#man I forgot how much I loved Madonna as a kid

[whereisthedamndaddymanual]

If you line all my seeds up next to me you can tell they are mine

If you saw them in the very late 20th century you are dead and this post isn't for you.

[nightguide]

monogamy analogy of the universe according to River Sea

convo about the 4 wives is actually fairly great to talk about the even lengths of a mans duty to handle orphaned women (that is on the contrary to his likeability if the desired flavors known to him is more so than why he managed to acquire a similar taste to one occurring flavor to his dreams in a monotonous fashion), so to all you Glee kids, this is how a man can gain up to 4 wives in natural reality

1 wife = he likes to leave it to Allah, that is so much more than saying the taste of the centre of her heart is like so to him by first glance (meant to be last in this life and all the way through)

2 wives = he had an affair, so the guilt is shared between his piety (he did not know) to how he ended up with her on the first time (so it was a pairing between one disabled man and one mind (woman) who was about her own life as an aristocrat to his pauper

3 wives = he is physically disabled but you (relative or friend) may never know about his dreams except the women knowing him like a star

4 wives = he does not commit adultery but was actually a foreign man (life threatening situation that almost had him killed to him being a megastar on the other side that got his fame via rags to riches but has no ordinary effect on his life since it was the youngest of the 4 wives that had it the hardest, so it is the youngest wife that lived his equal (last wife) so there is no proximity to his bearings of a nature to him like he was always one with her, so the relationship is actually polygamous

to Schue's case. the preggo woman in the beginning had a point (helping Harper out) and he did rile her up over a X Y Z situation that got the Glee cast (poor little stars) nowhere, so he did not skip the 4 wives jump rope but gave Sue a reason to fire Figgins effective immediately upon knowing his status did not help Harper read between the lines at the time (Madonna - Vogue (Sue's version) is out now

body cannot tell the time. so here is the explanation of the veil (shyness is intellectual sincerity).

eyes = women virtue life with an optimistic gaze (father's dream)

physical body = women are who they love so they believe and they are (nothing changes a daughter from a father in a married life parting ways from her past once living as her father but not even there, so she is her mother once more but long gone and forgotten her dreams make sense to harmonious living (mother became what she does)

motion = the wife in question is going to be modestly in touch with her home once more gaining her new life as a woman of the ages (so she is why loneliness never forgot her but loved her as a friend like a friend she is, so Chuck in actual reality is about her time forgotten (new life back in the day)

Ned forgot how to function the daytime as nighttime (eclipse) so he is realigning himself in order like of his maturity (slurred expression)

just don't actually like people but admire, Lee Pace is sincere and resilient, much like i'm honing all this fan-fiction drama like i never wrote any fan-fiction sincerely growing up but i do pride on sincerity through easily explained reasons of existence since my former life before me matters too much too deeply (as a student in fashion design) that i care too much about the philosophy than talking about random men on the internet for a suggestive reason to believe in a bias (like if you know fashion, the cutting on the bias is how the fabric frays, you use optimism to conceal the fray than letting what's hidden be hidden for all time and you knew it, so explaining the fray is what is becoming of you method-logically than making sense of the garment in actual reality)

like that was how i looked at Keanu Reeves, like everybody loves him by the looks but nobody cared enough to respond to his stage presence than saying charity is universal than being credited once more as a humanitarian than gaining a repertoire of being that and failing 1m+ hungry kids for you being you and that's the public being blind to your status than seeing you between the lines. there is no such thing as charity if not noted clearly for the record, every celebrity had been set up that way right now

[beesmygod]

i really really like talking movies esp with someone who actually took me up on a recommendation knowing that they were taking a risk on something old and of a biblical morality so i'm really tickled lol. like genuinely, thank you for talking with me. i also want to make sure i dont come across at MAD at your interpretation because despite how i act about thing, hearing people explain why they did or did not like something as subjective as a work of art is like. what its all about!!! RIGHT??? when i get to (gently!) probe people about their opinions, it's most interesting and valuable to me when people come away with a different take. as long as its like. somewhat informed. you are more than qualified. its really lovely getting to do this.

for example, and this is really embarrassing, i hadn't put too much thought into the role of women in the story outside of the obvious madonna/whore thing going on with mrs cooper and the mother. ruby's temptation by harry comes off as eve with the apple actually. the reverend is such a fucking evil force of nature that he drives the kids through like 8 different biblical adventures in the course of like a week. they float down the river until they are taken in by another family. they take refuge in a barn to escape the man who's hunting them. it's a very objective view of good and evil: children are innocent and need to be protected; satan comes in many forms. its SO biblical. it even has that weird opening scene where mrs. cooper (who the audience won't meet for another hour) lays out the theme of the movie to all the children under her care, including the two protagonists who survive. she opens with "beware of false prophets".

man i forgot the music even changes to a lullaby in the middle of the credits. we're catching the end of the events of the movie in opening of the movie...i didnt even notice.

anyway: i think it helps that the movie is so VERY unsubtle in how it presents itself. reverence harry powell sticks out like a sore thumb in EVERY scene because he's the only imposing figure looming over everyone else in a pitch black suit. the obtuseness of the imagery is honestly half of what charms me about this movie.

the first half of the movie really is so balls to the wall pure horror that it's disconcerting when the tension first collapses after the kids escape. i think about the movie's transitions as being sort of intentional now that i know how the story is being framed and understand it. we, the audience, get to see and understand the ugly truth about the origins of the children. perhaps, after they wash ashore far from their home, that's mrs. cooper picking up the narrative and adding her biblical overtones. that's when the biblical stuff really starts to come into the narrative.

the comments of this mentioned the scene where mrs cooper starts singing along with harry, and i love that scene a lot. it's directed insanely well and makes harry come of as some kind of honest to god creature sent from hell. and it begins with harry starting his signature rendition of "leaning on the everlasting arms" with cooper pointedly and directly filling in his verses with "leaning on JESUS"

hes so fucking creepy lol. mitchum tore this role up

I watched Night of the Hunter in part because you have talked about loving that movie. The person I watched it with wanted a break in the middle because it was so stressful and we finished watching it a different day. I specify because the first and second halves of the movie almost don't even feel like the same movie.

First half: one of the best movies ever

Second half: cloying and sentimental, lots of weird focus on young women being stupid and self sabotaging bc they're horny (almost validating the preacher's misogynistic worldview), the boy slips up and reveals the money due to trauma but it also feels like the writers didn't want him to "get away with it" because it would be "immoral" if he got to keep the cash his dad stole

Idk, what do you think? Is this a bad take/bad analysis?

i dont think it's an unfair take at all. i still like it a lot, even considering the second half because the entire thing feels very, very biblical right down to the evil jezebels causing problems lol. it really is kind of like a modern day bible addendum where in the end, a specific definition of moral and spiritual righteousness is being pursued and pushed.

however, the girls motivations are understandable when you remember she too is an abandoned child. if robert mitchum showed up out of nowhere and started telling you how special and great you are, you might be inclined to believe him

[zodiacrant]

10th House and Daddy issues  (This is also applicable to any father like figures in your life not only your biological one. It also sheds some light on what would you be like as a father/father-figure)

 ✤ Aries in 10th house ✤

✤You and your father have a hot and intense relationship. There’s is such a difference in power where your father implemented their dominance and rules over you, creating an unbalanced relationship. They have a tendency to one up you and be competitive over the simplest of things, creating a wedge very early on. 

✤Your daddy issues played with your self confidence. You’re unsure of yourself and your decisions, often going along with it just to avoid conflict . You have a fear of loud noise and screaming, and feel very uncomfortable around others.

✤As a father figure you’re strict and upfront. Growing up with a no-nonsense father made you knowledgeable of both sides and any tactics your kids could use. Cause you been there, you’ve done that. However, you won’t repeat your fathers mistakes and would allow your kids to have their time to shine and enjoy life.

✤You’re into romantic daddies that exude confidence effortlessly rather than force it. Love to travel, preferably works in a high risk job or even can be in the mafia so you can live that godfather fantasy.

✤ Taurus in 10th house ✤

✤Your father was very strong willed, stern and stubborn. You two had a hard time when having any conversation. Disagreeing leads to an argument and they had to have the last word. No word is above theirs.

✤Your daddy issues made you a conformist. You approve of others ,even if you disagree, and keep your true opinion to yourself. You doubt your capabilities, work, undermine your contributions and believe that your thoughts are wrong or irrelevant.

✤As a father figure you’re stern but kind. Your time with your father taught you how to listen and now it’s time to talk. You will make a clear set of things that have to go your way but allow your kids to have a say when it comes to other things. You will be conflicted and get scared of imaging your father so you gotta find a balance in there.

✤You’re into daddies that treat you like the king/queen that you’re. Clothes, food, mansions, yacht, flying around the world. You want someone give you what your father never did. Very Lana Del Rey.

✤ Gemini in 10th house ✤

✤Your father was very childish and immature, possibly having little to no respect for anyone. They’re the father and they can do whatever they want. They didn’t mind their business and were always in yours, violating your privacy made you a very sneaky person and a big time liar. They would sit around while you’re with your friends, making fun of, embarrassing you, humiliating you all at your own expense and to please their tiny fragile ego.

✤Your daddy issues developed a hate for childlike behavior and immaturity. You’re intolerant to pranks, roasts and other unsavory acts. You’re quick to take it personally.

✤As a father figure you’re a vicious protector. No one can come to your kid with that playground bullshit. You’re quick to shut it down. Your children grow very dependent on you emotionally, rendering them immature in some ways. 

✤You’re into a smart daddy, very career man, educated and highly knowledgeable. Someone that can take you to the world wonders rather than just talk about then, a person of their words and keep promises. They highly stimulate you, Intellectually of course.

✤ Cancer in 10th house ✤

✤Your father enforced their ideals and beliefs on you. You were not allowed to do anything without them approving of it first. Friends, clothes, video games, social media, music and even food, they had the say on what’s comes and goes. 

✤Your daddy issues made you a rebel. You go against any rules, and don’t like to be told what to do, you like to be shocking and be controversial. Think religious girl gone wild, like Madonna or Katy Perry.

✤As a father figure you cherish your kids for who they are and give them the liberty of being their own person. The down side is that your kids have little respect for rules and others wishes and personal space. Disciplining them is especially difficult since they do as they please with no regards cause “I am my own person and I do as I please.”

✤You’re in love with daddies with power that are very macho and masculine. Police officers and criminals are a big part of the fantasy. Being with a powerful daddy makes you feel feminine and like a whole woman.

✤ Leo in 10th house ✤

✤Your father was an unbearable self centered overlord. They took good care of themselves but gave just the bare minimum to you. They drove good cars, slept on a good mattress, flied first class and wore designer clothes. You on the other hand took public transport or drove an old used car, slept on their old jacked up mattress, was lucky to even get on the trip and wore the same old clothes. 

✤Your daddy issues made you self sufficient. Your independence made relationships seem pointless, you were provided everything to yourself so no one compared. People are expandable so they have to prove their worth and purpose. 

✤Being a father figure you taught your children how to be on their own. They cleaned after themselves and were responsible for themselves, as much as a child can. You gave them tough love when needed but also gave them the freedom of learning and living their life to the fullest. Your motto is “when you stay ready, you don’t have to get ready”.

✤You’re into dominating and different power dynamics. Pool boy, the Gardner, a coach, a secretary, you like to dominate and have sex with a young daddy. Meow cougar.

✤ Virgo in 10th house ✤

✤Your father had set up relentless standards that were basically impossible to achieve. Being good was expected and a most, but every fall or second place made all those achievements disappear. Completely destroying your self-esteem.

✤Your daddy issues made you a perfectionist that is hard to please. Everything has to be a certain way or else it’s all going to the trash and in vain. Your father’s disappointed words play on a loop in your made. To the world you’re the best of the best, but on the inside you’re your own worst critique and enemy.

✤As a father figure you’re your kids biggest supporter. You don’t only give them advice but teach them the tools to be great at solving problems.You can be at times over critical with how things should be done but you’re not opposed to your children correcting you or doing it their on way. Sometimes.

✤You want a daddy who got it all. The wealth, the prestige, the brains and the career. You want someone that will not only fulfill your physical needs but also give something priceless, knowledge and know-how.

✤ Libra in 10th house ✤

✤Your father was pushover that cared more about others opinions over your own happiness and individuality. He was easily played by others and didn’t defend you. He isn’t around when you need him and is very dependent on others. 

✤Your daddy issues made you an independent go getter. You’re socially skilled thanks to years of raising yourself on how to dodge uncalled for comments from family members, and have a good balance between giving people a second chance and stand in your ground.

✤As a father figure you’re a fair minded person that treats every child specifically based on how they’re and their needs. You value honesty and doing what is right, you teach your kids to learn from their mistakes. That means they will be given a second chance as well as suffer the consequences of their actions.

✤You’re into cheesy romantic things, you love to be pampered and be taken care of your. That means daddy got to have a good bank accounts, since wine, diner, flowers and diamonds don’t come cheap and so does you.

✤ Scorpio in 10th house ✤  

✤Your father was very critical of you and had difficult expectations for you. They asserted themselves over you by meddling all aspects of your life to make you “theirs” forever.

✤Your daddy issues made you a cut-throat straight up over achiever. An everyday politicians, you know how to manipulate and change minds. Growing up with your father made you strong willed and assertive, no one can get through your icy thick walls.

✤As a father figure you give what was not given to you as a child, freedom and no expectations. You raise your children to be smart, strong and capable humans that won’t need others.

✤Your daddy issues made yearn for love and affection. Living a love story is something no one would guess that you’re looking for, but that’s because they don’t know you.

✤ Sagittarius in 10th house ✤       

✤Your father inconsistent in your life. One minute they’re  cold, the other they’re hot, first it’s left and then it’s right. Living with your father was crazy to say the least. Their inconsistency made it difficult feel safe or stable in anything.

✤Your daddy issues reflected badly on your behavior. Early on you were flaky, late, lazy and felt abandoned from all those times your father forgot and wasn’t there. Then the cycle switch and you start taking your life very seriously, the idea of being your father or seeing their behavior in other boiled you. You’re a straight shooter that stuck to their guns no matter what.

✤As a father figure, you try to always be there for your kids. You want to make memories with them and document everything so those memories will live forever. It is very hard for you to get over your father but making up with your kids help.

✤You’re into adventures daddies that are not afraid to take risks and live life to it’s fullest. You love making memories, especially if it’s in a foreign country at night where anythings feels possible.

✤ Capricorn in 10th house ✤

✤Your father was a nit picky authoritarian that meddled with all aspects of your life. For the most past of your childhood you were not to be exposed to anything they disagreed with and you were very sheltered. Your teen years were weird and awkward since the way they brought you up made them the only person that was there and had any effect on you.

✤Your daddy issues rendered you incapable of holding social interaction and lacking real knowledge of the world. You emerged in your young adult years as a child again, as if you truly started to live from the moment you left your father behind.

✤As a father figure you’re precise and attentive. You remember a lot about your kids, and you gave them all that they needed physically and emotionally. Because of the way you were brought up, you can get overly protective and paranoid over their safety and who they’re with. Although you can be suffocating to them, no one can deny that you raised your children to be well educated and wholesome people.

✤Your daddy issues made you crave someone that holds a powerful or influential position. Politicians and religious figures make a big part of the sexual fantasy. Reliving being dominated by someone like that is a secret that you keep that you will never tell.

✤ Aquarius in 10th house ✤

✤Your father was more focused on their work and external affairs. You felt abandoned and unheard growing up, where your issues were not as important and that you should be grateful for what you have.

✤Your daddy issues made crave attention and being wanted. You feel angered when unheard and would do anything so people would like you. Growing up with your father, however, made you value your life goals and passions.

✤As a father figure you’re a mentor and teacher. You teach your kids through actions and show them their true potential and strength. Helping them grow into a great human being is more important than being successful.

✤You’re into an easy going daddy that showers you with all the attention you crave. Someone that’ll spoon you but also knows how to use non physical communications. You want someone that can take you far away.

✤ Pisces in 10th house ✤

✤Your father undermined your work and treated you like a child. There was never true praise and they didn’t take you seriously, making you feel unworthy and incapable. Growing up, they always took your comments, opinions, and thoughts as a cute little from their baby that doesn’t know better.

✤Your daddy issues made you dependent and lazy. You’re emotionally immature and can’t handle the pressure of everyday life. You don’t give yourself credit for the work you’ve done and on bad day you expect others to do the work for you, whether it’s to make you feel better or run a simple errand, dependency, work and individuality are things you will always struggle with.  

✤As a father figure you’re pushover. You give your kids all the attention and things they want as a way to fulfill your deprived child self.This may grow into a problem though, since living vicariously through your kids never works out well.

✤You want a daddy that will baby you and make you feel like the princess/prince that you always dreamed to be. They’ll give you the fairy tale fantasy you used read, a romance just like in the movies and gives you the type of love you always hear about in songs but never saw in real life.

[deberiaestarescribiendo]

The Lost Children #Writer Wednesday Din Djarin Modern Day Bounty Hunter x f!reader

For #Writer Wednesday created by the amazing @autumnleaves1991-blog and tagging @clydesducktape (thanks a lot for the hard work of compiling everything each week)

Summary: This a part 2 of a fic I wrote a few months another Wednesday, read it here. After you scape with Din and your child, you try to find a life again even if that means he has to leave you.

Warnings: Language, talking about neglecting children or abandoned kids, guns. This is fluff with angst and Din being a softie but a dumbass expressing feelings

A/N: I'm super tired, so be ready to find many grammar and mispellings I didn't have the time to really read it through.

The lost children

For a bit, that’s what he said, what he promised until you’re safe and settled.

“So you can keep your little kid in the babycare with the rest of the kids while you’re working. One of the cabins to the right of the front office we’ll be entirely yours. We only ask that you keep clean and in a good state”

“Of course” you’re shining, happy and excited

“You heard that Greg, we’ll have a place on our own” your arms hold the baby tightly, rocking him softly until he giggles. When you turn to Din, he can see your eyes glowing, kissing little Greg’s head, you whisper thank you

Thanking him? what for? He just pointed out that small, almost entirely ripped from the wall, announcement of a local hotel in the middle of the woods that looked for personnel willing to work and live in the resort when they were stopping at a gas station.

It is a perfect place to hide and live a peaceful life and let a baby grow up in the middle of nature. Greg and you could be happy. So why is he thinking that he should make up some excuse so you don't stay, so you don’t leave him. He should be selfish and grab your hand and run away again like you’ve been doing for weeks now, but that’s not life for a baby, and you deserve it, leave the past behind. And him, even if he doesn’t want to admit, it’s part of your past of that runaway woman that commited many mistakes.

But Din’s a bounty hunter, his life on the road, from one job to the next would only make you unhappy, and at the end, you would hate him; and that’s it’s not an option.

Nothing has made Din happier than seeing you smile at him, the little comments here and there you tell him praising him and thanking him one, twice, a thousand times for helping you, the way the baby caresses his face with his small hand and those big eyes looking at him intently until he smiles with only those two little teeth. The way you look perfect, almost like a Madonna from the Renaissance, when the street lights hit your face while he’s driving and you hold your baby against your chest, both of you sleeping in the car.

Would you think he’s a creep for staring? There’s a warmth that grows inside him when he stares at you and baby Greg. A warmth he doesn’t want to let go. He cannot offer you a good life and Din doesn’t want to force you to live like he does, just because he’s so selfish to let you go.

“So what do you think?”

The manager leaves them to think about the offert. And Din balances his big body from one of his legs to the other, hands on his hips, he sighs

“I think”

I think you should be with me

I think I should protect you

I think I should protect Greg

I think I want to be with you, the both of you, forever

I think I love you

But he doesn’t say it

“I think you should take it. It is a good place for a kid”

You frown, even baby Greg looks at him puzzled from the crook of his mother’s neck

“Yes, it seems great, quiet...And I like that Greg could be with other kids. But what about you?”

Your eyes look big, pleading, there’s a question, a petion in them but you don’t say it with words so maybe Din is imagining it, he wants so bad that you will stay with him that maybe he’s making that up

“I will go and…”

And miss you

And miss Greg

And be alone again

“Start the business again somewhere else” he shrugs, and he sees the light flicking in your eyes, the idea in your head being shattered, you’ll never ask the question and he will never answer.

“But you can stay a few days, right? Rest, eat properly for once and repair the car”

“I don’t know…”

What would hurt more? leaving already or prolonging it?

“I don’t want to be this direct, Clint...” he likes that you keep using that nickname you gave him when you’re in public. You only use his real name when you’re alone. Making it even more special, it’s intimate, more anything he has ever felt.

“but you need a shower. And I do too and this stinky baby” you bury your nose on little Gregs neck and it makes him laugh out loud that angelic and sweet giggle hits him hard and before he even knows it, Din is nodding

“A few days won’t hurt”

It’s surprising how they fall easily in a routine. How they seem to find a perfect way around each other, a perfect model like the stars and planets always circling around each other and never colliding. You, dancing softly in the kitchen humming while you stir the soup, baby Greg chasing his little frog while Din holds his back so he doesn’t lose his balance

“Hey, you want this?” Din smiles fondly to the baby and with his long arm places the soft toy far away from him “C’mon like before “ his big hands on his side while the babe excitedly starts crawling towards his frog

“Hey! look! he’s getting faster!”

You smile at them, that big and serious man has the proudest smile, so bright and pure watching your baby grow before his eyes.

It’s been almost a week and he’s still repairing the car, or so he says. The manager hasn’t asked any questions and just assumed they are a family. And you must accept that you do look like one, a broken and weird one, but more than anything you have ever experienced.

And you wish he stayed forever that he could be a father to Greg, he certainly acts the part.

“Dinner is ready.”

The scent of the pines, the bugs chirping and the soft crackle of the fire is the perfect lullaby. Your baby has taken the habit of falling asleep against Din’s wide shoulder while the three of them enjoy the small porch outside the cabin.

“I think the car is ready”

The words you fear the most float in the air and you’re almost tempted to ignore them

“Hmm” you don’t face him yet, just look at the trees and try to swallow the pain “And where will you go?”

“Don’t know yet”

“How will I contact you?”

“I…”

“Do I have to search on Craigslist? Some old codewords in the newspaper? How do you even find a bounty hunter?” you’re laughing, but it really doesn’t hide the pain in your tone

“I have a phone” Din rolls his eyes at you but he’s amused, surprisingly he’s smiling more since you met him, he’s not that stern or cold as you pictured him when he caught you

“That would have come in handy when we were lost in the desert”

“I mean a fixed one”

“You have a house then?” you turn to him, lowering your voice midsentence as you see your son sleeping peacefully on Din’s arms

“Sort of”

“I will need you to expand that a little bit more Din”

Din in the quiet of the night, the moon, the stars and the fire illuminating your face he admires you pronounce it: The tip of your tongue showing softly between your teeth and he wishes to see you repeat it one, twice a thousand times.

“My family, my...it’s difficult to explain, anyway, it’s my safeplace, where I go to rest, I get the information for my next jobs, etc”

“Oh...okay, so I call you there?”

“Yeah you could, and write if you want” he offers with pleasing eyes

“Penpals, great” you answer and it sounds more sarcastic that you intended

“You could send me pictures of Greg”

Din lowers his eyes to the soft crown of the baby, that soft place on his head where he smells so sweet and tender. He can believe that he’s going and there will be no nights like this.

“I will do”

Your eyes get teary watching him softly kiss you babe, carrying to his crib whispering sweet words so he doesn’t wake up.

“So I’ve packed many water bottles, and those protein bars in case you get yourself lost in the desert again, cowboy. Sadly you won’t have my unparalleled company” you joke tapping him on his arm

“No, I won’t” Din forces a smile “I...Take care” he awkwardly squeezes your forearm

“You too-Shit!” you scream slapping your forehead “The sandwiches! I knew I forgot something. I made you something for lunch. I’ll be right back”

You press little Greg to Din’s arms before running away leaving them with wide eyes and a confused look

“Take care of you mother, kid, sometimes she can be a lot to handle”

“Hi, Ken” you say breathly as you storm inside the reception and get inside the staff meeting room.

“Hi! Has your boyfriend left already?” He asks while writing something on his agenda

“Not yet” you say looking for the lunch bag you had prepared inside the fridge. You hand stops midway when you heard her voice

It is horrible, we have not consolation, our baby has been kidnapped and we have no information

Her fake cries fill the room, some national tv is making a report on the kidnapping of little Greg. The tragic zoom at her face fades away when they show a picture of your baby.

“Fuck…” you mutter

I need him back. He’s my baby

“He’s not your baby, you bitch” you spat under your breath

“What did you say, hun, you need something” Ken raises his eyes to you, one eyebrow arched, he follows your eyes to the TV

“That baby looks exactly…” and then you know

You grab your sandwich bag and strom out as you did before. Din is holding Greg on his hip while he finishes loading the trunk with his bags

“We’re out of here”

You cry when you reach to him, pushing him away, you close the trunk door

“Wait what happened?”

“No time, let’s go”

How has this man trusted you so much as to run away with you? For all he knows you could actually be a kidnapper, that story about leaving your son with someone you trusted and that eventually you discovered that they were assholes could be fake. But he doesn’t. He runs away, drives and drives without asking a question.

“She had the guts to say it was his son, he isn’t. She barely had it for a few months until I could settle my life. And then she asked me for a crazy amount of money because children are expensive you know I fucking payed for a a new pool in her stupid house, while my son was always dressed in old clothes, too big or too small. They didn’t care for him”

And on top of trusting you, he lets you rant away all you anger

“There’s no way I’m giving him back. I rather die!”

He stops the car, the road again is silent, dressed in the colors of the sunset

“Calm down, you’re scaring him” Greg looks at you with trembling lips not knowing why he should be scared or angry, he just knows that his mama is upset “He will stay with you, I promise”

“The police must be searching for us” your warm tears cloud your eyes

“They won’t find us where we are going”

He ditches the car somewhere and you see him burning it. He carries the big bag on his back and hands you water and snacks from time to time.

“Just a few miles more”

The red stone looks like some ethereal cathedral around you, a palace in the middle of nowhere almost like another world, magical and eerie. If there’re marks or signs you don’t see them, but Din walks among the rock so sure of his steps searching among the labyrinth of rocks. And suddenly…

You hear the soft clicks of many guns' trigger locks going off at the same time. But Din softly whistles some tune and from all over: up the rocks, between them, children come out. Kids, all different from one another, some really young, others tall and weirdly looking teenagers in that mixed age where they are not a child nor an adult and others already grown to be young adults.

“Din” a curly haired girl dressed with camouflage clothes runs towards him with open arms, she has a crooked smile as she has lost some of her front teeth

“Hey, gumball!” Din bents down when she hugs him, her sweet face pressed against his belly

“Who are they?” a boy, holding a shotgun to his side, his face full of red dots, frowns at you

“They’re friends who need help” Din explains raising one of his arms trying to calm down the group

“Are they lost too?” Gumball asks

“Yes” Din nods

“But she’s a mum” some kid screams from above

“Mums can be lost too. C’mon, we’ve been walking for hours, can we go home?” he answers

“Of course, let’s go. Boba will be happy to see you” Gumball grabs Din’s hand and smile widely jumping happily through the stone corridors

“Wait, Din, what the fuck? who the fuck is Boba? What are these kids doing here?”

Gumball fires a concerned look at you

“She said two bad words”

“Gonna let it pass, Gum, she’s a bit scared and tired” Din smirks your way and you question in silent muttering the fuck again and again

“I see you pronouncing it, you know?” Gumball rolls her eyes “No bad words or you pay the price”

“Yes, understood, sorry” you close your lips hard trying not to ask more questions until you arrive home or whatever that is.

After a few minutes of turning left right, left right, right left you’re completely lost until the stone towers open up a way to a plain and on it, a ranch.

Some horses roam around nibbling on the pale green grass that grows on the land. A house on the centre is painted white but the paint looks old and chipped.

Now in the clear you count the children that surround you, ten, ten kids in the middle of nowhere.

“Welcome to the Watch” Din smiles at you, he almost look shy and earning a upset look from Gumball, he releases her hand and holds you with his big palm on your back

“What is this place, Din?”

“Home” he simply answers

The kids run through the porch screaming and opening without a care the door to the house

“Yeah, I heard you, little heathens” a masculine voice screams from the interior

His hard steps clack on the ground and you hear the spurs before you see him arriving with his leather boots, his used jeans and a low cowboy hat covering him from the sun

“I thought something must have happened to you” he says, evaluating Din. His tanned face is covered by a long and twisted scar from his lip to his forehead, he has dark eyes like Din but colder in a way, very deep and when they fall into you, you hug your baby tightly without thinking it

“I see” he says “C’mon on in, that baby can’t stay too long in the sun”

The house is nice, surprisingly tidy given the fact that there are ten kids living in it. The furniture looks like the exhibit of an old auction house, each one of them completely different of style, color or age from the other.

The man that everyone call Boba gives some orders to the group and they efficiently start doing what he asks

“Prepare a room for our guests”

“Bring water and food”

“Prepare some fresh fruit for the baby”

You sit, little Greg with eyes wide open. As any baby he’s absorbed by all the children around him, and he reaches with his little hands trying to grab them

“Little fella wants to play, you can leave him on the rug if he wants to”

“He’s fine here, thanks” you say holding him although Greg is already removing your hands from him wanting to explore

“Boba, we have nowhere to go” Din explains sipping on his cold water

“I guess, you have never brought anybody here” He reclines himself on his rocking chair watching Din intenly

“We need to protect them for a while, until we can find a solution”

“You’ll be safe here, you know that, you can stay as long as you want, just respect the house rules” and he points to a wood board, engraved in them are a few rules

Be respectful of yourself and others

I finish my tasks as promised, ask for help if I can’t

I will not curse

Be clean of yourself and your environment

Protect your family and your house above all

“They seem...pretty logical, won’t be a problem to follow them” you smile uncomfortably

“Well, somebody said you have a potty mouth, young lady. So watch it, but for the moment, you may rest, we will see for the rest tomorrow” He sighs when he gets up and taps on Din’s shoulder before he goes to the kitchen

“Let’s make dinner” you hear him scream, before the rumbling of pans and chopping and children screaming start

“Din…” you say after a moment

“I know you have a million questions”

“Duh!” you laugh nervously

“This is my family, we’re not related by blood but by circumstances. Lost kids, abandoned, neglected; we have a safe place here and in time we go out in the world and make our own life but we always have the Watch over us. A place where we’re watched over, taken care of, listened…” his caramel eyes glow and you see his strong and stern facade crumble before your eyes, in this place he can relax. He feels safe so you can too, right?

“We’ll be fine here” He reaches for you hand, the one that holds little Greg caressing him with your thumb, and covers both of you squeezing softly

We, it’s the second time he has referred to you as a group, you and me and Greg, We.

“We’ll be fine” You smile back, lowering your face, you kiss his knuckles, leaving a warmth there Din will be holding for hours.

You don’t notice, but the whole time during dinner he passes his thumb over that small place of his skin where you kissed him.

(Hey! remember when you read that fic in May? I continued it...so sorry that it took so long, I've taken the liberty of tagging you since you were interested in a follow up from the first one @fangirlalexia @childrenofthewatch )

[mindofharry]

Wave G.D

in which you move to california for the summer and grayson is the life guard.

based in the 80s !!!

smut and fluff !!! feedback is welcome as always <3

The sun beamed through your window, blinding you when you opened your eyes. you sighed placing a hand over your poor watered eyes, reminding yourself to buy curtains. California was good - better than your old town. but waking up blind every morning for the last week was not something you enjoyed. but you’d take that over madonna being blared at 6am by your 14 year old sister, tanya. God, sometimes you even missed it. missed the loud, chaotic energy of your small hometown, and your weird little family. but as you said, california is good. you reminded yourself, change is good. growth is good. sometimes you forgot that you have to grow to be better, and that change isn’t some evil thing. you need change to move on and become better.

Your aunt had been kind enough to let you stay in her home for the summer - she was off doing god knows what, and needed someone to cat and house sit. You were the first one to offer. Lord only know, that if you didn’t take this offer, you would’ve stayed in that town for the rest of your life. like you, your aunt escaped the town of houston. all your family grew up in houston. a town in a town, you called it. it was small, only a population of 2,000 people. not many people left either - so when you did, it comes as a surprise.

you wanted to travel, see the world. and california was just one stop on your trip.

Today was day of looking for jobs, you had put it off too many times this week. you told your mother you would get a job on the first day here - it’s been 7 days. And your mother was starting to call more than twice a day. You wanted to become a writer or a journalist - that was the dream. but that had to be put on hold for now. even though thought your aunt was paying the bills etc, you still wanted to find a job to make friends and have some cash. you saw a nice dinner about 10 minutes away from here, so maybe you’d have dinner there once you had some cash. beats having microwave dinners every night.

so with that in mind, you got up and made your way to the bathroom. it was small and quaint. exactly like the house. it was nothing special - which is what you loved. a small little home, with small little bathrooms. that’s sounded quite nice to you. After looking around your small bathroom, you turned on the shower, hissing a bit as the hot water hit your skin.

you walked out of the bathroom, leaving the water run for a minute. Opening the dresser pressed against the wall, you decided on a white crop top and denim shorts. Your mother would kill you if she saw how small the shorts were, but she wasn’t here. You grabbed a bra and underwear from the top drawer before walking back into the bathroom. you stripped down, leaving your huge t-shirt on the floor.

When you stepped in the shower, you thought about how good this summer could be. Even if you ended up not making any friends, it still could be the best summer of your life.

so you had to make the best of it.

After your shower - that you spent way too long in, you got dressed into the clothes you grabbed earlier. your hair was still soaking wet, but the towel and the Californian air would dry it. You brushed your teeth, and attached your septum piercing onto your nice. “does this look like i’m cool, or i’m going to rob you?” you asked yourself in the mirror. your mother, hated everything about the piercings and tattoos. She said quote “i feel scared looking at you, y/n”. Tattoos especially made you feel so creative and free, something about them made you feel so happy.

Running down the stairs, you grabbed your converse slipping them on. slipping you mean - pulling them on. God, they were hard to get on. you looked into the drawer and found your purse with, 20 dollars in it. “great” you sighed walking out the door and locking it.

your aunt lived in a nice neighbourhood, small houses, small families. usually people that just had kids or older people that didn’t want to be a put in an old persons home. it was nice and relaxing. different from houston, you’d admit. but nice and needed.

The walk to the centre of town was fine. You got a few looks, considering the town was so small and everyone knew everyone. You were basically the new kid at school. But so far no ones said anything bad - that you know of. The town was full of stores. Retail stores, smaller family stores like toy stores etc.

you spotted the diner straight away, running across the street quickly. Luckily spotted a sign saying they were looking for more staff - you knew diners were quite popular, so you really got your but in there. A tall woman, with brown hair and warm smile greeted you at the till. “hey, darling. what can i do for you” she asked, you looked at her name badge, lisa. A nice name for a nice lady. “i’m actually looking for jobs, saw that you were looking for staff! maybe we can schedule an interview or something?” you asked picking at your nails. lisa looked you up and down and then sighed. “well, if i’m being honest, you’re the only one in weeks that’s offered to do some work around here” she confessed, it made your heart shatter when she looked down - it looked like she was about to cry.

she sighed once again to herself “you good with people?” she asked, placing a napkin down on the counter. you nodded, messing with your hands. “i know first aid too. real good with kids, i was going to study to be a teacher” you confess, trying to butter yourself up.

lisa nodded “what’s your name?” she asked and you put your hand out to shake hers “y/n l/n. i’m looking after my aunts house for the summer” you say and she smiled. “well good. you’re hired” she grinned pulling you into a hug.

“welcome to the team, honey”

After that and a celebratory milkshake, you decided to go the beach that was a 5 minute walk from the diner. lisa said her daughter works just around the corner from her and her sons surf and do lifeguarding down at the beach. Maybe you’d run into them. they had to be maybe 16? You didn’t know anyone older than that, that wanted to be a lifeguard willingly.

You took over your converse and socks as the sand because harder to walk in. there wasn’t much wind and it was really hot so of course it was packed full of families and teenagers. Most were locals, but others travelled hours to come this beach - and you weren’t sure why, until now.

A man probably 20 or 21, was running towards you, topless. It was hard to look away, his abs were just staring at you. His red shorts clung to his thighs - he reminded you of show that had aired in september, something like bay watch. He looked like he belonged on that show. You wouldn’t mind getting to see that everyday. You now understand why there was probably more teens than families.

Grayson had spotted you the minute you stepped foot on the beach. god, were you beautiful. Your simple outfit was like the sexiest outfit he’d ever seen, because you were wearing it. Your piercings and tattoos were so incredibly hot, he’d never seen anyone like you if he was being honest. He came from a town where not many people expressed themselves, everyone except him and his twin that is - and now apparently you. Ethan, graysons twin, spotted you too. He knew grayson was already head over heels for you.

“she’s definitely new” ethan voiced climbing out of the water, pulling his shorts up. grayson nodded agreeing “yeah, might go, uh see how she is” grayson said making ethan chuckle. “sure, whatever you say bro” Ethan laughed before walking off the his chair.

Grayson began running up to you, he could see you checking him out. Good, he liked that.

finally after what felt like ages he arrived at where you decided to sit down. You looked up at him smirking cocking your head to the side.

“grayson dolan” he smiled sticking his hand out, you shook it still with a smirk on your face. “y/n l/n” you say as he sat down beside you. “you’re new to town right?” he asked putting a hand through his hair. you just nod putting your hand on the sand.

“met your mom earlier. said she had two handsome boys at the beach. she must have meant the other one” you tease making grayson raise an eyebrow, smirking. “oh yeah?” he asked resting on his elbow.

“hmm” you hummed looking down on him. “i have to say, never gotten that one” grayson said, you just shrugged “maybe you just need some humbling grayson dolan” you said standing and wiping your shorts to get the sand off.

“i’m working in the diner tomorrow. maybe you can come and i’ll humble you some more”

“i think i like the sound of that y/n l/n” grayson smirked getting up himself. “see you then, grayson” you smile walking away.

fuck, he thought. He was going to make y/n l/n his.

you arrived home smiling like crazy. you’re not even 24 hours here and you’re already head over heels for a man you know hardly anything about.

you pulled off your shoes again and through them on the floor. when you skipped into the kitchen and put on the radio, girls just want to have fun came on. You grabbed a spoon and danced around the kitchen waiting for cyndi lauper to sing. “i come home, in the morning light” you sing jumping up and down.

“girls they wanna have fun”

after dinner and another shower you watch a movie and then head to bed, waiting to see that lifeguard again tomorrow.

You woke up early on your own body clock. that has never happened before, but seen as you’re meeting a boy and having your first day of work it seems to make sense to you. you shower and use all the good stuff. you also shave - just in case, you never know.

you leave all your peircings and change into skinny black jeans and a fleetwood mac shirt. lisa said she’d give you the uniform in your locker and that you could change in the bathroom if you’d like, you agreed with that. it meant that you didn’t have to wear the uniform home. you wore your converse and placed your hair in a loose ponytail.

you walked to the kitchen and grabbed a water and apple, and ate it quickly chugging the water down afterwards. you quickly ran back to the bathroom and brushed your teeth, before running to the door and making your way to the dinner - you really didn’t want to be late on your first day.

“y/n!” lisa smiled pulling you into a hug. “good to see you again” she said pausing “go get changed and then i’ll teach you some bits” she grinned placing a hand on my shoulder and pulling me along into the locker room. “here your locker, your uniform is in there. you can change in here or the bathroom just down the hall” she said, making you nod with a smile.

lisa left and you got dress into the blue top and skirt, the collar was lined with red and there was a white apron placed around your waist. your white converse actually went perfectly with the uniform, so you gave yourself a pat on the back for that.

once you walked out the place look a bit more lively, which made you happy and eager. You wanted to get on the locals good side. “oh good! you’re ready, this is lily. she’s a little bit older than you, working here part time” lisa said introducing you guys. you smiled and shook her hand “y/n” you say and she smiled “so nice to meet you” she replied taking the pen out of her hair.

“so all you have to do in take people’s orders. then tell the chef” lisa said giving you pen and paper “i won’t put you on the till yet, but i will teach you tomorrow” she said and you smiled nodding. “be nice, smile and make small talk” she listed and then placed a hand on your back “you’ve got this. now table two needs a waitress” she said pushing you off. you walked down around the counter and to table two. “hi, what can i do for you” you say smiling.

“huh, y/n” grayson said making you look up from you paper. you smirk at him dropping you arms down to your waist. “grayson dolan, knew you couldn’t resist me” you tease making him laugh. “seducing costumers on your first day? y/n seriously?” grayson said making you shake your head.

“shut up. what can i get for you” you say and grayson smiled. “are you on the menu?” he asked leaning back. you bite your lip, trying to hide your blush. “maybe. what’s the offer?” you asked rocking back and forth on your feet. “a dinner. me and you. maybe some kissing, never know” he said placing his hands on the table.

you shrug smirking again, you tear a piece of paper out and begin to right down your address “pick me up at 7.” you say and give him the sheet.

“now what can i get for you?”

the day went by rather fast after grayson asking on you a date. you loved the job, lisa and lily so much already and knew this summer was going to be one to remember.

“y/n you did so good today” lily complimented taking off her apron. you smiled “thank you. it was actually a lot of fun” you say taking out your clothes out. “saw you talking to gray” lily said with a teasing smile.

“oh shut up! it’s only one date”

“grayson dolan does not do dates. consider yourself lucky, than man looks like wants to marry you” lily said making you roll your eyes. “now i have to go home to my husband and baby while you are out enjoying your life” lily said dramatically making you roll your eyes.

“enjoy” you say waving and walk off out of the locker room.

you say goodbye to lisa before pratically running home to get ready for your special night with grayson.

once you got home you ran to your room and placed your clothes in the wash basket, after a quick shower you pull out the one dress you packed, a white off the shoulder dress. it was nothing special, but it was comfortable and you felt pretty damn good in it - and of course your signature converse. you put your hair into a half up half down sort of look and only put on some mascara and blush. you wanted to look simple, yet cute. but the piercings and tattoos kind of cancelled out the cute.

you look at yourself in the mirror and nod at yourself. “you can do this. you can have fun” you say and place a hand on your hip. “you look good.” you say and smile and then just on time, grayson knocked on the door with flowers in his hands.

you walked down to the door and took a breath in before opening it. grayson stood before you, in a white shirt and dress pants. the sleeves of his shirt were rolled up so you could see the vains, God he looked good.

“wow. you look beautiful” grayson breathed out handing you the flowers, you blushed and smiled. “thank you, come on in” you say walking to the kitchen.

you walk back down and see grayson leaning against the table his hands in pocket. “hmm. you look so good” grayson said standing up. you just held out your hand “why don’t we skip dinner and go the beach instead?” you asked and grayson raised an eyebrow.

“sounds great”

so you both walked down to the beach hand in hand. laughing at the most stupidest of things.

“i thought you were from bay watch the first time i saw” you laugh and grayson pushed you away pouting. “so sexy” you giggle making him shake your head. “well i for one heard wedding bells seeing you” grayson teased pulling you into him. you hummed and looked up him. “you’re definitely husband material” you say walking down to the beach.

“sure” he said rolling his eyes and pulling you down. none of you had towers or spare clothes, but this. this moment is what you both needed. the cold air, the waves crashing and the birds talking. all you could hear was the water, the birds and your giggles.

you pulled off your dress rather quickly, leaving you in a black lace bra and panties. grayson was gawking, he pratically had to close his mouth with his hand. your body, was perfection. it was beautiful. Once grayson was ready he picked you up making you squeal and ran to the water.

“grayson” you giggle and hit his back lightly.

“oh shit, it’s cold” you say wrapping yourself around grayson. “oh is it?” he teased placing his hands on your thighs. you smirk knowing exactly what he was doing.

“yeah, it’s cold” you say putting a hand in his hair. you look down to his lip and bit your lip making him groan. “fuck it” he said placing his lips on yours. you moan and he lets his tongue make its way into your mouth.

“fuck me” grayson hummed into your mouth making you giggle and push his head into the water.

“try and catch me!”

You both come out of the water soaked and giddy. “put my shirt on” grayson said throwing his shirt at you.

you pull it over your head and place your hand in graysons after he put his pants back on. “you wanna come back to mine?” you asked and he nodded “no ones home. for the whole summer” you say walking backwards.

“so we can fuck anywhere” you say smirking, grayson groans and picks you up making you laugh. he pratically carried you the whole way home, only putting you down to unlock the door.

once you guys reached your bedroom he kissed you again, picking you and throwing you on your bed. you lay there looking up at him with teasing eyes. “take of the shirt” he demanded, making you sit up and throw the shirt on the ground, leaving you in a wet bra and more than wet panties.

“so beautiful” grayson said as he climbed out of his pants, leaving him only in his boxers.

grayson grabbed your face in his hands and your lips finally meet once again. his fingers tighten around your face as he begins to kiss you roughly. one hands drifts from your face to your bare thigh, his fingers glide up and down your thigh making you shiver.

“you like that, baby?” he asked and you nodded “more” you begged and he pecked your lips. “soon” he said his fingers making their way between your clit, placing his lips back on yours.

you moan into his mouth as he begins to get faster, his fingers going to your slit, him playing around with it.

“don’t stop” you moan into his mouth, he looked at your teasingly. “don’t want my cock then?” he asked cocking his head to the side. you nodded quickly, “yes gray, i do, want it so bad” you moan bucking your hips.

“cum, and then i’ll make you so full”

you cummed quickly, your hips going in all different directions. he waited for you to come down from your high before taking over your panties and bra. he sighed in content, “so beautiful” he repeated kissing your breasts and down your stomach.

“please” you begged again, making him smirk. “one second, honey” he said kissing your thighs. he pulled down his boxers and you moaned at the sight, his cock was huge and the tip was full of pre-cum. you wanted his cock in you, now.

after putting on the condom he had in his pocket grayson finally pushes into you, making you moan out. “oh fuck” you moan holding onto graysons shoulder. grayson gets slower and slower. “come on grayson. fuck me like the bad girl i am” you whispered into his ear. he groaned and placed a hand on your neck, before pounding into you. you bed begins to creak loudly banging against the wall. he wraps his hand around your neck tighter making you scream out.

“keep going, gray” you say bucking your hips.“i’m gonna cum” you cry and graysons nods going faster. “me too. come on, cum for be princess” he said pounding into you.

you both cum and grayson stays in you a little longer, when he takes his cock out you feel empty, but he just pulls you closer to him.

“who knew you could fuck like that” you tease placing your head on his chest. grayson just chuckled and kissed your head, pulling you closer to him.

“another round?”

“how could i say no, lifeguard”

[brightbeautifulthings]

MAYHEM BY ESTELLE LAURE BLOG TOUR & CHAPTER EXCERPT

The Lost Boys meets Wilder Girls in this supernatural feminist YA novel.

Available July 14th, 2020

It's 1987 and unfortunately it's not all Madonna and cherry lip balm. Mayhem Brayburn has always known there was something off about her and her mother, Roxy. Maybe it has to do with Roxy's constant physical pain, or maybe with Mayhem's own irresistible pull to water. Either way, she knows they aren't like everyone else.

But when May's stepfather finally goes too far, Roxy and Mayhem flee to Santa Maria, California, the coastal beach town that holds the answers to all of Mayhem's questions about who her mother is, her estranged family, and the mysteries of her own self. There she meets the kids who live with her aunt, and it opens the door to the magic that runs through the female lineage in her family, the very magic Mayhem is next in line to inherit and which will change her life for good.

But when she gets wrapped up in the search for the man who has been kidnapping girls from the beach, her life takes another dangerous turn and she is forced to face the price of vigilante justice and to ask herself whether revenge is worth the cost.

From the acclaimed author of This Raging Light and But Then I Came Back, Estelle Laure offers a riveting and complex story with magical elements about a family of women contending with what appears to be an irreversible destiny, taking control and saying when enough is enough.

About the Author:

Estelle Laure, the author of This Raging Light and But Then I Came Back believes in love, magic, and the power of facing hard truths. She has a BA in Theatre Arts and an MFA from Vermont College of Fine Arts in Writing for Children and Young Adults, and she lives in Taos, New Mexico, with her family. Her work is translated widely around the world. 

Twitter | Instagram | Get Your Copy

Read on for a special chapter excerpt of Mayhem!

three Santa Maria

“Trouble,” Roxy says. She arches a brow at the kids by the van through the bug-spattered windshield, the ghost of a half-smile rippling across her face.

“You would know,” I shoot.

“So would you,” she snaps.

Maybe we’re a little on edge. We’ve been in the car so long the pattern on the vinyl seats is tattooed on the back of my thighs.

The kids my mother is talking about, the ones sitting on the white picket fence, look like they slithered up the hill out of the ocean, covered in seaweed, like the carnival music we heard coming from the boardwalk as we were driving into town plays in the air around them at all times. Two crows are on the posts beside them like they’re standing guard, and they caw at each other loudly as we come to a stop. I love every- thing about this place immediately and I think, ridiculously, that I am no longer alone.

The older girl, white but tan, curvaceous, and lean, has her arms around the boy and is lovely with her smudged eye makeup and her ripped clothes. The younger one pops some- thing made of bright colors into her mouth and watches us come up the drive. She is in a military-style jacket with a ton of buttons, her frizzy blond hair reaching in all directions, freckles slapped across her cheeks. And the boy? Thin, brown, hungry-looking. Not hungry in his stomach. Hungry with his eyes. He has a green bandana tied across his forehead and holes in the knees of his jeans. There’s an A in a circle drawn in marker across the front of his T-shirt.

Anarchy.

“Look!” Roxy points to the gas gauge. It’s just above the E. “You owe me five bucks, Cookie. I told you to trust we would make it, and see what happened? You should listen to your mama every once in a while.”

“Yeah, well, can I borrow the five bucks to pay you for the bet? I’m fresh out of cash at the moment.”

“Very funny.”

Roxy cranes out the window and wipes the sweat off her upper lip, careful not to smudge her red lipstick. She’s been having real bad aches the last two days, even aside from her bruises, and her appetite’s been worse than ever. The only thing she ever wants is sugar. After having been in the car for so long, you’d think we’d be falling all over each other to get out, but we’re still sitting in the car. In here we’re still us.

She sighs for the thousandth time and clutches at her belly. “I don’t know about this, May.”

California can’t be that different from West Texas.

I watch TV. I know how to say gag me with a spoon and grody to the max.

I fling open the door.

Roxy gathers her cigarettes and lighter, and drops them in- side her purse with a snap.

“Goddammit, Elle,” she mutters to herself, eyes flickering toward the kids again. Roxy looks at me over the rims of her sunglasses before shoving them back on her nose. “Mayhem, I’m counting on you to keep your head together here. Those kids are not the usual—”

“I know! You told me they’re foster kids.” 

“No, not that,” she says, but doesn’t clarify. “Okay, I guess.”

“I mean it. No more of that wild-child business.”

“I will keep my head together!” I’m so tired of her saying this. I never had any friends, never a boyfriend—all I have is what Grandmother calls my nasty mouth and the hair Lyle always said was ugly and whorish. And once or twice I might’ve got drunk on the roof, but it’s not like I ever did anything. Besides, no kid my age has ever liked me even once. I’m not the wild child in the family.

“Well, all right then.” Roxy messes with her hair in the rear- view mirror, then sprays herself with a cloud of Chanel No. 5 and runs her fingers over her gold necklace. It’s of a bird, not unlike the ones making a fuss by the house. She’s had it as long as I can remember, and over time it’s been worn smooth by her worrying fingers. It’s like she uses it to calm herself when she’s upset about something, and she’s been upset the whole way here, practically. Usually, she’d be good and buzzed by this time of day, but since she’s had to drive some, she’s only nipped from the tiny bottle of wine in her purse a few times and only taken a couple pills since we left Taylor. The with- drawal has turned her into a bit of a she-demon.

I try to look through her eyes, to see what she sees. Roxy hasn’t been back here since I was three years old, and in that time, her mother has died, her father has died, and like she said when she got the card with the picture enclosed that her twin sister, Elle, sent last Christmas, Everybody got old. After that, she spent a lot of time staring in the mirror, pinching at her neck skin. When I was younger, she passed long nights telling me about Santa Maria and the Brayburn Farm, about how it was good and evil in equal measure, about how it had desires that had to be satisfied.

Brayburns, she would say. In my town, we were the legends. 

These were the mumbled stories of my childhood, and they made everything about this place loom large. Now that we’re here, I realize I expected the house to have a gaping maw filled with spitty, frothy teeth, as much as I figured there would be fairies flitting around with wands granting wishes. I don’t want to take her vision away from her, but this place looks pretty normal to me, if run-down compared to our new house in Taylor, where there’s no dust anywhere, ever, and Lyle prac- tically keeps the cans of soup in alphabetical order. Maybe what’s not so normal is that this place was built by Brayburns, and here Brayburns matter. I know because the whole road is named after us and because flowers and ribbons and baskets of fruit sat at the entrance, gifts from the people in town, Roxy said. They leave offerings. She said it like it’s normal to be treated like some kind of low-rent goddess.

Other than the van and the kids, there are trees here, rose- bushes, an old black Mercedes, and some bikes leaning against the porch that’s attached to the house. It’s splashed with fresh white paint that doesn’t quite cover up its wrinkles and scars. It’s three stories, so it cuts the sunset when I look up, and plants drape down to touch the dirt.

The front door swings open and a woman in bare feet races past the rosebushes toward us. It is those feet and the reckless way they pound against the earth that tells me this is my aunt Elle before her face does. My stomach gallops and there are bumps all over my arms, and I am more awake than I’ve been since.

I thought Roxy might do a lot of things when she saw her twin sister. Like she might get super quiet or chain-smoke, or maybe even get biting like she can when she’s feeling wrong about something. The last thing I would have ever imagined was them running toward each other and colliding in the driveway, Roxy wrapping her legs around Elle’s waist, and them twirling like that. 

This seems like something I shouldn’t be seeing, some- thing wounded and private that fills up my throat. I flip my- self around in my seat and start picking through the things we brought and chide myself yet again for the miserable packing job I did. Since I was basically out of my mind trying to get out of the house, I took a whole package of toothbrushes, an armful of books, my River Phoenix poster, plus I emptied out my underwear drawer, but totally forgot to pack any shoes, so all I have are some flip-flops I bought at the truck stop outside of Las Cruces after that man came to the window, slurring, You got nice legs. Tap, tap tap. You got such nice legs.

My flip-flops are covered in Cheeto dust from a bag that got upended. I slip them on anyway, watching Roxy take her sunglasses off and prop them on her head.

“Son of a bitch!” my aunt says, her voice tinny as she catches sight of Roxy’s eye. “Oh my God, that’s really bad, Rox. You made it sound like nothing. That’s not nothing.”

“Ellie,” Roxy says, trying to put laughter in her voice. “I’m here now. We’re here now.”

There’s a pause.

“You look the same,” Elle says. “Except the hair. You went full Marilyn Monroe.”

“What about you?” Roxy says, fussing at her platinum waves with her palm. “You go full granola warrior? When’s the last time you ate a burger?”

“You know I don’t do that. It’s no good for us. Definitely no good for the poor cows.”

“It’s fine for me.” Roxy lifts Elle’s arm and puckers her nose. “What’s going on with your armpits? May not eat meat but you got animals under there, looks like.”

“Shaving is subjugation.”

“Shaving is a mercy for all mankind.” 

They erupt into laughter and hug each other again.

“Well, where is she, my little baby niece?” Elle swings the car door open. “Oh, Mayhem.” She scoops me out with two strong arms. Right then I realize just how truly tired I am. She seems to know, squeezes extra hard for a second before letting me go. She smells like the sandalwood soap Roxy buys sometimes. “My baby girl,” Elle says, “you have no idea how long I’ve been waiting to see you. How much I’ve missed you.”

Roxy circles her ear with a finger where Elle can’t see her.

Crazy, she mouths. I almost giggle.

[mithranqueersmusings]

Before This Dance Is Through VI

Chapter: 6/16

Rating: M (Smut Warning)

Summary: Ringo's being going through a dry spell for the last year or so and when he regretfully tells his best friend John, he insists on taking them to an all-male strip club for some "fun". Ringo isn't sure whether it's the alcohol, his desperation or a mixture of the two but he thinks he might be falling in love with a stripper.

Tags: AU - Strippers, Modern Setting, Smut, Slow Burn

Pairings: George Harrison/Ringo Starr, John Lennon/Paul McCartney

AO3 link here / Fic masterlist here

Ringo found himself getting excited for the following Tuesday, he'd be sitting at home watching the television and suddenly the image of Spike in a short skirt or wearing makeup would flash into his mind and he'd have to consciously calm himself. John tried to get him to go along to the club in the meantime, but Ringo refused for a multitude of reasons, although he wasn't sure which was the genuine one. Part of him was still a little nervous about facing Spike again, especially after how much alone time he'd been spending with his pictures. Another simply told him that he wanted to wait, it'd be more special that way, and he didn't really have the primal urge that John seemed to have that resulted in him ending up at the club almost every night.

In the days leading up to the event Ringo spent most of his time working. The school year was coming to an end which meant he was being called in for a mass amount of activity days. They weren't Ringo's favourite thing in the world, he much preferred earning his money by teaching students one-on-one but it definitely mixed things up a little. The day would mostly consist of younger children coming into a large hall where Ringo would talk for a little bit about drumming before the students got a chance to try it out themselves. It got a little chaotic at times, and Ringo felt relieved that he didn't have to bring his own kit in because these children were anything but predictable. Sometimes they'd result in one or two students expressing a real interest in drumming and so Ringo would give them one of his business cards to pass along to their parents; more often than not it wouldn't result in anything at all but on occasion he could get several new students from participating in a few of these activity days.

One aspect of these events that Ringo never enjoyed was the attention he got from the teachers. He'd gotten used to it by now: one of the younger female teachers asking to try it out and for Ringo to show them how to play - just an excuse to get him stood over them with a chance of their hands touching - but no matter how often it happened it didn't make it any less aggravating. While the children busied themselves with the array of instruments set out, Ringo often had no choice but to stand at the back and talk to whichever teacher was meant to be supervising them. The smalltalk wasn't the problem, usually it was quite refreshing to talk to someone else who worked with children, it was the awkward flirting that drove him up the wall. The worst was when they'd pretend to have a child interested in learning how to drum, or that they themselves were, but when Ringo would actually press for details it would amount to nothing. It was never the men that flirted with him, Ringo had started to think he was the only gay teacher in the area, and there had certainly been times he'd wished they had.

"You need to look gayer." John had pointed out.

"I'm going into a school, John, I can't rock up in a rainbow tank top covered in glitter." Ringo chuckled.

"Why not? Kids love glitter."

There was one male teacher in particular that Ringo had liked the look of, but he'd only met him the once; he taught English, or had it been art? The problem was that the female teachers would be so desperate to volunteer to stand in for Ringo's lesson with the students, even if they seemed to be aware there was no chance of anything actually happening, that he rarely got to see another man. Every time he went back to that same school he'd hoped to see that particular teacher again, yet he was always disappointed.

He was heading back home after completing a session at the local secondary school, the one he'd actually attended when he was younger, fairly exhausted from the energy of the children and massively exhausted from the persistency of the women. As he sank into the driver's seat of his car with a sigh, he swore he was going to buy a rainbow pin to attach to his jacket to ward off anything in the future. On his way home he stopped off at the record shop, partly to pick up something that'd improve his mood but mostly in the hopes that he'd see Spike again. He'd rather see him in an ordinary setting, without the dynamic that existed in the club, as strange as it had been at first. But luck was apparently not on his side today as there was no sign of Spike anywhere in the shop, he'd even browsed the clothes in the basement, which he'd never done before, just to increase the chances of bumping into him.

When Tuesday finally came around Ringo was in dire need of some intoxication, so much so that he went along with John's idea of beginning the drinking before they'd even sat down to eat dinner. Ringo cooked for the two of them while John sat in the kitchen waffling on about some new idea he was having for a story. It was unusual for them to be eating dinner over at John's place, but it was far closer to the club and Ringo definitely wasn't going to risk driving with how much alcohol he was planning on drinking.

"I'm surprised your oven isn't covered in cobwebs considering how little you use it." Ringo stated as he fried up some bacon.

"Why would I use the oven when I have a perfectly good microwave?" John mumbled in response, he was scrawling down ideas messily in a notebook.

"This is not a perfectly good microwave." Ringo chuckled as he gestured with the spatula.

"Calm down, Gordon Ramsay." John quipped.

"What are you even writing?" Ringo asked as he walked away from the oven.

"My mate's putting together some gay poetry book and asked me to write something for it." John explained without looking up "I should've finished it two days ago but I forgot."

"Maybe tonight will give you some inspiration." Ringo tried to read what John had already scribbled down but his handwriting was fairly intelligible.

"Don't tempt me. Paul's already said he won't accept any more poems as payment." John chuckled to himself.

"Any more?" Ringo raised his eyebrows.

"Long story." John finally looked up then and flashed Ringo a grin.

By the time they'd finished eating they were already quite drunk, John had begun blasting music from one of his many playlists.

"Sooooo." John leaned over the table slightly "How's Spike been treating you these last few days?"

Ringo felt his face reddening and he tried to tell himself it was just the alcohol "No complaints from me."

"Can I have a look?" John tilted his head and smiled.

"Er-" Ringo hesitated "I dunno."

"Oh come on!" John reached his hand forward teasingly "I'll give you the 20p or however much a day costs, if that's what you're so worried about."

Ringo didn't budge "Pay for it yourself if you wanna see."

"I'm the one who bloody told you about it in the first place, you twat." John huffed but he was still smiling "Is there something you're not telling me, Ringo?"

"What do you mean?" Ringo shuffled in his seat.

John's smile widened then he casually picked up his drink to take a sip "Nothing. Don't mind me."

The two of them managed to get over to the club in one piece, although John did stumble into the road a couple of times. It was considerably more busy than a normal Tuesday night, or so John claimed, and there were far more people clamoured outside smoking than there usually was. Ringo felt like he had to brace himself before stepping inside, closing his eyes for a second and taking in a deep breath. The amount of people inside was astounding and Ringo began to worry that this had been a bad idea after all. Music was blaring as loud as always, it was difficult to even think but luckily Ringo didn't really need to think when he had John by his side, pulling him over to the nearest bar. As they moved further into the club Ringo could finally see what all the fuss about, one of the strippers was walking around in tall heels with a transparent platform - the kind Ringo had seen in films - paired with a lilac skirt and a white bra. Ringo recognised the man under the makeup from when he'd been here before, he never found him particularly attractive but the sight of him like this definitely interested him at least a little.

"This is gonna be well confusing for my sexuality." Ringo stated as they moved away from the bar with their drinks in hand.

"Best of both worlds for me." John replied with a grin as he looked out amongst the crowd of people.

"So you're into girls again now, are you?" Ringo nudged John lightly.

John paused for a second then turned his head to face Ringo "What are you drinking?"

"Vodka coke, why?" Ringo furrowed his brow in confusion.

"Well you were drinking beers back at my place. You're into drinking vodka now?" John raised his eyebrows in turn.

"I don- Oh, I see. Point made." Ringo punctuated his sentence with a sip of his drink.

It was difficult to get a decent view of the main stage on which someone dressed as Madonna was doing a very graphic dance to 'Like a Prayer', Ringo had never really thought about the double meaning of that song until this moment, but considering it was neither Paul nor Spike they weren't entirely interested. Both of them were scoping around for any sign of their 'preferred' man but it was almost impossible to pinpoint anyone in such a mass of people, particularly when none of the dancers were particularly looking like themselves. John grabbed Ringo around the wrist and pulled him through the crowds until they were heading down to the back room, Ringo could recognise the rhythm of the distant song as Queen's 'I Want to Break Free'.

"I should've worn my Freddie outfit." John commented as they descended the stairs.

"Someone might've beaten you to it." Ringo chuckled.

"This is a strip club not a drag show, don't get it twisted." John shouted over the music as they walked through the door.

Ringo realised very quickly how very 'twisted' his expectations of tonight really had been when he caught a glimpse of what was happening on the stage. Upon hearing the song, Ringo had expected some crude recreation of the music video complete with fake moustaches and enormously large, and clearly fake, breasts. But no, he couldn't have been more wrong. Ringo stopped in his tracks in the doorway, his eyes widening and his throat feeling suddenly dry; John had to pull him forward with great force just to get them over to what few empty seats were left around the edge of the room.

"I told you this was the more alternative stuff." John said excitedly but it wasn't until he settled down on a stool that he realised "Wait... Is that-"

"Yes." Ringo replied bluntly, his mouth remaining slightly open after he'd finished speaking.

It was Spike. Of course it was Spike. Handcuffs were around his slim wrists, chaining him around the pole in the centre of the stage with his arms raised above his head. He wasn't wearing a wig but his face was painted quite beautifully, purple eye-shadow merged with dark eyeliner and a light peach lipstick, somehow he looked even more breathtaking than usual. The makeup was the least startling aspect of the whole thing, even the outfit wasn't what had stunned Ringo, although it was a definite contender; he wore a black laced-up corset which was pulled tightly around his slim frame connected to which were his stockings, on his feet he wore a velvet heel which buckled over his ankle. The sight was simply diabolical, the way his flat chest was still exposed and the hair of his underarms clearly visible alongside the femininity of his face and body. Even that wasn't the issue. The issue was that he wasn't alone on the stage, someone from the audience had stepped up and was slowly unlacing one of the threads of his corset. Ringo could see that a black skirt, almost a tutu, was lying discarded on the edge of the stage. When the realisation sunk in of exactly what was going on, Ringo wasn't sure he'd be able to get up again.

Spike had his characteristic grin on his painted lips as the man slowly pulled at the fabric keeping his corset in place, they were close enough that they easily could've kissed - and for a long time Ringo feared that they would. The man soon lost interest with the corset, giving Ringo a second to breathe in which he hoped the man was going to turn and leave, then moved his hand to run up Spike's clothed leg. He brushed his fingers over the thin material, gripping the back of Spike's thigh and lifting the leg up to wrap around his own waist. Ringo felt sick. If this had been anyone else, anyone else in the world, he wouldn't have cared, hell he probably would've been aroused by the whole thing. But it wasn't just anyone, it was Spike. The worst part was that he had no reason at all to be getting upset, this was his job and Ringo certainly wouldn't have been complaining had he been in the man's position.

"Is this even legal?" Ringo mumbled to John.

"Fuck knows." John's eyes were wide with excitement "Are you gonna go up there?"

"Me?" Ringo scoffed "Not very likely."

The man had continued running his hands over Spike's body, but as soon as his fingers crept up towards his crotch he was pushed away; it was light, clearly wanting to appear playful, but the man quickly got the message and hurried back to his seat somewhat embarrassed as though he'd fallen into some kind of trance. Now alone on the stage, Spike began scanning the audience - who were watching very intently - for someone else to help him 'break free'. While he waited he made a very enticing show of how bound to the pole he was, sinking down almost to the floor with his hands still raised high as he spread his knees out to draw attention to prominence lying in his tight underwear.

"I like this. Very clever. Why do the stripping when they can do it for you?" John was talking more to himself than to Ringo, who was barely listening.

Spike's eyes moved over to where the two of them were sitting and Ringo thought time must've stopped for at least a second. John took a moment or two to realise the eye contact but as soon as he did he was quick to move, shoving Ringo off of the stool and luckily onto his feet. Ringo was surprised his knees didn't give out immediately, but he was stable enough to turn around to glare at John who looked at him smugly.

"You can thank me later." John winked and then nudged Ringo towards the stage with his foot.

Fuck. Ringo prayed for the floor to swallow him up in that moment, it almost felt like it had when he saw Spike's expectant gaze looking directly at him. He wished he could've just sat back down but not only did he not want to make a fool of himself, but also he knew John wasn't going to allow that. Slowly he made his way over to the stage, fortunately the room was so small so it didn't take him long, meaning he didn't have to be so conscious of not only Spike's but also the whole room's eyes on him. He could hear his heart thumping in his ears, his breath was uneven and he had to consciously stop his hands from shaking. Spike's grin had grown, his eyes slightly squinting as Ringo approached him sheepishly. John had begun whooping from where he sat which spurred on a few others in the audience. The whole thing felt like some strange fever dream, perhaps even a nightmare.

Spike had gotten back up to his full height, usually he was only slightly taller than Ringo but now with the added platform of the heels he practically towered over him. Even in this submissive position, with his arms helplessly chained above him, Spike still oozed dominant energy as he watched Ringo fumble where he stood in front of him. Ringo had no idea what to do, his hands felt heavy and almost impossible to lift; watching someone strip was one thing, but actually stripping someone was something else entirely. Up close he looked even more stunning, a faint blush lying on his cheeks which accentuated his high cheekbones perfectly, his dark eyelashes elongated with mascara and sparse glitter dotted across his fair skin. Ringo never considered himself as someone particularly kinky, but he was feeling a rush he'd never felt before. He had no idea how long he'd been stood there, how long he'd been staring up at Spike who's teeth were beginning to show past his curled lips. It must've been long enough for Spike to worry that it would start getting awkward if he didn't do something, and do something he did.

It all seemed to happen in a heartbeat, Spike turning himself around and bending downwards so that his bare arse - he was wearing yet another thong, which Ringo had quickly noticed - grazed against Ringo's crotch. Ringo let out a small gasp, bordering on a moan, as he watched Spike's tongue dart over his sharp tooth. He hadn't realised that an erection had already been growing since he'd laid eyes on Spike like this, but the sudden contact make him very aware of how hard he was getting. It sent a bolt of adrenaline through Ringo's body and he was sure to make use of it, he didn't want to stand there like an idiot as much as it would've been the easiest thing to do, so began imitating what he'd seen the previous man doing and started unlacing the ribbon of Spike's corset. While he did this, or attempted to at least, Spike continued to move his hips and dip down slightly on the pole but never quite made contact. Both the ribbon and Spike's skin were soft to the touch, the silky feeling of the material put Ringo at ease somewhat. His fingers must've been quite cold because every time they brushed against Spike's skin he let out a quiet noise, Ringo didn't think he was aware he was even doing it. The unravelling had been far easier than Ringo had expected it to be, his desperation in the moment probably helped considerably, and soon the corset fell off of Spike's chest with ease. Ringo held it in his hand for a second and wasn't sure what to do with it: the skirt had clearly been tossed aside without much care but Ringo really didn't want to look inconsiderate like the previous man had. Spike seemed to notice Ringo's momentary dilemma and gestured slightly with his head for Ringo to throw it, which he did quite erratically. John let out a loud cheer at this and Ringo was suddenly very aware of his presence on the stage; had John been silent this entire time or had his brain just blocked it all out? It was enough of a falter in his mindset that Ringo decided it was best he got back to his seat. As much as he'd love to pick off each item of clothing piece by piece until there was nothing left, this alone had almost been overwhelming and he didn't want to risk looking like an idiot.

Ringo flashed a nervous smile to Spike who was still watching him with that same intense gaze, then hurried off the stage to clutch his drink eagerly. For a moment Ringo thought he saw a hint of disappointment in Spike's eyes as he turned away, and that when he got back to his seat Spike had been looking at him while he'd been walking, but he wasn't sure. John gripped Ringo with both hands and shook him excitedly, a massive grin on his face.

"I told you tonight was going to be the one! And it's only just getting started." John giggled as he finally let go of Ringo.

As much as Ringo didn't like to admit when John was right, though it happened far more than anyone would've expected, his words in that moment couldn't have been truer. The night was only getting started, what followed was nothing Ringo could've anticipated.

[dailyskyferreira]

Sky Ferreira Returns With an uncompromising vision and the studio hours to back it up, the enigmatic singer is back with a new single—and a promise that her first album in six years will be worth the wait.

So, what’s Sky Ferreira been doing all this time? Well, for the last 35 minutes or so, she’s been in the bathroom.

“I’m so sorry,” she says when she finally emerges, eyes wet, arms full of winter layers. It’s a late-February afternoon at New York City’s Russian Tea Room, the fabled blini-and-caviar haunt of candy-red banquettes and eternal Christmas ornaments where Madonna once worked the coat check. About a half hour ago, the 26-year-old singer turned up for our afternoon-tea reservation only to disappear in an immediate whorl, as if a czarist vortex sucked her into the basement. What she had thought was an asthmatic flare-up, she now explains, was actually a pretty severe anxiety attack. A panicked twinge remains in her expression, like the distant memory of tasting a lemon. In town from Los Angeles for three days, she tells me, “I’ve been anxious to the point that I haven’t slept at all.”

It’s a nerve-wracking moment for Sky, a pop artist, actor, and model who’s lately been keeping a low profile. This is partly because she seems to find the social contract of the PR exchange stressful, but also because she doesn’t want to suck up all the air before she gets a chance to breathe. “You really can get sick of someone’s face,” she says, as only someone who has loaned their own to Jimmy Choo and Calvin Klein could. “I don’t see the point of doing a bunch of photoshoots or press when I don’t have anything out.”

The fact that she hasn’t had anything out might be the biggest stress of all. Signed to Capitol Records at 15, Sky spent years in teen-pop A&R purgatory—groomed as a naughty-girl-next-door type with mall-Shakira hair and prefabricated singles with names like “Haters Anonymous” and “Sex Rules” (“We are animals/No matter what we deny/Our bodies strong, like magnets” are actual words she sang)—only to have her minders decide she wasn’t worth the trouble and shelve her long-promised full-length debut. Rather than give up, she used money she’d earned modeling and finished the album without their help.

Released in October 2013, Night Time, My Time was a rare major-label triumph of craft over product, a purposeful barrage of seething recriminations coated with ’90s-grunge textures and ’80-pop incandescence. It sounded like “My So-Called Life”’s Angela Chase mainlining John Hughes films and channeling her existential anguish into a record—except Night Time was the vision of a 2010s 21-year-old, and the truths were all hers.

The right people loved it. In the spring of 2015, Sky announced her second record’s name was Masochism and promised its first single that summer. The summer came and went, then the fall, and some winter too. On that New Year’s Eve, she addressed the delay obliquely on Instagram (“I refuse to put out something that isn’t honest”) and promised “in 2016 you will hear it.” In 2016, you did not, and now it’s 2019, and, still, no album. At this point, she can’t post online without some commenters popping up to heckle, “where’s the album sky” or “MASOCHISM!!?” or “still waiting,” like they’re hungry people rage-texting Seamless.

These impatient fans aren’t alone in their enthusiasm. “She’s one of those beautiful, rare people who can probably do anything,” says Debbie Harry, who’s had Sky open for Blondie. “If there’s anybody I would ever be jealous of, it would be her.”

Naturally, all of this—the anticipation, the unfulfilled promises, the time lapsed since her last release—is adding to the pressure she puts on herself. She feels like she has to explain. “It wasn’t by choice.” It wasn’t creative paralysis, nor was it a creative hiatus. “I wasn’t just taking time for myself the last five years.” During that time, she landed a half dozen movie roles, but she says she didn’t decide to focus on acting instead. “I never stepped away from music.” She alludes to vague external hindrances: “I’ve been at the mercy of people the last few years”; “gatekeepers”; “the rug pulled out under me”; a “someone at my label” who undid the generous arrangement she had to work with Kanye West musical director Mike Dean; and the very real issue of a young woman telling men what she wants and not settling for less. Then the labyrinthine nature of her production process is, as you’ll see, akin to playing charades blind-folded while riding a dog, and everyone else guesses with kazoos. Plus, she’s a perfectionist. Obsessive. She’ll do 800 takes. She’ll consider every option—and then she’ll consider it again.

But the primary reason it’s taken so long: Sky doesn’t just want her new songs done, she wants them to be good. By good, she means, executed the way she intended, no matter how long she waited to find the right violinist. Properly mixed so they don’t accidentally sound like pop-punk in the car, because “someone puts some shit on my voice” and she forgot to play them in an Uber. (Sky never learned to drive.) Songs that know their place in the broader pop continuum, not what’s hot on streaming. “I’m not looking for ‘a moment,’” she says. “I’m looking for a career—and real careers, you build them.”

She’s deemed two songs good enough to share with me. The first single, “Downhill Lullaby,” is a five-and-a-half-minute, goth-noir, chamber-pop piece—with strings!—that could have easily closed an episode of the revived “Twin Peaks.” (The association may be deliberate: Sky appeared in the show’s 2017 return, deeply admires its director, David Lynch, and the series’ music supervisor, Dean Hurley, produced the song alongside her.) Another forthcoming track, tentatively titled “Don’t Forget,” is a new wave time warp, a lovely bit of nostalgia therapy for people who were never there—even if it is, according to Sky, “about burning down houses.”

By now we’re settled into a booth, one Sky has selected in the empty part of the restaurant, far away from her manager and publicist, who’ve come along to chaperone. Her natural espresso roots have outrun her hair’s blonde highlights, and her dark T-shirt reads “CHICAGO METAL MANIA.” We’ve managed to order tea by asking the waiter to bring what he likes (a nice, orangey, spicy chai) and then momentarily horrify him when Sky asks if, instead of sending the teeny triangular sandwiches with mayonnaise back to the kitchen (she hasn’t touched them, and mayo makes her gag), we can give them to someone who’s homeless. “I’ll get you the ones without mayonnaise,” the waiter says, taking them away.

“I don’t have a back-up plan,” Sky says. “I never have. I don’t have an education. I don’t know how to, like, play music in the [traditional] sense. I’m socially awkward and stuff—I couldn’t really do a lot of other jobs either,” she says. “Literally, there’s no other option for me. So this has to work.”

There are many Sky Ferreiras. There’s Sky the model, a Hedi Slimane muse who’s walked the runway for Marc Jacobs and perfected a glare so haunted the Bates Motel must be jealous. There’s Sky the actor, who played a key supporting role in director Edgar Wright’s big-studio heist flick Baby Driver, but doesn’t have an agent. There’s Sky the live performer, who battles stage fright, but who also opened a 2014 Miley Cyrus arena tour, fell down an elevator shaft on night three, and still took the stage the next day.

There’s also the Sky here at the Russian Tea Room, whose left dimple comes as a surprise because, come to think of it, you’ve rarely seen photos of her smiling. The Sky who shouldn’t eat gluten because of an autoimmune condition, but doesn’t really tell people about it because it sounds like bullshit. The Sky who’s watched enough “Game of Thrones” to see her pets’ personalities reflected in the show’s characters. (For the record, her cat Egg would be a Lannister, while his brother Squirrel would be from the North.)

This Sky speaks in em dashes. It’s less that she loses her train of thought, and more that her thought train is screeching onto a new track. Sometimes you’re right there with her, but other times you’re watching the conversation from a distance like a detached caboose that just kept going straight. “I know I keep going in circles,” she says, “but my mind kind of always does that—spins.”

You don’t interview this Sky as much as steer her, but first you listen. “I’ve always been really shy,” she says, six minutes in. “I was actually mute for years when I was a kid.”

Little Sky Tonia Ferreira hummed along to the radio before she could talk. Raised around Los Angeles, mostly Venice Beach, her young parents split when she was a baby. Her dad tended bar, sometimes with her in tow, and when his roommates got cable, she devoured MTV. “I always hung out with a lot of adults,” she says. “I was, like, one of those kids.”

Being one of those kids meant she didn’t know how to talk to the kids who knew how to talk with each other. She was bullied constantly. She also had trouble with numbers and spelling—she suspects she’s dyslexic, but never got tested—and for a while, was so unhappy, she stopped talking altogether. “I had really long hair, didn’t speak, and had dark circles around my eyes,” she says, describing herself as a child. “I looked kinda feral.”

As the story goes, Sky’s first-grade classmates didn’t know she could talk until she sang “Over the Rainbow” in school. “As long as I can remember, I’ve felt the most like myself when I was singing,” she says. (Roughly 18 years later, she covered the Wizard of Oz ballad at David Lynch’s Festival of Disruption, and the director still raves about her version, telling me, “It was incredible. So beautiful.”)

She lived with her grandmother, who worked as a hairdresser. One time when Sky was around 7, she sang for one of her grandmother’s clients. Impressed, the man suggested she join a gospel choir. The man was Michael Jackson. So she did. Jackson also gave a 9-year-old Sky some grown-up advice that’s shaped her approach to art and music ever since: “He was like, ‘Don’t focus on things that are just around you—you need to look back to the history of music.’ And that’s what I did.”

Yes, Sky went to the Neverland Ranch—“a lot.” She also went to Jackson’s other houses. No, she didn’t witness anything untoward. “It wasn’t just because I was a girl,” she tells me, a few days before the controversial HBO documentary Leaving Neverland aired. “I was around a lot of kids.”

Yes, she’s grown hesitant to talk about her grandmother’s larger-than-life client—for all the reasons you’d expect, along with a few you might not. Like, that it’s difficult for people to wrap their minds around the fact that the King of Pop could be a formative elder acquaintance in the casually anodyne way of, say, a dancing-school teacher or a little-league coach—someone whose small encouragements could be so big. “I was really quiet, but when someone sees something in you...” she says of Jackson, before abandoning the thought. “I had a connection to him, but I’m not, like, his family.”

Sky has also routinely been asked to account for the bad behavior of men in her orbit. A dominant narrative surrounding Night Time, My Time’s 2013 release was her relationship with indie rock band DIIV’s frontman, Zachary Cole Smith—an ex-boyfriend with whom she was arrested that September. He was the driver of the vehicle in which heroin, ecstasy, and a stolen license plate were found (and someone who’s since publicly acknowledged his struggles with addiction). Throughout that album cycle, the arrest became a more delicious red herring than anything Sky had actually done.

“The thing that’s still so fucked up about that: I didn’t have a drug problem, I dated someone who had a drug problem, I was in a car with someone who had a drug problem,” she says. “No one wants to talk about how my charge got dropped.” And the whole Kurt and Courtney star-crossed mythos that dramatized the headlines around the arrest? Spare her. “I was really young; I wasn’t even 21 yet for most of it. That wasn’t my great love story of my life,” she says, adding, “The people that have treated me so much better—they’re the ones who deserve the attention, not that guy.” (Presumably, one of those people is her current partner, Elias Bender Rønnenfelt, frontman of the Danish punk band Iceage.)

Those who have followed Sky’s personal life could easily read “Downhill Lullaby” as an extended metaphor about a tumultuous relationship: “I can see that you want me/Going downhill too/Going downhill into a lullaby.” But she’s adamant about distancing her songwriting from the egos of her ex-boyfriends. “That’s the one rule I made,” she says. “The one thing that I’ve always had is my music. If someone treated me badly, they don’t get to have that. I don’t want to drag the weight of what they did around forever.”

For Sky Ferreira, time is not a flat circle, but rather a sticky mass of saltwater taffy. She tends to run late, but once she’s present and engaged, she can summon an Iron Man endurance. At the Russian Tea Room, two hours of conversation easily floats into six-and-a-half, and eventually we’re the last diners to leave. Somewhere in this elasticity, she talks about her refusal to give up on the work. “I’ve literally been using my life savings to do this record.” She is not motivated by money—to her, time isn’t money, but money is a thing to buy more time.

This springy relationship with time can make Sky seem almost anachronistic. In conversation, her offhanded pop-cultural mentions span director Todd Solondz’s 1995 cult indie Welcome to the Dollhouse, Courtney Love, the 1980 Loretta Lynn biopic Coal Miner’s Daughter, the 2018 iteration of A Star Is Born, and the cheerful ’60s sitcom “The Andy Griffith Show” (which she concedes, “No one my age knows”). Sky’s reference points, like Michael Jackson once advised, exist within a totality, not a blip.

One of her artistic lodestars glows brighter than the others: When Sky was 13, she discovered David Lynch. “He’s the first person who ever saw the world the way I saw it,” she says. “It was the first time anything made sense.” You can see Lynchian dream logic throughout her work. In fact, the staggering, airy title dirge from Night Time, My Time came to her in a dream. “I wrote it in the middle of the night, half-asleep,” she remembers about the album closer, which was built around a line spoken by the doomed girl at the center of the “Twin Peaks” saga. “Then I woke up the next day and I finished it in an hour. I still have the notes; the handwriting’s all fucked up. ” When she finished the song, she knew the album was finally done.

So Sky’s cameo in “Twin Peaks: The Return” had the meta-ness of astral projection. She played Ella, an enigmatic bar patron who talked about a penguin and flaunted a “wicked” armpit rash. “She played that scene so perfectly,” Lynch tells me. “She inhabited that character and made it real from a deep place. When she scratched that rash, you could really feel the itching!”

“Downhill Lullaby” summons the creeping orchestral gloom of “Night Time, My Time.” A sweeping arrangement in five parts, Masochism’s first single begins with a sashay of strings and an interpolation of the unmistakable squee of the Verve’s “Bitter Sweet Symphony,” followed by a murmuring, angered bass. Sky exhales a numb indictment—“You leave me open/When you hit me”—and amid the layers of kettle-drum thunder and keening violins, there’s seduction and revenge, confusion and queasiness, silkiness and elegance. It sounds like the last thing Daniel Day Lewis’ Reynolds Woodcock hears before the poison takes hold in Phantom Thread.

This habit of visualizing music—Sky does it too. Except for her, it’s the first step of many in the song creation process: “I see it like it’s projected in a movie theater.” “Downhill Lullaby,” in particular, began with a vision of water in darkness. “Lakes kind of terrify me,” she explains, recalling a childhood memory of feeling lost in a Maryland forest that packs a similar unease. “In a lake, by yourself, you look at the bottom and it’s murky and still and you can’t really see anything or feel anything—and if you do, it’s fucking terrifying. It always feels like something will grab you and pull you under.” The eeriness became the foundation for the song.

She likens the ordeal of making “Downhill Lullaby” to Mickey Mouse’s Fantasia turn as the sorcerer’s apprentice. “You know how all the brooms are making a gigantic mess and the water starts rising and rising and rising and rising?” she says. “It was sort of like that: Magical, but at the same time, ‘What is going on?’ And then cleaning it all up.”

Her technique is more like a collagist—one who both scavenges her raw materials and oversees the fabrication—than a traditional songwriter. Conceptually, she works backwards, starting a song with an imagined outline of the final arrangement, isolating each sound element, and then embarking on the oft-laborious task of identifying studio musicians with the time and patience and willingness to conjure each sound individually, so that once she’s gathered all the pieces, she can begin the meticulous process of putting them all back together.

This unorthodox approach to songwriting has led to recurring logistical difficulties for Masochism. Namely, figuring out how to articulate what she hears so that someone who’s not in her brain can actualize it. “Nobody really understood what I was trying to say or wanted to do on paper,” she says. “It was a really long process.”

Sky never learned how to read music and she’s too self-conscious to use instruments that aren’t her voice in front of others. So if there’s an obvious reference point—like a certain note in a ’90s-radio staple she wants imitated—she’ll play that for her collaborator. But when there’s not, she’s often like a conductor asking to summon a mood.

In the case of Danish violinist Nils Gröndahl, who recorded all the strings on “Downhill Lullaby,” she recalls telling him: “‘Play it as if you’re one of the birds in Snow White, singing underwater, while slowly being suffocated by plastic.’” And you know what? In the end result, it’s easy to hear all that.

Additionally, Sky is even more particular about her final mixes. She will only be satisfied after she’s evaluated her song in seven different listening contexts: a car stereo; a smartphone with “regular” headphones; a smartphone with Apple earbuds; a smartphone’s built-in speaker; on a laptop; through “really bad, bad computer speakers—like the ones that came with Dells back in the early 2000s”; and the lush splendor of the studio, which is a personal luxury because, as she notes, “most people aren’t gonna listen that way.”

And she goes through this convoluted course of action for every song. It’s no wonder Masochism has taken so long. Says Sky, “I’ve accepted this is how I work and stopped feeling bad about it.”

Two Fridays after her insomniac New York trip, Sky is on the line, self-confidence restored, completing a high percentage of her sentences. Earlier in the week, she received the “Downhill Lullaby” master, immediately dropped her phone and shattered its screen, so now she’s on speaker. “I was like, I hope this isn’t a metaphor?” At least she’s laughing.

As for Masochism. She tells me she produced most of it herself, wrote with Los Angeles-based dream-pop artist Tamaryn, and worked with Ariel Pink collaborator Jorge Elbrecht. The proper album is coming, Sky swears, almost positively in 2019. Granted, she said the same thing last year—and the year before that and the year before that and the year before that—but this time, she has finally loosened her grip on some songs.

“Downhill Lullaby” may sound like dying Disney birds and “Don’t Forget” may be electro-pop arson, but Sky promises “more poppy” songs on Masochism too, as well as more “abstract,” orchestral stuff. “It’s very big, but also very violent,” she says, half-chuckling. “But not all the songs are super-dark.” Beyond that—the number of songs, tracklist, other credited collaborators—who can say? Sky can’t yet. She has some songs in mind she’d still like to write.

[skeppsbrott]

Cronus.mp3

27 + 26 tracks straight from Cronus Ampora’s media player. 93 + 87 minutes. One part straight pop, one part mostly more credible music.

[Side A] [Side B]

Oooh boy, I’ve been putting publishing this off for so long because it’s just never perfect, but truth is it never will be so I might as well publish it. The idea was to make a playlist of music that Cronus would listen to and/or identify with, eventually this split into two playlists, somewhat arbitrarily divided between pop and rock. Below are links to the songs, but I don’t think that any one lyric will be representative of the song and why I view it as a Cronus song, neccessarily.

The one band I include twice is Le Kid, mostly to juxtapose their excellent cover of Mr. Brightside with the original. Unfortunately, the version on YouTube isn’t as good as the studio version, which also seems to be floating around on tumblr for anyone interested.

Side A - Pop

Justin Bieber -  Sorry - You gotta go and get angry at all of my honesty

Le Kid -  Mercy Mercy - You should be saying you will treat me, treat me right

Erasure -  Love To Hate You - Sending shivers up and down my spine

Semisonic - Get A Grip - Well don’t be blue ‘cause there’s no one to play with you

Jason Derulo - Trumpets - Is it weird that I hear angels every time that you moan?

Katy Perry - I Kissed A Girl - Hard to resist, so touchable

ABBA  - Gimmie! Gimmie! Gimmie! (A Man After Midnight) - How I hate to spend the evening on my own

The Drifters - There Goes My Baby - I broke her heart, and made her cry

George Michael - Faith - Well I need someone to hold me but I’ll wait for somethin’ more

Madonna - Like A Virgin - You made me feel I’ve nothing to hide

Anton - Begging - I’m on my knees and ready for your answer

Phil Collins - You Can’t Hurry Love - How long must I wait? How much more can I take? Before loneliness will cause my heart to break

The Limousines - Internet Killed The Video Star [Tommie Sunshine remix] - I’m a shitty romancer, baby; I ain’t gonna lie, but I’ll be damned if that means that I ain’t gonna try

Mike Posner -  I Took a pill in ibiza (Seeb remix) - I get along with old-timers, ‘cause my name’s a reminder of a pop song people forgot

Movits! -  Sammy Davis Jr. - They say I sound old-school, baby, like Frank, and Sammy Davis

The Temptations - Ain’t Too Proud To Beg -  Please don’t leave me, girl, don’t you go

The Weeknd - I Feel It Coming - So baby, I can make it right, you just got to let me try

Kanye West - Heartless - I did some things, but that’s the old me

The Chainsmokers - Closer - Tell your friends it was nice to meet them, but I hope I never see them again

Carly Rae Jepsen - Your Type - I’m not going to pretend that I’m the type of girl you call more than a friend

Taylor Swift - Style - You’ve got that James Dean daydream look in your eye

Urban Cone - Old School - Keep saying chivalry has faded, girl I can’t wait to prove you wrong

Robin Thicke - Blurred Lines - I hate these blurred lines

Prince - Kiss - I want to be your fantasy, maybe you could be mine?

Robyn - Call Your Girlfriend - Don’t you even try and explain how it’s so different when we kiss

Lady Gaga - The Edge Of Glory - I got a reason that you should take me home tonight

Le Kid - Mr. Brightside - Now she’s letting me go

Side B - Rock

The Killers - Mr. Brightside - And I just can’t look, it’s killing me

Franz Ferdinand - Do You Want To - I’m gonna make somebody love me

Blink-182 - Built This Pool - I wanna see some naked duuuuuudes!

Jefferson Airplane - Somebody To Love - Wouldn’t you love somebody to love?

Top Cats - Basket Case - She says it’s lack of sex that’s bringing me down

The Vapors - Turning Japanese - I want to kiss you when there’s no one else around

Neon Trees - Everybody Talks - Hey sugar, show me all your love, all you’re giving me is friction

Mando Diao - Dance With Somebody - I’m falling in love with your favourite song, I’m gonna sing it all night long

Jack White - Love Interruption - I want love to grab my fingers gently, slam them in a doorway, put my face into the ground

Arctic Monkeys - R U Mine? - Are you mine tomorrow? Or just mine tonight?

The Smiths - There is a Light That Never Goes Out - And in the darkened underpass, I thought, oh God, my chance has come at last

The Kinks - You Really Got Me - Don’t ever set me free, I always wanna be by your side

Red Hot Chili Peppers - Tell Me Baby - Tell me lover, are you lonely?

Chuck Berry - Roll Over Beethoven - Long as she got a dime, the music won’t ever stop

Meat Loaf feat. Cher - Dead Ringer for Love - A man he doesn’t live by rock ‘n’ roll and brew alone!

Elvis Presley - Don’t Be Cruel - Please, let’s forget the past, the future looks bright ahead

Maroon 5 - This Love - I won’t say good bye anymore

The Rolling Stones - (I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction - Baby, better come back, maybe next week? ‘Cause you see, I’m on a losing streak

Billy Idol - Dancing With Myself - Well, there’s nothing to lose and there’s nothing to prove, when I’m dancing with myself

Bruce Springsteen - Pink Cadillac - Honey we can park it out back, and have a party in your pink Cadillac

Fall Out Boy - Sugar, We’re Going Down - I’m watching you two from the closet, wishing to be the friction in your jeans

Pulp - Common People - When you lay in bed at night, watching roaches climb the wall, if you called your dad he could stop it all

Foster The People - Don’t Stop (Color On The Walls) - Don’t stop talkin’ to me, don’t stop giving me things

Queen - Somebody To Love -  One day I’m gonna be free, Lord! Find me somebody to love

The 1975 - The Sound - And you say I’m such a cliche

Frank Zappa - Bobby Brown Goes Down - I am the American dream, I do not think I’m too extreme - and I’m a handsome sunnovabitch, I’m gonna get a good job an’ be real rich!

[80srockher]

Yuri on Ice Rewatch and Live-Commentary, Episode 1: Easy as Pirozhki!! The Grand Prix Final of Tears

*There are spoilers throughout.  I also make assumptions that anyone reading has already seen the episode or has a grasp of the content.*

Source: http://yurionicescreencaps.tumblr.com

The opening scene is so pretty.  Really sets a tone.  I went in knowing nothing about the anime first go-around, so I found Yuri and Victor’s grow/glow-ups montages interesting.  

This theme song is… not my favorite.  Maybe it’s the French horns?  That and too much synth.  I usually skip over it but want to give it a chance this go-around.

Heh, Victor and his gold blades to match his gold medal.  And his European af haircut.  Can’t remember the last time I saw an American past the age of 12 with bangs. No mistaking him for anything other than Eastern European.

Also, the poster on the left is for Victor, I believe.  Can he pull his leg that high in the air?  Was that featured and I forgot?  I’ll be on the lookout for it.

Also, looks like Jean JACK made it to Sochi and placed third here too, lolz.

Yes, please listen to your coach, Yuri.  Don’t poke the wound.  Stay off the internets.  ESPECIALLY the figure skating internets.  What little I remember from when I used to follow the sport is that it’s dramatic, to put it nicely.

I keep getting distracted by the utter Euro-ness of the Europeans in this show. The cut of Coach Celestino’s suit is so Italian I weep. He’s too smooth.

Yuri’s name tag has his name in Cyrillic as well?  Cute.

My first impression of Yuri was that he looks about 18 and that impression hasn’t changed.  Perhaps it’s the glasses, but he def looks youthful. I’m also someone who’s been accused of looking a decade+ younger than I actually am, so I can sympathize.

Speaking of sympathy – Yuri caved to pressure, binged ate before the competition while mourning his dog, then bombed his first trip to the Grand Prix final.  All in front of his idol.  Damnity damn damn.  Sorry, kid.

Is Cao Bin ever introduced on the show?  Something else I forgot, maybe?

Now, when I first saw this poor child crying in the bathroom, that’s when I knew the series was going to be much different from the light-hearted anime about figure skating I expected.  It got real deep real quick.

Yuri Plisetsky “The Russian Punk”.  Is this something the in-universe media refers to him as?  Because I only recall (JPN) Yuri saying it and only this once.

This screencap is during the scene where the journalist Marooka (sp?) is hassling Yuri about his future plans and instead of answering, Yuri can only stare at someone else’s puppy that reminds him of his dead Vicchan.

This baby is crying. Cry.ing.  This has been a tough day for poor Yuri, overall.

And he talks down to himself so much.  It’s all his fault he caved to pressure. He was an idiot to think he could meet his idol on the same playing field.   He’s come so far and still thinks so little of his accomplishments.

So, I understand this “one year later” is not really accurate, lol.  It’s just the new  year following the previous season.  I was confused initially about a number of soon-to-happen events before Yuri’s mental alter ego cleared it up.

So, per Minako’s voice actress, Yuri really is pronounced YOO-RI.  Cute.

Four Continents is… not a Grand Prix competition?  My figure skating knowledge is all rust now.

LOL, Minako does. Not. Play. And she wears a pinky ring.  My God, that death grip on poor Yuri.

It’s snowing outside the train station when Yuri and Minako leave.  So, it’s not unusual to snow in this region in March, but it’s highly unusual a month or so later. Man, hard to believe Yuri sat around for almost an entire month before the infamous video became viral.  More on that, later.

So, based on everyone’s interactions with Yuri so far, the only person who cares that he didn’t make it to the World Championships is him.  And he should care since he’s worked basically his entire life towards that goal.  But, he doesn’t appear to have let anyone down but himself, though he doesn’t act that way.

So, the fact that the family hot springs is named “Yu-topia”… did that influence Yuri’s name at all, I wonder?

Ha!  I wish I could have recorded the Japanese actor’s voice when he says this line.  He makes Yuri sound so done with it all, lol.  It’s the best.

Ok, so a number of very interesting and entertaining things happen in succession that I don’t feel like screencapping.  No hug between the littlest Katsuki and the senior Katsukis, even though he hasn’t been home in 5 years.  Fascinating. No doubt cultural (I’m guessing) but fascinating.  

Yuri’s mom basically calls Minako a drunk.  To her face. LOL.  But I imagine no one can get mad at this sweet lady.

Minako calls Yuri out on his weight gain in front of God and everybody.  Though, I think it’s more of a matter of his clothes no longer fitting due to said weight gain.  

But, his parents don’t care. Eat more pork cutlet bowls, Yuri! Welcome home!

Vicchan’s shrine is where they also store the unused treadmill.  Want to bet the only person to use it was Yuri?

Then older sis Mari-neechan appears with frosted tips.  I can appreciate a character that doesn’t beat around the bush (a trait she inherited from her mother, I imagine).  Welcome home, Yuri, but don’t sit on your ass.  Start thinking about your next move.    

Actually *loads headcanon* I suspect Mari doesn’t want Yuri to give up on skating.  The longer he stays at home, the more quitting becomes a possibility.

So, the Katsuki family hot springs resort (Inn?  Restaurant?) is the last one standing in town.  Very OT, but I wonder if the hot springs are still an attraction at all and are perhaps, government-owned?  Protected, used by tourists for a fee, perhaps?  I think about things like that.

Having never visited a hot spring, and based on the setting around Minako while she watches the World Championships on TV, it appears to be a place for people to come, soak, and lounge and grab a bite to eat if the mood strikes.  So, the Katsukis wait on people basically all day long.  Gotta be exhausting work.

Yuuuuuko!  The Madonna of Ice Castle Hasetsu!  Yuri’s crush on her is hella cute.

A slight segue to Yuri’s perceived attraction to Yuko and what it could imply about his sexual identity.  Per his labeling of Yuko as a “Madonna,” I figure Yuri considers Yuko untouchable, perhaps even “too good” for him.  Yuko, just like Victor, is “ideal”.  For someone as self-conscious as Yuri, comparing any romantic prospects against his two ideals was probably a convenient excuse not to get *too* close to anyone, male or female.  That being said, he didn’t pursue Yuko.  Alcohol loosened enough of Yuri’s inhibitions to eventually openly flirt with Victor, but this is still an important distinction, IMO.  He pursued one of his ideals (in more ways than one, even going so far as to leave home to in hopes of becoming Victor’s equal) and left the other one behind.

Yuri idealizes/d Yuko, and comes to love Victor.  He’s gay.  Bi, at the least.  

I don’t feel confident in applying any other labels, because I’m a straight.  Yuri could fall under any number of categories as long it they include, IMO, same-sex attraction.

In actuality, Yuko is “introduced” to the audience as Yuri’s straight love interest, but that doesn’t last long.  Cute and clever, show creators.  Cute. And . Clever.

Then we find out, via flashback, a) how adorable they all were when they were little kids and b) Yuko wanted to see Yuri compete against Victor.  Yuko has been a profound influence on Yuri.

So, Victor.  This guy is in a class by himself.  The animators obviously invested a lot of time in his movements.  You can see why he leads the field even at 27.

Also, the creators had the nerve, the audacity, the unmitigated gall to compose an original opera aria for a cartoon.  That was my next indicator that this was more than a cutesy figure skating anime.  

The song really is beautiful, too.  Probably my favorite in the soundtrack.

Who’s the last IRL skater to win 5 consecutive World Championships?  Michelle Kwan, maybe?  Who is Kwan’s male equivalent?  Back then, probably Alexei Yagudin?  May research. May not. 

Anyway, Victor is the Michelle Kwan of YOI-verse lol.

Hmm.  Here come the three brats.  Good God.  Poor Yuko and Takeshi lol.

So sweet to see Yuri’s childhood bully is his biggest fan now.

Sooo, Yuko’s triplets secretly record Yuri’s private performance, post it online (sometime before April 10, when Victor shows up), and things progress rather quickly from there...

Or do they?  It appeared to me that Yuri caught up with Yuko at the rink the same day he returned home.  Did he skate Victor’s routine for her that day, as well, or did it happen later?  Perhaps the triplets waited a few weeks to post the video, or else it took a few weeks to go viral.  Did Yuri turn off his phone for *weeks* to avoid the world?

Maybe he got home on March 30 and then the whole month of April just went to hell for him?  The possibilities...

LOL, I’m so SO mad the title of the video is “Katsuki Yuri TRIED to Skate Victor’s FS Program”. Those brats.

This might be the most unattractive Victor’s ever looked.  Severe close-ups aren’t flattering on anyone.  Welp, down the rabbit hole now.  

So, in the next scene it snows in April which doesn’t stop anyone from stripping naked to bathe in a hot spring, apparently.  Or it just doesn’t stop Victor.

#moneyshot

I like this ending theme much better.  It’s a head-bopper.  The Instagram reel kills me.  

Thanks to anyone who took the time to read through this stream of consciousness!  No idea how long it may take me to get through the rest.  I tip my hat to those who regularly and passionately participate in fandom.  It’s a lot of work!

[writingblankspaces]

Super-Liked 

Baekyeol

PG

Chanyeol accidentally Super-Likes Baekhyun via dropping his phone on his face.

Ever since Sehun had convinced Chanyeol to make a tinder profile, his face became acquainted with having a phone dropped on it in the dead of the night when Chanyeol stayed up swiping through people.

Chanyeol, however, wasn’t a quick learner and on a particular night, he found himself interested in this one guy’s profile. In fact, he stared at his pictures for nearly ten minutes before he moved to swipe left because the guy looked too far out his league.

As Chanyeol moved his finger, his phone fell from his hands and onto his face. When he opened his eyes, he saw the match screen, along with a blue star in the middle, signifying that not only had he dropped his phone on his face, but he’d also super-liked the Baekhyun guy on accident.

He debated going and unmatching to save himself some face, but when he didn’t get a message in the five minutes Chanyeol stared at the match in disbelief, he figured that maybe Baekhyun would just ghost him and he wouldn’t have to bother unmatching.

Despite how levelheaded he was when he came to that decision, his heart skipped in his chest, and his stomach lurched.

Why would someone like Baekhyun be interested and swipe right on him? The guy seemed entirely too intellectual and gorgeous even to want to be bothered with someone as tall, lanky and corny as himself.

After all, his profile consisted of nothing but a list of his hobbies and a few dad jokes here and there, whereas Baekhyun’s spoke about how he desired to find a person to have deep and meaningful conversations with, especially with things involving space and cats.

The most Chanyeol knew about space were limited to what was in the Star Wars movies.

It took nearly twenty minutes of candy crush and a few deep breaths before he was able to calm himself down to go to bed. When he rolled over to go to sleep, he failed to see his screen light up with a notification.

Instead, he saw it in the morning, and just the thought of Baekhyun messaging Chanyeol first sent his nerves into overdrive the rest of the day. He kept messing up cords and blanking out on his guitar students, dropping pieces of pasta off his fork at lunch, and he’d walked into about three walls before the day was finished.

Only when he was back home, vacantly staring at the TV as some stupid reality show came on, did he fish out his phone and open the app to read the actual message.

Wow, a super like? I’m flattered ~_~ Am I that cute?

His fingers hovered over the screen, and he debated what to type, trying to come up with something witty, yet also showcase his very corny personality, which Chanyeol considered to be one of his best traits.

Finally, he thought of a passable reply and sent it, gritting his teeth the entire time because the whole situation was more than shooting his shot. No, he was shooting the ball from half court and could only hope that it at least grazed the hoop or backboard.

Would you be mad if I told you that the super-like was an accident, but that yes, you *are* that cute?

After he finished typing and sent the message, he threw his phone on the couch and jumped up from his seat, immediately pacing the room.

Would his flattery actually get him somewhere or would Baekhyun think he was boring?

A few moments later, his phone lit up with another notification.

Well, I’m not mad, but I’m glad we matched. You’re not bad yourself. Not to be too forward, but are you looking for a hook-up or relationship? Your profile doesn’t say anything, so I wanted to know, so I don’t ask any uncomfortable questions.

His fingers typed faster this time, and he repeatedly typed and erased various responses, eventually settling on something simple.

I’m not the best at hook-ups so I would say a relationship, but what about you? I know your profile said something about wanting someone to talk to.

Chanyeol wanted to type more, but he decided against it. That’d been enough, and if Baekhyun was interested, he’d open the conversation for more in-depth explanations.

Another notification.

Well good. I’m not the hook-up type either. How about we continue this over text? This feels so impersonal, and I like you so far.

Following the message, Baekhyun listed his number and Chanyeol copied it then saved it into his phone.

Everything was going so smoothly that Chanyeol felt the hair on the back of his neck stand because it was too smooth.

Too perfect to be true. Something had to give.

Growing up, kids made fun of him for various reasons whether it’d been his weight, his unexplainable love for ferrets or his large ears that he never quite grew into. As a result, he was always on guard and uneasy when things went too smoothly, especially a potential romantic relationship.

It wouldn’t be the first time he’d made that mistake, and for his own sake, he’d like to keep it from happening again if possible.

Chanyeol pressed the message button and thought about what to type before he sent a message to the number.

You’re not going to pop out my closet and tell me I’m being punked or anything will you?

For a moment, the typing bubble came up on the screen, and Chanyeol waited, and his stomach tossed.

No, unless you want me to hide in your closet and scare you. It sounds like fun, but definitely not ideal for a first date.

A date? Baekhyun wanted to go on a date? Date him?

The thought sent Chanyeol’s nerves into overdrive, and he stuck the tip of his thumb into his mouth, chewing the nail.

He went on like that for nearly ten minutes until his phone dinged again with more messages from Baekhyun.

Chanyeol?

Still there?

Chanyeol’s heart sped up when more typing bubbles appeared on the screen, then disappeared half a dozen times before the screen of his phone finally dimmed, then went to sleep. The entire time Chanyeol stared at it, finally looking away when he heard a knock at his door.

“Why do you look surprised? We made plans to chill yesterday,” Sehun commented after he gave Chanyeol a once-over. When he didn’t receive a reaction, he slipped off his shoes and pushed past Chanyeol, claiming his usual spot on the man’s couch.

“Sorry, I’ve just been um preoccupied, I forgot,” Chanyeol finally answered, his voice flat as he eyed his dark phone screen. Sehun’s eyebrows quirked, interested as he reached for it, quickly typing Chanyeol’s password and eyeing the exchange with Baekhyun.

If it’d been anyone else, Chanyeol would’ve had a problem at the blatant disregard of his privacy, but since it was Sehun, Chanyeol didn’t even blink. Instead, he just hunched his shoulders and sunk deeper into the couch.

“He seems really into you. Why are you ignoring him?”

“I just don’t know how to reply. What if he’s like, pretending to be into me? He’s way too hot for me,” Sehun put Chanyeol’s phone down and patted his friend on the shoulder with a sad smile on his face.

“There so no such thing as ‘too hot’ for you. We both know you’re a catch and anyone would be lucky to even breathe the same air as you. Also, if Baekhyun didn’t like you, he wouldn’t be wasting his time. This isn’t high school anymore.” The words got a small nod from Chanyeol, and he unlocked his phone again, his fingers hovering over the keyboard as he thought about what to type back.

Yeah, I’m here, just had to run a quick errand.

Sure he was lying, but it was way too early in their interactions for Chanyeol to disclose the recurring downward plunges in his self-esteem. He’d save that for the third date, thank you very much.

Ah okay. Sorry if I’m being too needy or impatient. But speaking of errands, I have to go to work in a bit, but I was wondering if you wanted to do dinner tomorrow night? There this new Poké place near my house and I heard it’s good.

Sure. What time?

Is 8 good? We can meet up there, or I can pick you up? Whatever is better?

“Despite what you say, you’re actually pretty good at texting,” Sehun whistled, wiggling his eyebrows at Chanyeol.

Chanyeol collected air in his cheeks and made a face at Sehun in response, which earned him a hard poke in the cheek, “stop being a coward and make it clear that you’re asking him out.”

The air rushed from Chanyeol’s mouth with a puff, and he stared down at his phone because Sehun was right.

8 sounds perfect actually. See you then~

And just like that Park Chanyeol found himself nervously buttoning his shirt in the mirror as he looked over himself one more time. It was nearly 7:45, and he needed to leave his house soon if he wanted to make it to the restaurant on time.

The moment he arrived, nearly tripping through the door, he recognized Baekhyun.

The pictures on his profile barely did him justice with his honey blonde hair and smooth skin. Chanyeol briefly thought about asking him for skin care tips but decided against it last minute.

He wanted to make a good first impression.

Chanyeol stood in front of Baekhyun for a few moments before the man looked up, recognizing him immediately.

“Ah, you’re here! How long have you been standing there?” Baekhyun sounded embarrassed, and Chanyeol made a mental note of how cute he looked as his cheeks turned a light pink.

“Not too long, but it’s alright. Should we get a table? I heard this place gets packed at dinner time,” Baekhyun nodded and stood up.

It was then that Chanyeol noticed just how much shorter Baekhyun was than him.

Cute.

To Chanyeol’s surprise, the date went well, and he and Baekhyun hit it off.

They liked the same kind of music—90’s grunge and 80’s pop—and the same TV shows. They even discovered that they’d gone to the same college, but unlike Baekhyun who’d graduated after three and half years, Chanyeol had dropped out due to disinterest.

“So, this guy tried to tell me that the 80’s wasn’t Madonna’s golden years and I couldn’t take it anymore. I just walked away from him,” Baekhyun explained, telling Chanyeol in great detail about his last Tinder date as they walked around the empty streets.

“Well I’m glad you didn’t walk away from me,” Chanyeol muttered more to himself than Baekhyun, but the man heard him anyway.

For some reason, he didn’t offer a response and only reached for Chanyeol’s hand, giving it a reassuring squeeze.

Chanyeol picked up the sentiment immediately, and a small smile graced his lips. Even though they were walking, now that Baekhyun was holding his hand, his heart was racing.

“I don’t usually hold hands on the first date, but I’ll make an exception,” as Baekhyun said the words, he realized that he’d already made plenty of exceptions for Chanyeol that night and he was about to make one more.

Chanyeol tried to be suave and said the line, “what else don’t you do on a first date?” but as he said it out loud, he immediately regretted it and wished he could shove the words back inside. Baekhyun, however, glanced up at Chanyeol, then let out a laugh that sounded like it came from the pit of his stomach.

When he finished laughing, he stopped walking, “this.”. Chanyeol also stopped, and he looked at the shorter man in confusion. Without warning, Baekhyun rocked forward and place a soft peck on Chanyeol’s lips.

As he pulled away, he took in Chanyeol’s reaction and immediately started to freak out. Chanyeol’s expression looked akin to a short-circuited robot. Only after Baekhyun waved a hand in front of his face did he finally blink.

“I’m so sorry, I should’ve asked first, I—” Baekhyun went to ramble on, but Chanyeol stopped him by holding up his hand. There was a sheepish smile stretched across his lips and a light flush across his cheeks, “no it’s okay Baekhyun. I liked it. It’s okay.”

After that, they both walked in silence for a minute before Chanyeol cleared his throat, “would it be too much if I asked for another date?” Baekhyun looked up at Chanyeol with an incredulous expression on his face.

“I was going to ask you the same actually,” Baekhyun admitted with a bright smile on his face.

Chanyeol could’ve sworn his heart stopped for a few beats.

[beepbeeprichiellc]

Closer

Summary: Richie Tozier has a layover in New York and spends it drowning himself at the bar. He is surprised when a familiar face walks in, even more surprised to find that it was the boy he had left behind long ago.

A/N: I had some extra time tonight so I thought I would dabble a little. This is my rendition to Closer by The Chainsmokers via Reddie. It's super depressing....I regret nothing.

Word Count: 1831

Masterlist

Smoke trailed from his cigarette, his hands bit into his scotch as he swirled it around the glass, watching the tornado diminish every time. The bartended spoke to him but he ignored it, instead focusing on the buzz in his head. Richie groaned, downing the remainder of his drink and gesturing for another. He hated being away from his home in LA, hated staying at shitty hotels with shitty people. There was a bitter taste that lingered in his mouth that he washed down with his alcohol begging for it to take away his anger.

There was small commotion as a group of people entered the hotel bar, the men speaking amongst themselves. Richie shook his head, practically scorning them for interrupting his pity party. He tried to phase them out, pretend that they weren’t even there but their voices carried throughout the empty room.

“I think that Janet woman form Milwaukee has a thing for you. She was practically undressing you with her eyes.” A man said, jeering with confidence. “If it were me I’d have her up in my room without a second thought.”

The group laughed, amused by the crude joke. A soft voice replied, “No, I’m okay. She’s not my type.” Richie’s head snapped up, instantly recognizing the voice. He turned to the group, eyeing them from across the room.

There on the far end sat a well-dressed man, the top two buttons of his shirt was undone, his tie hanging loosely form his neck. He was much shorter than the rest of the men, and considerable smaller but he was more beautiful that anyone in that room, including Richie himself. The DJ eyed him, taking him in.

It had been four years since he had last seen Eddie Kaspbrak. Four years since he had left for Los Angles, only leaving a note to be found that next morning. It had been a shitty thing to do but Richie was just a kid, barely 24. He had been so completely head over heels for that boy and knew if he waited any longer he would have missed his chance for the career he had dreamed of. So he left him without a goodbye and now all Richie dreamed of was the small boy who he had loved, lost in Derry, Maine.

Eddie’s eyes met his and the DJ could feel his blood run cold. The smaller man cringed, still nodding at the conversation around him. Richie turned back to his scotch, feeling his heart pound in his ears. “Fuck.” He muttered under his breath, taking a long drink form the liquor.

“I need a gin and tonic” The familiar voice announced from beside him. Richie looked over, noticing Eddie standing a few feet from him, speaking to the bartender who smiled and nodded. Eddie ignored him, pulling out his wallet and paying for the drink.

“Oh my stars, is that Eddie Kaspbrak?” The former trashmouth found himself speaking before his mind could catch itself. The pitiful southern accent caused them both to flinch.

“Yeah it is.” Eddie replied coldly. Richie opened his mouth to speak only to be cut off by the bartender as he handed him his drink. “Thanks, keep the change.”

“How’ve ya been?” Richie asked, forcing himself to smile. “It’s been a long time huh?”

“Sure.” He replied, taking a sip of his toxic drink. “Excuse me.” He muttered, turning back and heading over to the group.

Richie shivered at the cold shoulder Eddie had given him, practically icing him out of existence. He watched the man leave, smiling at his friends as if the interaction between them had never happened. There was a gnaw in the DJs chest, an underlining emotion fighting to break through. With a boast of confidence and an extra shot of liquor, Riche stood up and made his way over to the table, putting on his best smile.

The others in the group instantly recognized him, practically fawning over him. “Oh my god, your Richie Tozier!” One of the other men cooed, “I listen to you every day!”

“Well thanks for keeping my pockets fat and my belly full.” Richie joked, earning a laugh form everyone except the smallest man. “I just wanted to pay my regards to my old friend Eddie here, haven’t seen him in what? Four years?”

“You know Rich ‘Records’ Tozier? Why in the hell didn’t you tell us? He is fucking famous!”

Eddie huffed, throwing daggers in Richie’s direction. Grinding his teeth he replied, “I guess I forgot.” There was a pause as he took a drink, letting the glass linger at his lips. “That was a long time ago.”

“Still, I mean this guy is a legend. He’s broadcasted all over the United States! I heard he slept with Madonna!” One of the other men bellowed, stars dancing in his eyes. “Madonna Eddie! I’d give my left nut just to talk to her.”

Eddie flinched, recoiling at the man’s statement. Richie cleared his throat, feeling his head spin from his intoxication. “All false allegations. That guy in the sex tape doesn’t even look like me.” The DJ replied, smirking. “Although I practically did give my right nut for Winona Ryder.”

The men laughed and Eddie rolled his eyes, shaking his head in disgust. “Hey man, sit with us. We will buy you a drink.” One of the stars struck men practically begged, pulling out one of the chairs. Eddie narrowed his eyes, his lip curling up in anger.

“Don’t mind if I do.” Richie replied, winking at the angered man.

“I need a stronger drink.” Eddie grumbled, standing from the table.

“Oh grab me a whisky sour will you Eds?” The DJ called, the old nickname sliding off the tip of his tongue effortlessly. Eddie recoiled, muttering something under his breath as he walked towards the bar. Richie’s focus returned to the men who lived and breathed for his every word. Smiling he said, “So the thing about Winona Ryder is-“

The men staggered as the left, unable to hold anymore liquor. A cab was called and they pushed their numbers onto Richie, pleading for him to call them if he ever came back into town. He accepted the gesture, stuffing the paper into his pocket, knowing that he would only toss them when he got back to his room. Everyone left, well everyone except Eddie.

The Kaspbrak kid held his own, able to keep his head level no matter how many drinks he downed. Richie was somewhat proud, in the olden days Eddie would have been gone just like the rest of those suburban men but now it looked as if he could drink the older trashmouth under the table.

Richie strolled back into the bar, noticing the smaller man nursing a new scotch. He swallowed the lump in his throat and sat back down, smirking. “Tell your friends it was nice to meet them but I hope I never see them again.”

Eddie scoffed, not looking up. “You didn’t have to do that you know?”

“Do what?”

“Barge your way into my life, you could have just let me enjoy a night out with friends.” Richie felt his heart twist in his chest as Eddie took a drink, hissing at the burn in his throat. “It’s been too long and I’ve come too far for you to pull shit like that.”

The DJ licked his lips, leaning back into his chair. “I wanted to talk to you but I knew you wouldn’t give me the time of day unless I took advantage of your friends.”

“They ate you up.” Eddie bit, “Just like everyone else. Richie ‘Records’ Tozier, American treasure my ass.” There was a mocking tone in his voice, sneering the words in the other man’s directions. “Screw you.”

Richie sighed, running his hands through his well-groomed hair. “I’m sorry about what I did okay? I was just a kid and-“

“Oh, shove it up your ass Tozier.” He barked, dropping his empty glass onto the table with a harsh clang. “Save your lying and jokes for your radio show, that shit doesn’t work on me anymore.”

“It never really did.” Richie corrected, ignoring the ping of guilt in his chest. “You always saw right through me.”

“Not when it counted.” Eddie muttered, shaking his head. “Never when it counted.”

There was a lingering silence between them, their past like venom in the air. The bartender called last call, shutting off the lights in the back. Richie looked at his old lover, taking in the way he had aged over their time away. He had lost his boyish charm, growling into his face and maturing his features. He was still so utterly perfect that it made Richie sick.

Richie took in a long breath, settling his nerves. “I did love you, you know.”

“Don’t even-“

“I have never loved anyone like I loved you Eds. Never.” Eddie remained silent, closing his eyes and rubbing the bridge of his nose. Richie couldn’t take it so his mouth continued to vomit his feelings. “I was so stupid to leave, I should’ve talk to you, told you about the job offer but I-I didn’t want you to uproot for me so I just left and I’msofuckingsorry.” He managed to choke at the end.

Eddie looked up at him, frowning at the tears that had fell from the DJ’s face. Slowly he reached across the table, erasing the water with his thumb. Riche’s breath hitched at the tenderness in the action, feeling his lingering touch against his skin. “Do you have a room here?” He asked, gesturing to the front lobby. “We can go up there and talk.”

Richie nodded.

The sun beamed into the room, spilling across Richie’s face. He groaned loudly, rolling over to snuggle the other side of the bed. His hand lifted, searching for the body that had been there that night only to find it empty. “Eddie?” He called, his fingers biting into the linen. “Are you up already?”

There was no response, and a sense of fear rushed through him. He lifted his body from the bed frantically begging whatever deity that he believed in this week, praying that the small man was still there. What he found though was a note, written in fine, almost flawless handwriting.

‘It was my turn to leave.’

‘Eds.’

Richie couldn’t help the tears as they came barreling in. He sobbed, pathetically clutching the note in his hand, whimpering the man’s name. It was what he deserved but not what he wanted. He had wanted Eddie, but that ship had sailed long ago with his own note. The effect of his decision had eaten away their chance together, ending their relationship for good.

Now all that remained was a battered DJ and a lost limo driver.

All that remained was two lovers, separated by circumstance.

All that was remained was their own heartache.

All that remained was Richie and Eddie.

Tags: @decaffeinatedpostmoon @hausofnikyhausofu @lizwillstealyourgirl @longlostlove

[mirroring-mirrors]

Heathers (1989) Sentence Starters!

Dear Diary...

Real life sucks losers dry.

If you want to fuck with the eagles, you have to learn to fly.

You're beautiful!

What is your damage?

Do they even have Thanksgiving in Africa?

This wouldn't be that bizarro thing you were babbling about over the phone last night, would it?

Hey, I'm really sorry I couldn't make it to your birthday party last month.

Think I'd probably miss my own birthday for a date.

I was looking around the other day and I dug up.. these old photographs.

I was talking to somebody.

Check this out. You win five million dollars from the Publisher's Sweepstakes, and the same day that what’s-his-face gives you the check, aliens land on the earth and say they're going to blow up the world in two days. What do you do?

Why can't we talk to different kinds of people?

Fuck me gently with a chainsaw.

Do I look like Mother Theresa?

Does it not bother you that everybody in this school thinks that you're a piranha?

What are you gonna do with the money?

I'd pay Madonna a million bucks to sit on my face and have her ride like the Kentucky derby..

That's gotta be the most spooky-assed question I ever heard.

You wanted to be a member of the most powerful clique in school. If I wasn't already the head of it, I'd want the same thing.

You used to have a sense of humour.

You know, maybe you should see a doctor.

God, _____, drool much?

Greetings and salutations. 

There are no stupid questions.

That's the stupidest question I've ever heard.

Let's kick his ass!

We're too old for that kinda crap.

You gonna eat this?

What'd you say, dickhead?

Can you bleach out urine stains?

I thought you had given up on high school guys.

Did you have a brain tumour for breakfast? 

So, tonight's the night. Are you excited?

You blow it tonight, and it's "keggers with kids" all next year.

So, what was the first week of spring vacation withdrawal like?

Hey kid, isn't the prom coming up?

I gotta motor if I want to be ready for that party tonight.

Are you gonna pull a super-chug with that?

If you're nice, I'll let you buy me a slushie.

I see you know your convenience-speak pretty well.

That thing you pulled in the caf today was pretty severe.

Yeah well, the extreme always seems to make an impression.

Did you say a cherry or coke slushie?

Is your life perfect?

I don't really like my friends.

Maybe it's time to take a vacation.

I want to kill, and you have to believe it's for more than just selfish reasons

So, when you go to college, what subjects do you think you'll study?

How's my little cheerleader, huh? 

Come on, now look, I don't feel so good, okay?

Hey, let's do it on the coats, it'll be excellent, huh?

You know, I have a little prepared speech for my suitor when he wants more than I'm prepared to give him.

Save the speeches for Malcolm X. 

You don't deserve my fucking speech.

I sound like a fucking psycho!

You stupid fuck!

You goddamn bitch!

You were nothing before you met me.

Lick it up, baby. Lick.. it.. up..!

Monday morning, you're history.

I'll tell everyone about tonight. 

Dreadful etiquette, I apologise.

I saw the croquet set-up in the back. You up for a match?

Thank you, that was my first game of strip croquet.  

I use my grand IQ to decide what colour gloss to wear, and how to hit three keggers before curfew.

I say we just grow up, be adults and die. 

I'm a no-rust-build-up man, myself.

Don't be a dick. 

I think last night we both said a lot of stuff we didn't mean.

How the hell didcha get in here?

What did you do, put a phlegm globber in it or something?

I'm not gonna drink that piss.

Grow up!

You think I'll drink it just because you call me chicken? 

Just give me the cup, jerk. 

I just killed my best friend.

What're we gonna tell the cops?

I can't believe this is my life.

I'm gonna have to send my SAT scores to San Quentin instead of Stanford.

At least you got whatcha wanted, y'know?

It is one thing to want somebody out of your life, it is another thing to serve them a wake-up cup full of liquid drainer.

We did a murder, and that's a crime

You might think what I've done is shocking -

People think that just because you're beautiful and popular, life is easy and  fun.

I die knowing no-one knew the real me.

Have you done this before?

Keep things business as usual.

We must revel in this revealing moment. 

You call me when the shuttle lands.

Where's your urge to purge?

Sorry to hear about your friend. 

Let's talk emotions.

Are we going to be tested on this?

How many networks did you run to?

What're you talking about? You hated her, she hated you.

Gosh, pop, I almost forgot to introduce my girlfriend.

Goddamn will somebody tell me why I smoke these damn things?

I gotta motor if I want to be ready for that funeral.

Jesus, God in Heaven, why didcha kill such hot snatch? 

Jeez, people are so serious.

Hi, I'm sorry. 

I just want my high school to be a nice place. 

Did that sound bitchy?

So, we on tonight, man, or what?

That pudwacker just stepped on my foot.

When I get that feeling, I need sexual healing.

Sorry, I'm feeling a little superior tonight.  

Seven schools in seven states, and the only thing different is my locker combination.

Our love is God.

Let's go get a slushie.

The funeral yesterday must really have been rough, eh?

It's more tasteful than it sounds.

I left them drunk and flailing in cow shit.

No, don't shut up, I'd like to know exactly what I did.

Yeah, I didn't expect to be calling either, I just guess my emotions took over...

I was wondering if you wanted all those things you've been saying to really happen?

It's always been a fantasy of mine to have two guys at once. 

Listen, my Bonnie and Clyde days are over.

Do you take German?

Tell me the similarity is not incredible.

The joy we shared in each others arms was greater than any touch down, yet we were forced to live the lives of sexist, beer guzzling jock assholes.

I mean, if you don't have a brewski in your hand you might as well be wearing a dress.

So, should I just whip it out, or...?

I was kind of hoping you could rip my clothes off me, sport?

Did you miss him completely?

Hey, I heard something out there, I'm checking it out.

Does this answer your question?

You believed it, because you wanted to believe it.  

Your true feelings were to gross and icky for you to face.

I did not want them dead!

My teen angst bullshit has a body count.

Are we going to prom or to hell?

I've seen a lot of bullshit. 

Is this as good for you as it is for me?

I need a copy of all this by Monday for my Princeton application.

It was chaos, fucking chaos.

Chaos is great!  

Chaos is what killed the dinosaurs, darling.

We scare people into not being assholes!

God, you can be so immature!

Hey, they're playing our song!

That's it! We're breaking up!

You can't bring them back, you must know that.

I am not trying to bring anybody back, except maybe myself.

And to think there was a time when I actually thought you were cool!

Blow up a couple of toasters or something.

Kind of scary though that everybody has got a little story to tell. 

What is this? Blackmail?

I'll ask you to do me a favour, it'll be one you'll enjoy.

Don't you start getting cocky on me now.

Do you know I'm still a virgin?

Nice guys finish last. I should know.

Are you telling me this is not a time for troubled youth?

I don't patronise bunny rabbits!

I guess I picked the wrong time to be a human being.

You were out of control!

Hey babe, I need a name.

God has cursed me, I think.

What are you trying to do? Kill me?

That's about the least private thing I can think of.

If everyone jumped off a bridge, would you?

If you're happy every day of your life, you wouldn't be a human being, you'd be a game show host.

What do you say we knock off early and buy some shoes or something lame like that?

People love me!

People love you, but I know you. 

Some people need different kinds of convincing than others.

Don't talk to me like that, OK?

Jealous much?

Why are you such a mega bitch?

Want to go out tonight? Catch a movie, you know, some miniature golf?

I knew you'd be back... I knew it.

You were wrong, and I was right!                

You've been depressed lately. 

Get off of my bed, you fucking psycho! 

Do you think you're a rebel? Do you actually think you're a rebel?

You're not a rebel, you're a fucking psychotic!

What do you think I'm gonna do with it? Take out their tonsils?

I've got a meaningful marked-up Moby Dick, what else does a suicide need? 

Is this turning out weak, or what?

My afterlife is so boring.

If I have to sing Kumbaya one more time...

I loved you! Sure, I was coming up here to kill you...

Our burning bodies will be the ultimate protest to a society that degrades us. 

Talk about your suicide pacts, eh?

What do they want, a written invitation?

Whether to kill yourself or not is the most important decisions a teenager can make.

Put your hands on your head.

Do you think that just because you started this thing you can end it?

I'll kill you, I'll fucking kill you, I swear to God!

How do I turn off the goddamn bomb, asshole?

You want a clean slate as much as I do. 

The only place where different social types genuinely can get along with each other is in heaven.

Do you know what I'd love, babe? Cool guys like you out of my life.

You've got power... Power I didn't think you had.

Now that you're dead, what are you gonna do with your life?

You look like hell!

My date for the prom kind of flaked out on me...

I was wondering, if you aren't doing anything, maybe we could rent some new releases? Pop some popcorn?

[sportsanimebreakdown]

Breakdown: Initial D

Okay a lot of new fans of the genre will find this a weird one. Not because of the cars (which are aMAZing) or the character designs (which are not) but because the series -along with its ridiculous eurobeat soundtrack- is practically legendary. The memes make themselves. But even the memes are done with good humor because, to be optimistic, I’d say that the fans are very whole-heartedly enthusiastic. (In a pessimistic way, I’d say that the story reinforces a lot of ideas of gender roles and the fantasy of an effortless traditional masculinity and its dual, serving femininity.)

But I digress. Let’s get into the breakdown. 

SPOILER FREE ZONE

Initial D: manga 1995-2013 by Shuichi Shigeno, 5 season of episodes alongside at least 4 movies and three OVAs, it’s a big one.

Tropes: Undiscovered Genius, Unbeatable Hero, Technical Sport, Cardboard Women, Teaming Up With Rival

Not-Your-Wikipedia-Summary: Fujiwara Takumi is a kid who’s been doing the deliveries for his dad’s tofu company (illegally) since middle school. Flying through the mountain pass in the wee hours of the morning, he’s developed, unbeknownst to him (though known to his ex-racer father), a killer instinct and technique for mountain pass racing (touge racing). When he trips into the racing scene by defeating one bigshot after another, it leaves everyone watching shook. He’s in for the long haul now, whether he likes it or not.

TL;DR Review: First off, I’d say if you want to get into this series, watch the three “Mugen” (Legendary) movies that have just recently been made because they go back and cover the battles and key plot points of the first few seasons of the series. Why would you do this instead of watching the actual seasons? Because they look like this-

It’s pretty bad. And you haven’t even heard the earworm beats they put this to. Just youtube it, dudes. 

It gets better as the seasons go on, and I have to admit that there’s a certain “it’s so bad it’s good” quality about the first season, but yeah if you’re used to the quality of modern anime, definitely watch the movies. 

That said, the story holds up well. Maybe it’s because ‘undiscovered genius’ is a catnip trope of mine, but I think it’s still a lot of fun. Unlike a lot of other sports in the genre, racing is a one-man sport so it’s much closer, pacing and story-wise, to something like Hajime no Ippo rather than a team-based story like Haikyuu or Slam Dunk. But, unlike in boxing, Takumi can team up with his rivals, as he does in the later seasons when he joins an expeditionary team. 

The female characters, as I’ll get into later, are terribly written. This is one of those series where I skip all the parts where there’s a female onscreen, because they’re so problematic (emotionally weak, bad drivers, two-dimensional, only there to be a sexual/romantic target for a male character) that I’d rather skip them then cringe through them. Like ewoks in Star Wars, I’d rather just pretend they don’t exist than have that shit shoved in my face.

So yeah. Fun story, great races, it’s a classic. Like the Great British Baking Show, it’ll get you seriously into shit that you may never have thought you’d get into.

I’d like to think that’s the first time Initial D has been compared to the GBBO on the internet, and I want some credit for that, thank you.

PS: I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention how huge an impact this series has had on the street-racing and rally-racing scene, by the way. I’ve only heard about the tip of the iceberg, but this series has gotten a shitton of people interested in drift racing and the AE86, Takumi’s car model. Drifting is a thing in large part due to this series. Which I FUCKING LOVE cuz it shows the power of comics. 

Objective Score: 6/10 and all of those points are for how awesome the races are. The character development exists insofar as each character has a trope that they represent and stick to, but it’s really just the backdrop for a whole lot of car nerddom and awesome racing.

Personal Score: 8/10 Excepting the ewoks, it will and always will be one of my favs. It helped get me into driving and cars in my teens and earned a spot in one of my top ten by that merit alone.

 SPOILER ZONE

Full Thoughts: OKAY. I’ve loved this series for so long that it’s hard to feel that glow again, but I thought that since I’d gone back to watch it again (in between drawing pages and needing a break for the goddamn stress injury in my drawing hand) I might as well do a breakdown.

First off, can we give HUGE PROPS to Shuichi-sensei who somehow manages to make weird-shaped boxes zipping around corners LOOK DYNAMIC? Like how the fuck did he do that srsly

...haha for a moment there you thought I hadn’t actually analyzed it yet. Well joke’s on you cuz oF COURSE I HAVE. It’s actually not super complicated: Japanese sound effects, being one or two-characters long, means that they can be used more easily as visual onomatopoeia for the texture of the sound it’s conveying. He uses that a lot. Then there’s the motion lines and an ability to draw any fucking car from any angle and BOOM there you have it. 

But on the flip side, his characters look like this so.... win some, lose some. 

 In regards to the issues with the women I discussed earlier... well. I can count on one hand with a pinky still left over how many actual female characters who last more than a wink-and-a-nod there are. There’s so few, I can tell you exactly who they are: first is the highschool popular girl who has a crush on Takumi for some strange reason we never discover (and who has Drama because she had a sugar daddy for a long time). Then there are the two-women-who-count-as-one-driver (???) driving team who take on Takumi early on. One of them has Relationship Drama with Takumi’s friend, and the other (an intimidatingly Mature Woman) starts crushing on/hitting on Takumi, providing us with the typical madonna/whore dynamic with Takumi’s crush that Japanese media seems to require even more than American. AND THEN we have the shit cherry on the shit cake, a female driver in the later season who’s actually talented (heyhey!) but OH WAIT she has insta-crush for Keisuke, Takumi’s rival and team partner, and she is now Emotionally Compromised for racing and.... also a total stalker and weirdo and if I hear her say ‘Darling’ one more time to a man who has no interest in her, I’m gonna report her to some sort of HR.  EDIT: OH WAIT I forgot there’s two chicks who exist to be relationship bait for Takumi’s loser friend. One of them lasts like 3 whole episodes.

And that’s it! In probably the only sport where it’s impossible to have any kind of gender-based advantage or separation (such as in school sports, where there are girls’ teams and boys’ teams) there are only FOUR WOMEN in the entire series, and of those women only two of them actually drive. 

It’s frustrating how common this is, and how it goes by so unquestioned. I mean, it wouldn’t be hyperbole to say that this series changed the sport it’s about. It popularized drifting, probably got a lot of young men traffic tickets, and got me into buying a junker to tear apart with my dad while he pointed at all the parts and taught me what they did. 

What else could it have done? What seriously badass female drivers would we have if the author had just not let his misogyny get in the way? “But that’s what the racing is like, man!” someone in the back yells. To which I reply: Shuichi is a STORYTELLER. If he’s big in the racing scene and looks around and says “huh not many women here” it should be in his creative best interest to ask “well what if there were?” Storytellers are here to envision what the world could be, not to enforce the prejudiced systems that are already in place. If he can imagine a 17-year-old kid being able to beat a gazillion 30-somethings at drift racing with no formal driving education, then he can damn well imagine a talented driver with tits who doesn’t exist solely for the sake of sexual interest. 

But as they say... if you want something done, you gotta get it the fuck done yourself. 

[magicianparrish]

Shit I forgot about in the Raven Boys

 I’m doing a re-read of The Raven Cycle because the first time around I read them so fast I apparently don’t remember shite about what happened. Or my memory is just that bad; possibly both. So just little things that were pointed out to me by my brain during my re-read. Will do for the others too eventually when I feel like it. 

Aglionby has a hunting club. Hound dogs, horses and all.  Fucking horses. Just how pretentious can one all boys boarding school get like smh 

The book takes place in April. I don’t know why I just assumed it was like June or something. I need to pay attention to dates more

Blue wears fingerless gloves that she knitted. God, no wonder Henry likes her so much, like that look is Madonna af 

Gansey has a frappuccino-stained notebook in his backseat. You know what that meanssss 

He’s also messy as fuck. Like god damn son do you have no shame?

Adam and Ronan dragged each other on dollys with Ronan’s BMW like those kids do give and shits about their safety 

Adam asks if he’s invited when they go somewhere. Someone protect this child 

When the Pig started up again, the Stevie Nicks song Gansey describes is called Edge of Seventeen. Perfect. 

Adam has shitty handwriting! 

300 Fox Way’s phone number is often mistaken for a gentleman escort company, like whatt 

Declan is a senior at Aglionby. Does that make him and Ronan like Irish twins or something? I need answers 

Ashley knows shit about Welsh history, like girl’s smart yo 

Noah fucking says he’s been dead for seven years the first time we meet him! Why the fuck did I not take that into consideration ever the first time around??? 

JEsus christ the Lynch brothers can fucking throw down in the parking lot breaking each other's faces and Declan’s worried about his car getting damaged like god you idiots 

Blue and Adam are so cute like that little talk they have outside of Nino’s is pure I love them 

Blue snooped through The Journal and found it very interesting

Also Gansey’s thoughts are scattered as hell like how does one even begin to understand that

And he doodles! Gansey is a fucking doodler  

Gansey is blind as a fucking bat. Jesus christ my man 

He also curses a lot more than I thought/remembered? Just a general note

Gansey is on the rowing team. Arm muscles like damn 

Ronan is secretly soft and loves animals and Celtic music what an Irish lad 

Ronan can grow a beard like overnight meanwhile Gansey can’t for the life of him and I think that’s hilarious and so does Ronan

Noah’s catchphrase: Don’t throw it away. I SEE YOU FORESHADOW 

Adam fucking sent Blue a carnation and baby’s breath like CHILD YOU ARE TOO CUTE

Calla works at Aglionby (as what thoooo) 

Adam decided to go to Aglionby because of a Ronan (or doppelganger of Ronan) at the grocery store 

Gansey shouted into an open field “ARE YOU LISTENING GLENDOWER, I AM COMING TO FIND YOU!” like what is this a dramatic and weird version of that scene of Maria in the open field singing “The Hills Are Alive” from the Sound of Music with her arms open and twirling because that is what I picture tbh 

Adam and Blue hold hands how cute

Noah owned a red Mustang and had a Blink-182 bumper sticker 

Gansey and Blue went on a little excursion together this was the start of their romance why didn’t I see it before? I might as well be blind as Gansey

Together they are Dick and Jane and that made me laugh the first time, and it shall make me laugh again 

Gansey confessed his Tragic Backstory of how he died via swarm of bees these two losers trust each other and they’ve know each other for what? Five days?

Gansey fidgets! While talking on the phone in the Vanilla car or whatever the fuck it is, he ran his cards over the steering wheel, stuck a card into the vent to see how far it would go, spun the knob on the window crank

Gansey almost fucking died from getting shot by Whelk and broke his thumb in the process

Adam keeps his change in a cereal box with a Transformer on it

Maura and Blue read together on Blue’s bed that’s so cute

Also Whelk got trampled by some weird Cabeswater animals because Adam wouldn’t let him into the pentagram for protection 

METAL AF 

These idiots dug up Noah’s grave to put him on the ley line. FRIEND GOALS AF. Breaking the law for friendship of their dead ghost friend