#why finish the historiography when i can do this instead

[gracelingdesolate]

dude I wanna hear about like. any of your characters for the 10 facts thing. especially your Jedi and commander petal give me The Details

oh boy this’ll be fun i wish i could do all of them PFFT but since you didn’t specify which jedi i’m doing all three

Raksha Svechl1. She’s Allaranthan, a nice little made up planet I came up with bc I didn’t want to sacrifice that part of her original design2. She didn’t start as a Jedi, she started as a Sith and was raised that way. She didn’t join the Jedi until she was about 13 and even then she has always felt like an outsider among them.3. She’s a trans woman and gay as hell she literally could not be more of a lesbian4. Her lightsaber is orange and inspired by this one bit of lore I found about a dude who took a red crystal and stripped the darkness and corruption from it, leaving his yellow. That’s basically what she did with her old saber.5. In Allaranthan culture the people receive a sort of spiritual guide to help them through life. While it’s important for normal people, it’s even more for a stronger Force wielder. Raksha’s is a massive dog-like creature.6. When Raksha was 17 she journeyed to Allaranth to find her guide. On that trip she met a very pretty girl named Sahmira and she fell so hard for her. They secretly got together and are still together as far into the story as I have planned.7. She holds quite a lot of the Jedi at a distance and respects very few of them. The only one she completely and absolutely trusts is her Master because she knows that he saved her from a horrible life with the Sith.8. She didn’t agree with the clone wars and didn’t get involved in them until she saw a certain commander being tried and found guilty for killing his Jedi general. When she heard he was being sent back for reconditioning, she marched straight up to Yoda and demanded that he let her take both Commander Petal and the rest of the 354th under her command.9. After a few disastrous battles, she realized that the 354th couldn’t function as an attack battalion anymore or it would destroy itself. She forced the Council and Senate to change them to dealing mainly in relief efforts and search and rescue missions.10. She survived Order 66 and fled to Allaranth. After a few close calls, she and Sahmira packed up and left Allaranth, disappearing into the Outer Rim where they waited and watched as the Empire rose and the Rebellion began.

Dier Anuli1. Dier is a human Jedi who has been with the Jedi for as long as he can remember.2. He is extremely dedicated to following the Jedi Code to the letter. Yoda is basically God and the Council is not to be questioned because they always know best.3. Green lightsaber!4. He prefers more defensive fighting styles than offensive.5. Before the clone wars began, he took on a padawan. A young Allaranthan boy called Noctin. He cared too much about Noctin and saw him as a son, which made his mentoring confusing at best. Sometimes he would treat Noct like a son and other times he would distance himself completely in an attempt to get back on what the Code asked of them.6. The wars began not long after and Dier was quickly given command of the 354th attack battalion7. He grew very attached to his troops, particularly to Petal, who he began to have more romantic feelings for. He tried very hard to dismiss them but didn’t have much success. In his attempts to do so he got cold and short with pretty much everyone. It didn’t make him any less possessive of them, however.8. As the war went on and he saw more and more horrible things it knocked everything he knew off balance. How could the Jedi have let something so horrible happen? They were supposed to be peacekeepers and instead they had turned into warmongers.9. In the end it was the visions that made him snap. He had horribly realistic nightmares of himself turning on his troops and slaughtering them in cold blood. He saw himself killing Noctin and going to the Temple for the Council. He saw himself killing those he had looked up to all his life.10. He snapped. It was a tiny mistake that set him off and he went on a massacre, attacking Noctin and nearly killing him before being stopped by his troops. He killed many of them before Petal was finally able to gun him down.

Noctin Aeriea1. Also Allaranthan! His guide is an owl2. Friends with Ahsoka bc like…………. please she’s my fav of course he’s friends with her3. He’s like the exact opposite of Dier. He loves everyone and doesn’t really try to stifle it unless he’s around the Council. Very free with his emotions.4. He’s trans too bc cisgender whomst5. He dual wields and has two blue lightsabers. Since in his original story his main weapon his two battle knives, I kept the speed and agility aspect of him bc this tiny boy can’t fight anything with brute strength pls6. He doesn’t have any real feelings toward the war. It’s really all he knows since he was dragged into it around 12 years old. While he does hate all the dying, he doesn’t know what his life would be without all the fighting.7. He viewed Dier as a father figure so when Dier fell it shattered him. His trust in everyone was broken and he though he did try to stay with the Jedi, he eventually left because he couldn’t deal with the war and the fear that he would be betrayed again.8. On his wanderings after he left the Jedi, he met two Allaranthans called Konas and Sarín. They took him into their little group and they all became very close.9. He was around to see Order 66 happen. Not good. Still trying to decide if anything happens to him.10. Didn’t join the rebellion until really late in the game bc he was terrified and couldn’t bring himself to risk his life or his friends.

Commander Petal1. Is super tight with Kickstart, Shade, and Scree. They’ve been together since Kamino2. He’s shit at languages and more or less cheated his way through that part of training. Now he just makes Scree translate everything for him.3. Got his name from a later training incident where Shade came up with the brilliant plan to shove a bunch of flowers into his pack and armor. He didn’t have time to get all of the flowers out so he spent the rest of the day trailing petals wherever he went- or as Shade loves to put it, “He had petals falling out his ass all day”4. When he was assigned to Dier, the very first thing he noticed was Noctin and how young he was. That really, really pissed him off and he never stopped being angry about it5. Does not like the Jedi for a multitude of reasons. Sending children into battle is very high on the list, and the fact that the clones are a slave army is right behind it6. He’s Force sensitive. He has told exactly four people in his entire life: Kickstart, Shade, Scree, and Raksha7. He did return Dier’s feelings but didn’t push anything bc even though he thought the Jedi Code was ridiculous, he respected that it meant a lot to Dier8. He was the one who killed Dier. He shot him after Dier seriously fucked him up and killed Shade. The shot nearly revealed him as Force sensitive and because he couldn’t explain it to the Council/Senate he was to be sent back to Kamino for reconditioning.9.  He really super duper hated the Jedi after that and was seriously considering going awol for a long time. He only stayed because he couldn’t abandon the 354th and make them face everything alone.10. Not sure how Order 66 affected him, but I have decided that afterwards he and Kickstart go awol and lay low under the reign of the Empire.

[nexility-sims]

get to know me.

tagged by: all my friends ! [insert crying emoji] thanks for the inclusion, @warwickroyals & @armoricaroyalty & @funkyllama & @trentonsimblr & @trouvailleroyals

favorite color: black, red, all of those verdant shades of green.

currently reading: [unhinged screaming] on the docket for today is gary nash's forging freedom and cynthia radding's wandering peoples. yesterday, i read stuff about the andes and also women in plantation households. for leisure, i've been reading since this summer: tommy orange's there there, ottessa moshfegh's my year of rest and relaxation, and stephen graham jones' my heart is a chainsaw. also y'all's stories ! i don't want to jinx myself, but i'm hoping to FINALLY catch up with @ardeney-sims this weekend, among some others i'd like to at least start. if anyone has suggestions for how to keep your place in stories instead of frantically scrolling someone's blog every time ... lemme know ...

last song you listened to: uh oh. spotify says "king" by florence + the machine, which checks out.

last series watched: my watching is all over the place. lately, it's been dance moms (finished. chaos) and season two of rez dogs (so good), plus i started rewatching american horror story: coven with a friend this week. i also started fear city on netflix last night but idk if i'll go back to it. why when i can rewatch goodfellas for the 1834935th time .... oh, and fear the walking dead ! i picked it back up recently but idk if i will continue anytime soon (more zombies, less interpersonal drama that isn't about zombies). either way, it's october. should be watching scary stuff.

sweet, savory, or spicy: i like them all but i'm a savory gal at heart. i love desserts so much, and i like spicy food more than it likes me, but ultimately... pretzels make my world go 'round.

craving: OKAY SO LIKE. i wanted italian food, and then when i sat down this morning to make my dinner plans, i was like "meh... vegetables?" i am craving green things, but i ain't a quitter, so we're having salad and decadent pasta tonight. we're in a weird and not-good place this week, mentally and emotionally, that's my explanation.

tea or coffee: i like both. but ... i have coffee daily—latte, almond milk because i hate the environment or w/e obviously, no sugar—but tea is more infrequent as of late. i am a southerner through and through, tho, so i love sweet tea. that counts.

working on: everything and nothing, it feels like. grading papers. trying to stay on top of my reading list. writing grant applications. writing a historiography for my dissertation proposal. building a house for sims who haven't even been born yet. researching tattoos and testing them in cas. procrastinating revisions for my story outline. ruminating on the asks y'all've sent. whew.

tagging: anyone who wants to do it ! i think everyone i might've tagged has either done it or been tagged. but, uh, tag me so i can see your answers, if you haven't & want to.

[linearao3]

I wanted to have my last chapter ready for today, which is the day of Queer Reylo Week focused on bi/pan interpretations of the characters. I couldn't finish the whole thing, but I'm excerpting (un-beta'd, so please forgive typos) a part where Ben and Rey talk about his feelings for Tai, and about what you want the people you love to know about you. Behind the cut, mostly for length.

...

Rey sees Tai in Ben’s dreams, and she wakes up feeling… bad. There’s no more precise name to attach to the feeling; it’s a bundle of a lot of feelings, and trying to pick them apart and examine them seems like it will also make her feel bad, and when you feel bad you insult your foster parents and snarl at your boss and things just get worse from there, so instead she just leaves the vague label, bad feelings, and pushes it down to the place where all the bad feelings go and then avoids that place.

The guy is dead. What is there to feel about it but bad?

It’s Ben who brings him up. It doesn’t feel like he does it on purpose; he’s arguing with his mother about some point of scholarship, and he says, “Tai said it was a reference to Pindar, and just aesthetic, that that was the fashion in prophecy in those days.”

“I thought your friend’s specialty was demonic taxonomy,” Leah says.

“He took his degree in Classics,” Ben says. “With a focus on historiography.”

The argument goes on, to places Rey does not understand or care about. But what sticks in Rey’s head is what stuck there before: Leah said friend.

Later, in the almost-quiet of a 4AM subway, she asks him. “Does your mom not know? About you and Tai?”

He looks out the window, like the sparking mosaics of the Lincoln Center station are suddenly interesting. “What?”

“That you were together. Are you not — out to her?”

“We weren’t together.” The train enters the tunnel, and the window goes dark. She can see her own reflection, but not his.

“Is that not allowed, for Watchers? To get with other Watchers?”

“It’s allowed. My mom’s parents were both Watchers. We just… weren’t.”

“Why not?” Why does Rey keep pushing? It’s the bad feelings, squirming their way up from where she put them and wriggling free.

“He didn’t — it wasn’t like that for him.”

Rey remembers Poe, showing her the picture of Ben. This is his only picture from his trip to NYC, and he turned his back on the Statue of Liberty to take it. “Like what?” He turns his head further, so all she can is his hair. She looks down at her shoes; she’s grinding one foot into the filthy floor like she’s trying to put out a cigarette. “Did you love him?”

Ben’s quiet for a very long time. They pull into 59th St, and then out again. He slumps, his shoulders hunched like a teenager’s. “Yeah,” he finally says, hoarsely. “Yeah. I did. But he — he didn’t want it to be like that. We were just friends. And we had sex sometimes.”

Like with me. Like how you think it is with me. Except I love you. And I bet Tai did too. And that’s one of the bad feelings, she realizes, miserably. She’s jealous.

But she’s not just jealous. “But — you couldn’t tell your mom?”

She doesn’t want that. She has a secret mental record of every bit of positive feedback Leah’s ever given her, and when she’s had a good night hunting, she plays them on a triumphant loop, hoping to add one more you’ve done well to her collection. She still feels a shameful little thrill when Leah talks to the council or to Ben and says my Slayer, like Rey is hers and she’s proud of it. So that’s another bad feeling. That she doesn’t want Leah to be someone Ben couldn’t tell.

He shrugs, a jerky, unhappy shrug. She’s seen him younger, in his dreams, and he’s moving like he’s back in that gawky body, like he’s the wrong size for his own mind. “What’s to tell?”

Rey swallows. “That you’re… bi. Queer.”

He stares out at the 50th St station, as the train leaves it behind, the walls tiled with the silhouettes of Alice and the White Rabbit. “I didn’t — I don’t — I guess. I guess I thought. I was in love with Tai. But Tai didn’t want it — he didn’t want it to be love. What I felt. So I pretended it wasn’t. And if I wasn’t in love with Tai, then what did I have to tell?”

She reaches out for his hand, and stops herself. “Could you tell her now?”

“Why?”

Rey swallows. The next stop is their transfer, but she doesn’t want to get up, and break the seal on this by taking it out and up and down the stairs at Times Square. “Because I think she might want to know. About who you are.”

He doesn’t say anything, and the brakes hiss, and the doors rattle open, and the announcer mumbles, 42nd St-Times Square. Transfer to the 2/3 and the N/Q/R trains. Transfer to the A/C/E via the passage to Port Authority. Transfer to the shuttle to Grand Central. Rey doesn’t get up. Neither does Ben. Stand clear of the doors, the announcer says, sounding exhausted, and the closing chime sounds. Neither of them move. The doors close. The train moves again.

She can barely hear him over the rattle of the tracks. “Is that? Who I am?”

“I mean.” Rey looks down again. His hand is plucking at the seam of his jeans. “It’s who I am,” she says. “And I think. I’d want. I’d want my mom to know.”

Oh great. More bad feelings.

He goes completely still. “Rey.”

“I mean. If my mom were like I thought she was. Or hoped she was. Or whatever. I don’t know how she actually was. But maybe I’d want her to know anyway. Just because she should. Like she should know how you died. She should know who you are.” She looks back up. He’s looking at her. His eyes are brimming. She loves how easily he cries, how exposed his heart is. She loves him. “And she should know what you lost. When you lost Tai.”

And that’s the worst feeling of all, isn’t it? Knowing what Ben has lost. It feels so awful, to remember that her parents are dead; it’s like being suffocated. Like there’s a hole in her chest, and everything is falling out of her until there’s nothing left. And when she thinks about Tai, she knows Ben must feel like that, too.

The tears spill out of his eyes. And she shouldn’t do it. It gives too much away. But she can’t help it. She wipes his tears the way he’s wiped hers, with her fingers. “She should know,” she says again, and he catches her by the wrist.

“You too,” he says, and she knows what he means, even before he says, “you said it was who you are too. Will you — will you come — do you want to tell her too?”

He must be able to feel her pulse speeding, in her wrist. But it could mean anything, couldn’t it? And he makes her pulse speed up all the time. Because they have sex. But they’re not in love. Because he hurts, all the time, for her sake, and she has to keep him safe.

“Of course,” she says. “We’ll both go. We’ll both tell her.”

He nods. He’s back in his own body again, not a gawky teen but a tall, dangerous man who knows his own body. Who knows himself. He nods again, more firmly, and lets her wrist go. “We can transfer to the F at 14th St,” he says, looking out the window. “That’ll get you close to home. Do you want to tell her tomorrow night?”

“If you want to,” Rey says. “If you’re ready.”

“Give me a date and a time,” Ben says. “I’ll make myself ready.” And his hand goes to his chest, like it always does when he’s tired.

[umbraja]

Screaming into the Void

I write for half an hour almost every morning. Not fiction. More like a transcription of the conversations I have with myself trying to untangle whatever pressing thoughts kept me up that night. I do this because I’ve learned the hard way that people don’t want to hear what’s in my head. Or at least the ones I talk to are tired of hearing it. Unfortunately talking about it makes me feel better. It helps me process and make sense of this absurd world we all live in. So I write instead.

If I could afford a therapist I’m pretty sure she would say that’s a good thing. Healthy coping mechanism. Therapists like it when people write about their thoughts. Journaling helps get ideas out, forces you to slow down enough to actually think about them, and being written down can help you remember it later. I get that. Journaling really is good therapy and I recommend it for everyone.

I just find it hard to understand why people don’t like talking about the things in my journal. But then I also don’t understand why people do most of what they do. I am Autistic so I don’t really get “normal” things.

“I’ve spent a lifetime being told to shut up”

My journal isn’t normal either. It’s not full of hopes, dreams, or even nightmares. It rarely talks about myself or my day and then only to exemplify a broader subject. Its entries are not addressed “Dear Diary” or to my future self or even some imaginary friend. The intended audience is most often all of humanity, or at least America. It reads like a collection of academic papers or editorials on a wide range of topics. I often end up doing research for these articles, as if they might someday be published in a very strange magazine.

But they never will be. I’ve been convinced that no one wants to hear what I’m trying to say. I’ve spent a lifetime being told to shut up about it. Stop being so paranoid/alarmist/negative. It’s rude to point that out. Or my favorite - No one cares about that. So I go through life observing patterns, taking note of things that normal people are too busy or afraid to see. And I do nothing with it.

Part of me hates that. The part that hasn’t given up yet. I really think it could do some good if people would just listen to what I have to say once in a while. Not that any of it is revolutionary. I’m no genius. It’s probably all been said a dozen times by people smarter than me. But good ideas bear repeating and it wouldn’t hurt to hear them again. Especially with all the bad ideas going around these days.

“Does anyone out there want to listen?”

This will probably go nowhere. I’m just screaming into the void after all. But I wonder - does anyone out there want to listen? So I’m writing today, for a lot more than half an hour, to ask anyone who sees this if they want to read my journal. Most of it’s not even finished. I usually give up once the crushing reality that no one cares starts to outweigh my need for connection. But if anyone is interested I will gladly finish whatever article they would like to read and publish it here for the world to see.

Pick an Article and I’ll Post It:

2020: Vindication for Losing My Mind in 2016

How to Find Meaning in a World That Doesn’t Make Sense

Apparently Making Everyone Live My Lifestyle Collapses the Economy

Workplace Inequality: I’ve Hit the Autistic Glass Ceiling

The Importance of Art in Civilization: Unifying Self Expression

How to Make CBD at Home and Why it May not be Legal

The Pandemic Showed Me How Stressful Being Normal Really Is

I Hated Social Media Before it Was Cool

Generational Poverty: the Engine of Systemic Racism

Sorry State of Women’s Health: Endometriosis Sucks

Historiography of the End of Civilization: from Sumeria to Us

How to Fix American Schools: Respect Different Intelligences

How Branding Made Zoom a Household Name though Discord is Objectively Better

When Were We Great? History of American Exceptionalism

Aquaponics: Making Fish Feed the World

That’s the Way it Is: Abuse, Neglect, and ASD

Copyright Paradox: Supporting Artists while Stifling Creativity

How to Fix Capitalism: Recipes for Eating the Rich

The Relationship Cycle: Why I Can’t Keep Friends

American Politics: Eerily Similar to Divorced Parents

My Father the Man-child: Growing up with a Narcissist

The World Would be a Better Place if Liberals Understood Branding

Body Hair Positivity: Good or Gross?

Rose Colored Glasses Prevent Migraines - Not a Metaphor

OK Boomer: Explaining to My Parents How Much Easier They Have It

When Fanworks Were Mainstream and How That Changed

What’s Wrong with Academia and How to Fix It

Being Moderate in America: So I’m a Liberal Now?

Conservative Hypocrisy: Quantity over Quality of Life

Liberal Idiocy: Being Right Doesn’t Win the Fight

Conservative Hypocrisy: Law and Order not Protect and Serve

Liberal Idiocy: It’s Hard to be Woke When You’re Poor

Conservative Hypocrisy: What Would Jesus Really Say about America?

Liberal Idiocy: Slactivism’s False Sense of Accomplishment

Conservative Hypocrisy: How to Sneak Facism into a Democracy

Liberal Idiocy: One Size Does Not Fit All

Conservative Idiocy: Private Gun Owner vs the US Military

Liberal Hypocrisy: Social Justice Warriors

Perceived Reality: We Really Do Live in Different Worlds

Standing Still: Paralyzed by Emotional Shutdown

American Sheeple: Generations of Domestication

Depression. It’s a Lifestyle.

How to Survive in a World That Doesn’t Want You

Leave a comment to let me know what you'd like to read. If anything.

[calpalirwin]

Shenanigan Squad

Summary: Ashton’s focus was simple: graduate. But if he happened to make some friends, and maybe a little more, along the way, he wasn’t one to complain.

A/N: College Ash AU!

Content: Swearing. Alcohol usage. AKA Bri and her usual bullshit.

Word Count: Just shy of 6k

And away, and away we go!

~~~

Ashton’s glasses pushed up as he rubbed at his eyes. Eight am was way too early to be having class. But, at least he had his friend Mike with him. Graduation was so close, he could practically feel the degree in his hand. And at least the class was taught by Professor Lewis. So even though it was early, the enthusiasm was infectious as the red-haired, freckled professor bounced around the front of the lecture room, his voice way too perky as he went, “Alright! Let’s get this started! Get to know your neighbors! Find out what they did over the summer!”

Ashton couldn’t help but chuckle at the older man’s energy as he turned in his seat and started conversing with Mike, catching up on how the summer had treated them both. While they had kept in touch, neither of them had actually seen each other since May right after finals. That wasn’t to say they weren’t friends though. A shared major and common quest for a scrap of paper was a bonding experience and Ashton had created a small close-knit group without ever realizing it.

“Ah, Jo! Nice of you to join us!” Professor Lewis said as a young woman walked in, backpack slung over one shoulder.

“Hey,” she greeted warmly, hurrying up the aisle and taking the empty seat behind Mike.

Ashton looked at the woman in her flannel with the sleeves rolled up, her blonde-streaked hair pulled back into a ponytail, her cheeks flushed from her fast-paced walk across campus. Her black glasses slid down her nose as she pulled a notebook and pen out of her backpack. She pushed them back into place and she flipped open the notebook before reaching forward to tap Mike on the shoulder. “Psst, Mike, what are we doing?”

“Jo!” Mike said happily. “Introductions. What we did over the summer. You know.”

“Cool,” she nodded, her brown eyes scanning the room. “Aw, sweet Luke’s here, too? Dope.” She offered a small wave to the tall blue-eyed blonde closer to the back of the room. “And you are?” she asked, her gaze settling on Ashton as she finished her scan of the room.

“Ashton,” he supplied, offering her a hand.

“Jordan,” she smiled, a dimple appearing in her right cheek. “Or Jo. Are you new to the history department? Or have we just never been lucky enough to have a class together?”

“Not lucky enough to have a class together,” Mike explained to her. “Ash is gonna be in thesis with us, too.”

“Oh, shit, yeah?” she asked, her eyes brightening. “Dope. Luke’s in it too, yeah?”

“Yup,” the green eyed boy said. “Not Cal though. He couldn’t get a section.”

“Bummer,” she said, leaning back in her desk. “So, Ash- Do you prefer Ash or Ashton?- How do you know this nerd?” she asked, gesturing to Mike.

“Oh, we took the historiography class last semester together. But we’ve had other classes together too. And Ash is fine.”

“Right, cuz you, Cal, and Luke ditched me,” she said with playful roll of her eyes as she nudged Mike’s shoulder.

Ashton wasn’t sure why, but he swallowed harshly as Calum’s name was brought up for the second time. He knew the brown-skinned boy fairly well, having had a class or two with him in the past. They were friendly. Ashton would easily consider Calum to be part of his close-knit group. But the fact that the girl to his right also knew Calum didn’t settle well in his stomach.

“It didn’t fit in our schedule. And hey, at least we had Lewis together,” Mike defended.

She nodded again. “True that. And my historiography paper was loads easier than yours.”

“Fucker,” Mike muttered with a small chortle. “Jo here got it easy with Lopez and turned in...” Mike started to explain to the rest of the small group but faltered. “How many pages did you turn in?” he asked, his green-eyed gaze shifting to the girl.

Jordan’s gaze went up and her teeth bit into her lower lip as she thought. “Like.. 4 and a half, I think?” she answered, uncertainly.

Ashton whistled low. “Shit, I turned in 12 I think.”

Jordan shrugged. “I got a B minus, so…”

“Alright!” Professor Lewis said, his hands clapping together to get the attention of the room full of history majors. “Let’s hear about your classmates’ summers.”

“Shit…” Ashton muttered under his breath, realizing that the group of two turned three hadn’t figured out who was introducing who.

Jordan waved a hand in a circle. “I’ll do Mike. Mike’ll do you. You’ll do me.”

Mike nodded in agreement but Ashton’s hazel eyes widened a bit in panic. He knew nothing about the girl he was supposed to introduce. He was so panicked at being unprepared that he even catch the way Mike jokingly wiggled his eyebrows at the young woman’s words. “What am I supposed to say?” Ashton whispered at her.

“I’m Jo. I’m in my last year. I went to Oregon,” she whispered back with a wink.

Ashton nodded and leaned back in his seat, waiting for their turn.

“You three?” Professor Lewis said, gesturing at the group.

“This is Mike. He’s a last year history major. And he played videogames over the summer,” Jordan started, making up something about Mike she knew to be true on the spot.

Mike laughed with a nod before he went about introducing Ashton. Then, it was Ashton’s turn. “This is Jo. She’s in her last year. And she went to Oregon over the summer,” the soft brown haired man said.

“Oregon, nice,” Professor Lewis nodded approvingly. “Do anything cool?”

Jordan shrugged. “Ziplining, cave exploring. Had a snowball fight at Crater Lake.”

“Snow in the summer, huh? That must’ve been cool,” Professor Lewis continued to converse.

Jordan laughed. “Not nearly as cool as white water rafting.”

“Sounds like quite the adventure. Glad you came back to us.”

“No place I’d rather be,” she grinned, hands clasping behind her head.

“You flatter me, Jo,” Lewis laughed before moving on.

Ashton on the other hand, agreed with Jordan. There was no place he’d rather be either.

~~~

“So, what’s the game plan?” Jordan asked, her backpack slung over one shoulder as the trio milled around the hallway outside the classroom, Luke having slipped out and disappeared already.

“Gonna hit up the library before thesis,” Mike told her, a hand ruffling his blonde hair.

“Aw, so that’s a no on food?” she frowned.

Ashton shrugged, his hands going into the pockets of his jeans. “I could eat,” he offered.

Jordan grinned and then her arm was flinging itself across his shoulders. “Catch ya on the flip side, nerd!” she waved with her free hand as she started walking towards the door, taking Ashton with her.

“You’re the nerd, nerd!” was the response called after her without missing a beat, giving Ashton the impression that this was a frequent back-and-forth between the two

“The nerdiest!” was the retort, complete with a middle finger thrown Mike’s way and a laugh that seemed too loud for a girl of her size. “So, Ash,” she started as they walked together, her arm dropping from around his shoulders. “Whatcha in the mood for? I’m thinking a bagel from the coffee shop sounds amazing right now. But, I’m open to persuasion if you want something else.”

“Nah, a bagel and coffee sound fuckin great now that you mention it.”

“Ooo a coffee person, huh?”

He shrugged, “Gets me through the day.”

She waved a finger at him in agreement, “Fair enough.”

“Not a coffee drinker, I take it?”

“Not really. I mean, I will on occasion. Like I’ll probably get one after lunch to power me though my poli sci class later.”

“Which one?” he asked, curious as he too had a political science class later in the day.

“California,” she frowned, clearly not excited about the concept. “It’s so dumb. Like I’ve taken California geography and California history, and now I have to take California politics? They should figure out a way to combine it all because the overlap is ridiculous.”

He giggled, knowing her pain all too well. “What time and who with?”

“Uh… 4 with Stevens.”

“Shit, me too!”

“Yeah?” she asked, turning to look at him, her brown eyes lit up with excitement behind the black frames. “Sweet! I won’t have to suffer alone.”

He giggled again and her heart did flips at the sound. He pulled the door to the coffee shop and held it open for them. “After you, m’lady,” he said with a silly posh voice.

“Oh, why thank you, good sir,” she responded in the same voice, even giving him a small curtsy before walking through the door and giggling. “You got a girlfriend, Ash?” she asked as they got in line.

“Nah,” he said, his cheeks flushing the same color as his red sweater, a hand pushing through his fluffy hair.

“Bummer,” she said with a sad shake of her head. “Me neither.”

“Oh?” he chuckled, her words taking him by surprise.

She giggled. “It’s a joke. But it’s also true. I’m bi. But, I got a boyfriend instead.”

“Oh…” he said. Of course someone like her would have a boyfriend. She was as if laughter and sunshine had become a person. Who wouldn’t want her? But it did make him feel loads better at her knowing Calum.

Jordan was grateful it was her turn to order so Ashton couldn’t catch her blush. She had heard the deflation in his tone. She had always thought herself too boy-ish and loud to draw much attraction from others. Attention she certainly held as it was hard to ignore the quick-witted young woman, but attraction? Nah, there were plenty of girls who were prettier and more soft-spoken than her. So it always took her by surprise when people seemed to like her. Especially when that attraction seemed to be coming from someone she deemed as so far out of her league as Ashton. “Eh, he’s an idiot,” she finally said, moving to the side so he could order. “Him and Mike are gaming buddies. It’s how I met Mike, actually.”

“Oh?”

“You say that a lot,” she decided with a giggle. “But, I can hook you up with someone if you like? I mean, I set Luke and Sierra, and Crystal and Mike. So, I’m pretty good.”

He laughed and shook his head. “Nah, I’m good for now, thanks though.” He only wanted to be hooked up with one girl and he was looking at her. And she had the most dazzling smile.

~~~

“You better have blocked Nick, that scumbag,” Jordan growled at Mike a week later, her usually shoulder length hair shorn short in an asymmetrical bob, showing the woman’s natural chestnut colored hair in its full glory.

“Already did,” Mike said, patting the hand she had slammed down on her desk with affection. “I dig the hair by the way. Very edgy. It suits ya.”

“You think?” she asked, a small smile at her lips, a hand running through the longer side. “Not too dramatic?”

“Oh, very dramatic,” Mike replied.

“Dramatic enough to appease the girl gods?” she asked sarcastically with a roll of her eyes.

Mike shrugged, “Here’s to hoping.”

“I really hate boys,” she said with another eye roll. “No offense to you guys.”

“None taken,” Ashton told her.

“Yeah, we’re men,” Mike added, making his voice deeper and puffing out his chest.

Jordan laughed and shook her head, “You’re a bunch of nerds is what you are.��

“The nerdiest,” her two friends smirked back at her. Then “Who’s Nick?” Ashton asked, curious about the boy who evoked such a rage from such a happy person.

“Her boyfriend,” Mike answered.

“Ex-boyfriend,” Jordan clarified, before tilting her head back to yell out, “God, boys suck!”

“And what’s your evidence, Jo?” Professor Lewis’ voice asked as he strolled in the classroom.

“Uh, all of history? Let’s face it, your gender blows.”

The man frowned. “That’s quite the over-generalization, isn’t it?”

“Perhaps,” she admitted. “But, you know I’m right. Your gender has an…” she paused, fighting to find the right word. “Affinity! For making history the chaotic mess it is.”

“I’ll grant you that much,” the man agreed. “Speaking of chaotic messes!” he continued, loudly, drawing the attention of the rest of the class and starting the lecture.

~~~

“So, what’s the game plan?” Jordan asked her usual question as the trio walked together out of the building.

The two guys shrugged. The small joy of taking a morning class that met on Fridays was that they did had the whole day to do whatever after class.

“Think it’s too early to get a beer?” she asked with a short laugh.

“Jo, it’s nine in the morning,” Mike laughed. “And you don't drink.”

“Much,” Jordan corrected. “And I’m not hearing a no.”

Mike shrugged. “I ain’t got shit to do. Your place?”

She high-fived the blonde, “Fuck yeah.”

“Do you even have anything to drink at your place?”

She smiled sheepishly, shrugging her shoulders. “Booze run?”

Mike laughed loudly. “How typical! Jo wants to get drunk, but wants us to foot the bill.”

“Hey!” she laughed back, poking his chest. “I am a broke college student. So you’re damn right I do!”

This earned laughs from all three of them. “Alright, so my place in say an hour? Bring your own choice of poison?” she asked.

There was a murmur of agreement, then, “Wait,” Ashton said. “I don’t know where you live.”

“Aw, shit,” Jordan said, her nose scrunching up as she pulled out her phone. She typed something into it and then both boys’ phones pinged. “There,” she chirped happily, pocketing her phone.

“Shenanigan Squad?” Mike asked, eyebrows raising at the name of the group chat. “Nice group name,” he approved.

“Oh, damn that is a good name,” Ashton agreed.

“I like alliterations,” Jordan shrugged.

~~~

“So, why’d you and your boyfriend break up?” Ashton asked as they all hung around Jordan’s place which turned out to be a small back house behind her grandparents.

She passed a hand through her hair and let out a slow breath. “Gonna have to get me drunk to hear that story,” she decided, giving a short laugh.

“That won’t take long,” Mike said, his gaze not shifting from the game he was playing with some other friends online.

“Shut the fuck up,” she laughed, a sound truer to her real laugh than the short one she gave a mere moment ago.

“Aw, you’re really gonna say you’re not already feeling it a little?” Mike asked, looking over at the woman to wiggle his eyebrows at her before returning his attention to the game.

Jordan tilted the cup in her hand to peer at the liquid swirling down at the bottom. “Almost. But, I’m gonna need a refill first,” she confessed, drumming her fingers against her jeans as she stood up. “Y’all need anything?” she asked, walking the short distance to the kitchen.

“Yeah,” came the response from both guys.

“Whoa,” she laughed, “I’m not your waitress. Mike, you know where shit is.”

“Yeah, but you’re up,” Mike said.

Ashton rolled his eyes and pushed himself off his spot from the couch. “I’ll help ya,” he offered, crossing the short distance to her fridge and pulling forth a beer for Mike.

“Mike, you’ve been dethroned as my favorite,” Jordan told her friend smugly before smiling softly at Ashton. Ashton noted the way it made her eyes squinch up- a true Jordan smile.

“Yeah, love you too, Jo.”

Jordan shook her head and set out to make her drink. “Bottle opener’s there,” she said, gesturing next to Ashton with the bottle of whiskey in her hand.

“Whatcha making?” Ashton asked, popping open the top to the beer.

“Jack and Coke. Want one?”

“Sure, thanks.”

“Fair warning, I make it with a lot of Coke,” she told him. “Like a lot, a lot.”

“That’s fine,” he responded. He could handle strong drinks, but he wasn’t the biggest fan of drinking himself. Getting drunk scared him.

“Here,” she said, holding out her cup to him. “This is how I make mine. Same or stronger?”

Ashton took the cup in his hand and took a swallow. The carbonated sweet drink held just the slightest trace of that good whiskey burn. “Yeah, that’s good,” he said, passing her the cup back. “How do you get drunk drinking like that?”

She took a deep drink, winking at him over the rim of the cup. God, he wanted to be that cup. “That’s my secret, Cap. I’m never drunk.”

~~~

“Catch ya on the flip side, nerds?” Jo asked, her hands going into the pockets of her zip-up hoodie as the trio walked out of the last class of the semester.

“Yup, see you nerds in January,” Mike said, pulling up his beanie down lower over his head.

“Where you headed?” Ashton asked Jordan.

She shrugged. “Home probably.”

“Wanna get one last coffee?” he asked, his hands pushing his hair to the side. Their bagel and coffee had grown to become the duo’s tri-weekly tradition, and Ashton wasn’t ready to say goodbye until January just yet. Not that he had made a move. No, he was letting Jordan recover from her break-up. He didn’t want to be a rebound. Plus, he wasn’t even sure if Jordan liked him that way. And as cliche as it was, he didn’t want to risk losing his coffee date buddy.

She smiled and looped her arm through his. “To coffee!” she declared in a silly voice.

“To coffee!” he giggled, taking the lead in walking down towards the coffee shop. “M’lady,” he said, getting the door.

“Why thank you, good sir,” she laughed. Then, “Hey, I’m sorry. I got a little caught up this semester with…” she let out a huff and waved her hands around, “everything. Did you ever get that girlfriend? Or find someone you’re interested in?”

He giggled and shook his head, his hair shaking with the movement, glasses sliding down his nose. He pushed them back up into place. “Nah.”

She frowned but her brown eyes remained playful behind her own glasses. “Aw, one of them ‘gonna finish school’ first types, huh?”

Ashton chuckled. “Yeah, I guess you could say that.”

She scoffed as she got her bagel and hot chocolate. “While I respect those types, I also can’t understand it. Like why not date someone while you ‘find’ yourself or whatever? That’s half the fun of a relationship is watching them grow into the person their meant to be.”

Ashton nodded his head as he grabbed his coffee and they took a seat but didn’t say anything. In his opinion, she was right. Half of his fun over the past semester was watching her grow back into her loud tomboy self. Instead, he watched as she sipped her drink, an urge to capture this moment washing over him. “Smile,” he said, opening his phone’s camera. Instead of smiling, she raised her eyebrows, giving him a mysterious quirky look over the rim of her paper cup.

“You gonna show me?” she asked, leaning across the table.

“Nah, not a chance,” he giggled, pocketing his phone.

“It is good at least?” she pressed.

He giggled more, his cheeks flushing slightly. “I’m not answering that.”

“Damn, that bad, huh?” she laughed.

He just laughed with her rather than admit his true feelings about the picture and the girl in it. It was perfectly Jordan in every possible way- cute and snarky with a little bit of knowing he’d never be able to fully pin her down.

He was walking just a few steps in front of her when he saw the phone come out. He turned, his tongue coming at the corner of his mouth as the camera shutter clicked. “Ha!” she laughed at him. “If you can take candids of me, you best believe I’m gonna do it back.”

She was more generous than he had been, tilting her wrist so he could look at the picture. “Damn, that’s bad,” he giggled.

“Well, by all means,” she gestured with her phone.

He rolled his eyes, but cocked his head slightly to the side, offering the barest hint of a smile. “Better?” he asked.

“Would it have killed ya to smile?” she teased.

“Would it have killed you?” he teased back, patting his pocket where his own phone was.

“Touche,” she relented. “Alright, catch ya on the flip side, nerd,” she finally said, stepping in the close the gap between them, her arms wrapping briefly around his shoulders.

“See you in January, Jo,” he responded, hugging her back and swallowing how easy this felt. Everything about his relationship with Jordan was easy. His urge to kiss her felt so natural he almost did it. His head tilted and his lips puckered. But then she was pulling out of the hug and his heart was pounding in his chest instead.

~~~

SmashIrwin: Last coffee of the semester with @heyitsjogirl

Liked by @heyitsjogirl and @mikerowave_X

Comment from @mikerowave_X: WITHOUT ME?!

@heyitsjogirl replied to @mikerowave_X: We’ve been getting coffee all semester, where you at?! #shenanigansquad

heyitsjogirl: Gonna miss this nerd. With @SmashIrwin

Liked by @SmashIrwin and @mikerowave_X

Comment from @mikerowave_X: Wow, the audacity… #ineednewfriends #shenanigansquad #morelikesheNAHnigansquad

@SmashIrwin replied to @mikerowave_X: Mikey, don’t even… #shenanigansquad

@heyitsjogirl replied to @mikerowave_X: What @SmashIrwin said. No complaining if you can’t roll with us #shenanigansquad #thenerdiestofnerds

~~~

Jo-girl: Fuck! Overslept! Don’t let Lewis drop me, lol

Smashton: I’ll make sure he doesn’t

Mikeywave: UGH HURRY UP!

Jo-girl: FUCK YOU! 

Jo-girl: Also save me a seat!

~~~

“Jo, welcome, welcome!” Professor Lewis’ voice chirped brightly as Jordan breezed in, her cheeks flushed from both the cold and the half-sprint across the campus as she took the seat next to Ash and behind Mike.

“Sup?” she nodded her head, half-heartedly, her glasses pushing up as she rubbed at her eyes and yawned. “Fuck, getting back into sync is gonna suck.”

Mike laughed, “How late were you up last night?”

She shrugged, “Like 2? What are we doing? Saying what we did over break?”

“And what we’re looking forward to most,” Ashton told her.

“May,” she said with a harsh laugh, then her eyes danced as she looked longingly towards the door. “Get me outta here, please!”

“Glad to have you in class again, too, Jo,” Professor Lewis said with an eye roll.

~~~

“So, how was your break?” Ashton asked as they walked out, having left Mike behind because he had another class in the same room.

“Just the recharge I needed,” she said, looping her arm through his. “You got class or is it time for coffee?”

“Nah, I’m free until Van.”

“To coffee!” she declared in that silly voice he had missed than he realized.

“Onwards, m’lady!”

Her laugh rang out, her breath still visible in the morning cold. “How was your break?” she asked, her voice back to its normal lilt.

“It was good,” he replied.

She nodded, accepting the barely-scratching-the-surface answer. Then, “Have you taken digital research yet?”

He shook his head. “I’m taking it this semester.”

“Sweet, who with?”

“Professor Walker.”

“Yes!” she cheered, pumping her fist in victory. “I won’t have to suffer alone!”

He giggled. “Professor Walker’s great, what are you talking about?”

“Oh, I know. But like… you know?”

He nodded, knowing what she wasn’t saying. Taking classes without Jordan sitting next to him just weren’t as enjoyable.

~~~

@heyitsjogirl: Not the same without my #shenanigansquad but jo girl is TIRED!

Liked by @SmashIrwin and @mikerowave_X

Comment by SmashIrwin: Clearly not too tired to commit BETRAYAL!

@mikerowave_X replied to @SmashIrwin: THIS IS TREASON!

@heyitsjogirl replied to @SmashIrwin: Y’all are idiots lmao.

~~~

“Deja vu!” Jordan’s voice laughed as she waltzed into the room and spotted Ashton in the same seat he had been in earlier when they had been in the classroom for their thesis class. “Holy shit, definite deja vu,” she continued to laugh, waving over at Luke on the other side of the classroom. “Lu, do I just have you for every class? You stalking me?”

Luke’s blue eyes danced and his blonde curls shook as he laughed. “Shh, just ignore me.”

“Hey, remind me to get your number after class.”

“Oh yeah, for sure.”

Jordan was about to turn to start chatting with Ashton but the door opened and in walked Calum Hood. “Yo! Where ya been, Hood?!” Jordan said, her brown eyes lighting up behind her glasses.

“Jo girl!” Calum said, taking a seat on the other side of her.

Ashton busied himself with staring out the window. Great. This was just what he needed. Competition from the tanned soccer god.

“Britt!” Jordan’s voice squealed as a young woman breezed into the room, startling Ashton from his thoughts.

“Jo! I’ve missed you girlie!” the woman said, coming to sit behind Calum.

“Do you know everyone?” Ashton laughed, breathing a little easier at the other woman’s presence. Maybe girl bonding would distract from Calum attraction.

“I’m popular, what can I say?” she winked. “Britt this is Ash. Ash, this is Britt. My year is not complete if I don’t take at least one class with her.”

Ashton clutched his hand to his heart in mock pain. “I am OFFENDED!” he gasped.

Jordan giggled and pushed his shoulder playfully. “Fuckin’ nerd. You know I love you.”

“You’re the nerd, nerd,” he mumbled, his cheeks flushing and heart racing at how easy the words rolled off her lips in his direction.

“The nerdiest,” she grinned.

~~~

Ashton’s heart sank a little when Jordan left the classroom without waiting for him. But when he pushed his way out, he saw her standing in the hallway, chatting with Luke. “And send,” she said, tapping at her phone.

Two seconds later, Luke’s phone pinged. “Sweet, see ya, Jo. Later Ash.”

“Later,” they both told him, watching the blonde sling off into the dark evening. Then, “Thought ya ditched me. Watched you go and was like ‘Jo! Jo, no!’”

She laughed. “Nah, I’d never ditch ya. C’mon, I’m parked in lot M.”

“Cool, me too,” he lied.

They made pleasant conversation as they trekked across campus in the dark, both admitting their delight in the course they were taking and how close graduation was. And also admitting their fear that graduation was right around the corner. “But you’ll be back in August for the graduate program, won’t you?” he asked her.

“Yeah, but still. You know people always tell you to chase after your dreams no matter the cost. But nobody tells you what to do when those dreams come true, you know? Like what happens when there’s nothing left for me to chase after? What if I’m chasing after something to fill a void that’s unfillable?”

He nodded, pondering her words. Then, “But is that any reason not to chase after what you want?”

Her laugh echoed throughout the parking structure. “God, no. I’m a firm believer that taking your chance is always worth the risk.” She reached into the pocket of her jeans to pull out her car keys as she jogged up the stairs. “Well, this is me,” she said, slightly breathless. “Catch ya on the flip side?”

“See ya, nerd,” he smiled before heading back to the staircase.

“Hey!” she called out after him, her hands on her hips. “You said you were parked here!”

“I lied!”

She laughed, shaking her head. “You didn’t have to do that, you know. I’m not afraid of the dark.”

“I know. I wanted to. See ya!”

She chuckled to herself as she watched him disappear down the stairs. Damn, he made it really hard not to like him. In their short time together, he had become one of her closest friends and he knew her almost as well as Mike did. It took a lot of willpower to not brush his hair out of his face every time she saw him. She bet it was soft and imagined it would fall through her fingertips like water. She bit her lip and chuckled again, deciding then and there that she would kiss that boy at graduation if he didn’t kiss her first.

~~~

“Hey, you stole my shirt,” Jordan said, her nose scrunching up playfully as she walked into class and took notice of Calum in his seat, wearing sure enough, the same grey NASA t-shirt Jordan was wearing.

“Psh, I had mine longer, so I think you stole mine,” Calum teased her back.

“Yeah, you’re probably right,” she laughed, taking her seat. “Hey, Ash.”

Ashton nodded in greeting, his gaze never leaving the window. “Gonna rain,” he murmured. A perfect metaphor, he thought with a sigh. His feelings for Jordan, much like the storm clouds outside were growing faster every second. And soon it was all going to come crashing down.

“Fuck, think we’ll make it out of class before then?” she asked, her brows furrowing together. She had a coat with her, but if it started pouring rain, she was toast.

Ashton shrugged. The storm in him was getting worse with each class session he spent with Jordan between him and Calum. Outside, lightning cracked across the sky and the first droplets began to fall.

~~~

“You good?” Jordan asked as they walked out of class together.

“Yeah, why?” he asked, his voice clipped, a frown on his face as he pushed his way out of the building. The rain was coming down, but the downpour had had given way to a lazy drizzle. Their hair began to frizz as they walked at a fast pace to the parking lot. He had started parking in the same lot as her since that first day of classes.

“You just seem off,” she commented, shoving her hands into the pockets of her jacket.

“Just tired, I guess,” he shrugged, walking a few paces ahead of her.

She shook her head and quickened her pace to fall into step beside him. “No. I know you. This isn’t your end of the day tired. This is something is wrong pissed off.”

He paused, his brows furrowing together. He had spent so much of his time noticing her that he never once thought to think she had been doing the same. Why would she notice someone like him, anyway? He was so… and she was so… “So,” he said, his voice as chilly as the air, resuming his walk.

“So?” she asked with a short chuckle and a click of her tongue. “Ash, we’re friends. You can tell me anything.”

“No, I really can’t, Jo,” he mumbled under his breath.

“That’s bullshit,” she scoffed.

“Is it?” he challenged, stopping again and whirling to face her.

“It is,” she asserted, planting her feet and crossing her arms, preparing for battle. Lightening cracked, illuminating them both, their eyes dark behind their rain-splattered glasses. “Well? Before I’m soaked, please,” she demanded, gesturing around as the rain started to fall faster and heavier.

“Do you like Cal?” his voice boomed with the thunder.

Her laugh was harsh. “Do I like Cal? What type of dumbass question is that?! Of course I like Cal.”

He gaze flicked away from hers, his face pinching. “Yeah, that’s what I thought.”

Another harsh laugh fell from her lips. “Wow, the nerd finally realizes I’m friends with Cal. Stunning discovery! Bra-fuckin-vo!”

“Friends,” he scoffed, his eyes still avoiding hers as he struggled to come to terms with the fact he had been desperately hoping wasn’t true ever since he first learned Jordan knew Calum. Of course the pretty girl would like the pretty boy. He really shouldn’t be so surprised. But the truth stung all the same.

“What the fuck is your problem?” she growled, her hands shoving at his chest. “You’re being a real jerk and honestly, I’m not sure if I like this side of you.”

“Do you like any side of me?!” The question flew from his lips, his voice cracking with another lightening strike.

“Again with the dumbass questions! Of course I like you!”

“You just said you like Cal!”

The pieces clicked into place. Every shy shrug of his shoulders. Every door he opened for her. How he parked in the same lot as her so he could walk with her at the end of the day. The digging into her relationship with Calum. His persistence that he wasn’t interested in dating. God, why did it take feeling like the girl was slipping through their fingers before they could finally fight for what they wanted? “You really are a dumbass, aren’t you?” she shouted. If he needed a fight to finally do something, she was going to give him his fight. “I can like more than one person, Ashton! I’m allowed to have friends!”

He flinched at the usage of his full first name. “That’s not what I meant and you know it!”

“Well, here, I’ll dumb it down for ya! Do I like Cal? Yes! Do I think he’s pretty? Yes! Does it matter? No! You wanna know why? Because Cal likes pretty girls, like Britt! Nobody who looks like Cal is looking at nerd tomboy Jo when a girl like Britt is right there behind him!”

Ashton faltered. Did Jordan really think she wasn’t pretty? Did she feel for Calum the same way he felt about her? That Calum was as far out of her league and she was out of Ashton’s? Fuck, of course she thought that. In what world would a girl like Jordan ever go for a boy like Ashton.

“Are you going to do something or just continue to stand there looking like a jackass?” her voice pulled him from his spiral.

The pieces clicked into place again. Every little smile she gave when he said he wasn’t interested in dating. Every hug that lingered. How she had told him she was a firm believer in taking chances, win or lose. Fuck it. Now or never.

He crossed the distance between them in one step, one hand gripping her chin as the other wrapped around her back. His head dipped down as he tilted hers up. His lips attached to hers and he smiled, feeling her sigh into it. It was deep and soft and it made their heads spin.

“Fuckin’ finally,” she said when they broke apart. Her eyes were shining as her finger traced the tingling in her lips.

“What?” he asked with a breathless chuckle.

“Took ya long enough.”

“I’m still not following.”

She rolled her eyes. “I like you, dumbass.”

“You do?”

“Would I do this if I didn’t?” she asked before kissing him, her hands running through the soft hair that fell through her fingers like water, just like she knew it would.

~~~

Jordan’s laugh bounced off the walls of the building as her and Ashton rounded the corner and found Britt with her back against the wall, Calum’s lips on hers. “See? I told ya Cal likes the pretty girls,” she told Ashton, her nose scrunching up.

Ashton giggled and took a page from Calum, pressing Jordan up against the wall, earning a small shriek of surprised laughter to fall from his girlfriend’s lips. “Shut up and kiss me, nerd,” he said before pressing his lips to hers. God, he would never get tired of kissing her.

“The nerdiest,” she smiled into the kiss.

“And the most beautiful.”

~~~

Tag List (Wanna join? Just ask!)

@goeatsomelife​ @flameraine​ @cashtonasff5sos​ @here-for-the-uproars​ @cxddlyash​ @1-irwin-94​ @baldcalum​ @sparkling-chaos​

[the-witty-kitty]

hello! i was scrolling through the a-level history tag on tumblr just in hopes of finding some inspiration to do work - although i still don't have the motivation to do so, is there any tips you could give me? i'm doing a-level history focusing on South Africa and America but am dramatically failing both, with very little knowledge retention. i have coursework coming up that i also have no idea how to accomplish.

((Oh hello low key shook that you’ve come to me because lmao I’ve had no idea what I’m doing throughout my sixth form life so far and high key flattered

Honestly, I relate to you on such a spiritual level because history modules have so much content in them that it’s overwhelming and makes me want to deck myself. Fortunately, the history department of my Sixth Form provide a content guide for us which, that and my exercise book, is the of base my revision.

Notes // Revision Book

Personally, I prefer to have all information for topics and sub-topics in one place which is handwritten out again in another book. These notes would be written into my own words and condensed down massively. Literally the most time-consuming element of my life, I wanted to scratch my eyes out. (Pretty colours kept me sane.) I’d also recommend bolding any key dates, historical characters, facts and figures and any key words that would help you.

Flash Cards // Mindmaps // Timelines

For me, physically writing revision on paper or in mindmaps or flash cards tend to help me to remember which is why I prefer it to re-reading notes or textbooks. (Some science bullshit in active memory or something idk) (Making them look #aesthetic helped to make the task less gruelling and insta worthy.)

Honestly, I would scribble notes and revision down on anything. I re-did mindmaps, notes, timelines, mindmaps, essays, questions, miNDMAPS. The repetitive element is the only thing that helped me to remember; it’s boring but I’d recommend it. Any A3 pads of papers are hella useful as well; I had a shit ton of these mindmaps and timelines up on my walls during March-May and it wasn’t pretty and looked pretty bleak but I guess it helped? After doing my flash cards and mindmaps, I’d re-do scruffy ones but without the use of my previous revision notes, that way I’d be using memory instead of regurgitating textbooks and notes.

Staff // Friends // Family

Exploit your teachers. Exploit the department. I feel pity for them after dealing with me, espesically after I spent the year sucking up to all possible staff members of the history department. A little bit of banter here, a little bit of teasing there and they were always there for me. They must hate me by now. I’d ask for anything and everything. Mark questions, mark essays, re-mark said essays and questions, ask for the mark scheme, sample essays, dates, figures, stupid knowledge that I didn’t need but interested me. Albeit I love history and the periods that we studied (Russian history oioi) but I would have not gotten any of it without some of the staff. A fav of mine - who doesn’t even teach me history this year but taught me a year prior through my GCSEs - sat with me 3 hours before the exam and went through everything on the Cold War and then it came up in my exam. He is a godsend. Use them, I’m sure they’re rad people.

I also babbled so much crap to my family, explaining all of the periods that we studied, all of the policies, strengths and weaknesses and all keys events. They had no idea what I was on about and most probably didn’t even listen but that’s fine I guess forget about me but it helped me to revise through memory not just repeating from my notes. Upcoming to my exams I would take on a teacher-esque role and repeat all of the content back to my friends; it was a two-way system: I’d think on the spot and they’d listen like a normal revision lesson.

(Wow man I’m such a nerd wtf I only just realised. I’m so sorry how long this is frick.)

Documentaries // Youtube

I’m so lazy wow. They help if you’re a lazy piece of shit like me, just actively watch them and even take notes so that you know you’re getting the most out of your time. I’d personally recommend CrashCourse on youtube. It’s got tons of subjects and topics and they’re between 10-15 minutes so it’s a quick burst of info that’s not too overwhelming. (Also I’m such a nerd and laugh at the inside historical jokes wow.)

Questions // Essays // Past Papers

Just do ‘em. My hand would cramp up so bad after doing one of these bad boy essays but gradually I saw improvement.

Make sure you 101% understand what you have to do in the question. Description? Analysis? Explanation? Comparison? The only way you’ll master identifying what to do and the technique is if you do past questions and get feedback. If you teacher doesn’t address faults as for them. (My ego was crushed so many times it hurt man. It hurt.)

Coursework

Unfortunately, I haven’t started my coursework yet - we’re starting straight way and it’s on Martin Luther King so quite the topic considering the modern day cough dickhead trump cough - however, I’m aware that we have to conduct our own research and gather quotes etc.

From past coursework related experiences, again I’d recommend using the heck outta your teachers. If you’ve got the time, do re-draft after re-draft. And if it’s a crap ton of work to do reduce it into sections of analysis of one historical source or on one topic, that way you have more accomplishments when you finish a piece and you’ll receive constant feedback as you go along, in which you can adjust your work accordingly.

If you are required to do research try and mix it up with written sources, accademic articles and historiography. Google Scholar is pretty rad and prevents you from seeing articles or sites that are bias and have bias opinions. I’d also recommend any government offical websites (typically with .gov) if you’re researching contemporary history within the last hundred years or so and need figures such as birth or death rates at the time etc. Your teachers most likely have a ton of physical book resources at their disposal which they’ll allow you to use. Again, that fav teacher of mine allowed me to borrow 5+ books on Russian 20th century over the summer for my Welsh Bac project so I’m sure you’ll find a kind sole like this one somewhere.

Although coursework is agonising, it’s arguably better than exams and allow you to have some control over the outcome so if you keep on top of it you can grab a nice grade before the summer and easily helped raise your overall grade.

(Pretty sure my coursework will be the final death of me because my exam board has a rule on teacher intervention and if too much help is given out marks are taken away which is such horseshit?? So check to see if there are any rules.)

Summary

Reduce school work and textbooks into your own language and book.

Make revision materials from your own notes - flash cards, mindmaps, timelines, poems, acronyms - literally anything just write.

Repeat repeat repeat - try not to turn stir crazy!

Highlight dates, historical figures, numerical figures, facts, and events.

Documentaries and videos are a time and energy saver.

Learn the question styles and technique and hand in essays.

Use any feedback given. Even read the examiner’s report if you can access it.

Coursework - try to get any feedback if possible. Bookmark any sources or websites used as you may have to reference if it’s a written piece.

Google scholar is exceptional at providing articles and therefore you’re not prone to any historical bias when researching your topic.

Government sites are scary but nice for juicy facts and figures.

Break it down into little easy chunks such as dates, policies, location or historical evidence/sources so it’s easier to see and handle.

Coursework will inevitably affect your grade and its more or less the only thing you can control so constantly improve it whenever and you’ll do amazing!

I hope at least one of these things help with your revision as everyone learns and revises differently. Honestly, I’ve only adopted this technique this school year and I’m sure next year I’ll have something new. I won’t shy away from the fact that history is my favourite subject and therefore revision for this area is not too gruelling, but I’m a lil nerd and mini revision freak so pls don’t be too overwhelmed.

I wish you all the best for the upcoming year and your exams! I’m always around if you ever want a chat so hit me up!

- Soph

[spilledreality]

the hippie phenomenon

“The New Yorker has always dealt with experience not by trying to understand it but by prescribing the attitude to be adopted toward it. This makes it possible to feel intelligent without thinking, and it is a way of making everything tolerable, for the assumption of a suitable attitude toward experience can give one the illusion of having dealt with it adequately.”

—Robert Warshow, "E. B. White and the New Yorker"

I wanna take issue with Kerouac and Didion, not so much with their writing’s literary value but as cultural criticism. Chance aside, a prerequisite of good criticism as I see it is a penetrating, upper-percentile comprehension of the subject at hand, coupled with an epistemic humility sufficient to the task of staying open-minded. Both Kerouac and Didion, though they represent opposite sides of the cultural and political coin, seem most primarily in judgment of their subjects, rather than intrigued by them. Both their practices show a dedication to deduction over induction, which is to say the opposite of learning. There is little demonstrated effort to adequately reconcile their worldviews, motivations, and values with that of an other (in Kerouac’s case, PTA moms and nuclear families; in Didion’s, the acidfreaks of Haight-Ashbury). Any good lawyer will tell you, if you don’t adequately understand your opponent’s position, your rebuttal will follow in inadequacy, cf. Ideological Turing Tests. 

Here's Kerouac in My Woman describing a job application (one implication being that the American laborer is a drone, a zombie, whose guise Jack and his friends must take on to get hired): 

We entered [the office] with our arms stretched out in front of us [drunk] like the zombies we'd seen in a picture the other day; we made our feet go slow and automatic like the ghost of death. We asked the man for a job. The poor idiot said, 'I don't think you boys will do.' We got out of there... laughing at the top of our lungs. 

2.

As the 50s turned into the 60s, the Beat ethos into flower power, Kerouac drifted into Long Island alcoholism; Ginsberg adapted, stayed relevant. The transition between decades bridged by the Merry Pranksters’ cross-country quest to "tune out, drop out" in a refurbished 1939 school bus per Wolfe’s Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test. 

On assignment for The Saturday Evening Post, Joan Didion traveled to the Haight-Ashbury district of San Francisco, where she saw posters of Ginsberg hung on the walls and devotees treated his opinions on the Krishna as of equal authority with the Swami. Didion saw a world falling apart, spiritually and socially in crisis. People forget, so it's worth reminding that Didion was not a progressive in this era. She was a National Review contributor and a Goldwater voter. And while I have no problem with her political conservatism, it’s important to link “Slouching” with the general moral hysteria over longhairedness taking place at the time, a hysteria which contributed in large part to Nixon's presidential and Reagan's gubernatorial elections.

The central argument (or assumption, or presumption of “Slouching” is that San Francisco is home to a generation of children (some literally, some relative maturity) who have embarked on an extended bad trip (either literally or figuratively) from which they may not ever return. Affectless and out-of-it, they show emotion only when discussing, acquiring, or ingesting narcotics (peyote, acid, smack, crystal, amps, and a now-mysterious “STP”).  “Pathetically unequipped" for the real world, they lack any serious political convictions or critical thinking abilities, instead swimming in self-delusion and macrobiotic diets.

I can't speak of Dideon's intent so I'll stick to her prose, sociopathic in its lack of empathy and interest. The essay’s divided into bits so that each section sports an ominous closing sentence cum punchline-zinger. Interviewees divide into strawmen or caricatures; none are depicted or explored as complex, flesh-and-blood human beings. Juvenile delinquents and drug dealers are picked as the primary representative spokespeople of a sizable neighborhood and subculture. There’s Debbie, 15, a runaway because “[her] parents said she had to go to Church.” There’s John, 16, who has left home because his mother “didn't like boots” and made him help out around the house: “Tell about the chores,” Debbie says. John: “For example, I had chores. If I didn't finish ironing my shirts for the week I couldn't go out for the weekend. It was weird, wow.” Shortly after her wide-eyed relay on chores, Didion recounts Debbie literally chipping a nail, then getting upset that the author isn't carrying extra polish on her. I'd say you can't make this stuff up, but I'm tempted to invoke Richard Bradley:

Some years ago, when I was an editor at George magazine, I was unfortunate enough to work with the writer Stephen Glass on a number of articles. They proved to be fake, filled with fabrications, as was pretty much all of his work. The experience was painful but educational; it forced me to examine how easily I had been duped. Why did I believe those insinuations about Bill Clinton-friend Vernon Jordan being a lech? About the dubious ethics of uber-fundraiser (now Virginia governor) Terry McAuliffe? The answer, I had to admit, was because they corroborated my pre-existing biases. I was well on the way to believing that Vernon Jordan was a philanderer, for example—everyone seemed to think so, back in the ’90s, during the Monica Lewinsky time.

I can't say whether Didion fabricated these stories. It doesn't matter either way. A piece which confirms existing biases of its readers, or which confirms its own initial biases at its start, doing little more than elaborate variations on a stereotype for thousands of words, is poor criticism and shoddy historiography.

A generic structure for a given section of “Slouching”: observe events unraveling around her, hazard a guess at (and editorialize heavily on) what is occurring, entertain the possibility of asking a participant or knowledgeable observer for more accurate information, and then—inexplicably—decide not to. In other words, there’s a lack of respect for her subjects’ subjectivity, or for her own ability to be wrong. Equally as incredible as this journalistic practice is Didion’s willingness to admit to it (and in the same breath berate Time and other publications for their own misunderstandings of the hippie phenomenon).

Didion gets haughty at points, seamlessly transitioning from picking on a teenager’s amateur poetry to a bout of philosophical reflection:

As it happens, I am still committed to the idea that the ability to think for one's self depends upon mastery of the language and I am not optimistic about children who will settle for saying, to indicate that their mother and father do not live together, that they come from a “broken home.”

For myself, I’m not so hot about the idea of a journalist who dedicates forty pages to belittling literal teenage runaways, especially when so many avenues of more substantial cultural interest are ignored. It’s off-handedly mentioned that McLuhan is read by many in the Haight community, as are the Hari Krishna and the writings of Zen Buddhism, but Didion never meaningfully pursues any of the community's beliefs.

3.

Some of the more interesting documents on this subject come from the exchanges between literary, Cold War liberal moderates and the generation of beatniks and hippies who were pulling the country toward a more radical vision. Adam Kirsch’s Why Trilling Matters charts the relationship between Lionel Trilling and his former student at Columbia, Allen Ginsberg. (Kirsch, drawing on Trilling, distinguishes between the Blakean and Wordsworthean impulse, Wordsworth a “representative of wisdom,” Blake as the blazing voice of passion. As Trilling writes, Blake's poetry would be one of the more significant influences on the art and voice of Sixties counterculture: “American undergraduates seem to be ever more alienated from the general body of English literature, but they have for some time made an exception of William Blake... uniquely relevant to their spiritual aspirations” and acting as a model for its “transvaluation of social and aesthetic values.”)

Equally good is the lifelong correspondence between Allen and his also-poet father Louis Ginsberg. Trilling and L.’s sensibilities are of moderation and qualification, both sure only of their own fallibility; the Blakean hubris is an ideology propping up conceits of heroism, a Manichean dualism where only the counterculture keeps it real. “Save me from that mixed-up, confused view of the Beat Generation which maintains it has a blueprint of Truth, obviously handed over to them in a mystic, blinding revelation from Heaven," Louis wrote to his son in ‘58.

An avid communist in the early-to-mid 1960s (before a trip to Cuba changed his mind w/r/t the freedom of its citizens¹) Allen berated his father in letter after letter over Lou's democratic socialist views, and got bit back:

Your holier-than-thou attitude, with your noble intentions, does not prove that you have a Heavenly blueprint of the truth. You may be a great poet, as I believe you are, but you can still have false ideas and false facts, despite your noble intentions. T.S. Eliot and Pound had Fascist ideas.

One more excerpt, for joy:

Dear Allen,

You have a right to your opinion, according to your lights; but I retain my energetic insistence to differ with you... on your whole Beat Generation's views that everything that is, to paraphrase Pope, is wrong. Everything, according to your views, is all wrong, all in ruins, all warmongering, all immoral—except you (plural; i.e., the Beat Generation). Nobody wants “beauty, poetry, freedom” but you (plural)... all is false; all civilization messed up, all progress in the wrong, false track; all doomed... (March 10, 1958)

The truth the Beats claimed to seek or else contain was partly religious, the result of chemical visions, Ginsberg hearing Blake’s voice come to him mid-orgasm, Cassady meditating. But it was also of the writers’ attempted escape from social structure, to chase an idea of the authentic self as the self unencumbered by the social. Trilling “...the idea of... surrendering oneself to experience without regard to... conventional morality, of escaping wholly from the societal bonds, is an ‘element’ somewhere in the mind of every modern person.” Hence the enormous success of On the Road, which functions as simulation, a virtual joyride for those unwilling, unable, or who know better than to take such a trip themselves.

4.

Morris Dickstein, Gates of Eden:

Postwar prosperity had provided [sixties radicals] with the freedom to protest, the freedom to run wild, and the luxury of dropping out without worrying about a job. But by the 1970s the economy turned sour and, as I wrote in [the 1977 edition of] this book, “we could see how much the rainbow colors of the culture of the sixties were built on the fragile bubble of a despised affluence, an economic boom that was simply taken for granted.”

This is not to invalidate the legitimacy of radicals’ complaints, but to complicate the picture of inheritance in dissent.

It’s no secret the Beats were a stretch short of sainthood. Cassady and Kerouac were philanderers, promising women marriages only to subsequently abandon them (illegitimate children included). Cars were stolen only to be drunkenly totaled. And Carr, of course, infamously knifed an overly attached romantic pursuer in Manhattan's Riverside Park, dumping his body in the Hudson River under conditions still unclear today.

Tied up in this transgressiveness is the question of privilege, a critique which Diana Trilling, wife of the famous Lionel, launches in her essay for Partisan Review, “The Other Night at Columbia”:

I had heard about [Ginsberg] much more than I usually hear of students for the simple reason that he got into a great deal of trouble which involved his instructors, and had to be rescued and revived and restored; eventually he had even to be kept out of jail. Of course there was always the question, should this young man be rescued, should he be restored? There was even the question, shouldn’t he go to jail? We argued about it some at home but the discussion, I’m afraid, was academic, despite my old resistance to the idea that people like Ginsberg had the right to ask and receive preferential treatment just because they read Rimbaud and Gide and undertook to put words on paper themselves.

Alexander:

The “heroes” of On The Road consider themselves ill-done by and beaten-down. But they are people who can go anywhere they want for free, get a job any time they want, hook up with any girl in the country, and be so clueless about the world that they’re pretty sure being a 1950s black person is a laugh a minute. On The Road seems to be a picture of a high-trust society. Drivers assume hitchhikers are trustworthy and will take them anywhere. Women assume men are trustworthy and will accept any promise. Employers assume workers are trustworthy and don’t bother with background checks. It’s pretty neat. But On The Road is, most importantly, a picture of a high-trust society collapsing. And it’s collapsing precisely because the book’s protagonists are going around defecting against everyone they meet at a hundred ten miles an hour.

I would hesitate to agree that America in the early 20th century was markedly higher-trust than modern times. Rates of violent crime in the interwar period are comparable to the highs of the 70s crime wave, and despite sagging post-1945, were only slightly lower in Kerouac's time than our own. (Trust != crime, I know.) But the mechanisms of opportunity and exploitation remain in play. It is a phenomenon in which transgressive parties advocate for their transgressive way of life as a replacement to the present social order, without realizing or acknowledging that their transgressions are logistically possible through this very structure. Behavior is advocated as moral in Beat writing which would fall apart as a Kantian imperative.

In Kerouac this is both identitarian and pragmatic; J.K.’s lifestyle is possible because it exploits a trusting industrial society and its hard-earned resources. But in Maggie Nelson’s queer theory, it’s primarily a matter of identity and spirituality, where transgression is an end (autotelic) in itself. This is the paradoxical relationship of hegemony to the queer: it is at once mortal enemy and dearest ally, struggle’s basis in every sense of the word.  

The Argonauts is frequently brilliant; its idea of flux (“a constant becoming which never becomes”) is infinitely valuable. But Nelson condemns at every turn the category, the pigeon-hole, the label. Words to her are cages which imprison minds and bodies. And yet both Nelson and Kerouac seem not to acknowledge that the lifestyles and self-images they hold so valuable—the rebellion, transgression, and self-elevation practiced by Kerouac; the queerness valued by Nelson—are possible only through the existence of a majority body or structure from which to self-elevate and self-other. They are advocating for identities of negation as if they were autonomous.

[1] Ginsberg was expelled from Cuba in February of 1965 for "talking too much about marijuana & sex & capital punishment"; he traveled from there to the less oppressive Czechoslovakia.