#feel connected and not trapped in loneliness town

[doliacuddles]

SHADOWS OF A MARRIAGE.

𝖳𝗁𝖾 𝖯𝖺𝖼𝗍 𝗈𝖿 𝖣𝖾𝗌𝗍𝗂𝗇𝗒.

𝖧𝗎𝗆𝖺𝗇! 𝖠𝗅𝖺𝗌𝗍𝗈𝗋 𝗑 𝖱𝖾𝖺𝖽𝖾𝗋

01 | 02 | 03 | 04 | 05 | 06 | 07 | 08 | 09 | 10

❝In our gazes lie the secrets of a love that never had its chance, trapped in a silence that screams the tragedy of what could have been and never was.❞

𝐖𝐀𝐑𝐍𝐈𝐍𝐆:

𝖳𝗁𝗂𝗌 𝖼𝗁𝖺𝗉𝗍𝖾𝗋 𝖼𝗈𝗇𝗍𝖺𝗂𝗇𝗌 𝖾𝗆𝗈𝗍𝗂𝗈𝗇𝖺𝗅𝗅𝗒 𝗂𝗇𝗍𝖾𝗇𝗌𝖾 𝗌𝖼𝖾𝗇𝖾𝗌 𝖺𝗇𝖽 𝖺𝖽𝗎𝗅𝗍 𝖼𝗈𝗇𝗍𝖾𝗇𝗍, 𝗂𝗇𝖼𝗅𝗎𝖽𝗂𝗇𝗀 𝖽𝖾𝗉𝗂𝖼𝗍𝗂𝗈𝗇𝗌 𝗈𝖿 𝗂𝗇𝗍𝗂𝗆𝖺𝗍𝖾 𝗋𝖾𝗅𝖺𝗍𝗂𝗈𝗇𝗌𝗁𝗂𝗉𝗌 𝖺𝗇𝖽 𝖾𝗆𝗈𝗍𝗂𝗈𝗇𝖺𝗅 𝖼𝗈𝗇𝖿𝗅𝗂𝖼𝗍. 𝖨𝗍 𝖺𝖽𝖽𝗋𝖾𝗌𝗌𝖾𝗌 𝗍𝗁𝖾𝗆𝖾𝗌 𝗈𝖿 𝖾𝗆𝗈𝗍𝗂𝗈𝗇𝖺𝗅 𝗏𝗂𝗈𝗅𝖾𝗇𝖼𝖾, 𝗅𝗈𝗌𝗌, 𝖺𝗇𝖽 𝗆𝗈𝗋𝖺𝗅 𝖽𝗂𝗅𝖾𝗆𝗆𝖺𝗌. 𝖱𝖾𝖺𝖽𝖾𝗋 𝖽𝗂𝗌𝖼𝗋𝖾𝗍𝗂𝗈𝗇 𝗂𝗌 𝖺𝖽𝗏𝗂𝗌𝖾𝖽 𝖿𝗈𝗋 𝗍𝗁𝗈𝗌𝖾 𝗌𝖾𝗇𝗌𝗂𝗍𝗂𝗏𝖾 𝗍𝗈 𝗍𝗁𝖾𝗌𝖾 𝗍𝗁𝖾𝗆𝖾𝗌.

Alastor could never have foreseen that his life would lead him to this crossroads, a dark and mysterious fork in the path of his existence.

Since childhood, he had always known he was different. While other children immersed themselves in the sweet illusions of first love, with hands intertwined and shared laughter, Alastor remained distant. The social circles that provided warmth and comfort to his peers seemed foreign to him, a stage where he had no place. Deprived of those experiences that seemed so natural to others, his heart beat to a dissonant rhythm.

He didn't respond to the same impulses as his peers. While they enjoyed games and laughter, he found unsettling solace in solitude and isolation. He watched the world from the periphery, with an eternal smile that hid a whirlwind of thoughts and emotions. That seemingly amiable smirk was an enigma to those around him, an impenetrable mask guarding his true intentions.

Alastor became a spectator of life, analyzing every move, every word, with almost cruel precision. While others lived their lives carefree, he delved into his own mind, building a refuge where he could be authentic, away from the judgment and misunderstanding of the outside world.

When he found you in the forest, sobbing amidst loneliness, a wave of genuine pity washed over him. It was a feeling he had only ever experienced seeing his mother suffer under the yoke of his father. With the memory of those fresh tears in his mind, he approached you with a radiant smile, the best he could offer in that emotionally charged moment.

He extended his hand with unexpected delicacy, helping you to your feet. That gesture, though simple, carried profound meaning. In that secluded corner of the world, far from the gaze of others, an unexpected and deep connection formed between the two of you. It was his first true contact with another soul, a moment laden with intense and genuine emotion that neither of you would ever forget.

From that moment on, you became inseparable, as if your souls were intertwined in an unbreakable bond. Even though you didn't attend the same school, you always found a way to meet after classes in a nearby park, where your conversations stretched until the stars shone in the night sky. Your laughter, whispers, and confessions filled the air, creating a refuge where time seemed to stand still.

But that bubble of happiness burst abruptly the day he had to move away. It felt like a vital part of his being had been ripped away, leaving him desolate and alone. The only person offering him comfort, besides his beloved mother, had been torn from his life. It wasn't your fault, but his father's, who had imposed the decision to leave their previous home, forcing you to stay in that small town.

A sense of loss and abandonment gripped his chest, mingling with bitter frustration. It was as if destiny, once again, was being decided by others, leaving a trail of pain and resignation in his heart.

His detestable father.

To say that Alastor simply hated him would be a gross understatement. What he felt was a visceral loathing, a fury that burned like an unquenchable fire, devouring every corner of his being. This aversion led him to make a drastic decision: to end his life on a dark night, when the stench of alcohol clouded his father's senses. He couldn't allow him to continue tormenting the innocent, especially his mother, who constantly suffered the atrocities of that man.

But far from feeling relief, that act became a turning point in his life. His father's death left Alastor and his mother in poverty. Without financial resources, they were forced to face a brutal and ruthless reality. His mother, who never managed to overcome the loss of her husband, became a shadow of herself, her health deteriorating day by day. Illnesses besieged her mercilessly, worsening their situation even more. Survival became a constant struggle, marked by desperation and uncertainty.

Over the years, circumstances gradually began to improve for Alastor. Each new job not only provided invaluable experience but also allowed him to hone his skills and open doors to more promising opportunities. It was amidst this upward trajectory that he discovered his true passion: radio. Alastor saw in radio not only the financial benefits it could offer but also the immense power of influence he could wield through the airwaves.

Determined to become a prominent figure, he dedicated endless hours to study. It wasn't just about acquiring technical knowledge; for him, it was essential to perfect his charisma and dialect, aware of the importance of communicating effectively and being understood by the masses. Every word he learned, every technique he mastered, was a firm step forward in his relentless pursuit of excellence and recognition. Every broadcast, every program, brought him closer to the pinnacle of New Orleans, the city he now considered home. In each transmission, he strove to capture the attention of his audience, making every phrase resonate with irresistible magnetism. Alastor was not just on the path to success; he was determined to conquer the world of radio, and nothing and no one would stand in his way.

But one day, those thoughts of greatness underwent a drastic transformation. Since your arrival in New Orleans, a question had nagged at Alastor like a constant thorn: Why did you have to reappear? It wasn't malice he felt, but an unsettling sense that your presence was an anomaly in his carefully orchestrated life, an anomaly that shouldn't exist, especially after what he had done, the dark thoughts of satisfaction he had experienced in that fateful moment with his father and other victims.

Maintaining your closeness had become a titanic task. That deep and sincere childhood connection seemed to have evaporated, leaving an uncomfortable chasm between you. Despite this, Alastor strove to be kind and cordial with you, as if every gesture and smile were the result of years of meticulous rehearsal in front of the mirror. Every word was carefully chosen, every movement planned with surgical precision, all in a desperate attempt to revive something that felt irretrievably lost. However, the results were not as expected; his efforts only deepened his confusion and frustration.

He never imagined the day would come when he would have to marry, let alone someone he barely knew and already considered a stranger after so many years of disconnection. But seeing the happiness in his mother's eyes, hearing how fervently she expressed her desire to see him married before her departure… How could he deny her that final wish, the woman who had raised him with so much love and sacrifice? Despite all the doubts and reluctance in his heart, he reluctantly accepted, driven by the desire to fulfill his mother's last wish before her inevitable farewell.

The wedding was a spectacle of luxury, with a crowd of unfamiliar guests who couldn't take their eyes off Alastor. Every move of his captivated, his imposing figure dominated the scene, his eloquence hypnotized, and his magnetic presence was impossible to ignore. And you, lost in the crowd, were no exception. At the altar, in front of everyone, you looked like a true work of art, dazzling and radiant, exuding a beauty that left everyone breathless.

"Alastor, do you take this woman as your wife, to love and cherish her until death do you part?"

"I do," he replied with unwavering certainty, his voice resonating with an authority that seemed to mark destiny itself.

"And you…"

"I do," you murmured, overwhelmed by the intensity of the moment. Your response, almost inaudible, elicited a mix of affectionate laughter among those present and a sweet tenderness in your parents' eyes, who watched you with pride and joy. However, those words, spoken in a moment of overflowing emotion, sealed your fate in a way you never could have imagined.

.

With an unusual tenderness, Alastor brushed aside the strands of your flushed and slightly sweaty face, his fingers caressing your skin with a gentleness that contrasted with his usual hardness. "Does this hurt you?" he asked in a whisper, his enveloping voice filled with genuine concern.

Instead of responding with words, you leaned into him and kissed him, an unexpected gesture loaded with emotion and meaning. That kiss was a spark, an impulse that surprised him and encouraged him to continue, dispelling any doubt or reservation he might have had.

For Alastor, watching you in that moment was like witnessing a masterpiece come to life before his eyes. Your naked skin beneath him, marked by the traces he had left with his lips and fingers, was a canvas now imbued with the imprints of his overwhelming passion. At first, he had resisted the urge to reach that point, but something in you disarmed all his reservations and pushed him to surrender with a passion he had only experienced once before, in very different circumstances. He felt a frenzied intensity consuming him completely; every caress, every sigh between you resonated like notes in a symphony of shared desires.

Every movement became a dance of fervor and longing, his emotions so intense they bordered on madness. He kissed you with desperate urgency, as if each lip contact were an anchor meant to ensure you never drifted away.

As he held you beneath him, his mind was a chaos of intertwined pleasure and guilt. Aware that he shouldn't be there, he knew his newfound desire to have you by his side was distorting his judgment. But every moan that escaped your lips, every whisper of your voice saying his name, dissipated any rational thought.

When they finally reached ecstasy together, he collapsed onto you, their ragged breaths melding into a single shared breath. He embraced you with a desperate intensity, as if fearing you might vanish at any moment.

"I'm so happy to have you as my wife," he said uncontrollably, the words spilling from his lips unchecked. The pure happiness in your gaze as you returned it made his stomach twist as if a thousand butterflies were fluttering inside him.

"And I'm happy to be your wife, Alastor," you replied softly.

.

Alastor's memories were woven with every breath of yours, intertwining with the present in the hospital room where they nervously awaited the results of many shared nights. Despite his constant pursuit, Alastor couldn't find any clear emotion at that moment. Had he made a mistake in embarking on this? Did he truly desire to be a father? He hoped that any future paternal instinct wouldn't reflect the cold treatment he had received from his own father.

As Alastor stared intensely at the floor, as if it were the most fascinating thing he had seen in years, he felt your touch on his arm, a signal that the doctor had the results.

The doctor called them from the waiting room door, inviting them into his office. Together, they walked down the hospital hallway, with dim lights and a scent blending disinfectant with old wood and medical books. The distant murmur of other patients and the soft tick-tock of a wall clock filled the air.

Entering the doctor's cozy office, filled with books and a sturdy wooden desk, the doctor greeted them with a warm smile. "Please, have a seat," he said courteously, closing the door behind them.

"Well," the doctor began seriously, adjusting his glasses as he flipped through the papers. "The results confirm that you're pregnant." His words resonated in the room, laden with surprise and contained joy.

You felt a mix of emotions: overwhelming happiness intertwined with palpable fear. It was a moment of bliss, yet also uncertainty about what the future would bring.

Alastor stared at you silently, without words. His eyes reflected astonishment and a tenderness rarely seen. In his mind, memories of his childhood mingled with the possibilities and challenges this new chapter would bring.

The doctor continued explaining the next steps, offering advice on prenatal care and answering questions. Alastor barely listened, absorbed in the new life growing inside you and how everything would change.

After the consultation, they left in silence. Outside, the city lights began to glow, casting long shadows over the cobblestone streets. Alastor gently took your hand, expressing his support and commitment to the new path they would face together.

As they walked back home, the cool evening air wrapped around them softly, creating an intimate atmosphere. Alastor let out a soft laugh that echoed in the quiet neighborhood. Without warning, he released your hand and wrapped his arm around you, drawing you close.

His eyes sparkled with a mix of amusement and tenderness as he looked at you. "Ready to dive into endless readings about motherhood?" he asked with a mischievous smile, as if about to reveal an exciting secret. His words hung in the air, filled with anticipation for the days ahead and the new adventure they shared together.

You shook your head, tears streaming down your cheeks as you absorbed the overwhelming news that Alastor had impregnated you. The impact of his words and the reality you now faced left you breathless. Alastor, seeing your distress, let out a light laugh and embraced you, though his gesture was more of a clumsy attempt at comfort than a display of genuine empathy in that vulnerable moment.

"Don't worry so much, my dear," he murmured softly, tinged with his usual irony. "You know a smile always suits you best. You're like an incomplete painting without it."

Intellectual property of @doliacuddles.

𝖳𝖺𝗀𝗌; @catticora @mo-0-o @alastorthirsty @its-a-dam-blue-brick @speedycoffeedelight @eris-norwega

[crimsonlyinglilly]

Day 1: food / risk / overexertion

Also covering Day 10 - exhaustion

Starting another another month this time with @augustofwhump.

Entangled minds- Sage comes across a witch had has Finn's soul and mind linked to the one closest to him. it's not hers he's attached to. Elijah and Finn are forced to get closer.

Finn and Elijah discover a new effect of the bond and Finn realised their plan to kill Klaus may work but will have consequences he doesn't want to face

Takes place tvd from ep 2x19 to 2x21

----

Elijah was flagging, for all his prefect mask and control he couldn't hide it from Finn since they shared a mind. 

The time daggered, tricked by the newest doppelganger and Finn wasn’t going further into his brother’s relationship with those that shared Tatia’s face, had revealed a unfortunate side effect of the spell that had bonded them, one far worse than the lack of privacy they have both been trying to hold the pretence of.

When Finn had noticed the pain and Elijah’s shock and anger at the dagger he had been terrified to find himself back in the dark trapped awake in his own body or perhaps Elijah’s instead he had experienced nothing until the dagger was removed to Elijah choking from being in a house without invitation.

It wasn’t until his brother managed to regain his breath on the doorstep that Finn noticed there was more than just the lack of air that was causing his heart to beat too fast. Finn had found himself in control of the body suddenly as soon as Miss Gilbert caught up in the doorway with the damned dagger in hand and his brother retreated into his mind.

Finn was very familiar with the fear Elijah hadn’t been able to completely hide from him; it was just strange to feel it from Elijah.

It seemed Elijah had gained Finn’s cursed awareness in his stead.

For all his resentment of his siblings, Niklaus and Elijah most of all, he wouldn’t have wished that on any of them. Elijah least of all now since he had become Finn’s only escape over since the spell. 

However with Elijah retreating into his mind he had left Finn to explain their history to the girl, part of him just wanted to leave the town and her to her fate because Klaus would come for her but he knew if he did that Elijah would simply return once he regained control of himself and suppressed all his feelings.

One of the many things Finn had learnt was Elijah took repression to a new level when it came hiding his own emotions and thoughts.

He’d have never known Elijah’s loathing of the monster's mother made them match his, or that Elijah was almost as self destructive as their other brothers.

He may have been the only one to know Elijah was petty and spiteful behind his manners and kind façade but the fact he had started a relationship with Damon Salvatore solely to spite Finn for taking over his body at Sage’s touch was a reminder to the stubborn brat his brother once was.

Something Finn had apologised for, he had been overwhelmed at her being so close and crossed one of the few rules they had set, but Elijah had felt the need to teach him a lesson by ensuring Finn was the one to wake up the morning after in the Salvatore's bed.

Then again no one sane based a plan to remove the leadership of a sect of vampire experimenting humans by trapping them in a room and setting himself on fire.

But it was then Finn realised he wasn’t the only one gaining anything from the spell that connected them.

Elijah had felt oddly pleased at Finn’s complaints and concerns, it had taken Finn moments to work out what the warm feeling for what it was, then they had both refused to talk about it. Elijah's thoughts had brushed it off as loneliness after half a century split from his family and Finn had accepted that.

Better than the truth that Elijah had missed his older brother and Finn had failed to be one since the younger ones were born.

After that Finn had stopped holding back his complaints and concerns at Elijah’s habits of skipping meals and sleep, as Elijah seemed to do whenever it came to his projects most often tracking down any hints of where Klaus had left Finn’s and their siblings coffins.

It was highly hypocritical given how Elijah was with their siblings but it had left Finn to realise it wasn’t wholly new as his own memories revealed how often he used to find Elijah staying awake during that first century, either sitting up for them to return or to check them in their sleep.

Finn will ignore how often he only noticed when he had woken from a dream of their childhood when Elijah’s breathing would falter in his sleep, and gone looking for him.

There was also how little he remembered seeing Elijah drink, more concerning since now he knew Elijah’s thirst for blood apparently outstripped his own, had always given how confused Elijah had been at his concern over it.

So he had explained the truth of their beginnings to the girl that had stabbed them; Klaus’ true parentage and the reason she was the target, mostly using what he had gathered from Elijah’s memories when they had first run into her, to tell her of Katarina.

He hadn’t quite been able to cover his coldness when he noticed the charred remains of the suit Elijah had been wearing and figured out the reason behind it.

Someone had tried to set his brother on fire and Elijah would have been awake for it, the only reprieve would be if Elijah suffering was like his he wouldn’t have felt it just heard the flames cracking on his flesh.

Not that Elijah was willing to speak about it once he had retaken control of his own body, he had ignored every attempt Finn tried. The only sign the whole thing had shaken him was when Finn had asked how he was going to explain it to Klaus to prevent him from daggering him, Elijah’s thoughts had frozen overwhelmed by terror for seconds.

Their brother had gotten far too used to using the weapons their enemies made against them and Elijah had helped too much in the past while Finn had been trapped, voiceless and forgotten. Something he knew Elijah felt guilty about since Klaus had claimed to have thrown them into the ocean and more so since he had learnt Finn had been awake for centuries.

Finn’s anger at Elijah had cooled when he felt the weight of his brother’s guilt, horror and self loathing.

Now he was mostly just saddened by how mother’s spell, nine centuries of guilt and chasing Klaus’ redemption out of desperation for his own had broken Elijah in a way he refused to accept.

Elijah had once been free-spirited, open and kind, honest in a way that used to drive father mad, now every word from Elijah’s mouth had layers to them and every breath was controlled.

Elijah took the news of the Martin witches' demise with annoyed disappointment discovering a broken tool instead of that his allies had been killed trying to free him. Finn took comfort in the fact that Elijah still cared enough that when he left to retrieve the potion to preserve the doppelganger’s life through the ritual, he didn’t contact any others for risk of costing them their lives like the Martin witches.

It was a small glimpse into the person that cared for people beyond their siblings, and Finn did not go looking through his brother's mind to find out if it was Henrik's death, the deaths of his friends in the werewolf pack at father’s hand or Tristan's betrayal that had caused that change.

So Finn had watched as Elijah pushed himself on the chance to save the girl who looked like his first love and ignored the signs of overexertion, given that the plan was to attack Klaus at his weakest Elijah didn’t need to be at his strongest and it was clear Elijah was trying not to think at the end goal of the plan.

Niklaus dead. 

The first person to love Elijah without grief coated every action, dead at his hand. The way Elijah was going he’d likely pass out after it, from missed sleep and skipped blood, to avoid thinking of it longer.

When they were finally able to confront Klaus he wasn’t surprised to feel Elijah tremble as his hand broke through Klaus' chest, even as outward appearance showed Elijah cold and calm, Finn felt all of Elijah’s hesitation. 

Elijah didn’t want to do this.

But Elijah was stubborn and this plan had come to them years ago when they realised they couldn’t find the coffins while Klaus was determined to keep them from Elijah. To save Kol and Rebekah at the cost of Klaus.

‘Put them first for once.’ Finn had used those words to push Elijah forward and was now regretting it. 

He knew if he let Elijah do this, if Elijah killed their brother it would only be a matter of time until Elijah, ever resourceful, found a way to follow him in death, likely only staying long enough to free the rest of them.

Finn couldn't risk that, not the little brother Freya had wanted to meet, not the only one of his siblings to accept Sage, not since he had shared his memories of her making Elijah to only other person to remember her.

It only takes a simple push to leave him in control of Elijah’s body standing over Klaus, his brother’s heart in his hand, Elijah allows it and Finn uses Elijah’s exhaustion to knock him out so he wasn’t aware of what followed, it wasn’t a true sleep and as Finn used his body Elijah would still be as exhausted when he woke but it gave his mind a break, something Elijah wouldn’t give himself.

As angry at Niklaus as he was for leaving him in that box, he wasn’t prepared to lose two brothers, not after nearly half a century getting to know Elijah in a way he hadn’t when they were children.

Elijah had struggled under the role of the oldest, a place he never should have had but with Freya gone and Finn to blind to notice any of his siblings' difficulties past his own and too stubborn to care for them, Elijah had done so.

Finn had watched as his parents pushed the tasks to Elijah and failed to notice as Elijah forgot how to ask for help.

Now it was time for Finn to take the role he should have and with Elijah’s centuries of experience accessible to him he would succeed in watching out for Elijah as well as the others. 

He’d just have to deal with Klaus and while he didn’t have Klaus’ attachment to Elijah to work for him, he had centuries being trapped in the coffin listening to Klaus complains and knowledge of Klaus’ precious Elijah that he didn’t.

He also knew if he did this Klaus would feel the need to punish Elijah, it was up to Finn to ensure it wasn’t a dagger.

[thirdtidemouse]

my (official and real) sketchbook playlist!! descriptions underneath! i have put the songs in a specific order and tried to make sure all the songs fit their vibe too outside (or disregarding) lyrics. also the types of music i think theyd enjoy lol.

1.. don't believe - vashti bunyan

oh, don't believe that love brings happiness gone tomorrow, here today love involves so much unhappiness don't believe what they say

lets kick it off with some folksy bittersweet 🤟this is both kaisa and johanna separately, before they meet. and their mirrored loneliness

2. apple pie - the scary jokes

i'll always be too shy to say what's on my mind i'm fantasizing all the time

the scary jokes are on this playlist. kaisa music. magic shygirl type of stuff

3. walking all day - graham coxon

walking all day with my mind on fire tryin' to get talkin' to you

this one's johanna vibes. ohh the days she'd spend walking round town, visiting the library, daydreaming about running into her and pretending it was an accident. she can't sit still, always restless, a teenager again

4. beautiful brain - mabel ye

i think you're beautiful i think you've got a beautiful brain i think you're beautiful i check up on it every day and while we sit just four feet across separated by a wall that is both white and moss i feel distance from you i feel closer to you

real ones know this came up in sketchbook week.. watch the music video for this!! (its sketchbook af)

5. super crush - tiger trap

i've got a supercrush on you because i think about you night and day

i'm not explaining this

6. the too much song - lemon demon

you're too much or am i not enough? you're (too much) and i feel this way much too much the longer that i wait the more you are much to my dismay

kaisa's perspective..

7. pink smoke - the scary jokes

you walk through walls set off the smoke alarms i feel your arms wrapping around me your aura almost drowns me pink smoke gets stuck in my throat when i say your name my heart goes up in flames

aaah johanna is crushing on a being of magic!

8. trees and flowers - strawberry switchblade

and i hate the buildings and the way they tower over me can't you see? i get so frightened no-one else seems frightened

strawberry switchblade is such kaisa music! goth & sweet! this song is definitely her but i think johanna's general anxieties about the city & the wilderness really show up in this song. they connect over these anxieties

9. i wanna be the moon - the scary jokes

it's scary to see you falling for me i wish that i could be i wanna be, i wanna be the moon i can't make you cry from way up in the sky and that's the reason why i wanna be, i wanna be the moon

kaisa's perspective. she doesn't like to get too close to people

10. it must be love - madness

i never thought i'd miss you half as much as i do

cmaaan johanna would love madness. london gerl. also one of the actual best love songs ever written ever

11. i have the moon - lush

you have to fly around the world all day to keep the sun upon your face i'd like to come and comfort you but i'd be blinded by the blue you have the sun, i have the moon

another sketchbook week song OOPS... literally sun/moon couple.

12. m'lover - kishi bashi

i wanna do what lovers do with you i wanna walk the edge of the earth with you

ripped STRAIGHT off the hilda soundtrack shamelessly. lovely magical sound. this plays when they're going on a very long expedition together

13. soho square - kirsty maccoll

one day you'll be waiting there no empty bench in soho square and we'll dance around like we don't care and i'll be much too old to cry and you'll kiss me quick in case i die before my birthday one day you'll be waiting there come summertime in soho square and i'll be painting stars up in the sky before i get too old to cry before my birthday

one of kaisa's first crushes was kirsty maccoll i'll say it. this song is so emotional the strings her vooiice!! this is a city love song. this is johanna leaving trolberg within the hc that they were childhood friends.

14. let's do everything for the first time forever - of montreal

may we dance again so i can pretend we're dancing for the first time? because when we danced for the first time i was so nervous!

it's been so long for both of them they're like teenagers again.. every time they talk its like talking to a school crush. embarrassing af. we both are out of practice with romance. let's do it together!!

15. black magic - little mix

take a sip of my secret potion i'll make you fall in love for a spell that can't be broken one drop should be enough

hehehehe!!!

16. my girlfriend is a witch - october country

spells fill the air i think i hear footsteps on my stair coming near her thoughts are telling me that she's here

quintessential hilda fandom song. how could i not?

17. she's got a new spell - billy bragg

one minute she says, she's gone to get the cat in next thing i know, she's mumbling in latin she cut the stars out of the sky and baked them in a pie, that's how i know she stole the scene and the scenery the script and the machinery, that's how i know that she's got a new spell

another witch's lover's song.. all that magic in one household can't be good.

18. lovers rock - tv girl

are you sick of me? would you like to be?

this song is just so chilled and lovely like a quiet night in. but captures the nerves and uncertainty of dating as well

19. riches and wonders - the mountain goats

we write letters to each other, invent secrets to confess to i learn foreign and exotic terms of endearment by which to address you we feed fresh fruit to one another we stay up all night and i am healthy, i am whole, but i have poor impulse control and i want to go home but i am home we are strong, we are faithful we are guardians of a rare thing we are filled with riches and wonders our love keeps the things it finds

domesticity and true love at its greatest. i love tmg!!

20. settin' the woods on fire - hank williams

you're my gal and i'm your feller dress up in your frock of yeller i'll look swell, but you'll look sweller! tonight we're settin' the woods on fire

off some country records johanna would 'co-own' with woodman. so fun. this gets put on in the pearson household when they have a family evening in

21. acolyte - slaughter beach, dog

annie, i want you to marry me we'll wait a few years i don't mean to frighten you i just want to be clear. man, it cuts like a dull knife when you're young and you're told 'makes sense when you're older,' darling, let's get old

not much to say on this one. i luv this song :-)

22. all i want is you - barry louis polisar

if you were a river in the mountains tall the rumble of your water would be my call if you were the winter i know i'd be the snow just as long as you were with me when the cold winds blow

juno soundtrack to finish it off :-) the core of sketchbook to me is joy & comfort & nature & magic

i hope u guys enjoyed this! lmk what you think of these interpretations! show me some lyrics you think about!

[captainpirateface]

Once upon a time, in a small town called Haddonfield, Michael Myers, the infamous masked killer, found himself drawn to the mysterious Camp Crystal Lake. As he wandered through the dense forest surrounding the camp, he felt an inexplicable connection, as if fate had brought him there for a purpose he couldn't comprehend.

Unbeknownst to Michael, another notorious figure lurked within the camp's shadows. Jason Voorhees, a relentless slasher with a hockey mask, had been haunting the grounds of Crystal Lake for decades. He sensed a new presence in his domain and felt both curiosity and a strange sense of familiarity.

One moonlit night, their paths crossed in the heart of the campground. Michael, with his stoic and silent demeanor, met Jason, a towering figure cloaked in darkness. Their eyes locked, and a moment of recognition passed between them. They understood each other's pain and loneliness, for they were both trapped in their own personal hells.

As the days turned into nights, Michael and Jason found solace in each other's company. They communicated without words, their connection transcending conventional means. They shared their stories, their torments, and the reasons the world feared them. In each other, they discovered a profound understanding and acceptance they had never experienced before.

As their bond grew stronger, an unexpected transformation began to take place. The cold, merciless hearts within Michael and Jason started to feel something entirely new—love. It was an emotion they had long forgotten, buried beneath layers of darkness and violence.

Through their love, Michael and Jason found redemption. They saw in each other the possibility of change, a chance to break free from their never-ending cycles of death and destruction. They made a pact to protect one another, to shield each other from the world that had cast them aside.

News of their alliance spread throughout the town of Haddonfield and the surrounding area. People who had once feared them now saw them in a different light. Some were skeptical, unable to comprehend that two monsters could find love. But others saw the beauty in their connection, recognizing that love could heal even the most broken souls.

Together, Michael and Jason carved out a new path, away from the shadows that plagued them. They never sought to harm the innocent again, instead becoming guardians of the forgotten, protecting those society had abandoned.

Their love defied logic and challenged social norms, but in the end, it was a testament to the transformative power of compassion. Michael and Jason proved that even in the darkest of hearts, a glimmer of light could emerge, and that love could conquer even the most terrifying demons within us.

And so, the tale of Michael Myers and Jason Voorhees serves as a reminder that love can be found in the most unexpected places and that redemption is possible even for those society has deemed irredeemable.

The End 🖤

[theoriginalsapphic]

what the opening track in their spotify playlist represents according to ChatGPT

Will Byers (Should I Stay or Should I Go by The Clash)

The song “Should I Stay or Should I Go” by The Clash is a classic rock track that features themes of uncertainty, ambivalence, and indecision. It’s a song about a character who is struggling to decide whether to stay in a relationship or leave.

A character who is represented by “Should I Stay or Should I go” might be someone who is facing a difficult decision or crossroads in their life. This could be a romantic relationship that they are considering leaving or staying in, or it could be a broader life choice.

The character might be feeling torn between conflicting emotions or desires, and struggling to weigh the pros and cons of the options. They might feel trapped or stuck in their current situation, but also afraid of making a change and facing the unknown.

Overall, a character represented by “Should I Stay or Should I Go” would likely be experiencing a sense of uncertainty o inner conflict, and grappling with the difficult task of making a tough decision.

Mike Wheeler (Smalltown Boy by Bronski Beat)

“Smalltwon Boy” by Bronski Beat is a powerful and emotive song about a young gay man who feels isolated and ostracized in his small town. The lyrics describe the character’s experiences of discrimination, rejection, and loneliness, as he struggles to find acceptance and a sense of belonging.

A character who is represented by “Smalltown Boy” might be someone who is grappling with their identity as a sexual minority, and the challenges that come with being open and honest about their sexuality in a society that doesn’t fully accept them. They might feel alienated from their family and community, and struggle to find a sense of connection and belonging.

The character might be experiencing feelings of shame or guilt around their sexuality, and might be afraid of the judgment and rejection they might face if they were open about it. They might feel trapped and alone in their small town, and yearn for the freedom and acceptance they believe they might find elsewhere.

Overall, a character represented by “Smalltown Boy” would likely be experiencing a sense of profound isolation and disconnection, and struggling to find acceptance and belonging in a society that doesn’t fully embrace them for who they are.

El Hopper (Papa Don't Preach by Madonna)

“Papa Don’t Preach” by Madonna is a song about a young woman who is dealing with an unexpected pregnancy, and is struggling to navigate the conflicting pressures of family expectations, personal autonomy, and societal norms.

A character represented by “Papa Don’t Preach might be someone who is experiencing a sense of conflict or tension between their desires and goals, and the expectations or demands of their family or community. They might be facing a difficult decision that challenges their sense of identity or threatens to disrupt their established relationships or social status.

The character might feel torn between their own desires and the expectation placed upon them, and might be struggling to find the courage to assert their own agency and make decisions that feel authentic and true to themselves. They might feel pressure from their family or society to conform to certain norms or expectations, and might be experiencing feelings of guilt or shame around their choices.

Overall, a character represented by “Papa Don’t Preach” might be someone who is grappling with the complexities of balancing their own desires and needs with the expectations and demands of their family and community, and who is seeking to find a path forwards that feels true to themselves and aligned with their own sense of identity and purpose.

Dustin Henderson (Break On Through (To The Other Side) by The Doors)

The character represented by “Break On Through (To The Other Side)” is someone who is seeking a way to escape their current circumstances and find something more meaningful in life. This person may feel trapped in their current situation, whether it be a dead-end job, a stagnant relationship, or simply a lack of direction or purpose.

The lyrics suggest a sense of urgency and a desire to break free from these constraints and find a new path forward. The character may be feeling frustrated or restless, and may be willing to take risks or make bold choices in order to pursue their goals. At the same time, there may be a sense of fear or uncertainty about what lies ahead.

Overall, the character represented by “Break On Through (To The Other Side)” is someone who is struggling to find their place in the world and seeking a way to break free from the limitations that are holding them back. They may be willing to take risks and pursue new experiences, but may also be wrestling with doubts and fears as they navigate their journey.

Lucas Sinclair (Bicyle Race by Queen)

This character is someone who is searching for a sense of freedom and liberation in their life. They may feel trapped or limited by their circumstances and are looking for an escape from their mundane routine. Riding a bicycle provides them with a sense of liberation and a feeling of being in control of their own destiny.

At the same time, this character is also someone who is a bit of a show-off. They like to be seen and recognized for their skills and abilities. They have a certain level of confidence and swagger, and they enjoy being the center of attention.

Underneath this carefree exterior, however, this character may be hiding deeper emotional pain or a sense of dissatisfaction with their life. They may feel disconnected from the people around them or unsure of their place in the world. Riding a bike is a way for them to escape these feelings and find a new sense of purpose and meaning.

Overall, this character is someone who is searching for a sense of freedom, independence and self-expression in their life, while also struggling with deeper emotional issues. They may be a bit of a risk-taker, but they are ultimately looking for a way to find a sense of meaning and purpose in their life.

Max Mayfield (California Dreamin' by The Mamas & The Papas)

A character represented by the song “California Dreamin’” by The Mamas & Papas could be someone who is yearning for a better life or a new beginning. The song’s lyrics describe their desire to leave a cold and dreary place behind in search of sunshine and freedom in California. The character may feel trapped or unsatisfied with their current situation and longs for a change.

The song’s themes of hope, escapism, and the search for something better could also suggest the character is somewhat of a dreamer, with a desire to break free from the limitation of their current circumstances. They may be optimistic about the possibilities that await them and willing to take risks to achieve their goals.

Alternatively, the character may have a sense of nostalgia or longing for a simpler time of past that they can never return to. The song’s lyrics could represent a desire to recapture a moment in time or a feeling of freedom that has been lost.

Overall, a character represented by “California Dreamin’” may be someone who is searching for meaning, purpose, or a sense of belonging, and is willing to take risks or make changes to find it.

Jonathan Byers (Creep by Radiohead)

The character represented by “Creep” by Radiohead is often someone who feels like an outcast or misfit, struggling with feelings of insecurity, inadequacy, and self-doubt. They may feel like they don’t fit with the people around them, and may even feel like they don’t deserve to be loved or accepted.

At the same time, this character often has a deep yearning for connection and intimacy. This character is aware of their own flaws and shortcomings, and feels like they are fundamentally different from the people around them, but they still long for human connection and affection.

In some cases, the character may be dealing with depression or other mental health issues, which can contribute to their feelings of alienation and isolation. They may feel like they are trapped in a cycle of negative thoughts and emotions, unable to break free from their own self-destructive patterns.

Ultimately, the character represented by “Creep” is someone who is struggling to find their place in the world and connect with others, even as they feel like they fundamentally flawed or unworthy. The song captures the pain and longing that comes with this struggle, and offers a powerful message of empathy and understanding for anyone who has ever felt like they don’t belong.

Nancy Wheeler (Girls Just Want to Have Fun by Cyndi Lauper)

A character represented by the song “Girls Just Want to Have Fun” by Cyndi Lauper might be someone who is breaking free from societal expectations and gender roles. This character could be a woman who has been raised in a conservative or traditional environment and is now rebelling against those norms. They may be seeking to assert their independence and individuality, and the song’s upbeat and catchy melody reflects their newfound sense of liberation.

At the same time, the character may be facing pushback from those around them, including friends, family, and society at large. They may be judged or dismissed for their desire to enjoy life, and could feel misunderstood or isolated as a result. However, the character remains determined to live life on their own terms, embracing their own identity and celebrating the joy and freedom that comes with it.

Overall, a character represented by “Girls Just Want to Have Fun” is someone is unapologetically themselves, breaking free from societal norms and expectations to pursue their own happiness and fulfillment.

Steve Harrington (Take On Me by a-ha)

The song “Take On Me” by a-ha has a vibrant and youthful energy to it, which suggests a character who is adventurous, daring, and willing to take risks. The song’s lyrics also hint at a sense of longing and desire, as the character seems to be trying to win over someone’s affections.

A character who is represented by “Take On Me” might be someone who is not afraid to pursue their passions and dreams, even if it means going against the expectations of others. They might have a charismatic and charming personality, with a talent for making people feel energized and alive. At the same time, there may be a sense of sadness or loneliness lurking beneath the surface, as the character struggles to find genuine connection with others.

Overall, a character represented by “Take On Me” could be seen as a complex and multifaceted individual, with a bold and adventurous spirit that masks deeper feelings of uncertainty and insecurity.

Joyce Byers (Thriller by Michael Jackson)

A character represented by the song “Thriller” by Michael Jackson might be someone who is fascinated by the macabre, the supernatural, and the dark side of life. This person may be drawn to horror movies, spooky stories, and anything that gives them a thrill. They may also have a bit of a rebellious streak, as they are not afraid to challenge societal norms and embrace their inner weirdness.

At the same time, this character may also be struggling with their own identity and trying to find their place in the world. They may feel like an outsider, disconnected from those around them, and yearning for a sense of belonging. They may also be drawn to the darker side of life as a way to escape their own problems and find a sense of purpose.

Overall, a character represented by “Thriller” may be complex, multidimensional, and even a bit enigmatic. They may embody a mix of darkness and light, rebellion and conformity, and fear and excitement.

Jim Hopper (I've Been Everywhere by Johnny Cash)

“I’ve Been Everywhere” by Johnny Cash is a song about a wanderer who has traveled all around the country, visiting a multitude of different places. The song’s lyrics list off a vast array of locations, from small towns to major cities, and it paints a picture of someone who has seen and experienced a lot in their life.

A character represented by this song might be someone who is a bit of world-weary and jaded. They’ve seen so much and been to so many places that they might have become a bit cynical or disillusioned with the world. They might feel like they’ve seen it all and that nothing really surprises or excites the anymore.

Overall, a character represented by “I’ve Been Everywhere” might be someone who is equal parts adventurous and disillusioned, someone who has seen and done a lot but is still searching for something more.

i'm not saying that a stupid spotify playlist should serve as evidence of how a character's arc would proceed, but i'm saying that so far it feels pretty fucking accurate.

[pinkmoondoll9shihtzu]

ugh i kno im just pmsing but i srsly cant stop fretting over my small town loneliness. i talk about it a lot. but its rly hard to keep the motivation alive when ur only source of validation & social life is thru a screen. i never feel connected to anything real.. i obsessively create tasks and projects to entertain myself and thats just kinda my whole existence. but i never even feel truly entertained cus i know it all leads to nothing, as it stands rn at least. and as much as i want irl friends its also scary because its so vastly normal to have infographic brain now like im not on any of the "apps" anymore im literally out of touch, on purpose.. its hard to trust ppl cld want to see me as anything more thann a tiktok aesthetic or a talking point. yeah idk what to do!! i just want to have fun and be carefree basically. i want to not feel trapped in reality, & i want to feel like my work is real not just a bunch of pixels flashing before your eyes then gone a second later.

[traipseartist]

July 4th - 7th - Yokum's Right of Seneca Rocks, West Virginia

I claim to be a Rock Climber™ but the majority of my experience is actually clinging to plastic rocks inside of blissfully air-conditioned warehouses in the part of town that's definitely getting gentrified.

I discovered I liked to climb at a time in my life when I was desperate to find something athletic that didn't make me want to walk into the sea. My body image after high school was in shambles and I developed a certain hatred for treadmills and ellipticals--symbols of punishment for over-indulgence or a demand I adhere to some kind of standard that I never really could buy all the way into. Needless to say, exercise was always a means to an end. If I could have put my brain in a jar and made my legs run the necessary number of miles to make me a size 0, I would have. Gleefully. Surely athleticism was mastering the ability to fully disconnect your body from your brain? Who wanted to be present for the heaving and the sweating and the oh-god-oh-god-this-is-how-I-die feeling that hangs in the balance?

Then I had a long-distance boyfriend who fell headlong into the sport and in my soft loneliness, I connected to him via chalk-coated climbing facilities. We would chatter on the phone about climbing problems, the world of outdoor climbing, competitions, characters at our respective gyms. When his life drifted away from mine, I stayed close to the wall. I felt not just the urge to be stronger and solve more difficult problems, but the desire to start speaking my body's language instead of pulling out the duct tape every time I needed to push through something that felt physically hard.

-------------------------------

So, yes yes, a beautiful back story. An illustrative origin that does nothing to explain why I'm clenching a stubborn half-sapling between my thighs and trying to keep all of my pistachio shells in my hat as I dangle my ankles thousands of feet above the valley floor in Seneca Rocks, West Virginia.

My partner Vincent and I are out with the Explorer's Club of Pittsburgh (some 20+ riotous humans with a distaste for a particular kind of self-preservation) on this fine holiday weekend when we agree to do something relatively stupid and exactly what we came for. We want to stand on the top of the biggest piece of exposed Tuscarora Quartz in the north east and shake in our boots while doing it even though we're mostly little indoor-monkey gym-rats.

Seneca Rocks, West Virginia is not like other climbing destinations. Some crags, especially those on the west coast that attract climbers from around the world, have their own sprawling ecosystems born of their touristic revenue. Joshua Tree has the strangest assortment of desert-proof fast-food establishments. Yosemite and the Sonora Pass have many of the trappings of a mountain get away: Adorable high streets in small boom towns scattered throughout the region, themed restaurants, condos and vacation homes stacked high and wide for visitors and returning locals alike. Something (wineries and theme parks and tucked away spas) for the person who has no desire to really disconnect from society, thank you very much.

Seneca Rocks, West Virginia has:

Yokum's Vacationland - a truly grandiose title for a double-wide cabin that feels like a themed gas station with a root-beer stand tacked on the back and some motel rooms up top. All the same, totally beloved.

Harper's Old Country Store - honestly, much cuter than Yokum's but probably less trafficked unless Yokum's runs out of ice or chocolate milk

Princess Snowbird's Indian Village & Campgrounds - not touching this one. It's been here for a second. It has RV hook-ups and could not be more American in nature.

The Gendarme - your local spot for outdoor guides, good advice, and the climbing gear you forgot.

There are campgrounds (Seneca Shadows) up the hill from Yokum's, and a little science center filled with dusty art-deco furniture across the way. All of this within the cast shade of the mountain you came for, and that is that.

The end.

Yet, despite the almost video game-esque limited nature of this local map, Seneca Rocks is obviously its own ticking entity. There are people who live here. The pepperoni rolls for sale in color coded zip-block bags (RED - Pepperoni and Mozzarella, BLUE - Mozzarella only, GREEN - EXTRA Pepperoni and Mozzarella) deposited in big wicker baskets by the cash register at Yokum's are made by a woman named Betsy. The local guides that cart litters of injured recreationalists down from the mountain are no NPCs.

So when you're teetering on routes with names like "Muscle Beach" and "Ecstasy Jr." that drape the mountain high above our tiny valley below, it's hard to feel that same uncaring maw of the great wilderness that I've felt so many times before when I've been playing with my own safety for fun and un-profit far from the sympathy of other humans.

Still, when a rope strains on a carefully placed nut in the crevices of Whorl's Thicket or you see some cotton slings tangled in the branches of a marooned tree under Traffic Jam, you are reminded that your survival--that any human's survival on this little quartz dinosaur spike--is purely by permission and tolerance only. There is no conquering here; there is only playing on the shoulders of a giant. It's reckless, even though it is surely allowed and time-tested.

I learned very quickly that the people I was climbing amongst, however, did not always have a passion for the reckless nature that is the hobby. Some of them had the exact opposite problem with their bodies and their minds that I found I had. They did not wish to separate their mind from their body so that they could push through the soul-crushing boredom of exerting physical labor without feeling much reward or time passing. Instead, they wished to sever the connection so that they could overcome the crippling fear of hanging on the edge, of being too frightened to progress--something I enjoy playing with, fiercely.

-----------------------------

At the summit of Seneca, there is a small metal lockbox the size you'd see keep cash in a concession stand on the perimeter of a high school Softball field. This box is full of notes, little plastic figurines, found treasure, a cow bell, a whistle. Well wishes, banal little messages for those behind or in front that may find themselves up here soon and again.

At base camp, there is a loose huddle of chairs around a dimming campfire and the air of survival from something we chose. Another day on the rock, another meal to remember the day we didn't fall off of it. Someone mentions a plaque affixed to a large boulder along the path up to the crag, seen just before the turn off to a torturous route upward to some other famous trad classics named "Stairmaster." It's a commemoration to a woman who was part of the Explorer's Club of Pittsburgh. She stepped backwards off of a steep step-around route on the mountain and fell to her death a week before her wedding in the early 2000s.

Someone says they wish they hadn't named her specifically on the plaque--it made the club look careless. Untrained.

There is a long pause before someone else says that her fiance wanted to bury her in her wedding dress. I put my mind back into my body, and my body back into my tent, and I am thankful to sleep on a solid, flat surface yet again.

[jgmartin]

HEADLIGHTS [short horror]

It started last week.

The lockdown, I mean.

Before that, things weren’t great but they weren’t awful. We weren’t the happiest place on earth, but we weren’t jumping off bridges either. We just were. We managed, is what I’m trying to say.

Now years of impoverished alcoholism have reared their head. The lockdown’s done its job. It’s kept us safe from the devil outside our walls, but sometimes it’s the devil inside that does the most harm. Sometimes it’s the thinking. The thinking, thinking, thinking.

That’s what does you in.

My town’s main industry has been on the decline for decades. These days most of us are on food stamps. We can’t afford to live here anymore, but can’t afford to move either. Catch 22.

A few years back the government opened up a compound on the hill, a research facility for military-types and the super geniuses you see on TV. A few weeks later, they announced the town would enter a lockdown. Something about a radiation leak. Something about acid rain.

Since it started there’s been one dead and nine missing. How’d the dead guy go? If you're wondering, it wasn’t radiation. It was self-loathing. They found Benny West near the woods with a smoking handgun beside what was left of his head, and a suicide note so wet with blood that nobody could read the damn thing.

Famous last words? We never knew them. But then, I don’t think any of us really needed to. You could still smell the booze on Benny’s breath, could still see decades of struggle etched into every line of his face.

As for the missing? They’re a tougher puzzle. Nobody’s found them. Nobody’s had any contact with them whatsoever. Not a text. Not a call. Not even a dusty email.

It’s odd, but maybe they’d just had enough, couldn’t take this place anymore and finally decided the lockdown was the worst of it. What’s the phrase? The last straw. Yeah, that’s what the lockdown was for them.

The last straw.

Since it all started, I’ve been going stir crazy. Being cooped inside with nothing to do but drink and watch TV will do that to a man. I think that’s why I did it, you know? Took a midnight stroll. Loneliness is a strange beast and it doesn’t pick and choose it’s time of day, but if I had to place it I’d say it always gets worse at night. There’s something about the dark that suffocates. Makes you feel vulnerable. Singled out.

So I went to her cabin.

My old highschool sweetheart. Vanny Williams– the only girl I’ve ever met that could shoot a target with her eyes closed and still hit a bullseye. The girl I called the love of my life, who left me after nine years because I couldn’t wake up in the morning without a shot of whisky.

That night, I needed her. Maybe I wanted to make amends, or maybe I just wanted somebody familiar, somebody warm who I could feel a sense of connection with. I don’t know. All I really knew is I couldn’t last another night alone in my cabin. Not with the whisky. Not with the .45.

So I set off.

The government was taking the lockdown seriously. One of my neighbors, Roger Huckbrite got a lashing from the sheriff for wandering around drunk after dark. They knocked out three of his teeth and told him next time they’d break his legs.

“No wandering at night,” they told him. “Otherwise those broken legs will be a mercy, Rog.”

I had a thing for my legs. I liked walking, liked kicking a ball and most of all I liked hitting the gas pedal of my truck. I didn’t want broken legs, so I stayed off the main roads and stuck to the logging roads. Hell, I didn’t even drive. Too conspicuous, I figured.

So I set those legs to work and took a walk. To the right of me was the hillside, all brush and boulders with the military facility up top, and to my left was the valley. Charmouth Forest. On the other side of those trees was Vanny Williams, but walking straight through them was a death trap. See, that night it wasn’t just dark, it was snowing, and where there was snow there was ice, and I didn’t want to risk a sprained ankle going down that valley slope. Not without cell service. Not when the weather called for a cold snap tonight.

So I kept to the side of the road with my eyes and ears on, and as I walked something caught my attention. It was above me. All the way up on the top of the hill, nestled near the military facility. Headlights. There wasn’t a doubt in my mind that those lights belonged to the sheriff, holed up there in his SUV and looking for cars on the roads breaking curfew.

Too bad for him that I was smarter than that. I didn’t just leave my truck at home, I made sure to wear my black jacket and keep close to the treeline. There wasn’t a chance in hell he was spotting me down here. Even still, his presence made my skin crawl. There’s something uncomfortable about being watched, and even though I knew the sheriff couldn’t see me, it still felt tense to be breaking the law right under his nose.

I decided I ought to disappear. Just until I got myself firmly away from his field of view. So I slipped into the woods, keeping certain not to stray too far from the road– just far enough that I lost sight of the sheriff beyond the canopy of fir trees.

I walked like that for maybe five or ten minutes. Kept it up until I rounded the bend in the road, and then I poked my head out and breathed a sigh of relief. The headlights were nowhere to be seen. The sheriff either took off, or I put enough twists and turns between us that the trees were now obscuring his view. Maybe he just figured nobody would break curfew on a night this cold.

Either way, it was good news for me.

I hiked back up to the road and then froze. Again I felt that familiar, uncomfortable sensation of being watched, like there was somebody stalking me in the dark. I looked back up the hill, wondering if I'd missed the sheriff's somehow but–

Light blinded me.

I stumbled backward, slipping on a patch of ice and falling onto my ass. Ahead, near the curve in the road sat a pair of headlights. The sheriff. But how? The son of a bitch must have been scanning the road with binoculars, maybe some fancy night-vision ones borrowed from the military types.

I groaned, getting up to my feet. He was still a fair distance away, far enough that he probably couldn't make out my face through my toque and hood.

That meant I could still get away.

I shot off into the woods, slipping down the valley slope and sliding over dirt and leaves and fresh fallen snow. I jumped and dipped, doing the best I could to dodge the onslaught of stray branches and renegade roots. I kept at it until my lungs got hot and I needed to breathe. Then I kept at it some more until I reached the valley floor.

Breathing hard, I looked back at the top of the slope. If I thought it was dark up on the road, then down here it was practically pitch black. It was all I could do to see the ground directly in front of me, but despite it all I knew one thing for certain: there weren’t any headlights.

I took a moment to lean up against a tree. Catch my breath. Get my bearings. I had to figure out which direction Vanny’s house was in. Was it to the North? North-East? The cold nipped at my ears, bit at my nose. It was worse down here. Frigid.

The damn sheriff really made a mess of things.

My hands dug in my pocket and pulled out my flashlight. I'd brought it along just in case things got too dark to navigate, and boy was I happy I did. Since I couldn't see the sheriff's headlights through the canopy of trees, I knew there was no way he'd see the glow of my flashlight either.

I flicked it on.

Good. That was better. Shivering, I used the light to navigate as best I could, spotting familiar landmarks that I remembered from playing in the valley as a kid and using those to plot my course. A big boulder here. A broken tree there.

It was all coming back to me. With any luck, I'd make it out of here before frostbite set in, and I'd get to Vanny's with all my fingers and toes in tact. She'd like that. Probably call me a damn fool for going to such trouble for a cup of coffee with her, but then I never said I was a genius.

Something snapped behind me.

A tree branch, maybe? It sounded big. I paused, wheeling around and casting my light as far as it would go. I couldn’t see anything but the shadow of tree trunks and fresh fallen snow. I knew for a fact that there were bears in those woods, but surely they’d be hibernating by this time of year.

“Hello?” I whispered. I didn’t think the sheriff had the dexterity to chase me down here on foot, but it was possible he sent his partner after me. “Deputy Marigold?”

No reply. Come to think of it, I couldn’t hear any sound at all. Not the pitter-patter of squirrels hoarding winter food, or even the flap of wings flying through the trees. The forest was silent. Still.

Another snap. This time, bigger. It rang out like a gunshot and I scrambled, running blindly backwards as my ears filled with the sound of rushing branches, ricocheting off timber as something plummeted toward the earth. A tree.

A fir branch whipped across the back of my jacket, smashing me to the ground and taking the breath out of my lungs. The ground rumbled as the tree crashed next to me.

I wheezed. Gasped for breath. I rose onto my hands on knees, freeing myself from the branch and trembling with adrenaline. I'd nearly just been flattened, and I couldn’t even tell where the tree had fallen from or what caused it. The dark was thick enough that my light didn't stretch far.

No, I told myself. No time to go investigating.

I wiped snow from my face, teeth chattering. I had to keep moving. Just a little further and I’d be out of these woods and in front of a hot fireplace, making coffee with the warmest woman I knew.

Besides, it wasn't that big a deal. Sometimes trees fell. That's just how nature worked-- it wasn't something you could predict.

I carried on for another few minutes when my stomach twisted. There it was again. That feeling. The same one I'd had up on the road, that feeling of being watched. Stalked. I swung my light around, doing my best to illuminate the snow-covered trees and brush, but I could barely see ten feet in front of me.

"Hello?" I tried again.

No reply. If there was a deputy down here, then surely they'd have made a sound when that tree came down, right? Of course they would. He'd have had to ask if I was okay, if I was still alive if only to properly fill out his report back at the station.

That meant it was my imagination. Just a bit of paranoia.

They say a dark forest is the ultimate evolutionary fear. The perfect embodiment of the unknown. Our ancestors didn't roam the woods at night because just about everything that lived there could see or hear them before they knew they were there. Some of those things were bigger than them, too. Hungrier.

But I wasn't some neanderthal, hunter-gatherer. I was smarter than that, and besides I could finally see the other end of the valley. The slope that led to Vanny's cabin. The lights of her windows peeking through the trees.

A low groan filled the night, distorted like a scratching record.

I spun around. My ears strained for the sound of footsteps, the sound of breathing but I couldn't hear a damn thing but my heart slamming in my chest. Was that the sound of an animal? If it was, it wasn't any animal I'd ever heard, and I'd lived next to these woods my whole life.

“Is somebody out there?” I called. An awful feeling took hold in my gut, replacing the creeping sensation of being watched. Now I felt like I was being hunted.

"Fuck this," I muttered. I took off at a sprint, racing toward Vanny's house as fast as my feet could trample the snow. It crunched beneath my boots, my breath coming in great white clouds. If there was some psychopath in the trees then I wasn't about to wait around and make this easy for them.

A screech pierced the forest. Wings thundered as birds fled from the tree-tops in droves, filling my ears with their cries. Another screech followed, this one lower-pitched. Snow crunched beneath feet. Not mine.

Something was walking toward me.

Time to move. I scrambled at the slope, struggling to find purchase against the icy incline. I slipped, falling, falling. My jaw smashed into a rock. The taste of blood filled my mouth, my vision swimming as I tumbled down the side of the valley, crashing against a tree at the bottom.

“Get away from me!” I coughed, spitting out one of my teeth. I felt dizzy as I got back to my feet, disoriented, but I held my ground, staring defiantly into the dark wall of trees and my unseen assailant.

“I’m armed,” I lied “If I were you, I’d turn right around and start walking, otherwise you’re getting my .45 between the eyes.”

Footsteps crunched beyond my vision. Whatever was out there sounded big, big as a bear or a moose. Now it was circling me. Was this what had knocked over that tree? Had it been following me this whole time?

Another screech, this one deafening. My head rang with the sound of it, reverberating around my skull like an exploding nail bomb. I clenched my ears and fell to my knees. Tears stained my cheeks, freezing in the air.

Light blinded me.

I shielded my eyes, stunned and disoriented as two headlights beamed down at me not ten feet away. I scrambled backward, confused. The sheriff? The hell was he doing down here? How did he get his SUV down that incline, let alone through all those trees?

The headlights began to sway, moving closer to me. No, that wasn't right. Headlights weren't supposed to sway, and wheels weren't supposed to sound like footsteps either. The crunch of the snow was like a bell tolling, each step marking me a moment closer to death.

"What are you?" I screamed, emptiness filling me up inside. Suddenly I felt weak. Hopeless. It was as though just being near this thing was killing my will to live. If I had my .45 with me, I'd have pressed it to my skull and pulled the trigger as many times as it took.

The headlights reached out. A long, twisted and gnarled arm that looked like it ought to have belonged to a tree grabbed me by my torso, snapping my ribs like twigs. I threw back my head and screamed.

A voice reached my ears, something deep and cold. Colder than winter.

It sounded familiar. It sounded like it lived at the bottom of every whisky bottle I'd ever drank, like the whispers in my head every time I'd fucked up, every time I'd made a mistake so bad I wished I was dead.

"I," said the voice, "... want to taste your misery."

______________________________________

This is the part where I tell you I managed to get away. That I kicked the creature in its giant, glowing eyes and made a beeline up the slope and never saw it again. I wish I could say that was the truth, I really do.

But the truth is much worse.

The truth is that Vanny Williams saved my life that night. Maybe she heard my screams. Maybe she just had a feeling that something wasn't right, that somebody was in trouble. Honestly, I don't even know if she knew it was me. Vanny was the sort of girl that'd go out of her way to help anybody.

She came out of her cabin and did what she did best: hunted. She rained bullets onto those headlights, distracting them, pissing them off enough that they let me be and ran off.

Ran to her.

Six bullets to its head, and still it climbed the slope of the valley like an anthill. Six bullets to its head, and still it took her screaming into the trees. Now she’s another statistic. One of the missing. The sheriff's calling me crazy for what I saw, telling everybody that I’m a drunk and Vanny just had enough and skipped town like the rest.

I know what I saw, though, and I think the folks at the military facility know too. The feeling I had beneath the glare of those headlights was like nothing I'd felt before, a hopelessness that's difficult to put into words. Simply put, I'd have taken death over another second of it. Even if that death came by my own hand.

Ever since that happened the military's been watching me. They've been driving by my house from sunrise to sunset, and more than once I've spotted somebody going through my trash. I've tried reaching out to news organizations but nobody wants to run my story. Even now, in the dead of night they're out there. Maybe they don't think I'm awake, or maybe they've just given up all pretense of keeping a low profile. I don't know. All I know is I can see them through the crack in my blinds, waiting patiently in my driveway.

Two headlights in the dark.

[generic-internet-name]

i was thinking about this a while ago, but because my english final was just graded i’ve remembered it and decided to put it all together in an actual post. anyways here’s my analysis of gothic and romantic elements in the forgetmenauts music.

a very common romantic element is the importance of nature(i highlighted so much of this in frankenstein) usually in context of the healing power of nature, or learning from nature, and the rejection of modern society and strict logic in favor of following one’s feelings(this is a response to the neoclassicalism of earlier periods). A lot of fmns music has this imagery. For example, in Cottonwood with the lyrics “copying lines/in the schoolhouse when i should/have been out kissing james/in the cottonwood” the narrator doesn’t want to be within the strict bounds of the school, but rather following their heart out in nature. similarly, in the marriage of bigfoot and mothman, the line “let’s burn down every fucking gift shop!” symbolizes bigfoot and mothman rejecting the commodification of their existence and the forests they live in. In both instances, the rejection of society connects directly to embracing nature and their love. 

another aspect that shows up a ridiculous amount in romantic and gothic literature is isolation, whether physical or psychological. the narrator in the yellow wallpaper being trapped in the attic, jonathan harker trapped in dracula’s castle, pretty much all of frankenstein, people are alone. This shows up all over the forgetmenauts’ music. In Domovoi, “the cabin is quiet and cold/the domovoi sits by the oven unlit/and waits for a family that’s not coming home” Gay Werewolf Murder Ballad shows psychological isolation in how the narrator has to hide from the other people of the town- “i search every face for the marks of our kin/for no one else may know” in the rusalka and the shepherd girl, the rusalka tempts the shepherd girl to isolate herself- “leave behind your narrow home/men shall leave you well alone” the wind in the orchard is all about loneliness and being unable to contact a loved one, i could go on but i’m not gonna point out every single instance cause that would be boring. 

i can’t think of anything else right now but yeah <3 hash tag literary analysis

[free-for-all-fics]

Part 4/7 💜📸📝

May 1936

Dearest Fanny,

Remember when I said I wanted to live like a cherry blossom? Cherry blossoms bloom within the grasp of death. With most flowers, the rot sets in…they fall… That’s the price of new life. Not cherry blossoms, though. They bloom beautiful, they fall beautiful. That’s how I want my life to be. To be beautiful and dignified for a fleeting moment simply by letting go of life. Daring to bloom knowing it won’t last, and so falling in vivid color. I wish I could live like that. I want to experience true beauty, if only for a moment.

I met someone who made me feel different. He showed me a whole new world, gave me hope. I honestly thought he could help me find a new me. I felt it with all my heart. But people didn’t understand us, didn’t want that from us. In the end, they took my hope from me. They took him away. People who can’t achieve beauty seek comfort in others. They fear anyone different. Hate them. Try to tear them down. I can’t take much more of this. Fanny, do you remember when we took apart all those abandoned mailboxes and birdhouses and built Bug Town? I first peered into Mr. Emory’s fascinating cases of beetles and butterflies at the age of six, in the company of Father. I recall my pity at each occupant, dead and pinned for display. It was no great leap to draw the same conclusion of ladies: similarly bound and trussed, pinned and contained, with the objective of being admired, in all their gaudy beauty. I’d go collect pill bugs and slugs and we’d put them in little houses, alive, and make up stories about their lives as we watched them until we got bored and released them back into the wild. Well, I went and set the whole thing back up. I even added new buildings. I just wish we could go back there. I wish I could keep building Bug Town with you. I wish you and I could run away together, Fanny. Just me and you... I just want to run to another place. A simpler, gentler place. A place of gentle pastels and beautiful, breathtaking, and perfect— Why do I feel like this? I’ve never felt like this before. It’s got to be because I lost that special person and the hope he gave me, right?

A long time ago, when I finally got to accept my feelings for Jim, I thought everything was going to change. But every day was still just like every day. He was still a drifter. I was still his friend. When you live in New York, people expect things to stay the same. If anything changed between us, it could ruin Jim and everything around him. So that’s how it went: Nothing changed when my whole world burned. I kept teling myself maybe after I got into college, I’d be able to express my feelings for him. I let the fire in my heart eat through my soul and body. I called myself a coward. But I chose to keep what little I had to enjoy. I was a poor kid crawled up in bed. Poor? Do I really deserve that charity title? Am I really the victim of all of this? Finding myself is the key to finding others, to realizing that I can form real bonds, that I can end loneliness and embrace a better future. Seeking a connection with others is a sign of weakness. It’s running away. The strongest animals don’t form groups; they act alone, and need only themselves to survive. Those who betray themselves to fit into a group are pathetic. There’s no beauty in living like that. But... I don’t really mind. I just want someone to understand me… For those I love, and for those who love me… I want to keep moving forward…and never look back... I wouldn’t go back, to the way my life was before. No. No, I can never go back to that again. Remember the time when I said that I don’t want to be trapped anymore? I think I’ve finally found a way to escape. You’re probably thinking, “Nothing too drastic, I hope.” It is drastic. There’s no going back once I’ve done it, but that's what I want. No going back. So I won’t. I’m far nicer than I was before I went to Cascade, you know. Running away is running a way, running a path both from and toward. It is all a matter of perspective.

Fundamentally, some people, like Mother, misunderstand the desire to escape the flesh. It’s not about escaping decay, or that the heart or the brain is less mutable than the flesh (foolish). It’s about the changeability! It’s about customization! It’s about being able to open yourself up to new things and swap parts around! This was what my spirit longed to do, to wander in strange lands. It couldn’t stand being trapped in one body all the time. It had wanderlust. I get butterflies every time I wander beautiful places I’ve never been. Dr. Jaquith once described me as a butterfly. ‘You are like a butterfly, beautiful to look at but hard to catch,” he said, “yet in that utilitarian life a butterfly of the soul dies, for we need the sweet nectar of the flowers and the warm rays of the sun. The sweet words, the laughter, the silliness and the spontaneous hugs are as needed as the air we breathe.” The sad thing is, I think cold types like Mother need it too, that’s why they seek us and cling to our warmth until our fire is extinguished. “If travel is like love, it is, in the end, mostly because it’s a heightened state of awareness, in which we are mindful, receptive, undimmed by familiarity and ready to be transformed. A person susceptible to wanderlust is not so much addicted to movement as committed to transformation.” I am ready to transform, Fanny. These brick walls have been my cocoon for the years I needed their sanctuary, and I thank them. My eyes wander their rugged clay surface, their rosy color bright yet earthen. My hands feel the warmth of sun, imparted to them yet given back with a steady determination. Leaving home was never going to be easy, but it is part of growing, of moving onward into new challenges. It is so very bittersweet.

Luggage, to pack at this time, is bitter and sweet. Yet it is as the striking clock, hands move onward. When the time of change comes I can only embrace it and make the best of what comes next. Now that time has come again. It brings a sense of rebirth, of the coming of new adventures. It’s not even about wanting something badly, it’s wanting it more than death. It’s dying for something and being reborn. It is as if my heart and soul have climbed into their own luggage and buckled in as happy passengers. There is a time to stay. There is a time to go. I believe I am close to the latter. At a certain point I need to go wandering. My feet need to hit earth, again and again, that bone-filling drumbeat. I need the sky’s colored threads to tangle inside me, pull me somewhere new. Everything I was I carry with me, and everything I will be lies waiting on the road ahead. The road doesn’t rise and the road doesn’t sink, it’s me that does the walking. Every day it’s right there and I can ride it anywhere or sit here on this curb.

I’m leaving, Fanny. I’m sorry but I can’t stay. Sir John Talbot and I have broken our engagement. I wanted it to work, not for Mother’s sake, but for John’s. And, if I was older, maybe I could have made it. But I still have my youth and I can’t throw that away on him. I’m not the right woman for him, and he’s not the right man for me. It was a mutual decision, and came as a surprise to neither of us. We parted amicably, and promised that we’d still be friends and keep in touch. I’m relieved and very glad to know our friendship won’t suffer and that, despite our broken engagement, we haven’t truly fallen out. It feels like a weight off our shoulders, like the stars have aligned and the world has shifted back into place.

Now that things are going back to the way they were between us, I no longer feel dizzy and disoriented, like I’m living outside of my body. But something’s changed, in a good way. I can’t explain or describe it, but I can feel it. I hope John can feel it too. He’s a good man with an even better heart, but it still belongs to his wife. He’s so very lucky to have loved and been loved in return, to have his heart held by a woman who could really cherish it and keep it safe. True love stories don’t end in a wedding, Fanny, they end in a funeral. He had his love story and it had a happy ending, for a time. And isn’t he the lucky one? It is better to have loved and lost, than to not have loved at all. I don’t know if he’ll ever find another woman to love him, if he’ll ever make room in his heart for her in that way, but I wish him every happiness.

I’m so sorry, Fanny. I do love you, you know. It’ll be hard to go, to let you go, my last link with home. I know that I leave many things behind, but it is time to go towards a new beginning and go in search of my destiny. I don’t know what I’m going to find, but I’m sure it will be wonderful. Being the person I am, and feeling the way that I do, getting excited about going somewhere new can be terrifying. Of course it is, I get it! As much as I had always longed to be freed of my duties and obligations, being released from such bonds was as much a severing as an emancipation. Emancipation resulting in madness. Unlimited freedom to choose and play a tremendous variety of roles with a lot of coarse energy. I might be afraid of damn near everything at first, but I refuse to let it paralyze me. I won’t be the woman who cowers behind four walls, never taking chances. I am a world of uncertainties disguised as a girl, and I want to die like I’ve lived. I always wanted to be larger than life. If I don’t travel, I’ll regret it. My soul will forever be empty. Still, it’ll be scary and lonely…and half the time I’ll be wondering why the hell I’m in Cincinnati or Hungary or North Dakota or Mongolia or wherever my ambition takes me.

There will be boondoggles and discombobulated days, freaked-out nights and metaphorical flat tires. In the first few seconds an aching sadness will wrench my heart, and I know I shall be homesick for you…but it will soon give way to a feeling of sweet disquiet, the excitement of wanderlust. Still, living in this moment I realize that it is a transition that will live with me all my days. Yet I take these emotions with me, these memories of comfort and joy. I see the places we did hopscotch as kids, throwing down them stones, leaping in time to our rhymes. I see the road in the right here and now, these shoes feeling how the sidewalk pushes back softly, always supporting, never asking. And in that moment I hear it calling with its sweet song of other places, all of them connected by the breathing land that runs under that tarmac, under oceans and mountains. That’s how I know I’ve gotta go, go with the road, take her curves and junctions, pause at the red, go at the green.

I went to such great lengths to hide it, but I suppose I can tell you this now: I wasn’t a very good student. I wasn’t smart enough to just get by. I wasn’t focused enough in class. I rarely passed exams. I skipped assignments. I was constantly on academic probation. I can remember the complicated face Mother made when I told her that my college application was rejected again and that I didn’t want to go to school anyway. None of us were expecting them to approve an application of a dropout with a low grade point average. As much as I wanted to be, I wasn’t anything like Dad. Not that Mother would ever let anyone know that.

You and I always used to stick together, and then when we were in junior high... I would get into trouble here and there and our parents would always compare us. You were the good twin...and I was the evil twin, as I liked to say. Two halves to a whole, and I was the rotten half, they said. I kind of got this image. I totally played it up as if that’s what I had to be or something. But at the time, as Mother and Father were in the middle of their divorce that was neither smooth nor messy, but something in-between, I was already thinking of doing what Jim was accused of doing: selling all my belongings, maybe inventing a fake identity, sticking out my thumb, and hitchhiking to roam around the world to be with the other hippies and vagabonds who had dropped out of school and tuned in to their surroundings.

All I wanted was to live a life where I could be me, and be okay with that. I had no need for material possessions, money or even close friends with me on my journey. I never understood people very well anyway, and they never seemed to understand me very well either. All I wanted was my art and the chance to be the creator of my own world, my own reality. I wanted the open road and new beginnings every day. When no possessions keep us, when no countries contain us, and no time detains us, man becomes a wanderer, and woman, a wanderess. I know, in my soul, that a love for travel is a gift and not a hindrance. It feels like a burden when the bucket list is bigger than the bank account, but a thirst for more of the world is not something to apologize for.

Denying its presence feels like denying something good in me, something God put there. One learns most when one wanders the world. Experience teaches is such a lovely saying. Hypocrisy is something I have learned saturates every level of our society. I see it more now than I did then. At some stage I started questioning everything that I was being taught and turned against various aspects of my upbringing. Maybe I had my reasons and maybe I needed new ways to cope like Dr. Jaquith said. I needed pain, I needed blood. Pain is beauty. The more pain somebody has experienced in their life the more physically attractive they are. Judge me if you want, but I’m talking about my own body. My own catharsis. About marking myself with beauty instead of ugliness. Anger is a thing I channel into my passions, I make it my rocket fuel to create a better world. All those times I have lashed out, lost self-control… I’m so dreadfully sorry. I am learning from those past experiences - learning how to become more as our father who suffered so much and yet was calm and kind to all.

Jim was like Father, always pushing his limits. Well… It was more like he was always being pushed, but he was good at it. That’s why he naturally became a journalist, a travel writer, while maintaining a high for adventure, for exploration, for new experiences and the discovery of previously unknown wonders. Jim was the best chauffeur I could ask for. Seeing him all sweaty as he worked on a car triggered something tingly within me. Something that made me want to catch him behind his back and never let go. All sorts of feelings and thoughts were pumped restlessly into my brain with every heartbeat. It gave me a bad headache. A good kind of bad headache. I wanted it to stop. I wanted it to never stop. But as soon as Jim gave me that “Hello” all those headaches were washed away. It used to be the best prescription I could ask for. Take away the pain and let only the good things stay.

I don’t want to start talking shit about her already but how can I resist? Every time I got in Mother’s view, it triggered an obvious backbite. I had an... interesting talk with Mother. One you’re never going to need to have. Well, of course Mother prefers you over me. Why shouldn’t she? I’m ugly and awkward, and I always say the wrong things. I fly around throwing away perfectly good marriage proposals. I love our home, but I’m just so fitful, and I can’t stand being here! I’m sorry. I’m sorry, Fanny. I’m sorry about being as difficult as I am, my brain’s just…built wrong. There’s just something really wrong with me. I want to change, but I…I can’t. And I just know, I’ll never fit in anywhere. Why is it that I can’t be content to live a normal life? Why do I spiral into depression when I am away from the wilderness for too long?

I mean...you’ve known, right? Like... I’ve known. I’ve known ever since Father took us with him to Europe. Mother didn’t, I guess. But she saw Jim’s note, and the suitcase under my bed, and she asked, “is there something I should know about you and Jim?” Mother kept doing what she does best: digging into other’s secrets. She tried to use Jim’s ex-wife and four adult daughters against him, against me. But that backfired on her and blew up in her face when I told her I already knew all about Jim’s past. In that moment, I was proud to have rendered her speechless. It gave me great pleasure to watch her sputter, trying and failing to form words. I threw a wrench in her plans, just as she had thrown a wrench in mine. But here’s the thing. I was prepared for her to be mad, or disappointed, or start crying or something. But she was just in denial. “You're too young to know what you want,” “you and Jim are just good friends,” “you just haven’t met the right man...” “It’s a phase.” That's what I didn’t see coming. That she wouldn’t even respect me enough... to believe me.

Maybe Mother thought...thought that Jim only took an interest in me because I was just a “rich but clueless American girl” who was lonely enough to do anything for anyone who was nice to me. Jealousy is a strong creature. It quickly devoured her mind. Soon, anger took control of her, and it took control of me too. And she just needed someone to be mad at, someone to blame for her misery other than herself. Sadly, coping with her bitchiness wasn’t the hardest part of the day. Even after Jim left me, anger stayed. It devoured me whole. A phase, she called it. Well, joke’s on her, because she is in for one very long phase. I only stayed as long as I had because Mother suddenly contracted diphtheria and depended on us more and more. Manby, Uncle George, you, me…all of us. She was ill and getting worse. And there was you, Fanny. I didn’t want to abandon you and leave you alone in that great empty house with Mother. Even if I could’ve chucked everything— But Jim wouldn’t let me. Jim. Jim. What’s the feminine for his word? That’s what I am. I knew he had been married with children before, that he abandoned them, and I walked right in with my eyes wide open. I said he would make me happier. And he had.

But now my beloved Jim has gone away. He left on a train and hasn’t told me where he’s going. I’ve lost touch with him. He vowed never again to step foot on the territory of New York or Wales, wishing for me to be free of him so I could be happy with John. How was he to know we’d break our engagement? And though I haven’t lost everything - I still have you and Uncle George here in New York and Father in Berlin (God, I hope he’s safe. I pray for him every night), my beloved family who lights up my life - If I don’t go after him, it’ll only seal my fate of never seeing him again, and the thought is too much to bear. I lost him twice already, but I can’t survive it a third time. So now you will never see me again, for I am on my way Northeast, there to start the rest of my life. I will never return to the territory of New York, not even when my mother, whom I despise with every part of my being, has left this Earth - unless she changes her ways. But I’m not holding my breath.

Between saying and doing, many a pair of shoes is worn out. As of now, it looks as if I’m right about one thing, that Mother is never going to change. Even if she told me she understands my need to move out of the city, I don’t feel guilty for leaving her alone in New York. I hate to add to her unhappiness, truly. But she won’t change. Not until she’s happy again, at any rate. She’ll come around when she’s not lonely anymore, if by some miracle Dad comes home. But not before. Our parents smile from the old photographs, full of the promise of youth. Mother stands in her wedding dress, modest by today’s standards, simple and white. Father is the proud man holding the arm of his pretty bride, the sunlight reflecting from his unwrinkled face. That was before...before the illusion shattered. It was before his infidelity and her hypocrisy surfaced and came to a head. I want to see them smile like that again, to find that love hiding inside their aching bones.

Bravery is the sweet spot on a spectrum from cowardice to fool hardy. There are times when running away is that sweet spot, when it is the brave choice. It is all a matter of circumstance, trust your instinct on which it has arisen. This is the moment. It’s time to take matters into my own hands. I tell myself, you aready used up your last chance to change your mind about running away, Miss Skeffington. Get yourself together. if not for you, for Dad. Mother sought her refuge in London and abroad when she was ill, while I found a place in the great wide somewhere. And so I stepped over the divide between childhood and all that lay beyond. I won’t be defeatist and say it will be my last time in this house. I’ll be back. Someday. Maybe. For now, I cautiously regard home as a place I’m leaving behind in order to come back to it afterward. It’s selfish, but at the end of the day, that's what we are - selves. If we don’t look out for our own interests, there are plenty who’ll be more than happy to chip away at our core, piece by piece, until we forget what we ever wanted.

Although I do not have the time to convey my good wishes to you in the way that I would like, I hope you know that you have been the kindest of sisters and although you may not want to hear this after what I’ve done, I am very grateful to you. I am sorry to be leaving home like this after so many years. I know I’ve said it many times in this letter already, and maybe you’re tired of reading those two words, but I feel like I can’t say it enough. Please forgive me for running off and leaving so abruptly without a proper goodbye. As much as I would’ve preferred to have taken leave in person, the matter was urgent, and I had no time to wait for you to get back from your date with Johnny Mitchell. It was decided just that very day, and my boat was scheduled to set sail so soon, so I had to leave rather abruptly to catch it.

By the time you read this letter, I will be halfway across the world, on my way to India. There’s something Jim said in his letter…it might be a hint as to where he is. Or it might be nothing. But I have to try. Besides, it’s not just because of Jim that I’m going. It was a thought, that. Not to attach myself to a man, but to confront instead the open world, the wide fields of France and Spain, the ocean, anything. Not just to hitch a lift with the first fellow who looked as though he knew where he was going, but just to go. I haven’t told Mother or Uncle George this, but there’s an art exhibition in Delhi, and I just received a letter informing me that I have a place as one of the featured international artists! I’ll be able to present my artwork in front of hundreds - no - thousands of people!! It might actually be my crowning achievement. But once this is done…then what? Do I have it in me to come up with something even better? How much longer can I enjoy the fame and praise I get now? Is there despair and disappointment waiting for me right around the corner...? No point in dwelling on what ifs now. I’ve already booked my ticket and it seems too good a chance to miss, so I will be starting my journey there. I must go for the adventure.

Perhaps a slightly perverted adventure of questionable consent, but beggars like me can’t be choosers. I wish to study painting abroad. All I want is a chance to pursue my passions, and I hope that gives me enough to live on and time off for fun with family and friends. I want the kind of work-life balance that has eluded our family for generations. India… It sounds so far away and different. I like different places. I like any places that isn’t here. If Jim is not there, I don’t know where I’ll go after India, but I just know I’ll have to keep searching. For him, for myself… Even if it takes months or years, I will find him - and if and when we can prove to Mother that all we ask of her is her consent - nothing more - then, and only then will I come back home. No sooner than that. I could give up the search, it’s the easiest option. But I’m not going to give up on him so easily, just when the going gets tough. What would I achieve? Many sleepless nights holding regret of all I didn’t seek? That option will never exist to me. My dreams are far too real. Down the hard road I find my place in the world, the closest to home I’ll ever feel. I’ll look for Jim around every corner. I’m taking back my life, and it’s due to him.

It is important, I feel, to give thanks to what has been, for in doing so the future walks upon a clean pathway. You and Father and even Uncle George have always fought my corner and been my allies. Even when I was failing almost all of my other classes and eventually dropped out of school, even when I received rejection letter after rejection letter from countless colleges, you continued to encourage and support me in my pursuit of an art and photography career. You believed in me, always told me that I am talented in my own right, and I am forever thankful to you all for pushing me to pursue my passions, even when Mother didn’t understand and was against them. I would’ve given up without you, Dad, and Uncle George. Not just on my art and photography, but on myself entirely. I leave with thanks for your and their many kindnesses.

In a way, I will carry you all with me. You will be my muses, my inspiration, and I will represent you and the love I feel towards you all in my artwork. If I don’t make the papers, I hope to show you my artwork myself someday. Darling, forgive me and rejoice for my mind is made up. In time you will understand and my prayer is that you will always accept that this was my decision, my free decision. Who would have dreamed taking a semester off to visit landmarks in Switzerland would result in meeting the love of my life and chasing after him? Don’t worry, I’ll be careful. I know you must be so worried, but I will be safe and well. No matter what you hear, nothing is going to happen to me. I will be fine and Jim and I will be together soon, I promise. I dare not call home at the risk Mother may pick up the phone, but I’ll write you every week, though there’s no telling when my letters will actually make it to you with how erratic and unpredictable the post can be sometimes. I’d write you every day if I could. I need space, so I believe this time away could be good for me. Leaving is my form of self-protection. There is no other way to accomplish it, or to give myself a chance to recover. My leaving is not only a choice, but a duty.

Anyway, you know Uncle Fred is in Diamond Stud, South Africa, so I have somewhere to go if something goes wrong. You know how much he loves us as if we were his own daughters of his flesh and blood (Dad had to rein him in more than once lest he spoil us too much, especially on Christmas and our birthday. Remember our eighth birthday? It’s very funny to think back on now but, at the time, Mother and Father were mortified. The words “Simple” and “Small” are not in Uncle Fred’s vocabulary). He always used to say our invitation to come live with him over the summer was open, just to cable or call him beforehand so he could prepare a room. He has plenty of space, so I’m sure he would love to have my company, should I ever want to stay with him, if my travels ever bring me around to South Africa.

Though I know he’s of no blood relation to us, and it may sound terrible to admit, there were times when I did wonder if he was my biological father after all. When I was growing up, I felt a certain way towards him, like there was an invisible connection or kinship between us that nobody else could see. I can’t describe it, but I felt it. I felt I was more like him than Father. He’s unmarried but never had and still has no interest in ever settling down and taking a wife, just like me. While he’s no virgin and loves the company of young and beautiful women, he never thought himself a family man. He wasn’t cut out to be a father and would much rather stay the “fun uncle”. Just like how I never wanted and still never want to be a mother. I’d much rather be the “fun aunt”. He was and still is built of different stuff, cut from a different cloth, just like me. He’s free, living it up as a rich bachelor, unbridled by marriage prospects. I envied him for so many years because he had the kind of life I could only dream of. When you receive this letter, let my words be the butterfly and the envelope their cocoon. Though I leave home, our bond remains, traveling different pathways yet eternally connected. Know, too, that I miss you terribly, and always, always will.

Love,

Your sister xx

P.S. Enclosed is a picture of the vilest woman ever born.

May 1936

Dear John,

Wanderlust is the pretty onward road when the duties that kept one anchored are lifted. It is neither running from nor running to, yet a sense of easy adventure, a gentle curiosity, a growing inner peace. What an unfortunate time for the wanderlust to strike! Although we were friends first, we never really had time to discover the souls of one another without the rest of these strong emotions. Perhaps then we would have seen how our passions and purpose would always take us in opposite directions...unless one of us sacrificed who we really are...then what? How could there be a relationship if one of us became a shadow of our former self, or worse, a sort of annex of the other, or a fading echo struggling to find self-worth?

In the carefully scripted wedding rituals, I detected bad faith. I felt less like a bride and more like a person pretending to be a bride, the way a little girl might process through her living room with a pillowcase draped over her head toward some imaginary groom. I refused to take engagement photos because who would ever believe that we were spontaneously bounding through a field at sunset holding hands? Or kissing in front of a brick wall? Who was that photo for? It couldn’t be for us because anytime we looked at it we would know all the work that went into it: A long afternoon spent smiling to the point of jaw exhaustion.

In this breakup I won’t break up. I refuse to because I choose to seize this opportunity, this chance you have given me, given us, to live and love again. I choose to love again with full power because anything less would feel anaemic. In my pain I thought you close to an adversary or oppressor, yet in truth you’re drowning in a sea of your own uncried tears. How can a soul be healthy if you refuse to feel your pain? Over the past four weeks I forgot what it was to smile from joy instead of painting a smile upon my face for others, one that felt empty and wrong. The truth is, we were simply wrong for each other. It takes a lot of healing to feel a spark again, to have the courage to let it grow and burn...so you can be sure I’ll keep on walking, exploring, making a new life with others who spark and flame. So, remembering the good times, cherishing our laughter and smiles, letting the quarrels fade to nothing, farewell, be strong, for I loved you in my own way. Not as a wife or a lover, but as…

Your friend,

Miss Skeffington

May 1936

Dear Jim,

Not every road untraveled is worthy of the imprint of your soles. Some are best left that way, forgotten and erased by the passage of time. For every soul there is a road not traveled by others. There are times we are called upon to take the road not traveled, as a sort of scout, checking its safety, ensuring that it leads to someplace of greater love, than to stick to well-known routes. Such exploration takes a degree of courage, a pure seed of faith, and a complete determination to do what is right for others. For it is the road that your love and passion will call you to explore, it is the reason you were called into existence.

When your soles meet that road, regardless of the challenge, your soul will rise, igniting a fire within. You walk this road not for yourself, yet for the good of others, to make discoveries that bring greater health to your community, to creation, to mother nature. So, I hope you have the courage to walk your road when it is revealed to you. Yet when we find the entrance to new, untraveled roads, when the urge to travel them comes from the loving impulse, from the callings of the heart, when they echo the soul in ways that feel like home, I say we travel them together. Let us be explorers on these paths that lead to greater birdsong and the regeneration of nature. For this sense of love we are all born to seek, is real sense, real sanity, and our inbuilt navigation system.

Why won’t you see me? Why won’t you return a simple message? I miss you so much. You’d love India, I think, probably. The nature here is totally different than back home. I keep thinking about the story you told me, about Allegra and the first mate lost on a mysterious island where even the plants are out to get them…and then I think of them together, out there in the wilderness together…and I start thinking of you again… I lie here in bed and I can almost feel you. I’ve been trying to save it up for when we’re together again.

I haven’t done a good job, okay?! But I tried… The love letter is so underrated. It’s challenging to write a love letter, for when we do the soul is naked. They take courage to write and so are incredibly elevating to read; for to render yourself so emotionally naked is a profound act of love. Without knowing why or how, I found myself in love with you, this strange wanderer. While I won’t lie and say I fell in love with you the day we met, I fell for you harder than a slip on black ice. You were funny, always cracking jokes. You had me in stitches on every date. People flocked to you like you were the only light in the room, hanging on your words, buying you drinks and slapping your back. After a time I wanted more than the “happy guy” persona. I already loved you, and I wanted to get to know the man behind the punch lines. At first you distracted me with jokes and I followed each one, laughing down every blind alley.

Then one day Fanny asked me some things about you, where you grew up, what your parents were like, who your best friends were, and I froze. After six months I knew nothing about you other than your alcohol and bed preferences. Maybe I was just in love with the dream you were selling me: A life of destiny and fate, as my own life up until we met had been so void of enchantment. Those things - mystery, fate, enchantment - they are things that young people offer us as soon as we get close to them. And if we’re not careful, we can be seduced by, and drawn back into, the youthful world they preside over. The freedom of the open road is seductive, serendipitous and absolutely liberating. I sat with you, reached out with my open heart and invited you to reciprocate, to make that connection. But then I walked away and went back to New York. I had to protect myself from the pain of the emotions. I had to make some effort to get over you. Then, just when I thought I’d made progress on that, you came back. You came back on the exact day I was going to make a bigger effort to move on. So, that was that. The universe wants this. I want this. It feels like you want this too. I fell in love more deeply upon meeting you in New York, but I couldn’t say. I thought you wanted to be friends and that was all. It broke my heart. It was rough. But I’d take you as a friend than not at all. Love is that way. You stay, you do all the good you can for them while you do the best for yourself too, get on with your life, pursue your passions and talents...

Your goodbye letter is the boots upon my feet and the bag upon my arm, yet come the calling of the black heavens and stars, it is the bed I rest upon and the pillow that welcomes me to dreamland. So it’s a matter of time and patience, I suppose. I never met a lover before who made every other man appear as if he were a two-dimensional paper drawing, men who would melt in the rain and burn on the first rays of a strengthening sun. And this confidence in your soul, in who you were born to become, as the man who stands with me, is the finest love letter I can ever write. For words are only the crude tools of emotion and it’s my heart you’ve won. With you I’m both completely free and completely in a cage, though it’s a cage I want to be in, because I feel safe there. My imagination is free, my creativity and intellect have no frontiers, it peeks in glee at infinite possibilities for ideas and learning. My romantic love, however, has entered the cage, locked the door behind herself and put the key out of the bars. That’s that. I’m done. I’m yours. I’ve found you at last. When you left I was scattered to the winds. But now... I feel almost whole again. Wanna know how much I love you? I love you to the moon and back. I’m crazy about you. I’m lost without you… I’ve been lost a long time... Let’s go back to our small world, where I placed my hearts at everywhere you loved. Let’s go back. I’m coming for you. I’m coming. I’m coming for you, Jim. Hold on just a little longer. I know this isn’t real, but the pain sure is. I keep hearing a German man’s whisper in the wind. After weeks of trying to decipher something, anything… I heard the word “Wald”. A little elbow grease at the library turned up a German dictionary. Wald means “forest.” I’m coming for you. I’m coming. I’m coming for you, Jim. There’s just one thing left to do. Take me with you. Please. Please, take me with you this time. You won’t leave me again, will you? You can’t just shake up my whole world and leave.

All my love,

Your storyteller Xxx

You turned, headed for the stairs. You ran down a busy train station, pushing your way through a crowd of stevedores and waving families. But it was too late. By the time you arrived at the platform, the last call had been announced and the train had pulled out of the station. You stood there, panting, defeated, watching the train receding. But little by little you became aware of another presence standing close by. It was Jim. Shocked, flustered, you backed away. He followed closely.

“Well, if it isn’t Miss Skeffington.”

“Mr. Masters.”

“I thought you might find me sooner or later. No one can keep a secret these days.”

“I knew where you’d be. It was hidden in plain sight in your letter. If you didn’t want me to find you, why did you write it? When have you condescended to hide from a woman, especially me?”

“Darling, you really shouldn’t have come.”

“I had to see you. I don’t trust you. I’m giving my regards to Chief Mahabu in person.”

“Well… You might as well know. There is no Chief Mahabu.”

“It’s all right. We’ll find one.”

“I don’t want you with me.”

“Please don’t. I liked you much better when you were blunt and natural. You’re such a bad liar, Jim. I’d never have got anywhere if I were as rotten a liar as you.”

“Don’t act as if you’ve made a great discovery, I’ve known it for years. It did not serve me well.”

“That’s why I’ve appointed myself your guardian. When we get to Los Angeles, I’ll make it legal. It’s a big world. Two can travel in it.”

“So what do you wanna do? Spend the rest of your life with tramps? Derelicts? No goods?”

“Sure. I’m a socialite and you’re a social climber.”

“No. I’m not gonna let you do it. It’s too lonely a life.”

“Not if we’re together, it isn’t.”

"You don’t even know where I’m going."

"I don’t care. I’d like to go anywhere. How can there be any adventure, any exploration, if you let somebody else - above all, a travel bureau - arrange everything beforehand? Is there really nothing I might say so you’ll take me with you?”

“I confess that…I was hoping that I might have a reason to take you with me, but congratulations on the celebration of your marriage. I saw the announcement in the papers. I’m very happy for you.”

“Oh, no! No! No, that’s…that’s Fanny. You remember my sister, Fanny! And Johnny Mitchell, actually. No, I’m… I’m not married. Please don’t go so far away. Not without me.”

“What? What about Sir John Talbot? He was your fiancé when I left.”

“About that... Jim, Sir John and I broke our engagement. We broke it the day you called me.”

“What? Why didn’t you marry him? Don’t you love him?”

“Not like we do. Not like us. He’s like you in many ways. Not your sense of humor, nor your sense of beauty, nor your sense of play. But a fine man, and a kind of refuge I thought I could never have. I thought my fondness for him might grow to be love or something like what we have. When my sister and I had to leave Berlin because of the Nazis and we parted for the second time, I didn’t think I’d ever see you again. We’d made our pact, and we were living up to it. Mother thought that, with my engagement, I would get over you, Jim. But when you came back, my feelings for you that I tried so hard to bury came back full force. They never truly left. But then you left again.”

“I couldn’t stay and watch you ruin yourself. I only wanted to stop you from throwing away your future.”

“May I remind you it’s my future to throw away.”

“You talk about the future like you’re flipping through a magazine. I asked you to marry that man and be happy. I didn’t ask you to go against your mother and tag along after me. But thank you for defending me and proving that you do care.”

“I didn’t know how much until she said those dreadful things. She thought the only way to break us apart was to show me what a deadbeat you were. I kept hearing the disgusting words she said, but at the same time, I felt something. A reminder…of how I felt when I fell for you. How it felt so right and terribly wrong. Screaming into my pillow never helped with making the feelings go away.”

“So you’re not angry with me?”

“No. Only with Mother. On the other hand, I thought she described the way you left me rather accurately.”

“If it’s any comfort, I’ve always regretted having let you go. I was a cad to make you care for me and then because of some noble sense of duty, to leave you to get over it the best you can.”

“Don’t blame yourself. Please, darling. John and I weren’t right for each other. But this? I know this is right. Just as I know we’ll regret delaying when we could have made it happen. You’ll regret it. I’ll regret it. ‘He who loves the most regrets the most.’ But we don’t have time for regrets now, Jim. Only love.”

“It’s different.“

“It’s not. Shall I tell you what you've given me? On that very first day, a little bottle of perfume made me feel important. You were my first friend. And then when you fell in love with me, I was so proud. And when I came home, I needed something to make me feel proud. And your camellias arrived, and I knew you were thinking about me. I could’ve walked into a den of lions. As a matter of fact, I did, and the lions didn’t hurt me. I’m reminded of a promise. Didn’t you say you would take me across the world and kiss me in one hundred countries before we die?”

“Let’s not live in a fantasy. Give it up. Give me up.”

“Is that an order? Jim, you should know by now that I don’t follow orders very well. Never have, never will. If we can’t be happy here, we must leave for a place that will accept our love.”

“But, my darling, is there such a place? Think... I can’t bear to see you hurt.”

“Let me tell you a story then. There once was a man named Sidney. He was a big explorer and naturalist who went all over the world. He did a lot of exploration on the Amazon. There was a lust of wandering in his feet that burned to set out for the ends of the earth. ‘On! On!’ his heart seemed to cry. Evening would deepen above the sea, night fall upon the plains, dawn glimmer before the wanderer and show him strange fields and hills and faces. Where? He wasn’t very close with his son, who was also an explorer. They’d only see each other by chance in weird remote places like Samarkand or Walla Walla. One day, he met a woman on his travels. She was a botanist, but was completely daft - she’d wear really bizarre outfits and she was one of the first women to ride on a steam train. He didn’t want her with him, and kept trying to push her away, but she kept coming back. Then he fell in love with her, and she with him. Together they roamed the world, two halves made whole. They never legally married, but it didn’t matter. They didn’t need rings or a piece of paper to tell them that they were husband and wife. To them, they already were. Now there’s a plant named after her, and a monkey they adopted that they named after him. That monkey became famous and went on to have many offspring. He has grandchildren and great-grandchildren that are still alive today.”

“The naturalist or the monkey?”

“Yes. Oh, you understand what I’m saying, don’t you? If our love has no home, let us spend our lives searching together! If I can’t have you, I don’t want anyone. So I beg of you again... Don’t send me away. Don’t send me back. I’ve come so far. Please, Jim. Take me with you. I promise I will make you happy. And I know you’ll make me happy too. Please give us a chance.”

“You...just won’t give up, will you? Of all the crazy...stubborn...foolish women...”

“Jim, answer me, please! I’m sorry. I don’t mean to have an outburst. I mean, give me your answer. Let us go to Africa with a sense our tomorrows are beginning. Please. Take me away. Take me to a place where we can be happy.”

“But if we run away together or elope, won’t I ruin your reputation? Won’t I be an anchor around your neck?”

“A very nice anchor around a very willing neck. Now, I know what I really want. Jim, let’s just not get married yet. You never wanted marriage anyway. I know that. Let’s just get out of here...and just see the world. Okay? All right? My darling,” you exhaled as he reached you, pulling you into his embrace and holding you close. You clung to Jim, the gentle thrum of your heart against his chest reinvigorating him after his long journey.

“I love you. I love you, sweetheart. I’ve been in love before. I won’t pretend that I haven’t. But I really do love you.”

“Then I’ll take that as a yes.”

“The trouble is, I’m not as simple as I used to be. My life is not as simple. I...just need to be sure I’m being realistic, not living in a fool’s paradise and dragging you into it with me.”

“I’ll still take it as a yes. Please take back what you said in your letter.”

“If you can stay by my side and have a full and happy life, I will. Will you have me?”

“With all of my heart.”

“But I have nothing to give you. My hands are empty.”

You took his hands in yours. “Not empty now.”

“It seems I missed my train. On purpose, darling. I couldn’t go - not yet.”

“When, then? When do you leave?”

“I don’t know. I truly don’t—”

“What do you mean? If you don’t know, who does?”

“You, darling. Only you know.”

He pulled you close and kissed you. You were thrilled. You pulled away.

“I intend to eventually go to Europe one more time, and I need a companion. How would you like to be the person I take?”

“I’d like that more than anything! I’m ready to travel...and you’re my ticket. To get away from that house, away from that life— Leaving has the sense of adventure, coming home to you however, would be my heaven.”

At that moment, you were interrupted by a whistle from a passing train. A train’s lights moved on the sheer curtains. Obeying an old habit, Jim checked his pocket watch - and smiled. “It’s a great day for the tramps of the world. They’re getting new blood.”

“How are we gonna start out? Under the train or in it?”

“This time in it. Just for the novelty.”

The emotion of your reunion sealed as a perfect photograph in your soul. Adventure grinned at you as a new friend, as an old friend, as if he knew the answer was yes before he asked. The ideas would come later, probably when you least expected it. The goal of your life was to tie adventure to your feet, stock memories in your pocket, hold imagination in your palms like fairy dust and sprinkle it on your tales. So you laced your boots and took a step onto the train. The backpack had broad shoulder straps that felt quite natural even with the weight added. With it you walked a little taller, felt the straightening of your back and your head rise a little higher. Somehow it was easy to carry, almost easier than having been free of it. The backpack had that well-loved look, the canvas of spring flowers showing signs of being washed many times. It took the form of your shoulder in the same way a friend’s hand might, gentle and warm. Your luggage hugged at your hips as if it was filled with future good memories. To the heart ready to travel, the backpack brought a frisson of joy. The backpack upon the compartment seat was the color of bright yellow petals, the sort of yellow that got brighter in the rays of the dayshine. It was a sort of bold, "Hello," something that was confident to glow in all weathers. It was the most welcome of sights, for it told of a new adventure afoot. Your luggage bags were plain and well loved, yet what mattered most was not your destination, but the journey. Your luggage bathed in the warm light that entered the window of the train, as if it spoke its contents of good times ahead. You took comfort as the bag hugged itself into your gentle form, the train rocking its maternal rhythm, anchored to centuries old rails. The train ride rocked you so gently as if you were a sweet babe in this carriage. Whatever was ahead could be a great challenge, and there could be tears, but it was your adventure to take and so you smiled.

Dear Fanny,

Here I am at the railroad station with a handful of other bypassers, about to board a train bound for who knows where! The only person who knows where we’re going is the conductor. I’ve found Jim and I’m feeling close to him as I’m back to traveling again. The road and the sky feel full of life. Wish me luck!

Love,

Your sister xx

Just before Fanny left, your mother suffered the ultimate humiliation when Edward Morrison, one of her old beaux, made what she at first believed to be a sincere marriage proposal, only to withdraw it when he began to suspect, incorrectly, that she was no longer wealthy. Without her husband, without her daughters, Fanny was left alone with her maid, Manby.

“Manby!”

“Why, Mrs. Skeffington. What is it? What’s the matter?”

“Manby. Manby. Don’t leave me.”

“Why, of course I won’t.”

“Promise me you’ll never leave me.”

“Of course I won’t.”

“You’re the only one I have left.”

“I’ll never leave you. Never.”

“You see. You see, I’m all alone. I’m all alone.”

“Mrs. Skeffington, wouldn’t you like to rest?”

“Yes. Yes, I think I would.”

“You’ll feel better after you’ve had a little rest.”

“You’re the only one I have left.”

Half a year passed. Not knowing who else to turn to, your mother made one last desperate plea to your sister, Fanny, who had moved out to Seattle with her husband, Johnny Mitchell, and, like you, went low contact with her.

“Fanny, please talk to your sister for me. Please. She hasn’t replied to any of my letters. This is no place for me. The men are cruel, and the land is cruel. I beg of you. I beg of her. I will do everything, anything, to make amends. If she will not take pity, ask if she truly wants to leave her family name to die out here in the dust? You’re our family’s hope now. Your sister is sick, a lost cause. I fear she has had her head turned and her hand claimed by that penniless charlatan, Mr. Masters. Please, say something to her.”

Fanny wasn’t going to defend your mother or take her side. However, though your mother was never particularly nice to her, or to you, she did bring you both into the world. So Fanny thought it’d be nice of her to write just one letter to you on your mother’s behalf, at the very, very least. Not just for her, but for you too. She thought maybe your dad would want it that way. Though Fanny couldn’t promise your mother that you’d listen to her appeals or entreaties, or be swayed into coming back to New York, she could try. And so that was what she did.

November 1936

Darling sister,

I am writing on behalf of our mother, but I do not think you will I miss you terribly, but it seems like Mother misses you most. When you left, Johnny and I went to a play and it was so late by the time it ended that we didn’t return home until the next day. I heard Mother and Uncle George talking. You ran away from home. You took all your things. And then I got your goodbye letter from India some weeks later. Mother still hasn’t opened hers. Though it’s been half a year, Mother is still hopeful that you’ll come home someday. She keeps telling Manby and the other servants that you’ll write to her or call any day now, that you’ll ring the doorbell and she’ll beat Soames to it and answer the door herself. But I had a feeling even then… I don’t think you’re coming back. Not anytime soon, at least. Your room is just the way you left it, though Mother and Manby have kept it impeccably clean for your arrival. Not a speck of dust or askew wall painting in sight. She’s never had much interest in cleaning or helping Manby before, but lately she’s been doing it almost obsessively. I can’t count the number of times she’s plumped the same pillow on the old chair you used to sit in. I think she does it to give herself something to do, to ward off her loneliness and the sad thoughts of you that come with it. She always seemed happy during the day, but at night, I often woke up because I heard something. It was Mother crying. She was always saying that she was sorry while Manby hugged her and tried to shush her with comforting words and pats on the back. I heard her crying even after she dismissed Manby and let her retire for the night. When she called me to ask for help, she was crying in her room again. I wanted to ask her if she needed help from a professional, but I think she doesn’t want anyone else but Manby and I to know. I’m worried. Should I talk to Dr. Jaquith about it? I know that come the morning, she’ll keep talking to herself and go on telling Manby that she’s going to personally make up the guest room for Jim to stay in, even if you come home on such short notice that she won’t have much time to do it.

If you ever come home, Jim can use my room if he wants. I won’t be needing it anymore. You remember Johnny Mitchell, don’t you? One of Mother’s (former) admirers. I didn’t wish to be courted by someone who was still in love with Mother, but he assured me that he wasn’t in love with her. He and I were married shortly after, and we left for Seattle. Johnny opened a branch office there. Mother had no idea, just like she had no idea about you and Jim. She told me the same thing she told you, that I should’ve talked it over with her and that I hadn’t known him very long. But I’d known him for several months, as long as I’d known her. It’s funny in an ironic way. You’ve known Jim far longer than I’ve known Johnny, yet she didn’t put up as much fight with me marrying as she did with you. I wish I had been there the day you left. I knew that one day soon you would go and I wouldn’t have been able to stop you from leaving, but maybe I could’ve stopped you and Mother from having such an explosive row. Maybe I could’ve mitigated the damage done so you wouldn’t have had such a destructive falling out. I won’t try to justify Mother’s actions. I never approved of her meddling in your love life.

Besides your flighty nature, I can only guess that she was so hard on you and pushed for a “suitable” marriage because she thought if you were married, you’d become solid, grounded. I can only guess she chose Sir John not only because he was well-born with money and position (and an ancestral castle to boot!) but because you already liked him immensely and he was a dear friend to you, so she thought he’d make the perfect husband for you. She imagined his homestead in Wales should’ve been enough to cure your wanderlust, that the prospect of spending the rest of your life abroad in a European castle should’ve pleased you as much as it pleased her. But it wasn’t enough and it didn’t please you. There was something much greater you needed to feed your soul. Now you and Jim are both traveling for your own self-care and to feed your wandering souls…existing in other places so that you could remember who you are and then come home to yourselves. You used not to know where you were going, but you knew you would arrive, you knew there would be an end to the long, blind road. Mother didn’t suppose secrecy would have even occurred to you. Ironically, her being so hard on you is what drove you to it. It was also possible, her distaste for Jim was at least partially fueled by her own humiliating experience with her former lovers when she invited them over after her illness. Their declarations of having their breaths taken at her beauty, omnipresent smiles, and devoted facades had her fooled, until after she lost her beauty and she realized most of them had wives and children of their own, and none of them ever truly loved her.

Though she was wrong about a lot of things, she was right about one thing though, in a small way. Sir John would’ve made the perfect husband for you. But only on paper. Not in practice. He was a dear friend, but that’s all he was. There was no spark, no flame. You wanted a love match and she knew that, but she wanted an advantageous match for you and prioritized convenience over love. She tried to appease you with assurances that love would come later, that you’d learn to love him in time, but you knew that this was a lie. Your love and affection for Sir John would never bypass warm fondness, no matter how much you wanted it to. John knew this too, so you both did the admirable thing and called it a day before either one of you got hurt. You parted as friends. Though I didn’t have a chance to tell you in person, I thought that was very classy of you.

Beyond the trails and hikes, there was so much to explore, especially since you were into foraging. Due to the merciless unpredictability of nature when combined with people and their knack for losing possessions, it was advised that you keep a camera with you at all times so you could take photos of memorable sights. Looking back, I think that’s around the time your love for photography was realized. And look at you now! You became a great explorer just like I said you would be! I still remember when you used to take me “treasure hunting” when we were children. I still have our treasures safely wrapped up and put away. I’ve taken great care of them. Hmm, where should I put them? They might look nicer a little closer to the light. They will catch the light from my desk lamp so nicely. My shelves would look much more interesting with your treasures on display! Mother hid most of your discoveries away. I pestered her for weeks to let me bring some of your treasures out of storage when I moved out. Oh, I almost forgot! When I came back inside from searching for your treasures in the shed, Uncle George showed me some of Jim’s published articles that he came across and saved in the travel section of the newspaper! Who would’ve thought we’d have such a talented writer and journalist in the family? I also saw the article printed about you!

‘Her art continues to captivate the hearts of the young, so we reached out to her for comment. Keeping her eyes fixed on her new piece, Ms. Skeffington had this to say:

“All I’m doing is showing what these girls feel on the inside but can’t show on the outside. If any of them connect with a girl in the art, it’s probably because they’re experiencing the same thing.”

She added that the flowers she depicts on the young girls she paints bloom out of the scars they bear. The flowers represent the girls overcoming past traumas, or at least their desire to do so.’

I managed to read them all before Mother took them away and gave them back to Uncle George. Darling, it was fascinating! It almost felt as if I were there myself! It made me think about how I would have loved to go with you so we could’ve gone treasure hunting again like we used to. Even though I was so young I still remember our adventures together in Europe after the divorce. Would you like me to share my memories of them? Well, I’m going to whether you like it or not! We talked about some of them already. It seems like such a long time ago. You were incredibly excited about each one. You were so happy about them, showing them to me and Father, you didn’t stop talking about some of them for hours. I thought, how can my sister be so excited over some old broken pottery or a heart shaped rock or fallen antlers… But it wasn’t long until I understood. I remember you being so proud of each and every find, no matter how small. I remember the first treasure hunt you took me on. The day that started it all! We found a pair of old dog tags. Dog tags are usually fabricated from a corrosion-resistant metal. From the looks of it, that pair must’ve been quite old as they were already starting to rust and deteriorate by the time we found them.

Mother was so upset when we brought those dog tags home, wasn’t she? “Darling, that simply will not do! Regardless of its condition - buried, corroded, or damaged - a dog tag has value to its owner or their loved ones. We should try to locate the owner.” I think seeing those tags reminded her of Uncle Trippy. Then there was the time you brought home that creepy clay mask. You found it wedged behind a stone near the river as you ate your sandwich. It must’ve washed up at some point. It was cracked and chipped in spots, and was a ghoulish green color. The paint was worn away in some spots, revealing its gray base since it had been under the swampy water for who knows how long. Mother was so repulsed by it. She probably thought it was cursed or haunted. Mother took away all the knick-knacks that used to sit on those shelves. “They’re taking up space on the mantelpiece! Take them away!” Once Father moved them to his study, I remember us creeping in to take a peek at them. You tried to scare me with the mask by pretending to wear it and be a monster. Even if there isn’t a specific story attached to that mask, just the sight of it was still creepy enough that I wanted to take a photo to show my friends. Do you still wear the empty locket you found? Does it still hold that picture of us? I hope it reminds you of those adventures we had together when we were children, and how thankful I am for everything you’ve taught me. I’ve had to beg Mother to let me visit you, you know. But now that I’m an adult and a married woman, I don’t need her permission or her money. I shouldn’t worry you with that kind of talk. I know we’ll meet again someday. Now, you must tell me about your visit to Delhi!

Love,

Fanny xx

In response to Fanny’s letter, you surprised her with a phone call. Sticking to your vow, you, of course, didn’t call your childhood house on Charles Street, but the firm Johnny worked at. From there, you asked for him by name and, when he picked up the other line, he happily gave you his home phone number so you could call your sister.

“She’s counting on you to bring me home, isn’t she.” You didn’t make it a question.

“They all are,” she said quite honestly. “But they won’t hold it against you if your heart says otherwise. They—we—wouldn’t want you there if it’s not where you want to be.”

You looked back to the road just outside your window. “I appreciate that,” you said in a quiet but steady voice. “More than you know. More than I knew. Fanny, I don’t think I’d bear it if you tried giving me a piece of your mind. You wouldn’t, would you? Even though Mother asked you to?”

“I would not. I gave Jim my bedroom, and that’s enough.”

“Please don’t tell Mother I called you. I’m not ready to come back, Fanny. It’s too soon. The people in charge of the exhibition arranged for me to meet with Brady Mueller, the agent. Quite a young man for what he has accomplished. During our meeting, Brady asked me many things, as if he was interviewing me. The brief introduction tumed out to be hours long. However, by the end of it, he said he had everything he needed and would get things moving right away. He called to meet with me today. He has the papers ready for me to sign. He said that the location of the new exhibition has been approved. All we need is the down payment.”

“That’s great!”

“I have a good feeling about him. I’d sign the papers almost immediately if Jim wasn’t here to help me look them over first. After that, I’ll inform my accountant, Helen, to transfer the money from my savings, since I’ve saved up quite a bit of money just on my own. Brady has been a great help since I brought up the idea of an art gallery for the public. I’m not sure if things could have gone so quickly if it had been some other agent. I owe him that much. The art gallery will open in three months. I’m so excited about it!”

“I’ll bet! I’m excited for you and I’m not even there to see it! How’s it coming along?”

“We have received most of the artwork from the contributors and artists. All I need is to ask Margot if she would be willing to donate some of her paintings. If this exhibition succeeds, it would be good for me and for Jim. I haven’t felt this alive in a very long time. I have a purpose now.”

“I told you that you would find it someday. I’m glad that day has finally come. Not to sour or dampen your good mood, but have you given any thought to coming back?”

“Oh. That. As for going back home… I don’t know if I ever will. I want to, someday. But…as it stands now… My mind still hasn’t changed from what it was when I wrote you and Mother those goodbye letters. The truth is, I’m not ready to go home… Oh, sure, I’ll travel and go abroad again but future trips will not stretch toward infinity like this one. They won’t contain so many possibilities. Heading home is the full stop marking the end of adventure and the beginning of a responsible life. And despite months of traveling, I’m not ready to be responsible.”

“So what are you going to do?”

“I’m going to stay and help this exhibit get launched, and then… I don’t know. I may stay here in this town another day or I may go on to another town. No one but you knows where I am, and I’d like to keep it that way for the time being. I don’t want Uncle George to worry, so as far as he knows, it’s just rainbows and butterflies here in India. Can you tell Mother to please just…stop? Just… Just stop. Good for her. She’s figuring her shit out. And that’s great. I’m really, really happy for her. But I’m…I’m tired. I don’t want to hurt anymore. And for some reason when I was with her, it just… It just hurt the both of us. So let’s just go our separate ways, okay? Just tell her to let me go. I’ll come back when I’m good and ready. I just don’t know when that’ll be.”

“Okay… I understand. It’s your life and you can choose how you live it. I’ll tell her you wrote me a letter saying that you still need space and to be left alone. And as for everything else… My lips are sealed. She’ll never know about this call. Take all the time you need. It won’t be easy for me, but it wasn’t easy for me either when your stay at Cascade was extended from two weeks to two years. But I survived our separation and sporadic in-person visits back then, in large part because of the frequent correspondence I sent to you. All the drawings, letters, and postcards I sent you helped me to uphold our connection. It tided me over until you could come home. I imagine it was much of the same for you. If we did it once, we can do it again. But that won’t make it hurt any less than before.”

“Thank you for understanding how much I need this, Fanny. Give Uncle George and Johnny my love. I’ll write to you.”

“I will. And I look forward to those drawings, letters, and postcards.”

“It’ll be painful, but we’ll make it through this, Fanny.”

“I know we will. You know as well as I do that we Skeffington women have a capacity for enduring.”

“You’re damn right about that. I love you. Bye.”

“I love you, too. Goodbye.”

“Mr. Martingale, urgent, sir.”

Mr. Martingale read the slip of paper. “Oh, put her on.”

“Mr. Martingale is ready.”

“Oh. Hello, darling. I was just thinking about you.”

“Oh, really? Have you missed me, Uncle Fred?”

“Well, I haven’t heard from you in a while. Not a phone call, a letter, or even a postcard.”

“Right… Sorry I haven’t been able to write or call you before now. My life has been…eventful…and it’s hard to make time for myself lately.”

“Oh, apology accepted, darling. You know I’m only teasing. I do love giving you a hard time on occasion. Did you get the postcard I sent you?”

“Yes, I got your postcard. Have you been having a pleasant holiday, Uncle Fred?”

“Very nice of you. But you and I both know you didn’t call me out of the blue to ask me how my holiday was.”

“…No. Sorry to interrupt your holiday, Uncle Fred, I’m giving you so much trouble, but—”

“Prerogative of a beautiful woman.”

“—we are headed to our next destination, Casablanca. And we know that’s close to you, so—”

“‘We’?”

“—who better to ask but you?”

“For how long?”

“For how long? That depends! It’s not generally known, Uncle Fred...but I’m very hard up. We’re running low on money…”

“I had no idea. I was under the impression that your father...”

“He did, but… Well, you see, he left most of his fortune to Mother and, well… All the best people make the worst investments.”

“That’s true.”

“Luckily I have a man I can trust to advise me. I should have returned to Diamond Stud a few years earlier, Uncle Fred. I could’ve used your advice. You would’ve been of immense help to me.”

“If you need money, all you need to do is ask. But you’re not in any trouble, are you?”

“No! No, nothing like that. Though we have come across some…unruly characters on our travels—”

“‘Our’?”

“—I promise I’ve been smart and keeping myself safe at all times. I’d never force you to testify in court for me or bail me out of jail. And while I appreciate your generosity, I wasn’t asking you for money. Just merely stating a fact.”

“You’re not asking me for money?”

“No. It’s not money that I want from you, Uncle Fred.”

“So you don’t want money, and you don’t need me to bail you out of a sticky situation. But you want something. So what exactly are you hoping to get from me, sweetheart?”

“It’s just…you said that your invitation to come visit or stay with you in Africa was always open. I was hoping that’s still the case and I could come stay with you? We’ve had a wonderful time in India and on the beaches of Barcelona. I think you would like the Gaudi architecture. It’s from a strange alien world—”

“Hold on. You keep saying words like ‘our’ and ‘we’. Who is ‘we’? Not you and Sir John Talbot, certainly? I followed the story of your engagement to him. Of course, the papers say one thing but the rumor mill says another. They do so love to contradict and misconstrue to keep people guessing as to who to believe. Both the papers and the rumor mill say a great many things, in fact. The papers say you called off your engagement, the bored housewives say you ran away from home—”

“That’s about the size of it. I wouldn’t trust either of them to get any of the details right, let alone all of them, but I can tell you both of those statements hold some truth to them.”

“And where have you been?”

“Oh, too many places to name in one breath. But I’ve had company. I’d be bringing him with me. I want you and him to meet properly, face-to-face.”

“I see. I’m not quite sure what you believe I am to do about your situation. You’re asking me to house a stranger, someone I’ve never laid eyes on before. And a man, at that! Well, plead your case.”

“Right. Uncle Fred, may I present Jim Masters? He’s my…partner. Say hello to my godfather, Fred Martingale, Jim.”

“Hello, Mr. Martingale. How do you do, Sir?”

“Very well, thanks for asking. Now, Jim, you can tell me truthfully, man to man. When my goddaughter said you were her partner, did she mean business partner or intimate partner?”

“Neither, but I lean more towards the latter. It’s a long and complicated story, Mr. Martingale. One I’m sure would be much better told in person. That is, if you’d be kind enough to let us stay. I’d like to meet you in person and put a face to the stories I’ve heard about you.”

“Oh, she’s told you stories about me, has she? She’s a very immersive storyteller, I’ll give her that, but nothing compares to hearing stories from the source. I have many more stories that she hasn’t heard yet.”

“I’d like very much to hear them, sir. And I have stories of my own you’d probably call fantastic, but they’d keep your attention.”

“Is that so? That would be very amusing. But tell me, what do you think of her?”

“What do I think of her?”

“If you’ve spent as much time together as you’re leading me to believe, then you must’ve formed an opinion of her. She said you’re partners, but you’ve all but outright told me you’re not sexually intimate, so tell me, what do you think of her? When you look at her, what comes to mind?”

Afraid Jim was about to fall into a trap, you grabbed the phone from him. “Uncle Fred, I assure you that we love each other very much. While I was deeply flattered by the attention of Sir John Talbot, I… I simply could not ignore my long-standing affection for Jim. You see, Uncle Fred, it wasn’t love at first sight for us, but it was love. What I mean to say is that love is surely the greatest force of all. Once Jim and I realized we were completely enamored with each other, nothing could stand between us. Not even, I’m sorry to say, the attentions of a good and kind man such as Sir John Talbot.”

Jim snatched the phone back from you before you could react. Before you could so much as ask what he was doing, he was already speaking impassionedly to your godfather. “Mr. Martingale, she’s correct in that it wasn’t love at first sight for either of us. There was attraction, certainly, at least on my part. But Miss Skeffington thought me presumptuous, arrogant, insincere. All fair, really. And I thought her a young lady barely out of leading strings. She was so much younger than myself, and so romance was entirely out of the question for both of us. But in so removing it, we found something far greater. We found friendship. You see, Miss Skeffington and I had been fooling all of Charles Street for some time. We had fooled them into thinking we hated each other…when really, all along, we simply enjoyed each other’s company so much we couldn’t stay away from one another. I’ve never been a man that much enjoyed flirting, but I’ve always very much enjoyed talking and storytelling. The trouble was getting somebody to listen, somebody to share with. But with her…Miss Skeffington…conversation has always been easy. She took chances. With every wall I built, she saw a canvas to be painted, a story to be written. Her laughter brings me joy. To meet a beautiful woman is one thing, but to meet your best friend in the most beautiful of women is something entirely apart. To answer your question, whenever I look at her, I’m a little overwhelmed by such beauty. She’s beautiful not just in her face and body, but in personality and spirit. And it’s with my sincerest apologies, I must say it took Sir John Talbot coming along for me to realize I didn’t want Miss Skeffington to only be my friend or traveling companion. I wanted her to be my wife. I still want her to be my wife. Not today, not next year, but someday. For twenty years I was lost, aimlessly wandering from place to place, without roots, without a home, without a purpose. But when she’s with me, when she holds my hand and looks at me with that “come and get me” grin, there’s no need for words. The sky's brighter looking at it through her eyes. Her eyes utter the sweetest love songs. Every time she turns around to face me, I know she’s singing only for me. I know I’ve found where I belong.”

“Well put, Mr. Masters. You are wise…or perhaps unusually lucky to understand friendship to be the best possible foundation a relationship, especially a marriage, can have. Even if that foundation should crumble as quickly as it was built. Put her back on.”

Jim handed you the phone. He couldn’t hear what your godfather said to you, but from your relieved smile and what you said next, he must’ve given in. It sounded to Jim like he passed the test.

“Oh, thank you, Uncle Fred! What? No, you don’t have to do that. Really, we can pay our own way. We will look for a cheap standby ticket and call you when we’re headed your way. Are you sure? We can manage on our own. We don’t need— Oh, all right. If you insist. You and I are the same. Once we set our minds on something, it’s impossible for anyone to change them. Sorry again for the short notice! Can’t wait to see you again, Uncle Fred! It’ll be good to be in Africa, for you and Jim to meet… Oh, I’m so excited! Right, you have a plane to catch early tomorrow. I won’t keep you any longer, then. Goodbye, Uncle Fred. And thank you again. I love you!” Once you hung up the phone, you turned towards Jim. “He’ll be up by plane in the morning so that he’ll be there to receive us. I tried to tell him he didn’t have to, but he’s insisted on wiring us the money to travel from Casablanca to Diamond Stud.”

“Well, goodbye, Captain Jorham. It was a splendid voyage and I enjoyed it.”

“Mighty smart navigating too. The last time I hit South Africa I was aiming for Charleston, South Carolina.”

“Oh, welcome. Welcome for the good Captain Jorham.”

“Hello, Mr. Martingale.”

“And this, I’m certain must be my goddaughter. Though you’re much taller than when I saw you last.”

“The last time you saw me, I was eight years old, Uncle Fred. I hit a growth spurt since then,” you laughed.

“And this must be…hold on, don’t tell me. it’s on the top of my tongue… Oh! Mr. Masters. Jim. Delighted to greet you.”

“Thank you. And thank you for giving us a place to stay, Mr. Martingale. I’ve never had anyone be so kind.”

“And how’s the enchanting Mrs. Jorham?”

“She’s waiting for me on board. Well, God bless you.”

“Thank you, sir.”

“Goodbye, Fred.”

“Goodbye, sir.”

“Well, Mr. Martingale—”

“Pablo, My servant, devoted to me. He’ll help load your luggage into my car and drive us to my house. My house is yours, for however long you need use of it. We shall drink to the past, forget the future, and pleasantly live in the present. I have a million questions about Europe to ask you both.”

“Yes, but time is—”

“Oh, please, please, time is unlimited in South Africa. It’s always early in the day, and we still have plenty of time. I’m a gentleman of leisure, with a house full of servants and a charming disposition.”

“And an overwhelming power of persuasion,” Jim noted.

Uncle Fred laughed. “Yes. You’ll be glad I persuaded you, my friend. But wait till you see South Africa, my home.”

“I’m going to write to Fanny and Uncle George once we settle in.”

“An admirable ambition, dear, but quite futile,” Uncle Fred said as he took a puff from his cigar.

“Why?”

“Because the people running the post office in Diamond Stud have quit, gone away. There is nothing left of it but an old abandoned building. Empty. Nothing decorating the brick walls. You can probably have it, but who wants it? It’s only good for squatting. The nearest post office that’s still active is in De Aar.”

“Well, I shall have to go there, if need be.”

“Now let me see. Yes, you’ll need a bit of tailoring the first thing and then… Jim, did you hear me? Jim.”

“What?”

“I said you need compeletely new and different clothes. I shall arrange with my tailors to…”

Jim laughed, interrupting whatever your Uncle Fred was going to say. “You remind me of my aunt. The first time I met her, she thought I needed clothes too.”

“And did you?”

“As I recall, I was two years old and stark naked.”

The men shared a good, hearty laugh. Their laughter was infectious as you found yourself laughing too. Though you tried to cover your mouth with your hand to hide it, there was no missing or mistaking the mirth in your eyes, which gave them a special sort of sparkle in the sun’s light that could rival the world’s largest diamond.

Back in the United States, your sister, Fanny, received two letters in the mail from somewhere in Africa. A place she had never been. Who did she know in Africa? There was Uncle Fred, but why would he write her? She knew he loved her just as much as he loved you, but she was Uncle George’s goddaughter, not his. At first glance, the envelopes looked to the rest of the world as any other but, upon closer inspection, she noticed the envelopes came with airmail stamps. They actually bore several stamps from African countries that she would likely never see, and were easily a couple months old, having taken their time arriving at their destination. The long-awaited envelopes came at last.

Upon opening the first one, she recognized the handwriting immediately. It wasn’t a letter from Uncle Fred. It was a letter from you. The handwriting was absolutely yours, and so Fanny’s heart leaped for joy. You were a more seasoned traveler already than most she knew. She was trembling so hard from either nerves or excitement or maybe both that she had to sit down. Never before had Fanny read a letter so quickly in her life, her eyes darting frantically from word to word, trying her best to take them all in, but her eyes inevitably skipped around. She was so eager and somewhat anxious to know how you’d been getting along that it was difficult to be patient, to resist the temptation to just skip to the end.

March 1937

Dearest Fanny,

I was right about the hunch I had about Jim’s letter. I found him and, when I did, I told him, “I want us to pack up everything we can and get in the car and let’s just drive... until we find somewhere... for us.” And he asked me... if I could really do that. And I said yes. Yes! It’s been a few months since our travels started. We sure get around. At one time my material possessions fitted in one suitcase. Do you know that I have a story for each of these places I’ve been? Well, I don’t know if they’re all true…but they are my memories.

Jim and I are now in the African desert proper, and the heat is beyond belief. It can be so hot here come summertime, yet in truth it’s simply giving back what went in, finding balance as the dawn approaches, ready for each new day. Consider this place for a minute if you will. There is nothing but desolation outside, mountainous crags amidst endless waves of sand. It’s a place as blank as a sheet of paper. It often reminds me of the interior of a whale’s belly. It’s only an intellectual association, of course. But it’s just from the whale’s sordid interior that we scavenge to base for the most exciting perfumes. And that can turn we confused with desirability, with virtue, with great passion. It’s the place we had always been looking for. Flat expanses would call to me… These are the places where the desert is most itself: Stark, open, free, an invitation to wander - a laboratory of perception, scale, light - a place where loneliness has a luxurious flavor... Drifting across the vast space, silent except for wind and footsteps, Jim and I felt uncluttered and unhurried for the first time in a while, already on desert time.

Say, why are we here? I mean Jim, me, Uncle Fred, any of us? Why do we stay here in Diamond Stud? Simply because we’re infatuated. Yes. Infatuated. Plucking at the skirts of this woman, this desert, this heartless courtesan. But we…we stay here, eternally hopeful for some small glittering favor. Amazing place, this place here in the desert where the gems lie just a few inches below the surface, free, free for the taking. Were if not for certain unfortunate restrictions. When we first arrived in Diamond Stud, Uncle Fred had warned us of the dangers of the desert, especially the prohibited areas. He told us stories of different types of djinni that are rumored to have been encountered in the desert.

The ifrit is a djinni of fire and flame, a vengeance called upon a murderer, implacable, unstoppable, the death of cities. It rises from desolation, from broken lands, and its sign is a shining light. It scents the vitality of its victim and seizes them with its burning eye until all life is drained, as a spider husks a fly. A du'a al-mas'alah, a prayer of asking, and true penance is the only defense. There once were men who had taken shelter in the courtyard of a ruined fortress until the sun was lower. But when their bodies were found, their skin was so dry and wrinkled that they looked like dried raisins. The official cause of death was dehydration, but others say it was the Ifrit that got to them and drained them dry, leaving their bodies to overbake in the sun. Then there is the ghûl and the hatif. The ghûl is a base djinni, a thing of fear, of trickery and shadow, dwelling in the deep places of the world. When it scents human flesh, it digs through the sand to the world above to snare the unwary traveler. It is tricksy, speaking with the voice of men, leading its victims into harsh places, there to slaughter, devour, and drink their blood. It doesn’t always kill its victims directly. It takes delight in manipulating its victims, sowing seeds of doubt into its victims’ minds, instilling paranoia and turning them against each other until they’re driven to murder. Similarly, the hatif is a djinni of calling, the voice alone in the desert; the cry of one bereft and in need of aid. Yet this voice is bodiless and unfleshed, spun of air and dreams; it assails the weary and the beleaguered, luring them from their path and into the wilderness. There they may search in vain, lost and thirsty, until they are bone and dust. Many men have died gruesome and unusual deaths in the pursuit of diamonds or hidden treasure, and many bodies were never found, theorized to have been reduced to easy pickings for vultures and other wildlife or otherwise reclaimed by the earth. If the gunfire of the guards stationed around the prohibited area won’t get trespassers, the elements will. The desert, the mountains, and the sea are sisters, tenacious triplets of nature, and once they have you, they won’t give you back.

Uncle Fred has made us feel quite at home. He has taken Jim under his wing, treating him like an unofficial apprentice while we’re here. He has expressed his interest in business to Uncle Fred, who was impressed by his ability to demonstrate his competence in being both personable and persuasive. They’re both “deliciously unscrupulous” (their words, not mine), and have a mutual respect and admiration for each other. They have quickly become close friends and have been showing each other the ropes, trusting each other to divulge the secrets of their respective trades. It’s no surprise to me that they’d warm to each other so quickly. They have a lot in common. So much, in fact, that if I didn’t know any better, I would assume they were two halves of the same person. If I didn’t know either of them as well as I do, I wouldn’t be able to tell them apart! They’re a real Tom and Huck to start. Pretty ironic, huh. Uncle Fred has spent his whole life searching for diamonds when all along he has possessed something far more valuable - his uncanny knack for making friends. As for me, I felt bold on leaving Charles Street. I thought my life at home in New York was miserable, but after coming here, I realized I am blessed more than I could ever imagine. When I envisioned my trip, I imagined exciting adventures, exotic locales, a jet-set lifestyle. I never thought grief and doubt would climb into my backpack and come with me. I pictured someday standing with Jim at the top of the Sun Gate, looking down at Machu Picchu, without ever thinking about the steps it would take to get there.

Jim and I had previously been staying in Casablanca but, despite being a neutral zone, corruption and illegal activity ran rampant and it was anything but safe. While we were there, we witnessed a man get shot to death in broad daylight and everyone around us was desensitized to it, like it was just another Tuesday afternoon! And the French Prefect of Police, Captain Louis Renault, kept flirting with me and trying to get me into his bed despite me refusing him over and over and over again! He was nonplussed by Jim being right there! The nerve of that man! With the help of Uncle Fred, we made a plan and moved on within the month. A good thing we left when we did too, because, just a few days after our departure, I read in the papers that Nazis flew in from Berlin. I can’t bring myself to imagine what might’ve happened to me if I had still been in Casablanca and they discovered I was the daughter of a Jewish man! I’ve seen what happens to refugees. I’ve seen how a wicked and corrupt system has given one man the right of life and death over his fellow man. I’ve seen a man beaten, tortured, killed because he was unfortunate enough to have been born poor. I become quite melancholy and deeply grieved to see men behave to each other as they do. Not just in Casablanca, but in Diamond Stud too. Though Uncle Fred has done everything to shield me from it, I know it’s happening here, and I’m sure in other areas of the continent too. Nobody warned me about this part. This is the curse of wanderlust, when the postcard image becomes a brutal reality. While Africa is a large continent, and there’s many parts of it that are perfectly safe and incredibly beautiful, there are others that are not at all what I thought it would be. No. No, it’s more savage, brutal and cruel than I could’ve ever imagined.

I think… I think it odious and unfair that some people are so well off and others are so poor. And beyond Africa, everywhere on the planet, I find nothing but base flattery, injustice, self-interest, deceit and roguery. I often feel I cannot bear it any longer. I’m furious, and it makes me want to break with all mankind, though I know this feat is impossible. Instead, I channel my fury, my frustrations, and any and all emotions that lie in between into my art. It’s the only way for me to cope with everything that’s going on around me. To stop myself from getting crushed under the weight of the world’s suffering when it feels like everything is falling apart at my ears. To stop myself from going insane from overthinking. It’s not up to me to save everyone. It’s not up to me to save anyone. I know this is the truth, but it’s a truth that’s hard to swallow.

I confess I find Diamond Stud rough and strange, and myself strange in it. By now, Mother has probably received word from Uncle George or the grapevine of gossiping ladies that I’m in Africa with Uncle Fred, and believes that I am here for a brief interlude of sensational experience before succumbing to a matrimonial fate. And while there’s surely no lack of sensational experience of every kind available in such a city, I hope that any experience I gain here will strictly go towards my pursuit of becoming a better artist and photographer rather than becoming a wife, and that all events of a romantic or sensational nature will be entirely confined to Jim, or to a sketchbook, canvas, or photograph. I wanted to do something for the people here, something meaningful without ulterior motives of expecting glory or praise and, though I had no luck at first, Uncle Fred has found me an opportunity to teach children. Well, I did not expect opportunity to knock so soon.

My students are dear boys and girls. Some of them remind me of myself when I was around their age. How curious to grow up with no mother or father, and your own older brother or sister having to act as parent in their stead. At first I was only teaching children, but some of the adults expressed an interest in learning too, so that they and their children or younger siblings could do it together as a bonding activity. Now I’ve been teaching both children and adults how to draw, how to paint. Whenever anyone gets discouraged in their art, I reassure them about the importance of not needing to be technically proficient in an activity to enjoy it, that there’s no such thing as mistakes, only happy little accidents. That not everything needs to be clear or easy to comprehend, that there’s beauty in all art, even the most abstract. I never thought I’d ever be good at teaching or giving pep talks, but my words tend to lift their spirits right back up. It isn’t easy, the work I do. Nothing but broken souls around me, and the ones that aren’t broke are greedy. Bone-tired. Life here is hard, but meaningful. I’m doing my best to bring a little joy to the world, what with all the gloom.

I dreamt that we were soldiers, Jim and I. We were dressed as soldiers are, in combat camouflage, guns at the ready. It was nighttime and we stared up a mighty cliff face, yet as we tried to climb, the bullets came from all around. Together we fought them, shot dead each one, then resumed our task of reaching the higher ground. I found a coin, old and covered in dirt, the engravings worn and the head of the king so tarnished as to be stolen from view. I held it in my left hand, watching the mud dirty my skin. So close to my face the coin had the aroma of stale blood. I turned to my right hand and in the palm was a new spring leaf, crowned by a perfect sphere of dew, reflecting an image of my face, softened and relaxed. When I turned back to the coin, the image of the king had freed himself and journeyed over to the leaf, igniting the growth of strong roots and new foliage that reached for the sunlight, robust, virescent.

Maybe Heaven is helping me find my calling? With all that has happened these past few months, my wish to make a difference, no matter how small, might just come true. I must be doing something right, because I feel useful for the first time in my life, like I’ve given children and adults a spot of hope as they try to survive the dark days of the looming threat of war, and that must be a good thing. They need me just as much now as they did a minute ago. And I’ve never been needed before. I’m not sure how much longer we’ll stay, but I hope that, after we leave, my students will remember me fondly. Maybe some of them will still be around when I come back, whenever that day may be. It’d be nice to reconnect with them, see how they’re doing someday in the future.

I miss you by the way, if that wasn’t obvious. I sure hope this letter reaches you before Jim and I move on to Ouagadougou and Nairobi. The post can be unpredictable at times, but I haven’t received any letters from you for a while now. In case this letter doesn’t reach you in time, I feel I should tell you we’ll be going to Algiers afterwards, but I’ve already said more than enough about me and Jim. I want to hear about you and Johnny. I hope you both are doing well in Seattle. How is everything going for you over there? I miss you. I wish I was there with you. Did you find more rocks to skip across the water? I remember when we were children, we would go to the lake to practice. You were worse compared to me then, but now I can never beat you in a match. I’m so proud of having such a hard working sister.

Love,

Your sister xxx

The second letter was much shorter, as if it could’ve been a post-script message for the first letter, but was written separately and at a later date, which told Fanny that you had made a spur of the moment decision.

March 1937

Dear Fanny,

Don’t tell Mother or Uncle George just yet, but we were supposed to only stay in Africa for one more week’s time, but we recently decided that we’ll be extending our stay in Africa for another six months. There’s so much to see and do in this beautiful continent, we want to experience as much of it as we can by committing more than enough time to exploring it. The plan is to still move on to Algiers afterwards, we’re just putting it off for the time being.

Love,

Your sister xxx

In September of 1937, you and Jim left Africa and moved on to your next big adventure. Ever since you left home, months passed, then a year, then two, then two and a half. Nearly three years passed, with you, Fanny, and Uncle George keeping in contact by exchanging letters and postcards back and forth with an occasional phone call along the way.

September 1937

Dear Fanny,

We’re finally in Algeria, and the stories don’t do this place justice. It is amazing! I’ve never seen anywhere as busy as the market in Algiers. The smells, the flavors, the colors and, oh, the noise! Some other highlights:

History. - The colonization of Algeria was rendered difficult by the presence of a native population which already had its own civilization, and was nomad and warlike in its instincts. A start was made in the region of the Tell, and then the mountains and high plateau land were taken in hand. There has been a spontaneous flor of Italian and Spanish immigration, and a system of land grants and other concessions have attracted large numbers of immigrants from the south of France who have settled down well in the country. Between 1904 and 1914, 206,000 hectares of land had been settled, of which 91,200 were free grants.

Mines. - The country is rich in minerals, which, however, have not been thoroughly exploited. The chief mineral resource is iron, the exports of which in 1920 amounted to 1,114,438 tons, valued at 33,879,000 francs. There are large phosphate deposits in the Constantine Province, which exported 334,704 tons in 1920 to a value of 18 million francs. There are also copper, zinc, lead, and antimony mines. Coal deposits were discovered during the war, and the work of British and American prospectors in the Oran indicates the possibility of existence of oil fields of some size.

Native rights. - The valuable help given by the native population of Algiers to France during the last war led, as it did in other parts of the French colonial empire, to a wider recognition of the political rights of the native. A law was passed on February 4, 1919, conferring French citizenship on any native of Algeria who had either served in the French army or navy, was a landowner, farmer, or licensed trader, knew how to read and write French, or was the possessor of a French decoration.

I may have picked up a little something for you and Johnny. You never know your luck! I like this place a lot. The people here are nice to me. Bringing the polaroid camera I bought years ago during my camera-obsessed phase seems like a good idea now. I am wandering through this life of mine, writing snapshots of my life. For me, the real win was the photos I took of Jim (watch out for Miss Skeffington, the rising stalker!) We all carried bottled water and day packs. I brought my camera, but Jim didn’t bring one. He said he didn’t believe in taking photographs; he planned to store his memories in his head, an idea I found incomprehensibly radical. My impulse to record was almost on par with my impulse to travel. But Jim has got every sunset that he’s ever seen memorized. “The best traveler is one without a camera,” he said. Well, I’m taking tons of photos. We’ll have to spend so much time together in the darkroom!

Can you believe your own sister was recently standing face to face with a real mummy? The tour guide was telling us some of the legends surrounding the desert. They tell you to stick with the group on tours. There’s a reason for that. I can’t wait to see you back in the States where I can fill you in on all of my stories. As promised, I’ll save the best stories for next time we meet in person, but I’ll share one of legends with you now, just to give you a taste of what you have to look forward to when I’m back in the States.

In life there was Setyamutef, an Egyptian prince and the only living son of the Pharaoh Senusnet, after his wife had suffered multiple stillbirths and miscarriages. He had seen wonders most men only dreamed of. But when his son was born at midnight, breathing and healthy, he was instantly more precious to him than all the wonders of the ancient world. On that day, the people thronged the byways of the city. When the doors of the tower opened, the name of their new prince rippled through the crowd before him like dye into water. “Setyamutef, Blessed Setyamutef.” Senusnet’s own father died before he was old enough to really remember him, but he grew up with his older brothers. However, the ones who lived past infancy and childhood all died prematurely sometime after they turned eighteen, either from foul play or tragic accidents. He feared his son would share the same fate as his brothers, doomed to die before his time if he ever came of age. He had alchemists from all over Egypt summoned to the palace, and they all came bearing a litter on which rested seven crystal orbs. But despite their best efforts, the rituals and spells they performed on the infant prince all failed. Their combined power wasn’t strong enough. To achieve what he wanted, Senusnet would need a great deal of power. Power that mortal men couldn’t ever hope to possess. The power of a god. So he called upon Khoret, the Goddess of Youth, sometimes called the Mistress of Eternity or the Childlike Empress since her mind was that of an adult woman, but her appearance was that of a perpetual child.

She stepped down, bare-headed and bare-handed, dressed in a simple robe, and she walked amongst the people. Some cried out with joy, some wept openly, but they all kneeled before her as she passed. Behind her came Mnisiria, another childlike deity who had the body of an adult man but the mind of a boy, who was her consort and thought to be a protector of households and, in particular, mothers and children. When they came to the palace, the royal guards and the Queen and Pharaoh themselves knelt before them in respect. They heard Senusnet’s entreaty, but they warned him that there was a heavy price to pay for granting his son eternal youth since it wasn’t a gift that could be given freely to just any mortal, not even ones touched by the gods. Even the gods themselves were bound to laws and rules more ancient than themselves, put in place by an invisible but omniscient being or force that came into existence before them, in order to maintain an always delicate balance. The balancing act that was their eternal obligation was precarious. One misstep too far to one side and the consequences could be disastrous for humans. The Pharoah, desperate to save his son from dying young, didn’t heed Khoret and Mnisiria’s warnings. They fulfilled their end of the bargain, but took all of the Pharoah’s memories from when he was a child as payment, including those of his brothers. He wouldn’t discover until later that, because of him, his son would pay a much greater price.

Like Khoret and Mnisiria, he was cursed to be perpetually a youth and could never age physically or mentally past the age of eight, trapped in a child’s body with a child’s mind. During a tumultuous time period of his father’s reign which included a great famine from which many died, the prince miraculously discovered a source of food in the desert that saved his people from their suffering. A Sifar tribe was founded and, as a gift to the young prince for his act of bravery and heroism, they called upon Tairin, the Goddess of Growth and Harvest, to provide them with special seeds so they could plant a juniper tree to allow the prince to grow to be an adult and purge the desert of rot and infidels. Before he could grow to his full potential, he was stolen away in his cocoon by a rival tribe and brought to what is now Algeria. They wished to have the child elevated to godhood with their leader as his consort. However, regardless of how much blood they tried to share with Setyamutef, there was no response because Setyamutef had in fact stripped himself of his flesh and traveled to the Land of Shadow. This tribe opposed to the Sifar, the Nanaki, called Setyamutef the Childlike Emperor or The Child Who Cannot Die. They were a people that refused the call to Islam, for their own ancestor, Kanebti, a bringer of healing and fertility, walked the sand, and how could they disbelieve the evidence of their own eyes? There was fighting, as there always is in such matters, but the Nanaki were wealthy, and made their peace through trade in salt and meat.

Even in his cocooned form, it’s said that Setyamutef has the ability to compel affection from others. Though originally thought to be a blessing and a sign of benevolence, this is referred to by his modern day followers as terrifying, as benevolence is not always synonymous with harmlessness. Perhaps this is why he is known as the most fearsome of all the Pharaohs and Princes who ever lived. Nevertheless, his tree where he once hibernated is known to provide shelter from the desert’s elements to those who are lost, but only to those pure of heart and free of ill intent. Anyone with a soul or heart that’s been blackened by greed or violence is said to be attacked by the tree, strangled to death by its branches and their bodies claimed by the desert, never to be found beneath the sand. Setyamutef is said to be awaiting for a promised mortal who is worthy enough to be his consort. He will guide them in the Land of Shadow, where he hopes to finally be reborn and manifest into adult form.

Though time has made it little more than folklore, perhaps there was once a real person called Setyamutef, a leader of his people. There’s a mountain named for him, and indeed his body may lie within or underneath it, hidden in the lost ruins deep beneath the surface. But it is speculated that there is more, much more, to that structure, wherever it may be. It is theorized that the deeper ruins are Roman in origin, and it’s there that archaeologists may find a mithraeum, set by the Romans to protect the gateway they seek. Once within...what wonders will those archaeologists see? While skeptics may chalk it up to hallucinations brought on by heatstroke, I think these are ancient memories of what truly happened in that place eons ago. Don’t most legends have some grain of truth to them? I don’t know for sure though. There are other, much older stories that have been conflated with his. Legends of the Gray Lady. The Sifar talk of their guardian spirit, a woman all in gray, who haunts the desert and protects their people against the specter of death. Perhaps the right word for the woman who walks the desert is goddess. She is a deity of healing, of succor in the wilderness. She has many names. People call her the Woman of the Tents, the Daughter of the Desert, or the Mother of Us All. She is wild and capricious; she cannot be summoned, but if her sympathy is roused she may choose to bestow her favor, giving of her body to quench the thirst of the dying, and guiding those who wander in the soft places. So people leave her gifts of desert flowers. There were also legends of a healer and weary travelers who were tested and saved by the Gray Lady as they struggled to survive in the desert.

But Jim and I stopped paying attention after the legend of Setyamutef. To be honest, the tour guide wasn’t the most talented of storytellers, and we eventually grew bored listening to him drone on and on. So we snuck off on one of the unmarked side paths while hiking in Chrea and got a little lost. Okay, a lot lost. For hours. I was running and deliberately lost my way. The world far off and nothing but my breath and the very next step and it’s like hypnosis. The feeling of conquering my own aliveness with no task but to keep going, making every way the right way and that’s a metaphor for everything. Wandering aimlessly, I love the thrill of unknown paths. I am a nomad. I am a wanderer. I am a drifter. Why do I keep on drifting? Yes, I wish I knew why? I am not aware of the reason myself. Why do I keep on drifting? I usually don’t mind getting lost, especially when I’m with someone I love. But I would be lying if I said I didn’t panic a little bit as it started to feel like we were walking for ever and ever and I couldn’t tell if we were getting any closer to where we started or if we were going in the opposite direction or, even worse, going in circles.

Luckily, Jim kept a cool head and right before the bus left, we found a trail, and came running down the path, soaked and covered in mud and sand from head to toe, shouting for the bus not to leave. The dirt was even packed under our fingernails, the skin around them raw and bleeding, and our shoulders ached. We knelt and plunged our hands into a cool stream we found along the way. The cuts stung like fire for a moment, and then cool numbness washed it away. Delay and dirt are the realities of the most rewarding travel. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, and Jim and I find beauty in the thrown away and broken things, the morbid filth that glues together our world - the necessary decomposition that life must arise from. Still, I can only imagine what Mother would say if I called home and told her about this... “you didn't get in trouble like this before you met Jim!” but I don’t think she know-knows about us.

Mother thought too hard. It’s not like that with travel. We can’t work too much at it, or it feels like work. I eased into the idea of letting go of control and simply letting life take the reins. And when I don’t hold it so tightly, it doesn’t thrash against me so wildly. It calms to a trot and allows me to take in the scenery, experience love, and learn what is important in this world: People, places, memories - not things or perceptions. Jim and I have to surrender ourselves to the chaos, to the accidents. Travel, we agreed, was a litmus test: If we could make the best of the chaos and serendipity that we’d inevitably meet in transit, then we’d surely be able to sail through the rest of life together just fine. So far, we’ve done pretty well, minus the times we overslept and missed our trains. Keep walking, Fanny, for sometimes the detours may find you a door, a route opening into a pathway that you never knew danced inside the buried layers of your wandering soul. The unruly characters we sometimes meet though... I’m really afraid that’s a whole other story. Moral of today’s story: Stick with the group, Fanny. Stick with the group. The tour guide is there for good reason, even if he is dull as dishwater.

Love,

Your sister xxx

June 1939

Dear Fanny,

Our third “anniversary” is coming up. Three years of traveling together. Last year, Jim invited me to my favorite restaurant. It was a complete surprise, and I was so happy. Things had been so hectic, I thought he might have forgotten. After dinner, we went back to our room, but we couldn’t sleep, so we drove to the ocean and spent the rest of the evening taking a turn along the beach. We were walkers of the velvet night, we were lovers of the light and each floral blossom. Our well traveled soles were born to embrace each onward path and seek horizons others dare not gaze upon. Walking was our most beloved way of waking, to stride out each dawn bare soled upon the beach jetty. But seeing it at night… The water was so beautiful as the light from the moon shone down on it. We talked and we played as if we were teenagers in love. Sprinting across the sand, leaving sinking footprints, splashing into the froth of a wave, laughing at the spray, pressing oyster and seashells into the beach, making patterns in the sand…

I sat down in the sand while Jim talked to me about someplace he had been. Every time he looked back at me, I felt a surge of happiness inside. So I sketched him doing just that. Talking, smiling with his hands behind his back… It didn’t take too long for him to figure out that I was, in fact, not paying any attention to what he was saying. He stopped talking and began staring at what I was doing instead. The odd silence made me look up to find Jim with his eyebrows raised, eyeing my sketchbook. “You’re supposed to draw something that inspires you! That’s the only reason why we are here, my dear!”

“I know!” I held the pages up to my chest, hiding it from him as he began to walk to me, motioning for me to show him my sketch. “And I am doing just that. So leave me be!”

He immediately stopped, “I inspire you?”

I nodded, holding back a laugh. “Yes. Now, stand just as you were before I run out of inspiration. You wouldn’t want that, would you?”

“I wouldn’t dare dream of such things.”

Once I was done and had set my sketchbook safely aside, he flung his arms under my knees, and picked me up bridal style. He looked up at me and grinned, “Darling,” he said, “come and see what I’ve made for you!” The wanderlust crept up again inside me like a shooting star, a sudden, violent urge to escape disappearing into darkness again. I pushed down the afterglow and focused. I could not remember the last time I felt that carefree. Ultimately, I have come to think, travel teaches us about love. It teaches us that the very best we can do with our lives is to embrace the peoples, places, and cultures we meet with all our mind, heart, and soul, to live as fully as possible in every moment, every day. And it teaches us that this embrace is simultaneously a way of becoming whole and letting go. When the world has become a pencil drawing, a masterpiece on the easel of the creator, I await for it to fade to black and arise anew. It is as if the nightfall were the curtains closing, and the dawn were their opening each day, the birds singing on cue with their beautiful serenade. While others sleep through the dying of the light, my task is to remain awake and witness its rebirth, to see how the pencil sketch becomes the greatest of technicolor movies. As the blackness comes I calmly watch myself be erased, eyes open and seeing nothing at all. The only evidence of my being is the steady thump of my heart and the cool air in my lungs.

Love,

Your sister xx

August 1939

Dear sister,

So much has changed, even just since you’ve been away. And my twin sister being gone for three years doesn’t make it any easier. It doesn’t feel real. But I’m not going to let it phase me. I used to tell you everything, and if I can’t do it in person, because you’re off gallivanting around who-knows-where with Jim, I’ll just tell it to this letter. Just like I was talking to you. I love you and I miss you.

Love,

Fanny x

October 1939

Dear Fanny,

Do you remember when you first wrote to me to tell me of your upcoming nuptials to Johnny Mitchell? Though it took a while for it to make its way to me, when I finally received it, I was ecstatic to hear such wonderful news! Of course, it was announced in the paper, but hearing it from you was all the more meaningful. Though I missed you, I was glad you weren’t there to witness my embarrassing display of excitement. The sounds that came out of me were indescribable. In Jim’s words, I was like a little kid who had too much sugar before bed but, once I told him the reason for my giddiness and showed him your letter, he understood and let me have my moment to celebrate you and Johnny. By the time you received my next letter, I could safely assume you were no longer Miss Fanny Skeffington, but Mrs. Fanny Mitchell. I hoped my letter would reach you by the time you and Johnny got back from your honeymoon.

There were many things I could’ve said, but to keep things short, sweet, and to the point, all I said was something Uncle George once said to me about Jim, and that was that I only spent an hour or so with Johnny, but I could tell you with confidence that there was nothing really wrong with that man. I knew he’d love you and treat you right, as a husband should. Although you said you weren’t going to have a big wedding and were just going to get married at the registrar’s office, I still regret that I could not be there with you. But I had a gift sent to you, enclosed with a card that emphasized how much I love you and wished the both of you every happiness. It was no surprise that you got married before me. You were always the practical one. Do you remember the wishes we made when we were children? Yours was to get married and have a family of your own, while mine was to roam the world and meet new people.

Speaking of marriage… Neither of us are sure how or who brought it up first, but the topic of conversation turned to just that. Nothing particularly happened to push Jim and I to this decision, but we keep having our best conversations while the world is asleep, trying to find ourselves somewhere between dusk and the sunrise. We were talking about anything and everything, even things that were trivial and inconsequential. We reminisced on how we met. We laugh now when we talk about the beginning, how I fell out of a tree and practically into his arms that day in Wakeforte Park! Even if we had nothing important to say, it was lovely just listening to each other’s voices. Now we’re wide awake. Except this time, we think we know what we intend to say to each other. Fanny, Jim and I have decided that… Well, there’s no use trying to win Mother over. She’s too sensible, so we’re going to elope. We’ve decided! We are going to get married while we’re here. I’m ready. I wasn’t sure before about eloping, but Jim thinks that Mother will never come round until after the wedding. I hope you’ll be happy for us, because it’s what we both want. I was surrounded by doubters. Mother, her old friends and neighbors… The only way to silence them is just to get married and have done with it. You can’t leave everything up in the air indefinitely. At least that’s a decision. Uncle Fred once told us he could have a Bedouin ceremony performed and that he’d be our witness. We weren’t too sure of the legality of it, but Uncle Fred said he’d look into it. We’re just going to go to a registrar’s office, just like you and Johnny did. I’d love to tell you more about it, but it can wait until I’m back in the States. Registrar offices don’t allow personal vows and get you in and out within ten minutes, so we’ll probably come back at some point and renew our vows on American soil, just so we can make our wedding a bit more personal and be certain our marriage is legal in both Europe and the States. Things with Mother might be different by then. I hope it will be for the better.

Though we will still have separate lives outside of our marriage, our destiny is by each other’s side. When Mother organized my wedding to Sir John, I was very angry. But, with this year, I’ve learned that I’m ready, that I want to love Jim as a wife loves her husband. We’re best friends, kindred spirits, and we’ll soon be husband and wife. We’ll love each other, and while we won’t be attached at the hip 24/7, all 365 days of every year, we will always be there for each other when it really matters. As I finish penning this letter to you, the wind howls, but I am warm, cocooned under the blanket by the fire in Jim and I’s motel room. We smoked cigarettes until six in the morning and I listened as his words flowed; plans, hopes, dreams, fantasies, everything that we know is possible and impossible, but I know that it doesn’t matter, for we will be together throughout it all, and that is everything. Now I need to stop writing because I’m falling asleep on his chest.

Love,

Your sister xx

October 1939

Dear Fanny,

It’s so insane to me that most of the people you meet in life are just passing moments. You’ll know them for a brief period of time before they’re a stranger again and there’s absolutely nothing you can do about it because that is just how it’s meant to be… Hardest part of life honestly. I don’t want to be a temporary moment or experience, I want to be with certain people forever. I realized that people, from new-made friends to life-long family, inevitably come and go in the composition of our lives, but that once they have appeared, they never really leave. And I realized too that the people we love - the memory of the people we love, their enduring, pulsing presence in our lives - is like those violins that street performers play. Every day, in one form or another, we take them out and play them, if just for a while. We become them, swooping, spiraling, soaring to the apex of our minds. We honor them and keep them alive - as they do us, intertwined. I welcome my journey with a strong heart. I stand tall and love the fresh air that comes from following this ever onward road. I stride in bold steps, feeling a sense of pride in each one. And this journey is not about a destination, nor arrival point or finish line... for there is no such thing. This journey is about the traveling, the traveling companions and the reason for the noble struggle. Friends come, friends go, often times I am alone, yet I have my compass, I have my path and I have two well clad feet each dawn.

The path doesn’t care about the terrain, that’s for me to deal with. The path is the path. So whatever comes I keep going. When I get knocked down I have to get up, because there’s no other way. I know what’s out there though, I know because the universe told me. It said, “just walk” and so I did. I still do. It says at the other end is peace, real happiness for everyone, and I gotta keep going even if the path makes me bleed. Sometimes it has, sometimes so much I just wanna stay down and feel the cold... then I remember why I started this journey and find my feet again. It’s lonely though, and I think some company would be nice if you can be brave enough. It’s freedom, it’s duty, it’s leading and following. I can’t promise comfort, but there’s plenty of stuff to kindle my soul and bring the sorts of smiles I thought only belonged to the stars. Jim and I have been going steady for many seasons now, steady in our hearts and souls, sailing quietly onward as ships together upon calm seas, sails always filled by onward breeze. So, as we love one another so much, as we can only see a future together, can we agree that the time has come to settle down, to accept that our stories are forever weaved.

Love,

Your sister xx

December 1939

My darling sister,

I hope this letter finds you well. How are things going? It’s been a while since I heard from you, so I decided to send another letter. You’re always in a different place all the time, so it’s hard to know your exact address. I hope things are going well. Just don’t get discouraged. I know things aren’t easy for you, and how hard it is to find an opportunity for this type of work. Your friends always ask about you. You should write to them too. I always hear them telling others how you took your car and set off on your adventure to chase your dream of being an artist. Oh, I guess now I know why you don’t write to them. I know you don’t want to disappoint them. Mother and Uncle George are fine. Uncle George misses you, and Mother doesn’t talk much about you. You know how she disapproved of your idea, but she loves you. And I love you too. Johnny and I are doing well in Seattle, but we miss you very much.

How delightful to hear you and Jim might elope! Other ladies might find it irresponsible and foolish, but I think it’s so romantic. We always used to say we couldn’t be any more different from each other, and that still holds true, but at least there’s one thing we have in common: Neither of us were ever attracted to the idea of a big, traditional white wedding with all the trimmings. Fashionable weddings reminded us too much of Mother’s extravagant parties and lost whatever appeal they might have had. To be with the one you love and exchange vows and rings signifying your love for each other only in front of someone with the power to bind you together under God… To share a kiss and sign your names on a piece of paper… To seal that bond no man can turn asunder in the privacy of a registry office… That was enough for Johnny and I, and it’ll be enough for you and Jim too, I imagine. All the rest of it - A church, flowers, a towering cake, and an overpriced white dress we’d only wear once… It all seemed so wasteful, just an excuse to throw money at something, to throw a party and be the center of attention to keep up appearances for people you barely know or don’t know at all. You must write to us and tell us of all your adventures! But save the best stories for when you see us again in person – soon, we hope! Your last letter got to me the day before we started riding the train back to New York, and I was reading it while on my way home! If you come home, we can read all our letters together and share our memories!

With love from your sister,

Fanny xx

As promised, you’d save the best stories for when you met again face-to-face. In the meantime, between 1936-1940, you sent both Fanny and your Uncle George snippets of stories in a trail of modest envelopes. Little more than tantalizing teasers for greater epics to be told and shared, yet their contents were always beyond expectations.

December 1937

Dear Uncle George,

Austria has been wonderful so far! Uncle Fred called, he wants me to get him a souvenir while I’m here. We’ll be going to many sites, among them Moosham Castle before we head back to Switzerland, and from there, the United Kingdom. It’s said to be haunted, so I’m expecting some good scares and mysteries!

Love,

Your niece xx

December 1937

Dear Uncle George,

So much for our skiing plans in Switzerland! We arrived here at Moosham Castle last night, just before a blizzard swept in! We didn’t get hit with the worst of it, but the mountain is completely shut down, and the surrounding roads are closed. I think Jim and I are one of the few guests who made it to the castle at all. The castle itself is private property, but there’s apartments and inns nearby and we were able to secure a room. The place is huge and old - and slightly creepy under the circumstances. You should hear this wind! What’s more, the owner is away on business. I tried to ask the caretaker how I could contact them, but he said he didn’t know. Doesn’t that seem odd? I couldn’t help feeling like there was something he wasn’t telling me. All this makes me a little nervous, but I’m determined to enjoy myself. I have big plans to explore the castle, once it opens again to the public after the storm passes and most of the snow melts.

I’ve been reading up on the castle’s history. The original owner must’ve been quite a character to have built such an extraordinary place. It’s filled with strange, dead-end corridors for one thing, and I noticed that one of the towers is totally different than the other ones. I heard from the radio that Switzerland is on high alert for any avalanches and search and rescue is on standby. I fear for anyone who may live in proximity. Avalanches happen so quickly…they’ll sweep you away and kill you in seconds, before you even realize what’s happening. There have been so many deaths and disasters in the past… Hopefully everyone close by was given ample warning and able to retreat to safer ground. Of course, Jim and I are safe where we are, but we may be stranded here for the foreseeable future, until the roads are cleared and safe to drive on again. Once the danger passes, I’ll have to save some time to meet Jacques Brunais, the French ski instructor, while we’re in Switzerland. Tell Fanny she’ll be the first to know if he'’s half as gorgeous in person as he looks in his photo. So Uncle George, I guess things never go quite according to plan! But at least this time, the culprit is just a snowstorm. I could’ve asked Matteo who works at the front desk to mail this letter for me, but I think it’d be best if I just hold onto it for now and send it at a later date. It is just as well, since the blizzard is preventing outside contact. Me? I’m still determined to mail this letter to you, then go out and enjoy this snow, once it’s deemed safe to do so. Talk to you soon! (I hope!)

Love,

your niece xx

August 1938

Dear Uncle George,

I’ve been taking some gorgeous shots while Jim and I are in France. Lush forests, endless hills, and a lake that I’m certain is hiding a couple of dead bodies. I was just joking when I first said it, but after talking to some locals, turns out the lake does have a myth surrounding it involving a dead body that may or may not be in there. The story goes that there was a French violinist and composer, Erique Claudin, who went mad after he was dismissed from the Paris Opera House. In a fit of fury over falsely believing his concerto was being stolen and plagiarized, he strangled a man to death. Acid was thrown in his face, permanently disfiguring him. To evade police, he ran through the Paris streets until he returned to the Opera House through the underground tunnels. Donning a prop room mask and a black cape, he assumed the identity of the Phantom of the Opera or the Opera Ghost, a mysterious figure that lived up to its title. While he was rarely ever seen beyond a silhouette or the end of a black cloak as he turned a corner, his voice was heard and his looming presence was felt. But the managers were skeptics. When he sent them threatening notes, they didn’t heed his warnings. When his demands weren’t met, he sabotaged stage sets, drugged the performers, and even murdered the prima donna and her maid. He kidnapped Christine DuBois, a beautiful singer who was his object of obsession. He caused a deadly diversion by bringing the crystal chandelier down on the audience and, in the chaos and commotion, kidnapped her. He took her down to his lair in the sewers where he intended to keep her with him forever, but she was rescued by police. However, the whole place was dilapidated and falling apart, on the verge of coming down. When the policeman’s gun went off, it caused a terrible rumble. The Phantom pushed Christine out of the way of the falling rubble, but was crushed to death. The policeman and Christine escaped just before the entire place caved in on itself.

The Phantom’s violin and mask were recovered many years later and are on display in a museum today but, after the rubble was cleared away, workers were both baffled and horrified. There was no body. A terrible chill went down their spines and the hairs on the backs of their necks stood up. They felt a presence with them. A presence they couldn’t see. It’s said that Claudin’s body is still down there, hidden somewhere. Maybe he survived the cave-in but, without hope, without love, without Christine, he drowned himself in his beloved lake where he once sought refuge, peace, and solitude. His body may be lost somewhere in the deep, inky black depths of the lake, but his spirit won’t rest, watching over his Opera House as a spectral spectator, a ghostly guardian.

The stories vary. Some say he’s friendly, a protector. A ballerina let her curiosity get the better of her and went down below and accidentally got lost in the underground caverns of the Opera House. She spent so long in the concrete labyrinth she was confused as to which path to take. She sat there all day, lost, figuring she’d never get out, when Erique just walked right through the walls. He stood and stared at the ballerina as he passed through. He smiled and beckoned her to come. “Follow me, child. I’ll show you the way back,” he said with one of his warm smiles. She wrapped her fingers into his cloak, her heart flooded with relief. She could have walked through them herself she supposed, but it was wonderful to have a guide. Others say he’s malevolent, a vengeful spirit seeking to scare away, harm, or even kill those that disrespect or otherwise desecrate his Opera House, his eternal resting place. I know it’s meant to be scary, but I couldn’t help but feel deeply moved by the tragic tale. I was sympathetic for Claudin. The poor man. I know the stories say otherwise, but I hope his soul is at peace.

Ghosts are one thing, but Jim and I have been following the story of Marie Antoinette’s missing diamond and journal ever since we stepped foot on French soil. During the French Revolution of the 1790s, Marie liked to frequent a particular tower in Chateau Rochemont. For her birthday, Louis gave her a tiara with a ruby, an emerald, a sapphire and a diamond in it. It was so extravagant that she refused to wear it, calling it her crown of ruination, as the French public was starving in the streets and it presented her as apathetic towards them. Marie had the tiara dismantled, with the sapphire and emerald sent to family members who lived in other countries and could thus keep the precious gems safe. She wanted the jewels to be returned to the people of France where they belonged, but she knew it couldn’t happen until the country had healed from the tumultuous revolution it was undergoing. We know she sent the emerald to her cousin in Austria, and the sapphire to her sister in Spain. However, Marie and the King were advised to take jewels in case they needed to bribe for their escape, so she took the ruby with her. However, they were still captured by Jean Le Bouef on June 25, 1791 and everything Marie had was taken. She then hid the diamond and her journal in a contraption, in a secret compartment underneath her tower that hadn’t been discovered until only recently, when a gang of diamond thieves attempted to steal both the diamond and the journal, but were thwarted by Auguste de Lancret, a museum curator and French Police when the heist was bungled.

Everyone in France, especially near Versailles, is resting easier, now that Marie Antoinette’s journal and her famous diamond are safe and sound. The journal and the diamond are going to be featured in a new Marie Antoinette exhibit in Paris. And it looks like everyone who contributed to recovering both artifacts will be rewarded! Those involved in the conspiracy are going to be charged with attempted grand theft. Juliette Blauschild, a French-born American author, historian, and museum curator, is thrilled because the French government has granted her permission to publish Marie’s journal in the US before it gets returned to France. This ought to help prove her theory about Marie’s character once and for all. Thanks to Auguste and his great-grandfather's efforts to find the journal, their family name is being celebrated all over France. Meanwhile, Auguste was showed the poem that his father, Jean-Luc, wrote him and he was relieved to know that his old man didn’t carry any hard feelings to his grave. All the talk shows want Auguste to tell his story on national television, but he keeps turning them down. I guess he doesn’t want to be famous or infamous. But, when Penelope Lane called and asked Auguste to be her business partner, he accepted! With her business sense and Auguste’s expert knowledge of the castle, I think they’ll make a great team! So, you know what they say Uncle George: “Il n'est jamais trop tard de changer l'historie.” It’s never too late to change history!

Vis ta vie!

Love,

Your niece xx

October 1938

Dear Fanny,

We are in the Chunnel! This is our second passage through the Chunnel! We’re on our way back from London, this time going to Brussels, Belgium. Sorry I didn’t write you on the way to London but I was too excited about the CHUNNEL!! London was great. I know you’ve always wanted to visit and I think you really should. You’d love it! If you and Johnny wanted to come back here as a family sometime I guess Jim and I could be convinced.

Love you!

Your sister xx

February 1940

Dear Uncle George,

Greetings from jolly old Wales. Although right now I’m not so sure about the jolly part. I’m afraid I come bearing bad news. If it were good news, I’d have telephoned. Jim and I have made an impromptu trip here to attend the funeral of John, Sir John’s elder son. He unexpectedly died on Monday following a hunting accident while on holiday in the Grampian Mountains of Scotland, where he was a frequent visitor. Poor John. He was only thirty-nine and they all knew the girl he was going to marry. I had rather a sad letter from Sir John a few days ago, announcing the death. In one of his passages, he wrote, “I dreamt last night I was in the park at Llanwelly, walking with John under the great trees, listening to the pigeons cooing in their branches. And when I woke, my eyes were filled with tears.” It was very moving. There were darkened spots on the parchment that smudged the ink. It’s a dagger in my heart to imagine Sir John, the charismatic community leader, who always held his head high with a stiff upper lip, crying while writing to me. Poor darling. He’s so unhappy.

A great part of living is expecting the unexpected. Considering our way of life, Jim and I thought ourselves masters of the art. We were living our once upon a time. Every day felt like a lifetime; every moment was alive. Our lips were for each other and our eyes were full of dreams. We thought we knew everything of travel, that we knew everything of loss. Ours was a world of eternal summer, until the autumn came. I’m so sorry for John’s loss. Grief is a journey, long and painful, but he doesn’t walk the road alone. Life is certainly a queer business—so brief, yet such a lot of it; so substantial, yet in a few years, which behaves like minutes, all scattered and anyhow. If humanity ever conquered mortality we would go, knowing that whomever we left behind we’d see again in the future. Time seems so infinite when you’re young…a month is an age, a year is a lifetime…it is a strange feeling, to realize how little of it one might have left. Our time on this earth is finite. It’s common knowledge, yet it’s a strange thing to realize and accept your mortality, to be confronted with it. It’s just one of those things you ignore. The days tick by and you just expect they will keep on coming. Until the unexpected happens.

That’s the thing about life; it is fragile, precious, and unpredictable. Each day is a gift, not a given right. However much you expect death, it’s still painful when it arrives. But that’s just it, we don’t know how much time we have. Jim and I are using ours to love. There’s nothing else worth living for, fighting for, or dying for. Believe me. We love each other, and we love our families, even if we’re estranged from them, above all else. The paradox of love is that to have it is to want to preserve it because it’s perfect in the moment but that preservation is impossible because the perfection is only ever an instant passed through. Love, like travel, is a series of moments that we immediately leave behind. Still we try to hold on and embalm against all evidence and common sense proclaiming our promises and plans. The more I loved him the more I felt hope. But hope acknowledges uncertainty and so I also felt my first premonitions of loss.

It took expensive train and cab rides to get here on such short notice. John sent us the money necessary to travel, and arranged transportation to and from the service. Jim and I are so grateful for his generosity. He doesn’t want anything more in return than our presence here. It will mean a great deal to him to have our support during this difficult time. We’re about to be picked up and dropped off at Talbot Castle, a huge, centuries old castle in the middle of a dark, foggy moor. Since Sir John and I are such close friends and care for each other deeply, (we were almost married, after all) he has invited Jim and I to stay for a couple weeks following the service. In his letter to me, he said the castle is too big for just him, Larry, and the servants, and that it’d be nice if he had an excuse to finally use guest rooms for their intended purpose: To house guests. All these years, they’ve just been collecting dust and he’s itching to air them out. He also said they’ve been having a really cold autumn up there and that there might be snowfall, so Jim and I should pack accordingly. “Usually if I’d wanted to freeze my backside off in the autumn, I’d have gone to Scotland. But lately, it’s been as cold as a bishop’s arse and twice as white, and London isn’t much better. I don’t mind saying it: I’m very disappointed,” he said in his letter.

But it looks like we lucked out and the storm didn’t reach here. There’s no snow falling. It’s a clean, crisp night. Just gone midnight. Feels like we’ve been here forever. Looking at it, this train station, this village is lonely and forlorn. We’re in the middle of nowhere. The station looks like it hasn’t been used in years. There’s not much here except a pile of luggage, including mine. I just dumped it there because it seemed like the right thing to do. The car should be here any moment. I’m surrounded by forests. The trees are completely bare in the winter months, but for now, the leaves are still clinging on to the branches for dear life in colors of orange, red, yellow, and brown.

It’s strange to think I was almost married to Sir John, yet I’ve never been here before. I should explore when I’m back from the service. I imagine there are plenty of forests in Wales to explore, full of treasures waiting to be uncovered in this mucky old moor. I’m reminded of when Tina and I went camping with Charlotte and discovered a moss-covered boot! I remember Tina bringing it up to her face to look inside…and shrieking in horror! “There’s a bloody rat in there!” she screamed! I used to love walking in the forests, going on hiking trails in Europe with Dad and Fanny and… Yeah. Yeah, maybe I’ll go walking in the forests when I’m back, if I can convince Jim to come with me. You should never hike alone. But we won’t stay out too late. Whether they’re to be believed or not, there are many legends out there about forests and the weird discoveries found in them. I was supposed to call the castle from the station to let John know we arrived here safely. So, there I sat, listening to the phone ring, waiting for someone to pick up. It wasn’t John, but his butler, Kendall, who told us that John’s gone! He’s been disappearing a lot lately, going on long walks without telling anybody where he’s going, but he always turns up before dark, so everyone leaves him alone to grieve in his own way. He left a note that suggested something terrible happens here in the moors at night, something about a wolf. The connection was getting really bad, and I could barely hear him, but I’m pretty sure he used the word “prowling” (or was it “howling”?) along with “dangerous” and “be careful”.

Accidents are one thing, but wild animals? Oh dear. I hope I know what I’m getting into. Do I belong to the city or the wilds? Am I human or animal? Am I sane or lunatic? Both? Neither? Yes. It’s nighttime, and although part of me is dying to know what frightened John away, another part of me is starting to feel a little uneasy. I can’t tell whether the uneasiness in my stomach is because of my grief, or because I’m a tad creeped out. Frankly, as beautiful as Talbot Castle is, I’m starting to get a bad feeling about this place. Uh-oh. I have to put this away because the car is here. I’ll let you know what happens when (and if!) Jim and I get back from the service.

Love,

Your niece x

[thanks--for--listening]

an eternity of almost

the post-guardians nebula and rocket friendship fic is finally here! this does have SPOILERS for guardians 3 so be warned. also for fic purposes, let's all pretend there was at least one night in between the final battle and That final conversation.

(also on ao3)

~~

The restlessness had yet to subside. Hours had passed since the battle, but Nebula could still feel the electric current running through her veins, lingering longer than it should. Its continued presence was illogical and infuriating and entirely expected. But it was beginning to drive her to madness. 

None of the others seemed to be affected. They’d dispersed quickly, adrenaline fading at the appropriate time. One by one, she’d watched the energy drain from their eyes, resigned to delay tasks until the morning as they made their way back to their respective quarters. They, like everybody else who populated Knowhere, required rest.

Nebula did not. It had been years since she’d held that same level of mortality. Something inside her forced her body to outlast its predetermined limits. She couldn’t remember which enhancement had done it, only that her increased endurance had never won her any battles — it had only trapped her in moments like this. 

She tried to keep herself occupied. To think of everything that had to get done, everything that required too much of her focus to let her mind drift. Lodging for the animals. Homes for the children. Repairs to most of the town. The list went on and on, but with the rest of Knowhere succumbing to their collective exhaustion, she was running out of practical distractions. 

It was how she’d ended up here, with the only ones who, like her, had yet to tire: the kids. She’d compiled as many blankets and beds as they could manage, but from her perch in the doorway, she noticed those supplies had been disregarded in favor of games she couldn’t follow and conversations she didn’t understand. 

She should have left. Surely somewhere on this planet, something was needed from her — her strength for a repair, or her arm to override malfunctioning software. The damage from the past few days had been extensive, and she suspected it had not been properly dealt with. Nothing seemed to be properly dealt with lately if she didn’t oversee the process. Working alone, she’d still be more productive than most of the civilians. It was simple math: she shouldn’t have stayed. These kids didn’t need her.

But here she sat. Watching instead of working. 

Curiosity was to blame. She just didn’t understand it. Their laughter. It was baffling. These were children who had grown up in cages, who were abused at the expense of a scientist who never cared for them, who were created out of some sick need for perfection and then abandoned as if they’d never even mattered. They’d suffered. Witnessed atrocities she was certain they would hardly be able to describe, let alone forget. And yet, despite their circumstance and their strange surroundings, their isolation and near loneliness in language, they never lost their smiles. 

It wasn’t that she wanted them to be upset; she simply didn’t understand how it was possible to find joy so quickly. 

“There you are.” Rocket’s voice broke through her rumination as he took a seat next to her. “How’d you get stuck on babysitting duty?”

“I volunteered.” 

Any of the others may have laughed at her, or questioned her sanity, or even her motives, but Rocket just shrugged. “Who's got next shift?”

“Me.” Unlike everyone else, she didn’t want sleep to come. She didn’t want to see what it would bring. 

“Nebula—“

“You all need rest. I don’t. And apparently, neither do they.”

“Yeah,” Rocket sighed. “These guys don’t seem to be getting the memo, either.” He nodded down, and it was then that she noticed the four faces peeking out from inside his pockets. 

It was instantaneous. The wires connecting, her eyes seeing one image and associating it with another. It didn’t matter how much she longed to burn the memory away — her wretched mind would never let her forget. 

She did her best to bury it. To keep her expression neutral and her thoughts her own. The last thing he needed was to know what she’d seen. What she’d always see. 

“You’re never going to believe this.” Nebula forced her eyes to meet his. “When I found them, there was a sign on the cage. Turns out I…I am a raccoon.”

“That’s not surprising. You’ve been told that many times.”

“Yeah, whatever. But did you know I’m from Quill’s fucking planet?”

That made her eyes go wide. Rocket laughed, and she could hear the forcefulness in it, but it was laughter, and it was his. That was good enough. 

“All the time we spent down there, and no one on that shithole ever told me.”

“They were probably too stupid to figure it out. It would be like expecting a newborn to do calculus. Those idiots hardly knew other planets existed.”

“Dumb as rocks. Good music, though.”

Nebula hummed in agreement. They hadn’t spent a ton of time on Earth — preventing the galaxy from combusting had kept them busy enough. Neither of them did it out of some sense of honor or innate goodness. They weren’t heroes; they simply had nothing better to do. 

They’d made a good team, though. Prior to Thanos, she hadn’t given any of the so-called Guardians much thought, so expectations had been drastically low. But Rocket had surprised her. She’d known he was smart, but she learned he was funny, too. Sarcastic and witty, constantly sneaking jokes into places they didn’t belong. 

He never made fun of her when she missed one. She wasn’t sure she had the words to tell him how much that meant to her.  

It had been his idea to try and do what they’d already been doing. To travel through space, solving problems using shades of gray. To answer calls from humans who wanted updates on parts of the galaxy they could hardly even fathom. To call themselves Guardians. It was Rocket who’d given her the title; she’d yet to feel like she’d properly earned it.

They’d settled into a routine rather quickly. She hadn’t had one of those since her childhood training sessions, and even then, her father had made sure to never allow her to get comfortable. But despite the effort it took to avoid lingering on the empty seats in the ship, or the desperation in the calls they received those first few years, she grew almost fond of the pattern they fell into. Hell, she even started looking forward to their check-ins with Earth. 

It would have been a lie, however, to say she’d maintained hope. Nebula had accepted early on that those who were gone would never return. Even when they got the call, when the plan fell into place and the math argued in their favor, she’d still spent most of her time waiting for it to fail. It wasn’t until they made it back to Morag that she’d allowed herself to consider the possibility of success. 

The universe had promptly punished her for that.

Even their victory hadn’t felt like one. It had seemed especially cruel that, at the end of it all, the only people who remained lost were the ones she’d cared for. But Fate had never once extended its kindness toward her — she had stopped expecting that to change a long time ago.

“I nearly called them,” Nebula confessed. She felt his eyes on her. She wasn’t typically the one to break a silence. “They’re primitive, but they have a habit of finding the right answers eventually. Thought for a second that might have been something we would need.”

“Why didn’t you?”

“You didn’t have that kind of time. And they wouldn’t have had technology advanced enough to help anyways.”

“Probably for the best. You know how they get. Everyone’s gotta sit around and drink tea and take their stupid notes and cry about everything first. No one can get anything done until they all talk about their feelings.”

She knew it was bullshit. She did. She could hear it in his voice, could tell that he was projecting something onto them that wasn’t entirely deserved. But again, her mind had already made its association, and even though it was supposed to be the antithesis of who she was as a person, she found her own reflection in his words. 

Now that the battle had ended, she had time to feel embarrassed about it. Nebula didn’t cry. She didn’t break down. She didn’t allow herself to be that fucking weak in front of anyone, but especially not the only person who would know exactly what she was feeling. 

But hearing his voice, knowing that he was okay…it had set her synapses on fire. There was no other way to describe it besides a total systems failure. 

The abnormality of it all must have caused it. That was the only logical explanation. She didn’t get to be relieved very often. It was usually loss after loss after loss. Natasha. Tony. Her sister. Herself. People died more often than they lived if they got near her. It was a fact of nature she’d come to accept ages ago.

Knowing only made the last few days worse. She’d been desperate to make sure he wasn’t part of that list, but every minute that passed had been precious, and the running clock in her head had expired while they were standing on the edge of that monster’s ship. And as she raged against the door, against Drax and Mantis, she’d been certain that they’d failed him. She’d failed him. 

Maybe that was why she was so unprepared. So…overcome. Hearing him speak, it was like a weight had been lifted off her chest, like a valve inside her had been turned a full ninety degrees, and she was powerless against it. All she could do was let the emotion rush through her. All she could do was feel it. 

“I heard you called Gamora.” There was a seriousness creeping back into his voice, a shift in direction she had hoped to avoid. “That had to have been hard.”

She buried the musings beneath the familiar layer of indifference, and did her best to ignore the sprouts of emotions that grew through the cracks. “It’s easier for me than it is for Quill. She still knows me.”

“Not really. Not who you’ve become.”

It took more effort than it should have to hide her discomfort at the sentiment. Nebula didn’t feel very different. The battle with Thanos, with herself, had proven otherwise, but at her core so much felt the exact same. She was still cold and callous and angry. Still unsure of what the future looked like. Still made up of more broken parts than whole ones. 

Gamora was the only one who looked at her the same. Or, at least, almost the same. The suspicion was there, always, but the resentment of their past had faded, replaced with something that, on rare occasions, looked like respect. 

Every other expression was reassuringly familiar. Frustration. Arrogance. Indifference. Skepticism. Nebula could handle a bit of doubt — it meant someone else questioned what the group saw in her. Someone else saw the truth.

“She knows enough.”

Rocket didn’t seem satisfied with her answer. If anything, he looked as uncomfortable as she felt. “All I’m trying to say is that I’m…I'm grateful, you know? You all gave everything you had to save me. I owe you guys.”

The guilt was as overwhelming as the relief had been earlier. He wouldn’t feel gratitude toward any of them if he knew what lines they’d had to cross. He wouldn’t sit this close if he knew what image was permanently programmed into her consciousness. 

“Okay, I know it’s a bit mushy, but you don’t have to look like you’re about to hurl—“

“We saw your file.” The words came quickly, too quickly to hide how she felt about them. To attempt nonchalance. Her eyes were glued to the kids, desperately trying to hold onto the image in front of her instead of the one waiting behind her eyes. “It was the only way to figure out how to deactivate the kill switch.”

“Ah. So that’s why you all keep looking at me like that.” 

She knew whatever expression he was talking about was likely the one she was currently wearing, so she kept her head forward, did her best to ignore his tone. 

Maybe it was because she’d spoken to him and hardly anyone else for five years. Maybe they just understood one another on a level that could bypass her own ineptitudes. Whatever the reason, she’d always recognized what he was feeling in a way that never quite clicked for the rest of their team. She could hear the sadness and embarrassment trying to hide behind indifference. She could hear resignation in his attempt at deflecting the seriousness of her confession. She could tell it was a lie. 

It was almost worse this way. Despite what she knew, she couldn’t figure out how to fix it. 

“I’m sorry, Rocket. For all of it.” She looked at him, tried to show the sincerity she suspected her voice wouldn’t, but now it was he who stared straight ahead instead of meeting her eyes. 

“Yeah, well, can’t be a Guardian without a tragic backstory, right? Just another part of the job.”

“No. It’s incomparable. What you went through, it’s worse than any of us.”

“Come on, Nebs. We’ve all suffered. I’m not special.”

“You were just a baby.”

“So were you.” His head turned quickly, the look on his face like an electric shock. He was angry now, and he wasn’t hiding an ounce of it. “You wanna compare childhoods? That’s fine. We can do that.”

“Rocket—“

“You think it doesn’t drive me crazy thinking about what he did? Finding fried nerve endings during each repair? Tracing his cruelty through every piece of machinery you never needed?” 

Nebula shook her head. “It’s not the same.”

“You’re right. It’s not. Thanos took so much more time from you. I got out young. I got to make my own choices. They were mostly stupid choices, but they were mine.”

“I wasn’t brainwashed or anything. I made choices, too.”

“You made decisions; you didn’t have choices.”

“Same thing.”

“No.” He was preaching now, invigorated with righteousness she couldn’t comprehend. “The difference is free will. Once I was out, I could go to whichever planet I pleased, do whatever I wanted. You spent nearly your whole life trapped in his shadow. Everything you did was because of him. It was all what he wanted.”

“You don’t understand.”

“I do.” There was an intensity in his voice, a passion that she hadn’t prepared for. “I may have been the one locked in a cage, but you were a prisoner, too, Nebula.”

He was trying to defend her. To defend her honor, her actions. The very ones that had led her to attack them, that had made her complicit in the deaths of so many people. It made her feel sick to her stomach, made her gears turn wrong and her sensitive flesh ache. 

“It’s not the same,” Nebula repeated, stubborn and defiant and desperate to make him understand.

“How? How is it not the same?”

“You didn’t deserve it.”

There was pain in his eyes, she could see it, but even though hurting him was the last thing she wanted to do, he had to know. He had to understand why they were so different. 

“Thanos never put a kill switch in me. I’ve checked. All that time he spent rewiring my body, and he never thought to wrap my heart in barbed wire like the High Evolutionary did to yours. Do you know why?”

“Because Thanos was a narcissist and not nearly as smart as he thought he was?”

“Because he knew he’d never need it.” She hated the desperation in her voice almost as much as she hated the truth of her words. “He knew I would never betray him, and that even if I did, even with all my enhancements, I’d never be strong enough to beat him. And he was right.”

It still haunted her. So many people dead, and if she’d been just a little better, a little faster, she could have prevented it all. She could have killed him where he sat, completely unexpecting, and watched as the shock and regret and pain flickered over his face before he finally bled out. She could have been worthy of the status they kept trying to place on her. She could have earned the look of admiration her old Gamora had left her with.

But she’d failed. The way she always had. Close, but not close enough. Nearly successful. An eternity of almost was once again stronger than her need for vengeance. 

Everything that followed was on her. The Terrans had looked at her and seen a savior, an ally, but only she had known it was a lie. Nebula had never saved anybody. All she’d done was delay the inevitable. 

“He was wrong.” Of all the responses she expected from him, that wasn’t one of them. 

“What do you mean?”

“You did betray him. You did beat him.” 

“Gamora betrayed him. Tony beat him. All I did was force Gamora’s hand.” 

It would have been better if she’d been broken. If she’d confessed. But she hadn’t known about the camera. She hadn’t known that he could see everything she could. That he’d robbed her of her privacy when he’d taken her eyes. It was the first thing she’d had Rocket remove when he was finally gone for good. But even that had been too late.

When Gamora had walked in, her first thought was that her sister would have succeeded. Once again, she’d found herself in the same place she always did: failures on display, her father staring at her with a smug kind of disappointment while Gamora watched from the safety of his shadow.  

They were different, though. Better. So she’d tried. She’d tried to ignore every instinct she had that screamed for her to remain silent. She tried to speak, to tell her to keep her mouth shut, to convince her sister that she wasn’t worth it. She’d tried to tell her to let her go. To deny him the one thing he’d always wanted, even if it went against everything they’d been raised to believe. Even if she was the cost 

Defiance was more difficult than she’d expected, especially considering she was relatively new to the concept. Torture, however, was not. She’d had plenty of practice with it. In between screams of agony and stretches of solitude, the same words echoed inside her head, keeping her grounded with purpose greater than her own survival. Even when her vision went blurry and her mind begged for relief, when her heart shuddered under the strain of sustaining whatever parts of her remained alive, she’d almost been able to withstand it. 

Almost.

But by the time her body remembered how to speak, they were already gone. 

All she was left with was the feeling of her sister’s hand gently holding her face. Every time she looked at this Gamora, every time they were forced to confront their tangled realities, she remembered one final moment of kindness. One she hadn’t deserved.

“It’s my fault he got the soul stone,” she said, her voice hoarse and hushed. “It’s my fault the snap happened.”

It was this consequence of her own inaction that stole her peace of mind and left her with fitful sleep. It was why she kept insisting that Gamora was alive and well when she knew it wasn’t that simple. There were questions she could not afford to answer. Not if she wanted to keep her. Keep them.

But Rocket deserved to know.

“I’m the reason she’s dead.”

It was the first time she’d said those words since their battle against Thanos. The first time she felt the weight of them. The truth of them. 

Attempting to hide the physical effect of her revelation would be a wasted effort. Rocket saw right through her, as he always did. He reached over, placed his hand on her shoulder, and Nebula did her best to not recoil at his touch. 

“That’s not your fault.”

“It is.” 

All this time they’d been traveling together, and she’d spent most of it waiting for them to put the pieces together. Waiting for one of them to throw the blame where it belonged and kick her out once and for all. To see right through her. A tiny, desperate part of her was still crying out, begging her to stop, to keep the truth buried and her position secure. But she’d never known how to do what was good for her. Self-preservation had always been her sister’s area of expertise. Heroics had been, too.

“I gave him everything he needed to bring his war to their doorstep. And when he did, I couldn’t even try and stop him. I was too busy stopping myself.”

“Nebula—“

“I didn’t beat him. The only person I beat was a more pathetic version of me.”

That was another sight she longed to avoid by starving off sleep. Sometimes, in her dreams, when the shot went off, her own chest began to bleed. Sometimes all the blood in her body was replaced with gears and bolts and wires, all spilling out of her with reckless abandon. Sometimes the younger version of herself begged for forgiveness, for mercy. Nebula never gave it to her. And she always woke up alone.

“I’m not talking about the battle. I’m talking about all this.” Rocket motioned around him. “He spent your whole life telling you that you weren’t good enough, or that you could only do what he wanted. But he’s gone. You’re not. And you’re thriving, Nebs. You’ve got a family. You’ve got your sister. You have everything, and he’s nothing more than a pile of dust polluting Earth’s atmosphere. You won.”

Nebula wanted to argue. She’d always had an image in her head of what winning looked like. Winning meant standing over another, blade held to their neck. Winning meant pinning the enemy to the ground, feeling the air slowly leaving their body until their muscles went limp. Winning was a physical, visceral thing.  

His description didn’t match. So either he was wrong, or she was. 

“You truly won,” she told him. “You got to fight him properly.”

“Eh. I had help.” He nearly smiled as he said it. Like it was already a fond memory. She supposed it was, in a way, although tonight would never be just another fight. Not for any of them, but certainly not for her. 

It was less the battle and more its location that was hard to shake. Every detail of that atrocious ship remained, even after its destruction. Dark, cold, tiny cells. Constant supervision, constant neglect. It was bad enough imagining a young Rocket in that kind of environment; it was unbearable considering the fact that it may have been worse. 

“Do you remember it?” She almost didn’t want to ask. If she didn’t, she could pretend the answer was no. She could live in blissful ignorance and believe he got to hold onto something she never would.

Rocked nodded. Nebula tried not to memorize the haunted look in his eyes, but she’d never had a choice. Everything always stayed forever. “I remember all of it.”

The rage simmered quietly. She did her best to keep it contained. “How do you stand it?”

“I don’t know. Try to focus on the good, I guess.”

“There was good?” Her voice cracked slightly, but she didn’t have it in her to care. All night she’d been drowning in sorrow, in waves of damaged pasts and presents and inevitable futures, but with one sentence he’d thrown her a lifeline. She clung to it desperately. 

“Yeah,” he said, and for the first time all day, his eyes lit up. “There was a lot of good.”

“Tell me about it.”

He didn’t hesitate. They’d spoken about their pasts before, bragged about conquests and enemies defeated, alluded to scars they each refused to share, but she’d never heard him speak with such bliss before. Such fondness. 

She learned how he met his group. Lyla and Floor and Teefs and him. Friends. Survivors. The ones who had no idea they were never supposed to make it, but who found joy in the life they were given anyway. 

Staying true to his word, he focused only on the good. Inside jokes and moments of comfort. The games they’d play to pass the time. The laughter found in the corners of cages and dreams of a world that was waiting for them. 

As he spoke, she swore she could see it. Four heads coming together. Metal fused to bone, linking them all through the bars. A ship flying away into a clear and infinite sky. And in the center of it all was her best friend, amidst the horror and agony of an experiment’s existence, loving and being loved back. 

She didn’t ask what happened to them. He didn’t need to say it. The unspoken words were loud enough.

“I always thought that I’d never had a family until Groot. Until you guys.” There was a distant look in his eyes, like some part of him was still staring at those who weren’t here anymore. “But maybe I did.”

It flared then, before she could compel it away. The jealousy. Green and ugly and tainting something beautiful.

She’d always wondered how it had been so easy for them to form this stupid little family of theirs. How her sister had fit in so quickly, so flawlessly. How Quill and Drax could understand something she couldn’t. But now, the pieces were all falling into place, and she could finally see what separated them from her:

They had all been loved. 

No wonder it had been so hard for her to carve a space out for herself. No wonder she’d needed Rocket’s help to do it. She was deficient. They’d all had a blueprint, and she was walking in completely blind. Worse, what she lacked was something so intrinsic that nobody had ever thought to search for its absence. 

Or maybe they had. Maybe that had been the driving force behind the hesitation, the looks of suspicion that greeted her upon their return from the dust. Maybe they’d all known that she had never learned how to love properly. How to be loved. Maybe that was why they hadn’t wanted her.

“I wouldn’t have made it without them,” Rocket said, and the far off look was gone, replaced with something much more determined. “That’s how I know I couldn’t have survived what you went through. I couldn’t have survived alone.”

“I wasn’t alone.” Even when she knew it was technically the truth, it still felt like a lie.

Rocket let her have it. “Do you remember your life before him?” 

“Not really.” She’d always known it was intentional, that he’d given her an infallible memory by wiping nearly everything except his own arrival. He’d told her as much. Said it would help her focus. Help her win.

What remained were flashes, mostly. Faces like hers. Skin that was monochromatic. Someone’s hand squeezing her own. Her body, despite lacking the part in question, still recalled the sensation, sent phantom feelings through her metal fingers. It remembered that, at one point in time, when she was made up entirely of flesh and bone, and machinery was something she used instead of something she was, someone had held her. 

She liked to imagine it was her brother. She liked to pretend she’d had one of those. It made Gamora’s rejection easier to swallow as a kid, to picture someone else out there, a real sibling, waiting for her to come home. 

She’d stopped dreaming about him after he took her hand. Part of her always wondered whether her father had known, somehow, what images her subconscious had conjured up. Whether he’d cut that fantasy out of her, too.

“Have you ever looked into it? Tried to go home?”

Nebula shook her head. “Even if it’s still standing, I can never go back. It’s…I’m too different. I’m not one of them anymore.”

“He doesn’t get to decide that.” He reached into his pocket and grabbed one of the tiny raccoons. “I may not be able to communicate with them, or understand them, but I’ll always be a raccoon.” Nebula watched as it crawled up his arm and around his shoulder. It moved like it belonged there. Like it knew it was safe. “I spent a lot of time convinced that I was an anomaly. Told myself it made me special instead of lonely. But it’s nice, knowing where in this dumb galaxy I came from. Knowing that I’m not alone.” 

He smiled, puffed his chest out just a bit, and added, “Even if there still ain’t no thing like me, except me.”

She’d always liked when he said that. She’d thought it was one thing they shared. The proof she had of her own value. But he couldn’t face judgment from his species. He didn’t have to be afraid of losing home for a second time. He wasn’t to blame for his alienation.

Nebula wanted to believe him. She wanted to think that she could find some kind of catharsis in following her roots to a life she never got to live. But she’d always known she wasn’t the only one of her kind. Her individuality, as he called it, was meant to justify her continued existence; she was supposed to be the best of her people because she’d been changed. 

Isolation from them was the point. Without it, she risked discovery of one of two possible truths. Either her people were weak, and he had been right to tear her apart, or they were strong, and her deficiencies were entirely her own. 

Neither would give comfort. And nothing would be healed from knowing.

That was why she’d stayed. Her people wouldn’t understand, but she thought he had. She thought they were the same, twin reflections of their makers’ mistakes. But maybe the only thing Rocket’s words proved for her was her inevitable loneliness. Maybe all this time nodding her head in agreement was just another one of her pathetic attempts to convince herself that she was more than damaged parts. Maybe she’d taken this mantra he’d held close to his chest and corrupted it so deeply that it was now unrecognizable, its meaning lost somewhere in translation.

Maybe everyone who’d ever called her a monster had been right.

“Do you hate yourself?” 

He choked on her question. “Damn, Nebs. That’s what you took from my whole speech?” 

She did her best to ignore the whisper that said she’d done it wrong again. Listened wrong. Responded wrong. Failed. Like combat, conversation was another field Gamora continued to best her in. The sting of defeat echoed even now. 

Part of her wanted to abandon the effort entirely, but the restlessness would never fade if she didn’t see this through. “Answer the question.” She hesitated for half a second, before adding, "Please.”

Rocket didn’t speak for a while. Nebula didn’t mind. She could be patient when she needed to be. 

“I don’t know,” he finally said. “Maybe. Do you?”

“I didn’t think so. I thought I hated everyone else. But Mant said we all do, except Drax. Now I’m not sure.”

“I wanna say she’s full of shit, but it’s hard to argue with the fucking empath. She’s probably right.”

That had been her thought process as well. It had been distressing, thinking only of herself as the subject of Mantis’s observation. It had felt like another loss, somehow. But she was used to losing. 

What she hadn’t considered was the understanding that came a little later. The implication that she was not the only one stuck beneath the crushing weight of self-loathing. Quill as of late had been impossible to ignore, but Rocket was supposed to be better than them. He was supposed to be happy. And yet even now, when the dust had settled and everybody had made it back home, he refused to deny it. He wouldn’t even try to convince her otherwise.

On the ship, she had accepted the truth of Mantis’s words without much of a fight; now, however, the admission of defeat she’d prepared tasted like ash and burned just the same.

“Rocket?“

“Yeah?”

“I don’t want her to be right about this.”

Rocket stared at her, intense look in his eyes, and when he spoke, she believed him. “Me, neither.”

The quiet came back, interrupted only by the occasional chatter coming from the children. There had always been a kind of comfort to it. With no distractions, she could hear someone sneaking up behind her. She could always be prepared to fight. 

He’d asked, once. When it was just them. Rocket had been the one to cave, to take Quill’s device and fill the ship with music. While she’d offered no resistance, she’d had no qualms about the quiet. He’d questioned it, eventually, so she’d given her logical response: silence was safer.

It was true, even if it wasn’t the entire truth. 

But how could she confess to living her whole life in something the others found so off-putting? She couldn’t tell him that it was easier. That she didn’t have to know the right thing to say if nobody ever spoke. That she could blend into the shadows, melt into the quiet best she could, so that nobody could spot her faults. So that nobody could punish her for them.

Nebula suspected he’d figured it out anyway, because more than anybody else, he indulged her. In spite of his Quill-level attachment to that tiny music machine, he gave her moments like this, with nothing to do but stare straight ahead and not make a sound. She knew it drove him crazy after a while, but he always stayed. He never made her live in it alone.

A kid ran up to them, breaking their shared solitude. Nebula watched her mime something, repeating the same motions and incomprehensible phrases. 

“Rocket,” she asked quietly, keeping her eyes on the kid, “you don’t happen to speak this child’s language, do you?” 

“Nope.”

“Of course not.”

Something in her face must have communicated her lack of understanding, because the kid ran off, only to return with another girl in hand.

The theatrics began again, the girls looking at her with an abundance of hope and excitement. It was grossly misplaced. “I have no idea what any of that means, kid.” 

She turned expectantly toward Rocket, but all he did was shrug. “I’ve got nothing. This language isn’t like anything I’ve ever heard.”

“Really? You could understand the tree, but not this?”

“Hey, I’m not the one with a computer in my head. It’s not my fault nobody programmed this language into you.”

“You’re the one who's been updating my systems, so that is technically your fault.”

Whatever he was going to say back was interrupted by the kid. Nebula turned toward her, and this time, something in the mimicry clicked. “You want me to braid your hair?”

In place of an answer, the kid just turned around and sat excitedly on the step in front of her. 

Nebula hesitated. What should have been simple was, as most things were, infinitely more complicated. But the kid turned around, a confused and slightly impatient look on her face, so she reached forward and began going through the motions.

“You know how to braid hair?” Rocket asked, not attempting to hide his surprise.

“Yes.” She answered with more confidence than she felt, considering her knowledge was only theoretical. 

She used to watch Gamora braid her hair all the time. Whenever they were alone, whenever they were getting ready to fight, she was always moving her hands so quickly, turning each strand into something beautiful. Something her own.

It took a little over six months before she finally caught her watching. They were still kids, and she’d yet to master the art of subtle reconnaissance. Rather than cower out of guilt, Nebula had found the bravery to ask how she did it. 

Gamora had snapped at her. Made some snide comment about her not even having hair, so why would she want to know how to braid it? 

I wasn’t always like this was what she’d longed to say back. But with Gamora, her words had always seemed to disappear when she needed them most, so all she’d done was storm off and prepare to fight again, confident that this time, she would be victorious. 

She was not. But when she woke up on the operating table, she found Gamora sitting in front of her. Braiding. Her movements were slower, more deliberate. Intentional. Despite having nothing in her own hands, Nebula found herself copying her sister. 

The next day, the moment had been forgotten. Dismissed, as if it never happened. Gamora still glared at her, still held nothing back. Offered no mercy. Their whole childhood was made up of those constant contradictions. 

No wonder this family shit was still so hard.

Pleasing the kid was much easier. One simple braid down her back had the girl squealing, and suddenly she had a line of expectant eyes.

She should have said no. It was her nature, after all. Her tolerance for this kind of thing was historically low. But now that she’d tried it, she was beginning to understand why Gamora spent so much time on her hair. There was something calming about it, in the same manner as cleaning a weapon or adjusting her hand. The repetition, the simplicity, the singular object of her focus, it made her shoulders feel less tight and her mind less cluttered. She didn’t want to stop.

Staring at the children, Nebula was reminded of a conversation she’d had years ago. A vow she’d made, one she’d thought completed with the death of her father, even if it didn’t come at her own hand. But perhaps she’d been premature in declaring that oath officially fulfilled. Perhaps there was still work to be done.

A path began to fork before her, two possible futures lying in wait. With it, a decision to be made: return to what was, or try and see what could be. 

No. Not a decision. She silently conceded to Rocket’s earlier argument as she realized that this — for possibly the first time in her life — was a choice. A choice about where to go. What to do. Who to do it with. A choice entirely untouched by her father, or her sister, or anybody else. It was hers alone to make.

If she picked wrong, there would be no one to shoulder the blame. No sister to resent or teammates to berate. No fault to give to anyone but herself. 

Nebula wasn’t afraid. Fear wasn’t part of her programming. But she hadn’t felt this vulnerable, this apprehensive of her own potential actions, since her standoff with herself. 

One road called to her, beckoned toward a life that used to be completely inconceivable. But it offered no assurances. No guarantee that it wouldn’t end in disaster. No proof that it was the right choice. 

More than that, she had no reason to believe that the act of choosing for herself wasn’t simply another one of her many shortcomings. As a child, she’d been too imaginative, wasting her time with dreams of sisterhood and family eagerly awaiting her return. She’d suffered greatly for it. What was to say that she wasn’t doing the same now? What trust could she put into a future she envisioned, when her mind had often been the cause of her perpetual downfall?

No. Her entire body stiffened as she forced the barrage of questions to come to a screeching halt. This was doubt. Nothing more than the erosive effect of insecurity, determined on dragging her back with each step she tried to take forward. She could taste its familiar bitterness, could identify it as a lingering side effect of her time spent under her father’s suffocating grip and her sister’s relentless judgment. 

Diagnosing the feeling didn’t rid her or it. Some part of her still longed for a command. Still trusted the word of others over her own. Still believed in the faults he’d claimed to see in her. He was gone, but she was not truly free. The shackles remained.

Rocket didn’t see her that way. He believed she’d survived captivity. He saw her as liberated. More than that, he saw her as victorious. Like so many things in this world, she didn’t understand it. 

But she wanted to.

“Do you think it’s possible?” For the second time, she broke their comfortable silence. 

“Do I think what’s possible?”

“This.” She motioned around her. “Getting over ourselves. Proving Mantis wrong. Building a life here.”

“Honestly? I’m not sure. But you and I should be dead a hundred times over by now, and we're not. So maybe anything’s possible.”

Nebula didn’t say anything, just continued braiding. Rocket leaned against her side, his own babysitting duties no longer needed as the tiny raccoons cozied up in his lap. She didn’t know how long they sat there, her braiding and him watching. Long enough for the restlessness to ease. For more kids to have braided hair than not. For the sound of his relaxed breaths to replace each labored one she’d cherished and dreaded hearing over the past few days. 

She kept expecting him to leave. To get the rest she knew he needed, or find someone else who could offer a better distraction. But he stayed. And in the midst of the tranquil monotony, she silently thanked her uncanny endurance for allowing her access to a moment like this. 

Eventually, the first girl came back. “I did you already,” Nebula told her. But now the kid was tugging at the very hair she’d just knotted together. 

Rolling her eyes, Nebula nudged Rocket. “Start taking them out,” she told him as she passed the kid to her left. 

Rocket looked at her blankly. “I don’t know how to do that.”

She wasn’t sure what happened next. Another error of her systems. A possible side effect of spending nearly seventy-two hours awake. A complete break in sanity. Whatever the cause, Nebula immediately began laughing. 

It was uncontrollable. Irrational. Loud and off putting in a way she couldn’t exactly describe. She half expected him to stare at her incredulously, or ask if she needed her wires adjusted somewhere. 

But instead, he joined her. The kids followed suit, even though they had no way of knowing what was so funny. She hardly knew herself. But maybe the only thing that mattered was the sound, not its cause. 

“You’re telling me,” she said when she finally caught her breath, “that you can build anti-gravity shoes without breaking a sweat, but undoing a braid is too complicated for you?”

“Hey, that’s not what I—“

“I thought you were supposed to have this fancy big brain. Isn’t that what got us into this mess in the first place?” 

“You know, I don’t think you’re allowed to make fun of me on the day I almost died.”

“You lived.”

His sarcastic smile melted into something sincere. “Yeah. We all did.”

Even though she knew she didn’t have a choice, she decided that if she did, she would commit that sentence to memory. 

“Give it your best shot,” she said as she shoved the kid in his direction. “I’m sure you’ll figure it out.” 

Rocket rolled his eyes, but sure enough, he managed to quickly take out the knot at the bottom and detangle the hair. The braids were tight, but his hands were small and moved quickly, and soon he had his own line nearly as long as hers. 

Nebula looked down, paused midway through the braid. These hands — which were cut off and rebuilt for one purpose, which were covered in blood and burns that could never scar, which longed for the sensation of a ghost's touch — they were still able to bring joy. 

She smiled again, only this time, she knew the reasons for it. She smiled because she’d proven Gamora wrong. She smiled because she knew, even with the lingering doubt, what path to choose. Mostly, she smiled because she was beginning to understand Rocket’s theory about winning. Each surgery had been done with specific intent, but maybe this was the reason she kept failing in spite of them. Maybe her father had been wrong. She was not made to kill, or fight, or win, but simply to braid and unbraid a child’s hair, unburdened by fatigue or pain or the passing of time. 

That was victory enough. 

[tomatoluvr69]

useless complaint post literally you don’t have to bother reading this it will just help me to rant a bit

This is sooooo not a real issue I’m just in the throes of pmdd but like I have a bunch of semi-expected (but way earlier than I’d thought) unemployed time so I’m using its alignment with the warm weather to go backpacking/live out of my car in [nearby national park and national forests] but right now I feel zero enthusiasm and I really hope it’s not gonna suck bc my heart’s not in it…like if I’m kind of doing it out of obligation bc it’s unusual to have such an extended span of time off when you’re an adult, then am I going to have the drive to get thru the parts that suck, like the exhaustion of steep trail days, the days when it storms so hard you have zero dry gear, etc. but really the part that I’m the most trepidatious about is the loneliness. But it’s so weird bc I’m struggling socially here and I really think some extended alone time would help?? But it’s always hard and I don’t want to lololol. Honestly what would help this the most is to just wait until after my fucking period. But as it is right now I feel like I’m just going thru the motions. If I could fucking live in my house for the equivalent amount of time without my social life encroaching I absolutely would but I’m so burnt out from my close friends leaving and from my last dear relationship here being at times really tough (it’s one that feels like my well-being rides on it— when it’s good, I’m on top of the world, when it’s not I’m hurt and confused and crawling out of my own skin). I still have a community here but it feels like it’s my roommates’ world, and I’m a guest whose presence is like…anodyne at best? And I really think I’ve just latched onto the idea of my trip as a vague mental escape hatch and haven’t really grasped the idea of the fact that I’ll still be present in my ailing brain and treacherous body when I go on the trip— I’m not just taking a nap from my (admittedly spoiled little baby) problems. And when I did the same thing for 3 or 4 weeks last summer I was dropped off & picked up, which created a really nice incentive to stay on trail— to leave, I’d have had to somehow communicate & coordinate with the relatives who’d agreed on a set date to come pick me up, i.e. effectively trapping me in the woods so I’d stay when I got all grumpy or sad or began semi-hallucinating human voices or was ready to throw it all away to get my hands on a slice of pepperoni pizza and a big old kombucha lol.

Anyways this is such not a real problem but me ol’ paranoid ass is convinced a whole passel of my irls have this blog’s url so I can’t freely complain about what’s really bothering me, which is that I’m starting to see harbingers of the devastating dissolution of my closest relationship. Or, even worse, my relegation to a much more distant connection. And I’m trying desperately to convince myself I should stay in this fucking town, because I’m suuuuuuuuper prone to just fleeing when I start to feel [inaudible], which is a super unsustainable way to live my life and o know it’s not [city] I’m trying to flee but myself which scientists are telling me I can’t physically do…but is that the truth?? Or is the truth that I actually do need a clean break from [redacted]…or is that just a convenient lie I’m telling myself so I can flee again. Or is THAT a convenient lie I’m telling myself so that I can keep my head in the sand and keep [redacted]. It’s so cool how you can’t trust your own heart and mind and you might just suffer from uncertainty forever and you’ll die chasing happiness with the grass always greener but also like pmdd and I don’t really want to go on this trip but I think I must. I think…

[nothing-narrative]

Have you ever looked at your hands?

Have you ever looked at your city?

Smelled it. Heard it. Felt the touch of its cobbles underboot. Annihilated your ego in a crowd of Christmas shoppers on a busy street.

I don't go out enough because if I do I fear that I'll lose the city that lives in my mind; that an unlovable reality will take its place. Or worse yet I fear that my love will leak out, be drained from me like so much blood from a slaughtered hog.

There's the tourist traps and the sights to see and the seaside and the museums and the opera houses and the shopping malls and the grandiose palaces of royalty old now repurposed for royalty elect.

That one street where all the partying used to be, all the hookers, the 'bad' part of town, in both senses of the word. The anarchist commune-turned-drug dealing hotspot at constant odds with the police.

Going down the street to the supermarket is painful enough. I smile and wave and when I see someone, queer, goth, weird, possessed, alien, doll, witch, fool, angel, demon, a small part of me rejoice because I am so very very very very very very very very lonely.

Every second of every minute of every hour of every day of every week of every month of every year of every decade of every lifetime. A false loneliness that I could tell you every psychological facet of and every childhood and teenagehood and adulthood trauma, every connection denied, every treatment-resistant mental illness, all of it.

It's growing cold out there. I hope there aren't anyone sleeping in the streets tonight, though I know there is. I hope there's someone or several someones out there who feels the same as I do about it and I know we'll forever more pass one another like strangers in the crowd.

There's a city in my head full of people I pretend to know the character of. It's the one I allegedly live in.

I think everyone has a city like that. Streets of nameless emotion. Looking out on it through the window, of a coffee shop or a train.

One day the sea might take back all the works of man.

One day the city might take me.

With both hands.

[dearestagony]

"I CAN'T FEEL ANYTHING AT ALL! THIS LOVE HAS LEAD ME TO THE END!" - breaking benjamin, red cold river.

"EMBRACE THE LIFE OF TRAGETY! A TIDE OF WAR AND BROKEN DREAMS!" - breaking benjamin, torn in two.

DearestAgony, just let go of me...

A STORY IN :: childhood trauma, socially awkwardness, dealing with the loss of a loved one, having one night stands with strangers, feeling trapped in your own home, falling in love, betrayal, broken hearts, found family, being kind to everyone you meet, feeling bitter about your past, supernatural creatures, and eternal loneliness.

"I WILL CLEAN YOUR FUCKIN' MESS AND LEAVE NO TRACE OF EVIDENCE!" - breaking benjamin, break my fall.

DearestAgony is an independent, private, highly selective, original character roleplay blog, featuring Prudence Stine, Annaleigh Lancaster, Lenny Grayson, and other original characters.

This blog is multiverse, multi-ship, and cross-over friendly. Established May 11th, 2024. Written and Loved by Ash / Ashheart. Mun is 21+ and goes by she & her pronouns. Please read my google document before interacting.

GOOGLE DOCUMENT. // INTEREST CHECKER. // RP MEMES TAG. // OTHER BLOGS :: SCOOBYNATRAL. ASHHEARTHELPS. BLUEFURRSMEMES. OFMIDNIGHTSREBLOGS.

"WHAT I'VE FOUND IN THIS TOWN! I'M HEADED FOR A BREAK DOWN!" - breaking benjamin, breakdown.

WANTED CONNECTIONS. A more detailed list will be featured on my google document. My muses are looking for :: friends, enemies, romantic partners, familial ships - basically any ship you can come up with.

WANTED FANDOMS. Here is a list of fandoms that I'd love to have my characters interact with. I am open to interacting with fandoms not on this list. These are just some of my favorites.

Yu-gi-oh! Duel Monsters, Yu-gi-oh! GX, Yu-gi-oh! 5DS, Naruto / Naruto Shippuden, Supernatural, Charmed, The Vampire Diaries && Spin Offs, Bones, Criminal Minds, One Chicago, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Angel the Series, Ouran HighSchool Host Club, Noragami, Snow White with the Red Hair, Fruits Basket, Scooby-Doo, Kingdom Hearts, Stardew Valley, Mystic Messenger, Disney, Sonny with a Chance, Grey's Anatomy, That 70's Show and Spin Offs, Pretty Little Liars and Spin Offs, Friends, and more to come!

[brutclhonesty]

★ spotted!! RYLAN YOUNG on the cover of this week’s most recent tabloid! many say that the 28 year old looks like MADELAINE PETSCH, but i don’t really see it. while the MAKEUP ARTIST is known for being SHARP WITTED my inside sources say that they have a tendency to be HARSH i swear, every time i think of them, i hear the song SHE’S SO MEAN by MATCHBOX TWENTY

details.

name: rylan young

dob: may 20th, 1996

zodiac: taurus

face claim: madelaine petsch

gender identity: cis female

sexuality: bisexual

profession: makeup artist

hometown: san diego, ca

spoken languages: english

positive traits: resilient, creative, strong, bold, fearless

negative traits: emotionally detached, self-medicating, guarded, afraid to be vulnerable

about.

Rylan Young was born into the glamorous world of celebrity but was given up for adoption by her famous mother when she was just a newborn. Her birth mother, a well-known actress, couldn’t keep her due to the pressures of fame and a demanding career. Rylan was adopted by a loving but financially modest couple who did their best to give her a stable home.

Unfortunately, tragedy struck when Rylan’s father passed away when she was fifteen. Her mother, overwhelmed by grief and frustration, began to turn her anger towards Rylan, blaming her for the loss of her husband. The once warm and supportive home became a place of blame and hostility.

Feeling trapped and unloved, Rylan decided to leave her small town and move up to Los Angeles as soon as she graduated high school. Her goal was both to find her birth parents and also figure out a life for herself in a different place, one with less ghosts than her home town. While she didn't actually meet her biological father, the move marked a new chapter in her life.

In Los Angeles, Rylan found a way to channel her creativity into a career as a makeup artist, attending cosmetology school and quickly building a name for herself in the competitive Hollywood scene, working with many celebrities and taking part in many award winning films and shows. Her determination made her hard to ignore, and her talent plus her work ethic is what keeps her steadily employed.

Now twenty-eight, with a striking appearance of vibrant red hair and an edgy style that matches her guarded personality, she is a hard to ignore. Her childhood traumas and the difficult relationship with her mother have made her very wary of forming close connections, which means Rylan keeps people at arm’s length, choosing to remain emotionally distant and cold. Despite this, she has a reputation for being the life of the party. She often immerses herself in the nightlife, using social events and parties as a way to numb the pain of her past and escape from her feelings of loneliness.

Rylan is incredibly resilient, and works hard to channel all her frustration and emotions into her work. Despite the hardships she faced, she managed to carve out a successful career in a tough industry. Her ability to reinvent herself and keep pushing forward is a testament to her strength.

However, she can be emotionally detached, and has a tendency to self-medicate through partying. Her guarded nature makes it hard for her to form meaningful relationships, and her fear of vulnerability often leaves her feeling isolated.

[xsadcorebenji]

observations_20230916

still without car in a town rather punitive to those who want to walk

on the lonely walk back i pass by

a parked car filled with belongings

i peek in and see someone sleeping, and can only think to myself what a relatable sight

sometimes wonder was i really better off not being in that position

but the lonesome confines of the car far and nowhere breeds monotony and in the depravity of the mundane stillness of time passing, a swelling sadness

on the wander back was a field and i wanted to lay down for a moment just to breathe the air that surrounds

yet all the signs that surround that scream

"private property" a harsh reminder that so many people would cast away their own agency for false security

comfortable convenience

on the pathway back, thought of my friend last night who drove me home, and his attempts to drive back several different ways back to break up routine

always fascinated by the habits of people who served wartime, as they seem to exhibit the same loneliness i do

the same cravings of breaks in routine

and the harrowing experience of abandon and the solitude and the waiting,

broke apart by a series of hyperactive intense moments only to be shoved back into a lazy calm, and an exhaust between the rapid shifts

was joined in the last bit back by a neighbor, we spoke a bit about nothing in particular and i welcomed the temporary companion

then wondered about how temporary and brief are all moments of cammaderies, companionship and otherwise

the harrowing taste of "nothing contains meaning"

well then why echo anything that gives the conscious being the emotion that they're "disposable"

everyone is "replaceable"

maddening aftertaste of a commodity culture

neighbor breaks asks if i understood his english and it was well spoken, but could only imagine the impatience he must've experienced from others to even ask

prior to writing this on the concept of writing i contemplated how rupi kaur really stained the taste of poetics on the tongues of many

and even then nothing feels more contrived than wax poetics which spells misery

as this was my solace prior to all these strangers invading my space and making a mockery of it

i write to conversate and connect

when you read my words do you feel anything at all?

do you feel close to me?

do you feel this all just a farce?

i miss the soft taste of spitting out my musings in an ethos without expecting echo just to be discovered and cherished by another

but now everytime i talk it feels like i am trapped in a shipwreck in a bottle

the pieces are all here

and it's easy to repair

but no one would dare

do words drink hallucinitory as

absinthe

in a vial so vile

with the afterwash of bile?

poetry demysterified and everyone can shitstain the airways with their clumsy words

and if any fury nestled in me

is watching those words get lauded over mine

and how dare you tell me to self-love

yet when i desire the same, you'd call me arrogant

then what should i do of invaded spaces?

i wonder if my words ever reached you

and i wonder if you felt like they meant anything at all

your perception of me is very subjective

and all i have is the mirror and my own perception of me.

a hall of mirrors in a solitude that rhymes to the beat of punitive solitary confinement

the prison panopticon must be everywhere then

well i just wanted the bittersweet taste of the unadulterated joy

that comes from shared hearts

could you carry me in two chambers of your heart?

and should i settle for half-hearted when no-hearted speaks abundant

all the therapy speak makes it feel like the half hearts are "healthy"

is it a miserable estate when i want to settled for three fourths your heart?

to health and other glass vases