privateanxieties

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My brain: hmmm I want to write something.

Each of my WIP: me?

My brain: no 💅

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literally any upper middle class tiktok self-identified ‘that girl’ in a pastel workout set with a thirteen step skincare routine and a green juice is a million times closer to being patrick bateman irl than any self-identified sigma film bro

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author’s notes today: hey guys so just a warning there isn’t 100% explicit verbal consent even though they’re both really into it so remember this is FICTION, also they don’t use a condom :((( but in real life safe sex is important!!! please be safe out there everyone

a/n back in the day: kept thinking about ____ stabbing knives through both of _____’s hands to pin him in place while they fucked so here you go lol =P

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No your honor i would never kill out of anger. I killed that guy for sport

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rip magneto you would have loved killing elon musk

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how could it have gone wrong, my approach was data-driven and trauma-informed

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Gonna chill out the rest of May and then change my entire life in June. Possibly July if that doesn't work out. Certainly no later than September or October.

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the author's barely disguised longing for a kinder world

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the issue with 2:15 is thats already 4 pm

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Hélène Béland (Canadian,b.1949)

Light catcher, 2012

Oil on linen

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dear professor i cant seem to lock in. its so over

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forget my mercy, take my blame (chapter 7)

Summary: An unexpected pit stop on the way into town serves to erase any doubt about what your purpose in life is. And everyone else will find out soon enough.

PREVIOUS CHAPTER | SERIES MASTERLIST

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If anyone asked, the only thing that could be offered by way of explanation is that it simply... happened.

The grass beneath your feet is lush but not dense, long yet quite frail. It gives way under your weight as if you're treading on clouds and remains bent in the wake of your steps, laying down a welcoming mat as if it's no problem at all that you're here. It might not be. You've filled up a spot or two in places like this before, so maybe it's an acknowledgement of your contribution. The earth is always hungry for guests and kind to those who provide them.

The town of Apolline doesn't have two of anything to rub together except places of eternal rest. It's a curious event when a town's dead begin to outnumber its living, but that is not the origin of this particular settlement. Apolline has two distinct cemeteries, because one is for the loved, and the other is for the faded. Many of the people who die in a place this isolated have few to remember them in life, and those who embark on their final journey with no relatives left behind will lament to find their resting place a neglected garden of overgrown weeds, shielded by hickory trees and lonely as can be.

Hazel would've turned a legendary pout at the state of it.

You were not in charge of her funeral arrangements. If you had been, she wouldn't be here now— tucked inside the corner beneath the largest tree, shaded from the ruthless sun but obscured from all other light too. She was supposed to let you take care of this like you'd once discussed, but she put off the notary appointment every single time it came around. As a result, the township made the decision to situate her here instead of the smaller cemetery closer to town, branding her unimportant in the afterlife. You're not sure if you're allowed to begrudge her the repeated delays. Maybe she didn't truly want to think about it, even if you never got the impression that Hazel was scared of death. Indeed, if anything, death might've had reason to be afraid of her, with the way she'd always speak so plainly of it. She left it no veil of mystery, and it felt mundane to hear her contemplate her life through the prism of its inevitable ending. Sometimes it felt like she was stealing those thoughts directly from your brain, and maybe that's why you were never phased when she'd detail all her morbid imaginings after asking you to make a good cup of coffee.

'Might be the last one I'll have, so it better be excellent, kiddo.'

She always did that. She always broke her days up into moments, always made them more significant than they had any reason to be. Hazel seemed to live on an internal clock that had fully accepted its eventual cessation. You never thought you'd be responsible for it. You should have— because that's what your purpose in life seems to be.

Thinking yourself ready for change was, as in retrospect most things are, foolish and pointless. The four years that have transpired since you stepped foot in this town could never be enough to unravel the intricately woven tapestry of binding habits that is your life, just as well as they could never be enough to meaningfully build upon it. Nothing that has happened in this near half-decade can be said to amount to real progress, except perhaps for you finally accepting life as it is. Of course, the last seventy-two hours have played an integral part in that— perhaps, even, the only part, because Apolline is a town where nothing ever happens.

With barely any life to it, it's the sort of place you once believed might be good for containing whatever is inside you that aches to devour less unassuming places. The town could hardly provide an opportunity for conflict to burst from containment and lay waste as it usually does in urban sprawls; unlike a vibrant city, Apolline is just a stretch of wilderness imbued with boredom, the personification of a lame tumbleweed. Despite this, moving here was among the greatest risks you've ever taken, all in the name of living some fleeting fantasy you might've once had.

It shouldn't have taken this long to come to your senses. Lots of people navigate adulthood with the guiding realization that there's no forcing themselves into boxes not meant for them. It's taken you longer than most to stop jamming that square peg into a round hole, but that's mostly because the only hole that would genuinely accomodate it is nothing but a freshly dug grave. There's only misery in that chasm, which you were once hoping to avoid. You're not so sure as to why anymore. To any outside observer, the natural progression of your entire life would only ever lead here: an abandoned cemetery outside the town that just a week ago you were still trying to convince yourself could be a home.

Coming to a halt in front of the murky grey headstone, your thoughts get swallowed up by the rattling silence characteristic of all forgotten places. What do you say at the grave of a woman whose death is your fault? It's not the first time you've happened upon this question. Too many years have passed since your grandmother's eulogy for the words to be remembered, but you're certain you used to know how to do this. Still, the words do not come.

You did not intend for this to be the destination when you set out from Frank's van, some time after the sun began its journey West. Truth be told, you did not intend to come here at all, ever. But especially not after everything you've done. There's none of Sam's blood on your person, but it doesn't matter. Killing always leaves something behind in the face, in the posture, and of course, in the smell. There's no way around it— you smell a little bit like death, and death has always smelled like rot to you. Not blood or guts or singed flesh, but rot; sometimes you think you can't really tell whether someone's truly dead until you smell it on them.

The wind shifts. A while passes.

You never saw her body, but you know it's the last time you'll stand before her, so you try to have some kind of moment. You try to stretch it into something more meaningful, like she would have.

In the end, you don't know what to say, so you say nothing. All the better— because the silence makes you remember where you're headed. A fucked up kind of pit stop, that's what this is. On the way from and towards more death. Your presence here accomplishes nothing. Hazel will never know that justice was done, no matter how hard you stare a hole into her name and the words beneath it. The epitaph is shit. You wonder who chose it. Her nephew didn't bother showing, and in a way you can't judge that. People who can do so build lives in rich communities, and you imagine they'd think Apolline a sad and pathetic little corner of the world they left behind. Returning would be uncomfortable.

Not so for you. In fact, you can't wait to arrive at your destination.

The brazen honesty startles momentarily. For a brief and perilous instance, it's almost like she can see you, the real you, yet can say and do nothing to show disapproval. She's a helpless woman under six feet of dirt, lying beneath emptiness and neglect.

It leaves a bad taste in the mouth, but you have to accept it: your entire life here, your very presence more than anything, is what earned Hazel a resting place among all these ghosts. You wonder if it's disrespectful to have even spoken to the woman at all. To have served her coffee and breakfast and freshly made bread from the same hands that have torn and split and crushed and squeezed. Was it cruel to have made her share her time with you? Deceitful to have presented yourself as normal? If she'd known, would she have run?

And are you wondering all this to avoid the natural conclusion?

You didn't do right by her in life. Why would you manage now?

Having yet more guilt to bear, you make your way around the weeds and hanging branches, heading towards the exit on the other side of the cemetery and keeping to whatever shade you can as you will the ruthless sun to descend faster.

Hazel will stay with the faded. There is no one in Apolline to remember her often enough to visit, and you've laid eyes on her for the last time.

You never meant to come. It simply happened. The cemetery was just on the way into town, down by the old brewery coming into view as you walk down the sweltering path. Both establishments are equally abandoned, slowly but surely being claimed by nature until they're as entwined with it as regret is with wrongdoing.

A sense of belonging was always hard to come by, but not as the rotting wood of the cellar door gives way and you step into the ambient darkness.

.

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-to be continued-

A/N:

I am reviving this story from the depths of hiatus hell and we'll see as to what state it's in once I edit the whole thing. There are things about it I can't change without making significant alterations to the plot, but I'll do my best to subtly redirect some aspects and patch up inconsistencies. This update was meant to be a longer chapter of plot developments, but since it's been so long since my last update and I am getting back into the groove of this story and these characters, I am taking it slow with a little contemplative update. I'm also not loving the fact that it's not third-person narration, because what was I even thinking. Let's see where this leads and if I can take us to a satisfying conclusion. Thank you for reading!

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You heard his too?

Oh, yeah.

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Guy who is touch starved but emotionally repressed goading you into punching him for completely normal reasons

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I wish age gap discourse hadn't spiraled the way it has because I want there to be a safe space to say "Men in their 40s who date 25 year olds aren't predators, they're just fucking losers"

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I just found out you have written for matt as well and I'm so surprised and happy?!? I'm going through my matt murdock phase again due to born again and to see that one of my favourite writers has written made my day

Thank you, that's so sweet! I almost forgot that I've written for Matt, since I think I got swept up by the original show very quickly and saw infinite story possibilities - and then they introduced Frank Castle and bam, Matt was no longer the main focus for me. I wish I could say Born Again reignited that phase for me, but unfortunately all it managed to do was crush my hopes and dreams lol. I am, however, writing for Frank again because episode 4 lives rent free in my head.

I also don't have Matt Murdock on my tumblr masterlist, but I have a couple more oneshots of Matt over on AO3 if you're interested. Here they are:

https://archiveofourown.org/works/46785997 (this is a stand-alone oneshot with fluff/domesticity)

https://archiveofourown.org/works/46554826 (this one is an in-universe oneshot of the 3-part story with Matt x superpowered!reader)