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aemiron-main · 1 year

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Who Is Edward Creel? If You’re Confused About Him, Read This Post

So, I’ve been seeing a lot of people asking about Edward Creel and who he is and what the hell people are talking about with him, so I figured I’d make a big general post about Edward. You can skip to the end for a bulletpoint TLDR summary.

Where Did Edward Come From?

I originally noticed him here, in the Indianapolis Gazette article about the Creel murders, and made an initial post about his name just being a reference to the idea of Vecna using Eddie/Edward Munson as a corpse puppet.

However, as I went through more of the Indianapolis Gazette, I realized that this goes WAY, WAY beyond “corpse puppet Eddie,” references, and rather than “Edward Creel being a reference to Edward Munson,” it’s actually the other way around, and Edward Munson is a reference to Edward Creel and has multiple lines that reinforce the idea of Edward being Vecna rather than Henry.

Here is a large post about some of the timeline differences, and it’s a post that’s been sitting in my drafts for a LONG time and is what initially prompted me to look further into the multiple timeline stuff/the concrete differences between Edward’s timeline and Henry’s timeline.

As far as “where did Edward come from in-universe?” goes though, THAT is a much more complicated question, one that I’m still trying to answer.

Who Is Edward Creel?

So, who IS Edward? Well, I very much think that Edward is Vecna, and here’s why:

1.) I talked in this post about the parallels between ST and Jekyll and Hyde, specifically regarding Henry Creel and Edward Creel versus Henry Jekyll and Edward Hyde, and how Jekyll and Hyde and ST tie into Carl Jung’s theory of the shadow. I would recommend reading that post for a solid intro into the idea that Edward is Vecna and the relationship between Edward and Henry and Edward being Henry’s “shadow self”.

2.) Eddie/Edward Munson is literally Vecna in the DND game- just like how Edward Creel is actually Vecna, they’re meant to parallel eachother.

3.) All of the name weirdness where there’s that whole scene with Robin and the Hawkins gang being uncle to figure out what to call Vecna (Vecna or Henry or 001), and how even though the supposed plot twist was that Henry was Vecna, it’s actually that 001 was Vecna, and we don’t know for sure if Henry is 001 due to the Edward weirdness, and all of the continued debate about names after the supposed plot twist/reveal tells me that we still aren’t done learning about who Vecna actually is. Especially since at the end of S4, Will just talks about “him,” and how he can still feel him, and doesn’t name him. You’d think if Vecna was Henry, they’d throw in a reference to Henry there, and that in general, they’d draw a stronger link between Henry and Vecna rather than drawing that link between 001 and Vecna, which is what they’ve done.

4.) There's some other reasons too, but I'm still finishing up the analysis posts for those.

How Is Edward Creel Connected To Henry Creel?

So, this is a question that ties into the question of “where did Edward Creel come from in-universe?”, and as such, is also a difficult question to answer. However, right now, these are the main theories about where Edward came from and how he’s connected to Henry (none of these are in any particular order, like 1.) isn’t the top theory or anything):

1.) Edward was split off or cloned from Henry in Hawkins Lab as part of Brenner’s attempts to recreate Henry, and then something happened with timeline and time travel weirdness, and Edward ended up with his whole own timeline where he grew up in the Creel house instead of being cloned/born in a lab.

2.) Edward and Henry are eachother’s naturally-occurring equivalents from different timelines, and one or both of them and/or the lab were messing with time and ended up swapping timelines/temporal displacement stuff.

3.) Henry and Edward were born as actual brothers in the same timeline but something happened with timelines splitting and they ended up in different timelines.

How Is Edward Connected To Timeline and Time Travel Weirdness?

So, I already talked about this post where I compare Edward’s timeline with Henry’s timeline and all of the drastic differences, but it goes beyond just different timelines, because we have all that imagery of Henry/Edward turning back a clock with his mind, and all of the general timeline weirdness/time travel imagery in ST, in addition to Vecna’s clock imagery.

I’m still figuring out exactly what happened and how he’s connected to Henry and timeline weirdness, but there’s definitely a big connection there, especially considering birthdaygate and the fact that in Edward’s timeline, the Creel murders happened on Will’s birthday.

Transcription of The Indianapolis Gazette Article Involving Edward

So, this is just a transcription of the article relating to the Creels, not all of the articles in the page (although I AM finishing up analysis posts of those articles).

Paper Title: Indianapolis Gazette

Publication Date: Thursday, March 26th, 1959. (MIGHT say 1958, but most likely 1959)

Article Title: 3 Dead as Police Probe Grisly Scene

Subtitle: Bodies Left Mutilated, Eyeless, Creel Defiant

Column 1:

Bulletin

"Local family man, Victor Creel, murdered his wife and two small children Saturday night.

The bodies were discovered early Sunday morning after Creel was found wandering aimlessly along the side of Highway 49, South of Hawkins.

Deputy John Snow from Hawkins Police Department intercepted Creel and made the discovery upon returning him home. The bodies of three persons have been found inside the home of a 35-year-old Town of Hawkins Roane County family man. Law enforcement officers searching Sundary Morning for signs of foul play found the bodies of Virginia Creel, Edward Creel, and Alice Creel strewn about the foyer of the house, six miles from downtown Hawkins.

Sherif fJack Kaulfield of Roane County and Director Larry Peacefield of the State of Indiana Crime Laboratory kept newsmen from the site Sunday.

Roane County Dist. Atty. ParkerJones said today that Creel had broken his silence that he "might of" killed the victims and admitted to being present when the victims died. Shortly after 11 o'clock, this morning, Creel was taken from the jails at Hawkins by Jack-" (article cuts off)

Column 2

"Officers who had been at the scene said these things were among those found at the Creels' home: The eyeless, mutilated body of Mrs Creel, "butchered, like you would clean a deer," according to one law enforcement officer. The mangled and eyeless bodies of the two young children- Virginia and Edward- laid deflated and bent on the floor of the foyer. Creel at first told authorities he knew nothing about the things that occurred at his house. He is decribed as 5 feet 10 inches tall, weighing about 158 (?) pounds, with light skin, light brown hair, and "appearing slight and unable to perform basic motor functions"- a condition likely brought on as a result of the psychological consequences of committing the murders, said head psychiatrist at Pennhurst Asylum, Alexis McMurry. Creel was known around town for his generosity and the Creel Family was regularly seen at Sunday Mass at St. Phillip's Catholic Church on Sundays. Which has led many locals to wonder what led Creel to commit such ghastly acts. A veteran from the second world war, VIctor Creel served two tours of duty in Europe and returned home a hero. After moving to-" (article cuts off)

Caption Under Photo

House of Horror

Here is the house in which the Creels lived for the last two years where authorities found the remains of Alice, Edward, and Virginia Creel- Victor Creel's wife, son, and daugther- Early SUnday in what police are calling "the most grisly set of murders the town of Hawkins has ever seen"

What Is Edward’s Timeline/Thw Indianapolis Gazette Timeline?

Here’s the key events and info that you should know if you’re interested in Edward’s timeline/the Indianapolis Gazette timeline:

Edward moved to Hawkins in 1957 and lived there for two years.

Edward’s father is Victor Creel, and his Victor is 35 years old as of 1958.

Edward’s mother is Alice Creel, and her age is not listed.

Edward’s sister is Virginia Creel, and her age is not listed.

The Creel Murders happened on March 21st, 1959 in Edward’s timeline.

How are Connie Frazier and Alice Creel and Mike Wheeler and Eleven Connected To The Edward Timeline?

Remember how I mentioned that Edward’s mother is named Alice, NOT Virginia (unlike Henry, whose mother is Virginia)? Well, that’s who “Mother Alice,” is (if you’ve seen me using that name on my blog), and I also think that she’s Connie Frazier.

I originally posted here about Connie being Henry’s sister, Alice, prior to the realization of how she connected to the Edward timeline, but then that turned into the realization that Connie is more likely Edward’s mother, Alice, rather than Henry’s sister, Alice. I’d recommend reading that post, so I’m not going to retype it all here, but the name “Alice,” plays repeatedly in the song “White Rabbit,” when Connie is on screen. I’ve got more Connie posts here and here. Mother Alice’s death in the Hawkins Middle School hallway in S1 even parallels Daughter/Sister Alice’s death at the Creel house in 1959.

In this post, I talk further about Connie being Mother Alice, but I also talk about something/someone else in that post- Karen Wheeler.

I think that Karen Wheeler is Sister Virginia/Virginia Creel from another timeline (the Edward timeline). I’ve got more posts about Karen being Daughter Virginia and Virginia-Karen parallels here, here, here, and here.

As well, @henrysglock has a bunch of great posts about how Eleven ties into this, as Eleven is likely Edward’s daughter in one timeline (daughter in the sense that he’s her biological father due to Brenner trying to recreate Henry/Edward).

However, if Eleven is Edward’s daughter in the Edward timeline, and Karen Wheeler is Edward’s sister in the Edward timeline, then doesn’t that make Mike and Eleven blood cousins? Yes.

I posted here, here, here, and here, about Edward Timeline Victor being Karen/Daughter Virginia’s father and therefore being Nancy, Holly, and Mike’s grandfather.

Summary

So, here’s the current main thoughts to know about Edward Creel:

He was originally found here, in the Indianapolis Gazette.

He is very, very likely Vecna, rather than Henry Creel being Vecna.

He has a timeline that is different from Henry Creel’s timeline.

Even in the definition of a timeline as “a series of dates,” and setting time travel/multiple timeline weirdness aside (even though he IS very much involved with that) his series of dates is canonically, indisputably, different from Henry’s, thus, literally different timelines even in the most basic sense.

His mother is Alice Creel and his sister is Virginia Creel, the opposite of Henry’s mother and sister.

The Indianapolis Gazette DOES NOT mention Henry Creel at ALL. ONLY Edward and mentions him repeatedly as being Victor Creel’s son.

Edward’s father is still Victor Creel, but his Victor is younger than Henry’s Victor, as Edward’s Victor was 35 in 1959 and Henry’s Victor was 40 in 1959.

Edward Creel lived in Hawkins for two years, and moved there in 1957.

In Edward’s timeline, the Creel murders happened on the night of March 21st and were discovered on the morning of the 22nd (Will’s birthday), whereas the murders happened on the night of March 25th in Henry’s timeline.

Edward Creel’s body was supposedly found with his eyes gouged out (whereas Henry slipped into a coma after 7 days and did not lose his eyes), however, in both Henry and Edward’s case, there is ALWAYS the possibility of the lab creating fake bodies, which is what I think happened, especially since we see the same State Troopers involved with Will’s fake body arresting Victor.

Edward’s sister and mother also likely survived, which is where we get into more speculation, because I have the initial post here about Connie Frazier being Alice Creel and then a post here about Connie Frazier being Edward’s Mother/Mother Alice/Alice Creel from another timeline and about Karen Wheeler being Edward’s sisters/Sister Virginia/Virginia Creel from another timeline.

I’m still figuring out exactly how Edward and Henry are related, if they’re a.) just eachother from naturally-occurring alternate timelines, if they’re b.) twin brothers from the same timeline but separated into different timelines scientifically or supernaturally or c.) Edward being Henry’s clone as a result of Brenner trying to recreate Henry in a lab or split off from Henry, or vice versa, and then Edward getting to live at the Creel house/experience the Creel murders via timeline weirdness even though he was “born” in the lab.

There’s also a solid chance that there’s multiple Henries (possibly even three or four, for example) and one Edward, or multiple Edwards and multiple Henries etc etc, because there seems to be multiple timelines happening, and also there’s multiple different Henries/Edwards during NINA, all with different blood splatters on their jumpsuits, and all with completely different, changing child corpses during their massacre sequences.

There is a “Richard Brenner”, listed in the S1 final episode article about Will’s vanishing, and Edward and his timeline is likely connected to Richard Brenner rather than Martin Brenner, or Henry is connected to Richard and Edward to Martin, I’m still figuring that out.

Some of the S1 scenes, specifically the ones involving Connie Frazier, seem to be occurring in the Edward Timeline (or one of the Edward timelines/the Indianapolis Gazette timeline), because if Connie Frazier is Mother Alice Creel, then she exists in the Edward timeline, so when we see her, we’re seeing Edward’s timeline. Unless, of course, she got mixed up into another timeline, which is always an option.

I’m suspicious that Edward was watching the Creel family from the void or from another timeline (see: Will’s “True Sight”/however he was able to see the alphabet on the Byers’ wall from the UD in s1 and was “trapped in the walls”/in the Byers’ house) and that Edward is what Victor was “sensing,” in the attic, much like Billy sensing/seeing El in the void in s3 and Mike seemingly sensing El in the void in s2. Will being “trapped in the walls,” of the Byers’ house is likely going to come back with Edward and Henry in S5 and Edward being “in the walls,”/watching the Creels from the void or from another timeline.

One of the “Henries” monologuing to El during the massacre is very very likely Edward

Regarding what I said about Mother Alice being Connie Frazier and Daughter Virginia being Karen Wheeler in the Edward timeline, that would make Victor Creel the grandfather of Mike, Holly, and Nancy, and would make Connie Frazier their grandmother.

And if El is Edward’s daughter from the lab and Brenner trying to recreate him, then that would mean that Mike and El are blood cousins in the Edward timeline.

List of My Posts About Edward

Here’s a current list of my posts about Edward, and I’m finish up a new pinned post/directory that’ll have a continuously updating list of links to my posts about him! (here is the link to the edward pinned post section)

Who The Fuck Is Edward Creel? Original Discovery of Edward Creel Post (x)

Edward Creel is Vecna and Henry Creel is Innocent: The First Shadow, Edward Creel, Henry Jekyll and Edward Hyde, and Carl Jung’s Theory of the Shadow (x)

Initial Post About The Creel Murders Happening On Will’s Birthday In The Edward Timeline (x)

NOTE: I use “Henry” in this post because this was before I connected it to Edward being a separate person, so just swap “Henry” for Vecna, but the Indianapolis Gazette IS the Edward timeline.

Confirming That The Creel Murders Happened On Will’s Birthday In The Edward Timeline (x)

NOTE: Same as the other post, use “Henry” in this post because this was before I connected it to Edward being a separate person, so just swap “Henry” for Vecna, but the Indianapolis Gazette IS the Edward timeline.

The Creels’ Disappearing Door and Magic, Colour-Changing Wallpaper (x)

Birthdaygate and When Did The Henry-Edward Split Happen And Was Edward Watching The Creel Family From The Void Or Via True Sight From Another Timeline? (x)

Edward Creel and the Lost Brother (x)

Edward Creel is Totally Vecna- Eddie’s DND Scene (x)

Edward Munson and Henry Creel and Being Blamed For Murder (x)

Revisiting The “If We Just Go Based On Henry’s Monologue, We Would Have No Clue Alice Even Existed Until The End And He Never Mentions Her By Name” Post With The Context Of Edward (x)

The First Shadow: Shadow(s) of The Past and LOTR (x)

The Shadows of The Past Have a Very Long Reach (x)

The First Shadow: Demons In Your Past (x)

Edward Being Bolded On The S4 Movie Board (x)

You’re Not A Child vs I’m Not A Dog And Henry Or Edward Being “Not A Child” (x)

Edward and Henry and 001 vs 000 (x)

Henry’s Colour-Changing Socks (x)

I Don’t Know What That Thing Is But It’s Not My Son- Victor, Henry, Edward, and Vecna (x)

Why Are We Seeing Through The Eyes of Someone The Same Height As Henry So Often? And Why Did Henry Look Up At The Camera? (x)

How Does Timeline Theory Stuff Tie Into Other Events In ST and How Does It Tie Into The Themes of ST and How Are The Duffers Going To Pull It Off Without Blindsiding the GA? (x)

Something Was Wrong With Me Vs What Is Wrong With My Boy (x)

Lost In The Darkness vs Hiding In The Darkness vs Hiding In The Shadows vs Good At Hiding (x)

Is Sam Owens Edward’s Father/Victor Creel From Another Timeline? (x)

“Well, my hair was buzzed and i didnt have these sweet old tatties yet”- Another Eddie Munson vs Edward Creel Parallel (x)

Just Move Your Date This One Time: Edward and Moving Dates (x)

All Your Theories About It Are Wrong, Because I’ve Seen One and Fought One: Edward Creel is Vecna/001 (ft Which One Is It?) (x)

The Lab IDs That Kali Dumped Out Vs Edward and Henry (x)

Edward Creel and the Criticism of Eddie Munson Being a Pointless Character (x)

Henward’s Plinko Reflection (x)

Henward Standing Like Alice Vs Standing Like Young Henward (x)

That’s The One: Will and 001 and Edward Creel (x)

I’m Eleven, You Long Haired Freak (x)

Edward, Eddie, and Straitjackets (x)

Joseph Quinn and Jamie Bower Doing Press Together, ST5, and Edward Creel/Vecna Using Eddie Munson as a Flesh Puppet So That Jamie Is Freed Up To Play Henry Creel (x)

Reblog of Stav’s Post Regarding Edward Creel, Eddie Munson, Reefer Rick, Richard Brenner, and Will’s Vanishing vs Eddie Hiding Parallels and Eddie Being Mistaken For Rick (x)

Eddie The Banished vs Edward Creel and Eddie’s Death Scene vs Edward Creel/001 Getting Sent To Superhell (x)

#stranger things #edward creel #henry creel #st creel timeline weirdness #byler

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pinkeoni · 1 year

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Will’s Creation Powers: A Man, His Dog, and a Baseball Bat

I don’t think I’ve ever made my own concrete creation power post that actually went into detail about this, so let’s discuss how the monsters in the Upside Down perfectly align with Will’s fear of his dad.

Pretty long post and discussions of child abuse under the cut

So right now my working theory is that while Will was being abused by Lonnie as a child, Will’s consciousness traveled to the Upside Down as a place of safety. There, Will subconsiously manifested his fears as the monsters in the UD.

We aren’t told in the show exactly how long the monster have been living in the UD. Perhaps with The First Shadow we will know more, but as far as we know it’s possible they haven’t always been there. We just know that they’ve been there at least before Henry got there, meaning that he at least didn't create them.

Why Do I Think Will Has Creation Powers?

I guess maybe I should explain why I believe that Will has creation powers in the first place.

Let's say you had a character that had certain powers, but you couldn't reveal them until the final season, how would you hint at them so they don't come out of nowhere, all without blatantly revealing them?

Will's art has been a staple of his character since the first season, it's even been used in regards to major plot points. IE Joyce recognizing that El's art in the lab is not Will's art, and Will drawing the tunnels in season two. Will uses art as an outlet for his creativity, but he also uses it to express his emotions, such as hurt, fear, or love.

We also know that Henry needs Will for something, although what exactly hasn't been stated. I don't personally believe that Will was simply in the wrong place at the wrong time, given how much we have been shown in season 4 is actually very calculated by Henry. We do know, however, that Henry wants to destroy the world in order to rebuild it in his image. So how would he gain access to an ability like that?

In season two, we learn through Kali that some power users have abilities that other power users don't have. Kali is able to create visions for other people. We also learn that gate opening in a power unique to El, and the "Vecna Visions" that we see is something that we've only seen Henry do. If Will had a power unique to him, and that power was related to his art, it wouldn't come out of nowhere.

Lonnie the Demogorgon

I’ll start with Lonnie, which will lead us to all of the other monsters. He is the main perpetrator here. kaypeace21 has a ton of theory posts on her page that goes into a lot of detail, I reccommend checking them out since it’s my main source of inspiration for this theory.

In my mind the coding between the demogorgon and Lonnie is pretty clear. Lonnie was mentioned as a possible suspect as to who Will could be with. The demogorgon eats its eggs. Lonnie is the predator that is hunting down and hurting his family. Demogorgon literally means “deep father.”

I wanna point out this scene too. Will is talking to Joyce through the wall and he says “It’s coming!” in reference to the demogorgon. It’s not the very next scene, but the next scene with Joyce shows Lonnie arriving at the Byers home.

Chester the Demodog

When the demogorgon appears outside of Will’s house on the night he vanished, Chester barks at the door. (Notice too how Chesters head is positioned right next to a plant, similar to how demodogs have flower shaped heads) When Jonathan goes to see Lonnie a little later, there’s a dog barking in the distance.

Perhaps, whenever Lonnie would come home, maybe after a night of drinking, Chester would bark signaling his return? Maybe Will associates Chester barking with his father?

One of the demodogs, formerly D’Art, was being kept as a pet by Dustin. Chester was Will’s former pet, who seemed to die before the season where demodogs are introduced. D'Art also killed Dustin's other pet, Mews, creating another dead pet correlation.

The Baseball Demobat

This one might seem like the biggest stretch, but if you pair it up with the other two it may not be that far of a reach. We know from season one that Lonnie used to bring Will to baseball games, baseball games that Will didn't even like going to. I propose in a theory here that baseball games may be associated with a particularly bad memory for Will. We see that Will did hold on to a baseball bat, which he uses to destroy Castle Byers with.

The demobats have long tails, similar to the long hilt of a baseball bat.

In season 4, when being attacked by the demobats, Steve grabs one by the tail and swings it to the ground like a baseball bat. Steve is also a character who was seen using a bat before in season 2.

Proposed Timeline:

When Will is a young child, he is abused by his father (possibly on his birthday?)

Will consciousness travels to the Upside Down, and possibly links with the Shadow Monster

Through a fear response, Will creates the monsters in the Upside Down as he associates them with the abuse of his father

Will, however, doesn't remember this abuse (similar to how El doesn't remember the massacre of the lab)

In season 5, Will will likely have to confront these missing memories and his powers will reawaken

#will byers #will byers has powers #stranger things #stranger things theory #stranger things 5 #creation theory #lonnie byers #tw lonnie byers #my theory #byler #<- target audience #said i was gonna work on drafts and made a whole new post instead #tw csa #tw child abuse

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frankingsteinery · 6 months

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thoughts on elizabeth x justine?

personally i don’t have many strong opinions on it! i don’t think there’s much in the text to support it (and i believe elizabeth refers to justine as her sister when visiting her before her execution if i recall correctly), but i think it could be fun and cute if you enjoy shipping. in general, i do acknowledge and have even analyzed the homoromantic/erotic subtext in frankenstein, but i don’t think it was intentional or intended to be read that way, and while i enjoy engaging in shipping sometimes (and i’ve even written waltonstein fic myself), i think honestly as a whole shipping within the frankenstein fandom tends to detract from the value of the book because people focus on (inventing) romance rather than the themes and commentary that are actually present, and it usually comes at the expense of the actual characterization. i get im complaining about shipping in a fandom space, which is often inherently shippy, but it’s still a bit tiring when the only interest and content/discussion surrounding supporting characters like henry and justine and walton (who IS a narrator and a complex, rounded character! why do we not talk about walton more!) are only ever through romantic relationships with victor, elizabeth or the creature.

i can’t talk much on elizabeth x justine because i haven’t seen too much content of it, but while it isn’t as severe as other fandoms, i do see henry and victor specifically flanderized and reduced into one-dimension tropes when shipped with each other. i get henry wasn’t a rounded character in the first place but he was definitely still flawed (ex. being avoidant about victors issues, never confronting the situation even when something was obviously wrong, etc) and at times even confrontational/chastising—not unkind but chastising (im thinking specifically when henry & victor first reunite at ingolstadt and henry lectures him a little for not having written to them) and i don’t see this written about very much at all, specifically in shipping content where henry is the happy sunshine golden retriever to victor’s black cat or whatever.

i also never really see mentions of henry’s life outside of context of his life revolving around victor if that makes sense, even though shelley goes out of her way to give us a bit of backstory on the clervals, and to establish that he has stuff going on outside of his relationship with the frankensteins. it’s always “henry is sad victor is going away for college and won’t be able to see him” and YES that is absolutely a part of it, but he’s also a dreamer who’s dissatisfied with the career that’s been dictated by his family, the life trajectory set out for him, who advocates for himself and argues with his father to pursue these dreams and get a higher education. he IS optimistic and a deliberate foil + supporting character to victor in a lot of ways, but he was also dissatisfied and upset with the career that had been chosen for him, and it’s implied his relationship with his father is a bit rocky, and, like victor, he could be a bit morose almost—go look in the 1818 novel when clerval is walking victor to the carriage after williams death; it’s quite far from most fanon interpretations of him

overall i think shipping in frankenstein can be entertaining, but i tend to be quite picky and enjoy content that dissects the themes and characters themselves more rather than romance just being the sole focus, and for this reason i tend to stick more to the analysis side of things!

#rob.txt #frankenstein #victor frankenstein #henry clerval #elizabeth lavenza #justine moritz #gothic lit #asks #this isn’t to slander people who enjoy shipping!#i do!#but often most content of it #isn’t my cup of tea : )

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kaspenhoward · 2 months

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Six The Musical Headcanons - Jane Seymour:

-I believe that like the beheaded cousins she too has PTSD but unlike her cousins she doesn’t trash, fight, run, or scream, she simply freezes, becomes silent and can’t move. The same for nightmares, where she taught herself to be quiet cause Henry in her last life got upset with her for panicking

-Why does Jane go through this though? You might ask. Well queendom that’s because as we all agree, Henry is a a*s, we know he didn’t truly love anyone all that “Plain Jane” talk from history books is probably from the fact Jane was ab*sed into being the perfect housewife and just that, which we know in reality is short of possible. Henry was a jerk meaning the unfortunately Jane probably suffered from that. Even with hints of the possibility in heart of stone; “build me up, tear me down” could be interpreted as Henry love bombing her just to hurt her soon after.

-I’m a fanboy for mother figure Jane as much of you probably are as well, her, quiet, gentle, motherly nature definitely pulled Kat (Katherine Howard) in quickly and two from what I like to believe, bonded very quickly. Jane does enjoy also fussing over the other Queens as well, and to tease her Anne and Anna enjoy jokingly calling her “Mum Jane”, Jane to tease them back will fuss over them excessively much to their chagrin

-Kat, called Jane mum once in front of everyone and was very embarrassed and worried about how Jane would take it, hid from everyone for as long as she could, but once Jane found her, she reassured her and told her it was okay. It now is common occurrence to hear Jane and Kat refer to each other as “mum” and “daughter” in the queen household and out of it.

-At random times during the night once every two months, you’ll just find Jane very awake quietly wondering around the house. Jane never really elaborates why she just says “making sure”.

-Jane prefers tea over coffee. She makes a really good tea, and much to the other queens chagrin, they never can replicate it no matter how many times Jane tries to show them how to make it.

-Jane is the only one who isn’t banned from using the oven, and only Jane and Catalina are allowed to use the stove without another queens supervision.

-Jane hates loud noises, especially yelling, and confrontation. And she’s terrified of “screwing up” as she likes to say even though the queens reassure her that she’s allowed to make mistakes. One time she broke a glass, froze for a minute but then frantically shaking tried to quickly pick of the glass, this ended up injuring herself and Kitty had to carefully pry the glass out of her hands to get her to stop.

-Jane actually finds very nice company in Cathy and Anna. Jane when she initially comes back is unable to read, Cathy discovers this one day when her and Jane are out shopping and Cathy teaches her how to read in private. Jane isn’t near perfect but she’s improved and finds pleasant company reading with Cathy or Cathy asking her philosophical questions which even if she doesn’t understand the full concept makes Jane very happy to try and answer because for the first time her opinion and knowledge is being asked of her. Anna is very energetic and while Jane can’t always match such energy, finds much enjoyment in having a nice day out with Anna sometimes who brings a lot of energy into the room/environment while also including Jane.

-Regarding the sexuality of Jane, I don’t really have a set idea cause it doesn’t matter much in my mind cause I think all the queens just need a long break from romance to.. process stuff and happily live as a family. I honestly don’t really complain about any shipping of the queens as long as it isn’t between the cousins but it’s more personal opinion that they all need a few years before any of that. BUT, Panromantic for sure. That’s my verdict she’s just too loving of a person to care about gender. (In my happy little ace mind I imagine all my favorite characters to be ace so that’s what I would say because I prefer living in that bubble)

-When Jane gets upset she gets one of two: immensely quiet or incredibly frantic. Whichever one she doesn’t like to be seen in that sort of state and tried to hide from the others. Effectively this doesn’t end up working in the end when Kat constantly clings to or follows Jane around like a little duckling. Leading to one day where Kat finds Jane crying the most silent cry ever that breaks her heart. After the incident Jane knows she can always go to any of her queens for help.

-Jane is the sweetest most kind hearted person ever, yes. But her infamous temper that comes out once every blue moon is terrifying enough it even scares Catalina.

Omg I love this queen so much 🤍🤍🤍

#jane seymour #jane seymour queen of england #mom friend jane #six #six the musical #six head canons #catalina de aragon #catherine of aragon #cathy parr #catherine parr #kathrine howard #katherine howard #kathryn howard #anna of cleves #anna von kleve #anne boleyn

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wibble-wobbegong · 2 years

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The Vanishing of Mike Wheeler

In this little post of mine i’m gonna be telling you the story of how Mike’s disappearance is gonna go in S5 through the perspective of the Hellfire DND game, which represents the Rightside Up/The Party’s POV, and an album which can be directly associated as the Upside Down/Henry’s POV of the same events, revealing how all of this is actually gonna go down in the show.

I know you guys all know what DND game I’m talking about, so I’ll introduce you to a little album called Under the Influence by Overkill from 1988.

In order to connect this album to the DND game, you have to look at the design of the cover here. The most prominent feature is the giant skull with horns and bat wings, right? When you go to look at the set up for Eddie’s DND stuff, there are two stickers:

Both of those have the exact same symbol: a skull with horns and bat wings. What makes these stickers unique is the lightning bolt behind them, which isn’t in the 1988 cover (the first time this mascot ever gets used). The only character we can directly associate with actual lightning is Henry. Yes, Will is sometimes associated with electricity in non-canon content, but Henry was literally struck by lightning in the show.

In the album, there are constant references to the invasion of the mind, being reborn, and there are a few mentions of needing to head for the light as well. This album is heavily coded as Henry’s POV, but it’s also tied to Eddie. That’ll be important for later!!

Character Establishment

Ok, so before breaking down the DND game itself, let me explain which figurines represent which characters really quick.

Mike is represented by his paladin, obviously. Same with Dustin and his bard. Lucas, although he isn’t playing right now, is still being represented by the ranger on the table. I believe the figure I’ve associated with El is a mage, which also lines up because Mike declares her to be the Party’s mage in S2. As for Max’s figure, I don’t have any idea what class that figure is meant to be but the figure is prominently blue, which is a color heavily associated with Max in S4. I don’t know much about DND, so maybe I just don’t recognize the class, or there isn’t meant to be a recognizable class because Max is a zoomer.

Now, as for Will, I hate this just as much as everybody else will but I think he’s being represented by the Vecna figure. For one, we know that Henry himself doesn’t really align with the description of the actual character of Vecna. More so, we never actually witness the Vecna figure attacking anyone. It’s implied, but the visual isn’t there which normally wouldn’t matter except that we do see the attack against one character; Mike. That attack doesn’t come from Vecna.

Most importantly, though, is the the design they chose for Vecna’s figure. There are many different versions they could’ve gone with but they chose the one where Vecna’s staff has the green in his staff. You know what that looks a lot like?

So, Will is being represented by the Vecna figure. Considering that this is all gonna play out in reality in the UD, that actually makes perfect sense because Will is sort of the Vecna of the UD, like how Henry is the Vecna of the RU. The’re opposites.

As for why the actual Vecna, Henry, is being represented by another figure is something that can only be explained through telling this story. Same with Eddie. So, let me dust off this book I found in the corner and show you what I’m talking about.

The Vanishing

So, the DND game is reflecting the reality of S5 when the party decides to go after Vecna. DND games have always been used to predict events in the pasy, as we saw with the ‘weird flowers in the cave’ coming true in S2 and Hopper’s cover-up story being exactly as described by how Mike and Lucas died in the S3 campaign. What I think it really important about this game, however, is the fact that the Hellfire game seems to be ending with a crawl. Crawls are used in DND to set up fights with monsters and take place on a set map, which is what the Hellfire Party goes through. There is a very deliberately set map for the end of this campaign.

It’s important to remember this, because 5x01 is called The Crawl. The Party is gonna be going after Henry pretty soon after Will/Mike reveals he’s still alive. I don’t think they’ll jump into it immediately, but in terms of episodes they’re either gonna be planning their attack or possibly setting it into motion in the first episode.

The meat of this section goes into two things; Mike’s dice roll and the third song from the album, Hello from the Gutter. After the Hellfire Party establishes that they’d fight Vecna to the death, the second scene is of Mike rolling the dice. Mike’s roll is actually given the same level of importance as Dustin and Erica’s rolls and it’s shot very similarly too. There’s one thing that all three of those scenes have in common, and it’s the color of their dice. Those are the only times the red-on-black dice are used. It’s not a matter of who gets to roll them, but rather what the represent. What the r-o-b dice are confirming is that this will be happening in the future. They’re inherently predictive of incredibly important events. Although all of this is predictive, these three rolls are the most important by far because they’re turning points in the story. So why is Mike’s included? Let’s really look at that scene. When Mike rolls his dice, we never see what number it lands on, unlike Dustin or Erica, but we know it’s low enough to ‘kill’ him. I’m sure you can figure out a number that would be low enough to lead to a death, a number that’s important to the story, and a number they couldn’t show us. One.

When we look at the result of Mike’s dice roll, something weird happens.

This is actually the first time we can confirm that the dark sorcerer is Henry, because that first image places the Overkill symbol directly above the dark sorcerer and even has the lightning bolt pointing directly at it. In the perspective of the RU, both Henry and Mike’s deaths are implied. Mike’s death is implied verbally and Henry’s is implied on the board. So, I’m actually gonna consult the lighting to explain this.

When you look at the lighting of this scene and compare it to the lighting for the other scenes of the DND sequence, this lighting is significantly darker with much heavier shadows. Many times throughout the show, we can associate the lighting of a scene changing into something darker with an illusion occurring. The perspective of the RU is being distorted. In actuality, both Mike and Henry are very much so alive. So what’s the point of having the paladin up while the sorcerer goes down? Look at where the paladin is standing. The paladin is in the shadow, in the darkness. The sorcerer is in the light. The darkness is showing the reality, where Mike is alive. The light is showing what the Party sees. Henry is associated with darkness and light is associated with Will. It comes together perfectly when you consider that our perspective of the events of Will’s vanishing in S1 is warped too. Just like how Will’s perspective was distorted then, it’s distorted again so he’s being shown Mike and Henry’s deaths, but Henry’s perspective shows the truth.

In that case, what actually happened? That’s where we turn to the album, which tells us exactly how and why Mike disappeared.

For the first two songs of the album, the perspective of Henry is established through lines like:

“Dirty little rumor, circulating round... / Spreadin' like the plague. in every little town / Capturing the spirit! and goin' to the head”

“From the fire to the streets / I've seen it all... / I've melted in the heat”

There are, however, lines that don’t quite line up with the idea we have of Henry. That’s where the connection to Eddie comes in. Obviously, there was a reason they decided to associate the album with Eddie rather than just placing it around in another way and that reason comes in when lyrics about being reborn start coming in.

“And then a brand new day! / A chance to be reborn / I've seen another way / No time to sit and mourn”

“Didn't want to sit and rot″

I’d like to point at that it seems like Henry’s body may very well have been rendered immobile due to being attacked by a molotov. Eddie’s dead body was left in the UD, complete with no consciousness yet not decomposed either. I’m not saying it’ll be permanent, but I do think that Henry may seek refuge in Eddie’s body by becoming the consciousness that inhabits it. That’s why Eddie is being so heavily associated with this piece of Henry; Henry is living in Eddie’s body. Henry is living through Eddie’s music taste much like he will be living through Eddie later on.

This is important because the song I mentioned at the very beginning of this is the song that tells us how Mike was taken. Mike isn’t stupid enough to separate himself on purpose and there would be too many people around to protect him if Henry just tried to force his way towards Mike. He needs something that would lure Mike away from the others so he can capture them in an illusion and get Mike alone.

This song is a call to a teenager, repeating the phrase ‘hello from our little hell’ over and over. The story goes and has someone who survived the gutter live to tell the tale and beckon the child to join him. He even tell the child that they’ve been expecting him. I think Henry had called for Mike in Eddie’s body and beckoned him away from the others, because of course Mike would follow Eddie if he thought he’d found him. Mike has seen 3 people come back from the dead, it’s not unbelievable that the same could happen for Eddie. Mike cares about his friends like no other, so if he needed to find Eddie he would.

This might seem like a reach, but then I’d like to bring your attention back to that shot of Mike’s paladin and the dark sorcerer. The paladin’s shadow reaches out and connects with the cultist who represents Eddie (or, rather, Henry in Eddie’s body). The cultist is in the light, but is connected to the darkness by the paladin’s shadow. Eddie is still, technically, Eddie in both the Party’s POV and Henry’s POV, except before Mike is taken he’s tricked into believing that Eddie is still Eddie inside and out, but the reality is that Eddie is only Eddie on the outside.

What’s most interesting is that I don’t actually think Mike was taken involuntarily. When I mentioned having a potential date for when Mike disappeared, I got that from @aemiron-main and his insight about the LOTR/ST parallels. One thing he informed me of was that a deal was made on April 6th to end the week of hell occurred. To set the timeline, the first death of S4 happens on March 22nd, then a week passes by and the show ends on March 29th. A week after that would be April 6th, leaving the hell that is the UD to rain on Hawkins. If Mike were to encounter Henry directly at his weakest, I think it’s very in-character for him to try and find a way to put an end to all the chaos and protect his friends, family, and Hawkins. Mike has always wanted to do anything he could to protect people, and he’s smart. If Henry wanted him for some reason, he would absolutely use that to his advantage somehow. Mike disappears after making a deal with Henry to put an end to the chaos and keep his family safe and Henry uses an illusion to convince everyone that both of them are dead.

The Experience

It doesn’t end there. Henry wouldn’t just end it because he has Mike, that makes no sense. He’s going to put Mike in a trance. Like I said, Henry doesn’t have the strength to maintain his own body and needs to recover. If he keeps Mike and doesn’t kill him, he can sap the strength from Mike slowly and consistently; those psychic connections give him power. He couldn’t kill Mike, because he’d need him for later but he could use that trance state to keep Mike in place and heal himself. How do I know this? The first song that details how this trance is gonna play out is called Mad Gone World.

“In a world gone mad and thriving in the boundaries of your brain / Imprisoned in a world solely created for the purpose of a crunch”

This line heavily implies the idea of a trance because it’s a world existing entirely in one’s brain, just like how the trance takes the world you know and puts it in a place only your brain can reach. Also, it’s a little funny, but the ‘world created for the purpose of a crunch’ is literally what the point of the trances is. He creates them so he can connect with his victims and kill them, crunching their bones. Lmao

“What ya see and what ya feel / Are nothing nothing real / A visionary climax! / An imagery so clear / Losing touch or reason / Both quickly slip away”

Again, more lyricism that equates to a trance-like state. We start to move more into what actually occurs during the trance, though. Mike slowly moves towards losing reason because he’s being put in a trance, and seemingly for a very long time.

“One million minutes... / One million nights / One million dreams I've had! / And a million fights / Livin' in a mad gone world / Livin' blind / Livin' with this worldly madness / Just a state of mind / Just a state of mind”

One million minutes and nights implies just how long Mike is going to be in this trance. It seems like Mike is going to be tranced for the two year time skip, which is why this album is from 1988 and not 1986. There’s also a great post here that explains why Mike being missing for the time skip makes sense narratively. A million dreams and fights implies undergoing tons of visions and such in this trance as well. Living blind is also a reference to the way that the vitcims’ eyes roll back when they’re tranced. And, all of this stuff is occurring as a state of mind to Mike because it’s happening in his head.

The other song that walk us through his trance are called Brainfade and Drunken Wisdom. They aren’t as extensive as the other songs, but Brainfade is all about accusing someone of being a liar, saying they’re “full of shit” and there’s also a short monologue that talks about Vegas and an RV which makes me think we’ll at least be getting a call back to the van and a memory with the actual Eddie and they’ll be intertwined. It could possibly be how we find out about how Mike is queer. Maybe he’ll relive the van scene and run out of the car and run to Eddie’s RV out of instinct and then find Eddie and confront another aspect of his queerness right after. Just a possibility.

The final song that details his trance is called Drunken Wisdom, and this song covers the other things we’ll likely see in Mike’s trance.

“Your bitchin's a bore / Don't wanna hear it no... more / So stop cryin' / Ain't feelin' nothing for you”

The first verse is all about getting someone to stop crying, that their bitching is a bore. That comes back to the way Mike doesn’t value his own feelings and believes his own opinions don’t matter, that his problems are lesser than.

“Sorry if I'm not as nice as you could be! / Why don't you take the time to see? / That the world! / Does not revolve around only you / And we got better things to do”

This addresses Mike’s selfishness and how he feels like an asshole for making things about himself sometimes. It’s about how he isn’t a good person and how there are more important things in the world than him, which is something we’ve seen him be insecure about before.

“Why don't we give you a call”

Direct hit! Mike’s lack of calls to Will and losing his best friend are here now too!

All of this would pile up on Mike, especially after years of going through it. That leads into our final trance song; End of the Line. It opens with a reminder that time has not stopped passing during all this. Then, we get this.

“On the edge, standing”

Well. I think we’ve seen this before.

“Time. Time after time / The end of the line / We stand and watch it fade away... / Sign of the time's the end of the line”

Yeah I think we get it. Mike’s gonna go back to the cliff. He’s gonna try to kill himself again. We got it.

“It's your move / So play... it right / Sometimes you get just one chance”

This’ll make more sense later, but I think that this is moment where the party opens a portal back to the real world and Mike has a chance. He can end it all, one way or another. This is the only chance he’s gonna get to pick.

“It's the end / It snuck up... / Quick and took you by surprise / The waiting's over”

The waiting is over. Mike’s made his choice.

The Rescue

Let’s take a quick step back to the Party’s POV. I don’t think we have any evidence of what happened during Mike’s trance, but I do think I can figure out who actually opened the portal and saved him. Remember the dice rolls? The r-o-b ones? There are two other ones.

This is clearly predicting El’s attempt at saving them, and it fails, but let’s look at it a little closer. Who are all the characters in this frame? We have Mike, Max, Henry, Eddie, and two skeletons. What ties all these characters together? They all exist within Henry’s mind one way or another, and the two skeletons are representative of Fred and Chrissy.

This is pretty much evidence of the fact that El is gonna go into Henry’s mind at some point and witness Mike’s trance. She won’t be able to free Mike or Max, but she will get to have her realization moment.

So who succeeds?

Here we have El, Dustin, Lucas, and Will. Only Will and Lucas are standing. Will and Lucas are the 20 that save Mike. Will makes sense, with his powers and such and him being Mike’s light, but why Lucas? Check this out.

Look behind Mike. Lucas is there. I think Lucas might’ve seen something that’ll hint to him that was he was seeing was an illusion. Lucas is gonna play a part in saving Mike because he’s the person who might actually know anything about what really happened. Assuming we’re getting the Mike/Will role reversal, then Lucas stays the same. The only person who wanted to find Will just as badly as Mike was Lucas (excluding Joyce). If Lucas thinks he can find Mike, he won’t stop, and he may end up going off on his own to do so or he and Will stick together because Lucas no longer has doubts about hoping.

So Lucas and Will are gonna be the ones to save Mike. Does Mike choose to go through the portal? Head First answers that.

“I push to the left, you pull to the right! / It's a stand off / Gainin' no ground / Outta the dark and into the lights! / It's a breakthrough / Startin' with sound”

Mike is going for the portal, dodging Henry’s attempts to push him to the left. He’s running out of the dark and into the light thanks to sound, which is exactly how Max escaped Henry the first time.

“Up down the front and side to side! / Code blue / We need it stat / I got the reason that makes you go! / Mid air / Suspended animation”

“It all ends with an all out dive!”

He makes it out, now suspended midair. Henry tried to kill him (code blue) and failed. It ends with a dive, just like how Robin, Steve, Nancy, and Eddie dove into the UD, Mike is diving out.

The problem is that this has brought Will to Henry. Overkill II is a whole beast on its own. It feels much more like a summary of Henry’s perspective on his relationship with Will than anything else, which is Gross. I won’t break down every single lyric because if you read it you’ll see what I mean and that’s also not the point of this post. It’s icky sticky bro

On a lighter note, however, I think we have a return date for Mike! Once again, I thank Em for telling me about these amazing LOTR parallels because April 7th is supposedly the date in which Sam and Frodo have their hospital scene after that week of hell (sorry I don’t remember the exact names and I think I forgot to tag the post he told me stuff in). Not only do the times line up, though there’s two years between the events for us, they also make sense with everything else we know about Mike and being in the trance during the time skip as well as the fact that April 7th is Mike’s birthday. That would be insanely significant, especially if that somehow ties into birthday gate.

Mike went missing on April 6th, 1986 and came home two years and one day later, April 7th 1988.

I know that was a lot, so thank you for reading!! There was a ton of info in here but it was so fucking fun to put together, so I hope it’s as cool to you all as it is to me :)

#overkill/dnd tag #mike hostage theory #mike wheeler #byler tumblr #I don't care if it's not 100% byler I think this is cool as shit so I want people to see it lmao #WHEN I FOUND THE LUCAS THING I WENT AHFEO{HBFONBF WEBGFU #same with a lot of this actually #i was going wild all week waiting to finally have the time to write this all out #my cage #it's open #im finally free #self reference

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adamprrishcycle · 1 year

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Okay, you want to talk Ronsey, you better buckle up! (This is going to be long, sorry!)

As the formerly known TRK Anon, I can confidently say that trc is still somewhat fresh in my mind, so I have lots of examples to support my argument. Now, given that I have only read the series once, my character analysis might not be as deep or intense as yours.

If you don't know already, I am a huge Gansey lover/supporter/follower/fan/worshiper/bitch. (Will Patton’s rendition of Gansey drives me absolutely feral!!!!) I have loved him since the very first time we know about his existence (Which is page 15 of TRB). If Gansey is part of the equation, I ship it! Bluesey, Ronsey, Declansey, Adansey, HELL…even Chengsey (I could care less about Henry, so the fact that I acknowledge this ship is a big gesture on my part) I just want to make it clear that I am not an Adansey hater, it's just not my kind of jam (*shrugs*)

I know that what Gansey means to me, Adam is to you. But Adam was tough for me. Like REAL TOUGH to discern. It was not until halfway through TRK (practically when Pynch becomes canon) that I was finally able to appreciate him, to see him eye to eye and say: You ARE knowable. I will give it to Adam, he has the best, most memorable, character growth/development in the entire series (Ronan being a close second). But his stubbornness during TRB/TDT was so unbearable to me. He was such a DICK to Gansey. And yes, there were instances when Gansey deserved it (like the hospital scene) but most of their interactions (at the beginning of the series) are somewhat tense. They are constantly walking on eggshells, afraid to trigger/offend/provoke the other. There are MULTIPLE references to them fighting pre-canon, mostly about money, occasionally about who owns who. The whole DC trip was so stressful for all parties involved. In fact, Adam was so unapproachable that Gansey and Blue kept their relationship a secret because of how difficult he had been back then. (Honestly, I think he would have unalive them both) Plus, he is a hypocrite (I guess we all are) because when the rent thing happens, he goes to Gansey first and throws a fit about it!! But when he finds out that Ronan actually paid his rent, he is “cool” about it. He doesn’t argue with him. He doesn’t feel offended. He just accepts it (it being both the money and the fact). The one thing that really upsets me is Adam wanting the favor for himself. I understand why he wants it, but he knows it is Gansey’s life purpose to find Glendower. It feels like a betrayal, you know? I just cannot stand people being mean to Gansey, it triggers me!!!!

And yes, I get it, there are some good moments between them. Like the call with Mallory when Gansey is trying to make Adam laugh. Or Adam fixing/diagnosing the pig. Or the two of them being ushers on Raven Day. But these moments are so…normal (mundane?) that they don’t feel special.

To me, Adansey is a somewhat “toxic” ship. It is a one-sided relationship, because Gansey gives and gives and Adam refuses to take. Adam practically (and literally) loathes? abhors? despises? everything that Gansey stands for (money, friendship, status, family, you get the gist). How can you possibly love someone that is the poster child of everything you hate?! I think Adansey would be the perfect ship for enemies to friends to lovers.

But Ronsey, oh my dear Ronsey!!!! To me, Ronsey is all about Gansey and Ronan meeting before Niall’s death. The way Gansey describes Ronan before his father’s death is so intoxicating. Gansey mourning the joyful boy that Ronan used to be. Gansey getting emotional over Ronan’s laugh. Gansey being completely and utterly amazed by Ronan’s dream creations (“You incredible creature”). Ronan being unconditionally devoted to Gansey. Ronan being devastated that Gansey has other friends; that Gansey is going to DC with Adam and not him. Ronan and Gansey. Gansey and Ronan. Maybe I am not making any sense right now because my brain convulses just thinking about these two.

They have been through it all. God, there are so many moments pre-canon that I wish we could get to experience. Can you imagine Gansey panicking at the hospital with Ronan’s blood in his hands? Can you imagine Ronan teaching Gansey how to punch?! I can’t remember if canon ever confirms how Gansey acquired his journal, but can you imagine if Ronan bought it for him!?!?!

@singersargentboi said it best: “The thing I love about Ronsey is that even in the books theres this sort of unhinged devotion between them that toes the line at being romantic/sexual.” Let’s unpack this together. Exhibit A) Kavinsky’s substance party. O.M.G. Gansey being such a deranged version of himself that even Ronan cannot stop smiling about it. (“What is it my dog needs?” JUST KILL ME ALREADY) Exhibit B) Ronan dreaming the keys to the Camaro in such a steamy delicate way that I am pretty sure he woke up with a tent in his pants. Exhibit C) Gansey bribing a full-grown adult for Ronan. Exhibit D) Gansey constantly scolding/disciplining/bossing Ronan and somehow stopping the Lynch brothers from killing each other. Exhibit E) Ronan going back home against his dad’s wishes, but still turns to Gansey for comfort (“Can I go and see mom?”) And if all of this does not convince you, I’ll leave you with this: “Gansey was far more of a brother to Ronan than Declan had ever been.”

However, I come to you with a peace offering, a secret third option: RODANSEY. Throughout the series it is constantly noted that 3 is the perfect number for magic ;)

THANK YOU FOR SPILLING YOUR THOUGHTS INTO MY ASK BOX 😍 this is delish and wow a HOT TAKE (to me, a simple woman who will live and die on the hill of adam parrish 🫶) although I understand your grievances from a protect-gansey-at-all-costs point of view! I think you’re right about them having the potential to be a toxic ship because of how much they fight. What’s funny to me is how it seems like they don’t understand each other… yet there’s at least 3 times in TRB alone where they communicate just by looking at each other which is amazing considering from what we know they have only been friends a few years but they’re that close and on that exact same level together. But then… they’re not. I think Adam has just had to rely on himself for so long that he can’t reprogram his brain to think differently, and gansey has had loving parents and a good sibling relationship and intense friendships therefore he can’t even begin to understand adam. They’re on diff planets right? They can’t relate to each other in any way shape or form. But then…. love comes along and makes it work??!??! This is why I’m an adansey girl.

BUT everything you said about ronsey…. That ferocious love I will never ever be over it ever 🥹 unhinged devotion is exactly right. And we all know the when I’m gone dream me the world quote but FOR ME it’s “he couldn’t say it, though. There were a thousand reasons why he couldn’t say it” like???? We were just supposed to move on from that? I can’t I wont.

(side note cuz I gotta defend my boy declan and say he is the best brother ever and I will not expand at this time bc spoilers but the dreamer trilogy will)

Rodansey…… now you’re talking my language. Truce? 🤝 thank u for this ask it’s made my day xx

#living for rants like this #took me on a whole journey #adam parrish #ronan lynch #gansey #adansey #ronsey #rodansey #trc #the raven cycle #declan lynch #niall lynch #ask #meledde #pynch

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lines-we-cross · 11 months

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According to David Zabel...

Carol will have two different stories moveing forward in season 2

To find Daryl

To find home is to find each other ��❤❤

The main focus of season 2 for me was always Daryl and Carol coming back together and what does that mean? And it becomes ultimately a story about how we as people can save each other. She's trying to find him, but in the process of telling that story: How are they ultimately getting to a place where they're kind of saving each other? So that was a big part of it.

The only thing that can save us is ourselves, is each other.And we're telling that through this big frame of France and the story and the characters that we've set up, and the world that we've set up, but in a more intimate way between Carol and Daryl.

The radio call did a lot of heavy lifting in terms of that, both for an audience of fans who I think got very excited when they talked on the radio, but also for an audience that maybe is new to the show and is going ‘oh, there’s this person back somewhere in America who loves him and whom he loves and something’s going on there. I don’t fully understand that she’s in some other place. And then you see her in episode six looking for him.

This moment in the radio call in episode 5 where she talks about something or someone having come back. And the impression we get, and Daryl also gets, is that something's a little off for her, something's wrong. And so that's going to also function into the story for Carol in season 2.

Remember Heath?He went missing when he and Tara went out looking for supplies in s7. According to Kang, Heath was taken by Jadis and the Scavengers off-screen and was traded off to the CRM for supplies. Did he managed to escap and return to Alexandria,to tell Carol and team family where Rick/Michonne are or did he find a radio to connect with them and that's how they find out where Rick/Michonne are?

My guess is Caryl leaves France by the end of s2. I would hope s3 is just the two of them on the road together,exploring their new romantic relationship while trying to find their way back home to Alexandria orr on their way to find Rick/Michonne. My point is i don't need Isabelle and Laurent tagging along like a third wheel when they leave France.

We deserve a season just focused on Carol and Daryl and their journey, preferably with kisses,hugs and lots of passionate nights under the stars.

You could have a nice plot twist with Cadron actually being Laurent's real father,maybe the reason Cadron didn't kill Daryl is because when Laurent and Cadron looked eyes,he saw something in his eyes and in that moment he realized Laurent is his son. He knew Daryl would get him safely to the Nest,and that's why he didn't kill Daryl.Then Cadron,Isabelle and Laurent can play house at the Nest,while Carol and Daryl leave. If Laurent has a real father,there is no reason for Daryl to be portrayed as a father figure to Laurent anymore.

Carol has an internal story

She also has this internal story, which we've only hinted at, but there's a whole internal Carol story that plays out across the episodes of season 2. And so she has a great dual track that we're setting her off on and we've shot some of that already, and it's going to be fantastic when it's all together.

So what's Carol's internal story?

Melissa said Carol is holding something back...

Daryl can sence something is wrong...

Let's just say for the sake of the argument that Heath did return,but that's not what Carol was referring to when she said came back

What if she was trying to tell him Ezekiel is sick,his cancer came back. If not for Henry,i highly doubt Ezekiel and Carol would have turned romantic. Carol was pretty pissed in s7 when Ezekiel kept showing up at her door,not to mention she thought the whole concept of him being King was ridiculous. Henry was the glue that kept Carol and Ezekiel together,with Henry gone their house fell apart. We all remember Ezekiel telling Daryl to back of in s9,how jealous he was when Carol turned to Daryl for emotional suport. Ezekiel is well aware of the strong bond Carol and Daryl share,and the reasons why it never got explored. Ezekiel and Carol have mantained a strong friendship,maybe he's the one who tells Carol to be honest and tell Daryl how she really feels. A friend telling another friend she deserves to be in the light,she deserves a happy ending too. Maybe Ezekiel dies durring surgery that takes place after Carol talked to Daryl,with Ezekiel death and Carol waiting for Daryl to return. She does a lot of soul searching and when Daryl doesn't show up as promised,she goes looking for him. To find him,and tell him how she truely feels. When they do reunite again,they have that honest conversation they never had in find me

Orr if i could pick something better....Carol and Daryl had a night of passion before he left,and while he was gone Carol found out she is pregnant. I know i'm grasping at straws here,but I would so love for Carol and Daryl to have a child together and to have their own little family.

#carol peletier #melissa mcbride #caryl #daryl dixon #daryl x carol #the book of carol #mcreedus

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himynameis4 · 1 year

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Upsidedown 10 Dimensions Theory

Okay, with the recent flood of dimension/time travel theories following Stranger Thing’s references to A Wrinkle in Time, Interstellar, Arrival, etc, (espec w/ @will80sbyers theories which are super interesting so GO READ THEM), I decided to toss my hat into the ring.

What if the Upsidedown as we see it—the one that mirrors Hawkins, the one that’s “stuck” on November 6th, 1983—isn’t just an “alternate dimension,” but another timeline? A timeline where November 6th was the day that everything was destroyed?

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^ This video was my first introduction to dimensions, time travel, dimensional travel, etc. Perhaps there’s a better video breaking it down out there, but this video has shaped my understanding of the dimensions.

If you don’t want to watch the video, here’s a mildly-butchered explanation of the relevant dimensions.

3rd Dimension—*our* dimension, the one we all exist within, which has length, width, and depth

4th Dimension—Time, think of it as *our* Timeline

5th Dimension—Multiple Timelines

6th Dimension—dimension above the fifth

I don’t really have a good way to explain the 6th dimension, and I do recommend watching the video—I’ll probably be consuming more dimension-related explanations to get a better grasp on the concepts, but here’s the basics.

To travel through a dimension, you fold the dimension above it.

The travel through the 3rd dimension, for example, you’d fold the 4th dimension, Time. But folding time, you could travel throughout space instantaneously—in no time at all.

If you want to travel through Time—specifically, *our* timeline, you’d fold the 5th dimension (Timelines, plural).

If you wanted to travel throughout Timelines (the 5th dimension)—alternate “universes” where things are ever so slightly different, where perhaps you have brown eyes instead of green, or you got a promotion instead of getting fired (or, on a grander scale, the dinosaurs never went extinct)—you’d have to fold the 6th dimension, because you’re trying to travel throughout the 5th dimension.

So… after I reviewed how dimension/dimensional travel/time travel could theoretically work (assuming stranger things chooses semi-realism), one thing was bothering me—which dimension is El folding when she creates portals to the upsidedown? And which exactly *is* the upsidedown, anyway?

If El was folding the 4th dimension, Time, then the Upsidedown would have to be a physical location in space, in our universe. Another planet, maybe, or something like it. But why would another planet mirror Hawkins exactly? Could Venca/Henry have transformed the planet to match Hawkins?

If so, why?? And why have the upsidedown exactly resemble Hawkins on November 6th, even though time hasn’t ACTUALLY stopped flowing in the Upsidedown?

Because we know time isn’t actually flowing differently in the Upsidedown and the Rightsideup. If it was flowing at a different rate, for example, Nancy and the Hawkins crew wouldn’t have been able to coordinate their attack against Venca, because time wouldn’t have been moving properly for the crew in the Upsidedown.

Not to mention, we know that the place El banished Henry to didn’t look like the Upsidedown.

This is where Henry landed:

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This is the Upsidedown Will & El see:

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So, what gives?

From the beginning of Stranger Things, when Mr. Clarke broke was explaining theoretical science to the boys after Will’s funeral in Season 1, these alternate locations were framed as “universes.” Mr. Clarke talks about multiple worlds, infinite variations on one another. What he’s describing sounds an awful lot like the multiple timelines that exist in the 5th dimension.

(Here’s a link to Mr. Clarke if you wanna rewatch that for reference:

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His explanation is obviously crafted to fit the show, especially with the talk of “tears” and “gates,” but it matches up.)

So. The Upsidedown could be an alternate universe, a variation on our own. Aka another timeline.

If it is another timeline, then that means El and Henry’ve been folding the 6th dimension when they create their doorways.

(Theoretically they—or another character like Will—could learn to fold the 4th and 5th dimensions, to teleport and time travel, but that’s a different conversation).

If the Upsidedown is this other universe, other timeline, why is it how it is? And how did it transform from the “realm” Henry was banished to, into a warped mirror of hawkins?

Well, what if the realm Henry was banished to wasn’t the upsidedown at all?

From here on out, we’ll be calling the realm El sent Henry to after the Hawkins Lab Massacre “Henry’s Realm,” because Henry refers to it as a realm in his monologue to El & it simplifies things.

So, in the very first video I linked, the narrator says that by traveling back in time—ie folding the 5th dimension to travel through the 4th—a person can create a new branch/timeline.

Well, if something as simple as bending the 5th dimension can result in a new timeline, what about someone making a gate through the 6th dimension?

Essentially, my theory is that the upsidedown is an alternate timeline of Hawkins—one that potentially deviated from the timeline our heroes are in (the Rightsideup) on November 6th, 1983.

Here’s how I think it could have happened:

El makes contact with the demogorgon, and, as a result, Henry

A gate starts to open between the Rightsideup and Henry’s Realm because of this mind-contact

The process of opening a gate via bending the 6th dimension creates a deviation in the rightsideup’s timeline (if you watched the video with Mr. Clarke, imagine his paper plate being folded in half, and then one half of the paper plate being folded again—now, when the pencil tears a gate through the plate, there are three holes)

There now exists a gate between Henry’s Realm and this deviated timeline, as well as the deviated timeline and the Rightsideup

Due to the direct connection to Henry’s Realm (unlike the rightsideup) this deviated timeline experiences an immediate influx of toxic chemicals & vine growth that rapidly shape the terrain (killing all human life & most other organic life, as well, but leaving things such as Nancy’s journal behind). This results in the rapid creation of the upsidedown

Henry sends a single demogorgon through to explore the newly-created upsidedown (aka the deviated timeline), and has said demogorgon continue on to the rightsideup, to our El, our timeline, and the lab

By the time Will arrives in the upsidedown, the initial chemical reactions that took place and resulted in the destruction/creation of the upsidedown have already occurred. There are other toxic chemicals remaining, but nothing lethal enough to instantly turn Will to ash

El, when she banished the demogorgon at the end of the season, banishes it to Henry’s Realm. This is why it’s not in the upsidedown when she wakes up in the upsidedown.

Okay, that was a lot, and i know it. I also don’t know how clear i was (sorry about that). There are a few reasons I think this makes sense, though.

For one, there’s only the one demogorgon in season one. We don’t see any demodogs, etc., or any evidence of the mindflayer. If the upsidedown was newly created, it makes sense that moving from Henry’s Realm to the Upsidedown would be a process done over time, which is why the shifting colors of the upsidedown (more reds in season 4) & the sudden appearances of demobats make sense, as more and more of Henry’s Realm’s creatures shift dimensions.

We saw the way the clouds in season four rotted organic material, and the way Jason practically dissolved.

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Both times, the dissolving happened very rapidly.

Then again, the upsidedown could be an alternate timeline without being an alternate timeline directly created by the opening of the gate on November 6th. Maybe it’s a mystery, how it became what it is now—all they know is that something happened in that timeline’s November 6th, and that until that point, the timeline was similar enough to our own for Nancy’s journal entries to be exactly the same.

Either way, i love the idea of the upsidedown being the sight of… well, not a natural disaster, exactly, but you get the idea. Like, hey, that journal belonged to a version of Nancy who’s dead now, along with alternate timeline versions of everyone we know and love plus the entire rest of the world, and it’s very likely we could see a similar destruction of our timeline if we don’t stop Venca/prevent more of these toxins from entering via the gates.

Not to mention the idea that, hey, Venca was banished to an alternate timeline, will we have to deal with alternate timeline versions of him? Does everything we do every trigger an alternate timeline? Is an alternate timeline created every time El opens a gate?

Basically, playing more with time and space and reality.

Idk if i explained this clearly enough, but i’m having a lot of fun with this concept! If anyone has any similar/alternate thoughts, or reasons they think this couldn’t work, please share!! I love talking ab this stuff lol.

(Edit: @givehimthemedicine bc ik you do a lot of how-the-upsidedown-works theorizing lol)

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plague-karm · 11 months

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Right since I’m beginning to settle down on my Digital Circus hyperfixation, it’s time to talk about another one! It surprises me that I haven’t talked about the Fnaf movie that much on here so don’t expect this to be concise, it’s gonna be all over the place so let’s go!

First off, I still can’t process that the movie is coming out in almost a week! As a self proclaimed Fnaf veteran (I’ve been a fan since the second games release) i thought this movie was doomed to be stuck in development hell but no! It’s real, fnaf is real, ye.

Anyway enough rambling, time to go feral over minor details.

Yes I watched the unlisted video in full and yes this has been on my mind for the past 7 hours or so. It captured the ambience of Fnaf 1 PERFECTLY and I couldn’t be happier about it. So I’m gonna talk about some cool stuff I saw during the video.

WHAT THE FUCK? SHADOW FREDDY? That was not on my bingo card, look at him, he’s glorious.

I also saw this small pill bottle, it’s likely that it’s Mike’s but I’m not sure why he’d have it, maybe it’s a Walten Files situation? He could’ve went through something so traumatic that he had to take normal pills to forgor? And if Mike IS William’s son here then that would explain why he didn’t know who he was during the job interview, so the event that happened that made him become prescribed to them was likely The Bite Of 83 if that’s the case. Or they’re completely unrelated since the movies timeline is completely separate from the games.

Enough speculating, time to talk about funnie murder man now.

They absolutely NAILED this design, I love how you can see hints of Afton’s clothes and those eyes, holy shit those eyes, I don’t know what it is but they’re so unsettling (loving the hints of purple in those peepers). I don’t know when the suit’s showing up in the movie (probably the third act) but its probably going to be my favourite part. And if the Spring Bonnie design makes me feel genuinely unsettled, I can’t WAIT to see what they’re going to do with Springtrap.

I know some people have said that this is going to be his design for the movie but I don’t think that’s the case, look at the small hints of Afton we see in the suit, there’s no blood, no hints of bodily harm, he clearly hasn’t been springlocked yet, and the suit looks worse for wear because it’s the suit from Fredbear’s, it’s old, it hasn’t been in use for almost 2 decades (it’s been confirmed by Emma Tammi that the movie takes place in the year 2000), and speaking of springlocks…

BBFC RATING HELLO?? UNDETAILED DECAPITATION?? HUH??

At first I thought it was referring to a possible springlock scene, but then I remembered something that would make a lot more sense

Maybe it’s referring to this? I’ve seen a lot of theories stating that Golden Freddy might actually be Mike after something happens (hence why Abby’s so chill with a golden bear that has Sans Undertale going into his eyes).

But it could refer to quite a few things maybe that’s how the five children were killed and stuffed? Possibly, but either way, I really hope they don’t cut out the springlock failure entirely, it’s really important to the timeline and I’m genuinely curious to see what they could get away with with the rating in mind.

ALSO THIS. Okay, so there’s obviously a few contenders here and I can immediately debunk one of them

It’s not Balloon Boy, we see him in a drawing during this scene in the teaser trailer, and I think it would be out of place for him to show up anyway (even if I’d find it fucking hilarious)

I think it’s either Henry or The Puppet, I don’t see it being anyone else (maybe there’s someone I forgot? Idk man Fnaf canon nowadays is ridiculous). Maybe if the Mike saw trap theory actually happens The Puppet will show up to do her thing and place his soul in the Golden Freddy suit? Maybe, it’s either that or a post credits scene. And with Henry I only see him having a VERY minor role, I’m not sure what he could be doing though, we’ll have to wait and see if he shows up or not.

Anyway I’m very excited for this movie and if it’s not at least a 7/10 I’m going to cry.

#karm rambles #fnaf movie #william afton #fnaf #im very normal #five nights at freddy's

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twelvegrimmyplace · 2 years

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Nick Grimshaw looks back: ‘Rihanna, Kate, Naomi – Mum was never fazed by them. But she did lose it over Alan Titchmarsh’

The broadcaster and his mother recreate an old photo and recall their wild nights out together

Born in Oldham in 1984, Nick Grimshaw is a presenter best known for his time on BBC Radio 1, as well as his mischievous charm and A-list social circle. Starting his career as a runner for MTV, he went on to present T4, became a judge on the X Factor, hosted the Radio 1 Breakfast show and now has a culinary podcast, Dish. He lives with his fiance, the dancer Meshach Henry, in London with his two dogs. His memoir, Soft Lad, is out now.

Eileen

Nick always wanted to be the centre of attention, and was a very comical child. In that picture, he was probably eight, and it would have been Children In Need night. When that happened, my God, he made everyone sit down. He’d get you nuts, crisps and sweets, and you’d have to watch the whole lot. He’d get obsessed like that with everything – television, radio, music. There was a dog book fad, too. He knew off by heart every breed and he’d take it to church when we went to mass, hiding it inside the hymn book so nobody could see.

Nick’s talkative. It was like switching the light on in the morning, then it was all day, nonstop. He was known for it, and would get in trouble at school because of it. He knew from a young age that he wanted to get a job at Radio 1. He said: “That’s where I’m going to work” and his dad replied: “Mmm, you and a million other kids.” But Nick stuck by it.

As well as chatting, he was in a band, playing the cornet. It was terrible. When I’d get my friends round – there’s a group of nine of us, we call it Girls’ Night – Nick would worm his way in. The cornet would come out. Once or twice he’d say: “I don’t want you to look at me while I do it,” so he’d have his back to us. He was way out of tune and we’d be bursting not to laugh but his dad would say: “Brilliant! Fantastic!” He got thrown out of the band in the end and I had to try to talk them into letting him back in.

When he left home for university we thought we’d gone deaf because it was so quiet. His house was a dump. You’d wipe your feet when you came out – it was atrocious. Then he was off to London. He wouldn’t really tell me what was happening down there – he’d just say he was handing out flyers.

I didn’t see a lot of him back then, but sometimes he’d bring his friends up for Christmas. Nick asked if Amy Winehouse could come one year. I said: “Why?” He said: “Well, she’s got nowhere to go.” She didn’t come in the end, but I did speak to her when she rang the house phone.

Nick’s very thoughtful. Even more so as he’s got older. He’s grown up, and I now see him settled with Meshach, and they’re so lovely together. My friends all say I’m so lucky he wants to include me in everything he does. I’ve had some brilliant holidays with him, but when I visit him in London it’s always a bit full-on. I get there and he says: “Don’t worry, we’ll have a nice quiet weekend” but it never is. He’s bumping into people, or there’s a party and we’re not home until quarter to six the next morning. It’s exhausting, but I do think, you know what? While I’m fit and able to, I’m going to enjoy it.

Nick

That was the prime spot in our lounge. I was getting ready to watch the telly and cuddle with Eileen. The green mark on my hand was from painting – possibly a frog. My milk teeth hadn’t fallen out but my adult teeth started growing – so you can see a single fang in the picture. My family were like: “Oh that’s horrible! That’s so gross.” They used to call me Wolf Boy. How mean.

I was enjoying my life at this point. I loved primary school. It was in a bungalow, and it didn’t feel as if I was doing actual work, just running around seeing gerbils or a stray dog. We’d do skipping or play rounders or welly chucking. It was about this time that I got into Hardcore Ecstasy – a rave compilation that I loved. At secondary school I had friends but I was never in a clique or a gang, and I wonder if it’s because my reference points were off because of my older brother and sister’s influence. I was less excited about the Spice Girls because I was like: “Yeah, but have you heard the Slits?” Pretty annoying. I obviously also loved Girls’ Night.

I don’t know what it was about cities, but I always wanted to be somewhere bigger. I grew up in suburban Oldham and enjoyed the chaos of going to central Manchester. Once I realised I wanted to do radio, I knew I had to go to London. It seemed there was so much life for young people there versus being on my mum and dad’s watch, listening to wood pigeons and having a potato hash for tea. I wanted a racket.

I ended up meeting Mairead [Nash] and Tabitha [Denholm] from Queens of Noize when I was doing student radio. That night we went out together and didn’t come back for 24 hours. My friend Jenny dropped me off the next day at my parents’ and my dad was in the front garden. As the car pulled up he said: “Where the bloody hell have you been? Look at the bleeding state of you!” I looked straight ahead and said: “Drive on.” He chased me down the road with clippers and I hid at Jenny’s. London was such a big fast city, so the friends I made I bonded with quickly. When I was unemployed, me and Amy [Winehouse] would get drunk in the day in Camden, and Mairead and Tabitha really looked after me. Sadie [Frost], too.

When my dad died [in 2016], a family friend, Sarah, said to think of it as the start of a new sort of relationship with my mum. We could be adults together rather than mother and son. I was worried about her feeling alone after such a monumental change, but we ended up becoming good friends and she’d come out with me to parties, or we’d go away with Sadie’s family.

Mum was never fazed by any of my friends. Once I took her to a Stella McCartney fashion week dinner and everyone famous was there – Rihanna, Kate, Naomi. None of it bothered her, although it was good gossip for her when she got back home and could tell Girls’ Night how gorgeous they all were. That being said, she did lose it when she met Alan Titchmarsh. The night before, I’d taken her to DJ with me at one of [stylist and journalist] Katie Grand’s fashion parties and we ended up having a big night. I was so hungover the next day when we were supposed to go to the Chelsea flower show together, that we ended up getting drunk there to get over it. Then she saw Alan. She was like: Alan! Alan! Weak at the knees for Alan.

My mum has also been a victim of many pranks on the radio. Once Alan Carr called her and said he was a casting agent who wanted to know if she’d like to be Pauline Quirk’s mother in Broadchurch. Another time, I called and said I had all these demands for when I visited next: that I wanted a kilo of wheatgrass and an ostrich egg. It was so funny that we made a song on Radio 1 of my mum going “Wheatgrass?” over banging techno.

When I was younger, I’d call her when I needed something – and also because contractually you should ring your mum. Then I called her for pranks. Now I phone every day because I want to gossip or to hear her news. Even though I’ll keep taking her along to parties, my favourite thing is still staying at home watching telly with Eileen.

[source]

#lovely!#nick grimshaw #grimshaw fam #press #soft lad

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xaviernottheprofessor · 3 months

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A Drive with Chance.

Who: Xavier. Mentions of @fletchervanhall @riley-francis-moore and everyone

What: Xavier arrives in NYC but it ends up in tragedy.

Where: midtown, NYC

When: 7 PM EST

A/N: Xavier goes to NYC for work and ends up in an accident so major trigger warnings.

Leaving California this time felt different. Xavier had already started spending time with his friends and family and he had gotten used to all of that. After hugging his kids tight and cuddling Phoebe, he showered his boyfriend with plenty of kisses as a gentle reminder of how much fun they’d have once he returned in just a couple of days. He had plans to get his big tattoo, work on some writing for his paramount show, go on actually holiday to see his family and Disney was in the cards too. He had promised Riley they’d catch a few movies over the summer and Xavier wanted to spend time with his friends and their families as well. Winter and Henry had a list of their own and he knew he’d fulfill it expeditiously.

But it still felt different and Xavier had felt spoiled by the short time off he had already enjoyed. When he had fostered Winter and Henry, he was sure to adjust his contract at SNL to include a bicoastal clause that allowed him to travel on film days and write from home. As time passed and as he realized this would not be a temporary home for the kids, his kids, Xavier started to wonder if this was his last season. Or perhaps he’d hang on to the fall or only come on as a guest writer/star. He had seen others do it and eventually break out in their careers. Maybe it was his turn. With the Oscar’s, his Emmy win and Paramount deal, Xavier was starting to feel like he was gravitating toward a gig that kept him anchored at home. He had a real family now that included his children, Fletcher, and Drew. He wanted a future with them in it and he knew that in order to have that, he needed to be where they were.

“Mr. Mitchell?” The driver cleared his throat, pulling Xavier from his thoughts. “So sorry, sir. I wanted to make sure you were well. We were talking about how La Guardia has chanced and you seemed off somewhere far.”

“Sorry, Chance.” Xavier smiled and reached over to pat the driver’s shoulder. He had been with the staff at SNL for so many years that the two had grown close. “I was thinking about matters I have to get to when I get home.”

“Understood! You’re probably feeling homesick with those cute kids of yours and your little step daughter too,” the driver smiled at the red light.

“Yeah, the three of them are pretty perfect. I’m very lucky, Chance. How’s married life treating you ?”

“You are! Lena and I want to have kids as soon as possible so hopefully we will right there with you. It’s going great! Oh and thank you for the wedding gift. We are looking for a nice place in queens and Nassau border so that’ll help a lot. So is Ben Barnes gonna be proposing anytime soon, sir?” Change laughed as he decided to take an emptier route than staying on sixth Avenue. “So much traffic!”

“Summer in New York City. The oiré welcome, man! You and Lena better invite me over once you get that home.” He laughed at the Ben Barnes reference, enjoying the fact that everyone was in on the biggest Internet trolling joke in history thanks to Frankie. “Well, we’ve been together for half a year. So I don’t know about that.”

“Mm hmm mm hmm but you want him to.” Chance smirked and stopped at another red light on a tree-lined side street just blocked away from the hotel where he’d meet DJ.

“Listen. I’m a huge romantic and I know that he’s definitely the one. But time will tell. “ Xavier smiled, looking out the window and then looking up at the thunder. “Well shi—-“

There were screeches and loud sounds, the sheer panic in Chance’s voice and the seat belt wrapped around Xavier’s neck. The music in the car played in Xavier’s ears as he tried to free himself and call out for his friend. It wasn’t long before the car was dragging upside down along the road and Xavier’s face smashed against the passenger window on the other side from where he was sitting. The seatbelt pulled away and off and everything turned dark.

Chance kicked his door open, not caring about his injuries and crawled out as he witnessed people calling 911. “Xavier!” He shouted from outside the car, pleading for help from onlookers who tried to get close but the mess was too dangerous. The fire department arrived first and before he could check on his friend, Chance was pulled onto a gurney. “That’s Xavier Mitchell!” He yelled out so they knew who they were dealing with.

The Range Rover was going about 86 MPH and slammed into the passenger seat. Are you okay? What is your name? Is he alive? Do we have a pulse?

The other driver is intoxicated. Chance, is there someone we can call? Who do we call?

Blood pressure is low, take him to Weill Cornell on 68th!

#tw car accident #tw car crash #para #hc #para: A drive with Chance

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aemiron-main · 11 months

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From what I remember the casting call for George said he was a 14 year old and recently they revealed Henry would be a freshman in HS (14-15 years old), while the party’s parents are said to be seniors? So are you under the impression that they’re lying about Henry’s age in the play and Louis is actually playing 12 year old Henry, and that there also is in fact a real character named George, who is 14, but has yet to be announced, with them saving that casting reveal for the premiere? Or are you under the impression that it is indeed a fake name, but not for Henry’s character, for one of the older actors already announced? I know timeline hijinks are in the midst, so it is possible that Henry being 12 according to the show and a freshman according to the play might be for a specific reason. But again, in the case of the play specifically, Henry is said to be a freshman, so he fits the bill as George based on that alone. It’s possible they could be lying about aspects or leaving certain details out, as they have even lied about Henry’s name before in the casting call for s4 with it being ‘Ashe’ instead of Henry. In this case I don’t really blame fans for assuming history is just repeating for spoiler purposes as opposed to assuming that everything they’ve announced publicly about the play thus far surrounding Henry is false. Aging up Henry and confusing fans, only to age him down to where people assumed he was to begin with, is not making a lot of sense to me. Only a very small fraction of viewers even know about the George leak, so I feel like giving the George leak all this weight as this irrefutable fact is starting to look like a losing battle at this point.

Hey, anon!

To kick this off, you asked:

“So are you under the impression that they’re lying about Henry’s age in the play and Louis is actually playing 12 year old Henry, and that there also is in fact a real character named George, who is 14, but has yet to be announced, with them saving that casting reveal for the premiere? Or are you under the impression that it is indeed a fake name, but not for Henry’s character, for one of the older actors already announced? “

And to put it simply, I think that George is a fake name for Allen Munson, and I think that Louis is playing 12 year old Henry.

As James talked about here, Allen Munson being George would explain why George-Betty was compared to Hellcheer/Chrissy and Eddie Munson, with Allen being Eddie’s father.

Allen Munson could easily be in that 14-15 year old range- we don’t know how old he is.

After all, in the show, Wayne Munson says that he himself was a kid during the Creel murders. And we don’t know the age gap between Allen and Wayne, and we don’t know if Wayne is using “kid” as a catchall for anyone under 18/including teens, but my point is, we don’t have a confirmed age for Allen.

As far as Henry being labelled as a freshman, I talked about that in this post!

And there’s also the play on words aspect of it- “freshman,” refers to the highschool category/age, but also refers to a newcomer, and Henry is most definitely a newcomer because he just moved to Hawkins. So, I won’t be surprised if the “freshman,” thing is a cheeky play on words regarding a.) Henry being new to Hawkins and b.) people being confused about Henry’s age because of Louis’ casting.

And even IF Henry is a freshman, the stuff from the George leaks STILL doesn’t line up with him! The personality doesn’t line up! The “powers” don’t line up!

IF Henry is a freshman, then sure, he fits that aspect of the bill for George- but Allen Munson likely does too. And Allen fits the personality traits that we see in the auditions, and also is more likely to fit with the “powers” that George has (which are actually more likely tied to that weird “radio wave that kills people” that’s mentioned in the audition), as they don’t align with Henry’s powers at all- George mostly talks about hearing voices telling him to do bad things, something that Henry never mentions, not even during his whole 1979 monologue.

Also, that Collider article mentions the Betty and George casting asking for 14-15 year olds- which, that casting call/article etc was a fair while before TFS/any 14-15 year olds at the time of that casting call could be an older teenager at this post/at the time of the play, so they may have been accounting for how much time would elaspe between casting calls vs the play, so both Patty and George may actually be older than 14 or 15.

And Patty/Betty is at least 15 based on this dialogue- which, her being exactly 15 would mean she’s been hiding in the confession booth since she was a newborn, which is unlikely- so there’s actually a chance that Patty is an older teen/16 years old.

Either way, regardless of what you think makes sense re: seemingly confusing the audience about Henry’s age/the freshman comment, the reality is that 12 is the canon age of Henry Creel as of 1959, and the play is both canon and set in 1959.

You also talked about “in the case of the play,” but something that I think is worth keeping in mind here is that you can’t just separate the play from the show like that because the play has been repeatedly confirmed to be completely canon to the show & that they’re working hard to make sure that everything lines up lore-wise.

Here’s the play being confirmed as canon:

And here’s them talking about how they’re making sure that all of the play lore lines up with the show:

So, separating it into the play vs the show doesnt work because the play is canon to the show. The lore is supposed to line up. So, if Henry IS older than 12, then there’s definitely some timeline fuckery going on, but there’s still very much the option that Allen is George.

“In this case I don’t really blame fans for assuming history is just repeating for spoiler purposes as opposed to assuming that everything they’ve announced publicly about the play thus far surrounding Henry is false. “

I don’t really understand what you’re saying here.

Like, Henry being George was never announced . Ever. That didn’t happen. The identity of George has never been revealed. I’m not sure what you mean by “everything they’ve announced publicly about the play thus far surrounding Henry is false,” because that’s not what I’m saying and they haven’t announced a single thing about George’s identity in the play or Henry’s age in the play (besides that freshman line that I talked about earlier).

So, if Henry isn’t George, there’s not really anything that would he retconned there/nothing that was announced that would turn out to be false because they never announced that he was George, and they never explicitly announced his age besides a vague double-meaning/pun freshman comment.

“Aging up Henry and confusing fans, only to age him down to where people assumed he was to begin with, is not making a lot of sense to me. Only a very small fraction of viewers even know about the George leak, so I feel like giving the George leak all this weight as this irrefutable fact is starting to look like a losing battle at this point. “

I’m kind of confused about what you’re saying here. I think this mostly falls under what I said earlier about how they’re not aging him down and up etc because they’ve never confirmed an age for him in the play. They HAVE confirmed that the play is canon and that he therefore should be 12.

And he IS played by an adult but a.) looking at some of the BTS pics where Louis is vaguely styled like Henry (not full costumes yet but partial), I definitely think he can pass as a 12 year old henry on the stage, and b.) I’ve talked before (here, here, here and here) about the ST-Tommy parallels and how TFS is likely taking inspiration from Tommy and the Tommy play specifically, and Louis being an adult playing a 12 year old could be an artistic choice like it was in Tommy, where Tommy is played by an adult but often presented as if he’s still a child:

And in Tommy, this casting choice is tied to representing a loss of innocence/growing up too fast due to trauma.

Which, the loss of innocence is a.) a theme present with Henry in the show and b.) loss of innocence is confirmed to be something that’s being addressed in the play:

Like, they aren’t moving his age up and down and confusing fans and retconning announcements etc because they haven’t announced his age. People are just making assumptions based on Louis being an adult.

Also, I’m not really giving the George leak any weight as irrefutable fact?? If anything, the people who are claiming that George is definitely Henry are the ones doing that. So, I’m not really sure what you mean in that regard. And even then, why would the leaks be completely accurate for Patty but fake for George? How would that even work, esp considering that Patty and George are literally reading the same scenes?

Anyway, anon, I hope that cleared some things up. There’s some aspects of your ask that I was genuinely confused as to what you were saying/asking, so sorry about that! Thanks for the ask, and let me know if you’ve got any more questions/things you’d like clarified! :DD

#stranger things #the first shadow #henry creel

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0nlythrowharrybeaux · 2 years

Text

Wonderful World - Part 4**^

It's finally here! Ugh I'm bummed I didn't meet my deadline of Monday, but I have the worst hay fever and my eyes itch and watered so much that I couldn't see and I took a benadryl and it knocked me out for a while 🫠 any way, here it is!

Series Masterlist

Warnings: talks/arguments regarding break ups and infidelity, female masturbation, bullying scene w/threat, and arguments about parental neglect.

WC: 10.2K

P.S. I realized I never put a reference picture for Wesley (Celeste's dad), it's gonna be at the end of this part before the tag list:)

The drive was quiet between Harry and Rebecca. He was feeling tense and irritated more than sad. It was strange really. Rebecca didn’t even seem to notice as she was texting away on her phone with a small smile on her face and he just knew that she was talking to Eddie. She had lied about him being single for some reason…almost as if hearing he was taken would somehow appease Harry, he didn’t act like a taken man. And well, Harry had really not acted that way either tonight, he had taken liberties with Diana that he truly shouldn’t have. He never intended to end his relationship over this crush on her though, but it seemed that his relationship was already heading down that road anyway. He cleared his throat and this made Rebecca glance up at him briefly before continuing on her phone.

“Are you gonna be spending the night like we planned?” He asked and she sighed and put her phone down.

“I don’t think so…” she said as she turned to face him, “Have a lot of prep to do for Monday.”

“Well tomorrow’s Saturday… you’ll have Sunday.” He reminded.

“I’d rather go to bed early on Sunday so that I can be well rested on Monday, I’ve got to be in court then.” She said and he hummed.

“OK. But before you go are you going to tell me where you actually were for twenty minutes tonight?”

“I told you that my mom cal-”

“Oh please…” he mumbled and she sighed.

“Look, you’ve been weird all night and-”

“I’ve been weird?” He asked glancing to her when they stopped at a red light, “You straight up lied about your co-worker’s relationship status to me and for what?”

“Well you’ve been all weird since you saw that text when there wasn’t even anything wrong with what he said!” She scoffed and Harry rolled his eyes with a frown and turned to her again.

“I get it if he texted you that at a decent hour, but it was nearly 10:30 at night when we finished dinner. What the hell am I supposed to think? And don’t give me some shit about how he knows it was late because I teach on Tuesdays when you fucking forget I teach on Tuesdays.” He said and she sighed, “Just…tell me what’s on your mind. You’ve been really distant for a while now and-”

“I‘ve been distant?” She asked with a frown as he turned on his street and she sighed, “Ever since you opened your practice you’ve been holed up in there all the fucking time!” She vented, “And then you just had to go and apply for that teaching position on top of what you’re already doing-”

“Don’t flip this on me, Becs.” Harry said as he pulled up into his driveway, “I’ve been bored! What else am I supposed to do? You’ve been obsessing over work over the last year and constantly bailing on our plans from putting work first, so of course I went and took another opportunity that would keep me occupied-”

“Harry, that’s part of our arrangement. Work first, we both agreed on that.” She said as he put the car in park and turned to her as she looked at him firmly as he scoffed.

“Our arrangement?” He questioned her phrasing wryly and she sighed.

“You know what I meant.” She said and he shook his head and before he could respond his phone started ringing and his car’s screen lit up indicating it was Henry and Harry picked up his phone and locked the screen, silencing the ringer before he looked to her again.

“You know what I think?” He asked, “I think that at one point our relationship really started becoming just an arrangement to you, I don’t know when that was, but I wish you had told me about it when you decided that.” He said and she was about to speak when he spoke again, “I’m not done.” He said and she sighed, “If you haven’t already cheated on me with that twat, Eddie, you’re definitely thinking about it and that really pisses me off.” He said to her as she frowned, “If you don’t want this any more just come out and say it.” He said seriously and she shook her head, not really sure what to say as she licked over her lips.

“What do you want me to tell you, Harry?” She asked before letting out a defeated sigh.

“The fucking truth! That’s it!” He almost shouted it at the top of his lungs because how hard could it be?

“Fine.” She said and he swallowed thickly before he nodded, “I…slept with Eddie. On Wednesday.” She admitted and he looked away from her and scoffed, “And that’s why! You act like you don’t care! Actually scratch that, you don’t care about anything that I do! You don’t care about my career, about my aspirations, you don’t seem to be understanding of how I need your support on my journey!” Harry’s phone started ringing again and it was Henry again and he switched it onto silence mode with a groan before continuing the conversation.

“What?! I go to the dinners and the schmooze-fests, and meet so many fucking city officials that I practically know who chose the fucking color of the garbage bins! What more do you want from me?! I don’t get it!” He shouted as he lost his patience.

“I don’t invite you just as my date, Harry. If you don’t see the opportunities there then that’s on you! You don’t want to do something bigger with your life? You could sit on the board at the hospital or attend more panels to give insight to the elected officials about mental health and be known for the good you’re doing out there!” She shouted back.

“Do you even hear what you’re saying, Rebecca? Where’s the sincerity in doing something good if you just want to be recognized for it? I don’t delve into the political aspect of my career because I don’t care about it! I do what I can by my patients, OK? I help them and I know that. Yes, our institutions are not at their best, but why would I waste time pushing and shouting at a bureaucratic brick wall when I can be making a difference in some people the entire time?” He asked and she sighed, “Why do you think I decided to open my own practice instead of joining an established one? I want to make an impact on people my way. I’ve been there for you in the ways that you’ve asked and-”

“Well it’s just not enough! OK?” She shouted in exasperation, “You’re not even upset that I slept with someone else, Harry. You don’t care enough at least he cares.” She said flatly and he shook his head as he shrugged.

“Well, I’m sorry, I guess our arrangement truly isn’t working out.” He said flatly before getting out of the car and shutting the door harshly as he headed up to his door. He pulled out his phone and saw another missed called from Henry and a text asking him to call him back when he got the chance. Harry couldn’t help but notice that neither of them were crying, they were just seemingly venting about how annoyed they’ve been at each other this whole time. He heard her door close and her steps rushing up behind him.

“So that’s it then?” She asked and he turned around and sighed.

“You cheated on me. You can’t stand there and act like there’s a way forward after everything you’ve just told me in there.” He said pointing to the car and she frowned.

“You’re not even going to try and fight for me? Just gonna hear that and give up?” She asked and he shrugged, “Are you even in love with me?” She asked and he looked off to the side before looking to her.

“I…I’m really trying to be.” He said honestly.

“Wow…” she exclaimed flatly before turning around and starting to walk to her car.

“Why are you trying to make me feel like shit for that? After everything you’ve said you expect me to believe that you’re in love with me?” He called after her and she turned around.

“You’re right. I never was either.” She admitted.

“Rebecca, listen to me.” He said coming up to her and grabbing her hands, “I do love you and I care about you and I want you to be happy-”

“Why couldn’t you be honest with me about those feelings before I went and…fuck!” She cursed with a frown.

“Because I truly was trying to make it work with you! I wasn’t going to give up yet. If I were getting to that point I would’ve told you.” He said and she nodded.

“I’m sorry I cheated.” She said looking into his eyes.

“Did you feel bad about it?” He asked and she looked down to the ground and sighed, “Well, that’s a no.” he chuckled and she glanced up at him to see that it wasn’t even sarcastic, he was genuinely laughing at it.

“I really tried to if that helps at all…” She said, quoting him from earlier and this led them both to laugh softly, “I’m serious though. It wasn’t even planned and afterwards I didn’t feel like I thought it would and I was just working up the courage to…to say it to you. That’s what made me feel bad, knowing that you didn’t deserve that.” She pouted slightly as she spoke and squeezed his hands, “Today I was talking with Eddie about how I was going to talk to you about it and we ended up making out. That’s where I was.” She finished and he nodded, “You don’t seem upset.”

“Neither do you.” He stated and she shrugged.

“I guess we were both just trying…” she said softly.

“Guess so.” He hummed, “So maybe it’s a good time to tell you that Henry and I both didn’t like him and hoped that our paths would never cross in an escape room again.” He said and Rebecca sputtered on a laugh, “We were gossiping about it with Diana.” He confessed.

“Yeah, he was kind of in shambles…” Rebecca said, “While we ummm, confess things…I will probably never do an escape room again.” She said and Harry laughed, “It’s the fucking worst.”

“You’re alright at it though.”

“Yeah, because I solve problems all fucking day, the last thing I want to do on my nights off is solve more problems. Stupid ones too.” She giggled and he shrugged.

“Yeah, fair enough.” He said.

“And you know, that Diana girl, she said something tonight that led me to having that chat with Eddie. I was complaining about the bar, you know I hate that bar.”

“Oh boy, do I…” he chuckled.

“I was basically telling Grace get used to it because you’re gonna end up here anyway. I don’t know why you guys talk though options if you’re always going to end up there, but anyway… I was telling them that you liked it because it gave pub vibes and she was basically saying that it was nice of us to still come here because it was probably really nice for you to find something like that here that reminds you of home and she just put things into perspective for me. Like she’s a fucking stranger and had a lot more consideration and care for what matters to you than I ever did! And that’s what made me realize that I needed to tell Eddie to just give me a bit of time to break things off between us.” She explained and Harry bit over his bottom lip to suppress the smile that threatened to break over his lips at the thought of Diana sticking up for him like that. “I guess what I’m trying to say is that…maybe I have been a bit selfish in this relationship. I know you’ve been so understanding and patient with me and entertaining all of my feats to get my foot in the door somewhere and well, you deserve someone who will do the same for you and who makes it about you too. Someone who can look past their own shit and just do things that make you happy simply because they make you happy and not complain about it.” She said and he chuckled.

“I think we all deserve that, love.” He said and she smiled, “Well thank you for everything, I’ve learned a lot about local government.” Harry said and she giggled.

“Yeah, I’ve learned a lot about…I don’t even know…that’s bad isn’t it?” She asked and he shrugged.

“You’ll do better next time.” He assured as he let her hands go and she nodded.

“I really am sorry about all of this.You really do deserve the world, Harry. I hope you don’t forget that.” Rebecca stated and he smiled.

“Thank you.” He responded before she walked off and got into her car and he headed inside once she took off.

As she drove away Harry felt like a weight had been lifted off of his shoulders somehow, she probably felt the same. He remembered that Henry had called him a bunch of times, so he pulled his phone from his pocket and called Henry back and he answered almost immediately.

“Hey man.”

“Hey, what’s up?” Harry asked and Henry sighed.

“I’ve ummm…I have to tell you something and it’s not good news.” He said and Harry frowned in concern.

“Oh, OK. Are you alright?”

“Yeah, I’m fine. But I just need you to know because I respect you and I love you and you deserve better-”

“Is this about Rebecca and Eddie?” Harry asked as he scratched at his head.

“Ummm, yes.”

“She beat you to the punch, man. She told me and she literally just left we ummm, we ended things.” He said.

“Oh, thank god. I had no idea how I was going to break that to you.” He said and Harry chuckled, “You don’t seem too torn up about it.”

“I’m not, neither was she… I kind of told her that I’ve been trying to be in love with her and just…can’t? She felt the same and so we just ended it.” He explained.

“Well I hate to say I told you so but she did say that you being together was very convenient and well…you know how I felt about that.” Henry said and Harry chuckled.

“Yeah, she called it an arrangement while we were arguing a bit so…” Harry mumbled. He then swore he heard someone in the background asking if he was alright, “Is that Grace?”

“Yeah. She’s the one who saw Eddie and Rebecca outside.”

“Oh, that’s why she suddenly wasn’t feeling so well…poor thing. You can tell her that I’m alright and that I really like her, I think you guys will be great together.” Harry said and Henry smiled.

“Thanks, man. I appreciate that.” Henry responded, “And well, I know that maybe it wasn’t everything you thought it was, but you still just ended a relationship, so if you need absolutely anything you know I’m here for you. Day or night.” Henry assured.

“Thank you, I appreciate that. Love you, man. Talk soon.”

“Love you, good night.” Henry said before they hung up.

As Harry got ready for bed he couldn’t help but think about Diana again. Yeah, he was single now, but that didn’t make her any less attainable and it sucked. Part of him wanted to tell Henry about how they knew each other and maybe he would if it got too hard or tempting for him to be around her. The nice thing now was that he didn’t have to feel guilty for being into her.

*********

Diana woke up her body so tense that it ached a bit, she was hot and worse than that, she was so turned on. She could feel her arousal slicking her up to the very tops of her thighs. She rolled over and saw it was only 6am and she groaned as she threw an arm over her face as her body continued to buzz. This wasn’t good… she had just had a sex dream about Harry and as much as she knew she had to dispel the thoughts, she was squeezing her eyes shut clinging on to whatever memory she had of it.

“Fuck it.” She whispered and sat up to dig around her bedside drawer and found her little clit sucking toy, it was only appropriate for the dream she had, had. She pressed it on before slipping it under the covers and moved her sleep shorts aside. She whimpered quietly as soon as her clit got sucked into the little opening of the toy and she opened her legs a little wider as the sensations started to take over.

In her dream he had been holding around her waist the way he had at the bar, except that in her dream they were in her office at the campus. His body was pressed against hers, she could feel that he was hard as his hand started wandering lower. She squeezed her eyes shut to try and remember the feeling as she pressed the button on her toy to increase the pressure of the sucks. She exhaled shakily as the pleasure very quickly started to expand to the rest of her body from her core. She moaned quietly as she envisioned how he kissed her neck while fiddling with the button on her trousers, “Can I feel how wet you are for me?”, he had asked in her dream, right up against the shell of her ear. She increased the pressure of the sucks again as her free hand bunched the sheets beneath her in a fist, the way she had done to his hair as he opened up her button and fly in her dream.

“Mmm, yes…” she whimpered as she envisioned the way two of his fingers slowly dipped down over her. She envisioned how his fingers had tickled down her labia before dipping into her slicked up crease and feeling her arousal pooling out of her entrance. He had moaned in her dream, right into her ear as he started to pet over her hole, slicking his fingers up before sliding them up to swirl over her clit. Her stomach started to tense up and her ears to roar as the blood rushed to her head with her breathing now becoming shallow as she continued imagining his fingers pleasuring her. It was the next part of the dream that had her going insane.

Suddenly she was leaning against her desk, gripping to the edge of it with one hand and the other woven into his hair as he licked and sucked at her clit fervently while his fingers drove in and out of her steadily. She was alone at home right now and could make all the noise she wanted, but in her dream she was at her office at work and she was fighting to keep quiet, occasionally being shushed by him before he’d smirk at her the way he had the night before. She moaned a little louder as she pushed the button to increase the pressure once again and she started panting and arching her back up just in the slightest as the toy and her imagination worked in perfect tandem to push her over the edge. Her whimpers increased just slightly in volume as that bubble of pressure in her core finally burst and she started melting as her feet pressed her up, her hips raised off the mattress just a bit as she tossed her head back and quietly came undone. Her body was covered in goosebumps as she kept the toy to her clit, powering her through her orgasm. And just before she pulled it away she squeezed her eyes shut and pictured him again, this time in her bed and his lovely, deep voice washing over her beautifully, “Fuck, that’s it. Don’t stop now, you’ve got one more in you, baby. C’mon, just be good for me and give me one more.”

With that image in her brain she focused on the pleasure underneath all of the sensitivity and quickly started to build to another orgasm. This one was more intense and she couldn’t help the yelp that slipped out of her mouth as the pleasure started to overwhelm her. Her legs trembled and her fingers hurt from the death grip she had on the sheets, but it felt too good to stop as those tingly and beautiful feelings came over her in waves until she had effectively worked through her pleasure and in a panic pressed her finger down over the little button, gasping when the two seconds it took for the toy to power down felt far longer than that. She inhaled deeply and exhaled shakily a few times as her eyes slowly blinked open, all blurry and heavy as she picked a spot on the ceiling to stare at as she slowly came down from the beauty of it all.

What am I doing? She thought to herself as the lovely feelings started to morph into guilt and sadness. Guilt because he had a girlfriend and sadness because even if he didn’t, there was no chance for them, he had confirmed that again tonight before they left, especially now that she knew that he too had an unprovoked curiosity and attraction towards her. It was best that this was the last time she entertained anything that had to do with Harry in her mind. She wasn’t going to indulge again, she needed to set her sights on possible things.

After her orgasmic bliss had turned to post-orgasmic shame Diana couldn’t sleep so she decided to just clean up and go for a walk or jog around the neighborhood to just expel any remaining tension from her saucy dream. It was about 7:45 when she made it back home and she hopped into the shower.

She made breakfast and then checked her classes for any submissions on their homework assignment system and she did see a few in there that she then worked on grading. She had been so entranced in reading someone’s paper that the chime of a notification made her jump up in fear and she exhale and rolled her eyes as she reached for it and saw an instagram message from Gabe, the history professor who was kind of her friend and asked her out on Wednesday. She opened it up and smiled when she saw a picture of a cup of coffee from Café Flores, apparently she told everyone about this little place.

g.klein88: You were absolutely right about this place. 15/10. EASILY.

Diana smiled as she typed out a response.

DianaBel__: I love being right haha

She proceeded to click on his story to see what he had been up to, it was about 9am now. Her eyes went a bit wide when she saw a tagged video of him presumably after surfing. His wet suit was half-off, rolled down enough to show off his chiseled abs and strong chest, he was waving the “hang-loose” sign to the person who had been recording and then the video’s owner was in the frame showing their own “hang-loose” with a bright smile before it cut out.

“Well damn…” she whispered and then saw that he was typing.

g.klein88: I had a feeling you would appreciate hearing it lol. Have you given any more thought to my invitation to go out?

Her eyebrows raised, boy he was direct. And she did like that because she tended to be rather oblivious to people’s intentions most of the time. And well, she hadn’t really, but after her incident this morning she needed to just focus her attention elsewhere.

DianaBel__: Why yes, I have and I’m definitely open to it…

g.klein88: Well are you free now?

She grinned as she read his message and well, she was… she just needed to pick Celeste up whenever she texted her.

DianaBel__: I am…what did you have in mind?

This is how Diana ended up downtown. She was walking up to Gabe now as he waved at her from a few feet away. He had suggested the farmer’s market, it was casual and they could walk around for a little bit and chat while running a bit of errands. After greeting each other with a hug and some very bright smiles the two were walking side by side as they headed into the market.

*********

Harry may have been subconsciously thinking about Diana because he swore he heard her laughter in his surroundings. He ignored it and smiled as he finished paying the local honey lady and just as he turned around he heard it again and as he started to look around he saw her, head knocked back as the laughed at some guy freaking out about something and after a few seconds he was chuckling along with her and then she tip-toed and wiped something off of the man’s chin with a friendly smile and he seemed to thank her before they walked off side by side. Harry couldn’t deny the reason for why he felt his heart shriveling in his chest and his stomach tightening up in a knot that made him feel nauseous. The disappointment he felt suddenly laid heavily on his chest and the smile that had been adorning his face had vanished.

He continued following them, not intentionally, but his car was in the lot, it seemed they were heading there as well so he reached into his tote and put in his AirPods before blasting some music and speeding past them with a small group of people. It’s not that he was upset at her, there was just no way he could get introduced to this man she was with. He was still processing his breakup with Rebecca while simultaneously juggling what he had felt when he saw Diana with this mystery man. He was just having a hard time balancing these seemingly juxtaposed situations all on his own, he didn’t need a closer look at whatever this was to her.

*********

As Gabe walked Diana to her car she could’ve sworn that she saw Harry down near the end of the parking row, but across the street. She couldn’t see well from far, so she squinted her eyes a bit to try and make sure it was him. He was in a white t-shirt and some jeans and he was wearing some kind of yellow hat on his head. Diana smiled as she watched him loading up his totes in his car.

“What’re you smiling at?” Gabe asked and she turned to him.

“I think I know that guy, he’s an adjunct at the university.” She said and he turned to look at him as well.

“Hmmm, never seen him before.”

“Oh, he’s with the graduate students.” She explained as she looked again as he rounded to the driver’s side of the car. She wanted to call out to him but she had no reason to. They had just agreed that after their little conversation the night before everything was over so she just sighed and turned back around, “So ummm, I need to go pick up my daughter, but thank you for inviting me out here, this was nice.” She smiled with gratitude.

“Nice enough to want to do it again?” He asked and she grinned, “Blink once for yes and twice for no.” he said and she laughed.

“Yeah, I think we can give it another go.” She said and he grinned. Gabe was very fun and easy going, he was also a level of hot that she couldn’t deny, he was very easy on the eyes. Yet she didn’t feel a pull to him strong enough to stop her eyes from wandering and she needed him to know because it wouldn’t be fair to say yes to him and still be crushing on Harry, “But I do want to tell you that I’m not exactly sure that I’m looking for anything too serious.” She shared and he smiled, “What?” She asked and he chuckled.

“Nothing, I just like how straightforward you are.” He shrugged, “Also, let me tell you something. I’m…divorced.” He admitted, “It’s been…nearly two years now?” He said and she nodded in understanding, “It just wasn’t working out.” He explained, “It was largely issues with her family, they were very intrusive and not too happy that she married well, someone like me. I was just an adjunct at the time. She’s the VP of communication for a very famous production company, she was the breadwinner, her generationally wealthy family didn’t love my minimal contributions.” He explained, “I maybe got a bit mouthy with her dad for belittling me…turns out she was thinking the same thing he was, just…waiting for the right time to say it I suppose.”

“Oh, I’m so sorry.”

“It’s alright, I’m over it now. We were only married a year, I’m still learning to un-love her, thankfully I loved myself more than her though, at least enough to leave.” He explained, “So I get it, not being ready for something serious. I just feel you’re nice and getting to know you seems like a good idea.” He explained, “We’re just getting to know each other better, we don’t even need to call it dating.” He chuckled and she giggled.

“I mean, I’m not that ruthless.” She said and he smiled, “Let’s just…ease into it. See what’s there.”

“Yeah, that’s a good idea.” He smiled.

They exchanged a few more words before hugging goodbye. As she drove over to Geri’s house she called Celeste to let her know she was on her way. She was excited to share her news with Celeste, that she’d gone through with the date she had been asked on. She’d definitely be happy that she went through it. When she arrived Celeste came out and settled into the car easily. She did seem very excited that Diana had gone on a date that morning, she still said she could do better and go for a nice dinner or something more romantic, to which she assured her that maybe in the future it could happen, but not yet. The rest of their weekend went back to the fairly normal routine to get ready for the week.

Celeste had therapy Monday and Diana recalled her steamy dream and well, her actions thereafter and she decided that she would wait in the car for Celeste’s sessions until her embarrassment passed. There was absolutely no way she could look in Harry’s eyes after what she had done.

**********

“Hey man, what’s up? How are you feeling?” Henry asked Harry over the phone as Harry made it into his house. He had been feeling down all day and while he knew he should attribute it to the end of his relationship, it had nothing to do with that.

“I’m alright at the moment. Was feeling a bit bummed earlier, but I just got back from a run, that helped.”

“That’s good, bud. Look if you need anything at all, I’m here. We should. Meet up for lunch or something this week? Maybe a drink if the week gets rough?”

“Yeah, definitely.” Harry assured, “How’s ummm, how’s Grace after having to see that?”

“She’s alright, she just felt so guilty knowing and not telling you.” He explained, “You know that I was always a bit skeptical of Rebecca, but ummm, I never thought she’d do something like that.”

“Yeah, you know in a way I’m kind of glad it happened this way because it just reaffirmed everything we don’t feel for each other. Infidelity sort of gave us a reason to not need to work through yet something else, to not settle.”

“Right.” Henry said, “You know H, waiting for the right person is definitely worth it.”

“Yeah, easy for you to say with a fresh new love.” Harry grinned and Henry chuckled.

“OK, there might be a small bias there but ummm…she’s the one H. I knew it from the first date.” He said and Harry smiled.

“That fast, huh?”

“Yeah, man.” Henry assured with a smile.

“So, how did you know?” Harry asked as he reached into his fridge to warm up some leftovers for his dinner.

“Well first off, everything was so easy. Like the attraction to each other was undeniable from the start. When we talk it just flows, like there’s not enough that I can learn with every conversation. I feel so happy when I see her or hear her voice.” He explained, “I don’t know, but it was one of those things that just felt right from the moment she came and told me about hitting my car.” He chuckled and Harry did as well, “After that first time that I looked into her eyes I just couldn’t stop thinking about her. It’s like something just clicked inside of my brain, there was a spark that woke me up.” He said and Harry hummed. He was covered in goosebumps because that’s literally how he was feeling about Diana. From the day he met her, there was just something about her that called out to him and it got harder and harder to ignore it.

“It sounds like you can’t miss the signs.” Harry responded.

“Yeah, you’d have to be an idiot to ignore them.” Henry chuckled and Harry smiled.

“Yeah, I guess so…” he accepted.

Monday went by rather slow for Harry, the one thing that was pushing him forward was getting to see Diana for whatever brief moment he got to greet her. After he bid farewell to his client he started to buzz with excitement, getting ready to greet Celeste and Diana. He straightened out his vest a bit before heading to his office door and opening it up. Celeste immediately stood from her seat and smiled at him.

“Hi Dr. Styles.” She greeted him and he smiled at her.

“Hi Celeste, where’s your mum?” He asked immediately and the second he realized what he had done he felt his stomach sink.

“Oh, she’s reading midterm papers in the car. Do you need to talk to her?” She asked and Harry shook his head.

“Ummm, you know I can just email her. It’s fine.” He assured as he plastered on a smile, “C’mon, lets head back.” He said and guided them back into his office. He sat down and she headed to the window.

“Dr. Styles?”

“Yeah?”

“Ummm, there’s a little cat out there on the fire escape, under your bench of plants.” She said and he immediately stood and headed over there, “It’s soaked.” She said and he frowned and peeked out the window as she moved out of the way to let him see. It had been raining on and off all day long and it seemed that this little guy was looking for shelter. Harry immediately unlatched the large window’s lock and opened it up and he crouched down to fit through it. Celeste watched on as he approached the cat who meowed as Harry approached it.

“C’mon, little guy.” Harry encouraged.

“Or girl!” Celeste said and Harry smiled.

“Yeah, just…c’mere cat.” He extended his hand gently and the cat sniffed it before getting closer. “Celeste, under the sink in the bathroom there should be a pack of microfiber towels, they’re blue. Bring one please?”

“Yeah.” She said and hurried off as the cat slowly started to come closer to Harry. It was shivering and it’s big green eyes were peering into his own with wariness.

“C’mon, I’m not gonna hurt you.” He said gently to the cat.

“Here, Dr. Styles.” Celeste said from behind and he reached back to grab the towel she had brought him. He let the cat sniff him again and it started inching forward. After coaxing it a bit more it had come close enough that Harry could scoop it up. It protested at first with a few mews but Harry had it in his hold, wrapped in the towel.

“Can you take the cat?” Harry asked Celeste and she reached her arms out and grabbed the cat as Harry climbed back in from the fire escape. Celeste was drying the cat’s head and Harry smiled, “Does it have a collar?” He asked as he closed the window and she felt around the cat’s neck.

“Nope.” She said and he hummed.

“OK.” He said as she carried the cat over to the couch where she sat with it in her lap. It pressed closer to her body, seeking more warmth, “Let me get a dry towel.” He said and came back moments later and helped her swap out the towel.

“Well, she’s a girl.” Celeste said and he smiled, “What’re you gonna do with her?”

“I’ll probably take her to the shelter and see if she’s chipped.” He said and she hummed.

“And if she doesn’t have a home?” She questioned.

“I don’t know.” He said and she sighed.

“Well I think you should keep her around. She could be a nice emotional support cat for all of us coming in. You can name her something cute, like Misty.” She said smiling up at Harry and he chuckled.

“Yeah, that’s a cute name. Well, I will think about it.” Harry said and she smiled as the cat snuggled closer to her as she gently patted at her damp fur, “So today you were supposed to get a final decision on what was going to happen with Megan.” He said and she nodded.

“They changed her consequence to suspension instead of detention. So she got suspended for the week and the girls who were with her, her friends, they got detention for the rest of the month. Megan also has to see the school counselor once a week.” She said and Harry nodded.

“Well sounds like she needs it. How do you feel about it all?” He asked and she sighed.

“I mean good, but I don’t know what comes next. Like, I don’t think this has fixed anything, you know?”

“Well, that’s a valid concern, but we don’t actually know that yet, do we?” He asked and she nodded.

“Right. I just…I don’t feel better.” She explained and he nodded in understanding, “I feel like I still need to watch my back.”

“Well, now that the administrators know they’ll probably keep an eye out on Megan, to make sure he doesn’t retaliate, right?”

“I guess so.” She shrugged as she pet at the cat, “I don’t feel happy about it or anything yet.”

“Well, that might take a bit longer. You still need to settle into how things might change. For the better.” He added in and she nodded.

“What if things get better and I’m still not happy?” She asked and frowned.

“Well, that’s not abnormal.” Harry said, “It could be that you’re depressed for other reasons, but the bullying has been the most obvious stressor so we all just assumed that’s what it was.” He explained, “Is there anything else going on that we should talk about?” He asked and she sighed.

“I…I don’t know.” She said honestly, her eyes were on his and he nodded.

“Sometimes we can just get depressed, it doesn’t always have to do with something deep inside, you know?” He explained, “Whatever it is, we can work through it. From the conversation we’ve been having is it wrong of me to say that you sound… hopeless?” He asked and she shook her head.

“No, that sounds about right.” She confirmed, “What if this keeps happening, over and over again? Maybe we fix the issue this year but someone else comes and makes things hard again next year.”

“Well, I am going to tell you something you might hate to hear, but in life, sometimes shitty things just happen.” He said and she frowned, “But the good news is that with time and experience and family, friends, and other help, like therapy, you’ll be more equipped to deal with the hardships. That doesn’t mean that they’re easier to manage or won’t bug you as badly, but you will be able to see the light at the end of the tunnel even brighter than before.” He smiled.

“Well that’s good to know.” She said as she continued petting at the cat.

“Yeah. Do you have pets?” Harry asked and she shook her head.

“No. Mom says we’re not at home enough.” She said and Harry nodded in understanding.

“I see. You know, I don’t have a pet either for the same reason. When you think about it, having a pet is a lot like a kid or even just a friend.” He said and she chuckled.

“How do you mean?”

“Well, we dedicate time to them and look after them. We care for them like they’re a part of our family. We learn what it likes, what it doesn’t like. We learn how it communicates with us…does that make sense? It’s like another member of our family almost.”

“Yeah.” She said and he nodded.

“So sometimes when we get busy or things change we start to look after the members of our family less. We lose touch with others and sometimes ourselves.” He explained, “And I think that this year has brought a lot of changes to you, Celeste.” She sighed, “High school is a big change. Your mom got promoted, so she’s been busier, you’re having trouble at school…a lot of things have changed and it’s normal to not feel like yourself.” He said and she pouted a bit.

“You know, it was her idea, my mom’s, to put me in guitar lessons. The band teacher shows me stuff too. I don’t need private lessons. I like them now, but at first I really hated it.” She admitted, “She was busier during the summer and I think she just signed me up to get me out of the way for a bit.” She sighed and Harry frowned, that didn’t sound like Diana.

“Do you really feel that way?” He asked and she nodded.

“She got her job and she just…disappeared. She used to pick me up every single day and we would have fun and make dinner.”

“Have you talked to her about this?”

“No. And honestly, I don’t know if she’ll listen. Even now, with this thing with Megan. It doesn’t seem like she cares. Or like the second I started getting comfortable with you she feels like she doesn’t even need to come up here and support me.” Celeste said. And almost for the rest of their time in the session Celeste just spent it venting about how alone she felt now. She had friends to spend time with, but the closeness she used to have with Diana was slowly fading and to her it seemed that Diana now cared about her job more than Celeste, which Harry knew was far from the truth, but Celeste felt the way she felt. Once again there were tears and lots of hugging the fucking cat in her lap, which with each passing second looked like it belonged here more than not.

Harry wasn’t sure if this was just a bad day, maybe they had a disagreement, or maybe she truly had been feeling this way for a long time but he couldn’t stop hearing her say that Diana wasn’t invested in therapy with her. That wasn’t the case at all, this was their fault. Diana wasn’t up here waiting for Celeste because of what they had shared on Friday night. He shouldn’t have touched her, shouldn’t have held her. He shouldn’t have been feeling jealous over her. The one thing he was afraid of had happened and his choices drove a wedge between Celeste and Diana. When Harry went home that night with the cat he felt quite defeated.

******* Tuesday Afternoon*******

Grace was running late on picking her up, so Celeste had spent some time practicing her guitar parts for the jazz band concert. She had just received a text from Grace that she was outside so she hurried to pack her music and guitar before running to the bathroom really quick.

She was just washing her hands when the bathroom door opened and she glanced up through the mirror she saw two of Megan’s friends coming in looking angry. She backed up as they approached her and her breathing was heavy.

“You shouldn’t have snitched on Megan.” One of the girls said and Celeste swallowed thickly, she couldn’t even speak.

“I’m sorry.” She whispered, the breath was leaving her lungs and her hands started to go numb.

“We’re gonna get you back. So watch your back.” The girl hissed and she couldn’t help it as her tears started to fall. Her guitar case was leaning against the wall and one of the girls looked at it with a grin.

“No, please don’t!” Celeste begged as the girl approached it and then kicked at the center of the neck of the guitar and she gasped as she heard the wood crack loudly.

“Oh my god!”, “Let’s go!” The two girls laughed and rushed out of the bathroom as Celeste opened up her guitar case to see that the whole neck was cracked through. She felt more tears fall as she groaned in frustration. She knew this would happen!

She got it together for Grace, but Grace knew her well and she knew that Celeste had, had a bad day or she was just moody, so Grace warned Diana anyway. And when Diana got home Celeste just felt all her anger from her vent with Dr. Styles just come back fresh.

“Hi mamita! I’m home!” Diana called as she made it into the kitchen and flicked on the lights so that she could start on dinner. “I stopped by a Cinnabon on the way home!” She shouted, after Grace told her that it seemed that it hand’t been a great day for Celeste, she wanted to do a little something extra.

“Hi.” She heard the mumble behind her and she turned around to see Celeste looking through the Cinnabon bag, “Thanks.” She said and started leaving again.

“Hey, hey, hey!” Diana called after her and Celeste groaned.

“What?”

“What’s the matter?” Diana questioned.

“Nothing.”

“Doesn’t look like nothing.” Diana smiled and Celeste rolled her eyes. “Grace told me you had a bad day.”

“It wasn’t bad.”

“She said you were crying. Did those girls do something to you at school again?” She asked and Celeste shook her head but looked away, “Celeste.” Diana pressed, “How can I help if I don’t know what happened?” She asked and Celeste groaned.

“That’s the thing! You didn’t help you made everything worse!” Celeste shouted with so much rage she was panting and Diana frowned.

“What do you mean?”

“I never should have listened to you!” She shouted with exasperation and Diana frowned.

“Something else happened, didn’t it?”

“Mom-”

“I need to know, Celeste.”

“Yes! Th-they broke my guitar. But none of this would ever have happened if you wouldn’t have talked to the principal! They’re so pissed that I told on them!” She accused angrily, “And now they’re gonna pick on me even more-”

“We did the right thing, Celeste!” Diana shouted back angrily, “What more was I supposed to do? Watch them hurt you more?”

“Ughh it doesn’t even matter because I’m gonna be miserable now and it’s all your fault!” She roared, “This is all your fault! I hate you!” Celeste bellowed at Diana before storming out.

Diana was frozen, as she felt her eyes welling up as Celeste’s stomps faded. Her hurt crawled up her throat and broke past her mouth in the sound of a sob. Her hands flew up to her face where she groaned loudly into them. She hated this. She had no idea how to fix this or what she had done wrong and she knew that the answer was not to get in a shouting match with Celeste She searched through her bag and pulled out her phone and dialed Harry’s office, she just need to talk to him.

**********

Harry reached for his phone as it rang, alerting him of a forwarded call from his office. It rang out after a few rings and then he saw a voicemail notification and decided to just check it out. He brought the phone up to his ear as he waited for the audio to play.

“H-harry, it’s me.” He heard Dian’s voice clear as day sounding so, so defeated, “I really need to talk to you.” She sniffed, “It’s not an emergency, ummm, I’d just like to talk.” She finished and hung up. Harry sighed and threw his head back on his pillow. He started at the ceiling for a moment and shook his head before bringing his phone down and deleting the voice mail. They’d barely had any contact and it had already affected Celeste in some way.

******

Diana decided to give Celeste some time to cool off. It was nearing 10 at night when she knocked on the door and peeked her head in when a soft “what” sounded through the door.

“Cariño-”

“Mom, not now.”

“Sweetie, we need to talk about what’s going on-”

“Why? Why now, mom?”

“Because I am worried about you!” Diana raised her voice, “I don’t know what’s going to happen to you next! And if there’s something I can do to prevent something worse-”

“Well you didn’t prevent anything! You made it worse! You meddled and now they broke my guitar and-”

“Sweetie, we can fix that quickly-”

“Yeah, so that I’m out of your hair again!”

“What? What are you talking about?”

“You just force me to do things so that you don’t have to waste your time with me anymore!”

“What? No, that’s not-”

“I don’t want to talk to you!”

“Fine!” Diana finally blew up and Celeste froze at her mom’s outburst, she had never heard her this upset. “You think I don’t care? That I just make everything worse? How’s this for worse? You’re grounded - phone and laptop handed over at 10:30pm until I decide. No friends over, even to study. And you are earning back the money it costs to fix that guitar.”

“What? Mom-”

“I have sacrificed my entire life for you because I love you. Even now, when you’re acting like a spoiled brat I don’t regret what I’ve done for you. But if you think I make everything worse, fine. Solve your own problems from here on out, because if you’re going to be ungrateful when I just want to help then I won’t help! I am done.” Diana seethed before storming out of Celeste’s room and slamming her door behind her hard. She was completely at a loss and she had no idea what she was going to do next. She laid in her bed, staring at the ceiling, willing sleep to come, but it wasn’t. Suddenly her phone started to ring and she glanced to it on her bedside table, she didn’t have the number saved in her phone but she picked it up anyway.

“Hello?” She whispered and then heard a sharp exhale over the line.

“Hi.” Harry’s voice came through the receiver and it made her skin come to life, “You called earlier?” His deep voice practically vibrated through the receiver.

“Yeah, it’s just…Celeste and I fought and I had a moment of weakness. Wanted to know what you had talked about last session.” She sighed, “It was a reach. I shouldn’t have done that.” She apologized.

“It’s alright. Are you alright?” He asked and she sniffled.

“Yeah, just…bummed. I lost my temper in the end and just went off on the poor thing.” She said and he frowned, “They broke her guitar today from telling on that other girl, Megan. She said it’s my fault.”

“Oh my god.” He said and Diana sighed.

“Yeah. I’ll let her talk to you about it next week, but just know it’s been rough.” She explained.

“Yeah, of course.” He assured. There was some silence before Diana spoke again.

“I ummm…I think I saw you the other day. Well it was Saturday at the farmer’s market?” She changed the subject and he bit his lip.

“Yeah? I was there in the morning.” He confirmed.

“Yeah. I thought I saw you loading your groceries.” She smiled as she recalled, “In a little yellow hat?” She asked and Harry grinned.

“Probably did. Sounds like me.” He said and she hummed. There was a short pause of silence before he asked his next question. “Why didn’t you come up yesterday with Celeste?” He inquired.

“I didn’t think you’d want that after everything we talked about Friday. Where we left things off.” Diana reminded.

“Right…I know.” He sighed and she smiled lightly. She felt it was hard to stay away from him too. “Want to know something?”

“Sure.” She responded quietly.

“My girlfriend? She was cheating on me, with Eddie.” He said and Diana sat up from her bed in shock.

“Oh my god…that’s insane! I’m so sorry. Are you alright?” She asked with concern.

“Yeah, I’m alright. We just…we’d both been searching for reasons to stay and ummm…our goals didn’t align from the start. We’ve been on two different pages, two different books even, for most of our time together apparently, so she found someone who was more in tune with what she wants.” He explained and Diana hummed.

“So you’re at peace with it?”

“More than I thought I’d be.” He stated with a chuckle.

“Can I tell you something?” She asked.

“Yeah, of course.” He replied, inviting her to keep talking.

“I…went on a date.” She said and he chuckled, ignoring the hurt in his chest.

“You wanted to tell me that?”

“Not necessarily you, just someone. I told Celeste afterwards on Saturday.” Suddenly everything started clicking about Celeste not being happy about Diana barely having any time for her. It worried her that Diana dating again would change everything between them, “I haven’t had the chance to chat about it with anyone.”

“And why me?”

“Because we’re not anything and you can be objective with me.”

“Not anything, huh?” He asked with a twinge of hurt in his chest, though his tone was playful.

“You know what I mean, Harry.” She sighed, feeling bad.

“Alright, what needs objectivity?”

“Just whether this is a good idea or not. On one hand I see how it can be. I hardly have a social life, I haven’t dated anyone in like two years…that was the last time I accepted an invitation from someone if I’m recalling correctly? And I mean, it could be good for me to…put myself out there. To have friends that aren’t Grace and my teenage daughter, or her buddies. It would be nice to have some company or to feel cared for in a non-platonic way. I mean, there’s tons of pros. But on the other hand I mean, there’s my job. It’s time-consuming, and Celeste…she’s dealing with so much and I want to be there for her first and foremost. Her wellbeing and happiness are my priority. So I’m nervous about introducing her to a partner and about changing our dynamic, it’s just been us two for so long…what if she thinks that I’m not happy with just us? Or what if she feels excluded?” she sighed in concern.

“Yeah, I hear you. But I reckon the right person would also consider and care for your child. It could be one of those situation where you introduce your partner as a friend first and work your way up?” He suggested.

“She’d see that coming a mile off… friend who stays the night?” She asked with a giggle and Harry giggled as well.

“Oh! So that’s the kind of thing you’re looking for.” Harry teased and she went all hot in the face, “You’re a cheeky little thing.” He teased.

“Oh my god…” she sighed.

“Hey, it’s OK, I’m not judging, but yeah maybe that would make things tricky with Celeste.” He chuckled.

“Yeah, it’s just at whatever point that happens at, it’s gonna be odd and a little uncomfortable.” She explained and Harry agreed.

“Well, I don’t know what to tell you, Diana… Objectively speaking? I mean, I think you’ll just need to be a nun from now on.” He joked.

“Oh god…” she giggled and he smiled, “So you’re really OK?” She asked after some moments of silence.

“Yeah, more than.” He was gonna take a risk, “So much so that as I laid in bed after Rebecca and I broke up, all I could think about was cherries.” He said and she felt her mouth go dry.

“Cherries?” She asked and he hummed.

“Mmmm, from your perfume. I could smell it on the jacket I was wearing and the scent just stuck itself in my mind until I went to bed. Was thinking about you, hoping that I didn’t hurt your feelings again.”

“You didn’t. I get it.” She said and Harry sighed, “Why are we acting like this is such a big deal? We hardly even know each other, Harry. Think about it. This is not a problem on its own, we’re making it a problem.” She said and he sighed. In a way that was true, they were freaking out because they found each other physically attractive. “Our best friends are in a relationship, we’re gonna see each other every now and again so how about we just reserve our non-shop talk to when we all hang out? I’m sure it won’t be often, at most once a month right? For the escape room?”

“Oh, so you are gonna join us?” He asked excitedly.

“Well yeah, I feel a bit obligated now that I know you’re a player short.” She reasoned and Harry winced playfully.

“Ouch!” He said through the line with a chuckle.

“I’m so sorry! I didn’t realize I was…don’t laugh at me.” She scolded in some embarrassment as she heard him laughing, “I truly was thinking about it in terms of the group. I’m sorry, Harry.” She assured as his laughter died down.

“I know. Just messing with you.” He confirmed and she felt a slight weight lifted off of her shoulders.

“OK, good.” She smiled as she stared at the ceiling, “You smell good too, by the way.” She spoke up softly and Harry smiled.

“Yeah?”

“Mmm-hm.” She confirmed with a bashful smile on her face. She was envisioning the feeling of his warmth wrapped around her like on Friday night. She wanted to be near him, to feel him hold her again, to feel safe in someone’s arms, a feeling she hadn’t had in ages.

“So this guy you’ve been dating…”

“It was one date, the farmer’s market. We’re gonna go out again this week I think. It’s new and I don’t know… I’m nervous.”

“About?”

“All of it.” She giggled.

“Well do you…like him?”

“He’s nice.”

“So no.” he chuckled and she laughed.

“I didn’t say that. I’m just getting used to the idea of liking him.”

“That didn’t sound any better.” He assured with a grin and she groaned.

“You’ve got my head all mixed up.” She chuckled breathily.

“What? How? I’m just interpreting what you’re saying.” He chuckled.

“By saying things about…cherries and my feelings and just stuff like that…” she said and he smiled.

“Mmmm, I see. Sorry.” He apologized, “S’kinda hard to forget though.”

“Yeah.” She admitted, mentally willing herself to recall the feeling of his body encasing hers.

“You said earlier that Celeste was your priority.” He said seemingly changing the subject.

“Yeah, she is.”

“So if you have 3 main priorities where are you on that list, Diana?” Harry asked and she grinned.

“Are you trying to therapize me?” She asked with a grin.

“No, it’s a serious question. The fact that you’re thinking about it is not a great sign, by the way.” He said with a smile and she sighed.

“Well, I can say with certainty that I’m in the top 5 priorities.” She laughed quietly and he hummed.

“I mean, it’s not uncommon for people to do that, don’t worry. I do it sometimes too. And I mean, I can’t pretend to fully understand what having a child is like, but I do know that for many adults with children it’s like they put themselves on the back burner until their kid turns 18, which is horrifying. And I mean, how is your kid supposed to learn balance if you’re not modeling that for them? Like when is the last time Celeste got to see you choose yourself and do something for you?” He asked and she couldn’t even come up with something.

“I don’t know, honestly.” She confessed.

“See that’s not good. I know you have many things to consider as you make choices, but every now and again throw something in there for you, you know? Something that’ll make you feel happy. Whether it’s dating or committing to the escape room thing-”

“Or talking on the phone with non-friends about friend things…” she added and he smiled.

“Exactly.” He agreed.

“Yeah, I will try…” she sighed. “Can I tell you something else?” She asked softly after a long moment of silence.

“Yeah. Tell me.” He responded as he stared at his ceiling.

“W-when you grabbed me, around my waist? On Friday?” She brought up nervously, “I haven’t been held like that in years. It was really nice and I’ve missed it. It’s what…prompted me to say yes to Gabe. I want that again.” She explained. Of course, leaving out that she kind of wanted more of that with him, but that wasn’t possible, so she needed to try with someone else.

“Even though you don’t like him like that?” Harry asked and she closed her eyes with a slight pout on her face.

“Well what else was I supposed to do?” She asked softly.

“I don’t know, but you did the right thing.” He said and she sighed. “Don’t get me wrong, I-I liked holding you. I liked how your body fit against mine. I liked smelling your perfume on my jacket for the rest of the time after and I-”

“Harry-” she interrupted.

“You can’t tell me that wasn’t seared into your brain for days after.” He interrupted her and she sighed.

“Of course it was, but-”

“So why are you calling and telling me about your dates? Why are you doing this?” He questioned with some hurt lacing into his tone and she sighed.

“Because I need you to know that I’m fucking trying!” She whisper-shouted, “I’m trying to do the right thing and not dwell on whatever weird tension or attraction exists between us. Even if…talking to you makes me happy.”

“Diana-”

“I can’t come first. Not this time, Harry. So don’t flirt with me or…touch me or talk to me about my perfume lingering on your clothes. Please.” She swallowed thickly and he nodded.

“OK.” He responded quietly, “Notice I didn’t apologize for it though.” He said and she smiled.

“I noticed.” She assured.

“Good. Just as long as it prompted you to do something for yourself, I don’t care. You deserve it.” He said softly.

“Thank you, Harry.” She hummed, “And thanks for even calling me back.”

“Yeah, of course.” He assured and she exhaled.

“Good night, Harry.”

“G’night.” He responded before the line went dead. Diana suddenly felt so empty and defeated as she stared at her ceiling. She had hoped that speaking with Harry had brought some clarity but all it did was confuse her even more.

This is Wesley Beniot - Celeste's dad, Diana's Ex:

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