Short fic: Never leave you
"I am sorry, Husker. I do not think I have really heard you right."
Ever since Alastor came back after licking th wounds he got from his fight with Adam, Husk had the questionable luck of regaining the popularity he had hoped to have lost with his Boss. Apparently losing not only control but face as well in front of the Pride Ring really reminded Alastor how much he used to love having someone who may complain about it but was unable to say 'no' to anything Alastor wanted.
In contrast to their relationship before Alastors years of absence there was however that Husks company was not only wanted by Alastor and Nifty but that now there were other people (Angel, Cherri Bomb, Lucifer and even Vaggie) who appreciated talking, joking and partying with the cat demon. Bonds with people other than Alastor and Nifty, that were forged before, during and shortly after the battle.
And Alastor, who was in desperate need to have something or someone who belonged solely to him since he did not even own himself and his self-control was ever so subtly falling apart, did not appreciate the thought of having to share the one soul that was truelly his.
Alastor appreciated it even less that Charlie and others were talking to Husk about the possibility of redemption and considering Alastor was feverishly trying to get out of his own contract he had the paranoia that his Husker must be doing the same.
"I.. I will not leave you."
"That's very good to hear, Husker. However, I am still missing a small little addition to that sentence."
"I will .. never leave you."
They had played similar 'games' before. Other times, it was 'I am yours', 'I belong to you.' 'I do as you say' and so on. For someone who owned his soul in a quite literal soul bond Alastor sometimes seemed quite insecure in the power he held once one was able to look past the smile.
"And why is that, mon chaton`?"
"Because you will never let me go, you damn .."
"Tsk, tsk, tsk. Wrong answer again, Husker. "
"Because .. I don't want to leave. "
It was a lie.
But it was a lie that Alastor liked to hear.
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Today my therapist introduced me to a concept surrounding disability that she called "hLep".
Which is when you - in this case, you are a disabled person - ask someone for help ("I can't drink almond milk so can you get me some whole milk?", or "Please call Donna and ask her to pick up the car for me."), and they say yes, and then they do something that is not what you asked for but is what they think you should have asked for ("I know you said you wanted whole, but I got you skim milk because it's better for you!", "I didn't want to ruin Donna's day by asking her that, so I spent your money on an expensive towing service!") And then if you get annoyed at them for ignoring what you actually asked for - and often it has already happened repeatedly - they get angry because they "were just helping you! You should be grateful!!"
And my therapist pointed out that this is not "help", it's "hLep".
Sure, it looks like help; it kind of sounds like help too; and if it was adjusted just a little bit, it could be help. But it's not help. It's hLep.
At its best, it is patronizing and makes a person feel unvalued and un-listened-to. Always, it reinforces the false idea that disabled people can't be trusted with our own care. And at its worst, it results in disabled people losing our freedom and control over our lives, and also being unable to actually access what we need to survive.
So please, when a disabled person asks you for help on something, don't be a hLeper, be a helper! In other words: they know better than you what they need, and the best way you can honor the trust they've put in you is to believe that!
Also, I want to be very clear that the "getting angry at a disabled person's attempts to point out harmful behavior" part of this makes the whole thing WAY worse. Like it'd be one thing if my roommate bought me some passive-aggressive skim milk, but then they heard what I had to say, and they apologized and did better in the future - our relationship could bounce back from that. But it is very much another thing to have a crying shouting match with someone who is furious at you for saying something they did was ableist. Like, Christ, Jessica, remind me to never ask for your support ever again! You make me feel like if I asked you to call 911, you'd order a pizza because you know I'll feel better once I eat something!!
Edit: crediting my therapist by name with her permission - this term was coined by Nahime Aguirre Mtanous!
Edit again: I made an optional follow-up to this post after seeing the responses. Might help somebody. CW for me frankly talking about how dangerous hLep really is.
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the way that one line from the new epilogue in an astarion romance is going to HAUNT me
just. what a profoundly intense thing to confess to someone.
like, just these six months of newfound happiness with you exerts a force on his heart equal and in direct opposition to two centuries of endless torment, the gnawing hunger and exploitation. this flashbulb-bright fraction of his long life holds the same gravity to him as years upon years of darkness and suffering.
in all likelihood, he hasn’t even known his lover for as long as his worst memory lasted, that year sealed away to go mad from starvation and sensory deprivation, yet he still tells them this brief time has been so fundamentally and powerfully important that the weight of even that unimaginable hell is vanishingly small compared to this present he has now and the future ahead of them both.
how am i supposed to act normal about this.
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HMMMMM bakugou being just. the absolute picture of sin.
he works overnight and comes home early in the morning, around 3 or 4 am or so, and you greet him and give him a kissy and ask how it all went. and even though it's still dark outside and he's been working for twelve hours—he's still coming off patrol, right ? so he's still got some energy left, and he eats something and takes a shower and winds down as you fall back to sleep.
and it's not until much later in the day that he wakes up, early afternoon, and you're kind of tiptoeing around so that he can get his much-needed rest. you slip into the closet of your bedroom for something and you think you're gonna get in and out without a sound, but his hearing is so attuned to just about anything and everything at this point.
so rough and raspy, he grunts out, "what're y'lookin' for?" and you whip around real fast and he's just—
half sitting up in bed, bare back leaning against the headboard. an arm behind his head, so that his bicep is tense and round and stone-solid. stretched like that, his obliques are more prominent, taut and rippling up the side of his ribcage. he must have gotten hot while passed out, as he usually does, because the comforter is all askew; one of his legs is bent, the fine hair a dark gold in the waning day; the other is hanging off the bed, lightly swinging as he watches you, and the blanket has come down enough that you can see the bulge of his thigh muscles beneath his stupid tiny black boxer briefs.
and he's just so. man. in every single way.
(his hair is flat on one side, too, and his eyes are still a little puffy from sleep—but you think that adds to it, all in all)
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