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intensionsuspension · 5 years

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Death Stranding Timeline

I put together a rough timeline for the overarching narrative of Death Stranding. I was able to piece together some parts of the timeline almost approximately, but admittedly, much of it is based on headcanon and conjecture due to parts of the lore being rather scant. Regardless, I tried to make it fun and I utilized invented details to enrich the worldbuilding. I also put together a few paragraphs explaining my methods in obtaining the more approximate dates. I’ve seen people talking about character age headcanons and attempting to pinpoint the duration of the Death Stranding, and I think I got pretty close to the truth with a few of these. Anyway, enjoy, tell me what you think. The full timeline is below the cut.

Death Stranding Timeline

August 25th, 1975 - Bridget Strand is born

November 27th, 1979 - Clifford Unger is born

August 16th, 1984 - Lisa Bridges is born

May 18th, 1985 - John Blake McClane is born

February 7th, 1995 - Deadman is ‘born’

March 13th, 1995 - Amelia Strand is ‘born’

May, 1997 - Bridget Strand earns a Bachelor’s degree in political science

August, 1997 - Clifford Unger enlists in the United States Army

October, 1997 - Bridget Strand becomes a political consultant under the campaign staff of

democratic senator Scott Faulkner

June, 1999 - Clifford Unger is one of 7,000 ground troops deployed during the end of the Kosovo War

September, 2000 - Clifford Unger joins the United States Army Special Forces

September, 2001 - Clifford Unger participates in the invasion of Afghanistan following the September 11 terrorist attacks

March, 2003 - Clifford Unger participates in the invasion of Iraq

September, 2003 - John Blake McClane enlists in the United States Army

November, 2003 - Bridget Strand is promoted to campaign manager of democratic senator Scott Faulkner’s reelection campaign

May, 2005 - Clifford Unger earns a Bachelor’s degree in Criminal Justice

May, 2006 - Lisa Bridges earns a bachelor’s degree in Fisheries and Wildlife Law Enforcement

September, 2006 - John Blake McClane joins the United States Special Forces

January, 2007 - Lisa Bridges begins her career as a Law Enforcement Ranger at Whitewater State Park near Rochester, MN

April, 2007 - Clifford Unger is promoted to the position of commanding officer (captain) within ODA 1116, Alpha Co, 1st Btn, 1st SFG

May, 2008 - John Blake McClane earns a bachelor’s degree in Strategic Intelligence

November, 2008 - Bridget Strand is elected into a democratic seat in the United States Senate

July, 2009 - John Blake McClane is transferred to ODA 1116 following the death of one of its Intelligence and Operations Sergeants

June 30th, 2010 - Heartman (Rudolph ‘Rudy’ Jacobsen) is born

July 16th, 2011 - Lucy Dimmonds is born

December 18th, 2011 - Iraq War ends

October, 2012 - Clifford Unger meets Lisa Bridges while on military leave, encountering her in Whitewater after he stumbles across her escaped German Shepherd,Victoria. A romance soon blossoms.

November, 2012 - Scott Faulkner and his running mate Bridget Strand win the presidency

October, 2014 - Clifford Unger and Lisa Bridges are married

February, 2015 - Lisa reveals to Cliff that she is pregnant, he retires from active duty to be with his family

March 15th, 2015 - Death Stranding occurs

May 29th, 2015 - Målingen and Lockne Leifsdottir are born

June, 2015 - President Faulkner creates the government organization ‘Bridges’, which is designed to create a network across the fractured America in order to administer aid to the civilian population. Its other, classified purpose is to research the cause of the Death Stranding and to synthesize potential solutions to the social, economic, and infrastructural issues it has caused.

July, 2015 - John Blake McClane leaves the United States Army Special Forces to pursue a career opportunity as head of Bridges security. Much of Bridges’ security personnel is comprised of military veterans.

August, 2015 - President Faulkner is killed during a voidout that obliterates Manhattan Island. The voidout is caused by the death of a stillmother during the preliminary embryonic chiral experimentation trial runs conducted by Bridges, experiments which would go on to become the blueprints for the ‘Bridge Babies’, also known as ‘BB’ units. The existence of the embryonic experimentation being brought to the public eye causes widespread outrage, and the research is discontinued. Following Faulkner’s death, his vice president, Bridget Strand, succeeds the presidency. While the embryonic chiral experimentation is officially discontinued, President Strand continues it in secret, desperate to discover the secrets of the new element ‘chiralium’ and its vast potential to bolster technological development.

September, 2015 - Cliff and Lisa are hit by a drunk driver while driving home one night after attending a play. Both receive serious injuries, Cliff; a shattered collarbone, humerus, and ulna, and Lisa; severe whiplash and head trauma, which leaves her comatose. Miraculously, the 7 month old fetus is largely unharmed.

October, 2015 - Cliff enrolls his family in an experimental medical care program that promises to utilize state of the art technology to provide them the best chance at recovery, as recommended to him by an old military buddy. An emergency C-section is conducted, and the 28 week old Baby Bridges ‘BB’ is placed in a portable pod synchronized with his mother’s heartbeat.

Bridget Strand acts as overseer of the experiments in secret, under the pseudonym Dr. Samsa. She hides her true identity behind a steel masquerade mask.

February, 2016 - Cliff grows increasingly irritated and untrusting of Dr. Samsa as she continues to avoid his questions and lie to him. BB is kept in his pod long past his due date and prevented from growing through the usage of hormone blockers.

December 23rd, 2016 - When John realizes that Cliff’s family is being harvested for chiral experimentation, he warns Cliff of what is going to be done to them. When Cliff tries to escape the facility with his baby, he and his entire family are killed. Baby Bridges is revived by Amelie on the beach, and he is christened ‘Sam’. Bridget Strand makes the decision to raise him as her own, as he was no longer a BB candidate after Cliff released him from his pod. After this unnatural resuscitation, the laws of nature are made gravely upset. Sam becomes the first repatriate and DOOMS sufferer, one who can travel between Earth and Hades and detect the spectral dead using his 5 senses. The dead, the Beached Things, return physically to the land of the living and claim more human souls, dragging the damned with them as they returned to the other side. Timefall, rain that rapidly ages anything it touches, begins to fall in showers across the American continent.

December 31st, 2016 - Sam Strand is ‘born’

March, 2017 - John Blake McClane fakes his death with the help of President Strand. He returns to the broken political scene under the pseudonym Die-Hardman and becomes a personal aide to the president.

October 1st, 2017 - Fragile (Giselle Depardieu) is born

November 8th, 2019 - Higgs Monaghan is born

April, 2020 - The United Cities of America (UCA) is established, as the state governments and boundaries have all but crumpled as a result of continuous voidouts, and only a few key cities remain.

June, 2020 - Deadman earns the position of Bridges head coroner as a result of his government-sponsored artificial personhood program.

May, 2033 - Lucy Dimmonds earns a Bachelor’s degree in psychology

March, 2034 - Lucy Dimmonds becomes a licensed therapist

February, 2038 - Sam has his first meeting with his therapist, Lucy Dimmonds. In the following months, the two begin to form a close and unprofessional relationship.

December, 2039 - Sam and Lucy are married, and Lucy retires from her practice.

February, 2040 - Lucy contracts DOOMS after becoming pregnant with her and Sam’s child Louise. She begins to have horrible visions of the apocalypse, which Bridget assures her are real portents of the future.

September, 2040 - Lucy chooses to commit suicide in order to avoid bringing a child into the world where the apocalypse is imminent. Her death causes a voidout, and Sam, who was busy making deliveries at the time, returns home to a smoking crater; all that’s left of his hometown. The survivors eye him warily and he can tell that they blame him for the disaster. In shame and grief, Sam resigns from Bridges and begins work as an independent porter. He changes his name to Sam Porter Bridges.

January 11th, 2045 - President Bridget Strand dies of metastasized uterine cancer. The plot of Death Stranding begins.

References and Reasoning Used in Creating Timeline

Deadman mentions that WW1 took place more than 100 years ago, meaning that the present day in Death Stranding is past 2014-2018

Deadman mentions that WW2 took place a century ago, which places the timeframe of Death Stranding’s narrative anywhere from 2039-2045. I opted for the late estimate as to make Sam a little older and give the timeline some room to breathe

Based on appearance, behavior, and age in relation to other characters (he was a baby when Cliff, Die-Hardman, and Bridget were all mature adults), I placed Sam at around 28-30 years old. If he were any older, characters such as Die-Hardman and Bridget would appear much too young in the present day. This would also make the period in which the Death Stranding occurred around 30 years.

Deadman explains that Clifford Unger took part in the Kosovo War, the Afghanistan War, and the Iraq War. This would place his years of service from 1999 to right before the Death Stranding and Sam’s birth, around 2015. We know his military career did not begin any earlier, as there is no mention of him serving during the Balkan Wars or Persian Gulf War. Assuming that he was around 18 for his first deployment during the Kosovo War, it can be pretty reasonably inferred that Cliff was born around 1979, and was therefore around 36-37 when he was killed. This lines up nicely with the age restrictions surrounding combat in the United States Army Special Forces (ages 20-36). Essentially, Cliff must have been 36-37 in 2016, for if he was any older he would not have been only recently retired from combat, and if he was any younger he would not have been old enough to have served during the Kosovo War.

Bridget Strand’s age is determined similarly. As both vice president and president, she would have had to have been 35 years of age or older, if she was vice president in 2012, she would have had to have been at least 35. I placed her at 37, which is still very young, but not quite the youngest on record. But, since she assumes the presidency in 2016 following the death of the president, she would have become president at 41 years of age, which would make her the record-holder of the title of youngest American president. Assuming she is 41 in 2016, she would be 70 years of age at the time of her death in 2045, which seems reasonable.

Most other aspects of the timeline are built around these key definable pieces of the puzzle and are subject to change as more lore is revealed.

Essentially, this is full of headcanons that I’ll be happy to alter if and when we get more information.

#death stranding #death stranding headcanons #death stranding spoilers #sam porter bridges #cliff unger #cliff death stranding #fragile death stranding #die-hardman #mama death stranding #lockne death stranding #hideo kojima #death stranding lore #amelie strand #bridget strand #higgs monaghan #beached things #chiralium #death stranding timeline #death stranding timefall

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kurawastaken · 5 years

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Hey got any sad dick headcanons?

Watch as I keep repeating myself:

-Dick lost his parents in November and spent time afterwards in juvie for at least a month. Now im debating if Dick did spend Christmas in juvie or if his first one without his parents was at the manor. One thing for sure is that it was the first December he spent in the cold.

-Dick used to be rather claustrophobic. They trained with Bruce to get a hold of it, mostly through controlled exercises where he'd be locked up in a confined place. The first few were pretty rough with Dick just begging Bruce to open up but he finished by succeeding enough where that fear is pretty much gone. He will still feel like rooms are closing on him when he's distraught or injured.

-Dick sleptwalked when he was a kid, he doesnt talk and will mostly just sit there or walk around nothing more, except that one occasion where he jumped out the window, thankfully a startled Bruce was there to catch him before his fall. It never happened once he grew up but he still keeps his windows locked at night just in case. Alfred noticed that it seems to have come back after Bruce came back from the dead. Hopefully it wont be as severe

-Dick actually has a pretty good handle on his fears and seems to always keep a rational view on them, which makes him the best to go against someone like Scarecrow, however, when fear gets to him, it GETS him, he shuts down. He will simply lock up and not move. During those times it's best not to touch him or get closer. The reason he doesnt move is because he's grounding himself on the floor that he's standing on, any exterior contact could break that focus.

-Hugo Strange however is the best at getting to him psychologically. Dick cant explain how but he just does.

-Ace was an old dog when Dick moved out of the manor for college, and later, Titans tower. He unfortunately was on a mission and missed Ace's last night. Alfred reassured him that Ace was not alone, that Bruce was there and Jason slept on the ground in Bruce's room next to the dog.

-He used to play the guitar during his down time or to relax, after Donna's death, Dick tried to play some to calm himself but the string snapped at some point. Visitors found the guitar broken on the ground, probably thrown against the wall, it stayed there to the day his apartment exploded.

-Dick didnt have that many sentimental possessions but the few he owned were destroyed in either the Circus catching on fire, His parent's florida home that was sold without his consent, his apartments exploding and the earthquake in Gotham. He doesnt dare touch any of the last remaining souvenirs that are still hanging around somewhere. Alfred did fix his gutted elephant plushie that he ended up putting in a safe somewhere. He's a little mad about a unique gameboy that Bruce gifted him when he was younger

-When his mind is not 100% on a mission or during his downtime, Dick cant stand to be in pure white clinical rooms.

-Speaking of clinical, Dick does not bat an eye at the most gruesome sights. Things that would make even Bruce flinch. It's kinda concerning.

-He cant stand the feeling of wet sand sticking to skin and clothes. The night his parents died he was covered in it. But water wasn't what was wetting the sand.

-This poor guy will never be able to sleep in. If his body can wake up at 6am maximum, it will

-Dick is a decent cook but his biggest problem is that he cooks too much for someone who lives alone. His parent's recipes were made for a whole circus troupe.

-Once Dick learned 10 months too late that a member of Haly's circus had disappeared. That man was basically his uncle so he went to investigate himself with the little clues that were left. After weeks of searching he managed to found traces into a forest. In that forest he will find the body of that man. The body was too decomposed and half eaten, not much was left to discover anynore. The case was closed as an accident. It is one of Dick's still open cases

-A lot of his finances went during the spiral into the horor that his last few months in Bludhaven were. First the circus burned and he paid for the repairs and refunds, then the bludhaven apartment was destroyed so paying for the victim's families and funding the survivors, then Bludhaven entirely blew up. He paid for Amy's family relocation etc... He ended up making that money back through the various stocks and other investments he owns but there was a period where he simply slept in the street for a while when he pride wouldnt let him go back to the manor

-Dick's personalization of his own space has always been a conscious effort on his side. Effort that he pretty much gave up on after Bludhaven blew up until the events of Blackmirror.

-He actually doesnt remember the days around the time that Hurt shot him in the head. Which was pretty unfortunate since one of those memories was Damian calling him a friend for the first time.

-He has always been sensitive to the cold. He's now wondering if the little tooth thing that the Court put in his mollar to modify his blood composition or whatever had an effect on that

#hcs #dick grayson #nightwing #batman ii #im going to remember like 3/4 of them once i post it #i must have forgotten so many #also shout out to laquilasse for letting me ramble with her for the whole night #sis is patient with me

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thorne93 · 5 years

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12 Days of Christmas (Hot cocoa - Peter Parker)

Prompt: December 21 - Hot Cocoa with Peter Parker / Spiderman

Word Count: 3202

Warnings: language… angst

Notes: Peter is college aged. Dan is an OFC. for the Marvelous Christmas Challenge @until-theend-oftheline @like-a-bag-of-potatoes…. Beta’d by @like-a-bag-of-potatoes and @carryonmyswansong (thank you both, very much).

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“Here you are, miss,” the host offered as he pulled the chair out for you, and let you sit down in the completely greenhouse styled part of the restaurant. Windows served as the walls and ceiling, with the floor marbled in large tan and brown stones. Space heaters were stationed every few feet to keep the bitter cold away from the windows. Alternatively, you could have sat inside, in the warmer, middle part of the restaurant like all the other patrons of the restaurant. But the sky and the city looked so gorgeous tonight, you wanted to sit and look out into the tiny garden the restaurant had beside their building.

“Thank you,” you responded as you sat down. Across from the white linen, Dan sat across from you.

Dan being a guy in your Behavioral Neuroscience class. He was rather handsome -- well, downright gorgeous. The two of you had hit it off early on in the fall semester. Both of you being Psychology majors and becoming study partners. He was rather funny and sweet. His eyes were as clear as crystal, and as blue as the ocean. He had a smile that could bring a girl to her knees. He was certainly charming, and seemingly smart and dedicated.

Sure, Dan was probably every girl’s dream.

But for you, he didn’t hold a candle to the one man who had really held your heart for several years. However, that man had no intention or desire of ever being yours. See, you’d practically grown up with The Boy Next Door. A boy who was kind to everyone in his life. A boy who could outsmart some scientists you’d shadowed. A boy who never made anyone feel inferior to his abilities. A boy who always had time for you. A boy who walked you home every day from school to make sure you got there safe. A boy who stayed endless hours at your house to help you grasp a subject. A boy, who had drastically grown up in college. In a way, you’d seen him come into his own. Bloom in confidence, evolve his education and knowledge, and become even more of a sweetheart.

Maybe he wasn’t every girl’s dream. Maybe Dan was, with his toned muscle, and deep, rumbling voice, and his own way of being charming and nice. He just wasn’t yours.

As with any romance though, the man who held your heart captive was bewitched by another. In high school, he only had eyes for her, and that stayed true for the last three years of college. Watching him love her was the hardest thing you ever had to do in your life. And you were powerless to witness it. You weren’t the type of person to make your feelings known. Even if you thought you had a shot with him, you couldn’t impose on someone else’s relationship.

He was your best friend after all, you couldn’t do that to him.

With Christmas fast approaching, you were really feeling the effects of being alone. In a few days, you’d head home to be with family, surrounded by your mom and dad, your brother and his wife, your sister and her boyfriend of three years… All to be reminded just how alone you were.

In high school and college, you remained single. This was by choice. A few guys had asked, but you were holding out hope that one day, the guy you loved, would ask you out. It didn’t bother you at first, the hope shining brighter than any lonely feelings that invaded your heart or mind.

Yet now, seven years later, you were finally ready to move on. The hope had fizzled out, the last flame had been snuffed earlier this month. So, when Dan asked you out on the last day of school, you accepted the offer without hesitancy or regret.

The host handed you two your menus and informed you your waiter would be there soon. And soon he was. Within a flash, your waiter arrived with ice water, took your drink order, and then scurried away.

Flashing his aquamarine orbs at you, Dan stated, “Thank you for coming out with me tonight. I know you’re leaving soon to go see your family.”

“Of course. I had one more night in the city. I thought we should do this before I left.”

“Finals were a total killer,” he remarked.

“I know,” you agreed. “But hey, here’s to one semester left,” you toasted, raising your glass of chilled water.

“I’ll drink to that,” he said happily, clinking his glass with yours.

From your left, you heard that unmistakable voice. “Y/N?”

Your pulse quickened. Immediately, the glass left your lips as you nearly yanked it away from your mouth, holding as you turned your head toward the location of the sound. “Peter?” When your eyes landed on him, you witnessed his expression morph from happy surprise to disappointed shock. It made your curiosity flare.

In an instant, you sat the glass down, about to stand but then he approached the table.

“Hey, what, uh, what’re you doing here?” Peter asked as he approached, his warm brown eyes darting between you and Dan.

“I’m actually on a date… with Dan,” you said, gesturing to your classmate as politely as you could. “Dan, meet Peter. Peter, Dan,” you introduced. “Dan’s a classmate of mine in Behavioral Neuroscience,” you explained. Although, in reality, you didn’t have to explain a thing to Peter. He hadn’t talked to you since the fall semester began. You’d tried reaching out a handful of times during the semester but got the cold shoulder.

You didn’t take the silence hard, at first, seeing as you knew senior year was a busy time for both of you. But by the end of the semester, you couldn’t exactly ignore the sting that came along with the radio silence.

“Hey, man, nice to meet you,” Dan greeted, holding out a hand and a star studded smile.

Peter, looking ten years younger, smiled and took your date’s hand. “Good to meet you. You guys been dating long?”

“No, this is our first,” you informed, shooting a sweet smile to Dan.

“I see. Well then I’ll leave you to it,” he stated. “Good meeting you, and good to see you, Y/N.” He waved a small, awkward wave before going to sit down several tables over, alone.

After the quick encounter with your best friend, you couldn’t help but steal a few glances at him all night. Each time, his face was long, solemn with the look of loss etched into his features. His brows remained furrowed, his eyelids drooped, his lips pouted slightly, his shoulders hunched forward. Every time you saw this, you frowned a little before re-engaging with Dan in conversation.

You couldn’t help but wonder what had your best friend so down. And if he was having a tough time or a rough night, why hadn’t he reached out to you in four months?

Alongside the concerns in your head, were the aches in your heart. When your heart went pitter-patter at the sound of his voice, and your stomach exploded into a million butterflies at the sight of his lopsided smile, you resented yourself. Would you ever get over this man? Even on a date with another, perfectly amazing guy, your body responded involuntarily in ways you weren’t sure would ever happen with anyone else.

“This was a lot of fun. Would you want me to walk you back to your place or…?” Dan suddenly asked, snapping your attention away from Peter for the fifth time. Either Dan was oblivious to your wandering eye, or he was being polite and not mentioning it.

“Uh, no that’s okay,” you declined sweetly, waving the offer off.

“You sure? It’s dark, and getting late, and cold. Wouldn’t want you to freeze to death. That might stop you from getting back home to your family.”

You chuckled a faint laugh, a ladylike laugh. “No, no. I’m sure. I think I’d like to walk alone tonight. I’ll be fine.”

He peered at you a moment longer, assessing if you were trying to appear is if you didn’t need him to do that, or if you had a bad date, or if something else was wrong. His lip curled up, gazing into your eyes.

“Well, alright. If you’re sure. Could you text me when you get home, so I know you got home safely?”

“Absolutely. Thank you, for dinner and everything. Now I’ll have something to talk about with my family when I get home for the holidays.”

“Me too. Can’t wait to see you in the spring,” he reminded, getting up from the table. The bill had already been taken care of by him, despite your best efforts to split the bill.

“Absolutely. Criminology?” you reaffirmed, giving him a pointed look.

“Yep. See you there. Text me over your break, if you feel like it. I’d love to have some company.”

“Will do.”

“Alright, goodnight, Y/N.” He leaned down and kissed your cheek quickly before straightening and disappearing through the restaurant.

For a moment, you enjoyed the moment of being alone. The waiter wouldn’t come back to check on you, and no one was in this part of the restaurant. So you stole the chance to stare absentmindedly out of the glass wall beside you, admiring the frost on the dark greenery.

With a heavy sigh, you stood up, slipped on your oversized coat, and exited the restaurant through the glass door straight into the garden. Taking your time, you stepped on the little stone pathway out through the gate, onto the sidewalk of Manhattan. The cold had hit you a little hard, but you’d felt harsher cold than this. Small, chilled breezes nipped at your face, making you wish you’d brought a hat of some sort.

You had only taken five steps up the sidewalk towards your house when you heard your name being called again. Like deja vu, the butterflies and erratic heart rate hit again at the sound. Just as you were about to turn to face Peter again, he was jogging up to your side.

“Hey, hey. Where’s Dan?” he questioned, his breath sending puffs of clouds into the air between you. It’d been a long time since you’d been this close to him, but you really, really missed this.

“Oh, I sent him home. Kinda. He offered to walk me home but I decided to go alone.”

“Oh… would you want to grab hot chocolate? I saw a stand one block over. I’m freezing and I could use some warmth to keep me going on the way home. Maybe we could catch up? I haven’t seen you in forever.”

For a second, you bit your lip. You wanted to do that, to be around him again. But he had sort of broken your heart by ignoring you all these months. Would jumping back in as if nothing happened be the smart move?

Yes, because despite a broken heart, you were his best friend, and there had to be a reason for him ignoring you.

“Yeah, sure. I could use a cup of something warm,” you agreed, keeping your hands jammed in your pockets to steal any sort of warmth you could.

A smile worth 1000 watts lit up his face as he gestured with his head in the opposite direction of your home. “Great. Cart’s this way.”

The two of you walked side by side down the street, mirror images of each other with your hands tucked into your coats, keeping your chins down in your zippers.

“So, how was the date?” he chimed up after you two crossed a crosswalk.

“It was fine,” you informed. “Really good, actually.”

“So he’s in your class, right? Why are you just now dating him?”

You shrugged. “Don’t know. Guess the stress of finals is over, and we don’t have the fear of awkwardness in the classroom if it didn’t work out.”

“Right.. Right.”

Just then, you two hit the cart. Peter offered to get your cup while you stood out of the way, off to the side, near a store front.

“Here ya go,” he offered as he came up. The two of you set off back towards your home now, receding from the bright city lights into the lamp posts only area of the city.

“Thanks. So…where have you been this whole semester? I thought you were sort of… ignoring me,” you admitted, feeling silly for saying that.

“What? No. No,” he stated, suddenly ashamed and guilty. “No, I uh… I got busy with school and stuff. Senior project, did some research, worked on getting an internship.”

Turning to him, a bright smile illuminated your face as you gripped his arm gently. “Oh that’s great. Sounds like you’ve been really busy.”

“Yeah.. yeah I was… I’m sorry, you know, for ignoring you. I didn’t mean to.”

You shrugged. “It’s fine. I was just worried is all.”

“I know, and I should’ve reached out. So what’s been up with you?”

Just as you finished taking a sip of the hot drink, savoring the rich chocolate taste, you answered him. “Same. Except the senior project. I worked in two labs, and did one internship. So I guess we were both too busy anyway.”

He nodded, seeming to want to explain himself further. “I just… Something happened.”

You slowed down, touching his arm. “What, Peter? What happened?”

“Gwen and I broke up.”

Your heart somehow sank and inflated simultaneously. Knowing he was hurting cut you deeply, and knowing you weren’t there for him. Yet, he’d instilled so much hope in you with those few words.

“Oh, no, Peter. I’m so sorry… Are you okay? When did this happen?”

“Right when the semester started,” he informed, taking a deep breath.

“Is that why you stopped contacting me?”

“Yeah… We started to have problems like a week before classes started.”

“Like what? You two always seemed so perfect.”

“Yeah, I thought we were. I really thought she was my future, you know? But man, as time went on, I just kept lying to myself about just how not true that was.”

“So you wanted to leave and she didn’t?”

“I guess so. I don’t know. She could sense it though and… she told me that I needed to stop talking to you and stuff. So I did. Basically she wanted to cut me off from everyone and focus on her. But then I realized how wrong that was, and how I didn’t like where things were going so I ended things.”

“That had to be hard for you.”

He nodded, his eyebrows shooting up in agreement. “Yeah, it was.”

“But if you two broke up, then why didn’t you reach out to me? I could’ve helped you through it.”

“I was so embarrassed and ashamed. I couldn’t face you and tell you what I’d done. That I chose her over you. That’s just… no.” He shook his head and laughed slightly, no humor in the noise.

“You could’ve though.”

“I know… But I just… I couldn’t. I thought you’d be mad at me. Heck, I was angry at myself. I just figured you’d be unable to forgive me for ignoring you for such a stupid reason. Then school got busy and it just snowballed.”

“I wouldn’t have been mad. Sure, I might’ve gotten pissed if you ignored me for her for months. But a couple of weeks…Yeah, I missed you like crazy, but hell, I was busy too. I mean, you love her, right? Of course you’d want to pick your girlfriend over me. It’s only natural to pick the person you’re in love with over anyone else.”

Peter made a half-amused faced. “That’s the thing… I didn’t.”

You frowned and stopped walking, peering at him. “What do you mean?”

“I mean… Gwen found out I had feelings for another girl. She basically told me to choose between her and the other girl.”

Your eyes went to the ground in thought. Wow, not only did he love Gwen, but he loved someone else. If someone kicked you in the gut it would’ve been more merciful.

“Oh, wow.” You blew out a breath of air, somehow trying to catch your breath from the blow. “That’s… When were you going to tell me? I mean… I’m your best friend, Pete.”

“Well, right now,” he said with a laugh.

“So when are you going to tell this other girl you like her? I mean, are you over Gwen?”

“I’ve been over Gwen long before we broke up… I was thinking of telling her tonight, when I saw her.”

Your eyes went wide. “You saw her tonight? What happened?”

“She was on a date with someone, and I knew I was too late.”

Your breathing became labored as your heart raced.

“Pete…. Peter, are you… You’re… are you talking about me?” you stammered.

He half-heartedly nodded, rubbing the back of his neck. “Yeah, but I mean like… I don’t wanna make this weird or anything. You just… never dated or anything… I guess I thought I had time to ask you out… I wanted to catch you before you went home on break. I thought when I saw you tonight it was a sign, but then I saw you were with that guy… Which is great… I’m glad you’ve found someone…”

“Peter…” you started, completely unsure how to even start this conversation. A conversation you’d always wanted to have. “Peter, I only went on the date because I gave up on you and me. You’d been with Gwen so long… between that and not talking to me for months, I decided to move on.”

“Move on? You had feelings for me?”

You took a step closer to him. “Peter, I have feelings for you. They haven’t changed. That date means absolutely nothing to me if you feel something for me.”

His eyes seemed to light up at your words, your proximity.

“Is that…” He swallowed, nearly trembling. He’d dreamed of this for a long time, too long. “Are you sure?”

You nodded vigorously. “Yes! I… Pete, I have been in love with you for years. I didn’t want to cause problems with you and Gwen though, so I kept quiet. I never dated anyone because I secretly hoped you’d ask me out at some point. When it never happened… well… I went on a date with Dan.”

He shook his head. “I only stayed with Gwen because I thought you didn’t have any feelings for me.”

“So all this time--”

“We could’ve been together.”

The two of you could hardly contain yourselves, the grins on your faces widening by the second.

“What do we do now?” Peter asked.

You shook your head. “I have no idea.”

He peered down at your cup and then up at your face. “We could start with finishing these hot chocolates back at your apartment, and then figure it out from there?”

You nodded, peering up at him with love in your eyes. Allowing yourself to feel the full extent of your affection. “I think that sounds like a perfect place to start.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

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Christmas Tag List:

@stooch-betch

#hot cocoa with peter parker #peter parker x reader #peter parker fic #peter parker #spiderman #spiderman x reader #spiderman fic #Kari and Ida’s 12 days of MCU Christmas

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seek-its-opposite · 7 years

Text

transient luminous events | season 2, post-abduction | wc: 2874 | ao3 here

summary: She suspects that if this were a sacrament, he’d already be absolved. But Scully is not a priest and she is not a miracle.

Central Florida after midnight is an oil painting, dry brush on rough canvas. Inky but thin, like you could tear it. They pull off the road just past a rusted speed limit sign, webs of Spanish moss flaring in their headlights, and for a second (longer, really) she already believes him: Science bends here like moss, like Dali’s clocks melting in the humidity. Mulder cracks the windows, turns off the car.

“Now,” he says, “we wait.”

She wonders if he hears the click of his slide projector when he narrates for her. As he unbuckles his seatbelt, he palms exactly four sunflower seeds from a bag in the cup holder, so smoothly it could be sleight of hand if he were the type to misdirect, and she thinks, You again. Mulder, waiting for an epiphany she doesn’t have to give him. Lately he’s been sitting with her like she’s still in the hospital, like he’s ready to jump up or fall to his knees.

“What exactly do you plan to do if she shows?” Scully asks.

“Follow her.”

His tone adds: Obviously.

As early as 1951, travelers headed to Lake Ashby before dawn have reported seeing a woman shrouded in blue walking ahead of them on this stretch of road, on the edge of the pavement. She is always gone by the time they catch up. Sightings picked up in the late ‘60s and early ‘70s before stopping abruptly in 1974—until, 20 years later, last week, a pair of young lovers saw a woman in blue vanish into the trees.

Young lovers is how Mulder said it when he told her.

“Has she killed anyone?” she asks, then frowns and shuts her eyes. Not like that, Agent Scully. Not like it’s Florida after midnight. “I mean,” she tries again, “have there been any documented fatalities tied to these sightings?”

“One man swerved off the road and hit a tree. Broke his leg.” He cracks another sunflower seed in his teeth. “But no fatalities, no. She just,” Mulder shrugs, “walks ahead of you for a while.”

“I see. So you flew me down here to observe an unsolvable phenomenon that doesn’t hurt anyone.”

“Yeah.”

“Just take me to see the Northern Lights next time, Mulder.”

He cracks a ghost-white smile. “I think I’ll need another few years before I’ve saved up enough money to take you to the end of the world.”

It surprises her that he sees the end of the world as a place. It surprises her that he sees it as a place they haven’t been. They drew their weapons on each other in an icy Arctic outpost. They work in a basement office at the far end of a crowded hallway where the laws of physics give way. She’s felt on the verge of falling into nothing since she offered him her hand, and now that she has—now that she’s vanished and returned, she understands that every point on the surface of this earth is the end of it. Most people have stopped feeling gravity.

“We have all night,” he observes. “I’ll keep an eye out if you want to sleep.”

“I’m not tired.” Maybe she says it too quickly.

“Are you still having nightmares?”

She doesn’t answer. She thinks of a window cracking. He keeps going, split as wide open as she is: “What do you see?”

White lights. Metal. Coarse bed sheets. Mulder jumping into a river to reach her and getting carried away in the current.

“Stories,” she tells him, in the voice she used to dismiss Missy over the phone last week. “Just fiction in the absence of fact.”

“Dreams are culled from memories, Scully, however muddled they may look.” He taps the steering wheel for emphasis. “I read we can’t dream a face unless we’ve seen it. And evolutionary psychology suggests that dreams are a way to process threats.”

“Mulder, recent neurobiological studies say we don’t even attach a cogent narrative to dreams until after we wake up. Our brains want to find logic in the illogical.”

He chuckles at that. “Do tell.”

Mulder. She holds herself in the lamplit contours of his jaw and remembers how clear his voice was in the senselessness of her hospital dreams. She says, “I just want to be awake.”

“You aren’t leaning against the window, are you?”

In answer, she leans further into the car, hands up in mock surrender. He turns the key, lowers the windows all the way, and turns off the car again.

“Crickets,” he explains. The shrill chorus is unmissable now.

She breathes an almost-laugh, matches his tone: “Mosquitoes.”

“Are you getting bitten?” There’s his hospital bedside voice. “We could listen to the radio instead.”

At sundown, on their way out the road, they stopped at a driftwood diner without any neon. As a radio in the corner played the Christmas staples, Scully had traced ringed coffee stains on the table and thought how unsuited this place was for Sinatra, for strings of tasteful white lights.

She’d expected to wear Florida like a wet wool blanket. In books, it was a state of heavy extremes, oppressive muggy heat and hurricane downpours, and she’d wanted its weight: as protection, as indictment, as any sensation that could flood the empty space in her memory. At the very least, she’d thought she might blend in among plastic flamingoes and tinsel trees and other bad mimics of living things. But so far there was no tinsel and no temperature in Florida, at least central Florida, at least in December. Just “White Christmas” in a land without snow. Two of the coffee-stain rings formed a Venn Diagram. She rubbed at the center.

She was raised on California breezes. Maybe it was rich that she wanted to find falseness here.

She realizes, in the car on the side of the road, how fiercely she’s rubbing the back of her hand.

“No,” she says. “I’m not getting bitten.”

The crickets chirp all at once. She can’t remember the last time she heard this many voices rise up for no other reason than to prove they can.

****

The second word she plays in Hangman is Evection, and Mulder guesses it.

"How do you always do that?" she asks.

“Well, I did consider a few other consonants.”

She swats his arm with her notepad, and he just holds out his hand. She passes him the pen.

“Evection,” Mulder shrugs. “A regular variation in the moon’s orbit caused by the attraction of the sun.”

“Fine,” she sighs, leaning back into the headrest. “Stump me.”

He doesn’t get the chance. They’re two vowels down when something that looks like a winged cockroach buzzes into her face, and she leaps outside, slamming the door before she knows what she’s doing. She doesn’t even notice Mulder followed her out of the car until she’s pushing the hair from her eyes.

“Are you okay?” he asks, and she thinks, just for a second, What would you do if I said no?

“Yeah,” she mutters. It was a bug. She straightens her shirt rather than look at him, but here he is anyway, like this is nothing to laugh at.

“Here.” His fingers brush the side of her neck. “Your necklace is tangled.”

“I got it.” She stops him with a hand to his wrist, her heels sinking in the gravel as she takes a step back. Mulder just stands there, palms flat against the sides of his jeans, watching her fumble with the clasp. He just stands there.

She will not be his dead girl walking.

“You know Mulder, this was pretty transparent.”

“What?”

“This case,” she emphasizes, like it’s in quotation marks. “Did Skinner even approve this?”

Mulder closes his eyes. He is impossible to figure out but easy to read, her partner. He tells the truth at top volume in an echo chamber; he deceives by omission. His confession is to close his eyes and curl his top lip over the bottom, and she suspects that if this were a sacrament, he’d already be absolved. But Scully is not a priest and she is not a miracle.

She leans into her outsized anger. “I’m not your project,” she steams, feeling good and alive. “You don’t have to protect me.”

“That’s not what I’m doing.”

“So you’re not sending me on fake cases that aren’t dangerous so you can trick me into feeling useful?”

Mulder looks stricken. “I didn’t lie, Scully. I never said we were assigned this investigation.” She runs it through: the thwap of a newspaper article on her desk, Mulder reciting the details of the case from memory while she tried to read. She’s back, Scully. We’ve got a flight this afternoon.

Fine.

He shoves his hands in his pockets and stares at the car. He says, “I thought we could both use a change of scenery.”

“Mulder,” she hesitates, glancing left to see what caught his gaze: their reflections in the windshield, glassy and distorted. “If you treat me like I’ll break if I breathe wrong wherever we go, it’s just the same shit in a different state.”

“Fuck, Scully, I know you won’t break.”

He knows she can. Three weeks ago, she fell apart in his arms at the bottom of a Minnesota staircase and he spread his fingers wide so he wouldn’t touch her bruises. She’s never doubted that he respects her vulnerability; she just doesn’t want him to accommodate for it. He’s reckless enough already.

He is still just standing there, the sleeves on the turtleneck he didn’t need to wear pushed up at the elbows. She is suddenly, vividly aware of the car, of the hot metal and the smell of rubber in stagnant humidity. Duane Barry’s trunk smelled like a spare tire. Her mouth goes cloth-gag dry.

“Can we?” she asks. She waves her hand at the road ahead and wonders how she’s so sure of this: He’d have known what she was asking even if she hadn’t.

“Sure,” Mulder nods. He looks relieved. He grabs their flashlights from the glove compartment and hands her one, and the flood of Pfaster’s headlights behind her eyes softens and clarifies into two beams that will never outrun her. And they walk.

****

“You’ve never been to Florida before?” Mulder asks.

“I spent most of my childhood in California, Mulder. We already had plenty of coastline.”

“Well, what do you think?”

“Of Florida?”

“Yeah.”

“I’m not sure I’ve seen it yet.”

She couldn’t tell him what she’s waiting for. With Mulder, she’s learned to know states by back roads and diners—places that dot the map in every town but only happen once, like the people in them. He has a way of seeing the singular in the ordinary. Here, it just seems ordinary.

“What was your word?” she asks. “In Hangman.”

“Oh, it was Flying cockroach.”

She plays along in awed deadpan. “Was it really.”

“I recruited the bug as a visual aid,” he insists, smiling straight ahead. “He just missed his cue. Came in too early.”

“You know Mulder,” she skips to get ahead of him on the road, then spins to face him, walking backwards, tucking her hair behind her ear. “I think your presentations are getting a little too interactive.”

He winces. It’s only for a second, but it’s enough to make the flashlight heavy in her hand, and she halts him in its glare. Mulder blinks.

“That’s not what I meant,” she says.

“What?”

“Cases aren’t slide shows,” she tells him. “You’re not presenting the field to me.”

“Scully...”

“No.” She steps closer, curling her fingers around his. "You have to hear me, Mulder. I have always known the risks.”

He rubs his thumb across the back of her hand and nods, and when he looks her in the eye she thinks Maybe, and she doesn't know where that thought ends.

She drops his hand and turns to keep walking, but Mulder doesn’t follow. He just stands there, white knuckles around a cold metal flashlight. He just stands there. “A storm is coming, Scully.”

“Mulder,” she protests. She thinks of the two of them side by side staring into a tree, of her partner taking a chrysalis as harbinger of danger. Of how they always talk around change.

“No,” he says, “I mean it’s going to rain.”

Her face goes hot at her misunderstanding. “How do you know?” she frowns.

“It’s in the air. Listen to how loud the crickets are.” He seems awfully sure of himself for a man wearing a turtleneck in Florida, and she swells with infuriating affection for him. She turns back. They hike shoulder to shoulder.

“What was your word?” she asks again, quieter this time.

“Imprint,” he says.

****

She flipped pictures to talk to him the last time they were split up. She slipped messages through cracks in the walls he tried to build and called him to a parking garage beneath the birthplace of a scandal. To know that you’re all right, she said then, but she had never meant, Lie to me.

****

Sheets of rain are rolling in the distance by the time they reach the car. The edges of the clouds glow orange, whether from approaching dawn or approaching storm she couldn’t say. Lightning whips the horizon.

“Northern lights,” Mulder says.

He perches on the hood of the car and scoots backward, all limbs, leaving handprints in the wax. “Want to watch the show?”

“Mulder, this is a rental,” she reminds him, but he’s already offering his hand, and she’s already taking it.

He adopts performative gravity as she slides next to him, bumps his arm. “Whatever happens to this vehicle happens in pursuit of our solemn duty as agents of the law,” he intones. Two streaks of lightning crash and join together. “Didn’t you ever do something you’re not supposed to do and get away with it?”

She died once and got away with it. She does not say this.

“The summer I was 15,” he continues, “I would take my dad’s car out in the middle of the night and drive it around Quonochontaug. Just speed the back roads.”

“And you never got caught?”

“He never said anything to me. At the time I thought I was really getting away with something, but part of me knew he already knew. I think he thought rebellion would make me a man. So I wanted to rebel against that,” Mulder says, “but maybe that proved his point.”

The whole sky blazes white.

“I snuck out onto my the porch and smoked one of my mom’s cigarettes once,” she concedes. “She did not know.”

“Really? Dana Scully,” he feigns indignation. “I’ll have to call your mother about this right away.”

“You wouldn’t dare,” she says. “You’re this close to being her new favorite, Mulder. Don’t blow it now.”

“Does she know a lot of Mulders?”

It takes her a breath too long to get the joke, but when she does she laughs, plainly and delightedly. And she could swear she sees something blue flash on the treeline.

“Did you see that?” She grabs his wrist.

“See what?”

The rain is minutes away. A rapid dip in barometric pressure, lack of sleep, expectation acting on perception...pareidolia. Rorschach’s test in bursts of light.

“Nothing,” she says, releasing her grip.

“I’m sorry, Scully.” Mulder scoots to the front of the hood and slides off.

“It was nothing, Mulder. Just the storm.”

“Not that,” he says, kicking the gravel like a guilty schoolboy. “I’m sorry I dragged you on a half-baked case.”

She slides down and takes his hand, squeezes it. She says, “You didn’t.”

The first drop hits her cheek, heavy and warm. They run to their doors and jump in, beating the full rush of the storm by seconds. It pelts the windshield with watery fists, roaring hollow in the dry absence of the car. The contrast feels familiar. They sit in silence until the rain eases.

“I don’t have anything for you,” she says finally. “I know you want me to be able to move on, but this time I lost—” He looks ready to interrupt, and she rushes to finish. “It's like going to space to fill a vacuum, Mulder. I have no memories to channel. There’s no one I can blame. Not with evidence.”

Mulder meets her eyes. “Something was taken from you, Scully,” he assures. “That is not your fault.”

She hadn't realized until now that she thought it was. She sucks in her breath, turns to the window to blink back tears.

He tells her, “You lose more time if you fight it.” He would know.

****

When the storm breaks and the sunrise is still hidden in clouds, they drive—“nowhere in particular,” Mulder says, but the closer they get to the coast, the fewer miles the signs say they have to go until Kennedy Space Center.

They stop for gas at a station with two pumps and no other cars, aside from one around the side of the building that she assumes belongs to the clerk, an older man reading the paper in a beach chair just outside the door. She gets out to stretch her legs, shielding her eyes to watch a pair of seagulls flock east. South for the winter, she thinks, and wonders if they know there’s a biological imperative they do not share.

Mulder has disappeared into the store. She finds it full of spinning display racks lined with keychains and magnets shaped like manatee license plates and Saturn V rockets. He’s at the counter, dropping a penny in the change bucket.

“Didn’t you pay at the pump?” she asks.

“I did,” he nods, and waves two water bottles in her direction. He palms a small paper bag into his jeans and doesn’t elaborate.

They pocket everything they have yet to tell one another and drive toward the shore.

#my fic #txf #msr #post-abduction #idk????

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andrewplaysmusic · 7 years

Text

Cadence-less Development Section

Much of western classical music is built on cadences. In a sonata by Mozart, for example, predictable, consistent cadences mark the phrases that make up the two sonata themes. Once you exit the exposition and dive into the development section, clear cadences are a little harder to find. Music just keeps moving around, modulating, and developing.

So, what’s been going on with me for the past few months?

May: Following my conducting clinics with Dr. Hammer and MJ Wamhoff, I had the honor of conducting Pacific’s Symphonic Wind Ensemble during the University’s Commencement festivities. I ended up conducting movements II and IV of Ticheli’s Simple Gifts. Right after commencement, I traveled to Cherry Valley, New York to begin my internship at the Glimmerglass Festival.

Mid-May through July: My time working at the Glimmerglass Festival as a Young Artist Program Residence Manager Intern was a little rough. I was having a hard time socially with folks who were older than me, and my job was lackluster and a little degrading to say the least. However, I did learn a lot about musicianship and the professional world of music. I had the opportunity to observe exemplary musicians at work. Guest artists Donald Palumbo (Chorusmaster of the New York Metropolitan Opera), Stephen Schwartz (Tony Award-winning composer), and Kevin Stites (veteran musical director) offered amazing insight.

August: I ended up leaving the job early; at times you must recognize when it’s not worth staying in a position. I traveled to Boston with my parents to do some sightseeing, and I also got to meet up with an old friend of mine who was working at Tufts University over the summer. We also visited the Verne Q. Powell flute factory where my parents were explained (in a two-hour tour) the reason the flute they bought me costs so much. Afterwards we drove back up to New Jersey, where my mom had arranged to reunite with some old high-school friend. Then up to the Big Apple. I caught Prince of Broadway (in previews), Miss Saigon, The Play that Goes Wrong, and Georama, in addition to Groundhog Day which I caught during my internship at Glimmerglass.

Returning to California early meant I had time to breathe, make various appointments, and slowly move into my new apartment at school. I had the pleasure of having coffee with my favorite professor, Dr. Rose, who just left his decades-long tenure at Pacific for a position at Stanford University. There are some people who are just too pure for this world. Dr. Rose is one of them.

Late-August through October: Okay. Let’s quickly talk about “Junior Block.” J Block is part of the music education program at Pacific. It’s where you talk about educational psychology, music, and the profession of music education. It’s the time when you really begin to observe teachers in the field and start to teach. I am in J Block.

In addition to the crazy workload in the class, I have several hours of fieldwork each week. Two-hours a week are spent teaching my very own musical classes to my very own students. I have second graders at Spanos Elementary School, and sixth graders at McCandless STEM Charter School, both in Stockton.

All on top of my other classes. But it’s such an enriching experience for me and the students. Seeing how music can affect children is phenomenal. Enough J Block. Moving on.

I also made the choice to schedule a solo flute recital next semester. I will be performing Maria Grenfell’s delightful unaccompanied solo Four Pooh Stories (1992, New Zealand), Karlheinz Essl’s electro-acoustic piece Sequitur I (2008, Austria), and Leonard Bernstein’s jarring and haunting nocturne Ḥalil (1981, United States) for flute, piano, and percussion. As you may have noticed, all the works were written within the last 40 years, and come from all over the globe.

In September, I had the pleasure of doing some work for Dr. Hammer’s professional ensemble, the New Hammer Concert Band. I sat in for all their rehearsals and took notes on rehearsal techniques, and I designed a new logo and concert poster. During the weekend of the performance, and Dr. Hammer was kind enough to offer to let me conduct the ensemble in rehearsal for a bit- what an experience! Conducting an ensemble of such a caliber is an intense musical experience. At the end of that same rehearsal, Dr. Hammer assigned me to help director Clubhouse Studios, the company he had contracted to video record the performance. From 5pm to 2am, and following morning (day of the concert), I marked up about 300 pages of score in preparation for the concert, ran a few test-runs to direct the camera shots, and hey, ho! away we go! we recorded the concert.

In September, I was also offered the job of Choral Assistant with the Stockton Youth Chorale program under the direction of Joan Calonico. I run warm-ups and sight-singing with children from third to eighth grade. This opportunity has forced me to work on my choral pedagogy techniques, as well as my classroom management skills.

I turned 21 in the first week of October. Some people like to celebrate their birthday by playing laser tag, going to the beach, or getting hammered. I chose to spend 9 to 5 at a professional development workshop with Little Kids Rock, an organization committed to helping teachers bring Modern Band to music education. It was an inspiring day and a day where preconceptions were turned on its head.

I’m sure I’m missing somethings here and there, but never mind those. What’s it look like moving forward?

November: Working with the pit orchestra for TAP’s production of Legally Blonde; conducting Scott Nelson’s senior project BrokenTimePiece. Then I’ll be watching Massenet’s Manon and John Adam’s premiere production of Girls of the Golden West at the San Francisco Opera.

December: Lots of various performances. Then the annual Palo Alto Caroling Corps!

I’ll try to update a little more often, but God only knows what my schedule turns into.

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samesurvivor-blog · 6 years

Text

Survivor

Here's my problem: I don't normally tell people in my life things because I don't feel like they care, or maybe I feel like I'm a burden when I share my problems. I just keep things to myself and I've gotten good at dealing with things on my own. But this is what caused my PTSD. After it happened, I went about my day pretending that nothing had happened. I quickly dried my tears, took a breath, went home and made sure to make it seem like nothing was wrong so my parents wouldn't ask me. I knew I could never tell them because it would break them to know that something like that happened to their little girl. And I know that I would be punished for something that is not my fault but that would be their reaction to their anger because that's how it usually is. I chose not to tell any of my closest friends about it because I knew this was something I could handle on my own. If I told anyone, they would feel sorry for me. They would see me as a victim, but that's not me. I don't want someone's pity. My friends wouldn't even know what to do if I told them, because who does? You can't go back and change what happened and you can want to help as much as you want, but how? What could you to say to someone like that? I wouldn't know what to say either as someone who's been through it. My brother has always given the best advice, but I feel like he wouldn't know what to say in this situation either. And again, he did a lot to help raise me, he wouldn't want to know that something like that happened to his little sister. I keep saying "little" because that's how my family sees me, but I want to make it clear that I was not little when this happened. I was 19. This happened in May 2017 and for a couple months, I was perfectly normal. I nearly deleted the event from my memory, I never thought of it. It was like it never happened and I thought that meant I was dealing with it correctly. I don't think of it so I don't feel negatively and I can go on with my life. In September, there was another event of similar occurrence but nowhere near the same level of intensity as the previous. There are levels of intensity for sexual harassment, assault and rape. For example, it might begin with catcalling, which isn't okay but very common and often not too traumatizing. But even within that there are different levels. Being given a "compliment" generally won't provide as much fear as other encounters women can experience on the street. My second event made me feel the same helplessness and lack of control over the situation and although it was a situation that I've been in prior to the event in May and have been able to handle before, it caused my body to freeze and I was left scared and in tears. I broke down. I thought this was my normal reaction to this situation, given my past. This is when I believe my PTSD symptoms started but I had no idea. The second event put me back in the first. I re-experienced emotions I thought I had forgotten. I cried more in this "silly" situation of someone denying me the eight to say "no" than my actual attack. In October, I started seeing #MeToo around. It pained me to find out what it meant the first time that I saw it. It pained me even more to find out the number of women I knew who have had similar experiences. I so desperately wanted to post this. But I can't have people in my life know. I even considered posting a picture and subtly hiding "#MeToo" somewhere in it, just so that's it's out there. But I could never build up the courage. Every time I saw that hashtag I instantly felt deeply saddened. When I read anonymous posts sharing intense detail, I often cried. I still didn't consider any of this to be PTSD, but I was triggered. And people use that word so often that I don't even want to use it now but I don't know how else to explain what's happening to me. It got to the point that I needed a break from the internet until the hashtag died down. When I would see one of these posts when I was on campus, I excused myself to the bathroom to cry. I could not watch a rape scene or an almost rape scene on a TV show or movie without feeling sick to my stomach and breaking down and crying. Not only that, hearing about other people's trauma that wasn't related to mine. The memory of my first event would invade my thoughts if the topic of conversation was car accidents, natural disasters or war. I became confused. In November, I participated in a study that was affiliated with my university, as I do from time to time. This particular study consisted of an extensively long questionnaire about everything. This included substance use, family history, what my home life is like, what my social life is like and there was even a section about if I had experienced any trauma. My responses to this questionnaire is what first made me start to consider that I might be experiencing symptoms of PTSD. November was also a particularly rough month for me with several other things going on in my life that would be hard for anyone to deal with. It was always one thing after another and it didn't seem to stop. And again, any time I experienced any form of stress, my mind would go back to that first event. It felt like this event was taking control over my life, control over me. I hate that. I hate to even admit it. I always thought I was in full control of my feelings. I never allow things to affect me in such a manner and I still do not understand why this one did or how it could. I considered myself to be very good at this but this one got to me. I then read that PTSD symptoms often develop when the memory of what happened and my feelings about it become disconnected. The way I dealt with this, and how I always deal with stress, is pretend it never happened and move on. Because life goes on and I can't pause it to deal with something. That may have worked for any other stressful situation for me, but this exact way I was approaching it caused my PTSD symptoms. And I can try to ignore my symptoms and move on like I normally would, which would make me feel like I'm in control. But what about this symptoms I can't control? What about when I wake up from a dream in which I try to escape a rape. My body is frozen, I'm already in tears and I don't know why and my heart is racing. I lie there waiting for my body to calm down. It is now December, I do my research about PTSD but tell no one. As a psychology student and a mental health advocate, it doesn't sit right with me. I can't tell other people what happened to me. I would not even consider a stranger or a professional. I can't have anyone attributing this event, with me. It's almost that I am ashamed even though I know it could not have been my fault. But even with all of the awareness surrounding this topic recently, I still hold my own stigma. The country that I was born in didn't tell men not to rape. It told women to learn self-defense, to carry pepper spray, to place their keys between their knuckles when they walk alone. Don't make eye-contact with men that speak to you on the street, they will perceive it as an invitation. Boys will be boys and we will not try to fix their behaviour, instead you should alter yours to accommodate them. Your safety isn't important enough to punish predators. Your word is just an allegation, it doesn't matter. I was raised in a house with parents who told me that a woman who gets raped deserves to be raped. Because a woman should not be out at night anyways. And she shouldn't have been dressing like that either. As if those are the only scenarios in which a woman could get raped and as if that is justifiable.Even with my extremely early curfew, I was sexually assaulted and raped in broad daylight. Yes, I am late for the #MeToo trend. But this isn't about a trend. This is about my inability to take control over my life because someone decided they had control over my body. Someone decided that my word meant nothing. My "no" didn't have as much credit as the "yes" in his head. And a man could read this and say that this is wrong but what about when you speak over me? What about when the words I speak do not matter to you and you discredit them because it came from my mouth and not from a man's, who you perceive to be more knowledgeable? What about when you think your opinion is more important and refuse to acknowledge mine? You are facilitating the patriarchy that engraves my fear when a man, who is bigger and stronger than me, looks at me for too long, leaving me wondering if his next move will be an attack. If my next move will have to be defense. I wonder why men suddenly tell me I'm no longer attractive when I refuse to have sex with them. Or even when I don't want to kiss them or give them my number. I wonder about the next time I will say "no" and if that man understands what that means. I wonder if there will be another time that I have to say "stop". I wonder if there will be another time that man tightly grip my wrists so I can't fight back and still thinks it's okay to proceed. I wonder if there will ever be another time that I kick and scream and cry in front of someone and if that would be enough to stop them. I wonder if someone will ever "keep" me again, fighting for my life, for several hours.

#mental health #ptsd #metoo

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