#we had a crab boil One Other Time and all ANYONE in this system can remember abt it was It Was Difficult

[euclydya]

my god. crabs r hell

[ablogwithoutacause]

You never watched Mi Familia with me. I understand it was painful. The complication in birth scene. The negative traits many of the characters had. I understand, but to me It’s a beautiful picture that depicts how we don’t get to choose what family we’re born into. But we have a choice, and we decide if we make it. I’m living something of a movie… a “Mi Familia” movie.

My anxiety attacks seem to be persistent but I work on them day to day to not let them control me. Today at work I did what you told me. Another sleepless night. Eight circles, one for every hour I was obliged to be there. As every hour passed, a circle was filled in. I do something similar for my daily push ups. Each circle represents a set of ten. Every day five circles are filled. I got through the day. Over thirty hours went by and I found myself at home. Anxious, worried that no matter how many times i closed my eyes, it was as my eyelids were held open by compressed springs ready to release back into an open coil. I was worried another anxiety attack was coming. My heart beat would not subdue to a controlled THun-thUN... no matter how many times I controlled my breathing. My cousin Tony told me this, "Being alone is real, getting lost in your head is real. Anyone can be a tough guy, a bad guy. But no matter how big, how strong that man is to the open eye... when the door closes, and the lights turn off... that's when it gets scary." Tony was locked up for over a year. He was a tweety bird in a cage... and probably came close to losing his mind more than a couple of times.

At this point I'm writing just to write. To clear my mind. To empty out my heavy load into the vast yet complex "inner-webz". I see it as doing something with my time. Investing energy into something else. shifting inertia from one object to another. My mind was yet again filled with unnecessary thoughts. Each thought, a crab in a bucket (my mind). Just as one wanted to escape, the others brought it down and the pressure, the space not being relieved of worry.

I spoke to my mother for over an hour on the phone. That was enough to allow me to sleep a few hours. I woke up a bit refreshed. Nothing replenishing, but just enough fuel to get me to the next town. My dinner was a pimped out yakisoba maruchan... As the noodles softened in boiling water... I heated up chopped leftover chicken with raw garlic and onions. After the chicken was hot and the onions were glazing, I drained the water from the noodles and threw them in the casserole with the chicken and the members of the allium family. I poured the yakisoba sauce in, and cracked an egg in there. It was very savory and masked the generic instant noodle taste. I wish i had some bell peppers in the fridge. that would've pieced it all together for me.

To accompany the dinner, I made a chamomile and cinnamon tea, lightly sweetened with honey from Zacatecas. My mom had told me to have a spoonful of honey to help relax and go to sleep. I then spoke to my older brother... we're worried for the youngest. He expressed to me how just as he was once worried for me, now I am worrying for the youngest. He handed me the big brother belt i had long refused to wear. Now I have put a distance between the youngest and I, a distance which would be used as a pneumatic tube system, like those in bank drive-thrus. Only respect and wisdom would be passed on from me to him. His break-up with your sister is promoting him to engage in behaviors that are concerning. Again... reminding me of Chucho from Mi Familia.

Now... It is time to attempt to sleep again... since I am scheduled to work in less than 5 hours. I have no control over what I dream. These stress related dreams are no good for my waking life. This will be my next task. Controlling how I react to said disturbing dreams. I don't want to be afraid of what is healthy for me... sleep. I miss you, I learn from you daily. I wish you were here. And because I want you here, I will do everything in my power to have you here. Love you.

[fabermemorialrink]

some mistake, part 7

Last part of chapter two! Chowder’s back, and we meet some new friends!

Also, a quick PSA: if I ever screw up with regards to race/gender/sexuality (or anything else), please don’t hesitate to let me know so I can do better! I want everyone to have a positive reading experience. Thanks!!

Chowder’s reaction to Dex bleeding on his shoes was a complex cocktail of fascination and disturbed worry: the cherry on top of a very informative face journey that Derek studied like visual poetry as Dex caught him up to speed. Like Derek, Chowder emphatically refused to stop visiting, which they proved so often that Dex had to kick them out after they skipped a team game night.

More often than not, Derek and Chowder head over to see Dex together, though there are times when one of them is too busy with work to go. Derek loves being part of a trio, but he also appreciates the time he gets to spend with each of his friends individually. Chowder’s roomie is often out and about socializing, so Derek takes to setting up a base camp on C’s floor, where they study and philosophize together. Most questions are open-ended and profound (who would win in a fight, Mr. Rogers or Elmo? would you rather sleep on legos or have a splinter in your tongue?), but the most important question of all cycles back into rotation every few days:

What’s up with Dex and the forest?

Chowder thinks it’s better not to prod, but Derek can’t leave it alone. It’s a secret, but the kind that Dex is willing to entertain guesses about. He archly shoots down Derek’s suggestions that he might be a woodland nymph like the girls, and repeatedly insists that if he had any kind of therianthropy, he would have already shifted and eaten one of Derek’s limbs in annoyance.

It comes up again in conversation when Derek’s helping Dex cut up invasive vines again. Knowing that the forest is alive puts this activity in a new light; Dex tells him that he knows which plants belong to the woods, and which ones the forest considers a threat, so Derek just follows suit and rips out the roots he’s instructed to. There was a lingering uneasiness at the thought of touching the plants again at first, but they’re in the outer ring, where the light filters in, and Dex promises that if anything tries to grab Derek again, he’ll hatchet it right off. Maybe he should be more freaked out, but he can almost feel the truce between himself and the forest now. At the very least, Dex’s presence always makes him feel at ease.

“How’s it going? Not too tough for your delicate poet’s hands, is it?” Dex calls over across the grove. The sleeves of his plaid shirt have been rolled up, and his hatchet and lantern have been put aside next to Derek’s calc homework that Dex was looking over - dangling from the lantern’s wire handle are his crab keychain and a small bottle filled with a rainbow of miniscule origami lucky stars that Chowder gifted him. There’s dirt all over Dex’s knees and hands, but his posture is loose and he seems content. It's a good look for him.

Derek makes an obscene gesture in his direction. Dex wholeheartedly refuses to believe that Derek would ever drop his gloves during a game, citing Derek’s chill masquerade and elegant piano student fingers which would surely shatter on some goon’s cheekbones. Derek’s not big on fighting either, but he resents the implication that he couldn’t at least hold his own to defend his teammates.

“What, you wanna have a go at me?” Dex says with a grin, straightening up to his full height, which is still obnoxiously taller than Derek.

Derek snorts, kicking a clump of roots and dirt toward him. “Don’t go crying to Chowder when I whoop your ass, you skinny bastard.”

“Right, like you wouldn’t trip over your own head while trying to throw a punch. I’m not going to fight you, pretty boy.”

The way he says those words isn’t much different from the Wicked Witch of the West calling Dorothy ‘my pretty,’ but it causes a curl of embarrassment in Derek’s stomach anyway. Dex does this sometimes - calls Derek pretty in that wry tone of his. But it’s not pointedly sarcastic, like the way he gets when he’s intentionally needling Derek about rich people stuff, so Derek is left wondering what it’s supposed to mean. He knows he has nice eyes, and that he’ll hopefully grow into the good facial features he inherited from his parents, but currently, he’s just kind of plain, and full of teenage awkward. Nothing close to pretty.

Still, when Dex says it with a hint of smile Derek’s dumb guts do a strange twisting thing where he thinks they might turn inside out, accompanied by a tightness in his chest from being put on the spot. Not chill. But it's probably good for him to get it out of his system now, in preparation for the far future when someone really does compliment him so he doesn't look like a total loser.

Still, it always gives him a second of pause, throwing a hiccup into his thought process and leaving him scrambling for words, like now. “Are you a witch?” he winds up asking, apropos of nothing, still stuck on the thought of Dex zooming around on a broomstick and cursing young girls from Kansas.

“Am I a witch,” Dex repeats, raising an eyebrow. Derek almost goes to change the subject, then thinks on it a moment, and decides he actually does want to hear the answer to this.

“Yeah, or a wizard? Or whatever the preferred terminology is.”

Dex’s brow wrinkles, and he shakes his head like Derek is a particularly foolish child. “I’m not a witch, Nursey. Where’d you get that idea from?”

“Never mind. Are you a cryptid?”

“What-”

“Animals or creatures known only through anecdotal evidence, like the sasquatch, or-”

“I know what a fuckin’ cryptid is, you dope, but I’m not some kind of goat man-”

Derek chuckles at the expression Dex is sporting. He looks utterly offended. “I was thinking more like the Dover Demon? Glowing orange eyes, weird-ass hands…”

“You’re dead to me,” Dex laughs. And he pointedly ignores Derek for the next ten minutes until Derek literally jumps on him. He successfully catches him, arms wrapped tight around Derek’s middle, but keels over when his knees give out.

So, no progress on that end, but Derek isn’t going to forget about it anytime soon.

Winter is wild and blustery this year, and Dex decides they can’t meet his friends until after all the snow has passed. Derek tries asking a few times, but Dex always buries his face in Derek’s latest history essay and starts commenting loudly in order to ignore him. There finally comes a day in February where Derek and Chowder show up on Dex’s figurative doorstep bundled to the nines and freshly brewed bribery hot chocolate. The snow isn’t anything more than a crisp flatbread layer under their boots (which Dex has also bled all over) but he still glares crossly at them nonetheless, trying to shoo them back to the dorms until they force feed him some hot chocolate.

“Dex. Bro. French Vanilla Truffle. Extra marshmallows.”

“Alright, fine, fine, get in here.” Dex finally concedes after he swallows three boiling marshmallows whole.

They stop by a spring that begins in the inner ring, though the other end of the water seems to disappear into a haze of shade and foliage. The water is frosted over in shattered panes of ice; Dex crouches down at the embankment and cards his fingers through the weeds as he peers under the surface, but stands shortly after and waves them along.

“She’s not in right now. We’ll have to catch her another day,” he says, and switches on his lantern.

Derek and Chowder link arms when they enter the heart, taking care to follow Dex carefully. Today, the heart is less terrifying, giving off just an aura of general unwelcomeness, but Dex’s steps are sure as ever, like he’s walked this unmarked non-path over the roots and through the maze of trunks a thousand times. They have to readjust to the wildlife noises again, but what’s even weirder is the sound that Derek finally notices coming out of Dex.

It starts off as a kind of uneven hum, but builds up to faint words he can hear when he concentrates.

“Interplanet Janet, she's a galaxy girl…”

“Are you singing Schoolhouse Rock?” Derek asks, trying not to sound as horribly giddy as he feels. He can get Dex to sing with him sometimes: mostly classic rock and Beyonce and pop hits from the mid-aughts. But Dex rarely begins on his own, no matter how much Derek waxes lyrical about his nice voice, which aggrieves Derek to no end.

Dex freezes for a split second, then keeps walking like it never happened. “Uh. It’s been stuck in my head for a while.” Probably since Chowder first started complaining about his independent science paper about new planets, Derek guesses.

“Oh, the grammar ones are the best! I like the adverb song,” Chowder says, starting to hum the starting notes.

Derek can practically see the shock of discomfort running through Dex’s spine, like electricity through a live wire. “It’s catchy, but a little too barbershop for me…”

“Oh my god, they’re not even a quartet,” Derek says in exasperation.

“Still…”

“What about Conjunction Junction?” C suggests next, which Dex agrees easily too, and then they’re off, Dex in a pitchy falsetto and Chowder’s tenor lowered to a raspy growl. Derek holds his breath, not trusting himself not to say something dumb and provoke them into stopping. Chowder has a way of getting Dex to do things that Derek never could in a hundred lifetimes, probably because C has secret mutant powers of persuasiveness and friendship and undetectable bullshittery.

Their duet continues into “Do the Circulation,” complete with Chowder spinning Dex around on his arm in a sloppy swing-dance, and Derek curses the forest gods and anyone else listening for not letting his fucking phone work out here, because when else will he ever get the chance to record this masterpiece? They both just look so charmingly happy, and Derek’s heart swells with it.

He almost forgets where they are until the darkness lightens slightly and the smog of flora opens up into a tiny clearing with a cottage nestled right in the center. It’s the very picture of a stereotypical fairy-tale cottage, covered in climbing ivy and magenta blossoms, built of gray stonework and wooden accents, complete with curved roof tiles and wall mounted lanterns that light the area with a homey glow.

“Uh,” Chowder says, mouth falling open. “So how many houses are hidden in this pocket dimension forest?”

“Not as many as you think,” Dex says, releasing Chowder’s arm, and turning to make sure he doesn’t lose Derek before they enter the house. “Bits? You home? I brought my friends,” he calls, rapping his knuckles against the heavy wood door.

“Come on in!” comes the response, with a slight southern lilt.

Dex pushes the door open and lets the other two in first. The inside is just as adorably quaint as expected from the outside, with a fireplace in the den, cacti on the windowsills and bundles of dried herbs hanging from the ceiling, and an enormous kitchen where a very busy blond is hustling back and forth, his arms cradling a glass bowl. The scent of peaches and sugar fills the brightly lit room, and Dex directs Derek and C to sit on a plump gingham couch in front of the fire. Right after they sit, Derek catches sight of three strange objects bobbing their way through the air toward them.

“Um,” Derek says. “I’m not imagining that, right?” He elbows Chowder, who turns to gape at what is apparently a few glasses of iced tea floating their way.

“Y’all like tea, don’t you? And I don’t mean that gritty, bitter nonsense you serve up here-”

“Sweet tea sounds great,” Derek says automatically as a glass settles into his confused hands. Dex catches his own, and guides the last glass into Chowder’s grasp, the other boy being too dazed still to do anything but stare in the direction of the kitchen, where whisks and butter and sugar are spinning in a waltz around Bitty. On the counter, peaches fall neatly into segments, pits falling to the side. Flour begins threading through the air like a curtain of snowfall, obscuring their sight for a moment before it settles down into his bowl, the whisk still dancing.

“Thanks, Bitty,” Dex says, jolting Chowder back to reality. He calls out a thanks as well, before chugging half his glass in one go, and sinking deeper into the couch.

Derek sips slowly at the tea in silence as he starts to piece together the scene before them. Flying objects usually means magic. And magic means...

“Wait a second- Bitty’s a witch? Didn’t you say witches didn’t exist?” he asks, whirling on Dex, who’s leaning casually against the wall.

Dex and Bitty share a look, then a short laugh at Derek’s expense. “I just said I wasn’t a witch. You made your own inferences from that. Wrong ones.”

Bitty shakes his head, sending his bowl to settle gently on the counter with a wave of his hand. “Oh, Dex, you didn’t tell them? Wait just a second, I’ll be right over,” he says while hurrying to wash his hands at the sink.

“Nah, Bits, I thought maybe you’d wanna show ‘em yourself. Though, I think you kinda already have.”

Dex smiles briefly as Bitty dashes around his kitchen in a flurry, before turning back to Derek, who makes meaningful Eye Contact with him, but all he does is scrunch his mouth and shrug.

“What?” he mouths silently back, and Derek throws his hands in the air. Chowder continues to be slowly absorbed by the couch.

Bitty finally arrives, holding three pies in his arms. “Now, Dex never did tell me what your favorite pies are, so we’ll have to make do with these for today, but I promise I'll have something special for you boys next time you come around.” He places the pies - French silk, lemon meringue, and apple - on the table, then waves his hand absently toward the kitchen, summoning plates and silverware.

“I didn't want you flipping out and making a thousand pies. You know you always over-bake when you know guests are coming. Anyway, it's rhubarb for Nursey and honey walnut for Chowder.”

In short order, Derek and Chowder learn that Bitty is much, much older than looks, definitely a witch, and quite possibly the greatest piemaker in all of New England. Bitty preens under their compliments, and has no trouble answering the barrage of questions they pelt him with, or dodging them with practiced southern flair, but he’s much more interested in learning about “Dex’s darling little friends.”

Dex has to finally excuse them so they can leave the forest before it gets dark, but they don’t escape without each of them taking a pie for the road and the promise to return again soon. Bitty starts rattling off all the sweaters and birthday mini pies they’re going to get, and Dex has to physically drag Chowder out the door, since he’s too amiable and polite to know how to leave Bitty’s orbit.

Derek is stopped on his way out by a strong hand to his elbow, and he’s afraid (slash hopeful) that Bitty is going to try and unload another pie on him, but he only gives Derek a smile.

“I just wanted to thank you two for being such good friends to our Dex. I know he can be a bit cantankerous, but I think you’ve really brought him out of his shell, Nursey. All of us in here have noticed just how much he talks about the two of you. I’m glad we could finally meet.”

His approval feels significant, like Derek’s passed some sort of test. Derek swallows, and offers his sincerest smile back. “Thanks, Bitty. He’s- he’s one of us. He’s my best friend.” There’s more he wants to say, but from the way Bitty nods, it seems like he understands even without words.

Dex introduces them to The Falconer and her boys a few days later. She lives in a house on a small outcropping at the edge of the heart, her flock scattered in trees and small satellite houses nearby, except J, who resides with Bitty when he isn’t transformed.

She shakes Derek’s hand with a firm grip, and he trusts her instinctively. Something about her brown eyes and messy bun give her an aura of put-together trustworthiness, and from the way she handles Tater when he swoops down to land on her shoulder, it’s for good reason.

“Only J is actually a falcon,” Dex explains as they sit on her porch watching J and Tater circle each other in the air in the more open space of the inner ring. “Tater’s a white-tailed eagle. Snowy’s a snowy owl.”

“Wow, wonder where he got the nickname,” Chowder snorts, and Dex grins.

“Yeah. There used to be a few others - Thirdy, Marty -  but their curses ended, so they left. Marty, at least, was also a falcon, so that’s where she gets the title, I guess.”

“So they’re just cursed? For thirteen years? Because of some old family bullshit from like a zillion years ago?” Chowder tries to clarify, and Dex nods.

“Something like that. I never really got the specifics, but yeah, it’s like some primogeniture fairy curse thing. The Falconer’s been watching over them in here for decades now, so they always send the next in line back here to roost when he transforms for the first time.”

“And no one’s ever looked into breaking this curse?” Derek asks, raising an eyebrow when Dex just draws his knees up to his chest and makes a non-committal noise.

“Some curses can't be broken.”

“No way, dude. Every clause has a loophole. Every bad deal has a way out. And every curse should be breakable. Otherwise, how could we ever hold onto hope?”

“How could we,” Dex echoes, staring up at the loose feathers that flutter down like errant flakes of snow.

They meet the flock over the course of several days, since their human hours don’t always align with daylight. J, as a human, is reserved and broadly Canadian, but there’s a quiet warmth in his eyes that really comes out when he’s with Bitty. Tater is gregarious and friendly, Snowy more calm and settled, but none of them hesitate to gently chirp Dex when he makes introductions, spouting off things like “finally, we are meeting Dex’s frogs!” and “so this is who you’ve been skipping flight practice to hang out with, eh?”.

“I can’t even fly!” Dex exclaims, and J laughs, leaving the room to help Bits in the kitchen.

“That’s why you shouldn’t skip practice,” Snowy says through a bite of honey walnut pie, and Dex flings a fork at him. It stops in mid-air, accompanied by a “what did I tell you about throwing my good silverware?” from Bitty.

Dex mumbles an apology and sinks back into the couch between Derek and C.

“Hey, why are we your frogs?” Chowder asks, and Dex coughs awkwardly and takes a sip of his tea before explaining.

“Uh, there was a year I rescued some frog eggs and watched over them that spring.”

“Dex watches tadpoles like mother hen, every day sitting at Lardo’s pond,” Tater says, crouching on the rug to imitate Dex staring into the water.

Dex ignores Chowder’s “d’awwww” and mutters out, “Yeah, so now they call any of my rescues ‘frogs’. And you guys are, like, the frogs, I guess. The rest are just people I helped back out.”

“That’s mad adorable. Frogs, C, how about that?”

“It is adorable,” C agrees. Dex buries his face in his hands and they slide in toward him to sandwich him on the couch more securely.

“This was a terrible idea,” he mutters as Chowder rests his head on his shoulder and Derek steals the rest of his coconut cream pie.

Terrible idea or not, Dex does reluctantly bring them to meet the nymphs when winter starts to fade into spring. Camilla, an athletic blonde dryad with a wry sense of humor, shows them her tree: a towering, conical red spruce. Dex points out the nearby tree that J accidentally damaged that time he changed back to a human while perched on a thin branch.

April’s grove of yellow birches is located in the far end of Lardo’s spring, the bare grass underfoot dotted with translucent violet flowers. She regards them sternly as Dex introduces her as a nymph of groves, “not a dryad,” as she emphatically insists.

“Oh, like an alseid?” Derek asks.

“Yeah, actually,” April says, looking almost impressed, her pretty mouth curving with a hint of a smile.

“Of course you would know that,” Dex says.

And Lardo, she whose bro-itude holds no parallel, they finally meet on a slow afternoon after midterms. She emerges halfway from the water to meet them, resting her arms on the bank.

“Your old frogs were cuter,” she says brightly, leaning her cheek against one hand.

“They're plenty cute,” Dex tells her automatically, then pauses, squints, and changes his mind. “No, sorry, you were right. These two are...eh.” He makes an ambivalent motion with his hand, and Lardo nods sagely.

“Disrespectful to say that,” Chowder scoffs, “when you have two of Andover’s most eligible bachelors gracing you with their presence all the time.”

“He’s been over-exposed,” Derek says. “Kinda hurts my feelings, honestly.”

“Well, when you two dreamboats are done complaining, Lardo can give us a tour.” Dex rolls his eyes when Derek tries his best smolder on him and gives him a gentle shove.

Lardo is sweet and sharply funny, and much more knowledgeable about art and literature than Derek would’ve expected from a naiad. Dex explains after another visit that almost all of the forest’s denizens can leave, though whether they want to varies from person to person. The flock tends to travel together, just in case one of them transforms out of cycle. None of the nymphs can travel more than a few miles from their true bodies, but it’s enough to be able to go to the library or the movie theater. They never do meet Jenny or Mandy; all Dex will tell Derek is “they’re around somewhere” whenever he asks.

Over the remainder of sophomore year, they hang out with Dex’s friends several more times. Derek doesn’t know when he starts noticing it, but it feels like he understands Dex better now, after seeing who he is when he’s with the others. It’s not that Dex is a different person, but some of that always present distance that even Derek can’t close disappears when they’re in the heart with his friends.

It’s to be expected, he supposes. They’ve known him longer than Derek has, but still, he wonders when they’ll reach the day when Dex will feel as free around him. Not as long he feels he has secrets he needs to keep, but Derek won’t press it. As it is, he appreciates how much more open Dex already is, now that he and Chowder know about the woods. It feels like they've grown closer.

“What is it? My hair weird or something?” Dex asks when he catches Derek looking one day. He'd just been laughing about something April muttered under her breath as J walked by. Derek had been transfixed for a moment, watching the soft lamplight of Bitty’s porch lanterns casting bronze over Dex’s face while a wheezing cackle escaped his mouth. It's an extremely stupid noise, but it's endearingly free, and Derek feels for a moment like there are no more walls standing between them. Here he is, light-hearted and golden in the darkest part of the woods, and Derek can almost see all of him.

“Nah, just thought I saw a bug,” Derek lies, and Dex frowns.

“Ugh, mosquitoes,” he says, annoyed. “You might want to start wearing bug spray; they're relentless out here, and you have a scratching problem. Better to prepare now, or we’ll have to spend all summer slathering calamine lotion on you.”

Derek agrees absently, thinking about how odd it is that a flower can bloom in the darkness.

When the year ends, Derek returns to the city with a promise to come back with cotton candy, since Dex hasn't had any for well over a decade.

Over the summer, Derek finds himself missing them more than usual. He's overseas with mama for a good chunk of vacation, and doesn't have the chance this year to visit Chowder. August feels like it drags on, and though he loves hanging out with his New York friends, he can't help but wonder what Dex is up to for the summer. At least he can call and skype C, though their time zone difference and Chowder’s bizarre summer sleep schedule make it difficult sometimes.

But Dex could be doing anything. On the nights when no one else is in the apartment but himself, Derek wishes more than ever he could convince Dex to come see him. Maybe he could help cure that guilty brand of loneliness that afflicts Derek even when he's surrounded by people.

Maybe Dex will finally feel like he can be all of himself around Derek.