#share and comments welcomed

[arliaeien]

Chapters: 5/? Fandom: ジョジョの奇妙な冒険 | JoJo no Kimyou na Bouken | JoJo's Bizarre Adventure Rating: Explicit Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings Relationships: Johnny Joestar/Gyro Zeppeli Characters: Johnny Joestar, Gyro Zeppeli, Hot Pants (JoJo), Diego Brando, Funny Valentine Additional Tags: Hurt/Comfort, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Fix-It, Pining, Requited Unrequited Love, Friends to Lovers, Canon-Typical Violence, Ableism, Internalized Homophobia, Self-Acceptance, Getting Together, Sharing a Bed, POV Alternating, Alternate Ending, Medical and Rehab (spin) Inaccuracies

Summary:

“The best miracles are imperceptible to the world.” – Unknown author

Gyro’s offer for Johnny to get rehab comes true. Important secrets considering Gyro’s past uncover.

Snippet:

[clownsuu]

i just love lovelie! i just noticed that they don't have scars in the mob au, did she joined the mob voluntarily?

Oh he does! They just aren’t noticeable from the front smhh

cw semi spooki imagery(???)

Technically it’s not a scar JDHDHDD but rather a completely open back smh (ripped wings gone wrong since hers are far more larger than Rob’s are/were)

Cons: well he can’t fly anymore LMAOO- and their back is rather unsightly (they don’t really mind it though- more power to ya if you power through your insecurities)

Pros: free storage to put her whip in smhh (and other things)

[9w1ft]

it’s been awhile and i thought i’d run this poll again!

there’s a max of 12 options so the “before and after 1989 release” options i have merged into before rep!

[xkwhwhwhah]

sally x julie fans where y'all at 🗣️⁉️⁉️

[endwersed]

what happened to just backing out of a fic if it goes a direction you're not a fan of

[slingbats]

just a reminder that I have this community going here on tumblr!

The header and icon are Gotham, but I really want this place to be able to open up to a lot more verses with more interpretations of the characters

as someone who doesn't delve into the tags/tumblr's search feature very often, I want this to be a place where people are encouraged to self-promo their works that they're proud of, or share works from others that they think deserve a spotlight

link to the community, for any interested

not spoiler free!

[cashmoneychiyo]

ohey we're finally using this poll feature

anyway thanks to tumblr's questionable updates, it's come to our attention that we can actually do photosets with more than 10 images now -- up to 30, in fact!!!

So we're actually able to fit whole chapters into one post rather than splitting them (obviously except for volume omakes which have maaany pages). Something you guys might appreciate since it means everything is in one place and we don't have to link to other parts in the post description.

However this also means the posts will become very long, which some people might not like; you can look at the Volume 14 omakes Part 3 post if you want an idea of how long a typical chapter post (14-16 pages) would look like. Also, I personally like to be consistent with how many images are in each row (2 per row vs 3 per row), which is easier to do when splitting the chapters HFKSJDHFJSKD but that is very specific to me, you guys probably don't care as much

So we're interested in hearing how you guys would like us to upload upcoming translations \o/ CMC members shall think about how to proceed with your thoughts in mind~

[nationalnerdsociety]

reminder that famous people are also just some guy, don’t put them on pedestals, be aware that they are not perfect and remember, men ain’t shit

[triptychofvoids]

I am 95% sure i have APD and i have no idea how to deal with it!! If you have any advice, please do tell. Giving you a platonic smooch on the hand.

auditory processing disorder, hmm.. as always i recommend researching it yourself for your symptoms and their severity and loon for what type of things may benefit you the most! depending on the severity, you might find something like auditory training, hearing aids, or listening devices to be helpful. otherwise, finding a way to cut down on background noise (ear plugs or headphones for example, or turning off and muffling other sources of noise in your environment) or asking people to speak slower/clearer/repeat themselves might help as well! if youre still having trouble understanding something like spoken instructions you could aslo ask people to write them down for you. and, sadly sometimes the subtitles on many videos are not great, but ideally it may help to watch whatever you usually tend to watch but with the subtitles on! but like i said, rsearch this yourself as well and try to find what will work best for you. and dont be afraid to explain your difficulties to other people and ask for help if needed!

[iliveinprocrasti-nationn]

I’m just writing out my thoughts here because I’ve just realised something about a situation from a number of months ago (could even be a year at this point) where my friend shared that he’d told his school friends about the word “kvetch” and its usage as a way to describe a type of complaining, and I immediately got defensive of the word to a point where I even tried to explain I knew I was being somewhat irrational, but that I couldn’t figure out why. I was mentioning how the word has different meanings, how different people can take that usage of “kvetch” in different ways, how his friends might not get the nuances, etc. And I had no clue why I was so defensive until today when I realised it was because I was scared.

I was lucky to have not experienced as much antisemitism at that point, but I was also very aware that I didn’t know those people. I still don’t, really. I didn’t know how they were going to use the word which, being Yiddish, I was thinking of as “my word” in this situation. Are they going to understand the nuances, or are they going to make it a joke? Or are they going to do something worse? I didn’t know.

And I think that’s the thing about Yiddish. A lot of goyim see the language and like the insults and the hyper-specific words and think other words “sound funny”, but they don’t get it. To me, Yiddish is the language my great grandparents kept from their children because it got them beaten in school. They only taught their oldest (my great uncle), but he would get his hand whacked with a ruler by his teacher every time he spoke it. It was the only language he knew, so you can imagine it got pretty bad. My great uncle didn’t like to talk about it. My great grandparents went on to pay a neighbour a quarter a session to teach him English, and they didn’t teach Yiddish to any of their other children, despite it really being the only language they spoke. They never became fluent in English. I’m only now relearning Yiddish to bring it back into my family, but I’m also aware it wouldn’t have been the type they spoke. I mourn that fact often.

Of course I love the insults. Of course I love how we have so many specific words for things. But it’s also so much more to me, and I’ve gotten more and more uncomfortable sharing any part of Jewish culture with goyim because of my experiences with goyishe leftists. The typical antisemitism you see from conservatives who think Jews run the world and own the banks and all that obviously sucks, but it’s the antisemitism from leftists that’s the most insidious because they’re absolutely convinced they can’t do anything wrong and that they’re correct and validated in saying what they say. And then their antisemitism is subsequently defended by other leftists who think and act the same. My being Jewish is almost a vetting process for new people - I bring it up once I get more comfortable to test their reaction because I don’t know how people are going to react anymore.

Sharing a random Yiddish word was nothing to him, but, to me, it was sharing a part of my culture with people who might disrespect it, if not harbour contempt towards it. Yiddish loan words can be fascinating, but part of me will always be a bit scared of the actions and reactions of goyim to Jewish culture.

[niimda]

I've been following some of those plural poll blogs for a little while now. I think it's fun to answer questions, especially ones that make me have to think really hard or consult others. It's a good way to learn about the worlds I inhabit and the people I inhabit them with, but I've been noticing some (if not most) of the questions are almost.. not applicable to us or our experiences. Specifically now: questions that want you to answer as or for the collective.

"Collective favorite [X]", "[Y] that describes everyone", "Collective opinion on [Z]."

While thinking about these questions I realized that it probably feels pretty bad to be expected to be radically different from everyone you share a brain with. That kind of expectation can unintentionally de-legitimize peoples' experiences and make them feel like they aren't "separate enough" to count.

At the same time, we don't have…a collective anything. Even this body is off-limits to at least one person. Trying to make all of us agree on something has made us run into more butting of the heads than anything else in the past six years, and that feels very strange! Being asked to exist cohesively and uniformly causes some of the most upset I've ever seen.

My favorite ice cream flavor is pistachio. Verin likes specifically Quality Dairy's Death by Chocolate. Oliver wants nothing to do with any of it. To answer with a single "collective favorite" would mean disregarding most opinions in favor of one. It's a silly example, and it's true most of the questions tend to be silly and un-serious in nature. So why should we have to fight over whose favorite gets the spotlight?

There are plenty of other common plural-community things that don't apply to us, being a system of less than ten with only one (introverted) introject. We don't tend to subscribe to common frameworks (roles, origin labels, and the shiny new consciousness labels), and microlabels in general just don't seem to have that luster. Being unconventional isn't new to us for many, many reasons.

The polls aren't even really my main concern here. We don't follow many, so it's possible it's just a few of them. But it's not the only context we're expected to present as less individual than we actually are.

The name of the group, Solsten, is neutral at best for more than half of us, but existing without a link to others in the system online is heavily frowned upon. "System tags" are commonly required in Discord servers that have bots for accessibility. Intra-system communication in public is laughable & weird at best, and outright banned at worst. We are expected to be a very single group of people.

We've known about each other for years longer than we've known about the plural community, so I guess it makes sense that we don't fall in with the norms presented here. We're in the age range now where we're "too old" for the youngest members to be comfortable with, and "too young" for the oldest.

The easiest thing for us to do has been to find others through our interests, and we've been very lucky to find three(!!) other systems who we're now very close with. They don't seem to be as interested in alterhumanity as I am, but I think all I can really do is take what I'm given. They listen and allow us as much space as we need to be uniquely and separately ourselves.

This was sort of an aimless ramble from the get-go. I haven't been here long enough to make in-depth critiques of common trends. (It's my understanding that other platforms like Dreamwidth and some personal websites host wonderful content of that variety.) But maybe we should start making all of our coworkers decide if they all had to be one animal what it would be. Even if our coworkers are already strongly and separately wolves, birds, and human beings.

[eruukat]

feeling many things rn. terrified abt a lot of life changes like switching majors and needing a new job and transportation changes and even stupid little stuff like fixing my hair or avoiding the roach thats hiding out under my bed. and then below all that is this simmering pot of butterflies about my partner. i knew our prev date was going to stir up a lot of feelings but im so. !!!!!!! idk if t4t love is just that insane and intense or if im just really really clicking with him but he might have the most beautiful smile ive ever seen. hes literally radiant and i think hes the first person to ever give me butterflies and after last date somethings *changed* and theyre like. still butterflies but different somehow. i dont know what im ready for but i think about him and his smile and i can imagine myself actually truly falling in love even though its just infatuation rn. but in the past imagining that felt more distant and i guess i didnt know what it would look like for me, but now i feel like i have an inkling or a possibility. i cant wait to see him again and hold him in my arms

[milkweedtussocktubers]

An Extensive "What Now?" List

So, I made a list. A very extensive "Trump Is President-Elect. What Now?" list. And it's fucking ten pages long and I know it's incomplete, because I am white, and multi-gender, and own my own home, and live in a blue state with enshrined abortion rights and so honestly can't know everything that needs to be on that list. BUT I'm posting what I've got so far. I'll also post the link, because it's a Google Doc that I'm continuously updating and sharing. PLEASE do not take my word as gospel - comment, add, share, spread, correct, message me. This is just a jumping off point, because so many of my friends wanted an action plan. All links except the What If Trump Wins? website are credited to @creature-wizard; they don't know it, but I read their posts and find their work very helpful, so I hope they don't mind that I included some of their links and info. Better than reinventing the wheel.

So THIS is the link:

https://docs.google.com/document/d/10zzAchLDd_NeqpWQXixmNQpH6X5ZsGpHRVsojx38Las/edit?tab=t.0

TRUMP IS PRESIDENT-ELECT. NOW WHAT?

I put together a list of ideas that I hope folks find inspiration in. This can be a personal action plan, a path towards resistance, or just an opportunity to feel a bit better. I welcome all thoughts, suggestions and changes. Please note that I am writing this from the perspective of a white, multi-gender farmer, and that will color and inhibit my ability to see certain issues or solutions. This is not a complete list, but can be a jumping-off point.

I've found this website incredibly helpful: https://whatiftrumpwins.org. All links found within this document are credited to @creature-wizard on Tumblr. 

COMMUNITY AND PUBLIC SERVICE 

Community ties are the most important things we’ve got - that’s where our strength lies. All those small-scale mutual aid projects? That’s what’s going to make life possible on the day to day. So: 

Take a deep breath, and knock on someone’s door. 

Check in with your neighbors - this can be a scheduled date, or just swinging by with an extra loaf of zucchini bread, or chatting over the garden fence. 

Offer to help someone with a simple task - cleaning gutters, building a raised bed, taking their dog to the vet.

Create a carpool system. 

Set up little libraries, freezers and fridges. 

Develop a list of ten local people you trust, with their contact information, and who you know will try to help you. Put the list in your phone, on your fridge, in your wallet. Put yourself on someone else’s list, and commit to it. 

Make friends and meet up with them on a regular basis. Have tea, cook together, go for walks, play video games. Just be there consistently. 

Open your house once a month for community get-togethers. Maybe these are queer/women/BIPOC-only safe spaces, maybe they’re street-wide potlucks. Maybe you make art while crying together. Maybe you binge-watch Lord of the Rings, eat popcorn and share joy.

Think about starting Swaps with your community. Swaps of clothing you don’t need anymore. Swaps of home-made food, seeds, plants or artwork. Swaps of household goods. Get yourself trading and sharing with each other. 

Get a roommate or two. It’ll help each of you save money, reduce loneliness, and might save someone from becoming unhoused. Don't feel obligated to retain that roommate if it's negatively impacting you. This is about a healthy present in a chaotic world, not a desperate act that results in abuse and destruction.

Libraries are funded in large part based on the number of cards they hand out, not books. Get a library card, even if you never use it. Many libraries let you apply online. If your library isn’t physically accessible, or you can’t safely leave your home but you have a cellphone, download the Libby app for books and audiobooks. It’s free, you just need your library card number. If you live or have an address in New York State, you can also get cards to the Brooklyn Public Library and NYC Public Libraries.

Places to volunteer: libraries, hospitals, schools, mental health hotlines, small farms and community gardens, animal shelters, food pantries, mutual aid organizations, medical clinics, harm reduction centers, fire stations, emergency rescue services. 

Advocate for handicapped accessibility in all public spaces. Does your library have a ramp? Your local co-op? Your house? Learn what your disabled community members needs are that are not being met, because it will get worse. 

Do you have skills that can contribute in new ways? For instance, if you're a great bike mechanic, I'll bet you can fix wheelchairs. If you're an electrician, you could help with your neighbor's solar system. If you're handy with a sewing machine, you can make flags and banners.

Keep it local - donate to the after-school music program in your town instead of, say, Planned Parenthood. National organizations will be getting a flood of funding from concerned citizens right now, but local organizations are often more effective and know their community’s needs more intimately.

If you want to participate but in person is too much, or not accessible, go to Zoom meetings. Call or email folks. Perform online tasks, or put up posters.

If you're not sure what you can offer, just ask what people need. Sometimes someone needs their dogs walked, or an emergency baby-sitter. Sometimes a non-profit needs someone to table at an event. Perhaps someone wants a logo designed, or just someone to keep them company. It doesn't have to seem big to you; it could still mean the world to someone else.

Online communities are just as important, and often more accessible. Make the space and time for those meet-ups, whether you’re messaging folks, playing video games together, or finding forums and inspiration. 

Become a safe person for those who need to go back in the closet, or who need to trust someone with their sexuality or gender. 

Run for local office, or sit on the school board. Be the opposing voice in a conservative group.

If you feel safe doing it: advertise. Put up every damn flag at your house except the American flag. Pride, Black Lives Matter, feminism, Earth first, land back - become a visible beacon of safety and hope. If you are still safe, now is NOT the time to go underground. Now is the time to find your people, and be someone for others. So flags, volunteering, barter, lending, carpooling, offering tea, offering your guest room. Make the connections.

The more we connect with and care for our neighbors, the more our neighbors will connect with and care for us. Let’s strengthen and widen our circles. 

*I recognize that for many, much of what I offer can be a genuine safety concern. Sometimes housemates are abusive. Sometimes neighbors threaten you with guns. Use your own discretion and trust your instincts. 

ENVIRONMENT

Small plots of ecological sanctuary make a huge difference. You can plant flowers, collect rainwater, start a compost bin, let your lawn grow, build a hedgerow. Stop spraying pesticides, pick up litter, plant a garden, research native species, celebrate milkweed…

Volunteer or donate to a local conservation organization. 

Visit a park or go for a hike. Visit a local protected zone and learn about the ecosystem with whom you live. Discover your watershed. 

Learn about local pollutants and advocate for protections. Check out your city’s water health publications. 

Question the installation of new businesses, factories and industries. How will they impact the air, water, soil and human health? Protest them with your friends - on a local level, it actually only takes a few hundred people to make waves. I’ve seen huge projects stopped because my friends sat in on every town hall meeting.

Become a citizen scientist - birdwatch, identify local plants and animals, track the weather and then report your findings to naturalist organizations. The Merlin App is a free app that matches birdcalls to the birds in your backyard, iNaturalist takes really accurate photos and identifies them. It can become a whole hobby that also helps maintain consistent scientific data. 

Get your generator in working order. Storms are gonna get worse and you'll need it when the lights go out. Batteries, light bulbs, candles. Get them now. Prepare as if for a blizzard or tornado.

Consider an air filter or a gas mask for after the Clean Air Act is repealed.

Find out whether or not you’re in a flood or hurricane zone, or if you will be in one as climate change continues. What can you do to prepare for or mitigate the damage?

MENTAL AND EMOTIONAL HEALTH 

Remember that you are WORTHY of receiving gifts and help. Allow yourself to receive help with grace. ASK when you need help, even if you’re not quite sure what you need. 

Eat a lot of food and drink plenty of water; your stressed mindset will make you burn calories. 

Treat yourself. Maybe that means binging television, or buying a cute pair of earrings, or taking a bike ride to your favorite place, or resting in the bath with some fancy soaps. 

Don't isolate. Meet friends for coffee, or Ultimate Frisbee, or to learn to make a cake together. 

Create joy. 

         Don’t Hesitate by Mary Oliver

If you suddenly and unexpectedly feel joy, don’t hesitate. Give in to it. There are plenty of lives and whole towns destroyed or about to be. We are not wise, and not very often kind. And much can never be redeemed. Still, life has some possibility left. Perhaps this is its way of fighting back, that sometimes something happens better than all the riches or power in the world. It could be anything, but very likely you notice it in the instant when love begins. Anyway, that’s often the case. Anyway, whatever it is, don’t be afraid of its plenty. Joy is not made to be a crumb.

Greet the sun. Listen to the stars. Breathe with the trees. Lay in the grass. Cuddle a cat. Talk with the moon. Find a new book. Take up knitting. Make music. Journal. Make art. 

Have set days each week for long-distance friends, and check in with each other at least once a week. Send them care packages. Ask for care packages.

Accept that you will not do everything every day, that some days you will stay in bed until one, eat ice cream in your pajamas and just nap with the dog. That is real and beautiful. That chance to relax? That's something they're trying to take away from us. Rest and relaxation and hammocks and good books are all at risk, so enjoying them is also revolutionary. It's important to keep normalcy alive.

Think about your boundaries. Are you, for instance, comfortable housing someone in need? Comfortable helping someone through grief? It's okay if not. But find those boundaries so that you don't overtax yourself.

PHYSICAL HEALTH AND REPRODUCTION 

Get a medical alert bracelet or have a medical alert card in your wallet. This way, no matter where you are, if you’re unconscious and sent to the ER, EMTs and staff know of your allergies and needs.  For instance, I’m allergic to penicillin, have low vitamin D and take St John’s Wort, a powerful herbal SSRI that could interfere with drugs. 

Find your state’s free Narcan programs, and request Narcan and drug testing strips so that you have them on hand if an emergency arises. 

Get a stockpile of COVID tests, decent masks, and if you plan to get the vaccines, do it now. 

Do not use a period tracking app; do nothing to alert the government to your reproductive medical needs. Unless it’s medically relevant, do not tell your doctor the date of your last menstrual cycle. Pay for all medical needs possible with cash, whether it’s Plan B off the shelf or a co-pay on a prescription. 

If you have any prescriptions, get them refilled as soon as possible. Get extras if you can.  

Get all your birth control needs met now. Implants and IUDs last for years, but if the IUD shifts, you will need medical assistance, so keep that in mind. 

Stock up on condoms and dental dams, get your STD screenings and all similar or related procedures, like colposcopies, mammograms and biopsies done now. 

Consider whether or not you need PrEP for HIV prevention. If you’re at risk but don’t have insurance, there are over-the-counter HIV test kits. They ARE pricey, though.

Stock up on pads and tampons or switch to cloth pads, period underwear or cups. They last at least six years. Cups take less water to clean, though. 

If you're planning to get yourself, your kids or your pets vaccines, do it before January. 

Those who don't want to have kids for the next four years and for whom it’s medically viable should consider a vasectomy. They're reversible, and no one gets stuck with an expected pregnancy. Tube tying is generally irreversible and reversal only has about a 50 percent success rate, depending on how the original procedure was done.

Stock up on basic first aid supplies and educate yourself in basic med training, like CPR, the Heimlich and how to treat pepper spray in the eyes (lots of water). Maybe you’ll find yourself at a protest and your friends get hurt, and you want to be able to help. Perhaps it’s an emergency and there are no safe options to call for help. 

Carry antihistamines with you, even if you don’t have allergies - the woman outside your local coffee shop may not be able to afford an Epi-Pen and you could be the one that keeps her alive long enough for the ambulance to get there. 

Get an umbrella, face mask,bullet-proof vest, and goggles, especially if you are considering joining a protest. Pepper spray, rubber bullets, shrapnel and real bullets are no joke and will be used against you. 

ECONOMICS AND RESOURCES

Invest in wood heating - real wood, not a pellet stove. When fuel prices go up, you will need to have a reliable source of heat. Best to get a wood cook stove. Investigate masonry or rocket stoves because they are very efficient and often can be built by a local company and don't rely on steel, which will also go up as more tariffs are implemented

Put some cash aside outside the bank. Put money in a high interest savings account, but NOT a CD.

Take your car to the mechanic now. Buy snow tires and get your vehicle in working order, because parts will skyrocket in price. 

In your trunk, put together a box of: motor oil, windshield fluid, a small empty gas tank, two gallons of fresh water, brake fluid, tire changing kit, tire pump - anything your car needs. Get two of everything. Have another crate with a blanket, gloves, $200 cash, dishware, a dog leash, some jars or Tupperware. That's for you, if you're in an emergency, want to bring home food, or need to rescue a stray dog. Put a snow shovel in, both for digging yourself out and for moving turtles.

Having a working bike with a tow-behind trailer is an asset, especially as gas and car parts rise in price

Find a list of banned books and obtain them somehow so that there are physical copies for when the online sites are shut down. 

Apply for food stamps, heating assistance, energy discounts, phone discounts, and health insurance now, so you have it for as long as possible before they cut programs.

Anyone close to being able to retire and collect on retirement should consider how that might impact their finances. It might be best to retire early, if you can collect.

Get all your fuel tanks filled now. Propane, oil, kerosene. Even gas stoves, and make sure they're in working order. 

Snail mail will be safer than online communications. Stock up on stamps; sometimes you can get discounts on the USPS website. If you’re sending a lot of packages, try PirateShip.com for discounts. 

FOOD AND WATER

Grow and preserve your own. Learn to cook and share with friends. Start or join a garden club or urban garden. Talk to farmers, read books, watch videos. 

Start looking around your area to see where you can wild harvest. Come Autumn, will you be able to harvest apples from the trees in the city park, or the old farmyard? Rose hips from the bushes along the sidewalk? In the Spring, dandelion leaves from your backyard?

Save seeds. Preserving specific varieties is good, but all seeds are valuable. 

Get a water filter, even if it’s just a water bottle filter. Save it for AFTER the Clean Water Act is slashed, unless your water is already too contaminated to wait. 

Find out how to buy local foods, because tariffs will raise the price of all international goods.

Stock up on food that has to cross a border, like black pepper, chocolate and coffee. Those are my top three, anyway. 

Find a space in your house to use as a root cellar, where it’s cool and damp and dark. Root crops, winter crops and fruits will store longer. You don't have to doomstock, but it's important to have a stored base until your community is strong enough to create its own food. So if during the Winter, you can't grow food, you have a few months supply until it's warm enough to grow again.

Learn how to grow sprouts or shoots on your windowsill. 

Small farms will become havens and targets. Grow with them, preserve, volunteer there, learn. 

Find a local source of meat, because the FDA will not be regulating food-borne illnesses anymore. And eggs, if possible. Buy half a cow or something.

Farmers markets will often accept FoodStamps as payment, and prices may be lower than the stores. 

Start sharing meals with neighbors - maybe you host dinner on Mondays and they host dinner on Thursdays. Lets you practice cooking and gives you a social life. 

PERSONAL AND PUBLIC SAFETY 

Unless they’re actively attacking, don’t trust anything the government says. But the minute they say they’re coming for migrants/trans folx/BIPOC - you go find those people, get them to safety, and pretend you never, ever, ever saw them. 

Do not tell figures of authority of your plans, your ideologies, your efforts to help those under attack. 

Take a self-defense course; the chances you have a weapon if you’re attacked are slim, so you need to learn how to use your body. 

Carry a lighter. It’s small, lightweight and legal with no permit. If you’re grabbed, then putting a flame - even a small one - to someone’s skin can make them let go long enough for you to run. 

Switch your Internet browser to DuckDuckGo. It blocks surveillance and ads. AdNauseam is  a browser extension that scrambles your data so it's less traceable, so the government can't see what you're doing. Get them both. They're free

Install blackout or dark curtains so that visual surveillance into your house is limited. I recognize the military has heat sensors, but your neighbor probably doesn't.

Be aware that Venmo and related apps tell the IRS what you're spending money on. Be careful what you use it for and how you record transactions. 

If making a “suspicious purchase,” like of Plan B, use cash. Wear a baseball cap, sunglasses, mask and contour makeup to hide your face from the security cameras.

Think about security proofing your windows, which makes them less breakable, or backglazing them with bulletproof glass.

The police, now more than ever, are an entity of the state. DO NOT CALL THEM, do not trust them. If you are raped or attacked, go straight to the hospital first. Do NOT shower. Go to the ER, tell them what happened and request a full rape kit. Go next to an independent organization that will help protect you and your rights, and help you decide next steps.

If there's something happening that you might otherwise have called the cops for, but there are people of color or trans individuals involved, DO NOT CALL THE COPS. They WILL kill trans and BIPOC folk. 

If you’re considering a divorce, and you’re serious about it, do it now. No-fault divorces are on the chopping block. 

If you're in the US, you can call 211 to help you find resources.

Crisis Text Line offers services to the US, Ireland, Canada, and the UK.

RAINN (Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network) is a US service offers a lot of information for sexual abuse survivors.

The Trevor Lifeline is a service for queer youth in the US.

If you're a minor, you may wish to read How To Escape Abusive Parents: A Guide For Minors.

If you're an adult, you may wish to read How To Escape Abusive Parents: A Guide For Adults.

You might search on Qwant for like something like "resources for people in abuse" or "abuse resources help" or "domestic violence survivors resources".

PROTESTING AND FIGHTING BACK

Make clear decisions and plans about what protests you'll be a part of and how. Tell only your most trusted friends where you are going, but be sure to tell them.

Obtain safety/riot gear, like masks, goggles and padding. Always carry fresh water for washing out wounds and pepper-sprayed eyes.

Practice that self defense you learned. What are the easiest moves?

Become someone's protest buddy, especially if they, for any reason, might be more vulnerable. Stick to one another and get each other out of dangerous situations. Come up with a safe word, and a safe way to communicate across a protest. A song, a wolf howl, a walkie talkie.

I know nothing about apps, but there are communication apps and social media out there that folx under oppressive regimes use and recommend. Find those.

Keep emergency contacts on standby if you're going to protest. Make sure there's someone who could help bail you out of jail or can help raise money for bail. 

Know your rights, and don’t give them anything when they arrest you. Make a list of lawyers and advocacy groups you feel safe trusting. 

Train in proper video and recording methods to track what happens and what the police do. 

If you're participating in a long term protest, plan properly for your health and the health of your home, partners and pets. 

Get your affairs in order. You may not make it out of a protest alive. 

When planning discussions with folks who might disagree with you, know that you may NOT actually be the best person for said discussion. If you’re really far left and you want to chat with your MAGA uncle about immigration, maybe find someone who’s more center-leaning but unsure to be a go-between. It’s less alienating to your uncle and less traumatizing for you.  

I know I’ve said this already, but carry first-aid supplies, learn basic first-aid, and carry a lighter, so that you can help those in need and protect yourself. 

Fight back with everyday statements. When someone says, “Those illegals are taking all our jobs,” say something like, “Wow, that sounds like some shit a weird Nazi would say.” Add “weird Nazi” to your responses. Laugh at the absurdities of MAGA statements. Make them feel foolish, or give good one-liners that leave them scratching their heads. Can’t think of any? Start binging comedians to learn how to give quick comebacks. 

In order to keep yourself from falling into a bad group, it's important to develop your critical thinking skills:  (credit to @creature-wizard)

Learn to apply the Five W's (who, what, when, where, and why) when encountering any information.

Learn common logical fallacies.

Learn the difference between fact, opinion, belief, and prejudice.

Don't equate emotional reactions with some kind of innate or higher moral guidance.

Ask yourself if you're "thinking for yourself" or being led to believe you're thinking for yourself.

Know what emotional manipulation tactics look like.

Watch out for these behaviors in any new group you join.

Yes, there are ways to confirm the age of an old text without having the original text itself.

Learn how propaganda works.

Watch out for these red flags in spiritual groups.

And watch out for this red flag.

Understand that belief doesn't have to be binary.

LEAVING THE STATES

This post is again from @creature-wizard:

Get a passport. It's also an easy way to officially change your gender market. Canada is becoming really conservative, but Mexico has some of the safest queer cities in the world. You can stay there for no reason for more than three months, leave for three days and come back and keep doing that indefinitely. It's cheap and warm and the food is spectacular. Plus the entire country enshrined abortion rights. 

You will need a go bag. It should include non perishable snacks, water, paperwork, copies of your id, cash, meds, and whatever you love for comfort. Know where it is at all times. Keep it near an exit. My go bag will at least contain my ancestral seeds, my teddy bear, and extra socks.

DO NOT UNDERESTIMATE WHAT THEY WILL DO. Remember the bomb threats, the arson and the insurrection. THEY WILL NOT HESITATE TO BURN YOUR HOUSE DOWN AND TARGET YOUR LOVED ONES AND PETS. Believe them. PLEASE believe them when they say they are Hitler. Trump is just a figurehead. He has the force of an entire party behind him. It will change everything. He can implement martial law overnight. 

Make two or three escape plans. During WWII, people escaped by walking, by hiding under garbage in trucks, by building hot air balloons that they flew, by living in attics for years. 

It can be done, but you have to think ahead. We don't have the time to say, "Oh, it won't get that bad.” People are already dying. It is that bad. 

If you know someone who is MAGA or even close to it, NEVER tell them your escape plan. Never tell anyone anything if you don't trust them enough to hold a loaded gun to your head.

If you’re leaving, consider how to bring your pets. Do they need vaccines to cross a border? Do you even have a cat carrier, and adequate food for travel? What about costs for boarding while you resettled in your new home?

Who will house you if you need a safe space? Make a list of places you have friends, or couches you can sleep on.

LOOK, IT’S TOUGH. IT’S GONNA BE TOUGH. BUT IT CAN BE JOYFUL, AND MYSTERIOUS, AND FUN, TOO. SO LET ME LEAVE YOU WITH THESE THOUGHTS:

Overall, the more you rely on community and less on capitalism, the more security you could have during difficult times. The more secure you are, the more you can and will feel comfortable helping others. 

The Holocaust happened because a lot of good people did nothing, in large part because they decided it couldn't possibly get that bad. But the right-wingers know how to play the long game, and they are actively chipping away at our liberties. 

The way I see it, there are now three primary parts to this rebellion: 

Those physically stopping the issues by destroying dams and animal testing labs, harassing and attacking politicians or corporations, and chaining themselves to bulldozers.

Those ferrying others to safety and providing the necessary resources for those leaving or hiding.

Those feeding, comforting and healing others through food growing, meal prep, offering tea and therapy, and putting down roots to grow community. 

So where do you stand? Do you fight or flee? Do you share cookies or get out the protest signs? Can you do all three? (Probably not, so choose wisely.)

And in the end:

IN 150 CHARACTERS OR LESS

Everything is on fire, but everyone I love is doing beautiful things

and trying to make life worth living.

and I know I don’t have to believe in everything,

but I believe in that. 

~ Nikita Gill 

Take care of each other and take care of yourself. You are not alone. Godspeed. 

[francy-sketches]

????

[brown-little-robin]

Mrs. Kageyama Reaches ???%

People have different sides to them. Mrs. Kageyama is fine with that. She knew getting into motherhood that her kids would bring some things to their parents, and other things, they’d want to deal with on their own. That’s fine. That’s what people do!

She, for instance, worries over her kids out loud, in front of them, but only about the little things. Bumps and scrapes. Bent spoons, dropped dishes. Not the big things. She locks the big things away like an adult, only letting them out a little bit at a time so she doesn’t explode. She whispers to her husband in the dark when the kids won’t overhear them: are there any psychics in your family? Do you think your parents would know anything about how to help Shige?

As far as either Kageyama parent can tell, there aren’t any psychics in their extended families at all. Shigeo Kageyama was the first person out of the ordinary in both entire bloodlines, all the way back to the farmers (on Mrs. Kageyama’s side) and fishermen (on Mr. Kageyama’s side) who started keeping records of their family lines. And oh, it worries Mrs. Kageyama that she doesn’t know how to connect with that side of him.

There’s nothing she can do. Shigeo floats in the air as a baby, and Mr. Kageyama pulls him down like a balloon, but he floats right back up again, and there’s nothing Mrs. Kageyama can do but wait until her baby gets hungry and comes down to her again.

As a toddler, Shigeo talks to things Mrs. Kageyama couldn’t see. He repeats swear words she couldn’t hear the spirits teaching him. Actually, in that case, there is something she could do; one conversation later, Shigeo understands some social niceties he didn’t know about before.

But she can’t help with the root problem of the spirits who teach him words that he shouldn’t know. She wishes she was a psychic, too, not because it seems like fun—it certainly doesn’t, not to her—but because at least she would know what her son was dealing with.

But it isn’t that big of a deal, probably. Shige manages fine. He floats potato chips around to make Ritsu laugh and levitates all the small objects around him when he cries. It’s just another side of him. Shigeo is clearly bothered when other kids think he’s weird, but the Kageyamas let him deal with that by himself. All they can do, really, is keep loving him, feeding him, and making sure he gets to bed on time. The rest will sort itself out. Some things just wouldn’t be helped by parents getting involved.

Shigeo gets quieter as he got older. He still smiles and plays, but he doesn’t laugh out loud as much. He got self-conscious, Mrs. Kageyama thinks, because of those other little kids. Part of Mrs. Kageyama wishes she could talk to him about it, but that’s not how these things are done. Even if she tried to coax Shigeo’s hidden hurt feelings out into the open, all the parenting advice says that that would just stop him from developing the strength to deal with it on his own. And besides, real adults don’t make their children deal with their parents’ emotions.

So she hides that side of herself away. She whispers to her dear husband late at night, what if Shigeo is actually being bullied? What’s the point where we should step in?

He doesn’t know. He says, I think the boy is doing fine for now. Let’s let him socialize by himself for a while. She agrees. They let him socialize by himself. Sometimes he comes home from the park muted and weary, but he usually perks up once he’s eaten dinner, and Ritsu never fails to get a smile out of Shige.

Ritsu can connect with that side of Shigeo that Mrs. Kageyama can’t. His delight in his brother’s powers makes Shigeo smile where Mrs. Kageyama’s loving concern would just be smothering. So that’s all right. Different people can help with different needs.

Shige and Ritsu are good kids. They’re good kids, and they love each other, and they love their parents. But there are things they don’t come to their parents for. And that’s natural.

One New Year’s Day, Mrs. Kageyama got a call from a concerned neighbor and rushed to her sons. She found Shigeo standing stunned, blank-eyed, a few feet away from Ritsu, who was bleeding heavily from a head wound. Head wounds bleed a lot, she was informed by the doctors who stitched Ritsu’s precious little head up. That’s normal.

There was more blood on the ground than what could be explained by Ritsu’s head. Since she didn’t have to do anything about it, Mrs. Kageyama allowed herself to forget that fact. And then she forgot it again whenever she thought of it. Forcefully.

Ritsu didn’t explain what happened. He just went along with his mother and the doctors in a stunned, disbelieving kind of silence. He was a model patient, the doctors said.

Alarmingly, Shigeo didn’t explain what happened, either.

Mrs. Kageyama scrubbed the blood off his face in the hospital bathroom, and he didn’t resist at all. His hair didn’t rise up off his forehead in discomfort, and nothing floated, not even the water from the sink.

She squinted at him. Something was strange about him. Looking into his cast-down eyes, she could almost see something behind Shigeo’s blank expression. Something…

Something…

“Shige…?”

Shigeo made dull eye contact, and for a moment she saw with perfect clarity a boy behind his eyes, a boy with white eyes, screaming.

And then she un-saw it. Forcefully.

After all, there was nothing she could do; everyone has different sides to them, and that’s normal. Not everyone can deal with all the sides of everyone else.

After that, something is different in the Kageyama household. It feels almost like the boys had hit puberty early. Mrs. Kageyama heard from other mothers and parenting books about teenagers, how difficult they were, almost like they became different people overnight. It’s like that with Shigeo and Ritsu, only they’re still baby-faced little boys, not teenagers at all.

The tendency Shigeo always had to turn into a muted shadow of himself after a particularly hard day becomes the norm. He’s quiet. Too quiet. He’s calm. Too calm. He doesn’t laugh at all anymore. It becomes hard to remember that Shigeo was ever genuinely, visibly happy. His smiles at dinner are muted, his eyes always tired, even when he’s thanking Ritsu for unbending his spoons.

He doesn’t use his powers anymore. Not on purpose, anyway.

It hurts the side of Mrs. Kageyama that she has hidden away, the side that wants to stare deep into Shigeo’s eyes and talk to him honestly, to show him her overpowering concern for the part of himself that Shigeo doesn’t come to her for help with.

It’s not like he’s a teenage delinquent or anything, though. He’s perfectly polite. In some ways, he’s exactly the same as before. He still returns from school tired and distant but cheers up at the dinner table, even though his expressions are subtler, nowadays.

But unlike before, Ritsu can’t cheer Shigeo up.

It’s similar with Ritsu: it’s impossible to explain to other mothers how he’s changed. He’s still a model child. He’s still cheerful and helpful and nice. He just…

Sometimes Mrs. Kageyama hears him crying at night. Sometimes she catches sight of him staring at objects with such a fierce expression that she knows instantly what he’s trying to do.

The parenting advice doesn’t cover what you do when one of your children hurt the other one but both of them refuse to acknowledge that anything is wrong. The parenting advice says that if your children are angry at each other, you should give them some advice but mostly let them work it out on their own. But what if they don’t work it out? What if they never even try? There’s nothing to say.

Their family name, Kageyama, begins to seem like a cruel joke. Kage, shadow, figure, dark omen; yama, mountain, something huge and powerful. Mr. Kageyama is the one who points that out, late at night, whispering to his wife. He asks, do you think we’re cursed? Our family?

She lies, No, I think we’re fine. This is pretty normal, I think. People have different sides to them.

He thinks that over. I think you’re right. This is just… like puberty.

Now that the boys are middle schoolers, “puberty” becomes an excellent excuse to explain why the boys don’t share their other sides with their parents or each other. Everyone in the household embraces the excuse with relief.

Ritsu gets good grades. Excellent grades. He’s diligent. Too diligent. He’s a perfect son and brother. Too perfect. Everyone accepts it.

It’s been years since the New Years incident, and Ritsu and Mob—Shigeo goes by Mob at school, Mrs. Kageyama learns from his homeroom teacher—still treat each other with polite respect and no genuineness.

And—Mob? Mob? It’s a name of no identity. Mrs. Kageyama finds that nickname more and more saddening as her son’s other side drifts further and further out of reach. She calls him Shige at the dinner table and he smiles. There’s a shadow self behind his eyes, just as there’s a shadow self behind Mrs. Kageyama’s eyes.

But, after all, people have different sides to them, and that’s only natural. It used to be Ritsu who could make Shigeo happy about his powers, who could touch that side of him that Mrs. Kageyama cannot. Now, there’s someone else in her son’s life who does that: one Reigen Arataka. Her son’s after-school part-time employer and master in the psychic arts.

Shigeo doesn’t show his psychic powers to his parents, not on purpose, anyway, but she’s so, so glad he has somewhere to go to use that part of him. He’s hard to read, but Mrs. Kageyama thinks he gets something really good out of those after-school consultation hours. He often comes home thoughtful, or happier, his shoulders a little lighter, the shadow self behind his eyes not so noticeably unhappy.

She’s happy Reigen Arataka is in her son’s life.

It’s a tremendous relief when Shigeo begins to blossom in middle school. He joins a club. A club! It’s amazing!

Of all things, he chose the Body Improvement Club, which baffles Mrs. Kageyama. Shige has never been… athletic. But she’s not complaining. She’s happy for him. She nearly gasps out loud, one night, when Shigeo tentatively refers to some girl associated with (but not part of?) the Body Improvement Club, Tome Kurata, as his friend.

She nearly gasps out loud, but not quite. She hides her true excitement in that other side of herself. Her shadow self and Shigeo’s shadow self are similar, she thinks—they’re too much for the dinner table. The dinner table is a place of relaxation. Never, never does any Kageyama disturb the sacred peace of the relaxed atmosphere of the dinner table.

Which is why it’s so strange when Ritsu starts acting up and declines to eat dinner with the family.

Something is going on with Ritsu. There’s another side to him, too, but it’s locked away where Mrs. Kageyama can barely even see it. Sometimes, she forgets it’s even there. She’s ashamed of that, but there it is: Shigeo’s troubles are so much more obvious and clear-cut than Ritsu’s that… well… anyway, it becomes obvious that something is going on with Ritsu.

His grins are sharp, his eyes deadly, mannerisms completely changed. It’s as if he doesn’t realize that Mr. and Mrs. Kageyama know him. It’s as if Ritsu doesn’t realize that his parents watch both their sons closely, knowing they’re going through things that they can’t help with because they’re just normal parents and you have to let your children work things out on their own.

Mrs. Kageyama begins to wonder if Ritsu is going to confront Shigeo, finally, with the way Ritsu looks at his brother, eyes venomous. She hopes nothing bad happens. So does her husband.

But then something good happens. Something involving Reigen Arataka and psychic powers, if Mrs. Kageyama had to bet. Shigeo and Ritsu miss dinner. They come home late at night, and in the darkness, straining her ears, tense all over so that she doesn’t make a sound and scare her sons off, she hears Ritsu and Shige stopping in the hall. She hears Ritsu say goodnight, Nii-san, and Shigeo answer, mm. goodnight, Ritsu. And then—amazingly—there’s a cloth-muffled thump that might have been someone clapping someone else on the shoulder, and a quiet, happy huff that can’t have been anyone but Ritsu.

Shige doesn’t touch Ritsu. He never touches Ritsu anymore.

And yet—!

Maybe kids do work things out on their own.

After the boys’ doors close, Mr. Kageyama shifts and hugs Mrs. Kageyama tight in sheer relief. She hugs him back, fiercely, silently, choked up. She’s close to tears.

The next day, Ritsu…. Ritsu has powers. He doesn’t show them off in front of his parents, but Shigeo accidentally bends a spoon at dinner, and while Mrs. Kageyama is scolding him and arguing with Mr. Kageyama in their well-worn, comfortable ritual, Ritsu takes the spoon and just looks at it, and it unbends with a happy little flourish.

Mrs. Kageyama is so happy she could cry, and probably will cry, later, actually, when the boys aren’t around to catch her. At the dinner table, she just lets those feelings slide into her other self and grumbles, “What’s with these kids?” to make them smile.

“Here, Nii-san,” Ritsu says.

“Thanks, Ritsu,” Shigeo says, accepting the spoon. And he smiles.

Shigeo continues to change. He comes out of his shell, little by little. Ritsu gets happier, seeming younger every day. Shigeo’s friends become a bigger part of his life. He starts leaving the house not only for Reigen Arataka but for his friends, not just for the club activities, either, but for karaoke, to go out for ramen, and just to hang out.

More psychic incidents happen. The Kageyama parents can’t help with that, but they can make dinner. They can tease Shige and Ritsu about their powers. They can watch, knowing something is wrong but not pressing Shigeo on it, when he comes home from a job one day with something deep and thoughtful in his eyes. Shigeo starts drinking water instead of milk for a few days. He flinches at the sound of crows and shies away when people move too fast. Mrs. Kageyama is torn in half with the desire to ask him about it, but she doesn’t. Shigeo deals with it on his own.

Shigeo temporarily quits working with Reigen Arataka, and the Kageyamas provide a no-questions-asked, relaxed atmosphere for Shigeo to come home to. It seems to help. They see Shigeo playing video games with Ritsu and they know that Shigeo and Ritsu are going to be fine. They’re taking care of each other, better than their parents can, in some ways. Kids are resilient. Their kids are resilient. They’re so proud of them. They don’t tell them how much they know.

They cheer for Shigeo at the school marathon with all their hearts, even though the sight of him with a skinned knee gives Mrs. Kageyama a jolt of pure terror. Well, he seems to have it under control now. He doesn’t even see them as he keeps running. He’s so big.

When Ritsu opens the door to a red-headed and clearly psychic “friend of his” they’ve never heard of before and looks at them with terror in his eyes, they pretend to believe him when he asks them to leave for a spur-of-the-moment onsen trip.

Maybe it’s selfish. Mrs. Kageyama asks her husband that as they eat dinner that night, pleasantly boiled-feeling from the hot water. “Do you think it’s selfish, leaving them to deal with their psychic problems on their own?”

“Oh, they’ll be okay,” Mr. Kageyama says. “We couldn’t do anything to help them anyway. I mean, look at that!”

He points at the television, where the news is going over the psychic terrorist attack in Seasoning City yet again, with not much more information than last time. There’s live footage of police cars floating in the air.

“After all—”

The TV frizzles and fills with static. Mr. Kageyama laughs a short, helpless little laugh.

“I get it,” Mrs. Kageyama sighs. “I just worry about those boys.”

The honest side of herself writhes in pain at the understatement, but she keeps it down.

“It’s all right as long as they’re together. Shigeo will have it handled,” Mr. Kageyama says. “He’d never let Ritsu get hurt.”

There’s a moment of uncomfortable silence. In each other’s eyes, Mr. and Mrs. Kageyama see Ritsu bleeding and Shigeo with blood spattered on his face.

“That’s true,” Mrs. Kageyama says, hoping it’s true. “They’re very capable kids now.”

When Mr. and Mrs. Kageyama return home, their house has been replaced with an almost identical house. They burst into muffled laughter together in their room, covering their mouths. The pattern of the floorboards in the hall is different. How—how?

They don’t tell Shigeo and Ritsu how much they know.

Everyone has different sides to them. The Kageyama parents are at peace with this. They are at peace with the fact that they are background characters in their sons’ lives. The four Kageyamas show each other a gentle, relaxed side of themselves. It’s a sorely needed safe haven for all of them.

They could keep this up forever. Mrs. and Mr. Kageyama giggle with each other sometimes at night about how Ritsu probably won’t know they knew he was having delusions of grandeur until they’re old and gray, and maybe not even then.

Everything is alright. Still, Mrs. Kageyama sometimes misses Shigeo as a carefree little boy. Still, her shadow self yearns to connect with his.

There’s a specific kind of loneliness she thinks she shares with her older son, something not quite shared by Ritsu or her husband, although they have their own versions. She sees Ritsu use his powers to open drawers and float his school bag over, and she sees Shigeo walk across the room to get his bag, and she thinks: Shige is still stuck in his head. But she doesn’t say anything.

It’s not because of the parenting advice anymore, and it’s not because she’s worried about stunting his personal development. Shigeo is a strong person. He’s been a strong person for a long time. It’s because it’s a habit, and every time Mrs. Kageyama thinks of cornering Shigeo and just… asking him, Shige, can we talk about your powers?, she remembers that she doesn’t have powers, and how can she dare to try to connect with that side of him now, when she hasn’t really tried to do that for Shigeo’s entire life?

It’s guilt. It’s shame. It’s a habit. It’s more comfortable to stagnate.

Kids work things out on their own, right?

Besides, Shigeo isn’t repressing his emotions so much anymore, just his powers. For instance, she heard him calling Mrs. Takane, the mother of one of Mob’s childhood friends. He’s going to talk to his childhood friend again! Mrs. Kageyama is curious what he might talk to Tsubomi-chan about. Is it possible that he might finally be processing the minor bullying that used to bother him so much? But that’s probably just overthinking on her part. Shigeo doesn’t talk about it around his parents, but she’s pretty sure he used to have a crush on Tsubomi-chan, and he might still have a crush on her. Adorable. He’s growing up so fast.

When the earthquakes hit, they hit her right in the guilty conscience.

It’s Shigeo. She knows it’s him. She never really had motherly instincts, but this isn’t a motherly instinct. This is her shadow self recognizing his shadow self, which is so much like hers. The boy with white eyes, screaming. She understands what he’s doing. He’s letting out all of the destructive guilt and shame and fear and rage at himself and everything else that Mrs. Kageyama has been seeing behind his eyes for years and years.

It’s Shigeo’s shadow self, and maybe if Mrs. Kageyama had managed to be brave for once in her life and talk to him about powers, secrets, and emotions, this wouldn’t be happening.

She stares at her phone, where a grainy photo of her oldest son blurs in her vision, and she feels the sob rise in her throat and the tear drip onto the phone, obscuring the bouquet in his hand, as if someone else was doing it.

She doesn’t go out to look for him. She doesn’t have powers. She’d get killed.

It’s Reigen Arataka who brings her son home—Reigen Arataka, who she’s only met once or twice before. He’s uncharacteristically disheveled and red-eyed with crying, and his head is bleeding. Shige did that to him—it’s obvious. Shige has clearly also been crying. He looks up at his mother and father, sniffs bravely, and starts crying again.

Mrs. Kageyama kneels and hugs Shige tight. Mr. Kageyama’s arms close around her and Shigeo, encircling them, and she starts crying again.

The government gets involved, in the form of a bored-looking bald man with a strange cigarette who shows up in a helicopter. He jumps down to ground level, interrupting the crying Kageyama family and the awkwardly standing by Reigen Arataka, and says to Shigeo, “Long time no see.”

Mrs. Kageyama does not like the implication that Shigeo has met this man before.

Shigeo pushes his parents’ arms away, gently but firmly, and steps up to meet the man. He says, “I’m sorry. I’d like to help.”

“Sure, sure,” the government man says dismissively. “Might take a while to rebuild the city, but I can pretty much guarantee no one’s going to mess with you. No one died, so…” he gestures lazily with his cigarette. “This kind of thing happens every once in a while with kid espers. Just thought you might like to know.”

The government man doesn’t spare even a glance for Shigeo’s parents. They don’t ask him anything. It’s like introducing themselves might shatter the illusion of good news and make the man shout, “Gotcha! Your son is going to esper jail right now!”

The government man returns to the helicopter and lifts off. And then it’s just Shigeo, standing awkwardly on the street and not quite making eye contact with his parents, and the voice of Reigen Arataka on the phone summoning other psychics, and a man with an umbrella, “Mob”’s coworker, apparently, arriving and nervously spiriting Shigeo away to meet up with some other psychics, including the one who apparently recreated the Kageyama’s house that one time.

So they don’t address the incident immediately. Shigeo comes home that night so exhausted that he falls asleep at the table. Ritsu looks more awake, but also so dreamily happy that his parents just… don’t ask him any questions. They don’t want to disturb that happiness.

The next day, they don’t address it again. Shigeo is a heavy sleeper. He wakes up slowly, brushes his teeth, and sets off for school, which didn’t get destroyed during his shadow self’s meltdown, probably for the same reason that their house went practically untouched, though shaken, among the earthquakes. Shige doesn’t come home until very late again, and when Mrs. Kageyama gives him a bento box to eat before bed, he just says thank you. To her tentative question—were you helping with the city today, Shige?—he gives an exhausted, affirming “mm.”

He’s tired. She lets him wobble off to bed.

It doesn’t actually take very long for the city to be healed. Shige stops being tired all the time right away after his bedtime gets back to normal. He’s livelier than Mrs. Kageyama has seen him in years—smiling, joking with Ritsu, arguing with him sometimes, sulking when he feels like it. He laughs again.

He’s so different. But he’s still Shigeo. And he still has something behind his eyes. At dinner, when their eyes meet, Mrs. Kageyama’s shadow self reaches out to her son’s shadow self, still.

Which is a strange sensation, because Shigeo isn’t repressing his emotions anymore, or his powers, either. But there’s still something there, something or someone existing in reserve behind his eyes. She second-guesses herself about it at first, particularly when Mob laughs or scowls or displays his powers and emotions like he’s never thought twice about it. He seems so… whole. It’s not a child made of shadows anymore. But in other moments—when he’s watching Ritsu or when he doesn’t have much to say, when he hesitates, when he has a forgetful spell—Mrs. Kageyama is sure she sees it. Another presence within her son.

Call it motherly instincts or call it Mrs. Kageyama’s shadow self resonating with her son’s shadow self—either way, she knows. Shigeo Kageyama is still hiding another side within himself, even though that other side is happier now.

So one day, a few months after the incident, once she’s sure Shigeo is really stable like this… Mrs. Kageyama catches Shigeo before school and asks him to come home and have a talk with her after school.

He looks surprised, then nervous, then pleased.

“Yes, mom,” he says. And that’s that.

Talking to a teenager is easier than they said! That’s Mrs. Kageyama’s first, indignant thought. And then right on the heels of that thought comes what am I getting myself into?!

After school, Shigeo comes right home. Mr. Kageyama will stay at work for a while, and Ritsu has student council today; it’s the perfect time. Mrs. Kageyama sits down with her son and finds herself at a loss, not knowing exactly what to say.

Shigeo waits, watching her seriously.

“Shige,” she says, and feels her shadow self rise up in her, telling her to just break down and cry. Her voice wobbles as she tries again. “Shige, I want to tell you something. I think you’re old enough…”

Mortified alarm flashes across Shigeo’s face. Oh no! She waves her hands, trying to erase what he’s thinking.

“About your psychic powers,” she says hastily.

He looks relieved for a split second, and then his eyes widen. His hair rises up off his forehead, and she hears a slosh as something happens to the water in the sink. He’s scared? Of all things, she had not expected Shigeo to be frightened of talking about his powers. She expected him to be irritated and dismissive, like the parenting advice says that teenagers always are. The parenting advice was wrong. Again.

Suddenly reaching her limit, Mrs. Kageyama throws out all the parenting advice she’s ever heard and just… tells the truth.

“Or, ah, not about psychic powers exactly. About… Shige, I think something runs in our family, and it’s not powers, but I think you and I share it.”

Shige’s eyes grow impossibly wider. He waits like his mother is about to reveal the secrets of the universe, and in a way, she supposes, she is.

“Tell me if I’m wrong,” she says carefully. “But you have more than one “self”, don’t you?”

He opens his mouth, and nothing comes out.

Nothing at all.

Mrs. Kageyama says, “You split yourself in half, back then… I saw it happen. I’m sorry, but I didn’t know how to help, because I… I didn’t know what to do about my shadow self, either.”

“Your shadow self, mom?”

His voice is quiet, so quiet. Mrs. Kageyama nods, feeling her shadow self sob and writhe in her head. It’s an unsightly thing. It’s so possessive, so emotional. She can’t let it do whatever it wants. That would hurt her children, and she loves her children, so, so much. She would never hurt them.

“I kept it quiet because I thought…” she takes a sharp breath. “It’s too much, and I wanted to keep you and Ritsu… comfortable. Parents can’t ask their children to carry their worries.”

“What do you mean?” Shigeo asks. He sounds so young, and so hurt.

“I never asked you what it was like to have powers,” she blurts out, and the wave of guilt that follows is tremendous, but so is the relief. “I’m so sorry. I let you deal with everything on your own. I didn’t realize…”

Shigeo’s lips are trembling. He says, “Mom, you have a shadow self too?”

“You’re just like me,” she says, and how, how did she never know that honesty could feel so right? “I knew you were just like me, and I didn’t tell you. I thought you could deal with it on your own. I’m so sorry, Shige.”

“Mom,” he says, and starts crying.

To hell with parenting advice. To hell with keeping her shadow self from shattering the relaxed facade of the Kageyama household. Shigeo deserves better.

Mrs. Kageyama stumbles out of her kneeling posture and grabs her son and holds him close.

“Shige,” she says into his hair. “Shige. Shige.”

“I thought it was just me,” Shigeo gasps. “I thought it was just me in the dark.”

And, with a start, she realizes why his shadow self is different now. They switched places, didn’t they? The Shigeo she’s talking to right now is the one her shadow self used to stare at longingly across the dinner table.

“So you’re that one,” she says, with all the shaky, weepy tenderness she's been repressing for years. “Hello. I’m so pleased to finally meet you again.”

Shige sobs. Everything in the room is floating. She could cry. She does.

Then Shigeo pushes himself out of the hug and looks at his mother, trembling but clearly happy and calm in a way she’s rarely ever seen him, even when he was young.

“You're wrong,” he says. “I am myself. I accepted both parts.”

“So you’re—” Mrs. Kageyama stops, thinking that over. Does it not matter anymore, to Shigeo? Which “self” is which?

Could it not matter to her, either, someday?

Tentatively, she lets more of herself out.

“I’m so sorry, Shige. I listened to the wrong advice. I should be the one helping you figure this out, not the other way around.”

Shigeo looks her in the eye. He says, “Adults can change too. It’s not too late.”

She looks back, and in his eyes she sees both of him, and she knows that now he sees both of her too. And she is not afraid to show him.

Not anymore.

[wishfulsketching]

Heya, here’s a another text from us, this time about our OCs Lu Zhen and co.

Check it out if you feel like it! It’s a little moment between these two learning to communicate together. Lu Zhen is crushing hard, Long Min doesn’t quite realize that he likes the funny little human too. His dad knows it tho.