#DR. SEUSS LIVING BOOKS

[retrocgads]

USA 1997

[carry-on-my-wayward-butt]

Daisy-Head Mayzie is a story about a child with "something vaguely wrong with her" being mocked by her peers, blamed for her own problems by school administration, mourned by her parents as if she's dead, exploited by medical professionals who just want funding, used as a platform issue by politicians, exploited as a token freakshow by capitalism, and in the middle of a depressive episode about whether she could ever be accepted by the community she had before this vague thing Became Wrong With Her, is encouraged to just believe that all the neglect and mistreatment she experienced was fine because it was at the hands of people who loved her before, and she was kind of a freak, and sometimes it happens again but she gets used to it so it's fine! Just lean into it Mayzie! You fucking freakshow!

[fingertipsmp3]

I’m trying to give The Grinch (2018) a chance, I really am, but all I can think is

[neil-gaiman]

Hi Neil, what's your opinion on the rewrite of Roald Dahl's works in the name of "making it available for all"?

Thanks.

I'm a lot more comfortable with this kind of thing when it's done by a living writer to existing work. I remember as a kid picking up a copy of John Masefield's Collected Poems, and seeing a 1930s errata slip in the book, which said "in the poem London Town, replace

“‘And craftily fares the knave there, and wickedly fares the Jew.’

with

“‘But wretchedly fare the most there and merrily fare the few.’"

And I nodded my 9 year old head in approval. Someone had pointed out to the poet that that line was awful, and he had fixed it.

I can't imagine anyone deciding to fix that line after the poet had died, though.

I removed a line from "The Day I Swapped My Dad For Two Goldfish" (over the objections of my editor, who wanted to keep it) because too many people had reached out to me and told me it had upset them or their children on reading it, and I realised it was being taken in a way I hadn't intended. So on later editions it went away.

And having said that, language changes. Enid Blyton's children's books have been rewritten, her children renamed (farewell Dick and Fanny) and so forth, with the idea that the Blyton estate is a commercial entity that wishes to remain viable. The Dahl estate is in the same place. So is the Dr Seuss estate -- and they chose to simply let some of the earlier books go out of print. There comes a point where it's not about art, but about sustaining a commercial entity. And I don't know what I think about that.

[nopecho]

LI Book Headcanons

I've had this thought in my mind all day and NEED to get it out there.

(content warning: mentions of JK Rowling. Not to worry, it's bad mouthing her.)

Eden: his favourite damn series is Lord of the Rings. My man started with The Hobbit, then dived into Lotr. He's read EVERY. SINGLE. Elf song that the book has to offer. He's a fantasy nerd. However I would also see him read Pride and Prejudice. Perhaps some Terry Pratchett, too.

Avery: she grew up reading her parent's notes and bank account details. HOWEVER she's also read 50 Shades of Gray, and gave her the idea in mind that if she has enough money, she can acquire any lover she wants. REFUSES to acknowledge that it's Twilight fanfiction.

Kylar: speaking of Twilight, he is a FANATIC. adores the idea of being the misterious vampire, that attracts Bella in his unusual charm. He's read every book. And I mean every book, he's read the genderbent version, the Edward POV, anything written by Meyer he's read. He was neither team Jacob or Edward, he was team Kylar. Drew his self insert vampire oc with Bella NUMEROUS times.

Robin: he used to be a Potterhead. He was SO into it. Identified as a Hufflepuff, did the patronus and wand quizzes, his favourite book is the first one. He was in SHACKLES when JK Rowling came out as a gross terf. The level of betrayal he felt is indescribable. He woved to never touch the books again.

Sydney: do you know those books Christian oarents give to kids to let them know about Jesus early? Yeah, Sidney's read them. However, when she got freedom to grab her own books, she discovered that she DIGS Greek Mythology. She has a whole collection of Rick Riordan's books on the shelf, has attempted to draw her favourite characters. The movies don't exist to her and whenever anyone brings them up, she death stares them.

Alex: you know the Grimm fairy tales? Those are his favourites. Just the dark forest themes, the magic, the horror aspect of it... It just works for him. He's lived his whole life in the countryside, so he can fantasize about getting lost in the woods and finding a gingerbread house.

Whitney. I saved the best for last. So in hus childhood, in my headcanon he could never really afford to buy books, let alone his parents giving them to him. He read a bit of Dr Seuss but that was it. NOW that he can actually afford some stuff, he discovered the duality of man. Comics.

On one hand, he absolutely LOVES thise cute, kid friendly comics. Peanuts, Garfield, the Disney Mickey Mouse comics. On the other, he absolutely digs the over-the-top action manga shit. I'm talking Chainsaw Man, DevilMan by Go Nagai, Hells Angels by Shinichi Hiromoto. He doesn't have enough attention span to read a whole book, but he absolutely LOVES comics.

Thank you for coming to my Ted Talk!

[television-overload]

fate is the handspike

(an X-Files ficlet)

[Read on AO3]

Summary:

Starting on February 23, 1964, Teena Mulder begins to worry about her young son. At first, she thinks maybe he's wishing for a little sister, a wish that will be granted very soon. But he insists the little girl he talks to is called Dana, and she's too little to play, but she likes when he reads his books to her.

(fic below the cut)

i.

At first, Teena thinks it's cute.

"She's just a baby, mommy, she can't play yet," he'd say.

"Oh, is that right?" she'd reply, indulging him in his childish fantasies. Perhaps this was his way of asking for a sister. The other moms in the neighborhood often urged her to give Fox a sibling, citing a child's need for company and social engagement, but Fox had always seemed so happy to play alone. She's not on the best of terms with her husband at the moment, either, which complicates things.

But then there's times when she sees Fox on the floor, legs splayed out before him as he recites his favorite picture books to his imaginary friend, and she wonders if she ought to be worried. Just a little.

Dr. Seuss, Curious George, Clifford the Big Red Dog... The boy has a photographic memory. Though he's too young to properly read, he has a grasp on the basic plots and recounts them in great detail, turning the pages as he goes.

"This one is called 'Where the Wild Things Are,' Dana," he says, because his friend's name—he insists—is Dana. He turns the book in his hand and shows the colorful illustration on the cover to a patch of carpet on the living room floor. "Don't worry, it's not scary," he assures her. Her. It. Whatever it is he's spent his days talking to since late February.

When he tells the story, he uses his own name, instead of 'Max.' That's how she'd always read it to him, and that's the only way he knows.

"And Fox told the monsters to be still!" he narrates with enthusiasm. "He used a magic trick and looked right in their BIG yellow eyes, and they were all scared. They said Fox is the most wild thing of all, and they made him king!"

ii.

There was one night when she'd woken to find Fox standing in the corner of his room, speaking softly to the wall.

"Shh, it's okay, Dana," he soothed in his little voice. "Here, I'll sing you a song. Twinkle twinkle little star...."

She never tells Bill what she's seen. He's always too busy to notice himself. But others know.

"He's quite an imaginative young fellow," Spender notes, taking a draw from his cigarette as Fox rolls around in the grass outside the house in Quonochontaug. Since "Dana" learned to crawl, he's been even more preoccupied than usual. He shows her all his toys, tells her the names of all his action figures. He announces to his mother one day that he's going to teach Dana how to walk. That she can only stand on her own for a little bit right now, but she doesn't cry anymore when she falls down.

Bill, if he ever catches wind of this, must think he's talking about one of the other kids from Teena's ladies' group. But there's no "Dana" in this neighborhood. Not on the Vineyard, either. She's checked.

iii.

The day she finds out she's pregnant, a part of her wonders. Though her knowledge of her husband's work is small, she knows enough to gather that things she might have thought impossible, could in fact be possible. Perhaps her son had been having visions of his baby sister, long before she was even conceived. Maybe it had simply been a sign that he would one day be a big brother. Soon.

She'd long since dispelled thoughts of ghosts and hauntings and exorcisms.

He tells Dana all about the baby in mommy's tummy. He giggles and makes silly faces, pausing in between sentences, which she gathers must mean his friend has developed the ability to speak.

"Mommy, she said my name! That's right! Fox! Fox!"

iv.

When Samantha is born, "Dana" seems to disappear overnight. This, at least, supports her theory that he had simply been preparing himself for a new sibling, and after a few years, she's completely dismissed the issue. Fox shows no other signs of strange or unusual behavior. He is nothing but a doting big brother, who occasionally gets annoyed by his freckle-faced kid sister, as any brother is wont to do. He reads to her, plays games with her, watches the television with her. They're two peas in a pod, and not once does the name "Dana" escape his lips. She is all but forgotten.

Until he's twelve years old. Samantha is gone, and Teena lacks the patience to deal with his questioning.

"Mom? Does the name 'Dana' mean anything to you?" he asks.

"What? Of course not, Fox, why would you ask such a thing?"

He looks down at his feet, shoulders slumping. "No reason. Forget I asked."

v.

When Fox lays awake at night, the bedroom next to his now dull and empty, he thinks he can hear a voice. It isn't Samantha's—though he'd thought so at first.

"By heaven, man," she reads, "we are turned round and round in this world, like yonder windlass, and Fate is the handspike. And all the time, lo! that smiling sky, and this unsounded sea!"

What does this girl know about fate? What does she know of this upside-down world?

"Read the next chapter, Dana!" he hears another girl's voice speak. The words are faint—muffled—like he's underwater. But her voice is clear.

He falls asleep, like most nights, listening to the tales of Ahab and Starbuck, and a great white whale.

-.-.-

Tag List ♡: @today-in-fic @agent-troi @baronessblixen @captainsolocide @cutemothman @deathsbestgirl @edierone @enigmaticxbee @figureofdismay @frogsmulder @hippocampouts @invidiosa @numinousmysteries @randomfoggytiger @skelavender @teenie-xf @thursdayinspace

[hometoursandotherstuff]

If I had $1.25M to spend on a house, pulled up to this one, and saw the big red gummy bear, I'd know it was mine. The 1990 home in Big Bear Lake, California is whimsical inside and out. 3bds, 3ba.

The home looks like a modern Tudor from outside. Look at the mushroom and the little figure under the tree. I can't make out what it is, though. I don't think it's a gnome.

No need to get upset about the taxidermied heads, b/c they're Dr. Seuss characters.

Family room/kitchen combo open concept space.

These two platforms in front of the window are kind of odd.

There's a sunny dining area.

Gray kitchen cabinets and a smart fridge. Very high end appliances.

Double purple doors open to reveal a pantry entrance on both sides.

I don't like that the microwave is in there, though.

Glass block shower with modern glass blocks.

Plus a sizeable sauna.

Up the colorful stairs that look like book spines.

Spiral stairs lead to a low lounging loft above the main living area.

The primary bedroom is very large, colorful, has a cute little fireplace, and doors to a terrace.

Wow, cool en-suite.

Walk-in closet.

And, even the laundry space is whimsical.

Interesting loft space.

Cute secondary bedroom.

I don't know why, but they did this to all the closets in all the bedrooms.

Rec room in the basement has corrugated metal wainscoting. Not particularly loving that. It's too rustic for me.

I imagine that this extensive collection would go w/the owners.

Small bar in the wall.

Deck overlooking the pool.

There's the option of covering the pool or leaving it open.

Near a resort and forest on .66 acre of land.

[callsigndragon]

Mrs. Floyd's class | Robert 'Bob' Floyd

Pairing: Robert 'Bob' Floyd x Teacher!Wife!Reader

Summary: Bob helps his wife on Read Across America day.

Word count: 966 (it's short, sorry)

Warnings: nothing! just fluff.

Tag list: @tayrae515 @alexxavicry @xoxabs88xox @mercurio23 @shrimping-for-all

(if you want to be in the 'All TGM' tag list, send me an ask!)

“Honey, it’s late already. You can finish this tomorrow” says Bob, trying to pry you away from your laptop. 

“Let me just write one more email, maybe this time they will answer me” 

“Alright, that’s it” he takes your laptop away from you. 

“Robert! I need to get someone for the reading day. This author just bailed out on me" you say, feeling sad that you promised your students to bring someone to read a book for them. You had been talking to this local author for weeks now, and he just emailed you that he is not coming. 

"It's too late. Nobody is going to answer today" 

You let out a sigh of defeat, getting up from the sofa and opening your arms. "Hug me?" 

Bob smiles softly and hugs you, his hand caressing your back. "Your kids will understand it, y/n. They love you and know you always do what you can for them. They'll understand it" 

You hug him closer, and Bob kisses your hair. "I prepared a bath for you" he says, pulling away from you and kissing your forehead. "Go relax while I finish dinner, okay?" 

You nod, walking away with heavy feet, your body fully envisioning defeatedness. He knows how important your 3rd graders are to you, and how you try to give them the opportunity to live different experiences in life if you can make them happen. He remembers last Valentine's day when you were adamant about making heart-shaped cookies for every student in your class. Bob knows how much you care, and he feels terrible to see you this way. 

And then he realizes he has the solution right in front of him. 

When he hears the soft click of the bathroom door closing, Bob pulls out his phone and immediately FaceTimes the whole Dagger Squad. He knows it's late, but he also knows that his aviator family wouldn't leave him behind. 

"Bob, have you called us with your butt or something?" Asks Hangman, knowing very well that Bob wasn't usually the one initiating a FaceTime call. 

"I honestly thought the same thing" agrees Coyote. 

"Guys, can you let him speak? Maybe it's something important" Phoenix, always caring about her wizzo, makes the two men stop talking so Bob can tell them the reason for this call. 

"Thanks, Nat. I know it's late. Like, really late. But I need your help" 

"It's something wrong?" Rooster immediately asks, very concerned. 

"Do you have anything to do on Read Across America day?" 

"Isn't that in two days?" questions Fanboy, looking at his watch. 

"Yeah, but Y/n had planned for a writer to read something for her students but…" 

"Wait, is this for Bobette?" Bob nods at Hangman's question. "Alright, buddy. Tell us when and where" 

He knew the Dagger squad would always have his back. 

Two days later, you're explaining to your kids how you tried to bring someone to read for them, even though it had been impossible. The kids seem a bit upset about it, but they know you have tried your best. Mrs. Floyd always did her best. 

You're looking for the book in your bag when a sudden knock on the door makes you turn. 

"Excuse me, it's this Mrs. Floyd's class?" says Phoenix, smiling at you. She's wearing her uniform and has a Dr. Seuss book in her hands. 

"Nat? What are you doing here?" you're completely shocked by her sudden appearance. "Come in, let me introduce you to my kids!" 

And when she enters, Hangman, Payback, Coyote, Fanboy, and Rooster walk in behind her. You're about to cry. Your friends, the ones you consider a second family, have come to help you. 

Bob, it's the last one to enter, a bright smile on his face. He is next to you in a heartbeat.

"Good morning, Mrs. Floyd" 

"Did you call them?" You ask, wiping away a tear. 

"Of course. Everyone was more than happy to help Bobette, you know" he chuckles a bit. 

"I wish I could kiss you right now" 

"Mrs. Floyd, care to introduce us?" says Rooster while waving to a few kids. 

"Of course!" 

You introduce all of them, and when it's Bob's turn, a few kids begin whispering and gossiping between them. One of the girls is the first one to speak. 

"Mrs. Floyd, is Lieutenant Floyd your husband?" 

These little kids love gossiping. More than their parents. 

"Yes, he is. Now, I know you want to know about their jobs and how cool it is to fly aircrafts, but let's read Phoenix's book first, all right? Then I'm sure they will be very pleased to answer all the questions you may have" 

It's funny seeing Payback and Fanboy reenacting a scene from the book as if they were the characters. You see the smiles on your students' faces and on your family's faces too. You can't say for sure who are the ones having more fun with this, aviators or students. 

After the book, you decide to make small groups, 4 or 5 kids are sitting in a circle with one of the aviators, talking, asking, and learning something they won't learn in their books, hearing stories, and maybe, dreaming of their future. 

"You know, I've always known you're a hell of a teacher but these kids look at you with devotion in their eyes. One of them even told me that he was to be like you when he grows up" confesses Bob, sitting next to you while watching the kids. 

"Was it Josh?" you laugh. He wants to be a teacher and he tries to help other students when they don't understand something. 

"Yep" 

"Thank you, Bobby. Thank you so much. They will remember this in the future." 

"Anything for you, darling" 

[tac-the-unseen]

COD Random character quirks

Fluff

Ghost:

•Remembers every story somebody tells him, but can't remember where he left his sweater

•Bites the inside of his cheek constantly, to the point of scarring

•If somebody doesn't drag him out of the house he would never leave. Despite this he does love going on a walk from time to time

•Hates talking about his past and will always redirect the conversation

•Extremely fast eater, it's a combination of Trauma and military training. Can finish a whole plate in less than 10 minutes

•Pauses for a long time in between speaking but can't stand it if someone else does the same

Soap:

•Obsessed with swords, but is terrible at wielding them

•Screams “DON'T GO IN THERE!” to the T.V when watching any horror movie

•Wears the ‘I <3 my hot S/O’ shirts unironically, and the loves them because “It's true!”

•Loves to be the best at everything

•Consistently orders the same thing at a restaurant. Has a specific order for every restaurant he goes too

•Learned some magic tricks as a kid and can still do most of them

Price:

•Wears crazy socks, think Spencer and his friend Socko (from iCarly)

•Laughs to jokes no one else laughs at to make the other person not feel bad

•Has one nipple piercing on his left nipple, He doesn't want to get the second one and just likes having the ones.

•Overly Humble, You have to fight him to take a compliment

•Eats while driving and has made adjustments in his car to be able to eat with full effect

•Knows a surprising amount of useless trivia and will bring it up in any conversation he can

Alejandro:

•Screams and runs at the sight of the bee

•Notorious for his eye rolling abilities

•Has a pretty sizable jewelry collection. Necklaces, bracelets, earrings, rings, and brooches (and he's willing to share)

•Frequently complements his S/O

•Steals food off of his S/O’s and friends plate

•Great cook and spends most of his time around/in the kitchen

Gaz:

•Secretly wants to be in a boy band

•Can't swallow pills normally

•Make fake scenarios in his head about him being the ultimate hero

•Snorts when he laughs

•Eats healthy snacks and playful shames others for eating unhealthy snacks

•Surprisingly good at impressions specifically impressions of British government officials

Roach:

•Sneak attack hugger

•His all-time favorite book is Dr Seuss's ‘Put me in a zoo’

•Sometimes forget other people don't know sign language/can't read it that fast and signs so fast that others have no clue what he said

•Gets a bad case of the giggles when someone trips (He cannot stop no matter how hard he tries)

•Likes to eat in private and feels weird looking at other people eat (Not a fan of restaurants or Mukbang asmr)

•Squirms in his seat/Can't sit still for that long

Konig:

•Wears a bunch of hair ties around his wrist

•Has to spend hundreds of dollars making custom shoes that actually fit him

•Is an adrenaline junkie on the battle field. He lives for the blood rush

•Has a house shaking laugh and Horangi makes fun of him for it

•Is a very neat eater, he's not overly delicate with his food but just likes to eat in a certain way

•Likes stretching out and popping his joints all the time.

Rudy:

•Sits on the floor rather than the couch

•Will politely remind you how good he's being in the midst of chaos

•Always supports/Roots for the underdog

•Always has Snacks in his pockets/backpack

•Messy eater, somehow always ends up with sauce on his shirt or crumbs in his pockets

•Lean onto the people closest to him

Mace:

•Puts hot sauce on everything

•Tells jokes with a serious face

•Always looking for new adventure, loves exploring, hiking, climbing, and learning about different cultures

•Frequently adjusting his shirt to show off his body modification (traditional tribal scars)

•Likes to eat food with his hand more than with utensils. He'll use forks, spoons, and knives when at restaurants, but when he's at home everything is finger food.

•Gets spontaneous piercing / tattoos

[starkwlkr]

saturn | michael berzatto

You taught me the courage of stars before you left How light carries on endlessly, even after death

Michael Berzatto

A loving husband and devoted father

November 15, 1979 — February 22, 2022

Ten year old Mia Berzatto read over her fathers memorial card. Her mother’s side of the family had a memorial service for Michael in her grandmother’s home. She couldn’t wait to get out of her black clothing and go back to wearing her father’s large shirts. She sat on her grandma’s sofa rereading over the card. After she was tired of looking at the same words, she got up to look for her mother, who was somewhere around her grandmother’s house that was filled with people.

“Mia? You okay, sweetheart?” Her mother’s Uncle Matt asked when he found her wandering the living room.

Mia nodded. Ever since the funeral, Mia hadn’t said much only to her mother and Aunt Natalie. “Where’s my mom, Uncle?”

Uncle Matt sighed. Y/n Berzatto was currently trying to keep calm in the hallway bathroom. “Have you eaten? Want me to make you a sandwich? Do you want a juice box?”

Mia shook her head. “I want my mom.”

Uncle Matt sighed once again. “She’ll be out in a minute, she’s in the restroom. I’ll let her know you’re looking for her. Why don’t you wait in grandma’s library?”

Mia’s grandma had made one of the unoccupied bedrooms into a little library so her granddaughter could enjoy it. Mia wasn’t the only one that loved being in that room, Michael loved it just as much. He would buy her many books and read them to her. Mia was learning about planets and galaxies so Michael practically bough every book about space, stars, planets, etc.

Mia walked to the library and saw an opened book on the floor. She approached it and saw that it was her favorite book that Michael would always read to her. It was a Dr. Seuss book called ‘There’s no place like space’ and every time Michael would read it to her, he would do a silly voice to match with the rhymes.

One thing Mia noticed right away was that the book was on the page talking about Saturn, her favorite planet. She tried to remember when was the last time she opened the book. Then it hit her. Michael was the last one to open the book, days before his death. She remembers the conversation they had that day about Saturn.

“It’s so pretty! And it has the rings! What’s your favorite planet, daddy?” Mia asked Michael as they layed on the floor looking at the illustrations.

“Well I think Saturn is my favorite too. If it’s yours then it’s mine.”

Saturn was theirs.

Mia couldn’t bring herself to close the book, not when her father’s hands had left it open on the page that talked about their favorite planet. She just couldn’t do it.

“Mia?” She heard her mother’s voice call out. “Uncle Matt said you wanted me? You want to go home?” Y/n approached her daughter, wiping away a few tears she still had left on her cheeks.

“Daddy left it on Saturn.” Mia said as she continued to stare at the book.

Y/n knew about their love for the planet and their book. She was just like Mia, she didn’t want it to be closed.

“Hmmm . . . I think it’s daddy’s way of being with us. You remember what he told you about stars?” Y/n asked.

Mia nodded. “That if I want to talk to him and he’s not here, I can talk to the stars because they listen.”

“Yeah, and guess what? Daddy’s with the stars now so he’ll always be listening to you.”

[growup-thatbeautiful]

timezone

Summary: Tangerine comes home. Post-Bullet proof.

A/n: i’d love to know if anyone would be interested in a prequel series about this pairing? lmk!

Word count: 2.6k

Bullet Proof Masterlist

~*~

The low hum of music playing through the small record player in the corner of the living room fills the air while you wash up the takeout containers from your dinner tonight. Jovie is fast asleep in her bedroom down the hall, curled tightly underneath her sheets.

Bedtime lasted longer tonight than usual because Tan has been on a job for the past few days. Ever since you moved back in with him, you’ve gotten used to living with him, and so has Jovie, which makes it harder when he isn’t here. You have a routine now to put Jovie to bed, an elaborate and complicated thing with many steps including kids' books and Tangerine’s own story times. So, without him, it’s been hard to convince Jovie to fall asleep these past few nights.

It took you four Dr. Seuss books and one game of hide and seek to get her into bed, which took more energy out of you than you care to admit.

Billy Joel’s crooning voice is interrupted by the ringing of your phone. Carefully, after you dry your hands, you swipe up on the screen of the photo of Tangerine and Jovie that fills it.

On the speaker, his voice fills the empty space between the two of you. You don’t know where he is at this point or if he’s finished what he needs to do- it’s too risky to discuss over the phone- but based on the sounds you think he’s driving somewhere. You can picture the way his ringed fingers grip the steering wheel, his eyes focusing on the road in front of him as neon lights pass by, reflected against the shine of the pendant around his neck.

“Hey, love,” he says, his voice sounding tired but nevertheless affectionate. “How are my girls doing?”

Your heart fills with warmth at his word choice, and you jump up on the counter to sit and talk for a while. “We’re good. I finally got Jovie to bed, though it took more convincing than usual.” Your head hits the wooden cabinet as you lean back and your eyes slide shut.

He hums in response and adds, “I swear to God, she gets her fucking energy from you. You used to be just like her “

“Because I couldn’t fucking trust you then,” you blame. “Had to sleep with my back to the door.”

“I have you no reason not to fucking trust me.” Tangerine’s voice is light, fond remembrance laced through his tone. “Even gave you the bed because I’m a gentleman.”

“You’re no such thing,” you laugh. “And I remember a conversation like this years ago where we couldn’t agree.”

Tangerine fully laughs this time, a low, happy-sounding laugh that you’ve been missing. You learned what it was like without Tan for all those years, so now every time he’s gone you feel it deeper, like something lodged inside your heart. Tan’s laughter dies down and he says. “Yeah, but we’ve fucking changed since then. You’ve come to see how much of a right pleasure I am.”

It’s your turn to hum in agreement. Silence falls between the two of you, but it’s not uncomfortable. You don’t know someone as well as Tan and have uncomfortable silences. You’ve been through so much- making it through silence isn’t the worst thing you’ve faced.

You break the silence, though, because you have to tell him how hard it’s been without him here. Even washing dishes had felt lonely without him bothering you, his front plastered against your back as he places kisses along your neck. “I’ve missed you.”

“The only thing between us is distance,” Tangerine says automatically. “And that’s fucking nothing at all, love.”

“I know.” You hate how weak your voice sounds. How emotion creeps through the cracks and seeps through the phone speaker. “It doesn’t feel like that, though.”

“That bad?” he asks. The concern in his voice carries through despite the bad quality. You don’t know if he’s alone or where he is, but it makes you feel safe somehow, knowing that he’s worried about you. As if he doesn’t already have enough to worry about.

“Not great,” you admit. “Jovie misses you too. She keeps asking me when you’ll be home, but she’s been busy with school.”

“I’m sorry, love.” It fills you with ache, how tired he sounds. You know that he trusts you- you’re not going to leave again- but that doesn’t make things like this any easier.

“It’s okay,” you assure him, or, at least, try to. “You’ll be back soon. How’s everything looking there?”

Tangerine sighs fully and tells through veiled metaphors how it’s been harder than he and Lemon thought to track down the mark they’re looking for, but he thinks that they’ve got a good lead. He tells you how the mark is usually unguarded and without weapons, so it will be easy once they actually find him. You can only hope for his safety.

But safety, in your lives, is a laughable commodity that you haven’t known for years. It’s your choice and you’ve had to live with it, through thick and thin.

“Do you need any help?” you ask when he’s done talking, praying that there’s something you can do. “I can see what I can find.”

“Love,” he says, and you can see the smile on his face from miles apart, a fond, exasperated smile that you know too well. “Enjoy your time off, I’ll be home soon.”

“You will?” You know it’s selfish, wanting him to yourself all the time. He has a job to do, and you’re distracting him, making it harder for him to get the job done. But it’s so hard when he’s so gentle like this.

“I don’t fucking care what else happens, I’m seeing you tonight, love,” Tangerine promises, his voice grainy from whatever low-quality service he’s on.

“Yeah?” you ask, smiling. It doesn’t have to be true to make you feel protected. Safe. It could be an empty promise, but you’d still have the same reaction.

“Yeah,” he says. “It’s time I stop fucking about here and come to see my girls.”

You feel like a schoolgirl from the way you’re grinning into the phone and thinking about him. “I’ll be waiting, then.”

“Try to get some sleep.” You don’t know how he’s the one taking care of you right now, but it’s nice to have someone tell you what to do.

“I will. Goodnight, Tan.” As hard as you try to hide it, your voice sounds hopeful and lighter than you intend it to. The last thing you want to do is guilt him to coming home. God knows you’re already responsible for enough of his guilt.

“Night, love.”

You move through the apartment, missing him less and more at the same time. You don’t want to think about it anymore, but all you can seem to see in your mind is him- the ink tracing patterns on his skin, the cold metal of his rings, and the tidy curl of his hair. With him on the back of your eyelids, you fall asleep curled up on the couch like Jovie is in her own bed.

~*~

Tangerine’s footsteps are light on the pavement outside of his house from years of practice. There’s blood on his hands, there usually is, but he can’t care to wash it off when you’re right beyond the front door.

The key to the door slips in after a few tries and shoulders open the door, wincing as a cut along his ribs is pulled tight. He’ll have to ask you to help him with that later. For now, though, all he wants to do is see his daughter and you safely asleep. It hadn’t been a hard job, just tiring, and he's exhausted down to his bones that ache and scream for him to lie down.

He can’t do that, though, until he sees you- your face lighting up in surprise that he made it home so fast. He promised you he would, and he’d rather not show up at all than break that promise. The two of you stopped breaking promises to each other recently. Carefully, so he doesn’t wake anyone up, he steps out of his shoes and his suit jacket, putting them in their place in the hallway next to Jovie’s green raincoat and your heavy black overcoat. The very picture of a normal family, those coats. It brings a weary smile to his face.

He’s expecting you to be in bed, but you aren’t. When he finds you, you’re dead asleep on the couch, a threadbare blanket covering you as the tv plays dimly, some movie he hasn’t seen before. It looks romantic enough to be something you would pick, though.

For a moment, before he’ll carry you to your shared bed, he watches you. He’s known for years that you’re the most beautiful woman he’s ever seen, but when you’re sleeping there’s something so fragile about you. The usual strength that you carry in your frame is hidden by one of his old sweatshirts and a pile of pillows, and the creases that he usually finds in between your eyebrows aren’t there. No, like this you look like a gentler version of yourself. Someone who, maybe, hasn’t had to make so many hard choices or do so many shitty things.

But that’s not who you are, and it’s definitely not the person he fell in love with. It sounds horrible, to think that the unforgiving circumstances of your youth are what led you to him, but it’s the truth more than anything else. He can’t count the number of times you’ve bonded over your shared traumatic experiences or cried into his arms about things only he can understand.

When he tucks you into his chest and lifts you with an arm underneath your knees, you start to stir. He’s proud to see, however, that you don’t panic like he’s sure you would with anyone else. You just settle deeper into his chest and go back to sleep.

As much as he would love to immediately lay down beside you, he has to check on Jovie first. It’s irrational, his fear, but given everything that’s happened, he has to do it.

She’s fast asleep just like you are, stuffed bear held close to her chest. The nightlight plugged into her wall casts a blue light around the room, lighting her curly hair with a neon glow. You always say that Jovie looks just like him, she got his curls, but he thinks she looks like you. She has your eyes, smart and bright, and she has your strength.

Gently, he steps over to where her bed is and kisses her on her forehead. “Hey, Jovie-love. I’ll see you in the morning, yeah?” Once he’s satisfied that she’s okay, he brushes the hair out of her face and kisses her once before padding out and shutting the door without a sound.

You’re sitting up in bed when he makes it back to your room, the sleeves of his hoodie falling over your hands as you shuffle to the edge of the bed. “You’re here,” you state dumbly, a grin spreading across your face. “I thought you were being hopeful.” You rub some sleep out of your eyes and reach for him, and his heart fucking melts. He lets you draw him in closer to you and his hands find their way to cup your face. Like this with him standing, he’s much taller than you, and he’s able to really, truly see you. The relief plastered on your face and the beaming, not-quite-awake smile make everything that he had to go through to get here worth it.

“Since when have I been fucking hopeful?” Tangerine grins. “I made you a promise, didn’t I? Had to stick to it.” There’s so much truth behind his words that he’s too tired to unpack right now, but you don’t seem to mind. You especially don’t mind when he leans down and kisses you gently, at first, but with more passion when he remembers that you’re real, and you’re here, and you’re all his. Slowly, careful of his various minor injuries, he leans forward until you’re laying flat on the bed with him in between your legs. He thinks he hides the grimace of pain he makes when you skim your hands down his torso, just enough pressure to make pain bloom beneath his eyes, but you know him too well to let something like that slip his eyes.

You also know that he’s never going to ask you for help when he’s hurt. So, you stop him with a hand pushed against his chest and ask, a little breathlessly, but with narrowed eyes, “Are you hurt?”

He lets out a long, low groan and buries his head in your shoulder. He mutters under his breath, but clear enough for you to hear, “Can’t get fucking nothing by you, love.”

It’s not the right thing to say, because panic spreads across your face as you try and get him off of you, looking for any sign of pain. There are the normal bloodstains on his clothes, but you assumed those weren’t his- they usually aren’t. “Where are you hurt?” you ask, your voice an octave higher than natural and your hands not as steady as he knows they should be. “Are you okay? I swear, Tan, if you’re bleeding out and you wasted all this time-”

“-Love, does it look like I’m bleeding out?” he asks, tilting your chin up with his finger to get you to look him in the eyes. There’s still panic in your eyes, but it takes on a sharper edge when you start to focus like he knows you can. You take in his clothes, the flush on his cheeks, the strength of his arms, and the smile on his face. He doesn’t look any worse than all the other times he’s come home with scrapes and bruises.

“No,” you answer unsurely. “But you’re good at hiding things.”

Tangerine can’t help the grin that slips onto his face at your stubbornness. “It’s nothing big, yeah? Just a scrape on my ribs. Fucking prick used a knife on me.” You don’t look completely convinced, but he sees the fight drain from your posture. Whether or not you realize it, you lean into his touch and close your eyes, taking deep breaths in and out.

“I’m okay, love, I promise. Everything’s going to be alright” There he goes again, making promises that he has no right to make. But with you looking at him like moments ago, like the world was ending if he was, he can’t do anything except promise you everything. He may be a fighter, but, against you and Jovie, he’s a weak man.

In the end, you take him to the bathroom anyway and fix him up, complaining the whole time that his wound could have gotten infected if he didn’t clean it tonight. He argues back that you would have found out one way or another, so he didn’t need to tell you. Really, though, he doesn’t mind your hands smoothing over his skin, gently applying antiseptic and bandaging it up.

History has proven that he’ll let you get away with almost anything, not that you try much anymore. All you ask for is that he comes home at the end of a job, and he asks the same in return. It’s what you should have done since the beginning, but he knows it wasn’t always as clear as it is now.

It doesn’t matter anymore. You’re both here now, his arm thrown around your waist underneath the sheets, your soft breathing lulling him to a state of almost-sleep. He’ll fall asleep eventually, he’s still exhausted, but right now he’s taking the moment to enjoy being home.

With Jovie. With you.

His family.

Taglist loves: @venusthepirate @shadows-of-nyx @syd-vixious @thefloatingpickle @sallyp-53 @fictionalcomforts @s-haa @the-bisaster @phoenixhits @wee-little-mouse @cupofstarss @eefos @slut-f0r-u @lotustv @kpopgirlbtssvt @amyg1509 @tangerinesgf @earth-elemental18 @theredvelvetbitch

[night-shadowblood-writes2]

Bridge The Gap With Me

Noa x human reader

basically we wake up in their world and we are trying to survive it. I did not edit this at all so if there are mistakes I'm sorry

chapter 1: waking up in a new world

Running feeling the wind in my hair the cool air rushing by my face with each step the deep inhail every few seconds filling my lungs a wide smile spread across my face. I felt free like a bird in the sky no one to hold me back. It gave me pure joy the terrain was new exciting and I was in no way letting stop me. I jumped over rocks, dodged tree roots, and rounded trees.

I loved it here the world so untouched by human hands watching from a screen was so different I air felt so much fresher and when I finally slow in small meadow I lay in the grass. I remembered when I woke up here I was in an empty building a binker of some kind, I was cautious scared even I took careful steps when there was no one around almost like I was abandoned here.

I remembered panicking but a few hours later I got up and looked further in depth in what I had missed I saw notes in books and plans that was there. It was far from the year I was in 300 years farther. I looked for provisions and it was mostly rotten or old. I ate what was edible and started planning what I could do to servive I couldnt stay here I even if I wanted to I needs resources in order to live.

So I grabbed the best kept bag and filled it with what I could. 2 pairs of pants that fit me well enough 2 shirts one was one size larger the other fits rather snug and the one I currently wore which for the best a pair of sturdy gloves. I got a pair of steel toe boots half a size too big I grabbed what looked like soap hand made and as much medical supplies I could a tent and sleeping bag.

My best finds after that was a pair of hunting knives that needed a bit of sharpening two metal pots and a fire starter. with those tools and supplies I walked out into the world. What met me was a world that mother nature reclaimed. With a deep breath I stepped out and left my safety net and leapt into the fire and here I am now a few months later. It was was slap to the face the harshness of my new reality but I did it somehow. I swore I cant thank myself enough for watching those videos on survival and the notes from the bunker on what was safe and what to stay away from.

So here I am now in this small meadow the grass tickling me it was spring time early spring to me it seems. I was getting close to a few building that were in the distance I was hoping to find temporary shelter there.

With a sigh I got up and walked there keeping an eye out if there was one thing I learned while in the bunker was that the new world I found myself in was my favorite movie series. Apes have taken control of the world and because humanity had little to do with the world other than struggle to survive it became this new beautiful utopia.

After a few hours and my feet feeling like the were swollen from all my traveling I arrived to buildings covered in vines I made sure I was properly covered getting tetanus was not on my list today or any other day. It was like looking at ruins on the computer or TV so beautifully tragic. I found a library and I swore I felt tears filled my eyes something to pass time no longer would I be stuck with my thoughts.

I looked at survival books medical books and tentivly I made my way to the kids area and found books that brought me back to my childhood Dr Seuss, the hungry caterpillar, and the rainbow fish from there I went to fictional stories like the Percy Jackson books to romance books to thrillers I filled a backpack full of my finds. I then found paper and pencils and art books that were there whether I was a good artist or not I didn't care. Even if I was alone I felt atleast a little less so now. I chose a random book and began to read letting myself escape even for a little bit. once I finished a chapter I got up made sure I was safe and secure and got ready for bed.

I stayed the one week before deciding to leave but making sure to remeber where it was incase I wanted to return. ive been on the road for a few hours when I came across a tunnel and was deciding if I should chajnce it and step through, after a few seconds to considering it I walked through. It was damp and smelled weird but with a brisk walk I was finally on the other side.

"Hmm now which direction should I go?" I said to myself my voice a little hoarse from no use. Deciding to go straight I remebered to remain diligent and keep alook out just because i havent seen and ape or human doesnt mean theres not any out there and if there was either I had no way of knowing if they were friendly.

It was starting to get dark so i found a liitle space to pitch my tent and make a small fire nothing too big just enough to keep me warm. I pulled out some water and a few berries I found on the way safe to eat from what the guides I had said. I was exhuasted making sure the fire was secure and no way start a forest fire i gotinto my tent and into my sleeping bag and slowly drifted to sleep. ' I hope I can meet someone soon.. hopefully someone nice' was my final though before I slept the same thought after a few weeks after waking up here.

[art-that-fucks-you-up-tournament]

SET THREE - ROUND ONE - MATCH SEVEN

“Cat in Obsolete Bath” (? - Theodor Seuss Geisel) / “You're Not Boring Anymore” (? - Tomer Hanuka)

CAT IN OBSOLETE BATH: This painting (and a lot of Seuss's darker artwork) give me the feeling that I can only describe as "a child learning that adults/their heroes are human beings". We are so accustomed to seeing him as an icon of children's books/art, that when we see these darker reflections of his mind (often using similar characters and creatures as his children's work) that makes me realize that this man is a human being that has gone through periods of despair. In this painting in particular, the background elicits emotions of emerging darkness. The titular cat having its top half hidden with its legs and tail looking so pathetic on the bottom, the water drops possibly being tears. What is he doing hidden away? Just bathing? Or crying. The wonkyness of the shower drain contributes as well. (princeoftheroses)

YOU'RE NOT BORING ANYMORE: For me, this piece captures the addictive nature of emotional instability. When you spend half your time feeling like death, overcome with sadness or anxiety, the other half of the time becomes a transcendental experience. Happiness is so bright and exhilarating compared to how longing and desperate you feel the rest of the time. I think this piece captures the two-sided nature of that kind of existence and how exhausting it is, and yet, it makes me want to go back and live it all over again, ruin the stable and "boring" life I have now in favor of emotional chaos. The blacklight coloring, the hollowed expression in the reflection of the window, the isolation and emptiness. (anonymous)

("Cat in Obsolete Bath is a painting by Theodor Seuss Geisel (Dr. Seuss.)

"You're Not Boring Anymore" is a piece by Israeli artist Tomer Hanuka.)

[hellcheer-heaven]

Hellcheer List: How caretaker Eddie helps Chrissy.

Thank you to @bluebunnymoose for helping me with this.

So I know that I’ve mentioned a previous headcanon where Chrissy and Eddie would have their “kid day” together. I do love the idea of the two of them engaging in that, but I really like the idea of Eddie being a gentle and loving caregiver to Chrissy.

Let's say she's having a rough week and she's just exhausted and overstimulated.

When Eddie can sense and see that she’s distressed, he goes right into caregiver mode.

One of the first things he does is hug her and offer her a stuffed animal.

She holds the toy and lets herself cry in his arms, tightly shutting her eyes as he rocks her gently.

“It’s okay Chrissy, just let it out sweet girl. You’re safe here.”

Sometimes when there’s too much going on, she may speak very softly, say a small selection of words, or nothing at all.

If she doesn’t talk, Eddie will ask her a simple yes/no question: “Are you tired? Do you want something to eat?”

He also gently encourages her to point to what she needs as well.

He's considerate and patient, letting her know that she can communicate her needs when she’s ready.

She’ll quietly ask for a bubble bath and when he asks her if she would like her bath toys, she looks up with a little smile and nods.

While he washes her hair and scrubs her skin, Chrissy will blow the bubbly foam and watch it float, reaching out to catch it before it hits the water.

Eddie smiles knowing that she’s feeling a little better, he’s even happier knowing that they will have the weekend to themselves to continue this for as long as she wants.

This means no errands, chores, and other adult responsibilities, just taking care of his one and only.

In their own small house, Eddie has already supplied the pantry with snacks and comfort food (bear shaped graham crackers, pop tarts, mac and cheese, chicken nuggets, etc.) that she was never allowed to eat in her childhood.

Eddie will help make their bed and decorate it with her stuffed animals.

He’ll rent a collection of cartoons and animated movies on vhs for them to watch.

He brings out a huge container of arts and crafts and coloring books to play with.

There’s a large soft blanket spread out with even more of her stuffed animals in the living room.

There’s a book shelf filled with her favorite stories from her childhood.

These include fairytales with happy endings, Alice in Wonderland, Winnie the Pooh, Dr. Seuss, Goodnight Moon, Charlotte’s Web, Peter Rabbit, Madeline, etc.

If she wants to color in a coloring book, Chrissy will lay down on the blanket, open up her big box of crayons, and have her back rubbed while she colors a picture of Minnie Mouse petting Figaro.

Before he heads to the kitchen, he gives her two choices for lunch: Grilled cheese sandwiches or pizza rolls.

They eat in front of the tv and laugh together as they watch cartoons and movies.

She’ll happily sing along and dance to the songs, and ask Eddie to join in, something he gladly loves to partake in.

During a sad scene, Eddie gently holds Chrissy as she squeezes her plush toy and presses it tightly to her face.

He rubs her tears away and pecks her forehead, sweetly reminding her that it’s okay to cry and feel sad for a character.

Even if it’s a movie that they’ve seen many times, certain parts never fail to make her tear up, “Seeing Dumbo cry is sad to watch, isn’t it Chrissy?”

“Everyone is so mean to him, he wants his mama Eddie. Dumbo loves his mama and she misses him.”

When Chrissy wants to make a pillow fort, they take off the couch cushions, rearrange some furniture, cover it with a blanket and crawl inside.

When she wants to play with her dolls, Chrissy decides how the story goes.

She’ll let Eddie know which dolls he gets to play with, what kind of voice to use, and what will happen next.

He loves to watch and listen to her create all sorts of tales and describe the adventures and hardships the characters go through.

After dinner time, she begs him to stay up just a little longer, but he softly reminds her that it’s time to get ready for bed.

He offers to pick her up and take her upstairs for her evening bath.

When she’s done brushing her teeth, he dresses her in cozy pajamas and lets her pick two books to read aloud.

During story time, she asks for him to read the book in different voices for each of the characters.

Then he turns off the lights and turns on the nightlight, singing or humming a few comfort songs to her as he tucks her in and boops her nose to make her giggle.

Chrissy will give him the puppy dog pout and tell him, “I’m not tired Eddie.”

Eddie can’t resist those pleading eyes and lays down beside her, brushing his fingers from the top of her forehead to the end of her nose.

She’ll try to keep herself awake, her eyelids feeling heavy as the gentle hum of his voice eases her into a peaceful slumber.

“I’m… not tired. Not… sleepy. Eddie…”

He stays at her side until she’s fast asleep, carefully getting out of bed, and tiptoeing away.

Eddie looks at Chrissy one more time, smiling at the sight of her so calm and serene, “Sweet dreams princess.”

The next morning after breakfast, they would go for a walk in the park and Chrissy would stop to look at the playground.

She wants to go, but she doesn’t tell him and she’s afraid of being judged by others, so instead she watches from afar.

Later on in the late afternoon/early evening, Eddie says that he has a surprise for her

After dressing her up warmly and telling her to bring one stuffed animal, he takes her over to the park.

All of the families have left and the two of them have the entire playground to themselves.

He would push her on the swing, race her down the slide, spin on the merry go round, climb the jungle gym, and play on the see saw.

After she’s tuckered out, Eddie takes her home and then it’s time to get ready for bed.

After a quick clean up and a shower, he joins her as well.

He lays down beside her and kisses her lips, affectionately whispering, “I love you Chrissy.”

[bracketsoffear]

Vast Leitner Reading List

The full list of submissions for the Vast Leitner bracket. Bold titles are ones which were accepted to appear in the bracket. Synopses and propaganda can be found below the cut. Be warned, however, that these may contain spoilers!

Abedi, Isabel: Forbidden World Adams, Douglas: The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy Asimov, Isaac: Nightfall

Borges, Jorge Luis: El Aleph Bradbury, Ray: Kaleidoscope Bradbury, Ray: No Particular Night or Morning

Caine, Rachel: Weather Wardens Clarke, Arthur C.: Maelstrom II Clarke, Susanna: Piranesi Coates, Darcy: From Below Coleridge, Samuel Taylor: The Rime of the Ancient Mariner Curtis, Wardon Allan: The Monster of Lake LaMetrie

Foster, Alan Dean: He

Gardner, Martin: Thang Godwin, Tom: The Nothing Equation Gonzalez, J.F.: Clickers Gorky, Maxim: The Song of the Stormy Petrel Grant, Mira: Into the Drowning Deep

Hawking, Lucy and Stephen: George's Secret Key to the Universe Hardinge, Frances: Deeplight

Inglis, James: Night Watch

King, Stephen: The Jaunt

Lewis, C.S.: The Voyage of the Dawn Treader Liu, Cixin: The Dark Forest (Three Body Problem Book 2) Lovecraft, H.P.: Dagon

Macfarlane, Robert: Underland Marquitz, Tim and Nickolas Sharps, ed.: Kaiju Rising: Age of Monsters Melville, Herman: Moby Dick Mortimore, Jim: Beltempest

North, Claire: The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August

Oesterheld, Héctor Germán: El Eternauta

Poe, Edgar Allen: A Descent into the Maelström Pratchett, Terry and Steven Baxter: The Long Earth series Purser-Hallard, Philip: Of the City of the Saved...

Reed, Robert: An Exaltation of Larks Reisman, Michael: Simon Bloom: The Gravity Keeper

Sanderson, Brandon: Firefight Seuss, Dr.: Horton Hears a Who! Simmons, Dan: The Terror Swift, Jonathan: Gulliver's Travels

Tennyson, Alfred: The Kraken Tolstoy, Leo: War & Peace

Verne, Jules: 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea

Abedi, Isabel: Forbidden World

"Reginald has gained a dangerous power. He can shrink anything he likes. And he wants nothing less than the world's most famous buildings. The originals in miniaturized form, of course. Gradually he builds up a huge landscape in his cellar. But Reginald has overlooked something, or more precisely someone. Otis was locked in the Statue of Liberty and Olivia had fled from the police into the famous Berlin department store KaDeWe, when suddenly at night the buildings shrank. Now the children are the size of a fingernail... While they fight for their lives, chaos breaks out in the world outside: where have the monuments gone? And who has stolen them?" Vast stuff: Otis' fear of heights is a huge plot point and he was born on a plane. While Olivia wants to become a pilot. Many scenes of being in high places and terrified, and focus on being very small in a big world.

Spoilers: This book contains two Djinns one that can change the sizes of things one that can make them small and one that can make them big. But they are running out of magic fuel so staying small is the big fear of the characters.

Adams, Douglas: The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

The series swings wildly between cosmic dread and comedy, from the insignificance of the Earth's destruction to the chaotic results of the Infinite Improbability Drive to the very notion of the Total Perspective Vortex, the story hammers home again and again the infinitesimal nature of our existence in the vastness of the universe.

***

"The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy": Seconds before the Earth is demolished for a galactic freeway, Arthur Dent is saved by Ford Prefect, a researcher for the revised Guide. Together they stick out their thumbs to the stars and begin a wild journey through time and space.

"The Restaurant at the End of the Universe": Facing annihilation at the hands of warmongers is a curious time to crave tea. It could only happen to the cosmically displaced Arthur Dent and his comrades as they hurtle across the galaxy in a desperate search for a place to eat.

"Life, the Universe and Everything": The unhappy inhabitants of planet Krikkit are sick of looking at the night sky- so they plan to destroy it. The universe, that is. Now only five individuals can avert Armageddon: mild-mannered Arthur Dent and his stalwart crew.

"So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish": Back on Earth, Arthur Dent is ready to believe that the past eight years were all just a figment of his stressed-out imagination. But a gift-wrapped fishbowl with a cryptic inscription conspires to thrust him back to reality. So to speak.

"Mostly Harmless": Just when Arthur Dent makes the terrible mistake of starting to enjoy life, all hell breaks loose. Can he save the Earth from total obliteration? Can he save the Guide from a hostile alien takeover? Can he save his daughter from herself?

The incomprehensible vastness of the universe is a theme repeated throughout the 'Trilogy". Notable examples include the guide initially describes Earth as 'harmless", after being stranded there for several years, Ford revises this to "mostly harmless". The Total Perspective Vortex, a machine that extrapolates a model of the entire universe, along with a microscopic dot labeled "you are here" this sense of perspective destroys the victim’s mind.

Asimov, Isaac: Nightfall

Lagash's six suns means an Endless Daytime, except for once every 2,049 years, when five suns set and the only sun left in the hemisphere is eclipsed by the moon. The scientists are trying to prepare civilization and themselves for the upcoming nightfall, but when it does occur, no-one is prepared for the thirty thousand stars that suddenly appear in the night sky. This leads to the far more devastating revelation how tiny and insignificant they are by comparison.

"Aton, somewhere, was crying, whimpering horribly like a terribly frightened child. 'Stars — all the Stars — we didn't know at all. We didn't know anything. We thought six stars in a universe is something the Stars didn't notice is Darkness forever and ever and ever and the walls are breaking in and we didn't know we couldn't know and anything —'"

Borges, Jorge Luis: El Aleph

In Borges' story, the Aleph is a point in space that contains all other points. Anyone who gazes into it can see everything in the universe from every angle simultaneously, without distortion, overlapping, or confusion.

Bradbury, Ray: Kaleidoscope

First published in the October 1949 edition of Thrilling Wonder Stories this describes a scene where a spaceship is hit by a meteor and torn apart – ejecting the crew into space. Each astronaut flies off on his own trajectory, hurtling to his doom. For a time they can all communicate through their helmet comms, but slowly, as the separation becomes millions of miles apart, they wind up as solitary figures, alone with his thoughts.

Bradbury, Ray: No Particular Night or Morning

This story takes place during a long interstellar journey. The destination and purpose of the journey are unclear. There are many men (it seems only men) on a large ship. Among them are friends Hitchcock and Clemens. Hitchcock begins to struggle with the idea that there is anything that exists outside of him, that none of it can be proven to exist. Clemens tries to argue with him until Hitchcock is finally treated by the ship’s psychiatrist with the captain’s knowledge, but to no avail. He finally dons a space-suit and leaves the ship. Over the radio he can be heard muttering about how even his own body does not exist.

At one point, Hitchcock is asked why he wanted to go on this journey in the first place. Was he interested in the stars? In seeing other places? In travel? He responds that “It wasn’t going places. It was being between”

Caine, Rachel: Weather Wardens

A speculative fiction series about the secretive bureaucracy that controls the weather. Consequences of this include severely pissing off Mother Earth, sentient storm fronts, and falling from great heights. Often.

Clarke, Arthur C.: Maelstrom II

This short story revolves around an astronaut named Cliff Leyland drifting in a low orbit around the moon after an accident with his capsule's launch. Much of his time is spent waiting to see if he can be rescued and reunited with his family, or is doomed to crash and die.

Clarke, Susanna: Piranesi

Piranesi lives in a place called the House, a world composed of infinite halls and vestibules lined with statues, no two of which are alike. The upper level of the House is filled with clouds, and the lower level with an ocean, which occasionally surges into the middle level following tidal patterns that Piranesi meticulously tracks. He believes he has always lived in the House, and that there are only fifteen people in the world, all but two of whom are long-dead skeletons. The status that decorate the halls and walls of the House are all gigantic and the halls themself are immense and bigger than what any human would be able to build on their own.

Coates, Darcy: From Below

"No light. No air. No escape. Hundreds of feet beneath the ocean's surface, a graveyard waits... Years ago, the SS Arcadia vanished without a trace during a routine voyage. Though a strange, garbled emergency message was broadcast, neither the ship nor any of its crew could be found. Sixty years later, its wreck has finally been discovered more than three hundred miles from its intended course...a silent graveyard deep beneath the ocean's surface, eagerly waiting for the first sign of life. Cove and her dive team have been granted permission to explore the Arcadia's rusting hull. Their purpose is straightforward: examine the wreck, film everything, and, if possible, uncover how and why the supposedly unsinkable ship vanished. But the Arcadia has not yet had its fill of death, and something dark and hungry watches from below. With limited oxygen and the ship slowly closing in around them, Cove and her team will have to fight their way free of the unspeakable horror now desperate to claim them. Because once they're trapped beneath the ocean's waves, there's no going back."

Coleridge, Samuel Taylor: The Rime of the Ancient Mariner

This epic poem of a sea voyage beautifully encapsulates the horrors of the ocean, from the terrific force of horrific storms and whirlpools to the unsettling infinity of life, both beautiful and strange, that inhabits the depths below. Most of all, however, it shows the horror of being stranded at sea as the ship is becalmed in the doldrums.

"Day after day, day after day, We stuck, nor breath nor motion; As idle as a painted ship Upon a painted ocean. Water, water, every where, And all the boards did shrink; Water, water, every where, Nor any drop to drink. The very deep did rot: Oh Christ! That ever this should be! Yea, slimy things did crawl with legs Upon the slimy sea."

The crew perish one by one, apart from the narrator. He, by killing the albatross, invoked the wrath of the sea. He alone must live on while the others are permitted to escape in death.

Curtis, Wardon Allan: The Monster of Lake LaMetrie

The story of Dr. James McLennegan and his sickly companion Edward Framingham who travel to a lake high up in the Wyoming mountains. When they reach the lake, McLennegan discovers it is home to an Elasmosaurus which attacks him, but he manages to kill it and removes the brain. Shortly afterwards Framingham seemingly commits suicide and McLennegan decides to place Framingham’s brain into the body of the Elasmosaur, as one does. While this works for a bit, the remainder of the story explores the horror of scale as Framingham's inability to adjust to his new size results in him snapping and devouring his now-insignificant former friend.

Foster, Alan Dean: He

A short story detailing an oceanographer's encounter with the last megalodon, a colossal shark that has lived for millions of years. He is feared by all other creatures and the sight of him installs a primal terror in humans.

Gardner, Martin: Thang

https://vintage.failed-dam.org/thang.htm The titular creature is large enough to grasp Earth between two fingers. It clears off all water and ice before chewing the planet, core and all, before it, in turn, is also eaten by a planet-eater eater.

Godwin, Tom: The Nothing Equation

A short story about how being stationed alone in an empty section of space drives a man mad. Like stories about lighthouses, but bigger. Short enough to link a complete ebook.

Gonzalez, J.F.: Clickers

"Phillipsport, Maine is a quaint and peaceful seaside village. But when hundreds of creatures pour out of the ocean and attack, its residents must take up arms to drive the beasts back. They are the Clickers, giant venomous blood-thirsty crabs from the depths of the sea. The only warning to their rampage of dismemberment and death is the terrible clicking of their claws. But these monsters aren't merely here to ravage and pillage. They are being driven onto land by fear. Something is hunting the Clickers. Something ancient and without mercy."

Basically, kaiju crabs invade the land -- because they're fleeing from something even bigger.

Gorky, Maxim: The Song of the Stormy Petrel

"A short poem, text can be found here. It describes the storm, vast and careless masses of water, roaring and ruthless skies, and a mighty storm petrel fearlessly taking on both elements. it even dares the tempest to get more intense, as all other oceanic forms of life (seagulls, grebes, a penguin) hide in horror before the face of the storm. stormy petrel in russian (буревестник), if translated literally, means 'the announcer of the storm'. there is a short old cartoon which depicts how this poem would function as a leitner, although the cartoon is very comedic and lighthearted. unfortunately, i wasn't able to find a version with english subtitles, but i think it would be clear just from the visuals"

Grant, Mira: Into the Drowning Deep

Seven years ago, the Atargatis set off on a voyage to the Mariana Trench to film a “mockumentary” bringing to life ancient sea creatures of legend. It was lost at sea with all hands. Some have called it a hoax; others have called it a maritime tragedy. Now, a new crew has been assembled. But this time they’re not out to entertain. Some seek to validate their life’s work. Some seek the greatest hunt of all. Some seek the truth. But for the ambitious young scientist Victoria Stewart this is a voyage to uncover the fate of the sister she lost. Whatever the truth may be, it will only be found below the waves. But the secrets of the deep come with a price.

Hawking, Lucy and Stephen: George's Secret Key to the Universe

The space aspects of it, as well as the fact that a character gets trapped in a black hole at one point, gives off Vast vibes to me. Synopsis for more info: The main characters in the book are George Greenby, Susan Bellis, Eric Bellis, Annie Bellis, Dr. Reeper, and Cosmos, the world's most powerful computer. Cosmos can draw windows allowing people to look into outer space, as well as doors that act as portals allowing travel into outer space. It starts by describing atoms, stars, planets, and their moons. It then goes on to describe black holes, which remains the topic of focus in the last part of the book. At frequent intervals throughout the book, there are pictures and "fact files" of the different references to universal objects, including a picture of Mars with its moons.

Hardinge, Frances: Deeplight

"In the old days, the islands of the Myriad lived in fear of the gods, great sea monsters that rose up from the Undersea to devour ships and depopulate entire islands. Now, the gods are no more. They tore each other apart in an event known as the Cataclysm. Fragments of their bodies (known as godware) are dredged up and sold. Hark and his best friend Jelt are petty criminals. When they embark on a dangerous scavenging expedition, they stumble across a strange, pulsing piece of godware and things begin to go very, very wrong."

Gods, the ocean depths, and poverty all play into the themes of insignificance in this novel.

Inglis, James: Night Watch

Concerns an interstellar probe which is still functional when our Galaxy is dying. The story ends with the community of probes launched by various races and drawn together by the fact that very few stars are still shining, setting out on the long voyage to a distant and still-young galaxy as the last star of our galaxy burns out behind them.

King, Stephen: The Jaunt

“As a family prepares to be "Jaunted" to Mars in the 24th century, the father entertains his two children by recounting the curious tale of the discovery and history of this crude form of teleportation. He explains how the scientist who serendipitously discovered it quickly learned that it had a disturbing, inexplicable effect on the mice he "sent through"—eventually concluding that they could only survive the "Jaunt effect" while unconscious. That, the father explains, is why all people must undergo general anaesthesia before using the Jaunt.

The father spares his children the gruesome semi-apocryphal account of the first human to be Jaunted awake, a condemned murderer offered a full pardon for agreeing to the experiment. The man "came through" and immediately suffered a massive heart attack, living just long enough to utter a single cryptic phrase: It's eternity in there...

The father also doesn't mention that since that time, roughly thirty people have, voluntarily or otherwise, jaunted while conscious; they either died instantly or emerged insane. One woman was even shoved alive into eternal limbo by her murderous husband, stuck between two jaunt portals. The man was convicted of murder; though his attorneys attempted to argue that he was not guilty on the grounds that his wife was not technically dead, the implications of the same argument served to secure and hasten his execution.

After the father finishes his story, the family is subjected to the sleeping gas and Jaunted to Mars. When the father wakes, he finds that his inquisitive son held his breath in order to experience the Jaunt while conscious…Hair white with shock, corneas yellowed with age, clawing out his own eyes, the boy reveals the terrible nature of the Jaunt: "Longer than you think, Dad! It's longer than you think!"”

Lewis, C.S.: The Voyage of the Dawn Treader

"The Dawn Treader is the first ship Narnia has seen in centuries. King Caspian has built it for his voyage to find the seven lords, good men whom his evil uncle Miraz banished when he usurped the throne. The journey takes Edmund, Lucy, and their cousin Eustace to the Eastern Islands, beyond the Silver Sea, toward Aslan's country at the End of the World."

I mean it's a story about trying to get to the end of the world. What's more Vast than that?

Liu, Cixin: The Dark Forest (Three Body Problem Book 2)

I considered other books in the series but this book more than the others deals with the impact of discovering there is other life out in the universe and the distance between worlds as humanity learns an alien fleet is approaching earth at near-light speed. This book is both vast in the scale of the universe but also on a time scale as it covers the 400 years between the fleet’s departure and arrival at earth.

Lovecraft, H.P.: Dagon

Link

The narrator tells of being on a cargo ship that was captured by a German sea-raider in the Pacific. He would eventually escape and drift until he found himself a “black mire”, which was full of rotting fish and more foul stenches. The things that he witnesses in the vast expanse drive him to madness, and eventually he kills himself rather than face the creatures he witnessed there.

Macfarlane, Robert: Underland

A series of essays on "deep time" - that is, viewing the world over timeframes of billions of years, rather than the shorter timeframes we live within & understand. It is essentially the vastness of time. This concept stretches eons into the past and future and is very daunting to read about. The essays all revolve around things underground and often focus on how they're so much larger than us, existing far before us and stretching far beyond.

Also there's a chapter where the author talks about a calving glacier he saw surge upwards hundreds of feet from the sea, unbelievably huge. He recounts how the ice at its base hadn't seen sunlight in eons, and had never even been seen by human eyes, it was so ancient - it then sank underwater again, to once more be hidden. And if that doesn't sound like the origin of a vast avatar idk what does

Marquitz, Tim and Nickolas Sharps, ed.: Kaiju Rising: Age of Monsters

From the forward: "Enter Kaiju Rising: Age of Monsters. This collection of Kaiju shorts continues the traditions begun by Kaiju pioneers, bringing tales of destruction, hope and morality in the form of giant, city destroying monsters. Even better, the project was funded by Kickstarter, which means you, Dear Reader, made this book possible. And that is a beautiful thing. It means Kaiju, in pop-fiction, are not only alive and well, they’re stomping their way back into the spotlight, where they belong. Featuring amazing artwork, stories from some of the best monster writers around and a publishing team that has impressed me from the beginning, Kaiju Rising: Age of Monsters is a welcome addition to the Kaiju genre and an anthology of epic proportions. My inner nine-year-old is shouting at me to shut-up and let you get to the Kaiju. So, without further delay, let’s all enjoy us some Kaiju Rising."

Notable for the fact the majority of the stories within are downer-ending horror short-stories versus more upbeat monster-fighting ones. Several also tackle concepts of an unstoppable, implacable force, themes of religious horror, and other Vast-aligned concepts.

Melville, Herman: Moby Dick

Okay so Ahab is Hunt, but the thing he's hunting is 1000% Vast. The book is very detailed in its descriptions of the enormity of whales and of the sea. Also, Moby Dick is basically outright stated as being God.

***

We all know what The Whale is about. Ahab has beef with Moby Dick, so he vows to hunt it. This is a particularly intelligent, huge whale that everyone advises to steer clear of, and possibly an allegory of God. The book itself is large, it's 135 chapters and a lot of pages and for some reason mandatory reading in some schools. It's a classic and rightfully so. Trying to read it in one sitting is like trying to hunt the proverbial whale, a foolish endeavor no mortal man should attempt. Infinity is best consumed one day at a time, and so is the book. Otherwise you'll drown in (mostly descriptions of) whales.

***

Man attempts to fight a giant whale that apparently is representative of the unfathomably great and terrible power of nature/fate/God, and thus almost everyone on his crew ends up drowning.

Mortimore, Jim: Beltempest

Synopsis: "The people of Bellania II see their sun, Bel, shrouded in night for a month following an impossible triple eclipse. When Bel is returned to them a younger, brighter, hotter star, it is the beginning of the end for the entire solar system...

100,000 years later, the Doctor and Sam arrive on Bellania IV, where the population is under threat as disaster looms — immense gravitational and dimensional disturbances are surging through this area of space.

While the time travellers attempt to help the survivors and ease the devastation, a religious suicide-cult leader is determined to spread a new religion through Bel's system — and his word may prove even more dangerous than the terrible forces brought into being by the catastrophic changes in the sun... "

Why it's Vast: The main conflict revolves around the massive natural disasters caused by changes to the Bel System's sun. Moons are ripped from their orbits, gravity waves create planetary earthquakes, and the void of space is rocked by solar flares. In response to these unstoppable disasters, a religion springs up in worship of the star -- as Simon Fairchild noted, religion was once a strong vector for the Vast, though it wasn't explored in much depth within the podcast.

North, Claire: The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August

"The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August" is about the titular protagonist Harry August. He is born, he lives, he dies... Except he does this a lot more than most regular people. Harry is a kalachakra (or ouroborus, the names are used interchangeably), a member of a select few people who, upon dying, simply return to when they were born with all the memories and knowledge of their past lives. This is all well and good until, while on the deathbed of his eleventh life, Harry is warned by a little Kalachakra girl that the world is ending, and he must stop it from doing so."

Vast realised in endless lives of the characters stretching before them till infinity. Vast realised in the perfect endless memory of the main character and some others. Vast realised in eternity.

Oesterheld, Héctor Germán: El Eternauta

Juan Salvo, the inimitable protagonist, along with his friend Professor Favalli and the tenacious metal-worker Franco, face what appears to be a nuclear accident, but quickly turns out to be something much bigger than they had imagined. Cold War tensions, aliens of all sizes, space―and time travel―this one has it all.

Poe, Edgar Allen: A Descent into the Maelström

Inspired by the Moskstraumen, it is couched as a story within a story, a tale told at the summit of a mountain climb in Lofoten, Norway. The story is told by an old man who reveals that he only appears old—"You suppose me a very old man," he says, "but I am not. It took less than a single day to change these hairs from a jetty black to white, to weaken my limbs, and to unstring my nerves." The narrator, convinced by the power of the whirlpools he sees in the ocean beyond, is then told of the "old" man's fishing trip with his two brothers a few years ago.

Driven by "the most terrible hurricane that ever came out of the heavens", their ship was caught in the vortex. One brother was pulled into the waves; the other was driven mad by the horror of the spectacle, and drowned as the ship was pulled under. At first the narrator only saw hideous terror in the spectacle. In a moment of revelation, he saw that the Maelström is a beautiful and awesome creation. Observing how objects around him were attracted and pulled into it, he deduced that "the larger the bodies, the more rapid their descent" and that spherical-shaped objects were pulled in the fastest. Unlike his brother, he abandoned ship and held on to a cylindrical barrel until he was saved several hours later when the whirlpool temporarily subsided, and he was rescued by some fishermen. The "old" man tells the story to the narrator without any hope that the narrator will believe it.

Pratchett, Terry and Steven Baxter: The Long Earth series

Blueprints for an easily to build device that allows people to "step" into a nigh infinite series of alternate earths get published online. The series deals with the exploration of these alternate earths, and the way their existence and accessibility changes human society over the next 50 or so years. The earths next to our own are similar to ours except that there are no humans, but further earths diverged from our own earlier in geological history; millions of earths away are worlds where the KT extinctions never happens, billions of earths away there are worlds where jellyfish live in the sky. It's emphasized throughout the books that all of these earth's are entire planets with billions of years of history that no one will ever fully understand because there's just too much space.

Purser-Hallard, Philip: Of the City of the Saved...

It's set in a city where every human or descendant of humanity who has ever lived has been reborn all at once, and the book makes sure you understand the scope of that. To pull out a few statistics, the city is the size of a spiral galaxy and has a population of a hundred undecillion - or 1 followed by 38 zeros. There's a watchtower at the city's centre which is the width of a continent and the height of one astronomical unit (the distance of Earth to the sun), and a city council ampithetre the size of a gas giant. When I think of a book emphasising physical vastness, I think Of the City of the Saved, because it doesn't just gloss over the size and call it incomprehensible, it makes sure you begin to grasp the scale of things. And that every character in the book is just one person on that scale.

Reed, Robert: An Exaltation of Larks

The book shows the heat death of the universe, where the stars have long since burned out, and stellar formation ceased, leaving behind a dark, cold, and empty universe. Time travelers from the end of time have steadily been working their way back to the Big Bang to prevent this gradual death from happening by turning the universe into an effectively Perpetual Motion Machine that expands, contracts, and expands again.

Reisman, Michael: Simon Bloom: The Gravity Keeper

A boy inadvertently discovers the book that controls the laws of physics and learns to play with gravity and velocity, which on multiple occasions results in him taking an uncontrolled fall into the sky.

Sanderson, Brandon: Firefight

This is the second book in The Reckoners Trilogy, which is about the eponymous group hunting Epics--people who were granted superpowers by the mysterious red star Calamity, but also turned evil and destroyed society as we know it.

In this one, the Reckoners go to Babylon Restored, a.k.a NYC. The city was flooded by the hydrokinetic Regalia, killing thousands and leaving the survivors to inhabit the rooftops of the sunken buildings. Regalia has immense control over water, able to manipulate it on both a mass scale and in a more precise way to attack with tentacles and create clones of herself. Most terrifyingly, she can see out of the surface of any exposed water--which means almost nowhere in Babilar is safe from her eyes.

The fact that the city is flooded is especially problematic for protagonist David, who can't swim and discovers he has a fear of drowning--especially after he is nearly executed in this way. To make matters worse, the Reckoners' base of operations is an underwater bunker with a window open to the water. This culminates in him facing his fear in attempt to save his love interest by shooting at the window to get out of the bunker. While Regalia saves him for her own ends, she also reveals something even more grand and incomprehensibly terrifying--Calamity itself is sapient and apparently malicious.

Seuss, Dr.: Horton Hears a Who!

Hey kids! Take a minute to think about what would happen if the whole planet existed on a single speck of dust, and how easily everything you know could be eradicated by complete cosmic accident!

Simmons, Dan: The Terror

Being trapped in the Arctic? Not just in the Arctic but in the middle of an ice sheet on the ocean? With the only land being a 3 day trek away? So all you can see before you is open plains of snow and ice and knowing underneath you is also the cold, uncaring, freezing ocean? That's not even taking into account the monster hunting you and your men is easily the size of 3-4 polar bears

Swift, Jonathan: Gulliver's Travels

Plays a lot with perspective -- Gulliver is a giant on one island, and an ant on another. There's also an island that flies and blots out the sun to conquer the lands below it.

Tennyson, Alfred: The Kraken

Link to the poem

Vivid imagery of deep-sea colossi and the enormous weight of the ocean and eternity.

Tolstoy, Leo: War & Peace

real world leitner - inspires dread and fear in the hearts of millions of russian high schoolers with its enormous page count, oppressively large cast of characters and incomprehensible fragments of french inserted directly into the narrative

Verne, Jules: 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea

Themes of insignificance and descriptions of colossal terrors abound.

[the-orange-tabby-cat]

GIF by loregifs

Wings Of The Dawn | Chapter 2

Joel miller x fem!reader

Summary: You are Jackson's librarian, a doll with a good heart, that has your life changed when a handsome man decides to take his kid and start again in your small town after completing their cross country journey. Having a hard time ignoring Joel's dark brown eyes, you find yourself wishing to have him close as you both navigate through love triangles, teenage drama, city gossip, and ghosts from both of your pasts. This is a comfort fic filled with slow burn and small town dynamics. Chapter summary: It's time for a lights out one on one session with your favorite Texan. And no, I'm not talking about smut… Yet.

read on AO3 | fic masterlist | masterlist | playlist | next chapter

Rating: 18+ eventually (first chapter free of smut)

Warnings/Tags: Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Slow Burn, Slow Build, Friends to Lovers, Age Difference, Small Town Dynamics, No use of y/n

Chapter Word count: 6k

｡˚🐾₊˚

CHAPTER 2

If you stare into the darkness for too long, you will notice that you can differentiate the shapes near you. For the first seconds, as your eyes get used to the lack of light, everything appears darker than it is, but as you keep them open, you see the details around you. After 21 years of living in the outbreak, being in the darkness from time to time isn't as challenging as it used to be, even for someone like you who wanted to run into the light as fast as you could.

"How many candles exactly do we need?" You asked Nath as she melted the beeswax little by little. There would be a programmed energy rationing for the following days as the dam got its amends done, making the demands for other sources of light higher.

It was a scorching day, much hotter than average for this time of the year. The heat in the candle-making process was hard to deal with, forcing both women to wear summer clothes and accept sweating as a regular reaction. You felt somewhat dizzy with the heat coming from the stove.

"We have 300 residents, I'm considering maybe 2 per person." She opened her mouth slightly, with her dark blue eyes looking above her, "600 up to 700 candles, maybe?"

"With just me and you making all of them? This is impossible." You looked at her, putting one of your hands behind your neck, scratching a little. From time to time, she would get a new plan that involved you both making something daring. Still, today, you were feeling tired from the start and decided to sabotage it before even beginning.

"Yeah, no shit, Sherlock. We will have helpers, they’ll be here any minute, so you better behave and help me get the rest of the wax." Next to her, there were some trays with leftover candles. Everybody donated what they had on their shelf for the initiative.

Accepting defeat, you look at her, thinking about having more hands on. "Wait, what kind of help? You never involve anyone else in your plans," you inquired while separating the donated wax by color. Nath was very social and had most of the city in a chokehold, but she wasn't the type to keep too many people in her private life.

"First of all, ouch, I have more friends other than you," you glared at her, which she promptly ignored, "second, I convinced your favorite teenagers to join us. What could go wrong? Am I right?"

Without asking, you already knew the teens she was referring to.

In the weeks after the dinner at Alfie's house, Cat spent at least one hour per day at the library, close to you. She made herself useful with the book system you created, helping to put the books back on the shelves before you asked for it. Other times, she would read to the little kids in a group that came with the people from the small daycare near the corner by the afternoon.

Cat was reading Dr. Seuss, a very old copy of Oh, the Places You'll Go!, with a few yellow spots at page corners due to time, one of the residents found under a bed when they first moved into a house and decided to donate it. The infants reacted with smiles and giggles when you heard the characteristic bell sound of the front door.

Ellie stepped in with two books under her arm. You recognized her plaid shirt from the day at the meadow, trembling a bit with the memory. "I presume you devoured both of those?" You said, nodding at the books. She laughed.

"Yeah, came to deliver these and get new ones," she replied, putting them on the counter. As you went to put them on the right shelf, you noticed her brown eyes lingering on the kids listening to Cat's reading.

"Why don't you sit with them for a bit as I get you something new?" She looked at you and nodded slowly, finding her a cushion on the floor behind the kids. You smiled and thought she probably hadn't experienced the childhood pleasure of someone reading for her. A quick image of your brother reading out loud came into your mind, and you buried it as you searched for your recommendation books' shelves.

Cat didn't mind Ellie listening to her as she flipped the pages and showed the images to the kids. Ellie was blinking slowly, following Cat's hand in front of the pages, no longer a teen but instead a child. You started to get her two books since only taking one per visit was no longer enough.

She came every day to the library. At first, she came and left in a few minutes, just wanting a book to take home, but slowly she started to stay longer. Sometimes, she came just to check the available titles, walking between the shelves; others to get new books to take with her, and at times just to go somewhere. She was lingering for something you didn't recognize but tried to provide to her. Comfort seems to be a word that came close to what you felt she needed. You separated a table for her, near the window, a little far from the main door, when you saw she only read at her house. It has been two weeks since she started to read by her chair.

Finishing the story, the kids got up, and the teacher thanked you and Cat, who was already on her feet and coming closer to Ellie. You noticed a little red on her pale cheeks, perhaps from not being around other teens that much.

"So, what do you think?" Cat asked with a smile similar to the one that Alfie gave.

"Kinda cool, but not much for me," Ellie answered, a little snarky but playful. You wondered if Joel had a similar approach to humor.

"Okay, what do you like then?" Walking through the shelves, Cat put a copy of The Princess Diaries at the table nearby. As Ellie rolled her eyes, Cat got a clue and flickered around the shelf a little longer until she found something. “Maybe this? It looks like a you type of book.”

Ellie read the Murder on the Orient Express engraved on the cover and gave a quick look at Cat, "Now we’re talking, what is it about?" and with that they kept talking until after the sunset. Your recommendations for Ellie that day were discharged as she took Agatha Christie home, following Cat's tip.

They became a buy-one-get-two kind of deal. Cat helped you around as Ellie sat and read whatever the girl chose for her. If Cat wasn't there, no problem, she would wait for her with you, doing whatever her mind wanted. This was one of those days when Cat wasn't supposed to be at the library for a while, and without someone of her age, Ellie swallowed up her shyness and started to talk with you at the back house.

The back house was mainly bureau style, with just the machine that once belonged to a printing place, primarily focused on invitations and small printing, you believed. Now, they were filling a different purpose, restoring books and helping to preserve memory a title per time. You were taking leather and measuring for a book spine near the table, Ellie watching it closely.

“Where did you learn to do this?” She quietly asked, absorbed in the process, her eyes watching every small move you made.

"My dad was an archivist for a church. Do you know what are those?" Putting the book spine right in the middle, you started to glue the leather at the cover and back cover. Ellie shook her head, confused.

"Books are more than just stories, they also hold details about the world around us. Or used to, at least. My dad's life purpose was to ensure that every document, book, or piece of paper that held the church's history, part of us, was in good condition. He took care of it to be preserved for the next generations. I used to watch him do this at our house, in his studio. I like to think he would like me to continue doing this."

“What kind of books a church needs?” Ellie was seated next to you, her arms crossed a little on the table with her chin resting above them. You glanced at her and saw that she was honest with her question.

"Do you know what a Bible is?" You asked, stopping all your actions. She shook her head once more. "Well, you don't need to know about it, anyway. Churches' books are mostly their origin history or a collection of stories about what they believe." Forcing your hands to work with the leather again, you reflected on how different your life would have been without religious symbols shoved down your throat.

"Sounds kinda lame if you need a book to tell you what to believe," she replied, twisting her mouth slightly as if she thought it was absurd. You smiled at her, thinking about how much she looked like your brother at the moment.

Cat came not much after that, together with Nath, who was wearing a t-shirt written: "turtley awesome." She saw you by the counter and grinned immediately, making you sigh.

"You have a new plan," you said, annoyed.

"Yes, I have a new plan." She announced at the same time. "Our favorite Mexican will be starting to work on the dam soon, so I thought my favorite doll could do this city a favor and deliver candles with me."

"That's it? Deliver candles from house to house?" Squinting your eyes at her, you felt it was too good to be true. She squinted back at you for a few seconds, making Cat laugh.

"She forgot to say that we don't have any candles left in storage. You'll need to make new ones," Cat said, and you mouthed an "oh" to Nath. Of course, her plan had a catch.

"Just like I said, our favorite Mexican will be working on the dam soon, and they need a shit ton of candles in, like, two days," Nath said, pointing to Cat, eyebrows raised. As Ellie left your work table and came closer to the counter, Nath looked at her.

"Nice shirt," Ellie observed, followed by Nath humming something and entering a staring contest with the girl. You looked at both of them, confused about what was happening.

"How old are you? 12?" Nath questioned. Ellie shortly replied, saying 14. "Do you have a curfew?"

"Okay, no more interrogation. Let the poor girl be. When do you want to start this candle mission?" Before Ellie opened her mouth, you moved your hands in a motion to stop, gaining a short laugh from both girls.

"You see, Cat I get it, but how did you convince Ellie to make candles with us? This is new. I only see her at the library," the gears inside your head running with you, wondering when they met beside the library a few days back.

"A lady never tells, Doll," she said, melting more wax, "but apparently, having a collection of t-shirts with puns did the trick."

From the Tipsy Bison, Nath had a good view of the main street. She was quick to observe who and what, and even faster to understand their motivations. She noticed that Tommy's niece was going every day to the library, and on the days it was closed, she would stay put at home.

Joel appeared here and there, mainly with Tommy by his side, she crossed paths with them a few times and could check Joel's address. With the house street in her mind, she made a connection: Ellie was going to the library straight from her house, not from the school building, and as Maria reported earlier, she was supposed to already have started.

Nath and Seth cooked the patrol's food daily, with the patrollers coming to the counter to collect it before going to the city gate. In one of the deliveries, she heard Joel would come with the day's patrol to inspect the dam before working on it. It was Sunday, the library was closed, Nath made up her mind to let Seth take care of the Bison for the day and started walking to Ellie's house.

"Hum, yeah?" The girl opened the door, confused. Nath and she had seen each other just once, at the library, a couple days ago. Ellie's eyes lingered a bit too much on Nath's chest area, probably reading the t-shirt with a mouse drawing and the phrase "smartest rat at the sewer."

"What color is your room's ceiling?" Nath asked, snooping with her eyes inside the house. Old American regular, not yet different from the previous decoration there before being occupied by J0el and his kid. Impersonal, just a place to sleep, not a home.

 She needed to find a way to get Ellie outside fast since Maria lived on the other side of the street and could easily question her motives for being there.

“Dirty white, why?” Ellie crossed her arms and raised one of her brows.

"Congratulations, you are a bored teen. Let me tell you what’ll happen now: you’ll come with me and have an amazing city tour, or you can stay here and your best choice is to sleep." Nath started walking down the pavement, shouting, "You have a minute to grab your keys and follow me."

Ellie rushed behind her, eager to have any excuse to leave her house. Nath had two main focuses during the tour: to present her with the basics of how the city worked and to gain a new alliance. She tried to make sure the kid understood the main buildings.

"Okay, let's get to the basics: buildings. The city has some structures inside our walls, but we also have some land a few miles from here to get some specifics. The food you eat is a mix of everything, Chad," she pointed at the man working on the garden as they passed by it, "is our gardner. Vegetables, fruits — you name it, are harvest inside the city and the animals come from the land outside. Try to get close to Chad, when you crave something sweet, compliment him, and he will give you a few berries. Works like a charm."

"The stable's horses are for the whole community, but if you start to patrol, you can choose one to be your main one." Nath continued as Ellie looked back at her in wonder.

“Which one is yours?” Nath laughed at the absurdity of the question.

“I don’t patrol, kid. Do you really think that I’d go around the runners and lunatics outside these walls risking my life? Hell no! My contribution is good alcohol and movie nights orchestrated by yours truly at the mess hall. Do you like horror movies?" Ellie didn't answer immediately, almost as if she had never seen one. "Well, you can try and see if it fits. The next one will be in a few weeks, you should come."

They walked through the main avenue and the main buildings. Nath showed her where they produced paper, how they got new fabric to make more clothes and not rely only on "treasure hunting." Little by little, Ellie understood the whole system of the city, including the government model. They were walking back on the main avenue as Nath continued the final part of the tour.

"If you ever get fucked up pretty bad and need a doctor, you go there and ask for Edwin. He looks a thousand years old, but pretty cool dude in case of an emergency," she spoke, nodding at the clinic on the other side of the street.

About four houses down the street, she started to speak again. "The little kids stay at the daycare until late during weekdays – make sure to do not cross their paths, or you will smell a diaper from a mile away," she twisted her nose and pointed at the said building. Ellie laughed, eyes bright as if she was taking notes of everything.

"And this is the best place in this city," Nath said as they entered the Tipsy Bison as the city tour ended, "it also opens every day of the week but for adults, not pests. You can't drink anything I have behind this counter, but you can eat a mean grilled cheese. Hungry?"

Turned out it was Ellie’s first time in a bar, exactly what you would hope for a 14year old, anyway. She was seated at a stool in front of the counter, watching from the kitchen’s door Nath make her a sandwich. Above the door, there was a black plaque with white letters:

NO SWEARING

NO FIGHTS

NO CORDYCEPS DISCUSSIONS

NO END OF THE WORLD TALK

"Why the hell do you have these rules for?" Ellie asked out loud, making Nath look at the plaque as she passed the door with the grilled cheese plate. "What happens if someone breaks it?"

“Pawpaw’s rules, not mine, but I still follow them. Don’t test them and you will be fine. Eat your damn sandwich,” she replied, Ellie was already taking a bite. “You like to read, huh? I watch you walk to the library every day. Dolly may be somewhat innocent, but I’m not. You are running from something.”

"What do you mean?" Ellie replied, getting tense at her shoulders, her small mouth a little more rigid. "I have no clue what you’re talking about."

"I get it, pal. A new kid that crossed the country with a grumpy man and ended up in a small town? Not the smoothest life," the girl looked down and took another bite. Nath continued, "My grandpa and I had our share of adventures before coming to this place, just me and him. If anyone understands you, this person is me. You skip school to go to the library. Dolly hasn't realized it yet, but I do."

"What the fuck do you want from me?" Ellie replied using her meanest tone. Nath pointed at the plaque with the rules. The girl looked up. "Not saying sorry for your stupid rules."

“Didn’t ask you to. Listen, I’ll keep your secret for now if you do me a favor.” Getting herself a little closer to the kid, Nath whispered, “I need to deliver some things around town and can’t be seen while at it, but you, nobody knows you yet. Simple and easy.”

"What kind of things?" She questioned in the same breathy tone, trying to keep her posture. "What can you give me in exchange? I won't do it for a secret. It’s too little."

“Basic shit, I can give you more details later,” Nath replied and waited for Ellie’s reaction, that just nodded her head once, “here’s the deal: you make me one deliver to check the quality of your work and come to my house next Sunday afternoon with Cat, I get you something from a smuggler outside Jackson. You name it.”

"Really, man? You want me to help with your stupid candles?" Ellie rolled her eyes, and Nath maintained her neutral expression, trying her best to get the kid afraid of her. It worked.

Ellie took her last bite and shook her head, "Fine, but no, something smuggled is too little. I want your shirt. The turtley awesome one." They sealed the deal with a handshake. One week later, Ellie and Cat were helping to make candles, to your utter confusion.

"Are you sure that this is your preferred weekend activity?" You asked as you finished making the second batch of candles. Looking at Cat, you continued, "Aren't we too old to be your pals for the day?"

"Old? Yeah, lame? No, also, I'm hoping to be paid with another apple pie," Cat said, and you smiled at her, putting the topic to rest.

Turned out that 600 candles were indeed impossible with the amount of time you had. You were tired of making them until way after the sunlight went away. Cat had gone home already, Ellie stayed to help clean everything and you realized it was probably too late for her to walk back alone, Joel was most likely worried.

Despite the kid saying to you that it was alright, you insisted on chaperoning her, carrying with you some candles, hoping that Joel would be less angry by it. As you walked the few blocks to their house, you came to the conclusion that you had no indication, clue, or even context for what Joel was like. Ellie spent most of the days at the library, but you never spoke about her relationship with him. He was a book waiting to be opened, one that you wanted to read every page and write small comments at the margins.

“I’m home!” Ellie shouted downstairs, as she entered the main door, Joel came from the kitchen. “Oh no”, you thought.

With a cloth rag on his shoulder, he stopped near Ellie, both hands on his hips and a knee popped. She opened her mouth, he quickly dismissed, "Don't. I told you, this is a safe place, safe as it gets, but you need to give a heads up before disappearing like that."

"I lost track of time, sorry. Nothing bad happened. Tell him, Dolly," she replied quickly, looking at you behind her shoulder. You were still at the front door, feeling awkward to enter the house. Joel furrowed his brows and looked at you up and down.

It had been a hot day, summer was not far away anymore. A tank top with shorts made sense for a day with your best friend, but in front of Joel, you felt naked. More naked than the day at the meadow. You jumped a bit, put on your best polite voice, and announced, "Sorry for showing up late, we did lose track of time. Ellie stayed with us all day. I can assure you she was fine under my eye."

Joel gave you a look, almost as if he didn't believe you. Remembering your first proper encounter at the Bison, he knew immediately you hated your nickname. Now he knows you were being just polite, not yourself, real. He looked through the doll in you, putting some weight on how his dark brown eyes gazed at yours.

"I mean it, she showed up by noon at Nath's door and stayed a little later to help us clean the mess. We made candles for the nights without energy. No more than that. I brought you some." You said in your own voice, no more the doll one.

"Right," he replied, looking down and then to Ellie, "Go to bed, you have school tomorrow. It's okay. I'm not mad at you." Ellie nodded, her face tensed still, and left without making any comments, leaving you alone with Joel.

For a few seconds, staring at each other, you both seemed to forget what you were doing. He spoke first, "So, the candles, thank you for them. They’ll be useful."

“Yeah, they will.” Putting the candles in his hands, you looked away when your fingers touched his. Not giving in to the feeling, you continued, “Have you seen the dam yet?”

"Hum, no, I’ll see the dam structure tomorrow." Joel quickly replied, short answer.

“Maria told the council that you used to work as a contractor, are you happy to do it again?” You tried once more, hoping to get more words out of him.

"I think so, it’s been so long that it feels like another lifetime," Joel replied, putting the candles away and taking the rag from his shoulder, not daring to look at you. Another lifetime, another Joel.

A younger Joel would have already asked for you to join him in the kitchen for a drink, maybe to walk you home, not this version with old bones and fear of everything. This one was too busy trying to keep what he already had near him, avoiding at all costs to be greedy.

To say that his first day back at a construction site was a dog day would be to lighten it up. He lied to you. Joel met Tommy a week ago to understand better the dam plan, the needs, and all by visiting it.

"Alfie is a good fella, not like some of the people we used to work with back at Austin," Tommy said as they walked down the main avenue toward the city gate. Joel allowed himself to see his baby brother as the 50 year old man he was, putting some trust in Tommy's words despite his history of having too much faith in everyone that sold him a good story.

Over the prior weeks, he tried to get some ground for him and Ellie. He would make her breakfast early in the morning, just like when they were traveling. Leave a lampshade lighted all night near her bedroom door to avoid bad dreams. Meet her at the mess hall every night to have dinner with Tommy and Maria. Walk her to school every morning. However, no matter what he tried, he could still notice the weight on her stare from when she asked if he was being honest with her.

Biting down the corner of his mouth, Tommy introduced him to Alfie at the city entrance. The man was accompanied by a young girl who looked similar to him. "Alfie, this is my brother, Joel. He will be joining us today at the dam."

"I heard good things about your abilities. Nice to meet you," Alfie started with a smile and shook his hand, "this is Catarina, my daughter. I will be home before the sunset, mija."

Joel controlled the impulse to sigh. Alfie was too smiley, too happy, too endearing, too young. Probably had an effect on women because of his thick accent, and being in his late thirties,  early forties maximum helped as well. He had a happy look in his eye as if he hadn't lived on the same Earth as Joel for the last 21 years.

 Cat gave her father a long hug and started to walk, leaving Alfie to talk with Joel and Tommy. The scene felt like a slap on his face, a reminder of what he one day had and now was shaking on his boots to keep. He assumed that Cat and Alfie had a similar age difference as Sarah and he had. Alfie was a natural, appeared to get along with his daughter, could smile easily, and had been a good friend to his brother over time. Envy wasn't a natural feeling for Joel, but he was sure he was jealous of the young man's destiny over his own.

He could sense there was conversation near him but only paid attention when Alfie said his name back at him. "Cat and Ellie are getting closer. Perhaps you both could join us for a backyard barbecue," he invited, smiling.

"Yeah, we’ll be there. Thank you," Joel agreed, looking in front of him, despite having not heard a single time Ellie mention Cat. He didn't know when, but he got so lost in his thoughts as they followed the trail that he lost his sense of reality a little. They were no longer at Jackson but on the back of horses following for the dam. He had no idea of how much time had passed.

“Hey man, I forgot to ask you. We saw you at Dolly’s door the other night, all good?” Tommy started as he got closer to Alfie, Joel behind them at the back of the trail. “All this cat and mouse must be tiring.”

“Oh, Dolly,” Alfie looked down a little, peaking Joel’s interest. “It is not, like, she is avoiding me, you know? But she hasn’t searched for me yet, I don’t know what to do.”

Alfie's smile was no longer decorating his face. Joel felt slightly guilty when he found out he felt better seeing the man's sadness. He had crossed paths with you a couple of times, but you looked at him straight in the eyes instead of running away. He saw how you dropped your shoulders as Alfie left your doorway, almost as if you were annoyed by the idea of being close to the man.

For a second, Joel allowed himself to believe you would have put your arms around his neck if he was the one kissing your cheek instead.

"She is a little difficult, but hey, progress is progress! Have you tried to ask Nath about it?" Tommy put a hand on his tight and looked at Alfie, a little lost in his thoughts.

"Not directly, she scares me a little," both men laugh as Joel didn't get the joke.

“Well, you should get a beer and try to get some alliances if you really want the doll,” Tommy advised and went straight to the front of the trail.

A well-known face waited for them at the dam. Joel glared at Tommy, who didn't look back at his brother's face. "Can't believe you didn't tell me this shit," Joel hissed low in his brother's direction.

Eugene and Tommy were fireflies together. Joel heard about the man over radio conversations over the years, listening to Tommy's enthusiasm as he spoke of his people skills and electricity expertise. Tommy searched for an older figure in Eugene because he no longer trusted Joel, simple as that. When Joel and Ellie showed up last winter, Tommy kept Eugene's presence a secret. Coming back during spring, he told Joel right away.

"Okay, you gotta check this out. I found the old floor plant of the dam in one of the office's rooms near the entrance. It will be a good rainy season, baby!" Eugene shouted hoarsely as the trio stopped their horses, Tommy and Alfie already walking behind him. Joel, however, stood back, taking a good look at the former firefly.

A slender man with long limbs, round glasses cracked in one of the lenses, and shaggy gray hair. His front teeth were slightly separated inside of a large mouth. It burned Joel's blood seeing Eugene so carefree, living a good life after years of Firefly actions and filling his brother's mind with ideas. Joel saw in him an old man who hadn't allowed himself to get old and hoped he didn't appear like this to the others, a joke of a man.

You were looking at Joel like he wasn't a joke to you, at least not a big one. His mind returning to the house with you, he waved the cloth a little on the air as if thinking and speaking at the same speed. "Why was Ellie with you?" He questioned a little for himself and a lot for you. He put some weight on the remembrance of that day at the dam, deciding to deal with it later.

"My friend, the bar owner - Nath, invited her to the activity." You replied with a lower voice as you shoved your hands in the back pockets of your shorts. "I can tell her to no longer invite Ellie if you feel uncomfortable."

"No, it's fine. Just took me by surprise, I guess," he quickly replied, pouting a little.

As you opened your mouth to say goodbye, a sizzling sound filled the room, and the lights flickered, followed by silence and total darkness. "Goddammit, fucking Eugene," Joel said out loud, leaving an intense sigh out of his body.

In the total darkness, you saw his silhouette against the moonlight that filtered from the kitchen's windows, a little far from where you stood in the living room. You could only hear you and Joel breathing.

"Guess we will have to use the candles before we imagined," he dared to speak, walking backwards into his kitchen. You were unsure of what to do, start to walk home? Wait until he came back with a candle lit up?

You waited, not by choice, but because you couldn't decide in time. You saw Joel protecting the candle's flame as he got close to you, his face lines soft from the orange light. His dark brown eyes were even stronger as the flame danced, reflecting on them.

"Come, I’ll get you something to eat," he spoke gently, and you followed his steps to the kitchen table despite the fact you were talking back.

“No, I will walk home, it’s already late,” you said without any intention to leave.

“Nonsense, it’s too dark for you without the lamppost. Stay a bit,” he replied gentler.

There was something sweet about how Joel moved around when his guard was low. It was the third time you met the man, but you noticed his shoulder line relaxed and his hands precise in their movements. In the dark of his kitchen, you wondered if he would appear the same with the lights on.

Joel heated for you some leftover tomato soup he made earlier when he waited for Ellie to show up. With a hint of embarrassment, you accepted the dish, lowering a spoon and tasting it.

"I'm not a huge fan of winter food during hot weather, but this is very good." He smiled, and a dimple appeared on his cheek. "Do you like to cook?"

"Not really, but I had to learn it due to necessity," he shrugged, frowning down a bit with his mouth. You laughed, and he smiled again.

"I learned due to necessity, and my soups don't taste like this," you teased, having another full spoon.

Time passed with the candle melting, and the only sound on the first floor was both your voices. Without noticing, you were almost whispering. You weren't sure if it was to avoid waking up Ellie or because it felt like a secret to be there alone with him.

“Can I get a little nosy?” You chewed your lower lip after speaking, Joel nodded. “Ellie comes to the library all the time. I think she is avoiding something.”

Joel's eyes got harder. "What do you mean?" He questioned, putting his back against the chair, getting some space from you.

“She reads a lot, which is amazing, but she reads to forget reality, not to her entertainment.” You lowered your eyes at your almost empty plate. Silence filled the room again. “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have said anything.”

"You are right," Joel affirmed, crossing his arms at his chest. His eyes were lost on the wooden table in front of him. "The way to Jackson wasn't easy, I can tell you this much. She came from a FEDRA school, it takes time to learn how to be a kid when you were raised to be a soldier."

Finishing your soup and resting the spoon on the plate, you looked at Joel. The lines between his brows were stronger now, his hands around his biceps holding tight his body closed. His plush lips were tensed as he stayed quiet, immersed in his thoughts.

"Time heals most things," you started, earning a quick glance from him, "she will open her shell. I will keep an eye on her, pinky promise."

His eyes went back and forth between yours. You felt a little awkward after saying such a childish phrase in front of a man older than you, forgetting for a second you weren't speaking with Nath or your brother but with someone you were spending more than 5 minutes together for the first time. Despite that, he put one arm on the table, close to your hand, and lifted his pinky finger.

Smiling with your mouth closed, you enlaced your finger with his. He slowly looked from your finger to your eyes and smiled back. In the low and trembling light from the only candle in the whole room, with his dark eyes boring into yours, you never felt more seen.

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