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horrorslashergirl · 4 years ago

Note

May I request another part of Another chance to start off?

Chromeskull x Reader- Another chance to start off Part 4

Authors Note: This oneshot that turned into a story. I almost forgot about it. Also adding some Jesse Childhood Ideas because why not?

Warnings: 18+ because of childhood abuse and disturbing themes about little Jesse

Words: 1.7k

Part 1 here

Part 2 here

Part 3 here

It's been two months and you still haven't heard anything from your so-called 'hero' other than the fact that he was on business as his assistant, Spann, called it. That left you to take care of your baby, but still no ability to go out of his place, save for the huge lawn around the palatial villa that you now resided in.

You didn't know anything about this man, and Spann refused to give you any details because it wasn't her place to spoke of such personal details, and according to her, it was his business to tell you, leaving you with tons of question about Jesse, at last, you knew his name.

Considering how much of a serious and sophisticated security system he had, you could only guess he was an important man. You took liberties when your little buddle of joy was sleeping to explore the villa. You agreed that his favorite colors were black, white, and accents of silver chrome and he definitely had an affiliation with skulls, and he had very expensive tastes in everything down from his cars to his clothes to the smallest things.

You were currently sitting on an armchair next to the crib of your baby waiting for your daughter to wake up and feed her.

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

Jesse Cromeans had a lot of issues and as big as his 6'7 tall frame he was a handful package; a bad temper, certain sadistic urges, a sassy attitude that made tons of enemies, not like any of them dared to go against him, but little people to probably none knew the whole story behind who he truly was.

One who was very observant could possibly tell that Jesse had mommy issues, considering his victims were all female, save for the brown-nosing males that were just collateral victims.

As a little boy, he was very shy, and his muteness didn't help him either. His family was always a mystery to most who knew him, but none dared to ask him about his relatives, not like in the present he had any. He didn't know his father, and he was always curious as a little boy about who his daddy was.

His mother, from the remaining memories, was a very beautiful woman, giving birth at a young age of twenties to little Jesse. His father didn't want to take the responsibility of raising a child, especially a disabled one, so he pretty much vanished after his mother gave birth to Jesse.

She was still young and clueless about raising a child, alas she took the responsibility and tried, for three years until she was diagnosed with bone cancer. Young mother at the flower of age with such a severe form of cancer was definitely a nightmare and it only persisted until Jesse was six and she died, leaving him to what he knew was the grandfather of his own daddy.

When Jesse asked his grandfather about his dad, the old man simply said that he shouldn't worry about dead bodies like that. His grandfather was a mortician, owning a funeral home company, that left Jesse with spending most of his time there, with the corpses. At first, he was just playing in the hallways, until he got curious and walked into a room, his brown innocent eyes widening at the scene.

That really scarred his mind, his grandfather on top of a dead woman's body...

It only turned worse when his legal guardian, his grandfather getting the full rights of raising Jesse, indulged the little boy into these activities; the first body being that of his own mother.

That not scarred his mind, it destroyed his psychical health.

That was the start of creating a beast, the beast he was today.

Probably that's why he was drawn to you; you were much younger than he was. What you didn't knew was that ever since you were brought to his place you have been monitored day and night. He loved to watch you nurture your baby, take care of the little human that was made of purity and innocence.

He kind of felt jealous in a way, because he wanted the same affection.

Definitely mommy issues.

Who could really blame him? He didn't exactly have a woman type to look up at, and girls were definitely a subject that was tough for him. In his teen years, girls were looking more up to the loud, obnoxious, and confident ones.

Since he started hitting puberty, he grew in height, and grew, and grew. He was a tall and lanky kind of guy, perhaps very awkward, but very intelligent, despite not getting credit for it.

With girls it was a different story, they didn't have the patience with him and his signing. His teenage years were full of nicknames because of his height, girls making fun of him, teasing him, but not in the cute kind way. He slowly started to realize why his grandfather had certain tastes in...women.

If they are dead, they cannot hurt you. Simple.

Still, from time to time he had that starving for affection, someone to be genuinely there for him.

He remembered after he finished high school...He left his hometown and after years of college and slowly but successfully starting his own business, he changed. The lanky and awkward guy bloomed into a ferocious and manipulative mastermind; pale skin by each year filled with more ink, muscles filling his lanky figure.

Jesse changed.

At first, it felt weird to have such control, but once he got that taste, he never wanted to let it go.

Back in the present days, Jesse didn't know what to think of you; he was probably pitying you, although that was highly unlike him. He pities none but seeing you watch over your offspring like a protective mother made his heartbeat in a way he didn't know it was possible.

He took a sip of his whiskey as he looked at the computer screen; tomorrow he will get back home to you and perhaps get to an arrangement, after all, you were wearing his family name.

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

It was morning, but you were awake for three hours, now you just finished feeding your daughter and she closed her eyes; after all, it was still the period of the baby that she needed more sleep than an adult, so you tucked her in, smiling at her angelic face.

You heard the door slightly open and turned around, expecting Spann, but you were surprised to see Jesse, your eyes quickly turning into a slight glare, getting in front of the baby's crib like a shielding mother lion.

Jesse found many things attractive on a female, but this was definitely something that triggered a more primal part of his male instincts. There was just something mesmerizing about a mother that protects her baby.

He pulled out his phone to type.

'We need to talk.' the electronic voice spoke, making you furrow your brows.

Despite wanting to give him a piece of your mind, you learned from your past relationship, if you could call it that, that yelling and throwing tantrums won't solve a problem, so you nodded, taking a glance at your baby, not exactly feeling like leaving.

'Spann will look over her while we discuss.' he spoke through the phone.

You followed him downstairs to his study, opening the door for you to enter then closing it to have privacy. You sat down on one of the armchairs in front of his desk, while he took his designated place behind the huge black desk.

'I know things have been inconvenient.'

You snorted at that.

"More like very chaotic. Look...I am very mad by this whole kidnapping-owning thing, but I also knew I should be grateful to you for saving me from my now dead abusive husband, which reminds me....You killed him...and it didn't look like it was your first time." you spoke in a firm voice.

Jesse smirked at that. Smart one...That's good.

'Then I should probably let you know everything.'

He began to explain everything, down from his facade chroming business to the real deal of the organization, everything about killing, snuff films, and piggies. It was like someone was telling you a horror story, leaving you shocked and disgusted.

"Great....so basically now I am involved in a mafia kind of thing." you sarcastically said, rubbing your forehead in exasperation.

'You can take it like that.' He waved it off, shrugging.

You sighed, then looked at him.

"What will happen to me?" you asked, pursing your lips into a thin line.

'Nothing. If I wanted you dead, you would have been from that night we meet.'

"That really relaxes me." you snorted, crossing your arms over your chest.

'I will protect you and your daughter.'

That surprised you. Why was he so willing to help a woman he barely knew and her baby? You tried to find an answer yourself but decided to ask him and his answer was ever more so intriguing you.

'No child deserves to grow without parents.'

He looked like he knew what he meant, perhaps he went through the same ordeal, without family, but it was too early to ask him such sensitive topics since you didn't know each other that good.

"So, you basically want me as your wife?" you asked in amusement, but his look showed that he was serious.

'I'm not forcing you. It's your choice.'

You huffed then decided.

"Probably too early...Can I, at last, get to know my future husband?" you asked, sassiness dripping from your voice, but behind it, it was sincerity.

Jesse was to say it, surprised by your words, and couldn't help but give you a toothy grin. He got up from his chair and walked towards you. You got up as well and were a little nervous when he was just inches away from you, his fingers typing on his phone.

'Tonight. Dinner. Spann will babysit your daughter. You need some quality time.'

You thought a little about it and decided that everyone deserved a chance to start off.

"Yes. I would like that."

Jesse smirked in victory and leaned down to kiss you, only for your index finger to press gently against his scarred lips.

"Don't push your luck." you said with a cheeky smile, making him chuckle silently.

Yes, indeed everyone deserved another chance to start off.

#Chromeskull #chromeskull x reader #Laid to rest 2009 #Chromeskull: Laid to rest 2 #jesse cromeans #jesse cromeans x reader #slasher x reader #horror movies

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illicien · 4 years ago

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Mortician/Medium AU

Okay, so I’m doing this again. I had another idea that I know I’ll never write, so we’re gonna do another adopt-a-story! This was inspired mostly by watching a lot of Ask A Mortician, though after starting to write it I realized the beginning had some parallels to The Medium the game, but only in the set-up really.

I’ll jot down what I’ve written here, and some of the ideas for the story at the end of that, but knowing I’ll never get around to it... y’know. Here’s a basic synopsis:

When you grow up in a dysfunctional family, you expect a lot of things. Mostly, you expect to be able to get away from them, eventually. Stephen thought for years and years that he had - he'd made his way to New York, he'd begun working at a morgue, eventually even inheriting it from the kindly old man who had owned it prior.

Of course, his family was dysfunctional for a lot of reasons, and perhaps he was the most dysfunctional of all of them.

After all, he could speak with the dead.

The rest is under the cut!

"They say," a man's voice broke the silence of his office, "that you can speak with those who have departed from this plane."

"I have no idea who 'they' are, why you would believe them, or why you should care," Stephen responded to the stranger without so much as looking up from his paperwork.

"Because there's someone I need to reach," the man responded, striding into the room and taking a seat across from the mortician without invitation.

"Then use a telephone," Stephen responded, setting his pen aside and looking up, folding his hands together.

"The person I need to speak with isn't on my plane-"

"Then you're in the same boat as everyone else. I'm sorry for your loss, but unless you have a body for me to deal with, or advice on a local cemetery, I can't help you."

"Can't, or won't?" the man responded, the low light from the lamp on Stephen's desk illuminated only a few strands of the man's pitch hair, and jewel green eyes. He was, after all, closed for the evening, why would he waste the power or risk strangers walking in?

And yet one had.

"Pick one. We're closed," he gestured to the sign absently. Green eyes never left him.

"He'll come to you in his own time. Perhaps by then you'll have reconsidered," the man sighed, getting silently to his feet and straightening the sleeves of his immaculate black suit, which seemed to blend into the darkness of the office.

He left shortly after, and Stephen barely followed his passing with his eyes before shaking his head and getting to his feet to double-check the door. Shuffling through the hallway, Stephen rubbed at his face slightly before reaching the door.

Locked.

The mortician groaned at that. Most of the otherworldly entities that he dealt with had the decency to wait until he was drinking, or on the border of sleep. This pesky one, it seemed, thought that he was still alive - walking through doorways, sitting, straightening himself out as he played pretend. He should've known better.

From here the idea is that Loki’s body is transferred to the morgue Stephen works at, with Tony arriving later in the day. Stephen doesn’t recognize the body - why should he? He hadn’t seen Loki properly. Tony is clearly grieving but trying to do his best to handle this situation, and even Stephen is feeling pretty bad for him because he’s not exactly fooled by Tony trying to act like he’s okay when there are literally tears in his eyes.

Obviously, people react differently, so Stephen takes his time with it all, checking with Tony about options for the body and what he wants done. Tony’s state of grief has a lot to do with the fact that he doesn’t know how Loki died, so he’s just absolutely mind-boggled by what happened. It came out of no where, and no one can really explain it. A part of him is hoping that Stephen can, at least, so that this can all be put to rest.

Of course, the problem is that Loki isn’t dead. Loki is separated from his body while attempting astral projection - he doesn’t know how to get back, and is himself in something of a state of panic over the situation (though you’d never guess, in typical Loki fashion) because, for one thing, he doesn’t want to leave Tony, and for another he doesn’t know how to convince people that he isn’t dead, or why his body has shut down.

As Stephen begins the process of getting Loki’s body ready for burial, Loki will not leave him alone about how if he does this, he’ll actually kill him. For real. And Stephen is at a loss because even assuming this isn’t just a ghost who isn’t ready to accept it, what does Loki expect him to do about it? And what does he expect to tell Tony, who, by Loki’s own admission, never knew anything about his magic?

Anyway, this was essentially the premise here. If you wanna take it and run with it, by all means. I hope you enjoy.

#adopt a story #IronStrangeFrost #IronStrange #IronFrost #StrangeFrost #OT3 #mortician AU

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glumpiglet · 5 years ago

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A Misunderstanding (F!ReaderxBeetlejuice)

So I made another one of these, I’m a greedy little bottom and only the thought of bug boi can satisfy me….. This is the point where I tell you I’m shamelessly self-inserting myself as the reader at this point. I’ve not done a lot of Xreader writing, so I’m learning I’m not great at making characters neutral, there are multiple things that just uh ... seemed to serve where I wanted the story to go so I used it XD sorry peeps I’m so bad

p.s thanks again to @boopeen for making the prompt post. I’m sure this wasn’t what they were thinking it would be used for XD

p.p.s my requests are open so slide into them if you feel so inclined. Love you guys <3

TW: Swearing, Drug Use, sprinkle of angst.

Angst: “I don’t want to do this anymore,”

Fluff: “please hug me, I really need it.”

Walking through your front door, you had to expel a sigh in relief, another long day at work done. Hanging up your purse and keys, you expected to be ambushed. Confused at the lack of.. Well any life in your apartment. The irony wasn’t lost on you.

Calling out for the company who you left this morning; you weren’t summoning him half as much lately. It seems to be he was just….. Sticking around.

“Hello?”

Where the hell was he? Inspecting the apartment for any trace, you came up empty. Part of you didn’t want to risk bothering him if he was actually busy with something.

On the other hand, you were selfish. There was only one way you wanted to spend your evening.

“Beetlejuice. Beetlejuice. Beetlejuice.” As per usual, you braced yourself for the explosion that was the arrival of your BFF from beyond the grave.

Silence.

Shrugging, you turned towards your bedroom. He was either actually busy, or trying to scare you. Most likely the latter, you weren’t exactly in the mood for a spook right now. You voiced that opinion out loud, and got no response.

The lights were off in your room, a chill in the air causing goosebumps on your arms.

In the corner, you could see two glowing orbs in the blackness.

You always were a jumpy person. You could run into a stranger turning a corner on a sidestreet, and scream bloody murder. A certain someone loved to use that to his advantage.

Nerves tense, you turned on the light. Ready for any amount of shock and horror that awaited you. Your eyes took in your normal bedroom. Rolling them, you took a step forward into the room, ready to call out once again.

“Boo.”

Luckily you were able to stop yourself from making any sound other than a gasp, whirling around to almost bump noses with Beetlejuice. Heart pounding, you reached out to shove him in the chest.

“Asshole!” Scooped up tight in his cold embrace, it was impossible to not feel the flush of utter happiness of seeing him after the day you had. All he had to do was give you that earnest crooked smile and you were already forgiving him.

“Mmm.. Watch your language, babes. Or I might have to spank you.” Chuckling in his arms, you took stock of Beetlejuice practically glowing green. Someone was feeling good.

“Hello, BJ. How was your day?”

“Great! I spent the morning scaring people in your hallway, I think I permanently scarred the guy two doors down, it was so hilarious!” Continuing to giggle as you extracted yourself from his grip, you turned towards the vanity, beginning the task of taking make-up off, removing your jewelry.

BJ watched you in the mirror, as always invading your personal space, murmuring into your hair.

“Then I had to...Go back for something..” The vagueness of his demeanor made you pause. Beetlejuice was always open and honest, perhaps a bit too much, actually definitely too much at all times. It was a trait that in equal parts you admired while simultaneously it annoyed you.

“Yeah, I got home and I was like, ‘where is he?’” Finished, you gently pulled him by his lapels. Taking the short trip through the hallway to the living room, depositing him on your sofa and sitting beside him. Taking his arm to wrap around your shoulder, you made yourself comfortable, knowing for a fact Beetlejuice would not mind in the slightest.

“Aw, miss me that much, babes?”

“Maybe…” Reaching out to take the remote. You turned the t.v on just for the background noise, some episode of a show you had seen multiple times. Snuggling further into BJ, you couldn’t stop your heart racing once more as his hands began to wander, running down your sides to rub at your thighs.

“Hell yeah, this is what I’m talking about,” Scoffing at how he could take any affectionate moment and instantly make it sexual, not that you were helping matters by throwing yourself over him. Before he got too carried away, you linked your fingers with his and held them in your lap.

“Be quiet please,”

This was the part of your day you could always look forward to, BJ had been teaching himself to chill out recently. It was hard to come home from work daily to a feral, sexually charged adolescent bouncing off your walls. You weren’t trying to change BJ, god no it was completely give and take, you were good for each other. He gave you spontaneous fun, letting you not take things too seriously. In contrast, you were trying to explain to him why some things were important to breathers, why you had to go to work everyday, pay the bills, etc.

It was becoming difficult to keep your eyes open. Feeling yourself slowly drifting off, you were dozing off on your friend…

Very few ‘friendships’ you had ever had involved as much cuddling as you did with Beetlejuice. Sure, nothing was ever run of the mill when it came to the demonic hurricane that was the self proclaimed ghost with the most. Not to mention the flirting. And long, quiet moments just gazing at each other, so close your breaths would intermingle…

Beetlejuice’s scent was one of the first hurdles you had to deal with in the beginning. You did realize you were hanging out with a dead guy, nothing could be done for his overall awful appearance.

In your youth, you had briefly wanted to be a mortician, morbid change of topic nonetheless, but you had the chance to experience a lot of dead bodies in that time. You didn’t ultimately go through with the career, but those memories always stuck with you.

So you were horrified when you first came in close contact with him, which was within the first two seconds of meeting, for he truly smelt dead. The association of it was the oddest sense of deja vu. The pungent, off smell was something you tried to ignore for as long as you could, not wanting to appear rude.

One time, the two of you were just sitting around the house all day, and you were asking him questions. About Death. The Netherworld. His life before you had known each other.

When you broached the topic of if he ever bathed, it seemed to confuse him. You knew it had been a stupid question, why would he? He had never been alive. Nor did he ever stay corporeal for long, before he met you. Stupid breather things like hygiene didn’t matter in the Netherworld.

“Would….you want me to start?” The question had been so tentative, you immediately felt bad for opening your mouth.

“No..No Beetlejuice, you’re right. You’ve never had to before, you don’t have to start now. I’ll get used to it.”

The matter was dropped and you had pulled him closer, insistence on squeezing tighter to prove to him it didn’t truly matter.

The next day you came home to your house in chaos. It looked like there had been a flood, water was everywhere and clones were on hands and knees with towels. At your appearance, there was a brief moment in time where everything stood still. You were standing in the doorway with eight pairs of eyes on you.

Then they attacked.

“She’s not supposed to be home yet!”

“Boss is gonna kill us!”

“Shut up, idiot!”

“Hey babes! Lookin’ good today.”

“Funny story, sweetness. Just a little accident,”

Hands grabbed at your arms, curving along your back as they led you into your living room, where the water luckily had not reached.

“Wait-wait. Everybody calm down. What’s happened?” Confusion did not abate as you saw Beetlejuice shuffle in from the hallway, looking unbelievably contrite. His head turned down, he wouldn’t even meet your eye as he mumbled out a:

“Hey,”

Expressing your bewilderment again, you shooed the hands off of you. You weren’t angry, but you were beginning to feel your hair begin to rise at the fact no one was actually giving you an answer.

“Sorry..We uh..might of kind of….floodedyourbathtub.” Not catching the whispered end, you stayed puzzled. Realizing something else was different, other than the disorder, you finally took notice of him.

He looked….Well he looked hot as fuck. You had never seen him in such a state of undress. His jacket and tie was gone, his cuffs rolled up to expose masculine forearms. He was also… surprisingly clean. His shirt was still dirt ridden, but the skin underneath shined porcelain. The sight of him without the usual grime that accompanied him made you pause.

Nothing could stop the flush you felt working its way over your face, if he knew he was making you blush you’d never hear the end of it, you had to stop before he noticed.

Eyes snapped back to his face.

“Your hair’s wet...Why-....Did you shower?” Looking from clone to clone, you noticed them all in different states of wetness/cleanliness. Some looked like they didn’t even get washed.

“You’re all wet…..Did you guys all shower together?”

The picture was beginning to form in your head, you couldn’t stop the incredulous giggle from the image of them all cramming into your one person bathroom.

“....Are you mad?”

Looking at Beetlejuice, you saw the anxious, fidgety demon trying to appear remorseful. He was too fucking cute, were you mad about him trying to clean himself up after you had selfishly told him he stunk? Opening up the floodgates, you began to laugh heartily, reaching out to hug him.

It was weird. He smelt the same, but different. His usual pungent stench you associated with death wasn’t gone completely, but it definitely wasn’t making your eyes water. Mostly, he smelt earthy, like a field after it rained. There was another familiar smell that was making you feel nostalgic, you realized it was probably because he used he Irish Spring you kept for emergencies, of course he would use the big green bottle, your silly bug.

“You’re so funny. Why would I get mad? It was an accident,” Shaking your head, you tried not to give a name to the fluttering in your stomach, and turned towards the nearest clone, running your hand through his damp locks, listening to him preen into your palm.

“Maybe next time, just do it one by one please,” Grabbing the towel from the clone’s grip, you walked to the edge of the puddle in your house and dropped the towel, soaking up the water.

Turning around, you felt the prickle of discomfort on your skin as you saw them all still staring. You loved the clones, thought they all had their own personalities and had more fun hanging out with them than your actual friends most times.

It still never failed to make you uneasy when they did this, observing you like prey. You couldn’t tell what they were collectively thinking, and their boss certainly wasn’t helping.

“Seriously, it’s just water guys, really it’s fine. Look nothing was even damaged.”

“Come on, I’ll help you finish.”

So that’s how you spent the rest of your day, mopping and rotating the towels they used until the floor was just damp, and called it good enough. That night, you had a full cuddle puddle with them all as you watched scary movies till dawn.

He had even started brushing his teeth for you. The first time you had walked in on him, fangs and droopy tongue covered in foam as it looked like he was attempting to choke himself with the extra toothbrush you kept in your cabinet. Not that you ever expected anyone else to use it other than yourself when your old one had lost the bristles, but the idea of BJ taking the second slot in your toothbrush holder made you pause. The heavy feeling in your chest coupled with the affection you couldn’t help but feel. You knew you were in trouble.

You were in love with Beetlejuice.

Being shook, you jolted out of your slumber. Opening your eyes, you realized you had fallen asleep on him. You expected him to maybe make some snarky comment that he wasn’t a pillow, but he just looked at you with an expression hard to place.

Mumbling out an apology, you remove yourself from on top of him, walking out of your room into the kitchen, catching sight of BJ floating beside you.

“Tired?”

“Just a long week, thank god tomorrow Friday.” Opening your fridge, you grimaced. It was time for some grocery shopping. Just deciding on an apple for the moment, you heard Beetlejuice rasp over your shoulder.

“It’s okay, sweet cheeks. I got just the thing for you to suck on.”

Spinning around, poised to throw a jab, the momentum left when you took sight of BJ looking at you mischievously, hand outstretched with a large joint between his pale fingers.

No amount of stubbornness could stop the smile on your face. Beetlejuice was incorrigible.

You snatched it from his hands as he giggled as mischievous as a child, you opened up your living room window and sat on the nook you so love to habitat often. Amused as BJ, just as you had on the couch, practically circled into your lap like a house cat. Not being able to fit himself, he huffed and settled his head on your legs instead.

Your landlord luckily was a 60 year old hippie that grew in your community backyard, you still didn’t need your place reeking of weed. Especially with the potent Netherworld shit he brought around.

Passing the joint back and forth, BJ blew intricate smoke rings around your head. Shaking your head, loving it, shifting through your hair. Blaming the high, gaining courage from the stuff, you began to attempt your own rings, amused at how they couldn’t keep shape. You loved the blanketing feeling that was passing over you.

Beetlejuice was practically purring, nuzzling into your legs. Without thinking, you began to scratch at his head. You really didn’t need a pet when you had BJ around. Watching as pink peeked through his roots, Beetlejuice butted the roach into the ashtray, setting his sights on you.

The air was thick with tension, unconsciously you lifted your legs, bringing his face closer, eyes bouncing between his, trying to figure him out.

This was a favourite game between the two of you. The classic game of chicken. It didn’t help that you were always the one to break first. It was just a lot of conflicting feelings.

It would be so easy to say yes to Beetlejuice, give into his obvious advances, but you didn’t want to be some breather booty call. Sure, the two of you had a great friendship, the thought of ruining it with your dumb feelings scared the shit out of you.

But you were only human. And an incredibly high one at the moment.

Sighing, turning your head away, you mumbled. “I don’t want to do this anymore,”

You were happy to get this off your shoulders, sad at the idea of his rejection and unbelievably ripped. Letting slip a pathetic giggle, the multiple emotions were causing tears to well in your eyes. This. He was just so important to you. You couldn’t believe you were about to do this and you were so nervous what his reaction would be.

“I see. I knew this was gonna happen eventually….Bye (Y/N).”

Wait, what?

Tilting your head up, you saw Beetlejuice standing up, shoulders slumped in defeat.

“Huh? No! BJ look at me please.” You jumped up, snatching at his jacket sleeve, forcing him to turn, but he wouldn’t look at you. What the hell just happened?

You felt your mouth go dry as you realized the way he had interpreted what you said. Oh no..

“I didn’t mean it that way at all. I mean.. I’m over just being friends, playing this game with you…. Not that it isn’t fun!”

You were digging yourself deeper, the words you wanted to say weren’t coming out.

What you wanted to say was ‘I love you Beetlejuice. I want you to move in with me and become more than friends.’ The weed was causing your mind to move in slow motion, this was the absolute worst timing for this. What the fuck were you doing?

No, no more of this. You weren’t backing down from this.

Beetlejuice wasn’t helping. In the midst of your freak out, someone was also happening to him. His hair had gone black as night. You had never seen him so...Blank. It would have been better if he was angry or obviously upset, you could deal with that. You had seen that before.

This was more terrifying than anything.

“No.. Not game as in I don’t take us seriously….I’m fucking this up so bad..” Babbling to him, he wasn’t saying anything. Continuing to just look in the distance, like you weren’t even speaking to him.

“Calm down BJ, please. I’m so sorry for just blurting that out. Let me explain.”

There was a quiet, tense moment you thought he was going to say no, leave you still. Hurt eyes slowly turned to look at you as he backed away, distancing himself from you.

Taking a deep breath, collecting your thoughts.

“When I said that, I meant that...done. I want us to… Be more to each other. Have a relationship.”

There. You had said it out loud. Still, you couldn’t stop the word vomit from continuing.

“I’m just… If that isn’t what you want Beetlejuice, you can tell me.. I want you to tell me-”

“Babes?”

“Yes, BJ?”

“Please hug me, I really need it.” Without speaking you rush over, climbing onto him, clutching desperately at his back, not believing how close you came from losing him. Unbelievably lucky that everything turned out Beetlejuice breathed your scent in deeply, muttering something into your neck.

Pulling back, you can’t help but continue the tears tracking down your face as you see his own glittering like amber.

“You scared me.”

Sniffling, you hide your face into his shoulder. That’s the worst thing he could have said to you. The fact that once again, boring, average you was reminded how much this powerful creature’s world revolved around you. It was the most humbling experience imaginable.

Striving to keep your mouth shut, you just breathed in the quiet moment. Basking in each other. No secrets, no hidden feelings.

“Woah. I’ve…..Never felt that before,”

“I know, honey. I’m so dumb. If I were just more honest with you, we could have been doing this so much sooner,”

“You’re not dumb, babes. I know i can be…. A lot.” Scoffing, you cover his mouth with your hand, watching his expression become one of surprise.

“Thank you, BJ. You are not too much..” Giggling, you lean towards him, “You’re just right.”

Not wanting to speak anymore, needing to finally show him how much you wanted him. You kissed Beetlejuice for the first time. You expected him to be eager, sloppy and immediately hot and bothered. Nothing could have prepared you for him to be so sweet and gentle. It made your heart hurt with regret. Why didn’t you want to tell him how you felt? There was still a lot to talk about, but there was something else you needed to show him first.

Pulling away, the two of you were flushed and panting, you licked your lips and watched as his eyes flitted to them.

“But it’s okay. I know a perfect way I could make it up to you.”

#beetlejuice #beetlejuice the musical #beetlejuice x reader #beetlejuice fic #beetlejuice prompt #beetlejuice musical #prompts #angst and fluff

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buckybarnesbingo · 5 years ago

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BBB Week 8 Roundup!

Some amazing fills made this week, go forth and appreciate our creators!

Title: Flower Petals Collaborator: writing-what-writing Link: Tumblr Square Filled: K5 - Hanahaki disease Ship: Bucky/Reader Rating: Gen Major Tags: very light angst Summary: Bucky’s been coughing up flowers and the only cure is if you love him back Word Count: 863

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Title: I’d Do It Again Collaborator: startrekkingaroundasgard Link: Tumblr Square Filled: U2 - Queer Platonic Relationship Ship: Bucky/Bruce Rating: Teen Major Tags: mention of torture, mild violence and threat Summary: After he is kidnapped, Bucky rescues Bruce from a facility which is trying to separate him from the Hulk. Word Count: 1620

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Title: As the Spirits Guide Us Collaborator: 27dragons Link: AO3 Squares Filled: Chapter 3 - K1: Poison Chapter 4 - K2: Dark Ship: WinterIron Rating: Explicit Major Tags: Alternate Universe - Prehistoric, Running Away, Spirit Animals, totem spirits, Coming of Age, Sharing a Meal, Sex, Frottage Summary: The Clan of the Hydra value’s Bucky’s skill as a flintknapper but despises him for being a crippled outsider. The Clanchief, in particular, seems to enjoy watching Bucky suffer. Bucky dreams of escaping, of finding a home with a new Clan, one which will treat him kindly. A talented maker and only child of the Keeper of the Way, Tony has only to complete this last rite before he can fully assume his place as an adult of the Star Clan. On this journey, the spirit-talker assures him, the spirits will bring him to meet his destined mate. Tony is pretty sure the selection of his mate has less to do with the spirits than with the machinations of his mother and the clan chief. Little do either of them know what the spirits have in store. Word Count: 5713

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Title: A sketch in red Collaborator: Nivelle Link: Tumblr Square Filled: Y4 - Seeing Red Ship: none Rating: Gen Major Tags: art Summary: art

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Title: A Night at the Nat - Chapter 4 Collaborator: Politzania Link: AO3 Square Filled: K3 - apology Ship: Bucky/Clint/Tony Rating: Explicit Major Tags: werewolf & supernatural AU, minor injuries/blood, eventual smut Summary: The fancy restaurant isn’t the only reason Clint feels out of his depth. Even though his dinner companions are clearly devoted to one another, they keep flirting with him. Maybe accepting this invitation wasn’t such a good idea. Word Count: 4701

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Title: Fire in My Soul - Chapter 1 Collaborator: squadrickchestopher Link: AO3 Square Filled: C3 - free space Ship: WinterHawk Rating: Explicit Major Tags: graphic depictions of violence Summary: Natasha interrupts him. ��So here’s what happened,” she says, letting her irritation bleed into her voice and her expression. Clint ducks his head even lower. “You two morons got the bright idea to get busy on a magic altar while wearing a magic amulet. Somehow, this triggered some kind of spell, and—I can’t believe this is an actual thing I’m about to say—it turned you both into little dragons.” Bucky stares at Clint, then looks down at his own claws. Then he looks back up at Nat. “What the fuck?” Word Count: 5442

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Title: Art Collaborator: startrekkingaroundasgard Link: Tumblr Square Filled: Y1 - nerd Bucky Ship: Bucky & Peter Rating: Gen Major Tags: art Summary: Bucky had always loved science fiction. He loved to get lost in the wonder of what was possible and consider how the future could be better. When he joined the Avengers, Peter soon learned of Bucky’s interest and immediately got him started on every major sci-fi franchise he had missed over the years. Star Wars ended up being his favourite and when Peter came in brandishing his new, fully functioning lightsaber Bucky couldn’t resist having a go with the weapon. That quickly lead to costumes and a fully fledged photo shoot to commemorate the occasion.

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Title: Red Carpet Rescue Mission Collaborator: darter_blue Link: AO3 Square Filled: B3 - Rescue Mission Ship: Stucky Rating: Mature Major Tags: meet cute Summary: Bucky Barnes can totally do this, he can fumble his way through a red carpet event and not lose his brand new nationally televised lifestyle presenter gig... he just has to remember to ask questions about the premier and NOT composting (being that he is, in fact, a Gardener and not an entertainment reporter). And when he sees a fellow sufferer in need of saving from all the lights, cameras, and hubbub, of course he's going to sidle over and be a friendly face. Except the poor, unfashionable gentleman perhaps isn't a ring in like Bucky imagined, is perhaps more famous than he looks?Is perhaps actually a real life superhero? This is just fluff and more fluff of disaster Bucky and an always charmed Captain America... Word Count: 5328

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Title: Arboreal: Songbird protocol moodboard Collaborator: menatiera Link: Tumblr Square Filled: B4 - Sunrise/Sunset Ship: WinterIron Rating: Gen Major Tags: Fluff, Bucky Barnes Needs A Hug, (Arm Maintenance), moodboard Summary: Moodboard for the fic Songbird Protocol by Arboreal. Fic summary: Tony apparently has a thing for musicians. It’s brand new information for him, but Bucky is irresistible.

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Title: we could take a chance, we could make it Collaborator: velvetjinx Link: AO3 Square Filled: K4 - partner in crime Ship: Stucky Rating: Explicit Major Tags: historical AU Summary: Bucky likes to steal treasure. Steve likes to steal it back for its rightful owners. But when they have to team up to fight a common enemy and sparks fly, will either of them be willing to risk their hearts? Word Count: 5385

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Title: When is a bed not a bed? (When you’re not in it) - Chapter 2 Collaborator: riotfalling Link: Tumblr Square Filled: C3 - free space Ship: WinterIron Rating: Teen Major Tags: non-graphic injury and violence Summary: There’s a tiny safe house, with one tiny window and one tiny couch. And one tiny little bed. (Now with chapter 2, because no bed sharing fic is truly complete until they’re home.) Word Count: 2.5k

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Title: Inspired By You Collaborator: MagicaDraconia16 Link: AO3 Square Filled: Y5 - Invisibility Ship: Teen Rating: Bucky & Tony Major Tags: AU artist/muse, smutty inspiration Summary: It was very hard work being a muse. Especially when the person being inspired absolutely refuses to be around the source of that inspiration. Word Count: 1004

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Title: A Quiet Moment Collaborator: Caiti (Caitriona_3) Link: AO3 Square Filled: B3 - Hair braiding Ship: Bucky/Clint/Darcy Rating: Teen Major Tags: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - No Powers, Polyamory Summary: Natasha and Bucky spend a quiet moment together. Word Count: 1561

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Title: Funerals Are Expensive. Get Well Soon. Collaborator: Ribbonsflying Link: AO3 Square Filled: C5 - Sharing Body Heat Ship: Stucky Rating: Teen Major Tags: funeral home, morticians Summary: “Is this the part where we turn from morticians into ghost hunters?” Sam asked as they flipped out the basement lights and locked the door back behind them. ”I sure hope not.” The men began their hustle back up toward the state rooms out front when they passed the cooler and heard the noise again. Steve and Sam both stopped in their tracks. “Is that-“ Steve turned on his heel and pointed toward the refrigerated room where people’s bodies were stored.“You know I ain’t ever been scared of dead people,” Sam answered, “...but if someone in that fridge is knocking, all you’re gonna see of my brown ass is a pinprick on the horizon as I get the hell away from here as fast as I can move.” === Did you know there's a woman who has a medical condition that has caused her to go to wake up in a morgue on three separate occasions? This is a story where Bucky has that same condition. Word Count: 7382

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Title: Beetles Collaborator: Justamanlymouse Link: AO3 Square Filled: U5 - Bucky/Steve Ship: Stucky, WinterIron Rating: Gen Major Tags: Howlie memories, Light angst, tw bugs Summary: Steve hears Morgan singing a lullaby that James used to sing to him and remembers the last time he heard it.“You know the wormy song? James sings it to me before bed.” He’s going to fucking vomit. “Oh yeah?” he manages. “Yeah.” she says, molding dirt very seriously with a little spade, “Said he used to sing it to you and it helped you go to sleep. You remember that?” Word Count: 721

#buckybarnesbingo2020 #bbb2020 #weekly roundup #bbb weekly roundup #bbb week 8

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jamesbucksiclebarnes · 5 years ago

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Rating: Mature: Language, VIOLENCE.

Chapter List: [1] | [2] | [3] | [4] | [5] | [6] | [7] | [8] | [9] | [10] | [11] | [12] | [13] | [14] | [15] | [16] | [17] | [18] | [19]

[AO3 Link] | [Fic Page]

Tag List: @crossbowking, @khaleesislytherin

SERIES SUMMARY:

"Not human. She was not human. They all knew it. Could almost feel it, but couldn't make sense of it. That was why they were afraid. Not because of what she used to be Before. But because of what she was now."

Having found herself serving as the right-hand to the Governor for too long, Synnove le Jacques does her best to make things right with the people of the Prison. Stuck beside her partner in crime, her irritatingly obnoxious and hideously problematic best friend, Merle, she does her best to fight back against the monster she has let the Governor become.

CHAPTER TITLE: The Harvesting of Gore.

After barricading the doors with the hideous lime green sofas we had found in the living room, the five of us decided it was best to scavenge through the place whilst we figured out our next move. I was pretty confident both the back and front entrances would hold quite firm against the biters gathered outside, especially if we remained relatively quiet. Sooner or later, they would lose interest, get distracted by another sound off in the distance somewhere. Either that, or Sasha would come back with help. It wouldn’t take her long to realise something had gone wrong. We were all pretty confident about that, which meant the most we could do right now was wait it out.

Ty and Michonne took the first floor whilst Glenn decided to try is luck in the large garage that connected to the western side of the building. Daryl and I ascended the rickety wooden staircase to scavenge through the second floor.

It didn’t take us long to realise there was little there in the way of helpful supplies. After all, most of the rooms upstairs were bedrooms, bathrooms, of a very sparse office space that was practically useless to us. Still, we decided it wouldn’t hurt to bring back some clothing, even some books from the study if we could.

The largest bedroom – besides the main – belonged to what I assumed were teenage sisters. Twins, by the look of it. Their clothing was all the same size, as were their shoes, though the aesthetic of which were practically polar opposite to one another. The sister whose bed rested against the north western wall of the room seemed to have an unhealthy obsession with the colour pink. A series of posters hung from the plaster beside her pink-duvet-ed bed, two of which were of a boy band of which I had some familiarity, and the other was from a fashion magazine. You could tell by looking from one side of the room to the other that these sisters had been vastly different people.

The second sister’s duvet cover was of a dark night sky, her pillows depicting what looked like a still image of a werewolf howling at the moon. Clothing was already scattered across her side of the room, all dark in colour, mostly black. The shoes were another story altogether. This girl had three sets of Goth boots. Three! I mean, power to her, but those shoes were like two-to-three hundred dollars a pair. She must have worked her ass off in order to afford three of them. Besides those, there were a set of runners I knew would likely fit Beth, and a pair of gumboots – or rubber boots, whatever you want to call them – that could come in handy.

I began to put everything together in one giant pile in the centre of the room. Everything I believed would be beneficial to bring back. It felt kind of weird rummaging through their underwear draw, but honestly? We needed them more than they did.

I was halfway through the first sister’s obnoxiously large collection of pink lace underwear when I felt Daryl’s presence in the doorway.

Turning in place, I held up one of the near-fluorescent magenta bralettes and gave him a wide grin. “Isn’t this just the perfect birthday gift for you? It’ll really bring out your eyes.”

Daryl snorted a laugh, leaning against the doorframe and crossing his arms over his chest as he watched me place the bralette on the ever-growing pile in the centre of the room. “Found anything?”

I gestured to said pile with a grin.

Daryl cocked a brow. “We’re gonna need a damn truck for all that.”

“Never doubt a teenage girl’s ability to overstock their closet,” I remarked with a breathy chuckle, stepping around the pile and moving toward him. “What about you?”

He shrugged one shoulder non-committedly. “Little bits. Ain’t much.”

“Better than nothing at all,” I remarked, to which he gave a nod that did not seem all that convincing. With a frown, I stepped closer to him, tilting my head slightly to catch his lowered gaze. “You okay?”

He nodded, but again, it wasn’t even remotely convincing.

“Hey. What’s wrong?”

His gaze slowly lifted to meet mine as his lips spread into a thin line. A muscle in his jaw tensed before he took in a long breath and blew it out through his nose with a shake of his head. “Ain’t nothin’.”

“Oh, it’s something,” I responded, stepping close enough to reach out and touch the bare skin of his shoulder. “Tell me.”

He sniffed before clearing his throat, swallowing back against something I couldn’t quite decipher. “Just… It’s a kids room, ya know?”

My expression softened and I closed my eyes for a fraction of a second before nodding. I understood. It was difficult sometimes to see the remnants of other people’s lives, as dead and splayed open as a corpse on the morticians table. The people that had lived here may well still be alive out there, but the truth of the matter was that the possibility was unlikely. It was never pleasant to think about the sheer amount of death and destruction that had been wrought by this world within the past year. All of the children that would grow up without parents. All of the children that would never grow up at all. My heart constricted painfully in my chest as I looked up at Daryl’s saddened gaze, fingers squeezing the muscles of his shoulder in an attempt to comfort him.

“Yeah. I know.” I took in a deep breath through my nose. “Want me to take it? You can go look through the master, I haven’t even touched that yet.”

Daryl shook his head, but I could in his eyes that he wanted to take me up on the offer. He just didn’t want to admit it.

“Daryl. Go to the master.”

He glanced up at me, slightly startled by the hard, commanding tone in my voice, but the way his expression softened – relaxed, even – at the realization that I was only doing this so he would wouldn’t have to admit being disturbed by the ghost of a child, made me smile.

With a solemn nod, he pushed himself off the doorframe and began to make his way down to the opposite end of the hall, at the pale white door behind which housed the master bedroom. I watched him until he disappeared inside before stepping into the hall myself, turning to look across at the open door of the child’s bedroom.

Something hard stuck in my throat, but I forced myself to swallow it back down as I crossed the hall and stepped inside, taking a deep breath through my nose. The distinct tang of plastic and stale air made me blink. The room was small, with dark blue painted walls and a single bay window that overlooked the eastern fields. A small single bed sat against the northern wall, covered by a dusty Toy Story blanket. The sight of it made me smile slightly, though it faded quite quickly when I remembered the what world we lived in.

Taking a deep breath, I moved further into the room, stepping over to the small wardrobe that had been pushed up against the southern wall. I pulled the draws open and began to rummage through the small clothing, pulling out a good handful and placing it on the dusty bed.

Judith was growing unnervingly quick. Soon enough, she would outgrow the clothes she currently had, and would need more. These toddler-sized outfits would fit her soon enough. Better to be prepared for the future, right?

I was partway through rummaging around in the toybox beneath the windowsill when I saw it. It had barely been a glance through the dusted windowpane, but the glimmering silver of the shed out in the paddock caught my undivided attention almost instantly. Even from this distance, I could almost clearly see the tractor sitting beneath the metallic awning, shielded from the mid-day sun, and the rotary blades that attached to the vehicles front.

The idea began to solidify inside my head before I even had the forethought to truly inspect how idiotic it was.

I closed the toybox and climbed atop its lid, balancing on my knees whilst I peered down, through the window, at the ocean of biters gathered around the base of the house. The distance between the edge of the crowd and the grassy expanse of clear ground behind them was… quite far. It would be a difficult jump, likely too far for a regular human to even dream of making. An Olympian athlete, perhaps, but just a normal, everyday person? No. Definitely not.

While I may not have been an Olympian, I was, in fact, not a regular human, either. I was quite confident I could make that jump.

Without taking a moment to really consider it, I reached out and unlatched the dusty window and pushed it open. All at once, the sounds of groaning biters flowed in through the open space, hitting me with enough force to make me pause in my plans.

During that brief moment of indecision, the sounds of meandering biters drew Daryl’s attention from down the hall. He came striding down the wooden floorboards, appearing in the doorway to see me kneeling by the open window.

“The hell you doin’?” he asked in a hissed whisper.

He closed the distance between us, reaching out to slam the window shut before I had a chance to even blink. The sound of the wooden window frame hitting the sill drew the attention of a handful of biters, causing a surge in attempt to claw their way through the front windows and doors. Thankfully, after waiting with bated breath for a moment, it became clear the barricade and glass were holding.

Daryl turned to look at me, one knee still atop the toybox, his hands pressed against the wooden windowsill. “The hell was that?”

I pointed out to the tractor. “See that?”

“What?”

“There. The tractor.”

“A’ight. Great. The hell do I care about a damn tractor?”

“It’s one of those spinny-death-blade tractors.” I grinned at him. “Think about how many biters we’d cut down with that thing.”

Daryl looked at me blankly for a moment before his brows furrowed. “It’s a what?”

“It’s got those rotating blades at the front of it, look.” I pointed toward it again, knowing full well he was already aware of where it was, and smiled wider. “I could get out there and hot-wire the fucker.”

“Hell no,” Daryl hissed, pushing away from the window and standing before the toybox with a deep frown. “You’ll get yourself killed.”

I straightened, turning on my knees to look at him. “Just think about how easily that thing will cut through the literal ocean of biters down there. We’d be out of here in a hot minute.”

“Ain’t worth it.” Daryl shook his head, staring down at me with a mix of concern and irritation.

I leant back against the heels of my feet, looking up at him with a pouted frown. For some reason, his instantaneous denouncement of my idea had struck me slightly off guard. I’d expected him to agree, to tell me to go for it. We both knew it’d be dangerous, but surely he trusted I wouldn’t attempt something that I thought I wouldn’t be able to do. But, then, it hit me. This was Daryl.

This wasn’t Merle.

Merle would have leapt on the idea, encouraged me, even. He would have told me how much he wished he had a damn video camera so he could immortally capture my stupid, gory shenanigans on film. The prospect of driving a rotary tractor through a crowd of undead would have excited him. He would have wanted to watch the entire thing from the safety of the overhanging eave, laughing the whole time as he yelled out stupid jokes and moronic commentary on my driving skills.

I felt my face fall before I had a chance to stop it. My gaze slid away from Daryl’s, down to the floor for a brief moment before I took a deep breath and turned in place to look back out the window, mostly to avoid him catching a glimpse at my sudden sorrowful expression.

I think he kind of realised my train of thought before I even had.

Slowly, he sunk down into a sitting position on the empty side of the toybox, turning his head to look at me with a sad frown. “I ain’t him.”

My eyes met his. “I know,” I said. There was no disappointment in my voice, only an undertone of thinly veiled grief.

“I ain’t gonna agree to somethin’ that dangerous just ‘cause it’d be cool to watch,” he continued with a sigh.

“It so would be, though,” I breathed, turning back around in order to sit properly next to him. My booted feet rested against the floorboards beside his, toes tapping against the wood. “I know you’re not him, and I’ve never wanted you to be. You know that, right?”

Daryl swallowed as he nodded his understanding, resting his forearms against his knees and leaning forwards. “I used to want to be like him. Followed him around like a damn dog.”

“Isn’t that just a younger sibling thing?” I asked, cocking a brow.

Daryl snorted, glancing up at me. “I don’t know. Is it?”

“The hell would I know?”

He straightened partially. “You ain’t got any?”

I averted my gaze, looking across the room to the empty doorway with small frown. “That’s… a complicated question.”

His lack of response drew me to look at him, seeing the question in his eyes before he even needed to voice it.

I cleared my throat. “I was, uh… I was adopted. My biological parents, they had other kids to other partners, but… Yeah, it’s hard to explain.” Which was true. The fact that my biological parents were as inhuman as I was made talking about them like the vocal equivalent to walking on black ice. I had to tread carefully each time I mentioned them – which, thankfully, wasn’t often. Most people that knew me were aware of my distaste for speaking on such things. In fact, I usually refused to talk about it in general, but, for some reason, it was oddly easier for me to say these things to Daryl than it was to anyone else.

I really didn’t want to ponder as to why that was.

“We ain’t got nothin’ else to do,” Daryl said softly after a moment.

“There are many things we could do other than talk about my clusterfuck of a childhood,” I stated simply, waving a hand to gesture toward nothing in particular.

“Like what?” he asked.

“Like… Like…” I lifted a hand, holding up a finger to indicate he give me a second to think.

The gesture made him snort a soft laugh.

“Like, play cards,” I said after a moment.

“Cards?”

“Cards. Or, alternatively, we could find some elastic and make a slingshot to fire random novelty items into the crowd of biters?”

“Again, I ain’t my brother,” Daryl responded, but this time it was more in jest than sadness.

“Don’t bullshit me, you’d enjoy that.”

We both laughed softly for a moment before taking near simultaneous deep breaths and sighing. The silence slowly blanketed the room, enabling me the ability to hear Michonne and Ty rummaging around in the lower level of the house. That, and the sudden, unexplained crashing sound that echoed through the house with enough volume to shake the walls.

Both Daryl and I shot up instantly, making short work of the distance between us and the doorway. We dashed down the hall to the railing that looked over the staircase just in time to catch Michonne and Ty bounding up the steps with a panicked Glenn a few paces behind. The sounds of biters filled the air, along with scuffling footsteps as they shuffled their way into the house from the direction of the garage.

I didn’t hesitate, grabbing Daryl’s arm and yanking him back down the hall toward the twin’s bedroom. Michonne, Ty and Glenn followed frantically behind. Once we were all inside, Glenn slammed the door whilst Michonne and Ty pulled the dark bed across to block the door. Barely a second after they’d pushed the bed in place, a resounding thud struck wood on the other side. Quickly followed by another and another, until the wood began to crack and the frame of the bed began to slide across the floorboards.

That was not going to hold.

Without another moment of hesitation, I snatched both Daryl and Glenn’s arms and began to drag them toward the window I’d entered through earlier. I could hear both Michonne and Tyreese following along behind me as I guided Glenn through the open window and onto the overhanging eave on the other side. Michonne followed quickly behind him.

The door began to buckle beneath the onslaught of the dead behind it, the force of it pushing the wooden posts of the bed against the floorboards with a sickening sound.

We all looked between one another, at a loss for what to do next. There was little room for us to fight as a unit. Michonne was just as likely to slice up one of us as she was to eliminate one of the dead with that sword of hers, given the close quarters.

I turned around in place to take in our surroundings, my mind running through a multitude of different scenarios at once, none of which ended in a particularly pretty way.

Until I spotted the window. The one I had climbed through no more than an hour ago.

Without hesitation, I latched onto both Daryl and Glenn’s upper arms and began to pull them toward the other side of the room, only letting go in order to unlatch the window and push it open. I shouted over my shoulder at the other two as I pushed Glenn none-too-gently out the now-open window, reaching out to do the same to Daryl. He pulled away, giving me a pointed look and waved his hand toward the window, gesturing for me to go first.

There was no time for this.

With an exasperated sigh out my nose, I turned to Michonne. “Go through, help Glenn.”

She, thankfully, did as I asked.

“See, it’s easy,” I remarked to Daryl, waving at him to follow along behind her. “Go.”

He ground his teeth but stepped through the window frame just as the doorway to the bedroom gave way. The wood split and crumbled, sending a wave of biters spilling out, onto the mattress blocking their way.

As quick as I could, I reached out and grabbed the back of Tyreese’s shirt, yanking him backwards and away from the undead. He stumbled slightly, but once I’d pulled him past me and toward the window, I steadied him with a hand on his upper arm.

“Go,” I instructed, using my free hand to pull a blade free. “Now. Don’t argue.”

He didn’t. It looked almost as if he wanted to, but he didn’t.

Daryl helped pull the hulking man through the window as quickly as humanly possible, all but pushing him aside in order to reach back through the window and grab my arm.

The dead were scrambling to get back up onto their feet, though most of them fell forwards once they gained their footing, unbalanced by the mattress. Those that had made it across the bed and onto the floorboards were more fortunate in their attempts.

I barely managed to slide across the windowsill in time to avoid being grabbed, though the momentum of the biters attempt brought it through the window alongside me.

My back hit the tiled eave. The biter came sailing through the window, angled to land almost perfectly on top of me. Of course, I’d thankfully read the situation almost perfectly and managed to raise my legs in preparation.

Once the biter landed on the soles of my boots, I launched it over my head, sending it sailing across the eave and down to the ground below.

Without another moment of hesitation, I rolled to the side, barely avoiding a second biter. Daryl reached down and helped me up onto my feet, pulling both of us back a few paces as a flood of biters began to slide through the open window and onto the eave alongside us.

Behind me, Glenn cursed.

I turned to Daryl, pointing up to the second story rooftop with the hand that wasn’t currently holding a knife. “Get up there.”

He pursed his lips in disapproval, knowing I planned to stay down here, but thankfully didn’t argue this time. Nodding to the others, Daryl tossed his crossbow up onto the roof before jumping and grabbing hold of the guttering.

Once he had hoisted himself up onto the second story rooftop, he reached down to assist Michonne. The two of them then offered their hands to lift Glenn up, leaving Tyrese and I on the first story eave.

One biter pushed through the window, able to wiggle itself free of the crowd that had basically began to plug the hole, toppling over onto the dark roofing brick. It was followed shortly by another. And then, another.

I didn’t waste any more time. The things were slow to get back up onto their feet, I knew that. Smacking Tyrese on the shoulder to get his attention, I lowered myself into a partial crouch and linked my hands together to give him a hoist. He gave me disbelieving look and shook his head.

I scoffed.

It was an understandable reaction, of course. I was a one-hundred-and-sixty pound twenty-four year old, that was true. But that weight was mostly muscle and my body clearly displayed that.

“Just fucking do it, big man,” I hissed, nodding toward my entwined hands.

He let out a sigh, gave me a concerned look, but reached up to grab Daryl’s outstretched hand as he placed his boot in my palms. The man was goddamn heavy, I’d give him that, but with Michonne’s help on his other arm, the three of us managed to lift him up onto the second story roof.

I didn’t get a chance to follow behind him. The biters from earlier had reached us mere seconds after Ty had pulled his leg back over the above ledge. Their outstretched hands reached for me, but I ducked out of the way quite easily, slipping past them until I was on the opposite side of the window from the others. More of them tumbled through the open window, climbing up clumsily onto their feet before shuffling their way toward me. A few of them miss-stepped, unsettling the tiles beneath their feet and sending their stupid asses sliding down, over the edge of the eave and to the ground below.

I continued stepping further and further back as the biters approached. Each step was careful, my inhuman instincts telling me that the edge was rapidly coming up behind me.

It was when I reached the corner and glanced behind me to make sure my feet weren’t going to slip over the edge that I noticed it.

The silver metal glinted in the noonday sun, striking with such a blinding light that my attention was immediately caught, gaze flicking over to its source. Over in the neighbouring field, sitting, alone, unloved, in that three-walled cage… was the rotary tractor.

I looked up at Daryl, who had been shuffling along the rooftop above in order to keep step with me. He saw the mad grin on my face and gave me a very pointed look.

“Syn,” he warned.

I only grinned wider, glancing back over my shoulder toward the farm shed in the distance. There was little in the way of obstacles, if I were being honest. Now that the majority of biters had been drawn inside, the grassy lawn that surrounded the farmhouse was practically empty. The fields still had a few stragglers, sure, but they were of little consequence to me.

“Syn!”

I ignored Daryl’s disapproving plea, taking off at a sprint, carefully placing my feet upon the rooftop tiles until I came to the corner of the next corner of the eave. Without hesitation, I leapt forward and into the empty air.

The ground came up fast beneath me. I expertly absorbed the impact, allowing my legs to bend and my body to roll along the grass before easily jumping back onto my feet and continuing my sprint in an almost fluid motion, turning in place to face the overgrown field between me and that shiny, shiny metal.

Above the wind cascading through my hair, above the sounds of gurgled biters, I heard Glenn let out a, “Go Syn!” and found myself laughing.

I ducked and slid beneath the biters dotting the lawn between the house and the fields, avoiding their outstretched arms with little effort. The fallen barbed wire fence glinted in the midday sun. I jumped over it and continued on in my sprint toward the farm shed.

A smile broke across my face, wide and unrestrained. God, it felt good to run. The wind in my hair, cooling the skin of my face, the sensation of speed as my legs carried me across the ground in long, rhythmic bounds. Even the feel of the long grass brushing against my sides as I cut through it like a knife, was almost euphoric. When had been the last time I’d run for the sake of running? When it hadn’t been for my or someone else’s survival?

Too damn long.

I reached the shed with little in the way of interference.

The tractor sat with its wheels behind wooden planks, the rotary blades connected by a long and admittedly complicated-looking attachment that extended from the engine. Its green paint was faded and flaking, the metal frame that acted as a guard above the driver’s seat was rusted almost entirely through, and the divots inside the tyres had actual spider webs spun within them. A moment of doubt made me pause and frown as I looked at this mess of a machine. It passed quickly and I stepped forward and began to remove the wooden planks from before the wheels, climbing up into the driver’s seat and letting out a breathy laugh.

This was going to be awesome.

If I could start the damn thing.

It took some fiddling. More than I would ever readily admit. But, eventually, I found the wires I needed, hidden away in the small gap between the barely-held-in-place bonnet and the long pole that lead to the driver’s wheel. Expertly, I used my knife to strip their ends and touched them tentatively together.

The tractor roared to life; the purr of its engine almost deafening. I let out a mad cackle before using the rusted metal of the guard to climb into the driver’s seat. The long gear stick slid into place with a painful amount of grinding, but once the thing got moving, it got moving. It was a bumpy ride, that was for sure, but I enjoyed every goddamn minute of it. Making my way through the long grass, I searched the dashboard in front of me for the right button to start the rotary blades. Thankfully, whoever had owned this block of land seemed to have the memory of a goldfish, if all the labelling on the dash was of any indication.

As I drew closer to the farmhouse, some of the biters came tumbling out of the front door, their attention caught by the deafening sound of the tractor’s shuddering motor. I waited until I had cleared the barbed wire to press the button clearly marked “Blades”.

They spun to life with a metallic purr, slowly at first, but gaining momentum by the second.

The first biter that stumbled in front of me was eviscerated so quickly, I barely had a chance to use my forearm to block my face from the spray of blood and gore.

I let out another mad cackle. “Fuck yeah!”

From that moment on, I drove around the farmhouse in a neat circle, taking out biter after biter with my spinning blades of death, and gaining quite the little tag-along crew behind me as I went. Above me, on the rooftop, the other three watched my antics with a mixture of expressions.

Daryl looked slightly concerned, though the expression was partially obscured by the small smile that had formed on his face. Michonne just looked straight up amused, whilst Tyrese seemed to be confused as to whether he should be disgusted or just happy I was willing to almost literally bathe myself in biter guts to save their asses.

Glenn, of course, was not shy in his blatant enjoyment. He and Michonne yelled out encouragements, pointed out biters that I may have missed from my vantage point, and laughed with each of my exclamations as my tractor and I tore through the undead like an oversized, portable blender.

Bits of biter were being thrown about in all directions, coating me in an immeasurable amount of undead viscera. Honestly, though. It didn’t even bother me. I was having way too much fun.

Morbid though it may have been, cutting through a group of bloodthirsty undead creatures with a rotary tractor was rapidly becoming the highlight of my entire year.

By the time I caught up to the back end of the train of biters following along behind me, the sun was practically beginning to set. I sped up a gear, using the open end of the dirt driveway to turn around, and began to run through the train of biters with increased sped. My mad cackling was almost louder than the tractor engine, though I had to stop quite suddenly as the spray of blood and guts was getting dangerously close to my open mouth.

Gross.

I was right at the end of the line of biters when the old tractor’s engine made a loud clanging sound and sputtered out of commission. A handful of biters were left, shuffling toward me at a very unimpressive speed. Half of them marched right into the exposed blades of the now-stationary rotary, impaling themselves. It was almost comical.

I reached out to grab either side of the rusted metal guard in front of me and pulled myself up, climbing atop the thin bonnet of the tractor. A few of the biters had managed to walk around the pointy thing and were now working on surrounding me. The first one to reach the side of the tractor dropped before they even had a chance to reach up for me.

Daryl.

I could see the lime green nock sticking out the back of the biter’s skull.

Drawing the blades from my belt once again, I slid down the side of the tractor’s bonnet, landing with one of my knives already imbedded at the crown of a biter’s head. I pulled it out and kicked the limp body, sending it sprawling into the three biters currently in between me and the front door of the farmhouse. They all fell backwards in a heap and I stepped forward, driving my blade into each of them one by one whilst they were on their backs.

Straightening as I pulled my knife free of the last one, I took a moment to look around. The dirt was stained almost completely red now, with pits of viscera and gore splattered about the once pristine lawn. Even the white wooden panels that made up the entirety of the farmhouse’s exterior was splattered with crimson.

I’d made a damn mess. And it was absolutely, disgustingly awesome.

Barely more than five biters were left. They milled about on the other side of the tractor, making their way diligently toward me. It took little effort to dispatch four of them, with Daryl taking the final one out with another arrow.

Once I had collected the two he had fired, I began to make my way toward the farmhouse door, sliding past the red car I’d unceremoniously parked by the stairs. I heard their footsteps as the three of them began to make their way back inside, through the upstairs window, whilst I cleared out the handful of biters that had remained on the ground floor.

Glenn’s voice echoed through the house as he reached the bottom stair, catching sight of me standing in the archway that lead to the living room. “That was awesome! You – Oh, my God. You look like a horror movie.”

I glanced down at my clothes, once black and grey, now completely covered in blood and small chunks of gore. Reaching up, I plucked what appeared to be part of an ear that had been caught on the edge of my jacket pocket’s zipper and flicked it outside. “Risk of the trade, my friend.”

I reached up to rub my hand over my face. My palm came away sticky. Gross.

“I do not want to know what my hair looks like right now,” I remarked with a grimace. Getting blood out of near white-blonde hair was a bona fide nightmare.

Michonne and Ty reached the bottom of the staircase next, coming to a stop when they spotted me.

“If Carrie were a sister,” Tyrese said, partially in disgust, partially in amusement. I don’t think even he knew how he felt about what he had just watched transpire. “You’d look like her right now.”

Michonne moved to the side as Daryl reached the ground floor, allowing him to pass by as I lifted the hand holding his arrows up toward him.

“That was stupid,” he grunted as he snatched them from my grip.

“But awesome.”

He didn’t respond, but the way his eyes lightened slightly, and the corner of his thin lip twitched upward told me he somewhat agreed. Without a word, he reached into his back pocket and pulled the red cloth he always kept there out, handing it to me.

“Good thing Hayden got the showers working,” Glenn remarked with a grin, stepping closer to me and running his forefinger along the sleeve of my jacket. It came away wet and crimson, which made his grin turn to a grimace.

I laughed, lifting Daryl’s cloth up to wipe some of the blood from around my eyes, lips, and beneath my nose. The smell was probably the worst part, worse than even the sensation of blood and gore on my skin. It was irritatingly sticky. The sleeve of my jacket would stick to the leather body whenever I moved, and my jeans felt extra uncomfortable when I walked. Still, the smell of rotting gore was not pleasant, especially not to an overly sensitive nose like mine.

“Come on,” Michonne said after a moment, stepping past us toward the front door. “We should load up the car and get the hell out of here.”

#the walking dead #twd #the walking dead fanfic #twd fanfic #the walking dead fan fic #twd fan fic #the walking dead fanfiction #twd fanfiction #the monsters among us #daryl dixon #michonne #tyreese williams #glenn rhee #biters #walkers #synnove le jacques #fanfic #fanfiction

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vios-rockland-corner · 6 years ago

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Rockland: Misfits vs. Professionals early speculation PT 1

The date of this post is 3/5/19. Please note that information revealed at this time via Patreon or any of the creator’s blogs may be subject to change after this date.

The Rockland universe is going to have a lot of different facets and story lines, and the first set of games coming out focuses on characters related to two separate groups: The Misfits and the Professionals. As usual, I am super early to this party, but I really wanted to put out my first interpretations before new content just to test whether I’m overthinking an aspect or not.

So I have this post titled as “Misfits vs. Professionals” more so as a comparison post. I have very little information on the Misfits and even less info on the Professionals. I’m probably going to be talking more about the Misfits for now as a result. I’ll keep this title in case I expand and do more posts on the two when more information comes out. But just to clarify again, “vs.” for comparison, not because of opposition.

At least I have no clue at the moment whether the two groups ARE in opposition to each other or not. That would be interesting to see, but for now I’m just assuming that these are two different groups entirely that inhabit the Rockland Universe.

First off, let me try to guess what the Misfits aren’t by what little information I have on the Professionals. There will be three characters inevitably relating to the Professionals, but the only confirmed character at the moment is “The Doctor.” He was actually created a little earlier like “The Artist,” but Runawayoutlaw moved his game to a different segment because he didn’t want the character coming out with, quoting the creator, people “he’s not associated with. He’s usually around the mafia people and shit like that.” So here’s the impression I get about the Professionals:

1) They’re a more sophisticated and/or serious group as the name suggests.

2) Very possibly a mafia or at least works with bigger criminal organizations such as the mafia.

I’m going to go out on a limb here and say that the Misfits most likely are not structured the same way as the Professionals are. It’s not that it’s out of the realm of possibility though. The Misfits could also be a mafia/mob group of their own, but I feel like if these 6 games (2 sets of three) are being separated right away on purpose, then I think that’s a good sign there’s a line being drawn.

It should be noted though that one of the creators has a toy.house account with some biographies up on these characters, and some of the stories DO overlap. Or at the very least, there are loose connections. “The Doctor” may not generally be part of the Misfits, but there is a character they’re associated with who is either labeled with the Misfits or as least friends/associated with some of said Misfits. Some of these biographies are old though, so I’m a little careful about considering which ties are still canon. There’s plenty of stuff that can be changing in development. It’s always going to be easier to speculate and piece together information when a solid game comes out.

So what do I think the Misfits are then? Well, there’s certainly some colorful characters. I’ve already done my pre-release thoughts on “The Artist,” “The Mortician” and “The Puppetmaster.” Jack Buchanan MIGHT have something to do with the Misfits, and by default Ashton Kinely as well by association. Whether that’s true, I’m not 100% sure yet. I’m pulling scraps together. It’s difficult when characters are being re-introduced. I also have to be careful what names I’m using when I write these posts. New followers to the franchise may have heard of Jack somewhere and very possibly have no idea who Ashton is. Long story short is they both do psychology and Ashton works under Jack’s tutelage. Jack himself is a very dangerous character, but if I elaborate more on that here then I’m going to get off track.

Getting back to the Misfits, it’s also apparent that there are SOME people in the group who are trained killers. It just sounds like the first three games have characters who aren’t specifically trained in killing.

I don’t know why, but I’m leaning towards the concept of the Misfits being some sort of secret society. I can’t really explain why I think that is. Scraping together that the characters involved are anything but normal, they’re not the same thing as the Professionals and you can be killed by these members brings me to the conclusion that there’s got to be something special that ties the group together. It could be a goal, a common ideology or even an item for all I know.

Part of it also has to do with the name for me. The definition of a misfit is “a person whose behavior or attitude sets them apart from others in an uncomfortably conspicuous way.” First of all, that name sounds perfect for these guys. The issue I suppose I have at the moment is how literal I need to take the name. It’s not the definition I take issue with, it’s the fact that the name itself doesn’t SOUND threatening. It sounds almost more playful or at least a lot less serious than the Professionals. I kind of wonder if the characters do blatantly tell people “I’m part of the Misfits” or not. If they do, what kind of response should that be eliciting from the listener? They’re odd characters, but do they consider themselves bad guys or just different? Hell, for all I know they may not actually be that bad of a group. Maybe the public knows and the group appears sketchy, but no one has any clue whether to be afraid or not.

I’m sure it’s weird that I suggest the characters have no issue identifying themselves if I believe the Misfits might be a secret society. Well according to Wikipedia at least, some societies may actually have a public presence. They conceal certain activities and members, but they don’t hide from the world that they exist in the first place. Maybe it’s something like that.

Another small thing I’ve been wondering is if all of the Misfits are humans. For the most part, any of the characters I’ve seen mentioned and associated with the group appear to be human. The only one that throws me for a loop is “The Puppetmaster” Dominick, whom I don’t know what exactly he is. He’s supposed to be overpowered, but he could still be human with special abilities. The thing with the Rockland Universe though is there WILL be supernatural characters. How that adds into the mix I’ll have to see.

Perhaps the Misfits band together because they’re opposed to other supernatural beings? Is the existence of all or certain supernatural beings common knowledge in the Rockland universe (there is some evidence of this through Rottenbonethief’s writing)? Or is it only very small areas where supernatural beings are known to exist? The Misfits may never inhabit an area where they cross paths with supernatural characters. I don’t know how far out the creators are expanding their universe.

Who exactly the Misfits and Professionals are I’m sure is going to become a little easier to answer when I get to see more of how the Rockland Universe functions and what kinds of characteristics and backstories these characters share. This post feels more like a heavy prep of sorts, so sorry about jumping around.

As usual, I’ll start labeling parts if I get more information and think it’s wise to expand from this initial post.

#rockland #the misfits #the professionals #runawayoutlaw #rottenbonethief #sugarhazard #pre-release

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tiny-personal-university-thing · 6 years ago

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Skincare and Other Ways to Live Your Best Life

Skincare

So I've had a lot of improvement in the condition of my skin (in terms of the occasional hormonal acne, and hyperpigmentation that serves to remind me how wonderful my pre-teen and teenage years were), and I thought it would share it with you all my routine.

Let me preface this by saying that I have tried everything for my skin. I’ve tried Proactive (which only really seemed to bleach my pillow cases), Tetracycline and Minocycline, all of the top of the line products from companies such as Peter Thomas Roth. I even went through all of the INTENSE steps to get on Accutane, only to find out that it doesn’t really do anything at all for hormonal acne and hyperpigmentation - and at that point the occasional cysts I would get were few and far in between *knocks on wood*. Long story short, you name it - I have tried it.

However, I have recently become some what of a product junkie, and have a mildly elaborate skincare routine that is relatively inexpensive, and actually works. Since I fully believe in sharing the wealth, I thought I’d share.

Mornings

I start off by washing my face using Noxzema Classic Clean. Noxzema is a timeless product - something your parents or grandparents probably used back in the day. It is by far the cheapest face wash I have ever owned (about $3.99-$5.00 depending on the retailer). I found out about it through my ex-boyfriend’s mother - who actually recommended it to me to ease the pain of a sunburn, as it has a cooling effect. You can read more about Noxzema here

I then move on to toner. I use Witch Hazel. It’s incredibly soothing, gentle on the majority of skins (so don’t come for me), and again - pretty cheap. I have found that it retails for usually $3-$5, with more high end brands (perhaps with Rose Hips Oil) going for $6-$7. I have used Witch Hazel for years and I love it so much. Technically, you don’t need to use a toner, but since using it twice daily I have really seen a difference in my hyperpigmentation and the overall oil production on my face. You can read more about Witch Hazel and it’s benefits here I apply Witch Hazel to my face using cotton pads, making sure to use both sides of the cotton pad all over my face.

Last, I use exactly 3 drops of Tea Tree Oil. As with most essential oils, you will probably want to dilute it with water, or even our good friend, Witch Hazel. Let me warn you now Tea Tree Oil is STRONG. Personally, I do not dilute it; however, you might want to at least build up a tolerance to it. Again, it is very strong - in smell and in potency. With this being said, I have used it every day for the past couple of months and have actually taken a strange liking to the smell! You definitely get used to it. Additionally, I have found that it doesn’t burn or irritate my skin, but use. your. best. judgement. Finally, Tea Tree Oil can be found cheap at many retailers. I purchase mine at Walmart for around $8 and the bottle will last me about a month and a half. You can read more on Tea Tree Oil here I apply the Tea Tree Oil directly to my face, using my hands to massage it into my skin until I don’t feel the liquid anymore. I will say that Tea Tree Oil definitely does not feel like oil, that is to say that it doesn’t have the same consistency as something like coconut oil.

I then proceed with my make up.

Nights

(Skip this step if you are not a make-up wearer) I begin by removing my make up with a make up remover. Currently, I am using Clinque’s Take the Day Off make up remover. It ranges between $10-$30 depending on if you buy it at Walmart or Ulta/Sephora. However, it is easily the best make up remover I have ever used. It actually takes it all off in one quick swipe.

I move on to using Noxzema again to really make sure I get all of the make up off.

Next, I do one of two things. Every other day, I alternate between one of two products. The first product is a Dead Sea Minerals Clay Mask, which you can get for about $3-$5. I leave it on for about 10-15 minutes, and then remove it using Noxzema and my Panasonic, but you can totally just use your hands. On nights that I don’t use my clay mask, I will use this amazing new product that I was fortunate enough to receive a sample of from Sephora - it’s the AmorePacific Enzyme Peel. Now, this is a pricey item, I won’t lie to y’all. But it makes your skin feel - and I don’t say this often - like a baby’s butt. I alternate using it because for a tube of it, it ranges between $45-60. But again - wow. It really works so well. It is also apparently one of the best selling beauty products in Korea. And it doesn’t burn or dry my skin out. I am so in love with this stuff. It’s a powder that you put a couple drops of water in, work it into a paste, and massage into your skin for about a minute. Again, I really only do this at night and every other day because it costs a pretty penny. You can read more about Dead Sea Minerals Clay Masks here and the AmorePacific Enzyme Peel here.

I then proceed with Witch Hazel. Again, I make sure to use both sides of the cotton pad.

Next, I use my Tea Tree Oil. This time I can use a couple more drops since I’m not really concerned with my face looking a little shiny or smelling like ... well Tea Tree Oil. It just makes my boyfriend crinkle his nose because I “smell like a koala.”

FINALLY, I finish it off with a dime size (lol more like a nickle) portion of my Curology bottle! First of all, for those of you who don’t know about Curology - it is a personalized skin care product that you can purchase online. I was able to receive my first bottle for free (I only paid $4.95 in S&H), and received it in two weeks. Curology really easy, you can do it on your phone. Essentially, you will need to answer some questions about your skin type, what your concerns are, etc. And you will also need to upload pictures of your ENTIRE FACE WITHOUT MAKE UP. Here are the pictures I took for your reference. Curology also connects you with a skin care professional to answer all of your burning questions about how to use your Curology. It also comes in a precious little box that says “I was made for you,” and I found that to be incredibly endearing. For the second box, I paid $19.95ish. The bottles also last you for about 60 days, so for how well this product works + how much money it will save you in potential dermatologist appointments is so worth looking into. Again, you can get your first bottle for $4.95, so why not?

Then I get my beauty sleep.

Self-Care

Especially if you have chronic pain, or stress/anxiety - I highly recommend the following:

Epsom Salt Baths - Personally, I like to pair my Epsom Salt baths with water that is pretty hot - almost too hot? But definitely know your limits on this one. I don’t want any of you passing out in your bathtub and turning into soup. Don’t put that evil on me, Ricky Bobby.

For baths - while I am soaking in my warm water that reminds me of the pit of Hell from which I came, I enjoy watching Youtube series such as Ask a Mortician, Buzzfeed Unsolved, various beauty gurus, and a plethora of other subjects. What I am trying to say is - take your time in the tub. Really allow yourself to detox.

For showers - pump up the jams, and get your inner Beyonce on. Nothing screams louder to me that something is off about me than whether or not I sing along to songs. If I notice that I am not singing to a bop I know the words to by heart, I stop for a second and ask myself what is bothering me.

You can also take some time to write down your thoughts in a lovely journal, doodle a bit, or look at aesthetically pleasing images which there are a plethora of on Tumblr.

I also found out the other day that we have to physically help our lymphatic systems drain. An un-drained lymphatic system (so to speak) can lead to you not functioning the way you need to, and just not feeling up to anything. I highly recommend that you read up on your lymphatic system here. However, long story short - you can help your lymphatic system out by staying hydrated, alternating between hot and cold (like a hot bath and then a cold shower), practicing deep breathing, or going for a brisk walk.

I also recommend drinking about a tea spoon of Apple Cider Vinegar twice a day. The benefits of Apple Cider Vinegar are numerous; however, here are some of the most significant ones:

weight loss, reduced cholesterol, lower blood sugar levels and improved symptoms of diabetes

Additionally - and this is important - if you chose to incorporate Apple Cider Vinegar into your daily regiment, be SURE to purchase the one that says “with the Mother.” I don’t know who she is, but that is the kind you need! Without going into too much detail, it definitely keeps you -- regular, shall we say? Apple Cider Vinegar tastes, well, like sewer water some might say - so you may want to dilute it with water or juice. Also, because ACV is quite acidic, you may want to drink it through a straw so that you don’t end up completely toothless. I am currently consuming 1 tea spoon in the morning, and 1 tea spoon before bed!

Also, ACV is apparently a great alternative to Witch Hazel!

It is also good to do little things that may make you feel good about yourself, like making your bed, painting your nails, letting your conditioner sit in your hair for a little longer, treating yourself every now and again, or maybe indulging in a little retail therapy.

Etc

Eliminate anyone from your life that makes you feel less than

Drink your water and take your meds

Make time for yourself. Do the things you love. You cannot just work, study, and go to class 24/7.

Don’t be afraid to invite people to go out.

Don’t be afraid to say no to people when you have to, this includes clubs, work, or hanging out with friends when you really need to eat, sleep, do some homework, get groceries, etc.

Anyway, I hope that some of these prove to be helpful to y’all! I know I promised that this summer would be the summer of self-care until classes resume for the fall, and I haven’t posted as much as I promised. I do hope to be better about that. Feel free to message me with your favorite skin care/self care methods, or comment them below this post. Additionally, I hope it goes without saying that if you can’t use these methods for any reason - you won’t try them, and that I am obviously not a doctor and can’t give you medical advice. These are all just things that have worked for me this summer, and I have definitely seen improvement in my skin, body, and well-being.

I hope everyone is enjoying their summers!

#self care #studyblr #studyblr community #skin care #amorepacific #curology #apple cider vinegar #witch hazel #noxzema #summer self care #self care isnt selfish

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mysteryshelf · 7 years ago

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FEBRUARY MYSTERY LOVING: BLOG TOUR - Death Theory

Welcome to

THE PULP AND MYSTERY SHELF February Mystery Loving Event!

DISCLAIMER: This content has been provided to THE PULP AND MYSTERY SHELF by Partners in Crime Book Tours. No compensation was received. This information required by the Federal Trade Commission.

Death Theory

by John D. Mimms

on Tour February 1 – March 31, 2018

Synopsis:

Mankind’s greatest fear is also its greatest obsession. What awaits when we shuffle off the mortal coil of this world? We all have our beliefs based on faith or science, but both struggle to provide a tangible answer. Perhaps it is possible to prove the existence of the soul, to prove it goes on after death. Following the violent death of his parents, Jeff Granger seeks reassurance that they have moved on. After recording what he believes to be his mother’s voice at the site of the accident, Jeff’s obsession throws him into paranormal research. Realizing that most people are doing it just for fun, Jeff forms his own group. He is joined by Debbie Gillerson, a school teacher; Aaron Presley, a mortician; and Michael Pacheco, a grocery store manager. Even though they are all investigating the paranormal for very different reasons, they are all trying to fill an emptiness in their lives. The deeper they probe paranormal theory, the darker their results. The only way to truly test the ‘Death Theory’, as theorized by Aaron, is to monitor a person’s energy at the moment of death. Horrified by the immoral and unethical application, the group dismisses the theory. A darkness seems to follow their investigations and the police become involved. A former colleague of Jeff’s, a self-proclaimed demonologist, believes a demonic force is attached to the group. The police are not so sure. Evil comes in many forms as the small group is about to discover.

youtube

Book Details:

Genre: Mystery, Thriller, Paranormal Published by: Draft 2 Digital Publication Date: January 30th 2018 Number of Pages: 320 ISBN: 9781537849713 Purchase Links: Amazon 🔗 | Barnes & Noble 🔗 | Google Books 🔗 | Goodreads 🔗

Read an excerpt:

Death is the closest thing to omnipotence we will experience in our brief time on this planet. It is an all-encompassing power, binding everything, and providing a cold certainty to an otherwise uncertain existence. The firm grip of this assurance reaches much further than the extinguishment of life; it greedily claims the hope and happiness of those who remain. It is a definite ending, but is it also a provable beginning?

Prologue

Linda Granger did not see death coming.

Sleep shielded her from the unfolding horror. The looming headlights and the panicked screams of her husband were beyond her conscious state. When her head shattered the windshield, the dream about her son ended, sending her into what’s next. Linda was gone before the car rolled seven times and wrapped around a large oak tree. Her husband, Stephen, was not as fortunate. He died two minutes later. Linda had fallen asleep from emotional exhaustion. She died with regrets.

Chapter 1

Jeff’s sheets were drenched in sweat. He strained to hear because he wanted to continue the conversation he had been having. The bass drum of his pulse throbbed in his ears, making hearing impossible. He sat up and glanced about frantically. Where had she gone?

As sleep gave way to the waking world, dread filled him. He remembered the terrible truth. These muddled conversations with his mother had become nightly occurrences since his parents’ accident. The last words he shared with his mother were over the phone, and they were harsh. The next time he picked up the phone, mere hours later, it was the Missouri State Police asking him to come to the hospital. It has been over a year since the terrible night, yet the pain had not gone away. In some ways, it grew worse.

Jeff rolled on his side as tears streamed down his cheeks. In his dream, he told his mother he loved her. He wondered if she could hear him. Somehow, he believed it might be possible. His grieving heart longed for a way to communicate with his late parents.

Jeff rolled over and tried to go back to sleep. It was impossible. He eventually got up and opened the blinds. It rained last night and a steamy mist shielded the street from view. This was the perfect morning to stay in bed and he almost did if not for two things. His sheets were soaked and he was excited about today. Even though he needed extra sleep, since he would be staying up all night, he just couldn’t hold back the excitement of investigating with his fourth paranormal group in as many months. Missouri Spirit Seekers claim to do purely scientific investigations, but the three previous groups he joined did as well. He hoped this time would be different.

They would be investigating Pythian Castle tonight, the most ‘haunted’ location in Springfield, not too far from Jeff’s alma mater, Missouri State. The castle was a very cool historical site, but to Jeff, it was another opportunity to find answers for life’s greatest mystery -death.

Although the investigation was still twelve hours away, nervous anticipation consumed him. He hoped this was not another séance based, sage burning, ghost hunt like most of the others. His previous groups were as far away from science as one could get.

Jeff brewed a pot of coffee and microwaved a bowl of instant oatmeal, before sitting down to watch his recording of the show which started him on the path to paranormal investigation. He viewed it often, but it had become a ritual to watch on the day of an investigation. If Jeff were counting, this would be his eighty-third time to watch.

The show starred two men, who were electricians by trade, investigating haunted places using the scientific method. They gathered measurable scientific evidence in their investigations. In this particular episode, they were investigating the catacombs underneath an old church in Baltimore.

What peaked Jeff’s interest were the Electronic Voice Phenomenon the men captured on their digital recorders. He wondered if EVP’s are actually the voices of the dead. The guys on the show didn’t commit one way or the other, they just presented the recordings.

“You up above,” a disembodied voice said.

“The way through,” another one whispered.

The most eerie utterance of them all said, “Come down here among us.”

Jeff’s reaction was the same every time he watched; chills intermingled with hope and fear ran up his spine.

Jeff reached into a box under the coffee table and retrieved his digital recorder. He held it in his hands as if it were an object of holy veneration. Jeff recorded his own EVP one night several months earlier at the scene of his parent’s accident. Short, incredible, and heart-breaking; his mother seemed to call his name from beyond. The EVP was still on his recorder, even though he had backed it up to a dozen sources. He would never delete it from any device. Never.

A loud thud rattled the blinds on the front door. Jeff jumped, almost dropping the recorder. His alarm lasted only a moment when he recognized the sound of the newspaper carrier’s rattle-trap station wagon puttering up the street. He peeled back the blinds in time to see the tail lights disappear into the mist. Jeff was still in his underwear with a gaping fly, but he figured his rural setting, coupled with the fog, would spare him any indecent exposure charges.

Jeff scooped up the paper, almost losing his balance on the wet concrete, and then backed through the door. He plopped down on the sofa and began to unfold the massive log of news. He was heading straight for the sports section when an article caught his eye. The title read:

Springfield … the Most Haunted City in Missouri?

The Kansas City Royals box scores could wait. Jeff dove right into the article. The ghosts of Phelps Grove Park, Bass Country Inn, Drury University, Landers Theater, Springfield National Cemetery, University Plaza Hotel, and Pythian Castle were all mentioned prominently by the author. Jeff had investigated Phelps Grove Park with one of his previous groups. One of the members claimed he saw the infamous spectral bride near the bridge, but Jeff had no such luck. He never had success when it came to firsthand experiences. Either everyone else is lying or perhaps Jeff is walking ghost repellent. He didn’t think they were lying, at least not everyone who made a paranormal claim. His recording of his mother was enough to keep faith in the paranormal.

He read the claims of Drury University with great interest. There were allegedly several ghosts, in a few buildings, which had taken residence there since the school’s founding in 1873. The saddest one was a little girl who died in a fire. Her phantom laughter could be heard from time to time in one of the women’s dorms.

Jeff enjoyed a good ghost story since he was a kid, but these were more than merely a spectral yarn. Each story offered a small glimmer of hope.

He didn’t read about Pythian Castle; there was no need. He had spent so much time researching it the last couple of weeks, he could recite the history word for word. The shadow spirits who allegedly resided in the basement intrigued him the most. They had been reported so often over the years, there was little doubt that something unusual was occurring in the depths of the castle.

Jeff finally checked the box scores, lamenting another loss by his favorite team. He scanned the comics before tossing the paper on the floor. He trudged to the bathroom and took a long, hot shower. Afterward, he put on a fresh pair of boxers and a T-shirt before stretching out on the couch. He fell asleep watching Netflix. If he dreamed of his parents again, he did not remember.

Jeff arrived at Pythian Castle an hour before dusk. The rainy morning had given way to a perfectly clear early evening. The ghostly apparition of the full moon glowed in the eastern sky as the sun began to dip. The large tower on front of the castle cast a long shadow over his truck as he pulled in and parked. He ascended the stone steps onto an expansive porch where a very large woman with a mystical fashion sense met him at the front door.

“Hello … Jack?” she said.

“Jeff,” he corrected. “You must be Swoosie.”

Swoosie half-nodded and half-bowed. She reminded him of a fortune teller he visited one time, just for kicks.

“Would you like a charm for protection tonight?” Swoosie asked, reaching into a velvet bag and retrieving what appeared to be a tiny silk pillow.

“No, thanks … I’m good,” Jeff said. He couldn’t help smirking a little.

Swoosie noticed.

“Suit yourself,” she huffed. “Spirits can pick up on those less experienced in this field. They tend to prey more on them.”

“Good,” Jeff said. “Maybe I will get some good evidence.”

Swoosie narrowed her pudgy eyelids and motioned for a man who was milling about awkwardly, studying old pictures on the wall. “Preston,” she called with a snap of her fingers.

He was a middle-aged man with a greasy ring of dark hair circling a large bald spot. His clothing was a mish mash of suit pants and a Molly Hatchett T-shirt. The shirt and pin stripe pants were riddled with stains.

“How are you?” Preston asked breathlessly. It seemed his pot belly was a strain for him to carry.

“Fine, Preston,” Jeff said. “Nice to meet you.”

“Oh … I think Mr. Leach is preferable,” Preston said. “I could be your daddy.”

“Not likely,” Jeff thought.

“I’m putting the two of you together tonight since you are both new to this,” Swoosie said. “You know … strength in numbers.”

Both men’s puzzled expressions testified their bewilderment of Swoosie’s logic as if to point out that it would make more sense to put them with an experienced investigator.

“I’m a fairly experienced investigator,” Jeff said. “Tonight, makes my twentieth investigation.”

Swoosie’s condescending smile let him know she still considered him a novice. She turned and then waddled over to a sofa in the foyer where her daughter and a couple of other men waited. Their familiar banter showed them to be a clique.

“Okay, Mr. Leach,” Jeff said. “Where should we start?”

This group didn’t set up night vision cameras or environmental equipment as he hoped. Each member was only armed with a flashlight, digital recorder, and maybe a camera. Jeff was sure most of them carried a silk charm pillow in their pocket.

“I think they want us to go the basement,” Mr. Leach said impatiently. “Didn’t you hear what Swoosie said?”

Swoosie was much larger than Mr. Leach, yet she seemed a bit more agile as he watched his partner shuffle down the corridor.

“Okay,” Jeff mumbled before following him down the stone stairs to the basement.

They picked a far corner in the dark, dingy basement, and then set their digital recorders on a wooden table. The musty smell of old buildings had become synonymous with ghosts in Jeff’s mind. Even though he knew better, he sometimes entertained the idea of it being a ‘ghost odor’.

The sun was beginning to set through one of the basement windows, so they agreed to wait until full dark before beginning their session.

“Hey … you know this used to hold POWs during World War Two?” Jeff said, nodding at the old cells across the room. The iron doors had been removed many years ago on all but one.

“It was an orphanage at one time, built by the Knights of Pythias,” Mr. Leach countered.

“Really?” Jeff said, a little confused at why an orphanage would be more interesting than a POW prison.

“Yeah, can you imagine how many kids died here?” Mr. Leach mused.

Jeff’s stomach twisted. His partner seemed a little too gleeful about dead children.

“Yeah,” Jeff said distantly. He watched the last rays of the sun disappear behind the shrubbery outside. When it was completely dark, he said, “Well, shall we get started?”

Jeff jumped when a flashlight beam flared in his eyes.

“Can I ask you something, Jeff?” Mr. Leach asked, lowering his flashlight.

“Sure.”

“How did you get into paranormal stuff?” Mr. Leach asked.

“Curiosity,” Jeff began and then anger began to simmer. He didn’t know why the question upset him so, it was benign and practical. Perhaps it was his partner’s tone. “It’s really nobody’s business,” Jeff snapped.

“Fair enough,” Mr. Leach said. “What did your fiancée say about it?”

Jeff glared at Mr. Leach in the darkness. How did he know he had a fiancée?

“What makes you think I had a fiancée?” Jeff asked, pointedly.

“I know things,” Mr. Leach replied. His coy response echoing from the darkness sounded like the prelude to a horror movie.

Jeff was angry. Mr. Leach seemed to have no boundaries. Jeff’s fiancée was a sore spot. She had been a former fiancée for almost a year.

“Why don’t you tell me her name?” Jeff said, a little too loud. Shushes hissed from deep in the darkness as his voice echoed off the stone walls. It seemed the whole building heard his question.

There was a very long pause. Jeff almost thought he was alone until the answer startled him.

“I can’t see that,” Mr. Leach answered. “Only events and feelings.”

“What are you … some kinda Jedi Master?” Jeff asked.

“I’m psychic,” Mr. Leach wheezed. His last word echoed about the basement, bringing more shushes from around the building.

“Oh,” Jeff whispered. He had encountered these people before; every paranormal group seemed to have them. Out of the dozen or so self-proclaimed psychics Jeff had known in his life, there was only one he believed legitimate. An old shut-in, who he delivered prescriptions to while in college, told him some interesting things about his life that came to pass a short time later.

“So, where is my fiancée?” Jeff asked.

There was a long silence before Mr. Leach replied flatly. “With another man, I’m afraid.”

Jeff didn’t say anything. He knew she was with another man now. Lurid images filled his head as to what they may be doing right now. Acid boiled in his guts and his heart began to pound. He didn’t expect this answer; he was looking for more of a geographical location. She had been with this schmuck for six months, two weeks, and three days, but he wasn’t counting.

“Does that shock you?” Mr. Leach whispered.

“You’re the psychic … you tell me,” Jeff barked. “Look, I just want to focus on the investigation, can we do that now?”

More shushes ensued followed by a booming female voice asking them to be quiet. Swoosie had some lungs.

They were so engrossed in their argument, neither man noticed the single cell door slowly swing open and a black shadow dart down the passageway. The air grew thick and uncomfortable, but both men thought it was from their awkward conversation.

Mr. Leach didn’t answer. A moment later, Jeff heard the beep of a digital recorder turning on. The small red recording light resembled a one-eyed demon in the complete darkness. Jeff knew he hurt the guy’s feelings, but he didn’t care. Mr. Leach had trodden on areas of Jeff’s life where he wasn’t welcome. In fact, no one was welcome. His fiancée had been the last living member of anything resembling family for Jeff. She had tried to get him to see a shrink to cope with his parent’s death, but he refused. Thus, the wedge between them was forged.

On the surface, Jeff seemed to recover. He tried to move on with his life. His preacher once told him that time is a river, washing away all pains and transgressions. Yet, for those who grieve, time is often an ocean. It ebbs and flows, sometimes exposing the pain lurking beneath the surface of our consciousness with each experience.

“Truth,” Jeff thought.

He finally turned on his digital recorder and began to alternate questions with Mr. Leach.

“Is anyone with us?”

“Are you angry?”

“What is your name?”

“How old are you?”

“Why are you here?”

“When did you die?”

They repeated this process several times in different areas of the building. They never heard anything. Hopefully, there would be some evidence on the recording.

Jeff found it difficult to focus. Of course, he was tired, yet it was much more than fatigue. Mr. Leach had upset him, there was no denying it. The thing bothering him the most was the image running through his head; His fiancée and some faceless man with a Chippendale’s body were in bed together. He tried to push it aside and focus on the reason he was here. When he turned his thoughts to his parents, it did not help. He kept seeing the make-shift white cross memorial at the site of his parents’ crash. The same cross where he had recorded his mother’s voice. It wasn’t only the mental image distracting him. His mother’s one-word response echoed in his head after every EVP question – “Jeff”. A few times he thought he heard her voice coming from the darkness – “Jeff”.

Jeff knew it was fatigue, it had to be. If not, Mr. Leach would have heard something.

Jeff left Sunday morning frustrated. He sat in his truck and watched the last act unfold in what had been an all-night circus. Swoosie, her daughter, Mr. Leach, and a few other men sat in folding chairs arranged in a circle on the front lawn. They had asked Jeff to join them, but he respectfully declined. They burned sage while performing a cleansing ritual.

“We can’t have any spirits following us home,” Swoosie’s daughter proclaimed. “This’ll keep ‘em put.”

The obese Swoosie sat with her back to him. Her butt dangled on either side of the stressed chair as the legs sank into the soft and dewy sod. She swung a burning leaf around her head, making her resemble an elephant trying to douse the flames of a burning tree.

Jeff realized the only way he would get anywhere is starting his own team. He turned the ignition, causing his lights to fall on the group. They turned and glowered as if he farted and belched in church. He smiled and waved as he shifted the truck into gear.

Missouri Spirit Seekers,” Jeff muttered as he left the gate, “seems more like shit seekers.”

***

Author Bio:

John D. Mimms is a business owner, paranormal researcher and author. John served as the Technical Director for a TAPS (The Atlantic Paranormal Society) family paranormal research group in Central Arkansas. During his four-year tenure with the organization, he helped supervise over 100 investigations and wrote more than sixteen technical articles. Paul Bradford, of Ghost Hunters International fame, read one of John’s articles titled A Christmas Carol Debunked live on the air of the Parazona Radio program on Christmas Day 2009. John also wrote a definitive technical/training manual, which is a comprehensive guide on equipment usage, investigation protocol and scientific theory for paranormal research.

In 2009 John decided to couple his knowledge of paranormal phenomena with his lifelong love of literary fiction. John’s first published work, The Tesla Gate, is the first installment of a three-part, heart-wrenching, sci-fi/paranormal drama.

Book 1 of this unique, ground-breaking story released July 2014 through Open Road Media. In January 2016, Open Road Media released The Tesla Gate Book 2: The Myriad Resistance. Book 3: The Eye of Madness is slated for release September 27, 2016. Though fictional, the trilogy is based on scientific, paranormal theory.

Publishers Weekly declared about The Tesla Gate in the March 3, 2014 issue “…touching sci-fi story that takes the reader on an unlikely road-trip adventure…a fast read with some entertaining ideas and a real emotional core in the relationship between father and son.”

The Examiner proclaimed in June 2014: “Entertaining as well as poignant, this book is extremely imaginative in its basic premise as well as the many colorful and emotionally compelling events that take place.”

John resides and writes on a mountaintop in central Arkansas with his wife and two sons.

Catch Up With Our Author On: Website 🔗, Goodreads 🔗, Twitter 🔗, & Facebook 🔗!

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Visit these other great hosts on this tour for more great reviews, interviews, guest posts, and giveaways!

Giveaway:

This is a rafflecopter giveaway hosted by Partners in Crime Virtual Book Tours for John D. Mimms. There will be 3 winners of one (1) physical copy of Death Theory by John D. Mimms (US ONLY) AND 3 winners of one (1) audiobook copy of Death Theory by John D. Mimms. The giveaway begins on February 1, 2018 and runs through March 31, 2018. This giveaway is open to US addressess only.

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usnewsaggregator-blog · 7 years ago

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Will a U.S. Adaptation Ruin Sebastian Lelio’s <i>Gloria</i>?

New Post has been published on https://usnewsaggregator.com/will-a-u-s-adaptation-ruin-sebastian-lelios-gloria/

Will a U.S. Adaptation Ruin Sebastian Lelio’s Gloria?

When asked about the field research he conducted for his film Gloria, the Chilean director Sebastian Lelio described going out with his mother and her friends. “When I have a drink with them,” Lelio told the magazine Cromos in 2014, “I see things from their side because they’re living something so fierce: a cruel process of disappearance, of becoming invisible in a society in which beauty is understood as an obsession with youth.” Despite his choice of words, the 43-year-old director—who is now working on adapting a version of the 2013 drama for American audiences—didn’t actually make a movie that dismisses women beyond their child-bearing years as “disappearing.”

Gloria doesn’t insist on an essential tragicomic sadness in female aging like so many films do. The story’s eponymous hero is 58 and long divorced, checking in at an office job by day, and working Santiago’s swank club-circuit for mature singles by night. Played by a radiant Paulina García, Gloria doesn’t explicitly reject her modest place in Chile’s free-market, so-called “miracle” economy. Instead, she seeks alternative fates on the dance floor, in the narcotic power of Lite FM nostalgia radio and in the companionship of a retired naval officer named Rodolfo (Sergio Hernandez). Mostly, though, even with the specter of abandonment and blindness (she gets a glaucoma diagnosis at one point), Gloria luxuriates in her own selfhood. She’s empathic and open and essentially untethered to the stultifying dramas that confine the lives of those around her, including Rodolfo and her grown children.

Critics in Europe and the United States praised Gloria for, among other things, its “authenticity.” Carlos Boyero of El Pais wrote that the film dares to show “with naturalness the nudity of people who’ve entered winter, it shows the desire of their bodies.” Betsy Sharkey observed for The Los Angeles Times that Lelio depicts sex between older adults in a way that “is neither gratuitous nor gross nor glossy.” But this marveling is ironically a feature of how invisibility is assigned and thrives. With Gloria, the tragedy is not in aging, but in the much-remarked novelty of a 60-ish woman in bed as something undistorted and even natural—as if it’s a surprise that human desire might persist to the end of life.

Gloria launched Lelio into the ranks of Chilean directors on the international radar, notably Pablo Larrain (of No and Jackie fame) and Sebastian Silva (The Maid). Lelio’s latest film, Una Mujer Fantástica, starring the trans actress Daniela Vega, opens in theaters across the U.S. in February. His first English-language feature, Disobedience, with Rachel Weisz and Rachel McAdams, debuted at the Toronto International Film Festival this fall to acclaim. And now, Lelio is also writing and directing a U.S. adaptation of Gloria, which will be inspired by the original story rather than a regular remake, according to The Hollywood Reporter. The film will star Julianne Moore, who has made a career of playing fascinating women across the spectrum of human experience, from a porn actress who’s lost custody of her son in 1997’s Boogie Nights to a linguistics professor with Alzheimer’s in 2014’s Still Alice. With a film as innovative as Gloria, whose ethos of self-deliverance translates across cultural boundaries, the prospect of a “reimagining” is bittersweet. But there’s reason to hope that, with Lelio at the helm, the Hollywood version could be the director’s rebuke to the fact that Gloria has few equivalents in American cinema.

* * *

Most stories about women in or nearing middle age form part of the small canon of post-divorce bildungsroman films, including Paul Mazursky’s An Unmarried Woman (1978), in which an electrifying Jill Clayburgh ultimately thrives after her marriage unravels. More recent examples of similar reckoning include Mike Nichols’s Heartburn (1986), based on Nora Ephron’s novel and screenplay; Richard LaGravenese’s Living Out Loud (1998); Audrey Wells’s Under the Tuscan Sun; and Diane English’s The Women (2008). Still, these movies are about women considerably younger than Gloria and in the midst or immediate aftermath of ill-fated marriages.

Meanwhile, Nancy Meyers’s Something’s Gotta Give (2003) and It’s Complicated (2009) are genial, indulgent films about the desirability of their accomplished, older heroines. But each film winks at viewers with the improbability and counterintuitive humor of its premise; suitors swarm, romantic triangles emerge, and sex is reduced to geriatric antics. Isabel Coixet’s Learning To Drive (2014), based on a Katha Pollitt New Yorker essay, stands out as a quieter study of personal restoration and tackling long-delayed projects in the wake of divorce.

But these are all isolated examples of movies in the vein of Gloria. Since John Cassavetes’s defining films from the ’60s and ’70s, in which the inevitability of aging hangs like a guillotine blade, few directors have taken an interest in the full-dimensional humanity of older women. More typically, an aging woman’s longings are mawkish, or else her besottedness makes for absurdist fun. In Alfonso Cuarón’s Great Expectations (1998), the characters are lithe, contemporary reinventions with the grotesque exception of Nora Dinsmoor (Charles Dickens’s Miss Havisham) played by Anne Bancroft. Nora is all thwarted womanhood, a permanently jilted bride aghast at the dispossession accrued by age. Her face weeps mortician-grade makeup, a willful perversion of Charles Baudelaire’s idea that women wear cosmetics “to make divine their fragile beauty.”

Somewhere on this same small spectrum, Sally Field plays a disheveled 60-something woman who dons a Minnie Mouse bow and stalks after a younger colleague in Michael Showalter’s Hello, My Name Is Doris (2016). Like Gloria, Doris spends her days in a cubicle—that overused emblem of stifled promise. It turns out she’s a “holdover” from a corporate takeover so that even her age is an eccentricity in an office filled with insouciant youth. Then, with one innocuous and misinterpreted elevator exchange, Doris is suddenly reminded of her own vitality, perhaps for the first time since her fizzled aspirations as a bride decades earlier. But now, the movie suggests, it’s too late for her to enter any desirable man’s field of vision, much less a young one. The comedy, of course, rides on her increasingly frantic efforts to do just that.

And this is where Gloria’s protagonist departs from most similar American heroines: She’s not essentially in conflict with herself. Her loneliness is not a grasping sort, but a dignified bid for transcendence. García appears in every frame with near unwavering grace, even when high on pisco sour and making out with a stranger against a graffiti-scrawled lamppost in Viña del Mar. Viewers watch the surface turbulence of Gloria’s life from a still, clear depth, as though the events are ultimately incidental: Rodolfo’s inability to leave the collection of broken, dependent adults that make up his family; Gloria’s ex-husband’s drunken regrets at a fraught family reunion; and her own son and daughter’s unpromising relationships. Gloria cries privately at her daughter’s abrupt departure from Chile at one point, not in a bereft sense, but the way parents can feel like helpless onlookers to their adult children’s flawed lives.

Lelio has said Gloria’s script, written with Gonzalo Maza, draws lightly on his mother’s life, and is broadly an exploration of her generation—women raised for marriage and later caught in the unfettered economic and social changes in Chile after its transition to democracy in the late 1980s. Rising inequality, living costs, and divorce rates spurred by rapid modernization echo in the story’s margins, as do darker insinuations of the country’s unresolved military past in the figure of Rodolfo. The audience sees a backdrop of confinement—stairwells, parking lots, tidy apartments. Santiago is reduced to a gray drift of development that registers vaguely in the reflection of Gloria’s car window. But Lelio defies tendencies to turn each new Latin American film into a thinly veiled comment on history and politics. Gloria’s physical surroundings are bleakly dim and unspecific, with the exception of a brilliant beach where she wakes up at one point, hungover and robbed of her purse.

Of the new English-language version, Lelio has said, “It’s going to be like jazz, you’ll feel the spirit of the original story but it’ll be reinvigorated and vital.” It’s hard to imagine how Lelio’s film needs to be reinvigorated. It’d be easy to make another comically disruptive spectacle of a female character’s post-menopausal sexuality. In less adept hands, if the erratic history of American remakes is any guide—from duds like The Vanishing (1993) and Shall We Dance (2004) to the accomplished The Departed (2006)—viewers might be served up an accelerated plot or sentimental pathos. The Hollywood Reporter inauspiciously suggested that, in Lelio’s as-yet untitled U.S. adaptation, Moore’s character will be “vacillating between hope and despair” over a love affair, before ending on a note of personal vindication.

Admirers of Lelio’s work can only hope the director will handle his new film with the same deftness he used in the original. What’s radical in the director’s vision is that Gloria’s body and desire are gracefully unremarkable frames for seeking pleasure and fulfillment. And that she’s startlingly visible in her ordinariness. Gloria is a sobering reminder that it’s not the “invisibility” of older women that’s the problem, but rather their systemic exclusion from cultural relevance. Whatever acts of contortion Lelio might end up performing to cater to American sensibilities, there’s hope that he’ll at least flout Hollywood biases against the aging female body. And if not, there’s always the original, in which Gloria, in a memorable revenge scene, confronts her fatuous lover with the cool of a hired assassin. How does she follow this act? With a night out—dancing alone.

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cc-hatredisland · 7 years ago

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Investigation. 01 {.Find Your Courage.}

Those were big words... but when I took a step back and thought about it, I didn’t even know the first place to start. I mean, come on, wasn’t this a bit much to ask? I’d never seen a dead body, let alone looked at one. I had the weird feeling like I was astral projecting or something, looking down on stuff from somewhere else. Maybe that’s why I was able to come up with those words before... it’s like my mind had accepted it... but then... my body was jut going to have to deal with the reality of it.

I’m not sure. I couldn’t quite put it into words, honestly.

But now that my moment of bravado was gone, I was feeling a little lost at sea. I didn’t even know the first place to begin. You saw it in all of those shows... people looking at marks and fingerprints... those detectives came to conclusions really easily. But I’m really not sure I’d know.

I just... didn’t know.

“Man, I just... this is messed up...”

“I’m still not sure one of us could’ve... done this. I mean, right? It’s not just me, right? How can we trust the stuffed fella wasn’t doing all this just to make us distrust each other?”

“... Investigating’s the only way we’ll know for sure. We don’t have much time so we should do what we can.”

I manage to nod but my head feels so heavy I half-feel it’ll fall off if I move any more than that. I managed to talk a big game but after the words had left my mouth my head was just... not really responding.

“U-um... I don’t mean to, um, you know... uh, you know, seem like...“

She waves her hands around. Somehow even with just that I get what it means.

“But I think, um, we should be, uh, er, how should I put this... watching the bodies...? Oh! Uh, see... in crime fiction the killers can go back to the scene of the crime and well, like, they’ll tamper with evidence and stuff... it’d be really, really bad for us if we let that happen. I d-don’t mean to be disrespectful! It’s still very sad but um! We have to do... stuff now... I think...“

I can’t stop thinking about how messed up it is. Nagase’s right but... come on, killing someone and then tampering with evidence on top of that? It felt like I’d somehow shifted into a different story genre here. Were... we really capable of something that callous?

Man...

“Nagase-chan might be right. We’re already dealing with two bodies... we can’t afford to let things get any more complicated. If that’s the case, I’ll stick around here.”

He pauses to look around before apparently finding a target in Nagase.

“Actually, would you mind staying here as well? I feel like your expertise could be really helpful.”

“W-what? Do you really think... hmm... mm... I-I’m not sure I can, um, do much but, uh... i-if you want me to stay here then, uh, okay. Yeah. Sure.”

“If nothing else, you can keep an eye on me. One person guarding a scene won’t do. We’d risk contaminating it that way.“

“... T-that’s true...”

“Shiratori-san. Could you tend to Anzai-san?”

The high tension Shiratori seemed even more uppity. I guess it made sense; maybe he was feeling the brunt of responsibility about now. He hadn’t moved away from Kurumi, either, his hand firmly holding onto hers. I guess he was making do without handcuffs. Seems like he wasn’t going to change his mind on the culprit anytime soon.

“If I do, Ogawa-kun comes with me.”

“Wha--? Who gave you the right to make that choice? I’m not gonna just stand around in one place while you give me the evil eye. No way. This is about me so I’m gonna solve it myself!!! You better stick out of my way!”

In one moment, she kicks at his shin and wrenches her hand free. She could’ve run for it but I think even she knew that’d just make her look worse. Instead she just gives him a withering look and heads for the door. Well, after that stunt he’s not far behind.

“You’re not going anywhere, Ogawa-kun! I’ll prove it! I’ll prove your the killer myself!”

Jesus...

I’m not the only one thinking along those lines. Rie heaves a huge sigh.

“This is so goddamn ugly...“

I can’t disagree.

“I’ll go. Someone’s gotta, right? Besides, ain’t no one gonna be overpowering me if it comes to that. I just... not sure I can look at her like this, anyway.”

It’s weird to say. Weird to think but I guess it’s true. We may not have been the best friends but that doesn’t mean some of us weren’t already kinda close. Daisy was always clinging to Rie... can’t be easy.

“Take someone with you.“

“Huh? You think I did this?”

“I think... it’s not out of the realms of possibility. So long as that’s the case, I’m sorry, but I’ll have to insist.”

She looks unimpressed. Rie casts a look over to Mikiro before settling one someone else. I may not know her well but I kinda get the impression that that’s her kindness. She clearly likes the guy. Probably doesn’t wanna take him body watching.

“Come on then. You.“

“Me?”

“You see another fruit bat in a dumb hat? Yeah, you. Partner up n’ all that shit. Get over here, we’re gonna keep the crime scene clean.”

“U... understood! Verily! I am at your disposal, Utsumi-dono!”

Rie grumbles, leaving the room and Buki follows behind, sandals clocking against the floor. It reminds me of Anzai... geez. I feel sick all over again. A hand on my shoulder brings me back to reality. I flinch but kinda punch out at the same time.

“Whoa there! ... Ah... geez, that’s my bad. Sorry for surprising you.”

“No, I.... sorry. I was elsewhere.”

He nods sympathetically.

“I was thinking... do you want to investigate with me? I guess that’s a pretty weird invitation, huh... definitely grim... but... well, I can’t help thinking working together’s the best course of action right now. We can make up for each other’s faults and, at the very least, keep each other company. It’s the little things that help.”

At this point and time, I get stuck on a really weird thought. How do morticians do it? Thinking about even one body makes me wanna just blackout, how can you get so used to that type of thing?

I’m kinda grateful for Manabu’s suggestion of company. Maybe it is the little things. Maybe everybody in dark lines of work needs the company... and yeah, maybe it’ll make this a little easier if someone else is there. I try to get my thoughts together before replying. Somehow the words that come out of my mouth aren’t the ones I want to say, though.

“What if... I’m... what if I did this, though?“

An amused laugh. Not sure it’s the time or place for that.

“Then... maybe I’ll be the next victim? What if I’m the killer? ... The point is, we can’t be sure either way. So why not declare a truce for now and work together? If either of us are responsible I think it’d become plain pretty soon.“

When he says it like that, I can’t help but think he’s got a point. It was kind of a jerk move to even say that in the first place; still not sure why it came out of my mouth. Perhaps all that emotion and worry and stuff just... kinda... exploded out. Not sure. But now that it’s behind me, my throat feels less clogged and the words seem to come out just fine.

“Then... yeah. I think it’d help a lot. Thanks.

“No need to thank me. The way I see it, we’re both helping each other here.”

Yeah, I guess... maybe he’s scared too. Scared... not sure that’s the right word for it but any word I think of just feels too mild. It’s like this dark cloud has taken all of us over and everyone’s just... afraid to even be near each other right now. That’s the best way I can put it, I guess. I nod my pseudo-agreement before finally coming to terms with the fact I’m ready to do what I can.

I’m not sure anything can really prepare me for looking at a body but I can’t just refuse. I’m gonna have to find my courage.

“Manabu, I... I’m going to look at Daisy.”

He blinks and for a second I can’t really decipher his expression. He’s never been an easy one to read. Manabu then kind of... I dunno, he seems to roll with it and nods.

“... It’s alright. I’ll be with you.“

It’s not much but it’s some kind of reassurance. Well, there’s no time like the present...

I walk towards the body, with all the strength I can muster.

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#hatredislandplot #hatredislandchapter1 #hatredislandinvestigation #kaede shimizu #manabu chiyoda #yuunagi maki #rie utsumi #kurumi ogawa #suguru shiratori #akari kotobuki #chika nagase #mikiro otomiya #naoki kumatani

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