ashlingiswriting - Tumblr blog

[ashlingiswriting]

the nations favorite writer - offer us any advice? going through a writers block rn

oh god i’m so sorry this took me so long, things got crazy for a second and i forgot 😭 thoughts below!

here (1, 2) are a couple posts that seem pretty helpful, but now i’m just gonna talk about what helped me with my last bout of writer’s block because i can still remember it in detail

again this is all just my own observations about myself because that’s kinda all i have—i’m no expert

i had too many other things going on and i did need to cut down on other hobbies a bit (in this case, i had to cut down on rp) because those other things all were...relatively small tasks and they took less time, so my brain would often go “hey what about this short and rewarding task vs this long and intimidating task?”

which goes hand in hand with training your focus—i think my phone really does impact that in a bad way. reading books helps with training focus, as does muscling through. i know muscling through goes contrary to a lot of advice, but it helped me. because a lot of times, i would start writing a scene and go, ‘wow, i hate this!’ but knowing that i didn’t have another idea of what to do, i just kept going until i realized why it felt wrong. and there were like...four or five different breakthroughs like that when i was writing my latest chapter. just ‘OHHHHHHHHH’ moments that i got to only after writing like a thousand or more words that i would not end up putting in the fic. it is NOT always like this but if you’re really blocked, sometimes it’s just cause you’re writing a genuinely emotionally complicated and crucial bit and your brain has to go down the wrong path a few times before it figures out the right one

part of that is figuring out what you feel about your current scene? like, sitting down and writing a certain scene, i would go, ‘no, this feels wrong, i don’t like it, i hate it’ and sure enough my instincts were right. it WAS bad. it was bad because it focused too much on the logistics and details of a side plot when i didn’t want to waste all that precious real estate and audience attention on something that was not connected to the core of my story. but i didn’t fully realize that till i was done. it was still good that i’d written out the long version, because it laid out all the information i needed (plus a bunch i didn’t, but still). idk. i love editing more than writing on a blank page. i love cutting more than i love creating. this may be a me thing.

could also be something went wrong earlier on, like your actual scene idea is quite good but you didn’t lay enough emotional or plot foundation for it to hit as hard as you want it to? reread your previous bits of fic and see if you can find the problem there?

i think peer pressure and/or friendship are huge for this—i don’t mean peer pressure as in ‘silly anti-drug advertisements where all the cool kids try to make you do weed’ i mean ‘hanging out in a community of writers & artists and/or with friends where there’s an atmosphere of people lowkey always working on their craft, whatever that may be’. because truly i think it helps keep writing top of mind & sort of normalizes the emotional struggles. plus the camaraderie is really nice! 

my current home of choice is the narcos fandom discord (which is only about 25% about narcos fandom at this point lbr) but i know there’s a ton of different places out there to be a fic writer in community with other fic writers, so take your pick. i will say that not every community is perfect and i think the ideal community strikes a balance between participation & low stress—that is, people support each other but they don’t feel like they have homework-reading they have to do that they’ll get penalized for not doing? yk? i’m rambling whoops

plus, getting a friend that is willing and HAPPY to talk through the fic with you—an editor, a beta reader, something like that—is a godsend. truly without bellinitini/narcolini i would literally not have even published chapter one of my current longfic. but the key is to find someone who genuinely is interested or who is willing to do a bit of a swap; you help them with theirs, they help you with yours.

and then there’s the audience for longfics, which may or may not apply to you. cannot lie, rereading comments, even for previous fics that are unconnected, is extremely motivating! maybe that’s just me! (i don’t think that’s just me) on that note, if you’re feeling real desperate you can always reblog ask games about your WIPs so that you can interact with your audience a bit?

you could always try to take in more art—that’s usually pretty refreshing for me. canon review is great, but taking in other stuff (fictional books especially) can make your brain start thinking in different ways, especially if your brain is a bit spongy like mine and tends to absorb little bits of other writer’s styles if you chug a lot of them. you could try to find books that deal with the same setting, the same themes, or the same relationship dynamics.

so for example, i read colorless tsukuru tazaki and his years of pilgrimage by haruki murakami in prepping for my next chapter of richiefic because richie references it in season 2. and genuinely, reading it made me understand his character a bit better. but i also have a character going to prison, so i have read some of the works of george pelecanos (the novel drama city and several short stories), because pelecanos deals with the justice system in a way that i think is admirably clearsighted, not melodramatic, very honest. i’m fixing to reread some of the parade’s end series because ford madox ford is, to me, one of the greatest of all time when it comes to complicated conversations where two characters are completely legible to the audience—completely understandable—while struggling through emotionally complicated conversations with each other. and i am about to try and get some more books set in women’s prisons + books set in modern day chicago. reading stuff with the context of “i’m about to write something related to this” is such a good way to read stuff, too. just feels really good and sometimes you need a positive feeling when you’re struggling through the depths of depair i mean writer’s block.

movies and tv are good too, though imo they’re not as helpful. i...personally avoid reading other people’s fanfic like the plague if they’re dealing with a specific pairing whose longfic i’m struggling to finish.

just putting it down and coming back in two-three weeks sometimes helps. couldn’t tell you why.

and finally. you could always drop the fic. it feels shitty for a while, but if the muse has genuinely left you for good, you deserve to enjoy the freedom instead of just like...struggling onwards indefinitely. this has happened to me with longfics before and it always makes me sad. but sometimes there is genuinely nothing you can do, and in those cases, forgive yourself <3 this is a hobby, after all

my top three recommended tactics, without knowing details of your situation, are: talk with a friend/editor, take in more art, muscle through. in that order.

i hope that helped??? i’m very sorry about your writer’s block, it’s the worst thing in the world. and i’m sorry that it took me so long, i need to be more organized

[ashlingiswriting]

i had to block a new follow just now and i realized...maybe i need to fire a pre-emptive warning shot? so let me be real clear.

i'm bisexual. and if you have a problem with gay shit you have a problem with me.

it is so stupid to me that i would have to write this on TUMBLR in 2024. tumblr!!! but anyways! if you hate gay fic then just don't follow me, it's that simple!

(@ the anon who asked about writer's block, sorry I haven't responded yet, that ask is gonna take me sitting down at a laptop for a solid 15-20 minutes and double checking my notes to make sure I haven't forgotten anything lol & i drove 4 hours yesterday and i'm about to drive 4 hours again today so my brain's kinda dead)

[ashlingiswriting]

Idk if you’ve ever seen mayans or sons of anarchy but those are my two favs rn i feel like you’d do really well with the source material + characters but all the fandoms you write for already both here and on ao3 are already so chefs kiss. have a good day!!!

I don't plan on watching those shows (although shoutout to Clayton Cardenas for...everything...) but thank you! 💛

[ashlingiswriting]

I just read chapter 9 and as always I’m obsessed!! There relationship is so complex and I’m so curious how Richie reacts long term to her confession at the end (which is so insane you are so smart for thinking of that). But on a side note I’m headcanoning that once she starts getting media all the people at beef find out and are actually lowkey impressed.

Thank you so much! 🥹

I...have many thoughts but I can't share them without spoiling. So I will simply say now that I think it's cool you have headcanons for the fic! 💛

[ashlingiswriting]

I love your writing and please don’t take this as a demand or anything but I was just wondering if you were interested in writing for more fandoms than the ones you’ve previously done?

Hello anonymous friend! I have written for a variety of other fandoms other than The Bear and Narcos, I've just put them all on AO3 instead of tumblr. List below the cut, with links. The length, quality, and tone varies wildly—I've been publishing there since 2018, so. You know. 😂

I don't currently have plans to write for any new fandoms, but you never know, especially with the Fandom Trumps Hate charity fundraiser coming up soon. And I usually participate in the Yuletide winter fanfic exchange, so fic for some obscure fandom may well come out of that.

Is there a specific fandom you had in mind? I'm curious! 💛

These are the fandoms I've written or created 2+ things for on AO3. I couldn't list everything. My AO3 profile is here. 💛

Peaky Blinders (TV) (42)

Chronicles of Narnia - C. S. Lewis (25)

Original Work (18)

Game of Thrones (TV) (16)

Narcos (TV) (13)

Narcos: Mexico (TV) (13)

Dublin Murder Squad Series - Tana French (10)

Venom (Marvel Movies) (8)

Marvel Cinematic Universe (7)

Avatar: The Last Airbender (5)

Daredevil (TV) (4)

Emily of New Moon - L. M. Montgomery (4)

Dublin Murders (TV) (4)

To All the Boys I've Loved Before (Movies) (4)

Love/Hate (TV) (4)

The Bear (TV 2022) (4)

Sam Wyndham Series - Abir Mukherjee (4)

Fast & Furious (Movies) (3)

Crazy Rich Asians (2018) (3)

Anne of Green Gables - L. M. Montgomery (3)

John Wick (Movies) (3)

Brooklyn Nine-Nine (TV) (3)

Taskmaster (UK TV) RPF (3)

The Godfather (1972 1974 1990) (3)

Parade's End - All Media Types (3)

Blue Castle - L. M. Montgomery (3)

Letterkenny (TV) (3)

A Little Princess - Frances Hodgson Burnett (2)

Shadow and Bone (TV) (2)

Black Panther (Marvel Movies) (2)

Actor RPF (2)

The Man From U.N.C.L.E. (2015) (2)

Six of Crows Series - Leigh Bardugo (2)

Never Have I Ever (TV) (2)

La Reina del Sur (TV) (2)

X-Men (Alternate Timeline Movies) (2)

Parks and Recreation (TV) (2)

Something New (2006) (2)

Spider-Man (Tom Holland Movies) (2)

Wonder Woman (Movies - Jenkins) (2)

Chronicles of Narnia - All Media Types (2)

Godless (TV 2017) (2)

The Defenders (Marvel TV) (2)

The Crown (TV) (2)

Queen of the South (TV) (2)

Sherlock (TV) (2)

Rebellion (TV) (2)

Ted Lasso (TV) (2)

The Far Pavilions - M. M. Kaye (2)

Set It Up (2018) (2)

[ashlingiswriting]

Tina Marrero & Richie Jerimovich

[ashlingiswriting]

chp9 was so scream worthy, I might have gawked a little (a lot) the mikey flashback + confession to richie at the end and the fire motifs throughout?? your mind is so gorgeous I wanna read it all and therefore commentary if you may!!

“you’re mikey” all the way up to “that just makes it his pyre, but he’ll never see it.”

aaaaaaaaah thank u so much @justficsandstuff! i’m beyond thrilled that you caught the fire motif & honestly so thrilled that you’re still reading at all!

commentary below

x

you're mikey.

fuck you.  

so fucking selfish, he says bitterly. it’s as close to hate as you’ve ever heard from him. but you’ve gone so far, you’re not stopping now.

richie, what the fuck do you want from me?

you know what i want! his voice goes quiet when he adds, did really you think there’s anything that could keep me away from you for five fucking years?

you know what he means.

can’t put words to it, can’t accept it, can’t fucking bear it—won’t—but you do know, you know exactly what he’s trying to say to you, what he’s trying to give.

you don’t deserve it, but it’s not for you anyways, it's for michael. it's all for michael, and it would be beautiful if it wasn't such a fucking waste to love a man when he's dead. richie’s gonna throw everything he has onto the fire in the hope that it will quench the flames. that just makes it his pyre, but he’ll never see it.

i don’t want to ruin it by overanalyzing, but. some thoughts. (proceeds to overanalyze)

↠ we’re reaching a point in this fic where you could play a where’s waldo type of game, but instead of looking for waldo, you’re looking for times that richie or julie say i love you to each other without actually saying those words. this is one of those times.

↠ mikey’s emotional presence is heavy in this scene. sometimes he’s present in ways that are sometimes totally natural and inescapable for richie and julie, but sometimes they manipulate or narrativize his presence for their own reasons, probably without even realizing it. julie can’t deal with love, so she decides it must all just be for mikey. richie can’t deal with the resentment and grief he still feels about mikey’s suicide, so he puts it off on other people, including julie at times. to be fair to him, she is pretty directly paralleling mikey, so he has some cause.

↠ this is the moment julie decides to go nuclear. she doesn’t want to, but once she processes did really you think there’s anything that could keep me away from you for five fucking years? she knows it will take everything she’s got—cruelty, lies, the whole shebang—to get him away from her. it’s a panic/survival response that she’s not 100% conscious of.

[ashlingiswriting]

do i know you? chapter nine

gifsource

[ chapter nine — 8.5k words ] [ masterlist ] [ prev chapters: one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight ] "i never fucking asked you to!" richie jerimovich x reader, past mikey berzatto x reader, slow burn

just outside your apartment building stands mikey, hunched against the wind and smoking. he gives you a friendly nod and you grant him a nod in response, guarded but polite.

you never know what you’ll get with this guy. he alternates between foul moods that verge on frightening and a brilliant good temper that tempts you to shine your phone in his eyes to see the confirmation of pinprick pupils. he has moderate nights, but they’re becoming rarer and rarer. 

still, his company beats the emptiness of your apartment. like a creature taken to a faraway zoo, you haven’t acclimated to your new environment in chicago, haven’t learned how to take this much loneliness; that’ll come later.

for now, you’re still standing on your separate little patches of sidewalk, familiar strangers engaged in tacit truce, when it comes flying out of nowhere.

fuck. 

mikey snarls it so savagely that you look over for threat assessment, just quick enough to catch him looking up at the pitiless hard sky, profile: once-broken nose, twisted mouth, adam’s apple. wild gleam of desperate dark eye, more startling than the snarl. sudden rage from a man is no surprise, but this one looks worse. this one looks caged. 

you can sympathize with that.

what? you say gruffly. 

his eyes shutter, his jaw pulses. nothing.

you shrug, turn away. resume the truce. 

in your peripheral, you can see him looking down and firing off a text. and you think that’s it, that’s all, but then he turns to you and says, you’re good at getting people to fuck off, yeah?

his voice is the voice of a friend, low and familiar, warm and a touch wry. his dark eyes the same. you’re looking at each other directly and it feels like a touch. 

a laugh startles out of you. you’ve been pretty direct about rejecting his attempts at conversation, belligerent, sweet, or otherwise. but here he goes again, trying, and you’re tempted.

mikey turns so he’s facing you, chucks his cigarette, and sticks his hands in the kangaroo pocket of his big gray hoodie. for some reason, that does it.

yeah, you say, i’m a world-class expert at getting people to fuck off. they should be giving me tenure, the way i could teach that shit.

then you’re the one i wanna talk to. 

you’ve got nobody else in this godforsaken city except patients and threats, and so it’s probably a side effect of loneliness, nothing to do with the man himself, but still: it feels good that somebody wants to talk to you.

you hesitate, fighting it. he exhales. 

who’s after you? you say. debt collector? ex?

my brother, actually. there’s an odd space, flicker grimace, between brother and actually. he’s not proud of this. again, you can sympathize.

why do you want your brother to fuck off?

he says nothing, rubs his shoe against a lump of hardened gum on the asphalt. ‘s complicated.

with that, your sympathy—never in abundant supply to begin with—goes down the drain. if he’s gonna play the whiny teenager, making you beg him for his deep dark secrets, fuck it. compassion isn’t your style anyway.

okay, you say flatly. you turn towards the street, keeping him in your periphery just in case. the silence grows heavy, but you ignore it. 

fuck it, he mutters. then, louder, it’s not that complicated. carmy’s the baby, and ma was always telling us to keep him out of trouble. i guess it stuck.

that’s such an innocuous way to put it, pulled from childhood. what about the rage from earlier, his trapped eyes? sense tells you to end things here. don’t be a trash bag for this man’s problems, whatever they are.

the thing is, though. it does feel good to have somebody talk to you like you’re a person. 

what’s the trouble? you say.

he sighs, settles in. you ever seen a house on fire? 

no, i’ve seen a helicopter on fire, but that’s…you look over at him, and you can tell it’s not the flames he’s talking about. no. you?

sort of. he pauses, and the silence is full enough that you know to wait for the coming story. so when i was little, i used to sneak down to the basement, right? i was supposed to be babysitting carmy and sugar, putting them to bed and all that good shit, but some nights i’d get bored. and they never got in much trouble without me.

they must’ve been pretty well-behaved kids, you say.

he laughs. he’s beautiful when he laughs, you can’t help but see it. not exactly.

i’m just saying, if my brother told me to stay anywhere, i would’ve been out the window by the time he’d gotten down the stairs. 

mikey gestures with his cigarette at exactly the wrong moment, and the wind snuffs out his cigarette, but he’s so caught up in his story, he doesn’t even notice.

nah, i knew how to play it. sugar was going through this phase where she was fixated on us taking her seriously, so she loved the responsibility. and what was carmy gonna do about it? he was like five. he smiles, remembering. so anyway, before i would go down there, i’d put on my little light up sneakers, cause the stairs to the basement were dark and scary. 

you find yourself smiling too. you can picture it. 

and my mom would be down there in the dark, watching the tv, sitting in my dad’s old chair. she was usually drunk or sleeping, but sometimes i think she noticed i was there with her and she was okay with it. or, i don’t know. he laughs, short and sharp. she definitely never changed the channel on account of me. i saw all kinds of crazy shit on tv before i was twelve. 

mikey pauses, then looks to you. what the fuck am i even talking about? there’s no real embarrassment in it, only appealing self-deprecation.

it works on you. you do want to know where this is going. house fire.

house fire, he echoes, pointing at you. okay, so one time i’m sitting on the floor next to dad’s chair, leaning on it, and i fall asleep. i wake up to this woman screaming. at first i think it’s real, but then i realize it’s from the tv, right? there’s a house on fire. the whole neighborhood is standing there watching, and there’s this old woman screaming, but they don’t look sorry for her. and after a second i figure out what she’s saying. she’s screaming at the firefighters to go in. and i didn’t get it, like, why is no one listening to her?

it scared him, you think. it must have. someone was in there?

i don’t know, i never found out, mikey says. mom woke up, and she saw that i was freaked out, so she got super fuckin angry and, uh. made me go to bed and all that. standing there and holding a cold cigarette, he looks tired. but when i was walking to the stairs, the woman stopped screaming. so i looked back and i saw on the tv that the house was gone. the whole thing collapsed. the roof must’ve caved in.

the silence lingers, then mikey looks across at you like a question. why should it matter whether you understand? why should you care? but your heart is in your throat.

it was right for the firefighters to stay outside, because if they’d gone in, they would have died. the roof was always going to crumble. whatever was inside the house, it was already gone.

you think you understand. so you’re inside the house. 

nah, mikey says, i’m the house. 

.

.

.

in the aftermath of christmas eve—gold chain, two generations, soup—christmas itself passes quietly without hurting much. 

save for a handful of texts, completely unexpected. 

> what’s the fastest way to infect people with food poisoning?

richie, of course. you don’t even bother to play coy by letting a few minutes elapse, like you had something better to do. he wouldn’t be fooled by that. he already knows better.

> it’s that bad?

> not fatal food poisoning, just the regular kind.

> it’s that bad? x2

> i think if we all threw up a lot we’d be having more fun.

> you want me to fake an emergency? pull a fire alarm, stage a bomb threat? i’ll drive the getaway car.

> your mind jumps to terrorism way too fast. you’re just looking for an excuse, aren’t you.

> seriously. 

> you’re the third guy. it’s al qaeda, then isis, then you.

> seriously, get out of there. come get an unfrozen burrito, if you’re hungry.

no reply. not even three dots to show he’s drafting. with your left hand, you drum a nervous beat on your kitchen table, and with your right, you send another text.

> you can bring sugar and carmy with you.

and there they are, those three dots. you don’t know if you’re more worried about what will happen if he takes up your offer, or what will happen if he turns it down. you don’t talk about carmy to richie, though richie talks about carmy to you. he knows that. you like tina and you don’t mind his other coworkers, but you avoid the berzattos like the plague. richie knows that too. your reasons are your own, but if it really comes down to it—

> it’s fine. all the people i want to save wouldn’t fit in the car anyway.

relief. yeah, that’s relief, and you feel a little guilty for it, but it’s just easier this way: you in the kitchen and no one else. 

> you have jumper cables in your trunk, don’t you? just tie pete to the top of the car like a christmas tree

> like i’d bring pete.

> cold hearted, that’s what you are.

nothing. no typing, no read 7:12pm, nothing at all. after fifteen minutes, you give up and toss your phone on your bed. drink your tea, though it has gone cold. try not to think about whatever’s happening in that other kitchen. try not to think about how close by it is, or how far. 

.

.

.

the day after christmas, you’re so busy thinking about richie that you almost deliver yourself to the feds on accident.

walking to your boss’s house without an invitation is never a good idea, doubly so when your boss deals his displeasure in blood, but after so long without pay, work, and news about your carbon monoxide poisoning patients, you’re desperate. the idea is that you’ll barter your knowledge of howie and kevin’s stupid shenanigans in exchange for information. maybe you’ll even ask for severance pay.

that’s why you’re thinking of richie. you’re trying to keep calm, and he’s something to look forward to. you wonder how he’s doing ice fishing with carmy. will they get frostbite? maybe. will they catch anything? doubtful. will they end up shouting? definitely. will—

you’re just about to take a left onto the caruso’s street when you see it: about nine or ten houses down, there’s a gaggle of suburban moms gawking at the caruso house, and beyond them, cop cars. 

this is it.

your stomach drops, and you look away immediately, heartbeat going full jackhammer about to drill through your concrete chest. keep walking straight, past the scene. you only got one glance before the instinct to flee kicked in, but you’re pretty sure that the cops were carrying heavy cardboard boxes out to their cars. you’re not worried about what evidence they might find—tweety bird wouldn’t let contraband be stored in her pantry, not in a million years—but you are worried that the cops were all a matched set. the navy windbreakers? that’s fed fashion. that’s.

yeah. this is it.

when you get on the bus, some part of you is surprised the driver even allows it. the end’s not here, but it is coming. only a matter of time. 

.

.

.

as you get off one bus and get on another, taking a circuitous route in a useless effort to try and allay the feeling of being hunted, your dread coalesces into nausea, the kind you get when a headache or period cramps are left untended too long. it’s physical. you focus on the fraying cuff of your hoodie, and all you want to do is lie down.

you’ve expected the world to end for a long time, so you know exactly what to do. you’ve done research. you’ve imagined it all in excruciating detail, and you’re not bothered by the unknown, except for richie.

richie’s the one unknown. imagining the end of the world with him was so unbearable that you could never force yourself to go through with the exercise of imagining it, and you kept him at arm’s length just enough to pretend that the end of the world would somehow leave him untouched. now that shit’s real, you can’t pretend anymore. when it comes to richie, you’ll be flying blind. you could kick yourself. you could k—

your work phone rings. it’s your landlady. you ignore it, but she rings again and again and again. finally, she texts you.

> please come up to the office as soon as you can. we have discovered irregularities with your october and november payments, and unless this is fixed soon, we’ll have to explore our legal options.

your landlady was not the one who typed that message. if she’d been the one typing, it would’ve looked something like get your ass up here, give or take a few typos.  

so yeah, there’s cops after you. this is it.

.

.

.

when you call your brother from a newly purchased burner phone, he answers immediately. what’s up?

it’s julie.

okay, he says very flatly. one nice thing about your family: minimum talking, minimum fuss. he doesn’t say a thing about the years past. he just repeats, what’s up?

i’m probably going to prison for a while, you say.

how long? 

should i be insulted that you’re not surprised?

he says nothing. you don’t know what you expected, really, but you hate that you’ve become the talkative one. 

stifling your annoyance, you say, like ten years max? it’s not like i killed someone, but i’m in with some assholes. i don’t know, i haven’t talked to a lawyer yet. 

silence on the other end. 

you pinch the bridge of your nose, nausea swelling. you can picture him, your one and only sibling, even though you know the picture must be outdated: broad-shouldered like you are, annoying, tall, decked out in some kind of colorless athleisure and the eternal baseball cap, slanted eyes narrowed even more than usual in judgment and exasperation.

are you there? you finally say.

you need bail? he says abruptly.

god, you want so badly to give him a shove, knock the stiffness out of him. no. no money. not from you, not from mom, not from anyone. that’s why i’m calling. if anyone finds out about this, just keep them out of it, yeah?

yeah. 

that’s where you should shut up, unless you want feelings leaking into it, but today’s a day of helplessness and this conversation is no exception. 

you say, a little desperate, i don’t want anyone near this one.

i got it, pebbles. with his particular mix of sardonic affection and condescension, the fog around you lifts, and there he is standing in front of you. you can see him clearly: pissed off at you now and probably forever, but still family. not much. but not nothing.

suck my dick, you say, awash with relief.

he snorts. and adieu.

you hang up on each other at exactly the same time.

.

.

.

i’m not telling you that. 

you’ve worn your lawyer down to a thin veneer of professionalism through which her palpable annoyance has begun to show. and you’re not even sorry. it gives you a certain satisfaction, a sense of getting your own back—her steely, emotionless affect was getting on your nerves before. 

you put all your remaining money into her retainer check because she’s not just a lawyer, but an effective one, according to your research. so it shouldn’t matter that you don’t know what she thinks of you. shouldn’t matter, but it does. you want to know her judgment, one way or another. maybe it’s because this is the first time you’ve told the full story to anyone. 

or at least, as close as you’re ever gonna get to the full story.

i’ve already explained confidentiality to you, she says. 

i already knew that you’re not gonna snitch on me unless i’m about to commit another crime, you say. but i’m still not telling you. 

all right. let me get this straight. she spreads her hands out flat on her desk, and her wedding band clacks against the dark wood. there’s not a strand of her gray hair out of place, and her brown eyes have lost their annoyance. back to professionalism. disappointing. you’re here because you believe you witnessed federal agents bagging evidence at your employer’s house, and you believe your employer has been arrested. your employer is giovanni caruso—

hold up, you interrupt. giovanni? that’s his name?

you call him old caruso, son’s name is jack, there’s a limited number of organized crime families in the area and i happen to be acquainted with that landscape, generally speaking.

you snort. that’s so fucking funny. 

if your lawyer finds you more annoying than before, she doesn’t show it. you have been working for caruso for over a year and a half in an off the books capacity as a doctor. you received biweekly payments to be on call between the hours of eight in the evening and eight in the morning, and during that time, you treated multiple gunshot wounds and other injuries, including broken bones, stab wounds, and carbon monoxide poisoning. while your clients were cautioned not to tell you their names or explain how they received their injuries, you do feel that you know enough information to be of interest to the police. you are not willing to testify.

on account of not wanting to die, yes, you say, adopting a professional tone to exactly match hers, dangerously close to mocking. you’re being an asshole for a reason. she’s tried to persuade you to testify before, and you don’t want her to try it again.

she continues unperturbed. you have been threatened with violence on multiple occasions to that end, sometimes with a weapon. so far, understandable. 

now the lawyer spreads her hands out on the desk in a summary gesture. 

now all of this is not necessarily as dire a predicament as you thought when you said you might ‘get ten years’. if you had proof you were coerced, i could get your sentence reduced even more, but as things stand this seems like a set of offenses that would land you around two or three years, five at the worst. you do have a medical license, so they can’t get you on practicing without. you never directly participated in any of the presumably violent crimes leading to the injuries, and you never procured the drugs and medical supplies yourself. other than the payments to your bank account, there’s not much of a paper trail because you took no notes, used neither laptop nor smartphone—yeah, you didn’t tell her about the michael and richie phone, because that would require telling her about michael and richie—and cycled through burner phones instead. so again, it will be hard for them to nail you on specifics, unless they have multiple witnesses.

i sense a ‘but’ coming, you say.

but i need to understand why you got into this in the first place.

with that, you snap. it’s been a day, and she’s using the words of a counselor with the expression of a robot. why the fuck do you care?

ma’am, she says, that glimmer of irritation just barely showing, you are paying me to defend you. i would rather not enter that fight with one hand tied behind my back. 

you’re an idiot.

of course she doesn’t care about whether you’re good or bad, clever or stupid. there’s no judgment to be had. all she cares about is how defensible you are. you really are an idiot, and you’re so relieved.

with that, it flows freely.

i fucked up, you say. i was a resident at ui—university of illinois—and i was on my second to last year, everything was good. but then the carusos tried to blackmail me into getting them the medical files of one of my patients, so i freaked out and quit. it’s hard to convey to her just how much your world ended, without sounding melodramatic. in the end, you keep it brief. i burned all my bridges. but then i had no job and nothing else to do, and they knew it. shit happened, and now here we are. 

she doesn’t hesitate. caruso tried to blackmail you with what?

no. that’s all, that’s it. she only gets the one word.

i can’t do my job if you’re being obstructionist.

i’m not tell you that—i’m not telling fucking anyone that. i’d rather go walk onto state street bridge and blow my brains out. there’s no way she knows what you’re talking about, but some of it must creep into your voice, because she does stop for a moment and think before pressing you again, this time with a slightly milder tone.

is it sex, violence, or money? she says.

none of the above. some money was involved, but not more than a month of rent. 

you paid, or someone else paid?

all right, that’s it. you charge by the hour, right? you say.

in your current arrangement, yes.

well, the retainer’s all i got. so. you pat your hands on her desk in a brisk, final gesture. i’m gonna fuck off now, you have a think, and then tomorrow i’m gonna swing by and you can tell me what i need to know about turning myself in. in the meantime, i’m gonna go get a burrito. 

for a split second, you think she’s going to argue with you, and you can pinpoint the exact moment when she resigns herself to having an unreasonably stubborn client.

you do that, she says.

as far as you’re concerned, she got the whole story. it ends with prison, the way it was always going to end. it starts the way it was always going to start too: you fucked up.

.

.

.

so you’re inside the house. 

nah, mikey says. i’m the house.

he immediately goes digging in the pocket of his sweatpants to get his lighter, refusing to look at you. the shame is how you know this is real.

it hits you then: he’s the one you want to talk to. you distrusted him before because he was so transparently on the brink of falling apart, but now you can see that that’s just something you have in common. you’re the house. you’re the fucking house. and here he is, someone who knows what that feels like, and there’s nothing else between you. what are the chances? 

what about you, mikey says, relighting his cigarette. do you have any younger siblings, or is it just the one? 

the question comes unexpected, and you realize that he knows you have an older brother—that you’ve talked about your family, that you’ve been drawn in that much and that easily. 

just the one, you manage to say.

ping, goes a little notification sound, and there it is, saved by the bell. he gets out his phone, and you point at it.

what? he says.

i got good news and bad news.

he looks back down at his phone, grimaces at the text, then puts it away. okay. what’s the good news?

you can’t help yourself. who asks for the good news first?

he shrugs, smiles, wide open and easy. i do.

for a second, you’re both smiling at each other. but then comes your next words.

good news is, i haven’t spoken to my family since 2019. when you say it like that, you can almost make it sound like something to be proud of. so. i really am the one you want to talk to.

shit, mikey says, looking at you. 

it’s the first time you’ve thrown him off kilter, and you enjoy it. 

you really are the one i want to talk to. he switches his cigarette from his right hand to his left so he can shake yours. i’m mikey.

his hand is callused and cold, but his grip is firm. it doesn’t feel perfunctory. it skitters electricity up your arm that you promptly ignore.

i know, you say.

his smile is harder to ignore. you never said what your name was, though. 

you only vaguely remember rebuffing him the first time you both smoked outside together. it feels so far away now.

julie, you say. you only realize that you gave him your real name once it’s too late to take it back. his hand is warm, engulfing yours. 

good to meet you, julie. 

likewise.

he lets go first.

you wanna hit me with the bad news? he says.

you stick your hands in your coat pockets. bad news is: if you want him gone, you have to want him gone. you say you want him gone, but you’re still texting the kid. what’s he supposed to think?

so you’re saying i should block him? you can tell from mikey’s voice that he already hates the idea.

i’m saying you already know what to do.

i don’t! he’s almost laughing, like the whole thing is so desperate, it’s funny.

yes you fucking do, you say. you just haven’t ended it because you don’t actually think things are over for you. there’s a chance that you wake up a different person tomorrow, and that’s enough reason to postpone the end of the world, right? 

he’s not laughing now. he’s not angry, either. the whole weight of his attention is on you, and he’s gone so perfectly motionless, you know you’ve hit bullseye. yeah. you really are the one he wants to talk to.

so, you say, the reason you want your brother to fuck off is not because you think you’re gonna sink to the bottom of the ocean and drag him down with you. it’s because you don’t want him to watch you floundering around, gasping for air, trying to survive. cause it’s fucking embarrasing.

okay, he says slowly, so you think i’m, what. being dramatic? it’s not a rhetorical question. he’s locked in, he’s really asking. you think the house isn’t on fire here?

you lift your shoulders an inch, wound tight, focused. honest, but not only honest. trying hard to say it right so he understands.

i don’t know you, you say. i don’t know the situation. all i’m saying is, if it’s only shame, then you’ll stay floundering in the in-between forever, fuckin miserable, never in and never out. 

mikey is listening so intently, you think maybe he does hear you. maybe he does understand.

and, you know. don’t do that, you say. just let the kid in, if it’s shame. it’ll hurt, but it won’t kill you. 

what if it’s not shame? mikey says. what if the house is on fire?

you hesitate. you love him? 

he’s my brother. there’s years in his voice, decades. you can hear every second of them, and all you can do is nod. 

yeah, you say. look away. take one last drag on your cigarette, then snuff it out before it can burn you. chuck it in the makeshift ashtray, and throw away your empty cigarette box too.

wordlessly, mikey passes his to you. you’re used to menthols, not whatever the fuck these are, but you take it because he offered. the taste is his, and the slow exhale. 

 is watching you, but before you can gather up enough courage to look back—he’s close now, which makes looking at him feel like a risk—his phone goes off and you try to tell yourself that that feeling is relief. 

this fuckin guy, he mutters, then types a reply.

you smile to yourself over the rough affection in his voice. a private smile, all yours. you’ve lost track of time out here with him, and you’ve got no desire to find it again.

carmy’s not giving up, huh, you say. 

what? it takes a second for his mind to catch up. oh, that’s not carmy. that was richie.

he’s so funny. you know you just say random names sometimes like i already know who they are? 

richie’s my best friend, he explains.

and are you shaking him off too? you’re aware that this is a lot to ask, and you want the answer precisely because it’s a lot to ask.

to your surprise, mikey laughs. 

richie? no. he holds out his hand, and you pass the cigarette back to him. richie’s not a guy you can shake off. his wife’s been trying to leave him for like a year, but he keeps hanging on. he’s that kind of guy. 

you attempt to withhold the judgment from your voice when you repeat, for a year? 

he shrugs. on and off, but it takes two to tango. it’ll work out.

okay, companionship only goes so far, no matter how much you like mikey. you’re not about to stand here and let a man tell you that keeping a woman in a marriage against her will is a good fucking thing.

it takes two to tango, but it only takes one to leave, you say. and i bet she has her reasons. 

look, whatever she has, richie’s not a quitter, mikey says. fuck, i couldn’t shake the guy if i had a gun to his head.

you smoke in stony silence, thinking to yourself that this richie sounds like an absolute fucking nightmare. for a while, your thoughts and mikey’s veer off on such diverging paths that you’re almost about to make your excuses and go back upstairs, the feeling of camaraderie gone. and then.

hey, mikey says. there’s an odd note to his voice, nearly gentle. how did you shake your family, can i ask? what did you do? 

you look over at him and hold that look for a long moment, fighting the urge to swallow.

there’s a lot you can give to mikey, and you’ll find out just how much in the coming year. but that. you’ll never give him that.

instead, you give him what you think he needs, what you’ve turned over and over in your mind during so many sleepless nights: the conclusion you finally came to, long ago.

you gotta make absolutely sure the house is on fire, you say. because if you’re not, if you leave your brother and live on, then you’ve done something unforgivable and you’re not even dead enough to escape.

.

.

.

there’s only one more thing you need to do before you turn yourself in, and despite the overwhelming urge to duck it—be a coward, find a way—you force yourself to walk all the way to richie’s apartment building. the exercise is supposed to wear you out, take some of the fight out of you, but it fails. now you’re just waiting for him with sore legs and recurring nausea.

you don’t have to wait long. one second, you’re grimly watching the smoke from your cigarette drifting upwards, and then there’s a flicker of motion down the street. you look, and there he is. richie’s coming towards you in long strides, his hands shoved into the pockets of his leather jacket, a man on a mission. he’s clearly spotted you.

hey, he calls, when he’s still stupidly far away. what’s going on?

it’s okay, you want to say, but the words won’t come. as much as you’ve kept hidden from richie, you don’t like lying to him much. so you just put out your cigarette in case you need to leave quickly, and you wait.

when richie finally reaches you, he’s evidently curious, but you speak first.

how was ice fishing? 

not too bad, weirdly enough. he settles in and lights himself a cigarette before continuing. maybe he’s under the illusion that this is one of your normal companionable nights, just happening in a different location. turns out carmy still sleeps better in a moving car, so i actually drove the long way home and i think it did him some good.

feels like it did richie some good too. he tried to take care of somebody and for once, it worked. you’re glad. he needed it, after that hell of a christmas.

you can sense his weary contentment, and you know you’re about to ruin it.

that’s good, you say quietly, and at the same time, richie says, what?

looking up into his face, your heart sinks right along with your hopes. his blue eyes are sharp enough. 

goddammit, but he’s caught on. he knows something isn’t right, and you’re not asshole enough to try and claw back an ease that’s gone for good.

i gotta go away for a while, you manage to say.

how long is a while? he says, uneasy.

you can’t do this.

hey, he says, a little softer, and you have to look away. you shouldn’t have even come. you shouldn’t have even fucking come. five minutes with him, and you’re already fighting to keep your face under control. 

can we go upstairs? it’s fucking cold. you feel exposed, visible to anyone who might drive by, and you can’t shake the rising urge to hide.

yeah, richie says. yeah, we can go upstairs. it’s not that cold out compared to your countless nights spent outside together, and he knows it, but he just opens the door for you.

.

.

.

the elevator ride is long and painful. you can practically smell the worry coming off him in waves, festering, so you don’t make him wait. as soon as his apartment door is shut and locked behind you, you say, how long i’m away kinda depends on the prosecutor. 

you, uh. he runs a hand over his mouth, thinking. fuck. what are the charges? 

we’ll see. i, uh, i have this feeling there’s feds involved. tomorrow i’m going to turn myself in. 

fuck, he says again, hard. he runs his hand from his forehead back over his skull, then just stands there for a second, head half bowed and hand gripping the back of his neck. you want to comfort him, but shouldn’t. you want to run, but can’t. 

instead, you take this opportunity to get in one last long stare. richie is the same as ever. his hair is dark and close-cut, his beard too. his eyebrows are scant, and there’s a ridge on his forehead as if to make up for it. his nose is straight and straightforward. there are bags under his eyes, because of course there are, but his eyes themselves are as blue as summer, so blue they’re barely believable. that’s him, that’s his face.

then there’s the eternal black leather jacket, oversized and complete with unnecessary shoulder straps for all the bags he’ll never carry. he smells faintly of smoke. he’s allowing you to stare at him, an indulgence that you can’t question without being a dick. he makes you want to not be a dick. all this is here, all this is real. 

richie says, what can i do?

he looks at you, and though his voice is subdued, you can tell he’s dead serious. thank god. you thought you’d have to beg for it, but here he is, offering. you really want to know?

he nods once, tight. anything. 

that one hurts, because he knows just how much a person can ask of him, and he’s standing there offering it anyway. 

i want you to stay out of it. 

dead silence. a muscle tics in his jaw. why?

i don’t want to make things messy. i don’t want to cause trouble, and there’s—you try to eke out a laugh, downplay it. but your laugh is raw and you can tell in his eyes that you’ve only made things worse.  there’s some fuckin trouble in this.

okay. he digs out his phone, swipes a couple times, and then points at the round blue logo of the jpay app. you see this? his voice is tight. i don’t know what makes you think you’re so special, but this isn’t the first time i’ve had a friend catch a charge and it probably won’t be the last. so you don’t need to look so freaked out, you’re not gonna infect me. i’m fine. i can help. 

fucking richie. the one night you need him to be unreasonable, and here he is making arguments, using logic and shit. exasperated, you try to argue your way out of this.

you were dealing coke just a few months ago.

richie scoffs. so what?

fak found out about that, didn’t he? you give him a look. fak, richie. fak. fucking—

he raises both hands, palms spread in irritation, voice rising. would you stop saying fak? 

irresistible. fak. 

i don’t—

come on.

okay. he gestures widely, in an exaggerated motion used to indicate he’s the sole light of reason in a dark world of total bullshit. maybe i've been exaggerating a little. maybe fak’s not the worst guy in the world. i mean, he can be a lot. clingy, sure. but a snitch? nah. he told carmy, but carmy’s not a cop, so that's different. it’s fine. we’re fine.

i'm just saying. if fak knows and carmy knows, other people probably know too.

it’s not even relevant, richie says. so i moved a little weight, who cares?

look, i’m not trying to be a dick, but i don’t think the cops were were hunting that hard for you. if they start digging into me, that’s gonna change. cause i’m not a snitch either, and i know they’re gonna want me to flip, so they’ll leverage whatever against me, and… yeah, you can tell he’s not finding this convincing. a bad feeling is growing in the pit of your stomach. just get it over with. 

there’s one surefire way to make him flinch, and you push that launch button, voice casual.

you helped michael get painkillers too, right? you say. 

takes a second, but he finally admits, yeah. i knew a guy.

michael was not keeping it neat and tidy, you know what i mean? it takes so much effort to seem this careless. but it works. he looks a bit more like he should—guarded, almost suspicious. 

what are you saying?

i’m saying i knew he was using within a month of meeting him. and. you can tell you’ve hurt him a little, but still, your arguments aren’t working, your wild swings aren’t working, he’s not listening to you, nd desperation wells up in you. is there nothing you can do? just, can you please stay out of this. you didn’t mean to say please, but it burst out of you. i don’t know what’s gonna go down, and i just want everyone clear of this. i know they’re coming for me, i know i’ll lose, and i don’t—i don’t want you anywhere near it all. 

richie is silent for a moment, thinking hard.

you rub your thumb over your wristbone. can we just…

what’s your plan? he says. that’s what i wanna know. like, you’re not fighting here, and i don’t get it. what happens after you turn yourself in? you’re not gonna get a deal if you don’t talk, so what? you’re just gonna sit there and take the twenty-five to life? 

twenty-five to life? you echo. richie, what the fuck do you think i did?

after one long moment of the both of you staring at each other, he hums a little james bond. 

your face lifts into a wide, incredulous smile. you think i’m. he does. he absolutely does, look at him. you could kiss him. you could shake him. you start to laugh.

his face twists like he just got pinched hard. no, i—what do i know, man, i don't know that much about the law or whatever, i just—

twenty-five to life!

—don't get fucking offended, okay?

i'm not offended.

i'm just a well-read guy with a very active imagination, and maybe i got a little carried away, but—

his shoulders are up by his ears, he’s so defensive.

richie, you say firmly. i'm not mad.

what? there he is. finally listening. eyes looking directly at you, electric blue, raw current.

you hold that silence a little longer than you need to, just to feel it. then, deliberately giving each word its own due weight, you say, you thought i’d killed somebody, and you were gonna help me?

richie shrugs helplessly.

i thought you had your reasons, he says. i always think you have your reasons.

that shakes you to the core. 

goodwill, you already knew you had his goodwill. but faith? jesus. you’re the last person on earth that anyone should believe in, but richie doesn’t know how wrong he is and you can’t tell him, so you just to stand there under the weight of his belief and try not to crumble. at this point, prison would be a fucking mercy.

you have to get out of here.

it'll be five years at worst, you say. your voice sounds strange even to your own ears, but you keep going. the feds will be shaking me like a fruit tree hoping some juicy information tumbles down, but everything i did was pretty boring. you think of the factory, the bodies laid out like so many logs. nonviolent, anyway.

doesn’t seem very james bond to me, he says you fuckin drama queen.

bottom line, you say, the thing is enough of a mess already, so just let me do my time and we can hang out after. i don't want you anywhere near this. you start heading for the door. i gotta go anyways, i have—

you serious? he cuts in, suppressed and flat. warning bells are going off in your head, but you walk on.

dead fucking serious, you say, unlocking the front door. i don’t even want anyone to know that we’ve met. 

dead silence, and then, richie says, well maybe you don’t get a fucking choice.

you turn and meet his eyes. there it is again, that stomach-churning nausea that you thought you’d managed to quell. the plummeting feeling of having no control. it stops you in your tracks. 

what? you say.

i mean, i’m not going anywhere, so fucking deal with it? the life has come back to his voice, and with it, all the anger. his blue eyes are sparking with it, he’s gesturing, he’s gathering momentum, and you try to stop him but you already know it’s useless.

richie—

look, i don't run when things get bad, i’m not that guy. i’m here. he smacks one hand into another. like i’m in it. that's the whole fucking point.

the point of what?

you know what i’m trying to say.

the point of what, richie? 

his face twists. oh, don't do that. don't do that thing where you act like you know everything that goes on in my head.

but i fucking do, though. 

yeah, well i fucking hate it.

if you hate it so much then why did you give it to me then? 

his voice goes higher. i'm not just gonna drop you!

i am literally begging you to drop me. somehow, you’ve crossed the room, you’re up in his face and he’s not backing down and the words are flying so thick and fast as you talk over each other that you can barely make out yours, much less his. i want you to drop me, i specifically—i did so much shit so that you could drop me, i was so fucking careful—

i never asked you to!

i got rid of my phones and i stuck to my rules and—

i never fucking asked you to!

if you get involved, it's gonna be fucking awful and it won't help, it won't even help, if that's what you think—

i can help! i'm not, fucking useless, like. you guys always—

that one, you hear. you guys?

why don't you ever fucking talk to me? he says, like the words are getting torn out of him. 

who the fuck do you think you’re talking to right now? for a second, you just look at each other. breathing hard. when you finally speak, your voice is quieter. richie, you are the only person i ever fucking talk to. but it doesn’t matter. there’s nothing anyone can do.

i don't believe you.

you don’t know how to get around that. after a beat, you say, okay, what is it, richie. cruel. what is it you're gonna do that's gonna help. you asked me to explain my plan, now it’s your turn. you tell me how you’re gonna help me with this. 

fucking…he looks up for a second, and then back at you. i know what you’re doing. 

you don’t even know what the fuck you’re doing at this point, but the way he’s looking at you is frightening. you could almost believe that he knows. and honestly, you don’t want to find out.

what am i doing, you say.

.

.

.

he turns and walks away, towards the bed. after a second’s hesitation, you follow. he sits down on the bed so he can crank open the window, light up, and smoke out of it. you stay standing. you really don’t know why you haven’t left yet. you were supposed to ages ago.

sit down, he says.

fuck you. 

fucking sit down.

no. 

jesus. he exhales, slow. you can see him settling a little. do you know why carmy was opening the tomato cans?

what is this, storytime?

patiently, he repeats, do you know why carmy was opening the tomato cans.

to make spaghetti.

he points at you. exactly. but the reason he was making spaghetti is cause he’d just gotten mikey’s note. deep breath. this isn’t a story he’s happy to tell you. see, mikey had left him this note on the back of a the spaghetti recipe, but i—i didn’t give it to carmy until there was this day. syd and marcus were gone. shit had gotten bad.

i remember, you murmur.

i was in the front, and i heard people yelling fire, so i came running into the kitchen and carmy was watching it all burn. just standing there. not moving. his eyes were open, but it was like he was asleep. 

and that’s why you gave him the note?

yeah. i know i should’ve done it before. but. 

he looks up at you, and you can see him appealing to you for some kind of mercy. maybe comfort. this is the thing he’s ashamed of. you understand that, you understand him, you understand shame better than anyone else, and there’s a sick comfort in it, knowing he’s that much more like you. at least he was able to change course in the end. you never did.

you don’t tell him that, though, because you’ve realized something else.

this is the thing he’s ashamed of, which makes it usable.

so i’m carmy, in your off-base and condescending metaphor, you say, callous. you're gonna come and save me? you're gonna put the fire out.

his eyes darken. no, you're not carmy.

no?

you're mikey.

fuck you. 

so fucking selfish, he says bitterly. it’s as close to hate as you’ve ever heard from him. but you’ve gone so far, you’re not stopping now.

richie, what the fuck do you want from me?

you know what i want! his voice goes quiet when he adds, did really you think there’s anything that could keep me away from you for five fucking years?

you know what he means.

can’t put words to it, can’t accept it, can’t fucking bear it—won’t—but you do know, you know exactly what he’s trying to say to you, what he’s trying to give.

you don’t deserve it, but it’s not for you anyways, it's for michael. it's all for michael, and it would be beautiful if it wasn't such a fucking waste to love a man when he's dead. richie’s gonna throw everything he has onto the fire in the hope that it will quench the flames. that just makes it his pyre, but he’ll never see it. 

okay, you say. my turn at storytime. 

you sit down next to him on the bed, accept his cigarette. take a drag, then lean on the wide wooden sill as you breathe smoke out into the cold. lull him into it. relax his guard. 

you thought you inherited me, right? you say. conversational. no heat. you were gonna take care of me for him, that was the plan. i’m mikey.

that’s not what i meant.

you have it backwards, is the thing. you can feel yourself sinking into it, talking like you have time, matter of fact, cruelty showing at the edges. like you’re an entirely different person, which is, of course, your goal. michael didn’t give a shit about me. i was just there. i was just a woman who happened to be conveniently close by, and lonely, and he fucked me. and that was fine, that was convenient for me too, but he got worse and it got out of hand. he got hard to be around. i found out he’d started stealing from me, so i broke up with him. he found a way to get back into my apartment anyways, and he guessed the code to my safe and stole pretty much everything. so i told him tina shouldn’t call me for help next time he overdosed. i told him he could finally die, for all i cared. and he did.

you’re looking at the sheets. you’re still able to talk, somehow. you feel numb, detached, like you’re watching yourself say it. 

the only reason you know me is because i felt guilty. i was gonna take care of you for him, that was the plan, but now this is getting out of hand and i’m fucking done with it. so here goes. it wasn’t just money he stole out of my safe. go take a look in the police report. i’d bet my life that there was a sig p365 in his hand when they found him. that was mine. i’m the reason he’s dead. you want to be loyal to someone? be loyal to him.

you crush the cigarette against the fake wood of the headboard. ash falls on his pillow.

playtime’s over. stay the fuck away from me.

this time when you leave, he doesn’t stop you.

.

.

.

on the train, hollowed out and swaying, you are approached by an elderly woman. her eyes are rheumy, concerned.

are you okay? she says. 

hm? 

you’re shaking.

you look down at your hands in your lap. she’s right. 

there’s nothing else to say. 

.

.

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[ next chapter pending ] [ masterlist ]

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a huge thank you to all readers.

taglist: @garbinge, @narcolini, @drabbles-mc, @beingalive1, @eternallyvenus, @cerial-junkie, @jackierose902109, @shinebright2000, @scorpiolystoned, @fancyvoidtragedy, @justficsandstuff, @fromirkwood — if anyone else wants to be tagged, let me know.

[ashlingiswriting]

I loved your Richie fic commentary, the parallels drawn to chp3 and the slow learning process between Julie & Richie feels so real and raw, one of the main reasons I love it so much is that all the flaws/self absorbed-ness she has is what fits her into the universe so well!! Love love love

This one is a little long so feel free to cater to the scenes you want to particularly focus on but from Open Gate (best Javi fic out there) starting from “(no, you know exactly what to do with him, you just don’t want to.)” All the way up to when Javi says “you agreed to dinner.”

thank you, anon! 🥹 sorry this reply + the next chap is so late, but i will be publishing the next chap of my richiefic today for valentine's day, so keep an eye peeled for that!

open gate commentary below

(no, you know exactly what to do with him, you just don’t want to.)

reader's still deeply bitter about javi leaving them, and they're trying to protect themselves.

anyways, he walks you home. if you were a real coward you would’ve declined that, but you weren’t going to say what you had to say in the parking lot, so okay. when you go to let yourself in, he leans on the fucking doorframe because of course he does. of course he does. ah, Jesus, Javi. swaying close. I’ve got a kid now, you say.

it's a silent question he's asking—the whole thing has been framed as a date and now he's coming in close—and it's a fairly oblique answer that reader gives him. it's a can we? and a no. it's big exes energy. they still understand each other so well.

and he says, thought that wasn’t yours? close enough.  dad didn’t fight for him almost at all, would’ve been bad if he did, though. his grandparents are old; his mom had him when she was older, and one of them is probably going to die when he’s around twelve, just statistically speaking, that’s the most likely—I’ve got to be here.

you hate how you catch yourself lifting your face to catch his response, to see what he makes of you. yeah, he says. I mean, I know. I know you’ve got to be here. It’s how you are.

sometimes i just have characters do things because the vibe is right and i figure out why later. this is one of those times, lol. i think javi avoiding commitment is contrasted with reader's personality here. reader could've ducked this whole future semi-parenthood, but instead they're leaning into it. and javi admires that.

you fight down the answering surge of pride and relief. yeah, it is how I am, so can we not— what? he says. smiling at you like he’s unaware of the dangers. we’re too old for this shit, Javi. I have a kid.

he's making one last try, and reader's now officially putting their foot down hard. i think they're finding it pretty difficult, though! he's all fond-eyed and charming and hnnngnhghghghgh

less of a smile, now. I wasn’t going to ask you to drag him to Colombia, if that’s what you— no. okay, then what were you thinking? I’m thinking I can't—you know, I can’t afford to— now it’s your turn to smile all wrong. he wants to be an astronaut when he grows up, you say.

it's kind of ambiguous, i think, how much of this is reader genuinely trying to keep their life clean and focused on the kid, and how much reader is using the kid as an excuse to not get hurt again. i don't know. i don't even think reader knows.

what does that— Javi stops himself. okay, he says, like he’s officially proclaiming defeat, and you could take that and go, you really could, except he says it like he’s a little offended about it. the fucking gall on this man, after everything.

he knows what he did to get to this place, but he's still offended, because at the end of the day, rejection always hurts, and javi's really not used to rejection 😂 not romantically/sexually, anyway.

you say, you think this ends differently? you agreed to dinner.

he got his hopes up & now he's getting a small taste of his own medicine. too bad, javier! lol

overall, i wanted their views of their relationship to collide. i think deep down, javi thinks of them as an off and on thing that he's fucked up in many times, but he can always come back. but deep down, reader thinks he's a hot stove, and if they touch him, they can expect to get burned. and this is the scene where they both slowly realize what each other are thinking. it hurts a little, but there's still this underlying weirdly comfortable flow because they're still able to communicate so well, with so few words. idk. open gate my beloved. thank you for asking <3333

[ashlingiswriting]

write a love story where one corner of the triangle is already dead

[ashlingiswriting]

i love do i know you? oh my fucking god youre writing is so amazing and i love your metaphors and the fucking cliffhanger you left it at??? jail!!!! please add me to the taglist because i am OBSESSED with this fic oh my godddd marry me right now

@fromirkwood 🥹 i've read this comment so many times over. THANK YOU! yes ofc i'll add you to the taglist!

[ashlingiswriting]

I know It’s 500 or less but your ‘he is not dead.’ piece awakened something in me. the prose was so striking and the last bit of ‘write a fucking will’ was chilling to the bone. tell me everything all the little details you could possibly spare I cannot watch carrillo’s last episode without thinking about that fic honestly

Thank you! 🥰 and sorry it took so long for me to respond.

fic commentary below!

He is not dead, and so you laugh. Sudden and ugly, like someone ripped it out of you, all teeth no relief, God, and in public too—in public too. A closed door to this room of half a dozen, but anywhere your President is, that’s in public. You can feel his eyes on your now, all their eyes, their concern, and for a moment, you can feel that you have slipped on the curb, but you’ve not yet smashed your nose into the concrete.

For this person and in this world, their first reaction to monumental good news—good news both personally and professionally—sounds like joy but doesn't feel like it. Honestly, I have way more thoughts on this reader character than made it explicitly onto the page. I feel like this introduction to them characterizes them as someone not accustomed to good news and not accustomed to showing emotion. Aaaaand of course I wanna tip my hat to the Carrillo/Reader dynamic, which ends up being ambiguous in some ways (in terms of what it actually is—is it a full on affair? is it one sided?) but completely unambiguous in terms of Reader's attachment to him.

For a moment, all you can think is, he is not dead, and in the crackle of the radio you can hear the bright savage clarion ring of a trumpet call. We are here, we are hunting. The dogs have been set loose and their slavering jaws hang half-open as they skim the wet cold ground.

This reader has a lot to do with the political class of Colombia at the time, the elite who all sort of married each other and went to the same schools and became politicians/journalists/policymakers/writers and idk, obviously I'm making this observation as an outsider, but it seemed to me in reading about many of these figures that on one hand, shit was very real in the sense that many of them died due to their involvement in politics. On the other hand, they were just doing what their families had been doing for years previously, which is try to increase their power and exert their influence over the country. In that sense I wanted Reader to parallel Carrillo in the sense that they were very ambitious and had a vision of what they were doing, but also I as a person don't....idk. Reader is probably involved in some fucked up stuff, or at least providing cover for it.

HOW DID I GET HERE.

Oh yeah! The vibes on Reader. That's why I chose the trumpets and hunting as a metaphor, it feels simultaneously like a class signifier and also visceral and ruthless, with a note of vicious glee.

Laid out in neat photocopies, one for each person, is an obituary for Horacio Carrillo, written out by one of Escobar’s more eloquent lackeys, possibly even Vélez. It’s like her, the language. Nasty and undeniably elegant, a letter written in cursive to come here and have your teeth knocked out one by one with a little hammer. It has all the details, the time and the place, even the name of the sniper who killed Carrillo—who was meant to kill him.

The obituary thing I took from history, although I jazzed it up a little. Escobar really did send an obituary to one (or more than one?) of the people he was trying to intimidate. It's been a hot second since I revisited the research so idk which person it was but I think it was a journalist from El Tiempo???

Anyway I just found it chilling.

Sniper shots are a tricky business. God bless a sudden lift of wind. God bless the widow of the man who had been standing beside him, the woman who has taken that bullet that was meant for you. It makes you lightheaded, all the things she has taken from you, the things she will have to do that you will not. The funeral arrangements, the thank you cards, the handshakes with his living friends, trying not to resent them for living. The low crushing sensation behind the breastbone when she has to break the news to his mother, fearful that if her grief cries out unchecked, it might break forth something worse in you—this is not your burden. Your shoulders are as empty as they have ever been.

I feel like Reader's seen a lot of this up close and personal with some colleagues and friends, which is why their vision of the future they just escaped is so detailed.

But then, wait. You are not his wife, either.

The others are staring at you. None of them are fools. Distantly, some part of you is cataloguing this, as it catalogues all threats. President, Vice Minister of Justice, hell, even a General—especially the General, come to think of it, for he once commanded Carrillo in direct operations—all of them have seen you laugh, and they will not misunderstand it, and they will not forget it. But they are all pragmatists, and what’s one minor outburst of unacceptable emotion compared to your day-to-day utility as right hand to the Minister of National Defense? Perhaps if you shrink in apology, they will accept it as a slip and investigate no further.

You do not shrink. You bare your teeth, still weightless, the joy of it blinding every other consideration, as if you’ve just stared at the sun.

Reader has absolutely no call to be this personally emotionally invested in Carrillo's survival, and their reaction is so notably bizarre that it indicates inappropriate emotions to the extent that if they don't steer themselves back onto course, it might even impact their job, because the last thing these guys need is two key players in the drug war having an affair. But...skskskskssksk Reader's actually feeling the relief now, and the weird vicious joy, and it's a high they're not used to handling either. So we're entering big Fuck It territory.

“They wrote an obituary,” you say, remnants of laughter running through it. “When will they learn?” The President exchanges a glance with Eduardo, and you know, you know, you will hear about this before the end of the day. But even with the joy subsiding, you cannot bring yourself to care. “Before you come for Carrillo,” you say, “write a fucking will.”

I can't even lie, the whole fic was written and the whole Reader character's personality was reverse engineered so I could have Reader say that line and mean it.

Random last thought: I left the nature of Reader's relationship ambiguous on purpose. I think what matters most is that Reader and Carrillo are so similar in their drive and their emotion and the utter commitment of their enmity to their enemies and loyalty to their friends that even though Carrillo doesn't literally show up in the fic, I hope the small-r reader, the person reading, understands that Carrillo and Reader have a sort of unspoken sympathy and understanding with each other whenever they work together, and that that's the basis of Reader's attachment, and.

And they'd be absolutely terrifying people if they were real and I probably wouldn't like them, honestly a;lsdkfjajsdkfj but because they're my characters, I love those vicious bastards very, very much. <3333

[ashlingiswriting]

For the recent passage questions: “for me, it’s pineapple condoms or nothing.” All the way up to Richie saying “are you really gonna punish me for a joke”

Idk why but I love that little bit so much and would love to hear your thoughts on it!!

thank you so much! i'm excited to get into this chunk of writing.

warning: i really get into the analysis here, possible to an insufferable extent. can't help it! i just love them so much & i have so much to say about it!

for me, it’s pineapple condoms or nothing. you’re a real high-maintenance fuck. you laugh. michael used to like that about you, just how easy you were, or how easy you made yourself. buddy, you got no idea. 

on the surface, they're bantering. haha! we're not going to have sex, for a silly reason! because the idea of us having sex itself is a joke, and we're both in on the joke, right? right?

it's them reassuring each other that it's fine, even though for both of them, deep down, It's Not Exactly Fine.

also, a few lines ago, julie has literally realized that she loves him, specifically because he takes it easy on her, because he's figured out a way to be with her without making her feel like she needs to run, and without making her feel like she needs to act like someone else. he fucks up a lot, but he's trying, and does it all with his own humor and heart and she sees that and she loves him.

which is in strong contrast with mikey, cause she started off very much herself with mikey, but when they starting having sex she promptly fell into weird, somewhat unhealthy patterns of behavior where she was like 'it's casual! that means you can fuck me whenever, never text unless you feel like it, disappear for an entire week with no explanation, it's all fine. i pretend that watching you fall apart doesn't kill me, you pretend that neither of us have intense emotional involvement in this, and, you know, it's functional!' and then he dies.

it's so obviously fucked in retrospect, but she 100% did it to herself. mikey didn't even ask her to be like that. she just...wanted to be wanted and got scared about demanding anything more.

in many ways, do i know you? is a love triangle story where one corner of the love triangle is already dead. but mikey's ghost is often just around the corner.

so even though again it's all jokes on the surface, julie's memory of how she shrank herself down and didn't demand what she wanted/needed from mikey, the last man she loved, is obviously gonna have an impact on how she views her—very recent!—realization that she loves richie.

it’s been such a long day for both of you, apart and together. of course you’re getting messy, of course it’s time to go. you zip up your coat, run your hand through your hair. 

you can see her here already trying to diminish and dismiss and repress that realization. her feelings can be blamed on the long day she's had. and she doesn't even call them feelings, she calls them "getting messy". she zips up her coat, runs her hand through her hair; prepares to go outside and leave; tries to put herself together/look normal.

let me drive you, he says again. you wave him off. no, i need to walk. clear my head. it’s december in chicago, fuckin pitch black—  i’ll be fine. it’s christmas eve, are you really gonna punish me for a fucking joke?

the story's very much from julie's pov, and julie can be a pretty self-absorbed character. (honestly, when i was writing this, i didn't know if i'd get any readers making it several chapters in, because she's not always a particularly sympathetic, nice, good, or attractive character. so again, i'm THRILLED that literally anyone is reading!)

anyways yeah julie can be very self-absorbed. this is partly due to the hermitlike existence she's been leading—she hasn't had to engage with other people on a particularly complex, intense, or deep emotional level, and even her relationship with mikey was noticeably stunted in several ways—but it's also partly due to just being a personal flaw of hers. she's so self-absorbed, in fact, that she actually misses what's going on with richie because she's busy thinking about richie, paying more attention to the man in her head than the man standing right in front of her.

a parallel thing occurs in chapter three, when she's fantasizing about how she'd heat up leftovers for richie if she took him up to her apartment; how she'd take care of him, in another world where she was willing to be that vulnerable. but like, he's right there! she could take care of him by paying attention to him right then and there, especially because he's venting and literally all he needs in that moment is a listening ear.

do i know you? isn't just a line from chapter one or the title of the story, it's also me drawing little hearts around one of the main themes of the story. how do you truly know a person and how do you learn to love them right?

julie thinks she knows richie because she knows so much about him from mikey's stories, but in chapter three she's surprised to find out that richie deals cocaine. of course mikey wouldn't have told her that, since it was mikey's idea for richie to do that, and in the end this is all because the beef was failing financially. that wasn't something mikey was proud of, so he didn't tell her about it. (shame & its sources & how to deal with it is another huge theme in the fic!) so in that moment julie has a rare moment of clarity and tries to look at richie physically to really fix him in her mind, to observe him for herself. to be in that moment with him. which is a lesson that she...could perhaps have learned more quickly & thoroughly lmao. but isn't that life? it's rare that people learn important lessons once and follow them perfectly ever after.

ANYWAYS. in this passage, julie's just preoccupied with being as emotionally opaque as possible and getting the hell out of there, so she's focused on herself, not at all on richie.

richie, in the meantime, is picking up on her weird vibes & doesn't know what caused this. he knows that she let him drive her before and that was fine—delightful, even—so something has to have changed. he chalks it up to the sleepover + condoms jokes, the fact that he's brought up, even jokingly, the mere idea of them having sex. and he also wants to take care of her, he does actually want to drive her home, so her rejecting that doesn't feel great! just feels like her being stubborn (which she is). so that's why he's like, it’s christmas eve, are you really gonna punish me for a fucking joke? like, we had such an amazing night together, we're closer tonight than we've ever been before, i cooked for you, you came willingly to my apartment, we talked about our families, and now you're going to reject my care and leave in a weird tension filled way that i'm like 80% sure is happening just cause i made some off color jokes???

also, as one might expect from a guy whose father was never around, whose best friend committed suicide, and whose wife left him...richie's kind of sensitive about being left. see: season 2, when he explicitly says he fears that carmy & co are gonna "drop this ass" & leave him in the dust. so! yeah!

what i do love, though, is that they've learned from last time, in a way. in chapter 3, when there was that disconnect between them and he senses it and is offended by it, she responds angrily and defensively, says something hurtful, and basically the only reason they don't get into a much bigger fight is because he showed a bit of mercy (probably spurred by the fact that she didn't show up the night before and he was truly concerned about her absence).

THIS time, even though there's a disconnect between them, when he bursts out in frustration, she understands what's going on and de-escalates the situation, reassures him, tries to be gentle. and even though he's not completely satisfied with her walking home in the dark, he lets it go, recognizing that she has her own reasons but she's not angry with him and she doesn't mean it as a rejection of him.

they're learning!!! i love it when they learn! it took us 34,000+ words, but they're figuring it out!

...

the extent to which all this analysis is post facto? YOU'LL NEVER KNOW, I'LL NEVER TELL 😂😂😂

anyways! thank you so much again for the excuse to scream abuot them, i've been drafting chapters nine and ten, and this thought exercise was deeply satisfying.

feel free to send me another of these my askbox:

[ashlingiswriting]

although i haven't been able to write out a proper answer yet i just wanted to say that the ask game anons i got made my day 🥹 thank you!

[ashlingiswriting]

[ashlingiswriting]

19! And if I add on to it, another character you want to explore too? (I love your writing style sm genuinely glad I stumbled upon your page)

19. What’s one pairing you want to explore next year?

Possibly Syd x Carmy? It's an intimidating ship to handle, because there are so many great pieces already written about them, such in-depth thinking, so much canon to review and relatively little free real estate. But they have a great soulmates energy.

Another character I want to explore? Hokti from Reservation Dogs, I think. Lily Gladstone's performance has such quiet yet deep gravitas, I think it would be an extremely difficult but worthwhile endeavor to try and write about her. Plus, the theme of "what do you do with yourself when your life isn't what you wanted it to be, and it's your fault" is something I keep coming back to, and I think that her character is a natural fit for that.

[ashlingiswriting]

writers wrapped

9 + 28

9. Favorite pairing you wrote for this year?

tbh I was pretty proud of two ultra rarepairs whose relationship dynamics I think I got pretty well: the van ness x feistl fic, and the teresa mendoza x oleg yasikov fic. for both pairings, i think only one or two people other than myself are actually Invested in the pairing, and that rarity level gives it a little je ne sais quoi 😂

28. Favorite work you wrote this year?

do i know you? aka my longass richie x reader fic...my beloved