#ohhhh harrison

[coffeeandcalligraphy]

24-Karat Harrison | BODY BACK Update #3

THE WRITING UPDATE WE'VE ALL BEEN WAITING FOR (I’M WE)!

Let's chat chapter 3 of my literary fiction novella, BODY BACK! Harrison stares at himself in so many bathroom mirrors, gets down to Don't Cha (Pussycat Dolls), tries to forget the man he once was, reclaims himself through excess, & more! Post under the cut!

Logline: After an argument with his mother draws him much too close to the past, Harrison turns to Jeremiah to help him develop a gilded persona.

Update 1 | Update 2

BODY BACK taglist (please ask to be added or removed :))

@thelivingdeceased @writinglittlebeastss @cuntylittlesalmon @obssesedwithscandaledits @jaydewritesfiction @keira-is-writing @onomatopiya @dustyplotbunnies @euphoniouspandemonium @rowansghost @strangerays @rodentwrites @wildswrites @saltwaterbells

Random thoughts turn into...

A couple weeks ago, I was oversharing in my tags and in the process of doing so, came up with the phrase "24-karat harrison."

#I don't drink but I can positively say drunk rachel would 100% be just harrison like 24 karat harrison #actually going to get him to describe himself as 24 karat harrison in the next bb chapter fantastic this was a productive random thought

AND SO 24K HARRISON WAS BORN!

What does it mean to split yourself into two facets, one polished, one unpolished? What could you do if YOU were "24-karat" for a day? This phrase instantly shaped the entire direction of this chapter.

Also, as a poet, I cannot overlook how wonderfully "24-karat" and "Harrison" match each other. VISUAL congruency?? Syllabic harmony??? THE ASSONANCE?? He was built for this.

The plot

CW: this is the most *mature content* chapter I've written in BB so there are mentions of sex, drugs, and suicidal ideation.

"24-Karat Harrison" jumps right off the last chapter of BB where Harrison's stormed away from his mother after she drives him to Lonan's apartment (lol). He arrives at Jeremiah's place tired of who he is and in desperate need of a major change.

The chapter is split into two simple halves: scenes in Jeremiah's apartment, and scenes in a Las Vegas nightclub. How Harrison manages to get into so many shenanigans in these two locations alone astounds me! :)

Scene A:

Harrison turns up on Jeremiah's doorstep soaking wet from the rain. He's looking for a distraction :) & Jeremiah provides :)

Scene B:

A Haremiah pillow talk moment that ends abruptly when Harrison asks Jeremiah if he has Tylenol???? (romantic king /s)

In scene A, Harrison noticed Jeremiah hosted a party. Here, he asks him why he wasn't invited, and Jeremiah suggests it's because he seems too quiet to party

Scene C:

In an attempt to manufacture a more confident personality, Jeremiah helps style Harrison, complete with a fur coat and cowboy hat (horrifying).

Scene D:

Harrison retreats to the bathroom while he and Jeremiah wait for their ride to the club. He's not confident despite the new outfit and goes feral on Jeremiah's hair products, makeup, cologne etc. He finally sees 24-Karat Harrison in the mirror and is pleased.

Scene E:

At the club, Harrison and Jeremiah run into Biyu, Jeremiah's friend from Chapter 6 of Moth Work. His confidence is shot when she suggests he's quiet despite his new persona.

Scene F:

Harrison dances with Jeremiah, but is unable to shake Biyu's comments. He presses Jeremiah for validation, but Jeremiah wants to have a good night, not therapize the man he's seeing.

As Harrison continues to pester, Jeremiah reunites with his friends and is drawn into a (potential) group make out session. Harrison gets overstimulated.

Harrison flees to the club bathroom for reprieve when he again catches his reflection and doesn't recognize himself. His lack of recognition angers him--he's tired of seeing everyone in his face but himself.

A man--Perry--who is one of Jeremiah's friends, interrupts Harrison at the mirror to flirt. Harrison is agitated but drawn to him nonetheless.

Writing process & themes

I talked about how I structure chapters for BODY BACK in THIS post, but essentially, I orbit each scene around a particular theme.

I didn't really know what the theme of this chapter was until yesterday. I'd noticed I kept "repeating beats" throughout this chapter--particularly, Harrison analyzing himself in bathroom mirrors, which happens THREE times. At first, I thought I'd done something wrong because Harrison seemed to keep "backtracking" in narrative which made his psychology seem inconsistent.

By the time I got to the final reflection analyzation though, I realized THAT was the theme--bobbing between extremes when you're in the middle of an identity crisis.

What Harrison doesn't admit to himself in this chapter is that he's lost himself since he broke up with Lonan. The only Harrison he knows is the Harrison who chased Lonan across the country, put his needs above his own, etc. Now that Lonan's gone, Harrison doesn't know himself at all. This is why he reaches toward 24k Harrison, a caricature of himself painted in broad, unsubtle strokes--at the very least, he won't forget himself if he looks ridiculous.

But it doesn't work! This is because versions of who he "was" keep popping up. He can't help but feel like the vulnerable person he was when he was with Lonan.

Therefore, we really explore extremes in 24kH. Extreme pleasure VS extreme hollowness (Jeremiah kissing him in the doorway and then immediately walking away in scene A). In scene C he’s hot but he’s not. He wants to sleep with himself but he’s not desirable at all. He's alright with begging but wants to be begged. He wants to live a very specific life where he buys cowboy hats for livestock and eats ice cream with his hands but he also wants to die. He’s Jesus but he’s discarded bits of gold (THANK YOU for pointing that out @jaydewritesfiction!). He’s twinkling but he’s the dullest person in the room.

It took me a while to actually see I'd been doing that--purposefully creating contradictions in narrative--the ENTIRE chapter. Smh Rachel, good job with all those literary devices you didn't realize you were using.

This chapter took me a lot longer to write than I wanted it to (about a month), but it's also because it's SO long (7k, which is currently half the manuscript). I'm so happy with how it turned out though because its creation represents EVERYTHING I love about it: impulsivity, chasing highs, uncovering darker folds of you the longer you sit inside manufactured gold.

Music

Music was SOOO important in the conception and understanding of 24kH for me, more than usual! In fact, I've made a very specific playlist that is a track-by-track breakdown of the chapter (in order).

Here's a quick breakdown of each song & where they go in the chapter!

1. Nobody by Greyson Chance (studio version) - Backbone of the ENTIRE chapter!!!! Chapter starts with this song.

2. Hands by Greyson Chance - Haremiah make out ANTHEM <3. Also in scene A.

3. Hellboy by Greyson Chance - End of scene A where Haremiah gets... intense lol love <3

4. Fade Into You by Mazzy Star - This is on the radio while Haremiah gets DOWN. Start of scene B.

5. Aloe Vera by Greyson Chance - Haremiah sharing a joint & pillow talk song. Middle of scene B.

6. I Got So High That I Saw Jesus by Noah Cyrus - Haremiah sharing a joint & pillow talk song but it's getting sadder & more internal. End of scene B.

7. Nobody by Greyson Chance (live version) - CRITICAL song for this chapter so it appears twice!!! Live version is Harrison at the start of scene C.

8. Black Mascara by Greyson Chance - Harrison analyzing himself in the mirror ANTHEM (this song is also the backbone of this chapter). Harrison goes feral in the bathroom because he thinks he's better off when he does what he fucking wants etc.

9. I'm Too Sexy by Right Said Fred - Actually this is supposed to be the Shrek version :) so :) anyway self-explanatory. Rest of C.

10. Welcome to the DCC by Nothing But Thieves - Walking into the club anthem (scene E).

11. SexyBack by Justin Timberlake - Dancing and feeling real good about it (beginning of scene F).

12. Don't Cha by The Pussycat Dolls - SELF-EXPLANATORY don't you wish your girlfriend was hot like 24-karat Harrison (middle of scene F).

13. Sex & Other Drugs by Greyson Chance - Fleeing to the bathroom anthem (for sex & other drugs??? maybe; rest of scene F).

I also wanted to talk about the significance of the track Nobody because... it's this WHOLE chapter! I wrote this tag essay about it a couple weeks ago when I shared an excerpt where Harrison sees himself as a trophy while in the 24kH getup (excerpted later in the post):

#also there are many greyson chance easter eggs here #the trophy bit i've already mentioned is a reference to the live version of “nobody” #where he goes 'i'm not the trophy you think i am' #which is actually not in the studio version #ANYWAY the LIVE VERSION is a sad piano ballad of THAT #so anyway I love that the trophy line #was cut from the studio version but is in the sad piano version lol #don't know how to more articulately describe harrison's psychology in BB except for... that

The idea of "I'm not the trophy you think I am" really is the thematic crux of this chapter. Harrison KNOWS he's not good enough for Jeremiah. He also knows he wasn't good enough for Lonan. Everyone's looking at him like he's a saint somehow--to Lonan he was, only mattering when he was long martyred. Jeremiah sees too much good in Harrison, good that Harrison doesn't see in himself. At moments, Harrison IS confident. He IS the trophy. But then there are those sobering moments when reality hits him and he knows he just isn't (SAD). It's why he creates 24kH because HE could be good enough (and the truth is, he still isn't).

Excerpts

Jeremiah greets Harrison at the door lol:

Jeremiah might be the only man alive who’d open the door for someone as soggy as Harrison.

He’s shirtless and damp from the shower, a green toothbrush lodged against his gums. His heathered sweats drape low on his waist, bronze skin varnished with moisturizer. And Harrison likes this—a man mid nighttime routine—but what he likes more is how unstartled Jeremiah is when he grabs him by the hips and kisses him so hard, bristles jolt against his tongue. What’s he looking for in another man’s mouth—heavens, gods, a prayer? Fuck if he knows. What matters are Jeremiah’s chiclet teeth, Jeremiah’s healthy gums, the way in one gulp, they all become Harrison’s. And this is what normal is, yeah—Jeremiah a minty man ensconced by a bare tungsten bulb, Harrison his midnight lover, both of them in need of the other simply because they are here, alive, men.

Jeremiah gives Harrison whiplash lmao show him king!!!:

But in one dizzy breath, they’re separated, and the thought is gone as quickly as Jeremiah who slinks through his apartment like an unbothered shorthair, telling Harrison to lock the front door, to follow him to the bathroom.

Harrison’s ears buzz. He stares at the living room, wipes his mouth of foam, his lips tingling with menthol. Jeremiah hosted a party earlier. A game of parcheesi scattered on the coffee table, the kitchen sink teetering with mismatched cups, saucers. Cigarette butts pock a strawberry-shaped ashtray like seeds. Harrison salivates, tempted for a moment to filch around for one salvageable enough to relight. It’s only when Jeremiah calls his name that he shakes out of his stupor. But still, by the time he reaches the beaded bathroom door, he has to distract his mouth by digging his lips into the scalloped moulding.

Jeremiah crooks a brow at him in the mirror, then turns to the sink, spits. He’s gargling with mouthwash when he asks a question.

“What?” Harrison asks. His head hurts. Jeremiah would have a bottle of acetaminophen in his medicine cabinet, wouldn’t he?

Jeremiah holds up a hand as he swishes, rubbing at spats of toothpaste on the mirror with his wrist. He spits again. “You go swimming or something?”

Jeremiah is an ANGEL in the bathroom:

Jeremiah leans against the counter, haloed by one of three lightbulbs that isn’t blown out over the vanity. Harrison offered to replace them a week ago and still hasn’t done it, perhaps because the low light is more inviting, the way it cups Jeremiah like mist. Though maybe any lighting would be inviting to Harrison when he’s like this—in such high need of ravaging something.

Jeremiah wets his lips, glancing away with a mute smile before he looks right back. “Or is the rain really bad?” Harrison takes a step forward, and then another, another. Suzanna could be looking for him, calling everyone she knows in this city to help bring her son home. She won’t sleep tonight, and Harrison won’t either but for different reasons. In front of him, Jeremiah is as sunny as he is unaware, his curls plump around his ears, a man Harrison would like to undo with one look—to make beg, like gods make their believers do.

Lonan Clark behaviour:

“You’re like a wet dog,” says Jeremiah. A breath wheezes in his chest.

Harrison looks up at him. From this angle, bowed against another man’s body, he could look like a believer in supplication. Please go gently. Please spare my life. “Thank you.”

CUTE Haremiah interrupted by Harrison's terrible timing:

Now Jeremiah nuzzles into his ribs. He smells like soap and orange rinds, his tattooed skin downy under Harrison’s callused fingertips. He traces an empty fishbowl on Jeremiah’s arm with his pinkie, a half-finished anatomical heart with his thumb, a wobbly dandelion with his ring finger, the cherub guarding his elbow with his index. I love you, he could say. They’ve known each other for two weeks, hung out less than ten times, spent most of their time examining each other’s hands. But this could be love, right? Jeremiah’s made him breakfast every night he’s stayed over—peach French toast, hot muesli, black coffee. Every time they watch film noir on Jeremiah’s two-seater, they simply find each other’s hair and twirl, sometimes meet each other’s mouths and hover there, these clement weekend lovers.

“You got any painkillers?” Harrison asks.

Jeremiah jerks against his skin, his nose knocking into Harrison’s shoulder blade. He hikes onto his elbow, brows furrowed like he’s about to say something when his eyes narrow on Harrison’s finger.

“You’re wearing my ring,” he says, leaning toward Harrison’s hand for a better look.

“Am I?”

If I were Harrison I would simply just forget about Lonan because JEREMIAH???

Jeremiah should paint his room sage. The cherrywood picture frames warrant it. In the corner, a gold mirror flares like Jesus’ spoked halo. Two crinkled issues of the New York Times on the vanity, an ivory sheepskin throw collapsed in the corner. Jeremiah exists here mid-motion—the condom wrappers on the hardwood leading to the mattress like Hansel’s pebbles, sunglasses spoked in a magazine rack, a used cotton ball stained with black nail polish on the windowsill. Harrison absorbs it all on his back like rapidly flattening dough. He could be part of this room, too. Last Monday, Jeremiah suggested he move in. “You can sleep in the bathtub,” he joked, but kissed the back of Harrison’s neck. He’d smelled bright like the leather polish he’d buffed onto his bomber jacket. “Or elsewhere.”

Jeremiah as a trophy & LMFAO tYLeNoL???

Now, Harrison weakly reaches for Jeremiah’s hair, winds a curl around his finger. Jeremiah is soft like brioche and as dazzling as a mirror ball. And what’s the difference between worshipping him and Jesus if they are both men? At least Jeremiah is here, a trophy in front of him.

“Tylenol?” he whispers.

Cont'd:

Jeremiah places a hand on Harrison’s face. In his eyes, Harrison is insufficient, an edge of a man. Perhaps it’s the headache or Jeremiah’s gentle concern, but after a moment, the feeling is so unbearable that he pulls away and buries his face in the pillow. The mattress springs when Jeremiah rises, and for a moment, Harrison feels suspended in air like a crucified Jesus above the altar. He doesn’t have a face, a body, a heart. He is just dust.

Harrison wants to be a spider so he can finally be a homeowner?? ok same:

He slumps back onto the bed, analyzing the popcorn ceiling when Jeremiah climbs in next to him. He slings an arm around Harrison’s bare shoulders, and they pass the joint back and forth, its scent rich like oregano. The smoke is delicate as a dissipating spider’s web, pale and gauzy like a curtain in morning light. As Harrison smokes, he imagines what it might be like to be an arachnid—the many homes he could make.

Harrison really knows how to ruin a moment pt. 5 bajillion:

There’s a damp spot on the ceiling that’s only visible when car headlights skirt past the building. Harrison’s meant to ask about it, but what would be the point now? It’s not like he could fix it—and if Jeremiah doesn’t look at the right time, he’ll never notice. “You didn’t invite me,” Harrison says.

Jeremiah jumps. From here, he’s a mere lump under the covers, the only physical evidence of him his warm breaths on Harrison’s stomach. “What?” he asks.

Harrison twists the joint, puffs. His tongue feels bloated like his jacket. “To your party.”

A pause. When Jeremiah next speaks, his voice is muffled by the sheets. “I didn’t think that was your scene.” He rests his cheek on Harrison’s sternum, and he’s heavy like the jacket too. “You know. Crowds.”

“What made you think that?”

Jeremiah burrows out from the duvet. Harrison knows he’s trying to look at him, but he’s caught up in the ceiling again, the way that patch ebbs like a candle’s flame. “You’re…”

“What?”

“I don’t know,” Jeremiah says, crossing his legs. “Meek.”

Harrison wants to laugh—meek like a lamb, a poplar, a monotonous prairie, a man’s whispered okay, a frail river, a piano’s high C played over and over and over and over and over again—but what comes out instead is a whimper. Jeremiah cups his face again, says something about good things, compliments, the power in mildness. He smells like baby powder now, plumeria—and why is that? He’s a man forever in change even in the simplest of ways, thriving in his evolution. Harrison’s favourite colour has been the same since he was four.

He holds Jeremiah’s jaw to shut him up. His eyes are flecked with topaz today, sienna tomorrow. If Harrison could touch God tonight. If Harrison could believe in something for just a minute.

“Make me feral,” he whispers.

COWBOY HAT??

Jeremiah starts with a new jacket. He’s made it clear that Harrison can’t go clubbing soaking wet, so they rifle through his closet and land on a fur coat that was last dry-cleaned months ago. It’s knee-length, the sleeves wide catacombs, the taupe fur brindled like Eliza’s tortoise-shell ring. Lonan’s ring, technically. In front of his standing mirror, Jeremiah unearths it from the garment bag like it’s a body, holds the hanger in front of Harrison so the fabric drapes off his chest.

“You like it?” asks Jeremiah, cheek pressed to Harrison’s shoulder blade. He’s laid out a tasseled button-up for himself that glitters like hematite in the light, and he’ll dazzle in it, of course—Jeremiah is built for this, the sharpened eyeliners on the bathroom counter, the dented cans of hair mousse, the nail file on the dresser, the ridged perfume atomizer he’ll mist himself with a moment before they leave the apartment. He is sleek beauty, a marbleized man ready to be polished, adored.

And what is Harrison, then? With the fur coat cinched against his body, he could be polished, too, couldn’t he? Sure, he isn’t a gilded icon, but maybe he sees Jesus in his face right now because he has the potential to be, or because at their cores, they’re both sad men. His hair doesn’t have to look like Suzanna’s, but instead like the young bark of cinnamon. And his eyes—they’re not his father’s but his own, an unmarred pool of teal. Maybe he’s a little rough where he should be suave, but that’s hot nowadays, isn’t it? Besides, if Jeremiah sees something angelic in that mirror, then yeah, Harrison could see it too. Forget his cryptic mouth, his hair that’s too long as Suzanna pointed out, his eyes and the way they’re wounded, not like a deer’s in headlights but like a deer’s in death. Forget the scar across his forehead, the way another man’s hands used to touch it not like it was lightning but a pathway to some better place. Sure, Harrison’s no Christ, no Jacob, no God—but why should he be? He’s here under the tungsten bite of Jeremiah’s chandelier, a man in shameless excess, eyes more spangled than this country’s flag. And he could stay here, couldn’t he? He could enjoy staring at himself, not like he’s bronze but like he’s pure gold.

Cont'd (this is so sad LOL):

He straightens, adjusts the fur on his shoulder. In truth, he looks too much like his mother, stands too much like his father, stares too much like Lonan. His hands aren’t soft. He’s got split ends. At best he smells like cigarette smoke, car exhaust, chlorine. But what does Jeremiah see? Maybe someone loveable yeah, maybe someone to cry over. For a moment, Harrison worries the answer is nothing at all.

And then a nose nudges against the back of his neck, Jeremiah muttering about Madonna’s new album, buying new razors, growing his own marijuana. In minutes, they’ll be dancing until the room spirals or until they’re extensions of the other, whichever comes first. And Harrison will love it all because he loves everything about his life—this new jacket, this new man, this face that isn’t a reminder of who used to look at it, this muggy room, this mirror like a portal he could almost step through, this breakthrough because he’s gold. He’s gold.

Harrison steps away from the mirror, presses a hand against his eyeball. He’s going to need another Tylenol. An Ibuprofen for the hell of it. What if Jacob never dreamt of God, made the whole story up? What if Jacob just wanted to run away with his livestock? Harrison could use livestock.

He turns to Jeremiah. “You got a cowboy hat?” he asks.

Harrison making out with himself because that's a normal thing to do:

Funnily, Jeremiah does have a cowboy hat. It’s aptly doused in cow-print, smells like plastic and mulch. In the bathroom, Harrison adjusts its stampede strings around his chin.

He leans against the counter, pressing his thumbs to his cheeks. He pulls at his eye sockets, his skin giving like a tablecloth twisted under the heave of roasted turkey. His eyes are rimmed in scarlet—how many times has he seen Suzanna with these eyes, and do her eyes look like this now? She’s probably looking for him, calling his name out in the night like it’s a prayer she knows won’t be answered. Would he take himself to bed like this? In thirty more minutes when he guzzles a vodka soda, his answer will be absolutely.

Harrison, he mouths to himself in the mirror. The bathroom is filmy or maybe it’s him—he’s in chrysalis, bloated in his own becoming or suffocation or whatever the fuck. The thing is, he doesn’t need a god and might be a king, but he’s also a man with a pounding headache. He tries again, his mouth shifty like cornmeal, like ash: Harrison. What do kings do when they get migraines? Buy a donut? Eat a saint? His eye sockets are vacant, his cuticles spinning into one another, hair sentient from the pool. Harrison. The walls smell like Jeremiah’s hair gel, Jeremiah’s fingerprints, Jeremiah’s latest cologne. In a minute, the paint could start peeling and Harrison could pick up the chips, tack them to his jaw like they’re gold stars or little HELLO my name is stickers. HELLO my name is, HELLO my name is, HELLO my name is. Harrison. Harrison. Harrison. He kneads his cheeks like he’s sourdough, pinches his eyebrows, goes: Harrison, sticks his fist in his mouth tries again—Harrison. Jeremiah knocks on the door, says something about leaving soon, a friend waiting on them.

Harrison sinks onto his elbows, hovering closer to his reflection. If he were another man, he’d kiss himself, right? Without a thought, he does, mouth glugging against the mirror. He doesn’t need any touch but his own—not Jeremiah’s, not Lonan’s. He’s a man in love with himself, right? He’s a good dancer, never burns pancakes, isn’t afraid of spiders. What’s not to like? When he pulls back, panting, his eyes are watery and he needs a drink now, a god to abandon, a lake to drown in, a coastline to paint, a mother to cry into, a Bible to burn, a guitar string to snap, a dragon tree to kill, a father to remember, a prayer to scream, a place to close his eyes and sleep forever.

He grabs Jeremiah’s eyelash curler off the counter, crimps his lashes so hard he pinches his skin. He doesn’t care. He’s yanking open cupboards and pulling out an eyeshadow palette, smearing silver pigment onto his eyelids, under them. He’s raking a wand of black mascara through his lashes like he’s the grass buried under leaves—like this is the only way to reveal himself. And maybe this is the way, spritzing himself in Jeremiah’s vetiver or orange rinds or baby powder. Harrison. He wants to punch his nose until he bleeds. He wants to kiss himself again.

0 to 100 all the way back to 0 babe:

Harrison meets his eyes in the mirror. Is he an animal? He must be something feral, starved of something and ravaged by that hunger. He could touch himself right here. Or not. He’s barely a man, staring at his face not like it’s his, but like it’s someone else’s. And how tired he is of that. Being a shadow.

He is the MOMENT:

Before he exits the bathroom, he studies his sterling reflection. He’s not who he once was. No Christ, no Jacob, no Jeremiah. And he shouldn’t be. Because he’s twenty-four karat, twinkling, not just otherworldly, unforgiving, untouchable, not just a god or a man—but a trophy at last.

Biyu puts Harrison in his place lmaoo:

By the time they cab to the club, Harrison’s so high he can nearly taste the neon lights. As they slot through the front door with other partygoers like flocking geese, he blinks at the rush of it all—the women comparing press-on nails by the coat-check, the men wearing vinyl and leather and glitter, drenched in cologne and sweat.

“You’re late,” comes a voice which should be familiar to Harrison, but under the thump of bodies, sounds as generic as a bag of baby carrots.

“Fashionably late,” says Jeremiah, his arm slung around Harrison’s furred shoulders. He pulls him close, toward the person, the woman, smells like sea salt, iron, a new set of rings flaring in the blue spotlights. “You remember Harrison?”

As if on cue, Harrison lifts his eyes to Biyu’s, Jeremiah’s friend from the restaurant. Tonight, she wears a gold cowlneck dress, her lipstick the colour of rust. And something’s different about her hair—the sides of her bob shaved, which is more of a relief than he’d like to admit. She’d looked alarmingly like Reeve when they’d met, moved like her, sounded like her. Maybe he’s too high to see it now, but what does it matter—a win is a win.

Harrison tips his hat, already searching for the bar.

“The quiet one,” Biyu says.

His eyes snap back to her. Her pupils are large disks, and if he squints, almost look like they’re pulsating. “What?”

“You were quiet,” she repeats.

Don't Cha!! ft. this:

Harrison dances because he knows exactly how to. To thready vocals, he lulls his arms through the air, drags his palm down Jeremiah’s chest when an electro version of Like a Virgin comes on. On the lighted dance floor he’s nothing but rattling limbs, inelegant turns, raunchy dips. Shifting atop his head: the cowboy hat. In his hand: a vodka soda topped with a maraschino cherry. Through half of Don’t Cha, he holds the red cocktail sword between his teeth like it’s a rose, nudges it against Jeremiah’s lip as they kiss, break apart, kiss again.

“Do you think I’m quiet?” he asks between a spin, his head unspooling like a cylinder of thread. The clang of drums spikes up his throat—soon, he’ll need a refill on the drink. More weed. A crucifix to snap.

Jeremiah twirls under Harrison’s arm, a magnetic man in his tourmaline glister. He could follow any man in this club home tonight with his silver nails, his exposed collarbone. “Kiss me again,” he says, sweating, his fingers hard around Harrison’s shoulders—half from his grip, half from his rings.

Jeremiah is really too patient:

This is what he needs, a consideration of fruit and the man in front of him, all svelte limbs, acidic mouth, sharp eyeliner. As he ducks to In Da Club and shimmies to Waiting for Tonight, he digs a palm into Jeremiah’s cheek—he’s solid like limestone, burnished as bronze, his eyes amber portals like a patch of quicksand.

“Did you tell Biyu about me?” Harrison asks. His head pounds, the music too loud, swelling in his ears like an inflating airbag. He should go back to the bar now. They’ve got whiskey sours, gibsons, margaritas. If he flutters his eyelashes long enough at the bartender, maybe he’ll get a little more than a free drink—that’s fine too. Kelly Clarkson sings about praying, breaking, and he could do both in the hands of someone who smells like blood oranges, tastes like Bible paper, stares like Jesus the moment before he performs a miracle, couldn’t he?

“Focus on me,” Jeremiah says, guiding Harrison closer by the hips, so confident as his wooden Mary bracelet jolts with the movement because he’s here in this blinking room, dancing because he’s twenty-one just like Harrison, because he’s electric, alive, because he’s blinding like noonday sun, steady as a fountain cycling the same water over and over, because he’s unashamed in this brisk light, shocking like the zip of battery acid on a tongue. He doesn’t need to try, melds into the bleating crowd like he’s part of it, and he is. He smells like pomegranates, tastes like cherries the next time Harrison kisses him—Chapstick? Cocktail?—and tomorrow, he’ll rise early for a shift at Greta, slip on his navy uniform polo, his makeup untouched despite everything Harrison will do to him tonight because he’s faultless, not quiet, hair precariously puffed, nails buffed to a glassy sheen. He and Biyu might catch breakfast at dawn, bond over their glittery eyelids, their intrinsic closeness, wonder over poached eggs if he’s worth it—graceless Harrison in this cowboy hat and smudged makeup, his jacket cuffs soaked with vodka soda, his head lolling to the insistent voice of Justin Timberlake.

“Biyu thinks I’m quiet,” Harrison says, knocking back the rest of his drink, his neck cracking. He wants to scratch off his face, replace it with someone else’s. “You think I’m meek. So what is it? Do I need to get a tattoo or something?”

Jeremiah glances around the club, his irises starred by a spotlight. What does he see when he looks out at the crowd? Perhaps he recognizes half of these people—from the way he ordered at the bar to the way he slunk so easily onto the dance floor, Harrison assumes he’s been here before. And maybe it’s not just that he recognizes everyone else on the floor, but that they recognize him in return.

Cont'd but with a lot more mouths:

“Did you hear what I said?” Harrison asks.

Jeremiah’s eyes snap back to his, except there’s something hazy there, something tired. “What would a tattoo do for you?”

“I don’t know. Edge? I just think I could—”

And then Jeremiah’s turned away again, right into the arms of someone else—a tanned man with a dense mustache and olive eyes, the man going, “It’s been too long,” and Jeremiah going “It’s been too long,” their grins calcium white, flashing in Harrison’s face. He throws a hand up to his eyes, squints when a second later, the man pulls a woman toward Jeremiah, her hair cropped low and cotton candy pink. She kisses his cheek, says he looks ravishing, he looks like a comet on its way to ignite planet earth, and they’re all holding each other now, friends bopping to Gwen Stefani, admiring each other’s bracelets, thumbs, friends curving toward each other’s ears, kissing each other’s cheeks, each other’s mouths.

Harrison blinks because how many hands do they have now? Every second they seem to multiply—pink hair girl with four, Jeremiah with six. One’s tongue the other’s. Their fingertips fusing. The club fritzes around them like it’s confetti, the lights rippling into a Christmas bow and now there’s a redheaded man running his nose along Jeremiah’s neck, down Jeremiah’s shoulder, wrist, hand. Harrison had just done that back in his apartment, pinned chest-to-chest against him like a monarch fastened to a spreading board, and here Jeremiah is now, enmeshed in touch, in adoration because he should be adored—the men congregating around him now have their priorities straight. If they all got on their knees at Jeremiah’s feet, Harrison would understand. They aren’t exclusive, don’t even know each other’s last names, and besides, how can Jeremiah help how everyone magnetizes around him? Harrison can’t blame them. Jeremiah is illusory under the disco ball’s speckled light, his throat long, biteable, his eyes syrupy in his high. A woman takes him by the shoulder, but not just any woman—Biyu, and her eyes are pinched, analyzing, because she’s looking at Harrison, her glossy crimson nails on Jeremiah’s cheek, and she’s kissing him too now, her body joining the cluster, and it’s good, the way they all roll limbs to synth, the way they turn into each other’s faces and kiss, kiss, kiss. The music clangs, their mouths full of spit. The DJ says to hold your partners close, and they don’t have to. They are not simply together, not simply in chrysalis, but osmosed in their becoming.

Cont'd (GIANT sentence - CW: self harm)

A hand on Harrison’s elbow. He flinches and is surprised to see it’s Jeremiah who’s touched him. How did he get here so fast? Harrison expects a trail of blurry bodies to follow him, but where did everyone go? They’ve dashed from the club like embers scattering from a dulled fire, nowhere to be seen but dangerous anyway and weren’t they all just over there, under there, and are they lonely on the ceiling and how do they plan to get down and is it too loud in here and why is no one using their indoor voices and should he cover his ears and where is his mother now and how did Mary say I love you and did she ever dream of fleeing to Hollywood or speeding down the I-40 or telling Gabriel no and why does everyone worship a god who demands and calls it creation and what’s his name again—Harrison?—and when did his hands sprout from child to whatever he is now and should he dye his hair red, cut his wrists again and is it possible to be young and happy about it and is he still dancing, he’s still dancing, dancing, dancing, dancing, and someone’s complimenting his silver eyelids and would he like them to touch him gently and is it hot in here to anyone else and does he taste blood or the ocean and is this what it feels like to die in holy light and Jeremiah’s right in front of him, unkissed, still as dark water, as Lonan in the night, and now he’s holding Harrison’s face, his rings cool against his skin, and he’s kissing him too, tastes like spearmint and chocolate lip gloss, rum and Coke, rusted metal—the mouths of everyone in this room and this isn’t so bad, how their bodies net into each other, how in one breath, Harrison’s teeth clack against Jeremiah’s, and in the next, clack against another man’s and then another’s, his stubble rough, mouth sour, a chandelier earring flailing against his cheek, and then through his ear, his hands wound into cinnamon hair and he could be kissing himself and maybe he is and doesn’t he want that, the floor gelid, the music like cotton wool, their pelvises threaded, the walls caving, their mouths locked, the floor lava, the room too bright, his headache like an earthquake, two pairs of hands rattling to the beat of this bursting room one moment, then clutched together as they follow each other to a dim bathroom.

This section was inspired by @dallonwrites' lyrics in narrative post!!! also soft Felix cameo <3

The room is electric purple, smells like grapes, sweat, flexes under Harrison’s shoes like a sandcastle collapsing, like a sinkhole swallowing a house. Bodies weave across the floor, someone lighting a joint in the corner, someone reciting Sylvia Plath into a paper bag, going, the happening of this happening, going, the earth turns now.

Harrison’s head pounds—he should’ve brought a blister pack of acetaminophen because at least then he’d have something to punch, or he should’ve punched out his own eye by now, disappeared with another man who isn’t Jeremiah and didn’t he try, and where is the man with cinnamon hair now? Harrison turns to look for him, but the room ripples with his movement, shirring in staccato clacks around him like a shaken rice maraca. He’d hoped he’d write his number on a man’s wrist tonight even though he doesn’t have a cell phone—he’d hoped he’d go home with someone who shouts the lyrics to Madonna’s Everybody in twilight’s stillness, a man who’d let the DJ shake him, a man who’d let the music take him. And he could do all of that with Jeremiah—Jeremiah who probably did those things at the party Harrison wasn’t invited to, Jeremiah who knows how to pass off frozen spanakopita as homemade because he’s a good host, Jeremiah who knows how to kick people out of his apartment with kindness, Jeremiah who’s built to be kissed, to be loved. And where is he now? In the artificial light, Harrison hunts for him too—but he’s not in the unhinging bathroom stalls, not in the teal grout, the running sinks, and maybe he never existed at all, missing like Jesus in the tomb—body gone, body gone, body gone.

Cont'd BODY BACK BODY BACK BODY BACK:

Harrison rubs his eyes. His ears still ring from the clatter outside, and he stands at the bathroom’s entrance like a child who’s lost his mother in the mall. Should he sit down? A group of girls form a ring on the floor, chant about Leos, Britney, men. Someone shuffles in past him, knocks into his shoulder by accident, apologizes over and over, their hands clutched against his face—I’m so sorry, I’m so sorry.

He yanks away. Don’t touch me, he wants to say, I don’t want to be touched ever again, but by the time he’s located his mouth, his eyes pulsing to a hi-hat, his nose burning on a cloud of cherry smoke, the person’s gone too. He presses his fingers to his eyes, wishes for a soft bed, a place to land, but then he’s rocking forward, right into someone else.

At first, they just stare at each other. The man’s got the same look in his eye—something gilt, something feral, an identical fear in his mouth. Harrison blinks hard, and the man does too—not a man, actually, but his own reflection.

He approaches the mirror, jolts at the way he touches himself—more carefully than he’s ever been touched before. Who are you? he wants to say. He’d like to leave this place now, the club, Las Vegas, the earth. He’d like to buy himself a pet tarantula, run off a cliffside, eat a tub of ice cream with his bare hands. Why did he come here again? His mind is so quiet. This could be peace. But who is he? In Jeremiah’s bathroom he knew, but now there’s this stranger ahead of him, the person who must be him—someone’s chandelier earring grazing his jaw, the cowboy hat lopsided, mascara running down his cheeks even though he hasn’t cried. Where did you go? he mouths, but he knows. He’s disappeared also like Jesus in the tomb, his limbs vanishing one by one, his skin melting off his hands—body gone, body gone, body gone. He grabs his cheeks, panicked because he’s on fire, gold tossed into the crucible. He’s going to burn to ash. He’s going to need a burial soon. His face has been stolen, his breastbone and knuckles too. A month ago, someone spat him into a basket like his body was ripe for the offertory—body gone, body gone, body gone.

“Back,” Harrison says, nose grazing the spattered mirror. His chest swells, and maybe he is burning, and maybe he’s right here, hidden somewhere in the pinprick of his reflection. “Back,” he repeats. He isn’t thoughtful. He isn’t profound. Maybe that’s fine. He squeezes his tear-duct, sticks out his tongue. He’ll die eventually, let his body disappear, but not right now. “Body back, body back, body back.”

Cont'd ft. Harry-something (CW: mild violence):

“I know you.”

Harrison whips around. In front of him stands a redheaded man—the same redhead who’d held Jeremiah close on the dance floor, trailed his oily nose along his neck. He wears a pair of browline sunglasses, a black vinyl vest draped with silver chains. He holds a clove, its smoke clouding the ruby pinging off his ring finger, his mouth ghosted with what looks like red lipstick.

“What?” Harrison says, jumping when the bathroom door clangs open and in come two more women. He lifts his fingers to his mouth, pulls up a hangnail until it stings.

“I saw you out there,” says the man, taking a puff of his cigarette. “Harry-something?” He looks like a scarlet ibis, strangely translucent. “JJ’s friend.”

Harrison digs his fingertips into his eye socket. His head feels like it’s been cleaved with an axe. “Harrison.”

Redhead smiles, blows smoke into Harrison’s face. “What’d you say?”

“My name is Harrison.”

“I’m Perry,” he says, and Harrison wouldn’t give a fuck if his name was Matt Dillon or Rob Lowe or Nash Baker because he’s blowing smoke into his face again, his clove flailing like a dislocated finger. He gestures to Harrison’s outfit, nodding. “You’re like a one man show.”

Harrison covers his eyes. Maybe he can find a dark hole in this club to dive into, somewhere no one will find him again. “What does that mean?”

Perry’s smile falters momentarily, but then it’s back, all teeth, no lips. “You’ve got this flair. You ever been told that? Weird, but good, it’s—”

The second he purses his lips to blow out more smoke, Harrison grabs him by the throat, pulls him so close he can see a constellation of blackheads on his chin, feel his heart hammering.

Perry yelps, nearly losing his hold on the clove altogether.

Harrison arcs his jaw around his ear. He smells like orchids, freshwater. “Don’t ever do that again.”

Cont'd - Harrison is weird :)

Perry laughs, the sound strangled beneath Harrison’s grip. Smoke fumbles out of his mouth like worms. He really does look like a bird, which in this case, isn’t a good thing. “Noted.”

“Do you want to kiss me?”

“You have a hand around my throat.”

“That’s not an answer.”

Well, I'll leave it there lmao!!! Sorry I subjected you to this man, but hope you enjoyed this gigantic update!

FIN. MAGNUM OPUS COMPLETE!

See you soon!

Rachel

[doomandgloomfromthetomb]

The Modern Lovers - Radcliffe College, Cambridge, Massachusetts, October 27, 1972

Ohhhh, New England! We're heading across the Charles and back in time — from Galaxie 500 in 1989 to their forebears, the original Modern Lovers, in 1972. This Radcliffe College tape has floated around previously, but it very recently popped up in much more listenable / much less hissy form. "A substantial upgrade," writes the DIME uploader — and that is an accurate assessment. This one now goes up there with the Stonehenge recording as one of the best early Modern Lovers boots out there. Huzzah!

What we've got here is the quintet version of the band, with future Real Kid John Felice on second guitar — Felice even gets to sing one of his own tunes, the garage-rockin' "Carla." But this is the Jonathan Richman show, of course, with JoJo leading the Lovers through that classic repertoire: "I'm Straight," "Someone I Care About," "Pablo Picasso," "Astral Plane" and beyond. Then there are several rarities, including a song I don't think I've heard anywhere else called "I Know I Turn Her On." Here, the Modern Lovers seem to invent about three or four Feelies songs. And I'm always happy to hear another epic "Plea For Tenderness." At the end of this one, I think Richman is offstage singing un-mic-ed amidst the crowd. A true showman.

Of course, there's also a fantastic extended rendition of "Roadrunner," with Jerry Harrison taking things into the stratosphere during an electrifying instrumental section. Finally, the revved-up cover of the Velvets deep cut "Foggy Notion" is a total treat as usual. That then-unreleased song seemed to be a secret handshake for VU fanatics back in the day; Rocket From The Tombs would tackle it a few years later, too.

What did the Cliffies think of the Lovers? Hmm, was anyone even there? The audience response to these great two sets makes some of those poorly attended VU shows from the late 1960s sound like absolute parties. Count those hands clapping!

[wuffgang-ameowdeus-moozart]

An average day in Family Video:

"It's just so stupid, you know?"

Robin looks up from where she is rewinding the tapes and nods enthusiastically. "I know, right? I mean, seriously, why would you pay an extra fine if all you need to do is-"

"I'm not talking about that. I'm talking about that." He points to one of the two monitors in the shop.

"Just....movies? Like, I get that working here sucks, but -"

"No! I'm talking about the scene that comes before this one- or well, now the one before that."

"Ohhhh. You mean needles."

In that moment a customer comes in. Robin goes back to rewinding tapes and Steve goes back to frowning. As soon as the customer is gone (thankfully an older lady who was not interested in starting small-talk) the conversation resumes as if she'd never been there.

"We really should be able to put other things to watch. It's not normal to know a movie by heart that isn't even good. I hate capitalism, it's destroying genuine art."

"Like back in the good old days when everything was black and white and mute?"

"Tell me one contemporary actor that comes even close to Charlin Chaplin."

"Dunno. Like, Harrison Ford?"

"Wow. I can't believe you are literally my soulmate. I'm so embarrassed."

Another pause. Robin motions to the growing pile of tapes in front of her and Steve starts putting them back in the shelves.

"It's just so stupid, you know? Like, I can deal with literal flesh-eating monsters from another dimension. I can deal with almost getting beaten to death more than once. I can deal with the constant stress of being responsible for a bunch of teenagers who put their "thirst for knowledge" before their own safety. And a fucking little needle gets me down?!"

"Steve. It was a traumatic-"

"Yeah yeah yeah, I know. I just don't...get it. Like, the flickering lights make sense. But I don't even remember being drugged up because, oh yeah, I was literally high as a kite. It's such fucking bullshit."

"One of the pros of being gay, I guess. I don't need to worry about donating blood."

They fall silent again. The conversation isn't over, they just need to find the right thread to continue. Talk between them rises and ebbs as naturally as breathing.

"Maybe I should just become gay, too."

"Oh my god you can't just choose to be gay you dingus. It's not like someone is gonna put a barrel against this hollow head of yours and force you to donate"

"I mean, it's not like men are unattractive. If, I don't know, Jonathan offered. I wouldn't say no. Like, I'm not gonna lie, when he got all mad back when I was still with Nance-"

"Deflection or over?"

Steve sighs. "Deflection."

"Resume or later?"

He sighs again. "I don't know. I mean it's not like we can do anything about it."

"Exposure therapy is a thing, you know. If it really bothers you."

"Like a tattoo or something?"

They are silent again. Robin rewinds tapes, Steve cleans the already spotless counter.

"What would we even get?"

"Dunno. Would have to be something discreet to not make job hunting even harder when this one inevitably falls through because of Demogorgons or Mind Flayers or some shit." She doesn't look up but Steve knows she is listening.

"You actually know the names?"

"Don't tell the dipshits."

Another customer comes in. This one is unfortunately a chatty one. Steve's behavior could perhaps be most accurately described as "bitchy". In his defence, he was in the middle of a conversation here.

"Okay, but a discreet tattoo. Like what. A tramp stamp or something?" Robin continues as soon as the door falls shut again.

"N- you know what. Why not?"

"Because it's a fucking tramp stamp Steve"

"What, are you saying I don't get around enough to be considered a tramp? I'll let you know-"

"No, Steve, believe me, I know. But if you get a tramp stamp, I also need to get a tramp stamp."

"Is that a no?"

A pause. Steve knows he won before she even opens her mouth

"You know what? Fuck it. Let's get fucking matching tramp stamps"

(more)

[libraryleopard]

Lulu—I have made it a goal of mine next year to Get into Movies more because I really have gotten into a rut of just rewatching movies / tv shows and not trying much of anything new. I have been following your watching journey this year with great delight, and not a little bit of inspiration I might add, and I wonder if you might give me some film recommendations? 🙏 like whatever you want - I am pretty much open to trying out anything (with the exception of horror movies that go hard on the gore/body horror). Thank you most kindly!

Ooh, yes, I'd love to give some recommendations! Here are some films I've enjoyed in the past year and a half or so.

Rye Lane dir. Raine Allen Miller: Super charming rom com about a chance encounter between two people in London who have a chance encounter after both recently going through break-ups. Vibrant, funny, good sense of place, excellent chemistry between the leads.

Chevalier dir. Stephen Williams: Biopic about Joseph Bologne, the son of an enslaved Caribbean woman and a white French plantation owner who becomes a celebrated composer and duelist in the court of Marie Antoinette. I love a big lavish period drama (and honestly my main complaint about this is that the protagonist's life is so interesting you could probably make a whole second movie following this one) and the lead performance from Kelvin Harrison Jr. is very good!

Showing Up dir. Kelly Reichardt: Quiet film about a sculptor in the weeks leading up to a showcase of her art at a local gallery and how her job, friends, and family keep getting in the way of her preparations. When I watching this, I kept waiting for there to be some disaster to push her everyday stress to the breaking point, but it's not really that kind of movie–it's just about how hard it is to carve out space to make art when everything in your life seems to be competing for your attention.

Polite Society dir. Nida Manzoor: Infectiously fun and stylish action-comedy about an aspiring martial artist who becomes convinced that her sister's new boyfriend is bad news and she must prevent their wedding. So energetic and hilarious (though I will give a content warning that there is a scene of an unwanted invasive medical procedure). Nida Manzoor's TV show We Are Lady Parts is a fantastic comedy about a Muslim punk band, also!

Mutt dir. Vuk Lungulov-Klotz: Indie drama about a trans guy named Feña having a terrible day in NYC as he hosts his visiting father from Chile, runs into his half-sister, and reconnects with his straight ex-boyfriend who hasn't seen him since he transitioned. I enjoyed how this was set over such a compact amount of time and also that the protagonist is allowed to be kind of angry and an asshole at times.

Aftersun dir. Charlotte Wells: Ohhhh this film absolutely devastated me. It has a framing device of the protagonist reflecting on a vacation she and her father took to Turkey when she was a preteen and he was in his late 20s as she tries to reconcile the memories of that trip with what she wasn't aware of a child. Really naturalistic performance from the child actress, frankly devastating performance from Paul Mescal, ending that has haunted me in a good way for months! This one is, like, really sad to the point that I described the plot to my mother the other day and she was like "why would you inflict that in yourself," but in a really nuanced and subtle way that creeps up on you, plus interesting themes on memory.

Are You There, God? It's Me, Margaret dir. Kelly Fremon Craig: Actually perfect film about a eleven-year-old girl navigating her family's move from NYC to New Jersey, the differents faith of her family, and the start of adolescence. I never actually read Judy Blume's book, but this film is just so sweet and heartfelt.

Blue Jean dir. Georgia Oakley: Tense historical film about a lesbian teacher in 80s England balancing her double life in a climate where "promoting homosexuality" in schools was forbidden under Section 48. Very stressful but also riveting, great atmosphere capturing the aesthetic and politics of the time.

Scrapper dir. Charlotte Regan: Quirky, colorful, and heartfelt film about a resourceful twelve-year-old girl who lives alone in a working class neighborhood of London after her mother's death until her absent father turns up and wants to forge a relationship with her. Good movie to watch after being devastated by Aftersun but also well-acted and fun and has a great performance from the lead kid actress.

The Taste of Things dir. Trần Anh Hùng: Period drama set in 1880s rural France about a chef in love with his personal cook and determined to woo her with his cooking. This movie made me SO HUNGRY because it's just long scenes of people cooking and eating delicious meals and just truly luxuriates in the beauty of that. (Though it was also sadder than I expected, so there's that, ah well.) Never have I wanted to eat boiled vegetables and beef so badly as when watching this movie!!

La Chimera dir. Alice Rohrwacher: My favorite movie of the yearrrrrrrr. Magic-tinged period drama heist about a British archaeologist in 70s Italy with the magical ability to sense hidden Etruscan tombs–which he uses to plunder the contents and sell them on the black market with his band of fellows thieves. It's about being haunted by the past, both ancient and in a grieving way! It's about the desecration of art for money! It's about a catchy folk song with liberal use of the triangle!

I Saw the TV Glow dir. Jane Schoenbrun: Unsettling/sad horror film about two misfits growing up in the 90s suburbs who become obsessed with the same obscure TV show–until the lines between fiction and reality blur. So haunting and heart-wrenching and also the soundtrack is phenomenal.

How to Blow Up a Pipeline dir. Daniel Goldhaber: Eco-terrorist heist film about a group of disparate people banding together to do exactly what it says on the tin. Good use of nonlinear narrative and ensemble cast, also a good conversation starter if you tell people the title of the film you just watched, haha.

The Unknown Country dir. Morissa Maltz: A grieving woman embarks on a road trip to reckon with her loss and place in the world. Indigenous community and family and a beautiful sense of poignancy. Lily Gladstone plays the lead and they are just absolutely luminous.

Bird dir. Andrea Arnold: Coming-of-age film about a 12-year-old girl living in a squat in England with her brother and irresponsible dad who befriends an eccentric man looking for his family in the area. It's a really interesting mix of gritty and fantastical and I thought the ending was uplifting without feeling unrealistic or saccharine and I admired that.

Hope you have fun on your quest to watch more movies, I've had fun on mine! If you're based in the US, I'd especially recommend seeing if your local library has Kanopy or Hoopla because I've watched some good movies that way.

[vengefulvermin]

Can i get more passage of time/music development yapping ☹️☹️☹️??? I give you official permission to yap the most you can im so interested

YES YES YES YES YES I LOVE THIS ASK

warning beneath the cut SCARY WALL OF TEXT WARNING 😱

decided to divide it into colored parts if you dont gaf about certain elements 😭

second warning all of this is unedited rambling so some points might contradict each other or just plain not make sense.

okay so for CONTEXTTTTT

i have diagnosed OCD, and like, roughly since the end of last year and the beginning of this one, the 'obsession' part of OCD that was negatively affecting me, was the concept of time. how fleeting it was. how it's basically unescapable ALL THINGS MUST PASS (get out of my head george harrison) that shit proper cold dead SCARED ME MAN. sleepless & haunting me in my dreams type shi. sometimes it still does. i try not to think about it too much

to cope, i found great comfort in the 70s-80s since at the time i was and still am hyperfixated on david bowie and that was sort of his prime (love his 90s-00s work tho.) i was also starting to think of how much parallels and similar experiences i have to previous generations and how it's not ALL that bad after all so far. i can still walk to a record store and roller skate if i really wanted to, or go to a diner.

okey here's where the life changing stuff happens. i decided i'd listen to pink floyd's the dark side of the moon. then TIME CAME ON. ohhhh god oh gosh golly god i was bawling and everything the whole song spoke to me on a molecular level. then i found out about DB's song also called time, and i ALSO crode to that. i was like. wow. i'm not alone on this feeling of utter desperation and helplessness as eventually all things Must Pass. (GEORGE HARRSION GTFO)

i used to be bitchy on how i whined i was part of the 'wrong generation.' i thought i was alone, but virtually everyone of almost every era has thought this. somebody who lived my dream life wished they had what i have now.

that's when i started to lowkey realize the parallels and oneness of human experience. i could go to a club in the 70s, and (granted the infrastructure and music remains similar) i could today. nothing would change on how i perceive events. there is no color filter on the past. unless you got huge TVs and stuff all over your house, you could walk around, and think it's the 80s. AND IT'S BASICALLY THE 80s. the way your parents or any other gen Xer saw the world with their *eyes* (not counting the changes in buildings and stuff) is the same as you today pretty much.

i already really enjoy subcultures, and particularly how they evolve and adapt. the indomitable human spirit prevails no matter how gentrified or 'banned' things become. nowadays i feel like there is No Youth Subcultures. at least, none that will pass the test of time and be memorable enough to be remembered in the books. nobody's gonna go to their child and proudly say: "when i was your age, i was a chav" or something. and i credit this to the lack of creativity allowed in the wider music industry.

HEAR ME OUT this is because 90% of youth subcultures had everything to do with music. and now, everything must be palatable. to be clear there's nothing inherently wrong with that type of music, but to me it speaks no soul. it has no risks. contemporary pop music is very much formulaic and this is because now more than ever entertainment (this also applies to movies btw) is more of an investment than passion. I WILL SPECIFY.

music production is so vastly different genre to genre, and we're not letting it flourish because of how much short form content is valued nowadays. LET ME COOK.

tiktoks are formulaic. algorithms are formulaic. WE'RE GETTING SOMEWHERE. there must be an instant hook or rift in music if you want to 'go viral' as a musician. digitized fame doesn't mean SHIT (to me), since clearly monthly listeners don't equate real world fans. album sales are being replaced with streams, and because of how ASS spotify treats its artists, newer, less established acts need to GET ON THE GRIND INSTANTLY to earn Coin. that means that to be smart and work with the exploitative system they're given, they have to make albums filled with 1 minute 30 second songs. so you can technically give them the most amount of streams possible. i feel with this formulaic approach, you can't get 6 minute long gutwrenching guitar pieces. no more 4 minute drum solos, hell avant garde experimental works were 2 people shout their names out at each other for 20 minutes. THERE ARE NO MORE FRANK ZAPPAS.

i'm not going to be one of those sad assholes who claim there's 'no more good rock music' and how it'll never be the same. as corny as this is, the next beatles or nirvana could be right under our noses and we'll NEVER know because of how fame is distributed. it sucks to see a small band beg on tiktok for streams to kickstart their career. but this is what we gotta work with. if we want subcultures to be created and thrive, we gotta go looking underground again, except unlike in the past it's a kajillion times easier now AND everything gets gentrified in 2 tiktok weeks. but this is evolution. MUSIC EVOLUTION

the end honk shoo honk shoo (it's midnight)

[freaky-flawless]

https://www.tumblr.com/freaky-flawless/758894466381840384/what-did-book-clawd-do-and-which-book-are-you?source=share

I was looking at the post you reblogged about someone calling Clawd annoying and you said , “Book Clawd can choke” in one of the replies.

It might be an old reply though

Ohhhh yes.

I was referring to the Lisi Harrison books!

The third one has a focus on Clawdeen, and in it we see him and Draculaura get together and it seems pretty cute and sweet, and all around he's fine character wise, with the caveat that he's kinda sexist. Tbh the book portrays that as being a commonality in werewolf culture (which is....infuriating) But in the fourth one, which focuses on Draculaura, the two are actively dating and he suuuucks.

He's portrayed as being too embarrassed to be seen with her in front of his friends, so every time the two are together, it's just him brushing her off. Meanwhile she's going through a wicked hard time, because Dracula also sucks in that book and puts a shit ton of pressure on her. And book Draculaura is such a sweetheart, and kind of a pushover, so it's extra hard to read.

So yeah...book Clawd (and Dracula) can still choke lol.

[ike-garden2024]

Supportive Mom 😅

Sooo I was telling my mom about the gacha system part of the games. [ for reference whenever I read a new route I tell her about the story. She likes IkeVil and a little bit of IkePri ] Anyway, after explaining it to her she goes...

( conversation was originally in Spanish )

Mom: And? Just don't get the cards, it's not worth it. But you better finish the extra stories. Saved stories are much more valuable than the cards.

Me: ... That's not the point!! Some of the cards are pretty 😭 You wouldn't be saying that if I said Alfons has a new card coming up!!

Mom: No no, it doesn't matter. His extra stories and birthday thing are much more important than his cards.

Me: Ohhhh... I forgot to tell you, I didn't get his birthday thing... it just passed, Liam's just started 🙃

Mom: WHAT?!?

Me: Sorryyyyyyy

Mom: So you got Ellis but didn't get Alfons? 🤨

Me: I also didn't get Harrison or William...

Mom: ... Hmm ... Well, get Liam's and make sure you get all those extra story events

Me: 😁👍🏻

I honestly started telling my mom about Villains before it came out, so we were both waiting for its release 😂 She ended up enjoying it more than I expected. Talking to her about it was random at first but now she'll reference the characters randomly throughout the day or ask for any new stories. We use gloves a lot in the house for medical related things and she'll say "mis guantes de Alfons" and she'll put her hands up 😂 Whenever we talk about financial things she always says something about Jude... and when my sister isn't being cooperative she says "dónde está William cuando lo necesitas y sus poderes" guess she wishes she could literally command my sister 😂

She'll ask about the IkePri guys every now and then but it's pretty clear she's a IkeVil fan. It's nice to have something we can share and enjoy together 😊 I'll be honest, I don't tell her about the $$$ I spend on these games, she'd be mad 😅

[ Spanish Translations: "my Alfons gloves" & "Where is William when you need him and his powers" ]

[sebsxphia]

Sebbie I keep seeing all the Harrison thoughts about him becoming a daddy and my heart has heart eyes!!!!!

When you finally start showing he can't keep his hands off you, but he loves bringing you down to the beach because the sound of the ocean waves helps calm the baby down when he/she's been kicking too much. He'll even sing the baby to sleep most nights and that usually allows you to get some sleep at night.

Harrison loves making mixtapes for the baby. He's made a bunch of them for his aunts, uncles, nieces and nephews, so when you found out you were pregnant, he had to make one. He'll put his headphones on your belly and just let the music do its thing.

You guys definitely do an ocean themed nursery for your little one. If its a boy, Harrison settles on Pirates Of The Caribbean but if it's a girl, you know he's insisting on either Moana, Lilo and Stitch or The Little Mermaid.

This man does NOT LEAVE YOUR SIDE the entire time you're in labor. He's rubbing your lower back, getting you ice chips and whatever else you need. Harrison is literally right there, holding your leg while you're pushing and telling you not to take your eyes off him. The midwife even asks if he wants to catch the baby and how can he say no to that? (lol).

The first chance he has to hold the baby, he's literally in tears because he can't believe you two made such a perfect lil human being. At night when your little one is particularly restless, he'll bring him or her down to the beach and listen to the waves while doing skin-on-skin contact with the baby.

ohhhh my goodness, yes! to all of these sweet thoughts! you capture daddy harrison so well, my love. i love how you write him and all of the little added details for him 🥹 like the mixtapes, the nursery having themes of the ocean and the coast, how attentive he is and this, “At night when your little one is particularly restless, he'll bring him or her down to the beach and listen to the waves while doing skin-on-skin contact with the baby.”

aaaaaaah! he’s the perfect daddy, i know he is! thank you for these sweet thoughts, my love! 💌

[thirteennhp]

:// OpSec Can Kiss my Ass

"Ohhhh, but you're a NHP, you shouldn't be as prevalent on the Omninet"

"Ohhhh, your relations to Horizon are too prevalent to be public it could put you in danger ohhhh"

Don't care, didn't ask. Whats the point of being an independent NHP if you spend your existence hiding? I spend a century getting outta that place and Ra willin' I'm keeping it that way. Shooting a gun is more fun than endless paperwork anyways (among other things). So Hello, Caio, 你好, or whatever else. I exist to be a shithead to spite the powers at be.

Despite my hatred for Harrison Armory shermans are too damn moddable to not use. With some decent changes, and removing of some reactor shielding that only the squishy pilots need to worry about, I got that puppy to run as hot as the core of a star and still purr. Good feelin' to see the fuckers you hate turned to slag, though I ain't against a good ol' fashioned duel as well.

Don't be surprised if my Omninet connection gets banned!

[carbonateddelusion]

sorry for pushing my AMS agenda but I feel like u would really like this song. maybe. at the very least the lyrics are very You to me.

Okay well I was going to paste a YouTube link but it’s not letting me so. The song is called Sweet Rosalie by American murder song. TLDR it’s a guy singing about he loves his wife sooo much and would do anything for her and excuse and forgive everything she does even as she’s actively causing public harm and killing people

ohhhh yesss... I like this a lot. reminds me a little of Mari and her sugar daddy, Harrison but not quite because he's fully aware that they're dangerous

[specialmouse]

I know you just posted paragraphs but do you have more tidbits about your OCs?

I do ofc ofc.. i'll give you everything i know..

davyne and opal arent all that fleshed out tbh like idk their backstories or anything. The script is about davyne realizing no one is watching her sets anymore so she puts blood capsules in her mouth before performing and pretends to cough up blood during dont let me be misunderstood by nina simone. Davyne pretends shes dying and opal posts the video to tiktok and it goes (relatively) viral (idk if tiktok would actually allow something they thought was real blood up there but idk and idk if this would even go viral LMAO), and the next gig she has the bar is completely packed and people are filming. Then davyne does a dramatic monologue, puts two blood capsules between her teeth and bites them then spits into the crowd, and starts lipsyncing to maybe this time LMAO it’s very heavyhanded. I titled it hard pill

The script with maryam and chunxiu are from is called venture. Chunxiu is 36, mixed as fuck because it’s 200 years later but his mom values her chinese heritage so she named him that. He was born on a wealthy space station and had access to the best education. He’s quite conceited and completely unaware of it; he thinks he earned his degree because he was smart, and he is, but it’s mostly because he was rich and had connections. Maryam is from Lebanon, which technically doesn’t exist anymore but the people there carry the name on (is lebanon an exonym? I couldnt really find an answer in the brief search i just did). They are one of the recipients of the rimco intergalactic scholar awards, which is where they take up 100 kids from earth each year based on their “academic promise”; it’s really a pr thing, because no one goes to school anymore. Maryam has been in space for 9 years when the script starts.

basically they go to a planet that's made just of a gelatinous clear ocean and a beach made of glass shards, with volcanoes on the seabed. it's like, literally nothing. it's supposed to be a one and done mission, in and out. chunxiu at this point has been to 30 planets to scout for a lack of life and he's getting angry at all of this; he's a biologist, he has a phd, he's meant for more than scanning things and finding nothing! he had actually found something a few years prior, several species of cyanobacteria, and it meant he had found alien life in the universe; then rimco had the laws changed as to what constituted life and it meant that he actually hadn't. so he's incredibly salty about that. anyway chunxiu and maryam have a discussion that reveals their disparate backgrounds and it goes into the ravaging of earth that the corporations have left behind, highlighting chunxiu's (and by extension anyone rich enough to life in space's) ignorance to what the corporations are up to, and have done in the past. they go to sleep, wake up, and it cuts to the pilot sent to retrieve them doing "peer review" (lazily doing their job again)-- and out in the ocean they see this blob creature with eyes like the moon that orbits the planet, and they're like HOLY SHIT LOOK LOOK WHAT IS THAT and the pilot kills it immediately. and theyre like WHAT THE FUCK IS WRONG WITH YOU and hes like do yall not know protocol..? oh wait i forgot they dont tell the techies shit. and walks away and theyre left there to be like ohhhh fuck. even if we find it they're killing it and we're not even important enough for them to tell us anything. and that's where it ends but i imagine they'd go on to start a revolution or something idk. havent gotten there yet

sooo about the harrisons... i named cash after cash bundren from as i lay dying by faulkner, silas and celeste were from my great-great grandparents and i named andy that because he wants to go by andrew to seem more manly but everyone still calls him andy. i might change his name to laurie/laurence for the same effect. andy is older than cash but cash was always the more masculine one, he was a massive bully but handsome enough and he got more girls and more attention than andy ever did, who was more sensitive and shy.

andy moved out of the town when he was 23 to new york to become a writer (this was in the late seventies, mind) and while he was able to find work as a journalist, he never really became a published author, and wasn't of much acclaim either. celeste was one of the prettiest girls in town growing up but she didn't have much aspiration. everyone in the town was poor but celeste was even poorer. she married cash when she was 18 and cash was 24; andy was 27 at this point. they had a series of miscarriages for five years straight until they had silas. cash had become a cadet in that time and was working his way up the police force. as soon as silas was born, cash's anger turned into abuse; physical abuse as well as alcohol. andy only came home to go to their great-aunt's funeral (used it as an excuse to get out of doing a pop culture piece he found distasteful; i'll figure out what it would be in 1989 with some google searches, idk). in 1997 cash shoots himself in the head in their garage after a drunken bender, but not before penning a three page letter to andy. the content of the letter is nonsense, blaming everyone in his life for his struggles, saying they (celeste, his coworkers, silas, the child celeste is pregnant with (that's not actually his), the dogs) are of the devil, saying he's fighting against children of satan, etc. andy, who is now in his 40s, hasn't had a major relationship in 10 years and is rather worse for wear. he receives the letter, and uses it as an excuse to visit celeste, who is now widowed. he doesn't see this as him taking his husband's widow, but rather him saving her from a life of single motherhood. the script is celeste and andy talking to each other and it becoming increasingly clear what andy's motives are. the conversation gets more and more tense as his not-so-pure intentions are laid bare to the grieving, over-worked celeste, and she throws him out. as andy drives away, he sees a kid beating up another child in the front lawn of the neighbor's. the kid leaves the other on the ground and makes eye contact with andy as he's come to a stop. it is clear (through dialogue from earlier in the script) that this is silas, and that his father's ways have already been instilled in him. end of script!

[sassyandclassy94]

So there’s this customer who comes in who looks almost exactly like Harrison Ford - he’s actually one of my favorites. He gave me a hug before Christmas because our store had something his wife was looking everywhere for (��Okay. I promise I don’t mean this to be creepy, I’m genuinely excited about this because you have no idea how long my wife has been looking for it; you made her so happy! Will you accept a hug?”)

Anyway, a few months back we were talking about The Boys in the Boat - he said he took his wife and youngest daughter to go see it. So today, when he asked me how I was doing I said “Meh, okay… I’m still obsessed with the Boys in the Boat though!” He laughed and I added “Did you know Don was a whole lot sicker than the film portrayed?”

Customer: “Ohhhh I know! My daughter went through the WHOLE shebang after watching that movie and she told me EVERYTHING as she went along. And that was one of the first things she told me.”

Me: “They picked such a good actor for Don. He didn’t have many lines but his expressions spoke volumes.”

Customer: *nods* “I agree.”

Me: “Plus the actor is so attractive.”

Customer: *laughs* “Now you sound like my daughter. Only she likes the one from Masters of the Air.”

Then that started a whole other conversation about Masters of the Air, lol! But then after that you know what he told me?🥹

“I just want you to know before I say this, I’m a dad of four girls, happily married to my wife of 50 years, so when I say this, know that I say it as a grandfather, and I say it to my girls: Your hair looks so nice down like that.”

Me: *taken aback because… I’m not real used to compliments outside of my mom* “Oh. Thank you!!! And I still think you look like Harrison ford.”

So there’s my positive customer story of the day🥰

[killian-whump]

So Colin’s playing golf, now I want to play mini golf with him. Whom from Colin Character Coven would play mini golf?

Ohhhh, I wanna play mini golf with Colin, too. I bet he'd be fun to play mini golf with. Well, let's be real, Colin seems like the kind of guy who's fun to do just about anything with - which is why we love him so much. It is also the cause of our existential woe.

As for who plays mini golf in the Character Coven... Who doesn't?! Like, if you don't play mini golf do you even have a soul?!

So obviously Professor Harrison doesn't play mini golf, since he doesn't have a soul. Oh, Preacher Peter, too - there's no mini golf in a post-apocalyptic dystopia. That's what makes it dystopian.

[coffeeandcalligraphy]

Psychometry i want to hear about any trinkets!!!!

👤 Psychometry: What is your OC’s most prized possession? What’s the history behind it?

okay so <3 let's talk about Harrison's guardian angel necklace bc it matters sooo much (and for some reason it's the one piece of OC jewelry I don't own???). In Moth Work, I randomly gave him a necklace and then it turned into a multi-book symbol!

some fun lore before I get into it is that this was lowkey inspired by my kindergarten teacher who used to collect guardian angel pins/brooches!

under the cut because this got autistic and long <3 !! hehe

OKAY SO! It's a small pendant of an angel/cherub though it's described a little inconsistently lol so idk what it looks like (when *I* eventually get one it'll look like That). Originally I described it as a "small wire angel inlaid with the grain-sized opal" which is CUTE but I also describe it with tiny crystals on the wings & in chapter 13 Harrison throws it so hard one of them falls off lollll.

THE LORE is that his mother Suzanna gave it to him (.......... before she abandoned him OOOF) & it's his prized possession! This bit from Feeding Habits explains that history:

Prayer sent him nothing when Suzanna slipped into his room past midnight when everything had settled, kissed him on the forehead. Nothing when she pushed a small golden chain under his pillow for him to and have that be the only thing he’d ever find of her for a decade and a half.

So Harrison really associates that angel not only as a gift from his mother but AS his mother because it's the only thing he had of her for a long time. He wears it under his shirt before he gives it to Lonan at the end of the book (though in SV he keeps it lol like he went "nah it's mineee"), though it exchanges between them a couple times. First time that happens is when Harrison leaves it in his jacket pocket and then Lonan robs him & takes the jacket :) (dw harrison robs him back in fh) & doesn't realize the angel's in there.

From there, it gets STOLEN when Lonan gets beat up by a guy after he unwittingly sleeps with his wife (lol the moth work/feeding habits lonan plots are soooo wild which is probably why hallowed bodies is boring it's BALANCE). This is context of the Lonan Beat Up art:

“I’ll leave,” he says, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. Blood from his eye makes him see only in red. “Just give me back the jacket and the necklace.” When the man raises his fist again, Lonan cringes into the wall and shakes his head. “Please. They belong to a friend.”

*a friend* bomBASTIC side eye

Lonan actually feels sooooo bad about losing BOTH iconic harrison paraphernalia, though he and Eliza manage to get them back later in the book. Lucky thing that he continues to wear them after this because Suz (who doesn't know him) sees him at a hospital and recognizes the angel and is like... bro you're not my child!! And Lonan's like ohhhh christttt that's my boyfriend's mommmm!!

She stares at him unashamedly, outlining each ridge of eyelash, jaw. Her eyes are a damp brown, something glittering in them like an unturned landmine. At first, he doesn’t react when she grabs the guardian angel. She thumbs the gem, stroking it carefully, and it’s only when she covers it with her palm like she’s suffocating it that he yanks away and cups it with his own palm.

At one point ELIZA starts wearing the angel necklace (because..... we can make assumptions) & is actually wearing it when Harrison finds Lonan again in part 3 after having the time of his life with Jeremiah:

He’s been staring at her for an hour, but only notices the necklace at this point. The gold chain shimmers under her collar, and a miniature figure presses through her scrubs when she leans forward on her knees. “That’s mine,” he says, reaching for it. Before he can touch the chain, Eliza’s grabbed his hand and pushed it away. The dusty turquoise of her scrubs makes her look even redder with anger. “Your necklace? That’s mine.”

She gives it back to him from there and he wears it for like a couple hours before he and Suz have the argument of the century & he does the aforementioned throwing.

But but but when Lonan takes Harrison to The Beach (very vague location loollll) to calm him down he HAS IT!! Love a man who collects his bf's possessions of the ground <3

“This got me out of a lot of trouble.” Lonan closes his hand around the pendant. It’s only when he pulls his hand back that Harrison realizes he’s been holding his since they first sat down—the absence of it cold and sudden. Lonan undoes the clasp, and drapes the chain around Harrison’s neck, so the pendant hits his breastbone.

He wears it for the rest of the book before he gives it to Lonan at the very end when he knows he is Done and Leaving lol

He almost says something but catches himself. He knows whatever he will say will keep him here, in this sun, on this barstool, reading the newspaper about moths, sitting next to Lonan, drinking his tea, never knowing what flavour it is. Harrison inhales, and on his exhale, unclasps the chain and drapes it around Lonan’s throat.

Anyway so from then on Lonan wears it! Harrison doesn't canonically take it back! I'm not sure if he would. Maybe I should write MW 3 to find out :))) this is them talking about it though when they first reunite!

“Are you wearing my necklace?” Harrison asks. His voice is dampened by the snow ledged against the windows. The pendant’s gone from coast to coast, seen things even Harrison hasn’t. Lonan doesn’t move. His eyes remain closed. He fidgets with the angel, says, “Yes.” “Why?” “If you want it back, I’ll give it to you.” “That’s not why I’m asking.”

So that's the story of the angel necklace! I actually don't know how Suzanna herself got it since it is hers, but I'd assume it was a gift or also passed down to her.

Anyway it basically looks like this!

this was fun!!!

[whammy-kiss]

Hi it's me the only other jerry harrison fan around (ik i'm not but). I got a lot of those facts from the band's 2001 biography This Must Be The Place, which i'm 70% sure is out of print sadly (though there might be scans on the internet archive) other than that here's a couple interview/performance clips i like:

https://youtu.be/3QU6hiQ2iBg?si=2zv-XARZlhZgRjM_

https://youtu.be/QOBphIlwBO4?si=udAQqjDyW1K-5PWg

https://youtu.be/bDHTFKC_lGg?si=6ofwWVWsTCvQ2aBP

ohhhh that’s too bad :(

i’ll try and remember to look on the archive to see if it’s up there, but in the mean time, i’ll look into the clips whenever i get the chance 🫡

[wonderxshows]

ohhhh reading harrisons preview makes everything make sense again

theyre the same guy