#the characters are great and i like the writing style

[gothnitsa]

"Bioware's writing has gotten worse"

Ok, so I'm going to rant post about something and make it everyone elses' problem.

So, I recently came across a video that compared a scene of a queer character interacting with an unsupportive character in Dragon Age: Inquisition and a similar situation Dragon Age: the Veilguard. The video and the comments seem to imply that one scene is markedly worse than the other in a way that is immediately apparent. I want to push back against this.

Aside from the transphobia/anti-nb shit that is suggested by the video's framing and rampant in the comments, saying one scene is worse than the other is a mischaracterisation and discounts a lot of queer experience.

The scene in Inquisition is very dramatic: the language is flowery and elaborate, the performances are intense, it is a very compelling and dramatic scene. The framing for the scene and visual tone communicate a great deal of intensity and anger from Dorian: there are heavy shadows and dim lighting from torches that flicker, creating a scene that visually has a darkness and instability to it. The blocking of the scene puts a great deal of distance between the player character, Dorian, and his father, representing the distance in their relationship. It is very much a well crafted scene.

Now, the scene in Veilguard is much different: it opens with a very casual tone and atmosphere, the lighting of the scene is very warm and saturated. It feels like we are at a dinner table having a friendly conversation. Then, when the bomb gets dropped, we start to get close ups of each of the characters, interrupted by wide shots of the whole table. The shot of the table reminds us of the physical separation between these two characters, an echo of the rift that exists between them. We then get various close ups of each of the characters which get progressively closer, mirroring the intensity of the scene and the emotions.

Ok, so now we have the "Dialogue," the actual matter under discussion and point of comparison for these two scenes.

As mentioned above, Inquisition's style in this scene is deliberately intense and dramatic. It feels almost Shakespearean. We are given exposition on why Dorian's homosexuality is frowned upon, we get a tug of war between these two characters and the pain they both feel is palpable in the performances: the way Dorian's father speaks with such pain in his voice and Dorian's ferocity and anguish illustrate how this conflict isn't what either of them want, how the values and cultural circumstances have burned this bridge between them.

Now lets look at Veilguard. Right off the bat someone might feel critical of the sort of awkward start to this conversation. I won't lie, it was quite funny to hear someone go "here are some vegetables...so I'm non-binary." It's clunky, it's awkward, it's a strange way to introduce the topic but if you call this "unrealistic" or "bad writing," frankly I don't think you've seen many people come out.

Coming out is often awkward, painfull, and full of conflicting feelings. There's so much hesitation and anxiety baked into the very concept that there isn't anyway to bring it up that isn't awkward. This is actually a pretty realistic way to depict it. Furthermore, the actual conversation is also what I would call pretty realistic for an outing: the child tries to put it in as simple of terms as they possible can, lay it out in a way they think anyone can understand only for the parent to simply reject the explanation. What follows is a brief exchange that rapidly increases in intensity that is brought to life by some well done voice work (though, personally I think the music was a bit over bearing and did a little too much heavy lifting; I would have preferred the scene silent).

You can feel their frustration that is only further compounded by the mother's past behaviour and general presence. Even in this short video clip you can tell right off the bat that this mother child relationship isn't the most healthy, so this is just more fuel to the fire for them. The exchange is brief, harsh, and loaded with baggage and past bad blood between these two. You don't need to even know who these characters are to feel that. This is a much more realistic example of a character coming out to an unsupportive parent. It is laden with tension, awkwardness, unresolved anger, the burden of past expectations. There is, bluntly, a lot going on in this scene. Even just from this short clip you can get so much from these characters and their relationship while at the same time conveying a pretty impactfull and, honestly, real feeling queer experience.

So, no, one scene is not "worse" than the other. One scene has a deliberately awkward moment to convey the difficult and uncomfortable nature of coming out while at the same time communicating a great deal of character and struggle.

The other scene is an intense and dramatic confrontation that is meant to be more instep with the dark and intense tone that this scene holds within the narrative.

Both are well crafted scenes with deliberate directorial, cinematographic, character, and music choices that successfully convey what these moments are supposed to represent.

[wannab-urs]

Pedro Pascal Character Fic Recs | Vol 42

AO3 | Kofi | Main Masterlist | The Spreadsheet Masterlist

Howdy Folks,

guess who's back! I don't know if I'm back to doing these consistently, but I have a hell of a list for y'all. Tags and summaries provided by the author, commentary provided by yours truly.

Mindfuck - Dave one shot by @whatsnewalycat

He said he could rattle the bees from your buzzing honeycomb brain. All you had to do was trust him with this power. So you did. And you do. Your valiant beekeeper meets you at this hotel every other Tuesday night, except on holidays.

Hypnotism, hypnosis-kink, Imperfect Praxis of Hypnosis, Humiliation, Implied/Referenced Cheating, Praise Kink, Smut, unprotected piv, D/s dynamic, Dom Dave, Mindfuck

One of the weirdest things I've ever read, but also one of the best. I was super into this. Mindfucking is WILD.... I'd read more of this universe in a heartbeat

Bittersweet Love - Dieter one shot by @ozarkthedog

Dieter is in recovery from drug addiction, the disease that cost him you. This is his first premiere after getting clean and his first one without you.

angst but with a happy ending! mentions of drug use and alcohol but nothing graphic.

This is such a sweet fic? That might be a weird way to describe it. I just love Dieter getting his shit together and all the good coming his way because of it.

Starlet - Dieter one shot by @whocaresstillthelouvre

Your husband has a big movie premiere, sure he looks great, but his co-star looks even better.

PWP, threesome, smut, fingering, oral (f receiving), lesbian fun, unprotected p in v sex, cum eating, addiction talk, sober Dieter, Kit Kats, I wrote this for the bi girls.

This fic is a dream, seriously. I want a hot movie star husband to bring pretty movie star women into my bed please and thank you.

Pas de Deux - Din series by @burntheedges

When Din Djarin – principal dancer at Concordia Ballet Company and generational talent in the classical style – suddenly left CBC and joined the Nevarro Ballet Theater mid-season, it shocked the ballet world. You never would have guessed that he would change your life, too.

modern AU, ballet AU, fluff, angst, flirting, dancing, lots of ballet terms (I’ll define things/link videos/etc. -- see below), misunderstandings, character study, romance, pet names (sweetheart, beautiful), lots of tension, later: smut, kissing, grinding, fingering, p-in-v sex, creampie, each chapter will have its own tags, Din lifts reader (see note below about reader)

This is one of the few modern Din AUs I've read, as I tend not to like them, but I can't recommend this enough. I was drawn in by the summary and hooked by the first chapter!

Never Let Me Go - Ezra one shot by @yopossum

Loving, reverent domestic smut with sweet, submissive Ezra.

SMUT; no plot that’s it just porn but with FEELINGS; sub!Ezra; established relationship; super duper in love; domestic fluff; comfort; gratuitous pet names; praise kink; body worship; body hair; grinding; breast and nipple play; teasing/edging if you squint; light bondage; riding; PIV; no condom (there’s come y’all); religious language and imagery as literary device; Ezra the human thesaurus; prose gettin purple; making grown men whine and cry; reader is not gendered, has breasts and a vulva/vagina, is described as having puffed nipples and dimpled thighs, can straddle Ezra, but no coloring, size, appearance, age, or ability is otherwise noted; Ezra is an amputee and healed and we love it (no gore or trauma or background re: his arm); but I did write this because I was watching Prospect without actually watching and was inspired by *~*those sounds*~* out of context tho; Beatrice is not reader’s name, just a nerdy Dante reference; I stole this title from Florence Welch; old person on tumblr; is this spacing wack?; not a beta in sight; 18+ only no minors

SUBMISSIVE EZRA!!! I loved this. Such a gorgeous fic.

Stick Buddies - Frankie series by @auteurdelabre

You and Frankie find yourselves in a complicated situation when invited to Benny's wedding for a week in Mexico. Despite your strained friendship, you both pretend to be a couple to save Frankie embarrassment when seeing his recently engaged ex wife. However as you navigate through this charade, old feelings and unresolved issues resurface.

friends to enemies, angst, fake relationship, bickering, there's only one bed, destination weddings, enemies to lovers, jealousy, idiots in love, revealed secrets, mutual pining, smut, HEA, so many fucking tropes.

friends to enemies to lovers??? Sign me the fuck up.

Where You Left Me - Frankie one shot by @chaotic-mystery

You meet Frankie for a date and reminisce about your relationship.

MAJOR character death. No movie AU but fuck Tom. This is overall angst heavy and please take care of yourself. Grief & loss, sadness, memories, I think that’s it? It’s just overall a bittersweet and tragically lovesick story. There’s no physical descriptions of reader other than wearing a black dress at one point and having hair that tickles Frankie’s nose. no y/n used

This shit made me cry in the best way. Please read this.

One of Your Girls - Frankie one shot by @pedropeach

unpacking some of frankie's old things leads to a revelation about his past. (OR to put it simply: frankie morales x triple frontier boys circle jerk)

Circle Jerk, Sub!Frankie, Bukkake, Facials, Cumplay, Cum Swallowing, frankie is literally a cum dumpster (and loves it), Praise Kink, Pet Names, Dirty Talk, oral (m receiving), Deepthroating, Cock Worship, Use of restraints, Sexy Photographs, Sharing, brief mentions of anal sex (m/m), for story purposes you are frankie's current gf, frankie x all the guys individually, this includes tom but he's not part of the circle jerk, sry tom

Really was not expecting this to be as tender and soft and sweet as it is considering it's one of the more filthy things I've ever read. Absolutely love it.

I'll Carry You - Javi P series by @almostfoxglove

You reunite with your childhood best friend when he arrives home from Colombia. Javier's sudden return to your life exhumes buried heartbreak, but he longs to set things right.

Eventual smut. Reference to canon-typical violence, injury, and the death of a parent. Plenty of alcohol consumption, yearning, and angst. YEARNING!!!

The yearning is exquisite. The fic is exquisite. I'm in love with this fic

Remorse for Remedy - Joel series by @pedgito

Alone, the Miller's brothers seem like your only hope. The outbreak is still fresh, weeks after the fall and all that matters is survival and the unlikely comfort that comes along with a man who wants nothing to do with you.

early outbreak, canon typical violence, morally grey!joel, smut (warnings given with each chapters), exploration of kinks, enemies to lovers, age gap (early 20s/mid 30s), unhealthy coping mechanisms, detailed warning with each chapter

I haven't ever read a series about Joel immediately post outbreak, which is wild. It's always raider!joel or qz!joel or jackson!joel. I love this new perspective and I'm so excited to read more.

Biology - Joel one shot by @endlessthxxghts

Joel hurt his back at work, so you've been helping him around the house until he heals.

able-bodied, female sex anatomy, and inherently fem!reader. No description of reader, everything is neutral (ex. “your bottoms,” “the curve of you” — nothing is specific in the way “you” are described). Age gap (reader early 20s, Joel in 50s). EXPLICIT MATERIAL PRESENT. HEED THE WARNINGS. WEIRD boundaries are crossed…you're not blood-related to Joel, but you were raised like you were. You call him “uncle.” Pet names (baby, darlin’, sweetheart, etc.). Pussy pronouns (she). Innocent touches until it isn't. Sexual tension galore. Slight dub-con. Icky Joel. Icky reader. Pussy grinding. Dirty talk. Slight degradation (“bitch” is used only once). Multiple orgasms. P in V unprotected. Reader is on top. Lots of teasing about the nature of yours and Joel’s relationship.

Well slap me silly and call me an uncle fucker because this fic was amazing. (they're not really related don't. look. at. ME.)

The Savage and the Sanctuary - Joel series by @justagalwhowrites

After the death of his daughter, Joel Miller fell apart. But when searching for answers at the bottom of a bottle and within his own rage doesn't fix it, he resigns himself to working for his brother in private security. It's a job that starts him down the path to stability and a semblance of a life, even if it's not one he particularly wants. At least it does until you show up. The biggest movie star in the world with your newly adopted niece in tow, you throw everything about Joel's life into flux. Is he capable of letting himself feel something again while protecting the only things left in the world that matter?

Protective Joel, Ellie & Joel Bonding, Joel is Bad at Feelings, POV Joel, Joel Needs a Hug, Alternate Universe - No Cordyceps Outbreak, Enemies to Lovers, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, Slow Burn

So pumped for a new Kit fic. Super into bodyguard Joel. The angst right out the gate is so beautifully painful, I just know I'm gonna cry once a chapter at least. (i've only read one chapter, so I have some catching up to do!)

Professor's Pet - Joel one shot by @chaotic-mystery

Professor Miller wants you to teach the class tomorrow morning & you need help being less nervous. What if he’s the reason you’re nervous, though?

Age gap but not specified, power imbalance (professor x TA, reader stutters when nervous, academic weapon, teasing, fingering, one (1) pair of panties ripped to shreds, oral (f receiving), spitting, pussy slaps, praise kink, name calling (good girl, sweetheart, baby, smart girl), dirty talk, talking you through it, spanking, condescending a little bit, cum eating, face riding, nasty freaky kisses to share your cum, no use of y/n

I cannot begin to explain how hot him helping her practice is. And then the smut.... I need a shower

Call It What It Is - Joel one shot by @joelsgreys

A disagreement over patrol duty leads to declarations that have been long overdue.

JACKSON ERA JOEL. established relationship. HEFTY AGE GAP (reader is in her 20’s and joel is 56). ellie and joel are fine bc i said so and they deserve nothing less. reader handles a rifle, joel’s a little too overprotective and almost seems controlling, but i promise he is not. well, maybe just a smidge. arguing, admission of feelings, joel miller says i love you (yes this is ooc, no i do not care bc i need this old man to tell me he loves me). angst, fluff. quite a bit of side character interaction before we get to joel and reader in the second half. the only physical description of reader is that she is shorter than joel.

We love overprotective Joel in this house

The Guard Dog - Pero Tovar one shot by @avastrasposts

Sent to your uncle's bleak castle in the north of England, you expect only a dreary existence until you meet his groundskeeper, a scarred, frightening Spaniard. But love in the Victorian era is not easy and life doesn't follow straight paths.

this is mainly all fluff with a bit of angst. Some of that casual racism and predjudice of the period rears its ugly head though. I've tried to keep the reader as blank as possible, but it's Victorian England and she's a lady so I have to presume she doesn't speak Spanish and has fair skin. No use of y/n.

This was so beautiful. I love the setting, I love the characterization, I love the story

Bloody Kisses - Tim Rockford/Dio series by @perotovar

shane has been in denial about himself for a while. newly single and with the help of one of his favorite singers, he opens his eyes to a new venture he could possibly take: the cop he sees on a semi-regular basis, detective tim rockford.

takes place in the early 00s, age gap (shane is 23, tim is 40), internalized homophobia, hurtful names (fairy boy, faggot, queer as a slur, etc), a gay porn magazine, lots of references to peter steele of type o negative (and his playgirl issue), male masturbation, acab, angst, protected p in a, fingering, excessive amounts of lube

I started reading this a while ago, but I never added it to the spreadsheet. I'm in love with how soft Tim is with Dio UgH

In the shadows of others, we grow - Tim Rockford/Dave York series by @sin-djarin

What happens when you put two different areas of law enforcement in the same room a few times a year to atone for their 'sins'? You find common ground and figure it out. Together.

M/M, Established D/s dynamics, each chapter contains individual warnings.

This pairing?? Obsessed. The feelings?!?!? Give me 14 more fics in this universe PLEASE

An End to Drought - Javi P one shot by @almostfoxglove

The future of your family's homestead hangs in the balance as Javier Peña comes home in the middle of a drought.

Javier Peña Smut, Soft Javier Peña, Sweet Javier Peña, Javier Peña Has a Big Dick, Smut, Fluff and Smut, Fluff, Neighbors,Javier might be a god? who knows!, Plot What Plot/Porn Without Plot, Porn with Feelings, Penis In Vagina Sex, Oral Sex, Creampie, Sex, Vaginal Sex, unprotected piv, Freyr, References to Norse Religion & Lore, Post Season 3

I'm obsessed with the way the challenge was interpreted. Is Javi a god? We don't know... but he sure fucks like one.

Some shit I wrote:

Make it Hurt - Logan Howlett x f!mutant!reader - sparring + pain kink

Morning Ride - Logan Howlett x f!reader - soft morning sex

You're So Dark - Dave York x f!reader - prof!Dave x student!Reader

[michameinmicha]

That feeling when you just finished a book and you want to stay in that world just a little longer...

[whitefang93]

Toastie!!! Hiiii!!!

Thank u for tagging me!!!

Okay I have a lot to share and thanks for giving me an opportunity to ramble and put my thoughts together so lets begin hehe

Last song - Fruits candy by Megumi kojima. I love Cardcaptors sakura and I seek that nostalgia often through this 90s jpop song. Life feels simple and the rhythm is stuck in my head like a loop!

Favorite color

Pink and purple/violet.

Last Book

We have always lived in that castle by Shirley jackson. So I was challenging myself to read some books for spookytober. And also something clicked in me with it's subtle parallels to monster's Leibert twins and Blackwood sisters.

Absolutely loved the atmosphere of this book of isolation of two sisters from surrounding world and how the home feels like a safe haven and an escape but caught in ghosts of the past in the house. A great psychological/horror genre.

Last Movie

I have been in a slump after watching a few movies of Japanese period fiction. It's all thanks to kaze hikaru, my love for chanbara/sword fights genre has come into forefront and I leaped into old japanese period films after Long..and discovered many gems.

So I think the last one was months ago, A geisha (1953) by Kenji mizoguchi. Stories of women of times, the geisha culture praised and lauded or seen through a rose tint glass, this speaks the story of two women who try to stand up against the norms that don't protect the rights and exploit women in name of culture upholding..

Unpleasant things no one tells or talks about.

Last TV show

Been few months since I invested in watching a TV show lmao my attention span is shit. I did speed run at 1.5x of Monster anime. Phenomenal. 7 years later revisting this seires and its stellar, all the more praise worthy!! A perfect adaptation of manga in 74 episodes. If you ever have time and feel like sitting for a noir style anime, a psychological thriller of slow burn then this is it!

Atmosphere, story, characters 10/10. This made my October Brain rot.

Sweet/spicy/savoury

I'm torn between spicey and sweet..., let's go with sweet atm! I'm craving basundi as I type lol

Relationship status

Single since forever lol

Last thing I googled

Lolita part 2 ch 2 summary. I get lost in the writing a lot of times and there's so much reading in between the lines.

Current obsession

Kagehina ☯️ ☀️ ⛰️

Monster by Naoki urasawa

Thing I'm looking forward to

Some financial stability lol

Ten people I'd like to know a bit better

I was tagged by @otakurooster907 and @thatfanficauthor107 (thank you both 🩷)

Last song: Defying gravity, from the Wicked musical (I'm so excited for the movie)

Favourite colour: it's that colour that is between pink and orange, like the sunset (as Peeta Mellark would say) or as if you were mixing the colours in the lesbian flag (as I would say)

Last book: Kafka on the Shore by Murakami, (I accidentally pictured Oshima as Suga the entire time)

Last movie: it was, once again, Inside by Bo Burnham, it's the perfect comedy special for when I feel like everything is going to shit, I can sing along while crying, and that's just beautiful.

Last tv show: I rewatched a the office episode yesterday, but I haven't watched anything new in a while :(

Sweet/spicy/savoury: sweet, but not too much. Sweet like dark chocolate, I'd say

Relationship status: single 5ever

Last thing I googled: "Xiaomi phone freezes reddit" because my phone keeps freezing, and I don't know what to do :(

Current obsession: which e-reader works the best on the web browser, because I have to buy one and I'd like to read ff from it without downloading the fics (if anyone has any advice I'll take anything)

Thing I'm looking forward to: the Wicked movie...

No pressure tags! @dellafloosh @this-is-krikkit @cosmorom @thegirlwhorideslikeasamurai @seijohsorbet @otabekisautistic and honestly whoever wants to do this! (I hope you don't hate me lol I've been tagging so many people lately)

[ohno-the-sun]

Little oc I’ve been thinking about for awhile

Name’s Roulette (maybe goes by Rue for short)

Featuring doodles by @garbagechocolate and @benji-draws

Lore under the cut (tw gore)

Roulette originally came from a different Pizzaplex location where she ran the prize wheel. Children would spend tokens to spin the wheel and she would give out whatever prize they won.

These prizes were typically tokens or toys, but whether it be by errant programming or an overly sensitive cheating prevention system, her games often ended with the wheel's options slowly being replaced by worse and worse prizes. In fact they didn't seem like prizes at all, more like things she'd take from you to add to her own collection.

After the mysterious disappearance of several human body parts and various lawsuits, she was decommissioned and sent to Sun and Moon's Pizzaplex for storage.

One day she wakes up to see a terrifying looking moon animatronic ripping into her innards. Horrified she barely manages to get away, hiding until Sun finds her.

Sun feeling bad about his counterpart destroying this poor animatronic, tells her he'll help fix her up. Little does he know that this animatronic is not as innocent as she seems.

Fascinated by his kindness and ease of access to fleshy human bodies, she ends up with an intense and unhealthy obsession with Sun.

Unfortunately, she also ends up with a deep hatred for Moon and wants nothing more than for him to disappear.

She has a plan in mind now, she will make this Pizzaplex her's, creating unlimited access to as many body parts as she desires. Sun will be her sweet pet and Moon will be dead in an alley somewhere.

Highly manipulative with a concerning lack of empathy, Sun and Moon are going to have a hard time with this one.

However, what she doesn't realize is just how close Sun and Moon are.

[pocketscribbs]

my favorite thing is when Sonic artists get creative and consider the characters’ abilities/personalities when drawing them in action

my personal favorite example is Tangle the Lemur and her fabulous tail

she ziplines down grind rails, she’s probably fast enough to spin dash regularly but she instead uses her tails to create her own “spiral dash”(this is what i’m calling it)

just one of the many reasons why I think Tangle is such a fun character, her excitable and thrill-seeking attitude mixed with her powerful, stretchy tail makes for some creative and entertaining visuals

[aroaessidhe]

2024 reads / storygraph

Saint-Seducing Gold

book two in the Forge & Fracture Saga

YA historical fantasy about a girl with a connection to an Orisha & power over metal

trying to find a way to reforge the broken pact between fae and humans to stop the increasing violence across London

she’s forced to leave her family & Shakespeare’s players to join the royal court and navigate the tenuous political situations while keeping herself & her loved ones safe

bi MC, navigating a relationship with both a boy & girl

[wykart]

I've been reading the Rivers of London series and I can feel Ben Aaronovitch trying to restrain himself yet there's still at least two Doctor Who references per book.

[lyril]

i feel like not enough people use writing fanfiction as a way to like... study and learn? outside of it being more practice and things. like sure, this is for entertainment first and foremost, but for me keeping the writing tone and characterization as accurate as i can to then transform it more into a writing style to create something good just ends up in me like, intensely studying the source material. i don't ever go off of memory i fucking break that shit down, study dialogue patterns and write down literally everything the characters i'm writing for say, observe the structure and themes and tone of whatever i'm looking at, watch and analyze things until i'm sick of them and come out a better writer because of that hands-on observation and because i simply fucking hate when other people go off of memory while writing characters i like ❤️

[unproduciblesmackdown]

also marble hornets fun fact #92 like it's fun that for once the neurotypical agenda accidentally got a win: when in that s1 "interview" episode apparently there was no particular plan to have tim be a recurring character before a strong audience response of speculation that there must be something more going on with this guy because his fidgeting with a notebook all throughout the video was indication of Liar's Anxiety or whatever; in reality tim sutton was not making any acting choice (to serve then-nonexistent writing) but was spontaneously being someone often fidgeting with paper. then call that unfolding developments

[paperconsumption]

from the feedback i got in creative writing class today i’ve realized that enstars has improved the way i write dialogue like an insane amount

[hana-loves-bumblebees]

Is there a Yuri!!! On ice x The Great Gatsby au somewhere out there? Because I believe it would work really well in any angle you could look at it

[cool-as-steel]

reread adventures of john blake after maybe six years... it is always unfortunate when something does not live up to how cool you thought it was when you were younger.

[telephonestalker]

If paranatural ever were to become a show, I would split chapter five into three parts. First of all, I'd split it up because of how long it is. The first part is Chapter 5, Part 1: A Dangerous Game of Hitball. This follows all the way to "It's one of them!" where it cuts off. Next episode is Chapter 5, Part 2: The Hunt & Stalk a Teacher which goes to the big reveal of who's been possessed the whole time. Finally, we have Chapter 5, Part 3: The Final Showdown which is the big arc, everyone's fighting & we end the first season there.

[queenlucythevaliant]

A Liturgy of Surviving

Scarlett always wanted to be like her mother, and maybe in another world she could have been. If the war never happened, she could have grown softer instead of sharper. She could have curbed her temper, married well, and been received in respectable homes all her days. Maybe, if it hadn’t been for the war, Scarlett O’Hara could have lived out her days in genteel artifice, just like Ellen before her.

Maybe. Maybe not. If you asked her, Scarlett would say that the question was irrelevant. “God’s nightgown!” she would exclaim. “Don’t ask me what could have been. The war happened and that’s that.”

          I won’t think about that now.  

The day after Scarlett’s world ended, she swore an oath that she would never be hungry again. 

She woke in pain. Her muscles ached and her joints creaked. She was nineteen, but she felt like she had a hundred years weighing her body down. Morning light slanted through the window and her head ached with the moonshine liquor that she’d downed the night before. From another room, she heard an infant crying. 

She passed through the dining room without eating, pausing only briefly beside her grief-ravaged father. She found Pork on the porch shelling nuts. The sun was up. Scarlett O'Hara drew herself tall and began to marshal her troops. 

Melly and her sisters were still infirm, so they were useless for now. Mammy could tend them, and Pork and Prissy were to round up the livestock. Dilcey to Macintosh, herself to Twelve Oaks; perhaps they’d find food. Yes, I know. I’ll worry about that tomorrow. Now get going. 

Those days as the war staggered to its end were some of the longest of her life. In between them, Scarlett would collapse into bed and rub the welts on her feet with clumsy fingers. Sometimes she’d picture Ellen and all her gentle admonitions to kindness and refinement, and she’d say aloud to the walls, “What happened to me? What am I doing?”

She didn’t dwell on the question, but somehow, she always knew the answer. “I’m doing what I must,” she would answer herself. “I’m surviving.”

People didn’t talk back to Scarlett anymore. They were all afraid of her sharp tongue, of the new person who walked in her body. This Scarlett bullied and cajoled until everyone obeyed her, and inevitably her orders were to work. She was all edges; any softness that she’d once possessed had been sanded away splitting rails and picking cotton. Good, she thought. Let them fear me, if it keeps us all standing. 

          I’ll think about it tomorrow. 

Scarlett was sixteen when the war began: sixteen in green muslin, fearless and unencumbered. She had her mother’s slim waist and her father’s square jaw, but her clear green eyes were her own.

She was sixteen when she married Charles Hamilton and lost him, seventeen when she bore his child and draped herself in black crepe. She got Melly and Wade in the bargain, but she didn’t want either of them. She wanted Ashley. She wanted to dance! She wanted, she wanted. She wanted Scarlett O’Hara back. 

At nineteen years old, Scarlett survived the destruction of her whole world. She could have cried for the loss of her girlhood, for her old self long gone with the soft hands and dancing slippers, but what good would it have done? Curled up in her childhood bed at Tara, Scarlett didn’t cry. Instead, she folded in on herself, knees tucked up to her chest, and tried not to feel her muscles aching. She would have to get up again tomorrow, no matter how badly her shoulders still hurt.

She had strong shoulders, Scarlett O’Hara. That was maybe the most important thing about her. At any time, at any age, her shoulders could bear whatever they were given. “I’m surviving,” she would say each morning when she rose. A stranger’s freckled face greeted her in the mirror, but Scarlett only squared her small thin shoulders, breathed in, took one step and then another.

          Tomorrow, when I can stand it.

Calluses form like this: repeated pressure or friction is applied to the skin, most often of the hand or the foot. The outer layer, which is made of dead cells, begins to be retained rather than flaking off normally. The dead cells accumulate, forming hard layers sometimes hundreds of cells thick. 

They form like this: you use your skin. The shell of hardness around it slowly thickens. 

          I can stand anything now. 

The day after Rhett left, Scarlett packed up Wade and Ella and she once again drove the long road home to Tara. She pushed her way past Suellen at the threshold, exchanged brief pleasantries with Will, and then fell into her old bed as she’d done so many times before.

The next morning found Scarlett basking in the slanting yellow light that struck the porch from the east. Her eyes were fixed on the fields beyond and there was a devilish look on her face. 

When Rhett came back—and he would come back, he had promised he would—he would find her here at Tara, where she was strongest. “He liked when I was strong,” Scarlett said to herself. That was something she’d always known, for all that she’d been blind to the true dimensions of it.

Day after day, Scarlett rose and moved through Tara’s halls. She ate her breakfasts in the place where she’d faced down the Yankee army, sorted through figures where she’d once debated with Melanie over whether they ought to risk sending Pork out on the horse to look for food. Twenty times a day, she walked past the place at the base of the stairs where she’d shot her deserter dead. Here, in these halls, she had made her greatest stands.

She’d stood more rigidly then, threadbare and starving and uncertain. She’d come to the end of herself, only to find that she had wells of strength hidden deeper than she knew. Her hands were calloused and dirty. What else could she do?

          I’ll never be hungry again.

It’s easy to view Scarlett as hard and amoral. Even those closest to her would not have contested that characterization. Perhaps Melly would have argued, but then, Melly always saw the good in everyone. Scarlett killed and she stole and she schemed and she cheated, and she did it all in cold blood. What a selfish, conniving bitch, you might say.

It’s easy to forget Scarlett’s compassion. When she beat that poor horse to keep it trudging the long road home to Tara, she regretted hurting a tired animal. Her concern for Melanie, her friendship for Will Benteen, her joy when Rhett made her laugh: these were all true and genuine.

Didn’t Scarlett love her father and mother? Didn’t she grieve to see her friends and neighbors ruined by war? Scarlett O’Hara risked her life to save Charlie’s sword for Wade to inherit, and she built her mills for him and Ella both.

None of this negates the ruthless things she did in the name of survival, but it does begin to explain them. Scarlett made herself hard when hard was what she needed to be. She determined to live without reservation, without softness and with little kindness. Rhett called her cruel, and maybe he was right. But Melly also called her sacrificial and devoted, and maybe she was right too. 

          No, nor any of my kin.

On that road home to Tara, Scarlett once said, “If the horse is dead, I will curse God and die too.” Someone in the Bible had done just that—cursed God and died. Scarlett remembered feeling like that person, a despair of Biblical magnitude.

But the horse was alive, and so Scarlett did not die. Later, she thanked God that her knees still had the strength to support her, that her neck was still strong enough to hold her head high. Scarlett was not Job’s wife, nor even Job himself. She was Rahab, who escaped the destruction of Jericho, who saved her whole household and survived.

“What a fast trick,” said the Old Guard when she stole Frank Kennedy away from Suellen. No, Scarlett could never be Job. She was Jacob, the trickster and supplanter.

          Just a few more days for to tote the weary load.

Scarlett was easily provoked into courage; that was one of the first things that Rhett learned about her. A few insults, a pointed comment, and Scarlett lifted her chin and flounced off to prove just how brave she could be. She shed her crepe years early, and to Halifax with anyone who objected.

Rhett did that same thing to her on the awful day that Atlanta burned. He insulted her and laughed at her, and when Scarlett spat, “I’m not afraid,” it was true. Her hands, which had moments ago been shaking too badly to hold anything, were steady now, and anger had crowded all the fear out of her voice.

Rhett kept needling her all the way out of the city, until they reached the Rough and Ready where he left her. The banter kept her sharp. As long as her eyes were flashing in indignation, she hardly noticed the fire.

Even after Rhett left, his jabs stayed with her. “What would Rhett say if he knew I couldn’t do this?” spurred her back into action more times than she would ever admit. It was a petty kind of courage, and it felt smaller than the great, soaring motivation that came with thoughts of Tara, of the O’Hara name and Irish pride and red earth, but sometimes petty courage was enough to bridge the gap between strength and exhaustion.

He gave her something to hold onto, something to ground her, and even Rhett only halfway understood what that meant. I want you at your best, he never told her, but he pulled her into it by taffeta ribbons and witticisms. As the years rolled by, she rose to meet him. They swapped sharp words and insults, him always claiming to know her and her shouting, “You don’t know half!”

One day on the jostling ride out to her mills, Scarlett told Rhett about the fire that the Yankees set in Tara’s kitchen. “I’m not afraid of fire anymore,” she declared with something like pride, and Rhett remembered goading her past the flames the night Atlanta burned. “I beat it out with my skirts, and then Melly had to beat me out when my back caught,” she went on. “Now I’m not afraid of anything but hunger.”

I don’t want you to fear anything in all the world, Rhett didn’t say. Once they were married, he laughed at her appetite and teased her, “Don’t scrape the plate, Scarlett. I’m sure there’s more in the kitchen.”

           No matter, ‘twill never be light.  

After the war, Rhett had his millions. Ashley had his honor. Melly had the Association for the Beatification of the Graves of Our Glorious Dead. Scarlett held a ball of red clay in her fist and whispered, “I have this.”

Her father built Tara from nothing and he loved those acres like they could love him back. He had come to Georgia a poor immigrant boy and he had won that red earth. Whatever Gerald could do, his daughter could do too: of this she was certain. This land, this firm red clay on which she stood, was both her battlefield and her prize; her birthright and her hallowed ground. She gripped it tight with all the passion of a lover. She longed for its rolling fields on cold nights in Atlanta, sleeping beside Frank Kennedy.

“Yes, I have this,” and she let the dirt run between her fingers and lodge beneath her nails. Melly had Ashley and Ashley his senseless honor. Scarlett had Tara.

          I’ve still got this.

When she rode out in her buggy with her lap robe pulled up to her bosom, Scarlett heard how people whispered. She felt indignant about it the first time, and the second time she worried what Ellen would have thought. The third time, she decided not to care.

She still complained to Rhett about the whispering as he was holding the reins one afternoon. He didn’t laugh at her, just looked sideways from the road with his dark eyes and nodded like he understood. “Be different and be damned!” Rhett said, and his tone was like a soldier who’d heard the bugle. It was so strange, how Scarlett could tell him all the worst things about her and he would always answer back like they were medals instead of secret shames. 

Most of the city was in mourning, but Scarlett wore colors. She pilfered the store’s inventory in search of bright green, washed and mended her curtain dress as many times as it would stand, and when the money came she wore gowns of emerald, blush, indigo, and scarlet. Let them stare, she thought. See if I care.

At twenty-two, Scarlett rode up to Pittypat’s in the evenings, long after Frank had come home from the store, and she felt condemned. To the well-bred folks of Atlanta, she was as bad as a Scallawag. But sometimes, when she was alone, Scarlett ran her hands beneath the lap robe and hoped that Rhett was wrong about children and grandchildren, that the child she was carrying would understand one day. I hope you’re nothing like Frank, she thought. I hope you have shoulders like mine.

           I’ll never be hungry again.

“It’s no use, Scarlett. You can’t scrub out the past,” said Rhett when at last he came to Tara. “You can’t take back the last ten years, no matter how you’ve come — to appreciate my charms.”

“You think I don’t know that?” Scarlett snapped. “There’s never any going back. Not ever. But Rhett—” she reached for his hand. “I love you, and at last we understand each other. We can build something out of that.”

They argued about it until Rhett left again, fuming and bitter, his Panama hat pulled low over his face. Scarlett made an unannounced visit to Charleston the next month. “I was thinking,” she suggested, “That we might sell the Peachtree Street house.”

Scarlett knew all the words for making men love her, so long as she understood what it was that they wanted. The Tarleton twins had wanted merry excitement; Charles had wanted to feel important and Frank had wanted to feel like a strong, successful man. Ashley had wanted someone braver and better than he was, and he’d found it in Melanie without having to risk himself on Scarlett. Scarlett had never understood what it was Rhett wanted, but she did now. Why, it’s always been my love he wants! So Scarlett spoke the right words, and this time she meant them.

“You were right when you said that we’re alike. Only—you’ve always known about me, whereas I’m just starting to know you. Will you tell me about that knife fight in California again? About the sail boat you won at cards?”

“You know those stories,” clipped Rhett. “You don’t need to hear them again.” So Scarlett went downstairs and pried the stories out of his mother instead.

The house on Peachtree Street sold within the month, snatched up by some Carpetbagger who wanted it for a hotel. Rhett traveled to Mexico, and returned to find Scarlett back at Tara preparing for spring planting.

“What do the women wear in Mexico?” she asked him, leaning on the porch railing in the slanting light. “What is your favorite place you’ve ever traveled?”

Rhett indulged her in brief, but then abruptly he chuckled and shook his head. “I know what you’re doing, you little minx.”

“Yes,” said Scarlett. “Of course you do.”

           Tomorrow, oh tomorrow!

The clay soil of Georgia is red from iron oxides. It’s red the way rust is red, the way blood is red. If a blister splits open and your blood falls on the ground, that iron-red soil will just swallow it up. You can bleed and bleed, and the stuff in your blood will always be one with the stuff of the soil.

When cotton and vegetables sprout from the ground, it’s easy to believe they grew from your very own blood, and that your own sweat and tears watered them.

           Never look back.  

“We women were soldiers too,” Melanie said once. Scarlett didn’t respect her yet—at least, not consistently—but this might have been one of the moments where she first looked at Melly and thought not that her heart was soft and timid, but that it was a sword.

“We never expected to be – or at least I didn’t.” She looked around the circle of ladies, at India and Fanny, until her eyes came to rest on Scarlett at last. “We were children then. We all imagined the world far simpler than it was.”

Melly, India, Fanny, Scarlett. These women had all been girls together. They knew one another at seven, twelve, fifteen, swaddled in silks and trying to seem more grown-up than their playmates. They’d competed for beaus and Scarlett had mostly won, except where Ashley Wilkes was concerned. They had lived through the war together. Now, Scarlett sat among them on Melly’s front porch and tried to remember if she’d ever in her life felt like one of them.

For Christmas, Melanie gave Scarlett a small book of poetry. Scarlett never read it, except for the one verse which Melly had marked with a green ribbon. She bit back the urge to sigh when she undid the wrapping, but Melly pointed out the bookmark and said, “This one made me think of you, dear.”

Scarlett didn’t like to think of it now, but once she’d been sixteen in green muslin, confident that dimples and a clear complexion were the only weapons she’d ever need. She had been a child, but that child had not died when Atlanta burned. The belle of Clayton County was not in the grave with all the boys who’d never come riding home from war. Scarlett was alive. She was right here.

“What is a dead girl but a shadowy ghost/ Or a dead man's voice but a distant and vain affirmation/Like dream words most? / Therefore I will not speak of the undying glory of women. / I will say you were young and straight and your skin fair/ And you stood in the door and the sun was a shadow of leaves on your shoulders/ And a leaf on your hair—"

Scarlett came home from her mills in the gray evening and she made her way back to the Wilkes’s ramshackle front porch. She left her buggy feeling condemned and she sat with the other ladies feeling alienated, but all the same she couldn’t bring herself not to go. The war was over, and these were the survivors. They were through fighting, hung up on glory, but Scarlett still hadn’t holstered her guns. 

“We were soldiers,” said Melanie, and in her heart Scarlett added, “Some of us still are.”

           I won’t let them lick me.

Supposing that Ashley had married her. Perhaps the sight of her in green makes him brave enough to shed his veneer of honor and say, “Yes, you’re right, I can’t live without you.” It’s a minor scandal when he casts Melanie off in her favor, but not for long. The war is beginning and besides, good men have made themselves fools for Scarlett O’Hara before. By the time the soldiers march away, the scandal is all but forgotten in favor of the fine figure they cut as they embrace at the depot: Ashley so brave in his uniform, his young wife radiant as she clutches him.

Ashley sends her long, meandering letters full of philosophical musings. Scarlett reads them uncomprehending and sends back missives full of I love yous. She kisses them when she mails them, sometimes with a Hail Mary for her husband’s safety.

Rhett doesn’t notice this Scarlett at Twelve Oaks, and so he’s caught off guard when he hears the young Mrs. Wilkes say something blunt and scathing at the Bazaar. He chuckles to himself in delight and later he asks her to dance, and of course Scarlett simpers and agrees, and it’s a merry night. But Rhett doesn’t come back to Atlanta for the rest of the war.

This Scarlett leaves for Macon with the rest of the women when the Yankees come to Atlanta; after all, she has no Melly to keep her in the city during the siege. She takes Ashley’s child with her, and it’s in Macon that he finds her after the war. He waxes poetic about the Old Days, the Horrors of War and Götterdämmerungs and the like. He looks at her with sad, tired eyes and Scarlett says yes, I heard you the first time. But what are we going to do?

Twelve Oaks is razed. They go to Tara. Ashley tries his hand at farming, but it’s Scarlett who manages to pick and plant and organize while Ashley’s fumbling attempts at working with his hands yield scant success. His heart isn’t in it, which infuriates Scarlett. C’mon, get up and fight! She looks into the tired face of the man she loved so ruinously at sixteen and wonders what she ever thought was so noble about him.

When taxes come due there’s no way to pay. What’s more, Ashley doesn’t even try. It’s here that Scarlett breaks with her husband. Between Ashley and Tara, it’s Tara every time.

So Scarlett bullies her husband into calling old debts in from a few impoverished friends and when that isn’t enough, she goes to see the tax assessor dressed in green velvet and makes some very personal insinuations about Mr. Jonas Wilkerson. From there, Scarlett bullies her one-time-beloved and does as she pleases, and Ashley has to live with the fact that it’s his wife who provides for the family. In every world, it is Scarlett O’Hara who keeps Ashley Wilkes alive after the war.

His pride lays down in the dirt and dies. Scarlett Wilkes shakes her head bitterly and plants more seed in her red, red earth.   

Supposing Scarlett could have imagined all this. What do you think she would say? Perhaps in her youth she would have cherished the idea, but the hard-eyed Scarlett who emerged after the war would have only leveled her small shoulders and said, “What does it matter what would have happened? I’ll think about it later.”

           There but for a lot of gumption am I.

The day after Bonnie died, Scarlett called for the buggy and went to her store. Rhett took this as proof that Scarlett had never really loved the little girl, that she was devoid of maternal affection as he’d always suspected, but Scarlett was grieving in her own way. She threw out two uncut bolts of blue velvet: expensive fabric over which she’d have upbraided a clerk to hell and back if he’d wasted even a few inches. 

It was true that Scarlett had never wanted any of her children when she’d carried them. She had not felt joy or love or any of the feelings that other women described when first she saw them. What she did feel, in the moments after Dr. Meade placed each child in her arms, was a fierce surge of protectiveness. She was certain that she would work and sacrifice and even die for her children, if need be. They were her blood, her flesh, her kin.

Scarlett had hated pregnancy each time it happened to her. She hated feeling large and lumbering, hated the way that her tiny waist bloated and grew until even her modified dresses didn’t fit right. She hated the inconvenience of morning sickness, the limitations on what she could do, the necessity of seclusion as delivery drew near. It was nine months of hardship and frustration capped off with many long minutes of excruciating pain. 

Bonnie had died in an instant. She’d been flying towards the hurdle and then, half a breath later, she’d been gone. Standing in the back of the store with two bolts of blue velvet before her, Scarlett swallowed back tears that Rhett would never see. It wasn’t right that a child who’d taken her so much time and effort to bring into the world could be gone from it so quickly. 

When she returned to the house a few hours later, Rhett had locked himself in the bedroom with Bonnie’s tiny body. Scarlett paused for a moment outside the door, but then she squared her shoulders and kept walking. 

          Just a few more days for to tote the weary load. 

Scarlett had a habit of humming “My Old Kentucky Home” while she worked. Splitting wood, planting and picking cotton, driving between her mills, keeping the books—even sewing. The song was a thoughtless thing, an instinctual thing. She hummed it the same way a person might worry lips between teeth or tear at nails. 

She repeated the words again and again until her heart pulsed to their rhythm. Just a few more days for to tote the weary load. I’ll think about it tomorrow, when I can stand it. Tomorrow, tomorrow. No matter, ‘twill never be light. I’ll never be hungry again. No, nor any of my kin. I’ll never be hungry again. They were a mantra: something to hold onto when the whole breadth of her world had narrowed to a single point. A refrain. A liturgy of surviving.

          Just a few more steps

Rhett loved Scarlett and it was terrifying. He feared that she would treat him like one of her country beaus: a lovely toy to play with and to tear to ribbons when she was done. He was afraid, so he hid his heart behind his impressive poker face and said “I want you” instead of “I love you.” He called her “pet” instead of “sweetheart.”

Scarlett loved Rhett and it was slow. He brought her bonnets and bonbons and Scarlett thought, “Why, it’s almost like I was in love with him!” He came to help her the day Atlanta burned, and Scarlett thought that she’d like to stay in his arms forever. When he chauffeured her to the mills, she thought that he was the only person in the world to whom she could tell the truth.

"You never told me you loved me, you know," Scarlett said the next time she visited Charleston. "I never knew. That's not to say you were wrong about me - about what I would have done if you had said something. But you should have been brave enough to risk it all the same."

Rhett closed his eyes for a moment and his mask slipped away. It was doing that more and more these days.

"But I did tell you — once."

"I think I would have remembered that," said Scarlett, pursing her lips.

"Ah. ‘It is far off; and rather like a dream than an assurance that my remembrance warrants.’ I suppose my humble confession was the least of your worries that day."

Scarlett wrinkled her nose. "What?"

"The day Atlanta burned, my dear."

After a long moment, Scarlett gave a little gasp which turned into a sigh as it ended. "Oh. That's right, you did then, didn't you?" She shook her head. "Rhett, I do believe you have the worst timing of any person I know."

          As God is my witness

The day she married Charles, she wore Ellen’s cream-colored silk gown, aired out in a hurry from the chest where it had been sitting since the O’Haras married back in 1846. She couldn’t breathe for how tight her laces were —sixteen inches, like Ellen’s waist was when the dress was purchased— and perhaps that was a good thing. Scarlett was light-headed throughout the ceremony and she scarcely remembered it afterwards. 

The day she decided to have Frank, it was raining hard. Scarlett left the jail in sodden velvet and was grateful for the drops falling on her cheeks to disguise the tears. It was sunny the day of the wedding, but she scarcely noticed that. Afterwards, when she thought of marrying Frank, Scarlett would always remember the rain. 

There was a fine mist over everything the day she got Rhett back for good. Scarlett was wearing her work clothes when he came riding up to Tara; she’d been walking the cotton fields that day, overseeing the progress of the crop. They were both a little damp when he kissed her.

           I’ll never be hungry again.

O’Haras and Robillards had always known how to dig their nails in, and by God, Scarlett was both. Her namesakes had long ago fought for their own plots of Irish earth; had survived and died and been hanged fighting to hold onto it. All Scarlett’s forebears, her folk, had left crescent-moon imprints on all that was theirs when it was finally pried from her hands. Scarlett gripped her little ball of clay and felt her nails dig into the heels of her hands.

She was her father’s hot-tempered daughter, but she had her mother’s steel-hewn spine. All the years of her life, she never saw Ellen Robillard O’Hara rest her back against a chair.  When Scarlett’s own time came, she held herself every bit as straight as her mother: she didn’t rest or lean, just stood and stood.

Maybe this is what she was always made for. Her green eyes weren’t for charming young men, they were for seeing dresses in curtains. Her hands were never supposed to be soft; they were meant for digging in the red dirt. Even her lips—Rhett was wrong, they weren’t meant for kissing. Scarlett’s lips were as sharp as the words that she spoke when she wasn’t afraid what anyone thought. They were meant to draw blood.

She had been sharp all her life, even when her edges were carefully concealed in layers of satin. Scarlett was not made to be soft; her core held no gentleness. She could not pretend otherwise. All she could do was stand straight, and hold up her tired old shoulders like they were the strongest thing in the world.

           I’ll think about it tomorrow. 

One day, at the Butler home in Charleston, Rhett taught Scarlett how to play poker, and subsequently how to cheat. They were still playing hours later, counting cards and hiding them in sleeves and making all kinds of ridiculous bets on losing hands. Just as she was taking off her right earbob to call, the thought rose to Scarlett’s mind unbidden: “What on earth are we doing here?” And just as quickly, there was the answer. “We’re living.”

At the end of this most recent road home, weary and damp from running through the fog, Scarlett found her way back into Rhett’s arms. In the evenings she listened to his stories and witticisms, and late at night she listened to the sound of his breathing. I will not speak of undying glory, she thought. Rhett was still here, and so was she. They were both still here.

Scarlett took off her left earbob too, for good measure. “I’ll raise you,” she said. “I have a good feeling about this hand.” There was still an ace hidden up her sleeve, but if Rhett noticed it he didn’t say anything. 

They survived together. They built something new. There is always profit to be made in building things, and these two were nothing if not industrious.

           After all, tomorrow is another day.

[callixton]

okay is this Good so far no and in a way that’s sort of frustrating but i do love fifteen so much