#IF I HAD WORDS

[formula-fun]

Hi!!!!!!

So happy that you have found time to write again!

By now I have reread the story too many times so I have been trying to “force” your two amazing stories on my best friend in hopes of finding someone to scream together (I have successfully dragged her across most of the fandoms I have dabbled in) and she was very excited when I explained the plot and showed her my too-long asks on your tumblr to her 🤣

Of course she would love them as much as I do, and she would be running out of excuses for wips (hahahaha) when it looks like the final chapters might be happening!

Very very excited! Thank you so much for taking the time to write! 😘

Hey hey!!!

Aww thanks so much!! I know its not for everyone and wips sometimes arent everyones cup of tea either but i hope she likes it if she gives it a try!! ive had the wildest month in the world so im only now starting to clean them up, but really hoping to have them up soon before school gets crazy again <3

leaving a snippet here for you since i love it so so much but am unfortunately about to cut it!

In Brazil Max doesn’t even bother pretending he wants to use his own hotel room. Charles has only been settled for fifteen minutes when a polite knock rings through the room, and when he opens the door it’s to the sight of Max standing in front of it, tapping away on his phone, his backpack slung precariously over the handle of the suitcase resting beside him.

“Is the WiFi working for you?” he asks in lieu of a greeting, wandering past Charles when Charles steps aside.

“I don’t know,” Charles says, amused. “I just got here.”

“Oh. Same.” He flops backward onto the bed, his knees hanging over the edge, not looking up when his suitcase finally overbalances and falls to the floor with a clatter. He drops his phone somewhere over his head, stretching his arms until they shake. He looks lazy and content, easy with the way he’s made a place for himself in Charles’ space, like he knows he’s always welcome. Charles wants to get on the bed and crawl toward him, one palm on his sternum, and see what his mouth feels like against Charles’ upside down.

He swallows hard.

“Do you want to order room service?” Max asks him.

They have places to be. Charles is pretty sure they do, anyway. They always do. He and Max have been apart for barely ten hours. It’s not long enough to miss someone; not at all.

He lets Max pick up the menu and narrate it aloud to him, halfheartedly debating each item while Charles systematically empties his suitcase across the entirety of the room. Max finally toes his shoes off and slides backward to sit against the headboard, picking up the phone and fiddling with the cord as he orders them a ninety dollar pizza and a seventy dollar fruit tray and a fifteen dollar bottle of sparkling water, and then mumbles something about putting it on his room’s tab instead of Charles’, even though their teams foot the bills anyway. As soon as the phone thunks down into the cradle Charles drops the shirt he was pretending to fold and turns to crawl onto the bed and curl into Max’s side.  

Max’s hand settles on his waist, heavy and warm. “They said fifteen minutes,” Max tells him. His eyes are wide and soft.

Charles shakes his head. “That’s fine,” he answers. His chest feels too big—too full. Max is looking at him with a gentle kind of happiness, and when Charles thinks about him seeking Charles out and living in his space he feels too much. He doesn’t know what to do with it all.

He cups his face and kisses him in greeting, finally—means to keep it short and sweet, but Max pulls him closer immediately. It’s stupid; it shouldn’t feel the way it does, when they’ve barely been apart a day. It doesn’t matter.

He relaxes into Max’s hold a little too much, half-sprawled across his lap and unbalanced because of it. Max just rolls them until they’re laying sideways, their heads at the foot of the bed, kissing lazily all the while. Time turns soft and elastic, everything else drifting away, Charles caught somewhere in all the things they’re pressing against each other’s lips: hello’s and how are you’s and I missed you’s and I love you’s.

When a woman comes with the room service cart Charles has to get up and let her in with wobbly legs, his lips tingling. He winces behind her back when he registers her alpha scent as she passes him, a stark contrast to the happy tangle of Charles and Max’s scents that’s taken all of half an hour to permeate the room. There’s no way she doesn’t notice it, but she doesn’t say a word. Max gives her a bashful red-lipped smile and a tip that’s double the cost of their food, and Charles resists the urge to put his face in his hands.

[mercuryal]

Today is 🖖🏻🚀First Contact Day🚀🖖🏻(RESISTANCE IS FUTILE, & also with you) as you may know, and in a fun coincidence I saw that You Are Good released a podcast episode today about another heartwarming, mid-90’s film starring ✨James Cromwell✨, Babe (1995) - that logically connected these two movies immediately in my brain, which culminated in me making a fast and loose edit that I tweeted out earlier: a mashup of the Star Trek: First Contact (1996) Phoenix launch sequence, & song “If I Had Words” by ✨James Cromwell✨, that he sings during a poignant scene from the children’s classic about a pig.

But, Dear Reader, I was not ready for how hard the combination hits you right in the 😭FEELS😭. This song fits perfectly with the hopeful beauty and overall meaning of Zefram Cochrane’s warp flight and Humanity’s subsequent first contact with the Vulcans- so obviously I had to make a better edit (now with 100% less bottle-fed pig suckling sounds! thanks official soundtrack ), like going back in time to save the world, here’s my second chance. That’ll do, Borg. That’ll do.

[megmoon1111]

you know what time it is!?

1995's Babe time

[littlemsterious]

i was thinking about that post comparing Jessica Rabbit as an asexual to Barbie and an asexual and then i thought of the Neil Gaiman post (was it a post?) about Crowley and Aziraphale being asexual sexless and then this happened.

anyways. thoughts?

sorry it took so long I meant to do this a week ago but my brain is full of rocks.

[Image ID a three sided venn diagram. the big circles show Margot Robbie's Barbie sitting in front of a mirror, Jessica and Roger Rabbit from the poster of Who Framed Roger Rabbit, and Aziraphale and Crowley from Good Omens standing back to back. Between Barbie and Jessica Rabbit it says "sexualised by society". Between Jessica Rabbit and Aziraphale and Crowley it says "Knows what sex is". Between Aziraphale and Crowley and Barbie it says "no reproductive system(?)". the center is the asexual flag. End ID]

Also i haven't seen the Barbie movie as of this edit so at least please tag your spoilers.

[faffreux]

it's weird to be attracted to an ugly frog like wtf is even your taste in men

i won't argue with you about whether or not fawful is ugly but it is weird yes, i agree

i have long accepted that i am weird

[mydairpercabeth]

season 4 is gonna hurt me i fear

[aru-art]

sourdough rolls with homemade lemon curd what the absolute fuck man

[feluka]

In front of the Journalists' Syndicate, Cairo, Egypt, on 15th January 2024.

The crowd chants:

مصر مشاركة في الحصار معبر بيننا و بين اهالينا الصهيوني متحكم فينا طول ما الدم العربي رخيص يسقط يسقط اي رئيس عملوها احفاد مانديلا و احنا فخوف و فعار و مزلة عايزين المعبر مفتوح

Translation:

Egypt participates in this siege! A crossing between us and our people! Controlled by Zionists! As long as Arab blood is seen as cheap, Any and every president must fall! Mandela's grandchildren have done it, While we are seized by fear, shame, and humiliation! We demand Rafah Crossing open!

[mokeonn]

"But if college was free, then people would abuse that and get useless degrees" hell yeah I would! If I could go to college without debt I would make it my job to get a degree in every little thing that interested me. I'd get a doctorate in film studies. I'd have a bachelor's degree for every science I like. I'd try to learn at least 5 languages with varying results. I would learn something "useful" like coding and then follow it up with a ""useless"" degree like art history. I'd be the world record speed run holder for getting every degree possible.

But I can't afford college without going into massive debt, so instead I spent the last 5 years trying to figure out what I am passionate enough about to consider going into debt over, because unfortunately being passionate about everything is extremely expensive to pursue.

[formula-fun]

hey em! how does charles' labour goes? are max and charles even jn the same country or does charles go back to monaco for his last few weeks? in other news, do you have a snippet of the new chapter for us yet?

they're both in monaco, I can tell you that much! it's during winter break so they're together and in the same place.

This won't be in the next update, it'll be in any potential sequel that gets written. i do have a snippet from the sequel for you though since i dont know how long it will take to see the light of day--probably a while, unfortunately. cw pregnancy discussions of miscarriage etc etc

The little scanner thing feels weird and alien, especially with all the blue gunk on his stomach that it’s pushing around. He thinks he might be holding Max’s hand too hard; his face is all pinched, and he keeps giving Charles worried looks when the doctor is looking away. That might be because of the panic that’s souring Charles’ scent. He doesn’t know. Not for the first time, he’s glad their doctor is a beta. 

“Alright,” she says, cutting through the silence. A blur shows up on the screen, grey and hazy. Charles looks away; looks at Max, who’s still watching, his blue eyes wide with wonder. 

“It’s turned around a little,” she says. She moves the probe again, and Charles’ abs jump. He shivers against the cold of it; squeezes Max’s hand. “There we go. There’s the head, and those there are the hands. Everything looks okay.”

“Charles,” Max breathes. He tears his eyes away, looking at Charles. Charles holds his gaze, frozen. He doesn’t dare turn around. He feels ancient; he’s been here before. He feels seven years old, refusing to look under his and Arthur’s bed in case it makes the monsters real. 

“There’s the heartbeat,” the doctor narrates happily. 

Max doesn’t look away from him. The wonder on his face slips into worry. He flexes his fingers, but Charles doesn’t let go. Charles squeezes even tighter, unwilling to let him move an inch. Max doesn’t wince, to his credit. He doesn’t even blink. 

“Is there anything wrong?” Charles asks her without looking away. 

She hums and moves the probe. It feels gross; he feels nauseous and too small, like he can’t breathe. His muscles hurt from how hard he’s clenching them.

“No, everything looks good. You have a very healthy baby.”

Charles bursts into tears. 

Within an instant Max is in his space, his shoulder beneath his cheek, one hand gently guiding Charles’ arm around his neck. “Can we have the room for a moment?” Max asks politely, as if Charles isn’t sobbing into his shirt. 

Charles doesn't register the doctor slipping out, just that the probe is gone and Max’s hands are on him, big and warm and safe. He shushes him gently, soothing up and down his spine as he murmurs a constant stream of calming sounds, and normally Charles would feel patronized for being taken care of like he’s one of Vic’s babies, but he needs this. Besides, when he pulls back finally Max’s eyes are wet. He needs this, too. 

“Charles,” he murmurs, hushed. “You didn’t say it was this bad.” 

“I’m sorry,” he gets out. 

“You have nothing to be sorry about.”

“No, I shouldn’t be scared. It’s bad for the baby.” His breath catches on a sob as he says it: ba-a-aby. He feels sick from all the sobbing, and the tears are stinging his cheeks. 

Max just shakes his head. He’s watching him like he’s trying to figure him out, even as he wipes away his tears with a tissue pilfered from the doctor’s desk. The tear tracks just get replaced with new ones. Max’s kindness always makes him cry even more, and especially now when he’s hormonal; he should know that by now. 

Charles sniffles, long and drawn out. Max is playing with the fine hair at the top of his neck in the way that always makes shivers run straight down his spine. It does the same thing here, even now, and Charles slumps into him. 

“I thought you were doing better after you talked to your mom,” Max says quietly. “Did it help?” 

“It helped,” Charles mutters. “It didn’t make it disappear.” 

“I didn’t think it would,” Max replies. “I just thought…why didn’t you tell me?” His tone is soft, like he’s talking to one of the cats. His touch is gentle. “I thought you would tell me, like last time.” 

“I don’t know,” Charles says, shrugging. He wipes at his eyes. “One of us should be excited about this. I’m excited, of course, but I–I have to worry. I have to think about it.”

“To think about losing it,” Max guesses, but Charles shakes his head. “Charles,” he sighs, his voice soft. “Tell me, please.” 

“Losing it but not knowing,” Charles admits, barely above a whisper. He fixes his eyes on the hollow of Max’s throat, refusing to look at him. “Sometimes it just dies. Having a corpse inside of me for weeks and not knowing, and then knowing and not being able to get it out. Or sometimes the baby is born with no brain or no head or no skull and it dies after an hour, or it has no kidneys and they cannot find a donor in time, and then they use the baby as a donor for other babies instead because it is not going to live. I cannot–” his eyes well again, and he pushes the tears away with the heel of his hand. When he looks up, Max is watching him with horror. “I need to worry. I will be ready if I worry. They keep telling me not to, but if I have to–to get rid of it, or watch it die, I want to be ready. So you can’t tell me–” 

“No,” Max cuts in, his voice thick. “No, Charles, I’m not–you’re allowed to worry. Come here.” Max pulls him in close, breathing like he’s trying not to cry. It doesn’t seem like it’s working. Guilt wells in Charles’ chest. Charles closes his eyes and presses his face into his neck, breathing in the familiar scent of him. 

“Are you not worried?” Charles says into his shirt. “You have to be.” 

“Of course I’m worried. I didn’t plan a life around a baby. I’m worried about losing you,” Max says, and. Oh. “I’m not just sitting here waiting for you to have a baby. You’re the love of my life. We’re partners. Please don’t protect me from things like this.” 

“You never said.” 

“I know.” He swallows, his throat bobbing. “I think that makes me a hypocrite, then. But we need to be more open with each other.” 

“You won’t tell me not to think about it?” 

Max huffs out a wet laugh. “That would make me a hypocrite, too.” 

“What do you think about?” 

His scent goes abruptly sour, fearful and sad. Max takes a deep breath, shifting them around to hold Charles closer. “Can we not talk about it here?” he asks quietly, even though all his muscles have gone tight. 

Charles nods against his throat. “Yeah,” he says, immediately regretful. He nuzzles at Max’s collar until he reaches the scar just above his collar bone; lingers there and waits for him to relax again. “Yeah. Later.” 

Max nods against his shoulder. He goes boneless as Max strokes through his hair again, their bodies pressed together except where the slight curve of Charles’ stomach holds them apart, and—

“Max,” Charles chides even as he relaxes further against him, “the goo. It is on you too now.”

“It’ll wash out,” Max says, uncaring. 

“You will look like you have been attacked by an alien when we walk out. You look like you fought a giant slug.”

“Have you been watching those weird horror movies again?”

Charles pulls away from him finally to look at him. Of course Max had worn something nice for once, ever-afraid of the doctors, and of course his four thousand euro designer sweater is now covered in blue goop. A little gelatin-like chunk of it is hanging from one of his pecs, and Charles flicks it off with a snicker. 

When the doctor finally comes back in she brings a new shirt for Max bearing the hospital’s logo. She politely turns around while Max strips off his old one. Charles doesn’t, and ogles him shamelessly. 

“These are for you,” the doctor tells Charles, handing him a box of animal crackers clearly pilfered from the pediatric ward.

“Are they not for children?” Charles asks, but he takes them anyway. 

“You are having a child, so it is kind of the same thing,” she points out. “Anyway, nobody stopped me. I hope you are feeling better. Is there anything I can do to help? Any questions I can answer?” 

The long muscles of Max’s back disappear beneath the heather grey cotton. The word VOLUNTEER spreads over his shoulders in massive font, stretching a bit when he reaches forward to fold the sweater with the goo on it. Charles chews his cracker slowly. Max looks back at Charles when the silence stretches for a beat too long; catches his gaze and then rolls his eyes, his ears going pink. 

“Everything is okay?” Charles asks finally. “No, um…spina bifida, or anencephaly, or…” 

“No,” the doctor says firmly. “Everything looks normal. We’ll continue monitoring, but if either of those were risks we would have caught them by now.” 

Charles nods. He pushes another cracker into his mouth; ignores the prickle of tears in his eyes. 

“And Charles is okay?” Max asks, wandering closer. “The blood tests are good?” 

“Everything looks good,” she assures them. “Charles, you’re a little bit lower on iron than last time. It isn’t an issue. Just try to eat a little more red meat. Do you feel okay?”

“I feel fine,” Charles murmurs. “Stressed, of course, but fine.” 

“That’s understandable. Just remember everything is normal. There are always risks, of course, but for right now it looks like neither of you have anything to worry about.” 

Max lets out a long breath and sags against him. Charles, exhausted, hands him an animal cracker.

[arowrath]

made on blinkies.cafe, text on the second blinkie from this post

[stuckinapril]

Unprecedented does not mean unprovoked. Iran was within its right to retaliate against Israel, because prior to that Israel had attacked one of its embassies in Syria—a direct result of the US emboldening Israel to basically do whatever the fuck it wanted without repercussions.

However, this does not change the fact that it’s unprecedented: Iran has never directly attacked Israel before. It has indirectly done so, through other countries’ drones, but never directly. This is the first time in decades that any major state has retaliated against Israel directly. Does that mean it’s unprovoked? No. It absolutely was provoked. But it also is a first, which is why the SWANA region is teetering on an uncertain edge right now.

[inkskinned]

so one of the things that's so horrifying about birth control is that you have to, like, navigate this incredibly personal choice about your body and yet also face the epitome of misogyny. like, someone in the comments will say it wasn't that bad for me, and you'll be utterly silenced. like, everyone treats birth control like something that's super dirty. like, you have no fucking information or control over this thing because certain powerful people find it icky.

first it was the oral contraceptives. you went on those young, mostly for reasons unrelated to birth control - even your dermatologist suggested them to control your acne. the list of side effects was longer than your arm, and you just stared at it, horrified.

it made you so mentally ill, but you just heard that this was adulthood. that, yes, there are of course side effects, what did you expect. one day you looked up yasmin makes me depressed because surely this was far too intense, and you discovered that over 12,000 lawsuits had been successfully filed against the brand. it remains commonly prescribed on the open market. you switched brands a few times before oral contraceptives stopped being in any way effective. your doctor just, like, shrugged and said you could try a different brand again.

and the thing is that you're a feminist. you know from your own experience that birth control can be lifesaving, and that even when used for birth control - it is necessary healthcare. you have seen it save so many people from such bad situations, yourself included. it is critical that any person has access to birth control, and you would never suggest that we just get rid of all of it.

you were a little skeeved out by the implant (heard too many bad stories about it) and figured - okay, iud. it was some of the worst pain you've ever fucking experienced, and you did it with a small number of tylenol in your system (3), like you were getting your bikini line waxed instead of something practically sewn into your body.

and what's wild is that because sometimes it isn't a painful insertion process, it is vanishingly rare to find a doctor that will actually numb the area. while your doctor was talking to you about which brand to choose, you were thinking about the other ways you've been injured in your life. you thought about how you had a suspicious mole frozen off - something so small and easy - and how they'd numbed a huge area. you thought about when you broke your wrist and didn't actually notice, because you'd thought it was a sprain.

your understanding of pain is that how the human body responds to injury doesn't always relate to the actual pain tolerance of the person - it's more about how lucky that person is physically. maybe they broke it in a perfect way. maybe they happened to get hurt in a place without a lot of nerve endings. some people can handle a broken femur but crumble under a sore tooth. there's no true way to predict how "much" something actually hurts.

in no other situation would it be appropriate for doctors to ignore pain. just because someone can break their wrist and not feel it doesn't mean no one should receive pain meds for a broken wrist. it just means that particular person was lucky about it. it should not define treatment.

in the comments of videos about IUDs, literally thousands of people report agony. blinding, nauseating, soul-crushing agony. they say things like i had 2 kids and this was the worst thing i ever experienced or i literally have a tattoo on my ribs and it felt like a tickle. this thing almost killed me or would rather run into traffic than ever feel that again.

so it's either true that every single person who reports severe pain is exaggerating. or it's true that it's far more likely you will experience pain, rather than "just a pinch." and yet - there's nothing fucking been done about it. it kind of feels like a shrug is layered on top of everything - since technically it's elective, isn't it kind of your fault for agreeing to select it? stop being fearmongering. stop being defensive.

you fucking needed yours. you are almost weirdly protective of it. yours was so important for your physical and mental health. it helped you off hormonal birth control and even started helping some of your symptoms. it still fucking hurt for no fucking reason.

once while recovering from surgery, they offered you like 15 days of vicodin. you only took 2 of them. you've been offered oxy for tonsillitis. you turned down opioids while recovering from your wisdom tooth extraction. everything else has the option. you fucking drove yourself home after it, shocked and quietly weeping, feeling like something very bad had just happened. the nurse that held your hand during the experience looked down at you, tears in her eyes, and said - i know. this is cruelty in action.

and it's fucked up because the conversation is never just "hey, so the way we are doing this is fucking barbaric and doctors should be required to offer serious pain meds" - it's usually something around the lines of "well, it didn't kill you, did it?"

you just found out that removing that little bitch will hurt just as bad. a little pinch like how oral contraceptives have "some" serious symptoms. like your life and pain are expendable or not really important. like maybe we are all hysterical about it?

hysteria comes from the latin word for uterus, which is great!

you stand here at a crossroads. like - this thing is so important. did they really have to make it so fucking dangerous. and why is it that if you make a complaint, you're told - i didn't even want you to have this in the first place. we're told be careful what you wish for. we're told that it's our fault for wanting something so illict; we could simply choose not to need medication. that maybe if we don't like the scraps, we should get ready to starve.

we have been saying for so long - "i'm not asking you to remove the option, i'm asking you to reconsider the risk." this entire time we hear: well, this is what you wanted, isn't it?

[korrasamibottles]

Why not HER muscly forearms

[toneelspeelster]

sarah nelson being a charlie spring lovebot

[luthienne]

Anne de Marcken, from It Lasts Forever and Then It's Over [ID'd]