#but i do think there's a massive failure of imagination around melissa and who she is and what her future could look like

[aspirationalpeony]

Yeah, I don't think I want to keep watching the episode tonight. It's understandable that they'd go in this direction and I hope the next 50 minutes will take things down a different path, but I don't have a lot of hope and it's just... Not interesting to me. It's just disappointing and frustrating. We'll see what happens, I guess, but I'm not interested in keeping myself awake when I have work tomorrow, just to be frustrated and saddened by another incredibly boring heterosexual storyline.

[chaosmagetwin]

The Wild Adventures of Ashley and Paul: Chapter 2

Lot’s to cover in this chapter! If you just want the story, but don’t want to get accidentally spoiled, don’t read the prompt list, or the Extra Errata (all in one link below). The Prologue and Chapter 1 are also linked below, so you can catch up on the story, or refresh yourself, if you are interested.

Enjoy!

The Prompt list with extra errata! : http://chaosmagetwin.tumblr.com/post/157916938995/100-dialogue-prompts-part-2

Prologue: http://chaosmagetwin.tumblr.com/post/157921576040/the-wild-adventures-of-ashley-and-paul-prologue

Chapter 1: http://chaosmagetwin.tumblr.com/post/157956747605/the-wild-adventures-of-ashley-and-paul-chapter-1

“Listen, I know you’re upset, but please put the baking soda down before someone gets hurt.”

“But, Paul! I can’t live without you! Once this baking soda hits the vinegar, carbon dioxide will fill this chamber, and we’ll die together! Free from the constraints of society!”

“Melissa, I am not the man you should be dying for. For you see... I am half machine! My lungs are steel, and your scheme would never fulfill it’s intended purpose.”

Ashley sighed, staring with glazed eyes at the old film from nearly a hundred years prior. Paul, the lead character, wore tinfoil and had a riveted steel body beneath his clothes, but otherwise looked like a walking trashcan. The science fiction story was supposed to be a classic in romantic tragedy. The woman, not caring that Paul wouldn’t die after he admitted he didn’t like her, commit suicide in the end. Paul would lament at the loss of the love of his life that he hadn’t realized he loved at the end. All in all, it was the most boring character study she’d ever been forced to watch by her ‘Genre’ Teacher. 

In fact, she was pretty certain the only reason they were being forced to watch it was because of her and Paul. Mr. Albrexek liked that sort of thing. He also enjoyed cringe-worthy line delivery and ancient movies with cliche characters. 

She looked over at Paul and saw him raise an eyebrow at her. “You’re not planning on trying to kill us both with a five year old’s volcano, are you?” They both grinned widely as the class burst out. 

“Yes. For my grand master plan, I must first visit the courts, and change my name to Melissa-”

“Quiet during the movie, please.” She bit her tongue and sighed. She had such a great joke lined up, too. She looked back at the movie, and felt like putting her head through her desk. These lines were going to kill her brain cells.

Ashley yawned as the English class ended, her brain feeling.... fuzzy. She watched as Paul stooped to exit the classroom door, feeling drained amusement as he struggled to hit his shoulder through as well. The people behind him were looking slightly frustrated; that was the days last class for Character High, and they just wanted to get home. 

A few moments of bemusement later, and he was finally through, with only minor damage to the frame of the door. She followed as they quietly headed for the exit. 

“Look, about the monkey...” Ashley blinked when she realized he was talking. “I was thinking maybe we could save some up for that new game you wanted. Maybe play co-op together or something?”

“... The monkey?” She asked, confused, her tired brain wheeling while trying to understand. Save up... monkey. For a game? Was there a game where they had to collect monkeys in order to unlock co-op?

“No, money. Money, Ash. The green. The coins. Da monah.” He raised an eyebrow at her as she realized what he had said. She flushed slightly and shrugged. “Wow, you are really out of it,” he said with a grin. “Want to grab some coffee before we go home, or just go and take a nap?”

She rolled her eyes. “No, I don’t need caffeine. How do you want to save up? I mean... according to our now dead author, we should be going out to eat.”

He grinned. “Yeah, but, I’ve never tried cooking before, and who knows, maybe I’m good at it. No reason to not try. We just keep on doing what we were doing already.”

She nodded. “I get the feeling, though, that you won’t be any better at cooking than me. He seemed pretty resolute that we should be going out.”

“Yeah, I get the feeling we both did things he didn’t like.”

She tapped a finger against her thigh for a moment, before saying “Do you think he wanted stereotypical characters? I mean, we’re... not exactly normal. You’re an emotional and intellectual cyborg who likes reading, and I’m a half demon-”

“Half devil.”

“.... Are we really going to argue over the semantics of my heritage? Half-demon girl who doesn’t worship Satan and make blood sacrifices to the old gods or whatever.”

“Also, you’re actually nice, not a ‘soul’ sucker, and you don’t get irrationally angry or try to make plans to take over the world. As far as I know.”

She grinned. “As far as you know. “ She pushed open the glass door to the exit and put her face into the sunlight to bask in the warmth. A beautiful spring day, the scent of flowers on the wind, with just the right amount of humidity to promise rain later in the afternoon. It was a lie, but it still felt nice. It was, technically speaking, winter, and South California didn’t exactly get rain too much. 

She flinched as the door crunched behind her, and she turned to look with an exasperated expression. Paul stood with his arm through the door, an embarrased look on his face, a single finger pointed forward. “I don’t understand! I only used a finger! A finger shouldn’t break glass doors.”

“It’s not as hard as you think, I promise.” She said through her face-palm. “You have a steel finger, and you used your entire arm.. not a single finger. You just... condensed the force of your entire arm into the finger. Come on, man, you know physics as well as I do.”

He sighed and carefully pushed on the bar to open the door and stepped onto the broken glass. “I took it slow and everything.” A moment later, a teacher poked their head around the corner. “Oh, boy.”

“NOT AGAIN! You’ve got to be kidding me! That’s the fourth time this week! What is it with you students and breaking doors?! Just OPEN them! Why is that so hard?!” Her shrill voice echoed in the concrete courtyard. “Just... get out of here. And be more careful! I swear, if i ONLY put students who broke doors into detention, I’d have a full class after school every day!” Ashley stepped back from the teacher and motioned for Paul to follow while she ranted. 

“Yeah... let’s... let’s be more careful about that. She looks like she’s about to have an aneurysm or something...”

“Come on, come on, go go go, NOOO! Damn!” Paul raised an eyebrow at the living room on the other side of the wall from the Kitchen. Ashley was obviously trying to beat something on one of her games. “Okay, now, this time, DON’T JUMP OFF THE CLIFF! Just... walk. Straight. NO! Straight! Now dodge! DODGE DAMN IT. Fuck! I HATE THESE CONTROLS!” He smirked as she vented her frustrations. Black Spirit 3 was giving her as much trouble as he expected it would. Still, she was already better at it than he was. He never was very good at action type games. Plus, if he got too focused on the game, controllers tended to break by virtue of accidentally increasing his grip a thousand-fold while trying to press a button harder or something. 

While she struggled with beating a couple of enemies, he struggled with cooking. He could watch videos on the internet literally while he was standing in the kitchen trying to cook what they were showing him, but it wasn’t helping his skill. The meatloaf he was trying to make had eggshells in it, and the various spatula’s he was trying to use instead of his hands weren’t doing the job of mixing the meat very well. He was seriously considering just ordering take-out and giving up for the night. He shuddered at the imagined feel of eggshell while he bit into what should have been tasty meatloaf. Gross. He checked the clock. Six. He had an hour before he thought Sarah, Karen, and Keith showed up, but that wasn’t enough time to cook the meatloaf and eat. 

“I’m going to order take-out!” He yelled from the kitchen. 

“Okay! What kind?”

“Chinese?” 

“Sure. Uhh.... Kung Pao. DAMN. No! Just... GIVE ME MY SPIRITS BACK, you ROLLING SKELETON FUCKS! THIEFS! AMBUSHERS IN THE NIGHT! I WILL END YOU!”

He grinned. “Just don’t curse the television, okay? Or the console!”

“Yeah, yeah... You know what the internet says when I look on it for help, or strategies? GET GOOD. Like thats helpful. Fuckers.”

“Hey, careful.Let’s try and keep the demon cursing to a minimum. Last thing we need is your brother showing up.”

“Ha, ha, very funny. HAH! TAKE THAT! BESTOC BUFFS! EAT MY SHINY METAL-” he ignored the rest of the sentence as he carefully typed in the numbers on his phone for the chinese resteraunt. 

“Ash, I’m on the phone in a bit.”

“And! Okay. I’ll be quiet now.” She lowered her shouting at the game to what he imagined was some angry muttering. 

A few minutes of talking on the phone, cleaning up his failure of a dinner, and getting the gunk out of the joints on his fingers, he sat down on the couch next to Ashley, careful not to come down too hard. She was furiously mashing buttons in a timed rhythm that somehow got her derpy looking anime character to dodge-roll a massive bosses swings and then poke it with a long, but exceedingly thin sword. The numbers were unimpressive at best, considering how much was being shaved off at a time. 

He could actually hear the moment she mistimed the dodge and got flattened into a pancake. 

“Okay.... I think I’m done for tonight. I can’t handle anymore.” She put the controller down and shook her head with a deep breath. She looked over him and raised an eyebrow, her eyes lighting up. “So... what do you want to do now?”

He blushed and quickly said “We have guests over in like... ten minutes. And the food will be here soon.”

She laughed raucously. “Okay, fair.” She leaned closer to him and seemed about to say something when the door knocked. Her face immediately darkened. “Darnit,” she muttered and got up.

He could only titter in response. Whenever Ashley got flirty, his mind didn’t work so good. Actually, it felt like the distinct impressions of a blue screen, without the actual crash. 

“Ah, thanks. Here you go... oh, wow, this smells great. THANK YOU!” She yelled as the car was already pulling away. He had barely realized she had actually made it to the door. He shook his head to clear it. She reappeared at the door, and set the take-out boxes on the coffee table. “So, uhm, question.” She was heading for the door again as he opened one of the boxes. “Why did you invite Keith?”

“To mess with you. Besides, the guy could probably use some friends, too.” He broke his chopsticks carefully along the seam and stirred the food. “He’s not that different from me. He’s just trying to fit in.”

“Yeah, but...” She sighed from the kitchen. Something clattered as well. “I dunno. You’re right, of course, it’s just that I don’t like him. He’s not funny, or knowledgeable like you. I’m not even sure what House he’s from.”

“He’s from Side Character Dorm, not a house.”

“Oh. Well, that explains a little bit, I guess. Still... are you sure?”

Paul nodded as she came back in with a couple plates. 

They’d been eating for a few minutes when a light knock sounded from the door. Ashley got up again, still chewing. 

“Agh! Kairn! Come onh en. Ah, sorry.” Karen giggled and and the two showed up at the entryway again. “Sorry, we’re still eating.”

“No problem! Hey Paul!” He waved carefully, his mouth still full from his own bite. He raised an eyebrow at her in a silent question.

“What?”

Ashley grinned. “You said you would bring pajamas, but I don’t think he thought you meant that you would only bring pajamas.” He nodded. It wasn’t that he minded. Karen was a tall but cute blonde-haired witch. Her pajama’s were simple ones with chibi anime witches patterned on it. Strangely, she still had her witches hat and a wand was stuck in the waistband of the pajama bottoms on her hip. 

“Also,” he said after swallowing, “didn’t you say you were bringing some others?”

She nodded, and made a small shrug. “The two I invited declined. They said something about needing a lizard-mammal, but... i don’t know what that is.”

“A lizard mammal?” Ashley and Paul echoed.

“Hey, I don’t pretend to understand. I asked my Magical Creatures teacher, but she didn’t know about anything like that besides a Chimera. The way they were talking about it, it sounded small, so... unless they were trying to get babies? I dunno. What are you guys up to?”

“Well, I was going to try mackin’ on my boy, but common decency, limited time, and food interrupted.” Ashley said quickly, her eyes darting to watch his face turn red. Karen giggled with a hint of nervousness. 

“Oh, uh, sorry to interrupt.” 

“Nah, it’s fine. Why’d you need to get out of your house?” Karen’s face darkened. 

“Ugh. My roommate. He’s a total douche. He keeps using scrying spells and and he tries spells he finds on the internet every few days. The last one turned him into a newt.”

“A newt?”

“Yeah. It’s unfortunate, but he got better. I just needed to get out for awhile, you know?”

Ashley nodded. “Wild House is pretty quiet, usually.”

“Except for the shouting at T.V. screens.” Paul added. Ashley shrugged in response. “I’ll grab you a chair or something.”

The door knocked again as Paul got up. “I got it. Might as well grab a few more chairs while you’re at it.” Ashley said as she went for the door again. “Sarah! Hi. Come on in.”

Paul snickered as he heard the response while digging in the hall closet. “Well, this is what I call a hell of a night!” Ashley groaned loudly. “Also, I passed by the school on the way here. Any of you guys see what happened?”

“See what?” Came Karen. 

“The schools gone. Just gone, like.. it’s an empty lot.”

Paul and Ashley spoke at the same time. “That’s impossible.”

Ashley continued. “How could an entire school just disappear?” Paul returned to the living room with three fold out chairs with cushions on them as Sarah shrugged. 

“How would I know? I’m from Murder Mystery House, not ‘School Disappearing Mystery House’. I would say one of our stories started, but the Magical Girls still go to school.”

“Yeah, but Magical Girls tend to have their stories in school.” Was Karen’s response.

“Says the magical girl.” Paul set the chairs up as he spoke. 

“Uhm, I’m a witch, thanks. Totally different.”

“... Unh hunh,” Everyone replied.

[buzzandnova]

Mother Writes Offensively Tone-Deaf Letter About Her Daughter’s Wedding, Becomes Internet Villain

A mom is attracting attention in the most recent Dear Prudence column on Slate for writing what may be the most insensitive missive to the advice columnist ever about her daughter’s wedding party. No one can even believe it’s real. 

Take a deep breath and read:

Q. Daughter’s friend being in wedding: My 27-year-old daughter and her best friend, Katie, have been best friends since they were 4. Katie practically grew up in our house and is like a daughter to me. My daughter recently got engaged to her fiancé and announced that Katie would be the maid of honor (Katie’s boyfriend is also a good friend of my future son-in-law). The problem is that Katie walks with a pretty severe limp due to a birth defect (not an underlying medical issue). 

She has no problem wearing high heels and has already been fitted for the dress, but I still think it will look unsightly if she’s in the wedding procession limping ahead of my daughter. I mentioned this to my daughter and suggested that maybe Katie could take video or hand out programs (while sitting) so she doesn’t ruin the aesthetic aspect of the wedding. My daughter is no longer speaking to me (we were never that close), but this is her big wedding and I want it to be perfect. All of the other bridesmaids will look gorgeous walking down the aisle with my daughter. Is it wrong to have her friend sit out?

via GIPHY

Holy moly. You consider your daughter’s friend like another daughter, but because she has a limp you want her hidden away? And also, you don’t even really get along with your real daughter? Lady, read the room.

Mallory Ortberg, who writes Dear Prudie, probably sees her share of dysfunctional situations come across her desk, but even she responded with disbelief:

A: I am having a hard time wrapping my mind around this letter. I encourage you to reread it and to ask yourself that time-honored question, “Do I sound like a villain in a Reese Witherspoon movie?” You are, presumably, sympathetic to your own situation and are invested in making sure that you come across as reasonable and as caring as possible, and yet you have written a letter indicting yourself at every turn. This girl is “like a daughter” to you, and yet you want to shove her to the side of your other daughter’s wedding just because she walks with a limp. 

Your daughter’s wedding will be perfect with Katie as a full and honored member of the bridal party. A limp is not a fly in the ointment; it’s a part of Katie’s life. It is not only wrong to have asked your daughter to consider excluding her best friend over this—it is ableist, and cruel, and it speaks to a massive failure of empathy, compassion, and grace on your part. You must and should apologize to your daughter immediately, and I encourage you to profoundly reconsider the orientation of your heart.

The Internet’s mind is blown, particularly by the oceans of meaning contained in the phrase “we were never that close.”

I am no longer of this earth. This letter has killed me. https://t.co/McnBl7wsfS pic.twitter.com/vAK3xsWiVh

— Nicole Cliffe (@Nicole_Cliffe) September 6, 2017

my first thought is that the asides “she’s like a daughter to me” and “we were never that close” together constitute an entire article

— militant lorax 🌲 (@theshrillest) September 6, 2017

My favorite part is that she said Katie was “like a daughter to me,” b/c apparently, to her, that means “not that close and I’m mean to her”

— David Harris (@Hero_Complex) September 6, 2017

“she is like a daughter to me in that she probably doesn’t like me just like my real daughter doesn’t like me because I’m a fucking monster”

— Melissa B. (@Buote) September 6, 2017

“(we were never that close)” there is a novel jammed between those parentheses i can feel it

— Caesar Honeybee (@maryellenmurr) September 6, 2017

But also:

The gall of trying to micromanage your basically-estranged daughter’s wedding on top of this…

— j/k lolling (@xoDrVenture) September 6, 2017

And:

more worried about the wedding being “perfect” than that her daughter is no longer speaking to her

— Jeff Abbott (@JeffAbbott) September 7, 2017

So much bad in such a short missive. Can you imagine having to talk to her at the reception?

Mother Writes Offensively Tone-Deaf Letter About Her Daughter’s Wedding, Becomes Internet Villain was originally published on Buzzing Lives