#i hate it all just let me purchase things that function properly and are made to continue functioning!!!

[comradecowplant]

Really hate the recent trend (or at least I personally noticed the pattern recently) of device power cords being removable adapters that usually disconnect if ever you gently nudge the machine instead of just permanently connected cords. Speaks to a "we are cheap and knowingly make cheap devices with cords that easily break and call a design feature of replaceability innovation rather than marketable incompetence" attitude I find particularly distasteful

[ailec-12]

Prompt: AU, bored and exploring Malfoy Manor at a social function, young Sirius Black finds an old diary belonging to T.M. Riddle.

Thanks so much for this prompt, Anon! To be honest, at first I had no idea what to do with it, but it would seem Tom’s diary possessed me as well, because once I started, I couldn’t stop. I’ve enjoyed writing teen Sirius a lot, so I hope you’ll also like it.

Shout-out to @mariagvogel for making this one shot better with her comments. It can also be read on AO3.

I.

Sirius hated them all —every fucking member of his family. Nothing could really top his hatred for his mother, who insisted on dragging him to those pure-blood parties no matter how much her eldest son embarrassed her. He was wandering around, sneering at the portraits that lined up the walls of the Malfoy mansion.

Those events were always supremely boring, but Sirius had never felt so utterly alone. Regulus was socialising with their cousins like the good Black son he was. Yet, the only cousin that really mattered, Andromeda, was not present and no one talked about her. Her face still decorated the Black family tapestry, but Sirius did not think it would last long. It was a very odd feeling. When Andromeda talked about cutting ties with her family, they used to laugh about going out in style. He had not seen his cousin in months, though, and, if she had concocted any plans with her Muggle-born boyfriend, she had not breathed a single word about it to Sirius.

The dark corridor he was crossing at the moment threatened to be as dull as the guests downstairs. At least he had managed to slip unnoticed from the party. He could not have shown his distaste as freely there. A somewhat distant crack startled him out of his thoughts. He froze on the spot. That must be Dobby. Although Sirius could not say he liked the house-elf —who was always too overexcited—, he pitied anyone who had to live under the thumb of a prat like Lucius Malfoy. Dobby was also far nicer than Kreacher. Even so, if he saw Sirius snooping around, he would be forced to tell his masters. Sirius would rather avoid angering his mother so soon when there was still a long evening ahead of them.

Thinking on his feet, he walked quickly to the end of the corridor, where a door hid the stairs to the attic. Andromeda and Cissy had discovered that one dragging a very young Sirius with them. He could no longer remember the exact reason, but they had been hiding. It felt like a very far memory.

Sirius closed the door carefully behind him and waited until he heard the second crack that meant Dobby had left. The party seemed not to exist in the absolute stillness of the stairs and Sirius let out a long-suffering sigh. Glancing up, he decided to head for the attic. It was a good hiding place if nothing else.

The room looked dirtier and more abandoned than Sirius remembered. It actually reminded him of their attic at home, full of useless and forgotten pure-blood memorabilia. He stepped around the worn-out furniture, dodging the odd-shaped items scattered in some parts. He could not help thinking that, if the rest of his friends were with him, poking around Malfoy’s stuff would have sounded much more exciting. Alone, however, Sirius did not truly feel like exploring.

Looking round in order to find at least something to distract him from the fact that there was no one to share his findings with, his eyes fell on a small bookcase. The dust made his eyes itch when he got closer and most books did not even have a title on the spine. He gazed at them blankly for a moment longer, trying to decide whether picking them up was worth the effort. His interest was suddenly piqued when he saw a small rectangular item wrapped in fading brown fabric. That time, he took it with no hesitation, revealing a black leather book. It was rather thin and the year on the cover —1942— let him know it was not a recently purchased item. As he opened it, he was disappointed to find there was nothing on the blank pages except for a name on top of the first one: T. M. Riddle.

Sirius let it fall, huffing. An empty diary whose owner did not even have the right surname for the house. He did not really care if it had been someone who had married into the family or if some Malfoy had stolen it. Somehow, Sirius was not able to picture someone staying for a sleepover and leaving their diary behind.

Bored, he sat down on the floor, near the diary. He could already see the others’ faces when he returned downstairs having ruined his new, shiny robes. The mere thought brought a smirk to his face and lifted his spirits lightly. He picked the diary back up. Perhaps no one would ever see it, but Sirius wanted to leave his mark in case someone else found the old thing.

He searched through the drawers and found a couple of broken quills, but no ink. He cursed out loud, remembering the Muggle drawing kit that Moony had gifted him last Christmas. He would carry a pen everywhere if he was not certain his mother would enjoy burning it while Sirius was still carrying it.

Nevertheless, he found a small piece of charcoal and did not hesitate to open the diary at the first page. In big capital letters, just under the name, he wrote, FUCK PURE-BLOODS —SB. He had to admit it looked lamer than it had sounded in his head, so he was trying to come up with another epithet when the words faded away. Blinking, he stared down at the yellowish pages. If it was a means of communication like the two-way mirror he used with Prongs, he might be screwed.

The diary answered right away.

Interesting choice of words to write on someone else’s diary. And who might you be?

Sirius looked at the words for a few seconds. It had been quite a prompt answer for an object that had seemed abandoned just a moment ago.

I’m not telling you my name, he decided to write at last. He was not that much of an idiot.

As you wish. Mine is Tom.

Again, the reply was quick. Sirius bit his lip, rolling the charcoal between his fingers.

Are you friends with the Malfoys?

I might be, came Tom’s enigmatic answer. They must not have taken great care of my diary if you have got your hands on it, though.

The calligraphy was elegant, although not as flowery as Sirius’s. For all his faults, the Malfoys were not as exclusive as the Blacks. Tom’s elusive comments sparked the boy’s imagination and he was already picturing Riddle as the offspring of a marriage between a Malfoy and someone of not such a high standing.

Focusing back on the pages, which had returned to their original state, he decided to try his luck.

Do you write to them often?

I can’t say I do.

Sirius could almost hear the playful tone behind those words.

What would you do if I took you with me?

Write to you, what else?

Sirius’s smirk grew bigger as he closed the diary and threw away the charcoal.

 II.

In the end, getting away from the gathering had indeed been worth it. His parents had not been able to do much in public, since they knew sending him home would actually have been a reward. By the time they had got back, both of them had been too inebriated to punish him properly. Sirius had got away with just his hurt pride at having had to apologise to the Malfoys plus a quick stinging hex before being sent to bed. Still, his leg hurt like hell from the surprisingly well-aimed spell.

He was lying on his bed, groaning into his pillow and with absolutely no intention of sleeping. He would like to contact James through the mirror —he did not think anyone would hear him despite the absolute silence—, but he did not want to come across as needy. He could wait until tomorrow to whine and tell his friends all his woes.

Turning around, he sat up and examined his leg. He concluded it would be better not to risk asking Kreacher for a pain potion, since it would lead to his mother hearing about it. In a couple of hours, it would no longer sting. Making what felt like an enormous effort, he stood up and started disrobing. It was only then that he remembered Tom. Still half dressed, he hurried to get ink and quill and got comfortable in his bed. It was pretty late, so he told himself he might have to wait until the morning for an answer.

Are you there?

Of course.

Sirius smiled at the immediate reply.

I —don’t— regret to inform you that you are no longer with the Malfoys.

His grin grew bigger as he felt clever. He would keep talking to Tom if it was going to help him forget about his misery for a while.

You sound like more interesting company anyway. I take it that you had fun and the event is over?

Sirius scoffed loudly.

I don’t think a single one in that bloody bunch of old snobs know what having fun is like.

You may be right, but why would you want fun when you already have power?

Reading those words gave him chills and sobered him up. Perhaps it was because Tom’s phrasing urged him to agree at first. He frowned and put down the diary to physically distance himself from that feeling. Almost right away, though, he picked it up again.

Do you believe that blood supremacy crap?

He felt something akin to disappointment and had to rein in the impulse to throw a cruder accusation.

What I believe does not matter. It is a fact they have power, is it not?

Sirius liked that answer even less and he felt his frown deepen. He stared as the ink faded, considering what he should retort. Apparently, Tom found his words sooner.

You benefit from that power, don’t you, S?

An inexplicable, overwhelming anger rose in the boy’s throat and he was scribbling furiously before he was aware of it.

Fuck you. My name is Sirius.

He slammed the diary shut and threw it in his trunk.

 III.

I’m a fucking tosser.

It was the first thing he wrote in two weeks and the black letters were blurry.

Do tell.

Tom’s response came at once as usual, but it felt oddly impersonal. It was just what Sirius needed, because the last thing he wanted was a friendly ear. He was determined to avoid thinking about the next letter he would have to write to Prongs.

I was going to spend half the summer at a friend’s, but I crossed my mother and ruined everything. I’m not going anywhere now.

A little splash smeared the ink before it disappeared completely. He wiped his eyes furiously while he waited for Tom to say something.

Oh, boo-hoo. Why would you act out if you needed her permission?

Didn’t plan on it, you twat. Just happened. You’d also scream at her if you’d met her, he added before a reply could come.

I think not. I’ve been told I’m a great actor.

Pretentious prick, Sirius shot back. He was feeling calmer, though, and not truly annoyed.

Tom offered no reaction to that, but Sirius did not want to finish their conversation so soon. It was a very welcome distraction from the pain and humiliation that usually followed an argument with his mother.

I don’t know how I’m to survive an entire summer locked up in this house.

Have you tried to escape?

I’m only 14. The Ministry will find me as soon as I try to do magic.

Of course, living as a Muggle is out of question.

Sirius frowned, not liking one bit the mockery he could feel behind the words.

It is when I have neither Muggle clothes nor Muggle money, he retorted.

And your friend? Wouldn’t he take you in?

James would, he was certain of it. However, that would require detailing exactly how bad things were at home. It was not worth it, Sirius told himself as he had a thousand times before. It was only three more years until he could do magic and then no one, not even his mother, could stop him —after all, his fourteenth birthday was just a few months away.

My family would not allow it, he wrote instead.

Are you important or something?

Again that derisive feeling. Sirius could not explain why he felt the other’s intentions so distinctly.

Or something, he agreed noncommittally. He was about to add something else when a knock on his door startled him.

Swallowing with difficulty, he reminded himself that only one person in their household would knock before entering. Not that his dear brother waited for an answer. Sirius had barely had time to close the diary when the door opened. At least, Regulus was not in the habit of barging in.

“What do you want?” Sirius snapped right away, feeling anger consuming everything within him once again.

Any tentativeness disappeared from his brother’s demeanour and his young face hardened. He closed the door after coming in, but did not step closer.

“Don’t take it out on me. I did nothing.”

“Yeah, I think that might be the problem. You never do anything. The perfect son,” snarled Sirius, in a well-rehearsed course of action.

“What d’you expect to get when you insult the whole family? Couldn’t you just go along with it for once and say what she wants to hear?”

Regulus was frustrated, but his controlled manner paled in comparison to the ire running through his older brother, who jumped off the chair, not caring about the noise.

“I’ll never stand by while she badmouths my friends,” he said, barely restraining from shouting. “But of course you don’t know what the fuck I’m talking about. You’d need to have some friends for that.”

The jab hit Regulus as hard as Sirius had intended and his pain was plainly visible on his face. He refused to regret having caused it.

“I just came to see if you were all right, you imbecile.”

Regulus practically spat the words before turning around and taking hold of the doorknob.

“Hurry up and move along, then. I’m fine.”

Regulus opened the door and stared back one last time. His mouth was a hard line and his eyes glistened. He looked too old for his age.

“You’re a liar.”

 IV.

Have you ever been trapped with no option to escape?

It was the middle of the night of a perfectly ordinary day, but Sirius could not sleep. Luckily, it seemed that neither could Tom.

Most people have at one point or another, came the answer, swift and vague as ever.

His friends were taking too long to reply to his letters and Prongs had forgotten the two-way mirror at home when he had packed for his holidays. Talking to Tom felt just as good, though.

More letters appeared in the centre of the page while he was lost in thought.

What matters is your ability to break free when the time is right.

 V.

What is ailing you this time? I can tell you didn’t steal an enchanted diary to complain about your house-elf’s cooking.

Their correspondence was getting more familiar and Tom did not hesitate to cut his ramblings short. Sirius decided not to beat around the bush, either.

Do you come from a pure-blood family?

I have old blood running through my veins, yes.

Sirius had never felt so grateful for Tom’s pretentious nature. He had a feeling the other would understand.

They burnt my cousin Andromeda’s face off the family tapestry. She has married a Muggle-born, so they say she’s tarnished our blood.

And you fear to suffer the same fate?

I’d fear to stay in this house forever, but

He hesitated. Sometimes, he felt as if he were offering up too much information, although nothing he had said so far was truly a secret.

she is my favourite cousin.

The words faded away slowly, as if the diary were absorbing Sirius’s strong feelings behind them, too.

I think she’s forgotten me, he wrote in a rush, feeling extremely self-conscious.

That time, Tom seemed to take an eternity to answer.

Pure-bloods are good at holding power, but their short-sightedness will be the death of them.

The words took Sirius aback and he did not think about his next response.

I thought you fancied that blood crap.

I told you. What I may believe or feel is not important. Ignoring the talent of those who do not fit the ideal perfectly will hardly do us any favours.

Sirius blinked, uneasy at how reasonable Tom sounded. He needed to think, so he wrote goodbye and returned the diary to its safe place. After a while, he realised he could contact Andromeda once he was back at school.

 VI.

Sirius skimmed through Prongs’s last letter. He still needed to get back to Moony and Wormtail as well. However, no matter how hard he tried, he could not shake off the feeling that his friends were far too predictable. James told him all about his brilliant family holidays, whereas Remus was as bored and lonely as Sirius. And he really could not bring himself to care about Peter’s latest crush.

On top of his apathy, he was worn out all the time. The bright side of it was that he was usually too tired to pick a fight with his parents. He spent most of his time locked in his bedroom, listening to Muggle music or just staring up at the dark ceiling —or writing to Tom. Sirius could not consider him a friend since the bloke had not revealed much information about himself. Yet, during their exchanges, Sirius did not feel quite so sad or angry, just sort of entertained.

There was only a week and a half until the beginning of the new school year. The rest of the Marauders would not be surprised if Sirius told them he had been too lazy to reply to their last batch of letters. Thus, he picked up the diary, willing to forget about the world for a while.

 VII.

You didn’t write yesterday.

Sirius felt a pang of culpability upon seeing the message. In fact, he had felt guilty ever since school had started. Normally, he waited until his friends had gone to sleep to take out the diary and write on it, sheltered by his drawn drapes. At first, he had looked forward to that nightly encounter, even if it made him feel like he was lying to his friends. During the day, Moony and Prongs were set on finding out what was wrong with him. Nothing Sirius told them stopped their nagging. He could admit he was bloody irritable around everyone those days, but it did not truly warrant their insistence. At least with Tom he had not needed to worry about reining in his temper so as to avoid worried looks.

Nevertheless, eventually, even Moony had let the matter of his bad mood drop. It had led to a more relaxed atmosphere in their friend group and, for the first time since their return, the previous night Sirius had gone to bed knackered and happy and, especially not feeling like he needed to seek out someone else’s company. Frankly, he had not thought Tom would care, but now the guilt rose back up and it was not because he was hiding something from his friends.

I was busy.

It was a lame excuse, but Sirius told himself he did not need to explain his reasons to a perfect stranger.

Hanging out with Hagrid again?

Distaste dripped from the ink of every one of those words.

No, planning a prank for a greasy git. He won’t know what hit him. Sirius’s smirk vanished before it fully formed. He frowned, still thinking about Tom’s comment. What have you got against Hagrid, anyway? He is all right.

That is because you do not know what he is capable of.

Sirius rolled his eyes at the condescending reply. He had known Hagrid for over three years and, while the man had his quirks, he was one of the nicest people Sirius had ever met.

Another sentence appeared as the first one was absorbed by the page.

Want me to show you?

He read the question a few times, trying to understand what it could possibly mean. Tom had never implied they could send anything other than messages through the diary.

“Can’t you– What are you doing?”

It was barely a whisper, but he had already jumped when Moony drew the curtains back and so, he ended up spilling ink all over himself and the diary. His wand was knocked off as well, falling to the floor with its tip still lit up. Sirius barely spared a glance at his friend as he attempted to get away from the mess.

“Bloody hell,” he muttered.

“I’m so sorry,” Remus apologised right away. Turning around for a moment, he retrieved his own wand from his bedside table. “I’ll clean it up.”

With a circular movement, he managed to summon the ink and get it back into the bottle. The diary was intact, not a black trace on it, although Sirius suspected not all the ink had been collected by Moony’s magic.

“Thanks,” he grumbled, because his friend was looking at him with soft eyes full of uncertainty.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to startle you. I just couldn’t sleep and saw the light from your wand.”

“It’s okay. I couldn’t sleep, either.” Sirius huffed, unable to stand the awkwardness any longer. “Sit down, for Merlin’s sake. Unlike others, I don’t bite.”

He received a brief, albeit quite powerful glare as expected, which in return brought a grin to his face as he closed the diary and put it in a drawer for the time being.

“Was that… a diary?”

Moony’s incredulity was obvious, so Sirius forced himself to let out a dismissive snort.

“Just brainstorming our next pranks. Prongs and I still have to take revenge on that Seventh Year Ravenclaw prick for laughing at us when Snivellus and Evans dumped us in the lake.”

“To be fair—”

“I don’t want to be fair, Moony. I want to laugh at Mr Brainy.”

Remus rolled his eyes, but a long yawn interrupted whatever he was going to add. Right on cue, Sirius also yawned.

“I think I’ll go back to bed now. You should try to get some sleep, too.”

“I will,” promised Sirius, smiling fondly at his always responsible friend.

He drew the drapes and snuggled up under the blankets, having forgotten all about Tom and Hagrid.

 VIII.

Guess who is not going home for Christmas?

Sirius was feeling light as a feather and needed to share his enthusiasm.

Did you get your face burnt off the family tree as well?

Not yet, he replied, beaming in the semi-darkness. His penmanship was messier than usual, because his brain was going too fast for his hand to keep up. I’m going to spend the break with Prongs. His parents have invited me to go with them to ski. The entire hols! he added, trying to convey his utter delight, for he felt like exploding every time he thought about the letter he had just received.

My mother will be furious, he kept on, not waiting for an answer. She will have to explain her disgraceful heir has once again chosen blood traitors over the family.

You do realise that, by cutting ties with them, you are only making things harder for yourself, don’t you?

As if I cared. I’m not going to put up with their pompous arses one minute longer than I need to.

Well, perhaps there is something better that you can do at school if you stay.

“What?” Sirius almost yelled, turning it into a whisper at the last moment.

I’m not staying, he wrote quickly.

Why did Tom feel the need to sour his mood like that? He had said he was not upset by the lack of daily updates on Sirius’s part, but he may have lied.

You never let me show you that memory about Hagrid. I could show you things about Hogwarts, places no other person knows about but me.

Sirius felt his hair stand on end. No one should sound so alluring through a written message. Without another thought, he slammed the diary shut and pushed it off his lap. He was suddenly afraid of how much he had longed to accept Tom’s offer.

As if a veil had just been lifted, he realised the diary was an object taken from a family with close links to dark magic and even darker social circles. He had been tired all summer and his bad temper had persisted after getting away from his family. He had only started to feel better once he had stopped writing to Tom every day.

He nearly tossed the diary out of the window, but he stopped when he took it in his hands. Surely, he was overreacting. He had been talking to Tom for months and, even though the other gave him the creeps from time to time, he had felt no dark influences trying to control him. Prongs always said he was paranoid about everything that had to do with dark magic and he reluctantly had to admit his friend may be right.

Tom must be even lonelier than he was to keep him company after all that time, for Sirius would not describe his life as fascinating. He was happier than he had ever been at Hogwarts, certainly, but Tom had put up with his continuous complaints about his family the entire summer. Perhaps it was only fair that he felt ignored since school had begun, because Sirius had indeed been writing less and less frequently as days passed. He felt like a terrible friend —even if they were not such—, so he picked up the quill again, dipped it in the ink and wrote,

Why do you like talking with me?

I thought you were braver. I thought you’d dare uncover Hogwarts’ deepest secrets.

The ink faded away slowly as Sirius found himself unable to tear his gaze away. New words appeared before he could think of an answer.

Let me show you, insisted Tom. It all started when

Sirius slammed the diary shut for the second time that day, although on that occasion his decision was fuelled by blind rage. The urge to know was still there, whispering in his ear that he should continue reading, continue writing. However, another feeling flooded him and he distinguished the sting of something else besides his hurt pride. He was under no delusions that they were friends, but he had hoped —believed— that the other’s interest meant he shared his feeling of comfortable attachment. Sirius had enjoyed being able to say anything without fear of being judged or pitied, but right then, he only felt manipulated.

Truthfully, he had very much longed to know the answer when he had asked why. Instead, Tom had insisted on talking about his own damn secrets and mysteries. In fact, Tom had elegantly sidestepped every personal question and had always sounded more invested in reading about Sirius’s troubles than any good news he brought up.

The hurt cleared his thoughts in the most painful way possible. At that very moment, he could not care less whether he was indeed paranoid or losing his mind. He had itched to know whatever Tom had been about to tell, but curiosity had played no role in it. The pull had been far less innocent than that and, once he could recognise it, he realised it had been there for a while. However, he had never expected that darkness would feel so sweet and intoxicating —so inoffensive.

Damn, he truly was a bloody idiot.

 IX.

Sirius had bravely fought the temptation to write on the diary again to curse its very existence and, so far, he had won. Still, he had buried the blasted thing at the bottom of his trunk and only taken it out on their last day before the holidays. He was currently waiting for his brother outside the Great Hall, while the students who had already finished their dinner passed by while animatedly chatting about their upcoming plans.

At last, he saw the familiar pale face and hurried towards the small group of Slytherins.

“Hey, Regulus!”

His brother glared at him, but murmured something to his companions and they promptly left towards the dungeons. Sirius could not help frowning at their backs —if the tables had been turned and it was him asking to be alone with a Slytherin, he would have expected a little resistance from his friends. Focusing his attention back on the younger boy, he saw the scowl was still very much present.

“What do you want?”

Sirius swallowed the urge to snap back, irked by Regulus’s defensiveness.

“I’m not going back home these hols, so I need you to make sure this gets back to the Malfoys.”

He handed out the diary, wrapped in the brown fabric, but his brother made no move to take it. Instead, he asked,

“You aren’t coming home?”

All of a sudden, Sirius felt his mouth dry at the vulnerability clearly present in the question.

“Um, I’m… I’m not.” He ran a hand through his hair. “It’s not that bad, though, is it? Mother will be in a foul mood when she finds out, sure, but I won’t be there to aggravate you all every day.”

His light tone was weak and did not get a reaction from Regulus beyond a renewed glower.

“So what, you want me to deliver one of your funny pranks to Malfoy now that he no longer attends Hogwarts?”

“Don’t be daft, I’d never let you take the blame and steal my spotlight.” Regulus refused to say anything and so, a tense silence ensued. Out of the corner of his eye, Sirius noticed they had drawn the attention of some students. He pushed the diary against his brother’s crossed arms. “It’s something I took from them at the beginning of the summer. I’m not interested in it anymore.”

Finally, Regulus took it and started to unwrap it. Sirius hurried to still his hands. Physical contact between the brothers had become rare nowadays, but neither seemed to realise.

“Nuh-uh. Everyone’s always going on and on about how you’re so much smarter than I am, so show a bit of brains. It’s one of those diaries you can’t stop writing on. Took me a bit to figure it out.”

It was not all the truth, but he did not know what the diary was exactly and hoped it was enough to deter Regulus from giving in to his own curiosity.

His brother was still looking back at him with plenty of mistrust in his clear eyes, but he would not keep an item like that —Sirius was sure of it.

“You can give it to Cousin Cissy,” he joked, breaking the silence once more. “I’m sure she’ll be delighted to have a reason to call on the Malfoys and insult the white sheep of the family at the same time.”

He wanted to add something else, either wish Regulus good luck or happy Christmas. In the end, the right words never came to him and his brother walked away after uttering a curt, ‘Goodbye, Sirius.’

 X.

It turned out that getting rid of that diary was the best decision he had made in a while. James’s parents had also invited Remus and Peter to their winter house for a week —carefully chosen by the boys so that Moony would not have to deal with any furry problems.

Not even Walburga’s Howler managed to shatter his happiness. It had arrived one morning, while they were all having breakfast. Sirius had prayed for the ground to open up and swallow him whole when he had seen Euphemia’s and Fleamont’s faces as they heard the usual string of slurs and threats —fortunately, Prongs was used to those Howlers by then. For a very long moment, Sirius had also feared what they would think of him after learning he was a thief.

In fact, he had barely dared look up when an ominous silence had returned to their table. However, it had soon been broken by a new string of voices, only that time there was a mix of indignation and reassurance and it was all in his favour. Sirius’s eyes had been suspiciously wet when his friend had clapped him on the back and he had had to talk the adults out of seeing Walburga Black before they went back to school.

Even if he did not manage to find an excuse to stay at Hogwarts during the next break, he would not have to face her in months. It was a very freeing, hopeful thought. He knew that his little stunt would bring other, more serious consequences eventually, but he was not very worried about whatever hell his mother had promised. Hell could not scare him when he already knew what it was like to live in it.

[ghostmartyr]

how a life can move from the darkness [2/?]

|1|

Brief summary before the cut: Two drug addicts (Eren and Historia) meet in group and decide to be roommates to make their living situation slightly less weird. From there we do the slow burn found family dance mixed in with the struggles and agonies of recovery. Heavy on friendship feels, especially EMA. Eventual yumikuri.

Frieda’s first real visit, where she was actually visiting her sister, not being their babysitter, ended with orders for them to invest in a pet. She didn’t phrase it particularly demandingly. She only said it once, and didn’t bring it up the rest of the night. She barely raised her voice loud enough to be heard over the stove.

She’d walked in on them during one of their mutual wall/ceiling viewing parties.

It was an order.

“No dogs.”

“Okay.”

“Or cats.”

“Okay.”

“Or ferrets.”

“Okay.”

Eren pulled his jacket tighter. The zipper was broken. He should have worn a sweatshirt. He walked down the sidewalk, foot hitting every crack and head wondering if his mom would have preferred a broken back to a broken heart. “Nothing that can get out and crawl around the apartment.”

Historia, behind the personal barrier that used to be the map to the pet store, said, “Eren, we’re getting a fish.”

“Oh,” Eren said. “Okay.” Pause. “Just one?”

“Do you want more than one?”

Eren wasn’t sure he wanted one. He wasn’t sure he wanted one of anything else, either. He mostly wanted Historia’s sister to worry less. He felt like he had two moms these days, and he was letting down both of them. “I… do fish get lonely?”

“Don’t know.”

That made two of them.

An hour, a very talkative employee, and five pamphlets later, Eren still didn’t have an answer to his question, and knew more about nitrate cycles than high school or Armin had ever bothered with. He also found out that the same yearly school field trip to the aquarium each year had taught him nothing about aquariums.

Pumps, vacuums, filters, water treatments, thermometers. Food. Tanks bigger than he could lift.

Armin would have loved this.

One text and he’d probably explain exactly what they wanted and what kind of fish to look for better than the sales guy, and ask if they wanted him to come help out in person with the selections. The trip wouldn’t be giving Eren a headache and he wouldn’t have visions of all the fish they were going to fail dancing in his head.

Armin wasn’t there, and Eren would have to read one of the hundreds of texts from him to find out if there was even a chance of changing that in this reality. Without hating himself so much he couldn’t breathe.

Historia was in the same leaky boat he was, so by the time the sales guy let them go with instructions to look around the store and figure out what kind of aquarium they’d like, Eren really had no idea why they were getting a fish. Besides the merit points from a successful purchase. If they pulled this off without anything dying, it would be like a giant neon sign announcing to the world that they were sort of functional.

The neon sign would not be going near the fish, because that screwed with the lighting, and that, according to the midpoint of their free lecture, would be bad.

“Did you have a breed in mind?” he asked Historia. The damp, weighty smell surrounding them made him feel like he was underwater and drowning. “Or a color?”

“You can pick,” Historia said.

Eren hadn’t met their new fish yet, but he felt sorry for it.

One of them had to put some kind of executive effort into this. Historia was paying for everything. That left him. He could handle walking around and figuring out which fish they were going to try like hell not to kill.

Sometime during their tutorial, they’d ended up in the tropical section. Everything was bright and smelled like the ocean. Eren’s eyes had spent the last ten minutes burning, and now that it was just him and Historia, he was having trouble keeping them from leaking.

Armin and Mikasa should have been there.

They weren’t, and they couldn’t be, and that was his own damn fault, and he didn’t want them there—

“Eren?”

He looked up from the stained concrete floor.

Historia had zoned back in, and was watching his clenched, shaking, fists. He tried to relax them. It didn’t work. He was standing in the middle of a fish store, trying not to cry, and he couldn’t hit anything because then he probably would kill a fish, and Historia being filthy rich wouldn’t fix how awful and pissed that would make him feel, and before he knew it he’d be back behind Zeke’s batting cages, hearing all of the offers the dealer was making and actually listening.

“Eren,” Historia’s voice said, firmly.

“Yeah.” His was too far away, somewhere under the waves of the ocean. But he blinked and he was looking at the bright colors, not the floor, and a quick swipe cleared the damp spots away from under his eyes. “Salt water’s okay, right?”

He could see her nod. Her footsteps followed him down the aisle, and he concentrated on looking at the damn colorful fish. He had no idea what to look for. The sales guy had set them loose with a happy smile, telling them that if they found something they liked, he’d help out with the step-by-step of what to buy first.

There were more steps to this than Eren ever wanted to think about, which probably meant it was healthy to try.

His eyes floated over to a tank on the other side of the aisle. Less colorful, and full of rocks. A lone fish roved back and forth inside, dark spines the size of his fingers swishing along with it. It looked like someone had chopped up a sea urchin and glued its spikes to a large brown goldfish with streaky frills. A lionfish, someone else’s happy voice reminded him, carrying the sound of hurriedly flipped pages.

He didn’t hate the thought of caring for one of those.

He walked over to the tank, crouching down to stare at the thing properly. The card sitting by the tank agreed with his memory. And the fish was too big to mistake for an art fixture. It looked like a real creature; a real pet, not just something to lock away and call personal growth. Alive and fierce. Frieda would approve.

“What do you think?” he asked Historia.

She watched the lionfish swish into one of its rock caves. They both did.

“Okay.”

By the time they were back in their apartment, and the giant tank with all its mixed water and pumps and gravel and sand and rock features was set up, and they were staring at it instead of a blank wall, Eren understood a little better why they were getting a fish.

He doubted it was the upgrade Frieda was aiming for. He also doubted they could do any better.

---

A week into cycling the tank, Eren found the will for the conversation he’d put off since moving in.

Eren wasn’t big on letting people take care of him. His mom could attest to that. To hear her tell it, the day he started crawling, he’d spent all his time crawling away from her. Bandaging his skinned knees as a toddler had taken an hour of convincing before he’d let his—

He didn’t like being kept, or treated like he couldn’t handle his own life. After rehab, he lost the right to that mattering. His mom wasn’t going to accept her grown son’s rent when he needed babying, and he didn’t have the energy to push past the shame and argue.

Things were different now.

He hoped.

Historia was his sponsor, not his mother, and he was hers. He’d seen the bill for their aquarium. Pre-fish (they were giving the tank a month before they picked up its resident). He’d lived in their apartment. He’d seen Historia throw things into their shopping cart without checking prices. She paid for it from a wallet full of holes, but she never cared about the cost or bothered with coupons.

He knew Historia and her family had more money than he would even know what to do with. He knew he couldn’t afford his share if they split it honestly. He didn’t care. He was an adult. He worked. He could help pay for his own sad life.

It was important, Petra had said once, to remember that they were still part of the world. Addiction was what kept them out of it; recovery meant finding their way back in.

That was one of the first meetings he went to. He’d broken a fingernail gripping his chair and acid had boiled up his throat. Petra’s cookies had been too soft, and he ate three to make the taste go away.

Things were better now. He was cutting up carrots for dinner in an apartment that he didn’t share with someone he had hurt.

“I want to start paying rent,” Eren said.

Historia, alternating between reading her textbook and watching a pot boil, briefly added him to the rotation. “I told you, you don’t have to.”

“I want to,” Eren repeated, wincing at the extra volume his voice picked up. “I’m not some helpless little kid who needs handouts. I can pull my own weight.” Even if he’d been happy acting like he couldn’t up until now. What the fuck was wrong with him. He kept talking, trying to skid over that thought before he crashed into it. “I can’t keep taking advantage of people.”

“You’re not,” Historia said. She leaned against the counter, frowning. “I’m the one who asked you to move in so I could stop worrying my sister. You don’t need to pay me for being selfish.”

“That isn’t the point,” Eren said.

Historia continued as if she didn’t hear him. “Besides, I’m not paying for any of this either.”

“That’s—look, Historia, I’d just…” Eren took a deep breath, because breathing exercises were supposed to help. They didn’t, but they were supposed to, and he couldn’t say some of the horrible things his mind came up with if he was inhaling. He screwed what was left of his useless courage and doubled down. “It would help my recovery a lot if I could help out with some of this.”

The words were terrible and lifeless, straight out of the meetings they both hated, and he should have stuck a thank-you somewhere in the middle, because he owed her everything for the help he was squirming out of.

Historia was looking at the ceiling. Her mouth was half-open, and Eren thought she agreed that he was back to saying all of the wrong things.

“My father’s paying for it,” she said quietly.

A block of ice coalesced in Eren’s chest.

“Oh,” Eren said, because even if she wasn’t talking about the dead one, she’d only ever mentioned the dead one before, and they both had dead ones and—he swallowed. Breathed. They’d never really gone over it, but Historia was easy enough to spot, and he’d gone to enough protests and rallies to know that blank silence was the worst thing he could do here, even if they weren’t talking about her. He smiled, jaw creaking with effort and soul cringing. “Your dad was gay?”

Timing meant he was expecting pain to get in the way of any relief. He was sure he was intruding on memories that weren’t any of his business, and even if he was trying to be a supportive friend, he was terrible at it, and they were now back to a place where he knew he’d be making things worse.

What he got was perplexed bewilderment.

“…What?”

He was definitely going to make this worse. “You—you said your dad was dead,” Eren said, slowly enough to be insulting on its own, “but your dad’s paying for the apartment, so that means you have—had, sorry—two?”

Historia stared at him.

She blinked, once, mouth forming a legion of unspoken words.

Eren, realizing he should have just shoved checks under her door each month, stayed standing awkwardly in front of the cutting board, waiting for the axe to fall and fervently regretting the lack of pills nearby.

“Eren,” Historia said at last, words warbling furiously, “my inheritance is paying for all of this. He put me in his will. Frieda wouldn’t let me—she thinks using it is good for my—” She looked across the room at the fishless aquarium.

“I’m supposed to spend it,” she said. Her mouth twitched, a muffled sort of chuckle escaping. Followed by another.

A peal of laughter whimpered from her lungs, ragged and horrified, and Historia was sliding down to the floor, hand pressed to her forehead while the fit of hysteria took over, giggles turning to honest cackles, tearing through the kitchen. Eren watched. He just stood there and watched.

Because she only had one dad, and she’d killed him.

He was dead.

The sob waiting in Eren’s chest came out wrong, not matching the horror and helplessness swirled in it, or the feel of blood warm in his hands as he tried to stop it all from spilling out even though it was too late, and he slipped down to the floor next to Historia, biting down on his thumb to keep from laughing.

By the time Frieda came by, bringing her weekly gift of ice cream, they were both crying.

---

Historia said they could work out splitting the fish costs and groceries, and there really wasn’t a reason to bring it up past that, so they didn’t.

Frieda didn’t, either.

Eren had the disturbing feeling that she understood.

---

Reiner wasn’t outside when Eren showed up for their run.

That was weird to start with. Reiner was as fanatically devoted to taking care of himself as he had been to heroin. Not just physically. He had a day planner. He’d offered to buy Eren one. The guy did not know how to flake.

Standing out in front of the house in Reiner’s usual spot was a woman Eren recognized from some of Reiner’s pictures. He’d flipped through them every single day of rehab, and Eren had wanted him dead.

He didn’t remember the woman’s name. She was scrolling through her phone when he jogged up, and the nod she gave him wasn’t very inviting. Dark circles shaded her freckles, but she was wearing workout clothes. Maybe Eren had missed a text, and he was helping out both of them today.

“Reiner still inside?” he asked.

“Yeah,” the woman said, pocketing her phone. “That’s where he’s staying, too. Bastard’s too sick to be conscious, forget running around the block.”

Too sick to warn Eren, too.

He was paying Eren. They were only sort of friends. Missing out on a run with him still made Eren want to crawl into the nearest hole and not come out. Reiner wasn’t exactly a bright spot to his day, but his day had started with a text from Armin. Reiner never made anything worse. Him and his normalcy had been something to look forward to when Eren woke up and threw his phone through his pillowcase.

World much gloomier than it needed to be at six in the morning, Eren said, “Is there anything I can help with? There’s a drugstore—” he wasn’t going to think about it, he wasn’t going to think about it— “a couple miles out I could hit for him.”

“Thanks, but I think Bert’s got the panicked nursing covered.”

Bertolt, Eren had met. He was usually watering the rosebush outside the house at the end of their morning run. “Great,” Eren said.

That left him… where? Needing to send a get-well text?

He made polite eye contact with Reiner’s friend. Like a person. “I’ll head off, then,” he said. “Let Reiner know today’s on me.”

The woman smirked at him. It might have been meant as a smile, but the glint in her eyes and Eren’s mood said smirk. “You have a side job exercising strangers,” she said. “Don’t volunteer to throw away money.”

Before Eren could point out that he wasn’t a dick, even if she was, she added, “Anyway, that’s what dragged me into this. Reiner thinks routines are part of the ex-junkie bible, and he didn’t want to screw you up just because he forgot to wash his hands. So I’ll be palling around with you this morning to assuage your mutual guilt complexes. You’re welcome.”

Eren had to unclench his jaw before he could speak. He wanted to go back to bed. He also wanted to go inside the house and wring Reiner’s fucking neck. The happy chittering of the birds sounded like cheaply ringing tin in his ears. “Reiner told you?”

Reiner told anyone?

Eren didn’t tell his friends that his client asked for makeup advice he didn’t have to cover up his track marks. He didn’t talk about Reiner’s lifelong fear of needles not holding a fucking candle to his snowballing drug habits. He didn’t breathe a damn word about any of it, not even in group, not even with the names taken out, because why the fuck would he do that to anyone.

“Don’t lose your head about it,” the woman’s voice echoed. “It only came up because he was already wetting himself over missing your appointment.” Her shoes thumped across the concrete, and Eren felt a slap against his shoulder. “He was worried, and hurling too much for his brain to keep a lid on why. He freaked out all over again when he realized what he said. He was trying to be a good friend, not an asshole. He just has a bad habit of mixing the two.”

Eren’s fingernails were digging into his palms. He had to concentrate to make them stop, but they stopped, and without the sting that said he broke the skin.

Deep breaths. The ones that never really worked.

“It’s fine,” he said.

“Right,” said the woman. He could feel her watching him. The scrutiny reminded him of the rehab shrink. Or a more hostile Petra. “Sorry. Usually I only bring up sensitive subjects on purpose.”

Eren didn’t know how much of a joke that was. He decided it didn’t matter. He reeled his head back to a zone where he knew how to handle all of this, even if he didn’t, reminded himself it was too early in the morning for him to shoot Historia a text asking for commiseration, and breathed normally.

“Do you need some time to stretch, or are you good to go now?” Eren asked.

The woman gave a one-armed shrug. “Feel free to run away from me at your leisure. I’m just here to take up space.” She watched him another moment before sticking out her hand. “Ymir, by the way.”

Eren shook it with as much heart as he didn’t have. “Eren.”

Her smile was all teeth. “Nice meeting you.”

----

Reiner wasn’t the only person who was sick, it turned out.

Eren knew he had to do something about the phone problem. This was a marked improvement from not thinking of it as a problem. He didn’t think he could steal credit for that. The outside world was screaming it at him. Armin had taken up regular texts like clockwork, and if that meant something was wrong, Eren didn’t know how to check without losing his mind. Being a fuckup and a coward would do that. Mikasa’s daily texts had never stopped. Hannes had gotten back to him about supervising some free climbers over the weekend. His first since his broken leg.

His pulse hadn’t dropped a beat when that conversation ended and a disaffected buzz announced a message from Zeke.

Zeke had barely spoken to him since the funeral. He’d walked him in and out of the rehab facility doors and left him alone. It wasn’t that different from the way things were before their dad died. The only change was him not dropping by unannounced to take Eren off on some adventure. If he’d tried that recently, no one had mentioned it. Eren wasn’t sure anyone had even bothered giving him his new address.

A text from Zeke out of the blue was a danger sign. Eren couldn’t just ignore it. He also couldn’t click on it.

Pacing the entire length of the apartment back and forth and back again, Eren could admit he had a problem. Step one. The last time that revelation had crept up and slammed him into a gutter, it was one of the worst moments of his life. This didn’t compare, but it left him feeling lopsided and tired. He couldn’t ignore his brother. Zeke had never ignored him. He had every reason in the world to, but he never had. Eren owed him.

He couldn’t open the damn text.

He made another agitated circuit around the apartment. His phone wasn’t set to tick down seconds, but they were playing back in his head fine without the help. He was rounding the couch, checking the aquarium and wishing they already had a fish to stare at—like that had a chance of helping, but maybe it did—when the loud clap of a slamming textbook stopped him in his tracks.

Historia, who he hadn’t noticed, was lying on the floor. Until a millisecond of time passed for her to gather her temper and she stood up from the rug, swept over, and threw out her hand.

Eren, who hadn’t come up with a better plan yet, gave her his phone. She almost took his hand off with it.

“Under Zeke,” he said. In case she mistook him for someone who had decided today was the time to finally go through and acknowledge the hundreds of unread texts Armin and Mikasa had sent him.

Historia scanned the screen in slow motion. “Someone’s sick,” she said, and visions of hospitals gone by and panic started up before she filled in the rest. “He wants to know if you can sub in for the game on Saturday.”

Baseball. No emergency. Baseball.

Eren breathed out, sighing. Relief was missing from it. He didn’t know why he had expected anything else. A quiet, petty hole that rehab hadn’t filled all the way was still waiting for Zeke to say something about what happened. He never would, and he was an ungrateful bastard for wanting more than what he’d got. What he’d got was more than he deserved. If Zeke never talked to him about anything but baseball, Eren would live with that.

That could really happen, too. Zeke loved baseball like he’d never loved anyone in his own damn family—

Eren moved to take back his phone before his head started something his fists couldn’t finish. Historia’s temper flare had vanished, and she dangled the device between them like it was the bomb about to go off instead of them. She made it look as large and unwieldy in her hands as it felt in Eren’s thoughts. He didn’t know why that helped. He wasn’t even sure if it did.

With how the day was going, Eren couldn’t be surprised when it buzzed with another text the second his finger brushed the casing. Historia jumped slightly, and Eren hated his eyes for catching the name on the screen.

Because Armin had started texting him again.

Great.

He was looking at the floor. Historia kept holding the phone. The bomb.

Great, great, great, great.

Eren could feel his breath shortening, his blood pumping faster, and he was supposed to be getting a grip and trying to be better than all of this and he wanted to break something. More things than he had the first time, or the second, or the third, or the twelfth, because all of those times hadn’t made the right impression, Armin was still trying, and so was Mikasa, and he was so sick of it, and himself, and Zeke, and—

“Have you ever been to a batting cage?” Eren blurted out.

Historia took a moment to answer. “What?” she said.

“Batting cage,” Eren said, feeling a tension headache building. “Have you ever been?”

“No?”

Ten minutes later, Eren didn’t think he felt a whole lot better, but nothing was broken, he hadn’t hurt anyone, and Historia wasn’t complaining about the sprinters’ pace they were walking down the sidewalk at. He didn’t think that last one was a point in his favor. She hadn’t given him his phone back. It was still a good thing. Someone was around to keep him from being stupid.

He led the way with a nervous energy that he hated. He knew how his body was supposed to work. It wasn’t a natural like Mikasa’s—and that turned the notch up on his leg speed one more time—but he’d spent time on it, and he knew how he liked to move. Purposefully. With real energy that came from the core. Not nervous sweats and clenched fists.

There were two batting cages within walking distance of their apartment. One, neither of them needed to be anywhere near. The other was fine, and normal, and open until midnight. Glazed lights decking a row of fence were visible from the street. The padded green of the fake grass stapled to every inch of the facility’s floor wasn’t. Two pairs of feet thumped across it to the cashier’s window out front.

Eren forked out the cash from his wallet to the drowsy employee manning the entrance before Historia had a chance to object. They marched on through without a word.

It was cool and dark outside, even with the glare of the lights, and Eren stuffed a helmet on his head from the rack and grabbed a bat before his thoughts slowed down enough to race in coherent circles. He couldn’t hit people anymore, but he sure could hit objects.

Historia was still trailing behind him, and she’d never been and he would help with that in a second after he took care of him, and watching was where it all started anyway it wasn’t like he was that great with words like—

He smacked the start button. His other hand clasped the bat, touching metal where the glue had peeled away from the grip. He raised it over his shoulder, a million lessons from a man who looked too much like his father coursing through his veins, and he was holding a metal pole and watching the blood spurt over it and his hands and

and

He remembered to hit the emergency stop and he made it to the trash can. That was the important part.

Fuck.

He didn’t know where the bat was, but all his hands were holding was the plastic bag around the rim of the trash can. His head was dipped down next to a collection of empty Styrofoam cups, gum, and vomit. The acidic burning in his throat waited for a swallow. The rest of him stayed still, waiting for the next hit.

That hadn’t happened before. He’d thought of it happening, but it never did. He hadn’t thrown up since he bet Jean he could drink an entire case of soda in first grade. He won. His mom still had a special sigh for that stain on the carpet.

Eren pulled himself out of the garbage. His knee was shaking. Badly enough to bring up more problems, so he sat down on the fake grass and let it scratch his fingers. He swallowed through the burning, and pressed a fist to his forehead.

Fuck.

Footsteps approached. Another cup showed up by his head. Not empty. Eren took it and sipped the water, and it was just like any other workout.

The only thing he could think of that would make it any worse was if he started crying, and he felt like he was going to.

Historia sat down next to him.

“Do you… want to talk about it?” she asked. She sounded like she was reading off a script. She was still holding his phone.

Eren hated his fucking phone. He wanted to throw it into a landfill.

He took a breath, and another sip of water. Besides the phone, which could go to hell, the hate felt cooler. Like all the lava out under the sky was turning into something solid. He’d liked Armin’s volcano phase. It’d been his phase, too. Like with the dinosaurs, and that one summer with pelicans.

He’d kill to be talking to Armin about pelicans right now. Instead he was sitting on a batting cage floor, the only support system he was strong enough to bear sitting right next to him instead of studying for her test like she was supposed to, and his lips were covered in drying bile, and he’d killed his dad.

Admitting he had problems wasn’t too hard when they were this obvious.

Eren opened his fist and dragged his hand through his hair.

“Do you have anyone?” Eren asked quietly. “That you have to make amends to?”

The answer was instantaneous, and not much of a surprise. “Frieda.”

Eren twisted his bangs around his fingers. Only a little of him wanted to tug it all out by the roots. “Not family. People you screwed up because they liked you and liking you meant they were around when you fucked up your life. Friends.”

Historia didn’t say anything for a whole minute.

“No,” she said.

That one was more of a surprise. It shouldn’t have been, because she was his roommate, and he had a pretty wide window into her life, but it was, and now Eren felt like even more of a dick. He dropped his hand into his lap and silently added Historia to his list. Maybe she’d be one he could actually cross off.

He didn’t know what to say next, because ‘sorry,’ was more of a distraction than he could deal with while being this useless, but as long as he was sober, he wasn’t the kind of person who wanted to just leave that bombshell alone.

Historia took pity on him and sighed.

“I had a fiancée in juvie.”

Eren blinked. He lifted his head. “You can get engaged in juvie?” he asked.

“You were in juvie?” was close behind, and he felt stupid enough thinking it to avoid saying it, because no matter how tiny she was, saying he had trouble picturing his drug addicted, father-murdering roommate doing time was…

“It’s not something you have to fill out paperwork for,” Historia said, continuing blithely on. “It’s just a promise. Words.” She shook her head. “It doesn’t matter. She was older, so she got out before I did, and after that, I never heard from her again. We never even—” Historia stopped herself. Her eyes shut. “She probably didn’t even mean it. It started as a joke.”

It didn’t sound like it came from any sense of humor he’d known. Historia wasn’t laughing. Neither was Eren. He took another sip of the water she’d found him before he crushed the cup and it spilled all over his jeans.

“She doesn’t even know my real name,” Historia said, almost inaudibly. Her blinks sped up. “She was gone before my drug habit could disappoint her. She would have—” Historia snorted and there was something dark and chaotic in her smile.

“She would have killed me.”

This was a joke she got. Eren didn’t.

They sat in silence for a few moments, sitting on the scratchy fake grass. Eren spotted his bat on the floor next to the open cage.

“I have these friends,” he said, “that I don’t know how to…”

Trailing off was as close as he could get to articulating it. Historia could probably figure out the gist by living with him. Tonight wasn’t the first time his phone had caused problems, it was just the first time he’d made them her problem.

“The text before we left looked like some sort of science fact-a-day,” Historia said. “Frieda has a subscription to a few things like that.” He could feel her watching him. Months of feeling like everyone was watching him had honed the sense. “He’s probably copying you on them.”

That sounded like Armin. The perfect way to start talking without saying anything.

He waited for anger to spike with the thought, but he just felt tired.

He looked at the baseball bat. Historia followed his look.

“Zeke’s my half-brother,” he said. “I owe him, but if Saturday’s anything like this I’d be better off not showing up at all.”

Historia said, easily, “I’ll fill in for you.” Like any of his friends would have after he dragged them out of their apartment in the middle of the night to have a panic attack in front of them.

Being too stubborn to admit that he needed help was what had gotten him here. He didn’t want to stay. He didn’t think anyone wanted him to.

“Have you ever played baseball?”

“No.”

Zeke was going to love this.

---

Zeke did.

He’d also shaved.

Eren hadn’t seen him without a beard in years. It was weird, made him look like he belonged at some sort of board meeting, and every time they made eye contact Eren needed a second to find his brother in the face.

What he didn’t find, and what he’d been scared of seeing, was their dad.

He didn’t know if he was allowed to say thank you. They didn’t really do that. Zeke hadn’t said anything about Historia showing up as the sub for his sub. He was grateful, since the tiny adult baseball league was his entire life, and he’d be heartbroken if he missed out on any of it, but he didn’t say it. Not with Eren. There was just this quiet expectation that it would all work out, because they were brothers. No thanks necessary.

Not being the one playing, Eren had too much time to think about that.

Now, after the game, sitting across from his brother at the pizza parlor Zeke had selected instead of the bar he’d taken his team to every game day for at least five years, Eren was still thinking about it.

“Your roommate doesn’t have a bad arm,” Zeke said. “Do you think she’d want to join up?”

“You’d have to ask her.” Historia had gone outside when Colt ordered a beer, and he didn’t know if she’d noticed that Yelena had spent the entire seventh inning stretch and drive over asking too many questions, but it was mostly going okay. She’d caught a fly ball and gotten a hit, and their team won. They’d both had worse days.

“I might, if you can’t play.”

Eren’s hand tensed around his drink.

Zeke wouldn’t ask. Somebody had shown up, so he wouldn’t ask. Eren still couldn’t shake the feeling that he knew. Even if there was no way he could. Zeke was like that. Hide and seek had turned into a banned game the nights Zeke babysat. No matter how hard Eren tried, Zeke always found him, and his mom had gotten sick of coming home to him exploding in frustration.

Eren wanted him to ask. Zeke came to Eren instead of hitting up Mikasa when he needed a sub. He cared. Eren wanted to feel it instead of just knowing it, for once.

He was an ungrateful brat, in a lot of ways.

Zeke paid for the pizza. Historia eventually walked back in and sat with them. Zeke asked about school, and rock climbing, and what they thought about the batting order they’d tried.

He didn’t ask about Eren.

Which was fine. What would he have said, anyway? He was ghosting his best friends in the world while they tried to keep him in their lives. He didn’t get to miss his big brother for having the brains to stay out of it all.

[next]

[vael]

2019 Annual Review

Each year, I look back at the previous year’s annual review and note that things didn’t go as planned. For some reason I am always surprised, but this time it’s a little painful, too. From 2018′s Annual Review:

“2019 outlook? Sunny! I hope it will be my best year yet.“

Oh, Vael. You built your house, you moved to the promised land. But your year did not go as planned. You are not even close to the zen you craved.

It has been a wild year. This will run long. All I can do is stick to the format and hope my memory and average writing skill will do the year justice. So, as usual, we start with the positive.

What went well this year?

We like our house. We do. The builder was no good, resulting in some warped walls and a lot of headache getting them to finish everything properly, but the layout is very suitable for us. My office is exactly what I needed, our TV room has just the right space for us. We finally have a respectable kitchen. Since I’m living and working in the house 24 hours a day, it’s important to have a comfortable space.

Game development. For the past five years, I’ve put in some serious work. A lot of it was within my game engine, GAM3, and tinydark’s gaming network, The Orbium. While I put in a lot of work, not much came in the way of actual games produced. I finally rallied in 2018 and put out Bean Grower. It was designed to be a supplemental game, not a main driver, so it will not bring in sustainable income. I went on to think that I should open GAM3 up to other developers, license the engine out and collect a share of what they make.

I resolved to refactor GAM3: a word which means to rewrite and modernize many parts of it so that it’s easier to work in, and for it to present better. I would come to realize this desire to share GAM3 was due to a lack of confidence in myself to produce something great, and financially sustainable. Around the time I was realizing that multiplayer was the answer, I discovered Marosia.

Then we moved, I took on contract work, and things generally slowed for me for a few months, eking out what development I could. I played Marosia throughout and in August, it died. I wrote a teardown for it. The stars had aligned: though I had a lot of prelim work to be done, I would make a successor to Marosia. I managed to hype a few people in the community with a demo of GAM3 and I spent the next few months coding a chat prototype and generally organizing myself, and finally mid-November began the refactoring. It would end there, but just this morning (seriously) we learned Marosia was coming back. I had a momentary freakout but it’s ultimately a good thing for my own game.

I haven’t been more excited for a project in a long time. I never thought I’d be so excited to create a standard fantasy world, but it’s a ton of fun, with intricacies I never considered. The game’s design lends itself to a sustainable monetization model: I’m thinking $3/mo for quality-of-life upgrades, with a discount for buying in bulk. I would have paid double for Marosia, so I think this is fair. (6 months of die2nite is currently priced at $69, 6 months of Hattrick is $90!) And most important of all, I can do it ethically, with a game that truly means something to people.

Web development. I’ve learned quite a bit this year! I am so grateful for svelte. I liked but never loved React.js. It always felt ponderous to me. I have no doubt The Orbium’s refactoring would have taken me half the time it did if I were learning svelte vs. React, simply because React is so much more convoluted than svelte, and all in the name of uglier syntax. Svelte seamlessly integrates style and functionality into UI components, which means that if I’m working with a button that clicks to open a modal, everything I need for that button is in that one file.

Due to my contract work (with Harley Davidson, I can reveal) I also got some experience with Symfony and other modern development practices in PHP. PHP doesn’t really excite me these days, loathing having to produce views with it, but it is at least comfy.

My job. “Yeah, yeah.” I got a raise, most of which was contributed to getting Eve and my son onto my badass healthcare plan. We’re developing like it’s 2012, which is frustrating and makes even simple tasks take forever, but I can’t complain about the pay nor the stability of the company and my position there. I also work mostly remotely.

What didn’t go so well?

2019 was dominated by the bad. Eve’s not putting out an Annual Review, but our pain is shared.

The move. 11 months after the contract was signed, our builder was finally ready to let us move in. The house was not finished, just livable. So we rushed out of Rhode Island. We packed my car with everything we could fit, even removing the spare tire, but we got almost all of it. Me, Eve, our son, and our two cats.

At around 7:30 PM, we were driving on a dark highway when we were struck by a muffler that had fallen out from the truck in front of us. It destroyed the front-end, spilling radiator fluid onto the road. I had no idea what was going on, but it so happened that a mechanic had broken down right near us and was able to help. The engine barely carried us to the nearest motel, and I was in shock. I carried all our stuff to our second-floor room, it was even lightly raining. And I was defeated. Eve reports she had never seen me so bad. I had no idea how long we’d be in this ghetto-ass motel, what it would cost us during this time of great financial need, and mostly: I was just miserable. We could have died. If it had hit one of our tires, we could have spun out at 70+ MPH. All I wanted to do was get to our house the next day, and here we were.

I won’t detail the rest here, but I do want to thank my friends for their support and appreciate the good fortune that we got through this time.

We got to the house at 11PM on a Sunday; I still appreciate our builder taking the time to show us around so late. And... it was not at all what we were expecting. We had no driveway, and it had rained. We were tracking in some mud but that didn’t even matter because the entire house had to be cleaned. There was dirt all over the floors, they’d forgotten I didn’t want a chandelier over the dining room table, and the feeling was that we’d gone through Hell (and austure financial practices) to get here and this was it. So much wasn’t done. We knew that, but we didn’t think we’d be sweeping and wetting the floor with paper towel just to have a place to put our stuff. Shoutout to my friend Cody for setting us up with a supply drop.

We spent a lot of time buying furniture, aided by our rental SUV, all the while worrying about our newly purchased things sitting around the house without our protection as workers came in and out. I had to go back to Virginia to pick up the car and through exhaustion, caffeine, stupidity, and anxiety, managed to go 88 MPH and get myself a ticket: a misdemeanor, even. I spent the entire day picking up that damn car (5 hours up and down) and returned home in the worse state I’d ever felt. I was emotionally, mentally, and physically depleted.

But there was no stopping for me: I took on contract work and I had to get it done just to stay afloat. And then we got a fucking dog.

The dog. At some point in 2018 we determined that our son could use a companion and that a dog really completes the family. Leading up to the move, we put a down payment on a rough collie: the “Lassie” breed. They usually run around $800 and we got her for $500. I was a fan of the breed and Eve had done research that proves it’s a great breed. (it is) Even after the accident, we thought we should pay the rest for her and bring some joy into our life.

We named her Esme, and getting a dog was definitely one of the worst macro decisions I’ve made for the family yet. I couldn’t last more than a month with her. It was my decision to get rid of her, which made my wife and son sad but we were getting so little out of the experience. The cats beat her up, she was afraid of everything, and all she wanted to do was run around but we kept her cooped up in the house because we had no fence. I hated that there was still a dog smell, and I hated that it farted during Game of Thrones. It was over when we went grocery shopping and came back to a poop-filled crate, which the circumstances of the night dictated I must clean.

Young Living. Eve was supposed to sell essential oils for some side money. We knew it wasn’t going to be big money, unless she got lucky or turned out to be a natural-born saleswoman, but it was something to do and we believe in the products. I really trust in Young Living and I personally have seen the benefits of their oils and products.

So she went to the YL convention in Utah to learn to sell and, hey, have some fun. She returned feeling even less confident: they’d changed some numbers, and the truth that we always knew was that the market’s highly saturated. There are memes trivializing the effects of oils and there’s no denying the company’s an MLM. A lot of the big earners made their sales early on. Coinciding with the bad feels of Autumn, we decided to put the oil dream aside and focus on mental and physical health.

Eve mental/physical health. The muffler changed a lot for us. It morphed what should have been a very happy time in our lives into a very stressful one. Eve felt fatigued and broken down, and I wasn’t much better off. One day before her planned back-to-action, pick ourselves up and get ready to enjoy Summer, she sprained and tore a ligament in her ankle while coming down the stairs. We hoped it was just a sprain and did everything we could to avoid going to the doctor, but a week later she hadn’t gotten better and so began the PT and bullshit regimen. Our plans of hiking the blue ridge mountains were crushed.

But she recovered, and I shit you not, the very day before she planned to return to action, it was Father’s Day. She was making me my special breakfast and was using a hand-blender to blend pumpkin french toast mix when she went to clean some gunk out of the blender with her finger. It was a split-second decision to help make breakfast faster. Her finger twitched, caught the irresponsibly sensitive power button and tore her finger up. Immediately took her to Urgent Care and then the Emergency Room. $3,000 and some luck later, she kept her finger, but has permanently lost some feeling in it.

That was a bad time for us. I was overworked, she was miserable, and yet she still managed to get to Utah to learn how to sell. To salvage our year. In Autumn, all the anxiety, stress, and the damage from her upbringing finally culminated and she broke. 

Her physical health tanked in tandem with her mental. She suffered frequent menstrual issues and her EDS (a joint disorder) flaring up. It is hard to detail all the pain and frustration, and it really is beyond the scope of what needs to be said. My wife is depressed, prone to feeling overwhelmed, and I’m happy to say that we are getting her professional help soon.

What’s remarkable is that I can’t recall a period of time that she didn’t try her best to recover. Every month, most weeks, she would constantly express that the next day or month was her time. She’s done it for this month and 2020 as well. And I don’t think she’s lazy or unmotivated. She is just defeated and I am a poor comforter. Honestly, I am just shit at helping people if the solution isn’t “well just force yourself to do the thing.” That’s how I get through my problems and it doesn’t work for everyone, not even always myself. Still she is strong. I think writing this out has helped me remember that.

Relationship with my son. I had hoped my increased efficiency and happiness would improve our relationship. I planned for more structure: things like “once we’re upstairs for bedtime rituals, no going back down.” Each night I make a point to spend a minimum of 30 focused minutes with him. But I have only succeeded in making our relationship worse. I don’t think he needs professional help, but there is something within him, from when he was three years old, that just prevents him from being a hard worker. Respect is important to me and I don’t respect him. He is a frustrated child, often not understanding the world, often forgetting things he was supposed to do. I’m not doing a good job of helping.

I think I could have done better, but there were simply too many fronts to fight.

Mental performance. I haven’t gotten any better from last year. I am still not as sharp as 2017-Vael. It is a matter of stress and lifestyle.

What did I learn?

How to be a homeowner! Generally how to manage a home. I got my tools, all cute with my little leaf blower.

SLOWWWW DOWWWWN. The outside of the house needs some work. We need to extend our driveway, clear an acre, and put up a fence. I could take a loan out to do this and be fine, but I could also just slow down. Take a deep breath. Enjoy what we have for the Summer. It sucks I won’t be able to use that acre for farming, but I think I have a good place to plant a single apple tree this year. And hey, less mowing.

A shit ton of web development.

Probably became more cynical. But I think The Good Place has helped remind me to be a good person.

To just accept Eve needs help. And that I really suck at helping her.

Future Outlook

All that bad stuff that happened? Pfft. Shitty year. 2020′s here, it’s a brand new decade. I’ve got a cool game I want to make, we’re gonna get Eve some help, and...

Get pregnant! Yeah! Right now we definitely aren’t ready for kids. We need to use our new health insurance to make a bunch of appointments, recover  financially, mentally, physically. But we very badly want more children. I feel it all the time. I have begun to suspect that genetics do matter, and I wonder if Abel’s laziness mirrors his biological father’s laziness. My dad loved to work and I do too. It might be possible to pass these traits on.

Better office. I need to get some furniture and improve my work environment.

Vacation! We desperately need a vacation. We’re going to Disney this year, either May or June.

Zen Vael. I will attempt to be “the person I want to be” as detailed last year. My soft goal for this is March 15th, as I set last year. I will undoubtedly fail that date. There is no way I’m wrangling my sleep and attitude in the next two months, but surely by the end of the year?

Thanks for reading.

Vael

[yuckitup-jwd]

Men VS Women

Women have many faults Men only have 2 Everything they say And everything they do

RELATIONSHIPS: First, a man does not call a relationship a relationship - he refers to it as "that time when me and Suzie were boinking on a semi-regular basis."

When a relationship ends, a woman will cry and pour her heart out to her girlfriends, and she will write a poem titled "All Men Are Idiots." Then she will get on with her life.

A man has a little more trouble letting go. Six months after the breakup at 3 am early on a Sunday morning - he will call and say "I just wanted to let you know you ruined my life, and I'll never forgive you, and I hate you, and you're a total floozy. But I want you to know there's always a chance for us." This is known as the "I Hate You/I Love You" drunken phone call, that 99% of all men have made at least once. There are community colleges that offer courses to help men get over this need; alas these classes rarely prove effective.

SEX: Women prefer 30-45 minutes of foreplay.

Men prefer 30-45 seconds of foreplay. Men consider driving back to her place as part of the foreplay.

MATURITY: Women mature much faster than men. Most 17-year-old females can function as adults.

Most 17-year-old males are still trading baseball cards and giving each other wedgies after gym class. This is why high school romances rarely work out.

COMEDY: Let's say a small group of men and women are in a room, watching tele- vision, and an episode of "The Three Stooges" comes on. Immediately, the men will get very excited - they will laugh uproariously, and even try to imitate the actions of Curly, man's favorite Stooge.

The women will roll their eys, groan, and wait it out.

HANDWRITING: To their credit, men do not decorate their penmanship. They just chicken-scratch.

Women use scented, colored stationery and they dot their "i's" with circles and hearts. Women use ridiculously large loops in their "p's" and "g's." It is a royal pain to read a note from a woman. Even when she's dumping you, she'll put a smiley face at the end of the note.

BATHROOMS: A man has at most seven items in his bathroom - a toothbrush, toothpaste, shaving cream, razor, shampoo, a bar of soap, and a towel from the Holiday Inn.

The average number of items in a typical woman's bathroom is 437. A man would not be able to identify most of these items.

MAGAZINES: Men's magazines often feature pictures of naked women.

Women's magazines also feature pictures of naked women. This is because the female body is a beautiful work of art, while the male body is hairy and lumpy and should not be seen by the light of day.

GROCERIES: A woman makes a list of things she needs and then goes to the store and buys these things.

A man waits until the only items left in his fridge are half of a lemon, and something turning green. Then he goes grocery shopping. He buys everything that looks good. By the time he reaches the checkout counter, his cart is packed tighter than the Clampett's car on The Beverley Hillbillies. Of course, this will not stop him from going to the 10-items-or-less lane.

GOING OUT: When a man says he's ready to go out, it means he's ready to go out.

When a woman says she's ready to go out, it means that she WILL be ready to go out, as soon as she finds her other earring, finishes putting on her makeup...

SHOES: When preparing for work, a woman will put on a Mondi wool suit, and then slip into Reebok sneakers. She will carry her dress shoes in a plastic bag from Saks. When she arrives at work, she will put on her dress shoes. Five minutes later, she will kick them off because her feet are under her desk.

A man wears one pair of shoes for the entire day.

CATS: Women love cats.

Men say they love cats, but when women aren't looking, men kick cats.

MIRRORS: Men are vain; they will check themselves out in the mirror.

Women are ridiculous; they will check out their reflections in any shiny surface - mirrors, spoons, store windows, toasters, Joe Garagiola's head...

GARAGES: Women use garages to park their cars and to store their lawnmowers.

Men use garages for many things. They hang license plates in garages, they watch TV in garages, and they build useless wooden things in garages.

MOVIES: For women, their favorite movie scene is when Clark Gable kisses Vivien Leigh for the first time in "Gone With The Wind."

For men, it's when Jimmy Cagney shoves a grapefruit in Mae Clark's face in "Public Enemy."

JEWELRY: Women look nice when they wear jewelry.

A man can get away with wearing one ring, and that's it. Any more than that, and he will look like a lounge singer named Vic.

MENOPAUSE: When a woman reaches menopause, she goes through a variety of complicated emotional, psychological, and biological changes. The nature and degree of the changes varies with the individual.

Menopause in a man provokes a uniform reaction. He buys aviator glasses, a snazzy French cap, leather driving gloves, and goes shopping for an expensive foreign sports car.

THE TELEPHONE: Men see the telephone as a communications tool. They use the telephone to send short messages to other people.

A woman can visit her girlfriend for two weeks, and upon returning home, she will call the same friend and they will talk for three hours.

LOW BLOWS: Let's say a man and a woman are watching a boxing match on television, and one of the fighters is felled by a low blow.

The woman says, "Oh, gee, that must hurt."

The man doubles over and actually feels the pain.

DIRECTIONS: If a woman is out driving and she finds herself in unfamiliar surroundings, she will stop at a gas station and ask for directions.

Men consider this to be a sign of weakness. A man will never stop and ask for directions. Men will drive in a circle for hours, all the while saying things like, "Looks like I've found a new way to get there," and, "I know I'm in the neighborhood. I recognize that White Hen store."

ADMITTING MISTAKES: Women will sometimes admit making a mistake.

The last man who admitted that he was wrong was General George Custer.

RICHARD GERE: Women like Richard Gere because he is sexy in a dangerous way.

Men hate Richard Gere because he reminds them of that slick guy who works out at the health club and dates only married women.

DRESSING UP: A woman will dress up to go shopping, water the plants, empty the garbage, answer the phone, read a book, get the mail...

A man will dress up for: weddings and funerals.

NUDITY IN MOVIES: Every actress in the history of movies has had to do a nude scene. This is because every movie in the history of movies has been produced by men.

The only actor who has ever appeard nude in the movies is Richard Gere. This is another reason why men hate him.

DAVID LETTERMAN: Men think David Letterman is the funniest man on the face of the earth.

Women think he is a mean, semi-dorky guy who always has a bad haircut.

CAMERAS: Men take photography very seriously. They'll shell out $4000 for state- of-the-art equipment, and build darkrooms, and take photography classes.

Women purchase Kodak Insta-matics, and often produce better-looking shots.

POLITICS: Men love to talk about politics, but they often forget to do political things such as voting.

Women are very happy that another generation of Kennedys are growing up and getting into politics, because they will be able to campaign for them and cry on election night.

LOCKER ROOMS: In the locker room, men talk about three things: money, football, and women. They exaggerate about money, they don't know football nearly as well as they think they do, and they fabricate stories about women.

Women talk about one thing in the locker room - sex. Not in abstract terms, either. They're graphic and technical, and they *never* lie.

LAUNDRY: Women do laundry every couple of days.

A man will wear every article of clothing he owns, including his surgical pants that were hip about eight years ago, before he will do his laundry. When he is finally out of clothes, he will wear a dirty sweatshirt inside out, rent a U-Haul and take his mountain of clothes to the laundromat, and expect to meet a beautiful woman while he is there.

WEDDINGS: When reminiscing about weddings, women talk about the "ceremony."

Men talk about "the bachelor party."

GYM SOCKS: Men wear sensible socks. They wear standard white sweatsocks.

Women wear strange socks. They are cut way below the ankles, have pictures of clouds on them, and have a big fuzzy ball on the back.

TOYS: Little girls love to play with toys. Then, when they reach the age of 11 or 12, they lose interest.

Men never grow out of their obsession with toys. As they get older, their toys simply become more expensive and impractical. Examples of mens toys: miniature TV's, car phones, complicated juicers and blenders, graphic equalizers, small robots that serve cocktails on command, video games, and anything that blinks, beeps and requires at least six "D" batteries to operate.

PLANTS: A woman will ask a man to water her plants while she is on vacation. The man will water the plants. The woman returns five days later, to an apartment full of dead plants. No one knows why this happens.

NICKNAMES: With the exception of female body-builders, who call each other names like "Ultimate Pecs" and "Big Turk," women eschew the use of nicknames. If Gloria, Suzanne, Deborah and Michelle get together for lunch, they will call each other Gloria, Suzanne, Deborah and Michelle.

But if Mike, Dave, and Jack go out for a brewski, they will affectionately refer to each other as Peckerhead, Scumbag, and Louse.

There are five things that women should never, ever ask a guy, according to an article in last April's issue of Sassy magazine.

The five questions are: 1 - "What are you thinking?" 2 - "Do you love me?" 3 - "Do I look fat?" 4 - "Do you think she is prettier than me?" 5 - "What would you do if I died?"

What makes these questions so bad is that every one is guaranteed to explode into a major argument and/or divorce if the man does not answer properly, which is to say dishonestly. For example: 1 - "What are you thinking?"

The proper answer to this question, of course is, "I'm sorry if I've been pensive, dear. I was just reflecting on what a warm, wonderful, caring, thoughtful, intelligent, beautiful woman you are and what a lucky guy I am to have met you." Obviously, this statement bears no resemblance whatsoever to what the guy was really thinking at the time, which was most likely one of five things: a - Baseball b - Football c - How fat you are d - How much prettier she is than you e - How he would spend the insurance money if you died

According to the Sassy article, the best answer to this stupid question came from Al Bundy, of Married With Children, who was asked it by his wife, Peg. "If I wanted you to know," Al said, "I'd be talking instead of thinking."

The other questions also have only one right answer but many wrong answers: 2 - "Do you love me?"

The correct answer to this question is, "Yes." For those guys who feel the need to be more elaborate, you may answer, "Yes, dear." Wrong answers include: a - I suppose so. b - Would it make you feel better if I said yes? c - That depends on what you mean by "love". d - Does it matter? e - Who, me?

3 - "Do I look fat?"

The correct male response to this question is to quickly, confidently, and emphatically state, "No, of course not" and then quickly leave the room. Wrong answers include: a - I wouldn't call you fat, but I wouldn't call you thin either. b - Compared to what? c - A little extra weight looks good on you. d - I've seen fatter. e - Could you repeat the question? I was thinking about your insurance policy

4 - "Do you think she's prettier than me?"

The "she" in the question could be an ex-girlfriend, a passer-by you were staring at so hard that you almost caused a traffic accident or an actress in a movie you just saw. In any case, the correct response is, "No, you are much prettier." Wrong answers include: a - Not prettier, just pretty in a different way. b - I don't know how one goes about rating such things. c - Yes, but I bet you have a better personality. d - Only in the sense that she's younger and thinner. e - Could you repeat the question? I was thinking about your insurance policy.

5 - "What would you do if I died?"

Correct answer: "Dearest love, in the event of your untimely demise, life would cease to have meaning for me and I would perforce hurl myself under the front tires of the first Domino's Pizza truck that came my way." This might be the stupidest question of the lot, as is illustrated by the following stupid exchange: "Dear," said the wife. "What would you do if I died?" "Why, dear, I would be extremely upset," said the husband. "Why do you ask such a question?" "Would you remarry?" persevered the wife. "No, of course not, dear" said the husband. "Don't you like being married?" said the wife. "Of course I do, dear" he said. "Then why wouldn't you remarry?" "Alright," said the husband, "I'd remarry." "You would?" said the wife, looking vaguely hurt. "Yes" said the husband. "Would you sleep with her in our bed?" said the wife after a long pause. "Well yes, I suppose I would." replied the husband. "I see," said the wife indignantly. "And would you let her wear my old clothes? "I suppose, if she wanted to" said the husband. "Really," said the wife icily. "And would you take down the pictures of me and replace them with pictures of her?" "Yes. I think that would be the correct thing to do." "Is that so?" said the wife, leaping to her feet. "And I suppose you'd let her play with my golf clubs, too." "Of course not, dear," said the husband. "She's left-handed..."

[laundryandtaxes]

Sorry if you already talked about this but I saw you talking about gun controls and how making them more expensive is a bad idea wich I think I agree with. But i was wondering what you think we should do to control guns and mass shootings? Mandatory background checks on all sales?

"Mass shootings" and "gun violence" are very distinct issues with very distinct solutions.

The enactings of mass shootings only have a few things in common. They are often committed by men with documented histories of violence against women. They are often committed in places with large gatherings of presumably unarmed people.

1. Solution number one would be to federally standardize definitions of domestic abuse. People with domestic abuse convictions are already legally barred from firearms ownership under federal law and have been for my entire lifetime. People saying otherwise are uninformed. BUT that definition is fairly strict, and does not always cover partners who do not live with the people they abuse. Get rid of that distinction (sometimes called the boyfriend loophole) and create a solid appeals process for those convicted. Federally prioritize domestic violence, maybe through allocation of funds. I hate the idea of giving cops literally any money, but for the most part they'll do whatever you'll pay them to do and you can turn their head in any particular direction with funding.

2. Make the ATF actually do its job. Anytime someone becomes a prohibited person (a felon - which is bullshit bc not all felonies are violent but ANYWAY- or convicted of a DV offense, etc) that person, if records are properly updated, is prevented from buying firearms at any store in the country. But nobody knocks on doors to remove the firearms of people who've just become prohibited persons. Whatever is in the house stays there. I think that's dumb as shit- in the case of the Aurora warehouse shooting that just happened this was a guy state police knew was not able to own guns, but nobody wanted to put a body on his doorstep to remove them. I think the definition of prohibited persons should be tightly narrowed to only include violent crime and domestic violence offenses, so that people aren't getting their guns confiscated over theft or license plate issues or other nonviolent offenses, and I think every single prohibited person should be able to appeal and regain their firearms rights. In the Aurora case, Illinois state police didn't want to risk sending a person or unit in. Fair enough. But people ended up dead because of that.

3. I think there is a case to be made that universal background checks COULD help here, to prevent people who can't buy guns at stores from just buying one from other citizens. But the reduction in deaths I think you could expect to see from UBC implementation would be really minimal, if anything- most mass shooters have either stolen or legally purchased their firearms after passing background checks. I suppose that, if the DV changes I talked about were implemented, more would be prohibited persons and would turn to the private market. I do not believe there is any way to ensure that background checks catch every single potential murderer and firmly do not believe the FBI (which runs the bg check electronically) should have any access to mental health records without a warrant.

For general violence, we already know exactly what reduces violence, and I do think it needs to be discussed not as gun violence but general violence, because that allows us to implement things we know work for violence overall. Guns aren't magic. They're just tools that can be used to commit violence. We know that giving people jobs (yes I am suggesting just giving, like candy) reduces their likelihood of engaging in violence of any kind. We know that poverty increases violence. All we need to do to drastically cut homicides is spend some money to lift people into more stable and I think that, over time, cultures that encourage or revel in violence will follow suit simply because those who did not grow up in violence are less likely to enact it.

Things I do not even kind of support:

-Bans on "assault weapons." The term means nothing but any semi automatic rifle, meaning any rifle that fires one round each time you pull the trigger. Those kinds of rifles can look like this

or like this

(those are all mine!) but they operate using 100 year old technology that is no different in concept from how a standard Glock pistol works. Pull the trigger, it goes bang. Pull it again, it goes bang again. Rifles in this category are excellent for any number of things and completely suitable for self defense. An AR-15 style firearm is my bedside/ home defense gun.

Even if this wasn't all true, consider this. AR-15s contribute REMARKABLY little to overall gun deaths in this country. We are talking a drop in the bucket- we are talking 322 people killed with rifles of ANY kind in 2012. Out of 13,000ish annual murders, that is remarkably small. So small that you are about 15 times MORE likely to be stabbed or bludgeoned to death (I'm linking the FBI numbers here directly) than killed with a rifle of any kind.

-Magazine capacity limits. They don't even make sense on their face. First of all it only takes on bullet to kill one person- is 10 deaths an acceptable number? Second of all, I am a relatively untrained shooter and fully self taught, and it takes me less than 2 seconds to drop an empty magazine from a rifle, load a new one, and fire another round. The California response to this is, well, make it harder to reload. Third of all, if I have a right to self defense with a firearm, then I have the right for that firearm to be functional, and MOST handgun malfunctions (talking in the context of concealed carry here) are due to magazine malfunctions. If I ever have to draw my handgun in defense of my life, I should be able to quickly fix any malfunctions. To put it simply, I believe I have the right not to be cobbled unduly in my own self defense. Fourth of all, considering that cops generally stand outside mass shootings waiting for things to die down (remember Pulse? Or Parkland?) the idea that the 2 seconds it takes to change magazines saves lives during assaults strikes me as ridiculous.

This notion that we can just get rid of the bad guns and keep the safe guns and all be safe is nonsense. Any gun can kill someone with one well-placed shot. Any person who owns a gun owns the means to do absolutely horrible violence to other people. These are things you have to reckon with in a society where private gun ownership is a right. I also think we need to be realistic about how low we can get our numbers. Let us assume that all 14,000ish people who were killed with firearms in the US in 2017 (to get that to work, organize results by year, then in the cause of death area click "injury intent and mechanism" and scroll in the box on the right to find FIREARMS) were killed using different firearms, so no mass shootings or double homicides, etc. Divide that by the sheer MASSIVE number of citizen owned guns in the country (a LOW estimate is 350 MILLION) and you're looking at .004% of all guns being used in murders. That alone should put this notion that the US is so astoundingly dangerous into context. For a nation with this many guns, and this level of easy access to guns, to have less than 15,000 murders using them per year should tell us that the very very vast majority of firearms owners are not harming anyone and therefore it literally only makes sense to tailor solutions to problems in a way that at least seems like it would work.

Few clarifying points here.

To be clear, I understand that the pro gun control instinct is to compare the US not to Brazil BEFORE lessening its guns laws (it still has stricter gun laws and a homicide rate a good 4 times higher than ours last I checked) but to the UK or Australia, etc, and not to compare homicides per firearm, but homicides using firearms per capita. This is nonsense because the number of firearms in those countries doesn't even come sort of close to the number here, and that number will not decrease but will only increase over time given the continuation of the 2nd Amendment as currently understood. Secondly, none of those countries have a right to firearms ownership and therefore many attempted solutions enacted there are literally not legally allowable here, just as total bans on private ownership of handguns except for competitors. Thirdly, the ownership of firearms themselves per capita does not come close in any of those countries to that here. I'm not denying that more guns probably means more deaths when comparing countries, though it does noy seem to mean more deaths between states in the US.

Another clarifying note, you will notice I am talking about homicides and cutting out suicides entirely. This is for two reasons. First of all I know absolutely nothing about suicide prevention from a policy perspective and don't even pretend to. If you have any good sources there I would love to check them out. Secondly, it allows me to talk about "gun violence," as in the use of firearms to commit violence between different individuals, more clearly. Thirdly, the very vast majority of the most popular gun control measures don't even claim to impact suicide rates because most gun control groups use those deaths (which comprise 66% of all deaths by firearm in the country, almost every single year) to pad their numbers while not actually talking about suicide as a phenomenon.

I hope this clarifies some things for you and if you have any questions please feel free to ask. I also typed this at 4 am after work so please excuse typos. I also hope that you understand I've picked sources supporting my argument because that's how arguments are supported, not because I'm not open to looking at all into opposing viewpoints.

[jordanjaeger]

Jean Kirstein x Female Reader: You Smoke Now?

Silence, the complete absence of sound.

It was a tranquil you were use to, having lived alone for the last year and a half of your life. Though it wasn’t ideal for women to live alone during these times, but with all the war and bloodshed that had taken place during the titan war, you didn’t have much of a choice after losing your father and mother amongst all the death and destruction.

You were left with nothing. No family. No friends. You were forced to get a real job and make ends meet. Luckily, your natural talent for picking up things fast earned you a higher position at your place of employment, which in turn allowed you to save up and purchase a small cottage within Wall Rose.

If only, however, the person whom you had met and fallen in love with was there to share it with you

“It’s been a while,” you said, breaking the silence between you and the young man sitting across from you.

Silence.

“About a month, maybe two I’d say,” you added, this time hoping for a response.

Once, again, more silence.

The young man continued to chow down on the hot meal you had prepared for him, only to be interrupted by you calling his name.

“Jean.”

His golden eyes flashed up to meet your brown ones.

“What?” he asked, mouth full of bread.

You let out a sigh, disappointed that the man whom you had longed to see for so long again barely acknowledged you since arriving to your home earlier that evening.

“Jean, we’ve been sitting at this table for almost an hour and you’ve barely spoken a word to me,” you told him. Jean swallowed his food whilst taking a small cloth to his face and wiping away the leftovers.

“Sorry, it’s just been so long since I’ve had a home cooked meal,” he explained. Jean took his cup and connected it with his lips. Then, he guzzled down the sweet liquid that was wine.

“How is it military, anyway?” you asked, resting your chin on the backs of your hands.

Jean finished drinking and firmly placed the cup back onto the table. He paused for a moment, eyes still focused on the cup. The memories he recollected from the last battle against the titans flooded his mind as he remembered all of the comrades he’d lost.

“Not now, Y/N,” Jean muttered. “You know I don’t like talking about that stuff when I’m home.”

You narrowed your eyes. Once again, your attempts at making conversation had been shut down. What was up with him? Had something bad happened? It wasn’t as if Jean wasn’t the talkative type before.

“Is everything alright?” you asked him.

Jean gripped the handle of his cup, teeth gritted. He recalled the heartbreaking moment when he found one of his comrades, no, his best friend, Marco Bott, lying lifeless against a brick wall. He felt the rush of adrenaline pump into his veins as tears began to form in his eyes. He knew he wasn’t ready to talk about it, so to save himself the trouble of breaking down, or worse, lashing out at you, he instead decided to go outside for some fresh air.

Jean arose from his seat.

“You got a lighter?” he asked, not daring to look at you in fear that you would see his tear filled eyes and ask him what was wrong.

You stared at him, confused by his request. What would he need a lighter for?

“Y/N, do you have a lighter? I need a smoke,” Jean said. Walking over to the kitchen cabinets, he began pulling open doors and drawers full of plates and silverware.

“You smoke now?” you asked him, disappointment in your voice. You, too arose from your seat at the table. “Since when?”

Jean stopped what he was doing as he rested his hands onto the kitchen counter. He let out a heavy sigh.

“Just, answer the question, Y/N,” Jean said with frustration.

“No, I don’t own a lighter. I don’t smoke. I hate smoking. You know that,” you told him. You were starting to become annoyed. How could Jean pick up the one habit you hated the most? Smoking. It was so dirty, so gross.

“I thought you said you didn’t smoke,” you reminded him.

“Yeah, well, people change,” Jean said. He threw his head back and stared up at the ceiling. He blinked away the tears as he prepared himself to turn and face you in attempts to walk out the door and find a lighter. He needed to smoke, and he needed to bad. Ever since Marco’s death, Jean was unable to function properly, and the only thing that seemed to calm his nerves was the nicotine.

“I’ll be back. I need to go find a lighter,” Jean said. He tried to walk past you, but you didn’t let him. You stepped in his line of direction, forcing him to stop. He looked past your head, as he was much taller than you, and tried shifting his feet to get around you. Still you wouldn’t let him leave.

“No,” you told him firmly. “Since when did you start smoking? Why? You know how I feel about that kind of stuff, Jean.”

Jean rolled his eyes. He knew that it would come to this, but he didn’t have the time, or the patience, to sit and fight with you. Not now. Not after having been gone for almost two months.

“Y/N can’t we talk about this later?” he asked you.

“No!” you pushed him away, making him take a few steps back. “It’s been almost two months since I’ve seen you! I’ve lost my mom, my dad; I have no one! I’m here all alone, by myself, all the time. I worry constantly about if the next knock at my door will be from you, or some other scout handing me your Survey Corps cape! So no! We can’t talk about this later, because I don’t know when later will be again!”

Jean took a moment to observe you as you spoke. He was well aware of your feelings towards him and the constant worry you underwent whenever he was away. He could see it all over your face. This made him feel bad, but it still wasn’t enough to make him talk about what happened during the Trost Battle.

“What is it with you?” you continued. “You’re so.. different since the last time I saw you. Your face, your entire demeanor, your habits, they’ve all changed.”

Jean felt the tears coming along once more as his throat swelled and his body began to tremble. He was trying his best to hold himself together, but hearing you point out the obvious changes in him only made it even more difficult. He knew he wasn’t himself lately, and he hated that it was starting to show after coming home to you. The last thing he wanted was to talk about his losses while with the person he loved the most, you.

“Y/N…,” Jean began, but the crack in his voice made him stop.

You heard it and immediately softened up. Whatever Jean was holding back, it wouldn’t be much longer before he couldn’t hold it in anymore.

“Jean,” you said softly. You took a few steps towards him, but he backed away from you.

“Y/N please..,” he begged, not wanting to break down in front of you. He was a man, a solder at that, and soldiers didn’t cry. They accept what is and move forward. At least, that’s what he was taught back during training.

“Jean, whatever is going on, you can talk to me,” you assured him, walking closer to him. This forced him to back into the kitchen counter. You continued to walk towards him until you found yourself inches away from from him. You placed a hand on his face, guiding his gaze to meet your concerned eyes. You could see the tears threatening to spill over as he looked at you.

“Jean, just tell me what’s wrong,” you spoke even softer.

Jean furrowed his brows as he closed his eyes. He placed his hand atop of yours and squeezed it gently.

“I..” Jean choked as he tried to explain. “I couldn’t save him.”

You tilted your head at him.

“Who?” you asked.

Jean bowed his head as he began to weep. He was still determined not to let you to see him cry. Instead, you took your hand that once rested on his cheek and moved it to the back of his head. You gestured for him to bury his face into the crook of your neck as he sobbed, your other hand rubbing his back. Jean wrapped his arms around your waist.

“Marco!” he finally let out. “I couldn’t save Marco!”

Hearing him call out Marco’s name sent shivers down your spine. You felt your heart break, the same way it did when you found out your parents had died. You knew what Jean was feeling, and you completely understood. Marco was Jean’s best friend, and you knew how much they cared for one another like brothers.

You shh-ed Jean quietly as you whispered words of condolences and assurance into his ear. Jean only held onto you tighter as you did this, indicating to you both that in the end, it wasn’t the nicotine he needed to calm him, but instead your affection and understanding to assure him that everything was going to be alright.

[vesperlionheart]

STAG

For @sariasprincy because she wanted this waaaay back when and I finally got around to attempting my hand at Dark!Tobirama Sakura. :D

He watched her pull her hair up, catching it with her fingers when it started to slip free. She ran her free hand over her neck, starting at the base where the peaks of her bones stuck out, bent as she was over the river. He felt just as trapped as the fish in her net, watching her pale fingers follow the curve of her neck, suddenly too dry and hoarse for words.

With silent fingers made skilled from year of weaving, she tied up her hair to keep it out of her eyes, and then looped it again into a bun she fastened with a hair stick that could have been a twig for how crude it looked. A few stray curls framed her face, rebellious and free as she straightened and let the sun fall over her profile once more.

Nothing else adored her figure, no metal or stone or bead or weaving decorated her as she set about hauling up her catch from the nets. A moment later he realized why that was so odd. She wasn’t dressed as the other women in his village were ought to do. She didn’t even wear skirts, but instead waded into the water with clinging damp trousers that rolled up just above her knee.

Someone called to her and she caught the thick rope out of the air before twisting it around her fist and digging into the shifting river bed. She set her shoulders and turned the shape of her body away from the source, then he saw her move, pulling the weight up from under the water.  

“I told you, brother, the freshest fish in the land right here. Even at market they’re not still wriggling,” Hashirama laughed. “You fancy some for dinner?”

“That,” Tobirama began, still somehow unable to look away, “should be obvious considering this was the reason for your troublesome expedition.”

It took some effort, but he manage the swallow, blink, and force his face away in that order. He caught sight of a pair of scarred fishermen wading out of the water with cages under their arms and the sight was enough to ease him back into his casual displeasure. He did not want his brother to get any ideas about their expedition being somehow enjoyable. If Hashirama ever got that into his head there would be no end to the nagging.

“It does you more good than you’re willing to admit to get out of that tower of yours,” Hashirama huffed. “You stay cooped up in your stoney prison all day and all night for months and years on end of course your personality is going to grow stale. I’m afraid I can’t take you anywhere that might make you happy.”

“I’m perfectly happy at home with my books and my work,” Tobirama lied.

Hashirama reached for his brother and drew him into a side hug, smushing their shoulders together.  “You work far too hard for such an unfavored wizard.”

“We can’t all marry princesses with lands as vast as east is from the west and grow fat for our daughters. Some of us must contribute to this wretched earth.” 

 Tobirama felt his lip curl as he pushed out of his brother’s hold and then straightened the front of his frock. It was pale gray with the crest of a black stag across the heart. A single pendant on a gold chain, vibrating with stored magic, hung down from around his neck.

Unlike his brother Tobirama dressed in muted colors of black and gray and didn’t decorate himself with many metals or jewels unless it served a function he could justify. If need arose, he could use the Hag’s Eye to unleash a simple lightning strike. All Hashirama’s ring could do was glitter.

Most days he never needed much more than his cantrips. It had been many years since his initiation into the Philosopher’s Guild and his promotion to Providence Wizard. There weren’t many others who were of his caliber anymore, and even fewer who could make him believe they were even a challenge. It had been so long he forgot what his limits were, sometimes.

“You said you wanted something different for dinner, so lets get some fish before the best tails are taken!” The cheerful Lord exclaimed, pushing past his brother and hailing down a pretty help maid who was setting up baskets for sale.

“Who even says such ridiculous things?” Behind Hashirama’s back Tobirama mocked his older brother in a higher voice that wasn’t nearly as flattering as the original. “Before the tails are taken. Pssssh.”

He froze when he heard a petite snort just over his shoulder.

Spinning on his heel he couldn’t help but raise his guard. Someone was close enough without his notice and as powerful as he was, he wasn’t without his enemies. 

The long tails of his sleeves flapped out at his side as he raised his hands for fire magic, but it was only his face that heated.

The lovely vision of a woman he had been transfixed on earlier stood with a crate under her arm, resting on her hip.

“Mister,” she called with a smile so bright and white it should have been a warning. “Will you buy from me today?”

-

“Of course I know about you. Anyone in the seven hills who has ever had to pay with copper knows about you,” Sakura laughed in an exasperated way. She leaned back on the end of the bar’s edge with her elbows. She let the leg she had crossed over the other bounce teasingly. “Why, you thought you were being subtle?”

“We have not been formally introduced. I know not your family and you-”

Sakura held up a hand to stop him and like some sort of strange magic he did. She was bewitching and pretty, but after enough encounters he was almost positive there was something more than just her own womanly charms that bound him so.

“We don’t do that sort of thing around these parts. No one under this roof doesn’t have to slave for his bread and home, mister wizard.” There was a rough tilt in her words, something rural and easy that made her words fit the landscape better than his own polished ones. She spoke like a local and he was, as always, the odd sheep out. He didn’t…hate the sound of her voice, even if she said a few things wrong or addressed him incorrectly.

“High Wizard or Tower Wizard would be more appropriate,” he corrected. In spite of his self imposed confidence, he felt himself tug on the end of his tunic and fret with the hem of its fabric. Something possessed him to worry if it was properly pressed and not wrinkled in her presence.

“Makes no difference to me,” Sakura said. She reached for her ale and drank deep before replacing it on the bar by her side. “I’m not working in the rivers today, so why bother me here mister high tower wizard?”

He could tell the way she said it none of his names were title, only worthless words in her mouth….her pretty perfect mouth. She shook himself free of the thought and pressed on with his business.

“You’re untrained, but you are not without the gift.”

Sakura stilled but then eased back into the bounce of her leg. She glanced over her shoulder and pointed to her empty tankard before wiggling two fingers. When the bar keep turned away to fill her order Sakura turned around as well.

“That wouldn’t be quite true, sir. It’s not legal to train the magic folk unless they’re sworn to a crowned figure. No one here has any magic.”

“Nature conforms to no man.”

“Yet it grows for the wizards and their towers,” Sakura countered quickly.

“You’re not as untrained as you first appear, I believe,” Tobirama pressed. He dared a step closer.

“Depends on your definition of trained and untrained, sir. I’ve never practiced magic in no tower or school, but I work the rivers and the fields when its time and I sew with the women and wash with them too. I can fix most of the carts in town and deliver most of the livestock too if the need rises for it. I’m half decent as a midwife because of necessity and some say I’m not shit at cards neither. Maybe I’m not magic trained, but I get by.”

Two tankards were set down behind her arm and she reached to drink from the second one.

“Are you unwilling to learn and develop your gift?” he asked.

He almost cringed, watching her down the first drink in a single breath. He thought she might offer him the second drink, but then she reached for it too replacing her empty tankard with the third one.

“No such thing, told you, we know it’s illegal. Any gift in any babe is prayed out of them right away. No exception.”

“But you’re not from around here, are you?”

Sakura didn’t drink, but stilled with the tankard close to her chin. She seemed to be staring down into it, watching something in her amber colored reflection.

“Oh?”

“Your accent is unusual, and I might not have noticed it at first because all rural accents seem to sound the same, but there is a difference. Where were you born?”

Sakura laughed, reaching out with the toe of her bouncing leg to touch his knee before turning around in her seat to finish the last of her drink. With her back to him she left the money on the table and then slid off the stool. Once on her own two feet, her petite stature became all the more apparent. Tobirama towered over her.

“I’m sorry mister tower wizard, but that’s too fun a story to not save for later when you actually get to know me.” She sauntered to the door and then turned on a half spin before ducking out. “Next time offer to buy my drinks you dumbass.”  

-

She was magic, he was sure of it. She was as rough as anything unpolished is bound to be when found in the wilds of nature, be he would be the riverbed that shaped her into her greatest potential if only she would let him.

But she was as vexing as she was enchanting.

She didn’t talk to him when she was working, and if she was selling she wouldn’t say anything to his questions and queries unless he purchased something, and sometimes she made him purchase more than he was willing to use just to get her responses. What was he supposed to do with four dozen river crab? He didn’t even like crab. No amount of butter was going to change that.

When she was at the pub she liked to play cards and he could usually get her to talk to him if he played with her, and he wasn’t bad, but her luck and perception was blessed by some higher power, be it fay or the Unknown or some organized god.

She spoke best after winning when he bought her alcohol.

He had learned where she came from, or as much as she knew anyway. Left behind as a baby in Oberon’s Forest and raised by working men, she had been trained to close off the part of her that gravitated towards things unexplained for fear of causing her foster family grief. The things she couldn’t help, like the suggestion and calming of emotions was something she had never been able to stifle.

“It’s funny how that doesn’t work on you,” she said once.

“I’m far too stimulated around you to be calmed by something so passive as a cantrip.”

She asked him to explain his words but he bought her another drink instead and then asked for his wine to be paired with a nice cheese and bread. She laughed and almost fell out of her chair, but it wasn’t because the beer, because it never was. She could drink a horse’s weight in ale and still do cartwheels.

In the past three months he had left his tower for a small town in his providence more times than he had in the six years he had been stationed there. He wasn’t sure that was a good or bad thing yet, but he knew it wasn’t going to change until he got what he wanted.

“You’re always asking me questions, why don’t you ever answer mine?” Sakura complained.

“You never ask me anything,” he said. His heart felt a little heavy.

“You never let me get a question in. You just start talking about yourself all on your own. Here’s a secret for you, honey, I never listen when you do that.” Sakura pulled her chair closer to his and he didn’t flinch, but his breathing might have skipped.

“I think I am insulted.”

Sakura waved her hand between them. “Don’t be, it’s the same as with everyone who’s stuck up. I don’t listen to any of them none either.”

“You think I’m stuck up?”

Sakura reached out and traced the embroidery of a gray stag on his black tunic. “Yeah, a little. Not the way your brother is because that man’s a eyeful of concentrated sunlight in the middle of summer if you know what I mean, but you got it with your wine and your cheese and the subtle ways you correct how I speak.”

His tunic wasn’t thin, but he could feel her finger on his skin under where she traced her pattern and it made him painfully aware of the fact that he had never had a woman trace any patterns on his skin with the exception of maybe his mother, maybe?

Sakura splayed her hand over the stag design and then looked up. “Who is it?”

He managed to still form words. “Who are you referring to?”

“The stag. Who is it? He’s on almost all your clothes.”

“He’s the horned king of the woods, and the creature I conducted my graduate thesis on in the academy. He’s not as well known, but he’s believed to be the one who carries the magic filled from life into death in his great antlers.”

“Poetic.”

“I was told he was morbid.”

“I wouldn’t mind being carried off that way.”

“I doubt you have to worry about that anytime soon.” He reached out and touched her face, proud of himself for daring so. There was a faint scar that had only been bleeding and deep two days ago when one of the crab traps snapped and shattered. “You heal unnaturally fast.”

“I eat my vegetables.”

“You are still clumsy,” he sighed, finding another cut behind her ear that wasn’t as well healed.

He used a cantrip to knit the skin back together and reduce the scarring. She pulled back when he was done and ran her hand over the skin, marveling at the feel.

“You can just do that?”

“Among other things. If you were willing to learn you could manage as much I’m sure.”

Sakura grinned and then dropped her hand. “No thanks. I appreciate the offer, but it doesn’t matter as much if I just have you to heal things for me.”

He didn’t like the way he felt when she said it, even though he knew he would of course do what he could if she were in need. Maybe it was his pride she hurt. “Don’t count on me so much. I wouldn’t always be there if you needed it. I have other duties I must see to, duties that call me away to far lands.”

“You’re fast,” she said around a yawn.

He didn’t think that was a fair thing for her to say, because of course he was fast. He had mastered the Misty Step decades ago and could travel across the different realities and astral planes with just a bit of help. If she called he would be there, like it or not, but she didn’t need to know that and count on it. 

It wasn’t like he was exclusively beholden to her whims or anything like that.

Sakura put her money down on the table and Tobirama scrambled to find his own money pouch for the food and drink, but she was already walking away. He dropped the silver coins and then a single gold in tip, scooping up her coins and jogging after her to grab at her wrist. She struggled at first but he huffed, calling her annoying for fighting him before pushing the copper and silver pieces into her hand.

“You know these were all originally yours, right?”

“You worked for them.”

Sakura snorted. “Did you ever eat the crabs?”

He fought the sneer at the thought of having to consume the hideous, crawling creatures. “They’re perfectly comfortable in their habitat at the tower until I have need of their…buttered meat.”

Sakura laughed, accepting the money. “I think I take advantage of you.”

“No one takes advantage of me unless I let them. If I did not wish it, not even your pathetic dredges of magic could sway me to deposit a single copper in your palm, but be as it is, I may do as I please.”

She stopped in the doorway, looking up at him, and he though he saw her react to something relating to him; maybe his words or maybe his face. She was still like a doe caught in a wolf’s sights. A terrible thought pressed into his mind when he thought of her like that. How easy would it be to just spirit her away into his tower without doors?  His tower where only those he took could leave and enter, how would she fare?

“It’ll be cold soon, please keep yourself well,” he whispered, leaning in to brush the end of his thumb over the skin he had healed. When she blinked he was gone.

-

Night frost came much sooner than anyone expected, and the villagers rushed like mad to make themselves ready and save what they could of their late harvests. Snow was still weeks off, not until the next month if the pattern of years was to be believed, but the cold was ever present, crawling down the throats of youths and making stupid men sick.

Tobirama took to donning his wolf furs when he went out on more and more errands for the Lords and King who seemed just as eager to put his magic to use for them. With the cold seasons more monster came out from the woods and waters to try and grab what they could of man meat before long sleeps. There had been several smaller Basilisks and even a Chimera he had been tasked with. Most populations on the edges needed to deal with simple were beasts and he hated being called out to deal with something a trifle wizard could handle.

It was several weeks before he could find the time to slip away and find her again.

Men still fished, but he found Sakura outside a woman’s barn with her hands and wrists still dripping in blood. She stared off into the distance not really seeing anything.

He stopped at her side and waited for an explanation.

“Can you bring anyone back from the dead?” Her voice cracked like wrinkled paper in her throat and made him wince.

“No, that is the forbidden magics that I am sword to protect the world against. I can start a stopped heart and force air into empty lungs, and sometimes I can save people who have started to die, but I can not resurrect the dead, no one can.”

Sakura turned her hazy eyes in his direction, searching for his face. “Why?”

He wasn’t sure what she meant, but he felt like there was no answer he could give her that would put her spirit to rest so he reached out and magiced the filth and blood off her hands, then wiped her tears away with his own two thumbs, holding her face as she started to waver.

“You are weary. Rest.”

He tugged her into his arms and she let him. The wolf fur cushioned her head and she snuggled into it, helping him affirm his choice to don it in the first place. He brought her back to the place she lived, the place she sometimes called home, even thought he wanted nothing more than to spirit her away to his tower and claim ignorance when others came calling.

No one else was home so he set her in the bed and then went off to find out what had happened.

One of the women in the village had a sick birth and no one had been able to stop the bleeding. Sakura had been present along with the elder healer, but even Chiyo said there was nothing either of them could have done.

“She’ll blame herself, but she shouldn’t.” The wrinkle of a woman glared at Tobirama and shook her finger without fear. “See that she rests her heart and doesn’t take this into her spirit. She’s not meant for such levity. It’ll consume her.”

But when he went to visit the next day she was in the garden, salvaging what she could from the last frost and readying the earth for what would come next. Some of the teasing was gone from her voice when they conversed, but it was not as he feared.

“Were you close?”

She didn’t move for a while, still hands and knees in the dirt. “No, but…I never lost anyone like that before. It made me feel terrible.”

“You did all you could.”

“I don’t think so. If I knew magic…”

“There are limits.”

Sakura stared up from the dirt. “Do you have limits?”

“Of course,” he lied. It was what she needed to hear. “Aside from that, even if it was possible, there are things I am forbidden from doing in the King’s Country.”

Sakura snorted and went back to her weeds. “Ah yes, the King’s Country, because he owns all of this and all of us. How could I have forgotten about that?”

“You would hate it,” Tobirama admitted with almost a smile. “I don’t think anyone could tell you what to do.”

Sakura sat up and laughed, her teeth gleaming in the filtered light as her whole body shook in mirth. She grabbed her sides and forced herself to settle enough for words. “No, but I’d like to see them try.”

“Be my apprentice then. Come live with me in my tower.”

Sakura braced on the ground and stood, crossing the patches to get to where he stood. She reached up on her toes and traced her dirty thumb over the bridge of his nose, then she poked the tip of it. He didn’t flinch.

“Sorry mister wizard sir, but I don’t think I will.”

Tobirama reached up and brushed the dirt off his face then flicked at her own button shaped nose.  He almost smiled, finally feeling content with Sakura’s emotional state. “I’m probably better off. You’d drive me crazy.”

“I think I do that already wizard sir.”

He thought it might be a nice time to lean in and kiss her, but he wasn’t sure why or even where the idea came from. She looked especially beautiful with no good reason. She wasn’t dressed in anything elegant or especially fine. She was dirty and a little untamed like usual, but she was still too much for him. His heart hurt to lock her away and keep her to himself.

The ink on his wrist stung and he hissed, looking down at that tattoo he and his brother shared. Sakura noticed the distress on his face and reached fo this hand.

“What’s wrong?”

“My brother summons me. I must answer.” It would be a simple thing for him to travel through nature or air to get to his brother’s side, but he hesitated to touch her shoulder and look down into her eyes. “Please stay safe. It is becoming dangerous with the cold season upon us. I will return shortly.”

“Of course.” She managed a smile for him. “Be safe.”

After visiting his towner he took off looking for a tree he might fast travel through. The burn on his wrist throbbed hotter and he ignored it out of spite. He didn’t have any great reason for it, but he wasn’t very happy with his brother.

The summons that burned dulled to a warm throb as distances were traveled in a single step. He emerged from the tree and brushed the last dustings of dead leaves off his shoulders. The tree was fat and short making it perfect to walk through, if only he weren’t so tall.

It took almost an hour more, but he found his brother in the war room and frowned at the sight of so many other wizards around the far walls. Some stood up straighter when they saw him, others didn’t bother to hide their sneers. Tobirama didn’t spare them another glance as he cut through to his brother.

“What of it?” he asked, showing off his wrist where the mark dulled from throb to nothing. “You summoned me from on far with no warning.”

“As all others were summoned. I thought it best you be here to see for yourself.”

Tobirama edged closer and saw a map of all the providences under the crown. His tower was at the edge, close to the wilds. Oberon’s Forest was just past that.

“What do the colors indicate?” he asked, pointing to the fog of color that rested over parts of the map. A minor magic some simple mage made possible, no doubt.

“We’re not sure, but those areas are off limits. I called you out of there against the council of others. They thought it best to leave you there.”

Tobirama looked again and saw the fog hang over his tower as well as Sakura’s village.

“What is it?”

“Blight.” The answer came from Tsunade, a relative witch who was also known as their best medical expert. Her expression was hard as she faced him.

“Livestock or timber?”

Tsunade didn’t flinch as she admitted, “Livestock, and it’s spreading to the people. No one is allowed in or out. The Emerald Order is putting up their barrier as we speak. My antidote won’t be ready for another three days of curing.”

He felt something dark sprout in his heart. “How long have you known about this?”

Tsunade didn’t flinch when a lesser man or woman might have. Hashirama wrung his hands, looking nervous among the wizards.

“Brother, I-”

“How long!?” Tobirama’s eyes flashed with red magic.

“It’s been contained to Oberon’s Forest for years and hasn’t spread since it’s discovery four ago. I’ve only started working on the antidote when the forestlings brought it out with the recet attacks.”

Tobirama turned and Hashirama caught him by the elbow. “Where are you going?”

“To warn someone.”

“You can’t.”

Tobirama turned the full force of his glare onto Tsunade who stood like stone, but her eyes were on the map that glittered with green light.

“Don’t you dare stop me!” he warned.

She didn’t look to him as she spoke. “There is nothing to stop. The barrier is already up.”    

It’ was a month later when they let the barrier down. Even with her antidote, the blight adapted. And even if he had reached her the moment he found out about the blight, Sakura’s exposure to the woman’s death had been caused by the blight. It rooted itself in her and Chiyo before he even knew about it.

When he was let back, her body was already cold, but not yet buried. Over two hundred different lifeless forms stretched out in the open graves he was expected to help close up.  

Hashiram was no comfort. “I’m sorry, there was no way you could have known and there’s nothing to be done about it now. Be at peace, brother. ”

There was no peace to be found.

Tobirama took her body back and set it on the stone in the pit of his tower where the walls collected icicles. It would keep her from decomposing, but that was the limit of his magics. He hated himself for how little he could do as he turned stone into gold and glass, making a casket he could see her through.

‘There was nothing you could have done.’

Tobirama donned his darkest cloak with the wolf fur and took no fire with him into Oberon’s forest. He still produced a candle that, when waved over his head, summoned a will o wisp to it’s wick to light the way. The pull of the sprite guided him deep, deeper than any mortal man dared. The forest lost its sound as he trespassed among the ancient roots. Creatures moved, but they were as silent as the grave.

When his light went out Tobirama stilled and waited….and waited…..and waited.

The breath on his neck made him turn just as he thought he might wait the rest of his night among the dead branches. Behind him. A dark creature loomed among the trunks, barely fitting when it shouldn’t have fit at all. It was black, but blacker than the night sky with its sick moon hanging low and full. Where its body stood Tobirama saw only void.

The horned king of the wood bent his head towards Tobirama and his antlers glittered like dark onyx. Among the prongs dozens of ghosts were speared.

Tobirama knelt in the wet soil, burying his hands in the earth until it soaked under his fingernails. He breathed deep, grounding himself on something greater than his own power. “I’ve come for her.”

The stag lowered his head even further until Tobirama could see the ghosts it carried.

“What you ask may not be grated without a price. You know not the price for what you seek.”

“There is no price too high for this,” he swore. “I have come to claim my own.”

“Then you may walk, child, but take heed, you may yet pay for it in unexpected ways.”

The stag touched his massive face to the ground and Tobirama stood. He stepped onto its head and ran up the length of his face, running for whole minutes before he reached the first ghost. He felt his heart pinch with something sick and turned, finding her there, beautiful as ever, even in death.

He carried her spirit in a ring and then poured her back into her body before the dawn could break. He held her form in his arms among the shattered remains of her coffin, swearing up and down to every old god he knew the name of that if she didn’t return to him he would tear them from their thrones and turn the world over in black fire.

But Sakura breathed deep as the sun filtered through the windows and down the mirrored channels into her chamber. Tobirama felt shattered by the color of her eyes as she looked up at him and then smiled once more.

“Sorry I couldn’t keep my promise,” she croaked, barely managing a sound.

Tobirama didn’t care, he kissed her and folded her up into his arms.

-

And that’s how he wished his story would have ended, but nature would not be so undone without consequence.

Sakura was well known as a dead woman, so in his fear he kept her in his tower and dedicated all his days’ hours to her entertainment. He taught her how to disguise herself and even though her magic couldn’t hold up for more than ten minutes, he risked it some nights when the moon peaked out.

“You need to exhaust yourself on cantrips every day,” he grumbled to her. “If you don’t your limits will never change. Push against them.”

“I’m trying,” Sakura sighed. She rubbed her eyes and sank into a nearby chair and then proceeded the slump even further.

Tobirama’s heart pinched and he ran for her before she could fall off her seat. She giggled when he caught her.

“Don’t be so neglectful,” he chastised even as his face heated.

She managed to roll her eyes, but then closed them when her head fell onto his shoulder. “Weren’t you the one telling me to push myself just now?”

“I was mistaken?”

Sakura chuckled. “You’re never mistake.”

“Of course I am. You’re obviously exhausted and your master is a brute pushing you beyond your limits. How dare he breath.”

“Maybe he should answer some of that mail that’s been piling up. Someone else seems to need your help,” she said around a yawn.

“Worthless plebs crying for attention. No, I’m much better off terrorizing you.”

She weakly reached up to poke the tip of his nose. “Silly.”

Tobirama didn’t mind how his face warmed or his is belly seemed to fill with the buds of something just as warm. He pulled her closer and carried her up to her room.

Halfway up the stairs he stopped dead in his tracks. Sakura was asleep in his arms but her pale pink hair spilled over his elbow and not even shadows could hide who she was.

“It is true.”

Tobirama hunched over her form protectively. “Don’t speak to me.”

Hashirama’s face crumpled in hurt. “Brother, how could you! You were sworn to uphold the order of the world, not defy it so shamelessly! They spoke of necromancy but I-I defended you. I-I said you would never.”

Tobirama took another four steps, stopping just one shy of his brother. The stairwell was narrow, curving up and around itself up to the higher levels. It would be impossible to pass if Hashirama didn’t step aside, but it seemed as if the elder brother had no intention of doing so.

Tobirama didn’t care if his eyes flashed with red magic at his last surviving brother. “Move, you are in my way.”

Hashirama took a single step back, giving himself more hight over Tobirama while holding up his hands. “Brother, don’t do this. You know you need to put her back. The others need not know, but the balance must me found again. She had her time.”

The image of her under glass on a stone table made his heart stab with cruel viscousness. The very idea made him tremble. “You would have me render her lifeless once more…”

His voice was a deadly calm.

Hashirama took another step back onto the landing.

“The others don’t know, I won’t tell them. I can’t bring myself to see you like this, you’re not yourself anymore, my dear brother.” Hashirama’s face was wrinkled with stress as tears pooled in the corners of his eyes. “You are my only and best brother. You’re the greatest wizard in the land and you’ve stumbled but that’s fine. Please…just…”

Hashirama fell boneless on the floor, his eyes fogged with what all the corpses had after days of being dead. His skin was taunt across his tanned face as Tobirama stepped over the body of his last and only brother.

 Stray bolts of ruby colored magic crackled across the stone. Tobirama didn’t look back as his cloak trailed over Hashirama’s lifeless body on his way to the bedrooms.

Sakura slept peacefully on in his arms, not even flinching when he kissed her eyelids in reverence. She was perfect in his arms as he followed her into bed.

“I will never let you be parted from me again,” he whispered. “Never.”

[blxssomwrites]

Title: The scars we hide Fandom: Gintama Rating: K Word count: 1767 words

My first jump into this fandom! I’ve recently started watching this series, and Gintoki quickly cemented himself as a top fav. I haven’t went that far in yet, but I really loved the relationship shared between him and Otose so I wanted to write something about them!

This piece is inspired by the headcanons from @gintamajustaway! I’m still learning how to write the characters, so I apologize if the characterization feels off. Regardless, I hope it’ll be an enjoyable read!

They say that with age comes wisdom, at least when it comes to knowing that things aren’t always as they appear.

Otose might be old, facing pain and aches befitting of an aged body but her mind is sharp and her eyes are even sharper. It’s a boon to have when she’s running the bar; knowing when to pour and when to pull back is what allows her to have returning customers. It’s not necessarily good for business if she lets them die of alcohol poisoning, after all.

But Otose thinks that she gets more practice in telling the subtleties of human emotions and behavior from the idiot living upstairs.

Sakata Gintoki is many things, though among those who knew him, the general view seems to split into two. A lazy, good for nothing perm haired manchild that attracts trouble the way a garbage truck attracts flies. A kind yet fierce self sacrificing samurai who’d do anything in his power to protect what’s precious to him.

Otose has come to learn that there’s more to what meets the eye. Gintoki hides what he truly feels behind layers upon layers of masks, especially if it hints at pains suffered from the life or death battles that he finds himself in far too often.

It’s impossible to survive the grievous wounds inflicted on his abused body without complications. Otose knows that there are days where his old scars act up, but for all the whining that Gintoki does on a daily basis, this is the one thing that he’d keep mum on.

She learns quickly that his body language provides more information than words ever will. Gintoki laughs obnoxiously to hide a wince. Slouches when he thinks no one is looking. Clenches his jaw when he frowns. His movements are less sharp, more practiced and controlled, like he’s trying not to tug on anything in fear of ripping the seams wide open.

Otose often leaves him be, for she knows that Gintoki is both stubborn and selfless, who wouldn’t take too well with being fussed over because he made them worry about him. Whenever he comes into her bar by himself, she doesn’t question when she spots bandages peeking out of his kimono, the faint exhausted lines on a too pale face. Instead, she quietly slides him an extra drink to his order, comments that he looks like shit and pretends not to see the vaguely appreciative look he gives her from the reflection of the glass she’s polishing.

But Otose cares more than she lets on, and has enough common sense to know when to step in. If his old scars affect him too much by her standards, she’s not going to let him suffer in silence any longer, nor any more than he should.

When Kagura and Shinpachi entered her bar that morning without Gintoki trailing behind them, Otose pretends to look disinterested when she gives them breakfast, commenting on the lack of their silver haired boss.

“Ah, Gin-san said that he feels tired today,” Shinpachi replies, eating his portion slowly as opposed to the girl that’s shoveling down her second bowl of rice beside him.

“Yeah! Gin-chan told us to mooch breakfast from you cause he doesn’t want to make it,” Kagura says in between bites, then shamelessly asks for more rice.

Otose’s eye twitches even as she scoops out another bowl full, while Shinpachi flashes her an apologetic smile for her tactless remark. That soon slides off into an almost thoughtful frown. “We have a job to do today, but I guess it’s just going to be the two of us.”

“Hmph! He’s leaving us to do all the work today while he sleeps like a lazy bum.” Kagura makes a face. “Shinpachi! We’re not going to give him any of the pay, okay!? If you do I’ll hit you!” And she does smack him over the head.

“Ow! You’re hitting me anyway!” comes the heated reply, and then it degenerates into a nonsensical argument that hides the underlying worry that these two harbor. Otose knows that they sense something amiss with Gintoki, sensitive as they are when his mood genuinely plummets, but they’re unsure on how to tread on the subject. She doesn’t blame them.

When the pair finishes their breakfast and heads out to work, she makes an offhand comment on collecting rent from the lazy bastard later. Otose turns her back as the tension melts off of the children’s shoulders, and plans for her visit upstairs.

Roughly half an hour later, she exits her shop with supplies in hand and slowly makes her way upstairs. Otose doesn’t bother knocking, merely slipping inside with a slight shink.

Her steps are light, and it’s telling on how awful Gintoki feels when he fails to acknowledge her presence upon opening the door. The curtains were still drawn, probably in consideration for this prideful idiot who didn’t want his kids to see him in this state.

The blanket is pulled up that she only sees tufts of his silver hair. Otose sits a considerable distance away, for prior experiences taught her that with Gintoki and his past, it’s best to be out of his reach until she has a good grasp of his mental state.

“Gintoki,” she calls out.

There’s a flinch from under the blanket before it’s pulled down enough for red rimmed eyes to peek through. Otose feels her heart clench slightly at the pain hidden in them, but keeps her composure.

“Old hag.” Those eyes narrow. “If you’re here for rent, I don’t have the money.”

She knows that it’s an act to keep up appearances. He knows why she’s here but still puts up a front, this selfless fool.

“One of these days I’m going to throw your sorry ass out into the streets,” she replies with a faint huff. A beat of silence, then she wears a softer look. “What hurts this time?”

Gintoki closes his eyes, unable to stand the concerned gaze. He hates it, the man had once told her after too many drinks loosened his tongue. He hates making people worry for him, cause he doesn’t feel like he deserves it. Otose chalks it up to a drunkard’s rambling, and treats him a little nicer the next day when he complains of a hangover.

Otose doesn’t push even as the quietude stretches on for minutes. It’s a battle of wills, sprinkled with a dash of futile hope that if he remains still long enough, she’d give up and leave. Gintoki is stubborn but Otose didn’t survive this long by being docile, either.

They’ve done this song and dance before, back when it’s just the two of them. It’s only a matter of time before--

“... my shoulder.” Otose hums in acknowledgement, giving him room to elaborate if he wants. “... been a fucking bother since last night.”

Another hum, then she shuffles closer. Gintoki cracks open an eye at the noise, wariness clashing with her quiet resolution before he sighs. Otose doesn’t help him when he tries to sit up, though her hand hovers close at the small of his back, just in case.

He carefully sheds his pajamas, biting back winces when the simple act aggravates his shoulder. Otose has seen this strong back several times, and it’s never a pleasant sight when she sees new scars mixing with the old.

Her gaze flickers to the cause of his misery. It’s unsurprising that his dominant arm would bear the heaviest burden. It makes sense for his enemies to incapacitate the wooden sword that inflicts damage as if it were steel. Slash his shoulder and that should stop his rampage, right?

Too bad for them that Sakata Gintoki often defies common sense in his single minded desire to protect what’s precious to him. But damage is still damage, and despite being called the shiroyasha, Gintoki is very much human. His body can never fully recover, only repairs itself enough to function.

Otose brings with her a small bowl of warm water and a clean kitchen towel. She dips it in, squeezes out the excess water before she gently dabs his shoulder. Gintoki hisses at the contact, but aside from the initial flinch, he remains tight lipped.

Once it’s sufficiently cleaned, she picks up the small bottle of ointment, and squeezes out the clear gel onto her fingertips. Then it’s carefully applied on the marred skin. Another hiss, an instinctive lean to get away until he rights himself back up again. Otose continues the treatment, her practiced hand being as gentle as it could be.

After a thorough coating, she tells him to stay put prior to her exit, barely catching the grumbled complaint. Her initial action was to pour him a glass of strawberry milk, but after a moment of consideration, she switches it with cool water. A bottle of painkillers was fished out from inside her left sleeve, and with the items in tow, she returns to his room.

Gintoki is now wearing his pajamas properly again, still sitting upright. His eyes flicker to the door upon her entrance.

“At least you know how to follow orders.”

“Shut up.”

Still, he accepts the pills and water with a tiny nod. Otose goes to sit back down by his futon when he gingerly wiggles his way under the blanket again. The treatment might take the edge off, but what he really needs is rest. A difficult task while he waits for the pills to kick in, she’s sure.

Otose may not be able to alleviate his pain, but she can help him relax enough to make it bearable. Thin, wrinkled fingers slowly finds purchase in his hair, and after gauging his reaction, they slowly dig into his curls.

Ever so slowly, the tension oozes out of him. A small, appreciative sigh slips through his lips with each pass that she makes through his soft locks. Otose merely continues the comforting ministrations until his eyes slip shut and his breathing evens out. Her fingers remain for a while longer while she takes in his peaceful expression.

Her own lips curled into a small, maternal smile. Gintoki is stubborn and reckless, lazy and boorish, loyal and kind, and the son that Otose sees him as.

Eventually, she does pull away. Otose picks up her stuff, shuts the door behind her and continues on with her day. Things will return to normal soon enough.

(She doesn’t question when Shinpachi and Kagura gifts her with some red bean buns that evening, nor acknowledges the soft thank you that Gintoki utters when he passes by her the next morning).

[preserving-ferretbrain]

Race, Brand and the Placebo Effect

by Dan H

Tuesday, 31 March 2009

Dan rambles on the vague theme of Racefail~

This is an article about race, but it's going to start off being an article about shampoo.

I have, on occasion, had trouble with dandruff, and as a result have needed to purchase shampoo to deal with this affliction. In my second year of university, I ran out of shampoo, so I went to the local Co-Op and picked up a bottle of Head and Shoulders.

It wasn't until I was on my way back home with my purchase that I realised that the only reason I had chosen that particular brand was that I had been seeing advertisements for Head and Shoulders for as long as I can remember, so that in my mind “anti-dandruff shampoo” was linked with the Head and Shoulders brand on a fundamental and inextricable level.

This was something of an epiphany for me, because it finally made me realise that advertising does not work the way I thought it did. I had assumed, and I think most people assume on some level, that advertisements worked my making you see the advertisement and immediately want the thing advertised. Some adverts do (particularly ads for food or drink if I see them when I'm hungry or thirsty) but that's usually secondary to their main function, which is to get into your head on a subconscious level and make you associate a particular need (anti-dandruff shampoo, a cool refreshing drink, a boost to your fragile self-esteem) with a particular product in a positive way, so that your choices and actions are influenced without your even knowing it.

And it works. If I am generically thirsty and not making a conscious effort to drink more fruit juice, or actively wanting a particular type of drink, I'll buy a coke.

What's even more interesting about this phenomenon is that it works even if you are aware of it. I know that a big part of the reason I drink coke, eat fast food, and shop in Sainsburys is that I've been influenced by advertising, but I carry on doing them anyway because most of the time people don't make informed decisions about things, we just go with our first instincts and our irrational impulses, even if we know they're wrong.

The same concept shows up in all kinds of places. It shows up in the pharmaceuticals industry, people find shiny red pills in bold, brand-name packaging to be more effective than nondescript white pills in generic grey packaging. We respond instinctively to visual cues, and we don't know we're doing it.

I bring all this up, because one of the many semi-irreconcilable controversies that came up during the whole Racefail debate is the dichotomy of race-as-physical-appearance versus race-as-cultural-identity. Heck, the whole thing basically started as a direct result of Elizabeth Bear saying you should write non-white people the same way you wrote white people, and some other people respectfully disagreeing.

Essentially there's two problems. The first is that most characters – particularly most protagonists – in genre fiction tend to be white (and tend to be men). The second problem is that most invented cultures in genre fiction tend to be based on either medieval Europe, modern America or horrendous stereotypes of non-European cultures.

The argument can be made that the latter problem simply can't be addressed by white American or European authors. Hell, it could be argued that it can't be addressed by non-white American or European authors. Nobody can ever really shake off the preconceptions of the culture they were raised in, and you can never really understand a culture that isn't your own. You can know stuff about it, but no matter how much anime you watch you can never know what it's like to be Japanese.

The first problem, however, can be addressed by white, American or European writers, and should be. Again the argument could be made that, particularly if you're working in a created world, race is kind of an arbitrary choice and so is ultimately meaningless. This argument is half-right. In a created world, race is purely cosmetic, but it's cosmetic in the same way that the colour of a headache pill is cosmetic. It's the sort of cosmetic that gets in your head and changes the way you think.

It all comes down to the nature of racism (or, for that matter, of prejudice in general). Prejudice is a lot like advertising: people think that it's all about big, obvious things. You see an ad for coke, so you go out and buy a glass of coke, a black man applies for a job, but he doesn't get it because the guy who interviews him is a big fat racist who hates black people.

I'm going to go off on another tangent here and talk about

Captain Planet

.

Captain Planet

was a well meaning kids cartoon that took an endearingly multiracial gang of kids and had them fight villains who represented various ecological issues through the power of Earth, Fire, Wind, Water and Heart, which together allowed them to summon Captain Planet, who would lay the smackdown on evil villains who wanted to wreck the environment for no clear reason.

My mother really didn't like it.

She didn't like it because she thought it was dangerous to present the idea that problems for which we are all responsible (like pollution) are caused by single “villains”. I kind of think she was right.

I get that you can use a villain to personify something that is “part of all of us” (man) but I think it's actually hard to pull off in practice. Most of the time, personifying a social problem as an unambiguously horrible villain just sends the message that there are “bad people” out there who are polluters, racists, or whatever. This is why Whedon's cardboard misogynists piss me off, this is why the pseudo-Nazism of the Death Eaters was so annoying to me. Pollution doesn't happen because some guy in a cape decided to tip toxic waste into the sea for fun, it happens because guys like me can't be arsed to turn out heating down in the early summer.

The same kind of goes for racism. We all like to think that racism exists because of other people, that somehow there's some kind of rogue group of twenty or thirty hardcore racists out there who are between them responsible for all race issues everywhere, from the lack of Chinese characters in Firefly to the lack of decent Kosher butchers in Oxford. In fact racism exists because racist attitudes are pernicious, self-perpetuating, and all-pervasive.

There's a lot wrong with the Avenue Q song Everyone's A Little Bit Racist (it frequently sounds like it's using that statement to excuse racism rather than examine it - “ethnic jokes are so uncouth, but we laugh because they're based on truth” umm, no they're not, guys). It is, however, an important statement of fact. The reason that a white person is more likely to be hired for any given job than a nonwhite person is not because the person giving them the job is a cartoon racist, sitting there saying “no, I will not hire a filthy mudblood” it's because the person giving them the job is affected by racism on a level so fundamental they don't realise they're doing it. Just like you pass over the store-brand coke for the one in the red-and-white can you have been taught your whole life to associate with a cool refreshing beverage, so you pass over the guy (or woman) who doesn't look how you have been taught your whole life to expect a lawyer/teacher/investment banker/data entry clerk to look.

The really scary thing is that I catch myself doing it. I do, in fact, pay less attention to the opinions of my non-white and female friends. Even though I know that most of them went to Oxford and many of them have degrees in subjects that are actually directly relevant to the the topic of conversation. It's weird as fuck when you catch yourself doing it, just like when you catch yourself unconsciously reaching for a can of coke instead of a bottle of lemonade, or buy Head and Shoulders instead of a cheaper or more effective shampoo.

It all comes back to branding.

Now okay, you can make the argument here that I'm just passing the buck, and to a degree I am. Ultimately my attitudes, my purchasing habits and my behaviour are my responsibility, but they are influenced by the surroundings I grew up with. There isn't a causal link, I don't listen to my female friends talking and think “gosh, I remember this one TV show I saw had a woman on it who didn't know what she was talking about, therefore I won't listen to this person” nor do I think “well Willow knew what she was talking about, so this person must too”. I just have instinctive responses to things which are coloured by the society in which I was raised.

To put it another way, just imagine for a moment that Harry Potter had been a black kid. Of course first you need to get over the fact that it would then be a book about a black kid who gets rescued from his abusive black family by a kindly white guy, but if we assume that Harry was black and the Potter books weren't written in such a way that “Muggle” was effectively a racial slur. You would then have a situation in which the single most recognised fictional character in the world was a black kid (not only a black kid, but a black British kid). It would be huge, just like it was huge the first time they let an actual black guy play Othello. It wouldn't matter in the slightest that Harry Potter didn't listen to hip-hop or talk about Malcom X or use “urban” slang or do whatever else it is that white people seem to think black people have to do in fiction to properly represent “black culture”. The simple fact of the most popular fictional character in the world having black skin would have been huge. It would have changed the way a generation of children thought about race, and it would have changed it for the better. It wouldn't have been a miracle, it wouldn't have abolished racism overnight, but it would have done more good than any three government initiatives you might care to name.

Of course, if Harry Potter had been black, the book might not have sold at all, but that's a whole different problem.

Themes:

Topical

,

Minority Warrior

~

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)

http://mary-j-59.livejournal.com/

at 23:19 on 2009-03-31This is really interesting, Dan! The comparison between unconscious racism and branding makes a scary amount of sense. (And you are right about the "Potter" books, as well.)

But the fact that SF/fantasy often seems more racist than other types of lit is another problem entirely, isn't it? A friend and I were discussing this when racefail happened - the link is here, if you're interested.

http://mary-j-59.livejournal.com/40140.html

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http://viorica8957.livejournal.com/

at 00:31 on 2009-04-01(I keep getting an error message when I try to log in, so I'm using OpenID)

It's a pervasive problem, and one that is worsened by the fact that so many people refuse to acknowledge it. I was arguing with my mother about racism recently, and the argument she kept falling back on was "But don't you see how much has changed since the sixties? There's a black president! There's no segregation! Things are so much better!" It's a defense people use to ignore their own buried racism- "

I'm

not a Nazi/KKK member/skinhead, so clearly

I

can't be racist."

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Sonia Mitchell

at 03:20 on 2009-04-01

Even though I know that most of them went to Oxford and many of them have degrees in subjects that are actually directly relevant to the the topic of conversation.

I'd love to bristle more at that than I am, but much as I hate myself for it that's a bit of branding I end up buying into. Whenever my mum says I'm studying in Oxford I have to add 'Brookes, not proper Oxford' just to make it clear I'm not attempting to ride on coat-tails.

Anyway, interesting article. Whenever I'm staying for any length of time with advert game co-players (guess the advert on tv before the product is named) I find myself much more aware of how many don't mention the product until right at the end. Building up the atmosphere/message first and then linking it to the product, cementing it in people's minds on a less conscious level after a few repeated viewings, seems to be the way a lot of things are done.

Which, as you say, is exactly what makes these attitudes harder to spot - they don't come ready labelled.

Mary-j-59 - that was an interesting read, thanks.

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Guy

at 05:30 on 2009-04-01I think a really interesting example in relation to this question is the original series of Star Trek. For anyone who isn't a total nerd and therefore doesn't know this already, part of Gene Roddenberry's idea for Star Trek was that in the far future, all of our silly, parochial attitudes about race and gender and nationality and so on will have been resolved and looked on much like we look on witch-burnings or the crusades or whatever; we will have gotten over it and it'll just be a bit of ugly but quaint ancient history. And on this basis, he wanted to have a multi-ethnic crew, with men and women in equal positions, and, most importantly, for them *not to make a big deal out of it*, with "episode of the week on gender equality" stuff happening.

Of course, for any of us who watch an episode of Star Trek now, this is a pretty laughable conception of what's going on, because the most important person on the ship is Captain Kirk, a white American male, who is pretty much defined by his adherence to an ideal of American masculinity which is very much "of its time". Meanwhile, he's surrounded by a crew of other white men who are primarily distinguished by their funny accents... and Uhura, who essentially is a telephone operator wearing a very, very short skirt. So from the point of view of making a judgement about whether or not this represents a successful embodiment of Roddenberry's vision, we would stamp "FAIL" all over it in big red letters.

However, I remember seeing a documentary a while ago (possibly "Trekkies"? Anyway...) which mentioned that Uhura was the first black woman on television (either in a regular part or at all, I can't remember) and various well-known contemporary black women talking about how exciting and how important it was for them to see a black woman with a speaking part on TV. By contemporary standards the part seems incredibly sexist and virtually definitive of the whole "token black character" phenomenon, but compared with the standards of the other things on TV at the time, it was very progressive.

So I guess what I'm saying is, people making well-intentioned efforts to move the discourse forward are actually good and important, even if they fail in all kinds of ways to live up to the ideal of what they intend to attain or represent.

In terms of fantasy fiction, I think the clear beacon showing how the representation of people of other "races" (I have to put the scare quotes because I'm one of those who believes the term "race" is not a good descriptor of anything) can and should be done is Ursula le Guin's Earthsea series. Ged is not just a "white character with dark skin", but nor is the culture he comes from depicted as some horrible stereotype of an existing earth culture. It may be the case that in 50 years time people will look back on Earthsea and find it just as gauche as we find Star Trek now, but for the moment I would say it is the gold standard. It's also rather unfortunate that there doesn't seem to be much else around that is even trying to achieve that standard, but... "90% of everything is crap", as they say, and with genre fiction that is probably, sadly, an understatement.

Lastly (I hope that I don't break ferretbrain with such a long comment!) on the "everyone's a bit racist" question, I think there is a grain of truth in that statement but taken at face value I would disagree with it. I think... in my own case, I grew up in a suburb of Sydney where I never saw a black person at all, on a day-to-day basis. In fact, the only black person I knew was my grandfather (who is/was an Australian Aboriginal - but the genes are "dilute" enough in my case that I look absolutely white) who I did not see often. And so as a consequence I think I had all kinds of unconscious ideas about "other races" that I didn't really think about... I guess I didn't have any real sources of information beyond books and TV and lectures at my very left-wing school that took the form of "Don't be racist! For real!" (which were well-intentioned but I think were in their form a bit stupid, rather in the way that Captain Planet is a bit stupid).

Anyway, when the family moved to England we moved to a suburb (and I went to a school) where there were a lot more non-white people around, and I discovered that... a lot of my ideas had been really dumb, as well as being rather unformed. And in some sense, if you were to spell out those ideas in words, you would probably conclude that they were indeed racist ideas and that therefore I was "racist", despite all my intentions to the contrary.

But... I also think that it was that exposure to the actual people that broke down and changed those dumb ideas. And it remains my conviction that all the well-intentioned talk (or even, clever and subtle argumentation and explanation) in the world is no substitute for encounters with real people for breaking down prejudices based on ignorance. I suppose, to go back to your Shampoo analogy, it's kind of like this: the world may be full of explicit, overt messages telling you to buy a certain shampoo, and those overt messages may be supported by hidden and hard-to-unearth ideologies (bright packaging indicates a superior product to those in bland packaging!) but once you actually put the shampoo in your hair, it either works or it doesn't. (There may of course be an effect whereby those social messages cause you to undermine or misunderstand your own experiences, but this post is already waaaay too long...)

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Gina Dhawa

at 07:46 on 2009-04-01@Guy regarding Star Trek - I entirely agree. There is a lot of fail with regard to the depictions of race in TOS, but as a product of its time, I give it a lot of credit. And about the gender imbalance, it's very interesting that he was specifically told to drop the female second in command from the pilot episode if he was ever to get the series on air.

@Dan I've never been entirely convinced by the argument that a white author can't write non-white cultures, particularly in SF/Fantasy. OK with writing aliens and vampires and wizards, but can't write a black man? Right. I think the key thing people forget is just to have a

awareness

goes a long way. Doesn't go the whole way to fixing the problem, but it's a good start.

In the case of culture, it isn't a case of understanding truly everything about a culture that isn't your own, it's about respecting that culture and not treating like the exotic other. I'm not saying it's an easy thing to do, but hell, if I wasn't to write about a culture other than mine then I have no idea

what

I'd ever write.

Even though I know that most of them went to Oxford and many of them have degrees in subjects that are actually directly relevant to the the topic of conversation.

I will bristle at that, thanks.

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Arthur B

at 08:27 on 2009-04-01

But the fact that SF/fantasy often seems more racist than other types of lit is another problem entirely, isn't it?

I suspect a lot of this boils down to people using particular ideas or tropes developed by the grand old racist authors of the past without really thinking about where the tropes from and why they are doing it; all they know is "this is the sort of thing that happens in the SF/fantasy stories I like, so they're going to happpen in the stories I write."

For example, it's perfectly possible to enjoy Robert E. Howard's Conan stories in a non-racist way: you simply have to skip the ones which are just blatantly horrible, and treat the others as an inversion of colonialism, in which the simple beliefs of a "primitive" outsider prove to be more powerful and enduring than the hypocrisies of so-called "civilised" people.

There is nothing in this scenario which

requires

that the outsider be a white man from an analogue of Northern Europe, or the corrupt civilisations he encounters have to be Mediterranean/Middle Eastern city-states. But hundreds of Howard imitators, and even more folk who have been unconsciously influenced by his stories, make that assumption every time they use the idea. And that's racist.

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Andy G

at 10:18 on 2009-04-01"For example, it's perfectly possible to enjoy Robert E. Howard's Conan stories in a non-racist way"

I wondered about this recently when I was reading H.P. Lovecraft - whether we really can "read in a non-racist way" - as Dan says, it's not a matter of racist individuals, but of pervasive racist attitudes in society as a whole. Can we actually manage to remain a detached attitude where we're conscious of how terrible the "racist bits" are while still enjoying the "good bits" on their own grounds? Or are we just deluding ourselves that we're not just indulging a little bit in some unpleasant ideas?

I think you're spot on though about modern authors not reflecting on the dubious assumptions they take from older authors. I especially felt that about Olaf Stapledon.

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Andy G

at 10:37 on 2009-04-01Oh and there's also a great example

[here]

of the Captain Planet approach to complex world issues.

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Shim

at 10:58 on 2009-04-01

@Dan I've never been entirely convinced by the argument that a white author can't write non-white cultures, particularly in SF/Fantasy. OK with writing aliens and vampires and wizards, but can't write a black man? Right. I think the key thing people forget is just to have a awareness goes a long way. Doesn't go the whole way to fixing the problem, but it's a good start.

I suppose there's a bit of difference there, because if I wrote about aliens (or heck, even from an "alien perspective") there's little to no chance of aliens lambasting me in the Sunday papers about my ignorance and stereotyping. Also, because they're not real, there's no objective reality that my writing would fail to reflect. A lot of stories basically take White Middle-Class Anglo-Saxons and jiggle them a bit to make them vampires or wizards (sometimes, especially for wizards, these people are 'Celts' in an unspecified way that is hard to distinguish from WMCAS).

On the other hand, if I try to write about or from WMCAS female experiences, the fact that women actually exist means my writing can be objectively inaccurate. Same for, say, writing about Indian culture. So I think the fact that there is a whole deep, complex culture there that the writer doesn't understand is a real problem; while more understanding can mean they write more convincing stories, you can end up with the situation where people understand things just enough to make massive generalisations, or inaccurate depictions that convince the foreign readers but not the natives.

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Rami

at 11:24 on 2009-04-01

OK with writing aliens and vampires and wizards, but can't write a black man? Right.

Indeed, I've always found that particularly grating. Mostly that no one seems to even make the effort. And situations like RaceFail can make it worse for white authors who mean well and would like to make the effort but are scared off because the Wrath of the Public might descend on them.

My favorite line from "Everyone's A Little Bit Racist" is

♫ If we all could just admit / that we are racist, a little bit ♫

because I think it strikes toward the heart of a sensitive issue in pointing out that pretty much no one is free from racist ideas -- and if we admit that to ourselves and make a conscious effort, things could be a lot better. Lots of people mistakenly

equate racism with blatantly racist speech or actions

(warnings: PDF, racefail), after all.

For example, it's perfectly possible to enjoy Robert E. Howard's Conan stories in a non-racist way

I was thinking vaguely along these lines recently as well, when I picked up

Triplanetary

, and had to put it down after only a few pages because it was so full of the unconscious attitudes of the 30s and 40s. It may be a classic of science-fiction and have inspired half of the current generation of SF writers and editors, but the racism and sexism were a bit too much for me. It distresses me that, as Arthur points out, lots of modern writers have doubtless picked up a few of the tropes because they "really liked it in the Lensman series" and completely obliviously dropped them, scheming dark-skinned villains and helpless blonde damsels included, into their own work.

think the key thing people forget is just to have a awareness goes a long way. Doesn't go the whole way to fixing the problem, but it's a good start.

Absolutely!

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Rami

at 11:28 on 2009-04-01

massive generalisations, or inaccurate depictions that convince the foreign readers but not the natives

IIRC, that kind of thing was at the root of the whole RaceFail imbroglio -- when people did exactly that, but refused to admit it.

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Arthur B

at 11:34 on 2009-04-01

Can we actually manage to remain a detached attitude where we're conscious of how terrible the "racist bits" are while still enjoying the "good bits" on their own grounds?

We'd better learn to, otherwise that's everything from before 1950 down the memory hole...

Or are we just deluding ourselves that we're not just indulging a little bit in some unpleasant ideas?

Firstly, reading isn't condoning. You can read, and even enjoy, something written by someone you disagree with and still disagree with them afterwards; I really like Gene Wolfe but I'm not going to convert to Catholicism just because there was a nice mass scene in

The Book of the Short Sun

.

Secondly, if the stories have any merit at all there's going to be something more to them than just bigotry. Yes, Lovecraft used the fear of the outsider a hell of a lot. But the fun thing about that particular fear is that it's always going to be with us, and HPL had a clever knack of turning the fear of the outsider into the fear of the outside itself. When Lovecraft was writing about how threatening he found immigrants (

The Horror At Red Hook

) he was being horrid; when he was writing about how the entire universe beyond this placid island we call Earth is a cold uncaring void that is completely hostile to any life that even resembles us (

The Colour Out of Space

) he was being visionary. It's not always easy to divorce the cultural xenophobia from the cosmic vertigo - they're written by the same man, they have the same experiences and agendas shaping them - but I'd submit that it is possible.

Thirdly, there's plenty of Lovecraft and Howard where racism just isn't a factor, or is only a factor if you try hard to look for it.

The Tower of the Elephant

and

At the Mountains of Madness

spring to mind.

I honestly don't think that reading Lovecraft or Howard is necessarily going to feed anyone's inner racist unless they actually

want

to be influenced that way ("Oh man, I totally agree with that but I could never say it in public..."). It helps that they lived in a time when many people simply didn't know better; it doesn't excuse them, but it does mean that both the attitude of the society they came from and their own personal quirks are well-known and out there for all to see. As Dan points out, it's not the individuals who you can identify as being racist bastards who are the problem a lot of the time (although they're usually the ugliest symptom), it's the people where you don't necessarily see the subtext, perhaps because they themselves aren't aware of it.

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Rami

at 12:00 on 2009-04-01

You can read, and even enjoy, something written by someone you disagree with and still disagree with them afterwards; I really like Gene Wolfe but I'm not going to convert to Catholicism just because there was a nice mass scene

Depends how much you disagree with them, I guess, and how evident that is in the text. I agree you can't dismiss an author entirely because of their attitudes, since as you say there's got to be something other than bigotry -- but if the bigotry is omnipresent it does get pretty difficult. Lovecraft is a good example: I'm sure there were interesting ideas somewhere in The Horror at Red Hook, but because every other paragraph was about the demon-worshipping foreigners I found it impossible to get through and kept wishing I could punch ol' HP in the face. On the other hand, he's only peripherally bigoted (xenophobic, but in a more understandable way) in The Whisperer in Darkness, and that's much easier to appreciate for what it is...

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Dan H

at 13:18 on 2009-04-01

I'd love to bristle more at that than I am, but much as I hate myself for it that's a bit of branding I end up buying into. Whenever my mum says I'm studying in Oxford I have to add 'Brookes, not proper Oxford' just to make it clear I'm not attempting to ride on coat-tails.

Crap, sorry about that. It's probably deeply ironic that in an article entirely about the subconscious effects of prejudice on our everyday thoughts and actions, I managed to forget that using "went to Oxford" as a synonym for "knows what they're talking about" is, itself, kinda offensive.

Sorry folks.

To clarify, all I meant was that it was absurd that I find myself ignoring my friends' university educations or other relevant qualifications in place of easy stereotypes about race and gender.

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Dan H

at 13:39 on 2009-04-01

Lovecraft is a good example: I'm sure there were interesting ideas somewhere in The Horror at Red Hook, but because every other paragraph was about the demon-worshipping foreigners I found it impossible to get through and kept wishing I could punch ol' HP in the face.

I suspect this is one of those examples of White Privilege in action. It's easy for me and Arthur to read Lovecraft (well, easy for Arthur to read Lovecraft, I don't actually like his writing) and say "gosh, this is very racist but I still appreciate it as an artifact from its time." We're in a position where we can condemn racism without it actually harming us. There's a world of difference between reading an old work of genre fiction and saying "hey, those monsters are supposed to be black people" and reading a work of genre fiction and saying "hey, those monsters are supposed to be *me and my family*."

My favorite line from "Everyone's A Little Bit Racist" is ♫ If we all could just admit / that we are racist, a little bit ♫ because I think it strikes toward the heart of a sensitive issue in pointing out that pretty much no one is free from racist ideas

Yeah, I can see that. It's just that a lot of the way the song presents itself is in the language of racist apologism. Remember that the very *next* line is "and we could all stop being so PC!". The more I've thought about the actual sketch, the more I've been bothered by the way it's presented - remember it basically starts with a minority character (Kate Monster) calling out a non-minority character for being racist, and the non-minority character using "well you're racist too!" as a defence (and in fact citing the "but minority rights groups are racist as well!" argument).

But perhaps I'm overthinking it...

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Shim

at 14:16 on 2009-04-01

Lots of people mistakenly equate racism with blatantly racist speech or actions (warnings: PDF, racefail), after all.

Interesting linked article... overall I tended to agree with the arguments, but at times it gave me the feeling that they were interpreting things in the way that supported their expectations, i.e. seeing racist attitudes that

might

not be there. Given how complicated some of the topics were, and how much discussion of racial issues goes on, it's not surprising to me (for example) that people sometimes argued from several sides, or were less coherent on more personal, complicated questions. I'm also suspicious of suggestions that arguments like "I'm not a black person, so I don't really know" should be lumped in as ways to conceal racist attitudes, and the idea that it might be a valid point in some circumstances wasn't considered. Ditto, say, ambivalence over 'affirmative action', which people still can't decide whether it's beneficial overall and exactly what form it should take. Oh, and I'd have liked some counter-examples of answers that were

not

seen as hiding racist attitudes.

Also, it could really do with proofreading. But enough digression, back to Dan's article!

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Arthur B

at 14:48 on 2009-04-01

I suspect this is one of those examples of White Privilege in action. It's easy for me and Arthur to read Lovecraft (well, easy for Arthur to read Lovecraft, I don't actually like his writing) and say "gosh, this is very racist but I still appreciate it as an artifact from its time."

For what it's worth, I don't actually enjoy

The Horror At Red Hook

; I was raising it (not very clearly) as an example of a story that I'd usually just skip because the motivations behind it are entirely too obvious and entirely too ugly.

At the Mountains of Madness

is nice in that the monsters don't resemble

any

identifiable people - not physically, and not culturally - so that's at the other end of the spectrum.

I do think that a certain amount of white privilege is inevitable, but I don't necessarily think it's a problem so long as you're aware that it might be happening and that other people might not see your favourite author in the same way. (It helps to have a diverse group of friends and colleagues as well; "hey, that's meant to be my friend's family" is almost as shocking as "hey, that's meant to be my family".) The most important thing is to read with your eyes open, and to read diversely; I think an exclusive diet of Lovecraft, Howard, and the various descendants and imitators is vastly more unhealthy and likely to blind you to problematic elements in their stories than a more balanced reading range.

A tangent: it dismays me sometimes to see the amount of uncritical fanboyism that surrounds

The Shadow Over Innsmouth

, which granted is a decently-written story but it again has massively problematic undertones; any interpretation of it which doesn't at least acknowledge that part of the point Lovecraft was making was KILL THE HALF-BREEDS is wilfully blinding itself to a really major component of the story, and there's a distressing number of authors who keep reusing the Deep Ones without even considering that angle.

Granted, the angle that people imitate most frequently is the "Oh no, it turns out I am a Deep One too" revelation at the end of the story, but - like Lovecraft himself - nobody ever makes the leap to "wait, surely that means the Deep Ones can't be all bad".

Even people who admit that Lovecraft was a racist

do this. And nobody calls people on it or says "hey, you're just repeating Lovecraft's slurs against miscegenation", presumably because everyone's kidding themselves that the fish people are fish people and can't possibly be a metaphor for something else.

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Arthur B

at 15:06 on 2009-04-01

To put it another way, just imagine for a moment that Harry Potter had been a black kid.

He was, Rowling just didn't mention it in the books.

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Andy G

at 15:57 on 2009-04-01@ Arthur: I did enjoy Lovecraft for the kinds of reasons you said (otherwise I wouldn't have kept reading) - and felt that I could "pick and choose", appreciating and analysing without necessarily condoning. But equally, I was aware that some of the bits I now found uncomfortable I would never even have noticed a few years ago - because I only really imagined racism to be overt KKK-style hatred, as Dan terms it (and Lovecraft does occasionally go there) - and yet even back then I would have prided myself on being able to detach myself from condoning the "racist bits" of the stories, which I now realise are far more pervasive. That's why I hesitate a bit before saying I can definitely remain a detached, objective attitude without colluding in the questionable ideas and imagery. Even if we can distance ourselves from stories by regarding them as historical artefacts, I'm not sure that we can do that completely successfully while still enjoying them as stories.

I also wonder whether it's sufficient to find the bad bits "unpleasant", "uncomfortable" or "distasteful" (from the perpsective of white privilege) but keep reading anyway - I mean, at what point does the text simply become so irredeemably bad that the only thing to do is just not to keep reading? Again, I didn't feel that with Lovecraft, but is that a defensible position?

Hmm ... basically, I do kind of agree with you, but am niggled with doubt, because I wonder whether what I'm really trying to do is give myself an excuse to enjoy books and films that I really shouldn't.

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Gina Dhawa

at 16:11 on 2009-04-01

To clarify, all I meant was that it was absurd that I find myself ignoring my friends' university educations or other relevant qualifications in place of easy stereotypes about race and gender.

Sorry, Dan, if my hackles got raised. It's one of my buttons.

I do think that a certain amount of white privilege is inevitable, but I don't necessarily think it's a problem so long as you're aware that it might be happening and that other people might not see your favourite author in the same way.

This. People have different levels of privilege (white, class, education, etc) and that's such a big deal with regard to how their mileage will vary at what they will personally be able to deal with in texts.

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Gina Dhawa

at 16:19 on 2009-04-01That's not to say I condone racism or any other kind of bigotry in texts, just that I find it understandable that people who don't themselves necessarily hold bigoted views can find things to enjoy in texts that do.

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Arthur B

at 16:33 on 2009-04-01

I also wonder whether it's sufficient to find the bad bits "unpleasant", "uncomfortable" or "distasteful" (from the perpsective of white privilege) but keep reading anyway - I mean, at what point does the text simply become so irredeemably bad that the only thing to do is just not to keep reading?

It varies for me. I have, in fact, stopped reading Robert E. Howard stories because they were pure out-and-out bigotry. On the other hand, I read

The Horror at Red Hook

all the way through. When I do keep reading, it's normally for one of two reasons (or a mix of them):

- The story has something more to it than racism.

Red Hook

is awful for many reasons, one of them being that there really

isn't

anything more to it than the racism.

The Shadow Over Innsmouth

is, in many respects, just as racist, but it also features other ideas which are sufficiently interesting - and have exerted a sufficient influence over the horror genre - that those ideas are both worth salvaging and engaging enough that reading the story doesn't

exclusively

evoke discomfort.

- The story is useful for understanding the author, and I'm interested enough in the author to want to understand them.

Red Hook

as a story is terrible, but as an insight into what Lovecraft was thinking during his brief and unhappy tenancy in New York it's valuable.

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Dan H

at 18:11 on 2009-04-01

He was, Rowling just didn't mention it in the books.

I see what you did there.

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Dan H

at 18:44 on 2009-04-01Also:

Just reading the article you linked to Rami.

It's kind of terrifying, isn't it.

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Shim

at 18:45 on 2009-04-01

He was, Rowling just didn't mention it in the books.

Hmm... I reckon there were enough references to his tousled mop of hair, and looking pale, to make that problematic.

East Asian descent? Native American? Inuit? Totally possible.

(this leads me to something Dan mentioned once; racism discussions always leap on to Black/White dichotomies even though it's not the most obvious one for everyone. I'd argue in Britain that Chinese or South Asian ancestry is much more common, certainly in the north)

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Arthur B

at 18:49 on 2009-04-01look he's albino with really messy hair

you are racist against albinos you are

you want to kill them and turn them into

medicine

and that's wrong

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Shim

at 21:56 on 2009-04-01What a wasteful idea! Everyone knows that albinos are best used as ruthless assassins.

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Dan H

at 22:15 on 2009-04-01

I'm also suspicious of suggestions that arguments like "I'm not a black person, so I don't really know" should be lumped in as ways to conceal racist attitudes, and the idea that it might be a valid point in some circumstances wasn't considered. Ditto, say, ambivalence over 'affirmative action', which people still can't decide whether it's beneficial overall and exactly what form it should take.

I personally found it fairly clear from most of the examples that the actual opinions of the inverviewees were, if not racist, more likely to be perceived as racist than the opinions they tried to express.

It's things like the fact that pretty much all of them disagreed with affirmative action (which I'll admit can't be taken as racist in itself - it's a specific government policy and there's probably several reasons to disagree with it) but that none of them actually felt that they could *say* they didn't agree with affirmative action.

One of the things I've noticed in my recent Rambling Thoughts About Prejudice is that there's a lot of things that people are willing to condemn utterly (or support wholeheartedly) in the general case, but not in the specific. "I have nothing against interracial marriage, but I'm a little bit worried about the children" or "I support affirmative action, but obviously you can't let a better qualified white guy lose out to a black guy if it's a job he actually wants."

Ironically the person that comes out best is the seventy year old woman who says straight up "I'm against interracial marriage, but if my daughter married a black guy I'd still support her."

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Shim

at 22:44 on 2009-04-01

I personally found it fairly clear from most of the examples that the actual opinions of the inverviewees were, if not racist, more likely to be perceived as racist than the opinions they tried to express.

Indeed. Sorry, I'm not clear enough... it was the way the arguments were presented that I found dodgy, rather than anything in the analysis of the examples given; it seemed like they might be generalising from "this person said this, and in context of everything else they said which I have only partially printed here, they seem racist, so I think it may be tactical" to "this kind of language is a tactic to cover racism". The usual extrapolation problem arises. That's kind of why I'd like to see a comparison with non-racist people discussing the topics.

I found the paper a bit rambling (ooh, diminutive) and sometimes incoherent - for example, as basically a scientist I'm used to things with statistics and explanations of the experiment, rather than launching into an argument peppered with examples. Also I think it mixed up the names in at least one place (Andy/Mickey)?

I've had three goes at articulating why I agree with you about the old woman, and can't get one that covers all my feelings, so I'll leave it as "Yeah".

Back on the article... I remember the Captain Planet thing coming up in a PSE class about ethics, on the lines of whether there were actually specific Evil people. A surprising proportion of the class (upper sixth) were really set on this idea and did

not

respond well to questions like "so do you honestly believe that Pol Pot never did a single good thing?" or "exactly what characteristics distinguish between the Evil people and everyone else?".

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Dan H

at 23:17 on 2009-04-01The paper is a bit rambling, and does make a bunch of assumptions (you can't really go from "these white people said this" to "white people say this") but I think it highlights some interesting points. I thought the example with "there is a firm which is 97% white" was a really interesting one, because a lot of the arguments people made were basically "you can only say their hiring policy is racist if you have met their HR guy and you know that he, personally is a racist".

Which brings us neatly back to Captain Planet and the depressingly common belief that there really are Bad People out there who do self-consciously Evil things Because They Are Evil.

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Wardog

at 23:24 on 2009-04-01I'm not saying anything constructive here because I'm quite frankly *terrified* since it's such an incredibly complex issue. But I just wanted to mention that I found the article interesting and the comments equally so.

I was also really worried we were going to have our own small-scale racefail but I'm relieved we only had a highereductionfail instead.

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Rami

at 00:04 on 2009-04-02

That's kind of why I'd like to see a comparison with non-racist people discussing the topics.

I don't remember exactly where I was linked to this paper from, but the two studies mentioned in the paper (from which the interviewees were drawn) tried to measure prevalence of racist attitudes based on survey responses, and found very few sets of responses that appeared minimally prejudiced. I think it's because of this that the paper makes the assumption that the interview responses are evincing racist attitudes, even where the responses themselves could be seen as ambiguous.

I've had three goes at articulating why I agree with you about the old woman, and can't get one that covers all my feelings, so I'll leave it as "Yeah"

I'd say it's because she was honest ;-)

the depressingly common belief that there really are Bad People out there who do self-consciously Evil things Because They Are Evil

I don't doubt there are people out there who are and do; I think that, as you say, the problem with Captain Planet et al is that they encourage the belief that the little actions of every day (not turning off the lights properly, etc) are perfectly OK, and that the Badness is distilled into the Evil People and that they are the only ones to blame.

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http://roisindubh211.livejournal.com/

at 03:50 on 2009-04-02The Tarzan books are a little horrifying- I was pretty young when I read them and completely believed that racism ended in the sixties, but even then I understood that something strange was up with all the beautiful blonde women (and beautiful, blond Tarzan, of course). Why the hell would any ape (except humans) think a blonde was attractive? Later on in the series the racism gets more overt but its still ridiculous when its just "look how pretty and superior we are!"

My mom used to laugh whenever I watched Captain Planet and said I was being brainwashed.

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https://me.yahoo.com/a/x4HhAM1souauxovBXQn5IheyvJm6KIO2jP8MPvM5#590f1

at 03:53 on 2009-04-02Andy G.:

I mean, at what point does the text simply become so irredeemably bad that the only thing to do is just not to keep reading? Again, I didn't feel that with Lovecraft, but is that a defensible position? Hmm ... basically, I do kind of agree with you, but am niggled with doubt, because I wonder whether what I'm really trying to do is give myself an excuse to enjoy books and films that I really shouldn't.

I enjoyed Taming of the Shrew when I saw it performed twenty years ago in college. Then I watched it again within the last two years. It sickened me. When Katherina obeyed whatshisname, I booed, but only loud enough for my wife and maybe a nearby audience member could hear.

Unless the play is promoted/listed as one of the tragedies, I won't see it again.

Perhaps the harder question is: is it making an excuse for the racism rather than for the enjoyment of the read.

The language the theater used excuse the production of TotS was that it may *appear* offensive to the modern audience and that it was the norm for the time. But that's donkeyshit. Disney's Song of the South won't be 're-released on dvd/blueray for only a limited time' even though it was the norm for the time because it *is* offensive to the modern audience today.

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https://me.yahoo.com/a/x4HhAM1souauxovBXQn5IheyvJm6KIO2jP8MPvM5#590f1

at 04:14 on 2009-04-02

It all comes back to branding.

But the people that do the branding are members of the dominant culture.

Though arguably, that has been changing especially within last couple of decades. Well, at least to some degree though not quite for the better. Fucking BET.

- F.Dillinger

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http://sistermagpie.livejournal.com/

at 20:01 on 2009-04-02

But perhaps I'm overthinking it...

Honestly, thinking about it at all lead to overthinking, because although that song from Avenue Q gets quoted *all the time* in discussions of race, it doesn't really seem to be saying anything simple about race at all except in the title. It includes characters talking about actual racism that they experience (Gary Coleman "can't even get a taxi"), apologetics ("stop being so pc"/"ethnic jokes are based on truth") and some things that honestly sound like they know perfectly well they're defending racism: people make judgements about race not about "big things like who to buy a newspaper from, but little things like thinking Mexican busboys should learn to speak GODDAMN ENGLISH!"

In the end the song is kind of a big mess of things you've heard people say about racism, but without a clear pov. The clearest point actually is that everybody's racist and that's okay, but there's other stuff in there too...and also racism is such a hot button word it's hard to imagine using it to be completely positive. Also yes completely about the way it starts off with the idea that a minority is being "racist" to ever focus on its own group without including the majority, the "reverse racism" claim. Blech.

And regarding the rest, yes--in some of the discussions about sci fi I remember somebody mentioning the mystery genre and that shows a real difference. Where sci fi and fantasy has in many ways stuck to their traditional white guy roots, I don't think any mystery fan would say that they really expect the detective in any series to be white or male. I'm not a huge reader of mysteries, but even knowing the genre a little it seems like creating detectives from different backgrounds has become totally common. I guess since the detective is always going to have certain standard qualities (smart, analytical, observant, insightful etc.) people are eager to branch out in other ways looking for how they are different and how their differences affect how they solve crimes.

Where as fantasy seems still so stuck in the whole colonial project mentality...you've often got the race that's our pov race, who seemings white and British or American, and then you've got these other races who are all far more alike than the main race is. To us HP as an example, you couldn't really say what a Wizard was like personality-wise, but you could do that for a House Elf or a giant or a goblin or a centaur...

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Arthur B

at 20:57 on 2009-04-02

Where as fantasy seems still so stuck in the whole colonial project mentality...you've often got the race that's our pov race, who seemings white and British or American, and then you've got these other races who are all far more alike than the main race is.

I think sometimes it is colonial, and sometimes it is an attempt to be pseudohistorical. People have this odd idea that in the medieval period nobody travelled at all, and while it's true that 90% of the population never travelled much under normal circumstances a) that's still kind of true today in many places, and b) even though that was the case, you never had a situation where you had the English people who lived exclusively in a place called England whose borders were always much the same as they are today, and neighbouring them the French people who lived in a place called France with borders much like today's, and so on. People moved around: rich folk travelled and became merchants and sometimes settled in cities where the money was, poor people went on pilgrimages and were drafted into their lord's militia when time came to go to war, and enormous numbers of people ended up becoming refugees from plague, famine, and war - and that's just in medieval Europe.

This is not to say that our cultures aren't more diverse today than they were back then. But they were significantly more nuanced and heterogeneous than the sort of fake-medieval societies that sub-Tolkien fantasy hacks crank out. Writing realistically diverse societies is

achingly difficult

, and many people just don't try. (Which is wrong of them.)

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Dan H

at 02:04 on 2009-04-03

The clearest point actually is that everybody's racist and that's okay,

It's the "but that's okay" that I have trouble with. Or rather, it's the way *in which* it's supposed to be okay. I'm okay with the idea that "it's okay" to have racist attitudes in the sense that everybody has them, and having racist attitudes doesn't make you a bad person, just somebody who needs to be a bit more aware of race issues. The song, though, seems to imply that racism is just plain acceptable.

This might be a bit overly-analytical, but the song basically involves a bunch of minorities complaining about racism, then being revealed to be hypocrites. There's a fine line between humour about racism, and humour that is just plain racist and I fear that EaLBR strays into the latter camp.

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http://sistermagpie.livejournal.com/

at 02:35 on 2009-04-03

t's the "but that's okay" that I have trouble with.

Sorry, I wasn't clear there--neither am I. I don't think that the clearest message being "everyone (including minorities) is racist and that's okay" is a particularly good thing.

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http://descrime.livejournal.com/

at 17:52 on 2009-04-03re: Captain Planet clip: Oh God, that was so bad I had to stop watching at the 30 second mark. I think I watched CP as a kid. Obviously I wasn't a very bright child.

I thought the firm question was stupid, to be honest, if the only information they are given is that a firm is 97% white! Draw inferences!

I once worked for a small business that employed 5 people. It was 100% white. By the paper's logic, the owners were horrible racists. But the population size of the firm is too small to use statistics like that.

Also, what industry is this firm in? If a 20 person video game development company employes 19 males and 1 female, is it sexist? The population of video game designers is heavily skewed towards men and 20 is still a rather low number to be applying statistical inferences to.

If a hospital's nurses are 97% female, does that mean the hospital is discriminating against male nurses? To figure that out, you need the percentage of male nurses in the area to compare with.

Now, I did do an internship at a ~170 person, publicly traded company and every single position of importance was filled with a white male, and that did seem suspicious.

If a firm is 97% white, all that statistic tells us is that is could be racist, not that it is racist no matter how obvious the author of the paper finds that conclusion. Similarly, even if the company has reached that magical percentage that means diversity, it doesn't mean the company /isn't/ racist.

My aunt works for a large "diverse" company, 600 employee, and she told me about a month ago how a group of white coworkers had hung voodoo dolls from their desk lamps (as in mimicking lynching) in response to a black coworker reporting on some previous misbehavior they had done (I don't really remember the details). The company had no real policy to deal with the situation and basically tried to sweep it under the rug.

I thought the paper was interesting in that it showed some examples as to how people have developed a method of speaking around an issue that is impossible to discuss in our society.

I also thought it was interesting that people who reported having friendships with someone who was part of a minority group were much less racist towards that group. Which would suggest to me that diversity in elementary schools is probably one of the most important things we could do to help promote understanding.

I thought his methodology was a little suspicious for what he was trying to achieve--an honest discussion of racial prejudices. A stranger asking you questions to your face on a sensitive topic (which he obviously have strong feelings for) is hardly likely to promote honesty and is probably a large factor in the nervousness and stuttering the subjects showed.

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Arthur B

at 18:11 on 2009-04-03

If a 20 person video game development company employes 19 males and 1 female, is it sexist? The population of video game designers is heavily skewed towards men and 20 is still a rather low number to be applying statistical inferences to.

Wait, what? I know it isn't very fair to blame individual game companies for an industry-wide bias, but wouldn't it be completely fair to criticise them if they made no effort to address that bias?

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Dan H

at 19:31 on 2009-04-03

Also, what industry is this firm in? If a 20 person video game development company employes 19 males and 1 female, is it sexist? The population of video game designers is heavily skewed towards men and 20 is still a rather low number to be applying statistical inferences to.

I think you're actually making a classic mistake here, which is to make the focus of a discussion about prejudice the question of whether or not specific *people* are prejudiced instead of whether prejudice is at work in a given situation.

If a games development company is 95% male, whether they have 20 employees or 200 there's something wrong. Is it partly the fault of the industry? Probably, but not entirely. Roughly one in six

World of Warcraft

players are female, the proportion of women in your hypothetical company is one third that size.

There is, actually a serious issue here. An interesting statistic is that when people are asked to judge what a "balanced" gender mix looks like, they tend to settle on a male:female ratio of about 2:1 with anything more than that being perceived as unfairly biased towards women. Even

Buffy

follows this pattern, with the core cast of the first series being two girls (Buffy, Willow) and three guys (Giles, Xander, Angel) for a 60-40 split in one of the most female dominated shows on mainstream TV.

Part of what I've been trying to get at with the article above is the idea that it's all too easy to condemn prejudice in general, while making excuses for it in every specific instance. You actually

can

take the fact that only 5% of a company's employees are women as evidence of sexism. Evidence isn't the same as proof, but if your first reaction to the suggestion that your hiring policy might be sexist is to go on the defensive, you're never going to make any progress.

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Shim

at 22:54 on 2009-04-03@Dan

agreed. I do think the response depends on exactly what question is asked (and due to editfail/vagueness of the article I'm not sure) and how the interviewees interpret it; someone might say that racism was definitely at play (in the industry as a whole, in the education system...) but not necessarily conclude that the company itself is definitely racist. But as you say, it would be a pretty good place to start.

Re: gender balance; a similar rule applies to time-per-student in the classroom. Teachers of either gender judge a "balanced" lesson as one that gives far more time to boys (cf. "Language Myths", Bauer & Trudgill - let nobody say I make airy claims). Observers, students etc. also follow this pattern. Giving equal time is a major problem for teachers even when made aware of it and leads to people claiming the lesson is dominated by girls.

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http://arkan2.livejournal.com/

at 22:30 on 2009-04-06Another excellent essay, and great discussion, too.

Yeah, it's scary what advertisements can do, without being able to influence people through “subliminal messages.” Ever seen

The Ad and the Ego

? Heavy stuff.

And then of course, there's Naomi Klein's

No Logo

…

You're right, Dan, this is exactly how racism works. And sexism, heterosexism, classicism, ableism and all the rest. Until those types of oppression are completely eradicated, they'll be with us to some extent, but the first step towards making the solution is identifying the problem.

I also agree that you can't learn Japanese culture by watching anime, but that's not the same as saying you can't learn it at all. You can't learn everything about Japanese culture, or even just a subsection thereof—but then, this applies even if

you yourself are Japanese

. Nobody can know everything about a culture, their own or anyone else's.

Fortunately, authors don't need to do that much, any more than honest anthropologists do. How should an author in the United States go about writing a story set in modern India with modern Indian characters? To which I would reply: the same way said author should go about writing a story set in medieval Europe (or a decent knock-off thereof): research. Of course, cultural imperialism and cultural misappropriation are dangers that rear their ugly heads in the former case, but I think if the author comes at it with the right mindset (including but not limited to sympathy, sensitivity, awareness of probable pitfalls and a continentload of caution) they can pull it off (though you can't please

every

one).

I have the same problem with Whedon's Misogynist-Of-The-Week depiction of sexism as you do. Audiences in my experience tend to process characterization first, symbolism second. (A strongly feminist friend of mine who is also a major Whedon fan once tried to sell me some argument about how incredibly feminist the symbolism of the female characters in

Firefly

is. I'm betting she'd say the same about

Dollhouse

. My reply would be that even if so, the straightforward characterization is rather less feminist, to put it charitably, and that counts for a lot more.)

I'm sure

Harry Potter

could've sold if Harry had been black, or brown, or any other known shade of human skin. Whether it would've been such a cult phenomenon is a different problem. (Who knows, it might've been. And yes, that would've done more than probably any ten government initiatives. And what if he'd been Arabic …?)

people making well-intentioned efforts to move the discourse forward are actually good and important, even if they fail in all kinds of ways to live up to the ideal of what they intend to attain or represent.

That's a very good point, Guy. I believe I maybe try harder than Roddenberry to be progressive on issues of race, sex, sexuality, class and all the other -isms, but if in 100 years' time people aren't looking at my fiction and finding a dozen holes in it at first glance, I'll be one disappointed ancestor. I'll be disappointed because it will mean that a) the culture will not have progressed so far as to outpace anything I could even imagine at my most radical, or b) that I never ended up actually publishing any fiction (or at least none worth looking at). To some extent, whatever I do will be a product of its time, just like the

Star Trek

.

OK with writing aliens and vampires and wizards, but can't write a black man? Right. Indeed, I've always found that particularly grating. Mostly that no one seems to even make the effort. And situations like RaceFail can make it worse for white authors who mean well and would like to make the effort but are scared off because the Wrath of the Public might descend on them.

Yeah well, white privilege means that you can ignore all that and not have to worry too much. Whereas if you're a person of colour (say, Arabic) and you piss off the white folks, Allah help you. (There are exceptions like Salman Rushdie, of course, but they are very much the exception.)

I for one do care about public opinion of people of colour, but I think it better to take that risk and at least try to be part of the solution than play it safe and know for sure that I'm perpetuating the problem.

Firstly, reading isn't condoning. You can read, and even enjoy, something written by someone you disagree with and still disagree with them afterwards;

This is a good point, Arthur. I recently read Michael Crichton's

State of Fear

, and, for various reasons, have been obsessing over it for months. It's a pretty mediocre thriller, but I have an intense love/hate relationship with the discourse. Some of it I agree with, a lot of it I don't, but what really gets me is that Crichton sets himself up to make his points in a way that should get even the readers who don't agree with him thinking, then lets most of it dissolve into a tired political rant. I felt like I would've enjoyed the book more—should've enjoyed it more—even as I was disagreeing with it, but Crichton failed to try hard enough to connect with the skeptics (which is ironic considering we're presumably the one's he's addressing).

… Although, as Dan points out, there's a difference between something being disagreeable and something actually insulting you as a person because of the social group you happen to belong to, especially when there is a looong history of insult and oppression of people from that social group.

On the other hand, as we're agreed that in a racist society everyone is racist to some degree, all the fiction we produce is probably going to be racist in some way. So if we can't find any merit in racist works, then Arthur's suggestion of throwing out everything before 1950 is too conservative by half.

So basically, I guess, it all comes down to degree of offensiveness and personal taste. If you can find merit in something, I'd say there's probably some merit, although I reserve the right to withdraw my condone-ance (there doesn't seem to be a proper word for that) if the merit you find is something along the lines of e.g. “All Arabs are evil.”

As Dan points out, it's not the individuals who you can identify as being racist bastards who are the problem a lot of the time (although they're usually the ugliest symptom), it's the people where you don't necessarily see the subtext, perhaps because they themselves aren't aware of it.

Damn, you people are good at making excellent points with incredible clarity.

It helps to have a diverse group of friends and colleagues as well; "hey, that's meant to be my friend's family" is almost as shocking as "hey, that's meant to be my family".

That's my viewpoint too, and something I feel slightly guilty about not cultivating more some of the time. However, I do think there's a bigger difference than you suggest, Arthur. I have a lot of close friends who are queer, but when I see something homophobic, the fact that “they're talking about my friends” doesn't spring immediately to mind. Similarly, when I see something blatantly anti-Palestinian, I don't immediately think of my Palestinian-American friend.

I agree that it helps to have friends who belong to the insulted group in question, but maybe not as much as you suggest.

To put it another way, just imagine for a moment that Harry Potter had been a black kid.

He was, Rowling just didn't mention it in the books.

Or in the liner notes to the movie script. Dumbeldore's sexual orientation on the other hand …

the depressingly common belief that there really are Bad People out there who do self-consciously Evil things Because They Are Evil

I don't doubt there are people out there who are and do;

Well I for one, don't doubt the exact opposite, and think that's a

very

dangerous philosophical road to venture onto. Of course, it partially depends on what definition of “Evil” we're working under, but still …

re: Captain Planet clip: Oh God, that was so bad I had to stop watching at the 30 second mark. I think I watched CP as a kid. Obviously I wasn't a very bright child.

Me neither.

And yes, racism is amazingly adaptive when it comes to rhetoric.

I've heard elsewhere that positive exposure tends to dilute one's own prejudices at least. So yes, diverse elementary schools = very good idea.

Part of what I've been trying to get at with the article above is the idea that it's all too easy to condemn prejudice in general, while making excuses for it in every specific instance.

Like all other types of basically immoral attitudes/behaviors/actions. War/torture/murder/rape, people can (and too often do) excuse away the patently inexcusable when it gets down to specifics. If anyone has any suggestions on how to get people to stop doing this I'm listening.

very

attentively.

[limitlessmonster]

Title: A Permanent Formality Pairing: EreRi Word Count: 1600 Rating: E (nsfw) Summary: In which Eren finds the key to more than just Levi’s dick in a box.  A/N: Happy Birthday, Eren. ♥ Please excuse the Lonely Island reference hahaha On AO3

“The only thing I care about blowing is right here,” Eren says, patting the half-hard bulge underneath Levi’s trousers with a cheeky grin.

“Did you just compare my dick to a candle?”

“Both long and hard,” Eren teases as he drops his gaze and bites the edge of his lip in anticipation, “and drips sticky, hot, white—“

“Okay, that’s enough tequila for you.” Levi makes to grab for the empty shot glass and is unsurprised when Eren dangles it above him like the drunk little shit he is. “Are you fucking serious?”

“Be nice, babe…” Eren is fighting the slur in his voice now and Levi figures he should push the plans up before Eren ends up on the bedroom floor naked and shitfaced. “‘S m’birthday…”

“Yeah, no shit. Every bar from here to Jersey knows it’s your birthday,” Levi says, palming his face. In hindsight, agreeing to a bar crawl with Eren and a group of their friends sounded like a much better idea in the beginning. It distracted him, made him less likely to second-guess his decision about other things he’d been waiting to do for the last few weeks. But now, there is only an hour left of Eren’s birthday and Levi is no closer to executing his plan as he had been earlier in the night. And with the way Eren is hungrily eyeing his noticeable bulge like he can magically see through clothing, Levi decides that winging it is probably better than letting the moment pass altogether. He cradles Eren’s face and brings him down just enough to plant a quick kiss, quietly chuckling when Eren’s nose wrinkles in disappointment. “You know you’re drunk, right?”

“Damn straight, I am.”

“Pretty sure whatever you are, straight ain’t one of them.”

“I--” Eren pauses, mouth open with the rest of whatever his retort should be, and blinks instead. “Okay, you’re not wrong.” He gently backs Levi against the edge of the bed until Levi’s knees buckle and he falls, forearms braced along the charcoal sheets. “Stop stalling and let me open my present.”

“If I’d known that was all you wanted, I’d have slapped a bow on my crotch and called it a night.” Levi sucks in a breath as he watches Eren work his belt buckle and zipper open with such candid determination that he stifles the urge to help him with the task.

“You know me,” Eren says, shirking Levi out of his pants, boxer briefs tugged along with it. “Who needs to blow candles to make my wish come true when I can blow you instead and get the same result?”

Levi has a reply on the tip of his tongue, but as soon as Eren wraps his lips around Levi’s cockhead and swallows him down, the words disappear right along with his functioning brain cells. As inebriated as Eren is, he is surprisingly deft with his ministrations. Barely a stutter in rhythm, a break in pace, while he alternates between his hand, his tongue, the heated suction of his mouth; a race to see which one can take Levi apart faster. Levi groans, his head lolling to the side, eyelids at half-mast and watching Eren simultaneously stroke himself while giving Levi a new experience on the phrase “blow your mind”.

Eren seems to realize Levi is nearing the edge because he dials back the pace, his gaze flickering up to Levi’s face as he licks the underside of his cock with the hint of a knowing smirk. “You didn’t have to go through all this trouble, you know.”

“Mm?” Levi mumbles intelligently.

“Dinner and dancing? Bar crawl with everyone?” Eren takes Levi all the way down again, pulling off slowly and licking the weeping tip before his hand takes over with languid strokes. “You hate to dance almost as much as you hate going to bars, so--”

He pauses then and bites his lip, a lone eyebrow raised in Levi’s direction. Again, Levi’s response is on the tip of his tongue, and again, it dies a horrible, violent death at the sight of Eren biting his fucking lip because there are only so many things his brain synapses can focus on before overfiring. “So?”

“I would’ve been fine with takeout and a movie on your couch,” Eren murmurs, mouthing along Levi’s naked skin while his hand follows the trail, his grip tightening just enough to bring the coiling sensation back into Levi’s core. “Same result, more time for this.” And he swallows Levi again, all reservations gone.

With a gasp, Levi’s head dips back. His fingers clench around the starched sheets, grasping for purchase while Eren goes full throttle and rips a moan from Levi’s throat so wrecked that he almost doesn’t recognize the sound. A tremor rocks him, makes him lose whatever self control he’s tried to manage, his release shooting into the back of Eren’s throat as every inch of him is lit to high heaven. He rides it out all the way, thrusting a staggered rhythm as he fucks Eren’s mouth on pure instinct and Eren lets him, removes his grip on Levi’s hips and uses his hands, instead, to cover the deathgrip Levi has managed on his sheets. Then he angles his head enough to allow Levi’s cock to slide in and out with ease, his throat relaxing and clenching around him as the moment passes until finally, Levi’s entire body slackens and sags boneless against the mattress.

“What...the...fuck,” Levi manages, sinking back altogether as he attempts to catch his breath. He closes his eyes and exhales sharply through his mouth, the warmth from Eren’s hands disappearing a moment later. A familiar weight presses against him and when he opens his eyes, Eren has managed to straddle him, the satisfied smirk he wears reaching the bright green gaze now trained on Levi. “I did actually get you something, but fuck if I can beat that out.”

“Technically, I beat that out,” Eren teases, dipping his head to indicate Levi’s dick softening beneath him, his hand reenacting the motion with a cheeky grin and a waggle of his eyebrows. “You know, for clarification.”

This earns him a laugh, one of many that only seems to happen whenever Eren is around. Filled with amusement, affection. Happiness.

With a snort, Levi manages to reach into his discarded pants, extracting a small box out of the back pocket. “Like I said,” he says, grunting as he rises to sitting position, Eren still on his lap and looking at the box with brimming curiosity. He pops the lid open, pulls out a thin silver chain, and places it over Eren’s head. The metal gleams, stark against Eren’s bronze skin, the key at the end catching the light when Eren shifts to properly look at it.

He blinks rapidly, as though his brain is trying to figure out alternatives for Levi’s gesture more believable than what is actually happening. He licks his lips and Levi resists the urge to kiss him right then and there, resists the temptation at least until Eren can properly respond before Levi’s anxiety can kick in at the prolonged silence.

“Is that--?”

“A key? Yeah, looks like it.”

“For your place?”

“What else did you think it was for?”

Eren flushes, planting a hand on his face as his expression turns sheepish. “Well, considering I just tried to suck your brains out of your dick--”

“Such a romantic.”

“--and you watched the Lonely Island video with me the other day--”

“Oh my god, Eren.”

“Okay, but can you blame me?”

“It’s not a key to my dick in a box,” Levi says, half exasperated and half amused. “Besides, would’ve defeated the purpose if you got the key after you unwrapped me.”

Eren still looks mildly unconvinced. “Are you sure?” he asks, biting his lip again, the action going straight to Levi’s groin.

Levi shrugs, shifting to ease the sensation. “Most of your shit’s already here anyway. This is just a formality.”

“A permanent formality.”

“Well…yeah. If you want it to be.”

“Why the chain? You couldn’t have just gone with a keyring?” Eren says with a chuckle, holding the key between his fingertips like it’s the most precious thing in the world.

“I don’t know,” Levi says honestly. “Bought it on a whim, I guess. But as soon as I saw it hanging there, it just sorta...felt right. Like it was supposed to be there. ‘S that weird?”

Eren shakes his head and instead of responding, kisses him, arms draped over Levi’s shoulders. They pull away slowly, the kisses lingering like dying embers intent on burning long after the heat of the flames have long settled. They somehow make their way beneath the sheets, legs tangled together with Eren tracing lazy circles against Levi’s naked skin. He seems to be sobering up some, anchoring his forehead against Levi’s in that sleepy way that makes Levi want to curl up with him under the covers and stay there for as long as Eren would let him.

“Hey Levi?”

“Yeah?”

“Love you, you know.”

“Yeah, kid,” Levi says again, staring at the ceiling. “I know.”

“And I want it to be,” Eren says, nuzzling his face into Levi’s neck, his voice sleep-heavy.

“Hm?”

“A permanent formality.”

“Good. Now go to sleep,” Levi hums in response, mouth ghosting against Eren’s temple as a warmth settles over him. Happy. Content. Exactly where he’s supposed to be. When he hears Eren’s breathing even out, the rhythm slow and steady, he exhales a whisper, “Happy Birthday, Eren.” And then, because he can’t help himself, “I love you, too.”

[jade-bellatricus84]

Promptography 101 (part 3)

Okay guys! Here it is! Part 3 of my University AU staring Professor!Prompto and once this segment is finished I am hoping to do segments with the other Chocobros as well! Anywhos! I am SO SORRY this took so long to hash out! Life has been a real bitch to me and I hadn’t been able to do any writing lately until finally last night!

I would like to tag @geekgoddess813 @atarostarling @moonraccoon-exe @inconsistencys and @silverdriftdragon you guys are the literal best and I love you! Thank you for inspiring me to keep my head up and in the game. (both figuratively and literally. bahaha)

Summary: While out shopping you bump into Professor Prompto and proceed to spend the next few hours with him.

Warnings: Um, I don’t think there are any? If any of you find something that may be triggering PLEASE do not hesitate to let me know and I will make sure to properly tag it!

Word count: 1679

So! Without further ado, I give you, Promptography 101 (part 3)

You told him where you lived and he took off in that direction. The drive was amazing. He was a cautious driver despite going over the speed limit. He had such a strong back and you loved leaning into it. With your arms tightly wrapped around him you could tell he was fit. Sure he wasn't ripped like the hot P.E. professor you kept hearing about, but he definitely had muscle. You knew he had great arms, the man seemed to hate sleeves. As you were wondering how well built he really was you felt the bike slow to a stop by your apartment building.

“Here we are, mi'lady.” He stabilized the bike before helping you down. “I like the scenery it's so-”

You had slowly taken the helmet off and shook your hair out. When he stopped talking you had assumed he was searching for a word that fit but glancing at him told you otherwise. He had been looking at you. There was a faint blush to his cheeks as he quickly looked away.

“Ah-um-sorry, Y/N...That was- really inappropriate of me...I-sorry if that made you uncomfortable...” He seemed to be really flustered, just from watching you take the helmet off.

“Hm? Oh, no, it's fine really!” You smiled softly as you hand the helmet back to him. “Safety first, Bright Eyes.” You gave a soft giggle as his cheeks went an even brighter shade of pink.

“Y-Yeah, thanks, Y/N. Um, I should-I...I should go...” He turned to get back onto his bike. “I'll-um-see you tomorrow...wait-no-tomorrow is Saturday...no classes...I'll see you Monday.”

“Yeah. See you Monday...hey, Bright Eyes?” He paused in his movement to put his helmet on to look at you. “Thanks again for today. It really means a lot.”

“No problem. Anytime, Princess, anytime.” He put the helmet on and started the bike. He checked to make sure traffic was clear before giving you a wave and driving off.

You took a deep breath as you went inside, questioning what all of this meant. Were your feelings only amplified because you were emotionally unstable when you bumped into him? What did his reaction to watching you take his helmet off mean? How could you repay him for his kindness? All of these thoughts swarmed through your head, making studying impossible, and so you decided to take a nice and long hot bath to de-stress. You went to start the water for the bath and then started to gather everything you would need. You grabbed all your lavender scented bath items; bath bomb, bath salts, scented candle, bubble bath, everything you could think you might want. Then you went to grab you pajamas and a few fresh towels. Once you had everything officially ready you turned on your sound simulator and set it on the 'ocean waves' sound before settling into the tub for some much needed relaxation.

The next morning when you woke you decided to go take care of some shopping that needed to get done. Grabbing your keys and wallet you head to the nearby market. This market was your favorite, mainly because it had everything you could ever need somewhere in one of the many stalls. Your eyes looked around and, after wandering around grabbing the essentials, landed on none other that Prompto Argentum. He stood talking with another man about his age with raven colored hair and a bored expression. As you watched them the other man smiled and laughed and suddenly you recognized him as the University's Mythology Professor. You suddenly had the idea of somehow repaying Prompto for his kindness from the day before.

“Prompto?” Before you could stop yourself you called out to him. He turned in your direction, an involuntary reaction to hearing his name.

“Y/N, hey! Good morning, how are you?” He gave you one of those blindingly bright smiles.

“Good morning. I'm okay, thank you. I just...thank you, again, for yesterday, I really appreciate it.” You gave a soft, shy smile. He chuckled softly and shook his head.

“Hey, no problem.” He paused a moment, turning slightly back to the other Professor. “I'm gonna head on, finish running my errands. I'll meet you guys at Iggy's later tonight.” The raven haired Professor quirked an eyes with a smirk on his face as he nodded and turned to leave. He glanced at you, that smirk never leaving. “Yeah, sure thing. Have fun.”

“What?” The blonde seemed a tad confused as the other male walked away.

“I think he got the wrong idea, Prom...” You had said it teasingly but you wondered if maybe he really had gotten the wrong idea.

“What? Nah...Noct likes to mess around like that.” He shrugs some and gave you a soft smile. “I'm like...75% certain he was just messing around.”

The two of you began to walk throughout the market place. At one of the market stalls there were some really cute chocobo and moogle keychains.

“Oh my gods this is so cute!” You couldn't help but cry out as you saw them.

“Yeah, they really are. Oh! Give me just a second...this vendor has a new camera lens I've wanted for a while.” Prompto jogged off to a stall a little bit away and you took the time to purchase a keychain. The vendor told you that they were running a buy one get one free deal so you got two matching keychains.

You planned to give one of them to your Professor as thanks for his kindness yesterday. You hid the keychains and went over to him. He was purchasing the lens and getting it properly packaged to take home.

“Sorry, Y/N, didn't mean to run off on you like that. I've been looking for this lens for months. It's really popular with wildlife photographers. Man, I'm glad I switched rides with Noct.” He laughed softly, his face beaming.

“Oh, no, it's totally fine. I'm glad you were able to get it!” You found yourself smiling back at him. “Hey, so...I've been walking around for the last couple of hours and I'm starting to get hungry...would you...maybe...like to join me for lunch?”

“Really? Sure, I mean, if you're sure you want me around?”

“Uh, yeah, dude. Why wouldn't I? Also...why ask if I didn't mean it?” You gave a soft giggle and gently nudge him.

“Ahaha! Good point!” His laugh had you melting.

“Of course it's a good point, Bright Eyes. It only makes sense.” You were so relaxed and in such a good mood.

The two of you made your way to a chic cafe. It was pretty empty despite the crowd at the marketplace. You sat in the back corner in some comfy overstuffed armchairs.

“Gods, I need an Ebony.” He suddenly said as he fought a yawn.

“You drink Ebony?” He didn't strike you as an Ebony consumer.

“Believe me, I don't drink it for the taste.” He said with a laugh. “I drink it for the caffeine. Some days it's the only way I can function.”

“Really? I'm sorry...do you want anything to eat?”

“Yeah, but I'll get it...don't worry about it.”

“Uh, no, this is on me. I invited you here, besides, I owe you for yesterday.”

“No, you don't. I didn't do it so you would owe me, Y/N.”

“Regardless. I'm getting this. Now...what do you want?” He seemed to realize that you weren't going to give in and sighed.

“I'll take a club sandwich with a pasta salad on the side. Please and thank you.”

“Club with pasta salad. Got it. Do you take cream or sugar in your Ebony?” You seemed to really be in your element at the moment.

“Uh, yeah, two creams, three sugars.” He smiled softly.

“Got it. Okay, I'll be right back.” You skipped up to the counter and placed the order.

Prompto watched you the whole time. You were beautiful. He quickly averted his eyes as you came back with two mugs in hand.

“Ebony, two creams, three sugars. Trish will bring lunch over when it's ready.”

“You really seem to know what you're doing here. Is that coincidence?” He asked genuinely curious.

“No. I did a few barista/waitressing gigs back home during my high school years. I loved the work and most of my customers, but it just wasn't my passion, you know?” your eyes locked with each other and he nods.

“Yeah, actually, I do. I've been there. I know exactly what that's like. I got lucky, though, ending up doing what I love. Not everyone gets that privilege, and I thank the Astrals everyday for the fact Regis saw potential for a class otherwise I have no idea what I'd be doing.” He smiled softly.

“You're on a first name with the Headmaster of the University? That is so cool!” You were so impressed with this ball of sunshine.

“Yeah. Noct is his son and we go way back. Known each other going on 10 or 11 years now. Pretty much the same with Ignis and Gladio too” He smiled fondly. “Of course Ignis, Noct and Gladio pretty much grew up together, so I was the late arrival but, yeah, we're all pretty close.”

“Now, Noct was the Professor from earlier, right?”

“Yep. That's the one. Noctis Lucis Caelum, the University's resident Mythology Nerd.” He laughed softly and you couldn't help but laugh with him.

“Which ones are Gladio and Ignis?” You were curious about the other two.

“Gladiolus Amicitia and Ignis Scientia. Gladio does Phys. Ed. while Iggy does the cooking classes. If we keep hanging out like this you're bound to meet them.” He gave you a charming smile.

“I think I'd like that.” You smiled.

“To meet them or to keep hanging out?” Gods, how could he be so smooth?

“Both.�� You felt your cheeks heat up.

Thankfully, it was at that time Trish arrived with the food. The two of you started to eat and any conversation was about the food. You knew you were going to get yourself into trouble though. You were falling in love with your Professor.

[bentonpena]

Hitoki's High-tech bong lets you smoke weed with a laser, and it's as cool as it sounds

https://bit.ly/3aqhlNE Hitoki's High-tech bong lets you smoke weed with a laser, and it's as cool as it sounds https://bit.ly/3aq4U4e

It's a freaking laser bong • Sleek design • Easy operation • Smooth hits

It's not cheap • It's top heavy and can tip over easily

The Hitoki Trident is crowd-pleaser and an extremely unique way to consume cannabis. It's fun, it hits smooth, and did i mention it's a freaking laser bong?

The information contained in this article is not a substitute for, or alternative to information from a healthcare practitioner. Please consult a healthcare professional before using any product and check your local laws before making any purchasing decisions.

As new states push to legalize cannabis use for adults there are now more ways than ever to consume marijuana, but you'll be hard-pressed to find a cooler way to light up than with the Hitoki Trident. 

Simply put, the Hitoki Trident is a bong that uses a laser as its combustion process — that's right, it's a freaking laser bong. Is it a little ridiculous and over-the-top? Yes. But the Trident also delivers on its promise of providing a unique and smooth smoking experience that feels like it's from the future. 

What is the Hitoki Trident laser bong?

The product is the brainchild of brothers Jack and Joe Tran. Jack told me that he dreamed up the idea of using a laser after smoking a joint and thinking about those cheap dollar store lasers toys he and his brother used to buy as kids. But this is no dollar store bong. The Trident is sleek and modern and more like a piece of art. While typical bongs from blown-glass have always been considered a work of functional art, the Hitoki Trident feels a little more mature. 

That's right, it's a freaking laser bong. 

The Trident arrived on my doorstep in a small reusable box, and it sort of resembled the packaging that comes with a really fancy bottle of whiskey. The corner of my box was a little smashed, but the packaging was secure enough that the Trident was undamaged. As per the instructions, I immediately plugged in the bong to the supplied USB-C charging cable and returned less than two hours later to a fully charged device. 

The whole vibe from Hitoki is to create a more sophisticated smoking experience, and the company is not shy in putting that message forward. The inside of the box is inscribed with the words "Elevate yourself," "Elevate your surroundings," and "Elevate society." Along with the tools and accessories necessary to use the Trident, a grinder plate about the size of a credit card with the letter "E" etched into it was also included in the box. (Previously the device was known as the Saber, and the company called itself Elevareco before rebranding to the Hitoki Trident.)

Getting started with the laser bong

Along with the device itself, the box also includes a charger, a silicone hose with a mouthpiece, and a poker. After charging the device, set up is pretty simple, but you'll want to watch this video Hitoki has on its YouTube page that describes how you unscrew the water reservoir, as well as how and where you load your flower into the small chamber.

The Trident operates like other vapes on the market, and it only has one button on the top to operate it. Pushing the button five times turns the Trident on and off, and this is a great safety feature for keeping the device out of the wrong hands. 

The power button on the top glows different colors depending on which temperature setting you want, pressing the button three times cycles between those temperatures. Blue is the hottest temperature intended for "essential oil infused blends." Green is the medium setting and is supposed to be used for "fresh herbal blends." And finally red is the lowest setting and is ideal for "dryer looser blends and for better taste," according to the instruction manual that came with the Hitoki. (You can also use the Trident as an aromatherapy device, but I did not test out that function.) 

If I'm being picky here this was a little confusing for me as I typically associate the color red with the hottest temperature, but cycling through the temperatures is easy enough and there are only three so my stoner brain quickly adjusted.

You have two choices for actually firing the laser once you choose the temperature setting. Hold the power button and give the laser a moment to heat up, or tap the button twice and the laser will fire for nine seconds. If you choose to hold the power button, the laser will shut off after nine seconds as to not overheat the device.

But before you start firing lasers into your weed you need to load the device with flower and fill the lower chamber with water. This is a bong after all. The top of the Tident has a satisfying interlock that clicks when you open and close it. Considering this is a relatively high-powered laser capable of igniting things, this is a necessary and welcome feature, and the laser will not fire unless the "FDA standard interlocks" are properly closed. 

On the side of the Hitoki there is a warning label that  has the following message:

DANGER CLASS 4 VISIBLE LASER RADIATION WHEN OPEN AND INTERLOCK DEFEATED AVOID EYE OR SKIN EXPOSURE TO DIRECT OR SCATTERED RADIATION. 

There is also another warning sticker on the device that has a red DANGER label before it. "Only use smoking material and water as defined by the manufacture. Dangerous laser reflection can occur from misuse."

Simply put: Don't fuck around with the laser. 

Thankfully the Hitoki has a "laser shield" surrounding the combustion chamber and small window where you can see the laser fire, which will protect your eyes from the laser as long as the device is locked. This allows you to actually see the laser fire, which is really cool. Overall that has been has been my impression with the Trident laser bong — it's just really cool. 

Loading the water

The acrylic base for the bong unscrews to allow you to add a small bit of water to the reservoir that will ultimately help cool the smoke and vapor before you inhale. It was somewhat difficult to unscrew and it made a terrible noise once I tightened it back up, but ultimately I see this as a positive because bong water is one of the grossest things on planet earth, so I can appreciate a bong that keeps the water contained. 

Pressing the ignite button for the Hitoki Trident laser bong.

The instruction manual says to only use a small amount of water and fill it to "the line located near the bottom of the stem to prevent water from being sucked up into the air hose" when you take a hit. But the line is sorta hard to see, and I wish the reservoir where you fill the water had a marking on it so you don't have to guess or go back and forth to get just the right level of water. It's important to note here that the water level really is quite small, which may be confusing for bong users that typically use more water. 

Loading the chamber with herbs

One you have the water loaded up you can unlock the combustion chamber and load in your fresh herbs. The ceramic loading chamber unscrews from the device, which is helpful because it is quite small. Hitoki recommends finely grinding your herbs, and to not overpack the chamber for even hits. It also suggests that you use the end of the included poker tool to pack your herbs flat for the laser to hit — but not too tight. This makes more sense once you use the bong, as the laser is, well, a laser, so the area that it combusts is relatively small.

Once the chamber is loaded you need to keep the Trident upright, which is pretty standard for a bong filled with water. Regardless, the laser shoots down from the top of the bong into the loading chambers, so if you tilt the bong too much it is possible for your cannabis to fall out and it will not be combusted. 

Smoking your buds 

One you figure out the Trident it's actually pretty simple to use. Just tap the button twice and the laser kicks on just a moment later. Other combustion methods like vaping via a heated chamber can be annoying because they take time to heat up, and a huge bonus from using a laser is that it is immediate. No more awkwardly waiting, the Trident immediately lets you pull smoke from the combustion chamber, into the water reservoir, and through the supplied hose.

And speaking of the hose, I absolutely hated it. It's long and awkward, which may be OK for passing it between friends, but ultimately it just got in the way. I found that the hose sometimes pinched where it connected to the bong if held at the wrong angle, creating a kink in the hose which restricted airflow. On more than one occasion the length of the hose caused me to nearly knock over the device. 

Hitoki does offer an alternative to the hose on its site in the form of an adjustable silicone mouthpiece for $29.99, but I personally wish it shipped standard with the bong instead of the hose. But while I hated the hose, the seal was tight which I really liked. If you're going to spend nearly $500 on a bong, spring for the additional mouthpiece. 

However, Hitoki is currently running a promotion, and the adjustable mouthpiece will ship standard with the device for the rest of April. 

The Hitoki Trident with the adjustable silicone mouthpiece.

The thing about smoking with a laser is how focused it is on the herb, but with a little bit of pulling it's easy to get the Trident to ignite your bud into an ember. I found it best to use the poker and move your bud around a bit to get the most out of your pack. It's easy enough to unlock it and move it around. I got an average of two to three solid hits per bowl, but that's going to depend on how hard you suck, what kind of herb you use, and for how long you're hitting. 

The taste and experience 

Again, I must reiterate that smoking weed with a laser beam is fucking awesome. It's just a neat experience, but what makes it better is that the hits you get are smooth, and the taste is great. Using a laser for combustion is obviously a relatively new experience for cannabis smokers, and I really can't wait to see how this sort of technology can change the industry. 

While some people are used to sucking in butane fumes with their lighters, or smoking with hemp wicks, it was a nice change to get clean combustion and just taste the cannabis. Hitoki likens this this to a magnifying glass. 

Smoking weed with a laser beam is fucking awesome. 

"The Trident works in a fashion akin to how using sunlight and a magnifying glass is used to burn flowers with a concentrated beam of light," its website reads. 

And surprisingly I found the Trident a bit easier to control the pull and hit. You can pop on the laser for just a second or two and slowly puff away once your weed is lit. Bongs can be a bit intimidating for some, and the Trident does not have a traditional carburetor that some bongs have, meaning you aren't going to get steamrolled with an unexpectedly huge hit. While it may seem intimidating, the Tran brothers said that they think the device could be used to destigmatize cannabis use. 

Best of all, the battery is pretty powerful. Charging any sort of device is a bummer, but Hitoki boasts 280+ uses "on a single charge." I was unable to drain the battery in the multiple times I used the Trident. As for the charging time, an hour and 45 minutes may seem like it's a bit long, but it's not so bad considering how many uses that delivers. 

How much is the Hitoki bong? Is it worth it?

Overall the Hitoki is an amazing device, but smoking with laser beams also comes at a high price. The Hitoki Trident currently is on sale for $424.99, but it's normal retail price is $499.99. If you're feeling extra fancy, there is also a 24k gold Trident for $649.99. 

But as I recall the warning labels and laser disclosure on the Hitoki website, do you really want to use a cheap laser?

Tech via Mashable! https://bit.ly/2KzLn52 April 20, 2021 at 06:22AM

[beardedtheoristpaper]

Top 10 Best YouTube to MP3 Converters 2020

In this article, you will get the Top 10 Best YouTube to MP3 Converters 2020 so stick to this article we will provide you all information. There are so many people who use to listen to music with youtube in the background and do work I am also like this. Most of the time I listen to the Ted Talks, podcasts or interviews. This is the best way for me to listen to the audio and get knowledge or enjoy the music. In most cases, I listened to Talks, podcasts or interviews from my mobile phone by downloading the audio of the video in mp3 format and I can listen to it whenever I want to and enjoy it. which exactly is the best method to do this? You can do it by downloading the video from youtube then exact the audio file in an editing software like Adobe Premier or iMove.But it takes so much time and you have to install the software. You can do download the audio from youtube by the online tool which is so much easy to do. Let's save time and start so here is my top 10 Best YouTube to MP3 Converters 2020. Disclaimer: Before you use this 3rd party website to download make sure that that you have permission from the copyright owner of the content. Read YouTube’s terms of service, downloading videos without permission is explicitly prohibited. The article is only for information purposes only.

Top 10 Best YouTube To MP3 Converters

1. Free YouTube to MP3 Converter

In the name of this is Free is having so it is free to use to download the audio of the youtube videos. This converter has the feature to add the multiple files to it for conversion, which has to be untouched until it’s finished. The website or converter has the best option to download or convert entire channels from YouTube that what you are looking for but this may be so much time-consuming depending on the number of videos you download. The interface is Well-designed  Support Batch conversions Supports almost all the audio/video formats This is the best Free YouTube to MP3 Converter that why it is in the first in this article. Pros You have to do a little amount of click and your work will start to downloading with this converter. The speed of downloading is so much speed depending upon your internet connection and the bulk downloads. Cons The cons and the fault about this software are not they're but according to me, the cons could be the design of the software interface which is outdated but still very functional. This is the best audio software to download. 2. Converto

Converto is the software which is a free web-based video/audio converter requiring no special software for its execution. The convert webpage is designed so much simple. You have pasted the URL of the youtube video and you start to download the audio from Youtube video you can also select the format and quality. So if you want to be a  good online YouTube MP3 downloader this is the best option. Pros The cover is the good old YouTube to MP3 conversion and the design of the converter is so much easy to use and they don't tell you to fill up the webpage. The design of this is highly aesthetic. Cons The feature of this is limited to use to simple conversion. The more is the download link remains valid for 24 hours only. 3. Y2Mate

This is the best web-based video/MP3 converter. This works only for youtube to convert. The working of this is so much simple to use, First past the URL or the couple keywords, Then the video comes you have to select what you want to download and That's it the video audio will be download. The orange button is for the audio to download and the green is for youtube videos download. All Audio formats which are popular are supported The website all browser support Don't need to register in this Pros The download of the video or audio is free and this website doesn't take registration which is good part of this. When you have downloaded your Video or audio at that time you also can the finished product to DropBox or Google Drive, instantly making it accessible to all your devices. Cons The Y2 converter only works with youtube and it does not work with other video sharing websites like Vimeo or Dailymotion. The website is not working properly with the android this the worst drawback of this. 4. Online Video Converter

The website based converter makes in this list because it is so much easy to use and we don't have to download the software addition to download with the best YouTube to MP3 converters. The interface of this website so much simple. This website is the best all-round solution for all sorts of video/MP3 conversions and isn’t just limited to YouTube. No registration in this required. No limitation to download downloads of any software not required Pros This is the converter that works with all the browsers which are the latest. The downloading speed is also so much fast according to your internet speed. The Website has the feature to select the audio and video formats for yourself. This has the ability to download from so many dozen other video sharing websites. This is the best converter for those who download from so many other platforms. Cons The huge drawback is that this works with the android but sorry for the ios uses because it doesn't work due to the software limitations on the default web browser. 5. Convert2MP3

Convert2MP3 is working with video sites like YouTube, Dailymotion, and Clipfishallow you to download or convert videos to MP3  with so many easy steps. This site has also no registration in it which is good. The conversation of the videos all depends on almost the size of the video and the total traffic of the website. You have to only past the link directly or enter keywords and select for the video Support to download the audio and can download the Video also Pros The policy is the number one thing for you and this does not take any registration. The website offers you to customizability, such as so many poping ads to display on the desktop. It also set up the thumbnail as MP3’s cover. Cons The feature is less but this is the best in the list of the best YouTube to MP3 converters. The only thing you hate is when you click on the top download button it will open advertisement in a new tab. 6. YTD Video Downloader

This is YTD Video Downloader which provides to convert videos from almost all the media-sharing websites which are best for us the website such as Facebook, Dailymotion, and of course YouTube.The conversion can be doe in all the format which wee have to convert.The feature of this are: Allow to use converter and a player The latest version is much more best and stable than previous releases allow you to resume the download Pros The program came with so many features like you can edit in the last minutes of download this is done by the batch processing tools. The user experience of this so much good and you can get your download in less click and not take so much time. Cons The cheap feature which is not there in this is the batch converter doesn’t support batch downloads. In the free version, you cant do a batch download or convert but with the purchase, you can do. The most top issue is that the download speeds have a tendency to drop from time to time. 7. aTube Catcher

aTube Catcher is on my list because it is the only tool that provides truly a lifesaver with all-round features and functionality. The installation process of this so much speed and the interface of this solid. Some of you may think this is outdated but It converts YouTube videos to MP3. It converts in the batch simply put all the links it will start to do. The most beast feature are: Supports almost all the best video formats Copy and paste interface Allow Batch convert Pros The batch feature of this is the best feature for the people who are looking for Best YouTube to MP3 Converters. Most of the Tools charge for the batch but it doesn't. The converter has so many addition features as it comes such as a screen recorder, DVD creator and an audio recorder. Cons The converter only work with the youtube and with the other media sharing it doenot work. 8. YoutubeMP3

The best Converter in my list best YouTube to MP3 converters is the best YouTube to MP3 converters. This website is a one-page website and the interface of this is so much easy to understand and to be used. With this, you can play the output format and volume control to make sure the final file is of your liking. and also you can select the quality of the Mp3 file. Provide all features on a single webpage Supports the best feature with is audio and video outputs Conversion depends totally on the website traffic Pros This is the best for the people who are looking for the work should be done with less time so this is the best for those people. The website provides you to convert YouTube videos to MP3/MP4, Which is so much the best part of this. Cons It has the Advertisements feature in this which may open up in a new tab when you click on the webpage or on the Convert button. 9. Any Video Converter

The name of this Any Video Converter tells that it will convert any video from social media but the URL of Video which is best. You can do with this is You can get your hands on extra features such as DRM protection removal you purchase then it is so much best for you to use this. In addition, you can check my Top 5 Best Lighting Equipment For YouTube Videos And TikTok Videos. allow Batch conversion free to use for everyone Best interface Pros It will save so much space of this computer because it is software and you can download this by any browser you are using and convert the YouTuber video. You can do add watermark, crop the video and apply filters to the videos before you are started to convert. The software has the feature to supports almost all media-sharing websites on top of YouTube. Cons The software comes with so much of installation that will make it all the way to your PC if you’re not careful. 10. Free YouTube Download

This software is best and it has made for an uncluttered manner to download & convert YouTube videos. The feature of software are: The Design of this is excellent Has the feature to pick the user to format & quality It can be download so many at a time. Pros The application has the feature to play means you can take a variety of formats and qualities. You can add you to many multimedia to download at a time and can save the videos and audio. Cons The worst feature is in this that why it is in last because You can’t download videos with durations for more than three minutes. If you need to download more than 3 minutes then you have to purchase the application or software. And you can not save the videos other than youtube.

How To Download YouTube Videos To MP3

When you have to convert YouTube videos to MP3’s it is so much simple to do. All you need to do is, first you have select the video from which you want to convert then copy the URL. When you get the URL you directly have to paste in the Youtube converter and that's it converting start. When you are converting on the website simply you have to open your browser and search for the converter and paste the youtube video link and start the converting and most likely get several options on the type of output audio file that you like. Once you have done all simply click on download! It is so much simple are you think. The downloading speed mater on your internet speed can be up and down according to the traffic of the website if you are downloading on the website.

Conclusion

  Hopefully, you get the tool that you need and thanks for reading our article if you like to read then please do comment which your words. You can also use these downloader YouTube videos in other ways as you want to use. Take advantage of this tool and use this to take the best output of this. Hopefully, this article has been helpful for you. You can read our articles which is so many useful resources: What camera do YouTubers use in 2020 Top 5 Best Vlogging Tripods For YouTube Creators 2020 How Much Does PewDiePie Make? Full YouTube Earnings Report! Read the full article

[troublechild-atlantica-blog]

☼ Audition Headcannons ☼

IC Questions

What is their wand made of and why? “Dogwood wands are quirky and mischievous; they have playful natures and insist upon partners who can provide them with scope for excitement and fun.” Arista’s wand has just as strong a personality as she does. Made of dogwood with a phoenix feather core, Arista’s wand physical needs adventure and life in order to function properly. Nevertheless, despite the wand’s element of fun, it also access to a deep pool of power and potential— a fact that Arista needs to learn accept within herself.

What is their patronus? “The Fox Terrier - Bold, spunky, alert, and fearless by nature, those behind a Fox Terrier Patronus are also physically resilient and mentally strong. They are open communicators with leadership qualities that unfortunately get overlooked as their impulsivity and playful demeanor tend to make others underestimate them. Owners of this patronus tend to be blunt and prefer to say whats on their mind instead of worrying about proper rules.”

What does their boggart look like? Arista’s boggart takes the form of a nightmare whom she calls Shadow. This figure is tall, slender, and fashioned of pitch black darkness; save for the eyes which are shining orbs of white light. Shadow first came about following the consequences after getting caught shoplifting and is the embodiment of Arista’s anger, loneliness, self-hate, and the unmoving mountain of disappointment her father feels towards her. He frequents her nightmares on her low days as a reminder of her prison of shame that her father has placed her in.

What would they see in the mirror of Erised? The mirror shows a tall, bright room filled to the brim of art and music; all creations of Arista. At first Arista stands alone in the room, breathing in the pure happiness, bliss, and the success of her passion. And then, in the midst of her self admiration, her father appears. He walks up to her, smiles softly, and places his strong hands on her shoulders before saying, “I’m proud of you.”

PARA Sample

“Arista, you always do this! It’s my stuff!”

“Would you just like, chill out for a sec Aquata!”

“Is that my brush!?”

“I was gonna talk to you about that…”

“And my lucky bracelet?!”

“It’s not very lucky.”

Sister bickering matches were not exactly foreign in the Atlantica household�� especially when Arista was involved. In this case, the blonde’s ‘borrowing’ of her sister’s things was getting just a tad bit out of hand. “Arista its not that hard, just use your own stuff! It’s not my fault dad barely lets you near the mall anymore.” Arista frowned and balled her fists.

But it was true. After the shoplifting incident, Arista’s father rarely lets her go shopping unsupervised anymore, and when he does, he makes sure there are receipts to validate that the items were purchased legally. Arista criticizes herself almost everyday because of her actions that afternoon. Sure, she had shoplifted before without a problem, but they were always small things— a new shade of lipstick, a bra, a CD… but she got cocky. One summer day, the item that sealed Arista’s fate was rather expensive… a diamond studded seashell necklace lined with gold. In the end, Arista was just being reckless and greedy… but the real reason she stole the pricey jewelry was because it reminded her of her mom. Of course Arista never told anyone that, not even her sisters; and after her father learned about her thieving history, she was certain his knowledge of that information would only make things worse.

Now fuming and staring down her sister, Arista’s lips parted to fire back some stinging words of her own before another voice forced her to halt. “What is the purpose of all this yelling?” The blonde immediately backed down and turned to face her father. “Nothing,” she mumbled out quickly before folding her arms. But the damage was done. Her father had eyed up Aquata taking back her things before anyone could think of a smart way to react. His eyes swiftly fell onto Arista and they were not filled with kindness. His voice raised, “Again Arista? Tell me, is it that you never learn or are you deliberately being defiant towards me.” The blonde’s eyes fell to the ground. She had been trying so damn hard to fix her mistakes and impress her father but the universe seemed to be against her. She balled her fists again, trying to suppress her anger and frustration, “No! No dad I wasn’t doing anything I swear! I ju— we’re sisters its what we do, no one meant any harm we—“ but he cut her off. “That doesn’t matter Arista! This behavior from you needs to stop,” he sighed, “I thought I raised you better. And somehow you still wonder why I refused to allow your studying in Italy.” With one final stern look, her father exited and left Arista utterly crushed.

For a few long moments, the room was filled with silence. Arista could hear Aquata moving towards her but stormed out of the room before she could offer any useless words. After running to her bedroom and slamming the door, Arista had to let her anger out. She started kicking scattered shoes and throwing random pillows and accessories all until she eyed the work on her easel. Sitting proudly on the mount was Arista’s latest art project, a portrait of her father as a gift for his upcoming birthday. Giving in to her impulsive nature, the blonde yanked the nearly finished artwork from the easel before tearing it in half right down the middle. Tears welling in her eyes, she watched the agonizing scene of the painted paper slowly fluttering to the ground… and the second the pieces of portrait hit the hardwood floor, Arista broke down and crawled back into her shell of self despair.

[myrah519gaming-blog]

How to get free imvu credits 2016 test today

Look At Attempt Out Look At Our Games Imvu Credits Generator (1

IMVUMoreCredits is the first app that really functions! Too pricey! Great stuff by no means final. It used to grow to be more entertaining and a lot more joyful to play on IMVU. It isn't like this any much more. IMVU CEO's gone towards the classical cash whores journey and… it may be improved for them, but it is unquestionably worst for all of us. Ironically, the IMVU credit generatormay really be a extremely vital issue to occur to eickenbusch.info imvu credits generator given that their decision to kill the reseller system.

IMVU credits generator shopping is an crucial element of the exciting game IMVU. The index is packed with thrilling articles with objects what can be obtained to make the game customized according to the player and will be enjoyed with lot quite a few luxuries. This not only tends to make the game desirable but also advantages with producing greater levels of sport with competing with additional persons all over the planet. So that competition is further thrilling and thrilling with the appear that individual need to cash.

For Small Organization Saturday, creators of all popularity and results levels were encouraged to put collectively individual public chat rooms (or group up with other individuals) to highlight some of their items and attract new customers. This event is anything the IMVU group takes extremely seriously, and it is the second year this occasion has been held.

five) The moderators. Not only do they fabricate lies about your record to make an excuse to throw away the small spenders and new comers as they attempted to me and just use Google you can see I'm definitely not the only one, but they allow individuals to use it as a hackers paradise while they will ban a person stating they are allegedly employing stolen software program or not authenticated apps. I do not hate hackers. God knows I hold some Anons at the ready on Facebook for information and facts however I do not like troll hacking. It's exactly where you go in, talk s@#$ to a individual to get them to talk s@#$ back and then use that as an excuse to hack that particular person when they are defending them selves. True bully tactics. In the actual planet most people shun this behavior but IMVU rewards it. Tends to make sense considering IMVU has a reputation them selves for slipping in Trojans to those searching for a excellent deal in their offerings.

Credit is the virtual currency playing an critical function in the more quickly progression and getting awesome dresses. If you don't want to finish up finding into an situation and want to progress more rapidly, then making use of IMVU hack can assist here. It is hugely reliable, and most of the gamers favor it to obtain unlimited credit. Do you want it also? Nicely, there is no want of worrying about a single point.

The bottom line: IMVU may be advertised as just a further entertaining location for teens to interact and have entertaining, but it is loaded with sexual innuendo that might be inappropriate for several kids who are technically old sufficient to get an account. Always be intimately familiar with your child's on the web gaming and social networking habits. If you are not comfy, talk about it. Some kids could not be mature enough for the form of content sites like IMVU are supplying.

The premium membership I IMVU allows members to love limitless delivery of credits to the gamers but requires a lot of personal info of the players. The personal info of the player incorporates name, the address of the residence, bank account, other info and so on. Bank account and other information are needed for the monetary transactions and this is fearsome for the parents of the players. As most of the gamers are kids or teens their economic transactions are handled by their parents.

This game is basically a representation of how a $#!ty game need to be. At very first when I played this game i believed it was pretty cool becaue it had cute clothes and so on and they give at least 4000 free of charge credits, but the moment you run out of credits and try to earn additional it is a massive discomfort in the ass, they make you do a million surveys for practically 40 mins just to give you 10 credits when it says your supposed to get 1000. And dont even get me started on how weird and rude the men and women are on this game, your just gonna have to play it for oneself since I am not about create about that $#!. And the graphics are trash, the maps are ugly and its just a retarted game overall.

The globe of IMVU lets its users create a hopeful zone of their personal in the astonishing world of on-line gaming, where every thing is feasible and 1 can exhibit their skills of creativity and imaginative side completely. The principal idea of emerging this whole game was to let the kids and teens learn far more with their buddies in a thrilling atmosphere though constructing hugely sophisticated buildings, and defending their personal customized planet from the invaders. With the use of IMVU hack, the user will have a plentiful amount of IMVU credits in their pockets, hence they will be in a position to develop the space quickly and can also experience extremely bountiful and lavish buildings, and fulfilling the standard intention of the game. With no the continuous availability of the totally free credits, 1 can not have this ultimate feeling of enjoyment.

Here\'s A Quick Way To Answer A Catch with IMVU CREDITS

The globe of IMVU is a massive world that will attempt to simulate actual life. Alternatively if obtaining money, in IMVU you have credits. Why it is significant to get credits? As in actual life if you have credits in IMVU you can become a renowned individual. When it comes to the planet of virtual world game titles, it is vital to actually have the possibility to fulfil our requires and desires that individuals can not fulfil in true each day life. Obtaining totally free easy credits, it is the most valuable property to fulfil our inner requirements. It is important to have no cost credits in IMVU considering the fact that it helps you balance your day-to-day life. If you cannot be who you want to be in actual life, at least be famous in IMVU.

When come to use such the free of charge iMVU credits for the duration of the play of the fantasy games which is a lot more easy use and quite accessibility. Right here every point has wonderful out the hack tool. This tool can quite effortless and uncomplicated to accesses and it supports world wide web connection more than the Pc and yet another mobile device. Then it performs properly on your device in each case. It designed with the user-friendly interface so you can really feel free to set up and commence finely working with this hack.

The greatest and only property that tends to make a hacking system dependable is its capacity to deliver long-term accuracy. That is achievable by way of the limitations of free imvu credits you can generate each and every day per consideration. That is Ideal! In order to have an effective imvu credits cheat we require to have a every day limit of totally free credits you can generate. Hardly any comparable hack tools are created working with this idea and for this reason they fail the test of time.

IMVU users are 13 years old and up and the majority of customers are 18+ with the sweet spot at 22 years and female. Peak concurrency is 150K users in a 24 hour period. IMVU has reached 50 million registered customers, ten+ million special guests per month and a $40+ million annualized revenue run price. IMVU has the world's largest virtual goods catalog of additional than six million things, just about all of which are made by its own members who contribute more than 7,000 new things to our catalog every single day.

A passionate admirer of this enthralling gaming cosmos of IMVU can simply comprehend the desperate requirement of generating moves in the game. A accurate follower of this game would just like to move on and play, creating highest scores, earning lots and lots of income and steadily moving from a single level to yet another. Any one who will be indulged in the on line gaming ought to be aware of the hurdles and will certainly e hating it or the obstacles coming in between of the results in the game for moving ahead with the higher levels and greater scores. The miraculous powers of the IMVU hack overcome these obstacles and modify the whole scene. With the assistance of the Hacking tools 1 can freely love the game and is totally free from any sort of delays, hurdles and the credits of IMVU will be accessible in ample amount to the user as per the specifications.

Most person clothes and furniture products cost under 1,000 credits, with 5,000 credits becoming available to purchase outright for $five. Much more high priced items could possibly contain bundles of a number of items for one's closet or area, or especially impressive products, comprehensive with animation and the like. When more affordable things may well not result in a massive profit for the creator every time the item is sold, results in IMVU is a marathon, not a sprint.