#organic Saturday church

[organicsaturdaychurch]

Took some nice springy pictures with Whitenoise Whisper and Organic Saturday Church!!!

Whitenoise whisper pondering upon the pink tree

Organic Saturday Church prowling upon the pink tree

Both of them on/around the white tree!!!

Happy earth day guys like, if you have access to nature like go there!! go to the nature!!

[organicsaturdaychurch]

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!

[brimstone-rose]

[lightgaswaterelectricityrent]

Ok. The correlation in time between when I started noticing the organist and when my gym closed.....

[meetmeinthesandbox]

In 1992, Sinead O'Connor ripped up a picture of the Pope on live television, in protest of the rampant child sexual abuse the Catholic Church was actively covering up.

Ten days later, she was scheduled to perform at Madison Square Gardens, as part of a celebration of Bob Dylan. As soon as she got to the microphone, the audience began loudly booing her, seemingly in unison.

The organizers tasked Kris Kristofferson with removing O'Connor from the stage. He instead went out and put his arm around her and checked in on her and stayed until she'd steadied herself and was ready to perform. When she came off stage, he wrapped her in a bear hug.

"Sinead had just recently on Saturday Night Live torn up a picture of the Pope, in a gesture that I thought was very misunderstood. And she came out and got booed. They told me to go get her off the stage and I said 'I'm not about to do that'

I went out and I said 'Don't let the bastards get you down'. She said 'I'm not down' and she sang. It was very courageous. It just seemed wrong to me, booing that little girl out there. But she's always had courage."

[organicsaturdaychurch]

I am leaving this in my drafts NO LONGER!!

YALL REBLOG THIS POST WITH UR MOST CRYPTIC/CREEPY PICTURE OF UR LOVELY FURRY FUZZBALLS THAT ARE FURBYSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS

[blushcoloreddreams]

Perfume IS an essencial: Here’s 4 reasons why

Good Afternoon Dear Reader! Happy Saturday directly from Argentina

Before we dive into today's topic, I wanted to talk briefly about why these "practical" and lighter and style blog posts are JUST as important as the heart-felt blogs on heavier topics and more practical ones like organization, cooking and cleaning tips

This blog is a place where I am trying to gather useful information to help us grow as feminine women, whether that is in our hearts, our homes, our lives, or even in our own skin. I believe in a well-rounded growth perspective: I am trying to improve many areas of my life, even if they are just practical and simple.

So today I wanted to talk about one of these more "practical and simple" topics: perfume.

At first glance this topic can seem kind of boring, like "yeah, no one likes smelling bad, so wear perfume, DUH." But I think perfume is so much more than that!

I believe that a spritz of perfume can actually improve your day, your confidence, and your overall aura as a feminine woman.

***DISCLAIMER: I know that smells can trigger allergic reactions in people, and there are actually fragrance-free zones such as certain churches or work environments. Do not break those rules just to follow my advice LOL!

The women jn my life were always had a passion from perfumery and I remember using it even as a child, but I only started being interested in it during my teenage years and in the past my interest and collection only grew. But I remember that during times of intense sadness in my life, I understand that something simple as even filling in your eyebrows can be a completely exhausting task! So much personal care falls off your daily routine when you can't handle what life is throwing at you and I think that adding perfume to your routine can be an easy way to elevate your grooming.

In order to really stick to this habit, I decided to focus on WHY I should wear perfume. So here we go! This may convince you too.

1. Perfume Adds LUXURY To Life

I know what some of you may be thinking: "I'm just at home, and deodorant is good enough for me!" or "I'm just in an office chair, why do I need to smell amazing?" and finally, "I'm just going to work out later so it doesn't matter!"

You know what I say to all those reasons?

You are an amazing woman and you deserve to have a little extra luxury in your day, even if you are behind a vacuum, a computer, or a treadmill.

Most of us aren't going to be lounging on a velvet chaise with champagne and a cashmere blanket wrapped around us tonight anyways! We're not living that lux life, so why not add extra luxury into our days?

When you're vacuuming the house or reading through spreadsheets, it can be easy to feel like cinderella BEFORE she went to the ball. A fragrance reminds you that you are an elegant, feminine WOMAN, and that you are WORTHY of a little luxury.

So pick up a fragrance you love, (doesn't have to be costly,) and indulge! You are WORTHY of that extra 10 seconds on yourself.

2. Perfume Can Make You HAPPIER!

So today I was spritzing on some body spray when I realized that I had a soft smile on my face. Seriously: I was just smiling to myself! Sol de Janeiro cheirosa 71 (my newest obsession! ) evokes a reaction of pleasure: it makes me smile.

Do you remember learning about the senses in school? They can evoke emotion, thoughts, feelings, and action. Touch can make you take action when you feel pain. Taste evokes pleasure when you encounter delicious food. Likewise, smell can evoke pleasant emotion or distaste.

If there was a little life hack that could have you smiling 2 more times a day than you already do, wouldn't you do it? Fragrance is SUCH simple way to accomplish this!

And a bonus? When you smell good, other people notice! I LOVE when my husband tells me I smell good, or when a friend goes in for a hug and comments that she loves the smell I'm wearing. Smelling good feels GOOD!

3. Perfume Helps You Get in Touch With FEMININITY

When I was a kid, Id watch every morning my mom and grandma get ready and wear their favorite perfumes ( that I have the smell in my memory to this day). I made a promise to myself that when I became a woman at the age of I would begin doing 3 things EVERY DAY: wearing lipstick, carrying a stylish purse, and wearing perfume.

I think I knew, even as a child, that perfume was for women. Full grown, feminine, gracious, beautiful women. Adding fragrance to your routine is a way of stepping into that feminine womanhood and embracing yourself.

Perfume can also be especially helpful for women who are kind of uncomfortable with their femininity. You can begin exploring the possibilities with just a small change. Add a bit of mystery, femininity, sweetness, or glamour to ANY outfit. Elevate your look and tip toe into femininity with a fragrance. Pair a ponytail and sneakers with some vanilla body spray: you might be surprised at how it makes you smile!

4. Perfume Helps You EXPRESS Yourself

I truly believe that the sense of smell is neglected in our modern culture. We are MUCH more focused on the visuals of our beauty routine: hair, fashion, makeup, etc. And why? Well, you can't smell a picture on Instagram! Why invest in something so small when no one can really experience it? Who cares about smell?

Well, maybe we SHOULD care! When you meet someone, you are taking them in through a lot of the senses: a firm handshake, the visuals of their face, the way their voice sounds, and yes, THEIR SMELL!

When you go out into the world, think about the entire picture of you as a person: your smell, your style, your "vibe." What is your overall aura? Perfume can help you add a dimension of creative expression to your overall vibe and style. Express yourself!

***Bonus tip: Hydration is essential for perfume performance and it starts from the inside by drinking enough water and continues with applying lotion before your perfume. (Even better if you can do it post shower when your skin is still a bit damp). Some people also apply a small bit of vaseline or petroleum jelly to your wrists and neck (the pulse regions) before you spray. It helps your scent last longer!

And closing, perfume can add luxury to our day, help us feel happy, help us get in touch with femininity, and allow us to express ourselves! What's not to love?

xoxo

Júlia

[mariacallous]

Cantor Jennifer Bern-Vogel was used to hearing her mother tell the story.

On the evening of Nov. 9, 1938, her mother, then Marianne Katzenstein, who was 16 at the time, was in her family’s synagogue in Bielefeld, Germany, practicing the organ. She finished up, used a key to lock the building and returned home. Later that night, the synagogue was burned to the ground by the Nazis in the Kristallnacht pogrom.

Only two items survived the fire: a Torah scroll and Katzenstein’s key.

“I just remember her talking about it, her voice would change and she was just kind of slower and softer and very nostalgic when she talked about the whole story,” Bern-Vogel, 67, said in an interview. “Whenever she told the story and then held up the key, people always — and I experienced it myself — there was always this kind of gasp.”

Bern-Vogel, who has been the cantor at Congregation Emanu El in Redlands, Calif., since 2009, said the story of the key was “legendary” in her family.

And on Saturday, 86 years after Kristallnacht, the key returned home.

Bern-Vogel spent the past week in Germany, where she had lived for more than a decade when she was younger, reconnecting with friends, family and the Jewish community of Bielefeld, where the synagogue was reestablished shortly after the Holocaust. It was her first trip to Bielefeld with her husband and daughter, and her brother and niece, as well as a cousin from Denmark, also flew in for the occasion.

On Friday night, Bern-Vogel and the cantor of the Bielefeld synagogue led Shabbat services together. Bern-Vogel sang a song that was adapted from a poem written by her grandfather, with music composed by a longtime friend from Germany.

And following Havdalah on Saturday, the town held a ceremony that began at the site of the destroyed synagogue before moving to City Hall, where the official hand-off was made. The key was added to the collection of the town’s history museum and will be on display at the current synagogue building.

According to Irith Michelsohn, the president of the town’s Jewish community and of Germany’s Progressive Jewish movement, Bielefeld’s Jewish community has 450 members. The synagogue the community uses now was renovated from an old Protestant church and was inaugurated in 2008.

Prior to the Holocaust, Bielefeld was home to almost 1,000 Jews, Michelsohn said. The community has been revitalized since Michelsohn took the helm on Jan. 1, 2000, at which point she said there were only 35 members.

Michelsohn said the key’s return is immensely meaningful to the community.

“I was so excited, because we only have one Torah scroll, and now the key, that’s all we have from our old synagogue,” Michelsohn said. “And now the key is back. That’s so great, you can’t imagine.”

Michelsohn said the key is especially important as a vehicle to educate the current community about its past. She explained that like many German Jewish communities, Bielefeld’s Jews are almost all originally from the former Soviet Union.

“You don’t have many people who are originally from Germany,” she said. “Some of them converted to Judaism, some immigrated from Israel or other countries or are working in Bielefeld with a university, but most of the members in all of our 120 Jewish communities in Germany are from the former Soviet Union.”

The key, Michelsohn said, represents an opportunity to “teach them something about history, about the past, what we lost.”

It also returns a physical reminder of the old synagogue building, which had been built in 1905 and was commissioned by the Katzenstein family. Bern-Vogel’s maternal grandfather had been the head of the Jewish community, and helped hundreds of families escape Germany.

“It symbolizes a connection to the old and very, very nice building which we had,” Michelsohn said, adding that the destroyed synagogue was “such a marvelous building.”

Like the key she kept, the remarkable story of Bern-Vogel’s mother did not end in 1938. The following year, she and her younger sister escaped to England on the Kindertransport. Years later, she was at a Shabbat dinner in Israel when she met Julian Bernstein (later shortened to Bern), Bern-Vogel’s father, who also survived the Holocaust.

Julian was one of six children from a Lithuanian family, but only he and one brother survived the Holocaust. That brother, Leon Bernstein, and Bern-Vogel’s mother were both working for the World Jewish Congress; Leon hosted the Shabbat dinner where Julian and Marianne met.

The two were engaged within a week, and eventually settled in Iowa, where Bern-Vogel and her brother were raised.

In the later years of her mother’s life, Bern-Vogel said there had been efforts to bring the key to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C. But a contact her mother had at the museum passed away, and in 2017, so did she, at 94 years old.

“It just held a very deep connection,” Bern-Vogel said, referring to the key, a copy of which she still has. “I don’t think I thought about, when we were growing up, that the key would be anywhere else but with us. It kind of belonged to us.”

But as her mother aged, Bern-Vogel said her family wanted to determine where the key should go to be best taken care of and hold the most meaning. After a couple recent trips to Germany, Bern-Vogel said the answer crystallized.

“It just became clearer over the last couple of years, and especially after I went there last summer to meet with them at the synagogue and the museum, that it would really mean the most for everyone and future generations for it to be there,” she said.

Bern-Vogel said that even though her mother had a fraught relationship with Germany because of how her family’s time there ended, Bielefeld will always be their home. And she knows her mother would appreciate knowing that the key has made it back.

“I think that she would be incredibly moved by the reception that the key is going to have, and the people that are involved in the city,” Bern-Vogel said. “I think she would be very honored and happy, and I think grateful.”

[topguncortez]

Only For Emergencies - J. Seresin

whumptober masterlist || previous day

prompt: shivering

synopsis: You decide it's time to try and tame the beast, and you go to the one place where you know you'll be able to do it.

warnings: drug abuse, drug related death, cursing, mentions of death, detoxing, vomiting, mentions of relapse, mentions of parental death

word count: 2.9k

You weren’t sure how you got there, but someone must’ve called the police after Jake had left you on the cold concrete. You didn’t know that you had fallen asleep until you felt someone shaking you and you came face to face with a woman in a blue uniform. She had been nice and decided to not write you up if you promised to go to the drunk tank and sleep it off. You agreed, like normal. Sat in the back of the cop car, like normal. Smile at your favorite booker, like normal. Stretched out on your favorite bench, like normal. And in the morning, you gathered your belongings and left, like normal. 

You took the path home that would take you past the church that held NA. You didn’t go cause you were clean, you went for the irony of it. You sat in the back like a spectator, out of the circle where the sober ones lived, telling their harrowing stories of survival. There was one person, who had tried for the better part of two years to help you get on the straight and narrow. You swore you had enough 30-day chips to create a full year's worth. Duchess was probably old enough to be your grandmother, but she was a nice lady. She was a playboy model turned junkie like most of them are, but she found God and wanted to save the ‘youth of America’ as she said. 

But you didn’t need saving. 

You were fucking better than goddamn Clark Kent. 

You pulled the door to the old Methodist church open and walked the dim hallways that smelled of mildew and dust until you got to the sanctuary. You nearly moaned at the smell of fresh coffee and donuts. One of the only reasons you hadn’t been kicked away and told to come back when you really wanted to get clean was because of Duchess. She held out hope that something would change. She told you once that you still had that sparkle in your eye. You poured yourself some coffee, like normal. Grabbed a donut and a napkin, like normal. And took your spot in the back of the rows, like normal. 

Except, nothing was normal. 

You were expecting to hear Duchess’s thick southern accent. You were expecting to see that god-awful fur coat that she said was gifted to her by Heffner back in the 80s. You were expecting to hear the same story of how she moved to LA at 16 and was mesmerized by the disco lights and marijuana. You were expecting to be led into prayer by her, you mocking her accent as she recited the ‘Our Father’. This was your routine every Saturday morning. And who dares to fuck with your routine?

Who said addicts can’t be organized? 

But you were met with the sight of Paul standing in the middle of the circle, a grim look on his face. You hated Paul. He was some rich kid who had gotten his high school girlfriend pregnant and killed all in the same month. He apologized, did maybe seven years, and got released with the promise that he’d get clean and never try to vote in the state of California. 

“I got word this morning that Duchess has passed away. The beast got her.” 

 You paled instantly at his words. It felt like sirens were going off in your head. 

Duchess. 

The woman who had found God. The woman who had turned her life around and spent her free time knitting clothes for her grandkids in El Paso. The woman who still held out hope for you when no one else did. 

Succumbed to the Beast. 

You couldn’t sit and listen anymore as Paul talked about how brave Duchess was and how inspiring her story had been. It was like the walls were closing in around you. It felt like the Beast had his claws dug into your soft flesh and was tearing you to pieces. Tears started to cloud your eyes as you stood up from your chair, dropped your coffee and donut on the ground, and ran out of the church. You felt lightheaded as you pushed the front doors open and took a deep breath of fresh air. 

But even out here in the open, you still felt like the Beast was on you. 

So you ran. 

Your legs were burning as you ran as fast as you could trying to escape from the Beast. You couldn’t even remember the last time you ran from anything or for any reason. Maybe high school track? Before you twisted your ankle. But even then it was no more than a light jog. Now you were in a full sprint. 

— — — 

Jake was sitting at his kitchen table, staring at the coffee mug you had made him for your third anniversary. It had pictures of the two of you on various dates and a handwritten ‘I Love You’ on it. You looked so much younger, lighter, and happier. It was crazy how fast the drugs and alcohol had aged you almost overnight. But to Jake, you still looked like the most beautiful thing in the world. 

He summed it up to that was the crazy part about loving an addict. He could look past the cracked skin, dry hair, dark eyes, and haunting frame. You were still the girl he loved. Still, that beautiful girl that he had met that day on the pier. 

For the first time in his life, Jake was not sure what to do anymore. He hated himself that everything had gotten this bad. He hated himself for leaving you when you clearly needed him more than you let on. But how was he supposed to know? You were good at hiding everything. He didn’t know about the drinking issues until he came home from work in the middle of the day and you were passed out on the couch. He didn’t know about the pill issue until he saw that you had refilled your dead father’s oxycodone prescription. He just didn’t know. 

The anger was filling up in his body again, as he stood up from the table and grabbed the empty mug again, ready to throw it at the wall. This has happened several times over the past couple of weeks. He’d pick you up from Jerry’s, take you home, listen to you berate him, come home, listen to a voicemail you had left, and pick up the empty mug, ready to break it to pieces. 

But he always stopped before he could do it. 

Why? He was not sure. 

Maybe because once he broke it, it would be broken forever. 

Jake sighed and set the mug down, plopping back into his seat. He held his head in his hands, pulling slightly on his hair as he tried to rack his brain for what to do. He had started to keep his ringer on at all times, in case the city morgue called to come pick your body out. 

A knock at the door had startled him out of his thoughts. Nobody knocked at his door. Not a single person. The dagger squad all knew Jake kept his door unlocked, a habit from living in small-town Texas, and they’d just walk right through. His heartbeat plummeted. 

This couldn’t be it. 

This could not be it. 

Slowly, Jake walked to the front door, and leaned his forehead against it, saying a small prayer and bracing himself for whatever news the police officers on the other side of the door were going to tell him.

You were dead. 

Overdosed right there on the sidewalk last night after he left you. 

Jake could already hear the words now. 

He took a deep breath and turned the doorknob slowly, bracing himself for the worst. 

“Y/N,” 

“I don’t wanna die,” You were shaking on his doorstep. Your eyes were red, but not red from getting high, but from tears. You were still in last night's clothing, your make-up was smeared a bit on your face. And you were panting like you had been running a million miles to get here. 

Jake opened his arms and you collapsed in them, sobs leaving your mouth. He held you tightly against his body, scared that the wind might blow you away. You had lost weight and it was even more noticeable as Jake ran his hand down your back, feeling the notches of your spinal cord. Your hair smelled of cigarettes and stale beer, but he could also smell the coffee rolling off of you, which meant that you had gone to another meeting. He pulled back first and looked at you. 

You knew what he was thinking. You had said these words before when you were going through a psychosis episode. But you were starting to sober up and there was a certain pounding in your head that was the most unpleasant thing you had felt in a long time. 

“I need help,” You admitted and it tasted worse than any drug you had put in your body, “I need help. I need help.” 

You kept repeating it like a broken record, tears and snot rolling down your face as you spoke. Jake nodded his head wordlessly and guided you into his house, your lips still muttering those three words. He sat you down on the couch and went to get you a glass of water. He didn’t know the first thing about helping an addict through withdrawals, except that it got messy. Jake quickly grabbed the loaf of bread from the cupboard and put down two pieces before going to give you the glass of water. 

You thanked him as you took it, and drank most of it down in one go. Your throat was dry partially from running here and partially from crying. Jake sat himself down on the coffee table in front of you, keeping enough distance between the two of you and the door. You glanced over at it, still hearing the beast outside of it, clawing at the red paint. You started to shake again and Jake’s head perked up. 

“A-are you cold?” He asked and you looked at him. 

“The beast is gonna get me,” You whispered. Jake just nodded, not wanting to make you even more paranoid. 

“How about you lie down?” Jake gestured to the couch. You looked like you maybe got an hour of sleep, “I’ll make sure the beast stays out. You take a nap and we can talk more when you wake up.” 

You nodded and Jake helped you lay down on his couch. He grabbed the blanket that rested on the back and tucked it around you. He gently caressed your head as you closed your eyes, feeling somewhat safe from the beast that awaited outside his door. Jake’s heart broke watching as you curled yourself in, trying to keep yourself safe from whatever tricks your mind was playing. 

For the rest of the night, Jake stayed by your side. During your awake bouts, which didn’t last more than an hour or so, Jake was able to get you to eat and have you drink some electrolytes. He had done research, doordashing groceries and things he was going to need while you detoxed. He also looked up local rehab facilities. It was the last thing he wanted to do, send you to some lockdown facility that he would only be able to have supervised-one hour visits with you on the weekends. You had sent your father to a place like that, and you swore it was the final straw in your relationship with him. 

Jake also managed to get you to talk about why the change of heart. You didn’t go into much detail, either because your brain couldn’t come up with it or you were too scared to open up. You told him about waking up in the drunk tank this morning and hearing about Duchess’ death. 

“It scared you, didn’t it?” Jake asked. Your eyes were fixed on the TV screen in front of you. The sound was off, so it was just the flashing images on the scene that was playing out. Your hands were wrapped around a steaming cup of tea, “Y/N,” He called out softly, placing a hand on your thigh, “It’s okay to be scared.” 

You blinked, looking over at Jake, “I’m not scared of anything,” You gave him a weak smile, “I’m fucking Clark Kent.” 

Day two had been the worst. You were now 48 hours drug and alcohol-free, and it was really starting to hit you. You woke up in a pool of your own sweat, calling out Jake’s name. He had set you up in his room, volunteering to take the guest bed. You had tried to protest, but he said that the room was bigger and had an attached bathroom. During his research he read that constipation and diarrhea were common in the detoxing stage, and wanted to give you privacy. In your delirium, you somehow managed to pull yourself out of bed and start walking down to the guest room. Jake was just starting to get out of bed, having heard you call out his name, when he heard a crash in the hallway. He ripped open the door and found you withering in pain on the floor. 

“Jesus Christ,” He mumbled and walked over to you. You were hot to the touch and your clothing was soaked in sweat, “C’mon, we gotta cool you down.” 

“No!” You slurred. 

You were nearly limp in his arms as he picked you up and took you to the bathroom. He laid you down on the ground, and started the shower, turning it on as cold as he could get it. You curled yourself into a ball, your stomach was hurting like it could explode any minute. Jake held his hand under the stream of water, watching you as you pulled yourself to your knees and crawled over to the trash can. He grimaced as you got sick, and looked up at the ceiling. He guessed this was the best thing that could happen so far. The drugs were finally starting to leave your system. 

Once Jake determined the water was set to a good enough temp, he walked over to you, gently lifting your body up. You had vomit on the collar of your shirt, as Jake pulled it up and over your head. You felt weightless as Jake picked you up and walked over to the shower. Jake didn’t even think twice as he stepped into the shower, lowering himself down on the floor, still in his pajamas and placing you in between his legs. You instantly curled up against him, trying to get away from the cold stream of water, wanting to savor the warmth of his body. 

Jake hadn’t really got a good look at you before, seeing as you mainly dressed in baggy clothing. But now, as you sat in his arms shivering, he could see the bruises and the bones that were sticking out of your colorless skin. Your hair was greasy, telling Jake that it had been a while since you had last washed it. It was nothing like the well put together woman he had met all those years ago. That woman would be so embarrassed of the girl sitting on the shower floor.

“I’m gonna die,” You sobbed against his chest. 

Jake normally would grimace at the feeling of tears and snot dampening his shirt, but he didn’t even flinch as he held you tightly on the floor of his shower. You were starting to shake as the lukewarm water was breaking your fever. He held you tightly until your sobs turned to sniffles, and your shakes turned to small trembles. 

“You are not going to die,” Jake said, resting his chin on top of your head, “This is the suck, and you just gotta embrace it. When the toxins are out, you will feel better. It’ll take some time till it’s all out, but it’ll all be out.” 

You nodded, “How did you know what to do?” Your hands found the chain of his dog tags, twirling the metal around your fingers. 

“I watched you do it to your dad,” Jake muttered, “I think it was one of the last times he promised to get on the straight and narrow,” Jake scoffed, “I wanted so badly to tell you to just give him up. Let him kill himself, but you. . . you just would not quit. You’re stubborn, too stubborn for your own good.” 

You nodded your head again, your eyelids feeling heavy. Jake waited a couple more minutes, before reaching up and turning the water off. He gently slid out from behind you, grabbing a towel and quickly drying off, before pulling you from the shower. He sat you down on the closed toilet seat, grabbing a new dry towel and his fluffy white bathrobe. 

“Are you okay if I-” He gestured towards the towel in his hand. 

“You just saw me throw up on my shirt,” You answered, looking up at Jake, “You can dry me off. Please, I’m cold now.” 

Jake nodded his head, kneeling down in front of you and carefully, drying you off. You appreciated the gentleness of his touch, as he dried your body. You let him undress you, sliding the sopping wet undergarments off of your body and slipping the white fluffy robe on in their place. Jake then carried you back down to his bedroom, against your pitiful protests. He took his time, fluffing the pillows and tucking you into the ultrasoft sheets. He sat by your side, running his hand over your hair, something he used to do on the nights you’d come home after taking care of your dad, until your eyelids fluttered shut. 

“We’re gonna get through this,” Jake muttered to you, “We’re gonna tame the beast.”

note: part 3???? sike

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[organicsaturdaychurch]

a MAGICAL DELCIOUS pastry yas!!

am I doing too much for this furby wedding? possibly. do i care? not really. @organicsaturdaychurch

[organicsaturdaychurch]

Faceless Organic Saturday Church: Octorber 30th 2022

[bronzecats]

National Rainbow Week of Action in Canada

In this post I have compiled all the information I could find regarding upcoming events for the Rainbow Week of Action. There are two online events, and dozens on in-person events across the country.

"Within the Rainbow Week of Action, we are pushing governments and elected officials at every level to take action for Rainbow Equality and address rising anti-2SLGBTQIA+ hate. As such, we have identified calls to action for every level of government. These calls to action can be reviewed here."

Event list below:

Events are listed in date order, provinces in general west-to-east order. I have included as much detail as possible, please reference the links at the bottom of the post. At this time, there are no events in N.W.T. and Nova Scotia. Last updated: May 14th, 9:53pm PDT. Please note that I am not officially affiliated with / an organizer of these events, I have simply compiled all the dates to share on tumblr. Original post content.

B.C. EVENTS:

15th: Fernie; Fernie Seniors Drop-In Centre, 572 3rd Avenue, 6:00PM. (Letter writing and Potluck)

17th: Vancouver; šxʷƛ̓ənəq Xwtl'e7énḵ Square - Vancouver Art Gallery North Plaza, 750 Hornby St, 5:30PM. (Rally)

19th, Sunday: Abbotsford; Jubilee Park, 5:00PM. (Rally)

ALBERTA EVENTS:

15th: Lethbridge; McKillop United Church, 2329 15th Ave S, 12:00-1:00PM (letter writing)

17th, Friday: Calgary; Central Memorial Park, 1221 2 St SW, 5:30PM. (Rally)

17th: Edmonton; Wilbert McIntyre Park, 8331 104 St NW, 6:00PM. (Rally)

SASKATCHEWAN EVENTS:

17th: Saskatoon; Vimy Memorial Park, 500 Spadina Crescent E, 5:30PM. (Rally)

17th: Regina; Legislative Grounds, 2405 Legislative Dr, 6:30PM. (Rally)

May 18th: Saskatoon; Grovenor Park United Church, 407 Cumberland Ave S, 6:00PM. (Art event)

MANITOBA EVENTS:

16th: Carman; Paul's Place, 20 1 Ave SW, 7:00-9:00PM. (Letter writing)

19th: Winnipeg; Manitoba Legislature, 450 Broadway, 12:00PM. (Rally)

ONTARIO EVENTS:

15th: Barrie; UPlift Black, 12 Dunlop St E, 6:00-7:30PM. (Letter writing)

15th: Chatham; CK Gay Pride Association, 48 Centre St, 5:00-6:30PM. (Letter writing)

15th: Peterborough; Trinity Community Centre, 360 Reid St, 12:00-3:00PM. (Letter writing)

16th: Midland; Midland Public Library, 4:30-7:30PM. (Letter writing and pizza)

16th: Ottawa; Impact Hub, 123 Slater Street, 2:00PM. (Letter writing)

16th: Toronto; Barbara Hall Park, 519 Church St, 11:30AM. (Rally)

17th, Friday: Barrie; City Hall, 70 Collier St, 6:00PM. (Rally)

17th: Cornwall; 167 Pitt St, 5:30PM. (Rally)

17th: Essex; St. Paul's Anglican Church, 92 St. Paul St, 6:00-8:00PM. (Letter writing and pizza)

17th: Hamilton; City Hall, 71 Main St W, 6:00PM. (Rally)

17th: Kitchener; City Hall, 200 King St W, 6:00PM. (Rally)

17th: London; City Hall, 300 Dufferin Ave, 6:00PM. (Rally)

17th: Sarnia; City Hall, 255 Christina St N, 1:00PM. (Rally)

17th: Sault Ste Marie; City Hall, 99 Foster Dr, 11:30AM. (Rally)

17th: Ottawa; Confederation Park, Elgin St, 5:30PM. (Rally)

22nd: Renfrew; 161 Raglan St. South, 7:00PM. (Letter writing, fashion and makeup event, and pizza)

QUEBEC EVENTS:

May 15th: Lachute; CDC Lachute, 57, rue Harriet, 12:30PM. (Letter writing event)

NEW BRUNSWICK EVENTS:

17th: Woodstock; Citizen's Square, Chapel St, Next to the L.P. Fisher Public Library, 12:00-1:00PM. (rally)

17th: Saint John; City Hall, 15 Market Square, 12:30PM. (Rally, flag raising)

18th, Saturday: Fredericton; Legislative Grounds, 706 Queen Street, 1:00PM. (Rally)

NOVA SCOTIA EVENTS:

May 17th: Middleton; NSCC AVC RM 121, 6:30-8:30PM (letter writing and pizza)

P.E.I. EVENTS:

May 15th: Charlottetown; Peers Alliance Office, 250B Queen Street, 6:00-8:00PM. (Adult drop-in)

May 16th: Charlottetown, Peers Alliance Office, 250B Queen Street, 6:00-7:00PM.

May 17th: Charlottetown; PEI Legislative Assembly, 165 Richmond St, 12:00PM. (Rally)

YUKON EVENTS:

16th: Whitehorse; The Cache, 4230 4 Ave, 2:00-7:00PM. (Letter writing)

NUNAVUT EVENTS:

May 16th, Thursday: Iqaluit; Four Corners, 922 Niaqunngusiariaq St, 5:00PM. (Letter writing)

Reference links:

About the Rainbow Week of Action.

Website letter writing events list (does not include all events)

General events website list (does not include all events)

Instagram general events image list

Instagram letter writing / pizza party image list

[natashaslittlegirl]

Sweet Sin - WM

DO NOT COPY ANY OF MY WORKS. MINORS DNI +18 ONLY.

Sweet Sin | Sweet Wanda | Sweet blood

Summary: Your dream university and the one to which you were admitted is Catholic, the last requirement is that you have to take communion. Being a non-believer girl you were going to give up, until you remembered one of your neighbors thay could help, Wanda Maximoff, head of the choir and catholic teacher in your town.

Catholic teacher ! Wanda Maximoff x Student ! Reader

Smut, dirty talk, oral sex (w receiving), vaginal fingering (w receiving), praise kink, hair pulling, finger sucking, semi-public sex, church sex, age gap (legal r).

Words Count: 1400+ 

Wattpad Masterlist Wanda Maximoff's Masterlist

·

"Thank you, Miss Maximoff, for agreeing to teach me," you said smiling at the woman in front of you. "I really appreciate it."

"It's okay sweetheart, it's never too late." She smiles back at you to start catechism class.

You didn't like the church, or God, or anything that has to do with religion, but the university of your dreams was Catholic, so you swallowed your pride and started with communion to be able to enter.

Your neighbor, Miss Maximoff, was very sweet to you, letting you into the church for private lessons, she couldn't put you in the class with the nine and ten year olds kids, it would be torture.

So that's what your summer Saturdays were going to be like, three hours in church between Wanda's classes, and then the one-hour mass.

Sometimes you stayed a little longer than you should, helping your neighbor tidy up the rooms and the church. It is the least you could do since she was helping you fulfill your dream.

Not only that, you also had a little crush on her. The woman was beautiful, but she was unfortunately married to a disgusting man and she had two children, she was also extremely devoted to God, which if she found out that you are a lesbian she would probably pass out.

This Sunday the church had a charity event, a food fair with the whole town participating so that the money raised goes to the orphanage.

Wanda requested your help to prepare the salon for the event, which was behind the church, so here you were carrying chairs from the church storage room to the salon.

You spent all morning carrying and bringing things, your arms were already tired from so much effort, but it was worth it, since seeing the beautiful woman who gave you private lessons, in a black dress that fits perfectly fine her figure was worth all your time.

"Honey, can you help me bring some boxes from the storage room? I've already put the food on the tables, just need the decorations." She asked you smiling to which you nodded and walked next to her.

"My arms just hurt a bit, is it heavy what we have to carry, Wanda?" She tortured you into calling her by her name, you that calling her by her last name so formally made her feel old, even though you assured her she wasn't.

What you didn't know was that she didn't want you to call her that because of how much it turned her on, having that little authority over you.

"Oh, swettie, why didn't you tell me you were tired?" She stopped before entering the deposit, putting one of her hands on your cheek, caressing it.

"Because I'm okay, Miss Maximoff, I can go on" you smiled assuring her not to worry. A devilish grin formed on her face at hearing her name.

"You were a very good girl for me all morning honey, helping me so well, I think you deserve a reward don't you?" The smirk on her face got you, nodding as fast as you could. "Come with me, baby."

She opened the door, entering the room and closing the door right after you passed, leading you by the hand to where the organ was, the one that played every time the choir sang. Wanda positioned herself on top of it, putting you between her legs.

"Do you want your reward, sweetheart?" Her hand still grabbing yours, you gave it a squeeze as you nodded. She released you to start pulling her dress up, leaving it coiled to her hips, your lips parting at the revealing of her bare wet pussy, glistening with the little sunlight coming through a window.

Your mouth watered, there she was, legs spread, almost dripping in front of you. You sighed at the thought of tasting her, your hands went to her thighs, caressing them.

"Come on, take it, honey." she encouraged you and you fell to your knees to the ground, without taking your eyes off hers, now dark green, full of lust and desire.

You didn't waste another second and brought your face closer to your neighbor's pussy, the most devoted woman to God in the whole town was now exposed and wet at your disposal. And you were totally ready to sin.

Your tongue curled over her clit, causing her hands to go to your hair at the first lick, making you moan at the sweet taste of her.

If this was like eating the forbidden fruit, you'll sin every day for her, the most delicious and sweet sin you tasted in your entire life.

"Mhm yes, so good, dear." Wanda was trying not to moan so loudly, as even the little sounds echoed in the giant room, but you didn't care, you wanted her to scream until there was no air left in her lungs.

Your tongue ran up and down her wet folds, alternating between her entrance and her clit, her hand still in your hair, pulling you closer, if that was possible.

You plunged a finger into her without warning, stealing a loud deep moan from her throat, causing her to bring her own hand to her mouth to muffle the sounds coming from her.

You started slow, making her growl in desperation, bucking her hips against your face, another finger entered her, now two were working on her entrance while your tongue was on her clit, licking and sucking it.

Wanda's legs began to shake, squeezing your head, curling your fingers inside her, touching her g-spot, she felt in heaven.

You looked up, seeing how she had her head thrown back, one of her hands still covering her mouth, her brows knitted together and her chest heaving sharply for air.

"Don't stop honey, I'm so close, oh you're so good at this."

You doubled your efforts, even though you were already tired, but all of that vanished with the moans that Wanda let out of her lips.

"Oh fucking god, I-I'm gonna cum." and you stopped, suddenly you stopped and she looked down at you, with her eyes wide open and furrowed brows, not understanding what happened.

"That's not my name." and then she realized.

"Come on, Y/N, don't fuck with me now" a smirk formed on your face, her deep and agitated tone of voice sent a shiver down your spine, the way your name left her lips sent a wave of wetness to your core.

"I am fucking you now, Miss Maximoff." She growled at her name, grabbing your hair to pull it hard, making you groan at the tight grip.

"Don't be a brat now and make me cum, or you're gonna regret this." Her voice loaded with authority was all it took to start moving your fingers again, fast and hard, curling them while your tongue sucked on her already swollen clit.

Wanda came undone moaning your name, falling from her lips like every Sunday prayer. Getting you soaked with her cumming while you helped her ride her high.

You pulled your fingers out of her, bringing them to her mouth, for her to licking them clean, she moaned at her own taste.

"You taste so good, Miss Maximoff."

"I can't wait to taste you, my good little angel."

You shared a wet yet soft kiss, with her hands fixing your messy hair and yours in the back of her neck, deepening the kiss. When the lack of air became present, you both separated, you helped her get off the organ and adjusted her dress.

"Come on, we still have to decorate the room, sweet girl," but before going to the church, Wanda grabbed your wrist pulling you closer to her, your back crashing to her front just to whisper in your ear "I'll wait for you after the event."

[organicsaturdaychurch]

Look what I requesteddddd 🐛🐛🐛🐛🐛 when I have more furbys I’ll be BACK 😈😈😈😈 very happy about very yummy 10/10 would recommend

sorry for such a long wait, but here it is!! Organic Saturday Church stimboard!!!

requested by @organicsaturdaychurch

🌟 💛 ✨

💗 💖 💗

🌟 💛 ✨

rqs open!!

(sorry i couldn't find credit for the top middle one anywhere iwi)

[mrsshabana]

honestly i need a story time about the cult? also the link to that podcast, im intrigued now lol

𝐌𝐲 𝐞𝐱𝐩𝐞𝐫𝐢𝐞𝐧𝐜𝐞 𝐛𝐞𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐢𝐧 𝐚 𝐫𝐞𝐥𝐢𝐠𝐢𝐨𝐮𝐬 𝐜𝐮𝐥𝐭

Ok children gather around. It's story time 🤓

Note: Now I won't provide a link because I talk about a lot of personal stuff including my name and location, and I don't want so many people having access to that. But I don't mind telling my story here.

Content warning: Mentions of religious trauma and eating disorders

Ok, so let me set the scene. I was 18 and moved out of my parents' house. I lived in a ghetto apartment near my university where I was studying art.

Now when I moved out my parents stopped talking to me. So I really felt alone, I had no family, no friends, and I was in a new place so I was very desperate to have a connection with someone. So really I was the perfect victim for a cult because I was vulnerable.

One day I was walking out of the mathematics building when a student stopped me and asked me if I would like to read the bible with her. She was a Korean international student and she was really nice so I was like sure why not. Now at this point, I wasn't super religious but I did consider myself a Christian. But I never knew the bible very well and my family was the kind of family that only went to church on easter and Christmas.

So anyway, I read the bible with her and she explained it to me. The way she explained the passage was insinuating that there was a female version of god. That was something I had never heard of before but it was interesting to me so I decided to come with her to her bible study.

Long story short it ended up being this organization called "The World Mission Society Church of God." I went to their church and spent hours with them every Wednesday and Saturday because they made me feel accepted. They welcomed me and became like my family which I didn't have at the time.

Something I really loved about them was that their church was so diverse. There were so many different kinds of people there, I really felt welcome. Because growing up churches seemed so segregated. I'm biracial, my mom is white and my dad is black so growing up we either went to the white church or the black church. And at both I felt like people would stare at me and my family and that I wasn't welcome there.

So it felt really nice to have such a diverse church where I felt truly welcomed. Anyway, I ended up making a lot of friends there and I stayed with them for about 6 months. Then I figured out they were actually a cult. It's a long story but I won't go into it because this isn't even the main part yet.

After leaving the World Mission Society I felt really lonely again because I lost the only friends and sense of belonging I had. But I had to just keep going.

Maybe about 3 months later this random Korean guy approached me on campus and he asked me if I'd like to participate in a survey thing about the bible. I was skeptical at first because my previous church had told me that every Korean person was a part of their church. (Which obviously is NOT true). But my mind was thinking, "Oh no, what if they are trying to get back to me."

But I decided that it's not right to assume that this man is a part of that cult just because he's Korean. So I agreed to participate in this survey and I gave him my phone number.

Basically, a professor was writing a book where she'd answer people's most common questions about the bible. And she was surveying students to collect questions for the book. It sounded pretty cool to me so I was very interested.

I met up with the professor at a Starbucks on campus and I answered her questions about things I've always wondered about the bible. We'll call this lady Anya.

During our meeting, I expressed to Anya how I felt discarded by god because of my previous cult experience. I felt like I wasn't worthy of his love and I was very ashamed of what I did. Because we would literally pray to a human man who claimed to be god. After leaving I knew that wasn't true, and I figured god no longer loved me for what I did.

Anya was so encouraging and kind. She told me that is it 100% untrue, and that god does love me. That he put me through that experience for a reason and it only made me stronger.

Then she offered to do some bible study lessons with me so I could learn things the right way and start to feel a little bit better about my situation. And of course, I agreed. I was desperate to redeem myself and make friends again.

So I started going to this bible study once a week. Which turned to twice a week. Which turned into me going to some woman's house to have lessons. We'll call this woman Cara.

Cara was from Korea and so was her husband, they were extremely nice and welcomed me into their home. They would feed me ramen and cool snacks, and I honestly felt like a part of their family. There were lots of people in this bible study too and I made a ton of friends.

So fast forward, I had been studying the bible with them for about a year now. And nothing crazy, I was learning about the parables of the bible and the meanings of all those things in the bible that make no sense. It was very informative and interesting but nothing outlandish.

They sit us down for this big "reveal" about who the 2nd coming of Jesus is. Now they hyped it up so much and they told us that we can't judge this person no matter what. This whole time I thought it was going to be someone crazy like Kanye West or something. But no, it was an old Korean man.

He seemed unassuming enough? I had never heard of him so I didn't know why they made such a big deal out of it.

Now at this point, you are probably thinking, "Why the hell would you fall for this again?" Listen, trust me I was frustrated with myself when I left but you have to understand these people love-bombed me when I had no one. They became my family when I had none. They lied to me for an entire year so I'd trust them and get close to them before they revealed who they really were.

And they were a church called Shincheonji.

And I had no problem accepting this because these people had been my family and my best friends for an entire year. They'd feed me, watch movies with me, do anything to help me out. So I trusted them wholeheartedly. But really I was just being brainwashed.

So after I found out that they were Shincheonji they put me in their group for advanced students. And I'd begin studying multiple times a week at Cara's house and Anya was always there too. I would join the twice-weekly sermons via zoom as well. Where one of the Korean tribe leaders would give a sermon about something. I was in the Mathias tribe by the way, though that doesn't really matter.

I would do so so much with them, we even all went on a road trip to Houston where the other branch was. They even got me a birthday cake and surprised me for my birthday too. It was honestly great, and I loved them a lot.

We were basically encouraged to recruit as many people as we can because if we don't they will go to hell. They put so much pressure on us for this. They'd say things like, "Don't you want to save them?" And I am a very empathetic person so I felt like omg I want to save everyone! But on the other hand, ever since I joined Shincheonji my anxiety and depression went through the roof. The pressure to save the entire world is a lot for a 21-year-old girl. So I never recruited anyone myself because I didn't want them to have to struggle with the same mental health issues I did when I joined.

I also had some physical health issues arise as well. Their teachings would always preach how "The word of god is all the food we need." How spiritual food was more important than physical food. And that really stuck with me, especially when I got food poisoning and I couldn't eat solid food for two weeks. Something about not eating made me feel good. Like I didn't even need food because the word of god was enough, so why not just not eat at all? Not eating felt like the only thing I could control, so I clung to it. And I became anorexic. Being with Shinchenji was the only time I was ever considered underweight.

Anyway, I have so many crazy stories to tell about my time with them but I'll save those for another day.

I had been with them for about two and a half years before I started to question things.

We got a new teacher from Korea to replace Cara because she was going to have a baby. And this new teacher was a lot different and a lot less loving and nurturing than Cara had been.

She had said some things that I didn't agree with, and it started putting some doubt in my mind.

Ok so, on a side note I used to work at the library at my school doing data entry in the basement. And I would listen to podcasts a lot throughout the day as I did my work.

One day I found an interesting podcast about cults, where the host would bring cult victims onto the show and they'd tell their story. Well I was listening to an episode about the Moonies and I thought to myself, "Huh, they sound very similar to Shincheonji in some ways..."

But I knew I could not think such thoughts and that if I did any research then the devil would poison me through the internet. And I needed to strengthen my spirit for even thinking of such a thing.

So I went to reddit, and I found a subreddit called r/Shincheonji. I was like, "Oh yes! Now I can talk to other Shincheonji members and we can strengthen each other's faith!"

But it wasn't a subreddit for believers. It was a subreddit for ex-members and people who were against Shincheonji.

And at this point, I had already seen enough to plant that seed of doubt in me. I read more and more even though Shincheonji warned me I'd be poisoned if I ever researched them. But I couldn't stop myself.

I went through so much inner turmoil, you guys have no idea. My reality was crumbling so hard and I felt like my world was ending. It's hard to explain, but I was so indoctrinated and brainwashed by this point. This really ruined me.

I had to mourn the loss of all of the family and friends I gained these past years. I would cry almost every night because I missed them, and it was so hard to accept that they never truly loved me at all. To be honest, I still think about some of them to this day and I hope they got out and found peace in their lives.

No one in my life had known I was a part of Shincheonji. My closest friends nor my family, who had slowly started talking to me again. But I had to tell someone so I told my childhood best friend, we'll call him Blaine.

I got in a Playstation party with Blaine and I just cried. I cried so so much, and he was so confused. But eventually, I told him everything. And he was really supportive and gave me no judgment at all.

My main issue was, how could I leave? I have quite literally been living a double life this entire time and not having that scared the shit out of me. But Blaine advised me to cut them off completely and just leave without saying anything. Because his concern was that if they got the chance to talk to me, they would most certainly be able to pull me back in. And I know them well enough to know this is true. So that's exactly what I did, I left and went cold turkey. I even went as far as changing my work schedule too.

And here's where things get creepy.

I hadn't spoken to them for about a week now, and I'm at work. I'm working as usual in the basement on the computers and low and behold, three girls walk in. Girls from my cult, girls that I was close to.

Now students aren't allowed to just waltz into this room so they had some big balls to do that. But the weird thing was, I had completely changed my schedule and I was working on a day I normally had off. They should have had no idea I was there.

But here they were, holding a large cup of boba from my favorite place. And in my favorite flavor too, winter milk cap with mango popping bubbles.

They came up to me and said, "Hey girl, we noticed you haven't been coming to worship lately. Is everything alright?"

I said, "Oh uh yeah everything's fine! I've just been super busy with work and a ton of projects for class..."

"Ok, well we got this for you," they handed me the boba, "We were hoping to talk to you. We can wait for you outside and talk to you when you get off."

I started panicking so I said, "My mom is actually picking me up as soon as I get off so I won't be able to, I'm sorry! Maybe another time though, I'll text you."

They were convinced by my response so they left. And boy did I RUN so fucking fast after I got off work. I even called Blaine so he could talk to me in case they came after me, but luckily they didn't and I got home ok.

He started yelling at me for drinking the boba saying, "YOU IDIOT! THEY PROBABLY POISONED IT!"

But hey, free boba is free boba.

Anyway, after that event I knew I had to text that girl and tell her I was deciding to leave Shinchenji because I didn't want them to show up at my job again or follow me around.

So I texted her, trying to be as nice as possible and explain to her that I just couldn't do it anymore. I told her how this affected my mental health and my physical health. How I developed an eating disorder from being in Shincheonji too.

Her response was really rude and condescending. She said my mental health issues and my eating disorder were my fault and the work of satan trying to blame them. She told me that once I leave I can never be accepted into heaven, that I'm damning myself to hell as well as all of my family members. I'll be honest, she made me feel incredibly guilty and selfish for leaving. Their teachings were still ingrained in me. But I knew that I could never return after everything, so I blocked her and never spoke to her again.

Oh yeah and that book the professor was writing in the beginning, that wasn't real and she wasn't a professor. It was just a ruse to lure students in.

I will admit I could never get their teachings out of my head. And to this day, even though I know they were wrong, a part of me believes I am going to hell for what I did and all of my family will suffer because of me. So now I can't even look at a bible, and I no longer consider myself religious.

And after this experience, I reached out to that cult podcast that helped me realize I was also in a cult, and I got an episode of my own where I got to tell my story.

So yeah haha that's my story!

Today only my close friends know, and I never told my parents. They still have no idea and honestly, I don't know if I will ever tell them.

I'm still really plagued by a lot of things they did, and my worldview has never been the same. My life has never been the same. But I've been cult free for about 2 years now so I'm just taking it one day at a time.

I'm sorry this was so long. But if you read the whole thing I want to say thank you, from the bottom of my heart, for reading my story. And if you are a college student, please be careful because cults like this are rampant on college campuses, especially in the U.S.

After leaving the cult, I needed something to obsess over, something to make me feel normal. And that was Gyutaro! And I gotta say, obsessing over him is much healthier than obsessing over the teachings of a cult.

Anyway, I want you all to know that this blog has been an escape for me and helped me to feel normal again after this experience. And I don't need a cult to make me feel loved anymore. Because I have all of you :)

[compacflt]

For the requests/open inbox, this may not be the lane you're looking for, but you made a throw a way mention in a response to the ask about Ice's enforcement of DADT that Bradley and Ice probably got into it at one point about Ice being totally okay with DADT as a policy (which I love your read on Ice being like, 'yeah, nobody should ask and nobody should tell. what's the problem here?') I would love to see that argument go down. Or honestly, just any Ice and Bradley interaction after the reconciliation that suits your fancy. I find that dynamic in your world super interesting. Bradley sees him as a father, Ice sees him as the person whose father I killed. I love the drama.

Five times Ice was so obviously Rooster’s dad + one time he explicitly wasn’t.

[Carole. 1994.]

He’s such a nervous man. Usually that’s not the word people associate with him. Nervous? Never! But he is. Carole Bradshaw’s more a religious woman than a spiritual one. She’s never put any stock into “chockras” or “ouras” or whatever the other girls her age were fooling around with in the late sixties and early seventies. But she does believe that you can understand a person just by looking at him or her, and when she looks at Tom Kazansky, she sees a little anxious creature, shivering in the cold, like one of those tiny spindly dogs who always needs a sweater. Maybe it’s her southern maternal instincts, something primal and animalistic inside her, I need to take care of you—and when he nudges her with a nervous shivering shoulder and whispers, “Can I bum a smoke?” —she reaches down to take his hand and says, “I only have one left. We’ll have to share.”

She knows she makes him nervous. His ears are red, and so’s the back of his neck. It’s early on a Saturday morning, and the church is crowded, and he’s self-conscious about the fact that she’s holding his hand. Good. It’s so rare she gets to make a man nervous anymore. She waves to Bradley, proud in his little striped button-down and his little blue bow-tie, where he’s lined-up with all the other aspiring pianists against the stage along the far wall, under the bare postmodern crucifix. The recital isn’t going to start for another five, ten minutes, and it’s organized by age, so Bradley’s somewhere in the middle. If Tom Kazansky needs a smoke, Carole Bradshaw will bum him a smoke.

They exit out the side door, and the low murmuring of the other proud parents in the church fades to the quiet of the alley. Birds chirping nearby. The sound of a latecoming car on gravel somewhere far away. Her cigarette and the flick of his lighter, her eyes on his mouth and his puff of smoke—it’s lit. He takes a drag, closes his eyes, then passes it to her. “Sorry to make you share,” she says, and she’s watching the red flush creep up the side of his throat with a silent pleasure. When she takes her own pull, she looks down to see that the filter’s gone the sweet red-pink of her old lipstick. Kind of like a kiss, sharing a cigarette.

“That’s okay,” he says. Nervous spindly little dog. “Uh, what’s he playing?”

“Beethoven. ‘Für Elise.’” Then, before he can think to judge, she goes on quickly: “It’s more complicated than you’d think. Goes up and down and all over the place.”

“It’s a good song,” Tom Kazansky says, “though I don’t know too much about piano.” He pauses. “I’m learning a little German, though. I think it’s E-leez-ah. She must’ve been an alright girl if Beethoven wrote a song for her.”

Carole Bradshaw doesn’t know what to say to that. So she says this instead: “Thank you for coming. It made Bradley—well, over the moon, I guess.”

Tom Kazansky smiles shyly. “Sorry Maverick couldn’t come. I know he wanted to.”

Of course he brings up Pete Mitchell. Drags her back into reality. “He’s in Washington again, isn’t he?”

“Correct.” He reaches out for the cigarette; she gives it to him. “TOPGUN’s biggest advocate. I keep telling him he should go into politics. I just talked to him yesterday—he told me he went to the Natural History Smithsonian on Wednesday—he bought Bradley a dinosaur picture book, I think. Does Bradley like dinosaurs?”

Carole Bradshaw shrugs. What nine-year-old boy doesn’t like dinosaurs, but… “He’s more into sea life these days. Whales, sharks, fish.”

“Some fish used to be dinosaurs, they think,” says Tom Kazansky, clearly just trying to fill the silence. Ears red, lips red. Smoke out of his mouth like a fire-breathing dragon.

Carole Bradshaw doesn’t know how much dinosaur history she actually believes. So she says, “It’s still really nice of you to come. You know, Bradley—Bradley thinks of you and Maverick as his—well, his fathers, I s’pose. So it’s nice for you to be here.”

She watches his reaction—just nervousness. Straight anxiety. He doesn’t meet her eyes, like she’s just kicked him in the ribs. He does not want to be Bradley’s father. 

She says, “You don’t have to sign any papers, Tom. You don’t have to put a kid seat in your car. I’m just saying. Don’t worry about it.”

He says, “I can hear the kids starting inside—we should probably go back in.”

So Carole Bradshaw drops the cigarette butt to the ground and steps on it with the bottom of her flat. They go inside, and wait for a kindergartener to finish an overly simple “Canon in D” to take their seats again. She takes his hand. He lets her. After another half-hour, Bradley sits down on the bench in front of the hand-me-down Steinway and busts out “Für Elise” without a single missed note. It still shocks her, sometimes, to watch him play—it still shocks her, sometimes, that she is the mother of all that talent. And now maybe Tom Kazansky is the father of all that talent. How did that happen?

At the end of the recital, Tom Kazansky lets go of her hand. She knew he would. Knew his fatherhood is only temporary. But he lets go of her hand to accept Bradley’s great-big hug in the parking lot: “Gosling, that was so good.” Bradley’s proud smile is missing a few teeth. It makes Tom Kazansky laugh.

And after he drops them off at home, and peels away with a wave and a smile, Carole Bradshaw lights another cigarette from the half-full pack she’d brought with her to the recital and brings Bradley out to the backyard so he can play and she can watch him. But before she lets him go, she looks down at him and says flatly, “If kids at school ask you about Uncle Tom and Uncle Pete—you need to tell them they’re just friends.”

And in his eyes, she can see the confusion of a little boy who hadn’t been aware that Tom Kazansky and Pete Mitchell were anything other than just friends—the confusion of a little boy learning about duplicity for the first time in his life. 

“Okay,” he says, so she lets him go.

—

[Maverick. 1998.]

“Don’t go easy on him,” Maverick hollers breathlessly over his shoulder, fishing around in the ice chest in the sand for two cans of Coors; “He just joined the J.R.O.T.C.; don’t go easy on him; he’s tougher than all your squadrons combined; beat him into the dirt…”

“Thanks, Uncle Mav,” shouts Bradley from across the volleyball court, where he’s getting initiated into one of the volleyball teams of younger fighter pilots. 

Maverick flashes him a thumbs-up and finds his T-shirt on the first bleacher bench, pulls it on with one hand, and then hops up the rest of the benches to sit with Ice, who’s got his CVN-65 ballcap on and a book open in his lap and is offering informal career advice to one of the other lieutenants: “Yeah, so, in my opinion, it’s all down to what you think you can stomach… If you want me to look over your C.V., I can totally do that—I think I’m free Monday at around thirteen-hundred, if you want to stop in to talk. Not a problem. Not a problem. Alright. See you later.” He watches the lieutenant go, then lolls his head over to look at Maverick, who’s tossing an ice-cold can of Coors up and down. “Hey. Good game. —Coors, Mav? This is an insult.” But he takes the offered can anyway, looking out onto the court, where Bradley—fourteen and just entering his beanpole phase of evolution—is currently spiking the ball. “Cool.” It’s a nice summer Saturday, a casual opportunity for the officers of Miramar to socialize with their families (Ice is wearing a golf shirt and jeans), and by now pretty much everyone knows that Maverick Mitchell’s raising his friend’s kid and that he and Captain Kazansky are good friends, so this is pretty nice. Not much to hide.

“C’mon,” Maverick says, popping open his own can, “you and I were having a scintillating conversation, a few minutes ago.” He’s hunting around for the sunscreen so the tops of his feet don’t burn to ashes in the sun.

“Scintillating. That’s a big word for you. Wow.”

“You’re rubbing off on me, Sir Reads-a-lot—”

“See, that’s funny,” Ice interjects, “because I seem to recall, before you so-rudely interrupted me to go play volleyball with the kids, I was telling you that it’s really not that interesting. It’s actually, Maverick, quite boring.”

“Well, I’m intrigued now. Go on. Finish it off, I wanna know.”

Ice slaps his book shut and gives the long tired sigh of a man who is very self-conscious about the fact that he’s about to turn forty. He pops the tab on his can of Coors and huffs in exasperation when it foams all over his hand. “I mean it, my family history’s really not that interesting. Typical eastern-European immigrant shitshow. U.S. officials change one letter in our last name and everyone loses their goddamn minds… Actually, that story might be apocryphal, I keep forgetting which former Soviet Socialist Republic I’m actually from, I just can’t remember, all the borders got redrawn so many times, one of ‘em…”

Maverick smiles and pulls his TOPGUN ballcap back down onto his head, tugs the brim down low over his eyes so he can tip his head back and not go blind from the summer sunshine. He’d thought Ice would be reluctant to share his family history, but it turns out that most people are just afraid to ask him, and he’s actually pretty eager to talk, if you just ask. Maybe over-eager. He’s rambling. Maverick cuts him off: “Yeah, you do have a left curve to you, don’t you. Genetic.”

The dirty joke strikes Ice dumb for a second, but then he forges ahead, wisely choosing not to engage. He keeps going, oblivious to the fact that Maverick’s not really listening… “Anyway, my grandfather was Jewish, but he died literally the second he stepped foot in America, so it doesn’t count…my grandmother was Orthodox, crazy story how they ended up together; actually, that story’s probably apocryphal, too…she’s the one who raised me, pretty much. I told you that. She brought my dad out to Southern California when he was a little kid, but I don’t know if you’ve noticed, So-Cal’s not exactly the Mecca of Orthodox churches or anything, so he wasn’t very religious at all… My mom was from Milwaukee, I think. Or maybe Minneappolis. Some kinda Protestant. Forget which kind. The preachy kind. But then she died and I didn’t have to go to church anymore, so I didn’t.”

“You just never believed?” Maverick mumbles, half-joking.

“Nah. I mean, I always had too many questions no one wanted to answer. For instance: okay, say you’re bad. Say you commit sin…”

“I’ve never sinned, sir. You’re talking hypothetically.”

“Right. Me, neither. Hypothetically speaking. So you go to Hell. Well, the devil’s there, too, ‘cause he’s a sinner, too. But why’s he want to punish you? What does he get out of it? You’re both in the same boat!”

“Probably a sexual thing,” says Maverick, watching the purple-green imprints of the sun dance around behind his eyelids. “He probably gets off on it. The devil, I mean.”

Ice laughs and laughs. “Sure. Try saying that in front of my mom and see if you survived. I learned pretty early on that they don’t want you to be too curious. So I kept all my questions to myself.” He’s also joking, not taking this super seriously, but that’s a pretty in-character answer. “What about you, Mav?”

“If I’ve told you my family’s history once, I’ve told you a thousand times…” That’s a joke. Maverick’s the one who doesn’t like talking about his family history. Ice hasn’t heard any of it, and for good reason. Maybe someday he’ll tell him about it. “Later. But, remember, I used to be Southern Baptist? Jesus, I was serious into that shit, Ice.”

Ice snorts. “Yeah, right. You.”

“Not joking. I had about eighty girlfriends between fourteen and eighteen, but that’s the most pious I’ve ever been. Lotsa loopholes to make my relationships biblical. Was thinking about being a youth pastor. —I’m not joking. It was my whole personality, for a while. Most of my childhood, anyway.”

Ice is still laughing in disbelief. “Oh, yeah? And then what happened?”

Maverick smiles. “…Got hooked on sinning.” 

“…Yeah,” Ice replies, and Maverick can hear the nervous smirk in his voice, “I guess I’d know a little something about that.”

And normally that would be the end of the conversation. But Maverick’s feeling a little sun-drunk, a little giddy, and he’ll never, ever, ever grow out of instigating stupid arguments with Ice just for the fun of it. From beneath the brim of his ballcap he mutters, “…You think Carole’s brainwashing her kid?”

Ice huffs a laugh, and says through a lazy yawn, “I’m not militant in my atheism, no.” But he, also, will never, ever, ever grow out of instigating stupid arguments with Maverick just for the fun of it, and his curiosity’s clearly been piqued. He stews in it for a second before he snaps, “Do you think Carole’s brainwashing her kid?”

“I’m just saying she has him readin’ outta the Bible, like, five times a day. She sends him to church camp. Does something to a kid.” He has no dog in this fight, but this is fun.

“And what did it do to you?” Ice says, reaching down to shove his shoulder good-naturedly. “Weren’t you just telling me not five seconds ago how you used to be the perfect model of Christian charity?” Maverick mumbles a retort sleepily; Ice pushes on through it: “Bradley’s a human being. Either he grows out of it like you did, or he doesn’t, in which case, whatever, land of the free. That’s the First Amendment. You swore an oath to the Constitution. Maybe you should read it.”

“I’ve read it. I’m not Congress, shithead. How’s it go, you want me to cite it to you directly, ‘Congress shall make no law…’ actually, I don’t know what comes after that. Got me there.”

“Don’t call me shithead, dipshit. And whatever. Good thing he’s Carole’s kid and not yours, then. He’s got a mom who wants him to go to church. It’s up to him if he wants to listen to her or not. That’s growing up.”

Maverick tips up the brim of his ballcap to look at him, sprawled out in the bleachers very unprofessionally for the CO of this entire volleyball court, and snaps back, “Well, he’s a little bit my kid. The same way he’s a little bit your kid.” 

Ice just flicks his sunglasses down onto his nose and purses his lips and neither confirms nor denies this allegation. 

They watch the game together for a while, Ice’s toes pressed against Maverick’s lower back discreetly, trying to work their way under Maverick’s T-shirt. Until one of the young pilots approaches a few minutes later: “Sir!” / “What’s that kid’s call sign again?” Ice mumbles to Maverick, prodding him with his foot. / “Hooker.” / “No shit.” / “Sir!” says Hooker again. / “Which one of us, kid?” says Maverick. / “Captain Kazansky, sir. We’ve got a spot opening up. Wanna play?”

Maverick looks up at Ice expectantly. Ice sighs and harrumphs and waffles for a minute— “I’m too old for this shit.”

“Sir,” says Maverick, “it’s not a competition, but if it were, I’d be winning.” 

Lighting the fire of competition under Ice like that is always a good strategy. He rolls his eyes, but immediately stands and tugs off his shirt and rolls up the cuffs of his jeans; “I’ll only play if I can play with the kid.” 

So Maverick watches the teams get scrambled again with a smile, and sits up to watch Ice join Bradley in the sand. Bradley’s only just now taller than Ice, and Ice clearly isn’t used to having to reach up to curl an arm around his shoulders to strategize, his eyes narrowed like an eagle’s, staring down the competition. Maverick can read his lips from across the pitch: Alright, kid, I’ve been watching for a while, and I think I know these guys’ strengths and weaknesses…okay, here’s what we’re gonna do… And the game begins when Bradley spikes the ball.

Ice won’t always be this fun, this down-to-earth, this human. The admiralty and the guilt and the grief of the years to come will strip it all away from him, bring him back to the cold, remove him from his own humanity. And maybe, even if it isn’t conscious, Maverick can recognize that, right now, watching Ice dive into the sand with a laugh: this summer sunshine is only temporary. It’s gonna have to end at some point. So he doesn’t take it for granted. He keeps his eyes open and watches and tries to commit it to memory.

And after the game, Ice and Bradley come over so Ice can finish his beer and put his shirt and his baseball cap back on, and Maverick can make fun of them for losing. And: “What were you guys talking about for so long before the game?” Bradley asks Maverick with a grin.

“Whether or not your mom’s brainwashing you,” Maverick says.

“Oh!” Bradley says mildly. “…No, I don’t think so!”

“Oh, that’s a great start,” Ice laughs. “You would’ve made a great Soviet. No, I don’t think I’m getting brainwashed. Hey, by the way, Gosling, if you want a beer, Maverick and I won’t tell anyone.”

“Aw, really?” whispers Bradley. “Thanks, Uncle Ice!” And he races down the bleachers towards the ice chest in the sand.

Maverick watches Ice watch him go, fingers still pinching the brim of his CVN-65 ballcap, clearly worrying about something the way Ice always is. 

Then he looks down at Maverick, stares openly for a minute, and says, “You don’t think we’re teaching him to rebel too much, do you?”

—

[Bradley. 2000.]

“Kiddo! You’re here early!” It was Uncle Ice, walking through his own front door, catching a glimpse of Bradley watching the Astros-Nats game on the TV. He was still in uniform, but smiling wide, and he set his bag down near the couch and leaned over to ruffle Bradley’s hair goodnaturedly.

“Practice ended early today.”

“Oh, okay. Cool. Maverick should be home soon, still at work—your mom’ll be here in about an hour—she told me to put the chicken breasts in the oven, but you know me, every time I use this oven I set off the fire alarm, so you oughta help me with that…”

“And,” Bradley said, watching Uncle Ice wash his hands in the kitchen sink, “I got here early because I wanted to talk to you.”

“Oh, sure!” chirped Uncle Ice. Then he paused, sensing a trap. “What about?”

“Advice,” Bradley mumbled. He took a deep breath, and stood to follow Uncle Ice into the kitchen “I was just—I was just curious. If you had any advice for me joining the Navy. You know, with me being gay, and all. How do I—I don’t know. I’ve been thinking about it a lot. It’s kinda been weighing on me. Do you have any advice?”

Uncle Ice was still drying his hands off on a kitchen towel. Rubbing them red and raw. And when he raised his head to speak, there was something dull and startled in his eyes: “I don’t, um—no, I don’t—I don’t know anything about that. —You should ask Uncle Maverick about that.”

“I did,” Bradley said desperately, because he had. Yes, he’d gone to Uncle Mav first. “He—he told me to talk to you.”

“…Oh,” said Uncle Ice, now standing in front of a shelf to return one of his books to it. This surprised him. Maybe hurt him a little. “No. I—I, I wouldn’t know anything about that.”

“But—”

“And there are probably better people to ask than me or Maverick. I—I don’t know—that’s not really my…I don’t know.”

“Okay.”

Uncle Ice swallowed, put the book back on the shelf, then clasped his hands together and set them on the shelf, too, as if leaning over his captain’s desk to chastise someone. He blinked for a long moment. Clearly shifting gears. Becoming someone else so easily. Why couldn’t Bradley do that? “But I can tell you this,” he said, and his voice had gone grave and dim, “and I know you and I don’t always see eye-to-eye on politics—but I can tell you this, professionally, because I respect you, and I care about you, a lot—you’re going to have to keep it a secret.”

Dismayed, Bradley said, “Why?”

“Why’s a funny question to ask about something like this,” said Uncle Ice curtly. He shrugged. “Why? Because it’s the law. That’s why.”

Bradley swung his bat at the hornets’ nest. This was always dangerous with Uncle Ice. “It shouldn’t be a law. Don’t you think?”

“Doesn’t matter what I think. It’s the law. And we get paid to enforce the law, internationally speaking. And the military doesn’t work if personnel refuse to follow the rules in broad daylight. So.” He trailed his fingertip along the spines of all his precious books, then eventually found a different one, started flipping through it absentmindedly. “And even if it weren’t the law, it’d still get enforced extrajudicially. You know what that means?” He did that, when he was intentionally being cruel; used big words that Bradley didn’t know to make himself sound smarter. “It means outside the law. The way people talk to you. The way people respect you or don’t respect you. And this business, the one you want to go into, is all about respect. Being a pilot is kind of like being a knight: you have to be noble, you have to be honorable, you have to respect your service and your adversaries and yourself. And because I respect you, and because I care about you a lot, I’m just telling you the truth—you’re going to have to keep it a secret.”

Bradley blinked. There was something crushing and overwhelming about the truth—maybe the fact that it was the truth, maybe the fact that he hated the fact that it was the truth. It made sense. But it also meant his future was unspeakably bleak. He tried to speak over the lump in his throat when he said, “Yeah. That’s what Maverick told me, too.” And what he’d wanted to hear from Uncle Ice was that Uncle Mav was telling a lie. 

Something went soft and slightly wounded in Uncle Ice’s eyes. “I’m sorry,” Uncle Ice said gently. “I wish I could give you better advice than that. But that’s all I know. I don’t know any more than that.”

“Don’t you want to know more than that?”

“No.”

And thus did the generational gap widen into a chasm. 

—

[February 2003.]

Dear SN Bradshaw, / Please call/email/write me back when you get a chance. / Love Uncle Iceman.

…

[August 2003.]

Dear AN Bradshaw, / I hope you’re doing all right. I hope at some point you and I can get in touch to talk. Please let me know if there is some other address I should be sending my letters to. I am not sure if they are finding you. / Love Uncle Iceman.

…

[May 2004.]

Dear AN Bradshaw, / I wanted to congratulate you on your acceptance to college. Yours is a very good AE program & you should feel very proud. Please let me know if there’s anything you might need as you prepare to start your first year. / Love Uncle Iceman.

…

[August 2010.]

Dear LT Bradshaw, / I wanted to let you know that I’ll be at NAS Oceana for a conference from December 6-9. I understand that’s your neck of the woods—would you be interested in having dinner with me on either that Tuesday or Wednesday night? I would love to hear how you’ve been doing. You can reach my secretary at the number below. / Love Uncle Iceman.

…

[October 2014.]

Dear LT Bradshaw, / We Maverick and I want to wish you a Happy Birthday 30th Birthday. We heard you are deployed out in the Atlantic now—we hope you will be able to enjoy the enclosed gift card when you make it back to terra firma. Our updated personal cell numbers are below. / HAPPY BIRTHDAY! FROM UNCLE MAVERICK & Uncle Iceman.

…

“Haven’t heard back from the kid yet.”

“…You think we ever will?”

The longest silence.

—

[Pacific Air Type Commander Beau Simpson. 2016.]

You could see it in the way they held themselves. An utmost similarity. Aristocratic propriety. Maybe a little sense of entitlement: look how hard we’ve worked to be here. All three of them had it. More accurately: Captain Mitchell and Admiral Kazansky both had it, and had passed it down to their son.

“Captain Mitchell.” Everyone was watching. The sun had only just set; the sky was melting from horizon-red through orange and yellow and teal up to midnight black above them.

“It’s an honor, sir,” said Captain Mitchell, accepting Admiral Kazansky’s handshake. God, you’d never know it by looking at them. Half the people here on this Roosevelt flight deck knew about them, but they were so convincing that more people weren’t sure. TYCOM Simpson glanced at Rear Admiral Bates, who glanced back in confusion—I thought they were…? They were, TYCOM Simpson signaled, just abnormally good at keeping it a secret.

“Honor’s all mine, Captain,” said Admiral Kazansky, and he passed by without a second glance.

And when he made it down the line of aviators to Lieutenant Bradshaw—you could see it. The similarity in the way they held themselves. Straight and rigid and unyielding. Cold and dismissive beyond belief, even to each other. Admiral Kazansky held out a hand. Lieutenant Bradshaw took it, but refused to make eye contact. Quiet rebellion under the radar: Admiral Kazansky had taught him well. 

TYCOM Simpson glanced at Captain Mitchell, to gauge his reaction. And for once, he and Captain Mitchell were clearly thinking the exact same thing.

Like father, like son.

You could see it in their stubborn determination. How far they were willing to go. How hard they were willing to push. How long they were willing to hold their own hands to the fire, if it meant the familiar painful comfort of staying warm. “Ice-cold, huh?” TYCOM Simpson asked him the next morning, trying to pin down their strategy, trying to secure a guarantee that their family would do what their country asked of them, even if that meant death. Even if that meant the ultimate sacrifice.

“Only when I have to be,” replied Admiral Kazansky, which meant always, and—soon thereafter, he ordered Lieutenant Bradshaw to his death.

But also, Lieutenant Bradshaw went willingly, too.

“Dagger One is hit.”

“Dagger Two is hit.”

Loss is supposed to hit a man in stages. Isn’t that the truth? —Not so for Admiral Kazansky, whom grief obviously swallowed whole in just an instant. He did not break, or bend under its weight. Just stood there staring at the E-2D AWACS screen with wide wounded eyes—not disbelieving eyes. They were gone. Captain Mitchell and Lieutenant Bradshaw were gone. He was in no denial whatsoever. He had leapt straight to acceptance.

“Sir,” said TYCOM Simpson hesitantly, and he reached out to touch him—the stars on his shoulder—guide him back to reality—what must it be like, to lose a son?—to willingly forfeit your family?—

But before he could make contact, Admiral Kazansky drew a breath, moved away, and closed his eyes for just a second. Perfectly composed, even with the waters of grief closing over his head, even with three dozen observers in this C2 room all scrutinizing him for his response. Perfectly composed. How did he do it? How could he manage? How was he possibly still this proud?

“Vice Admiral Simpson,” he said calmly, “I relinquish my command to you, until you deem me necessary to return to my post.”

“Sir,” said Rear Admiral Bates, darting panicked, sympathetic eyes to TYCOM Simpson, but it was too late—Admiral Kazansky was already leaving the room. Head held high and steady. 

Some confusing weeks later, after Captain Mitchell and Lieutenant Bradshaw returned from the dead, TYCOM Simpson and Rear Admiral Bates would casually debrief the mission together in the lobby bar of the Waldorf-Astoria in Washington, D.C. No hard liquor, just beers. Just barely enough alcohol to give them an excuse to philosophize. “You think pride is a sin or a virtue?” TYCOM Simpson found himself asking, tracing the rim of his gilt-edged Stella Artois glass with a finger, after having recounted the above testimony.

“Neither,” said Rear Admiral Bates. “Gotta be a vice.”

“A vice.”

“Yeah. Good men die because of pride, bad men die because of pride…we send our sons to battle because of pride…wars are fought and won and lost because of pride… every war in human history, when you boil it down, begins when someone says, ‘You’re wrong and I’m right, and I’m proud of my own righteousness, proud enough to kill, proud enough to die, proud enough to send my sons to die…’”

“Oh, okay. That’s the root of all human conflict, then, according to you, Warlock. Okay.”

Rear Admiral Bates smiled and laughed at himself, too. Pride, he mouthed. Then shook his head. “We’re a proud species. It’s our vice.”

TYCOM Simpson was thinking about the two proudest men he knew, Admiral Kazansky and Lieutenant Bradshaw, and wondered what it was, exactly, that had driven a wedge between them, you’re wrong and I’m right and I’m proud enough of my own righteousness to send you to your death/inflict my death upon you… And then he remembered the warnings he’d previously received about Lieutenant Bradshaw and Lieutenant Seresin and their open relationship, and then he remembered Admiral Kazansky coldly shaking Captain Mitchell’s hand… and he wondered if the wedge between them was exactly that: the matter of pride.

—

[Tom. 2018.]

“Merry Christmas and a happy new year, and all that,” says Pete, raising his glass and reaching over the dining table to clink rims with Tom and then Bradley. “A good year! A really good year! —Sorry your guy couldn’t be here, Rooster. We’ll call him tonight before you go. Tell him we miss him.”

“Where is he again?” Tom asks.

“Washington,” Bradley says with a smile. “Big conference at the Pentagon. I’ll see him next week.”

“You know,” Pete says with a sly grin directed at Tom, “I’ve never actually heard the story of how you two got together.” 

“Oh,” Bradley says, shrugging as he tears open a dinner roll, “not that interesting. Pretty much what you’d expect. Inter-squadron competition-turned-sexual tension. Not exactly within regs, but we did meet each other before D.A.D.T. got repealed, so it wasn’t like we’d’ve ever been within regs, either…” (All the while, Tom’s smirking over the rim of his wine glass at Pete, No, Mav, I’m not gonna tell him I had them reassigned to the same boat…) “We broke up when I got sent to TOPGUN. But we figured it out eventually.”

“Glad you did. Sorry he couldn’t be here.”

Bradley hesitates, then says, “You know what I just realized? I never heard how you two got together…! You’ve never told me that story!”

Tom glances over at Pete, do you want to take this or shall I, and when Pete motions all yours, he sighs and says, “Uh, we don’t really know. We’ve just been telling people nineteen-eighty-six because it’s easy. But in a much more real sense…” He thinks about it, then shrugs. “Whatever. If you really want to know. In nineteen-ninety-three, right after I came back to San Diego to take command at Miramar, he and I had a drunken one-night stand. By accident. Which then turned into twenty-five years of accidental one-night stands. So.”

“Oh, c’mon. You guys bought a house together.”

“Yeah, that,” says Pete, “that was, uh, to facilitate the accidental one-night stands. Make it more convenient for everyone.”

“Cut out the middle-man,” Tom supplies, then shrugs again at the look on Bradley’s face. “That’s our story, kid. It’s not super romantic. We weren’t thinking about it that way. We didn’t know how.”

Pete raises the wine bottle to refill Tom’s glass—though it’s still halfway full—and then raises his eyebrows when he “notices” the bottle’s empty. Changes the subject as he stands: “Okay, what’s everyone feeling? Red, white, what’s next?”

“Red,” Tom says absently. “Anything big, I guess—first cab you see…” But then he thinks about it, and he amends his order before Pete leaves earshot: “Actually—we’ve got that petite sirah we gotta drink—two-thousand-four. Israeli. Might be somewhere in the back, sorry. But now’s a good occasion, I think, to bust it out for the holidays. No reason to save it.”

“Israeli sirah two-thousand-four,” Pete repeats, “okay. I got that.” 

Then he steps outside, leaving Tom and Bradley alone. It’s not awkward—they’ve worked really hard over the last two years to make it not-awkward, after the mission—but human beings are human beings. Prideful, stubborn creatures. There will always be a little guilt between the two of them, and a little blame.

“I have to be honest,” Tom says after a moment, interested in being honest for Bradley’s sake, “sorry we don’t have a better story to give you, about us. It is a little hard to talk about.”

“Why?”

“Well—we don’t know the words we’re supposed to use, for one. It’s your generation who sets the standard for that kind of thing. You young people. We’re a little out-of-date. And…well. I guess we’re just jealous of you. It’s hard to talk about.”

“Jealous?” Bradley repeats quizzically. “Why?”

Tom leans back in his chair and really thinks through what he wants to say. This is one of those impromptu speeches you never really intend to make, but are probably still important to get off your chest. “Maverick and I,” he starts carefully, “will never stop feeling guilty about what we did to you. Ever. You need to know that.” And when Bradley scoffs and huffs and tries to interrupt, he goes on, “Not just pulling your papers from the Academy. It goes back further than that. We will always feel like we deprived you of your father. The merits of that feeling are debatable, sure, but it’s a fact of life. A fact of our lives, anyway. And it’s dictated so much of how we live, and how we’ve lived, over the past thirty years. Part of the reason I came back to Miramar in nineteen-ninety-three was to be with you and your mom. Because I felt I owed you that, in return for what I’d taken.”

“You didn’t kill him,” Bradley says. “Or, at least, I never blamed you for killing him. You or Maverick both. You guys were my dads. You didn’t take anything from me. —Excepting the obvious, the Academy, but that was mostly my mom, I guess, so, whatever.”

“I’m just telling you what our lives have been like since the day I met you. Why we did what we did.”

“Okay. But I still don’t understand why you’re jealous.”

Tom smiles, a little faintly. “Because the other part of the reason I came back to Miramar in nineteen-ninety-three was to be with Maverick,” he says, “and I’m jealous of you because I didn’t recognize that at the time. —Everyone hopes, when they have kids—because, look, I’m not your dad, but you are my kid, really—everyone hopes they can bring their kid into a better world than the one they had when they were a kid, and we did. But no one prepares you for how jealous you get when your kid grows up in a better world than you did. I’m not sure people your age understand how hard it was for us when we were your age.”

“I do.”

“Sure, but I don’t think you do. I—I didn’t…” He sighs. “I never meant to fall in love with Mitchell. He never meant to fall in love with me. There certainly were men in relationships in the Navy back then who could make it work—we weren’t those guys. We looked down on those guys. Most people did. And when you were an officer, your job security and your paycheck relied on your subordinates’ respect for you. If we’d rocked the boat, traded away our respect for our relationship, well, we’d have each other, but we’d be out of a job. And then, if we’d been fired—what did we kill all those people for? For nothing! What a waste of all the lives we took! It wouldn’t have been honorable. Would’ve disrespected the Navy, our careers, the men we killed. So we didn’t talk about our relationship. You know that. Didn’t talk about who we were, or what we were doing, or why, because we were afraid of losing our own honor. Didn’t talk about it until the day you two died and came back from the dead. That’s what it took. Maverick still hates talking about some of that stuff, all the labels, all the words—that’s why I sent him to get a bottle at the back of the fridge, he might be out there a while…”

“Cunning,” Bradley says softly, but leaves the space open after he speaks.

Tom looks away. “Maybe this is getting too deep into the weeds. I’m just trying to tell you what it’s been like for us. Not sure how much of this you want to hear.”

“All of it. —All of it.”

Tom clears his throat. “…Well, Maverick keeps trying to convince me that we never wasted any time. And I know there is some truth to that—we didn’t start out liking each other at all—even if we’d been as brave as people your age are nowadays, even if we’d been open with each other about that kind of stuff, we still probably wouldn’t have ended up together. I mean, we really didn’t like each other. Especially right after your dad died, and especially after you left, in two-thousand-two. So maybe it was better for us in the long run that we didn’t talk about it. But I look back on the thirty years I’ve spent with him, and…it still all feels like a waste to me.” Maybe he really is too deep into the weeds. But he just wants Bradley to understand. “Look, Mitchell is, beyond any possible shadow of a doubt, the love of my life. Always has been and always will be. Right? —I just wish I’d known that at the time. I’m jealous of you because you’re exactly the age I was when I came back to Miramar to be with you and your mom and Maverick, and you’re already married, and you won’t ever have to sacrifice any of your honor for your marriage. You’re one of the most respected men in the Navy.”

“So are you, Ice, and you’re also married to another man.”

“I’ll remind you, though it hurts a little, that I’m almost exactly a quarter-century older than you, and you and I got married within a week of each other. I had to wait for times to change.” He holds Bradley’s gaze for a moment, then finishes the last of his dinner and sets his fork down on his plate. “So, if you were ever wondering why Mav and I are a little bitter around you and Jake, well, it’s because we are.”

“Oh,” says Bradley. “See, I always thought it was just because you and Maverick are both notoriously bitter people.”

“We are,” Tom admits through a laugh. Then he continues, “But—you should also know how proud of you we both are. How proud of you we’ve both always been. We’re not very brave men—well, we are, of course, but maybe not in the way that matters. It’s pretty gratifying to have a kid who’s braver than you are. Every parent’s dream, whether we want to admit it or not. You’re brave enough for all of us.”

It’s at this moment that Pete opens the garage door and sticks his head inside and hollers, “Ice, I can’t find it. What about a merlot? Can we do a merlot?”

“No, baby, the sirah,” Tom answers without turning his head. “It’s on the second shelf, you might—have to rearrange some of the bottles—we have too much wine. We need to drink more, me and you.”

“Not a problem,” says Pete, and he shuts the door again.

“It’s on the third shelf,” Tom tells Bradley in an aside. “He’ll find it eventually. He would’ve tried to change the subject six times by now. —The previous Secretary of the Army—he actually just got married this week, I think; I need to send a card—also gay. He and his partner invited Maverick and me out to dinner the last time we were in D.C. Most uncomfortable I’ve ever seen Mav in my whole life. Asking us questions like, ‘How did you guys get together…?’ ‘Was it easier for you guys because you were in the Navy…?’ ‘When did you…know…?’” When Bradley laughs, Tom does, too. It’s really nice, it turns out, to joke about this stuff with someone who understands. “We just made our answers up out of thin air. I was uncomfortable too, admittedly. That’s what I’m saying. Mav and I never learned the vocabulary to answer questions like that.”

Bradley starts taking their plates to the sink. What a good kid. “You know,” he says from the kitchen, glancing over his shoulder when Tom joins him at the counter, “it’s so funny you bitch that you and Mav don’t have a romantic love story, or whatever. When I was a kid, you and him were literally the pinnacle of romance.”

“Oh, really.”

“Yeah. There’s something romantic about the secret, too. When Jake and I made our relationship official—the first time—I begged him to keep it a secret just for a little while. You know; it was sexy, for a few minutes! Something only he and I knew!”

“And you immediately discovered how awful it is, I’m sure,” Tom says noncommittally. “I’m jealous of you that you learned that lesson young. —Yeah, real romantic. Maverick and I could’ve ended each other’s careers fourteen thousand times over. Real romantic.”

“And trusted each other not to,” Bradley points out—

—which makes Tom reconsider. 

Yeah, okay, maybe it’s a little romantic. The way Grimm’s fairytales, once you wipe away all the blood, are just a little romantic. “I’m of the opinion that the only thing getting old is good for is looking back on your life through rose-colored glasses. Sure. Historical revisionism it is. It was a little romantic.”

“What’s a little romantic?” says Pete, stepping into the kitchen and triumphantly brandishing his 2004 petite sirah; “Have I missed something funny? —It was on the third shelf, by the way. Could’ve told me that before I went and reorganized the whole fridge.”

Tom graciously accepts the half-annoyed kiss to the cheek, and answers, “Nothing you would’ve laughed at, I’m afraid.”

“Oh, one of those conversations,” says Pete, hunting around in the drawer for the corkscrew. “If you were planning on continuing, I can go out and rearrange the wine bottles by region instead of by year—” and scoffs when Tom kisses him back to reassure him, conversation’s over.

“Did you know,” Bradley says, “your husband is now openly calling you the love of his life?”

“Oh, yeah,” says Pete with a smile, popping the cork from the bottleneck, “he tells me that all the time. Nothing new.” Tops up their glasses, then deftly changes the subject: “Oh, gosh. I never asked. This is the big news. How are you and Hangman enjoying SOUTHCOM?”

“Oh, God,” says Bradley, rolling his eyes. “Let me tell you…”

“I think we did good,” Pete says later that night—they’re alone now, so he’s fine talking—as he tugs loose the tucked sheets to clamber into bed, and when Tom moves to turn off the light he adds, “No, you can keep reading.”

Tom sets his book down onto his chest and pulls his glasses off anyway. “Well, you and I are known for doing ‘good,’” he muses after a second. “We’re pretty universally renowned for being good at stuff. But, regarding what in particular? —Raising our kid?”

“Yeah. We did good.”

Actually, they didn’t do very well at all. But of course that’s not what Pete means. Pete means: it’s shocking and stunningly fortunate that they did as poorly as they did and still somehow ended up with such a good kid. Tom’s looking up at the ceiling and feeling very small. “How did that happen? Genuinely, how did that happen? I did always build getting married into my plan for my life—but I never thought far enough ahead to consider having kids. And now you and I have a kid who’s in his thirties. How’d that happen? I remember when he could barely walk!”

Pete yawns and rolls over onto his side and closes his eyes. “You and I have a kid who earned a Medal of Honor.”

“I know exactly how that happened” —and doesn’t like to think about it too much. “I suppose we’re just a family of overachievers. A lot of failing upwards, you and me. Somehow we failed our way upwards into a very happy lifelong relationship, a superstar kid…a few dozen medals each, ourselves…”

“That’s life,” says Pete sleepily.

“That is not most people’s lives. You’re aware that our lives look nothing like the average person’s life, right? You understand that?”

“That’s our life.”

Tom considers this. Yeah, it is their life. Wild how that happens. 

He smiles at the singular word life, sets his book on the nightstand, presses a kiss to Pete’s bare shoulder, and turns off the light.