#rip the days when I drew physical inked pieces

[teaweltzer]

Sorry if this was posted somewhere and I can't find it, do you have specific prompts you're following for drawtober or are you just doing what inspires you? (I admit I've never seen a drawtober before)

You can find all kinds of October month challenge prompts! Inktober & drawtober are the most popular with their own like official prompts. Then people make their own like oc-tober and other fun stuff people can do. I did a Tieftober last year where I just drew tieflings.

But I am not specifically drawing from a prompt list cause I'm too tired to have planned for things. So all I'm doing is drawing from the Ravenloft campaign that I'm in! First 7 days are the PC's we play so you guys know who the hell I'm drawing, then after is just fun stuff like in game scenes or stupid memes

[dreamerstreamer]

Never Meant To Be Yours

Pairing: Wilbur Soot x gn!reader

Summary: [Dream SMP!AU] Wilbur Soot’s heart may belong to you, but yours? Well...

Warnings: some cursing (hi, Tommy) + one scene with slight violence 

Word Count: 3.5k

A/N: i realized that i hadn’t written a story that was strictly just angst, so... ta-da! this story takes place during the betrayal of l’manberg. inspired by both the events of the smp and also heathers: the musical. remember folks: pog through the pain <3

The campfire crackled and popped as Wilbur tossed another stick into the roaring flames, the embers leaping up and soaring into the starry night sky. His eyebrow twitched in annoyance as Tommy opened his mouth again.

“I’m fucking telling you, Wilbur. Just let me sharpen some sticks and I can win this war for L’Ma—”

Wilbur sighed, reaching over to rip the two branches from Tommy’s hands. “Tommy, if you pick up another set of sticks one more time, I will throw your discs into the fire.”

Tommy gasped, absolutely appalled that he would even suggest it. “Big man, you wouldn’t fucking dare—”

“No,” Tubbo said, smiling as he threw some more kindle into the fire, “I’m pretty sure he would.”

“Oh, he definitely would,” Fundy confirmed, his tail swishing this way and that as he looked on in amusement.

Tommy frowned, snatching another stick from the firewood pile and turning to glare at Wilbur from where he sat on his log. “Fucking fight me for them, you beanie bitch.”

Wilbur stared back, unimpressed and his patience wearing thin. “Tommy,” he said, “I’m not doing this, again.”

“Oh? Are you scared of my sharpness 1000 sti—”

Without even an ounce of hesitation, Wilbur grabbed Tommy by his arms and hoisted him into the air, his feet dangling dangerously close to the campfire. Fundy hooted as Tommy let out a piercing scream, Tubbo watching with wide eyes and a grin on his face as the flames licked at the soles of his shoes. “I swear to fucking god, Tommy,” Wilbur nearly shouted, “I am going to drop you into the fi—”

“You lot seem like you’re having fun.”

Wilbur froze, Tommy practically melting in his arms in relief. “Thank the lord, I’m saved,” he muttered.

You walked over to the group with a small wave and a bashful grin. In an instant, Wilbur had released Tommy, dropping him back onto the log as he walked over to you. The irritation seeped out of his bones as he took in the sight of your face, your eyes glowing in the golden light of the campfire.

“You’re finally here,” he said, leaning over to press a quick peck to your cheek before sitting once more.

You giggled, settling into the space next to him. “Hi.”

Beside you, Tommy made a gagging noise. “Jesus Christ, you guys are actually fucking gross. I would never do some shit like that.”

You gave him a quizzical look. “But Tommy,” you pointed out, “I thought you loved women. Don’t you want to date one, one day?”

“I do love women!” Tommy confirmed. “And I respect them! But you know me, [Y/N].” He patted his chest, smirking with pride. “I’m married to the grind.”

You tilted your head at him, bemused. “Are you, now?”

He nodded with full confidence. “Of course I am!”

“And you didn’t invite me to the wedding?”

Tommy shot you a condescending look. “The grind and I have been married far longer than you and Wilbur have even been together—hell, I’d say we’re a better fucking couple than you two!”

You feigned a gasp and turned to your lover with a dramatic pout. “Hey, Will? Do you hear that? Tommy says his marriage to the grind is better than our relationship.”

Wilbur paused for a moment, blinking, then shrugged. “Well, that’s an easy fix.”

Confusion flashed across Tommy’s face. “How?”

Wilbur stood up and turned to look at you, a serious expression crossing his face. “I suppose we’ll just have to get married.”

You felt your jaw drop, a wave of shock running through you as Tommy sputtered, “Pfft—what the fuck?”

Taking a deep breath, you sighed, rubbing your temples. “Will,” you said, “getting married in the middle of a war doesn’t exactly sound like the best idea you’ve had.”

“But Wilbur never has good ide—”

“Well,” Wilbur said, cutting Tommy off, “how else are we going to beat Tommy and the grind?”

You cocked a brow at him. “Are you implying that are relationship isn’t already stronger than Tommy’s with the grind? That we have to prove it?”

Now it was Wilbur’s turn to sputter. “No, uh, I’m just, um—”

“Will,” you said again, “you realize you have a son that we both care for, right?”

Wilbur paused. “Oh. Right.”

You could see Fundy groan from the other side of the campfire, hanging his head in his hands. “Jeez, thanks, dad.”

Wilbur flashed his son a bright grin. “You’re welcome, son.” He whirled, triumphantly pointing at Tommy’s face. “See? Do you and the grind have a physical representation of your love in the form of another living being?”

Tommy’s face contorted in disgust. “Wilbur, what the fuck, no. I’m a fucking minor.”

The smile dropped from Wilbur’s face like a dead fly. “Oh. Right.”

Tubbo let out a whistle, raising his fist in the air. “Aaand, scene! That’s a point for Tommy!” He shook his head apologetically at the general. “Sorry, Wilbur, but you lose.”

Wilbur looked offended. “How did I lose? [Y/N] and I have a Fundy!”

Tubbo’s expression shifted to something more serious. “Didn’t you know that I’m a lawyer, Wilbur? You don’t mess with the law.”

Fundy let out another groan as Tommy howled in delight. “Oh, no.”

“Big Law is back!”

It didn’t take long for the bickering to start up again, and you found yourself zoning out, simply smiling and nodding every once in a while. A lone crow squawked in the trees above you, and you cast your gaze up at the night sky, watching as the campfire sparks danced and faded into the shadows above. Something stirred deep within your chest. 

It really was a lovely night, and you were surrounded by some lovely people, even if they were rather chaotic. With the campfire keeping you warm and their peals of laughter tugging at your lips, you almost felt sad.

Only a few more days remained of this idyllic life. Just a few days more until—

“[Y/N]? Are you okay?”

Wilbur’s worried voice drew you out of your thoughts and you turned to face him, plastering a small smile to your face. “Yep! Just thinking.”

He leaned down to peer closer at you, his gaze scanning your face. “What about?”

You averted your eyes from his, your cheeks dancing with warmth. “About you.”

He grinned and pulled you into his chest, ignoring the way Tommy pretended to choke at the sight. You giggled, your hands wrapped around Wilbur’s arm in return as he held you close.

High above you, the stars winked down at you from the pitch black sky, waiting and watching to see what came next.

Wilbur sighed, staring down at the map on his desk.

Just how was he going to stage an attack on a nation as large as the Dream SMP? Every opening would have been accounted for, and Dream was not a foe to be taken lightly. Even if all of them came in, bows blazing and swords drawn, Dream was still very much capable of taking them on, even by himself. That, he knew, and that was what weighed him down.

He slumped over, dragging a hand over his face. What in the world was he going to do?

A knock sounded at his door, startling him out of his thoughts.

“Knock knock,” you greeted, leaning against the doorframe with a smile. “You doing alright in there?”

Wilbur offered you a tired smile. “Not really, if I’m being honest.”

You stepped inside, slipping into the seat next to his. “What’s going on? Tell me.”

He sighed. “It—It’s just that the odds are so incredibly stacked against us.” His eyes were sad as he stared blankly down at the parchment. “It makes me wonder, is freedom even attainable, or is it just another one of my silly pipe dreams?”

You frowned, reaching over to stroke his face with the back of your hand. “Freedom is more than just a dream, Will. You know that.” You squeezed his shoulder. “Fundy is living proof of that. Your son is living proof of that. He was born in these walls, remember?” Your voice dropped to a whisper, and it sent a shiver down his spine. “He was born free.”

You pulled away from him, sending him a sugary grin. “We can become free, Will. I know you can do it. You’re not alone. You have me. You have us.”

His smiled crookedly at you. “Even Tommy?”

The look in your eyes was kind as you giggled. “Yes, even Tommy. I’m sure of it. Why else would you have made him your right hand man?”

He chuckled, turning his attention away from the map and onto you. “You’re right. You always know how to make me feel better, [Y/N].”

You offered him a small smile. “I try my best.”

The two of you set into a comfortable silence for a moment or two with you watching Wilbur strategically move pieces across the map while he jotted down notes on a slip of paper. It was only after a few minutes had passed when you spoke up once more.

“Hey,” you said softly, reaching over his ink well to slip your hand in his, “I want to show you something that’ll make you feel even better.”

He raised an eyebrow at you, his hand freezing on its quill. “Oh?”

You nodded, smiling sweetly at him. “I’ve been working on it for a little while, and I really think it’ll help us win that freedom of ours.”

He smiled at you, his gaze fond as he stood, setting his quill on the table. “Let me gather the men and I’ll be right there.”

It only took him a few minutes for him to rally everyone together, although he did have to silence Tommy when he let loose a string of curses yelling about his dedication to the grind. In practically no time, the whole battalion stood in front of you, eager to see what you had in store.

“Alright,” Wilbur said, bowing towards you, “lead the way.”

You grinned, jokingly curtsying back before turning on you heel, a skip lining your step as you strode toward a small tree sitting near the edge of the walls. “If you come down here,” you began, sliding down the side of the hill to point behind the tree, “you’ll see that there’s actually a small entranceway here.”

Wilbur’s eyes widened in surprise. There really was a hole in the hill dug out just here. He wondered just when you made it. “How the fuck did you keep this hidden from us?” Tommy muttered, squinting as you led them inside. “You didn’t even try to hide the fucking door.”

You shrugged, still strolling comfortably. “It was pretty out of the way and it faces the wall itself, so you weren’t likely to spot it, anyways. I didn’t really think it was necessary.”

The walls were dark and dank, lit up only be the occasional torch, but even then it was still dim. “This is a long tunnel,” Tubbo murmured after they had been walking for a minute or two, his head swiveling this way and that as he took in his surroundings.

You laughed. “Well, this place was pretty well-hidden, if I do say so myself.” Suddenly, you stopped, turning to look at the rest of the group. “Well, lads, here it is.”

You stepped in and to the side, and Wilbur gasped.

Lying just within the hill was a grand room. Every surface was made of smooth, polished, black bricks, and pale blue lanterns hung from each corner of the room, emitting a faint light that painted the room in an enchanting glow. Chests lined the walls, and in the center of the room sat a single button atop a panel.

Wilbur was floored—he had no idea when you had built all this.

“What is this place?” Fundy asked, his dark eyes wide with awe.

You hummed, tapping a finger on your chin as you strode to the middle of the room. “Well, I guess you could call it a secret base, but I’ve been calling it the final control room.” Something glinted in your eyes. “I spent a lot of time gathering resources and forging weaponry that we can use to fight.” You pointed at each labelled box with delight. “Look—you each have your own chest!”

Wilbur felt his heart swell with pride. Just when he didn’t think you could be any more perfect, you just had to shatter his expectations.

Everyone split apart, each rushing toward their respective chest with anticipation thrumming in their fingertips. Wilbur grinned as he reached his, unlatching the clasp on the front and flipping the lid open to reveal... nothing.

There wasn’t anything in the chest.

Uneasiness seeped into his stomach.

“[Y/N],” he said slowly, turning to look at you, “these chests are empty.”

You still stood in the center of the room, sending him that same sweet smile you always did.

“I know,” you said, lifting your hand to hover over the singular button lying on the control panel.

Something like terror struck his heart.

“[Y/N]?” he whispered.

It was only then that he noticed how cold your eyes were.

“It was never meant to be.”

What came next happened so quickly that Wilbur almost didn’t process it. He watched as your hand slammed down on the button, and a hole in the wall opened up to reveal the Dream SMP, their swords unsheathed and armour polished to shining. Screams rang out all around him, echoing in the tiny chamber of the so-called final control room. He could only watch in horror as his men were slaughtered at his side until a sword pierced his chest as well.

With a pained gasp, he looked up to you as he fell back, disbelief and the pure, utter pain of betrayal sinking into his veins while he coughed for air.

You still wore that saccharine smile of yours, the one he had fallen for long, long ago. Something menacing shone in your eyes.

He wondered how you could still be smiling at a time like this as his world went dark.

Wilbur awoke with a gasp, lurching forward with wide eyes. Panting, his hand flew to his chest, grasping at where he was just stabbed—or had been stabbed. His shoulders sank in relief as his fingertips met unmarred skin and the softness of his shirt, a sigh escaping his lips.

Coming back after death never really got any easier after the first time. He could only wonder what Tommy and Tubbo were going through—they were so young.

“Oh, you’re awake.”

Wilbur’s head shot to the side, his eyes briefly noting the fact that he was indeed lying on the bed in his room. On the opposite side of the room, you sat on a wooden chair, a book clutched between your fingertips. Something warm flitted through his chest as his eyes met yours, and he almost felt glad to see you.

Almost.

“What are you doing here?” he spat, a cruelty he had never felt for you before brewing within his gut. “Why are you even here?”

You blinked innocently at him, shutting the book in your hands and setting it on the table next to you. It was the declaration of independence, he noted with disgust. He felt sick knowing that you held it in yours hands, that you even signed it at all.

“I’m keeping you company,” you said casually, as if nothing had happened at all, as if you hadn’t just gotten him killed. “I didn’t want you to be lonely.”

Rage ripped through him, roaring through him like a wildfire. With shoulders shaking with agony, he tore the sheets from off his legs. “‘Didn’t want me to be lonely’?” he parroted mockingly as he stood to his full height. His glare was as cold as ice. “Is this some sick joke to you?”

You tilted your head at him, your mouth remaining a straight line—hard and firm. “Not particularly, no.”

That was when it hit him—when everything came crashing into him all at once.

You had sold them out.

You had abandoned them.

Did you mean anything you ever said to him? Did you ever really love him? Were your kisses ever real? Did his love really mean nothing to you? 

“[Y/N],” he breathed, horror wracking his every word, “what have you done?”

You stared at him, your expression blank and unreadable—an impenetrable wall standing between him and your psyche. He hated it. He hated how unreadable you were in this moment, and his anger older burned brighter.

“What were you thinking?” he shouted, his voice growing louder and louder. He ran a hand through his dishevelled hair, pushing it away from his soot-stained face. “We were going to get married. We—we were going to start a new life together. With Tommy, and Tubbo. Niki. Fundy, my son.” His eyes flashed. “Our son. Whatever happened to that?”

He sank to his knees, suddenly feeling very tired. The fire burned out, and an indescribable sense of sadness flowed in instead, flooding every inch of his being. He felt his eyes begin to water as you simply stared down at him, unfeeling and harsh. His voice cracked.

“[Y/N], why?”

There was no denying what you had done. He had seen it with his own two eyes, had watched a wicked glint creep into your gaze as you pressed the button and vanished.

You were a traitor, through and through, yet he still could not fathom why.

Suddenly, you took a stood, taking a slow and deliberate step toward him. Wilbur’s breath hitched in his throat as he saw you draw closer and closer, his heart pounding in his ears. Even after all that you’d done, after you’d betrayed him, his heart still yearned for you—still ached for you.

Just a step before you reached him, you stopped, crouching down to be level with him. For a moment, you simply stared at him with those eyes—those eyes he loved so, so much. Then, you opened your mouth.

“Wilbur,” you murmured, soft enough only for him to hear. “Oh, my darling, lovely Wilbur.”

Your voice was sickly sweet, dripping like honey that stuck to the roof of his mouth. He swallowed, the tiniest flicker of hope igniting in his heart. Perhaps this was all just some big misunderstanding, some prank that you were pulling on him—you always did love your mischief.

You smiled at him, the glimmer in your eyes wicked and unkind as you stood up. The sun hung just behind you in the sky, framing your face in a heavenly glow.

In another life, you would have looked like an angel.

“I was never meant to be yours.”

His heart shattered.

The tears were now freely streaming down his cheeks, running down like tiny rivers. He half-hoped that he would drown in them, that he would never have to see your beautifully wretched face again for as long as he lived.

Bending over, you pressed a soft kiss to his forehead, pulling away just a second later after gently patting his head. The spot where your lips met his skin burned, and he hated himself for wishing you would stay.

You strode over to the door, swinging it open with one last glance over your shoulder and an empty half-smile. “Goodbye, Will.”

The door closed. Wilbur stared at the solid oak wood, feeling an abyss open up inside him.

Gone—you were gone.

And he was left alone.

So much for getting married.

“Was it worth it?”

You stopped swinging your legs from the gold throne you sat upon and cast a glance up at Dream, his green eyes boring into you from where he was perched on the chandelier. How he got up there, you still had no idea.

“Was what worth it?” you asked, examining a diamond between your fingers.

He cocked his head at you, gesturing to the castle surrounding the two of you. “This life. Your new title. You gave up so much for them, after all.” He began counting off on his fingers, his lips quirking. “You faked a relationship with Wilbur, pretended to love his son, befriended that brat, Tommy, and then blew it all to smithereens for the crown on your head.”

His gaze flickered back to yours. “Well?” he said again. “Was it worth it?”

You looked at him for a long moment, your expression pensive.

You thought of soft, brown curls tickling against your face as you awoke on the couch. You thought of fluttering laughter and bashful giggles. You thought of a pearly white grin flashing at you from the other side of the campfire. You thought of an old acoustic guitar that was almost always just a little out of tune. You thought of gentle kisses pressed to hands, cheeks, necks, and mouths. 

You thought of Wilbur Soot.

And you smiled and felt nothing.

“Yes.”

[n0wornever]

Remember Me - Luke Patterson x Reader

“So I have this idea where the reader died with the boys she's like their friend/fan/manager type stuff but like she has this crush on Luke since forever but never acted up on it and so when they met Julie and stuff the boys kind of neglect her because they were so focused on making the band and stuff and she also sees the chemistry between Luke and Julie. After that she went and met Willie where they talked about their unfinished business and like the reader knows her unfinished business and it's not Luke...”

So this is....the saddest piece I’ve ever written, sorry in advance

It had been about two months since Y/N and the boys were planted in Julie Molina’s life. In that short period of time, Luke, Alex, and Reggie were able to creatively connect with the girl and start to play music again. As much as she loved to watch the boys succeed, she couldn’t help but feel a pain in her chest.

As the boys grew closer to Julie, Y/N slipped into the background. Unable to contribute musically and her death making it impossible for her to help with the marketing piece she used to take on, she was often relegated to an audience member and cheerleader. She didn’t mind encouraging her boys, but she couldn’t help but feel like an outsider from the group.

As she sat on the white sand, she looked out at the open water, listening to water whip around. A jolt pushed her back a few feet, leaving her breathless. As she came back from the sudden pain, she thought about what Willie had said to Alex about completing their unfinished business. With the physical pain of whatever Caleb ejected into their system, and the hidden pain her chest, she was aware of the fact that she couldn’t last long. 

She knew she needed to talk to someone about it. Her best friend had been the one she turned to when she felt her lowest. She had hesitated to say anything to him before because looked so happy with this second chance. He was writing and singing again, and most importantly, he was smiling again. She had ignored the fast beating of her heart when he grabbed her hand in excitement over the Phantoms’ first gig and definitely ignored the ache in her chest when she saw the way that Julie and Luke sang with each other on the stage. However, she knew this feeling in her gut wouldn’t go away with her letting it build inside, so she was finally going to rip off that bandaid. 

She snapped her fingers and was instantly brought back to the garage. She looked around the garage and didn’t see anyone initially. As she waited, she started to hear the muffled sound of voices outside the door. She walked over, opening the door a crack and peeking outside. She saw Luke and Julie, a soft smile across his face as he looked at her. One she once thought was reserved for her. She swallowed hard as she listened.

“Julie, you’re incredible, please talk to me. You know that you can tell me anything, right?” 

The girl looked up at him with wide eyes and a sweet smile. They moved to try to connect hands, his slipping through hers. She turned to face the house and he smiled at her side profile.

“This is an interesting little relationship you and I have…”

Y/N felt tears bubble toward the surface as she watched the pure encounter in front of her. She had felt like she had been replaced for a while now, but this was the physical proof she was looking for. She slid the door closed and fell against it, letting silent tears fall from her face for a moment before snapping her fingers again.

She landed in the middle of the quiet dance floor of Caleb’s club. She heard the sound of tires wheeling toward her and turned to see Willie racing her way. He slid up to meet her, picking up his board in his hand and smiling at her.

“Y/N, what are you doing here?” 

She clutched her wrist in her opposite hand, refusing to meet his eyes. She felt his hand grab hers and she finally met his gaze, unable to stop the tears from flowing. 

“What’s going on?” He pressed, his eyebrows raised in concern. 

She let go of his hand and moved hers to wipe the tears away. “I just wanted to talk to you about something.” She shoved her hands in her pockets as she looked up at him. 

He sighed, leading her over to the table. He sat his board on the chair next to him and turned to face her. She took a deep breath before speaking again. 

“You know how you said that by completing your unfinished business you could pass on…”

“Uh-huh…” He said slowly, one eyebrow raising at her. 

She rubbed the back of her neck “I was wondering...how do you find out what that is exactly...to do that…”

“Y/N have you talked to the boys-”

She stopped him, holding a hand out to his face. “I am certain it doesn’t have anything to do with them.” He stared at her blankly “You know that. We talked about how their scheduled performance will probably be the anecdote for them. That won’t work for me… I need to do this alone” 

He nodded at her, waiting a moment before talking again “Okay, so let’s think about this…. Do you have anyone that you have unresolved issues with? Anyone that you might have left on bad terms with?”

She thought hard about this question. There were many people that she never received clarity from, but one stuck out. Her mom and her were never really on great terms. She remembered the last argument they had the last night before she left for the Sunset Curve show. Her mom had been frustrated with her slipping grades and her continued focus on the boys’ career instead of her own. 

What really broke her was her mom’s stance that Luke “wasn’t good enough for her” and that she was wasting her time on him. The screaming match that followed this comment had left Y/N’s face red and her heart racing as she screamed ‘I hate you’ at her mother and slammed the door as she left.

She regretted that the moment she said it. She knew her mom was just looking out for her, that she wanted the best for her daughter, and was genuinely worried about her. She knew she didn’t like Luke, but it wasn’t because she disliked him, she felt like the boy was leading her daughter on and didn’t want her heart to hurt anymore. Her mom was there the nights she cried when Luke would go on dates with other girls or when he would cancel plans last minute. Her mom would console her into the early hours of her morning. Although they didn’t always see eye to eye, her mom cared about her and loved her more than anyone she ever knew. 

She felt her chest get heavier the longer she thought about that moment. She met Willie’s eyes again, placing her hands on the table as she told him the story. 

“I think I know what I need to do, thanks, Wille.” 

The right side of his lips rose at her, grabbing her hands and squeezing them. “You sure that this is what you want?” 

She nodded, standing up. She wrapped the flannel she stole from Luke this morning and pulled it over her shoulders. The pair exchanged a hug and a last goodbye before she poofed out of the room. As she opened her eyes, she was met by a scene she was all too familiar with. The tree was already decorated for the Christmas holiday, the dining room set the way her mom always did even though they rarely ate there. She walked forward, entering the living room. That is when she saw her, she almost cried at the sight of the grey-haired woman, knitting in her favorite chair. As she approached her and watched her stoically watching the screen in front of her, she shook from the emotion that fell from her body. Y/N tried to wave her hand in front of her face, but the woman did not react to the movement. She watched her for another moment before she walked over to the table.

She saw the pen and notepad on the table and concentrated on them. She exhaled as she was able to hold the pen in her hand. She touched the notepad, pressing the ink to the page. The words flew like water from her as the pen hit the paper. She got to the end and thought carefully before she wrote “Your Sunshine” at the end in neat cursive. She ripped the paper from the rest and folded into a perfect square. She held it up to her and kissed it gently. She walked to the kitchen, placing the note next to the coffee machine that she’d know the woman would eventually wander to. She looked around the room one more time before stepping through the back door. 

She sat down on the outside steps and took a deep breath. She rested her elbows on her knees and brought her hands up to cover her face. She finally took a moment to let go, crying into her hands, the tears collecting in her palm. She knew that she couldn’t bear to evaporate into thin air or whatever would happen at her home. She felt like that would be like her mom losing her twice, even if she didn’t see her. 

She snapped her fingers and heard the familiar noise of the waves around her. She let her eyes set on the water furthest from her. Sitting in silence as the grey day consumed her. 

Later that night

Luke’s body drew a subtle hue as he hugged Julie, feeling the strength reenter his body after a near-death after their last performance. The band hugged each other closely, spinning around in a circle at the opportunity for another chance to be around each other. As they separated, Luke looked around the room with wide eyes.

“Hey, where’s Y/N, I know she’s not formally a part of the band...but maybe this will work for her too?”

He looked over to the chair where he normally found her reading and didn’t see her lamp on. He ran over to the other side of the room by the stereo and found nothing. He ran his fingers through his hair as he sprinted back over to his bandmates. 

He jogged back to his bandmates, scratching his head “Did she say she was going somewhere tonight?” 

Before any of them could answer, they heard the turn of wheels near the entrance of the garage. They turned to see the long-haired skater frantically trying to catch his breath. His eyes darted between all of the boys eyes before he met Luke’s, fighting the tears he already felt coming. 

“Willie, what’s going on?” Alex asked, approaching the boy.

Willie looked up at Alex with tears welling in the corners of his eyes. He bit down on his bottom lip before speaking to the group.

“She didn’t want me to tell you guys, but my heart can’t take you all not knowing. I think Y/N is gone.”

Luke scoffed, pointing at the empty room behind him “Yeah, I just tried to look for her-”

Wille interrupted him, swallowing hard “No...she’s gone gone.” 

Luke’s face moved to a scowl, approaching the man with his fists balled “What do you mean? What the hell did you do?”

Wille pressed backward, and Alex intervened, pushing against Luke’s chest to separate the boys. The skater put a hand on Alex’s shoulder and moved him out of the way to meet Luke’s angry expression again.

“I didn’t do anything. SHE came to me this afternoon and asked about completing unfinished business. She told me she had to do this. She said something about it being her last hope.” Luke felt his eyes fill with water. He turned away from the group and slammed his hand against the wall, knowing well that it would bruise his knuckles.  

He screamed out in anguish before moving back over to her seat on the couch. His bandmates watched as he terrorized the room, ripping papers and pushing over furniture. Willie moved forward to try to console him but Alex’s arm rose, blocking the boy from walking forward. Alex nodded at his bandmates and Willie, the four of them leaving the boy alone in the room. 

Luke noticed a neat little square of paper sitting on top of the last book she read. He picked it up and saw his name written in her perfect penmanship. he sat down in her chair and wiped his tears aways on his ruffled top, steadying his breathing before unraveling the piece of paper. 

“Luke,

I didn’t want to do this, but I think leaving will be the best thing for my heart. I hope that your work with Julie gives you and the boys the second chance that you all deserve. I have never been prouder of you and no one in this world and afterlife deserves another shot of happiness like you do. I hope Julie takes care of your heart because I know that you deserve so much love,  I hope she’s willing to give that to you for as long as she can. Thank you for being my first friend, my first ‘boss’, and....my first love. I hope you never forget me because I know that it will be very difficult for me to forget you.

Love,

Your Sugar, Y/N”

He didn’t notice that he was crying until a few rogue tears hit the paper, drenching the words. He read the words “first love” several more times before folding it back up into her perfect square. He brought the note up to his lips and kissed it gently before holding it to where his heart used to beat. He looked up at the ceiling and whispered “I love you so much, I’m so sorry Sugar” to the air around him, letting the tears continue to fall as he sat in silence.

.

.

.

.

Tag list: @xplrreylo��� @lovesanimals​, @anythingandeverythingfandom​, @crybabyddl​, @oswin05​, @joshy-obx​, @lukeys-giggle​, @bumbleberry-pie​ @kiss-themoongoodbye​  @marinettepotterandplagg​, @lolychu​, @bathtimejish​, @dasexydevitt13​ @musicconversedance​, @txrii​  @bestdressedandstressed​ @daisiesforlacey​  @epikskool​  @bookfrog247​ @carleywhittaker​ @princessvader15​ @rudysbay​ @spooky-season-bitch

[trashmenofmarvel]

Branded - Chapter 42

Pairing: Demon!Bucky Barnes x Reader

Summary: Your captor loses patience.

(This is a fan AU of Falling’s Just Another Way to Fly by araniaart​ . Please check out this incredible series for all of your demon Bucky needs.)

Chapter Warnings: Angst, brief but intense torture

AO3

It was the beginning of the fourth day when your captor spoke with you again. The Alp had been delivering your meals and exchanging your buckets lately, so you’ve been without conversation and another human presence for a full day.

His appearance was not comforting. He was unshaven with hollow bags around his eyes, his lips chapped and his expression thin. He looked as if he hadn’t slept.

Good, you thought with no amount of sympathy. I hope you’re sleeping on a bed of nails.

He dragged the folding chair in front of the bars and sat down, staring at his hands for a moment before speaking. When he did, the words were heavy and drawn.

“My name… is Helmut Zemo.”

You watched him carefully. Learning the name of your captor wasn’t necessarily a good thing. Why reveal it now?

“I am formally an officer of the Sokovian Armed Forces. I was there, when the Ultron army attacked my country, and I was called upon to defend it. I did so with pride and determination.” He glanced down, voice flat as if he was recounting a report. “I lived in Novi Grad with my wife and son. It wasn’t safe for them, so I took them to stay with my father. It should have been safe.”

You digested what he said; it made sense and his accent did sound Sokovian now that you thought about it. But you couldn’t figure out why he was telling this all to you now, so you decided not to speak.

“My son was excited. He could see the Iron Man from the car window. I told my wife, ‘Don’t worry. They’re fighting in the city. We’re miles from harm.’ When the dust cleared, and the screaming stopped, it took me two days until I found their bodies. My father… still holding my wife and son in his arms. And the Avengers?”

He shook his head, emotions creeping back into his voice.

“They went home.”

A hollow pit of dread grew in your chest.

“The irony of it is, I was a great believer of the Avengers, once. I always wished to see them, especially the Iron Man, and fighting alongside them should have been an honor. Instead, my dreams turned to nightmares and my hopes to ash.”

He met your eye and the rage in them was so palpable you drew back a fraction. It was the gaze of someone who had nothing left to lose and would stop at nothing for revenge.

“I knew I couldn’t kill them. More powerful men than me have tried. I have been seeking the solution for years. An empire toppled by its enemies can rise again. But one which crumbles from within? That’s dead. Forever.”

You fought to suppress the chill that shot up your spine. It didn’t work.

“But how to do it? What weapon could I wield against the Avengers that would achieve such a goal? I turned to HYDRA for answers. I explored their old labs, the ones that were left untouched. There are many with evidence of their demonic experiments. And there was one in particular that caught my eye…”

Zemo leaned forward, bracing his elbows on his knees as he peered at you.

“Do you know what secrets it held within it? A large stone archway. Ancient. Powered by a piece of the Tesseract itself. It could create portals to other realms. Or at least, that was its purpose. I had no intention of walking through something so untested. HYDRA’s idealism is more realized than its creations. But… I was able to summon a demon. I bound it to me. And it had a very, very interesting tale to tell about another demon in this world… along with the human he protected.”

His smirk was thin.

“I’m sure you can guess who the demon was referring to.”

The Alp that Bucky had banished… had ended up in this lunatic’s hands. The odds had to have been astronomical, and either this man was lucky or you had the shittiest luck in existence.

As if he knew your thoughts, his eyes brightened with dark amusement.

“It was as if the universe was answering my prayer, and the opportunity to end the Avengers was within my grasp.”

Zemo rose to his feet, adjusted his brown coat, and looked you in the eye as he added:

“Who better to kill a Stark than a demon who has done it before?” He clicked his tongue. “Captain America’s own childhood friend.”

You jumped to your feet, prepared to scream every obscenity you knew at him, but then Zemo snapped his fingers. Black smoke poofed next to you and a pair of claws grabbed you by the shoulders.

Your shout was choked off as the Alp teleported you out of the cell. Even the short distance was enough to disorient you, sulfur cloying in your nostrils as you stumbled and gagged.

“I did warn you,” Zemo said, the regret there surprisingly sincere. “Your cooperation will be given. How painful it will be is your choice.”

You were still coughing, unable to respond, and the demon dragged you beside its master as you left the room for the first time in days.

The hallways were made of cold stone, much like your cell, with bulbs spacing the ceiling every few feet. There was nothing to be heard except scuffling footsteps and ragged breathes as you tried to break out of the demon’s hold around your neck. You might as well have been trying to fight with a statue all the good it did you. The Alp was very strong despite its jutting bones.

The room where your journey ended was considerably large and cylindrical in shape. You glanced around in confusion, and it took you a minute to realize you were in some sort of silo. Metal catwalks spanned overhead, tied to them were strings of bulbs, but the thing that drew your eye were the glyphs. Covering the walls, the ceiling, and there was even a large, elaborate circle carved into the floor made out of chalk. It looked like an especially evil children’s game.

Your struggles increased when Zemo pointed toward your destination and the demon obeyed. Directly in the circle was a table with wrist and ankle restraints built into the metal.

Every primal instinct in your body screamed that this was a bad place, but the demon dragged you onto the table and fastened the shackles around your limbs without difficulty.

“Don’t do this!”

You didn’t exactly know what he was planning, but you desperately didn’t want to find out.

Once the demon stepped out of the circle, Zemo bent down, and you had to turn your head to see what he was doing. He had a piece of chalk and scribbed in the last piece of the circle.

You wanted to know what it meant, but when Zemo approached a lectern a few feet away from the table, you grew still. It was covered with black cloth, and what he lifted from the surface froze your heart. A dagger, curved and constructed of ink black metal, flashed sinisterly in the light. Glyphs were carved into the handle and blade, leaving a cold wash of fear across your skin.

“This blade is called an athame. It’s necessary to the process of creating and binding demons.” Zemo drew closer, studying the blade as he slowly turned it, appraising it with quiet reverence. “It’s a sort of demon-bane. No doubt you are feeling that affect right now. The part of you tied to a demon will respond very strongly to this blade. But don’t worry. The human part of you will not be harmed beyond a physical wound.”

He was right—just staring at the blade filled your stomach with a sick churning, and you flinched when he used the blade to rip open the shoulder seam of your jacket and shirt. You tried not to whimper, heart racing as your chest tightened in panic. He lowered the blade toward the unchanged, faded mark on your shoulder.

You could have sworn the faint lines of the pentagram turned red as the edge drew closer. Once the flat of the blade touched your skin, you couldn’t watch anything at all. You couldn’t think, couldn’t do anything but scream as cold agony ripped through your body.

The blade was removed from your skin long enough for you to take a breath, and then it was applied again, sending you into another ripple of agony. You thought Zemo might have been talking to you, telling you this was a last resort to draw in Bucky short of killing you, but you were already dying. How could your body tolerate so much pain and still survive? How could your mind continue to function and not break as the agony lit up your nerves like a power grid?

And then, something changed. Through the electric pain that was so intense you thought you would catch fire, there was a shift. Small at first, like a leak that had sprung in a dam, and then all at once it released, flooding your body with warmth, a balm against the pain.

It felt so wonderful you actually laughed, throat raw from the screaming so the sound came out broken, but it was unmistakably a laugh.

Zemo pulled the blade away, but you ignored him. All of your thoughts were turned to the golden thread in your mind, no longer cold and dead, but alive and thrumming with… with… confusion, and then worry, and finally…

Rage.

Your smile died. The emotions you were feeling weren’t your own.

“That’s enough for now,” came Zemo’s soft voice. He seemed pleased. “Your cooperation is appreciated.”

“Nnn…” You struggled to speak, finding your control over your body was sluggish and distance. “No…”

His retreating footsteps were your only answer, leaving you tied to the table where you were helplessly bound.

You squeezed your eyes shut as tears leaked from the corners. You should have fought harder. Should have resisted instead of letting that crack form within you.

Because of your carelessness… Bucky was awake.

And he was furious.

Next Chapter

[charlottemadison42]

Timepiece

A new short story on AO3, 2.3k words, rated G, dedicated to the very dear @musegnome!

----

Crowley got a new watch at least once a year.

He liked them sharp and cutting-edge, bespoke and exclusive and expensive. By the time anyone else heard of the craftsman or the brand, he was ready to cast it off and find something better. From the first decorative clunkers of the early 1500's to the quartz revolution, he was always up to speed on the best of the best. Connoisseurs in Geneva and Tokyo and Dubai kept a lookout on his behalf these days. When they called, doubtless raving about a new mechanism or a new maker, he always picked up.

He didn't think about why he liked watches. If anyone had ever asked Crowley (nobody did) he'd have shrugged. His corvid instinct to collect shiny status markers was reason enough.

(And if every skip of the second hand offered proof of his progress away from the fourteenth century -- one step farther from Golgotha, farther from the flood, farther from the Fall -- that thought was seldom admitted entry to the fortress of his mind. Crowley looked forward, not back.)

Aziraphale had owned a total of four watches in his life thus far.

He liked the kind of timepiece that required winding by hand, with a little key, although he often forgot to. Luckily when he needed to know the exact time, his watch obliged him anyway.

It was conceivable that Aziraphale enjoyed the sensation of suddenly remembering, "Oh! I forgot to wind my pocketwatch!" because he delighted in having some small duty to do, a simple task at which he could not fail, a way he could help the world tick along.

For -- what was a mechanical pocketwatch, if not an elegant dynamic sculpture of the universe as humans experienced it? Aziraphale waxed philosophical about such things in the comfort of his favorite reading chair, while he smoothed the shiny etched surface with his thumb til he knew every groove. He meditated often and fondly about his watch as a Metaphor for Things.

(But the angel never asked where it might be leading him. Aziraphale looked over his shoulder at history with a loving melancholy sigh, watchfully guarding over the sum of human experience. But he did not look ahead. He hated endings.)

+++

Warlock Dowling went through an especially rambunctious phase at age six. He was old enough that his parents' neglect was starting to emerge from the background of his young reality into a Phenomenon that he Noticed. And the more Warlock Noticed it, the more he Did Not Like it, and he took it out on everyone within reach.

Nanny Ashtoreth's attempts to dress him resulted in arching and kicking and flailing fists. Brother Francis's nature walks ended with tantrums in the dirt. Warlock began to enjoy ruining things when he learned that he could: tearing up his own drawings, ripping leaves off the tulips and ferns, pouring grape juice on white linens, breaking toys. It made him feel powerful.

"Hell could learn a thing or two from this one," Crowley muttered.

"I expect they're going to, since he'll be running the show if we fail to do something about this," Aziraphale snapped in reply.

Neither angel nor demon had been prepared for the inexhaustible physical frenzy of an outraged six-year-old Antichrist.

But when Warlock finally smashed Aziraphale's pocketwatch on a paving stone in a fit of rage, the poor child broke through something else, too.

Warlock stared at the pieces of glass and the crushed face on the ground, at the minute hand all bent out of shape. He looked up at Brother Francis. He looked at Nanny, running across the lawn toward them.

And he started bawling. ...

[Click through to read more or finish on AO3]

Warlock knew that watch was special. He knew it was very old and delicate. In fact, the watch was the reason he'd learned the definitions of "fragile" and "breakable" and "irreplaceable." Once he had command of those words, he'd been allowed to hold it while seated on Brother Francis's lap. He'd even learned how to wind it, awestruck by the action and the shine. He always included the watch when he drew pictures of Brother Francis, attached by a chain of lumpy circles to the pocket of his baggy trousers.

Now the fragile breakable irreplaceable thing lay in pieces on the garden path.

Aziraphale was terrible at hiding his feelings. He was shocked and saddened, and it showed all over his face, though he did his best to suppress it. Every time Warlock looked up at him, the child cried harder.

Aziraphale was rapidly realizing that if he miracled his watch back together, even discreetly, Warlock was old enough that he would notice its reappearance. Warlock noticed everything. So the watch would have to stay at home, unworn, for several years at least -- perhaps until the end of the world. It had survived the Blitz, the trenches, the Seven Years' War, the Crimean War, and a number of unfortunate dining mishaps (though it was perhaps helped along by a few frivolous miracles). Aziraphale had not gone without it since he purchased it from the watchmaker himself back in 1689, in a dim workshop on the outskirts of Zürich. The angel felt some epoch ending. Endings made him sad. Especially these days, when they reminded him of The End.

But Crowley was there; of course Crowley was there. She scooped Warlock up in her arms even though he was getting big for that. She held him tight as he sobbed.

"Here's a how-de-do," she groaned, assessing the situation.

Aziraphale had been crouched over the ruined watch for so long now that his knees were stiff. He stood up and sighed heavily. "I suppose it's...it's only a watch," he said, dispirited. "I shouldn't grow so attached to worldly goods. ...And it's an opportunity to teach compassion, model forgiveness, and discuss respect for others' things, as well." He was letting the accent slip in his sadness, but Warlock was as far from paying attention as he could be.

"He's six! He can't track all that!" huffed Crowley.

"Well he's certainly tracking the bit about crushing the world under his heel!"

"Nnnnnrrrrrrgh," Crowley snarled in frustration. She was caught between her mandate to teach Warlock to be fantastically evil and her fear that succeeding would bring about the end of the world.

In the end, though, Warlock surprised them both by doing something entirely human, entirely his own. He cried himself out for several minutes on the lawn, and once he could speak again, he asked Aziraphale:

"Brother Francis, why did I do that?"

Then he looked to his Nanny, silently repeating the question to her with his bleary eyes.

Crowley and Aziraphale looked at one another, blinking.

"Um," said Crowley.

"...Why d'you think ye did, me lad?" asked Aziraphale, retreating from his hurt feelings into his ridiculous bucktoothed persona.

Warlock sniffed. "I don't know. I din't think it would feel like that." He squatted and poked the exposed paper of the clock face.

Crowley knelt down next to him. "Can you put it back together?" she asked.

"No."

"So what do you think you should do now?"

"Nnnno!"

"That's not even...nngh." Crowley looked helplessly to the angel. But they were both at a loss.

"Can we go inside?" Warlock finally pleaded.

And so they did. As Nanny and Warlock walked away, Crowley restored the pocketwatch with a snap of her fingers without even looking back. It was good as new once again.

But Aziraphale knew that its time had come. He picked it up, enjoying the way it fit just so in his palm -- the comfort of a handful of crystallized time -- and then he clicked it shut and sent it back home to the bookshop, where it would have to stay for now.

That evening, just before supper, Warlock showed up on the porch of the greenhouse with Nanny in tow. His little face was wrinkled up in concern and contrition and other Very Grown-Up Feelings as he presented Brother Francis with a card. It featured a colored pencil drawing of all three of them holding hands, and yellow triangles on the ground to represent the afternoon's event. The unsteady lettering inside read "soRRY for yuor wAtch From wARLock."

"I made you this," said Warlock, and he handed over the most awkward little handcrafted project. It was roughly disc-shaped, and it featured play-doh, pipe cleaners, and glitter glue. The face was sharpied directly onto the half-dried crumbling clay, and the chain was made of taped rings of construction paper.

It plucked every heartstring the angel had. He melted on the spot.

Crowley rolled her eyes as Aziraphale poured out fond words of thanks for his new watch and forgiveness for the old one, embracing Warlock between tearful phrases. But Crowley also had her least cruel smirk on, the one that was very nearly affectionate.

Before they left, Crowley also noted in a low voice that there had been no more trouble with kicking and screaming and tearing up houseplants today. Warlock had been upset twice, but had managed to calm himself down without help both times.

After she took Warlock away, Aziraphale tried to miracle protection over his new handmade treasure so that the play-doh wouldn't crumble and the paper wouldn't crush -- only to find that Crowley had already done so.

+++

Two nights later, on a crosstown bus bound for Soho, Aziraphale noticed that the lanky redheaded passenger in front of him happened to leave behind a small shopping bag when he disembarked. Aziraphale folded up his newspaper and slipped into the empty seat to take a closer look. Inside was a wooden box wrapped in plain black paper. It was marked "AZ" in black ink that was only detectable by its slightly more reflective shine.

Aziraphale opened it right there, and of course, of course it was a new pocketwatch. From Crowley. Crowley knew watches. And Crowley knew Aziraphale.

It was hard to date this one exactly, but he estimated the 1820's, and English-made; it was thin and modern and elegant, much lighter than the other. It was in excellent condition, although pleasantly worn with time. He spent the rest of the bus ride home admiring it, listening to it, growing familiar with the new face, wondering who it might have belonged to before. When he reached his stop, he slipped it into the waistcoat pocket meant for the purpose, and he felt like a new angel.

Gifts. How strange. A gift from Warlock, and a gift from Crowley. Gifts of time, restored.

Perhaps there was still time enough before the end of the world. Perhaps there might be time, after.

Aziraphale set the new pocketwatch down on his desk back at the bookshop, right next to his old favorite of several hundred years and his handcrafted masterpiece from Warlock. He had never thought to own more than one pocketwatch at a time. Now he had three.

He picked up the telephone to call the responsible party and offer sincerest thanks, but after some dithering, he decided not to. Crowley hated thanks. Crowley could even be endangered by thanks, if the two of them weren't careful.

Perhaps, instead, Brother Francis could show the new timepiece to Warlock and Nanny in the morning. He could explain how precious this watch was, since it was a gift from a friend. He could say that breaking something irreplaceable was sad, but it was not the end, not as long as the world spun on. He could talk about the way new things follow old ones -- and though the new things might be different, they could be lovely too. New things were worth holding out hope for, and worth learning to treasure, given time.

And after explaining all of that to Warlock, he could give Crowley a wink.

Which would communicate his thanks for the gift far better than any phone call.

+++

Over the next few years, Crowley found himself browsing for new wristwatches more and more often in his spare time. He bought them at a faster clip, too -- three in the year Warlock turned seven, six the year after that. Each was sturdier than the last, made to withstand impacts and temperatures and pressure that no watch was likely to encounter in the wild. But Crowley could feel the world running down, he could see the future he looked forward to contracting into nothing, and he burned with protective instincts as everything in him rebelled.

Meanwhile, Aziraphale spent more and more time with his books, especially history and memoirs. As he looked back over the story of humanity that he loved, the story he'd spent so much time recording and remembering, he felt it all spinning up to something awful indeed: The End. When Warlock turned nine, Aziraphale turned to his books of prophecy, feeling no small amount of distress. Looking ahead was painful for him, especially now. The future was unsafe, it was wild, it was ineffable, and unfortunately it looked to be very very short. Aziraphale did not forget to wind his pocketwatch anymore. It was a tool now more than a treasure, as The End drew near. It seemed important to remember what time it was, these days.

+++

As it happened, Aziraphale almost didn't notice when his fourth watch joined the collection.

In his defense, it was rather a busy day.

And since the new pocketwatch was identical to the one that Crowley had given him, down to the last molecule, it was unsurprising that making the connection took the angel a little time.

But some weeks after the End of All Things didn’t quite, Aziraphale realized that the watch in his waistcoat pocket was a gift as well. And this time it wasn't from Crowley.

When the thought occurred to him, sitting in his favorite chair in his restored bookshop, Aziraphale gasped faintly and set aside his well-worn copy of Now We Are Six. He had been revisiting children's literature lately for some reason. The Just William books had set him on a roll.

"Crowley, dear," he said.

"Nnnnghm?" Crowley hummed from the couch, where he sprawled limbless and relaxed as a squashed spider might if it were sort of into being squashed.

"We really ought to go and visit Tadfield sometime soon, don't you think?"

"Ngk."

"I have a great deal to thank Adam for, after all. And we should check in on everyone."

"Mmf."

Aziraphale palmed the fourth watch he had ever owned and ran his thumb over the back. "Do you think a wristwatch would be an appropriate belated birthday gift for someone Adam's age?" he asked absently.

Crowley windmilled himself up off the couch and sauntered over to give Aziraphale a peck on the cheek. "Hell if I know. Prob'ly. Maybe. More tea?"

"Yes, it's about that time, isn't it? Thank you, darling. Ever so."

[bitsandbobsandstuff]

A love that never leaves (11)

Summary: Sometimes when you go looking for the past, you find things you never expected. When an accident brings him face to face with something he never knew he lost, Bucky Barnes begins to understand an age old truth – it’s so easy, sometimes, to love the things that destroy us.

Characters: Bucky Barnes x Reader Warnings: Bad language. Descriptions of depression. Some pretty heavy sads. 

A/N: Flashback time. Grief can be all consuming and overwhelming. This time, we follow her while she tries to learn how to live again, before a night in 1946 changes everything. 

And again...I am sorry.

Links don’t work, so if you want to access the full ALTNL Masterlist, just click the MASTERLIST header on my blog.

Previously...

In her hand, is a ripped piece of faded blue cloth, with a familiar gray patch sewn into it; smudgy rust-red splotches color the edges like fingerprints.

Wings. Gray wings. Nostalgically familiar, because back in the war, each of the Howling Commandos wore one on their left sleeve, a mirror image tribute to the one painted on Steve’s helmet.

Including Bucky. Who wore one on the left sleeve of his coat.

The left sleeve of his blue coat.

Now, he stares uncomprehendingly at the piece of cloth. “What - “ he starts, but his voice fades. Small shivers are running through her body as she watches him, her face filled with dread. Taking a shaky breath, she whispers.

“There was one other time we met.”

*****

February 1945

The telegram informing her of Bucky’s death, written in Steve Rogers’ messy, cursive scrawl, sits on her kitchen table for a week. Across the creamy white paper are crinkled watermarks and trickles of black ink, where the paper swallowed her teardrops and bled out the sorrow of Steve’s words. One night, in a fit of anger, she tears it to shreds and feeds each piece to the hungry flames licking up the stone wall of her fireplace. There is immediate relief at the words disappearing, but even without their physical presence, the grief always returns.

March 1945

The plush wool feels soft in her hands. A week after his last visit, she saw the bundle in a storefront and bartered two of her old dresses for it; the color was a simple heather gray, but she knew it would look perfect against the deep blue of his coat. Every evening, she would knit until her fingers ached, but in a few weeks, she had a thick wool scarf, one of her old hair ribbons tied around it for a bow. She thought she would keep it as his birthday gift. Now, on what would have been Bucky’s 28th birthday, she wraps it around her neck and crawls into bed. Sleep doesn’t come, but every memory of him arrives like a fresh bullet, punched clean through her chest.

May 1945

Over! The war is over! Relieved cries reverberate through the town when VE Day arrives, children running down streets screaming with excitement, mothers and widows weeping joyously in the streets. Healing will take decades, but with those words, the world begins to plan for what comes next. Life is breathed back into the village and in the crowded town square, she lifts her face to the sunshine and closes her eyes. Fingers the chain around her neck holding the St. Michael medal Bucky gave her for their engagement, and wonders if she will ever be warm again.

July 1945

Wildflowers grow in riotous bursts of yellow and red and purple, filling the space behind her chicken coop with color. Laying amid the blooms, she sits in the baking summer sun, tracing her fingers over the colorful images on the postcards Bucky gave her. She thinks about traveling. About visiting those places, seeing them with new eyes, free from war. When she looks at the Brooklyn postcard, she wonders about visiting his family, but then she sees the crooked hearts he drew on the back, and she knows it would be too much. She puts the cards away.

September 1945

Leaves begin to fall, carpeting the grassy bank near the stream. Going through the motions, she dumps clothes from her basket, dunking them in the gurgling water, scrubbing them clean under crystal clear moonlight. Humming under her breath, she sings to pass the time, but the only words she can find are the ones she sang the first night Bucky found her by the creek and walked her home. We’ll meet again, don’t know where, don’t know when. It hurts too much, so she just stops singing.

October 1945

Soldiers have been returning for weeks. Gaunt and haunted, new men arrive every few days, and do their best to pick up the threads of their old lives. One Saturday morning, she walks through the stalls of the market, examining produce and talking with the vendors. A young soldier steps aside to let her pass, quickly pulling off his hat and smiling. Offering a quiet hello in response, she finishes her shopping and leaves; the soldier jogs after her and nervously asks, could he perhaps walk her home? The earnest look in his eyes is so familiar, it makes her sick. She gently tells him no.

December 1945

Taking a sharp kitchen knife, she goes into the trees and cuts an armful of pine boughs. She spreads them through her house, taking deep breaths of the sharp, piney scent. In the white vase on her table, she tucks them carefully in place and adds a small sprig of holly, the red berries shining brightly. Curled in the armchair beside her fire, she drinks tea and listens to the staticky crackle of Christmas hymns on her new radio. It’s a daily battle, but it happens. Life really does go on.

February 1946

Coming home late one evening, she unlocks her back door and hangs her coat in the hallway. Rubbing chilly hands together, she walks into her kitchen and turns on the light. She skids to a stop. Filling the small space, are two hulking men dressed in black. One steps forward and quickly grabs her arms, while the other plays with a length of rope and smiles at her. “We’ve been looking everywhere for you. Someone wants a word.”

There’s a cursory struggle, but she doesn’t fight hard. She thinks to herself, if they kill her, maybe she’ll see Bucky on the other side.

That thought makes her smile, before the world goes dark.

*****

For the second time in her life, she awakens in a cold cell. Stretching her aching limps, she knows immediately this most certainly isn’t heaven.

Hell has a very specific look to it. One she knows far too intimately by now.

The small cell is clean, containing a lumpy bed and a worn blanket; in the corner is a pitcher of water and a bucket, and high on the wall is a small window letting in slivers of light. Her hands are bound in front of her, rough pieces of rope looped so tight around her wrists, the skin has rubbed itself raw. Blood soaks into the bristly rope fibers, staining it with streaks of black.

Where is she this time?

Leaning back against the wall, she blows out a long breath and there’s a strange satisfaction in her realization.

She just doesn’t care.

*****

Hours or maybe days later, her door creaks open. Outlined in the doorframe, is a tall Hydra guard dressed all in black, a mask over his face, a pair of reflective goggles covering his eyes. When he sees her, the gun in his hands trembles the slightest bit, before it steadies once more.

So, she thinks. Here it comes.

Motioning with the gun, the guard indicates she should stand, but she mutinously stays on the bed. If she has to go, she will be defiant to the end.

Stepping forward, he hesitates briefly, before grasping the rope and jerking her to her feet. Balancing his gun at the back of her neck, he pushes her forward.

Down a long hall they go, moving through a set of wooden doors. With a mute resistance, she refuses to walk, forcing him to physically drag her instead. Finally, he simply picks her up and throws her over his shoulder, stalking down the hallway with a series of breathless grunts.

She kicks him the entire way.

When he arrives at a heavy oak door, he bangs three times and throws it open.

The room is surprising. This is no torture chamber, filled with metal tables and metal chairs and the metallic taste of electricity on her tongue. It is warm and cozy, a roaring fireplace on one wall, armchairs strewn casually around, tall shelves lined with books. 

In the middle of the room, stands Colonel Richter, a glass of whiskey in his hand.

“Please, come in,” he says cordially, laughter in his voice. “I’ve been waiting for you.”

The guard dumps her in a sprawling heap and departs. In the flickering firelight, she struggles awkwardly to her feet and readies for battle.

“You again. What do you want? You know I won’t help you,” she snaps, her eyes roaming around the room, searching for threats.

Richter looks amused. Sipping his whiskey, he comes slowly closer until he is only inches from her face.

“First things first. Before, when you stole away in the dead of night - that was a bit rude, don’t you think?”

“Go fuck yourself.”

The quick crack of his backhand sends her stumbling sideways. The heavy ring he wears rips open a fat gash on her cheek and she instantly feels blood begin to ooze.

“Such language for a lady. Did you learn that from him? Let’s try again, shall we? I have a story for you and I’d like you to listen,” he says. “A few months ago, we were working on him and in the middle of one of his delirious rants, I hear something interesting. Can you guess?”

Glaring at him, she remains silent.

“No guesses?” he grins, raising his eyebrows. “Alright then. Through all the screaming and crying, I hear him say your god damn name. Imagine my surprise.”

The first prickles of confused fear skate up her back. “What the hell are you talking about?” she spits out.

“It took some digging, but we managed to trace the path he and that wretched group of assholes from his unit made the last couple years of the war. I sent a few search parties out, and low and behold - here you are.”

Bucky told her once, how he and Captain Rogers parachuted from an airplane. She remembers him laughing about the free-fall, how it made his stomach swoop in a million directions. That feeling of free-falling sweeps over her now, turning her blood to ice.

“What do you mean? Who?”

Richter smiles widely, his eyes gleaming. Grabbing the bloody ropes around her wrists, he yanks her forward and pushes her into the shadowy corner of the room.

“Wait here. I have a surprise for you.”

Outside the door, she hears voices arguing. The scuffle of feet and the sharp bite of an angry voice. Suddenly, the door swings open and four guards enter, dragging a fifth man.

From the dark shadows, she muffles a scream.

Bucky looks exhausted. Dressed in a long-sleeved green shirt and ragged brown pants, he’s thinner than the last time she saw him. Rings of black circle his eyes, the vibrant blue now dull and listless. All his beautiful dark hair has been buzzed short and she can see bloody sores scabbing over along his temples. The left sleeve of his wool shirt is empty, pinned up at his shoulder and his right arm is tucked behind him, a leather strap looped around his wrist and stretched across his chest, keeping his good arm immobile.

“You didn’t tell me it was a party,” he rasps mockingly. “I would’ve put on my fancy clothes.”

One of the guards grabs a fistful of his shirt and drags him closer. “Jesus Christ, I am so fucking sick of your fucking mouth,” he sneers and Bucky shoots him a cocky grin.

“Sweetheart, you’re adorable when you’re mad,” he stage-whispers. In the blink of an eye, the guard draws back his arm and smashes his fist into Bucky’s face. Dropping to his knees, Bucky’s mocking laugh turns into a rattling cough that comes up with a spray of blood and he spits strings of red on the floor. “Like being kissed by your mom,” he says weakly.

Swearing ferociously, the guard moves to kick him, but Richter holds up his hand.

“For god’s sake, every fucking time. You know he does this, why do you let him get to you?”

The guard is visibly furious, but he says nothing. Instead, he grabs Bucky by the back of his shirt, hauling him roughly to his feet. Bucky sways precariously, before he finds his balance. Taking several deep breaths, he fixes his mouth back into that mocking smirk and lifts his chin.

“Evening boys. What the fuck can I do for you today?”

Richter gives him a congenial smile. “We have a visitor tonight. I thought perhaps you’d like to meet her.”

Bucky barks out a hollow laugh. “I sincerely fuckin’ doubt that.”

Richter’s smile grows impossibly larger. “Well, let’s see, shall we?”

Pulling her from the shadows, he throws her forward and she stumbles into the light.

Here’s the thing.

Bucky Barnes is so weak, he can barely stay on his feet. For the last five days, he’s eaten nothing more than a loaf of bread and a pitcher of water. When he walks, he greatly favors his right side, still unbalanced by the loss of his left arm even a year later, and when he speaks, his voice has a perpetually guttural sound, his vocal cords shredded from months of screaming. Sprinkled across his shaved head, are a mess of pink scars where the dull razor blades they used bit cruelly into his scalp.

He looks exactly as one would expect. A prisoner of war.

For weeks, he’s been on the verge of collapse, but the moment he sees her, none of that matters.

Horrified disbelief fills his face and his eyes flick from the tears on her face, to the trickle of blood down her cheek, to the blood-soaked ropes around her wrists.

With a feral howl, he lunges toward her.

Throwing off the shocked guards at his side, he head-butts the man in front of him, sending him flying back. With a well-aimed kick, he knocks the legs from under the fourth guard and the man falls hard, before Bucky levels a savage kick to his head.

Richter laughs delightedly as he watches the show, until Bucky rushes for him. Lifting his gun, he sets it casually against her temple and cocks it. At the click of the hammer, Bucky skids to a stop, his mouth still twisted in a vicious snarl. Sweat dripping down his face, blood dripping from his busted lip, his chest heaves furiously.

“You god damn motherfucking cocksucking piece of shit, you let her go. Let her fuckin’ go, or I’ll fuckin’ gut you.”

“I thought so,” Richter says smugly. “So, our Soldier has something to fight for. How utterly inconvenient.”

“You’re god damn straight I fuckin’ do,” Bucky hisses, staggering under the rush of adrenaline. “Hurt her and I swear to god, I swear to fuckin’ god, I will slit your fuckin’ throat.”

With a dramatic sigh, Richter keeps his eyes on Bucky and bends down to speak in her ear.

“Apparently this one’s special, fights harder than anyone I’ve ever seen. Every time we wipe him, every memory comes back in a couple days. I don’t know what Zola did to him, but his brain fixes it too fast. Basically, he just won't fucking stay down.”

“Fuck no I won’t,” Bucky interrupts.

“See what I mean? You know what happened last time,” Richter says softly, his breath hot in her ear. “I don’t care if he is Zola’s little pet, he’s a wild fucking animal and I’m not above putting him down. So here we are. You fix him or I kill him. Your choice.”

“What the fuck is he talking about,” Bucky asks, looking directly at her now. “What - darlin, what the hell does he mean?”

Looking into his eyes, she thinks about that lovely blue. For the rest of her life, she knows she will see it everywhere. In everything.

Behind him, the guard he head-butted lumbers to his feet and manages to get his forearm locked around Bucky’s neck. 

Richter stands behind her, waiting. Against her skin, he presses a light kiss and she shudders at the hideous feel.

“Come now. You love him, don’t you? Do the right thing.”

Clasped in a tight chokehold, she can see Bucky’s face turning red as he splutters for breath.

“No,” she chokes out. “I won’t. I won’t.”

Cruel fingers dig into the back of her neck and he hisses in her ear. “If you say no, I will put him in that chair and fry his fucking brain every single day for the rest of his life and I will make you watch. Even if he heals fast, he still screams like a baby. Trust me on that one.”

Bucky is still fighting, his throat working uselessly as he tries to draw a breath.

Every scenario, every choice, every possibility, flies through her head. Trying desperately to come up with a solution, with a way to save them both, she thinks and thinks and thinks.

And she comes up empty, because the answer is simple.

There is no solution.

There is no solution.

Then what choice does she have?

She remembers the parade of men from before, the sound of their screams as the chair rocked bolts of electricity through them again and again. The thought of Bucky strapped in that chair, his body convulsing as the electric currents wrack his body, as he screams for her to help him - it is inconceivable. She knows what she has to do. She knows.

What choice does she have?

“Yes,” she sobs, her eyes filling with tears. “Fine, yes, I’ll do it, please just - let him go.”

Motioning to the guard, Richter points at the floor. The man releases his death-grip on Bucky’s throat, kicking his feet from under him and Bucky falls hard to his knees. Wrenching herself from Richter’s harsh grip, she rushes to catch him before Bucky’s face hits the floor.

“You have one minute,” Richter warns, fading into the shadows of the dark room. “And then you do it. If you leave anything behind again, I will kill him.”

After everything, here they are. Together.

Kneeling in front of the fireplace, the warm light cocoons them in their own world, one last time.

Bucky rests his head on her shoulder, closing his eyes when she cradles his thin frame against her. In the quiet room, his short, shallow breaths echo raggedly. Carefully, she runs her fingers soothingly up his neck, over the spiky tufts of dark hair and his body wilts in her tight embrace.

Sighing wearily, he picks his head up and touches his forehead to hers. Cupping his face, she brushes her fingers over the scratchy stubble lining his sunken cheeks and he gives her a rueful smile.

“Hey, I’ve been thinking. You okay with a one-armed husband?” he breathes. “Promise I can still love you just as hard.”

Tears streaming down her face, she returns his smile. “I love it. It makes you look dashing.”

“That’s exactly what I said,” he replies, pushing his nose against hers. Precious seconds slip by as they sit in silence, breathing each other in. Both trying their damndest to remember everything about the other, before they lose it all. Finally, she whispers her favorite words in his ear.

“I love you, Bucky.”

He hums contentedly and smiles. “I love you too. Don’t ever forget it, okay? I know I won’t.”

It takes every last drop of willpower for her not break down. Because he will forget. He will forget, and she will make certain that he does.

Rubbing her cheek against his, she presses her lips to the shell of his ear, giving him one more thing that the rest of the world cannot take. Something that is theirs, and theirs alone.

“You’re everything for me, Bucky Barnes. You’re the love of my life,” she murmurs, and he leans his head against her. When he opens his eyes, she finds an endless ocean of sadness pouring from the blue depths and he speaks quickly under his breath.

“Listen to me. Whatever happens, I need you to do something for me, okay?” The desperate urgency in his voice makes her heart skip. “No matter what happens, don’t you dare stay here. I can see it in your face honey, don’t you stay here, stuck in this room inside your head, thinking you could’ve done something different. You understand me?”

Swallowing hard, she tries to answer, but he cuts her off. The words are full of fear, holding a message he needs her to accept. “Please, I’m begging you. When you get out of here, you find a way to go on. Find a way to live.”

Losing him again will break her. That fact is as certain as the sun rising in the east.

There’s no way she can do this again, but in her heart, she knows that’s not what he needs. He needs her to agree, he needs her to try, and if she has to send his mind into a graveyard of buried memories, at least she can do this one thing for him.

She owes their love that much.

“I will,” she says. “I promise, I will.”

“That’s my girl,” he whispers with a tired smile. Staring into his eyes, she does everything she can to memorize the love she finds there, before Bucky gives her a crooked smile and tells her one more secret. “You know what? I don’t regret anything that happened. If I had to do it all over, I wouldn’t change one damn thing. It all led me to you, and I’ll remember every piece of us to the end. Because this kind of love, it never leaves. Right?”

“No, it never leaves,” she echoes. Placing her hands on his cheeks, she kisses him full on the mouth, tasting blood and salt and love, trying with her whole heart to carve even a small bit of herself into his bones.

Breaking the kiss, her heart plummets at the sight of his sweet smile.

Blinking away her tears, she takes a deep breath.

And then she tears her entire world apart.

Surprise fills Bucky’s face when he feels the heat begin to pulse from her hands, when he sees the soft glow of white light from her fingers. Watching her in confusion, his lips part as though he wants to say something, but no words come. Concentrating harder than she ever has before, she gathers everything, all those beautiful memories that make Bucky Barnes the man he has become and she wipes them all away.

All his stories about the Howling Commandos. That spring day he caught a foul ball at a Dodgers game. Steve Rogers’ floppy blond hair shining in the summer sun at Coney Island. The way his mother sang while she baked, and the fairytales he read his sister before bed. How he felt looking in the mirror the first time he put on his uniform, pale and scared to death. Watching a brilliant red sun sinking in the ocean, the day he sailed for England. Every memory he has of her. The thrill of their first kiss and the way she held his arm when he walked her home from church  and the first time they made love and how nervous he felt asking her to marry him.

How god damn much he loves her.

Every colorful memory he owns, she siphons away. Nothing is left behind, because this time, she can take no chances.

The white light burns hotter, so bright Bucky squeezes his eyes closed and still she watches him through it all, until finally, finally, finally -

She lets go.

Bucky slumps unconscious, his chin tucked to his chest. Pressing one final kiss to his forehead, her silent tears splash to the floor. She wants to stay forever, to be there when he opens his eyes, to force herself back into this new life, to make him remember her. To make him remember who they are together.

My god. Oh my god, what has she done.

Before she can say a word, the guards rip him from her arms. Dragging him away, his head lolls to the side and the last thing she sees, before they exit the room, are Bucky’s eyes beginning to flutter open.

“Wait -“ she says, panic filling every last cell in her body, “no, please wait, don’t - please, where are you taking him?”

“He has work to do,” Richter says dismissively.

Sick with heartbreak and drowning in regret, she remains kneeling on the floor, and every last piece of her soul shatters.

*****

Day later, there’s a screech of metal, and her door bangs open.

Richter saunters in, a length of cloth folded over his arm. Behind him, is the Hydra guard who escorted her from her cell last time, his gun cocked and aimed.

Caked in dried mud and an obscene amount of blood, the bright blue of Bucky’s Howlie jacket is nearly unrecognizable. The left arm is mostly torn away, the thick material hanging in ragged strips below the elbow. With a grunt, Richter tears away a piece of fabric at the shoulder and tosses it at her.

“Here. Thought you might want this,” he says coldly.

At her feet, the cloth looks dark and dirty, but in the midst of grimy blue, she sees the gray wings Bucky had sewn into his jacket sleeve. She remembers tracing her fingers over them, asking what they meant. Bucky had grinned, his chest swelling with a bit of pride, before he wove tales for her about the Howling Commandos. He glossed over their missions and focused on the men instead, and she remembers how wonderfully he could tell a story. The small bits of humor he found amid the bleakness of war painted a bright world for her to see.

Now, she picks it up, touching the rusty-red smudges lining the edges of the wings. She looks up at him.

“Why?”

Richter says nothing, but a grim smile pulls at his lips. He draws out the pause, savoring the expectation in her face, before carelessly dropping a bomb.

“Zola lost him during a routine experiment. He coded on the table. Guess we haven’t made our soldiers as durable as we need just yet.”

This bomb, it finishes the job Steve’s telegram began. For the second time, she learns the love of her life is dead and now there is nothing but cold emptiness where her heart used to be.

“We no longer require your services. We have a new machine that should work just fine,” he tilts his head, looking down at her. “But thank you for your help.”

Spinning on his heel, he shoves the remains of the blue coat at the guard still waiting in the doorway.

“Burn it,” he orders. “And leave her here to rot.”

The door bangs shut and the lock clicks with a sickening finality.

*****

No food. No water.

For two days, she hears footsteps marching back and forth in front of her door. Something seems to be happening, but through it all, no one pays attention to the woman locked in the cell at the end of the hall, waiting to die.

In her dreams, she sees Bucky strapped to a table exactly like the one they used for her. Was he scared? Did he go willingly or did he fight? Did it happen quickly? Did it hurt? Did he realize what was happening before his heart stopped?

Was there any part of him, maybe buried deep down, that loved her to the end?

She dismisses that last thought. No, of course there wasn’t. She made sure of that fact.

In a strange way, she finds a perverse relief in Bucky’s death. At least this way, he will never know how she betrayed him.

Perhaps if there is an afterlife, someday she can find him there and beg his forgiveness.

On the morning of the third day, sunlight flows through the rectangular window near the ceiling and she waits on her bed. For someone to come. Anyone. To save her. To kill her. Either would work, she’s not picky. Watching the slow crawl of sunlight move across the floor, she counts the minutes, until she notices something peculiar.

Silence.

Sitting up takes a massive effort and rising to her feet almost knocks her out. Knees wobbling dangerously, her sweaty hand presses to the wall for balance, and she stumbles to the door.

“Hello?” she croaks, but it comes as nothing more than a rough whisper. Wrapping her fingers around the bars of the door, she rests her forehead against the cold metal. Summoning her strength, she tries again. “Is anyone there?”

Silence.

No one answers. No lights illuminate the hallway. There is no hum of electricity, no sound of a distant radio playing, no raucous laughter. There is no one there.

So. They left her to die then.

Angry tears fill her eyes, and she bangs a weak fist on the door. Without expecting a solution, she grabs the door handle and rattles it, hot tears spilling over and streaking through the dirt on her cheeks.

But miraculously - the door opens.

Stepping cautiously into the doorway, she scans the hallway and finds nothing. Perplexed, she looks down and her confusion grows. Outside the door, a cloth bundle is propped against the wall. Crouching down, she hesitantly pulls at the loose knot and it falls open, revealing a loaf of bread, a wedge of cheese, two apples, and a cracked leather canteen full of water.

Common sense screams at her to think, but she throws caution to the wind. Grabbing the canteen with trembling fingers, she flips the lid and chugs the cold water. It has a dusty, alkaline taste, but she cries with relief. Tearing off a hunk of bread, she stuffs it in her mouth, her eyes drifting closed at the taste. It hits the hollowness in her belly so fast, she almost retches, but she manages to keep it down.

The rest, she wraps up in the cloth sack and hugs it to her chest.

She walks down the hall. Through a small office, down another hall.

With every step, she expects to be stopped. But nothing happens.

At the end of the hall, is a heavy black door. When she opens it, sunlight spills in and she takes a deep breath of fresh air.

From the outside, the base looks like a series of old buildings, but there is literally nothing else. No people. No vehicles. Nothing but the peppy chirp of birds warbling in the trees. For one brief moment, she stands in the morning light and thinks about giving up. Such a soothing thought.

But then the sound of Bucky’s voice fills her head.

Find a way to live.

The years that follow will be filled with devastating sadness, but beneath it all, she will hold these words close to her heart. She can do this for him.

So, she starts walking.

Down the ruts of the narrow access road leading away from the building, one foot in front of the other. She anticipates bullets hitting her from behind, but nothing happens. On she walks, through a forest of trees, one step after another. Into the open, where the access road joins up with a small country lane. She turns left and keeps going. Five slow miles she traipses along, until a town appears.

On the edge of the main street, she sees a small grocery store and walks inside. Covered in grime, shivering from head to toe, she tries to speak, but instead, she collapses. An older woman looks up from behind the counter, and her curls of thick black hair bounce when she rushes around the front counter shouting in Italian for help.

For two weeks, she stays there recovering, but no one comes.

In that sleepy Italian town, she finally understands.

After everything she has done, after everything they stole from her, after they broke her one last time - it appears that Hydra really was finished with her.

With freedom should come relief, but that is an emotion reserved for saints, not sinners like her. What she has done, she can never undo.

She will live with that fact, from now until the end of her days.

*****

Next Chapter

*****

[realm-sweet-realm]

Susie’s Possession

Remember that post from a few days back? You know, this one here about the crew getting possessed by a demon? Well, I wrote something about that. It’s a shameless, bloody mess and I hope you enjoy it.

---

Susie Campbell came to slowly, her ears ringing. Joey Drew and Sammy Lawrence were standing over her, the former holding her hand. "Susie. Oh my God, are you okay?"

Susie unsteadily attempted to stand. Her legs felt too long. The last thing she remembered was a loud crash as she'd tumbled headlong out of that machine. "I... I think so." In that moment, Susie became aware that the ink machine in front of her looked split in half. "What happened, Sammy?"

"Do you remember agreeing to become Alice Angel?" Sammy asked. Susie nodded, noticing that Sammy she wasn't looking up at Sammy anymore, but rather looking him right in the eye. She didn't like where this was going. "Well, we made you Alice Angel. But something must have gone seriously wrong."

"But you do look good," Joey Drew added cheerfully, "And if you aren't harmed, well, I guess the only harm is to this here machine!" No longer groggy, Susie could detect a nervous edge in that chronically positive voice of his. "So in other words, no harm that you have to worry about. Sammy, why don't you take Susie home. Give her some support through this big ol' change. I'll figure things out here."

With that, the two left. It was a long walk home, but at very least it gave Susie a chance to get herself re-oriented. Sammy let her cry and cry about how strange she felt, about how she'd never known the details when she'd agreed to this, about how she felt violated. He was there to comfort her and offer advice. He even agreed to sleep in her bed with her that night when she asked. That night she almost believed that she'd get used to this. There were things that would change, yes, but she was looking forward to where this would take her career. Nothing to do now but make the best of things, she supposed.

The next morning, her attitude had greatly changed. She woke up before Sammy and went to go look herself over in the mirror. Look what they did to you. she thought. Though, it didn't feel like it had come from her.

Yes, and I'm mad, and I don't know how I'll trust them again. But let's focus on getting used to this now. Hmm... some red lipstick might really offset all this bla-

You see? This is why they did this to you. You're weak. You're pliable. You're letting them get off consequence-free for MURDERING you. You showed one your dependence by accepting his comfort. They're only going to keep using you if you keep on like this.

There was no doubt, now. There was some other presence in her. Well, what else could I do?

Give me just a little control, and I'll show you.

Susie hesitated. J-just a little.

Just a little. You'll be able to stop me at any time.

And so, Susie gave in, just a little. There was a mental shift, and Susie saw her eyes glow a faint red in the mirror, settling on dark brown instead of the black they'd previously been. She found herself walking to the kitchen, as though propelled by habit. She wasn't choosing it, but she felt she could stop if she wanted. She bent down to the cupboard beneath the sink and gathered a mass of cleaning fluids into her arms before heading back to her bedroom, where Sammy still lay asleep. What are you going to do to him? Susie asked, remembering that mixing cleaning products could create deadly mixtures. The demon was silent. Susie wanted him to stop, but she didn't. That little part of her that loved Sammy... she was fighting against it, but she found herself walking faster, swinging the door to her room open, unscrewing the first cap...

Wait! she mentally screamed. Let's do him last. Let's make him suffer. There's a bigger fish to fry and his name is Joey Drew.

Susie laughed a little. For a moment it had seemed like she and the demon had been one and the same. Still, she felt in control now. She returned the cleaning supplies, gently woke Sammy up and had breakfast with him, trying to act just as sweet and chirpy as always when really a large part of her still wanted to bite his head off. She found herself bagging up those cleaning supplies while Sammy was in the bathroom, along with a couple of knives.

(Why am I doing this? That stuff about going after Mr. Drew was just to stop the demon, right?).

Thankfully, Sammy didn't ask what was in the bag she was tugging along.

"So, you know what today is, right? The day of your first show?"

"Yep!"

"Great! Joey decided to give you all morning to practice. Your first show is at one. And I'll show you to your new dressing room. It's pretty spiffy, Alice." DON'T LET HIM CALL YOU THAT "I think you'll like it." Sammy attempted to give Susie a little elbow jab.

"You know, I kind of got up on the wrong side of the bed, and I don't want to snap at you. Can we please just not talk for right now?"

Thankfully, Sammy agreed not to talk, showed her to her dressing room quickly, and left. It was a pretty dressing room, but Susie had bigger concerns. She sat down in the corner of the room and closed her eyes. Alright. You said that I would be able to stop you at any time. Well, I'm done with you now, so you can go away.

But we haven't done what we've planned yet.

The words hit her like a flash and brought Susie to her feet, searching for her bag until she regained control.

No!

He's a murderer! A liar! A monster! Susie plucked up the bag, not feeling the least bit in control. She had to keep herself from running to his office and settled for walking as quick as she could without arousing suspicion. She knocked on his door, and there was fear in his eyes when he opened it. Without thought, Susie put her foot in the door, and shoved her way in despite his resistance. Her ink form must have been stronger than it looked, and Susie was riding the demon's honed, instantaneous instincts. Within seconds, Joey was on the floor, Susie's high-heeled shoe on his chest.

Susie took a moment to admire her work. How strange- this time yesterday, she'd been shy of five feet and never would have thought to physically dominate anybody. Now she was looking down upon the man she'd held on a pedestal. She'd never felt more sadistic.

"Well, well, well. It seems that your little plan came at a price."

All Joey could do was try to push her off of him to no avail.  "I'm going to take from you what you took from me."

"No! No, no please! Help!" Joey screamed. Susie dug her heel into him further.

"Shhh... You know, maybe I will spare you. If you do just a teensy little favour for me." Now these were her words. She knew they were.

"Anything."

Susie took the intercom microphone from Joey's desk and shoved it close to his face. "Call Allison. And Sammy."

Joey nodded. Susie hit the appropriate button. "Hello! This is Joey Drew. Could Sammy Lawrence and Allison Pendle please report to my office as soon as possible? Thank you."

With that, Joey had outlived his usefulness. Susie didn't even bother paying attention to which cleaning supplies she took out of the bag. She trusted the demon to pay attention as she kept her eyes on the look on Joey's face. Caps were unscrewed, chemicals were poured. The resultant chemical haze left Joey choking and wheezing, his face turning a delightful shade of purple as he struggled for air. Susie stepped off of him and watched him crawl pathetically to the door, passing out before he could reach the handle. Stepping over his body, he looked to the hall. No one had come yet, so she settled down at Joey's desk to wait.

It took a minute for Susie to come off her power high and realize- oh my God, Sammy was coming. What was she going to do? Kill him. He deserves this, too!

No! I know there's good in him. I need time to sort out my feelings, but-

In that moment, a piercing headache descended upon Susie, blocking her train of thought. She got up and poured more chemicals on the floor, then looked down the hall. They were coming. In that moment, Susie took back control. "Sammy, I- er, Joey- changed his mind. He just needs Allison," she said, barely keeping it together. So much of her was infected, wanted to pull them both in- honestly in saner times she might have warned them both. She settled for waiting for Sammy to leave, and then pulling Allison in. Allison began choking, but somehow it just wasn't as satisfying this time. Susie went to get her knives.

Then, Allison broke the script. She got up and grabbed the device for the intercom. "Send... help..." she wheezed before tossing the device at Susie's head. Susie whipped around and stabbed her, more out of panic-induced adrenaline than anything. They began a furious tussle. Allison was weaker than Joey, but with Joey Susie hadn’t been shaking in fear. Still, Susie managed to get her on the ground and she stayed there.

Oh my God. What do I do? What do I do?

Give in more completely. Just let me have more power and I'll get you out of this.

You got me into this! Susie got up from Allison's bleeding body and stumbled over to a wall, where she stopped, panting with the exertion of keeping what was left of her control.

All I can do is harness your worst instincts. Revenge, survival, whatever. I'll get you out of here, minimal trouble.

Not a millisecond after Susie agreed to give in, she felt as though she'd been shoved against the wall. Her vision became red-toned. Inky black wings snapped out of her back. Her fingernails grew into claws, and her horns grew longer. Susie knew that she no longer had an ounce of control.

There was a banging at the door, and a male voice yelling for her to open up. The demon ignored it in favour of ripping out Allison's hair and tucking it into her belt. Those lovely grey eyes, she decided, she couldn't remove while keeping in one piece. When she did open the door, Thomas was there, along with two other strong-looking men. One tackled her to the ground. She drove her claws into his crotch, which got him to let go, but the other two men were on her just as quickly. The demon's instincts were quick, however, and it managed to slip away and take off flying down the hallway. Susie realized that they were heading for the recording studio, but she was just about corrupted enough that she didn't care. Once there, she descended upon Sammy Lawrence like a bird of prey and ripped apart his ribs with her claws. Such adrenaline was in Susie's system that she didn't even register the vengeful words she was aiming at him. Jack Fain attempted to pull her off of Sammy, and she gave him a scratch across the face before reaching for Sammy’s now-exposed heart. It was then that the three men from earlier caught up with her. Restrained by every limb, Susie Campbell was escorted, writhing and screaming, to an iron cage in a supply room.

---

Susie didn't have any physical needs anymore, so no one had any reason to visit her. The iron cage was cold, and almost as uncomfortable as the staring eyes of the other ink creatures. Still, she was almost thankful for her imprisonment- it was only there, after plenty of time and effort, that Susie was able to root the now deeply-seated demon out of her mind. She wasn't sure how long it had been, or how long she'd have to stay here, but she at very least, she knew that when she got out, she would be herself again.

[farfanfiction]

At Last

Pairing: Jacob Seed x Reader

AUs: Soulmates

Warnings: Fluff, angst, cursing, mentions of abuse, blood, mentions of cannibalism, starvation, knives, a happy ending for once

Word Count: 2,487

A/N: I’ve been in a really Jacob-y mood and I need some sort of fluff with him before I write the next chapter of Loyalty To The Pack. This type of Soulmate AU involves both soulmates feeling each others pain, in case you didn’t know. Thank you all for sticking with me through this journey and enjoy some Jake fluff and just tell me if I did Jake any justice. And like always, give me some feedback on what I could do better or what I did alright, where you wanna see this whole mess go, or something you just don’t understand. The gif is not mine.

   Soulmates were a blessing. That’s what your mother would always say when she was attending to the various scratches and bruises littering your body. You always wondered why she held soulmates in such high regards when all they caused was pain. Physical and emotion pain plagued you all your life. Most of the time, the pain wasn’t caused by something you did. It was caused by the fucker that seemed to get attacked almost every day. That starved almost every day causing you to eat everything in your fridge in order to sedate the squizzing pain in your stomach.

   You always cursed the people that would brag about their own soulmate. Ether getting a mear scratch on their cheek or was sad for a single day. Those people complained about getting a simple scratch when it felt like fire was eating at your skin or bullets were piercing through your chest. It got so bad that your mom had to take you to the hospital and they prescribed you with suppressants that would simply get rid of the pain altogether. When you first took that pill all you could feel was utter relief. You curled yourself into your parents’ couch and gave a long, heavy sigh. It was over, you were finally fucking free! No more burning, no more depression. No more pain.

   The only downside to the drug was the loneliness. You couldn’t feel your soulmate and your soulmate couldn’t feel you. It felt like a piece of you had been ripped out and you couldn’t imagine what your soulmate was feeling at the moment. Not being able to feel you after almost twenty years of pain and suffering together. But that was ok, you wouldn’t meet anyway. It was rare to meet your soulmate.

   How wrong you were when you said you would never fucking meet. When you became a Junior Deputy for Hope County, you thought nothing of it. You had your suppressants, nothing could distract you from your duty. Not even the crazy cult that moved in a few years back. Your parents had moved to Florida when the cult moved in, excuse me, Project at Eden’s Gate. A group of just bad Seeds, literally.

   Your job was just to leave them alone and if they did something serious, then you would do something. So all you did was sit at your little desk and scroll through the countless complaints from Hope County citizens about the Seeds. They're stealing my land this and they’re buying guns that. Everyone in this fucking county has guns, it doesn’t matter if a group of organized Georgian preppers have them or not.

   In this group, it wasn’t the leader that scared you. He was just a religious hipster compared to his older brother. Jacob, you think his name was. Big and burly was the best way to describe him. He always stood with his huge arms crossed as his blue eyes held nothing but utter boredom and an “I honestly don’t give a shit” attitude. He was the most intimidating compared to the hipster and the weasel. John just freaked you the fuck out, but Jacob truly scared the shit out of you.  

   When you went to arrest Joseph with the help of an ass Federal Marshall, you got to get up close and personal with Jacob. “(Y/N), cuff this son of a bitch”, the Marshall’s words echoed in your head as you faced Joseph, but you were looking clear at Jacob for once as you noticed the bright red rashes along his cheeks. You were born with the same rashes down your face and arms and they never went away, but always burned.

   “(Y/N), put the cuffs on him!” This snapped you out of your trance as you looked around you. You looked down to see Joseph’s arms held out to you as if he wanted you to grab them. You trembled as you stared at his inked palms and the metal cuffs that jingled in your hands like bells.

   You slowly, but surely latched the cuffs onto his wrist and Joseph watched as a small tear fell from your (e/c) eyes. “I’m sorry.” You whispered not to Joseph, but to Jacob. You looked at Jacob in the eyes and you gently grabbed his brother's shoulder and led him to the door. Yet, you stopped for only a second. Was this the right thing to do? Where you really going to take away your soulmate’s brother? Were you going to cause him even more pain? You just stood there and watched both Sheriff Whitehorse and the Marshall walk out of the door of the church. You were alone with the Seeds and there is no way you were going to leave this church alive. Not with Jacob staring holes into your back with his cold, blue eyes.

   Suddenly, a large hand wrapped around your throat, squeezing just enough to have you wheezing for air. You slowly let your hands drop from Joseph’s shoulders and John came up to take off his handcuffs. The Father slowly turned to look at you and smiled. “It is ok, my child. You are safe, no one will hurt you now. Faith, please.” His hand slowly cradled your cheeks as the rough hand grabbing your neck loosened their grip.

   The sister, Faith slowly walked into your field of vision. She let out tiny, happy giggles as she removed a small vile of green dust from her dress pocket. Joseph moved out of the way as she came closer, opening the vile and pouring its contents onto the soft palm of her hand. “I have always wanted a sister.” She giggled out again as she blew the dust into your face. Your (e/c) eyes slowly began to droop as you turned to look behind you. Jacob was the last thing you saw before passing out.

   “Get up. Come on pup, I don’t have all damn day.” Dirt was kicked at your face as you slowly woke up. Rusted bars blocked you from seeing the dirty combat boots that kicked piles of dirt at your face. You slowly rubbed your eyes and looked up. Jacob stood in front of the cage, his arms crossed as he stared down at you.

   “It’s about fucking time. I was about to go in there and get you myself.” You just simply looked at him as he mocked you from outside the cage. You hoped to God you were the only one captured, but you knew there was no possible way everyone got away scot-free.

   “Where, where is everyone?” It was a stupid question that would have an equally stupid answer. Jacob held back a smirk. He was definitely going to have fun playing with you.

   “Shipped off to my other siblings, doing whatever, I honestly couldn’t give a shit if they’re dead or alive, but you. You are what I want, pup.” The mear thought of your coworkers being held captive or worse sent shivers down your spine.

   “Speaking of what I want, I believe this is what you want.” Jacob reached into a pocket of his dirty jeans and pulled out a small tablet of white pills. Your suppressants... How the fuck did he get those!?

   “Please, please give them back!” You knew you looked so desperate at the moment, but honestly, you couldn’t give a fuck. Jacob’s smirk got bigger as you pleaded. He knew exactly what he was doing, there was no possible way he didn’t know you were both soulmates. He wasn’t that stupid. Hell, he brainwashes wolves for a living. Wolves of all things!

   “Ah ah ah, not so fast. These suppressants have made you weak and we all know the weak have their purpose.” He slowly drew out each syllable with finesse as he took the tablet and dropped it on the ground. Without even thinking, you reached through the bars of the cage and tried to grab the tablet, but Jacob’s dirty combat boot got there first. He crushed the pills with his heel and dug it into the dirt. The crunch of the pills alone made you go into a cold sweat.

   “And you understand your purpose now, don’t you pup?” He said it in such a teasing manner as if he found this to be the most hilarious thing in the world. He grabbed the dirty tablet from the ground and threw it into your cage. “I’m gonna make your life in here a living hell.” That’s all you could remember before scrambling to the pile and looking for any whole pills. There had to be one, just one. You weren’t going to let this bastard win.

   There was the only one left that was covered in dirt, but it would have to do. You swallowed it down immediately and glared at where Jacob just stood. If he wants a battle you’ll give him a war.

   The past few weeks in that dirty cage were utter hell. You screamed for food and water just like the other prisoners. You reached your shaky hands through the bars and tried to touch anyone that passed by. You were going to die in this cage like an animal and it was all your soulmates fault. A fucking blessing my ass.

   The only good thing about being in that cage for that long was the fact that you weren’t brainwashed with that damn music box yet. Jacob had threatened it, walking around each cage with the box and watching as each and every prisoner except you scurried in fear to the corner of their cages.

   The time not being brainwashed had you focus on an escape plan. There was no plan, there was no way of getting out. You had even debated giving into Jacob once or twice like he wanted. The suppressants helped with that. It had been a week since you took the last one and the effects were starting to wear off.

   Feeling his pain after years of resisting had you on edge. The squeezing feeling in your chest would not go away no matter how much you cried or screamed inside the cage. It only got stronger and stronger until all you could feel was the pain. This is what you deserved. This was God’s punishment for you after ignoring Jacob for your own selfish reasons. Sometimes you even believed this, it was beginning to drill itself into your head. Imprint itself into your very memory.

   With Jacob’s emotional pain came the physical pain as well. The red rashes you had all over your body were beginning to burn again. A smoldering heat burning into your skin. He would no doubt you were his soulmate if he saw those rashes from under the dirt and makeup you wore to cover them.

   “Well, you look like utter shit, pup.” You blinked back tears as you watched Jacob approach your cage. He knelt down beside your tired body and gave a slight smirk at your pained expression.

   “It was wondering when those suppressants would be flushed out of your system. This is for your own good, pup. Those pills made you weak, misdirected you from your purpose. Without them, you can be truly strong.” He slowly took out his army knife as he spoke, the blade shining in the light of the full moon. A perfect night for a perfect Alpha like him.

   “You see this, pup? This is a military grade knife, given to marines as part of their uniform. When I got this knife, I thought nothing of it. I’ve been defending my brothers from my old man with my bare fists, why would I need a knife? But, I finally understood what it was for when I hauled my ass to the nearest base with just this knife and a member of my unit dead in the dirt. I understood my purpose when I cut open Miller with this knife. Pain is purpose. You just can’t seem to grasp that.” He got closer and closer until you could feel his breath on your dirty face.

   “So, I’m gonna show you your purpose, pup.” He then took the knife and made a nice, clean slice down his forearm. Despite bright blood dripping from the deep wound, his face remained calm and collected. Jacob just watched as you grasped your own bloody forearm. Tears slipped from your (e/c) eyes and Jacob just watched with a look of utter satisfaction.

   “This is your purpose, it was only you. You were meant for me and you can’t deny that. Not when you have my marks to prove it.” Jacob reached through the bars of the cage and held your cheek with a gentleness you didn’t know he could possess. You could feel the pain begin to dull as he brushed away the dirt and makeup with his thumb and revealed the red rashes that covered you (s/c) skin.

   With the way he touched you, it was no surprise that you fell asleep. He held you with such love and kindness it was unreal. Was he trying to get you to trust him in order to use you later? Did you have a different purpose? It was hard to tell with him.

   You woke up slowly the next day, the sun coming from a window hurting your eyes. Wait, window? Yes, there across from you was a small window and a very large man. Jacob was watching you from a chair far too big for his size. His bright blue eyes never wavering from you.

   “Go back to sleep, pup. I got ya, I promise.” He gave a small smirk unlike no other and watched you fall asleep once again. No more pain. You were with your soulmate at last.

[yusselah]

Draw Well, Be Well

My Daughter’s Reminders

My daughter Jenny grew up falling down, with a fractured tibia here and a black eye there. Injuries stemming from a central nervous system disorder with a  hard to pronounce name: Incontinentia Pigmenti. After 32 years, the words still freeze on my tongue. 

I.P. is not a one-size-fits-all genetic disorder in the ways it affects the lives of the baby girls who are born with it. For Jenny, a woman with a girlish face and a small body, this rare neurocutaneous condition deprives her of many things: the balance to stand, walk, or enjoy the kind of grapho-motor control that enables her mother and brother, both formally trained artists, to draw with precision. 

Precision can be very appealing in the right hands. But my daughter doesn’t draw for appeal, or approval. She draws to be well; to feel well; and for her, thank goodness, the very act of picture-making has for decades now afforded her a pleasurable way of breaking past the gravity of her immense motor and cognitive challenges. The story of Jenny’s love of picture-making and the goodness she’s drawn from pictures are perhaps best illustrated in the images she paraded through my old appointment book in a furious sprint over a cold winter’s night when she was 16. As they remind me, indeed I cannot forget them, she was quite ill in body and mind following a mind-shattering fall after becoming severely sleep deprived at a special summer camp. Had the staff been trained to detect and act on the signs of her obvious sleep deprivation, she might have been spared the half year she lost while living in the painful limbo in her shattered consciousness, where unrecoverable sleep falls. She might have avoided her hallucinations, and the dreadful fear of being swallowed back into the jaws of the seizure monsters that ripped entire pages from her school calendar while she was a little girl. 

I refer to these images as my daughter’s reminders, in part because she made them in an old datebook of mine, drawing freely over pages containing handwritten reminders of my appointments and tasks to be completed. But even more so because her images like the fast-falling peanut shell and winged red horse she drew there remind me of the importance picture-making has played in our lives. They remind me how reliably Jenny Lily Gordon, now 32, has piloted herself through dark times on the tip of a pen. How she’s drawn genies back into fallen bottles. And created a hearth of warm friction when her off-kilter body ran a little too cold - as it often does when her neurological temperatures flowed in different directions. Warm on her left, frosty along her right. But “just right” — like a fairy tale porridge — when her busy left hand is working with her eyes to make a new picture.

From the moment she was able to pick up and hold onto a crayon at the age of three, which was not easy for her, drawing has given my daughter a trustworthy way to communicate when words failed her. You see, Jenny’s thoughts get stuck in the upper shelves of her fragile brain’s speech and language freezer. She finds it easier to produce certain kinds of ideas using ink and lead pigments which fly effortlessly from her drawing instruments without a lot of words weighing them down.

Making pictures offers her a profound well-spring of wellness because the activity also provides a fount of liberating physical release. For although she can’t ice-skate or play soccer, she can take great speed on the point of a No. 2 pencil. And the rhythmic sound the lead tip makes against a sheet of paper is music to her ears. “The paper is a mountain I can climb, where you and me can go up to anywhere, we can fly away,” she once told me as we drew beneath a star-studded August sky . To Jenny, the earth’s gravity can be supremely limiting while her paper universe is boundless.

Since her earliest years, our curly-headed, cognitively- and visually-impaired daughter, has been drawn to our home’s bright, white shelves. They’re packed with paper, old calendars, new and used sketchbooks, fat patches of fabric and pens and inkwells of tangy colors: raspberry, lemon, blueberry, carrot, eggplant and chocolate. She continues to reach for these colorful supplies to flavor her way over the bitter aftertaste of some pretty potent medicines.

These particular reminders of Jenny’s scratch deeply into my memories --and my wife’s -- of many of her hardest times. Times when she lost her appetite completely. Times when she couldn’t grip a spoon or hold a cup of milk; night times when repeated falls from her consciousness — sparked by uncontrollable seizures — ripped entire pages out of her school calendar. These are the kinds of drawn reminders I kept hidden in a desk drawer for years even though I cherished them as visual celebrations of Jenny’s remarkable tenacity and strong desire not to be counted out.

When the tornado side effects of her powerful anti-convulsants began to lighten, she immediately reached for her friction sticks to draw her way back to a steadier state of mind. Her pens and pencils were like a conductors’ baton with which to find the music to lift up and re-organize her disordered mind. The pictures were dance partners to her songs. Pictures went hand and hand with singing. They were dance partners that came together over many hours, across many days, until a new destination appeared. These pictures trigger my gratitude for the ancient red line of drawing - the pulsating, sanguine line which runs like the Hudson River through all of human time. Drawing has also given me a way to express gratitude everyday for a piece of chalk, for a circle, or those beautiful, swift lines that drive comic books.

But I have a special gratitude for these images she paraded across the grey pinstriped pages of my old 2007 appointment calendar. They remind me how drawing alongside her for over three decades has again and again restored our hope of finding some joy in the next five, ten or fifteen minutes. The hope that drawing provides is coming in very handy right now as we live through this vaccine-less pandemic.

It is often said that a picture is worth a thousand words, but to me these pictures are worth a thousand pictures each. An entire year can be glanced in a solitary image: like that long stretch of time when Jenny’s leg was broken in a completely preventable fall. Thank goodness her hands weren’t hurt. She could still wield magic markers, whose bright, magical colors and pungent scents helped lessen her pain.

“My leg hurts, but the itching is worse,” she told me as we drew cats’ faces over the dense, white cast that stretched from her foot all the way up her thigh. She had injured her right leg during a fall from a rowing machine in a health club. The “trainer” had not remembered to fasten the seat belt, but left Jenny’s right foot tightly fastened to the binding in machine’s pedal; when she slid unattended from the seat and struck the floor, her bound leg twisted radically, resulting in what her orthopedist reassured us was “just a skier’s fracture.” But “just” to Jenny is not really any old just. The fracture healed fine, but the surrounding anatomy never quite restored.

I’m reminded how at night her swollen limb throbbed with blue pain - and that the little balance she had before, enabling her to stand up and pivot with our support, was gone. So we carried her.

One night as we drew more icons over the rock-hard plaster, she paused to say, “Joseph, did you know I am drawing-able? I am very, very able to draw. I can draw all day. I’m never afraid. I have zero paper fright.”

“So you have no ‘stage fright’ when you draw?,” I clarified.

“Zero!” she shot back. “It never hurts to draw, it’s never scary so don’t be scared, dad, ok?”

Ever since, I have tried to take her word for it. Not fearing how a picture might be seen or judged by others is a freedom few of us carry over from childhood.

“Jenny doesn’t draw for anyone’s sake but her own, does she?” an artist friend John asked me as they sat together at a tall window overlooking a row of massive trees outside our Bronx apartment.

She had been drawing at that sill for several hours, filling the pages of an old composition book that once belonged to her brother. Old sketchbooks, spiral notebooks or other semi-used booklets of paper held a special allure because they contained the appealing marks of people whose drawings she loved.

“What are you drawing?” John asked. “The birds, the squirrels?”

The animals were busy that afternoon, flying between branches which dropped red and yellow leafs

“I’m just drawing a picture, John,” she replied. “You want to make one?”

“I once just drew lots of pictures, too, Jenny. On the farm where we all grew up. I drew between my chores and homework.”

“You weren’t scared right?”

“Not a bit,” he replied, as he grabbed a pencil.

Picture-making’s reliability in shifting one’s vantage point is helpful when you’re perpetually sitting on the edge of your next fall. For eleven years she was besieged by seizures while transitioning into and out of sleep. I am reminded of those nights by her image of the hovering “seizure monster” who, she said, was like “crocodiles biting through her pillows.” They flew off with her voice. “I couldn’t speak when they came.” Examining her picture several years later, she told me “I’m glad that bitch is gone.”

Many of our hardest falls are lurking just around the corner, yet we don’t see them even as we’re heading towards them. Like that tree branch snaking beneath the cement sidewalk, opening up a crack that swallows the wheel of your wheelchair, sending you crashing. A collision with asphalt can mark up your porcelain face with alarming exclamation points. These shout out your extreme vulnerability to your neighbors when they see you in the lobby of the 14-story, red-brick high-rise you call home. 

“The colors hurt a lot more than my face does” she once confided, referring to the attention that comes with every bloom of these dreaded color palettes. The hues of purple, crimson, curry yellow, and cloudy grey can take weeks to fade. These are times to stay clear of windows and mirrors, because the reflections really do hurt. Whenever she got slammed she reflexively turned to picture-making, selecting and blending soothing colors and picturing a reassuring and perhaps more stable landscape.

All of this is to remind me how I am deeply grateful for these particular pictures made in her fierce sprint to recover herself from the calamitous fall she took when she was 16. These are the book of pictures I hid away for years. I just couldn’t bare to look at them. They were too potent, too illustrative of that most shattering fall that I should have seen coming. I felt guilty for having placed my paternal trust in that Godforsaken sleep away camp; a sailing camp stationed in a former nunnery in picturesque Newport, Rhode Island. It was there that she fell unnoticed through her REM cycle into the depths of the most severe sleep deprivation. A clueless trio of camp nurses were simply too untrained to see what had happened to her, even though she was unable to speak, sit, eat or  recognize her own parents. “Oh, she’ll be just fine,” the smiling nurse told us, having no idea that Jenny’s severe sleep loss had disorganized her brain so profoundly that she took a year to fully recover. She lingered in that place where unrecoverable sleep falls, alone and lonely, a lost soul in a song-less, picture-less limbo. She dwelled in that nowhere space from late August through late December.

It was a hellish period during which time I soon came tumbling down my own mental hill, like Jack following Jill. Which is why these images remain such vivid reminders of that night in late December as Jenny’s recovery began to take shape in this remarkable parade of pictures, which sprouted fruits, and birds, and rivers, and strange bits of self-portraiture, like that disembodied head rolling down August.

They are still dancing in my old datebook with the red ribbon place mark. Her quickly drawn bright plumes of birds feathers and her fast-falling orange peanut shell all poured forth one winter’s night and morning four months after her August fall. They flowed swiftly when just a few hours before she could barely lift a pencil. After so many painful days of passivity, depression, and sleep disturbed nights, they took form through her tired fingers onto the grey pinstriped pages of my old Lettes of London appointment book. And as she drew I knew as only a parent can know that our daughter was surely on her way back to her steadier self again.

I saw the sparkle return to her wan, brown eyes; and the red rouge come back to her pale cheeks. Should I ever forget what drawing can do for a human being  I will look at these pictures once again. 

When she first reached for the place-mark of that old appointment book, I was annoyed with her lingering illness and with myself for having held onto all these dozens of outdated appointment books - paper objects that had left me bound to the past, and clinging hopelessly to the idea that if I could just plan my days carefully enough that I might not be so fearful of the future. I had gritted my teeth as I began tossing the red- and black-covered journals into the trash. But when the red ribbon danced from the Lettes’ binding it lit Jenny up like a fuse. “Please give it to me, I want to draw in it,” she said as I handed the book over and helped her gather up her markers. 

She quickly began charting her way across the meridian of reminders cluttered with notes of my old appointments. Several hours later, she was still going strong, but I insisted that she stop and try to get some sleep. As sound sleep cycle was still eluding us. She nonetheless awoke early the next morning to continue drawing. 

“Look at all of these wonderful pictures you made. You draw so well,” I said as she moved her friction sticks swiftly over the pin-striped pages like a wind-filled sailboat cutting across Naragansett Bay.

“Well, dad, you know,” she replied, “Draw well, be well.”  She lifted her head to survey the colors of her many pens that lay before her, picked out several reds and oranges, and drew on fearlessly for hours. 

- Joe Gordon

[drawandbewell]

Draw Well, Be Well

My Daughter’s Reminders 

My daughter grew up falling down, with a black eye here and a broken leg there. She doesn’t have enough balance to stand or walk, not without falling that is.  

She’s crashed face down on floors, and scraped herself roughly against sidewalks, all while trying to take just a few more unsteady steps. She’s fallen off chairs and sofas, and struck hard, sharp things, like table corners, one of which left a crooked hairline scar on her lily white chin. 

But as these wobbly pictures of Jenny’s remind me, she’s often been able to draw herself back to a steadier state of mind – faster than she might otherwise have – by reaching for her pencils and pens. I call these pictures of her’s my daughter’s reminders. They remind me of things, bitter and sweet, about her struggling childhood and adolescent journey towards a challenged adulthood.

They poignantly recollect the people, places, and things she’s been drawn to while moving over the thin ice of her tippy 29-year life. They remind me, too, of some of her most black and blue times; times so fracturing that simply picking up a marker was a Herculean task. A picture drawn with a swollen hand and a black eye is to her just another picture. For me it is a badge of courage.

Made during a painful, difficult time 13 years ago, these particular pictures remind me that with a well-inked marker in her wobbly left hand, Jenny can find the inner strength to draw herself towards a kind of greater equilbrium. Again and again she’s leaned on drawing to reach towards a greater awareness of herself and others.  

She draws rapidly, rarely pausing, and never erasing. Her pictures, which she mostly tosses away, have served her about as well as any images can. Perhaps because they help remind her that while she can’t skate, swim or run, she can handily picture a world of real and imagined things. Transforming her idea of a bird’s feathers into bright pink and purple plumes, for instance, isn’t a matter of image-making. It’s a rhytmic, physically rewarding act that is brimming with muscular release. She can draw for hours, and generate fresh energy as she goes. 

“I have zero paper fright,” she says in her halting speech, adding, “When I make pictures they can go out to anywhere.” This oft-repeated phrase “go out to anywhere” speaks to Jenny’s wish to be unbounded, free, and able to do anything. And, so she says, “It is great to be drawing-able.” 

Looking at these pictures, my memory swings back to her third birthday when she was coming out from under the fierce weight of a painfully drawn-out illness.  She was struggling to hold onto a red crayon which kept falling from her tiny hand. When she finally produced the first bold marks that she had in a very long time, her pale face rouged up, and she declared in utter delight, “Look, momma, look! I make go!” The action of making things go -- partly serves as an antidote to her movement disorder -- and is yet another reminder of why she clings so tenaciously to her picture-making habit. 

I hope never to forget the night when she drew her fast-falling peanut shell and broken, ice-cubed clock in a furious sprint in our New York City apartment. They flew from Jenny’s hand on a dark, blue December night as she labored to speed her recovery from one of her longest falls ever: her shattering fall through her REM cycle. It happened in late August, four months before, when she crashed in that hard to find place in the human mind where unrecoverable sleep falls. 

She was 16 and had been a frightened, unhappy camper at a special sleep-away camp for youngsters with disabilities. While she went sleepless over several nights, the young counselors and nursing staff completely misread the alarming signs of her incoherance, incontinence, and loss of appetite. My wife and I were in the dark until we received a call from the mother of one of Jenny’s camp-mates. “Katie’s afraid that Jenny’s cracked up,” she told us. Katie, had it right.

In the wake of that fall, Jenny was so lost and disconnected that she couldn’t draw a simple picture or sing a solitary song from late August until the last week of December 2004. Sleep deprivation becomes a torturous thing when it crumbles the mind of a person with a fragile, cognitively impaired brain like my daughter’s. Like Jack following Jill, I myself became exhausted and sleep-deprived trying to keep vigil over her. There was little comforting her as she reeled backwards into reawakened memories of her scariest fears. I remember her swatting the air around her head of brown curls as if she were shooing away August’s mosquitoes. 

“What’s wrong?” I asked her.

“Seizure monsters want me,” she said warily. “They’re going back to my brain.” 

She wasn’t suffering from seizures or skin rashes. Those maladies had stopped buzzing her several years before. But as these drawings remind me there’s no erasing the difficulties drawn in permanent ink by her hard to pronounce genetic disorder. It’s name – Incontinentia Pigmenti – still freezes on her tongue. 

It is owing to this rare, X-linked chromosomal disorder that Jenny’s vision is impaired, that she sits forever on the edge of her next fall, and struggles to retrieve her spoken language. And it’s why she lacks the precise kind of graph-o-motor control that her artist mother and artist brother have. It is this fine motor shorfall that may help explain why at the age of 29 her pictures resemble those of a much younger person’s. Some might say a child’s. 

Clearly, Jenny looks half her age, if not younger. She’s small in stature, has a high-pitched voice, and gaps in her warm smile where a handful of teeth refused to grow. And yet, as these pictures also remarkably remind me, she has grown up to be 29, a nice warm age I once really feared she might never reach. As her black and red seizure monster recalls to me, her childhood resembled one long convulsive time, an eleven year stretch in which she regularly fell through her own conscousness. Those long, seizurous falls ripped entire weeks out of her school calendar. They left her as floppy as a Valium-soaked rag doll.  Yet just as soon as she could manage to hold a marker again, she wielded it tenaciously. The results, even the scratchiest, most indecipherable, became energizing spring-boards. 

She doesn’t draw for my sake nor for art’s sake, but for her own sweet sake. I can see now, in my sixty-fifth year, that her picture-making has rarely forsaken her. By reaching for her place on the ancient red line of drawing, Jenny has repeatedly found a pathway on which to keep herself living as well as she possibly can.  

Is it any wonder why these pictures are worth a thousand pictures each to me? A thousand, if not more. Their value reaches beyond their immense worth to her. For me, there is something gorgeous and uplifting in her left-leaning shapes, shaky lines and triumphant colors flying incontinently over thousands of freshly started pieces of paper. 

Jenny doesn’t recall drawing her backwards facing rooster or purple head rolling down August. It took a year from the time of her depriving fall at that sleep-away camp before she fully recovered. And it wasn’t until several years later that I was able to take them out of the desk drawer where I had hid them from myself. They were too potent like a once familiar song heard on the radio from long ago that absorbs one in a by-gone gloom. They had a wicked bite to them, but when seen a few years later in light of her enormous progress and a growing foreground of her newest joys, next greatest loves, and generally happier self-portrait, they looked altogether positive, hopeful, and important. They looked like a parade of curious icons and images, marching boldly, if unsteadily across the pinstriped lines of difficult times passing by. 

They are nothing more than the handi-work of a pencil-thin,16-year-old daughter strenuously drawing herself through a dark winter’s night to recover her healthier rhythms. In this rediscovered cadence are the notes of the first song she sang as she began reconnecting her severed memory to the rest of her lonely self.  The glue she needed to hold her delicate sleep genie in its fragile bottle didn’t come from a new medicine or her hospital stay. It was squeezed from her pens and pencils. 

We have since given names to a few of these images. Some she has offered captions for. Others appear to be of no interest to her whatsoever. But taken together they evoke that time of sleep-disordered days and nights, crying-jags, sweat-soaked pillow cases, and embarrasing public explosions of inappropriate laughter. But they also underscore her return to hope, and the wellness which followed right behind it, because just when I feared that she might have landed permanently down Humpty Dumpty’s wall, she spotted the red placemark that dangled from my outdated appointment book, and with it she found her spark again.

I was about to trash my 2003 appointment book in a pique of anger. My frustration had turned to rage as we hung in the limbo of her un-wellness. With the New Year just a few days away, I watched her push away another bowl of pasta. How could she still have no appetite? As she sat staring blankly out the kitchen window I wanted to shake her. That’s when I swept up an armful of my old hard-covered journals, diaries, and calendars from a nearby bookshelf and hurled them into a plastic trash can. The crash startled her. She could see that I had lost it. I was bent on getting rid of every single datebook I had ever bought. There were mover a dozen, and each reminded me of my worst frustrations. They marked years of my fruitless work, wishful thinking, and her countless medical appointments. They were mocking me with their dust, and rubbing it in about my obsessive habit of writing things down in little printed boxes, in hopes of bringing some order to my disordered daughter’s life. What good had they done? Here we were, drawing a complete blank in our boxey, low-ceilinged Bronx apartment. Home had never felt so bleak, so stale, so drab. 

It was a good thing that the bright red cotton ribbon placemark leapt from the binding of my 2003 Lettes of London diary as I aimed it at the trash. Serendipitously it landed in her sight.

“What’s that?” she asked.

“It’s a book mark, it remembers your place.” 

“Really?” she said. “I want to draw in it, where are my markers?”

They were piled high in a long, wide tray exactly where they had been resting since August.

She hungrily opened the dairy. And as she began drawing, her eyes brightened and her skin pinked up.  After three hours of continuous picture-making she could barely hold up her head. I mader her stop and carried her to bed. She rested with the book alongside her pillow and awoke a little bit after five a.m. "Can we get up yet?” she asked, “I want to draw some more." I told her to wait a while, at least until the morning sun rose. When we returned to the kitchen table at a nine she looked much better. She drank some light, sweet coffee and had a few bites of buttered toast. For the next three hours later her images continued moving along the meridians of weekly reminders. Every time she turned the pages to draw across a new area she moved the crimson ribbon along with her. “It’s a bookmark, it reminds you,” she said.

 "Look at all these amazing pictures you made," I told her. 

 "Thanks," she said, “can I please draw some more?"

 “Sure, you can. You draw so well.”

She set down her pencil, quickly picked up another, and with the hint of a lilt in her voice reminded me, "Well dad, you know, draw well, be well."