in-the-candlelight

[in-the-candlelight]

by tucker

[in-the-candlelight]

By the grace of God I am who I am, and His grace towards me was not in vain.

1 Corinthians 15:10

[in-the-candlelight]

Edward Holcroft as Arthur Kinnaird The English Game (2020-)  |  1x01

[in-the-candlelight]

[in-the-candlelight]

August 11, 2025, 11:58 p.m.

My intention with this was not to talk too much about family, or even the past. I wanted to focus on my inner world and late-blooming sexuality, but the past loves to boomerang back around. The past never truly feels like the past sometimes. Older brother has trauma, walks around with darkness in his mind and feels like no one cares about him. It's not unfounded, the roots are very real and entangled. He sees and expects the worst, he's also not that comforting. Our blood and skin are the same, but he saw and remembers much more than I do. I feel guilty for everything and it feels like no one forgives easily, he never does for sure. When family issues get brought up, the feeling it brings me is so hard to describe. It's this sickening, twisting, fearful, almost panicked feeling. The totality of the past and everything I'd rather forget gets unearthed in my gut and painfully reminds me "You'll never escape this. This is your family". I love and miss everyone. I feel guilty, resentful, invalidated, dismissed, afraid, invisible, judged, not comforted. I don't know how to help my brother, what I can do or if there's anything for me to do. He doesn't forgive and that's what I fear most about him. Family is such a great source of anxiety, especially when it's merged with the future. I never know what to do, besides to run away. "Fake my death, go to Cuba, that's the only option". But that would hurt everyone. There's always this sore inside of me, a wound I can't stitch or even find in my body.  

I feel like I'm drowning in my loneliness and fear and there's no one to run to. I'm neck deep in the ocean with my arms outstretched for help, who's coming? I see no one.

[in-the-candlelight]

Monday, August 11, 2025 ~ 1:43 a.m.

I know my soul is a flame in the dark, I saw it once when my eyes were closed. I once asked God to show me the color of my soul and He delivered. Desire, sensuality, longing, grief, and fear all entangle themselves inside of me, amorphous and inseparable. I've said to myself before that arousal feels just like a spell. My limbs loosen, eyelids lower, I lose strength in my hands and legs, I can even feel it in my mouth and gums. A magical, intangible mist that dances on the skin until it floods the entire body. Sometimes it feels like tiny electric shocks springing up from the bottom of my spine. Ache is when desire goes unmet and sensuality goes untouched, it starts to reach its hand out even further for relief or rescue from the dark. It twists inside of me on bad nights and I can't do anything about it besides dream or cry. Untouched and unknown. I've never been with a man or woman, never been kissed or chosen in any way. I still feel like a little girl trapped in a woman's body, but my desires remind me just how far away I really am.

I have one desire that I think of often, it's now morphed into an ache. It involves Edward Holcroft. I first saw him in a short video with the scene from Alias Grace, the one where his brows furrow with painful desire and restraint as she unbuttons her dress before he stops her. The caption was about preferring older men too, and now I was cursed. The size of his hands send me spinning, I loved everything about it. Over a short time, he became the center of my desires and now I only ever dream of him or Blue. I feel like sand getting taken by the wind when I think of him. His lips are so beautiful, dark pink and full. All I want to do is take both sides of his face in my hands and kiss him as sit in his lap. I'd kiss one corner, and then cover every inch with my kiss as I move to the other side of his mouth. I adore wavy hair, and his is no different. Golden, wavy, full. I'd run my fingers through it as I kiss him or while he's sleeping. I'd trace his teeth and cheekbones with my fingertips as I stare into his eyes. I'd take in every inch of him the way I would Michelangelo's 'Pieta'. He's sculpted and contoured as if he was carved instead of birthed like any man.

Most of my cravings are sensual, not always sexual, and in this fragment of my femininity, we're both lying in bed together. I've always enjoyed the thought of naked cuddling, indulging in the gorgeous luxury that is skin in between soft sheets with no intention or expectation of sex or performance. Just presence and sensuality, calm togetherness. Honeyed ivory sheets, antique wooden coffered ceilings, long stick candles burning in the dark as it glints off the brass. Everything is warm, a light golden hue in a darkened room. Home itself is medieval, ancient, Renaissance-era romantic. There's a storm outside in the middle of the night but it's not violent, the deepest slate grey before it becomes black. My legs entwine with his as he wraps his arms and hands around me tightly, I hide my face in his neck and he breathes in the scent of my hair. I can feel the soft hair on his legs and the strength of his chest. My favorite look on a man is grown-out hair that reaches the ears, or sometimes just past, with a full beard. Short, trimmed, clean, and soft. I absolutely love a strong build on a tall stature, without looking overly manicured or swollen. That's the look he has in The English Game and it's hard to see him in that role, it takes so much not to cry at the sight of him. I pull my face to his and ask him to nuzzle his beard against my face and neck, he wordlessly agrees with mink-soft eyes. We both relish in the sensation as he nuzzles and kisses my whole body, the desire continues with nuzzling my face in his chest hair. It's hard to explain what this world does to me, it's like a strong current of wind as it passes through a field and makes the land look like its breathing. I can almost feel it on my skin. I could melt. I hope I can have this one day, eternally. I wish for it deeply. I hope I find it.

[in-the-candlelight]

Stained-glass windows in St. Vitus Cathedral, Prague, 2018.

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Thundering On, 1920’s, George W. French. American (1882 - 1970)

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The Day After (1895) by Edvard Munch

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Valencian fisherman (1897) by Joaquín Sorolla

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Kitchen Garden at Louveciennes (1873) by Alfred Sisley

[in-the-candlelight]

The Lady from the sea (1896) by Edvard Munch

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Hilma af Klint (1862-1944, Swedish) ~ Doves (Duvan) No.2, 1915

[Source: opensea.io]

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Hilma af Klint at her studio at Hamngatan 5, Stockholm c. 1895

[in-the-candlelight]

Jacob's Ladder — 1799–1806 grey ink pen and watercolour on paper, 398 x 306 mm William Blake

[in-the-candlelight]

Lana Del Rey “Did You Know That There's a Tunnel Under Ocean Blvd”

Image by Neil Krug

https://www.instagram.com/neilkrug/

[in-the-candlelight]

Lana del Rey, 2014

📸 Neil Krug