#unless beck wasn't available

[bolddeducktionneverfails]

Kit Cloudkicker vs. Launchpad McQuack

"I feel like I know that guy..."

[tachimichishrine]

wld it be crazy of me to request smut with margaret mitchell bsd. like. idk. could be plotless -🍳

<yk what would be crazy? if I already had a margaret smut in my drafts. that's crazyyyy right. i totally didn't already have this fully planned in my head and thats the reason this came out so quickly. yeah nope that's insane. (BTW WELCOME 🍳 ANON MUAHAHA)>

"reputation"

⫭◦⨝◦⫬

sugar baby! margaret mitchell x fem! reader

warnings: nsfw ; HARD bondage (shibaru) + bdsm ; oral (giving+receiving) ; masturbation (f) ; brat taming ; degradation/praise ; im getting a lil too comfy on this account so yall are gonna start seein my kinks ; intended lowercase ; cursing ; unedited mnmnmn ;

her family's reputation.

her family's reputation was the reason margaret joined the guild.

her family's reputation was the reason she had to work so hard, trying to repay all their debts.

her family's reputation was the reason she found herself at one of fitzgerald's fancy parties with the elite, rich and most posh out there, acting as though she belonged. there was once a time where she would've felt like she truly did, but that was long ago.

it was the reason she was wearing her most refined clothing, dressed up to appear as though she was still part of a family of importance when you caught her gaze from across the room.

the reason she laughed a little bit too loudly at all your jokes and quips once she found out you were truly a woman of high class, several small fortunes all available at your fingertips whenever you so desired.

the reason for the rest of this tale was a little more blurred.

you invited her over to your home often, offering her lavish gifts and meals that she hadn't experienced in ages. if you spotted a single tear in her dress, you not only recommended a tailor and seamstress to fix it up for her, but you picked out at least five similar dresses in your closet and ordered her to wear them in the meantime.

your intentions became clear after one week, when you had been shopping (and insisting you foot the entire bill) by her side and pointed out a lingerie store.

then you asked for her measurements.

you proposed it so elegantly, just like the aristocrat you were; it was an arrangement, is all. she would come over a few times a week, and you would pay off all of her family's debts. all of them. margaret couldn't say no, although she had quite a significant amount of doubts about the dignity of it all. nevertheless, you convinced her that the payments would be untraceable, simply an anonymous donation to your family from a benevolent third party. it wouldn't become a scandal unless she wanted it to be.

so, she didn't just let you take her measurements, but she also tried on any and every erotic outfit you picked out for her. some were cut-outs, her nipples bare and exposed as you propped yourself up on your elbows, watching her with a hungry look in your eyes, while others were hugging all over her curves. however, you let her chose her favourites, and bought them in every colour imaginable. you wanted your darling to look pretty, after all.

today, she was wearing a new outfit: rope started at her neck, wrapped around in a skillful double loop that was merely tight enough to choke back any of her retorts, and trailed along the rest of her body in a spiderweb of masterful knots and patterns.

slightly tipsy, that was all she was, yet she couldn't remember what moment you'd begun taking off her clothes and turning her into modern art. margaret found you to be gentle, ever loving while you fucked her beyond her wildest dreams, but this time you called her over with a slight twinge in your voice. the drive over here felt shameful, shameful that she was selling her body for the sake of her family's reputation, but it wasn't her place to judge herself. this had been going on for so long that it felt natural to show up at your every beck and call.

"beautiful," you kept muttering over and over, almost to yourself, as you spun her around. it appeared that you recently returned from a trip in japan, where you somehow stumbled across the art. in one of the hundreds upon hundreds of rooms you had, the infrastructure was fitted with a simple hook dangling from the ceiling, reinforced so that it wouldn't collapse under the weight of a human being.

she was hanging from it, a slightly painful experience but it was distributed so masterfully all over her skin that the searing was somewhat pleasurable. what wasn't pleasurable was the overstimulation, the way you'd been looking at her for hours, touching yourself in front of her while she was restrained, unable to move even a single millimeter.

the rope was expensive, somehow— she wasn't sure where a woman of high class would go to buy rope. you'd created a collar at her neck, the remainder of the material creating a line of knots running down in between her legs, rubbing right on her dripping pussy, then up from her ass to re-attach to the neckpiece. a symmetrical zigzag of red lined both her sides, connecting right under her collarbone, above and below her tits, and her bellybutton. as for her legs, you seemed to want them as untouched and bare as possible, so you only wrapped the rope around her wrist and ankles before throwing it across the ceiling fixture.

she truly was a sight to behold, so gorgeous and naked, all for you. your initial goal was just to try it out, a new and illustrious type of bondage that was too exciting to pass on. you opted against the gag in case it ever became too much for her, but you never really established a safe word. you just assumed that she would tolerate it like the brat she was.

you'd cum twice already just watching her and fucking yourself, aided by the feeling of her squirming as she shifted attitudes. at first, she seemed to be having fun, telling you how to shift the ropes so it didn't hurt too much and enjoying the harsh hair pulling you did to get her to face upwards and allow you to kiss her loosely.

after a while, margaret got demanding, a little bitchy even. your hands stopped playing with her face and began taking advantage of your position of power, hers of powerlessness. you grabbed her tits, massaged them with greedy fingers, then seemed to get the better of yourself as you hoisted her higher so she was the right height for you to suck on them. and fuck, did your tongue work magic, impatient as always but the desperation made it feel so good. you flattened your tongue on her sensitive nipple, dipping the tip all around the bottom of her chest then let your teeth sink into her, deep. she let out a soft groan at your nibbling, biting down on her lower lip to keep quiet as you got rougher, grabbing her in between your index and thumb in order to secure her in place while you coated her in your saliva.

"fuck... so good..." you murmured at her taste, shifting to the other side while your free hand rubbed on your panties in between your own legs. "you taste so goddamn sublime, my dear. absolutely exquisite when you're all tied up for me, so patient. you'll be patient, won't y-"

"s-shut up," she breathed out, voice shaky as she tried to shift around mid-air and ease the tension in her core. she managed to rut her hips back and forth by arching her back, painfully rubbing her clit on the rope, desperate for friction.

her efforts were amusing. "now, now, sweetheart, the whole point of this is that you just relax and let me take control, no? so why do you have to be such a fucking whore and ruin it all?"

you tightened the restraints, not allowing her to do anything except breathe, if that. not to mention, you went from caressing her thighs and littering them in kisses to grabbing the end of the rope and continuing your line down her legs, completely typing them together so that her entire body was just one long line of restrained limbs. the more concerning part was that you'd gone from holding her knees apart so you could dip your fingers on her soaking cunt before you licked them clean, to sealing them shut. the wait had already been agonizing, but now you made it clear you had no plans on fucking her any time soon.

you dropped her torso, her shoulders hitting the floor and head contorted so she had no choice to look up at herself, wrapped like a fucking christmas present. you looked down at her, look both sadistic and amused, then spun her around so that she was facing the other direction.

"you know I like to hear your pretty voice, my dear margaret," you said sweetly, then smacked her ass roughly. "you know I don't like it when you hold back"— another slap —"when you open your bratty mouth to say anything except my fucking name like a good whore" — you spanked her once more — "which you are, dear. you're such a good whore, worked up and trying to get yourself off on the rope just from me sucking your needy tits." you slapped her once more, but this time you didn't pull your hand off, instead groping her from in between the tightly woven rope. she moaned, rolling herself on the floor as she tried to listen to anything you just said, but all she could think about was feeling you on her again.

"luckily, I'm in a good mood," you smiled, tying her wrists together behind her back then twirling her around again so you could look at her. you got on your knees, cradling her face in your fingertips lovingly while you pressed a soft kiss onto her lips. "you've had enough of watching me fuck myself, haven't you my dear? would you like to do it for me? would you like to fuck me, margaret?"

it felt like a trick answer, so she just waited, looking up at you with those beautiful eyes of hers she knew you couldn't resist. you used the fact that she was suspended from her ankles at a height that allowed her head to rest flat on the ground in order to part your knees and lower your aching pussy onto her face.

she tried so hard to please you (at first, it was about the money. she was your sugar baby after all, and that was essentially the extent of your relationship. and yet, as time passed, she really did want to make you feel as good as she did when you had her laying down on your plush duvet and pillows, eating her out). before you could even lower yourself all the way, her tongue was already sticking out, reaching upwards to get you on her as soon as she possibly could.

"eager now, aren't we?" you teased for a second, halting your descent just so you could feel her breath hitting you in a feverish attempt to get your cunt on her lips for a few more seconds, then gave in with a stretched out moan. "oh... oh my fucking... mmmn... margaret... you needed me that badly, did you?"

the words stopped and the moaning begun; you didn't have any reason to hold yourself back, nor did you. she sucked on your lips so hard, bottom teeth grazing your throbbing clit while you helped by bouncing yourself on her. you grabbed onto her tits while she finally managed to thrust up into you, fucking you on her tongue with the kind of skill that felt unnaturally good.

the stimulation was wonderful, but her sobs muffled into your ass were even sweeter. she tried, so hard, to rub her thighs together while she ate you out all the way to your orgasm, but you'd learned your lesson and made them tight enough that there was frankly no point in trying. but she'd been so obedient that you figured you'd indulge your sweet darling once you finished screaming her name through your high.

you got off of her face, delicately kissing off the remnants of your cum on her cheeks. "amazing as always, my beauty. shall I return the favour?"

one yank and the whole thing fell apart— margaret fell onto the ground, still tied up with her arms bound behind her back and legs practically sewn together, but no longer hanging from the ceiling. you grabbed a knife off of the table in the corner (your safety net, so to speak) and cut off the attachments on her legs and her wrists. her torso remained bound with her tits sticking out of the circle of red rope, however, because you had thought about it a bit longer and decided you did indeed want to watch her try to fuck herself pathetically on the piece of rope tied between her thighs.

and so, you did. with her on all fours, you grabbed onto the piece of rope now loosely sticking out of the collar and yanked it. she gagged, a beautiful, needy choking noise as it simultaneously collapsed around her throat and her pussy. you eased up a little bit, but in no time your other hand was clutching a handful of her now messy hair while she tried to rub her hips on the piece of rope.

she was starting to cry again, the frustration too much to bear but not enough for her to voice her desire out loud, not letting up on her pathetic humping. you softly kissed the back of her neck, whispering into her skin that this was enough, that she could rest and you would take care of her, but she didn't seem to believe a word of it.

to show that you were serious, you flipped her on her back and stopped kneading her soft flesh in favour of kneading her gushing pussy. you intended on fingerfucking her, you really did, but she was so wet and you didn't know if you could handle letting all that perfectly good arousal go to waste. you grabbed some of the pillows you had stashed in the corner of the room, placing them under her so she would be comfortable as you went down on her, shoulders under her knees and her cunt open to you and only you.

she really did have a beautiful voice, especially when she sung your name out. high pitched, but sultry in the most gorgeous of octaves, as though she were an angel condemned to this world. she let out needy whines as she started to get closer and closer, but she was already on the edge for the past hours and it barely took a few thrusts of your tongue inside of her to have her spasm all over your face.

you laughed, scolding her briefly for not warning you but at the same time, exceedingly pleased. somehow, the ropes looked as flattering on her as the finest pieces of lingerie, and you told her so as you cut her free and kissed her softly.

"how was that, dear?" you helped her back into her dress once you'd put on your own clothes. "was I too harsh?"

she shook her head. "not at all, it was rather... fun. you really do have the most incredibly lewd ideas, though. I'm not sure how you do it," she added with a gentle tease.

you helped secure the body of her dress, tying it from the back before sliding your hands around to the front and holding her from behind. you kissed her neck up and down, taking your time as you smelled her and relished in her taste.

"I have to confess, I was hoping I could've kept you here longer, but it would've been cruel for me to deny you for that length of time. you see, as I promised, every... session, I repay part of your family's debts."

margaret was such an impatient woman. "and? why are you reminding me of this?"

you ignored the tone of her ask and laid kisses along the back of her ear. "well, they're all paid up. I put in the last payment right before you arrived today."

an awkward silence ensued, neither of you sure what to say next. thankfully, she was the one to do it.

"in that case, our arrangement... it's over."

"yes," you said solemnly. "margaret, dear, I know I called it an arrangement, but—"

"shut up."

this kind of brashness was common with her, no doubt, but what surprised you the most was her swirling around to meet your gaze and pulling you in by the waist.

"our arrangement is not over. I should still like to continue to meet you for these sessions, as you say," she stated, very matter-of-factly, like there was nothing you could do to argue her words. "will that be a problem?"

you hid your elation well, instead leaning in to kiss her deeply. "not at all. but I'm not sure how I will be able to compensate you for your time, darling."

"oh really? I could think of a number of ways. a day at the spa, a reservation at the splendid restaurant that just opened on fifth, the roses are quite expensive this time of year too..."

you giggled, picking her up so that she would be weightless as you spun her around excitedly.

"anything you want, margaret. I'll get you anything your heart desires, because all that mine wants is you."

[shadowmaat]

Another author successfully torpedoes their own career. Publisher's Weekly says he's been dropped by his agent and I bet it's only a matter of time before his distributor (Simon & Schuster) releases a statement of their own.

It's the sheer ineptitude of the plot that I find fascinating. This guy sincerely thought it would be okay to solicit nudes and additionally gave zero thought to the fact that some of those booktok reviewers were underage.

But it gets better! The emails were sent from his own personal email, right? And he was blaming "one of the many" PR firms he works with for doing it without his approval. And people were rightly calling out the fact that it was his own PR company responsible.

Look, there's a remote possibility that if someone is profoundly ignorant they might have their personal email tied directly into their PR biz. IF they themselves were in charge of sending the emails. It's much harder to accept that a co-founder's personal email would just be... generally available for use by anyone else at the company. You might be able to argue it, especially if the "company" was only a couple of people who were already friends, but it definitely isn't something that would hold up to any kind of scrutiny. Especially if the friend isn't willing to take the fall for your crime. LOL!

In the PW article the author (Sophia Stewart) spoke to Barker, who is now claiming that no no no, it wasn't HIS PR firm that was responsible, it was another, unnamed one out of "Central America!"

A random, foreign company that had access to his personal email and thus (apparently) BestOfTikTok's mailing list.

There's just no way. Not at all. Your own company having access to your private email, maybe, but one where you're just a random client? Seriously?

Barker is a best-selling author and he has shown himself completely unable to craft a believable story. My personal suspicion is that he chose "Central America" because he figured the laws on soliciting nudes might be more lax there. That's a whole other kettle of snakes I don't have the time or knowledge to get into beyond another "fuck you" to Barker. Also worth noting is that if a "Central American" company was operating in the US (assuming they have the legal right to do so) they would still be bound by US law. So maybe a double "fuck you" to Barker.

If I was a victim of a predatory company using my details to engage in unsavory (and possibly criminal) behavior, the very first thing I'd do is throw them under the bus. Name and shame! You want to know the real creeps here? It's Peeyar Firm out of Panama City! The CEO is BD Jarker!

TBH I'm not sure why he would need a group out of "Central America" to help him handle PR anyway. No shade intended, but unless Barker's books are incredibly popular there I just don't see why it would be necessary. Wouldn't the point be to hire a company in the specific country or region where you'd need it? And then utilize it for that specific area? Since, you know, that's probably where they're allowed to operate and would know the laws & regs (and trends) better than you.

Like I said, Barker can't craft a believable story, not even to cover his own ass. I understand the pressure of having the world hammering on your door demanding answers, but FFS, if this is your reputation and livelihood at stake, at least come up with something that's remotely plausible.

I think that's what bugs me about situations like this. Beyond how repulsive and predatory it is to offer money for nudes from booktokkers, why can't you come up with better excuses? Or even, shock of shocks, admit you're a perv, apologize in full, and agree to get therapy? Or hey, if you have "many" PR firms at your beck and call, maybe reach out to one or more of them for help getting you out of the mess you made? That's part of what good PR peeps do: mitigate damage. Dude may have helped found a company, but it's clear he doesn't know anything about how the industry actually works.

new drama

Having spent five minutes researching PR firms and how they operate, I think it's safe to say that a reputable firm would never encourage illicit behavior on behalf of their client. I also feel- although I don't have proof of this- that a reputable firm would run any campaign (especially one with questionable morality) past their client before enacting it. Especially if they were directing people to send stuff to the author's email address. Like, you don't put a campaign on blast with the goal of getting tons of submissions without warning the client of a possible incoming flood of emails.

Personally, if I was going to run a promotion on someone's behalf, I'd also set up a promotion-specific email so that A) submissions wouldn't get lost and B) my client wouldn't have to worry about missing any important personal/work emails amid all the submissions.

JD Barker is a "sexy horror" author. He has a new book coming out. As is common when a new book is coming out, there's a campaign to try and encourage reviews. In this case the campaign is trying to encourage young women booktokkers to do their reviews in the nude. There are multiple options and they're phrased as "suggestions" rather than requirements, but there is the matter of payment involved. And if you want to get paid you need to send your video directly to the author for review so he can decide if it gets approved or rejected.

If you think that sounds a little sketchy, you aren't the only one. Mr. Barker is currently disavowing all knowledge of this campaign and saying it's entirely the fault of one of the "many" PR firms he uses. Twitter users seem to think that the PR firm in question is one that he himself was involved in creating, but I'm not sure that makes any difference from a professional standpoint.

I can see three possibilities here.

Someone at the PR firm has a specific beef against Barker and decided to try and torpedo his career (along with their own).

The PR firm is grossly incompetent, did no due diligence, and has fucked this up beyond all reason.

Barker is lying, it was his idea all along, and now that he's been caught he's throwing an unspecified PR firm to the wolves in an attempt to save his own ass.

No matter how this plays out, it's a bad, bad look. Especially since, from what I've read, there was no attempt to verify the ages of the women/girls who received these emails. Asking adults to send nudes for money is bad enough, but asking (or "suggesting") potentially underage girls to pose nude for you is, well, I'm pretty sure you all know how revolting that is.

Maybe the vague phrasing will be enough to keep it from becoming a criminal investigation, but this is still sketchy as hell and I hope the responsible parties face some serious repercussions.

[mor-beck-more-problems]

Secrets & Fury || Morgan & Blanche Feat. Agnes Bachman

TIMING: Current

LOCATION: Bachman House Ruins

PARTIES: @harlowhaunted & @mor-beck-more-problems

SUMMARY: Morgan and Blanche make contact with the past. The truth is not meant to soothe.

CONTENT: brief mentions of suicide

The only thing left of what had once been the Bachman House was a few outer support beams and a wall, sticking out of the ground in a way that wouldn’t have been possible unless the ground swallowed the house whole. Which, in fairness, it did. Blanche remembered Morgan, Cassie, and herself throwing themselves out of the home and into the adjacent garden as the ground trembled and swallowed the cursed house… Blanche had never asked Morgan where the house went. Was the house still lingering below the soil or had it disappeared somewhere else entirely? Blanche stared at the dirt, grimacing at the patches of weeds that had feebly tried to break through to no avail, and decided that she would ask ahat at different time. There were no spirits here, not this time. The cool chill that ran up Blanche’s spine from time to time was the cold December air… And the dark, leafless trees that loomed around the area as if they were watching her. As Blanche painstakingly drew the circle in the dirt, she couldn’t help but feel as if she was doing this in front of an audience. Like this was a final test to see if it was worth it -- if she was worth it.

The silver, jeweled barrette kept her blonde hair out of her face, and every once in a while, she would reach up to run her fingers along the smooth, teal gemstones encrusted on the trinket. It made her feel better. Blanche remembered what Jasmine said about Focal Points, and even if it was false, at least it gave her peace of mind. At least it brought her closer to the one she missed most of all. Even that made her feel more powerful than before.

This was what she was doing when Morgan arrived. Blanche glanced at her, her hand falling back to her side as she gave her a strained smile. “Hey,” she said softly, and she grabbed her pink lighter from her pocket. Time to light the candles. “You can put it in the middle of the circle. What you brought of Agnes’, I mean.”

Morgan had tried to come early. She hadn’t been to the old Bachman house for even a drive-by hello since it had tried to collapse with her, Blanche, and Cassie in it. She couldn’t see the place as a benign victim of circumstance after having to face off against Hannah Bachman, hearing the ways she mimicked her own mother in her brand of cruelty. Pulling alongside the street now made her feel as though the wood and nails had been as complicit as Constance in the horrible things that had happened here. What she had expected to find, to get used to, she wasn’t sure. All she knew now was that Blanche had beaten her to the punch and settled into a circle inside the ruins. That’s what happened when you got too anxiously punctual people together, she guessed. “Fancy seeing you here,” she said wryly. “Our appointment isn’t for another ten minutes, Blanche.” She reached into her bag and took out the arm bone she had stolen from Agnes’ grave, wrapped in fabric. Deirdre had been able to identify her with just a touch: thick dark hair like Morgan’s, large eyes that were brown instead of blue, and an anguished look as she laid down in a rickety bed and worked a pillow around half her face, a pistol in her hand. She had been crying, Deirdre said. Morgan couldn’t think of any other way she might have gone, not with what she’d been made to live with. “Genuine, banshee-identified great great grandma Agnes,” she said softly. Agnes’ family title sounded strange, knowing that she had died only a few years older than Morgan. They felt more like equals now, women who had been ground up and bent into the wrong shape, who were tired, who just needed to catch a break for once. Morgan sat down just outside the circle, careful not to disrupt any of the markings. “You um...when you bring them here, you don’t have to see how they died, right Blanche? I mean, she’ll look…” Like there’s a massive exit wound on the side of her skull. “How she did when it happened. But that’s not something you have to carry, is it?” Morgan asked.

“I’m nothing if not efficient,” Blanche replied. The grin on her face didn’t quite reach her eyes, though she was pleased to see that Morgan looked alright. Blanche had been here for forty-five minutes already, but she wasn't’ about to tell Morgan that - she sought out the flattest part of the ruins and spent an absurdly long time drawing the circle. She looked sharply at Morgan, the question burning in her throat. How did great, great Grandma Agnes die? Not that it mattered, because she would do the seance no matter what, but she couldn’t help but think of the bullet wound inside Sammy’s skull and Winn’s chest, and how Bea’s head never sat quite right on her shoulders… But Blanche shook her head. “I’ve seen some pretty gruesome deaths,” she said. Blanche didn’t know Agnes, so she hoped her appearance wouldn’t stay burned into her memory like her friends. There was some part of her that knew this wasn’t true, she remembered spirits maimed in all sorts of ways… But as Blanche finished lighting her candles, she stood, brushing the dirt off her jeans. “She’ll look how she chooses too,” Blanche said, “If she’s been around since she died… Then she’ll probably have learned to change her appearance by now. But if she hasn’t or she doesn’t want too…” Blanche reached to fiddle with the hair clip in her hair again, chewing on her lip in thought. “That’s her choice. It won’t prevent us from doing what we’re here to do.” She examined her circle for the upteenth time, looking for imperfections. She could find none. With a small breath, she looked back to Morgan. “Are you ready, Morgan?” She waited for Morgan to nod, before going to settle into the dirt.

Blanche took a few deep breaths, glancing over at Morgan to really make sure she was ready, before she began reciting the sanskrit. The power Blanche felt flowing through her and the circle was almost on par with the deep seeded resentment in her soul. It was strange and exciting and somehow different than when they had been in her apartment. It was a mistake, Blanche decided, to not have come here the first time. Wind howled around them, the flickering of the candles erratic but never going out as it circled them. She was clear headed, drawing her energy from the back of her mind - rather, the back of her head, she supposed, where her great grandmother’s clip lay. She focused on that as she opened the portal of communication, the chilling wind whining in protest as she pushed forward. It was tiring, but slowly, a woman flickered into sight. Slowly, her transparent form grew stronger, and Blanche could make out her features and the frumpy old clothes she wore. With a push forward, Blanche ended the opening of the ritual.

“Are you Agnes Bachman?” Blanche asked, glanced at Morgan for confirmation before anything else.

Morgan kept her eyes trained on the center of the circle, like letting her hair blow the wrong way might turn everything around for the worse. She heard the wind in her ears, saw the small candle flames surge on their wicks. Doubt gnawed in her stomach, she’s not coming, she’s not here and she’s not coming and I’m never gonna know what really happened. Shit, was she awful for trying to reach out with her will and pull her toward them? For wanting her to be stuck here all this time, just to have someone she could talk to? Morgan didn’t have time to find an answer inside herself. A silhouette formed in a circle, then a face.

“Oh, shit…”

Agnes Bachman didn’t have a hole in her head. Her wavy hair hung just below her jaw, styled in waves Morgan had seen in fashion panels from the 1910’s. She had loose housecoat, or maybe it was just a regular day coat that had been retired after getting too big and patchy, hung heavy on her frame. (Morgan couldn’t figure out how that worked, the woman before her didn’t have a body, so how could anything be loose or tight or anything in between? And yet just from looking at her, Morgan could imagine the pointy ends of her joints and the ridges on her stomach from going hungry on and off for years.) She had a bemused half smile, one that was way past surprise, and a face that looked hauntingly like the one Cece had pulled out of the magic trunk. “It’s you,” Morgan whispered. “This whole time, I’ve been looking at… Agnes.”

“Is there someone else I would be?” Agnes asked. She had a high, tired kind of voice, not unlike the wind that had swelled around them only a minute ago. It was a reedy voice, torn up from too many cigarettes. Smoking was unladylike in Agnes’ time, but maybe she’d stolen her husband’s cigarettes, or bummed some off people with more money. Maybe after a certain point she had decided not to care. She looked around, taking in what was left of the house, the hole in its core, the stars above and the jagged, splintered ruins reaching through it like so many broken fingers. “I remember this place.” She scoffed, smirking. “It feels a shame I’m not more surprised to see it in pieces. You’re supposed to bond with the place you grow up. It’s how you maintain your ties with the earth.” She turned back to them, gesturing self consciously around her temples. “Is anyone gonna tell me what this party’s about...?” The smile she gave each of them was thin, like she was afraid something bad was going to happen. How often had she been blamed or yelled at for Constance’s mess? “One of you has to know something, if you’re pulling me cross-country to my old house.”

“Y-yes. I mean...we...uh…” Morgan fumbled for words and gaped at Blanche, silently asking for help.

Awestruck by her success, Blanche stared at Agnes in a sort of wonder. The wind grew calm around them, still lightly tugging at loose hairs and flame to let them know it was still there. She had done it. She pulled Agnes Bachman back here. Blanche gaped right back at Morgan, suddenly speechless herself. All coherent thoughts flew out of her head and suddenly she forgot how to speak any language whatsoever.

“Wha-” Blanche stuttered, and then realized she was the one supposed to be running this ‘party’. She almost leapt to her feet, but stayed rooted to the spot so she wouldn’t jostle the circle. “Agnes,” Blanche tried again. “My name is Blanche Harlow. I’m a local medium in White Crest. This is Morgan Beck, she’s your great, great Granddaughter. I’ve… We, rather… We’ve contacted you because we want to ask you about the past, specifically relating to Constance Cunningham.” Her words were formal, but they were at least confident.

“Is it alright if we ask you a few questions?”

Agnes hadn’t stopped looking at Morgan since she’d appeared. Morgan straightened her shoulders under her gaze and angled her head this way and that, trying to find the angle that would give her the most ‘respectable impressive descendant’ look, not that she knew what that was. Agnes smirked at Blanche’s fumbling and Morgan noticed an array of little smile wrinkles that gave her some comfort. She must have been happy, or something like it, for a little while.

“I should tell you,” Agnes said, leaning in with a conspiratorial look, “I told my kids not to settle down, so they maybe wouldn’t have any of their own. But I’m not surprised they didn’t listen to me. Kids never do, so don’t get any ideas.” She squinted taking in more of Morgan. “But that’s not going to be a problem for you, is it, sweetie?”

“No,” Morgan whispered. “I mean, I have a...I haven’t really discussed it with my girlfriend, we’re gonna wait fifty, maybe a hundred years first. That’s the kind of family planning you get with a zombie and a banshee!” She laughed, shrill and pained. Was this how you were supposed to talk to your grandmother? Did it matter when she only looked five years older than you? “I died. Because of the family curse. Seven months and change, so I’m still adjusting. But it’s fine! I mean, it’s not, but it will be.” She gripped her wool skirt, fighting the urge to crawl closer to Agnes.

“Girlfriend, you say? I’ve seen things get better for some girls like that in the last hundred years. I should’ve figured it ran in the family. Mama was right about something after all.” The smirk she gave was bitter, scratching an old scab on her heart, and if Morgan hadn’t already heard about Hannah Bachman’s dismay from Leah, she would’ve seen the cut her response had left in Agnes’ face. “Your death, sweetie, does that mean the magic doesn’t touch you anymore? Whatever you and your girl do, are you safe from it?”

Morgan nodded, eyes beginning to well. “Yeah, we are. The curse didn’t follow me after. We’re good. It’s just uh…” She looked sidelong at Blanche. “It’s Constance? She’s here and she is…” Evil. Cruel. A walking nightmare. “Really, really determined to make up for what her curse can’t do anymore. And I...we were wondering...if you could tell us what really happened. I read Lucrecia’s diary, but I want the truth from you. And before you say anything, I don’t blame you. I don’t know where it started in the family, but I know you didn’t deserve to carry this like it was all your fault, and I don’t blame you for what she did.”

Agnes straightened up. “I can’t talk about Constance,” she said flatly. “And the person who started that story was me, because it was true.” She turned to Blanche. “Can you put me back somewhere? It doesn’t have to be home, I don’t much like my new grave. But somewhere else, please.”

Blanche thanked every God that may or may not have existed that she had excellent memory recall. She backed off of Agnes, ready to do what she, as a private investigator trainee, did best: listened. The true extent of the Bachman curse had been made apparent to her when Morgan died violently in the middle of town and became a zombie, but Constance never put into thought that there could be life after death… Funnily enough, Blanche hadn’t put that much thought into it either, before she met Remmy. Blanche rested her hands in her lap, leaning forward on her knees as she concentrated on keeping the line of connection open.

“You can’t talk about Constance? Or you won’t talk about Constance?” Perhaps Blanche’s voice was a little sharper than it needed to be, but she wasn’t here to pull punches. She was here for the truth. After the truth was known… Well, then she could deal with Agnes. Agnes, from what she felt, would need to move on. But one ghost problem at a time. This seance wasn’t for Agnes, it was for Morgan. And, to an extent, though Morgan could never find this out, it was for Constance too. Constance deserved closure and peace - the last thing Blanche wanted for her was to Cordelia or Lauren Langley.

Blanche leaned back, her head tilting to the side slightly as she examined the ghost. “Don’t you want to make sure the right one is known?” Maybe she didn’t, though. Blanche pressed her lips together for a moment. “I won’t be sending you anywhere,” she said, “Until we get some answers. And I’ll have you know… I’m very persistent.”

“Is there much of a difference as far as you’re concerned?” Agnes asked. Her squinting gaze turned on Blanche, running up and down to appraise her. Morgan’s mother had a similar look when she was trying to worm out of a conversation she didn’t want to have, but Morgan didn’t get the sense that Agnes was looking for points of weakness or ways to hurt Blanche. It looked more like she was working a puzzle. “If people think badly of me, it’s because I got the ball rolling. I don’t have any right to be sore about any tall tales that have gotten rolled into the truth.” She looked at Morgan again, smiling in a sad way that made the zombie’s heart lurch. “You should blame me. And I am sorry, I will always be sorry, for my part in your death. Even if it means you get to wait a hundred years to have a family with a woman you love--” she paused, staring off somewhere Morgan couldn’t follow. “It shouldn’t cost you what it has. Death is too high a price, especially after what you must have suffered. It’s not much of a life to begin with.”

“Don’t say that,” Morgan whispered. “I know you’re...yes, I was miserable and I didn’t get to do anything I set out to, but you didn’t cast the spell. You didn’t take one falling out and turn it into a hundred plus years of--”

“No.” Agnes’ voice turned to rock while somehow never rising above her quiet. “No, Morgan. I’m not going to discuss it in those terms. Or at all.” Agnes looked over at Blanche, checking to see if her point had been effectively made, but Agnes had never gone up against Blanche ‘I do what I want’ Harlow. She withered under the young woman’s look and pursed her lips as her position sank in.

“Listen,” Morgan said gently. “I’m going to get her back for what she did to you, to all of us. However hurtful, however awful or complicated, it didn’t merrit what she did for retribution. I’m going to make sure she…” Morgan winced, not wanting to throw her position in Blanche’s face. Of all her friends, she had been the most honest, and the most kind, about her position. “I’m going to make us even.”

Agnes’ face dropped with horror. “You what? You can’t. Sweetie, whatever you’re up to, you can’t do that to her. You have no idea what she--It was my idea to run away! I made her take all the risks. Crafting the glamours that would make us look older, hiding the money I’d stolen in her tree, hiding travel clothes, securing our transport. My mother watched me at all times, I was afraid we wouldn’t stand a chance if I slipped away somewhere I couldn’t explain. I was selfish and I was scared and I made her do everything for me, and then I--” She looked helplessly at Blanche again, her wish transparent in her eyes: please, please. “I let her fall for me too,” she said. “We were caught, the morning we were set to leave. Constance told the truth and I--I didn’t. She had given a story and I knew we were sunk and I wouldn’t see the light of day for weeks unless I did something different. I--”

Agnes’ reedy voice seemed to snap. Her silent appeals to Blanche were going nowhere; the medium only stared her down harder than before. And every, “hey,” and “you don’t have to be afraid,” that Morgan gave only seemed to make her more desperate.

“I said she was kidnapping me. That she’d hurt me.” Agnes said at last. “We had stolen pistols from the Logan’s house to protect ourselves. I told my mother to check her reticule, where I’d told her to put them and she thought it was proof. I didn’t know they were going to tell everyone or turn her into a pariah. I thought she would be run out of town, dropped on the nearest cart, never to return. I had no illusion of being forgiven, but gods help me, I did not know my mother would leave her with nothing and make her live like some poor animal. When I realized, it was too late.” Agnes clenched her airy fists, fighting the impulse to cry. “I would like to go back now. Send me back now and have done with it.”

Morgan tried to reach for her, forgetting everything except how badly she wanted to know the woman in front of her. “No, you can stay, Agnes. It doesn’t matter what happened before—”

“Now. I want to be gone now. Please. I will not answer anything else. I won’t.”

Anger was an emotion Blanche was used to, and the more Agnes said, the more angry she got. Fury and disgust twisted into her stone faced expression as she sat there, her arms crossed as Morgan and Agnes conversed. Finally, with a wail, Agnes turned to her, begging to be set free. “Coward,” Blanche said unkindly. “You’re a coward.” Blanche pushed herself up to her knees, as if she was going to move to stand. She didn’t, however, because her energy was being spent in keeping the connection open. Still, Blanche’s eyes flashed angrily.

“I’m not naive enough to say Constance is blameless. Constance is to blame for a lot of things -- Morgan’s death and the subsequent death of others in her path for revenge - but you…” Blanche shook her head, “You chose wrong and you lied. You lied to save yourself and threw the one you loved under the bus.” Blanche scoffed in disgust. Never before had she felt such anger towards another ghost. The closest that came was Lauren Langley, but even that held a different sort of anger than the rage that bubbled in the pit of her stomach now. If she could, she’d throw a fist in Agnes’ face.

“You are not to blame for Constance’s actions,” Blanche said, folding her arms over her chest. “She is able to make her own decisions and do what she will but… You are to blame for hurting her. You are to blame for lying. You are to blame for the misery that was thrust upon her as punishment for a crime she did not commit. You lied because you were a coward. And that -” Blanche jabbed a finger at Agnes. “- Is what you should feel remorse for. That is what you need to reflect on. And then you’ll be able to move on.” While Constance was on a warpath for vengeance that would end up destroying her. It was hard not to blame Agnes for everything.

With a sweep of her hand, the wind howled around them, growing louder as Blanche recited the end of the ritual that would close the communication with Agnes. She didn’t want to hear what Agnes had to say, even as her pain stricken face was seared into Blanche’s mind even as she disappeared from the circle. The wind quieted and the candles surrounding them extinguished. The ritual was over. Blanche slumped back into the dirt, exhausted, but too angry to give in to sleep.

“All of this…” Blanche said, sneering at the place Agnes once stood. “Because of a cruel lie…”

Morgan flinched at Blanche’s words as if they had cracked against her skin. She called out her name, trying to interrupt, “That can’t be the whole story, there has to be something else…” But Blanche’s fury had found its target, and though Morgan couldn’t fathom why, she understood that it would not let go. “Don’t be cruel. Blanche, please!” But please only got Blanche to say the words that would send Agnes back to wherever she had been before. Morgan grasped at the air as Agnes vanished, her face shut and clenched with shame. Something in the air lifted, like heat diffusing a cold room. Morgan continued to stare into the circle. There had to be something else. Maybe Hannah Bachman was the real culprit, for making her daughter so afraid that she wanted to run away in the first place. Maybe Agnes had sensed something unstable, even dangerous in Constance and took her change to back out rather than run away with someone who was willing to sign off on the misery of generations of people. There had to be something, because if Morgan’s family had been right about Agnes, then how was she supposed to split her vengeance between them? Who was she destroying Constance for besides herself if Agnes had tried so hard to beg her not to? Morgan’s gaze dropped from the air where Agnes had just sat and down to her own hands: discolored around the nails because she was between meals, protected by gold cuff bracelets on her wrist, so no one would see the bite that made her what she was. Ruth Beck hadn’t cared a wit that she was going to be avenged, Morgan wasn’t even sure if she believed it. Morgan’s father had lost his last tie to the earth when he saw her happy with Deirdre. Deirdre herself insisted the choice was hers to determine. And now the memory of Agnes’ horrified face stood frozen in Morgan’s memory. Was it still fair, and still enough, if this was for her satisfaction and hers alone?

“She was just…” Young? Stars above, could Morgan really say that without it getting thrown back in her face two seconds later? “She was scared. She didn’t know what was going to happen and we don’t know why she really…” Threw someone she supposedly loved under the bus. If Hannah was so dangerous, enough to run away from, why wouldn’t Anges have figured out that Constance was going to suffer without her protection? Wouldn’t that have been obvious? Was her ignorance to the consequences just another lie too? Morgan shivered, frowning into the ground. She was long used to disappointment, but she hadn’t thought that meeting Agnes would leave her more confused than when she’d started. “I don’t know,” Morgan sighed. Nothing she put together in her mind fit the way she wanted it to. “Whatever, why-ever she really did anything, she paid for it with her life and a hundred years of being hated.” Slowly, she lifted her gaze to Blanche, scrutinizing her expression. She had seemed more invested in Morgan’s family drama than she had before. Morgan had taken great care to keep her out of it as much as possible. “What was that all about, just a minute ago?” She asked gently. “I’ve never seen you like that with a ghost before. Is everything okay…?”

She was just - Blanche almost snarled the word ‘young’ right back at Morgan. Constance was just as young. She was nineteen. Blanche could remember, back in high school, where her only long term boyfriend broke up with her and how devastated she had been. If that situation had been anything like Agnes’, which it hadn’t, and Logan had wronged her in some type of way, Blanche would have wanted to curse him and his entire family too. The thought was snide, and filled with anger. She realized, with a start, that she was two seconds away from defending Constance’s honor, and that wasn’t right either. Constance had done wrong, Blanche reminded herself, her palms suddenly sweaty. She hadn’t meant to, mostly, of course. Maxine had been an unfortunate accident, and the incident with Nell… Blanche wanted to believe that she really didn’t know that Nell had been in the car until it was too late. And Morgan had said intentions matter. Blanche wanted to believe that, and she wanted Constance to give up this calling of vengeance on Morgan’s family because at the end of the day, Morgan hadn’t done anything wrong. Morgan hadn’t done this to Constance. Agnes, she thought the name with disgust, started this.

But that didn’t make Morgan’s target goal right either. She had the cold reminder that Morgan’s end goal was to torture and erase Constance from existence. The thought of her being in pain made Blanche… Well, it made her sick to her stomach. Constance didn’t deserve that. She needed to be at peace while she was still able. At least, then, she would be happy. She would be able to move past what Agnes had done, and it wouldn’t have to lock her into a toxic storm of resentment and fury.  At Morgan’s question, though, Blanche’s palms frew more sweaty, and she wiped them on her jeans. “I wasn’t wrong,” Blanche mumbled to her shoes, shaking her head. She refused to look at Morgan, instead turning to start gathering her things in her back. Her face had flushed, but it had been a little pink already from the anger she burst out with during the seance and from the exhaustion the clung to her. “In order to move on, Agnes needs to come to term with her choices she made while she was living. She can’t do anything to change them, not now,” Blanche’s lip curled in disgust as she carefully stuck the candles in her bag, straightening to sling it over her shoulder. She went to the magic circle she had so carefully carved into the dirt with a sharp stick and some chalk and destroyed it. While Blanche hadn’t listened to Granny’s teachings, she did remember that Granny said to never leave a circle unattended, just in case. Finally, she reached up and pulled the jeweled, silver hairpin from her hair, letting her blonde hair tumble down. Carefully, she put that in a separate pocket of her backpack. Her shoulders slumped tiredly and looked at Morgan, “I’ll talk to her again soon,” Blanche said, decidingly. “I’ll call upon her again and speak her more closely, once… this is all over.”

Silence froze and bristled around them; Morgan held her tongue. Blanche’s ire was hot and sharp as a needle fresh out of the fire. She didn’t have to say a word for Morgan to know she was angry at her too. For Constance. For being “unfair.” Maybe if she wasn’t the one crushed over her whole life and promptly murdered, Morgan could understand these good for nothing principles, or whatever strange projection was going on from Blanche’s angle. She’d confounded people on moral questions before. Only the stars above knew how many passes she gave Deirdre, and that was just for starters.

“No,” Morgan admitted quietly. “But I never said you were. That wasn’t my point.” The point was that Agnes’ mistake should have only destroyed two people, at most. Tragic, but contained. Constance had driven Agnes to the kind of misery that made her want to end her life. And then proceeded to do the same to every other Bachman descendant, those who weren’t horribly killed by her meddling out right. It was unbalanced to the point of grotesque. What pity, what understanding was there left when Constance’s last stand was with someone she’d never met, except to try and destroy? At least Morgan was taking a stand for her own family.

“If there’s another way to get Agnes to White Crest, some way she can be around without a circle, I’ll look after her so you don’t have to keep your hotel for ghosts open longer than you already have to. She’s my family, I should at least try to help her. I want to.” And she wanted to understand why Agnes was so opposed to her finishing this ugly game Constance had turned their lives into. Seeing Ruth’s total apathy at the news had been one thing, but Agnes’ horrified face sat heavy and sick in Morgan’s stomach. She shouldered her bag and dusted herself off, looking down at Blanche with guarded concern. “I still don’t know why you’re so determined to help me, but thank you, Blanche.” She reached out a hand to pull her up. “You need anything right now?” She asked quietly. The differences between them felt as strong as the similarities in this moment, certainly nothing that could be solved with a trip to a diner or a few twenties stuffed into Blanche’s bag. But Morgan was tired of losing people, and she had a sick, prickly feeling in her stomach, almost like guilt, and she was desperate to be rid of it.

It was a strange fury that had settled in Blanche’s stomach, and she didn’t understand it. Blanche knew Morgan held different opinions on the whole subject and that their end goals were different, so she wasn’t understanding why she was so upset at Morgan’s insistence that Constance was the only one in the wrong here. It wasn’t fair - none of this was fair. Perhaps Constance had been right in that the Bachmans - that Agnes Bachman and whatever that thing Cassie, Morgan, and Blanche had confronted in the house so many months ago - were the evil ones. Whatever that meant made Blanche’s head spin because she also knew that no matter what, killing Morgan was inexcusable. How was it possible to care so much for a ghost that did something so horrible to a friend? And was she so determined to help Morgan, or was she determined to help Constance? Couldn’t there be a way for her to help both? Why was the answer one or the other? Blanche was sick of having to choose and she was sick of having to ask herself hard questions and she was sick of having to think.

Not for the first time, Blanche felt that fuzzy, static feeling in her head.

“You could summon her, or she could travel herself,” Blanche finally said, her tone devoid of any true emotion. “What I just did isn’t anything other than opening a line of communication. If I don’t close the line, she could get stuck in the circle. That’s why, even after you dissipated wrong Agnes, I had to close the ritual. But it’s not a permanent means of keeping them here.” She swallowed, wrapping her arms around herself as she shook her head. Blanche was quiet a moment as she hoisted her bag over her shoulder, and looked at Morgan. There were words on the tip of her tongue, but she couldn’t quite find them. Confusion and anger melded together, and Blanche realized that it might be better to not say anything at all. “I don’t need anything, no.” Blanche said. “I’m going to go home though, I’m… I’m tired.” It wasn’t a lie, she realized. She was exhausted, and Blanche wondered if she hadn’t overdone it. There was supposed to be a balance so she didn’t feel like complete shit afterwards. But as she turned on her heel, giving a quiet goodbye to Morgan as she trudged back to her jeep, she started to think that maybe the energy she spent on the seance wasn’t the only reason why she didn’t feel well.

[opisacat]

at this point I need ppl in my life that can tell when I'm doing rly bad and reach out to me because I will never ask for help with mental issues it's impossible