it takes far too long for soap to realise ghost won’t touch him anymore
he doesn’t avoid him, which he considers no small a miracle given how he usually treats his emotions, and he’s too busy being thankful to notice. thankful he didn’t run from him, thankful his simon has returned to him, no matter how changed he is from the man he knew. ghost doesn’t shy away from his touch so long as he knows it’s coming and he spends long nights just tracing the scars on his newly bared face; following half-remembered tracks and memorising new ones
but ghost never reaches back. he’ll press into his hands like a starved man, melt beneath the smallest of touches but he never initiates. and now, his regular touches have disappeared; no longer does he clap him on the back after a job well done, doesn’t cheekily nudge him after making a recruit shit themself just by giving them a look and soap hadn’t realised how much he’s come to rely on them until they stopped. how much he’s grown to care for ghost the way he used to care for simon
he can’t confront him about it; ghost’s fight or flight always firmly tuned to flight when it came to matters about himself. soap would’ve if it meant fight; if ghost would just put his hands on him again, he’d take his violence with the passion of a lover, wear the marks he left behind with grateful pride. but he remembers the look on ghost’s face when he’d ripped his balaclava off, when he’d stripped his barrier and his protection and spat, “i ruined you the moment i touched you!”
so soap waits. he waits for ghost to crawl into his bunk, to take off his mask and surrender himself to his touch; a touch that seems to burn as much as it freed. and instead of taking his face in his hands and worshiping it the way he has every other night ghost’s come to him, soap takes his gloved hand in his own
ghost flinches, the preemptive bliss fading from his eyes as reluctant fear takes its place. soap brings it up so it hovers between them and already feels him edge backwards. he doesn’t let it stop him and gently tugs his fingers free of the glove one at a time until his hand is bare to him; visibly shaking in the dark. soap brings it towards his face, holding firm when ghost tries to yank it back and presses into it; his breath hitching as he finally gets the touch he’s missed for years
“stop, john,” ghost whispers and it hurts to hear the pain in his voice; closer to begging for the soft touch to end than he’s ever been under torture
“no,” he refuses, pressing a kiss to the centre of his palm
his eyes shine in the dark, arm twitching as he fights himself; pulling back against his grip and leaning into him in turn. (how can he stand to put his mouth on him; can’t he taste it? the dirt and decay that lives under his skin? the maggots that swim in the slow beat of his blood; the rot he’s been trying so hard not to spread to him but he’s weak.) “you don’t know how broken i am. i’ll ruin you, john.”
soap kisses him again; thick, phantom blood coating his lips. “i’m not letting you slip through my fingers again,” he promises, swallowing it down. “i’ve missed you too much to be afraid of getting cut, simon.”
211 notes
·
View notes
The Story Behind The Song: Arctic Monkeys’ early ambitions on ‘A Certain Romance’
Lucy Harbron – Far Out Magazine | January 17, 2024
It was 2006. Mortgages were crashing, and businesses were going bust. Tony Blair was on his last legs in office as the longest-serving prime minister since Margaret Thatcher, and the hangover of ‘Cool Brittania’ was beginning to set in with an unexpected ferocity. Things were bleak when a young Alex Turner sang, “There ain’t no romance around there” through the public’s speakers. Arctic Monkeys were about to write themselves into musical history as the voice of a new generation.
The final song on their debut album, there has always been something special about ‘A Certain Romance’. In 2022, after the release of their seventh album, The Car, Turner seemed to find himself reflecting back on that 2006 track. To the musician, that early cut holds a clue to everything that was to come as he said the piece “showed that we did actually have these ambitions beyond what we once thought we were capable of”.
Coming in at over the five-minute mark, ‘A Certain Romance’ almost feels like the Arctic Monkeys’ version of a rock opera, summarising all the themes, feelings and energy that came before it on their seminal album Whatever People Say I Am, That’s What I’m Not. It has the cheekiness of ‘Fake Tales Of San Francisco’ and the catchy instrumentals of hits like ‘Dancing Shoes’ or ‘I Bet That You Look Good On The Dancefloor’. Utilising the northern charm of ‘Mardy Bum’, it stands as a final, neatly summarising point on the social commentary found in their early tracks like ‘From The Ritz To The Rubble’ or ‘Riot Van’. Really, it could be argued that ‘A Certain Romance’ is the ultimate example of Arctic Monkeys’ original sound, perfectly encapsulating all the things that made the world listen up and pay attention.
It’s like they seemed to know that, too, always allowing the song a special place. In fact, it was really the band’s opening remark. Years before the offer of a debut album came around, the group were a well-oiled machine with their own local hits. They had the northern live music scene in their hands as their homemade demo CD was passed around like everyone’s worst-kept secret. Beneath the Boardwalk features eight out of the 13 songs that would be on Whatever People Say I Am, That’s What I’m Not, albeit in a slightly different, lower-quality version. But the opening number, ‘A Certain Romance’, sounds just the same.
It’s all there, from the rolling opening drums to that final guitar solo. Recorded and produced in a rented studio at only age 17, the existence of ‘A Certain Romance’, one of the band’s most explorative and energetic numbers, in this form this early in their career feels like a diamond sitting in a mine. It proves that they were always onto something special.
They never needed any help. In fact, their producer, Jim Abbiss, noted that they even seemed nervous about the help. “I think they were probably a bit weary, like ‘who’s this guy? And is he gonna make our sound this or that.’”
They didn’t want anything to change too much, as the group already had the songs figured out. Turner certainly did, as the track’s meandering narrative about hometown lads, fights, and local boredom is already there. Talking on a podcast, original member Andy Nicholson revealed the story behind the song. “We had a practice room with a pool table in, and we had a party in there, and we invited another band who were friends of ours, and we all had some drinks,” he said. “Then something happened, someone throws a pool cue, someone throws a pool ball, and everyone ends up fighting,” he added, explaining the lyrics, “there’s boys in bands / And kids who like to scrap with pool cues in their hands.”
But the magic of Arctic Monkeys lies in their nuance. What begins as a snooty analysis of his local landscape is a genuinely affectionate take. “Well, over there, there’s friends of mine / What can I say? I’ve known ’em for a long long time / And, yeah, they might overstep the line / But you just cannot get angry in the same way,” Turner sings, looking around at his bandmates and lifelong friends. ‘A Certain Romance’ is not only a time capsule for the group’s beginnings but is an ode to all the people who were there with them. It’s an ode to the hometown that made them and all its various characters.
But as the last guitar solo roars to life, there is an unspoken statement that they’re going to be bigger than what they came from. “I remember when we were recording ‘A Certain Romance’ and having a conversation with the producer about the final guitar solo,” Turner told NME, recalling the moment these songs were reworked for their debut. But they wouldn’t let anyone mess with ‘A Certain Romance’, knowing exactly what they were doing and trying to say with that one. In the 2003 demo version, all the feeling is already there, and Turner wouldn’t risk it.
“There’s something that happens at the end of that track where we break some rules in a single moment,” he continued. What happens at the end of the piece feels even more special, considering how the album was recorded. “These are the songs we wanna do, and I think this is the order we wanna do them in,” Alex Turner told their producer, recounting the conversation in 2007 to RadioX, “And he goes, ‘alright, we’ll try to record them in that order as well.’” As the final song, that last guitar solo is the last thing recorded for the album, standing as a cathartic outlet and a chance for the band to prove themselves.
“We focused on the [emotional] effect of the instrumentals over the words,” Turner reflected on the track, concluding, “and I feel like we’ve been trying to do that again and again since then.”
+
28 notes
·
View notes
I've decided I need to set a boundary. Not for my followers on here but more so for myself. I don't owe anyone an obligation to write or not to write something. And this is in no way directed at anyone, i just felt it necessary for me to make this post after reflecting on myself as a writer. I feel as though there's a strange connection between both writer and reader, almost a parasocial one to an extent where writers are expected to pump out fic after fic without having the fics be too boring but they must include smut but not be too sexual because you need fluff in it too and all of the above and it just gets so draining. I very much feel as though writers are sold extremely short by Fandom community and are more often than not expected to be held at different regards than other artists. Most often, writers are not considered to be artists in Fandom settings and it's so tiring. I've seen so many pieces of art that are not writing oriented about things or people that I would love to write about as not only a challenge to myself but also as engagement in my hobby but then consider my audience and force myself not to. I'm tired of doing that and it's nobody's fault but my own. I don't care if you don't like what I write, who I write about, or what I'll write next. Some of you won't like what I write about and that's just not my problem, unfollow me if you have to but I want to have the freedom to engage with my hobby without feeling as though I'm chained to different expectations that other artists whom are not writers aren't. It's not fair, and you all know it's a double standard. Not to mention, you all pick and choose, and I'm so damn tired of it.
54 notes
·
View notes
Something that really bothers me about the rose coloured glasses vis a vis tellius and fe fans (ESPECIALLY from 3h fans who learned about tellius later) is that many like soren purely because of his main ship (i mean i like ikesoren too but come the fuck on) and jokingly characterise soren as a stereotypical nasty mean limp wristed sarcastic gay man instead of a deeply flawed branded angry at the world and definitely trauma bonded to ike, but micaiah is still absolutely getting raked over the coals over the blood pact and not being ike’s fangirl
Well,
Jokes often involve flanderisation, so Soren being flanderised to oblivion when people joke about him isn't something I really care about, but maybe that's because I'm not really fond of Soren to begin with lol
What annoys me more is when some people try to rationalise Soren's anger and backstory by either pointing at Almedha or Deghinsea being responsible for everything, and I'm like, what.the.fuck?
Almedha's just, idk, I won't call it sexism, but damn - that woman loves her son who is the only reason why she hasn't completely lost her mind over 1/losing her powers 2/being casted away like trash by her "BF" 3/being rejected by her dad 4/thinking her brother was tortured and abused to death because of her actions 5/being separated from her beloved child.
Deghinsea being "uwu bad bcs he's the reason why brandeds are rejected by both beorcs and laguz" is another take I really am not fond of, and iirc I wrote a post earlier this year about it? But to some people who buy the "Crusts BaD" as the reason why Fodlan sucks, I guess they need to have someone to name and pill all of the world's nonsense rather than, well, in Tellius' case, realise that the worldbulding and the lore really sucks, to the point where the duology touted as the most "against racism" of the franchise, is pretty much way more racist than anything Tru Piss can throw us (yes, because in Tru Piss we have characters rejecting coexistence, in Tellius, it's the world mechanics - whenever a Beorc and a Laguz coexist too much, the Laguz dies...).
As for Miccy,
Just like, imo, Soren gains some "new" attention and "uwu excuses for why he's being a snarky jerk at times", Miccy used to be bashed when FE10 was released (with all the Mary Sue accusation being thrown around!) because she was written to be a sort of foil/antagonist to Ike, and when the party reunited, she was demoted to a "soul-jar" role, let it be regarding the greater plot, or, even, her own backstory!
TBH, for people who didn't play FE10, if Ike is the bestest thing since melted cheese, Miccy, who opposes him, must be BaD and so you can pile everything you don't like on her, hoping to see it stick.
Or even worse, I've seen posts here and there comparing Miccy to Supreme Leader and how misunderstood uwu she is, which is the worst insult poor Miccy ever received since FE10 came out rofl
17 notes
·
View notes