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aria-ashryver · 22 days

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SAAM2024 - SA Awareness Month

TW: SA, discussions around rape and sexual violence

Listen, I’m going to talk about something it isn’t easy or fun to talk about. I’m going to try and get a point across, and hopefully have it amount to something legible, because I am already feeling my body physically reacting with symptoms of stress.

I want to talk about sexual assault.

Did you know that April is Sexual Assault Awareness Month? And has been, for the last 23 years? Because I sure didn’t! Which is wild, considering I am a survivor of six separate incidents of sexual assault, two of which were penetrative rape.

I looked up the SAAM2024 hashtag and found crickets. Because who the hell wants to talk about sexual violence and rape on a random Thursday, right?

The thing is, we need to be having these conversations.

Of course, the onus isn’t on survivors to start the conversation — who would ask someone who is horrifically traumatised to open those scars again and talk about their trauma? I couldn’t even say the word “rape” for years.

[note: I have chosen not to censor the word rape here as a part of my own recovery process. Its just a word. I refuse to let it incite terror. Its just a word. ]

So who, then? If we could all talk about sex and sexual assault —if these were topics of conversation that weren’t so taboo to discuss— we could begin to take steps to make things safer for ourselves and for others.

So here I am, talking.

I feel it is important to destigmatise sex as this hush hush topic; it’s important to be able to discuss safe sex, consent, to differentiate what is just “bad sex” from what is assault. People are often quick to brush off encounters that give them the ick as just “bad sex”.

I was no different.

At sixteen, I didn’t have the terminology to describe what happened to me as rape. In a culture that glamorises illicit affairs and drunken hook-ups at parties, I didn’t have the comprehension to realise that what happened to me was not some sexy, drunken, desirable thing.

[trigger warning for more context around the first of my rapes]

I had been at a party, celebrating the wrap of my high school’s theatre production. I had been drinking underage and was extremely drunk*.

(*which in no way excuses what happened to me — it is important to take steps to dismantle rape culture and victim-blaming.)

There was a classmate I had been on a few dates with, and though we had been handsy during makeout sessions a few times, we had never discussed having sex. He offered to pick me up from the party, to give me a place to stay for the night. He had not been in attendance at the party, and was completely sober. By the time he drove us both home, I was already intermittently blacking out.

I have only a few memories of that night. One, crystal clear even to this day — a concerned classmate, grabbing my arm as I was heading out of the venue. The look of alarm on his face as he asked if I had a safe means of transport home. I lied to him. I have no idea why. I told him my mother was waiting in the vehicle that had just pulled up, and he let me go.

The next memory that I have is of his bedroom ceiling. A vague, blurred outline of his unclothed body over mine, as he was raping me.

Yes, we had been at that tentative, early stage of a potential relationship. Yes, I had taken him up on the offer to go to sleep at his house.

But, in the state I was in, there is no possible way I could have consented to sex.

I knew something was wrong, afterwards. I knew I spent the next night curled in a ball, sobbing in the shower for a reason. I knew there was a reason I froze up when a friend side-eyed me at school the following Monday, and said “you had sex with him, didn’t you?”. What I didn’t understand was that the reason was because I had been raped.

Because I didn’t have the vocabulary to describe my experience as such.

Because people don’t like to talk about sexual assault.

But we need to talk about sexual assault.

Conversations about sex can and should be removed from the concept of arousal. You can and should talk about sex without it being labelled as horny, or flirty, or suggestive — because it is just another topic to learn about.

Sex is an intricately nuanced thing that can mean so many different things to so many different people. There are elements of shame and embarrassment around sexual encounters sometimes; young and naive as I was, I was ready to take my crawling feelings of shame, self-blame, disgust, and put them down to “it was just bad sex”.

It wasn’t until long after the horror of my second, more violent rape, that I was able to pinpoint some of the trauma responses as being the same as that first time. There were patterns there, feelings that, had I been in a position of knowing more about safe sex and consent, I would have recognised sooner for what they were.

Its all well and good to go “hey! Don’t rape people!” and pat yourself on the back for your activism.

But the thing is, that kind of does sweet fuck all to actually help people who are at risk of experiencing sexual violence. What we really need is to take actionable steps toward improving people’s sexual safety and practises around consent and safe sex.

So what does that look like?

We talk about sex and consent without stigma.

We believe survivors and do not victim-blame

We practice respecting other people’s bodily autonomy in everyday scenarios, before it ever reaches a sexual context — if someone doesn’t want to hug you, respect their autonomy! If someone tells you to stop tickling them, even though they are laughing, hey, guess what? Respect their autonomy!

We remember what consent looks like, and take steps to inform others — consent is always clear, continuous, coercion-free, and conscious.

We make it second nature to take basic steps toward safety — never leave a drink unattended at a party! Stick to a buddy system to ensure people get home safe! Not because you suspect something will happen, it's just a default behaviour!

Be that classmate that tries to stop a drunk person walking out into the night alone.

The more we do these kinds of things, the less mystical and nebulous this whole “safe sex and healthy consent” thing becomes, and the safer we all are for it.

I’m gonna cut myself off here for my own wellbeing, as this has been extremely taxing, but let me provide a few links that I think are relevant. I hope this might be in some way helpful, and encourages others to continue the conversation offline. (or online, even -- reblogs are totally fine, and please feel free to add other stories or links if you have resources to share)

Be safe, and to any SA survivors who happen to be reading this, please know that you will always be yours, and what happened to you was not your fault. 💖

What is Consent (VeryWellMind)

History of Sexual Assault Awareness Month (NSVRC)

Sexual Violence Prevention: Beginning the Dialogue (NSVRC)

How to Support a Survivor (CRCC)

Finding Help If You’ve Been Sexually Abused (Crisis Text Line)

#tw sa #cw sa #cw sa mention #tw r*pe #SAAM #SAAM2024

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stolasqueer · 6 days

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Love you ex CisHarmful beings

Yes that does include ex bigots and ex abuser's

Yes that includes people who have sexually / physically offended

Yes that includes CisHarmful beings who are now TransHarmful

Yes that includes those who are now in ConAbuse relationships

Yes that includes those who have relapsed into hateful / harmful rhetoric or actions from time to time

Yes that includes people who do or don't want to go to therapy

Yes that includes people who do or don't feel bad for what they did

Yes that includes who do or don't want to apologize

Yes that includes people who still do harmful stuff unknowingly, accidentally, out of habit, or otherwise

If you're moving on or at least trying to get better from that ily

#stolas says #cw abuse #cw abuse mention #cw sa mention #tw sa #radqueer community #transid community #transid safe #radqueer please interact #pro radqueer #radqueer

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elysianholly · 3 months

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Seeing Red

The way people will hop into my mentions to attack Spuffy fans with reminders of Seeing Red tell me two things:

They have no problem with using SA as a weapon while claiming the moral high ground, and almost exclusively in conversations where SA is not the topic (as I don't bring that up lightly). It's used as a quick jab, a gotcha, and that is really fucking gross.

Only violent SA counts. There are numerous consent issues in BtVS, but since only one committed by a lead is filmed as violent, it's the only one that matters. Like it doesn't matter that Willow roofied her girlfriend then, upon being caught, immediately set out to reoffend on a larger scale. It doesn't matter that Faith r*ped Buffy and Riley and SA'd Xander. It doesn't matter that Buffy SA'd Spike in Gone. It doesn't matter that Xander intended to do a spell to remove his ex-girlfriend's consent for the express purpose of hurting her. In a show where monsters are the metaphor, too many people just blatantly don't see the metaphor. And this is very troubling because SA doesn't always look like SR. But if that's the only one that counts because that's what you think SA is supposed to look like, what message are you sending victims?

#spuffy #seeing red #cw sa mention #cw rape mention

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locklylenerd77 · 9 months

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Aziracrow kiss scene analysis

Okay, so we've all seen it.

But what does it mean? Today I'm going to talk about Aziraphale and Crowley's kiss.

Viewpoints

Firstly, there are numerous ways to view this scene, including assault, romance, desperation, and an attempt at communication. I won't be talking about all of these, but I do want to delve deeper into the body language of Aziraphale and Crowley.

It's not "cute".

Firstly, this kiss wasn't romantic, gentle, or tender. Crowley grabs Aziraphale by the collar and basically smashes his lips onto Aziraphale's. It's quite an aggressive kiss, throwing them both off-balance. They sway a little, both of them very still, and neither of them pull away or deepen the kiss. It's obvious neither of them know how to kiss, and I think this makes it unpleasant for them both. We see Crowley holding Aziraphale for quite some time but nothing happens. He doesn't pull away to see if Aziraphale is okay, or use body language to make Aziraphale feel more comfortable. He's got no idea what the purpose of the kiss is, but its the last thing he can do. The kiss wasn't romantic, it was a culmination of the prior 6000 years.

Aziraphale's reaction

Secondly, Aziraphale is very clearly in shock. He gradually closes his eyes and places his hands on Crowley's back. It seems to me that this is him trying to "kiss back", except he obviously doesn't know how, and he's confused and angry at the same time. He looks distressed, which could be because of the situation, but also because he's trying to decide what to do. He doesn't want to hurt Crowley by shoving him away in disgust, or kiss him passionately back. They're both in new waters.

It's important to note that Crowley seems to release Aziraphale and not the other way round. He's the instigator of the kiss. Aziraphale is breathing heavily afterwards, on the verge of tears, and this signals to the audience that he's panicking slightly. I think this is because it couldn't be more clear now that he and Crowley are in love. There's no room for ambiguity or questioning- Crowley's defined his feelings (and their relationship) now, and through a human action.

Although they were both aware of their love, they were also both comfortable in their relationship, and perfectly happy going on dates, sharing property, calling each other pet names, and hearing others refer to them as a couple (at least, they don't deny it most of the time). To summarise, the kiss wasn't needed. Defining their relationship by human means was unneeded. Aziraphale is upset and disgusted because the action is so unnecessary, so unlike them. Crowley's trying to fit them into a mould as a desperate attempt of preserving the relationship. Crowley's confession might have been a way of indirectly asking for reassurance, or making their pre-existing relationship more physically intimate, but its's not a get-down-on-one-knee "will you go to nandos with me" imogen-from-heartstopper. His confession also clearly doesn't change anything, because Aziraphale doesn't recoil in shock, or even react much. He knows Crowley loves him, but he doesn't communicate that. So Crowley, thinking Aziraphale has misunderstood him, tries again.

Why kiss?

I think it's crucial that we understand that the kiss isn't a confirmation of their love. Crowley has already stated that they could've been "us", and that "he would like to spend" his existence with Aziraphale. The kiss is a reinforcement of what's already been said, and Crowley instigates it because he's trying to communicate with Aziraphale through human behaviours to bridge their contrasting perspectives.

This fails.

Crowley and Aziraphale already know they love one another. The kiss was a "stay with me, I love you" from Crowley, and an "I know, it's more complicated than that" from Aziraphale in response, but neither of them see it that way. Crowley was trying to make it clear how he feels, when that wasn't the problem. Nothing was unaddressed after Crowley's speech, and the kiss was an unexpected and confusing event for them both. Crowley never planned this- their bad communication has just reached a point where he's desperately trying to make Aziraphale understand him using any tool he can.

My thoughts

I think the true function of this kiss is to highlight their dysfunctional relationship. They can't communicate, so they fill in that gap with apology dances, protecting one another, and human interactions like kissing. They're so far apart in perspective and worldview that the only way to communicate is through a common thing they are both familiar with, which is human behaviour.

The reason Aziraphale is so upset, from my interpretation, is that the kiss changes nothing. They're both talking at one another and not listening, not compromising or attempting to understand each other's views. Aziraphale and Crowley both talked the talk, and the kiss is just Crowley repeating his earlier words. Essentially, Crowley's still not listening. They still aren't communicating.

We view kissing as a romantic interaction between two people to show mutual affection. For Crowley, it's not that. It's a final, desperate resort. "This is how I feel, can't you understand? I'm going to make you understand in the only way I know how that I have left!" But Aziraphale does understand, and he agrees. He just wants them to be together under different circumstances because he's in a toxic relationship with heaven and he thinks he can change it for better.

Summary

-the kiss wasn't romantic, it was just passionate

-Aziraphale isn't disgusted, he's confused and devastated because they've failed to communicate again, and they can't reach an understanding

-The kiss doesn't change their relationship, it just defines it, and neither of them really wanted to define it. We see multiple people pressure them into a "relationship", from calling them an "item" to interrogating Crowley about their status (he's not anybody's "bit on the side"!), and this causes Crowley to want reassurance, especially after their relationship has weakened slightly due to the stress of recent events concerning heaven, hell, Gabriel and Beelzebub, and poor communication. He confesses due to not only insecurity, but others changing his viewpoint of his relationship.

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Thanks for reading my essay I have too much free time

#cw sa mention #tw sa #good omens #ineffable husbands #good omens 2 #good omens spoilers #give me aziracrow or give me death #aziracrow #aziraphale and crowley #aziracrow kiss #good omens kiss #essay #idk what im talking about

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locoier · 2 months

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i’m not going to talk much about everything going on with cellbit, because a lot of the things he’s gone through hit far too close to home for me, but i just wanted to say that i support him 100% and my heart breaks hearing everything he’s been put through. no one deserves to go through that. as someone who is both acespec and an SA victim, it is genuinely horrifying to hear about all the things he’s been forced to endure publicly about everything. my heart goes out to cellbit, anyone who has been told they are broken for their asexuality, and anyone who has been forced to stay quiet about the abuse they’ve endured. this is probably the most personal post i’ll ever make, but so much of what cellbit has gone through is horrifically familiar, and i wanted to show my support to him and to anyone else who has ever been in a similar situation.

#qsmp #cellbit situation #<- tagging for people who need to filter these posts #cw sa mention

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unhinged-transmasc-man · 11 months

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(This is a very long post, but worth reading)

Being a trans man is bizarre. Because you grow up being treated as a girl and sexualized as one, mocked and diminished and dismissed as one. “Oh you’re just a whiny little hysterical girl, shut up.” You’re constantly gaslit about your interests and experiences and trauma. You know what it looks like when someone sees you as small and insignificant, unworthy of listening to. You have femininity forced onto you and get punished if you disobey. If you’re Asian, you’re even more sexualized and infantilized due to fetishization. And if you’re black or brown, society never considered you innocent to begin with. You’ve been an adult from the moment you were born. Being socialized as having a white girlhood is a very particular experience. But if you’re on the internet and in queer spaces you learn that femininity is always really good, actually, that it never punishes anyone, and that you can be anyone except a man. You can be a lesbian, you can be non-binary, you can be butch, you can be transmasc, as long as you don’t Step Over The Line to being a man. As long as you Stay Good. These ideas slowly creep into your head and stay there, sometimes being what keeps you from realizing you’re a man.

And then you realize you’re a man. And you still have all those experiences, you’ve still been hurt by misogyny in the same way, you’ve still had violence enacted upon you. But now it’s somehow worse, because the same people who supported you when you were butch, or a lesbian, or transmasc but not a man, suddenly they’re gone. You can see the distaste they have for you. Suddenly those “jokes” about men you and others made out of pressure and internalized self-hate affect you, and it hurts. So you speak up, say that actually, you’re a man and you’re not bad. And they laugh at you. They say that either “oh we didn’t mean YOU,” or “if you’re a man, then you’re included.” And what are you supposed to say to that? Either all men are evil but you’re not evil so you can’t be one, or you become a victim of a kind of violence resulting from 2010s Buzzfeed “progressive” gender essentialist bullshit “feminism”, where you have to tolerate demonization of your identity as a man to be acknowledged as a man. Sometimes you’ll take it, because you want to be seen as a man so bad that even being complicit in your own dehumanization is better than being forced into womanhood. (I’m also talking about you, pick-me trans guys. If you grew out of it, good in you, but this may be a wake up call you need.)

So you go on the internet for a supportive trans community and you find that things have shifted since you thought you were still an identity of Not A Man. You still have the same experiences, but now you can’t complain about them. People call you “a whiny hysterical little girl,” but in different words. Now you’re “an aggressive toxic man.” Keep in mind, you’re still regularly misgendered and treated as a girl offline, but that doesn’t matter to these people. You’ve crossed that line, and now you’re Bad, and there’s nothing you can do about it. You can’t talk about experiences, you can’t talk about prejudice, you can’t talk about issues that uniquely affect trans men. You can’t talk about how cis women throwing a tantrum at inclusive reproductive language is at words meant to include trans men, not trans women. You can’t talk about how afab socialization still effects you, that it keeps you from speaking out at this very moment. You can’t talk about the rate of violence, or of murder, or of sexual assault. Suddenly the people who know full well how inherently violent it is to misgender trans women in death are saying “but terfs like trans men, they just want to save you, you don’t die like we do,” and you don’t know what to say. Because it’s so untrue.

You know exactly how terfs attack trans men, all the fear-mongering about “poor autistic lost lesbians,” and “amputating healthy breasts and fertility,” and “internalized misogyny, they did this to escape the patriarchy.” You know the fear-mongering about it and where it comes from, because you’ve seen it from the day you were born. It’s the language of putting men who they see as deviant women back in their place. And yet no one besides you and other trans men seem to see it. When JK Rowling comes out with her transphobic manifesto, she talks just as much about trans men as she does trans women. And yet the only response you see to her is “trans women are women!!!!”. And generally, that’s the only response you ever see to any type of transphobia. That trans women are women. This gets so ingrained that anyone other than you is completely unprepared for how to defend trans men against transphobia, because they think transphobia only affects trans women and don’t understand the unique language. It also doesn’t help that most of them already believe the same things (mainly, that being a man is Bad and Not Progressive) and they can’t argue against what they believe.

And so here you are, still experiencing misogyny and violence, still being misgendered and threatened, uniquely in danger for being visibly trans, but you can’t talk about it now. Because you use he/him now, and that makes you evil. Other trans people, who are supposed to be your family, think you’re evil. They project their hatred of cis men and masculinity onto you, and you’re bewildered. You realize they can accept you for being trans, but they can’t accept you for being a man.

They’ll try and get you to separate those parts, say nonsense like “all transphobia is only based on trans women,” when you know for a fact it affects people in different ways. If you say telling all men to die is problematic, they’ll call you transmisogynistic and sexist as though you don’t know misogyny like the back of your hand. You try telling people who have been dehumanized for being trans that you don’t want to be dehumanized for what makes you trans, and get demonized even further. You get the worst combination of all. You get diminished and mocked and condescended and dismissed, “Oh you’re just a whiny little hysterical girl, shut up,” turns into “Oh you’re just a whiny little hysterical man. Stop speaking over women.” You’re still constantly gaslit about your interests and experiences and trauma, because liking masculinity is seen as bad now that you’ve realized you’re a man. You know what it looks like when someone sees you as small and insignificant, unworthy of listening to (especially as growing up as a Jewish girl, and now a Jewish man). They see you as not only small and insignificant, unworthy of listening to, but they justify it with your identity. Before, it was that “women” weren’t worthy of being listened to because they were stupid and insignificant, and now it’s that you’re a man, and men shouldn’t talk about their experiences fear because they’re Evil. You had femininity forced onto you and got punished if you disobeyed, and now you get that again! But now you’re a “toxic man” if you hate being misgendered. You get the misogyny of being treated like a woman and the demonization of being a man, and you can’t talk about either. “You can’t complain now,” they say, “you asked for this. You chose this.”

They use the same language of those “he’s only pulling your hair because he likes you” teachers (“terfs want to forcibly detransition you bc they care about you”) or “you were asking for it” adults after being catcalled for the first time at age 12 (“you chose to be a man”) or the same fucking language as terfs, who they claim to hate. They use this same language, except now it’s a chance for them to project their trauma with masculinity onto you. You learn a lot of people only hate terfs because they don’t include trans women, not because they’re fascists who believe in innate gender essentialism and that your genitals determine everything about you. You learn a lot of trans people are terfs. In everything but name, they are. They believe in gender essentialism, in radical feminism, that all men are evil, just including trans women. In their view, they slot trans women into the status of white womanhood as eternal victims, and trans men into the status of white manhood as eternal oppressors. Except that doesn’t work.

(Not to mention that non-binary people can also be men or/and women, and are entirely left out in all of this except to fit into this oppression point calculator developed in a previous un-invented circle of discourse hell)

You find a small circle of trans men and mascs talking about the same stuff you’re talking about. You realize that realizing you’re a trans man means you have to become an activist for trans men. Every word you think of to describe your own experiences is, again, mocked and dismissed. You’re gaslit even more heavily than you were before, by the same people who claim you have power over them. People who have never talked to a trans man in good faith spread misinformation, that testosterone is easy to get (it’s actually harder to get than estrogen because it’s a level three substance that results in a felony if taken without a prescription), that it’s poison (and maybe it was for them, but they say it as a universal statement), that all trans men worry about is misgendering, ignoring the very real violence against us specifically for being TRANS MEN. And you die a little inside and grow very disillusioned and alienated from other trans people. You notice that traits of a testosterone-induced puberty are demonized even when that hurts trans women, and you notice any trans women who try to speak up are silenced, just as you are. And it hurts. Where is the community in this?

But still, you have your own community, slowly raising awareness for these things. You dust off your skills you got from validating yourself from harm from your abusive mother, and put on that same shield you used against abusive cis boys in high school who made period jokes and said cis lesbians just wanted to be men. You use the language to describe your own oppression that you know to be true. You use “transandrophobia” and “anti masculinity” without apology. You’re not going to apologize, flutter your lashes and give a nervous laugh the way you did for cis men when you were in danger, to other trans people about transphobia. Not anymore, not now, and not ever again. You work through your own self-hatred of masculinity that the queer “community” fully endorses and practices daily, and realize that being a man is good, actually. You start defining your own ideal of masculinity, and start being your own role model of what you want to be as a man.

You’re on testosterone and see it demonized daily by other trans people, and see that what gives you happiness is mocked as what makes you unlovable and disgusting. It hurts, but you learn to brush them aside. Solidarity is important, you’ve always known this. Sometimes you can get through to people, who will realize they’re hurting you and stop. But some people won’t, and will victimize themselves eternally. That’s not your fault, and the emotional labor you carried over from being raised as a girl means you especially need to hear this. That’s not your job. Not because women should have that job, but because no one should have to do more work than is equal. You are trans because you are a man, and so your manhood cannot be separated from your transness. Other people practicing transphobia against you is their fault, not yours.

You start to learn that damn, the patriarchy really does effect men from how other queer people treat you. Because people, especially women (both cis and trans) start treating you like a non-human robot, an emotional punching bag. That’s if they don’t demonize you entirely. But still, you have your community, you’re transitioning, and you’re happy. You start growing into your manhood and masculinity, really growing into it. And there are times when you’re really, really happy. You decide to make your own representation. Don’t let anyone take that away from you, fellow trans men. You are handsome, you are strong, you are resilient. Your are courageous and lovely and kind. You are worthy of love not despite being a man, but because you are a man. It’s been hard, it’ll be hard. But it’s worth it to be a man.

(This ended up being a long post, a combination of what started out as a rant and turned into more of a personal journey narrative. I want to make people feel heard. You are valid. It’s not just in your head, they are gaslighting you. You aren’t sensitive, you aren’t dramatic, you aren’t toxic, and you aren’t whiny. You’re a trans man who wants to be known as a man without being demonized for it. Never be afraid to speak up against transphobia, especially when it’s from other trans people. They should know better, it is not your fault. I love you. I’ve also learned more about multigender people and intersex people, but I can’t speak to their experience at all and so didn’t want to misrepresent. But I can only imagine it’s even more complicated and hard for you, so you get even more love and support <333)

(If you’re not a trans man or transmasc reading this, and you support it, thank you. This was specifically about trans men because it’s the man part people really demonize, and transmasc as an identity is still seen as “safe” because it’s “not a man”. For supportive trans women and transfems, I love you. Keep speaking up for us. But for anyone who comes at this in bad faith, re-evaluate why you feel attacked. Are you perpetuating harm against trans men? Are you continuing gender essentialism but justify it because you have a marginalized identity? Are you projecting your trauma against cis men, men in general, and masculinity against people who can’t fight back? Reflect and grow the fuck up. Are you a trans man who’s bought into dehumanizing yourself so you can be seen as “one of the good ones”? Are you a white trans woman weaponizing your newfound sense of white womanhood onto trans men, especially non-white trans men? Reflect on how demonizing men and masculinity as inherently predatory and dangerous effects jewish men, black men, brown men, disabled men, and Asian men. And maybe just white cishet men as well!!! They’re also people!!!! Being a man isn’t inherently a bad thing. You should be mad at systems, not people, and individuals when they perpetuate harm. Being marginalized in one area doesn’t mean you can claim to be the voice of the community while hurting members of the community you supposedly consider yourself apart of.)

#cw transandrophobia #transandrophobia #transmisandry #anti-masculinity #cw sa mention #cw terf mention #cw jk rowling #trans guy #trans man #trans men

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numberonecodwomenfan · 1 month

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Like We’ll Never Have Sex

i’ve been sitting on this fic for a few days and im finally posting it…. they make me insane. im praying farah isnt ooc but she might be 😔 anyway fic under the cut

CW for very vague mentions of past sexual assault, farah has Been Through Some Stuff

“Alex,” Farah whispered. The lump beside her on the bed shifted.

“Hm?”

“Did I wake you?”

“No,” Alex said, even though Farah clearly did. He rubbed the sleep from his eyes and rolled over to face her.

“What’s up?”

“I can’t sleep. I feel like something is wrong,” Farah sighed. Alex smiled like a man entrusted with a secret.

“You always feel like something is wrong, ya ‘amar.” Alex held his arms open and Farah shuffled into his embrace. She shivered at the ticklish sensation of Alex’s mustachioed lips pressing kisses to the back of her neck.

“You can relax sometimes, y’know,” Alex mumbled, lips still glued to her skin.

Farah sighed, a bone-tired, heavy sigh, and slipped her hand into one of Alex’s to tangle their fingers together.

“You know I cannot,” Farah whispered, voice quivering with exhaustion, “There is always something that needs to be done.”

“‘S there somethin’ that needs to be done right now?”

“I am sure there is. I just- I just don’t know what.” Farah curled into Alex’s warmth and let him hold her close. Tightly, to make her feel safe, comforted, but not tight enough to make her feel trapped.

“What you don’t know can’t hurt you, my love. Right now, the only thing you need to do is sleep. You’re exhausted. I can see it in your eyes, and it kills me inside.” Alex pressed soft kisses against Farah’s head, trailing down her neck until he reached the collar of her sleep shirt (which was really one of Alex’s shirts, an old band tee with a coffee stain that Farah liked to steal).

“I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be,” Alex sighed, “What do you need from me? Is there something I can do to help?”

“I don’t want to make you do anything for me,” Farah said, twisting around in Alex’s arms to look up at him. Alex pressed their foreheads together and one of his hands snaked up into Farah’s dark hair.

“Nothing you could ever ask of me would be too much,” Alex assured her, his calloused hands gentle as they cupped her face, “I would do anything for you.”

Farah sighed and hid her face in Alex’s chest.

“Just- stay here with me. That is all I want from you right now.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

———

Farah still couldn’t sleep. Alex could tell- her restless shifting jostled him awake many times, and he was starting to lose sleep as well. He did as she told him, stayed by her side and held her close, but it clearly wasn’t working.

“Farah,” he said softly, nose still buried in Farah’s hair, “You need to sleep, honey.”

“I know.”

“Can we try something?”

Farah was silent for a moment, and Alex had almost begun to hope she had actually fallen asleep when she spoke.

“Sure,” Farah sighed. She sounded defeated, almost.

“Could you take your shirt off for me? Or lift it up?” Alex realized too late how his request came across when he felt Farah tense up against his chest. He could practically feel his heart crumble in his chest when she ever-so-subtly shifted away from him.

“Alex, you- you know I do not want to… do that kind of thing. Not now, anyway,” Farah whispered, and Alex suddenly wanted to cry because she sounded ashamed. The look on her face broke his heart once again, apologetic and embarrassed, but most heart-shatteringly, afraid.

“No, no, God, no, that’s not what I meant. Farah, I know you don’t want to have sex. I’ve told you that I’m okay with that. We could never have sex, and I’d be okay with that. If I ever try to pressure you, or make you feel like you have to have sex with me, I give you my full permission to shoot me on the spot.” Alex looked down at Farah and watched her dark, tired eyes dart over his face. After a moment, she finally spoke.

“…I know. I’m sorry. I know you would not do that.”

“God, baby, don’t apologize to me. I’m the one that should be sorry- I made you uncomfortable. All I wanted to do was rub your back, it’s what my mom did for me when I couldn’t sleep as a kid,” Alex explained. He felt sick with regret, his stomach churning at the very concept that Farah, the love of his life, the woman he blew himself up for, might ever be afraid of him. He watched her tense shoulders relax just a little. “Farah, have you- have I ever made you feel pressured to have sex with me? Or to do anything you don’t want to do?”

“No! No, never you. I have just… You know what I have been through. What I have seen.” Farah sucked in a shaky breath. “I know you. I know you would not hurt me that way. But sometimes I still feel their hands on me, like- like stains on my body. They did not like that I fought back. They found different ways to put me in my place.” Her voice cracked and wavered.

Alex waited. Waited for her to gather her thoughts, waited for her to do whatever she needed. He waited while she cried. He held her as closely as he could as she cried and sniffled and unintentionally used his shirt as a tissue.

He rarely saw her cry, and never like this. She had shed a few controlled, carefully contained tears over the death of her brother, though her quivering bottom lip had given her away. Alex had seen the way her eyes watered when she saw him again after his ‘death.’ But he had never seen her cry like this. It was unexpected, to see Farah so painfully human.

She had spent years rebuilding her flesh and bone into steel and brick and mortar for the sake of her people, and Alex felt as though he had accidentally swung a wrecking ball through her chest.

“Sorry,” Farah whispered, barely audible against Alex’s chest.

“Don’t be. I’m so sorry you went through that, my love. I don’t really know what to say, to be honest.” Alex stared at the top of Farah’s head. He wished he could know what was going on inside.

“You are here. That is good enough.” Farah sniffled and pulled away, only to be met with the mess of snot and tears she had left on Alex’s shirt. “Your shirt-“

“-Is just a shirt. I’ll live. I blew myself up for you, baby. A little snot is nothing,” Alex chuckled. Farah let out a little huff that could have been a laugh. “Here,” Alex said, nudging Farah’s shoulder, “Turn over? You can keep your shirt on if you want. Tell me if you want me to stop, okay?”

Farah considered for a moment, before slowly, hesitantly, turning her back to Alex. As he traced his eyes over the slim yet muscled planes of Farah’s back, he felt as though he was struck with the sudden realization of Farah’s trust in him. This woman, who had been through so much, been hurt by so many people, and hardened herself into a stern, sharp-edged commander, was baring the most vulnerable part of herself to him, trusting him to give and not take. Trusting him to put his hands on her and only go as far as she wanted him to. He felt her shiver when he laid his hands on the base of her neck, and on instinct, pulled away like her skin was on fire.

“You alright?”

“I am not made of glass, Alex. You kissed me in that same place just hours ago.”

Alex breathed out a little chuckle and moved his hands back to Farah’s shoulders. Slowly, slowly, he traced the dimples of her shoulder blades and ran his fingers down her spine. His thumbs pressed just so into those little knots of tension, not enough to hurt, but enough to loosen Farah’s board-straight posture.

His touch was warm against Farah’s back, and she found herself melting like butter into the mattress. She hummed, content, as Alex gently worked out some of the tension in her shoulders.

Even once Farah’s shoulders no longer strained with the evidence of holding the weight of the world, Alex didn’t stop. He rubbed circles over her trapezius and kissed along her spine, traced patterns onto her back. He felt her breathing even out under his palms. Finally, she was asleep. Before he pulled her back to his chest, he took just a moment to trace a few words onto her back; “I love you” he wrote, buried his nose into her hair, and promptly joined her in sleep.

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