beenherewaytoolong

[beenherewaytoolong]

"What are those 'freaks' exactly?" Steve asks from the back seat of the car. He does have a vague idea but it's not something that comes up in daily conversation or gets covered in classes. He's not even interested in going, but his parents rarely take him anywhere, so when his mom mentioned that a freak show came to town and she wanted to check it out, he backed her up and his father reluctantly agreed to make it a family trip.

“Human curiosities,” his mother answers, which explains nothing to him.

“Mother Nature’s fuck-ups,” adds his father, making Steve frown. 

Wasn’t nature supposed to be orderly and thought out? Meticulously crafted by evolution or god’s plan, whichever you believed in? (Steve’s teachers had a confusing beef about it.)

Then again, nature invented spiders, which Steve would consider a fuck-up on its part. He remembers Dustin telling him about a comic about a spider-man. The thought of a human-shaped arachnid makes his skin crawl and he loses all his curiosity on the topic. Suddenly the family trip doesn't seem so fun anymore.

The short drive to the empty fields on the outskirts of Hawkins is filled with the Top 40 playing on the radio. His father taps his fingers to the beat of some of them, proving against all odds that he's capable of enjoying trivial human things. Steve loves to sing along and dance in the confines of his room but here, trapped in a car with his parents, he just bops his head slightly, not wanting to disturb the silence.

The freak show is a lot like the circus his uncle took him to once. There is a scattering of tents and trucks in varying sizes, all in a similar, kitschy theme of a fun fair. The air even smells of popcorn and hot dogs.

His mother scrunches her nose as soon she steps out of the car.

“This is not what I expected,” she comments, eyeing the scattering of kids and families running around.

“Well...” His father slams the door shut, pulling out a cigarette even before locking the car. “These things are dying off because of human rights activists,” he says around the cig he's trying to light. “Guess they had to rebrand to keep the business afloat.”

It's Steve’s turn to scrunch his face. His dad makes everything about business and money, even something supposedly fun, like a Sunday family trip to a fair; freak show, circus, whatever this is.

“It used to be a huge tent with displays. Now each of them gets their own? Who do they think they are?” his mother laments while hanging onto her husband’s arm, while Steve tails behind.

They pass a tent with a Siamese Twins sign hanging from the front, with a man at the front of the line, gathering money and letting people in. Nearby is another tent, occupied by a Bearded Lady, then a Half-man Half-wolf behind it. The line to that one is particularly long.

The Harringtons agree to take a walk around and decide which ones they want to spend money on, and whether it's even worth it. They've already paid an entrance fee that gives them access to most of the attractions anyway.

They pass a couple of smaller booths, a face-painting clown, and a juggler, before reaching the biggest tent in the center. In front of it stands a chalkboard with a schedule of main events. According to it the next show, between 1 pm and 2:30 pm, was a music performance, pricing a dollar per song: The Twisted Jukebox. 

Steve decides to stay back, with a couple of bills burning in his pocket, while his parents keep exploring.

The light coming in from the top of the tent illuminates a box in the stage center, throwing a long shadow against the soft glow. As he comes closer he realizes it's a jukebox, and he wonders what could possibly be so special about it to warrant an hour-and-a-half-long performance slot. The sign says 'a dollar per song', but does it even take bills?

He decides that the couple of minutes left until the start gives him enough time to examine the machine. It isn't as close to the edge of the stage as he’d like but he presses against the wooden construction nevertheless, cocking his head to the side. The jukebox looks off, different from the ones he'd see at diners, but he can't exactly put his finger on why.

“Hi! Would you like to request a song?”

The sudden voice to his left startles him into bumping his elbow against the stage. He winces as he turns around.

A blonde girl is smiling at him apologetically. She's wearing a short green dress, with a jacket he's seen on other circus staff thrown over her shoulders. She must be involved in the show, then.

He glances back at the jukebox, the song list unreadable from his vantage point.

“What are my options?” he asks, looking at the girl again. 

“Any song works!” she says with a bright smile, and he frowns at her, confused.

"That's not how jukeboxes work," he observes. But her smile only widens.

"This one does," she assures him. "So?"

His mind blanks in when put on the spot like that, but he thinks back to the songs he's heard on the radio today.

"Madonna's Material Girl?" he suggests hesitantly. For some reason, she laughs.

"That's perfect. You're the first one today, so you'll get the honors. Do you have a token already?"

The face he makes must be answer enough because she smiles and produces a coin from her pocket. Or a poker chip painted gold to resemble a coin.

"I hope you have a dollar because I don't have any change yet."

He remembers how gigs work, that you have to pay the performers, and dives into his pocket. He didn't take much with him, but one dollar isn't a problem. He exchanges it for the golden token.

"Follow me." The girl motions at him and turns around abruptly. Stunned, he does as he's told until they reach the steps on the side of the stage. She moves aside as if expecting him to go up there.

He's confused as all hell. Is this how all circus performers were? Freaks in both senses of the word?

The girl chuckles at him and she's too cute for Steve to be offended but it's a close call.

"Hop up there, put the coin in the slot and the show will start. I'll come get you after that."

His confusion triples down but he's used to nodding along when a cute girl talks to him so that's what he does now as well. Blondes are not exactly his type, but maybe he could ask her out and show her around town later.

"Okay," he says before stepping on the stage. When he turns around the girl is gone and he hopes it's not some kind of twisted joke.

The sunlight coming through an open flap on the tent's dome lights the stage, casting the surrounding audience in shadows, which Steve is grateful for. He doesn't want to know what kind of faces they are making looking at the dumbass on stage approaching a jukebox.

It looks almost like any other he's seen before, though the paint job is custom. Twisted Jukebox is written at the top in scratchy letters, and the sides are painted with images of fantastical creatures: dragons, unicorns, and the like. Not Steve's style but someone did a good job on it.

The songs list though, is... peculiar. It has things like:

Anything by Metallica, please,

No Wham! I beg of you,

Country over Pop.

Steve wonders briefly if he had even woken up this morning. Everything from the moment his mother proposed a family outing has been too weird to be real.

Finally, his eyes land on the colorful slot with an arrow pointing to it saying "$1 - 1song". He rubs his thumb over the token he's been given before flipping it sideways and sliding it in.

The coin rattles inside like it just fell through into an empty box. He frowns.

read the rest here with art by @blasvemous

And then, the sides of the jukebox fall apart.

[beenherewaytoolong]

BREAKING UPDATE ON THE PLUMOCALYPSE!!!

When I got home the neighbor kids were hanging around the parking lot as they usually do. I saw an adult making the rounds and popped out of my car hoping to snag her and ask if she’d like plums. I didn’t see her when I got out. But I saw a little girl and I said, “Is that your mom walking around?”

No, I was informed.

“Well can you ask your mom if she wants plums?”

She ran off. I looked over and saw two slightly older girls lounging. “Do you want plums?” I called.

Yes.

I grabbed my enormous box of plums and brought it outside. All three girls were waiting and the first kid said, “She’ll take them.”

I told them I had been given 106 plums. They were suitably impressed. I held out the box to let them pick out plums but the first girl confidently took the box. “You don’t have to take them all if you don’t want…” I offered dubiously.

“We want them.”

So I handed her the whole damn box, at this point somewhere close to 87 plums. And just like that, I was free. Her mom might be upset at receiving 87 plums or maybe her daughter gauged correctly that they could actually use them but either way. I am blissfully free.

[beenherewaytoolong]

agnostic is lowkey the funniest belief system it's just like yeah idk it's none of my business

[beenherewaytoolong]

Tried singing this to the cadence of the song it did not go well.

when i was a young boy i had the philosophy of ‘balls are the boobs of the penis so its ok that i want to suck on them it doesn’t make me gay” and tbh i was cooking

[beenherewaytoolong]

can we like, have adaptations made by people who care about the thing they're adapting

[beenherewaytoolong]

ever engage with a media you really really liked and thought you were going to become obsessed with but it doesn’t quite lodge itself into your brain at the correct angle and you can just brush fingertips with the version of yourself from the alternate reality where it completely corrupted your every waking thought

[beenherewaytoolong]

SINNERS 2025, dir. Ryan Coogler

Maybe once a week I wake up paralyzed reliving that night. But before the sun went down, I think that was the best day of my life. Was it like that for you?

[beenherewaytoolong]

Truly the all time funniest writer thing is when you're doing edits and you think to yourself "omg I've got the PERFeCT sentence to add right here!" and then you stick it in all excited, only to find that literally three lines down you have virtually that exact same sentence in the draft already.

[beenherewaytoolong]

Always funny when the smalltime gimmick blog also wants to take Big Discourse Stances but because their gimmick is some silly nonsense it looks like a guy taking off his Disney Character Mask to lecture you about the Gold Standard

[beenherewaytoolong]

some silly comic under uwu

[beenherewaytoolong]

[beenherewaytoolong]

(Takes place in the Steve: The Chicago Cryptid AU)

Robin uploads a video to her Tiktok account like, “If you’re ever wondering what I’m saying during my time lapse videos.”

And then it cuts to a different Robin working on a needlepoint project. Steve is off-camera mid-conversation like, “-wouldn’t say girlboss because I’m not a girl.”

Robin: You’re putting too much thought into this.

Steve: Unless girlboss is a state of mind. Like when Eddie calls me babygirl.

Steve: …anyways, boy-boss, gaslight, gaping.

Robin: ?

Steve: What? I’m not a girl and boss is like, a non-binary word.

Steve: And if I just say boss than it sounds like I think all bosses should be guys, and I don’t.

Steve: Why are you staring at me like that?

Robin: Gatekeeping.

Steve: What?

Robin: Gate. Keeping.

Robin: It’s gate-keeping. Not gaping.

Steve:

Steve: I’m pretty sure it’s gaping.

Robin: WHY WOULD IT BE - *end of video*

[beenherewaytoolong]

[beenherewaytoolong]

GET TO KNOW ME: ♡ [11/15] Female Characters: ☆ Amy March (Little Women)

I have been second to Jo my whole life in everything, and i will not be the person you settle for just because you cannot have her.

[beenherewaytoolong]

STRANGER THINGS 2.01 | Chapter One: MAD MAX

[beenherewaytoolong]

Thunderbolts* 2025 | dir. Jake Schreier