#on the run from the law together with identities they wear and shed on a whim twisted up by grief over their upbringing

[ardentpoop]

anyway s2 will always have a place in my heart

[rodeoxqueen]

Hi! I saw that your requests were open and I was wondering if you could do hc’s of like the dmc boys as Mafia bosses and what would it be like dating them??? Thank you! 🙏🏼

Howdy,

Only did Dante and Vergil’s. I don’t know too much about them mafia leaders, got enough work lassoing them wanted outlaws on my side of town. 

If you want a good reference of mafia Dante and Vergil, I’d recommend you check out @cssmuse ‘s drawings of Dante and Vergil wearing suits. 

-Rodeo 

Dante 

Before meeting Dante, you meet Tony Redgrave first. A charming man with a family business, a cozy Italian restaurant in the city. 

However, it’s a cover for all the money-making crimes he commits heavy-handedly.

He’s a natural at reading people. He’s a walking lie detector. Good luck trying to f*ck him over a deal when making business with him in the underground. 

Dante is like Reggie Kray, the twin mobster to Ronnie Kray who were notorious in England. 

He decides to court you, flirting heavy-handedly and taking you on nice dates. He never lets you touch the check. 

While next to you at a nice bar, he smiles off-sightedly at the in-disguise private investigator sitting a few tables away. 

You get expensive flowers delivered to you every day, richly colored and freshly imported from Denmark. 

Dante is a regular around bars and other dives, but he hasn’t brought another person with him ever. Not since you. You quickly become the talk of the underground, his love interest with starry eyes and clean hands. 

Dante is a dangerous and careless man. He doesn’t leave evidence around because he’s an idiot, he does it because he knows no one can do anything to him anyway. 

This man doesn’t need backup, but his enemies do. He likes to do the dirty work more than you think. With Ebony and Ivory, he walks into confrontation with his Beowulf brass knuckles on his hands. 

He tries so hard to keep his real identity and reputation away from you until eventually, it catches up to him. He needs to tell you. 

“Tony Redgrave died decades ago,” Dante says. The infamous Dante Sparda, the Twin Terror, stares at you with his true self revealed. 

“But Dante Sparda has been using his name for the last forty-odd years.”

He only tells you once he knows you won’t leave in disgust, but he still has that crawling thought that you will. When you truly don’t, it’s a breath of relief.  

He’s a stubborn man and he’s raised from violence. He’ll break a man’s face in and hold you tenderly with the same hands. 

Dante always has an arm around you or a hand on the small of your back. He likes to show you off, dressed in his favorite red shades and shining rings. 

He never wants you to get into his business, he would much rather have you “sit there and look nice” rather than participate in crime with him. It’s easier for him if you don’t get that involved. 

Dante would get thrown into the slammer sometimes for a petty charge. He gets offered a phone call and he will never ever spend it well. 

“You got one phone call, inmate,” Dante smirks at the guard, dialing a familiar number. 

“Devil May Cry?” 

“Is your refrigerator running?” 

“Goddamit Dante, are you in jail again?” 

“You know it, nephew.” 

“(Y/N) is going to tear you a new one.” 

“Oh, I know. Bail me out?” 

“FINE.” 

He loves you a lot, he never wants to see you behind bars because you loved him and got looped into his crimes. Even though you’re rather entwined in a relationship with him, there are times when he pulls away and you have to return him to you. 

“I’m not a good man. You know that.” 

“I’m not a good person for sticking around with you. But maybe that’s why we should be together. If we’re both going to Hell, I’m going down with you.” Dante’s hands wrap around your frame and he hugs your tightly. 

All empires fall. When Dante takes that plight to damnation, he’s got your blessing- lipstick kisses all along his jugular. 

Vergil 

He’s the Ronnie Kray To Dante’s Reggie Kray; the colder twin with little trust for others. 

Unlike Dante, Vergil treads quietly up the underworld’s ranks. He’s extremely difficult to approach and impossible to reason with. He will not let you get the better end of the deal without being at the sharper side of his sword. 

Vergil wears the same styled suit all the time. It isn’t until he undresses when you discover he’s covered in tattoos. 

He doesn’t want to see you killed or used against him as a pawn. He’s incredibly overprotective and even the slightest chance of someone endangering you ends with them being dead in the gutter.

Vergil is busy all the time but every night, he sheds his sins to be with you. He’ll be gone in the early morning, a feeling of cold lips grazing your cheek before he leaves. 

Vergil works with Dante in their now-shared crime syndicate, although he is not one for fake identities. He’d much rather be known to the criminal underbelly only. Finding him and falling for him is a very very rare situation. 

While people beg for their lives, he sits in his seat with his hand resting on his face, a silver band on his ring finger. Lately, anyone who dares to put their hands on you sees that new shining ring before they die, Vergil’s cold eyes watching their end. 

Vergil goes shopping with you, once in a blue moon, to make you feel better. Someone made you upset and he beat them to an inch of their life before taking you to the finest establishments. He thinks you do not know what he has done, but the single fleck of red on his collar tells you enough. 

He’s so stuck in his pursuit of power and sometimes it scares him that he’s attached to you. It distracts him and he hates distractions. He says this yet a single glance of you diverges his mind away from his throne, and he indulges upon it heavily. 

Despite his avoidance of flashy appearances, he makes sure you are adorned with the finest clothes. He takes good care of you, and you take good care of him. He dislikes social outings but takes you with him when his brother forces him. You are his star jewel, the blue dragon clutching you gently between his claws. With this dangerous man, the crowd parts for you. 

Dante and him butt heads often. Dante wants alliances but Vergil wants to monopolize. Debates end with bloody noses and disheveled suits as the twin terrors fight anytime and anywhere. 

“Goodness, you should stop them.” A patron asks of you as Dante and Vergil throw gut punches and right hooks. You sip a drink. 

“It’s just business.” 

Dates are sparse but lavish. A simple dinner with the two of you, where you discuss everything but what Vergil does every day. With you, he’s just a dry-humored man who likes classical music and poetry. 

Vergil isn’t like his brother, who deals with law enforcement all the time. Vergil has to deal with rival mafia leaders trying to one-up his empire. 

“All things end. This won’t be forever, this life.” 

“I’ll spend forever with you anyways.” 

“You’d be a fool.” 

“I’m your fool.” 

“And I you.” 

[victorluvsalice]

Sims Challenge Wednesday: Vampire The Masquerade Bloodlines!

Hi all! We’re putting the usual Newcrest Adventures updates on pause for a week because I recently finished a little project I’ve been working on for a little while now -- doing Sims 4 challenges for two of my other favorite video games, Vampire: the Masquerade -- Bloodlines and Fallout 4! Yes, I’ve mentioned wanting to do this before on the blog, and now, finally, I’ve completed the initial drafts of each challenge! And I figured, who better to share them with than all of you. :) So let’s start off with the VTMB challenge!

(Oh, and note -- yeah, I just saw in the tags that someone’s actually come up with a VTMB-inspired Legacy challenge for The Sims 4. Mine’s a completely different one-generation challenge, but I am intrigued to see what’s going on with the Legacy version!)

VTMB SIMS 4 CHALLENGE

Premise: It all started out so well – a night out at the clubs, a flirtatious wink across the dance floor, a trip back to a seedy hotel room to get it on with your new partner. . .and then suddenly, in a mix of pain and pleasure, you find yourself lacking a heartbeat. And then some other people storm in, and you find out that:

A) you have been changed into a vampire

B) the person who changed you did not have permission to change you into a vampire

Your “sire” is put to death for disobeying the laws of the vampire underworld – but the rulers of your local city decide that you can be allowed to live. So long as you run a bunch of errands for them, of course. . .your only way out? Make some allies, make some money, gain a ton of power, and keep your head down until you can kick every one of these people’s asses personally. That is, if you (un)live that long. . .

This is a challenge loosely inspired by the experience of being the Fledgling PC in the video game Vampire: the Masquerade – Bloodlines. The goals are to become a Grand Master Vampire, graduate from a shitty apartment to a decent one, and defeat a bunch of other vampires in duels to prove yourself.

Packs required: Vampires, Get Together, City Living, Eco Lifestyle, Island Living, Cats & Dogs/Cottage Living

Your Sim: Create your “Fledgling” in CAS. Your Fledgling should be a Young Adult. You may start them out as a vampire to start the challenge immediately, or start them as a human, make a sire for them, then have them changed in-game to gain a few days to build skills and enjoy sunlight. (Remember that the sire must be killed after your Fledgling starts their change! I recommend locking them outside in the sunlight.) The challenge starts the moment the Sim transforms fully into a vampire.

Each Fledgling vampire in Bloodlines belongs to one of seven clans – Brujah (clan of rebels and brawlers), Gangrel (clan of loners and animal lovers), Malkavian (clan of mentally ill people and oracles), Nosferatu (clan of warped looks and computer specialists), Toreador (clan of lovers and artistes), Tremere (clan of magicians and scholars), or Venture (clan of leaders and those of rarefied tastes). Pick one clan for your Fledgling and assign them an appropriate personality trait –

Brujah – “Hot-Headed”

Gangrel – Either “Cat Lover,” “Dog Lover,” or “Animal Enthusiast”

Malkavian – “Erratic” (you may sub in a custom trait for mental illness if you have one)

Nosferatu – “Geek”

Toreador – Either “Art Lover” or “Music Lover”

Tremere – “Bookworm”

Ventrue – “Snob”

Optional: Also assign your Fledgling the “Kleptomaniac” trait as, in the original Bloodlines game, you do end up stealing a lot of stuff to sell to vendors for quick cash.

Optional: If you’re strictly following how vampires work in Bloodlines, leave your vampire’s Dark Form identical to their normal form except for their fangs (except if you’re playing a Nosferatu – then instead customize the Dark Form to look like their post-transformation Orlockian-self (think Straud’s Dark Form) and have the “regular” form be the disguise they wear around humans to fit in). However, if you really want to do a custom Dark Form, I’m not going to be the one to stop you.

Their World: Set up the rest of the save file according to the below guidelines:

Your fledgling must live in a terrible apartment in either San MyShuno or Evergreen Harbor. This apartment must have a low-quality bed, a low-quality kitchen, a small low-quality bathroom, a TV, and a desk with the cheapest laptop. It must also have at least the “Filthy” lot challenge. Upon moving there, set their starting money to $100 (this is the amount they got for expenses).

Make or download at least three or four other vampires (depending on if you want to use the premade Vladislaus Straud or not) and make sure that they live in nice apartments/houses and are at least Master rank (cheats are totally allowed for this). These vampires must all be part of the same club (your choice for the name), with one chosen as the leader – this is the club that “rules” over all the local vampires and is making sure your Fledgling doesn’t step out of line. Set them up to meet regularly either at one of their homes or at an appropriately-kicking nightclub. Club activities are at your discretion, though remember – if they’re in public, they shouldn’t break the Masquerade by showing off powers or drinking plasma!

Make one “Independent” vampire and set them up however you wish, though they must be at least Master rank as well. They may be important to your Fledgling later!

Make sure you have at least four nightclubs (obviously they don’t have to all be in the same world) for your Fledgling to visit on the regular.

Goals:

Your Fledgling is looking to complete the following:

Become a Grand Master vampire, with all the power and perks that entails

Complete the Master Vampire aspiration (they may work on other aspirations as well)

Earn at least $5,000 simoleons

Move into better digs (either a better apartment or their own house)

Defeat all the members of the ruling club of vampires in Vampiric Duels

Rules:

Your Fledgling is not allowed to get a normal job, as per the rules of the council. Your Fledgling is only allowed to earn money by selling items they have made or found (or swiped, if they have the right trait) to other Sims, or by doing Odd Jobs. Any Odd Jobs that your fledgling finds that come from the ruling council (that is, if you see their picture by the job description) must be prioritized.

Your Fledgling may drink from plasma packs both purchased and homemade, but cannot use plasma fruit while the challenge is ongoing. (This means no doing the Good Vampire aspiration until you’ve completed your goals!)

Your Fledgling may drink from Sims, but must not break the Masquerade in doing so. They must either isolate the Sim they choose to drink from and compel them for a drink; or they must isolate the Sim and flirt with them at least five times before asking for a drink (to make it seem like they’re asking to make out or woohoo instead of drink their plasma). Either way, they must not be seen feeding by other Sims. The Fledgling is allowed five slip-ups – after that, the challenge is failed and they are put to death.

Your Fledgling must get to know the ruling vampires – a friendly relationship, however, is very much not necessary. They are going to be battling them sooner or later for the right to live life on their own terms!

Your Fledgling must follow the rules of their clan when purchasing powers: All vampires may purchase the Garlic Immunity, Vampire Creation, and Child of the Moon powers. Brujah vampires may purchase the Detect Personality, Vampiric Strength, Vampiric Slumber, Supernatural Speed, and Influence Emotion powers. Gangrel vampires may purchase the Bat Form, Vampiric Strength, Vampiric Slumber, Dampened Emotions, and Beyond The Herd powers. Malkavian vampires may purchase the Cast Hallucination, Command, Irresistible Slumber, Deprive Needs, and Influence Emotion powers. Nosferatu vampires may purchase the Eternally Welcome, Vampiric Strength, Irresistible Slumber, Odorless, and Mist Form powers. Toreador vampires may purchase the Eternally Welcome, Vampiric Charm, Mesmerize, Supernatural Speed, and Influence Emotion powers. Tremere vampires may purchase the Occult Student, Command, Manipulate Life Spirit, Deprive Needs, and Immortal Pleasures powers. Ventrue vampires may purchase the Detect Personality, Command, Mesmerize, Dampened Emotions, and Beyond The Herd powers. No vampires may purchase the Sun Resistance or Tamed Thirst powers.

Your Fledgling must also follow the rules of their clan when it comes to weaknesses: All vampires must purchase the Withered Stomach weakness – human food is indigestible to them. Brujah vampires like to rebel and fight – they should get into a fight with another Sim at least once every three days. They may fight the ruling vampires, but it doesn’t count as “defeating” them until they do it in an official vampire duel. They are also encouraged to purchase the Sloppy Drinker or Insatiable Thirst weaknesses. Gangrel vampires prefer open spaces and animals to being around people – they should have at least one pet (probably a cat or dog, although if you think you can fit a chicken coop or animal shed into their final home. . .) and prioritize socializing with that pet over socializing with other Sims. They are also encouraged to purchase the Uncontrollable Hissing or Undead Aura weaknesses. Malkavian vampires must deal with their madness – they should indulge their whims as much as possible (no matter how little sense they make – hell, the less sense the better), and you’re encouraged to let them do their own thing as much as possible as well (full autonomy on, people!). They are also encouraged to purchase the Uncontrollable Hissing or Fitful Sleep weaknesses. Nosferatu vampires are all warped by their curse into visions of pure ugliness – they should stay in their Dark Form as much as possible and only “put on their human disguise” to go to a club – and even then, they can only “keep up the illusion” for four hours. Being seen on a community lot by a large group of mortals in your Dark Form is a Masquerade violation, so keep track of the time! They are also encouraged to purchase the Dayphobia or Undead Aura weaknesses. Toreador vampires are mesmerized easily by what they personally consider beautiful, and are also a little more sensitive to the fact that they’ve become undead monsters – they should spend as much money as they can on beautiful artwork for their homes every three days, and spend most of their time admiring lovely objects and/or Sims when they’re out and about. They are also encouraged to purchase the Guilty Drinker or Eternal Sadness weaknesses. Tremere vampires are insular and ill-trusted by other vampires, and are so focused on their scholarly pursuits they lack physical fitness – they should not bring any of their relationships with other vampires up above “Acquaintance” (barring the Independent, see below), and should not improve the Fitness skill (or any other physical sport-related skill) above 5. They are also encouraged to purchase the Sloppy Drinker or Dayphobia weaknesses. Ventrue vampires may only drink from certain kinds of people – they should pick a distinguishing feature (hair color, eye color, personality trait, etc) and then only drink from Sims with that trait. They may drink regular plasma packs, but cannot drink ones made from fish or frogs. They are also encouraged to purchase the Guilty Drinker or Insatiable Thirst weaknesses. Optional: Your Fledgling can take the Thin-Skinned weakness no matter their clan, but I actually wouldn’t recommend it – while it fits with the World of Darkness lore, your Fledgling is going to have to be active during the day for their Odd Jobs most likely. Basically, take that one at your own risk!

Your Fledgling may befriend your Independent vampire – in fact, this is encouraged, as the Independent vampire can teach them a new power! Upon becoming friends with the Independent vampire, your Fledgling may learn one “out-of-clan” power that does not conflict with any of their weaknesses.

Your Fledgling must visit a nightclub once every three days to socialize, dance, and generally pretend to be human. If they can find a way to make money at the club or discreetly feed, even better.

Your Fledgling must “officially” defeat all members of the ruling vampire club in Vampiric Duels in order to break their hold on their unlives. Once this is accomplished, they may get a Freelancer job or sell things direct from inventory instead of to other Sims to pay the bills, as they are no longer under the club’s thumb.

Optional Hard Mode – Four Factions: There’s not one club, there’s four – and none of them like each other! Make three extra clubs, each with at least four vampire members, to represent the four main factions of the original game – the Camarilla (the “official” vampire government, kind of stodgy), the Anarchs (rebellious and looking for more freedoms), the Sabbat (want to revel in their monstrous nature), and the Kuei-Jin (Asian “vampires” who are trying to take over the area; feel free to make them a different kind of occult altogether!). Your Fledgling may choose to join any one of these clubs, or none of them. If they join a club, they have to defeat the leaders plus one member of each of the other clubs in Vampiric Duels to earn their freedom; if they go Independent, they just have to take down all four leaders.

Optional Hard Mode – Limited Map: Your Fledgling can only travel between the worlds of Evergreen Harbor (Santa Monica), San MyShuno (Downtown L.A.), Del Sol Valley (Hollywood), and Mt. Komorebi (Chinatown – it’s the closest we’ve got, just stick to the more city-like neighborhood). Their initial bad apartment must be in Evergreen Harbor, and they must upgrade to one of the best apartments in San MyShuno.

Optional Hard Mode – The Sequel: Your Fledgling is actually the protagonist of the ever-in-production Bloodlines 2 – aka, they’re a Thin-Blood, and their Embrace was REALLY illegal. Adjust the rules as follows:

Thin-Bloods often don’t show signs of any clan, but they are generally hunted and killed just for existing. If you have StrangerVille, I would recommend the “Paranoid” personality trait, but otherwise, customize them as you see fit.

After buying their shitty apartment, you must set their starting funds to zero – they did not receive anything for expenses, because. . .

They’re not under the thumb of the ruling vampires, they’re on the run from them. To be caught is to be killed, so your Fledgling must avoid their notice. Do not attempt to interact with them before you’re powerful enough to take them on, and avoid any Odd Jobs that come from them. (They may still talk to the Independent vampire, who doesn’t care about the politics.)

Their lack of clan means they may choose from almost any of the available powers (aka, anything but Sun Resistance and Tamed Thirst), but must have double the points needed to buy them before they can purchase them (due to their weak vampire blood). They also cannot sire new vampires, so they cannot take Vampire Creation. Befriending the Independent vampire allows them to purchase one power for normal cost.

[foreficfandom]

Mystic Messenger - Domestic Disputes And Bad Habits (mysme x MC)

--- Zen ---

He hadn’t lived with anyone for years. After running away from home, he struggled with housing, sometimes couch surfing and sometimes he had legitimate leases. And when he lived with others, he was usually the ‘messy roommate’ because leaving home at a young age meant little opportunity to learn how to manage a living space. 

Even now, his apartment is relatively clean largely by virtue of him not owning a lot of stuff. He doesn’t cook so no dishes to clean, he doesn’t own loose knick knacks to spread around. 

When he housed you for a couple days prior to the first RFA party, he had quickly cleaned his apartment of empty beer cans and loose socks, which made it look like he was a man who kept a clean house. But unfortunately, that wasn’t the case, and by the next afternoon you noticed random articles tossed over chairs and upon the floor.

That was fine when it was only his space, but when the two of you began living together, Zen quickly had to learn that it wasn’t acceptable to shed his clothing upon the floor all the time, especially when the laundry basket was right there. No, Zen, get your loose socks out of the couch cushions. Zen, stop piling up empty cigarette boxes on the nightstand. Zen, once you’ve unwrapped the sheet mask from its plastic envelope would it kill you to throw it away, instead of leaving it on the bathroom counter?

He’s consistent when it comes to chores like doing the laundry and taking out the trash. But asking him to hang up his jacket instead of letting it crumple in the corner? It’s like getting blood from a stone. 

After a while, you finally get him to pick up after himself. “It’s our home, now,” you said. “Not just yours.” A promise that said he wasn’t alone, anymore. And he took it to heart.  

--- Yoosung ---

It may seem like his depression-ruled lifestyle seemed to change overnight, but that wasn’t the case. Sure, he did regain a lot of his motivation and energy, but simply getting a new lease on life won’t overrule years of neglecting yourself.

You’d text him in preparation for a date, only to arrive and find out he hasn’t even left his bed since he replied with an ‘I’ll get ready!’ More than once your dates had to be rescheduled because Yoosung had been stuck in bed, or still in his pajamas on his desktop. 

On the third time you voiced your complaints, Yoosung got a bit defensive. He couldn’t help it, it’s hard for him to maintain a tidy schedule after so long lacking the proper will. 

It was a terse discussion. Your first couple fight, if you will. “Yoosung, are you sure you’re okay? You don’t want to seek professional help?” “No, MC, I’m fine. What could a counselor possibly help me with?”

It was Yoosung’s own initiative to finally google some nearby therapists during a particularly slow morning. He didn’t tell you he’d been seeing someone until four sessions in, since he struggles with the idea that he might need help. You hug him tightly and treat the both of you to tasty pastries at a cute bakery. 

Yoosung took his therapy to heart. He started slow, working on self-affirming mindfulness and motivating himself to tidy his living space. Then he worked on his time management, which helped his schooling and energy both. 

Within the year, both you and Yoosung saw progress. He felt better, which made his life better. More time to live. More time to spend with you.

--- Jaehee ---

Domestic arguments didn’t arise until you moved in with her. Before that point, Jaehee and you meshed so gracefully, it was damn near magical. 

Even moving into her place and having to carry around heavy couches and unpack a million boxes didn’t dampen that honeymoon phase. You loved witnessing Jaehee’s hidden strength as she tugged your mattress down seven flights of stairs. 

But within a week of living with her, you noticed that you and her ... clashed when it came to interior living. You kept using up the hot water before Jaehee could take a shower. She would misplace your possessions thoughtlessly. The both of you thought each other as messier. 

It was like a new roommate situation. At first, the two of you tried to calmly talk these things out. But new issues would arise after the old ones were resolved. She didn’t like how you tossed your coat across the desk chair, or left the living room lamps on during the night. 

“It’s my apartment, MC!” “Oh, I’m sorry, I thought being your co-owner at the cafe we co-manage meant my co-money go into our co-rent!”

Jaehee went to work in a huff, leaving you to your own devices. Alone in the apartment, you decided to do some regular chores, and as you rested for a minute you absorbed the living space - you could see Jaehee’s touch in ever corner, thoughtfully and carefully labored over. It really almost seemed like your mindless efforts were invading her space.

When Jaehee returned that evening, the two of you tried to apologize at the same time. “Oh, sorry, you go -” “No, you, sorry for interrupting -”

“It’s just ... MC, I want to apologize for treating you like a naughty guest. You’re my partner now and deserve more say in our home.”

You made up and eventually the apartment evolved into a true home between the two of you. A perfect representation of your love.

--- Jumin ---

The dude can be shockingly conservative. In the beginning, it only manifested in him being somewhat of a prude. “I wish you wouldn’t wear that particular dress to the social. You look more beautiful when you show less skin.” “... you mean you’d personally prefer I didn’t show much skin, right?” “Yes? What was wrong with my previous sentence?”

But sometimes he’d be watching the news and blurt out, “I’m not sure if marriage between two men should be recognized by law.” Which leads to you trying to convince him that he’s being very unethical. 

He usually ends up saying something like, “I’m sorry, love, I’m rather uneducated when it comes to this issue,” and leave it at that. Because he’s not some right-wing jackass or anything, he just grew up in an isolated Christian family and never really got to socialize beyond that. So he never learned about viewpoints that challenged what he heard growing up.

It can be infuriating, though, especially with issues you’re concerned about. Because Jumin just kinda tries to compromise by taking a non-stance, since he just doesn’t have a strong opinion on things like reproductive rights or colonialism. It’s partially due to his sheltered background, and partially due to being raised to literally be conservative in his life dealings.

But after seeing you becoming more and more frustrated, he digs a little deeper and realizes that he’s kinda being an ass.  Eventually he begins to say things like, “I think you’re right, MC. Demonizing drug abusers is antithesis to their recovery. They deserve sympathy instead.”

But a pleasant surprise is his appreciation for climate conservation. He likes to donate and fund green power initiatives because he believes in preserving the environment and preventing nature exploitation. You join his efforts, and he finally understands how important it is to have solidarity from your significant other.

--- Saeyoung/707 ---

Being merely twenty-three years old (not to mention his neglected upbringing) leads to some rocky relationship problems. His self-doubt and anxiety can go wild during his worse days, making him revert back to his colder personality and try to push you away once more.

It doesn’t manifest as just him ignoring you. His mind can make him do some really round-about sabotaging. One day, you open the kitchen cabinets to see it all the objects thrown within haphazardly. You confronted Saeyoung and it took hours before he coldly confessed that he was considering throwing away all your favorite foods, before realizing how fucked up that would be and quickly replacing it all again. 

He knew it was his mother’s influence talking. And the thought made him sick. 

Sometimes, you responded to his darker days with loving patience and lots of hugs while he allows himself to break down. Sometimes, you choose to distance yourself a bit. Either way, Saeyoung’s mood eventually evens out. The two of you talk at length about why he feels the way he does, and why he’s propelled to do these things. As time goes on, his dark moods pop up less and less.

On a lighter note, Saeyoung can be a pretty messy dude. Partly because of his underlying mental issues, partly because that’s the type of guy he is. He doesn’t shower as much as you like him to, and he tosses trash just ... everywhere. If his bunker wasn’t so big, the clutter he alone produces would bury you both. No wonder he needed a ‘maid’. 

Yeah, it takes more than a few pushes to make him stop being a slob. He eventually owns up, but not without some effort. Everyone living in the house is grateful. 

--- Saeran ---

It took many months before Saeran felt stable enough to start integrating into normal society, and even longer before his daily schedule began to stabilize beyond surprise breakdowns, spreads of bad days spent holed up, or horrible dips in moods.

Saeran would always live with dissociative identity disorder, and during the first few years it could get tough. Both ‘Suit’ and Ray would be triggered seemingly without warning, and sometimes last for days. Ray did anything he could to earn your affection, ‘Suit’ defected his fears by trying to provoke you. 

Therapy and medication was an ongoing process. You and Saeran went through more than a couple of therapists before finding the ‘one’. Medications had to be tried then dropped because of side effects, or lack of effectiveness. There were long periods of months in-between where all he could do was hope this new treatment would be more effective than the last.

‘Suit’ once got particularly violent with you, not hitting but shaking you by the shoulders and screaming in your face, “Just say it!! You hate me ... you want to hurt me!!”

You found 'Suit’ later, crying and curled up in a corner. After long coaxing, he confessed that he was so afraid you were eventually going to hurt him, so he was pushing you to see if you’d do it. 

And Ray’d do things like blow away all his saved up money to buy you gifts in a desperate show of affection. Just because the two of you were living in a safe, stable environment doesn’t mean old haunts wouldn’t pop up.

Saeran eventually got better and better. Looking back now, Saeran is so much happier. He never lets you forget your amazing influence on him. “Thank you for saving me, my love.” 

--- Jihyun ---

He’s the perfect example of a loving boyfriend. After his two years spent in a therapeutic journey of self-discovery, he returned ready to be a reliable partner. And for the most part, he lived up to it, barring some moments where he accidentally gets sucked into bad memories.

Insomnia is the most common problem. Settling down to sleep means his mind gets easily swamped, and when he does manage to sleep he wakes up during the night and gets overwhelmed with memories once again. Some nights are worse than others.

He tries not to get up from the bed to avoid waking you too, but you eventually develop a second sense for his insomnia spells and you can feel it when he’s struggling. Then he feels bad that he’s affecting you this way.

See, that’s his problem that he can’t resolve on his own. He thinks of his problems as obstacles that bother others, and not the obstacles themselves. This prevents him from finding ways to truly resolve them. 

“I’m sorry, MC. Go back to sleep.” “... Jihyun, how many nights has it been since you’ve slept properly?” He measures it by the nights you’ve been kept awake too, and you stop him there.

“Don’t you see? It’s not about me. Think about your own health.”

And that’s not easy for him. He had obsessed over being a figure that offers unconditional love for so long, it’s hard to shed it. He thinks of his mother and his eyes grow wet. 

He and you find a relationship therapist, and it helps a lot. Jihyun’s two years of self-discovery did wonders for his mood, but it took a bit of professional aid to really unravel the really complicated stuff. 

He feels his state of thinking shift gradually, and it makes his life less cloudy, less stuck in those bad memories and regrets. Instead, he goes to sleep every night thinking about how much he loves you and his family. His heart falls asleep feeling light instead of heavy. 

[tomsfoma]

The Meanest Thing I’ve Ever Done

I still consider my first real girlfriend to be Beth Ann Mabee. We dated the summer of my freshman year, and she was the first girl I ever French kissed. Still though, my first long-term relationship – and the girl to whom I lost my virginity – was Sadie Conners. Sadie and I had a tumultuous relationship that was based primarily on teenage hormones. During the year we were together, I shifted identities from athletic hockey player with class clown tendencies to full-blown reckless stoner. When we first met, Sadie was playing goalie for the varsity soccer team and I was playing right wing for the JV hockey team. By the time we broke up, she was still playing goalie for the varsity soccer team, and I was skipping class to smoke weed and steal cigarettes. Like most teenagers in relationships, we broke up here or there for a day or two and then got back together, making up with characteristic teenage passion. The final time we broke up though, felt different. It had the weight of ineffable finality. I knew there would be no making up that time. The final time we broke up was because of one of the meanest things I’ve ever done to anyone.

The summer before my junior year, my family was taking a week-long vacation at my parents' cottage in Canada. My dad’s side of the family has these four cottages all next door to one another on Lake Erie. At the end of this row of cottages, there’s another summer cottage that belongs to a family consisting of a mom, a dad, and two daughters. One daughter is around mine and my brother’s age and the other is my younger sister’s age. My father grew up with their father, and in a way, they’re like honorary family members. They’re just family members that we only see in summer — at the cottage.

On this particular trip, my friend Mike joined us. Of all the years we were best friends, he only came to the cottage a few times, but this one was memorable for two reasons. One: it was his first trip, and two: it was the origin of the awful deed that caused the end of my relationship with Sadie and left a permanent scar on mine and my brother’s relationship.

One sunny afternoon during the trip, Mike, myself, my brother, my sister, and the two honorary daughters were hanging around talking and goofing off. It was a relaxing day and the wind from the lake kept us cool and comfortable. We were sitting on a picnic table in the backyard, not far from the tree swing that hung from a giant oak tree. The two daughters had brought a makeup kit with them. It was a small, square pink box with metal edges and a metal handle. The boys were talking trash and the girls were painting their nails. At some point, the girls had the idea to put makeup on my brother. We all chased, caught, and pinned him down. Mike and I held him to the ground while the girls painted his face with blush and glitter and lip gloss and deep purple eye shadow.  Mike took pictures with his digital camera. My brother fought back, but only a little. He had a crush on the older honorary daughter, and I think he enjoyed the interaction with her.

Several months later, the magic of summer was wearing off and the reality of school was setting in. My brother was transferred from a public middle school to the Catholic high school that Mike and I were attending. The day before school started, my brother was boasting about how cool he was at his current middle school, and how nobody could embarrass him at that – or any – school. Mike and I fought hard to be cool, and it didn’t come naturally to us. We didn’t have a lot of friends, and we didn’t run with the popular crowd. My brother’s arrogance was an assault on our efforts, and we took his challenge to heart. We were two years older than him, but we were still just boys.

Mike had a good reputation with parents and teachers. Behind the scenes though, he had devious ideas. He just didn’t have the guts to execute them. That’s where I came in. I had a terrible reputation with parents and teachers. I didn’t care what adults thought of me as long as my peers thought I was funny or entertaining or cool.

The devious plan Mike had this time was to use the photo of my brother that we had taken at the cottage several months earlier. We were going to create a gay personal ad for him and post it around the school. It said homophobic things like “my favorite color is obvi purple,” “my favorite activities include watching men’s volleyball,” and “I enjoy Rice-a-Roni, but I’m the REAL San Francisco treat.”

We printed off dozens of copies the night before the first day of school. We arrived early the next morning and hung them up on lockers in every hallway, plastering them throughout the school in a huge clockwise motion. By the time we arrived back at the hallway we started in, the first ones we had hung up were gone.

The teachers had started taking them down as soon as they saw them. Between that and students grabbing copies to show their friends, the posters didn’t stay up for long. 

But they stayed up long enough.

I didn’t see my brother that morning. He was so embarrassed by the posters that almost as soon as he arrived at his new high school – to the scene of strangers laughing at him -- he turned around and decided to walk the five miles back home in the rain.

He didn’t get far.  Early into his journey, a beige 1992 Park Avenue pulled over and rolled down the window. “Ryan, what’s wrong? Do you need a ride home?” Sadie asked. He wiped the tears away from his beet-red face and nodded. When Sadie arrived to school later, she had words with me.

My immaturity had always been a point of contention with her, and this stunt was the final straw. Unforgivable was the word she used. Her voice was devoid of any anger. She had only contempt for me now.

I spent the rest of the day feeling like I had a ball of lead sitting in the pit of my stomach. When I got home, I asked to see my brother, but my parents said he didn’t want to see me. I told them I wanted to apologize, but they told me to leave him alone. I desperately needed to get rid of the anxiety and shame that beleaguered me, and I knew the only way to do that was to tell him how sorry I was.

Later that evening I walked into his room to find him lying face down on his bed, on top of his Notre Dame comforter, shoes still on, backpack lying on the floor next to his bed. “I’m sorry,” I said, “I didn’t realize what I was doing. It was stupid.” He didn’t respond. “Dude, I’ll make it up to you, I promise. I already got 4 weeks detention and I think I’ve got more punishment coming from school and mom and dad on top of it.” He remained silent.

“What can I do to make it up to you?”

“Go away,” he mumbled into his pillow.

“I’m sorry,” I said again, “I mean it.”

“I don’t forgive you,” he replied. I walked out of the room and shut his door behind me.

Days passed before he started talking to me again, and when he did it was with more restraint. Over the coming weeks and months, we started talking more freely, but things were never the same. Maybe it was because he was adjusting to high school and growing up. Maybe it was because I was going through my own shit, breaking up with girlfriends, getting arrested, getting suspended, getting in fights. Maybe we were just two very different people who happened to be raised in the same home, and we were inevitably going to grow apart anyway. Maybe the friendship we had as children was destined to die. Or maybe my unforgivable mistake killed it.

Later on, in his high school journey, my brother became one of the bona fide cool kids. He ended up attending the University of Michigan before moving on to Notre Dame law school. After graduation, he got a job at a prestigious law firm in Chicago and eventually moved on to an even more prestigious law firm, where he’s currently working today. Last time I checked anyway.

We don’t talk much anymore. When I do see him at the occasional wedding or funeral, we’re polite, and we talk to one another, but it doesn’t feel like I’m talking to my brother. It feels like I’m trying to make small talk with an ex-classmate.

Every once in awhile I think about him and the friendship we had as kids. Sometimes I miss the person I was when we had that friendship. The person I was before I rotted away and shed my sweeter self.

Sometimes I wonder if I’ll ever see him again. Or if he’ll ever forgive me.

[sunshineandfangs]

Klarosummer - Quote || قلم قدرتمندتر است

Quote: “Newsflash - seashell bras give me hives.”

@klarosummerbingo

This one gets a bit meta. Also yes, I am going to make you all suffer through the Persian alphabet because when I tried to get a phonetic translation I failed and just butchered the language.

---

Caroline nibbled on the tip of her pen, struggling to find the words she wanted to say. She didn’t often use pen and paper, only when she was suffering a particularly strong block. Something about the motion, the way dark ink looked on clean paper was soothing and satisfying. Usually, by now something would have come to her, but today? Nothing.

She groaned, tossing the notebook down beside her as she leaned backward against the seat of the bench. It wasn’t comfortable. The hard wood digging into her spine and shoulder blades, blood rushing to her head as she let it hang.

Grumbling some more to herself, she eventually threw herself up and out of the bench, taking back her notebook as she marched through the park. Nature was good inspiration, or so she’s been told.

---

Shoving through the front door, Caroline set her keys down with a clank in their designated dish. All she managed to accomplish was getting a semi-decent workout, her pace increasing from a walk to a mild jog the more frustrated she got. That, and amusing herself by drawing a very fancy calligraphic “t” for the word “the.” SpongeBob was a classic.

Trudging toward her room, she threw herself across her duvet, glowering up at the ceiling as if it had all the answers to her problems. And she glared long enough for her eyes to start to feel strained, solving exactly zero of her problems. Tiredly, she rubbed her palms against them, figuring it was time for a break.

It was just so frustrating. She had all these worlds circling around in her mind. Sometimes she could picture them so vividly it felt like she could step through and taste them. There were characters who seemed to beat against the inside of her skull, their voices and thoughts and feelings so strong.

But the link between her imaginings and reality just didn’t click all the time. She would go to write something, but it just wasn’t quite right. Cross it out, backspace, start again. Stare blankly at a blinking cursing feeling a scene in her mind and having it escape her as soon as she went to type.

Caroline bit her lip. 

Well, that wasn’t quite the whole truth. 

Closing her eyes, she let herself fall. Down, down, down the rabbit hole of her mind, sinking into the core of her being. She reached out, grasping the strongest pulse she could sense. 

Caroline gasped, eyes shooting open as she lunged for her laptop.

“Newsflash - seashell bras give me hives.” Poured out onto the page, a vivid image of young woman danced around in her mind. Red hair, slight waves, green eyes, a smattering of freckles. Her name was Candice, she knew, a bit of a spitfire and sassy, but also kind.

Her friend was Nina. A brunette, her hair curlier and longer, and her personality a bit more abrasive. But they were steadfast friends. Their relationship birthed in childhood, forged in the fires of teenager drama: boys and crushes and sex, rumor mills and social ladders. 

Now, at twenty-six the two of them did odd jobs together as they worked to pay for med and law school respectively. This one probably one of their weirdest.

“You know that,” Candice scowled.

“Suck it up, buttercup,” Nina chirped, looking a bit too delighted for Candice’s liking. “The pay check for this one is really, really good. It’s crazy how many people want to pretend mermaids are real. But hey, whatever, money is money.”

Caroline’s fingers flew as she typed, depicting the (mis)adventures of Candice’s and Nina’s latest job. The little pulse she could feel fluttering in her chest grew louder and stronger until two heartbeats seemed to pound inside her.

It was startling when she finally looked up, the sky pitch black outside her window, the clock on her computer helpfully informing her it was now 1:29 AM. She had lost hours pouring herself into her stories. Fleshing out the details of Candice’s and Nina’s relationship. Added in family members and romance. It felt good to release the little slice of life into the world.

Quickly, re-reading what she had written, Caroline debated whether she wanted to continue or not. Build a more intricate world or let it go? Let it go, she finally decided. The heartbeat settled down until it was just her own once more.

---

Klaus scowled at his canvas, rather irked that the only paintings he could make lately were distorted smears. Don’t mistake him, he was proud of his abstract work, just not when it conveyed frustration and a lack of inspiration.

He tossed his brush aside, wiped the paint flecks from his skin. Running an aggravated hand through his curls, he decided to get out of the house.

---

The park wasn’t a place he would normally frequent, but desperate times and all that rot. As expected though, as he let his eye drift around the scene before him nothing much caught his attention. There were screaming children, tired parents, enamored couples. The typical things one might expect to see and none of them sparked new passion or anything of the sort.

And then he saw her.

She looked frustrated, not unlike himself really, but there was something about the way her eyes flashed with her ire. The purposeful way she moved as she went from a walk to a run.

Klaus left not long after, carrying his unexpected muse with him.

When he made it back to his apartment, images came to him in a hurry. A passionate gesture with an arm. A cat-like smile, mischievous and playful. Gorgeous flashing eyes, bright with temper.

As soon as he started, he couldn’t stop. The vivacious blonde woman stayed a constant, but others soon came to him. A red-head. A brunette. An unexpected desire to do a study of water and distortion. The shimmer of scales.

It was certainly some of his best work.

---

Caroline walked listless down the sidewalk, a heavy smear of concealer under her eyes to disguise their puffiness. She wasn’t sure how many tears she had cried. Enough that though her heart still felt like it was being crushed, there were none left to shed.

Just a few months ago she had felt on top of the world, new stories seeming to pour out of her by the dozens. An original work ready to be published. And then a week ago she got a phone call.

Her mom was sick. Cancer. Terminal.

She didn’t live far away, and Caroline had dropped everything to go and visit. She still visited everyday, making sure her mom was comfortable, that she was getting the best care available. Yet she felt useless, she was doing everything she could and it seemed to be nothing at all.

And her mom could see it wearing on her, had all but kicked her out and told her to come back when she had a chance to take a breath. 

Well, here she was. Breathing. And not feeling better at all.

She kept walking. Not bothering to scramble for cover when a drizzle built into a downpour. Moved at the same pace and ducked into the next building several feet down.

She blinked. Blinked again. Wondered if stress and grief had made her go crazy.

Apparently, she had stepped into a gallery, and spread across the walls were snapshots of Candice and Nina, exactly as she had pictured them. She even saw would looked like a glimpse of mermaid tails.

Impossible.

---

What are the odds? Klaus thought, incredulous. His muse just stepped into his gallery.

---

Caroline’s eyes darted around wildly. If she had been more famous, then maybe she would think someone hacked her manuscript or something. But she wasn’t. Not at all.

Her upcoming book would be her first full length novel, everything else she had published in magazines. Short stories and poetry. An editorial or two when her inspiration was particularly low.

How could this be?

Because it wasn’t just a resemblance to her characters. They were identical, down to the pattern of freckles across Candice’s nose.

“We’re technically closed, love.”

Caroline jumped, startled out of her wide-eyed examination of Candice.

“O-oh,” she stuttered, whirling around. “Sorry, the door was open. And it was raining. I-do you know who did these?” She rushed out, desperately needing the answer.

---

Klaus was startled by the woman’s apparent mania, her resemblance to the muse he discovered in the park almost nowhere to be seen. He answered her though, perhaps that would lend some clarity to this baffling situation.

“I did.”

He stumbled back when she lunged for him, her thin fingers deceptively strong as she gripped his arms, eyes wide and gleaming. “When? How? What made you think of these images?”

“Bloody hell, woman! They just came to me. I was in the park looking for some inspiration and I got it.” He certainly wasn’t going to mention it came from her now. She seemed unhinged enough already.

---

Caroline stumbled back, an absolutely absurd idea bouncing around her brain.

This is crazy, Caroline. Crazy!

And yet she couldn’t help herself. What could it hurt? 

With almost no conscious thought, her hand reached for her bag, snagging the small notebook she always kept on her. Her movements egged on by half remembered dreams, flashes of figures she thought belonged only in her mind.

She grabbed a pen and started to write. How a distraught blonde named Caroline stumbled into a gallery and discovered paintings of people she had thought she only imagined. How she had an extraordinary idea and started to write. Write out her story. Penning out a future in which a doctor calls as she finished writing. Calling to report a miracle. That after numerous tests checking and double checking, it seems Caroline’s mother’s cancer has gone into remission.

The pen dropped from her nerveless hands. Her heart pounding in her throat, her breath halted as seconds stretched like hours.

And just as she was about to ridicule herself for her insanity, her cell phone rang.

---

Author’s Note: Yes, I did cheat and wrote about writing. I also liked this story’s concept more than I ended up liking the execution :/. It’s definitely a weird one though.

Anyway, the title means “The Pen is Mightier” obviously derived from saying the pen is mightier than the sword. Unfortunately, an Englishmen first said that so in my quest to make a non-English title I did some mental somersaults. Basically I took the idea that writer’s are the “gods” of their own worlds (which Caroline makes even more literal here). And one of the first monotheistic religions known to us is Zoroastrianism which originated from Persia. And that concludes today’s peek into the weird way my mind works.

[iwantunique]

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Promising review: " Ordered this for my mother in law’s birthday, I included three pics of it. One with it off, and each of the color settings for the light. Comes batteries in ready to go, the base of it is touch-sensitive so you only have to put your finger on it to turn it on (if anyone’s looking for disability-friendly gifts it’s a big selling point!) really lovely, cannot wait I see her reaction but until then this gets an easy five stars from me."--Sam Turner Get it from Amazon for $39.95 8. Christmas Apron With Pot Holder, Oven Mitt and Kitchen Towel This Christmas with Family, Friends and Magnus Mary Christmas Apron Set! Gift this Cute Christmas Present to Your Mother, Wife, Mother in Law, Sister or Friend Who Loves to Cook. Christmas Kitchen Gift Set includes Christmas Cooking Apron, Kitchen Towel, Pot Holder, and Oven Mitt. Light beige cooking apron with holiday red in-scripture. “Eat, Drink, and Be Merry” printed on chest. 33” L x 27” W. Adjustable neck strap to eliminate the hassle of tying. Two front pockets. Kitchen Towel: Light beige with holiday red in-scripture. “Peace Love Joy” printed on the bottom right of the towel. 28” L x 17” W. Pot Holder: Light beige with holiday red and white. This is Holiday Kitchen Linen Set is # Perfect holiday present for mother, Christmas Gifts, Christmas present for wife,Oven mitt,Towel, pot holder, present for women, Christmas kitchen towels.

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Promising review: " This was the perfect gift for my niece, a mother of 2 little kids. She absolutely loved it, opened a bottle of wine, and started using it right away!"--Joni Get it from Amazon for $15.97 10. Christmas Bracelets Gifts Rose Lover Rose Gold Plated Cuff Bangle Peach roses reflect desire and excitement. The peach rose means that love is anxiously budding, you need to hurry to catch up to romance! Rose gold is a color scheme of gold and copper, elegantly symbolizes the union of two to become one and the promise of a lifetime. About This Most Popular Christmas Presents 2019: ♥ Valentine's Day Gifts for Her ♥ Inspired by the Rose which signifies romantic and love, this cuff bracelet is a great gift of love, perfect Valentine's day gifts for girlfriend wife mom daughter to say "I love you". Search "qianse rose lover" to find the whole set (necklace and earrings).♥ Bracelet Metal ♥ Eco-friendly Rose Gold Plated Zinc alloy, Hypoallergenic, Lead-Free & Nickle-Free, Passed Swiss SGS Inspection Standard. Made with Swarovski crystals: crystals are supplied by Swarovski but used by our own designers and manufactured in our own workshops. This jewelry belongs to QIANSE Jewelry, not Swarovski.♥ Bracelet Warranty ♥ 30-day money-back guarantee for any reason; 12-month warranty for quality-related issues. If there is any problem with your purchase, please feel free to contact us, we will help to fix the problem. Thank you!♥ Swarovski Crystal Bracelet ♥ This is NOT a Swarovski product but a piece made with Swarovski Crystal. Qianse has its aspiring designers in France. We purchased Swarovski Crystals as raw material and skillfully manufactured in our independent workshops.♥ Bangle Bracelet Craft ♥ Stones are inlaid under a microscope by a top-level master. ▲Missing stones sometimes happen when being delivered with many turns and stops. Just contact us and we will assist you in finding a solution promptly!

Promising review: " This bracelet is absolutely stunning. Honestly, it is much prettier than I originally expected based on the pictures. The pink heart makes this a perfect gift for someone special, although I bought this for myself. If you love rose gold (like I do) this bangle is definitely a must-have! "--Skinny Latte Mommy Get it from Amazon for $26.99 Read the full article

[books-n-wine]

~**~ Excerpt Reveal: FROM THIS MOMENT by Melanie Harlow ~**~

From This Moment, an all-new sexy and emotional standalone from USA Today Bestselling author Melanie Harlow is coming October 10th!

From This Moment by Melanie Harlow

Genre: Contemporary Romance

Publishing Date: October 10th, 2017

It was like seeing a ghost.

When my late husband’s twin brother moves back to our small town, I want to avoid him. Everything about Wes reminds me of the man I lost and the life we’d planned together, and after eighteen long months struggling just to get out of bed, I’m finally doing okay. I have a new job, an amazing support group, and a beautiful five-year-old daughter to parent. I don’t want to go backward.

But I’m drawn to him, too. He understands my grief and anger and loneliness like no one else—and I understand his. Before long, that understanding becomes desire, and that desire becomes uncontrollable.

We make excuses. We blame our sorrow. We promise each other it will never happen again.

But it does.

And when our secret threatens to destroy his family and my reputation, we’ll have to decide what’s more important—loyalty or love?

Excerpt:

“Want to go out in the canoe?” he asked. “Okay.” I ditched my flip-flops on the small, beach-level deck, and we set our wine glasses and the bottle on the deck’s little round table. Wes was already barefoot. Together we dragged the forest green canoe from the tall beach grasses on the side of the deck down to the water’s edge and tipped it over. “Let me rinse it out a little,” Wes said, frowning at the dirt and spider webs inside. “Want to grab the paddles? They should be in the shed.” “On it.” I went to the small shed on the embankment, opened it up and grabbed the oars, which stood in one corner. On the shelves were life jackets and sand toys and deflated rafts that probably had holes in them, and scratched into the wooden door among other graffiti was WP + CB. Huh. I’d never noticed that before. Who was CB? I glanced over my shoulder at Wes, who’d taken off his T-shirt and tossed it onto the sand. My stomach full-out flipped. Quickly, I shut the door to the shed and brought the oars down to the canoe. Wes stood up straight and stuck his hands on his hips. He wore different sunglasses than Drew had worn, more of an aviator than a wayfarer. The body was similar, though Wes’s arms seemed more muscular, especially through the shoulder. Other things were the same and caused a rippling low in my body—the soft maroon color of his nipples, the trim waist, the trail of hair leading from his belly button to beneath the low-sling waistband of his red swim trunks. In my head I heard Tess’s voice. Arms. Chest. Shoulders. Skin. Stubble. Muscle. The smell of a man. The solidity of him. “What’s the law on drinking and canoeing?” he asked. What’s the law on staring at your brother-in-law’s nipples? I wondered, swallowing hard. What was wrong with me? “I think we’re okay,” I said, handing the oars to him. Our hands touched in the exchange. “Let me grab our glasses.” “Perfect. If you hold them, I’ll take us out.” I retrieved the wine glasses from the table and walked carefully across the sand to the lake’s edge, taking deep, slow breaths. A sweat had broken out across my back. I was wearing a swimsuit beneath my cover up, a modest tankini, but I didn’t want to remove it. Wading ankle deep, I attempted to step into the canoe, but it wobbled beneath my foot. “Whoa.” Wes took me by the elbow and didn’t let go until I was seated at one end, facing the other. “Okay?” I nodded. Despite the heat, my arms had broken out in goose flesh. “All right, here we go.” As he rowed us away from shore, the breeze picked up, cooling my face and chest and back. “Drew and I used to have canoe-tipping contests.” I snapped my chin down and skewered Wes with a look over the top of my sunglasses. “Don’t even think about it.” He just grinned, the muscles in his arms and chest and stomach flexing with every stroke of the oars through the water. Momentarily mesmerized, I allowed myself the pleasure of watching him. It was okay if we were both thinking about Drew, wasn’t it? In fact, it was only natural that I was intrigued by the sight of Wes’s body. He was my husband’s identical twin, for heaven’s sake, and I missed his physical presence in my life. I missed looking at him naked. I missed feeling the weight of him above me. I missed the feeling of being aroused by him, of my body’s responses to his touch, his kiss, his cock. Deep in my body, the rusty mechanism of arousal creaked to life. My nipples peaked, my stomach hollowed, and something fluttered between my legs. Oh, Jesus. I sat up straighter, pressed my knees together, and closed my mouth, which I realized had fallen open. Hopefully I hadn’t moaned or anything. After another sip of wine, I turned my head and studied a freighter off in the distance. My heart was beating way too fast. It’s only natural. It’s only natural. Wes stopped paddling and set the oars in the bottom of the canoe, their handles resting against the seat in the middle. “We’ll have to bring Abby out here.” “Definitely.” Did my voice sound normal? “She’ll love it. Here, want this?” I held his wine glass toward him and he reached out to take it. His fingers brushed mine, and I pulled my hand back as if the touch had burned me. “Thanks.” He tipped the glass up then looked along the shore. “I’d like to find a place on the lake. Maybe not along this stretch of beach, though.” I caught his meaning and smiled. “A little too close to home?” “Yeah. But I don’t want to be too far away. I’d like to get a boat too.” “What kind of boat? Drew always talked about it, but we never quite settled on one.” “Not sure. Maybe just a little fishing boat, something to ski behind.” “That sounds fun. Drew loved to ski.” “We’ll have to teach Abby.” I laughed. “You, not we. I managed to get up and stay up a few times, but I am not the expert.” “You can teach her to cook, I’ll teach her to water ski.” “Deal.” Separate activities seemed like a good idea. “Breakfast was incredible.” “Thanks.” I tucked a strand of hair that had escaped my ponytail behind my ear, but the wind blew it right back into my face. “I really like working there. I’m so glad Georgia suggested it to me.” “How long have you been there?” “Since spring, when they got busy. I’m not sure what I’ll do this winter when it slows down. I’m dreading it, actually. Abby will be in school full time, and it will just be me at home alone.” This was something else I hadn’t talked about with anyone, how worried I was that the gray skies and cold weather and silent hours would set me spiraling into depression. “I always thought I’d have another baby to take care of, but life saw things differently.” “You’re still young, Hannah.” I shook my head. “I’m really not. And I feel even older than I am.” Please don’t go Grief Police on me and tell me I’m being ridiculous, I begged him silently. This isn’t the life I chose. It was handed to me and I’m doing the best I can. But he didn’t say anything more, just sipped his wine and looked out at the horizon. I was grateful. “What about you?” I asked. “Think maybe you’ll get married now that you’re back? Have a family? Abby won’t have any siblings so she needs some cousins.” “That seems to be a popular topic of discussion around here,” Wes said, shaking his head, “but I really have no idea.” “Small town. We like to know everyone’s business.” I smiled. “Hey, what about CB? I saw your initials carved with hers on the door of the shed. Maybe she’s still around.” He groaned. “Is that still there? Jesus. That had to be twenty years ago.” Hugging my knees, I leaned forward. “First love?” “Not even.” He hesitated, as if he were trying to decide whether to confess something. “Come on,” I cajoled, carefully reaching out of the canoe, and splashing water toward him. “Tell me. I’ve been spilling my guts for an hour.” “First kiss.” I squealed. “And?” He cringed. “It’s too embarrassing.” “Wes, I had a completely humiliating breakdown in front of you last night. I got snot on my arm.” “This is worse.” “Get it out. You’ll feel better.” “Let’s just say it was a very awkward, very fast experience.” I gasped. “You lost your virginity to her?” “No. Just my dignity.” Laughing, I tilted my head back and felt the sun on my face, the wind in my hair, and something like joy in my heart. It had been a long time.

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http://www.melanieharlow.com/from-this-moment-chapter-1/

About the Author:

Melanie Harlow likes her martinis dry, her heels high, and her history with the naughty bits left in. When she's not writing or reading, she gets her kicks from TV series like VEEP, Game of Thrones, House of Cards, and Homeland. She occasionally runs three miles, but only so she can have more gin and steak. Melanie is the author of the HAPPY CRAZY LOVE series, the FRENCHED series, and the sexy historical SPEAK EASY duet, set in the 1920s. She lifts her glass to romance readers and writers from her home near Detroit, MI, where she lives with her husband, two daughters, and pet rabbit.

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[mycorrectviews]

Report from Israel:  Political Suicide and Genteel Racism

Twilight of the Netanyahu Era?

Corruption has already brought down one Israeli prime minister, and a minor infringement of foreign currency regulations by his wife brought down another.  Netanyahu, now Israel’s longest serving PM, is knee deep in no less than three major corruption scandals, and his wife will soon be charged in a fourth.  The law, apparently, does not oblige him to resign until convicted, though legal opinions are mixed. Ehud Olmert, his corrupt predecessor, threw in the towel when he was indicted (Bibi is not there yet), but his public standing had already crashed as a result of the Second Lebanon War, and a well-orchestrated,  mendacious, right wing campaign to paint it as a military failure of epic proportions. Bibi’s Teflon, opinion polls show, has barely been scratched – yet. Things could change if one of his coalition partners – fearing the ubiquitous stench of misconduct -- forces his hand, as Ehud Barak did to Olmert.  Meanwhile Likud ministers are closing ranks – at least publicly.  The time may come when they, too, decide it is time to give someone else a chance.  Problem is, the alternative could be worse.  Defense Minister Lieberman, for instance, (I still cannot grasp why such a Putinesque xenophobe got that job) has his eyes on the top spot.  (He’d have to merge his party with the Likud – not an impossible scenario).  Forty-one years ago, Yitzhak Rabin left the prime minister’s office, taking responsibility for a US bank account his wife had maintained from the time he served as ambassador in Washington, in violation of foreign currency regulations that were later rescinded.  Rabin, to be sure, was a man of integrity.  Bibi doesn’t know the meaning of the word. 

Labor Commits Suicide

Last month the Labor Party elected a wealthy businessman to replace the hapless Isaac Hertzog. Avi Gabbay came out of nowhere, joining the party just a few months before the primaries.  His CV includes a six-year stint as CEO of a telecommunications firm, after which he helped form a new party with Finance Minister Kachlon, serving briefly as environment minister under Netanyahu.  Gabbay seems like a decent guy (he’s the first Labor leader I’ve never met since coming to Israel 30 years ago).  He’s an articulate self-starter, intelligent, and went through the school of hard knocks, having grown up in a poor, Jerusalem family.  Gabby, however, is not a candidate for prime minister, no matter what he or his party says.  He’s the candidate of an opposition party competing with other opposition parties to be the largest opposition party.  Gabbay has not served a day on the Knesset Security and Foreign Affairs Committee, a mandatory rite of passage for any pol aspiring to national leadership. He’s never served in the security cabinet, never run a major, government institution of any kind.  Every idiot junior government minister from the Likud has more security credentials than him.  Gabbaywon the Labor primaries running on the “I’m new, try me” ticket.  When the novelty wears off, allot of people will be banging their heads against the wall, saying, “What was I thinking?”  New elections, after all, may not be far off. 

 Genteel Racism and the Tragedy of Israeli Socialism

I met Amir Peretz in 1988.  At the time he was the up and coming mayor of Sderot, his Stalinesque mustache reminiscent of Israel’s t Zionist pioneers, a firebrand socialist with a grasp of working class sensibilities.  I asked him to speak to the Labor Young Guard in Bat Yam in the middle of a municipal election campaign.  He didn’t hesitate and came up to help, only to find me and four other guys in the room (OK, I was new in the country and didn’t know how to market it). Years later, after the Lebanon war and subsequent rounds of fighting in Gaza, I accompanied him on visits to bereaved families who had lost their sons in battle.  As a former defense minister, Peretz makes it is business to visit every such home.  No press, no bells and whistles, just a condolence call and a chance for the family to shed a tear as they share the details of what happened with someone who knows every battalion, every IDF deployment.  His energy and commitment are boundless. 

Amir shatters the great divide in Israeli politics, the divide between Mizrachim, descendants of Jews from North Africa and the Middle East, and Ashkenazim, whose parents or grandparents came from Europe.  A stubborn socio-economic divide separates the groups by every empirical measure, from education and family income to life expectancy.  Nine times out of ten, a company will choose a CV with the name Abromowitz over Abuoutbul.  During the mass immigration of the 1950’s and 60’s, Mizrachim were settled in remote locations in the country’s geographic periphery, establishing a demographic presence that secured the country’s borders.  These development towns, as they are known, were plagued by drugs, unemployment and a sense of grievance against the Labor establishment, not least of all the kibbutzim – usually the closest symbol of Ashkenazic privilege they knew.  Borrowing terminology from the US, a seminal Mizrachi protest movement that emerged in an inner city Jerusalem neighborhood called itself the Black Panthers.  By 1977, Israel’s North African immigration came into its own, helping sweep Menahem Begin and the Likud to power.  And just as the right embraced the Mizrachim, the Israeli left embraced the Palestinians, so that the ethnic identification between Ashkenazim and Labor extended to the idea of peace itself.  It is this politics of identity that has defined Israeli politics to this day. 

 In 1983, when the Likud was taking control of development towns, one after another, Peretz won the election in Sderot on the Labor ticket.  Born in Morocco, Peretz was severely wounded in in the army and, after extensive rehab, worked as a farmer before entering politics.  He quickly branded himself as a leader of the Labor’s left wing, championing a Palestinian state long before party stalwarts would even consider the idea.  His career took him from municipal leadership to head the Histadrut labor federation and, ultimately, to the position of defense minister and deputy prime minister. His political achievements include a higher minimum wage, mandatory pension and the Iron Dome anti-missile system that has literally changed the strategic balance of power between Israel and the terrorist organizations that surround it. 

 In 2006, as the head of the Labor Party, Peretz faced a catastrophic party split, with Shimon Peres and other top leaders bolting to Arik Sharon’s new Kadima party, and a brief lived pensioner’s party siphoning off support from that traditionally Labor voting demographic.  Labor, however, won the development towns and, together with Kadima, was able to form a peace coalition.  Amir chose the defense portfolio and, in an historic first, brought about the appointment of a Moslem Arab as a government minister. That government was brought low by Hezbollah missiles and Olmert’s corruption.  The war itself granted Israel over a decade of quiet on the northern border, but the public imagination remembers it as a colossal failure.  Rumblings against Peretz began on the center left.  Why did he chose the Defense Ministry to begin with?  One Labor voter told me “the problem with Peretz is he doesn’t know when a job is beyond his competence.”  What, indeed, did that guy from you know where think he was doing in a job held by the likes of Ashkenazi giants such as Ben Gurion, Moshe Dayan, Arik Sharon and Ehud Barak?  During one visit to the front, a journalist got a photo op of Peretz looking at the horizon through binoculars.  Peretz obliged, but didn’t bother to take the lens covers off.  The unfortunate photo of Peretz looking through the covered binoculars reappeared mercilessly in the paper, electronic and social media.  As if to say, “what do you expect from a….”  That’s when I figured it out. 

 Peretz took some time off from public affairs to recallibrate, teaching for while in boarding school for underprivileged youth before planning his comeback.  In 2011 he ran again for party leadership, contending against the briefly serving Shelly Yehimovitch.  The voting breakdown showed a classic black-white fault line.  76% of Tel Aviv primary voters chose Shelly.  80% of voters in southern development towns went for Amir.  And the kibbutzim?  85% for Shelly.   The Labor Party won’t release a breakdown of the 2017 primaries, but my guess is the figures would be similar.

 I tried to figure out where the antagonism to Peretz comes from in discussions with people from my in-laws’ kibbutz, located adjacent to Sderot.  Folks here grew up with Peretz, and many to this day work with his articulate and charismatic wife, Ahlama.  And it was Peretz who, against opposition from the experts, insisted on developing the Iron Dome missile defense system that has transformed the kibbutz from a target for Gazan rocketeers to a flourishing community.  The response I got from one acquaintance was that “Amir seems too ethnic,” an answer as unfair as it is bizarre.  Unfair because never in his entire career has Peretz played the ethnic card or trumpeted his North African background.  Like Bayard Rustin’s famous essay, Amir thinks Israeli politics must move from race to class.  Bizarre because Avi Gabby, too, is the son of Moroccan immigrants (the latter point is a cause for some celebration.  For the first time in history, both front-runners in a Labor Party primary were Mizrachim).  The explanation, however, is apparent when you see the two in action.  Peretz wears an open shirt collar.  Gabbaysports an expensive suit and tie, befitting a telecommunications boss.  Peretz speaks with pathos, raising his voice for dramatic effect, betraying emotion (you know, that’s how those people speak. . .).  Gabbayspeaks quickly like a hi-tech executive.  Peretz’ walks with an uneven gait that betrays his military wounds. When Gabbaywalks through the door, he seems like your rich cousin. 

 Avi Gabbaymay indeed increase Labor’s share of the vote in the next election, but it will be at the expense of another, centrist opposition party, resulting in no net gain for the center left.  Peretz might have lost Tel Aviv voters to Yair Lapid's centrist list, for instance, but he would have attracted new voters from development towns, potentially bringing about a paradigm shift like he did in 2006, paving the way for a center left coalition.  No politician in Israel, aside from Bibi, is more qualified to serve as Prime Minister than Amir Peretz.  He’s been a mayor and a Histadrut boss, a defense minister and deputy prime minister (and environment minister along the way).  He’s a guy who has both fought in wars and led wars, a true working class leader and an authentic representative of the pioneering, Labor Zionist tradition.  Instead, Labor voters chose someone “new.”  And less “ethnic.” I’m beating my head against the wall already.

 Get Back to Where You Once Belonged

 Several Years ago I managed the organization behind several of Israel’s bilingual schools, Hand in Hand. After a few years running my own business, I’ve now taken on the management of Hagar, an organization that runs the bilingual Arab Jewish school and community of families in Beer Sheba.  A fascinating organization bringing together not only Jews from different backgrounds but a diverse group of Arabs from the urbanized north as well as Bedouins from the south. It’s a place where children live and learn together, celebrate the holidays of Islam, Christianity and Judaism, learn about the tragedy of the Palestinian Naqba along with the Jewish national story of holocaust and rebirth.  And, like so many social change organizations, it’s in desperate need of funds. Unlike the liberal Tel Aviv bubble, Beer Sheba is a more right wing town.  “Like Sinatra sings it,”If we can make it here we’ll make it anywhere.”  It will be tough, but I’m ready for the challenge.  The way I see it, I can’t solve the Israeli Palestinian conflict, but I can help promote shared citizenship within Israel.  Wish me luck, comrades.

[readbookywooks]

Henry Jekyll’s Full Statement of the Case

I was born in the year 18 — to a large fortune, endowed besides with excellent parts, inclined by nature to industry, fond of the respect of the wise and good among my fellow-men, and thus, as might have been supposed, with every guarantee of an honourable and distinguished future. And indeed the worst of my faults was a certain impatient gaiety of disposition, such as has made the happiness of many, but such as I found it hard to reconcile with my imperious desire to carry my head high, and wear a more than commonly grave countenance before the public. Hence it came about that I concealed my pleasures; and that when I reached years of reflection, and began to look round me and take stock of my progress and position in the world, I stood already committed to a profound duplicity of life. Many a man would have even blazoned such irregularities as I was guilty of; but from the high views that I had set before me, I regarded and hid them with an almost morbid sense of shame. It was thus rather the exacting nature of my aspirations than any particular degradation in my faults, that made me what I was and, with even a deeper trench than in the majority of men, severed in me those provinces of good and ill which divide and compound man’s dual nature. In this case, I was driven to reflect deeply and inveterately on that hard law of life, which lies at the root of religion and is one of the most plentiful springs of distress. Though so profound a double-dealer, I was in no sense a hypocrite; both sides of me were in dead earnest; I was no more myself when I laid aside restraint and plunged in shame, than when I laboured, in the eye of day, at the furtherance of knowledge or the relief of sorrow and suffering. And it chanced that the direction of my scientific studies, which led wholly toward the mystic and the transcendental, re-acted and shed a strong light on this consciousness of the perennial war among my members. With every day, and from both sides of my intelligence, the moral and the intellectual, I thus drew steadily nearer to that truth, by whose partial discovery I have been doomed to such a dreadful shipwreck: that man is not truly one, but truly two. I say two, because the state of my own knowledge does not pass beyond that point. Others will follow, others will outstrip me on the same lines; and I hazard the guess that man will be ultimately known for a mere polity of multifarious, incongruous, and independent denizens. I, for my part, from the nature of my life, advanced infallibly in one direction and in one direction only. It was on the moral side, and in my own person, that I learned to recognise the thorough and primitive duality of man; I saw that, of the two natures that contended in the field of my consciousness, even if I could rightly be said to be either, it was only because I was radically both; and from an early date, even before the course of my scientific discoveries had begun to suggest the most naked possibility of such a miracle, I had learned to dwell with pleasure, as a beloved day-dream, on the thought of the separation of these elements. If each, I told myself, could but be housed in separate identities, life would be relieved of all that was unbearable; the unjust delivered from the aspirations might go his way, and remorse of his more upright twin; and the just could walk steadfastly and securely on his upward path, doing the good things in which he found his pleasure, and no longer exposed to disgrace and penitence by the hands of this extraneous evil. It was the curse of mankind that these incongruous fagots were thus bound together that in the agonised womb of consciousness, these polar twins should be continuously struggling. How, then, were they dissociated?

I was so far in my reflections when, as I have said, a side-light began to shine upon the subject from the laboratory table. I began to perceive more deeply than it has ever yet been stated, the trembling immateriality, the mist-like transience of this seemingly so solid body in which we walk attired. Certain agents I found to have the power to shake and to pluck back that fleshly vestment, even as a wind might toss the curtains of a pavilion. For two good reasons, I will not enter deeply into this scientific branch of my confession. First, because I have been made to learn that the doom and burthen of our life is bound for ever on man’s shoulders, and when the attempt is made to cast it off, it but returns upon us with more unfamiliar and more awful pressure. Second, because, as my narrative will make, alas! too evident, my discoveries were incomplete. Enough, then, that I not only recognised my natural body for the mere aura and effulgence of certain of the powers that made up my spirit, but managed to compound a drug by which these powers should be dethroned from their supremacy, and a second form and countenance substituted, none the less natural to me because they were the expression, and bore the stamp, of lower elements in my soul.

I hesitated long before I put this theory to the test of practice. I knew well that I risked death; for any drug that so potently controlled and shook the very fortress of identity, might by the least scruple of an overdose or at the least inopportunity in the moment of exhibition, utterly blot out that immaterial tabernacle which I looked to it to change. But the temptation of a discovery so singular and profound, at last overcame the suggestions of alarm. I had long since prepared my tincture; I purchased at once, from a firm of wholesale chemists, a large quantity of a particular salt which I knew, from my experiments, to be the last ingredient required; and late one accursed night, I compounded the elements, watched them boil and smoke together in the glass, and when the ebullition had subsided, with a strong glow of courage, drank off the potion.

The most racking pangs succeeded: a grinding in the bones, deadly nausea, and a horror of the spirit that cannot be exceeded at the hour of birth or death. Then these agonies began swiftly to subside, and I came to myself as if out of a great sickness. There was something strange in my sensations, something indescribably new and, from its very novelty, incredibly sweet. I felt younger, lighter, happier in body; within I was conscious of a heady recklessness, a current of disordered sensual images running like a mill-race in my fancy, a solution of the bonds of obligation, an unknown but not an innocent freedom of the soul. I knew myself, at the first breath of this new life, to be more wicked, tenfold more wicked, sold a slave to my original evil; and the thought, in that moment, braced and delighted me like wine. I stretched out my hands, exulting in the freshness of these sensations; and in the act, I was suddenly aware that I had lost in stature.

There was no mirror, at that date, in my room; that which stands beside me as I write, was brought there later on and for the very purpose of these transformations. The night, however, was far gone into the morning — the morning, black as it was, was nearly ripe for the conception of the day — the inmates of my house were locked in the most rigorous hours of slumber; and I determined, flushed as I was with hope and triumph, to venture in my new shape as far as to my bedroom. I crossed the yard, wherein the constellations looked down upon me, I could have thought, with wonder, the first creature of that sort that their unsleeping vigilance had yet disclosed to them; I stole through the corridors, a stranger in my own house; and coming to my room, I saw for the first time the appearance of Edward Hyde.

I must here speak by theory alone, saying not that which I know, but that which I suppose to be most probable. The evil side of my nature, to which I had now transferred the stamping efficacy, was less robust and less developed than the good which I had just deposed. Again, in the course of my life, which had been, after all, nine-tenths a life of effort, virtue, and control, it had been much less exercised and much less exhausted. And hence, as I think, it came about that Edward Hyde was so much smaller, slighter, and younger than Henry Jekyll. Even as good shone upon the countenance of the one, evil was written broadly and plainly on the face of the other. Evil besides (which I must still believe to be the lethal side of man) had left on that body an imprint of deformity and decay. And yet when I looked upon that ugly idol in the glass, I was conscious of no repugnance, rather of a leap of welcome. This, too, was myself. It seemed natural and human. In my eyes it bore a livelier image of the spirit, it seemed more express and single, than the imperfect and divided countenance I had been hitherto accustomed to call mine. And in so far I was doubtless right. I have observed that when I wore the semblance of Edward Hyde, none could come near to me at first without a visible misgiving of the flesh. This, as I take it, was because all human beings, as we meet them, are commingled out of good and evil: and Edward Hyde, alone in the ranks of mankind, was pure evil.

I lingered but a moment at the mirror: the second and conclusive experiment had yet to be attempted; it yet remained to be seen if I had lost my identity beyond redemption and must flee before daylight from a house that was no longer mine; and hurrying back to my cabinet, I once more prepared and drank the cup, once more suffered the pangs of dissolution, and came to myself once more with the character, the stature, and the face of Henry Jekyll.

That night I had come to the fatal cross-roads. Had I approached my discovery in a more noble spirit, had I risked the experiment while under the empire of generous or pious aspirations, all must have been otherwise, and from these agonies of death and birth, I had come forth an angel instead of a fiend. The drug had no discriminating action; it was neither diabolical nor divine; it but shook the doors of the prison-house of my disposition; and like the captives of Philippi, that which stood within ran forth. At that time my virtue slumbered; my evil, kept awake by ambition, was alert and swift to seize the occasion; and the thing that was projected was Edward Hyde. Hence, although I had now two characters as well as two appearances, one was wholly evil, and the other was still the old Henry Jekyll, that incongruous compound of whose reformation and improvement I had already learned to despair. The movement was thus wholly toward the worse.

Even at that time, I had not yet conquered my aversion to the dryness of a life of study. I would still be merrily disposed at times; and as my pleasures were (to say the least) undignified, and I was not only well known and highly considered, but growing toward the elderly man, this incoherency of my life was daily growing more unwelcome. It was on this side that my new power tempted me until I fell in slavery. I had but to drink the cup, to doff at once the body of the noted professor, and to assume, like a thick cloak, that of Edward Hyde. I smiled at the notion; it seemed to me at the time to be humorous; and I made my preparations with the most studious care. I took and furnished that house in Soho, to which Hyde was tracked by the police; and engaged as housekeeper a creature whom I well knew to be silent and unscrupulous. On the other side, I announced to my servants that a Mr. Hyde (whom I described) was to have full liberty and power about my house in the square; and to parry mishaps, I even called and made myself a familiar object, in my second character. I next drew up that will to which you so much objected; so that if anything befell me in the person of Dr. Jekyll, I could enter on that of Edward Hyde without pecuniary loss. And thus fortified, as I supposed, on every side, I began to profit by the strange immunities of my position.

Men have before hired bravos to transact their crimes, while their own person and reputation sat under shelter. I was the first that ever did so for his pleasures. I was the first that could thus plod in the public eye with a load of genial respectability, and in a moment, like a schoolboy, strip off these lendings and spring headlong into the sea of liberty. But for me, in my impenetrable mantle, the safety was complete. Think of it — I did not even exist! Let me but escape into my laboratory door, give me but a second or two to mix and swallow the draught that I had always standing ready; and whatever he had done, Edward Hyde would pass away like the stain of breath upon a mirror; and there in his stead, quietly at home, trimming the midnight lamp in his study, a man who could afford to laugh at suspicion, would be Henry Jekyll.

The pleasures which I made haste to seek in my disguise were, as I have said, undignified; I would scarce use a harder term. But in the hands of Edward Hyde, they soon began to turn toward the monstrous. When I would come back from these excursions, I was often plunged into a kind of wonder at my vicarious depravity. This familiar that I called out of my own soul, and sent forth alone to do his good pleasure, was a being inherently malign and villainous; his every act and thought centred on self; drinking pleasure with bestial avidity from any degree of torture to another; relentless like a man of stone. Henry Jekyll stood at times aghast before the acts of Edward Hyde; but the situation was apart from ordinary laws, and insidiously relaxed the grasp of conscience. It was Hyde, after all, and Hyde alone, that was guilty. Jekyll was no worse; he woke again to his good qualities seemingly unimpaired; he would even make haste, where it was possible, to undo the evil done by Hyde. And thus his conscience slumbered.

Into the details of the infamy at which I thus connived (for even now I can scarce grant that I committed it) I have no design of entering; I mean but to point out the warnings and the successive steps with which my chastisement approached. I met with one accident which, as it brought on no consequence, I shall no more than mention. An act of cruelty to a child aroused against me the anger of a passer-by, whom I recognised the other day in the person of your kinsman; the doctor and the child’s family joined him; there were moments when I feared for my life; and at last, in order to pacify their too just resentment, Edward Hyde had to bring them to the door, and pay them in a cheque drawn in the name of Henry Jekyll. But this danger was easily eliminated from the future, by opening an account at another bank in the name of Edward Hyde himself; and when, by sloping my own hand backward, I had supplied my double with a signature, I thought I sat beyond the reach of fate.

Some two months before the murder of Sir Danvers, I had been out for one of my adventures, had returned at a late hour, and woke the next day in bed with somewhat odd sensations. It was in vain I looked about me; in vain I saw the decent furniture and tall proportions of my room in the square; in vain that I recognised the pattern of the bed-curtains and the design of the mahogany frame; something still kept insisting that I was not where I was, that I had not wakened where I seemed to be, but in the little room in Soho where I was accustomed to sleep in the body of Edward Hyde. I smiled to myself, and, in my psychological way began lazily to inquire into the elements of this illusion, occasionally, even as I did so, dropping back into a comfortable morning doze. I was still so engaged when, in one of my more wakeful moments, my eyes fell upon my hand. Now the hand of Henry Jekyll (as you have often remarked) was professional in shape and size: it was large, firm, white, and comely. But the hand which I now saw, clearly enough, in the yellow light of a mid-London morning, lying half shut on the bed-clothes, was lean, corded, knuckly, of a dusky pallor and thickly shaded with a swart growth of hair. It was the hand of Edward Hyde.

I must have stared upon it for near half a minute, sunk as I was in the mere stupidity of wonder, before terror woke up in my breast as sudden and startling as the crash of cymbals; and bounding from my bed, I rushed to the mirror. At the sight that met my eyes, my blood was changed into something exquisitely thin and icy. Yes, I had gone to bed Henry Jekyll, I had awakened Edward Hyde. How was this to be explained? I asked myself, and then, with another bound of terror — how was it to be remedied? It was well on in the morning; the servants were up; all my drugs were in the cabinet — a long journey down two pairs of stairs, through the back passage, across the open court and through the anatomical theatre, from where I was then standing horror-struck. It might indeed be possible to cover my face; but of what use was that, when I was unable to conceal the alteration in my stature? And then with an overpowering sweetness of relief, it came back upon my mind that the servants were already used to the coming and going of my second self. I had soon dressed, as well as I was able, in clothes of my own size: had soon passed through the house, where Bradshaw stared and drew back at seeing Mr. Hyde at such an hour and in such a strange array; and ten minutes later, Dr. Jekyll had returned to his own shape and was sitting down, with a darkened brow, to make a feint of breakfasting.

Small indeed was my appetite. This inexplicable incident, this reversal of my previous experience, seemed, like the Babylonian finger on the wall, to be spelling out the letters of my judgment; and I began to reflect more seriously than ever before on the issues and possibilities of my double existence. That part of me which I had the power of projecting, had lately been much exercised and nourished; it had seemed to me of late as though the body of Edward Hyde had grown in stature, as though (when I wore that form) I were conscious of a more generous tide of blood; and I began to spy a danger that, if this were much prolonged, the balance of my nature might be permanently overthrown, the power of voluntary change be forfeited, and the character of Edward Hyde become irrevocably mine. The power of the drug had not been always equally displayed. Once, very early in my career, it had totally failed me; since then I had been obliged on more than one occasion to double, and once, with infinite risk of death, to treble the amount; and these rare uncertainties had cast hitherto the sole shadow on my contentment. Now, however, and in the light of that morning’s accident, I was led to remark that whereas, in the beginning, the difficulty had been to throw off the body of Jekyll, it had of late gradually but decidedly transferred itself to the other side. All things therefore seemed to point to this: that I was slowly losing hold of my original and better self, and becoming slowly incorporated with my second and worse.

Between these two, I now felt I had to choose. My two natures had memory in common, but all other faculties were most unequally shared between them. Jekyll (who was composite) now with the most sensitive apprehensions, now with a greedy gusto, projected and shared in the pleasures and adventures of Hyde; but Hyde was indifferent to Jekyll, or but remembered him as the mountain bandit remembers the cavern in which he conceals himself from pursuit. Jekyll had more than a father’s interest; Hyde had more than a son’s indifference. To cast in my lot with Jekyll, was to die to those appetites which I had long secretly indulged and had of late begun to pamper. To cast it in with Hyde, was to die to a thousand interests and aspirations, and to become, at a blow and for ever, despised and friendless. The bargain might appear unequal; but there was still another consideration in the scales; for while Jekyll would suffer smartingly in the fires of abstinence, Hyde would be not even conscious of all that he had lost. Strange as my circumstances were, the terms of this debate are as old and commonplace as man; much the same inducements and alarms cast the die for any tempted and trembling sinner; and it fell out with me, as it falls with so vast a majority of my fellows, that I chose the better part and was found wanting in the strength to keep to it.

Yes, I preferred the elderly and discontented doctor, surrounded by friends and cherishing honest hopes; and bade a resolute farewell to the liberty, the comparative youth, the light step, leaping impulses and secret pleasures, that I had enjoyed in the disguise of Hyde. I made this choice perhaps with some unconscious reservation, for I neither gave up the house in Soho, nor destroyed the clothes of Edward Hyde, which still lay ready in my cabinet. For two months, however, I was true to my determination; for two months I led a life of such severity as I had never before attained to, and enjoyed the compensations of an approving conscience. But time began at last to obliterate the freshness of my alarm; the praises of conscience began to grow into a thing of course; I began to be tortured with throes and longings, as of Hyde struggling after freedom; and at last, in an hour of moral weakness, I once again compounded and swallowed the transforming draught.

I do not suppose that, when a drunkard reasons with himself upon his vice, he is once out of five hundred times affected by the dangers that he runs through his brutish, physical insensibility; neither had I, long as I had considered my position, made enough allowance for the complete moral insensibility and insensate readiness to evil, which were the leading characters of Edward Hyde. Yet it was by these that I was punished. My devil had been long caged, he came out roaring. I was conscious, even when I took the draught, of a more unbridled, a more furious propensity to ill. It must have been this, I suppose, that stirred in my soul that tempest of impatience with which I listened to the civilities of my unhappy victim; I declare, at least, before God, no man morally sane could have been guilty of that crime upon so pitiful a provocation; and that I struck in no more reasonable spirit than that in which a sick child may break a plaything. But I had voluntarily stripped myself of all those balancing instincts by which even the worst of us continues to walk with some degree of steadiness among temptations; and in my case, to be tempted, however slightly, was to fall.

Instantly the spirit of hell awoke in me and raged. With a transport of glee, I mauled the unresisting body, tasting delight from every blow; and it was not till weariness had begun to succeed, that I was suddenly, in the top fit of my delirium, struck through the heart by a cold thrill of terror. A mist dispersed; I saw my life to be forfeit; and fled from the scene of these excesses, at once glorying and trembling, my lust of evil gratified and stimulated, my love of life screwed to the topmost peg. I ran to the house in Soho, and (to make assurance doubly sure) destroyed my papers; thence I set out through the lamplit streets, in the same divided ecstasy of mind, gloating on my crime, light-headedly devising others in the future, and yet still hastening and still hearkening in my wake for the steps of the avenger. Hyde had a song upon his lips as he compounded the draught, and as he drank it, pledged the dead man. The pangs of transformation had not done tearing him, before Henry Jekyll, with streaming tears of gratitude and remorse, had fallen upon his knees and lifted his clasped hands to God. The veil of self-indulgence was rent from head to foot, I saw my life as a whole: I followed it up from the days of childhood, when I had walked with my father’s hand, and through the self-denying toils of my professional life, to arrive again and again, with the same sense of unreality, at the damned horrors of the evening. I could have screamed aloud; I sought with tears and prayers to smother down the crowd of hideous images and sounds with which my memory swarmed against me; and still, between the petitions, the ugly face of my iniquity stared into my soul. As the acuteness of this remorse began to die away, it was succeeded by a sense of joy. The problem of my conduct was solved. Hyde was thenceforth impossible; whether I would or not, I was now confined to the better part of my existence; and oh, how I rejoiced to think it! with what willing humility, I embraced anew the restrictions of natural life! with what sincere renunciation, I locked the door by which I had so often gone and come, and ground the key under my heel!

The next day, came the news that the murder had been overlooked, that the guilt of Hyde was patent to the world, and that the victim was a man high in public estimation. It was not only a crime, it had been a tragic folly. I think I was glad to know it; I think I was glad to have my better impulses thus buttressed and guarded by the terrors of the scaffold. Jekyll was now my city of refuge; let but Hyde peep out an instant, and the hands of all men would be raised to take and slay him.

I resolved in my future conduct to redeem the past; and I can say with honesty that my resolve was fruitful of some good. You know yourself how earnestly in the last months of last year, I laboured to relieve suffering; you know that much was done for others, and that the days passed quietly, almost happily for myself. Nor can I truly say that I wearied of this beneficent and innocent life; I think instead that I daily enjoyed it more completely; but I was still cursed with my duality of purpose; and as the first edge of my penitence wore off, the lower side of me, so long indulged, so recently chained down, began to growl for licence. Not that I dreamed of resuscitating Hyde; the bare idea of that would startle me to frenzy: no, it was in my own person, that I was once more tempted to trifle with my conscience; and it was as an ordinary secret sinner, that I at last fell before the assaults of temptation.

There comes an end to all things; the most capacious measure is filled at last; and this brief condescension to evil finally destroyed the balance of my soul. And yet I was not alarmed; the fall seemed natural, like a return to the old days before I had made discovery. It was a fine, clear, January day, wet under foot where the frost had melted, but cloudless overhead; and the Regent’s Park was full of winter chirrupings and sweet with spring odours. I sat in the sun on a bench; the animal within me licking the chops of memory; the spiritual side a little, drowsed, promising subsequent penitence, but not yet moved to begin. After all, I reflected, I was like my neighbours; and then I smiled, comparing myself with other men, comparing my active goodwill with the lazy cruelty of their neglect. And at the very moment of that vain-glorious thought, a qualm came over me, a horrid nausea and the most deadly shuddering. These passed away, and left me faint; and then as in its turn the faintness subsided, I began to be aware of a change in the temper of my thoughts, a greater boldness, a contempt of danger, a solution of the bonds of obligation. I looked down; my clothes hung formlessly on my shrunken limbs; the hand that lay on my knee was corded and hairy. I was once more Edward Hyde. A moment before I had been safe of all men’s respect, wealthy, beloved — the cloth laying for me in the dining-room at home; and now I was the common quarry of mankind, hunted, houseless, a known murderer, thrall to the gallows.

My reason wavered, but it did not fail me utterly. I have more than once observed that, in my second character, my faculties seemed sharpened to a point and my spirits more tensely elastic; thus it came about that, where Jekyll perhaps might have succumbed, Hyde rose to the importance of the moment. My drugs were in one of the presses of my cabinet; how was I to reach them? That was the problem that (crushing my temples in my hands) I set myself to solve. The laboratory door I had closed. If I sought to enter by the house, my own servants would consign me to the gallows. I saw I must employ another hand, and thought of Lanyon. How was he to be reached? how persuaded? Supposing that I escaped capture in the streets, how was I to make my way into his presence? and how should I, an unknown and displeasing visitor, prevail on the famous physician to rifle the study of his colleague, Dr. Jekyll? Then I remembered that of my original character, one part remained to me: I could write my own hand; and once I had conceived that kindling spark, the way that I must follow became lighted up from end to end.

Thereupon, I arranged my clothes as best I could, and summoning a passing hansom, drove to an hotel in Portland Street, the name of which I chanced to remember. At my appearance (which was indeed comical enough, however tragic a fate these garments covered) the driver could not conceal his mirth. I gnashed my teeth upon him with a gust of devilish fury; and the smile withered from his face — happily for him — yet more happily for myself, for in another instant I had certainly dragged him from his perch. At the inn, as I entered, I looked about me with so black a countenance as made the attendants tremble; not a look did they exchange in my presence; but obsequiously took my orders, led me to a private room, and brought me wherewithal to write. Hyde in danger of his life was a creature new to me; shaken with inordinate anger, strung to the pitch of murder, lusting to inflict pain. Yet the creature was astute; mastered his fury with a great effort of the will; composed his two important letters, one to Lanyon and one to Poole; and that he might receive actual evidence of their being posted, sent them out with directions that they should be registered.

Thenceforward, he sat all day over the fire in the private room, gnawing his nails; there he dined, sitting alone with his fears, the waiter visibly quailing before his eye; and thence, when the night was fully come, he set forth in the corner of a closed cab, and was driven to and fro about the streets of the city. He, I say — I cannot say, I. That child of Hell had nothing human; nothing lived in him but fear and hatred. And when at last, thinking the driver had begun to grow suspicious, he discharged the cab and ventured on foot, attired in his misfitting clothes, an object marked out for observation, into the midst of the nocturnal passengers, these two base passions raged within him like a tempest. He walked fast, hunted by his fears, chattering to himself, skulking through the less-frequented thoroughfares, counting the minutes that still divided him from midnight. Once a woman spoke to him, offering, I think, a box of lights. He smote her in the face, and she fled.

When I came to myself at Lanyon’s, the horror of my old friend perhaps affected me somewhat: I do not know; it was at least but a drop in the sea to the abhorrence with which I looked back upon these hours. A change had come over me. It was no longer the fear of the gallows, it was the horror of being Hyde that racked me. I received Lanyon’s condemnation partly in a dream; it was partly in a dream that I came home to my own house and got into bed. I slept after the prostration of the day, with a stringent and profound slumber which not even the nightmares that wrung me could avail to break. I awoke in the morning shaken, weakened, but refreshed. I still hated and feared the thought of the brute that slept within me, and I had not of course forgotten the appalling dangers of the day before; but I was once more at home, in my own house and close to my drugs; and gratitude for my escape shone so strong in my soul that it almost rivalled the brightness of hope.

I was stepping leisurely across the court after breakfast, drinking the chill of the air with pleasure, when I was seized again with those indescribable sensations that heralded the change; and I had but the time to gain the shelter of my cabinet, before I was once again raging and freezing with the passions of Hyde. It took on this occasion a double dose to recall me to myself; and alas! Six hours after, as I sat looking sadly in the fire, the pangs returned, and the drug had to be re-administered. In short, from that day forth it seemed only by a great effort as of gymnastics, and only under the immediate stimulation of the drug, that I was able to wear the countenance of Jekyll. At all hours of the day and night, I would be taken with the premonitory shudder; above all, if I slept, or even dozed for a moment in my chair, it was always as Hyde that I awakened. Under the strain of this continually-impending doom and by the sleeplessness to which I now condemned myself, ay, even beyond what I had thought possible to man, I became, in my own person, a creature eaten up and emptied by fever, languidly weak both in body and mind, and solely occupied by one thought: the horror of my other self. But when I slept, or when the virtue of the medicine wore off, I would leap almost without transition (for the pangs of transformation grew daily less marked) into the possession of a fancy brimming with images of terror, a soul boiling with causeless hatreds, and a body that seemed not strong enough to contain the raging energies of life. The powers of Hyde seemed to have grown with the sickliness of Jekyll. And certainly the hate that now divided them was equal on each side. With Jekyll, it was a thing of vital instinct. He had now seen the full deformity of that creature that shared with him some of the phenomena of consciousness, and was co-heir with him to death: and beyond these links of community, which in themselves made the most poignant part of his distress, he thought of Hyde, for all his energy of life, as of something not only hellish but inorganic. This was the shocking thing; that the slime of the pit seemed to utter cries and voices; that the amorphous dust gesticulated and sinned; that what was dead, and had no shape, should usurp the offices of life. And this again, that that insurgent horror was knit to him closer than a wife, closer than an eye; lay caged in his flesh, where he heard it mutter and felt it struggle to be born; and at every hour of weakness, and in the confidence of slumber, prevailed against him and deposed him out of life. The hatred of Hyde for Jekyll, was of a different order. His tenor of the gallows drove him continually to commit temporary suicide, and return to his subordinate station of a part instead of a person; but he loathed the necessity, he loathed the despondency into which Jekyll was now fallen, and he resented the dislike with which he was himself regarded. Hence the ape-like tricks that he would play me, scrawling in my own hand blasphemies on the pages of my books, burning the letters and destroying the portrait of my father; and indeed, had it not been for his fear of death, he would long ago have ruined himself in order to involve me in the ruin. But his love of life is wonderful; I go further: I, who sicken and freeze at the mere thought of him, when I recall the abjection and passion of this attachment, and when I know how he fears my power to cut him off by suicide, I find it in my heart to pity him.

It is useless, and the time awfully fails me, to prolong this description; no one has ever suffered such torments, let that suffice; and yet even to these, habit brought — no, not alleviation — but a certain callousness of soul, a certain acquiescence of despair; and my punishment might have gone on for years, but for the last calamity which has now fallen, and which has finally severed me from my own face and nature. My provision of the salt, which had never been renewed since the date of the first experiment, began to run low. I sent out for a fresh supply, and mixed the draught; the ebullition followed, and the first change of colour, not the second; I drank it and it was without efficiency. You will learn from Poole how I have had London ransacked; it was in vain; and I am now persuaded that my first supply was impure, and that it was that unknown impurity which lent efficacy to the draught.

About a week has passed, and I am now finishing this statement under the influence of the last of the old powders. This, then, is the last time, short of a miracle, that Henry Jekyll can think his own thoughts or see his own face (now how sadly altered!) in the glass. Nor must I delay too long to bring my writing to an end; for if my narrative has hitherto escaped destruction, it has been by a combination of great prudence and great good luck. Should the throes of change take me in the act of writing it, Hyde will tear it in pieces; but if some time shall have elapsed after I have laid it by, his wonderful selfishness and Circumscription to the moment will probably save it once again from the action of his ape-like spite. And indeed the doom that is closing on us both, has already changed and crushed him. Half an hour from now, when I shall again and for ever re-indue that hated personality, I know how I shall sit shuddering and weeping in my chair, or continue, with the most strained and fear-struck ecstasy of listening, to pace up and down this room (my last earthly refuge) and give ear to every sound of menace. Will Hyde die upon the scaffold? or will he find courage to release himself at the last moment? God knows; I am careless; this is my true hour of death, and what is to follow concerns another than myself. Here then, as I lay down the pen and proceed to seal up my confession, I bring the life of that unhappy Henry Jekyll to an end.