#and then her viewing & funeral was right in between mother’s day

[buckybarnesss]

I was thinking the other day, Stiles has really gone through so much with his mom. There's being with her when she died (and the rush of relief/guilt that must have brought), dealing with her forgetting him and attacking him, and then having to fend off a magical clone of her in season 6.

It's interesting to me because no one else really has this level of parental trauma, and it's reoccurring in Stiles' narrative even though he never really talks about it. It's like it really is too personal for him to talk about with anyone, maybe not even Scott.

stiles as a character only makes sense when viewed from the lens of the trauma left by his mother's condition and death. claudia died when stiles was 8 years old and by that point she had gone through severe deterioration both mentally and physically.

we don't know when claudia started exhibiting over symptoms of dementia but i would hazard a guess of maybe 2-3 years seeing as she had a child within the last eight years of her life and stiles has memory of claudia before she was ill. still. it's way too young for him to fully understand what is happening.

like he internalized claudia's delusions that he was trying to kill her to the point of believing it on some level and believed that he was going to kill his father too. like jesus fucking christ.

his anxiety and obsessiveness surrounding his father's health and safety stems directly back to losing claudia. it's why he's so terrified of losing his friends.

hot take here i think his infatuation with lydia is wrapped up in feelings about claudia. he says he's been in love with her since the 3rd grade which would've been around the same time claudia passed. he latched onto lydia martin as a concept and didn't start seeing her as a real person until season 3.

his speech to her in master plan wasn't stiles talking to lydia it was talking to the lydia that was the stand in for his mother.

"you see, death doesn't happen to you, lydia. it happens to everyone around you, to all the people left standing at your funeral, trying to figure out how they're going to now live the rest of their lives without you in it."

it's why their relationship cannot progress romantically until the ghost of his mother is exorcised, but i haven't fully watched 6a yet and i still don't really view a romantic relationship between them as necessarily healthy.

but speaking of 6a, jesus christ the level of trauma of stiles has due to having to endure people forgetting about him. especially his father. his mother already forgot him once and died now his dad too? plus his closest friends. stiles's greatest fear come to life.

like with derek the trauma stiles endures isn't really talked about. stiles witnessed the mechanic get crushed by his jeep in abomination while being rendered helpless to do anything but watch and that's just glossed the fuck over.

this doesn't get into the relationship stiles has with his dad because that's all kinds of tangled. noah stilinski isn't a perfect father. there's definitely a level of stiles being both treated as a child and as an adult by his dad.

and you're right stiles resolutely doesn't discuss it with anyone. it's like he's taken it as his burden to bear and that's it. stiles keeps people emotionally at arms length as some measure of protection for himself. he's not really willing to crack himself open and share. emotionally vulnerability scares him.

one of the few times we see him really open and raw in front of others is when he's trying to talk scott down in motel california and holy shit stiles was fully prepared to just die with scott. you could say he was bluffing but was he? was he really?

the kids ain't alright in teen wolf. allison was never more right when she broke down saying "we're just a bunch of teenagers. we can't handle this."

they all need therapy.

#my blog #teen wolf #thoughts on teen wolf #stiles stilisnki

[paradoxesofgalaxies]

Therapy recap

We started off talking about how we've been doing lately and I opened up about how avoidant we've been and how hard it's been for us to socialize. Which I connected to the time of year as we're in the lead up to the anniversary of fleeing the Manor which triggers a lot of flight impulses

We talked about the Beans struggling more recently including the other night when 22/28 Beans fronted in about half an hour. C asked about what that was like (dizzying and exhausting and headache inducing) and while talking about it I referenced one of husband's parts. Turns out we had never mentioned that husband also has DID. So we talked about that for awhile. How neither of us knew we had DID when we met (tho we initially bonded over coming from v similar fucked up churches) and the process of figuring this all out.

We talked about disorganized attachment for awhile after I told C about Bean and husband's conversation the other night (C was cracking up over Bean sagely telling Sean that it was disorganized attachment XD). This led into talking some of the earliest traumas/circumstances of my birth that made attachment difficult (my mother's father died 4 days after my birth and at 17 days old we flew down to deal with funeral stuff and the next few months were spent bouncy around between my mum and my grandma and her friends. Mum was suicidal and my father was an active alcoholic and on frequent business trips).

At some point we talked about leaving the church. Oh right, it was after talking about how mum told me in my late teens not just about her suicidality but also what her plans had been 🙃 and how our reaction at the time was mostly annoyance that she was trying to bond with us over suicidality. Which led into talking about my disconnection from the concept of family that we had talked about last week and how husband had pointed out that it makes sense how much disdain I have for the concept of family when that concept is so linked to authoritarian xtrian views of family. Which is how we got to talking about leaving the church.

Which led into talking about queerness and how I'd gotten involved in my high schools gsa as an ally long before I figured out my own queerness.

We were talking about how queer people will find each other even when still closeted and I related it back to husband and I finding each before either of us knew we had DID. Which led into talking about how it can difficult to relate to people that haven't been through any significant trauma. Like how people without major trauma tend to be more thrown off by dark humor or how they'll be horrified by things that seem like normal anecdotes to me. So it can be easier to connect to other traumatized people. C and I talked about how the trauma olympics suck but the overcorrection to treating all trauma as equal also sucks. C said that most of their clients are queer so most of us are traumatized to varying degrees but occasionally he gets given a client through his agency that is cishet and non-traumatized and it's wild how different their concerns are.

Then we bonded together a bit over how wild it can be to get a glimpse into cishet culture. Like the obsessions over biological clocks or wedding culture. We ended up going over time laughing about it XD

#galactic gab #therapy logs

[twilightmalachite]

Raison d’être - A Premature Burial 8

Author: Akira

Characters: Shu, Mika

Translator: Mika Enstars

"Kiryu. Come to think of it, we’ve known each other for a long time now, but I’ve never truly hit you before, haven’t I?"

[Read on my blog for the best viewing experience with Oi~ssu ♪]

Season: Winter

Location: Starmony Dorms Theater Room

Night of that day, in the Starmony Dorms Theater Room…

Kuro: Hmm. I might not fully understand, but it sure sounds complicated.

So you’re watchin’ funeral scenes in movies for visual references for this Funeral Contest?

Haha, you’re surprisin’ly hardworkin’ over this. ♪

Shu: You sure are in a good mood for whatever reason, Kiryu. It’s rare to see you so relaxed without a single wrinkle between the eyebrows… Did something good happen to you?

Kuro: Ahh, y’see, Itsuki… I feel like I’m able t’relate to ya for the first time.

They’re surprisin’ly nice, aren’t they? A frilly and fluttery cute outfit…

Shu: What on earth happened to you, Kiryu!?

Nazuna: Itsuki~… Kuro-chin is so cruel~, I even said I didn’t want to do it…

H-He forced me to wear children’s girl’s clothes and took picture after picture of me…

Shu: Kiryu. Come to think of it, we’ve known each other for a long time now, but I’ve never truly hit you before, haven’t I?

I do not think I can beat you, who knows karate, but as a gentleman, I challenge you to a duel. Kagehira, you stay here with Nito.

Mika: Nnaah…?

Nazuna: Well, I’m happy you’re angry on my behalf, but didn’t you used to do the same thing too?

Anyways, it’s fine. I’m not angry anymore, or rather, I feel like I was able to be useful to Kuro-chin out for the first time, so I’m happy about that.

Rather, Kuro-chin accepted me however I am. Back when I had been pretending to be a doll, and all this time up to now too.

It’d be unfair if I were picky and say that I only approved of the rough and reliable Kuro-chin he usually is.

Kuro: Nito…♪

Shu: Even so, I think it’d be better if you refuse what you don’t want to do, Nito.

Nazuna: That’s true, but… I’m the one saying it’s fine, so don’t fight about it on your own~. It’ll complicate things.

You have your hands full anyways, don’t you? You don’t have the time to bother yourself over us.

Mika: That’s true, but I don’t have a good understandin’ the circumstances either.

Kuro: So what are the circumstances, then… I feel like I’ve gone too far and lost Nito’s trust here, so I’d like to redeem myself.

I’m no stranger to Itsuki, and I don’t mind workin’ together to help out Nito’s old group.

Shu: I didn’t ask for your help. I am not in so much trouble that I would ask for your help, truthfully.

Kuro: Don’t say that. If three people gather, the wisdom of Manjushri, the more there is the merrier, no?

Shu: Hmph. Despite your inability to study, you seem to be able to come up with Buddhist idioms without any trouble. Just whose influence is that?

Anyways. We are planning to hold a Funeral Contest in accordance to our Grandfather’s impossible task.

Kuro: Hmmm. My mother quietly had hers amongst relatives. The rich sure like their flashy things, don’t they?

Shu: Right… It was restricted to relatives, so I regret that I was unable to burn incense for her on that day.

Your mother had done so much for me, yet I’m afraid I’d acted unfairly at the very end.

Kuro: Haha. You know best that my mother wasn’t the type to care about such things… Itsuki.

Shu: … …

Kuro: …My bad, I ruined the atmosphere.

Shu: No, the atmosphere should have been solemn from the beginning, that is… what a funeral should be like.

My grandfather is the strange one making a festival out of it.

Kuro: He’s been a strange old gramps for a while now.

But still, from what I do know ‘bout him, I know your gramps was a great guy. He was a real fine, respectable man.

Back when I was jus’ a stupid kid, if I went and did somethin’ I shouldn’t have, even though we weren’t related, he’d scold me ‘til the sun went down.

I’d even start sheddin’ tears…I can still hear your grandpa yellin’ at me every time every time I’m ‘boutta stray off the beaten path.

Shu: I agree… He’s gotten more irritable with age, but he truly was a great and respectful grandfather who would never do anything inhumane.

And yet… We have discovered this grandfather to have had an illegitimate child.

Thanks to that, my household is in commotion as if the entire world turned upside down!

Nazuna: I don’t mean to be impolite, but… Isn’t it a bit unbelievable to have an illegitimate child be discovered while the estate is sorting out inheritances? It’s straight out of a drama.

Kuro: Is it really true? Nobody’s makin’ this up? Or, y’know, just one of your gramp’s jokes?

Shu: As of right now, we don’t know its validity.

After saying what he had wanted and causing such a ruckus, Grandfather withdrew back to the hospital with no visitors allowed.

I cannot approach the man himself for confirmation. A hospital is a curious little world, where a doctor’s opinion takes precedence over the family’s.

If the doctor orders no visits, even one’s own family members cannot enter the forbidden cave.

Mika: Guess that’s a given… But it’s really such a suspicious situation, truly.

Up ‘til now, there hadn’t even been a rumor that he had an illegitimate child.

Shu: Yes. Grandfather is well-known both at home and overseas as having a loving wife, and it was “common sense” that the only woman he’s ever loved in his lifetime was my grandmother, who passed away some time ago.

There is simply no way he has an illegitimate child.

Nazuna: And this… Rafayello, claims to be this illegitimate child? That was his name, right?

Kuro: Who in the hell is this guy? Judgin’ by his name, he some foreigner?

Shu: I am assuming it is a fake name. He said that he is hiding his true identity for some unspecified reason, it’s immensely suspicious.

My parents and the rest are currently visiting a government office to confirm the truth, but… His identity remains unknown.

Mika: He gave a quick greetin’ while we were in the guest room in Oshi-san’s house, but he went quiet after that.

Kuro: Ya said he was speakin’ to ya through a doll that looked just like Mademoiselle…

We dunno where the doll came from, but ya think he installed some communication device in there?

Shu: That seems to be the case. Although I have not checked its contents, I do not wish to take apart such a beautiful doll.

If it comes down to it, we may need to ask someone mechanically-inclined to conduct a scientific analysis… But, we are not in a dire enough situation for that yet..

Kuro: Well, right now this all feels like some big joke. This whole thing, includin’ Raffaello, feels like a setup by Grandpa..

Shu: And so if it is, it would be foolish to contact the police about it in earnest..

Making a big deal out of it would be tasteless, as it would publicize and bring shame to the family.

Goodness gracious. It’s a hundred times better than having really passed away, but this Grandfather of ours sure is in trouble too!.

[ ☆ ]

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#raison d’être #raison d'etre #event #translation #shu itsuki #mika kagehira #kuro kiryu #nazuna nito

[messedupfan]

When I Look At You | Chapter 8

Summary: Y/n begins to make progress on the house, Leigh slowly moves in, and a dog stumbles its way into their lives.

A/N: This is my first attempt at making a gif lol Hope you are doing well! IF YOU HAVE A NAME SUGGESTION FOR THE DOG PLEASE LET ME KNOW! Enjoy!

Masterlist | All Chapters | All Stories Taglist

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The first week in the house was rough. The second was a little easier. By the third, you made the decision to have the rooms boxed up. You order tens of boxes and put them together as you fill each of them with your wife and daughter’s things. Switching rooms after each box is done so that you don't feel too overwhelmed by taking them down. 

For the first time in years, you call Taylor's parents to offer things they might want of hers or of Allison’s. They were upset with how long it took you to contact them. Pointing out how insensitive you’ve been by shutting them out. They give a passive aggressive compliment about your newest book which you forgot they were on the PR list of who to send the book to until they mentioned it. They continued by saying that you looked very well on the news. As if nothing bad had ever happened to you. 

After they hang up on you with the request that you never contact them again, you sit in the closet with what is left in this world of your wife and you cry. You hold a pile of her clothes that still smell like her and scream into them. Frustrated from the phone call that you had with her parents. They never did like you because of how fast the relationship happened. They only tolerated you during the marriage because they did love their daughter and granddaughter. Now that both ties between you and them are gone you’re sure that they are happy that you’re out of their lives for good. They blamed you at the funeral and the last words from her mother before today were, “It should have been you.” Something that you couldn’t argue with, because you thought the same. Still do most days. You allow yourself to grieve and hate them for an hour before you resume packing. You couldn’t dig a hole for yourself. You couldn’t stop living again. You couldn’t let yourself rot in the closet. 

When the closet is done, you feel as empty as it is. Instead of dwelling on the emotion you make a phone call and a couple hours later, you are looking at dogs with Leigh in your office. “So you haven’t figured out what to do with this place,” she starts as you continue to scroll down the pages of dogs. You make a noise to acknowledge her. “And we’re still not moving in together,” she continues as she walks and plays with the trinket on the bookshelf. 

“Not unless you’ve changed your mind,” you turn to her. 

Leigh gives you a soft smile, “No, I haven't changed my mind.” She continues where she left off as wipes her finger on the shelf to collect some of the dust. She makes a face and can't wait for the day you want to clean. Or even hire someone to clean. “But you want to get a dog together now instead of later?” 

You offer her your hand to hold and she takes it. You pull her onto your lap in your desk chair and she makes a noise in surprise. Up until now, you haven't been this close to her in the house. “I am making the effort to show that I believe in us.” Slightly confused, she asks you to elaborate. “Getting a dog with you. I don't know.  I guess it symbolizes, at least to me, that I not only see a future with you. I want a future with you. I want to build a life with you.”

She hums, “So a little puppy is supposed to prove all of that to me?” 

You nod, “Well I could get a ring–”

“Woah,” she moves off of your lap. “I think a puppy is enough for now.” You laugh and pull her back to you to share a sweet kiss. When it ends the two of you remain close while gazing into each other's eyes. As much as you tried to avoid it, she indeed became your best view. Something that you’ll admit to her one day but you don’t want to hear her teasing right now. That’s not the mood you were in. “You don’t waste time, do you?” She has her fingers making soothing circles on your cheeks. 

“We never know how much time we have, why waste it?” You kiss her again. This one growing with her eager hands pulling on your shirt. Knowing where it leads, the action brings you out of the moment and you begin to panic a bit. “Hold on,” you whisper against her lips. Leigh stops and asks you what’s wrong. “Nothing it’s just…” She doesn’t need you to finish speaking, she has a pretty good guess as to what is stopping you. Guilt covers your features as you don’t want her to feel rejected and to reassure you that she is fine Leigh gives you a lingering kiss on your forehead. You smile at the affectionate way she treats you and change the subject. “So, tell me. What kind of dog is your dream dog?” 

She gets in a better position on your lap so she can take a look at your screen. Scrolling down a couple of pages, neither of you can make a decision. So you move onto what to eat and from there, what to watch. Normally, after food, the two of you would cuddle but when she makes the move you scoot further away. Leigh observes your tense body and wants to know what is really going on in your head that is making you pull away. It was getting difficult to continue pretending that she understood you and that the wall you seemed to be building didn't affect her. 

The past month since you moved back in has been tough on her as well. She missed you living close to her. She missed sneaking in your bed on the nights she didn't get to see you. She missed watching you come in from your morning run while she had a morning tea. She missed being touched by you. She missed you. This is the first time since you've been here that you have invited her over and she knew that this transition was going to be tough. But nothing could have ever prepared her for it. 

“It’s getting late,” you break her thoughts. 

“Is it?” She checks the time on her phone. It was only six thirty. You were trying to get rid of her. Despite the why, it still hurt. “Y/n,” she starts, “are we okay? I know you said getting a dog was supposed to mean that a future together is what you wanted but,“ she sighs. “Are we okay?” 

You scratch your cheek as you try to clear the scrambled thoughts in your mind. It was hard to find the right words to describe what you were feeling. The last thing you wanted to do was say something and give her the wrong idea and upset her. But you figure that holding back and not being straightforward would hurt her, and you never want to hurt her. “When I'm here with you or even just thinking about you, I feel like I'm cheating on them. I feel like I’m doing something I shouldn’t be. I don't know how to fix that,” you admit. It was a bit of a relief to finally be honest with her about the conflict. But you feel bad that you're having these confusing emotions. It didn't make sense, the only person you should be concerned about cheating on is Leigh because she is here. She is alive and she is your girlfriend. Sort of.

“I can understand that, love,” she says affectionately. Her tone and expression make you feel a little bit better and some of the tension releases from your body. “Why haven't you told me this before?” You shrug, not having any other answer. She takes a minute to figure out how to navigate the conversation if you’re not going to be as talkative. But she wanted to help you understand what you're feeling and why. “If I were to stay the night. What do you think that would do to you?” 

“I don’t have a bed for you to sleep in,” you abruptly shut the idea down. 

“Don’t you have a couple guest rooms?” You look off to the side and clench your jaw as you confirm that you do. “So what if I slept in one of them tonight, and you slept in your bed?” 

“I,” you trail off and take a big breath. “I don’t sleep in my bed. I sleep on the couch in my office,” you admit and rub your hand on your thigh. “I can’t bring myself to be in that unfinished room longer than an hour or two. I haven’t even tried to lay in that bed.” 

Leigh nods and starts to think of other things she can do to help make things easier for you. She suggests that you either finish the renovations Taylor started or come up with your own plan. Make the room your own. You take the moment to bring up if you make it your own, then it will have to be redone when she moves in. Leigh gives you a small smile. “So, you’re keeping the house?” Her challenge causes you to let out a humorless laugh. You didn’t know but you didn’t want to do anything that would have to be torn down by you. “Okay, if you really want to, we could do something together.” You massage your face in thought, it still feels wrong in some way. Redoing the rooms meant erasing what was once there. Erasing them. 

Though, you have to remind yourself that Taylor was going to gut the house room by room. She wanted the entire place to look brand new. She had felt this great need for change just before she died. If you were to go into her office, you would find the blueprints of the house and mood boards for every room. If you were to open her laptop you're almost certain that she left a few tabs of Pinterest open. She wanted to remove what was already once there. You should be allowed to do the same. 

“Okay, I think I like that idea. I think we can work with that,” you agree, moving closer to her and putting your arm across her shoulders. “You’re amazing, you know that?” She snuggles into you as she jokingly tells you that she does know. “Do you want to spend the night?” Leigh smiles into your chest and agrees as she lifts her head up to give you a kiss. 

Leigh wears your clothes for pajamas and sleeps in the guest room. At first, she is in there alone because you still feel odd about it. She hid her disappointment well as she bid you goodnight and crawled in by herself. To help her fall asleep, she hugs a pillow to her chest and puts another between her legs. But they couldn't replace the comfort you provide her. So she was unable to fall asleep. After an hour of you tossing and turning on your couch you decide to ignore all of the negative feelings against sharing a bed with her and storm out of your office. It was easier to fall asleep without her when she wasn’t near but knowing she’s under the same roof, your body refused to let you pretend you didn’t need her. Halfway to her room, you bump into each other. 

The two of you share a laugh at the situation, having the same intention to join the other. You start to scratch the back of your neck and she scratches her arm. Standing in front of each other awkwardly in the dark. Leigh reaches for your hand as a nonverbal invitation and waits for your next move. She wasn't going to make you share a bed with her if you weren't ready to. You rub her hand with your thumb in contemplation. After a couple of minutes of thought, you start heading towards the guest room. There was no way that you were going to make her sleep on that couch. You didn't want her back to hurt as much as yours does.

Walking in, your body is stiff and still uncertain about doing this. Then you feel something touch your chest and suddenly your body loosens. The heaviness in your heart releases as if it was healed. Your movements are more natural as you pull her further into the room. Leigh closes the door behind her. She waits for you to climb into the bed first and make yourself comfortable before she joins you. Leigh starts on the other end of the bed to respect your feelings and allow you to keep the control over the situation. You’re thankful for the gesture but find it a little unnecessary. 

“Come here, silly,” you whisper to her. Leigh doesn’t attempt to hide her excitement as she moves to be closer to you. She gives you a soft kiss on the lips as she settles herself against you the way that she has fallen in love with. Once she’s in her position you get an overwhelming wave of adoration for her and you feel that you have to express it to her in the moment. “I cannot wait to build a life and a family with you,” she tightens her arms around you in a wordless response. You almost weren’t sure that she was still awake or not. So you continue, “I love you and I want you for worse or for better.” 

Leigh tilts her head up to you and places her lips on your cheek. “I want you in sickness and in health,” she whispers. You smile at the words and continue to exchange the vows to her. She continues with you until they’re finished and at the end the two of you exchange a slow burning kiss that leaves you wanting more and more. 

The following weeks, the rooms get packed up and the boxes get divided up into donate, store, and toss out piles. You try to toss out and donate as little as possible before putting the rest of the boxes in the basement for storage. Leigh spends the night every Friday after you take her out on a date. On Saturdays, the two of you spend time going over ideas for redecorating the rooms before she goes back home. Sometimes when neither of you can agree on this or that she will invite some of her friends over for the extra input. Only problem was that her friends Drew and Becca side with her on everything, so you invite Jules and Stevie over in order to keep things fair. She found it funny that you chose to have her sister on your side but her sister made it clear that she liked you better. Leigh pretended to be offended but was far from it.

When the two of you actually start to make progress on the house, she brings her mother around for the two of you to get to know each other better. It was Leigh’s way of showing you that she is serious about you because the last person she brought to meet her parents was Matt. Amy wasn’t surprised when she heard about the book deal her daughter was given, she always knew that her daughter was a talented and hardworking writer. She was surprised when you stayed in her daughter's life and even more surprised when the two of you got together. But she wasn’t opposed to it. In fact, by the end of the first dinner she had given you her approval of being with her daughter. As she was leaving, she established a new dinner schedule with you, Leigh, and Jules to share a meal on Sundays. Which Leigh wasn’t too thrilled about, Jules didn’t mind, and you were thrilled to oblige. It was the first time a parent of someone you were with actually liked you. Plus, it added to the amount of days Leigh stayed at your house. She went from once a week to the whole weekend. 

When you meet her father for the first time, the man acts a little hostile towards you. Something you were prepared for but still irritated by. No one likes being treated like they're not good enough for the person they’re with. Even if they think it themselves. Leigh left his place unhappy, which he noticed, so Richard invited the two of you over to try again. She denied the first three invitations. You convince her on the fourth time to give him another chance. Since you never met your father and your relationship with your mother is practically non-existent, you know what it's like to be without family. You didn't want her to shut her dad out because of you. She reluctantly agrees to another meal with him. 

The second dinner with him goes smoother than the first. He is a little more inviting and his questioning is less of an invasive interrogation. Although the pair of you can tell he still dislikes you, Leigh saw that her dad was trying. It means something to her to see that. All she can hope for is that he doesn't offer her a getaway car at her next wedding. If there ever is one, of course. She hopes that there will be, but of course she wasn’t going to pressure you. As for you, the last thing you were looking for was his approval of the relationship. It wasn’t important for you, especially knowing his history of infidelity. But it was important for Leigh that you and her father at least get along, so you swallow your disdain for the man and play nice.

Returning to the house with her after dinner feels normal and the normalcy feels refreshing. The lingering guilt and grief that used to haunt you is no longer there. You watch Leigh as she comfortably makes her way around the house as if she lives there. She practically does as it is, there was still a conversation to be had about it. For weeks you’ve been putting it off. But now, the thought doesn't scare you or make you feel as conflicted as it once did. In fact, the thought of her officially living here with you sounds exciting. “What’s that look for?” Leigh asks with her adorable smile as she catches you staring. 

“I’m keeping the house,” you confidently state. “And I think we should stop pretending you don't live here and you should move in. If you want to, of course.” 

Leigh is impressed by the certainty in your voice, so she doesn't question it or make you second guess yourself. “Okay, I'll move in with you. But not until we finish up our room first. Just to make the transition easier.” 

You beam at her, “Okay, yeah, after our room is done sounds just fine.” From there she says that she's going to jump in the shower before bed and you make a joke about joining her. Without a second thought she  hooks her fingers in the collar of your shirt and makes the joke into a real thing. After all, the two of you had something to celebrate.

A couple days after making it official that the two of you are going to live together, something odd happens. While leaving a paint store you and Leigh watch an angry man chase a small dog down an alleyway. The dog appeared to have something of the man’s but you didn’t like the way he was screaming at the animal. By the look of it, neither did Leigh. You hand her the paint cans that you were carrying and tell her that you’ll meet her in the car. She tells you to be careful as she lets you go and you promise that you will be. 

“You good for nothing mutt! You ruined it!” The man lifts his leg, gearing to kick the dog. 

“Excuse me, sir!” You shout, successfully stopping the old man from harming the dog. 

“Mind your business!” He shouts. “This damn thing is always scaring away business and stealing from my bakery! It’s about time someone put it down!” He turns back to the helpless dog. This time you run up to him and push him into the pile of garbage bags. You apologize, toss a few bills from your wallet onto his chest and scoop up the dog. Although the man pockets the money, he was still furious as he began to chase after you. 

Luckily, Leigh wasn’t too far and she had her window rolled down. “Start the car!” You shout as you continue to run in her direction. She doesn’t understand your urgency until she sees the angry man yelling profanities at you. 

“What did you do?” She asks as you enter the car with the dog. You promise to explain later. “You better!” She says as she pulls out of the parking spot and drives away. You look behind you to find the old man slowing down and raising his middle fingers at you.

“Damn, the elderly aren’t so elderly anymore,” you say, slightly out of breath. The dog starts to lick your face out of gratitude and you laugh as you process what just happened. “I think we need to get you to the vet,” you say to the dog. “Do you think there’s a place that will take a last minute walk-in?” You ask your girlfriend. 

“No clue, but you can look one up while you tell me what the hell happened back there,” she snaps. She wasn’t a fan of adrenaline rushes and having to get the two of you out of there gave her one. 

“Smart,” you say and dig in the front pocket for your phone. “I rescued this poor thing from a very grumpy man. Ain’t that right?” You speak in a goofy voice as you answer her question and pet the dog. Leigh settles down at a red light as she looks at you with the stray dog in your lap. It was panting a lot and that concerned her. She didn’t think it was a good sign. “Oh! Okay, the website for this place says that they do emergency walk-ins for rescued strays!” You put the address into the gps just in time for the cars to start moving again. “Do you think we should keep him? Or her?” As you ask Leigh, the dog snuggles its head into your chest. 

“Let’s see what the vet says first,” she responds and you agree. You had no idea what could be going on with the dog. Arriving at the veterinary office, you begin to feel as nervous as the dog. But it was better to get them checked out than to blindly take them home. Leigh signs the dog in and the two of you sit in the waiting room until it’s your turn. Leigh holds your hand when you have to leave the dog alone to be checked out. “I wonder if this is a sign,” she says. You give her a confused look and she bumps her shoulder against yours. “When you couldn’t decide on the house and I couldn’t decide if I was ready to move in with you, we couldn’t decide on a dog. Now that we did both of those things, maybe he’s supposed to be ours.” 

The corner of your mouth lifts, “You think so?” She shrugs her shoulders. As you think about it some more, you begin to really hope that everything is okay with the dog and that anything that might be wrong with him will be an easy fix. It’s a while before the two of you are called back to the room and they inform you that there was no microchip in him. Which meant that he has probably been on the street his entire life. The veterinarian says that he is now updated on all of his shots and that he will need a flea bath if you decide to take him home. She includes that she did have to give him a few stitches as it appeared that he had cuts under his fur that could be from anything. You had your guesses but you didn’t want to upset yourself. Other than being hungry and dehydrated, the dog appeared to be in good health. 

After filling out some paperwork and being taught the process of registering him, the two of you get the okay to take him home. You and Leigh leave the building with a new giddiness. “I did not think we would be getting a dog today,” you say, still processing how you went from arguing over shades of blue to now owning a dog. “What do you think we should name him?” 

Leigh looks at the sleeping dog through the rearview mirror and hums in thought. “Bandit,” she states. You look at her funny but she sticks with the name. “What? He stole something when we found him and you have to admit, that’s a pretty cute name.”  

“Technically, he didn’t steal it because I paid for it,” you correct and she slouches back into the driver’s seat.

“Then you come up with a name,” she says. “Look for a pet store while you do so we can pick up some things.” You do as she says and on the short ride to the pet store you try to think of a name for the dog but come up short. He didn’t look like a Bandit to you but you couldn’t place any other name on him. “I hope when we have a kid it will not be as difficult to name them,” you frown. 

Leigh’s heart jumps at your words and instead of teasing you and making you back away from what you said she asks, “How did you name Allison?” 

You let out a soft laugh and turn to her, “Taylor had the name picked out long before we even met. She was really good with names. Did I ever tell you that she named every character in my books?” 

“No, I didn’t know that actually,” she pulls into the parking lot outside the store. “Are you coming or are you going to stay in here and let Bandit get his rest?” You shake her head at her silliness as you inform her that you’re staying in the car. “Okay, I won’t take long,” she pecks you on the lips before leaving the car. 

You turn around to pet the sleeping dog and sigh. “You’re not a Bandit. You’re more of a…” a name fails to come to mind. “Okay, I don’t know what you are. But you are not a Bandit.” Leigh returns to the car thirty minutes later with a couple bags. She didn’t get much because she wanted you to be able to give your input, so she got the basics of what will be needed for the night. A small bag of food, a couple of bowls, a few chew toys and things to get rid of fleas. Pulling out of the parking lot, she asks if you have come up with a name yet and laughs when you admit that you don’t have one yet. 

“It’s okay to accept defeat, love. Bandit is most definitely his name,” she teases. You cross your arms over your chest with a stubborn attitude as you continue to reject the name. “I know I should be annoyed with you right now, but I can’t help but find you so adorable.” You roll your eyes at her words. The rest of the night, Leigh orders the dog around using the name she has given him for the time being and since you don’t have an alternative, you allow it. You wash the dog as she makes dinner and let him roam around the backyard. The two of you eat your meals outside to keep an eye on him and make sure he doesn’t escape. He was a surprisingly well behaved dog but you were still going to make an appointment with a dog trainer. 

When it comes to bedtime he jumps on the bed and lays in between the two of you. Leigh almost kicks him out but you convince her otherwise. She agrees as long as he sleeps next to her instead of in between because she needs to be in your arms. You agree to her terms and the two of you shuffle under the covers until the both of you are comfortable. The dog follows along with the both of you and settles himself against Leigh once she is settled. She lovingly strokes his fur as she thinks of how she wants to address what you said in the car earlier. “So,” she starts in a whisper, “you want to have a kid with me?” The question makes you smile and you press your lips against the back of her neck as you confirm that you want kids with her. The clarification makes her happier than she imagined she would be. 

It was all becoming so real to her and like you, she didn’t want to waste a second of it. With the way everything seemed to be falling perfectly into place, she felt that the only thing left to do was to ask you, “Will you marry me?”

Chapter 9

Taglist: @madamevirgo @wqndanat @thisischaismagic @artisannat @olsensnpm @evenbeingcrazy1998 @bentleywolf29 @awkwardmandalorian @agaymilflover @sayah13 @princessprudy  @wandsmxmff @wandavisionmoot @angryraisin @likefirenrain @tearsofglitter @feltlikethat

#sorry for your loss #fanfiction #leigh shaw #leigh shaw imagine #leigh shaw x reader #sorry for your loss imagine #leigh shaw x y/n #leigh shaw x you #when i look at you

[perrydowning]

Saying Goodbye to Mr. Downing

This post contains references to funereal practices.

Yesterday, we said goodbye to my beloved best friend and husband, Patrick. Well, his vessel, I suppose. My Love is right where he’s always lived, tucked just here, in my heart.

I come from no religious background because my mother was and is such a hippie—she would never make such an important choice for a sentient being! I can actually see the offended look on her face at the very idea right now.

So, when it comes to death I’ve kinda had to wing it. I’ve lost quite a few close relatives and dear friends over the years, so this was my sixth cremation and fourth where I was responsible for the details. I used to make some pretty dark jokes about this trend.

Now, though, I see that I was being prepared. I knew what I needed to do to feel I’d fulfilled the primal need to honor, cherish, embrace the enormity of the loss and the change. Obviously, this time is … indescribable, but how I wanted to try to capture just a bit of our magic came to me swiftly.

When Mr. Downing and I would talk about what each of us wanted after death, all he would ever say was some variation of, “Cremation, the rest is whatever you need, baby.”

Thus, I painted my wedding vows to him on a muslin shroud; it was a long process and gave me many hours to consider the words I’d said 17 years ago. Finding that I’d fulfilled every vow, every day for all of our life together is a kind of completion I don’t think I knew existed. While I worked, it felt old, sacred, as if I was inscribing ancient, holy things.

When it was time, I shrouded him and placed a few items from me and letters from family. I chose to send him with his favorite book, an awful, lopsided scarf I’d knitted him 20 years ago that he would wear with pride, *whisper* a pair of my panties, and a dictionary. Why a dictionary? While we were dating, I’d given it to him with the note, “I can never find the words to express how much I love you, so I thought I’d give you all of them.” I can’t find the words for losing him, either, so I figured I should send it with him in a valiant second attempt to express that which defies expression.

The few people who I’d asked to be there helped me place 10 dozen blooms around him so that he was cradled with love and beauty. Then they left the room so that I could be alone with him for the last time, from a certain point of view. I read him the words his friends and family had sent from afar (and grumbled that they’d shaved off his lovely beard). 

I told him every day how much I love him, but I figured a few more times would be okay.

Patrick always enjoyed brushing my hair, so it felt right to send that with him, as well. I cut off my braid, placed it over his hands, and kissed him goodbye.

I watched them begin the cremation process and then it was time to go. We said thank you to the person who’d assisted through the steps (amusingly enough named ‘Ren’) and walked out into the bright morning sun.

Among the agony, the fear, the sorrow, the despair, there is now a healing ribbon of peace wound through it all. There was nothing left unsaid or unresolved between us. I have no regrets. It’s a pure grief, I suppose.

Thank you for reading this. I’m grateful to be able to share an accounting of this fixed point in my life.

Please be especially good to your loves today, for me and for Mr. Downing

#personal #grief #death #cremation #mr.downing

[coloricioso]

The ancient Greeks had the belief that swans sang when the day they were going to die, so a swan's song was associated with death, funerals, and mourning. In Aeschylus' Agamemnon Clytemnestra mocks Cassandra's anguish and her death by saying: "The pair has met no undeserved fate. For he lies thus; while she, who, like a swan, has sung her last lament in death, lies here, his beloved..."

Swans were Apollo's sacred birds because of their association with music and prophesy, but they were also associated with other deities. We have Zeus who turned into a swan to seduce Leda -Helen's mother-). But we also can name Aphrodite, whose chariot was guided by swans, and as Monica S. Cyrino says, swans have an "ostensibly devoted behavior towards their partner, with whom they mate for life" making them close to the goddess of love.

Socrates views the "swan song" as a happy one because since swans are Apollo's sacred birds, they share his prophetic power:

And you seem to think I am inferior in prophetic power to the swans who sing at other times also, but when they feel that they are to die, sing most and best in their joy that they are to go to the god whose servants they are. But men, because of their own fear of death, misrepresent the swans and say that they sing for sorrow, in mourning for their own death. They do not consider that no bird sings when it is hungry or cold or has any other trouble; no, not even the nightingale or the swallow or the hoopoe which are said to sing in lamentation. I do not believe they sing for grief, nor do the swans; but since they are Apollo's birds, I believe they have prophetic vision, and because they have foreknowledge of the blessings in the other world they sing and rejoice on that day more than ever before. (PLATO - Phaedo 84e-85b)

So, I feel that Aeschylus was well aware of the swans' connections to Apollo and Aphrodite since, following Socrates' logic, swans and Cassandra are both related to Apollo, sharing his prophetic power. And, as the swans stay together for life, faithful and loyal to their partner, I think it's incredibly beautiful to make the connection of swans with Cassandra's loyalty towards Agamemnon. Clytemenstra herself, out of anger and jealousy claims emphasizes Cassandra's faithfulness to him by calling her "his prophetic faithful mate" (θεσφατηλόγος πιστὴ ξύνευνος).

Juliette Davreux (1942) believed that Cassandra was in love with Agamemnon, but, since Aeschylus was reluctant to portray women's passions in his plays because women -especially Athenian women- were expected to be modest, Cassandra doesn't explicitly confess her love due to modesty; Aeschylus would rely on piety, empathy, and pity as resources to subtly show Cassandra's demonstrations of love, along with her highly positive terms to speak of Agamemnon. This is something that Sabina Mazzoldi (2001) disagrees with. Mazzoldi says that it's not possible to demonstrate that the bond that unites Cassandra to Agamemnon in the Aeschylan tragedy is one "of a loving nature" and that the behavior of Cassandra shouldn't be read as a feeling of love. While Mazzoldi agrees that Cassandra "does not judge Agamemnon responsible for her own misfortunes and for her country… and instead manifests, on several occasions, feelings of pity towards her master" she insists that "no further meanings should be attributed to this". Despite not believing Aeschylus' portrayal of Cassandra and Agamemnon as lovers, Mazzoldi says that: From the later tradition of rhetoricians and mythographers we receive confirmation that the relationship between Agamemnon and Cassandra, sacred παρθένος (virgin, maiden), crystallized as a love bond and was placed at the origin of the tragic epilogue of the Atreides saga.

I personally believe that Juliette Davreux is right because in Aristophanes' Frogs, the comedian mocks Euripides' plays where women are open about their feelings and love. Aristophanes makes Aeschylus' ghost say: "No one's ever known me to write about any woman in love." to which Euripides' ghost replies: "No sir, you've got nothing to do with Aphrodite.".

To conclude, I want to connect the swans' imagery of love and faithfulness with the poem Cassandra, written by the Chilean poetess Gabriela Mistral (winner of the Nobel prize). In Gabriela Mistral's poem, Cassandra mourns her country, and as the Aeschylus' portrayal, she is loyal to Agamemnon, without blaming him, and equally mourns his and her death. Gabriela Mistral explores Cassandra's feelings further and depicts the prophetess as being in love with Agamemnon. According to the poem, Cassandra's love is so strong that, ultimately, she views their deaths as a liberation of life that allows her to be forever with Agamemnon in the stars. In an alternative version of the poem, Mistral also has Cassandra saying pridefully that Agamemnon has loved her and will keep loving her forever in Hades, so Clytemnestra's scorn doesn't bother her. In Gabriela Mistral's poem, like Socrates, Cassandra abandons the tragic and thanks to her prophetic knowledge and wisdom, ultimately embraces a positive view of her and Agamemnon's ending. Something I echoed in my Cassandra's short comic:

SOURCES:

Plato - Phaedo 84e-85b

Aeschylus - Agamemnon

Aristophanes - Frogs

Monica S. Cyrino - Aphrodite

Jean-Jacques Alrivie - Socrate avec Cassandre. Deux élus d’Apollon menés par leur dieu jusqu’à la mort

Sabina Mazzoldi - Cassandra, la vergine e l'indovina

Juliette Davreux - La légende de la prophétesse Cassandre d'après les textes et les monuments

Paola Angeli Bernardini - Mujeres y diosas en el Mediterráneo antiguo

Alicia Esteban Santos - De princesas a Esclavas. En Troya (Heroínas de la mitología griega II).

Collages done with Canva (Premium).

#Cassandra #Apollo #Apollon #Aeschylus #Agamemnon

[iboatedhere]

By far, the worst thing about living in Washington is the summertime humidity.

It slaps you in the face the second you step outside, it makes you sweat through your clothes without even doing anything strenuous, like you’re swimming through lukewarm bath water, while breathing pea soup into your lungs.

TK hates it. It makes him long for New York winters, and the blizzards that will roll through the mid-atlantic in January, snarling traffic and turning the sidewalks and roads into skating rinks. 

However, the humidity does have its charm. 

Like right now, on the patio of a taco place a few blocks from TK’s apartment. Carlos has the top four buttons of his shirt undone, giving TK a perfect view of his collarbone and the gold chain and cross that hangs around his neck. There’s a thin sheen of sweat on his skin that glows warmly beneath the streetlamp, and the flickering tea light on the table between them. Carlos’ glass of sangria is sweating in the heat, leaving a ring on the table, and his fingertips damp. When he takes a sip, TK gets to watch his throat work as he swallows, and the way his tongue sweeps across his bottom lip catching any stray drops, as he puts the glass back down.

TK’s spending a lot of time staring. Probably too much time. An almost borderline creepy amount of time.

But Carlos is gorgeous, and TK finds himself at a loss for words in the face of all that beauty, and it’s not as if he can ask “how was work today?”

“How was work today?” Carlos asks, and TK barks a laugh, nearly knocking over his iced tea as he reaches for it.

“It was…you know. Crazy, like it always is. I brought up student loan forgiveness,” he says, and Carlos’ brows raise in interest. “But was quickly shot down. We’re running on healthcare this election.”

Carlos hums and tips his glass back and forth on the table. “Well. It’s not like that’s unimportant. Do you think you’ll actually get anything accomplished?”

“You know,” TK says, “has anyone ever told you you’re a bit of a pessimist?”

“A realist,” Carlos corrects. “I have plenty of faith, but I haven’t actually seen anything work out the way it was supposed to.” He takes another sip of sangria, TK’s eyes narrow in on his tongue again. “I don’t like to be disappointed.”

“I don’t want to disappoint you.”

Carlos opens his mouth, then snaps it shut as the waitress comes over and asks if they’re ready to order. 

Carlos orders a bowl with broccoli and kale, and politely asks to add grilled chicken. 

It’s neat, clean, and healthy, and makes TK rethink his order, but he panics and orders the brisket taco anyway, then sheepishly asks for it without cilantro.

The waitress nods, unfazed, and jots it down in her notebook before telling them she’ll get it right in for them. 

Carlos smiles and thanks her then looks to TK.

“You know,” he says, “my Tia Lucy would be rolling in her grave if she knew I was out on a date with a guy that didn’t like cilantro.”

“It tastes like soap,” TK tells him. “It’s genetic, my father couldn’t stand it either, but my mother, I remember her eating bunches of it just to tease us. She still does it with me.”

“Sounds like she and I would get along.”

“You would,” TK murmurs. “She’s a lawyer, corporate, so the antithesis of what you want to do but…she’d approve.”

“What about your father?” 

TK takes a deep breath. They’re really gonna do this.

“He was a fire captain in New York City. He passed away about two years ago. Lung cancer.”

Carlos swears. “I’m sorry, I didn’t know.”

“Of course you didn’t,” TK says, shrugging off his apology. “It’s okay. He was sick for a long time, just like a lot of first responders ending up being after 9/11, and then he got better, and then…that was the last time I was in New York, for his funeral. I only stayed for a few days because it was only a few months before the midterms so…”

Carlos stares at him. “So?”

“So I had speeches to write. I had to get back.”

Carlos continues to stare, and TK reaches for the bowl of tortilla chips in the middle of the table and pops one in his mouth. 

“What?” He asks, around a chip. 

“Nothing,” Carlos says, “it just seems like you didn’t get a chance to grieve.”

“Oh no, I grieved,” TK tells him, vaguely remembering the night Paul found him in the hotel room in downtown Columbus, already a six-pack deep with an unopened bottle of Tylenol in the bathroom. How the media didn’t find out about that relapse, or the thirty days he spent getting treatment, he’ll never know. “Nobody made me come back to work,” he points out. “It’s something I needed to do.”

“I get it,” Carlos says, then he winces. “God, now I feel like an idiot for joking about my Tia being dead.”

“She’s not?”

Carlos shakes his head, looking deeply distraught. “I was trying to be funny.”

“It was funny,” TK says with a laugh. “Really. I’m not offended. Feel free to make fun of my palette some more. I’ll help. Sometimes I find even mild salsas to be too spicy. Like this…” He pokes at the tomatillo salsa that came with their chips. “Even this is too much.”

Carlos looks at him in disbelief. “I can barely taste that.”

“I’m weak,” TK admits. “I’m your Tia Lucy’s worst nightmare.”

Carlos laughs, and TK feels warm all over.

#wip wednesday #911 lone star #911 lone star fic #tarlos #tarlos fic

[tybaltsjuliet]

What are disney moments that Wreck you? To this day hearing mulan's dad say "the greatest gift and honour is having you for daughter" brings me to my knees

GODS, YEAH. as an army brat with a complicated relationship with my own father, mulan and her dad mean a lot to me. not to mention ariel and triton, pocahontas and powhatan, mr. banks’s whole arc in mary poppins...

speaking of fathers, “remember who you are.” i can get through mufasa’s death fine, but that moment gets me full-on sobbing EVERY. TIME. bonus for the song “endless night” added for the musical.

thinking about the musical adaptations, the way they decided that the beast letting belle go was not devastating ENOUGH in the movie (it IS) and added “if i can’t love her.” “evermore” from the live-action remake does a number on me, too.

the whole “go the distance” sequence, but especially “i would go most anywhere to feel like i belong.” gets me right in the alien feelings.

“aloha ʻoe” in lilo & stitch always left me crying as a kid, and it’s only gotten harder to watch now that i’m older and have a better understanding of the absolute hell nani goes through.

more of a horror-induced Wrecking than the others on this list, but...everything about mother gothel. i was a sensitive kid and always had emotional reactions to disney movies, but i never expected to have to walk out on one during my first viewing because of how badly the villain triggered me... and then “mother knows best” happened. i love tangled, but i still have a hard time watching it because of that.

i think cars is underrated and that route 66/“our town” sequence is unbelievable. i just. i have a lot of feelings as a person from the U.S. south about the way rural small towns have gotten left behind and it hits hard.

it might make me basic, but anna and elsa’s relationship always gets me. the last verse of “do you want to build a snowman?” is devastating, and elsa is one of the disney heroines i relate to a lot, so her whole arc just puts me through the wringer. cinderella is another one - i see a lot of myself in her, and i cannot get through either her animated movie or the live-action remake without a lot of crying. happy, sad, and everything in between.

and, of course, because of who i am as a person, the whole opening sequence of the sword in the stone and seeing arthur retrieve the sword in the end.

oh! and this would not be complete, without my favorite meta disney story, about “feed the birds” from mary poppins. as robert sherman tells it:

on fridays, after work, [walt] would often invite us into his office and we’d talk about things that were going on at the studio. after a while, he’d wander to the north window, look out into the distance and just say, “play it.” and dick would wander over to the piano and play “feed the birds” for him. one time just as dick was almost finished, under his breath, i heard walt say, “yep. that’s what it’s all about.”

they played it at walt’s funeral, too.

#;ask me your questions and get some answers. #;dream factory.

[grandhotelabyss]

A free excerpt from behind the paywall of my novel Major Arcana, Part One, Chapter 4, "Out of Time."

She kept an Instagram account for the store updated at least once a week with enticing photos and descriptions  of new arrivals, and she followed everyone back who followed her. She kept her eye on the DMs for business inquiries, but she inevitably found either obscene demands (“tits or GTFO,” “feet?”) or, still more obscene to her mind, messages deploring her because she had not issued this political statement or that, which she never did, since she wasn’t one for the news either, being, as she’d been informed by her uninvited ethical tutors, a “privileged bitch.” 

She did see a meme in the feed one day, however—the day after Jakey’s funeral in fact. Though she’d guessed that it had been meant as a dark joke, like most memes she ran into, commiseration in shared suffering and a shared laugh from some despairing boy in some suburban basement who couldn’t get laid (is that why Jakey had despaired? no, he was surely too young, or had been too young, young or old as he’d ever be, to have worried about that). Instead of giving her a grim chuckle at the often unspoken truth, however, this meme so succinctly but also strangely and beautifully expressed what she thought of as her dilemma that she, who had not cried at her son’s viewing or his funeral, began to shake and sob right there behind the counter, beneath the encyclopedia set, in her mercifully empty shop.  The meme showed a little blonde girl, five or six years old. She looked dutifully into the camera, squinting or wincing more than she was smiling, a look more of apprehension and resolution than childish cheer.  Above an expanse of grass behind her reared the old skyline of the city she somehow thought, even now, that she would eventually somehow run away to, the skyline as it had been for the whole last quarter of the last century, commanded by those two columns, those giant bars of glass challenging the sky, proclaiming the dominion of man, of commerce, of America, for better and for worse, over the face of the earth.  In the grass between the little girl and the Twin Towers lay what appeared to be a couple indistinct on the old pre-digital film, too far away to see, but probably laughing, probably staring with new lovers’ inexhaustible appetite and fascination into one another’s eyes. The sky was clear but somehow ominous—probably the meme artist had with some digital tool or other exercised poetic license—not quite blue as a clear calm sky is blue, like the sky that Tuesday morning over two decades ago had been, but storm-darkened halfway to an electric indigo.  The color reminded her of when a pleasant dream slowly curdles to a nightmare. You’re in the car with your father; you’re on your way to a party; it’s a sunny day. Then it’s not sunny anymore; he turns his eyes from the road to face you; those black marbles aren’t his eyes; that man is not your father; a party, you somehow understand, is certainly not where you’re going. In this purply unnatural monsoon sky above the girl, the couple, and the Towers, the meme artist had typed, in a typewriter font evocative of the middle 20th century, the slogan: The world you were raised to survive in no longer exists. Whatever it meant exactly—whatever political message the mememeister had intended—she thought it described her problem exactly. She could have been that girl on that day. Over a long weekend when she was a girl, her mother had taken her on a Greyhound to the city shortly after her father left. They’d shopped and dined and gone to museums; they got dressed up and went to see Miss Saigon. How could it be that she was 38 and had already lost so much?

And not to spill the magician's secrets, but one formal principle of the novel, which is set between the 1970s and the present, is that its temporality is always hazy, floating, dreamy, you never quite know exactly what year the characters are in—except that both 9/11 and the pandemic are constantly alluded to, as the brutal tears in/of 21st-century reality, history's nails on which humanity has been hung.

#creative writing #contemporary fiction

[littlemisslipbalm]

Punisher

Josh Kiszka x reader

From the first person's point of view

Summary: you bump into josh kiszka the night before a Greta van fleet concert. as a big fan, you live out the song punisher by phoebe bridgers.

Capitalizing off my lived experience meeting Josh, not really a fic but I had to write it out. I still cannot believe I was wearing my Phoebe shirt when I met Josh and it really was the most punisher I've ever gotten.

1.5k Word Count, absolutely no warnings besides this being more so a recounting than a fic, not really like my usual stuff

The first time I met Josh Kiszka was about 24 hours before I was set to see him in concert.

I love a good place to hide in plain sight

I walked down the corridor, knowing my way despite only having been here for the first time today. Just a few hours prior I had walked the same steps. The lighting was dark inside the restaurant, an old converted church. Irish step was playing on the floor below me as I weaved behind servers and around tables. Clacking of dance shoes and the tinkling of muted conversations sped by as I walked a funeral march into the rest of my life. 

And here everyone knows you’re the way to my heart

I felt terrible all day today. Sick, perhaps, but I wasn’t willing to admit it to myself just yet. My body ached and was bloated, my clothes tied me up. The early dinner hadn’t satiated much inside me, but the Irish IPA had thrown my mind off kilter. I walked back from the bathroom where I thankfully did up my belt and looked over my appearance once. Twice less than I would normally. If I had been feeling like my usual self, I would have applied lip balm, put on some perfume and gotten the piece of food out of my teeth. I would have taken my dirty hair out of its messy updo and gotten it to look halfway decent. If I had known who I was about to run into I would never have left the way I had.

But never not sweet to the trust funds and punishers

The trust funds were already there, standing beside him and discussing something related to music. There were musicians' names engraved into the tiles on the ground in the walkway between the restaurant and the lift. I was leaving this way because my mother had hurt her knee and could no longer take the stairs. We had come in this way and I was taking us back out. 

I swear I’m not angry, that’s just my face…

His face froze when I came upon him. My eyes likely went as wide as my entire face. My mouth began to move before my brain could. It almost felt like I was always going to meet him here, in this moment. 

“Oh my god, shut up, you’re kidding,” I said to no one in reality, a laugh and a slightly shocked smile on my lips. I thought my mother was behind me but apparently she was further behind me than I thought. 

My mind was a haze with the beer I had chugged minutes ago. 

He looks at me, still rather confused. His classic ensemble adorned him and he looked incredibly clean especially compared to me – a sight for sorry eyes. The clean cuffed khakis, a white t-shirt beneath a slightly buttoned light brown button down and a yellow-ish jacket with a custom logo printed on the right breast. His hair was coiffed and his facial hair was neatly trimmed. His skin was clear and bright with not a dark under eye in sight. 

My smudged eyes looked back at him, still in awe and quickly beginning to worry that I looked insane. 

“Sorry,” I must have stuttered. 

“You’re fine,” He responds easily, clearly understanding that I was a fan shocked at seeing him. 

“We were just leaving,” I tried to communicate that I wasn’t stalking him or coming up to him, but that he was in my path to leave. Looking back on this, I’m not sure why I felt the need to clarify this. It seems relatively obvious that I wasn’t stalking him if I was leaving a restaurant he was just arriving at. I also have no idea what I would have said to him otherwise. 

What if I told you I feel like I know you, but we never met?

“Oh,” My mother finally appears from behind me, “Do you two know each other?” 

I look from her to Josh in bewilderment. 

“Yeah, kind of,” He smiles, his voice casual and light. His eyes are kind and a warm brown as he speaks, seeming to have gotten his footing in the unexpected situation. 

It’s for the best

My mother is confused and I smile at his joke because somehow we’ve already managed to create something just for ourselves that my mom is not privy to. 

I must say something like “Oh yeah” in agreement with him, but I look at my mom and know she isn’t convinced. 

I add, “He’s who we’re seeing tomorrow night.” 

“Oh,” My mom replies, “Are you in the band?” 

Josh laughs and confirms that he is in the band. Somehow the information that he is the lead singer gets thrown out there. I laugh at the absurdity of the situation.  

I can’t open my mouth and forget how to talk

He asks where we were from. My mom says California, near San Francisco and then asks where he’s from. I've barely said a full sentence.

“Michigan, originally. Now we live in Tennessee.” It’s disputed whether he said Nashville or Tennessee but my mom said I know too much and it was probably just Tennessee. 

She tells him that they’ll enjoy their time at the restaurant even though neither of us really had - she doesn't mention this fact. He also mentions that they’re waiting on a big group, him and the four other men with him so we weren't keeping him. 

My mother asks if she can take a picture for me and I’m watching the ordeal. Josh replied affirmatively. She says my name when I don’t move to get next to Josh. It still doesn’t feel real. His scent is strong, some fancy cologne that is spiced with a bit of sweet vanilla in there. Calming, soothing, loving. 

My mom still is insisting that she thought we knew each other when she walked up to us, like we were friends who had just run into each other while in another country. 

He holds onto my shoulder and I smile the best I can, hoping I don’t look wretched in these photos. In reality, my mother only takes one picture. It’s passable. I’m wearing my platform shoes today, but Josh is still taller than me. He’s an incredibly short man though, shorter than he comes off as on stage. 

My arm is hooked under his arm and rather than going around his waist my hand travels up to his shoulder closest to me. It sits flat for a moment before I retract it, feeling that it’s maybe too intimate to touch him despite him being the one to put his arm around me so casually. 

I relent after we’ve taken the picture, “You actually do look like one of my friends.” 

Josh quirks his head at me as we now stand side by side. “Really?” 

“Yeah,” I supply, “He’s got the same hair and the mustache, but he’s from Spain.” I hear myself rambling and cut myself off, I could’ve kept going - same colored eyes but then again they are brown so that’s not uncommon. I also kick myself now for not saying something with greater flattery than ‘but he’s from Spain’. I easily could have said, ‘but he’s not as good of a singer.’ 

Josh laughs and adds a smile, “Yeah I’ve kinda got a Spanish look going on.” 

“But ‘Kiszka’s not Spanish?” 

“No,” He laughs again, “It’s Polish.” 

Once again, I know too much, but I’ll allow myself to at least know his last name if I’m a fan of his band. 

Cause even if I could, wouldn’t know where to start, wouldn’t know when to stop

It’s coming to an end. I have no idea what to say, despite wishing for this moment since I fell in love with the music. I could’ve asked about any of the musicians on the floor that I’m sure we both like. Or about Florence’s new album. Mentioned my love for John Denver or Fleet Foxes. Complimented the music or his voice. Requested Tears of Rain. Anything I’ve ever wanted to say to him. My mind is blank. 

“I’ll see you tomorrow,” I say. 

He smiles and nods, maybe he says goodbye, I don’t remember. His smile is a great warmth, his eyes a kindness. I’ll forever wish I could be cocooned in his presence. It was peace when all I felt was chaos radiating from me. 

Then I decided to add, “Hopefully I can actually see you.” 

He nods and maybe laughs again, I don’t have to explain, he knows what I mean. I’m short and likely won’t be able to actually see him on the stage. 

He walks away and I walk to the elevator but my mom is now in conversation with one of the other men with Josh. He’s asked about ‘San Fran’ and is telling her about his group's itinerary after the show tomorrow night. I had already pressed the elevator button and it opened and I held it for a little, waiting for her to come. She doesn’t. In that time, Josh walks back in and sees me waiting for my mother who is in conversation. I don’t bother to say anything because I think we’re both glad for the painful experience to be over. I give a weak smile. I am so tired. 

He hugs the man next to my mom and walks away again. I don’t see him again until the next day at the concert, but thankfully I can actually see him -- I'm one row behind barricade. In my heart, I believe he remembered me and sent a few smiles and points my way. 

#josh kiszka x you #josh kiszka x reader #josh kiszka fluff #josh kiszka fanfiction #josh kiszka fan fic #josh kiszka gvf #this kind of makes me sick to post but also I want to share

[airedelalmena]

Day update. it was a good day and I accomplished things again.

Most of the day mourning. Then a whole second day in the second half of the day, it felt like. I went out to buy Mama's clothes for the viewing. Somehow was blessed to manage to find something nice and classy and beautiful that she would have worn in her daily life on a nice day out. (At her best and happier times, before things got really hard and her health made it so much harder, and her isolation.)

Was taken to drop them off at the funeral home. The woman who works there is eons more truly kind than the church people who are so cold whom I'm having to deal with to get anywhere. She hugged me, and interestingly, instinctively, probably, she patted my back while she hugged me...like my mother did...which was learned when she burped me as a baby. I didn't say my thought but I asked her if she had kids, and she said yes, a daughter and a grandson in another state. Reflexes like that are learned and ingrained. Even if you're not literally burping an adult, but you're softly treating them like they're your child. God.... Just writing this. :''''s

Then I finally made it back home. My sister was going to come over but I got home an hour later than intended. So she came then. Still very good, because I've needed her. But we missed the event at the library, which I had intended to go to because Mama wanted for us to go together. So I hope they do more of them in future. Tarot card night. So that she and I can go together and sort of make up for that loss.

She hung out with me for hours and we just talked. Opened up a lot more about my life and she did about hers, some, too, though she was trying to be a listener for me, which was so kind.

Didn't end up being cuddly, but that will come with time. Wish it had been the right mood or energy, or that I could have it now. I'm having to take my hugs wherever I can get them. Mom and I were so physically affectionate and cuddly. Especially the harder that our lives became and how starved for grounding social connection we were. We were a team and only had each other. Yes, it was largely a chain reaction from her bad life choices. But those came from extreme, immense trauma and dissociation that had shaped her whole life. I cannot hold it against her now that she's gone. I couldn't do anything else, couldn't afford to do anything else, while she was alive, because she was still holding me back. Now I have to find a balance and it's finding me and I have to forgive. Wish to GOD it didn't have to happen this way... I wanted freedom and good life changes and a new start for us in this place, and my own independence, so that THEN I could really work on rebuilding our relationship. As it was, under her thumb I was bitter and hateful and we fought and god, fuck it was so unbelievably ugly. Back and forth between that and hugs and love because we recognized just how much we needed each other to heal.

My sister helped me to clean just by being there. She surely felt useless because I didn't invite her to do much. But typical for the ADD and just the...being human, I needed to have her around to do any of it.

Prepared more of my "forever broth" using the leftovers from before she passed away. So this was technically her last meal. I mixed the dregs of her tiny bowl into the rest of it and then added my pasta slurry/starch water and some spice and boiled it together. Ate a bowl, so this was my way of eating that meal with her one last time. The rest will go into the forever broth properly. This is my ritual now. It's like spiritual and spiritually involved and connecting for me.

When you make the same foods as your loved ones did in life, you are eating the same things, you are connected to them. With culture this means through centuries. With the "forever broth" it's even deeper. A literal part of it touched their mouth/stomach/bowl. Even years later, that was still true. Continuity in a serious way. You are still sharing that one, long meal with them. Together.

Even if I for some reason lost or finished this batch one day, I can always make the same foods. I have that knowledge in me. She was praising me for really having begun to teach myself how to cook. As in, without fearfully following recipes, hoping not to fail or fuck up. I learned that cooking traditionally wasn't and didn't have to be that: recipes are just guidelines. So it freed me to finally be confident with it. I enjoyed learning from her.

I need to get all of Nana's recipes from her psycho brother. He has all the copies. I will make them and feel things about the ones she made. I will try to remember recipes that were favorites of hers or her own, not just her mother's. Her adaptations. If I can.

I could write and write. I'm done for the night.

No benadryl. This will be interesting.

Good night. So, hopefully, good night's sleep, too.

Fitting and also spiritual that the third day was easier. Also so evident that socialization heals me, at least the right way anyway.

It looks as though I will be forced by money constraints to cremate instead of bury. So I am insistent on a viewing beforehand. Yes, I am bitter abou this and will probably deeply continue to be. Greed. Greed.

On the way to the thrift store to buy her clothing, I was in an Uber with a Turkish man who spoke to me of his own loss of his 35/36? year old wife, to a heart attack. And how he would never love again. Mom was like that with my stepdad.... I get it. I get it. He helped me immensely and was so kind.

Goodness exists. I feel things. Keeping going.

#personal #grief #mm tag

[her-power]

The End of All Things (Part Two: e.m. x fem reader)

TRIGGER & C/W: 18++++ MDNI, Mama is serious!

Part One

Sweet! Semi-dom! Eddie, hurt/comfort, mostly fluff, death, talk of death, grief, descriptions of a deceased person, swearing, making out, smut, unprotected p in v (be smart, not dumb) oral/fingering outside (f receiving), shower sex, gentle choking, humor, more death talk, alcohol use, heavy drug use. This content has heavy subject material about death, dying and loss, please do not read if you are not comfortable with this. ESPECIALLY if you have recently experienced a loss and you are newly grieving. If you also feel something like this is gonna be therapeutic, do what you think feels right for you. I tried to be as accurate as possible, I put in my own experiences with funeral homes, etc

Summary: This follows the reader as they try to navigate this new love with their best friend Eddie Munson, while also navigating loss and what comes after. This takes place 5 years after S4. Reader & Eddie are in their mid twenties. The year is 1991. The song in this chapter is based off A Day to Remember song, so they get all the credit for it. I've decided to make this into 5 parts. I realized as I was writing this part there's been a theme each chapter that was completely unintentional and I'm really excited on how this is gonna go now. Enjoy!

Word Count: 13.3k

A/N: This is based off of a life changing event that happened to me when I was seventeen. This is for everyone who has suffered a loss of a loved one, a pet, a friend, a parent, a sibling. I see you and I love you. Thank you SO much for reading Part One. I honestly didn't think it was gonna get a lot of feedback like it has been, so I appreciate all of you beautiful people.

The late afternoon sun was bright and hot. The kids in the neighborhood were doing backflips in their pools, laughing and splashing each other as they welcome Summer with open arms. You sat in the living room with your father, and your uncle. All of you sat around the coffee table, and Eddie paces behind you, biting his thumbnail. Robin had come by the house earlier in the day, awkwardly and sweetly offering her condolences and almost having a full-blown happy tear crying fit when she realized you and Eddie were together.  

It had been two days since your mother’s death, and the funeral home needed answers on what to do with your mother’s body. 

“She wanted a viewing and then to be cremated after. Separate some of the ashes between us and bury her with your parents in Boston, at least, that’s what she wrote here.” Your father glances up from your mother’s document of her wishes that you didn’t even know she wrote and looks over at your Uncle Jimmy who only nodded. Jimmy hadn’t been back in Boston since they buried your grandparents, that was when you were still living there. 

Your knee bobs anxiously and sweat pools on your palms. Your rub your palms on your dark floral print spaghetti strap dress and awkwardly adjust your shoelaces on your docs. It was almost a hundred degrees outside; the air conditioner was doing next to nothing to keep the inside of your house cool. 

The thought of your mother laying on a cold table, naked, stiff, getting wiped down by a stranger, getting her make up done, and dressed into horrible clothing suddenly made your skin crawl. 

“I want to do it.” You say out loud, and you feel their eyes on you.

“Do what?” Your father asks you. He was unshaven, dark circles were prominent under his eyes. 

“I want to choose her outfit, dress her, clean her. Do her make up—"

“Absolutely not.” Your father interrupts you. 

“Why?” Your eyes narrow at him, and you feel Eddie stiffen behind you.  “She was my mother.” 

“Y/N, there’s professional people for a reason for that. I’m not going to subject you to seeing your mother’s body in that condition. You need to remember her alive, not like that.” 

“I don’t want some fucking stranger touching her. I’m doing it. They allow family to do it.” You raise your voice, and your father pinches the bridge of his nose. 

Eddie says your name, putting his hand on your shoulder. You flinch away from him, glancing up into his eyes. 

“You agree with him, don’t you?”

“Yeah, I do. Sweetheart, you’re going to be seeing her body. Before the wake, the funeral. You shouldn’t see her like that.” He tells you sweetly and you roll your eyes, standing up from the couch. 

“If you don’t tell them, I will.” You look at your father. “She was my mother. And I’ll be damned if someone makes her look like a dime store whore. Call them and tell them I’m doing it.” 

Your father looks at you with sad eyes and nods once. Jimmy doesn’t say a word, tears fill his eyes, and he fixes his eyes on your mother's picture. Eddie stares at you, his hands gripping the back of couch and he shakes his head at you. 

“What?” You snap. “You got something to say, say it.” You instantly felt guilty for snapping, but you were exhausted. Every night since her death you were having nightmares, and Eddie was there for you through it all. Only stopping home once to check on Wayne and work a few hours at the record store. 

He stares at you, biting his bottom lip, eyes slightly narrowing, he sucks in air through his teeth. “I think you need to just stop and think for a minute.” 

You scoff, turning on your heel and storming out the back porch. You find your dad’s pack of Marlboro cigarettes. You weren’t a smoker, maybe the occasional social smoker when having a little too much to drink, but at this moment, you needed a little buzz, and if nicotine was the way to go, you didn’t hold back. The smoke billows in your lungs, and you lean back against the deck railing. Eddie comes out soon after, clad in his ripped black jeans, an Iron Maiden t-shirt and dirty converse. 

“This is crazy.” He tells you, his eyes wide with concern but no hint of judgement. 

You push yourself off the railing and walk down the steps to the backyard, you weren’t in the mood to talk anymore. 

“Stop. Just stop for a minute.” He steps in front of you, and you glare up at him. 

He sees the cigarette in your hand, his eyebrows furrow, you could tell his mind was spinning. “Give me this!” He takes the butt of your hand, inhaling on it once and flicks it behind him. 

“Spit it out, Eddie!” You were losing your patience. 

“I want you to stop and think about this, please.” He places his hands on your upper arms, you tense under his touch and gaze. “This is a body. A dead body. Your mother’s body. You are going to be alone with her. The morticians completely disconnect when they dress up a body for a viewing; you’re her daughter. You can’t disconnect.” 

You feel your anger creeping up your throat, the grief pulling at your heart, the hot tears in the corner of your eyes. “She’s mymother. Mine. You of all people should know why I’m doing this, but per usual, you’re fucking clueless!” 

He lets his arms fall. “What are you talking about?” 

“You have been hearing me scream myself awake for two nights. The nightmares are getting so bad, I feel like I’m walking into one even when I’m awake. I need to see her.” You say, gritting your teeth, and you fist the hem of his t-shirt. “This is the only way. Only way I know this isn’t some fucking dream I can wake up from. I’m doing this because I need to see that she’s really dead.” 

He stares you, the brightness from the sun made his eyes look almost gold, you put your hand over your stomach, clenching your hand into the fabric of your dress and quickly wipe a tear away. 

“Y/N, sweetheart, you’re gonna see her at the wake.” He says gently. 

“Eddie, just stop trying to be Mr. Logical and be my best friend for ten fucking seconds. How many times have I’ve tried to talk you out of something stupid? Let’s see, there’s the time you jumped the school fence to rewire the speakers so everytime the principal would get on the intercom PORN would start playing through the speakers. Or the time you stole your neighbor's car so we could catch the last showing of A Nightmare on Elm Street 4 at the drive in, in Indianapolis because the stupid van was broken or the time—"

“You’re comparing the stupid shit I did to bathing your mother's body?!” His voice rises almost comedically. “Jesus H. Christ! What I do is STUPID. What you’re wanting to do is fucking INSANE.” 

“Then I’m insane!” You yell, letting out a laugh, your hands slap against your thighs, and you shrug, a slight pain hits your chest. “Eddie, I need you to support me with this, even if you don’t like it, or if it’s weird or gross.” 

His eyes dart to yours, wide and glassy. “You think I’m freaking out because I think it’s gross? I’m freaking out because it fucking breaks me everytime I hear you cry or scream or say her name and I’m left fucking speechless because I don’t know how to help you. I can see the pain in your eyes and hear it when you speak, and it’s only been two days. You have a lifetime of this, and I don’t want this to be the thing that makes you slip away from me.” 

Your stomach does a back flip, and you feel even more guilty than you did before. You step closer to him, reaching your hand up, curling your hand through his hair. 

“I’m not gonna slip away.” 

“You don’t know that.” He says, tiredly. His right hand grips your waist and gently pulls you towards him. “You’re scaring me.” 

“When have I ever let you down?” You say, giving him a small smile and he tilts his head at you, raising his eyebrows 

You laugh, squeezing your eyes shut. “Don’t say the Iron Maiden show. I got the stomach bug, that wasn’t my fault.” 

He laughs, smoothing down your hair. “Yeah, you were pretty gross that night.” 

“You’re the only who decided to stay.” You poke him in the chest. “Sorry you were fed false information that girls don’t shit.” 

He laughs, holding you closer to him, your back slightly arches as you look up at him. “Do you trust me?” 

“Of course I do.” 

“Then let me be with her. Let me do this for her.” You cup his cheek, poking his dimple. “I promise you that I will be okay.” 

He lets out a low growl and you smirk. “I hate how fucking convincing you always are.” His hands squeeze your waist. “It’s annoying.” 

“But, ya love me!” You give him a goofy grin and he scrunches up his nose. 

“Yeaaaah…kind of regretting opening my mouth now.” He laughs when you slap his chest. “I’m kidding, you loser!” 

You laugh, going up on your toes to kiss dimple. You gently pat his shoulder and nod towards the house. “Come on, let’s get this over with.” You take his hand and walk quietly back into your home.

You had ended up compromising with your father about the whole ordeal. He wanted the funeral home to embalm your mother first and place her undergarments on themselves. You reluctantly agreed and had said for you to be at the funeral home the day before to get her ready for the viewing. Which was on Tuesday, in three days. That gave you plenty of time to decide what outfit to choose for her. You promised yourself you would wait for tomorrow; tonight, Eddie was performing at the Hideout with Corroded Coffin. It had been a long time since the band had performed there. The shitty part of growing up was responsibilities, and you all had a lot of them. Eddie was the assistant manager at the record store. Saturdays were the biggest money-making day for them, but the store owner/manager Sully had promised he could take the day to practice and to perform because it would be another long while before the band got back together. Also, Sully had a soft spot for you, and when he had heard about what happened to your mother, he had sent two bouquets of beautiful flowers to your house, along with a check for $500, which you planned on giving back to him. You worked at the Barnes and Noble in the city, and since you had been there for five years, the owners were nice enough to give you two weeks off.  Unpaid, but you were good with saving.

Gareth was the first one to greet you as soon as you walked into the door of the Hideout, he hugged you so tightly you thought your bones would break. You spot Eddie coming out the back door, he had changed into a torn up black v neck, exposing more of his chest tattoos. He was carrying an amp as you make your way towards the back, he spots you, smiles goofily at you and he struggles a little bit with the weight of it. You giggle, grabbing the other side of the amp and helping him place it gently on the ground. 

“Looks like you’re losing your strength there, buddy.” You say with a wink. “Haven’t seen you struggle with an amp since 10th grade.” 

He rolls his eyes and laughs. “You just caught me off guard, is all.” His eyes dilate, a familiar lust is in his gaze, and you blush. You were in the same outfit as earlier, just with added red lipstick. 

“You knew I was coming early.” You say, tucking your hair behind your ear and he smiles, pulling you towards him by your hips. 

“I know, I just stop breathing whenever you walk into a room.” His lips gently graze yours and you lean back slightly, looking up at him with a grin. 

“You are so lame, you know that?” You laugh.

He scrunches his nose, and he laughs, pulling back from you. “Yeah, you know me too well. I suck at trying to be romantic. Give me a good D&D story line, and I’ll write the next best campaign, but romance…yuck.” 

“Just watch 9 ½ weeks, you’ll learn a thing or two.” You wink at him. 

His face falls and he laughs. “I didn’t know you saw that movie, you dirty, dirty pervert.” 

You giggle, biting your lip, stepping away from the stage to grab a drink. “Have you seen Kim Basinger in that film? I’d let that woman take full advantage of my body and be strapped to the bed for the rest of my life.” 

The familiar lust appears in his eyes again and he lets out a low growl. “You can’t say stuff like that to me before I go on stage.” His neck muscles clench as he swallows hard. 

“Why not?” You blow him a kiss, stick out your tongue and throw up the devil horns. As you turn around, you feel the cool metal of his rings wrap around your wrist and he spins you around, crashing his lips to yours. He hungrily slips his tongue into your mouth; you moan quietly, and he holds your face in his hands.

“Five minutes, all I need is you and five minutes in the bathroom.” He says breathlessly. 

You shake your head, smirking. “Sorry, Casanova. You’re gonna have to wait. Our friends are here.” You both glance at the door, seeing Steve and Robin walk through the doors; Eddie groans, resting his forehead against yours. 

“I literally hate you.” He whispers to you, and you laugh. His hands grip at the fabric of your dress, squeezing your hip, causing your dress to rise up your thigh slightly.

“Whoaaaa, getting a little handsy there, eh Munson?” Steve says with a smirk and Eddie rolls his eyes. Steve hugs you tightly, whispering a sweet condolence in your ear, causing a dull ache in your tummy. “Heard you two finally admitted your feelings for each other. Heard it was all over the house too.” 

Both you and Eddie’s eyes snap to Robin who is just smiling. “Robin! No one needs to know that.” 

“I’m sorry it just slipped out! I was so happy that you were finally together, and I couldn’t control it. We literally had a bet how long it was gonna take and I won.” 

“You guys are great friends.” Eddie says with an eye roll and a chuckle, kissing the side of your head, whispering. “You’re mine after the show.” 

A blush creeps on your cheeks and you bring your lips to his ear. “Kim Basinger.”  

He eyes you hungrily, biting his bottom lip. “Again, I hate you.” 

He walks away from you with a wink, and you giggle. You sit down at the stools with Steve and Robin, you order yourself a beer. There was surprisingly a lot of patrons in the bar tonight you notice as you look around. It was a whole eclectic group of individuals. Metalheads, town drunks who kept to themselves, and high schoolers with fake IDs. You watch as Eddie places Sweetheart over his shoulder and adjust the microphone. He throws Sweetheart over his shoulder, and smiles when Steve whoops. 

“Atmosphere hasn’t changed. It’s been a while since we’ve performed here. Thank you for being here, it is much appreciated.” His voice echoes through the microphone and you feel your stomach do a back flip. “We’re Corroded Coffin, and this is an original song.” 

He flips Sweetheart to his chest, looks at you over his eyelashes and winks at you. He glances back at Gareth who nods and hits the snare and then the double bass pedal, Eddie strums down, the buzz of the electric vibrating, and the bass rumbles through the building. They play like that for a few breaks, and Eddie starts to sing. You feel the music through your veins, remember when they wrote this song in your room during a horrendous snowstorm and your mother had made them all hot chocolate. 

You mouth along the words with Eddie: Violent delights, violent ends, end of heartache in this prison, not coming back, twisting the blade, blade of the dying, a dying wish, a dying wish, watching you fall, fall from grace, who’s gonna carry your casket? Who’s gonna carry your casket? 

Gareth wails on the drums, the double bass thrumming through your ears as Eddie goes into an electric guitar breakdown, head banging and dancing around the stage. You felt more relaxed, every horrible moment and feelings from the last few days disappearing as the music wraps you up like a blanket.  

Robin was cheering and whooping, moving her whole body to beat. Steve was trying his best to look like he wasn’t enjoying it, but his foot tapped along to the beat, and he drummed his hands along his thighs. You were vibing with the beat, your whole body moving, your hair whipping around as Eddie strummed his last cord, whipped around, met your eyes and that lust appeared again, only it was coming from you. He smirks at you and finishes the song, repeating the chorus, screaming the last line of words into the microphone and the song ends with a final drum solo. 

Eddie couldn’t believe the reaction they got from some of the patrons. Most of you ended up getting free drinks, Steve had to peel Robin away from a much older woman who was ready to eat her up if she asked, and seconds later you were holding her hair back in the bathroom as she vomited and cried about the beautiful woman who looked like Phoebe Cates from Fast Times. You had to tie your own hair back, because she was making you laugh so hard your hair kept falling in the toilet, the stalls were so tiny. You felt bad for laughing, but you had a good buzz on, and Robin was one of the funniest people you knew. Eddie made Steve pull his car around back to make it easier to get Robin out safely. She could barely walk; Eddie had stood outside the door, watching the struggle as you tried to pull Robin out of the bathroom by dragging her under the arms. He could’ve helped sooner, but watching you struggle gave him so much joy his stomach hurt from laughing. 

You groan, pulling her towards you, but you end up slipping on a wet spot and you both tumble to the ground. Robin’s face was awkwardly smushed against your chest and you glare up at Eddie from the floor, who was still laughing. 

“Help me, asshole!” You yell at him, trying your best not to laugh. 

“No, this is heaven for me.” Robin mutters, nuzzling her head in your chest. You pat her head and Eddie wipes the tears from his eyes. 

“Okay, okay, come on, you big flirt.” Eddie says to Robin, squatting down and lifting her off you, throwing her over his shoulder in a fireman’s carry. You lift yourself up off the floor and wipe the dirt and grime off your dress. Your hair was already falling out of the hair tie, and you follow them out the back door where Steve was waiting with the car. You heard Robin gag; Eddie looks at you with panic in his eyes and Steve helps him set her down. You quickly look for something she could vomit in and find a dirty trash bin, kicking the lid off it as you hold back Robin’s hair once again. 

“Oh, my little weirdo.” Steve says, gently rubbing her back as she vomited out pure liquid. Once she was done, and everything looked like it was out of her system, you and Eddie help her in the passenger seat of the car.

“I love you guys.” Robin says with a grin, patting Eddie’s face. “If you hurt her, I will murder you. Wait, did you smoke? Gross!” 

“I love you too, Rob.” Eddie says, kissing the top of her head. “Get her home safe.” He says to Steve and Steve laughs. 

“Wish me luck, I thought I was done being a babysitter.” He scoffs and laughs. 

“Not with your best friend, buddddy!” Robin says, blowing drunk kisses at the two of you as Steve drives away. You wave and shake your head, your stomach hurting from laughing the rest of the night.

“Ten bucks she pukes in his car.” You say, nudging him. 

“Twenty she pukes on his lap.” He holds out his hand to shake yours and you take it, agreeing to the bet.

“Deal.” You say with a chuckle. 

You pull your hair out of the hair tie and let it fall, you scratch at your scalp to soothe the tightness from it. Eddie puts his arm around your waist, pulling you into his side. 

“Wanna get out of here?” He asks, pressing his lips to your hair. 

You sigh, leaning into him. “You okay to drive?” 

He nods and laughs, guiding you towards the van that was hidden in the darkness of the back parking lot. “Made myself sober up when I saw how drunk Robin got. You good?”

“Yeah, just a buzz.” A loud, long yawn escapes you and you laugh. “I don’t want to go home yet.”

“Where do you wanna go, sleepyhead?” He chuckles, rustling your hair. 

He unlocks the passenger side door for you, and you stare up at him, leaning against the door panel. You reach up, tucking a strand of curly hair behind his ear, run your thumb along his jaw as you cup his cheek. There was so much you wanted to tell him; how you didn’t believe you’d still be standing if he hadn’t been your best friend during this time; how you were so forever grateful for him and his big, beautiful heart. He smiles sweetly at you. 

“Nowhere yet.” You say softly, pulling his face towards yours. 

Your lips press against his, opening your mouth into a slow, passionate kiss. He places his palm on your lower back, pulling you against him. He tasted like beer, cigarettes, and a hint of mouthwash. He cups the side of your face, his fingers curling into your hair. A warmth settles in your tummy and between your legs, a loving ache that you’ve started to grow used to these last few days. You breathe heavily as you pull yourself away from his mouth, he stumbles into you a little, letting out a throaty chuckle, resting his forehead on your shoulder. 

You kiss his neck, catching him by surprise as you graze your teeth near the tender spot under his ear, causing him to shudder and groan softly; you bring your mouth to his ear. “I thought I was yours after the show?”

A low growl rumbles in his throat and you feel his hold tighten around your waist as he lifts you up onto the passenger seat, you squeal with delight. You try to tuck your legs under the glove box, but he pulls them back towards him, smiling under the moonlight. Your dress had risen on your thighs a little, and you shudder as his hands move up your legs, and onto your inner thighs, tugging at seam of your underwear while he stood outside the door.

You realize just then what he planned on doing, your eyes widen. “No, Eddie, someone will see.” 

“No, they won’t, trust me.” He grins at you, leaning up his chin to kiss your lips. His tongue opens your mouth, and you gasp when you feel him palm you over the fabric of your underwear. He still kisses you, moving your underwear to the side, his fingers lightly dancing against your clit. 

Your head falls back automatically, lightly knocking against the gear shift and you quietly moan. He gazes up at you, giving you that smirk, resting his chin against the hills of your breasts. 

“Louder.” He says, pulling the fabric of the top your dress down with his teeth, exposing one your breasts. You gasp again once you feel his tongue swirl around your nipple. He kisses and sucks, pulling away with a groan. “Louder.” 

He shoves two fingers deep inside you and you moan, loud. He brings his mouth back to your breast and gently bites the skin around your nipple, moaning with you as he pulls away, slinking his way down your tummy, until he’s kneeling on the metal step. He pulls his fingers out of you, smiling and placing your left leg over his shoulder. He pushes your dress up, kneading and tugging at your meaty thighs, his hot breath hits your cunt.

“Get loud for me, baby.” He whispers sexily and you feel your pussy clench at his words. 

A sound escapes you when you feel his tongue lick a long stripe from your hole to your clit, and he gently sucks. You pull his hair and groan, holding onto the head rest as another loud moan escapes you. He moans, burying his face into you, gripping your thighs hard, flicking his tongue out, you feel your toes curl in your boots. He lets out a groan and runs his finger down your clit and places two back inside you. You clench around his fingers, your back arches, and you get loud. You completely forget you were only a few feet away from the back exit of the Hideout, and you smile, realizing you didn’t care anymore. He looks up at you and you meet his eyes, he curls his fingers inside you and warmth crept up your belly. You let out a breath, and make yourself sit up more, wiggling your hips to get him to pull away from your clit. He looks at you with a raised eyebrow and you grab fistfuls of his shirt, pulling him up to your mouth until he’s climbing into the van, kissing you deeply. You crawl backwards in the driver side, pull him to where you were sitting and quickly unbutton his pants, pulling his hardened cock out of his zipper. 

He opens his mouth to say something but you’re already on top of him, kissing him again and lowering yourself onto his cock and he groans in your mouth. He holds onto your hips as you slam your ass up and down, the two of you getting louder and louder with every movement, every roll of your hips. 

“I’m yours now?” You whisper breathlessly to him, holding his face to look into his eyes, your mouth falls open in a moan.

“Yeah…unghh…yeah, fuck.” His eyes roll back in his head, a throaty groan escaping him, and you smile, moving your hips faster. 

“Good.” 

You stood in your bedroom that Monday, looking back and forth between two outfits you had picked out for your mother. The rain pitter-pattered on the roof, and you pull the hood of the sweatshirt you stole from Eddie over your head. The first outfit was a lavender button up maxi dress with sleeves, her favorite pair of Mary Jane shoes, a gold necklace with an emerald pendant. The second outfit was a dress she had worn on her twenty-five-year wedding anniversary, it was a soft blue, fitted at the waist and had floral print sewn on the chiffon skirt. Your father and uncle Jimmy were out looking for suits to wear. You didn’t sleep last night. You toss and turned, the house so eerily silent. You barely dreamt because you barely slept, and you were a little grateful for that. 

Eddie wanted to come with you today, but you knew this was something you had to do alone. He had to work at the store today and knew he would get clumsy when he was distracted so you can only imagine that the store was in shambles, and he was probably letting out high pitched yells and screaming “Fuck!” every sentence. Which made you laugh thinking about, the never-ending chaos of that man was something he should be proud of. 

Any shade of your purple was your mother’s favorite color, and you were happy with your decision when you drove silently to the funeral home and glance at her lavender dress hanging on the hook in the backseat. You decided on her sterling silver ruby pendant because you wanted the emerald one for yourself, selfishly. You tuck the pendant under your shirt and flick the radio on. James Taylor’s voice came through the speakers singing one of your favorites, and you lean back in your seat, reminiscing to yourself about the car rides like this with your mother. The rain let up a little, leaving little sprinkles of raindrops on your windshield. You had the copy of the death certificate you needed to give the funeral home in the back pocket of your jeans, you didn’t look at it yet; you weren’t sure if you were going to. 

Foster & Sons Funeral Home peaks out on the corner of a little side street and you pull down the long driveway into the spacious parking lot. You suddenly felt very small, and your heart began pounding in your chest. 

Eddie was right, this was insane. 

You rest your head against the steering wheel, inhaling through your nose and out your mouth slowly. Your hands tremble and you look up, seeing one of the directors standing by the front door. The man looked like Lurch from the Addams Family and you swallow back a cackle of a laugh because why would anything be normal about this? 

“Okay.” You tell yourself, breathing in deeply. “Okay. This is fine. This is fucking fine. She’s not even in there. It’s just a body. It’s just a body.” 

You awkwardly wave to Lurch who doesn’t even move, take out your makeup bag and your mother’s dress out of the backseat. Walking up the stone steps you can already smell the overwhelming aromas of the flowers through the door, you walk past him to the lobby, looking to your right, seeing a whole line of wreaths, standing sprays and bouquet after bouquet through the double doors to the viewing room. You pause, not bringing yourself to go in there yet and look up at Lurch who waited patiently for you. 

“Where do I go?” You ask him. “Oh.” You pull out the death certificate from your back pocket, and your hands shake as you hand it to him.

He takes it from you, giving you a soft smile. “Come with me.” Okay, Vincent Price, you think to yourself and smirk. You decided his new name was Vincent Lurch Price. What the fuck is wrong with my brain? Why are you making up names during this time? Why is he so tall? Is he wearing lifts? What the fuck am I doing here? I’ve lost it. I’m crazy. I’m fucking crazy. 

You follow him down a long stretch of hallway and were honestly surprised how big the place was. The floor was a checkboard marble, and your converse scuffed as you hurried alongside Lurch. There’s a tiny elevator he takes you to, and you step in, your stomach drops when he hits the button, and you are both lowered to the basement. 

It smelled like a haunted house. 

He leads you down a small corridor, towards a few tiny offices and stops outside a blurred glass door that says Authorized Personnel Only. He stands by the door and glances down at you. 

“She’s through there.” 

“In there?” You point to the door. “I just go in?”

He nods. 

“She is prepared for you; her modesty is protected. She has been embalmed so don’t be alarmed if the skin feels different. I will be down the hall if you need me.” He walks away from you, and you watch as his tall form disappears down the corridor. You glance back at the door and your hand hovers over the doorknob. Sighing, you push open the door. 

The first thing you notice was how bright it was in there, you had to squint your eyes; it was so clean, and cold. It just looked like an empty basement to you, with drains, and metal tables. There was a separate door that was ajar, labeled Mortician. You slowly walk towards that door, your heart pounding in your chest. Opening the door with your foot you spot the table, and there she was, covered with a clean white sheet. You stand there for a few moments, staring at the sheet. 

There’s a wooden table leaning against the wall to the right of her, you finally find your footing and rest the dress and the make-up bag carefully on the table. You rub the sweat off your palms on your jeans and let out a shaky breath. 

You put your hands on either side of the corner of the sheet and pull it down, you squeeze your eyes shut. You open your eyes, and you look down. Your breathing picks up as you stare at her, you walk backwards, your lower back hits the table and you yelp quietly. The sheet only fell a little past her shoulders, they had fastened a type of bra around her chest. Her skin looked almost gray, and you had to swallow back the bile that stuck in your throat. There was a small incision near her left collarbone, and you caught a glimpse of the autopsy stitch peeking out from the top of the sheet. Her hair was already styled neatly in the way she always wore it; you step closer. Tears fall from your eyes as you look at her face. This was your mother, but it wasn’t. You reach your hand out, carefully running your fingers down her cheekbone and you snap your hand back. It felt like a statue, it was hard, cold. You close your eyes, breathing in through your nose and then out. 

Moving closer, you reach out your hand, and smooth out her hair. Tears fall from your eyes on to the table next to where she lay. You imagined she was only sleeping, her beautiful face relaxed, a soft smile on her face. You take out your favorite picture of her and place it next to her head.  The next hour felt like a blur as you quietly put the make up on her face. You had asked Lurch to assist you in dressing her, after your attempt to do it yourself you almost vomited at your feet because you didn’t realize how stiff her entire body would be. Once she was dressed, Lurch gave you a minute with her. 

She looked more like herself, but you realize she didn’t look like she was sleeping. She looked dead. You silently chuckle to yourself, knowing that would be something she would say, and you felt slightly comforted by that. You wipe your tears away with your shirt sleeve, and lean down, leaving a soft kiss on her forehead. You look at her one last time, your legs feeling weighed down by cement blocks. 

You didn’t want to leave her alone. 

You feel a heavy hand on your shoulder, and you become startled, Lurch was giving you a sympathetic smile. “You will see her again tomorrow. She looks lovely.” 

You glance up at him, your eyes filling with tears, and you nod. He leads you out of the room and you silently cry as you both make your way up to the lobby. Before you leave, he hands you the death certificate, informing you that they already had a copy, and you take it with shaky hands. 

The walk to your car felt long, the sun was out, and the temperate had risen. You take off Eddie’s hoodie and tie it around your waist, your black tank top was sticking to you in all the wrong places. You plop in your car, put the keys in the ignition and crank the windows down. You throw the make-up bag in the backseat and feel the crinkle of the death certificate in your back pocket. Lifting yourself, you pull it from your pocket and study it with your hands. It was folded in threes, and you realize you’re holding reasons why your mother was dead. 

You cave.

You open the paper, and your eyes immediately notice the typewriter print.

Time of death: 6:00pm

Cause of death: Natural

Findings: Pulmonary embolism, myocardial infarction, renal failure, congestive heart failure (ongoing)

Congestive heart failure? Since when?

A sound so deep and guttural escapes your lungs and you let out a scream. The paper falls to the floor and you slam your hand on the steering wheel, once, twice, three times. 

You barely say a word to your father when you walked in. You had driven around for hours until it was almost dark. You muttered you were going for a walk when he asked what you were doing, and that Eddie had called a bunch of times looking for you. You grabbed some cash from your drawer and shove it in your back pocket. You head towards the front door and your father stops you.

“Please, honey. Tell me where you’re going.” He looks desperate and you felt like the biggest piece of shit in the world. He was grieving her too.

“I’m just going for a walk.” You sigh. “I’m going to a bar. I’m not gonna be late.” 

“What happened at the funeral home?” 

“Nothing happened.” You tell him, shaking your head. “Nothing happened. It was just a body.”

Stop trying to be brave, dumbass.

He stares at you. “Let Eddie go with you.”

“No.” You snap and then groan. “No, I’ll be okay. I just need to be alone.” 

“Y/N…tomorrow is the funeral…please…please don’t be stupid.” His eyes look sad, and your heart breaks.

“I’m not!” You groan. “Daddy, I’m sorry. I don’t mean to yell. I’m not gonna be stupid, I promise.” 

You open the door and step out, feeling his eyes on you as you walk down your driveway towards the end of your street. You hated lying to him, you were gonna be stupid, but you felt like you deserved to be stupid.

The walk to the bar only took twenty minutes, it was newer, recently opened within the last year. A lot more of the townies went there, some newly 21-year-olds, a far cry from what you were used to from the Hideout. It was a nice hole in the wall, two pool tables in back, a bar that was shaped like a half rectangle, and some high-top tables. You find a stool and sit on it, throwing a twenty-dollar bill on the bar and ask the bartender for a shot of bourbon and a beer. You wipe the dried tears off your face and knock back the bourbon. You realize you hadn’t eaten, but that never stopped you before. 

Eddie was panicking when he hadn’t heard from you after coming back from the funeral home. He was pretty sure your father wanted to kill him after the third phone call, and he told him you were still not home. The phone rang loud in the trailer when Eddie walked up the steps from returning home from the record store, he tripped over the rug as he ran to pick up the receiver, getting his foot tangled around the guitar cord in the process. “Fucking christ!” He grumbles, placing the phone to his ear and untangling himself. Your father tells him that you took off on a walk and had said you were going to a bar, but didn’t say which one, and that he had a weird feeling. Eddie tells him he’s going to look for you and hangs up, rushing outside to his van. He knew you wouldn’t be at the Hideout; it would be too obvious. He speeds out of the trailer park, trying to remember which bars were in the area. 

                         The cold water feels good against your face as you pat it dry from the napkin in the bathroom. You could feel the bourbon coursing through your blood stream and sigh. You wash your hands thoroughly, glancing in the mirror as the stall door opens behind you and a young beautiful blonde comes out, vigorously wiping at her nose. She had a glass mirror in her hand and places it on sink next to you, wiping at her face and washing her hands. You could see the residue of the white powder on the mirror, and your heart rate picks up a little. Was it anticipation? Fear? Adrenaline? 

The blonde sees you looking at the mirror and smirks. “All you have to do is ask, pretty.”

“Oh…no, I wasn’t. I didn’t…no thank you.” You smile awkwardly and dry off your hands. The blonde shrugs, applying mascara on her lashes. 

You walk towards the door, gripping the handle but you pause. Memories and thoughts scramble in your brain as you remember the last time you did a drug stronger than weed. You were nineteen and Steve was having a house party. You had drunkenly stumbled into the garage, seeing a few people you didn’t recognize, separating the cocaine between each other. You remember you didn’t even hesitate, you didn’t know why, but as soon as that dollar bill hit your nostril you fell in love. You felt like you could fly, you felt happy and excited all at once, you felt like nothing could harm you. That was the one and only time you fell in love with cocaine. You swore to yourself you would never do it again because of how much you loved it, how sometimes it felt like the missing piece within you whenever you felt down. 

You turn to look at the blonde and she glances at you through the mirror, smiling. She nods to the stall behind her, and you follow her. She locks the door, the two of you sit knee to knee as she takes out the mirror, placing it on the lip of the toilet seat. You thought that was kind of gross, but after she sprinkled the powder on the mirror, she took a hardcover book from her purse and placed it in her lap, which made you feel a little bit better about your decision. She separated two lines and rolled up a dollar bill. 

“Oh, here.” You tell her, handing her a ten-dollar bill. 

“Save your money, you look like you need this.” She smiles at you, her face dips towards the mirror and she snorts. You watch as the powder disappears up the straw and her head falls back and she sighs, smiling. 

She hands you the bill, and you take it, your hands shaking. But again, you didn’t hesitate. You cover one of your nostrils with your finger, and breathe in. The back of your throat immediately goes numb when you feel the postnasal drip down your throat, your nose stung a little. You sigh, wiping the excess from your nose and leaning your back against the stall door. Your lips tingle and your head feels a little heavy, but you smile. 

Oh, how you smile.

Eddie ends up finding you in the bar, dancing to Joan Jett by the jukebox with the blonde girl. The two of you had already been to the bathroom three more times, and you were very high. He could see a difference in you, but he doesn’t say anything, he couldn’t yet. You willingly leave with him, telling the blonde girl, whose name you immediately forgot. As soon as you are outside the bar, he scowls at you.

“I’ve been calling you all fucking day.” 

You glare up at him, tightening the sweatshirt around your waist, stumbling awkwardly. “I’ve been a little busy.”

“Getting high, I can see.” He was mad, and there wasn’t an ounce of you that felt bad about it.

“Oh fuck off, Eddie. I had fun. What’s wrong with having a little fun?”

He lets out a humorless chuckle. “Your mother’s funeral is tomorrow. Was it really that bad at the funeral home?”

“No!” You yell. “Fuck, I did cocaine. So what? At least I made sure it was before doing it, unlike someone who snorted a whole fucking line of heroin.” He abruptly stops walking.

“Don’t throw that back in my face! I don’t regret much but that is one of the things I fucking regret in my life and you know that!” Pain flashes in his eyes and you immediately hate yourself for bringing it up. He stops walking and stops at the door of his van. “Get in, you’re not going back home like this. You’re gonna sleep it off at my place.”

“Nah, I’m good.” You say through your teeth.

He sighs, pinching the bridge of his nose. “You are the biggest pain in the ass, get in the van.”

“No.” You cross your arms over your chest. 

He stares at you, shaking his head. Before you could protest, he’s picking you up and throwing you over his shoulder. You scream loud, and he opens the back of the van, dropping you down on the smelly, shag rug you always hated. 

“Eddie!” You scream. “Son of a bitch!”

He shuts the back of the van and you forgot that it would lock from the outside. He gets in the driver side and peels away from the sidewalk. You awkwardly stumble towards his seat. 

“This is kidnapping!” You say to him, awkwardly crawling into the passenger seat, and plopping down. You bump your head on the glove box, and he holds back a laugh.

“I’m not stopping you from jumping out the next light, sweetheart.” He looks over at you, smiling that stupid smile. 

You cross your arms over your chest and lean back, grinding your teeth. You were coming down from the drugs. “Just take me home.”

“No, your dad has already been through enough, he doesn’t need to see his only daughter coming down from a drug binge before his wife’s funeral.” He takes a sharp turn into the trailer park, and you don’t answer him. Knowing he was right, but you weren’t about to admit that to him. 

He parks in front of the trailer, and you feel his eyes on you, you both sit there in silence. “Why?” He finally asks you quietly.

“Because I wanted to feel something different.” You say, not meeting his eyes. 

“Do you have any more on you?” 

“Nope.” You tell him. “Kind of wish I did; it would make the rest of this fucking night tolerable.” 

You see a flash of hurt in his eyes and he scoffs, pushing the door open with his shoulder and slamming it shut. You watch as he goes inside, the screen door shutting with a slam. You run your hands through your hair and bring your knees up to your chest. This is the second time tonight you’ve hurt his feelings, and you knew part of it was the drugs. For almost a week he has been with you, taking care of you, making you laugh, joking with you, making love to you and you return the favor by being an asshole. 

You were so angry. Not just at yourself, but at everything. Angry that your mother was dead, angry that a simple surgery caused your mother’s apparently already weak heart to give out, angry that you had to figure out how to navigate this already crazy life without her. Angry that you hurt your best friend not once, but twice. 

Angry. Fucking angry. 

You step out of the van and step into his trailer. He was in the small kitchen with his shirt off, putting together sandwiches. It was very warm in his trailer. He didn’t look up when you walked in. You untie his hoodie and place it on the back of the chair. You watch as his back muscles clench when he reaches for two plates in the higher cabinets. You study him, the large tattoo on his back that started from his back right shoulder, all the way down to the curve of his hip. His jeans hung low at his waist; you could make out the small pieces of hair sticking out from his happy trail. 

“Where’s Wayne?” You manage to ask quietly. 

“Another overnight.” He mutters. “He won’t be back til late morning.” He puts a plate with the sandwich in front of you, it clanked loudly on the small table and the sound made you jump. He sits down on the couch, his boot clad feet rest against the coffee table and he turns on the television, still not making eye contact. You weren’t hungry, but it felt rude not to eat, you pick away at the crust from the bread. 

“You don’t have to eat it; I was just being nice.” He mumbles. He was really upset with you, and the pain in your chest got bigger as you stare at his form. 

“Eddie, I—”

“You can have my bed. It’s late, you have a big day tomorrow. I already called your dad.” He finally meets your eyes. There was nothing behind them except pure, unfiltered, hurt. Defeated, you nod, silently walking back to his room, closing the door quietly. 

Eddie watches his door close with you disappearing and leans forward on his knees, placing the sandwich he didn’t know why he made on the coffee table, holding his hands to his mouth. Part of him knew it was the drugs making you act the way, and the other part knew it was you trying to manage your own emotions with the grief. It didn’t stop the hurt he felt in his chest though; certain moments from a long time ago were brought up that he wishes never resurfaced. 

He wishes it never resurfaced because now he won’t stop thinking about it. He remembers thinking he was snorting was cocaine, but as soon as it went into his airways, he knew he had fucked up. He had vomited so hard afterwards, and wanted to kill whoever supplied the stuff. Then he started to feel it, really feel it. And everything else was over for him after that. He made the same promise to himself that you did, he would never touch the stuff again. But you broke that promise, and he doesn’t know what to do with that information. 

You wake up the next morning with a groan, the sun was peeking through his broken blinds, and you squint. You had stripped down to your bra and underwear in the middle of the night, you had forgotten to turn on his air conditioner. You can hear the shower running and you sit up. Your head was pounding, not just from the hangover, but from the amount of cocaine you did the night before. 

A pain hits your chest when you realize how awful you were to him last night. You shouldn’t have done the stupid drugs; you should’ve just walked away but you didn’t.  Swinging your legs off his bed, you awkwardly stumble out of his room and head towards the bathroom. The door was slightly ajar, and you could see the steam on the glass door of the shower, and a blur from where he stood. You push open the door, and you know he hears it because he pauses, but continues to wash his hair. You sit down to pee, not embarrassed by the sound of it. Being best friends with Eddie Munson for ten years, you would lose count the number of times he’s stood in the same bathroom with you as you did your business. 

You step out of your underwear and unclasp your bra. You push the sliding door of the shower open and step in. The inside of the shower itself was spacious. You stare at his back, the dimples above his ass, and the curve of his hips. He doesn’t say a word to you when you step closer to him, you press your lips on the spot between his shoulder blades, his body slightly trembles at your touch, and you slink your arm around to his chest. His hand grips your forearm, holding it there. 

“I’m so sorry.” You whisper to him. The water cascades down you now, your hair soaking. He takes your hand and places his lips to your knuckles, turning around to face you. You look up at him, he cups your face. 

“How are you feeling?” 

“I’ll live.” You say, twirling his wet curl in your fingers. “You are the last person I wanted to hurt, and I did that more than once last night. I’m an idiot, who thought they could handle something they couldn’t. And I took that out on you, I’m sorry.” 

He smiles softly, his fingers running over your lips. “I take it I was right?” 

“As always.” You say with an eye roll and a smirk. 

“Are you okay?” He asks gently and chuckles. “That’s a dumb question.” 

“No, it’s not.” You smirk and shrug. “I guess, right now I am. But I probably won’t be in a few hours. It was a lot, seeing her that way…finding out what caused…” You pause. “Eddie, how can you stand here and ask me if I’m okay and be so goddamn sweet to me with the way I acted last night? With what I brought up?” 

He smiles at you, cupping your face with both his hands. “Because even though you’re the biggest pain in the ass I have ever met in my life, I still love you. Like a whole lot. You’re my best friend, above everything else, and you need to know that nothing you can say or do will make me leave you. I already told you; you’re stuck with me.” 

“But Eddie, what I said about the heroin…”

“Look in my eyes.” He tells you and you listen. “Promise me this, okay?” You nod. “Promise me you will never touch the stuff again, and if you feel the urge to, come to me instead. And I’ll do the same.” 

You squeeze your eyes shut, feeling a dull ache in your chest. What you brought up last night not only brought up memories he wished to forget but brought up the way it made him feel. As if you couldn’t hate yourself more. 

“I promise.” You tell him, opening your eyes. “I’m so sorry, Eddie.” 

“Stop.” He tells you gently, rubbing his nose along your jaw. “Just kiss me.” 

You do as you’re told, and your lips meet his in a sweet kiss. His hands caress your back, gently moving down to massage your ass. The water from the shower was steamy, and it felt good against your skin as you kissed him. You press your breasts into his chest to deepen the kiss, and he chuckles when you slip a little and fall into him. 

“Turn around.” He tells you softly, and you do so. You can hear him lather soap into his hands and groan quietly when he starts to massage your shoulders. You moan quietly, your muscles relaxing under his touch. He moves closer to you, and he lathers more of your back. His hands move to your tummy, gently rubbing circles around your belly button, moving his hands up to massage under your breasts. Your nipples harden and your head falls back into his shoulder as he gently massages your breasts, his fingers gently moving over your nipples. The sensation of his lips on your neck, the sound of the shower and the intimacy of him touching you causes a wetness to pool in between your legs. 

You can feel his cock pressing onto your ass and gasp when his hand travels over your mound and fingers your clit. His lips still lick and suck at the skin of your neck and your breathing picks up. He holds one of your breasts in his hands while the other plays with you gently. You reach behind you, taking his cock in your hands and start gently stroking him. His moan rumbles against your ear and he pinches your nipple. He rubs you faster, and you drape your other arm around his neck, moaning loud. His lips find your mouth, and he kisses you deeply and opens his mouth to massage your tongue with his. He pulls away from you, pushing you against the glass door with a thud and you smile in amazement at his forceful gesture. He goes down to his knees and he immediately sucks on your clit. You gasp, your back arches against the glass and he massage your ass, groaning as his buries his face into you, lapping you up. 

He pulls away with a moan and looks up at you with a smile. “Fuck, you taste so good.” 

He stands up again; kisses you hungrily and whips you around so you’re pressed up against the glass. The coolness from the glass makes your nipples harden once again and you bite your lip, feeling him move his fingers up and down on your opening. You feel him press up against you and the hardness of his cock as he brushes the tip of it against your ass and grinds into your folds.

“Oh…” You moan out and you feel him as he angles your ass up a little. His slides his cock into you and the bathroom echoes with both of your moans. He fucks you against the glass, each roll of his hips causing a sensation to flow from your belly all the way down to your toes. Your head leans back and you feel his hand cup around your throat, gently applying pressure and you cry out, pushing your ass against him as he slams into you, harder. 

He applies more pressure to your throat, and you welcomed this new pleasure with open arms. This was a sensation you’ve never felt before, he wasn’t hurting you, or trying to cut off your air supply, but it was new and the way he was manhandling you was making you seconds away from exploding all over his cock. His mouth finds your ear and gently grazes his teeth. 

“Ooh, someone likes it when I do this.” He coos in your ear, groaning with every thrust. Your cunt aches nicely at his words; still getting used to the fact that your best friend, who was now your boyfriend, your lover, who you were madly in love with, was fucking you like this. 

He thrusts into your harder and you cry out when he pulls away. He turns off the shower and you turn to look at him, catching your breath, your cheeks flushed, both of you soaking from head to toe. He kisses you deeply, pulling away to lick your neck, suck and bite at your nipples. 

“Get on my bed.” He tells you breathlessly. You still stare at him as you open the shower door, he helps you step out carefully and you still watch him with a smile, walking backwards towards his room. He shuts his door, spins you around and pushes you on your stomach, lifting your ass up to meet his hips. You grip his sheet as he slams his cock back inside you, the sounds that came from him were almost animalistic and so sexy, you moaned loudly with him. He holds your hips, and you arch your back, your hair was dripping onto his covers. 

Tugging gently at your hair, he lifts you up so your back is against his. His mouth meets yours and you kiss passionately, his hand is at your throat again, pressing down, your cunt clenching as you get close to release. His other hand goes in between your legs and finds your clit, rubbing circles as he continues his rhythm. 

“Fuck, baby.” He groans in your ear, his movements getting a little sloppy as you continue to clench around him. 

“I’m gonna cum, Eddie.” You cry out and he moans in approval, his cock hitting your insides faster and faster until you scream out his name and you cum, hard. The sudden tightness around his cock causes him to groan out, exploding inside of you and he lets out a loud, throaty moan. He breathes loudly, still groaning out as you feel another orgasm rip through you. The sounds from both of you were so pornographic you didn’t know how to form words. You collapse onto the bed, your face burying in his pillow as you gasp and catch your breath. You smile lovingly as you turn to your back and let out a soft laugh. He swallows hard, gently laying on your chest and brings your nipple into his mouth and sucks gently. Your back arches at the sensitivity and another moan escapes you. His wet hair was draped over your chest, and you curl your fingers in it. 

“That was…” you laugh. “That was different.” 

He lifts his face to look at you, gently grazing his fingers over your throat. “I didn’t hurt you, did I?” 

“No, nope.” A laugh escapes you. “Never thought in a million years I’d be choked out by my best friend, and it feel good.” 

He blushes, hiding his face in your chest. You rub his back gently, and sigh. You both lay there quietly for a few moments. Realizing what today was, your stomach does a back flip, and you tighten his hold on him. 

“I’m scared.” You whisper. 

He gently rubs your belly. “I know.” 

“You’ll stay with me? The whole time?” 

He lifts his face up to meet your eyes, running his hand over your face. “I won’t leave your side. I promise.” He leans up, kissing your lips sweetly, gently and you sigh, holding him closer as you stare at the ceiling. 

Eddie had driven you back home to get ready, he promised he would be back as soon as he was dressed and meet you back at your house. You had hugged your father so tightly as soon as you walked in, taking him by surprise. You stood like that hugging him for minutes and he embraced you lovingly, you apologized for last night. You left out the part of you finding out that your mother had congestive heart failure, you didn’t feel right bringing up an ailment your mother had for years, unsure if he knew or not.

The funeral itself started at 4:00pm, but they wanted the family to come an hour and half early to take some time with her. Since your mother was being cremated afterwards, the burial would be private, and the plan was for your uncle to go to Boston to place some of her ashes in the soil of your grandparents’ grave. Your father had asked if you wanted to do the eulogy, you reluctantly agreed but had no idea what you wanted to say or could say. You stood in your room in front of your full-length mirror. You stood there in black tights that went all the way up your waist, and a black lacey bra. For someone who had an entire wardrobe full of dark clothes, especially black, you couldn’t decide on a top. 

You end up finding a fitted black dress with short sleeves, the neckline was a little low, but you placed your mother’s emerald necklace over your head to give it a pop of color and something to look at besides the hills of your breasts. Your doc martens were your mother’s favorite shoes on you, you would catch her wearing them from time to time, so you step into those. 

You had accentuated the waves in your hair with a little hairspray, placed a little mascara on your lashes and didn’t bother with lipstick. There’s a knock at your front door and you glance at the clock, it was 2:30pm, it must’ve been Eddie. Your father had let him in, and you could hear them patting each other on the back’s after giving each other a hug. You hear his footfalls come into room and you glance at him in the mirror leaning against your door frame. Your breath hitches at the sight of him. 

He was wearing a black dress shirt, the top three buttons undone, exposing some of his chest, tucked into his jeans. His silver chain necklace with his guitar pick was peeking out. He wore a black blazer which was a little fitted and you were wondering if he had borrowed it from Wayne. His black jeans were surprisingly not ripped, and he wore pointed toe boots. You couldn’t tell if you were staring at Eddie Van Halen or Eddie Munson. Either way, he looked so handsome. You smile at him in the mirror, and he smiles back, he walks towards you, wrapping his arms around your middle and you lean back into him. 

“You ready?” He whispers, kissing your hair. “You look beautiful.” 

“Are we supposed to look beautiful?” You chuckle softly and sigh. “Yeah, I’m ready.” 

You turn to him, and he holds your chin between his thumb and forefinger, his brown eyes kind as he stares into yours. “If you need a minute, you tell me. We will take a break, get some fresh air.” 

You nod, staring up at him, cupping his cheek. “What?” He asks you with a smile.

“You’re just…you’re something else, Eddie Munson.” 

He smiles. “You just bring out my good side, I’m a huge asshole. You know this.” 

You laugh, leaning up on your toes, kissing him softly. “Okay, let’s go.” You take his hand and the two of you walk out of his room, your stomach was in knots, your palms began to sweat, and you couldn’t swallow. This was it. This was the moment you dreaded for 5 days.

Your dad had driven with your Uncle Jimmy to the funeral home, you followed behind in your car with Eddie. When you pull into the parking lot, you notice the orange cones, and the directors standing by the doors. You both step out of the car and he takes his sunglasses off of his eyes.

“Lurch?” Eddie says out loud, looking at the tall man by the doors, you mutter a curse, covering his mouth with your hand, bringing his head to your shoulder and you cackle loudly. He looks up at you very confused and you pull your hand away.

“You have the loudest mouth, shut up. I’ll tell you later.” You whisper to him, holding in your laughter.  

“Yeah but…look at him!”

“Shut up, Eddie!” You laugh and you follow your father and uncle up the stone steps. Lurch nods at the two of you and you still suppress your laughter as you walk into the lobby. 

There’s a guest book to sign with prayer cards, the Irish Blessing was printed on the front with her name, birth and death date. Eddie takes them and puts them in his pocket, signing his name. You both follow your father and uncle’s tall forms into the viewing room, and you immediately stop breathing as you see the beautiful mahogany of her casket. There was a soft melody of piano music playing through the speakers. 

Your father walks towards her, and before you had a second to react, his legs are buckling. Eddie rushes to him with Jimmy on one side, cradling him so he doesn’t fall. Your hand goes to your mouth as you watch the scene unfold, you stood frozen, and the sound of your father’s cries sent daggers into your heart. You feel your feet move before the rest of your body and rush towards him, you rest your palm on his back and kneel in front of him. 

“I’ll go with you, Daddy. Hold on to me, okay?” He looks up at you, tears streaming down his face, and he nods. Eddie and Jimmy help him to his feet, and you link your arm in his. They stood behind, watching as you two walk slowly to her. More sobs escape your father as you stand in front of her, your eyes fill with tears and you turn your head away, resting it against father’s arm, squeezing your eyes shut. You could hear Jimmy sniffling behind you, you couldn’t look at him either.

“Oh, my girl.” He cries softly, kneeling on the prayer bench. As you finally open your eyes to look at your mother, you realize that you may have completely disassociated while doing her make up. She looked stunning, and you thought the whole time you were doing her make up, she looked dead, not asleep. But she really looked asleep. Your father meets your eyes and kisses the top of your hand. 

“She looks like her.” He says, smiling softly. “Thank you.” 

You nod, gently helping him up to move away from the casket. You sit your father down on one of the cushioned chairs and hand him a cup of water from the pitcher on the table. You sit next to him, holding his hand as you watch Jimmy kneels in front of your mother. His shoulders shook with sobs, and he gently smooths out her hair, he stands up from the bench, walking down the hallway to wipe his tears, pacing.

Eddie didn’t kneel, he stood there with his hands resting on his thighs. He stares at her, biting his bottom lip and you could see his eyes fill with tears. He goes to touch her hand but stops himself, a soft groan escapes him, and he shakes his head, turning away, pressing his palms to his eyes, walking away down the aisle of chairs. You feel your father nudge you to go to him and you stand up, walking towards him. His back is to you, his palms are still pressed against his eyes, and you place your hand on his lower back. He turns to you, so many tears fell from his eyes, and you pull him into you for a hug. He holds onto your waist tightly, quietly whimpering into your shoulder. “I’m sorry, I don’t know what that was.” He sounded so pained; your heart broke.

“You loved her, that’s what that was.” You tell him softly and he lifts his head from your shoulder. You wipe his tears away from his cheek and he sighs. “If you want to go back, I’ll go with you.” 

He shakes his head and smiles at you. “No, it’s alright. There are a few things I need to say to her.” He kisses your lips gently and you watch him walk back towards your mother. 

He kneels and rests his chin on his hands as he looks at her, more tears fell from his eyes, and he didn’t seem to care. He knelt there for a few moments, and you watch as he snaps his necklace from his neck, placing it gently on her hands, the guitar pick resting against her ring finger. Your bottom lip trembles at the intimate moment, and he gently kisses the top of your mother’s head, lingering there for a moment before pulling away. You feel yourself falling more in love with him at that exact moment.

He walks towards your father, embracing him in a bear hug. Your father squeezes his shoulder, the two of them having a silent conversation and Eddie wipes his eyes, walking back towards you. He slinks his arm around your waist and pulls you to him. You sigh, glancing at the clock. More people would be showing up. 

The funeral home was full of people you either hadn’t seen in so many years or had never met in your life. A lot of them had wonderful things to say to about your mother and some had even brough pictures which you hadn’t seen before. A lot of them had traveled from Boston. You almost broke down when Hopper walked in, he hugged you close to his chest and patted your head. 

“Don’t forget to take a breather, kid, okay?” He says gently and you nod. 

You had stepped outside for a moment, placing your hand on your knees to breathe in deep. It was so overwhelming in there and so stuffy. You felt like you were suffocating; you didn’t even tell Eddie you went outside, but he had found you anyway. Gently rubbing your back as you try to settle your nerves, he whispers that Steve and Robin were there. Robin was already crying when she hugged you, she had a glass dish in her hands. 

“I forgot to give this back to your mom when she made that casserole for me. I’m sorry, I kept wanting to give it back, but I never thought…I didn’t…” She was sputtering and you gently place your hand over hers.

“Keep it.” You smile at her, and she nods, Steve leads her inside and Eddie looks you over. 

“It’s almost over.” He tells you gently.

“I know.” You sigh. “I know.”

Your father peeks his head out the doorway. “Honey? It’s time for the eulogy.” 

You stop breathing, you had forgotten. 

Eddie sees you tense and keeps a watchful eye on you as you walk silently back into the funeral home. There was a small podium in front of her casket, and you look up at Eddie with pleading eyes, he walks with you to the front, keeping a short distance between you two as you stood there, looking at all the solemn faces of your mother’s loved ones.

“Um, thank you all for being here…” Your voice shakes. “I didn’t write anything or have anything prepared.” You inhale deeply, looking behind you at your mother’s form. You stare at her face; your bottom lip quivers and you inhale a shaky breath. You turn back towards them. “I’m sorry, I can’t do this…I’m sorry.” 

Eddie squeezes your hand as you go towards him, you see him stare at your mother and he holds your face in his hands, looking in your eyes, asking you a silent question. You nod and he pulls away from you. Everyone’s eyes fix on him, and you lean your shoulder against your father. 

Eddie lets out a breath and begins to speak. “Hi, some of you know me, some of you don’t. My name is Eddie, Eddie Munson. I have known this family for ten years, and I guess, I guess I have a lot to say about this special woman.” He looks over at you and smiles. “I never knew what it felt like to have a mother, I mean, if I did, I was really little, and those memories have completely faded. That all changed when I met this woman. Without questions, without judgement, she took me in as her own. It took me some time to get used to, I was used to being loved by the ones who cared about me, but when it was that motherly love, I had no idea how to deal with it. There were times I think I tried to push her away, especially when I got in trouble, but she forced her way through my walls and held on tight and I didn’t…” His voice shakes, tears pool in his eyes. “I didn’t let go. I didn’t want to. She was a force to be reckon with, right Hop?” 

“She terrified me.” Hopper says from his seat, and everyone laughs. 

Eddie chuckles, glancing over at you. “She protected her own like a lioness. Her beautiful daughter is living proof of the pure heart and soul of that woman. It would take hours for me to express how grateful I am for this family, for her as mother I always needed. I loved her, and it hurts that I can’t tell her that.” He looks behind him at her face, a tear falls freely from his eye. “But for now, I can tell you all what you already know. You will never find another one like her, a woman that embraces a freak like me into her arms, a woman that cooks a meal for an entire army. A woman who sends some of the toughest dudes running just by being in her line of sight. A woman who loved and loved hard. She wouldn’t want us sad, let’s be real she’s probably up there pointing and laughing at us, calling us babies.” That got another laugh out of them. “That’s what she wants us to do. Love. Love hard, tell your loved ones you love them. Follow her example and honor her everyday if you can.” 

Tears are streaming down everyone’s faces, especially you. You embrace Eddie in a tight embrace, your voice muffled in his chest, and you tell him your thanks over and over. 

Once everyone started to file out, you overhear your father talking to your uncle in the lobby. 

“I can’t do it; I physically cannot bring myself to do it. She was my baby sister, the thought of her…”

“It’s okay, Jim. It’s okay. We can figure something out.” Your father tells him gently. 

You walk closer to them. “What’s going on?”  

“We have a change of plans for her ashes. It’s not fair to put it all on Jimmy. We can brainstorm and figure out a better plan.” 

“Well, I can do it.” 

Your father looks at you. “Really? You’d go to Boston?”

“Yeah, you know how much I loved it there. It would be nice to go back. I have enough money saved to get a hotel room for a few days.” 

“Don’t worry about the money, I’ll take care of the hotel. I’d feel better if someone went with you.” 

Eddie walks into the room, his eyes still a little puffy and he gently grips your waist. 

“Wanna go to Boston?” You ask him. 

“Right now?” He asks you, cocking his eyebrows. 

“No, dumbass. In a few days. With my mom.” You stifle a laugh at his face which held pure confusion. “Her ashes?” 

“Oh! Oh yeah, yeah I’ll go. Road trip?” 

You nod and look up at your dad who smiles tightly, and you chuckle at his expression. “My daughter and Eddie Munson in a hotel room. Alone. Together. For a few days. Pretty sure God has it out for me.” 

He claps Eddie on the shoulder, heading back into the viewing room to say his final goodbyes to his wife. Jimmy hugs you tightly, thanking you for doing something he couldn’t and had left the funeral home, he had already said goodbye to your mother. 

You walk back into the room and your father gives you a minute alone. Eddie stands off to the side watching you. You kneel, gently smoothing out her hair, caressing her cheek gently.

“You know you were right about everything.” You tell her quietly, glancing over your shoulder at Eddie. “About me and Eddie. You always had that sixth sense about you.” You place your hands over hers and smile. 

“I’m gonna marry him one day. I’m gonna have his babies and we’ll have a cute little house with a dog. But you already knew that.” 

You wipe a tear away and lean forward, kissing her cheek softly. “I’ll see you in Boston, mama.” 

#eddie munson #eddie munson x reader #eddie munson x female reader #eddie munson x smut #eddie munson x fluff #Eddie Munson x hurt comfort

[starlingsrps]

in the aftermath.

over the two days of neil’s visitation, elise develops a very specific ranking of which family members and family friends she can bear to be around. most of his family is on thin ice, hers definitely is. her friend stacy brings nutmeg and nutmeg and stacy are the top of the list. neil’s high school football buddies who haven’t seen him since a turkey trot in 1999 are towards the bottom. the list gets shorter by the day and by the final night, she’s down to one hand and very tired of pretending she likes anyone.

her oldest sister, laura, bundles her off and into her massive suv with her teenage daughter before elise can rip their sister hallie’s head off in the funeral home parking lot. she swoops in between them as she has all their lives, neatly ending an argument over tights before it can begin in earnest and tells elise to hold up, they’ll leave in a minute.

izzy fiddles with the bluetooth and elise huffs and tries to take three deep breaths in the backseat. her brother in law keeps telling her that she just needs three deep breaths and she keeps getting stuck on two. like everyone else, she knows justin means well but if he wanted to be actually helpful, he’d invent both a cure for cancer and a time machine. she leans her head against the window and closes her eyes. maybe trying to leave her body will help instead.

the car door opens and closes with a thunk and the engine starts. izzy skips through five songs in a row, including a goo goo dolls song elise has always liked but doesn’t have the energy to say so. laura sighs and elise tenses.

“she’s trying to help,” laura says gently. 

“if she wants to help, she can keep her fucking opinions to herself for once in her goddamn life,” elise shoots back without opening her eyes. she hears laura sigh again, the put upon and weary sigh of the eldest daughter. she drums her fingers on the steering wheel and tells izzy to stop scrolling and pick something already. izzy stops on a alanis morrisette song. she’s probably trying to make elise feel better with a nineties playlist - spotify is izzy’s love language - but she can’t bring herself to appreciate it right now.

another sigh, this one forcing elise to open her eyes and meet her sister’s in the rear view mirror. “do you need anything for tomorrow? we’ll drive right by that target.”

it feels like a dare. elise feels her lips twitch. her bratty youngest sister always comes out when she’s wedged between hallie, who always thinks she’s in charge, and laura, who actually is. she has a dress for tomorrow, a nice black one her mother picked up at marshall’s and elise already knows she’ll never wear it again. hallie had decreed that it was inappropriate for elise to not wear tights to her husband’s funeral. the hvac is busted at saint michael’s and if the turn out at the visitations is any indicator, they’re going to be wall to wall. sue her for not wanting to wear tights in what is sure to be a sweltering church on the worst day of her life. if she has to bury her husband, she would at least prefer to not do it wearing control top.

hallie had huffed. elise couldn’t go bare legged to a funeral mass. 

“what are they going to do if i don’t?” elise had asked. “not let me in?”

“you wear stockings to a funeral, elise,” hallie snapped. “weddings, funerals, court appearances.”

“i didn’t wear stockings when i got married either.” at hallie’s widened eyes, she had snapped back that it had been july.

this was april, hallie retorted. and she could wear stockings.

laura had stepped in then and loudly announced that she’d take elise back and shoved her in the suv before she said anything else. 

“ellie?” laura asks again. “target?”

she sighs and closes her eyes again. “tights.”

laura waits in the car (probably sneaking a cigarette, izzy  says) while they go inside the store. elise is used to smaller city targets so the sheer sprawl of the suburban target overwhelms her a bit but izzy leads her straight back.

the prospect of picking a pair is suddenly overwhelming, one more thing she needs to do in a week where she’s been overwhelmed every waking minute. she feels like shit - she’s exhausted, has a blister on her left heel, knows she’s getting a cold, and just wants to go home and crawl in bed to wake up three years ago and have a do over.

“hallie probably has a rule about fishnets, huh?” izzy says, a hesitant joking undertone in her voice. 

“maybe if i were a madam.” elise pinches the bridge of her nose. “jesus christ, do they have anything?”

izzy purses her lips and scans the wall of packets of sheer and solid tights, all with clearance stickers. there are swimsuits a few aisles over but they’re both wearing black and looking at end of season clearance - as if she didn’t already feel like she stuck out like a sore thumb. “just solid maybe?”

elise shakes her head and lifts her much gnawed pinky nail to her mouth. “it’s going to be an oven in that church.”

“she’s so full of shit.” izzy grabs a pair of sheer black tights and shoves them at elise. “there.”

elise flips over the package to check the size chart - she never remembers what her size in tights is because tights sizing is stupid - and sees there’s a seam down the back of these. and they’re 60% off. “izzy-“

izzy snatches them back. “look, if hallie only wants to focus on you wearing slutty tights tomorrow, she’s got fucked up priorities.”

slutty tights makes elise laugh for the first time all day. it sounds rusty. “slutty tights.”

she nods solemnly. “slutty tights.”

it’s one more thing this week that elise knows she should probably care about more than she does. she buries her husband tomorrow - she can’t bring herself to give a shit about tights or the sandwiches or that there are now three competing aunts bringing lemon bars to the potluck afterwards. if she can stay upright through tomorrow and then back to the apartment before she shatters, she’ll take it. besides - pissing off hallie is the first thing besides grief she’s felt in a week.

“i’ll take the slutty tights.”

#type: writing #c: elise scott #me @ me: you wanna stop using grief as a theme so much bud? #me @ me: nah.

[teenageread]

Regretting You

Synopsis:

Morgan Grant and her sixteen-year-old daughter, Clara, would like nothing more than to be nothing alike.

Morgan is determined to prevent her daughter from making the same mistakes she did. By getting pregnant and married way too young, Morgan put her own dreams on hold. Clara doesn’t want to follow in her mother’s footsteps. Her predictable mother doesn’t have a spontaneous bone in her body.

With warring personalities and conflicting goals, Morgan and Clara find it increasingly difficult to coexist. The only person who can bring peace to the household is Chris—Morgan’s husband, Clara’s father, and the family anchor. But that peace is shattered when Chris is involved in a tragic and questionable accident. The heartbreaking and long-lasting consequences will reach far beyond just Morgan and Clara.

While struggling to rebuild everything that crashed around them, Morgan finds comfort in the last person she expects to, and Clara turns to the one boy she’s been forbidden to see. With each passing day, new secrets, resentment, and misunderstandings make mother and daughter fall further apart. So far apart, it might be impossible for them to ever fall back together.

Plot: Morgan, turning the old age of thirty-four, thought her life would be different than what it currently is. Her current life involves taking care of the house when her husband Chris went off to work at the hospital, and hoping she would not get into a fight with her sixteen-year-old daughter Clara, who seems like she wants to do anything besides being nice to her mother. But what did Morgan expect when she got pregnant right out of high school? Chris was her first boyfriend, and in their senior year, they had fun together, especially when Chris’s best friend Jonah started dating Morgan’s younger sister Jenny. The four of them were inseparable until Morgan told Chris she was pregnant, and Jonah broke up with Jenny and skipped town. Marrying young, Morgan stayed home with Clara when Chris went off and got his degree to provide a life for this young family. Yet, now that Clara is older, and Chris is established in his career, it is time for Morgan to do something with her life, something for herself. As even Jenny, the wild child she is, is now getting ready to settle down with Jonah, who reappeared after seventeen years and got Jenny pregnant. Life was predictable, but nice to Morgan. Until it was not. When a car crash kills both Jenny and Chris, Morgan is left to pick up the pieces of their lives and come to terms with why her husband and sister were driving to a hotel when they were supposed to be going to work. Clara also decided now is the time to rebel, skipping her father’s funeral to get high, and start falling for the boy her parents told her to stay away from. Clara, who was beginning to see the flaws in her mother, especially as she keeps catching her alone with Jonah in a more-than-friend way, was totally obsessed with Miller. Despite what her father thinks of him, Miller is a nice dude, who clearly sees Clara for her worth and talents. As Clara and Morgan dive deeper into their new life without Chris and Jenny, secrets begin to be revealed, promises made, and romance begins forming for both mother and daughter. Thoughts: Colleen Hoover gives us a mother-daughter tale, about the differences and similarities of dealing with grief. Where Hoover normally takes a take on romance novels, this one is pretty by the norm in terms of grief novels. With a chapter showing us what Chris and Morgan were like when they were teenagers, Hoover spends the majority of time flipping between Morgan and Clara’s point of view, focusing on the present, with a little bit of Morgan’s and Jonah's past. Despite the two points of view, it was clear that Morgan was the main character, and Clara was there for some unneeded drama. Maybe because Hoover writes for adults, often having their characters in their early to mid-twenties with Morgan being the oldest that I have read at 34. So having a 16-year-old, and her first relationship was not making me interested at all, when Morgan had the real drama to deal with. Sure Clara being mean to her mom added tension in the story, but the whole thing about Miller is such a teenage romance, that if I wanted I could have read Sarah Dessen who’s sixteen years old a lot better than Hoover’s. Clara’s entire viewpoint was irrelevant, and often just took time away from Morgan’s storyline, of figuring out what Chris and Jenny were doing together when they died. This was also unlike Hoover who normally drives deep and heavy into the darkness of the relationships but did not give us that in this novel. Not reading the letters, no smut scenes, and a bunch of wholesome conversations with Jonah, it just did not read like Hoover normally does. I felt like Hoover could have made this novel more impactful by showing us more of Chris and Morgans' marriage. Because it sounds fine, Chris was not abusive nor unloving, but he also was not prince charming making the betrayal heartbreaking. Hoover tried to give depth to Chris through memories of Morgan’s past, but these were so Jonah-centered that Chris was seemingly ignored. Also about Jonah? Fine, decent, there is not anything worth writing about him so I am not going to. The book is fine, with a moving plot, fast writing, and enough drama to add some twists throughout the story. Yet this novel is not anything special and would blend into the background of other romance novels despite it having Hoover’s name.

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Buy the book: Amazon

#Regretting You #Colleen Hoover #book review

[nwdsc]

(Esther | The Welcome Wagonから)

Esther by The Welcome Wagon

In the very early morning of July 1, 2017, Pastor Vito Aiuto stood before a bonfire on a grape farm in the Central Valley of California, just outside of Fresno. It was still dark, the embers of the bonfire rising into an infinite black sky. Vito’s arms were around his wife, Monique, as they watched the morning light slowly illuminate the face of their 10-year-old son, Isaiah. Soon, they would fly back to Brooklyn to a life left behind two months before, a life that had begun to feel unmoored, maybe even unbearable. But the sabbatical trip had been filled with moments of grace, large and small. The bottle of icy grappa left on their table with a smile in Rome. The view of the city, ancient and lovely, from the window of their hotel. The sense of ghosts weaving between the tourists, nuns, and schoolchildren. The days spent on the farm, making bad table wine, having good conversation, and sleeping in the beds of dear friends. In the moments of connection these other moments bestowed, Vito knew something had been restored. He was ready to go home. “It felt like we had been changed, and so to go home was going to be all right,” he says. Home would feel like home again. That feeling, of being welcomed back into your own home, your own life, your own family, and your own faith pervades Esther, the fourth release by Welcome Wagon. Shortly after Vito returned to Brooklyn, he found himself holding his guitar and allowing his fingers to play a few notes that just felt…right. Those notes would come to remind him of that morning outside Fresno and would eventually come to be “Isaiah, California,” the first song on the album, and the first song written for it. Over time, other songs arose, and Vito captured them with gratitude. An album began to take shape. Then the pandemic hit, and Vito’s strumming, lyrics, and thoughts became the soundtrack of the family’s lockdown lives. Though Monique had given up painting a decade prior, she now felt an urge to go home as well, to reconnect not just with an artistic identity but with her midwestern family. As an art student at The Cooper Union in New York, she had passed the lonely hours in her studio listening to the calming crackle of cassette tapes her grandmother had sent on which she’d recorded herself reading the bible. As a young mother, Monique had flown home from her grandmother’s funeral with a treasure trove of old magazine clippings, wrapping paper scraps, and invitations sent more than half a century before. Now, with her grandmother’s cassettes playing in the background, Monique began using pieces from this collection to create large-scale collages, beautiful, evocative, and almost haunting in their pastiche of the past. “Using the music as a starting point, I wove together any objects on hand that fit with the chords, the vision, the melody, the spirit of the songs,” says Monique, whose paintings provide the album art. Her grandmother, Esther, gave the album its name. In fact, to the extent that Esther is a departure for Welcome Wagon, it’s thanks to Monique’s contribution to it—an artistic representation of the wholeness the couple found after their sabbatical trip. Recorded mostly in the spring of 2021 at Mason Jar Music by Jeremy McDonald and in the summer of 2021 at Sounds Familyre studios by Daniel Smith (Danielson), the songs often put Monique’s voice front and center, giving the album a certain balance and depth. Meanwhile, some of the bible recordings feature in the songs, making the project both a family affair and a tapestry of legacy. Yet as much as Esther is about homecoming, it is also about making peace with—and a home in—uncertainty. In both family and faith, there is a sense of profound knowing and equally profound mystery, which Welcome Wagon explores lyrically and sonically. Chords remain unresolved, their progressions posing questions rather than offering answers. “I Know You Know” poignantly details what doesn’t need to be asked of an intimate partner, while the delicate chorus of “Consolation Blues” repeats “I know, I know, I know, I know” as if the singers were trying to convince themselves. The raucous ‘Lebanon’ describes a childhood experience through the uncertain filter of memory, is followed by the gorgeous exaltation of revelation and transformation in “Nunc Dimittis,” the Latin text of Luke 2:29-32. In “Matthew 7:7,” the verses speak of the reliability of unconditional love. But even that song of ultimate affirmation begins with a question. In Esther, the questioning is the destination, and it is one where peace can be found and home—and art—can be made. There’s a salve there. There is music. There are moments of grace, large and small. Welcome. クレジット2022年11月4日リリース Performed by: Monique Aiuto, Vito Aiuto, Will Graefe, Emily Haselschwerdt, Evan Mazunik, Jeremy McDonald, Sean Mullen, John Mark Painter, Daniel Smith, David Smith, Jeff Taylor, The Welcome Wagonyre Choir. We worked on this album between March of 2020 and January 2022. Primary recording was done at Mason Jar Music in Brooklyn, NY, produced and engineered by Jeremy McDonald, with additional engineering by Christian Thomas. Later recordings were done at Sounds Familyre Studios in Clarksboro, NJ, produced and engineered by Daniel Smith. We are indebted to these fine producers during this strange, hard time of life. Additional tracks were recorded in Henderson, Tennessee, Watertown, Tennessee, and Denver, Colorado. Special thanks to Elin Smith for creative assistance and support. The album was mixed by Daniel Smith and mastered by Greg Reirson at Rare Form Mastering in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Bible verses were read and recorded by Esther Andre (1919 - 2013) in her home in Wauseon, Ohio, between 1992 and 1995. Those recordings were initially made so that her granddaughter, Monique of the Welcome Wagon, could listen to her read the Bible while she worked on paintings at the Cooper Union. Art direction by Monique Aiuto, Andrea QasGuargis, and John Beeler. Creative direction and copy by Lia Strasser. All photography of The Welcome Wagon by Denny Renshaw. Special thanks to Tami Lowman for spiritual support. And to David Jennings for the Friday afternoons. Words for “Bethlehem” and “Noble Tree” are by Venantius Honorius Clementianus Fortunatus and were translated by John Mason Neale. “Nunc Dimittis” is the traditional Latin text of Luke 2:29-32 in the public domain. All other song lyrics and music © 2022 Vito Aiuto New Jerusalem Music/ASCAP. All rights reserved.

#2211 #RC #****

[yurifem]

😢 i miss my mom 😢

#sp.txt #bleh #hate that may is coming up #so much shit is happening #like the night of the 7th i was in the hospital all night till she died at 7am the next day #and then her viewing & funeral was right in between mother’s day #sad times #and then her fuckn birthday is in the same month!