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dumdumsun · 2 years

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Break and Mend

A/N: Welcome back! If you guys haven't seen the post linked at the end of my pinned post, then you can find it here. I recommend you read it as it's important as one of my readers. I would appreciate it a lot <3

Warnings: a panic attack, mentions of PTSD, murder, death/dying, blood and alcohol

Word Count: 2732

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Chapter Two: Moving Forward

After the usual routine of weighing him, drawing his blood, taking his blood pressure and taping the wires to his head, Will was fully prepped for his usual talk with his usual doctor. He, Joyce and Hopper all sat in the room in silence, Will laying in the patient’s chair until the door to the room opened. In stepped Dr Sam Owens, a small smile on his face.

“Sir Will, how are you? Mom, Pop,” He greeted the three before moving over beside Will, sitting down in a nearby chair and scanning his folder. “Let’s take a look, see what’s going on here. I see you shaved off a pound since we saw you last. Must be making room for all that Halloween candy,” He joked, receiving a quiet scoff of amusement from Will. “What’s your favorite candy? Desert island candy, if you had to pick one?”

“I don’t know.” Will shrugged.

“Come on. Life or death situation, what would you pick?”

“I guess, uh,” He glanced over at Joyce, who mouthed a random candy name to him. “Reese’s Pieces.”

“Good call. Good call,” Owens looked up from his folder. “I’m more of a Mounds guy, but I gotta say, peanut butter and chocolate, come on, hard to beat that. Alright, tell me what’s going on with you. Tell me about this episode you had.”

There was a bit of silence before the boy answered, “Well, my friends were there and then they just weren’t, and I was back there again.”

“In the Upside Down?” Owens asked, Will nodding. “Alright, so what happened next?”

“I heard this noise, and so I went outside, and it was worse.”

“How was worse?”

“There was this storm.”

“Okay. So, how did you feel when you saw the storm?”

Will narrowed his eyes. “I felt… frozen.”

“Heart racing?”

“Just frozen.”

“Frozen, cold frozen? Frozen to the touch?”

“No,” He shook his head. “Like how you feel when you’re scared, and you can’t breathe or talk or do anything. I felt… felt this evil, like it was looking at me.”

“It was evil? Well,” Owens shifted and cleared his throat. “What do you think the evil wanted?”

“To kill.”

“To kill you?”

“Not me,” Will whispered, making eye contact with the doctor. “Everyone else.”

A silence fell over the room as Hopper and Joyce shifted in their seats. Dr Owens blinked before slowly nodding. “Okay… so, when did you come out of this episode? Was there anyone with you when you shook yourself out of it?”

Will hesitated. He had failed to mention that he had seen Doc in the Upside Down with him. He had heard her, had felt her. And while he knew it wasn’t best to keep certain information from the doctor, it was dangerous for more people to know about her. What she was and what she could do. So, Will decided to only be half honest.

“Yeah,” He cleared his throat. “My friend, (Y/N). She found me outside. When she touched my arm, I was back here. I didn’t even know she was there.”

“Has she ever been around during an episode?”

Honestly, he answered. “No.”

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That evening, at the Wheeler residence, the family sat around the table for dinner. All except for Nancy, who was with Steve at a dinner with Barbara’s parents. The family dinner had been quiet save for the scraping of utensils and the sounds Holly would make. Doc was sitting beside her brother, who sat stiffly and only picked at his food. Earlier on, she had to hear Mike get a talking to from their parents about his recent behavior, which put the boy in his usual unpleasant mood.

“After dinner, I want you two to pick out your toys for the yard sale.” Karen finally spoke.

“Okay.”

“Fine.”

“Michael, two boxes’ worth.”

Mike’s head snapped up. “Two boxes?”

“You heard me.”

“I’m fine with you giving away a couple, but the other ones have way too much emotional value.”

“Emotional value?”

“They’re hunks of plastic, Michael.” Ted spoke through the food in his mouth.

But Mike wouldn’t let up. “You already took away my Atari. And why doesn’t Doc have to give away so much of her stuff?!”

“(Y/N) didn’t steal from Nancy.” Karen calmly answered, Doc shrinking in her seat.

“I didn’t steal. I borrowed.”

“Oh, and you didn’t curse out Mr Kowalski last week either, right? Or plagiarize that essay? Or graffiti the bathroom stall?”

“Everyone graffities the bathroom stall.”

“So, if your friend jumps off a cliff, you’re gonna jump, too?” Ted asked.

Doc carefully watched her brother’s expression, remembering that Mike had in fact jumped off a cliff for the safety of their friend once before. The boy only rolled his eyes as Karen continued, “We know you’ve had a hard year, Michael. But we’ve been patient. This isn’t strike one. This isn’t even strike three.”

“It’s strike twenty. You’re on the bench, son. And if it’d been my coach, you’d be lucky to still be on the team.”

Both Mike and Doc narrowed their eyes at the odd analogy their father had been using.

“I mean, (Y/N)’s been having a rough year, too, and you don’t see her going off the rails, do you?” Karen gestured to her daughter, who ducked her head to hide her face from Mike, who was staring at her in annoyance. “Two boxes. Two.”

Mike huffed before harshly stabbing his fork into his food. Doc had decided not to add in her two cents on the argument. Her parents and brother were already heated (well, Karen and Mike were, Ted was indifferent to just about everything), and she didn’t want to get any taste of what Mike had gotten in just a few short hours. So, she tried to lighten the mood.

“Um… Brenda wants to have a sleepover with me and Sheriece at her house this weekend. Is that okay?” She quietly asked.

“Sure, sweetie. What are you girls gonna do?”

“I don’t know. I think we were gonna help Mrs Holloway bake cookies. Oh, and I was gonna make Brenda’s sister, Heather, a dress. So, we were gonna discuss fabric and designs…”

Karen smiled warmly. “Sounds exciting, sweetie.”

After dinner, Doc had gone to her room to start picking out toys to give away. Over a year ago, she had grown out of her Barbie dolls and Holly hadn’t taken interest in most of them, so she supposed those could be a good start. Entering her room, Doc frowned when she saw that the box that was once on her bed was no longer there. Sighing out, she figured Mike might have taken it since he needed one box more than he first thought. Exiting her room, she descended the staircase and headed towards the basement. Opening the door, she was going to shout down to her brother had she not heard his voice.

“El, are you there? El? It’s me. It’s Mike. It’s day 352, 7:40 pm. I’m still here.”

Heart shattering, she slowly began down the stairs, making sure to stay as silent as possible to not disturb him.

“If you’re out there, say something. Or give me a sign. I won’t even say anything. Just… I wanna know if you’re okay… I’m so stupid,” Mike muttered before pushing down the antenna to his walkie and standing. Just before he was about to walk away, he heard the crackling of static and a faint voice.

“Mike.”

Not noticing his sister past the beating of his heart, he rushed back over to the fort and dove for his walkie. “Hello, is that you?!”

“Yeah, it’s me, Dustin. What’re you doing on this channel again? I’ve been trying to reach you all day. We were right. Max is Mad Max.”

“Yeah, I’m busy.”

“But-”

Mike pushed down the antenna again and his eyes moved up to Doc, who was now standing before him patiently, wide-eyed. “What.”

She cleared her throat and straightened her posture. “Did you, uh… Did you take my box?”

“What?”

“The box sitting on my bed that I was gonna use for my stuff going to the yard sale. Did you take it?”

Standing up, Mike sighed heavily. “Yeah. So what?”

“What do you mean? Why did you take it?”

“You don’t need it. Mom’s not making you fill two boxes. I need it more than you do.”

“That doesn’t make it okay for you to just go into my room and take things without asking. You didn’t at least think to ask me first?”

Mike widened his eyes and threw his arms out to the side. “What the hell does it matter?!”

“It matters, Mike. It really does.”

“You’re seriously about to stand there and hound me over a box? Seriously?”

“It isn’t just about the box, Mike, it’s your whole attitude!” She crossed her arms, raising her voice a bit. He frowned and turned to her.

“My attitude?”

“Yes, your attitude. You’ve been a total asshole for the past few months. At first, I was just letting it slide because I know you’re emotional, but Mom’s right. We’ve all been patient. I can’t control how you feel and you lashing out is really exhausting.”

Narrowing his eyes, Mike dared a few steps in front of his sister, who showed no sign of backing down from this. “You wanna know what’s really exhausting? Being the only one who still cares about Eleven after everything we’ve been through as a Party.”

Doc sputtered in disbelief. “What are you talking about?! I still care about El!”

“If you really cared about El, you wouldn’t be holed up in your room making clothes, or out every second with Brenda and Sheriece! You and everyone else are just acting like she didn’t disappear!”

“That is not fair, Mike! You think I don’t wonder where she is? If she’s still out there? If she’s alive?!” She saw him flinch at that. “I care about her! There isn’t a day that goes by where I don’t think about her!”

“Then why am I the only one looking for her?! I’m not even the one with superpowers here!”

“I can’t do what El does! I can’t find people!”

“Well, what can you do?!” Mike boomed. “You’ve known about your powers your whole life and all you’ve done with it is kill people!”

Doc’s breathing stuttered. Feeling the sting in her eyes, she hopelessly blinked back the tears threatening to fall. Her shoulders rose and fell with the heaving of her chest, desperately trying to keep from crying. Swallowing thickly, she stared at her brother, who still angrily stared back. “I’m gonna give you one chance to take that back. One chance.”

Mike didn’t respond. His expression softened a bit at how visibly upset he made her, but he was too stubborn to even speak. So, drawing in a deep breath, Doc began back up the stairs.

“Fine. Keep the box.”

Doc couldn’t sleep that night. When she had finally calmed her rage and convinced herself to get ready for bed, she could only stare up at her ceiling. She was still getting used to the darkness, the silence. It was all very foreign to her still, but she felt as if she were making some progress. The past few days, it was taking less and less time for her to fall asleep. This night was different, however.

She couldn’t remember the last time she had gone to bed this angry. Doc had been convincing herself for so long that what she did to those agents was self defense, that she had saved people. But at the end of the day, it was still murder, and it still haunted her. Mike, as angry as he was, had no right to use that against her. He was being insensitive, as usual. He was stuck in the past, he wasn’t allowing himself to move on. Doc was trying, she was. She’d been trying her whole life to move on. And she knew that a regular sleep schedule would help greatly. But as she closed her eyes, Mike’s question rang in her head.

What can she do?

She knew only so much about her abilities, about where she came from. She taught herself to keep her powers at bay, for the most part. But was dismantling vehicles and bursting open heads truly all she could do? If so, what was she even for if she was made to be a weapon? She wasn’t a weapon in the Wheeler home, so what was she to do with this useless power?

“Doc.”

Snapping her eyes open, Doc hurriedly sat up. Her eyes moved everywhere around her room in search of whoever had just called out to her, but she found nothing but darkness. Shutting her eyes again, she tried to calm her breathing. It felt as if someone were pressing on her throat. She began to curl into herself as she felt the walls closing in on her. She hesitantly opened her eyes and immediately looked at her door, that felt like it had stretched a mile away.

“Oh, god… Oh, just breathe… Breathe… You got this, (Y/N). Please, just breathe. Come on…”

She continued to plead with herself as she fell out of bed. The floor felt as if it were dropping away from her as she made the seemingly long journey to the door, her feet giving out on her several times. She was gasping like a fish out of water by the time she reached her door, flinging it wide open.

With the light from the hallway pouring in, the walls instantly pushed away, the floor returned to her feet and the pressure let off her throat. Doc took in deep, shuddering breaths as she wiped her tears away. It took a minute, just standing in her doorway, to realize that her pajamas were soaked with sweat. Doc didn’t care, though. Not when she was filled with so much relief. Releasing a slow, long breath, she returned to her bed.

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

A relatively long drive through the woods later, Chief Jim Hopper had pulled up to the cabin that once belonged to his grandfather. He huffed and exited his truck, making his way up to what he called home. A little ways away from the cabin, Hopper stopped short and stared down for a bit before carefully stepping over a wire. He climbed his way up the short staircase and found himself on the porch. Opening the screen door, he reached a hand up and knocked twice, then once, and then thrice. Immediately the locks from the other side could be heard clicking before he was granted access inside.

Stepping inside, he was greeted with the sound of the television playing loudly. He took off his coat and hat, hanging them up before going to turn off the television. His footsteps echoed throughout the otherwise silent cabin as he removed his gun holster from around his hips and set it down on his kitchen counter. After grabbing a beer from the fridge, he made his way to the very small dining table. The table was already set for two people, two premade meals covered in aluminum foil set across from each other with a fork and knife set on a napkin beside each of them. Hopper let out a sigh at the sight of what sat at the edge of the table.

A plate of half-eaten Eggos.

“Hey, what did we talk about?” He called out before taking a seat in front of one of the placements.

“No signal.” A female voice called from somewhere else in the cabin.

Hopper froze for a second in confusion. “What?”

“No signal. It’s 8-1-5. You’re late.” The voice scolded.

“Yeah, I lost track of time. I’ll signal next time, alright? Uh, and it’s eight-fifteen. It’s not 8-1-5…” His voice trailed off as the owner of the voice entered the room and sat down across from him.

“Eight-fifteen.” Eleven slowly repeated, now sporting a head full of brown curls.

“Now, what did we talk about?” Hopper softly asked, gesturing to the plate of waffles as he rolled up his sleeves. “Dinner first, then dessert. Always. That’s a rule,” He leaned forward. “Yeah?”

“Yes.”

And with that, the two removed the foil and began to silently dig into their dinner.

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#stranger things #stranger things fic #stranger things x reader #st #st fic #st x reader #mike wheeler #dustin henderson #lucas sinclair #will byers #eleven #jane ives #max mayfield #will byers x reader #lost and found #break and mend

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tessagray · 1 year

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Holly j or Paige ? Sav or Drew? Zane or Riley? Anya or Clare? Fitz or Owen? Sean or Craig? Marco or Jay? Jimmy or Alex? JT or Spinner? Toby or Danny? Ellie or Manny? Jane or Darcy? Have fun! :)

i vaguely recall these being for gifsets but the amount overwhelmed me so in an effort to clear my inbox, i'm just going to list who i prefer here and if the mood strikes i'll also gif them in the future

holly j or paige (but honestly this was hard)

sav or drew

zane or riley

anya or clare

fitz or owen (no <;3)

sean or craig

marco or jay

jimmy or alex

jt or spinner

toby or danny

ellie or manny

jane or darcy

#anonymous #mail

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sleepysera · 1 year

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"The results of the study were extremely positive. Both groups experienced improvements in mood, but the yoga group had a greater boost -- and only the yoga group showed an increase in GABA levels. This suggested that mood improvement is associated with increased GABA levels -- and that yoga practice is associated with this positive correlation."

-Liz Owen and Holly Rossi, The Yoga Effect (2019)

#books #quote #nonfiction #health #yoga #mental health #psychology #neuroscience

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bigboxochristmas · 2 years

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Yuletidings 2002: Jingle Bell Boogie!

1. Christmas Day - Detroit Junior 2. I Told Santa Claus - Roomful of Blues 3. Christmas in Hollis - Run-D.M.C. 4. Santa Bring My Baby Back - Elvis Presley 5. Christmas (Baby, Please Come Home) - U2 6. Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas - The Tamlins 7. Christmas Time - The Chris Stamey Group 8. Merry Christmas Baby - Luther Johnson 9. Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer - The Cadillacs 10. Go Power at Christmas Time - James Brown 11. Deck the Halls - Metal Mike 12. Every Valley - Cast of ‘Handel’s Messiah: A Soulful Celebration' 13. Rock ‘n’ Roll Christmas - George Thorogood & The Destroyers 14. Santa Claus is Coming to Town - The Harmony Grits 15. Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree - Cajun Gold 16. Santa Claus - Little Charlie & The Nightcats 17. I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus - John Cougar Mellencamp 18. God Rest the House - Jeff Lorber 19. Jingle Bells - Buck Owens & His Buckaroos 20. Jingle Bells - Yello 21. What are You Doing New Year’s Eve - King Curtis 22. Holiday PSA - Peewee Herman

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I’m not positive, but I’m pretty sure I did this one in 2002. After the comparatively solemn mood of 2001’s post-9/11 collection it would make sense to want to do something more upbeat and fun. As the subtitle makes clear, this collection was meant to be “Dance Music for a Cool Ride at Yuletide”. Beyond that there was no particular theme or genre, just an eclectic mix of holiday tunes for the listener to bop around to: some funk, some blues, some rock & pop, some reggae, some zydeco, some rap, some doo-wop, some fusion, some country, etc.

Highlights include: the jubilant funk of “Christmas Day” by Detroit Junior; Run-D.M.C.’s holiday classic, “Christmas in Hollis”, built around a sample from Clarence Carter’s “Back Door Santa”; U2’s cover of Darlene Love’s “Christmas (Baby, Please Come Home)” - pretty much the only version to come close to the power of the original; the fake-out, wonder-bread intro to the greasy funk of “Every Valley” from Handel’s Messiah: A Soulful Celebration; Yello’s hyperspeed “Jingle Bells” and the easeful seduction of “What are You Doing New Year’s Eve” by King Curtis.

The cover art was another repurposed Christmas Card.

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atlwntic · 2 years

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(ᴗ˳ᴗ ۫ . . 𖨆♡︎𖨆 # ❙❘❙❘❙❚ 🥁🧤 !! 𝗻ᩨ𝕖𝘄ׇ͠ 𝗉𝗼𝘀ᩚt͟ :: ✿⃮▒⃔% ˚ ୨❤︎୧ 𖥻 🌳🌟 % ✶ 𓇢 𓈒ⵌ꫶ ❟ ﾉ🧦⁑᳡?¿ 𝗹𝗶𝗸𝗲 𝗼𝗿 𝗿𝗲𝗯𝗹𝗼𝗴 사臘ᰢᩙ ࣪⭑❛ 𝖼𝗋𝗲d͟i̶𝘁𝗌 ꭑᧉ ^_^ )

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morganaspendragonss · 3 years

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fic request because i am d e s p e r a t e : tarlos carlos whump with supportive gabriel reyes ??? if you’re down to write him that is. i love ur work n ur whump n i think u would write a p good gabe. 🥰

holly’s august extravaganza day 1: against all odds (we're still here)

i'm always down to write gabriel! thanks for the prompt trick, i hope you like it!

ao3 | 2k | car accidents, whump, major character injury, angst with a happy ending

“I told you we should have brought the car.”

Carlos scowls over at TK, shifting one of the many bags he’s carrying higher on his arm. It cuts painfully into his skin, his good mood from earlier long since soured. The knowledge that TK is, of course, right isn’t exactly helping matters.

“In my defence,” he starts, for probably the fifth or sixth time, “when we texted your dad to see if he wanted us to pick up anything from the store, I wasn’t expecting a full list.”

“We could have told him no.”

“TK, he’s your dad and we are literally crashing his home right now. I’m not gonna tell him no.”

TK opens his mouth, presumably to retort with a comment about how his dad loves Carlos and loves having them around. Both of which are things Carlos knows perfectly well, thanks, but he’s still not interested in testing it by refusing to get Owen’s kale chips or that specific brand of shampoo which took half an hour—and two stores—to track down.

Whatever TK was about to say is abandoned when one of his own bags slips out of his grasp and falls to the ground with a depressing thud. It bursts open—because why wouldn’t it—and spills their purchases across the sidewalk. The only solace is that nothing breaks, but that’s where the good news begins and ends; Carlos’s eyes track a can as it rolls down the street and into the gutter, landing in a puddle of dirty water. TK looks forlornly between the dropped bag and those still balanced on his arms, then heaves a long-suffering sigh and crouches awkwardly, easing the other bags down as carefully as he can manage.

“Call an Uber,” he grumbles. “We are not walking home like this.”

On that point, they’re in agreement. Carlos spares himself a moment of idle amusement at TK’s predicament before beginning the arduous task of extracting his phone from his pocket without dropping any of his own shopping.

He’ll hate himself for it later, but he’s so focused that the screech of tires coming around the corner barely registers as a blip on his radar. He doesn’t notice anything until TK suddenly barrels into him, throwing Carlos to the side just before something else, something heavy, crashes into them with a blinding flash of pain, and then—

Nothing.

Oh my god!

Someone call 911!

Are they even alive?

Just hold on, son, you’re going to be just fine.

Beeping.

Carlos frowns, slowly blinking his heavy eyelids open. It takes a minute to register his surroundings for what they are—a hospital room—and a further minute to notice the presence at his side. It’s his father, looking exhausted, turning his cowboy hat in his hands as he stares at the floor.

“Dad?” he croaks, wincing at the soreness in his throat. “What happened?”

His father’s head jerks up, his eyes going wide as he sees Carlos awake. “Mijo. It’s good to see you awake.”

“Dad, why am I here? What happened?”

He sighs, reaching out to pat Carlos’s arm. “There was an accident,” he explains. “A drunk driver lost control of his car and mounted the curb right where you boys were standing. He was speeding, so he hit you pretty hard. Your foot was crushed under a wheel, you have a fractured wrist, and you bumped your head when you fell so you probably have a concussion. The doctors say you should heal just fine, though, gracias a Dios.”

Carlos lifts his head to look down at his body, only just registering the casts on his arm and foot. There’s a dull ache radiating through his entire body and his head is pounding in time with his heartbeat, but he’s alive and he’ll heal. He should be happy about that, but the only thing occupying his mind is his dad’s silence on TK.

“What about TK?” he asks, part of him dreading the answer. “I remember him pushing me; is he okay?”

“He’s…” His dad hesitates, sending a cold slither of fear down Carlos’s spine. “Alive.”

Carlos stares, the beginnings of panic stealing his breath. “What does that mean?”

His father blows out a long breath. “It means you were right,” he says, meeting Carlos’s eyes. “He did push you, so he took the brunt of the hit. He suffered a serious open pelvic fracture and broken ribs, which punctured his lung. Last I heard, they managed to fix him up and they’re not expecting any further complications, but we won’t know for sure until he wakes up.”

“He hasn’t woken up?”

“Not yet. He will, you’ll see.”

“I want to see him.”

And Carlos knows what the answer will be to that—a resounding no. He also knows that he won’t be able to argue; his father is incredibly stubborn, and when he digs his heels in, there’s no moving him. But he needs to at least try—he’s not going to stop worrying about TK until he sees him, and probably not for a long time after that.

His dad sighs and fixes him with a firm look. “Carlitos, you and I both know that’s out of the question,” he says. “You’ve only just woken up, you need to give yourself time to heal before exerting your body even more. Besides, he’s in good hands and Owen is with him, so we’ll know as soon as there’s any change.”

“Joder, Papá, I know all that,” Carlos cries, frustrated, barely able to refrain from throwing his head back on the pillow. “I just hate that he’s here, hurt, and I can’t even see him.”

“Lo sé,” His dad smiles gently, something that’s probably supposed to be comforting, but really only gets on Carlos’s nerves. “Escúchame, hijo. Descansa. Cúrate. Then you can focus on TK.”

It’s easier said than done and his father knows it, but Carlos has no choice. The conversation is effectively put to an end by his dad reaching over and pressing the call button next to the bed. A nurse comes in and quickly sets about checking his vitals and asking enough questions to make Carlos’s head spin. His probable concussion becomes definite, but otherwise he’s in good shape, all things considered.

He can’t help but wish he weren’t.

Two days later, Carlos is deemed fit to be discharged, providing he has someone to help him and providing he agrees to rest and not do anything even close to strenuous. TK is also awake now but, according to Owen, he’ll be kept in the hospital for at least another week. The break to his pelvis was bad, so he’ll need a wheelchair for a while even after discharge, and his refusal to take strong painkillers means his recovery is going to be long and painful.

Carlos is itching to see him. It’s been torture cooped up in his room without knowing how TK was doing—there’s only so much relief messages passed through their fathers can bring. It had only been his father’s stern and steady presence that had kept him in that bed when he felt like he was losing his mind with worry.

But now, finally, he’s being wheeled into TK’s room and helped onto the chair next to the bed. Owen stands off to the side, watching the two of them with a mixture of affection and sadness in his gaze, and his dad hovers behind him, but Carlos only has eyes for TK.

He looks incredibly tired, but he attempts a smile when he rolls his head to look at Carlos, extending his hand out across the distance between them.

“Hey, Ty,” Carlos says softly, taking TK’s hand in his good one. “How are you feeling?”

“Been better. Not sure if I’ve been worse. I think this might just beat getting shot to that title.”

“That’s not funny.”

TK just hums, his eyes drifting closed for a second. “Maybe not.”

“Why did you push me?”

TK’s eyes fly open at the question, confusion overtaking his expression as he stares at Carlos. He moves as if to sit upright before groaning in pain, his face screwing up. Carlos reaches out for him, but he’s beaten to it by his father, who places a reassuring hand on TK’s shoulder.

“Take it easy, son,” he says gently. “Don’t move too much.”

“I hate this,” TK mutters, his body relaxing bit by bit. His gaze is still clouded when he looks back over at Carlos, but he manages a soft smile all the same. “I pushed you because I didn’t want you to get hurt. The car would have hit me either way; I’m just sorry I wasn’t able to get you out of the way in time.”

Carlos blinks at him, dumbfounded. “You’re sorry?” he asks, disbelief colouring his tone. “Ty, you’re in the hospital, seriously injured, because you chose to save me instead of yourself. Why would you do that?”

“You know why.”

Carlos does; of course he does, but it’s not enough to assuage the guilt still bubbling in his stomach at the sight of TK in the bed.

TK sighs, squeezing his hand. “You would have done the same for me,” he points out. “We both know you would have, so don’t you dare ask me to apologise for my choices.”

“I know. I won’t.” Carlos closes his eyes, deflating a little. “I just hate seeing you hurt.”

“And I hate seeing you hurt, so maybe you can do us both a favour and go home. I’ll be fine.”

Carlos must need his hearing tested, because there’s no way TK just said that. There’s no way his boyfriend told him to leave right after calling him out for hypocrisy. Except apparently he did, because he’s trying to disentangle their hands, and Carlos is not having that.

He grips onto TK even tighter and glares at him. “TK, if you think I’m leaving you here—”

“Carlos,” TK interrupts quietly. “I get it. But, babe, you need to rest and heal, and you can’t do either of those things sitting here.”

“Watch me.”

“No.” TK shifts his gaze over Carlos’s shoulder, a slight smirk playing at his lips. “Mr Reyes, can you make sure he rests?”

His dad laughs, leaning over to pat TK’s shoulder. “Of course. I’m sure once his mother sees him, she won’t let him out of her sight for a week anyway.”

TK grins. “Good to know.” He yawns and resettles himself slightly in the bed, his eyes fluttering shut. “Carlos, if you’re still here when I next open my eyes, I’m not kissing you for a month.”

“You shouldn’t make threats you know you can’t follow through with.”

“Don’t make me make it two.”

Despite himself, Carlos laughs. He leans over and presses a lingering kiss to TK’s temple, then stands as well as he’s able, leaning on his dad for support. “Alright, I’m going. I’ll see you soon. Love you.”

TK already sounds half-asleep when he mumbles, “Love you too,” back, and Carlos can’t even be embarrassed by how ridiculously smitten he must look, even though he’s in front of both their fathers.

He allows his dad to move him back to the wheelchair and says a quick goodbye to Owen, keeping his eyes on TK for as long as he can. Just as they reach the door, he catches TK’s eyes opening to slivers, obviously checking to see if Carlos is actually leaving. Carlos shakes his head at him, causing TK to flush at the knowledge he’s been caught. His eyes slam shut again, his tongue poking out childishly, and Carlos laughs, a lightness settling in his heart even as TK’s room disappears from view.

It’s going to be a long few months for the both of them, but they have family behind them to help them get through it.

And they have each other. Which, given everything, Carlos thinks is nothing short of a goddamn miracle.

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illustratedtapes · 5 years

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Welcome to Illustrated Tape’s favourite releases of 2018 that sounded and looked good, chosen by this year’s contributors. We’ve put together a playlist featuring one track from each of the releases featured so you can check out the sounds we were digging this year. Happy listening!

➔ spoti.fi/2LCgrQp Listening in order recommended

Delta Sleep - Ghost City Big Scary Monsters, 10 August Artwork: Owen Findley at Or8 Design Selected by Megan Reddi // IT014

This is my favourite music/artwork combo of 2018! The whole album is just amazing - it is beautifully arranged and has this lovely dreamy quality to it, with repeated musical motifs woven throughout to really pull the whole album together. Not only is Ghost City musically fantastic, but the artwork is beautiful and so fitting for the album. It is designed and screen printed by Owen Findley and the warm colours, imagery and textures are just spot on.

Definitely my favourite release of 2018. It is my go-to driving album and I will be blasting it while we’re driving around this Christmas!

➔ Listen to Illustrated Tapes 014: Nautical Dusk by Megan Reddi

Okay Kaya - Both Heavy Body, 1 June Artwork/design: Kaya Wilkins, Aaron Maine, Phillip Wong

Selected by Hannah Buckman // IT016

Okay Kaya’s Both as an album that came out this year which I enjoyed, and which I feel has a strong visual component to it. To me the album feels sickly (in a good way), gloomy but still pop. I think the mood is conveyed really well through the Adinah Dancyger directed music vids and the album art.

I liked finding out more about Kaya’s thinking behind the project, like how the twin in the videos is like a physical manifestation of trauma... it’s something that once I read I couldn’t stop thinking about. The idea of something traumatic inducing this birth of a second self, a kind of split off part that is still attached in some way to the whole, but there being a kind of safety in acknowledging what might be a darker part of yourself, from a distance. Also the album art kind of conveys the idea of duality and how that relates to race/sexuality, but I didn’t feel like that was really explored as much. I think I like this album ‘cos it kind of ties in with things (mentioned above) I’m currently interested in, but maybe it feels a bit surface-y at times.

➔ Listen to Illustrated Tapes 016: Protect Your Extremities by Hannah Buckman

Quavo - Quavo Huncho Capitol / Mowtown / Quality Control, 12 October Artwork: Mihailo Andic

Selected by Conner Perry // IT020

I think my favourite music/design combo of this year has to be Quavo’s Quavo Huncho. Not only is it full of bangers, the cover by Mihailo Andic is just brilliant. It really sets itself apart from the Migo’s visuals and changes the way you listen to the record. Definitely check out the rest of his work, especially the stuff for Lil’ Yachty.

➔ Listen to Illustrated Tapes 020: Nice one bruva by Conner Perry

Parquet Courts - Wide Awake! Rough Trade, 18 May Artwork: A. Savage

Selected by Holly St Clair // IT021

I was really late to the Parquet Courts party, but actually both of my initial encounters with their two recent releases have been solid arguments for the importance of decent album artwork. For both Wide Awake! and Human Performance I ran into - literally - the artwork before the music. Twice, two years apart, whilst wandering around London I turned a corner and came face to face with Adam Savage’s superb cover work. He smacked me in the face with poppy colours and amorphous dancing forms and I loved every moment. Add in an anarchic use of type and you’ve got me shouting, “Oh shit! A new Parquet Courts album!” to no one in particular outside an old meat market in Shoreditch.

A. Savage is both front man and painter and that adds a special flavour to the whole affair. Album marketing can be a laboured, commercially driven affair, there’s something authentic - a little DIY flavour - about this relationship between artwork and music. It’s a nice parallel to the musical throwbacks typical of the bands style. Wide Awake! dropped earlier this year and it’s fab. (Although, I love the artwork so much even if it was god awful I’d still buy the record and hang it on my wall.)

➔ Listen to Illustrated Tapes 021: To: You, Love: Me by Holly St Clair

D.A.L.I - When Haro Met Sally Burning Witches, 23 May Artwork: Luke Insect

Selected by Thomas Hedger // IT017

According to my recently played, I’ve been stuck on a pre-'90s loop. I've crept slowly into 2018's releases picking out albums like books - by their covers - and it really paid off! I don’t often delve into electronic but I love this album, it’s a perfect blend of hopping on your bike and hitting the tracks, nailing the look of how the album feels in all its haze. A solid sunny day good time.

➔ Listen to Illustrated Tapes 017: Sink by Thomas Hedger

Young Fathers - Cocoa Sugar Ninja Tune, 9 March Artwork: Tom Hingston

Selected by Katie Chandler // IT003

This cover was immediately striking and memorable to me. Upon listening to the album, I found that the artwork resonated with this feeling of odd, unrestricted expression. It's a little unsettling, ultimately bold and intriguing. Much like the music, it feels hot and cool all at once, like a burst of energy that leaves you in a sweat. It's the exhilarating soundtrack to your runner's high, and you're not really sure why you're running or what you're running from.

➔ Listen to Illustrated Tapes 003: Porch Light by Katie Chandler

Gesu no Kiwami Otome (ゲスの極み乙女。) - Suki Nara Towanai (好きなら問わない) Taco Records, 29 August Selected by Greg Stasiw // IT009

Although it’s not the ambient and electronic fare I usually enjoy, Suki Nara Towanai (好きなら問わない) by Gesu no Kiwami Otome. (ゲスの極み乙女。) is a hoot. The artwork features a stylized neon pachinko machine. Or maybe it’s a console in a rad indie pop spaceship, which would also make sense for this funky fresh group! It feels somehow familiar, somehow alien, and altogether really, really cool.

The neon suggests something retro, and there are some retro leanings in their funkier tracks, but it's definitely neon as seen in 2018. Modern pop (and J-Pop) tropes emerge, but infectious basslines, tight drumming, and smart keys make this album something special. Some math rock even surfaces at times, and the remix included proves that this group goes for whatever feels fresh. One look at the artwork reminds me that this is one of the funnest albums I've listened to in a while. “Funnest” is definitely a word when you’re talking about this band!

➔ Listen to Illustrated Tapes 009: Atmospheres by Greg Stasiw

Aphex Twin - Collapse EP Warp, 14 September Artwork: Weirdcore

Selected by Alex Vissaridis // IT002

2018 was a great year if you grew up listening to the music I was into. Some of my all-time favourite artists released new stuff this year, and they didn’t disappoint. The artwork was pretty excellent too, but nothing grabbed my attention like the world created around Aphex Twin’s Collapse EP. Album art doesn’t seem to mean as much as it once did, so it’s always exciting when it appears outside of the little square on your screen in unexpected ways.

This year, Aphex Twin logos appeared all over the world, from Elephant & Castle tube station to the side of a record store in Tokyo, designed in a way that made it look like the logo was collapsing into the environment around it. I’m a sucker for stuff like this; random cryptic messages that send internet detectives into a frenzy. It was eventually announced as marketing for the Collapse EP, but they kept the ‘collapsing logo’ visual going on the EP artwork, in the music video for the track ‘T69 collapse’, and even through to projection-mapped videos around London (again announced in typical smoke-and-mirrors fashion) and a collaboration with Crack magazine. Way more than just a collection of pixels.

➔ Listen to Illustrated Tapes 002: Tape Fuzz by Alex Vissaridis

Flohio - Wild Yout EP Alpha, 2 November Selected by Rachel Maughan // IT012

I got into Flohio after I saw her on COLORS in January with 'Band'. She's fucking explosive on that track, you can feel her spitting straight into your chest. She's been savvy with her producers and killed her work with God Colony - 'SE16' was my most played track of the year. Her 2018 EP, Wild Yout is a cocktail of perfection.

Mashing up genres it's a high energy listen with punchy, grimey hip-hop that is uniquely South London. The artwork is beautiful simplicity - her achingly slick androgynous aesthetic, the clean photographic composition, with a flowing chain to bring it tightly back to SE. Gorgeous.

➔ Listen to Illustrated Tapes 012: High Rise by Rachel Maughan

Sudan Archives - Sink EP Stones Throw, 25 May Photography: Jack McKain Design: Jeff Jank

Selected By Tom J Newell // IT004

Sink submerges the listener in flowing loops and beats, with splashes of violin and vocals floating above the sunken monolith, which stands tall on the deep blue cover art. The composition is reminiscent of two of Jank’s other iconic Stones Throw sleeves, Donuts and Madvillainy and continues his striking yet varied art direction for the label.

Check out the ‘Nont For Sale’ video from the EP too, which adds powerful choreography and styling to create another successful visual accompaniment to the music. Much love to Sudan Archives and hats off to Jeff Jank. I painted a tribute to the cover art on a 12x12” piece of wood.

➔ Listen to Illustrated Tapes 004: FEAR. by Tom J Newell

Drinks - Hippo Lite Drag City, 20 April Selected by Molly Fairhurst // IT015

Hazy, dazed, an album I hold dearly to 2018 (and many strangely lit walks in a then new, unknown city).

A collaboration between Cate Le Bon and White Fence’s Tim Presley, the pair took an (isolated) retreat to St Hippolyte-Du-Fort in the south of France to record, frankly, crudely, seemingly, whatever the fuck they wanted to. Hippo Lite is born, a joyful, playful, sometimes quiet, sometimes screaming object.

What senses like an eavesdrop through closed doors rightly has a cover that can’t be quite understood- a narrow column of, at the glance of the reader, ‘nonsense’ notes, which flank photos of Le Bon and Presley. Both are snapshots of an absurd holiday we have been invited along to, so long as we sit across the table. A tender and private piece.

➔ Listen to Illustrated Tapes 015: The Wilder Woman by Molly Fairhurst

Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs - King of Cowards Rocket, 28 September Artwork: Sophy Hollington

Selected by Drew Milward // IT010

First off, this album is wall to wall, solid gold bangers. Kind of like the lovechild of The Fall and Black Sabbath, who has been cautioned by the police for possession of a massive bag of skunk, a bong in the shape of a skull and a copy of ‘The Holy Mountain’ on DVD.

Aside from the fact it’s a full on riff-o-rama, the artwork by Sophy Hollington is absolutely incredible. It summons up the sound of the band, via folk horror infused wildness. It really captures the sonic landscape of the album, yet completely avoids any of the cliched imagery that could so easily have taken its place. It really is the whole package.

➔ Listen to Illustrated Tapes 010: BE GONE, YOU CREATIVE GREMLINS! by Drew Milward

Djrum - Portrait With Firewood R&S, 17 August Artwork: Michael Mitsas

Selected by Sam Ailey // IT001

Portrait With Firewood is one of those rare gems within the electronic genre - a true ‘album’. With holistic production, emotional range, and a captivating narrative, this really is a stunning listening experience from start to finish. Felix Manuel combines electronic and acoustic sounds seamlessly on this intimate record, with exceptional attention to detail in his sampling and tender piano sections played by Felix himself.

Michael Mistas’s cover art is a real departure from the typical design aesthetic of electronic albums and caught my attention straight away. I love its composition and rough, imperfect execution. To me these feels reflective of the range and depth of emotional states explored across the album, and the feeling that some things are easier to express through your craft than with words. Plus I’m a sucker for pink things.

➔ Listen to Illustrated Tapes 001: Quiet by Sam Ailey

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finishinglinepress · 6 years

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FINISHING LINE PRESS BOOK OF THE DAY: A Perfect Day for Semaphore by Holly Day $18.99, Full-length, paper https://www.finishinglinepress.com/product/a-perfect-day-for-semaphore-by-holly-day/ Holly Day has worked as a freelance writer, indexer, and editor for more than 25 years. She has over 7,000 published articles, poems, and short stories, and more than a dozen published books of fiction and nonfiction. Her book titles include Insider’s Guide to the Twin Cities, Walking Twin Cities, Music Theory for Dummies (also released in Dutch, German, Portuguese, Spanish, French, Persian, Polish, Italian, and Russian editions), Music Composition for Dummies (also released in German, Portuguese, and Spanish editions), Guitar All-in-One for Dummies, Piano All-in-One for Dummies, Nordeast Minneapolis: A History, A Brief History of Stillwater, Minnesota, The Book Of, and the poetry books The Smell of Snow, Late-Night Reading for Hardworking Construction Men, and Ugly Girl. Her writing has been nominated for a National Magazine Award, a 49th Parallel Prize, an Isaac Asimov Award, eight Pushcart awards, and three Dzanc Book’s Best of the Web awards. She is the recipient of two Midwest Writer’s Grants, a Plainsongs Award, the 2011 Sam Ragan Prize for Poetry, and a Dwarf Star Award from the international-juried Science Fiction Poetry Association. A Perfect Day for a Semaphore is exactly what I hope to find when searching for a poetry book: interesting thought process, compelling narratives, deep sense of place, depth of mood/tone/emotion. Some books yield only one or two good poems, this one offers an abundant continuity of written graces. –Rhonda J. Nelson, 2000-2001 Florida Fellow in Poetry “Beyond the curve at the edge of the world, there is a monster that knows who you are” — the poems in Holly Day‘s new collection brim with stories that chill the bones, hint at Grimm tales and bad choices made long ago, under neon lights and the influence of one too many beers. With an eye for the natural world and a dark sensibility, Day writes songs to discomfit the reader, imagines drowning, envisions wings, breaks the necks of small creatures in a Gothic assemblage of poems with a sense of the inevitable, yet dares to ask, “what if?” –Julia Park Tracey, Poet Laureate emeritus, Alameda, California Holly Day‘s A Perfect Day for Semaphore turns like the earth, dark one moment, light the next. Her poems break the crust of soil and blossom, strangely ordinary, and reveal what resides in the subconscious. There is the joy of becoming lovers, having children, and becoming family. Yet while we sleep, the subconscious sends out its slippery vines of doubt and dread. The poems instruct the reader to reject the colorful birds, the dun-colored sparrows that stay constant are the ones to count on and to nourish. Just when a relationship seems doomed, accepted, sleep arrives, and in sleep, the lovers’ bodies gravitate to the embrace, saying how foolish we are to think what we know is the one true answer. Day seems to say the gods of myth gave us stories, but failed to allow us access to all that wisdom, and yet, each of these poems is in itself, a key. –Jo-Ann Mapson, Los Angeles Times‘ bestselling author of Bad Girl Creek, Solomon’s Oak, and Owen’s Daught PREORDER SHIPS SEPTEMBER 14, 2018 RESERVE YOUR COPY TODAY https://www.finishinglinepress.com/product/a-perfect-day-for-semaphore-by-holly-day/#poetry

#poetry

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kkoehn17 · 4 years

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Nothing has ever qualified me to tell you what the best books, movies, music, etc., of the year are, but that has never stopped me from giving you what I believe to be a highly educated opinion.

I mean, who needs all the fancy words and validating credentials when I can just tell you, hey, this didn’t suck and I think you should check it out.

So that’s what I’m here to do today.

Here are all of my top recommendations from 2019, just in case you’re looking for something good to kickoff your 2020.

Books

The Tattooist of Auschwitz by Heather Morris (Historical Fiction)

Little Fires Everywhere by Celeste Ng (Fiction)

For One More Day by Mitch Albom (Fiction)

Girl, Stop Apologizing by Rachel Hollis (Self Help)

The Silent Patient by Alex Michaelides (Mystery/Thriller)

Daisy Jones & the Six by Taylor Jenkins Reid (Historical Fiction)

My Lovely Wife by Samantha Downing (Mystery/Thriller)

Where the Crawdad’s Sing by Delia Owens (Fiction)

Beautiful on the Outside by Adam Rippon (Memoir)

Over the Top by Jonathan Van Ness (Memoir)

Podcasts

How I built this with Guy Raz

ESPN 30 for 30

Beach Too Sandy, Water Too Wet

Dr. Death

Duolingo Spanish Podcast

The Trypod

The Clearing

My Dad Wrote a Porno

The Dropout

How I Built This

Homecoming

Movies

Free Solo

The Dawn Wall

Booksmart

Unicorn Store

Someone Great

Frozen 2

A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood

TV Shows

Fleabag (Amazon Prime)

Single Parents (ABC)

The Politician (Netflix)

The Act (Hulu)

Killing Eve (AMC)

Modern Love (Amazon Prime)

Dead to Me (Netflix)

Euphoria (HBO)

Four Weddings & a Funeral (Hulu)

When They See Us (Netflix)

Music

Heard it in a Past Life by Maggie Rogers

GIRL by Maren Morris

When We All Fall Asleep, Where Do We Go by Billie Eilish

Daylight by Grace Potter

Lover by Taylor Swift

Cheap Queen by King Princess

The Highwomen by The Highwomen

Divinely Uninspired to a Hellish Extent by Lewis Capaldi

Free Yourself Up by Lake Street Dive

Happiness Begins by Jonas Brothers

Misc

Hippeas: THESE. ARE. SO. GOOD. I truly cannot stress this enough. Their one and only flaw is that they come in relatively small bags UNLESS you want to brave Costco for the monster bags. I personally am not always in the mood to brave Costco, which is why I found…

…White Cheddar Cheetos Puffs! These are the perfect sister snack to Hippeas and are also delicious. Who knew I had such a thing for white cheddar this year?

Duolingo: I downloaded this app to learn Spanish and have genuinely loved using it! They are always adding new challenges and new ways to learn and I look forward to going on each day.

Birkenstocks: I waited a long time and listened to a lot of hype about these before I finally pulled the trigger but I am so glad I did. Believe everything you hear. These are wonderful and I will miss wearing them in the winter months. (find this pair here)

Old Navy Leggings: I am constantly on the hunt for good leggings that aren’t one million dollars, which according to most retailers, is a big ask. But I bought a pair of leggings from Old Navy early in the year and loved them so much that I bought 4 more pairs. They are so comfortable and just the right amount of thick, AND, most importantly, they have side pockets, which is the real game changer. (find this pair here)

Check out more List-cember posts here.

My 2019 Rec Roundup (List-cember #5) Nothing has ever qualified me to tell you what the best books, movies, music, etc., of the year are, but that has never stopped me from giving you what I believe to be a highly educated…

#2019 in review #advice #best of 2019 #blogging #Favorites #internet #life #rec roundup #recommendations

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deythbanger · 5 years

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Say

by DeYtH Banger Bullshits... bullshits... bullshits... are runing around... depression and anxiety books are costanly ruining moods of comedians and other people. Probably down here I am going to be fucking wrong... fucking wrong that's what I want to underline. Lay of undercare Nobody really care Careless And Carefree Why people just have self-sabotage mechanism... a mechanism which ruins... self-destructive... really ask yourself this... why nature why God even created this feature with human... he could have done pleny other good shit... why God gave us Devil's hand and tail and the Angel is somewhere where no money are needed and soul is ever needed. Again wrong and again wrong... say it and proof it... say it and proof it... I don't have pleny stuff to lose... just I don't have... nothing really is funny... everything is just words... sentences....texts..... nothing is really funnny... beating the shit out of you... jealousy is a emotion which makes another person to feel guilty.... and one other... to make him... anger and even violent. W h a t t y p e o f f u c k e d u p story is this... to introduce yourself in this video... in this movie.... OKAY.... OKAY... I DON'T CARE... I DON'T FUCKING CARE ABOUT YOUR NAME AND WHAT YOU DO PROVIDE WITH THE TRUTH NOT WITH THE GARBAGE Ribbing.. .rabbit... and blowhole... I am not sure where I am ... I just insulted few people... I used the pick up material to do that... so put it in the high-intellectual category... we are not talking about the Dean Koontz world or even Stephen Kings world.... their books are genius filled with compelx words... when you read them you feel the superiority. There is pleny of bullshit out there... to get it clear it out... and to categorize the whole shit you need a bullshit detector... you need to know that the dating advice is bullshit, the recycling thing is bullshit, breast implants... dick enlargment, bible... all marketing bullshit.... fucking markething bullshit. Rapping and rape and killers... and skills.... All this things we can't see in the real life... boring people face with day to day challenges.. proffesors saying bullshit, entrepreneurs selling bullshit... HARD WORK HARD BEAT UP GETTING UP DOING IT HERE IS THE FUCKING TRUTH FUCKING MOTIVATOR I FEEL GUILTY I AM NEAR SUICIDAL AND THIS MOTIVATION YOU CAN PUT IT IN YOUR ASSHOLE FILLED IT FILL THIS SUCKER IF YOU DON'T PUT THAT YOU GONNA GET A DICK A FUCKING DICK YOU NEED TO BE FUCKING BRAVE TO DO THAT THINK ABOUT IT... THE GUY WHO IS A HOMO IS 1000% W IN OTHER WORDS INTO MEN AND FUCKS ASSHOLE IS A VERY VERY BRAVE HUMAN KIND JUST THINK ABOUT IT GIVE A THOUGHT DON'T THINK ABOUT THE PHONE DON'T THINK ABOUT FACEBOOK DON'T THINK ABOUT THE PAST DON'T THINK ABOUT THE FUTURE Did you know that there is law of attraction... (I CALL THIS A BULLSHIT....ATTRACTION OF BULLSHIT... LAW OF BULLSHIT)... this law says that what you say that you attract what you do this what you attract.... and "don't" doesn't exist in the universe... OH GOD... THIS BULLSHIT MAKES ME NERVES "Don't"... exist... I have read thousand of books... I am reading pleny of books and now and reading articles and watching films and movies and being in school and it exists... "Don't" "No" "Not" and all other bullshit.... "don't" exist... people say it to day to day life... they express it RECYCLING LOSING 10000000 TIME WASTING TIME IGNORING ALL THE PRODUCTIVITY Oh humans... oh fucking humans always wanting to help and to give and be nice and be right and be perfect ... And the whole thing is bullshit no need for this holly dumb shit stop being so egoistic and real and authentic... OH GOD GET A GRAMMAR BOOK FUCK RSD JULLIEN LET RSD MAX SUCK SOMEBODY'S COCK LET JEFFY ALLEN TO GET SLAUGHTERED IN A HOUSE LET OWEN COOK.... TYLER DURDEN WHO DA FUCK HE IS... LET HIM GAG... ON A COCK LET HIM DIE LET HIM DIE LET HIM IN IT'S TIME TO FUCK HIM oKAY... judge me I am damn wrong... I am fucking wrong... tell it... proof it... think about it.... just give a thought Yoga is a bullshit Stretching Stetching labels labels that's what we believe labels is what believe give a nice dumb ass story a fucking nice a good one a obstacle a challange day to day problems a character faced with reality then give him super ability and now we have Jason Capital a bullshit a scammer... just say it... I am bullshittter I GOT A PROBLEMS WITH GETTING OUT I HAVE PROBLEMS WITH MANNER AND THOUGHTS AND BODY LANGUAGE JUST FUCKING SAY IT I AM BULLSHITTER STOP READING STOP WASTING TIME OKAY... OKAY I GONNA STOP I GONNA STOP BUT SOMEWHERE IN THE MIDDLE Knowledge... knowledge i love it... I love i t I like to sleep i like to get in paranoia state losing and wasting time and getting to do stuff... I lvoe it I like the day to day stress... it's lovely process... no need for motivation... I just don't need it I got anxiety I got bipolar I got depression Lovely lovely adventure of life no commentarry!

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winstonhcomedy · 5 years

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HDWDTW? 12/12-12/15 “They Have Alien Pubes on the Wall?”

What a fun weekend of shows cutie pies. So let’s get right into it baybees!!!

Thursday night I had a show all the way in Harrisonburg Va. It was a show put on by Dawn Davis Womack (clean/christian comedian) at Restless Moons Brewing. I have never done this show before, but I am a little nervous because I am supposed to be doing 20 minutes clean. This isn’t a church clean set, but anytime I am asked to do clean I always worry that I’m going to slip up and really upset/offend the booker.

I get there and I”m on the show with my buddy Paige Campbell. We get there a little early and do some joking around. Paige and I are shooting the shit talking about how worried we are about it being a clean show. He looks to our left and they have paintings of naked alien women with full bush. He says, “Yes make sure you guys don’t say the f word, but if you have some time please check out our alien pube exhibit.”

Dawn gets there. We talk about some of the other shows we have coming up. I pointed her in the direction of some other bookable clean comics. She mentions a cool opportunity she has, and all in al we are having a good time.

The host of the show and other half of X2 productions (they put on the show) Steve McClay showed up. He is a super nice guy, and made sure to ask everyone for their credits before the show started. Paige and I’s buddy Christopher Cantrell also showed up, and got to do a guest spot on the show. I asked to go early so I could try to make it to Crozet to do a guest spot on JR Stoffels show at Pro Re Nata.

Eventually the show starts and we have a pretty solid crowd of about 30+. Steve goes up and gets the show rolling and has an ok set, but everyone is paying attention. After his set is Cantrell’s. He does ok too. It is weird because this is the first time I’ve seen him work super clean (not that he’s incredibly dirty) and you can definitely tell. He had some jokes work well, but others they either didn’t get or weren’t on board with the subject matter.

Working clean is tough because when someone says clean it can mean a lot of different things. They could mean absolutely no sex jokes, no swearing, just no f/c/n word, there could be certain topics they don’t want covered 9-11/holocaust/cancer/aids/rape/sex/death, or if its a church they might want church related material. So when you are going earlier in a show, you might not know what that crowd exactly wants. So I was happy to have a couple people go in front of me so I could get a good read on the room.

I am super blessed and lucky to be able to work clean. I prefer being somewhere in the middle of clean and dirty just because that is more authentic to who I am, but I like working clean. I appreciate the challenge of it, and I do enjoy doing shows anybody can enjoy.

Dawn goes next and she keeps the show rolling. The crowd is into it, but they haven’t been cracked open yet so I am super nervous. I work clean so infrequently I am alway afraid I don't have enough material, or I'm doing such old material I know I won’t have a great time either. So this set I decided to try a lot of stuff I had never done clean before.

I went up and had a really dope set. I did some jokes I hadn’t done in a super long time and they worked. I also did some new stuff and they worked as well. I did about 22 minutes and honestly I only lost them a few times on a couple topics (scientology for a minute/owing china money). Moments of those jokes worked, but the rest of the set was way better. I’d give it a B. Definitely room for improvement, but I am definitely proud of that set.

I was running late and hopped in my car and headed to Crozet. I went as fast as I legally could, and got there two minutes too late to go up. Which is ok. I got to hang with JR, Abdulla, Keaton Ray, Brock Hall, and I got to watch Jesse Jarvis do about 30 to close out the show. He had a hot set and apparently the whole show was amazing.

After the show a dude who had seen me before came over and told me he loved my comedy and that he actually knew people I went to hs with. Turns out they were at this show. So I got to catch up with part of the Gantt family (a dope family that sent their kids to the same school I did). It was really awesome catching up and they said they’d catch another show in the future. This was a great way to end the night. I headed home in a great mood.

The next night I had a show in Lorton Virginia. Rahmein Mostafavi booked me to do a feature set in front of Baltimore comic Tommy Sinbazo (laughfinder podcast)!

The show was at the Workhouse Arts Center which apparently used to be a prison that they converted into a venue for the arts. I got there and immediately was surprised at how dope this place was. I walked in and got to catch up with Tommy and Rahmein. Two incredibly talented, funny, and kind dudes. We shot the shit while Rahmein finished setting up for the show.

When the show started Rahmein was really working his ass off to get this crowd into it. There was about 30+ people here, and they weren’t a bad crowd. It just seemed really hard to get them on board with stuff. Rahmein did his best, and set me up pretty well.

I went up and had what felt like a horrible set. I did about 23 minutes and I felt like half of it worked. It was one of those sets where you do a joke and it kills, then you try to ride that momentum but you lose them and have to start back over from scratch.

I had some jokes hit super hard, but I was battling with this crowd for the entire time. They didn’t want to give me anything. All in all though after listening back to it. I did better than I thought. I definitely lost them a few times, but I won them back and even closed super strong which felt good. I didn’t want to leave a shit stage for Tommy. I got off stage and Rahmein and Tommy were both complimentary. For the room that night it was a pretty good set. I’d give it a C.

Tommy went up and had a super good headlining set, but it was obvious he had to work his ass off too. He closed well, and I got to catch up with them for a little bit more after the show before I headed home to get a good nights sleep before having to go to my cousin’s wedding the next day.

Sunday was a chill day. I got brunch with some comics, and went by 2nd and Charles. After this I went over to Brandon Beswick’s house and waiting for Kate Carroll to get there since we were all riding down to Cozzy’s together to do the improvised standup show (audience writes topics that comics have to riff on while on stage) that Holly Owens was running at Sunday Funnies.

The drive down was super fun. I love both of those folks a lot. We chatted bout some stuff going on in the scene, our thoughts on comedy, and what’s it like having a bunch of new comics in the area. It was super productive and a good chat. Lot’s of good laughs, and lots of insight.

We get there and legit there are some super dope people on this show. It’s like a ton of my favorite comics from down there. Just good, funny, people who are great to talk to. I got to catch up with one of my favorite dudes in the whole world Garret Barnes and pitch him the idea of he and I ripping off John Mulaney and Nick Kroll’s “Oh Hello” by being two older southern gentlemen and call it, “Oh hey y’all”!

The show starts and because Kate has a show in RVA to get back to, we three go first. Brandon had a super fun and weird set. He did a bit on 11/6 (9/11 flipped upside down) that didn’t kill but it tickled me quite a bit. Then Kate follows up and actually had a suggestion that played into one of her bits.

I went next and had so much fun. I had the topics of natural disasters, asians, gnnorrhea, waxing, and Samsung vs iPhone. I had fun riffing on all of these, it got playful, weird, and offensive which is exactly how I wanted it to be. I’d give this set a B+. After this we rode back, and I kept dozing in and out of sleep I was so tired. All in all an amazing weekend of shows!!!

OH BAYBEES THANKS FOR READING!! I love you all very much. Hugs and kisses and I’ll see you cuties soon!

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stevenvenn · 6 years

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Steven's Nifty 50 of 2017 - #40 - #31

Here are my favourite albums of 2017 - 40 - 31 (of 50). These are in no particular order just how I saw them relating to each other. Doing a true countdown would be too nerve-wracking. You can listen to my favourite cuts from each of the albums on Spotify and watch them on YouTube (links below). You can also read my thoughts on the albums below the links broken into 5 posts counting down by 10s. Enjoy and feel free to comment.

Spotify playlist:

https://open.spotify.com/user/stevenvenn/playlist/7qSpcgdwXuoLtIStRQeRto?si=WNoUzudHSgGJ75cWnlRGDA

YouTube playlist:

http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLqUMf7mP_mnMOmDl94VCPIJPFliPf62a5

NOTES

31. St. Vincent - Masseduction (Loma Vista)

On her fifth album Annie Clark has really grown into own as one of the most important composers and performers in rock music today, if not all music. Masseduction demonstrates a more electronic St. Vincent mixed with Clark’s exceptional guitar playing (one of the most underrated talents that she demonstrates consistently on each album). I had mentioned in the past to some people that this album has all hallmarks of a St. Vincent musical in it’s execution. It wouldn’t surprise me that Clark’s next project may be a stage musical (the videos and live performances in support of Masseduction showcased a much more dramatic and costume-focused turn for St. Vincent). There’s a feeling of futuristic pop/glam style on this album inspired most by Bowie and artists like Prince (who I think that St. Vincent has inherited the sexy pop music mantel from). But also the electronic pop of artists like Devo and Giorgio Moroder are also touchstones here. Not to be overlooked the production wizard of the year, Jack Antonoff, worked with Clark on every track and the electropop stylings here have a kinship to the other project where he really excelled this year Lorde’s Melodrama.

32. The xx – I See You (Young Turks)

The trio of Romy Madley Croft, Oliver Sim, and Jamie Smith returned in 2017 with a wonderful album that showed Croft and Sim integrating their vocals, now more matured and rich, to great effect. There’s a definite expansiveness to the xx’s sound now. By far the true advancements were made by Smith (who also goes by Jamie xx). It appears to the ears that Jamie xx, in doing his solo electronic dance record In Colours and various remixing projects during a small hiatus, has really come to the fore in this third album with his production being the star here. The album is more cohesive and sonically diverse than the band’s two previous releases with Croft and Sim’s voicing floating neatly over Jamie’s skillful production arsenal. Sim as well has integrated his bass playing in a more dubby way that complements Jamie xx’s clubbier beats and textures.

33. Kite Base – Latent Whispers (Little Something)

2 basses, a synthesizer, and a drum machine. If one bass is strong then two must be twice as amazing right? Well that’s definitely the case when one of the bass players is the exceptional Ayse Hassan of London post-punk rockers Savages. The mix of her playing with the soaring vocals and electronic programming of Kendra Frost (along with Frost’s pound for pound dueling bass) make this release more of a true band effort than a side-project for Hassan. The electronics flit around the heavy bottom provided by the two basses. There’s a sense of using the bass as a lead instrument (especially on the grimy “Grids”) that Peter Hook perfected so well in his days with Joy Division and New Order. Vocal experiments like “Dadum” and “Miracle Waves” demonstrate that these girls are not just a one trick pony though often channeling artists like Stereolab’s Laetitia Sadier if by way of Nine Inch Nails.

34. The Moonlandingz – Interplanetary Class Classics (Chimera/Transgressive Records)

Mix up Marc Bolan and T-Rex’s 70s glam, the big goth of Sisters of Mercy and Bauhaus/Tones on Tail, and throw in the much missed apocalyptic/retro squiggles and mechanical drumming of Add-N-To-X, and you start to get an idea of what Sheffield, UK’s megaband might sound like if you’re trying to describe them. Starting out as a joke concept for two bands, Eccentronic Research Council and Fat White Family, Moonlandingz is unlike anything I’ve heard before really. This is a crazy mix of sci-fi sounds, gloomy b-movie Hammer horror tropes, and psychedelic freakouts. It all feels like a train running out of control that’s taking us for a wild ride. How do you end this crazy journey of musical exploration and experimentation? Well with Yoko Ono of course (son Sean Lennon was this release’s producer). Front to back this is one crazy hell of a spooky spacey nightmare groove fest that never seems to let up.

35. Moon Duo – Occult Architecture Vols. 1 & 2 (Sacred Bones)

The duo of Ripley Johnson and Sanae Yamada are back in 2017 with not one but two great albums of fuzzy, psychedelic sounds backed by an unrelenting motorik beat. There’s a hypnotic druggy feel to these songs that seem more suited to listening via headphones when you're high than listening at other times. There’s also a Neu vs Sabbath playing in the space lounge minimalism (especially on tracks like “Cult of Moloch”) that just carries you from one song to the next making the 2 albums feel at times like one long spacey headtrip. There’s nothing new really here in this incarnation of Moon Duo’s oeuvre but damned if it isn’t trippy and magical. Space truckin’ jams for your head.

36. Novella – Change of State (Sinderlyn)

Hollie Warren and her band deliver more of the compact and sweet psychedelic pop that they debuted with on Land. Change of State appears to be a refining of that retro sound with a smoother mix this time by James Hoare (Ultimate Painting) directly to an old analog 8-track. Novella have always been able to flirt with a sound that's a stylish mix of psychedelic guitar and spacey keyboards. Hollie's voice channels a bit of Broadcast's Trish Kennan, Dum Dum Girls, or some of the slower breezier tracks of Stereolab's early career, especially in the layered female vocal exchanges. There's a definite kaleidoscopic vibe to all these songs that seems to come right of the 60s.

37. Jane Weaver - Modern Kosmology (Fire Records)

Speaking of retrofuturist triumphs in 2017, Jane Weaver came out with the very strong, bubbly synth masterpiece Modern Kosmology that seems to be beamed in from outer space. The landscape is modern and modular in sound style and mood recalling some of the greats of this realm like the aforementioned Broadcast, Stereolab, Komeda, library sounds, Krautrock, but also films like Fassbinder's "World on a Wire" and Godard's "Alphaville." The soaring "H>A>K" starts us off on this electronic space odyssey that ends with a Vangelis-like moment leading into "Did You See Butterflies?" where Jane channels Laetetia Sadier. Overall this is one magical Farfisa/Moog adventure that delights my ears and my love of futuristic visions from old British sci-fi.

38. Sampha - Process (Young Turks)

British electro-soul singer Sampha first came to my attention when his voice ended up on many of my favourite tracks on SBTRKT's self-titled debut in 2011. Here Sampha is singer, songwriter and producer and you can feel the purity of his voice and words taking the centre stage this time. Here we get late night songs of heartache, nostalgia for his first pure experiences playing piano in his Mother's home, and reflections on life and how it can be cruel and trying at the best of times. He sings it all with grace and heavy emotion backed by some minimal but beautiful electronic textures. But the music is just a support for the true star here, Sampha's intimate, and at times slightly melancholic, voice.

39. Kelly Lee Owens - s/t (Smalltown Supersound)

Welsh electronic producer Kelly Lee Owen's debut is a transcendent mix of dream pop, electro-tribal bouncy beats (a la Arthur Russell who is the inspiration for track 2), and atmospheric synths. It's all hazy and ethereal with Owens voice floating over harder edged minimal techno. There are moments like on the Jenny Hval-sung track "Anxi." that recall the melodic work of early Aphex Twin and Autechre. There's also something post-apocalyptic in mood like that of a Philip K. Dick novel or the urban menace of J.G. Ballard especially on tracks like "Evolution." Owens' dark soundscapes are rendered less sinister when cracked open by her otherworldly vocals.

40. Penelope Trappes - Penelope One (Optimo Music)

Australian singer Penelope Trappes, one half of electronic duo The Golden Filter, has turned in a very underrated minimal masterpiece relying mostly on her treated vocals that seem like she might be holed up in an empty castle or dark cave. Indeed the mood of the album is decidedly spooky and ghostly in the tradition of This Mortal Coil, some of Bjork's quieter darker moments, and Micah Levi's soundtrack for the film "Under The Skin." There's a pace to Penelope One that can be glacial at times with many songs comprising of a few reverberated notes and dark drum machine beats. There's a definite spell cast here that feels like waking from a nightmare at 4am and existing in that space between dream and wakefulness.

#nifty50of2017 #stevenvenn #bestof2017 #music

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morganaspendragonss · 3 years

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Hello 🥰 Whump fic idea :)TK lands in the hospital, again. But this time they're serious, serious injuries, he is under a respirator, he is not breathing on his own, the doctors do not give him much chance of survival, they even advise it would be the best to prepare for the worst and say goodbye, just in case. Owen calls Gwen, she's arriving the same day with Enzo and baby junior. When in the hospital they find out how it happened and that it's mostly Owen's fault (I don't know, for example, he allowed Tk to enter the unstable building to tend to the patient, or whether he made someone else angry and this person unloaded it on TK, or Owen decided to do something reckless and TK wanted to save him or it is The arson situation from 2x12 so Gwyn arrives pregnant, without a baby of course), Gwyn slaps him twice and Enzo punches him right in the nose, breaking it, for risking TK's life. Fortunately, despite the bad prognosis, TK wakes up, but after he took his sweet time being in a coma.

holly's august extravaganza day 3: the meetings for those in my wake

thanks for the prompt! i really loved writing this one though i need to confess to toning it down a little? idk but with the way it was going it didn't feel right to have enzo break owen's nose. i hope you still like it!

ao3 | 3.3k | major character injury, coma, angst with a happy ending

For years after the divorce, Gwyn came to learn that any call from Owen was almost certainly bad news.

TK got in a fight.

TK overdosed.

TK was shot, he’s in the hospital.

Over and over, until the first words out of her mouth whenever Owen’s name flashed up on her screen were, What’s wrong?

Things have been better in the three years since her time in Texas. Gwyn suspects it’s partly TK’s influence—he’s been more than enthusiastic in getting to know his baby brother, and Isaac has latched onto TK despite only seeing him in person every few months or so. But they’ve talked as well, she and Owen, and they really are doing better. They’re almost like friends now, which is why Gwyn thinks nothing of it when he calls just after she’s put Isaac to bed for the night.

“Owen, hey,” she greets. “What’s up?”

The silence she’s answered with is the first sign that something’s wrong.

The sob that follows is the second.

“Owen?” Gwyn repeats, louder this time, her heart leaping into her throat. She sits down heavily on the sofa as she waits for Owen’s response; there’s only one thing that could make him cry like that, and tears prick at Gwyn’s eyes as she imagines TK hurt again, or worse.

“Gwyn,” Owen eventually manages to gasp out, voice wrecked. “Gwyn, it’s TK. He’s… You need to get here. You need— It’s not like last time. They don’t know if he’s going to— They don’t think— It’s bad. Really bad.”

Owen breaks off, crying harder, and Gwyn claps a hand to her mouth. She remembers well how devastated he’d been when he called about the gunshot, but this a whole other level. Gwyn’s head spins with the potential implications of that and she finds her breath coming in sharp gasps, but it’s Owen’s next words that knocks it from her altogether.

“They think we should say goodbye.”

The rest of the story comes haltingly—someone got angry after his son couldn’t be saved on a call, he came to the firehouse, he attacked TK—but Gwyn barely hears it. Her boy is in the hospital again and this time…this time he might not be coming home. She can’t understand it; she spoke to him just two days ago, they made plans for he and Carlos to visit for Isaac’s birthday, and now…

“I’m so sorry, Gwyn,” Owen finishes. She feels a flash of that age-old urge to scream at him, but she fights it off, not wanting to wake Isaac.

“I’ll be on the first flight over,” she promises, then ends the call, sliding off the couch to the floor. Her phone falls from limp fingers and harsh sobs tear from her throat, muffled by the press of her fist against her mouth.

Enzo finds her there an hour later and immediately takes her in his arms, not complaining about her tears soaking his shirt. When she tells him what happened, he insists on joining her, and Gwyn allows herself to take that shred of comfort and run with it.

She thinks it’s the only comfort she’s likely to get right now.

The next flight isn’t until morning, so Gwyn spends a sleepless night packing and unpacking their suitcases and making phone calls with the firm and her clients to cancel everything for the foreseeable. She has the brief, terrible thought about whether she should pack funeral attire, which almost sends her into a panic attack as reality hits her all over again.

Enzo saves her from it, gently guiding her to bed, but not before she packs the clothes anyway.

Isaac seems to pick up on her mood when they’re hurrying out of the house, remaining mostly quiet aside from the odd question about where they’re going. He perks up considerably when he finds out they’re heading to Austin, babbling about seeing TK, and Gwyn has to blink hard to keep from crying again. Enzo reaches over to take her hand, and he barely lets go until they’re landing in Austin.

The entrance to the ICU looms before her, and Gwyn feels stuck. There had been a part of her, still, that had hoped to find TK miraculously awake and on the mend, like the last time she had made this trip. She doesn’t want to believe that he’s here, hurt, maybe dying.

But he is, and she’s forcefully reminded of that fact when a kind-looking nurse approaches her hesitantly.

“Ma’am? Can I help you?”

Gwyn blinks at her, her brain taking a moment to catch up. “I, um. I’m here to see my son. TK Strand.” She pauses, then shakes her head, cursing herself internally. “Tyler Kennedy Strand.”

The nurse’s entire demeanour changes, a sympathetic smile taking over her face. “This way.” She leads Gwyn through the ICU, then points at a door near the end of the corridor. “Tyler’s room is just there. I promise, we’re doing everything we can for him.”

Gwyn nods absently, her gaze stuck on the door the nurse had indicated. She walks forward slowly, the room seeming to get further and further away until, suddenly, she’s standing on the threshold, and she sees her son.

TK is barely visible, his face half-obscured by the ventilator, half by bruises, and heavy gauze covers his forehead. His arms, resting limply at his sides, are littered with scrapes, and if Gwyn squints, she can just about make out more bandages peeking out from under the hospital gown.

She’d thought that seeing him would make it all real, but she feels separate from everything somehow, only one thought going through her mind on repeat.

This is not my son.

A quiet whisper draws her attention to the figure sitting at TK’s side. Gwyn has to suppress a gasp as she takes in Carlos’s appearance; she hasn’t seen him in person since the wedding last year, and his pale face and red-rimmed eyes cut a stark contrast to that day. He hasn’t noticed her yet, wholly fixated on TK, one hand gently stroking the tufts of hair poking out above the bandage. His lips move and Gwyn knows she should walk away, but instead she finds herself leaning closer, straining to hear Carlos’s words.

“It’s okay, sweetheart,” he’s saying. “I know you’re fighting and I know you’re going to try as hard as you can to come back to us—believe me, Ty, I am praying every day to see those pretty green eyes of yours open again. But I—I want you to know that it’s okay if you can’t. If it gets too hard, if you need to let go, you can. I already miss you like crazy and I really, really, don’t want to live the rest of my life without you, but the thing I can’t stand more than that is the idea of you suffering.

“Come back if you can, but if someday you find you can’t, remember that I love you and we’ll be okay. I promise.”

Carlos sniffs and ducks his head to place a gentle, lingering kiss on TK’s cheekbone. It’s such a tender, intimate moment, but it quickly shatters when Carlos looks up and spots her, his eyes going wide. “Gwyn. I’m sorry, I didn’t realise you were there.”

She waves him off, willing herself to finally step into the room. “I’m the one who’s sorry. I should have said something, but I didn’t want to interrupt.”

Carlos nods, giving her a small, sad smile, which Gwyn does her best to return. She pulls up another chair and sinks into it, reaching out to take TK’s hand. She’s startled by the coolness of his skin, and more tears burn in the back of her eyes.

“What did the doctors say?” she asks, clearing her throat and twisting her body towards Carlos, though her eyes never leave TK.

“That it was a miracle he made it through surgery,” Carlos says, sighing wearily. “Eight stab wounds, too much blood loss, damage to his organs, broken ribs—that’s all bad enough, but they’re most worried about his brain. He took at least two blows to the head, and add that to the fact he wasn’t breathing for a good few minutes… They keep saying not to speculate, but we all know the odds here.”

Carlos’s voice breaks and Gwyn reaches out to comfort him, feeling sick to her stomach at the revelation. Why anyone would do this to her boy, she can’t comprehend; she finds herself both wanting answers and feeling unable to take any more.

Owen chooses that moment to appear in the doorway, looking every bit as wrecked as he sounded on the phone. “Gwyn,” he says roughly. “I’m glad you’re here.”

Carlos moves as if to give them privacy, but Gwyn shakes her head at him, cutting off his protests before he can even get them out. “You stay with him, Carlos,” she tells him. “We’ll talk in the hall.”

They head to a quiet spot not too far from TK’s room, and Gwyn turns to face Owen, holding her arms. “What the hell happened, Owen? Why is our son lying in there, not even breathing on his own?”

A flicker of a frown crosses Owen’s face. “I told you—”

“No, you didn’t.” Gwyn clenches her jaw, staring him down. “You said he’d been attacked, not that some maniac had used him as their personal punching bag.”

A few more seconds pass before Owen relents, sighing. “There was a call,” he starts, voice heavy with sorrow. “A car accident; dad and his kid were trapped inside. We got the dad out but the son was stuck pretty good. It took a long time to free him and by then it was too late—EMS did their best, but he was gone.

“The dad went ballistic, screaming at all of us, but especially at TK. We don’t really know why, but it was probably a convenience thing; TK had been the one to break the news, he was the closest person—the guy wasn’t exactly thinking clearly. He threatened him, tried to hit him—the cops had to arrest him eventually, but you know TK. He refused to press charges, said that the dad was just in shock and that he understood.”

Gwyn smiles a little at that; her son has always been too forgiving for his own good. It’s never come back to hurt him this badly before, though.

Owen pauses, throat bobbing as he seems to work up to the next part. His voice is quiet, and he seems reluctant to meet Gwyn’s eyes. “He showed up at the firehouse a week later—the dad, I mean. He said he wanted to apologise and, I swear, Gwyn, he really did seem genuine. None of us wanted to let him near TK, but ultimately it was TK’s decision. They went round the side of the house to talk; when neither of them came back after twenty minutes, we went looking.

“By that time, the guy was gone, and TK was…” He stops and shakes his head, swallowing hard. “He could barely breathe. Tommy and Nancy did what they could and they got him here quickly, but we have no idea how long he’d been like that before we found him.”

Gwyn’s head snaps up, a white-hot anger flashing through her. “I can’t believe you,” she hisses. “You left our son alone with a man who had already threatened him for twenty minutes, Owen.”

Owen frowns. “I told you, he seemed genuine. And TK—”

Gwyn can’t help it; she slaps him. “Don’t you dare,” she grounds out, crowding into Owen’s space. “Don’t you dare act like this was his fault.”

“I wasn’t—”

Her arm moves on instinct, but before she can connect again, a hand closes around her wrist. Gwyn turns to find Enzo staring at her, brow wrinkled in confusion.

“Gwyn, what’s going on?”

She shakes her head and takes a step back from Owen, freeing herself from Enzo’s grasp. “What’s going on,” she responds tightly, “is that he is part of the reason why my son is half-dead in there.”

Enzo gapes between them. “What?”

She ignores the question, needing to focus on anything else to keep her anger from overwhelming her. “What are you doing here anyway? Where’s Isaac?”

“He’s with Grace and Judd, they offered to babysit so I could come here. What—”

“Hang on,” Owen interrupts. “What is he doing here? I figured he’d stay in New York with the kid.”

“Isaac is TK’s brother, Owen,” Gwyn says, turning on him again. “And Enzo has just as much right to be here as any of us; he was more of a father to TK than you were sometimes.”

Owen’s eyebrows shoot up to his hairline. “Him? You’re joking, right?”

Gwyn isn’t sure what happens next, who starts it, but soon they’re all yelling, insults and accusations flying around the ward. There’s a furious nurse heading their way, but before she can say anything, another voice cuts through the argument, quiet and trembling but still somehow powerful.

“Get out,” Carlos says. “All of you.”

They all turn to him, Gwyn’s lips parting in shock. Owen takes a step towards him, holding his hands out in a gesture that’s probably meant to be pacifying.

“Carlos—”

“I mean it, Owen,” he snaps, harsher than Gwyn has ever heard him before. “You all screaming at each other is the last thing any of us needs, least of all TK. The only person to blame in all this is the guy who attacked him, and he’s already in custody; he’ll get what’s coming to him. If TK—” Carlos breaks off, clenching his jaw and staring down at the floor. He closes his eyes for a moment, before breathing out shakily and looking back up at them. “If anything changes, I’ll call you, I promise. But you can’t be here right now. Go, please.”

Carlos doesn’t wait for a response before turning on his heel and going back into TK’s room, reassuming his position next to the bed. Gwyn watches him for a second, nodding when Enzo pointedly takes her elbow.

“He’s right,” she says, directed at Owen. “We should go.”

Owen glares, gearing up to argue again, but he must think better of it as he suddenly slumps, all the energy draining out of him. “Right,” he mutters. “Right.”

They file slowly out of the ICU, closely watched by the hard eyes of the nurse from before. Gwyn spares one last look before forcing herself forwards; if getting here was hard, walking away is a thousand times worse.

Three weeks pass with no change and, crucially, no improvement. Gwyn spends more time with Carlos than she ever has before, and she hates that it’s her son being comatose that has brought the two of them closer. A tentative peace exists between her and Owen and she knows—truly, she knows—that the attack wasn’t his fault, that there was nothing that could have stopped it.

But she can’t help but be angry that, once again, her son was seriously hurt and she wasn’t around.

She takes Isaac to see TK once, when the worst of the bruises have faded a little. She worries that he’ll be scared, and he does seem to hesitate when they reach the room; in truth, Gwyn hadn’t wanted to bring him at all, but he’d kept asking about TK and she’d found herself helpless to do anything but acquiesce.

They still haven’t told him what’s going on. No-one knows how to. All Isaac knows is that TK is a little hurt and he needs rest, and even that knowledge seems to upset him.

Once he gets used to the sight, Isaac stretches his hands out to the bed. “TK,” he says simply, looking pleadingly up at Gwyn.

She hugs him close, trying to smile for him. “TK’s asleep, sweetie,” she explains. “He needs rest.”

“When wake up?”

“I don’t know, baby. I don’t know.”

Three weeks pass, and the doctors start talking about options and next steps. It’s obvious what that’s code for—they want to pull the plug. They’re told to take all the time they need to discuss it but, ultimately, the decision will be Carlos’s, as TK’s husband and next of kin.

Gwyn knows what choice he’s going to make; it’s the same one she, or anyone else in his position, would make.

That doesn’t make it any easier to bear, for any of them.

Gwyn finds him in the hallway, bent over with his head in his hands. She goes over and quietly sits in the chair next to him, placing a comforting hand on his back.

There’s a long silence before Carlos sniffs and turns to her, his face the picture of devastation. “I don’t know how I’m supposed to do this, Gwyn,” he whispers, voice cracking. “How am I supposed to just give up on him like that?”

She shakes her head. “You’re not giving up on him, Carlos. You’re letting him go.”

“I don’t know how to do that either.”

“None of us do.”

Silence again, but this time, it’s Gwyn that breaks it first. “Listen, Carlos, I know this is hard. God knows I wish none of us were even here. But we are, and we have to do what’s best for everyone, including TK.”

“I know that,” Carlos admits. “I just don’t want to lose him.” He closes his eyes and leans into Gwyn, allowing her to wrap him in a hug. “I wish we had more time.”

Gwyn’s heart breaks all over again, and she squeezes his shaking shoulders. “We’ve got time,” she says, though she knows that’s not what he meant. “As much as you need.”

The sob she’s answered with tells her there’s not enough time in the world for Carlos to say goodbye to TK.

The call comes in the middle of the night. Dread pools in Gwyn’s gut as she accepts it and lifts the phone to her ear, her hands trembling.

“Owen?”

“Gwyn. TK, he—he woke up. It was only for a few seconds, but he woke up, Gwyn. The doctors said it was a miracle; they think he might actually recover.”

Gwyn gasps, a sob crawling up her throat as the news sinks in. It’s everything she’s been praying for ever since that first call, and all she can think about now is getting to TK.

“I’ll be at the hospital in fifteen,” she says. She ends the calls and raises her hands to her face, wiping away the tears beginning to fall from her eyes.

Maybe this nightmare is finally coming to an end.

TK is off getting tests when Gwyn arrives, but she’s finally allowed back in the room an hour later, Carlos and Owen on her heels. The ventilator has been removed, replaced by a nasal cannula, and his eyes are open—barely to slits, but Gwyn doesn’t care. TK is awake and alive, and that’s all that matters.

As soon as she’s in the chair by the bed, she reaches out for him, her touch feather-light as she strokes his cheek. “My brave boy,” she whispers wetly. “My brave, brave boy.”

TK’s head rolls on the pillow so he’s facing her and he mumbles something that’s probably meant to be a greeting, but the words jumble together and come out as gibberish.

Gwyn thinks it’s the most beautiful sound she’s ever heard.

They’ve all been briefed about the risks of brain damage and all the potential lasting consequences which could impact the rest of TK’s life. But right now, as she holds TK’s hand with Carlos on his other side and Owen at her back, Gwyn chooses to take solace in the constant rise and fall of TK’s chest and the heart monitor beeping out a steady rhythm.

There’ll be enough time for worry later; for now, her son is alive, and Gwyn can’t think of anything else that's more important.

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morganaspendragonss · 3 years

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I hope that you are doing well! I love the your writing! If you are open to a Tarlos fic request: TK to Carlos after the doctor has told him Carlos might not make it through the next 48hrs "I cannot imagine life without you, please don't let me live my greatest fear. I won't survive."

Carlos has been working a case and it happens that he becomes a target. He starts getting messages at work, at home and becomes paranoid but doesn't tell TK, but TK can see that Carlos is on edge. Carlos picks a fight with TK so that he goes to stay with Owen for a while. Carlos does this to protect him, let him at least stay away so that if anything happens, TK is safe. Then one night, Carlos is alone at home and someone breaks in, torture ensues and he is barely clinging to life. He calls 911, Grace answers and he can barely get the words out "it's Carlos, send help". 📍

holly's august extravaganza day 10: i can't imagine my life without you

thank you!

ao3 | 1.9k | descriptions of torture, major character injury, angst, hopeful ending, open ending

TK knows he’s annoying people. The atmosphere in the ambulance is thick with tension whenever they’re out on a call, and it’s not much better back at the firehouse. He tries to keep his distance, occupying himself in the gym or aggressively doing chores, but he can’t avoid everyone forever and his bad mood is starting to spill over.

Like when he and Nancy fell back into their old pattern of snipping at each other, or when he nearly bit Paul’s head off when he asked what was wrong. It was less the question itself—though TK certainly doesn’t want to get into why he’s so out of it—and more the way Paul phrased it. Nobody likes to be asked ‘trouble in paradise?’, particularly when the answer is yes.

He just doesn’t understand. It had come completely out of left field—one minute everything was fine, the next Carlos had turned to him with guarded eyes and a clenched jaw, and said six words that sent TK’s whole world crashing down.

“I think we need a break.”

Carlos hadn’t explained why; when TK had tried to push, he’d turned it into a fight, until TK had no choice but to leave. He’s been staying with his dad for a week now and he desperately misses his boyfriend, torn between wanting to go over and check on him and wanting to give him space.

He’d settled on a text, a simple you okay?, which still felt woefully inadequate. Carlos had been on edge for weeks before the blow up and TK hadn’t been able to get a word out of him about why.

The text is still unanswered, though it’s been marked as Read.

TK huffs and hauls himself up into the ambulance to check stock. He knows Nancy has already done it and she’s going to be pissed if she catches him, but he needs to keep his mind occupied somehow, lest he start to spin out. But the peace he finds is short-lived, as not ten minutes after he starts, TK looks up from his clipboard to see Judd approaching, hands held out in a pacifying gesture.

It has the opposite effect, TK’s nerves becoming that bit more frayed at the spooked animal treatment he’s getting, but his pointed glare does nothing to deter Judd. Nor does turning his back and returning to work, as he finds out when Judd’s heavy footsteps stop behind the rig and don’t move away.

“TK,” Judd says, his voice suspiciously rough.

TK doesn’t bother turning around, hoping it will get the message across. “Fuck off, Judd,” he says, which would normally be a guarantee of riling him up enough to get him to either leave TK alone or engage in a more physical manner.

At this point, TK doesn’t really care which reaction he gets.

Unfortunately, he’s not in luck today. Which, honestly, tracks.

“I got a phone call,” Judd continues, undeterred, “from Grace. Now, I figure you’ll be getting a similar one soon enough, but we thought it might be better if you heard it from us first.”

TK sighs and hangs his head, reluctantly turning around. “What?” he snaps out. When Judd doesn’t react, not even with a raised eyebrow, a quiet dread begins to pool in his gut, a little voice in the back of his head telling him he already knows ‘what’.

He tries to push it down, but there are very few reasons why Grace would call Judd and ask to talk to him. TK takes the proffered phone in a shaking hand, his heart starting to pound as he lifts it to his ear.

“Grace?”

“Hey, TK.” Grace’s voice is gentle, as it always is, but there’s a soothing note to it now, and more of the pieces start to slot together in TK’s head. “Listen, honey, I’m at work and I just got a call come through. I’m… I’m so sorry, TK. It was Carlos.”

TK’s breath catches, tears pricking the back of his eyes. “What do you mean?” he demands, voice shaky. “What do you mean ‘you’re sorry’?”

“He was… I don’t know. He was barely able to talk, but it sounded real bad. EMS 122 were in the area at the time so I sent them out; they should have arrived at the hospital by now.”

And TK… TK doesn’t know what to say to that. He slumps back on the bench in the rig, breathing turning shallow as he imagines what could have happened to Carlos. The last time they’d seen each other—the last time they’d spoken—it had ended with them throwing insults across the kitchen island and with TK packing a bag and slamming the door behind him.

The thought that it might be the last memory they have together kills him inside.

He needs answers. Before he can face this new reality, he needs to know what happened, which means there’s only one thing he can do right now.

“Grace?”

“Yes, sweetie?”

“I want to hear it.”

Judd has followed him up to the mercifully empty bunkroom, refusing to leave after both his and Grace’s attempts to dissuade him had failed. TK ignores him for the most part, but he does give in to his request to put the phone on speaker. Much as he wants to deal with this on his own, it is a kind of comfort to have Judd’s steady presence next to him.

“Are you sure about this, TK?” Grace asks for the millionth time. TK appreciates her concern, but he needs this. He needs to hear it for himself.

“I’m sure.”

“Alright then.”

He hears a few clicks and then the recording starts, Grace’s voice coming over the speaker.

“9-1-1, what’s your emergency?”

No response.

“Hello?”

The silence continues, broken only by static, and then what TK recognises as heavy, gasping breaths.

“Hello, is anyone there?”

A few more seconds pass, and then, “Grace.”

TK has to suppress a sob at the sound of his boyfriend’s voice—though, if he didn’t know for sure it was Carlos, he wouldn’t have recognised it. His words come out ragged and hoarse, riding on breaths that seem to be getting slower and more laboured by the second. TK clutches the phone tighter in his hand, biting down hard on his lip.

“It’s… It’s Carlos. I… Send help. Please.”

“Carlos, can you tell me what’s wrong?”

But Grace goes unanswered, and TK suddenly notices that he can no longer hear the sound of Carlos breathing. His own breaths hitch, his lungs refusing to expand properly, and his vision blurs with tears as he curls in on himself, hands braced on the edge of the bed and gripping tightly onto the covers.

He doesn’t notice Judd taking the phone back, nor is he aware of him moving to sit next to him until he’s being pulled into a strong embrace, TK’s head cradled against Judd’s chest. Judd whispers things TK doesn’t hear as his hands gently rub his back, the touch grounding him as he loses himself to tears and the overwhelming pain in his heart.

Five minutes later, TK’s phone rings.

Fifteen minutes after that, they arrive at the hospital.

“Please,” TK whispers, clutching onto the hand in both of his. “Please don’t make me do this. I don’t… I don’t want to live a life without you in it. I can’t, you understand me? I can’t. If you leave, I won’t survive it, so you just hang on for me, alright? Forget what the doctor thinks, you keep fighting, and come back to me. Please, Carlos. Please.”

TK looks up, hoping to see Carlos’s beautiful brown eyes staring right back at him, but of course they’re not. He might never see them again, which is something TK is still trying to wrap his head around. That’s not the only thing either; Carlos has so many injuries that he’s struggling to remember them all—the only thing he does remember with horrific clarity is the doctor’s words when he’d asked to speak to TK privately.

“We’ve done what we can, but I’m afraid Officer Reyes’s wounds are grave and there is a significant possibility that he may not make it beyond the next 48 hours. If he does, then we will re-evaluate, but currently his chances of recovery are slim. I’m truly sorry.”

TK wipes away a stray tear and presses a kiss to Carlos’s bruised knuckles. His other hand is completely shattered, and TK can barely stand to look at his face; it’s been beaten to a pulp, there’s a patch over one eye, and whoever attacked him even went so far as to rip out some of his teeth.

It’s grim, and that’s to say nothing of the rest of his body. Torture is the only word to describe what happened to Carlos—brutal, savage, and without mercy, somebody tortured him in their home.

And he was alone.

“Son, you didn't know.”

“That’s no excuse. I left him.”

“Carlos pushed you away. He was trying to protect you.”

“And where was I when he needed protection?”

“TK—”

“Don’t, Dad.”

“TK, I really shouldn’t be doing this.”

“Please, Mitchell. I need to know. Carlos knew something was going to happen but he chose to drive me away instead of letting me in. I just… I just want answers.”

“...I’ll see what I can do.”

Carlos makes it through the 48 hours, but not without incident. Somewhere around hour 32, the machines had started going haywire, summoning an army of doctors who shoved TK out of the room, leaving him to stare in through the blinds as they worked to save Carlos’s life.

They’d done it, but it had taken TK hours to come down from the resulting panic attack.

“Oh my god.”

Mitchell is standing at his shoulder, watching him warily as he flips through the file she brought him from the station. She keeps looking around anxiously, as if her sergeant is going to appear and arrest her for misconduct at any moment, but TK only has eyes for the images and words in front of him.

“Did you know about this?” he asks, gesturing to the myriad of threatening messages they’d apparently found in Carlos’s desk.

She shakes her head. “We noticed he’d been acting weird, but we figured something was going on between you two. He never said a word to anyone that I know of.” She pauses and sighs shakily, placing a comforting hand on TK’s shoulder. “We, um. We found some at your house, too. In Carlos’s nightstand.”

TK stares, first at Mitchell, then at the file, then at Carlos, still just as silent and motionless as he’s been since the day all this happened. “Why?” he breathes, and he doesn’t know which one of them he’s addressing the question to.

The doctors are amazed when they get to a week and Carlos’s heart is still beating. He still has a ventilator breathing for him and there’s still been no sign of him waking up, but he’s not giving up.

TK wants to say that he never doubted him, but he can’t ignore his paramedic training. He’d heard how badly Carlos was injured; he’d seen the crime scene photos and all the blood coating their bedroom.

(He’d needed several minutes in the bathroom to recover from that sight)

Much as he didn’t want to admit it, all the signs pointed to Carlos not making it.

But he’s still here. Still fighting. And TK can’t help but let that little bit of hope into his heart.

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morganaspendragonss · 3 years

Note

For bthb what abt a flash back of TK’s first overdose? it seems like he’s had that happen before

holly's august extravaganza day 11: start again from the beginning

not sure if this is exactly what you wanted anon, but i hope you like it anyway!

@badthingshappenbingo prompt: flashbacks

ao3 | 1.1k | pre-canon to episode 1, drug abuse, overdose, flashbacks, implications of suspected suicide, alternating time lines

Owen trusts his son. He’s watched TK fight his addiction and stay sober for the last six years, and he has faith that he can handle himself.

But when TK doesn’t show up for work the night after proposing to Alex, Owen knows that something is wrong. Some might call it a father’s intuition—there are, after all, numerous reasons why someone newly-engaged might be running late—but the hard truth is that they’ve been here before.

Owen sits a few more moments at his desk, trying to convince himself that he’s wrong, that TK is going to walk in any second now. But he doesn’t appear, and, besides, TK is usually fairly punctual—certainly never this late. This is something he’s never done before.

Except once.

Owen taps his foot, checking his watch for the fifth time in as many minutes. TK is supposed to be meeting him for dinner, or was, twenty minutes ago. It’s entirely possible that he’s forgotten, but Owen has sent him enough messages asking where he is for that to become a non-issue. Equally, he could have been delayed at the Academy, but as time ticks on, Owen becomes less and less certain in his convictions on that.

He hasn’t missed TK becoming more distant lately. He supposes that’s what comes with a kid growing up and moving out, but it’s more than that, he knows it is. Teenage rebellion wasn’t enough to describe TK’s outbursts at that age, and adult independence doesn’t even begin to cover whatever’s going on now.

With a heavy sigh, Owen pulls out his phone and calls the lieutenant in command—he’s not above using his own position to get information on his son.

“This is Anderson.”

“Anderson, it’s Strand. I was just wondering if you were still in session at the Academy.”

Anderson sighs, his raised eyebrow practically audible. “Owen, if you’re calling to ask about TK, just say so,” he says. “You’re not subtle.”

Owen winces—he supposes it is pretty obvious. He keeps his silence, which seems to be confirmation enough for Anderson, not that he ever really needed it.

“Please don’t make a habit of doing this, but just this once, I can tell you that TK didn’t show up today.”

He freezes, a cold dread washing through him. “He call in sick or something?” he asks, swallowing, hoping against hope for an affirmative.

Another sigh. “Nope, not a peep. Whenever you do see him, do me a favour and tell him that kind of behaviour won’t fly, not now and definitely not in the future.”

“Sure thing,” Owen says tightly. “Thanks.”

He doesn’t know what’s going on with his son, but it can’t be anything good. The erratic behaviour, the standoffish-ness, and now this… It doesn’t make any sense.

He heads off to TK’s apartment like a shot, his bad feeling growing with each passing second.

When TK doesn’t open the door, Owen’s suspicions are all but confirmed. Part of the curse of being a firefighter is becoming a very light sleeper, so he would have heard the banging even if he were asleep. And there’s no way he stayed over at Alex’s; it’s too far away, plus, according to TK, they haven’t met up there in months. It’s fishy, if you ask him, but TK never does.

Owen doesn’t waste any time calling the crew down—he knows what’s happening now, and if he’s wrong… Well, then he’s wrong and TK will be fine.

But Owen’s pretty sure he’s right.

Even so, despite the familiarity of the scene, despite the fact that he knew it was coming, Owen’s breath is still stolen from him when they break into the apartment and find TK face down on the floor.

He doesn’t think he starts breathing again until TK does.

A team of paramedics is already at the apartment when Owen gets there. One of the firefighters accompanying them blocks the doorway, preventing him from entering, but Owen sees enough for the final pieces in this ugly jigsaw to come together.

Pills scattered across the floor. TK’s roommates with pinprick pupils, their blinks slow as they passively watch the chaos in front of them. And TK, spread-eagled on the ground, an ambu bag over his face and a paramedic performing compressions on his chest.

His son is overdosing.

Owen feels frozen, trapped in a nightmare as memories of the past few months—years, even—flash through his mind. The acting out, the pulling back, the strange moods… They were all signs, all happening right under his nose.

And he missed every single one.

He watches on fearfully as the paramedics administer Narcan, as the room goes quiet save for the hiss of the ambu bag. Each second in which TK remains still, his chest unmoving, feels like an eternity, and Owen’s heart beats frantically in his chest as he waits, and waits.

Owen Strand is not a praying man, but today he sends pleas up to any god who might be listening for TK to be given another chance.

And, somehow, by the grace of god—or, more accurately, a team of paramedics—it works. TK gasps back to life, his eyes flying wide and his chest heaving, and Owen almost collapses in relief.

He takes careful note of the shame in his son’s eyes when he jumps in the back of the ambulance, but he doesn’t remark on it. There will be a time for difficult conversations and remedial actions later; right now, Owen has to be there for his son.

Something, he’s beginning to realise, that he’s failed to do for a long time.

TK is released from hospital by nightfall, on the proviso that he has someone to watch over him for the next couple of days. That’s no problem—Owen has no intentions of letting TK out of his sight for the foreseeable whether he likes it or not. Though, right now, TK seems entirely indifferent on the matter, and on everything else.

He’d answered the doctor’s questions with short, one-word responses, just barely avoiding a psych eval and a stay in the mental ward. Owen is grateful for that, at least, but there is a part of him that wonders.

Wonders what could have caused TK to throw away years of sobriety, to go so far as to— Well. He doesn’t know that TK intended for it to end the way it did, but he’d be lying if he said he hadn’t thought it. Given what he does know about the situation—which, admittedly, isn’t much—and about TK’s history, it’s not a stretch to believe that last night might have been something of a final straw.

Whatever the case, it’s abundantly clear that Owen has, once again, failed. Something has to change, and this time, it has to be something big.

Deputy Chief Radford’s card is burning a hole in his pocket, and suddenly Owen knows what he has to do.

#bad things happen bingo #911 lone star #911 lone star fic #tk strand #owen strand #lone star #911ls #holly's august extravaganza #fanfiction #my fanfiction #writing #my writing #anonymous

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