#managed to read (and understand?) macbeth last week

[bothsidesnow2000]

*pretends i’m meg ryan in you’ve got mail by getting books from the library and sitting in the sun reading with a cup of coffee from starbucks*

[fangirlingfromdownunder]

A Sweet Mishap - Chapter 23

Pairing - Jensen Ackles x Reader 

A/N: I just want to start by thanking everyone for all the love on this story so far. Let me know if you want to be added to the tag list. This chapter is a little heavier (as is the story going forward, but I'll include potential triggers for each chapter as relevant), so please read the TW below and only read on if you feel comfortable doing so.

Potential Trigger Warnings: none

A Sweet Mishap Masterlist | Main Masterlist

─── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ ───

The next few weeks pass by in a whirlwind. Jensen successfully persuades a New York-based production company to hire Mamma Jo’s to cater for their set. Each order is massive, requiring everyone to work a little later to cover the enhanced workload but it provides a steady income that almost entirely covers the rent, even with the added fuel costs for deliveries and the increased salaries. He asks me to officially take on the management position, this time with a pay rise. The added workload makes it harder to keep up with my studies, but the pay rise allows me to comfortably cover my bills for the apartment and help Anna so it’s worth it.

My contact with Jensen falls back to sporadic texts when I’m on break or on the subway but he constantly reassures me that he understands and is busy himself, while also slipping in warnings to look after myself and not burn myself out.

Before I know it, it’s opening night for Grease. I get to the theatre early for final rehearsals, hair, makeup and wardrobe fittings. My first costume consists of a simple white shirt, flowing green skirt and pumps, completed with a cream cardigan. Being in the ensemble, Alyson and I do each other’s makeup, a simple base with a touch of sparkle. I complete the look by styling my hair into a retro pinup bun. My job is just to fit in with the other ladies in the scene, but there’s no harm in trying to look my best. 

The wardrobe and hair and makeup department give us a once over, spraying obnoxious amounts of setting spray and hairspray over us as they give us the seal of approval to wait in the wings. We find a tiny crack in the curtains and peak through with excitement and trepidation as we watch the seats fill. While it’s not the largest theatre in New York, it’s by far the biggest I’ve ever performed in. Up until tonight my biggest performance was in a tiny production of Macbeth that I did as part of an assessment for a Performance and Skills class last year in the college’s teaching theatre with just a few other students and professors for an audience. The jump from an approximate 30-top audience to upwards of 1,000 has me sweating. I look over my shoulder and notice that Alyson is fairing no better. I reach for her hand and squeeze, and all of a sudden I’m glad I’m not the lead. As the lights dim and the overture starts playing, I feel a surge of adrenaline course through my veins.

The crowd falls silent as the leads, Mary and Jake, take to the stage fully in character laughing and giggling as ocean sounds fill the theatre. Despite my raging nerves, I just enjoy their performance from the wing. As the lighting changes and the crew seamlessly transform the beach into Rydell High I squeeze Alyson’s hand tighter. Once I hear the school lunch bell trill, us and the rest of the enemble enter the stage and perch on the lunch table and pretend to laugh and talk as the pink ladies and Sandy fill the table front and centre. 

The first act passes in a blur of music, dance, and dialogue. Every step, every word, every note is executed with precision, my heart pounding in time with the rhythm of the performance. As the final notes of the first act fade away and everyone clears the stage back to the dressing room for the intermission, I can't help but feel a sense of pride wash over me. Eventhough I know no one was focusing on me or likely even noticed me in the background, it’s such an accomplishment to just be up on that stage. I know from previous experience in the audience  and my classes that every role is essential, even the background actors and ensemble. The show wouldn’t be the same without them. So, I plan to give it my best every time I walk on that stage to help the leads shine and just enjoy every second. Now that I’ve got a real taste, I know there’s no going back.

After the show, as I’m walking out of the big theatre doors along with a couple of other cast and crew members someone tackles me into a hug. It doesn’t take me more than a second to hug back with a giant smile. 

“Stella! You made it!”

“There’s no way I’d miss my best friend’s first show on broadway!” 

I notice Nick and Anna standing off to the side with a massive bouquet of roses and we move out of the walkway. “Thank you all for coming! It means so much to know you were in the crowd.”

“We’ll always be there to cheer you on,” Stella replies happily and then nods at the bouquet. Nick holds out and I take it graciously, breathing in the intoxicatingly beautiful aroma. 

“You didn’t have to do this. Just being here is enough.”

“Uh, we didn’t actually. We’re just the messengers.” She pulls out a card from the side furthest from me and holds it out.

I don’t open it straight away. I know there’s only two options of who would send something so extravagant for my debut, but I already spoke to option one before the show and they apologised for not being able to make it to the debut, but promised that they would fly out during the week. So, knowing exactly who’s name is on that card, I slip it into my bag without opening it. 

Stella doesn’t question me. She knows I am working through everything at my own pace. “I could really go for a burger right about now,” she says to change the subject.

“I definitely worked up an appetite,” I agree.

So, the four of us walk to a nearby burger joint, order and then get a booth in the back. Once we sit down I place the flowers on my lap as Stella and Nick take the seat opposite Anna and me 

“Did he say anything?” I ask Stella.

“He just asked me to pick up the bouquet and get it to you. It was all already paid for and the card was already in it. I said that he had to fight his own battles. He promised he would.” She then quietly adds, “I may have also mentioned something about castrating him if he ever hurts you again…”

“Stella!”

“What? You’ve been hurt too many times before. But I’m here now. And I’m not scared of a fake monster hunter. Plus, us girls need to stick together.” She winks at Anna and she laughs – it’s a beautiful sound that we’re only just getting to hear.

Nick pats Stella’s knee and says, “She’s a force. But you’ve helped us so much. It’s now our turn to return the favor.” He looks at Stella with a knowing smile.

She looks at him and then back at me. “I think you should read the card.”

“You read it?”

“No, but I just think you should read it.”

As I pull it out of my bag the waitress comes over with our drinks and burgers. I take a sip of my soda before opening the card.

Hey Darlin’, You were amazing up there! You truly are a star! I hope this is the first of many times I get to see you shine. - J

I look up at Stella confused and she just says, “Take the back exit.” I look down at my untouched meal. “We’ve got it. Go!”

Still in shock, I grab the bouquet and my bag and sneak out the back door. I look around and see a black Range Rover parked to one side of the alley. The windows are dark so I can’t see in. I cautiously walk up to it and then the back passenger door pops open. “Jensen?” I call out softly, still unsure.

He slides to the edge of the seat and swings his legs out the door. “I wasn’t sure you’d come.”

“Me? What are you doing here?”

“I know things between us are still complicated. But I couldn’t miss your debut.” He offers his hand but doesn’t step closer. He waits for me to make the decision.

I hesitantly step forward and take his hand. “This doesn’t-”

“I know. But, I’ve gotta be back in Vancouver by morning. My flight leaves in a couple of hours, so, can we just…”

I nod and let him lead me into the car, out of the cold night air. “Hey Clif,” I say once I get in. 

“I think I’m gonna take a lap. I’ll be back in a bit, Boss. Nice to see you again, Y/N.” He steps out of the car and disappears down the alley. 

“I can’t believe you came. And these,” I hold up the oversized bouquet, “It’s too much.”

“I know you’re not the lead, but it’s a big deal. I was gonna get the flowers regardless, but seeing how happy you were up there. Even in the background, I couldn’t take my eyes off you. You have a long career ahead of you and I just hope you’ll let me cheer you on from the sidelines, and maybe one day, front row when you’re the lead.”

“I’ve watched enough performances to know how important the ensemble is. I get to make the lead look good. And if I can do that, then maybe one day someone will be just as passionate about doing the same for me. Up on that stage…It’s like nothing I’ve ever experienced and I never wanted the show to end.”

“You keep performing like you did tonight and it may never have to. This is just the beginning for you. I know it.” I notice his eyes flick down to my lips but I tun to look through the front windscreen.

“When did you fly in?”

“Last night. But I didn’t want to throw you off before your big night. And I swear I don’t have a big ego, I was just concerned that if you knew I was here you might get stressed and overthink things. And I just wanted you to go out there and give it your all. Exactly like you did.”

“Thank you.” I let myself relax a little and lean back against the cool leather seat as I look back over at him.

He lets out a breathy chuckle and nods. “Yeah…I may kinda suck at playing it cool. But then again I did coerce your best friend into letting me play at her wedding and then used her again to orchestrate tonight, so…”

“You really should leave poor Stella out of this. You’re taking advantage of her love for Dean.” I shake my head with a smile. “No one’s ever gone to so much trouble for me. My parents didn’t even make it tonight…”

“I’m sure they wanted to-”

“Yeah, they called and they’re coming later in the week. Their reasons were sound. It’s just…”

“You’re not used to being put first? I may’ve said a lot of dumb shit in the past, but of everything I’ve said, I did mean one thing with all my heart…I’m gonna prove that you’re my number one. I don’t expect you to believe it right away. But one day you will. I don’t care how long it takes or how much work I need to put in.”

“Jensen…” I smile at him and then teasingly ask, “How much have you had to drink?”

“Just a glass of wine during the show. I’m sober enough.”

I lean over and kiss his cheek. “Thank you for tonight. For coming, for being honest, for everything.”

“Much like your broadway career, this is just the beginning.” He puts his hand on my cheek softly to guide me to meet his eyes. “I know I’ve got a lot of walls to break through and a lot to prove and make up for. And I hope you hold me accountable for all of it. Give me a high bar. I want to be who you deserve, not someone else that you settle for.”

I nod. “Okay…But, what if I don’t know how?”

“I have a feeling you’re learning. You’re starting to realise your worth. But, really, just follow your heart and your gut. You know your fears and what you don’t like.” His eyes flick back to my lips and this time I don’t turn away. Instead I give him a small nod. He leans in and kisses me softly, his lips are soft and warm against mine. I close my eyes, savoring the moment, feeling a rush of emotions swirling inside me. When he pulls back, I can see the sincerity in his gaze, the vulnerability that he's allowing me to see. “I'll be patient, Y/N. I'll wait for you. Just promise me one thing.”

“Yeah?”

“That you won't give up on us before we even have a chance to begin. I know I let you down but-”

I smile, feeling the weight of his words but also the hope that they carry, and I cut him off by pecking his lips softly. “I promise,” I say softly, “But you have to promise to talk to me too. We can’t have a repeat of that night. Especially when it all could have been so easily avoided.”

He nods, “I promise.” He pecks my lips again and then pulls me close to snuggle up in his arms. “We don’t have long and you’ve been so busy. I want to know everything.”

“Jens-”

“No arguments. We don’t have time, just talk. I just want to be close to you and listen to you. Tell me anything.”

As I tell him about the changes at the cafe, my long hours, my upcoming exams and the relentless rehearsal schedule which will now turn into daily shows, he hugs me close. He peppers soft kisses over my head and slowly drifts down to my neck as he offers intermittent hums of agreement or approval. I try not focus on his smile or hot breath against my skin and just keep talking instead.

When I stop talking he pulls away. “Was that okay? Not too much?” I shake my head. “You let me touch you when you’re talking. You’re comfortable, relaxed. Even on those first nights…I love you like that.” He pulls away abruptly when he realises what he said.

I pull him back for a quick peck. “I know what you mean. It’s okay.”

He nods. As he leans in to kiss me again, we’re startled by the front door opening. I pull back abruptly and stare at Clif. “Sorry to interrupt. I gave you as long as I could. We have to get to the airport.”

Jensen looks down at his watch, “Shit, already?”

I gather up the bouquet and my bag that dropped on the floor preparing to get out but Jensen grabs my arm. “We’ll drop you off on the way.” I go to unzip my bag to get my phone but he stops me, “They know. They’ve probably already gone home.” He takes his hand off mine, “But she’s your friend, if you want to check that’s fine.”

“It’s late, Nick would’ve forced her to sleep by now.” I see his slightly worried look at my choice of words and add, “Not in a bad way. She’d stay up all night and then sleep in and be grumpy at work. He does it for her own good. No one could truly make Stella do anything she doesn’t want to do or that she doesn’t know is in her best interests. She’s a force.”

“Yeah…She definitely seems like it,” Jensen says as Clif starts the engine. We both put our seat belts on as he pulls out of the alley. 

“Don’t worry, she won’t actually castrate you…unless you hurt me again…”

“Well, good thing I don’t plan on ever doing that again. But uh, thinking of work…Please tell me you don’t have an early start…”

“I’m used to it. Plus, I’d gladly trade a few hours sleep for the time we had tonight. I truly didn’t expect it. But what about you? It’ll be morning by the time you get back, especially with the time difference.”

“I have a late shoot tomorrow. So, don’t worry about me.” He smirks, “Actually…Maybe you can worry about me a little when I’m out there freezing my ass off in the middle of the night.”

Before long, Clif pulls up in front of my building. I don’t bother correcting them and telling them that I’ve been staying at Stella’s house. I don’t want them to go further out of their way for me, plus it would be nice to spend a night in my own bed. I undo my seatbelt and look over at Jensen with a smile. I put my free hand on the handle, but before I pull it open I turn and kiss his cheek again. “Text me when you get back? You came all the way out here for me, I want to know when you get back safe.”

“I promise.”

“Good.” I nod and jump out quickly before I hesitate any longer and make him miss his flight, or make Clif feel awkward. I stand on the sidewalk and wait until the car disappears into the distant traffic before making my way into the building.

As I step out of the cold night air, I can still feel the lingering warmth of Jensen’s touch on my cheek and his lips on mine. It brings a smile to my face as I kick off my heels and place the bouquet of roses in a vase of water on the kitchen counter. The events of the evening replay in my mind like scenes from a movie, each moment etched into my memory.

My phone buzzes with a text message, and I eagerly pick it up to see a message from Jensen: 

Thank you for an amazing night Sleep well, beautiful

I can’t help but blush at his words, feeling a rush of emotions flooding back.

Settling onto the couch, I let out a contented sigh and close my eyes, allowing myself to relive the evening once more. Despite the uncertainties and challenges ahead, there is a glimmer of hope blooming in my heart. Maybe, just maybe, this could be the start of something real and beautiful.

─── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ ───

Taglist: @stoneyggirl2 @hobby27, @n-o-p-e-never, @deansimpalababy,

@winchesterwild78, @kr804573, @chriszgirl92, @smoothdogsgirl

@speakinvain, @deans-baby-momma, @1967winchesterimpala

@lmg14, @superrey

[wingsofkpop]

Hiraeth - I.VIII: These Paths We Walk

pairing(s): Hybrid!Im Jaebeom x Reader, Witch!Mark Tuan x Reader, Werewolf!Jackson Wang x Reader, Vampire!Park Jinyoung x Reader, Supernatural!Got7 x Reader

genre: Supernatural!AU, Dark Magic!AU, heavy Angst, light Fluff, eventual Smut

warnings: Mature language, mentions of death and murder, violence, gore and blood, some satanic themes, etc. 

word count: 7,1k

synopsis: How far are you willing to go to find out the truth about Moon Dye Bay?…

chapter directory

Necromancy is a form of spiritual divination in which the executioner acts in the summoning of and communication with the lost souls of the dead. Its origins date back to the ancient Greeks, as the word necromancy is composed of Greek terms νεκρός (nekrós), "dead," and μαντεία (manteía), "divination." During the European Middle Ages, necromancy grew to be associated with black magic by traditional witches. As a result, its practice became strictly forbidden due to its disruption in the balance of nature. History recalls only one powerful witch ever held the ability to raise the dead at will—

“Still doing research for that special project?” Your mind snaps back to reality at the sudden inquiry. Tearing your gaze from the textbook, you look up to find none other than your favorite student in front of your desk. Hyunjin offers his usual crooked smile at your newfound attention and raises a questioning eyebrow. 

You can’t help but roll your eyes before answering, “You know the point of a study period is to—I don’t know—study? Preferably by yourself?”

He snickers. “I have a question that requires your extensive mastery in the literary arts, Ms. (L/N).”

“I’m sure you do.” You release a heavy sigh, not bothering to voice your annoyance at the use of your surname. Instead, you deliver Hyunjin a shake of your head before gesturing his continuance with a wave of your hand.

“I’m a little confused by the ending of The Grapes of Wrath,” Hyunjin pauses, “okay—a lot confused. I mean, why would Rose of Sharon breastfeed a stranger she literally just met? It’s weird…” 

You chuckle at his scrunched expression. “You’re right. It is pretty weird.” 

“So why’d she do it?” 

“Well, Rose of Sharon knew the stranger was starving to death,” You begin, leaning back in your chair to better hold Hyunjin’s gaze, “so you could say she wanted to give him a second chance.” 

“But why? She doesn’t even know him.” 

“Maybe not, but if you had the ability to save another person’s life—be it a stranger—wouldn’t you?” 

“But even after all her and her family went through, I don’t understand how she was able to find it in herself to do that. Especially after the loss of her baby.” 

“Humanity is a complicated, yet beautiful force, Hyunjin.” You hum gently, “Even among all the cruelty, hatred and hopelessness, it still manages to find a way to prevail—that ending is proof that against all odds, humanity will always win.”  

“I never thought about it like that…” Hyunjin shakes his head in disbelief, “Thanks, (Y/N)...” 

“It’s what I do, kiddo.” 

While the student grows silent to scribble down his realizations, you take the time to skim over your own notes—or lack-there-of, that is. 

After Youngjae agreed, albeit rather reluctantly, to assist you in your mission to return Jackson Wang to the land of the living, you spent the past few days cornering the bookstore and mausoleum’s supply of resources about raising the dead. But just your luck, every text thus far has proven to be less than helpful. According to the siphoner, necromancy is one of the more rare magical arts that is only practiced by specialized, powerful witches, which, unfortunately, also means there is limited access to such information. Neither you nor Youngjae have been able to find a spell or ritual that can guarantee Jackson’s resurrection without some kind of dire consequence. 

Who knew magic could be so complicated? 

“You know, you’ve been out for the past week…” You lift your head to meet Hyunjin’s gaze once again. “Is… Is everything okay? I don’t mean to pry, but it’s just so unlike you to miss any classes…” 

The typical university student probably wouldn’t give a damn about a missing professor, much less an absent TA. Hyunjin’s visual apparent concern spreads warmth throughout your chest—you are powerless to hold back the small smile that stretches across your lips. 

��A couple of my roommate’s friends disappeared out of the blue last week, so I just needed a few days to help her out.” You raise a playful eyebrow, “Don’t tell me you missed me?” 

“What? No way.” Hyunjin scoffs, “Though I did have to use Sparknotes for the past few reading assignments and barely passed Wednesday's quiz—” You burst into laughter, reeling your companion into the same fit only seconds later. After a brief moment, Hyunjin manages to collect his composure and finish, “—I am glad everything is okay… and that you’re back.” 

You nod with a smile. “I appreciate that.”

Aside from the daily meetings with Youngjae and nightly cry-piles with Sana, the past few days have proven to be quite uneventful. Jackson has not appeared in your bedroom since that first night, and true to your word, you haven’t told Mark about your quest for his revival. God knows what kind of Hell would break loose if that were to happen. You also haven’t visited the Prime residence since the day you caught Jaebeom with his drop dead—mind the pun—gorgeous vampire conquest. You’ve been meaning to call Jinyoung, but between your hours pilfering through useless research texts, comforting your distraught roommate and attempting to track down your M.I.A. best friend, you haven’t quite found the time. 

And though you’d never admit it to anyone, you needed some time alone—to think.

A rather obnoxious bout of laughter tears you from your thoughts, which is quickly followed by a scold from Professor Park. In an attempt to find the source, you peer past Hyunjin’s form and the sea of other students to the very back of the classroom where a group of young girls are utilizing the period as social hour. Amongst the familiar faces sits a pretty female student you don’t quite recognize, having never encountered her around campus before.

And although you can barely see her, something about her demeanor seems… off. 

“Hyunjin? Who’s that girl back there?” 

Hyunjin turns to examine the subject of interest before returning with a shrug, “According to my sister, she’s some exchange student from Taiwan. I haven’t met her, but I think Yeji said her name is Tzuyu.”

“And she transferred here this week?” 

He shakes his head. “Actually, today is the first day anyone has seen her.”

You go to inquire further, but the booming call of Professor Park announcing the end of class beats you to it. Hyunjin bids you one final thank you and a goodbye before sprinting off to meet his friends at the classroom exit. It is not until him, Professor Park and the remainder of the students are long out the door do you return to your research. However, the moment you manage to relocate your place, a sugary-sweet voice commands your attention once again:

“If I could bother you for a moment, Ms. (L/N), I need your help…” 

“Of course.” You mask your annoyance with as genuine a smile as you can muster and turn your gaze to the student. “What can I do for…” Your smile immediately falters at the sight of the young woman from earlier in front of your desk—only in this instance, you can definitely recognize her… 

It’s none other than Miss Aphrodisiac herself from the Project Estate. 

She offers a radiant smile, but the feature seems less than friendly. 

“Hello again, (Y/N). I don’t believe we properly met during our last meeting… I’m Tzuyu.” 

“Yeah, um, I-I wasn’t expecting to see you in my class…” You chuckle nervously, cautiously sliding your notes inside your book before closing the cover. “What… What are you doing here exactly?” 

“With how much the student body rants and raves about their newest teaching assistant, how could I pass up the opportunity to see you in action?” Tzuyu elegantly takes a seat on the edge of your desk before running her fingers through her flawless, auburn locks. Something about the dexterity of her fingers sends goosebumps budding across your skin. “Plus, it’s not everyday I meet one of Jaebeom’s… human companions.” 

“It’s not like that.” You insist, “Jaebeom and I barely know each other—”

“Ah. Right.” She giggles, “You’re close with the other brother. My mistake.” 

You bite your tongue, holding back the snide comment that would likely lead to the dismembering of your head from your body. Instead, you swallow what little remains of your pride, rise from your seat and ask stiffly, “You said you needed help with something?...” 

“You’ve read Macbeth, haven’t you?” Filled with both anxiety and confusion, you watch as Tzuyu takes a pencil from the container of writing tools perched on the surface of your desk. She twirls the utensil between delicate fingertips, gazing at it as if it is the most interesting object on the planet. You don’t need your gut to remind you something is most definitely off with her behavior.

“There’s this one piece of advice that Lady Macbeth tells her husband before he goes off to commit murder: ‘Your hand, your tongue: look like the innocent flower, but be the serpent under ‘t’... ” She pauses, “Tell me, Ms. (L/N)... What exactly could that mean?” 

Your blood runs cold when she fixes her dark gaze on you. No longer interested in the pencil. 

You bite the inside of your cheek, attempting to ground the frantic beating of your heart before it literally leaps from your chest and into the palms of your company. Out of instinct, you chance a quick glance at the door—you may not have a mug, but a nine-hundred page, hardcover book to the face might make a pretty good distraction. 

“Hm, I suppose you’re more of an expert with prose.” Tzuyu says, lowering the pencil into her lap before hopping to her own feet. “Let’s try a bit of Frankenstein then…” 

She begins to stalk toward you, her eyes still locked onto yours like a vice. Your body immediately shuffles backward, attempting to keep as much distance between yours forms as possible. You only get so far—your back meeting the surface of the wall behind you as Tzuyu centers herself a few mere inches away. You can feel her crisp breath on your face as she murmurs:  

“‘I have love in me the likes of which you can scarcely imagine and rage the likes of which you would not believe. If I cannot satisfy the one, then I will indulge the other’...” 

“What are you—” 

Before you can finish your thought, a searing pain paints your vision white. The agony spreads through your veins like wildfire, stealing every ounce of oxygen from your lungs and rendering your knees weak. With a trembling hand, you’re able to save your form from buckling completely to the floor—but not before catching a glimpse of the same pencil impaled in the side of your waist. 

“Poetry is much more tasteful, in my opinion.” Tzuyu sighs, licking the blood from her nails as she backs away. You want to say something—scream and call her a plethora of less than appropriate names—but your mind is literal mush between the shock and the excruciating pain. You collapse to the floor with a breathy gasp, cupping your bleeding side with your opposite hand.

The vampire saunters toward the exit. Just as she makes it to the doorway, she whirls around to throw one final innocent smile in your direction: “Do us both a favor and stay away from Jaebeom… I wouldn’t want to scar that pretty face.” 

With that, she’s completely gone. If it weren’t for the pencil in your midriff and the blood seeping through your clothes, you would have thought you’d dreamt up the entire encounter. 

“Shit…” You gasp, attempting to dislodge the wood from your flesh. It doesn’t budge, deeply embedded between what you assume to be your ribcage. A pained wheeze spills from your throat as you reach for your bag, paying little mind to the bloodied prints your fingers leave in the fabric. After numerous attempts and anguished movements, you manage to fish your cell phone from its pocket. Crimson smears across the screen as you pull up the first contact you can think of. 

You really should have taken the rest of the week off.

 ☽ ☽ ☽ ☽ ☽ ☾ ☾ ☾ ☾ ☾

From his perch behind a tree, Jinyoung silently stalks the movement of a burly stag as it parades across the forest floor. The creature, unknowing of the predator that hunts from a far, approaches a wild berry bush and begins to feast off its bearings—unknowing that its end is fast approaching. 

Jinyoung usually does not like to draw out these moments and would have killed the deer by now. Whether it is due to the absence of his physical strength or the tornado of thoughts tearing through his mind, he simply cannot bring himself to end the animal’s life just yet. There’s something so pure about watching the stag go about its existence, he realizes—he must allow its innocence to prevail a little while longer.

It’s been days since his recovery from the huntress’s attack, but he can still sense the weakness lingering in his bones. While Jaebeom’s blood chased away the fever of the wolf venom, it was not enough to regenerate his body to its full power. If he were to do so, he would need human blood… but that can never happen again. Not in this lifetime.

Animal blood keeps him mobile, and that is more than enough.  

A loud snap of breaking branches returns Jinyoung to reality in time to watch the stag tear off into the trees. He makes no move to chase after it, not desiring to waste his strength. After one final glance to his escaped meal, Jinyoung turns and greets the approaching figure with a tight frown:

“I already told you, hyung. I have no interest in accompanying you on a hunt into town.” 

“You know, it would be a hell of a lot easier than tracking down food out here…” Jaebeom snickers, “Not to mention, one human equals a dozen squirrels.” 

“And as I said, I much prefer the squirrels.” Jinyoung meets Jaebeom’s gaze with a heavy sigh, “I am perfectly fine, hyung.” 

“You’re a shitty liar.” Jaebeom shakes his head. “You need human blood.” 

“What I need is to find a new fare.” Jinyoung pushes off of his perch to traipse deeper into the forest, but the appearance of a hand on his shoulders halts his pace. He allows Jaebeom to maneuver his form back against the trunk of a tree, welcoming the slight relief the support brings to his muscles. He makes sure to keep his expression blank to mask his instability. But like always, Jaebeom sees straight through him. 

“You’re weak, Jinyoung…” 

“Nothing a nice rabbit can’t fix.”

Jaebeom purses his lips. “You can’t deny it forever. At least try a blood bag—”

“Why did you give me your blood?” Jinyoung interrupts his companion’s lecture, peering at Jaebeom with unwavering, unblinking eyes. “I thought you wished to punish me?”

“I was going to—I mean, I wanted to…” Jinyoung watches Jaebeom very carefully, noting the frivolous nature of his typically cocky features and hidden message behind his gaze. If he knew any better, Jinyoung would actually believe there to be some shred of humanity left behind those dark irises. 

“But you couldn’t.” He finishes.

“Don’t think it means you’re off the hook for working with Tuan.” Jaebeom huffs while taking a few paces backward. Jinyoung opens his mouth to respond, but the hybrid’s hushed murmur emerges instead, “(Y/N) came by last week… to see you.” 

Jinyoung holds back a smile. “Did she now?... I suppose you told her about your change of heart then.” 

Jaebeom remains silent. 

“Jaebeom-hyung…” Jinyoung’s eyes flutter shut as an audible exhale blows past his lips, “You need to tell her.” 

“It won’t change anything.” Jaebeom says with a frown, “She made it very clear that she already hates me.” 

“(Y/N) is much different than others, hyung—” 

“What do I care anyway?” The hybrid tsks, his sullen expression transitioning into one of indifference. “She can hate me as much as she wants. I don’t give a shit.” 

“Hyung, please—”   

The shrill ring of a cell phone introduces a bout of silence. Jinyoung has never been so annoyed by modern technology since now, grabbing his phone with a less than pleased sigh. He eyes Jaebeom while lifting the device to his ear, wordlessly communicating that the conversation is far from over.

“Hello?”

“Jinyoung?... H-Hey, it’s me.” 

“(Y/N)?” Jinyoung’s annoyance completely dissipates at the sound of your quivering voice. He notices how Jaebeom also reacts to your audible presence through the stiffening of his broad shoulders. He shakes it off as unease from your previous encounter and focuses back onto you, “Are… you alright? You seem a bit stressed.” 

“Yeah, you can c-call it that…” Your inhale picks up over the line, and Jinyoung cannot help but grow concerned by its unusual heaviness. “You are not going to believe the shitty day I’ve had.” 

“What happened?” 

“Well, the barista at my campus cafe accidentally made my usual decaf, my boss is seeking revenge for my time off through hundreds of ungraded essays… and I was stabbed… with a pencil.” 

Jinyoung’s eyebrows furrow. “I apologize, but I don’t think I understand…” 

“Long story short, Jaebeom’s scary, yet incredibly sexy girlfriend paid me a visit and literally stabbed me with a fucking pencil—” Your explanation cuts out into a yelp, which is followed by an array of stuttered curses, “And it—shit—hurts like hell.” 

“I’m on my way right now” Jinyoung, heart racing and head spinning, forces himself to his feet and hurries back toward the manor—Jaebeom hightailing close behind, having picked up the entire conversation. 

Before Jinyoung can inquire more about your condition, Jaebeom snatches the phone from his grasp and lifts it to his own, “Where did she stab you?” 

“Jaebeom?... My-My side… The pencil is wedged between my ribs, I can’t get it out…” 

“Don’t worry about removing it. Just try to control the bleeding as best you can.” Jaebeom explains, “Jinyoung and I will be there soon.” 

“Wait! Why are you—” Your voice cuts out as Jaebeom ends the call. Jinyoung notices the whiteness of the hybrid’s knuckles as he silently returns his phone. If it were any other situation, Jinyoung would have brought up their chat from earlier, but your wellbeing is on the line.  He delivers his companion a dark glare. To his surprise though, Jaebeom’s expression mirrors that of pure, unadulterated anger. 

Jinyoung pinches the bridge of his nose before releasing a sigh, “Do I even wish to know why your mistress attacked (Y/N)?” 

“I’d like to know too,” Jaebeom scoffs, running a hand through his jet black locks, “considering I told her that (Y/N) was off limits.” 

“You find out then.” Jinyoung hisses, “Or I will deal with her myself, and I won’t be as kind.” 

“Oh, trust me.” Jinyoung can practically sense the murderous lust spilling from Jaebeom’s pitch black irises—far from the light of humanity. “Kindness is the last thing on my list right now, Jinyoungie.”  

 ☽ ☽ ☽ ☽ ☽ ☾ ☾ ☾ ☾ ☾

“—and then she just acts all innocent! As if she did absolutely nothing wrong! I mean, what kind of self-serving, sadistic bitch does she think she is—Mark? Are you there?” 

“Huh?” Mark flutters his eyes open at the sound of his name. He blinks at his surroundings in confusion, still dazed from his abrupt wake-up call, before remembering his phone and the person currently speaking on the line: 

“Mark? Don’t tell me I put you to sleep?” 

“Nope, nope. I’m here.” Mark replies hurriedly, wiping the remnants of his nap from his eyes. “Luna’s a complete and total bitch, I got you.” 

Lia sighs, “Yuna, Mark. Not Luna.” 

With a silent yawn, he lifts his arms over his head and expels the kinks from his shoulders. Once his muscles are taunt and stretched, Mark releases a heavy exhale and murmurs, “I’m sorry, Lia. It’s just… been a long week.” 

“I get it, Mark.” She hums softly, “But I wish you wouldn’t stress so much about this. Minho made his choice, and there’s nothing you can do about it.” 

“I don’t believe that.” Mark rises from his chair before pacing across the room to the mausoleum’s lone window. He pulls the curtain aside, peering out at the vacant hills of the graveyard. “If he would just talk to me, then I’m sure we could figure something out.” 

Hundreds of phone calls later, and he still hasn’t spoken with Minho since the night he claimed to be leaving the coven. No one has. Not even Jisung. And Mark can’t figure out what’s bothering him more: the fact that Minho won’t pick up his phone, or that you have been purposely avoiding him for the last week. 

He’s trying to give both you and the young witch time—truly—but Mark can’t help but feel as if something is off. 

“Minho needs to figure out what he wants himself.” He forces himself away from the window, receding across the room to lean against the lectern as Lia goes on, “You can’t be there to hold his hand every time he goes through one of his moods. It’s not good for him or for you.” 

“What am I supposed to do then?” 

“Nothing, Mark. You do nothing.” 

Mark shakes his head, “You know I can’t do that.” 

“Just give Minho some more time to get it together.” Lia says, “He’ll come around eventually.” 

“I hope so.” Mark goes to grab his coffee mug from a nearby table, but accidentally knocks his elbow against the corner of the lectern. A mass of papers and books slide from its surface, crashing to the floor in a rather vocal descent. He releases a quiet curse, tucking his phone against his shoulder before lowering to the floor to begin tidying the mess. 

…How long does he have to wait until you come around?  

Lia continues to speak as he gathers the escaped pages, “Have you talked to Yugyeom lately? I heard that one of their wolves just up and disappeared.” 

“Yeah. That kid, Changbin.” He says, “Gyeom thinks he probably took off after our fight with the huntress. Remind you of someone?” 

“In this town? A lot of someones.” 

Mark goes to respond, but the title of a particular document clears the thoughts from his mind. Pushing aside a couple other pages, he grabs the flimsy packet before raising it into better view. At first, Mark is confused, unsure why this type of reference would be out and about. But as he surveys the other fallen objects, his confusion gradually shifts to realization… 

Then rage. 

He doesn’t bother to look up as the door opens, nor does he spare the puzzled newcomer a glance. Still clutching the document, Mark rises to his feet and takes the phone from his shoulder with his free hand. He pays his companion no mind as he quietly murmurs: 

“Do you mind if I call you later?” 

“Not at all. Just try to think about what I said.” 

Mark bids a final farewell to Lia before disconnecting the line. He takes a moment to drag a hand down his face before turning to a wide-eyed Youngjae. As soon as Mark raises the document into view, his expression immediately shifts to a panic. 

“So…” Mark tilts his head with a tight frown, “You want to explain why the hell you’re looking up resurrection spells?...” 

Youngjae shakes his head, “Hyung—”

“Explanation, Youngjae.” Mark watches the siphoner’s face shift through a rainbow of emotions. From terror, to anxiety, to dread, before finally settling on guilt. Keeping his gaze to the floor, Youngjae eventually delivers a shrug and whispers: 

“...To try to bring Jackson back.” 

Mark’s heart practically splits open. 

He stares at the younger witch with incredulous eyes. “Are you fucking stupid, Youngjae!?”  

“It looks bad, I know—” Youngjae hurries forward to stand in front of Mark and lifts his hand in good faith, “—but I’ve been doing a lot of research and experimenting with a couple spells and I really think that we can—”

“You aren’t thinking shit.” Mark spits, rounding toward the siphoner until their noses are a mere inch apart. “We don’t screw around with necromancy, Youngjae… It’s dark magic.” 

“We just have to find the right spell! (Y/N) and I are searching—” 

“(Y/N)? What does (Y/N) have to do with this?” 

Youngjae immediately closes his mouth, his eyes growing glassy in the evening light. 

It takes a second for the puzzle pieces to fit together—your inquiries about Jackson, Youngjae’s daily trips to the bookstore, your evasion—but once the realization hits, Mark feels his entire body go numb. 

Youngjae rushes forward to grab Mark’s arm, “Hyung, I’m so, so sorry! (Y/N) thought it would be better not to tell you, so I just—” 

Mark shrugs his hand away, refusing to meet Youngjae’s pleading gaze. “Get out.” 

“Just let me explain—”

“Get the fuck out!” A loud crash echoes throughout the mausoleum as Mark flings his mug across the room, causing the object to meet the opposite wall before shattering to a million tiny pieces. Youngjae doesn’t persist, grabbing his bag and beelining straight out the door. Mark pushes the sounds of the younger’s sobs from his mind as he goes, unable to see past the anger boiling inside his body. But even against all the rage, a sense of sadness remains at the forefront of his mind. 

His best friend betrayed him—again.

 ☽ ☽ ☽ ☽ ☽ ☾ ☾ ☾ ☾ ☾

“You find and take care of (Y/N).” Jaebeom commands, slamming his car door shut with a little more force than necessary. Then again, he can’t seem to bring himself to care above the red-hot fury coursing through his veins like venom. He ignores the curious stares of a nearby group of female students and proceeds to move around the car, “I’ll catch up with you later.” 

“And where exactly are you going?” Jaebeom bites back a glare as Jinyoung halts his movements. His entire body thrums, as if physically yearning for vengeance, but he masks his temper with a sharp inhale and a promise to release his frustrations out later. 

He nods at his companion, “I’m going to do what I should have done before.” 

Jinyoung merely stares at him for a moment, and Jaebeom can only hope he can’t see past the bloodlust in his gaze. Fortunately, Jinyoung doesn’t question him further. He releases Jaebeom’s shoulder and delivers one final nod before turning in the direction of what both can only assume is your classroom. Jaebeom allows himself a moment to watch Jinyoung—his noble brother—sprint off to save the day—to save you. Again. 

Jaebeom swallows the bitterness accumulating in his chest and heads in his own direction. It won’t be hard to track her. He can already smell her Chanel perfume—she’s close by, he realizes. 

She wants him to find her. 

Sure enough, Jaebeom recognizes her silken auburn hair and Louis Vuitton coat beside a towering oak tree, staring down at her phone. He doesn’t bother to check if those students are still watching him and speeds over to his target’s perch. Even when he’s a mere few inches away, she continues to mindlessly scroll through her phone. Jaebeom’s anger grows when he notices the amused smirk etched across her pink lips. 

“It’s about time you showed up.” Tzuyu says, “You know how much I hate to wait.” 

“Give me one good reason not to rip your fucking head off right now.”

“Not even a ‘hello’?” 

Jaebeom growls, “You think this is a game?”

“Perhaps.” She raises her calm gaze to his own before offering a sultry smile. “Beautiful evening, isn’t it?” 

Her flirtations only add fuel to the outrage raging through his body. He speeds forward again, snatches her wrists and slams her smaller figure against the trunk of the tree behind them. Tzuyu winces at his aggressive movements, but Jaebeom feels no sympathy. Your trembling voice and pained breathing echoes in his ears like a siren, tempting him closer to the point of no return. 

It would be so easy to plunge his hand into her chest, to squeeze her heart until it's nothing but bloody ash. Or maybe he should tear her limbs off one by one, make her suffer until she’s begging him to end her—

“You really do care about her, don’t you?” Jaebeom awakens from his imaginary rampage at the question. Her usual smirk is no longer along her face, but instead replaced with a thoughtful frown. 

He growls, pressing her wrists further into the bark of the tree. “I told you to stay away from her. You said you wouldn’t touch her.” 

“I never thought I’d see the day the big, bad hybrid, Im Jaebeom falls for a human.” 

“Shut the fuck up.” His tone is quiet—murderous. “I’ll kill you.” 

“No. You won’t.” 

“Yes. I will.” 

“No, Jaebeom.” She shakes her head with a sigh, “If you kill me, (Y/N) will never forgive you.” 

As if she had taken a red hot iron and plunged it through his heart, Jaebeom lets go of the vampire and stumbles backward. He barely catches himself before he collapses to the ground, and even then, his legs feel like they’ll give out at any moment. 

Tzuyu, still leaning against the tree, tilts her head with a hum, “She’s a good one, Beom. I feel it… that aura that carries around her.” 

“Stop it—” 

“And it’s because she’s good that she’ll never belong to you.” She murmurs, “But you already know that… don’t you?” 

“You’re fucking sick.” Jaebeom hisses. 

To his surprise, Tzuyu’s expression softens. “I’m sorry, Jaebeom.” 

There’s too many emotions swirling through his mind. He can’t think—can’t breathe. His chest feels like it’s caving in on itself, and his hands won’t stop shaking. He can’t get your face out of his head—your beautiful eyes looking at him with such betrayal and hatred. It hurts. It hurts so much. Why won’t his hands stop fucking shaking? It’s too much. It’s all too much—

He can’t help it… He has to turn it off. 

A switch flips inside of his soul, immediately locking out every ounce of pain. His lungs inhale each new breath smoothly, and his limbs remain as still as a cat. With a clear head, Jaebeom returns his eyes to Tzuyu, who is still gazing at him with such tenderness and understanding. For a moment, the warmth of her gaze reminds him of you. 

Tzuyu cautiously takes a step forward, “Jaebeom…?” 

“You’re right.” He nods, “I’m not gonna kill you.”

“What are you—ah!” Her inquiry elevates into a scream as Jaebeom whirls forward and sinks his teeth into her shoulder. His fangs plunge through the fabric of her expensive coat before piercing deep into her flesh. She attempts to struggle, but he is stronger… and the damage has already been done.   

He pulls away, licking the blood from his lips as Tzuyu collapses to the ground. She clutches her wounded shoulder, staring up at him with eyes of betrayal, confusion and fright. 

“You… You bit me.” 

Jaebeom smirks, “I suggest you spend the next day or so wisely… it’s going to be your last.” 

Tzuyu’s expression turns rabid. She scrambles to her feet before sneering at the hybrid, “The sooner you learn to accept your fate, Jaebeom, the sooner you’ll find peace—” 

“Meh. Fate’s overrated.” 

“Just remember this—” The vampire growls, “—after you turned me, you murdered the love of my life… at least I had the kindness to keep yours alive.” 

He snickers, turning to leave. However, just before he takes a step, Jaebeom throws one final comment over his shoulder, “Thanks for all the sex.” 

With that, Jaebeom smirks to himself and saunters off into the glow of the setting sun. 

☽ ☽ ☽ ☽ ☽ ☾ ☾ ☾ ☾ ☾

Jinyoung rushes down the hallway, careful not to speed for fear of running into a professor or student working after hours. The fragrance of your blood builds with each step, and he can’t help but grow more concerned with that knowledge. At the very least, he can still hear the faint beating of your heart. 

He follows the scent past a couple corners and down another long corridor to a massive, dim lecture room. Fearing the worst, Jinyoung quickly steps through the doorway before immediately spotting your incapacitated form through the darkness propped up against the opposite wall. He doesn’t hesitate to speed across the room and kneel in front of you. You’re unconscious, he realizes, but breathing—that’s enough to lift the heavy weight from his chest. 

“(Y/N)?” He calls gently, lifting his hands to cradle your face in his palms. “Come back to me, my dear… Please.” 

“Jinyoung?...” He’s never been more grateful to hear the sound of his name until now. Your eyes flutter open and dart around the area before drowsily settling on Jinyoung. The vampire in question breathes a sigh of relief, caressing the apple of your cheek with his thumb. 

“There you are.” He murmurs, “How do you feel?” 

“Like I was stabbed…” You raise an eyebrow before peering down at the pencil protruding from your abdomen, “Well, would you look at that.” 

Jinyoung holds back a smile at your sarcasm, appreciating that even wounded, you still manage to bear your usual fiery charm. His own eyes turn down to the object jabbed within your waist. He carefully analyzes the damage, determining the best possible solution to its extraction. As you said on the call, the pencil itself is trapped inside your ribcage. Jinyoung will have to be careful not to accidentally fracture your bones. 

He bites the inside of his cheek before returning his attention back to you. “I need to remove it, but it’s going to be painful. Very painful.” 

You roll your eyes, “It will also hurt a lot less when it’s out. I can handle it.” 

“I know you can.” 

Jinyoung keeps his gaze connected to yours as he wraps his fingers around the wood of the pencil, taking extra care not to brush against the swollen skin of the lesion. Your expression remains fatigued, yet indifferent during his preparation. He waits for your nod before he continues. 

In order to prevent as much further damage and to make it as painless as possible, Jinyoung removes the pencil as quickly as he can. Your furrowed brow and teary eyes slice at his soul, but he doesn’t stop until the object is completely taken out. Once it's free, Jinyoung tosses the pencil into a nearby trash can, pulls the sweater from his body and utilizes the garment to cover your slightly bleeding wound. He ignores the crimson of your blood staining his fingers, instead lifting his clean arm to his mouth before biting down. 

“What… are you doing?” 

“My blood will heal you.” Jinyoung answers, offering forth his bloody wrist. “It’s how I saved you after your assault in the alleyway.” 

“If I die with your blood in my system, won’t I become a vampire?” 

“You aren’t going to die.” 

You shake your head, pushing away his wrist. “Thanks for the offer, but I’d rather not risk anything.” 

“At least allow me to bring you to the hospital then.” He insists, “You’ve lost quite enough blood for one day.” 

Jinyoung curses at the mischievous smirk that spreads along your lips. “You have got to stop saving my life.” 

“Stop putting yourself in danger, and there would be no need for me to.” 

“Last I checked, I had no idea Vampire Victoria Secret was gonna show up and stab me with a fucking writing utensil.” You snort, gesturing over to your desk, “Grab my stuff before we go, please.” 

Just as you requested, Jinyoung goes about gathering your laptop and assorted belongings before sliding them into your bag. One book, however, catches his attention. For a moment, he pauses to stare at the title, then flips open the cover. His mouth runs dry when he discovers numerous pages of notes in your handwriting. 

Jinyoung closes the book before turning back to you, who is struggling to climb to your feet. He moves to help you, stabilizing your body against the wall while asking, “Why are you researching necromancy?” 

“It’s a long story.” You inhale deeply, “But to keep it short… Youngjae and I are going to try to resurrect Jackson Wang.”

At the mention of the alpha werewolf, Jinyoung’s muscles grow stiff. He stares at your face, attempting to read the stars in your dreary irises. After what seems like a long moment of silence, he eventually speaks, albeit quietly, “You understand resurrecting someone from the dead is no simple task… Why would you even attempt such a thing?” 

Your expression softens. “Because Jackson didn’t deserve to die, Jinyoung. The pack lost their leader—Mark lost his best friend.” 

“Resurrection is a dangerous craft, (Y/N).”

“Not if we find the right spell.” You argue, throwing your bag over your shoulder with a sharp inhale. “I know it sounds bat-shit crazy, but I have to try, Jinyoung. For Jackson and for Mark.”

Jinyoung inhales a heavy gust, before releasing an even heavier breath. He curses himself at being so affected by the hope in your eyes. Your determination is too alluring—you are too alluring. 

“I have a collection of grimoires kept by a coven of Dutch witches who specialized in necromancy back in the 15th century.” He finally says, “I will gift them to you as long as you grant me one request.”

Your eyes immediately brighten. “Of course. What do you need me to do?” 

Jinyoung grabs your hands. “I want you to forgive my brother.” 

“Jinyoung—“

“After you left, Jaebeom fed me his blood.” He explains, “He cured the werewolf venom, so I wouldn’t have to suffer.”

Your face first contorts to confusion, then to Jinyoung’s surprise, guilt. “He didn’t tell me…” 

“As I told you, Jaebeom has a good heart.” His lips upturn into a sad smile, “He just… has difficulty revealing that side of himself to others.” 

With that, Jinyoung carefully gathers your body into his arms. He manages to cover your soiled clothes with your jacket before heading for the door. 

“It is your choice. I will give you the grimoires no matter what you decide.” 

Jinyoung’s heart leaps when your head collapses against his chest, right over where his heart proceeds to race. Judging by your silence, he expects your mind to have descended into unconsciousness once more, but is pleasantly surprised when your slurred voice reaches his ears, “Hey, Jinyoung?” 

“Yes?” 

“Thanks for saving me. Again.” 

Jinyoung smiles, “It was my pleasure, (Y/N).”

☽ ☽ ☽ ☽ ☽ ☾ ☾ ☾ ☾ ☾

“Such a fucking idiot!...” Youngjae hisses, stomping his way past gravestones and monuments through the light of the setting sun. Usually, he would stop to appreciate such a beautiful moment in nature, but his mind is too preoccupied with thoughts of remorse and anger. 

Youngjae knew better than to keep something like this from Mark. His heart immediately drops when he thinks back to the older witch’s furious outburst—Youngjae hasn’t seen him that angry in a long time. Not since Jackson was alive.

He shakes the thought from mind. He should have never agreed to your idea in the first place. Jackson Wang is dead. And he can’t be brought back. End of story. 

A faint murmur of voices awakens Youngjae from his self-loathing. He hadn’t realized how deep he has traveled into the forest until now, so deep that he’s very close to the shore of the bay. His curiosity expands when he notices a strange light emitting from behind a group of closely placed trees. Against his better judgement, Youngjae decides to investigate. 

The nearer he approaches the site, the louder the voices grow. With a closer view, Youngjae can barely make out two figures conversing in front of a large bonfire. Due to the shadows of tree cover, he can’t recognize their faces, but something about their voices seems familiar to him… 

“You’re sure this is going to work?” 

“I’ve been planning this for years. There’s no way it won’t.” 

“Doesn’t this spell need a crazy amount of power?” 

“There will be a blood moon tomorrow night.” Youngjae watches as one of the figures retreats to the opposite side of the fire. If he is a bit closer, he might be able to catch a glimpse of his face. “I will have more than enough power to complete the transformation.” 

“And it won’t kill me? The transformation?” 

“You sound like you’re having second thoughts…” 

“I’m not!” The second figure insists, “The Primes deserve to pay for what they’ve done.” 

“And pay they will.” Youngjae’s blood runs cold as he finally gains sight of one of the figures. “The Primes and Mark Tuan.” 

“Holy shit—” Youngjae moves to make a mad dash back through the forest, but just as he takes a step backwards, his foot catches a large divot in the earth. He crashes to the ground with a faint yelp, cursing the new ache in his ankle. Panic skyrockets through his veins at the sound of approaching footsteps. Even against the slight pain, Youngjae manages to force himself to his feet, ready to make a break for it, but a broad chest halts his movements. 

Youngjae’s heart stops when he meets the gaze of Changbin, the temperamental omega from the werewolf pack. 

He smirks, “Your mother ever tell you it’s rude to eavesdrop?” 

Youngjae hisses, “Screw you.” 

Changbin remains unbothered. “What should we do with him?” 

“Well… we can’t have him warning anyone of our plans.” Minho comes into view, wearing a similar smirk to that of the werewolf. “And besides, he might turn out to be pretty useful to us.” 

“Why are you doing this!?” Youngjae demands as Changbin shoves him back to the ground. “Are you that desperate for revenge that you’d actually kill Mark-hyung!?” 

Minho shakes his head, “I’m not gonna kill him. That special gift is reserved for the Primes.” He chuckles, before lifting his shoulders in a shrug. “I’m just gonna take back what I rightfully deserve…” 

Youngjae sneers at the witch, “You’re a fucking traitor! A sick, selfish—” 

The siphoner immediately grows silent when Changbin lands a harsh hit against his cheek. At the heavy impact, Youngjae goes flying to the earth and doesn’t rise again. 

Changbin glances at Minho, “You sure about all this?” 

Minho only smirks. 

“I’m dead sure.”

[lokiondisneyplus]

Today I left the house wearing a face mask for the first time.

I had woken up to the sound of heavy rain, which is always surreal in Los Angeles, and when I look out of the window to the hauntingly dehumanising sight of bandana-clad dog walkers, an eerie weight settles as I remember: this is our reality now.

I’m standing in the supermarket queue, a line dotted by crosses taped on the floor of the underground car park to signify our designated 6ft distance. Easily 50 people long and snaking around the perimeter of the building, I make my way to the last available X-marks-the-spot and join the other masked Bandits. I haven’t food shopped for over a week and am in need of supplies.

There is an obnoxiously loud man two crosses ahead of me ranting into his phone with such a high energy, the surrounding Bandits have allowed an extended social distance of a cross on either side of him. I sigh, remembering I’ve left my headphones at home, so am unable to tune him out, I wait and exhale, wondering how I am going to get used to the claustrophobic sensation of hot air and fabric condensing on my face.

Loud Phone Man is not wearing a mask and it's clear we’ve passed the tipping point of mild judgement, at least here in LA, where Bandits exchange a raised eyebrow, (about the only non-verbal Bandit communication available) which somehow magnifies the annoyance of this shopper - not only loud, but breathing indiscriminately all over us in this confined space… what does he think this is? Last week??

It’s Monday on #Week4 of Covid-19 lockdown in La La Land and as I shuffle to the next X I reflect on the journey so far.

After a whirlwind press tour to promote the release of Misbehaviour in UK cinemas (sadly cinemas were shuttered just days after the film's theatrical release – but it's available to watch online at home from April 15th!) I returned to work in Atlanta for Loki, the Marvel limited series for Disney Plus I’ve been working on, so am on set when I get the news that we are going on hiatus as a precaution due to the accelerating coronavirus, initially for one week. Thinking it would be longer, but still unsure at that point, I book a flight to LA to sit things out there for the time being. The next day Trump imposes a travel ban on travelling in or out of the US for 30 days, and with my visa situation and the pace at which everything is moving, it feels risky to fly to the UK in case I cannot get back into the country when filming recommences, whenever that will be.

So, with my housemate and her dog for company, we embark on social distancing, self-isolation and Lady Macbeth-level hand-washing.

Managing a constant low-level anxiety about my parents and loved ones, and friends in New York, London, Johannesburg and all over the world, I become consumed by the news, glued to the BBC website and KCRW talk radio for the latest figures. Like families gathered around “the wireless” in wartime, everything is unfolding so rapidly and the news, never this dramatic in my lifetime, takes on disaster-movie proportions.

FaceTime and WhatsApp become my lifelines as the reality of the pandemic is tinged with a weird detachment… a numbness I later realise was a form of shock that lasts for nearly two weeks and puts me into a hyper-focused state as I race to keep up, stay informed and learn how to adapt to this new rhythm.

I am of course aware that I am so privileged to be safe and personally unaffected thus far, but grasping the truth from what is overblown, and fact from politics and propaganda, give everything an out-of-body zero gravity quality; a new normal we are all united in.

Things are kicking off in the food line as my attention is caught by an exasperated Valley Girl three Xs ahead who finally explodes at Loud Phone Man, “ OH MY GAAAAD, USE YOUR INSIDE VOICE, CANT YOU SEEEEE EVERYONE IS LOOKING AT YOU CAUSE YOU’RE TALKING SO LOUD… WE ALL HAVE TO STAND HERE, OHMYGAAAD!” As she stomps her Ugged feet to the next X the security guard and smiling store employee (no mask) approach and I can feel a repressed inside-voice-cheer emanate from the rest of the line in applause.

The Bandit Couple ahead of me raise another eyebrow in solidarity and Female Bandit begins to capture a video of Loud Phone Man on her iPhone. The air gets thin, the energy tightens, “Hey Man,” Smiling Store Employee intercepts, Security guard flanking, “You wanna keep it down a bit, people are stressed, y’know? Thanks Man.” Valley Girl scowls, Bandit couple exchange glances, while still filming, Loud Phone Man defends, “I WASN’T EVEN TALKING THAT LOUUUUUD!!!” (Collective Bandit eyeroll) “YESSSSS YOU WERE!!!” Hisses Valley Girl, “Yeah Man, sorry you were,” Store Employee placates. taking the referee stance. I notice Loud Phone Man is wearing flip-flops, on a rainy day. He continues his conversation into his device, phone held to his lips, like a dictaphone, barely any quieter. “We have to be prepared…”

I sigh and feel warm breath on my cheeks. Mouth drying I look at my phone for escape and see that Boris Johnson has been admitted into intensive care for persistent and worsening Covid-19 symptoms. I suddenly feel very far from home and very sad.

I remember the things I’ve been doing to keep grounded and my spirits up. One of the benefits of turning out old cupboards was rediscovering my long dormant art materials. Painting, such an absorbing and transporting activity for me in childhood, was once something I considered doing instead of acting, but found it a little socially isolating - so acting won because it felt more collaborative. Now, of course, painting in isolation is perfect and becomes the most comforting of pastimes and a creative channel as I make images of my family and feel like I am spending time with them.

Understanding how superfluous actors are in a crisis such as this, I come to terms with the fact that staying at home, as passive as it may seem, is my contribution for now. Having the luxury of not having to home-school any children and knowing my work is pretty much on pause until social distancing recedes, I try to reframe this time as a chance to rest and refill the creative well. I read novels for pleasure, something I rarely find time for beyond work-related reads. I take my first Zoom yoga class (alexdawsonyoga.com), I join a 21-day online meditation experience (chopracentermediation.com), I take local hikes for fresh air and make first ever batches of banana bread and chicken soup. I even buy a mini trampoline online which, after a mildly challenging self-assembly, I’ve been sweating it out on to streamed classes online (lekfit.com) with a friend in Toronto, followed by accountability FaceTime coffee dates to virtually high five!

By the end of week two, the adrenalin crash truly hits and I’m exhausted from the constant rhythm shifting, news consumption and uncertainty. I’m an eternal optimist and good at self-motivating, but even when you’re Keeping Calm and Carrying on, you need to crash at some point. I nearly cry when I get my mum an Ocado food delivery slot - nothing has been available for weeks - and the “what ifs” that I have been keeping at bay with all my other activities release with relief and gratitude.

That’s when I discover Brené Brown’s new podcast Unlocking Us and find such solace in her calm and thoroughly researched words and conversations. Since her TED talk fame as a charismatic shame and vulnerability researcher, I’ve read all of her books and there is always something practical and nourishing in her work, told with humour and in a deeply relatable way - which I’ve found comfort in while in the midst of folding laundry, cleaning the bath or chopping vegetables.

Back in the food line and things are moving; the tension of the Loud Phone Man Vs Valley Girl dispute still simmers but everyone relaxes as they get closer to the front-door finish line. Smiling Store Employee does his speech on the new system: no reusable bags allowed, sanitised trollies and a one-way system in the aisles inside marked by arrows on the floor, to minimise contact with other customers. It all feels so surreal and regimented, but the Bandits, already drained from the 30-minute wait, constant Loud Phone Man soundtrack, near car park fight and everything else they’re all adjusting to, nod wearily behind their moist makeshift masks. It’s a bizarre sight.

Still chatting, Loud Phone Man makes it in and there’s a collective “phew” eye-contact exchanged between Smiling Store Employee and the remaining Bandits. Then his smile drops and crinkles for a second. “Yeah, he’s been in every day this week. It’s kinda sad. There’s no one on the phone.” The Bandits' brows knot quizzically. “Yeah, I think he has mental health issues, he just talks but the phone’s not on and he has no ear pieces, he just talks into it… 'They’re coming, we have to be prepared.'… I don’t know what to do.”

The reality breaks my heart. It seems to highlight the collective insanity we’ve all been processing and in that moment I just feel so frustrated at the state of the world and how this pandemic has exposed so many cracks in our society - from mental health to healthcare to privilege and poverty, everything just feels so raw.

I try to look for the silver linings and, among all the fear and anxiety and loss, I’ve been so inspired by human resilience, adaptability and creativity. I’m hopeful this great pandemic leveller will bring a new era of authenticity. An opportunity to shift mentality from Me to We.

Week three in self-isolation felt almost normal, which feels weird to admit. I’m getting lots of sleep and take regular meditative baths, which I’ve renamed Home Spa. I’ve found ways to safely contribute in my local community. When the shelves were bare from panic buying, I chatted with the manager of our local grocery store, who seemed so overwhelmed, so my housemate and I volunteered to stack shelves after hours. Although not exactly the front lines, we have fun and it feels good to give something back in our small way.

We of course negotiated to be paid in baked beans and toilet paper.

[the-regal-warrior]

In Which Thomas Is an Idiot

Here it is: my very first fic for Stalking Jack the Ripper. I’ve been in love with this series for a while, so I figured I’d try my hand at writing for it. This story is a little surprise for the absolutely lovely @city-of-fae - while it’s not nearly as good as the beautiful stories she brings to life, I’ve been inspired by her and wanted to give her some love.

Huge shout-outs go to @highqueenofelfhame for helping me plan this and to @tangledraysofsunshine for editing for me. You’re both absolutely amazing and I’d be lost without you!

Summary: Thomas Cresswell is an idiot, but it’s for a good reason, he swears. Or, Audrey Rose Wadsworth catches him in a lie and is determined to get to the bottom of it.

Warnings: I actually don’t think there are any necessary warnings for this one. That’s new.

.

Audrey Rose was completely and utterly baffled. Beyond that, even. 

Her uncle, once the greatest forensic pathologist the police department had ever seen, was now a professor at the local college. Audrey Rose, despite only being a sophomore, had been studying forensics and helping her uncle cut open dead bodies for long enough that she served as a tutor for the two senior elective classes he taught. During the two hour lab, his students would be taken through one of his previous cases, complete with models of the cadavers and mock crime scenes. Since he taught the class twice a day, she only sat in on one lecture, but she tutored students from both classes. 

Most of the students who came to Audrey Rose for help just needed a little guidance in connecting the dots. They would often understand the conclusion, but needed someone to help them truly see how her uncle had gotten to it so quickly. Since tutoring sessions involved making her rounds between individual students, this was relatively easy to accomplish. Usually all she needed to do was explain things a little more in depth, and they were good to go. 

But “usually” did not apply to Thomas Cresswell.

As far as Audrey Rose was concerned, he was the biggest idiot she’d ever encountered - at least in terms of this class. He was at every single tutoring session she offered, yet he never seemed to make any progress. 

When he’d first come to her for help, Audrey Rose had been a bit taken aback by him. He was one of the most beautiful boys she’d ever seen, and he seemed intelligent, both in the way he spoke and in the way he handled himself. He was reading a different classic novel each week, seemingly for fun because she knew he didn’t have any English classes, and their conversations about said books were always in-depth and riveting. She’d figured he’d just been confused by something her uncle had said during class and needed clarification. 

Her thoughts on the matter, however, were quickly disproven by the end of the session. 

But the confusing part, however, was his grade on the test she’d just graded. 

100%. 

She usually didn’t pay attention to the names on tests - frankly, she didn’t care how the students did one way or another - but she’d recognized his handwriting immediately. Worried about what she’d see on his test, it was with some trepidation that she started grading it.

When she got to the last page, she couldn’t quite believe what she was looking at. 

Quickly grading the rest of the stack, she picked up Thomas’s test and made her way to her uncle’s desk. “Uncle Jonathan,” she began, resting a hip against his desk. “Can I ask you something?”

Looking up from the lessons he was preparing, her uncle inclined his head. “Of course, dear.”

“Well, I’m a little curious about the grade one of your students got on his test.” When her uncle only nodded at her to go on, she added, “It’s Thomas Cresswell. His test was perfect - not a single point off.”

“That’s hardly surprising. Thomas is practically my best student.”

Audrey Rose couldn’t help it - her mouth dropped open in surprise. “He is?”

“Without a doubt. He gets a perfect score on every test. Thomas is the first to volunteer an answer to every question I ask, along with being one of the few students willing to challenge answers the other students have given. He’s participated in a fair amount of demonstrations, and he’s the only student who got a perfect score on the pretest. I imagine this class is actually quite simple for him, but his work always goes above and beyond.”

“Huh,” Audrey Rose muttered. “You don’t say.”

At the inquisitive look her uncle gave her, she just shook her head and returned to her table in the corner of the room, a plan already forming in her head. 

~*^*~

By the time the next tutoring session rolled around, Audrey Rose had a plan - a plan she was willing to bet would work flawlessly. If Thomas challenged answers given by other students, she had no doubt he’d correct her if she started giving him wrong answers. 

Making her rounds, she mentally thanked her uncle for choosing to discuss a case involving blood splatters today - something nice and simple for her to purposely get wrong without sounding like she was doing it on purpose. 

“Cresswell,” she started, walking up behind him. “How’s it going over here?”

“Not so great, Wadsworth.” Thomas turned his gaze to her, confusion swimming in his eyes. “I can’t seem to grasp the whole blood splatter/direction of impact concept.”

“Well, it’s pretty simple really.” Pointing to a picture in their text, Audrey Rose managed to keep a smirk off her face. “Since the blood is splattered on the wall to this side of the body, you can tell the bullet came from the left.”

Making like she was moving on to the girl at the table next to Thomas, she only managed to take two steps before Thomas was interrupting her. “Um, wouldn’t that imply the bullet came from the right?”

Glancing back down at the picture, Audrey Rose sculpted her features into a look of mild embarrassment. “Oh, you’re right. Sorry about that!”

Thomas just nodded at her, his focus already moving to the next scenario. Audrey Rose continued to the next student, glad her plan had already started to work.

~*^*~

The rest of her tutoring session had continued in the same fashion. She would make her way back to Thomas and give him another incorrect answer, each one getting more and more complicated. 

And each time, Thomas corrected the inaccuracies in her statements. It was almost like he couldn’t quite help himself.

As the last student walked out of the classroom, Thomas pulled his bag over his shoulder and wandered in Audrey Rose’s direction, his hands tucked into his pockets.

In what had quickly become a routine for the two of them, Thomas would walk Audrey Rose to her car, the two of them discussing classic literature and their favorite books along the way. Clearly, he hadn’t caught on to her plan if he was continuing on like everything was normal.

“So,” he began, an easy smile falling across his face, “I finally finished Dracula, and I must say, I don’t agree with your belief that it’s better than Frankenstein.”

“That’s great, Cresswell.” She cut him off before he could get into a rant about the merits of Frankenstein, needing to get to the bottom of this whole deal. “But I need to talk to you about something else before we discuss why you’re wrong about how great Dracula is.”

“Sure, Wadsworth. What’s up?”

Audrey Rose caught his eyes with hers then, her gaze never wavering as she said, “You know, I was very impressed with your last test score - not a single question wrong.”

“Oh, you saw that?” His gaze dropped briefly to the floor before meeting hers.

“Yeah, I was helping my uncle with some grading. It really took me by surprise.”

“Well, what can I say? You’re an excellent tutor.”

“Cresswell,” she cut in, her tone sharp. “I talked to my uncle about it. I know that you’re his best student, that you get scores like that on every test. I know that you even got a perfect score on the pretest.”

His gaze fell to the floor then, and he refused to meet her eyes, no matter how long she stared at him.

Heaving a sigh, she continued, “So, why, exactly, are you acting like you don’t know what’s going on when you could probably be helping tutor the others?”

“Well,” he started, his voice a bit sheepish, “you weren’t supposed to know I was pretending not to understand.”

“Thomas Cresswell, I’m not amused by this. Why on earth would you waste your time and mine like this?”

He finally met her gaze then, his eyes filled with something that looked suspiciously like pain. “I’m sorry, Wadsworth, I really am. I just wanted to spend time with you.”

“What?” Whatever Audrey Rose had been expecting, it wasn’t that.

“I was enchanted by you the minute your uncle introduced you to us during the first week of classes. You only sat in on our class once, but I was taken by the way you handled yourself, the way you were so sure of yourself as you helped your uncle perform a demonstration, the way you quickly and efficiently shut down anyone who thought you didn’t know what you were doing because you were younger. I just - I didn’t know how to approach you.”

“Thomas -” she began, but he held a hand up to stop her.

“I know it seems ridiculous. But you made it clear you didn’t have the time to deal with any of our nonsense. I was just afraid you’d shut me down like you did everyone else.”

“Thomas,” Audrey Rose started again, and this time he let her continue. “Why would you think I would shut you down, when I am as taken with you as you claim to be with me?”

Now it was Thomas’s turn to be confused. “You - what?”

“Cresswell, I’ve never met another man who has captivated me like you do. I was smitten the minute you walked in carrying a copy of Macbeth, and then immediately began analyzing it when I asked you how you liked it.”

Shaking his head, Thomas just gave her a sheepish grin. “I’ve been a fool. But I’m a fool for you, dear Wadsworth. Will you do this poor fool one small favor and accompany me on a date tonight?”

Laughing, Audrey Rose intertwined their fingers, kissing him quickly on the cheek before replying. “It would bring me nothing but pleasure, Cresswell, my dear fool.”

Leaning down, Thomas pressed his lips to her forehead as his laughter joined hers in echoing around the empty classroom.

.

As always, please let me know your thoughts, and if you want to be added to my tag list!

Tags: @highqueenofelfhame @city-of-fae @musicmaam @throne-of-ashes-and-beauty @tacmc @tangledraysofsunshine @keep-a-bucket-full-of-stars @tonystarkdadmode @tamaranianprincess

[thegoodtailor]

Since I’ve been mostly offline since mid-May, I’ve been wanting to give a Summer 2020 update on how I’ve been coping. The biggest change is education, I’ve absolutely thrown myself into it.📚

Getting the “heavy” out of the way first. My GP continues to petition my insurance, but Medicaid and COVID-19 have been a double punch and I’m still not getting referrals through. I’ve been housebound since June 2019… I can barely remember a time when I wasn’t struggling to make it through the day. There’s just nothing I can say.   

I should probably add that there’s also been a 60% increase in COVID-19 cases in my county in the last two weeks, so it’s just a terrible time to try and get treatment. 

After a year of this, I’m finding it extremely difficult to talk about my health. It’s just been too much, for too long, you know? It’s 24/7 for me. I try and bury the panic as much as possible, but it’s always waiting at the edges of my mind. I have to willfully stop thinking about the pain, or any of the symptoms, or I feel like I’m going to loose it.

For obvious reasons, my mental health has really suffered this last year. I’ve a cousin who recently took her life while in quarantine and it’s made me hyper aware of the cliff’s edge. The last 16 years have been a stupidly long sequence of traumatic events. I haven’t had a chance to be a normal teenager or young adult. It’s been one blow after another after another after another. I’ve no idea what it’s like to feel safe or live outside of a toxic environment. Like anyone who’s experienced stuff like this, there are triggers that are left behind. Like emotional landmines. In the past, I could handle them and find ways to navigate them. Now… it’s like everything is setting me off. A smell, a taste, a sound, an image. It’s like I’m made out of sugar glass.

This is the major reason why I’ve not been around since mid-May. I can not handle the amount of suffering I’m seeing, because I’ve had no escape from my own. It breaks me. There’ll be a time when I can stand up and take action, but right now, I need to heal.

Putting all that aside, I’m going to share the positive things I’ve been doing to help me cope:

Because pain/stress makes it hard for me to sleep, I tend to begin my day at 3am. I’ve a strict hour-to-hour routine to keep pain levels stable and manage the gastroparesis-like symptoms. My meals are pureed mush (protein/veg/whole grain) and simple carbs (fruit, crackers, cookies, etc). My stomach can only handle a limited volume every 5 hours, so everything must be carefully measured. I’ve developed my own DIY physiotherapy. 30min every day. My weight is stable at 94lbs. 

Being able to manage symptoms has also meant I’m better able to care of my mom. It was terrifying to be critically ill, unable to care for myself, and thus unable to help her. Without a support system, everything is like dominos. I couldn’t even go to the ER because I was afraid of leaving her on her own. 

It took months of effort, but finally getting strong enough to take Brawn (my dog) for short walks has been an absolute blessing. He’s looking so much more healthy and happy. A proper bouncy pup again. I swear, I was beating myself up for year because I couldn’t care for him. It just ate me up.

Which finally brings me to the main point of this post… 

I’m doin’ SUMMER SCHOOL.🥳 Well, my own variation of it. It’s a long, complicated history, and one that I’ll fully tell at a later date, but I missed out on my 1-4 grade education and jumped into 5th grade with only what I’d picked up from Montessori pre-school. I then did 5-7th grade and subsequently dropped out of High School during my first year (visual deterioration amongst other factors). I’m not unintelligent, but I’m ridiculously uneducated. Do I know what an adverb is? Do I know my times tables? No, but Shakespeare comes as second nature to me and I can play a fair game of chess. 

When I was in school, there wasn’t much awareness of issues like dyslexia or autism. Just learning to read was a Herculean journey. I couldn’t hold letters or numbers in my mind… or even my mother’s face. So many small details adding up. I missed out on so much because I couldn’t understand what was being taught to me. When I got home, I felt like I had to translate everything back into a language I could understand. It was exhausting and frustrating. 

So here I am. Very sick and sleep deprived, but absolutely determined to learn. I desperately needed distraction, something I could throw myself into, and I finally found it. I’m now surrounded by middle school workbooks and watching short lectures on Khan Academy and YouTube. I’m getting an education in my own fashion. 💪

“My dearest coz, I pray you school yourself.”

— Macbeth (Act IV, Scene III), William Shakespeare. 

~ Cóz 

[philosopherking1887]

Letter to Tom Hiddleston

As I posted before I saw Tom in Betrayal in London, I wrote a letter (composed on the computer then transcribed by hand on nice stationery, which caused some flare-up of my tennis elbow...) to give to him after the show. I didn’t get into the stage door line fast enough to be able to see Tom; he only went partway down the line before going back in. (I’m not sure if that was his idea or his handler’s. Charlie Cox, meanwhile, did go all the way down the line; I got his autograph on my program and a couple of photos of him, though not with him.) But some house manager/handler person was collecting letters, cards, and gifts, and when I asked skeptically whether he would actually give them to Tom, he said, “100%”. So in theory, Tom actually received this and might read it. Maybe it was dumb, or presumptuous, or outright rude, but I expressed my condolences for what the MCU did to his character. If Tom isn’t actually as depressed about it as he seems, it won’t matter -- he’ll ignore it like the rest of the nonsense fans probably write to him -- but if he is, maybe it’ll help a little to know he has allies.

Anyway, here’s what I wrote.

---------------------------------------

Dear Mr. Hiddleston (or Tom, if I may),

I’m a philosophy postdoc at [redacted], in London for an on-campus interview for a lectureship at [redacted]… which actually isn’t until next week; I extended my trip a few days on the front end so that I could catch one of the last shows of Betrayal before the run ended. It’s more than a little silly, but I’ll admit that a large part of the reason I was hoping [redacted] would invite me for a visit no later than mid-June was so that I’d have an opportunity (or excuse) to come see you act in person.

Like many people you’ve heard from, I’m sure, I became a fan of yours through your portrayal of Loki. I was blissfully ignorant of the MCU until 2015, when a friend invited me to see Avengers: Age of Ultron. My interest was piqued when I learned that Joss Whedon wrote and directed it, since I greatly admire his work. So of course, because I wasn’t raised by wolves, I had to go back and watch all the previous MCU films in chronological order. I wasn’t really hooked until I watched Thor, but not because of the title character.

Loki’s story was deeper, more tragic, more Shakespearean than I expected from a comic book movie, even in this golden age (though perhaps not from one directed by Kenneth Branagh). It was striking that the villain (seemingly) died not as a direct result of his wicked actions, in the Wile E. Coyote-like fashion favored by Marvel and Disney movies, but by suicide, prompted by his father’s rejection. He was three-dimensional, flesh and blood, and never lost the audience’s sympathy even in his cruelest moments—like Shylock, Cassius, or Macbeth. Then, when Loki turned up again in The Avengers, more desperate and ruthless but fundamentally the same proud, wounded spirit, I was fully drawn in. (Whedon’s incisive writing certainly didn’t hurt.)

I needed to know who played Loki with such poise, charm, and pathos. After getting caught up on the MCU (including another nuanced, twisty, show-stealing appearance from Loki in The Dark World), I needed to find more of your work. I watched Unrelated, Archipelago (ouch), The Deep Blue Sea, and the Henry installments of The Hollow Crown. I went to see Coriolanus when it was shown in a local movie theater; I watched Crimson Peak, The Night Manager, and I Saw the Light when they came out.

And the amazing thing all of these performances had in common is that you disappear into each role, inhabiting each character completely. You make the most diverse characters equally believable, from the selfish frivolity, with an undercurrent of sadness, of Freddie Page or Prince Hal to the grim inflexibility of Caius Marcius to the inscrutable chameleon Jonathan Pine and, of course, the mercurial, self-destructive Loki. When you speak Shakespeare, the words flow as naturally as if you grew up in Elizabethan England, and the meaning comes across so lucidly that I feel like I did, too. I had no idea what Coriolanus was about when I went to see it (generally not recommended with Shakespeare), but I found myself as effortlessly caught up in it as if it were an episode of Game of Thrones. Nonetheless—and this is what drew me to your work in the first place—you put the same kind of thoughtfulness and conviction into the most (apparently) frivolous roles that you do into Shakespeare.

I haven’t heard anyone say this or ask you about it in interviews, maybe because they know you wouldn’t be able to say anything publicly if you agree or maybe because there are so few people who feel this way, but I want to express how sorry I am about what was done to your character, how thoughtlessly all your masterful work and dedication were thrown away—in Infinity War, yes, but even more insultingly in Thor: Ragnarok. Maybe I was just imagining it, but I sensed from your comportment during the press for Ragnarok, however gamely you talked up the humorous new tone (you are, after all, a professional), that you weren’t entirely happy with the way Loki and (to an even greater extent) Thor were “reinvented”—or, more accurately, bowdlerized, made into caricatures rather than characters: Loki was turned into an effete, hedonistic cartoon cut-out “trickster” who betrays people for shits and giggles because it’s “in his nature”—completely disregarding, or rather attempting (successfully, for most audiences) to erase, his complicated, compelling motives for his misdeeds in previous films; and Thor was turned into a compassionless, narcissistic bully (however much the movie tried to make out that Loki was the narcissist) and, to use some technical terminology, a fratty douchebro. This mean-spirited retcon, which gleefully mocked its predecessors and the people who liked them (especially with the parody of Loki’s death scene in The Dark World), was not the conclusion to the trilogy that Thor, Loki, or their fans deserved. It was not the conclusion you deserved, after the heart and soul you put into the character.

All that is to say: even if Marvel didn’t understand or appreciate what they had in your Loki, some of us do, and we are grateful for the dignity and compassion with which you incarnated a character who suffered from emotional abuse, social ostracism, and mental illness (Ragnarok cannot make us believe that all of these problems are mere “childish fixations,” to quote the director, or a lazy failure to “grow and change”). I hope the Loki TV show turns out to be worthy of the character as you, Branagh, and Whedon shaped him, not another cynical effort to cash in on Loki’s fans while making no secret of the contempt in which we are held, especially because most of us are female, and bowing to the dislike of the Reddit crowd that can’t understand why a cerebral, slightly androgynous, morally ambiguous character is more appealing to women than the standard self-certain male power fantasies (must be because women always go for assholes, right?). I haven’t decided yet whether I want to subscribe to Disney+ so that Marvel knows exactly how many people care about Loki, or boycott it in protest of how the MCU has treated Loki and his fans. Maybe I’ll compromise by using someone else’s login…

To conclude (finally; we academics tend to wax long-winded): Thank you for all your magnificent work, which clearly demonstrates your respect for both your craft and your audience. You’re a true artist, and you manage to elevate everything you act in (your eyebrow movements furnished most of the sincere pathos in Ragnarok). I hope you will continue to act both in the theater, which is obviously your true passion, and in film and TV so that your work is accessible to a larger audience. Or do more of those National Theatre Live things; best of both worlds.

Sincerely, etc.

[beatriceinmessina]

American Horror Story: Cult Rewatch--Episode IV, “11/9″

SPOILERS for the entire season and William Shakespeare’s Macbeth.

Macbeth and Lady Macbeth.  (Screenshot by me, from Netflix.  And ha, it looks like they’re looking down at my notes.)

The episode flashes back to election night, before the cult starts.

Winter takes a selfie in the voting booth.  Isn’t that illegal and causes your vote to not count?

Ally promises to vote Democrat, but then votes for Jill Stein, which Ivy knows about in the first episode.  When did she tell her?  Did she even tell her, or did Ivy find out on her own?

Kai and Gary jump the voting line.  Gary obviously needs a doctor, but wouldn’t Kai be told to go to the back of the line?  What are the rules of this polling station?

Everyone votes very quickly.  What about the rest of the ballot?  Don’t you have to fill that out too?  

I’m positive that if a man pulled out his bleeding stump of an arm at a polling station, he would be rushed to a hospital to recover, then be psychologically evaluated.  Has Gary been evaluated?  He needs it.

After the intro, the date is 09 November 2016, so Kai seems to begin to form his cult on that day, meaning the previous episodes (with the exception of the first scene) take place after that, likely in the rest of November and December 2016 or January of 2017.

How long has Kai been watching the Wiltons, that he selects Harrison as the first person to recruit for the cult?  They appear to vote before he comes in, so he probably didn’t see them then.  How did he find them?  Was it just because he was a member of the gym, or did he join to find Harrison?  How much control does he have at this point?  It’s only one day after the election!

Kai knows enough about Harrison to know he’s gay even though Harrison’s just met him.  Again, how long has been be watching them?  How has he been watching them?  Does he have cameras everywhere or something?

Kai says he works in technology, specifically coding.  He could probably hack into a camera in someone’s house and watch them.  On the other hand, he could be lying.  I’m not entirely sure he even has a job prior to deciding to run for city council.  He also says that he tested at a genius IQ level at age ten, which could be possible--he is very intelligent and good at getting in people’s heads, but again, that could be lying.  There some things he says that I know aren’t true, and some things he says that I’m not sure about.

Kai tells Harrison that while he likes women, he will fight and kill for anyone, man or woman, if they’re part of his team.  He adds that “and if they wake up in the morning with a hard-on that won’t quit, I will find a way to make sure they know how much I love them.”  This is the start of indoctrination: letting Harrison know that he’s okay having sex with men, opening up the possibility of them sleeping together, if Harrison is with him in his endeavors.  He’s using his sexuality to draw Harrison in.

Harrison says that sometimes people masturbate in the steam room--are people allowed to masturbate in a gym steam room?  What if someone else is in there?  Doesn’t that count as sexual harassment, then?  Or indecent public exposure?

When did Kai have the time to sneak into the steam room and draw the smiley face without Harrison noticing?  He went right there from the end of their session.

About the shower masturbation bit: How is Kai so sure that Harrison is going to walk in on him doing that?  What if someone else came in?  Why wouldn’t he close the door just in case and then open it when he saw that it was Harrison coming in?  Why does Harrison just watch him?  Does this count as indecent exposure in a public place?  (He’s probably doing it on purpose to let Harrison get an eyeful, though… Kai likes to use sex to get people interested, which is interesting in of itself.  He is later established as a complete misogynist, and yet he uses a traditionally feminine means of villainy--sexuality.  What is this archetype of the person who uses their sexuality as a weapon often called?  The femme fatale--which is French for “fatal woman.”  The femininity is right in the name.  Why would a man who so disdains women employ a tactic that he likely associates with them, and therefore would disdain as well?  I won’t deny I like seeing the trope gender-flipped, though.  It’s cool, and fun to think about.)

The “Macbeth scene” (my name):

It’s been at least twelve or thirteen days since the election, since this apparently Kai and Harrison’s last session out of twelve.  

Kai has somehow managed to get into Harrison’s head well enough that the bullshit he spouts about being a mirror and quoting Nietzsche makes sense to the latter and he doesn’t ask questions.  Then again, Harrison is very vulnerable here--he’s about to be homeless, and he’s feeling down on himself.  It’s classic cult leader logic--get them when they’re feeling lost, and reassure them to make them think that you have all the answers.

“Harrison, I’m just a mirror.  Anything you see in me is in you.”  (Kai).  These words are almost lifted directly from a 1970 Rolling Stone interview with Charles Manson, a man who (in my opinion) Kai might as well be.  They’re so similar that the season is kind of just that history repeating itself.  Perhaps this is the writers trying to seed the Manson material that wil happen later.  (An additional note: I discovered this completely by accident about a week after watching the episode while reading this article.  It even mentions this season!)

The actual Macbeth part begins with Harrison cleaning up in the steam room and Kai walking in.  Harrison, like Macbeth, is in a place of uncertainty; Kai, his Lady Macbeth, urges him to take power and control of his life, which in both cases means murder.   There’s also a bit of a gender thing going on--Lady Macbeth insults Macbeth’s masculinity to encourage him, and Harrison probably is feeling a bit emasculated right now, being made to clean up other men’s semen, which leaves him vulnerable to Kai’s manipulations. Harrison, however, is more willing than Macbeth--he doesn’t ponder killing as Macbeth does, he simply does it. On the other hand, his reaction to murdering Vinny is almost identical to Macbeth’s to murdering Duncan--freaking out.  Kai is the opposite: calm and covering up the murder, just as Lady Macbeth does.  

Kai is able to hack into Vinny’s phone to send a text from it as well as erase three weeks of security footage seemingly due to a computer virus.  Perhaps he’s not lying about working in tech.  Either that or he’s a really good hacker.

He also confirms that he’s been watching Harrison and everyone around for a long time.  How?  In person?  Through cameras?  What kind of operation is he running?

More classic cult leader logic: Kai tells Harrison that they’re going to destroy everything to create a better world.  He smartly doesn’t specify what that world is, but promises a better one to someone who’s having a hard time, which is part of seeming like he can provide all the answers.

Kai apparently knows enough about the human body to instruct Harrison how to cut off a head.  Has he done this before?  As a matter of fact, did he ever kill anyone before he started the cult?

Cut to December of 2016, when Beverly is reporting on Vinny’s murder.  I’m guessing that his body wasn’t found for about a month or a little more than a month.

Beverly’s not a part of the cult during this report, since it’s this that draws Kai to talk to her and recruit her.

Kai takes Adderall, which is prescribed at one pill a day, but he’s also popping more than one at a time.  Also, I just want to point out that he looks like a modern-day, ratty Daario Naharis in this scene.  

Beverly understandably cracks after being harassed during work, but still checks herself into a rehab facility, which doesn’t really seem like her, since she’s very headstrong.  Was she made to by her boss?

Once again, Kai practically appears behind someone, this time Beverly.  Honestly, does the man wear some kind of noise-cancelling shoes?

Beverly takes up Kai’s offer for coffee even though she has no idea who he is.  Why would she do that?  Why would anyone do that?  He could be dangerous!  He is dangerous!  The fact that she took him up on the offer and didn’t walk away is honestly a stroke of luck for him.

Kai almost acts as a more chaotic version of James March here, asking Beverly how it felt to do something bad (as March often does with John), and encouraging her to kill people.  He tells her that fear gets stronger and scarier as it spreads (which is pretty obvious) and essentially asks her to be his minister of propaganda.  An earlier scene has shown that Beverly is worried about her job, as Serena seems to be rising in the ranks of the news station.  Kai is preying on that here; giving her an opportunity to become valuable when she feels like she isn’t.  

“If you get the world scared enough, they will set the world on fire for us.”  (Kai).  So he wants people to be so scared that they’ll do anything for him.  Does that mean he’s going to make people scared of him, or of the world at large so that they’ll cling to him?  Maybe both.

The backstory Kai gives Beverly (Iraq, Yale, etc.) is such blatant lying that I’m not entirely sure she believes him either, given the indulgent smile she gives him after.  Did he really think she going to believe him, or is he using the lie to paint himself as stupider than she thinks he is, so she’ll underestimate him and he’ll be able to control her later?

Beverly tells Kai that there aren’t any open seats on city council, so this is before the Changs are murdered, meaning that they were probably murdered in mid-December of 2016.

“I need you, Beverly.”  (Kai).  The vocabulary is specific.  Beverly isn’t feeling especially needed at her job at the moment, given the assignments she’s been getting (such as the landfill), but Kai is there to fill that hole.  Like with Harrison, he takes advantage of a person at a moment of low self-esteem and unhappiness.  Once again, pretty classic cult recruitment.

Only Harrison, Meadow, and Kai show up to kill Serena and her cameraman.  Are Samuels and Gary not part of the cult yet, or could they simply not make it?

As the clowns walk away, Kai appears to be holding Serena’s heart in his hand.  Holy shit.  That’s all I can say.  Jesus freaking Christ.  That’s… that’s another level of depraved.

Two people are dead, but at least the puppy is alive.  The puppy lives, and that makes me happy.  Also, I want to pet it.

Meadow is clinging to Kai’s every word in the next scene.  I’m guessing she’s already in love with him, and he probably knows it, given that he’s going to use her love for him to his advantage in two episodes.  (Just a note on the way Kai talks here--he’s very slow and deliberate, building up anticipation for his reaction to the masks.  He knows he’s got them (or Meadow at least, Harrison doesn’t look too interested) completely in his thrall.)

Kai tells Beverly that he will do anything for her, a probable callback to him telling Harrison something similar earlier in the episode (see above).  So he wasn’t lying about that--he’ll do anything for anyone in his circle, or if he thinks it’ll get them in his circle.  And it’s part of indoctrination--he’s making Beverly feel like he cares about her, like he’s one of the only people who cares about her, so she’ll come to rely on him.

Beverly is next seen reporting on the finding of Vinny’s severed head, which was reportedly alerted to the police by anonymous tip.  Did one of the cult members call it in, to work more fear-mongering?  

Flash back to 07 November 2016, the day before the election.  Ivy first meets Winter when the latter defends the former after Gary sexually assaults her.  I’m guessing that Ivy met Kai through Winter, likely after confiding her frustrations in her about Ally voting for Jill Stein.  An important question: is the cult tormenting Ally only because Ivy is angry and wants to hurt her, or does Kai have some vested interest in Ally?  (I’ve seen the interpretation that he’s in love with her, which is interesting to think about.)

Kai must have some kind of ability to move without sound, because he opens the door to Winter’s room and walks in without her noticing.  How stealthy can he be?  I’d swear he was a ghost if this season wasn’t the only one without supernatural elements or magic.

He also seems to notice the blood on Winter’s finger even though she’s standing far from him in a dimly, red-lit room.  Again, does he actually have some kind of power?

Kai honestly looks rather aroused when Winter tells him that hurting Gary “felt fucking fantastic” and orders her to tell him everything.  It’s like if James March and Viserys Targaryen had a son.  An extremely disturbing son.

Given that Kai frees Gary from the basement, Winter must have told him everything, but why, when it’s not in her interests at all?  My guess: she’s afraid of what he’ll do to her if she doesn’t.  Even though the cult isn’t a thing yet, he still exerts some power over her, especially since she likely knows of his violent tendencies and inappropriate attraction to her.  (I am using the words “likely” and “probably” a lot in these notes.  I’m sorry; it’s simply that not everything is confirmed and I must hazard guesses based on dialogue and body language.)

When Kai goes down to find Gary, there’s a shot where the background is completely black, and he’s the only thing in the shot that’s lit.  No comment here.  I just think it looks really cool.

“Humiliation” and its varieties is a word Kai uses with almost all of his followers recruited so far: Harrison, Beverly, Meadow, and now Gary.  He even uses it to refer to himself in the first episode.  Humiliation is key here; Kai takes people that feel humiliated and works with it, because people hate feeling humiliated (in my experience), and he’s promising them that he can take away that feeling, and maybe even help them punish those who humiliated them.  He’s using it to get them to do insane things that they would otherwise never do (i.e., Gary cutting off his own hand).  Throughout this whole episode, he’s been doing that, and I won’t say that it’s not clever, since it’s working very well.

I don’t like Gary at all, but I do feel sorry for him.  No one deserves an insane man manipulating them into cutting off their own hand.  Not even to vote.

Kai looks unnerved by Gary cutting off his own hand.  This man cut out a woman’s heart without flinching, and this freaks him out?  What the hell are his standards for gore?  Not self-inflicted?

[massielandnetwork]

Important Economic Trends During Anarchy

2021 – Let the Games Begin

12. A Christian Secession – “Double Double toil and trouble”

The Demented Marxists (DM) have the cauldron at the rolling boil stage. A few weekly highlights included Arizona calling out their National Guard because of the catastrophe occurring along their Mexican border but Biden and his merry band of DMs say everything is fine. The DM’s favorite harpy, Dr. Fauci, announced Xi “Masks forever!”. Our military is now politicized with Critical Race Theory (all whites are bad) being used to remove political conservatives, now to be treated as domestic terrorists. Biden has appointed his panel of liberals to recommend expanding the U. S. Supreme court from 9 to 13 justices. Why only 13?

If they are going to make the Supreme Court a source of mockery, perhaps they should increase it to 90. Afterall, the DMs and BLM have successfully eliminated “blind justice” and replaced it with mob rule and intimidation. An illustration of the DM’s definition of capitalism, the BLM Founders have become wealthy shaking down major corporations including sports organizations. When does the Marshall arrive to be the adult in the community and wipe out the bad guys?

With Hong Kong now fully “integrated” into China, Xi is sending large sorties of fighters and bombers into Taiwan air space. Meanwhile, Russia has amassed 80,000 troops along the Ukraine border. The explanation given is that Trump was unpredictable but Biden is known. Does that mean “owned”. Which is more important to these characters, money or power?

Shakespeare Plays. Most of my years in high school that phrase signaled something to be endured in English class. But his writings took on a new meaning when I saw my first live Shakespeare play with professional British actors in a professional theatre. I have been hooked ever since. While I am not a student of his plays, I seek them out because I enjoy them. My preference is his comedies but even his tragedies are enjoyable because Mr. Shakespeare interspersed humor in odd places in them. He knew his audience. He poked fun at everything.

This past week, if not this year, has reminded me of the famous scene in William Shakespeare’s play “Macbeth” where the witches gather around their cauldron to stir up the trouble to be endured by the characters in the play. Those witches are hyper-active today. I can hear them chortling as they chant “Double Double toil and Trouble” while stirring their boiling pot.

Talk about boiling pots, the NBA announces its number of viewers is estimated to have dropped to around one-half of the pre-BLM level. Some former NBA fans have been quoted using a different phrase “Shut up and dribble”. While quite descriptive and clear in its communication, it does not have quite the same ring as Shakespeare’s famous witches’ quote.

Another popular phrase heard in the discussion about the NBA is “Go Woke and Go Broke”. Apparently, the NBA Commissioner is concerned because he said this week that the BLM phase was about over. Do you think he meant his players would shut up and dribble or was he commenting on the fact that the three self-described Marxist BLM founders have become multimillionaires? Woke folks are hard to understand.

In contrast with “Wokeness”, a group of artists in Cuba have created and performed a song that has become amazingly popular. It is called “Patria y Vida” (“Homeland and Life”) and lauds freedom while celebrating George Washington. Can we send the BLM folks to Cuba?

Meanwhile, Portland continues to be a war zone. The police are the equivalent of unarmed rangers and the downtown area is, well, destroyed. Beyond heartbreaking, one church had been feeding 1,000 homeless folks but has been forced to stop because they are spending their money on repeatedly repairing their building from the riots. Is this still America? When do the adults show up and re-establish sanity? No wonder there is a movement in Oregon to merge most of that state with Idaho. The Idaho legislature has voted to consider it. A sign?

1. Keep watching the activity about the fraudulent election last November.

a. The Michigan Supreme Court ruled that the Michigan Secretary of State exceeded her authority when she approved a variety of changes to the state’s election laws. Was the “certified” election in Michigan a fraud? YES.

b. The Arizona legislature authorized recount of 2.1 Million votes in Maricopa County, Arizona is about to start.

c. Wisconsin’s legislature voted to investigate the 2020 election. All the DM’s voted against it. Odd behavior for anyone convinced the election was honest.

d. The Georgia Secretary of State is blocking the review of the Fulton County (Atlanta) Georgia actual ballots by the auditors. Odd behavior if there is nothing to hide.

e. Lawsuits have been filed and counter filed by Mike Lindell, Sidney Powell, and Dominion (the voting machine company). Stay tuned, much more to come.

100 days into the DMs’ coup (am I the only one that feels like it has been 100 years), here are some quick observations of events that will impact our economy:

1. This week it was reported that the rate of inflation in March was 1%. That is an annual rate of 12%. Talking heads reading their teleprompters reassured the public that the rate of inflation was going to calm down as we move through the year. After all, the DM’s are in control using economic techniques refined in Venezuela. What could go wrong?

2. Biden and his fellow DM’s continued to push their twin infrastructure bills. The DM’s have us on a path of massive spending to make the national debt “manageable” via devaluation of the Dollar which the consumer experiences as inflation (rising prices). In contrast the Trump Administration had the USA on a path of rapid economic growth which would thus enable the payment of our national debt. The contrast in pain is enormous. Churchill once said that “Believing you can tax and spend to create prosperity is the equivalent of standing in a bucket and trying to raise it by its handle.”

3. In a truly capitalistic economy, the brake on this run-away train would be applied by the 10-year Treasury. While it continues to fluctuate 1.50% to 1.70%, I do wonder what the rate would be if The Fed was not distorting the financial market via Quantitative Easing (QE) - The Fed buying our government debt. Even in the face of QE forecasts from various sources estimate that by the end of 2021 the 10-year Treasury will be 2.5% to 3.0% and mortgage rates will increase to 4.0% to 4.5%. That is a low mortgage rate but a huge increase over the lowest rate last fall.

4. This week NAR released a study on the land market in 2020 which highlighted that the land and the residential markets were the two real estate segments that did well in 2020. The others suffered significant losses. The residential market experienced significant increases in prices. The NAR report indicated that land prices were more stable but they did not dissect the land market into its different segments. Our database indicates the segments experiences varied greatly.

In the land market, I am hearing the same conversations I have heard just before each of the last four recessions. Environmental regulations have gotten worse and approval times are lengthening.

Remember, higher interest rates mean lower real estate prices. We are in the peak of this real estate cycle. Every previous time I have witnessed bubbles burst, shortage become surplus seemingly overnight. Unsustainable things continue until that unpredictable moment when they stop. In a financial crisis “Cash is King”. Get prepared.

A great piece of land remains The Best investment long term unless the DMs get us to full-fledged Marxism. Capitalism builds wealth, Marxism/Socialism consumes it in self destruction. Pray for a return to honest elections in the USA. God is in control. Men make plans, but God ALWAYS wins as Paul describes in a letter written while he was imprisoned in Rome.

“I want you to know, beloved, that what happened to me has actually helped to spread the gospel, so that it has become known throughout the whole imperial guard and to everyone else that my imprisonment is for Christ; and most of the brothers and sisters, having been made confident, dare to speak the word with greater boldness and without fear.”

(Philippians 1:12-14) New Revised Standard Version, Oxford University Press)

Stay healthy,

Ned

April 22, 2021

Copyright Massie Land Network. All rights Reserved.

[hexiewrites]

you love the sea: part four, moirai [fate]

setting: non-magical, mythical AU pairing: marcus flint/oliver wood word count: 3525 A/N: the fourth and final part of @flintwoodandco​‘s giveaway winning fic! indigo’s amazing idea was so much fun to write, and I’m so glad I got the chance! much love to my beta @nymphadoraholtzmann​ for all her hard work here. <3 even more bonus points to @scourgify this week, who made this amazing mood board inspired by the fic!

also, a note that I explained the chapter titles in the authors notes on ao3. it’s kind of a spoilery explanation so I won’t copy it all here, but the TLDR is: they’re named for the greek fates (the moirai), who control your life. fun fact: the fates are somewhat analogous to the three witches / weird sisters of Macbeth, who Marcus reference in chapter two.

(part one)(part two)(part three)(you can also read it on ao3!)

I’m not excited, but should I be? is this the fate that half of the world has planned for me? I know I love you and you love the sea but what holy water contains a little drop, little drop for me?

- unbelievers, vampire weekend

When Marcus woke up again, everything was dark. He was so cold he could barely feel his fingers, and even though his head still throbbed it felt slightly less like his skull was about to implode at any moment. With a grunt, he pushed himself up onto unsteady feet and swallowed to try and clear the dryness out of his throat.

It took him ten minutes to stumble his way up the hill and to the cottage, and he frowned when he realized the door was open.

“Oliver?” he called out, voice hoarse and ragged, as he closed the door behind it and sunk down against the wood, taking deep breaths. The hill had drained any of the energy he had left, and he wasn’t sure he could make it into their bed by himself. He still wasn’t sure what had happened - had he been sailing? - and it was especially concerning that his boyfriend was nowhere to be found.

“Ol?” Marcus tried again, groaning and closing his eyes as the sound echoed through the empty house.

Empty.

Marcus sat for a long moment against the door, taking deep measured breaths and trying to summon the energy to crawl into the bedroom and see if Oliver had already fallen asleep. Why hadn’t the other man come looking for him? How had he managed to pass out on the beach? Nothing made sense, though his entire brain felt slightly like mush, so Marcus wasn’t sure if he was the right person to be trying to sort out a series of events at all, let alone determining how much sense something made.

Finally, he stood. With the help of the walls to lean on, Marcus made it into their bedroom, and frowned again. Something was wrong, his brain alerted, as he glanced over and noticed the empty bed. Something was wrong, he thought, as he realized Oliver’s coat and shoes were still sitting by the door. Something was wrong - because the trunk was open. And the only thing inside it was Oliver’s ring.

Marcus stumbled into the room and dropped down to his knees in front of the large trunk, reaching inside to see if it really was as barren as it looked, avoiding the ring and hoping he was wrong. The wood was cool and almost felt damp to the touch, and Marcus leaned closer and inhaled the all too familiar scent of salt water.

And then it all rushed back to him, and he crumpled a little closer to the ground in disbelief. It hadn’t been a fuzzy dream. Something had happened, he must have been sailing - though he still couldn’t remember that part - and Oliver wasn’t actually Oliver at all. Or, well, he was, only he also happened to be a seal.

It was all too confusing for Marcus’s concussed brain to puzzle through and so he dragged himself up into the bed, sunk further into the covers that smelled like Oliver - salty and cool and fresh - and fell asleep with his tears still drying down onto his cheeks.

It took Marcus four full days to shake the worst of the dizziness brought on by what was most definitely a concussion, and probably a partial drowning. His lungs still hurt when he coughed, and his brain swam if he tried to do any one task for too long, but the unbearable agony of the cottage had finally become too much.

He spent all of the fifth day packing - his things only. He couldn’t bring himself to go through the closet and pick out all the things he’d bought for Oliver and try and figure out to do with them. Every time he touched them another wave of sadness washed over him and it took far too much work to keep suppressing the emotions threatening to drown him.

And then there was the trunk. Marcus didn’t even have it in him to shut it, and so it sat empty and open and mocking him at the end of the bed. If he hadn’t been so stupid, if he had just stayed home, Oliver wouldn’t have had to rescue him. Even that was fuzzy - Marcus was still coming to the realization that his boyfriend wasn’t exactly human, and remembering the specifics of what exactly a selkie was seemed too hard to bear.

The thing that stood out, stark and loud in his brain, was that if a selkie fell in love and then went back to the water, they wouldn’t be able to return to land as a human for seven years.

Seven years.

Could he survive that long?

Finally, Marcus had the cottage fully packed and ready to go. Oliver’s clothes still hung in the cupboards and the trunk still sat open on the bedroom floor with the ring glinting up at him, and Marcus locked the door behind him with the thought that he might never come back.

Seven years.

He could barely stand to look out at the water as he loaded up the boot of his car. Over the past year, the amount of things he owned had barely grown at all, and he had no problem fitting it all inside and slamming the door.

Marcus made the mistake, before he climbed into the driver's seat, of looking out at the water one last time. He wasn’t close enough to be a hundred percent sure, but he knew what the telltale splash in the bay meant, and he choked out a final sob before he started the car and drove away, forcing himself not to look back again as he left.

The first year was unbearable.

It took Marcus nearly six months to go an entire day without being dizzy from the concussion, and eight before he went an entire day without crying over his loss.

It didn’t help that he’d returned to a group of friends who were unaware of the pain he’d been through. Who looked at the ring on his finger and laughed and congratulated him and asked where the lucky girl was. Who didn’t get it, when Marcus said he was gone. Who thought he’d been dumped and decided he needed an attitude adjustment and a series of increasingly worse blind dates. Who laughed like that hadn’t lost what Marcus had - because they hadn’t, and who didn’t understand, because they couldn’t.

The second year was sharp.

Marcus went entire days without crying, entire hours without thinking about Oliver. And then he’d catch sight of a head of sandy blonde hair, or bright blue eyes, and everything crashed down around him. It took weeks to pick up the pieces, sometimes, and those weeks were spent in darkened rooms with bottles of whatever he could get his hands on to make the time pass faster, faster.

Pansy recommended a therapist, who talked about death and grief and living with loss and who screamed when Marcus threw his glass to the floor and watched in fascination as it shattered and spread and blood leaked from his palm.

Blaise recommended a nightclub, where the girls (and boys) were too pretty, too made up, too thin and lithe and malleable. The first one called Marcus “stoic”, but went home with him anyways. The second one said he was “damaged”, but led him into a nearby alleyway with a grin on his lips. The third, and final, had looked into his eyes and sighed, and said that he could never be what Marcus needed, and sent him on his way with a soft kiss and a promise that it could get better - if Marcus would let it.

Marcus didn’t think he wanted to let it. The pain was sharp, but it was there, and if the pain was there, maybe Oliver was too.

The third year was dull.

Oliver was a memory, more than anything else. Sometimes Marcus opened a box he hadn’t dug into much and caught a whiff of salty ocean air and it was almost as if he was next to him again. But for the most part, Oliver didn’t exist as a real person so much as a fragment of Marcus’s mind - the lost sensation of togetherness and the taste of burnt cooking and the memory that once, he had been loved.

If it weren’t for the ring that he still wore on his left hand ring finger, Marcus might have been able to start to forget. His friends had, anyways. Draco called twice a week sometimes with someone else he could set Marcus up with. Adrian dropped by with beers every other Saturday and tried to goad Marcus into watching porn, or going to a strip club, or anything at all to act like the single man he was supposed to be.

Instead, Marcus moved through his life quietly. He’d started working for Draco’s company, and he showed up in the morning and put his head down and worked all day and left. He didn’t make friends, or seek out hobbies. He turned up for things he was supposed to turn up for and tried not to drink more than seemed healthy and mostly avoided anything that could set off his memories again.

It was harder than it looked, but at least the pain remained dormant and instead of the sharp sting of loss and hurt, all Marcus was left with was the dull pressure of a ring on his finger and a reminder that once, he hadn’t been alone.

The fourth year, when everyone around him seemed to be starting their lives and getting married and moving on, was throbbing.

Draco’s wedding was first.

He married a bushy haired girl with dark skin and too long a name. She worked for the government, and laughed too loudly, and pulled a face when one of Draco’s older relatives made a thinly-veiled racist comment. Standing at the front of the Malfoy’s lavish ballroom, she glowed, and Draco’s smile seemed brighter than Marcus had ever seen it before when he walked towards her. The room clapped as they kissed and Marcus clapped too, and pretended to ignore the way his heart pounded into his chest and his eyes stung with the effort of holding back tears.

Terence and Adrian were married next, outside on the football pitch where they had met and grew up and fallen in love. Their wedding was bright and loud and the alcohol flowed freely, which was the only reason Marcus managed to survive the day without a breakdown. It was, in some ways, how he had pictured his own wedding. It wasn’t formal, but it was alive, and it was a constant reminder that Marcus’s stupidity had lost him the thing that mattered the most to him.

Pansy was the third and, thankfully, final wedding of the year. She married Daphne in the winter, with snow swirling around their shoulders and landing in their eyelashes. They nearly melted into the background, each in stunning white dresses with matching smiles on their faces. Marcus had been dragged outside for photos and had since lost sensation in his toes and fingers, and he stood and smiled as best as he could and tried to figure out how to numb his heart in the same way. Pansy had tugged him aside, halfway through the reception, and kissed his cheek and told him that she loved him anyways, even though he was being an idiot, and that one day he would be just as happy as she was.

Marcus had nodded, and promised her he would. He couldn’t stand the pain anymore.

The fifth year was different.

After four years of pain, Marcus was tired. His body ached, and his heart hurt, and he was tired of being sad and alone and empty.

So he tried to move on.

The first date was a disaster. Marcus had spilled his wine over the table and the girl across from him huffed and turned her nose up, mumbling about a hundred dollar dress and his giant clumsy hands.

The second date was better, with a smiling raven haired boy who didn’t laugh when Marcus stumbled over reading out the wine menu, and explained with an open heart that he understood loss and heartbreak.

The third date was with a man with broad shoulders and bright red hair tied back in a ponytail. He took Marcus to a bar called The Reserve and made a joke about dragons that seemed a little too on the nose, but made Marcus laugh anyways.

The fourth date, with the same redhaired man, was fun - a sensation Marcus had forgotten had existed. They rode a motorbike around the city, and Charlie, the redhead, laughed with wild abandon when Marcus mentioned feeling a little safer when he was on the edge of danger.

His sixth date, Charlie ended up in his apartment. And then, Charlie found the ring that lived on a chain around Marcus’s neck, and snapped that he wasn’t going to be someone’s mistress.

Charlie understood, when Marcus tried to explain. Charlie stayed anyways.

Marcus woke up in another pair of arms and sobbed in the bathroom because everything about them was wrong.

There were no more dates.

The sixth year was stressful.

Marcus spent weeks pacing his apartment, trying to decided what he would do. He was pretty sure, all those years ago, that Oliver had said that after seven years a selkie could return to the land. But, even Oliver had seemed confused about it and if it really worked.

And what if Oliver came back to the land and decided he was happier as a seal? What if he didn’t come back at all? What if he looked at Marcus and realized he’d been silly to love him at all?

What if, what if, what if, what if-

When he had mentioned to his friends that he wanted to look better, look younger, Blaise suggested dying his hair to get rid of the handful of grey strands that had popped up over the past few years. Draco tried to convince him to start an exercise routine, though he was so busy chasing after his two small children he didn’t have much more to say than “get your ass to the gym, Marcus!” Pansy and Daphne took him shopping and forced him to buy an armful of new sweaters and shoes and demanded that he throw out all of his tshirts.

He didn’t.

He did start running again, and halfway through the year decided he had to suck it up and signed up for a membership at his local pool.

At least, Marcus thought to himself one day as he towel dried off in the locker rooms and tried to ignore the way his heart was pounding traitorously out of his chest, at least if he was wrong, if Oliver couldn’t (or wouldn’t) come back for him, the sea could take him anyways - he had nothing left to lose.

The seventh year was alive.

Marcus, for the third and final time, packed his entire life into his car and said goodbye to a home he had grown into it. The drive to Scotland was nerve wracking, and it took all of his energy to keep his hands on the wheel and his tires on the road. He spent the ferry ride to the island with his eyes focused firmly inside the boat, not willing himself to look out towards the water. He worried, the entire way up his driveway, that things had changed too much. That he had lost his only chance.

He cried when he saw the cottage, and again when he unlocked the door. In seven years, not much had changed. There was a layer of dust coating every surface, but Oliver’s clothes still hung in the closet and his trunk still sat open at the foot of the bed.

And now that he was here, Marcus was terrified. He spent hours cleaning the entire house, beating back the dust, washing Oliver’s clothes, wiping the grime off the engagement ring that matched his and replacing it carefully inside the trunk. It all felt surreal - as though he was floating in a strange state of uncertainly, not sure if any of this was worth it. His life for the past six years had been floating precariously in the balance, and the future stretched out in front of him, unknown and uncertain.

Finally, he couldn’t put it off any longer, and he began the trek down towards the water. It all felt so similar, but different enough that he could feel that things had changed. He was different, now. Would Oliver be? Did he age, as a seal? Would he be happy that Marcus was back? Sad that he left? Angry that Marcus had led to this in the first place?

Marcus shed his shoes and climbed out onto his rock - their rock, and settled in, staring out at the water. Nothing happened, just the gentle sway of the ocean and the splash of waves around him, and he let out a soft sigh. “Oliver,” he whispered, and the name felt foreign and yet all too familiar on his tongue. “I’m sorry,” he tried, shutting his eyes and taking a deep breath. “I’m sorry that I was such an idiot, that I… that I ruined everything. I’m sorry I left you… I’m sorry I couldn’t-” Marcus had to swallow back a sob, and he barely felt the tears that tracked down his cheeks, dripped off his chin into the water below. “I’ve missed you,” he said, tears running more freely now. “Seven years without you was hell, Oliver, and I’m sorry, I’m so sorry, I’m so-”

Marcus was cut off by a splash and he opened his eyes faster than he ever had before. The sight in front of him pulled another sob from his throat and he shook his head in disbelief at the seal that floated in the water in front of him. Not just any seal.

Oliver.

Marcus nearly tripped off the rock and waded out another foot into the frigid waters, reaching a hand out towards the creature. He watched as the seal, as Oliver blinked once, and then twice. And then he watched as the seal skin began to fall. And then there was a body crashing into his, long arms around his back, the scent of salt water filling his nostrils and the warm solid feeling of Oliver in his arms.

“Marcus,” Oliver gasped, crying in earnest as they held each other. Oliver was naked, and clinging to his sealskin with one hand - Marcus could feel it against his back. “Marcus, you came back,” Oliver cried, and Marcus nodded.

“Of course, of course I came back,” he murmured, holding Oliver as tightly as he could. “I had to… I couldn’t be here, those years. I couldn’t see you and not be with you, I… I’m so sorry that I left, Oliver. I’m so sorry that I-”

“Not your fault,” Oliver mumbled, pulling back to stare into Marcus’s eyes, a grin breaking out across your chest. “You’re here now.”

Marcus nodded, and he wasn’t sure which one of them leaned in first but their lips touched and seven years of loneliness, seven years of pain and heartbreak and dull, throbbing, sharp ended abruptly and faded like a distant memory.

Together, they stumbled out of the water, and Oliver reached out, pressing the skin into Marcus’s hands, watching as his boyfriend marvelled and skimmed his hands across it. Marcus glanced up, then, holding onto it and not wanting to let go but also not wanting to make the decision, not wanting to be the fisherman who trapped his love on land.

“But,” he mumbled, looking down at the skin and then back to Oliver, understanding the weight of what was happening between them. This was more than a marriage proposal, more than a whispered I love you or a frenzied kiss in the middle of the night. This was everything. “You’ll be miserable.”

Oliver’s smile was sad, and he couldn’t stop his eyes from tracking back out over the water, seeking out the pod of seals he knew were hovering nearby, waiting. They knew what was coming, knew what would happen if he left. They had said their goodbyes and made their peace, and promised to find him if they were summoned too. “I’ve never been as miserable as I was these seven years without you,” he admitted, with a half shrug. “You’re it for me, Marcus,” he said, stepping forward and catching Marcus’s jaw in his hands, pressing their foreheads together. “You’ve always been it for me.”

“Forever?” Marcus whispered, trying to keep his voice as steady as he could. This had been his dream, had been the only thing he wanted for years. But now it was here, and he had to be sure.

“Forever,” Oliver confirmed, and his face broke into a dazzling grin. “Take me home, Marcus,” he whispered, lacing their fingers together and tugging the man away from the beach, pulling himself away from his old life and towards his destiny. “We have some catching up to do.”

(<3 tagging: @pctter, @scourgify, @mxrcusflint, @oliverwvvd, @dramione84, @provocative-envy, @inimitablebiscuit, @ff-sunset-oasis!)

[metzili]

Things that Have Happened To Me at School: January-March

Boy: I’ve lost all faith for the human race. Do you know how many things people have managed to get stuck in their rectum?

Teacher: you need to stay away from the internet

Boy: the internet needs to stay away from me. It depends on who gets the restraining order first

...................

(My teacher plays music while he teaches)

Teacher: *stops* oh yeah, this is a good one.

Boy: what is it?

Teacher: what? Have you guys never listened to Spoon?

Girl: oh yeah. I love Spoon. I also love when they did that song with Fork

Girl 2: and that Spork fanfiction? Omg that was great

...................

Music: starts playing Ke$ha

(The only music my teacher plays is classic rock)

Everyone: *gets quiet*

Teacher: the fuck is this shit

Class: OHHHHHHH

...................

“Hey, listen to this song about grilled cheese”

...................

(In band class)

Boy: *playing around*

Girl: Adam, stop acting like your chair placement!

Everyone: oooohhhh

Boy 2: low blow, man

Boy:*slowly melts to the floor*

Me, who rejoined band a week ago and took his chair placement:

...................

Teacher: I have to warn you that at the end of Act II of Macbeth-

Girl: SATAN SHOWS UP

Teacher:...you’ll have to read the last scene by yourselves

................

My Latin giving a lesbian dating advice. He told her to not even bother with the girl she liked if she won’t even text back because that’s just rude

..............

Teacher: okay so who can give me an example of a paradox?

Girl: Spaghetti is a noodle and a noodle is spaghetti?

Teacher:..no

....................

Girl- oW HE HIT ME Teacher- I don’t blame him you’re more annoying than my nephew

.....................

Teacher: apparently it’s bad luck to say Macbeth before a theatre performance

Girl: wait how is it bad luck

Teacher: it’s like...how it’s bad to say Voldemort

Class: ohhhhh

Boy: see, if you want us to understand, just talk in harry potter references

Teacher: noted

Girl: okay but why is it bad luck

Teacher: weird stuff happens if you say it, like one time someone traded the prop knife for a real one and an actor accidentally killed someone on stage

Girl 2: what I want to know is if that person was charged with murder

Boy: yeah because it was accidentally

Girl 2: I’m gonna look it up

Teacher: you can’t find murder charges from hundreds of years ago in a different country.

Girl 2: I can if I hack into the British government’s FBI

Teacher: what

Girl 2: what

...................

“So, how’ve you been? Been bothered by any fuckboys lately?”

...................

Teacher: why are you looking up where I’ve lived before

Girl: Just because

Teacher: but how

Girl: okay so in tech class we found this code thingie that literally told you everything about someone so we looked up our teacher and found out everything like we even found out where he was holding his wedding in a month

Teacher: great. I’m teaching a class full of hackers

...................

“I get to write short essay introductions because I’m a short girl”

...................

My math teacher wrote the number 8 really weirdly and everyone noticed and this one girl, Riley, made fun of it so my teacher changed the 8 into an R and proceeded to write “Riley sux” on the board for revenge

...................

Teacher: Justin stop acting like a lazy piece of crap

Girl: You can’t say that!

Teacher- I can say it because I’m a lazy piece of crap

...................

Boy- I betted on the Patriots winning and I got $5 from my coach

Teacher-Betting is illegal

Boy-

Teacher-

Boy-

Teacher-

Boy- *runs out of room*

Teacher- YOU’RE GOING TO JAIL

...................

“Boy shut your turtle-looking Michelangelo face up”

“Excuse you I’m Donatello”

...................

Teacher: I mean, who wakes up in the morning wanting to do evil to other people

Boy: Donald Trump

(This was Inauguration Day)

...................

Teacher: *singing* My name is Riley and I’m a loserrr

Riley: True

Teacher : And I have no frieeends

Riley: tHAT’S NOT TRUE

Teacher: I DIDN’T MEAN IT

Riley: YES YOU DID

Teacher: You got me there

...................

Teacher: So why is Macbeth angry about *sees a girl taking pictures* Zipporah taking sELFIES UNDER THE DESK

Zipporah: he’s just jealous of this nude lip gloss

...................

Teacher: Mussolini spoke of reviving Roman greatness-now where have I heard that before? Sounds kind of like “Make Italy great again”

...................

“Why does Snoop Dogg need an umbrella?”

“Fo’ drizzle”

...................

Teacher: We’re going to be outside this period so let me put on my jacket so I can look like a full on pimp

...................

We were doing IRL geometry questions outside and the last question was if the tree in the parking fell, which administration's cars would be screwed. (Yes, that was how it was written) When we were done, our teacher said to just screw it, we’re going to walk straight through the office instead of going around the school to look like gangsters. He also said to wink if we saw any administration and say that we figured out how to destroy their cars.

...................

Teacher: *reading an email* important weather information is being sent to you

Girl: can we leave

Teacher: it’s just a thunderstorm warning

Girl 2: SEVERE thunderstorm and tornado warning

Teacher: why do you care so much? I thought all you kids wanted to die

Girl: yeah but I want to die in the my aesthetic house not this dump

Teacher: you don’t want the firefighters looking for your body saying “ew can you believe this girl died in this place it’s total trash”

Girl: yes

...................

Girl: *clearly distressed* DID YOU KNOW CRAYOLA GOT RID OF DANDELION YELLOW

Boy: *also distressed* I KNOW

Girl: It was the best yellow! W H Y

Teacher: wtf

Girl: I mean why did they add another blue they already have like six of them

Teacher: I’m sure if you find the volume of this metaphorical 100 meter crayon Crayola will re-instate dandelion yellow

...................

Girl: can you please check your email for the weather email

Teacher: there’s nothing there because no one cares whether you live or die

[archivesdiveronarpg]

Congratulations, LUXE! You’ve been accepted for the role of MACBETH. Welcome back, Luxe! You have no idea how happy I that you applied for Macbeth once more. I don’t know what else I could say that I haven’t said before: you play at his best and worst qualities and it’s wonderful. You always get me hooked from the interview, to the para sample, to the extras that you made. The para sample, in particular, is what really clawed at my heart. He’s a beautiful, broken thing and you’ve captured that perfectly in a couple of paragraphs. We love our tragic man and I cannot wait to see him on the dash once more. Please read over the checklist and send in your blog within 24 hours.

                                                                             WELCOME TO THE MOB.

OUT OF CHARACTER

ALIAS | Hello loves! I’m Lux. Guess who’s back, back again? Maybe?

AGE | Twenty one.

PREFERRED PRONOUNS | She/her please!

ACTIVITY LEVEL | I’d like to consider myself a solid six or seven? I do have quite a lot of free time as my schooling is online and I only work part time. I find that even when I can’t find time to get on the dash, I try to plot pretty constantly so that my muses aren’t just sitting stagnant. However, I might have to start on a very small semi-hiatus, should I be accepted. Only for a week, and I won’t be absent the entire time. I just have a terrible case of strep throat and three classes to finish before the end of the year.

TIMEZONE | PST.

IN CHARACTER

CHARACTER | Mikael Falco, also known as the great and terrible Macbeth.

WHAT DREW YOU TO THIS CHARACTER? | I fell in love with Shakespeare from a very early age; I went from an illustrated and abridged collection of Shakespeare’s greatest plays when I was six to inheriting my mother’s The Complete Works of William Shakespeare that she’d scrawled all over in college courses. I deigned it absolutely vital to my educational experience to lug that massive volume back and forth to school every day when in sixth grade Honors English I was finally given an excuse to read Shakespeare. Macbeth has always been my favorite story of the great bard’s. I can still remember being weirdly unfazed as a small child, reading Macbeth and seeing specifically the image of the floating dagger, dripping in blood and hovering just out of Macbeth’s reach as he followed it, arm outstretched and chestnut curls clinging to his face. So, with all of that being said, Macbeth was naturally the very first character I looked at when I found Diverona. Seeing my beloved Macbeth as an Italian mafioso with such a beautifully adapted backstory led me to know that there was no point in looking any further. And, truth be told, Milo Ventimiglia is so well-suited for the role so he did have a bit of an impact on my decision.

WHAT IS A FUTURE PLOT IDEA YOU HAVE IN MIND FOR THE CHARACTER? | Oh goodness, I feel as though this is a bit of a loaded question? Obviously you lovely admins have plot progressions in mind and I have no idea how Mikael will fit in with particular portrayals of the characters, but here goes nothing! Mikael is an obvious suspect for the murder of Alvise. Too obvious, in fact, which leads me to believe it couldn’t have been him. He’s too careful to have slipped up now when so much is at stake for him. So, under that pretense, I imagine he’d take some interest in finding out who really was responsible. Of course, his main goal is to seize whatever scraps of power he can in the midst of all this chaos and hoard them away, somewhere the light can’t touch them, where not even Lucretia can get her hands on them. Some smaller goals of his, side quests if you will, include continuing to mess with Matthias, seeing how much more pressure it’ll take until he finally snaps, and, though I really don’t believe it happened with Alvise, I would love to see the classic plot of the Scottish Play go down in Diverona. It’s just too fun to pass up.

IN DEPTH

WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE PLACE IN VERONA? |

Dark eyes narrowed at the question.  The answers which immediately presented themselves weren’t exactly the most APPROPRIATE.  STUCK SOMEWHERE INSIDE MY OWN DAMNED HEAD was too vague,  too foreboding.  Didn’t fit with the PERSONA.  IN MY WIFE’S BED was too VULGAR.  He forced himself to toss that one out as well,  tongue darting out between his lips as he thought.  Finally he found an answer spilling out of him,  though he wasn’t sure how TRUTHFUL it was.  ❛   The CATHEDRAL.  Obviously.❜  He chuckled,  fingering the cross at his neck a bit nervously,❛   Isn’t it EVERYONE’S  ?  Or have you been FORGETTING to go to confession,  my friend  ?  ❜  It wasn’t entirely untrue.  Nighttime found him on his knees,  apologetic words of ATONEMENT ripping themselves from between clenched teeth,  falling to the silk sheets like HOLY WATER TEARS.  Prayers,  yes,  but he knew no gods.  They were sacrificial words offered on a silver platter to the only ruling force in his life apart from his own bloody ambition  :  LUCRETIA.  And they never seemed to be ENOUGH to satiate her hunger for burnt offerings.

WHAT DOES YOUR TYPICAL DAY LOOK LIKE? |

The question sent LAUGHTER rumbling through him and he readjusted in his seat,  deep thought gone,  replaced with amusement and an urge to RECLINE comfortably.  ❛   That’s on a need to know basis.❜   he waited a beat before continuing,  smile still curling at. his mouth,  ❛And you don’t NEED TO KNOW.  Security reasons,  of course.  You understand,  don’t you  ?  I telL YOU where I’ll be Tuesday at three o’clock,  then you tell a FRIEND and suddenly my Tuesday is cut short by a BULLET to the head.  Now,  I don’t know about YOU,  but I prefer to spend my Wednesdays BREATHING.  And every other day,  of course.❜

WHAT ARE YOUR THOUGHTS ON THE WAR BETWEEN THE CAPULETS AND THE MONTAGUES? |  

❛   I THINK,❜  he began, eyebrows raised. A bemused expression had settled gracefully onto the hard lines of an age-worn face,  and he was trying very hard to mask the thought behind his response,  swirling the contents of his glass and staring deep into the liquor as it sloshed in the crystal,  ❛   I think war makes men afraid,  and fear makes them SLOPPY.  ❜ Though ever so carefully preceded by an assurance that the words which drip like honey from chapped lips are merely thoughts,  flickering ideas and nothing to be taken SERIOUSLY,  his tone conveyed quite the opposite.  It was a FIRM assertment,  the practiced answer of a man who has lain awake asking himself the same question too many nights to count.  ❛They make MISTAKES,  and then other people are left to clean up the mess.  Step into their shoes.❜  He took a swallow from the glass before setting it back on the table at his elbow,  savoring the BITE as it flowed scraping down his throat like glass finely ground.  Remembering himself,  Mikael forced a chuckle and leaned back in the armchair,  legs spread solidly apart,  offering up a crooked smile.  Lucretia tells him the half of his mouth that’s always stuck,  FROZEN in place,  reveals his true nature.  His true INTENT.  That it gives him away,  no matter how hard he might try to play into the contented disposition he’s crafted for himself to wear in the daylight.  He’d never tell her,  but it’s moments like these he thinks she’s RIGHT.

IN-CHARACTER PARA SAMPLE |

❛   Forgive me,  Father,  for I have SINNED. ❜   The words tumbled from his lips before he knew what he was saying.  His heart had suddenly become a ticking time bomb,  threatening to shatter his ribs and send pieces of him splattered across the cement.  Trembling head to toe,  Mikael stumbled backwards a few steps,  eyes black and WIDE as they surveyed the growing pool of blood at his feet.  She was so YOUNG.  As ice cold and steely as he had made himself,  collateral damage sometimes had the ability to WRENCH the bubbling tar pit hidden away in his chest where a heart should be.  He swore loudly and forced himself to turn from the crime scene he’d just created,  shaking hands rising to smooth back already perfect hair.  A nervous habit if he ever had one.  

❛   FORGIVE me,  Father,  for I have sinned.  ❜   The sentiment presented itself on his tongue once more,  and he spat it at the grimy brick wall,  slamming his palms against it as hard as he can manage,  stifling both a scream and the BILE rising in his throat.

It seemed an eternity later before he finally turned back to the girl lying dead in the alley.  Not a death she deserved,  but this wasn’t ABOUT her.  No,  it was about sending a MESSAGE.  The message,  at the moment,  appeared to be that his guilty conscience was turning his stomach into a VOLCANO.  Faintly,  the realization hit him that his hands were bleeding,  palms bruised and BROKEN from his outburst.  

❛   SLOPPY,  ❜   he chided himself angrily,  hands rising to his head once more,  grabbing handfuls of dark hair and TUGGING with a nervous ferocity the likes of which he had never known.  Mikael felt lips lips moving of their own accord,  saying a whispered Hail Mary as his eyes squeezed shut so tightly his eyelids threatened to POP.  Still somehow,  tears managed to curl under thick lashes and streamed quietly down his face,  fists now pounding at his temples.  He had been warned that the first kill was the WORST.  But THIS  ?  This ravaging GUILT that threatened to crack him open from the inside and send whatever FRAGMENTED soul he had spiralling into the dirt  ?  He FORCED himself to bite his tongue,  stop spewing whatever religious nonsense he knew he hadn’t believed in YEARS.  

He inhaled shakily and tight fists unwound from his own dark locks.  Calloused fingertips pressed into his eyes before sliding down his face,  collecting hot tears and flicking them away with a disgust yet unmatched in his repertoire of emotion.  He allowed himself one last GLANCE at the poor young thing on the group,  eyes wide open and GLASSY.  Allowing himself one more show of emotion  —  he was ALONE,  after all  —  he strode to the girl’s side and carefully knelt beside her.  Tugging the handkerchief from his breast pocket,  Mikael wrapped the cold silk around one hand and PLUCKED his father’s crucifix from where it sat,  clutched in the lifeless hand of his very first VICTIM.  

❛  DAMN.  ❜   The clasp was broken,  though he suspected it could be fixed.  It would reside in his pocket until then.  As he was about to stand,  Mikael had a THOUGHT.  He stuffed the kerchief back into his pocket,  the idea now taking root in him and steading his resolve anew.  Brow furrowed and head cocked to one side,  a smile crept across thin lips as Mikael gingerly dipped one thumb into the puddle of blood at his feet.  With it he made a delicate,  CRIMSON sign of the cross on the girl’s forehead before careful fingertips ghosted over her eyes,  shutting them.  

❛  You can have PEACE now,  ❜   he murmured,  halfway jealous of the girl’s departure from whatever troubles she had left behind in life,  ❛   The Lord has taken possession of your soul,  and you are FREE.  ❜  There were no GODS.  It was a fact he had always known.  Perhaps the first step to becoming a god himself,  he thought,  was this.  After all,  KILLING must feel good to God,  too.  He does it all the time.

EXTRAS | Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to do as many extras as I normally like doing, but I did make A PINTEREST BOARD as well as A PLAYLIST for my love Mikael! I also couldn’t help myself and I did SOMETHING A LITTLE ON THE SILLIER SIDE.

[secondsightcinema]

Of Monocles and Mystery: Charles Douville Coburn

As Stanwyck’s shipboard cardsharp “father” in All About Eve (1942)

He’s one of the preeminent character actors of the Golden Age of Hollywood, and, like Sydney Greenstreet and Marie Dressler, among the small club of performers who started hugely successful movie careers around age 60, which at the time was not “the new 50,” it was less Golden Age than Golden Years—time to sit on your laurels and yell “Hey, kids, get off my lawn!” Instead, having only months before lost Ivah, his beloved wife and professional partner of 31 years, Coburn got on a train to Hollywood for a one-picture deal at Metro and immediately became as indispensable to the movies as he had been to the American stage for nearly four decades.

I’m as fascinated by the latecomers as I am by the Rooneys, Garlands, and Dickie Moores who started their screen careers when they were barely out of diapers. I love to watch people grow up and find their voices, see how they chart their uncertain course in the business and in their personal lives. But those who come late to the party, fully formed and with full lives already behind them, are equally intriguing. What’s the story they carry in their voices and faces, where did they come from, what did life throw at them along the way, and how did they respond? What did life make of them, and what did they make of life?

In Coburn’s case, he was prominent enough that I figured there’d be a full-length biography, or if I got luckier, even a memoir.

I didn’t get lucky.

So after the obligatory stops at his Wiki and his entry in David Thomson’s Biographical Dictionary of Film, I started nosing around for other blog posts. I read just one—Cliff Aliperti’s at his Immortal Ephemera site, mainly looking for clues and sources—and started poking around for online links.

This kind of research always puts me in mind of Citizen Kane, and I indulge in an entirely unearned identification with the nameless reporter character who spends the better part of a week trying to plumb the mystery of identity before wanly saying No, he hadn’t found out what Rosebud was, but in any case it wouldn’t have revealed who Kane really was—it was just a piece in a jigsaw puzzle.

Some of you know what this is like. You find contradictions and errors, or intriguing little factoids that raise way more questions than they answer.

With Coburn, this begins at the beginning, with his birth. Some bios say he was born in Savannah, Georgia, but it was actually, per Coburn himself, Macon, Georgia, in 1877, and it was a few years after that his family moved to Savannah. So Coburn was born in the heart of the Confederacy, where veterans of the war would have been everywhere and as Faulkner famously said, “The past is never dead. It’s not even past.” Do the place and era of his birth explain the fact that Coburn was supposedly a member of White Citizens’ Councils, white supremacist groups? He was a proud son of Georgia who left his papers to the University of Georgia. I ran across one reference to his railing against the 14th Amendment in a late-life interview. It is painful to confront things like this about a beloved actor, someone you feel as if you know. But of course, you don’t, and people are complicated.

All accounts say he began his theatrical career at the Savannah Theatre as a program boy, though he said he was 13 and other sources say 14—I’m inclined to go with his own recollection, though one can’t ever be sure the source isn’t exaggerating for effect….

But all sources including the primary one, our boy Charles, agree that having risen through all available jobs at the theater, when he was 18, he became the Savannah’s manager. This would make it 1895.

I found no references to his parents or the circumstances of his upbringing. Was he at the theater out of love, or did his family need the money? I’m thinking here of Claude Rains, who began his work in the theater at the age of 10, his childhood one of grinding poverty. But of Coburn, at least with what I found poking around online, we have to speculate or leave it alone.

Rich, pervy Uncle Stanley, In This Our Life (1942)

In 1901, he moved to New York. That leaves six years between 18 and 24 for him to practice his trade and prepare to take on the big time. He says he originally hoped to become a “light opera comedian,” but when he saw a Shakespeare play, he was lost, or maybe found. The classics would always be the foundation of his passion for theatre.

What was that New York like? Now I’m thinking of Marie Dressler in Dinner at Eight, her eyes misting with nostalgia as she recalls the New York of her greatest years, when she was the toast of the town, young, beautiful, talented, successful, and surrounded by adoring swains. She pictures snow, and carriage rides to Delmonico’s. Dressler could probably have drawn on her own memory for that moment. Coburn’s turn-of-the-century New York was probably a bit less misty, but it’s always a good idea to have one’s salad days in one’s youth, when one is strong and has a high tolerance for squalor.

But look, by 1905 he starts his own company, the Coburn Players, and meets Ivah. They marry in 1906 and until her death in 1937, they are partners in life and work. Supposedly they had six children. Supposedly one of them became an auto mechanic who married a teacher, moved to California, and fathered movie star James Coburn. Is this true? I do not know.

I found that Playbill has a terrific site with a database of old programs, and while it doesn’t list all of the 30-something Broadway shows in which Coburn was actor, director, producer, or all of the above, it did provide a bit of background for this largely ignored part of his career. Here’s Coburn’s bio from WHO’S WHO IN THE CAST of Around the Corner (1936); according to Playbill, it ran for only 16 performances:

WHO’S WHO IN THE CAST

CHARLES COBURN (Fred Perkins), one of America’s foremost actor-managers, was honored last June by Union College with the degree of Master of Letters in recognition of his services to the American theater. Having embarked to the “enchanted aisles,” that marital and professional partnership known as Mr. and Mrs. Coburn entered upon a lifelong devotion to the classics and other nobilities of the theatre, with a repertoire eventually accruing of sixteen plays of Shakespeare, one of Moliére, three from the Greek and more than a score of the Old English, early American and moderns. They have played under the auspices of a hundred colleges and universities and once—the only actors ever invited to do so—they gave an evening performance on the White House grounds. Some of Mr. Coburn’s most important New York appearances have been in “The Better ‘Ole,” “The Yellowjacket,” “The Imaginary Invalid,” “So This Is London,” “The Farmer’s Wife,” “French Leave,” “The Bronx Express,” “Old Bill, M.P.,” “Falstaff,” “The Plutocrat” and “Lysistrata.” Mr. Coburn was in the all-star casts of “Diplomacy,” “Peter Ibbetson,” “Trelawney of the Wells,” and The Players’ production of “Troilus and Cressida.” He was Father Quartermaine in “The First Legion.” Last season he was starred with William H. Gillette, and James Kirkwood in the revival of “Three Wise Fools,” and last June he played the title role in The Players’ revival of George Ade’s comedy, “The County Chairman.” Ol’ Bill, Falstaff, Macbeth, President of the Senate of Athens, Bob Acres, Rip Van Winkle, Col. Ibbetson, and Henry VIII are among the fine portraitures in his gallery of stage characters. At the invitation of President Dixon Ryan Fox of Union College, Schenectady, the Coburns have been importantly engaged during the past two summers in organizing and directing at that college The Mohawk Drama Festival and the separate but related enterprise, The Institute of the Theatre. The central feature of the Summer Session is a festival of great drama, presented by a distinguished professional company, now established as an annual event of national significance taking on a character similar to that of the Stratford and Malvern festivals in England. /

The Coburns were part of the top echelon of the New York theater scene. For the 31 years of their marriage, they moved in those circles. I found this 1942 New York Times piece on Coburn, which has some wonderful color and detail about his life, where he lived, his sense of humor.

“Piggy,” Lorelei Lee’s dishonorably intentioned diamond mine owning friend in Gentlemen Prefer Blondes (1953)

NYT, 1/18/42, p162, by Theodore Strauss via TimesMachine

A Man and His Monocle Charles Coburn, Traditionalist, Keeps Step in a Changing (Show) World

Charles Coburn is 63, a fact which alone gives him the right to appear in public with a monocle. Happily he also has the rather special sort of face a monocle requires, a certain paternal austerity, a benign aloofness—in short, the countenance of a man well fed upon a rich tradition. If the man is also of a height ordinarily reached by other men only on stepladders, that helps greatly too. Most of all, however, it is the tradition that counts, and in Mr. Coburn’s case he has aplenty. He has been a pillar in our theatre for longer than most of us can remember, and if latterly he has made a pretty farthing by displaying his talents in the West Coast Shangri-La in such items as the forthcoming “King’s Row,” it is a tribute to his culture and attainments that Hollywood is the place where he works contentedly eight months a year. New York is where he lives. It is understandable, of course. Mr. Coburn was nurtured in a mellower climate than that which made Sammy run. Though by no means an old fogy to sit in slippered state at The Players, his mind is solidly furnished; it has the bright polish of old brasswork. It is stocked with reminiscences of those years before the theatre became prohibitively expensive and movies alarmingly cheap, and it is strewn as full of Shakespearean quotations as a brook with pebbles. Over the years his mind has obviously assumed a sort of protective coloration that blends well with the comfortably old-fashioned furnishings of the lofty-ceilinged studio salon near Gramercy Square.

Charles Coburn, Esq. Mr. Coburn first moved into the premises in 1919 when Bohemia still stood on a bearskin and daubed pigment on six-foot easels. Somberly paneled, and with a fireplace large enough to roast a fair-sized midget, the room itself is a veritable museum of carved mahogany, portrait paintings, and assorted abracadabra. Most of the furnishings, Mr. Coburn explains, are props accumulated from that long line of plays in which he and Mrs. Coburn appeared and often produced, from their marriage in 1906 until her death several years ago. “I couldn’t sell the stuff for a nickel,” he confides gently. “But it’s a kind of reminder. It reflects the lives of a couple of people who lived here for quite a long time.” Like an elder craftsman who can wear the toga with authority, Mr. Coburn is apt to become troubled over the future of the art of acting. America, he says, has not produced an outstanding actor since 1926. Personalities, yes, and glamour boys and girls, but not an actor who can play a gentleman one night and a guttersnipe the next with equal effect. The old stock companies, where a young actor could spend his apprenticeship among experienced performers, are gone, and the colleges, where acting could be taught in concert with more mature talents, have thus far failed. The result, Mr. Coburn gloomily believes, is an art dying in the hands of those who could still pass it on.

Cycles and Bicycles Mr. Coburn himself began early. At 13, he took a job as program boy in the Savannah Theatre and five years later became its manager, the youngest entrepreneur in the country. During the two years under his aegis he saw such stars as Henry Irving, Ellen Terry, Maxine Elliott, Mrs. Fiske, Modjeska, Otis Skinner, Richard Masterfield and Stuart Robson walk across his stage. Meanwhile he in turn was preparing for a career as a light opera comedian in amateur productions of “The Mikado,” or “The Little Tycoon,” and he still remembers the lingering glow of that night when Emma Abbott, a reigning favorite, snatched him from a crowd of enthusiasts and kissed him roundly. Ever since, he has been “flattered beyond words” by requests for autographs—thinking that perhaps some youngster may feel as he did. “That is as it should be,” he says, falling into quotation. “It is a world of make believe, and it is in ourselves that we are thus and so.” In later years, and before his long association with Mrs. Coburn as an actor-manager, he spent his apprenticeship as utility man, advance agent, and once, as a means of making a living while looking for work in New York, as a member of the “greatest bicycle racing team of all time.” But when that career threatened to take him from his Broadway precincts, he pawned his bicycle for $29 and hasn’t been on a wheel since. In fact, Mr. Coburn no longer cares for healthy exertion as its own reward. “Look at all those people who exercise regularly,” he exclaims. “What happens to them? They die!”

Listen to that—he sounds just like Charles Coburn!

And then in December, 1937, Ivah died, leaving Coburn bereft of his companion, his wife, his theatrical partner. But a man of such energies, an entrepreneur who had acted, directed, produced, and run his own touring company for decades, was not ready to fade away from grief at 60. Ten months later, in October, 1938, he got on a train and headed out west to begin his next act, the one we know him from.

NY Times, 10/10/37, no byline CHARLES D. COBURN TO APPEAR IN FILM Stage Actor Leaves for Coast for Role in “Benefits Forgot,” His First Motion Picture

Charles D. Coburn, stage actor, the director of the Mohawk Drama Festival at Union College, Schenectady, NY, left by train for Hollywood yesterday afternoon to appear in what was said to be his first motion picture.* He is to play in “Benefits Forgot,” a Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer production, in which Walter Huston will be starred. J. Robert Rubin, vice president and general counsel for M-G-M, said that Mr. Coburn had been signed to a one-picture contract with an option on his future services. Production work on “Benefits Forgot” will start next week, he said. As director of the Mohawk Drama Festival, held every summer at Union College, Mr. Coburn has repeatedly voiced the belief that there is now a “crisis in the American theatre” because there were no stock companies to serve as a training school for young players. Mr. Coburn appeared on Broadway in March in “Sun Kissed” and in 1936 played with the late William Gillette in “Three Wise Fools.” For many years Mr. Coburn appeared on the stage with his wife, the former Ivah Wills, who died last December 27.

A few months later, he’s comfortably ensconced in his Hollywood Blvd apartment, throwing a reunion for cast members of a popular show he had been in 30 years before. I’ve boldfaced names you’ll probably recognize…

NYT, 1/3/39, “Old Bill” Holds Reunion Coburn is New Year’s Host on Coast to ‘Better ‘Ole” Actors Special to the New York Times

Hollywood, Calif., January 2—Survivors of “The Better ‘Ole’” company made New Year’s the occasion of their first reunion in twenty years as guests of Charles Coburn, the original Old Bill, at his apartment here. Stage and film celebrities turned out to greet him and the others comprising “three muskrats,” Charles McNaughton, Bert, and Collin Campbell, Alf. Others of the old troupe present were Mrs. Kenyon Bishop, the original Maggie; Lynn Starling, who played the French colonel; Eugene Borden, the French porter, and, collaterally, F.H. (Frankie) Day the Gramercy Park greeter of the dawn who played with Mr. Coburn in the sequel play, “Old Bill M.P.” The “muskrats,” the Tommies created by the wartime crayon of Captain Bruce Bairnsfather, donned white aprons in their post-war “pub” and served guests, who included several members of The Players in New York and many once associated with one of the five companies that played “The Better ‘Ole” on Broadway and on the road. Among them were Mr. and Mrs. Guy Kibbee, Mr. and Mrs. Monte Blue, Mr. and Mrs. Kenneth MacKenna, Mr. and Mrs. Patterson McNutt, Walter Connolly, Nedda Harrigan, Mr. and Mrs.Charles Judels, Pedro de Cordoba, Fritz Leiber, P.J. Kelly, Thomas Mitchell, Andre Charlot, Janet Beecher, Olive Wyndam, Marcella Burke, Georgia Caine, Emma Dunn, Marjorie Wood, Frieda Inescourt, Esther Dale and Irene Rich. Mr. Coburn is the only living Old Bill. The others were DeWolfe Hopper, James K. Hackett, Maclyn Arbuckle and Edmond Gurney. In the New York company, the late Mrs. Ivah Coburn played Victoire, the French maid.

So the years pass, with Coburn occupying himself on screen, stage, and radio, splitting his time between L.A. and New York.

Then, in 1959, the second-to-last mystery I found: his second marriage.

NY Times, 10/19/59 Charles Coburn Marries LAS VEGAS, NEV., Oct. 18 (AP)—Charles Coburn, 82-year-old actor, dropping his famed monocle only to kiss his 41-year-old bride, today married Mrs. Winifred Jean Clements Natzka, widow of a New York Opera Company basso. The ceremony took place in the chambers of acting Justice of the Peace J.L. Bowler.

…and this leads to yet more questions. Did he marry for love, or for a tax deduction? He railed about tax rates in some of his late-life interviews, using the issue as a hook to promote You Can’t Take It With You, the show he was then touring.

And the final mystery: Most sources say this second marriage produced a child, a daughter. To which I say, seriously? Is an octogenarian Coburn supposed to have been up to siring a child? On the other hand, he managed to sire six of them 50 years before, and he was obviously a man of remarkable stamina. But perhaps his bride was pregnant by the opera singer who had widowed her, and that’s one reason why she was interested in marrying a man twice her age?

So, like Rosebud, none of these things definitively answer the riddle, Who was Charles Coburn? But they fill in some important blanks, they give us the flavor of his life in the New York theater, and the life he carried around inside himself when he made all those glorious movies we’re still watching.

And also like Charles Foster Kane, on August 30, 1961, death came for human dynamo Charles Douville Coburn, then 84, following minor surgery at Lenox Hill Hospital in New York City. One obit said his wife and one of her two sons from her previous marriage were with him when he passed.

Not a word about the baby daughter, or, for that matter, any of the other six Coburn offspring, either in this obit as survivors, or mentioned a month later in a piece about his will and estate.

So if I ever get to have a cocktail with him in that cozy little bar in the sky, I’ll see if he can clear any of this up.

This was written for the 2019 What a Character! Blogathon, hosted by Aurora, Kellee, and Paula. Please go take a look at the other fabulous entries—you’ll be glad you did.

from Second Sight Cinema | https://ift.tt/2ppTglK via https://ift.tt/2XrDBz8

[mathematicianadda]

The telescope

The telescope offered a shortcut to stardom for Galileo. We offer some fun cynical twists on the standard story.

Transcript

The year is 1609. What a time to be alive. In London you can go to the theatre and catch the fresh new play Macbeth. In Amsterdam you can make a quick buck trading in stocks—a brand new invention. Science is on fire as well. Kepler’s Astronomia Nova is published this very year—an exquisite masterpiece demonstrating that planets move in elliptical orbits among other things. Quite clearly the single greatest scientific work since the time of Archimedes.

So many exciting things happening. How will you keep up with this whirlwind of innovations and fascinating developments? Perhaps with the aid of another newfangled invention: the newspaper. The first of which comes out right this year, promising in its title to cover for its German readers all “gedenckwürdigen Historien”—thoughtworthy events. Truly it is a time of the new. The winds of change are blowing throughout Europe. Thoughtworthy events are everywhere you look.

What about our friend Galileo? What is he up to at this time? You won’t find him in any of those chronicles of thoughtworthy events. Galileo is already well into his middle age. He is a frail man of 45, not infrequently bedridden with rheumatic or arthritic pains. He is stuck teaching basic geometry for a pittance of a salary in some backwater town. Had Galileo died from his many ailments in this year, 1609, he would have been all but forgotten today. He would have been an insignificant footnote in the history of science, no more memorable than a hundred of his contemporaries. It has often been said that mathematics is a young man’s game. Newton had his annus mirabilis in his early twenties—”the prime of my age for invention,” as he later said. Kepler was the same age when he finished his first masterpiece, the Mysterium Cosmographicum of 1596. Galileo was already nearly twice this age, and he had nothing to show for it but some confused piles of notes of highly dubious value. In short, as a mathematician the ageing Galileo had proved little except his own mediocrity.

It is this middle-aged, run-of-the-mill nobody that first hears of a new invention: the telescope. Now here was his chance at last. He only had to point this contraption to the skies and record what he saw. No need anymore for mathematical talent or painstaking scientific investigations. For twenty years Galileo had tried and failed to gain scientific fame the hard way, but now a bounty of it lay ripe for the plunder. All you needed was eyes and being first.

The mysterious new “optical tube for seeing things close,” as it was called, was the talk of the town at the time. Galileo first hears about it in July 1609. A week or two later a traveller offered one for sale in Padua and Venice at an outrageous price—about twice Galileo’s yearly salary. This enterprising salesman found no takers for his offer. But the sense of opportunity remained in the air. And it was an opportunity tailor-made for Galileo: finally a path to scientific fame that required only handiwork and none of that tiresome thinking in which he was so deficient.

The design of telescopes was still a trade secret among the Dutch spectacle-makers who had stumbled upon the discovery. But acting fast was of the essence. Making a basic telescope is not rocket science. Soon many people figured out how to make their own. “It took no special talent or unique inventiveness to come up with the idea that combining two different lenses … would create a device allowing people to see faraway objects enlarged.” Reading glasses and magnifying glasses were already in common use: they obviously made text and other things appear bigger. They were used for thread count in the cloth business for example. So it was not a far-fetched idea to lenses them to magnify more distant objects as well. And the external shape of the telescopes people reported seeing suggested that at least two lenses were combined in a long cylinder. It didn’t take a genius, therefore, to soon strike upon the simple recipe Galileo found: take one convex and one concave lens and stick them in a tube, and look through the concave end. That’s it. No theoretical knowledge of optics played any part in this; it was purely a matter of hands-on craftsmanship and trial-and-error. As Galileo himself basically admitted.

About a month after first hearing of the telescope, Galileo has managed to build his own, with 8 times magnification. A bit later, maybe 12 times magnification, eventually 16 or so. If you go to a modern toy store or sports good store and but whatever cheapest binoculars they have, that will have the same magnification as a Galilean telescope basically. So if you have an old pair of field binoculars lying around, you basically have a Galilean telescope. So dust it off, why don’t you, and follow along with your own observations as we describe what Galileo found.

In any case, Galileo’s first goal is to leverage the telescope into a more lucrative appointment for himself. He gives demonstrations to various important dignitaries—”to the infinite amazement of all,” according to himself. So on the basis of this Galileo enters multiple negotiations about improved career prospects. Between hands-on optical trials and lens grinding, these showmanship demonstrations, shrewd self-marketing and hyperbole about how “infinitely amazed” everyone is by him, Galileo must have had a busy couple of months indeed. And on top of this marketing campaign and juggling potential job offers, his regular teaching duties were just starting again in the fall.

So we can easily understand why, in these hectic days, the scientific importance of the new instrument for astronomy was not realised right away. At first neither Galileo nor anyone else thought of the telescope as primarily an astronomical instrument. Galileo instead tried to market it as “a thing of inestimable value in all business and every undertaking at sea or on land,” such as spotting a ship early on the horizon. But the moon does make an obvious object of observation, especially at night when there is little else to look at. Perhaps indeed moon observations were part of Galileo’s sales pitch routine more or less from the outset, though as a gimmick rather than science.

But this was soon to change. In the dark of winter, the black night sky is less bashful with its secrets than in summer. It monopolises the visible world from dinner to breakfast; it seems so eager to be seen that it would be rude not to look. In January, Galileo takes up the invitation and spots moons around Jupiter. Yikes! Other planets have moons?! This changes everything. Suddenly it is clear that the telescope is the key to a revolution in astronomy. Eternal scientific fame is there for the taking for whoever is the first to plant his flag on the shores of this terra incognita.

For the next two months Galileo goes on a frenzied race against the clock. He writes during the day and raids of the heavens for one precious secret after another at night. In early March he has cobbled together enough to claim the main pearls of the heavens for himself. He rushes his little booklet into print with the greatest haste: the last observation entry is dated March 2, and only ten days later the book is coming off the presses. Remarkable. It’s a turnaround time modern academic publishers can only dream of, even though they do not have to work with hand-set metal type and copper engravings for the illustrations.

It was a race against the clock and Galileo won. “I thank God from the bottom of my heart that he has pleased to make me the sole initial observer of so many astounding things, concealed for all the ages.” So wrote Galileo, and his palpable relief is fully justified. Little more than dumb luck—or, as he would have it, the grace of God—separated Galileo from numerous other telescopic pioneers who also produced telescopes and made the same discoveries independently of Galileo. For example, Simon Marius in Germany who discovered the moons of Jupiter one single day later than Galileo. As one historian observes, “a delay of only three or four months would have set [Galileo] behind several of his rivals and undercut his claim to priority regarding several key discoveries with the telescope.” Perhaps it was not the grace of God, but Galileo’s desperation, born of decades of impotence as a mathematician, that drove him to publish first. Being incapable of making any contribution to the mathematical side of science and astronomy, Galileo needed and craved this shortcut to stardom more than anyone else.

Accordingly, Galileo greedily sought to milk every last drop of fame he could from the telescope. “I do not wish to show the proper method of making them to anyone”; rather “I hope to win some fame.” Those are Galileo’s own words. His competitors quickly realised that, as one contemporary says, “we must resign ourselves to obtaining the invention without [Galileo’s] help.” Still six years after his booklet of discoveries, people who thought science should be a shared and egalitarian enterprise were rightly upset by Galileo’s selfish quest for personal glory. One writes as follow to Galileo: “How long will you keep us on the tenterhooks? You promised in your Sidereal Message to let us know how to make a telescope so that we could see all the things that are invisible to the naked eye, and you haven’t done it to the present day.”

Meanwhile Galileo never missed a chance to mock stuffy Aristotelian professors for thinking “that truth is to be discovered, not in the world or in nature, but by comparing texts”, Galileo wrote in scorn, adding that “I use their own words.” His opponents themselves had stated that “comparing texts” was their methodology. But if Galileo genuinely wanted them to turn to nature he could have shared his techniques for telescope construction. In truth it served his own interests very well that these people were left with no choice but “comparing texts” while he claimed the novelties of the heavens for himself.

Let’s look at Galileo’s professional situation in a bit more detail. You may have heard that Galileo was a “Professor of Mathematics.” Indeed he was, for twenty years. But we must not let the title fool us. The position had nothing to do with the research frontier in the field. In modern terms Galileo’s position was more comparable to that of high school teacher. Galileo taught very basic and practical courses. His lectures were unoriginal and usually cribbed from standard sources. His mathematical lectures went no further than elementary Euclidean geometry. He also had to teach a basic astronomy course “mainly for medical students, who had to be able to cast horoscopes.” They “needed it to determine when [and when] not to bleed a patient” and the like. Perhaps Galileo didn’t mind, for he seems to have been quite open to astrology judging by the fact that he cast horoscopes for his own family members and friends without renumeration. Alas, he did not enjoy much success as an astrologer. Here’s a quote from The Cambridge Companion to Galileo: “In 1609, Galileo … cast a horoscope for the Grand Duke Ferdinand I, foretelling a long and happy life. The Duke died a few months later.” That’s great, isn’t it? Such a nice bit of deadpan there by The Cambridge Companion.

Galileo was eager to get out of his lowly university post. Now with the telescope he was in a decent negotiating position. After much scheming he resigned from the university and took up a court appointment. You would rather work for some rich guy, a patron, than at a university. That was how it went at the time. Some decades later Leibniz for example did the same thing. He could easily have taken a university job but who wants to be an academic when you can be the resident scholar in the gilded halls of some prince?

So Galileo got his wish. His new appointment freed him from teaching duties and boosted his finances. But Galileo also had an additional demand. Here is what he says:

“I desire that in addition to the title of mathematician His Highness will annex that of philosopher; for I may claim to have studied more years in philosophy than months in pure mathematics.”

This is traditionally taken as a request for a kind of promotion: in addition to being a great mathematician, Galileo also wanted recognition in philosophy, which in some circles was considered more prestigious and in any case included what today is called science (then “natural philosophy”). But I think a more literal reading of Galileo’s request is in order. Galileo is not only declaring himself a philosopher; he is also confessing his ignorance in mathematics. Taken literally, his statement that he has spent “more years in philosophy than months in mathematics” implies that he could not have spent more than two or three years at most on mathematics—which indeed sounds about right considering his documented mediocrity in this field.

Anyway, back to the telescope. So Galileo had some success with it clearly, but not everyone was convinced.

Some believed “the telescope carries spectres to the eyes and deludes the mind with various images … bewitched and deformed.” Perhaps these peculiar “Dutch glasses” were but a cousin of the gypsy soothsayer’s crystal ball? The “transmigration into heaven, even whil’st we remain here upon earth in the flesh,” as Robert Hooke put it, may indeed seem like so much black magic. Add to this the very numerous imperfections of early telescopes, which often made it very difficult even for sympathetic friends to confirm observations, not to mention gave ample ammunition to outright sceptics.

Indeed, we find Galileo on the defensive right from the outset, just a few pages into his first booklet. Seen through the telescope, the moon appeared to have enormous mountains and craters—a big deal, allegedly one of “Galileo’s” monumental discoveries. This was based on shadow effects. Looking at the moon when it’s half full, you see that the surface is uneven because of the shadows cast by mountains and craters. But already there are big problems. The boundary of the moon was still perfectly smooth. A crazy inconsistency. How can there be big mountains in the middle of the moon, but none along the edge? It doesn’t make any sense, yet that’s what it looked like.

Here are Galileo’s own words in the Sidereus Nuncius of 1610, his famous booklet and first claim to fame. “I am told that many have serious reservations on this point”: for if the surface of the moon is “full of … countless bumps and depressions,” then “why is the whole periphery of the full Moon not seen to be uneven, rough and sinuous?” Galileo replies that this is because the Moon has an atmosphere, which “stop[s] our sight from penetrating to the actual body of the Moon” at the edge only, since there “our visual rays cut it obliquely.” So when we look at the edge of the moon our line of sight spends more time passing through the atmosphere of the moon and that’s why it’s blurred. Hence it is “obvious,” says Galileo, that “not only the Earth but the Moon also is surrounded by a vaporous sphere.” This is of course completely wrong.

So already we see that there were serious problems with the telescope. It’s not as simple as saying: the telescope showed everyone new facts. What was a fact and what was an inference or an illusion? Not a trivial question, and as we see Galileo himself got it wrong right off the bat.

And there’s plenty more where that came from. Another puzzling fact was that the planets were magnified by the telescope, but not the stars. The stars remained the same point-sized light spots no matter what the strength the telescope. Some even mistook this for a “law that the enlargement appears less and less the farther away [the observed objects] are removed from the eye.” Galileo tried to explain these things, but once again he gets it completely wrong. A correct explanation was given in 1665, it’s a technical optics thing.

Clearly, then, in light of all these challenges to the reliability and consistency of the telescope, it was important to understand its basis in theoretical optics. That is why, presumably, Galileo felt obliged to swear at the outset, in the Sidereus Nuncius, that “on some other occasion we shall explain the entire theory of this instrument.” To those aware of his mathematical shortcomings, it will come as no surprise that Galileo never delivered on this promise. Kepler—a competent mathematician—took up the task instead, and in the process came up with a fundamentally new telescope design better than that of Galileo. That’s in Kepler’s Dioptrice of 1611. Kepler’s telescope uses two convex lenses instead of Galileo’s pair of one convex and one concave lens. According to Galileo, Kepler’s work was, in his own words, “so obscure that it would seem that the author did not understand it himself.” A modern scholar comments that “this is a curious statement since the Dioptrice, unlike other works by Kepler, is remarkably straightforward.” Apparently still not straightforward enough for a simpleton like Galileo, however. Indeed, Galileo’s naive conception of optics was still mired in the old notion that seeing involved rays of sight spreading outward from the eye rather than conversely. He repeatedly gave statements to this effect.

Regarding the mountains on the moon, let’s look a bit more at the significance of that, which has often been overstated. So Galileo’s famous discovery is, as he puts it, that “The moon is not robed in a smooth and polished surface but is in fact rough and uneven, covered everywhere, just like the earth’s surface, with huge prominences, deep valleys, and chasms.” Now, it is all too easy to cast this report by Galileo as a revolutionary discovery. The “Aristotelian” worldview rested on a sharp division between the sublunar and heavenly realm. Our pedestrian world is one of constant change—a bustling soup of the four elements (earth, water, air, fire) mixing and matching in fleeting configurations. The heavens, by contrast, were a pristine realm of perfection and immutability, governed by its very own fifth element entirely different from the physical stuff of our everyday world. If we are predisposed to view Galileo as the father of modern science, a pleasing narrative readily suggests itself: With his revolutionary discovery of mountains on the moon, Galileo disproved what “everybody” believed. Indeed this is a standard story peddled by many scholars. Let me quote two of them.

“Every educated person in the sixteenth century took as well-established fact … that the Moon was a very different sort of place from the Earth. … The lunar surface, according to the common wisdom, was supposed to be as smooth as the shaven head of a monk.”

Here’s another quote to the same effect. This one is from a Harvard University Press book from 2015, “Galileo’s Telescope”, so this stuff is mainsteam modern scholarship. Here is the quote:

“In those years virtually no one questioned the ontological difference between heaven and earth. … The difference between Earth and the heavenly bodies was an absolute truth for astrologers and astronomers, theologians and philosophers of every ilk and school. … If the Moon turned out to be covered with mountains, just like Earth, a millenary representation of the sky would be shattered.”

So in other words, Galileo sent an entire worldview crashing down by using data and hard facts to expose its prejudices.

The problem with this narrative lies in one word: “everybody.” The Aristotelian worldview is not what “everybody” believed. It is what one particular sect of philosophers believed. As ever, Galileo’s claim to fame rests on conflating the two. If we compare Galileo to this sect of fools—as Galileo wants us to do—then indeed he comes out looking pretty good. Members of this sect did indeed try to deny the mountainous character of the moon in back-pedalling desperation. For instance by arbitrarily postulating that the mountains were not on the surface of the moon at all but rather enclosed in a perfectly round, clear crystal ball. So that way the surface was smooth after all, even though there were shadows and stuff, because the shadows were in the interior of this glass sphere. If we mistake this kind of rubbish for the state of science of the day, then indeed Galileo will appear a great revolutionary hero.

But to anyone outside of that particular sect blinded by dogma, the idea of a mountainous moon had been perfectly natural for thousands of years. It is obvious to anyone who has ever looked at the moon that its surface is far from uniform. Clearly it has dark spots and light spots. If one wanted to maintain the Aristotelian theory one could try to argue, as many people indeed did, that this is perhaps some kind of marbling effect. The moon is still perfectly spherical, only it has some differential colouration like a smooth piece of marble. Or maybe it’s a reflection thing: perhaps the moon is so polished that it is reflective like a mirror. So the light and dark areas are not actual irregularities in the moon itself but just the mirror image of oceans and stuff on earth.

Whatever one thinks of the plausibility of such arguments, they are certainly defensive in nature: the Aristotelian theory is on the back foot trying to explain away even the most rudimentary phenomena that any child is familiar with. The idea of an irregular moon is an obvious and natural alternative explanation. Which is why we find for instance in Plutarch, a millennium and a half before Galileo, the suggestion that “the Moon is very uneven and rugged.” That’s a literal quote, from antiquity.

If we look to actual scientists and mathematically competent people instead of Aristotelian fools, we find that “Galileo’s” discovery of mountains on the moon was already accepted as fact long before. Kepler had already, and I quote him, “deduced that the body of the moon is dense … and with a rough surface,” or in other words the moon is “the kind of body that the earth is, uneven and mountainous.” Those are quotes from a 1604 work by Kepler. Before the telescope.

Kepler also points out that this was also the opinion of his teacher Maestlin before him, who, according to Kepler, “proves by many inferences … that [the moon] also got many of the features of the terrestrial globe, such as continents, seas, mountains, and air, or what somehow corresponds to them.” That’s from the Mysterium Cosmographicum, 1596, long before the telescope.

In a later edition of this work, Kepler added the note that “Galileo has at last throughly confirmed this belief with the Belgian telescope,” thereby vindicating “the consensus of many philosophers on this point throughout the ages, who have dared to be wise above the common herd.” Indeed, Galileo himself says his observations are reason to “revive the old Pythagorean opinion that the moon is like another earth.”

So, altogether, Galileo’s discovery of mountains on the moon was not a revolutionary refutation of what “everybody” thought they knew, but rather a vindication of what everyone with half a brain had seen for thousands of years.

The same goes for other supposed discoveries by Galileo relating to the moon. For instance the discovery of the phenomenon of “Earth shine”: like moon shine, but in the reverse direction. So reflected light from the earth lights up the moon to some extent. Galileo discusses this as one of the novelties made clear by the telescope, but in reality it had been correctly explained previously, by Kepler in 1604.

A similar reality check is in order regarding the idea one sometimes hear that Galileo’s discoveries regarding the moon instigated celestial physics. These people say: By revealing the similarity of heaven and earth, Galileo opened the door to a unification of terrestrial and celestial physics—in other words, he led us to the brink of Newton’s insight that a moon and an apple are governed by the very same gravitational force. In reality, though, a unity between terrestrial and celestial physics had been advocated since antiquity, as we have seen. You don’t need a telescope to realise that this idea makes sense.

Meanwhile, Galileo’s bumbling and superficial attempts to do celestial physics are an embarrassment to all, as we have seen. Remember his erroneous thing about planetary speeds being determined by falling from some faraway point toward the sun, or his completely wrongheaded calculation of how long it would take the moon to fall to the earth.

In fact, Kepler had already written an excellent book on celestial physics before the telescope: the Astronomia Nova of 1609. This is the work where Kepler explains the elliptical orbits of the planets (which Galileo never accepted or even mentioned). Kepler explains the elliptical orbits of the planets as the result of a quasi-magnetic force residing in the sun. So that’s certainly celestial physics in full swing before the telescope.

Ok, so that’s what I had to say about the telescope itself. Next we must turn to the impact of telescopic evidence on the debate between geocentrism and heliocentrism. That’s next time. Thank you.

from Intellectual Mathematics from Blogger http://bit.ly/2D0mRWy