#like i aint tryin to have this turn up in search results if i can help it u kno

[noxrynne]

uhhhhh this site sucks i had to edit this four times to get the thing to actually do thee cut goddamn its more cuz its a block'a text no one should be forced to scroll THAT long over sheesh

Just putting it under a read more as people really hate the animation/show and the weird thing is it's one of the few times I think I've related to a character present in it (who is usually the topic of everyone's derision) in such a way where it's like looking in a mirror when I was... god, fucking 12 - 22~, and kind of it clicking in my head what was wrong with me. Not like, full picture, but. I don't know, I never really related to a character like this before and it's weird. Not necessarily in a bad way, either. Like, it makes me uncomfortable. Sure, but it's kind of... a healthy discomfort, for me at least. To see it all laid out in this way where it... and I feel pathetically stupid for this, clicked in my head why someone from my trans therapy group yelled at me after they realized how I was treating myself. I went through a lot of similar dark places. I behaved in similar ways. I got yelled at, like I deserved, but never understood why someone cared. I've been working on self improvement in this area for a while, and it's absolutely the hardest one. And a lot of it did, maybe stupidly? Begin with this character and some of the songs that followed, and now I'm really thinking back on it since my boyfriend and I watched the newly released show and. There's a scene that hit me really hard. I don't think it didn't belong there. It nailed in the idiot part of my brain the "see? other people have problems like that. Know people like that. Are treated that way, too. It's not that there's something wrong with you, intrinsically. Just a dash of rotten luck and collapsing in on yourself in the aftermath." It took it seriously, in a context that meshed with my brain to where I felt like "yeah, that's. That's at least. How I felt. Pretty much. When I was treated like that. Brushed it off and turned it into jokes, too." I don't wanna get into all the nitty gritty details, because they aren't pretty and I still have to contend with it. But it felt kinda... mmm, I don't know, like when I saw so many people shitting on it - saying it doesn't belong, in fact, this should never be portrayed, it's immoral to portray this and so on. I have such a warped view of... the topic, I guess? But I mean, it did help me contextualize a few things better that I've been struggling to. And I found a lot of comfort in that uncomfortable scene because of that. And... like, I know I have a... how do I phrase it, like a... not... normal view? Since I... like, was kinda... I mean. Like. I. I don't know. I mean I know. I just. You know. But I don't know, like. I feel nervous talking about it, because of the media property it's related to and how strongly people feel about it. And, I mean, I know the healthy answer is to just be "fuck it, you're allowed" but I guess I just think back to all the times things I liked/cared about were shit on and feel like "Should... I feel... guilty? Because I kinda do. And I don't think I should. But maybe I should? Is there something to it or... something that I don't get?" and yeah this is about Angel Dust in Hazbin Hotel. yeah this is the character story that got me to (even with the pilot/songs) try to actually tackle this shit 'cuz I still can't get myself to physically talk about these things irl. and. idk. its. mm. its hard to really feel like im. i just. i dont talk about it much at all 'cuz i dont wanna annoy people if they hate the show 'n stuff 'cuz i know ppl feel strongly and. yeah. so i over explained it because a part of me wanted to express a kinda... happiness that a story got me to think better about myself. and i dont. understand why there's so many like. snap judgments or vitriol, i guess.

[antiquegeometry-blog]

SHELLY

 by

William Buck

  Shelly Megford pushed several items aside to keep from tripping: a mother of pearl comb, a rusted pump handle; a bronze spittoon. She glanced at the spittoon; it sat timidly in a corner, its gold and soiled tincture rusting peacefully. That’s the way it is around here, she thought – the gold and soiled nature of things. The place was nothing much to look at. A concrete floor, busted windows, and a cracked ceiling were all that sheltered a fantastic array of objects: old chandeliers, discarded computers, broken appliances, unobtrusive spittoons – and bath tubs. Especially bath tubs. A bathtub beneath every window, a bathtub beside every door. Bathtubs in the corners, bathtubs against the walls. For this was Shelly’s primary business, the restoration of antique bathtubs, the kind that sat on their own four feet and had a single drain at the bottom. And were even heavier than they looked. She had developed some muscle, Shelly had, by lugging those porcelain beasts around.

           She was a handsome, broad shouldered woman in her mid-twenties, with short cropped brown hair and hazel-green eyes. They were hunter’s eyes, clear and far seeing, always on the lookout for a restorable antique. Her employer Old Ed (as he was called by everyone) had started the antique store with his wife Brenda, who had died of cancer two years ago. Now it was just Old Ed, in the front helping customers, and Shelly in the back: sanding, painting, and hammering anything that fell in front of her. Now it was true that, if everything were added up and squared, Shelly’s income came to something like three dollars an hour. However, she did not feel poor. This was partly due to the fact that she had always been poor. Born in rural south Texas to a mentally disturbed mother and a father who made his money gambling and breeding game hens, Shelly’s childhood had been without frills, to say the least. Her mother had been institutionalized by her sixth birthday; her earliest years had been spent traveling with her father from one clandestine chicken fight to another. Her father had taught her the rudiments of math in his gambling forays, and she had, for the most part, taught herself to read by struggling over the contents of magazines with the titles “Feathered Warrior” and “Fighting Rooster”. So by necessity the unvarnished brutalities of life were things taken for granted, although not for that reason excused.

           Scant – that was the word for her childhood. There never seemed to be much of anything at hand. If she wanted something, she had to figure out a way to get it herself, or do without. She learned how to cook and how to prepare poultry while traveling with her father. From one secretive, vicious cockfight to the next they roamed: young Shelly, her eyes on the lookout, would scoop up the vanquished chicken, pluck it, and then cook the parts in a warm soup. She learned which vegetables were good and what their tops looked like; sneaking away during the thick of the gambling, Shelly would forage through the gardens of the farms where such events were often held, gathering sometimes almost a week’s worth of salad. The same with clothes. She had perfected the rag picker’s art of searching: under the metal bleachers, clinging to broken chicken wire, behind a makeshift

bar she would find them, useful pieces of clothing. But of course, the types of affairs where clothing was sometimes left – where her father was known as master of the ring – were always attended by men. Men who labored for a living, either on a farm or construction site. Shelly cut and stitched the clothes to fit her small frame, although it was soon obvious that she would have a robust build – making her even more likely to be mistaken for a boy.

           From her father she had learned the ability to extemporize, and to notice the small signs that betrayed the desperation of men. Important abilities, for no gambler had ever prospered without them. Her mother had been removed from her life when she was too young to remember much of anything. When memories occurred to her it was usually during sleep, as disturbing and vague dreams that passed like summer storms, leaving her tired and irritable. Gary Megford’s attitude toward his daughter was one of indifference, if not negligence. She was just a part of his game, a stray pet that no one bothered to run off. Even so, she tagged along, watching, scrounging, not really talking to anyone. Since most everyone thought she was a boy, and most everyone she encountered  was either a gambler or a fugitive, or a laborer starting over or one just beginning, no one payed her much attention.

           Things began to change, however. It had been the morning after a round robin  series of cockfights that had left six roosters dead and one of the local cowhands stabbed, though not fatally. Shelly had just turned twelve. She was bathing with her father in a local waterfall when the sunlight caught her at a special angle. Her father noticed that her breasts were becoming pear shaped, and she had pink, firm nipples. He rubbed his chin, a worried expression crossing his face. Later that night, during a break in a pit bull fight, her father called her over.

           “Hey there, Shelly. You know what?”

           “What daddy?”

           “You know we cotton to some pretty rough characters around here. There’s people here that don’t really care about things … It’s just as well that nobody knows you’re a girl. Some of these fellers could give us some real trouble. You understand what I’m tryin’ to tell ya?”

           “Yes, daddy.”

           Earlier that evening he had been gambling with two ex-felons, and had come out on top with three Jacks. A thought had occurred to him.

           “Your mama named you Shelly, and I loved her sure enough. But I’m gonna give you a nick name, it’s what I’ll be calling you from now on around people. Your name is Trey. Okay Trey? You hear me on this one?”

           “Okay.”

           This seemed to work out and her father ceased worrying about her. He would call out to her “Hey Trey, can you bring us some sodas over here?” and it seemed to her that it was a good enough name to be called. Shelly and her father could have possibly wandered on like this for a very long time, had Gary Megford not killed a police officer.

           It began during a dog fight on a ranch near El Paso, Texas. He had made arrangements with the land owner to run two fights: one between pit bulls at 10 p.m. and the other a cockfight at midnight. There had been heavy gambling, and drinking, from start to finish. Beside the makeshift bar, he was sitting with five other gamblers playing poker. Shelly had just turned thirteen; he had bought her a pair of teal maracas that she shook as she walked about. The men called out to her as she walked by.

           “Hey Trey, you worked today?” one of them said.

           “You fixing to start a mariachi band?” asked another.

           “Could you bring us another round of beer over here Trey?” her father asked.

           “Okay.”

           One of the men rubbed his nose. “That boy smells a little flowery,” he said.

           “Aw hell,” her father said. “I’d rather him smell like a flower than a puppy’s butt.”

           There were a group of cowhands that had come down from a private ranch near McConnaly, all of them either fifteen or sixteen. One of them kept looking at Shelly. As she walked to the back of the bar he followed her. There was no permanent latrine, only a square side of boarding that you walked behind. It was set on stakes and there was about a foot clearance from the ground. Shelly walked behind it and pulled her pants down and clear of one leg. As she squatted above the ground the boy fell to his side and looked under the boarding. A vigorous stream of clear urine shot from between her thighs and onto the soft dirt.

           “Yip!” he shouted and rolled away. He went to the other boys and told them. Shelly thought that she had heard something, maybe a opossum or some other rodent. She placed the beer bottles on a round serving tray and carried them to the gamblers. The boys were farther out, in the dark of the trees, discussing it. One of them had a rope in his truck.

           “I don’t know,” one of the boys was saying. “She looks really young.” He had just turned fifteen himself.

           “My daddy always said if it’s old enough to bleed, it’s old enough to breed. And I believe him”

           “But has she had one yet? And besides, your daddy is doing life up state.”

           “So’s yours! Hey, if you don’t want some of this, just get on now.”

           “No he aint’. Thirty years, and he’ll be out in fifteen if he don’t start fightin.”

           The other boy paused to consider this. Meanwhile Gary Megford had wandered away from the table during a break in the playing. He was rubbing his thumb on a pair of steel rooster spurs. The night in heavy heat; the air a canopy of haze. He stopped for a moment, listening. He could hear the voices of boys in the distance, and although he could not make out the individual words, he could tell by the rushed tone that they were working themselves up to do something bad. He walked slowly and quietly in their direction. What lighting there was came from an old outdoor generator, all he could see were dim shadows in the trees. He could now see their faces. Shelly was over by the bar, and he could see one of the boys pointing to her and talking to the others. He walked up from behind and tapped him on the shoulder.

           When the boy turned around Megford’s left arm shot upward under the boy’s right arm pit, lifting him up on one foot. His right hand held the spur and it was pushing up directly under the boy’s testicles. The boy could feel a trickle of blood coming from them. He realized that only the slightest bit more pressure would result in the spur impaling his scrotum.

           Shelly had noticed her father walking and turned in that direction to meet him. She walked up behind them and from that angle it appeared as if her father had the boy in a friendly although awkward embrace. She could hear him saying “and I’ll turn you into one of ‘em if I see you around here again.”

           He dropped the boy and she watched as he reached for the pistol he always carried in his belt loop. They all turned and ran however, not interested in anything further, jumping into their trucks and speeding away into the night.

           “Is everything alright daddy?”

           “Sure is Trey. Hey, how about you getting us some of that watermelon? I’ll be over in a bit.”

           “Okay.”

           As the boys sped away from the encampment they passed a county police car that was parked along the side of the road. The sheriff’s department had been tipped off to the fights and had a unit on every road leading out. Soon their rear view mirrors were filled with rotating lights, the sound of sirens filling the air. Under police questioning the boys claimed that they had thought it was going to be a Holy Ghost revival. They had come to see a sermon and were greeted with the spectacle of animal fights. They had been given a strongly flavored punch, they said, that they were unaware contained alcohol. They would have left earlier but were afraid that they would be followed.

           The police were talking to each other on their radios. They didn’t have warrants, and were unsure what the best course of action would be. One of them had a suggestion.

           “Hey what about that new guy? You know the undercover. Is he still up?”

           The sheriff was now on the radio. “He’s on call. Yeah, that’s not a bad idea. We’ll send him in, maybe he’ll just happen onto something.”  

           He was at the station eating a bologna sandwich and watching a Netflix special on topless dancers when the call came. He didn’t really understand at first, except that he was going out somewhere to investigate. It was three in the morning. The area was just off a turn in the creek that he was familiar with. He was sweating as he walked toward the encampment, the night was humid. As he approached he suddenly remembered that he had forgotten his vest.

           He walked slowly forward, watching as cars and trucks were driving off. It was all shutting down. He began to feel the onset of panic. He couldn’t go back though, he had to prove his worth to the department. He walked by the table of gamblers, now half sleeping in a drunken stupor. One of them muttered in his sleep.

           “Take it out on the man, not his vehicle,” he was saying. “Bust those teeth out, gouge out that eye. But don’t scratch that fender.”

           Another one seemed to mutter in drunken reply “Fender bender.”

           He walked on, his sense of panic increasing. Yes, he had just started the new job, but was it worth his life? His legs felt weak, and his chest pulpy, as if it had gained in mass. There was only one light on as he approached the bar. He had pulled his handgun and was holding it out in front of him like a flashlight. In the money room behind the bar Megford had all of the evening’s take stacked in neat rows, almost ten thousand dollars. The door was open, faint lantern light leaking outward. The undercover rounded a corner and noticed it.

           He stepped to the entrance and looked in. What he saw were dozens of knives, gaffes, spurs, and other cutting objects. The studded collars of fighting dogs hung from the wall, and several piles of cash lay stacked on a wooden table. And right beside them lay a sawed-off 12 gauge shotgun. He took one look at Megford’s weathered and stark features and fired.

           In the top corners of the room small mirrors were mounted to reflect the doorway and the hallway outside. Megford had looked up and saw the undercover stepping to the doorway. He was already dipping low when the shot was fired. He grabbed the 12 gauge as he turned and squeezed the trigger - both hammers were cocked. The blast dislodged the undercover’s intestines and his appendix flew free and flopped upon the ground. It ruptured, spilling a river of poison.

           Megford kicked it across the room. “That’s my opinion on the matter,” he said.      He was wondering how he was going to present this to the police. He got down on one knee and began searching the man’s clothing, pressing against his shirt. Megford’s fingers closed upon the plastic identification card. He held the police officer’s law enforcement credentials up to the lantern.

           In the absence of light there are no distinctions. For there is no advent or hope for those whose souls are predestined to the hollow pit and darkness. Best to have never been born than to endure this thoughtless and merciless charade.

           It was the end of the trail, he knew. The police caught up with them less than a day later, at a diner north of Abilene. They were sitting in his truck, eating hamburgers and fries. The police ordered Megford to exit with his hands on his head. He was trying to say his goodbyes.

           “Look Shelly, I’m not going to be seeing you much anymore. I just want to say … there are some people who feel that it’s best to have never been born. I was one of them. But being able to be with you these last few years, just sort of walking around and seeing things through your eyes – it was worth it.”

           They enrolled her in the state school. The cafeteria guard in charge of orientation wore netting over the tight bun of her hair. She was scrolling down a computer screen of names.

           “Shelly Megford. Do you go by Shelly?”

           “No ma’am. I have a nickname. Trey.”

           The guard scratched at her hair. “Tray? Like a cafeteria tray?”

           “No ma’am, like in cards, a Trey of hearts.”

Available on Kindle/Amazon by William Buck:

Relic Of Peril: A Novel

The Mermaids & Other St