#which is true! literally never felt this strongly about any other insert before

[beast-feast]

I don't even have any other words than I want her and want to be her . I was gonna say something else but I forgot. Other than I think I should be allowed to be him. For a little while ❤️

[imliterallyjustablackgirl]

Prowitch' is also right tho, if the time is correct, then theses people don't even know the version of Syd we know, it would be Sher- other jobs - Beef? More like : Other jobs - Sherid- Beef. Carm's side of Syd's mistake is SO fascinating: Another proof of Carmen's ego getting in his own way @rainabi-blog is absolutely right, Carmen could have just canceled the orders. If you have worked in a kitchen, comes to a point where you have to be like, yeah, no: that's too much. I strongly think there's a part of him who went on action immediately, but almost as weird inconscient excuse to be like look ; (1) what you did. ( it wasn't ready) and (2) you made me do (yelling and all) Follow me here * drag y'all with me* The orders came in early, it's already a rush they most likely couldn't or wouldn't be able to catch on, NORMALLY. That mistake was made by Syd, Syd who like @prowitchazel said views Carmy as an equal and wants to fix it TOGETHER - Carm I M M E D I A T L Y went bezerk - and tried to fix it on his own. To fix ''HER'' mistake on his own, she didn't have to the room to say two things - We can hear her say ''OK-'' before she tried to fix things. She showed initiative. Which he shot down. (Mind you, how interesting that the Bear fandom are so crude with Syd's mistake but everytime there's an edit of Carm, it is the exact moment he yells at her they take- not even food for thought- that's a breadcrumb) Carmy's mistake isn't brought up at all. Even him apologyzing to her, isn't brought up except from Sydcarmies - Most of them even wonder why he apologized.

There's such a patronizing aspect to it, because it's not as if she didn't try, to fix it. It's the fact he immediately went - Yup. Syd. That's on you. It wasn't just him being her boss. His ego was wounded because this gorgeous girl (someone insert his chest puffing here) , came in here and now she changed everything and she came with his title on the tips of her lips - mind you he HATES his title but my God was he blushing when she said '' You are the most excellent CDC''. Oh by the way, how fucking ironic, like that's legit what Richie was blaming him of doing - Carmy changed the Beef meal for sandwiches, came with his ''Yes chef'', hum- fine-dining talk- new menu...Carm baby. I think there's a part of him that felt betrayed by that, like he got smitten quickly and he reproaches himself for not viewing Syd as an opponent stepping in his kitchen (Norma part of him) and got somewhat relieved that he got someone to share the vision with ( Carmy from the Beef days). Syd holds the same standards he does- She answers to yes chef, she understands why they need to do things the way they do, so I think he took this one on the chin. He wants to lowkey show her she wasn't ready. Despite her being overqualified for the job, mind you. That's why she even go to ask ''' what does it with any of this'' when is literally looking at orders to immediately fix her mistake. Why, keep up with the obvious chaos. Like boy- Tug on the electronic cord- What was he trying to do... Was he trying to live up to Syd's meal- Syd's meal that ''wasn't'' ready yet got praised over the sandwich HE started with. Was there bitterness there? I feel like maybe because he still wanted her there because he didn't think she would walk out, he thought he could throw that at her and she would catch on. Because if it's ego matter, then Carmy wasn't just another yelling chef in their world right, he was also a jealous chef and a petty chef. That's why I think she walked out. Carmy making it about her dish, in a mistake that didn't have anything to do with it....Tsk tsk tsk. Carmy could change the Beef but the Bear he wants would have involved Sydney for sure. I think that's why he says he ''couldn't do it without her'', because quite frankly he was aiming at making his brother's restaurant better, never the dream he had with his brother to be true. When he comes back in town we visibly can see that he is corned into the person he was before, a mix of his trauma in NORMA and his family trauma- all in one.

That's why is apology has ( it lacked acid- I still want to teach you, I still want to do this with you) so shoved it up your ass (too funny not to add) . He's like maybe I can be the person you admire, one last time. So, yes, ABSOLUTLYYY, I always read it as I came here with the hope of making impactful change WITH YOU and Carm's ego wasn't part of it for sure, because then she could have done it with any other chef. She admires Carmen's craft and has followed him. Seeing him there must have felt like faith for her. *finally drop y'all to the floor* Sorry for making u follow me

Syd's mistake

Use this post as what are your theories on what happened with the ticket machine before Syd walked out. I've seen I think @unladyboss said that Gary might have messed with it, which I believe, but I'm still torn. 'Cause what happened for real, my poor girl was running around trying to fix her mistake, just to be yelled at again. That's what I say when I say I want Syd to be able to do mistakes and to grow, Richie being a dick didn't turn people away but her mistake did, so many people use that to explain why they dislike her. Despite us knowing Carmy almost burned down the restaurant. Despite knowing Richie has been a d.

THE PART I WANNA GET AT, THAT has been HAUNTING ME: When Syd says: '' This isn't on me'' I think, the mistake might have been hers but what she meant is your behavior did this. He'' I told you it wasn't ready'' and both of his frustrations collided, his frustration with Syd and her mistake overflowing with his own feelings and ego. Sometimes I think, about perfection and what it means to Carmy and how it's almost an admission he wanted that for Syd or with Syd. He wanted to teach her more and thought maybe she was being too green too quick, which would have been good advice from a boss-employ stand, right. To tell her to slow down, to take her time but the truth is that Carm didn't either? Someone in here said their friends were chefs and that Carm must have trusted her to let her cook for all of them on her first day, she wasn't hired yet, I think. So, it's kind of funny to see the thing that was told about Syd right being impatient and if I recall green(?) When you think about it, she wanted to make the Beef better then Carmy legit asked to open a restaurant with her so who's really eager here, Carm. Like, he wants her to perfect herself yet, I keep thinking about the post ( I forgot who, sorry but @ them) That Carmen used to view anyone new as competition, so maybe it's me but there's something to be told that even in the mix of all of this there's a part of him that still hangs to the idea of teaching Syd: '' I told you it wasn't ready'' Because he knows deep down that she came here to learn from him- and then ego hits - and he goes to yell and rambles. Which I think is from a place of insecurity: Maybe Syd didn't come to learn from him, maybe she came for another reason.

[fitzefitcher]

faction conflict soapbox, pt. 2

school 2: I’m tired of faction conflict, in general

@alldepressednshit​ said: To be honest, it feels overdone. Also, it keeps getting sidelined by *insert world-threatining asspull* BfA could’ve been great if it was an actual civil war. Like a baron zemo type setting out to destroy the horde and alliance from within.

@ashyteg​ said: I wish we could all hang out and play hearthstone

@baenling said: annoying as fuck. should have been over in mists of pandaria. literally zero reason for the faction war to continue

@swampgallows​ said: i just like being a zombie lady with a conscience and an ability to be hugged by huge monster people who are my family and would never hurt me

Anonymous asked: I wish people would stop bickering over which faction is worse, admit both factions are problematic and stop trying to morally high road the other for faction pride.

Anonymous asked: Hi yes I have come to talk about Horde vs Alliance. Honestly I use to be a big fan of it back in the day. Two big factions, warring over resources that would occasionally have to realize there are bigger threats. Thought it was fun, had faction pride in grinding up PVP reps to be like: Yes FOR THE HORDE. I just think things took a big downturn in Mists. Before it felt kind of balanced, sure Garrosh was "bad" but at the time i thought: well Varian started the war back in Wrath. 1/?

Having the war break out across the continents when before it was sort of like a cold war with a few active fighting spots was cool! I didn't think the Horde was being portrayed as 100% evil! But after that... I don't think the Alliance has really been shown ever in the wrong or negative. And that's just fucking boring. Not to mention literally punishes half the player base for preferring one faction. The Horde has so much creative potential but they never use it. So really sours it. 2/2

so I think the core issue with this is probably less that the faction conflict itself is happening, and more that it's happening but without any sense or meaning, and that it's happening in such a way that feels extremely unbalanced on either side. faction conflict, when it's done well, can be an extremely rewarding and memorable experience.

 like, anybody that's played vanilla will tell you how fun an experience the scarab wall event was, and I myself remember how fun the thunder isle event was. and I think what worked for those events was that they were less like. Dark, Gritty War Conflict, and more played like a high school field day. Like there's certainly competition, and faction pride, but it's actually fun because it's more focused on Achievement than it is on Active Conflict. Like, people meme on the Argent Crusade Sponsored Renaissance Faire, but tbh that's some the most fun I've had with wow, and it ended being a really memorable experience for me and many of the people I was playing with at the time, in part because it was so light-hearted and silly and campy. in my opinion, wow is at its best when it leans into the stupid, silly camp, and that's why hearthstone has a better handle on warcraft and its characters than wow does lmao.

But I will acknowledge that this doesn't always work beyond just gameplay mechanics and overall experience- I love the argent tournament, but as a story, it's dumb as fuck, and at the time, felt extremely out of place for the wrath storyline. Like, we did naxx, then ulduar, and we were revving up to do ICC, which was (and still is, for the most part) regarded as one of its most serious story arcs, and it held a lot of gravity to it in terms of buildup, and the sort of consquences it would have afterwards. Whether or not those consequences were actually addressed afterwards are another issue entirely, but the point here is, ICC is an extremely memorable raid, and was very rewarding as an experience and story end (for the most part, let's stay on topic though), and it absolutely would not have worked if they had leaned into the campy silliness that worked for other things in wow. Here, the grim seriousness does work, because there was plenty of setup and payoff for it. like, even well before we get to ICC, or even wrath, there's buildup for the scourge starting in vanilla, and even in w3.

I think the wrath expansion in general was very very memorable, bc it was an expac where the stakes were pretty well-balanced in terms of alliance and horde content. like, the alliance's bone to pick with scourge is fairly obvious, and while the horde's was less so, the forsaken's was even more obvious, and there was planting and payoff of how the horde needed to go, both because the forsaken are their ally and this is their time of need, and that the scourge are a threat to everyone. truthfully, the alliance side of things I don't remember quite as well, but it was more staged as like, the alliance sort of acknowledging that Arthas (and that many aspects of the Scourge including KT and the cult of the damned) are very much problems that stemmed from the Alliance, and that they had a sort of responsibility to take care of it and make things right, even if they weren't necessarily Directly responsible for Arthas himself. So, there's equal setup in place for both factions, and equal stakes, even if they're not the same, and what faction conflict that does happen within the storyline has a setup and payoff. like, let's look at the wrathgate: a rogue faction of forsaken unleash hell on everyone at the battle of the wrathgate, whether they be scourge, alliance, or horde, and there are immediate consequences afterwards for each faction that feel engaging and meaningful. horde-side, you have to drive out the traitors that turned against your ally and retake one of your core cities, and alliance-side, you're taking immediate action against a faction that just completely fucked you over at a really key battle against a mutual enemy, a particular part of that faction that was already on thin fucking ice to begin with in terms of like. doing morally questionable, reprehensible things. and the ending, while daunting and honestly a little emotionally frustrating, neither punishes nor rewards either faction, and amps up the conflict in a way that feels realistic given the circumstances. And I think that this was really memorable as a questline, and as an expansion, because again, there was setup and payoff, but also, the prior two expansions weren't super focused on the faction conflict as much as wrath had started drumming up.

yes, there was conflict, obviously, but it wasn't so all-consuming as to make it tiresome or overwhelming or frustrating, and didn't feel particularly unbalanced or unfair. I think it should also be noted that faction conflict had never taken the spotlight so strongly in this way before, so it was this novel thing still being explored, and again, working off of things that had previous setup, felt like reasonable or realistic consequences, and above all, were balanced in what sort of story beats were being explored for either faction. wrath for the most part felt like a very natural, very organic step forward in the wow storyline overall, and while I don't agree with every decision made with it, particularly towards the end, I cannot deny that it was definitely one of if not my favorite expansion, and was extremely formative for how I engage with wow, and with stories as a whole.

all that being said, I think it's a fairly reasonable conclusion to draw that faction conflict in recent years has been souring the game for a lot of people, and I can't really blame them, as I, too, have a bone to pick with it. bofa in particular was pretty rough for a number of reasons, but I think the number one reason is how unbalanced it felt in terms of storyline for either faction. bofa imo sortof works as a synopsis for why Horde Bias(TM) is such a huge point of contention between horde and alliance, in that the horde faction spent most of the expansion losing characters, whether that be to character death or death of character development, watched their faction tear themselves apart for what feels like dozens of times now, and basically felt as though that the Evil label was being forced on them, and that they had no choice in the matter for any of this. The alliance faction, meanwhile, didn't really get much of anything. Kul Tiras isn't really as rewarding a leveling experience as Zandalar is in terms of the individual zone stories being strung together, the allied race factions they got didn't feel as fun or varied as the ones the horde got, and seemingly had no actions, issues, or consequences with any sort of serious examination. It's hard to have fun or get any sort of emotional satisfaction from a story that doesn't really let you do anything, and doesn't really show that your actions have any consequences at all, whether they be good or bad, and seemingly is spending all of their time and attention on the other faction. Like, the horde is suffering, and that suffering is definitely, wholly unfair, but the alliance seemingly isn't getting any sort of attention, at all. But because they're not constantly getting a bat to the head story-wise, horde players (including myself) just get really frustrated when accused of favoritism, because like. There is literally no benefit whatsoever to having blizzard's attention, when all blizzard does is take away everything you love lmao. This, I would say, is a matter of violence vs. negligence. Both are forms of harm, but they are radically different in terms of how they hurt you, and neither is inherently more hurtful than the other.

I think if I were to propose a solution to this, I think that the first step should be to pull back on faction conflict as a major component to the story, which they have at least partially. But I think the next step is to give a fairer distribution of attention to characters. Like, I complain about the Horde losing characters, and I'm not taking that back because it's True, but it would be remiss of me not to touch on the fact that, for how many dozens of characters the alliance has, the only ones who really get the attention are like. Human Males. In particular, Anduin. And if they're not Anduin, they're usually characters within Anduin's immediate peer circle. And then the characters that aren't human men and do get attention are usually ones that are getting shafted, somehow, or are getting painted as Wrong and Violent and Stupid for Disagreeing With Anduin- i.e., tyrande. And before Anduin, the only character that really got any sort of serious attention was Varian, which is probably why alliance players as a whole took his death so hard. It's hard not to feel some kind of way about losing a favorite toy when that toy is damn near the only one you functionally have lmao.

I know shadowlands as an expac has been pretty polarizing to people in terms of experience, but tbh I think this is a good step forward in resetting the stakes, and making things in either faction feel a little more balanced. I do think that the consequences of the conflict in bofa has to be addressed Eventually, and I'm honestly a little afraid of what they're going to do next, but this is alright for now.

[thequibblah]

directors cut for WTRF? 🥺👉👈 not biased at all obviously just objective third party asking for a directors cut hmmm hmmmmm

literally how could u do this every other word in that fic is an easter egg i can't shut up about..... bestie u are about to have regrets

one thing u should know is that 90% of things in this fic have real-world equivalents and its not even like....... hidden equivalents. serie primo = serie a, for instance. this trend is going to continue and i won't apologise <3

fun fact i named the bar the Bar and the drinks after shapes because i was too lazy to come up with something actually clever

this bit

I’m grinning to myself by the time she approaches my table.

was a very intentional fakeout and if you read this and thought "she" would be lily, feel free to sue me for emotional damages

the biggest conundrum of this AU was, how are jily not going to have met in school when magic exists? the solution was, of course, having multiple magic schools. but i couldn't let one of them have hogwarts, that didn't seem fair. i know i did sort of let lily have it..... but i felt more comfortable making hogwarts a university so there was a legit reason why james wasn't there and in gryffindor (if he'd gone he absolutely would have been)

once solved, i did the fun thing of naming them! ottaline gambol's was easy, i just scrolled through the list of ministers for magic and picked a progressive one. peverell hall was a whim, made all the funnier when lily's reaction is:

Much was made at Otty’s — one of the more progressive magical schools, named for one of the more progressive Ministers of Magic — of schools like Peverell Hall and St. George’s. The latter, I know, is chock-full of pureblooded elite. Peverell Hall is supposed to be slightly better, but still.

dang, it's gonna be funny if she ever finds out james is a descendant of the guy it's named after

fun fact, i included this because peter's question was a real thought i had when reading bond and free, your inspiring writing knows no limits:

The first thing you conjure in Walking Wombat is a yellow quill... “Why yellow?” Peter asked. Eddie gave him a strange look. “Why not?”

i realised i'd put jily in the same conundrum they had in tis the fucking season here:

It’s only then that I remember she’s just bought us drinks. I turn back to my triangle. “Oh, shit.” I suppose I can pawn it off on one of the others.

...but of course the resolution is rather different, and i do so enjoy a james with no filter (aka default james)

I briefly lose control of my brain and my tongue. “Is it too soon to say I’m in love with you?”

by the way, no-filter james will be a theme. wild things sure do run fast but not as fast as this boy runs his mouth!

also, another interesting challenge here was making sure james has a reason to be the way he is in AU. i love playing around with james's childhood/background and seeing how that affects his character while (hopefully!) staying true to who he is. i did that in ttfs by having him move around a lot and not meet the marauders until after the flashback timeline, which is why he's less of a git — he doesn't have the level of comfort in a social setting that canon james has with hogwarts, which is basically his playground from day 2 of first year lol

here, james was probably a fkn nightmare all through school, but of course he gets a big ego check when his quidditch career is derailed. i imagine his years in italy as a continuation of that humility lesson.

I will fully admit I used to be a cocky prick. This is what comes of being a kid who grew up with everything. But one useful thing that the whole fiasco four years ago taught me is humility. I’ve learned how to ask nicely for another chance.

and so much of writing him in wtrf is juggling that typical confidence with the insecurity/fear of losing something he's invested so much in (and has seen slip away before). it's really new to me, because typically i give lily uncertain life circumstances, but i suppose it's both of them in this AU.

the car thing was... i swear didn't start out as smutty, it was purely because i wanted a way to establish lily as muggleborn in a world where the connotations of not having magical parents is very different. more to come on that!

also, come to think of it, by this metric...

I’m now in dangerous territory, since that adds another impressive action to her running tally.

...i think james is already in love with her LOL

this bit:

The street is considered indecent and the downstairs hallway would have our landlady come running at once, so if it pleases Your Honour, we would recommend the sitting room sofa.

...was actually because in draft one lily was a lawyer, but then it was funny enough that i didn't want to take it out, but NOW i realise it makes it sound a little like she's addressing james as your honour, which.... hm. but anyway, we move on

Marc Bolan begs us to get it on through the stereo, vocalising my thoughts exactly.

the song here was initially "you shook me" (h/t @keepingupwithpotters) but i chickened out because zeppelin is SO horny dfjkhgkjs

also, it gave me so much joy to read everyone reacting to lily thinking about her ex (the general vibe was "who the fuck is this guy!!! ew!!!!") — rest assured (or, unassured??) that he has a part to play in all this. anyway, this is one of my fave lines:

He’s just a person, and there’s such a relief in sleeping with James and not the myth of a guy.

because as any come together reader knows....

Just James. Just James. It was never just James.

wtrf lily will learn!

literally the whole world knows i'm obsessed with needle drops that have no subtlety at all, but this one...

We just laugh, tangled together in a sweaty heap, as “Heaven Is in the Back Seat of My Cadillac” plays through the car’s speakers. “On the nose, isn’t it?” James says, sitting up.

...was pure luck, because i was looking up the top hits on the uk singles chart for the week(ish) this scene takes place in so that i could find a song that would realistically play on the radio, saw this, and was like omg the stars really do align

i feel like the thing i enjoy most about writing romance is the importance i get to place in noticing/looking/observing (and sometimes, not noticing!). it's just such a powerful but simple writerly tool, and god knows i am obsessed with pithy descriptions anyway, so this bit i am especially happy with:

James is already waiting, leaning against the car with his hands in his pockets. I feel as though I’m seeing him for the first time, the faint light of the flickering streetlamp catching him in profile: the strong slope of his nose, the hard line of his jaw, the curve of his smile. He studies the facade of our building with open curiosity, and I wonder what he’s looking for.

(one can only imagine james's train of thought in this moment. perhaps "ah. here lives the future love of my life"?)

“Thanks,” she tacks on at the end. I tip my head to one side in confusion. “For what?” “For, I don’t know. Being nice.” She laughs awkwardly. “I don’t do this very much.”

it wouldn't be a quibblah original tee em without some discourse to come about the nature of romantic/sexual relationships, would it? one thing i enjoy about this AU ("one thing" i say as if this isn't the billionth thing in a list) is that i get to write a romantic lily who's squaring that romanticism with what she perceives as the culture of the times. (this is a bit of a staple in all my characterisations of lily, but it is not often paired with casual sex, the complication of all complications!)

oh this bit literally wrote itself like i didn't even pause to think just vomited it out:

In the morning — and it must be early still — the sun streams through Lily’s sorry excuses for curtains with aggression that cannot be ignored. I crack open an eye to find myself sprawled out across her bed, quite literally spread-eagled. She’s attached to my side like a barnacle. Or a very pretty barnacle, anyway.

i'm especially proud of james's voice in this story. i don't often write first-person fic and i was worried how it'd turn out, but i think james as a character/narrator typically colours his own 3rd-person narration so strongly that it ended up a smoother transition than i'd feared!

also i just. i can't resist throwing in comic relief and i hope that this whole segment was a gentle enough preparation for the awkwardness that followed LOL

All of a sudden, the balcony door bursts open. I nearly drop the mug. “What the—” Mary pokes her head around the corner, sporting a righteous smile. “Morning, handsome.” Over her shoulder she shouts, “He’s on the balcony!” I blink. There’s a sound from inside the flat, as if something very large has just been dropped. Then a swear. “Oh, shit,” I say, realisation dawning, “you weren’t looking for me, were you? It’s so loud out here—” Mary cups a hand around her mouth and stage-whispers, “Lily was frantic.” She’s quite violently yanked back, and Lily herself appears in the doorway, slightly out of breath. “Should’ve checked the balcony first,” she says, and closes the door before Mary can insert herself into the space again. “Hi,” I say, which is agreed-upon best practice for greeting a woman you’ve just had fantastic sex with and ideally would like to have sex with again.

to this day i don't know what lily dropped. let's hope it wasn't expensive!

Captained the under-17 English squad at the World Cup some years back, Serie Primo’s lead goal-scorer of last year… Only an injury in what should’ve been his first season at Puddlemere mars his record. I wince reading about it and comparing it to a heap of press clippings. James Potter was hurt, and Puddlemere didn’t fancy paying for him not to play, so they shipped him off to Milan.

(you cannot imagine how much pointed interrogation of my brother it took to gather this intel.) i constantly worry that i've got dates or timelines wrong somehow — you might notice i tweaked under-17, which used to be under-19 until i realised that made no sense (even though in terms of its career importance i would much preferred it to have been u-19.... anyway). i also found out that u-17 football squads don't actually have captains but i said fuck it on that count.

but obviously i started writing this AU for the sports possibilities, only to discover i'm going to have to interfere a great deal with the Timeline (you shall see in future instalments).

god i really went through the whole fic. like i reread the whole thing to do this. here u go clare jfbghjfd

[becasbelt]

Words: 4,874 Fandom: Pitch Perfect (Movies) Rating: T Relationships: Chloe Beale/Beca Mitchell Characters: Chloe Beale, Beca Mitchell Additional Tags: Angst, Pining, Canon Compliant Summary:

Chloe is in love with Beca, and Beca is in love with Chloe. Just… not at the same time.

In which Beca and Chloe can’t seem to figure out their timing.

Dedicated to my loving mother @darby-carter <33

* * *

Falling in love with Beca Mitchell isn’t something that Chloe necessarily expected upon their first meeting, but she can’t say that she’s particularly surprised by it, either. Chloe has always been free with her emotions- something that her mother always says she admires about Chloe.

Although she can’t really know for sure, Chloe likes to think that she generally feels things faster and stronger than most people. When she hates someone, she will go out of her way to avoid them at all costs. When she likes a show on Netflix, she will spend every waking moment watching it and looking up any information she can find on it. When she crushes on someone, they become all-consuming; Chloe thinks of them constantly.

So when a small spark of attraction starts deep in her chest for Beca, Chloe knows that it is only a matter of time before Beca completely takes over Chloe’s world.

And take over Chloe’s world she does, with startling swiftness and terrifying completeness.

Because even if Chloe has been in love before, every kind of love she’s felt in the past pales in comparison to how she feels about Beca.

And sometimes, Chloe thinks that Beca might just love her back.

Beca is a naturally prickly person, Chloe has noticed. Averse to almost any form of physical contact, affection, and intimacy. The emotional side of things isn’t much nicer. Beca hardly answers questions about herself and tends to get her way out of any conversation that seems like it may be heading in a sincere direction. It’s almost impressive how well she does at distancing herself from others, both physically and emotionally.

Maybe that’s part of why Chloe falls for her so hard and so fast; she just aches to make sure that Beca feels loved in some way.

So naturally, Chloe inserts herself into Beca’s life.

And Beca, shockingly enough, doesn’t really seem to mind.

At practices while Aubrey is lecturing Amy about her lack of cardio, Beca will slink away from Stacie’s attempts of showing affections towards her, only to allow Chloe’s arms to circle her middle from behind a moment later. Beca will answer Cynthia-Rose with some sarcastic quip when she asks why Beca is in the Bellas if she hates it so much, yet when it comes up in a late night conversation with Chloe a week later, she seems to have no problem opening up about how her dad will help her move to LA after the year is done if she ‘shows some real effort.’

Chloe seems to be Beca’s exception in almost every aspect of life, which thrills Chloe to no end.

Beca kissing Jesse is unexpected and surprising, to say the least.

Chloe didn’t think that Beca even liked Jesse as a person, let alone liked him as a potential romantic partner.

Watching Beca and Jesse kiss quite literally breaks Chloe’s heart. She cries about it on she and Aubrey’s couch for a solid week until Aubrey tells her that she needs to get over it, because it’s not like she and Beca were even dating or anything.

It was just a crush, Aubrey tells her. She hadn’t even known Beca for all that long, Aubrey says. You’ll be okay, she assures her.

But none of those things feel true to Chloe.

It’s funny, Chloe thinks as she watches the Hallmark channel, bottle of open wine cradled in her lap protectively. It’s funny how discovering that someone you have a crush on likes someone else feels like a breakup, even though you were never even in a relationship to begin with. At the end of the day, the person who broke your heart never technically had any obligation to love you back, because they never knew how you felt in the first place. It is an entirely one-sided heartbreak, which makes it all that much worse.

And since Chloe has always felt emotions more strongly than others, she thinks it’s pretty safe to assume that her heartbreak hurts more than it really should.

* * *

Failing Russian lit isn’t something that Chloe necessarily expected herself to do, but she can’t say that she’s particularly surprised by it, either.

The class was hard, and Chloe knew that she had done poorly on a lot of the tests and assignments in it, so her failing isn’t exactly the most shocking news of the day.

There are both upsides and downsides to Chloe having to stay in school another year.

Positives: Chloe has another year to figure out her life before she has to face the harsh reality that is the real world. Chloe gets to be in the Bellas another year, which is arguably her favorite thing in the world. Chloe gets to stay with Beca for another year.

Actually, the whole ‘staying with Beca’ thing could be a downside as well.

It’s a downside because Beca is dating Jesse, and Chloe is still tragically in love with Beca.

The thing is, Beca justmjust it so easy to be in love with her.

It’s in the little things that Beca does. Like the way she makes mixes for Chloe and gifts them to her with a shrug, telling her it wasn’t a big deal. Like how she looks so adorably grumpy cuddled up with Chloe under a blanket during Bella movie nights. Like how her cheeks flush whenever Chloe kisses her cheek, allowing it with only a small amount of grumbling.

Every single little thing that Beca does is endearing to Chloe, which is as frustrating as it is wonderful, because Beca gives Chloe so many reasons to hope that they could be together someday. It’s in the things she says:

“I’ve never known anyone like you before.”

“You’re the only person I feel like I can trust in this world, Chlo.”

“I don’t deserve you.”

If Beca didn’t have a boyfriend Chloe would swear that Beca felt the same way. If Beca didn’t have a boyfriend, Chloe would have absolutely told her how in love with her she is by now. But the reality is that Beca does have a boyfriend, one which she is very much in love with.

So for now Chloe will just ignore all the different ways that Beca Mitchell can make her heart clench and selfishly hope that Jesse and Beca won’t work out in the end somehow.

* * *

Chloe is still selfishly letting herself hope three years later, with no end in sight.

Emily asks them if they’re dating one day over lunch, causing Beca to almost choke on her food. Chloe pats Beca’s back as she tries to fight the blush blooming on her cheeks, avoiding sweet, innocent Emily’s curious gaze.

“What?” Beca squeaks out as soon as her airways are clear again.

Emily blushes deeply. “I was just wondering if you guys are dating, because you’re always holding hands and sharing a bed and saying ‘I love you’ and you just seem to know each other really well.”

Beca laughs as if the idea is absurd, and Chloe ignores the slight pang of hurt that it sends to her chest. “Oh wow, no. We are definitely not dating, Chloe’s just super affectionate.”

She’s still laughing as she says it, as if it’s the funniest thing in the world, which makes Chloe feel slightly offended. “You make it sound like dating me is the worst thing that could ever happen,” Chloe says coolly, raising an eyebrow at Beca.

It’s almost comical actually, the way both Emily’s and Beca’s eyes widen in response to that.

“No no no, that’s not what I’m saying at all,” Beca rushes out. “I just don’t think we’d never date.”

Chloe’s pushes down the tears suddenly threatening her eyes. “And why not? You don’t think we’d be good together?”

Beca shakes her head and laughs in astonishment. “Jesus, dude, that’s not what I’m saying.”

“That’s what I’m hearing.”

“Why are you pushing this so hard?”

Chloe shrugs in an attempt to act indifferent. “I just want to know why you wouldn’t date me.”

“Because you’re my best friend and I don’t think I could ever like you like that.”

Silence follows Beca’s statement, filling the kitchen with tense energy. Emily looks between Beca and Chloe nervously while they stare at each other. And as much as Chloe is hurt by Beca’s words, by her claim that she could never see Chloe as more than a friend, she still can’t help the way that her eyes drift down to Beca’s lips.

“Thank you for the clarification,” Chloe says quietly before forcing her eyes away from Beca’s face. She stands from the table and moves to set her plate in the sink, excusing herself from the kitchen without another word.

Beca doesn’t come after her.

* * *

Somehow Chloe ends up moving to New York with Beca.

Well, Beca and Fat Amy, that is.

Chloe never expected to move to New York, but she can’t say that she really minds it all that much. It’s vibrant and exciting, full of people and possibilities; exactly Chloe’s type of scene.

Except, Chloe usually spends the night in with Beca instead of experiencing all that New York has to offer.

Beca, who is recently single for the first time in nearly four years.

Beca, who came out to Chloe a couple months ago over an intimate dinner at a nice restaurant.

Beca, who will never see Chloe as anything more than her best friend.

And Chloe, being the hopeless, stupid romantic that she is, still can’t help but feel a tiny bit of hope that something will change between them. The hope is small, nearly completely put out at this point, which is exactly how Chloe likes it. Being in love with Beca at this point is more like embers in a fire bit rather than a raging inferno: still there, still warm, just not quite as intense.

Although, some nights those embers spark into a small flame, and those nights are usually aided by alcohol.

Tonight is one of those nights.

And Chloe honestly really hates herself, and hates Beca, and hates emotions, and doesn’t understand what the point of anything is anymore.

But damn if Beca still isn’t just as breathtaking today as she was when Chloe saw her at that activities fair five years go.

Beca is talking about… something. Chloe honestly isn’t sure what she’s going on about, because she’s had nearly a full bottle of wine and it’s making her head fuzzy and right now Chloe is positive that Beca has never looked so good in all the years they’ve known each other, even if she is only wearing sweatpants and an old Barden t-shirt.

“And like, I asked him if he was happy with that take, and he just shrugged so I was like ‘do you want to run it again?’ and he shrugged again, which really made me want to shove his fucking sunglasses down his throat.”

“He’s stupid,” Chloe says distractedly, though she doesn’t know who Beca is even talking about at this point. She’s too busy admiring the earrings lining Beca’s ears, and the curve of her neck so perfectly on display thanks to how Beca's hair is pulled up in a messy bun, and the shape of her lips and how kissable they look.

Chloe was sitting on the other end of the couch from Beca. She knows she was because she purposefully sat on the other end at the beginning of the evening to keep herself from reaching out a touching Beca impulsively.

So Chloe was sitting on the other end of the couch, but she is definitely not sitting on the other end when she pulls Beca in for a kiss by the back of her neck.

As soon as Chloe realizes what she’s done, she is immediately mortified with herself and starts to pull away. Hands coming up to cup her face halt her retreat, however, and a mix of confusion and elation overcomes her when Beca starts kissing Chloe back.

Their kisses become increasingly more frantic the longer they last, Chloe eventually pushing Beca back against the couch cushions to lay on the top of her. Chloe isn’t sure how long this dream that she’s in is going to last, so she figures she might as well enjoy it for as long as possible.

Chloe deepens the kiss, tongue pushing its way past Beca’s lips as Beca groans beneath her. Beca’s hands tighten in Chloe’s hair, not necessarily pulling or pushing in any way; just holding as if Beca is trying to anchor herself. Chloe knows that she’ll have to pull back for air soon, but she’s scared that as soon as they stop the dream will be shattered, so she tells her lungs to suck it up and pushes her lips harder against Beca’s.

Beca is the one to pull back, her head pressing against the cushions beneath her to gain some distance between Chloe’s lips and her own, chest heaving as she tries to steady her breathing. Chloe is panting too, but instead of taking the time to breathe probably she begins pressing lights kisses to Beca’s neck, unwilling to part from Beca quite yet.

Beca’s breathing starts to even out and she lets out little sighs of contentment at Chloe’s ministrations, hands stroking softly through Chloe’s hair. Eventually Chloe’s lips stop moving and she relaxes her body fully on top of Beca’s, enjoying the closeness as she buries her face into the crook of Beca’s neck.

The hands in Chloe’s hair move until they’re running lightly over her back instead and Chloe resists the urge to shiver. She remains quiet, not wanting to shatter the calm that surrounds them. Beca says no words either, and that is the way they remain, tangled up on their shitty couch in their shitty New York apartment until they fall asleep.

* * *

The next morning, Chloe wakes up still entangled with Beca. Beca is still asleep – which doesn’t surprise Chloe, she’s always been the earlier riser between the two of them – so Chloe carefully climbs off Beca and makes her way to the kitchen to make some coffee.

Beca wakes up with a grunt just as the coffee finishes brewing, and Chloe smiles a little at the familiar action as she pours coffee into two mugs, settling down in one of the chairs at their tiny kitchen table.

“Morning, Bec,” Chloe says once Beca is sitting up and looking a little more alive.

Beca grunts again in response and shuffles over to the table, plopping herself down across from Chloe and reaching for the second mug of coffee. She takes a generous sip and curses when it burns her tongue, and Chloe can’t help but chuckle in response.

It’s a few minutes later when Beca is finally awake enough to form actual sentences, and what she says makes Chloe choke on hot coffee.

“So what was last night about?”

Chloe coughs as she tries to clear the liquid from her throat. Beca winces in sympathy. Chloe uses the choking as an excuse to find her words, because she honestly had not expected Beca to confront her about their impromptu make out session.

“Um, I don’t know,” Chloe says hesitantly after a minute. “I was just drunk, I guess.”

It’s a lame excuse. A terrible excuse, in fact.

“Oh,” is all Beca says.

“What about you?” Chloe questions, turning the question on Beca. “You kissed me back.”

Beca shrugs and avoids eye contact with Chloe. “I’m not sure. Like you said, we were drunk.”

Disappointment fills Chloe as Beca opts for the easy cop-out as well. “Right,” she says, looking down at her coffee. “Just a drunken mistake. Nothing more than that.”

And in that moment, Chloe feels those burning embers within her completely die out for good.

* * * * * *

Falling in love with Chloe Beale isn’t something that Beca expected upon their first kiss, and she would be lying if she said she wasn’t surprised.

Because Chloe has been Beca’s best friend ever since her first year at Barden, even if she tried to downplay just how close they were a lot of the time. She didn’t want to say that she saw Chloe as a sister, because there would be a lot to unpack there if that were the case, but Beca definitely never thought of Chloe in a romantic sort of way at all.

Sure, Chloe was kind and thoughtful and always knew just how to make Beca’s day better. She was always there when Beca needed someone to talk to, or a shoulder to cry on, or just a good hug because she’d had a shitty day. And Chloe really did give the best hugs, and Beca always felt so at home in her arms, especially when they were cuddled up together after falling asleep while working on Bellas stuff or homework or just talking until they could barely keep their eyes open. Plus, Chloe has always just understood Beca in a way that nobody else ever has…

Shit. Had Beca been in love with Chloe the whole time?

The realization that Beca had possibly been in love with Chloe for years causes Beca to pull away from the kiss that had grown decidedly more heated than any friendly kiss should ever grow. Her chest heaves as she struggles to catch her breath, both overwhelmed with the passion of the kiss and the way her thoughts have attacked her in such a sudden onslaught. Chloe moves to kiss her neck, seemingly undeterred by Beca’s withdrawal, and Beca is torn for a moment between pushing her away and pulling her closer before ultimately deciding to do neither.

Beca remains silent – save for the involuntary whimpers and sighs that escape her due to Chloe’s lips moving against her body – as she processes her new emotions. Eventually Chloe stops her ministrations and settles her weight against Beca, and Beca waits for the inevitable moment that Chloe pulls away and makes them talk about what just happened.

Except, that moment never comes. Chloe only burrows herself deeper into Beca, apparently content to remain silent for the remainder of the night.

Which she does- which they both do, actually. Chloe falls asleep soon after, leaving Beca to stare at the ceiling in the dark of their apartment and wonder how her heart is still beating so fast in her chest.

* * *

Beca holds off her curiosity about the whole thing the next morning for as long as she can, but ultimately ends up caving only about half an hour after waking up.

“So… what was last night about?” Beca attempts to sound casual, but is painfully aware of how much she’s failing.

She asks the question right as coffee goes down the wrong pipe in Chloe’s throat, causing her to start coughing for a few moments. Beca winces and internally curses her poor timing.

“Um, I don’t know,” Chloe says once she can speak again. “I was just drunk, I guess.”

Beca’s heart sinks. Of course it was because they were drunk, why else would Chloe have kissed her?

“Oh,” Beca says lamely.

“What about you?” Chloe asks suddenly, glancing at Beca. “You kissed me back.”

Panic fills Beca at the question, so she tries for an indifferent shrug and stares into her coffee. “I’m not sure. Like you said, we were drunk.”

Out of the corner of her eye, Beca thinks that Chloe’s shoulders might slump a little. “Right,” she says softly. “Just a drunken mistake. Nothing more than that.”

Beca looks back up at Chloe only to see that Chloe’s eyes are directed down towards her drink. The sun shining in through their apartment's sole window shines over Chloe, bathing her in golden light. Beca’s heart pounds painfully in her chest at the sight and fuck- right there in that moment she feels herself fall hard.

* * *

Being in love with your best friend is difficult, Beca has decided. On top of that, being in love with your best friend and living with them and sharing a bed made it all that much worse. Beca wouldn’t ever wish it upon her worst enemy.

Beca wishes things could go back to the way they were before, when neither of them were secretly in love with the other, and when Beca’s heart didn’t feel like it would burst out of her chest when Chloe came home from work in the evenings, and when Beca felt like she could tell her best friend anything.

Beca wishes she wasn’t in love with Chloe.

But the thing is, Chloe makes it so easy to be in love with her.

It’s in the little things that Chloe does. Like the way she always makes coffee for Beca in the morning, even though Beca has two perfectly good hands and could make it herself. Like how she’s always willing to give Beca a back massage after a long day of Beca hunched over a soundboard or computer for work. Like the way she doesn’t seem to mind Beca’s frequent awkwardness in most aspects of life, telling Beca that it’s ‘endearing’ to her.

Which Beca thinks is unfair because every single little thing that Chloe does is endearing to Beca. Chloe makes Beca feel like the most loved person in the world without trying. It’s the way she says things like:

“You’re my favorite person in the world.”

“I don’t know what I’d do without you in my life, Bec.”

“I’ll always be here for you, no matter what.”

Beca has never had someone that is such a stable in her life like Chloe is. Beca never has to worry about if Chloe has her back, or if she can trust her, or if she’s someone Beca can count on because Chloe has done nothing but be dependable in the six years they’ve known each other.

And while Beca would like to tell Chloe how she feels about her, she can’t. She can’t tell Chloe and risk losing the singular best thing that she has ever had in her life.

* * *

Beca doesn’t know who this Chicago guy is, but she does know that she hates him.

She doesn’t know why exactly she hates him- actually, no, scratch that because Beca actually has many reasons why she hates him. At the very of top of that list is the way Chloe can’t seem to get enough of him.

From the very first moment Chicago stepped into view and introduced himself, he had Chloe following him around like a little puppy. Beca had tried to keep up with them at first, trailing uselessly along Chloe’s side, attempting to jump into their conversation every now and then, but ultimately decided that it was no use.

Chloe was hooked on this guy, which meant that Beca’s presence when she was around him was obsolete.

Beca didn’t like it.

For years now, Beca has been used to being Chloe’s favorite person in any given situation. She’s gotten used to (and fond of) the way Chloe clings onto her in some sort of way when they’re together- holding her hand, looping their arms together, hugging her waist from behind. Except now Chicago is the one on the receiving end of Chloe’s physical affections. Chloe is always pushing his shoulder playfully, or brushing a hand down his arm, tugging on his hand; any excuse to just touch him, it seems.

Beca feels colder than she has in a long time without Chloe’s presence near her.

And Beca has never been one for physical affection. Physical touch is decidedly not one of her love languages. Beca has always been more of a quality time type of person, where no contact or words are necessarily needed for her to feel close to someone, but now that Chloe has stopped directing all her touchiness towards Beca, she realizes just how much she craves that connection with Chloe.

Throughout the course of the entire USO tour, Beca begins to feel like Chloe is pulling away from them- whatever them is. Beca has never felt so much distance between them, both physically and emotionally. The whole situation is rapidly spiraling out of Beca’s control and she has no idea what to do about it.

So Beca decides that she’s going to tell Chloe how she feels. She’s already losing Chloe as it is, so she might as well say fuck it and go all out.

Beca dedicates her final performance to Chloe, even if she never actually tells anyone she’s doing so. She thinks she makes it pretty obvious, though, what with the way she doesn’t take her eyes off of Chloe for the entire first half of the performance before inviting the rest of the Bellas onstage. Their eyes connect and Beca smiles from the stage, thinking that maybe there is a chance that Chloe feels the same way.

When all the Bellas rush to hug her at the end of their performance, Chloe the first one to do so, Beca has to resist the urge to kiss her right there onstage in front of everyone. Beca doesn’t want to rush this, she wants to do it right.

As soon as Beca is able to break away from all the ‘important’ people she needs to talk to afterwards, she starts rushing around to find Chloe. Her thoughts start spinning in her head as she tries to figure out what exactly she’s going to say.

You’re the greatest thing in my life.

I’ve never wanted to be with someone as much as I want to be with you.

I love you, Chloe. I love you I love you I-

Beca finds Chloe.

Chloe is kissing Chicago, looking happier than Beca has ever seen her before.

Suddenly Beca understands exactly what people mean when they say their heart has been broken.

Because she feels it happening to her right now.

* * *

The silence between Beca and Chloe in the car is uncomfortable, which is how all their silences have been since returning home from the USO tour.

It’s an unfamiliar feeling, having uncomfortable silences with Chloe. Pretty much since the first time they hung out, they have always been comfortable around each other. Part of that is because Chloe is a natural at interacting with people and makes conversation easily, but even when they weren’t even talking things were always easy with them.

The silence between them now feels like it’s trying to choke Beca.

Arriving at the airport feels almost like a blessing to Beca, because it means that they don’t have to endure the tension any longer, but it is also most definitely a curse as well.

Because arriving at the airport means that Beca is leaving for LA soon. It means that she is leaving Chloe soon.

They walk through the airport until they get to security, making small talk along the way. Beca stays mostly quiet, though, internally debating with herself the entire way. Because she is quite literally running out of time and now is her last chance to tell Chloe how she feels, but she knows that Chloe is with Chicago now and it would be unfair to dump all of her feelings on Chloe before she jets off to the other side of the country.

And Beca is afraid. Afraid of losing Chloe, afraid of telling Chloe how she feels, afraid of never telling Chloe how she feels.

But Beca figures it’s now or never.

“I have to ask, Chloe. Did you… do you think we ever could have been something together? Something more than friends, I mean,” Beca says quietly, uncertainly. She swallows before adding, “Do you think we could have loved each other?”

Chloe smiles softly and gently laces her fingers with Beca’s. She leans forward and brushes a kiss against Beca’s cheek, and Beca’s eyes instinctively close at the feeling. “Beca, I think you I both know that we loved each other. We just… never seemed to get the timing right is all.”

Beca’s breath hitches at the words. Chloe smile turns a little sad and she squeezes Beca’s fingers once before letting go.

The speakers above them inform Beca that her flight is ready to board, so Beca grips her suitcase handle and prepares herself to walk away.

“I love you,” Beca tells Chloe before she can lose the nerve. “I think I’ll always love you.”

Some expression flashes on Chloe’s face – regret, sadness, clarity, maybe – but it passes too quickly for Beca to tell exactly what it is. “And I think a part of me will always love you, Bec.”

And somehow that’s all they say before Beca is turning around and walking through the gate of her flight, all of her senses feeling completely numb. She wills herself to turn back and rush towards Chloe; to kiss her, to tell her that she can’t go to LA, to tell her that she can’t live without Chloe in her life. She wills Chloe to call out to her and tell her to stay, tell her that she loves her, to give Beca a reason to stay.

Beca doesn’t turn back, and Chloe doesn’t call out.

And maybe that is the most unexpected thing of all.

[agentravensong]

Why Frisk, Chara, & Kris Being Non-Binary Is More Than Just a Headcanon

An UnderTale/DeltaRune Analysis

Since DeltaRune came out, I’ve been sucked right back into the Undertale fandom. Unfortunately, while I’ve seen tons of great fanart and interesting theories relating to the game, it seems the introduction of a third playable human character who isn’t explicitly male or female has also somewhat re-sparked the debate about whether the genders of Frisk, Chara, and now Kris are up to the player’s interpretation. 

On one side, you have people saying to just respect everyone’s headcanons about these characters, down to deciding their pronouns. On the other, you have people saying the three characters being non-binary is part of their thematic purpose in the games, on top of being positive canon representation for a rarely recognized group.

I fall into the latter camp, and this post will explain why. (WARNING: long and text-heavy post)

NOTE: This post was written in late 2018. Since then, I have made an updated version with additional points in Google Docs, which I then used as the script for a YouTube video. As such, this post should be considered an incomplete, though still sound, version of my argument. If you have the time, rather than continuing to read this post, please click the above link(s) to read the Google Doc and/or watch the video for a full understanding of the topic.

If you find yourself repeatedly coming back to this post for whatever reason, remember that my ask box is always open! I’d be more than happy to clarify my position :D

A quick definition to start us off: if a person is “non-binary”, it means that a person doesn’t see their gender as being exclusively male or female. Many non-binary people prefer to be referred to by the pronouns “they/them/theirs” instead of “he/him/his” or “she/her/hers”, since “they” is already a gender neutral pronoun.

 Also, just in case someone doesn’t understand this, a person’s gender identity is not necessarily related to who they are romantically or sexually interested in.

This post will be split into six sections of unequal length, with the focus progressing from literally interpreting the text to Toby’s intentions and the outside impact of having these characters be non-binary.

1. The basics: All 3 characters are referred to exclusively by gender-neutral pronouns in the games.

Let’s go character by character, shall we?

FRISK

It’s admittedly hard to find examples for this, since most of the time people are talking about Frisk in-game, they’ll be talking directly to them in second person. However, while looking through screenshots provided by the UnderTale Text Project, I found these:

Thank you, Alphys!

EDIT: Hey look, a more obvious example I somehow forgot about!

CHARA

All of the following quotes come from the character Chara was supposedly closest to in the entire Underground, Asriel. As you read, think about this: if Chara’s preferred pronouns were anything other than they/them, why would Asriel not use their correct pronouns here?

“Chara hated humanity. Why they did, they never talked about it. But they felt very strongly about that.”

“When Chara and I combined our souls together, the control over our body was actually split between us. They were the one who picked up their own empty body. And then, when we got to the village, they were the one who wanted... to use our full power.”

I’ve seen some people take Flowey’s mentions of Toriel in his New Home Genocide monologue to be confirmation that Chara goes by “she/her”, since he doesn’t refer to Toriel by name... even though Chara wouldn’t have been awake at that time, and when Flowey DOES talk about Chara in this monologue, it’s in second person, since he believes YOU are his old best friend. This misconception isn’t common, especially these days, but I figured it was worth addressing.

KRIS

Out of the three humans, I think Kris is the one who people are most likely to associate with a specific gender based on their name. But despite the theory videos and such you may have seen where people referred to Kris as “he”, this is not reflected anywhere in-game.

(Got these screenshots of DeltaRune’s code from this tumblr post) 

The lines in the first photo are what Susie says when she’s trying to break Kris and Ralsei out of prison, and you have the option to suggest to her which way to go. The second example. according to Kris’ page on the DeltaRune fandom wiki, is said by Ralsei earlier in the game, if you do not run to complete the clock puzzle to open the door right after reuniting with Susie. Unlike the first example, it is clear in this case that Kris is the only one being referred to. 

I remember seeing someone somewhere argue that Susie and Ralsei don’t know Kris well enough to know their “proper” pronouns. When it comes to Ralsei, I can see that argument... but did you notice that he knows both Kris and Susie’s names without asking? It seems he knows more than he lets on... and while Susie certainly wasn’t friends with Kris before this, the fact that they’re in the same class is enough for me to think she would have heard Kris be referred to by their preferred pronouns at least in passing by this point.

And that’s it. Frisk, Chara, and Kris are never referred to by other pronouns... with, admittedly, one exception:

Why does Chara use “it” for themself here? If I had to guess, it’s likely a combination of them being a ghost of their former self without a soul of their own (Flowey’s shown us how much your personality and sense of self is tied to having a SOUL) and the corruption from the Genocide run (remember that gaining LOVE affects a person’s mentality). They see themself as a demon, no longer a person. Whether that’s literally true to any extent or just how they feel after everything they’ve been through doesn’t really matter, I just wanted to cover this point before anyone else could bring it up. It’s not like it makes them not non-binary or anything.

To be clear, not all non-binary people go exclusively by they/them pronouns. Some prefer to go by masculine or feminine pronouns for their own reasons; some go by “neo-pronouns”, ones invented specifically for those who identify as non-binary; and some people go by more than one set of pronouns. However, in the case of Frisk, Chara, and Kris specifically, the fact that they only go by they/them pronouns makes them non-binary, and using any other pronouns for them would be incorrect (even if you have them go by they/them AND he/him or she/her).

Really, that should be enough to prove that the three humans being non-binary is canon. After all, you never have any of the other major characters in Undertale or DeltaRune explicitly state “I’m a girl” or “I’m a boy”. We know their genders because of the pronouns everyone refers to them by. Sure you’ll see gender-bends of those characters, but no one ever claims that those are on the same level of validity when it comes to canon as the actual canon.

But I know that isn’t enough for the people who came into this post disagreeing with the premise, so let’s actually get to countering some of their arguments, shall we? The main argument, of course, is that the humans’ are all meant for the Player to at least partially craft identifies for, including deciding which pronouns they use. But first...

2. Small Fish First: Other characters who are obviously not meant to be self-inserts use gender neutral pronouns.

...I want to cover the easier to counter idea that they/them pronouns are meant to just be, for lack of a better term, “placeholders”; the pronouns you use when you don’t know a person’s gender, rather than being valid permanent pronouns on their own.

If this were true in the case of Undertale and DeltaRune, you’d expect the humans to be the only ones referred to by these pronouns. They’re the ones whose identities are left ambiguous so the Player can project onto them, right?

But that couldn’t be father from the truth. In fact, the majority of the monsters you encounter in both games are referred to with gender-neutral pronouns (they/them and/or it), if any pronouns at all.

Now one might say, “But none of those monsters are really meant to be individual characters.” I get why you’d think that. But you’re forgetting at least one person...

Yup, Napstablook, despite what many fans have assumed from what I’ve seen, does not go by he/him pronouns, but they/them. And it’s not just in the narration either. Undyne does too in certain phone calls with Papyrus. ...Then again, she barely knows Napsta, and we see in DeltaRune that she defaults to they/them when talking about people whose gender she doesn’t know (specifically in that game, Alphys). 

But that isn’t my last example. One of the few people who was ever close to Napsta was Mettaton (before he became a celebrity). And what does Mettaton say after Blooky calls in to his final show?

What this proves is that Toby recognizes they/them pronouns as valid for an individual in his work, which I hope makes buying that he purposefully made all three humans canonically non-binary easier for skeptics to swallow (we’ll get back to whether he DID purposefully do that later).

But I’ll acknowledge that there IS a difference between the three humans and the other characters in the games who use they/them, due to their relationship with you as the Player. So with that tangent out of the way, time to diffuse the “everyone can have their own headcanons about the kids’ genders” argument.

3. Thematic Context: All 3 humans have moments of asserting their agency, and part of the game’s subtext is how they each relate to the Player, rather than them all being blank slates.

Again, we’ll go character by character.

FRISK

This section is, admittedly, the one with the least evidence compared to the rest. But here’s what we have, and it’s pretty obvious:

After this moment, as was shown earlier, the other monsters know Frisk’s name and will refer to Frisk in the third person with they/them pronouns. Now, consider this: If Frisk used other pronouns, wouldn’t they have corrected the monsters here? Sure Frisk don’t talk without being prompting much throughout most of the game, but considering how they just shared their name, something equally as personal as their pronouns, I don’t think it would feel too out of place here.

Alternatively, if Frisk’s gender was up to the Player’s interpretation, the Player could have been given a prompt to correct the other characters with the “proper” pronouns for Frisk. You could argue it would be pointless this late into the game, but couldn’t that logic apply to the reveal of Frisk’s name as well? In this case, the lack of such a moment speaks more to me than having such a moment would.

Now, I totally get why people would project onto Frisk up to this point in the narrative, including assigning them different pronouns. It wouldn’t be a plot twist otherwise. Even their design seems to lend to that, with the unrealistic bright yellow skin Legos and emojis have to make them more race-neutral, and their emotionless, unchanging facial expression (though it’s worth considering that most of the other character’s overworld sprites don’t change expression much either; I’m pretty sure Alphys’ overworld sprite keeps her dopey smile even when she’s talking about the depths of her depression and failure at the end of the True Lab section). And this actually works to UnderTale’s benefit through most of the game, making the connections you forge with the monsters feel more personal.

The significance of this moment is that it asks the Player to be willing to change their perspective. Throughout the True Pacifist run, you help Frisk to change the mindsets of the characters you come across; this is most obvious with Undyne, who has been raised to see all humans as the enemy, but comes to admit that at least “some humans are OK, I guess” after befriending you. Along the way, you learn that there’s more to these monsters than first impressions may suggest (again, Undyne being a great example). Now, the game is asking you to look deeper one more time, and presenting you with the challenge you’ve posed to all the other major characters: are you willing to recognize Frisk’s autonomy; to understand there is more to this person than you first saw?

EDIT: Hey, remember that screenshot from earlier where Flowey asks you to “let Frisk live their life”? He’s literally asking you to let Frisk be free and truly themself, rather than resetting and taking control of them again. So there’s some more food for thought.

CHARA

While you are the one who names Chara (the reason for which will be considered in the fourth section of this post), consider these points:

1. If the purpose of Chara’s entire character was meant to be just a reflection of you as the Player, then why give them a “true name” at all?

2. Chara’s backstory is integral to the setup of UnderTale’s plot, and provides a good amount of hints at their original personality, easily making them less of a “blank slate” for the Player to project onto than Frisk.

3. Chara makes a clear distinction between the Player and themself in their monologues at the end of the Genocide route. In case you forgot, here are some reminders.

First meeting:

“Your power awakened me from death.”

“My ‘human soul’, my ‘Determination’; they were not mine, but YOURS.”

“With your guidance, I realized the purpose of my reincarnation.”

“Together, we eradicated the enemy and became strong.”

If you agree to ERASE the world: “You are a great partner.”

In the abyss:

“Interesting. You want to go back.”

“You want to go back to the world you destroyed.”

“It was you who pushed everything to its edge. It was you who lead the world to its destruction.”

“But you cannot accept that. You think you are above consequences.”

“Perhaps, we can reach a compromise. You still have something I want.”

“Then, it is agreed. You will give me your SOUL.”

Second meeting:

“You and I are not the same, are we?”

“This SOUL resonates with a strange feeling... You are wracked with a perverted sentimentality. ...I cannot understand these feelings any longer.”

“I feel obligated to suggest: should you choose to create this world once more, another path would be better suited.”

To say there is no connection between Chara and the Player would be unfair. I mean, if they hated humans their whole life, why do they end up taking out that rage on the monsters, the ones who were actually kind to them, in the Genocide run? Like Chara says themself, you guide them, teaching them definitively that “in this world, it’s kill or be killed”; and the influence you have on them is much more obvious if you subscribe to the Narrator Chara theory (but that’s a whole other can of worms).

Like with Frisk, Chara presents the Player a challenge, but in a more subtle way: can you recognize that YOU are at fault, rather than blaming your actions on a damaged kid who learns from your example and never got the chance to grow beyond their mistakes? And part of meeting that challenge is recognizing that Chara is, or at least used to be, their own whole person.

KRIS

Now we get to the really fun part. DeltaRune as a whole seems to be delving even deeper and more explicitly into the relationship between the playable character as an unwilling vessel and the actual Player than Undertale did. Outside of the prevalent message that “Your choices don’t matter” (which I’m guessing will end up more like the “kill or be killed” of this game rather than DR’s intended final moral), the main evidence towards this is how the game starts.

1. A red soul appears on screen when the unknown speaker (presumably Gaster) asks you if they’ve successfully connected with you. The soul is what you control throughout this sequence. The implication? The SOUL in this game is a manifestation of you as the Player. In fact, considering some of the Chara quotes I mentioned earlier, this could be true of UnderTale as well.

2. You spend time making a vessel, only for it to be discarded, because “No one can choose who they are in this world.” This lack of choice is actually foreshadowed when you choose which legs you prefer, since all but the last choice are the same. The game is pointing out right away how superficial these choices are.

3. The speakers says “Your name is...” and Toriel seemingly finishes the statement by calling out “KRIS!”

The message of points 2 and 3 combined is pretty obvious to me: we don’t get an empty vessel to put ourself and our ideas into in DeltaRune. Kris is NOT an empty vessel; they have an already established backstory and personality, which we get multiple hints at (mostly when going around town at the end of the demo).

The fact that you have to go through this creation process on every new file, even after beating the game, suggests it’s more than just a framing device, but directly tied to the game’s narrative and/or themes in some way. So, let’s keep this scene in mind as we look at Kris’ defining moment at the end of Chapter 1.

In the middle of the night, Kris is wrestling with themself in bed until they fall out. Their walk is very stilted and jerkish, reminiscent of a zombie, or someone possessed.

Kris opens and closes their hand a few times before digging into their body and pulling out their soul, their eyes blank. (Notice how this doesn’t seem to actually leave a hole in their chest or anything? Almost as if the soul was never a part of them in the first place...)

They go to the wagon and harshly YEET the soul into the cage (the flavor text for which mentions it has already seen a few crashes... has something like this happened to Kris before?).

Kris walks back to the middle of the room, as if to purposefully stand in the center of the DeltaRune symbol on the floor, then pulls out a knife from seemingly nowhere, and turns to the camera with a red glow in their eyes.

Now, I totally get why most people will immediately assume that Kris has been possessed by a post-Genocide Chara here. I’m pretty sure the visual similarities between this scene and the one that plays if you choose to stay with Toriel in a soulless pacifist run in UT are intentional.

But remember how we mentioned the red SOUL, at least in DeltaRune, is a manifestation of the Player? This is actually reinforced in this scene, because you’re able to move the SOUL back and forth within the cage.

We’ve been controlling Kris via that SOUL the whole way through the game, and now? Kris is done with us. THIS is their prime moment of agency in Chapter 1 - reclaiming ownership of their own body - and I doubt that it will be their last.

There’s a ton of other stuff I could mention about Kris, like how:

* they had their own save file, which you overwrite at the first save point

* multiple NPCs in the town will comment on Kris seeming more talkative or looking off today, because YOU’RE making them interact with people

* Kris’ ability to play the piano is worse than normal with you controlling them, according to the hospital receptionist

* the narration says Kris feels bitter if you throw away the one possession in their inventory, the Ball of Junk (”bitter” isn’t the emotion one would feel if they did this of their own free will)

or all the hints at Kris’ true personality as an introverted, codependent prankster. But that could be a post in itself. My point is that, if Frisk and Chara’s individualism from the Player was subtle in UnderTale, this is pretty straightforward, if you know where to look.

And if these three humans are all their own characters, then shouldn’t we consider what seemingly little we DO know for sure about them as canon? We all take their names to be canon, so why not their pronouns?

That’s the bulk of the argument done. But when discussing canon, there is one thing that always has to be considered:

4. Can We Know The Creator (Toby Fox)’s Intentions?

Well, not really.

Some may bring up the one tweet where Toby suggested to name the fallen human (Chara) “your own name” as evidence that you ARE meant to project yourself into these characters. 

However, I think you could just as easily argue that doing this ADDS to the impact of when Frisk, the character you physically control, confirms themself to be their own person with their own name, rather than a mold for you to pour yourself into. 

And though Chara does make it clear that they themself as a character are separate from you, the whole Genocide ending monologue does hit harder when the person reprimanding you for their sins, who describes themself as “the feeling you get when your stats increase”, shares your name.

While putting this post together, I came across this interview Toby did about Undertale back in September 2015, and took particular note of this section:

While this technically doesn’t confirm or deny anything either way, how hard would it have been for Toby to say, “Well the protagonist is meant to have their gender be up to the player’s interpretation”? I doubt he would have gotten more backlash for that then he would have for definitively saying that Frisk is MEANT to be non-binary (though I doubt that would have stopped people from making them male or female anyway).

Then again, the article does start with the interviewer saying this:

“I told Toby Fox to skip questions he didn’t find interesting, and boy did he take me at my word.”

So maybe he just didn’t have anything worthwhile to mention.

I can’t say with certainty that Frisk and Chara’s genders were never meant to be up to the Player’s choice, even after what I mentioned in section 2 (and I doubt Toby would want to make a statement on it at this point). Same with Kris, for now.

However, if the rest of DeltaRune ends up going in the direction I suggested in the previous section, I honestly would not be surprised if there’s a moment where Kris confirms they are nonbinary, as a show of agency and individualism akin to Frisk telling Asriel their real name. I wouldn’t really call it a “theory”, and it’s hard to speculate what the other chapters of the game will at all be like based on what relatively little we have... but I wouldn’t have mentioned it here if I didn’t think it had any validity.

5. Why Does This Matter?

Outside of the previously mentioned stuff relating to the games’ themes/messages about choice, agency, and individualism, there’s one big reason: representation.

How many games can you think of where there are any explicitly non-binary characters? How many where that character is a major one, who doesn’t get treated as particularity different from the others just on the basis of the pronouns they use? And how many of those games are even close to the popularity of Undertale in its hayday? Even expanding these questions to media other than just video games won’t net many more results.

For people who are striving for representation, seeing posts like “Just let people have their headcanons :)” can come across as the OP not understanding how much that representation means. Even worse, coming back to the point I made in section 2 of this post, it could be seen as the OP denying that being non-binary is just as real and concrete as being male or female (a problem which more mainstream representation of non-binary people would help solve!).

But don’t just take it from me. After all, as a binary cis girl myself (”cis” meaning not trans), I can’t speak generally for all the trans and non-binary Undertale and Deltarune fans out there. So allow me to link some posts which provide their perspectives:

This first post is from before DeltaRune was released, and mainly focuses on Frisk, but goes in-depth on the topic (and the OP provided me some feedback on my post, so if they see this, thanks!)

I came across this post just while scrolling through the DeltaRune tag about why this stuff matters to non-binary fans.

This post is specifically about how using they/them pronouns for the kids is preferable whether or not it’s literally canon.

Here’s another post from the same person covering some common counter-arguments.

And if the other posts are too long for you to bother reading after going through mine, this one sums up the point in one sentence.

I know some people flinch at the mere mention of the word “representation”. I know that some will argue you shouldn’t need to see representation of a group you belong to in a piece of media in order to be able to relate to the characters and/or feel validated yourself - because I’ve seen people make this argument. But, I mean, I certainly find it easier to relate to characters that I share traits with; that’s just how humans work. It’s probably the main reason why people assign different genders to Frisk, Chara, and Kris in the first place! Besides, who does it hurt to include more diverse characters?

Oh right, there’s the idea that “forcing” creators to include representation is bad for creativity or whatever. Well good thing that’s not what this is about! As far as I know, no one is telling Toby he has to ADD new characters to fulfill a quota; the characters in question (Frisk, Chara, & Kris) already exist in his work. The point of this post is to show that the three of them were MEANT to be non-binary from the start (assuming I provided enough proof to convince you), so people won’t continue to erase that representation. By making them binary cis boys or girls, you’re only taking away from the original text (and giving people more to “complain” about).

Honestly, what does one even have to gain story-wise from assigning different genders to the human kids? I can’t remember a time I saw where making them strictly boys or girls added anything to their characterization or opened up different story possibilities (I’m sure you could could up with a theoretical example, but compared to the endless fanworks that DON’T do that, they hardly make a dent). Speaking beyond just Frisk, Chara, and Kris, characters being non-binary shouldn't affect how you ship them. You can give such characters more overtly masculine or feminine designs/appearances, but still have them be non-binary and go by they/them pronouns (most people don’t naturally look androgynous after all). In a work with voice acting, casting someone with a more masculine or feminine voice to play a non-binary character shouldn’t stop you from portraying the character as non-binary either - just refer to them with the right pronouns! 

And if people who find your work continuously misgender your non-binary characters or ask what their “real” gender is, don’t let them get to you. You don’t need to respond to every such comment, but when you DO respond, clearly state that these characters are non-binary, politely correct the people who refer to those characters by the wrong pronouns, and, if worst comes to worst, block the people who won’t respect that. Before you (using “you” for the rest of this paragraph to refer specifically to my fellow binary cis peeps) can even think to argue “that sounds like too much work” or “it’s not worth the potential controversy”, remember that non-binary people in real life have to deal with this crap far more often than we do, and for them, it’s personal. If they can handle it, why can’t you?

Yes, Frisk, Chara, and Kris are fictional characters, not real people. But more representation of non-binary people in media helps others learn to understand and respect them, both in fiction and in real life. Honestly, it’s beyond time for people to accept that “they/them” aren’t “placeholder pronouns”, and the genders of people who use them aren’t up for others to judge. It’s just who they are, and really, how hard is that to respect?

If nothing else will convince you, think of it this way: if you’re not in the group being affected by a discussion like this, and you don’t care about the people in that group, keeping yourself out of the conversation saves everyone time and energy, without hurting anyone.

6. Conclusion

So, to briefly summarize this essay-length post’s main points:

1. Frisk, Chara, and Kris all go solely by “they/them” in their respective games, so having them go by any other pronouns is technically diverting from canon to the same extent that gender-bending any other character would be, NOT a valid interpretation of the original text. 

2. There are other individual characters in these two games, such as Napstablook, who are referred to by they/them pronouns, even by those who were close to them.

3. The three humans are all shown to be more than just blank slates for the Player to project themself onto, making the stuff which IS definitively said about them (specifically, their names and pronouns) canon parts of their characterization unless directly proven otherwise.

4. We can’t assume Toby’s intentions, but even if he didn’t initially make Frisk, Chara, and Kris gender neutral for the sake of giving non-binary people representation, many people have taken it as that. Thus, seeing others say that the humans’ genders are up for interpretation is interpreted as those people not respecting non-binary identities as valid on their own.

The one other point I can think people might bring up would be the idea that kids as young as Chara or Frisk wouldn’t identify as non-binary because they wouldn’t understand the concept. To that argument, I’d suggest looking up videos about people who realized they were transgender as kids. In general, if there are concepts in this post you didn’t quite get or agree with, research is your friend!

Speaking of which, as this post I came across in the DeltaRune tag yesterday pointed out, fun fact: “non-binary” is an umbrella term that still leaves some slight room for personal interpretation when it comes to the humans’ genders! To use myself as an example, I personally headcanon Chara as firmly agender, Kris as a a demi-boy (someone who only partially sees themself as male), and Frisk as genderfluid (meaning that their sense of gender regularly changes). However, despite the nuances in their gender identities, I only have them go by they/them pronouns, their canon ones, in my fanworks. Doing otherwise not only goes against canon, but can be considered misgendering, and thus should be avoided.

This doesn’t mean that you can’t make up ANYTHING about what Chara, Frisk, and Kris are like either. People have plenty of headcanons about the backstories and other quirks of characters like Sans, Undyne, Mettaton - basically the whole cast of both games - and there’s nothing stopping you from doing that for the human kids. I certainly have my own ideas of what Chara and Frisk’s lives were like before they fell into the Underground. The difference is that those are speculating on things not outright said in canon. But Frisk, Chara, and Kris going by they/them pronouns IS canon, and should be respected as such.

At the end of the day, neither I nor anyone else (not even Toby) can outright stop people from having their opinions about these fictional characters. But since I had some free time this weekend, I figured I could take a stand for something I care about relating to a fandom I’ve emerged myself in for the past few years. My main hope in making this post is that you’ll understand why certain people disagree with the seemingly righteous stance of “It’s all up to interpretation, just let people do what they want!”. And if you knew nothing about non-binary identities before, hopefully this was educational for you!

If you have any remaining questions or suggestions relating to this post, feel free to reblog with your feedback or send me an ask. Until then, this is Agent Raven, signing off.

[secretgiftsforshaman]

Real Healing Shit Part 2

After our play last night, I felt unsettled and upset and it took me a while to identify why. Much of it was an emotional release that came up to be processed, but some of it was unmet needs in the moment, because I did not understand them enough to ask for them to be met. I must emphatically insist that you did not do anything to hurt or neglect me. What we have done together has not, as far as I can tell, created any new injuries (at least for me), it has only uncovered old pain and trauma which already existed in my body so that it could be released. What follows is what I have processed and come to understand on this front so far:

I’ve written before about how stiffly I’ve always held my hips and pelvis because of the stuck, stagnant energy therein, and how I carry a lot of weight on my abdomen, and how much of it is a physical manifestation of the energetic armor and unprocessed emotions that I’ve accumulated over the years. I refuse to accept the bullshit (super unscientific, harmful, and dangerous) idea that thin = healthy and fat = unhealthy, because I, as a person who is studying and familiarizing herself with the true best practices regarding our relationships with food and with our bodies, know that everyone’s body is capable of knowing what it wants and needs, and that happy, exercised, well-nourished, and healthy bodies can be (and are) all kinds of different shapes and sizes. And I also intuitively know that my particular body will be happier when I can let go of much of the weight that is extra for me - because it is a simultaneously literal and metaphorical weight. The energetic/psychological/historical patterns that I have stored in my chakras/energy body *are* the same thing as this extra flesh. In order for me to do much of the Divine Feminine healing work we both serve - that which comes from my own life, and that which I have inherited - I need to engage with and dislodge these stuck emotions and traumas, and then feel them until I can release and resolve them. (I seem to have inherited a LOT of energetic trauma from my family and ancestors - all kinds of crappy behavioral/relationship/thought software, especially through my maternal line. My work is cut out for me!)

It feels like there is a deep, deep well of this stuff that is stuck deep in my lower belly, and that it can be accessed through ecstatic movement, energy work, sex, and pleasure (and naturally, the overlap of these) - through the physical and energetic movement of and within my pelvic bowl and female reproductive organs. The first time I remember masturbating was sometime in later elementary school when I discovered that pressing deeply into my lower abdomen brought me a particular pain-pleasure, never satisfying, but strongly desired all the same. Even after I learned how to stroke my clit to orgasm in college, I have continued to find myself wanting to press deep into this tight, needy, aching place (often when I’m full of sexual energy after a clitoral orgasm) which I think is somewhere near or just beyond my cervix, and I believe to be the inner nexus of my second chakra.

I think that a lot of the types of sexual desire that I’ve been feeling - wanting to be fucked hard and rough and deep, wanting my ass spanked and played with and fucked, wanting to be split open and have everything I’ve been carrying around in this place pulled out and held and tended to, wanting to be emptied of all the old, stagnant, painful detritus so that I have space to move kundalini up into and through my second chakra in a way that will allow me to truly surrender and receive pleasure and create and connect socially and sexually in healthy and whole ways: all of this lust is my bodymindheartsoul asking for the type of sexual energy work that it needs to heal itself. This is, I think, a big part of why we are called to each other: you are a safe, trustworthy, masculine source of the destructive sexual energy I need to destroy and heal the feminine wounds that Gaia has bestowed on me to carry and seek healing for. You are an acolyte of the Goddess who knows how to hold the Sacred Space I need to do this work, and I am a healer in her training/self-healing/transformation journey preparing to serve the Divine Feminine in my future clients (both formal/mass-consciousness clients and the erstwhile “clients” that have always been drawn to me for counsel and nurturing). This is why we are drawn together. This is our sacred contract.

For the longest time I’ve wanted to be filled and stretched open in a way that my own fingers could never achieve. During sex with Sweetie, I could never relax enough to accept more than two of his fingers at the absolute maximum - most of the time one was as much as I could take, but I often wanted more then, and I DEFINITELY do now. I don’t think we really spent enough time with foreplay, with few exceptions, and that this is part of why I found it so difficult to accept penetration: I rarely felt safe/unguilty enough to take as much of his time and effort as I needed to become fully aroused and/or have a truly satisfying climax. I also think that my bodymindheartsoul knew that I was not yet mature enough, or safe and held enough, to begin processing the stored shadow ‘stuff’ that would be woken up once I allowed anyone (wether someone else or even myself) deep enough into my body to touch it and awaken it.

A little over a week ago, I (finally, at the ripe old age of 29!!) got myself a dildo. This long held and growing desire to be stretched open the way I have never truly been ready for before - almost like lancing an abscess - has made penetration sound so fucking good that I gave in and sought out something to fill that need (pun so intended). The first time I tried the new toy, again about a week ago, it was very difficult for me to enjoy. I brought myself to climax once before I even began inserting it, because I hoped it would help prepare me. It didn’t help much, and eventually I had to stop because try as I might (again - I made the mistake of trying to force my pleasure, and I think I tried too soon after my bleed ended as well) it became more and more painful and I slid further and further away from pleasure, let alone orgasm. As I was trying to force myself back towards pleasure and climax, I became angry and frustrated with myself, but eventually I became numb and almost detached. I think that some lines blurred between the stored pain that I was tapping and releasing, and the pain that I was causing myself.

In the time since, I have experimented more with my new toy (but also while trying to practice self-compassion and surrender and self-trust) and I have achieved two of the BIGGEST, most long-lasting orgasms OF MY LIFE, and I loved the boneless, deep, pleasurable aaaaaache afterward :) Last night I wanted to experience another amazing climax like that, and to share it with you. I also felt that longing to be stretched open, to be fucked hard and rough and ragged, and it wasn’t until after the fact that I realized it was at least partially because a deeper part of me wanted more of that stubborn baggage exorcised out of me - it wanted the violent sex that could break open my injured parts so I could do more healing. Our dance turned me on enough that it was easy to penetrate myself and accept the toy I wanted to use, and with it I tried to give myself that hard deep fuck, but I really wanted someone else - someone I trust, like you - to give it to me. I kept pushing myself again, and I fucked myself deep and hard, and I became frustrated, and at once point - almost like a fever breaking - my emotions shifted and a vulnerable, sad place opened up within me, and a deep muscle trembling began. If you’ve read anything about psoas muscle/deep pelvic muscle trauma release, you’ll know what I’m talking about. This happened shortly before we both agreed to let go of orgasm and call it a night.

After we slowed down and stopped, I continued to feel a deep, occasionally sharp physical pain, with it’s correlated emotional ache and sadness, and wanted to debrief and receive aftercare and comfort to process it with. I think my assessment of feeling ‘restored’ was a little premature - it was less a restored energy, and more that I was feeling the healing process begin. Because we didn’t continue this work together, I turned to familiar sources of comfort to self-soothe and regulate my nervous system: hearty food, an audiobook, my bed, and a mindless phone game (mahjong, sudoku, and nonograms, if you’re wondering). These are all useful tools which, sometimes I use intentionally, and sometimes I misuse to numb myself out with. Last night, I chose to mindfully use them to help me settle and cope with the pain and sadness that our play had woken up in me, but these are only coping mechanisms: they are not the held sacred space and emotional connection that I needed to support me while I did the healing work with the released trauma. I wanted to ask you for more attention, but I chose not to both because I wanted you to have enough rest after giving so much of yourself, and because I needed to step back and try to understand what I was feeling and needing before I could explain it to you and ask you to help meet it.

I want you to know - with absolute certainty - that you cannot accept *any* responsibility for this experience I had. Yes, I felt my needs and I were neglected and untended, but because I did not communicate that to you (largely because I didn’t yet understand what those needs were), you are 100% blameless in this. Furthermore, it is only because of this unpleasant experience that I do now know what I want and need, and what to ask for in the future.

Because of my raw, mid-transformation state, and the way that sexual play has such power to prompt emotional release in me, even casual, fun sexual play has potentially intense emotional consequences for me. If we are going to continue to play, I would ask that we only allow ourselves to get into it when we both have the time and energy for aftercare and processing. For my part, I promise to improve my self-monitoring and communication so that I don’t set myself up to be neglected again and we can both have a better idea of when I will need that extra attention, and when I am safe to just have some fun. I ask you to keep in mind that I am dealing with deep and difficult work - deeper than many other Dakini you have danced with, I suspect - and I will need you to make sure that both of us are tended to as we do. Even light, easy play has the tendency to draw serious business out of my metamorphosing energy body. I am still learning how to fill my own cup, and how to ask for help filling myself up when needed. Please encourage me to tend to myself this way, and I encourage you to do the same. Neither of us can serve the Goddess from empty vessels.

I know down in my bones that I need to process this physically stored emotional/mental/spiritual trauma in my second chakra and develop healthier ways of processing trauma and meeting my needs that go beyond mere coping mechanisms and instead allow me, one day, to do this work for myself. I don’t want to rely on you forever. I want to learn how to hold the space I need for myself while I heal - because that is what will make me strong enough of a healer to hold sacred space for others, too - but until I learn how to do so, I need your help to destroy those energetic blocks and I need your support while I reassemble myself afterwards. I need my Shaman to swim alongside me in the shadowy deep. Teach me how to fish in the bottom of my ocean, Weaver. Help me weave a net to catch myself. To fish out the good pieces I can rebuild myself with and leave the dross that only weighs me down.

This isn’t the kind of work we can do every day - my system isn’t yet strong enough to process this deeply more than once, maybe twice a week. I trust us to flow and feel the timing out as we go. I am intimidated and afraid of the vast sea I’m diving into, but I have come too far to give up now. I have done entirely too much giving up, and I’m committing now to saving myself before I drown, and training until I am a strong enough swimmer to accompany others in their own oceans.

Time to jump in the deep end, Lover. Are you coming with me?

All my love,

Your Lionfish

[taenys]

have you considered talking to tom and letting him know how you feel regarding him still keeping contact with his ex?

I assume you follow me on twitter and saw my dumb emo tweets last week :/// but yeah, I have actually in the past. Well, kind of. He brought it up before in like August or something last year after he noticed (I’m sure more than once) that I got weirdly quiet and awkward when he’d say something like “I was talking to insert ex’s name here about blah blah blah” and I’d sort of just “uh huh” and shift uncomfortably. She’s his friend though, so for him he’s just sharing an anecdote of a conversation he had with a friend, not a big deal in the grand scheme of things. He’s a smart dude though, and I’m terrible at hiding my emotions anyway so it was fairly obvious I wasn’t totally cool with those little anecdotes so after a couple times of that, he finally brought it up. He asked if it bothered me that he was still friends with her. I went into a sort of panic mode and shut down and gave him a weirdly cold answer because I didn’t know how to articulate the 5000000 words that were running through my mind. I needed time to process how I wanted to answer that because it was much more layered than what he was probably thinking. 

Anyways, I went on here as soon as I got home, my safe space to vent in really long essay format about my feelings LMAO, and wrote this massive thing explaining how I felt and why I felt the way that I did (which if you don’t have time to read THAT essay on top of THIS 2k one, then the tl;dr version is essentially: I strongly dislike her because I feel like she was very toxic and just generally a pretty shitty girlfriend and he sacrificed so much and gave so much to her and that relationship and got very little care and love in return . And that damaged him and soured his entire outlook on love and dating, namely his ability, or maybe his desire, to love someone as profoundly and selflessly as he had in that relationship). 

So after writing that whole thing I thought, “okay I need to communicate this to Tom now, but how? Wait another week until I see him in person? Let him think I’m just a petty brat who doesn’t want him talking to his ex because I’m “jealous” or some dumb shit like that for that whole week????” Absolutely not. So I sent him the link to that huge essay (yeah, I sent him a link to my blog here, so I’ve been exposed!!!!!) And he read it and thanked me for being open and honest. And that was the end of that. It was never brought up again. From then on, I had assumed that meant he would no longer say things like “I was talking to ---- the other day…” or would at least be more considerate about it knowing it made me feel…sad and uncomfortable. But then last Friday a few hours before he was going to pick me up to stay at his place, he brought her up and it felt like a punch to the gut. 

So Animal Crossing has been my thing since it came out recently, I’ve been addicted like a billion other people are, and he’s been watching me play it since the beginning, keeping up with my progress and whatnot. I show him the goings on of my island, he sees me freak out over cute character interactions with my villagers, etc. I literally talk about it all the time with him and send him giddy texts and pictures updating him on my adventures and stuff because he’s my best friend and I want to share that stuff. I even named my island “Higgins” after his cat. He also knows that I love the villager Pietro to death (because I whine and mope about it all the time to him) and am DYING to have him on my island. So much so that I was considering spending up to 60 dollars on an official amiibo card to get him on my island, like a complete nutter.  

However, there are other ways to acquire a specific villager in that game, one of which requires making a “fake” amiibo card with a special chip and an android device with some specific apps. It’s cheap, and seemingly easy, but I hadn’t actually done any research on how to do it yet. I don’t actually feel like I have time to worry about that and it’s not high on my priority list right now. But anyways, the reason I’m sharing all of this is because Tom texted me that Friday saying that his ex was going to make her own fake amiibos and offered to make me one for Pietro. That’s really nice, isn’t it?! Yeah, it is. Except it made me feel really fucking shitty and depressed. Why?! Why though. Why do I have to CARE about shit that doesn’t matter anymore? 

Well, for one just seeing her name typed out tends to activate instant sadness and discomfort for me (I won’t use the word “trigger” but you get what I mean). But then it morphed into “Wait, why is he talking about me with her? Why would she offer that? Did she just casually mention she was making those and he then asked if she would make one for me? Or perhaps during whatever conversations they’ve had about the game, seeing as he doesn’t play it himself, he only had my experiences to share with her and that’s how she knew about what character I wanted. What else does she know about me, my interests, our relationship, etc? Has he ever...complained about me to her? Does she know that I don’t like her? And if I say “no thanks” to her offer (which is what I ultimately did say) will she think I’m being weird and immature? Will Thomas think so too? Does he already? 

These were all questions that began flooding my mind, making me feel worse and worse. Chronic overthinker, I know. I cried, out of frustration with myself for reacting this way. I was being irrational and ridiculous. And I knew this, which is why I chose to let it go. I let myself be sad about it for as long as I needed to be (which was luckily really only like a day and a half). But I let it go. Because it’s not actually a big deal. I was overreacting and overthinking and I knew this so I didn’t bring it up and I hoped to FUCK he wouldn’t either. I let myself be sad about though, because suppressing shit doesn’t help, but I just got through it. I worked through it internally. I felt like I owed it to him to try. And I felt better soon after. And even more so now being able to write about it in detail like this. Very cathartic and good for me to express it openly without judgement in writing. So thank you for allowing me that freedom.

It would honestly make me uncomfortable to know that Thomas is divulging personal snippets of my life, personality, interests, quirks, and our relationship with her just as small talk or whatever. I don’t want her to know me (or more than basic surface level stuff about me. maybe that makes me shitty). The same way I don’t want to know her. I already feel like I know TOO much about her (which is completely my own fault of course lmao). But I know and respect that Thomas has every right to share whatever information about his life he wants with her (and all his other friends, for that matter), and I’m a (significant) part of his life so naturally I’m sure to come up. He was just thinking of me in that moment when he sent me her offer, I’m sure. Thinking how happy it’d make me to have that character FINALLY, but not realizing my complete disdain for who I was receiving it from would ruin it for me completely LMAO. Yeah, I want Pietro but not THAT bad. Maybe that does make me petty and immature. Whatever.

I will never ask Thomas not to be her friend to talk to her. Never. One, because I don’t ever want to be that controlling and manipulative. And two, because I understand what she is to him. She’s basically...his ex-wife lmao. That’s the simplest way I can put it. They’ve been friends for a long time and lived together for five years. He moved to Oregon for HER. Marriage was in discussion near the end. I mean, they probably could have gotten married if certain circumstances had been different (though I doubt either of them would’ve been happy in that marriage). They adopted a cat together. So she’s basically his ex-wife with whom he shares a “child” with (the cat), and he will therefore always have an important connection with her. She’s likely always going to be his friend and part of his life. I accept that and respect that completely. 

But for me, I will always see her as someone who was toxic and damaging to Thomas when they were together, and they were together for a long time. I understand that now they’re just friends so there’s no more toxicity in their relationship, and enough time has passed that he’s likely forgiven her and perhaps she’s even apologized to him for the way she was, but the effects from their relationship will always be there internally for Tom. I’m in a relationship with a Thomas who no longer lets himself get intensely attached to his romantic partners. I believe there is a wall no one will ever penetrate that keeps him safe from ever getting truly heartbroken or hurt again. He will likely never love me with the fervor and selflessness that I love him with because he cannot or does not want to give himself to a person like that anymore (this is all assumption of course, I don’t know the inner workings of his heart as well as he does and maybe I’m wrong). And that’s all because of that relationship. 

He will love and care for me as much as he can, will be firmly loyal and devoted and good and honest and kind. And that’s all I could ever ask for and want. I must emphasize this! I am not saying that Tom isn’t “good enough” or isn’t “giving me enough.” He loves me in his way (I can’t ask him to love me in MY way, that’s not how love works), and that’s all I’ll ever need. I love him unconditionally. But his whole concept of “love” and relationships has never been, and likely never will be, the same again for him. She really was his “one true love.” He’s “I’m not looking for anyone to ‘complete’ me” Thomas now, not “hopeless romantic, giving up everything and moving across the country for someone” Thomas anymore. I’m not saying I want Thomas to do something grand and dramatic to prove his love for me, or that I think he’s broken and needs to be fixed. I love him just as he is and would not change him in any way. He is perfect to me just as he is. 

My point is that he loved all he could love with her, for five plus years, and she drained him until there was hardly anything left. And as a result he (likely) decided he should never love someone that much ever again. And that crushes me completely. And I blame her for that. I’ll always blame her and always resent her for that. THAT’S the reason why it bothers me when he mentions her. She had selfless, devoted, hopeless romantic, emotional, vulnerable Thomas and she...didn’t care. She just wasted all of his love. How anyone could do that, I’ll never know. She never loved him as much as he loved her. He deserved better, and I’ll always be hurt by that. 

And so for all for all of that I…don’t like her. And I don’t want to try to like her. I don’t know if I ever CAN like her. And I hope he never demands that I do get to know her or become her friend or something because she’s really THAT important to him or whatever. God, I really hope that’s not a deal breaker for him or something but I feel like he would’ve mentioned that back then when it was brought up the first time. Maybe someday I’ll care less, I’ll get over it, I’ll forgive her too, but for now it’s still something that I can’t look past. I can live with it, I can accept it, but I don’t enjoy being reminded of it. 

I hate her for hurting the person I love. That’s all it is.

also I AM EXTREMELY SORRY FOR WRITING 2K+ WORDS ON A QUESTION THAT REALLY ONLY NEEDED A YES OR NO ANSWER SDJKLFDJKLDFJLKDFJKL; I just REALLY had to get this out of my system, and also need it for future reference in case it DOES come up again in the near future I want a sort of guide on how to express myself because I’ll likely be too emotional to articulate it verbally properly so it would be nice to have like an outline of things to touch on...if that makes sense. 

[aleatoryalarmalligator]

Life Story, Part 39

My father had planned a family trip to Florida, for us and Tammy to come along the summer of 2004. The plan was that we get into a rental vehicle, and we drive out to Portland Oregon, stay the night at a fancy hotel that my second cousin Jason (no relation to friend Jason at school) had a prominent position in, and then fly from there to Florida where my uncle Bob would be waiting. I had never heard of Portland before. I had actually never been to a town bigger than Spokane (though I had been to Florida once before as you may recall, and Florida, by comparison to the northwest seems to rarely become rural and therefore seemed like a town that never ended). And I had only been to Spokane about three times in my entire life.

Tammy was upset at having to leave her kids behind. Her and my father seemed to be having problems, but were trying to make the relationship work long enough to go on vacation. I remember I foolishly stayed up the whole night before we left. Back in those days MTV used to give it's users the option of a personalized page, where you could discover music and connect with other users. It was kind of like a more limited MySpace. Nothing of the sort exists on MTV any longer of course, and I doubt very many people even remember. My new favorite band was Rancid. I would listen to ..And Out Come The Wolves about three times a day. I loved Tim Armstrong. He was my hero. I wanted to be punk, but at the same time I knew it wouldn't be cool to profess yourself as punk, so I wanted others to label me as punk so I could then dismiss that I was punk, therefore proving even further just how punk I really was. At least that was my whole internalized logic on the matter.

I thought I knew what punk was, and I felt like even though I wasn't edgy and punk, I could at least put others down who were less edgy and punk than I but thought they were – for the sake of keeping punk 'pure' whatever that means entirely. I was obsessed with condemning posers. I would go on these absurd rants against 'the posers' all day sometimes. I am sure Sarah, bless her soul, who had to passively listen to countless hours of my concern for the teenyboppers who thought that Avril Lavigne and Hilary Duff were true punk rockers, simply because Hilary Duff had worn a bracelet that had spikes on it for a photo shoot one time was weary of it, even when she chose to agree. In my mind, I was defending some great concept from the end. I wanted to be someone who had strong opinions. It didn't matter if I was able to defend them or not.

The night before heading out to Florida, I was spending so much time watching and thinking about musicians I hated, that I might as well have been considered a fan really – having spent as much time thinking about these artists as an admirer would. I started sending these unnecessary messages to people whenever I could to people who liked Hilary Duff, Avril Lavigne, but also to people who were fond of Courtney Love. I thought she was also extremely trashy, and I did this thing where I compared her to Kurt Cobain and put her down. I would message these people and let them know how shallow and trashy they were, and how they were killing punk and should ashamed of themselves. They would  generally jump into a very pointless argument with me, having found the strong need to defend their favs. Somehow, I guess I must have thought I was making some kind of difference. It's such a foreign notion to me now, sending hate mail. I would have to be getting one hundred dollars an hour or more to waste my time pestering people. My only stab at guessing is that I was perhaps displacing my frustrations in life onto something I could attack, rather than all the things that I could not.

I was exhausted all the way to Portland, having stayed up all night embroiled in pointless back and forth between strangers online. I had never been farther than ten miles west of Lewiston in my entire life. So it was a shocking surprise to me when I found that past Lewiston, the world continued. We drove through an endless sea of dry empty Eastern Washington desert and heat. We drove through small towns even more empty and vague than Kendrick, towns like Waitsburg and Dayton. It was hard to imagine places more desolate than the small towns that I hailed from, but these places were even farther away from the cities than where I hailed from, and they were surrounded with nothing but fields for hundreds of miles.

A million years later we arrived in Portland. Despite my bleary eyes,I had never seen such a place and could barely contain gasps of disbelief. Despite my exhaustion, the view of The bridge that separated the east and west side was overwhelming. I had never seen such tall buildings. These buildings and this bridge, though large, are not the stately sky scrapers or bridges you see in New York or Chicago. But having lived in rural Idaho my whole life, the only real bridges I was used to seeing were the rustic kind that went across a roaring creek, or a small river.

I was also amazed to see all the obvious poverty. In Lewiston, there had been a man called The Bridgewalker who had been homeless more or less by choice, and he walked back and forth across the bridge all the time. I had seen him going to and fro for most of my entire life. Unfortunately, in 2001, he was found stabbed to death by someone who never was caught. Aside from him, I had been honestly unaware that there were homeless people that simply had nowhere to go. I had always assumed that the government would prevent this kind of poverty from happening. How could people simply walk past this without having a gut instinct that something in our society was horribly sick. Even if these people were uncooperative or to a degree driving themselves down, that too said something about our society. It was something new for me to contemplate.

We parked our vehicle at some point and walked down the streets. I saw people of every walk in life, including punks. I was fascinated by just how many staples and fliers there were on the wooden street poles. As we went along, a woman fell out of a building in front of us, and was instantly on all fours on the sidewalk throwing up her guts. I couldn't look away, though my father strongly insisted that I must.

The hotel was quite nice. When we went into the hotel, our cousin Jason (whom I had not really ever met) was gracious and brought us to our rooms. As an employee there, he had been able to pull some strings and get us a discount. From our place in high building, we could look down over the whole of the city. As the sun went down, the night lights were brilliant. Portland was a town of energy and decay. It reminded me of garbage that was given new life and in so doing became precious. I had never seen hip hop culture in real life. I had never seen real punks, or an counter culture really aside from a very small amount of hicks who happen to also line up with metalhead.

This stuff is just a day in the life for a great many people. I realize my shock and awe is probably a little bit silly sounding, but just this introduction to a city blew my mind. I felt in my bones that I belonged in a place like this. I couldn't wait to tell Sarah all about it, so that someday we might move to the city to become recognized and earn our place as rock stars. Underneath this big glorious egotistical craving for fame was of course the rage and disappointment of having had a life full of disrespect and abuse. Imagining that in the end, all the losses in my life might make sense made living worth trying. It also kept me distracted as well from the underlying fatigue of missing Zack all the time. I wanted to become a legend. I wanted to be adored and loved by endless amounts of people to make up for all the empty sadness I felt all the time.

In the morning, a tax picked us up and we were on our way to the airport. Tammy and my father didn't seem to be enjoying themselves in the least. I was, however. As we were situating Allison and David and getting our luggage in the vehicle, a homeless man came up to the cab driver in the window. He asked for money, threatening to prevent us from leaving the area until he got his money. The cab driver seemed callous and had a personality naturally ready for any bit of conflict that came his way. The both of them cussed one another out. We all got in the back with our stuff, and as we were leaving I watched the homeless man run after the car and throw a slushy (where this came from I shall never know) screaming obscenities at us the entire time.

The airplane ride over from Portland, to Denver, to Florida was of course fantastic. I had said it before, but air travel is one of my very favorite things in the whole world. I was given a window seat, which I deeply appreciated. We flew all day, and showed up to Florida that night. Its always a shock to arrive in the south by plane. Idaho has extremely dry air. It is very much what I am used to. To me the air is almost unbreathable down south. It's hot and moist and dense. I always go into mild shock when stepping of the cockpit. My uncle Bob and his wife Marty picked us up in two separate vehicles. Marty had been fond of me when I was younger. I had thought in my youth that she was pretty nice as well. However, now that I was older, I soon saw past this. It was her in the driver seat, I in the passengers side. Allison and David were in the back seat sleeping.

Marty apparently could not see me in the darkness of the car. She started talking about how disgusting it was that people dyed their hair. She thought people with piercings and tattoos deserved to die. She then started talking about how even though she liked the south, she wished that most all of the (insert racial slur)'s would go back to Africa, China, Mexico, Israel, Eastern Europe. She talked about how dirty other people were. She literally said she hated all music, blaming it for most of the U.S's problems. That the young people having a sex life made her sick. Marty hated children and had abandoned her own, feeling nothing for them. She was very proud of this fact. I didn't say anything. I didn't know how to make a point back then, and was somewhat used to agreeing for the sake of agreement in the moment, but this was too far. I mostly just sat there – wondering when she would see that I had dyed my hair black and my eyebrow was pierced. Also, I was chubby, and according to her, she honestly wished slow and painful deaths on overweight people – though she herself was a little chubby. I realized very quickly I didn't like her. And the shock on her face when I stepped out of the vehicle and into the home was priceless.

I was set up in a separate bedroom for my visit. I crashed that night after a day of flying, and woke up in the morning in a pool or sweat. They turned the air conditioner off at night. I thought this was very strange. If anything, I find that in places were it is always hot, it is actually much more beneficial to keep the air conditioner on at night instead. I have always been overly sensitive to heat. I realized in dismay that a gel pen I was using to write had fallen out of my pocket. I had been so tired, I had fallen asleep in my street clothes. The pen had leaked all over the sheets I was sleeping on. Ordinarily I would have told someone in the house and apologized, but Marty had seemed so atrocious the night before, I chose not to. It seemed like it would only add to the stress.

Bob was really into music. He had a lot of money, being a superintendent to several schools, and he was able to buy enough to keep several guitars. He had specialty Eric Clapton kinds of items. My father and him messed around with guitars in the music room, but as far as playing the instruments went, nobody in the house was allowed to make a peep, since soulless Marty hated all music. I had troubles understanding why Bob was married to her. Eventually, probably a week later, Marty discovered the spilled ink on her sheets. She also discovered that I opened my bedroom window at night. It was so hot at night I was beginning to feel dizzy, and even the outdoor air was preferable. I guess, though I don't know if this is a fact, if you leave a window or a door open too long in Florida, than some kind of rot will begin taking over almost immediately. At least that is what she insisted. She also exaggerated and said the sheets were three hundred dollars. My father looked them over, and honestly, they were absolutely not that much money. Marty hated me. She took Allison and David aside throughout the trip and told them as much. The entire time, she seemed to find reasons to be upset with my being there, once even shouting at me. My father had to step in on my behalf.

We tried to do fun things everyday. It really felt like Tammy was annoyed most of the time, and my father was stressed and trying to win her over somehow. At some point we went to a flea market. I still have a wraparound that I bought from one of the vendors. I stared longingly at the Buddhist statues and knickknacks on display, and my uncle Bob ended up buying one for me – which  I also have kept. I tried to enjoy the ocean again. We arrived on the shores of the Atlantic, and for the second time I couldn't handle it and went crazy. I loved it at first, though I couldn't help but look at a this person who was so tan that their skin was a dark orange brown and get a bit disturbed. I also really wondered how so many people enjoyed being in the same place. I tried to dig after a clam, but with little success, the bugger was too fast. The ocean was also nowhere a person could reasonably swim. And as I looked at it, I began questioning who I was. I became separated from my thoughts somehow, and started sensing the notion that there was not one version of me, but several, all of us looking out at the ocean, and none of us being aware or understanding one another. I started feeling shaky and confused. I felt like the tide was static, and it was the land that was moving back and forth. I became dizzy and almost passed out. I became nauseous. I knew from previous experience that something was actually wrong with me and nothing had actually changed, and after an hour of being separated from the ocean, I felt better again. The ocean and I can never be a match. I have tried looking up what this feeling could be. I guess it's some kind of seasickness or vertigo. But there is this strange psychological element to it that baffles me to this day.

We visited Disney World again. This time we went to Magic Kingdom. I don't remember everything about it, other than there was this 3D movie. They had us put on glasses, and I watched in horror as the Bug's Life bugs on the screen became real, and flew into my face. When one of the bugs began blasting acorns into the face of the audience at one hundred miles an hour, a blast of air from the seat in front of us blew air in our face. They had these choreographed fans, and when the bee flew behind and stung the audience, a pointy object came out from the backs of our chairs. I had had quite enough of this and took the glasses off and closed my eyes.

Most of Disney world was waiting in line. Most of the people seemed unhappy. I was able to get somewhat close to the fantasy castle that I had so dearly wanted to live in when I saw it in pictures as a young child, and I was disappointed to find that the castle wasn't really a castle. It was more or less a prop held up by planks. There might have been some places a person could be in inside the monument, but this was probably for those who worked on or around the castle. I couldn't help but take note that many things I had believed were magical and enchanted as a child were actually very much this way. Though my favorite ride (maybe the only one I really thought much of) was the It's A Small World Ride, which was basically being in a boat that carried you through these intricate vivid surreal settings with these electronic puppets all around you singing and dancing. Randomly the lights would go out and you would drop thirty feet or so. Allison was crying by the end of it.

We also went to the Everglades, and I adored it. There is a unique loveliness to that place that is hard to explain unless you have been there. Dead trees, moss, and living organisms of all kinds were teeming out of this swamp. There was this overfed alligator that laid out in the front of the resort area. It seemed to be overfed with the intention of showing guests just how big a gator could be. I was astounded, but couldn't help but feel that the alligator's life in that small containment was quite unnatural and a little sad. We took a tour on a motor boat that stopped at random places. It was marshy and intricate in detail of twigs and muck. Little alligators and large turtles swam up to the boat. I tried my very best to get a good photograph, and my father had to hold me back from getting too close to an alligator for the sake of a decent picture. After the trip, which I wanted to do again, but couldn't, we went into the restaurant and I ended up breaking my vegetarian diet and eating alligator. I remember liking it, though nothing distinct about it comes to mind.

My father wanted to go to the Florida Keys with Tammy, and we wanted to see my older sister Maria, who also lived in Florida. We didn't exactly, want to, but I hadn't seen my niece Jasmine in a very long time, and now I had even more nieces and nephews. Florida is strange in that you seem to be able to drive from one side to the other with a relative amount of ease. We drove a few hours to this other part of Florida. This part was really rugged it seemed to me, and beaten down. The buildings looked to be falling apart and neighborhoods far more seedy. There was a lot more graffiti on the walls of businesses, and a fair amount of small loan businesses and places of that nature. Florida wasn't all resorts and sandy beaches.

We found Maria's house and were dropped off with the promise of getting picked up in a week. This ended up being one of the most unpleasant weeks of my life. The place was run down and garbage was everywhere. There wasn't very many decent places to sleep or sit. The couch I was sleeping on was soiled and gross. There wasn't really any food, though there was enough. Maria made hamburger helper every night. And the family all watched either cheap infomercials or this bad tasteless comedy called Stuck on You, about conjoined twins. Everyday I found myself bored out of my mind, wanting to be anywhere else. It was always hot, the carpet was sticky. Jasmine was five now, and I did enjoy being around her. Ian was two or three and he seemed to be a bit more of a handful, and Chantelle was just a little baby, with a particularly pretty face, which I don't give that compliment lightly. Babies can be cute, but they often aren't pretty.

In order to get by mentally, I ended up spending several dollars on Ben and Jerry's ice cream at this nearby corner market. By this time in my life, I was eating a lot, and it would be dishonest for me to underplay it. I was eating two or three of those small five dollar containers a day while visiting Maria. Ordinarily, I never had the money to buy snacks, but given my situation and the feeling of being trapped, I felt I really had no choice. I ended up spending around eighty dollars on ice cream. It was one of the biggest amounts of money I had ever had in my pocket at any one time, and that is what I blew it on. I really regretted it. So in order to make up for this, when my father finally came and got me – which felt like years later, I lied to him about where my money went, and I told him that I spent it on food for Maria, since her and her kids seemed to be starving. He felt badly about my martyrdom and reimbursed me. I had also eaten so much ice cream that I had made myself disgusted even at the site of it, and it was almost two years before I would partake in eating it ever again.

I wish I could say that my favorite thing about Florida was Disney World or the beach. The Everglades were close. But to be honest, we went into a department store and I found Radiohead's 'The Bends'. It's something I could have found at home in Idaho, but the new setting, the new kinds of trees, weather, and overall tropical nature of Florida brought this album to life somehow. I might be one of the only people in the world that feels on instinct that The Bends is a tropical album in any way. I spent most of my time in Florida listening to The Bends over and over again on my headphones with my portable cd player. My greatest memories were of listening to this album on repeat, while watching the world shower with rain.

I kept thinking about Zack, somewhere out there. And I thought very hard about the promises he made to me before he left. He had promised me that he would come get me one day, him, Melissa and I, and we would escape. I wondered very seriously where people could ever go to escape truly, as it seemed that there was a homogeneous undercurrent to the world, regardless if you lived on one side of the globe or the other. And what was there to escape? What was it we were fighting against exactly? He seemed to doubt the legitimacy of everything, and had been paranoid about the government in all it's forms. So really, could there be such a place?

I have no idea of the details behind all the days that Tammy and my father were gone, but they seemed miserable with each other when they arrived to pick us up, and for the remainder of the time, it only seemed to get worse. Eventually, Tammy seemed to befriend Marty, and the two of them started openly talking badly about both my and my father. I knew something was up, but it was hard to put my finger on it. And there were moment where my uncle would look me over, and I felt kind of strange about that as well. I didn't want to think that he was being a pervert, but I had some indication to believe that he may have been being one. He was also being very accommodating and friendly. He burned me the Beatles Anthology 3, which is my favorite Beatles album. He gave me a small acoustic guitar as well.

The last days I mostly stayed indoors in the overheated room that I could no longer cool down by opening the window, else the spores of fungi come in and take over the entire house. My CD player ran out of batteries, and there was no available opportunities for me to go get more. So I mostly laid in bed all day and watched all of The Tenth Kingdom – which I found a copy of somewhere in the house, and hours and hours of the Ricki Lake Show. I felt gross. And everyone was angry at one another. It was hard for me to leave the bedroom without one of the adults making me feel weird.

On the last day, my father came into the room. He sat me down and told me that Uncle Bob and Aunt Marty were willing to keep me. Basically, they felt that I was a lazy teenager who needed a kick in the boot, and having me stay there with them would be a bit like bootcamp for me to reform me – change me from a bad teenager into a good one. They were willing to pay for me to get the schooling I needed to catch up. They might have been willing to even pay for my college if I stayed long enough. They would set me up in one of the rooms and I could have things that I never even really thought about having since they were so far out of reach. My uncle had money after all. They also wanted to get me into the habit of doing a lot of chores. I felt very strongly that Marty was hoping to turn me into a maid that she could ridicule whenever she wanted.

With the reality of the situation at hand, I told my father I would think about it, and I did. I wanted a new life away from Kendrick, but the pain of Ava and Zack was still very much a part of my daily life, that seemed like it would never go away and was always staring me in the face when I woke up in the morning. I wanted to stay close with Sarah, but most of the time it was hard to do much with her. She slept till four in the afternoon and rarely left the house unless it was night time. And most of the time she just wanted to sit at the computer and talk to people on the CKY forums talking to her online friends. This might have been a chance for me to be a new person. The money was there at least.

But I couldn't help but remember my uncles strange way of looking at my chest, and then just thinking of living with my wretched racist aunt. Something felt very wrong about it. Not to seem totally shallow, but it never made much sense to me how Bob was married to Marty. She had female baldness, a squinty mean face, this strange shrill voice that was constantly criticizing and angry, and most of the things she said were horribly racist and disgusting. She was honestly too horrible to even get a job. Whereas, my uncle didn't share any of her values, had a fancy job, looked pretty normal and seemed very bright and talented. He had paintings he had done all over the house, and they were amazing. They seemed to have nothing in common. So why did they want me to be a part of it? Like, both of them were willing to keep me around, but with both of them it seemed to be for entirely different reasons. Marty wanted to beat down a young woman since she felt this cruel vindictive urge to do that sort of thing to someone else seemingly all the time, and my uncle wanted to shower me with gifts – and look at my chest(?)

I had this strange hunch about the situation, and I could think of many scenarios that seemed horrific, that involved good cop, bad cop, blackmail and guilt, possible molestation, and ultimately two sociopathic people looking to destroy my spirit. This might be a very unfair assessment and the ravings of my own mistrustful imagination. I realize it might shock and horrify my uncle who might have honestly felt he was trying to do right by me. I am being honest writing this now in a way I never really have been too often about the situation. Because really, nothing happened. I am going purely on small microexpressions and notions that I was given. After a week of being home, I declined. My father seemed relieved. In doing this, I might have turned down a free education, a possible grand future, but it seemed wrong on instinct, and if for no better reason, I could not imagine calling Florida home. It seemed wrong to leave Sarah and Zack if nothing else. As hard as life was in Idaho, I couldn't simply deny my destiny there. And even for all the problems I had, I would have missed my own father, whom I could at least trust to never look at me inappropriately.

On the plane trip home, I was disappointed that I would be getting a middle seat instead of a window. Allison took the aisle seat next to me. At first, nobody seemed to be taking the designated seat by the window in my lane, so I held out hope that the person would not arrive. As I sat there, a very large woman boarded the plane. She was the largest woman I had ever seen. When I call her fat, I don't mean it as an insult. It was simply and truly the case that she was so large she could barely walk. And her seat was right next to mine as the window seat.

There really was barely enough room for her. We both got up for her and let her get in her seat. She seemed extremely uncomfortable. I got this strong feeling that she was actually terrified. People were looking over the seats in front of them just to get a look at her. I didn't want to be rude either, but her girth was such that she was spilling into my seat, and there was really almost no room for me. I could not really operate the video screen in front of me to watch anything, since her fat had spilled over  the armrest with the buttons on it.

We started flying and when we reached a level altitude, as is the custom, a flight attendant served us Sunchips. She accepted them, but I noticed that as she was eating them, she started crying. I felt so horrible for her. I didn't know anything about her life at all in any way, but I really had this strong sense that whatever had brought her onto an airplane had to be really traumatic. And I could tell that she knew that her fat was spilling over onto my lap. She was humiliated. As uncomfortable as I was, with this close of proximity, I really could understand that this was causing her serious fatigue an distress and misery was so much worse. The plane ride was several hours. In that time, without having any window to look out of, being trapped between Allison sleeping against me, and her on the other side, I was stiff as an uncomfortable board. She continued to cry for a good many hours. The minor bit of turbulence made me feel kind of sick. It was not a fun plane ride home.

However, I will say that this trip made me really think about what it means to be that heavy in the world. I was able to get a grasp of the humanity of her situation in a way I may never have been had I not been thrust into this circumstance. Sure, I have always been somewhat more or less heavy myself – but not on that level. For her, there was no escaping just about every technical and societally negative aspect for this woman who clearly was suffering and simply wanted to be able to be treated with dignity. It's an uncomfortable situation that I think many people would have gone home laughing at, if they had been in my shoes – because most people, if I am going to be honest, are not very kind. Her experience was something nobody should have to go through with. And people her size should not have to pay for an added seat. It's dehumanizing. There should be seats that are designed for people like her, and she shouldn't have been forced to put herself in a situation where she was humiliated like that. And when a few years ago, that Nicole Arbor 'Dear Fat People' video came out on YouTube, I really thought everything that was said was horrible and vicious. I couldn't help but feel like Nicole Arbor was targeting this woman that I sat next to a decade previous.

My father and Tammy ended up breaking up when we got home. By the time we were on the plane, Tammy was saying she felt sorry for me that my father was Dave. I listened to her awkwardly. I guess Tammy had been pregnant, had not told my father, and had chosen to get an abortion instead as soon as she got home. Or something like that, I am not entirely sure of the time scale of this situation. My father was an angry sobbing mess, feeling that Tammy had somehow aborted his baby – as he is pro-life. He wasn't quite so adamant that this was a case of murder, as he has at least the vague notion that abortion isn't exactly that simple. But he was upset. He tried to visit Tammy here and again, but eventually they were done, and another potential stepmom was out the door.

And that more or less was my trip to Florida. It cost my father over eleven thousand dollars, which seemed unreal to me. I never told him that my favorite part had simply been listening to The Bends on my headphones while watching it rain, an experience that had only cost me a mere 14$.

PART 38 - http://tinyurl.com/ycr7la8q

PART 37 - http://tinyurl.com/y8trssqd

PART 36 - http://tinyurl.com/y9ygq9q8

PART 35 - http://tinyurl.com/ya5xhe2f

PART 34 - http://tinyurl.com/yc6y4p69

PART 33 - http://tinyurl.com/y87449dz

PART 32 - http://tinyurl.com/ycetanep

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PART 30 - http://tinyurl.com/ybht9aul

PART 29 - http://tinyurl.com/ybfcr9j2

PART 28 - http://tinyurl.com/yagdlo47

PART 27 - http://tinyurl.com/ydcj5fgf

PART 26 - http://tinyurl.com/y73nvl73

PART 25 -  http://tinyurl.com/y6v6pgoj

PART 24 - http://tinyurl.com/ycak5d8r

PART 23 - http://tinyurl.com/yac6sk3g

PART 22 -  http://tinyurl.com/yat6cfnw

PART 21 -  http://tinyurl.com/y783egno

PART 20 - http://tinyurl.com/y8jskymt

PART 19 - http://tinyurl.com/rfhbms8

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PART 17 - http://tinyurl.com/y77unlng

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PART 14 - http://tinyurl.com/yb4cfedq

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PART 11 - http://tinyurl.com/yc9qhj84

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PART 8 - http://tinyurl.com/ybl37utq

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PART 5 - http://tinyurl.com/msnz4am

PART 4 - http://tinyurl.com/k9x8esg

PART 3 - http://tinyurl.com/mwp9atx

PART 2 - http://tinyurl.com/lbt6xq2

PART 1 - http://tinyurl.com/l8xbvg8