something so incredibly domestic to me about billy and steve just going on a walk together
steve turning up at the hargrove’s during winter break while neil and susan are at work and max is at the arcade. steve knows billy is at home because they talk now. they’re friends. sort of. so steve knocks on the door. rings the bell twice. tells billy to c’mon because he wants to go for a walk.
and billy’s just staring at steve like he’s lost his mind. ‘cause billy plays basketball, sure. billy lifts weights. billy swims. billy surfs. or did at least did. billy does, like, everything but billy doesn’t do wintery walks.
tells steve exactly that.
steve doesn’t take no for an answer, though. billy tells him he doesn’t have a winter coat and steve holds up the extra one he’s got in this big bag beside him and- billy doesn’t know how he didn’t notice it before. totally wasn’t too distracted by the way steve’s talking, face lit up and cheeks flushed from the cold.
billy comes up with a few more excuses but steve’s stubborn. billy knows from experience so he gives in. lets steve wrap him up in this huge coat, bitching and swearing the entire time. tells steve he’s gonna freeze his balls off and it’s gonna be all steve’s fault.
they leave eventually, though. steve grinning at billy the entire time, stupid dopey look on his face and billy trying to look at the trees instead. at the leaves. at literally everything except steve.
but steve’s looking at him. keeps sneaking glances because he’s got billy hargrove beside him, nose pink and eyes wide as he looks up at a flock of birds that just scattered. because billy’s got a hat on, pulled down to his eyebrows and a scarf that he’s pretty much buried the lower half of his face in.
because billy’s, like, cute. or whatever.
so they walk. and they talk. leaves crunching and birds chirping. sun flitting in through the trees. maybe billy lights steve’s cigarette, maybe they carve their names somewhere, maybe they kiss about it .. who knows !
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Summary: Crowley reflects on all the things he can not say.
TW: very brief (less than a sentence) mention of abuse.
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Sitting alone in his flat, surrounded by his plants, Crowley thinks that he could drown beneath the weight of all the things he doesn't say.
He tries not to dwell on it.
After all, what good does it do?
But sometimes, in the dark and the quiet, he finds himself reflecting, suffocated by solitude, caught in the realization that his entire existence is built upon an amalgamation of half-truths tangled in an increasingly complex web of lies. Their weight rests heavy on his shoulders, every false word leaving a bitter taste on his tongue.
Meanwhile, every true thing he has ever thought or felt is kept on a leash, chained to his heart and left to starve.
It's exhausting.
The way he pretends he gives a single shit about Hell, or Satan - he doesn't. He must play his role, though, and play it well, crafting whatever narrative is required to ensure he will never be required to take up a position back in the dark, stinking Pit. So he does, taking credit for so much of the awfulness that humans inflict upon themselves. Immersing himself in their cruelty, their wickedness, reporting on it as though it were his own cruelty made manifest, and all the while wondering, questioning in silence, how God could have created something with the capacity for such evil.
But he must never speak his loathing for the devil, for damnation, for Heaven and Hell and the Plan, the Great bloody Plan, and never admit the way the suffering of the world and all the people in it hurts him.
And it does hurt.
It hurts every time Heaven turns a blind eye to a hungry child, refuses the prayers of a beaten woman, denies the pleas of a prodigal son.
It shouldn't though. Not for him.
He's a demon, after all, stripped of Grace, damned by God Herself. He had Fallen, burned alive in boiling sulfur, been changed into this cursed shadow of himself. Hadn't that been punishment enough?
It wasn't, apparently. More penance must be owed because he, an immortal being, must watch these humans in their misery, and it hurts. What's worse is that Crowley does not understand Why.
He thinks he will never understand, and isn't sure he wants to.
And even if he could give voice to this pain, this confusion, who would hear him? God's ways are Ineffable, and all the while, Satan laughs. There is no one, no one, who sees, who cares, not the way he is compelled to see and to care.
No one, except perhaps...
Aziraphale.
The sense of drowning begins to become unbearable, sinking deeper, reaching farther. All of the pain of hiding from Hell, of cursing Heaven, of seeing the beauty of humanity dragged through the mud again and again and again by its own fallibility, it is all amplified by the agony of the lie that consumes him most of all: the facade he crafts each and every day as he forces himself to act as though he - a demon - is not entirely devoted, black heart and broken soul, to an angel.
He loves him.
A plain, simple truth.
And it is a torture to pretend as though he doesn't; as though he hasn't loved that angel for over six thousand years. To pretend that the angel is not beautiful, and precious to him beyond imagining. To pretend he isn't a balm against Crowley's brokenness, soothing his pain, easing his confusion, bringing him some semblance of peace.
But in loving him, the web of lies only ties itself tighter, and the loneliness only grows. Crowley knows, he knows, he must not reveal this truth, for both their sakes. And so he forces himself to let the years pass, not seek the angel out too often, not contact him needlessly, not ask him to go to dinner, get a drink, go for a walk, do anything, anything at all, so long as they do it together.
Oh, the way his entire being vibrates with the desire to be near him, though, near him always, his every cell and atom yearning towards him like a light-starved flower towards the sun.
The way he has to physically restrain himself from touching him when they are together: his hair, his face, a brush of fingers or legs or lips.
The way he has to hide his eyes for fear they'll give away the truth in his soul, that he would do anything, give anything, be anything, for him.
The way he cherishes every smile, every laugh, every glance, collecting them like flowers, pressed between the pages of his memories.
The way he dreams of an impossible future where they are together.
Together.
Just the two of them.
Away from all this; from Heaven, from Hell, from God and the devil, from humanity and all its suffering.
He sits in his flat, head in his hands, his plants leaning toward him as though they can sense his loneliness, as though they could help.
In the quiet and the dark, he loves, and he loathes, choking upon his silence, crushed beneath millennia upon millennia of dammed emotions, a reservoir held within the fragile walls of his heart, the pressure building, demanding release, begging for relief, but he will find no catharsis and he knows this.
He knows it
and he drowns,
and drowns,
and drowns.
☆•☆•☆•☆•☆
Thanks for reading 🖤🤍
I imagine this "scene" would happen sometime in the years prior to the Armageddon that wasn't. And yeah, it's literally the opposite of "Because, underneath it all, Crowley was an optimist." But know what? I'm in my feels today, so Crowley gets to be too, and that's that.
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GUMROAD IS BANNING NSFW CONTENT IN THE NEXT 24 HOURS
I haven't seen anyone talk about this yet, so I might as well.
They've updated their content policy to comply with payment processor Stripe and Paypal's censorhip. They gave 24 hours. On March 16th 2024, Gumroad TOS will no longer allows sales of any written or drawn nsfw content.
This is going to hurt for so many creators. Giving that little time leaves people's source of income wildly unstable, especially with such a huge overhaul of what content is allowed.
I hate this. I hate what censorship is turning the internet into. I hate that nsfw content creators keeo getting pushed to the fringes, that they need to digitally migrate so often, because nowhere can be trusted to allow their art for long.
I don't know what to do next, there isn't some sort of "here's what you can do to help!" People just deserve to know.
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I pointed this out in a Discord server I'm in and thought Id share here:
Bob Iger announced that Disney is going to absorb Hulu, and Hulu will no longer exist next year. All shows will move to the Disney+ app.
Disney also announced they were going to remove shows and movies periodically from their streaming services.
I believe both of these moves are because of the Writers Strike.
Disney knows its going to lose the strike. There is too much public support. Specifically, the WGA is going to win writers getting more residuals from streaming.
So if Disney takes shows off of streaming, they dont have to pay the writers the residuals.
They are going to use excuses like "not enough funding for the server capacity" or "not enough views to warrent keeping the show". These are BULLSHIT. Its all greed. Its only GREED.
Pay attention to what happens in the following weeks.
And keep supporting the writers' strike.
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