#which has been so inspiring!

[lupine-trees]

don’t hold me like you know me

“Oh, golden boy, don’t act like you were kind. You were mine, but you were awful every time.”

[ i’m going to need y’all to forgive me in advance for this one. i saw a beautiful collage earlier using the above lyrics from bleachers’ “merry christmas, please don’t call,” and, well.. here we are. i will say, it’s not all so very bad. i don’t know that it’s a happy end, but there’s a glimmer of something there. cheers! ]

drarry | angst, nonlinear, draco pov | word count: ~2.6k | rating: m | warnings: physical violence, drinking, implied mental health concerns

_ _ _

The streets are sleek with the midwinter showers, and the rain itself should have been an omen: harsh, pelting, unforgiving.

Draco’s coat is drawn tightly around him, hands tucked in the illusory warmth of his pockets. There’s a roast waiting at home (the slow cooker hopefully having worked according to the instructions), and the promise of a hearty meal is the singular motivation that has gotten him through a particularly tedious day at Gringott’s.

His focus had been diverted to this very thought— it’s the only reasonable explanation for why he didn’t see him sooner. Every other near-brush carefully avoided, every pass through the streets of Diagon painfully aware. But the rain and the roast had lulled him, dulled him, and before it can be helped, Potter has careened from the new apothecary and directly into Draco.

Draco is nearly bowled over, his feet almost coming out from beneath him entirely as his heart does a horrible scrabble in his chest. Harry catches him, of course, polite and apologetic, murmuring a quick, “Oh, I’m so—” before catching sight of Draco. His hands, gentle around Draco’s shoulders, snap swiftly away.

“Oh, Dr— uh, Malfoy,” his mouth drawing tight, his jaw a harsh tic. His gaze shifts down the street, back into the shop, then drags over Draco, his hand crumpling around his brown paper parcel as he nods at him sharply, an acknowledgment or a dismissal or something else equally inscrutable. He stalks off down the street.

It’s worse, really, than Draco had imagined it might be, seeing him again, after… well, after. He’d worried of a scene, a shouting match. That he himself would fight, or else that he’d fawn and fumble and fall back in, all forgiven.

This is worse— the sheer nothing of it is worse.

Draco gathers himself, having stood, (how long?) too long on the street, stricken. He collects himself and walks home, where a mediocre roast is waiting.

The worst part, really, is that Draco had noticed the purple rings under his eyes, and known (too knowing) that he must still be sleeping poorly.

. . .

Potter is fucking into him, and Draco can hardly breathe, but really, that seems of little consequence in the context. He heaves a shaky breath as Harry mutters something low in the back of his throat about hating him, and Draco can only snap back, pathetic, “I hated you first.”

The fact that he doesn’t hate him now, that he can’t hate him now, is, too, of little consequence.

Harry had burned into his life like a fire, an ill-fated handjob in a pub loo that transfigured into a flurry of angry letters sent back-and-forth via Owl post, Harry showing up on his stoop, pounding on the door, then the sex, hot and biting, and Draco, the next time, dragging him through the unlocked Floo, and then just not bothering to lock it again after, an unspoken and open invitation frequently used.

A fire, yes, but the fickle sort.

. . .

Gringott’s had a required minimum on the guest list for the annual Wix Wellness Worldwide fundraising gala, and Draco had pulled one of the four short straws. He was doing his level best to blend with the wall furnishings, a firm grasp on the glass of wine he’d been nursing through the night.

Potter was here. He would be, of course, but Draco’s managed to avoid him thus far, his reflexes on high alert.

The unfair thing, though, is that it is exponentially more difficult to avoid someone who is actively looking for you. Draco had caught sight of him at the edge of the dance floor, head swiveling, gaze casting over the crowd, and had shrunk back, ducking behind a particularly ostentatious floral arrangement. Potter, though, had been an excellent Seeker for a number of reasons, and as Draco is slipping around the corner into a nearby enclave, a familiar voice stops him in his tracks.

“Funny seeing you here.”

He’s frozen, a moment, his heart a stammer beneath his suit, before he turns, expression shuttered. Guarded.

“A work engagement, I assure you. I’ll be gone soon.”

Harry’s face is more open, now, than that day on Diagon, something having softened, but he’s being careful, too.

“Not on my account, I hope. It’s a nice party. You should enjoy it.” He raises a glass to Draco, the tiniest smile flickering over his face, before he turns and melts back into the crowd.

Draco is left, again, stricken, again. The emptiness, the pointlessness of the exchange aches and claws at him, cruel perhaps, or at least preposterous, in light of all they had done, what they had been or not-quite been.

He grabs his cloak from the coat room, attendance requirement be damned, and apparates home (where a perfectly fine roast is waiting).

Never mind that he felt some relief (curses) that Harry’s eyes were clearer, his facade better-rested.

. . .

Draco doesn’t mean to be tender, but it’s hard, when Potter is the way he is.

Not always— it’s easy to fight with him when he’s itching for it, up on his high horse and merciless, caustic. Days when the past is closer and crowding, breathing heavy down his neck.

But there are the other moments, fleeting as they may be, when he goes quiet and contemplative, when he seems at ease in Draco’s bed. More at ease, anyway, than anywhere else.

“I wish, sometimes, that things had been different,” Harry murmurs, Draco curled half over him, head resting on his chest.

Draco runs a hand soft across his side, easing. “I know,” he says, feeling buoyed, foolishly, by the thought. Feeling, in turn, sunken.

The wishing, he is quickly reminded, doesn’t make it true. Makes the truth a bitter sort of thing.

“I wish—” Harry shifts from underneath him, drawing away from the covers and up, suddenly pulling on his jeans. He sits on the edge of the bed, turned away from Draco, eyes downcast. “I wish you were someone different.”

“Get out,” Draco snaps, pointless, Harry already making for the Floo, already leaving.

. . .

The bar is crowded and the kind of loud that makes it easier to be out with Blaise and Theo, catching only every other musing.

Draco is two shots and a gin & tonic deep when they spill through the front door, a cacophony all their own, elevating the soundscape. A gaggle of Gryffindors & co., Potter, naturally, at the fringe. Draco works to make his face stay something subtle, composed, and Theo rolls his eyes as Blaise says something unintelligible about ‘all the gin joints in all the world.’

He can’t leave without rousing suspicion, and he can’t stay without losing his mind. So, he orders another round of shots, and Blaise takes one graciously, and Theo takes one carefully, slanting him a glance only a little on the side of concern.

He’s moved to a gin fizz, feeling marginally less on edge, when the warm hand lands on his side, and his whole body goes to ice.

“Hello, stranger,” Harry says warmly, the faint smell of whiskey on his breath, and he slowly pulls his hand away, placing it on the bar to wave down the tender.

Draco’s world is ready to tip sideways, and his friends are on the dance floor, which may as well be a million meters away. He blanches, eyes going wide as he turns towards Harry then takes a shaky step back. He looks good, which is its own little tragedy, making Draco’s heart do a complicated pirouette.

It’s not fair, he thinks lamely, and of course it’s not, but when has it ever been?

“I like this shirt,” Harry says, tugging at the hem, an easy smile on his lips. The fabric is lightweight, a pale blue. “This color always looked nice on you.” Draco makes a mental note to burn it (or else to keep it somewhere safe).

Harry keeps his hands to himself, now, mouthing at the lager the bartender deposits before him. Distance, respectful, Draco supposes, but he still feels the lick of the flames at his heels.

He can’t think of a single thing to say, not anything worth putting into words. His throat feels dry, and he downs his drink.

“Gin?” Harry asks, knowing, preparing to wave the bartender down again.

“No,” Draco answers quickly. “Vodka, actually. And I was just leaving.” He turns, and feels a tug at his shirt again, Harry’s fingers catching.

“Draco, please, I—”

“Don’t,” Draco hisses, and it comes out just as warbly as he feels. “Potter, I’m asking you. Let go.”

Harry releases him, an unhappy look falling over his perfectly-fucking-well-rested eyes.

Draco wades onto the dance floor just long enough to tell his friends goodbye, and as he makes for the door, he does not look back.

At home, he pulls his tupperware from the fridge, picking at the leftovers of yesterday’s roast straight from the container until his stomach ceases its swilling.

. . .

He had gone to Harry’s, that last time, and it had been a mistake.

He’d been living in Grimmauld, then, and the whole place, while never exactly inviting, was even worse for wear. It had been an accident, sort of, that they wound up there— in a rush, convenient, tearing at one another’s clothes in the front hall, leaving a trail up the stairs.

It’s after, when he’s gone to the kitchen for a glass of water, that things fall apart. He can’t find a glass, what for the dirty dishes scattered on every surface, and then realizes after poking through them for one to wash that Harry doesn’t seem to have any glassware at all. He settles on a mug, which he washes with the ratty dishrag behind the sink and then fills from the tap.

Draco can’t seem to help himself, moving through the house in the quiet of night, Harry tucked in bed upstairs. He’s looking for a sign of him anywhere, though, and coming up clueless.

No photos, no trinkets, not even a magnet on the fridge or a jacket hanging in the hall. The bin is full to overflowing, and all of the furniture is old, inherited, ill-used and showing it. His cupboards are near empty, and the bookcases are so covered in dust that it’s evident none of the books within them are his. It’s eerie, a bit, but more than that, Draco simply finds it sad. Lonesome.

Draco’s own flat is nothing to write home about, sure, but it is still, in some way, his. In some way, home.

Grimmauld feels… haunted. Empty.

He pads upstairs, mug in hand, and Harry stirs as he settles back in the bed, resting upright against the pillow.

“Hello, stranger,” Harry mumbles, sleep-and-sex-slurry, rolling to Draco’s side, wrapping an arm around him.

Draco’s fingers go to his hair, curling through it, soothing, too soft for what this is.

“We should go to the grocery in the morning,” he says (softly), and Harry stills then shifts, gaze lifting, squinting up at him.

“What?”

“The grocery. I’m starving, and you’ve got nothing in the fridge. I thought we might make breakfast.”

Harry pulls back, still processing, waking, turning on his side as he fixes Draco with an unreadable look.

“Why?”

Draco, unsettled, works to walk it back, to make light.

“Fuck, Harry, I didn’t think it was a big deal. I just— I thought it couldn’t hurt. We could make some food, do some washing up. You can just say no, God.”

Harry’s brow furrows. “Wash—?” He catches sight of the mug in Draco’s hand, and a flush crawls up his throat. “Why were you in the fucking kitchen?”

Draco feels his jaw set, defensive. “What do you mean, why was I in the kitchen? I was thirsty, I got a drink.” He lifts the mug demonstratively.

Harry sits upright suddenly, rising out of bed. “You should go,” he says, low, a stormy look coming over his eyes, already dark with exhaustion.

Draco freezes, before fury slams into him like a freight train. “What the fuck?” he answers icily, clambering out of the bed. “You’re serious?”

“Yes,” Harry answers, gesturing towards the Floo.

“Why? Over groceries? Grow up,” Draco rumbles.

“I didn’t ask you to go poking around in my shit,” Harry snaps back, moving towards him across the room. “My groceries and my dishes and my life are none of your business.”

“I was trying to help,” Draco snarls, his eyes fierce on Harry’s.

“I didn’t ask for that,” Harry answers, something hot and tremulous snaking into his tone.

He reaches suddenly for Draco’s wrist, snatching it in his hand and turning it upward, the mug slipping from Draco’s grasp with the force, clattering with a crash to the ground. The inky underside of his forearm looks sickly in the dim lamplight, exposed.

“Why would I ever ask you for that?” Harry growls, his fingers digging at the Mark.

His grip is harsh, and Draco grits his teeth against the shock of pain, finding it harder, though, to guard against the jolt that rakes through his heart.

“Let go,” he seethes, and Harry, slowly, releases him, blinking at his own hands as Draco grabs his cloak from the floor.

“Draco,” Harry calls as he moves for the Floo, but he doesn’t stop. He steps through into his own living room, Harry’s voice still ringing behind him.

“Mal—”

He reaches quickly for the mantle, slicing his wand across it to lock it, to cut the connection.

The Floo goes dark.

Draco sinks to his couch, cradles his wrist (tender), and wishes he were anybody else.

. . .

Luna’s hosting the party to celebrate the sighting of pixies in her back garden, a response to her recent research and restorative efforts. Draco has nearly talked himself out of going half a dozen times.

In the end, he goes, swearing a commitment to two hours— no more, no less.

In the end, it wouldn’t have mattered how much time he committed. Any time around Potter now was, well, was… (Devastating. Painful. Unbearable.) Was too much.

Harry is late, which, initially, makes things easier. Draco makes polite conversation with Luna and Padma Patil and Hannah Abbott. They start in on the food, and Draco takes a stroll around the garden, sticking to the well-worn, specifically designated paths Luna has charted through it. He spots no pixies, but the plants throughout are lovely.

He arrives back at the house, and he ought to have been expecting it.

“This roast is really good. Who brought it?” Harry is asking.

“Oh,” Luna says with a smile, catching Draco’s eye as he slips in through the back door. “Draco did.”

Harry turns to him then, eyes wide, before he settles into something softer. “Hi.”

“Hello,” Draco answers, clicking the door shut behind himself.

“Your roast is excellent,” Harry says, casting a careful smile.

“Thank you,” Draco answers. “I’ve been working on the recipe.”

“It’s paid off,” Harry says. He points to the counter. “I brought pigs in blankets, if you’d like any. I’m gonna—” He gestures to the living room, where the rest of the guests have gathered for a presentation Luna’s prepared.

Draco feels a bit unsteady, with the casualness of the conversation, the closeness that hasn’t reached into claustrophobia.

“Sure,” he answers.

Harry tips his drink at him, juice in a compostable paper cup. “It’s good to see you.”

After he goes, Draco settles against the kitchen counter, considers the pigs in blankets.

Serves himself another helping of roast.

[shalom-iamcominghome]

I've been doing a lot of reflection as of late, especially after this past class.

This past class was about the Torah and Tanakh in general, and the way the rabbi talked about the commandments (specifically the ten commandments) has made me really reflect on how I interpret them, specifically the fifth commandment, or honoring your mother and father.

This is a commandment I have wrestled with for a long time - in fact, it brought me away from g-d at multiple times. I was severely abused when I was incredibly young by my mother, and I used to feel insulted at the implication that I were to honor her while she got to live a better life. It was hypocritical, in my eyes.

But this rabbi surmised that this particular commandment was because parenthood is an act of creation, something that is like the g-d from which we come from. My realization is this: I don't think we're necessarily meant to take even these commandments literally.

I this particular commandment is more of a call to honor creation - creation is a gift, and like any gift, many people simply will not like it and will discard it. The person who abused me created me, but she did not honor creation. She didn't honor me, but I can still honor it.

I have started to honor creation much more. I'm too young, too unstable, not mature enough to be a father (though I fantasize about it), but I create all the time. I create relationships, I create with my hands through crochet. I create memories, I create my world. And I can honor who I am and where I came from that made me who I am. I've been learning one of the mother tongues of my family (Italian, since part of my family originates there) and it was judaism that inspired me to do this.

I don't think g-d wants me to honor my abuser. I think He wants me to remember the Holy action of creation. When I am a father, that act of creation will be Holy, and indeed, I am already joyful about the thought.

I have seen many people struggle with this particular commandment, but I think this perspective helps me personally. I don't think I ever have to forgive my abusers (plural), and I don't think I am commanded to simply because they happened to be family. I am commanded to recognize the holy, to elevate the mundane. In doing so, I will remember g-d. Through creation, I honor g-d and everything he has done for us, for me, and for our collective people.

[unproduciblesmackdown]

Lackadaisy Enrichment

[geomimetry]

suggestive monster stuff under the cut

i havent posted art in almost a year and this is what i decide to break the ice with hi

go big or go home amirite

[crescentfool]

orpheus and thanatos 💚

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

Bonus 9: So that's where the turtle came from!

[First] Prev <–-> Next

[acediscowlng]

honestly very obsessed with the idea that matt reeves may actually managed to create a movie that is the perfect encapsulation of robin's thematic importance to the batman mythos accidentally.

like. he just did that entire movie. and did not realize he was actually talking about robin. made a whole entire movie showing batman as a protector of children and the need for a symbol of hope alongside the symbol of fear. and apparently did all of that while not thinking of robin the entire time. like. he was just "yeah the batman does need something to balance the violence with his genuine and sincere desire to do good" and somehow missed the eighty year old character that answers the question he poses at the end of the movie.

just. what an unhinged way to approach batman. my disappointment for a lack of robin is currently overpowered by the sheer fascination of the idea of matt reeves seemingly understanding and agreeing with the importance of robin but like. only on a theoretical level. because he also does not think robin is important enough to be part of the story.

i want to study this man like a bug.

[fogwitchoftheevermore]

I'm slowly making my way through a new project- editing the entirety of the album PUNCH by Autoheart to the Life Series.

I was originally planning to post all of the edits in order of the songs on the album, but I instead made the Lent one first and am too excited to keep it in my drafts any longer while I work on the first four songs of the album (especially since we're coming up on finals seasons and the amount of time I'll have to work on these is gonna plummet so fast). So instead, I'll be posting them as I make them and make a masterpost of them all in order at the end.

That being said, I hope you enjoy this! I'm really proud of it and a lot of work went into it.

[light-the-spark-of-dawn]

Jason Todd was That Kid who would stay up all night reading if no one stopped him- and he was also sneaky enough to hide his book and pretend to be asleep when Alfred or Bruce checked on him. Unfortunately, this usually meant that he ended up cranky and tired during the day- and his nighttime patrols as Robin only made things worse.

Most parents would simply confiscate the book and flashlight. But most parents didn't have kids who were adopted street rats. It had taken far longer for Jason to become comfortable in the Manor than it had for Dick, and neither Bruce nor Alfred wanted to undo that progress by taking away his possessions, even if it was temporary and for his own good.

Hilariously, the solution came in the form of Hal, Ollie, and Barry all falling asleep during a Justice League meeting while Bruce was reading off a report. Even Clark and Diana were starting to doze off toward the end. And not a single one of them were even the slightest bit apologetic about it.

"Sorry Spooky, but I don't have the willpower to stay awake through your speeches."

"I have an accelerated attention span, so you might only have been talking for twenty minutes but for me it's more like three hours. And my blood sugar is starting to crash."

"This meeting could and should have been an email."

"To be fair, it was a very dry report."

"You have a nice voice, Bruce. But we can only listen to it for so long."

Incorrigible menaces, the whole lot of them. He missed the days when his fellow heroes were too intimidated to talk back to him. Still, his friends' irreverence gave Bruce an idea. He returned to the manor and went to check on his son. Sure enough, there was light peeking out from beneath his bedroom door. "Can I come in, chum? I know you're awake."

"...how'd you know?"

"I'm Batman." Even through the closed door, Bruce can feel Jason's judgmental look. "And even a little bit of light is pretty noticeable in a dark hallway."

"Damn. Alright, come in."

The hinges creak as Bruce pushes open the door. Jason is sitting up in his bed, with a thick book on his lap and flashlight in hand. His face is expressionless, but Batman's careful eye notes the slight tension in the boy's posture.

Bruce pulls Jason's desk chair over and sits next to the bed. "So, what're you reading?"

Jason tilts the book upward to show the cover of The Complete Works of William Shakespeare.

"Huh. I thought you preferred prose."

"I do." Jason shrugged. "But Othello was interesting enough when we read it in class, so I figured I'd give some of the other plays a shot."

"I see. So which one are you reading now?"

"Julius Caesar."

"Ah I had to read that for my eighth grade English class. Alfred told me then that Shakespeare sounds better when read out loud." Bruce pointed at the book. "Mind if I have a crack at it? I have it on good authority that I have a nice voice."

"Who said that??" Jason looks skeptical but still hands over the book.

"Wonder Woman." Bruce flicks on Jason's desk lamp so he can see the letters, leans back in the chair, and begins to read, "The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars..."

As Bruce reads the lines of iambic pentameter in a slow, steady cadence, Jason's eyelids begin to droop. Before long, he's fast asleep, and doesn't stir when Bruce stops reading and tucks a bookmark between the pages, when he sets the book down on the desk and turns off the lamp, or even when the hinges creak as he closes the door behind him.

Just in case though, Bruce waits in the hallway for several minutes to see if Jason's flashlight comes back on. Thankfully, there is only darkness. Bruce breathes a sigh of relief, then jumps at Alfred's sudden quiet whisper.

"Quite the performance, Master Bruce. Though I do think the Bard would consider it a tad underwhelming."

"Well," Bruce chuckled. "you told me once that an actor should play to his crowd, and my audience was one boy who needed to sleep."

"An unorthodox interpretation of my lesson, but if it encourages Master Jason towards healthier sleeping habits, I think it is a lesson applied well." Alfred nudges Bruce's elbow gently, guiding him along the hallway toward his own bedroom. "Now, do follow his example and get some rest. Or else I shall have to recite Pericles, and nobody wants that."

[unganseylike]

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“Love Like Ghosts" // The Raven Cycle

When your true love is destined to die, is already dead, or will always be leaving. And other moments of ghostliness. 

[spec-tralarts]

divine wrath

[nobodymitskigabriel]

So the thing about Gabe to me is that he doesn’t quite fit in the categorically of Angel Who Is Eventually Humanized the way that Castiel or Anna do. He is more down to earth than the other angels but specifically in the way that GODS are, not humans. Like, even if he's not literally Loki, Gabriel is functionally an earthen deity for the millenia he spent dicking around and killing people. Other gods are literally the crowd he runs in, and he's an asshole because gods are assholes (and he specifically decided to be one of the more extreme asshole gods). Even though his sensibilities can be very human-like, even if he generally likes humans and wants them to stick around, there was always some level of divinity to his cruelty. So even if he did ultimately choose humanity I feel like putting him in with the angels who actually know what it's like to be human misses this part of his character.

[solcarow]

seafood trio portraits !

+ some alts. with spoilers !

[lunarharp]

played dragon age 2...just simple scribbles

[greenerteacups]

What do you think of jkr as a writer? I for one has always felt like she didn’t treat her female characters well. It felt strange, being critical of her when she was god queen of the earth, and also being 10

I think most of the problems in her books can be chalked up to genre hopping. Books 1-3 are perfectly good and serviceable children's books — great children's books, even! They have compelling, relatable characters and juicy mystery plots. They have problems, sure, but for the first three books someone's ever written — especially someone with little or no background in creative writing — they're really fucking good. So: there's her flowers.

The last four books pivot sharply into much more emotionally complicated and sociopolitically loaded territory, because they're describing a war. And it's hard to write children's books about war. I would venture you can't really do it, at least without dramatically misrepresenting what war is! And so Rowling makes the executive decision somewhere during the writing of Book 4 that she's not going to flinch away from that, she's going to go for dramatic realism, and she kills Cedric Diggory to let us know. People had died in Harry Potter before, of course — Quirrell gets sent to the fucking shadow realm, for example. But children haven't. (It also gives parents who are reading these books with their children a warning shot: shit is about to get significantly more real, think twice before you buy the next one of these for your 10-year-old.) After that, Rowling starts leaning much more into dramatic realism, and the fast-paced mystery-novel plotting of the first few books is replaced by a slow, simmering political conflict that unfurls over the course of about a million words.

The problem — besides the fact that she's picking one of the hardest things to write about, like, in all of literature, war is really insanely complicated and emotionally intense and hard to portray well — is that she's now trying to use characters, plot points, and technologies she developed for a children's series to enact a sprawling war drama among teenagers and adults. So Hermione, who was a reasonably precocious snobby eleven-year-old, becomes this sort of encyclopedic all-knowing savant of the wizarding world, who somehow remains functional and mostly even-headed despite her identity being the chief target of a prolifically murderous terrorist group. Draco Malfoy, a schoolyard bully whose primary tools included 1. namecalling and 2. telling teacher, JOINS said terrorist group (and admittedly does react reasonably, i.e., has a total crashout and takes to sobbing in a girls' bathroom whenever he gets a free minute). Dumbledore, who starts out as "whimsical friendly winky-wink trustworthy grandfather type", ends up being Magical Winston Churchill in a violent game of spycraft and espionage, eventually revealing he's only been keeping Harry at all these seven years because he wants to KILL him! And like, maybe really good technical writing could smooth out these transitions and make the first-order dramatic choices seem more natural, but Rowling is like, a Fine Writer, technically speaking. meaning she's reasonably consistent in characterization, her plotting is well-paced and believable, she has a clear authorial voice, and her prose is readable. personally, that's not enough to get me to buy into some of the changes that happen in the later books, and because she stuffs these things so full with new elements every installment, a lot of stuff ends up getting glossed over.

And like, I still love the books. I think they're wonderful, and they taught me how to read. but i can say that and also say that Rowling probably did herself a disservice by trying to write four giant war novels as sequels to her first three mystery children's books.

[averlym]

litany of the martyrs (click for better resolution!)