#trans mob? sure whatever. i love trans mob too

[fiendishartist2]

shout out to my fav panel in all of the mob psycho manga

[vochka]

Appreciation... rant?

So it is Wednesday and in the past two years, this has become movie night. A beloved colleague became a friend and because we worked next to the cinema, we could go watch a movie after afternoon shifts. We did this just about every week, even though there was no transit to take us home by the time the movies ended so we'd have to walk home alone at night like absolute idiots. It was fun. I feel like a little kid ready to stomp my feet with that "but I don't wanna go home!" attitude every time we have to; I have no words to describe how much I enjoy this woman's company.

It is now Wednesday and I'm sulking at home because I suffered workplace injuries and we have to skip our little tradition for yet another week. No movie night tonight!

Instead, I reflect back on what we've seen already. It's a lot. I'm not picky so I let her choose whatever she wants to watch, which usually means I neither know the title of what we're watching nor what it's about until after I've seen it. Maybe even after-- I am dense.

What I do know is that there's never been a queer piece of media we've missed. This woman has, to my knowledge, had little interaction with gay people before me, but her immediate instinct has been to look for media that would be relatable for me to watch and I have sat and cried in that cinema more times than I can count. Partially, because of her.

Mostly because of her.

This is whom I befriended.

I live in a Slavic country. We're better about queer rights than many of our neighbors, but the people themselves are largely still uneducated, bigoted, and stuck in their ways. Not long ago there was an effigy of a gay couple and their child burned in the streets by a mob. It's ridiculous. Then there's her.

Not once has she asked invasive, probing, or judgemental questions to ridicule or mock, not once was there a comment about finding me the right partner, and not once has there been a hint of judgment in her eyes, even for things she directly said she didn't understand!

When she doesn't know something, she asks. When she heard I was trans, she took the initiative to ask for my preferred name and pronouns and made sure I knew I could speak to her if something made me uncomfortable. She made every effort to make sure I knew she was there if I needed someone to talk to, that she was a safe person to turn to, and that her doors were open if I had nowhere else to go.

I love her.

Fiercely and platonically, as a sister and as a friend, I love her to death. She has been such a solid rock in my life in the few years I've known her that I lament fate for not letting me meet her sooner. She's done more good for me in a handful of years than my family has in decades; I don't even know how to begin paying her back for the light she's brought into my life. She's an absolute ray of sunshine.

This, unfortunately, is too much to smother a normal person in so I can't bring that level of energy into a single conversation and instead get to rant? vent? yell my appreciation for her at internet strangers because the world deserves to hear she's amazing and she deserves to be loved by the entirety of it.

[kincalling]

Hey, i've been in the mob psycho 100 fandom for years and only just have noticed im kin with reigen. So hey, reigen arataka, greatest psychic of the 21st century here!

Not sure about a lot specific mems rn, but i can share a few things I might remember.

I had pretty poor vision but usually didn't like to wear glasses and I also couldn't really afford contacts so I'd wind up getting mob to read things for me a lot of the time. Once dimple showed up, he would help a bit too.

I really liked Serizawa, and got the feeling he liked me too, but I don't remember if anything came of our relationship.

Teru (used she/they, came out as trans post-canon) would come to my office for "relationship advice" because of "some girl she liked" but then I noticed that whatever advice I gave them, they wound up using with Mob.

During the time when Mob wasn't around and he was doing things on his own (the "seperation arc", which from what I remember lasted a few months), I would overwork myself often. If I ever fell asleep in the middle of doing work at that time, I'd wake up to a bunch of work being done. way later I found out that Dimple would possess me to help me out with some of my work.

I can't really remember much else, besides maybe some inconsistencies with the mogami arc, where I'm pretty sure I was briefly possessed by Mogami? Everything else seems mostly canon compliant though.

I'd really love to find Mob or Serizawa! Ritsu or Teru too! but really i'm excited to find anyone who shares some of these memories with me! :)

🃏

[mourning-again-in-america]

@youzicha​ said: I still have no idea what you post on each blog. Horny posts and Supreme Court quotes..?

this blog is specifically designed for me to be dumb as hell and do whatever the hell i feel like; i specifically posted some things in the past on this blog that i’d never admit to agreeing with in the absolute public of my main tumblr. i’m still pretty fucked up from the time i posted about incels, intending to say something like “calling for the genocide of incels is really fucked up! continuing to treat them as deserving of scorn or worse systematized murder isn’t going to help, will only hurt, and shouldn’t even be on the table in the first place!” but i worded things somewhat poorly by saying that incels aren’t “illegitimate, which people loved to use as a starting point to start with “well incels aren’t systematically disriminated against” and ended with “which is why we should kill them all”. (the phrasing is still something i stand by because 1. a person cannot be “illegitimate” 2. calling for entire classes of people to be “illegitimate” and not deserving of the systems we humans set up for each other is the first way that mobs instrumentalize their hatred) some responses that i got, completely conflating “incel” with “otherwise generic violent misogynist” (because i was reblogged with a certain neo-Jacobin rat-adj tumblr user):

their feelings of inadequacy don’t come from an oppression that can keep them single and feel unwanted (like disabled or black folks or trans folks) ... they want a sentient fucktoy that they can do whatever they want to whenever they want to and anything less is a woman being a bitch to them.but for the disabled, trans, and black people in my life, they genuinely want real fulfilling relationships where they not only feel wanted but feel wanting. they want to feel loved and feel love. ... but incels are violent misogynists who have and do kill women and fantasize about killing women who have scorned them. they are unwanted because they don’t want a relationship, they want a slave. so their feelings of scorn are illegitimate because to them, being scorned can mean something as simple as being told “i wish you would pay attention to my feelings more.” so they should be hated and othered.your average single person with social anxiety who isn’t a violent misogynist? they deserve to be cared for. but not incels. they shouldn’t be alive.

Illegitimate, and deserving of more than a stomping.

Very stupid hot take, OP. You’re setting up a simplistic and totally false either/or dichotomy. Incels aren’t an oppressed class of people, they’re a leaderless, self-radicalizing murder-suicide cult. Compare them to groups like The People’s Temple (Jim Jones), Heaven’s Gate, Branch Davidians.

So many of those creeps would have girlfriends if they practiced basic human decency. I have no sympathy for them.

they haven’t figured out [basic human decency], much like the Zucc in the opening scene of that movie about him, their problem isn’t that they’re nerds or w/e it’s that they’re terrible people

If someone seriously labels themself an incel then it is not only legal, but also everyone is morally obligated to beat the shit out of them

there was a point in my life where i would have identified as an incel if pressed on the matter. i tried my hardest not to be a creep, and i tried hard not to be a misogynist, but i legitimately wasn’t sure what was required in order to be a “proper feminist” so i wouldn’t be a “misogynist”; did i need to quit listening to the beach boys, because their brand relies on the fantasy of buxom women in swimsuits? did i need to swear off rush forever, because of their libertarian and Randian influences (influences is a light word)? did i need to renounce scott pilgrim and watchmen, because the movies & comic books objectify women? was i misogynistic because i enjoy d/s? i didn’t know!

i loved scott alexander’s essay “untitled” because it finally said what i was too afraid to ever admit to anyone; that i didn’t know what to do in order to be “good enough” to date someone without hurting them with my “toxic masculinity”, or if i should resign myself to an uncomfortable life of perpetual loneliness.

would all of that hate have been directed at me if i’d chosen different words, still conveying the same point? i think so. do i want this barrage of thousands of notes of hate ever again? not really!

so, this quiet little sideblog where i post about whatever i want and not bother with precise wordings, where i test the waters and see what i can get away a with posting before i get a torrent of hate poured on me yet again. i don’t want to ever again experience people, in significant numbers telling me i shouldn’t be alive 

[mkstrigidae]

Current WIPs and Fic Concepts

I promised I would do this yesterday, and then I forgot!!! (I was very sleep deprived). Anyways, here are a bunch of the WIP premises that I have in my 'unfinished drafts' folder. Most have at least a few pages written for them, but I love them all! ☺️💕

- A Santa Clarita Diet AU (Jonsa) Takes place in sunny southern California, where a shitty dinner at a mediocre restaurant turns into a huge problem for Jon and Sansa when Sansa's heart stops beating. Although she seems fine, Jon is flabbergasted several days later as he watches his wife- who alphabetizes their pantry and refuses to let anyone wear shoes in the house- rip the throat out of one of the sleazy new partners at their law firm, eating half of him before anyone processes what's going on. Hilarity ensues as Sansa's inhibitions and filter disappear, Arya ropes an extremely confused Gendry into helping figure out what the hell is going on just because he moderates the zombie forum on reddit, and Jon tries to deal with the fact that the woman he loves more than anything is now a humanitarian. He really could use a drink. (This one is actually mostly complete, but i need to refine a few things- i really love it. It's as gory and irreverent as the show, so viewer discretion advised, but it's a BLAST to write).

- A Thor/MCU AU (Jonsa, Steve Rogers/Sansa)- Asgardian prince Aegon is banished to Midgard after one too many arrogant decisions, and is promptly hit by a van containing Dr. Sansa Stark, Dr. Barristan Selmy, and Margaery Tyrell- two astrophysicists studying wormholes and Sansa's best friend and pseudo-intern. Marg yells at him, he yells back, Sansa tases him, and Barristan didn't sign up for the kind of heavy lifting that getting a 200+ pound slab of muscle into the back of a van takes. And then Aegon's younger brother, Jon, shows up, in the middle of an identity crisis because, apparently, he's adopted. He wasn't intending to stay, but he's rather drawn to Dr. Stark and her brilliance, and against her better judgement, she starts to trust him, and maybe even like him. This story is in about three parts so far- the first is based on 'Thor' and the second on 'The Avengers' and are fully Jonsa, and the third started as a family bonding story between the Stark kids and Tony (Ned and Tony are second cousins, and Ned was really supportive of Tony in rehab without expecting anything in return), and accidentally turned into a Steve Rogers/Sansa Stark story, which is a pairing i am HERE for. A lot of this one is written, but it needs some fill in before publishing, although it's one of my favorites that i've written to go back and actually read.

- A Star Wars AU (Jonsa) where Sansa and Arya are Alderaanian princesses who are off planet when Alderaan is destroyed- Sansa as a senator and Arya as a pilot, both working for the rebellion, and jon is a smuggler who does not know how all of these people got on his ship and why two princesses are sassing him. His copilot, Tormund (yes he's a wookie), thinks it is hilarious. I started this one just the other day, and it's already thirty pages long, most of them involving Sansa and Arya sassing people. Dany is a leader in the rebellion, Roose Bolton is the emperor, and Barbrey Dustin is a disgruntled former jedi trying to live in peace on a remote planet until another Stark crashes into her life and harangues her into teaching again.

- A witches/magic AU (Jonsa) where the Starks run an apothecary and spellcasting supplies shop. Jon had been completely in the dark about magic before his mother confessed to being born into a family of witches. He finds himself traveling to her hometown, trying to understand her world more clearly, and what it means for him. On the way, he develops something of a crush on the red-headed shop clerk who brews the best headache potions in town. Featuring lots of magical shenanigans, this is one of my favorites in the folder :)

- A 24 hour diner AU (Jonsa) where Jon is a local mob boss, and Sansa works the late shift at Seaworth's diner to buy textbooks for the PhD she's working on in botany. Sansa's running from memories, and Jon has a soft spot for the red-headed waitress who always remembers how he likes his coffee.

- An East of the Sun, West of the Moon AU!!! (Jonsa) This is one of my fav fairy tales, and of course i couldn't resist Jon as a direwolf striking a deal with the starks!

- A Roomates AU (Jonsa)- Arya, Jon, Tormund, and Sam have been renting the same house together off Winterfell's campus for years- but when Sam moves in with his girlfriend, they need one more person on the lease. Sansa, about to relocate to Winterfell for grad school, finds out that her boyfriend has been cheating on her and that her housing plans have fallen through, all on the same day. Needless to say, she's a bit upset when she calls Arya to relay the news. There's a simple solution here, if Arya and Tormund can stop teasing Jon about his crush for five minutes. (any excuse to write tormund and arya roasting jon, tbh).

- A Fae AU (Jonsa)- When Sansa, a baker living in the city, washes her face in an enchanted spring on a camping trip, she gains the sight as a result. Suddenly able to see the fae underworld all around her is disorienting and terrifying. Sansa tries to conceal it- afraid of what might happen if the fae around her know that she can see them- but slips up, and catches the attention of Jon Snow- one of the lords of the unseelie court.

- A nuclear winter wasteland AU (Jonsa)- (?? I don't even know how to describe this premise, haha) where the Starks are living and running the Free Winterfell settlement in Siberia after a worldwide nuclear meltdown. Before the fallout, Sansa was one of the world's preeminent researchers in plant genetics and pathology, and works at the settlement to create newer, disease and radiation resistant crops to distribute for free to other settlements, aiming to break up the monopoly that Lannister Corp has on the market. Jon is a scavenger, searching throughout Siberia for his sister Rhae who disappeared several years previously. When he runs across Arya Starkovna, helping her fight off another band of radiation ravaged scavengers is just instinct- he doesn't think twice about it. In thanks, she brings him to the Winterfell settlement, where her brother Robb offers Jon sanctuary and resources, in exchange for serving as a bodyguard for Sansa when she travels to other settlements. Sansa is not particularly thrilled by this arrangement, but given that multiple parties seem to want her dead, she doesn't have much of a choice but to accept his company.

- A reincarnation AU (Jonsa)- of sorts. Robb is an archaeologist who finds a strange set of runes at a site up north, and immediately calls in Jon Snow- a historian and expert in said ancient language, as well as an old university friend of Robb's. When he arrives though, Robb shows him their most valuable finds- two mysterious ice blocks, with what appear to be perfectly preserved bodies from over a thousand years ago. No one could ever have imagined that either of them were still alive, but when the ice melts, revealing two very alive girls, the entire crew is instantly buried in NDAs, and given an assignment from the Westerosi government to figure out what the hell was going on. Sansa and Arya wake up, extremely confused about the world they live in, trying to adapt and mourning all that they've lost, even as the people around them wear familiar faces.

- Soulmates AU (Jonsa)- (Yes, another one, I love this dumb trope) Trauma surgeon and medical resident Sansa Stark is having a very bad day, and ends up meeting her soulmate during what she thinks is a mugging gone wrong. Fortunately, he’s not the one mugging her, just an intervening bystander, but she ends up slightly shot nonetheless. Sansa’s fretting about bleeding on the upholstery in his car, but Jon is a bit more worried about her injuries than the blood stains. He’s a bit confused when she threatens him if he takes her to a specific hospital, nearly has a nervous breakdown when she insists on doing her own triage, and is very charmed when she insists on ice cream after taking pain meds at the hospital. On Sansa’s part, she’s a little less concerned about being shot, and a bit more concerned about whatever weird first impression she’s making to her soulmate while high as a kite on pain pills. (this one just needs some tweaking to be postable- I'm not sure if it's going to be a oneshot or a series, but i love what I have already)

- A Demon/Archivist AU (Jonsa)- where Sansa works in the university's historical archives in Oldtown, and is learning to restore old texts with her fellow student and friend, Alleras (Trans Sarella is an amazing concept). When Joffrey Baratheon shows up with a pile of old books from his family's library to donate, Sansa is eager to get away from his sleaze, and accidentally takes one of the books home with her in her rush to leave. Unbeknownst to her, it's more than it appears, and when she leaves it open overnight, she accidentally summons forth Jon- an ancient, powerful, and extremely annoyed demon who is under a curse, and now hers to command. As Jon and Sansa try to get used to this new normal, the Lannisters (unaware that Joffrey had donated the tome) try desperately to find the book and it's owner, wanting Jon's power for themselves, and putting Sansa in considerable danger unless she can figure out how to break Jon's curse. Fortunately, she's a pretty good researcher, even if Jon is initially a bit of a grump. (This is based on a total wish-fulfillment mary-sue type premise for something I wrote when I was thirteen, and I revisited it and wanted to see what it would look like if i took it very seriously, and i am really enjoying it so far. It's a love letter to the terrible, heartfelt writing i was doing in middle school that created the foundations for my writing today, and so much fun).

The one that I am MOST excited about though:

- A Pacific Rim AU!!!! (Ned/Cat, Gendrya, Braime, Sansa/Jon Umber)-Twins Sansa and Robb Stark have always been completely in tune with each other, and when your parents are Jaeger pilots and your mother invented the neural handshake, what option is there but the Jaeger academy? Sansa studies to be an engineer, but ends up copiloting the Jaeger 'Winter Wolf' with her twin brother, after they lose Ned Stark to cancer. When Robb is ripped out of the conn-pod and killed by a kaiju while he's still connected to Sansa, she barely manages to kill the creature before stumbling back to shore, traumatized, grieving, and swearing that she'll never pilot again.

Unfortunately, the Kaiju don't stop just because Sansa does, and when the end of the world is imminent, Marshall Catelyn Stark orders both her daughter and former pilot Jaime Lannister (who lost his twin and copilot, Cersei, several years previously) back to Hong Kong for one final stand. Forced to face both her demons and an irate Arya, furious that Sansa had abandoned the rest of them after Robb's death, Sansa and Arya have to figure out how to pilot Winter Wolf together before the apocalypse comes for them all.

Featuring Marshall Catelyn Stark (commander of the Hong Kong Shatterdome, inventor of the neural handshake, former Jaeger pilot, and BAMF), Sansa x Jon Umber (Yes i know it's a rare pair but i've always kind of loved the idea of them, even though we know so little about him), Kaiju parts dealer and smuggler Petyr Baelish, bickering kaiju biologist Dany and theoretical mathematician Jon Snow, LOCCENT officer Theon, lots of snark, lots of angst and heartfelt conversations, and a weird friendship between snarky-grieving-asshole Jaime Lannister and kind-quiet-grieving Sansa Stark, who are the only two people in the world who know what it's like to lose a copilot and a twin in the drift.

Thanks for reading guys!! There are more, but some of them I just don't know how to explain quite yet, haha. I'd love to hear what you guys think about these!

[banhchao]

So .... Purghaps do you hate BTS less now? Pls. They've done so much charity work, they inspire me to be kinder and more generous every day

Lol I don’t necessarily hate BTS themselves; I strongly dislike their fandom and the way they overhype them and give them too much credit for what they actually do (which isn’t their fault). I also don’t think their activism is entirely genuine... like it’s great that they donate money to different causes and all, but when they donate to BLM one second and then advertise the NYPD’s police brutality robot dog (that we KNOW is gonna be used to target black and brown ppl) the next... the dots don’t connect. It’s like there’s no thought and actual significance put behind their choices - they just follow whatever with lack of intent. there’s also other stuff like the whole Jim Jones scandal... why would you sample someone that is a well-known cult leader and racist mass murderer?!? you can’t feign ignorance on that... you have to do research on the person in order to obtain the sample. and the man didn’t even apologize but did a cop-out by blaming it on a producer instead. and lots of other terrible racist stuff such as members saying the n-word and being colourist, their photo shoot at a Holocaust memorial and usage of blaccents and cultural appropriation. Some with apologies but most not I believe - they give me no reason to respect them.

For people that are appointed UN ambassadors, a prestigious position in Human Rights, shouldn’t they do more than just throw their money at different causes (especially having so much)? ARMYs frame BTS like they are these revolutionary activists fighting for social justice when really... they haven’t really done anything to really enact change or show support. Even putting out unapologetic statements and standing in solidarity can mean a lot. For example, Jonghyun (God bless his heart), openly supported a trans woman and changed his dp to a statement she had written about the experience of trans people to help spread her message back in 2013. This was (and probably still is) considered controversial and risky and yet Jonghyun openly stood by her and tried to spread her message as far and wide as he could. although some may not see this as a substantial action, many were touched to see someone they looked up to and loved openly and unapologetically supporting them. This was an act of solidarity that came straight from the heart and he’ll always be remembered for being so kind, genuine and of a warm and loving heart.

As sure as I am that the BTS members make their donations with kind intentions, their “activism” is lacking. If they truly wanted to enact change there are so many ways to truly and substantially show their support and help many causes than just throw money and give performative, surface-level activism. in addition they have performed actions and made choices that contradict their activism.They have been antiblack and antisemitic and have not released proper apologies for either. and it does not help that their fandom has been notoriously antiblack and toxic, doxxing, harassing, sending death threats and being nasty to people for merely criticizing them. They are even antiblack to Black ARMYs!!!! An infamous example was when Cupcakke tweeted something about finding Jungkook sexually attractive and had a whole mob of ARMYs being brutally racist and misogynistic to her and framing her like a predator - despite the fact she’s literally the same age as the guy. She was forced to leave the internet for awhile to escape the unwarranted disgusting hate. For some reason loving those 7 dudes make a lot of people toxic and nasty - and that’s not a healthy environment to be in. There is an irony of them being mental health advocates and against bullying and yet having fans that actively destroy others’ mental health by cyber bullying them.

If BTS inspires you, good for you! And kudos to them for their charity work and donations - I know they will go on to help and change the lives of many around the world. There’s nothing wrong with liking a music group and being inspired and touched by the things they do - those feelings are valid and you should keep doing you. But that’s not the case for me and a lot of other people for valid reasons and that opinion should be respected too.

[askburningpassion]

Ok, since my OG backstory for Rai in @pastelpaperplanes's Cops and Mobs AU was too inconsistent with the AU storyline, I decided to do some changes to her origins so that it could be logical and be more sympathetic for Optimus (poor boy's already suffering so much) but not minus the angst and tragedy... Here is the new, improved one:

- For the first 7 years of her life, Karai was raised by a Japanese family who were ninjas in disguise and living in discreetion under the government of their home.

- Tragically, both her father, ToughFight (Yamada Denzou) and mother, PaleBurn (Yamada Airi) were attacked by assassins at their home one night and were brutally murdered. SwiftSkill (Yamada Rikichi) barely survived from the attack and went into a coma. Karai had to escape for her life at the request of her mother, evading from chasing assassins and eloping to the main capital through a ship.

- Some time before the incident, PaleBurn told her daughter on what to do in case this situation happened.

- Once reaching the main capital of Cybertron, Rai found an old acquaintance of her mother, Madame Kuruto Kage (SharpOptic), a retired Dokutake kunoichi) who took her under her wing and care.

- Kurokage managed to convince the top leader to allow Karai join their clan as a recruit under a false identity; none of the members know BurningPassion (Tanaka Raika) is actually Karai's fake name and that she was the daughter of a traitor and an enemy (in their eyes).

- 11 years pass by, Burning is recognized by comrades and enemies alike as an accomplished warrior and killer. She is considered to be the Dokutake Clan's best and prized asset, second was NavyCharge (Captain Tatsumaki).

- Somehow, she reunited with her older brother, Rikichi during an assassination mission.

- Her other life outside her concealed profession, is being a lone teenager living as a single mother with two other children she adopted as her own. One was Genary (Tanaka Moses), an abandoned trans mechling whom she rescued from birth and @blubrownrpblog's Tanaka Gala (Burning gave her her surname when she took her in) who was a runaway orphan. Along the way, she befriends @cyberghost-scout's Ghostwire and found her first love in the form of Valimar (@marco95z).

- About that time, she comes across Optimus from the diner she used to have meals with her kids or with partners in arms.

- They slowly but surely developed a carrier and offspring bond Burning craved for so much ever since her mother died.

- She and Megs met during one of her undercover missions of gathering info about his mob. Megs noticed that she had an uncanny resemblance to a dimmed part of his past...

- Burning and Centerttention (Bijin Masami), a former thirsty, obsessed admirer of her brother, SwiftSkill and a terrible bully tormenting her daily years ago, are still bitter enemies. The latter know many secrets which Burn has yet to unravel.

- In their personal goal to find and destroy those who were responsible for the murder of their family, Burning and Swift uncover many dark secrets that shake not only whatever they thought they knew about their tragic misfortune but their relationship as siblings. And that they (Burning especially) are steps away from discovering the most unbelievable conspiracy they could ever imagine.

- How would Burning's life be when she discovers the truth?

Original backstory:

Yamada Karai/Tanaka Raika (BurningPassion), Tanaka Moses (Genary), Bijin Masami (Centerttention), the names ToughFight, PaleBurn/Airi, SharpOptic, NavyCharge and SwiftSkill belong to me.

The Yamada family (minus Rai/Burn), Kuruto Kage and Captain Tatsumaki belong to Nintama Rantarou.

Ghostwire belongs to @cyberghost-scout.

Gala belongs to @blubrownrpblog/@blubrown9637 while Valimar belongs to @marco95z.

Cops and Mobs AU belong to @pastelpaperplanes.

[a-dauntless-daffodil]

more Vamp Glimmer and Supposedly-werewolf-actually-just-a-furry Adora

- Not-sure-if-dating-vampire-or-cosplayer Adora chatting with any bats she sees in case they are girlfriend

- putting out a welcome mat so possible vamp gf won't ever be stuck outside her apartment 

- (it doesn’t quite work like that but adora leaves the mat out anyway) (just in case)

- watching Glimmer determinedly eat pizza while Bow facepalms and looking out for her when she gets violently sick later and being like ? Lactose intolerant?? OR deadly vampiric garlic allergy??? 

- its both

- and worth it

- Vampire glimmer remembering seeing her gf fight off a werewolf and screams internally bc adora is human she could have DIED 

- also how strong is she to fight off a werewolf while wearing a full body realistic furstuit??? 

- hooman gorlfriend STRONK!! 

-Question: how did human adora fight off actual werewolf? 

-Answer: she read somewhere that werewolf bite could one hit K.O. vampires. Pure protective girlfriend panic did the rest 

- this gets swapped once glimmer realizes her gf is 100% human, and very mortal, and won't actually regenerate or heal in moonlight, and could potentially be cursed for all eternity or eaten

- anything supernatural and not friendly within 100 yards of Adora can and will be mobbed by a cauldron of killer bats

- Adora think this is Very Cool

- but she also still wants to Fight too 

- Bow face palms even though he isn’t even there to see it he can just sense them being reckless gay idiots by now he can just TELL  

- Bow’s not a vampire YET but he’s been thinking about it for years bc his best friend is an immortal undead being of the night and he never wants her to be lonely 

- Glimmer was actually a dhampire originally but uh a thing happened- Bow got mistaken for an actual vampire and she jumped in to protect and.... turns out that dhampires come back as vampires when they ‘die’. Who knew?

- (glimmer’s just grateful she got done with high school before she changed. collage would have made her a nocturnal shut in anyway so no biggie) 

- Glimmer’s mom (also Vampire) was a lot more freaked out over it

- it made her a lot less pleased with the idea of Glimmer dating a werewolf aka a thing that hunts vampires on instinct once a month and is one of the few creatures capable of killing them fairly easily 

- she made a lot of very thinly veiled threats to Adora

- Adora was Confused 

- Adora spent a whole year thinking Glimmer’s goth dad had been killed by a furry and they even had a talk about how Glimmer felt dating Adora and how she didn’t want Adora to trying being someone else bc she was already nothing like the people who attacked her dad and SOMEHOW they still didn’t figure things out. Amazing 

- Micah isn’t dead he was a human who got attacked by werewolves for being around Vampire Angella and she turned him to save him but he has to spend a few decades in underground recuperating before he can wake up again :(

- Glimmer, back when she was a living dhampire, was really scared he’d sleep for centuries and she’d never get to talk to him again

- another reason she’s cool with being a 100% vampire now 

- Vampire Glimmer leans into her vampireness with glee- smokey eyeshadow, glitter, metal studs, corsets and fancy skirts, black lace fingerless gloves, lots of moon themed pendents, earrings that look like drops of blood, etc 

- She calls her fashion TRAS-ylvanian Vamp-bi-er because she also uses the trans and bi pride flag colors just like, constantly

- Vampire Glimmer: Things I need to survive. One, clothes themed pink-purple-blue, and Two, clothes themed Blue-Pink-White

Bow: What about blood?

Vampire Glimmer: Oh, yeah. That too I guess 

- Vampire glimmer can sprout smol bat wings 

- she is very pissed. her mom’s wings are HUGE and she cannot WAIT to have wings big enough to use as her own ultimate vampire cape

- after finding out Adora is actually a human Angella gets worried for Glimmer in a whole new way

- by then she’d actually warmed up to ‘werewolf’ Adora and trusted her and was actually glad Glimmer’s girlfriend had some supernatural powers to protect her, but now Glimmer is with a human just like Angella was, and she’ll either lose Adora like Angella almost lost Micah or have to make the choice to change her and possibly be left with the guilt of that for the rest of her eternal life

- (Angella’s a little terrified of Micah waking up. What if he doesn’t like being a vampire? What if he pretends he’s fine with it but secretly isn’t and is lonely and miserable forever??)

- she talks with glimmer about it all and they share many hugs. Yay undead mother-daughter bonding! 

- but this also makes glimmer worry bc she used to think her turning Adora a non-issue bc werewolf but now it’s a thing they have to think about and UGH her head hurts blegh whatever 

- not long after Glimmer catches Adora very seriously trying on some cheap fake party fangs and taking notes on how they feel

- Glimmer laughs so hard she cries 

- then she almost dies when Adora asks her “Vat’s vrong?”

- back to the I Am A Furry reveal, Adora sits down with Glimmer and explains that sometimes a furry is just a person who has a fursona and like dressing up as it if they can afford to and that’s literally all there is to it 

- glimmer does some research and comes back with even more questions 

Vampire Glimmer: If your fersona is bipedal werewolf but your fursuit is hyper-realistic to point where i thought it was a REAL wolf, then does that make you a Feral or just a detailed Anthro?

Adora: how do you KNOW about all this??

Vampire Glimmer: google exists. now answer the question so I know which terrible pun to send in Bow’s good morning text 

- 

-For the next few months after finding out The Truth glimmer suffers like, two more Truths per day 

- Vampire Glimmer, texting from inside her coffin: Wait, if you’re not a werewolf then why do you eat your meat so raw?

Adora: .... i can’t cook...

Vampire Glimmer: .......... fair enough

- half an hour later -

Vampire Glimmer, texting again: WAIT if you’re not a werewolf then how come you get all moody and grumpy and run off into the woods every full moon??

Adora: LARPing is fun but also stressful and brings on my period AND you can’t fully appreciate a good werewolf fursuit without both the right backdrop and bright moonlight 

Vampire Glimmer: Oh. huh

- half an hour later -

Vampire Glimmer, calling adora from inside coffin: Why do you always smell like dog

Adora, sobbing: I VOLUNTEER AT AN ANIMAL SHELTER DURING THE DAY MY SHIFT IS IN TWO HOURS  PLEASE  LET ME REST IN PEACE

Vampire Glimmer: OH MY GOD I’M SORRY BUT WHY ARE YOU EVEN ANSWERING YOUR PHONE

Adora, sobbing harder: I JUST REALLY LOVE TALKING TO YOU!!!

Vampire Glimmer: BABE I LOVE YOU TOO BUT THIS IS INSANE EVEN DEAD PEOPLE NEED MORE SLEEP THAN YOU’RE GETTING 

- glimmer texts bow and has him make an emergency coffee run to Adora’s so she be kinda sorta functional. This becomes a ritual and Bow joking complains about having to do their ‘dark bidding’ (adora drinks her coffee black) (Glimmer hates that Bow managed to make a both a vampire AND a coffee pun)

- by far the most horrifying thing of all is the fact that Adora has no canine allergy to chocolate. She just doesn’t like it

- vampire! Glimmer lies awake for several days trying to process this

- in the end they both just really love each other <3 

[indecentpause]

A question for you, Pause: you always seem to have new projects on the regular--you finish one and you move on to the next INCREDIBLY smoothly, and I was wondering: how do you manage to keep the floe of words and ideas up to allow you to do so? And do you outline, do you have a way to keep all of these straight in your head?

This is an EXCELLENT question and the honest answer is that I’m a Big Fat Cheater. I’ve had a TON of old works that just needed minor fixing up, and as I finish them I queue them up in my head and post them after the current thing is finished posting on Ao3. Walking Out of Stride (which I’m starting to post Thursday) is my last complete multi-chapter story, so I won’t have anything to post right after except continuing to post excerpts from In the Basement, in the Sky, and one-shots or short stories.

That said, I do have an organizational system of sorts, because you ARE right: I do almost always immediately start a new project upon finishing one, even if nobody sees it for a while. Writing keeps me together, it’s the one thing I can always count on as a creative outlet. I have a folder for each story/book/novella/project, then a folder within that for each draft (anywhere from two to five so far), and in each folder I keep relevant notes for that draft: things I want to add or delete, if I want to swap two chapters, characters I’m adding or cutting, whatever. Even if it seems super minor, I write it down, because even minor details can end up being really important. I don’t have outlines as such, but I have pages of notes of things I want to happen vaguely in the order they happen, snatches of dialogue or prose I’ve thought of that I might want to use, etc.

I have like five WIPs right now, maybe six? I have a headache and don’t feel like counting, but something like that. :p I used to work on multiple projects at a time, but I never finished anything and realized I need to just do one at a time if I’m ever going to get anywhere. If a paragraph comes to me for something else, I will write it down, of course! But I only actively work on one thing at a time now, and I’ve found I get a lot more done.

As for keeping up with new ideas? Man, I wish I could tell you. They just kind of happen, especially when I’m half asleep, so I make sure my phone is right there so I can make notes without getting up to turn on the light for a notebook and pen. Sometimes they will be based on something, like In the Basement is based on old RP characters, so I’ll have something to work with. Sometimes I’ll just be like, “man, wouldn’t it be great if there was a boy meets girl high school romcom YA story, except they’re both trans?” And I’ll take something from my own life I love – in that story’s instance, cooking and baking – and find a way to work that in as their Common Denominator instead of just “wow that other person is hot.” That’s how That Boy, That Girl came to be.

There have been times I haven’t written for MONTHS when the depression part of the bipolar disorder hits. Once it was a little over a year. So I do struggle sometimes, especially in the winter because the amount of sun I get really can change my mood drastically. I’ve just been lucky this past year, that I’ve always had ideas and thoughts and TIME to sit down and write, and I’m lucky that my wife loves to write too and is literally right there if I ever get stuck. And so far that’s all you’ve seen. But I’m not a superhero, haha, you just happened to only be around when I’ve generally been doing well, so far.

I’ve found music really inspires me, and documentaries, too. Like you, I can’t have music playing while I write, but sometimes I’ll put my itunes on shuffle and just lie in bed listening for a while, and I’ve gotten a lot of ideas that way. And documentaries on things that are interesting to me is how I got the idea for the Prohibition-era mob retelling of Hamlet. (I’ve been working on that one on and off since 2006, and I’m about 70 pages in on the current draft. So. I have shelved stuff, too.) Everything Went Numb by Streetlight Manifesto inspired Until Our Hearts Go Numb.

I also write a LOT of AUs of myself, haha. So there’s that. I post those, too, in case someone might like them. Then you already have characters and maybe even a setting, then you just need a plot. When I want to write but have no ideas or I’m stuck on everything else, I look for AU ideas and go from there.

For one-shots I use a lot of prompts. You can check out my prompts tag if you want, that’s where I’ve stored my faves!

I just realized how long this is getting, and I feel like I’m starting to ramble. I hope this answers your question! If you need clarification on anything or want to ask anything else, you are more than welcome, anytime.

[minusram]

under the cut: trans reigen ends up going to his high school reunion (~3.5k?)

-just a few short scenes, it kinda streamed out of me this morning. 

warning for MAJOR headcanoning (fanon ahoyyyy), high school bullying (unrelated to transness!), misgendering, deadnaming, and some minor homophobic language, but it’s really not an angst parade; i just want you to be safe. kinda bittersweet i guess. takes place 1~.5 years before canon

“I’m serious, that’s what happens,” Reigen says, walking next to Mob on their way to an assignment. He still isn’t used to the new uniform, like having a little black shadow keeping pace beside him whenever his student is following him around.

“But how do they get it in?” Mob asks, quietly skeptical.

“A big syringe, and then the carbonation makes the marble swell so it doesn’t fall out.”

“But—”

“I’m telling you, Mob, that’s how they make Ramune bottles. Listen to your master.”

“Reigen-shishou, I don’t think that’s how it works.”

“Reigen?” a woman says from behind him, “Reigen from Saffron High, is that you?”

Reigen can’t move, petrified by panicked shock that someone from back then has recognized him, even after everything; he loses his chance to abscond when she comes around to stand in front of him. Oh fucking hell, it’s Ooka Minami. She was in his class all through high school. He hated high school.

“Hey! Airi-chan! I can’t believe it’s you! Wow you got butch—look at that suit! Guess you really were batting for the other team, ne?”

Then she laughs. And that would be why.

“Gosh, Minami-chan, it’s been years!” Reigen gushes, “And it’s so great to run into each other, but I have to be going, so sorry; huge deadline, business to deal with, you know how it is...” he says, sweat popping up as he manoeuvers to make his belated escape.

“It’s okay, Shishou, I can deal with the spirit. You talk to your friend,” Mob says, extraordinarily and unhelpfully obtuse. If Reigen isn’t going to be able to get out of this conversation he at least doesn’t want Mob hanging around to hear it. Reigen shoos him off, and Mob goes silently into the park to deal with whatever’s been bothering the retirees who sit on the benches there every afternoon. It’ll be fine; this job is small fry, nothing he hasn’t handled before.

“Spirit? ...Shishou?” Ooka asks, skeptical.

“Yes,” Reigen says shortly, “I run an exorcism agency. He’s my student. We have a job. So I should really—”

“Spooky Airi-chan deals with ghosts now? And you were always such a skeptic.”

“Well, it’s a living,” he says, resigned to at least a few niceties. “And you?”

“I’m just out taking care of some errands, picking up stuff for dinner tonight. I know, it’s a little late, but running a household is hard work, especially with two kids around the house. You know how it is,” she says, with a gloating smile.

“I can’t say that I do,” Regein replies, light and dry.

“Oh, you’re not married?”

“No.”

“Better get on that, christmas cake.”

“Thanks for the advice. Well, Minami-chan, this has been spectacularly fun, but unfortunately I do have to go, sorry.”

“Oh, no problem. It was nice to catch up! Do you have a business card?”

“According to social convention,” he says, reluctantly digging out the case to hand one over, “I must admit that I do.” Ooka takes it and skims the contents greedily before tucking it in her wallet.

“I’d return the favour, but I don’t have any. After all, I’m a housewife,” she says with a sweet smile, the same one from back then, when she’d asked him if he had a crush on her in front of the entire class.

“Congratulations. I really must be off now, Minami-chan.”

“Bye, Airi-chan! See you soon!”

Unlikely, Reigen snarls in his head, and “Have a nice day,” pleasantly outside it, face smooth and bland as he turns to go find Mob.

Either there was nothing here or Mob’s taken care of it already, because the kid is being mobbed by a bunch of geezers that practically totter on their feet. Surrounded, he doesn’t notice Reigen until Reigen’s gently elbowed his way to the centre of the throng of old people cooing over Mob’s adorable face. If his student were half as popular with people his own age as he is with grandparents, Reigen might have to do something to prevent his esper from succumbing to the peer pressure of spending time with people not fourteen years his senior.

Reigen tows Mob to freedom, says goodbye to the group, collects payment from the park manager, and sets off back to the office, Mob beside him.

He shoves his hands in his pockets and hears his heartfelt desire for Mob not to mention the encounter like a chant in his head.

“Who was that?” Mob asks, dashing his hopes. Reigen blows breath out through his nose, and answers:

“An old classmate.”

“A classmate?”

“From high school.”

“Oh. Was it nice, to see her again?”

“It’s not the worst thing that’s ever happened to me.”

“Why did she call you -chan?”

“Ahh, it’s an old joke from high school. You… had to be there, ha.”

A joke—yeah, sure.

That’s a good word for it.

-------

A week later, the office gets a letter from his alma mater, and Reigen regrets. Why didn’t he just lie? Nobody from Saffron would ever have thought about him again, but now that Ooka has his contact information it seems he’s been brought back into the mailing list’s fold.

It’s probably about money, isn’t that the sort of correspondence you get from high school?

He opens it; it’s an invitation to his ten-year class reunion, happening soon. It’s a bit late notice, but from the date printed in the corner of the photocopied sheet the rest of the letters were sent out months ago.

Reigen smirks as he balls up the page; there’s nothing in the world that could make him go to that shitshow.

But when he reads the second one, he drops into his seat.

-------

Reigen toys with the zipper on his jacket, sitting on the edge of his bed, ready to hang up if the wrong person answers the phone. He’s relieved when his target picks up on his first try.

“Hello?”

“Hey, Ma.”

“Arataka! Have you finally learned to call me without wild horses dragging you to the phone?”

He lets out a silent sigh and shifts on the mattress to lean on his free hand.

“No, sorry, I’m still trying to find my feet at the ranch. Are you free to talk?”

“For you, always.”

“Great. I have a bit of bad news, we’ll have to reschedule those plans we have in a couple weeks.”

“But why? If this is something to do with that shady business of yours…”

“No, it’s nothing like that. I just thought I’d go to my class reunion, and I just found out. It’s the tenth anniversary, can you believe it?”

“Ten years, really? Oh, time goes by so fast. But Arataka, I’m so pleased! I know it was hard sometimes, but after you graduated I was so sad you lost touch with all your friends.”

His friends, such as they were, were delinquents and thugs who introduced him to smoking, cutting school, and violent self-defense. His parents never knew about them. But they were loyal, and now, years down the line and far too late for it to matter, he finds that he’s a little sad too.

“Well, I can go say hello and goodbye, anyway.”

“Apricot, are you sure? I don’t want you to get hurt...”

“Geez, Ma, what’re they gonna do, beat me up? I can handle myself, don’t worry about it.”

“I am happy you’re going. Fine. You still won’t cut out this psychic nonsense and get a real job?”

“Nope.”

“So when are you going to settle down, then? I don’t care who it is, although I’m aching for grandchildren, Taka, aching, but you need someone to take care of you—”

“Wow look at the time, I’m late, sorry, love you, gotta go,” Reigen blurts, and hangs up. He falls back to bounce against the bed, staring up at the ceiling.

An inelegant retreat, but hey—it works.

He hauls himself up to look into finding an appropriate suit.

-------

Weeks later, Reigen stands just outside the door and listens, pretending he’s scoping out the room and not psyching himself up to face people he thought he was done tolerating a decade ago.

“Eh? A spirit agency, really?! And after all that shit about how ‘ghosts aren’t real’ and ‘there is no afterlife’. God, she never shut up about it!”

“Enlightened Reigen-sama, better than everyone else.”

“Ha, remember when she ruined the haunted house? During the cultural festival… our second year, I think.”

“Oh my god! I completely forgot about that!”

“And when—”

“Yeah! Damn, what a nightmare.”

A pause.

“...I hear she’s a dyke now.”

“Whoa, watch your language, dude.”

“Fine, fine, but still.”

“Seriously?”

“Yeah, I’m with Ooka-chan on the planning committee, she’s the one who found her.”

“No way, Minami-chan said that? I don’t buy it.”

“They really hated each other back then, it might just be a rumour.”

“But Reigen-chan confessed to her, didn’t she?”

“Whaat? No, no, that was just bullying.”

“Girl bullying, brr.”

“I don’t know, she always seemed kind of weird to me.”

“That’s just because she kicked your ass when you asked her out.”

“Ha!”

“Hey, shut up!”

“You had bruises for a week!”

“She didn’t kick my ass… it was those assholes she always hung out with.”

“Uh-huh.”

“Sure.”

“If you say so.”

“I’m not lying! It was!”

“Okay, dude, whatever.”

Reigen sucks in a slow breath during the lull in the conversation, his back to the wall just outside the door, and remembers the assholes he used to hang out with. One less now, and the thought clenches something stricken in his chest.

“But seriously, she’s a psychic now? What a load of crap.”

“A crossdressing psychic, even.”

“What was her stage name supposed to be again? It was something like… sparkling.”

“Oh wait, it’s on the tip of my tongue—”

“Splendid, marvelous, amazing…”

“Arataka!”

Reigen jumps.

“Yeah, Arataka, that was it.”

“Reigen Arataka, psychic extraordinaire.”

Well it’s hard to ask for a better opening line than that. Reigen steps out, into the gymnasium—patchily decorated, brightly lit—and smiles.

“You rang?”

They startle, all four of them, spinning around to stare. He doesn’t recognize them really, vague faces that populated the halls long ago; except for Honda. He did kick his ass, actually, for asking him out, but also for trying to cop a feel on the roof.

“Holy shit! Did you— I mean, how the fuck are ya, Reigen-san?”

“Yeah, how’ve you been? It’s great to see you.”

“I can’t believe you came!”

“Oh, likewise,” Reigen says with a wintry smile, “It’s so nice to hear from old friends.”

“Haha…” one of them goes, weakly.

Reigen isn’t overtly hostile, but exchanging pleasantries is tense; about who’s working where now, and who got married to whom, and whether that nasty old Mori-sensei died or just retired without a trace.

“This has been very enlightening—you all have so much to say, it seems I’ve really been out of the loop—but I think I see someone over there I can’t get out of saying hello to, if you know what I mean. I’m glad we could catch up.”

“Um, sure…”

“You too…”

“Yeah, go for it…”

Reigen walks off, and hears them start up again behind him.

“What the hell—”

“Was that really her?”

“No way, that was a damn dude! What happened to my cute Reigen-chan?”

“Your Reigen-chan? Honda, man, give it up.”

“Yeah, even if she was into guys, there’s no way she’d pick you.”

“I dunno, I think that suit looked pretty good…”

Their voices fade into the crowd.

-------

Reigen wanders the halls, and comes across a gallery of photos, those that made it into the yearbooks and those that didn’t. He’s surprised to find one of himself, printed out and posted with everyone else. But then, they didn’t all hate him, and even if they did this is all ancient history by now; it’s impossible that everyone on the reunion committee’s as petty as Ooka and those assholes he was eavesdropping on earlier.

It’s Reigen, sixteen years old and staring into the camera, unimpressed. Slim, fierce, blond, flatchested, and wearing the girl’s school uniform, but altered; without the kerchief, and the skirt lengthened down to mid-calf. Hair short, as short as he wears it now, but the cut looks different framing a youthfully feminine face. Tall—for a girl, ha; Reigen got his height early in life—and stance confrontational, feet planted and only half turned to look, photograph showing signs of movement in his clothes and hair like it’s a candid shot. For all he knows it was, he doesn’t remember ever seeing this picture before. Reigen can just make out the cigarette in his younger self’s hand, smoke trail snaking behind the sleeve and ember hidden by the swirling fold of the skirt.

He remembers that kid, remembers living that way; he doesn’t resent being that person even if life was shitty beyond measure the entire time he was.

“Ah, Reigen-kun.”

The voice is familiar, if more warbled than he remembers. Reigen gladly turns to meet it.

“Hey there, Teach,” he grins.

“Still with the hair, I see. When are you going to give that up, you look like a delinquent.”

“I keep telling you, Ikeda-sensei, it’s natural,” he says, grin widening until it’s shit-eating.

“Mmhmm,” Teach hums, skeptical, “That old line. You shouldn’t lie to your elders, Reigen-kun; I’m old, not blind.”

“Honest. I swear,” he says, hand to his heart, perfectly composed into earnestness except for the smile still on his face.

“Oh get over here, you hooligan, and let me look at you.”

Reigen gets over, to be inspected by a spry woman, age only slowly catching up to her under the cardigan and dyed hair, arms folded across her chest.

“As rough as ever,” she concludes with a small smile, after a detailed visual inspection, “Airi-kun, you haven’t changed a bit. Although the suit is new, I suppose. But it looks good on you, very charming.”

That name in the mouth of someone he respects twigs him something awful. Reigen looks at her, considering, and though his heart pounds he decides to go for it.

“Well, Teach,” the nickname comes out a little croaky, but he musters and continues, “I have changed a little bit. Or, I suppose you could say I’ve grown more honest with myself.”

“Oh?”

“Yeah, um, I— I go by… Arataka… these days,” he says, and is immediately filled with regret. He shoves a hand up against his mouth, trying to seem pensive and patient rather than freaked out and on the verge of running away. He can’t stand to watch her, to see if it hits, so he snaps his head to the side to look at the pictures again. If that was too subtle for her he’s just going to give up; there’s no way he can say it again.

“Oh,” she says, and his pulse jumps even higher with the word, “Arataka...

“Well, Arataka-kun, you look very handsome, then.”

The laugh bursts out of him, one tense bark before he gets a hold of himself and turns back to look. She’s gazing at him calmly, seemingly unruffled. She doesn’t scream at him, or assume he must be joking, or berate him for growing into such a disappointment. Maybe this is fine, maybe he hasn’t just ruined one of the few things worth keeping from his troubled adolescence.

“R-right. Thank you,” he says, a little shaky.

“You’re welcome to it, Reigen-kun, I promise. And… I’m sorry about Abe-kun. I know you were friends.”

“Yeah,” Reigen says, personal revelations forgotten as he looks down at the scratched linoleum, head full of ghosts and memories. Of people from back then, the last time he was here.

“Yeah,” he says, swallowing, “Me too.”

-------

The memorial service for Abe Katashi is short, awkward, and perfunctory.

An only child whose parents have been dead since he and Reigen still ran together, there’s no one to put together anything better than the impersonal effort of the Saffron High planning committee.

Reigen looks around as someone he doesn’t remember drones on apathetically about tragic loss and road safety to an uncomfortably shifting crowd, and doesn’t see anyone else from their little gang in attendance.

Depressingly, he finds only school employees and former classmates with even less claim to closeness than his own.

No friends have come forward from outside the school; Abe lived alone.

This will be the only funeral.

-------

After the feeble sham of a service, everyone parties; lights dim, chatting loud, bad dancing and standard karaoke combining in an unholy musical mess.

Reigen gets drunk at the bar.

Ooka finds him there, slumped, plastered already from half a glass of sake, and sits next to him.

“Enjoying yourself?” she asks, signalling the bartender for another glass.

“Are you kidding me?” Reigen replies, inebriated and indiscreet.

“Oh, well, it is such a shame about Abe-kun, of course. He had a sort of rough charm, back in school. Shiori had such a crush on him, you know.”

“I didn’t. Shiori… was she the one with the weird nose? Or the one who couldn’t keep her eyes of Fujioka-sensei’s ass during P.E.?”

Ooka laughs as the bartender comes back, putting her glass on a napkin in front of her.

“The second. Although between you and me, I have no clue what she saw in that man. He was already going bald ten years ago.”

“Some people like old things,” Reigen mumbles into his arms, folded on the bartop, “but he always kinda looked like beef jerky.”

Ooka laughs again and holds up the bottle. Fuck it. Reigen drains the glass for her to pour.

He sits up to return the favour. Why is she talking to him?

“Why are you talking to me?” he asks. Whoops. Possibly downing the sake wasn’t such a good idea. Well, he’ll nurse the next one.

“Aren’t we friends?” Ooka asks, disingenuous. Alright, they’re doing this then. Might as well, it’s not like he’ll ever see any of these people again.

“No, we’re not. You made that pretty damn clear when we were fifteen. I thought we were, though, until then.” Shit, too honest, too honest. This was definitely a bad idea. Reigen moves to disengage, to hell with the drink. It’s an open bar anyway.

Minami catches his arm before he can push away from the counter. Reigen stops, frozen, breathing picking up from the hand dangerously close to his wrist. She squeezes, just a little, and he rips away, almost toppling off the stool before he catches himself on the edge of the bar.

“Don’t, um, I don’t— like. Being touched, there,” he says, eyes wide. Minami looks startled, and suspicious, but visibly brushes it off.

“Fine. But it’s rude to just walk away, we were talking.”

“You know what else is rude? Calling someone a lesbian in public.”

“Even if it’s true?”

“It’s not— Agh! It’s not, I’m not a lesbian, I like both, okay, now will you cut it out?”

“Oh.”

“What. After all that, you gonna tell me you didn’t know?”

“No, I’m just surprised you’re admitting it to me.”

“Well, I am pretty drunk.”

“Yeah, Airi, I can tell.”

She’d know. He was fourteen when he tried booze for the first time, in Minami’s room the last summer before they thought they’d part forever, trading sips from a warm beer they stole from the stash hidden in her parents’ apartment; talking about how grown-up they’d be, once they were high school students.

“Why did you do it? That, to me? We were best friends in middle school, but once we graduated it was like you just fucking despised me. You made my life miserable, Minami, and I’ve never understood why.”

“Oh, I don’t know. It was so long ago.”

“What the fuck,” Reigen says. He can feel himself getting worked up, he’s always been a terribly melancholy drunk. “Is that shitty cop-out supposed to mean something? ‘Oh, it was a long time ago. Why don’t you get over it already?’ I can’t believe you did that to me, it was horrible. Everyone hated me! No one would talk to me, not a single person, for weeks! And it was all your fault. I thought you were my friend! And after what I did for you, even, after your dad—”

“Shut up,” Minami snaps, low and intense.

Reigen’s teeth click shut.

“Fine,” he says quietly, half to her and half to himself, “Fine, I’m done. I don’t know why I came here, what I thought would happen…” He sighs. “Bye, Minami-chan, have a nice life. I don’t think we’ll meet again.”

She huffs, and pinches his sleeve to stop him from walking away.

“I don’t know, Airi. I just… did. It was a weird time for me.”

“Whatever, Minami. For the record, it was a weird time for me too.”

and.. yep *shrug* that all i got (well, except a few spare lines that don’t have scenes attached...) this is basically just a write&dump 

ended up with a lot of dialogue, and none of my favourite parts of ‘high school reunion’ fics. may or may not continue, we’ll see

feel free to point out typos, or concrit, or whatever. i’d actually love to hear any thoughts! (as always)

[helloarmchairphilosopher]

Writer's works in progress

I saw that someone else had written up their wip-s, so maybe writing up mine will make me GET ON WITH IT and help me write more on one (or more) of them. 1) 1938 Brooklyn Murder mystery: in which a Ripper (any killer with a knife is always dubbed a Ripper by the press, it's a thing) stalks the young men of the queer/gay community of Brooklyn. One by one young men die and the cops either can't or won't do anything about a few dead [slur]; the mob doesn't care either; war looms in Europe; the Mayor is trying to clean up the city before the World's Fair; the dynamics of the queer community itself is changing as men and women who previously might not have considered themselves part of it are thrown in with it, with new laws meant to manage a moral society; and two men, in exactly that predicament, are watching their friends dying at the hands of the Ripper and hoping they're not next, while dealing with feelings for each other. (The historian in me has run amok.) 2) The Sweater Curse: (Bagginshield) In which hobbits consider it bad luck to make crocheted or knitted garments for themselves (a sign that one has no kin) because sweaters are made and given between first and second degree blood relatives (parents and children, grandparents and grandchildren, aunts and uncles and nieces and nephews). Other kinds of garments are given freely. If a sweater is given to an unrelated person it is considered a proposal. In which dwarves make their own crocheted or knitted garments for themselves (a sign of their craft-skill and self-sufficiency). Other kinds of garments are bought and sold freely. If a sweater is offered as a gift to another person it is befuddling at best and an insult at worst. The Sweater Curse in our world says that if a person, usually a woman, starts to make a sweater for their significant other, usually a man, before they are married, the relationship will end. The fic I'd imagined had a happy ending - with Thorin thinking that Bilbo had been making the sweater for himself. "You loveable dunce, did you never notice I'd keep borrowing Kíli to size it correctly for you? I'd be swimming in it!" 3) transman Phil Coulson fic. I'm not trans, so I'd have to tread carefully here. My real aim is feminism and femininity. A male Coulson has leeway in a manner that a female Coulson would not. A male Coulson is not told that he is missing out on the essential manly quality of being a father and a husband; he is not automatically assumed, on walking into a room, to be the secretary or the assistant. Women always have to be twice as good to be perceived as half as competent, and then (often) they're told not to be a b*tch about it. But all this from the point of Clint Barton, who is kind of clueless, and who really loves Phil (I kind of love this ship and like the rest of the fandom I'm not really sure why), means that he just sees grade-A badass Phil Coulson. Full stop. No edits. No matter what is, or isn't, in his past, in his pants, in his medical file, or what his parents used to call him. 4) Werewolf romance novel Tall dark and handsome (TM) is the antagonist who is stalking and eating people. He's a creep who plays into rape culture and preys on young women who think that his bad boy vibe cover up anything other than a black heart. The protagonist is a smart and kick-ass young woman with a shiny degree and huge student loans working below her talents, as a barman, which is how she knows of the antagonist and his creepiness. She has a friend, her landlady's daughter, who is close to her age. (Yay for passing the Bechdel test? I'd better, after actually meeting Alison Bechdel.) The love interest is this sandy blonde dorky guy, a drifter who works construction and throws darts at the bar. When people start getting chewed up he's the prime suspect, and even our protagonist doesn't know what to think - but only until our antagonist tries to take a bite out of her, and he intervenes, as a werewolf. And from there it's your usual. I got sick of the werewolf books with creepy rape culture overtones and not passing the Bechdel test and thought, I could do better. 5) a Clint Barton/Darcy Lewis fanfic, in which she helps patch him up after Loki's mind control. In the comics, Clint had a pretty messed up childhood. Circus, dad who beat him, taught to shoot by a man who beat him and then used him first as a thief and then as a killer (or so I loosely understand; and I'd be using a variation on that in the fic, anyway). He would have had to have therapy for it at SHIELD just to be functional as an agent around people. But Loki's mind control messed with all that, breaking the locks and self-management he'd had for so long. He'd have major depressive episodes and PTSD following it. And Darcy, being a civilian, might not be the best person to bring him out, but she was there for Thor and the Destroyer. She saw some shit. And who knows what she had in her childhood. (I do, because I created it, but I'm the author and I can do what I like.) What was done by Loki cannot be undone, but what was done before Loki could, just maybe, be done over again, more painstakingly and with greater care, like walking around the glass shards of a broken vase. 6) a Fíli/fem!Bilbo fic: in which a pregnant Bilbo runs from the Mountain. (Thorin died of his wounds, but Fíli and Kíli survived.) Bilbo, in whatever feminized spelling of one's choosing, won't, can't, stay. The memories of battle, of being shaken like a rat over the gates of Erebor, are too fresh and too raw. The halls reek of dragon and she hears Smaug's eerie deep voice creeping in the shadows. No, she cannot stay. She must go somewhere green. A month, a year, five years, forever, she must go somewhere clean and cleansed. And Fíli, her One, can't go. She knows this. And she, even though she's his One, can't stay. Magic lover's nonsense and whatever, there's reality you have to deal with, and sometimes reality means PTSD and dragon stink. So they argue, the night after his coronation. She is due to leave the next day with Gandalf and it'll be the last time - it's emotionally fraught. He's mad and she's mad, because they both *want* it to be different. In my mind's eye I saw the argument, in the indirect result: his name was Frerin. And, of course, that can't be let alone, since as the eldest son of a king, half-hobbit or no, he is heir apparent to a throne, and a birthright. Tolkien wrote that dwarf populations at the end of the end of the Third Age and into the Fourth dwindled until the race itself failed - meaning that there were too few women having too few children. This is obvious enough from what we see in the appendices. A king having a son hidden from him and raised by a non-dwarf woman, even if she is his mother? A scandal, the fanon assumes, and I presume with it. 7) a Bucky Barnes in slightly more efficient and effective hiding fic. There's that photo going around of Sebastian Stan from the set of his latest movie and he has this big mustache, and jeez if Bucky looked like that, some people commented, and not all 90s Grunge, he might have escaped a lot better, since the photo Zemo circulated assumed that Bucky looked like a hobo. Personally I don't see Bucky growing that mustache (looking like Howard Stark, who he assassinated, would give him a heart attack). Nor do I see him as a teacher, of math or otherwise, as the original post suggested; he'd never pass the background check. But there's another picture of Sebastian Stan I saw that was also relatively recent (but before any of the photos from the set of I, Tonya) with a full beard, and if he'd grown that out, if Bucky had grown that out, maybe he might have looked like Norm Abram back when he was younger. So, maybe a carpenter. It's a sin to hide that beautiful jawline, but effective. Bucky would get away from HYDRA and SHIELD both, just by staying off the radar and not looking like what they expect. He could even use his real name - there are 4,207 other James Barnes-es in the US, what would make him special? There are only 27 Clint Bartons. One borrowed social security number, one rented house, anywhere would do but I was thinking Santa Fe (because I've been there and can describe it, it's cool enough in part of the year he can wear long sleeves outside and the rest of the year there's air conditioning and he can wear long sleeves inside to cover the arm, and because it's a tourist town, people with money to spend on his carpentry work). From my notes, in particular: He checks in at the spots the Smithsonian mentioned. Red Hook, Dumbo, Coney Island. Those spots in Brooklyn that are supposed to have had that towheaded little captain America to be and his sidekick to become running amok in the 1920s. Some pieces fit. Bits of bitty Steve fit in, here and here, slotting back into Bucky's memory. Steve is a huge, pun intended, part of who he once was. To have made Bucky forget Steve, no wonder he forgot himself - - or was it the other way around, that Bucky forgot himself because he forgot Steve? 8) nonfiction, Torah commentary, starting with Genesis (Bereshit). 9) nonfiction, the history (I've been working on for five years) of the Hasidic movement during the Holocaust. Various dynasties and their rebbes, and the rebbes' successors, and the survival of the Hasidim and the Hasidut - how it worked, where it happened, how it happened; but from there, which members of the rabbinical families did not survive? Why? What attempts were made to save them? When attempts were made, who was given first preference and what stated reason, if any, was given? These are questions that have not yet been answered. And I have limited access to Hasidim, by language and by culture. These are not questions anyone would ever give me a straight answer to, of course. I have strong suspicions. Nothing more. The demographics of death - these are records we do have - say a lot. And the final chapters of the book, or the last volume, or the next book, also needs to be written: the rise to power of the other Hasidic dynasties, the massive shift in power away from Poilisher-Yidish culture elsewhere due to the near destruction of that community. Lubavitch, Bobov, Satmar, Belz, and Ger - only the last is Poilisher-Yidish. Before the war the largest Hasidic dynasties were to be found in Poland: Ger, Aleksandr, and Radomsk. There's a lot here no one else has done. I suppose it falls to me. So, I have many things to work on. I have lots to choose from. If only my brain would ACTUALLY LET ME DO IT, DAMMIT.

[paperficwriter]

Oh man this was so hard cause you have so many good examples of writing ;A; If I had to choose just one... Dammit, Onigawara hated that look on his face. And he hated even more that he wasn’t actually asking him out, because he would have said ‘yes’ without even hesitating. But that didn’t seem to be happening, so… “I’m not uncomfortable! I am totally comfortable! I’ll fake date the hell out of ya!” I just looooove this paragraph so much~💖💕💖

Yessssss same!! I’m going to do this whole scene, because I lub you

---

This scene, as I’m sure you can imagine, was really really important to me. I wanted to write it in a way that stayed true to the characters and introduced Musashi and Mob as being trans in a way that was significant without halting the flow of the story.

After practice the first time, when they were all getting changed, he had seen Musashi in the black, form-fitting top underneath his regular clothes, and he must have been looking a bit too long because he turned and noticed. “It’s a binder,” Musashi said, without even being asked.

“I know that!” Onigawara replied, defensively, even though it was a blatant lie. “I ain’t stupid.” It tickles me thinking that Onigawara is the type who’d be like, ‘I KNOW WHAT IT IS’ (*looks into camera like in the Office* ‘I had no flipping idea what it was’).

“Okay, okay.” Musashi’s stern gaze softened a bit. “Take it easy. I didn’t mean it like that. Just…throws some people. Most folks don’t know what it is.”

“Well, I’m not ‘some people.’” When he looked around at the other club members, they were all going about their normal business, largely unconcerned. (Frankly I think the rest of the Body Improvement Club would have just been ready to throw down if necessary, and once Onigawara was good, it was just business as usual after that. While I don’t think this is a widely known fact, I think that it probably has come up before, from how Musashi responded initially) They didn’t have a problem, so why should he? “Wear what you want, man.”

“Is it comfortable?”

Now there was silence in the locker room, and all eyes turned to Mob. Mob, who always changed in the bathroom stall and never in the main area with the others. Who was looking up at Musashi with a wondering, questioning expression, eyes wide, his backpack held to his chest.

“Yeah,” Musashi said after a moment, “but my first one wasn’t.”

“And you just…wear it under your clothes?”

Musashi nodded, and even though Onigawara wasn’t sure at the time what was happening, he kept quiet and watched them talk.

“Did you…do your parents know?” Mob asked, fingers tightening on his bag.

“Yeah, we talked about it. I paid for it, though, with my own money.”

“Could you…” Mob’s voice seemed to break, but he cleared it and said quickly, probably louder than he meant to, “Could you help me get one if I can pay you back?!”

Okay, this part I’m going to go on a ‘writer rant’ for a second, because I really, really tried to make this a ‘show, not tell’ moment using the dialogue. I wanted to convey that Musashi has known this about himself for a while and that though he has talked to his parents about it, it’s still something he’s having to deal with on his own. Mob, on the other hand, has clearly not talked to his parents, and he doesn’t know how to deal. So the fact that Musashi is willing to support Mob in this scene and the ones following were really important to me. Because while the representation is good, showing solidarity and a sense of community among similar characters is also a big deal. I like to think that I succeeded, based on input from readers.

That night, Onigawara had done a lot of reading. On his phone on the way home on the bus, to and from the nursing home, on the way to work… and even learning as much as he could he still had a million questions. But no matter how much new knowledge he had, it didn’t change one fact that had been true from the day that Musashi approached him and asked him to join the club.

He liked Musashi. A lot. The fact that he was…or had…or whatever…it didn’t matter. He liked Musashi for who he was: strong and kind and fun, when he chilled out. AND THAT’S WHY YOU WIN, ONIGAWARA. YOU GOOD BOY, YOU.

“Do you…like guys?” Onigawara asked, the words going high in his throat.

“Yeah. Don’t you?” My man Musashi: may not believe in violence, but doesn’t pull his punches.

“Whattaya mean ‘don’t you’?!”

“I always thought you did.”

“Well, good. ‘Cause yeah, I do.” He flicked the side of his nose with the pad of his thumb, leaning back against the hallway wall. “So you think that if we tell Mob that a dude like me and a dude like you (JUST A COUPLE OF DUDES IN LOVE, NO BIGGIE, WHATEVS) can be going out and whatnot, he’ll feel better ‘cause it would be like him and this Hanazawa kid?”

“Basically.” For the first time, Musashi’s gaze shifted to the ceiling above them, the corners of his mouth turning down. “If you’re really not comfortable with it, I understand. I just think it could help him feel better. I hate to think he’s always going to be scared of reaching out, because of who he is, you know?”

Dammit, Onigawara hated that look on his face. And he hated even more that he wasn’t actually asking him out, because he would have said ‘yes’ without even hesitating. (-Richard Attenborough voice- And here we see the pining bancho in his natural habitat -- notice the surly tsundere emotions!) But that didn’t seem to be happening, so… “I’m not uncomfortable! I am totally comfortable! I’ll fake date the hell out of ya!”

YOU TELL HIM, ONIGAWARA. YOU’RE GOING TO BE THE BEST DAMN NOT-BOYFRIEND EVER. -insert guitar solo here-

[revmolly]

Resist/Dance ~ An Easter Sermon

My first Easter sermon at First Church Berkeley! It included compulsory group dancing. And I still didn’t get tomatoes thrown at me!

~

Rev. Molly Baskette ~ First Church Berkeley UCC “ResistDance” ~ John 20:1-18 Sunday, April 16, 2017 ~ Easter Sunday

I know a lot of people named Jesus.

There is, obviously, the person who brings us together today:  the radical, brown, refugee, outsider, preacher, prophet, child of God who could not stay dead no matter what they did to him.

But I know others. There is Jesus, our cheerful and capable janitor here at Beth El. And I just met another Jesus, the undocumented man I met at the sherriff’s office on Thursday, when Rev. Rachel and I went to advocate for the rights and dignity of our immigrant neighbors. Jesus is everywhere, if you have eyes to see.

When I graduated from seminary, my husband Peter and I moved to Mexico for a year, to work at an orphanage, the Casa San Jose. As problematic as we now know orphanages to be for child development, the Casa was a pretty happy place, all in all. I’m Facebook friends with many of the kids we tended back then. They are young adults now with families of their own, some of them in LA, with or without documents, making a life. And they unfailingly talk about the joy of that time in their childhood--how much fun they had, how they took care of one another, how in spite of the trauma and burdens they bore, they felt safe and loved.

When we lived there, there were 141 kids on site. And three of them were named Jesus. Clearly, we had a problem. How to differentiate between all the Jesuses? The eldest, a handsome teenager, got to be, simply, Jesus. The next youngest became Chuy, an affectionate nickname for Jesus in Mexican culture. And the youngest of all was 4-year-old Chuyito, little tiny Jesus. Chuyito was a dead ringer, I imagine, for the original model, childhood edition: curly brown hair, winsome brown eyes. He barely ever said a word, and always hung his head to the side, in curiosity or skepticism, as if anticipating the day when he would be debating the Pharisees.

Chuyito loved to crawl into my lap and stay there for hours, and I loved him there, because we were both pretty homesick and lonely, and when life is hard you need a soft place.

My favorite memory of Chuyito is not from that year, but a couple years later. When Peter and I left the Casa to go home to the US, we discovered we were homesick for Mexico, and so we’d travel back with a group from whatever church we were inhabiting, and give them a chance to fall in love with the kids the way we had. On our first trip back, our group brought a backpack for each of the hundred-plus kids, stuffed to the brim with clothes, art supplies and toys, and handed them out on our last night together. The boys, including Chuyito, put their backpackson immediately and refused to take them off. Then we strung Christmas lights, rented a DJ and a speaker, and had a giant dance party on the patio. Bankers and little boys do si doed and swung one another wildly to salsa music and Madonna alike. Chuyito, now a full-on boisterous 7-year-old, danced like a maniac for hours with his backpack on, until his movements finally slowed, until he fell asleep, face down on the tile. With his backpack on. Even Jesus needs to rest.

I have a friend, a UCC minister, who suffers from pretty debilitating depression. You’d never know it. She seems happy enough, and is one of the funniest people I know. But her depression has almost ended her marriage; it has hobbled her parenting; it caused her more than once to reconsider her career as a person who has to be hopeful as a profession.

My friend told me something once I’ll never forget. There are times when medication doesn’t do its job, when prayers fail her, when nothing is working to shift the great gray elephant of depression that sits on her soul. And this is what she does in those moments: she changes one thing. Just one thing. “If I’m lying down, I get up. If I’m standing up, I sit down. If I’m inside, I go outside. If I’m outside, I go inside. If I’m alone, I get with people, if I’m with people, I get alone. If I can change one thing, then I can change more things. If I can change more things, then perhaps I can change everything--or, God working in me can, anyhow.” All she has to do is make one little movement.

I myself have never suffered from a lasting or truly devastating depression. To be perfectly annoying about it, being happy has always come pretty easily to me. But this year has tested me severely. Some mornings, including this week, the news has flattened me to the bed, immobilized me as surely as a deep depression. Pick your poison: Syrian children sarin gassed, America making mushroom clouds in Afghanistan, North Korea testing ICBMs, flying coach while Asian on United. Health care under threat, public schools under threat, the rights and lives of immigrants and refugees, black folks, Muslims, queer and trans under threat. We don’t know who will live and who will die before this bitter cup has passed from us. All this against a backdrop of winter rain, such needed rain but a rain that now feels like it will never end, a perma-rain that chills the soul as well as the body, a new and possibly forever climate-chaos abnormal.

I’m trying to remember that this is an Easter sermon.

If I often feel despair these days, I who have every advantage, how must it be for those who don’t share my privileges? Those who face actual and immediate threats to their lives? The undocumented, the brown-skinned, the broke?  I have my whiteness to shield me from ICE and the cops, my paycheck to shield me from poverty. I even have a faith to shield me from sorrow if I choose it, to hide in a La La Land of Easter joy where everything turns out all right in the end.

And yet I have met so many people, who no matter how systems and circumstances might conspire to kill them, have mastered the art of defiant joy. I guess that’s what you do when people want you dead--staying alive is your only countermove.

And Jesus, himself broke and brown and unhoused, is the best example of living big and beautifully in the face of violence and death. I’m always amazed by his capacity for resurrection. Jesus made a decision. He could have stayed dead. He’d discharged his duty to the human family. He taught us everything he knew, offered us an entirely new way of being human, he loved us hard in spite of our frailties, and in return we rejected, abandoned and crucified him. Who would sign up for more life in the face of that?

I confess that sometimes it just seems like a whole lot less WORK being dead. If you’ve had a near death experience, or even surgery under general anesthesia, you know what I’m talking about. There is something truly compelling and even seductive about the idea of slipping away, into a place beyond pain, beyond suffering. A place of eternal rest that no fear or sarin gas can touch.

Jesus lived through the worst we could do to him; he reached that moment of peaceful surrender, and he made a decision to come back.

And he didn’t do it by half-measures, either. He didn’t shamble out of the grave, explaining himself. He didn’t try to stay under the radar to avoid the authorities. He came back in a BIG way.  We cut him down but he leapt up high. He made resurrection into a Broadway show tune, complete with the choreography of hapless disciples running all over the stage.

The early church fathers came up with a word to describe the Trinity: perichoresis, literally, circle dance. They understood God, Jesus and The Holy Spirit as movement, constant flow from the beginning of Creation. And being dead did not exempt Jesus from his place in the dance.

Did you know that some researchers at Oxford did a study? They taught a group of volunteers, each in private, the same dance moves. Then they taught another group, individually, all different dance moves. They noted everyone’s pain tolerance levels by putting extra-squeezy blood pressure cuffs on them. [who comes up with these studies? I have no idea] Then they set them all free in the same room, on a dance floor, with headphones on.

The ones who had learned the same dance began to sync their movements. The ones who knew different moves, or heard different music, each did their own thing. And when the experiment was over, they measured each one’s pain tolerance again. The ones who had moved in sync were able to stand significantly more pain than before. But the ones who heard different songs, or were taught different dance moves to the same music, experienced either no change in pain perception, or actually felt more pain than they had at the start. Perichoresis, dancing in sync, had legitimately made the synched dancers able to bear more pain.

Of course, they didn’t control for people who find any kind of dancing in public painful. :)

Dance is the body’s jazz hands for the soul. Dance is God on the move. We dance our babies around the kitchen. Practice the moves to Thriller in our bedroom for hours. Dance is the mosh pit, the all night rave, Asian grandmas at Zumba class--all of them just as much church as where we are right now. Dance is the 7-year-old Mexican orphan tearing it up on a tile patio; a 3 year old in the aisles at church who will not be stopped but just HAS to dance to every hymn. Dance is Ghost Ship, the young ones gathering before the fire that night, ready to worship at the altar of joy, and now dancing at home with God; and dance is this community, today on Easter, rising from our own ashes.

Dance is resurrection: the mom in chemo doing a three minute dance party around the living room in defiance of her white blood cell count. Dance is a flash mob practicing for the Climate March, to show how the Earth will rise up against us if we don’t rise up for Her.

Dance is what we do when we have too many feelings and not enough words. Dance don’t cost a thing--it belongs to everybody without regard for ability to pay. To dance is to let God move through us, reanimate us no matter what grim reapers are haunting us, the perichoresis that began before everything, the music still playing, healing us, body and soul.

Dance is THIS GUY. To dance is to laugh in the face of death, and all its minions.  They have not won--whoever “they” are--if we can still dance.

Every day, someone, somewhere, faces the powers of death. But then they change one thing. They make one little move. They put down the bottle. They call the therapist, the DV hotline, the immigration lawyer. They pack a bag. They write their name on the application. If they are lying down, they get up. They join the dance.