#like at what point does 'life imitates art' become just a genuinely shit piece of media

[o-wild-west-wind]

A Biracial Reading of OFMD, ft. Iggy’s Revenge Izcourse

a.k.a. I typed out a sentence that turned into an accidental essay of meta, whoops!

Y’all…I love this fandom to pieces, but I don’t think some of you realize why not all of us love Izzy/may be critiquing him. And major disclaimer—I am in NO WAY telling anyone to stop enjoying him as a character. This is NOT an anti-Izzy post (I will go into more detail on why I in fact encourage you to keep doing so later, and to the people who are sending unsolicited hate mail to Izzy fans & haters alike: please don’t!)—I’m just tired of seeing vitriolic hate against the people writing about him as an antagonist, or critiquing his actions based on canon, or post after post of “why don’t people love Izzy like I do!!” and then aggression when people explain their honest opinions. Look: we all have our skrungly little bad guys. I get it!! I’ve got my own collection!! I too have become a consumer and enjoyer of the Izzy fanon!!! PLEASE don’t take this as an attack—I just want to provide some personal, potentially fresh context from at least one (obviously non-exhaustive) perspective for those who want to know why Izzy isn’t universally adored, and also to make a plea for a safer fandom space where we can talk about our perspectives on these fictional characters without escalating to unnecessary vitriol, especially as s2 be upon ye (bc holy shit fandom is supposed to be fun, we’re having fun and that’s an order 😤)

(Oh, and I know I’m potentially stirring the pot with this post, but this should go without saying: don’t send each other death threats. What the fuck. Nobody do this?!)

So now that the legalize is out of the way: I want to share that the reason I initially imprinted on this show—and on Ed specifically—was because I’d never seen an explicitly biracial character treated with such complexity, nuance, and grace. While our ethnic makeups are vastly different, I too am half-white & half-brown—which means we’re absolutely nothing culturally alike, but our worlds view and treat us as pretty much the same regardless. And like Ed, my dad resents my mom and my racial makeup, and is prone to what I like to call “white violence.” Not going to overshare on the internet, but let’s just say that all this compounded makes Ed feel highly relatable to me (although for legal purposes I promise I have not krakened my dad 🙃).

When I first watched the show (and honestly also until my 3rd or 4th rewatch), Izzy IMMEDIATELY made me think of my dad. He also immediately made me think of Ed’s dad. Their mannerisms, word choices, and tones of voice; the obsessive need for control; the default of violence; the gradual dehumanization until an ultimate kraken-ifying breaking point—it all read to me like an intentional parallel. A shadow of white violence following Ed around that he hasn’t been able to shake, and mirroring to him the things he fears the most, including the things he fears within himself and feels forced to become (he is half-white after all, and this is a whole other post, but tl;dr there can be a lot of baggage that comes with being half-white/half-poc in regards to grappling with your toxic relationship to that white side of yourself, and especially if your white parent was racist and/or violent). And you can claim a different reading of all of this if you want (I genuinely mean that, like I’m in favor of meta & I think it’s great to analyze these things) BUT. that does not change the fact that I felt what I felt as a result of what was portrayed on screen and combined with my lived experience. Because fictional characters are just that—fictional—and are vessels by which you can process the world; we will always bring our personal lived experiences to anything we consume, and that’s okay—that can be the point, even. Art imitates life imitates art. Interpretation is the name of the game!

(more under the cut)

So when I watch this show, it’s a helpful tool for me to process my own feelings of being victimized by the white violence that’s followed me around my whole life, as well as the ways in which I’ve rebelled against it/tried to make peace with a non-toxic version of whiteness (in parallel to the more overt theme of masculinity, which is—ding ding—inexplicably tied to whiteness and western colonialism) via chaos, love, hurt, and sometimes giving up and giving in—and in this process, Izzy is a safe target. And you know why that is? Because he’s FICTIONAL. I can feel rage towards him because he’s NOT REAL. I can better understand and process the pain I’ve felt and rarely seen societally acknowledged by watching it paralleled on screen via actors and writers who have likely also grappled with similar feelings (I mean, I genuinely have made more progress with my personal biracial trauma via this show vs. years of therapy), and if I want to assume the worst of Izzy based on my interpretation of canon to help me through this? That’s fine! Because I can’t hurt his feelings and he can’t hurt mine!! Because he’s not real!!!

And here’s why I still support the Izzy-enjoyment: I am sure that many of the people who love Izzy and defend him to the ends of the earth probably feel a similar way that I do about Ed. It’s why we get all riled up and protective of these characters, why we might take attacks on them as attacks on ourselves; recognition of the self in the form of the other, and all that. Izzy is a vessel by which to safely work through the dark feelings and the pain you’ve bottled up—and he’s a safe way to do that because he’s FICTIONAL. And that’s a beautiful thing imo!! That’s truly the beauty of art—it is what we make of it, and what we make of it helps make ourselves better. It’s good to be open to interpretation.

HOWEVER: that does not give you permission to discount my relationship to this show (as I will not discount yours), and more importantly: that does NOT give you permission to reject the notion that canonically in s1, Izzy is literally and thematically (emphasis on thematically) an antagonist who is purposefully written to cause harm that can be interpreted as a hate crime, especially to those with lived experience of homophobia/racism/ableism/bullying/etc.—and you cannot harass people about this when conversing about theories of canon. If someone sees Izzy’s dialogue as cutting, degrading, and even triggering, that’s extremely fair of them to do so—clearly Ed was written to feel it that way! Con himself has paralleled Izzy with Judas! And can interpret it all differently? Sure! But you CANNOT assume that everyone else will, and then get upset when people don’t. I can’t believe I need to spell this out about an angry white guy in a show about toxic masculinity, but if someone does not like Izzy, it is likely due to a personal history of harassment (or worse) that he is reminiscent of; by making a point to defend him to someone—even if you are well-intentioned—you are very much putting salt in a wound.

I want to take this opportunity to further emphasize some tenets of fandom in general:

you can like characters who do horrible things without needing to jump hoops to argue their morals as pure 👏

conversely, you can critique their actions and still like them (encouraged, even) 👏

you can like characters who do horrible things simply because they’re cool and hot and interesting—don’t worry, we know it’s not the same as liking people like them irl 👏

your liking a villain archetype says nothing about your own moral virtue 👏

you can like horrible characters and see reasons for why they are the way they are/view them as tragic/note sympathetic dimensions of their personality/root for them to have redemption arcs while acknowledging that said redemption arc may not have happened in canon yet and that these are implicit, not explicit, readings of canon 👏

and you can also reimagine canon and change their contexts in fan works so that they ARE morally virtuous 👏 but PLEASE just be mindful and accountable when you do this in a context where not everyone will see a character the same way as you, and where multiple of people of marginalized identities have spoken out about the harm not doing so can cause. Just be honest, sincere, and kind, listen and learn, and don’t harass people for understandably needing space from a character that symbolizes something different to them than it does to you.

Also: blocking tags or people just because they have character opinions different than yours is totally okay and does not mean anything other than “I am curating my online space to have a better time,” it’s NOT personal

And most importantly: FANDOM IS FOR FUN! This isn’t our day job! We come to fandom to decompress. Don’t ruin people’s safe spaces!!!

Like I said, I’ve grown to enjoy Izzy over time thanks to fandom and fanon, and I think it’s fantastic that fandom can have such diversity in the way it interprets canon. I can’t wait for his probable redemption arc (it will likely be a healing thing to witness for many of us) and I’m truly glad that we can all have different relationships to the same characters. But please—when some of us need Izzy to be a punching bag, just let him be a punching bag. No, it’s not homophobic and DEFINTELY not misogynistic to view him as an obstacle in Ed and Stede’s relationship (baffled by the amount of times I’ve seen this take—it’s a funny joke but if you actually think Izzy is treated the way female characters related to other mlm ships have been treated, the point is very much going whoosh). You don’t have to engage; it’s not personal. It’s not about YOUR relationship with him—it’s about MINE. Please let me feel and even discuss rage towards him when I think about episode 10. Please let me throw as many sandwiches at his head as I need to. Because I PROMISE, it won’t hurt him—because he, and none of these characters, are real; and yet we, the fans, very much are.

[xuleism-blog]

hey demons, it’s me, ya boy !  or you can just call me amber. i use they / them pronouns, live in gmt + 1 tmz ( usually a cursed place because nobody is ever online @ the same time as me ... ) who seems to get eternally mixed up with simple english even though its my mother tongue bcs im dumb and would d*e for victoria song in a heart beat. here we have joanne the scammer but if he was chinese, xu lei ! for plotting or just general ranting about how much pain your oc brings you which im a pro ™ at , hit me up in the ims, or add me on disc*rd at RUDELOVE#5604 for a quicker reply. if you want me to find you first – just hit that like button and i’ll get to you and love you down instead. 

tw: drug use, shitty parenting 

lei is that guy who's like ‘i'm not gonna do it’ and then everyone looks at him kind of endeared because ‘that's nice’ and then five minutes later he does it. is he a hot mess? absolutely. he's gone through through his life scraping by based on decent first impressions and thereon after, Kind of Winging it ™. it’s what he’s used to. 

he's twenty-one years old, and you probably know him as an agreeable, good-natured, easygoing albeit pretentious art restorer working at the local museum in gwangsan, who occasionally guest lectures at the university and parks his ferrari up front ‘unintentionally.’ he used to be a little pretentious - but he's grown up a little ever since money changed his life for the better, and at least shaped up to be a semi-decent adult.

jk absolutely not he sucks. beneath the exterior, he’s actually a street rat from china who made it good as an art forger. never got the degrees he says he has, never did the job he says he did before this. he’ll tell you he's from beijing and you’ll relate it with wealth and affluence, not the opium addicted parents and having to live in a drug den instead of a home. when his mum and dad, who were also artists in shady business’, were caught dealing in exchange for drugs lei decided to pack up and leave once and for all. he's ended up in gwangsan via a friend, and been told to lie low for the mean time. but is he gonna? probably not my friend

fast forward a few years and a whole lot of won later, things with his family are pretty rocky. lei’s parents are trying to get into contact with him to bail them from jail and, to cut a long story short, he thinks jail is what She deserves. he kinda detests that he’s even related to them @ this point, he doesn’t know why he should be responsible for them when they never really fit into the idea of the 'picturesque' family with sturdy morals when he was doing drug runs for them at young ages. family is a rlly sore spot for him and he just dissociates when anybody brings it up. 

to brighten things up he likes art puns. has probably said something along the lines of ‘ if it’s not baroque, don’t fix it.’ casually in an every day conversation or if he was in the middle of a bank heist he’d be the one to say ‘ grab the monet and lets gogh. ’ tell him his puns are shit im begging u

he also sometimes tends to talk like dj khaled wherein he thinks he has a ton of haters and that an unidentified they ( nobody ) are out to get him. if you dont count police because yes they’re on his ass 

he dresses somewhere between glam rock and Lazy Asshole That Owns (1) One Leather Jacket and 100 cashmere scarves. he likes to show off - he's kind of arrogant and definitely means to be so? he’s super impulsive as well, and tends to say shit that gets him in trouble because his mouth is quicker than his brain. lei breathing is one giant recipe for disaster. don't be shocked if you find him roughed up or bruised it's his Aesthetic. 

lei is also really Really into his art. all the sleaziness involved with imitating famous art pieces aside, he loves it. becoming successful and rich off of something that he’s genuinely good at and is allowed creative freedom @ is great, since he was pretty awful when it came to the important stuff when it came to school. 

sexuality wise, he’s pansexual ! he's very flirty... kind of unashamed but never really takes anything he does with other people very seriously? he's embarrassingly romantic and fun to date if you can handle that he might love himself more. he would make u mix tapes and take u out to shows and bars and maybe use a fake name at first but it's a good time. it’d be.. an interesting story to tell. 

finishing off w this gif because its him to a tee :

[elfnerdherder]

Ill Intentions: Chapter 4

You can read Chapter 4 on Ao3 Here

If you’d like to become a patron and support my work, check it out Here. Every little bit helps!

Chapter 4: Smoke Break

           He sat in a small room in Quantico, dismissing the notification on his watch that he should have eaten already. He stared down at the photos of Hannah Oberly and now Russel Stevens, then considered Crawford across from him. Jack said nothing, merely stared. Will sighed and looked back down at the pictures obediently. Spying one that seared against his vision, he reached out and tapped the photo thoughtfully.

           “Was he hoping the worms would break him down after dying?” Will wondered. “In case no one found him in time?”

           Jack let out an irritable grunt, disgusted.

           “I called you after I made sure he was alive,” Will added on. “And I even took the note with me so that you could see.”

           “You should have called me the moment you found the note,” he snapped.

           “Am I being held officially?”

           “I’m thinking about charging you with obstruction of justice,” he snapped, steepling his fingers. He considered Will over them, brow lowered darkly. “Does the fact that he could have died mean anything to you?”

           “He’s going to be okay,” Will reassured him.

           “Traumatized,” Jack corrected.

           “Appreciative,” Will countered.

           They glared at one another across the table.

           “We’re keeping the note, and since we already have your prints on file, we’re taking DNA, too.”

           “That’s fine.” Will had already photocopied the note, expecting something much like that.

           “You do this again, Mr. Graham, I’ll get so many gag orders and lawyers up your ass that you won’t know how to sit right for years,” he warned.  It was reminiscent of what he’d threatened Charlie with.

           “Do you want the other notes, too? They’re at my apartment.”

           “Much as you’ve probably contaminated them, yes.”

           Will had photocopied those too. He wished he could have figured out what brand of fountain pen the Chesapeake Ripper used, just so he could have traced over the curls and loops of his handwriting, learned something about him in the way he dotted his I’s, but he’d run out of time for that. If The Ripper called again, maybe he’d remember to ask.

           “Can I ask a question, off the record?” he asked as he signed a paper with his statement.

           “Is it really off the record?” Jack asked.

           “I’m not Freddie Lounds,” Will retorted.

           Jack nodded, that flicker of comradery in his eyes as he looked at Will. Will liked knowing that there was someone else in the world not affiliated with him in a bias way that hated her, too. Maybe in another life, he’d be on the same side of the table as Jack was. He could see it, a specially bred dog made for hunting psychos, reporting back to get a pat on the head before being locked in the kennels till the next one came out to play.

           “Did he take anything from them? Not for reporting –like I said, I’m keeping this out of the news. For now.” He emphasized ‘for now’ with a pointed look. “The Chesapeake Ripper took organs, but these two lived. He found ways to put them under; are they missing anything…vital?”

           Jack Crawford would have been a terrible poker player, what with the way expression ranged across his face, first surprised, then horrified, and finally resigned. Even before he answered, Will knew. “Oberly is missing a kidney, and so is Stevens.” A long, pointed stare. “Off the record.”

           “Off the record,” Will swore.

           He took a taxi back to DC, fingers drumming along his knee as he stewed on that. Both times trophies, but trophies one could live without. Why did he choose them? Did he find a riddle on the internet, deem it clever, then find someone that fit the type? Or did he first see a person and find inspiration in their ways, their mannerisms?

           He highly doubted it was as easy as that. The Chesapeake Ripper was methodical, precise. He chose Will, somehow knowing that Will would rather play games with him than turn everything into the FBI and disappear until everything blew over.

           Which begged the question: why the fuck wasn’t he doing exactly that?

           He huffed out a quiet breath, glancing down to his watch when it beeped. A message from Beverly asking if he’d survived the FBI. In a manner of speaking, yes. In a manner of speaking, no. He was more than aware what was normal, what was right. He was supposed to turn everything in, duck his head and write his column from the confines of a rather safe and secluded place of the FBI’s choosing. He would inform them of any phone calls or contact, let someone with a degree and specialty in psychopaths handle everything.

           You were two years away from suicide, I’d wager. Six months away from alcoholism.

           He didn’t like the aftertaste of considering that, though. With the way he’d leapt at the chance to go on a hunt for clock towers and funeral homes, there was a subconscious part of him that’d decided from the start that he was going to do this, regardless of the danger.

           More than likely because of the danger.

-

Your readers will surely relish your insight to my psyche, as much as they enjoyed seeing you delve into the Minnesota Shrike’s. Truly, the masses revel in a good witch hunt, much the same way they enjoy reading about death and torture until they’re part of it.

This one is only mildly harder.

The man who invented it doesn’t want it.

The man who buys it doesn’t need it.

The man who needs it doesn’t know it.

You have three days.

-Avid Fan

           Will sat slumped on Beverly’s couch, editing and stewing over replies, her laptop propped up onto his chest. Using someone else’s computer was a personal affair, he felt, the keys foreign and oblong to him. The faded spaces didn’t fit his thumbs right, and they hovered over the spacebar, hesitant. He’d needed the change in atmosphere, though. He had a reminder on his watch to beep to let him know to change scenery every once in a while.

           “It’s a good thing they’ve got Lounds collaborating, otherwise people would think you were making this shit up,” Beverly said, munching on kale chips. She offered one to him, and Will accepted it, letting it hang out of his mouth as he tapped idly on the faded ‘A’ key, nodding.

           “We’re writers and we couldn’t make this up,” he mumbled around the chip.

           “Shit, you’re on the news!” He gave a start at her shout, and he slid the laptop down just enough to look at the television, blinking rapidly at the mildly grainy image of a camera marking him coming out of the funeral home with Stevens strapped to a gurney. Thankfully, the distortion made him appear ruffled, uncertain of himself as a police officer led him towards cars where he folded his arms tight around his chest, rocking from toe to heel –at the time, the leaping of awareness from vein to artery to capillary gave him the feeling of a near-ability to fly. He’d wondered absently that if he leapt from a building, if he’d never have to reach the ground.

           “An unknown source sent the video in, saying they were longboarding by when they happened upon the chance encounter. This begs the question, though; is this life imitating art, imitating life? Just what are the lines of journalism that credits an almost vigilante-esque behavior? Where does the reporting stop and the police step in?”

           “She’s just pissed it’s not happening to her,” Beverly said, grabbing another chip. “Hell, I’m a little jealous.”

           “We can trade if you want; the FBI’s up my ass now.”

           Beverly looked like she was genuinely considering it. After a breath, she exhaled and shook her head dismally. “No, I saw that answer you gave to the period question. Leave the genuine life advice to me, and you go write about crazies.”

           When they brought a behavioral analysist on to discuss the sort of person that would entertain an ‘avid fan’ such as that, Will snatched the remote and muted it. He didn’t need someone on the TV telling him something he was already very much aware of, thank you.

Avid Fan,

With the FBI involved, surely you will begin to feel the heat, now. After the rescue of Russel Stevens, they are certainly keen to keep people safe, especially from people much like you.

To address your behavior as well as answer the question that Lacy4Luk sent in, regarding your personality, I’d say that first impressions tell me you have a wild flare for the dramatic. You were a child not given much in the way of attention, and that loneliness grew, fostered into something ugly throughout adolescence and finally peaked upon reaching adulthood. You revel in the macabre because you feel you’ve found your niche. You think yourself an artist, and unfortunately, Lacy4Luk, the artistic desires of Avid Fan lend them a monstrous appetite.

This is a person, however, that will not stand out –not because they don’t wish to, but because they’re intelligent enough to see that individuality is well, but too much of it falls under scrutiny. They will be pleasant in public, affable, kind, and one would even argue charmingly charismatic. People will trust them because they make it so easy to trust them. There is an aloofness, however; this is not a person that lets just anyone into their home. Their home is their fortress, and the people that enter it are either being used, or they are very much about to be.

           Beverly read it over his shoulder, munching on her chips. The noise was distracting, the bag crackling, and he winced away from it, holding her laptop up as an offering.

           “I like that you switch from addressing him to talking to Lacy instead,” she commented. “You’re saying you see him, but you’re just as interested in everyone else.”

           “Lacy4Luk,” he corrected.

           “You can’t pay me to refer to them as those weird ass names.”

           “They do pay you to refer to them as those ‘weird ass names’,” Will retorted with a short laugh. “They pay both of us.”

           “We’re not on the clock, though.”

           That was true. Why was he working on this outside of work? He wasn’t writing for the daily news that was delivered Monday-Saturday, he was writing for the Sunday Edition, a weekly piece with the ‘best of the best’. He felt like he had to, though. He felt like it would be somewhat of a disservice to Russel Stevens to not. The poor man had been buried alive in one of his own coffins, worms thrown in to help him decompose.

           Enough time had passed throughout the day that he could adequately process the horror of it, although it didn’t seem to sink in the way he knew it should.

           After enough kale chips, he e-mailed his work to his laptop at the apartment and headed home, watch beeping to let him know he’d reached triple his step goal for the day. He acknowledged the notification, kept walking. Maybe he deserved a cake or something for achieving the unthinkable. Tripling your steps is a pretty big deal, or so he’d heard from their health department.

           This is the most exciting thing that’s happened to you in a long time.

-

           The papers hit Sunday, and by Monday he watched his e-mail fill to the brim. Was there a limit to how many people could send in e-mails at once? Would his inbox implode? He absentmindedly redid the settings so that his watch didn’t beep every time he got an e-mail. It was so distracting that he almost missed his reminder to go and get a cup of water.

           You’re a hero, it’s so amazing how you don’t wait for the police to save people.

           The police already has a bad response time, give them a riddle like that and it’s no wonder you didn’t wait for them to go and save him.

           Do you think you’re real FBI or something? Honestly, this is making me rethink my subscription to Tattler News, that and on the front page Freddie Lounds is always the top half, and I’m tired of her tone, but this is just getting ridiculous now with the whole man hunt thing.

           Hi, are you faking these things?

           Why is this happening to you? Who is this Avid Fan in correlation to you?

           The actual written letters were far better. When people had to write out each letter, they were more careful about what was put down. He thought of his cork board, now with photocopies rather than originals, and he sighed. The Chesapeake Ripper certainly was very careful about each mocking, taunting word that was written. Every single flourish was purposeful, as though he knew Will would later trace over it with an almost sort of reverence to the actions as he tried to ingrain the ink into his fingerprints.

           As many abrasive questions about the validity of his actions as there were, the ratings inched up just a little bit more. Enough that Charlie was going to keep the column. Enough that despite some of the harsher, accusing statements, there were scores of other letters from his ‘avid fans’.

-

           Tuesday didn’t bring a letter from the Chesapeake Ripper, and work crawled. His watch beeped. Get water. His watch beeped. Eat lunch. His watch beeped. Walk around. His watch beeped. Get water. His watch beeped. Speak with someone other than the computer monitor. His watch beeped. Catch the bus.

           The bus was broken down, though, and with traffic the way it was, darkness had fallen by the time he managed his walk home, feet furious and watch beeping to congratulate him on his steps that day. It wasn’t fun to walk five miles in dress shoes, no matter the ‘memory foam’ assistance in the sole. Memory foam. Like he wanted shoes that could eat up the memories of sitting on his ass all day under too bright work lights and in front of a computer screen where a woman asked him if ‘he was the ass hole almost killing people, just to get ahead in his career’.

           When he went into his apartment, he locked it behind him and flipped the light, letting out a short, aggravated curse when it didn’t work. Power outages were common, although certainly a pain.

           When he turned to see the shadowed visage of a man, though, it occurred to him that it wasn’t a power outage at all.

           His first thought was to unlock his door and run out of it, since that was a logical escape. When he went to move, though, his legs locked and he found himself decidedly frozen, throat dry and mouth gaping open. There was only one person that would find a way to leave them completely in darkness within his own apartment –unless he had a slew of Avid fans, but Will Graham wasn’t that arrogant –and if he’d wanted to kill Will, there was the second thought that he would have attacked when his back was turned, when it was easy to subdue him. Standing poised by his crummy table and his corkboard, Will didn’t think that was the case.

           “I can only see your outline, so I’m wondering the thoughts no doubt racing through your head,” the Chesapeake Ripper said. It was the same accented, cultured voice from the phone. In person, it was deeper, a mellow undertone of completely controlled delight.

           “I thought about just walking out of my apartment,” Will said, and he had to clear his throat to dispel the dryness. It made him sound hoarse, scared. Truth be told, it wasn’t fear; much like finding Oberly and Stevens, there was a thread of excitement, a whisper of something fantastic that made his heart skip beats, and he was very well aware of just how messed up that was.

           “Why didn’t you?”

           “Then I thought, it’s the Chesapeake Ripper; if he wanted to kill me I’d already be dead.”

           “Oh?”

           “So if you weren’t here to kill me, why would I ruin the chance to have a conversation with you?” Will’s watch beeped, to remind him that he should have eaten dinner already. The sudden light in the dark was blinding, and he quickly swiped the notification away, irritated by it. It made his eyes, adjusting slowly as they were to the dark, blind all over again.

           “You haven’t eaten,” the Chesapeake Ripper noted. “You should fix that.”

           “I’m not the best at cooking in the dark.”

           “Luckily for you, I prepared a dish so that you didn’t have to.”

           The Chesapeake Ripper prepared a dish. Will would have laughed at the thought, but even he had his limits. They considered one another, two solid cuts of shadow in the dark, and it occurred to Will that he’d even thought to draw the light-cancelling blinds so that not even the traffic and the busy streets below could interrupt them.

           When the Chesapeake Ripper didn’t move, Will headed towards the table, bumping into the chair before he grabbed the back and pulled it out, sitting down. Sure enough, when his hands came to rest on the top, fingertips bumped a fork that skittered to the side. The sound was jarring, unsettling in the otherwise quiet room.

           “What is it?” he asked.

           “What do you smell?”

           Knee-jerk was to suspect him of putting human remains on a plate for him to eat, but as he lowered his head to inhale the aroma, he was surprised to find something savory, spices with a rich hazelnut undertone. Fingers skimmed across the plate, then traced out the odd, oblong shape of a very cooked, very dead bird.

           “Hazelnut, fig; I think Armagnac? It’s meat. A bird.”

           “Have you ever tasted the Ortolan, Mr. Graham?”

           “Is that what this is?” At the prolonged, unanswered silence, he shook his head. “I haven’t.”

           “It is quite illegal here, but I have a lovely butcher who finds ways to entertain my palate when the mood strikes me. They claim it is to better capture the aroma that one places a napkin over their head in order to partake, but I for one know it to be that they wish to hide their face from God.”

           “If God is omniscient, he would see beneath the napkin,” Will pointed out. The shadow of the Chesapeake Ripped shifted, moved, and he sat down at the table across from him.

           “We give them their hopes, such frailties as they are.”

           “Is that why you leave the lights off?”

           “The lights are off because I want you to be blind, Mr. Graham.”

           Right. Will nodded, staring across the distance with eyes straining to see. He could make out broad shoulders, but otherwise there was no distinguishing feature. His fingers twitched near the fork by his plate, urging him to grasp it –to what end?

           “I’m going to venture that the bird isn’t poisoned because that would take away the fun,” Will stated. He was proud of the fact that his voice didn’t waver.

           “I wouldn’t do that to the food.”

           Maybe it was the way he said it, but Will could almost feel his lips curling up on the edges, a sublime joke that only he understood. “You’re eating their kidneys, aren’t you?” he asked, and his voice lowered as he thought of the other trophies from victims. “You’re eating your trophies?”

           “And now you will wonder for the rest of the evening if it’s not my intention to kill you after all,” the Chesapeake Ripper said, delighted.

           His watch beeped to tell him to drink a glass of water. The sudden light burned his eyes, and he hissed, slapping the notification away, rendering him even blinder than before. He blinked spots out of his vision, focused on the shadowed blob not more than three feet away. So close, yet so obscured he couldn’t see.

           “Are you going to eat?” the Chesapeake Ripper asked gently.

           “Did you make enough for yourself?”

           “I did.” The small scraping sound of a plate on cheap, pressed wood. “Many people enjoy the ease of discussing business over dinner, and I thought it sad to not partake in something as delectable as this.”

           “…All in one?” Will asked, passing his tongue along his dry lips.

           “All in one, Mr. Graham.”

           He grabbed the bird, fingers brushing against what felt like a handful of dried fruits, fingerfoods for ease of consumption in the dark. He’d read a few articles on chefs in France fighting to have the bird made legal to serve in their restaurants again, the shouts of foi gras and other controversial delicacies their platform. The birds had always looked mildly stupid, plucked and served up no larger than a baby’s fist. His lips glided along the skin, and with a quick, short breath, he tilted his head back and dropped it into his mouth, biting down.

           It was savory, gamey in its own right. He bit down on flesh cooked just-so, perfection as organs compacted on bone, fragile and brittle. They shattered under the weight of his teeth, fig fresh on his tongue as he swallowed, a salted aftertaste as small bones scraped the back of his mouth and broke flesh. To consume, he took in some of himself, he thought, and if that wasn’t something smacking of darkly romantic and twisted, he didn’t know what was.

           Just across from him, the shadowed shape of the Ripper’s face tilted back as he too partook, and there was something grossly intimate about the silence, about the sordid act as they witnessed one another do something that apparently even God would shame.

           His fingers poked and pushed the dried fruits –now that he could touch them further, he was more convinced of that –and he stared, weighing. Assessing.

           “Worth it?” Will asked.

           “Far more revealing about your character than anything I’ve seen you display in a public setting, I assure you,” the Ripper replied. “You didn’t hesitate.”

           “I didn’t.”

           “And despite the person you’re sitting across from, you’re very much not afraid.”

           Will swallowed, savoring the aftertaste of hazelnut coupled with blood. “I’m not.”

           “How different from the dour, sad-faced man that you present to others, glasses askew just-so, fingers that dance across the touch screen of a device that determines your every move.” The chair creaked as he shifted, and every sense was alive to it. It was true what they said, that the loss of a sense heightened all others. He swore he could smell the faint cologne of something ridiculously expensive and musky. “You abhor socializing.”

           “I do.”

           “And yet you can sit across from me rather than run because you’re curious.”

           Curious was a good word. So was excited, but Will didn’t want to admit that part. “Others would argue stupid rather than curious.”

           “You’re not stupid,” the Ripper replied without hesitation. “In fact, I would argue that in most cases, you’re the smartest man in the room.”

           Somehow, coming from him, the compliment smarted as much as it hummed with sincerity. What use was it to Will to have his intelligence validated by the type of person society would rather see dead?

           “What now, then?” Will asked. “You didn’t come here just to feed me.”

           “I was curious,” the Ripper said, “about what you’d do when faced with a situation in which you were put at a disadvantage.”

           “Here we are, two curious people in a dark room.” Will shifted in his chair. “You’re not going to reveal yourself. It’s too soon.”

           “Too soon,” the ripper agreed.

           “I do have questions, though.”

           The Ripper huffed a laugh, the shadow of his head bobbing in a nod. “I’d imagine so,” he mused.

           “Have we met before?”

           “Yes.”

           “Where?” At the silence, Will pressed, “When?”

           “Two years ago, although I’m almost convinced you don’t recall.”

           Two years –two years? Will scrambled through his thoughts, people, places, sensations, but nothing rose to mind. He’d been at Tattler News even then, resigning himself to a life of bad writing and bad wedding cake. Even The Ripper took note of it.

           “Nothing comes to mind,” he said slowly. “It must have left an impression, though.”

           “It did,” the Ripper agreed pleasantly.

           He wasn’t going to tell Will, and for that Will was resigned to not press. He didn’t want to be too curious, too pressing to something that the Ripper wasn’t inclined to share. It would look weak, grasping, and it’d waste what little time Will felt he had left.

           “Why do you schedule yourself so strictly, Mr. Graham?” the Ripper asked when he didn’t speak. “Why do you make yourself a slave to a laundry list of items on that watch?”

           Silence. Will debated lying. He debated smudging the truth a little.

           “Quid pro quo: if you are honest with me, I will be honest with you,” the Ripper said.

           “If I didn’t, I’d forget to do any of them,” Will said after a moment. “Sometimes when I’m thinking, time moves differently. I’ll wake up, maybe drink some coffee, but I stare at the traffic and next thing I know, it’s 6:00 P.M., and I’ve lost an entire day because of the traffic.”

           “What about the traffic moves you?” the Ripper wondered.

           “The way the lights cut across windows from the street shops; horns blare overhead, arcing along metal frames housing the curses of the one running late, fists slamming against reinforced plastic, children shrieking as parents race across crosswalks.” He reached up and rubbed away the crease between his brows at the thought. “It’s not just traffic. Little things. The steam rushing from the kettle, the way a person tilts their head as they speak angrily into a phone, the way lips fumble over words they wish they’d never said. I could feel myself bleeding into the world moving around me. I’ve been told by psychiatrists that my mind doesn’t have barriers.”

           “You’d become so wrapped up inside of it that you had to create a timeline in which you could function as an adult,” the Ripper realized. “Rather, as what society says what an adult would do.”

           “That, and I was tired of food going bad in my fridge because I’d forget about it,” he replied dryly. His mouth worried over his question: quid pro quo. An answer for an answer. “Why are you eating them?”

           The Chesapeake Ripper stood, and he circled the table. Will tensed in his chair when he drew close, when gloved hands rested on his shoulders to squeeze, massaging away tensed muscles bunched at being in such close proximity to a murderer. The Ripper’s face lowered, and the tip of his nose traced along the shell of Will’s ear, down to his throat. To Will’s utter surprise, he inhaled deeply, mouth open against his skin like he could consume some aspect of him. It made a shudder curl down his spine, rest warm in his stomach like a fine red wine.

           “Because I was hungry,” he murmured against his neck.

           “You cannibalize people because you’re hungry?” Will asked skeptically.

           “It’s not cannibalism if they’re not equals, Mr. Graham,” he said with utmost seriousness. “And I assure you, they are certainly not our equals.”

           He walked out of the apartment, and Will let him. The curious part of him thought to run after with his phone, grab a picture before it was too late, but the darker, more manipulative part of him whispered that it would spoil the fun.

A special thanks to my patrons, @hanfangrahamk @matildaparacosm @starlit-catastrophe, Superlurk, and Duhaunt6! You guys are the best!