#like the socialist party is right there lol

[femmesandhoney]

i cannot believe anyone actually thought jill stein was a better option than kamala, but if you were in a state where the socialist party was an option and decided jill fucking stein was a better option i just know you're for real stupid lmao. like if you really wanted to vote third party that bad because of the current US stance on Israel and you vote for stein you were so played and its embarrassing to watch 😭

[shafran-saffron]

Hey langblr check out this mythical pull I got the other day:

That's a russian to burmese textbook, I've been searching for something like that for MONTHS(I've even found a scan of the first few pages of that exact book online tho), but then I found out that the site of the biggest bookstore in Moscow (and probably the whole of Russia by extension) had LITERALLY ONLY 1 COPY so I went there and bought it!! It was pretty cheap too (like 15$)!!!

The wildest part is that it's from 1971 and was published by the ministry of foreign affairs of the Soviet Union!! There are people out who think their textbooks are too old because they're from early 2000s and I got this relic.

[torgawl]

i voted 😕

[genderoutlaws]

do you have any advice for someone feeling hopeful and hopeless and not sure where to start? people are talking about organizing and i don't want to sound dumb but i don't know what that entails really.

hey, not dumb at all. hang on to that hopefulness. i think in terms of organizing the most essential thing you or anyone can focus on right now is

joining a socialist organization near you. do your research and live your values but i know the largest membership currently resides in DSA and i believe they're doing the work to create a mass socialist party. i've crossed paths and been supported by them a lot as a union organizer and am just now officially joining after a longtime friend/comrade has been urging me to for awhile.

unionizing your workplace. please feel free to message me for more specifics, i obviously can only speak with the experience within my own coffee shop as a 24 year old and being repped by WU, but building class consciousness and building union power among the working class is vital. tenants unions are also great though i do not have personal experience with them.

wearing a mask, staying up to date on covid and h5n1 studies and educating your peers, joining a mask bloc, advocating for better air filtration in your community spaces,, if we want to organize the working class we need all of us, disabled people included. and a lot more people are disabled now from repeat sars-cov-2 infections than realize or care to admit.

look out for your unhoused neighbors. get involved with food distribution, harm reduction, mutual aid services,, Food Not Bombs is awesome and is likely to have a chapter near you. this also kinda folds into the joining an org cuz i know my DSA friends are also heavily involved in organizing against encampment sweeps and advocating for affordable housing.

this is what comes to mind immediately for me and again feel free to message me about any point if you want more direction or clarity or to just talk it out, i'm still finding my footing and always trying to be better. also this all obvs can depend on what area you're in. but generally, any organizing outside of the electoral process once every 4 years is a great starting point lol

[fashionlandscapeblog]

Here's a little story and my 2 cents:

Honduras (where I'm from) experienced in 2009 a U.S. backed coup d'état, which led the country to live a lot of what the United States is currently undergoing, namely the extreme polarization of society, the fear of the rampant threat of a scapegoat (in HN it was communists who would allegedly take away your children, belongings, etc) or foreign forces (in HN's case it was Chavez, in the case of the Ú.S. it's illegal immigrants), and the outrageous lies from all mainstream media to justify the illegal regime's repressive actions against the population. Zelaya's wife is the current president of Honduras and none of that is happening, because neither of them is a socialist (not that socialists take away your belongings or children lol), but social democrats. I will never ever forget when Manuel Zelaya (the democratically elected president ousted by the putsch) clandestinely returned to the country after being ousted, specifically when Hillary Clinton qualified this action as 'reckless' and instead of supporting his return, she pushed for new elections.

On the other hand, a huge part of the population (the resistance) realized all of this and started to educate themselves and others politically. They took action through activism, protests (which received violent crackdown resulting in the death of peaceful unarmed protesters by the military), art, culture, etc.

People realized we had a two-party system problem, where the very same elites that backed the coup controlled both and whoever was in power (like Animal Farm's pigs vs the humans). The part of the population that was aware of all of this worked incessantly for 12 years to break the two-party system. They succeded, but for that the country paid a high price: 3 far-right extremely corrupt narco governments that managed to entirely plunder an already extremely poor country. Only then, the majority woke up. It seems a recurrent fact in history that the the worst has first to happen for change to occur, which is extremely sad.

[determinate-negation]

How do you deal with (or recommend dealing with) liberal USAmericans in your personal life/circle? I have friends who...their hearts are in the right place (I guess. Being generous) but they seem determined to keep believing that nothing that happens has a reason at all. When confronted with uncontroversial statements like "the two parties are not significantly different esp not for the global south" they double down. What is to be done.

lol most of my friends are socialists. but tbqh i think more often than not someones consciousness is changed by broad external factors that impact their life or force them to reevaluate something they held to be true more than by a conversation. if your conversation can really force them to reevaluate something then maybe it will be useful. or if it comes at a time in conjunction with some bigger change in material conditions. but otherwise i dont know how productive it is. ive honestly lost patience for this because its maddening to be like listing the evils of imperialism to see that it just doesnt fit into someones worldview. this is the ultimate issue of consciousness and idk what to do to actually make people get a grip. educating yourself so that you can confidently argue what you believe in is like probably the most useful thing

[crazy-pages]

People like you showing Biden and other democrats that even genocide won’t stop you from voting for them, no matter what, have destroyed this country.

Fucking genocide apologist.

Okay I'm gonna rag on you for a moment because you're dropping anon-hate and anon-hate always deserves that, but then can we talk seriously?

First of all, lol, this is hopelessly optimistic of you to think that Biden's loss would change the mentality of the Democratic party when Hillary Clinton's loss didn't. It makes me look fondly back on my childhood when I was fresh-faced and naive enough to believe that a presidential loss could change the trajectory of a political party whose election officials, party apparatus members, and most of their elected officials will remain unchanged regardless of the outcome of a presidential election. I know you think you're a cynic kid, but trust me you have levels deeper to dig. Get on my level.

But to move past ragging on you and to speak seriously-

Sometimes, there is no winning move in an election.

Let's talk about an issue a bit more abstract than genocide first. I would really like the United States' business system to function more in line with socialist principles, where holding any sort of position of authority over others in a company requires the voluntary and democratic buy-in of those they oversee. I think unions don't go far enough, I want business executives to be elected and constrained in their actions by internally enforced constitutions.

And there is no elected official I could vote for to make that happen. They do not exist. But I can make decisions about which elected official will be easier to organize under, to get closer to making that happen. Who's going to be easier to fight? I'm not talking about voting for someone I think can be pressured into giving me what I want, I'm talking about someone who will simply be less hostile to organizing efforts. Sometimes that's as simple as "which state officials will let me have a graduate student union at all in this state?" and sometimes it's a question of what Supreme Court precedent I expect to be set by a president's judges, and which will be easier to fight later through other non-voting actions.

So here's the horrible, awful, sad truth I have for you.

There is no voting option for USA citizens, including non-participation, which will save the Palestinians in the Gaza Strip. We can hope for protests to continue to erode support and keep the issue in focus, we can use our financial positions to donate aid (as much as is allowed through), hell those of us with access can perform sabotage. But there is no voting option which will affect whether the genocide is permitted to continue by our officials, because this is a two-party oligarchy, not a genuine full democracy.

There is no voting option which will influence the long-term trajectory of the Democrats or the Republicans and whether they continue to be the kind of parties which will support genocide either. Neither is there a no voting or third party voting option which will replace either of them.

If you want that to happen, you're going to need to do organizing and disruptive actions outside the voting system. Maybe if we form enough connections at pro-Palestine protests, do enough organizing work, we can mimic the March on Washington and show up at Washington DC with a hundred thousand people and the implicit threat of "we are capable of putting this many people in the capitol, do not make us come back here". (It worked to get the Voting Rights Act passed).

But that organizing will not occur independent of our voting political system. Obviously not, Biden has been happy to give his seal of approval to police violence against pro-Palestine protests. But Trump's response to the Portland protests was worse. Much worse. He sent in federal troops who were even more violent than the college crackdowns and who black-bagged random people off the street to intimidate protestors, without even the fig-leaf of legal justification the college crackdowns have used (which is scary because it opens the door for even further escalation).

If you want to continue organizing outside the voting system, who is voted in is going to matter for that organizing. Biden is making it difficult, but it can be worse.

Also, Trump is going to make things much worse for a lot of different demographics, who will have much less available bandwidth to help with pro-Palestine organizing. One of my close friends is a trans woman living in California and right now she can and does help with the pro-Palestine movement. But if Trump is elected and passes federal anti-trans laws, that's not going to be possible for her anymore. She'll have to hunker down and go into defensive survival mode, just for the right to exist.

I know this probably sounds like me being derisive and saying, "Ohh, you're a single issue voter about genocide, tch, how naive!". But it's not. It's the practical reality of organizing. People who can commit hard, on the level necessary to affect change outside the voting system for people on the other side of the planet, are not people who are desperate and barely surviving. People who can help are people who are in a position to help others. And if Trump gets elected, a lot of people are suddenly not going to be in a position to help anyone but themselves, if even that.

As an extreme example, when Hitler came to power in Germany, well before the Holocaust got underway, he successfully killed socialist organizing in Germany. But not just because he was directly targeting them with police and the army. The previous regime had been doing that too and they hadn't successfully killed German socialism (hell they'd slaughtered socialists with cops after the socialists saved the freaking government from a coup, they were certainly no allies of socialism). But Hitler, by targeting Jews and disabled people and Romani and queer folk directly, hit populations who otherwise represented possible socialist allies. He made them hunker down and focus on purely self-defense, which allowed him to fully clean up socialist opposition before turning on minority demographics with the full force of the Holocaust.

Direct police violence against political opposition (what Biden has to offer) is less effective than that and a prejudicial campaign of dehumanization and oppression against demographic groups aligned with political opposition (what Trump has to offer).

If there's no voting option which will free Palestine (and there isn't), ask yourself the next question then. Is there a voting option which will free up people to help fight for Palestine's freedom?

If there is, and you're honestly more concerned about Palestinians than your own feeling of moral gratification, take it. Vote, get it over with, and then go back to doing the actual damn work.

[tiredguyswag]

There’s a really insidious blog called hindulivesmatter that wants to promote themselves as an education blog to Westerners but is really Hindutva. They jumped all over a Bengali Jewish’s blogger’s post (they of course assumed this blogger, being Jewish, couldn’t be South Asian) warning Jewish Tumblr that a lot of blogs promising “Jewish-Hindu solidarity” are really just Hindu supremacists promoting Islamophobia and Christophobia and don’t actually care about Jews, claiming they were lying and “speaking over Hindus about our own oppression” lol. This Bengali Jewish blogger literally has non Hindu relatives in India who deal with Hindu supremacist oppression firsthand but ok sure. People like hindulivesmatter claim they “don’t hate Muslims, just are worried about Hinduphobia” but then somehow make excuses for every Hindutva thing as not being hateful including today’s temple holiday, claim that Hindutva meaning Hinduness means that opposing it is Hinduphobic (which is just the worst argument�� it’s like saying it’s anti-socialist to be anti-Nazi bc their party had “socialist” in the name), and they UNIRONICALLY believe that “love jihad” is a real thing that is an Attack on Hindus! I really think more people need to put blogs like this on blast. Some others like them are rhysaka and hello-coffee. You probably know about these jerks already. But I want more of Tumblr to see because I’m so tired of blogs that are really just right wing racist nationalists taking advantage of Tumblr users’ interest in respecting other cultures and listening to people from those cultures about it, in order to spread their hateful garbage. It keeps happening. Russian nationalists did it, Greek nationalists, Japanese nationalists tried to pull it on anime fandom here, now Hindutva. It’s disgusting. And a username like that is so obviously an attempt to appeal to BLM supporters. I’m so tired

oh yeah I knew about them already. I have them blocked, but for anyone else, please don’t bother arguing with them (they’re not gonna listen) or harassing them, just block them

[pixies-love-envy]

Too Sweet: Jude

Character Intro

Name: Jude Fox

Nickname: Fox/Foxy

Pronouns: They/Them/Theirs (they are physically male)

Role in story: Antagonists

Bio/summary/description: They’re a political science major going to Redwood University. They aspire to be a political journalist but are currently working at a pizza restaurant. Harlow Knight, is close friends with them even though they happen to be Cricket St. James ex partner. They broke up with her hoping she would fight for their relationship instead of just accepting it. They were wrong and want her back desperately. When they meet March Starling in one of their classes they become fast friends, however, when they discover March is courting Cricket their intentions turn sour.

DOB: February 29, 2000 (Pisces)

Sexuality: Queer

Ethnicity: German American

MBTI: ENFP-T (Campaigner)

Occupation: Dishwasher at a pizza joint

Appearance

Height: 5 feet 9 inches

Hair: Blonde fluffy wolf cut

Eye: Green

Build/physique: Lean build (semi-muscular if you squint)

Notable features: Heart shaped key on their left wrist, flower and vine tattoos up and down their right side starting from their neck going down their shoulder and onto their hand. They also wear a silver chain.

Clothing style: A mix of grunge and punk aesthetic

Extra

TRAGIC BACKSTORY

Quote: “Did you know socialists can really fuck.”

Traits/quirks:

They’re pretentious. They think that because they know about politics they are better than everyone.

They’re deeply insecure and need constant affirmations and affection.

They’re afraid of commitment.

They’re very creative with their art but not so much in other parts of their life.

They call themselves a pessimist but they hold out hope that the world will change for the better

They’re extremely passionate in their efforts to make the world a better place for everyone.

Fun facts/headcanons:

They are extremely minimalist They have maybe 7 outfits and 12 personal possessions, so they're constantly asking everyone if they can borrow things from them. They completely refuse to buy their own stuff (despite definitely having the financial means to) but they never explain themselves and nobody knows why

They steal from people sometimes just for the thrill of it. They don’t steal anything big and they’re not being malicious (most of the time). They just swipe a fork off someone’s table or take a penny out of someone’s purse.

They’re polyamorous because they aren’t really a jealous person and also it’s less pressure on them to care for their partner if they have someone else to lean on.

They plan on living with friends as long as possible because they’re afraid of growing up.

Hobbies/skills: Vexillology, video games (specifically fallout), drawing, political theory, map making, playing guitar, and studying history

Likes: abandoned buildings, talking to homeless people, various drugs, punk shows at bars, crystals (only because they look pretty), Star Wars, and rupaul’s drag race

Dislikes: fascism, capitalism, organized religion, politicians, police, hyper realistic art, pop music, social media, mainstream news, and house parties

Fun fact about Jude is that I unintentionally made them into my ex boyfriend. So, I decided to lean into it and now they’re like twins but Jude is cooler and prettier lol. This is what healing through writing looks like 😌

Too Sweet Masterlist

@mundanemoongirl tagging you because you seem to be interested in updates!

IF YOU WANT TO BE TAGGED IN TOO SWEET CONTENT PLEASE LET ME KNOW!!!

[cloveroctobers]

KIARA CARRERA — spring prompts 🕊️

A/N: oh kie…the frustration (which toned down after the first episode of S3 lol) and love I have for you. Now that I’ve completely finished the season…there’s definitely a contrast to her character this time around. I’m only here to give kie a fem love interest. Not your vibe and aren’t really interested? Please exit stage left now.

Synopsis: Kiara surprisingly gets insight on another kook, specifically the high-maintenance diva, Henrietta “Nettie” Beaulieu once they cross paths again over a series of unfortunate events.

Warnings: spoilers from the end of season three!

Using this prompt list here and numbers 49.) barbecue parties in the garden + 36.) rain in bright sunshine

GIFS BELONG TO: @esterexpositio + @henryburrell !!!

⋆·˚ ༘ * ✧ ੈ✩‧���˚ ⋆·˚ ༘ * ✧ ੈ✩‧₊˚ ⋆·˚ ༘ * ✧ ੈ✩‧₊˚ ⋆·˚ ༘ * ✧ ੈ

“You’re staring.” Sarah whispered to Kiara on her way by with a plate full of platanos and pieces of hog that Cleo, Pope, and even Nettie managed to trap for dinner hours ago.

Kiara blinked rapidly and scowled over her shoulder at the blonde who smirked at her, walking backwards before taking a seat against a tree near John b.

“No, I’m not.” Kiara glowered.

John B finally looked up from his plate, butting in, “no, you’re not what?”

“Drooling over Nettie.” Sarah told the long haired teen with a bump to his shoulder, making Kiara widened her eyes and shush Sarah who shrugged her shoulders innocently.

It was a John B’s turn to smile now, “oh, yeah. You’ve totally been doing that since I got comfortable over here and this is my second plate.”

Greedy bastard.

Greedy bastard.

Greedy bastard.

“Um, the fact that you two are watching my moves today is completely creepy, I just thought you should know.” Kiara got to her feet, dusting off her Jean shorts.

She was on guarding the relic and gold duty while everyone else had their dinner.

Sarah laughed a bit, “it’s kinda what we have to do for each other since we chose to live out in the forest again and in a foreign country. You’re welcome, Kie.”

A wink was sent to the Olive-skinned girl, which irritated her more than ever.

This was somewhat true, after both John B and Sarah lost their fathers and after finally finding the lifelong treasure Big John searched for, they decided collectively to stay in South America for a little longer. They’ve done it before living on an isolated island for at least a month so what would it hurt doing it again? There were a few out of the group who contemplated about returning back to the Outerbanks right away: Pope considered heading back for school purposes but second-guessed not wanting to leave the pogues behind, Nettie hated the wilderness with a passion—the only time she was solid with being outdoors used to be for tennis and now it seemed like it shifted to gardening…mainly she thought about leaving because she didn’t have all of her skincare products with her, and Sarah struggled with the idea of telling Rafe that their father was gone for good this time.

“There’s nothing to be embarrassed about,” John B added, “I was wondering when you would come to terms with your crush.”

“Excuse me?!” Kiara hissed, stalking over to John B that he immediately sat up straight, “I do not have a crush on—on Nettie!”

Sarah frowned, leaning towards John B as she whispered, “I think she’s still in denial about it.”

“Seems that way, yeah.”

Kiara growled, ready to beat the two with a stick, “you two don’t know what you’re talking about, so shut up!”

“Like I said there’s nothing to be embarrassed about…I think you two would balance each other out with your hippy fiery socialist ways and Nettie’s… strong fashion sense?” John B struggled with his words that Sarah had to elbow him, quite hard.

Kiara was crossing her arms now with a scowl still written on her features. Was this the best John B could do to convince her when it seemed like he still didn’t know who Nettie even was?

“Is that the best you’ve got because that was a garbage take.” Kiara uttered.

Sarah swallowed her food, “what John B means to say is that you two could be the perfect match!”

“But why?” Kiara pressed, “last I knew there was something going on with her and Addy?”

John B awaited Sarah’s response since he didn’t know who that is either.

Sarah shook her head, “oh no that’s over. Addy’s dating some girl that’s on her cheerleading team. That’s been a thing since Nettie’s mother shipped her off to one of those programs your parents sent you off to— which was highly abusive, I hear, in Atlanta. she’s been single as far as I know. Also we just see something that you’re either oblivious to or playing stupid about.”

That made Kiara look over her shoulder at the pony-tail wearing girl. She was sitting across the makeshift barbecue pit which was covered in large leaves and surrounded by some wildflowers—probably picked by Nettie herself, providing an additional pretty view, on a stump next to JJ, surprisingly, laughing at something he was animatedly talking about. It was nice to hear some laughter around here, with Nettie’s sounding just like bells and hope.

Kiara would have never thought Nettie was in a place worse than Kitty Hawk. Especially when it comes to those that don’t deserve it. Did Nettie deserve it? Kiara and Nettie had almost a non-existent relationship? Well not really, back when Kiara, Sarah, and Nettie all went to the same school they only shared a class together freshman year. The first half of Kiara’s freshman year was something she wanted to burn from her memory but kept buried in the back of her mind instead.

She’s only known a few things about the girl in the short time that they interacted. Such as: Nettie was originally from Atlanta with a controlling mother apparently, Kiara knew her father was a firefighter but it seemed like he wasn’t around most of the time, and that she lived here in the kook area with her Olympian grandmother who actually lived across the street from the Carrera’s. Nettie’s been over Kiara’s house once or twice since Kiara’s father, Michael Carrera, thought the two would get along.

Yet it seemed like the more Nettie analyzed Kiara’s bedroom, it felt like judgment but Kiara misunderstood her direct tone—to a certain extent. Kiara always suspected that Nettie was more than just best-friends with the star of the cheerleading team and Nettie never brought her up once when she came over to Kiara’s house.

There was always more than what meets the eye, that’s for sure.

“And how do you know all of this?” Kiara asked, arms still folded, eyes burning on the back of Nettie’s frame.

Sarah awkwardly cleared her throat, “uh some girls told me at this party I went to…it doesn’t matter! The point is, she isn’t just some kook and there could be more between you two if you just try.”

Did Kiara want to try?

She could admit that she did judge her just as much as Nettie judged her. Yet she ended up here with the rest of them for a reason and she was there with JJ to break her out of Kitty Hawk so…where did that leave the two of them?

Soon she found herself heading over to Nettie as Pope and JJ tended to putting the smoke out from the leaves. Off to the side, Nettie and Cleo seemed to be holding a conversation to themselves now, while staring out into the open greenery of the forest.

The two shared two bottom halves of a broken water bottle, leaving Kiara to only hear the end of their conversation.

“Yeah, I don’t know sis. Just goin’ with the flow ya know?” Cleo replied before she perked up at Kiara making her way over, “what’s goin’ on, kie?”

Nettie glanced over at Kiara, before she brought her broken plastic water bottle to her lips but said nothing.

“Not much,” Kiara swung her hands in front of her as she faced the two girls, “you two holding out on the hooch?”

Cleo chuckled with a shake of her head, “what?! Nah! You’ve got to know the little bit we had was devoured by the boys days ago! Nettie here found us something else for the mean time.”

Nettie deeply inhaled as Cleo nudged her. A smile stretched over her moisturized lips as she held out the rest of the bottle to the brown haired girl, “here. I’ve made it myself with some leaves I’ve found scouting the other day. I’m sure it has some health benefits or whatever but mainly it tastes sweet, almost like fruit and it’s refreshing.”

Cautiously Kiara gripped the plastic, her fingertips brushing against Nettie’s as she sniffed at it. The smell was faint, herbal and did have a citrus hint to it which was interesting considering that it was filled with water and mashed up leaves?

Silently she wished that she wasn’t drinking out of plastic right now but giving their circumstances, she had to swallow that pride down along with the liquid. Everything Nettie described was true, it was earthy but slightly tart when it hit your tongue before it smoothed over with a sweetness as it glided down your throat.

“Wow,” Kiara found herself coughing a little bit off-guard, “it almost like a seltzer.”

“Riight,” Cleo nodded her head in approval, “its fire.”

Kiara popped her tongue with a nod of her head, “it’s alright even if there maybe chemicals mixed in with those leaves.”

“Oh here we go.” Cleo kissed her teeth, scratching at her hair as she looked away, already sensing what was about to come.

Nettie argued, “yeah it’s not the wreck’s supposed filtered water but it’s the next best thing.”

“What do you mean ‘supposed?’”

“What I just said,” Nettie stated, “I never knew filtered water tasted like well-water and here you are complaining about my beverage of choice.” She plucked the plastic back from Kiara’s hands.

Kiara frowned, glancing over at Cleo who raised her hands in surrender, unsure why this beef was occurring in the first place.

“Okay just because I have a opinion on something doesn’t mean you get to attack my family’s business.”

“It’s called making a comparison,” Nettie fully turned to Kiara, “dont get upset when I’m just providing a rebuttal for your opinion. You know it’s actually nice to see you back up the only two kooks who you might actually like, although they threw you away the second you didn’t live by their rules.”

Cleo began, “Whoa let’s not—

Humorlessly Kiara chewed down on her bottom lip in frustration before she spit out, “yeah well you’d know all about that wouldn’t you? At least my parents actually want me around. Shouldn’t you be mad at your meemaw or is she just the same as my parents?”

Realization crossed over Nettie’s eyes that Kiara knew why she “disappeared” for a year. It wasn’t much of a secret but everyone in town speculated their own rumors about why she left the Outerbanks. However none of those rumors were true and she wasn’t sure how much Kiara knew of her story at that hellhole but it didn’t matter.

She struck a nerve just as Nettie got underneath Kiara’s skin.

Nettie chucked the bottle to the left of her, getting into Kiara’s face as she glared right into her face. All Kiara could do was smirk as Nettie tried her best to be threatening, which Kiara heard she could be but nobody had the right to shit on her parents but her.

“Move,” Nettie yelled.

Kiara ran her tongue over the front row of her teeth, “sure…only if you make me.”

Nettie’s nostrils were flaring at this point and with a rough shoulder check to Kiara’s, she stalked off, leaving the rest of the pogues highly confused.

“Hey,” Sarah walked to Nettie who held up her hand to silence the girl who told Sarah that she’s, “nothing but a gossiping bitch,” on her way out.

“The hell was that, Kie?” JJ asked from behind.

Kiara threw up her hands, “I’m just using my own words against her’s. It’s not my fault she couldn’t take it.”

“Yeah I don’t think throwing each other’s pain in each other’s faces was the way to go about it, girl.” Cleo huffed with a shake of her head.

Kiara pointed at herself, “why am I being lectured to when she’s the one who started with me?”

“You didn’t have to throw the whole chemical line in, just be appreciative is all you could do.” JJ told Kiara who scrunched up her nose.

Kiara flatly said, “I didn’t mean anything by it. It was just a thought…that happened to escape through my lips!”

“You’re not thinking clearly, Kie.” Pope added, still crouching by some rocks.

Kiara honestly felt like she was being attacked right now for just being herself and she didn’t need anyone to be on her side. It wasn’t supposed to be about sides with this group but Nettie was the new-new face to the family so why was it feeling more difficult to welcome her in?

“I don’t need you guys ganging up on me,” Kiara yelled, “if I would have known this is what staying in Venezuela would be like, I would have gone back home already.”

The friends went quiet at that, not wanting the bad to outweigh the good in this adventure but they were also her friends and knew how to call each other out on their shit.

“It’s not our intentions to make you feel like that and you know that Kie. We also know you’re headstrong, but you just need to see Nettie’s perspective. This isn’t her element and maybe the tea was her way of trying to I don’t know, bond with you?” John B was attempting to be the voice of reason, which was really shocking honestly.

Kiara groaned with her head thrown back, “fine! Whatever, I’ll go see if I can find her and have a proper conversation without you guys being all up in our business.”

“Whew! Thatta girl!” JJ clapped it up just for Kiara to send him a middle finger.

As the girl vanished from their view, they all turned back to each other with curious glances.

“Are we going to go ease drop?” John B asked, itching to follow.

Sarah held him back, “No, not yet. Let them argue it out first.”

Pope stared off in thought, “…do you guys think sending Kie after Nettie was the best idea?”

“Guess we’ll find out if the screams turn into pleas.” Cleo muttered, looping her arm with Pope’s as she sat on the rock behind him.

Kiara knew she had to be walking for at least ten minutes before she found Nettie by the river. It was much cooler here compared to the mugginess up on the hill and Kiara just knew she would find Nettie here. It was the one place where she could wash her clothes and skin in peace so it only made sense.

“Henrietta,” Kiara exhaled as she caught her breath, “you walk pretty fast for someone who hates the outdoors.”

Nettie rolled her eyes, turning back to press her chin into her arms, “leave me alone, Kiara Carrera.”

Kiara sighed as she fanned at the sweat on her neck before she stepped over the rocks and pebbles to stand beside her, “no, I don’t think I will. Not until we come to some sort of understanding, where we can be in the same space without being at each others throats.”

“You’re the one who has a problem with me.”

“What?”

“I knew you didn’t like me from the moment I asked if I could sit next to you back in biology class.”

Kiara frowned, “I don’t…remember that?”

“Yup! you ended up saving that space for Sarah while I had to squeeze in at a table between two other classmates.” Nettie rolled the tension off her shoulders, “it wasn’t a big deal but I just wanted to ask you a question since the classmates I was stuck sitting next to didn’t know shit.”

Like Kiara said, everything about that preppy school, she pushed to the back of her brain. She hated that she couldn’t remember this happening and how dismissive she must have made Nettie feel. Sarah and Kiara were still good friends before their fall out but Kiara felt like she wouldn’t have been rude about declining someone a seat.

Not purposely at least.

“Well…what was the question?”

“I don’t remember.” Nettie found herself saying as she trailed off in thought, “Probably something stupid.”

Kiara felt her nose wrinkling a bit in amusement, “Like us debating over plastic, water, and leaves when we don’t know what we’re gonna do about the treasure.”

“Hey, you started it with the chemicals and I’m all for keeping harmful chemicals out of the body but it’s pretty damn hard with us living like it’s the pre-historic times.” Nettie snickered, resting her cheek on her arm.

Kiara shoved her hands into her back pockets, “I’ll admit, I let it slip and I didn’t mean to insult you when I know what our current situation is.”

“Is this an apology?” Nettie felt her eyes forming into slits.

Kiara twisted her lips around, “…you said my parents threw me away like I’m nothing.”

“And you also said my parents didn’t want me, which is just as hurtful because you don’t know much about me…and I don’t know much about you. I don’t know why…when JJ almost hit me with that dreadful looking brown van after I overheard what your parents did…I felt like I needed to help you. I don’t even know you that well but I understood.” Nettie was staring out into the cool river again.

Kiara didn’t know how this made her feel, hearing Nettie admit this to her but surely she felt something…knowing that she cared about her well-being just a bit.

Henrietta is a gorgeous girl to Kiara with many layers to her. She sat there in what was uncomfortable silence because the two girls weren’t sure how they meshed together. She was the confident girl with a athletic legacy to follow who walked the halls with a bounce in her step. However there was also this girl who could spew venom so recklessly, yet felt the need to help break Kiara out of a place that could potentially ruin her life.

Did Nettie not want that for Kiara too?

Kiara swallowed the lump in her throat as her eyes trailed over Nettie’s bronzed toned arms, spotting the external wound right above the crease of her armpit.

“Did they do that to you? At the camp-program or whatever—in Atlanta?” Kiara slowly sat beside Nettie, stumbling over her words while getting a better look at it.

Nettie followed Kiara’s gaze and went to cover the wound, “yes but I don’t want to talk about that—not here—not now.”

Kiara exhaled and dipped her head, fully aware that topic was a heavy one and Nettie did not want to share that experience just yet.

It was Kiara’s turn to understand, to realize that Nettie was giving only what she physically could, even if that means in portions for right now. 

“I’m sorry for getting off on the wrong foot with you, constantly.” Kiara said, looking into her dark eyes before quickly staring off into the distance, so it didn’t feel as if she was being weird in doing so.

She didn’t realize Nettie staring right back at her, wanting to hold her stare.

Nettie hummed, “and I’m sorry for always having my guard up…especially when it comes to you.”

With her hand resting on top of Kiara’s, Kiara felt her heart began to drum against her chest.

Oh what a feeling?

“Here’s to trying to be better…friends? Or just better towards each other?” Kiara tested but shamelessly stared down at their hands for what felt like awhile.

What a pretty picture, how her hand felt against her’s.

Her eyes flicked up to Nettie’s, watching as the fresh drizzle of rain flew down over the both of them. To the left of Kiara’s peripheral, she could feel the heat of the sun beginning to break through the cloudy skies and Nettie was now staring up at the once gloomy sky.

Kiara just wanted to kiss her.

And so she moved her hand from underneath Nettie’s soft one, trailing it up the side of her neck while Nettie looked down at the space where their hands once resided.

“…What’re you doing?” Nettie was quizzical, although it appeared there was amusement in her tone.

Kiara cleared her throat, “can I try something and can you promise that you won’t be disgusted by my actions?”

Nettie leaned towards Kiara as she pretended to think about it, “if you’re thinking about doing what I think you are…I hope you smell nice enough, especially with how long we’ve been out here.”

Kiara’s lips fell open into a gasp although her cheeks were tinted pink at her previous idea, “you bitch!”

A laugh erupted Nettie’s lips as she reached forward on Kiara’s sleeveless loose-fitting skirt, yanking her lips right to her’s. Instantly Kiara let out a sigh of relief against Nettie’s lips, using her hand to brace herself against Nettie’s thigh. Her heart may have climbed up into her ears with the way Nettie was kissing her, as if time was all they had.

She couldn’t find herself getting tired against her lips, with her lips following Nettie’s tempo. As Nettie was pulling away, she pecked Kiara’s lips a few more times before fully settling back, leaving Kiara to touch her fingertips against her own lips, eyes still closed.

“You have no idea how long I’ve wanted to do that.” Nettie rested her hand against Kiara’s hand that felt warm against her thigh, “and as usual, you took too long.”

“Wooow, I mean Huh?” Kiara finally opened her eyes.

Nettie laughed, “I liked you from the moment I saw the turtle tapestry in your bedroom.”

“I couldn’t tell,” Kiara widened her eyes with a nervous laugh, “it’s clear we have a lot to talk about then.”

“Yeah…maybe somewhere where my hair isn’t getting drenched?” Nettie folded her arms over her head like the Regina hall meme.

Kiara rested her hand on the small of Nettie’s back before gliding it up the back of her neck, “I’ll help you with it later but first…I’ll take another one please.”

“Another?” Nettie asked, turning her lips right to Kiara’s, locking them together once again.

Nettie moved to cup Kiara’s jaw with a laugh, “you’re cute Carrera. almost cute enough for me to forget about my frizzing hair but it’s not gonna work for me.”

Kiara watched in slight disappointment as Nettie hopped to her feet, wrapping her ponytail into a bun. Then she held her hands out to help Kiara to her feet, the two staring at each other in wonder.

“It was worth it.” She teased, licking her bottom lip with a squint against the sun, before nodding to the opposite direction, beginning to lead the way from the river.

Nettie shook her head as she stomped after the just a smidge shorter girl, “you have no idea what you’re getting yourself into when it comes to my pride and joy.”

“Oh, please. Don’t underestimate my magical hands,” Kiara declared before she paused and spun to peer over her shoulder, “that wasn’t a innuendo for anything!”

“Relax, before I have to calm you down with another kiss.” Nettie lightly threatened, making the tint in Kiara’s cheeks almost invisible as her brows raised in temptation.

Nettie laughed, reaching forward to turn Kiara back around by the shoulders as they trudged up the steep hill.

“Hey you guys!” Sarah greeted the two as they made their way back to the set-up.

John B immediately reached for Kiara, cradling her face much to her bewilderment, “oh, she’s good! No war marks on this one!”

“Get off!” Kiara playfully shoved the brunette away, who laughed.

John B then held out his hands for Nettie next as Kiara carried on but soon halted his movements as she told him, “Oh you do not want to do that when my skincare routines been out of whack for weeks now. Touch me with your filthy hands and you won’t see dawn.”

Letting out a low-whistle, John B stepped away while Nettie went to stand in the center of their temporary home.

“So everything went alright out there?” JJ asked, hands on his hips as everyone held their breath in anticipation.

Kiara looked over at Nettie as Pope tossed an arm over her shoulders, “I think we’re good for now, don’t you?”

“As long as you don’t disrespect my way of adjusting to this lifestyle any longer then yeah…I’ll give you your flowers.” Nettie was sharp with her words but the wink she sent Kiara’s way, was enough to let her know to play along.

“Well that was passive aggressive.” Sarah mumbled, tongue in her cheek.

Kiara glared at Nettie, “well how about I tell you where you can shove those flowers, huh?”

Cleo reached for Kiara to keep her from charging over to Nettie who laughed at her with a fan of her hand, “whoa! This hostility is really killing the vibe, eh? I thought you just said you two were good?”

“We’re works in progress but some more than others…” Nettie informed letting a few beats of silence go by before saying, “and my god you guys are so gullible!”

Kiara laughed in Cleo’s arms while the brown-skinned girl appeared just as confused as the rest.

Pope sighed and squinted against the drizzle of rain, “I was gonna say you two are going to give us some serious whiplash, especially since I saw you guys kissing down by the river.”

“WHAT?!” John B bounced on his toes in excitement.

Sarah’s joyful gaze immediately went to Kiara’s who quickly shifted her glaze to Pope with a shake of her head.

JJ laughed with a fist pump shooting into the air, “I knew it!”

“Jesus, Pope! How do you know that?” Kiara didn’t attempt to hide it.

Pope sheepishly rubbed at the back of his neck as Nettie gave the boy a side-eye underneath his arm, “I may have stumbled across you guys on my way to use the bathroom.”

“I can’t believe you’re also a nosy asshole, Pope!” Nettie pulled his arm from around her, while Pope chuckled and gave JJ a low-five.

“Welcome to the family, Nettie! This is what you get so you might as well get used to it!” Cleo hollered as everyone circled around to pull each other into a group-hug underneath the Venezuelan rain.

Nettie gagged as she was smushed together by everyone but can honestly say she’s never been so accepted by a solid group of people.

And when she looked over to meet Kiara’s adoring brown eyes, Nettie held on tight with a smile meant solely for her.

⋆·˚ ༘ * ✧ ੈ✩‧₊˚ ⋆·˚ ༘ * ✧ ੈ✩‧₊˚ ⋆·˚ ༘ * ✧ ੈ✩‧₊˚ ⋆·˚ ༘ * ✧ ੈ

Continue along with my spring anthology series here.

[vintage-vermin]

Every once in a while I'll sit down with mates and we'll watch something with a vague socialist ideal behind it. We don't search out specific media, but sometimes an actor just walks up to the 4th wall and starts talking like a Ted X talk. Simple shit like; "Maybe we shouldn't let everyone starve in these countries when food overproduction is a legit thing." "maybe killing the homeless is not a good idea?" or "just try to be nice and don't tell people who are doing something harmless that you don't enjoy to kill themselves." And I half zone out on these messages because I already learned these like 20 years ago and I don't need a refresher for something I already uphold. I have that sometimes. If you try to explain something I've had in my belief system for like 25 years and you talk to me like a child, I zone out. I'm not gonna stop ya because I know some peeps need to hear basic shit, but goddamn. Which really puts me in such a weird spot when the neo-libertarian conservative next to me has his world view shattered about addicts not just being addicted for the sheer fun of it or something. I just have difficulty trying to explain some of these basic human rights things to people of the same age group sometimes. Like, fuck, how did you not start thinking or learning this shit at least in your early 20's. What the fuck. How the fuck did you get through life up to this point while legit thinking you're the main character and we all de-spawn when you leave the room. I used to try, but I got tired of the endless bad faith arguments, "lol u made a typo so I won" and the slurs. At this point, it really ain't my job to educate you unless you pay me. Just read some shit NOT made by people who do shout-outs to StormFront or by the name of DerUnteidigeKriegMan88 if you wanna learn. But that means people would need to understand Google and it's fun way of leading you to garbage. It means they need to critically think for a moment when HitlerCunnyFan tell them ethnostates are okay. Which for some, is asking way, WAY too much.

You might tell me "oh, you should hang with better people" bae, I hang with like 4 generations of people due to the nature of my work. I spend 9 hours in the open air, directly interacting with random people and workers. Everyday I can end up working with whole new groups of like 20 people and then have a chance never see them again and meet 20 new ones tomorrow. You talk a lot inbetween the boring bits, lots of people can't really stay composed in a way and start telling me why voting for the super-villain-trump-wannabe that's looking to deport him and his family just for his skin color was the best vote this middle-aged Egyptian man has every put in, according to himself. I dunno, I just get frustrated about various connected thing sometimes. I get annoyed when people pretend our country is this super liberal paradise filled with shinning souls or some shit. It ain't and it never was. Conversion therapy is still 100% legal, still fucktons of extra stipulations for gay marriage, poor trans healthcare which is only going to get worse now that the people voted in the extreme right-wing party and half the people that are supposed to lead the country just parrot what the USA does, regardless of context of how different things are across the other side of the world. Just a little background frustration that's always going on.

[drbased]

Thank you so much for answering ! I was so hesitant about sending that ask because to me it was just an unnecessarily morbid and sad vent, so imagine my surprise when you said it was lovely to receive 😹

I have watched the alt right playbook series when it came out ! I used to be very involved in skeptictube back in the day and everyone recommended it. I'll need to rewatch it ! I was wondering if you had recommandations about the satanic panic specifically, as you mentioned listening to/watching something about it ?

Your paragraph about conspiracy theories is SO on point! I definitely need to translate it and show it to my mother, you worded perfectly what I've been trying to explain to her. Q anon really is a good example of these things because it is exceptionally stupid and extreme.

A few things about the Emmanuel Macron theory :

My father didn't come up with it, he never does. I'm not sure how to say it in english but my father is very influencable, he is very easily convinced by people trying to sell him products (or ideas...). Most of his ideas come from people he follows on twitter and odyssee. As for the theory itself : the idea that Brigitte Macron is actually male is very popular amongst french conspiracy theorists, and I suppose you are not aware, but even without that she is quite the controversial figure. She was the president's teacher in high school and if I remember correctly, when he got his diploma she left her husband for him and they have been together even since. I'm not giving my opinion on this whole debacle because it's above my paycheck lol, but as long as my father has known who this woman is, he has hated her with a burning passion and made it very clear from how he talks about her. Long story short he wants her hanged on the time square 👍. This is all very hypocritical of him considering he never had any moral issues with his sister (my aunt) marrying a man she started dating when she was 12 and he was 28. And never acting up and doing something to help her when he turned out to be abusive. (Shocker I know)

For your answers : I agree with everything apart from the fact that Macron is a right wing politician and my father also wants HIM dead 👍 he wants everybody dead. He used to be anti death penalty and a profound pacifist, but now he cannot dislike things or people normally. Everything becomes extremely violent.

Writing all this has been very cathartic! This situation has been harder and harder to live by the day (I still live with my father after all) and I've been having a bit of a breakdown because of it. It's hard to remain cordial and polite with someone like this everyday, because every activity, every subject of conversation is tainted. It has taken all the joy out of our home life, mine especially. So thank you for hearing me out :) you're really cool

Nice to find another informed and cultured fellow like myself! I'm very glad you're familiar with the alt right playbook. Imo it should be standard 'reading' for any wannabe leftist. My favourite video is the one on 'controlling the conversation' which has entirely shifted how I engage with people online, and is responsible for why you don't see me argue much on here.

Don't worry about being morbid, I'm used to all sorts of things I probably shouldn't burden my fragile mind with. Regardless, I think it's so important that women speak out about our experiences with each other. What I find so fascinating about feminist analysis is that literally every subject you can name will inevitably relate back to some patriarchal ideology/practice - which makes sense because women are 50% of the population and male oppression is so universal that of course it would permeate everything.

Huh, Macron's wikipedia page mentioned associations with the socialist party. And I also figured that it would make sense him being considered left wing, since right wingers are obsessed with emasculated, 'soft' men having left wing politics. However I did originally intend to put 'left wing' in air quotes because I'm aware that even self-proclaimed left wing parties are liberal at best.

Here's the video that sparked my thoughts - it's a much more standard exploration of the history of satanism so there's not much in terms of analysis, just history. I'm getting slowly used to it but now whenever I hear a man speak on a political/philosophical subject, the absence of feminist analysis is palpable. I'm a big fan of breadtube and skeptictube but since I started engaging with feminism I can't help but notice those glaring gaps where they'll say stuff like 'trads want women to go back into the kitchen because they believe that men and women should have certain roles' - they're so deathly afraid to address what those roles are and why they exist, it would be funny if it wasn't frustrating. If I find any better resources on satanism I'll let you know; it would be cool if anyone has any good book recommendations on things like satanism, conspiracy theories etc. from a feminist point of view. (I think Gyn/ecology might touch on it? I've not got a copy unfortunately).

I am very unsurprised that your father is fine with a age gap between an older man and woman but not the other way round. It's one of the oldest double standards in the book, I'd wager! Also unsurprised about the sharp turn to loving violence in all forms. It's funny isn't it, how the absurdity of qanon is so obvious - it's been said before by women on here that there seems to be something so enticing about these farcical ideologies. I think people like confidence, they like the idea of being sure against all odds, and the more ridiculous the assumption the more you have to take it in on faith - and then you're locked in, because admitting it was wrong will eventually require you admit it's also patently absurd. I think a lot of people just don't want to take that leap. There are a lot of books on how to escape cults that might be of interest? Combating Cult Mind Control by Stephen Hassan comes to mind - I haven't read it but I've heard good things about it.

I didn't know you still live with him - that's incredibly tough. I can strongly imagine how difficult that would make day-to-day life. I have experienced something similar before. Not being able to talk freely with loved ones in your own home really does change something inside you, I think. I'm glad writing it all out has been cathartic for you - we women need to do this more, our experiences need to be heard and documented. I hate the fact that because of our visibility online we can never give too much away, but there are ways around it I think. It's been so incredibly cathartic for me to write - it's made me feel not crazy, it's given me focus and purpose. Anyway, best of luck to you, I hope you get out of that situation as soon as possible, or at least find some way of making it more palatable for yourself.

[racefortheironthrone]

hi ser steven

been following awhile and while i came across your blog and tumblr from all the asoiaf stuff, i definitely stayed for the historical and economic analysis along the way

so my ask is more of a beginner's to left-right economic/political terminology question: is there a difference or distinction between a social democrat and a democratic socialist?

i see a lot of US politicians say they're the former and oly one prominent one identifying themselves as the latter

or there not really a distinction but the order became important because americans are still terrified of socialism's association with the red scare?

p.s. pardon my english and lack of knowledge of some issues, english isn't really my first languange and my knowledge of american history is the cliff-notes version lol

I'm afraid you've openeed up a rather large can of worms with this question. Not that it's not a useful or important question, but it's annoyingly complicated.

Because there is an explanation about what the differences between "social democrat" and "democratic socialist" are in a European context, but then there's an entirely different explanation about what the differences between "social democrat" and "democratic socialist" are in an American context.

The European Context:

In a European context, the difference between the two labels largely has to do with how different groups on the left feel about the Third Way movement of the 1990s and what's happened to the left (or more accurately, center-left) politically since then. So, for example, democratic socialists are more likely to emphasize the need for a shift from a capitalist to a socialist economy than social democrats, who traditionally have sought to regulate and reform capitalist economies.

However, this can very easily get into the weeds, especially if you try to follow the complex ideological manueverings and movements from the 1950s-1970s in the British Labour Party - where social democrats were the right wing of the party and socialists the center and more revolutionary socialists the left - and how those influenced struggles within the Labour Party in the 1980s that helped give rise to New Labour and so forth.

The American Context:

But the reason why the largest and fastest-growing socialist organization in the United States is called the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) and why Bernie Sanders calls himself a democratic socialist actually has nothing to do with that complex economic debate, and everything to do with a man named Max Shachtman.

Max is a complicated and controversial figure in the history of the American left. On the one hand, he was probably the most significant American Trotskyist, he created this whole theory of "bureaucratic collectivism" that caused Trotskyists to fight amongst themselves about whether the USSR was "state capitalist" or a "degraded worker's state" until the Berlin Wall came down, and he was by all accounts a highly charismatic speaker and someone who recruited other intelligent and hardworking people into the movement.

On the other hand, Shachtman was also a lifelong devotee of entryism, a sectarian tactic by which members of an organization join or merge into another, larger organization. Rather than actually genuinely intending to work for the interests of the new organization, they're really there to recruit people into their own organization, steal the mailing list and the rolodex (this is how political organizations used to work before the advent of computers and the internet), and cause the larger organization to split and become politically paralyzed, so that it no longer poses a threat to the expansion of their own organization.

Shachtman was kind of a genius at this, because people from other organizations would agree to mergers with him, despite knowing that he had done this to other organizations before: there was the Workers Party of the United States merging into Norman Thomas' Socialist Party back in the 30s, then there was his break with the Socialist Workers Party in the 40s, then it was the Independent Socialist League merging with the Socialist Party in 1958 - and on and on.

Anyway, by 1972 said Socialist Party decided to rename itself "Social Democrats, USA." Michael Harrington (who was Shachtman's most prominent protege thanks to his authorship of The Other America) decided to break with Shachtman and the former Socialist Party due to their anti-Communism and thus support for (or rather, opposiition to opposition to) the Vietnam War.

In order to distinguish themselves from Shachtman and the "Social Democrats, USA," Harrington and his allies ultimately decided to go with Democratic Socialists of America as the name for their new group, and one of the historical ironies of the American left is that they probably would have gone with Social Democrats of America and avoided a whole lot of future confusion from European visitors and journalists had their former parent organization not had a name that was too similar.

[ewanmitchellcrumbs]

How do you think Ewan vote? How do people of Derbyshire vote? Like their general political affiliation. Do they generally vote like those underdeveloped red states do, vote against their interests in the US. Totally ignore this if you don’t want to get into it, I understand. Saw some election news and I’m curious and bored lol

Derby has a Labour local council currently - it's a working class city, so most people tend to vote in support of left leaning/socialist parties that are in favour of supporting workers' rights. The UK political system is essentially a three party system - Conversative, Liberal Democrats and Labour (there are other parties, but they don't really get a look in) - the more affluent an area the more likely it is to be overwhelmingly Conservative, meanwhile the poorer an area the more likely it to be Labour (or have people who just don't vote at all, as they're rightfully disillusioned with the current state of the Government)

Labour used to be a party worth voting for back when Jeremy Corbyn was leading it - it was reflective of socialist values and genuinely stood for giving a voice to those from marginalised communities. However, since Keir Starmer took over it has become a diet version of the Tories and now when you go to the polling booths you're just choosing which colour of neo liberalism you'd like.

As far as how Ewan votes, I have no idea - if I had to hazard a guess I'd say either Labour or Lib Dem.

Please note this is the first and only political ask I'll entertain on this page, so I'd like to actively discourage anyone from sending any follow-up - that's not what I created this page for.

[mostlymaudlin]

Instagram husband? 👀🤭

@thewholelemon asked for this too!

so, some may be familiar with my great british bake off au, Nothing Equals The Splendor. this takes place in the same universe! it's another one where im not sure why i didn't finish it, because it's over halfway done.. but whatever lol. im actually going to put the rest under a read more because there's a HUGE spoiler for the original fic!!

soooo if you remember, simon won the championship. and now he has to be really active on social media to reap the benefits. and baz makes it his mission to ensure that they have good content to post LOL, so he's constantly taking pics of simon (like an instagram husband). the fic is actually told in a collection of outsider POV vignettes -- niall, shep, dev, and penny -- before coming back to simon/baz povs.

now that im looking at this, i think the reason i stopped writing it is that there's Tension that arises between simon and baz bc of all this social media stuff and i kind of didnt want to deal with it once i got into their heads -- bc the outside povs were so fun!! esp bc i loved my versions of niall and dev in this verse.

i'll give you the full dev pov scene, because why not lol:

I didn’t expect Malcolm to take Baz’s whole new thing well. Baz’s dad has always put a lot of pressure on him. I don’t think he expected Natasha Pitch’s son to grow up to be a queer socialist. (Baz’s politics are kind of bullshit since he’s still paying rent and tuition with Daddy’s old family money. But so am I, so I can’t really judge.)

Anyway, I certainly didn’t expect this: Malcolm and Baz’s boyfriend chummin’ it up at my grandmother’s garden party. Simon had expressed mild interest in Malcolm’s newest magickal livestock endeavor (Literal fire-breathing guinea pigs. Inspired.). It devolved from there. 

I’ve always maintained that my uncle Malcolm is a softie underneath it all — mostly because I know that’s how Baz is. The Grimms are sensitive folks. And as soon as you give their weird niche topics a spoonful of attention, they fall apart like putty in your hands. You should hear Baz wax on about baking, it’s insufferable. But also very sweet. 

Or maybe Simon Snow has some kind of secret key to a Grimm’s heart. 

“Wait, my American friend taught me this one,” Simon says, reaching his hands out for Malcolm’s youngest kid, Swithin. “I've been working on the railroad / All the live-long day. / I've been working on the railroad / Just to pass the time away!”

They’re several drinks deep, passing Swithin back and forth on the steps of the back porch and singing him nursery rhymes. Malcolm just finished a rousing rendition of Ladybird, Ladybird! that made Swithin coo with laughter. 

“Dinah, won't you blow, / Dinah, won't you blow, / Dinah, won't you blow your horn?” Simon’s voice is carrying now, Swithin bouncing joyously on his knee. 

Daphne and I are standing nearby, watching the whole affair with wide eyes. 

“What is happening right now?” Baz hisses. I jump — I hate when he sneaks up on me. Stealthy motherfucker. 

“Shhhh,” I say, putting a hand on his shoulder. “They’re bonding. Nature is healing.”

Daphne laughs at that, loud enough that both Malcolm and Simon look over at us, cheeks equally pink as they realize they’re putting on a show. Daphne takes out her phone and takes a photo of them. She’s lucky the porch lights are on — the sky is a dusky purple at this stage in the evening.  

“Could you please send that to me, Mum?” Baz asks, his voice small. I’m worried he genuinely might cry. 

“It can go on my Instagram!” Simon calls over. Baz grins, walking over to sit next to him on the steps. Swithin reaches for Baz, and he swoops him up, kissing his forehead. Then he leans over and kisses Simon’s forehead as well. 

Malcolm doesn’t even flinch.

[bitchfromthecrypt]

I'm not starting a whole new blog for this lol,

I present to you all, the first four chapters of the second draft to my (hopefully) coming soon novel, "As We Know It"

Very loose bad bad awful summary: Powerhouse lawyer Angela nearly dies after a nuclear war, finds town full of previously assumed mythical creatures and makes a little home, meets hot vampire queen Khalida and hot Weredragon Nobel Patience D'Herensuge, and they fall in love a while after they find out they're soulmates. This leads to socialist anarchy.

☾☾☾☾☾☾☾☾☾☾☾☾☾☾☾☾☾☾☾☾☾☾☾☾☾☾☾☾☾☾☾☾☾☾☾☾☾☾☾☾☾

Trigger warnings: Death, brief mention of suicidal ideation, war, nuclear war. description of Gore

Hope y'all enjoy!

Chapter One

If you asked Angela, she’d tell you, all doors really should be automatic.

It’d make life so much more convenient. You come inside from carrying a load of groceries and you don’t have to worry about futzing around with your keys, standing around for five minutes trying to figure out how to open a door that feels like it hates you.

This door definitely hated her, she mused.

Why wouldn’t it? She hadn’t used it in years, and now, finally, stupidly, she wanted to just open it up and waltz on out of the place she’d been safe and stuck inside of into a world that was probably filled with toxic waste, rats with human ears, and human flies? Did she want to avoid using it ever again that bad?

Maybe.

She reached a hand out to try to unlock, still jolting back like the lock itself had been exposed to radiation for the past three years.

She leaned back against the cold, rusty, steel walls, too tired to care about tetanus, thinking about the past for the millionth time that day.

God, Angela Weathers, top contract attorney at her firm, lover of parties, name brands and biannual vacations to wherever the dart landed on the map, never used to think about the past.

Angela, the last surviving human on earth, just sits in the dark talking to herself about it. On a good day.

“I should have just gone to the main office.” She said, outloud, for the billionth time.

“Daryl put some important documents down here in the bunker, but not often enough to even warrant a check, he had mentioned every other day upgrading the system, switching to using computers and the web.”

That was the other thing she did for fun, standing next to the door and pretending for a minute there was someone else on the other side of it.

‘Why did you?’ She imagined them asking, ‘When you heard the sirens, you could’ve walked out, the door was closing slowly enough.’

Groaning dramatically and banging the back of her head against the wall, wincing a bit, her fresh retie as pretty as it made her feel raising hell on her tenderheaded self.

“I don’t know. Probably the same reason no one else came down. Maybe they panicked, maybe they froze. Maybe their brain just made the smart decision for them.”

She turned firmly to face the door, reaching for the door again, more so to fidget with it than anything.

“You’d think, all of us, a group of thirty-somethings would be able to either follow the nuclear war briefs we’d been getting since we were ten or to make up our minds about whether or not surviving it would have made any goddamn sense.”

‘Well, of course,’ they’d say, ‘this place has everything you could need! Shampoo, jugs of water that tasted off even though they were filled with just water, just enough spironolactone to last you up until sometime between today and next year.’

“Canned peaches, canned chicken, canned ham, shoes that are too big for me, and super ugly,” she whined, kicking the ankle high industrial combat boots she hadn’t even tried to put on yet.

It's not like there was anywhere else she could go.

It didn't matter how much food, or water, she had left or how well the shelter’d been built.

Living there, alone and scared was much worse than anything that could happen to her out there, right?

Right.

She knew that.

So why couldn't she open the door?

She stood up, smacked her cheeks and tried not to think about how many times her coworkers and girlfriends had fixed her makeup for her after she’d done it.

She used the code, conveniently hidden under the eighty-seventh can of beans, she pushed all the right buttons and heard a little ringtone that probably used to sound melodic, at least a little happy, maybe a little annoying after a while.

All that came out was a quiet, rhythmic groan.

She could've opened the door then. She should have, honestly.

Why didn't she?

Is it the fact that she's probably killing herself just by thinking of abandoning the only thing that's been safe, no, certain after all these years?

Her books, as boring as they were, she couldn't take them with her, if she didn't pass out from toxic sludge inhalation she'd need to be able to move, and carrying around fifty seven American classics in the hopes of finding a nice spot in the shade to reread them wouldn’t be the wisest decision.

“No,” she said “I don't think it's any of that.

Or maybe it is. Maybe it's all of it.”

The hatch was open before she could think.

Mindless, like a robot programmed to keep taking one slow step after another until its batteries died, she walked down the short, but seemingly unending hallway, brown leather boots meant for someone five shoe sizes bigger than hers and all.

God, she wouldn’t have been caught dead in these before. God, the reads she would have gotten from Tamara alone. She would have demanded she go change.

‘If you’re gonna die, you have to do it wearing something cute, you can’t just be in an ugly ghost outfit for all eternity, what am I supposed to say when we meet in the afterlife and all my friends see you have those things on?’

Angela laughed a little bit thinking of her, thankfully. Crying gets boring after a year, and she wouldn’t have wanted her to be some sad sack forever.

She wouldn’t have wanted her to be leaving the bunker either, but she can’t make everyone happy.

She’d never really been that concerned with that particular hobby, to be fair.

She knew she was brilliant. Her mom had about twenty of the trans pride flag and harvard summa cum laude graduate bumper stickers on her car, she’d gotten her first and last job at counsel authority on the other side of the country at twenty-five, and she’d crafted about two thousand contracts per year for the greater half of her adult life.

She also got stuck in a baby swing at a playground at age twenty seven, while completely sober.

Now that was definitely it, that was the problem. That was the reason why she couldn’t bring herself to do any more than stand in front of the final barrier keeping her in and all of the fifty foot women and godzillas out. She was just thinking. Something Angela either did too much, or too little of at any given point in time.

The days she was really lucky, the days things always worked out for the best, were the days when she got to choose which one, as rare as they were.

“Today’s as rare as any other. Not much distinction between them anyway.”

Angela made the decision fairly quickly, to do a bit of both.

If she was gonna live, not just survive, but live, and thrive, she’d obviously need to think sometimes.

But if she was going to die, which she was fairly certain she was, she didn't want to realize it until it had already been good and done with.

Her eyes closed, and both hands on the comically normal looking doorknob, she tried and failed to empty her mind.

She wanted to rip every horrible thought straight out of it and toss it into the brand new paper shredder she had for a solid two days back in her office.

She imagined shredding pictures of Godzilla, of barren, gray, wasteland, of horrible chill that comes with stepping out into a nuclear winter that everyone around her had been talking about for years, of the loudest sound she'd ever heard in her life, just before she'd narrowly missed watching her family, her species, and the only world she'd ever known, one she now considered her favorite, die.

But you can’t really shred most of those things, can you?

She opened the door.

Chapter Two

There was not a single person in this small group of royals—which they’d resolved to refer to themselves as before they’d even agreed upon a space for them to meet—who was below a thousand years of age, including Patience, however they at least knew how to operate a simple pocket watch, and they’d woken up practically weeks ago for the first time in hundreds of years.

“Well what if we just let them loose?” Terry, queen of the spring court, a tall and spritely being who hadn’t done so much as read the pamphlet Patience had handwritten for each of them, began her neverending tirade of insisting on complete anarchy, not that she’d know that word. Too hard to spell.

“Terry, we have been over this. We need to enact some sort of system in order to avoid further harm. The lack of unity between nations is what led to this in the first place.” The leader of the Siromo tribe of mermaids, Amaka said, the only person Patience could hear over the crowd of voices, all insisting that the best moment to share their rebuttal was the exact same time as everyone else.

They got out of their chair, one of thirteen golden thrones that rested around their egregiously large golden roundtable, topped with designs carved out of opal and lapis lazuli, and went to drink some water from the lake outside, their notice of leave hanging ignored in the air.

Patience stared at themself in the lake, for many more minutes than it would take to shift and take a sip of water.

Who was he?

Gods, he’d barely remembered his family, he thought his father was kind, the last memory they’d had of him was the day he’d met his mother.

They were hunting, they were about to pull the trigger, killing some kind of bird or deer, probably, who knows, and something rumbled through the air.

If they were to describe it, they couldn't say it was a sound, or a feeling, as woefully simple as the thought was in their mind, it was just big.

The calling heaved through the air with such a strength they feared it would become corporeal and grab them.

They can't say they remember much of the evening after that. They couldn’t forget her, no matter how long they’d tried to.

With her wild red hair, her braids that reached far beyond the floor in her tall and daunting human form being the main reason she preferred to stay a dragon.

She had held him very often when he’d cried. They couldn’t remember why, they just know her cool scales as she nuzzled him the way a cat does a kitten had made many of their nights as a young child feel safe, despite sleeping in the dark woods. ALthough wolves were not as frightening as dragons, there was not much reason to be fearful.

It was unwise of her to grow old. The one thing she did that made Patience angry with her after all of the years they’d spent together, her only unforgivable act.

She said she hadn’t wanted to watch him die, they’d been sick for months, only coming out on days when it was warm enough that they didn’t feel they’d break in two if they took a single step. She said that no mother should have to watch her child as such. That she would instead gift him with what she had been gifted eons ago, that only one dragon could exist in a space at any given time.

And she died. She chose to.

Patience had mourned. He slept his days away and the amount of time he spent awake and aware of the world shrunk as each year passed, and by the time they felt anything once again, they had realized that being aware hadn’t improved their days by any measure.

The only reason they were awake now is there were no other options.

These people were not suited for the title they’d deigned themself with, and he wasn’t either. But if he did nothing, then they’d have no reason to be, and that would mean she’d have gone for no reason at all.

Their musings were interrupted by the sound of the door flying open and the feral gaze of the vampire queen settling on him for one long moment before she went barreling into the forest.

They shook a little bit, all seventy thousand pounds of him chilled a bit more than you’d think their cool blood would allow for.

They did not like that woman.

She definitely had a strong heart, for lack of a better word, but anything that required complete focus, sitting still, and following the rules of bureaucracy seemed like methods she would and has used to torture her enemies.

Well, more torture in addition to it, but still.

Patience was a royal now. It was his job. He’d agreed to his position when the time came, and she had as well.

He would never understand why.

The vampiress had never spoken more than a few words to Patience and yet, they found themself consumed by either irritation or at her every action, or lack thereof.

She’d behaved like every other “Royal” had, with no real regard for the reason they were there.

The humans were dead.

As was their trade, and their cameras, and their policies, and more of their animals than any creature left behind would like.

The world, at least as every last semi-immortal being knew it, had changed beyond comprehension, and the entire remaining population had entrusted this too small room full of those of all different species, religions, cultures, and walks of life in general to come up with something resembling a solid plan.

The few months immediately after they'd gone were horrendous.

The fairfolk nearly went extinct from the lack of breathable air, of foliage, and of general smog.

Every last being on earth had to work together to bring this planet back, and despite the fights, trickery, and grief, they'd managed it.

And they'd be damned if they let themselves get to the point of destroying it all over again.

This meeting was more than a casual party, it was the beginning of every decision ever to be made for the rest of the world.

And so, on the seventieth of the initial meetings, in which all the leaders were supposed to be present, when Patience would find they would be missing one crucial vampire queen. And the anxieties would rise, Patience’s blood would slowly but surely begin to curdle at the ever rising idea that someone must go to retrieve her before the week should end, before they all go back to their kingdoms having wasted days, which while not exactly a huge amount of their lives, were still full of painful small talk and brash comments, only to maintain the same stalemate they've been in since their worlds got turned upside down.

They weren’t aware of it, hearing her quiet but not inaudible footsteps ring through the forests, but they would be the one to see to it that she would return shortly.

Chapter Three

The thing you'll have to remember about Khalida, is that she's not selfish, not in the true sense of the word.

To be selfish, you’d have to be aware of the fact that you are a person. That you exist. That the people around you have lives and feelings and that this fact should matter to you.

Most days, Khalida was not a person. She was a force. A force that used to need to eat.

She still could. She thinks about it sometimes. As much as she could think.

Khalida was no longer one to think.

She had been, for a bit of time. When she was a child she thought constantly, even more so as an adult..

Then the first century passed, and she hadn't aged a day, and all that time and money and all those vastly different lives, well, they added up.

And after the nine hundredth body, after the millionth piece of gold, it's kind of hard to recognize that those around you, or even you, yourself, matter.

So when khalida was in the meeting, imagining how the leader of the good neighbor’s summer court would taste and what noise she’d make when she felt her teeth in her carotid—not the most ideal place, but beggars couldn’t be choosers some days, and it’d be a great deal of work to find a better spot, and she smelled it, she was confused.

The scent, somewhere off in the woods, it was sweat, dirt, and most importantly, human.

And the faintest hint of Guerlain Shalimar.

Did she think before she ran after it?

Yes. More than she should’ve.

Chapter Four

When she saw those kids—kids? She still wasn't sure, they were way too small to be kids—standing at the very top of a tree and giggling to themselves about a joke she immediately knew she'd never get, Angela thought for a second that maybe things would be ok.

This changed after she realized their size.

And their pointy ears.

And their limbs that bent at such odd angles, and the thousands of colors on them that no human should be able to see, let alone have in their clothes.

And that one of them jumped straight down the length of the tree only to catch themself a millisecond before hitting the ground and using their deceptively strong dragonfly-like wings to soar right back up to the top.

She considered going back into the bunker, just for a second, but a phrase popped into her head that rang so familiar to her, “Ah, poor Miss Taylor, she would be very glad to stay!” from Jane Austen's Emma. and the urge to turn back dissipated. Because as lovely as the story was, and as strange as those not children were, she should not remember that line.

Either she was hallucinating and her brain was really capitalizing off of that human fly thing or she was psychic. Both would mean something new, and at this point, she’d take it.

She stared up at them, enthralled, unable to move. Realizing with each passing moment that she was allowed to stare how their skin glowed, how their eyes were too wide, how some of them even had flat, horizontal pupils, like goats or something.

In hindsight, she probably should have noticed they were staring back at her much earlier than she did.

But when the whispers and giggles stopped, and eyes that were crinkled with smile lines turned cold and hard upon seeing her, it didn’t take long for her to become as hopeless as someone in her situation. ought to be.

The first one to jump down was neon pink, Angela couldn’t have recalled many other details about her, because it hurt to look at her for too long. She landed directly in front of Angela before she could blink and asking a million questions before she could open her mouth to say “hi! I'm Angela, I apologize for staring at you like some massive freakazoid, I only did it because you don't look normal in any sense of the word.”

“Who are you? I've never seen you before. What brings you here? Are you human? You are, aren't you, oh I used to love humans, sorry about what happened, anyways, how are you holding up? How did you hold up? Where are the rest of you? What do you have in your bag? Why are you wearing those horrific shoes?”

Angela nearly felt embarrassed for staring into the minuscule creature's bright yellow eyes for a full minute as she kept going, not processing a word she said, she got the feeling this was just how fast people—were they people?—talked now.

“I'm sorry, can you repeat...all of that?”

Maybe if she just closed her eyes for a second, if she shook her head and clicked her heels three times, she'd open them and all the creatures would be people, recognizably human people who are seconds away from directing her to a fallout shelter away from whatever poisonous fumes were floating in the air and making her hallucinate.

She tried.

They didn’t.

They only giggled at her.

Instead of responding, her brain decided to not only short circuit, but make her silently weep, in front of a new bunch of strangers, the first five minutes of her reintroduction to the world and she’s already crying in front of complete strangers.

“Aww, pretty one, why are you crying?”

They all swarmed her, the little people, some trying to wipe her tears away, flying back and shaking like a dog upon realizing their leaf skirts were drenched.

“Can you cry less messy?”

Mumbling more to herself than to the small beings she guessed were fairies, she dabbed at her tears to avoid making her imaginary mascara run, “I’m alright, I'm fine, I'm sorry, I'm fine.”

The faeries gave each other a look, one seemed to be asking something of the others, if the body language of this version of the world was the same, Angela guessed tiny neon pink lady vehemently disapproved.

Her lip reading was shot, not that it had ever been great, but despite not being able to make out what they were saying, she knew that look very well. ‘That’s the look you get from friends and family members before you do something very funny, and very stupid,’ she thought.

She used to find it funny.

“Well, if you're really sorry, you can come with us.”

One of them, a small orange one, covered in little green droplets, it looked like a leaf on the first day of fall that actually feels like the season’s changed. He flew directly in front of her face, making her go cross eyed to focus on him. It rested its hand directly onto her nose.

“What?” Angela asked, sounding and feeling so much weaker than she’d like to seem at this moment.

“Yeah! You could come with us! It's so much better where we're from, the food, the music! Oh the clothes, imagine how good you'd look decked in this frock!”

A different one, less human looking with the many different shaped spots covering its dark brown body. They gestured to their…dress? Skin? Whatever it was, it wanted Angela to picture herself in it.

Unsettled as she was, she did.

It felt like a movie. She saw herself, sitting at a table, full of every possible food you could think of, from a good plate of ribs and some pecan pie to cream filled donuts, and more food that she could not attempt to identify than food she could, but they made her mouth water all the same.

Shifting quickly, like a dream that had completely shifted in plot, suddenly she was waltzing on a pink glass dance floor, while she somehow still felt soft grass under her, wrapped in the arms of a different person with every beat change, never without a glass of some wine she also couldn't quite identify in her hand.

She pictured sleeping in a bed full of these other beings, the same size as them now, inside of a hollow in a tree, the dull glow of the moon bathing over them as she curled into a ball and closed her eyes, drifting away.

The first minute since she left in which she felt safe, as fractured and dangerous as it was, disappeared before her eyes as the image faded and in its wake was the sight of all of the little things peeling off into the air far away from her.

The rejection didn’t have long to set in.

There are many things Angela could say would be her biggest nightmare.

Things like, being alone in a bunker for a year with the knowledge that everyone she'd ever met, everyone she'd ever loved, everyone who she might have become great friends, lovers, family with; was dead.

Things like beginning to forget the faces she's known her entire life.

Things like waking up in the middle of the night convinced that life no longer held any meaning.

The weird forest full of things she couldn't understand didn't scare her that much, in comparison.

This thing did.

She didn't know how to talk to those…bugs? Small people? Flower people? But there was no realm where she could possibly comprehend whatever It was.

By the time she’d started running, which was shortly after she’d turned around to see it, she’d realized two things.

One, that it was nothing. Like, truly nothing. An empty space where something should be, the dead winter that makes a noise that should ring in your ears suffocate under snow.

Two, it wanted to kill her.

This was new.

Those things, the people that abandoned her to face this thing that she couldn’t look in the eye, because it had no face, even though her entire body shuddered every few seconds because the hairs on the back of her neck raised like it was a person staring at her.

The sudden onslaught of darkness didn’t register to angela as she ran, narrowly avoiding tripping over her feet, her breath made no sound, the clunking of her too big shoes thudded against the tall grass, but anyone in the forest would not know that from the still, tranquil quiet that followed the predator and prey.

The transition from when Angela remembered what it was like to be a human being and the moment her mind decided for her that she was nothing but a thing that needed to run or die was brief and the closer it got. The more she felt the biting, isolated cold of a vacuum in space against her back as it reached out to tear her apart atom from atom, the more her brain slipped away and the further she sprinted.

It was pitch dark, the sun had set, there was no room left for her or the trees’ or the thing that was rushing her’s shadows’ to morph on the ground, but the whole place was glowing, the wind had its own heartbeat, a part of her would day recognize.

It swirled around her, almost mockingly. Maybe one day it would remind her of the nights her older sisters would stay up with her, telling her scary stories about the dumbest things, and the terror which evolved into exasperation the older she got, instead of being a sensation to hold on to in the gap between her reality and her ever encroaching complete absence.

She ran, hearing the screech of some animal and darting after it, following any noise or thing of substance.

She ran around a bend in the trees and locked eyes with a huge bear with three huge rabbits in her jaws, and a dozen more resting in a bloody pile in the hollow of a tree, drool cascading down her mouth following sharp white teeth that Angela would guess hoped could cut the thing chasing her, even if it meant it would kill her next.

‘Much bigger than in the movies,’ she managed to think for a second as she barreled towards it.

If she was able to see or reason fully in that moment, who knows if she would have seen the bear’s eyes widen a bit in terror before it grabbed her by her shoulder and tossed her on it’s back in a smooth and quick maneuver that probably gave Angela whiplash, but she could not have felt it then, all she felt was dense and coarse fur that she buried herself into in an attempt to not fall off and be left to whatever was hopefully now leagues behind her.

Minutes or hours later, when she stopped relying solely on blind instinct and the fear and panic started to firmly set in, she realized they’d slowed down at about the exact same time she’d started to sob into the furry back of what she was slowly beginning to remember belonged to a bear.

But it walked, silently grunting and growling a bit as angela tried her hardest to calm down for long enough to get off of said bear and make some kind of escape plan and not enough to start thinking about how close she is to dying and how much she missed her parents.

‘At least they won’t have to hear about me dying via horrific bear attack.’ She thought.

It took Angela a good five minutes to notice that not only was the bear not protesting by any means, but that it was carrying a weird weaved bag that closed completely at the top.

It took one minute for her to decide to talk to it.

“Hello?”

She, of course, got no response in return. So she, of course, tried again.

“Listen, I don't know if you're…I don't really know what…do you know, do you know if there's a town nearby?”

Angela abruptly fell to the floor even though the bear slowly tilted its body to the side in an attempt to gently knock her off.

She attempted to process the feel of the ground underneath her while the thud of the bear’s paws rumbled through the air while she dropped the weaved bag on the ground next to a tree and the rabbit’s that it had apparently been carrying the whole time and trotted behind it.

The human fly thing was weird, but Angela was not prepared to hear the twitching and squelching sounds that came from behind that tree, and she definitely wasn’t prepared to see a chubby, brown arm reach out to pick up the bag.

A short black woman, who didn't look much older than twenty, with a chestnut brown Afro that framed her heart shaped face trotted around the corner with the same jolly gait the bear had, picking the rabbits up and shoving them in a separate basket that she'd seemingly pulled out from nowhere.

She was fat and beautiful and she did not look as though she could lift a one hundred and eighty pound five foot seven woman up off the ground and give her a piggyback ride.

“What, how, and who the hell is she?” She should work on that habit of saying things out loud.

“The town isn't far from here at all, I think you can take a guess, I don’t know, a witch could probably tell you, I guess? And I’m Maggie. Good to meet you! The circumstances could definitely be better, but it’s nice to see a new face.”

Angela stared at her, unblinking for an uncomfortably long time.

She’d been attacked, and she still shuddered at the thought of that thing, and saved by a bear who was actually a person. What could she even say?

“Your dress is so cute. Is that Versace?” She cringed the second she asked, but it’s the closest thing to a reaction she could manage.

“No, I don't really know who that is, but I made it myself.”

Angela nodded, wondering for a second if she run.

“Wicked. My mom always tried to teach me to sew, but I just never really got into it.”

The bear—Maggie nodded, “yeah, it’s hard starting out. Let me tell you, I didn't have the slightest interest in it until they invented the machines. I'm so glad we were able to reconstruct them, half my wardrobe wouldn't exist if we hadn't.”

She reached down and offered Angela a hand, holding back a laugh as she yelped a bit when she took her hand and hauled her up.

Angela brushed off her clothes without breaking eye contact with Maggie, hoping bears were one of the animals you were supposed to make eye contact with, “I feel you, if you want something done right you gotta do it yourself, you know?”

The bear woman smiled and nodded, “Ugh, don’t I know it? Oh, goodness, it’s like pitch black out here for you! Are you still headed to town?”

Angela nodded rapidly, “Yes! Yes, thank you, I'd really appreciate that. I'm a little, well, honestly, a lot, turned around right now.”

The woman sighed and gave her the most pitying glance and honestly, she appreciated it more than she should’ve. Being looked at at all felt like such a privilege, even if it’s by a possibly murderous bear woman.

“Yeah. I can only imagine. Can I give you a hug?”

Angela immediately shook her head. “Later. Please, but I can't right now.” If she hugged someone for the first time in years after everything that happened tonight she would cry forever. And she was starting to feel really dehydrated from all of the running and she’d only brought a small flask of water cause she hadn’t thought she’d have long to use it and she really didn’t want to cry in front of this stranger again, even if a hug sounded like it would fix all of her problems.

Maggie nodded, “Of course. Come on, honey. You look like you could use something to eat. And probably a long nap.” She said before leading her down the direction of an obviously frequently used path.

“Thanks. I'd be fine with just some directions even, I just really don't know where I'm heading.”

She tentatively picked up a rabbit with her thumb and pointer, trying to touch as little of the corpse as possible while still helping.

“It's fine, hon,” Maggie said, taking the rabbit from her and shoving it in her basket, “you've had a rough night.”

She trailed along after Maggie through the forest, making small talk for the first time in three years ever so often, letting there be a lull in the conversation long enough for her to be eternally grateful she was still good at it.

“If you don't mind me asking, how did you… get all the way out here?”

Obviously she meant “How did you not die horribly?” But Angela appreciated her at least trying not to paint the elephant in the room neon green.

“Well, I was inside a bunker."

"A what?"

"When everything happened, I was at work. I went down in the basement to look for some pens or paperwork, or something, I can’t even remember what, and then everything happened all at once and the door was closed behind me and—"

Angela squeezed her eyes shut, trying to focus on the sounds of the leaves crunching under her feet.

"Go on. If you want to, that is. If it's easier, maybe you can just tell me what a bunker is?"

She squeezed her eyes closed, shaking her head to try and erase the thought from her mind, laughing a bit at herself, "right, yes, that's what you were asking. It's just an underground building created to protect its inhabitants from nuclear warfare. I was living in one. For the past three years. Or nearly, it would have been three next week."

The woman whistled, "Damn. That's a long time without—"

"Yes, I know." Angela cut her off.

Whatever it is she was going to say, good food, a real shower, a hug from a family member, it wouldn't help to hear someone say it out loud to her.

She was quiet for a moment before stopping, making Angela halt too, now aware of the fact that she had been following a complete stranger through the middle of nowhere.

"What's your name, by the way?” Maggie asked.

She wore her most professional smile, the one she used for interviews where condolences weren't required, the one she used to greet potential clients, the one she used at a bar when she wanted a free drink, the same smile she hasn’t had to use in three years.

"Angela Weathers, a pleasure to make your acquaintance,” She refrained from reaching into her pockets for the business cards that she had brought with her despite it all.

The woman smiled, "It’s a pleasure to meet you as well. It seems like you've had a rough go about things so far, Angela. I’m sorry to say you don’t have many options, but I can offer you some."

Angela nodded, immediate relief flooding her at the idea of being able to use actual logic to make an actual decision again.

"Alright, shoot."

"What?"

"I mean, tell me the options."

Maggie nodded, "alright, so, right now we're walking to the village, obviously, we're calling it Noman, but we're all still workshopping titles."

"But it's been three years." she said, looking at her confused.

Maggie rolled her eyes, "I know. Write the elders and ask them about it, supposedly they'll answer, but not sooner than twenty hours after it’s sent.

Or days, or weeks, or months. Or,” she looked at Angela briefly, “years.”

“Wait, the elders?”

Maggie rolled her eyes, “Yes, that’s what we’ve been calling them. They haven’t exactly been doing much to stop, well, what was chasing us just now.”

“Don’t bring whatever that thing is up again. Please.”

Maggie nodded. “There’s not many of them, if that helps.”

She smiled slightly, “it doesn’t much. But maybe soon it will.”

Maggie smiled back at the young woman, “I hope it does.”

Angela nodded, coughing and looking straight ahead, “Anyway, the options?”

“Yes! Right! OK, right now, we're walking towards the village. I run an inn, and nobody can come here and everyone has there own homes, so I do have a spare room. If you wish to stay there for a couple of nights, you're more than welcome."

“You would do that?” Angela stared at Maggie and got a look in response that could only mean that statement had broken her heart. Maggie’s face brought her back to every moment she’d taken one cookie from her grandma instead of three.

Maggie just nodded.

“I'll admit, I don't know what to say, or how to repay you at all.”

Maggie shrugged, “you don't have to say anything. And you definitely do not have to repay me.”

Maybe Angela stiffened when she heard her say it and didn't realize, maybe her smile faulted a bit, or maybe Maggie just smelled the fear of saying and doing nothing for longer than a few seconds on her breath.

“Well,” she drawled, “if you're really looking for something to do, you could help me make the stew for tonight. Can you cook?"

Angela remembered the first time she'd invited her parents and sister over for dinner at her first apartment, and how much money she'd lost on her security deposit after the burnt and overcooked pasta noodles started a fire and left a permanent stain on her ceiling.

She tried and failed to imagine the horror of someone having her handle the knives and body parts of some poor, innocent rabbits.

"In a manner of speaking."

Maggie squinted at her, "if that's not your prime skillset, you can always wait tables or help me and the kids clean rooms."

Angela nodded, trying to hide her shock at the idea that such a young woman/bear had kids.

‘Hey, who am I to judge, it's the eighties,’ she thought, thankfully not saying it out loud.

“Alright, what's option two?"

"The town isn't big, word gets around, you could ask around and see if you can apply for any positions, tomorrow though, maybe even next week, alright? I won't hear any word about you going off in the middle of the night to find work. If you're really stubborn, I'll show you the safer areas to rest in the woods until you're able to afford a house.”

Angela nodded, already knowing sleeping alone in the woods wasn’t an option anymore.

"So, option three?"

"I could give you some new food, maybe some fresh clothes if you have something to trade, and take you back to your bunker."

"Option four?"

"That's it, I'm afraid. Or it's all I can think of, at least."

Angela did not want to go back into that bunker.

She knew it probably would be her best bet, to stay there for a while, get some food, maybe dip into a little of option two and start looking for a job while she stays at home base.

But she really didn't want to.

She wanted to wake up stressed about work again.

She missed the sounds of people running around, and arguing, she needed the city.

Always had.

“Alright, let's try option one.”