#also ive been obsessed with lipstick marks | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

ohwereusingourmadeupnames · 4 years

Text

It’s the Colours You Have

Pairing: Peter Parker/Tony Stark Rating: Mature (M) Notes: This is my ballet au fill for @starkerfestivals summer bingo. I had a lot of fun doing some research and watching some ballet to get a feel for this one - here’s hoping you enjoy! (Title is from Colours by Grouplove) Warnings: Peter suffers a pretty not good injury and there’s some NSWF stuff. Summary:

Peter Parker grew up in the dance studio and thought his entire life would revolve around it. All of a sudden, an injury takes that dream out from under him. He finds a way to stay in the world of dance through photography, his knowledge giving his work a different edge. What happens when he meets Tony Stark, a new dancer for NYCB? (Love stuff happens, that's what.)

Read on AO3 here.

Peter always thought professional dance would be his life.

At a young age, he convinced Uncle Ben to let him try one of the local studio’s classes. It took a bit of convincing – Peter was 6 years old at the time and didn’t quite understand the man’s hesitance. In the months leading up to Peter’s plea, he danced around the sofa in their living room and obsessively watched Step Up – where most boys his age were rolling around in the dirt, Peter studied the lines of dancers’ bodies and pictured himself making those same exact moves.

After what felt like a lifetime for Peter, Ben finally gave in and signed him up for all of the classes available. In his excitement, Peter took everything seriously and excelled through the beginner’s classes before the year was over. Madame Romanoff pulled Ben and May aside when sign-ups and company auditions for the next year were about to take place – in the simplest of terms, she let them know how talented of a dancer Peter was; he needed to be taking more advanced classes.

So, he did – Ben and May didn’t hesitate to put him where he needed to be; they already knew his potential, he was steadily moving through grades at school, too. Their nephew had an innate sense of talent for just about everything. Peter put his entire being into the things he liked – it made putting the squeeze in worth it. For a while, he didn’t see what that meant for the two of them – he simply enjoyed the fact that he could dance and get better at it with every single day that passed.

Landing a place on Romanoff’s dance company gave him access to top notch ballet instructors. He was very small but made up for it in the strength that he possessed. With the intention of making him one of the male pas de deux dancers, Peter cut out the rest of his classes and focused solely on ballet and pointe. It made him feel powerful and in a lot of ways beautiful, too. Even if it was weird for boys his age to love dance and feel their best while doing it. He’d gladly take the teasing – Peter loved to dance and no one was going to stop him.

The dance world took him under and guided all of his decision making. Peter worked hard all of middle school to get into Midtown Fine Arts and Dance, a high school that catered to those that were seeking entry into art’s colleges like Juilliard and TISCH. Getting in was a validation he’d been searching for and everything about his life moved to revolve around his time there.

Between Romanoff’s and Midtown, Peter was working so hard that he didn’t even realize he’d put himself in a position where his body couldn’t handle the stress. He wanted to get into Juilliard so bad and knew the only way he’d be able to go was through a scholarship. In every class since his freshman year, Peter heard about senior showcases and how every second in the walls of Midtown were preparation for that.

Every dancing piece in productions, Peter took part in. Whenever they needed a volunteer teacher to run through the parts with the younger kids, Peter volunteered. The desire to succeed overwhelmed him and by the time he got around to preparing for his senior showcase, he was at a loss and so physically exhausted, there were times when he didn’t know how he was actually still standing.

That should’ve been a clue – the fact that every part of his day felt like a chore, and that when he sat down to rest, he was comatose within seconds. Other things were trying to warn him of the ultimate shut down coming his way. His toes never recovered from the extensive pointe exercises and his muscles were always aching. If he knew that pushing himself would have been the thing that brought the world he created down – well, he still probably would have done it.

Two weeks before senior showcases, Peter was warming up when he felt a sharp shift in his lower back during a turn. The wince it pulled from him almost doubled him over. He stopped suddenly and took a couple of limping steps towards the long bar across the back wall. Hiking his leg onto the bar, Peter let out a loud ‘fuck’ when he felt the shift again. The want to keep going couldn’t override the numbness he felt in his toes.

As elegantly as he could, Peter hit ground and laid down as flat as he could, his entire lower back on fire.

It took 3 people to get him up off the ground; any sort of shift in weight made the source of his pain explode with unmanageable stimulus. Peter didn’t remember much of the movement from the floor to a gurney and into the back of an ambulance – his brain turned off to counteract the significant shift in his life happening.

The next few hours were spent getting scans and assessments done – Peter floated along from one place to another in the haze of the drugs they gave him to relieve the world ending pain. He didn’t need to hear the doctor’s words after he saw the look in his eyes – any chance of getting to Juilliard on his feet was out the window. 2 fractured lumbar vertebrae that would need to be fused and 3 ruptured disks were the thing to finally take him out. He wondered briefly, if Flash would feel undercut by his injury – he’d been gunning after Peter for years.

Thankfully, Midtown was sympathetic to his situation and let him stay around to finish the end of the year and graduate. It took a lot out of him to gimp around and be within viewing distance of the classes he’d been leading only days prior.

Being stuck with a walker for the first couple of weeks after his back surgery pushed him to work hard and get his feet back under him. Though he’d never get to dance again, at least he could walk – walking was one of the things Peter wanted to be able to do for the rest of his life. The necessity to put his all into walking and just getting around took the brunt of the blow off losing dance – it served as a good distraction, at least.

By the time the second part of his senior year came around, Peter was able to walk and get around. He was looking forward to finishing up his school year and finding out what the rest his life would be like without dance. Yet, he also longed to be close to the one thing he loved so dearly. And thankfully, Madame Romanoff offered him a good solution right before the big company recital at the end of the year.

When he walked into the studio, his heart thumped painfully against his chest. It felt like such a long time since he walked through the doors and caught his reflection in the mirror upon first glance up. A part of him wanted to walk over to the bar at the back of the room and start his stretching process, that piece of him craved the elegance of his long lines and powerful turns. Yet, the rational part of him understood that walking was more important and pushed him to move further into the studio towards Natasha’s office.

“Ah, Mr. Parker – glad you could join me. Please, have a seat,” Natasha said the second he walked in the door, the dark red lipstick coating her lips making her smile look big and bright. She kept her hair in the traditional ballerina bun and walked around in high heels – but she was kind and knew talent when she saw it. Grimacing at the little bit of a twinge he still felt, Peter took a seat in the chair in front of her desk, his fingers knitting together in front of him.

“I’ll cut right to the point. Life has dealt you a shitty card and it’s ridiculously unfair. You should be involved in dance, Peter. It’s a part of you. So, I thought – why not see if you can capture it, instead.” She turned in the big chair she was sitting in and grabbed something off the filing cabinet behind her. The fancy camera with the biggest lens he’d ever seen coming into view was not what he expected.

Her smile grew when she saw the look on his face. The whiteness of her teeth was slightly intimidating, even now, after knowing her for more than 10 years. Peter tossed a smile back her way and looked tentatively at the camera now sitting on her desk.

“What’s that, Madame Romanoff?” Peter asked, unable to keep the curiosity from getting the best of him. He was always on the other side of pictures and hadn’t picked up a camera ever in his life. The big screen and fancy dial on the back looked intimidating from where he sat, and he hadn’t even picked it up yet.

“Go ahead, Peter – it’s my solution. Figure out how to use it and then apply what you know about the art of dance to the art of photography. You know what’s beautiful. Long lines, sharp movement patterns – the beauty of a picture is how you capture it. The technical shit can be learned, the inherent knowledge you have about dance can’t.” She grinned wider when he didn’t hesitate to take the heavy camera from her.

“I want you to come to classes. You have a home in this studio, Peter. Don’t think because you’re not using your feet doesn’t mean you can’t be a part of what we do here.”

With that, she shot him another smile, then shooed him out of her office with a swift flick of her wrist.

----

Taking to the task like he tried to do with everything else, Peter dug his nose into the Canon Mark IV 5D user manual that he found online and figured out how to change the settings on the camera. It blew his mind, how many things the camera could do and how in depth the pictures could be. That was the first step.

After another couple of weeks of figuring the camera out and taking it with him on the daily walks he started embarking upon during his recovery – Peter finally felt comfortable enough to return to Romanoff’s in an attempt to do exactly what she said; capture dance.

It took a while – a lot of trial and error and frustration that Peter hadn’t ever experienced before. Things usually came easy for him. Yet, the more he did it, the better he started to feel about it. Thoughts of graduation and the future were out the window for a while – Peter dedicated himself to figuring out how to keep a foot in the world that seemed so unfairly gone from him.

He shot the end of the year recital and felt proud of the results that he ended up with. Of course, it wasn’t nearly as fulfilling as actually being on the stage, but – it brought him a sense of happiness, nonetheless. When he handed over the files to Natasha, she pulled him in for a hug. The clench of her arms kept him close, the words she whispered to him abundantly clear – “There you are.”

For some reason, those words hit him hard. His injury at the beginning of the year took a lot from him. With his rehab and the changes that came with the debilitating loss of the use of his body to create an art he devoted his life to, Peter bounced around, slightly lost. The realization that he could still connect with dance drove him forward – finally, Peter felt like he had a direction again.

Trying to get into TISCH’s photography program was a nerve-wracking experience and forced him to have to really evaluate why he wanted to make still frame his focus. The life of movement stayed alive in the photographs and he grasped onto that through the application and interview processes. His portfolio and approach must’ve been enough – Peter got acceptance and scholarship money to start the next semester.

Natasha, upon learning that he’d be in town and pursuing photography, brought him on as the in-house photographer. It didn’t pay much, but he got to have unlimited access to subjects and people that were always looking to show off the skills they worked so diligently to achieve. Peter appreciated the opportunity that Natasha provided and worked hard to provide her with his increasing talents.

Little by little, Peter honed in on his skill and absorbed as much knowledge as he could in his classes and on the job. College passed by in a blur of attending company ballet and TISCH dance productions to shoot as much as he could. He put his work in every showcase available to him and learned from the critique that people threw his way. In the dance world, critique was fodder and fed into the challenge that photography constantly imposed upon him.

Upon graduating, Peter took a job with Juilliard in the arts department as a media director and took care of the photography and visuals for all of the productions the entirety of the department put on. And because Juilliard had a direct link with New York City Ballet, Peter did the media for them as well.

When he took a step back and looked at it, his life was still wrapped around dance – and now, he didn’t have to sweat it out and perform on the stage to be directly within it. He lived in a great apartment in Manhattan and got to see his Aunt May every Sunday for whatever concoction she decided to come up with for them. All and all – his set up wasn’t terrible. Now that he had his professional life worked out, Peter felt desperate to see where the other parts of his life could take him.

As luck would have it – Peter got a nudge in right direction a couple of weeks later when he found himself in the Lincoln Center waiting for the dress rehearsal for the Nutcracker. It was one of his favorite ballets and he enjoyed being able to shoot the multitude of versions he’d get to see throughout the holiday season. And if rumor was to be believed, there was a new prince dancing with the prima ballerina.

The music started up a little while later and Peter got lost in the movements. He didn’t need to take any snaps tonight, but wanted to make sure he knew what the lighting looked like and where every group would be coming in from. Since he was working both video and film, he needed to be able to shoot from all angles. For a while, he let his camera dangle from his side and just let the dance run away with him.

By the time it got to the Prince and Sugarplum Fairy’s dance, Peter had his camera poised over his eye, the entirety of the pass one of the most important things he needed to get during the show. Their initial andante maestoso brought the two of them on the stage and in a swift dance across it – the prince in fact a totally different one than the year before. His tight calves and well sculpted thighs and hips were packed into white tights that highlighted every one of his movements.

Peter’s finger stuttered a few times through the tarantella, his focus on the dancer’s beauty and strength as he leapt and landed across the stage. When he pulled the camera down to make sure he got at least a couple of shots to play around with, Peter sucked in a sharp breath – the man was even more gorgeous than he expected, the details of his well-kept facial hair and dark brown eyes standing out the most.

Satisfied that he knew enough about the show, Peter packed up his equipment and headed out before the final act with all of the dancers came on – he knew from experience that it would be a free for all and didn’t need to plan for that. He wanted to play around with some of the images and got lost in the thoughts of the prince as he was walking out – not noticing that he was walking right into someone until well after they collided.

“Holy shit,” Peter gasped out, his long-lost dancing skill coming into play when he managed to turn and barely hit the person, instead of barreling through them and bringing them both to the ground. “I’m so sorry!” Peter put a hand on the wall and let his heart rate calm down before looking over at the person he almost took out.

His stomach dropped when he noticed the dancer he’d been eyeing up from his spot at the edge of the stage – his eyes were even darker up close and his mouth pulled into the most charming of smiles. Sucking in a breath, Peter just barely stopped himself from slapping his hands over his face. A dark red blush moved across his cheeks instead, the heat of it warming up his skin alarmingly.

“You’re pretty quick on your feet,” the man said instead of the 20 other things that could have easily come out of his mouth. Peter quirked a brow and let the slightest trace of a smile slip across his lips.

“I used to dance,” Peter replied quickly, the openness he was feeling in that moment as fleeting as some of the grumpier moods he sometimes found himself in. “Glad I still have it.” That made him smile wider, Peter a little surprised when the man across from him also smiled. It led to the slightest wrinkles in his cheeks and made Peter’s heart race.

Before the man could say anything else, a wide stagehand came walking down the hall, his eyes intent on them. “Tony, it’s the final number – you’re up.”

They shared another looked before the man, Tony, turned and started walking back in the direction he came from. Peter felt himself smiling and was surprised to see Tony holding the dressing room door open, his arm and head peeking out from behind it. “What’s your name?” He looked at Peter hopefully, his eyes wide.

Peter tightened his grip on the case he’d been pulling behind himself and let a couple of heartbeats pass before he answered – it was important that he thought before he spoke. “I’m Peter Parker,” he finally remarked, his eyebrows knitting slightly.

With a wave, Tony shot him a wink and started to disappear behind the door. “See you later, Peter Parker.”

----

The next 5 days were busy and filled with too much looking down the scope of the camera and 3 showings of The Nutcracker daily. Despite that, Peter found some time to look up the beautiful dancer – the name Tony was enough to get him a full career rundown and multiple links to pictures and videos of his past performances. Though a little older, Tony Stark seemed to be hitting the peak of his career now, instead of at a young age like most dancers. The write up he looked through said something about engineering, but he didn’t delve any further. It felt a little weird to have looked as deeply as he did to begin with.

Every night, Peter found himself watching Tony a little closer – he was all long limbs and taut muscle, his form technical but not exactly perfect. His lifts were where he excelled, though – the bundles of muscles waiting to spring into action were stretched to the limit, making the intensity of his strength standout even more.

Unable to find the courage to actually approach him, Peter spent too much time editing the images of him, ever click of his mouse meticulous and precise to create the perfect balance of camera work and Photoshop manipulation. After too many nights of it, Peter forced himself to acknowledge that talking to Tony seemed pretty necessary. Making sure to put some of his favorite on his phone, Peter felt resolved to at least show some of his work off in guise of starting up a conversation.

The final show came around with excited energy – Peter always enjoyed the last curtain call the best; there was always a certain sense of satisfaction that only that round of applause could bring. He switched up his shooting position and did some clicking from the flanks to catch a little backstage action – the decision proving to be a good one when he heard a throat clear during the first act.

“Fancy seeing you here, Peter Parker,” Tony said, his eyes shining in the bright light streaming in from the stage. He looked at Peter without blinking, a slight tilt to his head.

Peter forced himself to take a couple of breaths, his head suddenly spinning from the flush of epinephrine that his sympathetic nervous system decided shoot through his veins. The excitement of bumping into Tony probably more than obvious. “Right – fancy seeing the photographer taking photos,” Peter replied as he moved the camera to his eye and took a couple of quick shots of Tony who’d started to stretch in the open space around them.

Tony’s beaming smile made Peter’s breath catch, his eyes going to the back of the camera out of habit – the image he found there already one of his favorites of the bunch. Looking up, he gestured down at the camera in his hand. “Want to see?” Peter asked, his hands already turning it, making it more inviting for the man.

It took everything in him not to watch Tony walk towards him in the sheer shirt that, in the light, made his tanned skin stand out through the white fabric. At this closeness, the tights on his legs were translucent, Peter privy to the thick vein that ran from Tony’s calf all the way across the front of his highly muscled thigh. All those details in just the span of 5 steps – Peter wondered what he would find with an unlimited amount of time to explore him.

Shaking his head, Peter forced himself to focus when he felt the inevitable warmth of another human body getting close to him. He used his thumb to scroll back through the last 4 images he shot, a grin slipping across his face. “You have a nice smile,” Peter mumbled softly, the muscle in his forearm twitching with every click from one picture to the next. He got to the end of the roll before daring to turn his head.

“I think you’re just a good photographer,” Tony retorted, a chuckle rushing from his chest. They were close enough that Peter could feel his arm lift and clench with the sound. It made him stiffen, his skin breaking out into prickly gooseflesh. If he didn’t move, maybe he wouldn’t have to lose the rise and fall of Tony’s rhythmic breathing against him.

“Must be both then.” Peter shifted, his brain all of the sudden realizing that he was missing key pieces of the show in favor of flirting with the very attractive and incredibly distracting male dancer. “Come find me after the show – I’ll show you some from the week.” He gave Tony an encouraging smile, then turned back to look out through the curtain.

Peter heard him laugh again then the softest “okay” before the closeness of his presence could no longer be felt. Forcing himself to not turn and look, Peter did his best to pay attention to the rest of the first act – his racing mind all of the sudden not completely dedicated to the art before him on the stage.

As usual, the second act went a lot faster than the first – there was a bit more action and the dancing was not as convoluted with plot. From this perspective, Peter could see a lot more of the sideline action and felt glad he decided to trust his gut and move around a little more. When Tony stepped onto the stage, Peter gripped his camera harder – his eyes peeled for the smallest of details.

The cheeky bastard managed to look his way a couple of times throughout his solo, Peter more than certain that he got some snaps where Tony was staring directly down the pipe of the lens. It took more focus than ever for Peter to actually finish without dropping the camera and watching the ending number – since it was the last one, they changed it up and gave more solo time to each of the leads; then finished with a long bow with a few teary words from NYCB’s director. While she spoke, Peter got his equipment together and disappeared to start downloading some of the shots.

A little while later, Peter was pulled from the culling process by a tap on his shoulder – he squinted behind his glasses to make sure he was at a stopping point and turned, his fingers pulling the frames from his face when he noticed it was Tony.

“Don’t take those off on my account,” Tony said with a smirk, his hair freshly wet and brushed back from his face – the natural look of his skin even better than the brightness the spotlight and well-placed makeup gave him. His lips settled into a light smile and he leaned against the table Peter found to spread out on. He must’ve been nose deep in his work for longer than he thought.

“I just need them for the light,” Peter mumbled, jamming them into the pocket of his shirt. Glancing down, he shifted the computer so Tony could see. “Your tarantella was great tonight.”

Tony leaned in a little to look at the picture more closely, the move bringing the sharpness of his cologne into Peter’s space. As if he was trying to measure his own arms on the screen, Tony reached out to trace the line of his hand down to the middle of his chest. “You said you danced, right? You can tell – the fact that you framed up that specific move says a lot. That’s so crisp, Pete,” Tony admitted, the man pulling back, his hands shoving the long sleeves that were trying to settle on his wrists up his lean forearms.

Taken aback, Peter adjusted himself in his chair. It’d been a long time since he talked to anyone about that part of his journey through dance. Sometimes May would look at him wistfully and relive some of the memories with him, but even that made his heart ache. Licking his bottom lip, Peter nodded his head. “I did about ten years at Romanoff’s, she got me started with the photography thing after my injury.”

They locked eyes for a second, Tony’s eyebrows up, almost completely buried in the hair that was now creeping down, trying to cover his forehead. “Natasha Romanoff? She’s still on 5th, then?”

Grinning, Peter nodded again. “5th and then a newer studio on 64th. She’s flourishing,” Peter said, his hands coming up to make air quotes with his fingers. “Do you know her?”

“She was a couple years ahead of me at Juilliard. I didn’t get into the dancing world until a little later in life, so we were the same age, despite not being the same year. We partnered for pas de deux once,” Tony remarked, his eyes glowing with the memory. “You must’ve been good.”

Peter put his hand on the touch pad of his computer and went about saving the photo on the screen to distract himself – his heart started to beat a little harder at the thought of how much talented he cultivated in his youth. “I wasn’t terrible. I did not treat my body very well, however – back gave out before I could really see how good I could have been.” Clenching his lips shut, Peter wondered where all the words came from – he hadn’t been this chatty… ever.

Tony crossed his arms and leaned more heavily against the table, his forearms now on display, the lines of muscles firm and wrapped in tanned skin, the veins there pulsing from the work the man did that night. “Ah – that’s the worst. I’ve been fighting off a bum toe for a couple of years – the pointe gets harder and harder as the time goes by,” Tony muttered wistfully, his foot shifting subconsciously. “How long have you been taking photos?”

Without much thought, Peter started the process of packing his computer and hard drive into their cases, his eyes never leaving Tony. “About 7 years now. I went to TISCH for a 5-year program and have been working for Juilliard and NYCB ever since.” Finally done with the menial tasks that kept him preoccupied, Peter stood up. “What about you? You here to stay or just doing a stint with the company this season?”

Despite not saying anything, Tony followed Peter when he started walking – the natural way they just sort of accommodated each other weird for having only met once before. Tony waited until they were in the foyer of the Lincoln Center before speaking again. “I’m here to stay. NYCB gave me a company spot and choreographer position. After being on the road so much the past couple of years, coming home felt right.”

Though they were right by the door, neither man made any move to go exit through any of them, the two men obviously more than willing to mill around and talk. Peter pulled his camera case close to him, the metal of it cool against the thin material of his khaki pants.

“There’s something about the city, right?” Peter asked, his head turning to look at the still busy street right outside the door. “I’ve been here my whole life.”

Smiling wide, Tony nodded – the gesture answer enough. Peter watched him shift and smile a little bigger. “Any chance you’re free for headshot type stuff? I could use an update.”

The question caught him off guard for a second, his hopes of maybe getting to know the guy slowly starting to become more of a reality as the moments passed. That thrust him into gear – Peter fumbled into his pocket and scrolled through a couple of his photo files before he found his infographic.

“Everyone is on break for the holidays, so I’ve got lots of time. Turn your AirDrop on, I’ll share my info with you,” Peter replied without hesitation, his cheeks warm from the events of the night and the distracting way Tony was making him feel. “The Juilliard studio has great lighting.”

After grabbing his info, Tony reached across the space between them and gripped his shoulder, the touch firm and friendly. “I’ll get ahold of you. Thanks for making me look good.” Throwing him a final smile, Tony hitched his bag up his shoulder and walked quickly out the door and into the cold December night.

----

A couple of days passed before Peter heard from Tony – they decided on a time and agreed to meet at the Juilliard studio that Friday. For 4 days, Peter immersed himself in the editing process to make the time go a little faster. It didn’t, but that was always how it worked when he was looking forward to something.

In his need to fill up all the spaces of time, Peter did a bit of online shopping and ordered a couple of different backgrounds to play around with. When the day came, Peter used his key to head in a little early – his lighting set up would take a while to get put together and if his hands were busy, he didn’t have any time to fret about the nerves coursing through him or the hopes he hadn’t been able to put to bed since meeting Tony. Getting ahead of himself seemed like a recipe for failure – but he wasn’t one to not step out on the limb just because of a little fear.

Two solid hours of preparation went by much faster than he figured it would – Tony walked in through the door while he was still fiddling with the long backdrop, the sturdiness of it important if Tony was going to jump and move on and around it. He didn’t notice until he looked up to see how straight it was and caught Tony’s reflection in the mirror behind him.

“Hey, Tony,” Peter started, his face breaking out into a familiar smile. “I’m just about ready. I got the door to the bathroom unlocked, so you’re free to change as much as you’d like.” He tugged at the backdrop one more time before finally feeling satisfied – he knew what he was doing, the nerves needed to go the hell away.

Tony looked at him for a moment, his whiskey-brown eyes roving over his face without any shame. It felt good – being looked at like that. Whatever it meant; Peter wasn’t going to be mad about the attractive man in front of him not being able to tear his eyes away. The only thing that ever made his heart race like it was in that moment was dance – that had to mean something.

“I’m ready to go. I just need to put my bag down and change into my flats,” Tony finally said, his eyebrows quirking as a soft grin lifted his cheeks.

“You should probably stretch, too,” Peter remarked offhandedly, his eyes returning Tony’s stare, inch of skin by lovely inch. He was happy to see that there were a couple different cuts of shirt in his hand – they’d have a lot to work with. With that in mind, Peter went about making sure his camera was connected to his computer while Tony got ready.

As expected, once they got started, things went seamlessly. Tony was used to be instructed and took Peter’s suggestions in stride. They did a bunch of different poses in each outfit, Peter making sure that Tony switched to pointe at least once during the process. By the end, Peter was laughing at the faces Tony made at him when he switched positions.

Almost satisfied, Peter put the camera down and stepped onto the backdrop. He swung his arms from side to side to get his blood flowing, then swopped up into a one footed stance without much trouble (the twinge would come later.) “I want you to leap and land like this – I’d demonstrate, but this is as far as that goes,” Peter joked, his body saturated with endorphins from the rush doing any sort of movement with his body always brought.

Tony didn’t move to get in position, so Peter straightened up and started to think about how else he could describe it. A hand on his arm stopped him, Tony’s fingers squeezing lightly. “You still have such good technique,” Tony mumbled, his hand moving to pull at Peter’s until he was a little further onto the backdrop. “No turns, right?”

Nodding, Peter relaxed his body and let himself be led into a resting position, Tony’s hands now on his hips. “Let’s see how well you remember your backwards steps,” Tony whispered, his lips just a few inches away from Peter’s ear. His fingers tapped on the right side of Peter’s hip and they were off in that direction – his arms widening when they got to the edge of the pass.

It felt weird for a second, being in the hold position; but he quickly got over it, the relief of any stress on him quickly taken by Tony’s hands and their tight grasp on his hips, Peter’s feet barely touching the ground. They went through a couple of moves before Peter was stopping their movement with a subtle touch to Tony’s hand.

“That’s enough for me.” Peter was grateful for the brief experience and threw an even more sincere look over his shoulder at Tony. “Thank you, though – I haven’t moved like that in years.” He lifted his hands over his head and stretched himself as long as he could go before walking back over to his camera set up, his fingers wrapping around the base with ease.

When they were all done and Tony was walking out of the bathroom in street clothes, Peter looked up and motioned to him. He let his eyes linger on the way Tony’s jeans sat on his hip, the cut of his shirt enhancing the slimness there. Tony moved with ease, the man more than familiar with his body and the things he could do with it. Shaking his head, Peter moved away from that thought – it could very easily get him in trouble.

With Tony by his side, Peter smiled at him, then started to go through the frames he took throughout the two hours they’d been working. Tony spent a lot of time critiquing himself and grinned when Peter went out of his way to say the exact opposite of whatever came out of his mouth. The stills were beautiful and after a little work, would be more than enough to circulate around in resumes and show leaflets.

“Those are great, Pete – I like how well you capture the action; I honestly don’t think I’ve ever seen anything like it,” Tony commented, his eyes still wide from the cruise through the photo gallery. At some point, he let his hand drift to Peter’s shoulder and kept it there, his fingers now gripping on and off. “I’d love to see more – want to grab a coffee, or something?”

As it happened, coffee ended up being a quick walk to Peter’s apartment where he got as far as pulling his computer out before Tony was flung across his hips, muscular thighs clenching with every move he made. Peter was surprised for about two seconds before he grabbed a handful of Tony’s ass, and dragged him closer, their mouths meeting in a heated kiss without either of them hesitating.

Peter didn’t usually do stuff like this – kiss people he didn’t know much about, but at the same time, he didn’t like to miss out on good things, either. He watched Tony reached down and take his own shirt off, the muscles of his stomach and arms rippling as the cells fired and clenched. When he relaxed, Peter was pleased to see that Tony was very cut up and would ripple gloriously as he thrust into him in the near future.

The fact that Tony managed to get his shirt off of him and the button of his pants undone without him noticing blew Peter’s mind, the man had a way with his mouth and let his tongue do terribly dirty things. In 25 years, Peter had never been kissed like that before – Tony’s carnality was exactly like his dancing, thorough and highly skilled.

It seemed like Tony came prepared because Peter was suddenly naked and on his back with Tony between his thighs, a packet of lube and a condom dangling from his fingers. They made eye contact for a moment, the desire in Tony softening as an affectionate look rolled over his face. “This okay? You’ll tell me if you’re not comfortable?” Tony’s questions rolled off his tongue without him stopping the scandalous press of his hips.

“It’s a lot more than okay. As long as you don’t roll me up into too much of a ball, I’ll be just fine. Just don’t stop whatever it is you’re going to do,” Peter babbled, his lips totally loose now that most of his thoughts were clouded with lust and completely focused on the delicious press and pull of Tony’s fingers on his skin and cock against his own.

He was pleasantly surprised when Tony shifted and pushed at his hip until Peter took the hint and rolled over. Leaning on his forearms, Peter spread his legs as much as he could on the couch and thrust back a little, his ass entirely on display. Groaning when Tony used his hands to spread his cheeks, Peter looked over his shoulder to see dark eyes staring at him longingly.

Tony emptied the packet of lube on the flat of Peter’s back and swiped his fingers through it. His free hand ran along Peter’s flank and lulled him into a sense of comfort – the breach of Tony’s fingers around and then against his rim secondary to the sensation of first a knuckle and then an entire finger slipping into him. While he moved his hand, Tony peppered all the skin he could reach with kisses and licks – he was obviously in the business of taking Peter apart one piece at a time.

Progressively, Peter got lost in the rush of his lust for Tony and the scorching touch that made his skin prickle and the well of heat in his stomach start to trickle over the edge. Tony’s weight held his hips down just enough that with every thrust back against talented fingers that were now aggressively stretching him open, Peter got the slightest amount of friction against his cock. It was both too much and not enough in one agonizingly delicious movement.

Draped completely over him, Tony pressed his lips to Peter’s ear when he pushed in. The stroke to slide inside was firm and didn’t stop until Tony’s hips were pressed against the muscle of his round ass cheeks. Peter shifted until he could accommodate his weight on one hand – he reached back and gripped Tony’s hair hard with the other, the moan slipping from his lips forcing a flush down the length of his chest. “Oh, Tony – “

From that point on, Peter lost track of time and space – he was so completely wrapped up in the tactile sensations and the sensitivity of nerve fibers that were constantly being stroked and prodded. With Tony’s arm wrapped around his middle, Peter gave himself over to the sensations, the long, slow glide of a firm cock in and out of him driving him absolutely mad. Little by little, he melted into the rhythmic bump of Tony’s cock against that spot deep inside of him and got closer to a finish that felt like a long time coming.

A shout left his hips when Tony used the grip around his chest to pull him up until his back was firmly pressed against the skin of well-muscled pecs and abs that were clenching with every thrust Tony delivered. Peter felt him slow down and move the grip of his hand from his chest to his hips, long fingers digging in. “The way you move against me, Pete – it’s driving me insane. It’s like you know me. Like you’ve studied my body and know exactly what it needs.”

His cock throbbed at the trueness of Tony’s words. Though he didn’t have a chance to physically explore it, Peter knew a lot about the way Tony moved from the images he’d been editing non-stop – it seemed like he learned a lot more about Tony than he originally imagined. Bringing his hands until they were resting over Tony’s on his hips, Peter laced their fingers together and let out a long moan; the carnal noises the only thing he could conjure up in that moment.

Another few thrusts of Tony’s cock dead against Peter’s prostate had him coming without a single touch to his throbbing erection. It was a novel thing for him, so he watched with wide eyes as he shivered and clenched and finished with the most release he’d ever seen come out of himself hitting the bedspread underneath him. Tony rolled his hips and thrusted through it until he was moaning against Peter’s neck and collapsing them both on the bed – the man courteous enough to turn them on their sides and away from his own puddle of cum.

Peter couldn’t stop the helpless moan that slipped from his mouth when Tony pulled out and rolled away to get rid of the condom. He turned and watched him move around until Tony finally joined him on the bed again. It shouldn’t have surprised him, the fact that Tony wrapped a hand around his arm and pull him back until they were resting as close together as possible. A nose ran through the sweaty hair at the back of Peter’s head – Tony pulling in a long breath before settling in.

“You can still dance. That was the most flawless piece I’ve ever been a part of,” Tony said softly, his hand flattening against Peter’s stomach to pull him even further back, despite the fact that there wasn’t any space left between them. “Rest up for a bit – I’ll take you out for another spin in a little while.”

Laughing, Peter let his hand rest against Tony’s, their fingers lacing with ease. He snuggled in, Tony’s warmth lulling him into a sleep haze.

----

The fact that Tony didn’t leave the next morning spoke volumes – Peter didn’t do a lot of dating, but he understood wanting to spend time with someone. They made pancakes that were barely edible and talked about Tony’s travels through Paris the previous two years. He’d been traveling with an international company that did a long stint in France. When it came time for Tony to leave and get some practice in for the day, Peter went with him.

It took on a different sort of intimacy, shooting Tony after that. Because he knew so much about the freckles on Tony’s skin and the way the dancer moved in the throes of passion, Peter could appreciate the thrust of his hips and the powerful strides for a completely different reason. It brought a whole new meaning to a long, slow seduction. They didn’t make it out of the locker room before Peter was on his knees, worshipping the cock and hips attached that moved with such poise and grace.

Spending the rest of the day together felt like the right thing to do after that – Tony came down his throat and watched with wide eyes as Peter stayed on his knees and stroked himself with a tight fist in long, quick strokes. The soft pet of his hair lulled him into a daze for a while, his cheek laying against the bottom of Tony’s stomach until he felt the tingle leave his toes and lower limbs.

Tony pulled him into a deep kiss when he stood up, strong arms wrapped around him and his swift tongue chased the taste of his own spend in Peter’s mouth. Peter didn’t know who was moaning but it was almost enough to bring him back to full hardness, though, he knew he couldn’t handle any more time on the hard floor or any of the surfaces available to them there. Suggesting a late lunch made Tony smile and when he grabbed Peter’s hand on the way out of the building, Peter let the hope of things actually going somewhere wash over him.

So, maybe Peter couldn’t dance on his own 2 feet anymore – with Tony by his side, he quickly learned that dancing was just as much a feeling as it was a collection of movements and lifts. Lying in bed with Tony between his legs later that night, Peter figured out that the roll of his hips and the caress of his hands felt just as good as the carefully crafted choreography that he’d be so accustomed to. The same way his body used to take the crowd apart, Peter slowly tugged at Tony’s seams until the dancer was thrusting into him with abandon. His name on Tony’s lips at the end of their coupling the ultimate standing ovation.

And as the days past and Peter got to spend more time not only wrapped up in the fun of watching someone else succeed, but also in the beauty and grace that was Tony Stark. The spring brought Bourne’s version of Swan Lake, which consisted of an all-male cast. Peter, having decided that NYCB was where the most opportunities were available, applied and got the job as the full-time photographer. Which meant he got to spend all of his day shooting ballet and only ballet. An absolute dream come true.

Watching Tony dance the part of the prince was absolutely magical – between trying to catch all of the best shots and catching every single one of his pristine moves, Peter spent all 7 days of multiple shows trying to capture him in the best possible way. They hadn’t been dating all that long, but Peter was moved to make sure Tony understood how he truly saw him.

It took a few weeks to find the perfect picture and get it blown up and printed to perfection. After getting it in the mail, Peter measured and built a custom frame for the photo – the dark brown wood a beautiful contrast to the white costume Tony was wearing in the print. Finally finishing it a couple of weeks into May, Peter stepped back and looked at the physical manifestation of his heart with a critical eye. It was Tony – Peter had a hard time finding any sort of flaw.

His ears prickled when he heard Tony putting his key in the lock – a couple of months prior, Peter pulled out one of his old TISCH key chains and made a copy of his apartment key. He left it in Tony’s pointe shoes and got a screaming call when he didn’t notice – the tip of the key stabbed him; but, the sincerity of the gesture made the large cut he had to nurse for a couple of weeks totally worth it.

He waited until he heard the keys clatter against the bowl that Peter kept right by the door to pick up the frame and carry it out into the living room where Tony was standing, his feet and arms bare, his dance tights still framing his legs in the sinful way they always did. Peter stopped dead in his tracks when Tony noticed him, the man’s dark brown eyes caught between looking at Peter’s face and the big frame he had in his hands.

“What’s that?” Tony asked, his cheeks coloring at the bluntness of the question. The man might’ve been a few years older than Peter, but he never failed to project youth and reckless wonder. The words made Peter laugh, his face spreading wide with the smile overtaking him. Instead of answering right away, Peter closed the gap and jammed the frame into Tony’s arms.

Peter gave him a few minutes to get his bearings and process what was in front of him. In the many days’ worth of searching, Peter finally decided on a picture of Tony in the middle of a leap. His eyes and chin were up, his hips completely square – but the thing that really caught Peter’s eye was the look of pure happiness of Tony’s face. There were many dancers that could get their legs completely straight through a leaping straddle, but there weren’t many that looked to be in absolute rapture when they did it. Every time he passed by it, the look made his heart pound, so he figured that was sign enough.

Tony looked up at him, his eyes wide. “This is what I look like, huh?” Tony asked, his fingers doing the customary reaching out to touch thing they always did. Peter watched him trace the length of his body across the glass – the idea of fingerprints not even registering. The appreciation of his work never meant so much.

“Beautiful, right? I thought, for a really long time, that I’d never really have the same connection with dance that I did when I actually got to do it myself. Then, I met you and got to see talent and passion in a totally different light. I don’t need to be moving to feel what it’s like to be on the stage when I watch you. Maybe it’s because I love you so much and I’m biased, but I’m a fan – your biggest one, probably.” Peter let all of the words flow from him before stopping for a breath. He felt his lips slip into a beaming smile – it felt so damn good to let that off his chest.

Even the very first ‘I love you’ between them felt good coming from him – he didn’t need Tony to say it out loud to know that he loved him. It was apparent in the way he touched, his fingers were constantly seeking – whether it was knowledge or pleasure, Tony was always interested in finding out. It was glaringly obvious in the way bourbon hued eyes followed him around the room when they weren’t standing together and looked so deeply within his own when they were. His gentle words and the innate ability to know just what Peter needed said things that a singular phrase never could.

Yet, when it came from Tony’s lips, Peter couldn’t have imagined a better moment. “You’re a big softy, Petey,” Tony mumbled, his lips pressing together for a second before continuing. “I love you, too. By the way. I know you know, but I also know how good the words sound. I love you. I’ll say it however many times you want to hear it.” As elegant as always, Tony moved to lean the frame against the edge of the couch to free his hands up, then tugged Peter into them, their lips finding each other in a soft kiss.

“I don’t think there’s a limit, Tony,” Peter muttered, his voice scratchy from the rush of arousal and happiness and a billion other things.

Tony gripped his cheeks and pulled him in for another kiss, his next words said against his lips like a prayer – “sounds okay to me.”

----

Later that year, Peter and Tony stumbled through their apartment after opening night of The Nutcracker. As a veteran this year, Tony wowed the audience in a way that only someone seasoned and comfortable could. The performance was flawless, Peter a little disappointed that he couldn’t show his enjoyment as much as he would have wanted to. The second they got behind the door of his car, however, his hands were all over Tony. They almost didn’t make it into the house before Peter was straddling him and really letting his appreciation show.

They fumbled through the door and passed through the living room that was littered in Peter’s work – when they first hung the few framed photos of Tony, he complained about it being a little weird. Yet, the more Peter added to it, the more Tony seemed to be behind the idea. It just took a little prodding for him to play into the narcissism that all dancers were inherently in possession of. He really started to relax when Peter added a few of the two of them, the idea of looking up to see physical representation of their connection a nice one, one that they both wanted to get behind.

Peter let his eyes glance over them briefly before crowding against Tony’s back and herding him towards the bedroom. All of the walls on the walk there were covered in Peter’s work – his own narcissism showing in the diligent way he went about making sure all of the frames throughout the house matched and looked absolutely perfect.

When they moved in together, Tony wanted to go all in, so they got all new stuff and created something that was joint and completely Tony Stark and Peter Parker mixing all the aspects of their lives. From the bedding to the bowls they ate out of, everything was picked out together.

When he was finally able to settle between Tony’s legs with just his boxer briefs on, Peter sucked in a deep breath and gave himself a second to enjoy the man stretched out beneath him. The strain from the night’s performance had Tony’s muscles taut and his veins bulging from lack of water and electrolytes – he’d be ravenous for the next few days.

His eyes were wide and completely glazed over, the pupils taking over the bourbon Peter so eagerly drank in every time he looked in Tony’s eyes. The hands that were normally so sure of themselves were reaching to touch Peter searchingly, their next step still undetermined.

Allowing himself to share a heated look with Tony, Peter shook his head and forced himself to focus – there was plenty of time to get distracted in the beautiful view of his boyfriend later. He sat up a little and reached into his bedside table, the lube and condom hitting the comforter below them, the movement enough of a decoy for Peter to get the square box he’d been hiding there open and on the muscled expanse of Tony’s chest.

They weren’t traditional, so he bypassed the one knee thing – instead, he pressed his body weight into Tony, one of his hands holding the box so he could see it while the other ran through shower wet brown hair. It wasn’t the most romantic thing, but it felt right. Everything about Tony felt right. A forever of that was the only thing he’d ever want.

“If you’ll have me, I’d like to be your number one fan forever. Please, marry me,” Peter whispered, his nose caressing Tony’s as his lips pressed the words into any piece of stubbly skin he could reach. “Please,” he prompted again, the plea unneeded, but falling from his lips, anyway.

“How could I possibly say no to that?” Tony asked, his response coming with a quick lift of his head and warm lips pressed against Peter’s. His hands moved into the long hair at the base of Peter’s neck, fingers tugging lightly.

“Put that ring on me so I can find out how it looks against your skin while I’m holding you down.” Shooting him a wink, Tony dragged him in for a deep kiss, the box on his chest momentarily forgotten.

#starker #ironspider #it's the colours you have #starkerfestivalsevents #bobbie writes

50 notes · View notes

tootyfrootycasbooty · 4 years

Note

how do u think u are inspired by punk subculture and others like ska and alternatives... like i find it very cool and see u talk in ur blog, wanted to know more... do u have any recomendations? like films, books... anyway thanks have a nice day u r lovely!!

WOW big question with a big answer under the cut. lovely lovely elizabeth just did an interview w me for Berlin Art Link and i discuss punk & subculture & fandom in the context of my art practice and dissertation there!

my dad brought me up on the music very young, little babby me in the car singing along to the clash and the specials....it’s always just been a part of how i see myself, and i struggled w it a lot more when i was younger, it didn’t exactly mesh with being a black preteen/teen in one of the Whitest parts of the country. i think it will always be an influence i carry with me thru fashion and music tastes, and it’s been really nice in the last 2 years to kind of rediscover that part of myself bc i stopped acknowledging it for a big long time.

i am the most annoying defender of ska because The Internet has reduced this entire genre down to like...shitty third and fourth wave american ska which is ???? not even something i’ve ever really associated as ska, it’s so far removed. ska is a jamaican genre and it’s the precursor to rocksteady and reggae, and there’s a really interesting relationship between different subcultures in postwar britain who kind of transcend anti-black racism of the time to find common ground in black-british culture. a lot of that comes from ska - punk and skinhead culture have both been hugely whitewashed or misremembered by their more commercialised/infamous versions in the media, despite there being so much variance & nuance at the time, and when both were early in their incarnations they centred around ska and reggae. read: don letts, beautiful dreadhead brother/dj to the punks. my white dad introduced me to reggae bc he was punk, while my jamaican mum could not give a shit about it!! anyway i know more about 2-tone/second wave ska than the first bc i was obsessed w Ghost Town by the specials as a kid, and while writing my dissertation i realised how fantastic it is that was i was drawn to a genre that specifically marries black and white culture in britain through music, very audibly and visually too, and it’s just....overtly political while being outrageously fun....it’s very honest and timeless and now more than ever, it feels relevant. imo, ska was often hopeful/joyful (even if the lyrics weren’t necessarily) while punk was nihilistic. i think it’s also worth saying that british and american punk have very different histories and offshoots, even tho they happened at the same time and had many crossovers.

my recommendations, whew ok!

books: black by design - pauline black (AMAZING biography by singer of the selector, mixed race and adopted, i gasped so many times bc so many parts of this book reflected my exact feelings of discovering my own blackness, even tho our child & adolescent years were like...4-5 decades apart); lipstick kisses - greil marcus (very dense but mostly very interesting, altho it does go wildly off topic sometimes. comparing 20th century social history to medieval religious history etc. it’s wild. if u want an academic read about this is IT, the way he links the letterist & situationist international to punk is just *chefs kiss*....also in general v good commentary on how mass homogenous culture combined w a loss of true freedom via capitalism, eventually creates civil unrest like may 68 and punk.) and england’s dreaming - jon savage (the go-to history of punk, basically starting with malcolm mcclaren’s childhood and how his art school background combined w may 68 led to him & vivienne very consciously creating a stylised movement, but it rly covers a lot more than that)

more academic texts on punk: subculture, the meaning of style - dick hebdige (aka the very same bastard of I Love Dick); punk rock, so what - ed. roger sabin (this is a fantastic collection of essays on dif topics that u may not ever consider in relation to punk, but the ones on race, women, and commodity are fab...so good for solidifying the concept that punk existed beyond the sex pistols and was much more interesting than them too); i havent actually read any ska specific academic texts but i wld be interested to! also dayglo! the poly styrene story for my fave black punk leading lady

films & tv: this is england (of course...how i could i not...i implore u to watch the film and then each series bc the journey is spectacular & effortlessly shows how transient and changeable these subcultures could be as music and fashion and social circumstances change); farming by adewale akinnuoye-agbaje (big trigger warning for violent racism & internalised racism, so harrowing & worthwhile tho, i dont think it deserved the shoddy reviews it got...it rly undid me); dance craze by joe massot (2-tone documentary); sex & drugs & rock n roll (ian dury is great is often left out of punk conversations but he’s a big part of my childhood and stiff records was v influential to punk & post-punk)

just general good films abt subculture: northern soul (ive been going to northern soul nights since moving to london and the history is so interesting and i wish i could go back in time and BOOGIE my god it seems incredible....also see fiorucci made me hardcore, a video art piece by mark leckey); 24 hour party people; quadrophenia; the football factory (fun fact, my dad became a punk bc he didnt like football & was tired of being beaten up by footie fans lmao); velvet goldmine.

#i went ham on this sorry #u can ask a dweeb about their diss topic and expect a short answer #my art #kinda sorta not really but u know!!!!#Anonymous #ask and you shall receive

6 notes · View notes

ghosts-n-whores · 4 years

Text

I’m drunk again and I’m sick and I feel like I have to tell this story and get all of this out of me before I fucking explode. Also this is hella fucking long. I tried to shorten it but frankly, all of these were big, life-altering moments. If i’m going to spew out a lifetime worth of unspoken trauma, I’m gonna tell it all. Let me have my moment.

The first time my weight was ever brought up as an issue I was 5 years old. Me, my mother, and my sister were getting ready to take family portraits at the church we attended. My father was too drunk and too ashamed to be a part of it. Dads drinking and drug use was the worst kept secret in the fucking world but mom did her best to put on a good show. It obviously embarrassed her though and when she gets upset anyone can become a target. Mom had dressed us all in matching purple shirts. As she put my shirt on me she stopped, poked me hard in the stomach, and with a look of disgust told me to make sure I sucked that in before the flash went off. When we got home that night I stood in front of the mirror for the first time and recognized the flaws in my reflection.

My parents divorced soon after and my new stepfather arrived, bringing with him a new era of torment and criticism. It wasn’t all reserved for me though. Suddenly my sister, who until that point had been the golden child and light of my mother’s life, was coming under fire too. Everyday I listened to how fat her ass had gotten, that they couldn’t understand how a 14 year old had so much cellulite. She was so skinny, so perfect before. What had happened? (Spoiler: puberty had happened. She had developed hips and ass. And for reference here, my sister was a size 4. She was, and still is, a knockout.) I, too, faced scrutiny of course. My mother still insisted on dressing me every morning. And every morning of my life I listened to how much weight I needed to lose, how big I had gotten, how many rolls I had. Body shaming had become my new normal. The morning of school pictures mom put me in a floral print dress. I hated it. I sobbed hysterically. In retrospect, there was nothing wrong with the dress. It was pretty. The problem was that I hated me in the dress. The square neckline and spaghetti straps made my shoulders look broad, showed off how big my arms were. I actually found those pictures a few years ago. I immediately noticed how bloodshot and swollen my eyes were, how I had hunched my shoulders together in a subconscious effort to make myself smaller. My mom gushed about how pretty I was but all I could think was “that poor girl.”

I have a mole/birth mark/something on the inside of my labia majora. Mom discovered it when dressing me one morning and proceeded to pin me to the bed so she could look at it. Now, I understand as a mother you want to make sure there’s not some cancerous growth on your kid. But fully pinning them down while they scream and cry, because you’ve taught them their entire life that that is a private part and no one should ever touch it, seems a bit extreme to me. What I felt was by no means a sexual violation. But it was a violation of my privacy, my trust in my mother, my bodily autonomy. I realized I was viewed by all the parental figures in my life as a possession for them to do with what they wanted. Children didn’t have rights in my household.

The first time I ever stood up to my mother was also the first time I was ever called a bitch. I was 7, mom was telling me how fat I was again, and something in me just kinda snapped. I told her she wasn’t exactly skinny either to which she replied “Well, Savannah I’m 40 years old, it’s a little different.” I told her that meant she’d had 40 years to lose it then, huh? She told me I was a bitch and to dress myself from now on.

Things continued in much the same way for the next several years. My sister developed a drug habit, my father’s worsened, and my mom and stepdad became the bane of my existence. My sister’s boyfriend had introduced me to MTV and eyeliner. I was deeply enthralled with all things early 2000s punk rock. It was the first time in my life I connected to something. But I soon discovered that, to my mother, the only thing worse than having a fat daughter was having a goth daughter.

Now, this is something I still don’t understand. My parents were the generation that grew up in the satanic panic of the 80s. As an adult I discovered my stepdad, who was obsessed with Ozzy Osborne as a teenager, found himself part of a small town scandal involving satanic rituals when he was in high school. The rumors were obviously never true, and we all know that satanic imagery was just Gen X’s way of conveying shock value and rebellion. But to have lived through that, with that knowledge, and still think there was something genuinely wrong with me for claiming my own version of it is just....fucking asinine to me. But honestly that whole experience is another story entirely.

Back to my point, one day I was clothes shopping with my mom at target. (I’ll preface this story by telling you this was the last time I stepped foot in a target with another person until I was 19 years old. And even then, he just showed up and I nearly had a panic attack.) She and I had went to try stuff on and she barged into the changing room behind me. I begged her to get out, that I wanted privacy. She demanded to see how the jeans fit. They didn’t. I already knew they wouldn’t when I went in there and knew what she’d say when she found out. She berated me, loudly, about how the seams were going to burst. How she couldn’t believe I couldn’t even button a pair of pants. When I had been sufficiently reduced to a crying mess on a changing room floor she slipped out and sweetly told me to let her know how everything else looked. This is what she does, brings you to your lowest point and then suddenly turn on this sickly sweet charm. It simultaneously drives it all home and makes you look insane for being upset. My father does the same thing. I’ve never been able to tell who learned it from who.

It was about this time that MySpace became a thing. Mom knew I had one but was too naive to ever look at it. Social media felt like a safe haven to me. It had my music, my friends. I could obsess over whatever new band was breaking onto the scene. I could be myself without ridicule. Until one night, anyway. A cousin of mine had seen my page, reported it to my grandmother, who immediately called mom to tell her she needed to look at the “sick shit” I was posted on the Internet. My mother burst into the room, threw me out of my chair, and proceeded to pour over my profile. It was all studded belts and black lipstick. My profile song was “My Sweet 666” by HIM. My sexual orientation was listed as bi. My mother and I both very nearly stroked the fuck out as she took it all in.

My brain, in a last ditch effort to save itself, has repressed most of the conversation that night. I’m thankful for that. It’s a lot of the reason I’ve never really told anyone what happened that night - I can’t fucking remember it. But I do remember my mother telling me how disgusting it would be to be bisexual, and how even if I was (and she was adamant that I couldn’t possibly know what it even meant), it would never be something to admit out loud. This was her moment to tell me all the horrible things she had ever thought about me. I don’t remember what all was said, but I remember lying on the floor begging for her to stop. That I loved her. That I was sorry I wasn’t what she wanted. She never stopped. Eventually, she came to my weight. Again, I don’t remember it all verbatim but I do remember being told that I ever did was “eat and gorge and eat and gorge.” To this day, I can still hear those words when I look in the mirror. Ive spent a lot of time shoving them out of my head, but my god are they loud sometimes.

We moved to the lake when I was 12. My mom had recently had my younger sister and was working 5am to well past midnight some nights. That left me and my stepdad at home. My school bus would only drop us off at the end of the road but my stepdad refused to pick me up like the other parents did. He told me it would be good for me to get the exercise and walk. Our house sat at the end of a 2 mile long gravel road. The heat rose well over 100° daily. I was head to toe in long, black layers. I passed out on that walk more than once. Even when I did make it to the house, he would lock the doors and windows. He told me to go run laps and when he felt like I had done enough, he would let me in the house. He was going to force the weight off of me if he had to.

I told my mother more than once and she either outright denied it, refused to deal with it, or sided with my stepfather. She sings a much different tune now that their marriage has fallen apart and she’s searching for reasons to hate him, but the fact remains...it was abuse. Neither of them ever actually cooked so I survived off of energy drinks and crackers. Mom would come into my room, find the wrappers, and tell me I would be 300lbs one day if I don’t stop funneling food into my face. It didn’t matter what I did though, the weight wouldn’t leave. This was partly due to the fact that I was fucking 12 years old, and partly due to the fact that, to all of our surprise, I had a thyroid condition. I also had faulty ovaries which only further threw off my hormonal balance. The rest of that summer they were kind to me. Shoved food at me, coddled me. I always imagined it was because they felt guilty. But it didn’t last.

That summer I moved back to my dad’s. Up until this point my father had always firmly been on my side in this battle against my mother. That changed immediately. He put me on the Atkins diet and I felt like I was dying every day. Fuck, I even gained weight. I resorted myself to the fact that I would never have a happy home life but school would be different. I didn’t take into account that I had just stepped back into a small town and I looked like an extra on a Marilyn Manson music video shoot. People I’d known since preschool, who all claimed to be excited to have me back, ostracized me in one glance. I was goth, I’d gotten fat, and I was immediately tossed in the reject pile. I attempted suicide for the first time that night, a month shy of my 13th birthday.

A lot of things happened in my teen years that aren’t entirely worth mentioning here because it’s all the same. My dad started looking into plastic surgeons because he was sure I would have grotesque, loose skin once I finally lost weight. He also became fixated on the idea that I must have something wrong with me because “all that extra weight has to be putting strain on your organs. You have to have diabetes or damage to your heart.” I was taken to every doctor in the tristate area it seemed, searching for a condition that was simply never there. When a doctor would start questioning his reasoning for this, we would move to another doctor. I’m not saying I was a victim of Munchausens by proxy, I’m just saying the line was getting a little blurry. We never found a problem with my heart but it all later manifested as crippling hypochondria.

Eventually I just started blocking it all out. I stopped engaging when someone called me fat and started focusing on just getting the fuck away from them all. I refused to put myself down, out loud at least. I was going to train my brain to love the body it inhabited. And I did, kind of, for a while. I realized I never really had an issue with my body. I had an issue with everyone else having an issue with my body. Therapists, teachers, friends, family. Everybody felt the need to make a comment. And looking back, I nearly throw up. I was barely overweight. I was 150lbs when my father had me do my first glucose test. I will never understand how someone can become so fucking obsessed with the size of other people.

All of this was going pretty well until I went back to working at the haunted house. When you’ve spent years disciplining your brain into not hating everything about yourself, you stop hating other people too. You become a little kinder, a little softer. I was still new to this though and my newfound confidence was fragile at best. My new family quickly started to remind me of my old one. They were negative, toxic people. They were bitter at the way life had panned out for them and projected that onto everyone around them. No one was safe, and no one was your friend. When you’ve been on red alert since birth, you learn to recognize this pretty quick. So again, I just didn’t engage. I heard the horrible things they’d say but I let it roll off. The one time, in a moment of unbridled rage that I did stand up, I was immediately shot down. They pretended to handle the cause of the problem, but they looked at me with distain. It pissed them off that they had to take time out of their day to deal with a fat girl. They never said anything to me directly, but they always made sure I was in earshot. If I didn’t want to be called a whale, lose weight it’s not that hard. Stop being so sensitive. A stronger me would’ve said something. Burned the place down. Something. But I felt defeated. I was exhausted. These were supposed to be my friends and no one, NO ONE stepped up for me. It became crystal clear to me that no one would ever defend me in this life. All that negativity started to creep in, no matter how hard I fought it.

But I did fall in love at the haunt. And for a while he made me feel beautiful. I remember telling a friend of mine that it was the first time I’d ever felt comfortable sitting naked in front of someone without posing. But it brought to light a lot of insecurities I didn’t realize I was still hanging on to. He used to ask me to model lingerie for him anytime I bought it. I remember feeling overwhelming flattered that he would even want to see it, but also fucking terrified. So I refused, no matter how badly I wanted to do it. He eventually stopped asking, and my anxiety riddled brain concluded that it was because he didn’t find me sexy anymore. This idea backed by the fact that he only told me I was beautiful or that he loved me when he was drunk. He remained friends with the people at the haunt who put me down. I was left to assume he agreed with them. I want it to be known I don’t blame him for this. He had no idea what I was dealing with or where it all came from. I was afraid to have the conversation and my inability to do so is my own fault. He did the best he knew how to with what I gave him. I know that.

Sex has always made me feel empowered. It felt like a reclamation of my body. It was truly my liberation, but it would also be my downfall. To be as sexual as I am, I often don’t enjoy sex. I can never do the things I want to do, take control the way I want to, cum the way I want to, if I cum at all. I am forever thinking of what I might look like to them. What I smell like, what I move like. A fun side effect of severe hormonal imbalance is hirsutism, skin conditions, thinning hair. So not only am I fat, I’m hairy AF, have acne, and the hair that I do want is falling out. Do you know how fucking mortifying it feels to not be able to let a guy grab your ass because you know you haven’t fucking shaved it recently? And even when you do the window for feeling hairless is smalllll. My ex boyfriend probably only truly grabbed my ass a handful of times (there’s a pun there somewhere). But I couldn’t have that conversation with him. Wouldn’t. This is why I got into cosmetology so early. Fuck, it’s why I got into the tattoo industry too if I’m honest. If you don’t like the house, you paint the fucking walls right? It was just another (and admittedly much healthier) way of reclaiming my body.

If I am not the height of femininity, if I don’t ooze sex appeal and porn star magic, they won’t want me. I started placing a lot of my self worth in how sexually desirable I could be. Sex, at best, is an ego boost. And not a very good one. Since becoming single I’ve come into contact with a menagerie of men. They too have all had something to say. And they all play on a loop in my head. Here’s a list:

- “I’ve been with women with perfect bodies and ya know *side eye* not so perfect bodies.”

- “Ya know, if you were just a few inches taller you’d actually have a decent body.”

- “You remind me of Lardi B and she’s hot. I’m really into big girls. Send me a picture of your fat pussy.”

- “You know you’re a catfish, right?”

- “I’ll fuck anything, I used to hate fat chicks but honestly if you wanna fuck I’d be down.”

- “I secretly have a thing for bigger girls, but I’d never date one.”

I’ve shot down every invitation to hook up for the past year. I get on tinder for 5 seconds, immediately hear that catfish line in my head, and close back out again. I’ve stopped wearing makeup unless I have to. I dress in leggings and oversized tunics almost daily. I’ve come to terms with the fact that I have an eating disorder but have discussed it with no one. I do not know how to proceed from this point. I’m not at my lowest, but I’m somewhere close. My insecurities are my own problem but I don’t know how to get the reassurance I need without making it somebody else’s. But telling someone to call me beautiful, to gas me up, to put my mind at ease negates the point. I can’t place my self esteem in someone else’s hands. But my healing requires the ability to have that conversation. And that’s the hardest part.

I’m a grown woman now and my mother still grabs my double chin, just in case I forgot it was there. She still balks at my stretch marks. She recently told me she admired me for the way I dress. Said if she was my size she could never because she would be too ashamed. It was meant as a compliment. Funny how backhanded those can be sometimes. I think about her a lot and what kind of mother I would want to be. Both of my parents struggled with eating disorders. My mom still does. I know it’s the root of all her criticism. But I don’t want to be her. I don’t want to project my own trauma into my children one day. I think a lot about what I would say to 7 year old me. I’ve written her letters. Told her I was sorry for not loving her, for not being kinder. That it wasn’t her fault that the adults in her life failed her. I think of what I would say to a daughter. To a son. I like to imagine that I tell them these stories one day and they look at me in disbelief. I want self love to be so deeply ingrained that the concept of body shaming is unrealistic to them. But I can’t give them what I don’t have. So for now, I’ll work on that.

There is no real conclusion to this tale, I just needed to bitch for a minute.

0 notes

rebeccadunne · 7 years

Text

Your Chroma

by Sinead Gleeson from the latest edition of essential Irish literary journal Gorse

How does it start? The black of pre-consciousness, the pink

of uterine breaths, the red highways of arteries, splayed.

The beginning is red.

Fly over

This country

Of the body.

A spy photographer

On an aerial loop.

There is

breast and

brain and

bladder and

bowel.

Begin the descent to bone.

Dive into fissures of marrow,

To the source,

The red and white cells

of the blood.

Canada,

Japan,

Poland,

Peru.

Venal Vexillology.

III

To put down words about the body—medical, biological,

anatomical—is to present the body as fact. Its being in the

world—a being ‘being’—is irrefutable.

There is a photo of you. Your child body in a red dress at

a trout farm, the brown glitter of a fish wriggling on the

end of the rod’s line. You smile for the camera, and avoid

looking at the bubble of blood at its mouth. Its red gasps.

‘Colour is consciousness itself, colour is feeling,’ said William

Gass, who prioritised blue above red. Blue, he writes, is ‘most

suitable as the colour of interior life.’ Blue, above corporeal

red? What was he thinking?

How do we decide this interior colour? We are one colour in

life, another in death; one in youth, another in old age; one

in sickness, another in good health. We channel Yves Klein

and create a new shade for the interior. A born again hue.

VII

Because of his synaesthesia, Wassily Kandinsky associated

colours with shapes, and sounds. For him, red was a square,

the ‘sound of a loud drum beat.’

VIII

Repeat red over and over—red red red red red red red red

red red red red red red red red red red red red red red red

red red red red red—and it’s a hum, a drill, a drumroll. It is

also not-blue, not-green, not-black, not-white.

In the Tate, Rothko’s reds are dreamlike, hazy around

the edges. Are they on the canvas or under it, bleeding

through?

In an old cinema, long closed down, we watched Derek

Jarman’s Blue. I’m curious about his choice of colour, but

don’t question his motivation to use blue. In his book Chroma,

he says: ‘I know my colours are not yours. Two colours are

never the same, even if they’re from the same tube.’ I think

of his eyes and his failing sight. To be a person who has

spent their life looking, photographing, regarding—and

now cannot see.

You are both redheads, and tell me you like to mark this

by taking photos of the backs of your heads. You do this

in special places. Howth pier, the Cliffs of Moher, various

lighthouses.

XII

There is a black and white photo in a local newspaper,

dating from the 1930s. It’s creased, and heavily pixelated,

with that old photo blur. But it’s him, Red Con. This is the

only photo we’ve tracked down. I’ve never met him, nor has

my father, but we are related. I descend from red hair.

XIII

If blue, as Gass argues, is the colour of interior life, this

makes red a colour of the exterior. But red is the body. Red

is blood, organs, tendons, the red elements:

Rashes

Hives

Sores

The raised bridge of a new scar

Platelets working on the crust of a cut

The speckle of heat rash, like pebbles on the bed of a

stream.

XIV

Driving over the Golden Gate Bridge in a convertible,

sucking in cool Californian air, they argue about the shade

of the steel. Red. Scarlet. Terracotta. Red again, some

consensus. Circular talk of colour under the shadow of

heavy cables, but he knows the bridge’s shade is officially

called ‘International Orange.’ The company that makes the

paint sells a cheaper version called ‘Fireweed.’ He takes this

as a sign to roll a joint and tells his friends that 98% of

people who jump into the bay don’t survive. Those who do

always have the same injuries: broken vertebrae, smashed

ribs, punctured lungs.

You say tomato

I say blood

You say traffic light

I say muscle

You say fire engine

I say vein

XVI

LITTLE

Across the woods, basket swinging on a girlish arm, she

weaves off the path to pick flowers. Hood as protector—

stay hidden, girl, cover yourself up—in a tocsin shade of red.

Anti-camouflage. Here I am, come and get me! it says. And so

the wolf did.

RED

Get up! Her mother pulls the blanket off her teenage bed.

Take this to your granny, and wear your hood, it’s cold. The girl

is menstrual, cramped, innards torn. Her mother relents,

returning with a hot water bottle, and a box of Feminax.

There is a wolf in her womb, and she placates it with hot,

vulcanised rubber and codeine.

RIDING

The girl remarks on the size of her grandmother’s ears, eyes,

and teeth, failing to notice the lupine mouth, the rich pelt,

the cross-dressing, the anthropomorphic imposter in the

bed.

HOOD

In the belly of the wolf, she is safe. She cannot be eaten again.

Consumption saves her from more (male) consumption.

Stay hidden girl. Belly as cave.

XVII

Fairytales are always about women’s bodies. Rapunzel’s hair

and Sleeping Beauty’s somnolent face and Snow White

choking and Cinderella dancing with glass-slippered feet.

XVIII

Not glass slippers, but her aunt buys her red clogs, the first

shoes she ever loves. The heavy wooden stomp on the

concrete of the street, the scarlet curve of the leather a

possibility. She learns that women are meant to wear heels;

that heels appear to lengthen a woman’s leg, to accentuate

her calf, to make her more attractive. She decides she will

only wear clogs, or no shoes at all.

XVIX

Four women in black body con dresses gyrate to a 1980s

song. Robert Palmer, dressed like someone’s office manager

dad rolls through Addicted to Love. The women are heavily

made up, their eye shadow a palette of storm-cloud colours,

but it’s their lipstick I’m obsessed with: my mother’s matt

pinks and creamy browns having nothing on this. This red is

a declaration of war. The gloss is so high it looks like glass.

I practise on my lips with saliva. The models are arranged

democratically, two either side of Palmer. The only contrast

in uniformity is their faces and length of their dresses. Their

whiteness is a shock, the scraped-back hair severe. These

porcelain-faced, storm-eyed she-tomatons are part homage

to Art Deco painter Patrick Nagel’s women. The shock and

sheen of their scarlet lips is the only thing that interrupts their

monochrome faces. Is it because it’s the ’80s that the scene

is so homogenous, so lacking in multiculturalism? White

bodies the epitome of capitalism, even in pop music.

How should we present our face to the world?

How should we present our (female) face to the world?

Make-upped, pore-blocked in shades of ivory and sand.

Brow-arched, lash-lacquered, glitter-lidded. Branded by

brands.

XXI

We used to paint our lips with whale blubber, but now it’s

mostly wax and oils. I have yet to find the perfect shade of

red lipstick. Too orange, too ephemeral, too knife slash.

XXII

I once worked as editor of a spa magazine. I wrote dull

copy about acrylic nails and Glycolic peels, and was sent

endless products: emery boards and seaweed unguents,

poultices and tanning sprays; exfoliation aids in wood and

sisal. I interviewed a woman who gave facials with coloured

oils selected for a person’s mood and personality. Part spa

treatment, part mystical woo. In her tiny salon, above a pub,

she told me about oneness and inner beauty, self-examination

and higher powers. After a pause in her well-rehearsed pitch,

she pointed to a fleshy bump on my forehead and said:

Would you not get that removed?

XXIII

In 1967, Irish-born writer Lucy Grealy moved to the US

with her family. Life opened up with possibility, but aged

nine she was diagnosed with Ewing’s Sarcoma, a rare facial

cancer. Grealy endured thirty operations, radiation and

chemotherapy. In Autobiography of a Face, her novelistic

memoir, she writes: ‘This singularity of meaning—I was

my face, I was ugliness—though sometimes unbearable, also

offered a possible point of escape. It became the launching

pad from which to lift off, the one immediately recognisable

place to point to when asked what was wrong with my life.

Everything led to it, everything receded from it—my face as

personal vanishing point.’

XXIV

I have never broken a limb, even if my bones are

troublesome.

I have never needed stitches because of a cut.

I have never exposed my insides except for surgical

wounds.

My skin resealed with metal, paper and thread.

XXV

When my teenage hip started to disintegrate, baffled doctors

kept asking increasingly random questions:

Did you fall?

(Who doesn’t?)

Have you ever been knocked down by a car? (Once, but the driver

was going slow and we lived in a cul-de-sac.)

Have you ever had a tropical disease? (Can you get one from

going to Spain?)

Have you ever been bitten by an animal or strange creature? (I tell

him about Lough Derg.)

XXVI

At Dromineer, Lough Derg was like a beach. I swam out

far from the shore to float in the navy current that skirted

the lake like isobars. Swimming back, I stood when the

water was knee high, and felt a sharp pinch on my foot. It

wasn’t glass, and felt more like a bite, but I couldn’t see what

lurked beneath. I thought of monsters and sea demons, the

creature of the lake. There are not enough horror films set

underwater.

XXVII

A hotel exterior, painted walls, a fleeing woman in a scarlet

coat, the vertical lines of blood on a hanging woman’s legs, a

nosebleed, a trickle from a mouth. In Suspiria, Dario Argento

reminds us that we bleed; that the body is vulnerable—not

just to psychologies and fear—but to knives and violence.

The body is the ultimate horror setting.

XXVIII

I look at the mottled skin at your back as a forensic scientist

examines blood splatter.

XXIX

After major surgery:

I wake up to find my skin yellow and assume this is iodine

or antiseptic used to prep the body for being opened to the

elements.

I wake up to find that this yellow is not an ointment, but

bruising, from the pressure of knives, the kneading of

hands.

I wake up to red and yellow patches, pools of colour, the

body’s semaphore.

I wake up during hip replacement surgery and feel strong

hands shoving, the weight of arms, a rearrangement.

Who’s pushing me? I ask, before the anaesthetist tops up

the spinal block, shoving me back under the waves.

XXX

Arthritis and surgery withered my bones. My left leg is

thinner than the right, full of metal and scars. Frida Kahlo’s

right leg was thinner than her left, a result of childhood polio.

Kahlo painted not just her body, not just pain, but body and

pain united. Exposed spinal columns, a womb that triggered

miscarriages, herself pierced by nails in multiple works. In

her diary, she wrote: ‘I am DISINTEGRATION.’

XXXI

Eventually Kahlo’s leg was amputated below the knee and

in 1953, a year before her death, she had a prosthetic limb

made. A laced-platform boot with Chinese embroidery in

red leather. Red as defiance, and for the body and for all the

blood she’d shed.

XXXII

For nearly three months, I wore a cast that covered most

of me. When it was removed, the skin had piled up, and

looked like wax. The sediment of immobility. Removing it

was like rubbing smudges on a windowpane. I felt like a

snake shedding its skin.

XXXIII

Bones are hard as rock but our edges—skin, lids—are not

shores. The body is an island of sorts, containing several

isthmuses, in the throat, fallopian tube, prostate, thyroid,

urethra, aorta, uterus. Body as outpost, as tidal island.

XXXIV

In Northern Ireland we pass bays and inlets, but also red

phone boxes, red postboxes. Imperial, post-Colonial red.

The red stripe of St George’s flag, many Red Hands of

Ulster.

XXXV

I think of you as though you are a map. Of the contours of

your jaw, the hill of your back, the compass of your arms. I

see them now, at 10 and 2, an almost-Jesus on a cross. I try

to imagine your body at 11:11, or 12:34.

XXXVI

We play The Alphabet Body game and you laugh when I get

Z. What about Zinn’s Zonule? I offer, but you think I’m making

it up. The suspensory ligament holding the crystalline lens

of the eye in place. It’s not immediately tangible; there are

no children’s flash cards like there are for eye or mouth.

Zygomatic Bone you say, and ask me its location. It sounds like

zygote, so I guess it is uterine or cervical. I’ll answer by kissing

you there you say, and brush your lips against my cheekbone.

XXXVII

After the birth of my daughter, by C-section, my husband

said he looked up at the wrong time and saw my intestines.

The operating theatre floor looked like a murder had been

committed. And you were red too on the outside, viscous

and slippery as albumen, but your skin was blue, your lungs

working to inflate.

XXXVIII

After the birth of my son, he weighs no more than a couple

of bags of sugar, but I cannot pick him up. A new pain

in my wrist is intense, and feels close to the surface, like

someone tipping a scalding cup over it. I take a glass lift five

floors to see a man who will fix it. De Quervain’s Syndrome,

he says. Can you get it from lifting babies, who are light,

almost not there? Two tendons wrap around each other in a

red embrace. One surgical slit with a scalpel, like a ribbon-

cutting ceremony and it will be free. This injury is also called

Washerwoman’s Sprain (not Washerman’s).

XXXIX

The patron saint of childbirth, St. Margaret of Antioch, was

a committed virgin. Tortured for her faith, her flesh slashed

with nails, she was given the title after an encounter with

a dragon. The creature swallowed her whole, so Margaret

made the sign of the cross and promptly burst out of its

stomach, Alien-style. (Film critic Mark Kermode once said

that Alien is a film about male fear of childbirth).

I know a girl with Rosacea, which makes me think of

‘Rosary,’ not red. The skin is affected with papules and

pustules, reminding me of holy beads. I love these words

for awful things, and the galaxy of red under the moons of

her eyes.

XLI

You do not own your body if you live in this country. Your

womb is not under your control. Legislation owns your

ovaries. Lawyers lay claim to your fallopian tubes. The

government pays stamp duty on your cervix.

XLII

Tick tock, women’s body clocks.

Have a baby even though you’re not ready.

Have a baby when you can’t afford a home.

Have a baby when you’ve been raped.

Have a baby because you can’t afford the airfare to London

or Liverpool.

Have a baby between twenty and thirty-four, it’s the optimum

fertility window, they

keep

reminding

us.

The ticking of ovaries, your body as timepiece, swinging on

a chain.

XLIII

Heads, shoulders, knees and toes, knees and toes.

HIPS! TITS! LIPS! POWER! (REPEAT)

XLIV

Once you enter the medical system, there are rooms and

hospital numbers, blue disposable gowns and Styrofoam

cups. There are people speaking—always speaking—asking

questions, taking details. The body you think of as yours

is not private. It is in the system, on charts, in operating

theatres. Your body needs to take the lift to x-ray. Your body

needs to drink more fluids. Your body needs to come back

in three months. Your body is ours.

XLV

Just before her lumpectomy, photographer Jo Spence wrote

on her left breast: Property of Jo Spence? The question mark is

defiant and panic-stricken. The need to hold on to this part

of herself. To assert autonomy, even over the toxic growth

in her chest. To have a say in her own medical life. Later,

post-lumpectomy, Spence is photographed in profile, breast

puckered and scarred. Wearing a crash helmet, the image is

uncompromising. Come at me, it says.

XLVI

In the hospital, you are not supposed to use your hands.

In the bathroom, toilets flush and taps spill and blue

paper towels dispense with the wave of a sensor. Germs,

cleanliness, DO NOT TOUCH. The ward is a bubble,

confined and contained, and I feel like Margaret Atwood’s

‘Girl Without Hands.’

No one can enter that circle

you have made, that clean circle

of dead space you have made

and stay inside,

mourning because it is clean.*

XLVII

He used to give himself stigmata. Burning the hollow of his

hand with cigarettes. Pressing the red sieve tip into his heart

line, head line, life line. This is for you, he said, but I know it

connected him to himself.

XLVIII

The Catholic Church’s list of notable stigmatics is comprised

mostly of women, including St. Catherine of Siena. Born in

the mid-fourteenth century, she believed she was married

to Jesus, and that her (invisible) wedding ring was made of

his foreskin. Her stigmatic wounds were visible only to her,

and she suffered from anaemia. Every day, she fasted and

engaged in self-flagellation until she drew blood. In one of

many letters to her confessor, Raymond of Capua, she spoke

of a vision where she leads her followers into the wound in

Christ’s side, guiding an army into his blood.

XLIX

My birthday is the anniversary of the death of St. Ignatius

Loyola. Once a soldier, he was shot through the hip,

shattering his leg. I’ve never gone to war or been beatified.

There is no redness in death. Maybe this is where William

Gass’ interior blue comes in. But the body turns many

colours at the end: white, grey, blue, purple, a tinge of green.

The body spent and stopped and still is not red.

But when will the red stop?

When will I die?

When will you?

#sinead gleeson #gorse #literary journal #writing #new irish writing #irish #your chroma #red

4 notes · View notes