#but i’m so over men being the default for everything all the time even in our fucking language

[livvyofthelake]

going to start using female generic language more. no more “guys”… i’m over “guys” fuck “guys”. it’s “girls” now until men shut the fuck up forever about everything.

[velvetvexations]

it’s frankly kind of crazy to me how many folks just assume that everyone AFAB is treated as a woman, like. with zero complications or caveats. i have PCOS and have a disability that makes me look different from a lot of people (read: ugly, because i do not fit into white supremacist beauty standards). i have never been in my life truly perceived by anyone around me as a woman. female, sure, in the same way people treat dogs and horses and cats that are female - she/her pronouns by default (most of the time, though i do get ‘sir’ed on occasion because of my masculine features when you can’t see my huge fuckin tits (/derogatory)), an assumption of hysteria and stupidity in everything i say, routinely subjecting me to sexualization and sexual abuse - but i’m not ever really a woman to anyone.

i was thoroughly rejected from the concept by girls and women, looked down upon for being ugly and not having “feminine” interests or behaviors, having my features publicly mocked and denigrated, speculation about my genitals was public and humiliating, and it was generally assumed that i was a disgusting animal that no one with any dignity would ever be sexually attracted to except for rapists and pedophiles (and even then i guess i was supposed to be grateful for that attention because i was too vile and inhuman to expect anything better).

i literally always fit in better with men who did not feel any pressure to have to think about me as a sexual being, which was gay men when i was still IDing as a woman and straight men when i finally came out as transmasculine. if they didn’t have to wrap their head around how something as gross and ugly as me was supposed to be a woman (read: desirable), they didn’t have to agonize over how they were supposed to treat me. if i’m just one of the boys, that pressure’s lifted, and i finally got access to normal social involvement. i got the slightest access to personhood by no longer trying to be something it was basically completely agreed upon that i was a failure at.

as far as i’ve understood it that’s an experience some transfems have, finally getting access to normal social interaction by no longer having to pretend to be something they’re considered a “failure” at. i guess i just wonder why it’s always assumed that trans mascs never have this experience either. like we had it easy and still have it easy and are just pretending or making any struggles we have up for fun, i guess.

for what it’s worth (so this ask isn’t a total fucking bummer) i’m a lot happier now and am in groups where i am no longer expected to perform gender as strictly as i was growing up. i’m not reduced to my fuckability or lack thereof anymore and people value me like i’m a real fuckin person. and i never medically transitioned at all. i was just lucky enough to finally find people for whom being myself was what was actually important, not being a gender arbitrarily assigned to me based on being born with a V and not a P.

There's this really gross assumption that anyone transitioning out of being a woman is essentially "wasting" their assigned status as The Good Gender. It's very disgusting. I'm so sorry for everything you've been through and that people make it so rough assuming you've had it so easy.

[monstersinthecosmos]

kacy i wanna know how much of a perv you think daniel is LOL so much fic centers on armand dragging him through an experience *armand* wants. so like what's the ratio of daniel being a freak in his nature (and knowing this about himself) vs armand nurturing this trait into him?

My friend, I’m so glad you asked.

THE THING IS IVE GIVEN THIS A LOT OF THOUGHT and in some ways it’s like, what all of my Devil’s Minion fics are about LOL. And yet! I don’t have a simple answer to this question, the way real questions of nature vs nurture are complicated in the real world in real people!

But let me sketch out a framework of the way I’ve questioned this, and everyone might come to different conclusions and that’s the fun of fandom, because there can exist several thousand versions of Daniel based on the same text! AND I KNOW YOU KNOW THIS STUFF, I HOPE IT DOESN’T COME OFF AS MANSPLAINING LMAO but I’m excited to talk about this topic. 

Here’s what we know unequivocally from the text:

Daniel is 20 years old in IWTV.

That’s it, that’s the whole list.

And here’s some fanon that people often try to extrapolate from the text: 

💦 That he met Louis at a gay bar. UNCONFIRMED, but I think it’s likely? In the short story the bar is named the Pink Baby, I think that might be a gay bar or a dick reference idk lol. 

💦 Whether or not the Pink Baby was a gay bar, he and Louis essentially cruised each other and left the bar together! Daniel has the excuse that he’s hunting for interviews for his job, Louis has the excuse that he’s an apex predator who preys on people, but ? Take this wherever you need to. (Also blah blah Ricean biting=sex symbolisms.)

💦 Was Daniel bisexual outside of the assumption that most of the VC characters are bisexual/omnisexual? The only clue we get is that when he and Armand practice voyeurism, he hooks up with men and women. There’s a lot of interesting information packed into the voyeurism paragraph, like this line: Yet he lay empty afterwards, staring at Armand, resentful, cold. and I’ve seen the “resentful, cold” comment dissected many times in fandom. Is it the general resentment of their whole relationship? Is it because he wants to fuck Armand and not randos? Is it because he only wants the Blood? Does he not consent to being used like a zoo animal? Is he gay and doesn’t want to fuck women? Is he straight (minus the orientation-defying vampire attraction) and doesn’t want to fuck men? I’ve seen all kinds of takes on this LOL. But still, no real definitive answer about his orientation in the text.

💦 What did the “roaming the bars of the world” comment mean? Sometimes I read Anne Rice’s language as being kinda lofty and exaggerated but was he ACTUALLY traveling the WHOLE WORLD or is he hyping up that he trolled bars in the Bay Area? Is he FROM the Bay Area or was it a stop in his travels? He worked for a radio station (not in the book, but mentioned in the short story + The Vampire Companion and The Alphabettery) so did he live here, even if he traveled a lot? Was he wealthy before vampires if he was traveling this much, if you think he was a traveler?

AND AFTER ALL THAT, here’s some extra questions where Daniel is FREE REAL ESTATE that every fan has the freedom to make the fuck up:

💦 How much sexual experience did he have at 20? Do we assume that by default as an Anne Rice character he probably had ample teenage sexual experiences, and if he did, is there a quality over quantity aspect to consider? Is the sex we have as teenagers like, all that to write home about LMAO. Do we really understand kinks yet, or do we need to grow up and gain some perspective first? 

💦 As an Anne Rice character, by default, do we assume he & everything else is sexually charged LOL, are the interviews and cruising and taking people home a code for bringing partners home? What percentage of his interviews were also hookups?  

💦 When we talk about nature vs nurture for kinkiness, how micro and macro is this? As a fellow Off the Cuffs fan I know you understand the “radioactive spider bite into kink” concept, and some kinks are so specific to our experiences. But BEING KINKY in itself IS nature, isn’t it? I’ve read some sex & kink theory that kink is (psychologically) more like an innate orientation. IE: in the way you can be straight or gay, some people are also by default turned on by being smacked or by whatever paraphilia. Whatever that thing is, the way it takes shape, is the nurture half. But like, many people can have the same experience and 99% of them don’t develop a paraphilia right? So I think that capability exists in kinky folks at all times, especially when so many of the radioactive spider bites are things that people discover in childhood. ANYWAY I RANTED but I say that to say; DANIEL MOLLOY IS A MONSTERFUCKER, IWTV IS THE PROOF THAT HE IS A MONSTERFUCKER. IT WAS THERE THE WHOLE TIME. 

So I bring up all those questions to encourage everyone to make up their own story with this, but I’ll tell you where I personally landed and how I approach it in my fics!!!

The Daniel in MY OWN fics is 20, single child, estranged from his parents, dropped out of college because he didn’t have ADHD support and was struggling, bisexual and promiscuous! I wonder if he went through that like college freshman thing where he got out of his parents house for the first time and partied a little too hard because he COULD! I like to read “bars of the world” as an exaggeration, I like to think he was a normal guy NOT globe hopping, sticking to the Bay Area, maybe he was out there for college, and guess what! There’s a thriving gay liberation culture there, so he finds some safe spaces to experiment with that! 

However, I think the text leaves space to think he didn’t have a lot of close friends, or wasn’t close with his family, due to the way that he simply ✨fucks off ✨ after IWTV. NOW, that’s just me! Because there’s potential here for a TRAGEDY of people looking for him or grieving him! But idk I just like thinking that he was already on the outs and the interview pushed him over the edge.

So I ask like, does the 20 year old have a ton of kink experience? Is he good at sex? WHAT DOES RESENTFUL, COLD MEAN? Was he celibate during the chase years? Are the voyeurism sessions the first time he’s had sex since his old life? Even if he had random hookups during the chase years, was this qualitatively good sex? Can you truly get into good BDSM on a hookup or do you need a trusted partner? (This is subjective, idk, but!) 

Also, how much kink is theoretical and private (to masturbate to) vs stuff you actually try? Especially if we believe that kink is nature, someone isn’t less kinky if they’re celibate, the way someone isn’t less gay if they’re celibate, or even a virgin. As Daniel becomes more and more obsessed with vampires, and with Armand, does it take over how he jerks off? Does he think about getting bitten? HE LIKES SNUGGLING WITH DEAD THINGS.

So like, there IS an element of Daniel being the unwilling witness of Armand’s rapidly shifting hyperfixations, and it’s natural that fandom pervs would extend that to sex acts and kinks. I LOVE IT, yes! It makes sense. 

But when you say like, which one of them is in charge, I wonder if it’s relevant if we assume Daniel enjoys it. (Does he? Would he? Resentful, cold?)

Here’s some points that come to mind when I imagine it as purely Armand’s doing:

💦 People sometimes misunderstand BDSM dynamics when it comes to power and control, because BDSM is a consensual fantasy between two adults. The sub is just as in control, because they allow it. In that sense: Do we believe Armand respects Daniel’s consent? Would he force Daniel to participate if he wasn’t enjoying himself? 

🩸 (How much can we compare this to Venice and how Armand was prepared for vampirism? I’m putting this in parentheses bc I’m putting a pin in this one, I CANNOT ADD A SUB-ESSAY INTO THIS POST ABOUT COMPARING VENICE TO DEVILS MINION but thinking of this too. Returning to the under-negotiated kink in Venice and how much is diegetic to the text, how does experiencing a spectrum of sexuality benefit someone’s last years alive ((sub-parentheses: does Armand flip-flop on turning Daniel as much as Marius did with Armand, does Armand subliminally know he’ll turn Daniel one day, does he go through these experiences as a precursor to turning Daniel eventually?)) are these experiences more for Armand to process the way he was groomed for asexual immortality vs being purely selfless and for Daniel’s benefit?)

💦 Armand uses Daniel as his usher into the modern age, and is it fair to assume he could sense Daniel’s kinkiness and knew that this was the person for him? 

💦 How dubious is Daniel’s consent here? How addicted to Armand’s Blood is he by the time they start fucking around? Is he already within the throes of Ricean Omnisexuality where he’s down for whatever? Does the Blood influence this as well? Is there a secret subliminal violence creeping into your body when you’ve been drinking it again and again? What about less violent kinks, like your feederism fic? Does the Blood encourage all types of excess and consumption??? 

But if DANIEL is the driving force here, I still must consider:

💦 He meets Armand and his life essentially ends when he’s 20 years old. Was he really self-aware of his kinks? Did he know himself very well sexually yet? 

💦 While exploring kinks can be mutually beneficial by sating Armand’s need for WEIRD HUMAN STUFF, maybe it IS something Daniel wants. It’s something he’s missing out on, because he checked out of regular human life when he was 20. Like, everyone’s different, so, I’m not saying that people can’t be sexually articulate at 20, but I know I fucking wasn’t! And I personally never fucked anyone that age who was good at it LMAO. So like how old would Daniel have been before he experimented enough to really know what he liked, and how much of him getting to know his sexuality involved Armand during the next decade?

💦 And this ties into Armand being his sugar daddy! That’s canon! Armand is his sugar daddy! If Daniel, at 28 years old, starts lamenting “I wish I’d gotten the chance to try watersports when I still had a normal life :( “ wouldn’t Armand have arranged that for him? 

🩸 (Again let’s talk about Venice and what did Armand learn there about being the vampire lover, how much does he process and repeat on Daniel, and for whose benefit?)

💦 If Daniel is an innately kinky person, and realizes as he’s approaching 30 that he never really got to explore it properly, wouldn’t Armand usher him through that experience? Even if Armand didn’t plan to turn him, I wonder if he saw the window of Daniel’s mortal experience closing, maybe he worried that this is the type of thing people need to be wild about while they’re still so young. And outside of stigmatizing Daniel's age, it's also about how he was becoming less and less healthy, dying of alcoholism at 32, so there was a small window here for them to have sex adventures.

So basically, I’m saying that the nature half feels very much like Daniel being a monsterfucker, the nurture half is the actual experiences he got to have. And I don’t think he’d be in this situation in the first place if he wasn’t a bit of a monsterfucker, and wasn't a innately into danger and pain. Like, we don’t get a TON of examples but Gretchen and Babette didn’t try to fuck vampires! We know that vampires give humans the heebie jeebies! What kind of sick fuck is into that?!?!?!? 

I don’t really have one single answer here. When it comes to the large library of kinks I think either of them can be blamed, and I also think it 100% makes sense to use Armand as a vehicle to write fic about them as if they’re another collection of human oddities for him to explore. But even using Armand’s weird bullshit to process that doesn’t mean it’s not mutually beneficial, and I think it gets into a fuzzier area that’s up to the writer when it comes to their take on the relationship, how dubious the consent is, how much do they actually like each other and get along? Can it be mutually beneficial in the end even if one person is driving? (see: the conversation about the second whipping scene in TVA and how it works out in the end.) Is it something they have fun agreeing to and negotiating in advance? 

I can totally see how someone might write this as a fun thing that they talk about beforehand as easily as it could be Armand forcing mystery adventure on Daniel and suddenly he’s tied up in some shitty apartment in Hells Kitchen with some man pissing on him, and did he ever even reveal this kink to Armand or did Armand pull it out of his head? 

The ship dynamic is so fucked up and coercive and resentful and toxic, even though there is real love here, so there’s this whole spectrum to use when you build your fanworks and headcanons!!!!!!! AND LIKE

IF IT’S COERCIVE AND FUCKED UP, DOES IT DRIVE THEM FURTHER APART OR BRING THEM CLOSER TOGETHER? IS DANIEL RESENTFUL AND COLD AND DOES THIS CAUSE FIGHTS? IS THIS A WAY FOR THEM TO PROCESS SOME OF THEIR COLDNESS AND RESENTMENT BECAUSE THEY AREN’T GOOD COMMUNICATORS? DO THEY DO BETTER AFTER THESE SESSIONS AND FEEL CLOSER BECAUSE THEY BROKE THROUGH SOMETHING NEITHER OF THEM KNEW HOW TO SAY?

Gosh idk.

Anyway I apologized in the beginning for mansplaining but I also want to apologize for this non answer LMFAO. I hope it doesn’t feel like a cop-out to not have a real answer, it’s just that I think there is such a rich context with a MENAGERIE of possibility !!!!!!! 

[beautifulpersonpeach]

Lol.

Yeah… the more news that comes out just confirms more of what I thought. This unnamed character who moves from HYBE to ADOR, and mere weeks later, HYBE gets a ‘tip-off’ and all the incriminating documents are in his work diaries where he narrates things MHJ has supposedly said, including that she believes that Bang establishing BTS or groups with the same cache as BTS, was him copying her…. Everything that’s found in his documents is almost clinically incendiary lmao. Like, weapons-grade rage bait. Partly because of how bizarre it is. And the sinker - they tie it to Min Heejin supposedly wanting more money. MHJ has meanwhile released another, stronger statement refuting the allegations about trying to stage a management takeover, or artists contract leaks etc.

Of course, the discourse about this is going to develop predictably, especially after the mention of BTS and other groups MHJ supposedly says copied her.

This has all the makings of one thing and only one thing, to me. It doesn’t change my opinion about Bang PD but it does make me revise my view on Min Heejin, she’s a bit more naive than I assumed her to be. I feel a bit sorry for her, because she’s been got. Again. It’s similar to the ig situation that also started with ‘a gift’ her ‘friend from SM’ gave her to congratulate her on launching ADOR - a gift that ended up being the most damning controversy that almost sunk the group. A controversy where the primary demand was for her to leave NewJeans and HYBE. Now, a ‘right-hand man’ transfers from HQ to her team and it’s his uncorroborated narrations that match what’s in the ‘tip-off’… the demands are the same.

I like MHJ, but I’ve always watched her with caution because in Korea, no woman makes it to the c-suite without making a shit tonne of enemies. Imagine it to be triple the amount a regular working class man makes on his way up the ladder, because that kind of status in Korea is something you’re either born into, or born close to. It’s rare for working class men to work their way up and even more rare for women. In fact, I’d say it’s an aberration.

I see all the flack MHJ gets for being a narcissistic bitch, wanting to constantly assert ownership of her ideas, wanting to be widely associated with her successful projects, etc. I see people irritated by her arrogance, but full disclosure, I like her for it. For several reasons, but one reason is that in her environment, the default is to let your male superiors take credit for your work. It happens in corporate environments all over the world, but in Korea it’s a mentality entrenched in the DNA. Pushing against that earns you enemies every time you speak, by default. But I suspect that’s how she worked her way up from being a graphic designer to having a seat on the board of directors at SM Entertainment before leaving when they wouldn’t give her more autonomy. So, in my eyes, she’s got spunk. But also, now I see she’s clumsy.

Oftentimes with corporate drama, there’s no point using moral language because it’s just business. You either pitched the best deal or you didn’t. You either fucked up or you didn’t. It’s cold numbers and rationality - business. But… there are some cases where it’s not really about the business, cases where it’s personal.

I don’t have meaningful insider information, I’m reading the press releases and ‘leaks’ along with everyone else, so I can’t be certain and that’s why I’m talking in this long-winded ramble without coming right out to say exactly what I think. What I’ll say though is that this is less about NewJeans and more about Min Heejin. And she’s the first person who should’ve understood that and taken necessary precautions.

Clearly, it doesn’t look like she has, and in that sense she has no one but herself to blame. She’s being stupid, in fact I’d say delusional in some ways, but I guess some things can’t be helped. NewJeans isn’t exactly fucked, but it’s clear that yet again, they are collateral damage. And it’s a shame.

[noemilivv]

hi hi! i just saw that you were doing matchups for hazbin, and i wanted to send something in!! this is my first time sending in anything like this on tumblr, so hoping i’m doing this right!!

✧ i’m genderfluid, and i’m generally more interested in men than i am women

✧ i’m ambiverted - i was raised in a way that made me a bit socially isolated, so i have issues with being social today. i don’t really know how to introduce myself to people, so i don’t speak to people unless they speak to me first. when it’s someone new, i usually let them lead the conversation, but when i’m comfortable with someone, i talk a lot more - i’ll tell them random stories i remember, and infodump about my current interest, run down the entire plot of the book i’m currently reading, all of that. my brain goes faster than my mouth a lot of the time, and i have trouble putting my thoughts and feelings into words.

✧ my style is all over the place. the most common color in my wardrobe is black, because mixing and matching colors kinda stresses me out. not to mention what i wear in my day to day can change depending on where i feel on the gender spectrum at any given time. my default is combat boots and (faux) leather jacket + gold rings and earrings

✧ my main love languages are acts of service (receiving) and gift giving (giving) - making people stuff is a sort of hobby of mine. i crochet a lot, and i love love love making people plushies <3 a lot of the time i’ll even start a craft project that i don’t even really want to keep and put it away in a stash of stuff to give to other people when the opportunity arises

✧ i bounce hobbies a lot, but the main ones that have stuck with me over a long period of time are drawing/animating and reading

✧ i have obsessive-compulsive disorder. there are certain topics/words i absolutely cannot say due to my ocd labeling it as taboo, and it’s made me a very superstitious person

✧ i cycle through interests a lot lot lot, but animation (both itself and as an industry) have been my main one for a while now. currently, i’m also really into dinosaurs and jurassic park! (fun fact, the velociraptor in jurassic park ought to be closer to the size they depict the dilophosaurus, and the dilophosaurus ought to be closer to the size they depict the velociraptor!)

make sure you don’t burn yourself out with these, i’ve seen you answer a lot already, take your time!! thanks in advance!

haha dw you did everything it seems!! i’m already burning myself out a bit sadly, as i’ve seemed to get a lot of requests than i can chew haha, but i’m gonna make it work!! you seem like such a sweetie, so ty anon for requesting!! i match you with…

Lucifer !!

Luci is a bit socially isolated too haha, as he sits at home and makes ducks all day

Speaking of, you two have your fair share of grandma-grandpa hobbies that you do together (crochet, knitting, etc)

He loves trying new hobbies with you, it keeps you entertained since your hobbies bounce back a lot, and it gets him out of his comfort zone

Also, he loves reading to you, he will do a bunch of silly voice for all the characters XD

You both just tend to info dump about your favorite topics to eachother, which Lucifer loves, no one really listens to his odd rambles, so the fact that you do is very heartwarming💕

[lesbians4armand]

okay have been thinking about this for a while so here’s a non fandomy post about my lesbian experience with gender.

first and foremost i consider myself a cis woman, my pronouns are she/her. but this gender identity also feels very informed by my sexuality.

I think despite how horrific the Covid quarantines were they provided an incredible space for self exploration as the full detach from society meant a lack of performance, this is why wilder styles in makeup and fashion became popular during this time, but it was also a popular time that we were talking about sexuality and gender identity because of the isolation and looking within that happened.

I was a young adult when this happened, just out of my teens, never truly having thought about my gender identity. I identified as bisexual for a long time, which i now come to realise was mostly due to comphet (a discussion within itself), but i was never really aware of the full spectrum of queerness.

I think a lot about the Dolly Parton quote “find out who you are and do it on purpose” as that seems to sum up my thoughts very well. I’m cis, but not because it was a default state that i never thought much about, it was a conclusion i came to through exploration and it’s something i recommend to all people. Find out who you are, explore the masculine, the feminine, everything in between.

Gender identity at the time was like a clothes shop, you could go into a fitting room and see how things felt, how they looked. I came out wearing the same clothes I went in wearing, but so thankful that I knew they were right instead of wearing them because I always had done. And sticking with the metaphor I’m so happy for those who went in and came out wearing something else, that’s wonderful!

But knowing for a definite fact that I was a woman, and felt uncomfortable being referred to as anything else, I came to realize i was a lesbian, and a lot of the exploration I went through was subconsciously coming to terms with that. I didn’t want to be a man, I was just gay and still blinded by heteronormativity and compulsive heterosexuality.

Now I come to gender presentation, different to identity. I don’t post images of myself online (at least not in fandom spaces, i keep my personal things separate) but I am very feminine. Having these explorations before also made me realise I do prefer the feminine. There are specific sorts of presentations and even identities that come with being lesbian in a society that is so male focused, while having no interest in men. These seem to have been a lot harder for me to figure out.

How do you be masculine while having no desire for or to be a man? How do you be feminine when you have no desire to be with men as society expects you to be. Do the makeup and hair dye and dresses I wear mean I present less queer?

I’m a woman, there’s no difference in me gender-wise to any woman who is not a lesbian, yet it feels like a totally different experience. Maybe I’m still coming to terms with it or maybe lesbianism truly is something entirely different in a society that values men over anything else.

Any other opinions from lesbians, transgender people, or nonbinary people would be greatly welcomed, but this is also a musing post rather than a philosophy, argument, or an identity

[tentacledwizard]

3 and 37 for ask game if you please :)

(rubs hands together gleefully) you asked about movies. this is my moment. Hold on to your hats, it’s Tentacledwizard Rant Hour.

3 films I could watch for the rest of my life and not get bored of:

FACE/OFF, dir. John Woo. 1997, rated R for faces being taken off, killing and murder, John Travolta licking his fake daughter’s face, pretty much everything you can think of that’s R-rated. Starring Nicolas Cage and John Travolta.

 So, I was told I shouldn’t watch this movie because it was “boring” and “terrible.” ok, dad. sure. It proved to be neither! As soon as I finished it I wanted to rewatch it just to observe the nuances in Nick Cage’s acting. And John Travolta’s, but Cage is who I’m really here for. He plays this unhinged, flamboyant villain, then does a complete 180 (body swap, sorta) and plays a straight-laced FBI man PREVIOUSLY played by John Travolta (who, you guessed it, now plays the flamboyant villain).

The acting. The ACTING augh I could analyze it for hours. I’m not even good at analyzing facial expressions and stuff (it is the tism) but the acting skill in this movie made me even more of a Nicolas Cage fan. The sheer range of emotions that wash over his face during a fight scene in a prison. god DAAAAMN. He plays two men in one movie- one who’s just batshit insane and reveling in it, and another who feels like he’s become the former in more ways than just physical.  

 FBI Man finds himself melting into this persona he’s playing, and he feels perversely drawn towards the villain’s lifestyle. He’s wearing the face of the guy who killed his child, and he’s starting to enjoy it. Meanwhile John Travolta walks around wearing the face and mannerisms of a straight-laced FBI man, and his ascent to power is scary to watch. It’s (rolls around on floor screaming) it’s so good. I haven’t seen A LOT of movies so if you asked me this question in a couple months, my answers here would probably change. However, Face/Off is not moving off this list. 

There’s even a funky little evil man who stole scenes from Cage himself. He plays the villain’s brother, Pollux (name sounds like Sollux, and he  points out the inherent eroticism of salmon in documentaries). Something about his line delivery has made me deeply obsessed with him. He and his brother are messed up and evil but they care about each other almost codependently. It’s fascinating to me. Also for some reason the scene where Nick Cage talks about his first date with his wife makes me cry. One second I’m thinking about the scientific inaccuracies inherent in the movie’s plot, and the next I’m looking at Cage’s sad face through a layer of saline. Curse you, sentimentality.

So, yeah, Face/Off is incredibly good. Certainly not perfect, but super fun. Also this is the 90s and all the stunts are entirely practical, which is super sick. The two golden guns are iconic and almost certainly inspired Jake English’s strife specibus, lmao. And… Nick Cage! Yeah I think that’s enough Face/Off thoughts I can put here before this becomes an entire longpost. (checks Face/Off google results) HOLD ON NOW there’s going to be a Face/Off 2? Or is this just a rumor? Woah. I will have to google this.

National Treasure, dir. John Turteltaub. 2004. Rated PG-13 for guns and a mildly suggestive scene because of course they had to put a blonde lady in a mildly suggestive scene, and British people. Stars Nicolas Cage, Justin Bartha, and Diane Kruger. 

Yeah ok at this point this is like my default movie. Should I be ashamed for enjoying this? Nuh uh. Life is too short to be ashamed for enjoying a silly action movie. Im killing cringe culture with two golden guns. In other news I have seen this movie eight times, and talked about it to anyone who’d listen. Here is a full review of it that I wrote. When I missed out on a trip to Washington DC, I watched this to really immerse myself in the setting. When my mom and I wanted to watch a film, I put this on and she said “phallus” every time the Washington Monument was onscreen because she’s fun like that. When my best friend whom I love dearly came over, the first thing I did was put on National Treasure. It’s kept me grounded and also gives me a good chuckle at some of the goofier scenes. This movie is a…

It’s a…

The joke is low-hanging fruit, but yeah, it’s a national treasure. This is admittedly Cage at his most mainstream. He’s an action movie hero guy, but in a PG-13 movie made by Disney. When asked about a possible National Treasure 3 in interviews, Cage seems kinda annoyed. I mean hey, I would be too. His acting in this film doesn’t seem like something he’s personally interested in, although he does a good job. However, I think his character’s parallels with Nick Cage’s real life are pretty interesting, especially because the director knew Cage since highschool. More on that later.

Where Face/Off’s selling point was “Nick Cage and John Travolta swap faces,” this one’s is “Nicolas Cage steals the Declaration of Independence.” And then a bunch of other stuff happens, but that one sequence is the best in the entire movie. The parallels and differences between two teams’ methods of stealing the Declaration really got to me. After that, there’s a bunch of adventuring… making leaps in logic… puzzles… what’s not to love! :D I will say that the main character is somewhat casually misogynistic in this film, which makes me grimace every time. He does learn his lesson in the second movie (though he remains pretty static, which frustrates me because there was an OBVIOUS CHANCE for character growth there… hmm maybe I will review nat treasure 2 sometime).

Something I forgot to mention in my full review is that Jon Voight and Harvey Keitel are in this movie, which is quite the slay. However, this means that I ended up thinking of Jon Voight as a Good Guy the next movie I saw him in (Mission Impossible). Uh. so apparently Jon Voight plays a lot of villains. As for Harvey Keitel, he plays an FBI Man. (looks at “Harvey Keitel movies” page) OH SHIT he’s in THAT MANY iconic movies?? That’s awesome. He’s a cool guy!

Ok, let me talk about Jon Turteltaub. So Nick Cage and Jon Turteltaub went to the same high school, and they both wanted the lead role in Our Town. (Trust me on this, I’ve read like three Nicolas Cage biographies.) Turteltaub got the lead role, whereas Cage got the role of Constable Warren. According to this interview, Turteltaub never let him live it down. Ouch. So after that, Cage couldn’t stand Our Town. and then after THAT, Jon Turteltaub went on to direct the National Treasure movies. Guess who stars in National Treasure! Yeah, that’s an anecdote that is just really funny to me. They also collaborated on Sorcerer's Apprentice, which I have yet to see. Nick Cage plays a sorcerer, hells yeah. Now according to Turteltaub, “there’s a lot more Nic in [the sorcerer] than in [the main character of National Treasure].” Yup, that’s pretty much what I thought. (shakes head) Nick Cage movies, amirite? If you really want a lot more National Treasure thoughts, check out my review! Yeah ok that’s enough shilling for myself, ha ha. This is a cool movie and you can watch it whenever, with whoever. Probably. P.S. everyone is at their most autistic swag in this movie. But especially Riley Poole, played by Justin Bartha. I adore him. 

3. Anger Management dir. Peter Segal. 2003. Somehow rated PG-13 despite the constant sex jokes. Starring Adam Sandler and Jack Nicholson.

Ha ha, PSYCHE. i absolutely hate this movie

3. Employee of the Month dir. Greg Coolidge. 2006. Rated PG-13 for retail working and reference to Vince Downey [Dax Shepard] seducing women in various places around a Costco. Stars Dane Cook, Jessica Simpson, and Dax Shepard.

I really like this movie. What more can I say? It’s a low-budget rom-com from 2006, and the director did not need to go that hard with the gay subtext. But he did! And I am forever grateful. (checks time) it’s getting kind of late, so let me direct you to my super hype review that I wrote a while ago. The reason I wouldn’t get bored of watching this movie is the sometimes batshit, beautiful turns the plot takes. Bam, this rom-com is now randomly a sports movie for a few minutes. Now Vince and his sidekick Jorge are breaking into the main character’s house to make him late for work. I don’t really know how to explain, I just love that kind of thing in a movie. It’s unpredictable and fun in kind of a stupid way. 

Also, Jorge and Vince are the emotional core of the movie. Their relationship is messy, but it’s even more sweet and heartfelt than the actual main romance of the story. It’s the romantic B-plot. If Employee of the Month were an Alternian movie, Karkat would go into a huge rant about its portrayal of moirallegiance through Vinzce and… Jorgay (lmao). Pretty similar to what I did in my previous review. If you realllyyyy wanna read a scene-by-scene breakdown of their relationship, check that one out! Actually that one is just me having emotions about them. “OMG THEY HUGGED.” u kno. that sort of thing lmao. @creatcher made some fanart of them kissing yey :D

So, yes, Vince and Jorge are amazing, and Jorge is especially amazing. Can’t wait to see Napoleon Dynamite (his actor plays Pedro in that one). There’s a lot to be said about the character Efren Ramirez plays here, but I doubt I have the expertise to really do a critical analysis. also this is still a low-budget romcom about retail workers. OH yeah also the plot is really funny- the romance turns out to have very little by way of stakes, so it’s actually Zack (played by Dane Cook) competing against Vince for employee of the month. That’s the core conflict of the movie. Well, one of them. They’re literally jousting in a costco like “two gay old sailors” (Vince’s words, not mine). This movie portrayed homestuck quadrants before they were even a thing (refer to a shipping chart @cgtg and i did for more clarity). Employee of the Month is unexpectedly great. Obviously none of the movies on my list are perfect- this one includes some racism/ableism from Vince, and I already mentioned the National Treasure misogyny- but they have a lot of redeeming qualities. And i mean a LOT.  they also all have a short guy for me to be obsessed with. So that’s the three movies I picked, and why I’ll never get bored of them. Hmm. I guess it depends on how many times I watch them!

Share a secret: 

 Hmmmm ok this is a tough one. uuuh… ok here goes: My darkest secret is that my crush looks exactly like John Egbert. There’s a real person in real life who looks like John Egbert. One cannot fathom the amount of horror this entails. They even have the same taste in movies. The same SHOES. That’s your secret for the day, tune in for more at 10!

Yep, I wrote a lot of stuff for this ask. It was fun, though. I enjoy ranting about movies. Thanks for the qs!

[free-for-all-fics]

Part 2/7 💜📸📝

“I didn’t like the way he stared at her.”

“Who? Oh, Mr. Masters? I didn’t notice.”

“Well, I did. He’s still looking.”

“Who, Fanny?”

“Mr. Masters.”

“Don’t look at him, then.”

“Do you think he’s after her, George? I rather hope not, if I’m honest.”

“Why? He has a bit of money. And he’s clever.”

“But is he just looking for a wealthy socialite?”

“Well, he seems quite taken by your daughter’s beauty, and he wondered—”

“Why? I mean, why should he wonder?”

“He wondered if there was anybody— Well, that is, anybody she liked.”

“Did he ask you to find out?”

“Who, me? No, no. I just—”

“Well, you may tell him that we don’t like anybody in our house. That is, we like a great many people, but we don’t like men. Oh, we like men, too, but don’t like men who wonder about who else we Skeffington women like. My daughter is too young and far too clever to bother about who wonders about her. It’s ridiculous, that’s all. Ridiculous.”

“Why don’t you ask Mr. Masters to dinner? You can look him over and learn the worst. Give him a real chance, and perhaps you’ll like him even more than Sir John Talbot.”

“That won’t be necessary. An agreement between Sir John and I has already been reached.”

“Still invite him. You can size him up and he can size you up. If you don’t invite him, Fanny, then I will.”

You got eyes for Jim Masters, the chauffeur. Fanny had her suspicions, but there was some part of her that didn’t want to believe it. Manby said when you told your stories, Jim always made everyone be quiet so he could hear well. Jim was super likable. Everyone liked everything about him. You couldn't stop smiling when Jim started talking. The smiles you gave him made your mother want to puke. You smiled as if your relationship with Jim meant much more than the one you had with her. She’d never seen you smile like you smiled when you were around him. She told you to bring him to the house for dinner but you said he wouldn’t come because he was too shy and wouldn’t have time between his work, but Fanny wondered if that was the truth. Something changed. She felt it. It could have been so simple only if Jim didn’t get in the way. Both you and Jim kept saying nothing was going on between you. But she wasn’t about to believe everything was just rainbows and butterflies. In her eyes, Jim was using you to fill his sad, empty life. Fanny knew she had to do something. You’d been growing the idea of leaving New York since you came back from Berlin. Living with her didn’t help much with you being attached to your hometown. She and you never got to talk about it seriously, you didn’t really want to, but every time you hinted about leaving, Fanny tried so hard to ignore what it meant for her. Even those pictures in the morning newspaper were laughing at her... They were making fun of her impending doom. They were all saying,

“Ha ha ha. See? You’re gonna die alone here.”

She couldn’t let that happen. Then she remembered. Jim wrote secret letters to you. Manby got hold of the most recent one and gave it to her. In it, he was asking you to meet him. She locked it up so you wouldn’t ever read it. You weren’t allowed to see Jim of course and if you never saw that letter maybe you would think he didn’t like you anymore and maybe you would stop liking him. Your father would’ve known what to do. Fanny wished he was here. Unbeknownst to you, she knew where you kept your diary and letters. But they had no special meaning for her. Until curiosity got the better of her. What if you wrote something about Jim in your diary? What if your diary had something to do with Jim’s existence not just in your life, but in hers? She started digging. The first few pages were nothing outstanding. Just about your new school.

August 1932

When you live in one place your whole life, your next door neighbor is kind of like, your default friend. And Jeremy only got weirder over the years. With Janie Clarkson as his mother… I can’t put him completely at fault for how insufferable he was when he was a kid. Moving away has been a good excuse to...not see him anymore, but he did say he had plans to move out when he turned eighteen... I wonder if he’s going to follow through with those plans. Maybe he was just saying it because he was sick and tired of his overbearing mother and wanted to separate himself from her. Whatever his decision, hopefully the years have done him some good and he’s freed himself from his mother’s clutches. Hopefully he’s grown out of whatever his mother’s influence did to smother his individuality and corrupt his personality and behavior when we were in school together. Can’t say I don’t empathize with him. He and I share the same sentiment about our mothers. Maybe I'll give him a call to see how he’s doing.

September 1932

Starting at a new school is a right of passage at certain ages, yet when you are the only new person you feel that there is a spotlight on you. But in that attention there is a chance, right? There is a chance to find new friends to connect with. Going in with a positive attitude is easier said than done, but when you make a great leap, you have to commit to it, right? That's how you land with grace on solid ground. So this new school, I’m gonna make it be okay. I can do that. Starting at a new school is a chance to start over, to have a reboot of who I want to become, a chance to make new friends. On this first day of school I’ll go to meet my other family, the one I will spend years learning with. I will gain new brothers and sisters from various walks of life. I will become part of their community and begin that journey of growing into the fine lady I am destined to become.

October 1932

[…] As for now, I’m just gonna leave those POI on my ‘To Do List’ which is already filled with a crazy amount of homework. I now know why youngsters of Zurich will try their best to get as far away from school as possible after class: to escape from choking on the pressure that teachers give them! Even on weekdays, pretty girls like Stephanie will have their boyfriends give them a ride, and others make use of the power of PUBLIC TRANSPORTATION to get to the more crowded part of town. It does feel too quiet since I’m no longer in public school, but at least I don't feel as lonely as I did in New York. At least I don't have to watch everyone I know turn their faces away like I’m some kind of a demon spawn. At least I don’t have to be reminded how fucked up things can be in a single moment.

November 1932

[…] but people in this town see graffiti as nothing but trashy doodles. I want to show the hidden side of girls—their impulses, their urges. What are YOU hiding inside…? Fanny, Uncle George, Father… they all tell me, “Don’t worry about what people think. Be proud.” How could I ever be proud of myself…? My classmates talk about me…

“Well! I don’t think you suffer as I do. You don’t have to go to school with impertinent girls who label your father just because he’s Jewish.”

“If you mean libel, then say so, and stop talking about labels as if Father was a pickle bottle.”

“I know what I mean. And you needn’t be satirical. It’s proper to use good words and improve one’s vocabilary.”

“Vocabilary?”

Father told me that it’s important to have goals in life. I wonder what life goal I should have. I wonder what Father’s goal is. Might not be a bad idea to leave town, actually… The great thing about graffiti is, the world’s your blank canvas, your home, begging for you to paint it with your hopes and dreams. I can have fun anywhere. Maybe that should be my goal. I’ve decided that’s what I want to do with my life. I’m going to travel the world, painting, photographing, and documenting my own finds! Well, as soon as I’m old enough to escape Mother, that is. There was an explosion in my brain... the good sort... the type that carries more possibilities than I could be conscious of... but there were hundreds of ideas there in that buzz of electricity... I could feel it. It was the calling card of adventure, of paths awaiting my feet.

Fanny kept flipping through the pages, until she found what she was looking for. It wasn’t even a challenge. She saw just how far back your and Jim’s affiliation went. It was beautiful. She found the perfect story, all she had to do was fill in the ending.

September 1934

So funny to find this diary again! I must have forgotten it at the bottom of the drawer during my travels. I still remember how innocent I was then... So many years ago... I remember being thirteen going on fourteen. I wanted to learn photography, so Father hired Rupert to be my tutor. At first, I thought he would be too old to teach. Plus, his techniques were probably too ancient. But when he came, I was surprised that he was a very humble person. Despite our age differences, we talked for hours. I felt comfortable around him. Then he showed me the photos he took. They were beautiful. It was around that point that I figured out that Rupert was perfect as a tutor, that I shouldn’t have been so quick to judge the old man. I'm glad Rupert was my teacher. I spent nearly five years under his tutelage and it’s paid off! Though I am only eighteen going on nineteen and will never get a degree in photography, Rupert said I’m a professional in my own right!

September 1934

Today I climbed a great pine tree at Wakeforte Park to try to get a shot of something. I can’t remember what I was even trying to photograph, but I didn’t realize how far up I had climbed until I fell out of the tree! I met a kind man when I hurt my leg. He rushed over and helped me, asking if I was okay and if anything was broken. Luckily, nothing was.

You know that feeling where the first moment you see someone, it's like they have a big gold star around them, and you have to get to know them? Well, there's this man. I had no idea how I would ever, like, have an excuse to talk to him... until he opened his suitcase to take out some bandages and I noticed all the pictures, stickers, and souvenirs that decorated both the outside and inside of it. He was a seasoned traveler from the looks of it and, when I mentioned it, he said he just came back from a trip in Hong Kong a month ago and he was now visiting Switzerland. Just passing through, really. Maybe I should have been frightened of him. This older man who saw that I was alone, who possibly felt like I owed him something, which was the worst thing a man like that could feel. He looked grim, all right. I could see how his face might frighten a lot of people, but I couldn’t imagine being afraid of him. Somehow, I... I rather liked him.

“You have a very bad habit of climbing trees. This is no place for children.”

“You think of me as a child? Well, you’re wrong. I am much younger than that!”

“You think my face frightens people, do you?”

“Did I say that out loud?”

“Yes. So you must’ve been thinking it.”

“Yes... sir. Frankly, I do. You understand, I don’t think you mean to frighten them, but your face— Well, you asked me, sir, and, yes, I do think so. But you don’t frighten me. You intrigue me. You’ve been to Hong Kong, huh?”

“My girl, there’s no spot on this earth I haven’t been.”

“Tell me about your time there. What was it like? What did you do?”

“Well, I confess once in Hong Kong when I was desperate I sold a relic of which I was only a part owner.”

“Yeah?”

“Mhm. Being a citizen of San Francisco I sold my share of the Oakland ferry to an Australian who wished to make a gift of it to his fiancée. And a very lovely fiancée. You know, she had the most beautiful… Well, that’s another story.”

“I’ve bet you got a satchel full of stories.”

“Mhm. I got the stories, all right. Trouble is, finding somebody who’ll listen.”

“Well if there’s a couple of bottles of beer around, I might be persuaded to lend an ear.”

“If there isn’t any, I’ll make some. Drink up, my good woman. The Earth’s a savage garden.”

“…It was the third day. I had fallen in with a group of Moorish travelers. One of them was suffering, struck with the curse of Scrofula, so I prayed with them for her fortitude, that she might reach the Cave of the Mother with all speed. They told me that a temple was within two day's journey, should all go well. Yet there was an obstacle still to overcome. The path went through the demesnes of one Idris Hannachi, a robber-baron of the Ottoman people. Pilgrims had to pay a heavy tithe to use his water, and to travel the mountain pass. I had spice, and three thalers left. I prayed it would be sufficient…”

“…Nigh a tenday I’d gone without honest fare worthy of the name - drank naught but what the sky offered for my thirst. Why, some bread, cheese, and a cup of wine would’ve appeared unto me a feast! Surely those fine people wouldn’t begrudge me a mite of rest and repast before I got ‘out with it’? Fine, fine. I turned a deaf ear to the clarion calls with which my scorned stomach beseeched me. Graver matters were at hand. Plenty to digest, after all. A good deal to stew over, if you will. Words ladled with import should be savored so as to better absorb their meaning, wouldn’t you agree?”

“…And so I drank the native wine, signifying eternal friendship. It was a touching scene as I bade the Mahabus farewell. For eight years, I said, I’ve been your chief. I give you modern plumbing, surrealist art, and a smattering of air conditioning. I hope that in time you forgive me. And so I leave you, before I bequeath you any more of the horrors of civilization.”

“I’ve listened to you for two hours. And two hours more solidly packed with bologna I’ve never listened to in all my life.”

“Well…perhaps I did lie a little. I like my stories. Like to hear myself talk. I like a little drama, I do. Mind you, lately there’s enough of it about. Do you know, my dear, as you grow older, you’ll find there’s nothing fuller than the truth. The whole truth and nothing but the truth.”

“You’ve kicked around the world all this time and you got nothing out of it at all. I wanna see this world too. That’s all I care about. I wanna get out of this hole. But it’s not wanderlust with me. Who cares about what New York or Copenhagen or Singapore looks like? They probably all look like Sacramento.”

“They all do. Except Sacramento.”

“What’s going on in this world? Things are happening all around us. Why are they happening? You ever seen so much hate in one universe? Well, who sets it off and why? You read this in the papers and that. One person tells you one thing and another person tells you something else. Well, who’re you gonna believe? They all got an axe to grind. I’m shut up here. I know from nothing. But I’m gonna find out. I’m gonna find out for myself. And let me tell you one thing. They won’t keep me in the dark.”

“Well, listen. Don’t take it out on me. I’m not keeping you here.”

“I’m sorry. I get too excited. Let me tell you another thing. When I find out, I’m gonna do something about it.”

“Okay by me. And with that, you rather like me, do you?”

“Yes, I do. I really do, in spite of everything.”

“And I like you.”

“What is your name, please?”

“Don'’t you think secrets are fun? Just refer to me as a wayfaring stranger.”

“But I owe you so much for coming to my aid. I should pay you back somehow.”

“You are paying me back by lending an ear. I want to know who’s letting me talk her ear off. You haven’t told me your name either.”

“Don’t you think secrets are fun?” you parroted his words back to him with a smile. “Just refer to me as an ambitious tree climber.”

“It sounds so mysterious. From where do you come?”

“I am of the wind whose sound is heard, yet none can tell from whence it comes or where it goes.”

“Well, the next tour group gathers within the hour. Try not to blow away before then.”

When I was a girl, Dad always told me to not trust strangers, especially men, but I’m a woman of eighteen, soon to be nineteen now and I don't think he’s a bad guy. If he was, why would he go out of his way to help me? They do say we sometimes become friends with those who are at the opposite ends, so maybe it's not such a weird thing. I’m exhausted but hyped up beyond my limits. I can’t sleep. How can I when the whole day just feels like a dream? Maybe if I meet him again at the park, I can tell him stories of my own.

October 1934

I’m finally focused on my studies, so I think I might pull an all-nighter. It won’t be good for my skin (I can just hear people calling me "troll" and "nerd"), but I don’t care. I have to make it to college. Dad is counting on me to do well. I’ll make him proud by getting into my first choice. All right, time to hit the books till morning! My future isn’t in Switzerland or New York, it’s wherever college life is waiting for me. Everything’s riding on my entrance exam next year. I have to get out before I go stir-crazy.

February 1935

Today I went to Wakeforte Park again, and he was there! I raised a hand to wave and he spied me in an instant, sitting by the water fountain as I was. His face split into the grin I had imagined him to wear often. Then he came over in fast, easy strides and took my offered hand in his two, shaking and squeezing. I hadn’t seen him in over four months. I thought I was imagining him at first, seeing things. But it was him! I told him about the book I read last night. It was about the species of plants and flowers and that even now not all of them are discovered! I told him I want to be the one to discover them, but I’m not good at science. Then he said if I don’t give up, I can do it. I’m happy I told him. It was as if no time passed between us at all and we picked up right where we left off. He finally told me his name - Jim. Jim Masters. I like being with him. I can be myself in front of him. He doesn't judge me, or tell me what to do. He cares about what I think. He makes me happy. He talks a lot to me recently, and I feel comfortable whenever he’s around. I can be myself in front of him. He said we could meet here at Wakeforte for as long as we’re both in the area. I wonder if this is what friends are like.

“Where were you born?”

“The corner of Market and Cherry Street. Same hospital my father was.”

“Market and Cherry? Where's that?”

“Foot of the East River. It's about ten miles, I should say, from the nearest governess.”

“How do they call you?”

“Skeffington.”

“Curious name. Skeffington. That’s a strange name for Market and Cherry.”

“You mean, is that my real name? Yes and no. When my father was a child and he came over with my grandparents, the immigration official on Ellis Island wasn't a good speller...and ‘Skeffington’ was the closest he could get to Skevinzskaza. That’s my father’s real name. But Skeffington is what he goes by, so it says Skeffington on my and my sister’s birth certificates.”

“Market and Cherry… That’s in New York, isn’t it?”

“It is. I grew up on Charles Street.”

“You are far from New York, Miss Skeffington. Do you miss your family back home?”

“There’s not much of a family to miss. My father and sister are here, and my mother and Uncle George are back in New York. There’s my aunt, Martha Tintagel, but she lives in London, so I’m not very close to her. I’ve only seen her face on Christmas cards and such and have never heard her voice or met her in person. She’s a Lady and has a husband and three children - two boys and a girl. She’s a happy mother, always wrapped up in them. She loves being tied up, and is sure she can’t stand five minutes on her own feet unassisted. My other aunt, Nigella Pontyfridd, is wife to my Uncle George, but she kept her maiden name and they have no children. She doesn’t mind, though, because her heart is full to the brim of Uncle George. They’re not really my aunts and uncle, though. They’re my mother’s cousins. We’ve just always called them that for simplicity’s sake. As for everyone else… They’re dead. And they died before my sister and I were born, so we never knew them. Anything we know about them comes from the word of others. I miss Uncle George and Aunt Nigella, but my mother…”

Sensing that you didn’t want to talk about it, Jim changed the subject. “You have quite an art studio here. Did you bring all these art supplies from America?”

“A few of them.”

“May I look at them?”

“Of course. I even painted something for you to take with you on your journeys. Something to remind you of me.” You showed him the painting. It was small, a miniature portrait really, but the detail was exquisite. It was a painting depicting the exact spot you met, more specifically, the tree you fell out of and the surrounding area.

“This is beautiful. Looking at this, I can feel as if I’m actually there. You know, some works are so familiar. Looking at them is like being home again.”

“That's a nice music box you got there.”

“Most of my belongings I could bear to leave behind. I sold almost everything I owned to get my passage to come here, but this… Never. It's one of the few things I brought with me from the States. I will carry it with me everywhere I go.”

“What’s that little song playing?”

“Do you like it? A man composed it for a young violinist he once knew, a girl of infinite beauty and sensitivity. So far apart in age, yet a pair of misfit beauties they were. I can see why they both ran to the other. As for this… A remarkable painting by the hand of an even more remarkable painter.”

“You flatter me, sir. But I’m so happy you like the painting. I was thinking of you when I painted it. I knew you’d be able to tell.”

“Why do you always call me ‘sir’? You know my name.”

“Well, perhaps if I saw you oftener than once every two or three months. When you happen to be passing through.”

“If you think it’s on my way, you’re mistaken. When I left Spain my tour required I proceed direct to Paris. So…you see?”

“Then take me with you, please. You promised.”

“My dear, an attractive woman doesn’t go to Paris. She lets Paris come to her.”

“Meaning you, I suppose? You are so wise and so clever. Paris is a good place for a new life. I believe Paris is where you go to reinvent yourself. Will you be returning to Sacramento, Mr. Masters?“

“For God’s sake. Jim. Call me Jim. Please. Mr. Masters was my father.”

“Jimmy,” you said teasingly with a smile to match.

Jim laughed but then turned serious. “No. Jim.”

“All right. Jim,” you said, liking the way his name sounded on your tongue. “I better get going. My sister, Fanny, is waiting on me. Goodbye, Jim.”

“And when may I have the pleasure of seeing you again?”

“When Paris no longer comes to faith,” you teased him again before walking off.

Since he was heading out soon, he offered to give me a tour of the city.

“I was just going.”

“I’ll walk home with you. I’m afraid I’ve neglected my gentlemanly duties too long. Maybe I ought to go in and say goodnight to your old man and sister, huh?”

“Now listen. If you’re going to come around here to see me, you’ve got to promise to be friendly with my father, but not too friendly with my sister. While I want her to like you just as much as I want Dad to, she’s the pretty and sweet one of the two of us. We’re twins, but we’re nothing alike, you see. I wouldn’t be surprised, but I’d be greatly disappointed in you if you fell in love with her at first sight.”

“Who says I’m coming around to see you?”

“Who says you’re not?”

“Are you a natural brunette?”

“Practically. A chocolate rinse now and then.”

“I’m taking the boat out tomorrow at six. The main wall.”

“I’ll be there.”

“If you’ve got a good book, stay home and read it.”

“I don’t like reading. I was never much good at it in school. I couldn’t stand the snobs with impeccable taste. Still can’t. These people say: ‘I'd rather a good book than a shallow person’. They could cry over the plight of a fictitious character but they shamelessly insult real people because real people are ‘shallow’ and according to snobs these ‘shallow people’ don't deserve to live.”

“You don’t like reading? But last time we met, you told me about a science book you liked.”

“That was an exception to the rule. I can read, but only because of the efforts of my former psychiatrist, David Jaquith, and his wife, Charlotte. Adventure is allowing the unexpected to happen to you. Exploration is experiencing what you have not experienced before. I prefer spending my time doing something and actually experiencing it, instead of reading about it in some book. Do you know what I mean?”

“I think so. In that case, I guess…I guess I should let go of this. I won’t need it after tomorrow. Just one final reminder of bad memories I can do without. You can take this. I've already read it. If you read this and tell me what you think of it, that bad memory will become a good one.”

You looked at the cover. “Pulp horror fiction?”

“Yeah…sorry.”

“No, not at all! It’s my guilty pleasure.”

“Mine too. This one's great, You ever heard of Henrik Creighton?”

“I can’t say I have.”

“Oh! Well he—”

“Wait, we’re getting off-topic. Why did you mention taking the boat out if you don’t want me there anyhow?”

“All right, all right. Be there. Make that five instead of six. And uh, better bring your book along.”

“I’m sure there’ll be no need. You’ll have plenty of stories to tell me.”

“Don’t forget my jacket! It might get chilly later on,” Fanny called after you just as you were about to rush out the door for your…outing…with Jim. You didn’t want to call it a date. It wasn’t a date. Just a tour around town with a friend.

“You’re a darling. Wish me luck.”

“Aren’t I going to meet him?”

“What? And have him wonder why he picked me? No, you’re much smarter and better looking than I am. I’m only the intuitive one. We’re going out for dinner afterwards, so you don’t need to wait up for me.”

“I’ll wait up. If I want to.”

“And what will you tell Father when he asks?”

“Don’t worry about that. I’ll handle him when he gets home. Although you might have to tell him something when you get back. The truth, preferably. I might not wait up for you, but he undoubtedly will.”

“I don’t know why I’m making such a thing of it. You’re right. I could tell him the truth and he wouldn’t mind very much. He’d be happy I have a friend here.”

“We better not waste any more time dawdling. Isn’t Jim waiting for you outside?”

You gave her a quick kiss on the cheek. “You’re right! Gotta go!”

Out the window I could see the weird gigantic hill that was also visible from Jim’s motel room. He revealed that it's his secret base of some kind since few people actually visit Wakeforte Park and the surrounding area. He jokingly said he could take me there when I’m old enough. After dinner, Jim dropped me off at home and drove off. The second I went inside and closed the door behind me, Fanny was there waiting for me. She was sneakily watching me and this mystery man of mine from the window and now had a million questions. It was impossible to keep anything from my sister.

“Yoo-hoo! Hey, anybody home? Fanny, where’s Father? Isn’t he home? Is he asleep?”

“No, he’s still in Kreuzberg. There was a mixup and he has to take a later train. He called to tell me he’d be home tomorrow and to let you know. Lucky you!”

“Fanny, don’t tease.” Your admonishment was more playful than serious and Fanny knew that.

“Why, darling sister, who is he? Where’d you meet him?”

“Look, Fanny. I met him five or six months ago, but I’ve really only known him for two weeks at the most. He travels a lot. When we do meet, it’s mostly by chance. Well, he just came back last week. He's so handsome.”

“Where’d you meet this time?”

“He was with Mr. Hunneker. He drove up in a great, big, gray car.”

“Mr. Hunneker? As in Hamilton Hunneker, the Polo player?”

“That must’ve been the one.”

“Sister, you say the handsomest...”

“Well, make that the most distinguished.”

“Is he tall?”

“Well… Yes and no.”

“Is he young?”

“He’s young enough.”

“And he’s rich?”

“He is as poor as one might imagine an itinerant philosopher to be. Yet, as the hours go by I see that he is unfailingly generous to me. I am grateful to have a friend.”

“What did you say his name was again?”

“Jim. Mr. Jim Masters.”

“He can’t be so very rich.”

“He’s comfortably moderate in his money, But he’s rich in knowledge and experience. He asked me to go sailing with him Friday night. I accepted.”

“You didn’t?”

“I did.”

April 1935

I got some materials from my first choice in the mail today! I really want to be a college freshman at the Roski School of Art and Design in Southern California! If I got in, I’d be so, SO HAPPY! Dad, I’m going to work my ass off and be the best daughter ever! Thank you so much for everything!!!

May 1935

I’m so stupid sometimes. I was telling Jim that I was applying and hoping to get into my summer college program thing, and I was all making plans, telling Jim he should come visit me, stay in my dorm room. But he said, “Darling, I leave on June 6th.” I was like... “leave? You’re going? To where?” He said, “To Peru! What did you think I was doing all that stuff for?” I guess he’s been planning to continue his journey. And I guess he’s really going to do it. So I said, “I’m just... never going see you again?” He said, “Let’s just have fun while we can.”

May 1935

I asked Jim what he had to do to get ready for his trip to Peru. He said, “Not a lot, really. As a rule, I don’t allow myself to bring too much with me— the more I carry, the more slowed down I become. I have only a few possessions, but unlimited contact with the outside world while I’m…on the road, so to speak. I just wander every day. And then I keep on wandering from there.” So.. he’ll just go away. To Peru and then… to who-knows-where. The other side of the country? The other side of the world? My mind can't process it. That he’s really going to be... gone. Just gone.

June 1935

Jim had his going-away party with me tonight. He’s so incredible... When he was telling his stories, I could practically forget...everything... That we only had forty-eight hours left... That I don't know what comes next... That I can’t live without him. Then, he dedicated the last story...to me. And I couldn’t take it. I was out on the curb in the alley, sobbing till my ribs hurt. I would follow him anywhere. But I can’t, not where he’s going. After a long time he found me. He said he was sorry. He said, “I wish things could be different. I just wanted to make you happy.” I said, “I don’t think you can anymore.”

June 1935

We agreed our last night together would be our happiest ever, and we’d forget tomorrow was going to come at all. It worked for a while— We had a good time seeing Gabriel off, then ran up to the attic to look through our photos, to find one for Jim to take with him...and looking at them, I realized they were all in the past, and there wouldn’t be any more, and I didn’t know what I was going to do, and I cried, and he held me. He said he knew it was hard, but life would move on. I said I didn’t want my life to keep moving without him. That’s when he cried too. I was so exhausted, I must have fallen asleep like that, in his arms. In the morning, I woke up, and I was finally alone. I thought I found my happily ever after, but it was all a dream. I have to get out of here. I want to disappear. But where would I go? This is all a bad dream. This is all a bad dream. This is all a bad dream.

Darling,

Meet me at our secret place in Wakeforte Park. You know where. I need to see you one last time before I go to Peru. From there, I’ll go to Greece to make myself worthy of you. Be assured, my darling, it is you I want, and not your family. Please, do not do anything we will regret. Just in case I’m held up and can’t get away to meet you in time or something, I will leave a message for you with your sister so she can give it to you. It’s a puzzle, a sort of belated birthday gift for you. In that puzzle, you’ll have to visit both yours and my favorite locations in Switzerland. In each location lies a clue that I had written on the wall of the building exterior. The clues, when put together, will point to you the location of your gift. I thought it was a neat idea. I like vexing your brain, because when you are thinking real hard, like when you’re trying to capture the perfect shot or drawing the perfect subject, you are more beautiful than anything in the world. You’re always drawing in that sketchbook, looking so intense. While I’m gone, you can keep busy by looking for what I hid. Start by using this piece of paper to mark where all the rock pictures are. They will tell you what to do next. Your favorite flowers, start keeping them in mind too. Find my hidden treasure, darling. It’ll explain everything better than I could before.

Your friend,

Jim

June 1935

Dear Miss Skeffington,

After carefully reviewing your application, we regret to inform you that we are not offering you admission to Roski School of Art and Design. We realize that this decision may come as a real disappointment. We also hope that you will understand the decision as a reflection only of the extraordinary talent represented in our applicant pool, not a judgment about your own abilities. This year’s pool of applicants was the largest and most accomplished we’ve ever received, making our decision very difficult. Although we’d like to extend admission to all our applicants, we have limited space in each admitted class. Of the more than 19,000 individuals who applied to Roski School of Art and Design, most are fully capable of doing successful work and making a unique contribution to the Californian community. It is painful to us that we must turn away so many superbly talented students. You may be tempted to ask what was lacking in your application. In truth, it is usually difficult for us to point to obvious weaknesses, when so many applicants have demonstrated real achievement and potential for the future. Our decisions say far more about the small number of spaces available and the difficult choices we make than they do about a candidate’s personal and academic promise. While regretting that we were not able to respond positively to your interest in Roski School of Art and Design, we want to wish you every success in your educational pursuits. Experience suggests that regardless of our decisions, most of our candidates will be welcomed by other outstanding colleges. We acknowledge the time and energy put into your application and congratulate you on your academic accomplishments. We invite you to reapply in the future and extend our best wishes for the coming year.

Best regards,

Roski College Admissions Team

All that hard work was for nothing?! No way! I can't stay here! I can't be stuck here in New York with Mother!

June 1935

Jim is gone, and I can’t stop reminiscing on the time I spent with him. It all happened so fast. I was outside in the park reading when Jim appeared out of nowhere (again). He said “hello” and I started telling him how I actually enjoyed the book and how I never read the same book twice in my life.

“Well, I’ve come to entertain you. I’ll read aloud, and you can listen. I do love to read aloud.”

“I’d rather just talk, if you don’t mind.”

“But this is German romantic philosophy! We throw off all our constraints and come to know ourselves through insight and experience. But it got out of fashion now.”

“Not in the Skeffington family, I’m afraid. It’s just that there comes much emphasis on perfecting oneself.”

“Ah! This gives you a problem?”

“I’m hopelessly flawed.”

“If only we could be ourselves without perfection, like your poet, Walt Whitman, who rides up and down the streets of Broadway all day shouting poetry against the roar of the carts. ‘Keep your silent woods, O nature. Your quiet places by the woods. Give me the streets of Manhattan.’ I think we are all hopelessly flawed. Oh, no. I love to talk, too. Very well. Let’s talk.”

Ten minutes later we were passing Bess’ Bakery. Home of the world famous Belgian waffles. “You’d find no better waffles than in Belgium itself,” said Jim.

There was also a gym across the diner. Fanny hated those kinds of places because they were teeming with creeps. I found my own POI: a bookstore! It was weird seeing a bookstore and a gym standing side by side though. At the end of the tour I finally got to taste that sweet Belgian waffle Jim worshipped. I miss Bess’ Bakery. Fanny never shut up about its doughnuts when we were children. The doughnut shop was her MUST GO TO place. Personally, I enjoyed the blancmange we’d get at another little shop. It was soft, so it would slide down easily. So tasty. But the doughnuts DID taste sweet. Just like Jim’s heart. Each bite was another memory to savor. But just like a doughnut, it had an expiration date. It turned cold and bitter. I miss its warmth. I miss its sweetness. I need it. I need to eat it up.

Why? Because after all those months, I just can’t forget about what used to be the light of my life. (I know. Overdramatic, much?) Resonating with Jim as much as I did is bound to leave that big chunk of residue. Let’s just say this diary is what’s left of our relationship. I miss him. Even when I’m with him. I see him. Even when he is not looking. As the time we spent together grew longer, one question kept on growing with it. What does the ME in Jim’s eyes look like? Does he see me as I see him? Does he see me as I see myself? Does he see me as I want him to? Things were so much easier back then. Jim could just say, “Hello”, and I would say “Hello”. Nothing but spending time together after that, with the occasional visit to Wakeforte Park. We had such a good thing going.

Every time I was around Jim, my head spun faster than a tornado. I didn’t “get” Jim sometimes. Like, his walk and his talk and everything were all “anti-authority,” but he said he was in JROTC and did drills in perfect formation, following orders, no question. He went to join the Army and had to lie about his age, about who he was. He said, “they didn’t need to know what they didn’t need to know,” like it was no big deal. This coming from the man who punched a man so hard the poor bastard was knocked out cold to defend my honor... I learned when to stop arguing though. I don't think Jim “gets” Jim sometimes. The person I saw depended on who he was talking to and what he wanted. He could be everything from invincible to vulnerable, albeit with a new story of each new situation. He had an infinite number of childhoods. His parents were happy, divorced, fighting, abusive, or dead. His father had been a banker, a road digger, a burglar, or unemployed. His mother had been a drunk, a politician, a Sally-home-baker, or a tart. He was an only child, the last of eight, brought up in a foster home or the heir to a fortune. Part of me wanted to walk away, but I was the only one he could tolerate. Why? Because I never asked to see behind his ever-changing disguise. Inside that body was a kid, a kid locked in at some emotional age far younger than his forty-something exterior. I’ll never know what happened to him but, whatever it was, it just stopped his development at that age. It was a one-way friendship, I knew that, but he needed someone.

July 1935

At night when I kneel to say my prayers I rest my elbows on the hope chest Uncle Fred gave me for my eleventh birthday. “We’re going to make a family someday, just you and me,” you’d said. Inside that chest are our dreams, Jim. I’m keeping them safe on my end, so you do your part over there and we’ll be right as rain soon enough. Moving on won't be easy but as long as I keep myself busy it won't be that hard. As for my weekend plan... I’ll just improvise in the morning. Write you later!

“Doesn’t it feel odd to have the rooms back? And only asked to sit in them. I suppose we’ll get used to it.”

“I don’t want to get used to it.”

“What do you mean?”

“I know what it is to travel now. To walk around for a full day, to be tired in a good way. I don’t want to start dress fittings or paying calls or standing behind the guns.”

“But how does one escape all that?”

“I don’t know yet. Oh, Fanny, truly I don’t know if I could ever be good like Father. I rather crave violence. But I’m not dreaming of hitting anybody. I’m just unhappy.”

"Then you’d better have your tea while it’s hot.”

“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean what I said before. You’re not just as shitty as them. It’s just that I feel very lonely and overwhelmed. But I love you. I’m just unhappy, indeed,” you sniffed. “If only I could do like Father did and go to war and stand up to the lions of injustice.”

“And so Mother does in her own way. And Uncle George, with his charities.”

“Yes. But I want to do something different! I don’t know what it is yet, but I’m on the watch for it.”

“You’ll find it. And thanks for the apology, sis. I know it isn’t ideal living in this house… But I’m here for you, no matter what.”

“No matter what, huh? Let’s both go back to bed, Fanny. I’m tired.”

“Sure. Goodnight.”

July 1935

Let’s see, Dad. I hope your dear friend can help a girl out. Come on Corporal Mark Pearce, I’m counting on you. Ahem. ‘Dear Miss Skeffington, my dear, I remember your father well and am forever in debt to his many sacrifices in the name of freedom. He was a frank man, so you’ll forgive me for being frank when I say that he'd have a conniption if he knew I put his sweet girl in the line of duty.’ W-what? Fa-Father would be proud of me! I’ve had more conniptions in my first twelve years of life than Father has had in his entire lifetime! Oh, well. No point in having one over the first rejection. If at first you don’t succeed, try again. Back to the drawing board.

July 1935

Aha, the WASPs! Boy, I’d like to slip into the cockpit of a Twin Beech! ‘Thank you for your interest in the Women’s Airforce Service Pilots. Unfortunately, all of our WASPS must be at least 21 years of age, at least five feet and two inches tall, in good health, in possession of a pilot’s license and 500 hours of flight time. Our records show you do not meet all of these requirements.’ Well, that’s just FOOLISH! I’m a fast learner and… Oh. No use crying over spilled milk! Once more unto the breach!

August 1935

From the office of Harold Perkins. Oh yes, the fellow from the local recruiting office. Surely they’ll have something for me to do overseas. ‘Dear Miss Skeffington, We appreciate your numerous requests to be placed in the field, but believe me when I say the most action you’ll see is from behind a desk.’ Excuse me? ‘I’m sure you’re a top notch typist, so why don’t you come down to the Boston—’ Typing? I wonder what an itchy trigger finger would do to a girl’s word-per-minute. Oh, cheer up! Miss Skeffington, you’ll get there yet. No point in being all down in the mouth. Mother might begin to suspect something. She almost did at dinner. “Tsk, tsk, tsk, tsk. You’ve barely touched your plate, my love. Go on, have some more,” she said. She’s got a point. My body needs the vitality for action.

August 1935

To trust yourself when all doubt. To lead from a danger only you can see clearly. To explain enable the blind to see. To give people the power to hear the extraordinary in the ordinary, the everyday and normal encryption of the spoken word. To show them the messages and conversations that happen all around us to different levels of the brain. That’s quite the challenge. That’s quite the challenge when, until you can prove it, they will think you mad and threaten you with the consequences that come to the insane. To speak and risk the twisting of the knaves of sophistry. That is what they ask. Last time I complied I almost died. I almost lost everything for nothing. So, tell me again why, tell me why this is the time, because even if it is now or never, I won’t act unless I can win. I know more than most what these adventures into the world of the saviors costs...and the cost is never to myself alone. You know what? I do trust myself. I do. It’s every other bastard out there I don’t trust. This is a world of monsters. So many monsters.

Those bastards. Kraut…bastards. You don’t belong over there. I do! When I find that gun I’m going over there and there will be hell to pay! Oh, for Heaven’s sake, where is that gun? Now, Dad, don’t you fret. I’ll find that gun lickity split. No soldier worth his salt ought to carry those shoddy government-issued pistols. Plastic handles? Pshaw! Give me checkered walnut any day. Practice, practice, practice. I don’t need fancy tools to disassemble a gun. See the cartridge here as a screwdriver. Just like Uncle George showed me. Next time, we should get a stopwatch and have some fun.

September 1935

Women’s Army Auxiliary Corp, you’re my last hope. ‘Dear Miss Skeffington, thank you for your enthusiasm. While we are always eager for more Women’s Army Auxilary Corp, we are unable to offer you—’ …malarky! Fine. Let’s see what I can do at home. At the very, VERY least. I won’t— I won’t be deterred. Perhaps I could appeal again to Mark. He might listen to reason.

September 1935

Here it is, my last shot. Come on. ‘Dear Miss Skeffington, I’m not sure what you mean by being “ready and able” to fight. You’re five foot nothing, and a hundred and ten pounds soaking wet. How could you ever hold your own against a German brute? Think about holding down the fort instead. Think of the good you can do with a victory garden and a can drive. I’m sure a nice girl like you could certainly help out at the…women’s club bake sales downtown…’ Why won’t anyone give me a goddamn chance?

September 1935

I haven’t really been in a good mood since this morning. I got a letter at breakfast, but I didn’t have time to read it or even see who it was from since my schedule for the whole morning was filled. I left it in my dresser drawer to read later, and didn’t think much of it. It was midday by the time I got back. I’ve tried to lose myself in my art, but I’m not feeling it. Maybe it’s because Mother and I argued this morning? Probably not. We’ve clashed before. I’ve known for a long time we value different things. I just couldn’t stand Mother’s preaching attitude so I yelled back at her. I know I shouldn’t have done that but I’m so frustrated. She said that I’m not trying hard enough. What does that mean? I pressed her to keep talking, but she wouldn’t tell me anything after that. Is it because the Orwood girls teased me? I doubt it. They don’t know me. They’re just taking their issues out on someone. As awful as this morning was, this afternoon is looking up! Jim has written to me, and he’s coming to New York - more specifically, to Charles Street! Thanks to me, he heard about Mother’s advertisement for a new chauffeur that was put in the paper. Also thanks to me, the position still hasn’t been filled. Fingers crossed neither of us fall at the last hurdle and Jim gets the job!

Miss Skeffington,

It seems my luck has finally turned around. I received a phone call from the Silver Star Line, and it turns out I won a trip…to New York. I’ll be boarding the flagship Silver Star next week, and will soon be crossing the ocean to come see you. Or rather, your mother for a job interview. Hang tight, I’ll be on my way in no time. I can’t wait to see the look on your face when you see me!

Your friend,

Jim Masters

“Mr. Masters calling on Mrs. Skeffington. He’s here for an interview.”

“Oh, for the chauffeur position. Of course. Won’t you come in, Mr. Masters?”

“Thank you, I will. Hello, Mrs. Skeffington.”

“Hello. Let Clinton take your coat.”

“Thank you.”

“Let’s have some tea. How many lumps?”

“Uh…two, please.”

“Well, Mr. Masters, now do tell me all about yourself. Of course, I know all about your school and how you ran away to join the army. But before that, what?”

“Well, I used to live in San Francisco with my parents—”

“San Franscisco? My cousin, George, lives around there. I went to California when I stayed with him, you know.”

“Really? When?”

“During my pregnancy. Of course, at the time, I didn’t know it would be twin girls.” The mere mention of it brought forth a memory to the forefront of Fanny’s mind. A memory of Job. She tried to think of something or someone else but, once it began to play out, she couldn’t stop it.

~

“You’re laughing at me again. I suppose I’m just as fond of children as anybody else. Well, it’s just that... It’s just that babies grow up, and everybody expects you to grow up with them.”

“You’re not afraid of growing old, are you, Fanny?”

“Yes, I am.”

“Well, babies stay young for quite a long time.”

“Other people’s babies, never your own. Do I look puffy yet?”

“You look beautiful, Fanny.”

“I don’t know why. My face is all tear-stained.”

“Just enough to be becoming.”

“Well, I wanted to keep on crying, but I didn’t have the strength. You see, the sedative the doctor gave me made me very drowsy. Job, George is going to California in a week. I want to go with him and have my baby there.”

“You don’t want to have your baby in this house?”

“No.”

“But, Fanny, you love this house so much. Why, when we were married, you made me give up my home and live here.”

“Of course I love this house, but it’s too close to my friends. Soon, I’ll be all swollen and puffy and ugly. I don’t want anybody to see me like that. I couldn’t bear it. I won’t have them see me all swollen and ugly.”

“You’ll never be ugly, Fanny. And I don’t care how swollen you look. Fanny, a woman is beautiful when she’s loved. And only then.”

“Nonsense. A woman is beautiful if she has eight hours' sleep and goes to the beauty parlor every day. And bone structure has a lot to do with it too.”

“But I’m so busy in New York, and California is a six-day train trip. I won’t be able to see you very often.”

“I’ll write you every week, Job.”

“Fanny, that’s not the point. I want to be near you.”

“I’m so sleepy.”

“All right, Fanny. You can go to California if you want to. Fanny, aren’t you really happy about having...?”

~

Wanting to dispel the visions of Job and his sad, brown puppy dog eyes from both her mind and her sight, she quickly changed the subject back to what it was before. “Did you and your parents get on?”

“Yes, we got on very well. I’m an only child and, after my father died, I started to work for my mother as a sort of companion. Oh! And what a nervous, fidgety soul she was, too. Well, anyway, my mother had rheumatism, and the doctor thought, baths. Oh-ho, not that she hadn’t got baths. She had a very nice one in her house. Did you go to the baths while you were in California, Mrs. Skeffington? I mean, for your rheumatism.”

“I haven’t got rheumatism.”

“Oh, neither have I, but, you see, I figured baths wouldn't do me any harm, that is to say, while I was there. But I’ve always wanted to go to Europe. Not for the baths, of course, not at all, but for my writing. It's so good for writers. You see, my mother— Oh, but you don’t know my mother. What were you going to say, Mrs. Skeffington?”

“I wasn’t going to say anything. And I’m not Mrs. Skeffington. Not really. My husband and I divorced years ago, but I still go by his name.”

“I see. Well, Mrs. Skeffington… How are you getting along without him?”

“Oh, fine, fine, once I got used to it.”

“And your daughters?”

“You know, my daughters are... Well, they’re all right.”

“But they could be better?”

Around thirty or so minutes later, Jim emerged from your father’s office. You had been loitering outside, pretending to keep busy with drawing in your sketchbook so the servants wouldn’t question or bother you.

“How did it go? What did she say?”

“Your mother asked if I would like to be the chauffeur. She said your last driver wants to spend more time with his grandchildren, and is planning to retire. I have by the end of this week to decide.”

“And?”

“It’s a good opportunity. I’d get a raise in salary and I’d get to travel around the country. I think I’ll say yes.”

November 1935

It’s been almost two months since Jim first began driving for us. Instead of getting a taxi, Jim drives me. I know how to drive, I have my license, but this is one of the few times we can be together. Though we planned this scheme together, and I recommended him for the job under false pretenses so Mother would be none the wiser, it still feels strange that he’s the chauffeur and is technically below me. Social status serves as an invisible barrier between us when we’re in the company of others. As he’s driving, we talk freely as we always do whenever we’re alone together. I’ve been opening up more to him, telling him about the struggles I’ve been faced with, my rocky relationship with Mother, how I really dislike the confines and limitations of high New York society. I expressed that, despite having a successful art career, I felt empty and tired. Jim said that he wished he could do more to comfort me, since I’m going through so much right now. Sometimes, he will give me some suggestions when I ask what I should do. Other times, I just want someone to listen to me. Mostly, I am just happy to be with him. If only we could confess to everyone how much respect we have for each other, how much we admire each other. We’ve confessed to each other every opportunity we get, in different ways. I wish we didn’t have to hide, but keeping our friendship in secret will have to be enough for now.

“Hey, look, who’s taking you to dinner tonight?”

“Jeremy Clarkson.”

“Well, couldn'’t you speak to him?”

“I guess I could.”

“And who’s driving you to town tomorrow?”

“Matthew Jones.”

“Well, couldn’t I speak to him?”

“I don’t see why not.”

“And who’s taking you to dinner tomorrow night?”

“Brenda Jenkins. But nobody has to speak to her. We don’t like each other, so she probably won’t want me there, either. She was probably pressured into sending me an invite.”

“In that case, would you like to have dinner with me?”

“Oh, I’d be delighted.”

“Shall we go to the Waldorf?”

“Not the Waldorf. That’s where I’m not having lunch with Brenda Jenkins and her friends.”

November 1935

I told Mother and Uncle George that I was going to a double feature with Ann Lemp and that I wouldn’t be home till the morning. That’s only the half-truth. I did go to a double feature, but it wasn’t with Ann. Only Fanny knows who I was with. Afterwards, Jim and I crashed at a nearby motel. There was only one bed to sleep on, so we shared it. We kept our clothes on, only taking off our shoes and jackets so we’d be comfortable. He slept on top of the covers while I laid under them. The lights went out... I was turned toward him... My eyes started to adjust, and then I could see he was looking at me, too. In the dark, he smiled. My heart was beating so fast. I rolled over, I felt so... I don’t know, nervous? After a minute he put his arm around me and turned me back to face him, and he was so close, and whispered in my ear, “I really do love you, you know. In a way I thought I’d never love again.” I just nodded my head and I really hope he could tell. I really hope...that he meant what I think he did.

“Well, well, well, look what the cat dragged in.”

“Oh, Fanny! It’s only you. You startled me.”

“How was the double feature?”

“It was good, though I don’t remember most of either film, to be honest. We got distracted.”

“It’s past lunch time. You must be starved.”

“What makes you think I didn’t have any dinner or breakfast?”

“Well, you were out with Jim Masters. If you got potato chips, you were lucky. I saved you some leftovers. Turkey leg’s in the kitchen. If you’re hungry.”

“It’s beautiful. Can’t be Manby’s work. It’s too neatly arranged.”

“Manby did the cooking. I did the assembly.”

“Thanks. Mother very much worried?”

“No. I told her you’d be a little late because you had gone to Selena’s to do some shopping this morning. You called while she was out, and since it’s Sunday and the servants’ day off, I answered the phone.”

“I don’t understand. Why did you lie?”

“Mostly from force of habit. Although I did rather gather that Mother wouldn’t be too pleased if she knew that you were out with Jim.”

“I see. I can understand Mother’s attitude, though. You can’t grow very fond of a daughter you’re always trying to keep on a leash and out of trouble. She keeps herself separated from the servants, always strictly professional and impersonal. She expects the same of us. She doesn’t know Jim the way I do.”

“Of course not.”

“You saved this food for me, and you lied for me, and you like Jim. You sure nobody’s home?”

“Nobody.”

November 1935

A week passed since my movie night with Jim. Fanny and I were looking out my second story bedroom window at Jim, who was out on the driveway, working on one of the cars.

“There he is. Fanny, stand back a little. Well, I'm glad he's a man. Certainly would like to know a man for a change and have a little fun.”

“Don’t let Mother hear you say such things.”

“Hello! Good afternoon!” Jim called up to you, raising his arm to wave at you.

“That dreadful man, he waved back.”

“You’re every bit as bad as he is.”

“I know. I wonder how I could get to know him. I wish we had a dog or a cat, and it would get lost and he’d bring it back, then we’d get to talking...”

“I don’t think that’s very romantic.”

“Who said anything about romance? I’m going to go down. I’m going to talk to him.”

“And if Janie Clarkson or one of her friends catches you? What will they think? Stopping to talk with the chauffeur.”

“I don’t care. Anyway, Janie and her friends weren’t very friendly to Jim. They wouldn’t even say ‘good afternoon’ or ‘hello’ to him whenever they saw him when they passed by our house.”

When I came out the front door and walked down the driveway to meet Jim, he was wiping his hands off with a cloth.

“Miss Skeffington. Why do you sit at your window looking out at me when I’m working on the driveway or in the garage?”

“It’s my family’s property, and I can look out as much as I like.”

“I saw you. I waved to you, but you didn’t wave back.”

“I was embarrassed you caught me. It's rude of me, I know, but you always seem to be having such a good time. When I watch you work on cars, it’s like looking at a picture and I want to commit it to memory. I wish you could come inside. Then you’d be a part of the picture. But Mother mightn’t approve. She doesn’t believe Fanny or I should be too friendly or overly familiar with the staff. How muscular your arms are when you roll up your sleeves, your skin glistening with sweat from the summer sun as you comb your hair back from your forehead with your fingers while you pop the hood of a car to tinker with an engine…”

“Miss Skeffington.”

“Oh no. Did I say that last part out loud?”

“You did.”

“I’m sorry. My mouth has run away with me again.”

“No, Miss Skeffington. It’s your mouth that has me hypnotized.”

“Watching you just reminds me of when we were in Europe. You asked me to see a wrestling match with you and stay over at your friend's place in the city after. That was a lie-to-Mom-and-Dad situation. But it was sooooo worth it. The men in the arena were just so big and muscular and sweaty, and everybody was moving together like one intricate dance. Between two matches you leaned over and said, ‘how do you like your first wrestling match?’ I was so happy I felt tears starting in my eyes, and then you up and hugged me. I think you could tell I was crying.”

“I could, but I didn’t want to say anything and ruin the moment.”

“Sometimes you just have to lie to Mom and Dad, just like we did last week. You know, I’m going to tell you something. Everybody in this neighborhood likes you, except for Mother and her followers.”

“Isn’t your mother and her followers practically everybody?”

“Exactly my point. In fact, there’s a popular front against you. Mother formed it last night, and it’s made up of her circle of so-called friends, lovers, and their envious wives.”

“Guess I deserve it.”

“I don’t know about that. Maybe you do and maybe you don’t. But I don’t feel the way Mother does. If you ask me, I think you’re all right.”

“Do you?”

“I’ve always had a lot of fun talking to you. You know, you’re not such an ogre after all, no matter what they say.”

“In fact, I have a couple good qualities if you look deep.”

“You certainly do. You’re very understanding and you like Fanny and Dad. That definitely shows a lot of character. I wouldn’t be surprised if we became more than good friends after a while.”

I’ve felt like a shook-up can of nerves ever since. I hope we have a chance to talk again before I explode.

December 1935

Mother wasn’t home, something about doing some Christmas shopping, so Jim made an excuse and came into the house today. He came into my room and said he had a note for me from Fanny, just something to get past Soames. I told Soames I could manage from there and dismissed him, and then Jim and I were left alone. But everything was...different. He was sitting at my desk chair while I sat on my bed. He wouldn't look at me. Finally I asked him what was going on. He said he felt like he’d done something wrong that night in the city, that I must think... But I said no, there was nothing wrong. I just wanted to say... But I couldn’t find the words. I felt like I was going to cry, but I wasn't sad. He got up and sat next to me on the window seat. I looked at him. “Jim... do you...think...you could ever...” And that’s when he kissed me. A kiss should be the simplest thing in the world. Not this gentle stirring, like wind through the underside of leaves, inexorable as the glacier grinding behind us. So hot and yet it doesn’t scorch. No, with every breath, with every touch, his kiss carves.

January 1936

It’s different now. I mean, we still see each other all the time like before. But now when no one else is around...well, you know. So you COULD say we’re dating. But it’s secret. Secret dating? I don’t know. I mean I guess that’s the real difference: Now, when we get off the phone, or go home for the night...or it’s just quiet and we’re alone...we say, “I love you.”

March 1936

Mother’s birthday is next Thursday, the 12th. Instead of celebrating on the day, she’s hosting a birthday ball at the house this Saturday. Probably to ensure she’ll have the largest turnout possible. She’s invited everyone, even me and Fanny. Weird that she sent for us so she could tell us this HERSELF instead of having Soames, Clinton, or Manby do it for her. Even weirder is that she wants either of us there. Surely she wouldn’t want us, reminders of Father, to be there? I was expecting her to ask us to go to the theater again or make some other excuse to get us out of the house so that we wouldn’t take any attention off of her. Heaven forbid one of us talks to a man for more than five minutes while she’s in the same room. We’re her daughters, yet we’re seen as competition to her. Normally whenever she sent for us, she recited the same script along the lines of, “I wanted to explain to you and your sister, Fanny... l’m giving a dinner party on Thursday for some very old friends of mine. And I’m sure it would be a frightful bore for both of you. You understand? Why don’t the two of you go to the theater? I hear there are some very good plays now.” and we’d take that as our cue to make ourselves scarce. We’d always say, “Oh, yes. Yes, of course we do. All right, Mother.” After all, I reasoned that Mother, who considered herself a very sensible woman, was soon going to have a fiftieth birthday, and on reaching so conspicuous, so sobering landmark in one's life, what more natural than to hark back and rummage, and what more inevitable, directly one rummaged, than to come across Father? Perhaps it was the highly unpleasant birthday looming so close that set her off in these serious directions.

“Good morning, Mother.”

“Good morning, girls. Come in. What sweet dresses.”

“Oh, thank you.”

“You don’t think, perhaps, they’re a little old for you?”

“You sent for us, Mother?”

“Oh, yes. Yes, I wanted to explain to you, girls...l’m giving a birthday ball on Saturday for myself and some very close friends of mine. And I’d like you and your sister to attend.”

“Would you really, Mother?”

“Yes, very much. A lot of my friends have sons and daughters that are around your age. It’d do you both some good to mingle a little, make friends. Do you understand?”

“Yes, of course we do.”

“Mother, do I really have to go? There’ll be all those people,” you asked, your voice laced with anxiety.

“Oh, it would hurt my feelings if you stay in your room or go elsewhere. Besides, dear, you must learn not to be afraid of people.”

March 1936

St. Mary’s is an old school and very well respected. Though Mother didn’t care for it. She wouldn’t, even if it was where Georgia O’Keeffe herself learned to paint. I teach nice young ladies to paint. What could be more respectable? I only kept it a secret because I knew she’d be angry and/or disappointed. She found out about it the same afternoon as Uncle George, so she thought my contempt for them both was at least consistent. But I don’t have contempt for anyone. “George, why didn’t you stop her?” she asked, to which he asked in return, “Me? What could I have done?” It doesn’t seem to bother Uncle George that I teach at the school, or Fanny. Mother tried to tell me that the people in charge at the school feel sorry for me, that’s all. She’s wrong. Not everyone is as cruel and mean-spirited as her. I said as much. “Is it cruel to mind it when you stamp on our name and drag it in the mud? Now, get out of my way!” she huffed, and stormed off. Neither I nor Uncle George made a move to stop her. She just needed time to cool off and get used to the idea. I suppose in any other circumstance, I’d have to drop it. But I won’t. I’ve given my word to the headmistress, and I’m not going to break it. Things may be uncomfortable, but so what? I won’t be put in a cage! Soames came in and asked if everything was all right. He heard our shouting, which is unusual in this house. It... It was unusual, yes. But every now and then, I wonder if it isn’t good to shout a little and let off steam.

“Masters, when you’ve finished unloading, run down to the school and remind my daughter that we expect her here for dinner. And tell her I mean it. Really. She’s working herself to death like a canary in a coal mine.”

“I think she enjoys it though.”

Fanny turned around to put him in his place. “Please tell her to come home in time to change.”

Jim nodded grimly and returned to the car.

“I can’t possibly come! Really, Mother is incorrigible!”

“It’s not poor Masters’ fault.”

“But what is the point of Mother’s soirees? What are they for?”

“Well, I’m going out for dinner tonight and I’m glad. Is that wrong?”

The sudden act of courtesy was enough to leave me frozen. But to think of it, a self-conscious beauty queen like her would love showing off how ‘tolerant' she could be. I learned that very often the most intolerant and narrow-minded people are the ones who congratulate themselves on their tolerance and open-mindedness. I’d prefer celebrating quietly with her in her room, but since the party is practically being held for her and she is my mother, I thought it would be somewhat rude of me to not be there. Maybe I can use this birthday party as an opportunity to sneak away out the back door and spend more time with Jim. He has been nothing but sweet on me since Mother hired him, so the least I could do is show up, make my rounds of saying hello and exchanging pleasantries and engaging in idle chitchat with a few of the guests, then make my move. It’s not like anyone would miss me. I know Mother especially wouldn’t. Maybe…just maybe I could even piss Mother off if I manage to strike conversation with Jim. A Skeffington spending the entire evening with the chauffeur? Mother would be beside herself, fuming about how I mess up her ecosystem. No peer pressure, Miss Skeffington. Just clean drinks and hopefully some casual talk with Jim. What could possibly go wrong?

You finished your hair as Fanny entered.

“Mother said you were honoring us with your presence at dinner.”

“It’s easier there in the school. And I can always get changed back into my painting clothes if I need to. This stuck-up thing. Oh, dear. It shows.”

“I don’t know what you’re going to do.”

“I’ll blend it right in. I can do it with just a few strokes of the brush. Splendid. I’ll stick to every chair in the place.”

“I thought if I pinned this bow over it—”

“A bow? There?”

“I’m sorry, darling, but you’ll just have to sit on it.”

“Sit all evening?”

“You could stand if you’d keep your back to the wall.”

“You’d better hurry, girls,” your mother said as she came in to check on you. “Guests are arriving.”

“Oh... Oh, how I hate to be elegant.”

“Oh, how I detest rude, unladylike girls.”

“And I hate affected, niminy-piminy chits.”

“Oh, the dress is lovely, darling. Just lovely.”

“Oh, thank you, Mother, for letting me wear your velvet and pearls.”

“They’re old, but you’re young and very pretty.”

“Oh, thank you, Mother. Well, my shoes are too tight, and I have nineteen hairpins sticking in my hair and a curling iron burn mark on the back of my dress, and I feel dreadful.”

“Where are your gloves?”

“Here. They’re stained with lemonade. I don’t think I’d better wear them.”

“Why, you must. You can tell a lady by her gloves.”

“Not this lady.”

“A lady barehanded? You have to have gloves. You can’t dance without them.”

“Ha! I can’t dance and keep a back to the wall anyway. I’ll crumple them up in my hand.”

“At least wear one of my nice ones and carry one of your ruined ones.”

“Oh, all right.”

“Don’t stretch it. Your hands are bigger than mine. Don’t eat too much. Wait until you’re asked. Don’t be afraid, darling. Have you and Fanny got clean handkerchiefs? And don’t put your hands behind your back or stare. Don’t stride about or swear. Don’t use slang words, darling. Vulgarity is no substitute for wit, and wit is very fashionable at the moment.”

“All right.”

“And please don’t talk about Europe all the time. And especially don’t mention Cascade. You’ll embarrass me and yourself.”

Though she didn’t bring it up by name, I could tell she was referring to that infamous dinner party, when my unpleasant characteristics became especially evident, where I, unknowingly to myself, embarrassed her by singing and playing badly. I was only a child then, and was regarded as the plain-looking sister. Though much more sensible than my mother, I was still considered to be very silly by her peers. Despite the fact that my father was studious and once described as the most accomplished in the neighborhood, I lacked genius and taste.

“And stop whistling. It’s so boyish.”

“That’s why I do it.”

“I just want to make things easier for you.”

“For me or for you?”

“Don’t disappoint me, darling. Not now that you’re here.”

“Not to worry, Mother. I’ll be prim as a dish. Let’s be elegant or die!”

“Oh, so boyish.”

“Mother, you’re perfect.”

“Oh, thank you, darling. And you. Aren’t you the pretty one? Walk toward me, darling, that I may appraise you. Go on. Walk to me. Stand up straight. Turn around. Shh. Mm, yes. Oh, it’s quite as I expected,” she said. “You know, you’re very tall for your age.”

“Really? But, Mother, I’m nearly... Well, yes, perhaps I am.”

She placed her hand under your chin to cup your face. “You possess a woman's chin. Skin is a little dull. Have you not noticed? Observe her mouth, Fanny. And as for you, darling, now that you turn up your hair, you should realize you’re a young lady. My daughter...a woman. She’s beautiful, isn’t she? She’s going to be a stunning woman, don’t you think, Fanny?”

“Yes, she’s going to be.”

“I’m not! And if turning up my hair makes me one, I’ll wear it down or in two tails till I’m ninety. I won’t grow up and be Miss Skeffington. I won’t wear long gowns and look like a China aster. Oh, I’ll never get over my disappointment of not being a boy, and look at me! I’m dying to go and fight like Father did in the last war. Fine soldier I’d make. And here I am sitting and knitting like a poky old woman.”

“Knitting. Bless me. Poor you. Almost a lady. You must spend less time with the neighbor boys, and more time with me.”

You’ll never guess who I bumped into as I left the party that night. Oh, Fanny, it was meant to be. It was so perfect. There I was, weeping on the terrace, and there he was, Jim. He waited outside so he could give me some time without going too far.

Jim heard heels clicking on the garage floor and glanced up from the car engine. He did a double take as he saw you in your evening gown. You tilted your head shyly, waiting for him to say something. It was the first time you wore a dress since you were a baby.

“Don’t you dare laugh.”

“You look very fine.”

“Everything I own is trousers and shorts. Too boyish, according to Mother. Usually if I have to wear a dress or a skirt, Fanny lends me something. Mother lent me this dress from her season before the previous war. It’s very old, but she wants me to try to wear it out. If you ask me, it’s already there. Yards of fabric and I still feel naked.”

Jim continued to check you out.

“Where have you been all day?”

“Nowhere. I’ve just been busy.”

“I thought you were avoiding me.”

Jim walked purposefully forward. “Of course not.”

“But you haven’t come up with an answer yet, have you?”

Jim ducked his head and stared at the floor. “Not yet, I’m afraid. I know you want to see the world and play your part in its troubles, and I respect that, but… I have a lot weighing on my mind, and I need to sort it out before I can make a decision about us just yet. It won’t be long until I give you an answer. So, will you wait?”

“I’d wait forever.”

“I’m not asking for forever. Just a few more weeks. Darling, there’s something you should kn—”

“I’ve been thinking about us lately. Of course, I don’t want Mother to know that I deserted her so quickly so, if anybody’s around, you don’t mind if I act sort of cool and distant? To keep up appearances. Do you know how it is?”

“I certainly do. I understand perfectly.”

“Why are you smiling? I thought you’d be angry.”

“Because that’s the first time you’ve ever spoken about ‘us’.” Jim smiled with a sigh of relief and leaned forward to kiss you, but you held back.

“Yes, you can kiss me, but that is all until everything is settled.”

“For now, God knows, it’s enough that I can kiss you. The rest will be worth waiting for.”

You smiled at his reply and shared a kiss.

“In the meantime, you act as snippy as you like toward me so your mother and everyone else will think the front is still on.”

“Good. We’ll just act as if we never had that talk or shared that kiss. You know what I mean?”

“I know what you mean.”

“This can be good enough for us. It has to be good enough for us. I envy you. I feel so flat after the rush and bustle of the last two or three years. They were all sighing for the old days at dinner, but all I could do was think about how I wish everything could’ve gone back to the way it was in Europe, about how much more I want from life now than I did then. I wish I knew how an engine worked, for example.”

“I can teach you, if you like. But it’s very late. I think you’d better go back inside now, sweetheart.”

“Oh, please. Please, I can’t go back inside. It's dull as tombs in there. This is by far the most boring party I’ve been to in the last seven or eight years. Every time I go to one of these, l ask myself: What the hell am I doing here? I hate cocktail and dinner parties and all the schmoozers that come here.”

“Well, it’s a chance for all those people who admire your work to meet you.”

“No one gives a damn about art. All they care about is how much money they're gonna make out of it. They’re here for Mother and only Mother.”

“Are you sure it’s not too chilly for you out here?”

“Oh, no, I’m quite comfortable, thank you.”

“Does your mother know you’re here?”

“No.”

“Won’t she and the others worry?”

“They’re all so excited, they won’t care where I am. Come on, let’s have a drink! All the excitement of this whole thing has made me thirsty, so I brought a little pick-me-up. Shall we have a nightcap?” You pulled out the bottle you had stashed and hid underneath your dress skirts. Dresses could have their usefulness, you supposed.

“Scotch, neat as usual?”

“No. Bourbon.”

“Okay! But you know what your doctor would say...”

“Yeah... Well, he can kiss my ass! I’m old enough to choose my own medication.” Forsaking a glass, you took a small sip straight from the bottle, not caring how unladylike it looked, and then passed it to Jim as you leaned against the hood of the car together. You looked up towards the night sky from the open garage door.

“Why the fuck did I come back here?”

“Here?” Jim was, of course, referring to the garage and looked around. “To…drink?” He took a drink and handed you the bottle back.

“Back to New York.” You took another sip. “I spent the first twelve years of my life trying to get out of this place. And I succeeded. I should’ve stayed in Guatemala even after that school program ended. Sure, they got volcanoes and kudamundis everywhere…”

“What’s a kudamundi?”

“It’s like a little raccoon thing. They get into shit. People hate them.”

Jim took a swig when you passed the bottle. Instead of passing it back, he held onto it. “So is that what drove you back to New York? Kudamundis? Up in your shit?”

“No. It was the unrest in Germany. Dad thought maybe Fanny and I’d better come back here to Mother. We wrote her we were coming, from Berlin. But she never received the letters. I guess the censors must have confiscated them. We wrote her what we thought about the Nazis.”

“The Nazis. Yes, of course. Did your father come with you? I haven’t seen him, so I did wonder…”

“No. He’s still in Berlin. The Nazis don’t frighten him, but they frighten us, so...”

“So here you both are.”

“Here we are. It’s not at all the way I pictured it. It’s been done over, hasn’t it? Fanny and I were the last people Mother was expecting to see. Fanny…” you grabbed the bottle from him and took a long swig. “She’s the good one. When we were twelve, she got this binder where she planned out her whole life, and I swear to God, she’s going to stick to it. Bullet point by bullet point. Job, husband, house, kid. And when one sister is so on top of her game, it almost demands the other become a fuck-up, right?”

“What is ying without yang?”

“That’s how I see it. In Europe, she was off, doing life. And I was doing…something else. Backpacking, mostly. Surfing couches. Bumming around.”

“You did good getting off that boat when you did. St. Louis is dull as dishwater.”

“Jim, do you ever think of the old days there in Wakeforte Park?”

“Now and then, in the shower or in the car.”

“I felt quite at home there. More than I do here. Even back in New York, Fanny and I… We’re still like we were when we were kids. She will invite me places every once in a while. For the big events. Wedding. Baby shower. I’ll always say, ‘Sorry, sis. I’ll get the next one.’ But I never attend any of them. Too awkward. Too ashamed.” You took another swig. “I came back for Dad, and I’m staying for Dad. It’s weird living in someone else’s shadow. When the light shines on your life for the first time, it doesn’t look too good. Here I am. Nearing twenty. No roots anywhere. Except New York. So I figure I’ll make something of myself. I apply for college, hoping I can enroll somewhere to get a degree, then I tried to enlist in the war effort by applying to every branch and organization that accepts women... I wanted to do something my dad would be proud of… but I got rejected by all of them…” You trailed off and nearly fell asleep on your feet. Jim had to steady you before you collided face-first with the concrete floor of the garage.

“Um... You probably had enough to drink for tonight. A bit too much. My darling, you must be very weary to have drank so much. I’ll get you some water, help you to your room…”

“No, I can’t go to bed. Not yet.”

“You must, darling. I brought you a gift.”

“A gift?” His words had your attention for about three seconds, but you turned towards the sound of the front door opening. “There’s Mother and Manby now. Must be time for cake and presents. I better get out of here.”

“Let me walk you to the door at least.”

“It’s not that far. I can make it. Goodnight, Jim.”

“Goodnight.” He then stopped you for a moment so he could whisper in your ear, “And I give you leave to look in at me whenever you like.”

After you went inside with your mother, Manby walked towards Jim with a raised eyebrow. “I guess that irresistible charm of yours didn’t work on Miss Skeffington.”

“I’m saving it for you, Manby.”

March 1936

Oh, man… everything’s gone wrong! All my senses are screaming in pain. I don’t even remember drinking that much booze! Am I really such a lightweight? I had a tray sent to my room and slept in, but the pain only escalated the moment I came down after breakfast and Jim asked me, “Are you feeling okay?” No, I was not okay, and WHY IS JIM ASKING ME THIS? Did I do something to him?? It’s so unfair how because he’s a man and his body is built differently, he has a higher tolerance for alcohol than I do. He drank more than I did, but isn’t affected by it at all! According to Jim, I went from being quiet to crazy-happy and cute (his words, not mine) real quick. I was so close to being the center of the party that he had to bring me back to my room when Mother asked him to. We went upstairs to my bedroom and I wanted to wait it out, to make my triumphant return to Jim after Mother’s friends had left and everyone had retired for the night and fallen asleep. But my body had other plans, because I fell asleep minutes after my head hit the pillow. I didn’t even bother to change out of Mother’s dress and pearls. Why can’t I remember any of this??? Congrats, Miss Skeffington! You’ve reached a new low in life! Shit, is this how I die? I sincerely asked Jim if there was a good place to kill myself before I died of embarrassment. He said, “Maybe now would be a good time to show you my other secret hideout. Consider it an early birthday present,” since I passed the test by showing the whole room of Mother’s admirers and “friends” a different me. Is he seriously going to take me to another secret hideout of his?? I’m going to the Red Fern Gardens, the so-called most romantic place in New York with Jim (according to him). There’s something in my head that’s keeping me awake. And it’s not the hangover.

March 1936

Oh my god! Jim actually took me to the Red Fern Gardens. The hideout he mentioned was on a hill and had a wonderful view of the city. The whole place under the golden sunset. The best part of this spot was that it is quite hidden and unsafe. You could easily roll down the hill if you are careless or drunk, and no one could find you for days (how awesome is that?). Luckily, enough time had passed and most of the Bourbon had left our systems. I could tell the worst of its effects had worn off, but I still felt a lingering tingle or warmth in my blood. But being drunk in that wonderful moment didn't cause any accident, though. We sat there for less than an hour but it felt like an eternity. I can't even remember what we talked about. I do remember, saying how beautiful The Red Fern Gardens are and Jim being all indifferent about it. I guess you can get fed up with views like this too. There’s a motel nearby, so we have decided to make it our secret hideout from now on. That’ll turn it from something ordinary to something really special. Mother is uninterested in me, which should keep Jim and I safe. She won’t ever know that we are secretly meeting.

Today’s only regret is that I failed to bring the true essence of the Red Fern Gardens back with me (Photography can only capture so much. There’s so much more that can be seen with the human eye). At least the close up shot of Jim was not half as bad. When I came back down from the hill, it became clear that my life just became a bit more messed up now. I know because I really want to talk to Jim again soon. I know I promised myself to stay away from people, stay away from the drama. But when I look at Jim, when he talks to me, it feels like, maybe, just maybe it’s okay to have a little drama for myself. I'm not ready to define what this feeling is, but for now, I’m going to label it as ‘looking for a hand to hold' and just shove it under my bed just like the pictures I took. Help me get to sleep quickly today, Diary.

March 1936

Mother passed the crisis last night. Manby called Henri’s Beauty Salon to get Mother everything she’d… ”need”. He’s very familiar with Mother’s hair, so he’s made wigs for her. He’s also given her a face pack, muscle oil, wrinkle cream, tissue builder, massage cream, eyelashes, and astringent. She’s home now. She looks so…so…different.

“That must be Mother now.”

“Welcome home, Mrs. Skeffington.”

“Thank you, Clinton.”

“Darlings. Fanny, dear.”

“Hello, Mother.”

“Georgie, I had no idea that you were here. You know, it's heavenly to be back home again. Manby, shouldn't you go and see that the luggage is taken care of?”

“Yes, Mrs. Skeffington.”

“Georgie. This is such an unexpected pleasure.”

“Fanny, my dear.”

“Welcome home, Mother.”

“Thank you.”

“We’ll have some tea, Mother.”

“Oh, I think that would be delightful. Oh, this looks so cheerful after that depressing rest home.”

“Notice how Fanny arranged the flowers?”

“Oh, how sweet of you, Fanny. They’re perfectly lovely.”

“Sit here, Mother. Let me help you with your coat.”

“All right. You know, I’m not really such an invalid. Well, wasn’t it just like me to contract a child’s disease? Georgie, I look dreadful, don’t I?”

“Fanny, you could never look anything but adorable.”

“You’re lying. I know perfectly well how I look. But after a few weeks' rest I’ll be quite recovered.”

“Of course you will.”

“Henri saved my life. I don’t know what I would have done without him. He’s so clever. Of course, here I am, chattering on about myself. Fanny, what have you been doing?”

“Oh, nothing very much, Mother.”

“Have you seen Johnny Mitchell?”

“Yes, I’ve seen him.”

“How is he?”

“Oh, he’s just fine.”

“And what are you up to, darling?”

“Nothing much. Drawing and photographing. I don’t have time to get up to anything else.”

“Only, Fanny and I were talking about you. You know, the other day.”

“Oh?”

Your sister looked at you, just as caught off-guard as you were. She hadn’t spoken to your mother once throughout her illness. From across the couch, she looked at you with wide confused eyes and mouthed, “I didn’t say anything.”

“Yes, you see, sometimes in war, one can make friendships that aren’t quite…appropriate. And can be awkward, you know, later on. I mean, we’ve all done it. I just want you to be on your guard.”

“Appropriate for whom?”

“Well, don’t jump down my throat, dear. I’m only offering friendly advice.”

“Darling, I never said anything to Mother, honestly.”

“I believe you, Fanny. How could you have done? She didn’t want any visitors. But why did she suddenly start talking about inappropriate friendships out of nowhere? Could she be hallucinating?”

“She thinks you must have a beau, and if we don’t know about him, then you have to be keeping him secret. It’s just Mother being Mother. Don’t make such a thing of it.”

“Fanny, you know how Mother is not exactly... super open-minded about things. It feels like every minute I don’t spend with Jim, I spend worrying about her finding out about us. And what would happen if she did...”

April 1936

I don’t get it. Why would Mother suddenly forbid me to be around Jim? Is it because he’s not rich? Or because of our age difference? Is that why she also forbade us from seeing each other? Mother is so judgmental and hypocritical! She doesn’t want me to be near Jim, saying that I should find someone who is closer to my age and of the same class as me. What does that even mean?? Who determines what class Jim is in? Did she find out about us? Does she know we’re in love? Did she talk to her friends? Did those odious women say something to her and get into her head? Jim didn’t say anything to me about it. Maybe he doesn’t love me anymore? Or maybe he doesn’t know about what Mother said yet? I feel so confused.

I’m not too young. You’re just jealous and angry. You’re so accustomed to hogging all the men, but now that they’ve all left you with no thought to return, you can’t stand seeing me happy and in love with a man of my own choosing. If you can’t have a man who loves you, I can’t either, Mother? Is that it? This is all your fault. Everything. You're a heartless bitch. You STOLE my only friend from me, my place in this world, ALL of it. And you don’t even care. I’m invisible to you. I fucking HATE you. You’re not talented! You’re not special! You wasted your life away, and then came out of nowhere, suddenly decided you wanted to try your hand at parenting and ruined EVERYTHING! FUCK OFF FUCK OFF FUCK OFF FUCK OFF FUCK OFF FUCK OFF FUCK OFF!!! Get the fuck out of my life, you puffy, over-perfumed PRIMADONNA!!

I hate Mother for trying to stop me from seeing Jim. And I hate her even more for going so far as to drag John into it. John doesn’t deserve to be mixed up in this mess that she’s created. None of us do. She must be out of her damn mind if she thinks I’ll ever walk down the aisle or say “I do”. My engagement with John is just for show. I know it, John knows it, Jim knows it, and Mother knows it. When I mentioned to Jim that she seems to be really bothered by the name Nan or Nancy, he tensed up. I could tell by the way his hands gripped the steering wheel and flexed. When I asked if he knew her, he told me he did, and that he’d tell me about her and about himself, but not now, not in the car. It’s a conversation that requires the both of us sitting down. I let the subject drop for now. Nothing he could tell me could stop me from loving him.

Jim was there. He’s always been there. When you cut your knee from falling out of a tree, when you sobbed at night in a room you didn’t recognize, and when…you kissed him in the garage during her birthday party. You had no interest in men whatsoever and suddenly now you’re staying out late into the wee hours of the morning with a man more than twice your age?? That moment, Fanny got tired of doing nothing. You were in trouble. Jim was not for you. She didn’t know how to explain it, but…his presence here added to his enchantment. Somehow you thought your father’s charm glowed in him. It wasn’t George’s fault, but his stamp of approval was on Jim. If he stayed here, you’d run off with him, she was sure. And then he’d do to you just what he did to his first wife. Somewhere out there, there was Nan, Fanny thought, another woman who felt like she did that day she discovered Job’s infidelity with his secretaries. Nan was young and stupid when she married Jim and when she divorced him. It happens. She’s not the first girl to have been taken in by words that evaporated as soon as they were said, but it still hurt Fanny to see you, her daughter, potentially put yourself in the same situation. Did you even know about his past? Could you even begin to comprehend what life was like for Nan and those four girls after he scooted off? Jim was the cause of that woman's anguish. What do you—

She was sure you were headed for the same misery even now she couldn’t bring myself to describe, and you would assuredly wind up with a broken heart yourself because of him if you carried on as you’ve been doing. Fanny knew she couldn’t prevent that and, if Jim were to break your heart, you might not be as strong to cope with it as Nan was. But if your heart was to be broken, it wouldn't be because of her. She’d do the pleading now with Jim. If he really loved you like he said he did, he had to leave. Leave, and never come back. Only then you would know your place. It was looking more and more like George might’ve been right. She had to invite Jim herself. As you and Manby were downstairs in the kitchen, putting the finishing touches on a meal that you would undoubtedly take most of the credit for, Fanny knew she had to make the best of it. You were all going to have a wonderful dinner, and you would appreciate what she had done, even if you didn't know the half of it.

“Masters— that is, Jim... I must see you. Will you come to the house tonight? You needn’t stay but ten minutes. I must talk to you.”

“Anything wrong, Mrs. Skeffington?”

“Maybe. I don’t know yet. Could you come over for dinner tonight?”

“Whose invitation? Yours or your daughter’s?”

“Mine this time. Say, seven o’clock?”

“All right.”

“Good.”

As soon as Jim set the phone down, he heard a knock at the door. Who could that be? It couldn’t possibly be you, and you were the only person he would’ve expected. When he looked into the peephole, he was taken aback and took several steps backward. What was she doing here? He hadn’t seen her since… He thought that maybe if he didn’t answer, she would go away. But when she continued her persistent knocking after a few minutes of silence, he was proven wrong. It seemed that she would wait him out, no matter how long it took. Having no other possible escape route and no other choice, he took a deep breath and braced himself before opening the door.

“Hello, Jim.” She stepped past him into the room. Jim said nothing as she looked around, only stared at her in silent astonishment, disbelieving that she of all people was really there. “You’re awfully quiet, which is so unlike you. Don't you recognize me, Jim? Look hard. Look into my eyes. You called them the most beautiful you'd ever seen once, a long time ago.”

“I’m afraid you’re making a mistake.”

“No, Jim.”

“My name is—”

“Don’t pretend. I know who you are.”

“And who am I?”

“You’re Jim Masters, My ex-husband.”

“Your ex-husband? My dear woman, Perhaps if you’ll tell me who you’re looking for…”

“Oh, stop it. I saw the picture In the newspaper announcing Miss Skeffington’s engagement to Sir John Talbot. But I couldn’t help but notice you in the background, looking at the couple, or more specifically, her, your eyes filled with jealousy and longing and…something else I dare not name.”

“Nan. What are you doing here? You’re an awfully long way from California if you’ve only come to see me.”

“I had to come to see if it was true. It is.”

“What are you talking about? What’s true?”

“I can’t explain it. I only know it’s happened.”

“What’s happened? Nan, what are you implying?”

“You’re going to marry someone else, and leave her, just like the way you left me.”

“Oh, Nan. Nan. You misunderstand. We’re not—”

“Jim, it’s wrong. You can’t go on hurting people.”

“Nan—”

“I can’t let you marry her, Jim.”

“Nan! Would you just listen to me for a second? I know what you must be thinking but, as I said before, you misunderstand. Miss Skeffington and I aren’t getting married. Not anytime soon, at least.”

“You’re not? But you love her.”

“Yes. And she loves me.”

“And you want to be with her.”

“Yes. And she wants to be with me.”

“So, what do you have in mind?”

“Nan, this is hardly the time and place—”

“No. You must have something in mind. Otherwise you would not be conspiring to run away with her.”

“How do you know about that? Who told you?”

“Nobody. I just know you, Jim. It’s the kind of person you are. Flighty, running away from responsibilities… So what will you do to make a living? Do you think you’ll go on ringing doorbells trying to sell streamline refusCans and she will wait till you’ve scraped enough pennies together so you can be married?”

“If you must know, yes, we do have a plan. I’ve got a job on a paper. I’m a journalist now, but I’m not a fool. I’ve got brains. I could go into business. She could pursue her art career and work on commissions, sell sketches and paintings for money. She could have everything she wanted.”

“Young men’s talk. Oh, you would still want to give her those things. But you don’t know Mrs. Skeffington if you think she’d let you do it.”

“Of course she wouldn’t want me to run away with her daughter. Would you, if you were in her shoes?”

“No.”

“I’ll stay here at the inn until she’s ready to make her departure. I don’t want to cause her unnecessary stress by pressuring her to get a move on. She has important matters to attend to involving her family and Sir John Talbot. Loose ends to tie up.”

“Loose ends to tie up or ties to sever?”

“Nan, don’t be cruel. You can insult me all you want, I know I deserve it and more after everything I put you through. But don’t insult Miss Skeffington’s intelligence and independence by insinuating that she has no idea what she’s getting herself into. She may not be very book smart, but she’s an emotionally intelligent woman who can make up her own mind. She’s not a mindless doll to be molded into what I want her to be, only to get thrown away as soon as I get bored of her. I’m many things, I’ll admit it, but I’m not her puppetmaster, stringing her along and playing with her feelings. I’m not manipulating her thoughts or actions in any way, shape, or form. She knew very well the risks of carrying on with me. It took a long time, but eventually we built trust between each other and finally there came a day when I felt I could tell her everything. So I did. About you, about our daughters, about what my lifestyle has been for the past twenty years, what a life with me would truly entail. The good, the bad, and the ugly. I urged her to think through the implications, and I gave her all the time she needed. She listened intently the entire time. She thought about it long and hard and, in the end, she realized the pros far outweighed the cons. She’s made her choice. I did nothing to sway her one way or the other. So don’t for a second imply that I’m forcing her to give up her family. If they want to cut her off, that’s their decision. It’s not her doing, it’s not her fault. Nor is it mine. I know nothing I can say can convince you of my sincerity. To you, I’m a monster. But to her, and to myself, I’m a man. I’m just a man who’s in love and who is loved in return. Everything I feel for her, and everything she feels for me, is genuine. As soon as she comes to me, as soon as she lets me know she’s ready, we’ll go.”

“Go where?”

“I don’t know yet. Anywhere. It doesn’t matter. We’ll figure that out when we get there. The point is, we’ll be together.”

“So she’ll live with you? Unmarried?”

“Sure, why not? Nan, we’re not in the 1920’s anymore. The world has changed. People have changed. Many unmarried couples live together nowadays and nobody bats an eye at them. It’s much more practical, and not just from a financial standpoint. Don’t go clutching your pearls and acting aghast as if it’s too scandalous of a prospect. Many couples do it now as a sort of compatibility test, to see if they can actually stand living together before marriage. I���d never do anything to jeopardize Miss Skeffington’s reputation or put a black mark on her.”

“But this plan of yours… The worst of it is, you’d never know her disappointment. She’d never reproach you by a word or a look. But you’d always know what you’ve done to her life and so would she.”

“Well, let’s look at the other side of the picture, Nan. You say I can’t be with her. I’ll get over that, I suppose. But what about her? She gets excited about all my crazy dreams, but what happens to her dreams?”

“Well, you can run away if you want to. But listen, Jim. You couldn’t make her or anybody else happy. Do you know why? Because there’s only one thing in this world you’re good at. And that’s making people miserable.”

“Ahh. Don’t give me any of that paper cover philosophy. You listen to me. I quit selling whale’s teeth because of her. I wear ties because of her. I watch my English because of her. Well, look, I even went to work because of her. She has reformed me, and I’m not giving her up. Thank you for coming, Nan. Though I wish your visit had been under different circumstances, it’s good to see you. And thanks for all the things you didn’t say. You might’ve pointed out the beautifully poetic justice of a man deserting his family twenty years ago and being deserted by them in turn. Or you might’ve thrown together a few matsims, sins cast upon the waters, coming home to roost. Or you might merely have reminded me this is my past catching up with me. A final accounting. A case of delayed bookkeeping. You might’ve said all these things. But you didn’t. I don’t know if my prayers get much attention in Heaven, but they’re not just for Miss Skeffington. Of course, I thank God every day for how He made her, but I still have prayers for you and Sam, and the girls and their families. But I think it’s best you leave now. As much as I’d love to stay to chat and reminisce on our shared past and what we used to be, I have an engagement this evening.”

“What sort of engagement?”

“I have been invited to dinner by Mrs. Skeffington. Goodbye, Nan. I’ll give your regards to Chief Mahabu when Miss Skeffington and I are on the other side of the world.”

Instead of driving to the Skeffington residence, Jim instead opted to walk there. It wasn’t very far from the hotel, and Nan’s unexpected visit, though he wouldn’t go so far as to say she was right in her arguments, had still managed to shake him up. Though he hated to admit it, he was having second thoughts and could use the air to clear his head. But while he was walking, he could see a group of women up ahead, a circle of friends no doubt gossiping amongst themselves as he passed by them. Janie Clarkson was among them, and she had her legs crossed and was tapping her fingers on the armrest of the porch swing she was sitting on. Her hair was even neater than usual and her dress was new. She looked up from her magazine, smiling in that tense way she did when she was about to vent. She put her magazine down gently and smiled just the same way she did for her friends. They never knew the difference, but Jim did. 
“Did you hear about Rodger?” she began, her attempt to keep things light already waning. 
“Oh, no. What about him?” Mrs. Ridgefield took another sip of her coffee, trying not to lose all of her lipstick on the rim.
“He got his PhD last week, he called me, all excited. Those three letters just mean he wasted three years of his life and is massively in debt.” Then, despite the rising tension in her voice, she snickered. “What a fool, eh?”
Mrs. Ridgefield pursed her lips. She'd known Rodger a good deal longer than Janie and he'd always been a sweetheart. Not her type, but as far as friends went, he was a keeper.

With no other alternate route available to him to avoid the women, Jim squared his shoulders and kept walking forward towards the Skeffington residence, straight into Janie’s line of sight. As expected, as soon as she and her friends noticed him, she, though she didn’t greet him with so much as a “hello” or “good evening”, changed the subject to him. She was none too subtle as she purposefully spoke at a volume that let Jim know she wanted him to hear her conversation.

“Look, Gladys, Sir John Talbot is being announced.”

“He would be punctual.”

“That’s his car. Isn’t it a beauty?”

“It looks paid for. I’d still like a white horse.”

“Gee, Vera, an open car. It will muss Miss Skeffington’s hair up every which way.”

“No, it won’t. If she’s sensible, she’ll wear a scarf.”

“Well, what do you think of that man of hers? Miss Skeffington’s friend who's coming for dinner, Mr. Masters?”

“I’ve heard about him.”

“You have? I see. And have you reached a verdict?”

“Yes, I have. I think— Never mind. I’ll be quiet again.”

“I don’t like the way my color looks plain. Has anybody got a bright red lipstick? Mine’s grown anemic.”

“Here, I believe this is for the lips. Make yourself beautiful for Alan.”

“Oh, I didn’t think of that. Maybe I better blacken out a couple of teeth. Now what do you think of him?”

“We all know what to think of him. The problem is how to get rid of him.”

“Why? Is he staying? Say, Fanny isn’t going soft on him, is she?”

“I don’t think so. She didn’t say a word about doing such a thing.”

“But Fanny must be planning to accept him, make him one of the family.”

“You’re talking nonsense. Miss Skeffington is engaged to Sir John Talbot.”

“Do you think Mr. Masters is interested in her too?”

“What makes you say that?”

“Instinct.”

“Fanny’s also got it into her head that he’s interested in her daughter.”

“Mr. Masters seems to like her enormously. I think he may be, but I question his motives. He hasn’t been here for a while, has he?”

“No, he hasn’t.”

“And I know why.”

“Are you going to enlighten us?”

“She must be planning to dissolve her daughter’s engagement to Sir John in favor of Mr. Masters.”

“I’m not so sure. Miss Skeffington is determined on a love match for herself. She wants to be happy. But Fanny has big dreams for her daughter. If she was going to dissolve the engagement, why announce it tonight all of a sudden? She would never put Masters in the class with Sir John Talbot. She will be a very rich young woman with him. If I was in Fanny’s shoes, I would have felt very guilty selling Miss Skeffington to that Masters. She deserves better than a fortune hunter. Or shouldn’t I say that?”

“You can say it to us.”

“And if anyone plans to marry her for money, he’ll need much more to offer than Jim Masters.”

“What do you mean by that?”

“I know his kind like a book. He’s the ‘I-sold-papers-when-I was-a-kid-now-look-at-me’, type. I’ve got Miss Skeffington’s type neatly cataloged, too. Any bets? At any birthday party, she’s the sort that always piped up with: ‘I-never-had-a-birthday party-or-got-a-present’. Isn’t that right?”

“From what I can find out, he must be a fine one. It was a pity he backed off when Fanny had that trouble with her illness.”

“Maybe he thought she’d be too busy to bother with him.”

“You mean he wasn’t sure she’d survive the scandal.”

“Why? What’s he done?”

“I heard he has a daughter by his former maid that he refuses to provide for. Sent the maid and the child away to fend for themselves and live off scraps before the girl even popped.”

“Who?”

“That Masters.”

“Ha! I didn’t know the old fusspot had a child. Was it really born out of wedlock?”

“Mm, that’s not true. You’re talking nonsense. That’s quite enough on the subject.”

“You really think Sir John Talbot is worthy of all this here fuss?”

“Why sure he is, honey-child. Sir John Talbot has got money and lots of it. What Fanny wanted when she married was butlers like the Rawlings, with servants to order around. Now she wants the same for her daughter.”

“Then why allow another man in the house? I know the choice of husbands is eccentric in that family. They already claimed a Jew and soon they can boast a chauffeur, but even so—”

“Did anyone notice his eyes? They’re rather nice. Blue.”

“What are you doing? Defending him? Give me a piece of tissue.”

“Just because I happened to say he had nice eyes. Read your history. Some of the foulest people had the nicest eyes.”

“Well, I noticed them. They’re only fair.”

“Besides, they’re not blue. They’re brown.”

“Well, you’re crazy. They’re blue—”

“Oh, why are you always—”

“Now wait a minute. We’re not getting any place. What we need is a plan in case he intends staying.”

“Why does he stay? A man who’s wandered around the world all his life. You’ve got too much powder.”

“Whether he plans to stay or not, we’ve got to get rid of that-that indescribable monster as soon as possible.”

“Right.”

“Now wait a minute. I’m still not trying to defend him, but after all, I don’t think we ought to call him an indescribable monster. We don’t really know him.”

“All right. If you want me to, I’ll describe him. But the hair will be blue.”

“I dislike him just as much as you all do, but didn’t he fight in the last war?”

“First he ran away from his family.”

“That's the bravest thing I’ve ever heard of.”

“They couldn’t trace him anywhere. When they did find him, he was in an army hospital, wounded. He’d joined up under another name and lied about his age.”

“How perfectly splendid.”

“All right. That entitles him to one more night’s lodging. That better?”

“Much better.”

“But if you ask me, he’s got to go.”

“We don’t need a definite plan. All we’ve got to do is show him that he’s not wanted. We’ll freeze him out.”

“Freeze him out? Not with a man who’s been to Siberia.”

“It’s agreed then. We’re to keep the popular front against him ongoing, with or without Fanny. And nobody weakens.”

“Nobody. Gladys?”

“Nobody.”

“And in case anybody does begin to feel sorry for him, remember our motto: He shall not pass.”

“Well, I should be off.”

Jim entered the drawing room purposefully. Everyone stared.

“Yes?”

You tensed in anticipation.

Jim looked at your mother. “I’m here.”

Your mother got up and walked over to Jim. “I don’t think this is such a good idea. We mustn’t worry Manby.”

“You’ve asked me to come, and I’ve come.”

“Would someone please tell me what is going on, or have we all stepped through the looking glass?”

“Your maid has as much right to know as anybody else.”

“Why don’t I find that reassuring?”

“Miss Skeffington. How well you look.”

“Er, John. This is Masters, our chauffeur. Masters, this is Sir John Talbot.”

“Hello, Sir John.”

“Hello, Mr. Masters. Miss Skeffington never told me you were coming.”

“I didn’t know he was.”

“Well, the thing is, I was driving down from Rye and I suddenly realized I’d be passing the neighborhood.”

“What were you doing in Rye?”

“Oh, I was doing various car things.”

“I see. How do you know Miss Skeffington, sir?”

“Well, I don’t. Not really. But, uh, I want to. Very much.”

“We cannot always have what we want,” your mother mumbled.

“Oh, Mother, John, Masters is teasing. You know, before he was our chauffeur, Masters was our neighbor.”

“Or at least, my grandfather was. I was saying to Miss Skeffington, we should all see more of each other.”

“Maybe. Have you brought a dinner jacket?”

“Yes.”

“Well, you were very well-equipped to do your ‘car things’ in Rye.”

As John and Jim talked amongst each other, you went over to your mother and pulled her aside, speaking in a hushed tone so the men wouldn’t hear. “Did you plan this?”

“I might have said if he was coming from Rye, then he’d be driving quite close.”

“Rye is an hour or more from here. Don’t think I’m amused. I dislike my hand being forced.”

“No one’s forcing anything.”

“Just send John away! As quick as you can. For all our sakes.”

Instead, she then turned towards Jim and John, and raised her voice to grab their attention. “Now you’re here, Sir John, I hope you’ll stay the night at least.”

“Perhaps John is in a hurry to get home.”

“No, no, I’m not.”

“It’s settled then. Clinton, will you please tell Manby to set up a room for Sir John and to set a place for Masters at the table? He’ll be joining us for dinner tonight. And ask someone to unpack for Sir John.”

“Don’t tell me that Manby is the cook again tonight, Mrs. Skeffington.”

“Indeed, and why not?”

“Well, I think it’s time that I tried Miss Skeffington’s cooking.”

“Don’t worry, you will. Well, shall we sit down?” you said. Once John and Jim went into the dining room, you turned to your mother and hissed under your breath through gritted teeth, “This is so precisely not the way to win me over!”

Dinner that evening was an uneventful and uncomfortable affair. Nobody remembered anything about it except that time seemed to slow down to an unbearable slog. It was so unbearable that you, sick and tired of putting on the pretense, snapped. Whatever you said didn’t matter. What mattered was that you openly displayed your frustration as you threw down your silverware with a loud, metallic clatter and abruptly scooted your chair back. It made an irritating squeak against the fine wooden flooring as you threw your napkin on your plate and left, retreating to your room. Your plate was barely touched but your wine glass was emptied. You were so stressed that you had no appetite and were afraid that eating more than three bites would cause you to be sick and throw it all back up.

[dalliansss]

Angbang?

ULTIMATE SHIP MEME!

Send in two (or more) names and I’ll fill all this out about the ship!

General:

Rate the Ship -   Awful | Ew | No pics pls | I’m not comfortable | Alright | I like it! | Got Pics? | Let’s do it! | Why is this not getting more attention?! | The OTP to rule all other OTPs

How long will they last? Depends on the AU, for me, but by default worldbuilding I write with @skaelds they last even beyond the Old World.

How quickly did/will they fall in love? Pretty quickly for Ainur standards

How was their first kiss? Surprising for Melkor's part. Mairon at the time knew him as Thû, maia of Námo.

Wedding:

Who proposed? Mairon, lmao

Who is the best man/men? n/a

Who is the braid’s maid(s)? n/a

Who did the most planning? Mairon. It was a premeditated move hahaha

Who stressed the most? Mairon. Melkor didn't even know Mairon wanted to put a ring on it.

How fancy was the ceremony? - n/a

Who was specifically not invited to the wedding? - n/a. Ainur do not observe customs like Incarnates (men and elves) do. Wedding is a simple thing: shed their fanar, mingle their fëar. No need for ceremony or vows at all.

Sex:

Who is on top? Again, Ainur don't get intimate the way Incarnates do. Sex for them in shedding corporeal forms and mingling their spirits. But if you're being technical, Melkor mostly 'dominates', because he's Vala. His fëa is infinitely stronger.

Who is the one to instigate things? Mairon lol. Melkor doesn't care much for intimacy.

How healthy is their sex life? - Barely touch themselves let alone each other | 2 | 3 | 4 | Once a couple weeks, nothing overboard | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | They are humping each other on the couch right now

How kinky are they? - Straight missionary with the lights off | 2 | 3 | 4 | Might try some butt stuff and toys | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | Don’t go into the sex dungeon without a horse’s head

How long do they normally last? It depends lmao

Do they make sure each person gets an equal amount of orgasms? Yes

How rough are they in bed? - Softer than a butterfly on the back of a bunny | 2 | 3 | 4 | The bed’s shaking and squeaking every time | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | Their dirty talk is so vulgar it’d make Dwayne Johnson blush. Also, the wall’s so weak it could collapse the next time they do it. | It depends.

How much cuddling/snuggling do they do? - No touching after sex | 2 | 3 | 4 | A little spooning at night, or on the couch, but not in public | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | They snuggle and kiss more often than a teen couple on their fifth date to a pillow factory.

Children:

How many children will they have naturally? - 

How many children will they adopt? -

Who gets stuck with the most diapers? - 

Who is the stricter parent? -

Who stops the kid(s) from doing dangerous stunts after school? -

Who remembers to pack the lunch(es)? -

Who is the more loved parent? -

Who is more likely to attend the PTA meetings?

Who cried the most at graduation? - 

Who is more likely to bail the child(ren) out of trouble with the law? - 

Cooking: 

Who does the most cooking? Melkor imbibes more, but he's more into alcohol and wine. Mairon does not imbibe at all.

Who is the most picky in their food choice? - 

Who does the grocery shopping? -

How often do they bake desserts? -

Are they more of a meat lover or a salad eater? - 

Who is more likely to surprise the other(s) with an anniversary dinner? -

Who is more likely to suggest going out? - 

Who is more likely to burn the house down accidently while cooking? - 

Chores: 

Who cleans the room? - Mairon

Who is really against chores? - Neither. Both can pull their weight along tbh

Who cleans up after the pets? Melkor. His dragons, his work lol

Who is more likely to sweep everything under the rug? Neither

Who stresses the most when guests are coming over? Neither

Who found a dollar between the couch cushions while cleaning? Both

Misc:

Who takes the longer showers/baths? Mairon

Who takes the dog out for a walk? Mairon

How often do they decorate the room/house for the holidays? Neither

What are their goals for the relationship? For Melkor, finish his Great Work. For Mairon? To just stay with Melkor and order the world.

Who is most likely to sleep till noon? Neither.

Who plays the most pranks? Melkor.

[silversiren1101]

Top 5 Video Game Characters?

Ooooh characters this is hard… This is not in order because that’s impossible for me lol

1) Estinien Wyrmblood - FFXIV: tall stoic fully armored elf boy that is broody and mean, is actually extremely gorgeous with long white hair, has a tragic past, is very protective, and hilariously has no concept of money. He’s been in the game for like 10 years and his growth as a character has been phenomenal to watch and follow. He feels like a friend and old lover lmao

2) Edea Lee - Bravely Default: aside from having one of my favorite visual designs of all time, she’s adorable and stubborn and so very passionate about what is right and wrong. She grew up very sheltered/indoctrinated and seeing her confronted with the direct opposite of everything she was taught and having such moral strength of character to say “fuck all this we are so wrong and we need to fix everything!” is amazing to me. Mgr gr grr

3) Mio / M - Xenoblade Chronicles 3: THE HOPE. THE LOVE. THE DESPAIR. THE SEEING YOUR LOVED ONE TURNED INTO SUCH A MONSTER OVER THE INEVITABILITY OF FATE YOU SACRIFICE YOURSELF TO MAKE IT ALL END. THE “WE WILL FIND EACH OTHER ALWAYS NO MATTER WHAT REINCARNATION WE’RE IN”. THE I LOVE YOU SO MUCH AND FOR THAT I MUST END THIS IN THE DESPERATE PRAYER THAT NEXT TIME IT WILL WORK NEXT TIME WE WILL BOTH MAKE IT YOU WONT BE ALONE AGAIN. THAT there won’t be a next time. It’s time to let go.

I’m so sorry but XC3 has maybe one of my favorite canonical romances of all time in Mio and Noah / M and N that it hits almost every single YES YES YES button of mine and makes me fucking feral. Mio also has just a gorgeous design and her story of accepting her inevitable demise to the last days counting down in story is so beautiful and painful. It’s a story of grief and coming to terms with what is so unfair when everyone around you still has time left that you don’t. I literally cried writing this thinking about it. I adore Mio. Honestly it was a competition between Nia and Mio on which xenoblade catgirl to pick but Mio is such a clear winner for me.

4) HK-47 - KOTOR: Haha funny murder robot makes me laugh. Also the loyalty. There is a case to be made for the genuine loyalty HK-47 has for Revan outside of his programming, and I love them. That’s my metal murder son. He’s also just very interesting narratively! That hints about who you really are and such, and his use in KOTOR 2 is most excellent.

5) Regill Derenge - Wrath of the Righteous: it’s the current favorite most special boy! He hits all the checkboxes okay: knight, stoic/cold, resolved in his ideals, morally questionable methods/the greater good/ ends justify the means, unconventionally attractive, sexy voice, older man. He gets bonus points for seeming extremely straight forward but there’s so much nuance and stuff going on under the hood so to speak, and he’s an awesome example of subtle storytelling in his ideals, motives, and contradictions/hypocrisies! I won’t go too into him because, well, he’s my current favorite, and I can talk forever, but my favorite is his relationship with Yaker. He’s always hard on him, and always talking negatively about being loved by his subordinates, yet… even your companions can see that’s not the case. Not just Ember but Lann will bring up his relationship as a mentor to Yaker, and Regill admittedly calls him “a good plant I’m bad soil” almost begrudgingly. He has self banter too where he has concerns about how his men will fare without them, sounding almost anxious. Lastly, and this is huge, how the points are calculated in his Act 5 quest during the trial. Mechanically, several things in the game affect this, but ultimately having points is BAD and getting 3 points is the immediate failure. You get points by things like being on a chaotic mythic path, accepting the profane gift from nocticula, or trying to reason with Baphomet. Most everything else gives no points, making them neutral. Only TWO THINGS give you negative points which are things he actively approves of: being a Hellknight yourself, and then making Yaker your hellknight ambassador, which involves standing up to Regill and protecting Yaker from unfair punishments. Regill mechanically approves of this MORE than being on the aeon path! That’s huge! He’s a bit of a hypocrite/liar in this regard and I love him for it, he’s more attached to his men than he lets on, and has a much deeper appreciation of Yaker than his overt actions suggest.

I can easily say much more, but that’s good enough for now.

[declaredmissing]

wanting someone older and wiser to save me

There was a night I fell asleep crying and heard my sister’s voice in my head, “it’ll be okay, little moon.” I realized how much I missed the best friend I used to have in my sister. That relationship is lost, and I don’t know how to recover it or where to go from there. When I find myself missing ‘my sister’, I wonder if I’m really longing for an older figure to reassure me that everything would be alright. I don’t know how to be that person for myself. There’s a person I’m afraid of becoming, and I don’t know why.

I dreamed last summer of a human rights lawyer walking into the house with the broken refugee family, taking the little girl away and saving her when the girl was about to jump. How explicitly my subconscious was telling me I long for a mother, for a hero, for some magic person to provide me unconditional love and protection and kindness. A dream showing me how I wanted to rescue others before myself. I wanted someone else to rescue me, because I didn’t trust myself to be there for me.

There’s a little girl, standing at the edge of a window, about to jump in the pool, and she wants someone older and wiser and kind to sweep in and save her. She’s my daughter, and she’s me, and she’s the little girl inside my mother too, inside probably every woman I’ve ever known.

Self-destruction used to be the only language I knew when I needed help. In times I felt the most rage, I felt driven to prove I was more willing to destroy myself and go further than anyone else would. Dumping my journals and writing in the trash can, letter opener to my skin, to my paintings. Ending friendships, cutting my ties to the world. Erasing myself was the only way I felt I could exert control in a life where I otherwise felt helpless. It was my attempt to speak, to beg people to see that I wasn’t okay, to ask them to care, but in a manifested in a cry for help that didn’t speak at all. I wanted someone to stop me. To tell me I was too valuable to be lost. But there’s no wiser or older figure who’s going to sweep in and reassure me of my value. Realizing that left me with a deep and aching loneliness, but instead of turning others, I decided to contain the pain, and this reduced me to being isolated and weaker. I searched for security by deciding to enter a ‘men’s world’; safety in self control and self restraint.

In response to my own fear, I decided to develop a tough skin to protect myself. I found myself looking up to fictional figures with traditional masculine traits – self control, determination, cool, emotional discipline, and mastery. Self-sufficient, independent women, who are fucked over in many ways but refused to be helpless. Alienated with no support system, but plenty of rage to fuel them. Aimee, Lisbeth Salander, Aomame, Lara Croft. They had a voice, and they had power, even if it was in a sense dressing over deeper wounds, to protect the softer parts of their underbelly. I thought rescuing myself meant being untouchable. Being able to defend myself. To not be scared anymore. I wanted to be both weapon and armor itself. The kind of girl who could walk home alone at night and have nothing to be afraid of.

Emma Berquist in her article True Crime Is Rotting Our Brains observed, “So many true crime shows advise women to trust their instincts, but how can we trust instincts that have been hijacked by induced anxiety?” She worried that being primed to read danger in innocent situations “are not sensible reactions, they are the thoughts of someone who has been deeply traumatized.” I wonder how much of my instincts for survival are led by misreading the world. Defaulting to believing this world is a dangerous place, and in my body, I am not safe here. I often think of the police officer I dated, who was alert and guarded and could sense in every gesture or open space, the potential for danger. I related to him. I understood him. I wanted to become what he did in his response to fear.

Much of the criticism against women’s self-defense are objecting to how women must prime themselves to signals of danger. How we must be the ones to train and protect ourselves, instead of questioning society and demanding that society as a whole must become a safer place. It skews our perception of danger.

We are primed with our hands holding our keys in the the way that alert, vulnerable women do walking alone at night.

Many of my heroines are driven by anger, of experiencing women in their lives being abducted or murdered. Who they become is from the effect of these stories on their psyche.

Our very culture skews crime and violence to embed fear within us. I’ve been thinking of other insiduous ways it does this, encouraging us to mistrust each other, read danger into each other, in the name of encouraging safety, being alert. As a smokescreen to distract us from the deeper causes of violence. Heightened fear became the underlying landscape driving me to muay thai, combat sports, self defense. When I walk alone at night, every stranger could potentially whip out a knife. They warn of this in kali, demonstrating how casually one could stab you, as if it were a normal thing to expect. If, according to Berquist, “crime stories are a fundamentally conservative way of looking at the world,” what would a radical way of looking be? What would be the opposite of ‘fear-stoking propaganda’? What would it mean to practice self-defense as a way of truly finding power in oneself, rather than it being a reactive way of seeking power, like a man buying a gun?

I’ve been thinking about it what it means to take agency for my own life. There are days I feel like I’m just barely threading myself together; that I’m only just holding on to the strands that bind me. I think of how I’ve grown, since I first commuted to Brooklyn to learn Muay Thai, wrapping my hands on the train. Looking for courage. Looking for armor. Combat sports has become my lifeline when I don’t know what else to do with myself. It’s hard earned confidence. Focusing on the bag is a way of channeling my anxiety to a certain outcome–I know how to practice. I know that this isn’t wasted effort. The concentration and energy feel productive. There’s no confusion. Each strike is its own reward.

I found some kind of fulfillment and reward through the repetition of kicking a bag. Driven to perfect my roundhouse kick, fueled by the thrill of a perfectly executed kick. I learned to build habits and structure through long term persistence and self-forgiveness. It was the best thing I did for myself at that time in my life where I was going through a personal crisis.

I found survival in the drive to keep working, with a laser-like intensity, on something even after I’ve lost immediate interest. Learning what rules I do want to form for myself. Reward in my tenacity in itself; not to be recognized or to feel safer, but in the sheer joy of seeing myself improve. Survival in discovering my ability to stick with something even when it was hard.

Turning to martial arts and starting to fully grasp just how powerful I can be – how overwhelming it is to lean into something new, to be bad, to persist–and then to be truly whole-heartedly empowered by the results. Training myself to not be disappointed so easily by my failure or clumsiness, at how my body simply did not know yet. To not feel frustrated that I was getting it wrong, or that it wasn’t coming together or feeling easy yet. Enduring hardships and learning the grace to bear them well.

Finding agency through martial arts hasn’t solved my life problems, and it doesn’t make the world objectively less dangerous.

Now, I just want to live from joy and wonder; to run towards, not from.

But with tenderness and infinite patience, I’ve learned, along the way, that no one else is going to do it for me. It’s a hard lesson to accept. I grew armor as a kid, learning to rely on myself, but at heart, hoping someday someone would care for me. I held on to that fantasy, and my anger came from the injustice of feeling that was withheld from me. I struggle to accept that no one else is going to tell me the words that I want to hear, but it’s hard for me to feel like it’s okay to say those things to myself. But I hope to let go, to accept with grace that my belief in myself should not be dependent on others believing in me. There will be people who love me, who treat me kindly, generously, but if I’m able to unfailingly protect myself–be sacred to myself, treat myself like I would be my own daughter–then I’ll never be breakable.

focus on the evolution in my perception of/relationship to martial arts.

The moment I decided to box was when I watched Tomb Raider, and Vikander, the underdog, was hurling herself at her opponent and refusing to give up. And I thought, maybe I could have it in me too. Croft, or the way Vikander played her – was vulnerable but also tough. She was someone who chose the hard path. Scrappy and resourceful and uncertain. And I identified with her. There is something triumphant and hopeful to be found in a character who, at the end, discovers just how truly powerful she is after emerging through crisis.

[thelesbiancitizen]

hello violet. may i ask why you detransitioned? the general consensus according to doctors is that transitioning is the best treatment for gender dysphoria. i'm really curious about your experience because i experience dysphoria as well, and i would like some guidance.

Hello anon! Yes, you may ask! Fair warning, I’m really gonna get into it, because I think it’s important that I am honest and in-depth here.

In regards to the consensus of doctors, you said it right in your question: the "best treatment" for gender dysphoria, keyword best. When you actually take a look at the science, doctors really don't know how to treat gender dysphoria. Transition seems to work for some people, yes. The author of this article (I know he writes for The Federalist. that doesn't mean this article is irrelevant!) looked at the studies often cited for supporting transition as a cure for dysphoria, and found that most of the studies were flawed and don't exactly support the idea of transition being 'the best treatment'. Again, there is evidence that transition helped some people, but overall, the data is pretty inconclusive. Many of the studies were self-selected and had a small sample size. It seems that doctors just don't really know how else to treat dysphoria -- transition is the only known treatment at this point, so only by default is it the ‘best’.

This was something I discovered in the midst of my transition when I was having doubts. I honestly had doubts the entire time I was transitioning, but I ignored most of it, because I was told it was ‘normal’ and that my doubts were actually more evidence that I was “really trans” and was just “internalized transphobia”. I thought this was odd but I was really invested in transition and wanted it to work so badly that I just ignored it as best I could and forged ahead. I wish I had listened to my doubts then. They only grew and continued to resurface from time to time. Sometimes the cognitive dissonance I felt was truly agonizing and I would be alternately panicky and depressed for days. Again, the online trans communities I was in said this was normal. I tried, again, to just deal with it. Though all the while my dysphoria was curiously getting worse and worse. But by all accounts I was trans. You can’t say that I wasn’t. My experience was exactly like every other trans man I had seen online and met in person. The same shit. I hadn’t just jumped into transition unthinkingly. I had been in therapy for several years and had discussed transition at length with my therapist. I had researched and researched and researched and watched videos and thought about it and thought about it and thought about it and it really seemed like transition was my only option for future happiness, based on everything I saw and read. Watching video diaries from trans men, it was like they had copy + pasted thoughts from my head into their videos. All the memes and things -- I related. More and more evidence that this was my best bet. I would have been nuts to not transition at that point (at least, that’s what I thought). So anyone who wants to claim that I “wasn’t really trans”, was “a confused cis person”, whatever, can frankly fucking shove it.  So why was it, well, not working? At the beginning, pre-T, I had dysphoria over just a few things, like my voice, my curves, and occasionally my breasts, but not all the time. I had come to see testosterone as The Holy Grail that would save me from my self-loathing. When I got on it, the first few months were alright, then my dysphoria took a steep upturn; that is, it got much worse. Things that hadn’t bothered me before were bothering me a lot now. As the months went on, I went from feeling fairly neutral to the idea of top surgery, to leaning toward it, to feeling like I absolutely needed it immediately. It made me extremely depressed to even look at my breasts, to notice them in my peripheral vision. That was new. Then I started having thoughts about bottom surgery, which I had never had before. Dysphoria about my genitals was brand new and it disturbed me. I was concerned that my dysphoria was growing, and my hatred toward my body was becoming stronger and stronger. The more my body masculinized, I was simultaneously elated and disgusted. It was very confusing and unsettling. I loved that I looked more male and that I was starting to pass, but I became ever more disgusted with my femaleness, and the things I perceived as ‘female parts’ of my body. I wondered, then, if the dysphoria would ever end. I thought of the accounts of other trans men that I saw and had followed along; I remembered how a lot of them started with a little bit of dysphoria that grew and grew the further along they got in transition. A lot of them had felt hesitant about top surgery, then ended up getting it. A lot of them said they never wanted bottom surgery, then ended up getting it. It started to look more and more to me like a slippery slope, like celebrities who get a nose job and then cheek implants and then chin fillers and then you get Kim Kardashian and Farrah Abrahams and the like. People who keep altering and keep altering their bodies hoping that the next procedure will cure them and give them everlasting confidence and happiness and make them love themselves, but it doesn’t. It never does. Because the problem isn’t external, it isn’t your body. That’s what I eventually realized. I didn’t like that I was hating myself more than ever and craving surgeries and becoming obsessed with picking out ‘flaws’ in the mirror. I felt insane. I felt like I did at the peak of my disordered eating episodes, except far, far worse. I knew that what I was doing was not healthy. Yet, everywhere I looked online, trans people were, well, doing the exact same stuff I was doing and calling it ~normal and healthy trans behavior~! It really started to freak me out. I decided to get off of all of the trans communities I was a part of. I deleted my twitter and instagram and reddit accounts and also stopped talking to my friends who were trans (that’s a bit of an extreme approach but I was really in a bad way. We weren’t very close anyway because I was so fucking depressed I had pulled away from everyone in my life. I don’t recommend anyone just cut off their friends willy-nilly). Within just a month of being left to my own thoughts, journaling incessantly and engaging in deep self-reflection, I started to recognize that transition really wasn’t helping me and was, in fact, making things far worse for me. I realized that a lot of the things I heard in the trans community didn’t make very much sense but I hadn’t questioned it because -- well, you’re not really allowed to question things in the trans community. I realized most of them were self-loathing and encouraging self-loathing in other community members. I realized how the focus on validation was inane and vapid. I realized that “AFAB” people — females — really had no place in the trans community and were constantly shut down and told not to share their experiences because it was upsetting to trans women. I realized if I continued with medical transition, I would be a medical patient for the rest of my life. That frightened me. I hadn’t truly thought about that before. What would happen to my vagina if I stayed on testosterone? Was I putting myself at risk for cancers or liver disease? Would I need a hysterectomy? What if I wanted to have children? What if I wanted to breastfeed? Transition was complicating those things and it just didn’t quite seem worth it anymore. I wanted to just let my body be.

The biggest reason, probably, was that I realized transitioning would be committing to hiding a huge part of my life, basically forever. That I would either have to constantly come out to people as trans and have to worry about who was safe and who wasn’t, or I’d have to go stealth, and pretend to be ‘one of the guys’, when I really couldn’t relate to men because I didn’t grow up as a boy. I wasn’t raised male, I wasn’t born male, and I couldn’t go back in time and change that. Men bond with each other over having shared childhood experiences, and I didn’t have those. I missed camaraderie with women so much. I missed that knowing smile that two women walking down the street make at each other. I missed the safety of women’s bathrooms. I realized I would always have the shared childhood experiences of women and that would never go away. And I’d either have to lie for the rest of my life and pretend that never happened, or I’d have to live in fear of my past being revealed if someone clocked me. And it all just suddenly seemed so stupid. Why was I doing this to myself? Why was I making myself an outsider like that? Why was I making myself a life-long medical patient when my dysphoria wasn’t even going away? I missed being a woman. I finally admitted it to myself and I cried and cried and cried. I realized that I had never really wanted to be a man, anyway — I just didn’t want to be a woman. I just was fed up with the difficulties of being a woman in our society and I hated being objectified and I hated being sexually harassed all the time and I hated feeling unsafe in my body. I hated being a lesbian, hated that people would make gross assumptions about me, thinking of a porn category before thinking of me as a human being. And I realized I had been taking all that anger and hurt and pain and basically directing it at myself. I had been harming myself because I was angry at the way society treated me for being a woman. And that made me cry even more. I cried for like, days straight. I’m not even exaggerating. I had so much pain in me. I realized my transition had been, ultimately, a really elaborate form of self-harm. I was blaming myself for the hatred directed at my body by a woman-hating society. But my body had never done anything wrong. I had never done anything wrong. I was suddenly overcome by a fierce overprotectiveness of my body. I immediately wanted to detransition. I wanted to protect my body and myself, and I didn’t want to hurt myself anymore. I didn’t want to continue hating myself and rejecting myself. There was never, ever anything wrong with me, and I was fucking pissed at all the people who convinced me that there was. And so here I am. I realized that gender is a lie and that being a woman doesn’t really mean anything other than a label that society has given to me by virtue of my female sex. People may not like it when I’m loud and opinionated and hairy and not wearing makeup and not being subservient and obedient but that’s their fucking problem! I could do those things when I was on testosterone and people didn’t care because they perceived me as male, but I hadn’t actually changed at all. The only thing that changed was that it was suddenly OK for me to be myself because people thought I was male. But I was actually free to be myself the entire time, even if some people don’t like it, and I’m free to be myself now, even if people know I am female. Fuck the people who think that masculine women must secretly be men. I realized that’s actually crazy homophobic. Fuck the people who think that lesbians are gross and would rather me ‘turn myself into a heterosexual man’ so that they can feel more comfortable. Who cares!! It’s my life. People might think masculine women and lesbians are disgusting, and those people are heinous and wrong. Woman is just a word to describe me and other female people who are adults; that’s all, it means nothing more than that. And that was the most freeing and wonderful realization. That ‘woman’ carries a lot of cultural baggage, but I don’t need to pick it up and carry it with me. I can be a woman and be myself and if people misunderstand me or dislike me for it, that’s their fucking problem, not mine.

And THAT is why I decided to detransition. :)

[theepisceswriter]

Taking you to pound town (Nanami, Geto, Gojo, Toji)

Synopsis: Need I say more? How the men of JJK get when the sex between you two really heat up and how their style of thrusting is. I suck at descriptions, but we been knew this 🥴

TW: mature things obviously, typos probably because I didn’t proofread, GN!reader, a whole lot of roughness with Toji, tiny mention of a belly bulge with Toji, 18+, MINORS DNI

NANAMI

Sex with Nanami is nowhere near vanilla at all. You two like to experiment around a lot, especially with new toys and gadgets, and you can’t tell me that Nanami isn’t into bondage at all. It might not be extreme, but he’s definitely left you mobility restricted a couple of times. The main action of intercourses between you two is never too rough, though. Nanami is the type who likes to take his time with you, gentle thrusts and long movements of his hips that let you feel every throbbing inch of his cock as he slips in and out of you at a pace that’s just right. It’s makes the two of you go crazy, you both love your default pace for sex. But on days when he comes home from work or Jujutsu high stresses? Oh boy. When you hear his glasses hit the dresser and see his tie already in his hands wrapped around them and the top buttons of his dress shirt unbuttoned? You and your poor hole are really in for it. He’s not rough at all when he’s manhandling you because the last thing he wants to do is accidentally take his anger out on you physically (on accident guys, not purposefully) and leave you with bruising. But what he does do is transfer that anger into energy and goes to work on your poor little hole that’s absolutely going to be sore by the end of this. Grunts and the loud sound of skin slapping against skin are the only things that can be heard along with mumbles under his breath about how terrible his day was. He grabs onto your hips and pushes them up at an angle that makes this pounding just as pleasurable for you as it is for you; his hands moving at such a fast speed from his thrusting that you don’t even have to move at all, he’s doing all the work for you. Needless to say, you won’t be able to walk straight for a couple of days. Lucky for you because Nanami just happens to be a master at aftercare.

GETO

Geto isn’t really languid with his thrusts. There’s no rolling of his body or hips like that, but not in a bad way! The length of his dick and the slight curve of it alone is enough to hit those spots inside of you and have your toes curling so he really doesn’t have to do all too much. He prefers to have you on your back so he’s able to see the expressions on your face and the way your eyes roll when he slides himself into you completely. I don’t see him having a big breeding kink, but the mating press is definitely his favorite position to be in with you because it allows him to be inside you so deep and all he has to do is fold your legs up more if he wants to get any deeper. Which he does all the time; have you to where your ankles are at your ears and his chest and body weight are directly on top of you as he thrusts into you; quick snaps of his hips up against you in intervals of two seconds. You’re stuffed and full of him the entire time in such a close proximity that when he decides to tease you by pulling all the way out until he can see his tip, you can’t help but whine at the loss of contact. Squirming underneath him begging for him to resume his position, but he doesn’t do it until he feels like it. Which can be minutes at a time, but finally he takes pity on you. That signature smirk on his face as he looks down at you, “You want my cock that bad? Hm? Fine, I’ll give it to you. It’s all yours baby.”

GOJO

The stamina this man has is incredible and he doesn’t care if you don’t have superhuman abilities like him, he’s going all in and you’re just going to have to deal with it! Everything is just so fast paced, but he has enough stamina and can last for a while so he’s able to do that. Plus, the feeling of his thick long cock ramming into you doesn’t match up to anyone else you’ve been with, it is truly an out of world of experience. He doesn’t show you any mercy either. You can have tears forming in your eyes and staining your cheeks and he still wouldn’t stop. Instead, thrusting into you deeper while he whispers a few reassuring, “It’s okay baby. You take me well. Like my cock was made just for you, you’ll be okay.” While wiping at your tears from overstimulation. Positions where you’re on top of him are his favorite because it gives you this false sense of being in control when really, even when he’s on the bottom, he’s still the one in charge and controls the pace you take him at and all. Plus, he likes to surprise you with his special move out of the blue when you’re on top. When he notices that you’re close to release he’ll lock his hands around your hips to balance himself and give himself something to hold on to while he begins to thrust up into you at a pace that exceeds beyond pounding. It’s like his dick and hips are moving at a speed that’s even faster than the speed of light. You’re a mumbling incoherent mess on top of him as he brings you to an explosive orgasm, but that still doesn’t stop him. He’s giving you two orgasms minimum with his special attack and he’ll even pull it out more than once if he wants to. By the time he’s done with you, you won’t be able to move because you’re so worn out.

TOJI

Every session with Toji is a trip to pound town and he’s so mean and ruthless too, but it’s Toji what did you expect? I’m talking taking you in doggy style with your back arched as far as it can go because he has his foot on top of it weighing down heavily on your poor back to hold you in place while he rams into like a mad man. At one point his foot even moves from your back to your head, a lot less pressure than your back but enough to have your face smashed down into the fabric or material of whatever he has you against, him laughing maniacally at you from above because of how silly you look with your cheeks smushed and lips pressed together like that. “So desperate like a bitch in heat that you’d let me do this to you? Step all over you like this? You love every minute of it, the way you clench around me gives it away. I want to hear you say it; say that you like when I pound into you and step on you like this.” Wheeeew! He’s tearing your insides and poor hole up, I wouldn’t be surprised if you were able to see a tiny bulge in your stomach every time he thrusted so ruthlessly into you. And when he doesn’t have you in doggy style? He has you pressed up against the wall with your legs in his hands, holding them up while he pounds into you because if he didn’t your legs would’ve been gave out on you and made you fall on the floor. Not saying that Toji Fushiguro leaves your legs trembling, but Toji Fushiguro leaves your legs trembling.

[myopinionhi]

A Will Solace Character Analysis: the Underappreciated Soft Side

I've noticed many fanfictions have Will Solace OOC. So I’ve been thinking about aspects of Will’s personality fans seem to either gloss over or exaggerate. Here, this post is me doing an in-depth analysis explaining Will Solace’s canon personality in the books, and how it can sometimes differ from fanfictions. Sprinkled in this analysis are tips to fanfiction writers on how they write Will as more in-character.

There is one major aspect of Will that people seem to ignore or underemphasize. Nico best explains it when describing Will in this quote

Jason was a fighter. You could tell from the intensity of his stare, his constant alertness, the coiled-up energy in his frame. Will Solace was more like a lanky cat stretched out in sunshine. His movements were relaxed and nonthreatening, his gaze soft and far away. In his faded SURF BARBADOS T-shirt, his cutoff shorts and flip-flops, he looked about as aggressive as a demigod could get, but Nico knew he was brave under fire. During the Battle of Manhattan, Nico had seen him in action - the camp's best combat medic, risking his life to save wounded campers.

To sum it up, Will Solace is a very chill and calm character. A lot of writers make Will more irrational, impulsive, overbearing, and emotional than he actually is. Will is not the type of character to create drama unless he's, as Nico puts it, "under fire." In other words, the intense side of his personality doesn't come out unless the situation is urgent or dire.

Fans remember during the Second Giant War how he gets angry and argues with Nico over Nico's health and shadow-traveling, so many assume Will is going to be this fiery over a lot of other things regarding their relationship. For example, fanfic writers may make Will controlling or overly sensitive with Nico. However, keep in mind, Will gets heated with Nico during the Second Giant War because Nico's shadow-traveling is killing him. This is how Will describes Nico's dire state.

"Coach Hedge told me all about your shadow-travel. You can’t try that again."

"I just did try it again, Solace. I’m fine."

"No, you’re not. I’m a healer. I could feel the darkness in your hand as soon as I touched it. Even if you made it to that tent, you’d be in no shape to fight. But you wouldn’t make it. One more slip, and you won’t come back. You are not shadow-travelling. Doctor’s orders."

Will is a healer. When he touches Nico's hand, he can sense how little sleep and food Nico has been getting and how Nico's being taken over by darkness. Nico is on the verge of death and hasn't cared about his health for a long time. Nico is also stubborn about it, so Will has to be aggressive in order to save Nico's life. This aggressive behavior is not the norm for Will, but it can sometimes come out when he has to assert control in a life-or-death situation.

Will is a calming prescence. He's a diplomat. He stops violence on multiple occassions.

He's one of the few people who's able to calm Clarisse's violent rage, and he does so in a gentle manner.

Clarisse pointed her dagger at Rachel. "What about their allies, huh? Did you see that tribe of two-headed men that arrived yesterday? Or the glowing red dog-headed guys with the big poleaxes? They look pretty barbaric to me. It would’ve been nice if you’d foreseen any of that, if your Oracle power didn’t break down when we needed it most!"

Rachel’s face turned as red as her hair. "That’s hardly my fault. Something is wrong with Apollo’s gifts of prophecy. If I knew how to fix it –"

"She’s right." Will Solace, head counsellor for the Apollo cabin, put his hand gently on Clarisse’s wrist. Not many campers could’ve done that without getting stabbed, but Will had a way of defusing people’s anger. He got her to lower her dagger. "Everyone in our cabin has been affected. It’s not just Rachel."

One of the most underrated Will Solace moments is when he stops a bloody battle from happening between Camp Half-Blood and Camp Jupiter.  

But he knew it wouldn’t do any good. After weeks of waiting, agonizing and steaming, the Greeks and Romans wanted blood. Trying to stop the battle now would be like trying to push back a flood after the dam broke.

Will Solace saved the day.

He put his fingers in his mouth and did a taxicab whistle even more horrible than the last. Several Greeks dropped their swords. A ripple went through the Roman line like the entire First Cohort was shuddering.

"DON’T BE STUPID!" Will yelled. "LOOK!"

People are so used to seeing demigods, especially male demigods, being aggressive fighters that they can't wrap their heads around a brave and strong demigod who actively tries to avoid unnecessary conflict and destruction as much as he can.

And that's Will Solace's strength: he has the ability to prevent as much harm as possible.

Will is a difficult character to write. There's a lot of dueling factors with his personality. He's calm and pacifying while also being brave and assertive. He's fun and lighthearted while also being intelligent, logical, and grounded. He's laidback while also being responsible and hardworking. He's insecure but not melodramatic. He's very caring and protective but not pushy.

Will's personality confuses Nico sometimes too.

He’d always thought of Will as easygoing and laid back. Apparently he could also be stubborn and aggravating.

The trick to writing Will is to keep in mind his default personality is a soft and lighthearted character. Writers tend to overemphasize the hard side of his personality when his default personality is actually the soft side.

Think of the relaxing, lanky cat metaphor Nico uses for him. He and Nico bicker often, and it works for Will because he rolls with everything and doesn't take things too seriously. He's able to alleviate Nico's moodiness with humor, wittiness, groundedness, and patience. Nico affectionately calls Will a "dork" because Will usually keeps things light. Interestingly enough, he's able to be lighthearted without coming across as insensitive or an airheaded goofball, the latter of which is something Nico dislikes about Percy's personality. On a related sidenote, another way writers make Will OOC is they make him too dumb or too immature. I know I mentioned to focus on Will's soft side, but be careful to avoid that too. He's a SENSIBLE, lanky cat.

The way Will keeps his composure during a stressful situation by using laughter while still being mature is expressed well in this exchange with Apollo. (Yes, Will has a lot to manage.)

It was difficult to think of this young man as my son. He was so poised, so unassuming, so free of acne. He also didn’t appear to be awestruck in my presence. In fact, the corner of his mouth had started twitching.

“Are—are you amused?” I demanded.

Will shrugged. “Well, it’s either find this funny or freak out. My dad, the god Apollo, is a fifteen-year-old—”

“Sixteen,” I corrected. “Let’s go with sixteen.”

“A sixteen-year-old mortal, lying in a cot in my cabin, and with all my healing arts—which I got from you—I still can’t figure out how to fix you.”

“There is no fixing this,” I said miserably. “I am cast out of Olympus. My fate is tied to a girl named Meg. It could not be worse!”

Will laughed, which I thought took a great deal of gall. “Meg seems cool. She’s already poked Connor Stoll in the eyes and kicked Sherman Yang in the crotch.”

The fiercer side of Will's personality comes out only when the situation calls for it; this happens sometimes when he has to be a caring family member, a responsible healer, or a warrior in a dire situation. Even when he gets more forceful, he doesn't get more forceful than he has to.

Since Will has such a balanced and lighthearted personality, what are his flaws? What are the dark sides of his personality? There are four main things that stick out.

1. He's insecure about his self-perceived lack of abilities.

"I agree," Will said. "I wish I was a better archer … I wouldn’t mind shooting my Roman relative off his high horse. Actually, I wish I could use any of my father’s gifts to stop this war." He looked down at his own hands with distaste. "Unfortunately, I’m just a healer."

2. He sometimes struggles to endure the heavy responsibilities he has as a healer and as a protector to his family.

“I got it reattached,” Will told me, his voice shaky with exhaustion. His scrubs were speckled with blood. “I need somebody to keep him stable.”

I pointed to the woods. “But—”

“I know!” Will snapped. “Don’t you think I want to be out there searching too? We’re shorthanded for healers. There’s some salve and nectar in that pack. Go!”

I was stunned by his tone. I realized he was just as concerned about Kayla and Austin as I was. The only difference: Will knew his duty. He had to heal the injured first. And he needed my help.

3. He forces himself to bottle his emotions to keep his composure.

Will laughed under his breath. “I’m terrified. But one thing you learn as head counselor: you have to keep it together for everyone else. Let’s get you on your feet."

Here's a second example.

I rested my hand on Will’s shoulder. “Don’t worry. We’ll be back by dawn.”

His mouth trembled ever so slightly. “How can you be sure?”

4. He constantly worries about his loved ones.

Nico rested his hand on Will’s shoulder. “Apollo, we were worried. Will was especially.”

In conclusion, Will Solace's personality is difficult to get correct. But don't worry, if you write Will as a laidback, witty cat in your fanfics, I guarantee he'll be more in-character than many other fanfics with Will Solace.

(Note: I am only human. If you believe I'm misinterpreting some aspects of Will's personality, feel free to express it. What I say isn't 100 percent the right interpretation.)

[imagineddworld]

FBI training (Part 1)

Pairing: Stiles Stilinski x Reader

Summary: The reader is the child of the two most skilled FBI agents of the States. At the FBI training she is paired up with a very determent young man who always finds a way to trouble her. 

Author’s note: I tried to make it as genderneutral as possible. But at some point there is a small implication that the reader could be female and their roommate could be male. But further than that, there is no specifications of gender. 

This is going to be a multiple part fic. The first part already took me way too long to write. So I apologize in advance if the next parts will take long to write too. I will try to finish them as quickly as I can.

Words: 3k (3084) 

On the most important day of your life, running late was not one of the things you had planned for. But seen how impulsive your roommate could be, it wasn’t out of the ordinary for them to mess up your schedule. They had stolen all your alarm clocks at night for some stupid experiment. Yes, you owned multiple. Normally you used your phone as an alarm. But after a couple mishaps caused by your roommate, you couldn’t put all your trust entirely on electronic devises. So you had bought an old-fashioned alarm clock that still ran on batteries, just in case something were to happen to your phone. But even that clock had been ruined many times. So from that moment on you always had some spare clocks hidden in your room, just in case. 

That they had found all your spare clocks wasn’t too surprising, seen that they weren’t hidden very well. What did shock you was that they hadn’t woken you up by their wild scavenger hunt. You were a light sleeper, even the smallest of noises could shake you out of your deep rest. That’s why you wore earbuds to bed, including that particular night. They often didn’t muffle the sounds enough, surely not during an experiment. Your roommate tend to forget about their surroundings as they start one, getting lost in their passion. You had awoken countless of times to the sound of falling objects, happy laughter, mumbles of rambling thoughts, excited jumping, soft sobbing and frequently a loud whine or groan. By now it was a normal occurrence. But of course, on that night the earbuds had done their job, cancelling out all the noise from the nightly events. 

The evening before, everything had gone smoothly. Too smoothly. You were supposed to suspect something, but your intuition had failed you due to the overwhelming amounts of emotions that threw you out of balance. There always had to be a bump in the road. Nothing ever went entirely good.  You had excitedly packed your backpack, leaving out a book to read before you went to bed. Next you picked out your outfit for the morning, neatly placing it on top of your wooden desk. Making that decision the day before took away a part of the unwanted stress to your already overflowing anxiety-filled body. Not that picking an outfit for the FBI Academy would be hard. They had a strict dress code. Everyone had to wear a white button up, tie being an optional choice. What you wore as bottoms also was a free choice, but they had to be formal and needed to show off professionalism.

Before you had changed into a big T-shirt and some sleeping shorts, you checked over your backpack and outfit; making sure you hadn’t forgotten anything. After double checking 3 times, you continued your night ‘routine’. (Your days never looked the same, so you couldn’t really call it a routine.) You washed your face and brushed your teeth, bidding your roommate goodnight as you passed by their room. Once in your room again, you placed your phone on the nightstand, making sure it’s charging for the night. Next you grabbed your earbuds, securing them in your ears before climbing into bed. While you sank into the pile of soft pillows, a mixture of emotions overwhelmed you. Excitement and anxiety had boiled up in your body throughout the whole week. But only now did they leave a tight, crushing feeling in your chest. None the less, sleep soon overtook your senses, greeting you with a peaceful night full of dreams.

As soon as your eyes closed, your luck decided to no longer be on your side. A default in your roommate’s experiment had caused a huge black-out in your building. The electricity had been out all night, resulting in your phone being dead as you awoke the next morning. Usually you could have trusted on your spare alarms, but those were also destroyed in the process of the experiment. That left you with no alarms to wake up to , therefore ending up being late.

What actually had woken you up was the harsh light shining through your thin drapes. It immediately triggered a huge wave of panic to drown, stealing all the air from your longes. Your eyes shot to the analogue clock that hung on your wall, cursing loudly as you read the time. You quickly jumped out of bed, stumbling through your room in a hurried state. At a rapid speed you pulled your clothes on, washed your face, brushed your teeth, tamed your wild bed-hair and desperately tried to make yourself look presentable in the little time you had. You ran back to your room to grab your backpack and the book you were supposed to read last night. Next you made your way over to the small kitchen, taking an apple from the fruit bowl. As you stuffed it into your backpack, you placed your book onto the table. While doing so, your eyes caught sight of your roommate sleeping with their head onto the cold surface. They were surrounded by your broken alarm clocks, pieces scattered everywhere. You couldn’t resist the urge to hit them against the head with your book. Not too hard of course, but hard enough to make any impact. They jumped awake, nearly falling off their chair. ‘Next time wake me up’, you said referring to their failed experiment, ‘Surely when you steal all my alarm clocks.’ You continued rushing to the front door, shoving your book in your backpack as well. They mumbled a small apology. ‘Usually you wake up way before your alarm’, their voice was groggy and quiet. While putting on your shoes you shouted your reply: ‘Not when I haven’t slept less than 6 hours in the past 5 days.’ Another apology followed, but you payed no mind to it. You shut the door behind you with a rather loud thud. You deeply breathed in and out before starting your run towards campus. The interaction hadn’t been in a mean manner or a sign of anyone being upset at the other. It was just your panicked, anxiety filled state being in need to rush, while they had their brain still filled with the morning fog. 

The reason why you barely had closed your eyes in the past 5 days, was because you were helping your parents who had stumbled upon a cruel twist in their rather difficult case. You couldn’t stand to just watch them suffer, so you pulled a few all-nighters with them until you solved most of the hard parts. The feeling of being able to solve such a thing, made it all worth it. None the less, it still had left you exhausted and drained. 

---

To your surprise you had made it in time. You had ran your way to campus, underestimating how far the distance actually was. You tried to catch your breath as you quickly checked your watch. You had 8 minutes till your class started. It was a little late for your liking, knowing how important punctuality is to them, but it would do. You lightly jogged through the halls as you looked at the map of the building that was supposed to guide you through the maze like structure. Even if you had been there plenty of times before in your life, it still was a confusing structure that didn’t want to stick in your head. 

Your mind was too occupied with other things, completely forgetting about your surroundings. So, it was only logical for you to run into a person. The impact of bumping into their harsh chest made you stumble back the slightest bit, but you were able to quickly steady yourself like nothing had happened. Before you could look at the damage you had done, a high pitched voice cracked out a long ‘noo’. In front of you stood a tall, raven-haired man with warm brown eyes. He was looking at the huge coffee stain on his white button while holding his empty coffee cup in his other hand. In the mean while you had gotten distracted by his beauty. You noticed small birthmarks littering his pale skin, resembling little constellations being spread out in the night sky. 

The string of curse words leaving his lips pulled you out of your fazed out state. You had accidentally been checking out this exceptionally beautiful man, who hopefully hadn’t noticed anything of it. It would be highly inappropriate and quite uncomfortable. Luckily for you his eyes were still on the huge coffee stain. ‘Oh, I’m so sorry’, you stammered out, immediately moving into action. You swung you backpack to the front, rumbling through your stuff in order to find the spare shirt you had stolen from your roommate. They didn’t mind. You were clumsy by nature and had to lend their clothes on plenty occasions. Neither was it your first time to ever ruin someone’s clothes, so you always tried to be prepared for moments like this. 

The man continued to angrily mumble to himself, clearly stressing out. He failed to notice the shirt you had offered to him, until you spoke up. ‘Here’, you offered him a polite smile as his head shot up at a fast pace. You were met with a confused look being plastered over his face. Assuming what his next statement would be, you answered before he could open his mouth. ‘It’s a men’s medium.’ As his facial expression didn’t change, you huffed out an annoyed sigh. He seemed to have trouble connecting the dots. He just had to accept the shirt, that’s all. You couldn’t lose any more time, surely not by a stupid encounter. ‘Take it or go in with a huge stain, it’s your choice’, you stated with annoyance clearly noticeable in your voice, while trying to continue your kind demeanor. You dropped the shirt into his hands. ‘If I were you I would change quickly’, you said over your shoulder before turning the corner that lead you to your final destination. 

You had made it just in time. The classroom already filled with students. You quickly sat down at one of the tables that still had an empty spot.  On your left sat a nice looking girl with her hair tied up in a tight ponytail. She offered you a kind smile that faded into a mean scowl only seconds later. Would she have recognized you? Did she knew who you were?

You were the child of two of the most skilled FBI agents of the States. They were top of their field and greatly respected by most people. Seen you family (who all worked in similar fields) were so well known, it was only logical that you also would gain the attention from outsiders. But that also caused them to make wrong assumptions about you. They were often too stubborn to see the truth or didn’t even want to take the chance to get to know you. They just thought you were an arrogant, ego-centric, selfish child who was spoiled to dead and never had to work a day in their life. They thought you were in dire need to constantly get all the attention. They expected you to think highly about yourself while looking down on others, therefore also expecting you to be condescending towards them.  Your parents had tried to prepare you for this. Not everyone is going to like you or take their time to get to know you before voicing their opinions about you. In this field, and similar fields, professional jealousy was very common. It made people act in vile ways. You feared this was going to happen in your training. 

 You sat in your chair with a scared heart while anxiously tapping your pencil against the desk. The supervisor was reading names of a list, but your mind drowned his voice out due to your excessive worrying. It all went smoothly, until he tumbled over a particular hard name. ‘Mie-Mic...’, the poor man looked questionably at his paper, desperate to pronounce the name correctly. As on cue the boy from earlier came to stand into the doorframe. His stained shirt was replaced by yours, fitting him just a tad bit too tightly. It showed off his muscular body even more. ‘Miecsyslaw Stilinski, sir... But most people call me Stiles.’ His voice was lower this time, but still clearly with with raging anxiety. Hearing his name roll of his tongue so smoothly made an alarm go off in your head. It sounded oddly familiar. Surely the nickname ‘Stiles’ had triggered a vague memory to resurface in your head. You just couldn’t figure out any of the details. It was like an itch you couldn’t scratch. 

The supervisor looked sternly at the new boy with an unimpressed look on his face. His eyes examined him, clearly judging his appearance. ‘Ah, I see. Well, next time be on time .. and dress appropriately. You don’t need to try showing off your pretentious muscles, it doesn’t suit you.’ That comment made you feel even more guilty. It was your fault he was late and had to dress in a too tight shirt. He apologized with his eyes faintly focusing on something behind the supervisor, before they quickly went to you in order to shoot you a nasty glare. You returned an apologetic smile that didn’t help much with the current situation. He continued to hold eye contact with you until the man’s voice filled the room again. ‘Now take a seat will you’, the annoyance was clear as day. His eyes left yours for a split second as he came to action, stumbling his way towards the empty chair that just happened to be to your right. As he passed by, still holding intense eye contact with you, his faint but sweet cologne filled your nose. A scent that later on would distractingly infiltrate your nose, no matter how much you tried to focus on something else. 

You were pulled out of your trance again when an excited voice filled your ears. ‘(Y/N)(Y/L/N), what a surprise to see you here. What could we possibly teach you? You already know everything and are following your parents footsteps flawlessly.’ Your cheeks reddened at his praising comment. The other students immediately glared at you, envying how sweet he acted towards you. Towards the others he had been cold and distant, whereas now he was talking highly about you. A big difference that everyone easily noticed. The room immediately was filled with a strong uncomfortable tension that reeked of jealousy.

The main reason for his kind demeanor towards you was because you already knew each other. Your parents often visited the Academy, helping with the development of new tasks or other improvements. Other times he visited you at home. He had seen you grow into the person you are today. His bond with you could be considered as a familiar one, or at least close to. So that explained. his fondness of you. The other reason for his praising was the status of your parents. It would be a shame on him and the Academy to talk down on or disrespect your family or you in any way. Besides the great help they provided for the Academy, they also were one of their sponsors.  You just hoped that they wouldn’t use this to your advantage by treating you differently and more highly. You wanted to be given a fair chance. If they were going to train you without fairly criticizing you out of fear of disrespecting your family’s name, then this whole thing would be a waste of time. 

‘Well, everyone is equal to the law. It’s one of the requirements we all need to go through to become an FBI agent. No matter how experienced or inexperienced we are, we all deserve to be treated equally’, you said timidly, trying not to sound overly confident or condescending towards others. You gave the supervisor a timid but kind smile while trying to avoid the burning glares. You didn’t want to go any deeper into the subject. 

Seen that you were a child of the two top FBI agents of the states, meant that you had been trained to follow their footsteps from a very young age. As a baby you were given a lot of puzzles and stimulants to train your senses. At the age of 3 the tasks started to be more difficult and challenging. At your 5 the training started to become serious. When you were 12 you already were allowed to help with smaller cases. At 16 you were actively helping them with all types of cases. Both your parents had gone through the same training, seen that their fathers also had been top FBI agents. At this point the training had become some sort of tradition in your family. Most of the people in your family had underwent similar trainings, as they all worked in similar fields. They varied from FBI agents, cops, sherifs, detectives to medical helpers such as nurses, doctors, firemen,...

The supervisor laughed at your comment. ‘I’m sure you’ll graduate without any trouble. It’ll be an easy game for you. Even in your sleep you’ll still be top of the class.’ Again, you shoot him an awkward but polite smile, being uncomfortable by the amount of praising he has done. It was overwhelming and placing you in a hard position. ‘That depends on how hard you make the tasks’, your timid voice became even more quiet as the mean glares had intensified. ‘Always so humble. Just like your parents.’ With that statement he ended his long praising session.

As he continued his speech of the importance of this training, you let out a deep sigh. You had turned impossibly bright, your face burning from embarrassment. Without intending to, he had put you as a target for everyone to hate on. He made you seem like the enemy that everyone had to fear. He had thrown tons of gasoline on the burning fire of jealousy. Your future colleagues saw you as the one thing that would stand in their way of becoming a FBI agent, something that would withhold them from their dream. If there wasn’t going to be rough play already, there sure would be now. This was going to be a rougher year than you had anticipated. You were already dreading the next day to come. 

-To be continued-

[sweetestlamb]

Walk Through A Storm

Author's note: Honestly, like I could help myself from doing this. it's short because I need to actually get my life together but enjoy. Oh also I don't wanna think anymore so someone give me title in the comments lol I'll pick the one that fits the best. (Thanks for actually giving suggestions, one really spoke to me!)

Summary: "I'm not ready to stop kissing you yet."

"I thought you were going to reject me." She whispers in between the small space between them, their lips are close enough to meet again in another soul burning kiss and he's tempted to close the gap again. They can talk later so for the second time in his life he wants to be selfish, she brings that out in him; makes him hungry for more than he thinks he deserves. She's been doing that since he first met her.

"I'm not ready to stop kissing you yet." Her eyes widen at his whispered words and without pause he leans closer softly pressing his lips against hers. She tastes sweet like the best candy he could never get as a young boy. Her little hands slide up his back dragging him closer and he goes easily, his walls are saw dust at this point and she's a windstorm. Wrapping his arms fully around her body he pulls her closer, cupping the back of her head as he swipes his tongue at the seam of her lips. She gasps in a way that makes his blood bubble and flow southward. The sea roars besides them providing the soundtrack to their first cognizant kisses. Hopefully the first of many.

The kiss drags and overlaps, her tongue persistent in his mouth and her hands busy stroking and rubbing at his back. It takes all of his willpower to sever their connection but he's starting to feel light-headed (and horny). This all still seems like a dream ever since he saw her running over to him, when she was supposed to be in Seoul. Leaving without telling him. Making him think the worst.

"Why do you look like you want to cry?" She cups his cheeks and he's reminded of that unforgettable night. She looks so concerned that he wants to disappear not used to being on the receiving end of such looks.

"Nothing. I'm fine." He tries to brush her off, viciously wiping at his eyes but she doesn't let him push her away, grabbing his hands tightly in her own. "Tell me what you're thinking. I told you everything in my head."

He almost chuckles at her expectant gaze. She sounds like him demanding payment.

"People usually leave but you're the first...to come back early." He smiles sadly thinking about all the people he'll never see again, and how he considered that she might go back to Seoul and realize that she was much too big for the pond that was Gongjin. He wouldn't have stopped her, she deserved the whole world.

"The first hm. I like that." He stares at her face, grinning at the satisfied grin and the enveloping dimples on both sides of her face.

"A daughter with your dimples would be dangerous, I think I'd understand how Chun-jae feels then." She pauses at his words mouth gaping and it hits him just what he's implied about their future. It's presumptuous and he should correct it but his tongue feels too heavy and her bright eyes suck the air from his lungs.

"Where's Mi-Seon? How did you get back so quickly?"

"Oh." She jumps cutely, suddenly hitting him on the shoulder and he winces ready to scold her for hitting him so close to his injury. But then she starts hitting herself on the head and instinctively he grabs her, stopping the self inflicted abuse.

"Stop that. I like that head." It's cheesy, something he would have cringed at if he heard another utter it but once he sees the smile she rewards him with none of that matters anymore, he'll say anything to make her beam like that.

"You're such a flirt." She fails at sounding bothered. "Oh and I left her in Seoul. It started raining and I realized you were it for me so I ran into the rain and left her on the sidewalk. Crazy right?" She starts snickering at her own words and he stares at her taken aback laughter forced out of his lungs at her infectious giggles.

She comes into his house like she belongs there, going to his fridge without permission and grabbing a bottle of water. He feels parched watching her drink it, never before has he wished to be a plastic bottle. So many firsts with her.

"What are you staring at?" She tilts her head like a bunny and he can't get the image of her with floppy ears out of his head.

"Cute."

"What?" She blushes furiously at his accidental slip and he clears his throat before grabbing his phone, desperately needing a distraction.

"Nothing. I'll call someone to pick up Mi-Seon."

"Who are you calling?" She asks walking over to him, sitting far too closely for his brain to function at maximum capacity. When a deep familiar masculine voice answers she squeals, bouncing in her seat and giving him thumbs up. He feels so proud he could burst.

"Don't say no. She's all alone and abandoned. What if something happens to her? Could you live with yourself?" He replies to the stuttering officers weak refusals and those are the right words to get the meek man moving, it's comical that he would be playing matchmaker for anyone else.

"You're a master manipulator." She accuses and he stares in surprise, "Does it upset you?" But she surprises him by leaning closer, spread deliciously across his compact couch. "No. It's sexy." Her face is glorious under the soft lighting in his living room and he swallows the drool collecting in his mouth, embarrassed when it starts a coughing fit. She thumps his back firmly before thrusting her water at him, "Drink." He listens obediently.

He gulps at the bottle, taking a deep breath before collapsing backwards into the couch.

"Am I making you nervous?" Making. As if it's only a present occurrence, as if she hasn't been making him swallow his words and expectations from the very beginning. He shifts looking at her through narrowed eyes.

She's far too innocently twirling her hair blinking up at him with wide eyes.

"You're doing this on purpose." She smiles serenely at the claim, leaning back onto the couch and by default his arm that's strewn across the top. She presses her body into the side of his body and he tightens his hold on her shoulder. It all feels too natural.

"I'm surprised it's working. You never seemed affected by me. You denied liking me so easily. Biological crisis, my ass."

He jumps at her cursing, she sounds too much like her father. It makes him smirk.

"I thought I had to. You were right, we are so different. I thought it was something fleeting for you, you told me you're someone who gets curious."

"Pfftt. You think I get curious about just anyone? I have high standards. I'm quite a catch you know?" Her signature bravado, but this time he can see through the veil better. Can spot the cracks and tears and it makes him want to protect her even more.

"I know. You're the best thing I've ever caught."

He'll never grow tired of being the reason that face turns so pink and flushed. (Immediately pushing aside an image of her beneath him.)

"Wait here. I have something for you." He wants to argue as she starts to leave his embrace but she's too quick for his grabby hands and he pouts at her unwanted departure. He moves to follow her but she's back before he's even finished putting on his shoes.

"Where did you go? We could have gone together."

"What? Did you miss me?" She teases, dimples flashing up at him.

"Don't be absurd." He denies but his cheeks burn yes.

"Whatever. I went to get this. Here." She thrusts a large bag at him, looking excited and embarrassed all at once. He takes it confused, prying it open and feeling more confusion wash over him.

"These are men's shirts." He says dumbly and she stares unimpressed at him, rolling her eyes before nodding.

"Yes. I got them for you in Seoul. Keep them even if you don't like them. They're a gift." She looks so small and... scared that he reacts without thinking, dragging his shirt over his head and throwing it to the side. The sight that welcomes him as his head pops out of the hole is not a new one, but it's still as effective as the first time. Hye Jin looks desperate, eyes locked on his now naked chest. His skin raises under her intense gaze.

"Miss Dent--Hye Jin ah?" His call doesn't do anything, well that's a lie it doesn't knock her back to reality like he'd expect instead it seems to be the siren call that lures her closer to him. Her hand outreached before landing on the tense muscles in his stomach, with one touch he already feels devastated.

"What are you doing to me?" He aches to feel and touch and kiss and fuc-

But it's too soon for all that. They haven't even defined this yet and despite all the lines they've crossed he wants to do this right.

Taking a step back he escapes her torturous touch and pulls a shirt from the bag, ready to cover himself back up from her too penetrating gaze.

"Wait." Her voice is so raspy and longing he has no choice and he watches mesmerized as she watches him hungrily, eyes darting all over his naked skin dissecting him. He swallows hard when he sees her little hands balled up in fists by her side. Disbelief swirling in his belly. "Okay. You can do it. That's enough....for now."

His cheeks flare at the seductively spoken words and to stop himself from devouring her like a starved man he slides on a smooth button down shirt. It fits him perfectly and gulps as he buttons it up. Nobody besides his grandfather ever bought him clothes.

"It's a perfect fit." Hye Jin echoes his thoughts smoothing a hand across the soft material. He stands ramrod straight at her ministration.

"Thank you. I'll wear it well." His throat is thick and he has to blink to chase away the tears pooling there, dangerously close to falling. She hums before stepping forward into his space again, that kiss effectively tearing down all the walls and lines they had both erected and drawn.

"You're already wearing it so well. But...it looks even better off. I can't wait to see it on my bedroom floor."

A scandalized squeak is all he's able to get out before she's diving at him and devouring his lips so roughly that they tumble onto the floor.

The pain in his shoulder is worth it as she kisses him senseless systematically driving out every doubt and insecurity. At least for tonight.