#to tell you where i am in my 'three and a half religions in a trench coat' era of my life: i actually closed my eyes and said the

[theinfinitedivides]

funerals, funerals, and more funerals. everyone cheered

[hunnylagoon]

Right Where You Left Me

Pt 4: The Sweetest Thing to Ever Scare You (Finale)

Ellie Williams x reader

I remember when I first saw you. I remember looking into your warm almond eyes and feeling butterflies in my stomach. But soon, when I looked into your eyes, I no longer felt the same warmth that I once knew. It felt as though you had killed all of the butterflies inside my stomach but yet, I still loved you.

Premise: You and Ellie are childhood best friends until you drift apart. Funny thing about soulmates is they tend to find their way back to each other. You and Ellie try to end the tireless war between you.

Warnings: Angst / drinking / violence / not really religious mentions in this one

Part one here!

Part two here!

Part three over here!

Guys I thought I posted this two days ago but I actually just saved it to drafts. Sorry for being an idiot lmao

I think that I have unlearned how to love.

That’s not even a word but there is no other way to tell you that I have turned myself cold.

Without partying to distract me and religion to fill in gaps of emptiness, I isolate myself and begin to write once again. I'm almost certain that my body has been telling me to write, that I need to pour myself into art as opposed to a girl I was friends with a million years ago.

I figure that I need to create rather than destroy but it might take me a while to do so.

The morning after I abandoned my faith on the church floor, I had woken up and expected Ellie to be gone, however, she was wide awake and playing subway surfers on her phone. Her hair is messy and her eyes are half-lidded. 

She turns to look at me when she feels the shuffling of the bedsheets; despite her doing nothing more than smile at me it is like an understanding passed between us, war is over.

Almost.

It's like I've forgotten how to be soft, I can't manage to get the words out that I need to, and the thought of it alone makes me cringe. "Breakfast?" I ask, unsure of what else to say.

Ellie passes on it and I awkwardly excuse myself, saying that I got called in to take a brunch shift at work. Of course, this is not true. What I do is get into my car and drive and drive until I get mad at myself for burning gas. 

The war between Ellie and I had ended but it didn't register in my head, I almost fell in love with it. Without the constant arguing and passive aggressiveness, there was nothing to put a wall between us and I wasn't ready to be vulnerable again. 

So I begin to feed Ellie the ugliest parts of me; I show her everything I'm sure she will hate but she doesn't, she's patient and shows me the kindness I have been looking everywhere for. Still, I am cold to her, I don't know what else to do. 

I try to push her away all over again but this time, she doesn't let me. Ellie comes into my room when I'm studying to sit on my bed so that she can be in proximity to me. Sometimes she'll ask me if I want to go for a walk or a late-night gas station run, all of the things we used to do.

When I'm angry at her, she lets it happen, she won't escalate the fight all she does is apologize and does what she can to fix it. Everything feels like it's in order again, Joel even starts to send me little text messages to check in on me and sends me Facebook memes that make him think of me.

As of now, we are setting up for Dina's twenty-first birthday. The living room, typically a space for casual gatherings and movie nights, had undergone a transformation. Vibrant streamers adorned the walls, and an array of balloons in assorted hues scattered themselves along the floor "Are balloons too childish?" Abby asks as she walks out of her bedroom.

"They better not be after I just spent half an hour doing all of these," Cat answers, giving her a scornful glare.

"They look great, Cat," I smile and give her a thumbs-up from where I am in the kitchen dumping bags of chips into bowls. "Should I make a veggie platter?"

Cat furrows her eyebrows "If you can finish it by yourself, sure."

"Cat, we aren't children, adults eat vegetables," Abby takes a seat on the couch behind Cat, investigating the hard work she's put into making the living room look nice for just one night "Isn't it weird that Dina is organizing her own surprise party?"

I shrug, placing a wooden cutting board down on the kitchen counter "I don't blame her, I don't think we've always been one hundred percent reliable, me specifically."

"But it's not a surprise if she knows about it."

"So?" Cat asks.

"So why are we calling it a surprise party if it isn't a surprise?"

"Why not?"

"Well, why can't we just call it a party?"

"I don't think it matters," I cut in, I begin to peel carrots and slice them up into quarters. Ellie comes out of her bedroom, she took a nap after completing her physics presentation, her hair in a messy bun, and she's in her typical pyjama uniform of sweats and a hoodie. "Hey, Ellie," I smile at her.

She rubs some sleep away from her green eyes "Hey," Ellie walks over to the kitchen island where I slice and chop vegetables and sits right in front of me. Even half asleep she looks like a statue of marble carved by a skilled hand.

Abby raises an eyebrow, asking 'When did you guys become friends?' without saying it and then it hits me like the plane in Lost. Ellie still hasn't told anyone about our history, our sixteen years of friendship is invisible to the eyes of those who think they know us well.

I'm broken from my thoughts when Abby speaks up "When are you picking up the cake?"

My heart drops "I'm not?"

Cat and Abby cast one another side glances while Ellie snatches a cucumber off my cutting board "Dina was handing out duties and you said you would take care of the cake."

I freeze, unsure of what to say "Nuh-uh." I shake my head like a child denying blame for breaking her mother's favourite dish.

"Yuh-huh," Cat shoots back. "How could you forget that?"

My mind fumbles for an excuse and somehow I land on "I forgot because I went temporarily insane from Lyme disease," What am I saying? "I got Lyme disease because I go camping in secret," I don't camp "And I never told you guys that I go camping because I'm deeply ashamed of it."

Now everyone looks perpetually confused, Ellie included "What are you talking about?" Abby asks, her eyebrows furrowed.

"Okay-well," I place my knife flat on the counter by the wooden cutting board, ignoring the odd spiel I just went on "I'm going to drive to-

"You dropped your car off for a suspension repair yesterday," Abby reminds me.

"Ellie is going to drive me to get a cake," I correct myself "I will be back to finish making my veggie plate." I quickly rinse my hands before grabbing Ellie's keys from the little jewelry dish on the island and yank the sleeve of her hoodie to pull her along.

Ellie doesn't say anything, she slips into some Crocs and we walk outside to her car. "Where are we headed?"

"Uh, hang on," In Ellie's passenger seat, I go on Google Maps to look up the closest bakeries that are still open at this hour, there are two, one a couple of streets away and the other one is across town and closing in twenty minutes. "Infectious Confections," I wrinkle my nose "That's a weird fucking name."

While Ellie tries to make conversation in the car I only speak when giving her directions to the bakery. She knows something is up and I can tell by the way she keeps glancing at me. I just can't manage to get it out of my head that she's still keeping me a secret. 

She pulls up to the bakery and I get out before she even turns her car off, she pulls the keys out of the ignition and trails behind me through the doors.

The bakery itself was rustic and clean, there were two display cases and tills one of the displays held danishes, croissants, cookies, scones and whatever those little swirly flakey things are called. The other display had a big chalk menu above it that read 'Cakery' Though what was in the display case was very sparse.  

"Hi," I walk up to the till, putting on the friendly smile and customer service voice that I usually only use at work. "This is pretty short notice but I was wondering if you had any cakes left or if I could get one made for today?"

The guy behind the counter is a scrawny teenager who looks like he has had a long enough day of dealing with annoying customers "We close in half an hour, there's not enough time to bake and decorate a cake." He explains it like he's said this to a million people, he's bored of the same phrases that his manager has scripted out for him.

"Any shot that someone didn't pick up their cake?" I ask, fingers crossed in the hope that he says yes.

"Let me talk to my manager," His voice drags on, and he turns around and disappears through a commercial kitchen door. I wait patiently, hands balled together in front of me as I rock back and forth on my heels. A minute or two later he comes back holding a bright blue cake with pink detailing of bows and mustaches, there's text on it that reads 'It's a...' gender reveal cake. "This is all we have left, they cancelled last minute.

I look back at Ellie to get her opinion, her eyebrows are furrowed slightly "Maybe we good just get some of those cupcakes and smush them together and smear the icing so it looks like a cake."

I wave her off "I'll buy it," I say this only because it is 5:41 and with each passing minute I am growing desperate, also I don't want Jesse to be disappointed that I fumbled the cake and ruined his girlfriend's birthday.

Angsty teenager puts the bright blue monstrosity into a cake box and charges me an absurd total for it, I bitterly tap my card on the machine. 

As I walk back out to Ellie's car I take a brief moment to look at the sky, it's the same hue as cotton candy and looks as if it had been projected from a watercolour painting, even after I get back into the car and Ellie begins to blast her old dad rock songs, I can't tear my eyes away from it.

After five minutes of silence from my end, Ellie finally asks the question that's been burning into the forefront of her brain "Why are you being weird?"

"Why haven't you told anyone that we met before we moved in together?"

Her dark eyebrows furrow "You haven't told anyone either-

"Yes, I have."

"Who?"

"Yara, Stacy, Kayla, Mitch, Nigel, Carmen, literally everyone from my work," I admit "I just haven't told people who know you personally so it can't make its way back to you because you clearly don't want people to know."

She falls silent, searching her mind for the right words. She clutches the steering wheel tight and looks dead ahead at the car's bumper-to-bumper ahead of us. "I just know how to slip it into conversation."

"I don't think it's that hard, you can just say that we were friends, you don't need to give an intricate play-by-play of everything that happened."

"Why is it important that people know if we're cool again?"

I turn my head to slowly look at her "You are the one who always said 'If we don't have honesty, we have nothing at all'," I point out.

Silence strings between us again, I almost want to throw up.

'We're cool again' Nope, not anymore, we are so very far from cool. Instead of Ellie casting me little glances as she had on the ride there, she ignores my presence almost completely while I glare daggers at her. Was she embarrassed by me? When we went to lunch together why did she lie to Dina about where she was? When she slept in my bed why did Cat ask me if I knew why Ellie came home at eight AM with nothing, not even a key? Did she crawl through my bedroom window to walk around to the front door and pretend she was just getting home?

AND WHY DIDN'T I CALL HER OUT?

She was keeping me a secret and that realization hurt worse than any injury I had ever suffered. She hasn't even told her dead who practically raised me that we lived together. 

God, we weren't even anything and she was keeping me under wraps like I was some disgraceful secret that she would get shamed for holding. The very second she approached our house, I got out of her car, she hadn't even stopped it completely but cake in hand, I hopped out of her car door and didn't look back.

I think I've had my fair share of partying.

After that month-long bender I had where I went to clubs every night and replaced food with vodka, I never wanted to even look at another solo cup full of liquor. Instead of drinking, smoking, or doing karaoke, I hide from Ellie.

I hide from her in conversations and sometimes sneak into my bedroom just to get a bit of breathing room from all of the strangers in my house. Wherever Ellie was, I was not. If she was outside, I was inside, if she was in the living room, I was in the kitchen enjoying my veggie platter. 

Have you ever been the only sober person around in a group of people? If the answer is no, have you ever babysat a houseful of toddlers? Because it's just about the same thing.

When I'm not hiding from the girl who wriggled her way back into my good graces just to trip herself off the podium, I'm cleaning up, protecting our furniture, holding back hair as girls I've never met sob into the toilet, and stopping the drunk from doing stupid things. 

"Hey, buddy," I take my can of hairspray that this frat-adjacent man is holding behind an ignited lighter "I don't think you would look good as a burn victim," His friends moan in disappointment as I do so, they were very excited to see a makeshift flamethrower; I wasn't in the mood to have my house burn down, or have a guy with peach fuzz waste my thirty dollar hair spray. 

Thirty dollars?

Note to self for later: Make smarter spending choices (And smarter relationship choices!).

I felt a tap on my shoulder only to turn around and see Dina, she wasn't drunk, just tipsy "Smile!" She holds up a camera to her eye and clicks the shudder button before I even have a chance to react the flash goes off. A large Polaroid begins to print out, Dina snatches it and shakes it until you can see my silhouette, my eyes are wide, my hair flying behind me from the quick turn of my head and I'm holding a can of hairspray angled to look like I'm going to spray the camera with it "Cute!" She smiles, tucking it into her pocket for later "Wait, I want a group picture of the roommates."

Dina takes my hand and pulls me to one of the couches where Ellie and Abby sit with some guy, she shoes him to get up and drags Cat over to replace him, she stands me in between Ellie and Abby and lightly pushes me down to sit wedged between the two.

"Jesse, please do not do me dirty with this picture," She hands the pink Polaroid camera to her boyfriend and quickly ushers herself to the far left of the couch where she bends over to kiss Cat on the cheek for the picture. Ellie and I are stiff and awkward when the flash goes off. 

After the picture is taken, Ellue turns to face me just the slightest "Hey, I think we should talk-

"I think it's time for cake!" I push myself off the couch and usher myself to the kitchen. 

I pull the cake out of the fridge, looking at what I had done to salvage it; Below the part that said 'It's a...' I wrote '21 year old!' in chocolate pre-made Betty Crocker icing that I had in the fridge for months, it didn't look the best, but it could've been worse.

Dina, of course, cackles when she sees it. To her, it is the funniest thing she's seen all night. I stick the candles in and light it with the light I confiscated from peach fuzz frat boy and push the cake towards Dina after tucking the light back into my pocket, she is illuminated in the glow of iPhone flash all filming her.

"Make a wish!"

Age Sixteen- Grade 11

I think back to how embarrassing it felt to be thoughtful.

How fragile I felt when I would share my feelings and how frail I seem when I do it now. Ellie was always tougher than I was, in rugby, in fights, just in general. That's why I figured she would be taking it better than me when I cut contact, once again I have been proven wrong.

"Conner, can we please just leave?" I pleaded with my then-boyfriend. The night had started fine but after a couple of drinks Ellie and I were becoming increasingly hostile to one another, it wasn't my intention to speak to her but the universe forced my hand when we were shoved into a circle of our friends and made to converse around the bonfire at the beach.

The salty breeze carried the sounds of laughter and the gentle crashing of waves, the scent of roasted marshmallows wafted through the air.

 "What, you need your boyfriend's permission or something?" Ellie held a can of berry blast Smirnoff, staring into my soul from the other side of the fire, the sparks glitter through the night like fireflies. Her words don't feel too bad but they don't feel too good either.

I cast her a glare before I looked back to my boyfriend "Please?" 

He is getting perpetually annoyed with me he shrugs away from my grasp, "Fuck off, we just got here," He mutters, Conner must think I couldn't hear it. He had already downed three Bud lights and a couple of shots of cheap vodka, now he is nursing another beer in hand. 

"Excuse me?" I say, narrowing my eyes. Everyone around the fire pauses their conversation to tune into mine. "Come on," I stand up and try to pull him along so we can have a conversation away from the prying eyes of our friends.

I can't pull the mass of the 6'2 quarterback along with me but he obliges and follows me where I yank him. As I drag him along the rest of the group giggle and makes jokes along the lines of 'Trouble in paradise' but Ellie is the only one who doesn't jump back into mindless conversation, her unnerving eyes are still on me while I chew my boyfriend out by the shoreline. 

"Why do I have to leave just because you're feeling a little bummed out?" 

I'm almost floored at out someone can lack so much empathy "Because you're my boyfriend?" I can feel myself tensing up.

"Why does that mean you can't get up and leave on your own?" He defends "You begged me to come here and now I just wanna down a couple of beers and hang out with my friends."

"You've already drank like twenty!" I retort.

"It's a fucking party!" Conner says, raising his voice "It's a party and it's summer and you're seriously trying to tell me not to have fun?"

"Fuck!" I shout in frustration "Why don't you ever call me? Why can't you ever let me in?" The argument is quickly escalating "Why didn't you tell me that you kissed Tamar and why haven't you told me that you love me?"

"Because I don't."

My words fail me. I knew he didn't, I knew that he hardly even liked me. My dad had thought so highly of him, she said he was the type of guy to rescue a baby from a burning building but as I look at him now, I figure that he eats babies.

I almost open my mouth to say something different, almost, but I don't. The rest of my life might have turned out differently if I didn't, I might've been able to salvage the rotting corpse of my relationship with Ellie but I didn't. "Fine," I say, voice calm and quiet "Let's stay."

Before that night I had never really gotten drunk but the second I got back to the bonfire, I was digging through the cooler and shotgunning canned Smirnoff. "Woah," Riley laughs "Someone's finally being a bad influence."

I got myself so shit-faced that when everyone else got up to dance to the music blaring through the Bluetooth speaker, I sat by myself at the shoreline, looking bitterly out towards to ocean while the tides crash at my feet and get sucked back into the ocean. For a moment I think about jumping in and letting my lax body get washed away and sink beneath the surface until I wash up as a water-bloated corpse that some nine-year-old will find when they're beach combing.

My mouth tastes like peroxide and blood, my lungs burn with a red-hot pain. The wind is becoming increasingly harsh and I ignore the hair that is tangled into my golden hoop earrings.

"Wow, you look awful," I don't need to turn around to know who it is.

"Can you just fuck off?" I say "I don't give a shit about you, just leave me alone."

She always had to antagonize me, Ellie went out of her way to stray from the group and bother me. It had something to do with the alcohol in her system. Despite her alleged hatred for me, she takes a seat next to me regardless.

"Fuck, you're so sensitive," She scoffs "I don't know why you're dating him, I'm not even sure why you'd want to fuck him unless you're too lazy to jerk off-

My hands think before my head and I deck Ellie right in the side of her face, getting a solid hit to her cheekbone. My hand flies over my mouth "I'm sorry, I-

Ellie doesn't waste any time in lunging back at me, she pushes me down by my shoulders until my back is in the shallow of the water that moments ago just splashed at my feet and takes a swing. The impact of her punch almost knocks me sober.

I take a sharp inhale, grabbing her elbows and pulling her down to where she was the one on her back and I was the one straddling her. I land one last blow to her nose, I hear a crunch and the panic immediately sends me scrambling to my feet. My eyes go wide at the blood dripping down, her face I turn to run but Ellie is faster, she grabs me by my hair and yanks me down further into the water with her. 

"Fucking cunt!" I cry, though my scream is drowned out by the overwhelmingly loud tides crashing on the shore "Get the fuck off me!" 

Ellie is better at fighting than I am, I had never been on this side of her before, usually, I had been the one to drag her away from fights but now I am the one who is going to stumble home numb from the devastating pain.

Frankly, I'm fucking scared.

She continues to drag me by my hair until I'm knee-deep in the water with her, she almost throws her entire weight into me, dunking me beneath the surface where her bony hands snake around my neck. My eyes have gone blurry with the salt water, they sting and burn. I can't see anything, all I can do is uselessly thrash beneath her. My hands push against her face, trying to pry her off my body. 

Eventually, I manage to claw her face with my fingernails, I dig deep enough that it breaks skin and she recoils just enough for me to knee her in the stomach and let me get out from under her. Just as I try to slip away she reaches for my hair again, but instead of tugging on my hair, she rips out my gold hoop earring. I screech out in agony, hand reaching for where the metal sliced through the lobe of my ear, I shudder in pain; my cries are now jagged and harsh.

This is the exact moment Ellie begins to regret what she's done. "Fuck, I'm so sorry, I didn't mean to." Her tone softens and she tries to approach me but I back away from her like a frightened dog.

"Get away from me!" Despite the pain surging in my body, I find the strength in me to hit her again, she staggers back tripping into the water. I hit her so hard that I feel a crack in my knuckle and I yelp out in the immediate shock of pain. 

I wasn't sure when the others had noticed this was happening probably because my vision had gone blurry from salt water and adrenaline but before Ellie could hit me again, she was being restrained by Riley and Kennedy while some guy who I had probably had two conversations with dragged my back to shore.

I keel over on my hands and knees and begin to start retching onto the sand. Laila rubs a gentle hand on my back, my hair sticking wet on my forehead. A seagull, disturbed by the commotion, took flight, its wings cutting through the charged air. 

Next to the pile of vomit I just heaved, blood drips down from my ear, pooling and then soaking into the sand. My neck swells from what is still the raw sensation of Ellie closing her hands around it. 

I look up at Ellie, there is blood that has dripped its way into her mouth, clinging to her white teeth. She has what almost looks like a cat scratch running down her cheek, blood begins to prick and spill from the lacerations.

She stares back at me and we don't say a word but we understand each other clearly, I never want to see you again.

"Let's go," Ellie grabs my arm as Dina begins to slice the cake "We're gonna fix this right now."

"Ellie, there are so many people here," I say in a hushed tone so people can't hear me.

"I don't mean here," She looks at me, face expressionless "Just get in my car."

"Excuse me?" I say, tone accusing "Did you just order me to get in your car?"

"Fuck," She sighs, dropping my wrist to rub her hands down her face "Please can you get in my car so we can work this through."

"There's nothing to work through," I retort "You're embarrassed by me or you still secretly hate me and that's fine, I meant what I said on winter break about the lease, the second it's up, I'm getting the fuck out of here."

"What? No, don't- just," She takes a breath, reevaluating what to say "I have a point to make but I can't make it unless you get in my car."

We stare at each other for a moment, I narrow my eyes and she is still unmoving. Every scenario runs through my head of what could be waiting for me in that car.

"Fine."

I sit silently in her passenger seat, my knees are pulled into my chest and I rest my chin on them. Ellie doesn't say anything either as she drives. I watch each traffic light pass me, every street name to try and make sense of where we are going.

I almost feel like I'm going to suffocate beneath the silence of everything going left unsaid.

When I spot the boardwalk up ahead, I know exactly where she's taking me "Ellie, why are we at the beach?" I give her a side glance "Do I need to take out my earrings?"

Heat rises to her cheeks when I say this, "Not yet," She jokes, getting out of her car and grabbing a tote bag from the back seat, and I follow in tow.

We walk past the boardwalk and onto the sandy beach, I'm already not feeling whatever she's doing; there is sand filling up my Converse and a slight wind chill, I'm really wishing I had a hoodie right now. "Can you tell me what we're doing yet?" I'm hugging myself in an attempt to stay warm "If we're still walking on the beach why couldn't we have just walked on the boardwalk instead? It literally has walk in the name." I'm already going off on one of my tangents.

She still walking ahead of me but she briefly turns around to face me "Can you just stop asking questions for a minute?"

"Okay, whatever," I mutter, trailing behind her still. I can hardly see in the night, the only light to guide us is the moon and the warm ceiling lamps from restaurants along the boardwalk. I can vaguely see Ellie's silhouette, she's outlined by the gentle glow radiating off the moon, I try my best not to stumble over things poking out of the sand that have been lost to sight by darkness. 

"Okay," Ellie stops, "Here we are."

"Where are we?" I ask "I can't see shit, I don't know where here is."

Ellie digs around in her pocket for her phone and turns on a flashlight and it reveals a small iron firepit that was cemented into a slab of concrete in the sand. She hands me her phone so I can keep the flash on her and she can see what she's doing. 

She pulls out some pages ripped out from her notebook "Can you hand me your lighter?"

My eyebrows furrowed, and I felt around in my pocket wondering if I even had one. I did, it had slipped my mind that I still had the bic lighter that I confiscated from Peach Fuzz. I hand the lighter to her and watch as she tucks the pages beneath logs that were in the firepit before we arrive, they are somewhat charred but still viable.

She flicks the lighter to ignite it and the paper catches immediately. The initial flicker grew into a tentative blaze, licking at the edges of the kindling. The crackling sound echoed through the night. 

Once she is sure the fire can survive without her feeding it, she steps away. "Alright, let's have it out."

"Like sex?" I scrunch up my nose.

"Oh my god, no, like let's talk this through." She pinches her nose bridge, taking a breath in before exhaling and putting her hand back down "We're gonna recreate the night of the bonfire how it should've been," Ellie reached back into her bag and pulled out two white claws "I snagged these from Dina's party, sorry this was kind of last minute."

I can't help the smile that grows on my face, I take one of the white claws and crack it open "I don't know how authentic this is gonna be if there isn't any canned Smirnoff."

I think back to exactly how that night played out and I take a seat on the sand, facing the crashing dark ocean. I sip my white claw, as expected Ellie takes a seat next to me, just what happened on the actual night.

"Wow," She says "You look really pretty and I'm an idiot for ever saying you looked awful," Ellie looks gorgeous illuminated by the orange light of the fire, and the breeze causes her flyaway hairs to drift in the wind. "I'm an asshole for pretending that I didn't know you, I was scared I would get hurt again and take it to heart like I did last time. I promise the second we get home that I'll come clean."

I don't know if I can deal with this sugary philosophy. She's being so sweet that it's rotting my teeth.

"Ellie," I say gathering my thoughts, it was so hard being honest with my feelings, it felt like I would get hospitalized if I showed any emotion. "I was so in love with you in high school that it killed me, and I was terrified that my parents would throw me out well, they did- but that's why I pushed you away and there isn't a day that goes by where I don't regret it." 

The surprise on her face morphs into a soft smile "What about now?" she asks "Do you still love me?"

I shrug, it's honest "I dunno, but I think there's room to try."

She looks from me to the ocean and the way the moonlight glitters off the surface "What happened next?" Ellie toys with the tab of her drink "Did you hit me?"

"Yeah," I say softly, following her gaze out to the waters "But if we're doing the night how it should've been, I'd rather just kiss you."

Ellie turns her head back to look at me. She shoves her white claw into the sand then takes my face into one of her hands and kisses me like it's her job, so tender and carefully like she's afraid I will break beneath pressure.

How weak have I become? My heart is so full of her that I can hardly call it my own.

A/N: Be grateful for this ending because I was very tempted to give you guys an unhappy one. Sorry that I forgot to post this lol, I’m sad this series is over but excited to show you all my next one which may be the angst-iest yet 👀

Thanks for reading!

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[hyun3hk3y]

Symbolism in "Portrait of Lady Edelgard Von Hresvelg"

This is something that I’ve usually never really felt comfortable doing. If you ever wonder why some artists are a bit more reluctant to actually *talk* about the “meaning” of their work, its because it strikes the same tenor as having to explain why a joke is funny.  If I have to actually lay it out for the viewer why certain decisions were made in the execution of a work of art, the magic of the whole experience may be lost.  Moreover, many artists avoid making definitive statements on their work because they do not wish to deprive viewers the opportunity to derive their own unique explanation. 

While I chiefly view myself as a fine artist, most of my artistic training was as an illustrator.  As an artist, this can lead to an interesting dichotomy when it comes to creating paintings.  During my studies, I was told that the job of an illustrator is to solve pictorial problems for people often by making pictures that tell a story or convey an idea.  Fine art’s definition, in contrast, tends to be more nebulous.  But I digress, on to the painting…

A number of people on reddit and Tumblr have remarked on the candle with the snuffed-out flame.  No interpretations on it have been offered, the mere presence of a candle with a smoldering wick is a strong enough implication.  However, this is one instance where I drew inspiration from art history so I believe it is worth elaborating on.  The animus for the candle originates in the Arnolfini Portrait by Jan Van Eyck.  Below is an image of the painting with the pertinent candle circled.

Art history scholars have a number of different readings about the candle’s presence, but the one I was taught in Art History is that the lit candle indicates the presence of the holy ghost or the watchful eye of God.  Three Houses draws from a number of religions for its world building, in the case of The Church of Serios, the developers took the majority of their cues from The Catholic Church.  If a lit candle would suggest Edelgard’s faith in the Goddess, then an extinguished one must imply Edelgard’s *loss* of faith. 

In addition to the extinguished candle, I would also like to direct viewers to the reflection of the candle in the polished wood table surface. In the reflection the candle is still burning very brightly, almost down to the base of the candelabra.

The purpose of this image is to recall a saying from old Taoism Philosophy in China: “The candle that burns twice as bright burns half as long.”  Those who are familiar with Edelgard’s back story in Three Houses will find its relevance obvious.  I doubt I am the only one to make the allusion.

This brings me to the next major piece of symbolism I employed in the painting, the dagger and the drapery on the table.  The dagger’s significance should go without saying, but its application as a device will become more apparent after I explain the table cloth.  To put it succinctly, the majority of the dark shadow shapes made by the tablecloth are arranged to evoke the shape of the crest of flames.  Below is another visual to help illuminate this detail. 

The immediate implication here is the detail of Edelgard possessing the crest of flames.  As for why I decided to depict it in a more concealed way…When I first got the idea for this painting, the whole concept was that if a person saw this painting in a gallery, they would be looking at an actual artifact from Fodlan, one that created by an artist who actually lived there.  This is why the second row of the inscription reads “In the Imperial Year” on the left side and “1179” on the right.  This means the painting would have been completed just before Edelgard starts attending Gareg Mach, and long before the greater public would know she has the crest of flames.  How the artist came to know this would remain a mystery.  I like to imagine it as a detail that Fodlan’s historians would debate over for years after the game’s narrative.

There is also a second message that I have intended with the dagger’s placement cutting (heh) across the crest…Gripping the dagger over the crest of flames is a statement about what the path is that Edelgard will take, especially when the crest is examined as representing the Goddess Sothis.  In fact, there are two (technically three) lines of dialogue from Three Houses I had in mind for this symbolism.

That about sums it up!  I may do a couple more posts in the future where I show how the painting evolved from thumbnails, to studies to the finished image if theres interest in that sort of thing.

[alpaca-clouds]

The DnD Lore Problem - Accessibility and Characters (and how BG3 might not help)

You know what? I am gonna talk about DnD Lore and the accessibility of that lore. I talked about this exessively before. But to summarize that long blog very shortly:

Wizards of the Coasts currently makes the mistake of putting basically most DnD Lore behind a paywall, rather than offering official ressources. This leads to a lot of tables actually playing with their original worlds, rather than Toril/Faerûn, which in turn also means, that they are not spending money on official products. While my anti-capitalist ass things that the lore should be accessible just so that people can enjoy it, I also think that this inaccessibility actually costs WotC A LOT OF MONEY.

Today I want to talk about another aspect of this inaccessibility, that is kinda linked to some of the stuff I talked about before, but also is linked to the things WotC is currently not doing in terms of both Honor Among Thieves and Baldur's Gate 3. A thing, that also might not quite work with BG3, though.

See, the core problem of this inaccessibility is, that a) there is no official place where you can just get base information about the world and the timeline, b) this world has grown organically for about half a century, which lead to clutter, but also to the fact that things are at times showing their age.

I might actually make a post on the gods and religion in the world at some other point - but for now let me talk about something else: Extended universes and access points.

The Problem with Extended Universes

Okay, let's talk about how a lot of the big franchises for the longest time have told their meta stories - including DnD - and how it kinda struggles to find its audience. The extended universe.

I am frankly not entirely sure what franchise has started this. I am assuming it was Star Trek? But that is just a guess. But at some point in the 60s oder 70s someone had the idea that: "Hey, we could totally give the fans more to chew on by making official tie-in comics and novels!"

And that was how it worked for very long. Like a lot of the big franchises had at times around 10 novels and comics (if not more) releasing per year that would just explore other parts of the universe and allow the very engaged fans to... well, learn more about the world. Now, I am not going to talk about all the drama connected to the Star Wars stuff, but if you know, you know.

DnD did this too. (As did a lot of the big TTRPG systems, like Shadowrun and WoD as well.) Having a lot of tie in stuff - in the case of DnD mostly novels - that told more stories on the world and also established like some big player characters within the world. Elminster Aumar is probably one of the best examples here.

Those established some characters that play a big role within the world and also told just more stories of those big world changing events. In the recent DnD history that would be stuff like the Time of Troubles, the Spellplague and the Second Sundering.

Now, here we have one big issue. And one issue where I am not entirely certain where it arose from. But the fact is: In recent years, people invest way less into those kind of books. This is just a fact.

It is the reason why those big universes went from publishing like ten novels a year to often not more than three. We saw that in the failure of the extended Universe Disney tried to pull off for Pirates of the Caribbean (though I will still maintain that another big problem was that they barely marketed that at all - hi, everyone, who did not know there were extended universe novels for PotC). We also saw that with League of Legends, who really, really tried to tell a lot more stories with short stories and then also some novels set in Runeterra, before finally giving up, because most people didn't care.

In terms of Dungeons & Dragons I can totally see that a lot of people will also say: "I do not care what some other people's characters do within the world." Buuuuuut...

Stories actually can help you understand the world. Which brings me to...

The Elminster Problem

Okay, I do not know how to put this, but... If you look at the novels coming out for DnD literally half of them focus on either Elminster Aumar or Drizzt Do'Urden. Characters that have pretty much been around since the very beginning and. Look, I don't know how to put it but... It shows.

I am currently reading some of the newer novels and the fact is, that they do not really feel like fantasy books from the 2010s and 2020s. Because Elminster and Drizzt are very clearly characters originating in a very different time when stories were told very differently.

I mean, just look at Elminster. He is a wanna-be Gandalf character. He is from the early, early days of fantasy and... Look, I personally just really am unable to identify with a character like this.

And while Drizzt is a bit better as a character, but even he... How to put this delicately? They are both very much characters written by white cishet men for white cishet men. There, I said it.

I am noticing this a lot with reading Salvatore's books currently. Like, female characters are not overly sexualized, which is a plus. But they also very much exist most of the time in service to a man or at least in relation to a man. There is not a lot of female characters running around that have their own agency.

Which kinda leads to another thing. I actually saw this one brought up by one of those very cliché nerdy Youtube channels talking on DnD, who recognized the problem as well: There are basically two large groups of DnD players who barely intersect. One is the cliché nerds, the other is a largely queer and largely diverse group. And the youtube guy, who was very in the white cishet nerd group, suspected that actually the later group makes up more of the player base by now.

Buuuut... that is also the group who really do not get catered to by the canon lore so far. That was until 2023 with DnD:HAT and BG3 - both catering actually a lot to those groups.

Honor Among Thieves and the undermarketed books

Okay, here is the thing: Honor Among Thieves had two novelizations (one for young readers, one for older readers) and two tie-in novels. One featuring Edgin, Holga, Forge and Simon before the stuff with Sofina went down. And the other featuring Simon and Doric taking place at the time while Ed and Holga are in prison.

I am honest: I really, really liked the Ed and Holga novel. It was super cute and charming and really gives a better understanding of the characters.

But of course once again there is the thing: The books - just like the Pirates of the Caribbean books - were super undermarketed. Like, most people I know off do not even know that there were books released. Heck, even within the actual active fandom there are again and again people who will be surprised that those books exist.

And... I actually also think that the books waste one big ass opportunity, by not at all tying into the broader lore. They are super self-contained.

And that is actually just a waste. Because the place were Edgin lived in? Yeah, that place was super affected by the Second Sundering. Heck, that might have had to do something with his troubles.

Why is that an issue? Well, because... there was not a lot going on there that was inviting you to further interact with the world and learn more abotu what is happening. For once, again, because I think it is a super fun and interesting world. But also, because... WotC wants to make money and is so bad at it, that it really boggles my mind.

See, here is the thing: They could've used those characters - that really are fun and sympathetic characters - to create an accesspoint into that world.

Alright, so what about Baldur's Gate 3?

Which brings me to Baldur's Gate 3 and the thing that a lot of people have noticed: The other Baldur's Gate games - as well as some of the other games releasing around 2000 - had their own tie-in novels going into the characters, their background, but also what they were doing in the future.

Something that so far BG3 has not done, which some fans have already critized. Because a lot of people have actually gotten really invested into those characters. A lot of the kind of people especially who so far are underserved by a lot of the tie-in stuff: Queer and generally diverse audiences.

Like, I think there would be a lot of people, who totally would read a novel, about...

Astarion getting drawn into some sort of political intrigue in Baldur's Gate while serving Cazador

Karlach's time in Avernus

Some Adventure Wyll got dragged into while being the Blade of the Frontier.

Shadowheart going onto a mission for Shar (maybe together with Nocturne)

Whatever Gale was doing during the Second Sundering

Lae'zel's youth among the Githyanki

The Dark Urge and Gortash starting up the entire conspiracy

... whatever Halsin had been up to in his long live

Heck, people would eat that stuff up. And you could not only use it to worldbuild but also once more create some access into the world and what happened there. And they are kinda wasting a lot of potential by not bringing out those novels.

Of course, there is one big problem: BG3 makes it kinda hard to write about anything happening after the ending. Because as it is right now, someone is gonna be pissed if a novel set after the game does not go with the decision for a character they go for. Like, Ascended Astarion fans are gonna be pissed, if they go with Spawn Astarion - and the other way around. Same goes with every other character where you have those big decisions happening.

This is something they will have to tackle eventually if they plan on doing something with the characters in the future (no matter if we are talking Larian or WotC), but it is definitely an issue that just arises from the structure of the game.

Bonus of course is, that you just cannot define a canonical Tav. But without a Tav, you also gotta act as if the story of the game happened without a Tav, which still is not ideal. I am honestly not sure with how they are gonna deal with this on the long run.

Access via Characters

Alright, but what is the actual issue here?

Well, basically there are two hurdles to overcome for the accessibility of the lore. The first is the physical accessibility - aka, what I talked about in the last long blog post. The second meanwhile is more related to making the lore engaging. And that happens through characters.

It is for me what happened last year. I actually tried to engage with the lore as the movie came out - but only when BG3, that tied a lot more into the actual lore was released I actually found proper access to the lore. Because I had concrete things I could now look for because the game hinted at so much both through characters and major story events happening.

Here is the thing: If you just have the lore on its own, it is about as engaging as reading a history book. Sure, as your local history nerd I find reading history books fun, but most people really do not want to read a history book to engage with a hobby.

People will however engage with stories and characters that interest them. Which is where we get back to the thing I talked about at the beginning: Right now most canonical novels and stories still cater to an audience that is male, cishet, white and also, let's be frank, definitely over 30 years old. Leaving behind a lot of potential fans that theoretically make up a big part of the player-base, but actually do not engage a lot with the lore for this exact reason.

Look. DnD right now is fairly close to being an actual mainstream hobby, due to the recent proliferation of formerly nerdy stuff. And yet WotC is bleeding money, especially in regards of DnD.

If you ask me, sure... DnD should go into public domain. But it doesn't. And given that there are so many creative, skilled people working on this - no matter how dumb Hasbro is and how shitty of an employer they are - I actually do want them to succeed. I have really become engaged with this world now. And I think it is a pity that they clearly do not know how to market this stuff.

[halemerry]

Alright, I've had a few people ask for this now so time to take a break from the big draft I’m writing to dig a little deeper on angel rankings in relation to Crowley.

Before we get into it I want to preface this by saying I am not a religious scholar. Like many of us I have a complicated relationship with religion and as a result this stuff was a long time special interest of mine but, as always, take it with a grain of salt.

To be frank, even if I was an expert, I think it’s also important to keep in mind that the Good Omens angel hierarchy has already taken some liberties on its own. It hasn’t been shy about reinterpreting things to suit its needs or about pulling from various sources to establish its own lore. It's definitely its own beast and there's no guarantee the universe operates the same rules that have become the most popular ones.

That all being said, let's get cracking.

So in canon we actually don't know that much about angelic rank. Before season two we knew there were Principalities and Archangels and that's about it. This season decides to give us a little more information. Muriel is a Scrivener (likely they'd fall under the general Angel category) and then we get a nod to Thrones and Dominions being a thing. We also learn there are orders/classes of various ranks.

With the exception of Scrivener which isn't a traditional rank at all as far as I can tell, these ideas all fit under the traditional Christian angel hierarchy.

The most influential version of this hierarchy comes mostly from Dionysius the Pseudo-Areopagite's De Coelesti Hierarchia (On Celestial Hierarchy). He divides angels into three Spheres, with three Orders within each Sphere. The Lowest Sphere contains the orders Angels, archangels (different from Good Omen's Archangels who are at the top of the food chain so to speak), and Principalities. The Middle Sphere contains the orders Powers, Virtues, and Dominions. And then the Highest Sphere contains Thrones, Cherubim, and Seraphim.

Now onto the angel that would become Crowley.

Thanks to us witnessing Crowley opening a document only accessible to Dominions and above, we can eliminate the lower half of these rankings.

This leaves us with Dominions, Thrones, Cherubim, Seraphim and the Good Omen’s version of Archangel.

Dominions are tied to things like regulation. Their job is to keep passions in check and deliver justice and judgment (to be frank these last two are in some capacity apply to most rankings of angel), They’re built to keep ranks beneath them organized and optimize their performances. They’re organizers. They’re functionally middle management and are sometimes known as Lordships. They’re also occasionally tied to the set of angels that destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah. 

The really only thing that even kind of suits him here in my opinion is the interacting with lower ranks bit but the vibe doesn't seem quite right with that. Crowley as we know him is not even really a leader even in his own schemes and has a tendency to rely on his considerable talent at improvisation and quite frequently on the cues Aziraphale tends to send him. (We get a stellar example of this dynamic actively in play in Episode 2 this Season). We also know now that the angel in question tended to work alone. He seemed baffled by the concept of Earth, as if it had been a long time since he’d had a check in with Head Office. 

So Thrones are what people tend to think of when you say the phrase Biblically Accurate Angel. They're the wheels with a bunch of eyeballs. They contemplate the power of God and have, you guessed it, ties to justice and judgment but in a more contemplative sort of way. They are associated with peace and submission, except for when they are sometimes also associated with the erelim - a ranking in the Jewish Hierarchy that tends to be more of a warrior class. They're maybe most famously associated with being a part of the chariot that moves God's throne around. They live where material form begins to take shape and are tasked with maintaining cosmic harmony.

Honestly I don't mind this for Crowley. That last bit especially sounds close to what we see him doing. And there's something very fun to me about a former Throne going off and getting himself a big gaudy throne. I’ll admit I have a hard time associating him with something so passive and again I feel like it doesn't quite fit how out of the loop he was about Earth, but this is probably the second favorite option of mine here.

If Thrones are the wheels of God’s Throne then the Cherubim are the ones making those wheels turn. They’re often represented as pushing Thrones about and attending God directly. Their job is to magnify God’s glory and serve as representatives of God’s power. They also, notably, were thought to be the superhumanly strong guards tasked with the protection of Eden.

Because of this we get a very old piece of theory: that Aziraphale was a Cherub who had been demoted. I’ve gone through phases with this theory but I definitely think it’s at a minimum fun to consider. And though I'm hesitant to take any Amazon promotional materials too seriously during the strike, there's a post here they've made recently that refers to Aziraphale as such.

Partially because this theory is so old and so rooted in the lexicon of my headspace for this media, I don't like this for the angel who would become Crowley particularly well. Superhuman strength feels weird in regards to him, as does situating him as a guard of Eden. And even if that line from season 2 where Crowley talks to Beelzebub about scaring that cherubs was talking about young angels and not literal cherubs, it seems like a weird phrasing for someone who was once the other kind of cherub to use. I like this better than Dominions but not nearly as much as Thrones.

Now Seraphim are a little unique. Their primary job tends to get framed as singing praise to God. They seat themselves around God's throne and sing holy, holy, holy at God. Several interpretations of them argue that they are different from angels entirely and only got grouped in with them in later texts like De Coelesti Hierarchia. They purify Isaiah in a vision he has and have strong associations with smoke and heat. They're tied to clarity and purifying via fire and occasionally are thought to help keep the world in order. Interestingly enough the word Seraph comes from saraph which means to burn and Seraphim can be translated as the fiery ones or those who kindle. Saraph is also used in certain contexts to describe a fiery flying serpent.

Now I’ll admit the Seraphim theory was always one of my favorites. If the show hadn’t recently been adding more ticks to the Archangel column I think I’d still probably be in this camp. There's the obvious bits that tie in here like the fire and snake imagery associated with both. But I can't help but to think of how often we get Crowley implying that just maybe God intended what they'd done to be the right thing. Or that scene where Crowley prays on the throne in season 1. He hangs off of it instead of sitting and begs God to not destroy them. It's an echo of a twist on what a Seraph would do in Heaven.

Now that just leaves us the Archangels. I won’t reiterate my other meta other than to link it here, but I do think the show at the very least wants us to consider this as a possibility.

In my opinion? Seraph and Archangel sit near the top of the metaphorical likelihood scale. I'd then follow this up with the Throne, then the Cherub, then the Dominion in order. But who knows! Half the fun of Good Omens is it doesn't always play by the traditional rules. And honestly there's something fun in never having an answer here. After all, no matter where he started, Crowley is Crowley now and that's the way it should be.

[buggywiththefolkmagic]

Buggy's Book Reviews: The Old Mountain Spellbook

Well well well, look who has returned after a long hiatus while life kicked my ass from here to Sunday. Let's get started with a bang shall we? TW: Slavery mentions, appropriation, generalized frustration at the writing space currently with the rise of ghost writers and AI.

This is: The Old Mountain Spellbook by Alda Dagny

Rating: 1/10 

Buckle up. This is gonna be a bumpy ride. Prepare to be shocked, horrified, and gobsmacked.

For context the cover art of this book caught my eye and then I read the small blurb of a subtitle for it and cringed so incredibly hard that the moment it showed up in my Spotify audio book list, I had to give it a listen for a measly 3 and a half hours of my life while at work. 

I regret this decision so very hard.

For further context:

This “author” Alda Dagny has also written books on…”The Secrets of the Nile” a three part series called “The Old Norse Spellbook:”, and “Secrets of Mesoamerica”. 

My head hurts from thinking about the gall to “write” on such a wide variety of topics in a seniority form. But before I get ahead of myself let me go back into my proper format for these reviews.

Pros: SOME of the information is right. The mentions of planting by the signs and how the signs works was very accurate. The generalized description of grannies, while very surface level and focused far too heavily on the midwife aspect, which don’t get me wrong is super mega ulta important! Was right if not very generalized. That’s about all I’ve got. 

It does mention that Hoodoo is a closed practice that stems from African Dispora/the Trans-Atlantic slave trade which good for this “author”. You will understand why that term is in parenthesis later! 

This book also included a Bell Witch mention twice which made my Tennessee heart hopeful for like two seconds.

Cons: Gods help me. For starters, I know this was likely not a choice this “author” made, but why in the seven hells did the publisher pick an AUSTRALIAN PERSON to do the narration for this book? The mispronunciation of Appalachia and Asfidy are now burned into my brain for life. I do not appreciate it. The MINIMUM a narrator should do is glance through for proper pronunciations. 

My gripes with the audiobook out of the way let’s get into the meat of this review: The book’s contents and why I believe this was ghost written/stolen from other places and put forward by an ai generated “author”. 

The second entire chapter of this book, a whopping 40 minutes of the audiobook, is all about Hoodoo. The real thing that got me was it SAYS that Hoodoo is a CLOSED PRACTICE stemming from Africa Diaspora. And what does this book do anyway? Break Hoodoo down into stupid candle magic and mojo bags and tell you how to do “it”. I was surprised it got the origin of Hoodoo right! It was RIGHT! And then it shits on itself. 

Examples: Hoodoo shares similarities with wicca. Tarot is incredibly important to the practice. And it is a religion and not a practice. The practice is “rootwork”. Did I mention that Hoodoo focuses on “doing no harm”? Oh and the third eye is important too, especially to Hoodoo despite it being a Hindu concept. I cannot make this up.

The wording of this book is also incredibly strange. I don’t have a ebook version to double check but I am positive the words Furthermore and However are included at least 50 times. EACH. The book also repeats itself numerous times. A good example is with the Furnace Ghost story it tells in the 4th chapter I believe? Where it repeats the same end of sentence with just slightly different beginnings within the same paragraph. There’s also other phrases used at the end of chapters to usher in the next that just read…weirdly? Examples: “Let me set the stage” “You are not going to want to miss this.” What are you writing a script or a book? 

Now for the proper “Appalachian Magic” side of the book. It consistently uses the term Granny Witch, and states numerous times that witchcraft was just fine! Appalachia did not care and the “fear” of witches never penetrated the mountains. But yet a “granny witch” would use faith not as a proper form of healing, oh no! It was “to keep doubters at bay”. So faith healing was a cover up and not the actual practice itself. 

This book also has two whole chapters on legends and myths, which is fine, if it didn’t focus on the ones everyone knows like Bigfoot and Mothman only. Like it doesn’t cover any of the smaller localized things or spirits at all. Just the things you could easily find if you googled “appalachia spooky”. Hmmmmmm. Strange isn’t it? 

This book also stated that tarot and black tourmaline was ULTRA important to Appalachian magic. Like where does that come from? There’s another chapter dedicated to the phases of the moon and “spells”  which they mean in a modern new-age witchcraft way and definitely not Appalachian, although I will give it props for saying the moon phases and astrology are different here. Because they are.

Tiktok was mentioned twice; it appropriates dreamcatchers and other Hoodoo items in the “non-Hoodoo” sections of the book. Hell, it even said, accurately mind you, that Mothman has even “spawned fanfiction”. It even got the information on where Roanoke was…wrong.  Roanoke is in Virginia. This book claims it is in North Carolina. 

The most damning thing however, and I use that however in a very sarcastic tone, is the “author” herself. I painstakingly typed in some text from the book and was surprised to see it come back as “human written”. I don’t think that’s quite true, if it is then they text portions must be stolen from other sources and shoved into a book form. Because this author? A bot.

Her profile image used on Amazon, which is the ONLY SOURCE of information on her, no socials, no google, nothing. Is AI generated. Proof is here: 

And a blurb from the book I wanted to include as well. The first of many furthermores used.

The author's Biography, which again is the ONLY SOURCE OF INFORMATION on this supposed person, says as follows: "Alda Dagny has always been drawn to history. Growing up in Scandinavia, history has always been all around her, gods and goddesses, pagan rituals and spells. Ancient ruins that dot her homeland captivated her from an early age, giving her a lifelong love of all things history. " That's all I can find. That's it. Just AI and or ghost writing/theft has officially found itself in the AFM space. I hate this society.

[elliebelliegirl]

"All Jews who are at all conscious of their identity as Jews are steeped in history,” wrote Isaiah Berlin. “They have longer memories, they are aware of a longer continuity as a community than any other which has survived.”

He was right. Judaism is a religion of memory. The verb zachor appears no fewer than 169 times in the Hebrew Bible. “Remember that you were strangers in Egypt”; “Remember the days of old”; “Remember the seventh day to keep it holy”; Memory, for Jews, is a religious obligation.

This is particularly so at this time of the year. We call it the “three weeks” leading up to the saddest day in the Jewish calendar, the Ninth of Av, anniversary of the destruction of the two Temples, the first by Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon in 586 BCE, the second by Titus in 70 CE.

Jews never forgot those tragedies. To this day, at every wedding we break a glass in their memory. During the Three Weeks, we have no celebrations. On the Ninth of Av itself, we spend the day fasting and sitting on the floor or low stools like mourners, reading the Book of Lamentations. It is a day of profound collective grief.

Two and a half thousand years is a long time to remember. Often I’m asked — usually in connection with the Holocaust — is it really right to remember? Should there not be a moratorium on grief? Are not most of the ethnic conflicts in the world fuelled by memories of perceived injustices long ago? Would not the world be more peaceable if once in a while we forgot? Yes and no. It depends on how we remember. My late predecessor, Lord Jakobovits, used to point out that three times in the Book of Genesis God is spoken of as remembering. “God remembered Noah” and brought him out of the Ark onto dry land. “God remembered Abraham” and saved his nephew Lot from the destruction of the cities of the plain. “God remembered Rachel” and gave her a child. When God remembers, He does so for the future and for life.

In fact, though the two are often confused, memory is different from history. History is someone else’s story. It’s about events that occurred long ago to someone else. Memory is my story. It’s about where I come from and of what narrative I am a part. History answers the question, “What happened?” Memory answers the question, “Who, then, am I?” It is about identity and the connection between the generations. In the case of collective memory, all depends on how we tell the story.

We don’t remember for the sake of revenge. “Do not hate the Egyptians,” said Moses, “for you were strangers in their land.” To be free, you have to let go of hate. Remember the past, says Moses, but do not be held captive by it. Turn it into a blessing, not a curse; a source of hope, not humiliation.

To this day, the Holocaust survivors I know spend their time sharing their memories with young people, not for the sake of revenge, but its opposite: to teach tolerance and the value of life. Mindful of the lessons of Genesis, we too try to remember for the future and for life.

In today’s fast-moving culture, we undervalue acts of remembering. Computer memories have grown, while ours have become foreshortened. Our children no longer memorise chunks of poetry. Their knowledge of history is often all too vague. Our sense of space has expanded. Our sense of time has shrunk.

That cannot be right. One of the greatest gifts we can give to our children is the knowledge of where we have come from, the things for which we fought, and why. None of the things we value — freedom, human dignity, justice — was achieved without a struggle. None can be sustained without conscious vigilance. A society without memory is like a journey without a map. It’s all too easy to get lost. I, for one, cherish the richness of knowing that my life is a chapter in a book begun by my ancestors long ago, to which I will add my contribution before handing it on to my children. Life has meaning when it is part of a story, and the larger the story, the more our imaginative horizons grow. Besides, things remembered do not die. That’s as close as we get to immortality on earth.

-Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks

[woodlaflababab]

A rant on Aang being fed, this is half serious half a joke

Starting with the Headband episode where they go to a restaurant that is specifically for meat (as we hear Aang say 'oh, we're going to a meat place?' and based on how he doesnt join them, the place doesnt have any other options) despite 1/4 of their group being vegetarian.

And if that wasnt bad enough, when they brush off Aang, Aang says, and I quote

"I'll just get some lettuce out of the garbage."

And they accept this???? And leave him??? They don't act like this is exactly out of the ordinary? How often is Aang going dumpster diving for food???? Like, what a weird fucking throw away line.

And then

What was he eating during the painted lady episode? Bc all sokka was buying was poisoned fish and clams. I hope they just, had rations, and they were just,,,, choosing to eat poison fish instead of said rations, bc the alternative, is Aangs been on his own foraging plants around a dead river for however many days they were there. Katara over here extending their stay like, hell yeah pop off katara, save those people, but also, she had to know Aang didn't have shit to eat right???? Aang’s not eating the berries, wtf is he eating? Katara you found edible berries? And didn't tell Aang?????

And I don't remember him complaining abt any of this, like, kid, child, you are in one of the most rapid stages of growth and are doing the physical work of mASTERING THREE ELEMENTS IN NINE MONTHS, sustenance is, in fact, a necessity

Catch anti-aang ppl coming out here and saying Aang should've just stopped being so picky, that if he really wanted to eat, he'd have eaten what was available and how the others aren’t responsible for making sure he's fed. That sounds exactly like some shit anti aangers would say.

And you know who it also sounds like? SOKKA

MY BOY

HOW CAN YOU DO THIS

He looks at the vegetarian whos a vegetarian bc of his dEAD CULTURE/RELIGION and goes "just stop being vegetarian :) even the meat here eats meat :)"

Sokka I love you, but omg I want to punt you across a courtyard

Im sorry, but if my friend were to come up to me like "I'm a vegetarian, have been my whole life, it's the way a lot of my culture does things, its something I learned from family and friends who are all now dead" I'd be half tempted to become vegetarian myself just out of solidarity. Is that just me? Am I just gung ho on friendship? Hello? 

Also, fuck you @ bumi throwing a fowl leg at him knowing hes uncomfortable with touching meat. Theres gotta be better ways to prove hes an airbender than making him panic by throwing a dead animals leg at him

Justice for Aang man, feed the poor kid.

[vvatchword]

In Which I Get Zooted (and Talk about Paradise Lost for some reason)

Part 2 (View Reblogs for Flavor) ->

I am reading Paradise Lost again. Jesus christ it is so good. The first time I read it I had to get used to Ye Olde Englifh Poetic Conventionf and didn’t do very well. Fortunately, I read lots of early modern English in the distant past—it’s like a language I’ve mostly forgotten. That means that repeated exposure has reopened the prose to me. Eventually, I’m going to have to pick up a book about John Milton himself, because there are definitely some alien theological and historical points whizzing right over my head.

I don’t know what it is about Paradise Lost. Reading Dante was painful outside the Hell part… Bunyan’s Pilgrim’s Progress makes me want to kick him in the pants. or die (Dante’s cuntiness goes a long way, that said)

But like every time Milton writes a Satan speech you just wanna do a fistpump. Just the most conniving, fascinating character. Every other fucker in the “good” section pales by comparison. Hell—I’ll just say it: all of the devils are beautifully written. They feel like real people. Half of the time, you’re nodding along with them, and there’s a point where you have to kinda look over your shoulder at Milton, like… buddy do you have any idea what you are SAYING.

The way that everyone talks about Paradise Lost, you’d think the whole goddamn text was about Satan. It’s not. Three of the ten books focus on Satan. All the others are about the war in heaven, Adam and Eve, or the Fall. Look here: if all we had were the books about Adam and Eve and God’s tried-and-true, this would still be great literature, but it’s greater because the stilted, proper characters clash against what are supposed to be our villains. We are literally being forced to ask the question: WHY do the devil and his minions sound like the people we’d rather know? If Milton’s God were real, I’d be straight-up scared of him, okay. I’d be in the “shit shit shit I hope he doesn’t see or think of me ever” camp.

Fun fact about Paradise Lost: people got mad at it for presenting the devil so well. They assumed that Milton was pro-devil somehow. This is because people have been bad readers since the beginning of time.

Milton is not pro-devil. He’s fallen into the problem that everyone has with writing God, which is: we have to explain why life, an extremely chaotic dumpster fire, is actually according to Divine Plan by a Big Guy Who Loves You! (Really!), but the more you try to explain the Plan the more you have to explain why God isn’t doing X or Y, until finally you have so many asterisks that essentially your religion is *teleports behind you*

So not only can no one read, no one can admit the real problem: how fucking shitty god and the angels are by comparison, and how they are, by all rights, being written correctly.

See, how ELSE could Milton have written God et al, that’s really the question. He does his best, and he’s very, very good at it. Look, I’ve read a LOT of religious texts over my life—and across the board, God is represented this way. CS Lewis wrote some wildly enjoyable fiction, but every time Jesus or God has to show up without the handy-dandy Aslan mask, everything stutters to a halt.

There are even points in the story where Milton has to tell you why what a devil is suggesting is sinful. For example, here’s the devil Belial giving his suggestions for how to deal with God now that all the devils are in Hell. So far, he has suggested not acting at all: God’s power is not only great in strength, it is great in cunning. He cannot be tricked; he cannot be beaten. So why not just wait it out? Don’t poke the tiger. Maybe the tiger will show mercy someday, if the devils don’t get used to the pain eventually:

“This horror will grow mild, this darkness light, Besides what hope the never-ending flight Of future days may bring, what chance, what change Worth waiting, since our present lot appears For happy though but ill, for ill not worst, If we procure not to ourselves more woe.”

Uniquely among the other devils—Moloch, Mammon, Beelzebub, and Satan all speak in this Book—Belial gets an addendum.

Thus Belial with words cloth’d in reason’s garb Counsel’d ignoble ease, and peaceful sloth, Not peace.

I can just imagine Milton reading it out loud to a friend and then that friend saying, “Hey, that Belial guy has the right idea!” and it’s like the tenth time that Milton has read this to someone only for them to look at him like, “Yeah, why not?” so Milton grumpily flops down at his rustic table with a quill and he’s grumbling about how everyone is a fucking idiot since he most clearly counsel’d IGNOBLE ease, and peaceful SLOTH, not PEACE, fuck thee, Thomas, thou slipshod bastard

In sharp contrast to Belial, Moloch—the first speaker—suggested fighting God until he just erased the devils from existence. Which is, you know, a mood.

It’s like the only way that you can represent god in fiction is as a one-dimensional cardboard cutout. The religious are terrified of judgment even while writing him and every time he shows up he’s boring and constipated. Of course we like the devil better: he’s more likely to give us a fair shake. God would fucking crush you like a beetle in slow-motion, ensuring you felt every pang, and he’d talk about how great he was the entire time he did it, and how he loves you, actually. Oh he loves you so much. There went your liver! Juiced. with love

So well are the devils written—so sensible, so motivated, so grounded—that the final devil to speak comes out of left field. Let me set the stage:

So far we had Moloch—future child-eater—suggest eternal war, with the aim of dissolution; Belial, who’s just like, why not chill and let the future bring what it may; and Mammon, who expands on that with “let’s actively seek ways to enjoy ourselves, altering everything around us until we form a world that meets our needs.” All of these devils focus on the pain of Hell, the loss of “bliss” (which I’m assuming is meant to imply both feeling and place: painlessness and Heaven, specifically), and the disgusting idea of returning to God, who they abhor.

Beelzebub brings up the idea of finding Earth, one tiny little planet that God made with a special creature called Man, and fucking around with it.

I had gotten so into the devils’ speeches—I was very zooted—that I had to do a double-take and then run back to re-read them.

“Bub, baby,” Belial should have said, “what the actual fuck are you talking about.”

Perhaps this is only me, but I couldn’t help but think of the vastness of creation, and the absolutely miniscule goal that the devils chose for themselves. The devils fell for nine whole days and nights, and Earth supposedly lies past dangerous voids and environments past understanding. It’s a big step down: go from fucking with the Creator to the Created, and not just any Created: some dumb human babies.

It’s the first break with the devils’ characters, and it doesn’t make a lot of sense.

to be CONTINUED.....

[helpimhopelesslyinlove]

I know its ooc for this acc, but i need to vent, or ill do something stupid and potentially dangerous, so im here, baring my soul to stangers on the internet ive never met irl before-

I think I got too close to the sun becuase I feel like I'm in a free fall rn and I can't get a hold of anything and I know I'm about to hit the ground, hard, buti don't know when or how far the ground still is or if I'm even going to land on spill ground because what if I fall into a bunch of rocks and die or fall into the ocean, I never learned to swim properly, I can BARELY keep myself afloat, and I know I'm going to die anyway from how high up I'm falling but I don't know when it's gonna be and everyone keeps telling me that I've got this all I have to do is open the parachute but the cord isn't working my parachute isn't working I don't know what to do some of the people who are supposed to be here for me are sitting on the ground watching me fall with a smile and a bucket of popcorn, the others who would catch me can't because they're all the way across the world, and I don't know what to do but everyone expects me to, I should have my life figured out already, everyone else my age seems to, why can't I, why am I like this why can't I just fly like everyone else why did my wings have to fail so miserably when my support system is down and will take at least two to three years before they're back up I need help someone send help please I need to talk to someone and I can't bc the people who'd want to can't do anything about it and the people who could help are convinced I can do it myself I hat being the oldest daughter and the oldest cousin, why do I have so many people looking up to me as a role model I'm a terrible role model if anything I'm more of a warning Hazzard don't do that sign why do all the adults keep saying I need to be perfect so my little siblings and cousins have a role model why where was my role model because my parents sure as fuck weren't it and they're always saying they didn't raise a quitter, well no shit they didn't raise me I fucking raised myself I'm at a point where I can't even talk about this out loud without crying I litterally had a three hour anxiety attack+mental breakdown and my parents still think I'm perfectly fine why did I have to move everyone's always telling me to believe in God and I have but if not a single thing I needed went right how do I keep believing I don't feel like the sky or the statues are listening anymore and I'm happy they do listen for others and I'm glad other people have a good relationship with their religions and their parents and people in general becuase I feel like crying whenever my favorite teacher used to say I did a good job at an event or said she was proud of me becuae she's said, word for word, many many times "I know it's not my place to tell you, but your parents won't, I know, so I will tell you- I'm so proud of you" and i- thank you you have no idea how much it means to me, but much as I appreciate it, you're not who I need to hear it from and it makes me cry because my culinary teachers were better parents to me in the one year I knew and had them than my parents were my entire like and I don't think that's okay, or that i should feel like crying evrytime I see my friends or anyone having a good relationship with their parents and I can't take this anymore please save me from school I know I used to complain but I've never actually hated it and now just the thought makes me feel sick and I used to love going to school and learning but now I'd litterally have take prometheus' placement eaten alive by vultures everyday than go to school again please help i can't live through another year and a half of this torture please help I can't do this please

[spotsupstuff]

What do you think about the RW ships? just curious is all.

hmmm.. well! first i do wanna preface this with the obligatory "i'm not hating on anybody with this, u do u and i do me is my genuine philosophy. i'll respect u from the distance if you do the same for me"

aight so i'm not gon list every ship in the fandom that has spawned in outta the stardust n give my specific opinion on it, cuz i'm not exactly keepin up

the only two ships i don't mind n find cute on the paper are NSH x Moon and Arti x Gour cuz both of them have that Old People Love Each Other in Easy Peace Despite The Circumstances Surrounding Them kick to them. i'm a weak bitch for that type of troupe for romantic relationships. not gon do anythin with 'em in my own stuff, though

i find myself more interested in the entirely and wholly platonic interpretation of everything in the game. platonic love is a matter of course, makin the story flow feel more smoother to me for that while also stayin nicely close to that religious narrative of the game (u can fight me on this but the Ancients' religion isn't *wrong*. the bad thing that happened with it is that it was taken to extremes and variety wasn't allowed. i could tell you why riddin oneself of the third and fifth sin isn't a bad idea at all- afterall, i kind of live by that myself!- and what they probably meant by riddin yourself of the sins without the extremist approach)

for the other ships... 🤔

well, the iterators are far too rooted in my head as sibs to vibe with ships with them, but more properly told: • Suns and Pebs are too much of "teacher and naive student" to me and i also find this dynamic more interesting to explore. uuuuu how spicy it is to think of Suns brainwashing Pebs but meaning it well uuuuuuuuuu • Suns and NSH are... let's just say that if i was in NSH's place and Suns talked to me like that i'd slap them so fuckin hard n if i WAS in a romantic relationship with them i'd dump them then and there (not in a bitchy ex kind of way, i'd be still down to talk, but i can't imagine bein in a relationship where the other half calls the most likely inevitable death of your closest friend a "setback" to their brainwashing of that friend's little brother would be Very healthy) • n i think what is the only other iterator ship left, Sliver and Moon... i find it kind of silly, honestly? like as far as *i* know the main reason why that exists is cuz Moon remembers what happened with Sliver after being given her own pearl about some notes she wrote herself on Sliver despite being baround three gazillion bagillion braincells short. i don't really see that as a strong incentive to start shippin 'em cuz like. you give Moon a very solid memory jogger and right in her second set of monologue she states that Sliver is literally a legend among the itties-titties. the best i can compare it to a real life thing is asking an american if they have any idea who Abraham Lincoln was at all. or asking a slovak if they knew who Finally managed to solidly establish our language after centuries of oppression. like of Course you're going to know That even on ur deathbed??? those are incredibly important historical figures for you n your home!!! also c'mon she remembers the feckin bug pupae, if THAT stuck in there this big boy info is def gon be kickin around

as for the slugcats... well ehh..... you can probably guess from what i mainly draw that i'm not Too focused on the slugs, only maybe Hunter so my slugshippin lore knowledge is p weak. when i first saw the slugshippin take off before i started postin bout RW again i thought it was silly to ship animals n still kinda do? 🤷‍♀️ doesn't help that canonically they have no business meeting each other except Monk n Surv (that is a strong No to shippin) and Hunter's writhing corpse n Gour (we are Not ducks we do not support necrophilia). i generally like to stick to the timeline, personally. good world-building. i respect good world-building too much to deviate too hard

BUT! i am going to use my status as pre-Downpour RW veteran and tell you to not listen to the whiny wrinkly babies in the tag that wail about how slugshippin is ruining the fandom. fuck 'em bitches, you do what u wanna (within moral common sense)

[lgbtawarenessproject]

[Image ID: A black man sitting comfortably on a greenish-white couch with his arms sprawled across the top. He is wearing a black durag with white stripes and a BLM shirt. He has an afro-textured beard. Above him is the Black American Heritage flag, which is three diagonal stripes of red, black, and red, where the center lies a yellow reaf surrounding a sword. The texted captions read throughout the video, "Juneteenth: Educational Purposes," "The Slaves Freed on Juneteenth were NOT African, they were black", "In Reality: African Slaves went extinct after generations of interacial breeding & indoctrination of Christianity", "The Slaves released & Modern Day Black Ppl today are the successful product of said brainwashing & deterioration of thr African in America!" and "Black American Heritage Flag created 1967." End ID]

[Caption: The man says, "Public service announcement in regards to Juneteenth: As we know, the holiday is less than a week away, and we also know, greedy ass corporations are going to try and capitalize and get a dollar in anyway, shape, or form. Which leads me to this announcement, or should be better clarified as advisory. If you step foot, in any store, and you see Juneteenth related products with nothing but the African flag or African flag colors, do not by that shit. This is in no way disrespectful to our melanated neighbors from the mother land. Because, if it's one thing, that the black community has been able to piece together with the context clues of history shared museums and novels. To map out what all happened during that time period, that history books would not tell us in school. It's the simple fact that the slaves that were finally being freed after the Civil War were not African. They were black. Please allow me to explain Juneteenth in that statement I just made. Slavery was officially abolished on January 1st of 1863, when Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation. Unfortunately, a portion of traitor sore losers- excuse me, I mean slave owners, decided not to relay that information to their slaves for another 2 and half years. Leading to another, smaller batch of slaves to finally found out they were on June 19th of the year 1865. And, honestly, Juneteenth is just the tip of the fucked up iceberg, as to what slave owners were capable of, when they did not want to give up their slaves. Because there were still slave plantations being discovered and shut down past the year of 1865. Killona Slave Plantation in Louisiana was the last recorded discovered in America, and shut down. And that was in the 1970s. The only reason those plantations lasted so long, was because of how isolated they were, in deep forests, and the constructions of roads, and highways, was what lead to their exposure. But in that century of slaves finally being free, there were several factors that they all had in common. They spoke fluid English with no African Language, they were all Christians with no practice of African religion, nor did they know what African tribe they were a part of. Within the first 100 out of 400 years of slavery, Africans were seperated from their tribes, their bloodlines, told to forget their names, and then forced to forget their African religions and learn Christianity, and forced to mix with other races. I have a friend who just discovered he was part Latino, and he does not look Latino at all. Hell, thanks to the best of my family's ability, I know I have African, Native, French, White, and Asian blood running through my veins, and I still don't know what tribes I am connected to. But, that is why I choose to have this flag on my wall, because this flag right here, represents all people of color, who either lost, or do not know their history prior to being naked and chained up on a boat. End ID]

Video ID by discord member

[gentlyjimin]

“If I could chose my dream, I just wanna stay right next to you.”  - kim namjoon, tokyo 

words: 1.3k

warnings: n/a, mention of religion 

work is unfinished, i am posting to see how well it is received.

------

“You know,” you started, eyes locked on the same person that your friend couldn’t help but glance at for the past half an hour, “for someone so confident, that guy sure does render you speechless.”

Unamused, Jimin turned to look at you.

“He’s not just some guy. He’s the guy.”

“The guy?” You repeated, brows raised. “What does that even mean, the guy?”

“Do you know who the guy is? Jeon Jungkook.”

You couldn’t help but roll your eyes.

“No-no,” he scolded after catching your eye-roll. Jimin shifted in his seat and moved closer towards you, “he not only led our lovely rugby team to victory the moment he joined it, but he also-“

“Got rid of all the dickheads and makes sure the team takes care of drunk people at parties.” You finished for him, unable to suppress a smile at Jimin’s unphased expression. “The Vatican should make him a saint.”

Jimin’s huge crush on Jeon Jungkook was evident the moment the sport star turned the entire team around. You’d argue that it existed the moment Jimin saw Jungkook, but your friend was adamant that it didn’t. He was also adamant that he didn’t suit short hair, but everyone knew Jimin could very well pull off being bald if he wanted to.

Jimin continued to deadpan you.

“What,” you laughed, “Jungkook’s a good person, nobody has ever said otherwise. He may be the guy to you, but-“

“Oh?” A light voice suddenly cut you off. 

Speak of the devil and he will arrive. 

“The guy to you? Do you have anything to tell me, sweetheart?” Jungkook continued. He directed his question at Jimin as he sat down and stole one of the fries that sat in front of the other man.

“Nothing that you don’t already know,” Jimin answered with a wink, to which Jungkook laughed while continuing to munch on the fries.

As the two fell into a hushed conversation, you shifted your gaze away from your two friends. Although the three of you sat together, their conversation felt too private to listen to, even as a friend. Instead, you moved your gaze to where you last saw your own crush. He was still there, still working away. He was wearing a dark brown, long sleeved shirt that you noticed kept getting in the way as his fingers glided across the keyboard in front of him. The long sleeves kept shifting the pages of his book. He didn’t seem to mind, though. You found that admirable about him; not only did he look good in brown, but he was patient. It may seem silly, but you found that small things like pages moving when you don’t want them to move was big enough to irritate a lot of people, including you.

Not him, though.

Last week you saw a girl trip and spill her coffee all over his jeans and notes. You could feel your heart break as you watched the pages soak up the dark liquid, but he didn’t even look at them. He jumped out of his seat to help the girl the second she fell. You could faintly hear her apologize to him, but he told her to not worry and that they were just notes.

If you didn’t know better, you’d say you were in love with him. 

Jungkook was one thing, but the Vatican should consider Kim Namjoon a saint.

You couldn’t help but internally cringe at yourself. If you rolled your eyes at how in love Jimin is with Jungkook, Jimin would straight up vomit if he heard what you were thinking right now. 

“You know,” Jungkook’s voice brought you out of your thoughts while you considered what you could possibly wear to a saint-decleration, “I could introduce the two of you. He tutors me in Philo, we take the same class.”

You sighed, wishing so very badly that you could take him up on the offer, but you were too afraid that it would all go wrong. Although you considered yourself to be a fairly confident person, you were not blissfully ignorant. You and Namjoon have never spent time alone together. All that you know about him, you know because the two of you are close to the same person. 

Min Yoongi. Both of you were also familiar with Seokjin and although you considered him a friend, you knew that he was closer to Namjoon than he was to you. 

“Listen,” Jimin started, picking up on your hesitation, “Taehyung is throwing a party this weekend. I know for a fact that Seokjin will be there, which makes it more than likely that Namjoon will be there too.”

Jungkook nodded, “which makes it a perfect setting! You guys won’t be alone. If you hit it off, great. If you don’t, we can come rescue you.”

“Exactly,” Jimin continued, “but either way you’ll get to know whether this is something you want to pursue, or if you should leave it alone and move on.”

You gasped in fake-offense, “move on? How could I possibly move on?”

It was Saturday, 7:36pm and you were halfway through getting ready. You had been texting back and forth with Yoongi, who had confirmed that Namjoon would be there tonight. You had also reassured Yoongi that if he needed an out at any point during the party, you’d be there for him. 

You were aware of his social anxiety, and how much it took for him to attend events like the one tonight. Although you didn’t know the ins and outs of what he had to deal with, you knew enough to offer support and reassurance. When the two of you were 14, there was one particular school event that Yoongi had to attend, a school concert of sorts. He was forced into doing a piano solo, but his set was delayed and cancelled because he was unable to breathe from the nerves. That was the first time you saw the extent of what your childhood friend was dealing with. Since then you promised to be his rock, his stability if and whenever he should need it, if it would be helpful. Sometimes your presence was helpful, sometimes it wasn’t. But Yoongi never shoo-ed you away. Not once. So you stayed, each and every time. 

By the time you finished getting ready, Yoongi had already texted you that he would be there to pick you up in 10 minutes.

This is good. You told yourself. You’d finally get to talk to properly talk to Namjoon, see what he’s like. You loved spending time with Yoongi, and he loved spending time with Namjoon, so surely you would love to spend time with him too?

Of course you will. 

Why were you so nervous? You were never nervous to meet people. You looked hot, felt hot. Why were you nervous?

A horn sounded outside. Has it already been 10 minutes?

“Ooooooh,” Yoongi scanned you up and down as you slipped into the passenger seat, “you dressed up just for me?”

You laughed, “you like?”

“I do,” he laughed, pulling out of your driveway, “and I’m sure that he will too.”

Yoongi knew. Of course he knew. How could he not know? Your interest in Namjoon was clear when you interrogated your friend after each time the two of them hung out.

“Do you have a plan?”

“Ah yes,” you mused, “I will show up, seduce him and hook up in your car. You’ll leave the keys inside for me, right?”

You saw Yoongi roll his eyes.

“I don’t have a plan. I just hope it all works out, that’s all.”

“Why wouldn’t it work out?”

“What if he doesn’t like me?” You hated how that sounded.

Yoongi clicked his tongue.

“Why wouldn’t he? Not only are you hot, but you’re interesting. And as far as I can tell, that’s what he’s after. He likes people with substance. You have plenty of substance.”

You almost blushed. Compliments from Yoongi were not a common thing. This one you’d cherish.

“Can you just repeat that, I didn’t get a chance to record it.”

“Oh ha-ha. Save that attitude for Joon.”

Joon.

[hurricanek8art]

So a lot of people have seen my Star Wars posts the last couple of weeks. I only have a handful of followers and I'm still pretty new to all of this, and it's been fun and kinda mind blowing. I would love to talk about Star Wars or other nerdy stuff more than anything right now, but... I have something I have to get off my chest.

My dog Lucy died this afternoon.

It was sudden, like this developed at some point in the three months since she was at the vet last, and there was nothing we could do. I can't bring myself to really talk about it. I don't think I ever will be able to. It's too much. Because Lucy was my everything.

I'm not posting this because I'm looking for sympathy or prayer. I mean I'll take it if you're comfortable giving it, but that's all really complicated stuff, y'know? Not everybody has a great relationship with grief or religion—heck I don't always have an easy relationship with either of them sometimes, but I'm working on it. I'm not digging for commiseration or "poor sweet baby"s or anything. I just... don't have many people to talk to in my life. And this is gonna be really hard for me going forward. Not that anyone needs me to tell them that, everyone who's been where I am knows this. I'm not ready to grieve. I've grieved half my life, really, for different reasons, different people. It's... complicated. I'm complicated. So I'm going to do what I learned how to do to cope with my grief as a child. I'm going to tell you a story.

It's a story about love and unexpected journeys. Of finding who you are through someone else. Of a girl and her dog, who found each other and were who the other needed in just the right moment. I want to tell you a story because if even one person reads this, just reads it, doesn't even reblog or like or anything, the story is carried on. And the story lives forever. And in a way, Lucy lives forever. Because she already does in my heart, and she always will. So I'm going to tell the world our story not because I'm looking for followers or likes or sympathy or whatever. I'm telling it because I want at least one person to know even a fraction of how much I love her. If you don't or can't read this because it's too much, too close, too anything, I understand more than anyone that it can be overwhelming or painful. But if you do read this rambly ode that I wrote last night in sort of a haze... I thank you, for carrying the story on.

I met Lucy when I was thirteen. My family had been looking into training a service dog for me for a few months. We thought that it would help with my autism, alongside the PTSD I was dealing with in the aftermath of my father's death a little less than a year before. Because we already had one wonderful lab mix, the local training organizations had turned our applications down, citing that it would be too complicated to integrate the dogs. A friend of our family who did occupational therapy through animals suggested we find a dog and train it ourselves, with her help and help from people she knew, so off to the local shelters we went. This trip was our third try, and it was the same shelter we found our lab in—third try's the charm, right? And it was.

My mom wanted me to look at the puppies down a different row of kennels. Easier to train when they're younger, and she has a fondness for labs. But I walked down the righthand row, waving and smiling and wincing at the noise as excited dogs barked, wanting to see why new people were there, and I saw her. She was in the middle of the row of kennels. She never barked, but her big brown eyes were bright. I knelt down to say hello because she was the only one not barking in my face, and she leaned against the chain link to get closer for me to scratch, still looking at me with those beautiful eyes. I didn't realize it in that moment, but that was the moment she moved straight into my heart. I wanted to at least visit with her in the introduction room. Yes, the puppies were cute, but I had a feeling this time, y'know?

When they brought her into the room, I was sitting on the floor. She about dragged the shelter volunteers across the room, making a beeline for me. Sniffing all over. No licking—she's never been a licker. That's alright. We played a little, my mom and brother watching kinda surprised because this dog didn't want to look anywhere but me. She sniffed curiously around the room a few times, sure, but otherwise, she was right there. Stayed right there. And then she did this.

I was a goner. Because I found my dog.

___

They told us they thought she was a dalmatian mix, estimated to be about one and a half, which was amazing because we did the math later and realized she was likely born around my birthday in December. Asked me what I wanted to name her. I was on a Narnia hyperfixation at that point. Lucy, because she was so sweet and curious. Later the name evolved into an homage to Lucille Ball, because she was wacky and goofy and fun. I don't care where the name came from. She was Lucy and she was my dog. We had to introduce her to our other dog the next day, at the dog park. It went fantastic. All she wanted to do was romp and play, and our other dog went from acting her age of 8 and sorta arthritic to a happy two year old again. Surprisingly, the shelter worker handed us the leash and said "she's yours for the weekend, we'll talk on Monday". Trial run I guess. I was fine. I was ready.

It was Friday, April 13th, 2012. My brother likes to make jokes that the date should've been a clue that she'd be a handful, but I don't care. A Friday the 13th was one of the best days of my life. Even if it didn't feel like it at the time.

(I swear she and our lab got along, that one is just one of the few pictures I have of them together at the moment 🤣 I have so many pictures, but I can't go through them yet. These are just the ones I feel comfortable sharing right now.)

___

She was not a dalmatian mix. We figured that out that night when we put her up in my room to sleep. I was too buzzed with excitement, so I was in the living room when I heard it. This bay from my room. Not a bark, a full on hound bay. I remember looking at my mother in shock, and she just shook her head, eyes wide. "That is not a dalmatian."

It turned out there was an foxhound breeding/hunting place a few miles out in the boonies from us. They don't actually fox hunt, it's more of a horse-riding club where you go out riding with a whole flipping herd of foxhounds, English and American, to exercise the dogs. The shelter had found her about a month before running around in the woods, no collar, no chip, nothing. We don't know if that really is where she was lost from, or how long she was a stray. No one from there came looking for her if she was theirs. She had some scars on her face, thin scratches you could only really see when you squished the loose skin on her face. I loved squishing her face so much. Lucy had pretty clearly never been raised around non-working dogs. Or humans. Or anything, really. The world of the suburbs was new and confusing to her, but she knew how to chase, and run, and scent-track. Never had a problem with wild animals trying to get into our yard again at that house. Lucy was here to protect her new people.

(I should be clear that there was nothing in this tree. No squirrels or anything. I think this photo really captures some of her essence, though 🤣)

Service dog training went out of the window pretty quickly. My mother, who'd had dogs for decades, had never adopted a dog as old as her before, and Lucy was a lot. Hyperactive, intense prey drive, stubborn and hardheaded and loud, oh my gosh she was so loud. And settling into a new routine after losing her husband while trying to raise two autistic kids, while we all dealt with PTSD, was a lot. She got overwhelmed and kinda shut down after a while. My brother didn't know how to train dogs either, so he shut down, too. I don't blame them at all, we were all grieving and they came back around eventually, but I was thirteen years old with a dog I had no idea how to train, and I felt alone. I was grieving and scared, and for a while I was terrified that it wasn't going to work out. Every time our family adopts an animal, we swear right then—that animal is a part of our family, no matter what. But it was so much, and we were dealing with so much.

But then Lucy would look at me with those big brown eyes. And I'd feel okay. Because she was my dog. And I was her person. And I wasn't going to give up. So I squared my shoulders, I went over everything I knew from what my mother had taught me over the years, and I trained my dog.

(this was from 2016, and it's the day I knew she and my brother actually did get along, despite all the headaches and banged-up knees from her not dodging around him quite in time that she caused)

Things have never been easy. But we got through it. We moved out of my childhood home, a little over a year after returning from everything that happened with my father. (It was a saga I really don't know how to share) My PTSD and trauma stuff got worse, and my now-regular panic attacks really got started, and I dropped out of therapy like an idiot, but through it all she was there, always, always. When it felt like no one else was. When it felt like I was drowning. I never got suicidal thoughts until the pandemic hit, and have never been anywhere near wanting to even think about following through on them, but even when I was in really dark places, no matter what, Lucy was there, listening to me with her big floppy peanut butter colored ears and her big brown eyes and her freckly-looking spots. Lucy saved me from fully spiraling into a grief-filled, depressed fog I wouldn't be able to find a way out of more times than I can count. As far as I'm concerned, she saved my life. She was never cuddly—I think she tolerated my attempts at affection more than anything sometimes, but that was okay. I'm pretty touch-averse when it comes to humans and hugs and stuff. Dogs, no, humans, yes. I understood, and I knew when she'd had enough and when to step away, and I did my best to respect that. She was fine with being independant, with just being near me. And I realized I was fine with it too. Because she was there. And I was there for her.

(She heard me open a snack container in the first pic; behind that bush was one of her favorite spots in the summer even though it drove me crazy when I couldn't find her 🤣)

Over the past few years, it felt like we'd really settled into where we were supposed to be. She never slowed down with age. She just... matured, I think? Especially after our lab mixed died in 2016 and it was just her and us humans. Realized she didn't have to constantly chase the next smell, be on the lookout for the next squirrel or bird or rabbit. When I took her out for our hours of hanging out on the back porch in the sunshine, as soon as the weather would turn warm, she went from constantly running around the yard to taking breaks to hang around my chair. Laying near me, sometimes even next to me. A few times she laid her head on my feet, or next to them, or against my legs when I was sitting on the ground. I almost cried every time because it made me happy she was so comfortable with that. (Scratch that, I did cry) My favorite was when we were out there in the evenings, and she'd fall asleep as it got dark, deep enough to snore. She felt safe enough to do that, comfortable enough, content enough to let herself fall that deep asleep, because she knew we were there to protect her, be there for her. Because I was there. And if you've never heard a hound howl in their sleep because they were dreaming about chasing things, you've missed out, it's possibly one of the funniest sounds you'll ever hear, and I got to hear it on a nightly basis. I heard it last night. Even when it kept me awake sometimes as her snores rattled the windows, I have treasured that weird yodel-y sound as it fluttered through her flappy lips.

Those summer days will be in my heart forever. And when the weather would turn cold, and my seasonal depression would get bad, I felt better because she'd let herself become a couch potato with time, and realized "Hey, I can sleep on Kate's bed when she's not on it! Score!" She was content, at last, after years of us working so hard to find a balance. That's what I've held onto all this time, what I'll hold onto in the coming months, years, decades. That she's content, and happy, and she knows that she is loved more than anything in this world.

I've grown and changed with her. It's been eleven and a half years, we had to have. I've lost family and gained family. Drifted apart from friends like an idiot when I should've held on. Sometimes I don't know if the person I've become is who I want to be, or need to be, but when I'm with her, it's fine. Because I was who she needed. I became an adult. I found new interests and hobbies; I found writing, I re-found art, I found music and making friendship bracelets and a little bit of sewing recently, though I'm bad at it. I found historical subjects, mythologies and folklore, stories I never knew existed, that fascinate me. I found Lord of the Rings and Captain Marvel and Paramore and Taylor Swift with her. I still don't always know who I am, but I found myself. And every bit of that, Lucy was next to me, watching me as I discovered it, listening to me sing to her and ramble on about whatever I was doing on the days we sat out on the porch or in my room, just us, and I needed someone to talk to. She was always a good listener.

I'm still struggling with my mental health, everyone in my family is. And I know the next few months are going to be hard. But every bit of my life with her, I've been happy, even when it got hard. Because Lucy was my dog, and I was her human, and we were Kate and Lucy. My only regret is how long it took us to find our balance, find out how to coexist when we were so different but the same at the start. I will always regret how long it took, even if I was a confused child for half of it, but I never gave up. I couldn't. Because she never gave up on me, even when I had no idea what I was doing. Anything else—the grief, the frustration, the fear—I regret none of it. I never will.

Because through it all, I had Lucy. And Lucy had me. And now, if you've read all this, as I rambled my way through our story, trying not to cry and laughing at some of the memories, maybe you know her a little bit too. Everything on the internet is forever, right? Well, now our story is forever. Lucy is forever.

And she will be in my heart forever, too. I love you, Lucy. My Goose, my Goober, my Goofus, my Lucy-Goosey Mongoose, my "no, no, stop that, please stop eating stuff you find in the yard!". I love your squishy face and your droopy lips and your floppy ears. I love your loud barks and your window-rattling snores and your incredibly weird sleeping positions. I love your big brown eyes and your goofy grin and your misunderstanding of the word 'gimme five' regularly leading to you enthusiastically smacking me in the face with your big ol' paws. I love how I had to show you how to chew apple slices with your back teeth because you'd never had one before, and how you'd mooch for a carrot that was supposed to go to the horses only to spit it out three seconds later and then immediately try mooching for another. I loved teaching you to boop me with your nose when it was clear you weren't comfortable with kisses as a way to show affection, despite the numerous times you almost broke my nose. I love you. I love you. I love you. You have been part of me since April 12, 2012. You always will be part of me. One of the best parts.

And now you're forever.

[thegreatclowncat]

Woah, could you tell us more about your house that was inhabited by demons? I’m glad you’re alright :0

on it, boss

and thanks!

ok this is going to be veeerrry personal. mental health, religion, stuff

so i rented out a room inside of a condo for my sophomore-senior year of college with two other people. It was a narrow house, with all the bedrooms on the 2nd floor. Mine was at the top of the stairs, the rest were down a hallway. In retrospect, we had nothing that would leak gases into the house that would make us hallucinate or feel weird. everything indoors was electric, and the water heater was in an outdoor room with open-air access outside. However, we had no carbon monoxide meter, so. that's for anyone to speculate.

I started noticing that feeling of being watched coming from down the hallway on days when I was there alone, but I shrugged it off and attributed it to the fact I've felt that way ever since I was a little kid (to the point I had phobias of dark windows, closets, mirrors, and photos with eyes in them)

Walking towards my roommate's room always felt like I was descending into a pit. Like sudden full-body goosebumps, intense thoughts like "go away. go away turn around", it seeming 2x darker than the rest of the hallway, etc.

At some point I started seeing stuff back there, but turning to look at it directly, there'd be nothing. I just kinda treated it all like whatever. When i was 13 i had major depressive disorder to the point I developed hallucinations for a brief time. I just figured it was the same old stuff.

Until my roommates started talking about it. They knew about it for a long time. they called it "the house ghost" and hoped it was friendly. I didn't really care about it then either. It wasn't a problem, especially when my roommates were there.

then suddenly, i was alone. my a-spiritual roommate graduated and moved out, and the roommate whose room was at the back of the hall- her mental health got so bad that she had to move back home. ✨ForeShadowing✨. She would visit occasionally, but I was alone most of the time, and this was when covid started so I was stuck inside the house all day, too.

I do not know when or why they were there. I don't know why they were rooted onto that last room. at one point I braved the hallway and opened my roommate's room (I had to put something of hers inside). I didn't get a good look around, but there was a giant band poster taking up half of her wall that was just a very large hastily-painted eye. literally no idea if that's significant in any way lmao, it just scared the crap out of me (see eye phobia). Later on, that same roommate left a wiccan book on the kitchen counter. Are demons attracted to things like that? the book probably, but the rest, I am unsure. I don't know how many other wiccan or new age things like that she had in her room either. I can only speculate on whether or not she intentionally invited them, unintentionally did, or if they were there before all of us.

I am unsure why I believed there were three. I think it felt like three.

well, at this point it becomes a lot more subjective. All i can describe it as is: the things in the house reallllyyy didnt like me, and their old target left.

I didn't know a lot of my own promises as a Christian, like that demons couldn't hurt me or anything and that I am inherently protected and etc etc. I did not know I had authority over them and could tell them to skedaddle. I was afraid of them, and honestly that's the worst thing a person can be lol. I do think demons can *torment* someone, but only if they're given permission to. I mean, they could never hurt me -directly-, only... bother me, a lot. especially attacking places where i was still broken inside, and bringing up things and mental problems i struggled with a lot in the past

I was quite happy at this point in my life, even with the isolation. I really didn't like being in school, though. content warning for this next paragraph, self injurious ideation:

But out of the blue, I started getting intense intrusive thoughts about self harm and suicide. It was near constant sentences sounding off in my head. I say that, because I don't naturally have an internal monologue. So I... attributed it to the isolation. I didn't pay attention to the fact that it only happened when I was inside the house. After a few months of that, it started stressing me out. One day, my very religious mother visited, and I had to leave for a few hours. When I got back, she pulled me aside and said that the whole time she was in my room, something kept trying to tell her to jump off my balcony, among other things. She started blasting praise music through speakers, but said "for some reason, it was really, really difficult." I think i just started crying. I asked her how many demons there were in the house. she said, "three." Gosh, I wish I knew how to tell them off at the time. anyway

She didn't know how I could live through that every day for the last however long it was. I didn't know either. It didn't get better after that. Normally, they couldn't come in my room, full stop. but there was one time i unintentionally agreed with something demonic (i didnt think it was inherently bad on the surface) and didn't realize, that night I saw someone standing in my room. eventually, i printed out Bible verses and taped them to all of the walls around the house so I could recite them as I walked to my room.

unfortunately that was also the start of me not being able to listen to secular music, bc some bands would also bring them closer.

As far as I myself went, I started having intense mood swings, nightmares, depressive episodes, the most major dissociation i've ever experienced in my life, and the stress started ruining my digestive system to the point where I had to stop eating solid food for a little bit. That was the beginning of my last 3 years of sickness.

i made a funny tiktok that no longer exists online making fun of the whole house situation, and im quite proud of it but it has my face in it, so no one gets to see it :P

I FINALLY got out of the house, and moved away, but sadly my problems stuck. persistent indigestion and malnutrition worsened mental health to the point I stopped making enough neurotransmitters to feel emotions and sleep and have a normal memory, i was absolutely tortured with different things. i was so afraid of messing up and making demons hurt me (which was a lie. a lie very useful for them)(i believe it's called legalism, which, bad). I was a complete mess, physically mentally spiritually.

but yeah it took 3 years to learn that i can just. act in the authority i was given. fully believe im protected and forgiven and healed, even in my mind. command things to leave and they have to. i also started listening to music again, bc i know things cannot hurt me anymore. i dont have to be afraid of anything. ever again.

i'm all better now, i havent had neurotransmitter problems in ages, my stomach is healed, i get to exercise soon, the mood swings went away, i rarely ideate bad things, i dont remember my last depressive episode, and i havent had intrusive or bad thoughts in a while! i mean im still kind of weird and eccentric but that's to be expected

[that-banhus]

Ten Books To Know Me

Rules: 10 (non-ancient) books for people to get to know you better, or that you just really like.

Tagged by @landwriter​, whose list I am pillaging for reading tips. In no particular order: 

Paladin of Souls - Lois Bujold. Cordelia Naismith is still my favourite of her characters, but the World of the Five Gods series is so kind. Bujold does religion better than anyone, and in a deeply humanist way. The exact inverse experience of reading Maria Russell’s The Sparrow, though both are phenomenal. 

Labyrinths - Jorge Luis Borges. The short story collection version of someone leaning in and going “would you like to hear a fucked up thought about set theory? No? Time?”

Watership Down - Richard Adams.

I was (understandably, I think) leery of books with rabbits after my Mom insisted that the first time I’d broken down sobbing over The Velveteen Rabbit was a fluke, and I’d misunderstood the point of the book, and then tried reading it to me another two times. I cried every time. HER point is that the bunny became real at the end, so it’s a happy book. MY point is that to the boy, the bunny was real the whole time, and that from his point of view it was essentially one of those horribly moralising 19th century fairy tales where the main character’s best friend dies horribly half way through but they go to Heaven so you’re expected to be happy about it. Except in this case, they’re burned alive. Watership Down was the runner-up for most traumatic childhood book about bunnies, but it made no bones about what it was. It knew when it was being brutal, and did it on purpose and well, and I love it still. It also was one of several deeply formative books for introducing me to my favourite trope: stories-in-stories.

The Lord of the Rings - JRR Tolkien. Yes, I know, everyone’s favourite, etc etc. Still, I read it young enough to sort of grow up along it as a trellis. I can’t put any of my favourite medieval works on this list per the rules, but Tolkien’s the reason I could read them as an adult and go oh, but you’re familiar. Also, the older I get, the more the whole ‘no kindness is ever wasted’ element makes me verklempt. 

Jackalope Wives - T. Kingfisher. I know, it’s not a book, but you’ll forgive me for that once you’ve read it, for free, right here: https://apex-magazine.com/short-fiction/jackalope-wives/

How good was that? Right?

Gaudy Night - Dorothy L. Sayers. I’ve never related to anything or anyone more than Harriet Vane as I read this, belly down on the grass in the Oxford botanical gardens this summer, in the middle of having a Bad Fucking Time romantically. Sayers’ characters are complicated and human, a little too smart for their own good sometimes, and prone to self-sabotage and overthinking. This book is so profoundly good at capturing the absurdities of love, and the negotiations of self that requires, while still being very tender about the whole thing.

American Gods - Neil Gaiman. I’ve never been in the US for longer than three months at a stretch since I was three, and growing up, it was largely mythological to me. America was Where Stories Happen. I read Stardust first, and possibly like Good Omens best of Gaiman’s, but American Gods put words to a lot of the experience of looking at the US from a one-foot-in-the-door-one-foot-out perspective.   

Caedmon - Denise Levertov. Once again cheating, this time it’s a poem:

http://www.southernhumanitiesreview.com/denise-levertov-caedmon.html

I’m also a tremendously basic poetry person in terms of liking Donne, Blake and Eliot. Mmm, weird feelings about God and/or WWI.

The Lacuna - Barbara Kingsolver. Possibly my favourite ending in anything I’ve read ever? I can’t say anything concrete without spoiling it, but the book starts out big, and then, at the end, gets narrower, and narrower down to a fine point, and - look, it’s very good. It has opinions about how we tell stories. The Bean Trees is also very good, though it’s been near a decade since I read that one, and I remember it less.

Frankenstein - Mary Shelley. Look, it has stories within stories, and a big, gothic, sweep of thought and emotion. It feels big, and deep, and bigger and deeper every time I go back.

Special mention because almost everyone who follows me is into Sandman: Doomsday Book - Connie Willis.

Would you like to CRY about the middle ages, and how people were people always and how no kindness is wasted? I bet you would. Maybe only read this if you’re feeling stable about pandemics again, though. I’m giving it another few months personally before going back.

-

I am, as usual, a tiny bit late to the tagging game and have lost track of who’s already been tagged. HOWEVER, I have a bunch of lovely amazing mutuals and new followers and if you want, please consider yourself tagged (that way I can also see who’s interested in maybe being tagged in the future, and get to know you better?)