steve harrington realizing that he’s got no purpose if he’s not protecting the people he loves from outer-dimensional beings, and has a minor (read: major) spiral about it post-vecna & the party fixing everything. he’s just a regular ole 20 something with no purpose— his friends are all in school, except eddie, who managed to pick up an apprenticeship as an electrician; putting all of that wire knowledge to use (just not in cars, he hasn’t hotwired one since 1986 and he’d like to keep it that way si vous plais) and making the rich houses have even cooler guts than they deserve.
the kids end up graduating (their first tries) and heading as one little pack to the same school (don’t ask me which, i’m a college drop out) and steve, eddie, and rob end up staying just outside of indy. rob finished school early, because of course she did, and she found that she may have a knack for hanging around high schoolers, so why not teach them how to become polyglots like she is?
steve still doesn’t know what the fuck he’s doing— he bartends at a little club in the gayborhood, because they went there so often that the bartenders just kind of pushed him into it, and don’t get him wrong— mixing drinks and flirting all night is super fun, but it also… is kind of depressing? even if he gets to be around people like him and see them happy— he knows that a lot of alcohol and drugs causes that happiness and he wants so badly for his people to be out and proud and not murdered for it. but he can’t do that,, so he does the next best thing.
he talks with one of the regulars, andy, who owns a little tattoo shop on the corner, and andy invites him to come check it out. so he does the next day he’s free, and holy fucking christ. tattoos aren’t his thing— at least not on himself, but on other people they’re gorgeous. and they’re painful, but you’re turning the pain into art and you get to live with it in your skin and look at it and think about the fact that you’re here and you made it and you fucking survived. and people purposefully put scars into their bodies? and not in the i-battled-literal-other-dimensional-beings-and-won kind of way, or the i-battled-my-personal-demons-and-won kind of way, which both are things he’s dealt with so fucking intimately— but in the i-will-decorate-this-flesh-prison-and-make-it-a-castle kind of way, and that’s fucking beautiful. queer people taking their bodies and making them into art with ink and hot metal and needles and the love that they have for each other and the passion and the fucking spite at the world that keeps them going and making their presences KNOWN.
and maybe he gets some piercings while he’s there— it’s fascinating and feels so weird and freeing when the needle punctures his flesh and the jewelry goes in— and now he’s got a shiny little ring hanging through his earlobe; his nostril; his lip.
he learns that piercings take time and effort and care and that he has to treat himself with love to be able to heal— and that he is deserving of that love and care and dedication, especially from himself.
he keeps going back, maybe not always to get stabbed, but to watch others have it done. to see how different people’s anatomy takes different piercings, how he can’t have a piercing through his cheeks because he bites them too much when he’s anxious, but the girl that just left got both of hers done and they looked good. they fit her face, like little shiny dimples.
eventually, the piercer, killie, asks steve when he’s going to help them with their needles and their piercings— and he doesn’t know how to react because he hadn’t even thought about it and yet… maybe he could help other people fall in love with themselves and their bodies and help turn them into art one day
maybe he could be a pretty boy with his scars and his metal and his missing chunks and his polos and his jeans and his sneakers.
387 notes
·
View notes
a big part of what makes eiffel feel like such a real person to me is that he's so average and unfulfilled even by attainable metrics. like, not even getting into any pop culture escapist fantasies. eiffel is the kind of guy who thinks if he was born a few decades earlier he'd be a traveling musician living out of a van, but realistically he'd be doing more or less the same stuff. he could be a local radio dj or a guy with a used record store or drive an old truck and have a yard full of rusty old cars up on cinder blocks he's trying to revitalize. he could be a skater, if he had the patience, and, um. the balance. zach once said that if eiffel had the money he'd buy a motorcycle and never learn how to ride it, just take a bunch of pictures of himself with it and tinker with it constantly, and if anyone asked why he doesn't ride it, he'd keep saying he wants to do some more work on it first. i think about that so much. there are a lot of things that he could do, that fit his sort of character archetype, and they aren't even remarkable things, but he doesn't. eiffel drove a corolla and worked at pizza hut and probably lived in a shitty apartment. sincerely, this is the best thing about him. this is why he's a real guy to me.
100 notes
·
View notes
We only see each other at funerals
(On Jason, Thalia, Nico, Bianca, and their parallels/connections)
The Titan's Curse (Rick Riordan), @/anxiousmaya_, Right Now (Gracie Abrams), The Battle of the Labyrinth (Rick Riordan), Joan of Arc (Mary Gordon), The Lost Hero (Rick Riordan), Episodes Toward and Elegy for Halley's Comet (Lindsey Drager), Jason Grace (Riordan Wiki), The Gods Show Up (Michael Kinnucan), The House of Hades (Rick Riordan), What the Living Do (Marie Howe), The House of Hades (Rick Riordan), Planet of Love (Richard Siken), The Blood of Olympus (Rick Riordan), Tangerine (Nolune), The Blood of Olympus (Rick Riordan), The Blood of Olympus (Rick Riordan), I Bet On Losing Dogs (Mitski), The Burning Maze (Rick Riordan), @/abhorarchive (Twitter), The Burning Maze (Rick Riordan), Seventeen (MARINA), The Burning Maze (Rick Riordan), @/rollercoasterwords, The Tyrant's Tomb (Rick Riordan), @/the-overanalyst, Where Things Come Back (John Corey Whaley), Grit (Silas Denver Martin), Softcore (The Neighbourhood), The Tower of Nero (Rick Riordan), Frost (Mitski), @/moonbends, I'm Your Man (Mitski), Sun Bleached Flies (Ethel Cain), The Tower of Nero (Rick Riordan), Three (Sleeping At Last), My Art
112 notes
·
View notes
Forget the IF, just wanted to check in and see if YOU were okay dear author? I hope everything is well. I know you have a process lol, but I miss seeing you on my TL from time to time.
oh, kjsdhfjskdf . how sweet<3 thank you for this! I am doing well, crafting ouro alongside some personal shifts and growth and setbacks and victories. it has been a godsend to take all this pressure off for this period and do things my way. though, I'll say: while it has taken and will probably take another while, this silence will be broken at some point. I'll avoid saying soon only because I'm staunchly sticking to my pace&process.
however !! I finished the draft for the first book yesterday. !! I am currently doing some hefty edits, collecting art and testing coding (&learning something new a hundred times over, over, again, whether it be storycrafting, interactivity, ui design, social media, art, code ... the list goes on) and so for the most part, I'm having a good time, as long as we count the entire spectrum of the human condition as a mostly good time. pfft.
I miss hanging out here too! I genuinely can't wait to get back to online shenanigans once I feel ready for it; if you'll have me, of course. I can imagine that this type of secret development is frustrating and everyone has their limit.
It means a lot that you sent this my way. Hope you're doing well too. <3
76 notes
·
View notes
we're sitting under the stars on my best friend's balcony,
and everyone but us have gone in for the night. I've just told you, hazy and drunk, that my astrology app feeds me bullshit every day, and sometimes I'm weak enough to believe it. But most of the time it's bullshit.
I don't know why I told you - to you, the stars are lifeblood, or at least a personality gauge based on spinning planets and hair size. "Leos are known for their big hair," you'd said, maybe only a few hours prior. I can't remember why I chose that bone to pick - I think I've reached a barrel-scraping desperation where I feel the need to assert, over and over again, that 'I defy you, stars!' even though it would be much easier to say that mercury in retrograde may be causing my acute depression.
You pull up your astrology app. We're friends on there, and I think I remember checking our compatibility and feeling drawn to the sex & love section, but that would be ridiculous. There's something in the bullshit my astrology app fed to me that I read out loud in drunken amusement that resonated with who I am in your eyes, sitting in front of you under the stars. Your app tells you that you might experience a big change when the sun comes up, that you'll have to reach for it with both hands, and I see your eyes flick over to me.
There's a defense mechanism that locks in, underneath my skin, that acts as a human deterrent. I look at my best friend and there is something primal and soft that begs to lean my body against her and touch her with a casual intimate care. But when she laced her fingers with mine, pushing up against my stiff palm like digging through stone, I had to look away. She knelt down by her puppy and took my hand in hers, pressing my knuckles to her forehead to show her puppy that I am safe, that I can be trusted, but the little creature watched me like a sentinel behind my best friend's back, wary and right.
I think I told you it might be bullshit; I can only remember myself contrary in the string lights. You insisted that it could be true. "What if everything changes," you said, "what if it's right and today" - we were far past midnight - "and today the-"
"The world ends?" I finished for you.
I don't think that's what you wanted to hear, the careless laughing way I said it. I stared at the back of my best friend's house today, hours after you left, and I thought about fate. I bent over backwards and stared up at the stars, framed by the staircase up to the porch we sat. The world didn't end, nor did it change substantially, and I'll admit I didn't want either. I want to stay the same forever, but the goddamn stars keep moving.
I've played this game before, and I've been the one to lose every time. I'd like to say I'm a good sport, but there's only so many hits you can take before it starts getting personal, and I'm afraid my jagged edges are sharpening in preparation. I can't let you be another meteorite I strain every muscle to push to the top of the hill only to fall back in the same bloody crater. You have to understand; where you see fate in the stars, glinting just for you, all I can see is apocalypse.
(28 August 2023, 3:26 am)
167 notes
·
View notes
stormy weather
jason todd x gender neutral reader. 720 words.
notes: a very abstract take on 'write a true story about you with characters instead of people', one of the prompts from the ever lovely @reaperintheroses drabble december! this was more 'write about feelings', but i tried.
warnings: vague bad headspace on jason's part
he was in a mood.
you weren't sure what mood, but it wasn't good.
it was, however, familiar enough that you weren't surprised when he walked through the bedroom like a ghost.
all he took with him as he left it was a nail file.
you sat quietly, listening for the window.
there it was, about half a minute later: the sliding sound of the window in the frame was quiet but unmistakable, as was the sound of it sliding shut behind him.
fire escape brooding.
you sighed- that was a surefire sign that the mood had settled in completely. you had hoped, somewhat naïvely, that it would be a "wrong side of the bed" situation; had hoped he would be able to shake it off.
with the mood here to stay, you put your phone aside and slid out of bed.
it wasn't something to fix. not days like this. as much as you wished you could carry the weight of this for him, you settled instead for trying to share the load.
you took your time walking through the apartment, giving him his space for a little while as you boiled water and steeped tea for him.
you dug out his largest, warmest sweatshirt, tugging it on to brace against the cold you knew was wrapped around him both mentally and literally. then, with a glance at his silhouette in the window, you picked up his mug and approached.
he barely reacted to the sound of the window opening, only shifting slightly so his ear was towards you in silent acknowledgement.
"i made tea," you said softly, leaning on the sill. "interested?"
jason hesitated a moment, the only sounds the traffic below.
he shrugged, twirling the nail file between two fingers.
you reached over, gently pressing the mug into his free hand, watching as he pulled it to his chest with a hum.
"do you want space, or would you prefer i join you?"
"...you can." his voice was steady, but uncharacteristically quiet and lifeless. "not gonna be much company right now."
you slid out the window, closing it behind you, and he glanced up at you blankly. "you don't have to be," you said firmly, quietly, as you sat down beside him. "i'm just here."
the metal was freezing, even through your thick sweatpants. it would take more than a stretch of the imagination to call it comfortable, but you settled in like it was memory foam.
you sat in silence, listening to him breathe beside you and watching it fog in your peripheral.
you sat until your legs ached and your nose felt about ready to fall off from the cold. you sat for far longer than it took him to drain his mug. you sat long enough that the rush of lunch traffic came and went below you.
you sat watching gray clouds churn in the sky, offering the only comfort you could: he wasn't alone.
eventually, he inhaled deeply, and you felt something shift.
"you want a grilled cheese?" his voice was rough and quiet, but using it was a good sign.
you recognized the offer as the thank you that it was.
"yeah," you matched his volume, gently breaking your silence. "that sounds good."
it wasn't over, not by a long shot. you could feel it in the air around you, as though jason was a storm and the front was rolling in. it would be a few days, you suspected, of this- of disconnect, of that distant look in his eyes.
and that was the best case scenario.
he pushed himself up and off the ground, wincing when his bad ankle popped unpleasantly, and you changed your mind. he wasn't the storm. a storm in his own right, sure, strong and beautiful and immovable to all the world, but in this case he was standing on the coast and watching the storm turn the ocean angry.
he reached a hand down to help you up.
you took it, squeezing it once, twice, three times in quick succession as you hauled yourself to your feet. once there, you relaxed your grip.
he kept his, keeping your palm against his own. bracing himself against the wind.
you'd be damned if you let him board up the windows and sandbag the doorways on his own.
680 notes
·
View notes