#love bursting pretentious men’s bubbles

[astrum-aetherium]

i sent the request about henry with a maths/science smart reader earlier and i was just thinking about how he didn’t know about the moon landing and how reader would’ve tear him to bits 😭😭😭

YUP. humiliation central. you, as someone with profound scientific knowledge, would wield allllllll the authority and allllllll the reason to chew him out and humble him over the fact. i’d never reject the opportunity to see henry winter put in his place. that’d be glorious. lol.

[the-good-bad-truth]

I think Megan is all hat and no cattle when it comes to sex, but the ongoing debate her supporters are dragging over whether she has a low or high sex drive is irrelevant for three key reasons:

1. She’s pregnant, which means she and Colson must have had sex at least once recently for him to be the father (unless they used IVF).

2. They’re still together, or at least still acting like it.

3. Even if he knocked her up now, based on interviews from 2010 to 2019, she doesn’t align with his ideal “dream girl” at all. Sorry to burst anyone's bubble.

Colson has previously described his “dream girl” as someone very different from Megan. This “dream girl,” whom he has already dated is confident, strong-willed, and fully aware of her worth, living a life that reflects those values. Unlike Megan, she wouldn’t engage in casual hookups, exploit her body for attention or financial gain, or use sex to gain leverage or status.

His "dream girl" ex is elegant, poised, reserved, sex-positive, and well-educated about sex. She’s quiet, genuinely well-read, and can hold both sophisticated and mundane conversations about the real world. She uses big words to speak clearly, not to sound pretentious. Her sex life is private but adventurous, including BDSM, safe knife play, and exploring various activities within a committed, monogamous relationship. She’s independent, financially stable, and treats her body as a temple, not as a weapon for revenge or financial gain. She lives a healthy, active lifestyle and is entirely self-sufficient—she doesn’t rely on anyone else for travel or expenses. She’s religious, cosmopolitan, well-cultured, a seasoned yogi, and has a unique style. She knows cities on the East Coast like the back of her hand, knows about secret eating spots in and outside her hometown, seeks out hidden dining gems in the cities she visits, loves thrifting, cooking, decorating, and cleaning her own space. Though she might seem innocent, she’s a “freak” behind closed doors. She’s into coffee and has one minor bad habit: smoking cigarettes. She collects unique lighters and other items, as she’s an aesthete. She identifies as a feminist, is into men only, and doesn’t succumb to peer pressure of any kind. Physically, he described her as someone with dark eyes, A-cup chest, a naturally round bubble butt she trains and a small waist she also got through fajas, as he joked about (and not rib removal like MF is rumored to have done).

Anyone who doubts this can watch every interview Colson did over those ten years, up until 2019. I find it hard to believe they could catch them all unless they watched them as they were released, but hey, the people who follow him only for Megan can spend their time as they see fit.

Finally answer your question about who we think he will possibly be with after her, as his fan, I can tell you I’d feel a little bad for him if he ended up with anyone other than his dream girl, but that's life. It would be something very common. Sadly, most people end up settling for what they can get. In his case, it looks like it’s going to be Megan. Whatever he chooses to do is on him, anyway, but I do wish him good luck.

I agree 100%.

[starshipsofstarlord]

Jealous

Pairing | Eric Northman x reader

Summary | bringing your partner to the bar seemed like a good idea in order to have a nice and relaxing night. However, he appears to become jealous as you speak to the owner of Merlottes.

Warnings | smut, jealousy, swearing, exhibition kink, unprotected sex, oral (f receiving), squirting, swearing

Requested ✖️

Quick link to my masterlist, if you’re interested in reading more of my crap 😬

A hunger derived in the vampire’s chest, a blossoming swarm of contained rage that made the sheriff clench his fangs and watch with piercing eyes. The laughter that resonated from your chest made him scowl, all because he was the one that was not causing it.

Instead, it was the dog that ran around this human grill, the shifter that more often than not, tried to distance himself from trouble. He was the owner of Merlottes. Sam Merlotte was his name, he had a head full of ashy brown hair, that had ropes of grey pleated through it. He was a nice man, warm and welcoming, the complete opposite of Eric in some sense.

The Viking vampire was known, and to your knowledge to be notorious. He never allowed anything to stand in his way, and if it dared to, he would literally, rip its head off if it had one. And despite that deadly feature that he exhibited, you still claimed to have loved him. The two of you were great together, you seemingly brought out the best in him, apart from right now.

Eric grunted to no one directly as he watched you swish your head side to side, shaking it as you laughed at something the bartender said. All that you were supposed to be doing were ordering drinks, not flirting with another one of the men that had previously been head over heels for Sookie.

With one last glance at the shifter, you turned back, sitting on the opposite side of the booth that Eric had been holding. You brushed your hair over your shoulder, it was obvious that you were relaxed in this environment. It was filled with your friends and neighbours, acquaintances and strangers. But it still, despite the limitless customers, induced you with serenity.

“The drinks will be here in a couple.” Despite informing him, it appeared that he could care less about the time until the order reached the surface of the table.

“Will that animal be serving them?” In reply, you laughed, dismissing the seriousness within his tone. That was, until you maintained eye contact with the tall blonde, noticing the feral presence decreasing the size of his pupil.

“Are you speaking about Sam?” You asked uncertainty, the owner having been the only one that you had conversed with in the bar, excluding Eric, so far. “Oh my god, you are.” Your speculation had been correct, and you couldn’t help but feel a pulse of annoyance within you.

If Eric actually ever listened to you, then he would know that your friends meant the world and more to you, and that included the shapeshifter. “I don’t like the way he was looking at you.” He put it simply, and you could only scoff at his defence. It was hardly a reason for him to appear and treat you so uptight and rudely.

“What, with care? Because news flash, maybe you haven’t noticed everything that I have done for you Eric, but many times my actions have proven that you are it for me. And if you can’t see that, you may as well be human!” To support your active words, you stood, the palms of your hands planted upon the surface of the booth.

Sookie quirked a brow as her head filled with your thoughts, however she had no time to adjust to them or check how you were doing, as you stormed out of the grill, leaving Eric with a frown and a sombre glaze in his untameable eyes.

But she couldn’t help herself from taking your place looking down at the table, judgementally prying Eric with a disgruntled frown. “Did you seriously question y/n’s love with you?!” Her accent came out strong, digging into the tense atmosphere that you had strongly abandoned.

Eric rolled his eyes at her intrusion, finding it to be a familiar, yet frustrating feeling of her always bursting his bubble. “It has nothing to do with you, why don’t you talk some sense into your vampiric boyfriend instead?” He jutted back at her, standing, and brushing off any possible lint from his blazer jacket.

Reaching into his inside pocket, he grabbed a small amount of cash, placing it upon the table, and walking past the half faerie, brushing against her as he went towards the door, leaving. Eric had no worries, he could sense that even whilst he was inside, that you were there, leant up against the wall, awaiting for him to follow after you. It was inevitable that he evens would.

Your arms were crossed, and you were facing the parking lot rather than the entrance. The stature that you upheld made it rather clear that you were angry with his behaviour; and not to mention that it was also in public.

The vampire knew that you loved him, despite Sookie’s feeble accusations. Fighting was not something that the pair of you were estranged to, however it made you furious to know that he would accuse you of being interested in somebody else.

It was certain that if Pam was here she would scold her maker for his uptight, and jealous outburst. But it wasn’t as though she would have been able to prevent it anyways, considering that she was all the way across town in Fangtasia attending to the business ongoing there.

“I do know that you love me.” His voice rang out in the cold of the night, frolicking to your ears and biting your lobes as you still refused to face the tall and unfavourable vampire.

“Right now, that is debatable.” Was your retort, feeling the cold air brush against your face as you felt it pinch your nose. “To not only insult my friend, but embarrass me in front of a bar full of people, that was not how tonight was supposed to go at all!”

Your body jolted as you suddenly felt his body press against the back of your own, his large and explorative hand dragging up the skin of your exposed thigh, that was free of coverage in the casual black dress that you had opted to wear for the occasion.

“I am sorry my lovely dear, you know how I tend to be, especially when I hear other men make you evoke that wonderful and all consuming laugh that gets my dead heart to beat every time.” A hitch of a sigh caught in your throat as you tried to remain unaffected by Eric’s flattery, but it was rather impossible, more so as his hands brushed against the lace of your panties.

On reflex, you snapped his hands away from that part of you, you were in the middle of the parking lot for Christ sakes! Though that did not, nor did it ever seem to phase him, if you were to guess, you had noticed some hints leading to him having an exhibition kink. And it was not as though you had never called him out on it, though, most of the time, you happened to give into his public desires.

It was often portrayed within the context and realm of his workplace; Fangtasia. Within the club, there was a frequent case of rendezvous that the club permitted to take place inside its various walls that were filled with vampires and their lustful humans. The exchanges that took place were anything but loving, they were filled by hunger, and the curiosity that simple people, that thought themselves to be edgy and desirable to the immortal eye, all making the rooms reek of pretentious assholes taking advantage of one another.

“We are not doing that here Eric.” You scolded his efforts, despite your craving for them to take place, and ravish you no matter the surrounding that were into the background anyways. With great resilience, you swatted his north travelling hands away, making them stoic from the adequate dismissal.But Eric Northman was never one to admit defeat, he had a plaguing tendency to get what he wanted, and he was always had a route of persuasion to get it.

“Aren’t we?” He asked wispily unto your drifting head, as though he were corrupting the stubbornness that was attempting to remain untainted in the rafters that floated so correspondingly through your weightless veins. “Then why are we sneaking to the back of the grill?” His words had a frown fired upon your face as you tried to register the truth behind his words, but in time before you could ask the mysterious vampire what he had meant by his words, he had sped you away to the said part that was already close by.

“Mature move.” You muttered, and the consequences of your off handed comment had earned you the vulnerable position of being pressed right up and against the back door, that was only usable to the staff. If you tilted your head just right, you could hear the clattering of plates being stacked, and the distant voices o Arlene and Terry as they partook in a private discussion that was supposed to be inaudible to anyone else’s ears.

Beaing that close to people that you knew, and in such a compromising situation where they could easily catch you, had you clenching your thighs together, clearly frustrated by the scenario of your predicament. Clearly. And with Eric standing smugly inside of you, once trailing his fingers on the high top of your thigh, his skin tasting your flesh that was beneath the dress, did not help the matters of your hormonal state.

“I said I was sorry.” Eric reminded you, stroking your thighs with his age old touch, and at the notion, your legs quivered, responding affective to his seducing touch. “Perhaps I have to prove it, would you like that y/n?” An audible whimper fell from your stiff mouth, evicting an amused and gloating smirk out of your boyfriend. He knew what he had done, he had moulded you into a desperate mess.

“I’d rather you apologise to Sam, and whoever else you happened to insult in your time in there.” Was your response, though he tutted at it, seeing through its mask, understanding what you wanted was for him to do more than just caress your thighs, and nothing more. “Eric.” A moan slipped from your mouth, as he fondled your breasts through the bleak fabric.

At first, you thought that he was going to pull the material down to expose your womanly globes, but instead, he tore straight down the middle of the dress, leaving it hanging from you by nothing more than a thread. His action enraged you only slightly, but before you could open your mouth to tell him off for destroying your clothing, he snapped the elastic of your underwear, leaving the personal garment to drop in a discarded manner at your heeled feet.

“You are indeed a sight for sore eyes. Do you know how jealous I would be if one of those fools came out here, and saw you so exposed? There’d be no words to describe how much I would want to compel them to forget, and you thought I was angry inside. That would be nothing more than an understatement my dear.” His hands cast themselves down to grope at your ass cheeks, pulling a surprised squeal out of your mouth.

This time, you did not try and stop his feeling of your body, instead, you rather encouraged it. Wrapping your hand in his smooth blonde locks, you began to push down, which was difficult considering how high his head was, leaving your arms half up in the air as you tried to make him descend. “Do something Eric, or I will.”

“Here?” He asked with a prominent smirk, feeling your hostile glare and intoxicating pout bore harshly into him. Rolling his eyes, he sighed, giving up on his verbal teasing as he sank to his knees, looking up at you from beside your legs. He pressed a sweet kiss against your navel, trailing down, until he was nipping at the curve of your mound, his hands resting on the back of your thighs, to pull you closer as he ran his tongue along the hood of your clit, making you bang your head back against the door.

The sound made you eyes go wide, as you worried that someone on the inside must have heard, though the thought quickly subsided as Eric began to eat you alive, stuffing his tongue in your entrance, leaving you to be nothing more than a mewling victim that was in distress from the pleasure that he gave you. His nose rubbed against your clit, as he hummed delightedly against you, the vibrations causing your body to quiver.

“Stop.” You panted, though he continued, staring up at you with those light eyes, that held much darkness of his past. “Need you inside of my Ric. Please, need you to fuck me good and hard, just fuck me.” There were tears frustratedly slipping from the corners of your eyes, as you were upheld of relief as Eric moved away, undoing his bottoms, and taking his long cock out, sweeping it against your slit.

“I’ll fuck you darling; let everyone know that your mine.” His free hand held the corner of your chin, plummeting his tongue into your mouth, to have one moment of calm, before he penetrated you, leaving you in a mess that had your eyes rolling to the back of your head and deliriously spinning from the euphoria that you felt. Eric performed at a fast and unrelentingly pace, slamming you hard enough into the door for everyone to hear.

It was certain that people within Merlottes could hear the sounds that were ravaged from your lips, though you were too absorbed in your own pleasure to care at all. Eric fucked into you hard, and you appeared unfazed as someone tried to open the door from the other side, the wood splintering against your back as your boyfriend‘s strength kept it shut, pushing your floundering body back against it.

And then you felt it, the absentminded swirl in your stomach, coaxing you closer and closer to release. Eric filled you first, and then he reached down, rubbing your clit, causing a clear stream to spray out from around his cock, leaving you utterly exhausted. You were half asleep now, and so, Eric picked you up, and sped away, leaving your torn clothes upon the floor, so that anyone that found them would know that it was the pair of you that had been using the outside wall as a mattress for your engagements.

[salparadiselost]

little jason doesn’t feel safe without dick around for the first few (days? weeks?) he spends at the manor, but is worried he’s being too clingy. dick, meanwhile, is driving himself crazy trying not to make jason feel trapped and holding back from physical contact unless jason initiates

Jason hated when Dick left.

He wouldn't say that he particularly loved the human, but Dick felt safe in a way that Jason hadn't had since he was an even smaller impling. The human held his emotions out on an offered hand, and he never punished Jason for taking a taste.

And those emotions were always... affection, friendliness, and openness.

There was never the lick of lust that he had come to expect of humans. There were never any of the bad emotions that had always came from humans when they saw him. There was never any disgust or flinching away or whispering that Jason was something dirty.

All humans had always treated him like that.

All humans... except Dick

Dick was just food and love and someone who could fill the hole inside Jason's heart.

He was Jason's anchor in the chaos that was moving into a new home and living with humans that all towered over him.

He was someone that Jason thought he could trust.

So Jason got really anxious when Dick left.

He whined as he saw Dick's sleepaway bag get put out into the hall, already full of clothes. Jason was half-hidden behind one of the pretentious statues that Bruce had in his front entry, and glared at that bag like he could burst it into fire.

He had hidden it this time, stuck it behind a cabinet in an abandoned room far where he thought that Dick could find it.

But the human was trained by the "Greatest Detective in the World" and had found it after an hour delay.

Next time, Jason was going to throw it in the pond out back.

“I don’t know how it got there,” Dick said as he walked into the main room with Alfred. He had his bathroom items in a plastic bag, the last things he gathered up right before he left. "I swear that I put it by my bed last night."

"I might have an idea," Alfred said with a sly knowledge in his voice.

Dick raised an eyebrow.

"Master Jason gets restless. I imagine that this is a symptom of that agitation."

“Oh,” Dick said in a suddenly small voice. “Well… then I better be getting out of your hair quick. I don’t want to overstay my welcome.”

Alfred patted him on the shoulder, and gave Dick a gentle smile that made Jason’s own heart ache.

“My boy, you can never overstay your welcome here. Please return to us soon.”

“I will as soon as I’m able,” Dick said with another heart-aching smile. The emotions in the room were all sadness and don’t go. So many emotions that wanted to keep Dick here, and yet he still picked up that damn bag.

Jason had to physically hold himself back from crying for the human that was rapidly becoming the closest thing he had to a packmate. Dick was soft. Dick was safe. Dick was filling that space that had been empty ever since Mama died.

When he curled up on Dick’s lap, their emotions lapping at each other’s, he felt like he was in the safest place in the world.

And when Dick left, he took all that rare safety with him and left Jason desperate for him to come back.

“Alright, well, please say goodbye to Jason for me.”

Dick slung that bag over his back and Jason had to swallow down a pathetic impling whine. His instincts were screaming, and his emotions were bouncing all over the place because he couldn’t keep them in control.

He wanted to throw himself at the human, wrap his arms around his legs, and keen until his pack stayed.

But he didn’t. He held back because no one liking clingy implings. Especially Incubi implings who were already prone to being too needy.

So he stayed quiet when his pack opened the door and left him behind.

When the door shut, he burst from his hiding place and ran up to the front window, staring through it to catch the last glimpses of his packmate as they drive off without him.

And when Dick became a small dot in the horizon, Jason left himself cry. He cried, and cried and cried, his keenings filling every one of the mansion’s corners.

Bruce came and picked him up in that cautious, uncomfortable way of his. It was so obvious that he hated touching Jason, that both of the oldest men hated touching Jason. They were awkward and pulled their hands away as quick as they could from his skin. They never touched him outside of feedings, and whenever he tried to nuzzle against them (it was stupid. They weren’t pack. He didn’t know why he kept trying to do pack things with them.) they went tense.

Even when he fed, they only did so for as short of a time as possible and when Jason said that he was full they left the room as quick as they could.

They never stayed for the bonding, the quiet moments that were supposed to be used to strengthen pack bonds if they had any. They didn’t have bonds, but it would still be nice to curl up next to someone instead of being shut into a room by himself.

“What’s wrong, sweetheart?” Bruce said as he tried to bounce Jason on his hip. Jason’s stomach rolled as he sensed the anxious coming from Bruce because he was holding Jason. And feeling himself cause if those bad emotions, he only made Jason cry more.

“Jason, Jason, please talk to me. You don’t have to cry, baby.”

Shut up, you stupid little thing.

“Master Jason, whatever is the matter?”

There’s nothing to cry about, sex toy.

“Please, sweetheart, calm down.”

Stop.

Jason couldn’t take it anymore. He twisted out of the human’s hood and fell to the ground. They looked even taller from his shorter height, and his heart raced faster. Hands were all around him, trying to scoop him back up, and he ran away.

He ran up the stairs and into the family wing and into the room that smelled like Dick and all his bubbly love emotions.

Jason heard them coming, footsteps hot on his heels, so he shoved himself under the bed. He wedged himself deep under it, with only one of Dick’s crumpled sweat shirts. It smelled like him and helped ease the terror.

He didn’t come out, even though the other men sounded like they were begging.

*****

Jason snapped awake to the sound of a familiar voice.

“Little Wing, what’s wrong? Why are you hiding buddy?”

Two blue eyes were staring at him and he had to blink to make sure they were real.

Dick.

He came back.

He scrabbled out of the bed and into Dick’s arms, making incessant little impling chirps as he shoved himself under Dick’s chin. Two warm hands caught him, held him close, and clutched him like they would never let go.

His instincts thrummed pack. Pack. Pack.

He flexed his claws and dug them into the jacket Dick was wearing. As if he could keep the human here by sheer force if will.

“What’s wrong?” Dick repeated.

“You left. You’re the only one who likes me and you left.”

Dick tensed against Jason and the felt the human’s emotions drop in shock. His packmate unconsciously held him closer and Jason purred into the physical contact. Something anxious that had been coiled up inside him finally loosened and fell apart.

“Oh baby,” Dick whispered into his ear. “I’m sorry. I’m here now.”

The human shifted, pulling Jason fully into his lap. His young instincts told him to fold up small, to tuck himself into his packmate’s chest, to purr impling sounds up at the man whose emotions felt like Mama’s.

The human wouldn’t understand the actions. He couldn’t know what it meant to have an impling pliant and purring in his lap like this. What a demonstration of trust it was for an impling. What kind of faith showed that a child of a species who guarded their young zealously and had been raised to fear humans, would willingly place himself in one’s lap.

But he liked to think that Dick did understand when he began petting Jason’s hair and washing over him in warm, loving emotions. Dick’s claws (no. Fingernails. Humans had fingernails.) began scratching Jason’s back and he absolutely melted.

“Jason,” Dick nudged just as he was beginning to fall asleep. “Why do you think that Bruce and Alfred don’t like you?”

Jason scrunched his nose. “Humans don’t like touching Incubi and Succubi. They think we are dirty,” he spat the word. “Bruce and Alfred always get nervous when they touch me.”

Dick’s face scrunched now. “How do you know that?”

Jason’s face fell flat and Dick gave a sudden chuckle. “Right, Incubus. Sometimes I forget that you can sniff out everyone’s feelings.”

He fell silent but his fingers didn’t still.

“That must be pretty scary for you, huh.”

Jason nodded, not even embarrassed about being wary of the two larger men. Large men were scary. They hurt and held him down. They were the ones that picked off packless implings and locked them in basements to never see the sun again.

“I’ll talk to them because Jason, they love you. They don’t know how to show it, but they do. They are just worried about scaring you more.”

He didn’t know how to take that. He didn’t know what to think about that.

Humans… being scared of him? Being scared for him?

It seemed like an impossible thought.

But sleeping in a human’s lap also seemed impossible and that was exactly what he wanted to do.

Thoughts were hard, so Jason just stopped thinking. Dick was here again, after all.

He would keep Jason safe.

[writings-of-dumpy]

The Princess and the Pirate - Chapter 5

A/N: Wow, I’m pulling out all the tropes!!!

I woke up to being thrown over someone’s shoulder. I thought it was Harry at first, but the shoulders and arms weren’t the same as the ones I had felt earlier today.

“Hey, let me go!” I said to whoever was carrying me out of the cabin.

“Shut up if you know what’s good for you,” a deep voice growled.

I started to wiggle and kick and managed to clock my kidnapper in the face with my heel.

“Shit! She made my nose bleed!” the man yelled and dropped me. I attempted to catch myself but ended up falling and heard a loud snap followed by excruciating pain stemming from my knee.

“Harr—” I attempted to scream for Harry’s help, but my mouth was covered by a heavily tattooed hand and a knife was held to my throat.

“Say another word and you and your friend are dead,” said a slimy voice in my ear. My head was forced to look over at another group of men who had Evie completely knocked out and over one’s shoulder. “Now be a good princess and do as your told.”

I felt a gag being placed over my mouth and my hands cuffed in front of me. They tried to make me walk, but my left knee wouldn’t work properly, and I suspected it was either fractured or dislocated.

“Pick her up! You broke her, Noodler!” the tattooed man spat at his cohort. I was then thrown over a shoulder again and flung onto what appeared to be a boat. Evie was placed next to me and bound in the same way. As soon as the men left us to sail the ship, I managed to spit out the gag and start nudging Evie.

“Evie, come one girl, wake up!” I called to her.

“Hey! Quiet down!” the tatted man spat at me from the helm. I glared at him and looked at my knee. I attempted to bend it, but I couldn’t seem to make it bend. A deep purple bruise had started to bloom all around my knee and I noticed that my shin and thigh were no longer aligned, which told me that my leg was broken. I used my thigh to flip my leg so that I could get a better look at my kneecap to assess it, which sent a sharp pain through me, and I yelped.

Evie woke with a start and looked at me completely panicked. I noticed that there weren’t enough hands to keep Evie and I quiet while sailing the ship, so I took advantage of it and leaned over to her.

“Hang on, I’ll get the gag off of you…” I said and pulled the cloth down past her chin with my teeth because our hands were bound to be immobile.

“What the hell happened?” Evie whispered.

“We’ve been kidnapped. Looks like they only were after us, though..” I told her.

“Why us?” Evie asked and I shrugged.

“Because the two of you are very important to the King and his knights. We would have taken Uma, but Ursula told us not to lay a hand on her,” the man who was called Noodler said as he tied ropes to the ship next to us.

I shot him a look. “So Ursula is behind this.”

“Not really! She just knew of our plan and sent us a message. No, the one behind this is the Captain himself…” the tattooed man said.

“Jukes! Neverland on the horizon!” a man shouted from the crow’s nest.

“Aye, we’ll be there soon, men! Our captain awaits!” Jukes said and the crew cheered.

“Sorry, I hate to break this to you, but Captain Hook has been dead for a very long time…” Evie spoke up.

Jukes formed a twisted and terrifying grin on his lips. “Dead isn’t really dead, though is it? You should know that, being the daughter of an evil queen who used magic to bring you and your friends to life.”

“What are you talking about?” Evie demanded darkly.

“Oh, you don’t know? You never had a father; you and your pesky little gang were all brought about by magic. Souls of the innocent were used to bring the next generation of evil, so they said...” Jukes told us.

Evie looked broken. “You’re a pirate, I can’t trust a word you say.”

“And yet you believe it, don’t you? Because a pirate is many things, but liar he ain’t,” Jukes concluded. “Sometimes the truth is worse than any lie a scallywag can conjure.”

“Hey, Evie, it’s alright. It doesn’t matter how you got here, okay?” I told her. “What matters now is how we’re going to get out of here.”

“Oh, you two will only be going to The Black Castle in Skull Rock, see?” a man with dark eyes said to us.

“Care to explain why?” I challenged, which earned me a smirk.

“Aye, the princess wants to know our plans…” he remarked.

“Might as well since she’s dyin’ anyway, Cookson,” Noodler responded.

I looked at Evie, who was staying strong despite the obvious fear in her eyes. “It’s alright,” I mouthed to her.

“When your pretentious king and the captain’s son bring us the dust and the book, we’re going to bring our captain back with the blood of three royals and the sacrifice of the son,” Cookson sneered.

“Well, I hate to burst your bubble, but you’re down a royal. And Harry would never sacrifice himself to bring back his dreadful father,” I spat at him.

“Oh, I think he will… and with you, the Queen and King, that’s three royals,” Jukes said and he turned the ship into what appeared to be Pirate’s Cove.

I raised a brow. “You’re mistaken, I’m no royal. Harry’s not too keen on his father either.”

Cookson laughed. “You are the daughter of Tarzan, aren’t you? That means you’re royalty. Tarzan’s the rightful king of Arendelle, as Elsa and Ana have found out.”

“I’m a princess..” I breathed out to myself. The ship stopped and I looked at Evie with wide eyes. Cookson and Noodler hoisted us over their shoulders and I saw a gathering of more pirates on the edges of the Black Castle’s interior. Suddenly I was dropped onto a hard and damp rock and groaned in the pain in my knee. Evie was then placed beside me and we were hooked up to the rock and shoved into the water that was beneath the rock. At this point, the tide was only up to our knees.

“This is an idiotic plan you’ve concocted. There are mermaids in Neverland who know who to save and who to let drown,” I told Jukes bluntly.

“Mermaids don’t come here anymore,” he said and gestured towards the archway at the entrance. I looked up and saw the severed body of a mermaid with the initials ‘JH’ and ‘WJ’ carved into her cheeks, which I assumed were for James Hook and William Jukes.

I swallowed hard and looked at him with distain. “You’re disgusting.”

“Sticks and stones,” Jukes retorted.

“You better hope your love comes for you, Queen Evie. Otherwise the two of you are croc food once you’ve drowned,” Noodler taunted as the pirates left us to die.

I looked over at Evie, whose head was hung downwards.

“Evie, it’s going to be okay. I can’t walk, my tibia is probably broken and my knee is dislocated, but you can get out of here, okay? As long as one of us makes it out, they can’t bring Hook back. Harry’s not going to let them either,” I told her and looked for anything Evie could use to free herself.

“Shut up, I’m not leaving you here,” Evie said and sounded like she had something in her mouth. Her head shot up and in her teeth was a bobby pin. “Take it, I’ve got another one for me!”

I grinned. “Evie, you’re a genius!”

Once I had the bobby pin in my mouth, Evie and I worked together to pull ourselves up on the rock so that we were once again on top of it and got to work unlocking ourselves from the chains the pirates had placed.

“Ben’s probably on his way now with the book,” Evie said and shook her head after a failed attempt at the chains.

“Yeah, and Harry’s got the Pixie dust,” I added. After a few moments of fenagling, I heard a click and my cuffs opened. Once my hands were free, I helped Evie get out of hers.

“Now what? We can’t just march out there, they’ll put us back or worse,” Evie asked.

“You need to get out of here. I can’t move, so I’ll take whatever they’ve got, but you need to GO,” I told her urgently.

“Forget it, I’m not leaving you here!”

We heard cheers and jeers from outside of the castle and heard Jukes welcome Ben and Harry to Neverland. Evie and I looked at each other and I went to work on a splint for my leg using the chains and part of my dress to stabilize it.

~Harry~

Adrenaline rushed through Harry’s system as their boat approached Skull Rock. As expected, he saw all his father’s crew, lead by none other than Bill Jukes. The pirates let out a sound of excitement and anger as Ben and Harry docked their boat. It had been at least a few hours since Rayla and Evie were kidnapped, though it had felt like mere minutes. Harry had a feeling that he knew why they wanted the book and Pixie dust, but he would keep it to himself until he was sure. Ben’s main objective was to rescue Evie and Rayla, then return to Auradon as quickly as possible. Before Harry and Ben set off for Neverland, Jay and Uma gathered the troops from the kingdom and were instructed to invade Skull Rock to imprison the pirates. Harry knew a fight was coming, but he wasn’t sure exactly when, but he didn’t want Rayla to be any part of it.

“So… did you bring what we asked of you?” Bill asked Ben.

“I’ve met your criteria, but first let me see them,” Ben said very diplomatically.

“Oh, they’re safe on the rock in the castle. Princess has a bit of a broken leg, though.. Won’t be swimming anytime soon,” Bill taunted.

Harry’s blood boiled. He knew exactly the rock they spoke of and the thought of Rayla chained up to it and left to drown made his body react to attack Bill, but Ben’s arm held him back.

“Ooh-hoo-hoo! Harry’s gone soft for the girl. This makes things much more interesting…” Bill taunted with his signature smirk.

“Release them to us and you’ll get your wretched book and Pixie dust,” Ben said.

“Problem is, your majesty…” Bill began. Without a warning, Harry recognized Noodler, Cookson and Starkey as the pirates that jumped and bound both he and Ben. “We need the two of you to finish what we want.”

Starkey snatched the book from Ben’s hand. Harry was rolled onto his back and searched until the jar of Pixie dust was found and taken by Cookson.

“Aw, Harry… You were such a promising captain. But then you just had to go and defile everything our captain taught you,” Bill said, and then spat on Harry’s chest. “Should have been you that was croc food. But now I’ve got a special plan for you now that I know you’re sweet on the princess… Lock him in the brig.”

“Don’t you dare touch her! I swear I’ll kill you, Bill!” Harry screamed at his former crewmate before being thrown onto the ship and into the hold.

[mininky]

Renatus (1)

Summary: (y/n) finds herself in a very unusual situation where her fate seems to be woven with Hades himself, who’s too much of a jerk for her to even admit that sure okay he’s kind of really good looking.

Pairing: Hades!Yoongi x reader

Warnings: none for now other than some cussing and mentions of a chamberpot and my small love speech to Sojourner Truth

Chapters: one two three

   Your 21st birthday had so far been incredibly uneventful. You had spent too much time trying to power your way through piles of essays and had little interest in drinking the night away unless it was with a painfully strong coffee that might actually help you get through all of the homework. Your birthdays were always relatively uneventful. Perhaps that was your fault, you were too absorbed in school and work at this point in your life to try to make functioning relationships, platonic or otherwise. Even as a child friendship had been a difficult achievement and birthdays were usually just a painful reminder of that. The only thing that ever stood out about your birthday was the flowers you received every year at midnight. A gorgeous arrangement of lilies, with no card and no name, appeared on the doorstep of wherever you lived every year like clockwork after you turned 13. At first, you had guessed it was your parents, but even they seemed to be perplexed at who it was. Your next guess was your grandmother who owned a small flower shop, but upon explaining the flowers to her on your 14th birthday she looked alarmed and said she would never give you flowers that symbolized death. As a teenager the flowers haunted you, you were constantly trying to catch who it was that left them but never saw a single person leave them behind. As an adult, you just welcomed that someone out there wanted to leave you a present, even if you would be too busy editing your fifth essay this week to actually give it much thought this time.    After what felt like decades you reread your most recent edits and cracked your knuckles. It was decent, it wasn't groundbreaking work by any means however creating something groundbreaking about a piece as famous as "Ain't I Woman" wasn't about to happen, the more important thing to you at this point was editing the essay so it didn't seem like you were only writing a worship piece dedicated to Sojourner Truth which turned out to be far more difficult than previously predicted as you found yourself constantly trying to stay on topic rather than rant for pages about the beauty of how unplanned the speech was, how it encompassed everything still wrong with society today, how the woman was so bad ass she literally walked away from slavery. Literally, she walked away, she didn't even run. As your eyes tried to skim towards the end you found the weight of the night finally hitting your mind and body, a deep lethargy sweeping over you. The last thought you had was a reminder that you needed to finish preparing for your presentation of Mary Wollstonecraft before succumbing to sleep.

   You weren't sure where you were or what was going on. All you knew is that you had fallen asleep on a mountain of homework with "A Vindication of the Rights of Women" as a makeshift pillow on your desk and now you seemed to be in a very strange dream in a very strange place and to top that off you were having a far too realistic dream where you woke up with-in the dream, yes that's exactly what had to be happening because the room before your eyes was completely new to you. The bed you lay in felt like something straight out of a five star hotel, the sheets where the smoothest black silk and the blankets were of the most gorgeous fur you had ever seen (faux you hoped quickly) and there were four posters with a canopy of black and gold mesh-like material, that upon touch felt also luxuriously soft and far too real for your liking. A feeling of anxiety began to bubble inside you as you opened up the canopy and walked slowly through the room. There was black and gold everywhere, and the room was larger than the entirety of the two bedroom apartment you shared with three other roommates. A grand ornate mirror stood on the floor, the length running up almost halfway to what had to be at least thirty feet ceilings (although judging the size and height of things had never been your strong suit) and oh good god was that a gold chamberpot?????? A CHAMBERPOT?    "Note to self, stop drinking so much caffeine my dreams are getting really fucking weird." The words came out as a whisper but echoed through the room. At that same time you heard other noises, other people speaking. In the distance, you could hear someone saying something similar to "a girl! No no no a human!! You're sure you sensed that in your room? But how????" Moments later an ornately carved wooden door that you somehow hadn't noticed burst open and two men tumbled in.    "How did she get in here Jungkook?" The shorter of the two asked the younger man, his eyes staring into yours for just a second before looking back at his companion. Even in your dreams people ignored you and were assholes, you really needed to do something other than study when you woke up. Maybe actually try talking to someone in your class, or joining a gym and try to strike up a conversation with the least pretentious person there.    "How am I supposed to know? I only came to visit you because I thought Persephone ran away again, this place gives me the creeps." The younger of the two looked down at his feet as he spoke, while at first he was annoyed now he seemed to be...intimidated almost?    "Well she's clearly not here and we clearly have a problem that there is a human here and she's alive and she seems to have just appeared, there is no sign of an intrusion and I have felt no presence other than your own come in through the entrance." With that, the more intimidating man started to walk closer to you. "Who are you girl?" Again you couldn't help to want to analyze the simultaneously lazy and commanding presence of his.    You didn't answer quickly, instead, you took time to inspect him. While you might be having a very bizarre dream and the guy did seem to be a bit of an asshole you must admit he was good looking. 'The good looking ones are usually assholes' you thought to yourself. He was short, and from what you could tell under his black robe (oh great my dream is taking a weird cult turn, I knew I shouldn't have tried to do my alternative religion studies so late at night after watching true crime documentaries yesterday) he seemed to be very slim, his face was almost cute if it weren't for the sharp look in his eyes and the tight clench in his jaw forming a formidable scowl. As your eyes traced over his features you heard the other boy (Jungkook he called him) say "Do you think she's deaf??"    "Quiet Jungkook. Girl, I asked you a question. What is your name?" His voice was slightly louder this time, slightly deeper from agitation.    "You're kind of an ass, how about asking nicely?" The words tumbled out before you could think and you found yourself growing red as Jungkook began to shake with laughter and kept repeating, "oh my gods she called you an ass Yoongi, an ass!"    'Ah so Yoongi is his name...' you looked back and forth between the two, your face growing hot yet again as you realized that Yoongi hadn't broken his gaze from you even under the commotion of his friend. "My name is (y/n), and I take it you are Yoongi...so tell me Yoongi, where am I dreaming that I am? I don't believe I've ever seen this place, I'm pretty sure I'd remember a gold chamberpot."    His eyes narrowed and Yoongi stepped closer, his breath fanning over your face. It felt like we stood in a staring match for ages, both of us too stubborn to lose before finally Jungkook stopped laughing and said, "You don't realize you're in Hades? Good gods, how did you even get here?"    That was enough to break your staring match as you looked over at the younger boy, "What? I'm dreaming that I'm in Hades? The ancient Greek underworld?"    "Ancient? Perhaps to you humans, yes perhaps it could be called ancient. Speaking of humans I don't believe I gave you permission to call me by that name, to you humans I am Hades." Yoongi didn't even blink or move away from you, his words shook with a quiet anger, his near whisper feeling more like a yell. At first, you felt small under his tone, uncomfortable under his gaze as confusion washed over you. The dream felt so bizarre and so unusual, but you couldn't help the gnawing anxious voice in the back of your head telling you that this wasn't a dream and that you were somehow standing in front of a mythological figure while the logical voice in your head was also saying that there is no logical way any god is real, that there is no possible way you were in anything but a dream.    The logical side of the argument waring within your head began to win out and mustering up some confidence you looked straight at Yoongi (or Hades or dream dude) and said, "Aren't you a little short to be the 'terrifying' god of the underworld? Also a little...young?"    Once again Jungkook howled with laughter, tears running down his face as he chortled out "short ohhhhhh my gooooodsssss. I like her! I say she should stay, this is great! Short!!! She called you short!"    To your surprise, Yoongi began to match your smirk and he moved his lips right to your ear before whispering, "While I want to appreciate how feisty you are, I more appreciate how much of an idiot you are for laughing at the face of death and its god. I could kill you, I could take your soul, I could devour it and ensure that your soul would never enter another body again."    You refused to show fear, you refused to shake in front of him. Even in this idiotic dream, you were just as stubborn as you were in real life. While your insides twisted with fear and anxiety bubbled up in your throat you steeled yourself to show none of that on your face. "Well, Hades" you spat out his name and gave a long pause before continuing, trying to match his lazy pace, "if this isn't a dream, and you are truly the god of the underworld then isn't it best to get me back to the world of the living? I have a presentation that I don't want to miss, I've been working my ass off and it's worth half my entire grade. So chop chop, lets get to it, big boy." You're not sure how but you managed to say all of that with confidence, not even a slight waver in your voice.    Yoongi stared back at you for some time before turning around and walking towards the door. "Fine, we'll go to the fates and see what's going on and see if you don't truly know how you got here or if you’re hiding something."    As you rushed to follow his fast pace Jungkook took stride in the middle of the two of you. "I'm coming with, this is by far more entertaining than anything else I could do." Jungkook had a smile plastered on his face, still wiping tears from his eyes as he spoke.

     You’re not sure why but you found comfort in that. While you didn't know the young man at all you found his presence far lighter and far more comforting than Hades’. Yoongi had this energy to him, a presence that felt overwhelming at times and a voice that encompassed this quiet power that lay in an angry bubble just below the surface. The entire time you walked you tried to mentally tell yourself to wake up and wrapped up in your thoughts you found yourself walking straight into Yoongi's back. Blinking you realized that Yoongi was sitting in a boat already and that Yoongi was waiting for you to step in. After taking a cautious step in you sat down next to Jungkook (to ensure you wouldn't have to sit next to Hades) and began to look around. Hades was unlike not only anything you had ever seen but unlike anything you would imagine it to be. What you assumed to be the Styx river was stunning, the waters changed colors constantly, from light lilacs to blood reds and brilliant greens to soft yellows and inky blacks. It was also covered with the most beautiful lilies you had ever seen. You began to reach out to touch on before Hades grabbed your hand.

   "Do not touch the water girl, the souls will try to attach themselves to you and trying to remove them is a very painful and often fatal endeavor." His voice sounded almost soft, almost caring. Yoongi looked wistfully at the water as you finally spoke.    "Lilies...every year I receive Lilies on my birthday and I'm sorry to say that today I didn't even check to see if I received them." Your voice came out in a dreamy whisper as if saying it too loud would mean that would break the spell of the unknown lilies that you treasured.    "You...I..."Yoongi seemed at a loss for words, his mind clearly confused by this statement. "You couldn't be..."    "Oh look Yoongs, we're already at the entrance. Hey, do you think you can transport all of us to the fates? They never seem to want to let me in. Crazy old bats." Both Yoongi and you were forced out of your thoughts by Jungkook, and you realized that indeed the boat had stopped at a sandy shore in front of a dark entrance where candles floated in mid-air.    Before you could even step out of the boat you felt a cold hand grab a hold of your shoulder and in just a blink of an eye, you found yourself standing in front of three very strange looking old women.    "Ah yes, we knew you'd come Hades!" The one on the left chirped as the one in the middle said, "You must surely remember!" The one on the right finished with, "You, after all, set this fate in motion!"    Your mind tried to take in everything. You weren't sure how you got here, or where here was (yet again.) The women in front of you looked exactly like cartoon witches, in black robes and bristly long white hair with a mad glint in their foggy eyes.    Yoongi stepped in front. "Fates, I'm not sure how...but this girl found herself in my sleeping chambers. I came to you because I assume you can explain how her fate is woven into the underworld or if this is just some elaborate prank by Zeus..."    You chose to remain silent instead of trying to add to the conversation, you were still trying to understand what exactly was going on. You couldn't help but think of the cartoon fates in Hercules and worked hard to stifle the laugh that was trying to bubble out as you gazed at the three old women in front of you.    "Why surely you remember!" Again they spoke from left to right, apparently one of the three could not speak for them all, again the image of the Disney movie lurked in your mind's eye. "Why you promised!" "Why you chose to wove this fate!" And then they circled back to the furthest on the left. "Why you saved that woman's boy." "You took her up on her offer that you would wed the woman's firstborn daughter" "And in exchange, you broke the taboo and let the boy live!" "Surely you remember." "After all" "We know of the lilies you send!"    "You...you sent the lilies?" Your voice came out soft, you sounded almost childlike as you thought back to the first time you received the lilies when you were just ten.    "I...I didn't know I was sending them to you, I just asked Hermes to send them..."Yoongi sounded startled and even slightly embarrassed almost, like a small child who's been caught in the act.    "I don't understand...how could you send them to me without knowing my name? And what do they mean save the son? My mother has no boys I have no brothers, I’m an only child. And...DID THEY SAY MARRY??? OH MY GOD THIS ISN'T A FUCKING DREAM AT ALL IS IT? I...I...I...ohh nooo my presentation!!!" You started hyperventilating as you continued speaking, the air around you felt dizzyingly hot and stuffy and the walls felt like they were closing in. If it's possible to feel exactly like a phone that's been submerged in water that is the exactly how your brain felt. Jungkook suddenly appeared next to you (or perhaps in the midst of everything you just hadn't noticed that he had been there the whole time, you really weren't sure) and tried to soothe you by rubbing the back of your neck. Yoongi looked both bewildered and...perhaps angry or jealous (or maybe you just secretly hoped that, but you really didn't want to try to analyze what you felt for Hades at that moment) as he watched the scene before him.    Once you managed to finally slow your breathing to a steady pace Yoongi said so quietly you could barely hear him, "I will answer all of your questions in time, but you need rest." And suddenly you found yourself as you had just hours ago slipping into another deep sleep without any warning at all.

alksdjf so this felt like a rushed mess? Sorry, this is actually my first fanfic and I haven’t tried writing anything fiction in ages but this idea just popped into my head and I figured I should just...go with it? Anywho this chapter is more like a prologue, I’ll try to update soon and I’m sorry if it’s just a hot mess, but I do hope you enjoyed this!

Also, fun fact, I once had to do a 12 slide presentation on Sojourner Truth and to this day I have never done another assignment that I loved more than that one and just as a reminder Ms. Truth actually had a Dutch accent as Dutch was her first language, in fact she was a slave in New York not the south so southern accents aren’t accurate in the slightest.

[lovejustforaday]

Album Review - You Forgot It In People by Broken Social Scene

You Forgot It In People - Broken Social Scene

Main Genres: Indie Rock

A decent sampling of: Post-Rock, Chamber Pop, Noise Pop

WARNING: One of the tracks on this album features prominent usage of the F slur and themes of self-harm.

Something that only the nerdiest of music nerds care about, which naturally I think is pretty interesting, is the difference between “alternative rock” and “indie rock”. Both are scenes that basically came out of a counter-cultural reaction to the over-produced world of 80s radio rock and hard rock. There’s definitely a lot of overlap in terms of bands that fit well into both categories, so they’re best understood as two scenes inside of one larger movement. But still, I would absolutely make the case that “alternative rock” and “indie rock” represent two distinct things when it comes to sound and approach.

To me, indie rock is the world of mature, often bittersweet, slightly weirder/dorkier rock music that’s ideally made best to be enjoyed by introverts and college students, even though anyone can love indie rock. There’s also a distinct DIY ethos and aesthetic to most of the indie rock scene that really defines the name.

Meanwhile, alternative rock is smart and subversive but still largely accessible, radio-ready, and flashy. In my mind, alt rock embodies a lot of the rock-star image that hard rock, glam, and heavy metal conjure up, just with a little more introspection and down-to-earth-ness.

Anyhow, the only real reason I mention any of this at all is because when I was a teenager in high school, it was mostly all alternative rock for me. I was into Garbage, The White Stripes, and Smashing Pumpkins. Bands that were subversive and challenging, but also huge successes with a clear rock-star appeal. Sonic Youth was one of my early loves too, and they sorta bridged the gap between ‘indie’ and ‘alternative’.

But if I’m being honest, Broken Social Scene and their enthralling 2002 LP You Forgot It In People was my gateway drug to the world of indie rock.

Like many of my first indie records, this was an album that my older brother passed down to me, and likewise this album in particular represents how important his influence was in helping me to discover so many great bands. It also represents the last days of my senior year and the fleeting summer of transitioning to university that followed, which is a time in my life that I deeply cherish.

Truthfully, a lot of the albums that I loved from those years have worn off a tad bit as I delve deeper into their influences and more music in general. But this still totally holds up as one of the best things I’ve ever heard from start to finish. You Forgot It In People is one hell of an ambitious record, and I have a lot of favourite moments on this album. But first, let’s take a look at the “band”.

Broken Social Scene are a Canadian indie rock ensemble that formed at the turn of the millennium. Spearheaded by Kevin Drew and Brendan Canning, other members of the group are rotational and the band regularly has upwards of seven members at a time. Broken Social Scene has hosted some of the most successful creative minds in the Canadian indie scene at early points in their careers; You Forgot It In People alone features Feist before her big breakthrough, as well as Emily Haines the lead singer of Metric who would go on to drop their first LP a year after this record.

Essentially, You Forgot It In People is a legendary piece of 21st century Canadian indie rock lore. Everything here is so ridiculously tight, so brilliantly conceived and crafted with care, and yet you can also totally feel that it’s a bunch of indie kids throwing stuff at the walls and seeing what sticks. This might sound pretentious, but I think I can honestly just feel how important a moment this record was whenever I listen to it.

It all starts with “Capture The Flag”, a short two minute instrumental opener of building ambient suspense, like a far away twinkling object in the night sky getting closer and closer.

This leads into “KC Accidental”, a sublime burst of rock instrumentation and fresh morning air that, incidentally, makes for a great alarm clock on your phone. But in all seriousness, this track is one of those moments of pure musical euphoria that feels like it could encompass the entire world.

“Stars and Sons” is so slick and smooth, I feel like incredibly hot stuff every time I listen to it, and it’s one of my absolute favourite tracks on the album. Brendan Canning’s cool vocals and the guitar riffs here both remind me of a cold glass of water, so clear and refreshing. I also just really love the laid back but propulsive feeling of the song and those claps get me every time. Seriously sexy production, an incredibly satisfying auditory experience.

“Almost Crimes” is a triumphant noise pop jam session of guitars, saxophones, drums, and synthesizers that makes me wanna jump up and flail around until I get dizzy and throw up. Kevin Drew and Feist make a wonderful duet - Kevin’s laid back slacker vocals are swallowed by the chaos while Feist’s melodic shouting becomes part of the chorus of noise.

This LP features quite a few instrumental tracks but “Pacific Theme” is definitely my favourite of them. True to its name, the lead guitar riff sounds like it’s floating lazily along a gentle ocean breeze while the rest of the music bubbles beneath the surface of a lively blue ocean. I wanna lay in a hammock by the beach with this song playing in my headphones as I stare up at a cloudy blue sky. Seriously, this track genuinely sounds like the colour “blue”, maybe even “ultramarine”.

“Anthems For A Seventeen Year Old Girl” is the signature song of You Forgot It In People and it’s one of if not THE essential bittersweet teenage indie anthem. The song is a heart-wrenching chamber pop ode that vocalist Emily Haines dedicates to her teenage self, a sad reflection on how society forces you to suppress your free spirit and act a certain way when you grow up with the simple refrain “used to be one of the rotten ones and I liked you for that / now you’re all gone got your makeup on and you’re not coming back” being repeated again and again over pained strings and a sad-happy banjo riff until you’re probably left in tears. This might be my one true favourite song on the LP, but then again You Forgot It In People is such a varied experience that it’s hard to pinpoint just one song.

“Lover’s Spit” is the other emotional core of You Forgot It In People, a grand and swaying chamber rock ballad that paints an oddly dramatic and emotional scene of oral sex with its lyrics. It’s not that erotic at all really, kind of sad sounding actually as if it were about having sex right before the end of the world. The backing band on this track sounds like it’s absolutely drenched in some kind of rainstorm. I know this sounds like a really weird combination of moods and ideas, but it actually works really well and I think this track is one of the most quirky and charming “sad” indie songs I’ve ever heard.

Meanwhile, the follow up track “I’m Still Your Fag” is warm, soothing, and folky, but the lyrics are downright miserable. The song is a story of two former same-sex lovers from the perspective of a gay man who was left in the dust by his closeted ex who left him for a heteronormative family life with wife and kids. The lyrics reference the narrators feelings of betrayal and abandonment, as well as self-harm and the narrator’s hesitant participation in his ex-lover’s kinks.

To be honest I don’t know this for certain but I don’t think Kevin Drew is even gay or bi, but the emotional delivery is incredibly sincere and I’m personally not offended by his usage of the “fag” slur because contextually I think it captures a really poignant aspect of internalized self-loathing that many gay men including myself have experienced. This is still a very bitter track for me to listen to even now, but it’s oddly comforting and beautifully poetic.

The album closes with “Pitter Patter Goes My Heart”, a small stripped-down instrumental reprise of the strings on “Anthems For A Seventeen Year Old Girl”. I think it’s a really excellent choice to reuse the signature musical motif of one of the most feelsy songs on the LP, especially right after the complete downer of the lyrics on “I’m Still Your Fag”. It leaves you with these little traces of tender memories and I think “Pitter Patter Goes My Heart” solidifies the emotionally rewarding experience of the LP.

It’s pretty obvious that a lot of really talented and creative people came together to make this project when you listen to it. Broken Social Scene really captured something spectacular on You Forgot It In People. I’m really glad I was able to first hear this LP at what feels like exactly the right time in my life, but truthfully I’ve only come to appreciate it more with time.

There’s a few tracks I didn’t mention here, but I should really reiterate that nearly everything on this album comes together in such a grand, perfect way and its one of the best flowing albums I’ve ever listened to. Seriously, if you’re someone who is at all into indie rock and you haven’t already heard this one, do yourself a huge favour and go experience You Forgot It In People for the first time.

10/10

highlights: “Anthems For A Seventeen Year-Old Girl”, “Stars And Sons”,  “Lover’s Spit”, “Almost Crimes”, “Pacific Theme”, “KC Accidental”, “I’m Still Your Fag”, “Cause = Time”, “Capture The Flag”, “Pitter Patter Goes My Heart”, “Looks Just Like The Sun”

[thecaffeinebookwarrior]

How to Write a (Healthy) Relationship:  An Illustrated Guide.

@trappedinfairytales asked:

Hi! Let me start by saying this blog is a god send for more than just writing skills, I even turned on your notifications 😂 Anyway, I apologize if you've already done a post like this, but I was wondering if you could do a post with different kinds of healthy relationships? I feel like it would help, because even though I am a bi girl, I've never been in a relationship so sometimes I don't know where to start 🙈 

@magnificentcollectiverebel asked:

Bro bro I'm trying to write a cute lil romance do you have any tips please I didn't realize writing needs so much planning also thank you for all the tips on characters both of my love interests are girls the tips help

Excellent questions! 

Now, there has been a request for me to make a post about LGBTQ characters, so I will talk more exclusively about queer relationships then; sufficed to say this post applies to all types of healthy relationships.  Even though you could say I’m BI-ased on the matter.  (I’ll see myself out.)  

In the meantime, here are my personal rules of thumb for writing a ship-worthy romance. 

1.  Allow opposites to attract (but do it right!)

No, I’m not talking about two characters who have no common ground or core values;  I’m talking about two characters whose traits compliment one another.  

Maybe one’s analytical and the other’s impulse driven.  Maybe one’s a happy ray of sunshine and the other’s a grump.  Maybe one’s an idealist and the other’s a realist.

Do you see pattern here?  Not only do these proposed pairings balance each other out, but their mutually beneficial to each other:  an impulse-driven character will add spontaneity to the life of their analytical partner, while the analytical character will keep the impulsive one from leaping off cliffs;  the happy ray of sunshine will brighten up the life of the grump, while the grump will keep the ray of sunshine aware of life’s problems;  the realist will keep the idealist weighted in reality while the idealist will help them to get off the ground.

Moreover, as each of them has something the other lacks and needs, it creates a natural magnetism between them.  

Just think of it like the old Greek myth, in which mankind was split in two by Zeus and each of them are searching for their other half to become their best selves.  

In terms of writing romance, pretend your two characters are two halves of a greater whole, and allow them to complete each other.

2.  Create chemistry and attraction (but remember that it does not immediately equal love.)

If I had to pinpoint the source of my frustration with the depictions of attraction in literature, particularly YA romantic novels, I would say it roughly narrows down to the fact that the attraction, as it’s depicted, is largely extremely vapid and hollow. 

Two characters that hate each other are not going to have true chemistry or be compatible for a long-term relationship, even if one of them is equipped with excessive depictions of eye-color and can smirk like a champ.

To create true chemistry, the readers have to crave the characters’ interactions;  they have to root for them to get together, not role their eyes when they finally do.

So how do you do this?  Well, first and foremost, there are different and better ways to convey attraction than the tried and true “cerulean orbs” and obnoxious smirks and whatnot.

First and foremost, save strong, sensual language, like “she leaned in close, and I tasted her breath on mine,” “My heart thudded painfully in my chest as I felt her body press against mine,” et cetera for when your characters are actually in an intense situation.  That way, your audience isn’t desensitized to it and are more likely to root for your characters when they finally shack up.

When your characters first meet, keep the language light and playful.  Unless you’re doing a modern, queer reenactment of Romeo and Juliet (which sounds pretty awesome, honestly -- so long as the ending is happier) most people aren’t righting sonnets about people they first meet.

Let your POV character check out her prospective partner if you so desire, but press hold on the purple prose.  

For instance, instead of something like this:

“Long lashes fluttered like the wings of the butterfly over peridot orbs, a faint gold dusting over the graceful slope of her nose.  Red lips as ripe as strawberries glistened in the sun, and a waterfall of gilded hair fell over her slender shoulders.”

Try something more along the lines of this:    

“She had striking green eyes framed with long lashes, a smattering of freckles over the bridge of her nose.  Her hair was a thick mane of unkempt gold, and when she saw me, she smiled.  Her lips were plump and strawberry pink.”

If you’ll notice, both passages convey basically the same thing (i.e. that this narrator finds her prospective gal-pal attractive):  one is just significantly less pretentious than the other, and in my opinion, a lot more readable.

As the story continues, you’ll likely want to build up the tension as the character’s attraction to one another grows.  Maybe your character starts to get butterflies in their stomach whenever their love interest is around, or there’s a tension-filled moment where their skin brushes together.  Maybe they’ve found themselves constantly looking at one another’s lips and mouths.

Keep in mind while developing your characters’ chemistry into something greater that contrary to what most YA novels will teach you, attraction isn’t love.  Finding one another’s meatsuits aesthetically pleasing isn’t reasonable merit for a long-term commitment.  Love, generally speaking, is often just that:  it’s a commitment.  It takes time to cultivate, and it isn’t fun 100% of the time.  But people stick with it anyway, because ideally, the payoff is worth it.

And that’s a good thing.  As an author, you get to build up on your character’s relationship, challenge it, make it stronger.  And that’s a lot of fucking fun.  Plus, you get to write all the cute romantic shit in the times in between.

If you are implying love at first sight (which, sappy bitch I am, I’m a bit of a sucker for) feel free to imply as such, but I’m still inclined to think short, sweet descriptions work best:  “Their eyes met, and for a moment, Ishmael could have sworn the earth had come to a stop while the world kept moving.”  Or perhaps, “Luna looked at Misery for the first time, and knew right away this was the woman she was going to marry.” 

Now keep moving.  Too strong language too fast weighs your story down, keeps the reader from relating to it, and detracts from the satisfaction of when your characters finally end up together.     

3.  Let your characters’ relationship be built on friendship.  

The other day, I got lunch with my best friend and her new girlfriend.  A year or so ago, she’d gotten out of a really toxic relationship that she’d been in since I’d first known her.  

I’d thought she was happy (because at the time, I didn’t have anything else to compare it to) but seeing her with her new girl was like seeing the proverbial sunrise for the first time.  (Pardon the floral language.  Even I’m not totally exempt from purple prose.)

We laughed, we made jokes, we all checked out the hot waitress together.  Overall, it was just like spending time with two close friends -- just, y’know.  They happened to be in a romantic relationship with each other.  And that, let me tell you, makes all the difference in the world.

I’ve said this before, and I’ll say it again:  all the sexual attraction in the world will not make up for the lack of a strong basis of mutual respect, affection, and camaraderie.  

Sorry to burst your bubble, authors of the mainstream publishing world:  even if they kiss in the rain till the cows come home, even if the music swells every time they make contact, even if it’s a love story for the ages, that means your characters actually have to be friends.

So ask yourself these questions:

Do your characters have any shared interests or hobbies?

Do they actively take interest in their partners’ hobbies?

Do they crack each other up, tell each other jokes?  Exchange playful jibes that aren’t pointed or hurtful?

Do they do the above more than they fight and bicker?

Would both your characters feel comfortable with their partner seeing them at their most comfortable (e.g. stuffing their faces with Nutella and watching bad reality shows)?

If so, would they join in?

If one partner feels hurt, neglected, or insecure, will the other partner take notice and attempt to comfort and reassure them?

Can they confide in each other?

Do they share the same goals, desires, and core values?

If you answered  ‘yes’ to most of these questions, congratulations:  your characters’ romance is more akin to Gomez and Morticia than most YA pairings today.  And believe me, that’s a good thing.

  4.  Make sure your characters are more or less equals.

She’s a ridiculously hot, intelligent, accomplished twenty-something.  He’s a an out-of-shape manchild in his thirties who makes lots of fart jokes and probably has a neck-beard.  

This pairing probably would raise quite a few eyebrows in real life, but it happens so much in movies and TV (particularly comedies) that no one even questions it.  Do I really need to remind you that the entertainment industry is largely male dominated?

This doesn’t always equate to characters being equal in conventional attractiveness:  movies such as Legally Blond and Hairspray, for example, both have adorable pairings featuring lovely plus-sized/chubby women and thinner, more conventionally attractive men.  Tucker and Dale vs. Evil consisted of a satisfying romance between a chubby, kindhearted hillbilly and a thin, conventionally hot girl.  Moreover, they don’t leave anything resembling the bad taste in my mouth that the aforementioned Manchild + Hot Girl trope does.    

But your characters will need to be more-or-less equals in terms of positive attributes.  Even if they differ significantly in conventional attractiveness or status, they’ll probably roughly even in out in terms of intelligence, good manners, kindness, conscientiousness, et cetera.  

It’s also best to avoid blaring power imbalances when writing healthy romances.  I’m inclined to avoid huge age differences (though there are instances where it can be healthy), and definitely avoid huge age differences where one of the characters is underage.    

Basically, if your pairing looks like they could belong in a Woody Allen movie, no dice.  (If you think I’m kidding, just look at his fifty-six-year-old self with a nineteen-year-old love interest in Husbands and Wives.)

Differences in wealth and status are also generally be okay, but be conscientious that they can easily become abusive if one person misuses their power (lookin’ at you, 50 Shades.)    

Last, and certainly not least, your characters will almost definitely need to be equals in terms of three-dimensionality.  No exceptions.    

Which brings me to my final point:

5.  Give your love interest purpose (outside of being a love interest.)

I’ve talked about this before, but why do you think there’s such a huge following for Kirk and Spock’s romance (besides that one episode where Spock gets super horny and the two of them role around in the sand for twenty minutes), when there are droves of female love interests for both?  

Why are Dean and Castiel AO3′s most popular pairing (besides the recurring prevalence of romantic tropes throughout their narrative), when the following for their more canonically established relationships are practically nonexistent?  

What about Holmes and Watson (besides the blaring case of queerbaiting in the BBC version, and the fact that Doyle’s Sherlock was rife with gay subtext), or Steve Rogers and Bucky and Barnes (besides the fact that the writers somehow find the possibility of making Steve a Nazi less offensive than having him love a man)?   

Internalized misogyny and fetishization of MLM by straight women is sometimes a factor.  But considering the popularity of these M/M pairings amongst queer women, I’m inclined to think its simply because these male main characters are simply the most interestingly written in their respective franchises. 

It also works the other way: why do you think everyone hates Kara and Mon El’s romance so much? Because Kara is a wonderfully developed, benevolent character (surrounded with equally developed, benevolent characters who would work much better as love interests, I might add) and Mon El is a callous, entitled jerk who only wants to become a hero to woo his prospective girlfriend. 

This is also why heterosexual pairings with equally well-developed characters have no problem at all finding followings.  Just look at Han and Leia, Mulder and Scully, Booth and Bones, Monica and Chandler -- both characters hold roughly an equal amount of weight in the narrative, so we give a fuck what happens to both of them. 

Healthy, well-balanced WLW romances with happy endings are difficult to find in media, but some of my favorite examples of ship-worthy pairings that fit this criteria are Korra and Asami from Legend of Korra, Willow and Kennedy from Buffy (even though I’ll never forgive them for what they did to Tara), Carol and Susan from Friends, and Alana and Margot from Hannibal.         

And of course, there’s these lovely ladies from Sense 8.

Bottom line is, make sure both your characters are important;  don’t follow the trend of meaningless, forced heterosexual romances in media in which one party could almost invariably be replaced with a sexy lamp or a dildo.

Make the love interest a hero in their own right, and the audience will root for them.

Best of luck, and happy writing!  <3 

[wearemozzerians]

Here’s today's full interview with Morrissey Official by 

Chrissy Iley for The Sunday Times:

I'm inside Morrissey’s hotel room at the Sunset Marquis, West Hollywood. It smells incensy, instantly exotic with a dangerous edge rather like the man himself. He’s in LA because he’s performing at the Hollywood Bowl and because Friday, November 10 has been declared Morrissey Day by the mayor of Los Angeles. He lived near here until a few years ago, but now he’s just visiting. Where does he live now? A sigh. “I’m in a different place all the time. I’m not sure why everyone wants to know where I live, what that says about me. It means my credit card is permanently blocked for security reasons. They think I’m an anonymous person if I’m never in the same place. I never ask people where they live, but they always ask me as if it would reveal anything about me. I’m here now, as you can see.” Because he’s performing. “Well … I don’t perform. I’m occasionally on a stage, but I don’t ever perform.” How very Morrissey. It’s as if he never wants to be really seen — except by tens of thousands every time he is on a stage, or when he makes one of his trademark outrageous comments, whether that’s about politics, or last week, defending Harvey Weinstein and Kevin Spacey (more of that later). He no longer lives in the house next to Johnny Depp? “No, he bought it to put his argumentative relatives in when they came to stay and since then I have been homeless. I just move around the world, which is a fascinating way to live. People say, ‘But surely you need your own kitchen.’ But I’ve managed for many years doing without.” Does he cook? “Yes I do, and it’s a very nice idea to have a kitchen ...” But room service will provide? “It tries, but it’s difficult sometimes. We don’t like to wait do we, really, for anything?” Does he travel light? “I have a sickening volume of possessions. They’re all stored away in different parts of the world waiting for that moment when I stop and buy a house and relax.” Does he ever relax? “No.” This is a moment where I want to tell him about the first time I heard his voice. So soul-curdling and deep-reaching when he sang How Soon Is Now? The Smiths are remembered by their fans with a huge amount of romanticism. It seems that they were around for ever, but in fact it was only five years — 1982 to 1987 — and four studio albums. But so many songs, such poetry that spoke for a generation about love and loss and waiting. Post Smiths, there was a series of solo albums, starting with Viva Hate, some of which were less loved. There was a dark autobiography in 2013 and a strange foray into novel writing — List of the Lost was reviewed as “turgid” and received the Bad Sex Award in 2015 for a scene describing a “giggling snowball of full-figured copulation”. But now Morrissey is back, as unconventional as ever. And with the release of the new album, Low in High School, he is on the radio, the television, that voice strangely more fluid and insistent than ever. Some of his views must jangle with his new generation of younger fans. He has said that he thought Brexit was magnificent, and the new single Jacky’s Only Happy When She’s Up on the Stage ends with a haunting chorus of “exit exit”, which some people have translated as “Brexit Brexit”. He denies it. “No, it’s not a Brexit song. There’s no Brexit in it,” he insists. “The line is, ‘All the audience head for the exit when she’s on stage’, so it’s nothing to do with Brexit. People just rush to stupid conclusions and create facts and create their own truths and slaughter the issue.” But he did say Brexit was magnificent, right? “I thought it was a fascinating strike for democracy, because the people said the opposite to Westminster, and that was extraordinary. David Cameron didn’t imagine the result could be as it was, but at least he did the honourable thing and slid away. The unfortunate thing is that politicians only speak to other politicians. They don’t speak to the people, so on that day their bubble burst. And now I don’t think Brexit has taken place, or even will, because Westminster don’t want it. It’s not that difficult. They’re just finding a way to not make it Brexit.” Is it true that he banned David Cameron from ever listening to a Morrissey-penned song? “No, that was never true, but these are the things I have to live with.” Big sigh. “I didn’t say it and it’s nice if everybody listens. It really is.” There’s nobody he wants to ban? “Well, only the obvious — the obvious international pest.” The orange one? “Yes.” “He’s beyond salvation. Beyond any help. The biggest security threat to America and the world. He’s like a two-year-old constantly reaching for something, damaging it and then moving on to something else and destroying it.” Indeed, the next day when I go to his show at the Hollywood Bowl, one of the backdrops is Morrissey holding a toddler with Trump’s head superimposed. A tiny tyrant. It goes down well. Morrissey is still mesmerising on stage as he lashes and whips his microphone cable. He gives us the songs that still speak to us even though they’re decades old. This audience — a diverse collection: black, white, brown; young, old and very young; men, women, gay, straight — seems to be with him all the way. No one minds that on Morrissey’s orders the only food sold is vegetarian. I’ve been to that same stadium many times and seen artists of similar years with pretentious trousers and hair plugs. I’ve seen them sing their old songs to a crowd of middle-aged spread. This concert was not like that. Though I could have done without the bit where the 58-year-old threw his jacket into the crowd and flaunted his unworked-out torso. But it was unselfconsciously done. On the sofa in his hotel room we sip bottled water and he asks me if I would like anything more dangerous. I suggest a coffee. He shrugs in despair. “That’s not what I meant.” The new album has created a buzz. “It feels good. People always want their latest offspring to be the cutest, I believe,” he says. He doesn’t have children. He has songs. Does he have a particular track that’s more important than the others? “No. I mean if you gave birth to quads you wouldn’t say which quad is the best one, would you? You would love all your quads equally for different reasons.” I tell him I’ve got four cats. “There. I rest my case. I bet you don’t pick one out and say you’re the one I love and boot the others in the linen cupboard.” We chat about how Russell Brand’s cat is called Morrissey. “Yes, and he’s still alive. I don’t mean Russell — I mean the cat. He is getting on now: I do mean Russell. I don’t mean the cat.” I read that Brand named the cat Morrissey because he’s an awkward bugger. He grins. “There you go. You should have guessed that one straight away.” But however difficult he can be — for instance, during the preparation of this article he spends four days saying he will do a photo shoot and then doesn’t — he is having a moment in the spotlight. “It’s certainly a moment that might annoy many people, but here I am and I offer no apologies and no excuses.” Hmm. The first single on the album, Spent the Day in Bed, has had more airplay in America than any Morrissey track ever. “I don’t spend the day in bed often but people love their beds,” he says. He advises several times that people shouldn’t stay in bed and watch the news because it is so depressing. He should know: Morrissey has spent much of his life depressed. Surely that’s where quite a few of the hits came from. “Years ago I sang a song called Heaven Knows I’m Miserable Now, and it’s like an old school uniform. People insist I wear it, but I’m really not that miserable. I’m not an unhappy person. Not in the least. I’m certainly very surprised and very pleased to still be here.” I’m wondering if his new resolution to appreciate life had anything to do with it nearly being taken away. He is in remission from oesophagus cancer. “I’d had quite a few scares and was on a lot of extreme medication. I lost a lot of hair. You can be as healthy as possible, but something will always get you in the end. I thought, here we go. Just accept it, but I’ve done very well. I’m not on any medication now.” And his hair is back — greying — and the Morrissey superquiff is perhaps not as super as it once was. “It’s real. A lot of people my age don’t have hair. They don’t have teeth, so I feel quite blessed.” Following his diagnosis in 2014, he “had a lot of scrapings, but they weren’t all painful”. Wasn’t he worried a procedure involving the scraping of his oesophagus would affect his voice? “No, incredibly,” he laughs. “In fact my voice is better, absolutely better than it was. I had to give up 150 things, from red wine and beyond, but that was OK because I don’t really like red wine. When you sit before a doctor and they use the c-word you hear it but you don’t hear it. You just say, ‘Ah, yes,’ as if it’s something you hear every day. Your mind goes into this funny little somewhere and you say, ‘Ah, yes,’ as if you knew it all along.” I’m not sure that’s how most of us would react, but then he’s always been one of these people who seem to be able to dislocate himself from his own being. “Giving up red wine was meaningless to me anyway.” Doesn’t he drink alcohol? “Just not red wine.” He also has a dislike of mushrooms. “Oh they are horrific, fungus — truffles make me cry. I say to people, ‘What are you doing eating fungus?’ Truffles shock me and the smell. Ewwww. Garlic is also horrific.” Morrissey’s superfood of choice is potatoes. “I’ve never had a curry and I’ve never had a coffee. I’ve never wanted one and I’ve never been handed one. I have Ceylon tea, very, very weak with an alternative milk. Cashew milk is beautiful. Dairy farms all over England are collapsing. Non-dairy milk is now 51% of the market, which is fantastic.” Thirty-two years ago, when he first sang Meat Is Murder, veganism was rare. A vegan diet was difficult to maintain. Now, vegan food is in supermarkets. “What about champagne?” he says. I’m not sure if he’s offering to crack open a bottle, but I hate champagne. “I’ve never met anybody that hated champagne,” he says. I’ve never met anybody that hasn’t drunk coffee or eaten curry, I ripost. “I don’t like any food where the following day you can still taste it or you smell of it or your clothes smell of it. I’m very, very bland as far as food is concerned,” he says. It is as if the psyche of Morrissey is so piquant, he needs to balance it with food that tastes of nothing. Not only has he never had an onion bhaji — “I’ve never had an onion. That would make me cry. It’s just too eye-crossing. I’m strictly bread and potatoes.” Not for the first time, the conversation drifts back to politics. Does he think Trump will be impeached? “It’s a long time coming and there have been multiple reasons and it hasn’t happened. It’s a shocking reflection on American politics. I understand people wanting somebody who is nonpolitical, who is not part of a system. But not him. They thought that he was something he absolutely is not. Surely people realise it now. Everything he says is divisive. It’s meant to be. It’s meant to distract you.” He is similarly disparaging about Theresa May. “She won’t answer questions put to her. She’s not leadership [material]. She can barely get to the end of her own sentence. Her face quakes. She’s hanging on by the skin of her teeth. She has negotiations about negotiations about negotiations about the EU. I’m not a Conservative, but I can see she’s actually blocking the Conservative Party from moving on and becoming strong. But as we know, politicians do not care about public opinion. And she wants to bring back fox hunting.” This is not only “cruel and disgraceful”, but signifies that May is “out of step and not of the modern world”. Morrissey loves talking about politics, there’s always an opinion. But then he says: “I’m nonpolitical. I always have been. I’ve never voted in my life.” At the last election there was a story going round that Morrissey voted Ukip. In fact, at a concert earlier this year, he appeared to support Anne-Marie Waters, an outspoken Ukip politician with anti-Muslim views, claiming the party’s leadership contest had been rigged against her. He is the most political nonpolitical person on the planet. He’s shy, except in front of thousands. He writes about love, but only admits to one proper relationship — with Jake Walters, a boxer from east London. They lived together from 1994 to 1996. When he was in the Smiths he declared himself celibate and said he hated sex. After Walters, he discussed having a baby with Tina Dehghani, a friend whom he met while living in Los Angeles, and in his autobiography he refers to a relationship with an Italian whom he calls Gelato. He’s said in the past he’s only attracted to people who aren’t interested in him. He’s never been on a date. He only writes about wanting to be loved. Many contradictions. “Well, I’m human. I’m not interested in being part of anything. I don’t see a party that speaks to me and I haven’t ever. My vote is very precious. I won’t use it just to get rid of somebody I don’t like because they’re all absolutely the same.” Does he think Jeremy Corbyn is the same? “He has had many opportunities to take a strike against Theresa May and he has resisted. It’s hard to believe that this is the best England can produce at this stage of the game. We survived Thatcher by the skin of our teeth, and somehow we’re all still alive and we are presented with Theresa May and Jeremy Corbyn.” I laugh, and he corrects me: “It’s a tragedy. The UK is in a state of cultural tragedy, dominated by political correctness. Nobody tells the truth about anything. If you tell the truth in England, you’ll lose your job.” This is not a rule, however, Morrissey feels applies to him. I ask him about the behaviour of Harvey Weinstein and Kevin Spacey who are both accused of multiple cases of sexual misdemeanours. He is in no mood to condemn them. “You must be careful as far as ‘sexual harassment’ is concerned, because often it can be just a pathetic attempt at courtship.” Most people wouldn’t see the kind of behaviours these sexual predators are accused of as in any way “courtship”. But Morrissey is undeterred. As this interview went to press it emerged that he’d told the German magazine Der Spiegel that the claims against Kevin Spacey — one of which alleges a sexual relationship with a 14-year-old boy — were “ridiculous” and argued, as he did with me, that definitions of harassment and assault have become too broad. “Kevin Spacey was 26, boy 14. One wonders where the boy’s parents were,” Morrissey said. “One wonders if the boy did not know what would happen.” On Weinstein, he said to Der Spiegel that some of the movie mogul’s alleged victims: “play along”. “Afterwards, they feel embarrassed or disliked. And then they turn it around and say, ‘I was attacked, I was surprised.’ But if everything went well, and if it had given them a great career, they would not talk about it.” He added: “I hate rape. I hate attacks. I hate sexual situations that are forced on someone. But in many cases one looks at the circumstances and thinks that the person who is considered a victim is merely disappointed.” Our conversation covers similar ground. When I ask him about these sexual attacks he says: “I’m sure it’s horrific, but we have to keep everything in proportion. Do you not agree? I have never been sexually harassed, I might add.” Perhaps that is why he seems so unsympathetic. Morrissey’s sexuality has always been a point of some discussion. Is it still true, I ask, that he doesn’t identify as heterosexual, homosexual or bisexual but, as he puts it, “humoursexual”? “No, humasexual as in we’re all humans.” Oh, I thought it was only about sleeping with people that you had a laugh with. “That would dramatically limit things, but certainly I think we are obsessed with labels, obsessed with knowing where we stand with other people, what we can expect them to do, and it doesn’t make any difference really.” Just like veganism, he insists, being sexually fluid and gender fluid is now much more accepted. “It’s extraordinary. People seem to be very relaxed by it.” But when Morrissey announced his humasexuality in 2013, he was a lonely voice. “Yes, I was. I spearheaded the movement. I know no other way, so nothing has changed for me, but the rest of the world leaps on. I am pleased because I want people to be happy. There is an expiration date on our lives on this planet. You have to be yourself and hopefully get some happiness from it. It seems everybody, in every respect of their lives, is coming out of their cupboard saying this is the person I’d like to be. I want to wear these clothes, not those that have been imposed on me. As long as nobody’s harmed, I think it’s good.” Is it true that he’s never been on a date? “Yes, I’ve never been on a traditional date. I’m not that kind of person.” No one’s ever said I’d like to take you to dinner? “No, never. But I’m happy with my vocation.” What does he mean by vocation? “I’m very interested in the singing voice. I’m very interested in making a difference in music, not simply being successful.” Isn’t it possible to do that and have a date? “No. I’ve never found it to be so.” It’s one or the other? “Well, life leads me. Does it lead you? Are you successful at the cost of something else?” I’m quite shocked by his question. I suggest that it’s not valid because I’m not really successful. He says, “Well you’re not working at KFC, are you?”and laughs a conspiratorial laugh. He’s interested in the way journalism has changed. “The Guardian, you can’t even meet them halfway. They are like The Sun in 1972. So obstinate. They don’t want to talk to you. They want to correct you. You can’t simply say, ‘This is how I feel,’ because they’ll say, ‘How you feel is wrong.’ And they’ll say, ‘He’s racist. He should be shot, he should be drowned.’ It’s very difficult to sit down with somebody and simply convey your feelings. In a democracy you should be able to give your opinion about anything. We must have debate, but that doesn’t happen any more. Free speech has died. Isn’t modern journalism about exposing people? When I was young I saw a documentary accidentally about the abattoir and I fell into an almost lifelong depression. I couldn’t believe I lived in a society that allowed this. The abattoir is no different to Auschwitz.” The tack back to animals reminds me he was once voted Britain’s second most important cultural icon by the audience of BBC 2’s The Culture Show, after David Attenborough. “It was beautiful but I don’t know about Attenborough’s regard for animals,” he says. “He often uses terms like ‘seafood’ and there’s no such thing as seafood. It’s sea life, and he talks about ‘wildlife’ and it’s free life. Animals are not wild simply because we pathetic humans haven’t shoved them in a cage, so his terminology is often up the pole.” I tell him one of my favourite songs on the album is Israel. It’s a romantic hymn to the country. How did that come about? “I have made many trips there and I was given the keys to Tel Aviv by the mayor. Everybody was so very nice to me and I’m aware that there’s a constant backlash against the country that I could never quite understand. I feel people are judging the country by its government, which you shouldn’t do. You can’t blame the people for the rulership. Israel is beautiful.” Steven Patrick Morrissey was born and raised in Manchester. A lapsed Catholic, he went to a religious school. Manchester in the 1960s and 1970s was damp, somewhere he wanted to escape from. Part of that escape was through television — and soap operas. He was once offered a part in EastEnders, but turned it down. “I was invited to be Dot Cotton’s other son, a mysterious son no one had ever spoken about, who returns to the Square, doesn’t get involved with anybody and doesn’t immediately have sex with anybody as most characters who come into the Square do.” So basically he’d have played himself. “Yes. I didn’t do it.” Is it too late? “For many things, yes … I was also offered a part in Emmerdale. I was to play an intruder in jodhpurs — which I’d longed to be, of course, I had waited years to be an intruder in jodhpurs — an intruder at Home Farm, but I refused to wear the jodhpurs. As they say, it’s nice to be asked.” He has no ambitions to act, his time occupied with the new album and a tour that will include China, Australia and Europe. China has one of the worst records for human and animal rights in the world, I point out. “You can’t simply fold your arms and say I’m not going to China because of the cat and dog trade, which is absolutely tearful, but hopefully your presence can make a difference,” he says. His only problem with not living anywhere is he has no animal companion. “My best friends have been cats. I had one cat for 23 years and one for 22. They just walked into the house, one when I was a small child and one when I was slightly older. I won’t say they were like children, because I don’t know any children that are actually nice. They were black-and-white and called Buster and Tibby. Tibby had been kicked in the face so he had to be fed by hand. He couldn’t eat from a plate. He required a lot of patience but he cured himself and became a healthy, incredibly happy cat. They certainly enriched my life.” It’s been hours now. Morrissey is too polite to end our meeting and I feel if I don’t end it I may never leave. For me, meeting Morrissey is like meeting a battered, black-and-white alley cat. Sure, he’s not to everyone’s taste. But that is the highest compliment I could ever give — although Morrissey is the only one who could recognise it as such.

The Sunday Times Magazine - Interview by Chrissy Iley:https://t.co/0rq4KHtItW 

We Are Mozzerians.

[jhyg-universe]

Secretary // BTS Mafia AU (MIN YOONGI)

tags > mafia

Y/N x Yoongi

Chapter One

©  moodboard @jhyg-universe

MIN YOONGI SECRATERY  

I could feel the wind rushing through my hair, the brown strands flying around my face like a dove. I ran with a speed like a cheetah, cherishing my last moments on this Earth. As I ran, I found a small alleyway to my right, the smell reminding me of dead rats killed by its prey. I sped into the alleyway, finding a dead-end. My eyes scurried around the alleyway, trying to look for any source of protection. My eyes scanned over a trashcan and without any hesitation I hid behind it, praying they wouldn’t find me. I let out a heavy breath that I had been holding since they laid their ill-ridden eyes on me. “Breathe in, breathe out, breathe in,” I kept telling myself trying to keep my eyes open from the whisper of sleep. After a few minutes of silence, I crept out of my safe haven, praying they weren’t anywhere near. I slowly tiptoed towards the entrance of the alleyway, my feet barely scraping the ground, the sound of mice scampering around me. After slowly tiptoeing back into the dim light of the night and looking around every corner imaginable, I smiled. “They couldn’t catch me, those bastards,” I snickered to myself. Before my feet could even reach to the right side of the street, I felt a chill run down my spine as I was knocked out, the last thing my eyes connecting with the face of those bastards.  

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EARLIER THAT DAY IN THE MORNING  

As the pads of my fingertips connected with that of the keyboard, I heaved out a heavy sigh. “What am I even doing here?” I thought to myself. I looked at the blue screen, my hazel pupils connecting with all the unread emails I needed to reply to. I opened them all one by one scanning them with pretentious daggers. After what seemed like replying to millions of emails, I checked the time. 9:00am. “Only 9:00am?” I cried out loud to no one in particular. “it's only 9:00 am and you’ve only replied to what? Five emails? You’ve been here since 8:00 Y/N,” a deep yet delicate voice whispered behind me, making me jump out of my navy office chair. I turned around, my eyes falling on the man standing behind me with a smirk plastered across his pale face. I could feel my face turning into the shade of a tomato. “I well ye- yes,” I stuttered, blatantly embarrassed. He smiled at me, clearly enjoying the embarrassed state I was in. “It's fine, I’ll pretend I didn’t hear anything Y/N,” he chuckled at me as he elegantly walked across the room, into his darkened office. I slumped back down into my chair, my cheeks feeling like furnace being lit for the first time. I started at the plague plastered across the black double door in front me, the name Min Yoongi staring back at me.  

After a couple of hours of replying to more emails, scheduling for meetings and business parties, it was finally my lunch break. I got out of my squeaky chair, stretching in the process. I knocked onto the double-door, waiting for a reply. “Come in,” said Yoongi. I opened the door, revealing his beautiful yet simple office. When you enter, the first thing you see is his black desk put right in the centre at the end, the windows facing either side. To the right is a beautiful deep red satin couch with a see-through coffee table, a deep royal blue rug situated underneath. To the left is a magnificent bookcase covering up the whole wall with thousands of books containing knowledge. I may have taken a few of them for myself without permission. I walked towards the desk Yoongi was sat at, his dark eyes watching my every move. I stopped before him, talking in a soft voice,” I just came to ask if you'd like to have lunch together today? I know you're busy with all the new things that’s been coming through, but I thought maybe you should take a breather,” I looked at him earnestly. He smiled at me replying,” I would love that Y/N.” I smiled, bowing my head before leaving his office. I went back to my wooden desk, grabbing my baby blue handbag and grabbing my cream coat before heading downstairs to drive our favorite little restaurant.  

After about ten minutes of quietly driving, I approached the small restaurant. I parked the car, getting out and striding along towards the door. I entered, greeting all the familiar staff with a bright smile before I headed towards the owner, Kim Seokjin. Seokjin, or Jin like I call him, has been friends with Yoongi since practically childbirth, they were like brothers. I smiled fondly at him asking, "can I just get the usual please.” Jin smiled at me, one of the most handsome smiles I have ever soon and nodded whilst saying, "it'll take about fifteen minutes today.” I nodded, heading towards one of the wooden chairs taking a seat. After about five minutes I decided to go to the bathroom, my bladder feeling as if it was about to explode out of nowhere. I ran into the bathroom towards the cubicle. Once I was finished, I stepped out and cleaned my hands, my reflection staring back at me in the glistening mirror. My hazel eyes were drooping from the lack of sleep of these past few days. My chestnut brown hair wove together like an ocean, drooping just above my shoulders on my cream-colored collar button shirt. I let out a silent sigh, grateful I didn’t have to live that other life anymore. This is my new life.

I step out of the restroom and saw my meal standing neatly on the countertop, a gazing Jin smiling towards my direction. “Thank you Jin,” I say fondly. I grab the bags the food is in and walk towards the car. As I entered the car, I thought I could feel a pair of eyes staring at me like I was a piece of prey. I could feel a cold breeze come over me. I grabbed the steering wheel tightly, my knuckles turning into the colour of snow. I scanned around the road before departing back towards the building, butterflies circling my stomach with anxiety.

I reached back to the tall building, heading to the first floor to eat lunch with Yoongi. I couldn’t shake the feeling that someone was following me. I felt like I was invisible but only to myself, with everyone else able to see me dead in the eye without my knowledge. The tiny sound of the elevator opening brought me back into reality, clearing the thoughts out of my mind like a mop. I quickly sped out of the elevator, heading towards the office, holding my breath with anxiety. I knocked on the door, my belly rumbling with anticipation of food while my palms sweating like a waterfall. I heard shuffling in the room before the door creaked open, with a small Yoongi smiling at me. “Sorry Y/N, I can't eat with you anymore, I have to deal with something, sorry,” he sighed with an apologetic smile. “Oh no that’s fine, don’t worry about it,” I replied with a little disappointment. While Yoongi closed the door, I saw a small stature sitting on the couch. They seemed almost familiar to me. I felt a pin drop in my stomach.

After annihilating the food, leaving Yoongis in the staff fridge, I replied to more emails and went through Yoongis schedule, solving some mistakes if necessary. Nine hours later and it was already 10:30 pm. I could still see the light throbbing in Yoongis office. With a heavy sigh I decided to pack up and go home. I left a small sticky note on his door in small writing saying, "Have a good night! I left the food in the staff fridge, make sure to eat before you go home. And don’t forget to go home please - Y/N.” Yoongi was notorious for staying at the BigHit building overnight or even several days. However, after he hired me about a year ago just after I left that ill-ridden home, all of that changed. If he doesn’t go home, he knows he will have to face my wrath. He may be a successful businessman, but he still needs to eat and sleep properly. I went down the elevator, pressing ground floor. Once I left the building I headed towards the left, my apartment being only a fifteen-minute walk. The breeze hit my pale face, the air around me being crystallized due to the cold weather.

As I was walking, I could feel a bubble inside me ready to burst. With a steady pace and sweaty palms, I slowly wheeled my head around to be faced with a black car. Not just any black car. It belonged to my father. Before I knew it, I could feel my legs dragging me away like a ragdoll, my breath pacing faster than a cheetah. My heart was racing away in my chest, like a child leaving its parent after throwing a fit. I whipped my head back to see if they were still following me and to my horror, I saw three tall men chasing me right on my tail. My eyes wandered the street, looking for anything that could save me. My eyes darted towards an alleyway and before I knew it my legs jumped there like a kangaroo. I hid behind the trashcan praying for a miracle. After what seemed like hours, I went out of the alleyway only to be met with darkness.

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My arms wandered around me, my hands contacting with the feeling of satin. “I’m lying down somewhere, on a bed?” I whispered to myself. I grungily sat up on the bed. My head was pounding as if someone threw a boulder on my head. My head raced with questions filling every space of brain capacity imaginable. I quickly looked down thankfully to see I was still seeing I was wearing the same clothing items I wore this morning. Or at least I thought this morning, who knows how long I had been knocked out for. I slowly got out of the warm bed, walking towards the door like a sloth. I grabbed the rose-gold knob, slowly turning it. “At least they didn’t lock me in like a prisoner, unlike last time,” I thought. I slowly opened the door, the light blinding my eyes. After my eyes adjudged to the bright light, I stepped out being welcomed with two guards situated on either side of the white door. I sighed deciding best not to ask them questions, it's not like they’d be allowed to answer anything anyways. I wandered my eyes around the hall. On the right there were several doors along the hallway with a dead-end and on my left, I saw more doors and an opening towards a room at the end. I walked left, praying he wouldn’t be. Once I reached the end I was met with a small modern kitchen along with a velvet soft pink couch lined along with the opening in front of the kitchen.  

I stepped towards the kitchen warily, my eyes wavering every nook and cranny. I saw a small sticky note stuck on the coal-like fridge. I ripped it off, reading what it said. Darling we have a dinner meeting tonight for a possible suitor. I bought a dress and shoes for you; it’s lying on the small vanity in the room you were in. The chauffer will pick you up around 6:00 pm. Do not be late. Love Dad. I rolled my eyes with annoyance. He didn’t even bother to see his own daughter after he got his little henchmen to capture me. What a scaredy-cat. I opened the fridge, eyeing the contents inside. Milk, eggs and water. Great. I grabbed the eggs to make scrambled eggs. After finishing the eggs, I went back inside the room I was in before, opening the soft darkened curtains. The light shone around the room. It was small but delicate like a flower. Like me. When you walk through the door, there is a small queen-sized bed with cream coloured satin covers. Across from the bed is the locked stained-glassed windows, with the elegant violet vanity sat on the right of the windows. A small black box with a deep wine-red ribbon tied around sat silently on the vanity as if it was mocking me. I scowled at it. Next to the box was a golden wrist-watch that read 12:07pm. I wanted to smash that watch to pieces.

After what seemed like centuries, the clock finally read 6:00pm. One of the guards in front of my door escorted me outside the house, a firm hand holding onto my arm, caging me in like an animal. We approached towards a black car, the chauffeur opening the back-passenger door. The guard pushed me into the car, giving me snare as he closed the door in front of my face. The chauffeur entered the driver's seat without a single peep and off we were deciding the rest of my life thanks to my “ever-so-loving" father. I couldn’t remember the last night I dressed up or even the last time I went out for dinner with someone, unless all the night less “sleepovers” at the office with Yoongi counts. I wore a royal blue strapless dress, flowing beneath me like a waterfall. It wasn’t too tight, so I felt more comfortable in it. I wore black high heeled MaryJane's along with my cat anklet that Yoongi got me for my birthday. I wore the gold watch that was on the vanity along with small pearl earrings, whilst my short hair was straightened, scraping my shoulders. I wore simple makeup, not bothering with anything fancy. It's not like I care anyway. I looked at myself in the rear-view mirror, disgusted with myself in allowing to be caught and trapped back into this deceiving world I was born into to.

Ten minutes later with complete silence, we came to a stop. The chauffeur climbed out of his seat and opened my door. I looked ahead of me once I was out of the car. We were in front of one of the most expensive restaurants in this part of town. It glistened with waterfalls surrounding it, the water droplets crystallizing the see-through exterior making it look like a palace belonging to a water Queen. The front double-door had small indents of diamonds surrounding it. A long light blue runway carpet stretched towards the doors. The chauffer extended his arm for me to wrap my hands around. We walked towards the double doors, two employees opening it up for us as if we were Kings and Queens of a country. The chauffeur brought us to our table.  A light green cloth draped over a round table like from King Arthur with four pearl-like tables sitting around the table.  A bouquet of dandelions was in the middle of the table and a small chandelier above, making the flowers shine like the sun with the chandelier lights draping on it.  

My father was sat on one of the chairs, a sly smile on his face. “Darling, how nice of you to join us,” he said in a sarcastic tone, his daggered-eyes snipping through me. I smiled and sat down next to him much to my dismay. My father was a businessman but not just any businessman. He was part of the Mafia. He wasn’t on the top, the top of the ladder belonged to Bangtan, but he did pretty well for himself, but he wanted more. He wanted more and thanks to me, his daughter, he could get more by marry me off to some guy that I don’t even know and gain all the riches thanks to the marriage. I didn’t want that. I hated being the daughter of a man in the Mafia. I hated and so I left. I left my old life behind, found myself a job as a secretary for Min Yoongi about a year ago and lived a new life as twenty-year-old Y/N with a small apartment, new relationships, and no family. Unfortunately, that obviously didn’t last long.

I sat at the table staring into space. I hated it here more than anything. I felt like a trapped bird having no taste of freedom. My father let out a small cough, standing up in the process. I ignored him. He grabbed my arm and forcibly pulled up. I scowled at him, sending daggers into him. I quickly got myself together, patting down my dress and plastering a small smile onto my face. Two men walked towards us both with navy suits, one was obviously the father and the other was his son, the man I would have to marry. I looked down, trying to imagine myself out of this situation, crying in silence. “Hello Sir, I thank you for this pleasure,” I heard my father say. I cringed on the inside with his high-pitched over the top happy voice. He was nothing like that at home. My father nudged me with his elbow, indicating me to lift my head. The next few seconds felt like a blur. I lifted my head wearily, my eyes freezing over the young man before me. My possible husband. Min Yoongi.  

by: jhyg-universe

[ephemeralavalon]

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It was past midnight when I realized that I had missed Mama’s call. I was surprised. She usually never called me after ten at night, and in the loud Houston downtown bar I hadn’t heard my cell ring. The Thirsty Monkey wasn’t the type of place I wanted to find myself drinking in late at night. In the sordid yellow light of cheap low hanging ceiling lights, everything had an impermanent quality to it. We were all just hollowed out people, dimming lamps and drawing shades in small apartments.

I hadn’t checked my phone until I awoke from my drunken slumber in the middle of the night. There was no voicemail, just a cryptic text message: call me.

She picked up on the third ring. “Where are you?”

I looked over at the mysterious young man lying in my bed. “I’m home.”

Her voice sounded thin and strained as if she was trying to talk through thick velvet. A seamstress with words, she’d learned how to bind her own words into smaller stitches until they vanished into the fabric. “Your Uela’s in the hospital. They’re telling us we should come by.”

By this point death didn’t shock me. It was routine for my family; Uela and Tito both grew up on farms, watched their mothers wring the necks of chickens till blood spattered; seen rabid dogs and possums shot; and assisted their mothers with last-minute abortions. I too had been raised around death, and was accustomed to the evanescence of existence. My first lesson was watching the annual death of Uela’s zinnia flowers. In the extreme Texas heat they’d wrinkle and shrink until the last petal fell. Then, Uela would plant the next batch.

My second lesson was with my Tito. He was out in the backyard mowing the grass. Like the flowers he too began to wither in the summer heat. He suddenly stood up straight, gripped his arm, and silently fell to the ground. After the heart attack, we were all hyper vigilant for any further signs of deterioration. The doctor prescribed him a mountain of pills. When I was younger I use to sit by Uela’s feet and watch her meticulously count Tito’s vitamins for him. One red. Two yellow. One white. Her hard and wrinkled fingers would gingerly trace over the shape before shoveling them in to his weekly pillbox. With each plop into the plastic box I prayed that Tito’s heart would grow stronger. Uela did this every day until Tito passed away.

“Will you drive down?” Her question hung like a noose around my neck. Physically we were hundreds of miles apart, but it felt as if she was standing in the room, leaning her weight into me.

“Mama, I don’t—”

“Of course. You never can Ofelia.” As her voice rang in my ear, I felt the searing sting of her words stab me in the stomach. There was a string of worry attached to her entreaty, and I imagined Mama standing alone in a dark room shivering to herself as she waited for my reply.

After Tito’s funeral, I’d left Pharr and my family behind for a waitressing job in Houston. We never got many customers to come down to Phil’s Diner, but sometimes amongst the slow lunch hour I found myself disappearing behind stacks of orders and unclean white plates. Yet, everyone could still sense my small town roots. They use to see it in my way, in the silk web-like bits of threads stuck to all my clothes.

“I’ll be down tomorrow night.”

I put my cell down on the nightstand and crawled back into bed with a stranger.

That night I dreamt of the garden in front of Uela and Tito’s home. The fuchsia flower petals of the crepe myrtle weighed the branches down till they bowed down to the floor. When I looked down, I realized I was a child, running through the crepe myrtle as if they were stage curtains, swerving in and out. At the end of the infinite row of trees, I came upon a large seed the size of my thumb. Over my shoulder I heard Tito’s voice.

“Your Uela would know how to plant that.” But when I tried to see his face, there was no one there, just a black void.

Then the whole dream burst into smaller bubbles and floated away into the recess of my mind.

The early morning sunlight filtering in from the window shades shocked me out of my sleep. Dancing in the ray of light were tiny specks of dust. My skin prickled from the heat. Though in contrast to last night my apartment was calm and quiet, Mama’s voice silently sat heavy in the air. I turned to my side. The man from last night was still lying in my bed, face down buried in the dirty pillowcase. After a while, his breathing became noticeable, a loud hiss of air coming in and out of his large nostrils. With my thumb and forefinger I pinched his nose, trying to stop the sound. He struggled for a second, his body was looking for some other way to breathe, and then he opened his mouth. I kept playing with his face until I heard my stomach growl.

I left the man in my bed, who I was now referring to as Tim, and got up to make myself breakfast. The egg yolk hit the pan and began to fry in the bubbling oil. Putting my head down on the granite counter top, I tried listening to the crackling sound. When I had a hangover the feel of the cold granite and the comforting sound of cooking use to calm me down. It was a now a habit for any time I was stressed.

After breakfast, I was halfway through packing when Tim woke up.

“Morning.” He watched me as I packed a black dress into my suitcase. “Going somewhere?”

“Sorry Tim. I’ve got to drive home tonight.” I shoved random toiletries inside.

“I’m Tom.” He paused for a second.

I looked at him once more. His messy strawberry blonde hair was parted in a pretentious way. He was definitely a Tim.

“Sorry Tom. I’ve got to be on the road soon.” I quickly dressed in some discarded jeans and a wrinkled t-shirt as an incentive for him to leave. “There’s coffee in the kitchen.”

Tom stood confused in nothing but his underwear. He kept turning his head from the kitchen to me, trying to find an answer.

Finally I said, “My grandmother’s dying Tom. You have to go.” He looked like he wanted to hug me for a second, but I pushed him out my apartment door with the rest of his clothes.

It was a routine I had picked up from Mama. She’d never been able to settle down either. There were numerous suitors—all nice well-educated white men—and three engagements, but as the wedding date came near things always seemed to pop-up. Then she’d met my father, and decided to skip the whole marriage and forever after crap. So she wasn’t all that surprised when he returned back to his wife.

Mama never had a dream. She’d only been taught to take care of her family. She knew nothing else. Even when the opportunity to leave Uela and Tito behind arrived at her feet, she simply stepped over and let the chance pass by. After all, someone had to take care of them in their old age.

After I was born, Mama got a job as receptionist for a law firm in town. While my mother worked my grandparents raised me. During the day I spent time with Tito and Uela, and at night I saw Mama.

The first image I had of Uela was of her back. No matter what time of the day, she seemed to always be hunched over the kitchen counter making something. I used to watch her as she made tortillas from scratch. Her tan hands would beat the flour dough into submission. Whack. Whack. Whack. The staccato sound of her wooden rolling pin filled the off-pink 50’s style small kitchen. A sweet smell of butter and flour filled the room, brushing against my nostrils. I would lean into the aroma and imagine the taste of the fluffy treats lying on my tongue.

Uela loved to cook, but she didn’t like having me in the kitchen. A wooden chair in the corner of the room was my space. I was not allowed to get up from it. Sitting in that small chair my back standing up straight, a strange desire to hug her back would come over me. The hungry need to love her scared me.

As a child, I wanted to be like Uela. Her and Tito’s bedroom was a frilly pink with white wooden furniture. Against one wall was an ornate vanity bursting with sparkling jewelry. When Uela was busy at work, I would sneak into her room and try on her things. My favorite was a beautiful white sun hat with pink trim she wore for gardening. The wide rim made my eight-year-old head look tiny and ridiculous, but in the inside lining of the hat I could feel where her damp head had touched the light fabric. Her sweat was still drying. That was the closest I ever got to her.

After the fifth time, she caught me sneaking into her stuff. I stumbled over my words trying to explain, but the words were caught in my throat. She stood over me, her shadow engulfing my tiny body. I began to sob to myself uncontrollably. She reached for one of Tito’s belts lying on the bed and pulled me onto her knee. I winced when the fist strike landed on me. Mama had never hit me once. I was unaccustomed to the feel of leather against my naked skin, but I soon memorized the sound. That day she only dealt me five blows. In the light, the welts that rose up from where the notch holes had hit me shined like the spider webs on the crepe myrtle.

Loving Uela was hard.

Tito was much easier to get along with. During his lunch break Tito would leave the office and take me to an old cowboy shop across the way from where he worked. When we walked in all the female store clerks stopped what they were doing and said hello to us. Caught in the spotlight, Tito smiled and told them all to treat his granddaughter like a princess, “mi princesa.” All the attention made my cheeks burn. With all the female clerks eyes fixed on me, I couldn’t find my voice. Tito turned, looked over at me and winked. My whole body relaxed as if I was wrapped in the softest blanket.

The women pulled out a chair for me to sit in. From there, I watched Tito as he tried on his white Stetson hat and shiny belt buckles. Seeing him in the mirror, reminded me of all those old cowboy movies he use to watch. Afterwards, he’d take me out for vanilla ice cream. We’d sit outside on wooden benches, eating our cones. That was our routine.

Even as I got older, things with Uela never got easier. Sometimes I wish my childhood were compacted into those memories of us sitting outside in the summer heat eating ice cream in silence. I’d open them up relive my childhood as only a series of happy memories with my Tito.

Before Tito passed away Uela asked me to write the Epitaph for his gravestone. Alone in her barely lit Pepto-Bismol pink kitchen we sat across from each other, a full tortilla warmer between us. Suddenly, Uela got up from her wooden chair, making a squeaky creak as the leg moved across the floor. She told me she needed to get something. She hobbled over to the stove, and began cooking something new.

“What are you making?” I asked.

She shrugged her shoulders in response. It’s nothing really she reassured me, but I watched as she began to pull out avocados, tomatoes, onions, cilantro, and cumin. With the avocado in the palm of her hand she drove a knife into the hard black skin, cutting it open. She stabbed at the pit, and laid it aside. She reached for her grey rock mortar and began to mash the avocado inside. The smell of guacamole filled the room. I wanted to know what it was for. Perhaps she was going to make us a little snack. After all, I had driven all the way over here just to sit and chat with her.

She remained silent as she continued to mix the avocado with the tomatoes and onions. After a great pause she finally answered me. The guacamole was for my cousin, Oralia. She was down from college for the weekend and Uela wanted to make her favorite food. The tortillas in front of me were also for her.

I asked if I could have a tortilla, but Uela said I had to wait. Those were for Oralia, not for me.

“You never liked my cooking much anyway,” she said.

Sensing I was getting ready to leave, Uela stopped me. She explained about the VA, how they needed a copy of every gravestone in advance, in case something sudden were to happen.

“I thought you should be the one to write something.” She spoke fast, stumbling across the words as they poured from her mouth.

We could only afford the basic package, twenty letters, that’s all we could give to Tito. You can’t say much in twenty letters, at least not a real goodbye. I tried to keep the message clear: Father, and Husband.

With her wrinkled hands, Uela turned over the written form with my epitaph on it. She let the idea sink into her thoughts. Her mouth was pulled back into a thin-lipped grimace. For a second, I thought she was going to ask me to write something different.

Instead, she turned to me and said, “ok.”

We didn’t speak of the epitaph again till Tito’s funeral. It was a small Catholic Church service with family and friends. A father who hardly knew my Tito, lead us all in prayers of forgiveness and blessings. There’s a part after the mass where everyone gets a chance to walk by the open casket. When it was my turn I took a long look at my Tito lying inside his red velvet lined pine wood casket. They had slicked his hair back, and put him in a black suit with a red tie. None of it made any sense. Where was his cowboy hat and belt buckle?

My uncle Jose and my uncle Roel loaded the closed casket into the black hearse. A trail of cars followed behind the hearse as it headed to the VA cemetery.

After the service, and after burying the casket, Uela stood by my side.

“They won’t be able to put the grave stone up until a month after he’s buried.” She said.

“It doesn’t matter. The whole process just makes it all feel too real.” Tears started to form in the corners of my eyes.

Without looking at me she said, “You’ve never loved me like you’ve loved your grandfather.” It came out almost like a whisper, a whisper that had been building strength in a dark corner of Uela’s mind for years. Her words echoed inside my body like the rush of a waterfall. I was caught up in them, drowning in the immense weight of my family. They strangled me and held me down. I felt Uela’s two hands reaching out from the darkness inside me. Scared I left. The day after Tito’s funeral, I packed everything I could inside a small suitcase and drove for seven hours straight till I ran out of gas in Houston.

Years later, arriving once again in my hometown, Pharr, the same fear suddenly came over me. The blue sky dissolved to darkness, and the town looked forgotten in the lonely light of the bright stars. From all the years of cotton picking and crop cleaning, there was a dust that permeated over everyone and everything here. Sewn from the shattered dreams and smashed remains of possibilities, the stale dust of impotence blanketed the town. You could see it even in the nighttime.

Nothing had changed in the last five years, except for the amount of for sale and going out of business signs in the town square. Passing through downtown, everything looked dead, except for the hospital, the largest complex in the whole town. The flashing lights and hundreds of parked cars out front alit the hospital in a beige glow like dead skin.

In the crowded waiting room my family stood out. The room was awash in off-white wallpaper with faded seashells. People were sitting in bright purple cushioned chairs. While everyone else cried and prayed for their loved ones, my family stood strong, unwavering in their resolute decision not to be emotional at times like these.

Mama was leaning back in her chair, looking up at the ceiling when she finally turned and saw me.

“Ofelia’s here,” she announced.

They swarmed around me, crowding me as they all gave me obligatory hugs and how-are-yous. In five years no one besides my mother had reached out to me in Houston, but I smiled out of politeness and continued the charade.

Mama pulled me aside. She kept her voice quiet and low but slowly explained everything to me. Yesterday night Uela had a heart attack. It was sudden and unprecedented. According to her doctor she was in perfect health. It happened while she was gardening they said. Earlier in the week she’d realized her crepe myrtle was dying.

“It doesn’t make any sense though,” mom continued “it’s a perennial, she’d only planted it last year.”

While she was digging the bed for the new seed, her heart’s pulse quickened, and she’d felt a tight squeeze before falling.

“No one was with her though. Thank god the dog started barking. That alerted the neighbors.” She looked back up at me. “But the damage to her heart looks severe.” She walked over to a chair and sat down. I took the one next to her.

“Is she up?”

“No. They’ll let us see her in the morning.”

It was only ten at night.

It’s never really quiet inside a hospital waiting room. The stray sounds from machines and instruments sifter through the walls and permeate empty spaces. Even if no one is sitting behind you, on your exposed neck you feel a warm breath cowering over you.

Even for people familiar with death, like my family, the weight of uncertainty plagued us in the sterile waiting room. The woman sitting in the chair next to me was hunched over, sobbing to herself. In her hands she clenched a wadded up pink tissue paper, so used it was falling to pieces. I looked over at my mother. She was asleep in her chair.

I felt my eyelids getting heavy, and my head naturally began to fall back against the chair headrest.

My eyes closed and everything went dark inside my head. In the distance I saw a fuchsia colored petal falling to the ground. As I got closer more petals began to fall. Petal after petal rained down from an invisible sky. Soon my mind was overflowing with flowers. Then I appeared, as a child once again. I ran through bunches of petals and played with the falling flowers, trying to catch them with my tongue.

“You’re missing it.” From behind me I could hear Tito’s voice. The child me turned to face him. In cowboy boots and a white Stetson hat, Tito began striding over to where I was playing. He took me into his arms and carried me like a princess.

A sudden gust of wind blew the petals aside. Underneath where there was darkness there was now grass. Suddenly the invisible sky dissipated into a baby blue. As we walked on I could see Uela and Tito’s house in the distance. When we arrived, Tito set me back down on to the ground. He stuck his hand into his pant pocket and pulled from it a seed.

“You forgot this.” He bent down and placed the seed into my hand. With his other arm he pointed to the crepe myrtle tree growing in the front garden. The ground underneath me seemed to shift under my feet. It was moving me closer to the crepe myrtle. The tree began to stir and shake. Its buried roots popped up from the ground, and became legs, taking the crepe myrtle away. Left in its wake, was a cavernous hole, waiting to be filled.

When I awoke the crepe myrtle was gone. Tito and Uela’s house had dissolved into the reality of the waiting room. Even though the dream was over, I sensed traces of it still in the room. Light poured into the dreary room from a window, and in the brightness a fine filigree of dust twinkled. I traced the web of dust with my eyes. It landed on my two sleeping uncles, Jose and Roel, my cousin, Oralia, and Mama.

Aware of my gaze, Mama turned to me and said, “Do you want to see your Uela.”

I hesitated for a second. I was afraid to leave my chair. “What will happen if I get up?” I wondered.

On the way to Uela’s hospital room, we passed by nurses pushing sick patients in wheelchairs, and families crying amongst themselves. There was the familiar hospital faint hum of machinery that canceled out the sound of any particular heart monitor. The hospital was just one surreptitious heartbeat, concealed by concrete and tile. My head hurt and I felt light headed by the time we got to Uela’s room.

Inside her room, all outside sound grew dull. All I could hear was her single heart monitor beeping softly then loudly at times. My own heart matched the pace. Uela’s eyes kept opening and shutting uncontrollably. She seemed to be wincing in pain each time they did. Under the white sheets her body seemed so small and fragile. I walked over to her and took her hand in mine. Her bony hand clasped onto my wrist. I felt her fingers digging into my skin.

It was a familiar feeling. Her long and outstretched fingers, the same ones I’d seen gripping a leather belt, pulled me into a protective embrace. I was eight when I tried to teach my Oralia how to swim. I thought I could hold her body up above the water by standing on my tippy-toes, but my cousin began to panic in the water. With her in my arms flailing, I quickly lost balance and found my whole head submerged into the cerulean pool water. My cousin kept pushing my head further down in order to keep herself afloat. I opened my eyes underwater and saw legs splashing rushing to get out, to get help. I tried to push myself up, for one small breath of air, but things started to get dark; the light from the summer sun was slowly disappearing along with the oxygen in my lungs. Then I felt Uela’s hands pulling me out of the water, taking me into her arms, and patting my back until I calmed down.

She saved my life.

When I was younger Uela seemed so big. I imagined that she stood at least two feet taller than me when she held Tito’s belt in her hands. But now, lying on sweat stained sheets in a sanitized hospital room she looked beaten down and weathered. Her bony fingers felt like they could break. Her round face had shrunk down into nothing but bones. I could make out the hollows of her cheeks underneath the wrinkles; I could see the layers of Uela.

Uela opened her eyes fully. She looked over at me and tried to open her mouth. She looked like a child gasping for air. Her hand gripped my wrist further. I tried not to wince.

“Uela, do you want anything?” I ask.

She blinks once then twice. Her mouth kept shutting. Open. Close. Open. She was searching for the right words.

I wanted to look away in disgust. She was moving like an animal does right before it dies. The image of Uela watching her mama strangle a chicken appeared in my mind. Mama was nodding at me, encouraging me to talk more.

“I’m sorry about the crepe myrtle.”

At first her voice was faint. I couldn’t make out what she was saying.

“What?” I leaned in, putting my ear close to her mouth. As she whispered in my ear, I felt the warmth from her breath on my skin.

“The seed,” She susurrated.

Her fingers released my wrist, and Uela closed her eyes shut this time. I was left with just the sound of the heart monitor. Beep…beep.

With Uela’s words still ringing in my ear, I drove out to her home. The front garden still looked the same, beautiful and maintained. That’s when I saw it, out of the corner of my eye: the crepe myrtle tree’s naked branches. The long brown limbs reached up to the sky, but their purple pink petal flowers were gone. Even the dried-up bulbs of the flower had fallen off. The tree was rotting. Against the blue sky the branches looked like lonely hands reaching up from the earth’s soil.

The tools Uela had been using were still lying on the ground by the new seedbed where she had left them. A large hole of dirt looked up at me. There was nothing inside of it; there was no seed for the new crepe myrtle. I’d have to chop down the old tree and find some seeds in order for the new tree to take. That was the trouble with perennials; if they weren’t planted just right rot could easily take over again.

Tito kept his tools in the backyard shed. I hopped the steel fence and broke into the small wooden shed. I pilfered a single axe from his collection. With the axe I began to chop the thin tree trunk down. As I was cutting into it, I saw how rotted the tree looked on the inside. A black fungus stained the revealed wood. Even as the sun began to set, I continue to hack up the dead crepe myrtle. Beads of sweat formed around my head. They rolled down my face into my eyes, stinging me, but I continued. The axe began to feel heavy in my hands. Each swing started to take a part of me with it.

By nighttime, I managed to clear most of the area. The new bed was ready, but I still hadn’t found the seed Uela and Tito were talking about. Desperately I scoured the ground with my hand, looking for the seeds. I dug deep into the dirt, until there was nothing but bits of leaves and soil trapped under my finger beds. But in the darkness the cut grass all looks the same, a blot of dark green upon the earth.

I looked up at the night sky. Houston is over run with shopping malls and tall buildings. All the commercial lights ruin the night sky; you can never see the stars. But out here, away from the city the stars are a swarm of firefly squids in the ocean, their bright bioluminescence decorating the blue sea.

The starlight shined down on me, and in that instant I saw a flash of light illuminating from the ground. Rifling through the grass, I felt the smooth warm touch of a single seed. In the deep hole Uela dug, I planted the last seed, and with the remaining dirt I covered the hole and gently patted it down.

With my hand, I leveled the dirt. It’s hard and smooth. Like a child I crumbled up into a ball on the freshly planted soil. It felt cold against my skin. Scattered around my body are the fallen branches of the dead crepe myrtle. As my eyes began to open and shut, I imagined the cold hard ground was my grandmother’s lap, and that the branches were her fingertips.

It's been so long since I updated this website. Hopefully, with more time coming in, I'll continue to write. For fun! It was past midnight when I realized that I had missed Mama’s call. I was surprised. She usually never called me after ten at night, and in the loud Houston downtown bar I hadn’t heard my cell ring.