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everlarkbirthdaygifts · 4 years

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Happy Birthday, madelion82!

Apologies for the short delay on your birthday gift, @mandelion82! We hope you had an amazing day today, and that you got exactly the presents you were hoping for! To keep your party going a little while longer, the wonderful @norbertsmom has written a story just for you!

Author's note: Happy birthday to @Mandelion82, sorry for the delay. I hope you enjoy your age gap, friends to lovers Everlark birthday fic. Big thanks to @mega-aulover who not only beta’ed this fic, but was also my writing partner. Without further ado…

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New Beginnings

Peeta Mellark is excited. There’s only 1 week left before school starts up again, but he’s excited nonetheless. He has the week off, and his best friend is finally home from her job at summer camp.

Summer without Prim had been completely boring. He had to work all summer in the family bakery because his older brother made the Panem University Football team, so Rye got to run around at practice everyday instead of working in the bakery like usual.

Peeta had to do all the heavy lifting, working 40 hours a week or more. Sure, the money was great - he bought a car! - but he was always dead tired by the weekend. And with his best friend away, Peeta had been bored.

But now, Prim and her sister Katniss are home. Peeta can’t wait to see them. He and Prim are juniors this year and Katniss is a senior. Peeta has had a crush on Katniss since his first day of school. When his dad introduced him to the daughters of his old school friend on his first day at Kindergarten. It was a day he would never forget.

He and Prim were in the same kindergarten class and became instant best friends. Katniss, a first grader, on the other hand, intrigued him, especially how she took care of Prim. She was a year older, so she knew the ropes. She held Prim’s hand and explained what was going on so neither Prim nor he was nervous.

Peeta’s own brothers never did that for him. When he and his brothers got to the schoolyard, his older brothers took off to go play with their friends until school started. Katniss, however, stuck around.

That first day, when the bell rang, all the kids were ushered into the auditorium. Peeta was so excited; he’d never seen so many kids gathered at one time. The school Principal, Effie Trinket held a welcome rally at the beginning of every new school year. Katniss directed Prim and Peeta to sit near the front so they could see better. Peeta quickly got bored of the Principal’s speech about rules and etiquette, but when Miss Trinket called Katniss up to the stage, that got his attention.

“My dear children, you are in for a treat,” Miss Trinket announced. “Your very own Katniss Everdeen is going to sing a song to start out our new year.”

Katniss stepped up to the microphone and in the voice of an angel started to sing a song called New Beginnings. Katniss voice soared to great heights. Prim giggled next to him, but Peeta didn’t pay any attention. He stared in awe throughout the entire song. When she was done, Peeta stood up and gave her an enthusiastic standing ovation. Katniss looked over at Peeta and smiled, and Peeta was a goner.

That was 12 years ago, and Peeta still holds that crush close to his heart. Not only was Katniss his best friend’s sister, but she probably thought of him as a little brother.

Now, Peeta is on his way to visit the sisters for the first time all summer. He knocks at the door, bouncing on his feet, excited to see his best friend.

The door opens, and Peeta’s eyes go wide and his voice catches in his throat, because standing before him in a tiny green bikini is no other than Katniss Everdeen, the love of his life.

Not that she knows that, but she’s staring at him like he’s some kind of dummy, Peeta thinks, but he can’t seem to get any words out. He’s so distracted by her long flowing hair that she flips back over her shoulder.

Katniss gives him a small shy smile. It's so brief Peeta thinks he imagined the look on her face. Her smiles are rare.

“Is he here?” Prim asks from behind Katniss and it seems to break the staring contest.

Katniss steps back and tells Prim, “You just might have to shoo the girls away at school when they see your boyfriend.”

“He’s not my boyfriend,” Prim says as she passes Katniss, who’s rushing off to the back into the house.

“Come on in,” Prim tells him, then whistles as he steps inside. “Wow, you really put on some muscle over the summer. Working in the bakery really did your body good,” she says while squeezing his bicep, and pinching him on the side.

Peeta pushes her away. “Whatever, but you sure got taller. You’re taller than Katniss now.”

“I know,” Prim giggles. “She hates it.”

Katniss comes back out wearing a cover-up over her bikini, but Peeta can still see her long tanned legs. She’s such a goddess, he can’t keep his eyes off of her. “I’m outta here. Have fun guys,” Katniss says and rushes off.

“Stare much,” Prim teases, and punches Peeta in the stomach.

Katniss quickly looks back, but scurries off before Prim sees she was returning his stare. Her phone rings as she walks away.

“Peeta,” Prim chides, “You know the rules. No dating each other’s siblings.”

That rule came about because in the 6th grade, their fellow students, Cashmere and Glimmer got in a fight because Glimmer started dating Cashmere’s twin brother. They didn’t talk for weeks. So Prim and Peeta made a rule that they couldn’t date each other’s siblings. Peeta agreed even though he had a huge crush on Katniss. He knew he never had a chance with her. She was a year older, beautiful, and all the boys liked her.

That call is probably from her boyfriend Gale Hawthorne anyway, Peeta thinks, and tries to put Katniss in her tiny green bikini out of his mind. Peeta and Prim spend the rest of the day swimming in the backyard pool, telling each other about their summer.

By the time Katniss comes back, the sun is dipping into the horizon and Peeta swears that shade of orange is now his favorite color. It casts her golden skin in a hue that makes her look like a goddess. Peeta dives under the water to calm himself down.

For the rest of the night neither notice Katniss keeps peeking outside. When Peeta goes to leave, it’s his car that draws Katniss out again.

Prim whistles, “This old junk needs to be scrapped, not driven.”

“Hey, no!” Peeta leans in and whispers, “Don’t listen to her, cheese-bun, she knows nothing about cars.”

Katniss grins, then says, ”Nice ‘66 Shelby Cobra Mustang, needs a lot of work, but it looks like it has good bones.”

Peeta stares openly at Katniss.

“Don’t be too impressed, Gale’s dad is a gearhead. He teaches Katniss whenever she goes over there,” Prim says dryly.

Peeta nods. Figures, her boyfriend probably drives a fully restored muscle car and takes her out every night. Peeta clears his throat, “I, uh, I bought it off of the goat man. You know that guy who runs the goat farm at the edge of town. He came into the bakery and was talking about getting rid of the car his son left in the barn before going off to war all those years ago. I went out to see it with my dad, and I couldn’t believe what he had. It was in terrible shape, as you can see, but I really have hopes for restoring her to her old glory.”

“Besides Prim, you shouldn’t be too harsh, this is the car that’s going to take us to school for the rest of the year,” Katniss says firmly.

“Sure,” Peeta squeaks out. He clears his throat and in a manlier voice he repeats, “Sure, yeah, I’ll be driving you ladies to school everyday.”

“Great, we’re gonna get laughed at on our first day back,” Prim whines, but Katniss tells her to shush.

Peeta gets in his car and starts it, but before he can put it into gear, it backfires. Prim shakes her head and grumbles while Katniss laughs and waves to Peeta as he pulls out of the driveway.

Peeta comes over everyday for the rest of the week, but Katniss is never around.

On the first day back to school, Peeta picks up Prim and Katniss. Katniss doesn’t say much. She has her earbuds in, listening to music. She gives him a quick nod and jumps in the back seat, so Prim can sit up front.

When they get to school, someone wolf whistles.

Cato Ludwig comes up and puts his arm around Katniss’ shoulder. “Now that Hawthorne is away, Kitty cat can play.”

Katniss ducks under his arm and pushes him away. Her legendary scowl in place. “Get lost, Cato.”

“Oh, not in a playful mood, are we?” he asks, then turns to Prim.

“How about you, little sister, you’re not so little anymore, are you?” and wiggles his eyebrows.

He goes to put his arm around Prim, but Peeta jumps in and twists Cato’s arm around his back.

Cato makes a counter move, but Peeta is ready and pins him to the ground. He may have been smaller than his brothers, but he’s had to wrestle his older brothers his whole life.

“Get off me,” Cato growls, not liking being shown up by a younger kid in front of the rest of the school.

Before Peeta can let him up, Coach Abernathy comes out of the building and blows his whistle.

Peeta jumps up and holds his hand out to Cato, who pushes it away before getting up himself.

“Cato and Peeta, enough of that.”

All the kids around make oohing sounds.

Cato whines. “I wasn’t fighting. Mellark jumped me.”

“Looked more like he was protecting his friends,” Coach replies. “From you.” He turns to Peeta, “You should think about joining the wrestling team with moves like that, but any more fighting and it’s detention for the both of you.” He emphasizes his point by pointing two fingers at both of the boys, then storms off back into the school.

“Thank you Peeta,” Prim tells him. She gives Cato a scowl and drags Peeta into the school by the arm. Katniss follows at a short distance behind them.

Peeta looks back at Katniss, and she nods, and mouths, “Thanks.”

“Mr. Mellark,” Coach Abernathy calls from his office.

Peeta hangs his head. Great, he thinks, I bet I’m getting that detention after all.

“I need to speak to you.” Coach Abernathy walks away.

Peeta tells Prim goodbye and follows Coach into his office. Once there Coach Abernathy shows him a chair.

“Kid you need an elective, that cooking class has been cancelled.”

Peeta sits up. “What?”

“Not enough people signed up and it got cancelled.” Coach Abernathy looks at his computer screen. “Let’s see, in that time slot, your choices are Auto Shop, and Public Speaking. Oh, wait a minute. You’ve already taken public speaking, so Auto Shop it is.”

“Great,” Peeta says as he gets up. I need Auto Shop to work on my car anyway, he thinks.

“Oh, and Mr. Mellark,” Coach Abernathy says before Peeta can leave the room, “You really should consider trying out for wrestling. You already got the moves.”

“I’ll think about it, sir,” Peeta says as he leaves the office.

Peeta just sits down in first period literature class. The teacher isn’t in the room, so most of the kids are still milling around. Cashmere, Glimmer, and Clove surround Peeta’s desk.

“Wow Peeta, you sure grew up this summer,” Cashmere tells him.

“Ya,” Clove says, then snaps her gum, “you got muscles, like your brothers.”

“You really took on Cato for Primrose Everdeen. He’s a senior. Is she your girlfriend?” Glimmer asks while twirling her hair.

“What? No, Prim is my best friend.”

“Oh, are you dating Katniss Everdeen, then?” Cashmere asks, then points at Katniss who just walked in the door.

Peeta makes a choking sound and stares over at Katniss who sits down on the other side of the room.

The girls all look over too, and Katniss quickly looks away.

“I see,” Cashmere says, and pulls the other two girls away, whispering and pointing between Peeta and Katniss.

“Katniss has a boyfriend,” Peeta finally says, although he doubts they hear him over their whispering. Katniss is going to hate being the subject of rumors, Peeta thinks.

Later that day, Peeta has lunch with Prim.

“People keep asking me about you, how you got so built, why you took on Cato.”

“Please, I don’t want to talk about that. Tell me about your day. Anything good happen?” Peeta asks.

Prim obliges by telling him about the new girl she met, named Rue. “She’s a new transfer from District 11 and reminds me of Katniss so much. She just loves the outdoors, and she sings all the time.”

“Sounds like you found yourself a new best friend,” Peeta teases.

“What? No!” Prim blushes. “You’ll always be my best friend. I just, I don’t know. I like her.” Prim looks down at her lap.

“Hey, no worries,” Peeta tells her, lifting up her chin. “I was just kidding. Go ahead and spend time with Rue. I’m happy that you made a new friend.”

“Thanks,” Prim says shyly.

The end-of-lunch bell rings and each heads off to their next class, Biology for Prim, and Auto Shop for Peeta.

Peeta walks down the long hallway to Auto Shop. He’d never been in this wing of the school before. His father had told him, back in his day, all the boys had to take Woodworking Shop and Auto Shop, while the girls took Home Ec, but nowadays, all those classes are electives.

Peeta steps into the classroom and finds several auto bays on one side of the room, and a long table with chairs lining the other side of the room. Several people are already sitting at the table, but he doesn’t know anyone yet.

“Hey Mellark,” a voice he was dreading to hear, calls behind him, “what are you doing slumming in Auto Shop?” Cato Ludwig asks him.

Before he can answer, the voice he loves to hear calls out, “Why, worried he’ll pin you again?”

The other kids chuckle as Cato’s face sours. “No one asked you, Everdeen,” he grouses.

Katniss Everdeen, this class just got that much better.

“Hey Katniss,” Peeta says shyly, rubbing his hand across the back of his neck.

“Hey, what are you doing here? I thought you were taking Cooking class this period.”

That’s odd she knew that, Peeta thinks. Prim must have told her.

“Uh, it got cancelled. This was the only class open. But I’m glad it was. Now I can learn how to work on my car.”

“Oh yeah. You need to ask Ms. Mason if we can use your car in class, but we’ll need to find another way to school. I don’t want to take the bus.”

“I can do that?” Peeta asks.

“Only if your car is worth my time,” A voice answers behind him.

Peeta turns around to find himself face to face with a woman in her mid twenties, with black spiky hair tipped in red, wearing a red tank top and coveralls folded down at the waist.

“Whatchagot kid?” she asks him.

Before he can answer, Katniss jumps in, “He’s got a ‘66 Shelby Cobra Mustang. Been in a barn for decades, but it could really be something if we can get to work on it.”

Ms. Mason nods. “Sounds good, and you guys can call me Johanna. I’m the teacher now, no longer the assistant, so what I say goes, got it?”

“Got it.” Everyone answers in unison.

“Okay, Lovebirds, you take bay one.”

“We’re not a couple, and the name’s Peeta, Peeta Mellark. Nice to meet you Johanna.”

“Kissing up doesn’t work in this class. And I don’t care if you and Brainless are together or not. Just do your work, Loverboy and you’ll do fine.”

Johanna moves onto the other bay assignments.

“Don’t mind her,” Katniss tells him, a light blush on her cheeks. “She gives everyone a nickname.”

“Yeah? How’d you get Brainless?”

“I forgot to put the oil pan plug back in last semester. Oil all over the floor. What a mess.” Katniss tells him with a grin. “It’s better than Meathead, or Marvelous.”

“Is that why they call him Marvel?”

Katniss nods with a smile. Katniss is something else in Auto Shop class, Peeta thinks. She really comes out of her shell, and Peeta likes seeing this side of her.

Peeta learns quickly that he knows nothing about cars, but the prospect of working on his own car with Katniss Everdeen is something to look forward to.

After school, Peeta drives Katniss and Prim home. Prim tells them about her new friend Rue, and how they are in almost every class together. She even wants to be a doctor just like Prim. With news of Peeta’s car being used in shop class, they find that Rue can drive them back and forth to school.

Katniss still sits in the back, but with Peeta now. They talk about everything they can do to the car. Peeta has never seen Katniss talk so much at one time.

Time flies, and the car is taking shape. Prim starts hanging out with Rue after school while Peeta and Katniss work on his car.

Peeta starts cutting his lunch short to go to Auto Shop class early. One day he is trying to configure the carburetor. He has to figure out how to connect the throttle link.

“Hey Mellark,” Katniss calls. “Why are you here so early? Shouldn’t you be at lunch with Prim?”

“I have to finish this up before class. I can’t mess up my test.”

“Let me help you with that,” Katniss says as she leans over.

“Thanks.”

“So quick, what do you call that,” Katniss says pointing to the round thing sitting on top of the engine.”

This is going to be painful. Peeta cannot focus on the car with Katniss so close. He’s staring at the graceful slope of her neck. Who knew a neck could be alluring. He begins to sweat.

“Earth to Peeta,” Katniss snapped her fingers in front of his face.

Peeta understands the meaning of becoming cross eyed. Momentarily his vision blurs and his heart rate spikes. He blurts out the first thing that comes to his brain. “An air filter?”

“No it’s the air cleaner.”

“Right.” Peeta feels like an idiot. How in the world is he supposed to study when he turns into a buffoon in her presence. Peeta takes a deep breath to clear his mind. “I feel like I’m never going to get this right.”

“Don’t, these old cars aren’t easy. But they are fun to work on. And trust me, there’s nothing like the sound of a finely tuned engine purring.” She gives him one of her rare rosy cheeked smiles.

Peeta has no idea what Katniss was talking about but he nodded. “Okay.”

“Now next question, what does a carburetor do?”

“It mixes air and fuel to make internal combustion.” Taking out a handkerchief he wipes his face and mutters under his breath, “I think.”

“Good.” Katniss reached out and put her hand on his forearm. “Name the different types of carburetors.”

Peeta thinks he’s going to combust. Nervously he wipes his brow again. He’s losing his concentration at Katniss' light touch. “Custom choke, vacuum, and multiple ven...vent-venturi,” he blurts out.

“Good. Now which one of those is in your car?” She squeezed his arm. Peeta is holding onto his sanity by a thin thread.

“It has a choke one,” he gasped. “I know because I was able to find the number…”

“You don’t have to say another thing, Johanna won’t really care. She just wants to make sure you know what you’re doing.” Katniss removes her hand from his arm, flicking her signature braid over her shoulder.

“Really.”

“Yeah, if you’re going to drive this around you want to make sure you know what to do if your engine dies, or lose control. It's important.”

Katniss stares at Peeta for a moment, then her face becomes pink before she blurts out, “You know, you smell like a cookie.”

Peeta wants the ground to open up and swallow him whole. Why can’t he smell manly, he’s got the smell like the bakery. “I’m sorry I smell.”

“You smell nice.” She takes a step toward him.

He stands straighter, unsure of what to do next. “Thank you?”

She’s so close he can see the flecks of yellow around her pupils when he looks down into her eyes. Peeta bends his head and Katniss lifts hers. She licks her lips and he mirrors her movements as their faces move close together.

The bell rings and the door to the shop bangs open. Peeta jumps back and Katniss steps away, suddenly interested in the car’s front tires. The other students start shuffling into the classroom.

When Johanna comes in and starts the class, everything is back to normal with Katniss. It’s like that moment never happened.

Half way through the year, Peeta and Katniss stay after class to work on his car once again. Peeta closes the hood and stands back, looking over his car. Katniss stands next to him wiping her hands.

“The car is close to being done.”

“So what color are you going to paint her?”

Peeta thinks it over. “Well, my favorite color is sunset orange, but that’s not an original color. What’s your favorite color?”

“Green,” Katniss says shyly.

“Really? Peeta says excitedly as he pulls up the color chart for 1966 Mustangs. “We can paint it Ivy Green. That’s an original color.” He leans over and shows her his phone.

“You’d do that?” she asks as she looks at his phone.

“Of course, You’ve put in as much work on this car as I have.”

Katniss looks up into Peeta’s eyes and smiles. “I’d like that.”

Peeta reaches out and brushes a loose hair behind her ear. “Besides, I would have been lost without you. I want to paint it your favorite color.”

“Okay,” Katniss whispers as she looks up into his eyes.

“Okay,” Peeta answers as he leans down, meeting her lips.

Katniss’ breath fans across his cheek. He pecks her lips experimentally.

Katniss places her hands on his chest and leans up on her tiptoes to capture his top lip. Peeta hands find purchase on her hips and flex gently at the sensation of her lips moving against his. Peeta’s heart soars as she deepens the kiss. It’s everything he’s dreamed this kiss would be. He cups her chin and she moans.

Katniss pulls away. Their eyes meet and once more their lips meet over and over again until they are both breathless. Peeta pulls away. “We shouldn’t be doing this?”

Katniss frowns. “You’re right, Katniss says, as she steps back. “Prim would hate me.”

“What about your boyfriend, Gale?” Peeta asks, confused.

“What are you talking about? I’m not dating Gale. I was talking about Prim. I know you two are dating. You’ve been best friends forever. She’d be stupid to not want to date you.”

“Uh, Katniss, if you haven’t noticed. Prim has been spending all of her time with Rue.”

“Really I thought it was because she was driving us to and from school.”

“Katniss, you’re the one I’ve been spending all my time with. I like you. I’ve had a crush on you since the moment I met you. This past year, working with you has been a dream come true.”

Katniss looks up at him and smiles. “Really?”

“Really,” Peeta answers her with another kiss. “So when you said Prim would be stupid to not want to date me, does that mean you would want to date me?”

Katniss looks down and whispers, “Maybe.”

Peeta lifts her chin back up and says, “I think I’ll just have to convince you.” And moves in to kiss her once more.

Neither of them hear the footsteps coming down the hall. “I think they are still in here,” Prim says. “The lights are still on.”

Prim and Rue walk in and find Katniss and Peeta in their passionate embrace.

“Finally,” Prim says.

“What about your,” Rue makes air quotes with her hands, “You shouldn’t date a brother or sister rule.”

“Rue I only did that because Katniss wasn’t ready to date. My sister’s so awkward about boys. I wanted to make sure she didn’t break Peeta’s heart. Besides, they’ve been dancing around each other all year. I think they’ll be a while. Let’s get out of here.”

Rue giggles.

“Shh....” Prim nods to the door.

Prim and Rue walk out hand in hand.

Back in the room, Katniss and Peeta each pull back and take a deep breath. Katniss looks around and asks, “Did you hear something?”

“Not a thing,” Peeta says, “but we are going to have to tell Prim about us. We had this rule…” Peeta drifts off, “but I think she will understand. They are probably waiting for us. Let’s go.”

Katniss and Peeta walk out, but Peeta says, “Hold on a second, and runs back, gives his car one last look and smiles at the thought of it bringing Katniss to him, and he turns out the light.”

This fic was inspired by both The Kissing Booth and Grease. I hope you enjoyed it.

#everlark #everlark fanfiction #everlarkbirthdaydrabbles #everlarkbirthdaygifts #fan fic #by norbertsmom

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starlight-vixen-emiko · 3 years

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RokuNami Week 2021 Day 1: Beach Umbrella

Hello everyone! Happy RokuNami week! @rokunamiweek

It’s been awhile since I written for kingdom hearts or RokuNami so I apologize if I am a bit rusty. Not to mention I am doing two shipping weeks at once so please bare with me.

All and all I look forward to summer fun!

This first fanfic also contains a bit of Soriku...Well ok, I haven’t written Sora and Riku particularly being romantic but I also ship Soriku so assume they are dating.

So without further ado...

~~~~~

Roxas and Namine sheltered themselves under the beach umbrella as best as they could because they honestly felt it was too hot to be at the beach. Sora and Riku encouraged them to go with them.

Namine decided to make the most of it and use this opportunity to sketch the beach surroundings. At the same time, Sora and Riku played in the water.

Roxas laid on the beach towel, trying to find paradise on the beach. But the only paradise he could see right now was him looking up at his lovely girlfriend as she sketched.

All they had to do was sit until Sora and Riku were tired, and then they could head to somewhere cooler. But after almost an hour of sitting, the wind started to pick up.

Namine held on to her sun hat and sketchbook, and Roxas sat up quickly, wondering if a storm picked up. But everything was still bright and sunny. The wind just suddenly became obnoxious.

Roxas and Namine really wanted to leave now, but then their umbrella started taking flight.

"Oh no!' Roxas and Namine both cried in unison.

Roxas ran off to get the umbrella, and Namine placed her sketchbook down to follow him. Helping her boyfriend with a runaway umbrella was more important than a few drawings of the beach.

But the umbrella fell into the water and floated like a boat. Neither Roxas nor Namine planned on swimming today. Thankfully Sora and Riku were still swimming around and swam over to retrieve the umbrella.

"Ahoy!" Sora cried. "What is this doing here?"

Namine and Roxas stood together as Sora got back to shore and presented them with their umbrella.

"Thanks," Roxas said as he took the umbrella back.

Suddenly Riku got to shore as well.

"So, are you two going to stop hiding under your umbrella now?" Riku said with a smirk.

The two blonde-haired teens huddled closer under the umbrella.

"It's too sunny, Riku," Roxas complained.

"No, thank you," Namine said kindly as she didn't want to insult Sora and Riku.

Sora and Riku gave their friends devious smirks.

"Well, at least let us join you two!" Sora said.

Now Roxas was slightly annoyed. The umbrella wasn't big enough for all four of them!

But he and his girlfriend leaned against each other while Sora and Riku laid down, not worrying that their legs were probably turning red.

Roxas did enjoy sitting next to Namine and fighting the heat while listening to the gentle sounds of her pencils and crayons. And Namine was inspired to draw Sora and Riku being beach bums.

But as annoyed Roxas was at the two of them, he couldn't help but show some concern.

"Be careful not to burn yourselves, you two!" Roxas cried.

"I should've brought another umbrella," Namine sighed as she colored Sora and Riku sunburn red and flipped to the next page.

Author’s Note: Ok, I apologize I started this off with summer blues of sorts. I am up in my neck in projects and I guess I kind of wrote this on autopilot.

I hope you guys enjoyed anyway, I will see all of you tomorrow!

This is Emiko Gale signing out!

#rokunamiweek2021 #rokunami #otp #my writing #my fanfiction #soriku #sort of...

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jlalafics · 4 years

Note

I’m clearly on a dessert kick at the moment ... how about Everlark chancing a moment alone at an event on the tour to enjoy some sort of treat they found/generally check in with each other and have a breather (or some variation or that — supportive Everlark moment alone on the tour) (I mean they do get caught trying to sneak away a lot, maybe sometimes they succeed)

Hope this satisfies your dessert craving! Thanks @rosegardeninwinter for the prompt!

______

District 5

It’s far into the evening when there’s a quiet knock on the door.

God, I hope it’s not Effie coming to complain about my lack of enthusiasm during the most mind-numbing speech in all of Panem. I don’t know how she comes up with these words, sometimes.

Pressing the door button, it opens and instead of an irate Effie, I find Peeta.

He looks me over. “You were really going to go to sleep?”

My gaze goes to his dark pants and heather-green long-sleeve. He’s also holding a brown leather jacket with a wool collar. “And you aren’t?”

“No. Get dressed,” Peeta urges. “I want to show you something. Wear something that’s not too obvious.”

“I guess my fuchsia sequin dress is out of the question,” I retort.

“Very funny. Hurry up, won’t you?”

“Fine.” I yank him into the room and Peeta looks surprised. “You can’t stand in the hallway waiting for me. Everyone thinks we’re engaged, we’ve probably since each other in various stages of undress.”

“Right,” he manages to sputter out.

I find myself grinning as I look through my closet, pulling out a simple navy-blue dress and a cropped jacket. Quickly, I pull my shirt over my head and shimmy out of my lounge pants.

Behind me, Peeta is quietly whistling to himself, probably avoiding the fact that I’m practically naked in front of him.

What a gentleman.

There are times, however, when I wish he wouldn’t be. When I wish we could recapture the hunger that had welled up inside our cave. Some nights on this train, I find myself replaying those kisses in my mind over and over—

“You okay?” I look over my shoulder to find Peeta watching, his eyes darker than I have ever seen them. I recognize that want in them. “You spaced out for a moment.”

I quickly pull the dress on and pull on the jacket. Finally, I bend down and pull out a pair of sturdy boots.

“I’m ready,” I declare.

“You look nice,” Peeta replies with a soft smile. “Now, let’s get out of here.”

++++++

We find ourselves in a village. The buildings are tall with cone roofs and painted in muted primary colors. Some have stone walls. As we walk through the village, the hand that isn’t grasping Peeta’s reaches to touch one of the stones. It makes sense as we are close to the mountains; it must be their primary resource for building material.

“Where exactly are we going?” I ask as Peeta looks around, his eyes searching the street signs.

“One of our handlers mentioned this one place…” We make another turn and his blue eyes brighten. “There!”

We go to where a small crowd hangs around a…bakery.

This isn’t like Peeta’s bakery as there are wide glass windows displaying trays of baked goods. Inside there are a few tables where the townspeople sit and lounge. It looks cozy and inviting and I find comfort in seeing people living their everyday lives, enjoying time to just be together.

It’s hard to feel like that when you’re on a never-ending train ride.

“Do you see anything you like?” Peeta asks me as we stare at various trays in front of us.

“I really don’t know,” I say. “Why don’t you pick for me?”

Together, we step inside and the noise ceases. I try to ignore the shocked expressions as Peeta leads me to the front counter.

All charm, Peeta gives the older woman with snow white hair a smile. “Hello. Francis recommended your bakery—”

“I’m flattered, Mr. Mellark,” the woman replies kindly. “My name is Mary. What can I help you with?”

“Peeta, please.” He turns to me. “Katniss and I have a limited knowledge on dessert pastries. What would you recommend?”

The woman beams at us. “Well, we are known for our eclairs—”

“I’ve heard about them!” Peeta says excitedly and I smile at his enthusiasm. He’s been so upset with me and I’ve given him several reasons to be. For the first few days of our trip, we avoided each other. However, Peeta has brought me with him on this jaunt so we can get out of our gilded cage for an evening. It is the faintest shimmer of forgiveness and I will take it. “May I see?”

The woman goes to one of the display cases and, taking a smaller tray on the counter, grabs a pair of tongs to pull out some eclairs. She returns, placing them in front of us.

There are two eclairs in front of us, both oblong-shaped, but one has a dark glaze on top and the other a lighter brown.

“This one is a chocolate éclair.” Mary points to the darker one. “And this one is maple. Both have cream filling and both are delicious.”

Peeta nods and turns to me. “I’m convinced. Katniss?”

I muster up a smile. “I trust you…but we don’t have money—”

“I’ve got it,” Peeta tells me.

“They’re on the house,” Mary insists, and she turns to me. “When I saw you with Rue…my heart just broke for you.”

My eyes fill and I’m barely aware as Peeta puts an arm around me.

Rue never had the chance to live, to be able to see any place but her hometown or even try an éclair. These are such little life moments, but they feel bigger since she nor any of the other fallen tributes will ever experience them. My chest burns at the thought.

“Why don’t I buy two more?” Peeta suggests gently. “Let’s enjoy them for the people who couldn’t.”

++++++

We find ourselves in a garden, entering through an archway that looks like the one in front of Victors’ Village back in 12. Peeta finds us a bench that overlooks the whole garden and from the far distance I can spot the shadows of the mountains that tower over the town.

“Wow, this really is beautiful,” Peeta says as we sit down. “Francis made great recommendations.”

“When do you even have a chance to speak to the handlers?” I ask curiously as he opens the paper bag.

“While Effie is lecturing you to smile and stuff, I get to talk to them,” he explains. “I mean the handlers are here to welcome us and someone has to extend their gratitude. We’re Victors, but we’re not going to be jerks about it. They love to talk about their District and Francis just happened to be a chatty one. He’s the one who told me that this is a great date spot.”

A date?

I’m confused for a moment. Is this what this is?

“I’ll give you the chocolate one,” Peeta tells me. “Just don’t eat all of it.”

I’m so flabbergasted by what he’s just said that I reach for the éclair, holding it at both ends and readying myself to take a bite in the middle.

Peeta chuckles lightly. “It’s not a sandwich.” He rotates it so one end is facing me. “Go ahead.”

Tentatively, I take a bite.

The pastry is light, and the chocolate glaze gives it sweetness. I’m amazed at how well the slight buttery taste of the pastry mixes perfectly with the heaviness of the chocolate. The cream is sweet and airy but messy. I find myself licking the excess off the sides of the éclair and along my lips.

“Wow,” Peeta says, his face slightly crimson but the smirk is evident on his mouth. “That’s an image that I’m going to remember for the rest of life.”

I smack his arm. “I’m new at this!” He laughs as I put the éclair back on its wax wrapping. “Peeta?”

He’s already polished off his maple éclair—gluttonous boy. “Hmm?”

I adjust myself in my seat. “Have you ever been on a date?”

“I’ve gone with my brothers and some girls on a group thing,” he replies carefully. “It’s more like I tagged along to make it even. Why?”

“Then how do you know this is a date?”

“I asked you to come out, you got semi-dressed up, I paid for the meal, and took you to what some people might consider a romantic spot.” Peeta turns to me, his eyes warm. “So, yes—according to my brothers, this would be considered a date.” His eyes look off in the distance towards the mountain and I hear his quiet sigh. “Were your dates with Gale different?”

Gale has never asked me to go anywhere but to the woods or maybe to the market. I wear what I usually wear; my father’s jacket and my hunting clothes. Not like Gale’s ever offered, but I pay my own way…and we’ve never really gone anywhere remotely intimate. The thought alone makes me wince slightly.

Clearing my throat, I respond. “Um…I’ve never gone out with him like this.” Peeta turns to me, his eyes hopeful. “So, I guess this is…a…date.”

Peeta nods and I look around at the magnificent garden around us as we sit in content silence. Quiet moments like this are rare, but we take what we can. I breathe in the cool air, hearing the slight whistle of the wind between the mountains and let myself relax for a second.

His hand covers mine and gives it a squeeze. I know he feels it, too.

There’s a shift in the air; something wildly intimate is happening between us. Something that neither of us can really explain. It’s new territory which can be scary but his hand in mine gives me assurance like nothing else can.

“How are you?” he asks me suddenly. An arm moves stealthily around my shoulders and Peeta avoids my suspicious gaze. “I mean, not counting the whole Snow hating us thing.”

“I guess I’m okay,” I answer. My body curls against his, my head to his shoulder. “And you?”

“I’m on my first date with Katniss Everdeen,” he tells me and I can feel his smile against my hair. “What more can I ask for?”

++++++

It is all too soon when we return to the train.

Being the nice guy that he is, Peeta walks me to my room.

It’s right across from his, but that’s neither here nor there.

“Thanks—” I say, my eyes darting downward. “—for tonight. I think we both really needed it.”

“I agree.” Peeta looks to me, uncertainty in his eyes.

My palms are sweaty because I’m waiting…hoping…that he’ll take that next step—

“Where have you been?” We pull apart, finding Effie charging towards us sans wig and wearing the most garish purple robe. “Do not tell me that you snuck out!”

Behind her, a groggy Haymitch joins us.

Something tells me he knew, but did he care about our one night away from our steel cage?

I’m betting not.

“Then we won’t tell you,” I reply simply. I take Effie’s hand, rotate it palm facing up and give her the paper bag with the extra eclairs in it. “Good night.”

++++++

I’m disappointed.

Not by the outing…date.

There is still a pleasant roll in my stomach at the memory of the garden…our garden…of the taste of chocolate éclair along my tongue…and the look in Peeta’s eyes as he watched me.

Actually, that gives me a whole different feeling.

Going to the closet, I take off my jacket and reach for a hanger—

A gentle knock sounds against my door.

Hanging my jacket quickly, I press the door button and find Peeta in front of me.

“What are you doing here—”

I don’t even finish the sentence before his mouth is on mine. My arms wrap around his neck as we kiss, his hands moving along the line of my back. The heat is encompassing; our mouths connected, breaths puffing against each other, and foreheads pressed. Somewhere along the way, my hands travel down, grasping at his shirt…not quite sure where this will go…nor caring.

“Peeta…” I whisper against his lips.

His mouth moves along my jawline trailing down to my neck. “Yes?”

“I had a really good time,” I whisper into his ear as he mouths the gentle curve.

Peeta kisses me gently, a promise against our lips. “I’m going to take you on another date one day.”

I close my eyes hoping, after this tour is done, he’ll make good on that promise.

FIN.

And we know what happens next.

District 5 is supposed to be located around the Rocky Mountains. I imagine that the town they visited was what was Veil, Colorado and the bakery in the Lionshead district. The gardens would the Betty Ford Alpine Gardens.

I’ve never been there, but now I want to go.

Thanks for reading!

#Everlark #During the Victory Tour #firstdate!Everlark #District 5: Power #Everlark Fanfiction #victorytour!Everlark

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popculturebuffet · 3 years

Text

Pinky and the Brain: Brain’s Song Review or Why You Hatin on Bruce Willis? (Comissioned by BlahDiddy)

Hello, Hello, Hello you wonderful people! It’s back to the Animaniacs Cinematic Unvierse for some more pinky, pinky and the brain brain brain brain brain, as I still have those two christmas reviews left in the queue. And since I went over the ins and outs of the characters history last time, we can just get right to it.

We open in Acme Labs, where Brain, tired of pinky’s antics is trying to a clockwork orange him into being emotionless by having him watch some emotional stuff. We also get some good gags but as usual for coveirng this show I can’t stop and cover every one, but this is a damn funny episode Point is Brain tries showing him things like evil kenivel and prscilla presley’s dear john letter to micheal jackson.. this episode has not aged well in places and we will get to that. Point is Pinky’s already tearing up when we get to a pastiche of the lion king but with tigers, which naturally opens the flood gates.. but in a nice twist it’s for BOTH of them. Brain despite himself can’t help sobbing and leaning into his buddy and the two hug. awwww. Pinky tells him there’s no shame in it as “No one can resist emotionally manipulative story telling with a sad score.. except maybe g gordon liddy”.. I don’t get that last part, but the rest is really funny and naturally gives brain an idea: to make his OWN emotionally manipulative film. to make people so depressed they can’t do anything and wil lhand him the world. Making a supercut of bojack horseman’s gutpunching moments would be faster but neither supercuts nor that show exist yet so he’s left to instead write a pastiche of the movie Brian’s Song. Brian’s Song is a tv movie about football players Brian Picollo and Gale Sayers, two star football players in college. According to tv tropes the two start out as rivals, become friends, Picollo helps Sayers recover from an injury.. then Sayers stays by Picolllo’s side as he slowly subcumbs to cancer. I only vaugely remembered it from I love the 80s and that it made people sad. Look i’ll go to the moon and back for comissions, even ones given out as a gift, but I draw the line at watching an entire 70′s tv movie, even with the unstoppably cool Billy Dee Williams starring in it as Sayers. I have limits.. and a best episodes of the year list to work on/watch the last few episodes for. I gotta draw a line somewhere. That said.. this team knows how to do GOOD parody: i.e. you shoudln’t have to know the thing being parodied to get it, it just makes it even funnier. So while the Brian’s Song parody is lost on me, it still works as schmaltzy sports movies captalizing on real life events never died. SOMEHOW. Please stop hollywood, please, I know i’m not a sports guy but even that aside we don’t need any more. Or if your not going to at least give us a revivial of friday night lights. That’s how you make me care about sports. SO it still works well. What dosen’t is most of the next bit, where our boys head off to hollywood. And look some bits are really funny: Brain having a rat tail and goatee

Don’t ask me why, pinky, who weirdly dosen’t have his own mechanical human suit, as his agent, it’s good. And what’s GREAT is the two pitching the film to tom hanks, the nicest guy in hollywood, only for him to throw a tantrum and demand they call him lord ruler. Given Hanks is STILL the nicest guy in hollywood to this day.. the joke is sitll hilarious, helped by the fact he’s one of my mom’s faviorite actors, so i’ve grown up with the guy my whole life. Love the guy genuinely great stuff, easily on par with that bit from the simpsons movie. But the issue is.. that’s the ONLY funny gag for the next three minutes, as Brain pitches it to bruce wilis, who is on board till demi reminds him he has to watch the kids and stuff. GET IT BECAUSE HE’S A FAMILY MAN... LAUGH, LAUGH AT HIM BEING A RESPONSIBLE AND LOVING PARENT LAUGGGHGHHH. Seriously Bruce Williams is awesome what the hell man. It gets no better as we get an unfunny montage of eveyrone turning down brain including Donny Most, as he just rose from the haze

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Sunday Monday, happy days. Point is that one bit was funnier than the handful of minutes of my life i’m not getting back. Seriously a fourth of the episode is wasted on thiis and the bruce willis bit combined. Why. The ONLY funny part is the ending where they get rejected by vanilla ice.. which is only funny now because he’s since made a small career in film showing up in Adam Sandler films, so his threshold for being in shit films is low. Then again his musical talent took a steep decline.. yes it somehow got worse.

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Just in case you think I was bullshitting you. Point is no one will star in Brain’s film or help fund it so he decides to go full wiseau and make it himself. So our heroes head home and we get some great bits in how they put it together. Brain INTENDS for Meadowlark Lemon, who I somehow knew was a Harlem Globetrotter, and who Brain taught to play his sidekick.. but he backs out so PInky gets the part afterall. Why? I don’t know.. seriously the joke dosen’t even remotely synch up. The only things he and bill dee share are being black and if that’s the reason they wanted to shove a globetrotter in this...

Yeah. Thankfully we’re past the poorly aged bits of this as the rest of the episode .. is just nonstop hilarity. There’s just too many jokes to go over, but some of hte best include: Brain’s hairpiece, mimicing Jame’s Caan, which is made of lint, Pinky having to wear stilts for one scene, using a treadmill to mimic walking, pinky finding great sets by raiding the garage finding a barbie playset for the hospital room and a game of electric football for the field. Huh I think ken burns made a documentary on that once.

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That’s also the only reason I know what Electric Football is.. also how did pinky carry all of that. Questions for later. Point is it’s just one clever gag after the next and you really DON’T need to know Brian’s Song to find this uproriously hilarious. Our heroes also flim it live, hyjacking the airwaves not to offer wishes but to air the film. Again the film is just one long string of great gags, no question so I’m not recapping it. But it works and the world leaders are too bummed out to do anything. Insert your own 2020 joke here. But in a nice chekovs callback Brain sustained injuries being on the electric football set, so he vibrates at inportune times, thus causing everyone to laugh, foiling his plan> It’s a great payoff and I do like how, as I mentioned in my last pinky and the brain review, it’s often Brain’s own fault and not ALWAYS just “pinky screws up” like I remembered. Here his insitance on doing the scene again and again depsite the risk and not acknowlding his pain screws him over.

Final Thoughts; This is a pretty good episode. Despite the down spot the last half of it is just so damn funny, again I coudln’t properly recap it because it was just one long string of great jokes and set pieces, and trasncends the film i’ts parodying. Worth a watch if you have hulu just fast forward a bit after the tom hanks bit. Also that was Dave Colier, aka terrible replacment venkman aka uncle joey aka that guy who somehow had sex with alanis morsette but is probably not the one that song is about. It was about Alf, wake up people. And for now I bid you all goodbye, goodbye, goodbye.

#pinky and the brain #pinky #the brain #maurice lamarche #rob paulsen #brain's song #football #bruce willis #vanillia ice #tom hanks #brian's song

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yourdeepestfathoms · 4 years

Text

Olly Olly Oxenfree (part four)

Part 1 Part 2 Part 3

TW: Victim blaming, mentions of drowning, another weed brownie

———————

all the outs in free

The mud sloshes loudly as Cathy and Joan trudge away from Fort Milner. They try not to look at the stew of muck beneath their feet, for they fear that they may see tints of red glistening in the slop.

Neither of them spoke as they walked across the field. Cathy was lost in thought, coming up with entire spider webs of theories in her head, while Joan was just in a state of shock. Her face was pale, aside from her eyes, which are still puffy and rimmed with red from crying. She had tried to wipe away the tears, but scrubbing her face with her sleeve only inflamed the skin further. She gave up after a while.

Dark mist rolled in the distance, near Main Street. Cathy watched the black fog. Sometimes she thought she could hear other footsteps stamping in the mud somewhere off in the distance. Other times it’s right behind her. She can’t be too sure.

She and Joan get to the fence that wrapped around the Comm Tower. When they looked at the metal chainlink, they didn’t feel safe, rather trapped.

It was there to keep them in.

“Hey! Hey!” Anne is running down from the ladder. “I saw you coming up from the tower!”

“How are you doing?” Joan asked.

“Umm- better.” Anne said. “No luck with the radio. It’s been what my therapist would call a ‘negative reinforcer.’ I’m just glad I took that second brownie.”

“What?” Cathy snapped.

“When did you take a second one?” Joan asked.

“Just before you came. Don’t worry about it!” Anne said as she climbs back up the ladder. If she sees the way Cathy is fuming, she ignores it.

“If that’s what you need- fine.” Joan said. It was clear she didn’t want anyone fighting at the moment.

The three of them climb up to the top of the tower where Kitty is waiting. The girl looks slightly better from when Joan and Cathy last saw her, but definitely still wry and jittery.

“Hey, Kit,” Joan waved halfheartedly. “Night’s still goin’, huh?”

“Yeah.” Kitty replied dryly. “I couldn’t get anything to work beside the speaker.”

“More than we could do,” Cathy said.

They all went into the tower cabin to get out of the cold. The wind was a lot crueler all the way up there, like it was adamant on knocking one of the teenagers off with its powerful gales. Joan shoved her next-to-numb hands into her jacket pocket, which didn’t help much since the coat was still wet from the rain at Fort Milner.

“Oh!” Anne suddenly said. “I got it! It’s Maggie Lee?”

“Maggie Lee?” Kitty echoes curiously.

“Yeah! She has a boat!” Anne went on. “Something good finally hatred loose from all this hysteria, eh? Anyway, my sister, Mary, used to work at the Park’s office. She had to deliver mail to that lady almost every day. I know there’s a key down there.”

“So, we’re gonna—”

“No!” Cathy barked. Kitty snaps her mouth shut with a small lurch of her shoulders. “No no no! We are not going to go with the first plan from the group’s resident burnout.” She wheeled around to glare at Anne when she said that.

Anne narrows her eyes and ruffled herself up. With her brown hair frizzing from her unruly, half-undone spacebuns and smaller stature than the dark-skinned girl, she looked about as intimidating as a raccoon trying to defend its piece of garbage it just stole from the rubbish bin. Her voice, however, was biting, like the chilled gales just outside the cabin.

“I am not a burnout!” She snapped.

“What other plan do we have, Cathy?” Joan said, trying to step in again.

“Oh, I don’t know! Fix the radio, find Catalina, set fire to the mug shop!” Cathy began to rattle off, “And those are just at the top of my head!”

“Those won’t do us any good.”

Cathy clenched her jaw and began stalking up to Anne. She easily towered over to paler girl, riling herself up like a smoking volcano about to blow or a mother owl who just had one of her chicks threatened- her talons are open and primed for blood.

“Anne,” She laughed harshly. Her voice is as cold and hard as a glacier. “don’t forget that this is entirely your fault to begin with.”

She seemed to forget about Joan taking all the blame at the cable car. Or, perhaps, she just didn’t want to throw her step-sister under the bus like that.

“Excuse me?”

“And now,” Cathy went on, overpowering Anne with her barbed tone. The gritting of her teeth quickly replaced the image of an owl with a timber wolf. “now you want us to trust you when things are really bad? YOU made Joan bring the radio- over twenty messages in all caps if I remember being told correctly. YOU brought us here!”

“Come on, guys, calm down!” Joan attempted to step in. “This is nobody’s fault! And if it is going to be someone’s fault, let it be mine. I already owned up to it! So...there! Blame is on me! Blood is on my hands!” Saying that last part made a sick feeling of fear coil deep in her stomach.

“Yeah, this isn’t very, uh,” Kitty tries to help cool things down, too. “Productive.”

But their efforts were in vain. Anne was pissed off, now. And Joan knew better than anyone that her anger was a deep, dark, long-running thing. The blonde steps back and pulled Kitty with her, as if she thought her friend may actually explode.

“It should be obvious that you’re the only weirdo here,” She said, going after Cathy with words laced in sickly green venom. “You are throwing all of this out of whack! We,” She gestures for her, Kitty, and Joan, “all grew up together!”

“Guys, please calm down.” Joan spoke up again. Her presence is finally reminded to the fuming pair, but not in the way she had wanted.

“Joan, I am not putting my life in this freak’s hands!” Cathy spat. She wasn’t going after Joan, in fact her eyes softened when she began talking to her step-sister, but her voice remained spiky and wrapped in shards of glass. “This entire night has been nothing but a joke to her! I mean, did you hear the first thing she said to us back up at that way station?” She does a terrible impressions of Anne’s voice, “‘I thought you were a werewolf’- like, what the fuck is up with that?! How are you even defending this bimbo?”

“Cathy!” Kitty yelped. Her eyes are wide in alarm and she glances nervously over at her cousin. She took another step back, this time being to one to pull Joan with her. It was as if she saw smoke wreathing out of Anne’s nostrils or something.

“I know you said Anne was ‘harmless’ or whatever, but the bitch ate two fucking weed brownies! In a crisis situation!” Cathy was working herself up to a proper temper. Her face was flaming red with rage, which was impressive given her darken skin color. “I’m done giving her passes. And you should, too.”

“I don’t need a pass from you.” Anne growled. “Joan is my best friend.”

That comment cut Joan deep in the heart. She had been mentally siding with Cathy, the girl did have a point, plus she was her new sister and she feared not going along with her would completely shatter their relationship, but Anne was right. They were best friends. They had been together since Joan was fostered by her mum and moved to the girl’s city.

God, she wished she didn’t have to be there right now. The ghosts were one thing, but this? She did not sign up for her relationships breaking into pieces right before her eyes.

“Oh yeah? Well, Joan is MY best friend!” Cathy barked back.

“Guys, please!” Joan shouted. “Stop it! Stop fighting!”

“Yes. Please.” Kitty agreed softly.

“Listen, I don’t care what Cavewoman Cathy says—”

“What is that?!”

“—there is a boat at Maggie Lee’s house. And the key is back on Main Street.” Anne went on, ignoring Cathy’s stupid, flabbergasted expression.

“And when your plan fails spectacularly, two of us are going to have to stay here with the semi-functioning walkie talkie.” Cathy said, crossing her arms.

“Well, Joan has the radio.” Anne also crossed her arms. If she was trying to make herself seem more mature or maybe was just trying to mimic and mock Cathy, neither Joan nor Kitty knew. “Are you okay to go to town?” She looks around Cathy’s hulking figure to look at her friend.

“Yeah,” Joan said. Sure, her throat sort of stung from yelling and the start of a panic attack was boiling up in her chest a welting sore, and there was also the whole being-wet-in-the-freezing-cold-night and persistent, never ending headache thing, but she chose to keep that to herself. “I’m fine. Ready whenever.”

“She shouldn’t go alone.” Kitty jumped back in. “Three of us don’t need to stay up here.”

“Right. I’ll go!” Anne volunteered quickly. “It was my brilliant idea in the first place.”

“Are you serious? Your food is going to kick in at any second and then you really will be a completely unreliable bimbo.” Cathy said.

“I am not a bimbo!” Anne snarled.

“Aaaagh! Stop it!” Joan growled. Her own anger was starting to bubble inside of her.

After her plea, Cathy rounds on her.

“Keeping in mind who has been with you this entire night—”

“Keeping in mind who you’re tired of!” Anne cut in.

“Keeping in mind who’s taller!” Cathy said louder. “Who do you want going with you?”

It was all so overwhelming. Joan wished they could all just go as a group, surely that was safer, anyway, but it was also just wishful thinking. If Cathy and Anne tried to get down from the tower together, Joan was sure somebody was gonna get pushed off.

She feels that coil in her stomach tighten and tighten and tighten. It becomes a painful sensation in her gut that she has no other choice but to-

“Cathy, let’s go.”

Cathy sighed in relief. “Thank you.”

“What?!” Anne cried. It was clear she hadn’t been planning for Joan to not pick her. “Why?! Why her?”

“We’re still doing your plan,” Joan said gently, hoping to cool her friend down. “Who cares about who’s on the Home and Away team?”

“But I wanna be on the Joan team.” Anne said. Her eyes looked genuinely hurt. Joan’s heart pinches painfully in her chest. “I wanna feel like— like— needed.”

The pinch gets tighter until it feels like two slim claws are trying to pull her aorta right out of her chest.

Joan tried to speak, tried to make her friend feel better, but Anne just sighed and shook her head.

“Just— just, fine, whatever. Go have fun, you two.” She said.

“It’s not supposed to be fun. That’s the point.” Cathy rolled her eyes.

“Oh god, will you just shut up?” Anne hissed.

“Okay, before things get stupid again,” Kitty said. “Good luck with the whole key thing. We’ll be waiting, guys.”

“Thanks, Kit. You’re the best.” Joan smiled at Kitty, who manages to give her one back. “But...are you gonna be okay with...the girl?”

Kitty actually laughed. “I’ll be fine. She’s just cranky.”

“I’m not cranky!” Anne grumbled from where she was very obviously sulking.

“I’ll take care of her!” Kitty assured Joan, who nodded and made her way out of the cabin with Cathy on her heels.

The trek down from the tower was silent. In fact, neither sister spoke until they were past the gate and back into the field.

“Look,” Cathy sighed. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to go that far back there.”

“Mmm.” Joan merely replied. She wasn’t ignoring Cathy per se, rather putting more attention on the darkness that lurked on the path to Main Street. She shivered.

“Okay, I’m just going to clear the air, alright? Just so Anne or whoever can’t say I was hiding it.” Cathy said. Joan glances back at her momentarily. “You may have heard that I was, uh, in jail?”

Joan says nothing. She just keeps walking. It very clearly makes Cathy uneasy.

“Well,” She went on. “I never went to jail. But I did beat up a guy and go to juvenile detention for it.”

“Why’d you, uhh...why’d you do it?” Joan asked softly. The thought that her younger sister was now scared of her sent cold vines of fear creeping up through Cathy’s insides.

“My mum got sick.” She said, “And then she got really sick and this kid threw a baseball at my head, and yes he was joking, but I just kinda-“ She sighed. “I popped.”

“We all break sometimes.” Joan said. “I understand.”

“You do?” Cathy perked up a little.

“Yeah.” Joan nodded. “Trust me, I do.”

Cathy smiled a little.

“I’m glad.”

She and Joan continue their trek until they got to Main Street. Cathy was just about to ask if Joan was religious, and if she wasn’t if she was going to reconsider after that night, when she noticed a human shadow cast across the pavement.

“Oh my god, is that—”

Someone was sitting on one of the light posts, their legs swinging back and forth.

“Catalina!”

Cathy and Joan rush up to the light, their eyes wide.

“She’s alive!” Joan said. “Man, I’ve never been so happy to see you in my l-”

Static.

Joan let out a short cry of pain as static filled her mind and vision seemed to glitch out like an old TV. When she looks up, Catalina’s eyes are glowing red.

“Oh no,” Cathy muttered, stepping back. “She’s doing- she’s doing the eye thing!”

“Come on, Catalina, snap out of it! Look alive!” Joan tried. “Umm...hang in there, baby?”

“Good try.” Cathy pat her shoulder.

Joan grit her teeth. She could feel the cold metal of the radio weigh heavily in her pocket. She has no choice but to slip it out and tune in.

102.3

The first triangle forms.

95.1

The second-

“NO!!”

Joan is falling, everything is upside down and she can’t see at all, but then she’s upright again and tottering in her spot like a newborn lamb. She winces.

“You think you can control me?” Catalina asked, tilting her head slowly. Her voice is like it had been back at Fort Milner, distorted and dark.

Cathy and Joan exchange nervous looks.

“What? No! We’re not trying—“

“No, you’re not trying!” Not-Catalina said. “You’re not trying at all!”

“¥ðµ håvêñ’† ¢håñgêÐ,” Said The Sunken. Their voices appear out of nowhere, origination from an unknown source. “ñð† å ßï†. ßµ† ¥ðµ’rê å £ïñê gïrl.”

“What— what more can we do?” Joan said desperately. “We’re barely holding onto our—“

“‘What more can you do?’” Not-Catalina echoed mockingly. “You can do your job, that’s for starters. You can be what you signed up for.”

“𝕎𝕙𝕖𝕟 𝕪𝕠𝕦’𝕣𝕖 𝕠𝕗𝕗,” Crackles the radio. “𝕋𝕙𝕖 𝕝𝕚𝕥𝕥𝕝𝕖 𝕞𝕒𝕔𝕙𝕚𝕟𝕖 𝕙𝕒𝕤 𝕟𝕠 𝕞𝕠𝕣𝕖 𝕙𝕖𝕒𝕣𝕥 𝕥𝕙𝕒𝕟 𝕒 𝕓𝕣𝕒𝕚𝕟.”

It just had to go and pipe in, didn’t it? What with Catalina- or Not-Catalina, Whatever the fuck she may be now, and those ghosts talking and all, the radio now chipping in only added to the intensity, and the terrible pressure pressing down on Joan’s skull.

“No more heart than a...” Not-Catalina’s voice trailed off and died. Her body fell like a rag doll from the lamppost.

“Is she-?” Joan swallowed thickly. “Is she, um, alive?”

“I-I don’t-”

Not-Catalina, or Catalina, now, stirs, then sat up. She blinked her normal brown eyes at the duo standing above her.

“Are you okay?” Cathy asked. “Can you remember anything that just happened?”

“I’m fine. I can— I’m fine.” Catalina stood up, brushing away the hands reaching down to her for help. “And I... I remember Fort Milner...and you two.”

“That’s it?”

“Well... I also remember that radio.” Catalina turns on Joan. “And I remember this being all your fault.”

-.-. --- ..- .-. .- --. . / .. ... / -. --- - / .- .-.. .-- .- -.-- ... / - .... . / .-- .- -.-- --..-- / -.. . .- .-. .-.-.-

The bonfire in front of the Main Street tunnel blazes slightly when Anne throws a few sticks into the flames. They get eaten away in seconds before Joan’s eyes, which are edged with a black blur. She blinked, smoke stinging them slightly, and looked up at the others.

“Wait, it’s Catalina’s turn already?” Anne asked.

“Yes, it’s my turn.” Catalina said. “I’ve been waiting this whole time!”

“Hold on-“ Joan looked around. The ocean licking against the rocky edge to the street is but a black void behind her. She snaps her head forward again, preferring to look into the foggy abyss that was the closed down tunnel behind Catalina. “What’s going on again?”

“It’s Catalina’s turn.” Kitty said.

“Yeah, it’s Catalina’s turn.” Cathy nodded.

“And you of all people should know what I’m not going at ask because I’m not going to waste it.” Catalina turned to Joan. “Joan. What did you do.”

Joan’s mouth hangs open like a fish out of water. Catalina’s judgmental stare does not pity her stunned expression.

“Tell me why my best friend, and your idiot best friend, and your new step-sister are all screwed.”

“This isn’t her fault.” Cathy stepped in quickly, already knowing things were going to get riled up.

“Cathy, I’m sorry, but you don’t know who you speak of, dear.” Catalina said.

“Catalina, seriously, I can vouch for this,” Anne said. “This isn’t her fault.”

“It has to be her fault, of course it’s her fault.”

Joan clenched her fists. The numbness in her fingers dissipates for a moment. Bubbling anger feels hot in her belly.

“Why?” Joan snapped. “Why does it have to be my fault?”

“Why does it have to be your fault? Are you serious?”

Joan clenches her jaw, glaring daggers at Catalina.

“You’re gonna learn, Cathy, I swear to god. The whole town looks at her like she’s got a fucking Scarlet Letter tattooed on her forehead, and the giant, lit up, Christmas tree reason why is that Maria is dead because of her!”

A near subzero sensation spreads through Joan’s entire body, and not because of the temperature outside. Then, the chill is overcome by molten lava-like fury that bubbles up like pus from an abscess.

“It would take a really sick person to see it that way, and I would love to hear your explanation!”

“Maria was going to be free! She was going to be out of here until this one convinced her to go swimming one last time.” Catalina stopped her pacing. Her eyes are cold and hard. “And she drowned. Maria drowned, while this one could barely flap her arms.”

All eyes turned to stare.

“That doesn’t make it my fault!” Joan cried. “Anyone could have been there— anyone— and then they would’ve watched her die, you unbelievable cunt!”

“‘Anyone’ wouldn’t have watched her die, Joan. Anyone else would have done something!” Catalina snapped back.

“Okay, enough!” Cathy steps in between the two. “Seriously. I can’t even believe we’re talking about this right now.”

“Cathy,” Joan scampered up to Cathy like a lost lamb would to its mother. She grips tightly to her step-sister’s sleeve. “Cathy, it was awful- it’s still awful... I-”

Cathy set a gentle hand on her shoulder. “I know. It’s okay, I know. But right now we’re going to break into that office, find that key, an we’re going to go home.”

“No.” Catalina said.

Cathy snapped her head around to the older girl. Her teeth are gritted. She’s clearly had enough.

“No?” She echoed, anger lacing her voice. “What do you mean, no?”

“Aagh!!” Pain lances through Joan’s head. Then Cathy’s head. Then Anne and Kitty’s. Catalina began to float into the air.

“All the outs in free.....”

What happens next is nothing short of a whirlwind. Cathy and Joan get jarred out of the time loop and, like the many times before, Cathy only has vague memory of being in it. However, by the pale, shaken expression on her step-sister’s face, she knew it couldn’t have been good.

When she asks, Joan says she doesn’t want to talk about it.

They break into the park building and find the key in the form of another pocket radio, this one with more stations.

It does not feel right in her hands.

As they’re walking back to meet up with the others, Cathy reads off a letter written by Maggie Lee, which talks about how the history of Edward’s Island was a lie and how she buried these secrets all over the area. The letter ends and, after the sister discussing the news, Cathy began to say something else as they passed the path that led down to the beach.

“Joey, why are you wearing that jacket? It’s, like, seventy-five degrees and the sun’s out!”

“What? It’s cold—”

Soft, fuzziness floods her mind. Her vision distorts, but her body doesn’t seem to react. Her muscles are calm...relaxed. She’s at peace for the first time that night.

“—and the sun is only kinda out.”

“No, see! Look! Sunlight!”

A voice ahead laughs. “Maria, we didn’t bring drinks.”

Joan was giggling, too, but then the noise catches painfully in her throat.

“Wait— Maria?!”

Her older sister grins at her. Her curly hair is done back in a rare ponytail- she usually prefers to have it down and frame her face in a way that makes her look like a lion. The smile painted on her pink lips would make even the sun jealous of its perfect glow.

“The one and only!” She chirped. At her side, Catalina chuckles lovingly.

“Where- where’s Cathy?!” Joan looked around frantically. That panic attack from before starts to rise up again, desperate to overcome her.

“Cathy? Who’s Cathy?” Catalina asked curiously. Her voice is so sweet when she talks to Joan, not laced with hidden poison or barbed with vision sarcasm, but genuinely loving towards the younger girl. “Is someone else coming?”

“Yeah, is that a friend of yours?” Maria added.

“You wanna know who Cathy is?” Joan grits. She’s tired of losing her every single hour. “She’s my new step-sister.”

She sees Catalina and Maria’s eyes widen.

“Now do you know what’s happening?”

She thinks they get it, but then Catalina and Maria began to laugh. They continued their trek down to the beach and Joan’s legs follow them without her command.

“Okay, can you call your new friend your ‘best friend’ or something?” Maria asked, giggling. “‘Step-sister’ is kinda approaching into my territory.”

“Yeah, it’s like when my mum calls her cat her ‘special little lady.’ I mean, I’m standing right there!” Catalina put in. She looked so happy...and not evil.

“Wh— why— why am I here?” Joan squeaked. She’s getting weak in the knees. She thinks she was going to be sick.

“You said you wanted to go to the beach.” Maria said.

“Good choice, too,” Catalina said. “Today turned out to be a flawless day.”

The nausea seems to melt away as they got down to the beach and stepped onto the sand. When Joan looked at the ocean, she felt no fear, no anxiety, no trauma-induced pain. Just...serenity and curiosity for the sparkling blue body of water.

Her mind feels like it was melting, but the sensation sends a ripple of peace through her body, almost like morphine. She calms by degrees in a matter of seconds. To be honest, she can barely remember what she had been freaking out about moments earlier... Even when Maria proclaims she forget her phone on the ferry and Joan and Catalina left alone on the beach when she ran up to go get it, she felt no nervousness.

She sat down across from Catalina.

“I’m glad we could do this today.” The older girl said. “I know you two are close and all I know it can be annoying to have the girlfriend around, but...”

Joan smiled slightly. “Yeah, I- I would love to. Really.”

Catalina beams. “I’m glad! And, hey, Mars loves you a lot. I mean, I’m sure you already know that, but seriously. She talks about you all the time.”

Joan giggled, blushing slightly. “Thank you for telling me.”

“Yeah, of course!”

“Had to fight the skipper for it, but he didn’t expect many squats I could do,” Maria said as she walked back over.

All three girls laughed.

Catalina excuses herself after Maria got settled to go but some drinks up at the shop, leaving Maria and Joan alone.

“I’ve missed you,” Joan whispered. “I-I know we live in the same house and everything, but- I missed you, Mars.”

“Aww,” Maria cooed. “I missed you, too, JoJo. Also, hey, I know this was supposed to be our day, but I completely forget that I promised Catalina that I would do something with her. Thanks for chaperoning.”

“No problem.” Joan said.

“It’s really important to me that you like her, so tell me the truth. What do you really think of us being together?”

Joan didn’t even have to process the question.

“Stick with it. Stay with her.” She said. “If she makes you laugh, if she makes you smile...who am I to think otherwise?”

Maria lit up brightly. “Thank you! Good blessings and good tidings!” She and Joan laugh. “Hey, I’ve never noticed that that’s a good jacket. I should ask for it back. My new one sucks. Feels like I got...shoes on my arms or something.”

Joan pulled the soft grey jacket closer around her. “No way, bucko!”

“Bucko?” Maria laughed. “You haven’t called me that in years! Come here- let me at least see if it still fits.”

“Fine!” Joan groaned. “But even if it does, I’m not giving it back!”

Maria scoots over and reaches to grab the jacket when Joan takes it off. When their hands brush each other, everything cuts to static.

#olly olly oxenfree #six fanfic #six the musical fanfiction #six the musical fanfic #six the musical au #six the musical #joan on the keys #katherine howard #catherine parr #anne boleyn #maria on the drums #catherine of aragon #tw: drowning #tw: victim blaming

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everlark-fanfic · 7 years

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The Kids Are Alright Chapter 1

So basically I wrote this chapter 1 as a sample for a post-epilogue fanfic centered around katniss and peeta’s kids, more particularly their daughter. If anyone is interested in me going further, let me know. Otherwise, enjoy:

Lilly

It was all basically a blur.

“One more!” “Another, Lilly, come on!” “Don’t be like that, just one more.”

The brightest lights I’ve ever seen, the smoothest alcohol I’ve tasted, the best music that I can’t help but dance to. The most handsome boy I’ve ever laid eyes on, pressing his lips onto mine, and then disappearing out into the crowd like he was never even here.

The Capitol is my new favorite place to be, hands down. I don’t know why I never listened to my cousins when they told me to come visit for a party, but tonight, on my cousin Finn’s 19th birthday, I had to see if all the stories were true. And they absolutely were.

In 12 a birthday party is basically your mother and father rounding your closest family and friends who aren’t dead to sit around and dance to the same exact song on the fiddle. Every year. And every year I roll my eyes and grit my teeth as my parents show all my friends the old square dance they used to do back before the revolution. Once my mother explained it to me, why she loves it so much, and why I’ll never understand how much dancing around on a full belly celebrating another year of life means to her.

And she's right, I will never understand. But right now all I can think about is how my speech seems to flow in cursive, my eyelids feel like they weigh a ton, my body seems to move like an ocean, and my lips still tingle from the sensation of a stranger. I’ve never felt more on top of the world than I do now, and then I fall.

“Lilly!” Piper laughs, “Get up, you look like an ass!”

“I can actually see your ass” Burch gloats.

“Ok, ok. I’m um, I uh, who was that?” I stammer, looking in the crowds for the beautiful hunk that just vanished.

“Who knows,” Fletcher giggles, “But he’s long gone now, better get your fix somewhere else.” He pours an ounce of a bluish purple liquid that looks like space into a small glass, handing it over, “One for the road?”

I feel violently sick just looking at it. “No thanks,” I croak out, visibly nauseated. “I honestly better be getting home soon.” I look over at the clock and I almost faint when I see that it reads 2:04 am. “Shit” I mutter. My parents are literally going to kill me. Now that the transit system in Panem is used a lot more to travel to the outlying districts, they had to make the trains much faster. Still, even with our ridiculously fast trains, I wouldn't be home until three or four in the morning.

Finn, who’s the oldest out of all of us grabs me by the wrist and hugs me so incredibly tight I feel like I can’t breathe, “THANKS FOR COMING LILY!” He practically screams right in my ear, obviously very drunk. He quiets down a bit, “Honestly, thank you, like you just are the greatest, and,” he hiccups “and I am so happy you came here for my birthday. IT’S MY BIRTHDAY!” he yells out to the crowd and they roar back encouragingly.

I smile and give him a kiss on the cheek, “Love you Finn, I’ll see you soon. Happy birthday!” He smiles and ruffles up my hair a bit, backing away slowly and then returning to the dance floor.

I turn to the group who appears to be taking another shot of the space juice. I chuckle when Piper and Burch make faces of disgust desperately trying to keep the liquid down. Fletcher does his best to look unfazed, minus the tears welling up in his eyes.

“Can I walk you out?” Burch asks politely, and holds out his arm for me to take. I gladly take it and Piper immediately takes my other side and we exit the party, leaving Fletcher and Finn to take care of each other.

The walk to the train station is quite chilly, in the midst of January it can get pretty cold here, so we all huddle together for warmth. After 10 minutes of us three drunken slobs stumbling away, we arrive at the station and the screen lets us know the next late nite train will be arriving in 8 minutes. We sit down on the bench on the platform and wait together.

“That was so much fun,” Piper sighs. “Finn is so drunk I can’t even believe it.”

Burch and I laugh, “Yeah, but it’s his day so we’re not allowed to judge. Every other day we can, though” Burch says.

While Burch and Piper joke about how Finn was starting to turn into our uncle Haymitch, I sink back on the bench and check my phone. 1 missed call from Mom, 1 missed call from Dad, another missed call from Mom, and a text from Terrin reading: “You’re in so much trouble :)”

I look around and cringe at the thought of going home. I feel so incredibly uneasy about it. I never really disobey my parents and I always let them know exactly where I am, especially if I go out of the district to visit my cousins, which I’ve been doing a lot more of lately. This time however, feels so different. I feel so uneasy, I could almost--

I hurl all over the platform, barely missing everyone's shoes. Burch and Piper look horrified.

“Sorry guys,” I wipe my mouth. “I’ve never partied like this before”

“Happens” Piper giggles and I shoot her a grin.

I can hear the chanting of the train coming closer, and soon enough it’s breeze is cooling off our sweaty faces. I carefully step over my pile of vomit and wave goodbye to Piper and Burch, “I’ll see you all soon. Let me know next time you want to do this again, if I’m not grounded by then.” I hop on the train and watch them try and mimic my moves to get over the pile. Burch pretends to push Piper into it and she almost loses her balance and swats him playfully.

My train leaves and through the window I can see Burch put his arm around Piper and gracefully swoop her up before he gently leans in for a quick peck on her lips. The sight of it makes my stomach wrench and before I know it, I’m puking again, this time into a paper bag behind the seat meant for motion sickness. After a few hurls, I look down and I whisper to myself “Burch? And Piper?” I hold down another wave.

I mean they’re cousins for God’s sake. Well, not really biologically. The six us have grown up together, at every family gathering, at every birthday party, at every funeral, and every wedding, these kids are my family. Our parents told us that we were cousins when we were young, but as we got older we figured out the real dynamic.

Finn came first, he is my aunt Annie’s son. My parents said as soon as they saw how happy Finn made Annie, the thought of having me didn’t scare them so much anymore.

Next came Burch, my uncle Gale’s son. He and Finn are only six months apart, and Burch was born right after the revolution. Needless to say, Burch was an accident, my uncle Gale only knowing my aunt Maple for three months before she was pregnant with him. Two years later, after getting married, they welcomed Fletcher, who is now sixteen.

Piper is my aunt Johanna’s daughter and she’s seventeen just like me, only about ten months older. She is the closest thing I have to a sister, my absolute best friend. My parents have been really close with aunt Johanna for almost twenty years, her and my father are even closer. Sometimes if something falls and makes a loud noise, they will start breathing hard but in the exact same way and my mom has to keep them from getting violent. I’ve only seen it happen once with aunt Jo, but a handful of times with my father. Aunt Jo was seeing this man formerly from District 11 when she moved to 2 to join the armed forces. They married and had Piper quickly, only for her husband to die in a test run of a new hovercraft they had designed. Her and Finn will occasionally bond over the fact that their dads are both dead and neither of them have even met them.

I came next, a surprise to my mother. She told me that she thought she was sterile, that when she went into the games her first time the stylists implanted something to stop her from menstruating and had no idea that it was reversed as soon as she and my father won. Three years later, my brother Terrin was born, he’s now fourteen, the youngest of us all by a two year gap, so he’s never really invited nor is he interested in going out to the Capitol with us.

When we were young, our parents couldn't really explain to us how they all knew each other. How could they? We would never understand that they knew each other because there was a Hunger Games every year for 75 years, and our parents had gone through it, and been a part of a revolution to put an end to their former regime, so they just told us we were family, and family we are.

That is why is so incredibly weird to see what I just saw. I have a million questions. How long has this been going on? Do uncle Gale and aunt Johanna know about it? How could Piper even THINK about seeing Burch like that? I shudder and then do my best to shake the feeling, dozing off, doing my best to try and sober up before I have to deal with my parents.

I’m woken by a sudden halt of the train, early morning miners quickly rushing out onto the platform to start the day. I get up, rubbing my eyes and smearing off mascara that Piper loaned me and check the clock to see that it’s 3:45 am. I find my father’s car and start it, driving painfully slow home, as I know what’s coming up if not tonight then first thing in the morning.

On my way home, I notice that the street signs are passing quicker than they should for the speed I’m going. That I seemed to not have gone through any intersections or stoplights, and as soon as I start to realize that I may not be as sober as I thought I would be, my headlights meet a tree trunk, my head hits the steering wheel, and then everything goes blank.

#The Hunger Games #THG #the hunger games fanfic #thg fanfiction #thg fanfic #everlark #everlark fanfiction #everlark fanfic

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wellthengameover · 7 years

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!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

you guys know how i’m always screaming about maurice right? well i didn’t know thERE WAS AN UNPUBLISHED EPILOGUE !!!! featuring maurice’s sister kitty being um ALSO GAY??? (or possibly bi, she seems very fond of alec lolol) and finding out that maurice is gay????

Since Violet Tonks had married ... [Kitty] had lost her vigour, no longer attended concerts, lectures on hygiene &c, or cared for the improvement of the world...

Then she thought “[Maurice] is not alone there: he’s working under that other man”, and with a flash but without the slightest shock the truth was revealed to her. “... I should imagine they are practically in love.”

“It must be much too cold up there alone,” said Kitty, whose idea of love, though correct, remained withered: for Maurice and Alec were at that moment neither lonely nor cold. 😍😍😍

‘Epilogue’ (1914) to Maurice, by E. M. Forster First published in 1999 by André Deutsch Ltd, London. Copyright 1999 The Provost and Scholars of King’s College, Cambridge -------------------- “The axe is laid unto the root of the trees…” This text, so well expressing her own state, rose unbidden into Kitty's mind. It had been induced by a distant sound of wood-cutting but she was unconscious of this. She was bicycling alone through a haggard country. All leaves had been stripped from the branches by an earlier gale, and now the wind boomed in monotonous triumph under a light brown sky. In such weather, the world seems emptied of good; warmth has gone, ice and snow, splendid in their own fashion, have not yet arrived. And Kitty had nothing to do, did not know where she was going, and did not care. She had left the high road because it wearied her, and turned into plantations; the track sloped, but into the wind, so that she still had to pedal, and over a worse surface. After an hour more she would get back to the inn where she was stopping, and eat her solitary tea. “The axe is laid … therefore every tree which bringeth not forth good fruit is hewn down … but no one wants to be barren”, she thought. “No one asks to be cross and sad, or five years older. Some of us might have brought forth fruit if we'd been nourished properly.” And sighing she cycled on, while the sound of the chopping grew more distinct. At twenty seven Kitty was as old as most women at forty; youth had found no resting place either in her body or mind. Since Violet Tonks had married – that rather than her brother’s disgrace had been the crisis –she had lost her vigour, no longer attended concerts, lectures on hygiene &c, or cared for the improvement of the world; but looked after her mother or helped the Chapmans wearily. Now and then she “struck”, as she termed it; must have a “real holiday alone”, as on the present occasion. But she never came home refreshed. She could not strike against her own personality. “Can I get out this way?”, she called to the woodman. He nodded, and replied in an independent voice “If you see my mate, Miss, will you ask him to bring up a saw he has, please”. “Yes, if I see him,” said Kitty, who felt that a liberty had been taken with her. But speech had interrupted her thoughts, and when the axe recommenced, it was as a human sound. Half a mile on, she saw the second man. He was piling logs at the side of a clearing. She called to him, and as he approached, she recognized her brother. He seemed a common labourer –not as trim as he who had accosted her. His trousers were frayed, his shirt open at the throat: he began to button it with hard brown fingers when she cried “Maurice”. But beneath the exterior a new man throbbed – tougher, more centralised, in as good form as ever, but formed in a fresh mould, where muscles and sunburn proceed from an inward health. “What, you’re never still in England … disgraceful … abominable…” She spoke not what she felt, but what her training ordained, and as if he understood this he did not reply, nor look her in the face. He seemed to be waiting – like the woods – till her sterile reproofs were over. “We none of us miss you,” she continued. “We never even mention you. Arthur tells us not to even ask what you did. I shall not tell mother I’ve seen you for she’s had enough to bear. A man further up gave me a message to you about a saw, or I wouldn’t have spoken otherwise.” “Which saw?” These were the only words he uttered: his voice was rougher, but still low, and very charming. “I don't know and I don't care,” she said, flying into a rage. Maurice picked up two saws, listened to the noise the axe made, and moved away carrying the smaller. It was her last view of him. The road twisted out of the wind, and before she had recovered her temper she was coasting away far below. The evening grew more dreary, and sky tree hedges acquired a granulated appearance, as though rust were forming on them, and announcing the earth’s extinction. As the tea brought warmth to her mind, Kitty began recalling her brother’s disappearance. She had never thrashed it out. “Something too awful” had been hinted by her brother-in-law, who knew most, and had been in secret communication with Clive. Clive would make no pronouncement, and had refused point blank to see Mrs Hall and be questioned by her. The two families drifted apart – the more quickly because old Mrs Durham and Pippa spread a rumour that Maurice had speculated on the Stock Exchange. This annoyed the Halls, for the boy, like his father, had always been most careful, and Kitty was allowed to write one of her sharp letters; she remembered its wording very clearly now, in the solitude of this Yorkshire inn. But what was the “awful thing”? Why should a sane wealthy unspiritual young man drop overboard like a stone into the sea, and vanish? – drop without preparation or farewell? The night of the wonderful sunset he had not returned – to the vexation of Aunt Ida, now dead, who desired a motor-ride, and on the morrow he was not at the office, nor at a dinner appointment with Clive. Beyond that she knew nothing, for masculinity had intervened. It was a man’s business, Arthur had implied: women may weep but must not ask to understand, and he warned them against communicating with the Police. She had wept duly, and comforted poor mother, but emotion had now been dead there – many years, and Oh what was it? She longed to know. What force could have driven her brother into the wilderness? Then she thought “He's not alone there: he’s working under that other man”, and with a flash but without the slightest shock the truth was revealed to her. “He must be very fond of his mate, he must have given up us on his account, I should imagine they are practically in love.” It seemed a very odd situation to her, one which she had never heard of and had better not mention, but the varieties of development are endless: it did not seem a disgusting situation, nor one that society should have outlawed. Maurice looked happy and proud despite his cheap clothes and the cold. She remembered how his face had changed when she spoke of the saw: it was the only remark that had moved him: abuse, entreaties, sermons, were all powerless against his desire to work properly with his friend. “Which saw?” Nothing else mattered, and he had left her. Well, and she didn't mind. He could if he liked. She had never cared for him, and didn't now, but she did understand him, and could dwell on him at last without irritation. She saw why he had always repelled her, in spite of surface generosities, why she and her sister, and even her [ ]m, and lived in a state of war. What were their thoughts now? And as the evening drew on, and the carpet bulged up in the wind, Kitty's own thoughts grew less sociological. In particular, she began to think of the unknown friend as a human being, and to be interested in him. She felt that though commoner than her brother, he might be nicer to a woman, she liked his strong loose body and the softness of his brave eyes, and wanted to see him again. He was “the sort of person in whom all meet” – so with unconscious felicity she expressed Alec’s nature, and she found herself asking the landlady about the men who worked in the woods through which she had bicycled. Her question was vague, as was the landlady’s answer: there were so many woods, she implied, and so many men, and some came and others went. “It must be much too cold up there alone,” said Kitty, whose idea of love, though correct, remained withered: for Maurice and Alec were at that moment neither lonely nor cold. Their favourite time for talking had been reached. Couched in a shed near their work—to sleep rough had proved safer—they shared in whispered review the events of the day before falling asleep. Kitty was included, and they decided to leave their present job and find work in a new district, in case she told the Police, or returned. In the glow of manhood “There we shall be safe” they thought. They were never to be that. But they were together for the moment, they had stayed disintegration and combined daily work with love; and who can hope for more?

Maurice by E. M. Forster, The Abinger Edition (1999), edited by Philip Gardner, pp. 221–4

#maurice #forster

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everlarkbirthdaydrabbles · 7 years

Note

My birthday is January 26th and I would very much love a fic about toastbabies in the snow. Because that's always what I loathe about my birthdays. Snow. So something to smile about in the midst of a Michigan winter. Thank you! :)

Wishing you the happiest of birthdays! To celebrate, an incredibly generous blogger who wishes to remain anonymous has crafted this incredible story, just for you! We hope you enjoy!

A/N: Modern AU. Rated T.

********************

“You ruin everything, Ezra Mellark!”

Willow’s mittened fists pummeled the boy’s chest in frustration, hot tears coursing down her face and instantly sticking to her chapped cheeks in the frozen winter air. At her feet stood the ruins of the snow fort she’d labored to build every morning over the course of the past week, the roof caved in and broken into pieces, filling what was left of the interior with debris.

In her first wave of anger she’d kicked out the walls, a light dusting of snow blowing off the chunks and scattering into the wind. When that wasn’t enough to quell the fire raging inside of her, she turned to the wide-eyed boy whose touch had brought all her illusions crashing down and began launching a long line of invective at him.

He only flinched at her words, his fair and freckled face turning a darker shade of pink the meaner she got, but when he refused to say anything in retaliation, she turned to using her fists. These, too, proved useless against him. Willow was lean and undersized—a scrappy, scrawny sprite of a thing—but the young boy was solid and broad and already built like an athlete. He could have easily stopped her attack or leveled her with one well-timed push, but Ezra neither cried nor fought back, just allowed himself to fall backward into the snow, staring up at her stupidly, like the stupid, stupid boy he was.

“What’s wrong with you anyway?” Willow cried louder, kicking snow at him with the toe of one of her pink suede boots. “Say something! Or are you no good at that either?”

But no sooner had his mouth opened to speak than Willow looked at the wreckage of her snow fort, and the fury overtook her again.

“Why are you always bugging me anyway?” she snarled. “Trying to hang out with me and my friends, getting in the way? I wish you’d never moved here! I hate you and your stupid face!” She kicked more snow at him, but this time her boot scraped the underlying sidewalk, the suede scuffing as it dragged across the harsh pavement.

Willow nearly exploded at the sight of her once-perfect boots, a gift her daddy had sent her for Christmas all the way from his new home in the place he called Denver, now also ruined by stupid Ezra Mellark, but before she could start up again, one of the other kids at the bus stop, her friend Bennett, put his hand on her arm.

“You gotta knock it off,” he said, his bright green eyes boring into her, imploring to the girl behind the kicking, scratching animal raging at the surface, “or you’re gonna get called into Principal Coin’s office. And you know what’ll happen then.”

Bennett was right, she hated to admit it. If she kept at Mellark, she was going to end up in detention—she might anyway. And that was the last thing she needed, to stare at Mr. Latier’s sour face for an hour while her mom sat in the parking lot in their ratty old minivan, waiting to give her a lecture. She didn’t need detention or to get lectured or grounded. Her life was already hard enough.

What she needed was her old life back, for her parents not to be divorced and for her daddy to come back home. She hadn’t seen him in months, not since her birthday and not even for Christmas, and now her mom was going out on dates with other men, like she’d never loved her daddy at all.

In fact, she’d gone out on a date a couple weeks ago with Ezra Mellark’s dad, and when she’d come home later that night, Willow had crept out of bed and peeked into the front room—her mom was leaning against the front door, smiling to herself and brushing three fingers against her lips like there was powdered sugar on them. Her mom had talked to Mr. Mellark on the phone a few times after that, and every time they spoke, it seemed like Ezra tried harder to be her friend, which made Willow tolerate the sight of his stupid face that much less.

When she thought about that secret smile she’d seen her mom make, she didn’t see what there was to smile about. Her daddy didn’t love her mom anymore—that’s what she’d overheard her mom saying on the phone to Aunt Prim the night he’d left with his suitcase—and maybe he didn’t love her anymore either. Maybe he’d never loved either of them at all. What could there be to smile about when your home had fallen apart and your own daddy didn’t love you?

She tore her eyes away from the ruins of her snow fort and watched the cars as they passed by on Dequindre to make herself cool down, staring absentmindedly at the the way the tires churned up the dirty brown slush that had once been snow. There were piles of that muck everywhere, tall, towering stacks of dirt mixed with snow that would linger until April, and that’s how her life felt too, like something pretty had been destroyed, and it would always be that way.

“I’m sorry… it was an accident. I was just trying to help,” she heard Ezra plead, but she refused to look at him, staring instead at the school bus as it crawled its way toward them on the slick road.

“I bet it was an accident too,” she said, every bit as quiet as the boy had been, but where his voice had been filled with candy, hers was filled with venom, “that you killed your mom just by being born.”

She walked away then, headed toward the line of kids forming on the sidewalk, eager to get out of the cold and into the heat of the school bus. From behind her, she could hear that she’d finally hit her mark and that Ezra Mellark had begun to cry.

But it didn’t feel good like she thought it would. Instead, she felt like crying with him.

********************

“And what are you going to say when they open the door?”

With a shaking hand she pressed the doorbell and then looked down at her daughter, watching the girl struggle past her pride. There was no way to know which of them was more to blame for that, Gale or herself. In all honesty, Willow had probably inherited it from the both of them, since she and Gale had shared virtually all the same faults.

“That I’m sorry,” Willow answered in a sullen voice, biting her lip and hanging her head.

“For?” She pressed the palm of her hand more firmly to her daughter’s chest, holding her tightly against her legs—whether it was to support Willow in her shame or to protect herself from what she might see from the man opening the door, she couldn’t be sure.

His gentleness and goodness were terrifying to her, so unlike any guy she’d ever dated. It made her feel naked, like there was nothing she could hide from him—especially not the fear she’d brought to his doorstep that maybe she was failing her own daughter. She hadn’t been enough of a woman to keep her husband from running out on her, and maybe she wasn’t enough of a mom either, to give her daughter the home she needed.

“For being a bully.”

She didn’t have time to prompt Willow to expound on what she’d done wrong when she heard the heavy footsteps approaching to answer the door. She swallowed nervously, trying to control her breathing, even though it was her daughter that was expected to do all the talking. Even in the frigid air, she felt herself growing hot and weak, her knees shaking slightly at the thought of seeing him again. All she could think about was the way his lips had felt on hers when he’d kissed her goodnight… she hadn’t been kissed like that in years—and maybe not ever—like she was something to be savored.

But what kind of person must he think she is now? She felt as culpable for the things her daughter had said as if she had said them herself, and perhaps more so. She’d be less anxious, maybe, if she’d spoken to him directly instead of through Principal Coin and one impossible-to-interpret exchange of texts.

-Can I bring Willow by after school?

-Sure. We’ll be home all night.

As it stood now, she had no idea what he thought about the entire situation, how angry and disappointed he must be not only in her daughter, but in her.

Then the door swung open, and there he was, his startlingly blue eyes (had they been that bright before, or were they only making up for the overcast sky?) peering at her through his black-rimmed glasses. He opened the storm door, his hand splayed wide over the glass to hold it open.

“Katniss,” he said in surprise, like it had been some other penitent parent he’d expected to come groveling at his doorstep.

“Peeta,” she rasped, her eyes falling to his lips for a moment before she remembered her daughter was standing there, probably pissing her pants from the agony of this. She cleared her throat and glanced down at Willow.

When Katniss looked back up at Peeta, he gave her a small smile and then looked down at her daughter, who, aside from the watery blue eyes she’d inherited from her maternal grandmother, was the spitting image of herself. “You must be Willow,” he said, looking at her daughter fondly. “I’ve heard so many good things about you. I’m Peeta.”

At kindness and acceptance where she’d expected only sternness and disapproval, Willow began to cry—deep, gusty sobs that shook her gut and made her chin quake. “I-I-I’m sorry, Peeta,” she wailed, sounding like a goat bleating for its mom.

Peeta’s eyes grew wide at the suddenness of her tears—a man watching Chernobyl in the act of melting down—clearly unaccustomed to dealing with the dramatics of little girls. “Oh no no, come in,” he urged, reaching out and wrapping an arm around Katniss’ shoulders, pulling her and her daughter inside his foyer. He shut the door behind them and squatted down to Willow’s height. “Hey,” he said softly. “You don’t have to cry. It’s going to be okay.”

A movement behind Peeta caught Katniss’ eye. A little boy, the spitting image of his father—freckles, messy blond hair, broad shoulders, and all—stood hovering nervously in the kitchen. Katniss smiled at him and nodded in greeting, and the boy smiled back—a gawky, gap-toothed grin, as friendly as his father’s.

He was as precious as his father too.

By the time Katniss looked back down at her own child, Willow had flopped her hands onto Peeta’s shoulders and was bawling her eyes out onto his t-shirt.

“Peeta, I—” Katniss scrambled for the right words, robbed of rational thought when Peeta looked up at her, the steadiness of his gaze cutting through all her armor. He patted her daughter’s back consolingly, hushing her, with each pat her daughter’s cries growing quieter until they were no more than pitiful whimpers.

“I’m so sorry,” Katniss tried to explain again—to say something worth saying. “She’s had a tough time adjusting to…” she swallowed thickly, not sure how much to admit, “…all the changes.” Willow’s arms made their way around Peeta’s neck, holding onto a man who was, for all intents and purposes, a total stranger to her until two minutes ago. “She misses her father,” she added, unnecessarily, like it wasn’t completely obvious from the way Willow was clutching onto him for dear life.

Peeta nodded in understanding, silently encouraging Katniss to say no more.

“Hey, did you want to talk to Ezra?” he asked Willow encouragingly.

She nodded vociferously into his neck.

“Okay,” he chuckled, gently peeling her off him and holding onto her shoulders to angle her toward his son.

Ezra took a few tentative steps out of the kitchen, wiping his palms onto his pants and smiling nervously, even though he towered over her and could ‘Hulk Smash!!!’ her with a single blow if he wanted. “Hi, Willow. I—uh—I didn’t tell on you,” he said. “I don’t know who did.”

“It’s okay,” Willow sniffled. “I deserved to get in trouble. I—I—” she hiccuped and balled her hand into a fist to knuckle at her runny nose. “I’m sorry for being mean to you. I should have let you help with the snow fort and…” she started crying again, the tears falling so fast they were like twin waterfalls cascading down her face. “I’m sorry what I said about… about your m-m-mom. I d-didn’t mean it.”

Peeta stood up and walked toward the kitchen, squeezing his son’s shoulder as he passed him. Katniss remained in the foyer, mortified over what Willow had said and heartsick that Ezra and Peeta had to hear mention of it again, even like this, by way of apology. She took a quick survey of the vicinity, the framed pictures lining the wall up the stairs, the ones in the family room, on the bookshelves and console table. Most of them were of Ezra and Peeta together, or with a group of blond-haired men who looked so much like Peeta they must be his brothers and father. Only a couple were of Peeta’s deceased wife—and both were from when she’d been pregnant with Ezra.

Katniss thought of her own home, how she’d left up a few pictures of Gale with Willow as a reminder to her daughter—or so she’d hoped—that her father loved her, no matter what happened. “Your mom loved you very much,” she told Ezra, moved by the recognition that the boy might question that. “I’m sure of it. Moms… just do. I loved Willow long before I ever saw her face.”

The vulnerability she saw in Ezra’s eyes, his openness and need to be loved, killed her. But the way his father looked at her when he walked back into the foyer, a fistful of Kleenexes in his hand, was worse. Peeta was looking at her like she was the rising and setting sun—a fiery, beautiful, fleeting thing he wanted so badly, despite all his fears, to touch. Whatever vulnerability she saw in the boy was magnified tenfold in his father.

Peeta handed the tissues to Willow, waiting with his hands open and outstretched while she noisily blew her nose into them to collect them from her.

“Did you kids want to play outside for a little bit, before it gets dark?” he asked, glancing at Katniss. “Maybe the two of you can go build a fort together.”

********************

“You can borrow a pair of my gloves if you want,” Ezra offered, not waiting for Willow to reply before opening the coat closet in the hall and pulling out a plastic storage tub overflowing with scarves and hats and mismatched gloves. “Here,” he said, holding out a fleecy gray pair. “I wore these when I was little. I think they’ll fit you.”

“Thanks,” Willow said, biting her lip and reaching out to take them.

“I’m sorry they’re not pink.” He looked down ruefully at her winter boots. He knew how much she loved the color—she always wore pink, every single day. She probably thought the gloves were ugly, and for a second he worried she’d hate him all over again.

She surprised him by smiling. “That’s okay.” She slipped them on, flexing her fingers to show him how well the gloves fit. “These are perfect.”

“Awesome,” he grinned, looking over at his dad and Mrs. Hawthorne, who were now standing next to each other real close. “We’re gonna go play in the backyard,” he told them, feeling triumphant now that it seemed like Willow might be his friend after all. He tugged at her arm to steer her to the back door. “Come on.”

Proudly, he guided her through the kitchen and out onto the back deck, eager for her to see the kingdom that he’d been dying to share with someone else. There was a tree fort that his dad had built when they’d moved in this past summer, a tall, looming structure built into a stand of pine trees, and a trampoline too—although it was too snowy to use either of them right now.

“You can come over when the snow melts, and we can play on those,” he said. “And I have video games too, if you want to come over on a snowy day.” He didn’t care what she wanted to do, though, as long as she was willing to be his friend—he thought it best not to tell her that and push the limits of her friendship.

Plodding into the waist-deep snow, he began scooping out a space for their snow fort. Willow joined him, the two of them working in companionable silence for several minutes. Ezra shot a glance toward the house, where he could see his dad and Mrs. Hawthorne standing in front of the kitchen window, looking out at them. They were standing close again, like moms and dads did, and he felt that familiar twinge of hope tugging at his stomach that maybe the four of them could be a family. He knew his dad liked Mrs. Hawthorne a lot anyway, because he talked about her all the time.

“Your mom is pretty,” Ezra said. When Willow scowled at him, he panicked, not wanting to upset her. “I didn’t mean that in a bad way, just that I can see why my dad likes her. She seems nice.”

Willow looked toward the house, her expression impossible to read. “She is. But if my mom goes out with your dad, I think mine might never come back home.”

Ezra considered her words, packing the base of the foundation for the fort. “Do you still think he might come home—your dad, I mean?” The thought of that upset him somehow, which only made him feel selfish. It would probably be best for Willow and her mom, but…

Her hands packed the snow tightly as she worked next to him, pressing down firmly on it to compact it. “No,” she exhaled. “I guess he doesn’t love us anymore.”

Relief surged through his veins at the thought of this mysterious Mr. Hawthorne staying far away, but he fought hard to hide it. “Oh, I’m sure he loves you.” Ezra was confident of that. “Like your mom said, parents do.”

“I’m not so sure about that,” Willow said bitterly, scooping out an armload of snow from a nearby bank and crushing and shaping it to form the base of one of the walls. “Your dad must love you a lot, though.”

“He does.” Ezra smiled as he thought about all the things he and his dad did together. “We bake cookies and cakes together—he lets me do the frosting—and he takes me to the museum to see dinosaur bones—I’m gonna be an archaeologist—and on the weekends, we stay up real late and watch movies. He’s my best friend.” My only friend, he thought, but chose not to say that out loud. He gulped, feeling a little guilty at the look Willow got on her face as he spoke about his dad. She looked ready to cry, her chin quivering as she fought back the tears welling in her eyes.

“I miss mine.”

Ezra stopped working and plopped his butt down in the snow. He grinned when Willow did too, sitting crisscross applesauce in front of him. Then he laid it all out on the table, the secret hope he’d been carrying with him ever since his dad had asked him who the pretty lady with the braid was, if she was someone’s mommy or a teacher. “You can hang out with me and my dad. And your mom could come too. We could be best friends… if you want.”

Willow looked at him hopefully. “You mean that? After I said all those things?”

Ezra felt himself flushing pink, and he looked away and began building the fort again so that Willow couldn’t read his thoughts. They must be so obvious. He wondered what having a sister would be like. Or a mom. Maybe it could be like this.

“Sure!” he said. “And besides… I know you didn’t mean them.”

A large chunk of snow hit him on the side of the face, but when he whipped his head around in alarm, expecting to see her scowl or to hear her yell at him to shut up, Willow was laughing instead.

He scooped up a large chunk of snow, heaving it back at her in retaliation, wondering if being a brother was anything like this.

If so, it was something he could get used to.

********************

“So… this—ah—wasn’t exactly how I imagined seeing you again.”

Peeta grasped the back of his neck, painfully cognizant of the mess all around him as he saw it for the first time through a woman’s eyes. And not just any woman’s eyes, but hers (were they this gray before, or were they only reflecting the color of today’s sky?). She had to think he was an appalling slob, seeing the natural disorder of his life like this. Boxes in the living room from when he’d moved in. Dirty dishes scattered on TV trays in the family room. The carpet covered in sock lint and cat fur (where was Buttercup anyway?). And all the toys. Everywhere he looked, toys. He hadn’t tidied up in a week. It looked like an indigent hobo lived here—or worse, a bachelor.

Which he technically was and had been for seven years, but he didn’t want her getting the wrong idea that it was a lifestyle choice for him.

“I’m sorry about the mess.” He gestured lamely around him to the whirlwind Ezra had left in his wake, and then stooped to pick up a toy dinosaur off the ground—a diplodocus—gripping it by its slender neck.

“Oh, please,” Katniss scoffed. “I’m the one who should be apologizing… for today… I feel so awful… and then barging in on you tonight. It’s the last thing you need, I’m sure, after working all day. I feel… awful. About all of it.”

“No, don’t be sorry, Katniss.” He said her name just because he could, a recent luxury, and his most favorite. “Really. The kids will be fine—better than fine. And I—ah—love seeing you. Anytime, I don’t care when. It’s just that this—” he sighed and put the dinosaur on the hallway table behind him. “Isn’t exactly what I had in mind for a second date.”

He straightened his glasses by pushing up at the hinge on the right side, thinking about how the date he’d had in mind for them had involved a copious amount of carbs and a shared bottle of wine and a dark movie theater where, if he managed to locate exactly where and when he’d left his balls, he’d hoped to rest his hand on her leg. And then later, at the end of the night, maybe he’d pluck up the nerve to caress the side of her breast while they made out in his car again like a couple of horny teenagers. But he could feel the dampness on his shoulder from where her daughter had trustingly pressed her face, and suddenly this didn’t seem so bad either. It was actually kind of perfect, how right it felt, Katniss and Willow being in his home.

“What did you have in mind?” Katniss asked—or might have. She spoke so softly, and to her shoes, that Peeta couldn’t quite be sure.

“Something a little fancier than a grand tour of my foyer.”

He noticed her face was flushed, and he was half-considering whether he’d had that effect on her when he realized she was still wearing her bulky winter coat. “God, I’m sorry… let me take that. I’m a little rusty. I’m not used to having company over, at least since we moved here… not that I had a lot of company before… I mean, platonically, yes…. But I mean female company… not that this… christ, this sounds like the beginning of a bad porno.” He laughed weakly over how tongue-tied she made him. It wasn’t a problem he’d ever had before with the women he’d dated, not even Delly, who he’d always considered to be the love of his life, but who had never consumed him quite like this.

Katniss laughed, unzipping her coat and sliding it off her arms, her right breast and then left jutting toward him through the thin fabric of her shirt. Peeta took her coat from her, trying not to notice that her nipples were hard—the air in the room must feel so much cooler to her than when she’d been wearing her coat. It was nothing more than that, and it certainly had nothing to do with his stupid porn joke (although that fact did nothing to quench his desire to run his hands over their peaks. He wondered what her breasts would feel like in his hands, about their weight and the smoothness of her skin, and what she would taste like on his tongue if she let him suck on them).

He turned his back to her and walked over to the closet so he could covertly adjust himself.

“Your house is nice,” she said to his back as he hung up her coat in the closet. It was impossible to miss the distinction she made between house and home.

“Yeah, it’s alright. But I guess it’s missing a woman’s touch,” he chuckled.

“I didn’t mean that… I just—” she stammered.

“I’m not offended.” He closed the folding door to the closet and walked toward the kitchen. “Come on,” he said over his shoulder, inviting her in.

He went directly to the fridge, pulling out a gallon of milk. Katniss took a seat on a barstool at the island, resting her elbows on the peel-and-stick tile the previous owners had covered it with and that he had yet to replace (note to self: must make that a priority).

“I thought I’d make us some hot chocolate. They can’t last out there for long. Want some too?” He’d already poured enough milk in the saucepan for all four of them, reckoning that if he couldn’t win her over with an outpouring of witty banter, then maybe his favorite recipe could do the trick.

He looked up at her over the rim of his glasses for her answer, and she smiled and shrugged at him. “Sure.”

With the milk warming on the stove, he grabbed a mixing bowl with a spout and a whisk from the cupboards and then a couple bars of milk chocolate from the pantry. Handing her one, they set to work breaking up the thick bars into small pieces. They worked together, their hands inches apart, as they prepped the chocolate for melting.

“I thought you’d be mad at me,” she said after a couple moments, dropping a handful of broken chunks into the mixing bowl.

He frowned, his hands halting mid-snap. “For what?”

Katniss looked over her shoulder, toward the window overlooking the backyard. “You shouldn’t have to get a phone call from the principal informing you that your son’s heart is broken.” She made a frustrated sound in the back of her throat, a strangled, pained noise. “I’m worried I’m letting her down, Peeta.”

It hadn’t been the highlight of his week, that’s for sure, hearing from Alma Coin. But then it brought Katniss here, and now their kids were playing together outside, so he could only consider that it had been for the best. “Her heart is broken too,” he said. “But you didn’t do that.”

She trapped her lower lip between her teeth, and Peeta fought the urge to reach over and tug it free. Instead, he reached over and grabbed a chunk of her chocolate bar, helping her to break it.

“I think she blames me for her father leaving. I don’t know… maybe I blame me.”

“It’s not your fault, what he did.” The asshole.

“No. And if I’m being honest, one of us had to do it first… end it. There was some… dark, twisted sadness between us that only got worse over time. Like we’d let each other give up on our dreams, and then we gave up each other.”

None of that justified cheating, but he didn’t point that out. “You were young when you met him.”

The milk began to bubble in the saucepan, so he turned around, preferring to watch it simmer than to see the pained look on Katniss’ face when she talked about her ex-husband.

“Yeah, um… it was the summer after we graduated high school. And then, within a couple months I found out that I was pregnant… nothing says happily ever after like an unplanned teenage pregnancy, right?”

He smiled ruefully at the milk, flicking off the heat. It was telling she hadn’t said we. She’d said ‘I was pregnant.’ With Delly, it had been we, from the minute they’d seen the matching blue lines to the minute the lines on her heart monitor went flat. Of course they’d been trying for a baby, and had been a good ten years older and entirely committed to each other. But Katniss had deserved to be a we too, to have someone there every step of the way. She still did.

He poured the milk carefully into the mixing bowl, watching it melt the chocolate in channels and gullies.

“But I’d do it all again, if it meant having her,” Katniss added softly.

“Yeah. The same here. And I mean… I know Delly would feel the same way too.” He waited a moment for the milk to soften the chocolate, and then he began to whisk the contents of the bowl, whisking hard enough to try to stir out the bitterness he felt at the admission. Acknowledging that he wouldn’t change the outcome—if it was a choice between having Ezra or not—had taken him years to even think. It still wasn’t something he’d really ever admitted out loud, much less to someone else.

And not just anyone else, but now to her.

He pulled open a narrow cupboard and began to sift through the spice rack, grabbing the salt, cinnamon, and cayenne (his secret, favorite ingredient).

“Were there ever times you felt like you were letting him down too, after you lost her?”

“All the time,” he laughed, mixing in the spices. “It was me, my two older brothers, and my dad trying to raise a baby. Guess how well that went?” He was grabbing mugs from the cupboard when she spoke, and he kicked himself in the ass for that because he’d give anything to see her face when she said it—

“It looks like you did an amazing job to me.”

He spoke past the lump in his throat. “Well, I still feel that way, sometimes, that I’m letting him down. I’m all he’s got, and he deserves a hell of a lot more. Delly and I had wanted a large family… and now it’s just the two of us.” He filled the mugs, one at a time, until all four were brimming with the creamy umber-colored liquid. He slid one her way, and grabbed one for himself before he walked over to the window to check on the kids. They were happier than two pigs in shit, pushing around piles of snow like they were building a wall to protect the world from the Wildlings and White Walkers. Katniss joined him, standing so close their hands brushed together.

It had been a while since he’d held a woman’s hand, and he didn’t think there had even been a time he’d wanted to touch someone more than he did now. So he did it—twined his fingers through hers. She looked at him, surprised, but he only smiled down at her and blew into the steaming liquid in his mug. Her eyes fell to his lips, and christ, he wanted to kiss her, but their kids were ten feet away, and they were framed in a pane of glass.

“He’s a great kid,” she told him, wresting her eyes away and turning her head to look out the window. “So generous and kind.”

“You’re doing a great job too, you know.” He ran his thumb from her wrist to the tip of her thumb in a smooth, comforting line. “I mean, look at that.”

Willow and Ezra were working side-by-side, gabbing away and rolling the snow into balls and chunks, packing and shifting and moving it in tandem.

“They’ll be inseparable now,” she said, a smile in her voice, as she held her mug up to her lips with her left hand and took a small sip.

God, I hope so.

Peeta looked down at Katniss, admiring the renegade wisp of hair that had sprung free from her braid and was framing the delicate lines of her face. He wanted to kiss her, to paint her, to love her.

“Did you want to stay for a while… watch a movie or something with us?” It was a school night, but he had to ask. One way or another, he wanted that movie with her.

“Sure,” she said, and he hated that she sounded so surprised to be asked. Who were the idiots and inbreds that hadn’t treated this woman like a fucking goddess? “We can stay a while.”

You could stay always.

They stood together in companionable silence, gripping each other’s hands and watching their children play together, until the playing devolved into a chaotic snow fight.

“She’s gonna be soaked to the bone,” Katniss grumbled.

“She can borrow some of Ezra’s old pajamas to wear during the movie. He’s got some pretty stellar Minions thermals I think will fit her. But lemme go call them in.” He lifted their intertwined hands and pressed a kiss to the back of hers, dragging his lower lip across her skin.

Reluctantly, he let her go and walked over to the door, yelling out for the kids to come back in for the night.

The kids yelled back, their whining and wheedling loud enough to come from a horde of fifty. “Do we have to?” they cried in unison.

Peeta shot a glance over his shoulder at Katniss and shrugged, not exactly wanting to be bad cop. “What do you say, five more minutes?”

Katniss smiled and left her mug on the table, walking toward him and mouthing, “Make it ten.”

Yup. Works for me.

“Ten more minutes,” he yelled out the door closing it hastily and locking it—why did he lock it?

No sooner had he asked himself that than Katniss reached him, pressing her hands to his chest. She leaned up on her tiptoes and planted a chaste kiss to his lips.

It was perfect agony, her hands on him, her lips on his. Without thinking, he wrapped his arms around her waist, drawing her against his body. His right hand found a free will of its own, roaming down to her ass and kneading her cheek. Katniss groaned into his mouth, winding her hands into his hair to tug him closer as they kissed. He didn’t care if she could feel how achingly hard he was for her because it was so painfully easy, being with her. And he wanted her to know that he was a man who wanted all of her, every part of her she was willing to give.

When she pulled away for air, panting and wild-eyed, Peeta took in the scene before him—Katniss standing in his arms, in his kitchen. The door was closed behind him but all he could see were possibilities for the future. They were as exciting as they were terrifying. The kids behind them, the kids ahead of them—this woman could be the mother of all his children, if she wanted. And he could be the father to all hers.

For the first time since he held his newborn son in his arms, he wasn’t afraid of wanting that. He wanted to give that to her.

He wanted to give her everything.

#Everlark birthday drabbles #peetasallhehasleft #anon

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madeahashofit · 5 years

Text

Code is *NOT* Poetry

Below is Walt Whitman’s When I Heard the Learn’d Astronomer

When I heard the learn’d astronomer, When the proofs, the figures, were ranged in columns before me, When I was shown the charts and diagrams, to add, divide, and measure them, When I sitting heard the astronomer where he lectured with much applause in the lecture-room, How soon unaccountable I became tired and sick, Till rising and gliding out I wander’d off by myself, In the mystical moist night-air, and from time to time, Look’d up in perfect silence at the stars.

The same poem read by one of the humans on Librivox

Read by the Character Gale on Breaking Bad

youtube

Here is the same poem displayed using javascript, via codepen:

See the Pen JgjdjP by bluthgeld (@bluthgeld) on CodePen.0

Can you see the differences among these items?

***

Earlier this week I shared a link to a Twitter thread that had been making it round my timeline:

This is insane…

Until I hard read this thread I had never clocked the concept of a “10X developer.”

On, you haven’t either? That’s probably best for the best; it’ll save you from the anxiety of believing that it’s something you should be.

A 10X engineer or developer is said to be a man – always a man – who can do 10 times the work of the average developer in the same number of hours. Whether this man/machine hybrid actually exists in the meatverse is subject to much debate in the darkest depths of Reddit and the Twitter Machine. Still, that controversy hasn’t stopped developers and coders from putting “10X” in their bios/linked in pages, and hiring managers and Vulture capitalists like the dude above from hunting that particular Unicorn.

I’ve worked with these guys before. Not just Developers/Engineers, but also sysadmin, guys who couldn’t be bothered to put on clean jorts or show up for a mid-day meeting. He’s got more important things to do, like manning the ramparts against midnight blackhats or playing WoW.

To a Carpenter, Every Problem is a Nail

Probably Your Dad…

They are insanely good at ticking off the bullet points on their job description, there is no doubt about that. However, they fail at the soft stuff: working with others, listening, considering thoughts/feelings/opinions of anyone “nontechnical.” A developer with the attributes listed in the Twitter thread may be able to make magic, but only the magic that they want to create. You won’t have a conversation with them over the watercooler. And they will not see any solution to a problem that goes beyond their own experience with the world. To a Carpenter, Every Problem is a Nail.

Like white, male developers building facial recognition technology that mistakes black women for men, narrow thinking, tunnel vision, and limited experience can bake limitations into our code.

And that would be fine if HR and hiring managers were just looking for these magical beings, these 10X Unicorns. But executives, looking to maximize their hiring dollars, absolutely look for these attributes in the Quarter Horses1 who do the actual work of making a company full of actual human beings produce software to be used by other human beings.

If you ask about work-life balance during an interview and the hiring manager gives an ironic smile, you can believe there is none. They want 10X in 100% of their people.

***

The value of a Liberal Arts education has taken a beating, since at least the first half of the Clinton administration. I have a fine arts degree. When I left high school and took the Amtrak up to Boston to learn how to tell stories, many of my peers went into engineering, hard sciences, medicine, computer science. A lot of people thought I was insane.

Here’s a typical dictum, from Sun Microsystems cofounder Vinod Khosla: “Little of the material taught in Liberal Arts programs today is relevant to the future.”

As said by someone who’s never read a book…

I can remember, distinctly, listening to Tom Friedman on some morning talk show, pontificating about how the world, as flat as it was, would need American’s to be the managers of the information society. An American (man), he implied, would be best served with a background in a very specific science or a very specific technical skill (like plumbing). Art, music, books, would still exist, of course, but for downtime, weekends, vacation. In the 90s, we were all headed for 4 day workweeks.

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To the leaders of the free world, philosophy, history, art were hobbies to be pursued after we provided management to the workers of the world.

Still, it looks like the recognized value of a solid, well rounded liberal arts education is resurgent:

If we want to prepare students to solve large-scale human problems, Hartley argues, we must push them to widen, not narrow, their education and interests. He ticks off a long list of successful tech leaders who hold degrees in the humanities. To mention just a few CEOs: Stewart Butterfield, Slack, philosophy; Jack Ma, Alibaba, English; Susan Wojcicki, YouTube, history and literature; Brian Chesky, Airbnb, fine arts. Of course, we need technical experts, Hartley says, but we also need people who grasp the whys and hows of human behavior.

What matters now is not the skills you have but how you think. Can you ask the right questions? Do you know what problem you’re trying to solve in the first place? Hartley argues for a true “liberal arts” education—one that includes both hard sciences and “softer” subjects. A well-rounded learning experience, he says, opens people up to new opportunities and helps them develop products that respond to real human needs.

***

This blog is a self hosted WordPress blog. The WordPress motto is “Code is Poetry.” Until my time at Flatiron, I hadn’t thought someone would believe that.

Poetry, like a photograph or a painting or a novel, is an object crafted by a human being. Not unlike Ruby or Javascript. It is designed to transmit information. Not just the facts on the page, but an emotion or feeling from the writer to the reader. Yes, art does fail to achieve this more often than not, though even objectively “bad” poetry will mean something, to someone. Rearrange the words on the page, change the structure or the syntax of a sentence and even that can mean something. See the work of e.e. cummings.

Code, on the other hand, fails completely when syntax and structure is not met exactly. Remove this line from the codepen above and see what happens:

const main = document.querySelector('main')

Code is a set of specific instructions from a human to a compiler on a computer. It may be satisfying to write it well, to achieve the same programming objective with fewer lines than the time before. To be efficient. Code itself transmits no meaning or feeling to a reader; what it produces may, but the code itself does not.

Code is the book. Code is the paper, the letterpress, the type, the ink. Code is the glue and binding. Code is even the postage stamp and brown kraft padded envelope that brings a slim volume of poetry to my house.

But it’s not the poetry. Words infused with human feeling and human thoughts, absent precise grammar, syntax, or even punctuation can still bring joy to the reader, bridge understanding between two people. The same is not true with code. Broken code fails completely to impart meaning to neither a human nor a computer. Code, when successful, is meaningful for what it imparts, not what it is.

***

Anyone can write a poem. Anyone can write code.2 To believe that they are somehow equivalent constructions betrays a fundamental misunderstanding of art and communication between actual people. In much of my reading, some work experience, and the links above suggest that there are those in our field that make hiring and firing decisions based on the idea that the arts and soft sciences are not important. That a coder should have no interests other than code. That coding is *the* solution, not the mechanism for delivering a solution.

If we don’t know or care about how people will use our software, we will fail. Or worse, create problems that cannot be refactored out of our code. See Facebook and disinformation or Twitter and hate. Both of these entrenched problems stem from a fundamental lack of understanding by their creators, willful or otherwise, of how humans use their products or how people share ideas. Zuckerberg and Dorsey can not see solutions to the problems they have created for our society. Not because there aren’t solutions, but rather, their owners do not have the imagination (or access to people with that imagination) to identify or implement solutions.

To stretch that metaphor to the breaking point ↩

At least, that’s the promise of the Flatiron program. ↩

First Published Here http://tiwygwymw.us/hx

by Robert Pedersen

#10X #breaking bad #coding #dorsey #facebook #flatiron #not poetry #poetry #thomas friedman #twitter #walt whitman #zuckerberg

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lodelss · 5 years

Link

On Lampedusa, a fisherman once asked me: “You know what fish has come back? Sea bass.”

Then he’d lit a cigarette and smoked the whole thing down to the butt in silence.

“And you know why sea bass have come back to this stretch of sea? You know what they eat? That’s right.”

And he’d stubbed out his cigarette and turned to go.

There was nothing more, truly, to be said.

What had stuck with me about Lampedusa were the calluses on the hands of the fishermen; the stories they told of constantly finding dead bodies when they hauled in their nets (“What do you mean, ‘constantly’?” and they’d say, “Do you know what ‘constantly’ means? Constantly”); scattered refugee boats rusting in the sunlight, perhaps nowadays the only honest form of testimony left to us — corrosion, grime, rust — of what’s happening in this period of history; the islanders’ doubts about the meaning of it all; the word “landing,” misused for years, because by now these were all genuine rescues, with the refugee boats escorted into port and the poor devils led off to the Temporary Settlement Center; and the Lampedusans who dressed them with their own clothing in a merciful response that sought neither spotlights nor publicity, but just because it was cold out and those were bodies in need of warmth.

Haze blurred our line of sight.

The horizon shimmered.

I noticed for what must have been the thousandth time how astonished I was to see how Lampedusa could unsettle its guests, creating in them an overwhelming sense of estrangement. The sky so close that it almost seemed about to collapse on top of us. The ever-present voice of the wind. The light that hits you from all directions. And before your eyes, always, the sea, the eternal crown of joy and thorns that surrounds everything. It’s an island on which the elements hammer at you with nothing able to stop them. There are no shelters. You’re pierced by the environment, riven by the light and the wind. No defense is possible.

It had been a long, long day.

I heard my father’s voice calling my name, while the sirocco tossed and tangled my thoughts.

I happened to meet the scuba diver at a friend’s house.

It was just the two of us.

The first, persistent sensation was this: He was huge.

His first words were these: “No tape recorders.”

He went over and sat down on the other side of the table from me and crossed his arms.

He kept them folded across his chest the whole time.

“I’m not talking about October third,” he added, his mouth snapping shut after these words in a way that defied argument.

His tone of voice was consistently low and measured, in sharp contrast with that imposing bulk. Sometimes, in his phrases, uttered with the sounds of his homeland — he was born in the mountains of the deepest north of Italy, where the sea is, more than anything else, an abstraction — there also surfaced words from my dialect, Sicilian. The ten years he’d spent in Sicily for work had left traces upon him. For an instant, the sounds of the south took possession of that gigantic body, dominating him. Then the moment would come to an end and he’d run out of things to say and just stare at me, in all his majesty, like a mountain of the north.

Before your eyes, always, the sea, the eternal crown of joy and thorns that surrounds everything.

He’d become a diver practically by sheer chance, a shot at a job that he’d jumped at immediately after completing his military service.

“We divers are used to dealing with death, from day one they told us it would be something we’d encounter. They tell us over and over, starting on the first day of training: People die at sea. And it’s true. All it takes is a single mistake during a dive and you die. Miscalculate and you die. Just expect too much of yourself and you die. Underwater, death is your constant companion, always.”

He’d been called to Lampedusa as a rescue swimmer, one of those men on the patrol boats who wear bright orange wetsuits and dive in during rescue operations.

He told me just how tough the scuba diving course had been, lingering on the mysterious beauty of being underwater, when the sea is so deep that sunlight can’t filter down that far and everything is dark and silent. The whole time he’d been on the island, he’d been doing special training to make sure he could perform his new job at an outstanding level.

He said: “I’m not a leftist. If anything, the complete opposite.”

His family, originally monarchists, had become Fascists. He, too, was in tune with those political ideas.

He added: “What we’re doing here is saving lives. At sea, every life is sacred. If someone needs help, we rescue them. There are no colors, no ethnic groups, no religions. That’s the law of the sea.”

Then, suddenly, he stared at me.

He was enormous even when he was sitting down. “When you rescue a child in the open sea and you hold him in your arms . . .”

And he started to cry, silently.

His arms were still folded across his chest.

I wondered what he could have seen, what he’d lived through, just how much death this giant across the table had faced off with.

After more than a minute of silence, words resurfaced in the room. He said that these people should never have set out for Italy in the first place, and that in Italy the government was doing a bad job of taking them in, wastefully and with a demented approach to issues of management. Then he reiterated the concept one more time: “At sea, you can’t even think about an alternative, every life is sacred, and you have to help anyone who is in need, period.” That phrase was more than a mantra. It was a full-fledged act of devotion.

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He unfolded his words slowly, as if they were careful steps down the steep side of a mountain.

“The most dangerous situation is when there are many vessels close together. You have to take care not to get caught between them because, if the seas are rough, you could easily be crushed if there’s a collision. I was really in danger only once: There was a force-eight gale, I was in the water with my back to a refugee boat loaded down with people, and I saw the hull of our vessel coming straight at me, shoved along by a twenty-five-foot wave. I moved sideways with a furious lunge that I never would have believed I could pull off. The two hulls crashed together. People fell into the water. I started swimming to pick them up. When I returned from that mission, I still had the picture of that hull coming to crush me before my eyes. I sat there on the edge of the dock, alone, for several minutes, until I could get that sensation of narrowly averted death out of my mind.”

He explained that when you’re out on the open water, the minute you reach the point from where the call for help was launched, you invariably find some new and unfamiliar situation.

“Sometimes, everything purrs along smoothly, they’re calm and quiet, the sea isn’t choppy, it doesn’t take us long to get them all aboard our vessels. Sometimes, they get so worked up that there’s a good chance of the refugee boat overturning during the rescue operations. You always need to manage to calm them down. Always. That’s a top priority. Sometimes, when we show up on the scene, the refugee boat has just overturned, and there are bodies scattered everywhere. So, you have to work as quickly as you can. There is no standard protocol. You just decide what to do there and then. You can swim in a circle around groups of people, pulling a line to tie them together and reel them in, all at once. Sometimes, the sea is choppy and they’ll all sink beneath the waves right before your eyes. In those cases, all you can do is try to rescue as many as you can.”

I have the distinct sensation that I’m face-to-face with human beings who carry an entire graveyard inside them.

There followed a long pause, a pause that went on and on. His gaze no longer came to rest on the wall behind me. It went on, out to some spot on the Mediterranean Sea that he would never forget.

“If you’re face-to-face with three people going under and twenty-five feet farther on a mother is drowning with her child, what do you do? Where do you head? Who do you save first? The three guys who are closer to you, or the mother and her newborn who are farther away?”

It was a vast, boundless question.

It was as if time and space had curved back upon themselves, bringing him face-to-face with that cruel scene all over again.

The screams of the past still resonated.

He was enormous, that diver.

He looked invulnerable.

And yet, inside, he had to have been a latter-day Saint Sebastian, riddled with a quiverful of agonizing choices.

“The little boy is tiny, the mother extremely young. There they are, twenty-five feet away from me. And then, right here, in front of me, three other people are drowning. So, who should I save, then, if they’re all going under at the same instant? Who should I strike out for? What should I do? Calculate. It’s all you can do in certain situations. Mathematics. Three is bigger than two. Three lives are one more life than two lives.”

And he stopped talking.

Outside the sky was cloudy, there was a wind blowing out of the southwest, the sea was choppy. I thought to myself: Every time, every single time, I have the distinct sensation that I’m face-to-face with human beings who carry an entire graveyard inside them.

I tried calling my uncle Beppe, my father’s brother. We called each other pretty frequently. Often my uncle would ask me: “But why doesn’t my brother ever call me?” I’d answer: “He doesn’t even call me, and I’m his first-born son, Beppuzzo, it’s just the way he is.”

The phone rang and rang for more than a minute, with no answer.

I hung up and went back inside.

We ate dinner, tuna cooked in sweet-and-sour onions and a salad of fennel, orange slices, and smoked herring.

There were four of us sitting around the table: Paola, Melo, my father, and me.

We were at Cala Pisana, at Paola’s house. Paola is a friend of mine. She’s a lawyer who’s given up her practice and has lived on Lampedusa for years now. There, with her boyfriend Melo, she runs the bed and breakfast where I usually stay as my base of operations whenever I’m doing research on the island.

I was setting forth my considerations on that exceedingly long day, in a conversation with Paola. From time to time, Melo would nod, producing small sounds, monosyllabic at the very most. My father, on the other hand, made no sounds whatsoever. He was the silent guest. Patiently, with his gaze turned directly to the eyes of whoever was speaking, he displayed a considerable ability to listen that he’d developed in the forty-plus years he’d practiced his profession, cardiology. He invited people to tell him things just by the way he held his body.

I was considering out loud that everything happening on Lampedusa went well beyond shipwrecks, beyond a simple count of the survivors, beyond the list of the drowned.

“It’s something bigger than crossing the desert and even bigger than crossing the Mediterranean itself, to such a degree that this rocky island in the middle of the sea has become a symbol, powerful and yet at the same time elusive, a symbol that is studied and narrated in a vast array of languages: reporting, documentaries, short stories, films, biographies, postcolonial studies, and ethnographic research. Lampedusa itself is now a container-word: migration, borders, shipwrecks, human solidarity, tourism, summer season, marginal lives, miracles, heroism, desperation, heartbreak, death, rebirth, redemption, all of it there in a single name, in an impasto that still seems to defy a clear interpretation or a recognizable form.”

Lampedusa itself is now a container-word: migration, borders, shipwrecks, human solidarity, tourism, summer season, marginal lives, miracles, heroism, desperation, heartbreak, death, rebirth, redemption, all of it there in a single name.

Papà had remained silent the whole time. His blue eyes were a well of still water in whose depths you could read no judgment whatsoever.

Paola had just poured herself an espresso.

“Lampedusa is a container-word,” she repeated under her breath, nodding to herself more than to me.

She sugared her coffee and went on with her thoughts. “And in a container, sure enough, you can put anything you like.”

Little by little, with a gradual rising tone, her voice grew louder, and the pace of her words became increasingly relentless.

“In the container called Lampedusa, you really can fit everything and the opposite of everything. Take the Center where the young people are brought after they land. Do you remember? You saw it when you came back here the year after the Arab Spring.”

It was the summer of 2012 and I’d asked a few Lampedusan piccirìddi — kids — who I’d met on the beach: “Do you all ever go to the Center?” I was fantasizing about the idea that the structure where anyone who landed on Lampedusa was taken must somehow constitute a focus of enormous fascination for them. “E che ci ham’a iri a fare?” those children had replied in dialect. I was stunned to hear their answer: “Why on earth would we bother with that place?” I had been convinced, until that moment, that the presence of new arrivals must have generated a monstrous well of curiosity, becoming the sole topic of conversation, of play, of adventure. Something rooted in the epic dimension.

“Would you take me there?” I’d asked them, hesitantly, already anticipating my defeat.

“We’d rather die.”

There was nothing about the Center that appealed to them, it had never interested them. Only after I finally saw it did I understand that I had committed an enormous mistake: I’d interacted with the children but used the parameters of an adult. Along the road that leads to the Center, there was nothing but rocks, brushwood, and dry-laid stone walls upon which signs appeared here and there, reading for sale. The only form of life was a thunderous bedlam of crickets. It was an arid place. Of course the piccirìddi never went there, there was nothing fun to do, nowhere to play. Myths aren’t built out of nothing.

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The Center had been built from the ground up on the site of an old army barracks. A number of dormitory structures, an open plaza, an enclosure fence. For all intents and purposes, it looked like a prison.

“Has anything changed about the Center in the last few years?” I asked Paola.

“The name. At first it was called the Temporary Settlement Center, then the Center for Identification and Expulsion, and now it’s a Hot Spot Center, whatever that’s supposed to mean. The governments change, the names rotate, but the structure is always the same: Under normal conditions it can hold 250 people, in an emergency situation it could take in at the very most 381 full-time residents. Those are the numbers, you can’t increase the number of bathrooms, or, for that matter, the number of beds. And in 2011 more than two thousand people were packed in there, for days and days, without being told at all what was to become of them. The world applauded the Arab Spring, and then imprisoned its protagonists. Was this the best response we could provide to their demands? And do you know what you create by keeping too many people shut up in such a small space? Rage. That’s how you create wild animals. And, in fact, a revolt broke out; they burned their mattresses and set fire to one wing of the structure.”

My father listened impassively, even though — clearly listening, but remaining opaque, inscrutable — he had to be squirreling away all that information. Melo was chewing on his lower lip, Paola continued to talk without taking her eyes off the demitasse of espresso.

“The Center, at least on paper, is supposed to be a containment facility if nothing else, right? And in fact, there’s a hole in the fence around the Center. I think it dates back to that period in 2011, but I couldn’t rule out by any means that the hole was there even earlier. It’s a great big hole and it works as a pressure valve, in fact, allowing the young men to get out, take a walk, come into town to try to get in touch with their families by using the Internet through the generosity of a number of residents. And what are you going to do, if a little kid asks you to let him talk to his mother to let her know that he’s still alive? Tell him he can’t use your computer?”

She’d continued to stir her espresso, tiny spoon in little demitasse. The sound of steel rattling against porcelain had punctuated the cadence of her words, like a rhythmic counterpoint, necessary to keep from losing the thread, to keep from plummeting body and soul into an abyss of screaming.

“Believe me, Davidù, it’s a good thing that hole is there. It’s a door, a way of keeping them from feeling like caged animals. So, you see what the point is? The Center is a structure garrisoned by the police force, inside which no one can go without special authorization. Not even a priest can go in. The facade remains intact. But in the fence, there’s always been a hole. It’s a well-known fact and no one does anything about it. And it’s a good thing that no one does anything about it, let me say that for the thousandth time. Here is a concrete example of how closely emergency and hypocrisy have to coexist, bureaucracy and solidarity, common sense and cult of appearances. Lampedusa is a container of opposites, for real.”

History is sending people ahead, in flesh and blood, people of every age.

Through the open window came the roar of waves, water rising, tumbling, crashing down onto the sand, pouring back out, and starting over again, in an endless relaunching. Melo, seated at the head of the table, had consigned himself to silence, just like my father. Melo, too, spoke little if at all, the whole day through, at most a bare handful of words, often drawled out, because speaking costs effort and effort is a burden.

Paola sipped her coffee slowly, and it wasn’t until she’d finished it that she started talking again.

“It is History that’s taking place, Davidù. And History is complicated, a mosaic full of tiles of different shapes and sizes, sometimes similar, other times diametrically opposed, yet all of them necessary in order for the final picture to emerge. No, wait, let me correct myself: It’s not that History’s taking place now. It’s been taking place for twenty years.”

She started taking long drags on a cigarette, her third in half an hour.

“As you had an opportunity to understand yourself this morning, the scale of this event can be perceived immediately when you witness a landing. But even if someone never had a chance to witness one, what can you expect them to care about the history of your, my, our perceptions? History is already determining the course of the world, tracing out the future, structurally modifying the present. It’s an unstoppable movement. And this time, History is sending people ahead, in flesh and blood, people of every age. They set sail across the water, they land here. Lampedusa isn’t an exit, it’s a leg in a longer journey.”

She crushed her cigarette out in the ashtray while Melo poured himself what beer remained in the bottle. Through the open window, warm fall air pushed into the room, scented with hot sand and salt-sea brine.

In the days following the Arab Spring, mass arrivals had begun on the shores of Lampedusa. An island resident named Piera had happened to be down at Porto Nuovo, or New Port, to supervise the efforts of the town constables.

“I’ve still got the scene before my eyes, it was completely insane! So many people had landed that you couldn’t make your way through the port. They were everywhere, the wharf was packed and the vessels were coming in and landing, more people one right after the other. A procession of refugee boats! And they were coming ashore by the thousands! We were there to give them a hand, but we were hardly prepared for anything like those numbers. A carabiniere was telling all the new arrivals in French to move over to the hill to make room for the others, and in the meantime new boats were coming in from the sea, all of them packed to the gunwales, and there was just no time to move people aside before the new refugee boats had already landed more young people. I really couldn’t begin to guess how many thousands came in that afternoon, it was impossible to count them, seven thousand, eight thousand, nine thousand, there was no settled number. And how could we ever reckon that number? There were more of them than there were islanders on Lampedusa, that much is certain. The ones who were standing on the hill, as soon as the boats came in carrying their families — wives, husbands, children — would rush down to rejoin their loved ones. An incredibly crazy scene: The police would try to separate them and we were caught in the middle, knocked back and forth. You couldn’t figure out what was going on. And from the sea, boat after boat kept arriving, so many of them, in quick succession. A flotilla! No one had ever seen such a thing. There was a gentleman who arrived with a falcon on his arm. On another refugee boat, one young Tunisian had brought his own sheep. A lovely sheep! A breed of sheep I’d never seen in my life, spectacular. A thick coat of wool, very curly! Stupendous. But in the end, we had to put the animal down. There was no alternative.”

There were more foreigners than residents on Lampedusa, more than ten thousand refugees as compared to five thousand islanders. Fear and curiosity coexisted with mistrust and pity. The shutters remained fastened tight, or else they’d open to hand out sweaters and shoes, electric adapters to charge cell phones, glasses of water, a chair to sit on, and a seat at the table to break bread together. These were flesh-and-blood people, right there before our eyes, not statistics you read about in the newspapers or numbers shouted out over the television. And so, in a sort of overtime of aid and assistance, people found and distributed ponchos because it was raining out, or they cooked five pounds of pasta because those young people were hungry and hadn’t eaten in days.

Everyone had been abandoned to their own devices.

The following year, the Italian government proudly proclaimed the figure of “zero landings on Lampedusa” as if it were a medal of honor to be pinned to its chest.

“And it’s true,” Paola had assured me that summer in 2012. “No boats are landing here anymore. We didn’t even see any in the spring. And do you know why? When the refugee boats are intercepted they’re escorted all the way to Sicily, and that’s where the landings take place, far out of the spotlight. Which means: zero landings on Lampedusa. From a purely statistical point of view, the logic is impeccable. And yet, you see? The island is fragmented, in the throes of anxiety, tumbled and tossed in this media maelstrom, a hail of contradictions. People talk less and less and, when they do, it’s only to complain about concrete problems, such as the lack of a hospital, for instance, or the cost of gasoline, which here is the highest in all of Italy. And they point out, with a touch of bitterness, that all the attention is always focused on those who arrived over the water, while the everyday challenges that we residents face don’t really seem to matter to anyone, except to us.”

There was the vacation season, the real engine of the island’s economy, to get up and running.

From time to time, someone would shoot a furtive glance toward the horizon.

“Sooner or later, something will come back to these beaches,” a fisherman had told me. That prediction, shared by all the residents, came true the following year, on October 3, 2013. It was an event that outpaced even our wildest nightmares. A refugee boat overturned just a few hundred yards off the coast of the island, the waters filled up with corpses, and Lampedusa was overrun by coffins and television news crews. What had actually changed in the recent years, after all, were just the minor details. The corpses found in the fishing nets, for example, were simply tossed back into the sea in order to prevent the fishing boats from being confiscated and held in a subsequent investigation. The reports of alleged sinkings — alleged because the only sources were the words of those who had traveled on sister refugee boats — were only mentioned at the tail end of the newscasts. In the absence of a corpse, it’s always better to leave death confined to territories that everyone prefers not to explore. And yet, in the months that preceded the October tragedy, the everyday rescue work carried out by the Italian Coast Guard continued as always, people continued to trek across the Sahara, women continued to be raped in Libyan prisons, the refugee boats and the rubber dinghies set sail and were intercepted, or else they sank.

History certainly hadn’t stopped.

* * *

Davide Enia was born in 1974 in Palermo, Italy. He has written, directed, and performed in plays for the stage and for radio. Enia has been honored with the Ubu Prize, the Tondelli Award, and the ETI Award, Italy’s three most prestigious theater prizes. He lives and cooks in Rome.

Longreads Editor: Dana Snitzky

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lodelss · 5 years

Text

Notes on a Shipwreck

On Lampedusa, a fisherman once asked me: “You know what fish has come back? Sea bass.”

Then he’d lit a cigarette and smoked the whole thing down to the butt in silence.

“And you know why sea bass have come back to this stretch of sea? You know what they eat? That’s right.”

And he’d stubbed out his cigarette and turned to go.

There was nothing more, truly, to be said.

Haze blurred our line of sight.

The horizon shimmered.

It had been a long, long day.

I heard my father’s voice calling my name, while the sirocco tossed and tangled my thoughts.

I happened to meet the scuba diver at a friend’s house.

It was just the two of us.

The first, persistent sensation was this: He was huge.

His first words were these: “No tape recorders.”

He went over and sat down on the other side of the table from me and crossed his arms.

He kept them folded across his chest the whole time.

“I’m not talking about October third,” he added, his mouth snapping shut after these words in a way that defied argument.

Before your eyes, always, the sea, the eternal crown of joy and thorns that surrounds everything.

He’d become a diver practically by sheer chance, a shot at a job that he’d jumped at immediately after completing his military service.

He’d been called to Lampedusa as a rescue swimmer, one of those men on the patrol boats who wear bright orange wetsuits and dive in during rescue operations.

He said: “I’m not a leftist. If anything, the complete opposite.”

His family, originally monarchists, had become Fascists. He, too, was in tune with those political ideas.

Then, suddenly, he stared at me.

He was enormous even when he was sitting down. “When you rescue a child in the open sea and you hold him in your arms . . .”

And he started to cry, silently.

His arms were still folded across his chest.

I wondered what he could have seen, what he’d lived through, just how much death this giant across the table had faced off with.

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He unfolded his words slowly, as if they were careful steps down the steep side of a mountain.

He explained that when you’re out on the open water, the minute you reach the point from where the call for help was launched, you invariably find some new and unfamiliar situation.

I have the distinct sensation that I’m face-to-face with human beings who carry an entire graveyard inside them.

There followed a long pause, a pause that went on and on. His gaze no longer came to rest on the wall behind me. It went on, out to some spot on the Mediterranean Sea that he would never forget.

It was a vast, boundless question.

It was as if time and space had curved back upon themselves, bringing him face-to-face with that cruel scene all over again.

The screams of the past still resonated.

He was enormous, that diver.

He looked invulnerable.

And yet, inside, he had to have been a latter-day Saint Sebastian, riddled with a quiverful of agonizing choices.

And he stopped talking.

The phone rang and rang for more than a minute, with no answer.

I hung up and went back inside.

We ate dinner, tuna cooked in sweet-and-sour onions and a salad of fennel, orange slices, and smoked herring.

There were four of us sitting around the table: Paola, Melo, my father, and me.

I was considering out loud that everything happening on Lampedusa went well beyond shipwrecks, beyond a simple count of the survivors, beyond the list of the drowned.

Papà had remained silent the whole time. His blue eyes were a well of still water in whose depths you could read no judgment whatsoever.

Paola had just poured herself an espresso.

“Lampedusa is a container-word,” she repeated under her breath, nodding to herself more than to me.

She sugared her coffee and went on with her thoughts. “And in a container, sure enough, you can put anything you like.”

Little by little, with a gradual rising tone, her voice grew louder, and the pace of her words became increasingly relentless.

“Would you take me there?” I’d asked them, hesitantly, already anticipating my defeat.

“We’d rather die.”

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“Has anything changed about the Center in the last few years?” I asked Paola.

History is sending people ahead, in flesh and blood, people of every age.

Paola sipped her coffee slowly, and it wasn’t until she’d finished it that she started talking again.

She started taking long drags on a cigarette, her third in half an hour.

Everyone had been abandoned to their own devices.

The following year, the Italian government proudly proclaimed the figure of “zero landings on Lampedusa” as if it were a medal of honor to be pinned to its chest.

There was the vacation season, the real engine of the island’s economy, to get up and running.

From time to time, someone would shoot a furtive glance toward the horizon.

History certainly hadn’t stopped.

* * *

Longreads Editor: Dana Snitzky

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