#like intersecting lines.... to intersect only at one point and then diverge never to meet again....

[soranker]

What’s the biggest emotional gut punch you’ve ever gotten from a show?

AHH i wish i had a good answer for this but i havent watched a lot of shows lately and im wracking my brain to remember if i had a strong reaction like that to anything i've watched in the past... ive def watched sad stuff that hit me in the heart but not enough to feel like a gut punch......

BAHA ok this gonna sound predictable but fr when i got to the end of volume 10 of trigun maximum i stopped reading for a couple of days LMFAOO T_T maybe even a week. i just reread that same chapter over and over again for a while lol

[unfolded73]

My Heartbeat Shows the Fear (2/4) - schitt’s creek ff

Summary: A canon divergent story: Patrick gets into a car accident and it brings the Brewers to town sooner.

Notes: This fic will be posted in 4 chapters, every other day. There is some description of injuries, but nothing too graphic or life-threatening.

The title is from “Overkill” by Colin Hay, which thanks to the show Scrubs puts me in mind of hospitals.

Thank you to Amanita_Fierce for putting so much time and thought into betaing this fic - you made it so, so much better. And thanks also to @high-seas-swan for some helpful suggestions, particularly on that one scene that I tore apart and rewrote.

Rated Teen, this chapter 5714 words. (ao3)

Chapter 1

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Chapter 2

Patrick first became aware of a constant, irritating beeping noise. He blinked his eyes open, his eyelashes crusty with sleep. Oh right, he thought as he took in his surroundings. He was in the hospital. It seemed like no time at all had passed since they told him that he was supposed to go into surgery for his arm. Was the surgery already over?

He looked down and saw his arm enclosed in bandages and a splint. Guess that's a yes to the surgery, he thought. The pain he remembered when he’d regained consciousness after the accident was gone, fortunately, numbed by what he assumed were some powerful drugs. He would have almost preferred some pain to this complete numbness.

Patrick had thought of himself as pretty unflappable when it came to getting injured — as a teen he’d suffered cuts that needed stitches more than once, and the sight of his own blood hadn��t really phased him. Once he’d suffered a ligament tear and knee dislocation playing hockey, and the sight of his leg bending the wrong way had been pretty grisly, but he’d still managed to joke around with his coach while he was being carried off the ice on a stretcher. None of that compared to the sight of his own broken bone protruding through the skin of his arm. That had triggered a visceral reaction, a deep, inborn knowledge from his hindbrain that screamed: this is very wrong! The paramedic in the ambulance had covered it with a bandage to keep any more dirt from getting into the wound, mercifully shielding it from Patrick’s eyes. The pain had been intense, though. ”He’s in shock,” he remembered the paramedic saying as he swam in a viscous soup of cold sweat and nausea and agony.

Catching movement out of the corner of his eye, he looked over to his right side and saw David sleeping on the pull-out sleeper chair in the corner of the room. He was still in his clothes, but he’d taken his shoes off and lined them up neatly next to the chair. The sight of David’s shoes brought a swell of emotion to Patrick’s chest.

“David,” he said. His voice was raspy, and he was suddenly aware of how thirsty he was. “David,” he repeated, louder.

David started up, lines on his cheek from the pillow under his face and his hair sticking up on one side. It made Patrick want to hug him.

“You okay? Need me to call a nurse?” David asked.

“No. Is there water?”

David nodded, standing up and grabbing a cup with a bendy straw off of a small rolling table. He brought it over, carefully directing the straw so that Patrick could take it in his mouth and suck down some of the water. It made him feel uniquely helpless, being tended to like this.

“How long have you been here? What time is it?” Patrick asked.

David glanced at the clock. “It’s 2:30 in the morning.” He pulled his sleeper chair closer and sat on it, taking Patrick’s right hand in his.

Patrick frowned. “How long was the surgery?”

“A couple of hours. Do you not remember when they brought you out of recovery?” David asked, the first hint of a smile that Patrick had seen flitting over his face.

“No. The last thing I remember was them prepping me for surgery,” Patrick said.

Now David almost laughed. “In your defense, you were very high when you first came out of anesthesia.”

“What did I say?”

“Well, you swore a lot, which was very out of character. And you said I was handsome several times.”

“You are handsome,” Patrick said with a smile.

“And now all of your nurses know it.” David squeezed his hand.

“I’m sorry I don’t remember that.” It sounded embarrassing, but he still would have liked to see a video of it — of himself high as a kite and gushing about his sexy boyfriend to anyone within earshot. He squeezed David’s hand back.

“Mm, don’t be. You threw up and you kept saying your ears were ringing and I might’ve gotten a bit… testy… with one of the nurses when she said it wasn’t anything to worry about.”

“My hero,” Patrick sighed fondly.

“How are you feeling now?”

Patrick tried to assess how he was feeling. He had flashes of more memories — agonizing pain when he was in the ambulance and when they put in him the CT machine, but now there was little more than a dull ache. “Not bad, actually.”

“Yeah, you’re on the really good drugs,” David said, pointing up to an IV bag. “Morphine, I’m pretty sure. Also some antibiotics, but it’s the morphine that’s relevant here.”

“That explains it.” Patrick lifted his uninjured arm and tried to smooth down David’s unruly hair. “Thanks for staying here with me.”

“They would have had to drag me out of here,” David said, his voice cracking with emotion. “You scared me.”

“I’m sorry.”

“It wasn’t your fault; it was the other driver’s fault.” David reached up and stroked a hand over Patrick’s forehead and cheek. “Do you remember the accident?”

Frowning, Patrick tried to probe his memories, and while he did so the automated blood pressure cuff around his arm filled up, squeezing his bicep almost to the point of pain before exhaling in a long hiss. “Not the impact. I remember flashes of being extracted from my car and put in an ambulance. Some stuff from when they first brought me in here.” He looked down at his arm. “I remember my arm looking really not good.”

David winced. “Yeah. Well, look at it this way: you’ll probably have a very manly scar when all this is over.”

“The car,” Patrick said. “I had all the products from the Mennonite farms in the car.” He knew insurance would cover the losses, but he still felt a stab of guilt that he’d caused some of their precious merchandise to be lost. It would take time to replace, time during which they couldn’t earn any money from the sales. He wanted to kick himself for not watching more closely at that intersection. He’d seen someone run that stoplight before. He should have been more careful.

Shaking his head, David said, “It doesn’t matter.”

“David—”

“Let me worry about it,” David said.

“You should go home and get some sleep.”

‘Not a chance. Besides, Alexis drove me here and I sent her home a while ago, so you’re stuck with me until she comes back in the morning.” He lifted Patrick’s hand to his mouth and kissed the knuckles. David’s eyes were suspiciously wet. “Also I may never let you out of my sight again.”

“I love you,” Patrick said.

“I love you more,” David replied, “as evidenced by me sleeping on this thing.” He pointed at the sleeper chair. “It makes me long for my bed at the motel.”

Patrick felt an itch between his shoulder blades, and shifted his body in an attempt to scratch it. A spike of pain shot through his side. Broken ribs, he remembered. Right. “Ow.” He chuckled uneasily. “This is going to put a real damper on our sex life.”

David leaned over and kissed his cheek. “Why don’t you try to get some more sleep? Your parents are going to be here in the morning.”

“My… what?”

His face cracking into a yawn, David answered, “I called your parents while you were in surgery. It seemed serious enough that they needed to know.”

Patrick’s heart began to race, which unfortunately he could hear echoed in beeps from the machines behind him. David noticed too, his eyes flicking up briefly to the monitors before looking back at Patrick’s face. Mind racing, Patrick tried to sit up, and another lightning bolt of pain kept him from executing that maneuver. “What did… what did you say?”

“That you’d been in a car accident and your arm was being operated on.” David’s face betrayed his confusion. “Patrick, I know you’re not super close with your parents but they needed to know that you’d been hospitalized.”

“Yeah, I know, but… David.” This was the worst case scenario, the thing that he’d hoped to avoid David ever knowing. If he could have just gotten up the courage to tell his parents the half dozen times he’d almost managed it, then David would never have had to know that he wasn’t out to them. That he was keeping his relationship with David a secret.

Well, there was no hiding it now. Patrick looked up at the ceiling and closed his eyes, steeling himself, before meeting David's concerned gaze. “I have to tell you something.”

David frowned. “What is it?”

“I’ve… I haven’t told my parents about the fact that we’re… together. I’m not out to them.”

“Oh.”

Patrick winced at the hurt on David’s face. “I wanted to tell them, I did, but then I didn’t go home for Christmas, and it’s just hard to… I don’t know how to say it, over the phone. I can’t get the words out.” He swallowed around a lump in his throat. “David, I’m sorry—”

“Mm mm, no. Don’t apologize.” David squeezed his hand and then kissed his fingers again, his facial expression difficult to read. The hurt wasn’t in evidence anymore, but perhaps because David was doing a better job of hiding it. “Coming out is very personal, and it’s something you should only do on your terms. Okay?” His mouth slanted to the side. “That’s why I brought this couple home from college one time and just told my parents to deal with it.”

Patrick chuckled in relief at the way David was trying to lighten the mood, but just as quickly his guilt rushed back to the surface. “I’m not ashamed of you, David. I promise I’m not.”

David’s lips quirked up. “Yes, that was obvious from the way you talked to the nurses about me when you were high.” He cleared his throat, sitting up straighter. “When your parents get here, I can just be… your business partner.”

His gut instinct was to say no. That wasn’t fair to David, or to what they meant to each other. But then he imagined it, lying here in a hospital bed, in pain and a little bit high on opiates, his arm in a splint, looking up at his parents towering over him and telling them he was gay. That he and David were boyfriends. It was an agonizing mental picture.

“Maybe… maybe just for tomorrow?” Patrick asked in a small voice. He sounded pathetic to his own ears. He looked up at the IV bag. “For one thing, I’d prefer to be sober when I do the whole coming out speech.” It was an attempt at a joke, but it wasn’t untrue. He didn’t feel like he was in any kind of mental shape to talk to his parents about his sexual orientation or his relationship with David right now.

Patrick couldn’t help but notice that David had pulled away from him a little bit, but he still had an encouraging smile plastered on his face. “That makes total sense. Don’t worry about that for right now. Just focus on healing, okay?”

Patrick reached out, putting his hand around David’s neck and pulling him in for a kiss. “I love you,” he whispered against David’s lips. “So much.”

David gave his shoulder a little pat when he pulled away. “Let’s try to get some more sleep, okay?”

“Yeah.” Patrick felt exhausted from just the half hour he’d been awake. “Okay.”

He watched as David resettled himself on the sleeper chair, twisting and turning before finally settling down and facing the wall. When Patrick finally fell asleep, his last vision was of David’s back, his shoulders rising and falling with his breath.

~*~

When the Lincoln pulled up in front of the hospital, David was outside waiting for it. He’d spent the rest of the night tossing and turning, noticing every time Patrick shifted in his fitful sleep, and then was woken for good at six in the morning when a new nurse came on shift and stopped in to check Patrick’s vitals and replace his IV bag. Patrick, meanwhile, was in more pain than when he’d awoken the first time, and he was in a mood to match. Alexis finally called to say she was ten minutes away, so David kissed Patrick’s cheek and told him he’d be back later and escaped.

He felt grimy, still in yesterday’s clothes, aware of his own body odor in a way that he absolutely despised. He walked over quickly to the car, wrenching the door open and collapsing into the seat.

“How’s Patrick?”

“Awake and coherent and cranky,” David said. “I told the nurse he needed to up his morphine, but they don’t listen to me.” He tilted his head back against the headrest and closed his eyes.

“You’re so sweet to stay by his bedside all night, David.”

He whipped his head around, looking for a sign that his sister was making fun of him, but her face was impassive as she concentrated on driving.

“Well, I couldn’t just let him wake up alone in the hospital. Can you imagine?”

“Yes, it happened to me in Singapore,” she said. “Also in Portugal, I think it was? Anyway. I’m glad he’s okay.”

“His arm is being held together with bandages and pieces of plastic and he’s in a lot of pain, but sure. He’s right as rain.”

“Maybe you shouldn’t have left then,” Alexis said.

David gestured emphatically down at his clothes. “If I can’t get out of these clothes and into a shower soon, then I might literally have a panic attack.” He turned and looked out the window at the passing fields. “Besides, his parents will be here in about an hour, his mom said.”

“Meeting the parents, David!” Alexis said, and he turned in time to see her execute an exaggerated series of blinks that seemed dangerous to do behind the wheel of a car. “I guess you do want to be freshly showered for that.”

He huffed. “I have to open the store this morning. I’ll meet them later.”

“David, no,” Alexis gasped, “you should go back to the hospital. Stevie and I can cover the store for a few hours. I talked to her about it when I got back last night.”

“I can go back tonight after work. His parents will be there with him,” David said, his stomach in knots, exhaustion weighing heavy on his limbs.

“Why are you being weird?”

“I’m not.”

“Yes, you are, David.”

Sighing, David rocked his head back to knock against the headrest several times. “Patrick’s not out to his parents. They don’t know we’re together.”

Alexis bared her teeth like that Chrissy Teigen meme. “Oh, David. Yikes.”

“I know. So being at the hospital means that I have to pretend to just be his business partner, and I don’t know if I have the emotional fortitude to do that right now when he almost died yesterday.” He turned and stared out the window again. “Can we not talk about it anymore?”

Alexis didn’t say anything, but she reached over and patted his shoulder in what he guessed was supposed to be sympathy. They drove the rest of the way back to Schitt’s Creek in silence.

By the time David was showered and dressed and had his hair in order, he felt almost human, and he was resigned to not seeing Patrick again until the evening. He stepped out into his and Alexis’s room only to see Alexis and Stevie standing there between the beds. They turned to him and folded their arms, determined looks on their faces.

He pulled up short, indignant. “What?”

“We’re going to look after the store for you,” Stevie said flatly. “You are going back to the hospital.”

“Patrick needs you, David,” Alexis said.

“Patrick doesn’t need me lurking around, making his parents wonder why his business partner is being so emotional,” David said, turning to the mirror and probing gently at the skin under his eyes. His lack of sleep was painfully obvious on his face.

“I’m sure he’ll tell his parents once he’s gotten his bearings. But in the meantime, he needs to know you’re standing by him,” Stevie said.

“That is a lot of sincere emotion coming out of your mouth, Stevie. Did you hit your head?”

“Fuck off,” Stevie said.

“You could also go by Patrick’s apartment and pick up some of his stuff,” Alexis said. “If he’s going to be stuck in the hospital, he’s going to need some comfy pajamas, and some changes of underwear. And a book or something.”

Okay, even David had to admit that was a good idea. He blew out a breath and crossed his arms, mirroring Stevie. “Are you sure you can handle the store?”

“Ugh, David, we’ve done it before,” Alexis said, stomping her foot. “Now go!” she said, shooing him out the door.

“Wait, I need you to do something else for me,” he said. “Can you contact the police and find out where his car was taken? I need to see if any of the things in it are salvageable.”

Stevie nodded. “We’ll take care of it.”

He made a quick stop at the apartment and packed a duffel bag for Patrick: pajamas, a pair of jeans and a t-shirt, underwear, a book from Patrick’s nightstand, and his toiletries from the bathroom. He packed Patrick’s phone charger, although he wasn’t sure if his phone had survived the crash. He started to put in Patrick’s favorite hoodie, but then he remembered that Patrick might not be able to get anything long-sleeved over his arm. Instead he grabbed the afghan from the back of the sofa, figuring that would have to do if Patrick was chilly in his hospital room.

The nurse at the front desk of Patrick’s floor recognized him, waving him through. It occurred to him that after yesterday, one of the nurses could inadvertently out Patrick to his parents.

David’s first impression of Patrick’s parents was of blue sweaters. I guess that’s where Patrick gets it, David thought as he hesitated in the doorway to Patrick’s room. The Brewers were standing by his bedside, his mother touching the top of his head affectionately. It was a perfect family tableau that he was loath to interrupt, but he couldn’t exactly linger in the hall all morning.

“Hey,” he said, stepping hesitantly into the room. “I’m David Rose,” he said by way of introducing himself. His eyes drank Patrick in, cataloging again the small cuts on his face. His instincts told him to go over to Patrick, to touch him, but he couldn’t do that now. Instead he stood awkwardly at the foot of the bed like an alien who didn’t know how to exist in the presence of humans.

“David! I’m Clint Brewer,” Patrick’s father said, holding a hand out for David to shake. David shifted his bag over to the other arm and suffered the overly firm handshake Clint gave him.

“And I’m Marcy. David, thank you for calling us last night.”

“Of course.” He turned to Patrick. “I went by your apartment and packed some…” He panicked. Was knowing where Patrick kept his things a tell? I mean, it wasn’t a big apartment; he probably could have figured it out even if he wasn’t over there all the time. “Some stuff for you.”

Patrick gave him a fond look. “Thanks.”

David fixated on the least intimate thing in the bag. “I grabbed your phone charger, but then I wasn’t sure if you even have your phone.”

“Yeah, I have no idea where it is. Still in the car, probably, and who knows where that is.”

“Stevie is looking into it,” David said.

“Thank goodness Patrick has you, David,” Marcy said, holding her hands out for the bag, so David surrendered it to her.

David met Patrick’s eyes, and then quickly looked away. “I’m just trying to be a nice person, Mrs. Brewer.”

Patrick snorted, suppressing a laugh.

A doctor David hadn’t seen before breezed into the room and picked up Patrick’s chart. “How are we feeling today, Mr. Brewer?” he said as his eyes scanned over the chart.

“Like I got hit by a truck,” Patrick muttered.

The doctor moved over toward Patrick’s injured side, forcing David to step out of the way. He watched with morbid fascination, unable to avert his eyes, as the doctor examined Patrick’s arm, then his side where presumably his broken ribs were. David caught a glimpse of terribly bruised skin under Patrick’s hospital gown, and he flinched. Pain was evident on Patrick’s face.

“No sign of infection; that’s what we are concerned with most with this kind of injury, so that’s a great sign,” the doctor said. He then checked Patrick’s pupils and asked him a few questions, making some notes before clicking his pen and putting it away. “Did they explain the surgery to you yesterday, Mr. Brewer?”

Patrick nodded. “Sure. That it had to be done quickly to prevent infection.”

“Right. We did what’s called an open reduction and internal fixation in this case. Metal rods were inserted which will allow your bone to fully heal.”

“Metal rods?” David asked, and then worried about how worried he sounded. Business partners shouldn’t sound so worried, he thought.

“How about that, you’ll get to set off the machine every time you fly,” Clint said, trying to lighten the mood.

“It’s routine,” the surgeon said, putting Patrick’s chart back on its hook. “If you continue to show no sign of infection tomorrow and the wound is healing well, we’ll go ahead and put a cast on it so that you’ll be able to move more freely.”

“Am I going to regain full use of my arm? I play baseball and—”

“And guitar,” David interjected, his stomach queasy at the idea that Patrick might never be able to play again.

The surgeon smiled. “Well, you’ll definitely be on the disabled list for the rest of the season, but there’s no reason that with a little bit of rehab you won’t be able to do everything you’re used to doing after a few months.” He gave Patrick a corny thumbs-up gesture. “Okay?”

“Yeah,” Patrick said. “How much longer before I can go home?”

“Well, that’s for the attending physician to decide, but I’d say tomorrow is a distinct possibility.”

“Thank you so much,” Marcy said as the surgeon gave them a wave and rushed out of the room as quickly as he’d rushed in.

David wasn’t sure what to do. There was no reason for him to stay now that he’d delivered Patrick’s belongings, and if he did stay, Patrick’s parents would probably wonder why.

“Is the store closed?” Patrick asked him. He had dark circles under bloodshot eyes, David noticed. He could probably use some more sleep.

“No, Alexis and Stevie are there,” David said.

“That’s your sister, and…” Clint asked.

“And my best friend.”

“Well, it’s very nice of them to help out,” Marcy said.

“Yeah.” David fidgeted with the hem of his sweater. “So I should go…”

“Do you have a hotel booked here in Elmdale?” Patrick asked his father.

“Not yet; we came straight here. I guess we need to find a place before we collapse,” Clint replied.

“Actually, I had an idea,” Marcy said, “if you don’t mind, sweetheart.”

“What?” Patrick asked.

“One thing you’re going to need when you get out of the hospital is food that’s easy to heat up. I was thinking we could stay at your apartment and I could use the kitchen to make you some meals and fill up your freezer before you get home.”

“Mom, you don’t have to do that—”

“Patrick, I want to. There isn’t a lot we can do to help, but I can at least do that.”

Patrick looked at David, and all David could do was shrug. It sounded like a good idea, actually, but he could also think of a few reasons why Patrick wouldn’t necessarily want his parents spending time unsupervised in his apartment.

“I can take them to your place, and… straighten things up.” David said, looking at Patrick pointedly to make sure he understood his meaning.

“Oh, we don’t care how messy it is,” Marcy said. “Don’t trouble yourself.”

“No, that’s a good idea,” Patrick said.

“It’s no trouble,” David added. “It’s on my way back to work. You can follow me in your car.”

“Thanks, David,” Clint said, clapping him on the back.

“Is there anything else we can do for you this morning, sweetheart?” Marcy was still at Patrick’s side, stroking his hair. David felt a stab of jealousy that he couldn’t stroke Patrick’s hair right now. Or kiss him.

“No, I’m good. I’m just going to get some more sleep, I think,” Patrick said.

“I… um… brought the afghan from your apartment.” David gestured toward the duffel. He wanted to spread it over Patrick’s legs, to tuck him in securely, but instead he stood to the side and watched Patrick’s mother doing it. Then he had to settle for a little wave as the three of them left Patrick’s hospital room.

“I’m just going to run to the restroom before we go,” David said, already pulling out his phone before he’d cleared the door to the men’s room.

911, he texted to Stevie. Need you to go to Patrick’s apartment and remove any evidence of our relationship IMMEDIATELY. There’s a spare key in the top drawer of the desk in the back of the store.

Stevie: why?

David: I’m bringing the Brewers over there. We’ll be there in 40 minutes.

Stevie: check. what should i be on the lookout for?

David: Photos, mainly. And there’s a shelf with some of my clothes on it.

He groaned to himself and then added, Make sure we didn’t leave lube out anywhere. Like the bedside table or on the floor next to the bed.

Stevie: gross. if I have to pick up a used condom, you’re going to pay.

David: What kind of animal do you think I am??? Although maybe also empty the trash. Thanks, I owe you.

She didn’t respond to that, but he’d have to assume she’d get the job done.

Stevie dispatched on her errand of subterfuge, he returned to find the Brewers in the lobby. “I’ll be driving an enormous black boat of a car; you can’t miss it,” David said to them as they walked out into the sunshine.

Once they were on the road, David’s attention bounced from the road to his speedometer to his rearview, making sure the Brewers were still behind him. By the time they got to Patrick’s apartment building, he was a tight ball of tension.

He had a text from Stevie waiting for him when he picked his phone up and looked at it. mission accomplished. who needs that many kinds of lube? im mentally scarred and also very curious.

“This seems like a nice neighborhood,” Marcy said, looking around.

David thought about the recycling bin he’d seen a couple of times outside the building that was full to overflowing with liquor bottles, and about the couple downstairs who had screaming fights on Saturday nights, but didn’t think either of those were anecdotes he should tell, particularly because they would indicate how much time David had spent in Patrick’s apartment already. Instead he just agreed noncommittally as he led them up the stairs.

It was only as he stuck his key in the lock that he realized that having Patrick’s spare key was one thing, but having it on his key ring with his keys to the store and his room key at the motel was quite another. He winced as he opened the door, hoping they hadn’t noticed.

“So this is Patrick’s place,” he said unnecessarily, his eyes straying to the mantel and then to the desk. Stevie had done her job — the photos of him were gone. His eyes raked over the shelving next to the bed and zeroed in on the shelf where he’d had a couple of sweaters and a pair of jeans. It was empty.

“It’s not very big, is it?” Clint laughed. “But Patrick never has been someone who kept a lot of things.”

David wanted to agree vehemently — the only reason the apartment didn’t look much more spartan was David’s influence — but he bit the inside of his cheek and nodded. “So here’s the key,” he said, unclipping it from his keyring and handing it over. So much for not drawing attention to his key ring, he thought. “There’s a grocery store, Brebner’s, that’s not far away. And you can get fresh produce at our store,” he added, which made Marcy’s eyes light up. “I should change the sheets for you,” he said, turning to the bed.

“We can do that, David. You don’t have to trouble yourself.”

“Nope! It’s no trouble,” he said, and he knew he sounded manic, but there was no way on God’s green Earth he was going to let Patrick’s mother touch the sheets that were currently on Patrick’s bed. “I help my friend Stevie change sheets at the motel sometimes,” he said as he quickly stripped the bed. “I’m very good at it.”

“Oh, Patrick mentioned the open mic nights,” Clint said, pointing at the framed poster on the wall. “Did you know he used to play at an open mic night in high school?”

David finished stuffing the dirty sheets into the hamper and grabbed a clean set from the shelf. “Mm hmm, he mentioned that.”

“I’m glad he’s picked it back up. I think he’d stopped playing guitar for a while before things ended with—” Marcy stopped herself, like it just occurred to her that she maybe shouldn’t be gossiping about her son’s past love life with his business partner.

“Rachel?” David supplied as he stretched the fitted sheet out over the mattress. Marcy came over and grabbed the other side, looking relieved.

“I wasn’t sure if you knew about that,” she said, putting her corners of the sheet on as David did the same on the other side.

He nodded, remembering the worst week of the last year (until this one). “I do.” Then felt like he needed to explain knowing it. “All those hours of working together, you end up telling each other things.” Although not, apparently, that he isn’t out to his parents, David’s brain supplied.

“Thanks for all your help today, David,” Clint said. “We really do appreciate it.”

David stifled a wince and nodded, trying to approximate a smile.

~*~

“Marcy, you don’t have to start cooking right this minute,” Clint said once they had the groceries unpacked. “You’ve barely slept in the last 36 hours.”

“I want to at least get a lasagna put together,” she said, organizing the ingredients for her meat sauce on the counter and then opening cabinets, looking for an appropriate saute pan.

“Well,” Clint said with a sigh, “give me the garlic and onion and I’ll prep them for you.”

Marcy fiddled with the knobs on Patrick’s stove until she had the correct burner heating up. “His store certainly was beautiful,” she said, thinking back to their brief visit that afternoon. “I never imagined that Patrick could put something like that together.”

“Well, he did tell us that he mainly handled the financial side of things, so I suppose the look of the place is down to David.”

“I guess that’s true.” She unwrapped the package of ground beef, worrying her lip between her teeth.

“He’s going to be okay, honey,” Clint said. “Don’t worry.”

She laughed. “Don’t tell a mother not to worry, Clint Brewer.”

She put the ground beef into the hot pan and began breaking it up with a spatula.

“I’ll tell you another thing,” Clint said. “I think David might have a crush on our son.”

Marcy frowned at him. “You know, it’s not okay to assume someone is gay just because they’re… you know. Effeminate.”

“It’s not that.” Off his wife’s skeptical look, he conceded, “Okay, it’s not just that. It’s the way he looks at Patrick. You didn’t see the way David looked at our son?”

Marcy blinked, trying to remember. She’d been so focused on Patrick, she’d barely looked at David while they were in the hospital room with him. “I guess I didn’t.”

“Well, I think there are some unrequited feelings there,” Clint said.

She mulled that over while she continued to put her meat sauce together. It wouldn’t be good for their business relationship if what Clint said was true. She wondered if Patrick knew, and if so if it made their relationship awkward. David seemed like a respectful person; surely he wouldn’t do anything to make Patrick uncomfortable at work.

Marcy was still worrying about it when she was brushing her teeth in the bathroom that night, beyond exhausted and ready to collapse into bed. She wasn’t sure what impulse made her reach out and open Patrick’s medicine cabinet.

“Hasn’t Patrick been saying he wasn’t seeing anyone?” she asked Clint as she got into bed next to him.

He was already half-asleep. “Yeah.”

“Well, he’s got a mostly empty box of condoms in his medicine cabinet,” she said.

“Marcy, you shouldn’t snoop.”

“I didn’t mean to!”

“You didn’t mean to open his medicine cabinet?” he yawned.

“It’s a big box.”

“Marcy.”

“Okay, sorry.” She curled up on her side.

“Maybe he hasn’t had any relationships serious enough to tell us about,” Clint reasoned.

She didn’t want to have to think about her son that way, having casual, meaningless sex instead of a real relationship. That wasn’t what she wanted for him. It was why she’d encouraged him to patch things up with Rachel in the past. And while she now believed Patrick when he said things were really over between them, she still hoped he would find someone else who would love him the way he deserved to be loved. All night as she slept, her hopes and worries for her son monopolized her dreams.

Chapter 3

[ddaenghoney]

chapter one

masterlist link in blog description.

As a successful songwriter, you want nothing more than the acknowledgment that the chart-topping musical pieces are your own creations. But contracts, relationships, and the difficulty of facing the stakes involved head on, keep your mouth shut until pressure builds too much.

Pairing(s): Park Jimin x Y/N, Min Yoongi x Y/N

disclaimer: any characters depicted do not represent the actual personality of the respected idol in real life.

Series warning(s)/genre(s): Chapter-based written fic, Slow-burn relationship(s), Fake-dating, Unrequited love, Songwriter/producer!oc, idol!Jimin, idol/songwriter/producer!Yoongi, friends with benefits, drama, romance, smut, angst, fluff (updated as needed)

Chapter warning(s): none.

Word count: 5013

if you enjoy please, please let me know!

“What if this album has my name in the credits?”

Tension shifts, where idleness and chatting of the choices presented neatly on the table became a new quiet. Glances bore like bullets, burning dots onto your back, shoulders, profile--avoiding the direct stare towards the CEO. She didn’t attend meetings like this usually. Just a divergence from normalcy due to a client canceling and her deciding to check in on the upcoming record for the most famous of the idols in the company.

Jimin’s neck remains still, eyes not focusing down at the copies of songs he was given at the beginning of session. Sitting beside the lady in charge whom only allows her eyes to address your sentence when the silence drifts into awkwardness. Her expression holds elegance, yet firm conviction set within her eyes. No words for another moment, but the ambiance feels reclaimed. No longer disturbed by your interruption of usual affairs.

“Why?”

The table hides your hands as they compress all of the tension into formed balls on your lap. Composed, composed; you left your mouth closed to consider the phrasing. This is owed to you. Your voice wasn’t as loud when you replied, “I wrote the songs.”

“So?”

You bite your tongue by choice. A way to repress more frustration.

“It’s best to keep lyrical credits to the minimum. Jimin’s name and the producers are enough mostly.” She dismisses the idea, while looking back at the papers you spent the past two months typing lines to. Her pen scribbles notes on the margins. Short ones, only a sentence of acceptance, before flipping to a new page.

At the returning conversation of concepts to fit the new album, your hands uncurl. The head stylist talks mindlessly with Jimin’s manager to go over the budgeting for the first music video’s costumes. An intern exits with an order to bring coffee from the breakroom. Your head tilts towards the dark wood, reflective only of a blurry shadow. Barely in your peripherals, Jimin’s hand settles on the table across from you.

His eyes are ready to meet yours when your head lifts back up. Face absent of a smile, but the sympathy in his eyes tells you he holds words at bay. Unspoken.

“What if it’s just one song?” Spoken for yourself.

Jimin’s eyebrows furrow at your continuation, wondering if you were truly unaware of the rolling eyes from those sat beside you. If you thought you could get a different outcome.

“It doesn’t have to be the title track, but one shouldn’t be an issue, right?”

“Your contract doesn’t require me to heed your desires.” The paper held in the CEO’s hand casts beside the stack, flurrying noise for a second. “And it states very clearly that you’re not to be credited. This is for the best interest of the idols.” She doesn’t regard your frowning, completely empty of care as she reaches for her mug.

“But hardly anyone would even notice-”

“Your name adds nothing to the credentials.”

Words evade your throat, while the air in it becomes invasive. It hitches into place, and the door reopens for the intern to walk with her heels clicking on the floor. No one speaks, but the focus on your person is apparent. Jimin’s finger taps once on the table, hesitantly, unassumingly.

You rise from the chair, ignoring the burn in your throat when he stays silent like the rest. But he does watch you exit the room, index finger leading for the others to drag into a fist on the polished table. Your sneakers make little noise as you go across the tile, frustratingly allowing you to hear the CEO thank the intern for more tea.

While you glare at nothing, the frosted glass door became closer. Reaching to pull it, you keep your jaw locked from the anger wanting to fall out, too far from reality to be prepared for the man on the other side. Your body bumps completely into him, a gasping curse whispering from your lips, followed by quick apologies when he steps back from the force. Confused eyes squint at your person as you mutter more about it being an accident, but the call behind you from someone asking what happened causes you to apologetically lower your head. A foot shift to the side of the stiffened man, then you pace down the hallway to the elevators.

“Did she get hurt?” The wheels on Jimin’s chair roll back as he starts to stand. “Or you too, I guess.”

“I’m fine.” Yoongi steps into the meeting room, regarding the CEO with a deeper bow of his head while he shuts the door behind him. “I was just going to ask about the equipment I need moved in my studio. The secretary said this meeting was finished.”

“It is.” Jimin bites his lip as the CEO ignored what just occurred. Signing her name onto the corner of the paper, like she did with the songs she was most favorable of. “Jimin has his title track chosen.” She passes the paper to the manager whose hands are prepared to take the song as though Lee Yerin was gifting him a jewel.

Jimin sits back into the cushion of the desk chair, hands fidgeting on his lap, as he wonders about following you, but he stays. You’re likely to the lobby at this point, and he wouldn’t leave without a cap and sunglasses in the very least. His phone escapes his pocket as he types the passcode, looking up at the CEO as she stands.

“Finish up here if there’s more to say. I’ll go with Yoongi to his studio.”

---

You groan loudly as the automated doors behind you shut. Walking swiftly to the curbside, you begin surveying for a taxi, or a truck to hop into the back of never to be seen again. The one opportunity to speak to the CEO in front of others involved in Jimin’s album and none of them said a word in your favor. Your tongue clicks, waving an arm to catch the attention of a driver. It wasn’t like you truly expected any of them to speak for you, but all the words you prepared for the circumstantial moment crossed your mind. The fluid sentences and reasonings all turned into white noise when you actually willed yourself to attempt opening the gate into the topic. A wonder lingers if you even managed to budge it. Doubtful.

In the taxi, your phone vibrates systematically, and for a moment you worry that it’s someone calling to reprimand your behavior. Taking a breath, you pulled the device from your jeans, internally cursing at the clothing you wore that day. You hadn’t assumed you’d run into Yerin, but now that you had you wished at least that you dressed like someone charismatic enough to argue the credentials. The breath releases as Jimin’s contact I.D. flashes on your screen. The picture behind the notification a memory of an overnight trip the month earlier.

“Hey,” You answer him, turning your head to look at the passing buildings and avenues. “Did anyone say anything?”

“What, no.” He quickly interjects, as he walks down the hallway towards the balcony patio. Jimin says nothing about his manager muttering to the choreographer about the scene. “Did you get hurt bumping into Yoongi?”

“No, but I bet he hates me even more now.” You recall his surprised expression as your body ricocheted off his, as well as the other sparse times you interacted with him so far the past few weeks of his company’s merger with your own. None of them felt entirely positive, but you had other things to think about than his perception-- be it likely annoyed with you or otherwise. “I don’t know what I should do.” You sigh, while your hand grips onto the center armrest during a swift turn.

“I didn’t know you’d say something like that,” Jimin admits his thoughts, while sitting on a cold, metal chair overlooking the intersection six floors below. “Took me by surprise.”

You bite your lip at his softened tone, something about it creating a worry in your stomach, but you ignore it to joke it off. “Always looking for ways to make myself look like an idiot, Jimin. My talent.”

“That’s not true.” He frowns at his boots, free hand picking a loose thread on his sweater. “I just,” Jimin’s voice trails, considering the times this month you mentioned your contract coming to an end in the upcoming summer. Half a year or so away. Or half a year left. “I don’t know what you expected from it honestly.”

The cab comes to a stop in traffic half a block from your destination. You give a payment for the ride and exit early, dodging around the hood of a parked car. His words scrape along your temples, despite their simplicity. You pacify the meaning by attributing candidness.

“Sweetie,” Jimin knows he kicked a nerve, but he feels no desire to rephrase. “Did you go home?”

“No.” You mutter, shoving a hand into your pocket where it fiddles mindless with a tangled earbud wire. “I’m gonna go to Joon’s place for a bit.” You listen to him sigh, thinking it to sound relieved. Likely Jimin worried of your temperament following the incident, but knowing you were willing to go out somewhere public longer gives him a bit of positivity.

“How late will you be there? I think I’ll be able to leave by eight tonight.” The implications of his evident desire to meet blur in your mind. A tone of gentleness leads you to believe Jimin simply wanted to be with you. In the confines of your apartment or his. Where words can be said and actions crossed without a care about the company’s opinion.

“I’ll probably be home before that,” The amounts of paper scattered around your dining table from the past week of scrambling to finish by today’s meeting crosses through your mind. Then the disarray you assuredly left your bedroom in when leaving that morning. “It’s a mess.”

“I don’t care.” Jimin giggles, the sound sweet and healing compared to the previous topics of conversation. “I don’t have a schedule tomorrow,” He pauses, smiling on his end at the thought, “Can I stay over?”

In your mind you know this is one of the situations that you shouldn’t let concoct so simply, when the two of you have time and time again avoided definitions of what goes on between you both, even though it’s evidently deep care, never properly spoken of. You don’t bring it up as you reply in an instant, “Yeah.” And you’re smiling just as warmly as he is with the affirmation.

Your slow walk compliments the energy rising in your voice as the conversation with Jimin about the songs comes up. You bite your inner cheek, listening to him recall particular lines that he especially liked from certain songs. The people moving around you in the busy intercity take no presence, instead just reason for you to absently dodge around. The air skidding blotches against your cheeks is also forgotten, more intent spent on Jimin reinstating that you worked really hard and the pieces reflect that.

“Wow,” Namjoon shifts his jaw rested on his cheek as you enter the front door. “That’s a huge smile.” The phone is already put back in your jean pocket, the jovile goodbye said before you came into his cafe. Or bar, somewhat a bookstore; you still never really understood how he classifies the establishment overall.

“My songs went over well.” You explain giddy in step as you make it to the bar stool and sit onto your spot like usual. Namjoon stands leaning over the counter across from you, letting his employees handle the slow flow of customers at this odd middle hour of the afternoon.

“Like usual?” He raises an eyebrow, voice sufficiently light-hearted, yet sarcastic as though the idea of your work being taken otherwise was alien. “You’ll end up moving to two zipcodes down by the end of the year at this rate. Lucky.”

“Like you don’t rake up practically all the after-party customers from Jin’s club every weekend on top of your always booked party rooms for business lunches.” You watch with a still present smile as Namjoon only shrugs his shoulder. Completely aware that he himself made more than enough money for satisfaction.

“Minoring in marketing was a good idea after all. What can I say?” You both laugh softly, remembering when he would call you after his minor-specific classes to rant to you about how greedy some of the other students ideas were. “So they all got accepted this time around?”

“I’m pretty sure. Maybe not all for Jimin, but they’ll probably get used by other idols too.” You watch as he steps away to listen to your answer. Namjoon fills a few glasses of water to assist an employee scrambling to get enough cups for an abnormally large group just sat down.

“And,” He brushes off the thanks from the employee as she takes the tray of eight glasses before turning back towards you, “Are you going to be credited this time?”

At the question you pause. Curl in your lips straightens out and Yerin’s incontestable, harden statements fill your ears once more. Your finger curls against the gloss of his applewood countertops. You glance down.

“No then.” Namjoon frowns sympathetically, his face now pondering how else to go about changing that fact. He dismisses the ideastorm when you sigh,

“Maybe I should just get over that, right?” You think of years gone by where you didn’t question the lack of recognition publicized for your songwriting. It felt easy to be uncaring of it when you were in college able to pay practically all fees outright because of the massive influx of revenue from the job you weren’t expecting much from to begin with.

“Your contract is up for renewal this upcoming year. Why don’t you try and change the crediting clause then?”

“It...” You know he’s going to get irritated from the completion of your sentence, but you’re unable to stop yourself, “It’s better for the idols already established if it stays this way.”

“Jimin?”

You just bite your lip, unable to view the expression Namjoon has when you could already hear an absence of warmth in his voice. He sighs, reaching to rub his jaw while glancing to the party of business people breaking into laughter at their side of the cafe. He realizes the complexity built between you and Jimin, and feels irritated because he also knows he should’ve said more earlier on to stop it from becoming what it is.

“Other idols too.” Weakly spoken. Namjoon stops a scoff from the fact. “It’s better for the company too. If they end up having to explain why their groups and soloists suddenly stop creating their own songs then it’s going to look bad.”

“Then they can just start writing their own stuff like they’re already pretending to.” Your head perks up from the quickness of his reply, and you watch him adjust his shirt as he starts walking down the bar. “I’ll be right back.”

You release a longer sigh while he goes to chat with the group of patrons. Truth of the matter exists in Namjoon’s cander. Even if you originally were okay with not being involved in the credit, the fact is that so many idols at this point had their names written into the slot instead, pretending to be self-sufficient and creative when more often than not it was all due to your own pen.

“Did you want something to eat or drink, Ms.?” The original waitress tending to the group of businessman stepped towards you with a smile.

“You really don’t have to call me that.” You say for a countless time to the girl whose been working here for more than a year at this point. She knows you’re friends with Namjoon, and granted he’s her boss, but the formality never settles for you. She only shrugs, and you dismiss the idea of changing her ways again. “Just a latte is fine, thanks, Jinsol.”

You’re left with only a few moments to contemplate the song issue before Namjoon returns with a scoff as he rolls his sleeves up his forearms.

“Sometimes I really hate having to be professional.” He mutters, taking his half-empty glass of water and drinking it while you raise an eyebrow. His eyes are still focused with an irritated gleam at the group of men somewhere behind you. You turn on the stool to look back as well, noting their posture is more rigid than you thought it would be from their earlier disposition.

“Jerks?” You ask, facing Namjoon once more. He nods,  

“Have to be creepy when Jinsol’s just trying to do her job.” Namjoon says at a normal volume, easy to hear across the room if they were trying to listen in. He doesn’t care, just places his empty dish into the bin below the counter to be cleaned later. “Anyways,” He averts his gaze back to you, flooding your perception with his determined yet soft stare, “You shouldn’t leave it like it is. You deserve credit. It’s long overdue.”

“If you heard how the CEO shut the idea down, I don’t think you’d be saying that.” You thank Jinsol when she reaches between you both only to settle the ceramic filled with just enough foam in front of you and saunter off once more to the group of businessmen with hot drinks for them as well. “She’s not going to budge.”

“Then quit.”

You laugh even though he’s somewhat meaningful in the option. You’re unable to stop from shaking your head at the incredulousness of the idea. “I’m not that loaded that I can retire already.”

“Go work somewhere else.” Namjoon then offers, watching with his lip dragging between his teeth when you begin frowning.

“Getting a job where I’m at was my lottery, Joon.” You return your eyes to the polish of the reddened wood, “I have nothing to put on my resume for experience that would get me anything great at another company, and trying to work independent sounds like asking for disaster.”

You both loiter in the following silence, Namjoon sympathetic and you annoyed about the entirety of the situation. If back when you sold the first song, disregarding the legality clauses in favor of the couple hundred dollars, you considered the implication of your casualness to the transaction, then maybe when you got a call the following month to go directly to the company for a meeting about further work you wouldn’t have been so easy to convince. Yerin was avid in her praises of the track’s success in the recording session, and you were shocked when she told you there was chart-topping anticipation from it. Of course it felt easy to sign your name on the dotted line when she told you there would undoubtedly be more with continued work.

“Namjoon!” The voice startles you, making your grip tense around the untouched latte. Namjoon huffs in his own surprise, while glaring at Seokjin walking into the establishment and disrupting the overall quiet the place had settled into. “I need to talk to you about the event happening this weekend.” Seokjin continues while you finally take the first sip into the foam atop the espresso. He sits beside you, waving his hand with a smile, “Hey, Y/N, didn’t expect to see you.”

“Just stopped in for a drink.” You smile in return, humored by his casual sweatpants and hoodie despite his position owning the popular club at the corner of the street.

“Spiked?” He raises an eyebrow, knowing the most popular sellers in Namjoon’s coffee selection where those with alcohol hidden in the flavors of vanillas and mochas.

“Maybe it should be.” You sigh, ignoring Namjoon’s rolling eyes. “Don’t let me interrupt your talk, I’m just going to finish this and get out of here.”

“No need to rush; he probably just wants to ask me if he can sleep upstairs.” Namjoon steps to lean against the counter behind him, crossing arms comfortably across his waist. Seokjin points at his statement with a finger, nodding his head,

“That.” You laugh beside him, while Namjoon just scoffs familiarly. “And I wanted to see if there was a meeting room here available that evening for a friend that’s going to be in and out of the club that night.” You gingerly drink at your warm beverage while Namjoon’s head tilts inquisitively.

“You’re not trying to get laid here are you-”

“Clearly not.” Seokjin rests his chin on his palm, “Why would I try for that on your tables anyways? People I don’t know have eaten on them.” You nodded at the fact beside him, thinking the reasoning made sense while Namjoon cut in incredulously,

“That is the only issue with it? I keep the tables clean.”

“It’s not about sex anyways!” Seokjin shuts down in a firm exclamation. You glance back at the businessmen who were evidently confused about the conversation between the two beside you. You take a larger gulp, more than halfway through with the latte at this point, and ready to skip out to avoid whatever your friends were about to discuss blatantly. “The guy just wants a place to chill in between time spent at the club.” He goes on, the motions with his hands emphasizing the need for Namjoon to accept. “I kind of owe him, and you kind of owe me--” Namjoon opens his mouth before Seokjin’s arm shoots out into the air to silence him, “Actually! Let’s all pretend we don’t owe each other anything and do things like this out of the goodness of our hearts.”

“I like that you changed the reasoning halfway through.” Namjoon laughs, rubbing his jaw, pondering the request silently until you speak up,

“I’m going to head out.” The two turn their heads towards you as your cup clacks gently against the saucer. You slide off the high chair, as Seokjin comments curiously,

“Some of the people from your work are going, you too?” You grimace which is answer enough for him as he begins laughing from your reaction. “Come on though; weekend before New Year’s should be sort of fun, right?”

---

Your pen makes dots in the corner of crisp paper. Feet dangling from your seat, while you think of the upcoming weekend. Jimin would more likely than not go to the club if a lot of the other employees were. Whether he actually had an interest in attending events like those or not, you weren’t entirely sure. Obligation seemed to be the word, but you doubted he hated it entirely as you recall other parties and team bonding experiences the two of you had ended up at. He was amicable with all of them, friendlier to particular people, but you’ve never known anyone to have problems with him.

Though you were never really needed at those occasions.

“Working on something?” Jimin’s voice is close, then in your vision as he leans over your shoulder to look at the unstarted piece. “Or not?” He giggles when you groan, resting your head back against his shoulder. His skin glows from the revitalization of a shower, and his locks of hair are still stuck together in their dampness.

“I was going to start something, but then I started thinking about random things.” You shrug, but smile as his lips find your cheek in a soft kiss.

“That’s fine. You should take the night off from it all anyways,” His hand tangles over yours to cause the release of the pen from your appendage. “Want to watch a movie, or something?”

“Okay,” You adjust on the chair, pecking his lips with your own, leaving them to see a smile as you continue, “Let me go take a shower too though; kind of need it.” He chuckles, kissing you again longer, his thumb rubbing gently against your knuckles,

“Should’ve took one together,” Jimin states with playful bluntness, while you get up from your chair. You eye him knowingly. He is completely aware of how far away the concept of a shower would’ve drifted if you both went in following an already lustful exchange on the mess you left your bed in. “Save water.” Innocent smile, that didn’t match the gleam in his eyes.

“Yeah, that’s why.” You pat his chest, leaving your hand there when he catches it. His stare falls over your figure: legs extending bare beneath his button-up shirt that he had entered the apartment wearing.

“You’re really beautiful, you know that?” Jimin steps closer, and you do nothing to stop gentle ministrations of his lips on yours. Followed by a scattered trail on every inch of heated, fond skin, fueled from your fingertips flexing against his abdomen and the light gasp when the plumpness of his mouth passes over an already sensitive reddened blotch on your neck. He squeezes your waist, wrinkling the fabric uncaringly while his lips remain there, only pressing a lingering kiss. You bite your lip, a sigh drifts out when he moves again, finding your collarbone, all too close to the rising beat of your heart. “Movie?” He asks then nips gingerly with his teeth to smirk as you writhe. Your nails drag against his firm muscles and he groans against you.

“Yeah,” You say in a breath, though your legs tremble slightly from his actions and the ones already transpired. “I want to spend time with you.”

“Yeah?”  Jimin’s voice comes out in grain, seeming happily surprised by your statement. Your body presses to his as he hugs you, smiling against your shoulder. “You’re adorable,” A whisper lost on your skin. The embrace tightens as your arms make it around his waist. “Movie it is then.”

In a matter of a half hour, you exit your bathroom cozily engulfed in an old shirt and sweatpants to find Jimin stretched on the bed. His fingers tap quickly against his phone, focus aiming at whatever app was open. You sit beside him, reaching over his waist for the package of cookies retrieved from the kitchen.

“Work?”

“One of the members of the group that just debuted over the fall,” He explains, glancing to you with a humored grin as you fit the entirety of the small sweet into your mouth. “Don’t choke.”

“Don’t eat all of my cookies.” You counter between crunches, a hand straying to glide rifts in his brightly pink hair.

“I can’t help it; the package was open, and they were there, how was I supposed to stop?” His head leans into your hand. Jimin tosses his phone beside him. “Anyways, he wanted to know if I was going to the club thing this weekend.”

“Are you?” You ask before thinking. Something about the event seemed distant from you, unspoken of by the colleagues you run into around the company. Dodged from your ears perhaps. Jimin shrugs as he moves to snake arms around your waist and puzzle himself against you.

“Yeah, because a lot of the people from the company merging with ours are going. My manager thinks it’d be a good way to get connected with them all.” His fingers are light in their strokes along your back, a yawn slipping from his lips while your nose finds purchase nuzzling peacefully against his neck. “What about you, darling? Are you going to join me?”

Your mind startles from Jimin’s inquisition, unbeknownst to him as he continues in massaging streams along your back. While time and time again you attended company and social functions where he would go, and the same vice versa, neither of you brought up events in a way that implies going as a couple. Because you and Jimin are not.

“Like go to it with you?” Your voice tests the connotation of his words in a murmur that you hope he doesn’t hear any longing in. You’re aware of the reality, you don’t hide from it or ignore it, so you wonder why your throat feels hollow in the way it did at the meeting that day when Jimin answers,

“We can meet up there.”

You smile. The same page. You read the outcome before Jimin spoke it. The relationship has always been on the blur for each other’s benefit. The emotional attachment ends at platonic, and other occasional circumstances are in the moment for fun. The way it’s always been since you made the rule to counter the shock in Jimin’s eyes more than a year ago at this point.

“Dunno if I want to go.” Less so at his offer. You believe it unfair to think in this way, but on the same list of why not attend the party you recall the blemish in your reputation currently sporting from your attempted divergence from normalcy that noon. Like you needed the stares from other employees.

“I,” Jimin says then stops, biting his inner cheek. You hear the hesitation and glance up at him to view his eyes cast aimless at your ceiling. Clouded mind. You lift yourself from his loosened hold, locking gaze when he checks to see what you’re doing. With your forearm stabilizing a small portion of your weight against his chest, you lean pecking his lips with your own. He remains quiet, watching and wondering if you possibly missed his almost sentence despite the stillness of your apartment. You kiss again, more languid and drawn out, letting time carry the word away from the present.

“Let’s watch something funny.” You bring back the movie topic, smiling as you raise yourself to search for the remote. “Or I’ve been kind of wanting to rewatch The Incredibles, is that fine?” You take his soft chuckle as affirmation before he says yes a second later, and your eyes keep focus on the television when you turn around.

Coaxing the sealed words out of him isn’t worth the argument, or worse.

if you enjoy please, please let me know! i hope you enjoy the series, i’m working really hard on it! : )

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[redorblue]

The Story of a New Name, by Elena Ferrante

I just finished reading The Story of a New Name, the second part of Elena Ferrante’s Neapolitan Novels, and I’m completely blown away by how good this book is. The first one, too, and I can’t wait to read the third and fourth part, but this one genuinely makes me want to bow down to Elena Ferrante and promise her my firstborn child. I’m not saying that it doesn’t have its lengths, but the amount of detail that she puts into the settings and the richness of the characters’ inner lives makes me want to read twenty more of its kind - it’s just that good. It even makes me want to freshen up my Italian because the difference between speaking standard Italian and the Neapolitan dialect is an important part of the book and would probably add a lot more depth, but... I can’t wait that long.

The first two installments of the tetralogy are mostly set in Naples in the 1950s and 1960s, in a poor neighborhood at the outskirts of the city. This is where Elena and Lila grow up: two girls with very similar backgrounds (working class fathers, stay-at-home mothers, miserable living conditions, a lot of domestic and street violence), but with very different personalities. Lila is a very extroverted person, direct to the point of rude or aggressive, courageous, impulsive, sometimes manipulative, very passionate, and gifted with a very creative and astute kind of intelligence. Elena is more of an introvert, a very diligent, responsible and disciplined person who tries to avoid conflict at all cost and has a good eye for unwritten social rules, with a rich emotional life but an aversion to sharing it with others. She’s also gifted intellectually, but rather as a result of hard work; she’s what you’d call booksmart as opposed to Lila’s intuitive intelligence that’s mostly focused exclusively on her rather volatile fields of interest.

In short, in many regards they’re each other’s opposite, which makes their friendship incredibly fascinating from the outside and alternately fortifying or toxic from the inside. When things are good, they ignite each others’ brains with ideas and they support each other no matter what; when they aren’t, Lila manipulates Elena into things that hurt her (or both of them really) and intentionally ignores her discomfort, while Elena distances herself, judges Lila and tries to assert her own superiority. The competitive streak that runs through their friendship at times inspires both of them to surpass themselves, but it also leads to them constantly trying to outdo each other - and let the other know. No matter how fraught their relationship gets though, they are always the most important person in the other’s life, both the anchor that stabilizes them as well as the benchmark that they measure themselves against. It’s a defining element of both the main characters’ lives, even as their paths drastically diverge: Elena, because of a combination of luck and hard work, gets the chance to continue her education after primary school and even goes to university, while Lila, who has the talent but lacks the luck, is not allowed to go to school any longer and is ultimately forced by circumstance to get married at 16 - which, considering her personality and the society she lives in, obviously does not go well. All in all, it’s a fascinating portrayal of a lifelong friendship under (at times) incredibly difficult circumstances that shapes both of them at their very core. It doesn’t romanticize or trivialize a bond like that, but shows it in all its ugliness and glory, and what’s more: it makes this friendship the central relationship of the book.

But the story is not only a brilliant examination of female friendship (and it is very distinctly female: both characters can never escape their roles as girls/young women in a heavily patriarchal society), it’s also a very observant analysis of the ways that class and gender intersect to shape and constrain the paths and personalities of Elena, Lila and their friends and neighbors. I’m tempted to add ethnicity to the mix, too; I’m not sure if ethnicity is the right term, but I can’t think of a better one, so I’ll stick with that. I’m not exactly knowledgeable about Italy’s demographic makeup, but if I remember it correctly, there is a quite distinct divide - culturally, economically, socially, linguistically... - between the North and the South, with the North as the economically stronger (and possibly less corrupt) part and therefore in a position to look down upon the South. This is an especially important aspect of Elena’s story in The Story of a New Name, when she goes to Pisa to study and feels forced to hide her Neapolitan background as much as possible. However, in the neighborhood where Elena and Lila grew up and where most of the first and second book takes place, ethnicity plays less of a role. Externally, within the framework of greater Naples, the main dividing line is class, expressed as income, way of speaking, access to education, clothing, and general display of wealth. The neighborhood itself, on first glance, is more homogeneous: even the local bigshots, who own a car, give out shady loans to the entire neighborhood and maintain ties to the mafia, aren’t particularly educated or refined in comparison with the Neapolitan upper classes. What they do have is money, and that’s one of the observations that I love about this book: money, no matter how much of it you amass, can never be the same as being born upper class; it can buy some privileges, but it can’t buy parity with the truly powerful. Within the limited domain of the neighborhood, however, money is one of the main mechanisms of stratification, the other being gender.

Toxic masculinity plays an important role in the story, and it shapes the lives of everyone in the neighborhood in different ways. We don’t meet many of the older men (= parent generation), but that’s a statement in and of itself: many of them are either dead, dying, or in prison. Those that are left are characterized by submissiveness and resignation to those with more power, and they channel their feeling of powerlessness and the resulting emasculation by beating and abusing their wives and children. The older women have lived too long under such circumstances: they do care about their children in some way, but the methods they use to make especially their daughters conform to patriarchal expectations and thereby protect them from male wrath end up doing just as much harm as the fists of the fathers. Female solidarity and close personal friendships such as that of Elena and Lila are rare because of the women’s feeling of disempowerment, trauma from a lifetime of violence and general economic hardship. And so the vicious circle repeats itself, with everyone caught up in it absolutely miserable, but unable to do anything about it, since class limits make it virtually impossible to get out.

This is equally true for the younger generation. The boys are taught from a young age to associate male behaviour with violence, aggression, a very prickly sense of honor, and a superiority over women that allows them to possessively watch over them and use violence against them to keep them in line. This holds true for rich and poor neighborhood boys alike, which proves that it is not an issue of class alone. The author further supports this argument by giving counter-examples like Alfonso, who in theory is just as predisposed to toxic masculinity as all the other boys: a violent father, (temporary) economic deprivation, violence in his peer group... What makes Alfonso different from most of the other boys is his personality on the one hand and his advanced education on the other. I think the author is saying that education is the key to overcome at least the worst outgrowths of violent male behavior. Of course education is contingent upon the class a person is born into, but with Alfonso, and partially Enzo (and Nino, too, much as I hate to admit it), she proves that neither class nor gender automatically make a man violent - and that neither one is an excuse for toxic masculinity. This claim is strengthened further by a counterexample, namely Bruno Soccavo, the son of a rich industrialist who leads a privileged life and still thinks it his right to sexually exploit the female workers at his factory.

But since the focus of the story is on Elena, Lila and their female friends and frenemies, this is where we get the most intimate insights into what toxic masculinity and economic deprivation/dependence together do to f**k up the lives of girls and young women. The girls mostly display a pretty thorough understanding of how things work: they know what they can and can’t tell the boys in order to avoid violence among the boys and towards the girls themselves. I’m pretty sure that even Lila knows how to avoid offend the boys’ sense of honor, but between her recklessness courage, her desire for freedom and her self-destructive streak, she just doesn’t care very much. But even this understanding, the result of a lifetime of studying the behavior of the men around them, does not help them very much because it doesn’t leave them enough room to put their feet down, let alone breathe. Lila is the best example of this: after being denied further education and blossoming into a beautiful teenager that attracts the attention of every male around her, including a rich mafioso, she really has no other option than to marry the (seemingly) most acceptable of her suitors at 16 years of age. But of course, he turns out to be violent and controlling, too, and since he’s more powerful than her brother and father, she really has nowhere to turn to. And as I mentioned already, neither the older women nor the girls have enough emotional or material capacities to meaningfully help each other. Some of them also simply don’t want to (the author doesn’t romanticize anything here, either), but I dare say that even that is a result of economic deprivation plus toxic masculinity: from a very young age they’re drilled to think of marriage as their only way to relative economic security, and their future husband’s affection as the only way to avoid being beaten or even killed. So it’s natural that female solidarity, as desirable as it’d be, is not very wide-spread in the neighborhood. Basically, what the book says about toxic masculinity and patriarchal systems is this: yes, it hurts both men and women, young and old, rich and poor; but in the end, it’s always the women, and especially the poor women, who end up with bruises on their face.

[moodboardinthecloud]

The Darwin Variant, and/or Love of the Fittest

The chaos grows and grows, everything around us faltering, falling. Who do we need to be and who are we becoming?

Once I was in a room with Margaret Wheatley, one of the people whose thinking on emergence and complexity helped me understand emergent strategy. I (or someone else) asked how we bring down massive systems through small, complex organizing. She said, essentially, that systems that are top heavy will inevitably collapse from their own imbalanced weight.

How do we survive these falling systems? Especially when many of them need to fall? How do we prepare for the opportunities in collapse?

I am thinking about that in this era of Covid, climate catastrophe, natural and unnatural disasters (this week there are wildfires, floods, droughts, earthquakes, and  disaster capitalism feeding off of all of it), cultural shifts, and long-term war consequences from indigenous struggles locally in the U.S. to the Taliban in Afghanistan. It’s all connected – decisions made from a competitive, supremacist, dominant mindset lead to top heavy economies and infrastructures, which inevitably collapse, leaving the survivors to contend with the detritus of empire.

Much of the crisis now feels out of our hands – even to me as a fairly connected radical movement person, most days it feels like a series of unstoppable events, to which I can offer prayer and donations, witness and attention. There are so many frontlines, each equally important to the soldiers in that particular battle. Stepping back to see it whole, there’s definitely the sense that we are trying to hold back tsunamis by plugging a million holes in a dam.

I realize that this sense of total pending and unfolding disaster is all over my Covid responses, thoughts and interactions. I am writing to face this disastrous feeling within me, to see if I can center a different perspective down in myself.

As both an antiwar and climate activist, I remember the devastation I felt when I first realized we weren’t going to be able to stop the wars against Afghanistan and Iraq. People were not going to sustain direct action, they were still going to pay their taxes towards the war, and be satisfied with resistance in the form of liberal punditry that changed nothing. This week we leave behind another nation long violated, knowing it will be eaten alive. It has taken so long to say, with humility, we lost a war we should never have been fighting.

With the climate catastrophe, I realized in my gut that we weren’t going to pivot our nation, our states, our towns to be in a just transition, not in time. Organizers inch forward proposals of survival and boundary, documentation and data, the responses much smaller and slower than the pending crises demand. We are up against capitalism, which feels so big, has so many heads. It is all so daunting. It is still the right work. But how do we make it matter? How do we meet the moment?

It could feel reasonable to give up the fight, all the fights, in light of this overwhelming comprehension of our species in its limitations. But then we are also in a period of massive cultural shift around race, anti-Blackness, rape and patriarchy. Systems designed to allow the total violence and control of those given power through a mythical supremacy are suddenly exposed down to the blueprint. Again, that labor of exposure is largely done by organizers who cleared space for the truth to be told with calls of Black Lives Matter and Me Too. We are rejecting these systems of harm in policy, action, and interpersonal encounters.

It’s all crumbling, concurrently. We are living through both the devastating fall of systems that guarantee life, and the necessary fall of systems that uphold violence.

So then Covid enters, stage right. It’s fast moving, wreaking havoc along the fault lines of existing vulnerabilities – those struggling to piece together enough inside of these multiple intersecting crises are hustling, hungry, taking risks to go to work, trying to survive eviction and exposure. Nations who let collective thinking lead are responding intelligently, and then there’s us.

Since the beginning, Covid has asked one thing of us: act collectively. First, the collective actions were maintaining the social distance of breath, hand washing, wearing masks. Then it was staying home unless you were an essential worker. And quarantining if you were sick. Then quarantining even if you were not sick. Doing work and community through virtual connections. And then, most recently, it’s been getting a vaccine that reduces the hospitalizations and deaths of those exposed to the virus. I cannot truly comprehend how many people have died as we figured out the necessary actions to take together. And now people are dying because we struggle to take collective actions.

To be fair, we are also in a period of peak socialized distrust. The divisions between us are dangerous and near total – we look to divergent news sources, have different conversations, suspect different aspects of government (from police to politicians to scientists) of wanting us surveilled, tracked, controlled or dead. Four years of a destructive and immature president did result in a wall, but not the border wall he threatened. The wall that now feels so solid in the U.S. is a cultural one that has deep roots and an ancient design, 3D printed hateful troll bricks stacked on top of colonial ruins.

Trying to be curious, to ask a question, to express a fear, to make a request, to assume a commonality – all of it quickly gets interpreted as building the division. Inside of this, on whatever side is for life moving towards life, I have been asking myself about boundaries, expectations, solidarity, and collective action. And love.

I now live by these words from my friend Prentis Hemphill, “Boundaries are the distance at which I can love you and me simultaneously.” Love. Not tolerate or survive, but love. When I speak these words, as reminder, as mantra, they give me hope that no one has to be disposable, cut off from that vast connectivity of love. It’s just a matter of distance.

I learned some time ago that not everyone was going to survive and see liberation, or right relationship with the earth, in this lifetime. Not everyone was going to be in vibrant, accountable communities in this lifetime. Not everyone was going to choose love. Not everyone was going to even be aware that they could want or need such interdependence. For so many people, it feels impossible to experience love, to give and receive that sacred extension of adoration, devotion, care, growth, belonging, loyalty and shared experience.

But with distance, perhaps even as far away as the moon, I can always see the species as lovable. I can see that everyone deserves that deep belonging which displaces greed and grasping. I can see us, young, beautiful, powerful, clumsy, tender, selfish – and generally lovable, like a rambunctious and curious child. Or sometimes lovable like the traumatized, neglected bully child who needs so much more love and attention to soften and trust and connect again.

With enough distance, I can love even those who, up close, hate me, or hate the earth, or hate anything different from them. I know “only love can conquer hate.” From far away I can see the haters of the world – those who hate nature, difference, complexity, freedom in others – in the grip of their own spiritual work, which is daunting, which devours from within. Knowing almost nothing of the mysteries of the universe, having only our own planet’s wisdom to learn from, I deduce that even the haters are processing something for the whole, though it may be something toxic, or something heading towards extinction.

With that guidance, I have been earnestly asking myself: what is the distance at which I can love those who choose individual freedom over collective care in the short-term, at the cost of a future? Those who choose to go unmasked? Those who still don’t wash their hands? Those who breathe and cough too close to me? Those who have access to and capacity for the vaccine and choose not to take it?

This year has been a brutal and necessary reminder that control and manipulation don’t work, for anyone involved. I have had to practice self-awareness of my own controlling nature, I have had to soften my grip on a fearful future narrative and return to the humility of the present. I am not in control of any choices or boundaries but my own. I cannot manipulate others into collective action, into choosing life, not even with all my best words. I can only be vulnerable, I can only live into my own values, I can only invite others to join me, and to teach me.

Collective action is still made up of individual choices, which is the beauty and bane of our species. Especially in the colonized capitalist borders of the U.S. Even in the face of policy and punishment, the American way is to choose individual thinking and action under pressure, to fight for superiority on any hill. This focus on dominance over the living rather than partnership with life is how we have racism, rape culture, climate catastrophe, economic disparity, war and disease all in rampant disaster states at the same time.

It is perpetually disgusting to contend with the reality that these disasters benefit a bloated elite. And too many of us participate in our small scale versions of their individualistic and hoarding worldview, thinking we are better than each other and the earth, deserve unlimited resources and access, and should never have to adapt to protect others.

This is humanity at our worst. How will we change?

At a certain point, even if collective action feels far away, there has to be an awareness of the pattern. We have to develop the systemic intuition to sense that the same glitch is present throughout all the systems. Thinking that your choices only impact you or those you immediately know – that you needn’t be concerned with or accountable for the results – is supremacist thinking at the root. It gets packaged as freedom and independence, but we are not individual entities. Humans, like all of nature, live within systems of relationship and resource. Our freedom is relational. Individualist supremacy is a delusional concept, perhaps safely enjoyed as fantasy but not to be applied as common practice. One way to see all of the current crises is as a single delusional wildfire consuming time and space.

What do we do though? How do we practice another way inside so much crisis?

I have a very small circle of beloveds now. Covid required me to get clear about who I absolutely had to be in contact with, who I would invest my time in arguing boundaries with, who I would risk my life to go see. Relative to the number of people I’ve met, the number of people I’ve marched with and for, the number of people on the side of justice and liberation who populate this earth…it turns out there’s a tiny handful that I can actually hold onto. And I now believe my work is to be a good member of the human flock with that small number. Yes, I can still sing out my birdsong to the whole forest. But I move in community, in relationships that are visionary and loving at the root.

I light candles every day around my hope that the distance at which I can love most people in this era isn’t that mortal boundary between life and death.

Covid keeps adapting, like a shepherd herding us as a group through the one gate that leads forward. When we think we alone can run off and stop attending to the whole, a variant emerges to gather us back groupward. The idea of being herded generates such resistance in me, “WE ARE NOT SHEEP!”, “I AM NOT A COW!” (“imspecialimspecialimspecial”)…and yet, are these not also sacred and communal creatures from whom I can learn? In this moment, perhaps theirs is the wisdom we need. Can we adapt to be herd, to be meek, to belong, to move together, to be humble together? Or maybe it’s more simple, more literal: can we be satisfied in a smaller range of physical space? Can we be satisfied inside of necessary boundaries?

It’s quite clear that one activity that keeps the majority of people safe and, coincidentally?, has a positive impact on the planet, is to stay home, stay still, travel less, reduce each personal footprint towards a collective reduction of negative impact. Perhaps variants like Delta will come every time we attempt to return to a normal that the planet cannot sustain.

I heard someone call it the Darwin variant and I can’t stop thinking about that.

The first waves of Covid deaths were our loved ones and strangers who didn’t know what it was. Then those who knew the name and symptoms but didn’t stand a chance. Then those who didn’t realize or trust just how dangerous it was. Now we are seventeen months into the official global pandemic, playing chicken. Most of those who are getting sick and dying in the U.S. now are doing so as a result of choosing not to believe in Covid, in its viral nature, or in the benefits and safety of the vaccine; or those who think they are beyond the reach of guidelines; or those most susceptible to misinformation from unverified sources; or those unable to avoid interaction with others caught up in denial or misinformation, tragically including our precious babies.

They all still expect and need care.

I feel empathy for those who don’t trust the government, even as I feel my own righteous distrust. What’s been helping me in this moment is how much I love the divine work of science. I believe that the sacred force that designed hummingbirds and eagles and the symbiosis of bees and flowers and the desalination of the ocean through vapor and rain also moves through the minds of our scientists. I feel a primal longing for more people to trust in the curiosity-based practice of science. I feel a political need for science to be decoupled from big pharma, which feels so close to how I need movements to be decoupled from big philanthropy. But currently it’s all the same tangled rope of innovation and struggle and funding to which we cling over an apocalyptic abyss. I am not trying to be dramatic here, I’m just being with what is.

Charles Darwin was a scientist whose writing explored many concepts, including one from Herbert Spencer: ‘survival of the fittest.’ The concept reverberates into moments like this. The common misinterpretation is that it means survival of the most physically fit, an ableist view. I’m sure you, like me, have seen able-bodied people argue against Covid safety protocols by saying those with strong immune systems will survive. Many of those I’ve seen take this stance have gone on learn through sickness or loss that that’s not how Covid, or any of our other current apocalyptic conditions, actually work.

I was reminded recently (in public) that Darwin’s own writing points to ‘fittest’ meaning those most adaptive and collectively oriented, those most suited to the immediate conditions. Our immediate conditions are chaotic, frightening, fast-changing and inevitable. What is grossly imbalanced is teetering and falling. What is wildly anti-planet and inhumane is exposed and falling. What is cruel and violent and unfair and ridiculous, it’s all falling.

And the persisting question for me is, what is the work of love in all this falling? Can love help us be the fittest our species has been?

I have sought to offer and experience all kinds of love throughout my life. I have learned that I can love people who will still choose to leave me, to risk their lives, and I will feel grief. I have been learning that there is the big collective massive love I feel for all that lives, and then the tangible offer of love as an energy, resource and commitment which I can only give to those with whom I am in a mutual, consensual and aligned relationship.

I find it hard to love those who hate science, and hate me…not impossible, at least in the big picture setting. But working to actively love those who hate me is immense labor, and if I am honest with myself, it’s generally not something I’m even interested in cultivating in the irreplaceable hours of my remaining life.

Because my love feels rooted not just in myself, but in myself as a fragment of the miraculous natural world, I notice the patterns of hate at the interpersonal, interspecies and global level. There is an undeniable overlap between this resistance to science and the resistance to wear a mask, socially distance and/or vaccinate, in spite of data that affirms the life saving impacts of each choice. And all of that overlaps with the resistance to do right by the earth. The resistance to move beyond capitalism to economic models that allow shared abundance. And the resistance to give up patriarchy and white sociopathy. And national supremacy.

How do I love this vast diversity of human beings, beloved and stranger, who are currently toxic to our collective survival?

I only see one way. If I define love as the willful extension towards spiritual growth that bell hooks and M. Scott Peck told me about, then when I come across all this resistance to the miraculous and collective aspects of our species, I willfully extend my energy towards the necessary and inevitable growth evidenced by that resistance.

It liberates my love to see the resistance to science and nature and interdependence as a cry for help, a sign of how important it is that we grow our capacity to act as collective beings. And, as is my practice, when I can see where that edge of growth is, I seek it in myself. Where in my own life do I still persist in actions that presuppose my importance and supremacy, rather than accept my small role in our collective existence?

I have begun to feel gratitude inside my Covid grief. It’s the result of thinking collectively, even trying to think as a cell or atom of this planetary existence, awkward as that may sound. Even as I despair at the deaths of those who didn’t have a chance to choose, and those who did not survive their risks, I have to acknowledge what else I sense here…at a certain point we have to consider that Covid might be aligned with the earth, of the universe, designed to get us to fight for ourselves, love ourselves as collective beings, love ourselves enough to set and hold boundaries that serve more than our individual wants and needs.

Can I surrender the recent-normal for the present need? Can I commit to practicing a new and limited present-normal for the sake of a species-future? Can I listen more deeply to the earth, to the patterns? Can I keep finding the space to feel for direction within the chaos?

It’s so complicated.

It is much easier for me to love those who want collective human life to continue, in right relationship to the planet. But perhaps that’s evolution moving in me, perhaps this is a sacred attention, a ‘love of the fittest?’

Even now, as I write this, I still love people who choose themselves over the collective every time. And, I’m noticing, every day they feel further and further away. Or I do.

Seeing the pattern of life unfolding inside the destruction and chaos, I keep bringing my attention to it. I despair and then seek laughter, seek the community of others who feel afraid but keep working to connect. I relinquish being right for being present. I don’t deny reality as I find my place in the present moment and try to be of the fittest in constantly changing conditions.

I don’t wait for perfection or magic, I participate in the mundane work of staying alive. I keep my distance, wash my hands, wear my mask, carry my vaccine card. I get tested at every possibility of Covid. If something gets through my mask, if a variant finds me in spite of my best effort, it won’t be for lack of trying to live. If the vaccine works for most people who get it, but somehow not for me, I accept my role in the collective story.

And in my life I keep writing, keep working to shift myself out of the center of anything. I shift my practices one at a time away from capitalist socialization that says I need to be the best at something to deserve a quality life. I redistribute attention, time, donate money…and ask for help.

I am rooting myself amongst people who are learning to think and act together, as pairs, small groups, communities. We ask each other more questions, about what we are choosing to practice and why. We know so much more about each other’s lives and patterns than ever before. We process our inevitable risk-taking with each other because we are imperfect, and we long for each other. We are raising children inside these unclear, ever-shifting boundaries, and we are moving our resources around amongst us to get through. Sometimes we find that in the light of all this new transparency, we aren’t as compatible as we thought. It’s OK. We let each other go on different paths through the adventure, and root with the people on our path.

So are these answers, these small breaths in the maelstrom?

Small circles rooted in love. Relinquishing control and offering love. Mundane practices as acts of love.

Humility in the face of the unknown is self-love. Seeing and shaping the whole, not as a million overwhelming waves, but as a sea – this is collective love. Living in generosity and gratitude, every day, is living love. Being nature, is being love.

It certainly feels like love is the way.

Perhaps. Perhaps.

And this may or may not fit in this piece of thinking and writing, but love is asking me to mention that I am centering pleasure even now, within the small circle. We are a pleasure flock, comforting each other, cheering each other on towards our best lives even today in these conditions. Pleasure connects us to ourselves and each other, to the aliveness at the funeral, to the blessing in the crisis, to the sweet new life pushing green up through the sludge.

We who are not yet dead are responsible for living fully, without regrets, with deep reverence for the wide range of emotion in the human experience. I look for the pleasure of home, of rooting and nesting, of growing things, of moving slowly, of being honest, of writing, of cooking, of dancing, of gratitude, of love. Every single day I dose myself with pleasures small and large, knowing that as it all falls apart, so much is growing; knowing that within myself and my circle I am seeding a path towards a future in which feeling and growing pleasure and aliveness and delight, in relationship to each other and our abundant and perfect planet, is our central focus.

There. It is long, but I have shifted myself from despairing overwhelm back to visionary center. It is a gift that I can only fulfill my own small destiny, follow the instructions that are clearest to me, move with my own consecrated choreography. When I feel completely lost, I can focus each day on being kind, being generous, and being honest. I light candles for all I cannot carry, and then move into the present moment with only my love. As everything crumbles above and around us, it is still true that the most strategic move is the ever changing dance of love.

http://adriennemareebrown.net/2021/08/19/the-darwin-variant-and-or-love-of-the-fittest/

[theblankgarden]

Dear Jessie,

Plum Bun: A Novel Without a Moral (1928) centres on Angela Murray, a middle-class girl from a black family in Philadelphia. Angela and her mother, Mattie, share a light complexion and sometimes enjoy ‘passing for white’ and going to fancy places that would otherwise have been forbidden to them in the segregated city. On the other hand, Angela’s father, Junius, and her younger sister, Virginia (Jinny), cannot ‘pass’, and prefer less glamorous, more family-oriented pastimes.

From an early age, Angela starts to associate happiness with wealth – and wealth with whiteness. We follow the two sisters from the time they were children to their early adulthood, as their lives successively diverge and converge at different points, in their attempt to navigate the topics of gender, race, and class. It feels almost as though Angela and Jinny acted as doubles of one another, two lines running in parallel and yet to meet at infinity.

I particularly liked the use of flashbacks inside flashbacks at the beginning of the novel, where we get to see the family’s daily life and the sisters’ childhood, as well as Mattie and Junius’ past. Angela and Jinny are both artistically gifted, but, like many black female artists in the early 20th century (like yourself!), they decide to firstly train as teachers to be able to support themselves. Career opportunities for talented black women were rare and, like their peers, Angela and Jinny rely on teaching as the most respectable source of income available to them at the time.

When their parents die, Angela decides to move alone to New York and to forge a new identity for herself. She changes her name to Angèle Mory, fits in with a group of white art students, and starts to live constantly ‘passing as white’. “I’m sick of planning my life with regard to being coloured. I’m not a bit ashamed of my race. I don’t mind in the least that once we were slaves. Every race in the world has at some time occupied a servile position. But I do mind having to take it into consideration every time I want to eat outside of my home, every time I enter a theatre, every time I think of a profession.”

We follow Angela’s conflicting choices, as she struggles to live the life she longs for, while trapped in an intersection of racism, sexism, and class prejudices. Her complexity as a character is the highlight of the book for me: Angela is unlikeable and self-centred, and unashamedly so. “‘Why should I shut myself off from all the things I want most,—clever people, people who do things, Art,—’ her voice spelt it with a capital,—‘travel and a lot of things which are in the world for everybody really but which only white people, as far as I can see, get their hands on. I mean scholarships and special funds, patronage’��.

She knows what she wants and goes for it, but she also owns it, when confronted with her mistakes. There is an edge to her that is forever eluding the readers. Every time we feel that you are leading us through a beaten path, you refuse to meet our expectations – and, in this way, you make us confront these expectations; you turn a mirror to what lies behind them.

You also paint a complex picture of ‘passing’ – as a way (sometimes the only way, at that time and place) to gain access to education, wealth, power, professional fulfilment, social and economic opportunities; but one that can also comprise deceit, fear, loneliness, and loss of self-respect.

Angela is constantly reviewing and questioning her choices: how far is she willing to go? At which point ‘passing’ stops being a harmless entertainment or a way for her to be judged for her merits (and not for her race), and becomes a form of ‘selling out’, ‘suppressing her identity’, or ‘demeaning herself’?

You refuse to give easy answers, but we have a sense that, when violently unequal power relationships prevail, Angela’s power to choose may as well be just another illusion: the conditions under which she has to make a choice are themselves demeaning. “And again she let herself dwell on the fallaciousness of a social system which stretched appearance so far beyond being”.

This topic ties in perfectly with the title and subtitle of the book. “Plum Bun” refers to the nursery rhyme in the epigraph: “To market, to market / To buy a plum bun;/ Home again, home again / Market is done”. Each of the five chapters in the novel relate to one of elements of this rhyme – ‘Home’, ‘Market’, ‘Plum bun’, ‘Home again’, and ‘Market is done’ – as Angela progresses from her life with her family in Philadelphia (Home) to her ‘selling out’ as white in New York (Market); then her relationship with a wealthy (racist) white man, her betrayal of her sister, and her ‘selling out’ as a woman (Plum bun); her reconciliation with her sister and her coming to terms with her identity (Home again); and, finally, her decision about her racial heritage (Market is done).

‘Plum bun’ may refer to Angela’s heritage (a prune hidden inside the cake?), but also to the ways in which an idea of femininity (as related to something sweet, passive, and alluring) is imposed on her in the corresponding chapter; or even the way she sells herself as something that can be bought (like a cake in the market).

The subtitle is also particularly interesting – ‘A Novel Without a Moral’ –, given that the book is structured on a series of conflicting moral choices. But you refuse to reduce their complexity, you refuse easy answers, or moral lessons. Further, your aim is not to evoke sympathy in a white reading audience by sacrificing your protagonist’s claim on happiness, but rather to turn the mirror around and show white readers what lies behind such a fictional device, what it really entails. You refuse to use your protagonist to teach white readers a lesson that should have been obvious from the start.

Another highlight of the book for me was the way ‘passing’ (as related to race, but also class and religion) and ‘marriage’ play out as means by which disenfranchised characters hope to overcome structural inequalities, but which also perversely play the double-edge role of reinforcing such inequalities. ‘Passing’, in particular, is shown under conflicting lights: as a form of transgression of a set of arbitrary and fundamentally unjust rules; and, on the other hand, as a form of assimilation, a way of reinforcing racism and racial hierarchy. It is shown as an exercise of individual freedom; and, on the other hand, as an expression of selfishness, a way of avoiding one’s responsibility to the black community, and of exercising freedom at the expense of other people or other equally important values. Once again, you don’t give easy answers here. “Stolen waters are the sweetest. And Angela never forgot that they were stolen”.

The other side of ‘passing’ is the underlying (and arbitrary) imposition of a duty to ‘come out’ all the time. In one scene, at school, Angela befriends a new student, Mary Hastings, who, when discovering later about our protagonist’s black heritage, professes to have been ‘betrayed’: “You never told me you were colored!” To which Angela says: “Tell you that I was colored! Why, of course I never told you I was colored! Why should I?” And later, pondering on what she would have done, had she been in Hastings’ place: “She thought to herself: “Coloured! If they had said to me Mary Hastings is a voodoo, I’d have answered, ‘What of it? She’s my friend.’”

The book borrows from a series of genres and tropes – coming of age, Künstlerroman, romance, domestic narrative, marriage plot, protest novel, the ‘fallen woman’, the ‘tragic mulatta’ -, but I particularly liked the way it puts a twist on them and eludes expectations. Despite all the book’s flaws – the outmoded, overly latinized writing style; the occasional verge on the melodramatic; the reliance on bald coincidences -, I was won over by its edges, its unlikeable but unshakeable protagonist, its unwillingness to please a white audience or to conform to their pattern of what a novel by or about a black woman should be. Angela’s defiant question to her classmate echoes throughout the book: Why should I?

Yours truly,

J.

Laura Wheeler Waring. Woman with Bouquet, ca. 1940.

“All right,” she said to herself wearily, “I’ll keep on living.” She thought then of black people, of the race of her parents and of all the odds against living which a cruel, relentless fate had called on them to endure. And she saw them as a people powerfully, almost overwhelmingly endowed with the essence of life. They had to persist, had to survive because they did not know how to die. – Jessie Redmon Fauset, Plum Bun: A Novel Without a Moral

About the book

Beacon Press, 1999, 408 p. Goodreads

Pandora Press, 1985, 379 p. Goodreads

First published in 1928

My rating: 4 stars

Projects: Classics Club; Back to the Classics, hosted by Karen.

My thoughts on Plum Bun: A Novel Without a Moral (1928), by Jessie Redmon Fauset #readsoullit #zora100 Dear Jessie, Plum Bun: A Novel Without a Moral (1928) centres on Angela Murray, a middle-class girl from a black family in Philadelphia.

[rassilon-imprimatur]

Time Lords and Alternate Timelines and Universes

Episodes of Doctor Who like Inferno or any of the appearances of “Pete’s World” can’t seem to help causing a question to pop up in the minds of some fans... 

Does this alternate universe have Time Lords? 

First off, there’s a difference between an alternate timeline and an alternate universe. We’ve seen that Time Lords are able to navigate timelines with ease (they call it “jumping time tracks”), and interestingly, Gallifrey almost always seems to be immune to to conflicting temporal pathways. However, alternate universes are very much beyond the Time Lords. 

Lawrence Miles’ The Cosmology of the Spiral Politic says it better than I ever could: 

There are many universes, and in no way is our current universe the “right” one or the “real” one. The exact number of other universes is obviously unknown, and debate still rages as to whether the number is infinite or just absurdly large (interestingly, this mirrors the far older debate about the size of the universe itself). Since we belong to a species which was born inside space and time, it’s sadly impossible for us to imagine anything happening beyond space and time, and we inevitably tend to think of these other universes as being simple geographical locations; as if we could burst through the walls of our own universe and keep travelling until we came to the next. Clearly this is ridiculous, but at the same time it’s the only way we can feasibly picture things. Since space doesn’t exist beyond the limits of the universe, even the word “outside” is badly-chosen, yet we have no other way of considering it.

There is an expanse between universes - frequently referred to, most notably by the Celestis, as an “ocean” - but it’s an expanse without either time or scale in the conventional senses. Here we’ll once again refer to it as Ur-space, though “space” is yet another misleading term, as nothing can move through it (there’s no distance there to move through). Nonetheless, we can think of universes as being “close” to each other or “far away” from each other, as long as we remember that we’re using these words purely for our own convenience. And since we tend to think about exploration in sea-going terms, we generally use the same terminology as the Celestis and imagine the many universes “floating” on the Ur-space ocean. (Similarly, it’s known that Ur-space is occupied by things other than universes, and in keeping with this nautical theme they’re often referred to as Swimmers. Unlike the universe/s we know, these Swimmers might actually be described as living beings, though in truth they don’t meet most of the requirements needed for something to qualify as life on Earth. In fact they’re vastly more complex, so it might be more useful to say that no living thing on Earth meets the requirements needed to qualify as life among the Swimmers. It’s thought, however, that they have no real intelligence of any kind. 

Intentional or not, the lore of the Void in Doctor Who episodes such as Rise of the Cybermen/The Age of Steel and Army of Ghosts/Doomsday fits well into Miles’ descriptions of an “expanse” between universe. This essay is an excellent description of how universes that occur naturally work, but one cannot help but wonder how the (oft misused) term of “parallel universe” fits in. 

In my opinion, Simon Bucher-Jones and Jonathan Dennis’ The Brakespeare Voyage has out the definitive stamp on how alternate timelines and universes work in Doctor Who’s context: 

Think of the universe for a moment as having three additional directions (alterward, paraward, and otherward) all at right angles to the ones you know (length, breadth, width and time). This is a tremendous oversimplification, but it may help.

Paraward, we find a sheath of histories which are either eternally separate from our own anchored time or which diverge and return to it so far in the past, or so far in the future, as to be – functionally – eternally separate from it in terms of the noospheres of the Great Houses. The physical laws of these universes are identical to ours, but all else is different. We call these paraward space-time entities ‘parallel worlds’.

Timelines which result in these Paraward worlds seem to branch off into their own universes. So, the Earth of Inferno and Pete’s World seem to fit this bill. At some point in this divergence, these timelines become their own functional realities, and develop the Void between them, like universes that are “spawned” naturally and float amongst each other. These paraward worlds, by being completely separate universes, seem to be the exception to the Time Lords’ defense from alternate and parallel time tracks, as David A. McIntee’s Face of the Enemy and Paul Cornell’s Timewyrm: Revelation reveal that the universe of Inferno had different versions of the Time Lords. 

(Craig Hinton’s The Quantum Archangel also confirms that the Inferno Earth was a result of a timeline divergence becoming a different universe.)

Miles’ also touches on this in The Cosmology of the Spiral Politic: 

The fact that nearby universes seem to originate from common ancestors has led to the description of universes close to our own as brother- or sister-universes, although there’s an obvious risk of this kind of language leading us to take the “genetic” analogy far too seriously. Besides which, the technology doesn’t exist in any known culture to (as it were) DNA-test a universe, so the exact relationship between one universe and another is always open to debate.

This has also, inevitably, led to the description of other universes as “parallel” universes. Although this is technically correct, the word “parallel” is potentially misleading. Generations of fiction and speculation have led us to think of parallel universes as universes which are in some way connected to our own, in which history has somehow split off from history as we know it, and this is wholly untrue. No physical connection exists between universes, at least not in their adulthood, though more than one child-universe could potentially grow inside its parent as part of a “litter”. (In fact, if you can ignore its connotations in fiction then “parallel” is quite an appropriate word. Parallel lines never meet, never connect and never intersect).

Bucher-Jones and Dennis continue in The Brakespeare Voyage: 

Alterward, we find those histories which divert, at crucial or innocuous moments alike, from ours. Here are the worlds where a toe goes unstubbed, or a vital battle is lost, where the five hundred and eleventh hair on a sloth in the forest has gone grey in one world, and white in another. Many (perhaps most of these) rejoin the main anchored universe as their micro-changes fall away into quantum uncertainty. When the million sloths are dead and decomposing, what effect will the colour of one hair have had? A few (the mathematics contains several high order infinities, so the number itself may be high) do not appear to rejoin, either eternally leading outside the ‘time-space’ horizon approachable by a normal time-ship, or curving back in closed loops longer than our normal ships can reach, beyond the futures we can access. We call these alterward space-time entities ‘alternate worlds’. Perhaps paraward is just a way of talking about extreme alternates, and alterward is just a way of talking about probability bundle universes. 

So, Afterward worlds are timelines that diverge from the standard time track, but are not independent enough or strong enough to exist in separate universes, and therefore exist as different time tracks. These are the alternate worlds that Time Lords exempt from joining (for the most part), and these are the alternate worlds devoured by the Chronovores in order to spare the limited space and matter of the universe (as detailed in Hinton’s The Quantum Archangel). Any alternate timelines that co-exist with each other in the same universe (Doctor Who’s The Iron Legion, Faction Paradox’s Warlords of Utopia) are ruled over by one version of Gallifrey and the Time Lords. 

Lance Parkin’s The Infinity Doctors strongly implies that the Time Lords, by becoming the Time Lords, made it impossible for them to have alternate and parallel versions in the same universe, regardless of time tracks/timelines...  

Gallifrey’s nameless sun rose over the Capitol Dome, as it had done since the first days of the universe. No sunlight penetrated the Dome itself, but the Oldharbour Clock that stood in the Eastern parts of the Capitol marked the occasion by chiming Nine Bells. On the ledge beneath the vast clock face, an intricate mechanical ballet began, as life‐sized animated figures emerged from their positions and set about their daily routine. They were gaily painted and beautifully dressed, certainly symbolic of something, although even the few Gallifreyans that had noticed them couldn’t agree what it might be. One of the problems was that the clock had never been built. Not in this timeline, anyway. It was a paradoxical survivor from the Time Wars, probably the only vestige of its parallel Gallifrey still in existence. It had just appeared one day, no one remembered when. The analogue Time Lords that had built the Tower had imbued the clockwork figurines with a degree of sentience and the capacity for self‐development.

... and in the same novel...

There was a gleam in Sontar’s eye. “I wonder who it was that the Time Lords fought? It must have been a glorious conflict, and a magnificent victory. Yet you choose to honour those that died by forgetting them. You should remember, Time Lord, that all your power, and this beautiful city, were not built without sacrifice.” 

The Doctor nodded. “Oh, no. Gallifrey honours its dead, as you will see. When we reach the Panopticon you will see the Flowers of Remembrance of the Lost Dead. There –’ he pointed across the city to an unassuming geodesic structure – ‘is the Tomb of the Uncertain Soldier.”

“You value a lack of decisiveness in your military? This man died because he hesitated?”

“No, no, no. This was a Gallifreyan body recovered from an alternate reality. We couldn’t identify him because that soldier, and many like him who fought in the Time Wars, didn’t hesitate at the critical moment, they chose to cancel out their own timelines for the greater good of Gallifrey.”

“An impressive sacrifice. It would please me to hope that my own men would destroy the universe rather than let it fall into enemy hands.”

The Doctor smiled forgivingly, and didn’t correct the old General.

All versions of Gallifrey that would and could exist in alternate timelines were destroyed by the fact that a Gallifrey became the dominant version. 

Cody Quijano-Schell’s Iris Wildthyme short story “The Golden Hendecahedron” retcons regeneration into a means of Time Lords circumnavigating the need to contort to and obey the pathways of alternate timelines... 

“Remember when I… the other Iris… was talking about how I don’t exist in parallel universes?  It’s a part of being a time traveller. We travel between possibilities instead of branching off down the paths of infinity.” She rubbed her fingers together slowly as if she was feeling her own fingers.

Tom noticed this Iris was aloof. Easy going. A little spacey. “So you’re saying most people, every choice they make creates a parallel timeline, one for each possibility?” He was surprised when she let out a loud, bold pleasant laugh.

“That’s right! But being adrift in time and space isolates you from that mundane reality. And that’s why travellers like me… change the way we do.”

“When you become a new Iris it’s not just your body healing itself…”

“…it’s the cosmic balance of possibilities being restored. Oh, you’ll get people trying to tell you it’s just a survival mechanism, but the change goes beyond biology or even technology. It’s temporal. It’s cosmic chance. It’s… infinite possibilities brought to life. Even removed from normal time, and all those branching quantum possibilities…the cosmos demands periodic change and new possibilities.”

... which really puts a fascinating spin on regeneration, don’t you think? 

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[Irregular Webcomic! #4035](https://ift.tt/2XUDFdi)

I've talked about the Banach-Tarski theorem at length before (even giving an outline of the proof). Briefly: The Banach-Tarski theorem is a mathematical theorem that proves that you can decompose a sphere into a finite number of pieces, and reassemble those pieces to produce two spheres of the same volume. I won't dwell on it further here - follow the link if you want to know the details. But yes, that's what it sounds like: a proven mathematical theorem of geometry that says you can cut a solid object apart and reassemble it into two exact copies. Clearly something Jesus would have found useful to feed the multitudes with a few loaves and fishes. Okay, back in that outline proof of the Banach-Tarski theorem, there was a bit that said:

Make a new set of points, call it M. The set M is made up of exactly one point from each of the slices we've just defined. It doesn't matter which point we take from each slice, as long as we take one point, and only one point, from each slice. (We can do this by using the axiom of choice, assuming you believe it - but that's a story for another annotation.)

This is that annotation. An axiom is a premise or postulate of mathematics or logic. It is ideally something that is so elementary and so obviously true that there is no need to try and prove it. The entire edifice of mathematics is then built on its axioms, using nothing but the axioms and formal logical proof to derive other true results. For example, using the accepted axioms of mathematics and geometry, you can prove the Pythagorean theorem. Sometimes an axiom is something that is so obviously true, but which cannot be broken down and proven using other axioms, that mathematicians decide that it must be counted as an axiom and assumed to be true. Euclid did this when he tried to formalise the study of geometry. He tried to prove the obvious fact that parallel lines never intersect, but found that he couldn't do it using his proposed list of axioms about geometry. So he decided that the fact that parallel lines never intersect must be an axiom, added it to his list of geometry axioms, and went on his merry way. Which was indeed fine for the familiar sort of geometry that we learn at school. But in a wider sense, Euclid made a huge mistake. If you assume the opposite of Euclid's axiom - that parallel lines do meet, then you can develop an entire self-consistent theory of geometry in which that is true, known as non-Euclidean geometry. I've talked about this a bit before, in the rerun commentary for #882. Sometimes an axiom is so obvious that mathematicians might overlook it completely when listing their assumptions. One historical example is the axiom of choice. The axiom of choice says:

If you have a collection of sets, each set containing at least one object, then it is possible to select one object from every set.

Putting it less formally:

If you have a bunch of jars, each jar containing at least one marble, then it is possible to select one marble from every jar.

Obvious, right? I mean, obviously true, right? If this were not true, then something would be seriously wrong and you might suspect some sort of fatal glitch in The Matrix. But hold on. Let's put it a bit more mathematically:

If you have a collection of sets, each set containing at least one object, then it is possible to select one object from every set. Noting the sets may contain an infinite number of objects.

So imagine the first set is the set of real numbers between 0 and 1, the second set is the set of real numbers between 1 and 2, the third set is the set of real numbers between 2 and 3, and so on. Each set is infinite, and indeed there are an infinite number of sets in our collection. But it's still trivial to select one object from each set: from the first set choose 0.5, from the second choose 1.5, from the third choose 2.5, ... , from the Nth choose (N-1)+0.5, ... for each positive integer N. This is still obviously true. It's hard to imagine a situation where the axiom of choice could possibly be false. Why would you ever not be able to choose an item from each set in a bunch of sets? But interestingly, there is no proof of the axiom of choice. You can't prove, from other rules of mathematics, that given a collection of sets that you can choose an item from each set. But it's so obvious that you can, that many mathematicians didn't even bother making this assumption explicit, and just went on and proved a bunch of stuff, assuming you can do this. But hold on a minute! It turns out that you can also assume the opposite of the axiom of choice - that you can't always choose an object from each set in a collection of sets - and then derive a whole other self-consistent field of mathematics based on that. It's kind of the non-Euclidean version of set theory, to borrow a term from geometry. And in fact, if you assume the axiom of choice, then you can prove some things that sound ridiculously absurd - notably the Banach-Tarski theorem. A consequence of being able to choose one item from each set of a collection of sets is that you can cut a sphere apart and reassemble it into two spheres of the same size. A thing that is obviously true leads logically and inevitably to something that is obviously absurd. For this reason, some mathematicians now reject the axiom of choice, satisfied that it is in fact false. In a greater sense, the axiom of choice is neither true nor false, in the same way that Euclid's parallel lines axiom is neither true nor false. You can assume it either way, and do a bunch of interesting and non-trivial mathematics either way. [This comic was inspired by a rambling conversation between me and some friends, which actually began talking about mathematics, and for reasons unclear to me now diverged to religion and abortion politics before neatly returning full circle. I turned it on its head a bit to make the joke here.]

[reviewfix]

Review Fix chats with Kamela Hutzley Dolinova (Minister of Mind Control, Evil Overlord Games) and Caelyn Sandel (Literary Miniboss, Evil Overlord Games), who discuss the origin and creative process of “Susurrus: Season of Tides.”

About “Susurrus: Season of Tides”:

Hidden in the shadows of our modern society lies a magical world filled with uncanny beasts, walking nightmares, and silent conspiracies. To uncover the truth of the world, you must transform into a vampire, werewolf, or mage and join their secret cabal. Team up with adventurers from all over the world to build a unique power base of connections and resources to advance your cabal’s objectives – or be a lone wolf and explore this immense world on your own. During your travels, you’ll meet a diverse cast of NPCs who will aid you in your search for knowledge. Unravel the world’s secrets and survive the terrors lurking in the shadows in Susurrus: Season of Tides.

For more on the game, click here.

Review Fix: How was this game born?

Kamela Hutzley: Susurrus: Season of Tides was brought into being when the lead developer, Edwin Karat, had an idea for a game that merged tabletop RPGs, LARPs, and visual novels. Interestingly, it was even partly inspired by a board game – Arkham Horror – in which random encounters often happen that have no future game consequences. In that game, you can enter a room, fail your roll, and smash a mirror from which a demon then escapes and runs off – but you’ll never hear from that demon again. In Susurrus, you can bet that somewhere down the line, the choice to free that demon will have consequences. Edwin brought on veteran LARP writer Tory Root to lead the narrative side of the game; her unique perspective is what gives the writing its richness, and the characters their depth.

The other unique piece about this game is the multiplayer aspect; we’ve often referred to it as a “choose your own adventure MMO” – only half-jokingly. While the gameplay most reflects the feel of a single-player interactive fiction game, the larger world behind the scenes subtly shifts depending on the choices that various players make along their journey. Different quests become available, distinct factions come into power, and players will be able to use chat and other tools to get in touch with each other and coordinate – particularly during faction competitions.

Review Fix: What was development like?

Hutzley: Hectic! We set ourselves a highly ambitious deadline: The company began in October 2016, and we wanted to release our game by Gen Con 50, which just happened. So the process had to be very fast, which is tough when you’re building a new engine – and building a game that relies so heavily on written content. We started the company with only four people, but we knew that we’d need to bring on a number of contractors for both writing and art in order to get something launchable by August. As development progressed, we ended up bringing on a number of other contractors as well to handle some of the UI and front-end issues, edit and sift through all the writing, and so on. It’s been a wild ride.

Review Fix: What makes this game special?

Caelyn Sandel: From the beginning, we’ve focused on two major goals for Susurrus: to create personal, realistic narratives with strong emotional engagement – and to maintain a world that is responsive to player action.

For the first goal, we created fully-realized, vibrant NPCs who have relationships to one another and take action informed by their history. The player knows that Rhys the antique dealer has a dark and storied past – but it’s the echoes of that past that are visible in their interactions. Prying for too much information only serves to shut that door more tightly…

As for the second goal: By joining a faction and pushing for influence, the cycles of power turn in response to the player’s efforts. What one player does may affect what quests are available for all players – and even what the city looks like from day to day.

Review Fix: What games influenced this one the most?

Sandel: The story and atmosphere of our game are very much drawn from classic urban fantasy stories – the kind made popular by role-playing systems such as Whitewolf’s Vampire: The Masquerade and the video games they released under that property. More recently, The Secret World provided an inspiration by being an online multiplayer urban fantasy horror game with vast conspiracies and factions.

In terms of gameplay and format, Failbetter Games paved the way for the realization of Susurrus as a creative process. While our mechanics diverge strongly from Fallen London, it certainly proved the viability of those mechanics.

Review Fix: What inspired the art?

Hutzley: There’s really two words for that: Duncan Eagleson. When we were looking to bring an art director on board, we knew that we wanted someone who would capture the dark urban fantasy feel of the writing in a way that was accurate, haunting, and beautiful. We also wanted something serious enough that drew from all the tropes we’re borrowing from without being reductive or derivative. Duncan, who’s been a friend of CEO Rickland Powell for a few decades, has illustrated for the Sandman comics, book and album covers, film…. Basically, he’s done it all in the horror/fantasy art space. So when we saw his first samples, it was very clear that he was going to be the right person to visualize this world.

Review Fix: Why do you think people love horror games so much?

Sandel: This question is deep enough for an entire thesis dissertation! Keeping it more simple and speculative, there’s a kind of morbid fascination with the dark and unfamiliar. The best horror stories play with the intersection between curiosity and fear – playing with warring desires to comprehend the unknown and to protect ourselves from potential danger.

Susurrus in particular moves freely toward and away from horror, which can help make those horrifying moments more evocative. In one scene, you’re reading a menu in your local coffee shop – and in the next, a crumble-toothed phantom stalks you in an alley.

Review Fix: What’s special about the story?

Sandel: It’s easy for stories of dark fantasy and horror to lean on their genre: a protagonist seeing the world with new eyes and trying to come to terms with their changed reality. In Susurrus, players won’t spend much time in the universe before realizing that they’re not the only ones adrift in an unfamiliar world.

The supernatural creatures of the city may exist in a world that is unfamiliar to the protagonist from the outset, but their world is changing, too – and they’re worried. Something has gone wrong with the equilibrium of power that holds great forces in check – and as new vampires, werewolves and mages awaken with unprecedented frequency, the player has the choice of helping them get to the bottom of it.

The strange, magical people who inhabit the city are people, too – and they find themselves plunged into unfamiliar horror just as the same happens to the player.

Review Fix: As an indie studio, what do you think you guys do differently than the big studios?

Hutzley: At this point, essentially everything! Given how small we are, our development process is much more collaborative and loose. We don’t have people that we bring on just to do this one particular piece of detail work on something without having an intimate knowledge of the whole. And because we’re new and small, we take a lot of risks that larger studios often can’t take: Our first game is definitely a niche one, and our primary goal is to make it exactly how we want it and hope that players love it as much as we do.

Review Fix: Any fun stories or wild moments during development?


Sandel: I’d be hard-pressed to glean any one thing from the continuous wild happenings that took place during development!

Possibly, I’d have to go with the team noticing that our URL could be parsed as “Evi Lover Lord” – resulting in the design of a character named Evi who, while her story has not yet been added to the game, already has character art and is destined to be one of the romance-able NPCs.

We’re an odd bunch.

Review Fix: How does this game disrupt the video game landscape?


Sandel: Did you hear about that eclipse that just happened? That was pretty much all us.

Oh sorry, the video game landscape. Forget that eclipse bit.

Evil Overlord Games doesn’t intend to disrupt video games so much as expand them – bringing outside perspectives and allowing games to meld with other forms of entertainment. We’re not the only creators who are blurring the lines between traditionally separate art forms, but we’re certainly trying to do so in a direction that’s usually ignored.

Review Fix: Who will enjoy this game the most?


Sandel: Readers, particularly fans of urban fantasy and horror, will love Susurrus. Fans of interactive fiction text adventure games and choose your own adventure books should also get a kick out of shaping their own story.

Review Fix: How do you want this game to be remembered?


Sandel: Is it a cop-out to say “as a success”?

More sincerely, we’d like to see Susurrus remembered as a game that pushed the boundaries of narrative games. Interactive fiction is a genre that has seen surprising innovation even over the past decade, and our team intends to bring even more new perspectives to it.

Review Fix: What are your goals for the game?

Hutzley: We really want this game to be something that players who love the deep narrative and emotional involvement of tabletop and live-action roleplaying can sink their teeth into. Because literally the only gameplay is reading and making choices, the quality and depth of the story is the primary focus. It’s also really important to us that the representation of characters in the game be highly diverse. We think we’ve done a pretty good job so far of creating a world where NPCs can be any race, gender, orientation, age, religion or ability. We want to give players a world where the heroes – and villains – come from all walks of life, and where all kinds of players can see themselves reflected in them.

In a broader sense, and on a longer timeline, we also want players to get into the multiplayer aspects – because we think that a choice-based narrative where your choices change the world for other players is a pretty cool idea.

Review Fix: What’s next?

Hutzley: We’re in Early Edition now, so the next steps for us include generating and finessing much more content over the next few months, refining the UI, building up our player base, and getting the multiplayer elements really moving.

Review Fix: Anything else you’d like to add?

Sandel: Our game is in active development right now, and we take player feedback seriously! If you play now and let us know what characters and storylines you want to see more of, your advice will have a real impact on the game.

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Review Fix Exclusive: Inside ‘Susurrus: Season of Tides’ Review Fix chats with Kamela Hutzley Dolinova (Minister of Mind Control, Evil Overlord Games) and Caelyn Sandel (Literary Miniboss, Evil Overlord Games), who discuss the origin and creative process of “Susurrus: Season of Tides.”