#thank you if you read it.

[gatalentan]

HOTEL ROOMS | AO3

Summary: The Young Melissa/Barbara cross an invisible line at PECSA.

She could feel herself sinking into something that might burn them both alive. This wasn't a game anymore.

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"Oh my god, I think my feet might actually fall off."

"I told you to wear comfortable shoes, but did you listen? No..."

Mel had been so bright-eyed and bushy-tailed when Barbara had invited her to PECSA with her, a year-and-change into their friendship. "It'll be much more economical if we share a room and carpool," - she'd said - "and also a lot more fun." She couldn't say no to that argument, really - not that it took a whole lotta arm twisting. She was excited about going to the convention in general - it was such an amazing learning opportunity. But it had come at a weird time in whatever it was they had going on.

She'd caught Barbara, on the highway, staring at her just a little too long, acrylics digging notches into the steering wheel, and figured that this was maybe getting a little mixed up for her too. Mel knew she was hot, she wasn't a complete dumbass, had had enough (unfortunate, messy) relationships through high school and college and after it too. She was pretty self-assured about all that. Saw the look in mens' eyes whenever she went into a bar. But as far as she knew Barb was straight. Married, even. Which didn't explain why she occasionally felt, saw, her eyes, intense, on the side of her face, or sometimes, well, her tits, in the break room, like she was a Rubix cube or something that she was trying desperately to solve, like she'd somehow invented gravity, like she'd hung the moon, like she wanted to rip her shirt clean off, her hands knuckling her coffee cup like it was the fuckin' Titanic door. Maybe she wasn't as straight as either of them thought.

She never mentioned it, or caught her eye. But it did stuff to her. Made her wanna preen, a little. Show off, a little. Dress nicer. 'Platonically' (yeah, right) touch her arm, knee, just a little bit longer. Push her luck. Just to see if she could get a reaction outta her. Test how well she could keep up her mask. It was the uptight ones, y'know? It did it for her. The challenge was fun, and this was just a game, just teasing. It didn't have to mean anything. They were both just really, really, enjoying the view.

If she told herself that, it made it easier to live with the fact it was never just that.

So the thought of their bags sitting side by side for a whole weekend was, well, a little terrifying, if she'd been honest, ‘cause this wasn’t part of the game. It’s like they were driving, Thelma and Louise style, towards something else. Entering a third space, not home, or work, but neutral, untested ground, an unknown territory with less rules, no witnesses. The domesticity of it all wasn't lost on her, either. The thought of getting to see Barbara Howard in the wild, outside of her natural habitat, in her pyjamas and no make-up, comfortably away from the pressure of public view… the thought that she was being trusted with that came with its whole, additional, set of baggage that felt so fucking heavy. Like she was being offered something just to see if she'd take it. Of course she would. Every time.

They somehow survived that first day, knee-to-knee at the crowded panels and hand-in-arm in the busy hallways, swapping notes and sharing overpriced concessions at another, foreign, table, orbiting each other like they were somehow still the most interesting people in any room they were in. The baggage was up in their (shared) bedroom, though, and she could feel it hanging over them like a promise or a threat.

By the time they made it back to the room though, after so many hours of travelling and sitting and standing and queueing, she was that dog-tired and sore from her stupid (but hot) outfit that all she wanted to do was collapse and not think at all. Definitely not think.

Melissa peeled off her jacket and flung it on the floor before collapsing in an undignified heap face down on her bed. She wiggled her boots off with some difficulty and kicked them across the room with two loud thunks that would definitely piss off the people in the room below. Ha ha.

"Uggghhhh. Do we really gotta go back out?" she mumbled into the pillow. Her whole body ached. She wanted a hot shower and pizza and wine and clean, white sheets. Well, she didn't know how clean these hotel sheets were, probably better not to think about that. But they were white enough. Better than having to get up.

She peered at Barbara with one eye in the low lamp light; Barbara, who was in the process of neatly removing her blazer and placing it on one of those weird, non-removable hangers in the open closet. Her posture was rigid and upright, looking as fresh-faced and unbothered as she'd ever seen her, like they hadn't just spent the same 10 hours together that had left Mel feelin' like she'd been hit by a semi and probably lookin' like it too. Her ass looked absolutely ridiculous in that skirt, too. What a bitch. So unfair.

"Do you really feel that bad?" Barb turned to look at her, looking all concerned, hands hovering in the air as if ready to fix her. Cute.

"Ehhhhh. I'll live. Little sore." Her ankles throbbed like punctuation. Who the fuck invented heels? An ass man, that's who. Not someone who had to wear 'em all day.

Barbara shook her head at her, tutting, returning to the closet. She knew better than to expect Melissa to be honest about her discomfort.

"Well, technically, no. We don't have to go. It would be nice to go for drinks, though. It's been a long day." She looked at her over her shoulder briefly, smile bright as the sun, looking like it hadn't been a long day at all. "You don't have to come though, if you're too tired." She smoothed down the sleeves of the white blouse she'd worn all day, a little rumpled but still professional, tucked into her purple vest. "But I'd like you to."

Aw, nuts. 

Guess she was going for drinks, then.

What a sucker.

Mel grumbled again, louder this time, kicking her bare feet for dramatic effect and smooshing her nose back into the pillow. 

Barbara clucked at her fondly. "Stop it." 

"Ugh. Fiiiine." She rubbed her tired eyes, and a little eyeliner smudged off on her hand. "Ah, shit. Hey Barb, do I need to put my face back on before we go out, or can I get away with it?"

"Hmm. Let me see." 

Melissa swung her feet off the bed and sat down on the edge of the mattress, self consciously pulling her own dark shirt over her belly. Bottle blonde hair curtained her face in messy strands, which she puffed at to blow away but it didn't do much.

Barb hummed, her eyebrows furrowed a little, taking two steps over from her side of the small room and, with no preamble, no warning, gently pushed her hair off her forehead, tucking it behind her ear to take a closer look at her, fingers landing and making a home near the crest of her jawline.

Melissa's traitorous eyelids slipped closed of their own accord, whole face suddenly slack, her whole body slack. 

“Oh fuck.”

She’d said it, moaned it, before she could take it back. 

Even she could hear how thick with want it was, like shattered glass.

Like she'd been waiting for this.

(She had.)

The panic crested like a wave.

She needed to do something, make a joke, break the tension, apologise, but couldn't, was trapped in space, heart a hummingbird, pinned down in a museum case just by the light touch of Barbara's tender hand.

And Barbara, she didn't say a word, didn't make a sound, and that was somehow worse than pity or shame or disgust, gave her nothing to read into.

But the hand moved, now, in slow motion.

(or maybe Melissa was dying, stretching out her final moments as a last kindness. It felt like dying, or floating away.) 

Barbara's knuckles carved a smooth line from ear to chin and crooked it gently between her thumb and forefinger, cocking her chin up just-so. Her thumb was perilously, dangerously close to her mouth and felt white-hot. If she just parted her lips a little more, she could kiss the pad of her thumb, take it into her mouth.

She didn’t. Because that would be insane. But she thought it, as the tension held, in a loop.

She couldn’t help feeling like a prize, somehow, being displayed, admired, in the crook of her hand for much too long to be easily explained. Like this was an indulgence Barbara shouldn't be taking, being savoured. It did something to her. Something that pooled low in Melissa’s belly, lit her up like a roman candle.  

I asked her to check my make-up. She’s just looking at me. That's all.

Shaking, now, the hand left her chin, beat a matching path along her other cheek, pushing the hair off the other side of her face and over her crown, holding her there in her warm palm. Every hair on her body stood on end in a long shiver, crying out to be touched too. Her breathing was ragged, she knew she must hear it; she could hear Barbara’s, tense as a bow string, as it coasted across her lips in the dark.

"Lovely." Barb whispered into the silence of the room, like she hadn't meant to say it, just an exhale of a held breath, seeming to somehow fill the whole space with it, filling Melissa's ribs and cracking them open. 

It was soft, too soft, like she was being smoothed out. 

She could feel herself sinking into something that might burn them both alive.

This wasn’t a game anymore.

Beyond this point was a conscious choice.

They couldn’t.

Her ring shone in the dark.

“Please.”

“I know.” Her hand, a whisper, a spectre, against her lips, an apology, before falling away.

They couldn’t.

She suddenly felt all of the strain in her body and fell backwards onto the mattress, staring up at her, heavy lidded and her underwear undeniably very, very wet. She felt loose all over, like her marionette strings that held her up had been slashed. 

She could see a whole theatre of emotions playing on Barbara’s face, like she’d become fully unhinged, fighting an internal war that Melissa couldn’t see, eyes not really seeing. It hurt her, badly, to see her hurting this much. To have instigated it, poked the bruises.

“Do you want me to go?” A small voice. Must be hers, because Barbara looked like she might cry. 

“No.” Assertive, determined, immediate. “No, stay. I’m sorry.”

To respond Me, too felt like an admission of guilt, and she was undoubtedly to blame, pushing this whole thing between them too, too far, maybe impassively far, maybe broken beyond repair - but couldn’t burden it, right now, couldn’t take it, couldn’t bear if she’d ruined this, and the shock hit her, then, like cold water, all over, what she’d maybe done, played with fire too recklessly, with a woman with a husband, a man who loved her, let herself get too close, took too much, got greedy. She breathed, but didn’t, not reaching all the places it should, her heart hammering to compensate, curling into herself, the mattress, the floor, the earth.

“Hey, Melissa. Hey. Look at me.” Far off, away. “Melissa, you’re ok, it’s ok. I’m here. I’m…”  a hand, careful, on her arm, not tight, just there: “I’m still here. I’m here. Breathe.”

She tried, she breathed, she counted, she looked at her, her dark eyes almost feral with concern, it pulled her in and out at the same time, slowed the scrambling, eventually, caught her breath, eventually, faded back into the sheets again, hollowed out.

The hand stayed there, a warm weight.

She shifted back into her own body again.

It wasn’t tension that was killing her anymore, it was the silence.

It held all the potential for Barbara to care, to pity having seen what she just saw.

She couldn't take that, right now. Didn't deserve it.

“Do you still wanna go out?”

She punctured it.

Barbara barked out a laugh that sounded like it had been locked away for a thousand years. It rang through Melissa’s body like church bells. 

“I could use a drink.”

“Me too.” She sighed, feeling fully deflated. Somehow, the floor between them felt more even again.

“Room service?”

“Did you win the lottery?”

Barbara just looked at her, where she laid curled up on the bed, for a moment too long, like she almost said, kind of. Then sighed, stretching a smile across her face that was just a little too wide. Melissa knew a mask when she saw one.

“We’ll figure it out.”

They just wouldn't talk about it.

[tawnysoup]

Finally now that the comic is fully public on comicfury, I get to share it with all of you here, too <3

If you enjoyed, please consider supporting by buying a PDF of the comic on itch.io: https://tawnysoup.itch.io/home-in-the-woods

[adam-scott]

ZOMBIELAND: DOUBLE TAP (2019)

[batcavescolony]

Katniss is such an unreliable narrator. She says "Then something unexpected happens. At least, I don't expect it because I don't think of District 12 as a place that cares about me" girl you deliver strawberries to the Mayor, you hunt and trade for the district, when you fell at Prim being chosen someone caught you, when you went to Prim people parted for you, when you volunteered EVERYONE stopped. Idk how to tell you but I think you're a pillar of the community.

[ursulaklegay]

its so scary to put yourself out there but a SINGLE message saying "hi i loved what you made it touched me in some way" makes it all worth it 10000%

[kilgarraara]

"I guess I never really faced my fears before"

[beepboopappreciation]

Is this anything

[itsscaredycat]

and they lived happily ever after 🥲🙏

[stil-lindigo]

lead balloon (the tumblr post that saved me)

if this comic resonated with you, it would mean the world to me if you donated to this palestinian family's escape fund.

--

no creative notes because this isn't that kind of comic.

I know I don’t owe any of you anything but I still felt compelled to write about my long term absence. And I feel far enough away from the dangerous spot I was in to be able to make this comic. I have a therapist now, and she agreed that making this could be a very cathartic gesture, and the start of properly leaving these thoughts behind me. I am still, at seemingly random times, blindsided by fleeting desires to kill myself. They’re always passing urges, but it’s disarming, and uncomfortable. I worry sometimes that my brain’s spent so long thinking only about suicide that it’s forgotten how to think about anything else. Like, now that I've opened that door for myself, I'll never be able to fully shut it again. But I’m trying my best to encourage my mind in other directions. We'll see how that goes.

I am still donating all proceeds from my store to Palestinian causes. So far, I've donated over $15K, not including donations coming from my own pocket or the fundraising streams which jointly raised around $10K. In the time since I made my initial post about where this money would be going, the focus has shifted from aid organisations to directly donating to escape funds.

If you'd like to do the same, you can look at Operation Olive Branch, which hosts hundreds of Palestinian escape funds or donate to Safebow, which has helped facilitate the safe crossing and securing of important medical procedures for over 150 at-risk palestinians since the beginning of the genocide.

[britishmuffin]

ATLA sketches because I'm deep into it atm 8)

★ patreon || website || twitter ★

[noodles-and-tea]

Last part whoo!!!

PART 1 / PART 2 / PART 3 / PART 4

[sonykatzen]

pretty boy

[howsublime]

Excited to share my first linocut, based on the three meme kittens that I love.

Update: Fancy a t-shirt?

[rozer0ry]

//SONIC MOVIE 3 SPOILERS

Comic based after the events of sonic 3 PART 3

Read the previous part here!

[andstuffsketches]

girl who lives in a cave