please Mr. Scamander, I know you are angry with me for initially lying to you, but I promise whatever I am saying now is absolutely sincere. I want to step things up here in my job, and I can—I can’t do this by staying behind... ” Maxine exclaimed impatiently. Newt grabbed her shoulder and made her stand still

“Look Maxine, Dragon reservation is not something anyone can go to, it requires years of knowledge and excellent magical prowess to handle the dragons and yet it is highly dangerous. You are a brilliant witch and have so many bright paths ahead of you, so I cannot jeopardise your life right now...” Newt let go of her and placed the suitcase on his tabletop to open it again.

“So it was a lie then--?” Maxine faced Newt again, folding her arms. In reply Newt simply lifted his face; as if in inquisition what was she actually talking about.

“You praising my academic prowess... You were simply flattering me Mr Scamander, patronising me, demeaning me? Is that it then?” Maxine questioned.

“Maxine, please do not make me say all these--” Newt snapped his case close.

“Then why let me know how impressed you were, why lay around a letter that obviously screams out “Romanian Dragon Reservation” in front of me, and let me read it...why not check my files yesterday after dinner instead of this morning, allegedly after the arrival of the letter?” Maxine cross fired so viciously that Newt felt clamminess under his collar.

“Admit it Newt, you want me there...”

“Maxine... this isn’t Wizengamot, and there is no way I am risking your life like this--”

...

“Tell me how you managed to come with me?” Newt asked Maxine as they stood on the mountain that ended as a cliff near the Dover Strait, struggling to stand still with the cold December wind from the Atlantic with their heavy luggage.

“Je peux être très persuasif”* Maxine drawled mysteriously.

“You could get hurt...” Newt said worriedly, “there’s still time to go back.”

“Mr. Scamander, I would rather die by dragon flames rather than dragon pox...” Maxine answered while they walked towards the cliff to a burly looking man with a stick and a bucket.

“We could end up in azkaban” Newt said nervously as the man stared at them with abnormally round eyes.

“Not if you let me do the talking... How you’re doing fella?” Maxine asked the man with cheerful tone.

“Five galleons for each...” his voice wiped the smile off Maxine’s face.

“Of course, how silly of me...” Maxine reached for the purse and pulled out ten galleons and winked at Newt, “here you go...” and then holding Newt’s hand stepped inside the bucket portkey. The blue light whirled them into the middle of Rue de Rivoli in Paris.

“Um Newt, there has been some mistake here...” Maxine looked around, “seems like instead of Romania, that dimwit just whirled us in Paris... serves that oaf right, the leprechaun gold will be vanished in a few hours.” Newt looked at her in a surprised manner.

“You gave him leprechaun gold?”

Maxine looked at Newt nervously and impatiently “who cares about a fiddler getting cheated, we should worry about this” she flailed her arms around “I know what Paris looks like, I have been here countless of times... if we are to travel like muggles why use a portkey then--”

“With your excellent mind, I thought you would understand better?” there was a not-so-subtle jab in Newt’s calm voice; obviously he wasn’t impressed with the cheating part. Newt startled to walk and Maxine inevitably had to follow, “after Grindlewald’s raid at the Pere Lachaise, travelling across the Europe is regulated strictly. Every portkey from the West leads straight to Paris, and the East ones lead to St. Petersburg. Then there are pit stops all across Europe,” Newt and Maxine had to be squeezed against a Baroque door near the sidewalk for a parade of Cugnots* rushed; “the portkeys are strictly regulated and only can be accessed from a specific time and day from specific places. As for us, our portkey is... ” Newt checked his battered wristwatch, “precisely in 2 minutes” they were already near the strange female statue and this time Maxine performed the confundus charm on the guard.

“Shame we didn’t get to stay... ” Maxine shrugged and whirled again with Newt with a strange looking shoe at the back of a restaurant. Suddenly a much colder gust of wind blown at their way, which was nothing like crisp air in Paris or the musty cold one from London.

“Welcome to Village Carta* Miss Maxine.” Newt spoke softly as they stood on a broad clean but bare looking street, on either side of which small houses, bars, pubs, schools spread across haphazardly. “We have come a long way from Paris. We are standing in the Southern Transylvanian County named Sibiu, and our destination will eventually get harder now...”

“Why... can’t we just apparate there?” Maxine asked as they started to walk through the village, “to a certain point...” Newt cornered Maxine by hand and disapparated and now they were standing near a broken Cistercian monastery that was standing like a ghost of a past monument. Newt went inside the chapel, taking Maxine’s hand and upon winding stairs and path; Newt tapped the wall with his wand a few times. The walls of the chapel moved into a passage and at the end of that passage they found themselves standing at the foot of a mountain, upon which stood a castle which looked older and grimmer than Hogwarts.

“We have finally arrived at our destination...” Newt said, and held Maxine’s hand which climbing the hill, “this is the real Abbey of St. Carta.* The one we left behind is a muggle artifice...” Newt now held both of Maxine’s hands as she struggled to climb with her small heeled shoes, “this was built by the Duke of St. Carta in 1100’s, and he was a muggle obsessed with witchcraft. However, all those were hoaxes, summoning demons and all that... however, Wizards made through before the Vatican stormed in and convicted the Duke. They sealed a pact with the Church so that they could have a facade of the Chapel of St. Carta, while the real one would be used for us.” Newt, after reaching the top of the mountain pointed south, and Maxine’s eyes glittered with wonder.

Dragons...

“This, Miss Maxine, is the Romanian Dragon Reservation... ” Newt stood behind Maxine as she marveled at her new scenery with a mesmerised look. Newt wanted to speak more, but he didn’t want to stray his eyes from this newfound marvel. Maxine was smiling, but it was not the scheming crooked one from her time with Theseus, or not the one she smiled as Audrey when she saw the bowtruckle. It was of pure joy and wonder, and it surprised Newt how it transformed her entire face. It wasn’t Maxine Valois, the Devil’s attorney, sneaky and cunning woman. She was someone entirely different.

“C’mon, let’s go inside and check in...” Newt half-heartedly led her inside the courtyard.

In the courtyard, three men were already waiting for Newt, and they came towards them with immense enthusiasm, but Maxine did not miss the confusion in their eyes when they saw her.

“Gentlemen, this is my assistant Maxine Valois,” Newt introduced her to the men, “and Maxine, they are few of the most talented wizards in all Europe: Ernst Bongartz” a tall wizard with sleek black hair, thin moustache and kind face bowed, “Luca Almaviva” a brunet man came forward and took Maxine’s hand to shake, “and James Wade...” a blond wizard with hard weather beaten face smiled from the side.

“So you are J.W... who wrote to Newt?” Maxine pointed at him and he smiled,

“Yes Ma’am... if we know we have a lady on board, we’d have dressed better...” everyone laughed with Wade, “now fella, I need to talk with you alone...” Wade led Newt aside.

“Come Miss Valois; let us take you to the living quarters...” Bongartz beckoned Maxine to come with them and waving Newt briefly, she followed the tall man.

“So where are you from Mr. Bongartz?” Maxine asked curiously as they crossed a hall and took a long and winding stair, Bongartz smiled and replied, “My family is from Praha, Madam, mais je suis de Vienne...”* he added with humour. Although he spoke quite fluently, but with his German accent it required a while to understand him.

“Vous parlez française...?* Maxine asked with amusement.

“Un peu Mademoiselle... This fellow is a muggleborn, so Durmstrang refused to admit me... so my family moved to Vienna, where they came across Nicholas Flamel, actually he was the one to find us and made us shift in Vienna, later we knew. He advised that they should admit me to Beauxbatons... I was thirteen when my formal education in magic started.” He replied with good humour, although his situation didn’t sound too nice. Suddenly they stopped, and Bongartz clicked the lock and the door opened to a specious room.

“We didn’t know you were coming, but this is the room Newt always stays.” He went inside and opened a door at the right that opened to an annex room, “shouldn’t be a problem because there are separate living quarters.” He came back and smiled “This is not very comfortable around this time of the year, but we make it do. However” he added with a change of tone “do not wander off... Dragons are sneaky creatures... one wrong move, even in the fortress can get you killed.” Bongartz warned, “And meet us downstairs in thirty minutes.”

...

They were all sitting near a fireplace after dinner. There was very few furniture in the fort that was not rotten and out of usable condition, so they decided to sit on the floor. From time to time the cold Siberian wind howled and thrashed against the centuries old glasses on the long narrow window, and with the dimly lit pallor of the living room, it seemed like they were convicts on exile.

“Can’t believe we almost sorted the blighters out in one day... cheers to our friend Newt, whose wits saved all of our bacons...” Wade raised a glass of firewhiskey, and everyone else joined in.

“And to Miss Maxine, our new friend, whose exceptional skills made the task possible” Luca Almaviva added and bowed his head at Maxine’s direction, and she replied it with a smile. Along with Almaviva, Wade and Bongartz, four other wizards were sitting with them, smiling and enjoying their new company.

“Enough with the chitchats... let’s do something fun” Wade came in, “how about some music?”

“I know where this is going, and I would not like it in...” Bongartz warned, but Wade wasn’t having it, “c’mon Ernst, play something for us... it’s been ages... Miss Maxine, Newt... you won’t believe how wicked he is with strings”

“Is it really?” Maxine perked up,

“Yes... It is a marvel to be seen” Almaviva agreed and patted on Bongartz’s back, “c’mon Ernst, give us a go...”

“Please, Ernst” Maxine requested and Newt smiled at first at Maxine and then at Bongartz, who was finally warm enough to give it a go. From the corner of the room, he pulled out an old violin, and tuned it.

“Gentlemen, this may be different than any other music you have heard...” Bongartz claimed while putting the violin on his left shoulder, as people around him ‘woo-ed’. “It is story my mother used to tell me when I was little...” he skimmed his eyes through his audience and with his wand enlivened the fire. And then his bow glided through the strings. It took Maxine and Newt a while that Bongartz was only accompanying, the real story was happened in the fireplace.

“What’s happening?” Newt looked at the fire taking shapes of two horses, and Bongartz smiled at him and soon the fire turned into a ghostly blue and isolated itself in the air and showed a young and one stout man riding through deep forest. Soon a ghostly voice burst into melody:

Wer reitet so spät durch Nacht und Wind?

Es ist der Vater mit seinem Kind;*

(Here’s the song with subtitles: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JS91p-vmSf0 )

The ghostly melody, the intricate violin and the spectral show captivated the audience to a hypnotic space. The people came closer to see the fiery figures dancing in the dark, and transmuting into different shapes. The cinematic play of light was so articulate that even though most of them didn’t understood German, the story displayed before them was clearly understood and enjoyed. Bongartz’s skilled hands played the violin in a manner that sometimes Maxine thought if she turned her head towards Bongartz, she might see a phantom second violinist, standing behind him like a great shadow, and staring at them with his cold glowing blue eyes. Maxine knew from the very first moment that it was no story from the Beedle the Bard or any other Wizarding European fairy tale. She marvelled at the muggle narrative and the haunting music of the entire spectacle.

But there was something sinister in that spectacle, in that trailing figure of the Elf King, which evoked a fear in her heart that she knew to bury long ago as childish stupidity. With the howling of the demonic Siberian wind outside, conjoined with the slumberous breathing of the dragons the atmosphere became even more spectral. For a fraction of second Newt’s eyes looked at the side at Maxine’s profile, and her face startled him.

“Maxine...” he whispered and led his palm towards hers. But before he could grab her hand, her thin fingers snaked his wrist. A sensation passed through Newt’s whole being, that made him to be concerned even more.

She was trembling.

Newt forced himself to draw from his concerned and worried state, because he sensed that it wouldn’t help Maxine at all. He knew that her fear ran more deeply than what it seems, it is not a reaction of a spectral show; this is the surfacing of a deep rooted phobia.

He rotated him hand to meet her palm, and slowly but firmly he held her hand within his, and his thumb stroked steadily from her wrist to her knuckle. Even then, the trembling didn’t stop. Eventually the spectacle was over, and somehow everyone in the room forgot to breath for several seconds. But suddenly, Maxine wriggled free of Newt’s hand and started to clap with a smile in her face. Only Newt noticed the faltering lines of her lips, and understood that she was forcing herself to laugh.

“Let’s act like we are all surprised...” Wade added with sarcasm and whistled on the top of his tone. Rest of them started to pat Bongartz so hard that it looked like they were trying to pummel him to the ground. Maxine, after doing her best to praise the violinist, got up on her feet and started to climb upstairs. Newt hastily followed afterwards.

“Maxine... Max” she stopped when she was called by the diminutive of her name, and looked back Newt. The ‘lumos’ her hand casted a ghostly light on her pale face.

“Are you okay...?” Newt asked, while taking two steps up.

“Yes... yes I am fine.” She tore her face from Newt and continued to climb upstairs. Newt hurried upstairs, and grabbed her arm abruptly. Maxine looked at his oddity with widened eyes, and whispered alarmingly, “Mr. Scamander... what are you doing?”

“You are still trembling... ” Newt let go of her arm, “I am simply asking if you are okay...”

“I am fine Newt, nothing to worry about...” Maxine forced a smile and clicked the lock to enter the master bedroom, and as soon as she heard Newt being in the bedroom, she walked towards the annex room at the right side. As soon Newt came, she slammed the door shut, but she was unaware that it was Newt Scamander who was concerned about her. He won’t give up until he is convinced that she is fine.

“Max, talk to me... what is going on...?” Newt kept slamming the door while Maxine, was slowly sinking herself on the floor, with her head on the knee, breathing heavily and trembling. Nothing was registering into her mind, except the seizure awaking flashes of the livid flames. She didn’t even hear when Newt said-

“If you don’t answer me I will come into your room...” and with a crack Newt apparated inside Maxine’s room and found her in a curled up state.

“Max...” he flickered the lights of the candles and bowed to her level. She was still trembling and breathing heavily. Newt at first didn’t know what to do or where to start. He was contemplating whether to put hands on both of her shoulders and pull her up, or hug her. But suddenly a hoarse voice spoke, shaking.

“Wand...”

“Pardon?”

“Point your wand at my temple...” Maxine raised her face and looked at Newt with ghostly eyes, as Newt did what she told him to do, “Occlumenta horribillis”*

Newt did what he was told. As soon as the spell was applied, Maxine’s terrified expression started to change and she started to normalise. Her breathing pattern mellowed and as soon as Newt sat back Maxine straightened up and looked at Newt with gratitude.

“Thank you...” Maxine huffed and leaned on the door. Newt’s head was bowed and he looked slantly at Maxine, the way he looks at his beasts, without making an eye contact. It might sound impolite, but Newt instinctively understood that direct attention might make Maxine slip into discomfort.

“Want to tell me now what is going on?” Newt asked softly.

For some moments she didn’t speak at all, and then slowly she spoke, as if she was very tired “when I was young, there was a huge fire... I can’t remember much of it, but it was tidal waves of blue flames, like Grindlewald’s cursed fire, and all I remember that I was standing in the middle... Next thing, I was admitted to L’Hôpital de Jean-Baptiste Déboire.”* She stopped, and smiled her usual smug crooked smile, “we all have our ghosts Newt, some less terrifying than the other.”

Newt sensed that Maxine was telling the truth, but not the entire truth, however he didn’t gave her the impression, instead, he grabbed her hand softly, “why didn’t they obliviate you?”

“They tried; apparently the Memory Charm would have caused a lasting damage, because the memory itself became so deeply embedded into my mind... ” Maxine stopped, “so from very young age, I started practicing Occlumency, helped a lot with the memory; it never really bothered me...” Maxine frowned as if to think what was different between the tiny flames of the Erlkonig show, the cursed fire of Pere Lachaise and her own memory of blue fire.

“So why now?” Newt helped her as she attempted to stand up, her legs were still wobbling.

“Maybe I am letting my guards down in some way...” she mused on her own, and smiled a grim smile, “maybe I need to be cautious...” she sat on the cold bed and tucked herself in. Newt helped her and his calloused hand caressed his assistant’s head for a moment, and instinctively, he bent his head to kiss hers.

“Take care, call me if you need anything...” he shut the door behind him and went on his bed.

Neither of them could sleep in the night. Newt, propping his head on his forearms spent his night about thinking of Maxine, and the memory of livid flames made Maxine’s night a waking nightmare. Obviously she knew why her occlumency faltered and it scared her to death. But on the other hand, she was concerned about Newt... his behaviours were affectionate and kind and it made her guilty for no reason.

As the black night ashened into cold gray morning, Newt straightened himself up, and took out a quill and a paper. His intention was clear, he was writing for Maxine, but not just to anyone. At first he thought of Theseus, but something in him told him that he wouldn’t be the one to answer his questions. So, after a lot of hesitation and discomfort, he decided to write to Dumbledore. He drafted his and Maxine’s narrative out after three pages were scrapped, and he added...

“...I know it is impudent of me to ask this of you, but giving to my assistant’s secretive and perpetually unpredictable nature, I could not think of anyone better than you who could confide me with the facts I need to know about her. No one understands the students of Hogwarts better than you, Albus and I implore you to look into it.

Yours inquisitively

Newt Scamander.”

Suddenly he heard rumbles in the next room. With a flick of wand, he cleaned the floor of crumpled papers, and hid his letter under the pillow. It was Maxine, standing on the door pane, fully dressed and hair tied in a short-bob and secured in fireproof tulle, ready to go. There was no trace of yesterday’s moment’s weakness or bone-chilling fear.

“Morning Newt...”

“You’re early...”

“Yes... ” Maxine answered, “I am starving... now c’mon...” she came near the bed, and pulled Newt by the hand with her easily and almost dragged him downstairs, “I can’t wait to get the dragons... Almaviva says, if we do well then we’ll be able to return home before Noel...”

“Pardon, what?” Newt broke from his stupefied voice.

“Noe... oh, you’re British... before Christmas.” Maxine ran towards the dining hall, where Bongartz and another wizard was setting the table, “oh Bonjour... thought you might not be sleeping quite well in a new place, so I woke myself early and glad that I did...” Bongartz greeted them, and noticed Newt’s unkempt self, draped in a thick dressing gown, and crinkled his brows, “no matter, no matter... food before dress.”

The beauty of living with wizards all across Europe is having variety of foods presented on the table as a regular basis. Soon other wizards started to sit down, and with a wave of wand, a range of familiar and unfamiliar food was brought before them. From bread to ham, salami to cheese, tea to coffee, juice to omelette, milk to cereals, porridges to muesli all of them was in front of them.

“We don’t have house-elves around here...” Wade answered, “so we cook what we wanna eat, and if you heard breakfast as the most important meal of the day, you heard it right... because someday, with the workload with all them blighters, it’s what you gonna eat the whole damn day.” Then he started to chew on some dark looking bread. “Ernie, pass me some salami will ya...”

“Here...” Bongartz threw him a piece of one and he caught them mid air.

“Whoa... that’s impressive...” Maxine exclaimed.

“Quidditch captain of Team Pukwudgie, class of 1917.” James proudly answered, and everyone laughed. “Ya play Miss Valois?” Wade asked, chewing the salami.

“No... I prefer watching...” Maxine added mysteriously, and Newt smiled at her way.

The men ate pretty quickly, soon the table, which was filled with all types of food vanished. Maxine, along with them ate till her heart’s content. Being a Frenchwoman she was quite snobbish about her food, but tasting all the Spanish omelette, Italian Parma ham, German bread and Romanian cold cuts she was overwhelmed, impressed and content. Newt on the other hand neatly ate one roll of rye bread and some sunny side eggs, with milk tea.

“Let’s go people...” Wade slammed the table and with others walked out the door in the open field toward the Dragon Valley. Maxine was dressed in tweed pantsuit with high boots and dragonhide gauntlet gloves. Today they were treating a dragon by excising a tumour out from its throat that was causing problem in its fire breathing and food eating. It was especially a problem because the dragon laid eggs which needed to be breathed with fire, and with malnourishment the skin, flesh and heart would not be at optimal condition when it dies and the things are harvested. They got half the tumour out, but the critical part was not yet excised. It was ensnaring the ignis-glandulis, or the fire glands.

“Open wide Rosie...” Wade screamed and tossed a whole pig in the air with a flick of wand. As the dragon, (by Newt’s expert eye, Maxine was informed it was an Ukrainian Ironbelly), opened wide to grab the food, Wade transformed the pig into an Iron stick, thick enough to withstand the hydraulic pressure of the dragon’s jaws and tall enough to keep the jaw wide open. As soon it was stuck, the wizards performed full body bind curse through the cavity of the mouth. Wade was stationed on the head of the dragon, grabbing one of the horned spokes. Newt went near the mouth as Almaviva and Bongartz kept him levitated, and with him was Maxine.

“Remember; be as gentle and delicate as possible... because if it hurts then the first people she will burn are us... lumos...” a flicker of silver light flew and stopped at the targeted place. Newt and Maxine, with great precision started to excise the tumour. The task was even tedious because each spell needed to be twice or thrice applied before it could actually work. Maxine was inside the oral cavity and was using severing charm to scrape out the tumours and the tissues ensnaring the fire glands.

“Um... fellas, I think Rosie’s coming back...” Wade screamed from the top, and Newt and Maxine started to scamper. Newt held his wand in his mouth, and started to pull Maxine by her leg. With Newt yanking her, Maxine had to yank the slight unsevered tissue as well. Being made of dragon flesh, it was extremely hard. And it was the pain that brought the Ukrainian Ironbelly to life.

With the pain, the dragon tossed its head and all three of them went in the air flying. But the other wizards were quick enough to perform the inertia spell and by the time they landed, Maxine cast a flame freezing charm so powerful that it protected all of them efficiently. And when they thought everything was over, came in the excised tumour, flying and splattering all over Maxine. Soon she was covered in green pus and dragon blood and it was hard to make out the real colour of her suit.

“Merde...*” she hissed under her breath, and then broke out into a violent laugh. Although the men were surprised at her antics, they joined in as well. There was a unique infectiousness in that husky, loud laughter that made everything light. Newt on the other hand, rolled his eyes and murmured “Scourgify” pointing at her. Then Newt came near her and tucked a stray lock behind her ear. 

“Really... you need to get your priorities sorted...” and the laugh redoubled.

Suddenly, they saw an owl landing towards them. It was surprising even more that the owl was not intended for any of those wizards, but it flew towards Newt. It was a shiny golden letter which he opened with slight discomfort and disregard because he was invited in the Yule Party in the Ministry of Magic. He obviously avoided public gatherings like this, and he was sure that if he avoids it, Theseus will surely lecture him.

While he was reading his invitation, the owl dropped another letter to Maxine before flying away. Unlike Newt’s gorgeous envelope it was plain and austere. Without even opening the letter, she knew whom it was from. Maxine perhaps thanked Merlin for the arrival of ministry’s Yule invitation, because if Newt realised what state she was in, she will never see an end of it.

“Gentlemen, if you’ll excuse me...” she hid the letter at her hip pocket, “I need to splash my face...” she casually walked towards the courtyard, and then she slowly accelerated her pace. By the time she was on the towers, she was running.

Slam

Duratus Clavem

Leaning back on the door, she started to strip off her duster coat, the tweed blazer and waistcoat. She was perspirating even in the cold of Romanian mountains. After loosening her collar, she reached for her hip pocket, where she had hid her letter. Her hand trembled as her red lacquered left index finger slid under the blue seal and flicked in open. Slowly, as if to avoid reading it, Maxine opened the letter, and a whimper escaped her lips. She sunk on the floor with her head between the knees, and the piece of paper slid away through her fingers. In spidery black script it was written:

Ma chère

It’s been long since I have corresponded. I hope everything is well. There is no day when I don’t think about you. When I think about you, I think about our old days together. I assume the feeling is mutual. I cannot believe I have finally found you; there is a joy in me that I haven’t experienced in a long time. I cannot wait to meet you again.

Yours truly...

Tags: @my-current-fandom-is

OOh... suspense!! whose the letter from? who is the mysterious person? why Maxine is sad/scared to read it? curious? Me too... XD

Cugnots: most popular model of cars in Paris 1920

Moara de Hartie : It is a non-profit paper mill located in Comana in Southern Romania. It dates back to some time in the late 19th century. I was reading Conan Doyle’s A Scandal in Bohemia, and got the idea of revealing location through the paper. If you have time (or you already did... good for you), try taking a break from BBC Sherlock and read the original book, it is brilliant... 

Comana: A region in Southern Romania, famous for paper and its own Natural Park and Monastery. I don’t know exactly where the Dragon reservation would be, but it made sense placing it in the South because of the geographical advantages: transylvanian forests and Carpathian mountain ranges are perfect for hiding dragons.

Je peux être très persuasif” : French for “I can be really persuasive“

Carta: A village in Sibiu county in Southern Transylvania. Sibiu is 7 hour drive away from Comana, where the paper of J.W’s letter is from.

St. Carta Monastary: Took the idea from the movie The Nun. The monastery depicted in the film (the dark looking castle) is the lodging station of the wizards. The real St Carta monastery, I have placed as the muggle artifice that conceals the real Carta monastery, the headquarters of the Dragon Reservation 

mais je suis de Vienne...” : French for  “but I am from Vienna“, Bongartz, hearing the French surname, spoke in whatever French he knew, as a gesture of gratitude to the French Magic School who took him in at a late age when his own Magic school (North West and Eastern Europeans consider Durmstrang their school) wouldn’t take him

“Vous Parlez Francais“: Maxine was surprised and asked “you speak French?“ to a German man. To her experience she never heard one speaking French, and he was good at it.

“Un peu mademoiselle“: “a little, miss“.

Wer reitet so spät durch Nacht und Wind? /Es ist der Vater mit seinem Kind: “Who rides so fast in the night and wind? It is the father and his dear son” the opening lines of Schubert’s aria “Erlkonig”. The words were from Goethe’s poem with the same name. It is really popular in Germany.

Occlumenta horribillis : Not an original HP spell. I have tweaked it as an occulumency spell, that suppresses only the bad or traumatic memories. I have heard that therapists sometimes teach their patients some key words to cope with anxiety and triggered situation, this spell is something like that. I have always thought Occumency could be used as a Psychotherapy alternative in the Wizarding World.

L’Hôpital de Jean-Baptiste Déboire: “The Hospital of John Deboir, the Baptist“ a French equivalent of “St. Mungo’s Hospital” 

Merde: French slang for “shit”.

Bongartz: I took the surname from one of my favourite violinist’s original name : David Garrett aka David Christian Bongartz

Almaviva: the only Spanish surname I know, from Mozart’s “Le Nozze di Figaro”

[vanja-novak]

Lovely Sad (Flashback)

It was three, almost four weeks into the summer, and Vanja had yet to hear back from his boyfriend in that entire time span. It wasn’t like him to worry, but considering they had seen each other so often at school, it felt odd to have him just up and disappear like like. Maybe he was busy? That could make sense, considering he had just graduated from school and Vanja still had another year to go. That must have been the reason, surely, that his owls all summer had gone unanswered.

Vanja wasn’t clingy, and he certainly wasn’t that person who desperately needed to be around whoever they were dating all the time. He didn’t need to see or talk to anyone that much, other than perhaps his sister. Though he was starting to agree that it was strange, that someone who you had spent an entire school year in a relationship with wouldn’t want to return your letters. It wasn’t as if he could have moved, and the letter got lost. That didn’t happen with wizard post. Owls were very proficient in getting their deliveries made, so he had no doubt that the letters were being delivered, unless there was someone intercepting them, which... he had considered, but only briefly. It seemed highly unlikely. 

Whatever the reason was, Vanja didn’t seem too concerned. The weather in Bulgaria was nice, July being their warmest month. Considering how cold and brutal the winters were there, this was like a total 180 switch. Vanja had been laying out on his front lawn, legs spread slightly with his hands folded neatly across his chest. His dark curls came down just above his eyes, which were closed to block out the sun, soaking up the warmth as the grass beneath him pricked at the back of his neck. Here, in this moment, nothing could have bothered him. Nothing except the fact that their owl had just flew in, it’s shadow swooping over Vanja’s head as he perched delicately on one of the fence posts.

Opening his eyes and tipping back his head, Vanja watched for a moment before pushing himself up and going to retrieve today’s post. Rewarding the creature for its service, Vanja untied the bundle of letters that they had retrieved, and instantly his expression changed from blank to bewildered, almost as if he couldn’t possibly be reading this correctly. All of the letters tied to the bundle were letters he had sent, all of the ones that had gone unanswered, returned back to him, unopened. He had never even looked at them...

Confusion and anger bubbled in the pit of his stomach as their postal owl took off, Vanja rushing back into his house without a word as he shoved the letters into a pocket. Since he wasn’t old enough to risk using magic outside of school, Vanja knew that he would have to find other means of getting outside of his house other than apparation. Luckily, there was always the floo network, which he had used quite often, though never by himself. There was a first time for everything, however, and Vanja needed, deserved, answers.

When his mother happened to walk into the living room just as he was grabbing a handful of floo powder, he muttered something along the lines of be back later, I know where I’m going, and took off, naming one of the wizarding towns in Bulgaria where he knew that he would find who he was looking for. From what he remembered, talking to him at the end of the year, his boyfriend had mentioned having a job at one of the shops there. Vanja didn’t visit this particular town all that frequently, but he knew his way around, and exactly where the shop was. 

He arrived, not having a plan of what he was going to do or say when he confronted him, not even sure if he would be working that day, but his gut told him to go anyway. Besides, there was enough rage slowly building in him to lose all common sense anyway. Even if he made a scene, he didn’t care, he was going to get a response out of him. Why he hand’t even bothered to open the damn letters Vanja sent.

It didn’t take long at all for him to find the store, pushing the door open, not caring that he almost hit someone who had walked by. They shouldn’t have been standing so close to the door anyway, after all. Within thirty seconds, less, even, he saw him, standing at the counter. At first, Vanja said nothing, rather he rushed up there and threw down the letters onto the counter, staring into the man’s eyes. He looked shocked, embarrassed, and a bit angry, all at once, but Vanja didn’t care. “What is the meaning of this? You have the nerve to send them back, not evening opening them?” he yelled, his native tongue harsher than English. Besides, he knew the male would understand that better anyway.

He was speechless, so Vanja continued. “Something could have happened to you, or something could have happened to me, and neither of us would know.” That was when the man asked him to calm down, though it wasn’t in a reassuring town. It was an you’re embarrassing me tone of voice, which only fueled his anger.  “Why have you been avoiding me? What, do I only matter to you in school? I wasn’t aware our relationship was seasonal.”

The man stared, silently, his eyes darting around the room as if he were looking for some sort of escape route. However, every time he tried to avert Vanja’s eyes, he was met by the familiar jade color following his every move. Vanja... we were never in a relationship.

Bullshit. Vanja’s eyes widened, pupils dilating furiously. “What the fuck are you playing at?” he demanded. The people who had once filled the shop either started to file out, or give the two space, but it was obvious that the lot were listening. It wasn’t serious. Just fun, you know? You should go...

There wasn’t a lot that could make Vanja lose control of his emotions, as he had spent his years hardening himself to avoid anxiety attacks and emotional breakdowns specifically due to reasons like this. He never wanted to be seen as vulnerable, as having a weakness that people could prey on, but this? Toying with his emotions and then ripping them out just like that? It took every ounce of composure in his body not to lose everything in the middle of the store. “Fine.” As he turned to leave, his emotions on the outside may have been rather well contained, the only hint of truth being the slight shimmer haunting the corners of his eyes, on the inside it was obvious he was upset, and when a bit of wandless magic occurred on his way out, others around them had probably clued in. 

Items from the shelves of the store had come crashing to the ground, several people shrieked in fright, and his ex-boyfriend —or, ex fling— was left to clean up shards of broken glass. Serves that bastard right, Vanja thought to himself as he stormed out of the building and back to the floo network entrance that he needed to take to go home. All the while, he didn’t dare let so much as a single tear stain his cheek while someone else could see him. He wouldn’t allow it. 

Everything between storming out of the store and getting back home had been a blur. Vanja was lucky he could concentrate long enough to take the right exit in the network, landing in his home fireplace with a thud. There was ash everywhere that he knew he would have to clean up later, and he was covered in grey soot, but he had to make it up the stairs before anyone noticed that he was back. Scrambling to his feet, he had tripped on the loose floor board in the living room that he always seemed to forget was there, muttering a curse under his breath before fumbling his way up the stairs and to his room, thankfully with no interruption. Only when he was in the comfort and safety of his bed did he allow all of the emotions to come pooling out.

Vanja furiously wiped away tears streaming from green eyes tainted darker with anger, though it was no use when they kept on coming. It felt like everything in him had broken the moment he heard those words, and he had been trying to hold himself together with spello-tape until he was in the privacy of his own bedroom. It wasn’t serious. What the hell did that even mean? If it wasn’t serious, why did they put a label on things? Why tell everyone you were with someone, to turn around and claim it was all just fun and games? 

The anxiety started creeping up his throat, slowly, and then all at once, and suddenly he couldn’t breath, and he reached for his throat, attempting to grasp at air that he couldn’t reach, his hand sinking to his chest as he started to hyperventilate. Breathe, Vanja... breathe... he tried to tell himself, but it was like all of the oxygen in the room was being sucked out by some invisible force, and for a moment he wondered if this was a similar feeling that people who had ever received a dementor’s kiss were subjected to. A fucked up thought to have in the middle of an anxiety attack, no doubt, but his mind had often traveled to stranger places. 

Sputtering and coughing profusely, Vanja hunched over in his bed, closing his eyes and willing for it to be over, trying to imagine the techniques he usually used when feeling anxious, and implementing them, though it was only working in small doses. He drew his hands away from his chest and threaded them through the tangled mess of curls, tugging at them to offer a distraction from the fact that his survival instincts were struggling to kick in and keep him alive. It seemed to work a bit better, though his eyes stung now, as he slammed them shut and focused intensely on regulating his breathing. There had been attacks in the past, but none of them like this. Slowly, tantalizingly slowly, his breathing started to normalize, and for a moment he wondered if that was the end of it.

Then, the itching started, like a burning in his arms, that wouldn’t go away. Clawing at the skin, he rose from his position, continuing to inhale and exhale slowly as his nails dug into the skin and left lines half a foot long embedded into his flesh. That wasn’t good enough though, as the sensation didn’t stop, and the urge to continue scratching was growing increasingly stronger the more he did it. Slow scratching turned into rapid repeated scratching, the hyperventilating coming back as tears continued to stain his cheeks, now blotchy and burning hot. So hot he swore in that moment you could probably light a fire with them. It took breaking skin to realize that he needed to stop, and when he looked down to see what he had done, it was almost like there was nothing left to be sad about.

Ashamed of the harm he had caused himself, his sadness quickly turned to anger. Clenching his fists, he turned to the nearest wall and punched it. Whether they had thin walls, or his adrenaline was just incredibly high after all of that, he didn’t know. However, there was no hiding that something was incredibly wrong after the commotion he caused, and the hand shaped hole in the wall. Vanja pressed his back to the cool surface, sliding down it until he dropped to the floor, curling up in a ball and burying his head between his knees, his hands folded on the back of his neck, cut up and bleeding. 

It wasn’t serious. “Bullshit. It was serious to me.”

[cstesttaken]

Weight Loss Honesty Essay

Photo: Getty Images

I was 13 years old when my dad brought home our first digital scale. It was Christmas, and at first it provoked the same excitement I felt whenever we got any sort of newfangled, vaguely techy object in those more analog days. I rarely weighed myself before that, usually only at annual doctor’s visits, but this machinery was sleek and shiny, with the ability to tell weight to the absurdly precise tenth of a pound.

It’s not that I didn’t already know that I was severely overweight. If the difficulty finding clothing that fit and the perpetual physical discomfort hadn’t already clued me in, fellow middle schoolers’ flip cruelty would’ve done it. But seeing the number on the scale was my come-to-Jesus — or, rather, come-to-Atkins — moment. I stopped housing restaurant-size dishes of fettuccine alfredo like I was a tween Caligula at a banquet, I reluctantly started exercising, and I convinced myself that flavored seltzer was a treat. (I was way ahead of the curve with that last one.)

Within a year, I lost all the weight I wanted to, and have more or less maintained it since. It wasn’t all that simple or straightforward, but both then and now, I rarely discussed the effort I put into what was a major, ultimately positive life change. For one thing, talking about your diet is inherently uninteresting. But I also held back out of a specific sense of shame that I couldn’t necessarily articulate at the time. I was bookish, inquisitive, and defiant, and I prided myself on those qualities; even though I deeply wanted to lose weight, this desire felt vain and ignoble, an admission that I cared about how others saw me.

I’ve been reminded of that feeling often since then, especially as the body-positivity movement has gained traction and weight has felt increasingly politicized. When Marisa Meltzer explored dieting as a feminist taboo for Elle back in 2013, she admitted, “the guilt I once felt about what I ate has been replaced by guilt over being the wrong kind of feminist — or maybe no kind of feminist: a woman pursuing something as pedestrian and frankly boring as losing weight.” She theorized that many self-identifying feminists who struggle with their weight may feign an attitude of indifference as a front. In the years since her essay was published, I suspect that’s only become more common.

Back in 2013, Meltzer pointed to Lena Dunham as the ultimate self-acceptance icon.Her body has been subject to relentless, often harsh, scrutiny since Girls first aired; most recently, the focus has been on her noticeable weight loss, due in part to working out with Tracy Anderson and eating a more plant-based diet. She’s been vocal in objecting to positive press. A couple of weeks back, Dunham responded to a magazine that included a new photo of her next to the headline “20 Slimdown Diet Tips Stars Are Using.”In a widely circulated Instagram post, she attributed her smaller figure to everything from her long-running battles with endometriosis and anxiety to living in Trump’s America and “realizing who ya real friends are.”She’d previously written, “my weight loss isn’t a triumph … because my body belongs to ME — at every phase, in every iteration, and whatever I’m doing with it, I’m not handing in my feminist card to anyone.”

Regardless of the whys and hows of Dunham’s weight loss, I’m struck by the highly charged way the discussion progressed. Numerous publications (especially woman-centric ones) praised her reaction. But, I found myself wondering, what if she had just wanted to lose some weight for the sake of losing some weight? Should it really be all that controversial or shameful to want to control how you look, especially if you have a job that keeps you in the public eye? Must dropping a few pounds come with a disclaimer, or 20? If women used to avoid saying they were on a diet because it might not seem cool or fun, now we worry about the possibility of offending others or losing our “feminist card.”

Fat acceptance was indeed born during the same era as second-wave feminism; today, body positivity and pop feminism exist as the significantly less radical, more widespread versions of their predecessors. As these ideals have deviated further from their origins, becoming more watered-down and commercialized, they’ve also become inextricably linked. A typical triumphant viral web-story plotline, especially for women’s sites, involves a woman “clapping back” at “body shamers.” Body positivity is now a savvy branding move: Take ModCloth, which pledged not to use Photoshop and publicly lent their support to the 2016 Truth in Advertising Act, calling for federal regulation of airbrushing in ads. (The indie retailer sold to Walmart earlier this year.) Andwhen Dove created soap bottles modeled on different female body shapes, it was hilariously misguided and widely panned — but it was also a natural extension of the infantilizing way businesses have attempted to profit off this mind-set.

It’s not like the industry devoted to shrinking us down has taken a blow: We can hardly go a few weeks without hearing about a new diet plan that features seemingly arbitrary restrictions (what, exactly, is wrong with mushrooms?) or an insanely punishing cleanse. But now, when it comes to actually discussing the deliberate changes we make to our bodies, we either wrap them in innuendo or scramble to deny them altogether, in an attempt to appear more enlightened.

One cultural barometer is the way celebrities talk about their eating and exercise habits (and the media coverage they generate). Unsurprisingly, it’s a long-standing tradition to ask people whose job it is to look conventionally attractive how they got that way and what they consume every day. But few ever admit to being on a diet — nobody wants to reveal how the sausage, or, more appropriately, the grilled chicken breast, is made. “Wellness” has also become a catch-all euphemism that allows one to admit to undertaking a transformation, but chalk it up to “health” instead of superficiality. Eva Mendes couched an answer about her routine by saying that she eats “clean” and, because she’s busy, truly enjoys having the same thing for lunch and dinner every single day. Spoiler: It’s salmon, quinoa, and salad. (“Eva Mendes’s Simple Eating Regimen Is So Refreshing,” Refinery29 gushed, either in willful ignorance or a profound misunderstanding of what a diet is.) A Glamour listicle titled “10 Celebrities Who DGAF About Eating Healthy” celebrated stars like Gigi Hadid, Emma Stone, and Jennifer Lawrence for being “quick to admit eating burgers, pizza, or red velvet cupcakes is just part of life,” though something tells me that, based on the industry they’re in, they must G at least a tiny bit of AF. At least Lawrence — whose meteoric rise to become America’s sweetheart was certainly aided by red-carpet sound bites about loving McDonald’s— finally admitted: “‘I don’t feel like I have a normal body.’ I do Pilates every day. I eat, but I work out a lot more than a normal person.”

The current cultural discomfort around dieting has trickled down to how even I — someone with firsthand experience undertaking significant weight loss — react when confronted with it. When acquaintances said they were trying Whole30 for the new year or posted hashtagged meal shots to Instagram, I remember balking: My first reaction was to think that they didn’t seem like the type of people to go on a diet, much less talk about dieting. (By contrast, the girls I knew in high school and college who now appear to be engaged in a Facebook weight-loss-shake pyramid scheme definitely do fit the mold I associate with “people who diet”— though are their motivations really all that different?) While visiting an old friend, I noticed that she had downloaded MyFitnessPal and felt an odd rush of embarrassment, like I had accidentally stumbled onto something I wasn’t supposed to see. We could talk to each other about our sex lives without batting an eyelash, yet counting calories seemed like a step too far.

I’m not saying we should necessarily be talking about our diets more — again, it’s boring, and I’m generally a proponent of all of us dialing back our abundant over-sharing a bit. But what a relief it would be to shed the anxiety surrounding how we discuss them, to lose the doublespeak and welcome more honesty.

Source

http://nymag.com/thecut/article/weight-loss-diets-body-positivity-honesty.html

[tinnyshinny]

♥️♥️♥️GROWN UP LOVE ♥️♥️♥️

Grown-up love is something everyone wants, but not everyone knows how to reach it. The thing about grown-up love is this—we are not going to be able to get it until we learn to be grown up ourselves! When we aren’t being grown-up, we portion the biggest amount of blame onto the other person. We wrongly believe it must be everyone else’s fault the relationships we’ve been in haven’t worked out. What we fail to see is that just because we want grown-up love, it doesn’t mean that we ourselves are ready for it. Sadly it doesn’t work that way. Just wanting something isn’t enough. We have to become the type of person we want to be to be able to attract the same qualities in another. Or at the very least to be able to keep it once we have attracted it. A simple way to look at it is to truly and honestly ask ourselves if we believe we are acting like an adult or like a child in our relationships. I’ve dated my fair share of men who were actually boys trapped emotionally in their younger years. Although the warning signs were there from the outset, I chose to be blind to them and continue dating them anyway. Partly because I used to be a firm believer that love was capable of conquering all, and also, because I didn’t want to accept that the handsome, charming, funny guy at my side wasn’t capable of “adulting” in a relationship! As I wasn’t willing to accept the truth, I have to admit, I wasn’t being adult either. I was just as emotionally stunted as they were. My expectations for someone else were ridiculous when I wasn’t even living to those standards myself. Although I wanted a grown-up relationship, I was heading down all the wrong routes to get to one. So it made sense, I had to make changes so that I could find the type of relationship I had been hoping for. Then, I could banish old patterns so that they did not keep repeating and so that they stopped haunting me. I realized that I only needed myself to be able to live fully. I didn’t need to depend on anyone else for love, happiness or anything else. I had been involved in intense dynamics whereby we foolishly believed at the time that if our relationship ended, our whole worlds would crumble with it. Now, I see clearly how juvenile that was and how it was keeping us in a parent-child dependency rather than allowing us to function as two grown adults. I also used to think that love had to be a little messy to keep it exciting. I believed that without drama relationships were calm but boring, and that it was okay to be a little volatile at times. After all, the making up afterwards was the best part of all. Although I hate admitting it, it’s all too often the truth—a mutual love of drama is what can hold childish relationships together. Although the relationship will be full of cracks and they are not likely to last, the rollercoaster ride leaves both parties dizzy and constantly reeling. This makes the experience one that can be very difficult to step away from. A grown-up relationship does not need to hurry. Nor does it need to wait. It has a good balance between the two. There will be no looking to the past wishing the meeting had taken place years before and no looking to the future wondering where the destination is. People change, relationships change. We can never expect the same person we start out with to be the same person at the end of the relationship. We are constantly learning and are subjected to a variety of stimuli on a daily basis that makes it entirely impossible to remain the same. Day-to-day changes may not be very noticeable but when we look back over time the changes are far more obvious. We need to be open and accepting of each other’s unique paths and work hard to offer unconditional love. This way we can still choose one another to love, but love each other without feeling the need to demand that things stay the same, or that one (or both) compromises themselves to keep the other happy. Change is scary, but we must let go of our need to remain the same just so we can cling to what feels safe or comfortable. When we are capable of adjusting to change we become fluid. There is no easier way to sail through life than when we are in a vessel that is able to constantly adjust to its surroundings so that it can flow freely. Trust in a grown-up relationship comes very naturally. One of the most significant things that highlights these types of relationships from others is that both people take accountability for who they are and are able to admit where they are going wrong. These relationships are not perfect. They will still have their own problems and troubles to face, but the difference is that issues will be handled with maturity and also good communication. When someone is willing to put their hands up and accept their flaws half the battle has already been won. Pride, ego and being afraid to show vulnerability are all things that can potentially cause significant harm to a relationship. There is nothing more endearing and appealing in a grown-up relationship than a partner who is being authentic and accepting who they are as a person, faults and all. When someone is open to change and willing to hear how they may be going wrong with certain things, in a positive way, it is one way to strengthen and develop, not just the relationship, but our own selves too. We should never be afraid to bring things to the table to discuss, so long as the discussions are carried out with fairness, respect and care for the other person’s feelings. In a grown-up relationship there will be no hidden agenda, game playing, control or manipulation. All the cards will be laid out so there is no need for guesswork or trying to read minds. Conversation flows freely whether it is about trivial subjects or deep and intense emotions—nothing is off limits. A relationship that is an adult one totally understands that the two people involved in it will not offer all that they need. Just like with food, there are a variety of things we need to fully nourish our bodies—and it is the same with our minds. Although this does not mean that monogamy needs to be tested, it does mean that accepting that individual friendships, hobbies and interests are essential to keeping ourselves healthy and our hearts full. When we compromise ourselves and sacrifice doing the things we love for the sake of our relationship we also turn off a light within ourselves. It is totally possible to live fully and love fully without one other person having the huge responsibility of being the person who meets all our needs. It is almost impossible for two people to be everything to one another whilst still providing everything for themselves. The most amazing thing about a grown-up relationship is that there are no expectations placed on one another. Each day is there to be lived without having any pressure on it to be anything other than real. Every moment within this type of relationship is a bonus—so whether it lasts a day or a lifetime, it will be a relationship that each party chooses on a conscious level daily. A grown-up relationship is not one of convenience or one to reach personal gain. It will exist to create memories, to share the journey of life together, to adventure as a team and to explore one another’s bodies and minds. There are no rules, regulations or conditions that need to be discussed. Each person within the relationship is virtuous, has good ethics and high standards for themselves. They are not quite a sinner and not quite a saint; they have found the balance of testing each extreme without causing damage to anyone or destruction to anything else. We first need to do the work to become the person we would want to date. When we are living fully and we realize who we are and what it is we actually want from another person, we will not fail to recognize that type of person and relationship when it arrives. Like attracts like, so whatever we put out there, we are highly likely to receive in return. We don’t need to sacrifice ourselves or any part of ourselves to make another person happy—quite the opposite. When we are entirely happy with who we are we will far easier meet with someone who feels the same, then the biggest test and challenge is not to try to walk in the other person’s shadows or try to drown out their light. Two people should be free to fully shine side-by-side, without being overshadowed. The radiant glow these two lights project is what is known as grown-up love.