#Will Ruby is the fun uncle up until everyone else fucking dies and then he just tries to replace the dads really hard

[idontliketomatoesleavemealone]

I like to make little family groups

Does anybody have any Hunger Games Covey OCs? I would love to see what name you gave them.

[needs-to-stop-looking-at-yigas]

So Sooga gets along with Revali, Sidon, Riju- what about Urbosa and Daruk? I don't think I recall the dynamic between him and the others. And I think Kohga is missing a few too- i guess im asking for headcanons here.

Oh good point. All of these are susceptible to change, so nothing is particularly set in stone.

Sooga;

Enjoys hanging out with Revali. He admires not just his talent, but the fact that he hides his insecurities very well. Match that with his quick wit and their mutual love for making fun of Link honestly makes them buddies. They like to train, have tea, and have a nice crab omlette (Sooga is on and off in terms of how comfortable he is, eating around Revali). Revali, along with every other rito (namely women) have a crush on him. Sooga just, fucking attracts birds for some reason.

Sidon is his close second friend. Big as he is, a lover of fish, Sidon is annoying in a sort of endearing way. He likes fishing, hiking, swimming, collecting shells with him. When they aren't having fun outside or fucking, you'll see them indoors, whittling while Sidon goes on and on about some story. Sooga likes to listen, Sidon loves to talk. They just work.

Riju. Riju is sort of like his niece. He treats her respectfully, but having grown up with six sisters, Sooga has the instinct to care for her. He takes her out for ice cream, he does her nails/hair, listens to her rant, and even helps pet sit Patricia from time to time (and Patricia LOVES him, she blows him kisses all the time). He's also kinda protective. A boy her age tried talking to her, he went missing the next day. Odd I know.

Urbosa. Urbosa acts like HIS older sister, and while women make him uncomfortable, he trusts her more than most. She's always there to give him words of encouragement, always there to help him against some rather hungry ladies- she just has his back. Sometimes they meet up for a nice dessert and talk about what they like in men (Urbosa loves ladies too, but women are lost on Sooga).

Mipha. Sooga and Mipha get along. They aren't at each other’s throats, but Sooga isn't exactly nuts about her. She finds him slightly imposing, he doesn't like being near women-without Kohga, they're awkward with one another.

Teba. Sooga and Teba actually get along pretty well. They're both rather strong and silent types. That is, until Sooga asks about the family life. They end up sitting next to each other, tending to their weapons, while Teba tells him what it's like to be a dad. They're quiet overall.

Daruk. Daruk and Sooga...they co exist. Sooga doesn't hate him, but he isn't a fan. Jealousy from Kohga aside, Sooga doesn't like that he's loud, brazen, VERY touchy, and is constantly trying to get him to eat. Suffice to say, Sooga would prefer anyone else's company (he was once in a room with JUST him and Mipha. It sucked).

Sooga and Yunobo. For some reason, he's chosen to adopt him too, and is constantly acting as his confident. He's constantly making sure he's eaten and slept, and is trying to help him come out of his shell. The 'he asked for no pickles' meme, but in an uncle way. Sooga likes to take him out to smash boulders during the day, and hunt for fireflies at night. Yunobo once fell asleep on him, Sooga didn't have the heart to move him. He had to see a doctor for his back the next day, but worth it.

Link and Sooga have a VERY competitive relationship. They've established early on that they're rivals, and as such, wanna beat each other's shit on a daily basis. They lowkey need to stop hitting each other and just bone, everyone sees it.

The Great faeries. Not champions, but imma include it anyway-they coddle the crap out of him because he's honestly adorable to them. He really. Really wishes they'd stop kissing him, just ONCE. They're all better than Malanya though, for some reason he fucking HATES Sooga.

Zelda. Sooga...does not like Zelda. I'll leave it at that. Let's just say you shouldn't leave them alone together.

Impa/Purah/Robbie. Its fucking on site with Impa, Purah is actually tolerable, and Robbie is just fucking annoying.

Kohga!!;

Kohga of course, LOVES his lil red fishy, Mipha. You kidding me? She's a cherry! An absolutely precious lil ruby! Kohga loves her SO much, she can pretty much just waltz into the clan whenever she pleases, and gets whatever she wants by asking for it. They're ABSOLUTELY bff's. Shopping, cooking, talking about boys and taking selfies, they're practically joined at the hip. I'm telling you, Kohga would end game any bitch if Mipha asked.

Daruk. Kohga LOVES the guy! Not just because he's easy on the eyes, but he's big, loud, rowdy, pair that up with his love for food, and these two can keep each other company FOREVER. Just, be warned if booze is allowed, and may god help your pantry. When they AREN'T raining hell, they spend time at the hot springs, and let me tell you, you've never seen two dudes happier, they're like pigs in shit.

Sidon. Kohga and Sidon get along great! Nice to look at, Sidon is also just a sweetie who just. Does whatever Kohga tells him to. Like Sooga, but dumb as hell. One of the few people that BOTH of them can hang around with. Seriously though, Sidon is a big dumb sweetie, Kohga LOVES it.

Urbosa. Her and Kohga get along, in a sorta 'let's meet for brunch on Sundays' kinda way. It's a casual friendship, and honestly? It's comfortable for them. He's still lowkey scared of her though.

Kohga is Riju's OTHER uncle. He's the more 'tell me about the boys you like' kinda uncle. Total enabler, he lets Riju do all the kid stuff she never really got the chance to do. You wanna play with chalk? Absolutely. You wanna get your shoes dirty? Course! You wanna eat all the candy and go pants a royal guard? He's IN.

Revali is an ass. Full of himself, snarky, and so in the closet, they bicker ALL the fucking time. They don't HATE each other, they just fucking can't get along. They fought over BREAD once.

Teba doesn't love Kohga. He's not quiet, he squirms a lot, and even if he's asleep, he tosses and turns a LOT. Teba just puts up with him, while Kohga thinks he's boring, but nice to look at.

Yunobo is more loved by Sooga than Kohga, but he thinks the kid is a peach. He teaches him how to talk to boys he likes. Can't help with girls though. Still sweet to the poor kid though, always brings him something to eat, because he worries.

Kohga LOVES Link! They both love food (especially fried bananas), Kohga loves Link's antics, Link loves Kohga’s funny dance moves- they just click. You'll often see them napping together after a buffet of food.

The great faeries! He LOVES them!! They're big, they're beautiful, they proud and loud- they are just his gal pals. He knows each ones specific tastes, and its so easy for him to charm the pants off of them during tea time. Don't tell anyone, but Malanya is his favorite, they love talking about horses.

Impa/Purah/Robbie. Kohga doesn't hate Impa, but the girl is SUCH a buzzkill. Instead of going and getting her a girl, she's here, scolding him for some random rule. Smh. He LOVES Purah though. They're TOTAL shutterbugs together, and they both agree that Impa needs to get a girlfriend. Robbie is also a TOTAL babe. Like if dude likes to experiment, Kohga can run some tests on that DI-

Zelda. Kohga...hates that he likes her. She's just a sweet gal, and with a smile like that? He can't hate her. He visits here and there for political reasons, but they do have lunch and catch up. Him and Sooga do sometimes help pick outfits/looks as well. And...well. The royal stables are a HUGE plus (seriously, Kohga SWOONS for her white horse. He jokes that he's more handsome than Sooga. He's half kidding, that fucker is a BEAUTIFUL horse).

[kelyon]

Golden Rings 17: A Name

The Storybrooke sequel to Golden Cuffs

Mrs. Gold revisits her past

Read on AO3

Mrs. Gold looked on in mute horror as Hunter Duke dumped more hot sauce on his triple bacon hamburger. He’d asked Ruby to give him three meat patties with no bun and steamed broccoli instead of fries. When Mrs. Gold had questioned that lunch choice, he had explained his new diet to her.

At length.

Hunter had always been the kind of boy who thought meat and spicy food were substitutes for a personality. He’d been the star athlete at Storybrooke High, taking home championships in football and wrestling. He’d been popular with everyone--except for the one girl he’d arbitrarily decided was the hottest girl in school. That girl, the valedictorian, hadn’t given the quarterback the time of day. Not until she lost her scholarship and suddenly dating the son of a lawyer sounded like the way to the best future she would ever get.

“They do the burgers way too overdone here,” Hunter said with his mouth full. “You don’t get enough protein if it isn’t bloody.”

Mrs. Gold shrugged and took a bite of her own burger. It needed more pickles, but it was still amazing. Toasted bun, crisp lettuce, a patty that was juicy but not messy. She hadn’t had a Granny’s burger in forever. When she was a kid, her parents had taken her out for burgers every Friday night after their shop closed. Mom would bring her own supply of extra-zesty mustard and Dad…

She set her bun on her plate. On those idyllic, bygone Friday nights, her father would spend the whole meal grumbling about money and expenses and couldn’t they have eaten at home? Mom had always told him to stop worrying and enjoy the moment. It was the end of another week and they were together, happy and healthy. She’d calmed him down and kept him focused, every time there was a crisis.

Until they faced the biggest crisis of their lives.

Mrs. Gold blinked out of her thoughts. For some reason, Hunter was still talking. Maybe it looked like she was listening. She’d gotten good at that when they had dated. Now that she was listening for real, she tried to catch up.

“I keep telling my dad he needs to just change the sign. ‘Duke & Duke & Duke’ has a great ring to it, right? Or he could for ‘Duke & Sons.’ I don’t mind sharing the spotlight with Steven. Or he could leave the sign as it is and retire! ‘Duke & Duke’ is classic, everyone knows we’re the best bankruptcy lawyers in town. Just let my brother be the first Duke and I’ll be second Duke and we’ll take this firm into the future! But Dad keeps brushing me off for some reason.”

Mrs. Gold took a sip of iced tea and desperately wished it was something stronger. “Did you… go to law school?”

She had the oddest feeling that she couldn’t remember how long they had been out of high school. All she knew for sure was that Hunter had enrolled at Storybrooke Community College--and she hadn’t. It was possible that he had gotten his bachelor’s. As Hunter was fond of saying, “Cs get degrees.” But SCC didn’t have a graduate program. Had he taken more classes on the internet? Or correspondence courses? It boggled her mind to think of Hunter of all people had gotten a law degree during the years she’d been Mr. Gold’s stupid slut.

“Well actually,” he explained, “you don’t need to go to law school to take the bar exam. I’ve got a bachelor’s in poli-sci and I’ve been around lawyers all my life. My dad knows everyone at the state bar. He’ll pull some strings and I’ll be all set.”

Mrs. Gold stabbed her straw at the ice cubes in her glass. It was so fucking unfair. Hunter was an idiot child who had never worked for anything in his life. His father--Richard “Big Dick” Duke--had bought him a Humvee when he turned sixteen, a speedboat when he graduated high school, and a college education just because no son of his wasn’t going to go to college. Now he would give his son the bar exam and a ready job and everything he would need for a future, without Hunter ever having to grow up past the maturity level of a toddler.

She’d lost her virginity to this boy. One summer night after senior year, in the back seat of that gas-guzzling monstrosity. They’d been dating for a while and Hunter had been perfectly content with her amateurish attempts at blowing him. But for her, the novelty had begun to wear off. So she’d suggested that he “put it in” instead. It was mostly a way for him to get his rocks off while she could just lie back and think of something more interesting.

Her memories of that night were dark and cramped and disappointing. She kept her shoes and her bra on the whole time. When Hunter was done, she had been more confused than anything else. This is what people made such a big deal about? Wasn’t sex supposed to be better than that?

It wasn’t until later, with Mr. Gold, that she had understood what people were talking about in romance novels.

But now that things were so strained with her husband, she found herself thinking back to the only other sexual partner she’d ever had. Looking at Hunter now, she had to remind herself of how bad things had been that summer, when he had been a welcome distraction. Hunter hadn’t wanted to talk about doctors’ appointments or shop inventory or arguing with financial aid departments--every fight a losing battle. All he wanted to do was drink, screw around, and have fun, and he welcomed her along for the ride.

I thought he would help us. I was wrong. He wasn’t what I needed.

Mrs. Gold shook the thought out of her head. The thought was true, but she recognized it as not being her own, so she talked over it.

“Have you been hanging out with any of the old gang? Sean or Jesse or anyone?”

It had been exciting to be included with the rich kids, to feel like she belonged in the world of the young and the reckless--people who didn’t have to worry about things because their parents would always be around to bail them out. They could do whatever they wanted because the world belonged to them.

Hunter shrugged. “Jesse’s an idiot, so no change there. But Sean’s been such a pussy ever since Ashley had her baby.”

Ashely Boyd had been in that group with her. Rich boys liked running around with poor girls because they were easier to impress than the rich girls. New Town young ladies also had parents who bought them cars for their sixteenth birthdays. They didn’t need to rely on spoiled boys to pay their way every time they went out, so they didn’t have to go along with whatever stupidity the boys came up with. Mrs. Gold had taken a lot of risks just so Hunter would keep thinking she was interesting.

But Ashley had loved Sean for more than his money and toys. All she ever wanted was for him to love her back and stay with her. Once, Mrs. Gold had thought Ashley was stupid for pining so hard after a boy who would never commit. But now she had a little more sympathy.

“What happened with Sean?”

“Mr. Herman kicked him out, cut him off. Now he’s living at Ashley’s place, working his ass off at the fish factory.”

“The cannery,” Mrs. Gold corrected quietly. Fish King Canned Foods was always hiring. It was always looking for people who could stand waist-deep in ice and fish guts for twelve hour shifts, operating machinery that could cut through a human hand as easily as it did a whole herring. Her cousin Andrew had gotten a job right out of high school. Her Uncle Peter had worked there for twenty years before he died.

“Like I said, he’s a total pussy now. All he does is work and hang out with Ashley, work and take care of the baby, work and sleep. You know he asked her to marry him a couple days ago? Utterly whipped.”

“Wow,” she said.

She had never respected Sean Herman, so it was weird to think of him actually growing up. People didn’t usually change around Storybrooke. But now the spoiled party boy was taking responsibility for his child and the woman who loved him. He had given up his own wealth and family status because he loved a penniless girl from Old Town.

It was impressive.

She finished her burger while Hunter started another monologue, this time about all the fat, lazy, poor people who came to his father’s office to declare bankruptcy. Forget being a lawyer, he should go into talk radio.

“I did ask you to lunch for a reason.” She grabbed her chance to talk while he was taking a breath.

“Oh yeah?” Hunter wiped hot sauce off his face with the back of his hand. “What’s up?”

“You know a lot of people,” Mrs. Gold said. “I was wondering if you might know somebody that I don’t.”

He slurped up the dregs of his diet soda. “Yeah? Who?”

Mrs. Gold gripped the edge of the table and desperately hoped he wouldn’t notice how hard it was for her to say this. The gold of her wedding ring was dull on this cloudy afternoon. “I… just have a name right now. I think it’s a woman named Belle.”

She could see the wheels in his head turning as he thought. “Belle? Hmm. I don’t know.”

“She’s probably young. Maybe our age. Maybe younger. Or older? Maybe she’s one of your mom’s friends or something?”

A woman as old as Karen Duke would still be younger than Mr. Gold. Maybe he was looking for more maturity now. In the days since she found out about Belle, Mrs. Gold had been racking her brain to try to imagine what kind of person she was. She was only moderately sure that Belle even was a woman. If Mr. Gold wanted this Belle person more than he wanted his own wife, she was probably the opposite of her in some crucial way.

Hunter made a face and scratched the back of his head. “Nah, I got nothing. Sorry.”

“Yeah,” Mrs. Gold looked down at her empty plate. “I’m not surprised.”

Seeing that they were both done with their food, Ruby came up to the table. “Now is this gonna be one check or two?”

It was almost funny how quickly Hunter looked to Mrs. Gold. He panicked at the thought of paying for his own lunch. Daddy must not be giving him an allowance anymore.

“You invited me,” he said, almost chiding her with the reminder of how things worked.

“Yeah, that was my first mistake.” Mrs. Gold took the check from Ruby and pulled out her purse.

A fifty would be enough to pay for two hamburgers and Ruby’s discretion. Not that Mrs. Gold was being particularly sneaky, arranging lunch with her ex-boyfriend at the most popular restaurant in town. But that didn’t matter either. She could take Hunter to the pawn shop and bang him in front of the cash register and Mr. Gold wouldn’t give a fuck.

And neither would she.

****

Wandering listlessly up and down Main Street, Mrs. Gold tried to keep warm. The clouds were dark and heavy with more snow. The sidewalks were shoveled, but there was always a residue of dirty slush. It was the time of year when trash kept showing up in the streets, no matter how many anti-littering signs Mayor Mills put up.

Mrs. Gold’s suede boots were more fashionable than sturdy. The same could be said for her coat, scarf, and hat. The cold seeped through her flimsy layers, until she was nothing but numb and damp, until it was hard to breathe, until she was so desperate to be warm again she resolved to go into the next open store, no matter which one it was.

Sugar’n’Spice was always warm and it always smelled good. Mara Trudine burned a different scented candle every day the shop was open. Today the candle was cinnamon and cloves. The whole place smelled like cider.

Mrs. Gold entered as quietly as she could. She hadn’t been in the store since before Christmas. And she had never walked through that door without strutting proudly, loudly announcing her intentions to buy whatever lingerie it would take to drive Mr. Gold wild.

Was Mr. Gold even capable of going wild for her anymore? Or did the sight of her just turn his stomach? He thought she was trash, she disgusted him, he didn’t want her and he never would again.

Ducking behind a rack of silky robes, Mrs. Gold took a breath to calm herself down. It was a bad habit she’d developed lately, thinking of the worst-case scenario just to make herself feel something. Her mind kept poking and prodding at her pain, pulling out her darkest fears and putting them front and center. She could push it away if she concentrated. If she tried to act normal, she could almost feel normal. Sometimes.

“Oh hey.” Mara had spotted her from the sales counter in the back of the shop. “Mrs. Gold, I didn’t see you come in.”

Steeling herself, Mrs. Gold walked out from behind the robes. “That’s me.” She tried to smile.

Mara stayed where she was. Bits of fabric were spread out over the counter. It looked like she was sewing something.

Mrs. Gold’s heart skipped a beat. The fabric was a shiny yellow-gold. Sometimes, when Mr. Gold was really pleased with her, he liked her to wear that color. Without thinking about what she was doing, she began to walk towards the counter.

“What are you working on?”

Mara looked up from her needle. Even after all these years, she had the same face she’d had as a kid--sharp brown eyes, adorably crooked smile, freckles all over her round cheeks. She looked so innocent. You’d never think she made a living off of unmentionables.

“Custom order,” she said proudly. “I’ve been trying to get tailor-made lingerie off the ground for as long as I can remember. Got my first order in October and more have been coming in.” She held up the fabric and Mrs. Gold saw a pair of panties that would go up to a person’s rib cage.

“Somebody wants that?”

Mara’s excitement dimmed in the face of Mrs. Gold’s skepticism, but she did her best to explain. “It’s shapewear,” she said. “See the reinforced panels? The idea is to smooth out tummy rolls and make a more flattering silhouette.”

Mrs. Gold looked over at the rack of Spanx. “Don’t you already sell that?”

“Yeah, but the stuff I make is sturdier than the mass-produced product. Better for people with non-standard bodies. And prettier too. Nothing over there comes in straw yellow.”

It was true. Most of the stuff in that section was nude or black. Mrs. Gold knew a thing or two about wearing corsets, but she had never actually needed one. She had thought Mr. Gold liked her to be skinny.

“That is a pretty color,” she said. “Who’s it for?”

Mara looked at her dubiously. “I can’t talk about a client, it’s confidential.”

“How are you planning on getting more orders without word of mouth?”

“Well, normally word of mouth comes from customers talking about the product, not a creator talking about their customers.”

Falling into old habits, Mrs. Gold tilted her head back as her voice went up an octave. “I know, but it’s just such a pretty shade of gold, I was wondering if someone special might have ordered it...?”

She let the question hang. Mara just frowned and shook her head.

“Come on, you’re smarter than that.” She held up the garment again. “This is for a plus-sized woman. Two of you could fit in here without straining the elastic. Mr. Gold didn’t order this for you.”

Without thinking, she leaned over the counter and got in her friend’s face. “Did he order it for someone else?”

Mara’s eyes went wide. Her mouth transformed into a tiny little O of surprise. Mrs. Gold pulled away and kept her eyes on the ground.

“I’m sorry,” Mrs. Gold said. “That was out of line.”

“Wow,” Mara said softly. “I, uh, I’d heard that something had happened. But I didn’t know it was that bad. I’m sorry.”

“Yeah, me too.” She turned around, pretended to look at something lacy until the urge to scream had passed. When she glanced at Mara, her brown eyes were trained on her.

“It’s not from him,” she said simply. “I’ll even tell you that my client paid with a credit card, so it was definitely her own money.”

Or maybe Mr. Gold was just covering his tracks. But at least he hadn’t called in the order himself. At least he wasn’t flaunting his disregard for her.

“Does he… Have you ever heard from him? Is he buying anybody lingerie?”

Mara shook her head. “I only see him on Rent Day.”

With nothing left to lose, she asked her old friend the same question she’d asked her ex-boyfriend. “Do you know anybody named Belle?”

Mara blinked. “I don’t… think so. The name sounds familiar, but I’m probably thinking of a character from a book or a movie. It’s not the sort of name you hear around Storybrooke.”

“No,” Mrs. Gold agreed.

“But I’ll keep my ears open, if you want.”

Mrs. Gold raised her eyebrows. “What about client confidentiality?”

“Well, whoever Belle is, she’s definitely not a client. And until Mr. Gold pays me himself, neither is he.”

You’re a good friend.

This time, Mrs. Gold didn’t swat at the thought that intruded into her head. She let it rest over her brain like a blanket. She let the thought warm her up.

She leaned against the counter and watched Mara work. The shapewear was fully constructed, and she was embroidering stalks of straw in a pattern along the sides. It was really pretty. The sort of thing that would give a girl a boost in confidence and excitement about her own body, her own clothes. Mrs. Gold remembered how fancy she’d felt the first time she wore something as simple as a bra and panties that were the same color. That sort of energy could get people through interviews or contract negotiations, any time you needed to feel powerful. Mara was helping people here, she was good at it, and it seemed to make her happy.

“So, business is good?”

“Yeah, it’s picking up. Valentine’s Day was a madhouse, but you know how that goes.”

Mrs. Gold nodded. Lingerie could be as popular as flowers when it came to last-minute gifts that men always thought would be cheaper than they were.

“Did you spend the day with anyone?”

Mara scrunched her nose. “I’m working too hard for that. Besides, I don’t meet a lot of single men in this business.”

She was able to snicker at the joke, and she was able to mean it. “Yeah, I guess not.”

They were quiet together for a minute, then Mrs. Gold asked a more personal question: “How’s your mom?”

Mara looked up from her embroidery for a second, but then went back to work. “She’s fine. I think she’s bored, now that the preschool is only open for half-days. She keeps asking me to move in with her.”

“I take it you don’t want to?”

A halfhearted shrug. “I don’t have a good reason not to. It would make sense, we could split the bills and keep each other company. But there is also something really nice about living by yourself. Even if it’s just a one bedroom apartment on top of your store.”

“I wouldn’t know.” Mrs. Gold drummed her fingers against the counter. She had gone from living with her father to living with Mr. Gold. The night after their anniversary had been the first time she had slept in any building by herself.

But she understood what Mara meant. When you lived with your parents, it was hard to feel like an adult. To make matters worse, Irma Trudine--Mara’s mother--had been a preschool teacher for as long as anyone could remember. She tended to treat everyone she talked to like they were a four-year-old whining for more juice and crackers.

Mama’s closest friend.

Now the voice was annoying her again. It was true that Irma and Mom had been good friends. That was why she had grown up with Mara as much as she had grown up with her cousin Janine. The three girls were inseparable, just like their mothers had been.

Until…

Mrs. Gold sighed. She was warmer now. She should probably buy something before she moved along.

“Do you have anything comfy around here?”

“What, like no underwire?”

“No, like pajamas, I guess. Or loungewear? I think I need to get a pair of sweatpants.”

Mara grinned. “The last time I saw you wear sweatpants, they had dinosaurs on them.”

“And they were fucking awesome.”

She had gotten those pants for her eighth birthday and worn them until the knees gave out. Even after that, Mom had cut them up for shorts and she’d worn them for another six months. If she could find sweatpants that had dinosaurs on them now, she wouldn’t think the mere act of wearing sweatpants was a sign of the end of her life.

But Sugar’n’Spice only had pajama sets with flowers on them--or hearts, but Mrs. Gold couldn’t bring herself to buy anything that looked like love. It was enough to buy comfort, something that would make it a little easier to be in her own skin.

Mara rang her up and gracefully accepted the extra fifty Mrs. Gold handed her.

“How about I call this a down payment on a custom order for you?”

Taking her bag, Mrs. Gold shrugged. “I don’t think Mr. Gold will want me in lingerie for a long time.”

“I didn’t say it was for Mr. Gold, I said it was for you.” Mara looked her steadily in the eye. “Come back some time and we can talk about what you need. Okay?”

She opened her mouth, and then closed it. “Yeah,” she said at last. “Yeah, that sounds good.”

“Good.”

****

The day wasn’t over. Mr. Gold was still in his shop. She could go there for a few hours of awkward silence. Or she could go back to the house, for a few hours of lonely silence. Then he would come home and make dinner. They would eat together and make stilted small talk. And then she would go to her bedroom, and he would go to his.

That was their life now.

He said he wanted her to stay. He said he wanted to take care of her. He said he loved somebody else.

It didn’t make sense. It was wrong. They were supposed to be together. Being near him, but not being with him, trying to act like everything was fine, trying to act like he didn’t matter to her as much as she obviously didn’t matter to him…

It was tearing her apart.

So she walked. Like a circling shark, she kept moving so she wouldn’t drown. She was trapped. Storybrooke was a small town, there were only so many places you could go in one day. And she had lots of days ahead of her. Mrs. Gold had the image of the rest of her life, stretching out to the horizon. She would have to keep walking, she would never be able to rest. She would never have a home again.

She was in Old Town now. The flower shop was behind her. Aunt Teri’s yellow and purple house was on this street. How many times had she walked the route between those two places? Her whole childhood, her whole life until she married Mr. Gold and moved into his house. She used to belong in this neighborhood.

Was there a way she could belong here again?

Turning at the plastic sign that said Hair Today! she went to the side door of the yellow house and knocked. Then she stepped away from the door and waited for an answer. She held herself against the cold.

Janine came up from the basement salon. Her mouth opened when she saw Mrs. Gold.

“Oh hi,” she said. “Mrs. Gold, you don’t… usually knock.”

“Yeah, I’m usually a bitch to you and I’m sorry.” She hadn’t meant to start that way, but she couldn’t avoid the truth anymore.

Janine’s eyebrows raised and her sky-blue eyes--a family trait--went wide. “O...kay,” she said slowly. Stepping outside, she shut the door behind her. The cold made her keep her arms crossed over her chest. “What’s going on?”

“I…” She didn’t know what to say. She had started, but what was the next step? “Things suck, right now, for me. And I kind of suck too. And I realized…”

What had she realized? That no one in her family would help her in an emergency? That she had built her whole identity around one relationship and without that she had nothing? That she had spent years intentionally, maliciously, pushing away all the people that had loved her in exchange for a man who only paid her? That all of those things were really fucking shitty? None of that was a realization. Mrs. Gold had always known what her life was. But she was just now starting to care.

“I realized I’m sorry,” she said. “For as long as I’ve been with Mr. Gold, I’ve been so caught up in him and it made me a worse person. And I want to be better.” She looked at Janine. “You deserve a better cousin.”

Janine sighed, her breath visible in the twilight. “So the honeymoon is finally over, huh? Are you tired of him or is he tired of you?”

Mrs. Gold pressed her lips together. Of course it wouldn’t be that easy. At the same time, she didn’t begrudge her cousin the snark.

“He’s tired of me,” she admitted softly. “And I’m kind of tired of me too.”

Now Janine looked more sympathetic. “What happened?”

“You didn’t hear? I thought everyone in Storybrooke knew by now.”

“Yeah, no, I’ve heard a lot of rumors. But I’m asking you what happened. What’s the truth?”

“He loves someone else.” The words slipped from her mouth like a burden off her shoulders. “Some Belle person. And like, like he loves her, Janine. More than he ever loved me.”

“Oof,” Janine let out a long breath. “Oh honey, that’s terrible. I’m sorry.”

Until now, Janine had been standing in the doorway, and Mrs. Gold had been in the driveway, with about five feet between them. Janine stepped out first, one arm open in invitation. The two cousins met in the middle. They didn’t hug, exactly, but they huddled together for warmth and comfort.

“Do you need to stay with us?” Janine asked. “We never did anything with Andrew’s room after--”

“No,” she shook her head. Mr. Gold asked her to stay with him, and even that had to be better than sleeping in her dead cousin’s bedroom. “I’m fine, I… He’s taking care of me.”

“What, like alimony?”

“No, we’re not… I’m not leaving him.”

Janine pulled away. “But you said he loved someone else.”

She nodded. “He does, but he doesn’t want the marriage to be over.”

There was a moment of silence while Janine’s face twisted in anger and disbelief. Then she burst out: “Oh screw him! Does he really get to decide that? That man is cheating on you and you don’t even get the satisfaction of walking away? Come on!”

Mrs. Gold couldn’t look her in the face. “It’s not as simple as that,” she said. “I--I married him, I need him, I…” The next words were small and soft: “I don’t want the marriage to be over either.”

Closing her eyes, Janine pressed the heel of her palm to her forehead. “I don’t know what to say,” she said. “I mean, the sanctity of marriage is great and all, but Mr. Gold has been nothing but bad to you for so long. And now you have a reason to get out, but you’re not taking it? Why?”

“Because this is different,” she said the words before she knew what they meant. “He’s different than he was when we got married. There’s something… good about him now. Something kind and gentle. Something that wasn’t there before.”

Janine rolled her eyes. “So now you have feelings for the monster?”

“He’s not a monster now. Maybe he was before--I can see that more clearly now. But now the only thing he’s doing wrong is… not wanting me. And it hurts, but it’s not an evil thing.”

He’s my husband and I love him. Can you understand that?

Shifting her weight back and forth, Janine kept her arms over her chest. “And he’s not… hurting you anymore?”

She shook her head. “Not even in a way I like.”

“Gross,” Janine said, matter-of-factly. “I mean, good for you that it used to be something you liked, but it is very gross for me to think about. Too much information is a very real thing.”

Both of them snickered at that. The years of lingering tension eased a little more.

“Can you at least stay for dinner? We’re having Spaghetti-Os a la Chloe.”

“Chloe’s cooking?” How old was she now?

“It was her idea. Under careful supervision, she is going to dump a can of Spaghetti-Os into a pot and warm it up. Mom might even let her into the spice cabinet for some basil.”

“Oh, that sounds like fun.” She shuffled her feet. “But I should get going. I still eat with Mr. Gold. It’s… weird.”

“I bet.” Janine put her hands in the pockets of her work smock. “Listen, I… I’m sorry. All this time… I could have been a better cousin too. We--I think the general idea was that… we were waiting for you to meet us halfway.”

“I get that,” she said. “And I never came close to halfway. Not with anybody.”

“Well, you did today. And I’m glad. We missed you.”

Nodding, she tried to keep the tears out of her eyes. All this time, she could have had her family. If she had just eased up on being Mrs. Gold, she could have been the same girl everyone had loved.

“I’m trying to make things better now, you know?”

Janine nodded. “I know.” They were quiet for a minute, then she asked. “Have you talked to your dad lately?”

“Not yet,” she shook her head. “Not him or Uncle Manny. I… I kinda thought I’d start easy.”

Janine half-smiled, half-winced. “Manny will be happy to see you. You’re the only niece he’s got.”

She snorted. “I’m the only daughter my dad has and that didn’t make anything any easier.”

“He loves you, Lacey,” Janine said. It was the first time Mrs. Gold had heard her first name in as long as she could remember. “We all do.”

[itsclydebitches]

RWBY Recaps: Volume 6. Argus Limited

This is a re-posting from Oct. 27th, 2018 in an effort to get all my recaps fully on tumblr. Thanks!

Volume Six is here, folks! I am so very, stupidly excited for this season. Heartfelt thanks go out to my friend who was all, “lol yeah sure” when I begged to use their FIRST account to watch. There are heroes in this world and they’re one of them.

A quick note about recaps from here on out: they will (my productivity willing) be uploaded sometime on Thursday or Friday proceeding the new episode. This is partly so that I’m not scrambling to post immediately afterwards—stress and bad writing all around—and partly so that, you know, we can actually recap stuff before the next episode airs. So yeah, that’s the goal.

Let’s do it!

We open on a gorgeous, snowy scene with ROOSTER TEETH PRESENTS smack dab in the middle. You know that feeling you get when you hear the Harry Potter theme at the beginning of a new film and the whole theater loses their shit? Same with Doctor Who and Star Wars? Whatever your preferred fandom, the point is I get the same chills when RWBY comes back and it’s excellent.

The animation really is gorgeous though and I sigh happily whenever I see it, thinking back to the days when cookies disappeared directly into Ruby’s mouth. There’s nostalgia, sure, but it doesn’t beat this detail.

We hear the distant sound of a train and then we’re thrown into exactly what we’ve wanted for literal years now: Team RWBY back together again, fighting not creepy adults but just some good, old fashioned grimm. They’re chimeras and… griffins? Ngl I’m not entirely sure, but they’re big, flying, fire-breathing nasties, so that’s really all we need to know. Luckily everyone falls back into old habits, easily supporting one another and executing perfect attacks (a contrast to the residual tension we’ll see in just a bit). Ruby is so busy posing after a successful kill that she misses the grimm coming at her from behind. Weiss saves her ass with a cheeky, “Thank me later!” At the end of the fight we get a reversal wherein a hit nearly sends Weiss tumbling off the side of the train, though Ruby grabs her at the last second with her own, “Thank me later!” It’s a fun little exchange made better when we think back to the Vytal Tournament. Weiss still “had her back” then too, but was more resistant to Ruby’s proclamation that they’re BFFs. Now the teasing is on both ends.

Notably, Ruby saves Weiss by taking her into her semblance, creating a cloud of rose petals that are half red, half white. Now combined with the old team-ups and some shots in the new opening, this has led a number of fans (myself included) to wonder if a WhiteRose pairing is in our future. Which also means that the ship wars are in full swing. Needless to say I’m not about that nonsense and I’ll only point out here what I said episodes back: if it’s a queer relationship with one of our main girls, and not a random side character who was previously out to murder a whole family? I’m on board.

Back in the fight though. The rest of team RNJR appears with Nora exclaiming, “Why is it always something?” God that’s a mood. Welcome to adulthood, kid. It’s just one crisis after another—except in your case the crises are objectively more dangerous. Sorry about that. We get to see Jaune’s improved reflexes as he fends off all the fireballs with his shield while Ren and Nora team up to knock some of the monsters out.

Honestly, I love this trope in action stories. Where—as Nora does here—a character just shouts out a friend’s name to get their attention and they immediately know what kind of move they’re about to pull off. It’s made more hilarious to me given that RWBY once had attack names and Jaune at least made the attempt with JNPR...but apparently they're not needed anymore. So unrealistic, yet so very cool when used.

So yeah, things are going pretty smoothly… up until Oscar yells out “Tunnel!” Ruby saves Weiss from falling, they manage to get over or between the cars, and in the sudden darkness we transition to what we only realize later is a flashback. At least, I didn’t realize it until later. Totally thought we’d had a time skip and they were just hopping another train…

My stupidity aside, before we hit the train station we actually see a familiar hallway filled with angry voices discussing the disaster at Haven—one of which is Adam’s. I really enjoyed this technique, wherein we slowly pan across the room as the voices grow more frantic and the sounds of fighting break out, the camera revealing bodies scattered across the floor. By the time we reach the throne—and Adam on it— we realize that the fight occurred prior to this moment, something that Adam is now remembering. He goes all skyward scream on us as he howls menacingly. Okay, dude. Compared to Cinder and Salem you’re really not all that.

Now we’re at the train station where Qrow is narrating a letter to Ironwood. Hell yes, please bring back the badass, protective Ironwood who defended the students at Beacon and stood up for Weiss. I’d be very pleased if he joins the RWBY gang by the Volume’s end. Qrow’s optimistic about the trip—they’ve plans to reach Ironwood before the letter does, which says either good things about Remnant’s transportation or bad things about its mail—though of course we as the audience know it’s not going to be nearly that simple. We learn that only two weeks have passed since the battle, but people are still reeling from all the implications. Lionheart tragically lost his life defending the school and oh, some students coincidentally were there and did some stuff. Excellent choice in showing us the mindless crowds while we hear this, the naive masses who, yes, would absolutely believe a story like this.

It’s easy to criticize no one supposedly noticing Salem, magic, the finger Ozpin has in every pie, etc. but ultimately people believe what they’re told—especially when it’s much easier to swallow than the truth.

Enough of the doom and gloom though. Ruby is having the time of her life.

Qrow: “What’s with the running?”

Ruby: ���What’s with the standing?!”

I love this girl so very much and it’s wonderful when we get to see her acting like the kid she is. She uses her semblance with abandon because yeah, if I could turn into rose petals I’d be doing that all the time too. Ruby teases Yang with something from the gift shop and I really hope we get to see what that is. Yes, we end the episode with everyone left stranded in the wilderness, but if Yang’s bike can survive then so can Ruby’s souvenirs.

(Seriously though they presumably lost all their luggage that sucks.)

Everyone else is in top, feel-good form too. Nora daydreams about hitting the beach, complete with a thought bubble of topless Ren and a beachball. Weiss quips about how she spent all last Volume getting out of Atlas, thanks, but Ruby reassures her that at least she’s back with the team now. When two jokers arrive boasting about how they’ll be the ones keeping the train safe from grimm, Ruby and Yang act exactly as nieces should when your cool uncle is telling them off. AKA, making fun of them behind his back.

God they must have been terrors as toddlers. I mean we already know Yang carted Ruby off into the woods one day so yeah, I’m pretty confident in expressing my surprise that Tai doesn’t have a full head of gray hair.

The two Nice Guys go on to specify that they’ll provide extra protection for a “generous tip,” which—while essentially a throwaway line—reminds us how most of the world functions outside of our close-knit cast. Money, and more specifically Schnee money, quite literally dictates who lives and who dies. Not everything about RWBY is fantasy oriented…

We learn that everyone is just waiting on Blake— “as usual”—and we cut to her with Ilia as the two of them say their goodbyes. Ilia will be helping Ghira lead the Faunus in a “new movement” and is supposedly 100% on the straight and narrow now. Cool? I guess? To be honest I’m fine with her taking a back seat for this Volume. There’s a moment where we get a shot of Ilia and Blake’s feet, the former’s angled forward in a classic kiss pose, and I was super glad to see that they were just sharing a hug. I really don’t want the first LGBTQIA kiss on RWBY to be iffy on consent, considering that Ilia knows Blake isn’t interested. Hug though? That was super sweet.

Sun and Neptune show up to say their goodbyes too. They’re heading to Vacuo to meet up with the rest of their team because, in Sun’s words, he’s the “worst leader” ever. You kinda are, dude? I loved Sun up until they had him following Blake without her permission and continuing to do so after she asked for space, all in the name of the guy supposedly knowing what the girl really needs. The reminder that Sun abandoned his team to do this just reinforces how much I dislike that plot-line.

Sun gets the kiss—on the cheek—and after leaving Neptune lectures him on “letting [Blake] go.” Except it’s not about you? Blake is off to quite literally save the world and the fact that these guys view that as a threat to any potential relationship is… icky. Ugh. Oh well. They’re presumably gonna be offscreen for a while.

The train finally arrives and everyone piles in. We’re back to bunk beds! And of course Team RWBY is situated exactly as they were in Beacon’s dorms. Weiss gets annoyed with Ruby’s cloak hanging down over the side. Blake has a book in her lap. Ruby challenges Yang to a video game. Cue nostalgia. I fully expect fluffy AU fics where they ride the train all the way to Atlas and treat the trip as one giant, dramatic sleepover. This is non-negotiable.

Tension seeps back in though when Yang moves to pull her luggage from the rack and Blake immediately hops up to help her. In a super guilty “I know I fucked up and now I’m gonna smother you” way. Really excellent voice acting here. Yang ends up reassuring her. No, things aren’t perfect between them yet… but they’re definitely improving.

While short, for me this scene was perfectly balanced between acknowledging the girls’ complicated relationship without totally undermining the happy mood. Nicely done.

Then Qrow shows up with a drink. A drink with a slice of orange on the side. I have never enjoyed a moment more and I was so surprised I didn't take a screenshot of it. Clearly I was too distracted and am I too lazy to go back for one now? You betcha. The point is everything is fine, dandy, and filled with alcohol.

So of course RT goes and ruins it for me. Something hits the train and in a split second everyone is on high alert. A quick peek out the window reveals grimm and Blake mutters darkly that it’s “just my luck.”

Qrow: “Not yours.”

Are they gonna leave the safety of the train to those bozos from before? Hell no. Especially when one guy is grabbed right when the fight starts. I mean, poor dude, but he also kinda sucked as a Huntsmen. He wouldn’t have even made it past Beacon’s initiation, let alone graduated.

…I guess he’s kind of like early Jaune? Useless, wannabe hero who acts more confident than he actually is? Aw, now I really do feel bad.

He’s grimm food though. Gotta move on with our lives.

The other dude isn’t doing too well either, though RWBY and NJR + Oscar quickly show up, coming full circle to where we began the episode. Oscar insists that he’s got this fight under control which tells me (hopefully) that in the past two weeks they’ve had serious conversations about if and when Ozpin gets to have control. That’s super great, though I do wish we could have seen it. Flashbacks, maybe?

As the fight begins Ruby announces that the plan amounts to “don’t let anyone else die.” Uh...Ruby? Buddy. Pal. This is why people die. Because they didn’t have plans! Pyrrha—god rest her reckless soul—went off after a freaking Maiden by herself. Jaune got Amber killed because he didn’t obey the plan of watching the door. Lionheart frantically calls Salem with no real plan for what he’s going to offer her in exchange for his life! Plans are important, Ruby. You’re the team strategist. It was a badass line, I grant you, but please do not.

Luckily, no one (else) dies. That would have been pretty brutal for a premier. +1 point for world building where we see that trains like this have built in defenses to fight off grimm. -2 points for how useless it ends up being. As Qrow quickly points out, the turrets are drawing all the grimm to the front of the train where the passengers are. So, not good. Oscar is charged with telling the surviving goon to knock it off already while Qrow faces off against the super fierce chimera grimm. Not gonna lie though, when its tail first started up I thought Qrow was getting attacked by a dove…

This time when we hit the tunnel everyone makes it back safely inside with the exception of Goon #2 who gets his arm injured in the scramble. He’s literally crying on the ground when, in a pretty harsh move, Qrow drags him up and demands to know what the hell all that was. Civility and benefit of the doubt? Not Qrow’s strong points. It allows Ruby to take control of the situation though. How do you make sure that your cast of kids is continually calling the shots?  A) isolate them and B) when you can’t do that have the adults act like children instead. We see that a fair bit in RWBY.  

Jaune steps in to heal the guy’s arm, which is an unexpected surprise. I honestly thought we'd get a whole Volume’s worth of him figuring out how to access and control his semblance, though I suppose once it manifests you’ve got the basics down. We’ve seen that semblances can be improved upon—Ruby turning other people she carries into petals; Ren dampening the emotions of a whole train—so presumably Jaune will be able to heal more complex and life-threatening things in the future. We also hear in the ensuing conversation that he can amplify someone else’s aura…to be decided what exactly that means, how it connects to healing, and what the limits of the skill is.

During some theorizing about the attack Ozpin brings up that grimm are attracted to the relic they’re carrying and… oh boy. Here we go. Is it tradition that every recap the fandom goes for Ozpin’s throat while I stand here defending him? Might be. Let’s create a (semi) comprehensive list:

This might have been less of a secret and more of a slip. The guy is thousands of years old and the forces they’re dealing with are stupidly complicated. He can’t info dump every detail of a multi-century war in one sitting. So—

He might have thought this was one of those innocuous things that shouldn’t take precedent right now. Not the sort of thing he needs to worry them with. He claims in the promo that he didn't lie to the group and he quite possibly didn't. There's a big difference between lying and not telling someone every single possible thing that might be pertinent. Especially when—

We know that grimm are already attracted to people/negative emotion and they’re sequestered within a whole train full of presumably stressed travelers. There’s no reason to think the artifact would put them in more danger than they already are and therefore isn't at the top of the list of revelations to dole out. Especially with—

Qrow and his bad luck semblance. He literally just implied that the grimm were there because of him. There’s a reason he didn’t want Ruby near him during the fight with Tyrian and now they’re all stuck together in close quarters. The grimm were coming anyway. Even if we didn't have Qrow's semblance and big crowds we can also assume as much because of—

Those turrets. They weren’t there for a fashion statement. The whole train was crazy armored. They’re clearly very used to getting attacked on this route. It's a normal thing.

All of which is to say that the relic is one of MANY reasons why they might have gotten a buttload of grimm on their tail. Ozpin mentions this as one possibility in a very “Here’s something else to consider” way and everyone (characters and fandom alike) jump on him like he’s solely responsible for this predicament. Besides, what would they have done differently? Not carry the relic? That’s not an option. Be more on guard? They’re already constantly on guard. None of their actions would have changed had they known.

Really though, it’s the keeping of secrets that people are mad about, not necessarily what the secret is. So if we ignore the possibility above that Ozpin legit didn’t think this was worth mentioning/even forgot about it, we have a) he withheld the information because it might have made them wary about traveling with others, but they need to get to Atlas as fast as possible and the train is the best way to do that. So yeah, that’s a possible change, though I agree with Ozpin’s theoretical logic here. It was worth the risk.

b) he didn’t tell them because—again—worry is a negative emotion and that might have just doubled their problem. Awful as it is, knowing you're carrying a thing that might attract more grimm is one of the best ways to make sure that you do, in fact, attract them. Knowing what the relic does is dangerous. 

c) he doesn’t trust them with all the information about these super powerful relics that are going to decide the fate of their world. Which honestly? Kind of fair. Yeah, I know he promised them no more secrets, but this is a centuries old, god-like entity making a promise to a child. It’s not even really a matter of trust anymore. We’ve got a core group of nine here and everyone has someone else they’re close to. Ruby isn’t going to keep secrets from Tai. Blake will probably fill Sun in when she sees him again. Weiss is close to her sister. Etc. In short, as soon as this many people know a secret it isn't a secret anymore. Ozpin is no doubt aware that anything he tells to their now massive group is fair game and he has to carefully consider what he wants to risk going public/landing in Salem's hands. A general doesn't tell every lieutenant the details of every plan. That's a good way to lose the war. Fate of the world vs. a promise made to Yang? C’mon. There are priorities here.

d) finally, we’ve seen evidence—particularly after the iconic food fight—that Ozpin desperately wants his students to be kids as long as they can. He might keep information to himself simply because he doesn’t want to burden them. And given all the reasons listed above for why they'd be dealing with grimm anyway, what's the harm in giving them what little peace he can? It's not perfect reasoning and if this is the case the others have a right to be annoyed, but it's understandable. It certainly doesn't make Ozpin the monster I see countless posts painting him as.

Plus, Yang? I’m not sure you have the right to get indignant about keeping secrets right now. Granted, there’s some ambiguity surrounding whether she’s mentioned Raven as the Spring Maiden, but regardless we haven’t seen any evidence that she’s told the group the details of what happened down in the vault. That’s a pretty big thing to be keeping to yourself.

A lot bigger than, “Oh yeah this relic attracts the thing we’re attracting anyway. My bad.”

Why the relic attracts grimm is another question. Because it’s connected to the original brothers? Just because Salem wants it and she seems to be the grimms’ creator? We’ll have to see.

Ruby interrupts everyone’s fury to point out that they have bigger issues at the moment and Ozpin’s expression kind of kills me? He looks so shocked to have anyone standing up for him, even if it’s a defense of practicality instead of his actions. I wonder if this Volume is going to have the team starting to lose a little faith in Ruby. Given the clear divide here (angry Ren, Nora, Weiss, Yang, and Blake on one side; Ruby, Oscar, Ozpin on the other) this might be a major theme moving forward. It would make a lot of sense too given Ruby's past relationship with Ozpin. To Yang he's just her headmaster; to Ruby he's the headmaster that let her into her dream school early. To Blake he's someone who wanted information from her before she was ready to give it; to Ruby he's the adult who gave her advice at the dance and was emotionally open with her about committing more mistakes "than any man, woman, or child." No matter how far she's come, they'll always be a part of Weiss that sees Ozpin as the teacher who didn't give her the leadership position she thought she deserved; to Ruby he's the man that has put a staggering amount of trust in her: by letting her into his school, giving her a team, sending her to Mountain Glenn, etc.

Now, it might be time for Ruby to put her trust in Ozpin.

Fight temporarily averted, they decide to separate the teams… which felt a little forced to me. I mean I get it. As said, giant group. It’s hard to write and keep track of that many, so let’s knock three offstage for a while. Jaune, Ren, and Nora will see the people to safety while Ruby and the rest of the gang eventually catch up. We get a glimpse of Maria—the old lady with awesome glasses—clearly plotting something and then everyone heads back to the roof to finish the fight with the grimm.

Blake has a quick vision of Adam; the last time she separated a train car. Excellent touch there. Ruby tells Ren to use his semblance through the scroll, but we also get a glimpse of their signals getting weaker. Another nice touch considering how important we know the scrolls are throughout the RWBY universe: how the team keeps in contact during the Volume Four short, the damage that the fall of the CCT tower has caused, etc.

We get a final, epic showdown with a massive grimm where everyone’s teamwork proves to be some top tier stuff. Blake and Yang capture it using Blake’s ribbon. Weiss freezes off its wings. Then—in a fantastic split screen—Ruby and Qrow both use their scythes to cut the creature in two. I’m here for the power family moves.

Only problem is that a final fireball from the grimm hits the train, derailing their section. Weiss keeps them all from dying an awful death, but now they’re kind of stranded.

I mean, they already were stranded before, but I guess the hope was the back of the train would have carried them farther down the tracks before losing momentum?

In the final scene we have an unexpected voice happily proclaiming that they’re still alive but boy, that was a close one! Maria hobbles out, having clearly planned to be with this group when they went their own way.

My personal theory? She knows (and to some extent recognizes) Ozpin. I can’t believe he wasn’t involved in a conflict like the Great War. Hell, he was probably at the center of it and Maria looks very old by RWBY standards. We have no concept of how long people in this world can live so I don’t think it’s a stretch to put her in her 90s or well over 100—old enough to have fought in the War and potentially recognize one of the central figures, even in a new reincarnation depending on her instincts, knowledge, and semblance. Her name lends a bit of credence to her age, if nothing else. As far as I know “Maria” doesn’t mean/isn’t evocative of a color… though I’m far from an expert. Could totally be wrong about that.

Regardless, we’ll see. More info arrives next week!

Other Details of Note

The grimm are at a distance when we first spot them and they actually look a lot like crows. The same motif we’ve seen with Raven and Qrow’s entrances but, you know, bad.

I really liked Qrow’s line to Ironwood about how they’re bringing “more than bad news.” It’s appropriately vague—can’t go admitting that Oz is back with the group—and at the same time quite up-lifting.

I personally take Ozpin’s “I hope they’re not from Beacon” as more of a joke than a true worry. If you’re telling me that this old as balls control freak doesn’t remember every student that’s ever passed through those doors… I don’t believe you.

When Blake is saying goodbye to Ilia and Sun we have lots of animation for her ears, helping to express her emotions. It says a lot about her character development that she hasn’t re-adopted the bow in such a crowded, human packed space.

Neptune is pursuing the “wrong tree” okay lol that was good.

When Neptune and Sun discuss re-uniting the team we briefly hear the soundtrack from their Vytal Festival match. Excellent.

Interestingly, Oscar gives Ozpin control immediately during the conversation about the relic, almost like he already knew what was going to be revealed and understood that it was important… I wonder how much they’re sharing thoughts now, two weeks later.

Here, have a beach Ren and happy birb. Yes, I went back for the screenshots...

[theoreticallyawriter]

Chapter 16: Couldn’t Be More Different

Read on AO3

September 27th Year 499,

Today is Mark’s birthday, he’s twenty-six today and in the past, when we could, my family had tried to celebrate birthdays together. It’s not like it’s something that people question, even though ‘faction before blood’ exists it’s not like there aren’t other families like mine. This is the first time I haven’t been there, and even though there’s nothing that I can do about it I still feel bad.

I miss my family so much and a very miniscule part of me just wants to go home and be with them, and my friends, and for things to go back to the way they were. And I know - I know that that can’t happen, I can never go back and things will never be the same again but everything here is terrifying and I would give anything to just go home and have some kind of reprieve from it all. But I’ve made my choice and now my only other one is factionlessness; and it’s not that I’m unhappy, I like it here well enough. I just want something familiar. I wonder if this was how the others - Mark, Minerva, Gwendolyn, and Maureen - felt after they first transferred. I know that Dauntless is different, but any kind of change is huge.

I’ve seen Amity before, spent time up there without my parents and I know all the ways that it’s different from Erudite. But it’s familiar to me in a way, like another home. My extended family was always more than welcoming to me and my friends. When my great-aunt Sophie was alive she just adored us and when my family would go up to spend time with her and her children she would always ask when I would bring my lovely little friends around again. She was a very happy, very friendly woman but also always kind of lonely. Her husband died long before I was born and so did most of her siblings and their spouses. I only got to know my great-uncle Dexter, but that was almost twelve years ago and I barely remember him. My mother’s parents both died before I could know them well; my grandpa - Leon - when I was two and my grandmother - Ruby - when I was six. My father’s parents stuck around a little longer, long enough for them to know me as a child, but I can’t remember them; all I know of them is from pictures, Minerva looks a lot like my grandma Carmilla with her long, curly, not-quite-brown-but-not-blonde-either hair and broad shoulders.

I’ve always wondered if Casey’s choice was at all influenced by all the time she spent around Amity through me. My mother’s Amity-born and raised cousins came to visit her just as much as she went to see them and they’ve always been the aunts and uncles I never had. It was nice, after my brother transferred I saw even more of them and I think they quietly always expected another one of us to transfer. I wonder if Marilyn, my mom’s cousin’s daughter who I’ve always been super close to, talks to Casey at all. On the few occasions I took her and Eliza up with me, or Marilyn came to Erudite, they seemed to get along pretty well. Marilyn is gentle, and kind, and good like Casey is.

I really hope that Casey’s doing alright. I miss her just as much as I miss my family and I want to see her again so badly. It’s not like I didn’t see her leaving coming – I didn’t see my leaving coming – and I was prepared to say goodbye. Hell, I did say goodbye when I met up with her in the Commons after the Aptitude Test. We had our last little group moment before everything changed forever and I couldn’t ask for anything else. I couldn’t have asked for better friends in general and I feel so lucky to have gotten to be a part of their lives, I just wish that we’d had more time together. I’ll always miss her I think, all of them, just like I’ll always miss my family because those ties are so deep and we’re so close. Or at least we were.

And I know that I’m supposed to move on, that I will move on, that we’ll all move on because that’s just what time does; but I don’t want to let go and I certainly don’t want to forget. The friends I’ve made here are great, but I just don’t think they’ll ever replace what Kira, Casey, and Eliza were to me.

We’ll have longer together, time to bond and time to grow even closer. We have our whole lives ahead of us and I have every confidence that we’ll always be together; we’ll grow up, and learn to be Dauntless, and wonder why we ever worried. Or at least that’s the dream, that’s the way I’ve always been told things are supposed to be. Everyone belongs somewhere, everyone finds something in their faction, everyone finds themselves in their faction. But I can’t seem to figure out what I’ve found, where I belong; I know that I should be patient, that things will fall into place all in due time as they always do. But I really don’t believe in fate and I hate the idea of just letting life slip through my fingers without a care. That’s probably not what people mean when they say things like that everything will eventually fall into place, but that’s what it sounds like and it irks me to an almost comical degree. I just feel like I have to take control of my life and be who I want to be; not what I think I am, or what’s the easiest thing to be, but the sort of person I want to be and how I want to live my life.

But I don’t know. I’d always imagined myself in Erudite, that seemed like where I was bound to choose, and that had made me so happy up until very recently. My test changed everything; I had a vision before, it was vague and it never quite felt as right as people say choosing where you truly belong feels, but now I’m questioning if I belong anywhere at all.

I didn’t feel like I could be happy in Erudite, so I left; but now I’m teetering just on the edge of miserable here in Dauntless. My only other option would have been Amity and while I might not have gone through the sort of trials that Dauntless and Erudite use to vet their initiates, I can’t imagine it ever being anything close to easy. If my friendship with Will has taught me anything, it’s that I really cannot resist being just a little mean to my friends, even though it’s all in good fun. And on top of that, I have no patience for people like Four and Peter; I tolerate Eric because his approval may help me further down the line, but I detest him and have never hesitated to talk about it with my friends. I’m not Casey, or Mark, or Marilyn; I’m not especially gentle or kind, I’m polite and I care about other people but I just don’t have it in me to just grin and bear the nth degree of complete bullshit like the Amity do. Aside from Abnegation, no other faction has hard rules against telling people to fuck off if they’re annoying you and I certainly enjoy that. I just can’t deal like they can. Mark – I swear on my life – can and does smile through anything and everything to the point where it actually kind of stops being friendly and circles right back around to unnerving. He’s always kind of been like that, diplomatic and patient even when he doesn’t have to be. I’ll bet that serves him really well as a faction representative, but I could never be like that.

I don’t even think I want to. I want to be kind, but I’m no doormat and I wouldn’t have it any other way. Divergence aside, I actually like the way that I am. I don’t have to be defined by it either; if I don’t tell anyone, if I just live my life honestly, I’m bound to do things that will define the sort of person that I am a lot more than a word and a few percentages ever could.

“Hey, Mimi.” My train of thought is broken by Christina, who’s leaning against my bunk.

I snap my journal shut and look up at her with near fear in my eyes. People aren’t usually in the dorms until it’s near lights out. I’d been with my friends in the Pit up until a few hours ago. This isn’t the first time someone’s seen me write in my journal, but it’s always been something that I’d been doing when they walked in. Christina is my friend, but I very obviously brought this journal from Erudite and I don’t know what she makes of that.

“Yeah?” I fidget sort of nervously with the end of my braid.

“I was just going to ask if you wanted to come with us to get dessert. One of the, uh, the Dauntless-born offered to show us one of the better cafés in the compound. They’re supposed to serve really good dessert.

“Sure thing.” I smile, but pause when I realize that I can’t put my journal back without her seeing where I hide it. “I’ll catch up with you in just a moment, okay.”

She gives me a confused look and then shrugs. “Sure. Guess I should have figured you’d want to put your book back wherever you hide it.”

“Uh, what?”

She gives me an amused look. “Candor, remember? And it doesn’t take a genius to figure out that you brought that book from Erudite. Not that it matters to me very much.” She adds on the last part when she notices the alarm on my face. She strolls out of the room and I shove my journal back under the mattress, then catch up with her.

“So what do you write about, If you don’t mind me asking,” she says.

“It’s just a diary. Um, it’s kind of a habit I’ve had for a few years now and it feels weird when I don’t keep it up.”

She nods. “Cool. You know, I never thought of you as the sort of person to keep a diary.”

“My mother got my first one for me when I was twelve, she wanted to see if it would help me let out my emotions.” I shrug. “I guess it works.”

“So what’s that like anyways, being a faction leader’s daughter?”

“I mean, as amazing as she is, I don’t really think of my mom like other people do. I mean yeah, she’s this incredible figure with all this power and influence and it’s really amazing all that she’s managed to amount to, but like she’s still my mom. We’re close and we care about each other.”

She nods. “My mom’s a lawyer, so I guess I can kind of relate. I mean she’s not really on the level that your mom is, but I know what it’s like to look up to your parents.” She chuckles half-heartedly. “Though I guess we’re not really doing much to live up to their legacies, huh?”

That stings a lot more than she knows, I have to fight a grimace as I say, “Yeah. But I’ve never really tried to compare myself to my mom. She was always doing a lot more at my age, so it’s not like I can expect to compare.” I decide to change the subject. “So, are you excited for Visiting Day?”

She shrugs. “More nervous than anything. I know they aren’t really all that happy with the fact that I left and, you know...they’re Candor.” She sighs. “I just don’t want to deal with her and my dad critiquing every single little thing.”

“I know the feeling, believe me.” My parents are snobs, I’ve always known it. They look down on everything that isn’t Erudite, but in their eyes there is something inherently less respectable about Abnegation and Dauntless; something that’s worthy of scorn and mockery. I’m not going to pretend like my siblings aren’t like this, like I’m not the exact same way just with different subjects. I’ve always thought that people like Eric, Four, Peter, even Dahlia, are just kind of worthless. They don’t seem to have any role or purpose other than to antagonize and to hurt, because it brings them some kind of sick enjoyment.

And my family’s views have sort of rubbed off on me; I have no love for Abenagtion certainly. I don’t like everything they do and I don’t really like the faction all that much honestly. As much as I care for Tris, I still can’t help but find Abnegation dull and their council to be overreaching and out of touch.

But that’s neither here nor there.

My parents don’t like Dauntless very much, this I know to be true. They’ve never liked Dauntless and I know that they never wanted me here. I don’t know what Visiting Day will be like; I know that they’ll be there, but I have a hard time thinking that they’ll be entirely pleasant about it.

“I guess we’ll just have to deal with our families and their opinions together.” She smiles at me and I return that.

Out in the Pit the light is different; whiter, duller. Up above, storm clouds gather and rain starts to drizzle on the glass. I pause for a moment, my head tilted back and a small smile on my face.

“What?” Christina says.

I glance at her. “It’s just…pretty.”

It reminds me of Erudite in a way; the natural light that came in through all the windows changed when it would rain. I used to like to sit in the library and just admire the way that the light filtered through the glass dome. Snow too, it was just one of the things that I loved about Erudite. The little things, the things you don’t understand if you aren’t there.

“Come on.” Christina takes my hand and tugs me along, chuckling under her breath. “The others are waiting.”

I follow, but trust her to lead me along as I can’t stop my gaze from going skyward – or skylight-ward rather. Maybe I feel just a little bit ridiculous admiring it as much as I am, but it’s hard to help when it’s just so pretty.

We meet up with Tris, Will, and Al, plus Marlene and her Dauntless-born friends by one of the outcroppings and by that time I’ve managed to stop staring, mostly. Uriah leads the way to this little café on the fourth floor of the Pit; all the lights are dim and colored, and the whole place smells like coffee and smoke. We take up the black sectional couch in the corner of the room. There’s barely enough room for all of this; Marlene is in Uriah’s lap and I’m squeezed in between Christina and Al with barely enough room to move my arms.

“The cake here is great,” Uriah says, “like even better than the dining hall great.”

“How did you find this place?” Will asks.

“My brother spends a lot of time in here, he’s good friends with some of the baristas and stuff.”

“Ay, Uriah!” one of the baristas behind the counter exclaims almost on cue. Uriah grins and gives a friendly little wave.

“‘M I gonna be seeing you here when you’re done with initiation?”

He shrugs. “Dunno.”

“Who’re your friends?” says another barista, this one with the thickest black eyeliner I’ve ever seen.

“Eh, just a couple of transfers who happen to be pretty cool.”

“We’ll be the judge of that,” says the first, grinning.

We go up in small groups to get food, every time someone sits back down it jostles the people around them and when Uriah flops back down after ordering, Al’s coffee splashes onto my lap. I grimace and Al gives me an apologetic look.

“Sorry,” he says.

“It’s fine.” I stand up. “I needed an excuse to get up and go order anyways.”

I order a coffee, very much like the kind in the dining hall it’s not quite as good as the Erudite coffee. But it’s plenty good. I return to the couch, wedging myself next to Christina.

For once, we manage to talk about something that isn’t initiation. The things that we actually like and used to do with our free time before we were confined to the dull group coffins that are the dorm rooms. It’s nice, normal, something that we haven’t really had a lot of over the last month between crazy instructors and crazier activities. Our laughter fills the little café and every so often the baristas will lean over the counter to interject with stories of their own, each one seeming crazier than the last. My sides hurt from laughing so hard and I can’t seem to catch my breath, though the people around me are no better really.

We must hang around there for an hour at least, long enough for all of us to finish our drinks and the ice left in Christina’s blood red iced tea to all melt. Then we leave and the rain outside is coming down even harder. I see a flash of lightning and for just a second I’m enraptured again by the sight and the muffled roar of thunder that follows. Then my hand is in Christina’s again and she’s pulling me along, grinning and laughing at Lynn’s joke that I wasn’t quite listening to.

One of their other friends whose name I don’t know scales the rough and notched stone, spurred on by the cheers of the Dauntless-born and eventually the rest of us too. Literally he just puts his foot in a little notch in the wall where the circuit’s wall becomes slightly flatter and starts to climb. He finds hand and footholds I otherwise would have never noticed and uses just his arms to pull himself up with enough momentum it sends him two feet higher. He reaches the level above us and we let out a rousing cheer, as do a few passersby. He pulls himself up on the guardrail and stands, raising his arms in triumph. Then he tilts forward, his arms spread to either side of him and Christina, Will, Tris, Al, and I gasp but the Dauntless-born don’t seem worried and apparently they were right as he grabs the railing at the last second and swings.

“He does this all the time,” Uriah says. “Trained in it.”

“That’s,” Will sputters as he looks for the right word. “That’s fucking absurd.”

Tris – because of course it’s Tris – flashes him a wild grin, her eyes wide and bright. “Welcome to Dauntless.”

Will raises his eyebrow at her. “You wanna scale that wall?”

“Oh absolutely not,” she says with a laugh. “I’d die and so would you.” She looks up again as the boy flings himself all the way over the railing onto the floor. “But still, it’s incredible.” He disappears for a second and then leans far over the railing, bending at the waist to fold over the bar. He gestures for us to cheer again and we do. Then he curls his fingers like he’s beckoning us up.

Marlene seems to think that too because she turns to Uriah and says, “Boost me up.”

“Oh hell no.” He shakes his head. “I’m not about to be an accessory to your crazy death wish.”

She pouts. “You’re no fun.” She can hardly hold the expression for more than a few seconds before she starts laughing.

“She’s right,” the boy calls down. “Since when are you the boring responsible one, Uriah?”

He scoffs. “That’s low, you two.”

“Well,” Marlene folds her arms, “prove us wrong then.”

He laughs, and shakes his head, and then weaves his fingers together and stoops for Marlene to boost herself up off of him. She wobbles and Lynn reaches out to steady her with a laugh that contradicts the nerves that show on her face.

The other boy hangs off of the railing and offers her his hand. She stretches up to reach him and their fingers just barely manage to grab hold of each other. She uses Uriah’s shoulders as a springboard and he stumbles, Lynn having to steady him this time as Marlene’s lifted into the open air by the other boy.

“Show off,” Lynn calls up to him, rolling her eyes.

He laughs and his grip on Marlene’s hands slackens for a second and she shrieks, but it tightens before she can slip completely and he jerks her up to stand on the outside ledge. She laughs and turns around to grin, gripping the railing and leaning forward. The boy keeps his hands over Marlene’s and Uriah and Lynn’s expressions darken.

“Come on, you two, you’ve had your thrills,” Uriah calls of to them. “Can you come down now?”

Marlene laughs and leans forward yelling, “Catch!” She lets go much to the panic of pretty much everyone.

Uriah scrambles forward and manages to catch her sort of, but it’s more like cushioning her fall than anything else and Lynn helps them both back to their feet with a kind of amused exasperation.

The other boy climbs down without needing to throw himself over and is descent is just as impressive as his ascent. He wipes the bits of stone from his calloused hands as he reaches the ground accompanied by a well-timed clap of thunder. Then we continue our circuit through the Pit, without any more climbing thankfully. We eventually wind up occupying one of the stone tables on the ground floor. My eyes wander back up to the skylight and Marlene just lays herself across the table to look up at it as well. Our conversation winds like a lazy river; initiation, movies, a new bruise, music, instructors, childhoods. I don’t have much in common with any of them, we all barely have anything in common with each other. The Dauntless-born are all friends but they couldn’t be more different from my friends and I. But we find jokes in the shreds of common ground that we share to laugh and joke until dinner when we split to our separate tables. I slouch while I eat, and talk, and my shirt still smells like coffee; I feel like a mess.

I love it utterly.

I sleep in for the hell of it, my eyes cracking open the first time when the other early risers are just dragging themselves out of bed and a second time when Will jostles my shoulder. I’m startled by how close he is to me, fully bent at the waist to avoid hitting his head on his bunk and one hand braced on the frame.

“Up and at ‘em, Mim.”

“Don’t call me that,” I mutter as I roll over and rub my eyes.

“Aw, are you saying I have to be original and come up with my own nickname for you?” He feigns a pout.

“Yes.”

He grabs my hands and helps me pull myself into a sitting position, laughing at the mess of platinum curls that hang around my face.

“Yes, yes, I’m a mess.” I scrape my hair back. “Laugh it up now, but I know what you’re like first thing too, you know.”

He tugs on my hands. “Stop stalling. It’s almost five forty-five. We’re going to miss breakfast if you don’t get ready soon.”

I sigh and drag myself out of bed, crouching to riffle through the laundry basket for something clean before shuffling to the locker room. I’m not the only one struggling to wake up, Christina is practically falling asleep in front of the mirror. I gently bump my shoulder against hers and her head snaps up again.

“Oh! Mimi, you’re up.”

“Turns out Will is good for something, he’s a human alarm clock.”

She chuckles and her head dips again, toothbrush still in her mouth as her eyes dip to half-mast. “Can’t wait for this to be over.” Her mouth is full of toothpaste.

I drag a comb through my hair and try to sort it into something presentable, though in Dauntless I’m learning that presentable counts as anything you can have on with confidence, no accounting for taste required. “Me too. Any ideas what you’ll do?”

She spits into the sink. “My brain physically cannot process career and life plans this early in the morning.”

I duck into a stall to change; yesterday’s black jeans and a wrinkled shirt. When I walk out to glance in the mirror it works better than I would expect it to. Add a little – okay, a lot – of eyeliner and I could see myself walking down the street as an adult member of Dauntless doing…whatever it is that adult Dauntless members do besides jump on trains, get tattoos, and hang around the compound.

“Hey,” Myra comes up to me, startling me and making that cool older Dauntless image crumble, “you look good today.”

“So do you,” I tousle her purposefully sloppily pulled back hair, causing even more lilac fly-aways. “I’m still loving your hair.”

“Are we ready to go?” Christina turns to me. There’s something different about her face this morning and I realize after a second that she’s filled in her eyebrows using the tips I gave her when we were essentially doing the teenage version of dress-up on Saturday. We’d tried to rope the others into it but Tris and Al were especially opposed and Will was lured away with them at the offer that they go for sodas. They’re not half as good as Erudite’s, unless you’re Will of course and then they’re the elixir of life.

“Think so. I like your makeup.”

“Christina!” Myra exclaims, her voice thick with delight. “I love your look!”

I can see the faintest hint of a blush in her cheeks as she lets out a nervous laugh. “Thanks guys. Gotta give Mimi credit though, if it weren’t for her I’d be totally hopeless.”

“We should exchange tips sometime,” Myra offers, beaming.

“Ooh!” another turns around, I recognize them as Rumi sans makeup and pulled up hair after a moment. “I got this really cool sparkly eyeshadow palette I’d be totally willing to share.” They still wears makeup, I don’t know how they manage with everything going on.

“We could have a makeup night,” says another, Quinn.

“Only if you tell me your secret to such flawless wings,” says a third.

Tris looks supremely out of her element in this conversation as it turns to palettes, techniques, brands, and looks. I decide to have mercy on her and let Christina lead us both out.

“Well that was unexpected,” Tris says.

I shrug, remembering encounters like that from my Erudite days when we were all still young and learning. It was like being in kindergarten again, an instant bond over a tiny commonality. I walk to breakfast with a little grin on my face.

“You look pleased about something,” Will sidles up next to me in the line. “Did Four slip on a banana peel or something?”

I chuckle. “Now that you say that, I wish. But no, I just…like it here.”

His eyes widen. “I think that’s the first time you’ve ever admitted that out loud.”

I scoff. “I’m sure that’s not true.”

“No,” Al chimes in, “it is. To be fair though, I don’t think any of us ever really talk about liking it here.”

“That’s because it’s awful hard to like being anywhere when you’re constantly getting punched in the face,” Christina says.

“So you’re not exactly holding up your resolution to not get hit in the face anymore?” Will laughs and Christina does too after she gets the joke.

“You’re not exactly a beacon of positivity yourself, Will,” I quip.

He pulls a face, like he wants to contradict me but can’t. “You know what, fine; I like being here and mostly it’s because I really like you guys and hope that we’re friends forever. Happy, Mimi?”

“Very.” My grin widens when I turn to him. “That has to be the nicest thing I’ve ever heard you say.”

Al scoops the entire group into his arms before the conversation can continue, taking every single one of us by surprise. “Aw, we like you too, Will.” As the line shuffles forward, Al attempts to move all of us at once which goes predictably and hilariously badly.

We take up our usual table and Myra waves at me from hers. I grin and wave back.

“So are you actually going to do that thing?” Tris asks.

I shrug. “Sure, why not. Chris, that sounds like fun, right?”

“Oh, definitely.” We’ve spent some time together away from the rest of the group working on her makeup skills, practicing techniques, finding colors and color combinations that work for her. “I’d love to try some of what I’ve learned on someone not myself or Mimi.”

“I still don’t understand why you’re so into all of that,” Tris says. “Doesn’t it get, like, I don’t know…uncomfortable.” “You get used to it,” Will chimes in. “It’s a lot of fun once you do.” He looks to Christina. “You could test things on me if you want.” He grins. “It’d probably be nice to work on someone with a little color in their cheeks.”

“Hey!” I exclaim, my mouth half-full of eggs.

“Mimi.” Christina gets closer to me. “Mimi.” She puts her hands on my cheeks. “I’m sorry, but he’s absolutely right.” Behind her, Will laughs so hard he snorts, a sound that causes the rest of us to break down into giggles.

“Whatever.” I roll my eyes, poorly pretending to be annoyed.

We start to meander toward the training room and I think to myself about how I keep trying to make myself acclimate, to remind myself that I don’t really want to go home and I could never really be happy there. I remind myself that this is everything that I’ll ever need and all that I could ever ask for. My friends are more than lovely, and I’m free here in a way that I never could be in Erudite. I convince myself that there’s nothing for me there, that I’ve lost nothing by leaving that I wasn’t already going to lose.

I haven’t decided if I’m succeeding yet, but every day I think I’m getting closer.