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whaleofatjme1920 · 3 years

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please scenario where him and his s/o have been besties with toby since they met as proxies when they were young and when they meet up later in life they confess 🙏🏻🙏🏻

Parking Lots, and Surrounded By Your Group and His

[Ticci Toby X GN!Reader]

[Warnings: mentions of death? Nothing major though.]

[AN: I changed the prompt,,,, ever so slightly,,,????]

When the crickets sing in the grass and the breeze is warm and gentle, Toby can’t help but be reminded of a simpler time when he would spend his afternoons catching bugs and eating ice cream on the front lawn with you. He can still hear your laughter as the sun begins to slowly sink below the horizon before the fireflies begin to make their appearance.

He used to spend hours on said front lawn catching them with you, listening to you speak and interjecting with his own jokes. The two of you always had such a grand time together, even when his father would angrily call him back into the house.

Toby didn’t know what love was when he was young, but only that he had it. Every little touch you gave him, the smiles and giggles, they were all small micro expressions of some kind of love - as much love as a child could give. Toby didn’t know how much he adored you. Growing up, the two of you had grown closer and closer. He saw you blossom into a young adult alongside him. Well, he didn’t really blossom, but more so choked his way into being a young adult. And you were by his side for it all, even the hardest, darkest days.

When he lost his mother and sister, he called you in a panic, his voice rough like sandpaper and creaking like wood. He was frantic, unable to form proper sentences. You threw out your evening plans and hopped in your car, driving like a mad man over to his house, ready to console him. The air felt still, cold and slightly clammy as you drove nearer and nearer to his house.

There, on the front porch waiting for you, head in his hands and tears drenching his form was Toby, unable to process the world and everything and everyone in it. He looked so broken and downtrodden as he clutched at his clothes tighter, rocking himself and hugging what physical part of him he could.

Your heart tore into pieces as you parked, then rushed out of the vehicle to hold him. “Toby, Toby!” You called out, tears welling in your eyes as you bounded up to the distraught boy.

He furrowed his eyebrows and blinked away more tears, letting out a strained sob as he picked himself up off the rickety wooden porch, meeting you part of the way. He felt the breath leave his lungs as you crashed into his arms, burying your face into his chest.

“I’m so sorry,” you mumbled like a mantra into his chest, letting him hold you tighter and tighter to the point you couldn’t breathe.

Toby didn’t let you go that night.

The last time he saw you was in the parking lot of your high school. Toby had been grieving the loss of his mother and sister, becoming more and more withdrawn into himself. He’d honestly been withdrawing from you as well, and that concerned you more than anything. So, to remedy this, you took matters into your own hands and forced him to meet you in the parking lot after school.

The two of you sat down on the hood of your car, talking about the world and its wonders and the things that are better left unsaid until late, late in the night.

Toby felt so at home in your presence that he was able to block out the voices for just a little longer. He reveled in the sound of your laughter and the presence of your being. He was just… Lighter than air to be with you.

But all good things must come to an end, and unfortunately, your parents desiring you home had brought the time the two of you shared together to an end.

“I love you, Tobes, you know that right?” You murmured as you hugged him for what you didn’t know was your final time.

“O-Of course I d-d-do,” he whispered back, nose burying into your hair. “I l-love you,” he said, tears threatening to spill once more.

The two of you remained in each other’s embrace before you parted from him, and he let you go for the final time.

And Toby felt alone, oh so alone.

So alone that he burnt down the village to feel its warmth.

There’s only been like, three moments in Toby’s life when he’s been surprised. The first being meeting you as a child, the second being the loss of the two most important women of his life, and the third? Being taken into the arms of the Operator.

He’s a proxy now, does his job well, and is with a group that sometimes tolerates him. He’s in a better place than when he was a child under his father’s roof.

“We’re going to work with another group tonight,” Masky says, a slight sigh lingering on his lips.

“W-Who are they?”

“You know Wallace, don’t you?” Hoodie suddenly cuts in.

Toby nods. He likes Ruth and Nyein, the other two he can live without.

“They got a new proxy,” Masky continues. “And they want us to take them for the evening. So, I guess we’re only working with their runt,” Masky finishes more to himself than anyone else. He brushes his fingers through his hair and pats his pocket for the car keys. “C’mon, might as well head over. Gonna be a bit of a drive.”

Toby glances over his shoulder at Kate, who is watching reruns of Judge Judy and slowly nodding off. “And s-s-she gets o-off scott f-free?” He teases lightly as he stands up, pushing his chair in across the checkered floor. He cracks his neck loudly before walking over to the sofa, his gloved hand rustling Kate’s hair.

She sleepily laughs. “Have fun and be safe, boys.”

“Get some sleep,” Masky chuckles, watching as Hoodie rustles her hair just as Toby did before heading out.

Toby zoned out a bit on the car ride to wherever the meeting place was. He always tended to zone out, but he couldn’t shake some weird buzzing in the back of his head. Something about the way Masky and Hoodie are talking about Wallace’s newest runt…

He doesn’t often remember things from his life before he became a proxy. The Operator made sure of that so he wouldn’t be too heartbroken to continue his job. But he’s always been able to remember you - more or less. Little glimpses, the feelings associated, you were never easy to get rid of.

Instead of mentally traumatizing him further, the Operator allowed him to keep his thoughts and feelings associated with you. Most days, Toby’s dim love for you spurred him forward.

“Time to go meet a runt,” Hoodie says, voice only slightly amused by the way the word ‘runt’ rolls off his tongue.

Masky parks the car and then shoves the keys into his pocket, nodding that it’s okay for everyone to get out of the car.

Toby stretches briefly in his seat before sliding out of the car, taking in the crisp night air. He takes a gander at his surroundings for a moment before locking eyes on a group of people. Wallace and his group - Toby narrows his eyes at the two men before catching Ruth and Nyein. His favorite proxy that’s not part of his group and his favorite independent other than Jeff and EJ. How nice.

Masky begins to walk over to meet the other group leader with Toby and Hoodie close behind. He looks tired, which is usual for him, but happy to see that Nyein is excitedly waving. “Heard you had a runt for us?”

“Sure do,” Theo says, looking over his shoulder. “C’mon out, they’re not going to bite you.”

“What, are they scared of us?” Hoodie chuckles as he puts his hands into his pockets. He glances past Theo to see a dark shape moving in the backseat of the car.

“It’s like, their first day working with people that aren’t us,” Wallace attempts to explain. “And from what we can gather, they only entered this life because of-”

“Toby.”

The name that pours from your lips sends Toby’s head and heart spinning. “E-Excuse me?” He barely manages to choke out as you step forward, pushing aside Wallace and Theo, looking at the much taller man with stars in your eyes.

“Oh my gods, Toby, is that you?” You whisper, still walking forward to meet him like a dream.

Toby’s eyes widen as he looks at you, no, stares you down. You look so much different than when he let you go as a teen - you’re all grown up now! Some things have changed about you, but other things have stayed the same.

Both your group and Toby’s give each other confused looks as if to ask the other if they knew about this before you rush forward, face planting into Toby’s chest.

He takes in a sharp breath and embraces you, laughter bubbling up from his throat. He takes in your sweet scent and picks you up, moving you from the group as he begins to twirl you and babble on about how much he missed you.

You giggle, tears falling like drops of rain from your eyes before you feel yourself planting back down into the parking lot, your attention focused on him and no one else. Your stomach is fluttering with butterflies as you look up at the teary eyed man. “How have you been?” You ask quietly, closing your eyes as Toby leans down slightly to rest his forehead against yours.

“Never better.”

#ticci toby #ticci toby x reader #ticci toby headcanon #ticci toby scenario #creepypasta #creepypasta x reader #creepypasta headcanon #creepypasta scenario #x reader #reader insert #fluff #loki fluff

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starryrogue · 4 years

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Hey. Below the cut is a LONG (2 page google docs) rant on being a gay sff book fan and the intersection of being a gay man in m/m spaces and book stuff. Just me ranting into the internet void. probs gonna delete this later so dont reblog/ or @ me or w/e

Before I get started, a disclaimer. This is a series of observations and rants based on my lived experience as a gay man in book and fan spaces. This isn't a formal critique or callout or call for action. Just an expression of confusion, frustration and desire. This isn’t me trying to dictate who can read and write and express m/m fiction. This isn't me saying “How dare women find enjoyment in things” since shaming women for “liking thing” is a long and complicated history. None of this has been checked for numbers and stats. There are a lot of generalizations below. There are probably more lgbt people engaging than I perceive. THERE IS A LOT OF GENERALIZING. This isnt an argument or formal essay. I emphasize, this is me, a gay man, ranting and reflecting on my experience. Now that we have that out of the way

On a fundamental level, M/M book spaces are predominantly women filled. Starting at the top of the process, authors (check goodreads), Publishing (my industry and the results of a recent survey showing employment stats in publishing), Readers and engagement (harder to say stat wise but checking goodreads comments), and Fandom (more just a lived experience) are mostly women . So as a Gay Dude its confusing. On one hand, I feel kind of if I'm entering a space not meant for me, a man entering a women’s. But on the other hand my identity is the subject of so much work, both properly published and fanwork. Is this a space I can enter?

Why is this the case? Why are women writing about this? Why is it finding an audience with other women? Is it a result of all of the above aspects just being woman heavy and it's a statistical result that most genre fiction being written/read by women? Fandom, shipping and M/M zines and fic are historically not led by men? Why? At the inception of fan culture, were there gay men engaging in shipping and using that as an avenue to explore male sexuality? Why have I only heard of fandom moms and not dads?

Please read none of these as acuistory. I am generally inquisitive and would like an answer with historical context and data. Again, it's hard finding a balance between being a man commenting/genrailizing on a genre/hobby predominaltey for women and also being gay and wanting to engage in M/M content since again, its part of my identity being reprisented and commented on. Obviously not all the people i'm generalizing are straight, or cis. There are probably a lot of wlw, trans and nb people in these circles but I can't imagine it's the majority.I’m worried this might come off as misogynistic?

But then comes the real life scenario where I go to Scifi/fantasy book events that feature mlm leads and relationships and at a glance) I’m like one of 3 guys in a room of straight women? (again, generalizing) and I think, “why are y’all here? I'm here b/c I’m gay, and this book is gay? What are you getting out of this relationship? Where are my Gay SFF bros?”

A lot of YA SFF M/M content seems to be coming from author moving out of fan spaces, using fic as a way to practice their craft. Is this an equivalent of stright bro enjoying lesbian porn? Maybe not in YA SFF but BL/Yaoi has alway been pretty for women, by women? What about all the Mass Market romance? Straight up romance and smut between guys? Is it enjoyable b/c its two dudes making out and the author and audience are attracted to men so why not make it two men? Is it the “cultural taboo” around gayness that makes it hot? In all fairness I’ve only read 2 or 3 Mass Market/Ebook gay romances and they were Okay (like 7/10ish?) but that's not a good sample size. Again, why are women/ straight or otherwise getting to depict and dominate a market about gay men? I really suspect that women who are into men drastically out number MLM and also women being into men has been less stigmatized (Generally) than men depicting gay romance and sex.

I wrote a post about being a gay man and liking love between men for a masculine. A kind or romance and intimacy seeped in masculinity kind of thing and a lot the likes I got (or could identify) were women. As a gay dude i want to intereact with other MLM about M/M media since like this is suppsoed to be depiciting our kind of sex and romance but it hard to find any? (I'm not looking craaaazy hard but it's frustrating that its not a default) but where are the mlm talking about gay relationships on tumblr and goodreads?

I’m not trying to dictate who can write and read and publish this stuff. It's just isolating. There are a couple things I could go on about like depictions of mlm in shipping culture or like why all the top Tapas comics are BL but I think that's a separate issue.

And now for some content rant

As far as canon m/m content in books, up until recently it came in 3 flavors. Literary Tragedy, YA coming out Angst, and Mass Market Romance. Comics are a little better but not by much. Growing up I had like Magnus/Alec in that C.Claire series and Wallace Wells from Scott Pilgram and I think that was it. There has been a recent move in Sci-fi Fantasy (SFF) to be more diverse but generally its a lot of YA with a little less coming out angst. All my faves are still genreally written by women but I think the queer women and NB authors do it best IMO.

I love SFF, but also I’m an adult so I am aging out of YA. Also YA coming out stuff especially contemporary is an easy way to get me anxious AF. Long story short, being a gay teen is tough and Id preferer not to relive coming out. I wish I had things like Carry On and How to repair a Mechanical Heart as a teen, but alas, I did not. Not that these books have no value, just there is still a gap in the market fot gay adult genre fiction(also why are straight women depicting coming out stories? Altruism?)

Give me that adult genre fiction with a gay romance b-plot please. (shout out to TOR for being market leaders but i need to do a deeper dive into indie presses). Shout out to things like Witchmark and Amberlough and The Last Sun. All great SFF stories in other worlds and full of magic and plot but also, dudes kissing. The one thing is gay authors have a tendecy to make thier books have darker topics like abuse, sexual assult/rape, homophonia, hard core drugs and violence, which i’m not going to deny. Let authors navigate the waers of gay culture in thier art. But I just want to read things like Juno Steel, queer AF but none of the homophbia and trauma attached. These asks are purely self interested, but I know there is a market for it.

(Also, there is this weird trend of Homophobia-Lite ™ where we arnt going to have the characters be bullied or outed or beaten/disowned but they need to “grow up” and get wives and families. Which on one hand is not great but on the other hand I like the way it reflects the lived experience of being ashmaed of your secuality but without the harsher traumas of the world. Its like me being gay in NYC in an artsy inudsrty. No one realy cares I’m gay and out but there are still little things that give me pause and some shame b/c interlized homophbia is a think. I think the SFF book makes it the best of both worlds of exploring homophobia without the darker themes. Ok end sidebar)

I have more thoughts on podcast content and fan spaces/shipping culture but this rant is already long. So I’ll leave it here.

Probs gonna delete this after a day or 2. This was mostly an exercise for screaming into the void at some gay nerd frustrations. This rant is not without flaws or critique. But again, just a rant. A gay dudes nerdy rant about fantasy books.

#starrysays #delete later

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baelllamyblake · 7 years

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The First Female Reaper ( Bellamy Blake x reader AU )

Summary : You’re a female grounder who’s been kidnapped by the reapers of the mountain men. Dr. Tsing has cleared you for the Cerberus Project and Bellamy has been going to the ends of Earth to get you back from the evil intentions of Mount Weather.

Pairing : Bellamy Blake x fem reader

Warnings : Lil’ bit of gore, couple curse words, not too bad.

Word count : 1,716 words. wowee i have a problem i don’t think i know how long one shots are supposed to be

A/N : yep, another long one. my inso for this one shot is just i never really saw a female reaper so i was like hey never been done before lets do this shit and i just took out Lincoln and replaced him with Y/N. i think it’s long but i think it’s still pretty good ( i hope )

FEEDBACK IS GREATLY APPRECIATED SO PLS FUCK ME UP WID IT <3

The world felt like it was moving in slow motion and the light was blinding. The noise of heavy boots and crunchy leaves echoed throughout your muddied brain, lighting off pain receptors like a million flares all at once. Your vision was blurry and your right eyelid left sticky from the drying blood on your face. You moaned in pain while trying to stretch your limbs. Strong arms and hands held your torso and legs in place. Your hands were bound tightly together. Someone was hauling you away on their shoulder but you couldn’t figure out who. It definitely wasn’t your boyfriend, Bellamy. He would’ve been kissing your face all over, begging you to stay awake for a few more moments. It didn’t matter anyway, you passed out after fading in and out of consciousness for so long.

Bellamy was worried, what if you were dead? He couldn’t stop pacing back and forth in the bunker while Finn was busy interrogating the one-eyed grounder about a damn watch. He was desperate to find you as Finn was desperate to find Clarke. He frantically wished you were by his side, holding his hand and keeping him grounded. Bellamy missed your beautiful smile and the way you talked when teaching him about Earth. He yearned to find you and bring you back home.

A bag was snatched off your head and revealed your surroundings. It was a dimly lit tunnel in Mount Weather. The memories came flooding back painfully as you kept glancing around at your surroundings. Octavia successfully bargained for you but Reapers attacked and kidnapped you. You wondered if Octavia and Bellamy were out there looking for you. Your daze was broken when the door at the end of the tunnel opened and a bunch of people in rubber suits walked into the low light.

“ Harvest, harvest, harvest… ” A woman with a clipboard looked to the fellow grounders before marking them down. Another man in a rubber suit began to inject the reapers with a crimson elixir. You narrowed your eyebrows in confusion after watching the reapers groan in relief and lay still in ecstasy. You brought your attention to the woman who kept marking grounders off. She stood before you and the helmet lights illuminated her features. You grimaced at the tan woman in anger. You didn’t deserve to be here.

“ Mark this one for the Cerberus program. ” The woman said, ticking another mark on her clipboard before observing you one last time. The mountain men grasped you by the biceps and you were too weak to rebel against their grip. The men dragged you to a dark, humid room before shoving you roughly into the centre. You turned around and was met with a torrent of boiling, hot water.

You woke up, fighting for air but was hitched to a chair by a numerous amount of straps. You wailed into your gag, jerking at the ropes, trying desperately to rip them off. The door opened and you lifted your head as much as you could to see who came in.

“ Hello, I’m Cage Wallace. ” the slimeball of a man said, running a finger along your jawline. His cologne burned your nose. All you could do was whimper in fear. He motioned over a guard with the same gun you saw the rubber suit man inject the reapers with. Your eyes grew glossy with tears.

“ The first dose is always the worst, honey. ” Wallace said smiling, not a single shred of sympathy could be found in it. The needle pierced your skin and you felt the drug be absorbed into your bloodstream instantly. You felt a high so unrelenting, you bit the gag in agonizing ecstasy. The convulsions were intense and your body went limp yet you were still clinging to life.

“ We’ve got a pureblood on our hands, boys. ” Wallace happily said, clapping his hands together while you inhaled and exhaled heavily, tears streaming down your eyes. Days and weeks passed but you didn’t know that, you just knew when the Mountain men were coming to torture you and give you your next vial. The torture grew in intensity: longer and more frequent shock treatments and higher dosages. They were conditioning you to become absolutely terrified of the high-pitched shriek a tiny machine emitted. The withdrawals were debilitating your ability to think of anything else but the red drug you craved so badly for.

Cage even had you kill a man for it. You were transformed to a hollow shell of yourself: enraged, hungry, and addicted. Wallace finally let you loose and you killed whatever you could before having to retreat to Mount Weather for that lovely red liquid.

Bellamy and Octavia were teaming together to find you and a way into Mount Weather without getting killed. Unfortunately, they were cornered into a dark and musty car garage by the enshrouding acid fog. Two guards accompanied them before splitting off. You killed the both of them in an rabid frenzy to satisfy the unyielding hunger for blood. Bellamy and Octavia stopped cold in their tracks at the sight they encountered. It was you with white paint splayed across your face, contrasting against the blood running down your chin and neck. You were hunched over Sgt. Scott’s dead body, devouring the meat and skin off his bones like a wolf.

“ Oh my god, Y/N.. What the fuck have they done to you? ” Bellamy’s voice broke as tears pricked at his eyes. You rose at the sound of his voice and immediately stormed the siblings in another blind fury. You tackled Octavia onto the ground and started strangling her. She latched onto your hands, trying to pry them off. Bellamy raised his gun and forced himself to pull the trigger. The bullet hit its mark, piercing your shoulder. You jerked off Octavia in pain, fleeing away from the two into the shadows of the garage. Octavia jerked up, almost hacking up a lung. The siblings quickly hid in a nearby car, hoping that you wouldn’t find them.

“ What are we going to do, Bellamy? Y/N’s a fucking reaper. ” Octavia choked out, her throat felt like it was on fire. You lurked around the car garage, on the prowl for the Blakes. The two hatched up a plan to get you out of Mount Weather and somewhere safe. Bellamy called out, grabbing your attention. You charged at your boyfriend, Octavia coming from the side to shock you in the ribs, knocking you out cold.

You slowly woke up, unfamiliar of where you were. You started screaming, foaming at the mouth and thrashing around in your chains. Bellamy kept watch over you from a distance, he felt guilty having to tie you down like a wild animal. Clarke and Octavia observed you from a close yet safe distance. You tried to strike one of the girls, the effort rendered futile.

“ I knew Mount Weather controlled the Reapers. I had no idea they were creating them. ” Clarke said astonishedly after noticing the purple needle marks in your neck. Bellamy scanned your angry face, nothing of you was there. It was completely replaced by severe addiction and violence. “ If they can do that to Y/N, what are they doing to our friends? ” Bellamy asked Clarke while examining your furious features, longing to embrace you in his arms.

Bellamy just stood in front of you, arms crossed over his chest. You pulled against the ropes as hard as you could. Your wrists started bleeding from the friction of the chains . You continued to thrash around before the chain attached to your wrist severed from the wall and you socked Bellamy square in the face. He staggered backwards, tripping over boxes while holding his cheek in pain. You yanked an ankle restraint out of the floor while Bellamy was disarmed. Clarke immediately scrambled over to constrain you. Your leg jolted out into her stomach, sending her flying onto the ground, dry-heaving. A steel pipe, wielded by Octavia, collided with your skull, sending you to the floor with a dull thud.

Clarke began operating on your shoulder, successfully getting the bullet out. Bellamy sat by your side, regardless of how dangerous it was. You finally looked peaceful despite having to be knocked out. Bellamy moved the hair out of your face and stroked your forehead gently. He needed you more than ever before.

The shit really hit the fan when Octavia barged in with Nyko, screaming that the commander is drawing near with a grounder army to massacre Skaikru. You seized multiple times, Clarke was able to revive you with chest compression but she didn’t know how long the compressions would work. Bellamy wasn’t going to give up on you though, he stuck by your side through every seizure and every coughing fit. He loved you far too much to lose you to addiction.

You seized once again, Abby darting to your side and commencing the chest compression. Bellamy squeezed your hand tightly, eyes growing wide when Abby slowed down then stopped completely.

“ It’s not working, it’s too late. “ Abby sighed out, looking to Bellamy. In a split second, he initiated the chest compressions. Abby was taken aback by Bellamy’s desire to keep you alive, she wasn’t aware of the relationship you shared. Abby scurried for a shock baton and in a last ditch effort, she shocked you in the chest in substitution of a defibrillator. You weren’t breathing so Abby shocked you once more. Your eyes shot open as you jerked to the side and started hacking. Bellamy sighed out in relief, he squeezed your arm as you coughed harshly.

You looked to Bellamy with tears in your eyes and embraced him tightly. It felt so good to feel something other than craving and emptiness. He wrapped his arms around you, bringing you as close as he could. “ I love you so much, Y/N. I’m sorry you had go through this. Thank you so much for staying alive. “ Bellamy choked out, crying into the crook of your neck. Your heart swelled and you broke down.

“ I owe you my life, I love you so much. “ you strained out, your throat crying in misery. Bellamy just pulled you closer and didn’t let go.

He couldn’t afford to lose the love of his life again.

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meupila · 7 years

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Blade Runner 2049 (2017)

Seen on October 6th 2017 in a 2D cinema.

A beautiful film, powerful story, and immersive experience. It left me feeling like its protagonist– exhausted, confused, and yet somehow at peace.

I am certain there was symbolism that went way over my head, but I thoroughly appreciated what I was able to register. The theological parallels with the figures of the savior, the holy virgin, and the immaculate conception pushed my expectations along subtly but surely. I was as devastated as K / Joe (Ryan Gosling) when I found out that I would not get to follow the path of the hero after all. The question seemed to become: if you are not the hero of the larger narrative, what is your role?

K, much like the audience, becomes a witness to a miracle. When it becomes clear that he himself is not the miracle, he must choose either to fight to preserve it or to sink into indifference/nihilism. Either choice would be understandable in his circumstances, and both would make for relatable stories, but Blade Runner 2049 takes us down the path of fighting for a larger cause– a path shared by many characters in the film. Sapper Morton (Dave Bautista) fights to keep hidden the story of the Replicant birth; Rick Deckard (Harrison Ford) leaves his loved ones to protect the miracle they'd created; Lt. Joshi (Robin Wright) desperately fights for social order; Niander Wallace (Jared Leto) is keen to transform civilization. They are all driven by a grand vision larger than themselves.

Therefore, the climactic fight between K and Luv (Sylvia Hoeks) is significant not only in the lives of those involved but also as a conflict between self-preservation and self-sacrifice. By this point, K's motivation is mostly devoid of ego, while Luv's main concern remains to be "the best of the angels". Somehow, Luv's shameless egotism made me sympathize with her– there is some of that in all of us. Perhaps by fighting her to the death, K completely kills what remains of his own ego. Perhaps by watching it, we experience part of that too, and this may explain why I was on the edge of my seat during this fight, unable to pick a side, and dreading either outcome. The encounter is visceral and genuinely tense, with the water pulling everyone closer to their death, relentless and impersonal. The blue and yellow hues from the fallen vehicle were a creative way to light this crucial scene, making the struggle all the more ethereal.

The cinematography (Roger Deakins) and visual effects were stunning throughout the film. In retrospect, the range of landscapes presented to us is remarkable, but during the film, they flowed naturally. Every moment was filled with marvelous detail, but worldbuilding never overshadowed storytelling. The vast cityscapes, mind-bending architecture, deep colors, and the wondrous reflections that lit so much of this film all seemed but backdrops to a powerful central narrative. In between being utterly lost in the emotional and personal, I would suddenly become aware of the amazing world underneath.

I have yet to research the extent to which Ridley Scott was involved, but it is obvious the film owes a lot to Denis Villeneuve's clear vision as a director, and to a good script by Hampton Fancher and Michael Green. The mojo is consistent, the structure is creative, and it's clear these filmmakers didn't take us for fools.

The acting was excellent. Mackenzie Davis as Mariette had a magical significance about her, and the overlaid performance with Ana de Armas as Joi was visually striking as well as emotionally potent. Armas completely sells the character of Joi, a disembodied entity that is totally genuine in its desire to be, to have a body, and to please K. The fact that Joi is a mass-produced product does not change the sincerity she projects, nor how easily we and K buy it.

Robin Wright as Lt. Joshi was very much human, with her arrogance and sensitivity blatantly exposed. Her final moments with Luv were painful to watch, and for a moment Wright embodied all of us in the face of the unyielding machine. When she downed that glass of whiskey, she knew what was coming, and so did we. In contrast, Jared Leto as Wallace was somewhat opaque and obscure, but I suspect this is how the character was intended to be. We get a glimpse of an overwhelming ambition and idealism driving him, but it felt distant and cold to me– human, but not in a way I liked. This should not be surprising, as after all there are very few Niander Wallaces in the world, and their calculated vision must be alien to most.

Harrison Ford, returning as Deckard, appears fairly late in the film and adds a reluctant charm, grounding the film at a point when it could have easily gone off the rails. He plays someone who has made tough choices and has long since learned to live with them. I wonder what a day in the life of Deckard would have looked like, drinking whiskey with his dog and tending to his bees amidst the surreal ruins of Las Vegas. One particular scene especially owed its poignancy to Ford's powerful performance: when Wallace throws into question Deckard's life and love as pre-determined and devoid of meaning, we get a long close-up of Ford's face and witness a sequence of subtle transformations. The terror that flickers across his eyes, and the weight that sets down upon him, and the inexplicable strength that he somehow musters to speak the words, "I know what's real," were thrilling to watch and a perfect vessel for my own experience of those same emotions.

The soundtrack (Hans Zimmer, Benjamin Wallfisch) and overall sound design worked wonders, completing the feel of the universe and driving home the dread and hope. I felt some kind of rage writhing beneath the music, subtle and powerful, and it hinted at the unimaginable inner experience of K and the Replicants in general. Who is to say what it is like to be an artificially intelligent bioengineered being? I have no idea, but rage is a primal experience I find easy to imagine in others.

Ryan Gosling's task of portraying K's utter fury and desperation cannot have been easy. Like Pinnochio, K is tossed between the lures of pleasure, dreams of family, and a quest for the truth. His relationship with Joi is fragile, touching, and tragic. His anger and hope in finding a father figure, Deckard, is ultimately baseless and heartbreaking.

On the one hand, his character is ultimately an alien– something entirely non-human; at the same time, his struggles mirror an experience that humans have utterly monopolized: the journey of defining oneself and one's path. The only reason this film works at all is that we can relate to K, but the main reason it works so well is due to the uneasy reminders that, in the end, he is not one of us.

There was a sense in me that his experience cannot possibly be authentic – a feeling clearly shared by K himself, who is constantly reminded that he "has no soul"– and yet I was convinced that those same feelings in me would be as valid as can be. As his doubt slowly seeped into me as well, I began to wonder about my own human experience: what makes it authentic?

In some sense, Blade Runner 2049 explored not so much what it is like to be an AI, but what it is like to be human. Perhaps the writers hid a jewel in an inconspicuous joke quipped by Deckard in the casino– when K asks him if the dog he lives with is real, Deckard smirks and says, "Why don't you ask him?"

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rayninsyde · 6 years

Text

Simpsonwave: the inkblot of a generation - by reddit poster NME24

Link to original post: HERE

It is a dark room, with a single-cushion sofa.

A sullen man walks in. Wearing a robe and a large pair of headphones, he sits and clicks his Walkman. As the camera slowly pans into his face – Homer Simpson’s face – melancholic synth chords usher us into a glitchy VHS world of shooting stars, childhood memories, frantic running, and unreal colours.

To the 3 million YouTube viewers of C R I S I S – even the hundreds in the comments who professed to crying – this so-called genre of Simpsonwave almost feels like a joke. And that’s because to anyone who knows its parent genre, Vaporwave, it is a joke. Isn’t it?

Origins

“Writing about vaporwave in 2016 is almost impossible” Scott Beauchamp would lament within a few months of C R I S I S being posted. Indeed, for the first web-grown genre to scratch mainstream recognition in music history, it remains awkward to write about. Critics such as Simon Chandler (2016) are prone to forgetting that Vaporwave the EDM movement is only half the story; vaporwave the meme is its other half.

In February of 2012, MACINTOSH PLUS released the online album Floral Shoppe, and with 10 million views in its first year, one song would become synonymous with the genre:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cU8HrO7XuiE

The out-of-place Japanese title, the cover art’s surreal juxtaposition of ancient and digital, and most importantly, the soulless, disfigured Muzak-like samples left an impression on critics. To Jonathon Dean (2012), this was “one of the best single documents of the vaporwave scene yet”, which “carefully constructs its own meditative headspace through the careful accretion of defamiliarized memory triggers”. Critical theorists such as Grafton Tanner (2013) quickly saw more than a “meditative headspace”. As a trend of combining such eerie samples with grainy commercials was popularized by Saint Pepsi’s Enjoy Yourself and Private Caller, such critics saw an unspoken anti-capitalist satire, drowning the listener in Reagan-era consumer culture to subvert its appeal.

“Why any confusion?” you ask. Just interview MACINTOSH PLUS or Saint Pepsi and their motivations should be clear. Then you run into another uncanny aspect: the alien distance between the artists and their listeners. Vaporwave artists use corporate-inspired pseudonyms, avoid interviews, and make no effort to show their faces, let alone promote themselves. When Bandcamp finally got a hold of Ramona Xavier (Chandler, 2016), who used MACINTOSH PLUS as a one-time alias, she responded “the ideological and philosophical themes behind my work come from a personal place – kind of a quarantine zone in my brain that I don’t let people into”. Each artist is a ghost on the internet, the “non-place” so many of us were raised in, which like a shopping mall, looks similar wherever in the world you go. That they refuse to be more than avatars indeed suggests deliberate alienation.

If that was the intent, you wouldn’t know it from the comments either. With its S P A C E D O U T T I T L E S, grainy Japanese commercials and faceless marble statues, it’s only fair that an aesthetic intended to leave the listener empty, confused and nostalgic was ripe for being mocked. It was, as Sam Sutherland acknowledges, endless second-hand parodying of this aesthetic across Reddit, YouTube and 4chan, as much as Vaporwave’s first-hand parody of consumerism, that propelled it into virality.

The undercurrent

It needn’t be said that postmodernism, parody and self-parody go hand-in-hand. A complete scepticism of grand narratives leads to deconstructing the “sincere” into the detached or comedic, leaving irony as the only means of expression. This scepticism lends itself to (though is not limited to) globalization, pop culture, and the worship of laissez-faire capitalism that emerged in the 1980s. Such songs as MACINTOSH PLUS’s リサフランク420 / 現代のコンピュー are a thorough exercise in deconstruction. The song samples Diana Ross’s Make Your Move, and with it, the synth sounds, motorik pulse, and cutesy lyrics emblematic of an 80s pop song. Ross’s voice is then pitched down to become ostensibly male, and the song is slowed down to assume an air of mediocrity. The lyrics are chopped and repeated ad nausem until they take on different meanings: “do you understand that it’s all in your hands?” becomes “do you understand that it’s all in your head?”

Much as a song about serious love is undermined to become one about solitude and solipsism in the digital “non-place”, the seriousness of vaporwave is undermined by internet users who, in the spirit of irony and sarcasm, refuse to take it seriously. Thus the saying “vaporwave is dead – long live vaporwave” (Beauchamp, 2016).

“Postmodernism feeds off distance,” Seth Abramson observed in 2014. “Radios, and even the early years of technological industrialization, emphasized distance in a way that was unmistakable. The internet, by comparison, is a strange mix of distance and closeness, detachment and immediacy – our sense of ourselves and strangers’ varying senses of us – that postmodernism doesn’t really seem to describe well”.

The shift

What then, given the history of Vaporwave, is so significant about an edited Homer Simpson listening to Resonance on his Walkman?

That it reconstructs the comedic and the detached into the sincere.

The Simpsonwave subgenre is best explained by YouTube user JavCee (2016): “take footage of early episodes of the Simpsons… now edit some wavy music to the footage…next, add a dream-like filter and VHS distortion to the entire video to represent the adult longing for a childhood they thought they had… even alternative scenes to better showcase the brain synapses sometimes crossing in memories…creating phantoms of times that probably never existed in the first place.”

This is quite a turn to take from Vaporwave’s agenda as we’ve described it. There is, as Sutherland (2016) points out: “something to be said about a new emotional resonance being added to a genre of music that I would argue exists specifically to mock the commercial and corporate vibe of mall-type music”.

As Homer sits like us – alone at night, ears plugged, facial expression vacant – we enter his mind to find something different to the cartoon caricature of an overweight, suburban dad. We’re suddenly thrust in memories of Marge as a teenager, Homer driving alone, his mother embracing him in a dream – Homer bowling alone – visions of his children – Homer running alone – his wife in bed. The second memory Homer thinks about, perhaps his most recent, is him sitting on bed with a strange woman, and bursting into tears.

The unexpected pain of watching this is both generational and personal; in the days that we curled up on the couch to watch The Simpsons after school, masculinity dictated that this was a side rarely acknowledged of not just cartoon fathers, but of our own fathers as well. Now, in one surreal moment, Homer Simpson runs through the woods from his thoughts, a tender victim of the passage of time.

In uploading this video, Lucian Hughes has injected meaning into not just a comedic cartoon, but a satirical genre that deliberately robs the listener of comfort. But should we allow him?

In 1993, author David Foster Wallace was a generation early in heralding “new sincerity”: “The next real literary ‘rebels’ in this country might well emerge as some weird bunch of anti-rebels, born oglers who dare somehow to back away from ironic watching, who have the childish gall actually to endorse and instantiate single-entendre principles”

Such a feeling steps away from presenting the meaninglessness of the society we have, and instead focuses on meaning at either the personal level, or in the societal future or past. To Vermeulen (2010), this is termed “meta-modernism”, something which “acknowledges that history's purpose will never be fulfilled because it does not exist. Critically, however, it nevertheless takes toward it as if it does exist. Inspired by a modern naïveté yet informed by postmodern scepticism, the metamodern discourse consciously commits itself to an impossible possibility.” Simpsonwave acknowledges the fakeness of the series, and brings that fakeness up a notch through the creation of alternate scenes.

Such videos as C R I S I S and W H E R E A M I G O I N G? both admit their manufactured nature and press on in pursuit of emotion. They are beyond political agendas and seek to quench, rather than solely bring attention to, a deep generational starvation of meaning.

And that is for better or for worse.

#simpsonwave #vaporwave #a e s t h e t i c

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archifists · 7 years

Note

do it for raminn, you horrible goblin

screeches

1. Who's the one who's reckless and always getting into trouble while the other gotta pull em out: why does ramona get into so many fights. why is she so fight-y. dewey can’t fight. dewey is afraid.

2. Who's the one to send the other "I love my gf/bf" memes: they both do, but dewey might do it more often.

3. Who's the one who listens to a music genre the other doesn't like and how does the other react: ramona is into like? k-pop and stuff like that. dewey is into one (1) genre and it is Not That, but he deals with it. even listens to it on his own accord sometimes, too ( but don’t tell ramona that ).

4. Which one spoils the other more and do they ever get competitive to show the other more love: dewey tries to spoil her sometimes, because now he has the money to be able to. it gets a little competitive but nothing too extreme.

5. How many years did it take to get married or was it just not for them: they were engaged a year or two after they started dating. the actual wedding came about a year or so later.

6. What was their wedding like: very pink and flowery ( which dewey found way too hilarious ). he let ramona really plan the whole thing, so.

7. Is their friends/family supportive: ramona’s friends are pretty supportive ( even wallace --- shocking, i know ). the schneebly family is also supportive, mostly because dewey is actually leaving them alone now.

8. How does one comfort the other when the other is in distress/having a panic attack/crying: dewey doesn’t really have panic attacks or anything like that, and he has absolutely no idea how to help ramona with stuff like that.

9. Which one dissociates: it’s ramona. dewey is pretty neurotypical.

10. Which one stares at the other's booty like "damn" and how does the other react when catching them: they both do this and they both know.

11. When they live together what kinda place do they live in? What does their home look like?: they live in a decent-sized apartment at first, but probably move into a bigger place later on in life. their place is always very messy, instruments and records and clothes everywhere.

12. What do their dates look like: they’re pretty chill? sometimes it’s dinner, sometimes it’s a movie date, etc.

13. How does each act when getting drunk: dewey gets loud(er) and obnoxious, and I’m not really sure for ramona.

14. Which one rolls over in the morning to wake up the other one just to give kiss them: they would both do this, but ramona would probably do it a bit more often ( only because dewey doesn’t wanna wake her, she’s so cute when she’s sleeping ).

15. Have they saved each other's lives before: if you wanna get deep, they probably saved each other when they met. if you don’t wanna get deep, then nope, they have not.

16. Does one have an interest the other think is weird but wants to listen to it regardless: dewey has this insane fascination with all things classic rock, I think ramona just deals with it at this point.

17. Which one uses cropped hentai as reaction images: ramona does and dewey is always confused.

18. Does one of them kinkshame the other: not really? if anyone is being kinkshamed, dewey is doing it to ramona.

19. Is one of them self conscious about their body? If so how does the other comfort them: ehhh, they’re both pretty okay with their appearances? dewey isn’t sure how to even comfort ramona if she wasn’t tbqh.

20. Say they were cuddling on the bed while listening to record player playing the background. Which song is playing?: mmmm your guess is as good as mine ( some kinda classic rock shit, but Who Knows really ).

21. What is their song? Like the song that gives them overwhelming feelings?: they don’t really have a song, but I would say it’s jackie & wilson by hozier.

22. What song do they listen to while going on a joyride: again, any classic rock would do.

23. What kinda joyrides do they go on? Relaxing ones or wild ones?: can it be called ‘wild’ if it’s just dewey being a reckless driver, because...

24. Where would they vacation for a honeymoon: ramona would probably choose japan, and dewey would be fine with that.

25. Do people ever get annoyed of their pda: probably, they’re pretty obnoxious with it.

26. Would they live in the city or the country: dewey is a city boy, I think anything else would drive him crazy tbh.

27. Which ones the red which ones the blue: ramona is probably blue, dewey is a dirty red.

28. Are either of them mentally ill, if so how do they help one another cope: ramona has some Issues (tm) and let me reiterate, dewey has absolutely no idea how to help. with anything, ever.

29. Does one have a spot on them where they would melt when the other kisses them there: don’t tell ramona, but dewey is a Soft Boy who would melt with like, forehead kisses.

30. Do they dance together: yes but they are Not Good at it.

31. Do they sing together: all the time. dewey is actually a pretty decent singer, though, so there’s that.

32. Which one is better at cooking than the other and makes most the dinners: dewey doesn’t cook. his diet consists of takeout, pizza, and fast food exclusively unless ramona cooks for him.

34. Are they a reckless couple or safe: dewey, again, is a Soft Boy, who tries his best to Stay Safe.

35. What be they kinks and do they try each other's kinks: dewey is pretty vanilla in every aspect of his life, so if anyone is kinky here it’s ramona ( but he will absolutely try anything for her, smfh ).

36. What would their valentines gifts be to each other: probably something sweet for ramona, like jewelry or something. she gets dew like, records or something.

37. Do they get into fights often? If so what do they fight over and how do they make up?: they never get into physical fights. they might argue, but it’s never over anything too big --- they’re pretty good about communication, so they have civil ‘arguments’ a lot.

38. Which ones top, bottom, verse: ramona is a scary lady and dewey will let her take charge of anything ever ( unless she wants him to, which is still fine with him ).

39. What kinda sex they be having (gentle rough whatever): they don’t have rough sex because it would probably freak dewey out. it’s usually very soft and gentle.

40. Who would fight in honor for the other if someone would insult them: ramona flowers would kill for dewey finn. dewey...can’t fight but he will try if he really has to.

41. Which one has a favorite movie that they have the other watch with them again and again: I could go meta here and say ‘ha dewey loves school of rock’ or ‘ha ramona loves scott pilgrim’ but y’know, I won’t. dew doesn’t really have a Favorite movie, ramona’s would probably be some disney movie or something.

42. How would one react if the other was to die: they would both be devastated, it’d be bad.

43. Who dies first: probably ramona. I don’t know why, but probably her.

44. Do they want kids: they do. they’re probably going to adopt later on in life, since ramona can’t have kids of her own.

45. How would they spend their last moments together: crying, probably.

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p-artsypants · 6 years

Text

320 State Street (17)- December 10, 2016

FF.net | AO3

Before we get into the chapter, I want to talk to you as a human.

As a writer and an artist, my job and my livelihood is to put my heart out on a platter (or the Internet) and wait for the knife. And for some reason, I like this arrangement. I love writing FanFiction, I love the whole process. And if you follow me, you’ll notice I’ve been reaching out into other fandoms to exercise. This story is so rich and complexed, and I still love it, but there was a disconnect whenever I tried to work on it. Then my mentor sent me this nugget of wisdom from David Foster Wallace. For anyone that wants to be a writer, I hope you read it.

“In the beginning, when you first start out trying to write fiction, the whole endeavor’s about fun. You don’t expect anybody else to read it. You’re writing almost wholly to get yourself off. To enable your own fantasies and deviant logics and to escape or transform parts of yourself you don’t like. And it works – and it’s terrific fun. Then, if you have good luck and people seem to like what you do, and you actually start to get paid for it, and get to see your stuff professionally typeset and bound and blurbed and reviewed and even (once) being read on the a.m. subway by a pretty girl you don’t even know it seems to make it even more fun. For a while. Then things start to get complicated and confusing, not to mention scary. Now you feel like you’re writing for other people, or at least you hope so. You’re no longer writing just to get yourself off, which — since any kind of masturbation is lonely and hollow — is probably good. But what replaces the onanistic motive? You’ve found you very much enjoy having your writing liked by people, and you find you’re extremely keen to have people like the new stuff you’re doing. The motive of pure personal starts to get supplanted by the motive of being liked, of having pretty people you don’t know like you and admire you and think you’re a good writer. Onanism gives way to attempted seduction, as a motive. Now, attempted seduction is hard work, and its fun is offset by a terrible fear of rejection. Whatever “ego” means, your ego has now gotten into the game. Or maybe “vanity” is a better word. Because you notice that a good deal of your writing has now become basically showing off, trying to get people to think you’re good. This is understandable. You have a great deal of yourself on the line, writing — your vanity is at stake. You discover a tricky thing about fiction writing; a certain amount of vanity is necessary to be able to do it all, but any vanity above that certain amount is lethal.

At some point you find that 90% of the stuff you’re writing is motivated and informed by an overwhelming need to be liked. This results in shitty fiction. And the shitty work must get fed to the wastebasket, less because of any sort of artistic integrity than simply because shitty work will cause you to be disliked. At this point in the evolution of writerly fun, the very thing that’s always motivated you to write is now also what’s motivating you to feed your writing to the wastebasket. This is a paradox and a kind of double-bind, and it can keep you stuck inside yourself for months or even years, during which period you wail and gnash and rue your bad luck and wonder bitterly where all the fun of the thing could have gone.

The smart thing to say, I think, is that the way out of this bind is to work your way somehow back to your original motivation — fun. And, if you can find your way back to fun, you will find that the hideously unfortunate double-bind of the late vain period turns out really to have been good luck for you. Because the fun you work back to has been transfigured by the extreme unpleasantness of vanity and fear, an unpleasantness you’re now so anxious to avoid that the fun you rediscover is a way fuller and more large-hearted kind of fun. It has something to do with Work as Play. Or with the discovery that disciplined fun is more than impulsive or hedonistic fun. Or with figuring out that not all paradoxes have to be paralyzing. Under fun’s new administration, writing fiction becomes a way to go deep inside yourself and illuminate precisely the stuff you don’t want to see or let anyone else see, and this stuff usually turns out (paradoxically) to be precisely the stuff all writers and readers everywhere share and respond to, feel. Fiction becomes a weird way to countenance yourself and to tell the truth instead of being a way to escape yourself or present yourself in a way you figure you will be maximally likable. This process is complicated and confusing and scary, and also hard work, but it turns out to be the best fun there is.

The fact that you can now sustain the fun of writing only by confronting the very same unfun parts of yourself you’d first used writing to avoid or disguise is another paradox, but this one isn’t any kind of bind at all. What it is is a gift, a kind of miracle, and compared to it the rewards of strangers’ affection is as dust, lint.”

—

“It’s snowing!” Tuff screamed at the top of his lungs.

“About time,” stated Astrid, from the counter. “It hasn’t snowed properly since thanksgiving.”

“I say, we go dune sledding on Sunday.” Tuff proposed. “Or, we could hook up the sled to my four-wheeler and ride around in the field behind my house. What do you guys say?”

Hiccup, who was now a mere shadow of his former shelf, smiled slightly. “Um, you know, that could be fun. What do you think Astrid?”

Hiccup always asked her permission to have fun these days. Because he felt like he didn’t deserve it himself. Which was a retched way to live. And she told him as much. Still, the look of guilt never washed away from his face. “I think that sounds like a great idea.” She smiled back.

“Awesome! I’ll make sure to get the sleds. I’ll text ya later with the details.”

Astrid was unbelievably grateful that it was winter and their friends were mostly oblivious. She didn’t need anyone asking about why she and Hiccup had lost so much weight, or why Hiccup was always exhausted. The obvious answer is that he couldn’t sleep. The more complicated answer was that the lie was literally swallowing him whole.

Jail or not, she couldn’t take it anymore.

On the way home, both were quiet, before Astrid finally spoke. “We should tell Heather.”

The car swerved slightly. Astrid couldn’t tell if it was black ice, or shock. “What?”

“We can’t keep going on like this. We have to tell someone. If anyone, it should be Heather. She would understand the best.”

Hiccup’s eyes never left the road, but she could see how fiercely he held the steering wheel. “I…” He began. “I understand.”

“I think you’ll feel better.”

“Will you?”

She pursed her lips. “Yeah.”

“Okay. I’ll call her when we get home, and invite her over.”

Astrid nodded, tension leaving her shoulders.

—

True to his word, as soon as Hiccup pulled into the garage, he took out his phone and called Heather.

“Hey Hiccup,” she responded on the other end of the line.

“Hey Heather…” He hesitated.

“Is something wrong?”

“Um…sort of. Are you busy tonight?”

“Tonight, no. I get out of work in an hour. Why?”

“I was just wondering…if you would be willing to come over? Astrid and I want to talk to you about something. It’s…about Scott.”

Heather was silent.

Astrid leaned in close to listen.

Finally she responded. “Actually, I wanted to talk to you about that too. I’ll come over after work. See you then.”

Hiccup released a sigh. “Okay, see you then.”

He hung up the phone and sat in his chair for a moment, unwilling to move. “It begins.”

“Yeah.”

“Astrid.”

“Hiccup?”

“I love you, always.”

“As do I.” She smiled back in return.

The duo walked inside, to see Valka working on dinner. “Hello my darling children!” She responded with mirth.

“Hi mom,” they responded in unison.

“I’m making spaghetti for dinner. Sound good?”

“Sounds great,” smiled Hiccup. “Um, Heather is coming over in like an hour. So, can you make a little extra?”

“Of course! Anyone is welcome at our table. Any particular reason for the visit?”

Hiccup looked away. “I just thought it would be a nice gesture.”

Valka, as a mother, knew immediately when her son was lying. But for once, she decided not to push it. “It’s nice of you. She must be lonely.”

“Yeah…” added Astrid. “Lonely…”

The kids withdrew to Hiccup’s room, to plan what they were going to say when Heather arrived.

All the while, Valka speculated.

—

An hour later, Stoick returned home from work. A few minutes after that, Heather arrived, all full of smiles. Truth be told, when Hiccup invited her over, she was ecstatic to come. There was never a warmer house then the Haddocks. Hiccup and Astrid greeted her with hugs. While Hiccup held her, he whispered. “We’ll talk after dinner.”

She nodded against him.

Valka’s spaghetti was…interesting, to say the least. Astrid had gotten used to the woman’s cooking. Not to say it was bad, it was better than her own mother’s…but it was always…interesting. She always tried to improve on something, as the case this evening when she added cinnamon to the sauce.

Heather ate it without complaint, just thankful to be eating with company.

Hiccup, despite being hungry as he always was, just pushed a meatball around on his plate. What was the point if he was just going to throw it up later?

“Why Hiccup, is something wrong? You’ve barely touched your food.” Valka asked, motherly concern radiating from her. “Yeah Hiccup,” Scott spoke from the empty seat at the end of the table. “Is there something wrong?”

Hiccup glanced up from his plate to make eye contact with the apparition. This had been happening for about a week now, and Hiccup was close to his breaking point. Yet, he would not respond to the ghost, since it was only an illusion of his own sleep deprived mind. He only glared at it.

“I’m fine, just not very hungry.” He responded to his mother, politely.

“You haven’t been hungry for a while now. Are you feeling well?”

Scott spoke again, “I’m kind of hungry, not very thirsty though. I’ve got all the water I could ever want.”

“It must be a bug,” Hiccup answered, interrupting. He hadn’t mentioned these ghastly visits to Astrid, or anyone for that matter.

“Must be nice,” Scott went on. “Being warm, and eating. Speaking. Having a nice family…and here you are, eating diner with my wife and my girlfriend. You just won’t be content until you take everything from me, will you?”

“They weren’t yours to begin with…” Hiccup muttered under his breath.

“Did you say something?” Asked Astrid.

“Uh, no, just making a mental note to myself.” “Gotcha.”

Scott called out, getting his attention. “Do you want me to leave? Am I bothering you?”

Hiccup didn’t respond.

Another conversation was happening between his parents and Heather, but Hiccup was just trying to tune all sounds out. But it was Scott’s grating voice that pierced through everything.

“Oh go on Hiccup, go ahead and tell everyone what’s bothering you. After all, you’ve got nothing to feel guilty about. Right? Right?”

If looks could kill. Hiccup glared down the table at the beast that tormented his awaking life. He nearly bit his own tongue in frustration.

“I know what you’re thinking. Rational thought is trying it’s best to take over and get me to leave. How dare I bother you after all I did? Pretty hypocritical, huh? Because of course, I didn’t feel bad about cheating on Heather with Astrid. I didn’t feel bad about attacking you in the dead of night. So why should you feel bad about dumping my body in the lake? Is it that you feel so impure, Mr. High and Mighty? You feel like you have crashed down to earth from your lofty place of perfection?”

“I’m far from perfect.” Hiccup thought to himself.

This thought made Scott go silent, and when Hiccup raised his tired eyes from his cold spaghetti, the ghost was gone.

Hiccup breathed a sigh of relief.

—

After dinner, Hiccup, Astrid and Heather retired to the basement. All was quiet as Hiccup made sure the door was closed and that Stoick and Valka were engrossed in a Christmas movie upstairs.

When Hiccup finally came and sat on the couch next to Astrid, Heather could see the mounting pressure in his shoulders. He simply swallowed and rubbed his legs in a nervous tick.

“So…” Heather began. “About Scott…”

“Yeah,” added Astrid.

“Before you say what you have to say, I…wanted to talk to you guys about something that’s been bothering me.”

“O-Oh?”

“Yeah…the police said it was a suicide…but I know Scott. He…” She hummed in thought, and took out her phone. “He sent me a message the day he went missing, it said, ‘Heather i know you’ll probably never forgive me and i understand. Just wanted you to know that im sorry for being the worst. ill be out of your way soon.’”

Hiccup and Astrid just listened.

“The thing is…Scott and I weren’t on friendly terms at the time. We were both extremely mad at each other. And he’s the kind of person to hold onto a grudge. He was…arrogant. He wouldn’t apologize…and he wouldn’t commit suicide.” She shook her head. “It just…I think…it might have been foul play.” She sighed. “I mean, I don’t have any evidence to support it, but he and David did piss off a lot of people. But it just feels…off. You know?”

Hiccup and Astrid looked at each other, before nodding.

“Back in November,” Hiccup began. “After Astrid’s father passed away, I invited her to come with me to Africa, and offered her the basement suite so she could save her rent money.”

Heather crossed her legs. “I remember.”

“So,” Astrid continued. “We went to my house and began packing up my stuff…and Scott showed up.”

A clear dread came over Heather’s face as the situation dawned on her.

Hiccup continued, “I was sitting in the kitchen, taking a break, when Scott spotted me and attacked me. And…we fought. Astrid tackled him and got him off of me, but then I tackled him back. It was all kind of a blur.”

When he hesitated, Astrid continued. “Scott had tried to strangle me, and then went in to strangle Hiccup. I heard him shout, ‘I hate you’ and that he was going to kill him. So I grabbed a skillet and hit him in the head to knock him out.” She rubbed her arm uncomfortably, and closed her eyes in shame. “Only afterwards, there was a bunch of blood coming from his head and he…I killed him.”

Heather was wide-eyed and slack-jawed. But didn’t say anything else. Hiccup took over, “since his dad is a judge, I…I convinced Astrid not to call the police and I went and hid the body.”

“Where?” Heather voiced.

“I took Eret’s boat out on the lake, and dumped him way out there.”

Heather leaned forward, resting her elbows on her knees while her folded hands covered her mouth.

“I’m sorry we dropped this on you,” Hiccup said, “I just thought…we thought you should know.”

“Thank you.” She said finally. “I know it was an accident, but…I honestly thought that Scott dying was the only way I was going to get peace from him.”

“Was it that bad?” Hiccup asked with a cringe.

“He was calling me at home and work with threatening messages. He messaged my friends and family to turn them against me…it was just a nightmare. So…thank you. Thank you so much.” She dissolved into tears.

Hiccup and Astrid both came around her and hugged her tightly.

“And it sounds so horrible to be thanking you for something like that, but I never thought I’d have peace of mind ever again!” She wiped her cheeks. “And his life insurance policy was still awarded to me…it wasn’t much, but I paid off our mortgage, and that’s something I don’t have to worry about anymore…” She shook her head, sniffling. “I feel like the maiden trapped in the tower and you two are the knights that slew the dragon keeping me hostage.” She broke out of their hug, her head clearing. “But I still don’t understand why you felt the need to hide the body.”

“Soren Jorgenson is a very powerful man.”

“Right, but the penalty for hiding the body is higher than manslaughter.”

“It is?”

“Yeah…” she thought, “I’d have to look it up, but I think it’s around five years. It’s one of those things I vaguely remember from my criminal justice course.”

Hiccup blanched, a frown coming over his face.

“Well, I won’t tell anyone.” Heather assured, collecting herself. “This was an accident. And I know you. Both of you are kind and gentle spirits that want nothing but the best for mankind. But if I may…Hiccup, I still think you should tell your dad. If just for closure.”

Hiccup was quiet, thinking.

“Are you sure you’re…okay with this?” Astrid prodded.

“I don’t know…” Heather shrugged with a mirthless laugh. “I think I’m in shock!” She shook her head. “You two covered up a murder, but of a truly evil man. I just…who am I to judge? I won’t say anything, since this…isn’t my problem anymore.” That final sentence was said with freedom, and peace. “He’s gone.”

“Bitch, I might be.” Scott spoke from the corner of the room. “And you’re happy about it? Your husband died, bitch. Maybe if Astrid hadn’t killed me first, you would have, huh?”

Hiccup frowned heavily in his direction, full of contempt.

“What? I’m just saying what you’re thinking, Hiccup.” He smirked, “because, as you often remind yourself, I’m just a figment of your imagination.”

Astrid took a deep breath, and managed to smile. “I feel…relieved.” She told Heather, honestly. “It feels good to talk about it, and let it out. You know? And knowing that you…don’t hate us…it’s just…nice.”

“But you don’t feel any better, do you Hiccup?” Scott was sitting on the coffee table in front of him. “This didn’t help at all, did it?”

Hiccup closed his eyes and rubbed a hand down his face in exhaustion. Scott’s voice just seemed to suck the life out of him. He peered over to Astrid and Heather who were now talking animatedly, with smiles on their faces. The bags under Astrid’s eyes seemed to stick out to him. If this talk made her feel better, then it was all worth it.

—

It had been two days since Hiccup got any concrete sleep, and tonight was no exception. At around 4 am, he stood in the kitchen waiting for Toothless to finish a steak.

In the dim light, the only sound was the quiet smacking of Toothless’ jaws and the quiet hum of the refrigerator. Hiccup leaned against the counter, the cold granite chilling his arms. Outside, the world looked like a snow globe, and all was calm.

But within Hiccup, the guilt continued to swirl like an endless sea.

“I don’t know how much more of this I can take, bud.”

“You don’t know how much more you can take? You don’t even know!” A sickly voice came from behind him.

“Oh, would you just give it a rest?” Hiccup responded, not bothering to turn around.

“I can’t sleep, Cousin. The current just keeps spinning and spinning me. I’m so tired…”

Hiccup glanced back only to gasp in horror.

The ghost behind him appeared as a bloated, rotting corpse. Bones exposed were the flesh had been torn by fish and sharp rocks. As he spoke, filthy black water dripped from his mouth and eyes and pooled on the floor.

Hiccup backed up against the counter, wanting to run, but frozen in place.

“How could you do this to me? To your own family? What about my mother? Does she know my restless spirit is trapped in the lake? Does she know I never found peace?”

“Stop. You’re not here.” Hiccup clenched his eyes shut. “This isn’t real.”

“I died before my time, Hiccup. I still had so much to live for…I still could have turned my life around.”

“It’s just an illusion.” He whispered.

Liquid touched his bare feet and his eyes shot open, only to see the floor covered in the inky water that still poured from Scott. Hiccup hopped up to the counter, only for the fluid to pull him back down like tar.

“Don’t fight it, Hiccup. This is your guilt, and there’s no way to escape it.”

“Leave me alone!” He shouted.

The liquid bubbled up, crawling up his legs.

“I will forever be your companion, tormenting your dreams and filling every hour of your day.” The apparition stepped closer, easily wading through the gunk that flooded the room. The appearance wasn’t like Scott anymore, and the voice sounded different, but still familiar. “You’ll never be free.”

“Shut up! Leave me alone!” He was now screaming, blind to the rest of the world.

“I’ll never leave you alone.” The ghost said, grabbing his face tenderly. The black liquid dripped out of it’s eye socket to reveal familiar steely green eyes. “Because I am you.”

Hiccup went to scream, but the bony hand closed around his throat. Only strangled noises escaped. He cried for help.

“I’m everything that you hate about yourself. I’m the evil within you. The sin that overwhelms you in your weakest moments.”

Hiccup clawed at the hand holding him, tears leaking from his eyes. “Let…me go…”

“As long as you hold this secret, you will drown.”

Distantly, he heard his father cry out for him. “Hiccup?! What’s wrong?!”

“What will it be? Jail?”

“Hiccup! Say something!” Astrid called.

“Or death?”

Hiccup took a shuttering breath, breaking through the horrors of his own mind. “I killed him! I killed Scott!”

Everything that had been haunting him disappeared, and he stood in the kitchen again, his legs trembling and his body drenched in sweat. His family surrounded him.

“What did you say?”

#320 state street #httyd #how to train your dragon #fanfiction #fanfic #hiccup horrendous haddock iii #hiccup #astrid #Astrid Hofferson #modern au

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forkanna · 7 years

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[AO3 LINK] [EF LINK]

NOTE: Yes this one is super short, too. Sorry! Next one will be better.

Let's skip to a couple days later. Not much else happened other than smarmy grossness. Of course, that still wouldn't be the usual level of pure, grade-A Canadian maple sap given that I was part of the relationship, but it was cute. Lots of takeout and movies, gaming, snuggling. Things that I had to get used to since none of my previous significant others had ever stuck around long enough.

Well… other than Scott.

Maybe that's why he was on my mind so much during that time. Literally the only other long-term relationship I'd had was him, and we were in high school, trying to figure ourselves out as much as we were trying to figure out each other and how to combine those two factors. Opening up those memories was like watching him drive away all over again, but I kept doing it. Had to figure out if there was some weird nugget of truth in there somewhere that could help me figure out how not to fuck everything up with Knives.

Scott and I didn't "date" much. It was definitely a benefriends situation; we were buds who started boinking in the back of my parents' car. So all of our activities were about the same as they had been before; practicing music, hanging out with Lisa Miller. We didn't do much that was coupley other than holding hands and sex. From what I heard, Scott got all those romantic experiences from Natalie after he dropped me like a bad habit.

So why did I keep thinking about him if there wasn't much wisdom to be had? Because I didn't have any other experiences to compare it with.

I'm pretty pathetic. But at least I had someone to call and ask for advice. He might not be the most monogamous person I know, but he is a flaming queer, and has had more success in the dating arena than pretty much anyone else in my extended circle. Maybe using my phone-a-friend lifeline counted as cheating, but when working with such a severe handicap, I figure it all shakes out.

~ o ~

"Well, well, well," Wallace Wells half-purred in that voice of his. You know the one. "The redhead."

"That is the colour of my hair, yes," I grumbled.

"Didn't expect to ever hear from you again once Ess Bee Bee and that other thing broke up. See you around in that bump-into-people-you-knew-through-people-in-Honest-Ed's way, sure…"

Gripping my drumstick tighter as I sat on my drumset's seat — the seat of power, a place from which I drew comfort and ability to cope with life — I said, "Same. But I got your number from Stacey, because… I need help."

"'Fraid I'm fresh outta that stuff."

"Help? You're 'out' of help. Really?"

"Yep. The generic kind. But if you elaborate, I might have a specific flavour blend in stock…"

He was definitely going to make me work for this. So I decided to stop being shy and cut through the double-talk and uncertainty. "I'm dating Knives."

The line was quiet for a moment. "That sounds painful. My advice is to buy plenty of bandages for when things get frisky."

"No, Knives Chau. Scott's ex."

"Oh!" he said in a pleasant tone of voice. Even now, I'm not totally sure whether he was trolling me or if he really didn't think I meant her the first time. "She was cute in a Pokémon trainer kind of way. Didn't think you played in the kiddie pool."

"She's in college now, you asshat. But I could use some advice."

"Advice for dating women? Fresh out of that, too."

Gritting my teeth, I said, "Wallace…"

"Alright, alright. So you're edging onto the Rainbow Road and you're afraid of flying off the side. I gotcha. Assuming that's the reason you called me instead of someone else you know…?"

"There's nobody else. Stephen's pretty much the only other person I could call, but he gives terrible advice. Hollie is in Nowhereville with Jason, who knows? And Steph… I just don't know her very well. Or maybe too well. I'm really not sure which."

"That makes me the bartender."

"What?"

"You know, the nameless bartender you tell all your deepest, darkest secrets to in hopes he can give you guidance because you're too blasted to figure out he couldn't care less about your life."

"Fine, nevermind. God, sorry to have bothered you."

But he was chuckling. "Alright, alright. I'm half-kidding; I barely know you and don't care that much, but you're family now. That has to be taken into consideration."

"I'm… family?"

"Gay family. A budding bisexual, right?"

"Y-yeah." I cleared my throat to get rid of that uncertain quaver. "I guess."

"We all start out 'guessing'. It's okay." He let out a long sigh, and there was the sound of something being moved around; he was probably working on something in his apartment, or at his job. Whatever that was. "How long have you two been having playdates?"

"A couple weeks, or whatever," I growled, ignoring the insult.

"How far have you gone?" When I let out a strangled noise, he reassured me, "For informational purposes only. Trust me, I'm not going to get off on two girls doing anything. If there's not at least one dick involved, it's off my curiosity list."

I started to correct him that one was involved, but again I felt that instinct to protect her identity kick in. Maybe I should ask her if she minded me telling people at some point. "Dry-humping. She's kind of… never done it, and I haven't done it with a girl. I swear, if you tell anyb-"

"Lips are sealed. Do you want it to go further?"

"YES! But I mean, only if she's ready."

"Good, that's good. I've had a hesitant date or two. No still means no, and that's more important than all the prep work in the world, but I have a couple ideas that could help get her in the mood."

That one hit me hard. Luckily, I just barely listened to her "no"s when we were drunk as skunks. Nodding as I chewed on my drumstick, I then put it down and said, "That'll help, but I'm actually more worried about… other stuff. Like, how to be in a relationship with a cute, bubbly, fun girl when I'm a vortex of despair."

"Opposites attract. Chances are, she already likes you because you're a vortex of despair. Not usually something people put on their eHarmony profile, though." But apparently, I had him curious. "What other stuff?"

"Dating. I suck at it. Like…" I tried to lower my defenses. "She's so sweet to me, and I feel like I'm just there. Sucking all the fun out of the room. I want her to feel what I feel. Or I guess, to show her that. Something."

"Awww, baby lesbians are so cute. Like puppies."

"Ugh…"

Then he sighed again, a long, floaty sigh of someone toying with someone else. Which would be me. "Alright, never fear — Wallaciraptor is here. Let's help you get rolling…"

~ o ~

When Knives walked in the door, I could tell she was caught off-guard by the way her purse fell to the floor instead of being set down. "Kim? I�� what's going on?"

"Nothing," I lied as I bent over to take the casserole out of the oven, showing off my bare ass. Just below the apron strings. Yes, I really did the cliché. Yes, it was super uncomfortable for me, since I'm not exactly a flesh-flashing kinda girl. But I thought, hey, it was worth a shot. "Making dinner."

Which was also part of the plan. There were multiple parts; I didn't know which one to try, so I tried everything. One big gesture to try and prove to both Knives and myself that I could be a girlfriend, and not just some drummer chick who acts like she's on the rag all the time.

"Yeah, but you're naked! I mean… almost!"

"You like it? I thought the green apron brought out my eyes." It still came out sounding sarcastic, even though I didn't mean for it to. My voice just sounds that way unless I'm actively suppressing the biting tone, and even then sometimes it bleeds through.

"Um…" Deciding not to comment on my butt, she turned toward the stove. "Smells great! We're having casserole?"

"Yes. And garlic bread. That's not done yet, though. And, um…" I glanced at my coffee table, where there was a cabernet open and "breathing" — Wallace's suggestion. I would have just put a couple of beers down to go with dinner, or at least uncorked the wine right before drinking it.

Knives walked over and touched one of the wine glasses with a finger. I got them from a dollar store specifically for this occasion, since I didn't own any before. Then she picked up the remote for the stereo system, which was pretty conspicuous because it was the only other thing on the table. "What's this do?"

"Hit 'play'," I said as I got out plates.

She did. And quiet, soft, romantic piano music started floating out of the speakers. Also from the dollar store, but I listened to the whole CD before using it to make sure it wasn't too terrible. She laughed… but it was a very specific, actual happy laugh. Not so much at my expense as just surprised at the situation, I guess.

"What is all this?" she asked as she went back over to kick off her work shoes and leave them by the purse. "Like… I thought we were just going to have cup ramen and watch TV."

"Wanted to try something else. Um… y-you'll have to tell me if it's any good. Never tried this recipe before." Hell, I don't think I'd ever cooked anything more complex than a frozen pizza in forever.

Once she was in the kitchen, she put her hand in the small of my back. "I'm sure I'll love it." Then she shivered and smiled shyly, withdrawing from the touch. "Not used to touching your skin like that."

"I can change if it's more comfortable for you. This was kind of just… y'know. The 'naked housewife fantasy' bit as a joke. Or maybe not a joke, if you liked it."

"Trying to get me in the mood?" she guessed with a slightly wry smile. When I flushed a little darker, she stopped smiling. "Wait… oh, is this really what that is?"

"Not exactly. But… kind of. I just… wanted to be a good girlfriend, or something like that. I dunno."

The silence was kind of tense. She didn't look angry, just a little confused and contemplating the whole situation. Then she glanced at the oven and back at me.

"How much longer? For the garlic bread."

"About another five. I'll be quick." Clearly, she wanted me in real clothes, which I already had laid out on my dresser. Ready for plan B.

And I was more okay with that than I first expected. Sure, it hurt a little that she didn't know how to feel about me being naked while we ate, but at the same time, neither did I. Just seemed like a weird idea. But Wallace swore it worked like a charm on this one guy he was dating, so I figured I'd give it a shot. No real harm.

Once I was wearing a nice white blouse and a long grey skirt, we got our plates loaded down with casserole and bread and moved things to the table, where we sat cross-legged and ate and drank. She told me about her day, and I told her about mine until the point at which I started getting dinner ready, which I didn't think was interesting — until she started demanding more details with her cute, patient way of doing everything. Incredibly, stories about me buying ingredients and wine glasses was actual entertainment for her.

And somehow, she managed to out-girlfriend me again. Shut up, I know it's not a competition… I know. But even after I drove like a thousand miles outside my comfort zone, hoping to really show her how much I cared and how much she meant to me, Knives was already there and had a jetpack to fly even further. She started doing the dishes as soon as we took our plates to the kitchen, said it was her turn to cook next time when I wasn't expecting it, asked if I had a long day, offered to rub my back when I moved my neck and made the world's tiniest wince… and she gave me the rub, and it felt so good. Told me I looked really cute in the outfit before I could ask. Sweetness and sunshine.

What kind of jerk was she to be so perfect?

To Be Continued…

#kim pine's precious little knives #forkanna writes #scott pilgrim fanfiction #wallace wells #scott pilgrim vs. the world #kim pine #kim x knives #forkanna the writer

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edc-creations-blog · 7 years

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E. N. Joy

The man might be the head of the family, but the woman is definitely the head of the house. Pastor Margie has been doing just fine running her house, as well as the house of the Lord, New Day Temple of Faith, all by her lonesome. As a matter of fact, her motto has been, “I can do better all by myself.”

Well, certain members of the congregation beg to differ. Some of them have been nagging at Margie for so long about finding a help mate that she just might be crazy enough to give it a try. Once her congregation learns the method in which she goes about seeking a man for the house, they might worry for her sanity. After all, a woman of the cloth would have to be certifiably nuts to agree to go on a reality dating show in order to find a husband.

Margie assures her members that she will be just fine, because the Lord will guide her. That may be so, but a former member comes across the miles to offer her help as well. Usually the voice of reason who can speak truth and sense into any situation, even Mother Doreen might not be able to handle this scenario.

As Margie and Doreen navigate the pitfalls of reality television, will the voices of the producers, production team, and not to mention the men—some of whom aren’t even saved—drown out the voice of God?

Watch the book introduction: https://youtu.be/LuJO444ihKA

Chapter Excerpt: Lady of the House by E. N. Joy

“Sister Melanie, did I just see you steal money from the church offering basket?” Doreen stood in the doorway of the church treasurer’s office. She’d just seen the church treasurer take one of the white tithes and offering envelopes and slip it into her sweater pocket.

Melanie shot up out of her seat. “First Lady Doreen!”

“It’s church policy that you don’t count the funds without myself, pastor, or another member of the finance board. You know what this means, don’t you? You’re going to have to resign from your position as church treasurer until you’ve been delivered from that pilfering spirit.” Doreen walked around the desk to where Melanie stood. “You know we are a place of healing and deliverance, so you definitely need to be here so we can minister that spirit of theft right on out of you.” Mother Doreen gave Melanie a great big Holy Ghost hug. “We love you.”

“And I love you too,” Melanie said, returning the gesture of hugging Doreen. “That’s why I would never—”

“Hey, you two.” Pastor Wallace Frey, senior pastor of Living Word Living Waters and Doreen’s husband, entered the room in a rush. “Sorry, I’m late, Sister Melanie.” He turned to close the door. “I know it’s my week to help you count the money.” He turned around to see his wife and Melanie releasing each other from a hug. Both their eyes were cast downward. “Is everything okay?”

“No, Pastor, everything is not okay.” Doreen nodded to the chair her husband stood by. “You might want to sit down for this.” He took his wife’s advice and sat.

“Honey, I know Sister Melanie has been with this church longer than I have,” Doreen said. “Which is why it pains me to see her have to go.”

Wallace hadn’t even gotten comfortable in the chair before he shot up right out of it. “What? Sister Melanie, you can’t quit.” He stepped around the desk and placed his hand on Melanie’s shoulder. “Whatever it is, I’ll make it right. I don’t understand why you didn’t come to me with something as serious and life changing as you deciding to quit.”

“That’s because I didn’t decide to quit,” Melanie said.

“What?” Wallace was confused. “If you didn’t quit . . .” He allowed his eyes to travel from Melanie to his wife, the only other person in the room who might be able to offer him up some answers.

“I had to let Sister Melanie go,” Doreen said, answering her husband’s unasked question. “Sister Melanie was fired.”

Wallace went and sat back down in the chair while shaking his head. “This isn’t The Apprentice. We don’t up and tell folks, ‘You’re fired,’ especially not folks like Sister Melanie. Not one who has served as an outstanding member of Living Word Living Waters since I can’t remember how many years.”

“Seven,” Doreen said. It was obvious she’d been keeping count. She wasn’t sure whether that was consciously or subconsciously. She could understand how her husband must feel losing a church leader, but a part of her couldn’t help but wonder if he’d be acting this way had it been any one other than Sister Melanie. “I don’t go around firing folks, that is, unless they’re stealing from the church.”

“You saw Sister Melanie stealing?”

Doreen nodded. “Took an envelope from the offering just as I was entering the office.”

Wallace looked at Melanie. In that instance, she looked up from the ground and locked eyes with her pastor. He shot her a knowing look.

“I’m sorry, Pastor Frey. I’ll clear my things out now.” Melanie’s eyes darted with nervousness. “I’ll go to the supply room and get some boxes.” She hurriedly walked to the office door.

With each step Melanie took, Wallace looked as though he wanted to stop her. This didn’t go unnoticed by Doreen. She surveyed the scene and waited with bated breath for fear of what her husband’s next action would mean, not only to the ministry, but to their marriage. If her husband stopped Melanie from leaving, then she’d know his was personal and not church business.

At the beginning of her and Wallace’s courtship, he had not hesitated to let Doreen know he and Melanie had been a couple long before Doreen had ever been thought of. But the sparks between them was no more. Just the love of Christ. That was the story Wallace had passed on to Doreen, and she’d believed him . . . up until now.

Doreen could hear her heart thumping loudly. She could hear her own deep breaths sounding like a gust of wind. She could hear loud and clear that voice inside her head begging and pleading to her husband to not stop Melanie; that he allow her to walk through that door. A man of God, her husband, wouldn’t think twice about letting a church employee go after being caught stealing. A man in love, though, perhaps not.

She watched as Melanie made her way through the threshold of the doorway. The corners of Doreen’s mouth raised into a slight smile as she now exhaled. She closed her eyes and thanked God that her worst fear had not come to pass. However, perhaps Doreen had thanked God a little too soon, as before she could even open her eyes she heard Wallace call out, “Melanie, wait. Don’t go!”

( Continued… )

© 2017 All rights reserved. Book excerpt reprinted by permission of the author, E.N. Joy. Do not reproduce, copy or use without the author’s written permission. This excerpt is used for promotional purposes only.

Purchase Lady of the House by E.N. Joy Christian Fiction. Book Three of the Forever Divas Series https://www.amazon.com/Lady-House-Three-Forever-Divas/dp/1622867513

About the Author BLESSEDselling Author E. N. Joy is the author behind the “New Day Divas,” “Still Divas,” “Always Divas” and “Forever Divas” series, all which have been coined “Soap Operas in Print.” She is an Essence Magazine Bestselling Author who wrote secular books under the names Joylynn M. Jossel and JOY. Her title, If I Ruled the World, earned her a book blurb from Grammy Award Winning Artist, Erykah Badu. An All Night Man, an anthology she penned with New York Times Bestselling Author Brenda Jackson, earned the Borders bestselling African American romance award. Her Urban Fiction title, Dollar Bill (Triple Crown Publications), appeared in Newsweek and has been translated to Japanese.

After thirteen years of being a paralegal in the insurance industry, E. N. Joy divorced her career and married her mistress and her passion; writing. In 2000, she formed her own publishing company where she published her books until landing a book deal with St. Martin’s Press. This award winning author has been sharing her literary expertise on conference panels in her home town of Columbus, Ohio as well as cities across the country. She also conducts publishing/writing workshops for aspiring writers.

Her children’s book titled The Secret Olivia Told Me, written under the name N. Joy, received a Coretta Scott King Honor from the American Library Association. The book was also acquired by Scholastic Books and has sold almost 100,000 copies. Elementary and middle school children have fallen in love with reading and creative writing as a result of the readings and workshops E. N. Joy instructs in schools nationwide.

In addition, she is the artistic developer for a young girl group named DJHK Gurls. She pens original songs, drama skits and monologues for the group that deal with messages that affect today’s youth, such as bullying.

After being the first content development editor for Triple Crown Publications and ten years as the acquisitions editor for Carl Weber’s Urban Christian imprint, E. N. Joy now does freelance editing, ghostwriting, write-behinds and literary consulting. Her clients have included New York Times Bestselling authors, entertainers, aspiring authors, as well as first-time authors. Some notable literary consulting clients include actor Christian Keyes and singer Olivia Longott.

You can visit BLESSEDselling Author E. N. Joy at http://www.enjoywrites.com or email her at [email protected]. Facebook: AuthorENJoy Twitter: @enjoywrites Website: http://www.enjoywrites.com Pinterest: @authorENjoy Periscope: @Author_E_N_Joy Instagram: @bestselling_author_enjoy LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/enjoywrites YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/user/enjoywrites Google: https://plus.google.com/106225352418367600340 GoodReads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/1159242.E_N_Joy

Lady of the House by E. N. Joy The man might be the head of the family, but the woman is definitely the head of the house.

#Chick Lit #Urban Christian Fiction #Women’s Fiction

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cantbuymemeth · 7 years

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1 “Evergreen” 1/5 The family of a rebellious teenager (Amber Tamblyn) moves to a gated community which has a unique and grisly way of dealing with troubled youth.

2 “One Night at Mercy” 3/5 A doctor named Dr. Jay Ferguson saves a strange patient (Jason Alexander) from suicide, only to learn that he is Death incarnate looking to take a break from his life’s work.

3 “Shades of Guilt” 4/5 After leaving a dark-skinned professor (Hill Harper) who’s asking for help, Matt McGreevy (Vincent Ventresca) soon learns to regret his action as he slowly begins to resemble the man.

4 “Dream Lover” 1/5 A comic book graphic artist named Andrew Lomax (Adrian Pasdar) somehow makes his dream girl (Shannon Elizabeth) real to help him with his writer’s block. However, who is real and who is fictional becomes unclear.

5 “Cradle of Darkness” 1/5 A woman (Katherine Heigl) working for a time travel organization is sent back in time to kill Adolf Hitler in infancy and prevent his reign of terror.

6 “Night Route” 4/5 After nearly being hit by a car, a female English professor named Melina Kroner (Ione Skye) is haunted by a strange bus appearing in her street.

7 “Time Lapse” 1/5 An orderly named Zack Walker (Ethan Embry), suffering from blackouts, learns that the gaps in time that he can’t remember were the result of a cop—briefly switching bodies with him—trying to prevent the assassination of the President’s daughter.

8 “Dead Man’s Eyes” 3/5 After the husband of Lauren Janus (Portia de Rossi) is murdered, she is inconsolable. At the trial, she absentmindedly places his glasses on her face—and suddenly, she is able to see through his eyes. The glasses recorded the man’s last moments, so his wife decides to try and solve the case—but she must face a very dangerous and familiar murderer.

9 “The Pool Guy” 3/5 A pool cleaner named Richie Almares (Lou Diamond Phillips) is having a recurring nightmare of a deceased man (Mackenzie Gray) who keeps telling him to wake up before shooting him.

10 “Azoth the Avenger Is a Friend of Mine” 1/5 A young boy named Craig Henson (Rory Culkin), beset by an abusive father and neighborhood bullies, wills his favorite superhero Azoth the Avenger (Patrick Warburton) to life, who teaches him about vengeance and courage.

11 “The Lineman” 2/5 After being struck by lightning, a lineman named Tyler Ward (Jeremy Piven) gains the ability to hear other people’s thoughts. Using his newfound powers for his own personal and financial gain, he soon realizes that everything comes with a price.

12 “Harsh Mistress” 1/5 A struggling musician named Cory Williams (Lukas Haas) purchases an infamous guitar, which leads to him gaining vast international stardom and wealth, but both come with a surprising price tag.

13 “Upgrade” 4/5 A housewife named Annie (Susanna Thompson), humiliated by her loutish husband and unruly children, wishes for a better life, only to find that reality wants to replace her as well.

14 “To Protect and Serve” 5/5 An idealistic police officer named Eric Boggs (Usher), determined to keep a prostitute (Samantha Becker) safe from her pimp, will stop at nothing in this world to protect her.

15 “Chosen” 5/5 A hopeless and destitute man named Vincent Hansen (Jake Busey) angrily rebuffs two persistent missionaries who may well have the answer to all of his problems at the time when some people start to disappear.

16 “Sensuous Cindy” 1/5 Having sworn off all other women upon getting engaged, a man named Benjamin Baker (Greg Germann) is put to the test by a virtual-reality beauty named Cindy (Jaime Pressly).

17 “Hunted” 1/5 A futuristic society is attacked by a vicious and mysterious murderer.

18 “Mr. Motivation” 1/5 A sinister toy doll (voiced by Pat O'Brien) encourages a timid man named Charles Stickney (Wallace Langham) to stand up to his boss Rick (Christopher McDonald) and take control of his life.

19 “Sanctuary” 2/5 Stranded in a modern day Garden of Eden, a sports agent named Scott Turner (Rob Estes) and a real estate agent named Marisa Sanborn (Elizabeth Berkley) soon find their idyllic world crumbling thanks to an injured motorcyclist (Nicki Aycox) and her working cell phone.

20 “Future Trade” 3/5 A man named Martin Donner (Frank Whaley) with a dead-end job at a big-box store and a dysfunctional family is lured into trading his future for that of a seemingly privileged man with a trophy wife (Sofia Milos). But he must have forgotten the age-old cliché: if something seems too good to be true, it probably is.

21 “Found and Lost” 2/5 A businessman named Sean Moore (Brian Austin Green) gets a chance to revisit the past and make another bid for Elizabeth Wicker (Moira Kelly) who was the woman that he loved.

22 “Gabe’s Story” 3/5 A deliveryman named Gabe O'Brien (Christopher Titus) suffering from consistent bad luck is given a surprising chance to change his destiny.

23 “Last Lap” 5/5 A terminally ill young man named Andy Perez (Clifton Collins, Jr.) and his best friend Marco Flores (Greg Serano) take a final ride in their souped-up racer that results in unexpected consequences for both.

24 “The Path” 2/5 A dissatisfied tabloid journalist named Ally Warner (Linda Cardellini) entrusts her fate in the hands of a fortune teller named Kamayo (Method Man) who gives her scoops in advance. However, her “sure thing” has hidden problems.

25 “Fair Warning” 4/5 A flower shop clerk named Tina Bishop (Taryn Manning) is viciously stalked by one of the multiple personalities of a troubled pet store employee named George Straitton (Devon Gummersall).

26 “Another Life” 5/5 Famous rapper Marvin Gardens (Wood Harris) overcame a tough childhood in the projects to become a millionaire with a wife, son, and mansion. However, painful, confusing visions plague him to the point that the thin line between real and fantasy is crossed.

27 “Rewind” 2/5 A compulsive gambler named Jonah Beach (Eddie Kaye Thomas) mysteriously learns how to travel back in time, believes he has found a sure bet to win big at the casinos. He soon discovers, however, that everything is a gamble.

28 “Tagged” 1/5 A gang member and tagger named Marcus Fisher (Todd Williams) confesses to murder when a mural painted by the victim transforms itself into a version of the crime scene.

29 “Into the Light” 2/5 A teacher (Samantha Mathis) gains the power to predict death.

30 “It’s Still a Good Life” 0/5 In the sequel to the 1961 episode “It’s a Good Life”, Anthony Fremont (Bill Mumy), the young boy who once terrorized his town with his amazing mental powers, is now a man and the proud father of a little girl (Liliana Mumy) whose mental powers are stronger than his.

31 “The Monsters Are on Maple Street” 0/5 In this update of the 1960 episode “The Monsters Are Due on Maple Street,” a neighborhood begins suspecting their new neighbors of terrorism after the power and water get cut off.

32 “Memphis” 4/5 A law clerk named Ray Ellison (Eriq La Salle) with only six months to live due to a brain tumor finds himself in Memphis, Tennessee in 1968 on the day Martin Luther King, Jr. is going to be assassinated.

33 “How Much Do You Love Your Kid?” 5/5 A woman named Donna Saicheck (Bonnie Somerville) who is contemplating divorce from her husband Ted (Steve Bacic) gets a phone call from the police that her son has been kidnapped. Donna then sees this as part of a twisted reality game show hosted by a man known as Nick Dark (Wayne Knight).

34 “The Placebo Effect” 5/5 A description of an unnamed disease that the hypochondriac Harry Raditch (Jeffrey Combs) supposedly has comes to life when those around him become infected.

35 “Cold Fusion” 4/5 A brilliant physicist named Paul Thorson (Sean Patrick Flanery) is ordered by the military to a remote Arctic lab where the final start-up preparations for an infinite power source are taking place. He becomes involved in a deadly psychological struggle with the device’s creator (Ian McShane).

36 “The Pharaoh’s Curse” 3/5 An aspiring magician named Mario Devlin (Shawn Hatosy) seeks to learn the secret behind a legendary trick by legendary magician Harry Kellogg (Xander Berkeley).

37 “The Collection” 5/5 A night of babysitting turns to cold terror when a young woman named Miranda Evans (Jessica Simpson) realizes that the eerily lifelike doll collection of her client Danielle Rander (Ashley Edner) may explain the mysterious disappearances of the previous babysitters.

38 “Eye of the Beholder” 0/5 In this remake of the classic Twilight Zone episode, a beautiful woman named Janet Tyler (Molly Sims) in a futuristic society where everyone is hideous undergoes her 11th attempt at surgically being like everyone else.

39 “Developing” 2/5 A young photographer named Edie Durant (Robin Tunney) discovers photos of her dead fiancé that could never had been taken and remains convinced that it is her deceased lover calling her to be with him in death.

40 “The Executions of Grady Finch” 3/5 A death row inmate named Grady Finch (Jeremy Sisto) claims to his lawyer Liz (Alicia Witt) that he is innocent as an unknown force ends up interfering in his executions.

41 “Homecoming” 2/5 An army officer named Rob Malone (Gil Bellows) comes home to try and make amends with his wayward son Trace (Penn Badgley) before the boy learns his terrible secret.

42 “Sunrise” 5/5 Five college students named Marty (Jonathan Jackson), Amber (Sarah Carter), Noah (Michael Peña), Eve (Lauren Lee Smith), and Wesley (Tyler Labine) explore an Aztec site. They carelessly knock over a jug filled with blood and in an instant, the sun goes out. The Earth will die unless something is done. According to some carvings, the only way to reverse the curse is to sacrifice someone.

43 “Burned” 1/5 An agoraphobic real-estate mogul named Scott Crane (Jason Bateman) is haunted by the ghosts of twin children killed in an arson he paid a man to commit.

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