#My clay sculptures keep breaking when they dry

[evilautismcrusades]

The Trials and Tribulations of the Jebble Sculpture

Once upon a six hours ago, I had a dream. It was a dream of creativity, of beauty, and of my beloved insane jester. It was a dream of cherishing him, a wish to hold him in my hands.

I didn't yet have access to getting my grubby mitts on an official Jebble talking plush, but what I did have was clay.

My first attempt begun smoothly. I had forgotten at the time that I owned oven-bake Sculpey polymer clay, and as such I used the more obscure Sculpey air-dry clay for my creation. I worked slowly, tediously carving each and every silly detail into his goofy round face, delicately attaching the pupils to his eyes and the ears to his head.

Working slowly was my mistake.

As I soon realized the fate to befall him, I began to panic, hastily kneading bits and pieces of clay in an attempt to finish forming him before he became too solid to work with. My efforts were for naught; in fact, in my rush to put on his features, he began falling apart, his features now messy and his body covered with divots from my nails. It was too late for him. There was nothing within my abilities that I could do to save him.

Thus, I had to make the difficult choice to abandon him. He sat on my dresser overnight and, in the morning, was as hard as plastic. His strained expression demonstrates his eternal misery, having to live with a half-finished body, wearing a half-finished outfit, covered in dirt and cat hair from the stickiness of the clay, but alas, there was nothing to be done.

This is how Pebble was born.

I wasn't satisfied with the outcome of my efforts. All this time spent on a dud, and for what? To leave him to sit barely right of my keyboard, forever gazing into my soul?

No. I had to try again.

That moment was when I realized how to do Jebble justice. I dug through my drawers, moving aside long forgotten craft books and papers, and pulled out my old box of Sculpey oven-bake clay.

When I say old, I mean old. I'd had this clay since four, maybe five Christmases ago, and that didn't make working with the already tough material any easier on my hands. It was dense, crumbly, and disheveled.

By some miracle from Toby Fox himself, I managed to make it work. Using the same original formula I had for Pebble, albeit at a slightly larger scale, I began sculpting. Two balls, one on top of the other.

The further I progressed, the more hopeful I became, but I tried to keep my expectations low. I hadn't sculpted anything since I was eleven, and most of my memories of it were the sadness that accompanied my beautiful pieces breaking.

And yet, I couldn't help but think he was turning out splendidly for my first time in so long. Even if his gums looked unnatural, and he had no bottom teeth, and he was currently little more than a slightly detailed head atop a sphere, he was beautiful. Surely nothing could go wrong...

I worked on him more and more throughout the evening as I binge watched Matt Rose and Jeaney Collects videos, often looking back at his ingame sprite for reference. He wasn't perfectly accurate, quite stylized in fact, but what did it matter? I loved him all the same.

It was here I realized I would have to make some further stylistic changes to his design, both for his own safety and for my own convenience. I knew from my own experiences that Sculpey's oven-bake clay could be fragile, especially without glaze (which I didn't have) or an internal wireframe (I did have crafting wire, but nothing to cut it with, so he unfortunately went without any). If I wanted to keep him for longer than a month in a house with my clumsy self and a cat who loves to knock things over, he would have to be optimized.

So, such changes were made. I decided to skip out on giving him arms, for the amusing rotund aesthetic it provided and to minimize the parts on him that could break. His legs would be simplified and his body would simply be placed directly atop his shoes. Black paint would be used to add the illusion of shorts. His tail would be made short and thick, curled closely to his body so nothing poked out too much. His ears and the bells of his hat were his only particular weak spots, but they looked nice as they were and couldn't be modified too much without rendering them unrecognizable.

He was still fugly, but it was a start.

I then would hit another roadblock: his collar. At first, it's quite difficult to distinguish just what it is based on looking at his sprite, and his other official depictions don't make it any easier; on the official Jebble plush, he dons the typical scrunchie-like poofy collar, but on the rest of the merchandise, including shirts and posters, it's more flower-shaped, for lack of a better word.

Personally, I am on the side of Jebble fanartists who portray him with the former, but I was quick to choose the latter for my sculpture for the sake of my own sanity; delicately folding all those ruffles would have been painful, and making and attaching a bunch of little triangles was infinitely easier.

Thus, this was his final design. Simple, skrunkly, and round.

Here's him fresh out of the oven, lightly toasted and ready to eat paint.

Getting paint to match his colors was quite an experience, helping me to remember just how blue he is canonically, despite how often he is depicted as purple. I, too, am guilty of making his blues warmer than they are, but what can a guy do? It looks good with the yellow and green.

Regardless, I wanted to stick to the canon colors for him, so I dug up my old bag of paints and mixed them up. Painting him went quite smoothly, and he was almost finished, but then...

One minute, I was holding him with confidence, taking care not to touch any of his still-wet paint as I added slightly darker shades of blue to his face.

The next, he had fallen face-first onto my desk with a loud thud.

My heart was broken, and yet it was still racing in my chest as I internally hoped that nothing had fallen off of him, that none of his paint had been smudged in my panic to pick him up, but even then I knew hoping was worthless. In this horrific accident, he had lost a good chunk of his right ear and one of the bells from his hat. How could I let this happen to him? How could I let my confidence do this to my beloved boy?

I didn't have glue to repair him, and for a moment I sat there on the brink of tears. All of my efforts really were for nothing after all. I'd might as well hit him with a hammer so he wouldn't have to suffer the same fate as Pebble.

Somehow, through the fog of desperation and sorrow, an idea came to my mind. I still had the pieces that had broken off, and maybe, just maybe, I could reattach them with the air-dry clay.

I stuck small blobs of it to the places that had broken and squished them tightly together, then smoothed out the edges to somewhat blend it in with the rest of the clay.

Thank the stars it (mostly) worked. The bell that had fallen off was too small to reattach, and had to be remade entirely from the air-dry clay, but it worked. He was fixed.

Recovery was a longer journey for him than it was for me, but thankfully he had his beloved hubby and weird brother to comfort him in these trying times.

He even got to wear Spamton's jacket, which was somehow simultaneously too big and too small for him, and he wound up looking like he was T-posing.

But after all this, once his repairs were dry, I repainted him and he was finally finished.

Behold him in all of his demented gremlin grace.

To top it all off, here's a doodle of him happy and recovered. <3

#deltarune #jevil #spamvil #spamvil isnt at all the focus of the post but tis mentioned so i thought id tag it for ppl who cant stand the ship #i am a tumblr newbie im sorry if this is reprehensible behavior #clay sculpting #sculpey #jevil deltarune #and his weird younger brother pebble #we dont talk about him

[shelbyshoe]

Divine Touch

One-Shot

Lucy is a renowned artist for the nobility longing for a man, well a muse, that she can't stop painting. Natsu is a god of creativity who craves freedom from Lucy's studio. Their desire for each other mount, but they fear the one golden rule. With just one touch their contract is dissolved, destroying everything they've built and keeping them apart forever.

(A nalu fic with some gruvia.)

Rated: Explicit (Sexual Content and Harsh Language)

Words: 8413

FF.net

AO3

“You made my nose crooked.” Lucy’s hand jerked, and her heart jumped to her throat. Natsu stood behind her, leaning against her worktable that stretched out in the center of the room. His long pale sleeves rolled up on his forearms. The fabric fell loose enough to hang slightly open at his muscular chest. Her countless hours of mixed media stained the wooden table. Lucy had warned him about staining his clothes, but he never listened. To be fair, he materialized in her studio each time without a spot on him. She checked the room in case anyone entered and heard her speaking to no one. Long windows perched on the walls just below the high ceiling. Only the clouds viewable from where they stood as though she worked in the sky. “Well, now you’ve just ruined it.” Natsu pointed to the lump of clay she worked on. His interruption had startled her enough to make the nose sit at an awkward angle. The life-sized mess of clay mocked her efforts. The rest of the body molded into a crude shape to suggest she sculpted a person.

“If you came to critique my work so early, Natsu, you can leave.” Lucy splayed her hands over the face to conceal it. Embarrassment crushed her chest as it did when he caught her working in her messy appearance. She cut her fingernails short, tied her hair up in a lopsided bun, and wore a gray smock covered in clay. Lucy put her tool down on the table beside him. “Shouldn’t muses be helpful?” He was. “And inspire their creative?” Oh, he did. The little tilt of his lips told her he already knew her true feelings.

“You’re my favorite creative,” Natsu said. If Lucy had ever felt swayed by his blunt declarations, she hadn’t let it show. She hung her smock on a hook behind her. His soft masculine laughter ran up her spine like fingertips. Objectively, a muse was a conduit for inspiration that she used daily. Subjectively, if Lucy remained in his presence for much longer, she’d break the one golden rule. No creative could touch their muse. One soft brush between them, and it was bye-bye inspiration. At the height of her career, she couldn’t risk losing the one thing that got her there.

“I’m your only creative.” She moved to the stone sink at the back of her studio. The water was cool against her skin and ran murky with the clay that caked her fingers.

“You don’t know that.” His warm breath brushed across her ear, but when she glanced over her shoulder, he stood in the same position far from the sink. A trick of the gods and Natsu was nothing if not a trickster.

“I told you not to do that.”

“Do what?” He held his hands up and leaned away from the table. She turned back to her sink as to not give him anymore fuel to his fire. His footsteps fell light against the hard floor. “The eyes are right.”

“What?” Lucy took the small towel on the serving tray and wiped her hands dry. Natsu stood in front of the unfinished clay version of himself. He leaned forward with a hand resting at his chin to stare his imitation in the eyes. At least she’d gotten the height correct.

“The eyes.” He pointed to the sculpture’s face. The crooked nose distracted her from the observation he made. “They’re perfect. Don’t change them.” Lucy stood beside him to see what he saw. When she made a sculpture, she worked on the face first. This was the first piece she’d ever done that clearly resembled Natsu. All the male figures she painted resembled him in one way or another, but she had concealed that fact well enough. When during the process of this project had she decided to sculpt Natsu completely? “Why did you stop?” He gestured to her freshly washed hands. They stood close enough that if she leaned, she could press her arm against his. The warmth of his skin sliding against her palms. Her fingertips tiptoeing across the valleys of his tanned muscles. His hands lazily navigating her body. Only a daydream.

“I don’t feel like having an audience.” She twisted away from him, keeping her focus on the material she used to wrap the sculpture, to prevent the clay from drying in her absence.

“That’s a shame.” His head tilted to the side and unabashedly examined her. Like a child observing an ant under glass. The casual way his long rosy hair fell to the side of his head made the youthful flush of his skin stand out. “I wanted to stick around longer.” He shrugged and shoved his hands into the pockets of his tan pants. “Guess I’ll see you around.” If those around them could see Natsu, they would surely know he wasn’t mortal. Power clung to his unblemished skin like embers on coal. The unfinished sculpture loomed over her. What a fool she was to believe that she made anything near the real thing. She threw the drape over the clay and tied it securely. The room still enough for her to know he’d disappeared. In Natsu’s absence, the room no longer felt vast like the sky— just another room in the long rows of studios. Her bag lay by the door where someone lightly knocked and peeked into the room.

“Oh, you’re already done?” Gray ran his fingers through his jet-black hair. An awkward habit, though not as awkward as his sporadic nudity.

“I feel uninspired.”

“The muse didn’t show up?” Gray chuckled and stepped into the hall. She closed the door behind her as if by seeing inside, he’d know Natsu had stood within. To everyone else, a muse was a mythical being. Speaking of divine assistance would put her job in danger.

“I wish,” Lucy said.

“I figured we could eat something.”

“I thought you had a class?”

“They canceled, so I picked up a job. I’ll have enough time to eat beforehand.” They fell into step together through the pristine hall. Each intricately carved door was a studio with an artist within. The royals collected them the way one would collect art itself. Lucy never complained—thankful she had a job and a place to stay, a small boarding room with all the other students at the adjacent university. Gray was in a similar boat, and while he didn’t like to talk about his past, she knew he’d come out of tough times. He pushed open the tall heavy doors to the gallery. The nobles displayed the artists’ works inside.

“Sometimes I wish your medium weren’t ice. Your work deserves to be here just as much as the rest of us,” she said. All her sculptures and paintings remained here, one-of-a-kind pieces. She eyed a painting she’d completed a month ago. A male back spread bare across the canvas. His tan muscles contorted while swathed in pink silk fabric. No one would know the subject was Natsu. Not even the muse himself knew. Lucy painted the torso alone in fear that his blossom hair would give her away.

“Why? So, the nobility can display my work and keep it from the rest of the world like pack rats?” His face scrunched in a scowl.

“I honestly don’t care what happens to my pieces.”

“I never understood that about you.”

“What do you mean?”

“I’ve always felt attached to my pieces.” He squinted at another one of her paintings. The portrait was tall and shrouded in dark colors. The man in the piece wrapped his arms around himself, gardenias peeked out between his clenched fingers, and red carnations bloomed in place of his face. The darkness wrapped around his bare body like an intruding force. She named it Vulnerability. When she painted this one, she had suspected the nobility would hate it, and Natsu would know it was of him. Thankfully, neither of those things happened. In fact, this was Natsu’s favorite painting. She often caught him gravitating toward it when she left the studio late at night. Lucy only ever met him in the art building. When the crickets sang their lament and the world lay still, she’d lie in her cupboard-sized boarding room and question whether she had imagined the muse. Then, she’d find him there gazing at a portrait that she chose not to say was him.

“That’s the thing.” Lucy paused in front of the painting. As much as she wanted to have a strong connection to it, she didn’t. The work merely paints on fabric compared to the real thing. “I’m attached to the act of creating, not the creation.” He shook his head, and they moved to the door that led to the outside world.

“What kind of job did you take?” she asked. The summer heat whipped her in the face as soon as they left the building. The daylight kissed her skin like a familiar whisper at her ear.

“I’m posing for some art students at the university.”

“Nudes again?” She worked to keep the smile from showing on her face while Gray scoffed at her.

“I do more than nudes, Lucy.” His brows came together in a look of indignation.

“But they are nude poses, right?” She jabbed him playfully with her finger.

“Well, yes, but that’s beside the point.” The farther away they were from the palace, the more her mind cleared of her work, and of Natsu. She’d return as she always did.

________________________________________

If the daylight whispered to her, then the moonlight howled. Lucy’s feet brought her to the studio like an obsession that evening. The studio remained the way she had left it trapped in time, waiting for her return. She lit the room and pulled the cover off her work. While Natsu’s impromptu visit flustered her into destroying a part of the sculpture, she had a chance to see the real thing as a reference.

With a carving tool, she scraped the abomination from the sculpture, sat at the table to remake the nose, and attached the clay to the face. Of course, Natsu was right. The nose rested perfectly with the rest of his face now that she had redone it. Lucy stepped back from the clay figure and eyed her work. He’d told her not to touch the eyes as though he knew she’d thought of changing them. Why? This version of Natsu loomed dark and pensive. The real one radiated mischief and stood bright in her room, in the sky. Yet, he’d told her they were perfect. She would keep them, if only for his confirmation of his likeness. Lucy dipped a brush in water and smoothed the surface of his clay face, an intimate gesture as if to caress his skin. She had a tune stuck in her head and hummed it as she worked. Her body relaxed into the familiar rhythm of creation, and her fingers made light guiding markings for a mouth. Natsu wore a smile the way others wore clothes. His upturned lips in a guise of charm. Her sculpture told another story. The story of a man who peeled off his smile at the end of the day and gazed at a world in which he wished he belonged. With another wet brush, she worked to mold the lips in a way that she imagined. They came easiest to her. Once the eyes told the story, the rest of the face followed. She mixed more clay, sat at her workbench, and went about shaping the ears. Her body hunched forward in full concentration, so she hadn’t noticed another presence until she heard the tune she’d hummed earlier. Natsu sat across from her at the table. His forearms rested on the wooden surface, he hummed soft enough that she had barely heard it before, and his eyes fixed to her work. He didn’t appear playful like the afternoon, but his face lacked the pensive look her sculpture wore.

“When did you get here?” Lucy’s hand hovered over the clay ear with her detail brush. She sat up straighter and prayed she didn’t look a complete mess.

“The better question is, have I ever left?” The grin returned in full force, and he slouched into his arms to lay against the table. His eyes flicked up to the figure behind her. “Looks good so far.” A surprising sense of relief washed over her. He liked it. She took great interest in the half-formed ear in her palm as to avoid his gaze.

“I left the eyes.”

“I see that. I like the mouth.” She glanced behind her at the pensive mouth she’d made.

“Do you have to be present to give me inspiration?” she asked. He tilted his head and raised a brow.

“Yeah.” No explanation, no flowery language, and a look that told her she was ridiculous for asking.

“Then you really are always here?” Somehow, Natsu trailing behind her without her knowledge didn’t disturb her the way she knew it should.

“Yes and no.” His eyes flicked to the night sky out the high windows. “You know, this building doesn’t have a lot of windows.”

“Well, there’s one there.”

“The only skylight in the entire building is in this room.” A fleeting frown dashed across his face until a fixed grin took its place. “Sometimes I want to burst out that window and set the world on fire.” While an alarming confession from anyone else, from Natsu it felt free and harmless.

“You can’t leave?”

“None of us can.” Her hand froze amid a brushstroke down his clay ear.

“There are more muses here?”

“Yeah, you’d like them, Lucy.” He said her name with a cheerfulness that gave her a false sense of endearment as if she could believe he truly felt fond of her. She held the clay ear at arm’s length to see it next to the real thing. Just focus on work, Lucy. Other muses are none of your business.

“Move your hair back.” Lucy focused on the ear in scale and overall shape. Natsu propped himself on the table so that his face hovered next to the back of her hand. If he wanted to, he could lean in and press his cheek against her. Her heart perched at the base of her throat humming at the beat stuck in her head. He slid his fingers through his hair to expose the naked curve of his ear.

“This better?” he asked. The soft warm breeze of summer breathed through the room and brushed against the back of her neck. A shiver ran through her like static.

“I told you not to do that.” Her voice dropped lower than she expected it to. How bothered was she by this little game he played? His eyes traveled over her face and down her neck. He allowed his hair to fall forward and sat back in the chair. She expected the seat to creak under the adjusted weight, but the only sound in the room was her own breath. The absence of noise the reminder of what he was, what they were. When he stood from the table, the room chilled.

“I hope I helped you.” Natsu shoved his hands in the pockets of his pants and left through the door. Had she done something? The weight of his absence pressed against her chest. Her brush hovered over the clay cradled in her hand. Her inspiration had evaporated along with him, like a slap in the face that said they were different. A creative and their muse. Without Natsu, her progress slowed to a crawl. She agonized over her work, and her brain screamed for her to start a different task. She couldn’t work without him.

“This is ridiculous. One ear. I just need this one ear.” Her brush made all the wrong moves, all the most undesirable shapes, but she made progress. That was enough. “I’ve made art without him before. I can do it again.” How long had she relied on his inspiration for her own motivation? And like a muscle unused for years, she stretched.

________________________________________

“Lucy, wake up.” A warm hand shook her shoulder. Lucy pealed her cheek from the table. When had she fallen asleep? Her hands clutched the clay ear. She’d redone it a million times. The rim of the clay had lightened overnight from drying. Her stomach dropped sharply, and her body burst with adrenaline. Dry clay meant the end of her project, yet she found her work covered and tied. The spray bottle of water sat beside it. Relief washed over her body, her legs turned to mud, and she slouched back in her seat. “Whoa, are you okay? You weren’t here all night, were you?” Gray asked. He sat across from her and leaned against the table. The position reminded her of Natsu that evening. Everything reminded her of Natsu.

“If it makes you happy.” She set the clay aside and stood to retrieve more.

“You should take a break. What’s got you working all day and night?” His attention snapped to the draped figure, and he pointed to it. “This?” She brought the clay to the table and nodded.

“What do you think so far?” she asked. Gray’s brows shot up and he rubbed the back of his neck.

“I didn’t see it. You really should get some sleep, Lucy.”

“You covered it for me. You must have seen.” Movement caught her attention. Natsu leaned against one of her shelves covered in art supplies. His interest remained on a tube of paint she’d left uncapped and planned to dispose of. Gray followed her gaze.

“I didn’t, I promise. You sure you don’t want to go home?” he asked. She shook her head. “You do look tired.” Of course, he didn’t see Natsu.

“I appreciate the concern, but I’m okay, really.” She kneaded the clay between her fingers.

“Do you need help with anything? I can at least come to check on you from time to time.” Gray leaned over the table to brush some hair behind her ear. How long had it been since she’d felt the warmth of someone’s skin? If he hadn’t pulled his hand away, she feared she’d lean into it. He apologized softly, lifting one of his dark brows. Natsu’s attention pulled from the paint and he moved to stand beside Gray. He leaned toward Gray’s head.

“That won’t be necessary,” Lucy said. These were the moments where the lunacy of having a muse sank in. If no one else could see Natsu, was he real?

“At least come to my studio for a bit.” He eyed her kneading fingers with a grimace. “A break or something.” He placed his hands over hers and the clay. Her fingers relaxed from their task. She grappled with his offer, as the sculpture loomed behind her and called like a siren. With Natsu in the room, it felt like a dam had broken. The object of her strange obsession stood beside Gray with a mirrored frown. Natsu tilted his head to Lucy and grinned. Oh no. If she acted out now, Gray would think her crazy. Natsu pursed his lips and blew a silent stream of air at the side of Gray’s face. Gods made no small gestures, so the gust of wind from his lips blew strong enough that Gray toppled from the table and lay on the floor. The artist sat up and held his cheek. While Natsu filled the room with laughter, Gray’s eyes widened as he scanned the room. Lucy dropped the clay and ran around the table to help Gray up. “What was that? Lucy, did you feel that?”

“Look, I’ll come by your studio this afternoon. I appreciate the concern.” She held out her hand to help him to his feet. His hand remained on his cheek as he spoke.

“Did you not feel that just now?”

“Feel what?” Play dumb, kill Natsu later. His hand dropped and he squinted at her. Natsu sat in the seat Gray ejected from and leaned his chin against his palm, watching the show.

“I’ll see you then; I guess.” Gray gave her a polite nod and scanned the room before he left. Lucy turned on Natsu as soon as Gray’s footsteps disappeared.

“What is wrong with you?”

“What? You didn’t want him here either.” He stretched as though he also took a nap at her art table. She went back to her spot across from him. “You have to admit his reaction was hilarious.”

“He was terrified.” Lucy worked the clay with aggression.

“He’ll be fine.” He waved a dismissive hand at the door and nodded toward her hands. “Lucy, you’re going to destroy that clay.” She slapped the clay against her work surface with a loud smack.

“I don’t need you interfering with my life.”

“Okay, then next time, I’ll leave your sculpture out to dry.”

“Gray covered it.”

“He told you he didn’t,” Natsu said. Lucy shook her head, picked up her clay, and carefully molded it into a new ear. When she completed them, she removed the cover from the sculpture and fixed the ears to Natsu’s clay head. She smoothed the clay with water and added clean details of the first strands of his hair that snuggly fit next to his ear. The flow of work kept her mind busy enough to ignore Natsu’s presence.

________________________________________

The bright afternoon sun soon flooded into the room and bathed the studio in warm light. Natsu had moved below the window and gazed up at the cloudless sky. His stance tense with hands wrapped in fists. His mouth tightened to a line and his jaw visibly clenched.

“I’m going to take Gray’s advice and take a break.” Her voice cut through his thoughts enough for her to witness him visibly relax. His scowl replaced with a sharp smile.

“Taking that ice queen’s advice?” He gave a clipped laugh. “I can’t believe he fell over like that.”

“What do you have against him anyway?”

“Nothing.” Natsu tilted his head away from the window. “He’s fun is all.” While his face appeared genuine, Lucy hardly believed his words.

“Muses are strange.” She washed up and covered her work to keep it from drying out. Her fingers slid her apron over the hook by the door. Natsu moved back to his seat, his leg bounced below the table, and his head turned back to the window. “Thank you.” His leg stilled.

“For what?”

“For keeping my work safe,” she said. He turned around in the chair, so that he straddled it, and studied her.

“Where are you going?”

“I said I’d go visit Gray.” Lucy held up a finger to stop him as he stood. “You are not coming.” His eyes glinted the way they did when she challenged him. “Natsu, I mean it, you’re just going to upset him.”

“It’s not like he can see me, Lucy.”

“I won’t be long. I’m coming right back here anyway.”

“Why do I feel like a dog that you’re leaving home for the afternoon?”

“Maybe, that is what I’m doing.” She closed the door as his laughter filled her ears. The sound made her stomach flip, and the feeling lingered all the way to Gray’s studio.

In the hall’s silence, she wished she’d allowed Natsu to go with her. Anything to liven up the cold dead air as she descended toward Gray’s place of work. She stood before his tall studio door and rapped at the metal entrance with the heavy knocker. When no one answered, she allowed herself in. The room dim except for a set of professional lights in the back. The room filled with the sound of tools on ice. His studio, half the size of her own, remained at a low temperature with dim lighting and no windows to preserve the piece.

“Gray?” The sounds stopped, and a chair moved behind a partition.

“Lucy, you made it.” Gray came to greet her, glancing behind her toward the door.

“It’s just me,” She said. He held his hand out for her to sit on a stool beside him. “How are you always shirtless in here? It’s freezing.” Gray laughed as he pulled away the partition to reveal the massive slab of ice behind it.

“Well, what do you think so far?” Gray stood next to her, eyeing the sculpture from her point of view. His fingers cradled his chin as he glanced between Lucy and the ice woman before them. Lucy had never seen this woman before. She lay on the ice like a mermaid basking on a rock. Her legs curled beneath her, one arm lay on the ice beside her, while the other hand slid through her hair. The dress she wore flowed beneath her. A slit on the side revealed ample hip and slender legs.

“Gray, this is amazing.” Lucy stood from the stool and walked around the sculpture. Sure, the fabric was still rough, and the ice beneath her needed work, but the person atop was beautiful. “Who is she?”

“Don’t smirk at me like that.” Gray reverted his gaze to the tools across the table beside the sculpture, but not fast enough for Lucy to miss the flush of his cheeks. Did he know this woman outside of work?

“Well? How long have you been dating?”

“It’s complicated.” Even without explanation, Lucy understood the feeling. Gray’s smile fell into a scowl at something behind her.

“What?” The room remained empty except for his equipment and other sculptures he’d worked on, all abandoned for this piece. From the moment she entered the room, until now, she felt another’s unfamiliar presence. Could it be?

“Nothing. I’m glad you like it.” He picked up a detail pick and went to work on the fabric of her dress.

“Hey, Gray?” Lucy’s mind swam with questions, but only one rang out for an answer. He acknowledged her without looking up. “Do you believe in muses?” His hand lingered over the ice.

“Muses are myths.” Even as the words left his lips, his hand remained still.

“I believe in them.” She crossed her arms over her body and shook in the icy room.

“What is that supposed to mean?”

“Gray, is this your muse?” She pointed to the sculpture in front of him.

“What if I said yes?” Gray twisted the pick between his hands and pursed his lips in the way he did when he bit at the inside of his mouth. Lucy placed a hand on his shoulder and felt him relax beneath her palm.

“Then I’d say—”

“Calm down, Lucy is just visiting.” Natsu leaned against the door with arms crossed over his chest.

“She’s all over him!” The woman stood behind Gray and shouted to Natsu. Her long, wavy blue hair fell over her shoulder as she leaned forward to point in the direction of Lucy’s hand. Natsu rolled his eyes. The woman huffed with hands on her hips, glaring at her.

“You’re his muse,” Lucy said. Juvia’s eyes widened, and her arms fell.

“Now you’ve done it,” Natsu said.

“Who are you?” Gray asked, noticing Natsu for the first time. He pulled Lucy closer to him and ignored the protest from the woman behind him. Natsu’s eyes narrowed on Gray’s hand on her waist. “What are you doing in my studio?”

“Well, now that she’s seen Juvia, I better introduce myself.” Natsu bowed low and gave Gray a shark’s smile. “I’m Natsu, Lucy’s muse.”

“Why can I see her?” Lucy asked.

“Probably because you guys were discussing us.” Natsu shrugged casually but tightened his grip on his upper arm.

“What do you want with Gray?” Juvia asked. She stood tall in the same dress as the sculpture.

“Juvia.” Gray’s voice warned, but he let go of Lucy.

“Want? He’s my friend.” Was his muse jealous? “Are you guys together?” Gray sighed.

“No, we work together,” he said.

“Juvia will change your mind!” the muse cried and blinked out of the room.

“Sorry about that, she’s—”

“Passionate?” Lucy said.

“Clingy,” Natsu added. Gray glared at him from his seat.

“What about you?” he asked. Natsu raised a brow, his smile remained planted firmly on his face.

“What about me?”

“Are you together?” Gray said.

“Gray, don’t do this.”

“No, I want his answer, Lucy.” Gray placed his pick on the tray and stood. “What is she to you? Just an artist to play with?”

“Are you not doing that with Juvia? Playing?” Natsu’s feet firmly planted to the ground as Gray took a step forward.

“Whoa there.” Lucy held an arm out in front of his chest. “I’m going to leave now.” She didn’t want to have them fight with each other. She also didn’t want to hear the answer to the question that Natsu avoided. She and Natsu weren’t together, she knew that, yet she feared hearing this from him.

“See you in the studio.” With that, Natsu disappeared.

“How have you not told me about him?”

“What is with that tone? I could say the same about Juvia, but you already know the answer to that.” Her frustration simmered, and Gray eased off.

“You’re right. It just all came out at once.”

“I know.” Lucy gave his hand a squeeze and pulled away. “I’m going back to work.” She hesitated in the doorway and gazed inside. Now that her friend stood alone in the room, he appeared so small. “Hey, Gray?” He glanced back at her. “I love the piece. Please, finish it.” He smiled as she closed the door and paced back to her own studio.

Her door slammed behind her as she entered. As she thought, Natsu stood under the high windows, gazing up at the vast sky.

“I told you not to follow me.” The frustration she thought she’d extinguished lit up.

“You know me better than that.”

“Yes, always meddling in my life.” Lucy pulled the smock over her and secured her hair on her head with a tie.

“How was that meddling in your life? You were talking about art and us.”

“What do you mean us? You and Juvia?” she asked, convinced he didn’t mean him and her. She pulled the cover away from her sculpture. How could she work on this while she fought with the very person she sculpted? I don’t need a muse to make art. Could she believe that now? All her success was due to the man standing in her studio. Somehow, the thought only infuriated her more. “Did you pick me?”

“What?” Natsu leaned against her art table, as she worked on the clay hair that fell around the sculpture’s face.

“Did you pick me to be your creative?”

“No.” Blunt as always. No hesitation. A part of her always imagined that he had chosen her specifically, that she was special to him. “Lucy, look at me, please.” Had she ever heard his voice this soft before? She turned to find him leaned off the table and in front of her. Lucy stood sandwiched between the art and the imitation in clay behind her.

“What? Have something else to add?” Her lip quivered. He no longer hid behind the veil of a smile.

“You’re crying.” He reached out, as if to brush away a tear, paused just before her skin, and pulled away. His brows came together, and his mouth set in a frown. “I can’t help you the way he can.”

“Gray? How?”

“I can’t touch you.”

“How would that help me?” she asked, wiping away at her cheeks. She took a breath to calm herself. Don’t fall apart, or he’ll leave. “Why are you bringing him up?”

“He can comfort you, can leave this building with you.” Natsu rubbed at the back of his neck and stared back up at the afternoon sun. “Can kiss you if he wanted to.” A warm breeze brushed against her skin, across her cheek, and down her neck. Her heart raced, and she worried he’d hear.

“Do you want to?” she asked. Natsu leaned forward so their lips hovered next to each other. Lucy closed her eyes and relaxed her mouth. The warmth evaporated, and when she opened her eyes, Natsu was gone.

Lucy sat at her studio table and stared at the sculpture swathed in fabric. Her finger slid over her lips as she pictured Natsu kissing her. She slumped against her worktable and shifted to see out her window. The afternoon sun had dropped away, and the studio tinted in purple and pink. Lucy stood and stretched. I can’t sit around forever. She stood before the piece that had taken so much from her already, uncovered it, and began to work.

________________________________________

“No peeking!” Lucy guided Gray into her studio with his hand firmly over his eyes.

“Can I look now?”

“Just stand here.” She positioned him far enough away that he’d be able to see the sculpture fully. “Okay, open your eyes.” Gray dropped his arms, his brows rose, and he gave a low whistle. “Well?”

“Lucy, this is incredible.” He stepped closer to the finished work. The clay stood dry and varnished. “The level of detail is amazing. Lucy, the clothes alone are immaculate.”

“So, you like it?”

“Of course! I mean, I wish it weren’t of that asshat, but I like it.” Gray’s smile allowed her shoulders to relax.

“I’m glad. And he’s not an asshat.”

“How long has it been since you’ve seen him?” He crossed his arms over his chest.

“Since our fight,” she said. He shook his head and let out a long breath.

“I mean, I’m one to talk. I haven’t seen Juvia.”

“Really? I thought she’d be all over you when I left.” Finding out about each other’s muses felt like so long ago.

“Not like we can really be all over each other,” Gray said.

“So, if you could, you would?” She nudged him with her elbow. His cheeks warmed and he nudged her back.

“I want her to see my piece once it’s finished, but I don’t know where she is.”

“Natsu told me once that he never really left. When I’m inspired, whether I see him or not, it is because he’s there.”

“Do you believe him?”

“I do. I never lost inspiration while I finished this piece. Something drove me that could only be described as supernatural.” Lucy had stared at the sculpture far longer than she’d like to admit, yet she still found her eyes gravitating toward Natsu’s face, his lips. “Did you ever resent her? Did it feel like you weren’t good enough without her?”

“Did I resent her for inspiring me? No.” Gray slumped into the seat beside them. “I have always been grateful to Juvia. I think of a muse as someone who boosts the talent we already have.” He shrugged and pointed to her piece. “Hard to resent them when they have us make things like this.” She couldn’t blame him for feeling that way.

“I miss him,” she admitted.

“I know.” Gray stood from the chair and made his way toward the door. “Let me know if you see them. If you need me, I’ll be finishing up downstairs.” Lucy nodded and sat down in her usual seat.

She stared at the door, out of focus, long after he’d closed it. Her thoughts swirl back to her own question. So, if you could, would you? She’d asked him that question without asking herself.

“They chose you for me.” Lucy nearly jumped out of her skin from Natsu’s voice. He leaned against the statue of his likeness and inspected his own face. Her heart twisted in his presence and her stomach lighter than air. When had she begun to feel this way for him?

“Who?”

“The fates. They told me you were important to me. I hadn’t even met you yet. Weird, huh?” He grinned and ran a hand through his rosy hair. “But I get it now.” Lucy still had to process the fates when he stepped forward and pressed his palms to the stained worktable. “Sorry that I haven’t been around to talk to.” His laughter bounced off her studio walls. Was he joking with her?

“What are you talking about, Natsu?” Lucy moved around the table and stood in front of him.

“I needed time to think about what I really wanted.” He eyed the statue of himself. “I realized that I need something from you first.”

“You’re not making any sense.”

“It’s perfect, Lucy.” Her name on his tongue sounded sweet, and his eyes sparkled with excitement. “Looks just like me.”

“I’m not so sure.”

“Are you? You’ve done it before.”

“I haven’t sculpted you before,” she said. Natsu felt different as he stepped closer. Desperate, maybe? She wasn’t going anywhere, so what was he doing? She shook her head. “Are you okay?”

“You’ve painted me perfectly. Every single time. Like you looked inside and pulled me out.” His eyes softened and his hand reached out to her. She sucked in a breath as his hand hovered over her cheek, her neck, and down her arm. While he never made contact, somehow, she still felt him against her skin.

“How did you know those paintings were of you?”

“I always knew. I assumed it was because I’m a muse, not because you cared. I still gave into that. I shouldn’t have.” He stared down at his open palm. “I keep thinking how selfish I am. A god with nothing to lose, and a woman who could have everything taken away.” This time, Lucy held out her palm. Her hand lingered just above his face, fingers traveled over his lips and hovered splayed over his chest. She could see his jaw work and his muscles tense, allowing her a moment to pretend. To have this power over a god. Intoxicating.

“Natsu, do you love me?” she asked. A warm feeling brushed over her hair and traveled along her jaw. His eyes softened, focused on her lips.

“Every day.” His eyes widened as he searched her face. “I made you cry again?” She shook her head.

“Damn the gods and the games they play.” She inhaled and willed herself not to break. “I want to be with you, to touch you.” She gladly took a gift from the divine, and this was the price she paid.

“Let me.” Natsu hadn’t wavered, as stone still as the statue that stood beside them. “Tell me and I will.” What was more important to Lucy? Could she live without the career she had worked tirelessly for? If she told him no, what would they be? Like a ghost, he’d linger. No amount of paint could give her what she really wanted. She’d forever wonder if she didn’t take the plunge.

“Please,” Lucy begged. Natsu pulled her to him like she was sand through his fingers. Quick enough and they’d never part. His lips pressed firmly to hers, softer and warmer than she ever expected. Her hands splayed against his chest. Then the world turned cold. Her hands grasped to nothing in the chilled air. Her eyes opened and she was alone. “Natsu?” Her blood turned icy in her veins, and her heartbeat pulsed in her ears. Just as he said, one touch and he disappeared. I can fix this. Her palm pressed against the worktable for balance. But how?

Lean tan arms wrapped around Lucy’s shoulders, a warm chest pressed to her back, and lips dusted a light kiss against her neck. She whirled around to face Natsu and the empty platform where her work once stood. “How?”

“I don’t know. I opened my eyes and stood in your art’s place.” Natsu’s gaze darkened and roamed across her body as if seeing her for the first time. She’d created a form for him, for a god. The relief welled up inside her chest. Lucy gripped the front of his loose shirt and pulled him to her. This time, she smashed her lips to his, hot and wanting. He wrapped his arms around her as she threaded her fingers through his silken hair. Natsu explored her mouth and pressed her back against the worktable. She nearly lost her breath when he pulled away, gazing down at her against the familiar wooden surface. The sun created a halo of light around his hair, and his lips flushed from their kiss. She reached up and finally pulled down his shirt. His tan skin chiseled like the god he was.

“Wanted a peak?” He grinned and pulled her hair down from her tie. Her blond hair fell around her head. He hovered over her and gave a long exhale.

“What are you doing?” she asked.

“Trying to calm down.”

“Why?” Lucy tugged at the loose fabric at his waist, tossed the shirt to the side, and worked on his pants. Her sex clenched at the look he gave her.

“I want to savor this.” He trailed his fingertips against her cheek, a whisper of contact against her skin, and her body arched up into his divine touch. So starved for him, her body responded. Natsu took his time to lazily trace her curves with his fingertips. When he moved around her most sensitive places, she groaned. Her skin going up in flames from the lack of what she really wanted. Lucy slid her fingers against his growing erection. Natsu sucked in air sharply through his teeth and grabbed her hand. He pulled her arm over her head and pinned her there. He feathered kisses down the base of her throat to her awaiting chest. Her nipples hardened to sensitive peaks through the fabric of her top, and his eyes flicked up as his lips surrounded them in heat. She wiggled her hips beneath him and pushed her breast against his mouth. The corner of his lips raised, as he pulled her button top open with a pop. Instead of pulling off her bra, he slipped the fabric around her breasts, pushing them up toward his mouth. He groaned as he suckled her nipple, running a thumb against the other in a languid tease.

“God.” She groaned and clung to him as he feasted.

“You called?” he said with a mouth full of her and skimmed his teeth against the flushed bud.

“Fuck.” She groaned when he slipped his hand to the juncture between her legs.

“I will in a minute.” Natsu flicked his tongue against the other nipple. The one he left cold without the warmth of his mouth.

“Will you quit joking.” The whimper left Lucy without her consent, dragged out by the long stroke of his tongue and his fingers that worked her folds over her pants. Natsu leaned back and pulled her body further on the table so her legs straddled him. He worked her pants and underwear from her hips, dropping them to the ground. With one swipe, her bra pulled from her body and into the heap of her clothes on the floor. “Natsu, please.” She reached out for him, her voice husky and lost. He worked his own clothes from his body. Heat pooled to her core with the full view of him, hard shaft freed and eager, and the tip glistened with precum. Instead of plunging forward, the way she thought he would, he kneeled before her and spread her bare to him. She raised herself up on her elbows unaffected by the slight embarrassment in the position. When he pulled her legs over his shoulders, her heart raced. Natsu’s deep green eyes met hers as he spread her folds with his thumbs and lowered his tongue to her damp arousal. Lucy’s head lulled to the side, her eyes half closed, as the pleasure rippled through her body. His name left her lips in a rush, and his tongue plunged deep into her heat. One of his thumbs swirled around her clit, and her body ached for more. She felt herself building up as he pushed further, stroked her faster, and made her legs shake at the sides of his head. She shoved her fingers into his hair. His eyes still locked on her face like a jungle cat. The look alone sent her into a frenzy of lust. The euphoria of her climax made her cry out. As soon as she thought he’d stop, he dragged another from her. Her body dropped against the table when he slowed. He moved her legs from his shoulders and rose with his mouth glistening from where he devoured her. Natsu buried his fingers inside her and pulled them out to slide them over his cock. His hand making an erotic squelch sound as he lubed himself with her. The anticipation built with each jerk of his hand, and she wiggled beneath him. Natsu grinned at her movement and clutched her thigh to still her.

“You’re not going to let me last, are you?” Natsu asked. She shook her head and opened her legs wider for him. He placed the head of his cock against her drenched vulva, and slowly sheathed himself into her, filling her with the length of him. Her moan resonated inside the studio, and his eyes rolled back with delight as he fully sank into her. He sat there for a moment inside her, breathing long and steady before he pulled out to the tip. Lucy almost protested until he surged deep into her with a hot smack of their skin. This time, it was his moan that filled the room. “Fuck.”

“I thought that’s what you’re doing,” she said. His hips moved, keeping any other joke from leaving her lips. He positioned his hands on either side of her head and moved his hips in a delicious rhythm inside her. Her hands clutched him for dear life, and she lifted her hips to meet his thrusts in exquisite pleasure. He slid a hand beneath her and pulled her hips up higher in just the right position. Her cries louder, faster than before as he rocked against her sweetest places.

“Coming for me, Lucy?” The teasing tone replaced with the husky sound of his voice, and the absolute ecstasy that she saw in his face. He slammed into her, as she rode her climax, and leaned back with her thighs in each hand. His lip caught between his teeth as he positioned himself. His cock visibly impaled her tight core. The sensual sight of him forever engrained into her mind.

“Come for me, Natsu.” Her voice, husky and raw in her own ears, spurred him on.

“Lucy.” Her name rolled off his tongue as he came deep inside her. His thrusts slowed and his chest worked to catch his breath. Natsu dragged out one of the chairs, sat, and pulled her to his lap. She straddled him and wrapped around him with her lips pressed into the crook of his neck. Warmth surrounded her in his embrace. Lucy slid her fingers through his tousled hair as they breathed. Natsu’s hands caressed her back in an intimate gesture that reminded her this was real.

“Don’t leave me again,” she said. His warm breath at her shoulder as he spoke.

“Never.” He enfolded her in his arms. She glanced at the pedestal that once held her work.

“You stole my sculpture.” Lucy felt his laugh against her.

“Would you like it back?” Natsu asked.

“No, you can keep it.” She sat back and cupped his face in her hands. Her thumb skimmed his skin. “I want to thank the fates.” Natsu placed his broad hand against the back of her head and pulled her into a deep kiss.

“Holy shit.” A voice came from the door followed by a click as it shut. Natsu’s boisterous laugh shook her. Lucy felt the heat spread instantly to her cheeks and playfully smacked him.

“Stop laughing. Someone saw us.”

“It was Gray.” Natsu barely got the words out. Lucy stood up quickly and moved around the table toward the door. “Hey, don’t go out like that.” He tossed her his long button up shirt. She wrapped the fabric around her and allowed it to hang to her knees. She peaked out of her studio and found Gray with his back against the wall beside the door. His hands clasped over his eyes.

“Stupid, stupid,” he said. She moved into the hallway and hugged herself tighter.

“Gray?” The man jumped from the wall and took in her appearance. His blushing cheeks darkened with the sight of her.

“I’m sorry. I should have knocked. I only came to tell you that I found Juvia.”

“Oh, well, I, uh.” What could she say to make this any better?

“Damn, I’m sorry,” Gray said again.

“This is a weird question, especially now, but did Juvia become your ice sculpture?” she asked.

“I freaked out, couldn’t say anything. I told her to wait, so I could tell you.” He wiped a hand across his face. “But, apparently, you didn’t need me to tell you.” The guilt of not having thought of Gray sank like a stone, and the embarrassment rose again.

“Shouldn’t you be going back to your girl?” Natsu opened the door wider. He’d pulled on his pants and ran a hand through his disheveled hair. Gray glared at him.

“I thought I’d tell my friend the good news, asshole.”

“Well, congrats. You better get to her. Hope everything works out for ya.” Natsu wrapped an arm around Lucy and pulled her into the studio. “Bye, ice boy.” He closed the door and pressed her back against it. “Thought he’d never leave.”

“Natsu! I was talking to him.”

“He’ll thank me later. I’m sure Juvia is losing her mind with jealousy since he came all the way over here for you.”

“You were helping him?” she asked. He shrugged and pulled her into another kiss. His hands snaked into his shirt, cupped the weight of her breasts, and slid his thumbs against her sensitive skin.

“I think we have a problem,” he said.

“What?”

“Now that I can touch you, I don’t want to stop.” Natsu pressed his forehead against hers and grinned.

“Then don’t,” Lucy said. He picked her up, her legs wrapped around his waist, and hoisted her to the worktable. She had to agree with him. She’d never get enough of this.

#nalu #fairy tail #nalu fan fiction #ft fan fiction #natsu x lucy #divine touch #my writing #muse au

[justanotherdyingpoet]

Unfired Clay

When I wash my hands, wet clay seeps out from beneath my nails.

My fingers are fragile things, my knees breaking at the bend, my face stiff and unmoving. My chest is a different story, solid ribs made soft by a beating heart. No one seems to notice what a wonder it is that I am alive, let alone breathing. No one notices that I am drowning with lungs full of slip.

I’m sorry for cracking, but this heat is drying me out, and I can’t quite keep it together.

I’m sorry. I’m crumbling, eroding like a statue with every movement. There are pieces of me all over the floor, pressed far into corners, deep into the carpet. It will take a long time for those pieces of me to be swept away.

I wish I could start over. Take this fresh clay heart out from behind my ribcage and mold it into something new. Something permanent, hardened by fire like all proper sculptures.

Something that knows how to be alive. I think I have forgotten.

#unfired clay #justanotherdyingpoet #original poem #personal poem #wrote this one in precalc! i think it’s pretty good for 9 in the morning #there are a couple meaning in this one

[gretavanfleetposts]

  hey, i really was in the mood for a ship if that's cool. :)

-to start out, i am 5'4 with brown hair and green eyes. i naturally have freckles everywhere and they show up more evidently in the summer. i am a pretty outspoken person, and i'm too independent for my own good. i'm told that i'm very stubborn, but i'm very thoughtful in my own way, despite not being an incredibly sympathetic person. i get lost in thought pretty easily, and love to ramble on and on about my interests. i make friends pretty easily. i am told that i'm a creative person, and have a good sense of humor.

-i'd say i'm an ambivert (both introverted and extroverted) in the context that i love being around people and going out, but definitely need my alone time. i spend my time alone listening to music 24/7, painting, and watching movies.

- that leads to my next thing about myself, i love film.  it's my passion, and i want to be a big director someday. i'm currently working on a screenplay that's going nowhere so far. that's the goal. my favorite movies are: the graduate, shallow grave, and la haine. i love wes anderson and stanley kubrick's directorial style. i can also quote the first eleven minutes of 'ratatouille' by memory alone. my comfort movies are odd. i love: fantastic mr. fox, the pixar story (a documentary i've seen at least a thousand times), and the truman show.

-my favorite books are: the catcher in the rye, looking for alaska, and my childhood favorite: the miraculous journey of edward tulane. my favorite article of clothing is a red and blue striped sweater that's like three times too big for me. it's so comfortable and i love to wear it with long skirts and baggy jeans.

-my big six are: taurus sun, libra rising, capricorn moon, taurus mercury, aries venus, cancer mars. my myers briggs is entp-t. 

-my sister has always told me that my secret talent was being good at just dance?? i don't know, i'm not incredibly talented at anything. i guess i can keep plants alive for a long time and i'm not awful at watercolor. i'm not the worst singer ever, but i don't really like to sing for people unless it's karaoke.

-my go-to pick me up songs at the moment are: on melancholy hill and dirty harry by gorillaz, basically anything by simon and garfunkel, scarlet begonias by sublime, and rainy day women by bob dylan.

-my ideal date would be one of three options: a.) staying in and taking turns watching each other's favorite movies in a homemade blanket fort while taking breaks in between to make cookies. OR b.) have a date at an art gallery. spending hours just aimlessly walking around hand-in-hand while you make small talk and look at the paintings and sculptures. it's even better when you pretend to be snobby art critics and make ridiculous pretentious comments on the paintings until you're both crying from laughing too much. OR c.) laying out blankets in the trunk of a car/truck bed and going star gazing and having a night-time picnic. just laying there and pointing out constellations, while eating small snacks and fruit.

-in a partner, sense of humor is usually my first go-to. if they aren't easy to joke around with or are serious all the time, we don't vibe. :// i usually go for someone that is more openly affectionate, and i'm less of an "opposites attract". i'd rather my partner be like me.

-other random facts about me are: i have a nickel collection in a jar, with over fourteen dollars in it so far (about 280 nickels). my favorite colors are green and brown. my favorite flowers are white tulips. my lucky number is 44, i don't know why. i don't eat red meat. i like things in even numbers, and especially love things in increments of fours. i bought an acoustic guitar and have learned only one song on it smh. i don't like tea of any kind, the texture of rapsberries weirds me out, and my dream car is a '69 chevy camaro. pottery and sculpture is so fun, but i hate the feeling of wet clay/drying clay on my hands.

-i feel like i've written way too much, but here's this. i hope it was helpful. also, there's a photo of me included for reference!! <33

Hey there!

❤: You are so beautiful!! Also I love how much information you included. I love reading all about you guys! And you have such big dreams; I really admire that. Not everyone can write or appreciate art the way you clearly can/do! You sound very talented to me. Keeping plants alive? That is absolutely a talent. I wish I could do that. And you're right, the texture of raspberries is weird.

Ship: Josh

Because: Josh obviously shares your love of film. I think being with someone who can share that passion with him would be a big deal. It's easy to bond over the music but you would understand him just a little bit better than anyone else. I can definitely see the two of you doing karaoke together and what a time that would be with Josh. And Josh is definitely easy to joke around with so I think the two of you would vibe well.

Scenario:

Josh had been gone for three weeks now and you were only surviving thanks to the facetiming dates and phone calls that he fit in whenever he could

It certainly wasn't like having him home though

He was states away at this point and no matter how much you wanted to be where he was, you had a life you couldn't just drop and leave behind

But Josh being the amazing boyfriend he was, he found little ways to make sure you knew how much he missed you

How much he wanted you by his side

How much he wanted to be by your side

Like the night he called you after a show and told you to go lie down in your backyard

You obliged and grabbed a blanket on your way to your backyard, plopping it down on grass and proceeding to lie on it with your eyes pointed to the night sky

"Look up at the stars, mama. Tell me what you see." His voice cam through the phone softly

You took in the stars above you, the moon shining big and bright, and attempted to describe its beauty to him

When the weather was warm, the two of you would often lie in the grass together or in the bed of his Jeep truck and point out different constellations to each other, making up new ones with funny names that you'd sometimes look for when he was gone just to feel a little closer to him

"Can you see the little dipper?" he asked quietly

You searched for a moment before you spotted the constellation you were very familiar with

"It's so beautiful, isn't it?"

You realized then that he must have been looking up at the stars too and you asked him where he was

"I snuck away from the after-show party. I just wanted to look at the stars with you"

Your heart swelled at the thought of him sneaking off while everyone was celebrating just so he could listen to your voice for a few moments over the phone

You told him how much you missed him but more importantly how proud of him you were

You could practically hear his smile through the phone

"Thank you, mama," he whispered

After the two of you were done talking, you laid in the grass a while longer, imagining he was doing the same, looking up at the same stars as you were

Soon enough you'd be gazing up together again

I hope you liked it! Thank you for the request!

-⭐

Ships are currently closed

#anon #ships #anon ships #gvf #gvf ships #greta van fleet #greta van fleet ships #gretavanfleetpostsships

[taetaesbaebaepsae]

Hues

A/n: Part 3 of soulmate au commission for @if-i-rise-with-yoongs​!

Summary: Taehyung has lived his life in a world of gray, using clay to express his artistic ability - until he meets you.

Warnings: mostly fluff, hint of sensuality and a titch of angst, no real smut just hints, arthoe!taehyung

Word Count: 2163

Taehyung loves the way clay feels in his hands, how it smells like earth and home, how it sticks beneath his nails, works itself into the creases of his palms.

His love of art started early, despite his condition, and sculpting was a way to get past it, a way to create, letting his hands bring forth what's in his head.

You'd think one couldn't miss what they'd never known, but Taehyung buys art that is said to have the most vibrant colors, runs his fingers along the paint as if he can feel them through his skin.

He's seen the world in dull gray his whole life, and it's rare but not unheard of, and for anyone else it wouldn't be much of a handicap but Taehyung longs to be able to see them, wishes he could dream in color.

Instead, he sculpts, and he gets good at it, ends up selling his work at a local gallery and eventually, a showcase.

He's a bit nervous at the opening, has two glasses of champagne, and of course his friends come, although Namjoon is uncharacteristically distracted, scratching at his forearm, eyes darting around the room.

Taehyung accepts a third glass of champagne and wanders around the room, finds himself standing behind a girl trailing her hand along his favorite piece, a female angel with wings instead of arms, nailed to the ground.

You jump when he says hello, yank your hands away. "I'm so sorry," you mumble. "I shouldn't touch."

You turn and look up into his eyes, smiling, and nervously tuck a strand of hair behind your ear and Taehyung can't help but notice the rose clip in your hair, it stands out for some reason and when he realizes why he gasps out loud, can't help himself from reaching out to touch it.

You don't pull away, just give him a quizzical look. 

"Your clip...is it...is that red?"

"More of a dusky rose, I'd say. Why?"

Taehyung swallows, doesn't know how to say it, how to tell you suddenly he's seeing colors when he's lived in black and gray his whole life.

"What's your name?" He blurts.

"Y/n. You're the sculptor, right? You're so talented." You gush, and he feels his cheeks flush at the praise.

Taehyung has never been very good with words, using his hands instead so he lets them guide him once more, takes your hand to guide your fingers over the grooves of the wings of his sculpture.

"You were right to touch," he murmurs. "Sometimes our touch can show us things our eyes cannot."

"She's beautiful," you breathe, and he nods but he's looking at the profile of your face as you say it, wants to trace the line of your jaw with his fingers.

Taehyung ends up following you around most of the night, enamoured by the passion in your voice when you tell him you're an artist, too, when you talk about your work, the vibrant colors you use. He wants to see it, now that he can see shades of pink, and now that he thinks of it, he can see the color you'd mentioned, a dusky rose, stains your lips as well and he can't take his eyes off them. When your tongue darts out to lick champagne off the edge of your glass, he can see that it's a lighter pink and it makes his mouth run dry.

The night ends with you giving him your card with a shy smile.

"I'd be honored if you'd come to my opening."

"I wouldn't miss it," he promises, and he almost mourns when you disappear around the corner.

When he looks down at your card, he runs his fingertips over the rose in the corner, still marvelling over the color there, and this time it's almost as if he can feel it.

Your opening is over a month away, and Taehyung finds himself jumpy and frustrated, unable to finish any sculptures, pulling your card out of his wallet over and over to see that rose and think of the color of your lips, the tip of your tongue.

It's less than a week later when he breaks down and calls you.

"Hello?" You chirp, answering on the second ring, and he's silent for a moment.

"Hello?" You say again, and he clears his throat.

"Ah, hello. It's Taehyung. From the showcase?"

"Taehyung! Yes, hello!"

He hadn't planned what he was going to say, so it just comes out in a rush.

"I keep thinking of you," he confesses. "I was hoping to get an early look at your work."

"O-oh. Well, sure! Would you like to meet for tea first? I can take you to my gallery, there's a few pieces there."

He's so relieved he almost drops the phone, thanks you a bit awkwardly before hanging up, getting dressed quickly in a button up and slacks, running a hand through his hair and washing the stray bits of clay from his face.

You end up taking the tea to go and Taehyung is intensely aware of every time your hand brushes his as you walk to the gallery.

When you enter the gallery you stop him at the door, hesitantly putting a hand on his chest.

He stops in his tracks, your touch sending a jolt through him.

"I know it's silly but...will you close your eyes?"

Taehyung obeys immediately, his heart speeding up when you take his hand and lead him.

"You can open them now," you say softly, but your hand lingers in his a moment and he doesn't open his eyes until you let go.

Taehyung loses his breath when he sees it, a sky with colors he can't even name and he can see almost all of them. There are tears standing in his eyes as he looks and he doesn't bother to fight them.

"Y/n," he says softly. "The colors…"

When he tears his eyes away to look down at you, you're biting your lip and looking down at your hands.

"Do you like it? You're so talented, I was nervous-"

He can't stop himself from lifting your chin with his forefinger and when you tilt your face up it's almost visceral, the urge to kiss you.

"It's wonderful. I've never seen anything so beautiful," he says earnestly, and your smile makes his heart skip.

He's like a kid in a candy store, asks you to name all the colors you'd used and he's so grateful to put a name to them.

Burnt orange for the streaks in the sky, bluejay blue for the sky itself, sienna for the ground beneath, flecks of gold throughout.

He doesn't know why he's been given this gift, all the grays fading to make room for these colors, but he can't help equating it with you.

There's more and more every day that he spends with you in the following weeks, the streaks of auburn you'd dyed your hair, the chocolate brown dress you wore the next time you'd gone for tea, and always, always, the dusky rose of your mouth, and every time your lips parts he daydreams of kissing you.

He asks you to help him pick out paints, is so excited to try it himself he can barely contain himself.

He buys a dozen paints, an easy and a few canvases, but when he's done and you turn to go, his heart sinks.

He grabs your wrist gently. "Y/n... will you help me? I'm… I'm new to this."

You agree right away and back at his house he eagerly sets up the canvas but when he looks at it, staring and blank, he has no idea where to start.

You watch him for a moment, and them hold the palette out to him. "Pick a color."

It's instant, the way his eyes are drawn to the rose that reminds him of your lips, and he dips the brush in it lightly, paints a streak across the canvas but it doesn't feel right, feels flat somehow and he huffs out a breath.

The next time, he dips a finger in the paint and you raise an eyebrow.

This time it feels better and he keeps working, tongue peeking between his lips in concentration, looking at you with a discerning eye off and on, until there are a pair of rose colored lips on the canvas.

"There," he says, satisfied, and wipes at his brow, leaving a streak of paint.

You giggle at him a little. "I've never seen finger painting this good, but your face-" you step closer, reach out to thumb along his cheek and it makes him draw in a sharp breath.

"I'm a sculptor. I don't mind getting a little dirty." He says, low in his throat.

"Yeah?" You're still smiling and he traces your jaw with his fingertips like he'd wanted to that first night, fascinated by the line of rose that marked your skin.

"Taehyung," you breathe, mouth parted, and it's too much, the pull in his stomach, the ache in his chest and he leans down to kiss you, soft at first, and then he slips his tongue between those dusky rose lips.

A moan builds low in his throat and he snakes an arm around your waist, loving the way you melt against him.

You drop the palette and the paint splatters over both of you and the canvas, and Taehyung barely notices but you break apart from him with a cry.

"Oh no! I'm… I'm sorry, I ruined it-"

Taehyung shakes his head vehemently. "Y/n-"

"I ruin everything," you mumble, and Taehyung is alarmed to see tears rolling down your cheeks.

"Hey, don't-"

But you're grabbing your purse and pushing past him before he can stop you.

You don't answer his calls or texts for a week and Taehyung is distraught. He spends hours staring at the canvas of your mouth with the paint splattered around it, leaving it unfinished on the easel.

When Namjoon comes over to borrow a few eggs, he notices the painting.

"Since when do you paint?" He asks.

Taehyung sighs. "Since I started seeing colors."

Namjoon's eyes widen. "Since you what?"

Taehyung lets it all spill out of him, tells Namjoon everything, and an expression almost like recognition spreads across his friend's face.

"Taehyung... what do you know about soulmates?"

It hits him like a ton of bricks and when he thanks Namjoon and ushers him out with a dozen eggs, he all but runs to your gallery, knowing your opening is that night and hoping you'll be there.

He's right, you're setting up all your paintings and he sees you just like he did the first night, your back to him, running your hands over a canvas.

It's different than your other paintings, it's a portrait and as he gets closer he realizes he recognizes the face...from the mirror.

"Y/n?"

You jump, spin to face him and it's such deja vu it makes him smile.

Before you speak, he speaks first.

"I never saw color until the night I met you. Everything was gray and bleak and now...now everything's bright and vibrant and it's because of you."

You blink up at him. "Because of me?"

"You're my soulmate," he explains, as if it's simple and it feels that way to him, explains the pull he feels every time he's near you, the longing.

"Y-your…"

Taehyung takes your hands in his, searching your face.

"Maybe...maybe I'm not yours," he says slowly, his voice low, heart seeming to split in his chest. "Maybe it's just me but I-I'm in love with you, Y/n."

You look down at your intertwined hands, flip his over, trace the lines of his palm with your fingertips, and Taehyung doesn't know how to feel, fights the hope rising in him.

"The night I met you, I started being able to feel my art when I touched it. It was like I could feel the colors through my skin. I thought I was going crazy."

You look up at him and Taehyung doesn't fight it, that urge, he kisses you softly.

"You're not crazy. You're wonderful."

"When I ruined your painting-"

Taehyung hums in the back of his throat. "You made it better. You make everything better." 

He pulls you into his arms, kisses your cheekbones and the bridge of your nose, making you giggle.

Your opening goes well and Taehyung stays at your side, taking your hand in his, wrapping his arm around your waist, touching you any way he can.

He takes you out for dinner to celebrate and he can’t stop staring at you, at all the colors he can see now because of you, and you invite him inside for tea after.

Finally, he’s able to run his hands along your back, your arms, feel you under his skin the way he felt the clay under his palms, and it feels just like the clay does, feels like home.

#taehyung x reader #kim taehyung x reader #bts v x reader #taehyung imagine #bts soulmate au #taehyung soulmate au

[emilycollins00]

A3 actors! Art in bloom

Type: One shot

Pairing: Miyoshi Kazunari x Reader

Theme: Passion / Art / Clash

Contrary to what many people and even classmates of yours thought, being an art student was not something you should chose to do lightly.

Sure, it seemed enjoyable, cute even. But no one ever talked about how many hours you would spend with a single portrait, drafting about abstract concepts or trying to discern at two in the morning whether a sculpture should turn more sideways or look at the ground to create a deeper perspective. 

Art was wild.

But you loved it and, why not admit it, you took it pretty seriously. Maybe a tiny bit more than most people.

That’s why you had always liked how Kazunari Miyoshi, although being the loud person he was, frequently went on and on with you discussing ideas when there was some debate in class. That brain of his was something else. His works and usual approach when mixing modern and traditional Japanese culture fascinated you. It really did.

But that had been changing lately, and it angered you.

Up until this year you hadn't really cared about it. Everyone had their right to live however they wanted after all.

However, without being able to tell when it began, you started casually observing him. You watched him talk to your other classmates as soon as the lecture, frowned as he concentrated on the draft they had one hour and a half to finish or taking selfies and live videos of the works you all were demanded to do. You even discovered yourself staring and how the sun caressed his profile first hour in the morning.

He had a nice profile.

By that point, something inside you was getting frustrated. He participated in class and attended to the lectures, but at the same time…? you felt he was starting prioritising social media over art, or looking for people for one of his popular mixers, like so many of your other classmates, who had most likely entered this major without much thought, did.

You would understand if he would have a part-time job, but the thought of him being able to do so much more and deciding to stop midway left you speechless.

You wished for him to take more things seriously. 

“Miyoshi, were you able to clean all the supplies from last class?" you called him out between the break. Everyone in class traded places to carry the main boxes with brushes, paints and whatever main source they had to work with each week "Our teacher told me to take some clay from there. I'm planning to use them for my final project, but I can't seem to find the key in the secretary office”

The university student lifted his head from his mobile and tipped on his chin, trying to remember "Supplies from...? Oh man, THAT is why I had them in my working space!” He palped his jeans looking for it “My bad, I was totes in a hurry and just closed as soon as we were done!” 

You contained an exasperated groan “Why would you get the key unless it was to clean the practice room?” 

Kazunari laughed nervously under your intimidating glare “True, true! It's just that I was talking with some friends over the phone and they were in a hurry so…” he showed you the key taking it out of his pocket, maybe to show that at least he hadn’t lost it “Do you need them now? I could go clean for you” 

The vein you had tried so hard to maintain calm popped altogether. Not wanting to keep talking, you rapidly grabbed the key from his hand and headed to take the supplies. God grief how you hated that carefree attitude. 

                                         ……………………..…….

“No prob, dude! Next time just hit me up with a DM and I’ll come running to your uni here! In exchange, I’ll need your help to finish the flyers so…” 

Recognizing the flashy voice, you slowly looked behind, witnessing the blond with another person. Was he meeting with people to play around here too? 

You couldn’t believe it. You all had your final projects deadlines almost spitting in your faces! That’s why you had to come to this other university to ask for permission to use a kiln for your final, as you didn’t have lectures prepared today and your university didn’t have any. Didn’t look like it was Kazunari’s case. 

“Uh? No way, Y/N-pyon!” he waved at you with both hands, confirming it was you indeed, as he got closer “Looking fleek today too! What are you doing here in Yosei?” the person walking next to him whispered something “They’re a friend from my major Tsuzuroon, I told you about them, dude!” 

You mentally scoffed. Without returning his greet and turning on your heels, you headed for the teacher’s office.

 “You said friend but…” Tsuzuru squinted his eyes, watching you leave “…It doesn't look like they like you very much” 

“No worries! Nowadays they are always like that. But their works are so lit! Y/N-pyon is the ultimate remix of you, Ten-ten and Yukki!” 

“That’s… not a good thing, Miyoshi-san”

                            …………………………………………

“Y/N-pyon, about-”

“Miyoshi, sorry. I am on my way to Yosei University to finish my work and unlike your usual approach of work to play, I actually don’t have time to waste”

“Uh? My works are…”

“Are what? I’ve been seeing you doing half-assed things all over the semester. This last week you didn’t even come at the afternoon lectures” you were pretty sure this was just you venting at this point “You’re amazing Miyoshi, I honestly think that, so why? If… If you only put more of yourself into it, your art would be even more unbelievable!”

He went quiet, a rare sight.

“Art it’s not something you just do for laughs; I thought you were one of the few people here that felt the same and-” the phone in your bag started ringing. Head  teacher. Inhaling deeply, you answered it “Yes?”

“Y/N-san? I am so sorry. Could you come to Josey university?” 

Losing the eye contact you had been maintaining with the blond boy, your heart sank as you heard the words ‘kiln’ and ‘malfunction’. “…Please tell me my final project is ok” 

                                       ……………………………….

You stood in silence, looking at the mess when you heard a knock at the door.

“I know I shouldn’t have followed and am expecting you throw me out the door but…” you didn’t move an inch so Kazunari took that as a free pass.

Just as the teacher told you, the electricity in the small building had had an issue and there had been a combustion, meaning, the sculpture you had kept here while working for weeks was now cracked and in shreds. You sniffed, brushing away the tears that were trying to come out from your eyes. All your hard work. All the time spent, had been for nothing.

“The Kiln is burnt. I don’t have anything good to save” you felt emotionally exhausted “Damn, I should have used air dry clay since the beginning… or not tried to sculpt anything” your vision became blurry again “I don’t know why do I make everything more difficult that it is”

Kazunari contemplated the situation, studying the seemingly full cracked sculpture from afar.

“Teach probably told you she would wait for you to turn on the work, right?” He saw you vaguely nodding you head “You got this!” he put his hand on your shoulder, you barely glancing at him “Look, If you still wanna use this base I’ll go ask for some moisturize and clean water to mix. Then I will maintain the upper part as you work down there, not bad idea right?”

You stared at him, finally grasping that he had come all the way here and was now trying to help “Why are you here? I… was being a busybody telling you how to work in our major” you had realized you had crossed the line back then.

Kazunari laughed, shaking his head “You were not saying anything that was a lie though, I don't want to admit it, but it’s true I've been a mess for a while”

“I guess parties require a lot of work” you bite your tongue hard. He was being a decent person trying to help and you couldn’t stop for two seconds to pick on him? You wanted to punch yourself.

“Mmm? Ah, our theatre troupe is almost opening for performance and the next troupe is on practices so flyers and scripts are running at full gas”

You stopped looking at your sculpture. What did he just say about a theatre?

“…What?”

“You’ve never come, Y/N-pyon? Mankai company is the best theatre in Veludo way! You totes should come, I’ll even send you the tickets for our new performance!” before you knew it, he had already DM you what you imagined was all the background information.

The moment you unlocked it, you almost dropped the phone. The photos and drawings of the posters were amazing, and you just knew who it had done “You… never said you had a job”

Kazunari considered what you pointed out. Mankai had managed to recover from what they needed to pay but they still didn't have enough founds “I’ve never thought about our acts as a job thought”

Your mind was a mess. Being an actor and doing publicity didn’t count for him as he studied? No wonder he usually left early! Now you felt even worst. You had behaved like a… “Uh, are these original templates?” you browsed over the performances’ posters, each one more astonishing than the other “This is… wow and this one?” 

He blinked, noticing how the tone of your voice was now more soothing. You had somewhat calm down. He would high-key enjoy hearing you talk to him like that more often “Hey, enough about me. We have work to do”

You agreed, putting away your phone “You’re right but again I… I am sorry, Miyoshi. And thanks, for staying” 

“No prob, Y/N-pyon!” 

“Would you tell me what I could do so you stopped calling me that?” 

“Eeeeeeh why? I think it fits! It's super-duper cute, like you!” 

Thump!

No. You told yourself.

Coming back to your senses you told yourself the warm you felt in your cheeks was due to summer starting earlier. It definitely wasn’t because of Kazunari smile directed at you, helped you or how the sun reflected on his perfect profile as you both started working on your work. 

Art was wild… but it was also an evocative of feelings.

_________________________________________________________

This one has been a difficult one! I wanted Reader to kind of clash with his mindset

Hope you guys enjoy it. Have a wonderful day! 💕

#a3 #a3! act! addict! actors! #A3! Actor Training Game #a3! #a3! game #kazunari miyoshi #a3 kazunari #reader insert #reader #kazunari x reader #a3! kazunari #miyoshi kazunari x reader #kazunari miyoshi x reader #one shot #a3 tsuzuru

[florencecastlewritings]

Kintsugi

A short original fiction by Florence Castle. If you enjoy this piece, please consider supporting me with a ko-fi donation.  The pottery wheel beside them lay still and clean, but the desk was coated in newspaper, stained with splatters of brown. Broken shards of a smashed charcoal grey dish were arranged carefully before them, and her lined hands, spotted with age, caressed the smooth fragments as she waited patiently. 

‘It’s called kintsugi,’ the young girl sat beside her said. The girl’s hair was cropped short, a wave of dark curls just skimming over one eye, her nose ring glinting in the light. It was amazing how young ladies dressed now. ‘I learnt about it at college,’ the girl continued as she mixed a glittering powder into a resin. ‘Rather than try and hide the damage, it just becomes part of the story of the object - embracing the flaws and illuminating them. I think it’s quite lovely - thought we’d try it this week.’ 

The older woman frowned slightly at the girl. She was extremely familiar, and now that she said that, she was certain she had been here last week. ‘I’m sorry, my dear, I don’t recall who-?’

‘Lucy,’ the young girl reminded her, with a pleasant smile. 

‘Yes. Of course. I did know that,’ she replied, waving a slightly flustered hand. She peered down at the little pot of resin. ‘And that’s gold, is it?’ 

‘That’s right. Biggest piece first?’ Lucy suggested. 

She nodded, and held up the largest fragment of the bowl; it had shattered down the middle, one side into several smaller shards, but this side was untouched. She held it steady as Lucy delicately applied the golden resin onto the edge with a small brush. 

‘I must say,’ she remarked, ‘I’m glad to see make do and mend coming back into fashion.’

Lucy grinned. ‘Yes. Nice to not just throw it away.’ 

She nodded sagely. ‘Everyone throws things away nowadays. I remember my mother helping me unpick one of my father’s old jumpers, so that we could reknit it into something trendier.’ 

Lucy raised her eyebrows, though she didn’t look up from the careful application of the gold. ‘What did you knit from it?’ 

‘A nice new cardigan for me; I told all my friends it was out of a catalogue though.’ 

She burst out laughing. ‘Did they believe you?’ 

‘Naturally.’ She picked up another fragment, and at Lucy’s nod, held it against the resin. Lucy leaned forward, continuing the repair. ‘We were very poor then,’ she told her vaguely. She could remember it quite clearly, the smell of the coal dust from the fire, the ancient mangle in the corner, the long queue outside the phone box on the street and the excitement when number fourteen got a telly. ‘Getting something new from a catalogue… that was… well, that was something worth lying about. A bit of glamour.’ 

‘I suppose they wanted to believe you,’ said Lucy. 

‘Yes, I suppose they did.’ She looked down at the bowl, steadily coming back into shape, the resin hardening into golden streams across the smooth landscape of the bowl. ‘Everything was so exciting then, but that’s childhood really, isn’t it?’ 

‘Aren’t things exciting now?’ Lucy prompted. 

‘Oh, well, I’ve seen it all, love,’ she replied. ‘And it moves too fast for me now to keep back. But I think back on those times a lot lately.’ 

‘Do you?’ asked Lucy quietly. ‘Like what?’ 

‘I think about my mother sometimes,’ she said. The fragment she had been holding was set enough to be released now, so she shifted her fingers to hold up another piece for Lucy, the thick blue lines of her veins sprawling across the back of her hands. ‘And my old school friends. And even the teachers sometimes. They just wander through my thoughts. I can remember my mother sitting by the fire, showing me how to unpick the threads from my father’s old jumper so we could reknit it into something new.’ 

Lucy blinked at her and nodded before looking back to the glistening gold roots that were growing steadily across the bowl. ‘That’s a lovely memory to have,’ Lucy said at last.

‘Yes,’ she said, remembering the mewl of the cat as they ignored its batting paw, the soft muttering of the radio, the glowing coals of the fire, the taste of the tea. Her mother’s hands, careful and precise, painstakingly picking away at the jumper. 

‘Like this,’ she had said. ‘That’s it.’ 

‘All my friends were so envious,’ she continued, remembering Judy Mayhew’s wide eyes and parted lips, and how Binky Conlon had run her hands over the outstretched sleeve of the cardigan, secretly born from a tattered old jumper. Binky’s eyes had narrowed as they noticed the buttons, familiar from the window of the drapers, betraying that it was not brand new from a catalogue, but she had pretended not to notice her friend’s suspicion, parading up and down the cracked pavement as though in a beauty pageant. It had been her pride and joy, that cardigan.  

‘One more piece,’ said Lucy, jolting her out of her memory. 

‘Oh… yes…’ She kept her fingers pressed against the cool ceramic, with just a little pressure to keep the pieces in place, her gaze tracing the seams of gold that shone between the fragments. ‘You were right,’ she said. ‘It’s very pretty.’ 

‘Isn’t it?’ said Lucy brightly, holding the last piece in place. ‘Even more precious than it was before.’

‘Yes… I really am sorry for breaking it.’ She had just remembered, suddenly, the bump against the table that had left the deep purple bruise on her hip, the high pitched crash of the bowl on the floor. She supposed it had been last week. 

‘Don’t be silly! I’m glad you did - I’ve wanted to try kintsugi for ages.’ 

Lucy took the bowl in careful, steady hands, and raised it onto a high shelf to set. 

She rose too, her slow bones aching, but then paused, gazing around the studio. The clay splattered sink, the surfaces covered with old newspapers, the shelves and shelves of ceramics, some half-finished, some beautifully glazed, pots and plates and vases and sculptures of unknown figures or animals. 

‘Did you make all these?’ she asked. 

The moment hung like the clay dust in the air, swirling in the light that fell through the window. Lucy’s voice was steady, reassuring, calm. ‘You did, Nana,’ she said. ‘Remember?’ 

She looked down at her hands, and for a brief moment they were slick with wet clay, gently pinching the sides of a growing vase, feeling it shift and move like a living, breathing thing, born from her hands. ‘Yes,’ she said, her eyebrows raised as she continued to stare down at her hands. They were quite dry again, marked only by the dapple of age spots and occasional flecks of resin that had escaped Lucy’s paintbrush. ‘Of course I do.’ 

#writing #original writing #short story #memory #dementia #alzheimers #fiction #Florence Castle

[tysonrunningfox]

Two Night Stand AU: Part 7

Ao3

Hiccup (3:52am): Astrid please, I can explain.  Better than I did.  I’m sorry. 

Hiccup (3:52am): Astrid

Hiccup (3:53am): I keep saying your name, I don’t

Hiccup (3:53am): It’s my favorite name

Hiccup (3:53am): I know my name I just a bodily function but I love how you told me that and also none of this matters because I

Hiccup (3:54am): Please, if you get these, please give me your number.  Please. 

Hiccup (3:54am): I’m not begging.  Not in the manipulative way.  Or any way. 

Hiccup (3:56am): Except I actually am begging. 

Hiccup (3:56am): In the pathetic way. 

Hiccup (3:58am): I thought about running after you.  I didn’t because well, I was naked, or not, that’s not, I

Hiccup (3:59am): Please, just say anything.  Please.  I need to talk to you.  I

Hiccup (4:02am): I’ve been saying ‘I’ a lot, that doesn’t mean I haven’t been thinking about what this means to you and I’m guessing it couldn’t be worse.  This couldn’t have gone worse.  I was everything you feared and more.  Or less. I don’t

Hiccup (4:03am): I don’t want your comfort, not that you’d give it, I’m saying I’m the worst.  I’m saying I’m awful and I’m sorry and this is so bad and it looks even worse than it is and I’d like to talk about exactly how bad it looks with you.  Only you.

Hiccup (4:04am):  Please, just message me back or give me your number or your address, I won’t stalk you, I’ll just send you a long-winded letter in cursive on cardstock. 

Hiccup (4:05am): I’ll buy cardstock, I can’t write cursive though

 This is pointless.  And stupid.  And the only thing Hiccup cares about even as he gets the notification that Heather’s plane has landed.  She’ll be home soon.  Fine.  It’s fine. 

He should make the bed.  He should shower.  He should do anything but obsessively message the perfect girl who isn’t responding. 

Astrid. 

Astrid. 

Astrid who feels like home.  Astrid who’s gone.  Astrid.  Astrid. 

He keeps saying her name like it has a hidden definition.  Like it’s a code that can unlock some way out of the mess he’s placed himself in. 

It can’t, because there isn’t. 

Fuck.  Fuck.  Fuck. 

Because he made a mess.  Not just a mess.  A mud pit, in which he voluntarily brought dirt into his life, and then mixed it with water, and then invited someone who lacked the qualifications to turn mud into structure into his life, and somehow, instead of being a disaster, it just lit everything on fire.  

The mud pit is a clay-pit.  The moving sculpture of his life fired into place the second that he realized Astrid for what she truly was.  Is. 

It has to be possible.

Or, you know, there’s just no reason to any of this. 

But the thing is that after pulling the short stick enough times, it ceases to be random chance and starts to feel like reserved karma.  And Hiccup would like to cash in. 

And yes, he understands that the idea of karma is not a genie in a bottle, it is not a magic wand, it cannot magically bring Astrid into his life, not that he’d want it to because—well, she’d hate it—but he thinks there should be some sort of cosmic station where one could exchange the sum of their theoretical suffering for what they want. 

Like he lost a leg, that’s…big ass misery, ok?  That was a gigantic ‘fuck you’ from the universe.  He endured it with a mostly strong chin and stubborn sense of humor, but right now, he is willing to drop it forever just for a specific configuration of ten digits. 

That’s a pretty good deal, right universe?  Deal or No Deal?

Spin The Wheel of Fortune, Universe. 

Do You Want to Be a Millionaire, Universe? 

The Price is Right, as in this is the best he has to offer, so Universe, maybe make your move. 

“Honey, I’m home!” Heather calls from the living room as she disarms the security alarm. 

Check.  The universe says, sliding the queen of the castle into view. 

“In the bedroom,” he says back, staring down at Heather’s note, wondering how leading with it would go.  Not well, not that there’s any way any of this will go well. 

It’ll be faster maybe, if he leads with the Dear John letter he knew about for weeks that led him to make a ‘fuck you’ account on a dating website and God, he is so stupid. 

“What the fuck is this?”  Heather dives right into it, standing in the doorway with a folded piece of paper in her hand. 

“Oh, sorry, I was supposed to be vacuuming with my pearls on,” he says flatly, “I forgot we were going to roleplay Leave it to Beaver, which takes on a very different meaning when you add the sexual element—”

“Hiccup,” Heather sighs his name like it’s an impossible to squelch bodily function, and he can’t keep Astrid off his mind for even a second, can he?  “The note, by the front door, what is it?” 

“I’ve…” He swallows hard, wiping his hand on his boxers before picking up his only shred of pitiable evidence, “I have the note right here.” 

“Trade me,” she raises a non-plussed eyebrow, but her hand shakes as he puts her own letter into it and takes the scrap of paper from her. 

Thanks for last night.  I had fun.  Great apartment!

xx Astrid

It’s smeared, written in makeup, casual in a way that Astrid isn’t.  In a way he thought he was before he met her.  His mouth goes dry and he tries to hide it, looking up at Heather and waiting for her to react to her own note. 

She stares at it for a second before frowning and folding a new crease in it.  When she holds it up at him like the last card in her Uno hand, it hits him for the first and final time that he really was batting out of his league with her.  Not because she’s too good for him, even though his decision process over the last week or so corroborates that, but because she’s wrong for him at some fundamental level that he never believed in. 

He knows he’s playing fast and loose with the concept of karma, but for the first time, fate makes some kind of sense. 

“When did you find this?”  She looks ashamed under her hard edges, the ones that don’t blunt and crumble even when they’re alone.  The ones he used to think were strong when maybe they’re actually cruel, but he’s not dumb enough to blame her for making him that way. 

Maybe they bring it out in each other.  Brought. 

“When did you write it?” 

“Does that matter?”  She laughs and Hiccup shrugs, willing himself honest even though it’s hard. 

“Probably not.” 

“Because of Alison, or whoever wrote the slutty little note you left me to find?” 

‘Yes’ is the honest answer, but not the right one. 

“Because you’re right.  It’s not working.”  He sighs, “it hasn’t been for a while, we’ve been…growing apart—”

“You haven’t been growing at all,” she retorts, “and your snarky, cryptic thing isn’t as charming as it used to be when I’m around it all the time—”

“That’s fair,” he taps his temple, “I live here, it’s not great.” 

“You waited until I was out of town and cheated on me instead of just telling me directly that you’d found my note.” 

“Yeah,” he nods, “and you didn’t give me the note, I think it’s fair to say that communication has been breaking down for a while.  And communication is the cornerstone of any relationship, so suffice to say when that breaks down, the relationship goes with it.” 

She shakes her head at him, slowly, a little shocked.  He doesn’t remember the last time he actually surprised her, the last time she authentically laughed at his antics instead of spurring him on with a half-interested glint in her eyes.  She doesn’t quip back though.  That hasn’t happened in a very long time. 

“What happened to you?”  She asks after a too long minute and he shrugs. 

“I…realized it was time to be honest.  To stop doing this just because we feel like we’re supposed to, because we’ve put so much time into it.”  He feels it now, everything that drew him to her in the first place.  All the hours and days and weeks they spent together, making friction like it was a resource.  “The fact is, I don’t think we’re right for each other.  I think we’re just…or at least I was scared that there’d never be anything better.” 

“So, you’re breaking up with me because you’re infused with optimism that we’re both going to find something better.”  She shakes her head, looking lighter and bored and not hurt enough for what he did.  “You really believe that?” 

“Not believing it wasn’t working.” 

“You’re an idiot,” she points at Astrid’s note, which might as well be his prized possession now, because he’s going to have to move and it’ll fit in his wallet. 

“Can I ask you something?” 

“Yes, I’m furious with you but…I get it.  I wrote the note, I wish you hadn’t found it while snooping, I should have just given it to you.  I would have if I thought you were capable of being this mature about this—”

“No, not about—we’re broken up, I think we both understand it, but umm…did you ever fake it?”  What starts as half a joke ends in some bitter, curious, cringing place that he never wants to visit again, but given that this is probably his last chance to get the facts, he goes for it.  “When we were together?” 

He makes a hand gesture that he wishes he hadn’t.  Heather shakes her head and he thinks she’s feeling the bad fit too.  He thinks, because he’s realizing that he never learned how to read her face, not really.  And not because she didn’t let him, and not because he didn’t try, but it’s a language with a different taproot, something he could struggle with for years and never be fluent. 

“A year together.  A fucking year and—all this,” she gestures at the apartment that he didn’t even really like, but agreed to because going with the flow was the way to make their bickering day touring apartments end, “gone, and you want to know if I faked it?” 

“You shouldn’t do that,” he lectures, internally cringing but feeling lighter.  Vindicated, maybe.  Fully through the veil of embarrassment and into someplace free.  “It’s no good for you, it didn’t help me.” 

“Right, you do so well with criticism.” 

“Maybe I do,” he shrugs, “I think we both know there are a lot of things we never learned about each other.” 

“You’re an asshole.” 

And that makes him think of Astrid, and how he’s never felt closer to anyone, and how he wants this to be over with and then, how Dagur is probably going to beat him up.  He probably should get in touch with his long lost cousin, that’s probably his only chance against Dagur’s impending wrath. 

“I can move out.” 

“Ok.”  She stands up and looks at him with dwindling recognition, the polaroid of the present crystallizing in her memory and affirming him eternally as ‘that dickhead’.  It’s…it sucks.  He sucks.  “Let me know when you’re out, I’ll go stay with Dagur.” 

“Shouldn’t take that long,” he regrets how mean it sounds until it seems like she doesn’t care, cut off from him in a way that isn’t new.  He should have noticed.  They should have talked.  They didn’t, he was an asshole, and now the idea of Astrid is a North star brighter than the blizzard and definitely brighter than the vengeance his ego would like to imagine in Heather’s expression. 

Except it’s not there.  And he has no ego, not right now, not when he’s so eager to exit this conversation and this chapter in his life. 

She is too.  She wrote the note. 

He should have just told her he found it. 

He’s so glad he didn’t, and he’ll hate himself for it later, when the leak in his heart is patched. 

“Alright.”  She stands up and he half thinks she’s going to shake his hand, but she doesn’t, “well, bye, Hiccup.” 

Her voice might catch.  His throat might hurt. 

As soon as she leaves, he opens the dating site again and tries to message Astrid. 

Hiccup (5:10am): I broke up with her

CustomerHelpBot (5:10am): The account you are attempting to contact has been inactivated

Hiccup (5:11am): good job changing your name, very convincing

CustomerHelpBot (5:11am): The account you are attempting to contact has been inactivated, for further information, please contact customer service at 303-555-7893

Hiccup (5:11am): that’s a really weird way to give me your number. 

CustomerHelpBot (5:11am): The account you are attempting to contact has been inactivated, for further information, please contact customer service at 303-555-7893

Hiccup (5:12am): I’ll call the number

He gives the supposed threat a minute to sink in before doing just that, and the robotic voice that picks up honestly shocks him. 

“You have reached the customer service hotline for America’s Favorite Dating Site, what can I do to help you?” 

It’s not Astrid. 

Not remotely. 

For one, the voice is entirely humorless, entirely dead.  Bored in a way she’s not capable of, he’s seen it as she prowled around this apartment he hates, looking for something to do.  Also, it’s a guy. 

“Hi, I—Hi, you’re not—I’m actually looking to get in touch with someone I met on your site—”

“What is your name, sir?” 

“Hiccup Haddock, my username is—”

“PrincessOutpost?” 

“Thanks for not making me say it out loud.”  He was drunk when he thought of that.  He was drunk when he made this stupid plan.  He was sober when Astrid showed up, eyes bright and shoulders strong, breathing hard as she introduced herself and shook his hand. 

So awkward.  So pretty.  

And no, that first time wasn’t great.  It was…necessary, like spring cleaning, but after they talked…after they got to know each other…

“I’m afraid we can’t give information about any of our cancelled accounts to anyone but the police.” 

“She cancelled?” 

“The last profile that you interacted with is inactive, as of even earlier this morning.” 

“That—come on, man, it—”

“I’m sure it was magical, but we are legally obligated not to give our customers information out.” 

“I really just need a phone number or an address or…or a last name.” 

“I get that sometimes you don’t get a chance to talk much—”

“Rude,” Hiccup snaps. 

“But we are legally obligated to not give customers’ information to anyone but the police.” 

“The police?”  He pauses, picking Astrid’s eyeliner note up off of the bed and staring at it, resisting the stupid, fond, useless urge to swipe his thumb across her name. 

“Yes, they’re men in blue who enforce the laws.” 

“So, if I know she’d broken the law, you’re saying I could get that personal information.” 

“Sir, our service doesn’t exist to help stalkers—”

“What about people who break and enter?” 

#two night stand au #hiccstrid au #modern au #httyd fic #one more chapter methinks #i fought off melatonin to finish this because it kept haunting me

[thewriterofmanythings]

And They Were Roommates

Day 5 of Widojest Week-There’s only one bed, or Alternate Universe

Nott and Yeza's apartment is undergoing renovations, and the cute foreign grad student Jester has been crushing on needs a place to stay. What could go wrong? Super happy with this fic. You can also read it on AO3. As usual big shoutout to @3fling for all the love and support, especially this time because I wouldn’t even have a plot for this otherwise!

Working at the local coffee shop had a lot of benefits. Free coffee of course, free pastries at the end of the night, listening to whatever music the employees wanted, and the flexible hours that worked with her school schedule.

The cute redhead grad student that came in everyday was definitely a plus too.

Jester had been working at Cool Beans for four years and had seen all manner of people come through the door. As a college town it wasn’t a surprise; people came from all over and stayed a few months to a few years while they studied. Some of those people stayed but most left to go back to wherever they came from or even off to new places. Jester herself dreamed of leaving one day, venturing out into the world and discovering what was out there. But for now she was here, working towards an art degree and making the best of her situation.

The redheaded grad student was a foreigner from Germany. He spoke excellent English though his accent was a bit tough to understand at times, especially if he ever got frustrated. His name was Caleb and he had come all the way from his home country to join one of the world’s best linguistics programs. He came in every day at exactly one p.m., ordered a sandwich and an americano with an extra shot of espresso, and sat down to study for two hours before neatly cleaning his table and heading out.

Jester enjoyed people watching, trying to analyze people from the way they walk, the things they did, how they interacted with other people. Even before she had a full conversation with Caleb she noticed he was quiet, polite, and had a dry sense of humor. His wardrobe was full of earthy tones, lots of boots and plain button up shirts, adding in jackets, scarves and hats when the weather began to turn cold. On the rare occasion he came in when it didn’t seem he was studying he still carried a simple black leather notebook. He often pulled the top part of his shoulder length hair into a sort of bun, exposing the pen he regularly kept behind his right ear. Ink marks and scratches along his hand indicated he did a lot of writing and, Jester would guess, he owned a cat.

Of course, it wasn’t all just staring from a distance. Jester had begun to build a friendship with Caleb thanks to a strange change of relationships. Most often at the shop Jester shared her shift with Clay and Molly; the three of them made a trifecta of hair colors and piercings that gave the warm shop an unexpected punk vibe. Clay was a gardener of sorts and had made friends with Yeza and Nott, the lovely couple whom Caleb was staying with during his time in the States. Molly was in a band with two women named Beau and Yasha and the group usually played in a newer dive bar downtown on Saturday nights. Jester and Clay went every week to support their friend, and one day while picking up a new plant Clay had told Yeza about the shows. Knowing it was unhealthy for Caleb to spend all his time in the house studying, Nott and Yeza had immediately booked a recurring sitter for their young son and dragged Caleb down to the bar to hang out with others. The eight of them had begun to get closer, but Jester still found it difficult at times to put herself out there and really engage with Caleb.

Today however was Jester’s lucky day.

“Caleb!” The small bell chimed through the coffee shop as Nott slipped in, shutting the door quickly to keep the cold wind from freezing the customers out. The woman was on the shorter side but no one ever noticed because her personality more than made up for it. Her sense of humor among the friend group was unrivaled and she could easily drink them all under the table.

“Ya Nott, is everything all right?” Caleb looked up from his laptop where he had been hyper focused on a paper. His brow was furrowed with a mix of worry and confusion.

Jester busied herself with straightening the pastry display, which was conveniently close to Caleb’s table. She could be particularly nosy at times due to her curious nature, but now she mostly wanted to make sure everything was okay with Nott’s family.

“I’m all right Caleb, but I’m afraid I do have some bad news. The renovation plans have been moved up by two whole weeks!”

“Oh, that means…” Caleb’s voice trailed off, his face turning into a frown.

“Yeah exactly! Yeza’s mom said she can take Luke, and we have another friend we can stay with, but she only has one extra room.”

“I see. So I suppose I will need to find a place to stay in the meantime since Clay will not be back until the end of the month.”

“I’m really sorry about that Caleb! I’ll help you look, surely we can find something soon. Maybe you can stay with Beau or something?”

“He can stay with me!”

Jester fought the urge to clasp her hands over her mouth. Wow, smooth move Jester. Inviting your little crush to live with you? There’s no way this is gonna go well, she thought to herself. She hadn’t even stopped to consider the ramifications of what she had volunteered for.

Something glinted behind Nott’s eyes and she nodded her head frantically. “Yes! Yes that would be perfect! You’re just the best Jester.”

“Oh, I… I would hate to impose, Jester, that’s very kind of you…” Caleb stuttered, his hands nervously fidgeting with his scarf.

“I think it sounds like the perfect plan.” Molly emerged from the back room where he had apparently been listening to the whole conversation. “Jessie might bring you out of your shell, Mr. Caleb, and Jester, well…. You could learn some tidiness habits perhaps.”

What a wingman, Jester thought, rolling her eyes at her purple-haired friend. He smirked, twirling around and walking to the register to help another customer who had walked in.

“Don’t you have a dog? I do not know if my cat would like that.”

“Oh that’s okay! Nugget doesn’t mind cats, he won’t bother Frumpkin!” Jester smiled at Caleb, trying her hardest not to blush.

“Well, I suppose it would be the best offer I could get on such sort notice.”

Nott beamed at the two of them. “Sounds like it’s settled then! I’ll help you pack up Caleb and we’ll be right over!”

***

“Soooo, this is my apartment. It’s nothing crazy you know, but it’s nice and has a good view and a lot of spaaace….”

Jester could feel herself beginning to ramble as she opened the door to her studio apartment. It was extremely nice for college student standards; her mother wanted her to be comfortable so she paid for Jester’s rent, but she also wanted her daughter to learn the value of hard work, meaning Jester was responsible for her own tuition and school supplies, as well as any other necessities. All things considered it was a pretty nice arrangement.

The living room was a nice open space with a gorgeous window overlooking downtown. The kitchen and living room were decorating in bright colors with unique art sculptures spaced around. In the center of the open area close to the window sat a large easel displaying a half finished painting. A number of half-dead attempts at plant keeping were littered about the area as well.

“You have a very nice place, Jester.” Caleb was huffing a bit as he carried in a large box of his belongings. Jester herself had Frumpkin’s cat carrier and a bag of cat supplies. There was still a fair amount of stuff to bring in but this was a good start.

“So I don’t have a second room but the couch is a fold out and it’s totally comfy.” Jester sat Frumpkin’s carrier down and unlatched the door. “Here, kitty kitty kitty!”

After a second Frumpkin lazily made his way out, beginning to inspect the strange new space. The two of them watched as he began to sniff the couch, marking the edge with his scent glands.

“You are an artist?” Caleb asked, gesturing toward the easel.

“I do! I’m an art major but I don’t get to do a lot of painting stuff at my level so I like to practice it here.”

“I look forward to seeing you work.”

Jester tried not to let Caleb see her blush as she began to help him unpack. The rest of the day was spent moving boxes to make sure everything was out of Nott and Yeza’s apartment in time for the renovators to begin their work, taking only a small break for Chinese food. The conversation was timid at first, the two of them dancing around each other the way acquaintances interact at a party when their mutual friend goes to visit the bathroom. But by the end of the night the two had sunk into a comfortable rhythm. As Jester went to sleep that night, she played over the day’s event in her head, giggling every time she thought about how she had made Caleb laugh. If she didn’t have a crush before, she was certainly deep in one now.

***

“Jester, look out!”

Caleb’s frantic voice came from inside Jester’s room. It had been a week since Caleb had moved in, and Frumpkin and Nugget hadn’t gotten along as well as Jester had assured him they would. He had spent the last hour trying to coax his cat out from under her bed and it seemed like the persuasion had taken a turn for the worse.

Jester glanced over from her position at the easel. She was enjoying her Saturday morning routine of hot tea and painting, listening to Regina Spektor ring out through the apartment via her wireless speaker. Her trance like state was broken as she saw Frumpkin shoot down the hallway, followed by Nugget’s large body. The cat turned sharply, but the poor dog was caught unaware and his attempt to switch directions was nowhere near as smooth, throwing himself right into Jester’s easel. Thanks to Caleb’s warning however, she was able to stabilize the workspace, only losing a bit of her paint to the tarp underfoot in the process.

Caleb ran out, his red hair a frazzled halo around his head. He frantically darted into the kitchen, trying to corner Frumpkin around the island, but the cat was wise and jumped up onto the counter, knocking over one of Jester’s plants in the process.

Catching wind of what Caleb was trying to do, Jester ran to try to intercept him, but the cat was too fast and she ended up tripping over Nugget instead. She braced herself for a fall onto the hardwood floor, but felt hands attempt to catch her. Unfortunately in his rush to help, Caleb himself was off balance, sending both of them tumbling to the floor.

Jester felt her face redden at being so close to Caleb. She could feel his breath on her face and his eyes were just inches away from her own. Her mind scrambled to think of something to say, an apology or excuse or anything, but her brain was short-circuiting.

“Paint,” Caleb said, pulling her out of her panicked haze.

“Wh-what?”

“Sorry, you uh, you have paint on your cheek.” 

She felt Caleb’s thumb rest on her cheek, gently wiping away a fleck of color. He still lay there though, holding her in his arms, inches from her face. She knew she ought to pull herself away, get up and clear her head, but she had to admit there was no place else she would rather be. “Thank you,” she said, barely daring to whisper.

“Your freckles are quite beautiful.” Caleb spoke breathlessly, his thumb still stroking her cheek softly. His eyes seemed transfixed, glancing over every bit of Jester’s face. She could feel his heart beat underneath her hand.

It’s now or never Jester, said the voice in the back of her head, and before she realized what she was doing she had closed the distance between him. Her lips touched his, quickly and softly before backing away. “I’m sorry Caleb, I don’t know why-”

Her voice was silenced by the sudden presence of Caleb’s lips on hers. He had kissed her back, but his held intent. Something about him was hungry, as if he had been waiting for this for months and he was going to enjoy every moment of it. She moaned into his mouth as her tongue slipped into hers and she moved her hand to the back of his head, intertwining her fingers through his hair.

Caleb suddenly moved away and Jester moved after him, craving more before realizing he had something to say. “I did not know this was a perk,” he said, chuckling lightly before kissing her again.

Jester in turn pulled away, laughing as well. “Only for really special roommates.”

***

“Caleb, the rennovaters are all done! You can move back in whenever you want to!”

Nott’s voice came across loud through the phone speaker, forcing Caleb to turn the volume down. It was seven in the morning and the sun was barely beginning to peek through the window of his apartment. He looked down at the woman next to him, still asleep with her blue hair splayed out across the bedsheets.

“Thank you Nott, but I don’t think that will be necessary for now.”

“Really?”

“Ya. I think things have worked out just fine.”

#widojestweek #widojest #jester lavorre #caleb widogast #critical role

[daveleddenwriter]

The Tortured Artist

The Tortured Artist

By Dave Ledden

For as long as I could remember I wanted to be an artist. My earliest memory is of my three year old self finger painting on the driver side door of my dad’s vintage Mustang. His face went blood red with rage and tears built up in his eyes when he caught me. I can still hear my mom’s words, vividly. “Calm down! She’s just a baby, she didn’t know what she was doing!” Needless to say he kept me well the hell away from his car for the rest of my childhood.

  For years I was the top art student at every school I went to. I continued painting, sketching, sculpting etc..  I got marks that were excellent, so I began studying art at college. I moved into a small place with my friend, Sasha. Well, at least I did for my first year of college. She dropped the philosophy course that she was doing and planned on moving closer to her home and her boyfriend. I was relieved to have some privacy, It meant I could have more space in the flat to work on my creations and she wouldn’t be here to force me to not stay up all night working. I was secretly excited the day she left.

 “I hope you won’t be lonely here by yourself.” Sasha said, putting clothes in a suitcase.

“Maybe a little, but I’ll manage.” I said, trying not to grin. “So you’re moving in with your boyfriend?” I never referred to him by his name because to this day, I’ve no clue what it is.

“No. We’ll move in eventually, but I’m not ready yet.” She replied. I nodded. Sasha then took a peak at the picture I was currently drawing. It was a ink sketch of a  cemetery with Tim Burton style headstones and trees.

“That looks darker than your other pictures” She said.

“I thought I’d experiment with a new style.”

“What has you experimenting?”

“You’re meant to experiment in college.” I replied, smirking.

Sasha laughed, then she became serious. “I hope you take care of yourself when I’m gone.”

“Yes mom.” I replied, sarcastically.

She continued  “Sleep, bathe, eat regularly.”

“Breath, blink.” I joked.

 We chatted until she had to leave. I helped her carry her luggage to her car. We finished loading her bags into the car. She hugged me.

“I’ll call you when I get home.” Sasha said.

“Okay.” I replied.

“Marian, please promise you won’t work yourself to death. Get some sleep and don’t shut yourself off from the world.”

I looked into her  eyes and saw that she was genuinely concerned. I didn’t want to promise her that, I knew if I did I’d be lying to her, but I didn’t want her to worry about me. So for what felt like an infinite amount of time, I couldn’t give any form of response. I stood quiet and expressionless. Sasha waved her hand in front of my face, snapping me back to attention.

“Marian, promise me!” Sasha said, with a stern look on her face.

“Ok…” I said, weakly.

***

I slammed back four cups of coffee and two cans of monster that night. After finishing my graveyard sketch earlier in the day, I had a new project to start working on. I was enjoying trying out the gothic art style and I wanted to make a sculpture in it. It was a doll, a girl with a white face and a long black dress and long black hair. The dress was made with some spare cloth I had and the hair was made with wool. I made her thin arms with some silver metal. Her face was also made with metal, but I painted it white. It took close to four hours to finish the doll and the sun was coming up. I looked at the sculpture with satisfaction and placed it on the shelf facing my bed. I finally crashed and went to sleep.

I woke in the afternoon, groggy and tired. I was blinded by the sun rays that invaded my bedroom through the curtain-less window. I rubbed my eyes until they adjusted to the light. When they did, I looked at my shelf, wanting to see the doll. My shelf was vacant and I was immediately wide awake from shock! I shot out of bed and stood frantically glancing around my room! I calmed down when I saw the doll lying face down on the carpet, about a foot away from the front of the shelf. The doll didn’t look damaged when I picked it up to inspect it closely. I was relieved because I wanted to work on a new piece tonight instead of repairing this one.

***

I created at least one art piece a night, sometimes more than one. I had a two week long break from college and I spent all of that time locked up in my apartment. I slept most of the day and worked nearly all night, every night. I never admitted this to Sasha whenever she would call. My groggy voice would always almost give me away, but I was able to reassure her any time she would become suspicious. My routine was working with little to no hassle… until halfway through the first week of the mid-term.

I heard strange noises at first. It sounded as if an animal was scratching the inside of the vents. I naturally assumed I had mice and I was quite angry that I’d have to leave my apartment to get traps or poison. I didn’t deal with the problem right away. I didn’t want to waste time. I had started a new sculpture that was gonna be far more complicated than any other ones that came before it, and thus required a lot of time to complete. It was a life sized self sculpture made from clay. The porcelain coloured skinned statue stood at 5ft 7’, and was clearly too large to fit into the kiln that I keep in the kitchen. My plan instead was to go over it with a hair dryer until it was bone dry. I got started and continued to work diligently on it. I neglected so much sleep, sometimes working the whole night through. When I actually did sleep it was only for short naps. I was beginning to hallucinate from exhaustion. A couple of times since the college break, I thought I saw my doll walk around my bedroom, through the cover of my eye. When I turned my head around to get a better look, she was always on her shelf where I left her, stood as he’d always been.

I only ate packaged foods that I didn’t have to waste precious time cooking or preparing. I also made sure that there was a cup of water next to me at all times so I didn’t accidentally kill myself with dehydration. I occasionally drank from the wrong cup resulting in me swallowing what I can assume to be a gallon of paint tainted water, in the course of only a couple of days. It was worth it. As long as I finished my piece, I didn’t mind having to withstand a bit of poison. Sasha rang a few times while I was focusing on the sculpture, so I didn’t respond. I was far too busy for guilt.

The scratching from the vents didn’t stop, in fact it had gotten worse. One night while I was making progress on statue me, so much It seemed that I would have it finished a few of days earlier than scheduled. The mice in the vent were going crazy! What was odd was the scratching didn’t sound like toe nails on metal, it sounded like metal on metal. It was pretty late, 03:35 A.M. according to my phone so I assumed I was just hallucinating again. I was too happy with my work to care so I powered through. All was going well until maybe a half an hour later. The scratching stopped for five minutes. I sat in total silence, glad that the mice were giving me some peace and quiet. Suddenly another noise emanated from the vent, but it wasn’t scratching. The sound that I heard this time, I can only describe as being demonic laughter. It didn’t sound like it came from a person. I’d never heard anything like it before, which is why I’m having difficulty describing it. It was high pitched, like a cartoon rodent, but it also sounded like metallic rattling!

My heart was racing and I was physically shaking. The laughter ended and when I calmed down I decided to not only get to sleep there and then, I also planned on taking Sasha’s advice to give up neglecting sleep in favour of my art, at last, before I completely lost my mind. I eventually did fall asleep after a while, but it didn't last long. I was forcefully woken up by what sounded like a fog horn. I sat up in my bed, terrified, “Ya know, I’m starting to think that it isn’t mice.” I said out loud to myself before exhaustion took over me once again. I was woken up again. This time by the sound of something heavy hitting the floor. I sprang up in my bed again and switched the lights on. My eyes were drawn to my almost finished self sculpture. It was now headless. The wires that were inside the sculpture, acting like a skeleton were sticking out of the top of the neck where the head used to be. They looked like they had been chewed through by an animal. Statue me’s head was on its side on the floor, looking at me face to face. I looked into its hazel eyes, there was a crack running through its left pupil and iris. The head was scalped. Shards of black clay, that was the sculptures hair was scattered all over the carpet.

I almost broke down crying at the sight of it. I then noticed her, the doll stood at the foot of my bed, facing me. She had a still poker face, but it felt like she was mocking me. I garnered the courage to speak up.

“You broke it, didn’t you?!” I sounded  small, like a frightened child. The doll remained stationary and gave no response.

“Why did you do it? That’s so mean.” I realised how petulant I sounded but I was trying to keep my voice from trembling. Yet again, no response. The doll just stared at me with its dead eyes. She was really pissing me off at this point and I lost it and screamed at her.

“Why are you doing this to me?! What are you doing in the vents?!” I was still shaking, but this time it was a blend of both fear and anger. I tried my best to maintain a straight face. The doll and I stared at each other down like we were in a duel, waiting to see who will draw their pistol first. Neither of us made a move.

“What am I doing?” I thought, letting the ridiculousness of the situation sink in. I looked away from the doll and hung my head for a split second. When I did, I felt something being thrown at my forehead. The projectile landed on my lap and I saw it clearly. The doll threw a balled up sock at me.

“You piece of…!” I stopped myself mid-sentence by biting my lip. I snatched the doll up and ripped it’s arms off with my bare hands. Her face remained expressionless, so I pulled off her head and crushed it. I then pulled her wool hear out of her dented metal scalp, and tore her fabric dress into scraps of rag. I bunched up her remains into a ball and tossed it in the trash, leaving my apartment for the first time in almost a week.

 I got back inside and collapsed to my knees in front of my wrecked sculpture and cried. I tried to calm myself down but I couldn’t hold back. All of my anger, fear, misery, got the better of me and what made it all worse was the fact that I was so tired! Two solid streams of tears flowed down my cheeks and I started cradling the severed head of statue me. I finished sobbing and sat at the edge of my bed. I told myself that I could repair the sculpture another time, but for now all I wanted to do was chill. I was too afraid to go back to sleep. I planned on sitting in my well lit bedroom and waiting for morning to come. It’s too bad that that didn’t happen.

I woke up lying across my bed on top of the covers. I was blinded by the light and I could hear a now familiar and horrifying metallic scratching. I looked at the floor and saw the doll standing before me, fully intact as if she never been damaged at all. She stood next to the sculpture of me. She had broken off both of the sculptures arms and the head was so crushed if was practically powder. “Die!” I roared, chucking my phone at the doll. I missed. I finally saw the doll move, it was lightning fast but moved as if it was on the verge of breaking to pieces. It preformed a strange side flip and my phone passed right by it. She then hissed at me and sprinted away. I didn’t see where she went.

After that night she didn’t leave. I could hear scurrying around the vents every night from then onwards. She would laugh at me and make sure that I never got a wink of sleep. She mostly hid herself. Only letting me see her so that she can force me to watch her destroy all my art. She loved when I was afraid and crying, she was having way too much fun making me her pet. She wouldn’t even let me leave my apartment and she snapped my phone in half. I was eventually rescued after a few weeks of this torment.

I heard a bang at my front door,

“Marian, dear, open up! you’re scaring me!” Said a female voice.

I was so relieved that Sasha had come for me, but I didn’t even have the energy to give a verbal reply let alone answer the door.

“Marian, you’re class said that they haven’t seen you in a month and you haven’t answered the phone for much longer than that. Let me in, I’m worried about you!” Said Sasha.

After an hour the police broke my door down and they and Sasha saw me lying on the floor. I was thin, pale, bony, dehydrated and babbling incoherently to myself. “What happen!?” Screamed Sasha. I really wanted to have the mental capacity to form a response, but couldn’t.

FIN

#short story #short fiction #my story #my writing #horror #comedy #horror comedy #horror story #comedy story

[brokenmusicboxwolfe]

On a photo of a not exactly human face I sculpted....

labratbren said:                                                                                                                            What do you do with them when they are done? Do you ever post pictures of the finished product? 

Ah, well, um....short answer? Nothing.

Here’s the longer answer (VERY long)....

While I was always drawn to sculpting, I really didn’t sculpt growing up. 

I mean, I tried to use clay I dug out of the ground, drying it in the sun, when I was tiny. Naturally it crumbled except for this lump of a head I still have. In Kindergarden the art teacher had his own kiln and let us use the scraps left over from the pots he had us make. I still have a loop armed alien and creature head I made, but he left with his kiln the next year. The dough art they had us make in second grade was gone by the next year, ‘cause this buggy and humid climate doesn’t agree with it. My parents gave me modling clay, but I hated it. I wanted something that would “stay”. 

But everyone acted like sculpting was hard, so maybe I wasn’t missing out. 

Then one day, when I was 19 or so, my hands got bored. Anyone would have laughed if I’d said I was bored right then. I had a book open to one side of me, a magazine on the other, as I went back and forth reading both. I was also  listening to music AND watching the movie The Brothers Karamazov at the same time. I have this problem where I always feel like I should be doing more, and when I am doing something I get itchy to be doing something else. Like my brain isn’t fully occupied even if I’m really enjoying whatever. That day my hands needed something to do, and there was this block of clay left over from a project one of Pop’s projects (a river system display, I think) It was just sittin’ there on the porch so....

And it turned out sculpting was easy! I mean, maybe not art bit doodling around having fun making faces. Do NOT be intimidated by sculpting! It comes so much more easiy than trying to convert our 3D world into some 2D drawing. Seriously, try drawing a nose head on! But toss on any wedge on a sculpted face and you have a nose...

Ok, maybe I just am bad at drawing! But I really do wish more people would try sculpting.

Anyway, the clay was another dead end, but it did inspire me to hunt for something I could “make stay”. And that something was sculpey. 

Whenever I was certain I would have the place completely to myself for a full hour I’d go stand out on the ramp behind the house and sculpt. It wasn’t too often, what with the house also being the office of the family business and my family being the sort of close one that did everything together. I couldn’t sculpt and be watched. All I needed was an our because I sculpted quickly. In an hour I’d have a little bust, rough as heck but with some detail I liked.

But then I ran out of places to put my busts in my already overstuffed bedroom. I solved this by just slicing the faces off and just baking them. I could glue magnets to them and line all the edges of my metal bookcases.

I did dabble in other things. I tried a full figure and made a few little stick figures. I sculpted something from Babylon 5 for my brother, mixed my box painting (I used to paint boxes when I had a table) with sculpting for a Discworld box for Mom, Easter bunnies for my parents, magnets for everyone, Christmas ornaments...

When she saw the Christmas tree ornaments my cousin Katharine, dollhouse collector, roped my into making her a doll. She had specific requirements for a 6″ tall Beast in what I gathered were Regency era clothes from her decription. In my ignorance I assumed the doll would have to have a jointed body, fabric clothes and furry fur, which kinda drove me nuts! But somehow I pulled it off! I sculpted a few more of those little dolls (no sewing on these!) as gifts for my parents and brother, as well as a bit of goofing around for myself (I liked my little  Sleestack a couple decades late for little me). But that was that.

Then the weirdest darn thing happened: I was suddenly stricken with a full imaginative block!

I stopped sculpting. I stopped painting boxes. I stopped writing stories. Worst of all I stopped dreaming! I still remember how upsetting that was, this sense of loss. It was like having a part of me paralyzed.  

It lasted years. Terrible years.

When my father became sick right after my irreparable rift with my brother, as I was facing the most terrible external loss of my life, something woke back up in me. Constant, vivid dreams, elaborate epics spiraling through night after night, images and stories that writing didn’t full  satisfy the need to express. I started painting miniature boxes again. Box after box after box....

But no sculpting.

I dunno why I still didn’t sculpt. I just didn’t.

Then my father died.

Pop’s death was a devistating moment. My father. My best friend. When Pop was sick I told him he couldn’t die because I wouldn’t have anyone to talk to. There is a lot of truth in that.  I love Mom dearly, but our brains work very differently. Pop might have been smarter, and his depth of knowledge was certainly mind blowing, but our mental wiring followed a similar eccentric pattern. That said, somewhere along the line my parents and I had become a sort of unit, functioning as one. Think one of those anime giant robots made of smaller ships, Voltron or something. Then imagine it functioning with the head section missing. Five years later we still feel that void.

So anyway, Pop was dead, the family business gone with him, and I was unemployed with no qualifications in a rural area with few job opportunities anyway. This was, and frankly still is, not a good situation. And my cousin Katharine thought she had a solution.

Katharine sent me a letter suggesting I make dolls. She’d shown the doll I’d made her to a dealer who said I had talent, and she sent me a copy of Art Doll Quarterly to show me that my “weird” stuff might have a market...

Honestly I felt inspired by this. I immediately seriously considered it. I’d work a bit bigger than 6″ scale, sculpt the clothes instead of the stress and tedium of sewing, and figure out a way to do ball joints. Because each thing would be unique (until I could teach myself mold making) and letting go of something I make is soooo hard for me, I decided to use the story of one of my painted boxes as inspiration. I’d make wolf people, which I figured would create enough sameness to help me let go, but enough variety to keep me from being bored. I quickly sketched out a reasonable design and got to work.

Obviously things didn’t turn out to be so simple. Sculpting ball joints by hand is fiddly to manage. It would need a bit of experimenting. I could do a head on day, casually. I could do the upper body, arms and waist joint  with a lot of effort another day. A third day would be waist and legs. Fourth day was the hellish threading. I wasn’t set up for safely storing unbaked work in progress, so I had to do these marathon one sitting sculptings on the bodies. Then I’d rest up a few days and just sculpt a few heads.

The ball jointing drove me nuts. So I gave myself permission to not worry about wolfheads, but just sculpt whatever head happened. From the backlog of heads I’d just pick one to experiment with body making. In just a couple months I was making progress.

The first discouragement came with an art show. The county has a sort of art society and they were having a sculpture show. I was scared silly to show my work to anyone, since at that point it was 2014 and I wasn’t even on Tumblr. No one had seen them. Still, when I went to see about entering the lady there was encouraging. I was soooo nervous and tentatively hopeful when I went to the grand opening with Mom amd my cousin Shirley. I was soon deflated. No one seemed to notice my figures. My work was the odd one out anyway in a sea of found object sculptures, colored paper masks and ceramics abstractly suggesting the figural. Also, everyone there knew each other and so no one was talking to me. At one point I did this really sad thing of hovering near my figures in case anyone came near so I could sorta maybe get them to notice them....

When the show ended a few weeks later the lady very nicely said at least a couple school children had liked weird figures, ‘cause, you know, kids like that fantasy stuff.  I definitely should sculpt a lot bigger and maybe use terra cotta instead....

Yeah. I felt my stuff was crap. I was crap. Why had I ever thought anyone would like my crap? Heck, I’d thought I’d at least find a club I could join, belonging, friends....

But, I kept at the doll making experimenting, crap or not. That winter it was too cold for much sculpting in my unheated house, but I could work on trying to figure out how to paint them....

Then life happened don’t ya know. At first I thought it was a temporary break while I dealt with crisis after another. I kept sculpting heads, strictly sculpting a head a day (still just an hour each)....until the spreading collapsed floor situation forced me to move the box I’d made for storing the bodiless heads out. And that was that for doll making.

Still, I kept sculpting. I went back to just the faces....

And that’s where I am now. I gave up sculpting every day, because I no longer have time. I watch a movie and sculpt. I bake the face and take pics I post on here. I wrap ‘em in tissue and put them in a storage container....

And that’s it.

I don’t do anything with them. I’m not entirely convinced there is any point anymore. My life isn’t going to include free time. Or tables to work on. It has been years after all, and it gets less and less likely I’ll make anything more than a few boxes full of chipped up sculpey faces for the nephews to find when I die. Well, unless they follow my brother’s advice and throw them out unopened! LOL

I sculpt just ‘cause I sculpt. I post pics of them on Tumblr, ‘cause Mom isn’t really all that interested in looking at them. They aren’t ever going to be anything, but I guess if I enjoy making them and someone out there likes looking at them that’s okay. They may be nothing, but that’s something.

#comments #art #sculpting #artists on tumblr

[elsewhereuniversity]

Elementary, My Dear

Whoever thought it would be a good idea to put a preschool on Elsewhere’s campus clearly didn’t know about the… special circumstances that would make the jobs of the teachers-in-training a living hell. They also chose to have it back right up to the woods. And, unfortunately, salt lines and small children don’t really mix.

Artists and musicians have a greater risk of being Taken, but they don’t have to deal with everything the Gentry can throw at them without so much as batting an eye.

It’s the Education majors that have it the worst, especially those who are working with the elementary-age students, the Gentry’s love of children far surpassing the fascination they have with artists. Those brave enough to work in the on-campus preschool/daycare, whether part of their curriculum or not, have to fight off all kinds of threatening entities (preferably before naptime), without betraying the fact that something is dangerously wrong (The fact that children See more than adults doesn’t help matters.).

The young ‘teachers’ quickly learn that it is very, very hard to tell some of Them apart from imaginary friends.

At recess, the crows perch on top of the chain-link fence, which is webbed with iron wire, and stand watch. They chatter at the children, sometimes flying to the top of the jungle gym and chucking indulgently as the tiny humans try to catch them. They never do, and the crows keep coming back.

When the crows are silent, something is very wrong. That is the signal to herd the kids inside and set them to making shiny little sculptures out of tinfoil and cocktail toothpicks, or sequins, air-dry clay, and an absolutely unholy amount of glitter. These are left outside the next day, and the crows flap down from the fence and pick them up- hopping within inches of their small, loud creators, who are sitting still and quiet, anticipation and wonder painted on their faces, and gazing back at them with jewel-bright eyes.

Salt dough ornaments are another popular craft project among the teachers (who, depending on how cautious they are, etch strange shapes and symbols into the back of each one); as are the saltwater paintings that glitter and shed flakes like snow, falling softly to the ground below where they hang on a clothesline in front of the windows. The crows, however, are not fond of salt dough, so the ornaments hang along the fence until they crack into pieces, or travel home with either the children or the students- and are fastened to refrigerators, slipped into memory boxes, or strung on lengths of string that hang along dorm room curtain rods.

When the students break out the beads, they string long strands of plastic beads right alongside their tiny charges- and hang the finished necklaces on a tree branch that hangs out over the iron-fortified fence. They never say why, though.

The stories they tell are almost all cautionary tales- Little Red, Goldilocks, Hansel and Gretel, and other children who trusted too easily or disrespect creatures that aren’t quite human- tales that warn of talking to strangers, and tell of the dangers of the woods. The dangers that are all too real not far outside of the relatively safe bubble of the daycare, where bells hang on the doors, where salt and shimmering glitter are ground into every possible (and impossible) surface; where outside the window, the crows stand watch.

x

#sunshine-and-a-hurricane #stories #long post #elementary my dear #education majors #children #nice #preschool #daycare #submission

[spiceimogenburchell]

Finishing touches/assembly- I ultimately decided not to cover the model in another coat of paint mostly because I’m already past the point I should have finished this by and I just wanted to get it finished and over with already. (Especially because the next project is the FMP.) But also because most of the model is reasonably well covered already and the bits that aren't are mostly on the underside of the worm and jaw which due to the position the worm would be in won’t be visible unless you are deliberately looking for them. In order to add another paint layer I would need help from Kirstie and I would have to wait for the paint to dry which for just neatening up the paint I thought ultimately wasn’t worth my time. So I moved onto adding the sand.

Thankfully the spice stream armature was still attached and intact. Although I kept the tile and wooden block underneath it throughout the process of adding the sand on because I didn’t want to risk the chance of it breaking. I started by putting a piece of paper underneath to catch the excess sand, covering the spice stream in PVA glue and added the sand at first by sprinkling it over the top. Since the containers that the sand came in where like spice/salt and pepper shakers with small holes in the lids. (I picked orange sand because in the latest Dune film the spice is depicted as this glittering orange substance which appears to form in small grains similar to sand or glitter. I was considering getting some orange biodegradable glitter to use but coloured sand visually looked more similar to what I saw in the film. It’s finer/flows better and has a slight natural glisten to it rather than being very reflective which I thought might be a bit eye straining so I settled on getting some orange sand. Along with the film when spice is referenced in the books when it’s colour is mentioned it’s orange. Such as the orange spice gas the Guild Navigators use.) Sprinkling over the top covered the large areas but I had to touch up the places where the sand didn’t stick and add multiple layers of sand to get full coverage. Some areas such as inside the mouth I couldn’t reach with the shaker, so I used a paint brush to pick up the sand with and place it on the harder to reach areas. I managed to get it done eventually but sand predictably was very awkward and messy to work with. There is a bit of excess sand stuck to the outer lips of the bottom jaws and in the gaps of the cracked clay on the sideboard. But other than that I managed to keep it reasonably neat.

To attach the board to the back of the bowl the original plan was to use wooden pegs hammered into the back which Kyrstie had previously drilled in. I had managed to stand the board upright against the bowl and align it so the clay I had added fitted tightly against the side of the bowl. Although there is a pretty distinct seam between the bowl and the board/they don’t blend together completely. But there isn’t an awful lot I can do about that and it adds to the old/worn and heavily used stone look that the rest of the sculpture has. So it’s not too much of an issue since it adds to the aesthetic. Although the holes in the board and plaster cast no longer lined up. So Kyrstie had to partially re-drill the holes through the holes in the board so pegs would fit. But before adding the pegs Kyrstie drilled some screws through the backboard and plaster to secure it in the exact place it needed to be for when the pegs were hammered in but also to add to the general stability of the connection. PVA glue was also added to the holes in the plaster before the pegs were hammered in so they stayed in place. The pegs are too long for the board to be placed against a wall and I’m apprehensive that I wouldn’t be able to pick it up without the parts moving/separating. But they hold the two pieces together well enough for me to take pictures of the finished outcome which is ultimately what I need them to do.

This project overall had been a bit of a nightmare with all the various mishaps with the plaster and clay, but despite my fears the model has managed to remain largely intact. And despite being a bit messy and generally rough around the edges that has worked to my advantage as it adds to the aesthetic and texture of the model. I’m not too keen on working with airdry clay and plaster again anytime soon (which I believe I have already mentioned in a previous post) but I managed to make what I had intended to and I think it looks cool. Although it’s probably going to forever be known as the snake drug toilet rather than a spice fountain. But considering the colour (especially in these photos) I can see where people are coming from.

[lsmithart]

** Installation Development: Sculpture

Preliminary sketch of my sculptural installation idea:

I began experimenting on a small scale with wire and gauze cloth to see how it sat in a sculptural form. I have some old barbed wire that Phil gave me a while ago which I thought would fit in well with my exploration of fractured and repelling connection, with the skin-like latex covered gauze cloth being stretched across the barbed wire.

Symbolically, barbed wire is described to produce ‘a kind of shock when it is used to enclose people, shaking their certitude that they are human. It confirms their fate: like beasts, they are to be worked or slaughtered.’ (Rowlands, no date).

Barbed wire excludes and includes, ‘magnifying “differences between the inside and the outside”. Barbed wire has long been connected to crimes against humanity. Invented in the 1860s and mass produced in the US from the 1870s, barbed wire’s first victims were the roaming tribes of the Great Plains, after the 1887 Dawes Act handed over vast tracts of indigenous land to white farmers. Barbed wire, often electrified, was an essential feature of Nazi concentration and death camps. Accounts by survivors rarely omit a mention of the deadly wire, which has become inextricably linked in memory with the extermination process.’ (Rowlands, no date).

Barbed wire in relation to human existence is therefore incredibly destructive and a character symbol of traumatic experience. 

Whilst experimenting with clay, I began to scrunch it up in order for the grabbing and touch element to be visible. This felt like quite a violent action. I imagined the small, handheld clump of clay as a potential candle holder. As a paradox within this train of thought, I thought about how candles are reminiscent of hope, life and death. They are often lit to commemorate a passing or a transformative event. Indeed, in ‘The Book of Symbols’ by Ronnberg and Martin (2010) they are described:

“Lamp is derived from the Greek root meaning to give light, shine, beam, be bright, brilliant, radiation. Lamp embodies the ability to strike a spark and keep it burning. Circumscribing its illumination of darkness, lamp has been associated with consciousness and its capacity to sustain the flame of life, hope, freedom, creativity the sacred and the divine. Flames suggest the continuity of life, death and rebirth. Release from the cycle of rebirths, achieving Nirvana, is the blowing out of the lamp. In the Berber culture of North Africa, when a child was born women would light a lamp and place it near the baby’s head, the lamp’s clay signifying the body, and the flame the divine spirit that glows within. The Tarot figure of the hermit: lantern signifies the solitary, dedicated seeking of one’s authentic path and luminous wisdom of introspection.”

I transferred the ‘grabbing’ clay technique to the large clay plinth that I embedded the barbed wire into. I chose to embed the barbed wire in such a way that it could potentially crack the plinth as I felt it gave an extra layer of uncertainty to the sculpture in relation to its context. As I ‘dressed’ the barbed wire in the gauze cloth whilst the clay dried, it caused the barbed wire to move and lean in different directions meaning that I had to stretch the cloth as much as possible in order to keep it steady. This was interesting conceptually as it enhanced my thinking about the sculpture as a material exploration of my internal experience.

“Cracks can be an opening into the world of imagination, while the crack in a teacup make it a leaky container, no longer safe. Cracks evoke dryness- the dry lips of fever or a house no longer cared for. Our voice cracks in a moment of insecurity, whilst the splitting experience of mental illness is often felt as if one’s whole world is breaking apart. Leonard Cohen: “There is a crack in everything / that is how the light gets in”. When something falls between the cracks it is forgotten or lost.” (Ronnberg and Martin, 2010). This exploration into cracks led me to physically break my mug whilst I was making the sculpture. I often find that my ideas can lead me to become impulsive in my material outputs.

Interestingly, I left the latex covered gauze cloth to dry on a large piece of plastic sheeting, causing it to fuse to the cloth. Although an accident, this gave the skin an extra layer of texture. As I tried to remove it, it caused some of the cloth to come free and some of it to be covered and some to be translucent. This got me thinking about how I could experiment with lighting in order to enhance parts of it and create potentially interesting shadows.

These little material experiments led me to consider how they could all function together within an installation setting. It felt key to my development to combine my object symbolism research with my material research in such a way that I am forced to consider the concepts and narrative in a physical realm.

References:

Rowlands, D. T., (no date). Barbed wire: a symbol of oppression. [Online]. Available at https://www.greenleft.org.au/content/barbed-wire-symbol-oppression. [Accessed on 08/10/2021].

Ronnberg, A., and Martin, K., (2010). The book of symbols. Taschen Cologne. Available at https://aras.org/sites/default/files/docs/00040Ronnberg.pdf.

#301

[newworldjackstretton-mason]

Materials used for my sculpture

Whilst creating this sculpture I mainly used a polymer clay called Super Sculpey. This clay is primarily used for sculpting and modelling because it doesn’t dry out if you leave it out, instead you have to bake it if you want to harden the clay. I found working with this material was very useful because it meant that I wasn’t on a short time restraint so I could add more details and change bits later on if I decide that something needs changing. You can’t do this with typical air dry clay because it either dries out before you're finished working with it or, when you do add water to the surface of the clay to make it workable, all the details you have been working on are lost.

There are a few different types of Super Sculpey that are designed to be used for different things. I used the normal base standard variant of the Super Sculpey as it was easy to work with and stayed in place fairly well and didn’t lose a lot of detail. Some other people in my class used the tougher variant of Super Sculpey which is a dark grey coloured clay which excels in keeping intricate shapes and making thin surfaces a lot for items of clothing or a metal mask where the normal version of the Super Sculpey wouldn’t work as well.

Super Sculpey was mainly used for the actual body shape and detail for the sculpture but I did use other materials for the armature underneath the clay to give the general shape of the sculpture and to strengthen it so that it would break as easily. These other materials are fairly common to find around houses and shops which is really useful because it means that I can replicate what I am doing for my course at home with relative ease. These basic materials are florists wire, tin foil and masking tape. Florists wire is incredibly cheap and easy to buy either online or in a flower shop and is incredibly useful for creating the basic armature for a sculpture because of how the wire is easily shaped and how the wire retains its shape once bent in a certain way. I used a few of these wires to create the basic shape of my sculpture so that I had a surface to work with when I was bulking the form out with tin foil and masking tape. These two very accessible materials are essential to creating a strong sculpture because they provide a bulky frame for the Super Sculpey to stick to so that you can mould and shape the super sculpey easier.

For one of my sculpture arms I wanted to add some wires or pipes to it to add some detail to the arm so I looked in a box full of old computer parts to find the wires that I needed. Old computer parts are incredibly useful for scratch building and sculpting because of how many different components you can find on a single circuit board which world well with the robotic theme of the sculpture. The only downside to using these old computer parts is that you have to be incredibly careful whilst handling them because there are sharp objects and potentially dangerous chemicals (battery acid) on them.

For my sword that my sculpture holds, I wanted a material that could be thin and strong and be able to accept detail without permanent damage to the actual material. I tried to use a piece of hardboard, but I didn’t like the look of the edges once I had filed them down once I had filed down the edges so instead, I used a flat bar of aluminium stock. This isn’t a very common thing to have in a house or a shop but it can be quite easily bought online for a reasonable price. I used aluminium because it was really easy to file and add details and that it is also pretty strong for something so thin. The other positive to using some thin aluminium is that when you file the edges down to create an actual blade's edge it doesn’t lose its edge like a piece of thin wood or hardboard would do.

The final material I used for completing my project was some balsa wood for the cross guard to my sword. I chose to use balsa wood because I needed to stack two layers of the wood together to form the correct thickness and balsa wood was the easiest material to cut small pieces that wouldn’t look badly cut. Balsa wood can be found at pretty much any modelling store because of how useful it is to creating buildings or scenes for dioramas. The one downside to balsa wood is that on its own it is very soft and easy to break accidentally.

[deztinywarriors]

ES Spectre Interlock Chapter 31-40

#Playchoices #Endless Summer #Fanfic #adventure #pixelberry