#the others will come back like ‘here’s what we did’ and he’ll go ‘eh. mediocre. c- except for nami. zoro gets an f x infinity’

[thychesters]

i like how zoro thinks he’s being merciful by using the blunt side of his swords on these shipwrights who aren’t their enemy. like no he isn’t hacking them in half but buddy you can still very much so kill them that way.

[just-a-whumping-racoon-with-wifi]

Mice in the Walls

CW: stalking, implied parental abuse, implied victim cutting ties with abuser, captivity, “it” as a pronoun meant to demean, choking, hitting, implied delusions, angry whumper, controlling whumper. 

Please read the CWs on this one. I’ll be more than happy to give you a general summary if you need (will probably do so anyway) let me know if you want a specific tag, and I’ll tag everything with this topic “Bernard tw” as he’s the culprit. 

Stay Safe loves, and do what’s best for you. 

[First Part] 

The doorbell rang and Bernard took a breath. As he opened the door, he put on his smile. The friendly smile, the inviting smile. The one he used at work and for the cashier at the checkout lane.

The mask. 

“Steven! How the hell are you?” he asked cheerfully, reaching out for a firm handshake. 

“Doing well, life’s just a joy.” The body smiled back at him, cheap wine in its hand and absurdly  ignorant of how pedestrian and mediocre its life was. Bernards eye’s skimmed over the man’s obnoxious shirt pattern, its ill filling slacks and cheap shoe polish before opening the door wider and gesturing it in with a smile. 

“Well, I didn’t invite you over just to stand on my porch! Come on in, lunch’s almost ready.” He had prepared some simple things, mostly store bought. He had no intention of trying to impress this pawn. 

“So Bernie, what’s new in the Wright household?” Steven asked lightly, setting down the bottle of wine and peering at the others displayed. Perhaps it would spark some recognition of how abject of a gift that had been. 

Bernard doubted. 

“Nothing much, Steve. Just livin the good life,” he recited as he ventured into the kitchen. 

“How’s Adam doing?” 

Bernard kept his back to the man, dishing out the potato salad. 

“Oh good, getting ready to graduate.” 

He could feel Steven pause behind him. 

“Oh? I thought something got jostled when he moved schools?” 

He bristled. Adam had moved, again. Always moving, blocking his numbers, spreading lies about him. How did he not realize that he just wanted the best for him? That he could help, that he could be a resource? The world wasn’t what Adam though it was, it was dangerous and hateful and-

The plastic container cracked. 

“What was that?” Steven asked, popping its head over Bernard’s shoulder. 

“Damn cheap plastic. Good thing I already got some out, eh?” His voice was pitched light and jovial, softly concealing his rage.  He put the now broken container to the side and picked up the bowl to set on the table between them. 

Bernard ate almost in silence, the body across from him droning on and on about the most inconsequential, mundane things. Its wife, its car, the remodeling of its house. It was pitiful. Nearly fifty-years of existence with only the most boring of conversations to show for it. Surface level, meaningless accolades that only made it seem more pathetic for how much it cared. 

The only time he found himself truly paying attention was when the conversation turned to the man’s daughters. They were also highly inconsequential, but they were the link that he had been searching for. 

They knew Adam. 

“Kesly is doing great, just about to finish high school. Man, can you believe it? Feels like just yesterday she was playing princess and pirate and now my baby’s going to college. Maddie’s just made varsity at her school.” 

Steven took another sip of its drink and winked conspiratorially at Bernard. “If Adam still plays then maybe they’ll face off some time, eh? She used to to whip his butt when they played in middle school.” 

Bernard squinted slightly with a toothy smile. “Only because he let her. And he’s gotten far better over the years.” He hadn’t seen Adam play since then, but he could only assume that his skill had improved over time.  

He took another bite of his lunch and made a mental note to find Maddie’s school and locate what colleges were in the district for lacrosse. 

Irritatedly, the conversation shifted to something pointless again and Bernard was left to wait until it could be useful. As the time dragged on, there was a dull thud from somewhere higher in the house. 

“What was that?” Steven asked, turning around its chair to look behind and above him. 

The fork bent under Bernard’s hand. 

“I didn’t hear anything.” 

Steven shook its head, wiping its mouth with its napkin. “No, no there was definitely a noise.” 

“Oh, that,” he replied casually, taking an even breath. “There’s mice in the attic.” 

A huff. “Sounds like pretty big mice to me. I can call a buddy out if you ever need anyone to do something about it. He’ll do it real cheap, too.”

Bernard waved him away, keeping the utensil under the table and bending back to its correct shape. “No, no need. I’m handling it myself.” 

They continued to chat uselessly, meaninglessly, until Steven finally decided it had wasted enough air here and would go be pointless somewhere else. Bernard watched him leave, said the expected this was great, we need to do it again soon, see you later before locking the door, finally free of such a useless creature. 

Teddy was hiding. Or at least, closest that he got to hiding with the chain giving his location away. He was between the bed and the wall, in the small space where the roof met the floor. 

He had been reading, laying on the bed trying to get lost in the book he had already read a million times. Maybe it had worked, considering that he had fallen asleep. The book fell. 

Now he was shivering in his only hiding place, desperately hoping that no-one had been home. He wished he knew what day it was, he wished he knew the man’s schedule, he could tell went it was safe. But no, there was no safety here, no regular pattern for him to latch onto. It was hell. 

The locked clatter and the ladder slunk down, filling him with fear. He was here, he had heard it. Teddy curled a hand around the bedpost. 

“Come out.” 

He didn’t, he couldn’t. He didn’t want to go back in the coal shed, didn’t want to be punished. It was an accident, and even then he was afraid that the nearly-memorized books would be taken away. 

“Now,” the man growled. Teddy shook his head and held on harder. 

Bernard groaned and wrapped the chain around his hand once, then twice, then pulled. The boy was still holding on so Bernard pulled again, harder this time. There was a small cry and a dragging noise as Teddy was pulled from behind the bed. 

Bernard looked down at him and only one thought screamed back in his head. 

Adam moved. 

Adam had moved again. 

He had moved, and blocked his number, his profiles, ever way that Bernard could contact his son were shut down, forbidden from him. He cut him out, disrespected him, shamed him left him to suffer through hours of meaningless conversation just for the smallest bits of information. 

Looking down, Bernard couldn’t contain his anger any longer. 

“You switched schools? Again? Without consulting with me? You ungrateful bastard,” he sneered, kicking the boy in his ribs. He yelped, eyes wide with fear. Good. He should be afraid, he should be ashamed of his pathetic behavior. He had been taught better than to disrespect him like this.

Teddy coughed and froze, tears starting to pour from his eyes. No, no no not this again. “Please,” he coughed, rolling onto his side. “Please I’m not Adam.” Every cough hurt, sending little bolts of pain through his chest and side. Still, he looked up to the man, staring into the steel cold eyes. 

“M-My name is Theodore Ramirez,” he rambled quickly, not for the first time. “My parents are Diana and Jonathan, they live in-” 

“NO!” The man shouted, pinning it down and wrapping his hands around its neck. No! No, no no no this! Stop! He squeezed, putting more and more weight on it’s thin throat. He would make it stop. 

Teddy wheezed, shoulders pinned down by the man’s knees. He was on top of him, he was choking him, he was killing him. He couldn’t breathe, couldn’t think. Struggling was useless, the man being so much larger than him. His clipped nails left practically no marks, drew no blood. 

“Don’t. You. Ever say that again,” growled, lifting its neck to slam it back into the wood. “Never. You are Adam, and you’re going to stay this time.” He loosened his grip the slightest bit. 

“Understand?” His question only had one correct answer. Teddy knew it, didn’t have enough air left to deny it. His head still spun from the blows, a loud ringing obstructing some of the words. 

“Y-Yes,” he managed, only the ghost of a noise. “Yes, I’m Adam. I’m sorry - I’m Adam.” The pressure let up more and more as he complied. By the end, the man was only resting his hands over the boy’s throat. 

Bernard signed and raised a hand to brush it across Adam’s cheek gently. “There. See, things are so much better when you stop lying. Let me take care of you, keep you safe.” 

The boy coughed and cried underneath him, never leaving him again.

~~

taggy boissss @whump-me-all-night-long @starnight-whump @highwaywhump @panic-and-chaos @as-a-matter-of-whump @cowboy-anon @just-a-raccoon-in-a-party-hat @milk-carton-whump

[snow-lavender]

The Last Day of Mediocrity

AKA, “Enter Marvin, Stage Left.”

Word count: 2382

Here’s a little ditty I like to call: Whoopsie, completely forgot to put these on Tumblr so now I’m posting three chapters in rapid succession. This is my take on Marvin’s creation, hope you enjoy!

AO3 Link Here

Marvin O’Sullivan paced around his apartment, talking animatedly on the phone. “It was great, you shoulda seen the kid’s face! I think Luke took a video of it. And we made so much cash, I’m gonna make my rent and then some this winter.”

“So what I’m hearing is ‘I had a great time, Emily, thank you for convincing me to go even though I was being a stubborn brat.” replied the phone.

Marvin rolled his eyes. “Yeah, yeah, I’m sorry for being a dick about it. But c’mon, cut me some slack! This was my first time leaving the country.”

“Well, that’s the kind of shit that happens when you’re homeschooled.”

“I’m not disagreeing.” Marvin snorted. He sat down on his sofa and started flipping through a book. “Really, Em, thank you for letting me take your spot.”

“Eh, don’t worry about it.” she said. “Gotta keep the talent fresh, am I right? Seems like it did you some good.”

“Yeah, it did. I got so inspired by the other performers there, I gotta jot some of these ideas down. Talk to you soon?”

“Sure will. Bye Marv.”

“Bye Em.” 

Marvin hung up the phone and slumped back into the couch. He summoned his notebook and started writing.

quick change?

Art on stage for ambience ambiance

More riffing w/ audience

kid orented set?

balancing shit

Amethyst out of juice

Need more rosemary

Flashier teleportation: saltpeter, indigo? got a theme

buy coffee

Small flames

↑LOTS OF PRACTICE↑

Aura residue on cards 

After a few minutes of brainstorming, he put down the notepad. If he was going to get

anything done, he needed to do some shopping. Which then lead to the hardest decision of any day. 

What to do about his face. 

He fiddled with the crude mask in his hands. Deal with disgust, or deal with disapproval? There was, of course, no good option. Either way people were going to stare at him. And normally he loved the attention. Hell, it was why he chose a career as a busker. But then, it was okay to be wearing a marker-covered mask from Poundland. At Tesco, not so much.

His hands automatically went to his cheek. Even after five years, the skin was scarred and rough. He remembered the doctor saying it would be that way for the rest of his life, never fully healing.

The flames around him grew higher as he screamed, Ma, please, help me! 

He stopped that train of thought right in its tracks. He was better off now. He was a fairly successful performer, he was providing for himself. He had coworkers who respected him, and people at the local coven who said he was the most talented wizard they’d seen in years. Hell, he even went to Pride in Dublin last month! Everything in his life was flying in the face of those assholes.

He was strong. He was accomplished. He was magnificent.

“Fuck it.”, he muttered, pulling the mask over his face.

Today, he was going to be who he wanted, general public be damned.

>=•=•=•=•=•=•=•=•=•=•=•=•=•=•=•=<

A few hours later, he returned to his flat, arms full of bags. He hung his mask up and shoved the door closed with his hip, making a beeline for his kitchen. The green light from the orb reflected off some of the cans and into his face, so he put those away first. Then he threw the beef in the fridge, restocked the butter, and shit, he was almost out of jam. Why didn’t he notice that this morning?

Finished with the groceries, he closed the pantry and grabbed the other bags. The more volatile plants would need to be stored carefully to prevent reactions, and he needed to grab some iron shavings for that new potion, and-

Wait.

Green glowing orb?

Marvin turned toward the TV, confused. Sure enough, there was a strange sphere floating above his sofa.

What the hell?!

He backed himself slowly into the wall. Thankfully, it didn’t react, but he still moved very carefully toward the hall. As soon as he figured he was out of its line of sight, he ran into his bedroom and slammed the door shut. 

“Okay, okay, calm down.” he whispered. He couldn’t think of any recent spells that could have caused...that.

Which meant this was something else. An intruder?

He ran for his bookshelf. Panicking, he pulled out the largest book he could find and started flipping through it. “No... no...no, come on!” He dropped that one and grabbed another. Halfway through it, he found the section on wards. “Okay, okay, weak, strong, proactive.. ...reactive!”. Silently cheering, he went over the spell in his head. Nothing too complex, just some clove and mugwort. He dogeared the page, grabbed those herbs, and left his room.

The orb was still there.

Marvin cursed and laid the supplies in front of him. He opened the book and started to cast the spell. 

“Cruinne beannaithe, iarr mé do chumhacht. Moladh dom neart agus rath a thabhairt dom.”

Purple energy began to swirl around him. He relaxed, but then noticed the other light source was growing brighter.

“Bacainn a chur in aghaidh olc. Cosain an teach seo ó dhaoine ar mian leo dochar a dhéanamh orm!”

His voice grew louder with fear. The things should have been weakening by now! He squinted, the light making it harder to read. 

“Iarr mé go héasca-”

Just as he reached the climax of the spell, the light became overpowering. He dropped the book to cover his face, and his magic vanished. He could feel power swirling around him, foreign and uncomfortable. It grew brighter and more stifling, making him cry out, until suddenly there was a flash, and everything disappeared.

Including himself.

>=•=•=•=•=•=•=•=•=•=•=•=•=•=•=•=<

Several miles away, he crashed to the floor. “Shit, shit, shit.” he muttered, scrambling for his spellbook. If he was quick, he could whip up a teleport before anyone noticed he was here-

“Uhh…”

Marvin whipped around. Standing in a doorway was a dumbfounded teenager, holding a steaming mug. He froze, still on his knees, grasping the book. “Hi….?” continued the teen.

Marvin was on his feet in a second. “I don’t know who you are, but let me go, now, and no one will get hurt.” he snarled. The other guy took a step back. “What? Let you go? You’re the one who materialized in my cousin’s flat!”

Marvin lowered his hands. “You didn’t summon me here?” he asked. “Then what was that light in my living room?”

“Light?” the kid repeated. He perked up. “Like a green, glowy orb thing?” 

Marvin nodded. “Okay, great!” the other said. “I mean, not super great, cause I bet you’re confused as hell, but that explains a lot!” He fished a phone out of his hoodie pocket. “I’ll text Seán. He’ll need a few minutes to stop recording, but then he can help you figure stuff out. You’re probably Marvin, right?”

Marvin bristled. “How do you know my name?” he hissed.

Kid shrugged. “It’s kinda complicated.” He held out a hand. “I’m Jackie. You want anything to drink? There’s still hot water in the kettle, I think.”

“Sure.” he replied, shaking Jackie’s hand warily. Marvin followed him into the kitchen, not wanting to let this stranger out of his sight. “You cast the spell that pulled me here, then?”

“Pfft, nah.” Jackie snorted. “I can’t do magic. Not traditionally, anyhow. That’s Seán’s scene.” He pulled another mug out of the cupboard. “Earl grey cool?”

“And Seán is your...cousin? The one who owns the flat?” Marvin guessed, leaning against the wall.

“Eehhh…”Jackie replied. “Technically no? He’s got custody of me, but we’re not...exactly...related. At all.”

“Then why..?”

“So we may have fudged the papers a bit. But hey, no harm done, right?”

Marvin stared at him. “And you’re just telling me, a random stranger, this? Not a great way to stay in his custody.”

Jackie shrugged, pouring more tea. “You’re gonna be living with us anyway, so why not?”

“Wait, what the hell?” Marvin stood up suddenly. “How did you get to that conclusion?”

“Shit.” Jackie replied. “I didn’t mean it like that. I mean, usually people like us stick together. I think. I’m still the first one here, but with the others, it seemed like-” he stopped. “Marvin, you okay?”

Marvin wasn’t listening. What the fuck did he mean by that? He’d said he wasn’t trapping him here! He hadn't felt any wards when he’d got here, but Jackie had acted like he wasn’t leaving. How was he so calm about this? His chest was tightening. Was it darker magic that had brought him here? Was this Seán dude a warlock, had he brainwashed this kid? He couldn’t breathe. He didn’t want any exposure to corrupt magic. The last time that had happened…

What the hell are you talking about? Please, just help me!

“Hey, Marvin, dude.”

Marvin’s head snapped up. When had he sat on the floor?

Jackie knelt next to him. “You back with me?” he asked.

“Y-yeah.” Marvin stuttered, accepting Jackie’s help as he stood up.

Jackie nodded. “Great. You really spaced out there for a sec.”

Marvin rubbed at his face. “Sorry, I-” he stiffened. He didn’t have his mask.

Jackie backed up as Marvin started looking around frantically. “You need something or…”

“My mask. Did you see where it fell?” 

Jackie shook his head. “I didn’t see any mask.”

“I need it.” Marvin insisted. He hated how standoffish he sounded, but this was important.

Jackie bit his lip. “I can go look, if that would help.”

“I need it.” Marvin repeated. “People are going to see.” See...see…

But Jackie had already seen his face. He hadn't been wearing it when the orb had shown up.

“Yeah, I got nothing.” Jackie said, returning to the kitchen. When had he left?

“Never mind.” Marvin said shortly.

“Are you sure? It sounded important-”

“Just drop it.” Marvin, pushing Jackie aside.

Jackie looked lost. “Oookay?” Then his phone dinged. “Oh! Seán’s finished recording. He’ll be down in a sec.”

Right. Fuck.

Marvin turned back to the living room. “So what exactly is going on?” he asked as they sat on the couch. His hands twitched, ready to cast at any moment. 

“What did you need Jackie?” a new voice said. 

Marvin turned. Standing in the hall was a man a few years older than him, maybe 25? He looked confused, but that changed to shock when he saw Marvin. “Oh.”

“Tada…” Jackie said, doing jazz hands in Marvin’s direction. He stopped when Marvin glared at him. “Where the hell am I?” he demanded, standing up. “He says you pulled me here. What the fuck do you want?” His hands glowed purple. 

Seán raised his hands. “Calm down man. No one’s going to hurt you.”

Marvin’s eyes narrowed. “Explain. Now.” 

“You know what a tulpa is?” 

“Yeah, so?”

“Okay, so, as far as I can tell, sometimes the universe tries to make tulpas based on characters I do, but it gets lazy and just pulls someone similar here instead.”

Marvin stared at him in disbelief. “What?”

“Look, I don’t get it either. Jackie can vouch for me though, he got pulled here when I did a superhero character last month.” The teen waved nervously.

“What, and you think I’m like that? I’m human, not preternatural. Don’t pull that ‘magicians are a different race’ shit, that got disproven in the seventies.”

Seán pulled a face. “Hell no. I’m just trying to make an analogy. Nothing really fits with this situation.”

“Just...okay, fine, I’ll go along with this. For now.” Marvin said, rubbing at his face.

Seán stuck out a hand. “I’m Seán McLoughlin. Nice to meet you.”

Marvin shook it. “Marvin O’Sullivan.”

“Wait, wait?” Seán pulled back. “Holy shit, I haven’t seen you since we were kids! How have you been?”

“Huh?” Marvin squinted at him. Then it clicked. “Jack!?”

Seán beamed. “Yeah! Man, of all people...it’s good to see you.”

“Wait, you two know each other?” Jackie interrupted. 

“The McLoughlins used to be some of the strongest magic users out there. My parents wanted connections, so we used to hang out.” Marvin explained.

“Yeah, I was the only kid in our family around his age, so we’d play together when the adults were talking.”

Marvin looked Seán up and down. He seemed to be doing pretty well for himself. He was almost as energetic and happy as he had been when they were kids. And if that hadn’t changed, well, he didn't seem like the type to deal with shady magic.

“Alright then. What was it you were saying about tulpas?”

>=•=•=•=•=•=•=•=•=•=•=•=•=•=•=•=<

Marvin stared out the window of the bus. Thankfully, Seán had paid for his fare back to Galway, since he’d left his wallet in his flat. He’d be back to his place by midnight.

This was a lot to process. Meeting someone from his childhood like that, well, it had brought a lot back up. Stuff he’d rather keep buried. He’d burned most of those bridges, and the rest had been burned for him. Now, a lot of the wreckage from those fires was coming to light.

Oh yeah, and the whole “figment of the imagination” thing. That was a lot to take in too.

Still, it was nice to see Jack again. 

Marvin looked down at his phone. Seán had given him his number if they needed to get back in touch. 

Of all the people he used to be close to, Jack was probably the least asshole-y. Maybe talking to him more would be nice. Especially since they had similar backgrounds.

The drive to Athlone was short enough that he could travel it for a weekend.

He opened the texting app.

From: M. O’Sullivan

To: S. McLoughlin

M.O.: Hey, could I come back up in a few days? I’d like to hang out more.

A few moments later, the phone dinged with a reply.

S.M.: Sure thing! :) 

[square-enix-headcanons]

Can I request the Organization doing recon at the Kingdom of Corona with their S/O during the lantern celebration and their S/O is too distracted enjoying the festival to do their job? (Kind of like Flynn did with Rapunzel.)

Awwww!!

(/edit omg I’m so sorry I forgot Xemnas sdhjkhk)

Xemnas

It’s the first trip to this new world, so Xemnas decided to do the first recon mission himself

You had no idea what to expect, so the festival is a very welcome surprise

However, that also means there’s a lot of world to do recon in

And, well, you’re definitely not supposed to interact with the people living here!

“We’ve spent enough time here; let’s continue somewhere else.”

He may be right, but damn, the festival would be so much more fun!

Still, the two of you leave the city pretty quickly; Xemnas will have to send someone else for the recon job in there

Xigbar

While he loves fooling around, his main priority is usually still the mission

So theoretically, he can’t let you get distracted before you’re done

But… There’s something about seeing you look back at the stands when he tries to leave with you…

He suggests you split up; you do recon at the festival, take notes about what kind of people you see at the stands etc

That way, you can enjoy the festival as long as you at least take some notes

(In the end, it’s just one mission, and not a too important one - to him at least. Long-term, it won’t matter if you only do a mediocre job at it)

Xaldin

Seriously annoyed by it

“Don’t you think you have wasted enough time with this already?”

(Bold words coming from the jerk I had to go fetch from Beast’s Castle!)

It’s… Kinda hard to enjoy the festival if you can feel his glare the entire time

So you decide to do your best and at least try to focus on the mission first

If you finish early enough, Xaldin is perfectly willing to watch the lanterns with you, though!

Vexen

He really tries to keep you on task

And tbh, he doesn’t quite get what you find so fascinating about the festival in the first place

“Yes yes, that’s all very nice dear, but can we now please focus on the task at hand?”

At some point, he decides it’s not worth it, and pretty much… ditches you to finish the mission on his own

To his credit, though, he won’t sell you out. He just doesn’t keep you company during the festival

Lexaeus

He is happy you’re having this much fun

But while he’d love to just hang out and enjoy it with you, there is a mission to be done

So whenever you get distracted, he reminds you that there’s something you’re supposed to be doing

The mission probably ends up taking more than twice as long as it should have, but you manage to finish it together

At least you got done before they let the lanterns fly, and Lexaeus suggests you do it together

Zexion

It takes him a bit to even notice how distracted you are

He can get very focused on stuff, and just assumed you were working, too

He notices when he turns to say something to you and you’re… Not there

Kinda annoyed, since he didn’t want to do all the work!

He doesn’t directly chew you out, but he gets very snarky with you. There’s a job to be done, after all!

If you finish early, he wouldn’t mind watching the lanterns together; he might even agree to strolling through the streets, looking at the stands, etc

However, the mission comes first

Saix

He’s kind of torn

On one hand, it’s kinda cute how excited you get

On the other, he already has one member who keeps slacking off, he doesn’t want to have to deal with another

He actually drags you away from the stands and reminds you there’s a mission

The more distraced you get, the more annoyed Saix gets, which… Kinda kills the mood

You even miss the lanterns completely due to the mission

Axel

He tries to motivate you for the mission instead

He kinda gets it; the festival is way more fun than whatever job you’re supposed to be doing!

But, well, you do need to do this job

In the end, he agrees to a short break to enjoy the festival a bit before returning to the job at hand

After the break, the two of you hurry up - maybe cutting some corners here and there - so you finish in time for the lanterns

Demyx

He gets it

He tends to get distracted during missions, too, tbh

Suggests you two slack off and just enjoy the festival together

So you just spend the afternoon enjoying the festival, not getting any actual work done

You might even suggest doing the work once the lanterns have risen, but Demyx is like “Eh, nah, we did enough”

The report is… lackluster. Not that Saix expected anything else from Demyx, though.

Luxord

“It is quite marvelous, isn’t it, dear?”

He totally sees why you’d get distracted

(Especially considering there isn’t much fun stuff to do in the World that Never Was)

He suggests a little gamble. A simple coin toss, and you get to call Head or Tails

If you win, you get to enjoy the festival while Luxord takes care of the mission, then joins you once he’s done

However, if you lose, Luxord is the one who goes to the festival while you have to work

Good luck!

Marluxia

He does understand you

However, right now, both of you should be focused on the mission

If he’s gonna betray the Organization, preferably with you by his side, he can’t have Saix keeping a closer eye on him so he can’t slack off

If you’re too distracted, he’ll ask you to do recon in one of the outer areas while he does the main streets - Fewer stands there to distract you

If there’s some time left, he definitely wants to watch the lanterns with you though

And he gets you some nice trinket from one of the stands

Larxene

“Come on, we have work to do.”

She’s kind of impatient; it’s just a random festival, she doesn’t care about this kind of stuff

… or so she claims

If you look closely, you might notice that she sometimes gets distracted, too, though not as much as you do

Still, she insists on finishing the mission first - But says you don’t need to do too well on it

Which means cutting quite a few corners, doing just enough that you won’t get in trouble

And then you still get to spend some time on the festival

Roxas

Well… He’s kinda curious about the festival, too

Since he’s never been on one before

He first tries to remind you about the mission, but soon enough asks a few questions about what all this is

He will try to remind you about the mission occasionally, though; the festival is nice, but to him, it’s not that great

You end up gathering barely enough intel for a report; you do get chewed out by Saix, but it’s not bad enough that you have to go do another recon mission

Xion

Like Roxas, she’s never been to a celebration

She starts asking questions pretty quickly; what the whole thing is, what it’s about, etc

She’d really like to spend time enjoying the festival, but the mission comes first for her

So, she tries to get you to focus so you can finish a bit more quickly and have some time left to enjoy

If you really can’t focus, she’ll tell you to stay and enjoy the festival while she finishes up the actual mission

If she misses out on the entire festival (and if it’d have been faster with you there), she’ll be kinda annoyed, but not for too long

(Especially not if you get her a pretty trinket at the festival)

[shewas-agaystripper]

The Clinic: Part Sixteen

The Clinic: Part Sixteen

Brian is sent off to Queen Mary's Psychiatric Hospital to cure his depression and borderline. His roommates, John in particular, help him push through this difficult time in his life

Hello dear people! It’s been a while since the last part part of The Clinic was uploaded, which has mainly to do with the fact that my original blog of six years was deteled by Tumblr without any sign or warning, and they would not react to any mails so I had to start all over; and two weeks into waiting for them to reply my laptop broke down and I had to take it back to the store. They said it would take 3-4 days to fix it but it took 18 so that was great! However, I now have my laptop back, and I have a new blog (with basically the same name but different dashes). Please feel free to talk to me and shoot me messages! I’m feeling kind of lonely on my new blog still :s

Anyway! The good news is that I finished Part 16 on an alternative laptop, and Part 17 will be finished before the end of the week also, and will follow suit! 

Have fun reading, and any sort of feedback or suggestions is appreciated!

P.s. Normally I’d link all the previous chapters here, but as SOMEONE @staff) deleted my whole entire blog, they’re now gone. If you haven’t read the previous chapters yet, or would like to reread them first, here is the whole thing on my AO3 account!

‘We’ll see you tomorrow, then, in doctor Imholz’ office. Try and fill in as much of this paperwork already, and make sure to be on time.’

With that, a stack of files, and a handshake from each of the individuals present in the dusty but surprisingly spacious staff meeting room, Brian was given permission to leave the room, and he all but stumbled outside. When he closed the door behind him, he could not help but lean against it with his back, close his eyes, and take a deep breath - something he felt like he had been unable to do for the past two hours. 

After having announced to Nolan and doctor Imholz the evening before that he intended to file for a reassessment to try and be dismissed from Queen Mary’s for the sake of being able to support John when he was released, his mentor had called together what they had called a crisis meeting in which staff discussed the viability of Brian’s wish to be released before. It had been a long and stressful meeting, one in which Brian had largely been left to sit back and let people he’d never been aware were responsible for his progress throw technical terms and mental jargon at each other. He had hardly been asked to explain his reasons for wanting to leave Queen Mary’s so soon, but the overall consensus in the end was that they would grant his wish for a reassessment. That was - he had been at Queen Mary’s for at least three months; had never perpetrated any acts of disobedience, vandalism, violence, and the like; had never skipped any meetings with his superiors; had always displayed what Nolan had called ‘proper and respectable behaviour towards staff and patients’, and, borderline or not, he was deemed capable enough to make his own decisions and understanding the consequences of them. 

Thank God. At least they still treated him as human despite the label they had stuck on him.

‘How’d it go?’

Brian recognised the voice of the speaker sooner than he saw him, even though he should have been able to see him from - as a matter of speaking - miles away. Being one of the few patients with long blond hair, Roger always stood out a bit; but now that he was the only one to be seen in the otherwise empty hallway, let alone that he was leaning against the wall right across from Brian, really made hi unmistakeable to Brian, even now that his mind was spinning like a whirlwind. 

‘Eh… I think it went alright?’ Brian said somewhat hesitantly. ‘They said I meet the, uh, qualifications to apply for a reassessment.’

‘And?’ Roger asked, eyes brightening with hope but still a bit cautious, as he, of course, had no idea what had been discussed in his absence. 

‘They said they’ll make a phone call to the board right this afternoon to formally open the process of reassessment.’

‘No way! That’s great news! You’ll get to leave!’ Roger all but shouted across the hallway, and before Brian could prepare for it, he was tackled in a hug so sudden and so tight that he almost dropped the stack of papers he had been clutching against his chest. To be fair, he was still clutching them against his chest; now that Roger had enveloped him in a nearly reckless embrace, there was no other place for him to put his arms other than squeezing them tight against his body. It was uncomfortable for a bit, mainly because Brian wasn’t so outgoing himself, and wasn’t used to Roger behaving this way either. However, as Roger continued to hold him tight and seemed to try and rock him encouragingly by skipping from one leg to the other, all while unintelligible but nonetheless encouraging sounds escaped him, Brian could not help but smile. It was good to see Roger, who he had seen so down and helpless during multiple relapses into whatever drugs he could find himself, be in such a positive mindset again. Of course, nothing was set in stone yet, and Brian realised all too well that chances were that incriminating information against him could be found during his trial, that the psychiatrist who would be called in to examine him could vote against him leaving, and that the jury might deem him unable of returning to society as of yet. But if the official start of his procedure to try and be acquitted from Queen Mary’s brought his friend so much hope and joy, then who was Brian to bring him down?

‘Oh my God, and you’ll be able to leave Queen Mary’s and live happily ever after with John far away from this clown academy!‘ Roger continued to mumble against Brian’s shoulder, and Brian snorted. 

‘That’s a name for Queen Mary’s I haven’t heard before.’

‘Am I wrong though?’ Roger asked, looking up at him in all seriousness. His blue eyes shone brighter than they had done in ages, and Brian couldn’t help but wish that Roger could always be like this, bright and bubbly and alert and happy. 

‘You’re not. But if you don’t stop crushing me now, this clown will have to be admitted into the infirmary with a pair of broken ribs.’

Roger let go of him with a sigh. ‘Don’t think I will leave clown academy alive if John finds out I broke your ribcage.’

Brian felt his heart skip a beat at the mentioning of the name of his partner. John, who had gone through a dreadful night filled with tearful wake-ups and nightmares, and who unfortunately had been least comforted by the idea that Brian was filing for a reassessment among the four of them. Brian had hoped that making that promise to John would alleviate his worries, but it hadn’t quite been the miracle cure he had hoped for. Looking back at it, he should have known better than to think that John’s grey skies would turn to blue at the mere mentioning of the option of reassessment. Despite the fact that John’s depression turned every good news bleak, it was also not at all guaranteed yet that he’d actually be allowed to leave. After this morning’s meeting they had clarity at least to the extent that Brian could be filed for a reassessment, but this of course did not mean his case would be approved of, or how long it would take for his psychiatrists to come to a conclusion. It might take months for all he knew - months of time he simply did not have. 

‘How is he?’ Brian asked carefully. 

‘Very quiet ever since you left for that meeting. We couldn’t persuade him to go out with us to play, so we stayed with him in our dorm.’

‘Thanks,’ Brian said. ‘That you didn’t- didn’t go off without him.’

‘Of course not. We know he’s not very stable at the moment, and he might do things that he’d…’ Roger’s voice trailed off as he searched for the right words to express what they both knew was possible but which neither of them was particularly eager to speak out loud. ‘Either way, he’ll be glad to hear you’ve been approved for reassessment.’

‘Yes, we should go tell him,’ Brian said, trying to oppress the hint of excitement he felt; after all, he had no idea how or even if John was going to react to this spark of good news. ‘Where is he?’

‘In the canteen with Freddie. Can you imagine how confused I was to see Freddie having to drag John to the canteen instead of the other way around?’ Brian, who could not picture the scene at all, shook his head. ‘Come on, I’ll take you there. Lunch started about ten minutes ago but I’m sure they saved us a plate. I’m bloody starving.’

Brian again nodded in agreement - that was, to the part where Roger said they would head back to the canteen. He was not exactly hungry, and would not mind at all if John, in his current state of depression, and Freddie, with his current solitary task of keeping an eye on John, hadn’t thrown some mediocre sandwiches and milk cartons together for their missing friends. Roger might mind a little more, though; he had gone without heroin for quite some days now, and as a result of this was starting to get food cravings. The evening before he had eaten more than all of his roommates together, and breakfast this morning had followed the same pattern. Freddie had looked at him with a glance of horror and Brian could swear he could see Freddie counting up the number of calories and the grams of fat in his head as Roger was making his way through his third serving of milk and honey loops. Personally Brian didn’t think of it as a problem at all. Roger was skin and bone after years of heroin dependency, so if this sudden food /sprawl/ would result in a few extra pounds, it would probably be for the better.

Brian followed Roger through the hallway, half-heartedly listening to his talk of the constant headaches and cold shivers that he experienced now that it had been numerous days without heroin or any other addictive. He nodded and said ‘yes’ and ‘amen’ when appropriate, but it wasn’t until Roger shouted at him to watch his step that he was taken out of the depth of his own mind.

‘Is it Tuesday today? I hope it’s Tuesday, it’s when they sometimes have croissants at lunch. If so, I hope Freddie saved me some, because I’m seriously craving some croissants with jam right now- watch your step!’

A strong hand around his wrist tugged him to the side, and Brian almost lost his balance. His first instinct was to scold Roger for catching him off guard all of a sudden, but when he looked down at the floor below him, his flurry of anger disappeared at once. Half leaning against the wall, half sprawled across the floor was a young man, whose closed eyes and pale face at once struck Brian as a corpse. 

‘Oh my God, Oh my God, Roger-’ Brian clamped a hand over his mouth and staggered a few steps back, staring in pure disbelief at his friend, who somehow remained completely calm and unbothered as he crouched down next to the body.

‘It’s okay. It’s nothing,’ Roger told him. ‘Or well, nothing- just some drugs. He’s still breathing and I can feel a pulse,’ Roger said, his hand around the man’s wrist. ‘Alexej, can you hear me?’  

‘You know this guy?’ Brian asked, still keeping at least a six feet distance between him and the guy who seemed more dead than alive.  

‘Of course. We’re in counseling together every morning. Group therapy or whatever it’s called,’ Roger said nonchalantly. ‘Alexej, can you hear me?’ he repeated - and then, when the guy again did not reply, a sharp slap to his left cheek made Brian shriek and Alexej groan and open one tired eye.

‘Roger!’ Brian whimpered.

‘Don’t worry. I’m in this scene, I know what I’m doing,’ Roger replied without looking up, and Brian was unsure if this answer should console him or stress him out even more. ‘Alex, say something.’

‘Hnn… I feel fuckin’… awful, man,’ the guy said under his breath, but Brian was still able to hear, besides the Slavic accent, the slur in his voice. He had no idea how Roger stayed calm in the midst of this, but then again - Freddie had also always remained calm and collected whenever Roger messed up his clean streak again and was found lying on the dorm room floor with a syringe lodging in his elbow. It was something some people could apparently get used to, but Brian had known right from the start that he was not among these ‘happy few’, or whatever one wanted to call them. 

‘Bet you do. Now, listen. Did you do this yourself?’ Roger asked him. Alexej nodded slowly, and Roger did so too. ‘How much?’

‘Wha?’ Alexej opened one eye again.

‘How many grams?’

His eye fell shut again. ‘Don’t… recall.’

‘Right. Well, sit still, I’m taking this syringe out of you.’ With trained expertise, Roger pulled the needle out of the man’s elbow. It was only when the object had been removed that Brian could see how bruised the skin in and around the addict’s elbow was. The image of it made him queasy, even though he had beheld similar sights on Roger’s arms time and time again. 

Alexej grunted when the tip of the needle was removed from his skin, and a drop of blood trickled down from the small puncture. Roger wiped it away and held the syringe up in the air to inspect the item at close quarters. Brian could not have determined anything from the injection, but Roger, an expert of the field, shook his head condemningly.

‘The filler area is still half full, and there are particles in it. Where’d you get this trash?’

‘Geoff sold it to me.’

‘Of course he did,’ Roger rolled his eyes. ‘Listen, don’t buy his shit again. If this is baking soda or whatever it can cause serious problems,’ he lectured, as if doing heroin wasn’t dangerous enough on its own. Brian would have snorted if the entire situation wouldn’t have been so pathetic. ‘It can clog your blood vessels or even arteries, and you can die from that. I know life in here is shit but it’s not worth dying for. You’re with me?’

‘Got it,’ Alexej grumbled.

Roger nodded, then held the injection up in the air again. ‘This syringe must be rather new. The needle is still very sharp - you don’t see that often in here,’ he said, lightly jabbing the tip of it against his forefinger, which made Brian more than a little nervous. ‘You don’t mind if I keep this as a reward for helping you, Alex, do you?’ he asked, and brought the injection up to the back pocket of his jeans.

‘Roger!’ Brian hissed, and his friend looked up with an innocent expression that definitely was completely unfit for the current situation.

‘What?’ Roger asked.

‘Put that back!’ Brian told him, and Roger, bringing up the syringe again, stared at the object, then at the source of it, and then back at Brian.

‘You mean like this?’ he asked, and Brian couldn’t prevent a gasp of horror when he saw the tip of the needle disappear into the bruised inner area of Alexej’s elbow - quite literally the place it came from indeed.

‘Roger! Stop that!’ he whimpered.

‘Just joking,’ grinned Roger, who then showed that he’d slid the needle right past Alexej’s arm, but which from Brian’s viewing angle made it look as if he’d jammed the injection right back into his arm.

‘Not funny,’ Brian all but pouted, unsure if his heart rate would recover from this stunt of Roger’s anywhere soon. 

‘It was hilarious and you know it,’ Roger said before turning to the person still on the floor. ‘Now, let’s get you on your legs and to the infirmary,’ Roger concluded and placed his hands under Alexej’s armpits, but his patient moved away from him with the little strength he could still muster.

‘No,’ he protested. ‘No infirmary. Been there. Isolation…’ From these half-sentences Roger and Brian were able to conclude that Alexej didn’t want to be sent to the infirmary out of fear that they’d put him in isolation to sober him up, but Roger clearly thought this objection was irrelevant.

‘I’m not gonna have you die on me, Alex,’ he said, gesturing for Brian to come over and help him haul the man off the floor. Brian cautiously stepped closer and positioned himself at the other side of his body, and hesitantly followed Roger’s example of placing his arm under Alexej’s armpit.

‘Won’t… just… no nurses,’ their companion said, struggling to try and keep himself on the floor when Brian’s and Roger’s joint power tried putting him back on his feet. Roger and Alexej argued back and forth, until Roger eventually told his groupmate that he could go if he’d be able to climb the stairs up to the dorm rooms himself. Having made this deal, Alexej allowed Brian and Roger to pick him up beneath the armpits and escort him through the hallway and towards the stairs, on the way of which they fortunately did not come across any staff members who might notice that something was off.

It took some time, persistence, and Roger’s threat of calling in the nurse after all to get Alexej upstairs and in bed. Brian judged that he looked somewhat better than he had done before, and after having gotten him a glass of water and Roger promising him he’d drop by later that afternoon to check up on him, the two men left the room behind to finally go to lunch and meet their friends. Roger was a little disgruntled at having missed the largest share of lunchtime, as he was still ‘hungry enough to eat an entire horse,’ and Brian was anxious to see John and bring him the news. They skipped downstairs, paced towards the canteen, and Brian had Roger somewhat begrudgingly throw the syringe he’d gotten from the encounter with Alexej in the bin before they entered the canteen. They found their friends at the usual spot at the back of the canteen, and Brian all but ran towards them. Somehow Roger was still faster than he was - presumably because he saw a plate loaded with croissants in the middle of the table, the promise of which seemed to make him forget about the syringe he’d just had to throw away on Brian’s watch. 

Once they reached the table, Roger was the first to slump down on the chair next to Freddie, and Brian sat down across from him on the vacant chair next to John. John did not look up at either of them, which made Brian’s heart sink a bit - but the smallest of a smile appeared on his partner’s face when he put his hand over those John had placed in his lap.

Roger was the one to do the talking once he’d settled down and grabbed a croissant from the plate. ‘Sorry we’re late. Had to patch up someone of my drugs group again.’

‘Henry again?’ Freddie asked.

‘No, Alexej. The Latvian guy,’ Roger mumbled between two bites of croissant.

‘Don’t think I know a Latvian guy around here,’ Freddie frowned. ‘But what do I care! How did the meeting go, Brian? Please tell me you’ve got some good news.’

Brian smiled at him, which was really all he had to do; the mere curling of his lips made Freddie squeal in delight.

‘You were approved for reassessment! Oh my God!’ Freddie flashed the biggest smile he’d ever seen him do, and even John looked up with a sparkle of hope in his eyes. ‘You’ll get to leave with Deaky!’

‘I’ve merely been approved, Freddie,’ said Brian, who - despite loving Freddie’s enthusiasm - knew he had to remain realistic. However, now that he had seen John smile at the good news, he allowed himself to share some positivity between the four of them. ‘But they’ve gone to my records and found nothing against me. No drugs smuggling or violence or being disrespectful towards the staff or anything, so the process can go ahead.’

‘Darling, that’s amazing news,’ Freddie said. ‘So what happens now? When will you have meetings with your psychiatrist and such?’

‘I’ll be assigned a new psychiatrist to evaluate me. Someone neutral, they said. I’ll get to meet him tomorrow morning,’ Brian said.

‘What’s his name?’ Freddie asked.

‘You probably don’t know him - he’s coming from an external mental hospital. They have to make sure he doesn’t know a thing about me yet and can’t be prejudiced in any way. Even Sarah and Jasper and doctor Imholz don’t know him,’ Brian said. ‘But his name is Fisher. I hope he’s alright.’

‘I’m sure he’ll be alright. And even if he’s dumb, all you’ll have to do is keep up with him for what, two sessions or so?’ Roger said, grasping the second croissant of the plate.

‘Five sessions,’ Brian corrected him. ‘I’ll see him once every day starting tomorrow until the end of the week. Then he’ll make a judgement about whether I’m ready to leave or not, and if he approves, he’ll vouch in favour of my request at the final hearing.’

‘Final hearing?’

‘Yes, in like three, three and a half weeks my case will go to a kind of court that will decide what to do. You know, two people from the board that rule this and other mental hospitals across the country will hear my case, and make a final decision. Those and - and my former psychiatrist.’ Brian could hear his own voice fall when he mentioned this past member of the jury. He had repressed every memory of professor Sumner for the past few days, even though he knew that once he’d go for a reassessment he would be standing eye to eye with him sooner or later. The thought of it was enough to make him shiver, which John seemed to realise, too. Somewhere along the line of the conversation, Brian had retreated the hand he’d placed on top of John’s hand to be able to awkwardly pluck at his own nails, but now he felt John putting his hand on his upper leg and gently stroking him as a form of wordless comfort. They shared a sideways glance with each other and smiled, which was enough to make Brian realise that his partner’s happiness was worth having to deal with Sumner again a thousand times over. 

Roger, still, was unimpressed with the entire procedure. ‘I think just skipping over the barbed wire would be easier than going through all of this crap. But I’ve gotta admit that I’m pleasantly surprised. I never would have thought Queen Mary’s would be able to pull off an actual protocol like this.’

‘Well, we don’t know that yet,’ Brian said. ‘They called someone in to evaluate me, is all they’ve done so far. And handing me two threes worth of paperwork to fill out.’ He nodded at the pile of papers he had dragged along from the meeting, and Freddie was the first one to pick up the documents lying on top to have a look.

‘Code of conduct. Mental health statement. Mental health history. Family background. Plan for return to society,’ Freddie read out loud. ‘It’s as if you’re to become the British ambassador to Saudi Arabia or something.’

‘I’ve definitely got my work cut out for me,’ Brian said, massaging his temples with his fingertips. Nolan had quickly gone over many of the papers he’d have to fill out in the following weeks, but the amount of them had been so staggering that Brian had felt himself drift off after half a minute. He knew he’d have to bring himself around to fill everything out as well as possible, but the idea of it seemed so daunting. It was so weird, so final, to know that this could be his way out of Queen Mary’s. That within a month he could be free again, free to go and do as he pleased, instead of being locked behind the barred windows and the barbed fences of a mental health institution. It was as if he had been at Queen Mary’s for years, yet at the same time he felt like it had been just yesterday when he had handed over his suitcase and said goodbye to his parents. He wanted nothing more than to leave, especially for the sake of John, but he was nervous. What if he wasn’t ready for it yet? His depression was nowhere near cured, and since no one so far really seemed to know what caused and what could alleviate borderline, he doubted he was very much cured in that area. What if he was to leave Queen Mary’s only to have a breakdown, and be shipped right back in? What would become of John if Brian proved to be unable to deal with the mental mess he still found himself dealing with?

‘When is all of this due?’ asked Freddie as he piled up the lot of papers again.

‘The first papers for tomorrow. Not all of it, but… quite some, I think,’ Brian said. A mere look at the stack of paper was enough to make him feel nervous. 

Roger whistled shortly. ‘I was gonna invite you to go outside and play some music, but I’m afraid you won’t have time for that then?’ 

‘I’m afraid not, no,’ Brian answered. ‘This is, eh, kind of more important at the moment. I need to get this done as much as I can.’

‘I’ll come with you. I’ll help you fill them out,’ John said resolutely, and Brian felt his heart swell.

‘Thank you. I’d love that,’ he whispered at his partner, who smiled at him a little shyly. 

‘Marvellous. Do you want us to help you, too, or should we make way for you to get down to paperwork?’ Freddie asked. Normally Brian would have been too nervous to tell them off, but now that so much was at stake and four people working on the same task would probably just distract him, Brian politely told them John and he would manage on their own - something that, much to his relief, went down well with Freddie.

‘Great. But first the two of you got to eat. Both of you haven’t had any lunch yet, and the canteen is closing in like five minutes. Can you believe that I’ve actually gone through an entire croissant while you weren’t here?’

‘An entire croissant?’ asked an obviously surprised Roger, who never would have expected his boyfriend to eat something like that if not directly faced with the threat of being dragged into the infirmary if he would not budge and eat the calorie bomb.

‘Don’t get too excited, dear. I was merely trying to persuade John to eat,’ Freddie said, which, Brian decided, sounded a lot more like something he would do.

‘You haven’t had anything yet, then?’ Brian asked John, who shrugged.

‘No. Not really hungry.’

‘Even not now that Brian’s come back with such good news?’ Roger asked, but the answer remained no. ‘Come on, Deaks, you have to eat something. Or do you need me to use my techniques for Freddie on you for a change?’ 

John now grimaced, and picked up a croissant from the plate, from which he slowly started plucking strips of bread. Roger, Freddie, and Brian enthusiastically spoke of the progress Brian’s case might be making and what to say to doctor Fisher when he would be standing eye in eye with him - whether to be all upbeat or to be sincere about his emotional condition. Brian, in the meantime, could not really get a hold on what John was feeling. On the one hand he did nod and smile every now and then, and answered without a problem when he was asked a question by one of his friends. Still, his heart did not seem in it, and when the lunch lady came over to tell them lunchtime was over, he had only munched down about half of the croissant, and seemed relieved he was now able to toss the remains of it back on the plate. It was Brian who tried to see if there would be some leeway that would allow them to take some food up to their room.

‘Could we maybe just finish these last croissants upstairs?’ he asked the middle-aged woman, who scanned him and his friends over for a few seconds. ‘It’s just that we had a special meeting with our psychiatrist and only got here five minutes ago,’ Brian tried, which seemed to make the lady think.

‘You know that officially I can’t allow that. It’s against policy,’ she said.

‘Please? John here has barely had anything yet,’ Brian added.

‘It’s okay,’ John said. ‘I’m not hungry. I’ll just have a cup of tea and we’ll go back to our room,’ he said, giving a nod into the direction of the vendor at the other side of the canteen.

‘I’m afraid that won’t do,’ the woman said. 

‘Are you in that much of a hurry to close off the canteen?’ Brian asked. He knew staff had been given orders from above to close off the canteen right after mealtimes, but did that really leave no room for someone to grab a drink before leaving? 

‘Darlings, have you been living underneath a stone?’ Freddie asked. ‘The coffee and tea vendor has been dismantled.’

‘The coffee vendor- why?’ Brian asked with genuine surprise.

‘Because last week Drew threw a cup of burning coffee in Clyde’s face, and he had to be taken to the local hospital for who knows what sort of degree facial burns,’ Roger said with an equal amount of amusement as irritation in his voice. 

‘I don’t even know why this sort of thing surprises me any longer,’ said Brian, lowering his face into his hands. If anything, it should surprise him that none of the masterminds they were surrounded by had come up with the idea of pulling off this prank earlier.

‘This is why we can’t have nice things, I suppose,’ John sighed, the legs of his chair scratching over the floor as he stood up.

‘You know, just take your croissant. You don’t strike me as the trouble-making kind,’ the woman said, which made Freddie grin mischievously, telling Brian that something undoubtedly inappropriate was about to leave his lips.

‘Obviously you haven’t met cold turkey Roger before his seven o’clock shower blowjob yet,’ Freddie said with one arm sneaking around Roger’s waist, but it was quickly batted away by his less than amused boyfriend. 

‘Thank you. We’ll be on our way,’ Brian said to the woman who now looked at them as if she saw water burning. He caught Roger’s lower arm to drag him along and make sure he would not stay behind to say anything in reply to Freddie’s comment that could make the situation even worse than it was already. John understood the hint and followed right behind with the stack of papers Brian had left on the table, and Freddie, probably out of fear of being left to explain himself to a now traumatised lunch lady, wasted no time in following suit. 

Brian all but ushered the couple out of the canteen, and only let go of Roger when his friend was done threatening Freddie that he would take revenge on him one way or another. By the time this happened, they had reached their bedroom already; John opened the door and practically burst into their safe haven. Putting the paperwork on Brian’s nightstand, he flopped down on his own bed, covering his face in his hands. 

Brian was not too sure what to make of this behaviour. John had always seemed relieved to be back in their room after a long morning of group therapy and two shared mealtimes, but his relief to be able to crawl back into seclusion again for the upcoming hours seemed to consist of something more this time. John was still stressed out and feeling down regarding the judgement which had been made concerning his more or less forced removal from Queen Mary’s in a month, and the steps Brian had undertaken to try and be admitted in time with him had so far done little to ease his nerves. He wished he could do something for John to help him ease out of the whirlwind of worries and depressive thoughts, but for the time being, there was little he could do. Promising John he would be right there with him on the day he would be acquitted would be too risky; after all, even though things looked good for him so far, he could not guarantee that his case would be approved of by the jury of mental health experts he would have to appeal to at the end of this trial. Even if it was, he did not know when he would be set free from Queen Mary’s. The judgement date had been set at approximately three and a half weeks from now, meaning that he’d get to hear the decision a few days before John’s expulsion date. He doubted however if Queen Mary’s would let go of him right away, or if - just like in the case of John - they’d allow another month between the judgement and the date of dismission, to allow for a month of transition time. John was currently in the dismission period, which meant he had sessions with social workers who tried to help him establish a routine for when he’s got to leave and return to his old life.

Not that there was much left of his old life, in all honesty. Both his mother and the aunt and uncle he had lived with had thrown him out, and he had no other addresses to return to. The address Brian and he had discussed was that they’d go and live with Brian’s parents for the first few months, before finding an apartment on their own somewhere in the city - which was a plan Brian’s parents had approved of once they had overcome the shock of hearing that Brian was going for a reassessment to leave Queen Mary’s less than six months after he had been sent to it. The counsellors John had spoken too, however, were less convinced of this plan - mainly because it was of yet unsure if Brian would be released at all, or when exactly this would be. They were busy trying to set John up with guided community housing for people just released from hospital, prison, or mental institutions like the one he came from, taking no note of the fact that it would make John miserable to live in a community setting with around the clock guidance and interference. Brian knew that these social workers meant well, but he thought it really rather objectionable that they refused to listen to John’s opinion on being sent to a housing group, and kept pushing forward their vision regardless of the wishes of the one they worked for. The inability of the counsellors and John to see eye to eye on the question of where he was to go after Queen Mary’s would deliver him back into society made John cooperative to the counselling sessions, and brought stress and tension to his days and nights. Brian wished he could drag the counsellors over the desk by their ties and tell them what he thought of their method of ‘helping’ his partner, but since the sessions were closed to John and his mentor only, there was little he could do. All that was within his power was trying to convince his partner that they’d work their way around it, that his parents were willing to let him in even if Brian would not have been set free yet, and pray that his case would be approved of as soon as possible.

‘I’ll just grab my lyrics book and then Roger and I will be on our way,’ Freddie said as he dug through the stack of notebooks in the drawer of his nightstand. ‘Is there anything we can do for you before you leave?’

Apart from a handful of witty comments in the style of ‘burn down Queen Mary’s’ and ‘bribing the judges to make sure they approve of Brian’s case’ John and Brian had little serious matters to ask for, so Freddie and Roger left them with the promise that they’d be gone for a few hours so that the other couple could have lots of time to get down to the paperwork. They left with a handful of pens and a few notebooks, and before they knew it, Brian and John had the entire room to themselves.

‘Well then,’ said John, who by now had removed his hands from his face and reached out for the bunch of papers. ‘Shall we get going, then?’

Brian, in all honesty, was a tad disappointed by John’s offer to get right down to business. He would have preferred to first take a moment to talk about how John was doing today, with the eye on his partner’s reassessment case and the idea of having to leave sooner or later, but he could tell that John had brought up the idea of doing straight to the paperwork that needed to be tackled just so they would not have to talk about how he felt. Brian was not entirely sure if this was the right way to deal with one’s emotions, but after recent events, he knew better than to push John into talking when his boyfriend clearly did not want to. 

‘Alright,’ Brian said, taking a seat on his own bed. ‘What’ve you got there?’

John skimmed through the papers. ‘Family background and Code of Conduct. What do you wanna start with?’

‘I’ll have Code of Conduct. If I’m not mistaken that’s just the way I’m supposed to behave after I leave Queen Mary’s,’ Brian said, holding out his hand for John to give him the papers. Their beds had moved close enough to be at an arm’s length from each other, and Brian suspected it would not take long before they’d permanently shove their beds together just like Freddie and Roger did. 

‘I’ll have a look at the family background. See if there’s anything weird in there,’ John said, to which Brian nodded. For a moment or so they both quietly read through their assigned papers, the only sound being that of flicking papers and that of John’s humming. Though it distracted Brian from reading a little, he had never heard his partner hum before, and decided to let it be - it was cute, after all, and a sign that John felt comfortable. 

‘It says here I’m not supposed to spread overly negative opinions about Queen Mary’s,’ Brian eventually said. ‘And that I’m not allowed to reach out to the press to share negative experiences anonymously.’

‘So does that mean you can share negative experiences un-anonymously?’ John asked.

‘I guess so. Maybe because they can trace me down and beat me up then,’ Brian said.

‘They would if they’d have staff they could miss,’ John grinned.

Brian flicked the page, and read in comfortable silence until a question popped up in his mind. ‘Have you had similar papers to sign? You know, since you’ll be leaving soon?’

‘Yeah, these things sound kind of familiar,’ John said. ‘I just never paid much attention to them.’

‘You didn’t?’

‘Not after I asked if they would keep me if I refused to sign, and they said I’d be let go of regardless,’ John said, and Brian felt a pang of hurt when he was reminded once again that John did not really want to leave this place that was the only home he’d known for these past two years. ‘These papers are just a formality.’

‘Oh. Should I just sign then regardless?’

‘I don’t think you’ll be approved of if you refuse to sign their dumb codes of conduct, I’m afraid,’ John judged. ‘Besides, spilling the beans on Queen Mary’s doesn’t seem like something you’d do anyway.’

‘Probably not, no. Let me just get a pen,’ Brian said, leaning over to open the drawer of his nightstand, then his pencil case, and fish out one of the only two pens he possessed at the moment. Given that Queen Mary’s had a strict no-sharp-objects-policy, getting to keep two pens was a luxury that Brian had come to cherish and a right he wished to protect. With the ballpoint pen in his hand he skimmed through the last paragraphs - something about keeping confidential information confidential and not slandering the names of any of the staff or his fellow patients - he went to put a somewhat shaky signature on the dotted line at the end of the handout. Just as he was halfway through adding the date and location of signing to the document, John caught him by surprise with a business-like question.

‘What is the gross yearly income of your father?’

Brian blinked. ‘Excuse me?’

‘Not for my interest. It’s one of the questions they ask you to answer in this family background. Along with your parents’ work experiences since the age of eighteen, and their involvement with law enforcement for the past twenty-five years, including petty crimes like parking fines and speeding tickets and such.’

Brian took a few seconds to reflect before replying. ‘It really is as if I’m becoming the ambassador of Saudi Arabia,’ he eventually mumbled. ‘Seriously though, how am I supposed to know whether my father was ever fined for driving through a red light before I was even born?’

‘Guess we’ll have to cross-examine him when we see him this weekend,’ John shrugged, straightening out the paper. ‘Both of your parents are coming, right?’

‘Yeah, they should be,’ Brian said. ‘At least that’s what mum said on the phone.’ He could sense John looking at him, but he did not have the courage to look him in the eyes at the moment, so he focussed his attention on the pen he now rolled between his thumb and forefinger. 

‘Are you nervous about seeing them again? Now that- well, since you broke the news to them yesterday?’

Brian hadn’t expected John to ask this question. He wasn’t usually the one to talk about emotions, let alone to bring up the topic if he was not coaxed into doing so. However, even though Brian wasn’t sure if he was quite in the mood to talk about it, he supposed he owed John something of an explanation at this point. He had told John that he had broken the news of trying to leave to his parents, and that they agreed to his request of letting them move in until they’d get an apartment for themselves, but other than that, he had been rather quiet about the whole matter. Part of it was because John hadn’t been very talkative about his reassessment either, but his parents’ emotional reaction had also been weighing in. This was something he had not told John, but he had a feeling that his boyfriend had been able to sense it - and now that he directly addressed the matter, it seemed best to Brian to break it to him.

‘A bit, I guess. My dad wasn’t happy, and my mom - well, eh, she cried. Said I was wasting my chance of healing by getting away from Queen Mary’s before they could complete their job,’ Brian mumbled, and he could feel John’s empathetic eyes on him. ‘But she said that if it was really what I wanted, then she would support me,’ he shrugged it off, even though he still had not completely overcome his mother’s reaction. It was weird in a way, because he had heard her cry a lot over the past six months - the days prior of his admission, the day of his admission, upon saying goodbye, the first few times they had telephoned, the first visit his parents had paid to him at Queen Mary’s - but this seemed different for some reason. Different, perhaps because now she cried not because she missed him, but because she felt so powerless now that he was leaving Queen Mary’s before his treatment was over - she might even be afraid of what was to become of him now that he might soon be out and about in society again. Because she was disappointed in him, or at least with his decision - which was incredibly hard to stomach for Brian. 

‘I’m sure she will support you,’ said John, who reached out a hand to put on Brian’s shoulder. ‘And your father will also come around sooner or later. He always does, you told me once, right? This will be no different.’

‘Probably, yeah,’ Brian said somewhat vaguely. ‘I mean, he’s got little choice - my mum already said yes to our plans, and regardless of what my dad might think, it’s my mum who wears the pants around the house,’ Brian chuckled, but his amusement faded when something else came to mind. ‘She was also the one to send me here, now that I think about it.’

‘She did that because she cares about you, sweetie,’ John said in the softest, most tender voice - one Brian would only get to hear when John tried to comfort him. ‘She couldn’t know it would be such a shitshow in here. She did what she thought would be best for you.’

‘It was, in a way,’ Brian sighed. ‘I never would have met you and those other clowns if I hadn’t been sent here.’

John pulled a face. ‘Out of all possible nicknames you could have called me, clown would be the one I personally never would have used. I’ve never said anything funny in my life.’

Brian begged to differ. ‘You called this place a shitshow like three seconds ago. And Roger called Queen Mary’s a clown academy just this morning.’

‘Sounds like him,’ John snorted before he pulled his hand away from Brian’s shoulder and tucked it under his head, taking in the sight of the ceiling for a moment before he said: ‘I’ll miss him when I’ll have to leave. You know, despite all the drama with his addiction and his vulgar comments and his annoying- annoying everything, I’ll still miss him. And Freddie, of course. I’ll miss him and his stupid enthusiasm about everything.’

Brian smiled at John’s way of appreciating their roommates, who overtime had become so much more than that. ‘I know. I’ll miss them too if I do get to leave. We’ve become such a team overtime.’

‘I never would have thought so before you got here,’ John admitted. ‘When I’d been assigned to a room with Freddie and Roger about a year ago, I thought I’d lose my mind. They were so… loud and intense and dramatic. I didn’t talk to my psychiatrist for a week when he refused to have me switch to another room. But I got used to them, and then you came around… And it just fit. You brought balance between all of us. You’re like… I don’t know. Some kind of glue that stuck us together.’

‘You’re so sweet,’ Brian smiled. ‘I’m sure Freddie and Roger will miss you just as much. I already overheard their plans of jumping on you for the longest hug you’ve ever had in your life on the day you leave here.’

John, contrary to what Brian had expected, did not pull a face but smiled back at him. ‘And you’re just letting them have that record?’

‘You know you can tell me if you need a cuddle,’ said Brian as he dragged himself up from his own bed in order to join John on his.

‘I can’t. Too antisocial to ask for physical intimacy,’ John said, although he did stretch out his arms to invite Brian into his bed and, more importantly, into his embrace. 

‘Physical intimacy, you say?’ Brian wiggled his eyebrows at John.  

‘This sort of thing is the reason why I’m antisocial in the first place,’ John sighed, but he leaned into the touch of his boyfriend anyway.

‘But you’ve made great progress,’ Brian remarked, tucking a loose strand of John’s hair behind his ear. ‘You talk during group therapy sessions, you go out and have fun with us and even with other people sometimes, like that time in the gym. You’re even allowed to leave because you’re doing so much better socially.’

‘Forced to, more like,’ John muttered. ‘I don’t want to leave.’

Brian, who felt like this might be a gateway to talking about John’s emotions concerning leaving Queen Mary’s in more depth, asked: ‘Even not if I go with you?’ 

‘That’s better, of course, a lot better. But I’m still - afraid. You know, what if I’m just a burden to your parents? What if they send me away just like… like everyone else?’

This was something Brian heard for the first time, and something that caught him by surprise, even though perhaps it shouldn’t have. John had seemed relieved when Brian had told him that they could live with his parents when they would first be dismissed from Queen Mary’s, but every place he’d ever lived had eventually kicked him out - his family home, his aunt and uncle’s place, and now Queen Mary’s. His fear of being expulsed again was reasonable, but Brian wished to tackle it. ‘What? They’d never send you away, honey. Trust me, they’re not that kind of people.’

‘But what if they don’t like me?’ John asked.

‘Why would they dislike you? You’re sweet and quiet and respectful. My parents will adore-’

‘Because I’m the reason you’re leaving prematurely,’ John burst in. ‘I’m the one who- you know, took away your chance at healing if all of this goes through.’

Oh, Lord. That was an aspect Brian hadn’t considered yet, but when John mentioned it, it hit him like a brick. Of course John worried about the effect he’d have on Brian now that his partner was trying to leave Queen Mary’s for his sake, and of course he worried about what Brian’s parents would think of him if this was to be one of his first impression on them. It explained John’s recent quietness and reticence, and Brian could hit himself in the face for not having seen it earlier.

‘Oh darling, is that why you’ve been so quiet about my reassessment?’

‘Maybe,’ John shrugged. ‘I just feel guilty.’

Brian, cuddling closer up to John said: ‘Never feel guilty. I never could have healed at this place of - of what exactly? Of staff members getting bitten in their arms when they try to break up a fight? Of dismantled coffee machines because the risk of people throwing hot coffee in each other’s faces is too high? Of secret isolation cells in the basement for if staff can’t handle the patients anymore and is not allowed to call the police out of management’s fear for inspection?’ Brian summed up. ‘I never could have healed here, John, and neither can you. This place is in the best interest of neither of us.’

‘I know,’ John gritted. ‘But that’s the thing - I want what’s best for you. And I’m not always sure that that’s me. Especially now that you’re about to be set free from Queen Mary’s, I’ve been wondering if I- if I should also set you free,’ John said with a sniff that Brian had a feeling preluded tears. It broke his heart seeing his partner like this, hearing how he felt about the influence he had on Brian, and his brain was working overtime trying to figure out something to say to show him that he had it all wrong - that being with him had made Brian feel infinitely better, and that he was the best thing that had ever happened to him, especially while here at Queen Mary’s. 

‘John- John, listen, honey. You are what’s best for me. I could never have imagined having come this far again, to the extent where I’m able to see that life is out there, and that I want to go back to it again. That’s all thanks to you,’ Brian said, cupping John’s face in his hands when his partner tried to shy away from his eyes. ‘Not because of Sarah’s endless chatter or Jasper’s enthusiastic but bloody annoying ‘thought schemes’ or whatever he calls them, but because of you. If it wasn’t for you, I would have stayed here, biding my time, waiting until they would either admit me back to my parent’s place again, or would ship me off to a long stay clinic. It’s thanks to you that I want to leave this place, go back to school, be back in touch with my friends and family, make a life again, together with you. Because you’re the one who showed me love again,’ Brian whispered, and he could swear he could see the tears in John’s eyes by now - and if those had just been an illusion, they were definitely there when he added: ‘I never thought I’d experience love again until I found you.’

‘Fuck, Brian,’ John choked out, using the back of his sleeve to wipe away his tears. ‘You can’t just… make speeches like that on a regular afternoon and expect me to be okay.’

‘It’s okay to cry. It shows that you care.’

‘I know. I just still have to get used to like… emotions and stuff,’ John said. ‘Fuck, this is unbelievable. They really think they can put me back and have me be a functional member of society? This place honestly doesn’t know what they’re doing,’ he said, desperately trying to wipe out another line of tears, but the smile that shone through underneath told Brian that he was happy despite it all. 

‘Maybe they don’t, but we do,’ Brian said. ‘We’ll go out there, sort ourselves out, get a nice studio apartment, buy some cheap pots and pans and floral furniture you wouldn’t want to be found dead on at a second-hand store, go back to school or work or whatever we want to do. We’ll visit Freddie and Roger until they’ll be let go of. We’ll play music until the neighbours knock on the walls, and drink lukewarm tea from a dysfunctional hand-me-down kettle that already seemed too good to be true.’ John’s smile grew a little wider, and Brian added: ‘And we’ll have one of those weird spider plants that grow all over the place if you don’t watch it. We’ll adopt a scrawny old cat that sleeps in our bed and hangs in the curtains at least twice a week. Your turn.’ 

John blinked for a bit. ‘Oh, eh… Well, I’ll ruin at least three shirts because I can’t iron for the life of me. We’ll have instruments and strings and guitar picks all over the place.’

‘We’ll have to accept ugly knitted pillow cases and crocheted tablecloths from our mums, which we’ll only bring out when they come around to visit,’ Brian followed up.

‘We’ll have an old radio or TV which keeps buzzing regardless of how well you tune it, and we’ll hit the screen with a rolled-up newspaper if we’re frustrated, as if that will make things better.’

‘We’ll have joined showers because there’ll be too little hot water for the both of us to shower separately. And I only want biscuit tins that actually contain biscuits in the house. No needlework or lightbulbs or clothing pins or the like.’

John, who by now seemed to get the hang of the game, said: ‘We’ll spend all of our excess money on records, and hang sleeves up on the wall as decoration.’

‘We’ll dump out that dumb kettle and buy a decent one, and we’ll try out weird tea flavours all day. Pineapple tea, cotton candy, or tomato-broccoli flavour or so.’

John pulled a face. ‘And I’d dump it right into the plant pots when you’re not looking. That might make those weird spider plants stop growing.’

Brian snorted. ‘And then I’d buy a cactus, and we’ll be known as the first couple ever to manage to kill a cactus. I also want a bed with at least twenty pillows and five different sorts of blankets and duvets on it so we can roll around all night. All as mismatched as possible - really kitschy.’

‘We’ll play guitar in bed until late, until I fall asleep with my bass pics still in hand. And when we wake up in the morning you’ll make your nasty tea and I’ll put on a record on the record player next to the bed so we can stay in late and listen to the Beatles, and we’ll be happy.’

Those last words were the most meaningful Brian had heard John say concerning their upcoming freedom - whether Brian would be released at the end of this reassessment trial or whether he would have to sit out his time at Queen Mary’s until the end, they would stay together, and they would be happy. They’d overcome the turbulence of their youth, the problems of the past, the battles with themselves - they’d be together, united, and they’d be happy together. They’d have each other even if the world around them would crumble, and catch each other if they would fall.

Brian tightened his arms around John’s torso, and pulled him in for a chaste but meaningful kiss on the lips.

‘And we’ll be happy.’

# # # 

Unfortunately for the pair of them, John’s new-found positive outlook on Brian’s reassessment and leaving Queen Mary’s behind did not last long. A mere few hours after Brian and he had signed paperwork and reunited with Freddie and Roger for a game of mensch-ärgere-dich-nicht, a bomb threat from an anonymous culprit - most likely to be an ex-patient or relative to a patient of Queen Mary’s - destroyed whatever had been left of the atmosphere as the entire populace was escorted into the basement while police flocked around the building. Nothing was found, but the threat and the stress of hours spent in suspense waiting for the police report had put a permanent strain on all four of the members of Room 41, and none of them slept well during the night that followed. The usual drill of incident-filled mealtimes and hostility in the hallways and activity rooms took their toll on John, who was further discouraged from the forced acquittal process through another string of meetings with counsellors who tried arranging help he didn’t want and resources he didn’t need. 

Brian tried to keep John somewhat upbeat by reminding him of the upcoming visit of his parents, which he hoped John would see as a safe haven to stay after Queen Mary’s, but it seemed to have the polar opposite effect on John. Instead of taking comfort in the fact that there would be a family waiting to take him in when he would be released, the mere idea of moving in with people he did not know and living at their expense seemed to freak John out, and no amount of reassurance from Brian that his parents would not mind and would love to take him in could convince him otherwise - to the point where on the day of the scheduled meeting, John hardly dared to come out of his bed.

‘Come on, lovie,’ said Brian, who had seated himself on the bed next to John. His partner, currently lying on his stomach with his face buried in a pillow, tried hard to ignore him. ‘Nolan will be here in a few minutes. You have to get up.’

‘Don’t wanna,’ John murmured into his pillow. 

‘I know, but you’re going to do great.’ When John ignored this comment, Brian sighed, running a hand over John’s back. ‘What are you most afraid of?’

John huffed. ‘Everything.’

Well, that was not exactly a conclusive answer, but Brian knew what he meant. John feared meeting his parents, their reaction to him, the paperwork they’d have to sign, and most of all, the finality of his time at Queen Mary’s the meeting would signify. They would talk of plans for the future and questions would be asked regarding his background, his mental situation, his ideas for the upcoming years - the mere idea of which Brian knew freaked John out. Still, he remained hopeful that he could convince his boyfriend to get up, brave his fears, and go out there; it was important that John would get to see his parents at least once before permanently moving in with them, regardless of whether Brian would be joining him right away or not. Especially if Brian’s request of reassessment would be denied it would be important that John at least knew who his parents were, given that he’d then go to live with them without having Brian there to be his rock in an otherwise unknown environment. 

‘You shouldn’t be. My parents won’t think anything negative about you, believe me.’

‘I’m sure they’re thrilled to find that their only son came home with a suicidal college dropout who was disowned by his own family,’ John said, and Brian felt his heart sink in. He hated having to hear his partner talk about himself in this manner, and was determined to make him feel more secure about himself - especially in the light of the upcoming visit.

‘Everyone in here is a dropout of some sort. Does that mean we’re all failures? Does that mean Roger, Freddie, and I are failures?’ Brian knew it was a bit cruel to put John on the spot like this, but his words seemed to have some effect on his partner.

‘Of course you’re not. You have plans to go back to school and make something of your life.’

‘And you don’t?’ Brian asked him. ‘You don’t want to go back to college at some point in time?’

John shrugged. ‘I guess.’

Knowing that this was likely to be the most he was going to get out of John at this point in time, Brian said: ‘You will. We’re going to get out of here, take some time to readjust, go back to school, find ourselves an apartment. I’ll finish my degree and you’ll finish yours, or find a job you enjoy, or- or whatever makes you happy. I’ll support you regardless of what you choose to do.’

John now turned around to lie on his back and looked at him, and it looked like he wanted to say something - a word of thanks, or an affirmation that he’d do the same for Brian - but he ended up just looking at Brian until his gaze was eventually pulled away from his boyfriend when a knock on the door distracted his attention.

‘I’ll go get it, dears,’ said Freddie as he bounced off the bed with a bit too much enthusiasm for his emaciated body, but he nevertheless made it to the door without too much visible trouble. The door was opened and Freddie enthusiastically exclaimed that Nolan had arrived (a useless statement really, given that no one else but their mentor would ever approach their ‘stink cave,’ as Roger had taken to calling their room as of late) but neither of his friends reacted to the announcement. They just sat there, each on their own side of the bed, looking at each other; Brian with a glimpse of hope and John with a look of desolation on his face. Brian knew John would have given it all he owned to be able to skip this meeting, which gave Brian all the more reason to try his best and pick his boyfriend up from the depth of the mental rabbit hole he had dug himself into.

‘Come, let’s get up. Nolan is waiting for us,’ Brian said. He deliberately let out the fact that his parents must be waiting on them, too - the mere mentioning of the presence of his mum and dad was enough to make John slide back into desolation. Brian had never seen anyone as anxious about a meeting as John was at that given moment, and he was running out of things to say to comfort him.

‘Baby, you know you won’t be alone there. I’ll be with you the entire time, and so is Nolan,’ Brian said. John didn’t react. ‘Do you need anyone else there? Maybe Freddie or Roger…?’ he said with a hesitant look towards the other side of the room, but he was luckily met with smiles and nods.

‘Of course!’ Roger said, the overly enthusiastic tone of his reply quickly explained when he added: ‘I’ll have to miss my counselling for once, but I don’t think that will matter too much.’

‘No, I’m fine. Just Brian and Nolan will do,’ John said, much to the relief of everyone apart from the proposer himself.

‘Well, Nolan and I are ready whenever you are,’ Brian told him, then corrected himself when he realised the vast liberty this statement would grant his partner to stay in their room for the remainder of the day. ‘Nolan and I are ready, and we’d like to go. There’s a lot to discuss and they’ve planned an hour for this meeting,’ he said, careful to address the discussion of future plans with his parents as neutral as possible.

‘Hm-hmm,’ John hummed as a form of answer, but his eyes were empty, and he made no movements that indicated he was planning on getting up from the bed anywhere soon. Brian thus took matters into his own hands and stood up from the bed, taking a few steps to the left so he could stand in front of John.

‘Come on, honey. Time to go. We have to take care of this sooner or later.’ Brian reached out a hand towards his partner to help him get up from the bed, but John merely stared at it. Brian heard the soft murmur of Freddie’s and Nolan’s voices behind him, and he sighed deeply before crouching down to John’s level.

‘Listen, darling. I know you’re not very comfortable about meeting my parents and talking about what to do when you have to leave Queen Mary’s, but you’re only making it harder on yourself by not cooperating. You’ll have to leave in about three weeks, and we can’t change that. The best thing we can do is arrange something so we can stay together and support each other.’

John blinked, then finally spoke. ‘But what if you won’t be allowed to leave?’ 

‘Then I want to make sure you’ll be in the best place possible until I’ll be dismissed. And that place is going to be at my parents’ house. Please, John, give this a chance. I know you’re nervous, and you don’t want things to change, but things will change, and we’re gonna have to deal with that in the best way possible.’ Brian’s voice was a bit more insistent than he would have liked for it to be, but it at last seemed to have an effect on John.

‘Promise me you won’t leave me alone in there,’ John whispered - pleaded, nearly.

‘I promise. You just have to say the word to let me know you’re no comfortable. And you don’t have to answer any questions you don’t want to answer, in case anyone might ask them,’ Brian vowed. ‘Come with me?’ he asked. He stretched his hand towards John again, and this time John took it.

John was still visibly nervous - the smile he gave Nolan when they came face to face with him in the hallway looked tensed rather than sincere, and he kept his head down as they walked through the hallways, past the canteen and the staff rooms and into the corridor leading to the visiting area. Brian had only been to the place a few times before, but he remained uneasy each time a guard opened the multiple barred doors they crossed on their way. 

‘Your parents have already arrived, I’ve been told,’ Nolan said to Brian. ‘They’ve also signed the paperwork in which they vow to take in John and you, or just John in case of- well, in that case,’ Nolan cut himself off when Brian shot him a look. Brian was glad that his mentor understood the hint - right as John was heading for the meeting he’d been dreading since the very moment it had been planned was not exactly the right moment to bring up all that could still go wrong in Brian’s process. The string of meetings with Professor Fisher, the independent psychiatrists who had been assigned to supervise the case and oversee Brian’s ability to return to society, had gone well, and the professor had given his blessing to Brian’s appeal. It had been a victory for Brian and all those around him - apart from John. Every time an obstacle was removed from Brian’s path towards accelerated freedom, all John seemed to be able to see were the new mountains showing up on the way. 

To some extent, John had a point. Even though he had managed to push his appeal for freedom past the internal staff of Queen Mary’s and an outsider in the form of a psychiatrist, Brian had no guarantees that the eventual jury he’d have to beat up to would grant him leave. Especially the presence of his former psychiatrist Doctor Sumner did not sit comfortably with him, but he refused to let this prospect weigh him down; he had a task in front of him, and he was going to give it all he could. Nothing, not John’s negativity nor his own nerves, and most of all not Doctor Sumner’s preening eyes and tight-lipped smile were going to hold him back.

Nolan babbled on about the contact he’d had with Brian’s parents over the phone - something Brian had been unaware of, and something he did not know whether to appreciate or to be wary of - but it was only when they reached the last door that separated the three of them from his parents that Brian really felt his attention resurfacing to the presence. The guard who had walked them all the way over searched their pockets for forbidden items and had a small fit over the shaving cream bottle cap Brian had forgotten he’d put in his back pocket that morning for no particular reason other than not knowing where to leave it as he was shaving. Nolan managed to convince the guy that it was nothing, so the item was confiscated and they were given leave to enter the heavy iron door.

‘Alright, folks. Are you ready?’ Nolan asked with his usual upbeat expression on his face as he stepped over the threshold of the door. Brian was ready to do the same, but one look at John was all he needed to know that John needed a few more words of encouragement.

‘One second, Nole,’ Brian said, not realising he just called his mentor by the nickname Freddie sometimes used to refer to him in private. He stepped into the direction of John, who was still standing next to the guard - and who slipped back a few steps when Brian approached him.

‘John…’ Brian said quietly.

‘I- I can’t do this,’ John told him. ‘I need more time. I can’t do this now.’

‘But there isn’t more time,’ Brian said. Then, stepping close quickly enough to make it impossible for John to back away from him any further, he placed his hands on either of his boyfriend’s shoulders and said: ‘Listen, John. I wish I could give you all the time in the world, but we don’t have that luxury. We have to step up now to make the best out of the situation; we’ll regret it if we let Queen Mary’s rehabilitation services figure out our future for us,’ Brian said. ‘And I know you think you’re expected to go out there and put on your brightest smile and act like the perfect foster child or whatever for my parents to take you into their house, but you don’t. You don’t have to live up to any expectations. You don’t have to be perfectly sociable and nice - it’s not a competition where the winner takes it all and the loser is left behind. There is no losing here, you see?’ Brian took a second to take a break from his monologue, but picked it up again before John could disagree with him. ‘You’re going to get out of his Godawful place and move into a home where people will care for you, regardless of whether I’ll be released right away or a few months later. My parents already signed the papers and they promised to take you in and take care of you for as long as needed. And you don’t have to worry about them liking you or not, because they will.’

John had remained perfectly blank throughout the soliloquy, but he snorted at those last words. ‘They won’t. I’m a disappointment.’

‘You’re perfect and they’re gonna love you. You’re smart and funny and polite - if you choose to be so - and perfect company. My parents have always wanted to have a second child, and getting one at the age of twenty doesn’t mean they’ll be any less enthusiastic,’ Brian said with a little smile, and he could see that John’s face copied his despite his lover trying to look away from him. ‘And as for you… You could do with a family after all these years. A real family.’

At the mentioning of these words, John turned his face away from him even further, but this did not prevent Brian from seeing that tears were brimming his eyes. The idea of having a family, a house to come home to every night, a space where he did not have to feel like an outsider, a burden, an unwanted alien - Brian could tell that it touched John, and he knew that this was the right moment to usher him through the door before either of them could think better of it.

‘Come on. Let’s go in,’ Brian whispered with a soft yet steady hand on the small of John’s back. He heard John smother a sob and saw him wipe the back of his hand across his eyes, but once this had been taken care of, he allowed Brian to gently usher him towards the door through which Nolan had just disappeared. John halted for a second when they neared the threshold - his hand seemed to be seeking Brian’s, and the guitarist placed his hand on John’s and squeezed it shortly. 

‘I’m right here with you.’

‘I know,’ John whispered. With that, he stepped over the threshold; Brian followed him, and then the guard closed the iron door behind them, leaving no way back until the end of the meeting. It was a thought that Brian knew should freak John out, but personally he was rather relieved to know that there was no other way for John than to follow him to his parents.

The meeting room seemed a lot larger than the last time to Brian - which was probably at least partially to blame to the fact that it had been filled with patients and their family members and at least a handful of guards and other supervisors the few times he’d visited so far. This time, however, his eyes darted around the room without seeing more than a single guard flicking through a leaflet in the corner of the room. There was one single occupied table at the other end of the room, towards which Nolan was currently making his way. He could make out the figures of his parents, who were standing up from their chairs as the stranger approached them. He could see his mum shove her handbag into her husband’s hands as the mentor reached a hand towards her.

‘Good morning, folks!’ Brian could hear Nolan say with a perfect mixture of politeness and informality. ‘I’m Nolan Ferrier - we’ve spoken on the phone.’ Brian watched as first his mother’s and then his father’s hand was pulled into a strong handshake from Nolan’s side. They seemed to share a few more quiet words, and Brian suddenly realised that Jon and he had not moved on any further than perhaps three feet away from the door. 

‘Come, let’s go over there. I’ll go first.’ Without awaiting John’s reply as to avoid giving him the opportunity to protest, Brian walked past the first row of empty tables. He heard the sound of John’s shoes clicking on the floor behind him confirming that his partner was following him. He then changed his walking pace to a more rapid one - he did not want to waste any time that could be used for coming to agreements for when either John came to live with them, either on his own or with him straight away.

The second his parents caught sight of him, the polite discussion of some sort they had been following with Nolan was wrapped up; hands were detached and excuses were made, and they turned to walk into his direction. He could hear his mother call his name - first softly, then louder - and his smile brightened. He hadn’t seen his parents since the last family visit, which had been at least three weeks ago at least. Their enthusiasm for seeing him, however, never seemed to subside; they were as happy and emotional as they came to him now as they had been the very first time they’d been granted entrance into the visiting room of Queen Mary’s to come see their son. Brian could already hear his mother’s first sobs before they had even gotten towards each other, although it was only a second or so later that they met in the middle. Brian was caught in the surprisingly strong grip of his mother’s arms, followed by those of his father. Being embraced by his parents always felt so secure, so safe - it was like coming home regardless of how far away he was from his paternal house.

‘Oh, Brian, my love! How are you?’ The voice of his mother was high and shrill so close to his ear, but it did not seem to Brian that this was an appropriate moment to say something about it.

‘I’m fine, mum. You know you don’t have to worry about me,’ he mumbled against the shoulder of his father. This time there were no guards telling them to break up and sit down - just the three of them getting a moment to express their love for each other through touch rather than through words. Not that that stopped Brian’s mother from blabbering on, though…

‘But you know I do,’ his mother sighed. ‘A reassessment! I didn’t even know what it was! Or that it was possible! And that you were already working on it-‘

‘Don’t wind yourself up too much, dear,’ Harold interrupted the stream of words flowing from his wife’s mouth. ‘Mister Ferrier will tell us all about it in a moment, I’m sure.’

Brian opened his eyes at the mentioning of his mentor, whom he had completely ignored since the moment he had met eyes with his parents. Much to his relief he saw Nolan smiling at him lazily, but the same, he assumed, could not be said about John. His boyfriend, who remained standing a few feet behind him, could hardly be comfortable around the family scene he was currently witnessing. Brian thus pulled himself away from the arms of his parents, and took a step back to line up next to the person he’d momentarily neglected.

‘Mum, Dad, this is John, my friend and roommate.’ Brian felt himself beam with pride as he introduced the boy around whom he’d centred his life for the past few months, and his parents seemed equally eager to meet him and exchange some words with the person their son had been unable to shut up about lately.

‘Oh, John! How good to finally meet you!’ his mother all but cooed, extending a hand towards him. ‘I’m Ruth May - Brian’s mother.’ John followed her example and shook hands with her and introduced himself somewhat awkwardly.

‘Er, it’s great to see you too. I’m John Deacon.’ He forced a small smile and withdrew his hand as quickly as possible; Brian hoped his mum would take no offence. He had told them during their last phone call that John was incredibly nervous - and that his antisocial personality disorder meant that he was not one to enjoy himself in social situations - so that they should be a bit lenient on him. Knowing his parents, they would behave just so; but Brian did feel that a lot of questions concerning John would be coming up as soon as his boyfriend would be out of their sight, especially when his father took his turn to introduce himself.

‘John, I’m Harold May,’ Brian’s father told him as he took John’s hand in his own. ‘We’ve heard a lot about you.’

Brian saw the smile wash off John’s face. ‘Is that an, uh, good or a bad sign?’ he asked with a renewed fake smile and a hint of humour, but Brian knew that it was really the joke which John tried to play it off yet. His mother laughed her typical, high-pitched laugh, and said she loved his humour, and his father was chuckling still when he disclaimed it had been a pretty good picture that had been painted of him by their son. Neither of this worked, though - and it was only when Brian put an arm around him that his tensed body relaxed a little.

‘A good sign, Deaky. Do you think I’d tell them bad stories about you? Do you think I even have bad stories to tell about you?’

John looked at him thoroughly at first, as if he was deciding whether Brian was playing with him or not, but eventually the slightest of a smile broke through. The somewhat awkward silence, however, by then had already prompted Nolan to speak up.

‘Shall we sit down and go over the arrangements? We’ve got quite a bit to discuss.’

John seemed to be most enthusiastic about following Nolan’s proposal. He agreed whole-heartedly and paced towards the table on which Brian’s parents had been sitting before. Nolan, who - as usual - seemed to sense exactly what he was feeling, made sure to sit next to him on the one side, and made Brian sit down on the other. Harold and Ruth sat across from them and waited for Nolan to bring out the papers he’d brought with him in a dark red folder with Brian’s name and patient number printed on the front. Brian saw John getting fidgety with the hem of his shirt while Nolan looked for the right papers, and placed a hand on John’s leg underneath the table.

‘Alright,’ Nolan eventually declared when he’d found the papers he had been looking for, and closed the folder to put it aside. ‘What we’re here for today is to go over the agreements which have been made for John’s rehabilitation into society, and that of Brian in case that his reassessment will be approved. I’m first just going to go through some formalities,’ Nolan announced. ‘Is it correct that you are Harold and Ruth May, parents of Brian May?’

‘Correct,’ Harold said.

‘So far so good,’ Nolan smiled. ‘And you were the ones who applied for your son to be admitted into Queen Mary’s Psychiatric Hospital, together with his psychiatrist Doctor L. J. Sumner?’ Brian felt his stomach turn at the mere mention of the name of his previous psychiatrist, but he buckled up for the sake of everyone around him. His father once again confirmed, together with the date on which they had filled out the application and the date of approval.

‘Then, according to this file right here…’ Nolan’s voice trailed down near the end of the sentence as he searched for the right paper. ‘Ah, here. According to this, you handed Brian over to the care of Queen Mary’s on March fifteen, nineteen seventy-one, by bringing him over and seeing to it that he was taken in.’

‘Yes. Wasn’t it you that took him in?’ Ruth asked. Nolan nodded with a small smile.

‘It was. It’s just that the protocol tells me to have you confirm all these details - because, as the next point tells me, you volunteered and were approved to take Brian back under your roof and carry parental responsibility for his well-being and further recovery when he would be released from Queen Mary’s?’

‘We are. And we still stand by that,’ said Harold, which preceded the next question Nolan was to read out loud. They were reminded of what it meant to be the guardians of Brian in a mental health context, and of which people to inform and turn to in case things went downhill again. That, if Brian had a fallback, he could be reported and taken back into Queen Mary’s, but that this would first need investigation, and could not happen overnight. This point seemed to make his mother more than just a little nervous - but, upon Brian ensuring her that chances of this happening were small, and Nolan telling her that help would always be available in case of acute danger, she eventually agreed. A few more such questions were answered and considered before Nolan placed down the papers and started looking for another set.

‘Now, as we all know, these arrangements will be critical in case Brian gets released after his reassessment trial. We cannot guarantee when or if that will happen, but what we do know is that John will be released in three weeks,’ Nolan said, and Brian saw John’s jaw clenching. The soothing hand stroking John’s leg seemed to be able to do little to soothe him when Nolan spoke on. ‘John Richard Deacon, taken in on September three, nineteen sixty-nine at age eighteen, after his foster guardians Alec Baldwin and Molly Baldwin-Forester signed him up to be taken into Queen Mary’s when they could no longer deal with his mental problems.’

‘Foster guardians?’ Ruth sounded surprised, if not a little afraid. Nolan looked at John as to find out whether he was allowed to tell them what happened, or if he should tell them that John would tell them later. Brian remembered having told his parents at one point during this past week’s phone calls and conversations that John could not return to the aunt and uncle with whom he had lived before being taken into Queen Mary’s, but he was afraid that his mother at the moment failed to see that the foster guardians which Nolan referred to were nothing more than John’s aunt and uncle. He knew the official documents referred to them as his foster guardians, but he understood how different, how dramatic this sounded - as if John had been a problematic child who had gone through multiple sets of foster parents over the years, the last pair of which had sent him away to a mental institution. It was far from the truth, but Brian could hardly blame his parents for getting an idea like this in their head.

To his utter surprise, John hardly blinked when he offered an explanation to Brian’s parents. ‘I was taken in by my aunt and uncle after my mum could no longer combine the care of my disabled sister with taking care of me,’ he said, which Brian had to admit was not a lie - just a very polished version of what he had actually gone through with his entire family locking him out. Brian could not blame him, though, for John only telling part of the truth to his parents. He doubted he would have been able to disclose more about his terrific past to a pair of strangers upon first meeting them - especially in John’s current state of being.

‘Disabled sister-’ Brian heard his father mumble, but he effectively managed to shut him up by giving the man, who was sitting across from him at the table, a light kick against the shin. His father’s face retorted, but he did not protest; he seemed to understand that this was not the right time or place to discuss the ins and outs of John’s life. Besides, Brian had clearly instructed them not to pry into John’s personal business; he would tell them what he wanted them to know as soon as he felt comfortable around them.

Nolan, like the hero he was, continued his story. ‘Alec and Molly Baldwin thus handed John over to the care of Queen Mary’s, but while our staff has reached out to them to tell them their nephew will soon be released and to ask them if they are willing to take him in again, they have declined their responsibility, and do not wish to be involved in backing John up in his rehabilitation process whatsoever, as they stated in a formal letter we received the other day.’ A light brown envelope was brought up and put in the middle of the table. Four pairs of eyes stared at it, but no one seemed to dare make a move or say a word. ‘John’s mother has also been informed, but she- she declared herself to be unfit of taking care of John again, referring to- her daily task of taking care of-’

‘Of my sister, yes. I expected so,’ John finished the sentence of Nolan, of whom both Brian and he was currently making up a more socially acceptable answer to refuse to take in a son again than what she really had told the staff upon being contacted. Brian wondered if she had yelled, if she had cursed her son, if she had laughed viciously and asked if they were out of their mind to ask her to take back the person who she deemed the one to have ruined her life. Brian guessed he would never know, and perhaps it was better like that - especially if John would also be spared from the probably /scalding/ reply his mother had made to the request.

‘Your sister, yes. Your mother sees herself currently unfit to combine, eh, her care with that of you,’ Nolan said. ‘Other family members we unfortunately could not reach. So that…’ he stressed while looking at the couple sitting across from him, ‘is where the pair of you come in’. 

Silence for a moment while Ruth and Harold looked at each other. Brian could see the doubt and uncertainty in their eyes. He realised he had sort of convinced them overnight to have both him and his secret boyfriend come back to live under the same roof as them over the past few days; after all, there had not been more than about a week between the first moment he had rung them to tell them about his plans of getting a reassessment, and this meeting which had been scheduled last-minute as his psychiatrist had approved him for the first round of his trial. He knew his parents were hesitant people in general, and the fact that they both did not know John and that they realised he suffered from mental problems wasn’t making it easy on them. Learning now that he came from a troubled family background also wasn’t making matters any less complicated for his parents, but Brian refused to let their fear of the unknown ruin his opportunity to escape Queen Mary’s with John - and, much more importantly, John’s chances of a stable future to make up for all the pain he had gone through in the past decade. 

‘Yes. Mum and Dad are willing to take in both John and me when we are released,’ Brian said in what he liked to consider a helping hand, but which his parents obviously had a different opinion about. 

‘We- yes. We are certainly willing,’ his father said, straightening his tie. ‘But, er, there are certain… uncertainties that will need to be clarified first.’

‘Of course,’ Nolan said in the most understanding of tones. ‘Of course. We have come to understand that, as far as we have been informed, you have no experience with caring for foster children - foster patients, in this case,’ Nolan said. Brian hated the word foster patient already. 

‘Exactly.’ Ruth shook her head vehemently, glad that Nolan understood they had reservations about the case now that everything was starting to get so real so quickly. ‘We have no prior experience with taking people in, and especially not young people.’

‘You’ve dealt with me for twenty-four years,’ Brian reminded them, but this unfortunately was not what they meant.

‘Of course it feels strange to let someone into your house at first - especially when it is someone you are not related to,’ Nolan admitted. ‘But experience leans that guardians and subjects, as they are commonly referred to, usually get into a good flow quickly, and can grow tight bonds.’

‘I see,’ Ruth said, obviously still doubting. Brian chewed on the inside of his cheek. 

‘You do not have to worry about finances either - as John is under twenty-one, one can appeal to the state for subvention. After he turns twenty-one, you can still get subvention for taking care of someone with mental health issues. We can help you fill out the application,’ Nolan said in what seemed like another attempt to convince Harold and Ruth not to come back on their promise to take John in. Brian appreciated it, but unfortunately his parents did not take the bait. 

‘Oh, the finances I’m not too worried about. But is there any sort of - aftercare after Queen Mary’s?’ Ruth asked. ‘To make sure John won’t… slip back into old habits?’ Brian was not entirely pleased about his mother using the word habits when referring to John’s depression and anti-social spells, but he was given no time to protest.

‘Naturally,’ Nolan assured her. ‘Queen Mary’s has an extensive programme, which consists of weekly meetups with either a patient’s psychiatrist before coming here, during their stay, or one that specifically works in our aftercare programme. Furthermore every ex-patient will also enroll in a programme to help them either find a job or go back to school, and help them build up their future.’

‘I would love to go back to college,’ John broke in shyly but confidently. ‘I want to finish my studies. I used to do electrical engineering at Chelsea College in London. It’s a- uh, College of Advanced Technology. Known as one of the best around the country,’ John said in what sounded to Brian like a helpless plead to make himself desirable to his parents. Brian felt a knot form in his stomach by merely listening to it - it was disheartening that his parents were being so distant and doubtful all of a sudden, especially right in John’s face. John, the person he loved with all his heart; the person who deserved the world and more, especially after continuously having been held down from it. The person for whom Brian hoped for a good ending to this entire mental health drama more than he did for himself or anyone else in the world. Seeing him being denied by his parents was one of the most painful things he had ever witnessed, and he had gone through quite some disheartening situations at Queen Mary’s.

Harold, either not seeing or ignoring his son’s deadly glares, nodded slowly. ‘Electrical engineering. A fine subject. You’ll never be out of work with a solid degree like that.’

‘Absolutely,’ Nolan agreed. ‘It will give him something to focus on - make sure he keeps himself busy. Studies show that people recovering from mental illness are three times more successful when they have a job or studies to focus on.’

‘I can also find a weekend job on top of that,’ John offered. ‘So you won’t have me hanging around the house, you know.’

‘Oh, that is not- not at all what we’re worried about, John,’ Harold said. Then, clearing his throat, he finally said the thing Brian had been fearing for the entire meeting. Putting his hand on that of his wife’s, he brought up to Nolan: ‘An issue I feel that my wife and I are currently facing, is that we are not… we are not mental health experts. We were not trained to deal with depression, and borderline, and-‘ he paused for a second as he looked at John, and eventually concluded his sentence with the words: -‘similar issues.’

‘Dad!’ Brian hissed at him, but this only made matters worse.

‘Your father is right, dear,’ his mother intervened. ‘We do not know how to deal with mental health issues. We don’t know John and his… his mental situation, or how to deal with it. You know what happened when you were at your worst…’

‘But he’s not at his worst anymore, and neither am I. John is being released because he’s doing so well,’ Brian said - which was not entirely the truth, but which he decided his parents did not need to know that it was either being let go of or getting locked up into long-stay facilities - ‘and I am the first person to qualify for a reassessment in years. Right, Nolan?’ Brian said, turning to his mentor sharply. ‘Right?’

‘Er, yes,’ Nolan said, clearly taken aback somewhat by Brian’s sudden fierceness. ‘You are the first in years to qualify, and John is doing well enough to leave Queen Mary’s.’ Again, this was only technically the truth, but Brian was grateful to his mentor for helping both John and Him. Nolan probably realised just as well as he did that this was the best chance John had to make a head start and not to end up in some shabby rehabilitation home and programme focussed on substance abusers and victims of domestic violence rather than on his antisocial personality disorder, and have his life spiral down even further than it had before. 

‘See? There will be no problem, Dad. I promise,’ Brian said with as much confidence he could muster. 

‘I am sure that John will behave well, and that chances of problems arising will be slim,’ his father tried to hush him. ‘But his - what was it, asocial personality?’

‘Antisocial personality disorder,’ Brian grumbled.

‘His antisocial personality - I fear it works just like your depression and borderline. Things can go well for a while, but when you had fallbacks, we could do absolutely nothing to help you. You were either unattainable, or overly emotional, or unreasonably angry and depressed - and that was just borderline, as to say so. What if John ends up in one of his antisocial spells? What are we supposed to do with that?’

‘You will be given guidance prior to taking John in, mister May,’ Nolan tried, but Brian was not as calm as his mentor was.

‘Then you leave him be! He’ll manage, and he’ll come back to himself in due time! Being antisocial in essence just means having moments of not wanting to interact with anyone and wanting to be left alone - a whole lot easier than dealing with my troubles, let me tell you.’

‘Brian…’ John called his name carefully. 

‘We understand, dear,’ Ruth said. ‘But we know you - we know what to expect of you.’

‘Yes, you knew what to expect,’ Brian said dryly. ‘That’s why you sent me away to Queen Mary’s, right? Because you knew exactly how to handle me.’

‘Brian.’ His name was called again, but this time in a more threatening fashion, coming from his father. ‘You’re our child - we’ve known you all your life. We do not know John, do not know his illness, his family, his background, his life story…’ 

‘So that’s a reason not to take him in and help him? Because you can’t verify that his parents are a decent middle-class couple with a husband working nine-to-five-hours at a company of national importance, and a happy housewife who has dinner ready at precisely six o’clock each day?’

‘Of course not,’ Harold objected. ‘You’re being ridiculous now.’

‘No, you’re being ridiculous!’ Brian said. He could hear Nolan telling him not to talk to his parents like that, but could not move himself to care about what anyone thought of him telling his parents some home truths. ‘You promised to help John, to take him in and give him a chance! And if you care to know his background so much - John came from a perfectly fine family, including nine-to-five job holder and happy housewife, until his parents lost a son, his sister was left severely disabled after an accident, and within the same year, his father died. Are you happy now?’

Brian could hear John take in a sharp breath of air beside him, and somewhere deep inside, he felt bad for having told half of history so casually to his parents for the sake of making a case against their hesitation to take someone they didn’t know under their wing. However, his frustration and determination to fulfil John’s promise of letting him move in with his family and building a stable background where he would be loved, accepted, part of a larger community, left him unable o do much more than put his hand on John’s shoulder and staring at his parents with cold eyes.

Harold was the first to break the silence when he coughed and shifted in his chair. Turning to Nolan, he said: ‘Gentlemen, could you give us a moment? A word between my wife and me and our son?’

‘Most certainly,’ said Nolan, who seemed almost eager to remove himself and John from the battlefield the discussion had turned into. ‘John and I will be just around the door. Call us when you need us again - because, and I don’t want to put pressure on anyone, but the papers will have to be signed today. Both to strengthen Brian’s case for his reassessment, and for John - because if he cannot stay with your family, our staff will have to arrange a place for him in a communal home.’

Brian could feel John’s eyes turning to him, wild and panicky, and he had to count to three before allowing himself to look at John out of fear that he might either start crying or start yelling if he did so right away. He was hurt, frustrated, angry, humiliated, betrayed - all of those both on his own account but mostly on that of John, who he had promised that he’d be allowed to live with his family upon being released from Queen Mary’s. His parents had promised him so, after all. They had been inviting and understanding and tolerant when speaking of the matter mere days ago, but now that things were starting to get real, they seemed to be getting cold feet. It made Brian feel sick and disgusted - it made him feel ashamed of being their son. 

‘It’s okay,’ he gritted when he eventually gathered the self-control to calmly look John in the eyes. ‘I’ll fix this, I promise.’

The legs of Nolan’s chair scraped along the floor when he stood up. ‘You coming, John? I think the May family needs some time to discuss.’

John looked at Brian with a sense of desperation, but nodded stiffly and stood up also. Brian put his hand on John’s briefly in passing, but John did not look up; he simply followed Nolan towards the exit of the room, leaving Brian with a taste of bitterness in his mouth and the feeling of his cold, thin fingers on his own. 

Brian found himself curling the fingers of his right hand into a fist, and tensed them until the knuckles grew white and the back of his hand pale and veiny. He stared at it in a determined mission to avoid any sort of contact with his parents until the heavy iron door of the visiting hall fell shut behind John and Nolan. 

His father was the first to talk between the three of them. ‘Look, Brian, we understand that you’re angry, but we need some time to process everything we’ve been told today,’ Harold said. ‘It’s not nothing to take in someone new, and to be responsible for them and live with them under the same roof for the upcoming God knows how long.’ Brian knew his father was looking straight at him as he spoke, but he refused to look back or acknowledge his presence in any other way.

‘Besides, what do we know about his condition? What if his anti… antisocial behaviour comes up again when he lives with us? Or worse, perhaps, if his trauma comes up?’ Despite himself, Brian looked up to face his mother as she mentioned the word trauma. He immediately regretted it as it seemed to give her the idea that she had made a point she ought to elaborate. ‘Everything we heard today about his father’s death, his sister’s disability, living with his aunt and uncle until they sent him away… It’s a lot to carry. Both for him and for us.’

Brian leaned back in his chair when his mother had finished her part of the monologue. So that’s what they were afraid of - that John would bring his trauma, his troubles, his history, into their lives. That having to live with someone who’d gone through a rough childhood would be hard on them, and not on the person who actually had to pick up his life again after having taken such a terrible start to it. It hardly surprised Brian to hear that his parents, two painfully average lower-middle-class citizens leading a painfully average life in their painfully average semi-detached suburban three bedroom-house, were opposed to take someone in from a less fortunate background out of fear that it would inconvenience their perfectly shallow little lives. It was shallow and embarrassing, and Brian did not have the words to properly tell his parents what he thought about their attitude. 

‘So that’s what you want, then?’ he eventually ended up saying after having chewed the inside of his cheek raw. ‘To break your promise and have John be sent off to a bloody communal home? My best friend, with whom I’ve spent the past half a year here? An anxious twenty-year-old with a traumatic family background and the remains of a depression, living with a bunch of crackheads in a filthy communal home in East End London?’

‘We never promised-’ his father calmly intervened, but he was interrupted just as quickly as he had taken the floor. 

‘But you did!’ Brian said, voice louder now. ‘You said you’d take both of us in, or him first and then me if I wouldn’t be released after this fucking trial, and allow us to build up a life again until we could stand on our own two feet! You promised!’ He was close to tears now - tears of anger and frustration and sheer humiliation that these liars called themselves his parents. The two people across the table shared a look that Brian couldn’t quite make out with his blurry tearstained view, but he knew they realised he was not going to take this breach of trust sitting down. 

‘I know, Brian,’ his father eventually said. ‘I know we did that. But that was before we knew the circumstances.’

Brian huffed out a laugh despite himself. ‘Circumstances? I told you about John, and his antisocial personality disorder, and that his sister was disabled, his father was dead, and that he used to live with his aunt and uncle before being sent here! You knew that all along, half of this even before there was even talk of either him or me being released. And now you’re changing your mind because of it? I’m calling bullshit.’

‘Brian!’

The person addressed ignored his mother’s admonitory calling of his name. ‘It’s bullshit. You’re just using it against John because you’re too lame to help him. To help us! I thought you cared about me!’ Brian realised that especially this last sentence was a petty low shot, but he was willing to steep down to whatever level it took to either convince, threaten, or sabotage his parents into letting John come home with him as they had promised him. 

‘It’s not that easy, Brian. It’s just- it’s very hard to take someone you’ve only known from stories, with a troubled background, into your house and just see what happens,’ Harold said. ‘Your mother and I have had a very rough time while you were away. We don’t know if we could handle having someone else in our house right now. Besides you, of course,’ was added quickly - something Brian didn’t know made matters better or worse. 

‘Oh, yes. I’m sure it’s been very hard on you,’ Brian said cynically, crossing his arms over his chest. ‘It must have been very hard, sitting around at home living your normal life while we tried to survive at Queen Mary’s. Saw people drugging themselves down at the daily. Fights in the canteen and people ending up at the infirmary with broken bones. Someone knocked John to the floor and tried to stab my eye out. Someone was murdered while we were in there, Goddamnit, and you talk about having had a hard time because you didn’t have someone to share boring stories about your nine to five job or the coffee visit to the neighbours with during dinnertime!’ Brian realised he was shouting now, and saw the guard stepping a few steps closer to their table from the corner of his eyes. He wondered if Nolan and John could hear him from the other side, but eventually decided that the iron walls and doors probably had been designed so as to not let through any noise. He did not particularly care so much about Nolan or the guards outside the visiting hall overhearing him, but he’d rather not upset John by having him hear his lack of emotional control in the given situation.

‘They tried- your eye? Someone was murdered?’

Brian should have known that breaking the news of the recent gang wars, the almost daily injuries, and Jimmy’s death-bordering-on-murder to his parents would not be something they’d take lightly. They of course expected their son to be safe at Queen Mary’s; this had been the entire reason they had sent him there rather than keeping him at home to see where his mental problems would take him. However, as he was in the mood to shock and make a statement rather than to comfort his parents about his safety at Queen Mary’s, he raised his voice again.

‘Yes, that’s the place you sent me off to! That’s the place I’ll have to stay in for even longer if they won’t let me go. That’s where’s John’s been in for two years, and the place you’ll send him off to again if you let him be taken into a fucking council house full of drug addicts and criminals and other people he shouldn’t have to deal with! Because unlike me,’ Brian breathed with an index finger prodding into his own chest, ‘unlike me, he doesn’t have a backup plan, or family to take him in! He’ll be left to the government, or a resocialisation programme for criminals and other freaks he doesn’t belong to, or simply to- to the streets!’ Brian could hear his own voice faltering and eventually breaking, so he cut himself off before real cracks would appear in either his voice or his iron facial expression. He knew that Nolan had spoken of a rehabilitation plan hosted by Queen Mary’s, but what this really meant was that people who did not have any family, were disowned by them, or did not want to return to them, were sent to join resocialisation programmes that hardly ever tailored to people recovering from mental illness. They often ended up addicted to drugs, in prison for dealing or robbery, or worse than that. It made his heart ache to even think of the possibility that John might be exposed to scenes like those if he would not be given a proper foundation upon leaving Queen Mary’s - a foundation it seemed that, for the lack of connections and resources of his own, only Brian’s family could provide at the moment. 

‘Oh, darling…’ 

A tissue, produced from his mother’s handbag, was pushed over to his side of the table. Brian hadn’t previously noticed that he had been crying, but moving the back of his hand over his right cheek once proved that he indeed had been doing to. He grabbed the tissue and pressed it against his eyes in an attempt to smother his tears - without much luck, that was. They kept coming and coming and wouldn’t stop, and Brian had no other choice than to give in to them,

‘Brian, my darling...’ The familiar voice of his mother was soft and soothing, but it did not give him any comfort - and neither did the words she spoke, even though Brian knew they were meant to bring him peace of mind. ‘We’ll find a way, okay? I promise we’ll find a way.’

‘What if I was in his place?’ Brian then asked, crumpling the soaked tissue into a ball in his hand. ‘If you- you couldn’t take care of me because you w-were occupied or dead, wouldn’t you want someone else to take me in to recover?’ he asked, now looking directly at his parents with eyes blurred with tears. ‘Or would you rather have me discarded to the streets and venture for- for myself? Would you?’ 

‘We wouldn’t,’ his father said. ‘Of course we wouldn’t. We’ll work this out, Brian,’ he said, but the words didn’t quite land on Brian, who was so far gone into the image of John being expulsed from any sort of society and having to roam the streets at night to find a place to sleep, that the words of his parents didn’t reach him any longer.

‘John is so sweet and good-natured and… and he deserves better than this. So much better than this. Please, you have- you have to help him!’ Sobs now properly overtook Brian’s body, and he rested his face on his hands on the table top. Sounds of chairs scratching the floor and heels clicking on the tiles approached, and then there was an arm around his shoulders and a hand stroking his hair and indistinguishable voices soothing him. It was as if he was five years old again and had screamed for his parents with all of his might after waking up from a dreadful nightmare. He was unsure whether it was a comfort or plain sadness that his parents still came running towards him to soothe him, but it at least felt good to have them at his side again instead of just having them look at him from a distance and staring at him with that weird, empty glance, trying to figure out what on earth was going on in his mind. 

‘It’s okay; everything will be okay.’ His mother stroked his cheek, and Brian thought he felt her press a kiss against his unruly hair. ‘We’re gonna help John. He’s- we’re going to take him in.’

We’re going to take him in. Brian looked up at his mother through teary eyes when these words, the ones that had once been promised and then denied him again, were spoken. Like a magic spell, he was drawn to them, and through a choked sob he whispered: ‘Really?’

His mother exchanged glanced with his dad first, but then pulled away her glance from that of her husband and nodded. ‘Really. We made a promise, after all.’

Brian felt a wave of relief flooding through his veins; one that allowed the muscles throughout his entire body to unclench and his mind to untangle. ‘Thank- thank you,’ he managed to squeak out. His mother smiled a sad smile - one not so much of happiness but one of acceptance - and stepped away from Brian. His father followed her example.

‘Come, dry your tears and come down to yourself,’ she said while handing him another tissue. Surprisingly enough, it was actually feasible for Brian to carry out these instructions now that he had been comforted about the fate of his partner. He wiped his face clean of tears, and by the time he was able to stifle most of the last remaining sobs, he could look his parents in the eyes again.

‘So you promise you’ll let John in? And you… won’t come back on it again?’ Brian asked, just to be sure. After all, he had been let down once before, and he did not know if he could take it to have all of his hopes shatter just like that again.

‘We promise for real this time,’ his father answered without skipping a beat, which Brian took as a good sign. ‘Your mother and I are just overwhelmed, is all. Within a week we got to hear that you would be going for a reassessment, that you wanted to have your new best friend move in with us because he can’t go home, then all these people called us and we received forms to fill out through the mail concerning our responsibilities when you’d be released and all the people and institutes we’d have to be in touch with still… So we just…. Went with it all hoping to be able to talk things over today, but we arrive in a storm of more papers and receptionists and mentors telling us to sign more documents, and then there’s John with this- excuse my languages but… problematic background, and I think we just- didn’t know how to handle it anymore.’

‘But then you should have said so. You should have told Nolan and us you needed more explanation or more time or more guidance, instead of taking ten steps back and breaking your promise to John and me. I haven’t seen him so- so hurt in a long time,’ Brian said. His saliva felt heavy and tough when he swallowed. ‘I told you how nervous John was to meet you over the phone just the other day. I spent a week to convince him to even come along to this meeting; he was too afraid to say or do something that would make you reject him. And then you go and… attack him and push him away for the reasons he can help least? His trauma following the death of his father, and the accident of his sister? His having to live with family because his mum couldn’t take care of him anymore in the depth of his depression? That was- that was plain low, dad. And you too, mum. Really, really low.’

It was only when Brian had uttered this entire soliloquy that he realised when he had said - and he immediately regretted it, despite having meant every single word of it. He knew his parents were not going to take kindly to being lectured by him about what they should and what they shouldn’t do. However, just as he expected to be told off for reprimanding his parents for behaving the way they did, the glance of his father’s face softened.

‘You are right. We were wrong to treat John like that,’ Harold said. Not seeming to know what he was to say afterward, he turned to his wife for support.

‘We will say sorry to John in a minute. I hope we can make him feel welcome still,’ Ruth told Brian, who nodded slowly, thankfully, at his parents.

‘Thank you,’ he whispered. ‘That means a lot to the both of us.’

‘It’s just… I know it’s no excuse, and I know that Queen Mary’s must have been a lot harder for you than it was for us,’ his father acknowledged. ‘But I think I speak for both your mum and myself when I say that I’ve been lying awake during the last few nights, wondering if this is really what you want.’

Brian frowned. ‘Whether what is what I want?’

‘This… all of this. To leave Queen Mary’s before your time’s due,’ his dad said.

‘My time is due,’ Brian said with some insistence. ‘I go where John goes, and he goes where I go.’

‘I know,’ his father said. ‘I know- and that’s what I’ve been worried about. That you’re not thinking about your own sanity and well-being, but about John’s only. You understand me?’

‘I do, but-’

‘Doctor Sumner worked hard to give you a spot here at Queen Mary’s, and despite the… circumstances we’ve heard about, we know that trained people do all they can,’ his mother interrupted. ‘Are you sure you want to put all of that aside?’

‘Absolutely positive,’ Brian answered. ‘I’d put everything aside for John - and not just because I… care about him so much, but because I know John is the best help I could possibly have.’

‘But what about your therapy, then?’ his mum asked.

‘He is a better help to me than any of the therapists I’ve spoken to so far, and any therapist I will ever meet in my life,’ Brian said. His father opened his mouth as to say something, but Brian held up his hand to summon him to be quiet. To his own surprise, it seemed to work. ‘John supports me through everything in a way not a single medical professional could ever do. He is always there for me, always tries to cheer me up and cheer me on with everything I do. He’s my rock in a way that no one else could ever be. He’s been my real help at Queen Mary’s, and the real reason why I’m in a much better place now.’ 

By the time Brian had finished this monologue, he noticed his parents really had fallen quiet, and simply blinked at him as to take in all they had just been told. It was at this point also that he realised he was a little out of breath, and, upon placing his hand on his cheek, he found that it was warm and glowing. My God, I must look like an idiot right now, Brian thought to himself. Fortunately for him, though, this was not the message his parents had taken away from the scene he had put himself in.

‘You really care about him, don’t you?’ There was a small smile on his mother’s face as she asked this.

‘Yes,’ Brian sighed. ‘More than about anything or anyone in the world.’

‘Well… It really seems like the only way to help you right now is to help John,’ his father remarked, which Brian realised summarised the current state of affairs pretty well. ‘So that’s what we’re going to do, then.’

Even though this decision had already been secured beforehand, it still made a wave of relief flow through Brian’s veins now that it was reinstigated. They were going to allow John to come live with them; John would have a place to go to; and, sooner or later, depending on the outcome of the reassessment, Brian would be there to live with John and his family again. They’d be together, just the two of them, without any of the disorder and the violence and the overall chaos of Queen Mary’s that currently formed the framework of all they did and said, and they would be happy.

‘We will do that exactly,’ Ruth confirmed, then, turning to her husband, she said: ‘Why don’t you go and fetch John and Nolan, dear, and let me have a second to talk to my boy alone.’ Despite the innocent smile on her face, Brian knew that his mother had something on her mind. His father must have realised this too, for his glance lingered between his wife and his son for a little too long to be just casual, but he then nodded and took his leave either way. 

Ruth waited until her husband was out of earshot, and then turned around to face her son again. 

‘Brian?’ She leant in a bit closer to him, as she would do when she had something serious or confidential to share with him.

‘Yes, mum?’ Brian said, hoping she would not notice how tight his voice sounded already.

‘About John… He’s not just your roommate, or your friend, now is he? He’s more than that.’

Oh, Lord. That was a lot quicker and a lot more to the point than Brian had expected it to be. Of course, he had foreseen the likeliness of his parents expecting something sooner or later once they’d live under the same roof with his parents. He’d thought of the possibility of his mum wondering out loud why they insisted on sleeping in the same room, or his dad remarking that they never left each other’s side. The way they would look at each other, smile at each other, sit a bit too close whenever they got the chance - he had thought of what to say when such matters would be raised. He had not, however, prepared himself for something as straightforward as this question, and in the heat of the moment, he did not trust himself to lie and tell a more socially acceptable answer. Besides, his mother looked at him with such a kind and comforting expression on her face that Brian was positive he could have discarded of a body on her behalf if she would have asked him.

Therefore, he nodded nearly invisibly in response. ‘He is. He’s… We are… everything to each other,’ Brian whispered. ‘I just… need him like I’ve never needed anyone before.’ A smile broke through on his face, but no matter how badly he would have liked for it to have been one of happiness or pride, it would be incorrect to say so. It was a long-hidden feeling of insecurity towards the future, of what people would think of them - of embarrassment and a feeling of failure. Not for loving John, but for breaking the illusion his parents had had of him for so long. An illusion he had had of himself for so long - one that never might have come to the surface if it hadn’t been for John and him crossing paths. Meeting John had changed the entire road of life he had always had in sight for himself, and the realisation that moulding his life around John and what they were together was going to be a reality, in all of its good and bad points, suddenly struck him. Tears filled his eyes, and when his mother did not respond to any he had said and simply looked at him, he shook his head. ‘I’m sorry.’

‘What for?’ she asked gently.

‘For- not being what you thought I was,’ he managed. ‘For not coming home with a girl.’

‘Darling…’ Brian knew that voice, and he could feel his mother’s hand reaching out to place itself on top of his own hand before she even completed the action, as a matter of speaking. ‘I don’t care who or what you come home with - whether they’re male or female, or Catholic or Anglican, or black or white or purple with yellow dots. What I care for is that you come home as you, alive and well, unlike - unlike some of the stories you hear sometimes,’ she said, leaving Brian unsure if she meant stories from mental health clinics in general, or the ones he had witnessed and shared with her. ‘I want you to come home happy again, and I can tell that he makes you happy.’

‘He does,’ Brian smiled despite himself. ‘He makes me happier than I’ve ever been.’

‘I know, and that’s what matters to us,’ his mum said. ‘Listen, Brian. Your dad and I wanted for you to come home happy again - that’s what we sent you to Queen Mary’s for. The first few nights after we’d taken you here I could do nothing but crying and praying that sending you here would make you feel better, happier, regardless of how this happiness came about. And God must have heard my prayers.’

‘John is a gift from above,’ Brian smiled. ‘He makes me happier than I’ve ever been, or ever could have imagined being.’

‘That’s settled then.’

‘Really?’ Brian asked, not having thought his mother would be so quick to deal with the fact that her only son came home with a guy. ‘But what about- you, or dad, or grandma, or the rest of the family? Especially dad. He’s- he’s always talked about how he can’t wait till my wedding day, and to see his grandchildren…’

‘I know. He’ll have to readjust his expectations, then,’ his mother shrugged. ‘This isn’t about him or me or anyone else apart from John and you.’

‘Thank you,’ Brian smiled broadly at the recognition he had not ever even hoped to get from his family so soon. Then, a less pleasant thought dawned upon him. ‘Mum, will you tell him?’

His mother did not need any context to know what and who he meant. ‘Do you want me to tell him?’

Brian thought for a second. On the one hand it felt liberating to tell the truth, to tell his parents where he and John really stood – but on the other hand, after already having told them more than he had already planned to do and without John’s permission, he decided against the plan in the end. ‘I don’t know. I’ll have to discuss it with John. It’s not something that concerns me only, you know.’

‘Of course. It’s not just you on your own anymore from now off,’ his mother said with a small smile. ‘It’s going to be you and your better half.’ Brian felt himself glow at the mentioning of these words. John really was his better half – and his mother was accepting of the position John played in his life. Maybe things were finally looking up for him. 

Things definitely seemed like they were heading in the right direction when the iron door burst open to reveal John, who skipped his way through the visiting room on his mission to find Brian. Brian heard and saw him coming from what seemed to him like miles away – he pushed his chair backward with more force than necessary, almost tripped over his mother’s bag, but did not let this stop himself from dashing towards John and catching his boyfriend into his embrace hallway down the room. When he squeezed John into a hug – and was similarly squeezed into one by John from the other side of things – his partner’s body felt warm and vibrant and alive; so much more alive than Brian had seen him in ages, or perhaps ever before. The grip of John’s fingers on the back of his grey uniform shirt was tight, like he wanted to avoid ever being separated from him in his life; as if Brian was going to allow anyone to come between the pair of them when John looked at him with the most appreciative and loving eyes he had ever been looked at with.

‘They’ll let me in,’ John squeaked in a voice squeezed with happiness and relief. ‘I’ll be allowed to stay and- and live with your family and- and with you.’ The arms around his back moved on to be placed above his shoulders, and Brian could not oppress the urge to put his own hands below John’s armpits and lift him off the floor for a spin. John squealed at first and then laughed, and when his feet were safely planted back on the floor, he threw his body against Brian’s so tightly that it took all of Brian’s strength to not lift up his chin and kiss him right there and then in the middle of the visiting room. He contained himself, though, and made a mental note to shower John in a thousand kisses once they’d get back to their room; a room which they might, with a bit of luck, exchange for Brian’s real bedroom, inside his real house before too long. 

‘Of course they will. I told you they were going to love you,’ Brian replied with the biggest smile. A side glance towards his smiling mother revealed that she really did approve of this statement of his.

Harold and Nolan caught up with them, and Nolan, obviously content and relieved with the turn-out of the meeting, was quick to produce the required paperwork that needed to be signed. Brian held his breath until the moment his father had put his signature on both the file ruling that he’d take his own son back in and on the file ensuring John would be placed under their care also. It was then that he knew there was going to be no return, a thought that made mellow happiness spread through his body as he rested his hand on John’s shoulder when his boyfriend signed the paperwork with a shaky but determined hand.

The formalities then having been taken care of and the time planned for the meeting being almost up, Nolan started shaking hands and speaking of next steps to be taken – financial compensation and guidance for family of what was clumsily referred to as ‘the mentally afflicted’ and other matters Brian could not find himself caring for at the time being. All he cared about was that they were one step closer to completing their plan of escaping Queen Mary’s before the place would turn either one or the both of them out of their minds, or possibly worse. 

Brian stepped forward to hug his dad and kiss his mum as a form of goodbye, and received some more words of comfort – that they would be there for his trial in a few weeks, and that John really would be welcome in their house regardless of how matters turned out for Brian. If Brian remained somewhat skeptical to that point, the last traces of doubt left his mind when he saw John willingly letting himself be captured in an embrace by both of his parents and receiving words of welcome, comfort, and encouragement. John managed little more than a series of ‘thank yous’ and ‘I can’t tell you how grateful I am’,  but Brian could tell by the radiant look in his eyes when he broke away from his family-to-be that he was finally, after all this time, gathering some hope for the future – for their future.

‘We’ll see you soon, Brian. And you too, John. We’re looking forward to it,’ Brian’s mother said when Nolan turned to lead his patients out of the same door they had come from an hour ago. John turned around once more to flash them a smile, and give them a wave; Brian followed his example, then placed his hand on John’s back and guided him through the door.

‘Phew. That was a wild ride,’ said Nolan, who pretended to wipe the sweat off his forehead. The iron door fell shut behind him, and he started moving towards the exit at the other side of the hall. Brian and John followed close behind. ‘For a moment I was afraid that – you know…’ They all knew what it was that Nolan was referring to, but no one was particularly keep on speaking the words out loud. ‘But I’m glad they turned around, Brian. That whatever you said worked, and that John won’t have to worry anymore.’ John smiled for a bit, but Brian could tell it wasn’t genuine. 

‘What’s wrong? Aren’t you relieved?’

‘I am,’ John confirmed. ‘But I still worry. What if you don’t get out, or if your parents change their minds on me…’

‘They won’t,’ Brian said before the thought could properly settle in John’s mind. ‘They’re not going to change their minds. And as for me – I’m gonna give it all I’ve got during the final hearing or whatever they call that. And if that’s not enough, I’ll… I’ll find a way to be out of here as soon as possible, honey. I’ll show the best of behaviour and cooperation they’ve ever seen in the history of this place, or try another reassessment. I’ll find a way to leave, I promise.’ John looked skeptical still, but luckily Nolan came to Brian’s rescue. 

‘You won’t have to open a second reassessment. Jasper and Sarah and others are all on your side of the case – and with such strong support and all the effort and dedication you’ve shown in filling out the paperwork, attending sessions with the new psych, keeping up your mental diary your diary, and your exemplary behaviour at Queen Mary’s, there’s not a single objection I think they can make against your case. I can see no grounded reason for them to turn your appeal down.’

‘See?’ Brian said to John, pretending to be not in the least surprised by this claim of Nolan’s that his admission was almost a fact already. ‘Nothing to worry about.’

‘But Doctor Sumner will be there,’ John muttered. ‘He’ll find a way to let you stay.’

Having arrived at the other side of the hallway, Nolan held open the door for them; but Brian halted his step the second John brought up the name of Doctor Sumner.

‘Sorry, who are we speaking of?’ Nolan asked innocently. Brian was sure he must have read the name of his former psychiatrist in one of the papers concerning the trial, but how could Nolan know the evil intentions of the man behind the name?

‘Thank you, Nolan. We’ll see you in a bit,’ Brian said with what he knew for a fact was the fakest smile he’d ever produced. He could tell his mentor was confused by their sudden secretiveness, but – God bless him – he nodded politely and disappeared through the door. Brian waited until the door fell shut again before he looked John in the face.

‘You know Doctor Sumner is going to be there,’ John stated, more firmly this time.

‘I know,’ Brian gritted. ‘I just hoped you had forgotten about him.’

John snorted. ‘As if.’ 

‘Fair enough,’ Brian sighed. The truth of the matter was that Doctor Sumner had also crossed his mind more than just incidentally lately. Ever since Nolan had informed him of the fact that one was to be judged by a panel of three psychiatrists, one of which would be one’s former psychiatrist or another mental health expert who could testify to one’s character and mental illness, he had feared the possibility of Doctor Sumner disapproving of his being released out of fear he would speak up about the injustice his former psych had pulled him through. He had repressed these fears as much as he could, however, and had hoped that John would have forgotten about Doctor Sumner completely. It seemed like there was no such luck for him though; the handful of times he had brought up the nightmare of a psych during trips to Queen Mary’s garden had obviously stuck in John’s mind, and he himself remained unsure of his destiny with Doctor Sumner playing a role in it.

‘Look. I know the situation is hardly ideal, but Nolan is probably right. Sumner has no valid grounds to restrain me to Queen Mary’s without revealing his fear that he used me for his experiments to get his breakthrough in the medical world or whatever. And if he doesn’t remember so, I might just have to remind him of it.’

John’s ears seemed to prick up at the hint of such a bold thing to do. ‘You’re thinking of doing that?’

Brian, not wanting to admit that he devised this plan literally a split second ago, turned to open the door and let his lover pass through it. ‘Perhaps. If he leaves me no choice – if he’s the one to make me stay I guess I might have to bring it up. It’s not like I’ll have anything to lose in that case anyway,’ Brian grinned. ‘But I’m sure it won’t come to that point – as Nolan said, the judges have no valid grounds to keep me here for, so they’ll probably let me go. And if Sumner is the only one who disagrees… Well, I’ll just say it’s suspicious and ask him if there’s anything from our shared past that might hold him back, and leave the ball in his goal from that point.’

‘Stone cold but clever,’ John snickered. ‘You know, when you first got here, I never thought you’d have it in you to be like that.’

‘Your talents must have rubbed off on me,’ Brian shrugged.

‘My talents were not the only things that rubbed off on you.’

‘John!’ Brian called out in surprise, turning to the side to see his grinning lover catch up with him. ��Cheeky! You did not get that from me!’

‘No, that must have been Freddie’s doing,’ John contemplated. ‘Having lived with him for a year or so has taken its toll on me.’

Brian stopped for a second. ‘Has it really been that long for Freddie?’

John nodded. ‘Same for Roger - he arrived only a month or so later, if not less. It’s kind of surreal when you think about it.’

‘It’s so weird - day to day life here passes so slowly, and yet in the grand scheme of things-’

‘May.’

Brian halted his sentence when he heard his last name being called out quite loudly in the otherwise empty seeming main hallway. It was early in the afternoon, and with no mealtimes, therapy groups, or other activities running - and a ban on residing in the canteen outside of meal hours out of a fear for fights and confrontation - there was little more than the occasional lone patient passing by.

‘Did you also hear…’ he turned to John, but was not given the time to await an answer.

‘Yes, you there. Brian.’

Brian could now no longer deny the presence of someone calling out for him, but it came as quite a shock to find that the source of the sound was no one other than Drew. Drew, the bully and murderer of Jimmy; the one who had threatened to cut his eye out, who had belittled and teased and pushed Freddie and Roger on multiple accounts, who had knocked John over and given him the biggest black eye Brian had ever witnessed - that Drew was now leaning against the matte glass wall of the canteen, with his arms crossed over his chest, a - strictly forbidden - toothpick between his lips, and for some reason a ground for calling Brian to him.

Brian could see John take a step back behind him, but then step forward again in what seemed like an attempt to show Drew that he was not going to back away. It made little impression on either one of them, for they all knew that despite the tough attitude John tried to keep up, and despite having stood up to Drew and having embarrassed him in front of all of his followers and enemies not too long ago, John did not feel comfortable around him. Hell, no one at Queen Mary’s felt comfortable around the brute of a guy; he was violent, unthinking, remorseless, and had shown on multiple occasions that he was capable of releasing the entire institution into chaos by planting his fists into the face of someone from the other side of things. Luckily he was on his own right now, but Brian nevertheless felt awkward and unsafe around him. Moreover, he could tell that John was feeling unsafe - and whatever Drew wanted from him, was not something he was going to burden John with. 

‘I’ll deal with this,’ he mumbled to the man standing beside him. ‘You can go to our room if you want to - I’ll catch up.’

‘No,’ John answered softly yet resolutely. ‘I’m not leaving you here.’ 

Brian was unsure whether he should be grateful for Jon’s determination to stay at his side or worried that whatever Drew wanted to get back at him for would now be shared with John also. But, like always seemed to be the case when anything happened for which he would like to be given time to think about and ponder the consequences, he was given absolutely no more than a split second before he had to act and speak up.

‘Brian May,’ Drew repeated his name. The look on his face was intense, as if he was trying to figure out Brian’s blood type with the help of nothing with his eyes. He remained exactly where he was and made no attempts at moving closer, as he was usually prone to do when trying to intimidate someone, but Brian still was not comfortable.

‘Drew Myers.’ Brian hoped the shiver in his voice wasn’t too audible - and that the last name he had picked up in the canteen a while back actually belonged to Drew. Drew at any rate did not comment on it being incorrect - in fact, he made no derogatory comments or showed otherwise unpleasant behaviour at all. 

‘Heard you’re going for a reassessment in a week,’ he said coolly. The little wooden toothpick between his lips switched to the other side of his mouth.

For a second Brian wanted to ask him how he got to possess this piece of information, but he realised soon enough that the news of the only successful attempt at leaving Queen Mary’s early must have spread like wildfire among its patients and staff. ‘You heard right,’ he therefore said just as coolly. Not knowing what to do with his hands, he crossed them in front of him in the same fashion as Drew did - which, he realised, must not have looked as cool on him and his 6’3, 130 pound body as it did on Drew’s be it somewhat shorter but a lot broader and more muscular one. Fortunately for him, Drew did not seem intended on calling him out today.

‘I’ll cross my thumbs for you. Hope you’ll get through.’

Brian was caught by surprise by this unexpectedly kind comment. He could feel John turning to look at him, but in his moment of surprise he could not unlock his eyes from Drew’s face. ‘Really?’

‘Yes,’ Drew said without a hint of doubt. ‘You deserve better than this.’

‘Er, thanks,’ Brian uttered after having shared a short glance with John despite it all. ‘We’re, eh, hoping to leave and pick up our lives again.’ He did not know why he said this, why he tried to make conversation with someone who had basically threatened to take their lives on multiple accounts, and who had done worse besides that. But Drew didn’t show a sign of violence or malice now; he seemed calm and reasonable and perhaps even civil, and Brian found himself unable to treat Drew the exact same way in his place. 

‘As you should,’ Drew nodded. ‘You never did seem to belong here, you know. Neither did you, John.’ His hands unfolded to give a quick little point at John, who swallowed a little painfully but remained constant otherwise as Drew’s attention turned to him. ‘Way too good for a place like this. You two are better than the whole bunch of us together.’

Brian had never expected Drew to say something so kind to them.

He had also never expected that Drew saying something kind to them would simultaneously be the last thing they’d ever hear him say. A mere three days after their unexpected meetup, Drew was stabbed between the ribs with a kitchen knife one of his newly admitted rivals had acquired during a secret trip to the staff kitchen and dining room. Nolan and Derek had given CPR, an ambulance had been called, but Drew had, as the story went, been pronounced dead upon his arrival at the hospital.  

Another life wasted. 

All Brian could do was hope his case would indeed be approved, or else he feared that the name of the person he loved most in the entire world might soon also have to be added to the list of victims Queen Mary’s Psychiatric Institution had produced. 

Thank you so much for reading! I hope you enjoyed - feel free to send me PMs or messages or anons about your opinions and suggestions for The Clinic, or just to come talk for a bit. I love and appreciate you all! <3

[romancevsreality-blog]

the bachelorette, season thirteen, episode eleven: is there ANYTHING that can get me excited for paradise?

I didn’t even have to check twitter to see the results.

I knew in my brain what was going to happen but my heart wanted to reject it.

Rachel and Bryan are engaged and the internet is pissed. I’m pissed. We’ve literally seen it on this franchise before - the attorney from the South falls in love with the good looking smooth-talker who she’s immensely physically attracted to. Andi Dorfman already did it, and even then it was less painful. Damn it, Rachel. You had it ALL. And now people will call your season a “failure” because you picked the wrong guy, your People cover sold poorly, Bryan was on a shitty UPN reality show, blah blah blah, and now we’ll never have another black lead on this series again.

Maybe I’m being dramatic, but this show prepares me for it.

I don’t understand the premise of the live finale, but this one is apparently going to be different - Rachel gets to awkwardly sit there in front of a live audience and watch herself break two guys’ hearts and settle for another one instead of being dragged out in the final hour of the finale to pretend she made a great decision!

We’re back in Rioja, in the Fanty Sweet, where Peter is still debating whether or not he’s going to propose. I don’t understand what the problem is for Peter. He signed up for a show where there’s a possibility of a proposal at the end. Remember Juan Pablo? Remember how terribly things ended for him when he couldn’t fully commit? I get it - you only want to propose once and get married once. But like, I don’t think Elizabeth Taylor thought “Eh, this wedding is nice, but I can’t wait for the fourth one!”

Come on, Peter. Be realistic. It’s The Bachelorette.

Rachel hands over the Fanty Sweet card.

Peter accepts.

The next morning, I scream because Rachel looks so gorgeous without makeup and her eyebrows are perfection. He’s feeling better, and she’s feeling better too, save for the fact that she wants a proposal and he doesn’t.

Fuck, we have to deal with Bryan’s Fanty Sweet now. Gross.

They ride horses, they drink wine in a gorgeous vineyard, and Rachel is distracted. She can’t stop thinking about Peter and The Stuff With Peter, and Bryan’s droning on and on about the strength of their relationship. Rachel is literally staring off into the (gorgeous) vines and Bryan is still 100% in her face, all up in her business becasue he thinks physical closeness = emotional closeness. Bryan calls their day “different” before they go to dinner, which is an interesting way to describe being someone’s consolation prize. He comments to her that she has been off all day and he’s noticed, and she agrees, and Bryan’s like, “SEE, I DO KNOW YOU.” Bryan, is that really worthy of a self-congratulatory moment?

Is anything?

They head into a much prettier Fanty Sweet than Peter and Rachel got, and literally say empty things back and forth to each other before they go into the room and bang it out.

I bet Bryan only has sex with the woman on top because he’s worried about his fillers shifting.

My Official Ranking Of Who Was Best in Fanty Sweets:

Peter. They definitely boned. He’s probably great at it.

Bryan. I mean, it’d be boring and mediocre but he probably put on some Sade and nothing’s wrong with a little Sade.

Eric. I just have a feeling there might have been a blue balls situation there.

The next morning they sit around and feed each other strawberries, and they make out in a barf-worthy way. Chris Harrison asks what went down in the Fanty Sweets and Rachel says she asked the men their credit scores and about their health insurance. Okay, Rachel. You’re still on my good side.

Finally we’ve reached the rose ceremony. Finally. Rachel wears a fabulous blood orange1 dress with black studs and basically we already know what’s going to happen. Rachel reminds us that she was eliminated at the final three and all but says “I better get a ring at the end of this shit, boy.” And Peter gets the rose.

Despite growing a man beard because Love Made Him A Man, Eric’s going home. Her feelings for him aren’t as strong as they are with the other two, and Eric thanks for for being open and allowing him to be open with her and he’ll always love her. She wonders if maybe she made the wrong choice.

Eric comes out for his time in the spotlight and says that loving Rachel made him whole and fulfilled him. I’m not crying, you’re crying. Rachel tells him he’s a great guy and the girl he finds will be so lucky to have him. You can tell their connection was real. I didn’t grow to LOVE Eric like some other people did, but I’m happy for him. I really am.

It’s time for the final two dates, thank god. Bryan and Rachel go on a hot air baloon and I cannot begin to give any kind of a fuck about him. I actually got up and cooked bacon in their date because I don’t even care. The whole date takes less than 6 and a half minutes, so they know we want to get to the goods. Bryan gives Rachel a custom Spanish-English Language dictionary and if women could lose their boners, this would make me look into a Viagra prescription. I can GOOGLE, motherfucker.

We enter into Peter’s final date and shit feels ominous. A monk takes them on a tour of a monastery, where Peter is feeling anxious about the idea of proposing to Rachel. Peter knows he’s falling in love with her, that he wants to spend his life with her, but he doesn’t know if it’s true love. He wants Rachel to be his wife and marriage doesn’t scare him, but he doesn’t know if he can propose.

Uh, Peter? You need one to get to the other. Stop talking about the future with her if you’re not going to give her what she wants.

They head into the evening part of their dates when Rachel and Peter were wearing the same thing. Rachel tells him that the “Motherfucker don’t get me up on that platform just to shoot me down” part of her speech in the rose ceremony was mostly for him. He tells her he loves her, but he’s not ready to propose because they’ve known each other about sixteen hours in total. Rachel calls him out for selling her a dream, and she doesn’t want someone who just wants to date her, she wants to know that whatever happens will eventually end in marriage.

The thing is, in any other scenario, Peter is correct. In this one, though, he’s wrong. Peter, you went on a fucking game show. I hate to call a woman a “prize” because women are not objects to be won, but the simple premise of this show is to fucking win. And to hopefully find love/marriage/sex/babies and all of that, but it’s mostly to WIN, and in this case, the prize is an engagement. You knew that going in. It’s like going on Jeopardy and being upset that you’re already given the answers and you have to provide the question.

Alec Trebek would have a field day with you, Peter.

When he says “I only have one opportunity at a proposal”, Rachel is right to call him out that he’s only allowing himself one opportunity. He’s choosing to be stubborn. He wants her to tell him that he’s the man she’s going to spend her life with, even though he knows she can’t and isn’t allowed to answer that question. We saw it implode in Ben’s face when he told both of his F2 that he loved them. But what I am sure of is if she had, he would have proposed. As much as Rachel wanted assuredness and confidence that This Was It, so did Peter.

Finally, Peter says that if it will keep her in his life, he’s willing to go through the whole shebang with her and get down on one knee the next day. He doesn’t think it’s the right time, but she’s the right person. He’ll go against his own personal stance on proposals and marriage just to keep her. And Rachel doesn’t want a proposal just to see how things might work out.

Personally, I think Peter wanted to have fun and potentially become The Bachelor and didn’t realize until it was time that - OH SHIT - he might have to get on one knee and ask this girl to marry him. It’s all fun and games until someone gets hurt. Rachel was pretty much begging him to ask her to marry him and then realized - oh wait, I have another dude who’s super into me and who I don’t have to literally beg to be in love with and want me. There’s no guarantee with Peter, unfortunately, and no one wants to be the one who pressured someone to be with them.

I hate that I get it.

I don’t agree with it, but I get it.

Peter wishes Rachel the very best when Rachel says she can’t go through the rose ceremony if he’s just going to be her boyfriend. It’s soul crushing. There all is aching.

And then I realize.

FUCKING BRYAN WINS BY FUCKING DEFAULT??????????????????

And then I’m in a rage unlike any other that could possibly be seen in my lifetime. I knew it was going to happen, I didn’t want it to, but here we are. Alas. I can’t even cry when Peter says they’re both going to regret this decision - I mean, maybe? I don’t think so, though. Peter, you knew what you were getting into. You knew, and you couldn’t bring yourself to do it. This ain’t right, but it’s what had to happen. He tells her that she’ll have a mediocre life without him, and I gasped aloud. Oh my god. What a thing to say.

Our last shot of Peter is him ripping off his sweater and crying into it. Peter, I still don’t want you to be The Bachelor, but UGH.

Here’s the thing, though: we already had this finale. We had it twice - Desiree and Andi’s seasons, respectively. Well, not really. If you married both of those finales together, dabbled a little more awkwardness in there, you’d get this episode. At least Desiree didn’t have to sit there and watch herself sob hysterically over Brooks deciding to eliminate himself despite her only wanting and being interested in him the entire time only to turn around the next day and get engaged to another man in front of a live audience. Andi - a lawyer from the South - picked Josh - a smarmy, skeevy, kind-of-good-looking-in-a-tilt-your-head-kind-of-way former baseball player. We’ve seen it before, and I’m disappointed as all hell by it.

Peter comes out to talk to Rachel with Chris Harrison, and things are tense as hell. Peter tries to explain himself but really just blathers on for a bit because he doesn’t know how he couldn’t get to a proposal. Rachel mentions that it wasn’t that she wanted a proposal, she wanted to feel like he was really going to commit to her instead of just saying empty things and not going through with them. Rachel throws mad shade when he tries to be like “I couldn’t get out of my own head,” and she’s like “Nah, you took your time and worked at your own pace, and stuck to your guns - but this format isn’t for you.”

Read: You Should Not Be The Bachelor.

And I think she has a good point, despite people on the internet thinking this was a nasty, shady comment. If Bryan thinks being The Bachelor means he’ll have the reins, he’s wrong. You lose even more of your agency when you become the lead of this show, and everyone who’s read an article with Jason Mesnick knows this. The producers have a show to make, and you’re just as much of a player in their game as the other contestants. We’ve seen what happens when the Bachelor tries to go rogue. You can’t “take your time”. He tries to apologize for the “mediocre life” comment, and Rachel shuts that shit down because she’s living her “best life”.

Peter claims that he “feels attacked”, a classic move by white people towards black people upon being held accountable for their actions. It’s misogynoir to prey upon the “angry black woman” trope, and I am fucking tired of seeing it happen, even subconsciously. Rachel’s assessing her feeling on the situation, not attacking you. We find out that Peter tried to reach out to Rachel, but he wasn’t allowed to, for obvious reasons, and that he left her eyelashes on the floor for two days. Wasn’t he staying in a hotel? Housekeeping? Also, if you break up with a girl due to your lack of commitment, don’t contact her again. That makes no sense.

I guess we’ll get through the proposal even though I’m gagging. And not in the good, Drag Race kind of way.

All Rachel can say about Bryan is that he’s a good person. That’s it. Bryan’s at least had the good taste not to pick the most hideous of Neil Lane rings for Rachel, which is nice. Bryan’s nervous, but confident because they’ve talked about this, and oh, he wins anyway. If Rachel hadn’t done that NPR interview and said she was engaged at the beginning of the season, I would say she ran away from Bryan with an epic speech like at the end of UnReal’s first season.

I don’t think she doesn’t have feelings for Bryan, it just all seems so… blah. So unexcited. We saw more emotion out of Rachel the night before than we did this entire engagement. Jesus, who decided to have this thing outside? The winds are insane. I doubt she heard a damn thing he said. Blah blah blah “Chemistry bomb”, blah blah blah, “I used to date exciting and complicated dudes but now I want you!”

He gets down on one knee, and she screams. He asks her to be is reina forever, and she squeals, “It’s so PRETTY!” She says “Yes, give it to me, it’s so pretty!!!!!!!”

Uh. Rachel?

This isn’t your best look. There’s no joy, no warmth, it’s just… there. Like, why would your instantaneous reaction be “Give it to me!”, RAQUEL? WHY ARE YOU DOING THIS? My response will be to faint, probably.

At The Final Rose, Bryan re-proposes, probably because she couldn’t hear him the first time in Rioja. Bryan hasn’t gotten his cheek fillers re-done, which is good. Here’s the kicker: they’re not rushing into anything. They’re not planning a wedding yet, they’re taking it slow and trying to figure out where they’re living first.

Oh, god. Then we’re treated to some gross Fuck Island footage where alleged sexual assault is played out as “controversy”.

I’m trying to be excited, guys. I really am. It’s gonna get me at some point.

See you next week.

Amanda’s Final Assessments of the Season as a Whole:

I think despite my early assessment, this is the best group of guys this series has had in a long time. Dean, Alex, Diggy, Kenny - there was a great lot and the greatness should have outshined the awfulness (Lee, DeMario - though I’m hesitant to paint DeMario as a villain in any form now)

I’m low-key rooting for Alex to be The Bachelor. I know last time they went with “fan favorite” instead of “Top Three” we got Juan Pablo, but still. I think he’s hot as hell, smart as hell, and woke as hell. Otherwise, I think the alumni have now realized that Fuck Island is just as much of an audition for Bachelor as their actual season/placement, so we’ll see what happens there. My low-key support for Ben Zorn also… y’all, do I have a type?

If I were Rachel and Bryan, I would exit the limelight as soon as I could and start on building a relationship. Go back to your jobs and your lives and pretend like shit’s normal. I feel for Rachel - I’m sure she expected the fans of this show (I will not call it Bachelor Nation) were going to love her choice as much as she did, and was shocked to learn that people think she’s desperate for a ring, that he’s phony, and that most of the fans were rooting for the guy she turned on massively in the end. I bet it hurt to see the audience’s reactions to her choices during After The Final Rose (During The Final Rose?) and she seemed visibly angry during most of it.

I hate Bryan more than I hate Jordan Rodgers and his Jimmy Neutron haircut, sorry. Clearly no one told Bryan the Real Housewives rule that you don't get fillers done right before the season starts.

Despite my dislike for Bryan, I still... like Rachel? I know people really seemed to turn on her and her ability to make extremely emotional decisions, but this happens every season with the lead. We love them until we don’t have to anymore. It’s what these people turn into after the show is over that will determine how I feel about them. Remember how we all used to love Tanner before it turned out he was kind of an emotionally abusive asshole who literally blames his wife for getting pregnant with a baby girl?

I’m still happy Rachel was our first Black Bachelorette™, though. I’m happy we got one period, but especially one so accomplished, smart, strong, independent, funny, and charismatic makes a damn good role model for young girls and women. She is still an admirable person. She’s still a god damn queen and better thn most. Just because she showed a few flaws is no reason to discount having a person of color in the lead of this show. We’re all fucking flawed and sometimes, we’re all unlikeable. Is she gonna do some things we don’t like? Of course, we’re not holding her to Michelle Obama-level sainthood standards.

Rachel, beware of Bryan’s mom. She’s the type that’ll give you a strawberry and glass-shard smoothie.

What I would have done as The First Black Bachelorette™: I would have been a lot less classy and a lot less diplomatic.

 ↩︎

[wishingfornever]

2/22/2018 – No Contact:  Siesta Thursday

I woke up at 8… fell asleep.  Woke up at 11.  Fell asleep.  Woke up at 1.  Staying awake.

Several dreams.  The first dream was about my boss’s boss’s boss. Supposed to be a woman.  Dreamed I was speaking with her but I can’t remember her face.  Makes sense, since I have yet to see her face. Second dream… Esther.  This one was different than recent Esther dreams.  We were sitting in a room with other people, I was bored and she asked me if I wanted to read an article for couples who broke up and are trying to get back together again.  I considered not going, but I reminded myself that I’d do everything I can to keep her. So, I said, “Actually, I would like that very much.”

Finally, the last dream I had, I was reminded that Esther and I no longer speak to each other and this saddened me.  I fell asleep and I was crying, speaking to these people who weren’t really there.  The room was dark.  It was night.  There was this woman there as well as several others.  The woman wasn’t Ariel, but I had told this woman I loved her but I could never love her as much as I love Ariel.  Then while I was crying, I rolled over to see the door open.  I was alone at this time and I thought it was this same woman and I told her I’m sorry when she approached me.  She got close enough and I tried to kiss her but she pulled back.  As did I.

I realized it was my cousin, and apparently she was fired from her job and she was massively depressed, though she wanted to be fired.  I reassured her, she left my room, I looked outside to this alleyway (that isn’t there in rl, it’s just these apartments out my window) and I saw a lot of rain.  A lot of Mexicans too, like we were actually in Mexico and not a part of Houston that is heavily populated by Mexicans… which wouldn’t be too inaccurate to say, tbh.

Regardless, something told me they were Mexicans.  I saw a couple walk down the street and I was jealous.  Then I saw a man hit another man on the back of his head with a club.  Then the police came.  It was a mess.

Perhaps that dream was a reminder that I worry too much about myself when the world outside my window has… well, the burdens of the world.  Criminals, cops, and lovers.  Idk.

Anyways, the Boss’s Boss’s Boss.  Triple B.  She was supposed to inspect the store today.  Yesterday, I closed.  I did a poor job but I discovered… energy shots make my nose itch.  It makes sense but I don’t have concrete evidence just yet.  It’s very peculiar. Might have something to do with stress?  Idk.

Customers are nice to me at work.  I don’t know how to react.  Several days ago, a woman tried to give me a bag of potato chips and a liter of pepsi.  I told her I don’t drink soda and don’t like chips.  She was nice and I felt horrible for saying no.  Yesterday, I had a can of pringles and a two liter of root beer.  I feel like an ass.

Of course, I hated the pringles and the two liter was to fix my water bottle which had become so dented I needed some carbonation to undent it.  Worked great, btw.

I was given a box of chinese food from a coworker.  Walked home with that.  I have to say, it wasn’t my finest moment.  Reason being is that there was chicken in it.  I felt bad for that.  I’m trying to be as vegetarian as possible.  :/

Regardless, I ate everything.  So consider 21st of February the last day I had meat.  I’ll count until the next day I inevitably cheat. We’ll see.

My manager, the one I closed with last night…  I legitimately think he hates Mexicans.  Dan is his name.  He’s the one who referred to customers as “Wetbacks” and on Monday (several days ago) said kid’s in the store were running loose because their parents were irresponsibly drinking and having a party a little bit down the way. I said “Oh, it’s Monday.  Mondays are the worst days for partying.”

“Mexicans don’t care,” he said.  “They party every night if they could and we have to deal with their kids because of it.”

The last comment, though perhaps not blatantly racist, didn’t sit right with me.  The way he said Mexican… that was an issue I had.

Ironically, I had mentioned to the store manager (Jack) of Dan’s “Wetbacks” comment and how it caught me SO off guard.  This wasn’t me reporting, I was just gabbing.  That day when he said “Mexicans don’t care,” I found out he told Berenice, a shift manager like Dan.  I asked him not to tell Dan about it.  I don’t want to get involved in Workplace drama and if he knew I was gossiping, there would be a major conflict of interests and working would be… difficult.

I hate working with Dan.  He smells, his breath smells, and he’s kind of a hassle.  Bad days are made worse with him.  I don’t have a lot of faith when working with him.  He complains A LOT.  Like so much. One of those.  I try to be polite, but god damn.  Like, he swears up and down that the store would fall apart without him (not those exact words, mind you).

Admittedly, he’s the only one who can do some chores because he is the only manager with a car.  But, still.  Some of the places he claims to have organized are kind of… crap.

I wonder if I’m just too extensive in my job or if everyone has phoned it in.  I swear I’ve phoned it in but I’ve been wrong before.

So, remember how I wanted to message Marjane Satrapi?  Ask her for advice?  Not feeling so confident, so I won’t be doing that.  I looked, and it’s probably a fan page I saw.  I don’t have any chance in hell to get guidance from her.

It’s a shame. When she stopped identifying as Iranian, I could relate.  When growing up, I pretended I wasn’t Mexican.  My dad sort of made it out to be bad, so I thought so too.  Now, I don’t want to identify as American but I don’t have anything else to be.

Dennis used to give me a hard time calling me, “Half-Breed.”  A lot.  It hurt more than I’d let on, but I ignored it.  Whenever I mocked him, he was quick to say, “omg, wtf dude?!” but I never pointed it out.  I guess I would have when dealing with Esther, but I was too emotional then.  Might still be now.

He also called me “Mama’s Boy” a lot with Adriana which wasn’t as bad as half-breed because it was always my dad I had to call or whatever.  I knew otherwise but half-breed… eh.

Whatever.  Not trying to shit on Dennis for busting my balls.  We all did it.  Shane was the worst at it, though.  Like, laughably bad.  Fun times.

Right, Marjane.

I was hoping to get into a discussion with a fellow Marxist and discuss life… how to approach my dad, tell her about Esther, tell her my troubles, just… I need someone I feel I can relate with.  Someone wiser than me.  I won’t get that with my parents because my dad is part of the problem and my mom is too invested in me.

I really feel alone.

Tomorrow, I’ll message Esther.  I’ll call my dad, too.  Esther I will try to make quick.  I’ll ask her if she’ll want me to change her name or whatever.  Try to keep her identities secret.  If not, I’ll keep the names how they are because… well, I’m lazy and I really don’t feel like changing ALL the names on a whim.  But if she wants me to, I’ll listen.  If she blocks me without saying a word, then I’ll assume she doesn’t mind.

Whatever the case, I’ll make it quick.  Let her know I still care… perhaps she’ll see that and open up dialogue again.  Won’t amount to much, but if there is a chance then this is the way to get there.

Of course, the worst case scenario is she blocks me immediately.  The most likely scenario is that she messages me to tell me “Change my name” and then blocks me without saying anything else.  The second to best case scenario is that she tells me to change her name, tells me she wishes me well, and then blocks me.

I can almost guarantee dialogue beyond that.  Life hasn’t been kind to me, but… idk.  Maybe sometime this year, things will get better.

Strangely enough, despite what’s happened since January, I feel like this may be my year.  I mean, it started poorly… and continues to be mediocre, but there are a lot of things that are being released that appeals to my interests.  Like, Age of Empires Definitive Edition is released (not for steam yet).  Kingdom Come Deliverance (which has a bad title) is supposed to be pretty neat, if you can get past his HUGE forehead.  Rome II Total War has more DLC being released for it for SOME FUCKING REASON.  Doki Doki Literature club is a graphic novel about poetry… poetry.

I can’t play of these things, yet.  Like, AoE isn’t for steam or Windows 8, KDC is too graphically intensive, Rome II DLC hasn’t been released yet or I refuse to get at full price, and DDLC is free to download but I won’t be downloading it yet.  Why not?  I don’t know, I figure I’d wait a little while to play through it myself but it’s already been spoiled for me so no rush.

Adela didn’t go to work today.  She was too sick.  Which is great because Max wasn’t in here.  So, I sort of slept in if you say taking a nap at about noon is sleeping at noon.  I have yet to eat and it’s 5. She’s going to barre soon and she’ll leave Max with me.  I think I’ll do some exercise, weigh myself after, have breakfast, then do the dishes.

I look a lot thinner than I used to.  I’ve lost a lot of belly weight.  I also feel stronger than I have in months.  I’ve never felt stronger which is perhaps to say I’ve never been weaker.  I’m ashamed to admit that.  But, I’ll get over it.

Speaking of getting over it, Max is in the room now.  He is something of a pest as of late and has been avoiding me.  He used to be super chill with me but something’s happened.  Now when we’re in the same room, he pesters me until I let him out.  He REALLY doesn’t want to even be in the same level as me.  Like, he waits downstairs when I’m in the room and when I’m downstairs he’ll be upstairs.

Hrm… Perhaps this started when we stopped giving him treats?  I can’t even remember.

He was walking over the keyboard as I was typing.  Unfortunately, his anxiety worsened when discord went “BLEEP” and that scared the crap out of him.  So, that makes him want to walk on the keyboard. And Max has the worst breath (not as bad as Dan’s, though).

Now that I think about it, everyone at work has bad breath.  I hate it. But I’m reminded of myself because I don’t bathe a lot when I’m depressed and I was depressed for a very long time.  :/

Eh. I’m bathing more than I ever had and I’ve never been so… emotionally unstable.  Things change, I guess.

About to walk max.  Tried to brush my hair.  Looked in the mirror. Smiled.

I look like the joker if he were chunkier and more Mexican.  The comic book joker.  The joker there is super skinny, but I have his angry looking smile.  Erm…

The reason for this is because I shaved yesterday.  No more beard.  It’ll grow back.  But… I probably shouldn’t shave.

That said, I now way 241.5 pounds.  What is that in Metric?  Not sure. The US is dumb.  But that’s pretty light.  Last time I measured myself, I weighed a bit more.  I’m still losing weight, but at a slow rate.

[carterthornton]

The Third Wave | Chapter Twenty: Punishment and Reunion

        "Arrgh! Christ!" Aiko winced as Ms. Fawkes pulled an icepack away from her wrist, proceeding to gently wrap the sprained forearm with a compression bandage.

       "Aw, don't be a baby, lass," Ms. Fawkes chuckled as she put a clip on the bandage, holding it in place. "There, good as new. Well... not quite, but you'll live." Ms. Fawkes got up from her stool and browsed the shelves, searching for anti-inflammatory medication (she had misplaced it the day before, and hadn't searched for it yet). Luckily, hiding behind a few other containers were the meds she was looking for, and she brought them over to Aiko, who sat on Ms. Fawke's medical bed in the center of the room. "Here we go!" Ms. Fawkes said as she handed Aiko her medicine. "These are anti-inflammatories- take em' for pain and swelling, but use in moderation, alright? Follow the instructions to the letter; I don't want to send to send ya to the hospital."

       "No prob, Ms. Fawkes," Aiko nodded, clutching her bandage tightly to make sure it was secure. "Thanks."

       "Yur welcome," Ms. Fawkes grinned, rushing over to Maeve, who sat off on the side in a lounger, awaiting treatment. "Now, onto my most frequent customer!" Ms. Fawkes almost seemed to skip over to Maeve, rolling the dragon-girl closer to Aiko as she hummed to herself. "Don't be followin' in the footsteps of this clown here..." Ms. Fawkes whispered to Aiko as she flipped Maeve over, examining her wound. "She's a bit of a loose cannon."

       "Yeah, I figured that much," Aiko giggled, Maeve grumbling under her breath. "How does her wound look? A member of my team treated it with his Mark. Has it healed at all?"

       "Well, he treated it right- plucked the shrapnel out and used a natural disinfecting agent to kill bacteria. Trouble is he didn't cover it up, and it's got a bit a dirt all in it." Ms. Fawkes walked over to a sink in the corner of the room, washing her hands vigorously before putting on medical gloves. She grabbed a pair of cleaned tweezers, picking out tiny pieces of dirt that were hidden in Maeve's wound. Unfortunately, some pieces were trapped; Maeve's enhanced healing had already begun to take effect and was quickly closing the injury with a new layer of skin. "Hmm... looks like I'll only be able to get out the exposed pieces. You're already healin' up."

       "Of course I am, I'm a Mythical Beast Mark-user," Maeve announced, prideful in the unique abilities her Mark granted.

       "Careful, Maeve..." Ms. Fawkes warned her, placing wet cloth on Maeve's wound. "I've treated countless characters like yourself who thought their Mark could protect em' from anythin'. Better healin' doesn't mean invincibility."

       Just then, Ms. Steele walked into Ms. Fawke's office, snorting under her breath as she saw Maeve on the bed once again. "Oh boy."

       "Robot-lady!" Yuko clapped as soon as she caught a glimpse of Ms. Steele's arms, standing close to Aiko.

       "Hey, Steely, whatcha doin' in here?" Gin's voice became sweeter as she turned to Ms. Steele, who sat down on a chair near the door.

       "Just here for a check-up is all- arm's on the fritz again," Ms. Steele replied, rolling her shoulder a few times and clenching her metal fist. She then popped her head up to get a better view of Maeve's leg, scoffing at the reckless dragon's new scars. "You gotta slow it down, kid. You'll get hurt if you keep this up."

       "Says the woman with cybernetics..." Maeve muttered.

       "She's right, ya know? You can't go rushin' into battle without any concern for safety, it's dangerous," Ms. Fawkes added as she slowly rubbed the damp cloth against Maeve's leg, mopping up any remaining dirt and debris whilst also cleansing the wound. "Listen to Ms. Steele, she's an expert when it comes to being reckless... right, cowgirl?" Gin shot Ms. Steele a naughty glance, teasing the veteran.

       "Shut yer trap, Potato-Head," Ms. Steele shook her head at Ms. Fawkes as she crossed her arms and leaned her head back against the wall, trying to hide the smile spreading across her face.

       "So, um..." Aiko treaded carefully with her next question, as she feared it would stir up unwanted emotions in Ms. Steele. "How did you get all those cybernetics?"

       "Yeah, tell us!" Yuko chimed in.

       "Ah, just got caught in an explosion- nothing epic or anything," Ms. Steele shrugged her shoulders, staring at the ground for a moment before continuing. "Typical injury on the battlefield."

       "Alrighty, lass, you're good as new," Ms. Fawkes declared as she finished bandaging Maeve's leg, handing her a package of extra bandages. "Here, make sure to switch em' when they get dirty."

       "Thank you," Maeve nodded, hopping off the medical bed.

       "You're very welcome," Ms. Fawkes beamed, looking over to Yuko. "How about you, sweetheart? Do you need anything patched up?"

       "Um..." Yuko checked her metal body for any scrapes or scratches; thankfully, nothing. "Nope!"

       "Hmm, I never did get either of your names..." Ms. Fawkes scratched her chin at Aiko and Yuko, sitting down on her office chair.

        Aiko stepped down from the medical bed and stood beside Yuko. "I'm Aiko Schmitt, and this is Yuko. She's err-... my sister."

       "Ah, I see the resemblance," Ms. Fawkes stated, noticing their similarities in face shape and body structure. " I can see who the athlete in the family is..." She snorted, pointing out Yuko's superior size and muscle mass.

       "Uh, yeah..." Aiko couldn't help but feel bullied for her mediocre height. "I'm not that short!"

       "Now, you guys run along to Headmaster Colter, he's got a bone to pick with the ya," Ms. Fawkes quickly shooed all three of them out into the hall, poking her head outside before closing it completely. "Have a good one!" And with that, Ms. Fawkes was free from a long day of tending injured students. "Bloody hell... I'm beat." She sighed, plopping back down on her office chair as she stared at the ceiling.

       "It must be damn tirin'- dealin' with all those reckless kid's injuries," Ms. Steele empathized with the exhausted nurse before her. "They're always so damn enthusiastic- gettin' into fights like that."

       "Were you any different at that age?" Ms. Fawkes smirked, bringing back old memories of their high school years.

       "Nope," Ms. Steele smirked as she tapped her metal hand against her leg. "But look where that got me, eh?"

       "You know it wasn't your fault- what happened to you," Ms. Fawkes reminded her like she had done countless times before. "Shit happens."

       "Yeah, yeah..." Ms. Steele brushed her off as she sat down on one of the medical beds, awaiting Ms. Fawke's healing touch. "Now, how about that check-up?"

       "Joy Steele... always so forward," Ms. Fawkes' voice became somewhat sultry, stirring up unwanted emotions in Ms. Steele.

       "What did I tell ya about callin' me 'Joy', Coal Cracker?" Ms. Steele's face flushed red as she forced a scowl.

       "Shut up and show me yur arm, Yeehaw," Ms. Fawkes giggled as she took Ms. Steele's forearm, raising it to see under her shoulder. "Hmm... not an expert with cybernetics, but it looks like ya got a dull magnet in there. You should check up with Billy downstairs, he'll patch you up."

       "Th-thanks..." Ms. Steele nodded as she clutched her left arm, testing its mobility.

      "Now, I'm curious... why didn't ya go right to Billy in the first place?" Ms. Fawkes bit her lower lip as she sat on Ms. Steele's lap, causing the poor gritty soldier to sweat from anxiety. "Did ya wanna ask me something, Maverick?"

      "W-well... I was wondrin' if we could maybe go somewhere tonight?" Ms. Steele slurred her words as the sweet aroma wafting off of Ms. Fawkes reached her nose, causing her to nearly go brain-dead.

      "Sounds good, A rúnsearc," Ms. Fawkes said in a bewitching voice as smooth as Irish cream, her amber eyes locking onto Ms. Steele's emerald gaze. "What did ya have in mind?"

       "Dinner? Maybe a movie?" Ms. Steele tried to calm herself down, but Ms. Fawkes made it exceedingly difficult to every hot and heavy breath she took. "I hear there's another Fast and Furious movie playin'."

       "It's a date then," Ms. Fawkes nodded as she skipped over to the door, locking it from the inside. "But first... I need a little time to unwind."

       "W-wait, here?!" Ms. Steele stuttered as Ms. Fawkes jumped on top of her like a cheetah pouncing on its prey. "Now?!"

       "Any complaints...?" Ms. Fawkes snickered drunkenly as she unbuttoned Ms. Steele's shirt, wrapping her long legs around the bumbling soldier's waist.

        "Uh..." Ms. Steele looked behind her lover, watching the door for a moment before finally giving in with a defeated grunt. "Ah, fuck it." A wild grin stretched across Ms. Steele's face as she grabbed Ms Fawkes and violently kissed her. "Ya fuckin' Clover."

       "Shut yur trap, Hick," Gin snapped back at her as she shut Joy up with another kiss. "I need some Fast and Furious right fuckin' here."

****

       Yuko held Aiko's hand as they entered the Headmaster's office, looking for Aiko's reassurance. "Ai-... Aiko?"

       "It's okay, Yuko. Don't be scared," Aiko calmed her little sister down, reaching up to pat Yuko on the head.

       "Oh... okay..." Yuko nodded as she looked all around the room, marveling at Headmaster Colter's odd taste in decoration. "Whoa, this is weird!"

       "An interesting design," Maeve affirmed Yuko's statement as she analyzed the space.

       "Not what you expected?" The Headmaster guffawed with his low voice, adding a jolly tone to the situation. "Come in!"

       The Headmaster's office was primarily designed with a 50's art deco style in mind, taking inspiration from jazz clubs and Hollywood glam of that era. Portraits of 50's pop-icons lined the walls where one would expect a bland still life painting to reside; Marilyn Monroe, Humphrey Bogart, Chuck Berry, they all were hung up in frames. There was even a jukebox close to the Headmaster's desk playing 'Maybe ' by The Ink Spots, and it's sound provided a very comforting ambience to the room that incited nostalgia in people that had never even experienced that generation.

       "Oh my God, is that-?" Aiko cut herself off as she took a gander at the Frank Sinatra album inside the jukebox, almost forgetting the reason why she came to the Headmaster's office.

      "Hush, buffoon!" Maeve silenced Aiko with a hushed scream.

      "Yep, it's original," Headmaster Colter answered her as he laid back in his chair, taking a deep breath. "Cost an arm and a leg to find. You like em'?"

       "Ah, yep... I like his music," Aiko nodded, trying to keep a serious face on. "So, um.. down to business then?"

       "Yeah, let's get to it," The Headmaster grabbed reading glasses from a compartment in his desk to read Officer Grey's report on the day's events. "So, you all can confirm these reports were true? You were all involved in today's incident and you actively went against a direct order given to you by one of the teaching staff?"

       "Yes." They all nodded.

       "Alright..." The Headmaster sighed, getting off his seat with an exasperated groan. "You're smart, honest students- that much is clear -but you disobeyed an order from a superior. That won't fly if you get out in the field one day; your commanding officer won't have time for any of your malarkey." He folded up his glasses and placed them back in the desk, slowly stretching as he got back up to relieve all the stress on his back that built up over the day. "Aiko, you're new here, so I hope you'll only have to hear this lecture once, but you..." He shot Maeve an annoyed look as he sat back down in his chair. "You've caused the teaching staff nothing but trouble since you first got here. Damn it, MacDonnell! You're a star student with stellar grades, but you've got to learn a little perspective. You can't just go barging in like you know everything because you don't!"

       "Yes, sir..." The fire inside Maeve seemed to dissipate, leaving her cold and emotionless; she simply stared off into space and nodded. "I'm sorry, sir."

       "Sorry isn't good enough anymore, and it's not good enough for your father either," Headmaster Colter shook his head as he packed up the papers of Grey's report into its file, placing it in his desk drawer. "My apologies, Maeve, but I'm going to have to give you a suspension to get my message across."

       Maeve was shocked back into reality by Colter's declaration. "Thank you, Headmas-."

       "There must be some other way, Headmaster. Maeve may have disobeyed orders, but she saved all those officers today! There must be some alternative to suspension...?" Aiko voiced her opinion on the matter, trying to shield Maeve from such a severe punishment. "Right?"

       "I suppose there could be..." The Headmaster scratched his chin as he thought for a moment. "Yes, I think I know the perfect alternative, though, I'm not sure if you'll be satisfied with it."

       "W-what is it...?" Aiko asked, cursing her conscious for covering Maeve's tail so quickly.

       "For the alternative, Ms. MacDonnell could live with you for the rest of the school week," Colter groomed his beard as he continued. "Yes... I think it would be a good way for Ms. MacDonnell to be more cooperative with her peers."

       "No, no, no!" Maeve waved her hands in the air as she voiced her concern. "I'm not going to live with..." She leaned in closer to Colter, secretly gesturing over to Aiko and Yuko. "Those two..."

      "Fine, then you take the suspension," Colter said as he tapped a pencil against his desk.

      "Um-!" Maeve trailed off as she weighed her options carefully. "I'll... take the alternative."

       "Yay, a sleepover!" Yuko cheered as she hugged Maeve tightly, completely ignoring her personal space.

       "Unhand me, you fool!" Maeve shouted at her captor, wheezing as Yuko hugged tighter. "Hrrnn!"

       "Yuko, what did I tell you about people's 'bubbles'?!" Aiko yelled at her sister, trying to pry Maeve out of her grasp. "Yuko!"

****

       In a storage warehouse in Rock Bay, in the Burnside District of Victoria, a door swung open, revealing Damian on the other side along with his fellow comrades. Reika, Camila, and Varg followed Damian closely, making sure he was safe from harm. Louise and Alistair tagged along behind them, whispering to each other in hushed tones.

       "Are we really gonna be meetin' these wankas, Damian?" Alistair spoke up, mumbling into The Father's ear.

       "These two are not 'wankas', they're old friends of the cause- the original Brother and Sister that joined eight years ago," Damian replied as he removed his sunhat. "Reika remembers them well."

       "I do! I'm so excited to see them all again! It's been so long!" Reika held her hands to her heart, reminiscing on the good times she shared with her old family. "Oh, Ara's gonna freak out when he sees how big I got after all these years!"

       "Yeah... big," Alistair gawked at Reika's rear as he trailed behind her.

       "Indeed, she shall," Damian let out a light chuckle as they all turned down a hall surrounded by wooden crates. "Please, try to be nice, everyone. We wouldn't want to be impolite to our elders."

       The Kin gathered at a clearing in the middle of the warehouse created just recently, as evident by the dust outlines on the floor which used to house various containers. The missing crates seemed to be arranged into two makeshift thrones, and sitting on top of them were two grizzled looking veterans. The one on the left was a woman in her early thirties, a Korean woman with very short, periwinkle hair that was done up in flapper curls. Despite her obvious Asian heritage (brown eyes, round cheeks, and a short nose), she had a very Western-looking body type and face shape. She had a long slender figure with tall legs and a very sharp chin, and she had a lengthy neck as well. The crane-like woman wore a purple tweed jacket over a red tank top cut above her stomach, with black denim jeans to tie it all together.

       "Bonjour, all!" She greeted them with a very dainty wave, gracefully crossing a leg over the other as she fiddled with a large steel needle in her hand.

       *Ara Kae Toutou (IMOP Bounty: 40,350,000 UND)*

        "Ah, Madame Toutou..." Damian kissed Ara's outstretched hand as she descended from her throne. "As graceful as ever."

       "Merci, Mousieur Dreyfus," Ara laughed, kissing him on either side of his face.

       "Oh, cariño... not more of that Frenchy-French garbage," The hulking man on the right grumbled with a thick Mexican accent as he rolled his eyes.

       The man occupying the next throne- aside from his height -was the exact opposite of Ara. His black hair was slicked back with Brill cream, and he had big and bold sideburns that complimented his bushy moustache. He was a swollen mass of raw muscle and testosterone, standing just under Varg's height, but far outclassing him in the brawn category. His broad neck was like a pyramid, and his barrelled chest stuck out of his tight, grey t-shirt. Each of his titanic arms was the size of Varg's torso, but his legs were fairly short compared to the rest of his body, though, they were still well-built. The man had a rigid face with a solid jaw line, and his eyes were dark brown; he appeared to squint most of the time as well. His black leather jacket just barely contained his musculature, and his tight blue jeans were done up with a spiffy brown belt made from the finest leather. The sleeves on his jacket were rolled up to accommodate huge metal cuffs on his forearms that looked as if they weighed at least a ton each, and he also wore modified hiking boots with heavy metal soles. He looked as tough as they come.

       *Pablo Hernandez (IMOP Bounty: 53,000,000 UND)*

       "Hola, Pablo," Damian gave Pablo a firm but cautious handshake as he stepped off his seat, wary of the raw strength behind his grip.

       "Hola, mi amigo!" Pablo pulled Damian in and hugged him like a brother would. "You look well, Damian! Have you been workin' out?"

       "I've had my share of field experience in these eight years," Damian replied, gesturing to his moustache. "You've grown facial hair, I see."

       "Ah, yes! You like it, eh? It took me a while," Pablo chuckled as he walked over to meet the rest of his old team. "Who are the newcomers?"

       "Of course, I must introduce you two. Come," Damian sorted his allies into a huddle, forming an amalgamation of Kin members, both new and old. "For those of you who don't know, this is Pablo; he was the first member I recruited all those years ago when Reika and I began, 'The Brother'." Damian then placed a hand on Ara's shoulder. "And Ara is the second recruit; she once bared the title of 'Sister' before you, Camila. But, since their roles have been filled, you shall refer to these two as your 'Grandmother' and 'Grandfather'."

       "It is good to work with you all, mes amies," Ara giggled delightedly as she struck up a conversation with Reika, whom she hadn't seen in years. "Ma parole, ma parole! You have grown into a beautiful woman!"

       "Thank you, Ara. It really has been too long," Reika felt an ego boost from Ara's compliment as she placed a hand on her hip. "How are you? How was Paris?"

       "Très bien, très bien, Cherry Blossom! Oh, ow wonderful Paris was! I will tell you more when we arrive at our new abode," Ara held back her enthusiasm, knowing full-well that Damian was about to get down to business. "Let us begin zen, oui?"

       "Yes..." Damian cleared his throat before continuing. "In light of our recent loss, I now realize just how different Victoria is from Vancouver. The population density of Mark-users is simply astounding. Though the IMOP forces are spread out far and wide across the island, there are many students at the academy that we may need to keep tabs on in the future. I must confess, we are horribly outmatched in this new environment, but we will adapt, like always. And so that is why I've invited some old faces back into the fold, you see."

       "So, what now?" Camila asked.

       "What is imperative to our cause as of right now is locating and liberating the Mythical Beast Mark-user hidden somewhere in this city by The Paladins," Damian answered.

       "And what do you know of this Mark-user?" Pablo inquired, crossing his arms as he groomed his moustache.

       "We know of her name, Isabelle. However, we know nothing of the Mark she carries- only rumours telling of its potential to aid entire armies in their advance," Damian explained in a grave tone of voice. "We cannot let a Mark-user of that calibre fall into the hands of The Paladins. If this girl is utilized properly by those fools, there's no telling the carnage they might inflict on fellow Mark-users."

       "Damn Paladins..." Varg spat on the ground at the mere mention of their name.

       "She is being held in a bunker somewhere underneath the Greater Victoria area," Damian sighed, tapping his thumbs together. "It's vague but at least it's something."

       "A bunker? Aren't zare many of zeez in za city?" Ara interjected whilst simultaneously inspecting her nails for any cracks or scrapes.

       "Yes, there are, which is exactly why I've called upon you two. We need more boots on the ground if we ever hope to find Isabelle," Damian responded, scratching his chin at the thought of such a large-scale undertaking. "And to start, we must work our way up The Paladin's chain of command until we finally sever the head of the demon, Peter Bishop. Once he's gone, the gang violence against Mark-users in Victoria shall be cleft in two."

       "The Master and Commander of the West Coast Paladins? Dios mío... how we gonna do that? That guy's a ghost." Pablo shook his head, dreading such an idea.

       "Like Damian said: we work our way up the food chain from local gangs, to grunts, to knights, and so on," Louise offered her support for Damian's plan. "It will take time, but it will eventually yield results."

       "Well, I ain't got better things to do anyways..." Pablo snickered, feeling all nostalgic as he heard the enthusiasm of Damian's group. "Let's do this."

       "Oui! Let us embark!" Ara cheered as she outstretched her hand into the middle of their circle.

       "Yes, let us begin," Damian smiled as he placed his hand on top of Ara's, the rest of his team joining in. "For the family..."

       "For humanity." They all chanted, hopeful of the future.

       "Ha ha! A happy day!" Pablo let out a hearty laugh as he hugged Varg and Camila. "We got any tequila at the new crib, eh? I'm in the mood for a party!"

       "And hopefully a shower..." Camila mumbled to herself as her nostrils puckered, catching a whiff of Pablo's overpowering musk.

[pers0nals-blog]

wow.... 4/19/17

Well hello there tumblr world. I did not expect to be back here writing out everything that seems to be going wrong in the world. It's crazy to me to read these because everything always seems to go right, I just have to be patience and let it do it's work. As for my New York boy, it ended up just being too much time apart and I didn't miss him. I mean the next time I saw him was October, almost a whole year later! And I wasn't interested anymore, he didn't have his shit together like I thought he did. But regardless, that break up was easy. So then I met another boy in NYC.... Except we work together. And this is where my life gets messy and I've made it so chaotic. I started a new job in July after getting laid off at my previous job. I was boppin around, I had another guy in my life that I was dating and had no intentions of dating anyone else. But then this guy.... I remember it was over Thanksgiving break. He told me he was coming home and all this stupid flirting crap but I was like cool idk who you are but do you homie because I had a man at the time and really didn't think he was that cute (but it was obviously he was into me). When I met him, nothing crazy either, very much not my type looks-wise. But personality? Everything I love. Confidence but cute and funny but sweet and of course always flirty and silly. Which is what got me. We ended up going on a date the week after and I remember thinking it was moving so fast for what i thought but he lived in NYC so I figured eh it's just something temporary and maybe if I move out there I can rekindle or something. The date wasn't even that cool tbh but he took me to a really nice dinner. We kissed, idk it wasn't anything out of the ordinary. As time moved on, I realized that he may have liked me and I may have liked him. I barely saw him because he was in NYC but then he told me he was moving back home. So we just talked everyday and he flew me to NYC and spent time with me and we were great and happy together. I knew he was afraid of commitment but he acted like I was someone important to him. He would say he couldn't wait to see me, kiss me, hug me, talk to me. This went on for 4 months and then he moved home. At this point, we had discussed possibly seriously dating. He said he was open to it but it would take time. After moving home, we probably talked less and barely saw eachother for moving back home. I was crushed, I was hurt and I felt lied to. I ended things on March 26th in the Equinox parking lot on the phone. He had the nerve to say "oh maybe we can talk down the line?" and that maybe he'd be ready but he didn't know when. That to me is just empty promises, empty everything. Of course going to work those next two weeks SUCKED. I felt like he didn't care about me at all, that everything we did was a lie and joke. We had this offsite coming up and I was just hoping he'd drunkenly admit to me how he knew he fucked up and that I was an amazing person that deserved the world (what's new!) Except that didn't happen. Instead it was beyond obvious to all my peers that we had some weird tension hanging above our heads. He continued to flirt with every girl there except me, saying it was "his personality". I told him we needed to talk because I saw him intently flirting with the new girl and I was just seeing my episode repeat and I couldn't help but feel like I was getting replaced. So I found out he was rooming one down from me. Creepy much? And we talked, and he just continued to break my heart. See for me, four months is a huge time and I had dropped other guys because I thought this guy was a good one. He told me that we were too different because "i liked coachella and he liked watching sports in the jacuzzi" which is utter bullshit if you ask me. We don't need to be twins? He said it hurt to tell me that it would never work out but this goes to the beginning of my story. This is where the emotional playing starts. Everything contradicts itself, it continues to spiral. So he tells me he'll never hook up with the girl I'm threatened by because I literally see myself there. The next day rolls around and I try to be friends because obviously I want him to want me. He makes a joke that I'm trying to mess with him so that "he'll come crawling back to me" and I'm like yeah you will because you'll see that you actually cared this whole time and I'm not losing my mind. Later, we end up hooking up and it was amazing per usual and I felt so powerful. The day after that, I wasn't sure what the hell I was doing but I was like yep I want to do that again. I continue my usual ploy and although it was a bit more difficult it worked. He kept asking me about why I was doing this and how my opinion changed so quickly. But to be honest, I'd rather have him in my life then not in my life. He was someone I wanted to get to know, someone I wanted to spend time with and if it had to be casual then hell I was doing it. So after a bit more drama (took a hot minute to get him to leave the bar), we hook up again. But this time, we talk about things. I tell him we should be casual and just hang out and it'll be fine and he goes okay cool. Then I tell him you know you miss me and he says he misses me. I tell him to text me because obviously I want to do this again.... This is where things turn to their worst. I leave and text him two days later because I notice he hasn't said anything which is weird. He responds a bit drawn back and then drops a bomb that he doesn't remember any of our conversation.... the I miss you, the casual hanging out, NOTHING. I don't know whether to believe him or think he's full of shit but at this point there is no use lying. I tell him what we went over, in a casual way, he tells me he doesn't feel comfortable because of my position blah blah and i tell him literally who cares because it's my life and i am going to live it. He says he'll get back to me... but here we are 3 days out and let me tell you he has not gotten back to me. Can you tell I'm FUCKING pissed off? I've lost all control of my feelings, my situation, my everything. I never get attatched to people that I know will complete fuck my life up. That was so college. But this you guys, this guy is all bad. He has commitment issues, has way too much money for his age, comes from a weathly family and loves girl attention. So now I'm here.... checking my snaps to see if he's viewed them, looking at my instagram pictures to see if he liked them, hoping for that sliver of chance he texts me back. But I'm living in a dream world. He wants to deny he ever had feelings, he wants to deny that he cared about me, he wants to deny everything he's said and continue to flirt with the new girl. I'm d-o-n-e. But why am I crying at work, feeling so uncomfortable? So lost and so helpless? Here's why: Dating anyone for 4 months is a long time, you're going to feel things. When you don't get what you want you are sad, but when you don't get what you want and someone tries to act like they never cared for you and that you are easily replaced and easily forgotten. Also when people tell you things and then just act like they forget.... I'm not forgetting. This boy wasn't the one, he was one that could be if he gave me the time. This experience has taught me to never date another coworker again. Nothing is worse then getting ghosted by a coworker who claimed to "never have feelings for you". This has taught me that I still am an emotional person and that I can feel things just like anyone else can. Also that I am worthy of so much more and deserve so much more then some half ass apology and mediocre answers. I don't deserve to feel uncomfortable at my workplace. So I'm just going to work on myself like I always do. Hide away from my coworkers and continue to love myself and love my friends. Also I think I'm going to go to Zara lol prayers to me and hopefully I will not have to write about this boy ever again. Can't wait to see him crawl back down the line and me just laugh.

[first-and-ten]

2016 Post-Regular-Season Check-In

What a ride, eh? 

I’m sure I’m not the only one who noticed the trend of incredibly high scoring in the NFL going the way of the dodo? It seems like there was more defense and less success in the passing game. That’s backed up by the fact that most of the playoff teams are the ones that have figured out good ways to use their running game. 

The playoffs are here now, and they feature some real oddities.

Records listed (preseason prediction) - (midseason prediction) - (reality)

Check out full prediction here

AFC

NORTH

Steelers (11-5, 3 seed) – (10-6, 3 seed) - (11-5, 3 seed)

Ravens (9-7) – (7-9) - (8-8)

Bengals (9-7) – (9-6-1) - (6-9-1)

Browns (3-13) – (0-16) - (1-15)

The Ravens put up a good fight, but the writing was on the wall with Pittsburgh’s offense. They do have a legitimate shot at taking down the Patriots. I’m still kinda shocked by what happened to the Bengals, I’m not sure what to do without their first-round loss to look forward to. The Browns are lucky not to have gone 0-16, nobody wants to do that. I’m not looking forward to the drama of their #1 overall pick, or to seeing whether they can actually find their quarterback. This team seems as far as ever from making things work, but they may finally have a coach, so that’s nice? 

SOUTH

Texans (8-8) – (6-10) - (9-7, 4 seed)

Titans (4-12) – (7-9, 4 seed) - (9-7)

Colts (8-8) – (6-10) - (8-8)

Jaguars (8-8, 4 seed) – (5-11) - (3-13)

If you told me before the season that the Titans would win 9 games and miss the postseason, I wouldn’t know what to say about that. I made as much fun as anyone of the Mularkey hire, but it seems to have been the right move. There are some clear things for the Titans to work on, but they’re so close to legit. The Texans made the playoffs without JJ Watt, and honestly it seems at times like it’s freed up Clowney to find his place in the NFL, which is great. But the Osweiller debacle looks worse and worse every week, and I really don’t know how they’re gonna move forward. Another year, another waste of Andrew Luck’s talent, and it wasn’t all on the defense. The Colts did finally have a 1,000 yard rusher, so that’s nice for them, but the offensive line is still crap. I’m baffled that nobody’s been fired over there, and I have no idea whether bringing Peyton in would fix anything. And then lastly, there’s the Jaguars, who have finally given up on the most recent era of disappointment. That’s not an incredibly appealing job, because whoever they bring in is going to have to fix the Bortles situation. I have been consistent in thinking he was crap, and I think that case is closed after this year. They were supposed to contend, instead they flatlined.

EAST

Patriots (11-5, 2 seed) – (14-2, 1 seed) - (14-2, 1 seed)

Dolphins (5-11) – (8-8) - (10-6, 6 seed)

Bills (6-10) – (9-7) - (7-9)

Jets (9-7, 5 seed) – (6-10) - (5-11)

The Patriots continue their reign of terror, but the rest of the division does provide some intrigue. The Dolphins finally made the playoffs, which I did not expect from them. I’m honestly kinda proud of Adam Gase, glad that guy’s got something going, I’m not so sure about Ryan Tannehill still though. Lucky for him he doesn’t have to be the one to stink it up in Pittsburgh next week. The Bills finish ahead of the Jets but are somehow in much worse shape. They’ll be looking for a new head coach, and I hate to say I told you so but I definitely did. I hope they find someone who will know what to do with the talent on offense, instead of thinking they need a defensive guy again. And I hope the ownership realizes the EJ Manuel experiment was a failure. I doubt it though, because it sounds like the GM is being a dick about it all. Keeping Todd Bowles is good, but the Jets are once again in quarterback no man’s land. They have four guys, and none of them seems like The Guy. Bringing Fitz back didn’t work, and Revis is clearly past his expiration date. With a ton of money going into the defense, they should be getting better results. This project could take awhile, I think patience with Bowles is warranted.

WEST

Chiefs (9-7, 6 seed) – (10-6, 5 seed) - (12-4, 2 seed)

Raiders (8-8) – (10-6, 6 seed) - (11-5, 5 seed)

Broncos (12-4, 1 seed) – (12-4, 2 seed) - (9-7)

Chargers (7-9) – (9-7) - (5-11)

Well, here we are. We did not make the playoffs. I will breath, and I will be okay, and I will move on. Frankly, it was a stretch from the beginning. There was so much that was unsustainable about our miracle 2015 season. But boy did it all come down fast. CJ and Manovich were our run game, and our run game was our offense, and it just disappeared. And now Kubes is out, and I am terrified that Elway will hire a defensive coach and Wade will be lost too. That’s pretty square one, don’t you think? I also hear that people want Paxton Lynch in, and I find a hard time imagining that he’ll really be better than Siemian by the start of next year. This is all just too complicated. I appreciate the sentiment, but this is why “win from now on” was never a reality. We’re not the Patriots, they’ve coma about their sustained success through general nefariousness and being godawful people. The frustrating thing, though, is that you can point to just a handful of plays in a handful of games that could have gotten us back. Say we play the beginning of the Chargers Thursday game a little better, we punt from midfield in OT against the Chiefs, we don’t drop that touchdown in Tennessee, suddenly we’re 11-4-1 and the 6 seed. But alas, no. Now we look to the future, to DeMarcus Ware retiring and making way for Shane Ray, to hoping Elway hires Shannahan and hoping that’s not a stupid idea, to rooting like hell for the Not Evil playoff teams which is like 3 of them. The Chargers are still maybe or maybe not playing in LA next season, and they fired their head coach despite the evidence that he was not the problem. Rivers and Gates will both be retiring soon, and they can’t keep their good guys off IR, and none of those good guys are on defense in the first place except Jason Verrett and now Joey Bosa. KC and Oakland both made the playoffs, I’m pretty disappointed that the Raiders are so hollowed out just because it makes it less dramatic that I predict them to fail miserably. Just know that I would pick them to lose to anyone but the Texans or Dolphins int he playoffs even with Carr. Without him, they are not winning a game, no way. The Chiefs, though... Their balance and explosiveness are key in playoffs, and they have a dramatic home field advantage. They have championship potential, which sucks because Travis Kelce and Tyreek Hill don’t deserve that.

NFC

NORTH

Packers (14-2, 1 seed) – (12-4, 1 seed) - (10-6, 4 seed)

Lions (5-11) – (6-10) - (9-7, 6 seed)

Vikings (8-8) – (11-5, 5 seed) - (8-8)

Bears (8-8) – (4-12) - (3-13)

What a roller coaster season for the Vikings! from 8-8 projection to the 5 seed back to a pitiful finish and a weird QB controversy. Peterson won’t be back, and the offense needs so much work. Minnesota saw what could be and then had it drowned in front of them. The offseason should be about trying to figure out what it was that made them so unstoppable in the first part of the season. The Lions are a puzzle, they’ve trailed in the 4th quarter of every game but one and yet are somehow a playoff team. Stafford was int eh MVP talk until he hurt his finger, and he was doing that with very little run support and inconsistent receivers. The defense isn’t special either. It’s weird to think Jim Caldwell was on the hot seat after last year. Jim Bob Cooter kinda bailed him out. The Bears are still at least a year away. They had no consistency at QB, but they found an amazing young runner who they can build around. Matt Barkley made a case and then unmade it over the course of the last month of the season, so there’s some soul searching to do there. Good move to keep John Fox, just like Bowles in New York. And then there’s the Pack. I don’t know what switch got flipped, but just when the Packers were a hard sell to even make the playoffs, they did exactly what they needed. Could have been Jordy finding his sea legs again, could have been Rodgers clicking into gear, but it is working. It’s not a fluke. The NFC is a brutal road this year, but somehow they have a shot despite the fact that their tailback wears 88 and their defense is just a pile of body bags.

SOUTH

Falcons (6-10) – (11-5, 3 seed) - (11-5, 2 seed)

Buccaneers (7-9) – (5-11) - (9-7)

Saints (9-7, 6 seed) – (8-8) - (7-9)

Panthers (13-3, 3 seed) – (8-8) - (6-10)

The NFC South features one of the more dramatic falls from grace. Turns out the Panthers needed Josh Norman more than they seem to have thought. They also need momentum, and they really need Jonathan Stewart to not get injured.  The Saints frustrate me because they consistently fail to make progress on the many things that stand between them and a return to relevance. It seems like it’s a done deal that within three years Brees will retire and Payton will go elsewhere and the Saints will be irrelevant again. Brees threw for 5,000 yards for the 5th time. Nobody else has done it more than once.  Unfortunately, the Buccs actually did build on their young core. Jameis was inconsistent but he has the targets, that’s for sure. And a mediocre defense doesn’t hurt as much when Doug Martin can keep the other guys off the field. I’m still not sold on Dirk Koetter, but I was clearly a doubter before the season, and the two games they finished over my projection were actually fairly significant. I was most surprised, though, by the division-winning Falcons, who I obviously really misread before the season. I was not alone, but I was incredibly far off. I remember thinking “honestly, this roster and staff seems like it could spend a whole season at the 6-0 Falcons from early last year.” I should have noted that hunch a lot more. The thing, though, is that the Falcons, despite having the league leader in sacks on their side, do not field a playoff defense. They just don’t. Someone is gonna shred them faster than they can shred back.

EAST

Cowboys (7-9) – (11-5, 4 seed) - (13-3, 1 seed)

Giants (8-8, 4 seed) – (8-8) - (11-5, 5 seed)

Washington (6-10) – (7-8-1) - (8-7-1)

Eagles (5-11) – (10-6, 6 seed) - (7-9)

This topsy turvy ass division just needs to stop, alright? Obviously the story of the season was the Dallas Cowboys being total freaks, which I hate. I do love the fact that the Giants beat them twice, that’s hilarious. I hate the media coverage they’ve been getting, but there’s no denying that after years of jibing at Jerry Jones for making stupid team-building decisions, he finally started listening to his son and it paid off. Of course, so did having Sean Lee around all season. I maintain that the Cowboys won’t win a playoff game, and I will tell you why: first of all, they are too young, and I don’t care how poised those young guys are, the team is going to find that the postseason is a different animal. Secondly, the defense is just not up to snuff. It’s been alright, but not the same caliber as the offense. And third, the two weeks off will get to them. It just will. It can’t not in the market they live in. They’ll start to believe things about themselves, and they’ll be inundated with the flashiness of it all, and then some team that’s all weathered and fired up will come in and play harder. Mark my words.  That team might even be the Giants, who look better under MacAdoo than they did under Coughlin. Amazing that they’re coming in despite poor QB play because they’ve got a good defense, and looking to blaze through the Packers and Cowboys to upset the Patriots who seem destined to win the ‘ship. I mean what year is it? And how is it that Eli is in his thirties, looks like he’s 9, and throws like he’s 70? And of course Washington and Philly are left looking in on the playoffs. It really looked like the Eagles were going to go, but much like the Vikings it all just came crashing down around midseason. Promising stuff from Wentz and Pederson, but it’s hard to know what to make of it. Just like with Cousins and Gruden last year. See how well that turned out? 

WEST

Seahawks (13-3, 2 seed) – (11-4-1, 2 seed) - (10-5-1, 3 seed)

Cardinals (11-5, 5 seed) – (8-7-1) - (7-8-1)

Rams (6-10) – (5-11) - (4-12)

49ers (4-12) – (1-15) - (2-14)

The 49ers are set to have their 4th head coach in 4 years. Their finances are a disaster in terms of salary cap, nobody wants to go work for a front office that’s always got two fingers on the trigger, players retire at an alarming rate, their new stadium is a drag, they played themselves out of the #1 pick with a last-minute 2-point conversion, they still have no QB and honestly not much of anyone else either. And those black unis are a crime. So life is good for the Niners, eh? Well, better than things in LA maybe. The Rams are also finally done with this 4-12 bullshit, so they’re asking someone to come to a team still adjusting to their new city to coach the youngest roster in the NFL, headed by a guy who can’t throw and who cost every meaningful draft pick from here until forever. The good part is that the front office just got done proving that they will give a guy TOO MANY chances, the opposite of SF’s problem. Oh and Aaron Donald, they have that. The Niners and Rams were supposed to suck though, what about Arizona? Say what you will about annoying sports hot takes, one of them before the season was that Carson Palmer would be below his 2015 level, and that was certainly the case. Such a waste, as David Johnson had an MVP caliber season. Larry Fitzgerald isn’t getting any younger, and he deserves a ring. The defense and the passing game really faltered, and when you think about it, they struck a fragile balance last season anyway. I think this particular window might be shutting for the Cards, and it’s perhaps time to build for a new one. That just leaves the Seahawks. Seahawks, come back to me, man. Please start drafting actual o-linemen. Russell Wilson cannot keep doing this, it in unsustainable. And then there’s the defensive injuries, which could easily cost Seattle a playoff run. Some weird, stupid losses this season already sunk them into the 3 seed, and I’m picking them as Super Bowl winners but honestly I’m just being a homer there. At least they’ve figured out how to use Jimmy Graham, though?

Pretty straightforward AFC, a lot more complicated on the other side. Call me optimistic but I think the Seahawks can catch fire and go get revenge on the Evil Empire. Matt Ryan is the MVP, but Rodgers is not far behind.