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clericbyers · 5 years

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learning to heal (interlude: the progression)

excerpt: On the weekends when the Party would group together and whisper stories in the night until exhaustion took them over, Mike would catch eyes with Will and feel something loosen in his chest at the fact that his best friend was okay. Almost like a rusty screw, untwisting from the hole in Mike’s heart it had screwed itself into as a flimsy patch job and the released pressure would leak relief through his veins. Everyone was safe. Everyone was okay. Will was safe, Will was okay, Will was here. School would come five days a week, El would kiss him every night that week before he biked back home, and the weekend would start anew with the friends he cared about most huddled together with comfort.

length: 15.1K words

POV: Mike Wheeler

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tag list: @vaugency, @lifeinvirtualreality, @princestanley, @berkkmans, @smhbyler, @ticomat, @lightswriting, @lithhiums, @lullabyers, @byers-remorse, @cstlebyrs, @lomlbyers, @babybyuns, @mavencslore, @lazy-storm-clouds, @waikidaby ♡

The first time it happened, Mike didn’t think much of it. It being a multitude of things but mainly focusing on a particular murkiness in the back of his head that lingered after the fact. He had kissed El at the Snowball that night and it was...it was nice. She kissed back that time, too, acknowledged his feelings for her that he had been trying to forget about when he thought she wouldn’t return. He didn’t really understand what the feelings were—a hefty blend of gratitude, affection, care, and confusion about liking a girl for the first time—but he thought they were nice enough to let linger. It was better than facing the gloomy emotions clenching his heart each time he took a breath and remembered the spore-infested tunnels he and the Party had traveled through with Steve. It was better than confronting the panic that took his throat in a tight grip whenever he passed by his middle school whether on a casual drive with his family or at the start of the next semester. No one seemed to notice him choke up in conversation and that was fine for Mike. He didn’t mind no one knowing and besides, the topic of conversation was usually something funny enough to bring his attention back before anyone could notice in the first place.

The second time it happened, Mike was a bit more concerned about it. It being not a multitude of things but a particular fright that paralyzed him under the shadows brought by night. The happiness he had been basking in since getting El back, spending time with a non-possessed Will, and hanging out with Lucas and Dustin playing video games seemingly vanished with the ease of a puff of cigarette smoke. All that was left behind was the grimy aftertaste staining his emotions a dirty yellow until the brightness found in happy thoughts was muted into black. This was not Mike’s first time having nightmares; no, he had his fair share after Will’s disappearance but this one was different. Nightmares about reliving traumatic events was normal at this point for all the kids. Mike organized sleepovers every other weekend in the year after Will’s return and they each helped each other sleep through the night when nothing else could help. It was his duty to make sure his friends felt safe, so he tried his best; careful not to tiptoe and make anyone feel weak but always keeping an eye out for what could trigger his friends’ new anxieties. Mike knew that Will hated the darkness and needed a nightlight to sleep along with his prescription medications, he knew that Lucas liked holding something in his arms when he slept, he knew that Dustin was still frightened by Mike jumping off the cliff and often liked sitting closer to him when they hung out. He knew that Will hated the cold and wore sweaters everywhere he could, he knew Dustin didn’t like when people mentioned dads so he avoided complaining about his own, he knew Lucas felt immense guilt toward dismissing El only to seemingly lose her and was a great listening ear when Mike felt sad about losing El himself.

Mike knew his friends. He knew what they needed and put that first, and yet, he sat in the dark with grimy yellow in his thoughts and black ink bleeding down his spine, wondering how he could be so foolish to start having such unrealistic nightmares himself. This fright was based in losing El again, in losing Will, in losing Dustin, Lucas, and Max, too. In knowing all he did about his friends and still not being enough to save them. He nearly lost Will to the Mind Flayer after all just a month ago and El had sacrificed herself (again) to close the gate. He watched Will have the Mind Flayer burned out of him, listened to Will screaming in pain and being unable to do anything to stop it. He watched Bob torn to shreds by the Demodogs and still felt the chills from tunnels rippling down his spine if he thought about it hard enough. All this burrowed deep inside where no one could touch came spilling over the edges into his unconscious dreams until they morphed into nightmares and left him gasping for air in the darkness of the night.

This was not a favorable situation. How could Mike be there for his friends when he felt like this? When he let his mind get distracted enough to pull from memories he’d rather not re-experience and force him to relive them in his sleep? The lingering shadows left from the nightmares was given a cursory glance in comparison to the underlying fear Mike felt about being exposed as so overemotional he couldn’t get a grip on his sleep. It was an unfair standard to hold himself to, what with him easily being there for his friends if they had nightmares during their bi-monthly group sleepovers, but he held himself to it anyway. The Party looked up to Mike; they counted on him when Will first disappeared and when Will was possessed. Even if the gate was closed, the horrors of the Upside Down still crawled about their minds. Mike could not afford to be weak in the face of that.

Surprisingly enough, Mike found his support in El. She was separate from everything else; she made him feel something new, something he couldn’t describe in full but he knew it was what he wanted to like, what he needed to like. She was a way to escape himself despite her presence being an equal reminder of the terrors Mike had faced months prior. It didn’t really matter when he would close his eyes and lean in toward her, press their lips together and take in the soft warmth left by the pressure. He liked kissing El, how the action forced him to close his eyes and not think about anything else but the moment. He liked how she giggled against his lips, made him feel a little fuzzy inside because someone willingly liked him. She didn’t have to like Mike—in his mind, anyone was fair game for her—but she liked him and it felt so good to be wanted in such a fashion.

A mixtape was playing whenever they kissed the night away, usually something Will gave Mike a long while ago. The songs made Mike hyper, it reminded him when he would spend time in his basement dancing with the Party to the latest hits after finishing a campaign. It was a great combination that left him leaving Hopper’s cabin feeling refreshed and almost invincible. There was no need for stupid nightmares when he had El to turn to, when he had someone who cared for him in a way no one else did and made fresh, new memories that could overlay the bad ones.

But then on the weekends when the Party would group together and whisper stories in the night until exhaustion took them over, Mike would catch eyes with Will and feel something loosen in his chest at the fact that his best friend was okay. Almost like a rusty screw, untwisting from the hole in Mike’s heart it had screwed itself into as a flimsy patch job and the released pressure would leak relief through his veins. Everyone was safe. Everyone was okay. Will was safe, Will was okay, Will was here. School would come five days a week, El would kiss him every night that week before he biked back home, and the weekend would start anew with the friends he cared about most huddled together with comfort. And if it happened again, if the nightmares came back and squeezed his throat until tears bled from his eyes, if that sickly yellow painted his scars and left him weary at school the next day, Mike had El to turn to. She liked him no matter what, she wanted him despite the isolation Hopper enforced on her. She wore baggy jeans and Hopper’s old plaid button ups and Mike liked it. He liked how she made him forget about the nightmares, about the confusion he felt toward her in the first place.

Then summer arrived with the blazing, hot warmth of the long lasting sun. Summer was the season for fun, for reviving and maintaining friendships, for spending hours at the newly opened Starcourt mall and bugging Steve Harrington at Scoops’ Ahoy for free entry into the movie theater. So, yes, summer started off pleasant enough. The Party (Max included) would hang out during the day, but Hopper was strict about El not being seen for another six months at least. They had to wait out a full year before allowing her to be fully in the public eye again and summer only brought it to about 7 months. So Mike hung out with El in turn, keeping her company when he could and while she wanted it. Given the fact that isolation was how she lived most her life, Mike couldn’t say he was surprised when she wanted to spend literally all night and day with him. He couldn’t say he didn’t want it either. Or at least want the distraction—need the distraction—to avoid another problem.

Mike liked El. He really did, and he cared about her in a way different from everyone else. But at the end of the day, when he biked from Hopper’s cabin and let the summer breeze cool the sweat on his neck, he found his thoughts easily wandering. Those thoughts wandered to that screw in his heart, the one that released itself whenever he made eye contact with Will. How the release of relief wasn’t only relief, even if he never wanted to admit it. He could still taste the tears in his mouth from that night; the night in the shed where Will almost lost to the Mind Flayer. He could hear his own voice echoing repeatedly in his head. You said yes, you said yes, you said yes like a mantra, each syllable timed to the beat of his slow, uneven pedalling. How could Mike ever forget his own vulnerability in that moment? The way his heart skipped a beat at the mere thought that this could be the end? Mike recalled a day he kept so dear to his heart in hopes that Will would remember it, too. And Will did and it saved him for just a moment longer and Mike knew, he knew then and there, that something was different. The hole in his heart made weary in the 3 days he had spent by Will’s side could only be filled by one thing and one thing only: Will’s own affection.

Mike tried, he really did. He tried to fill that hole with other things, with D&D campaigns and Saturday evenings at the arcade, with El’s lips against his own and Dustin’s leg pressed up against his during a TV reruns morning at the Sinclair’s. The screw worked but it hurt; it hurt every day until he could look into Will’s eyes and have concrete confirmation that the other boy was alive. He tried to ignore how the brunt of his nightmares focused on Will’s own misery, on how he snapped awake to the echo of Will’s cries in the back of his head. He would kiss El more furiously on those days, desperate to cling to reality and ignore how much he’d rather be side-by-side with Will doing nothing as reruns of Cheers aired. And once—but once turned out to be enough to start a bigger problem—Mike’s thoughts dipped into more than sitting side-by-side, drifted into mindless daydreams where his hands fisted in short, soft hair and his lips kissed away a smile he had memorized since he before he could read. He tried to tell himself it was El but deep down he knew better. He knew that when he closed his eyes he wasn’t thinking of her anymore and that was frightening.

Mike Wheeler was scared. He was scared of his own mind, of his own thoughts, of his own desires. Scared of filling that hole with what it wanted, scared of admitting there was even a hole in the first place. He didn’t want to need something. He was Michael Wheeler, paladin and Dungeon Master, de facto leader of the Party. He had survived a living nightmare, he had helped get his best friend back and got a girlfriend in the process. He didn’t need anything more, but he certainly wanted it and that frightened him more than anything. That drove him to need El for distraction and that need drove him away from his friends.

By the end of June, the weekend sleepovers were a thing of the past. No one particularly mentioned how the absence slowly crept into their routine as much as it had originally crept in in the first place. Mike found himself waking up from more nightmares, neck peppered with goosebumps as he stared across his room at the walkie talkie he often felt he didn’t have the right to use. It was an interesting jumble of feelings he felt toward the device, how it morphed from a way to maintain close contact with his best friend to the sole way Mike contacted El whenever Hopper half-kicked him out the cabin. The machine was different now. Mike was different too through his relationship with it. He couldn’t rely on childish crutches any longer, he wouldn’t allow himself to at the very least given the direction his thoughts had taken.

It was time to grow up.

Dustin’s return from Camp Knowhere managed to bring the Party together soon enough. Reuniting to organize a surprise welcome back party brought old party dynamics to the forefront which was a relief for Mike while confusion riddled his brain more often than not. Over the Party’s many years of friendship, the Wheeler basement had become home base for activities ranging from D&D nights to sleepovers and everything in between. Grouping together to organize a surprise for Dustin meant coming over to the Wheeler house and when Mike opened the door to let his friends in, it struck him how they hadn’t come to visit in awhile. Seeing Lucas and Will laughing between themselves about an inside joke as they descended down the stairs to the basement made something in Mike’s chest tighten. He suddenly missed this tight-knit friendship with a deep urge, this bond between the five of them that had yet to be broken despite the neglect Mike very well could admit he had partaken in, even if he wasn’t going to voice that aloud if he could help it.

El was able to come over, too, which was an absolute blast. She hadn’t seen much of anyone else during the summer so far so a lot of the first hour of planning wasn’t really planning and was mostly catching El up on what everyone else had been doing over the summer. Mike tried to ignore how he immediately went to sit next to Will on the couch as everyone else settled about the room. It was a subconscious thing, finding Will and commanding his legs to take him to the other boy no matter who was in his way. It was only after he sat down and heard Will’s small hey that Mike realized he hadn’t even thought about it, it was just second nature. As the party planning commenced, Mike found himself very distracted by Will’s leg pressed up against his. Mike couldn’t ignore how Will leaned into him a little when talking to Max, who was on Mike’s other side sitting on the arm of the coch. Mike kept his eyes tuned on El as he internally battled the emotions and thoughts brought by his proximity to Will. Lucas caught on pretty quickly and called Mike out for his staring. He playfully begged Mike to stop making heart eyes El for the minute it would take to check out the sketches for the banner they had moved on to discussing. The sketches were drawn by Will and it wasn’t masterful or anything along those lines, simply drawing out where they would paint the text and what colorful patterns they wanted to use to decorate the rest of the banner.

Mike knew this. He knew these sketches weren’t anything to write home about but as he turned to face Will fully as the boy at his side leaned in a little more so he could share the designs, Mike was caught in a thought about how much better Will’s drawings had become. Just from something as simple as a banner design sketch. There was something about having been by Will’s side for so long, watching him draw constantly from their D&D characters to random landscapes from nights in the forest—didn’t Will mention something once before about wanting to perfect his landscape drawings?—and being able to notice his artistic skills progress this much. Mike still had drawings plastered on the walls of the basement and his eyes flickered up to one near the couch with a memory-laden smile on his lips. Mike then realized how he hadn’t seen any of Will’s recent sketches this summer, which was perhaps why seeing this banner sketch set off so many emotions inside him.

Will looked up at him with curiosity in his eyes and his head tilted oh-so-gently to the side, a crooked smile on his lips as he awaited Mike’s approval, and Mike felt like throwing up from the intense emotions that slammed through his chest and burbled up his throat. Everything in his life sickeningly jostled sideways, everything about who he thought he was left his mind as empty as a desert, until all he could think about was that one emotion he felt whenever he looked at Will that wasn’t relief. The one emotion that built the daydream he didn’t want to think about. Mike couldn’t put a name to it but it lived alongside the fact he wanted Will’s affection and it screamed in his soul that his want for that affection was rooted in where exactly his own desires toward Will stood in the scheme of things.

There were basic facts about life such as the sky is blue and one plus one equals two. There were simple facts about people, too. Mike hated athletic activity and would rather keel over and die than have to participate in any extracurricular sport. Mike’s mom and dad didn’t really talk anymore to the point where Mike had trouble remembering the last time he saw the two together in a room when it wasn’t dinnertime and when they weren’t arguing. Nancy was often annoyed when she came back from her internship at the paper downtown. There were facts that were proven true despite the contrary belief. Things like tax cuts for the rich didn’t actually help anyone but the rich. Defunding health care services to move money toward military spending didn’t actually help the average citizen. And lastly, there were facts that were as undeniable as the sky’s color and basic addition but they were treated more like secrets stored deep in places not meant to be explored. Facts such as the fact Mike wanted Will's affection because he wanted his own to be returned.

It was probably a very inappropriate time to come to this conclusion—what with the Party waiting for his response on Will’s drawing—and though Mike mindlessly agreed and got the conversation back on track, he still couldn’t stop thinking about it. His mind was trained on Will’s closeness with an intensity he didn’t want and the nausea that followed was so intense, he had to lean back against the couch and close his eyes. That of course made Will concerned so he leaned in closer to Mike, which made Mike feel more sick as his eyes subconsciously danced down to Will’s moving lips. He was grateful though that Will wasn’t much of a touchy person as Mike probably would have jumped out of his seat and ran upstairs if Will laid a hand on him.

When the meeting ended, El went back to the cabin with Lucas and Max while Will stayed behind after Karen invited him for the sake of having company. Mike frankly didn’t want to see Will for another second but Nancy was excited to see Will again and spent most of dinner asking him about how his summer went and how Mrs. Byers was doing. The conversation gave Mike the chance to distract himself with his meal and ignore whatever tension his parents were exuding from across the table. Will always looked so comfortable sitting at the Wheeler’s table and Mike found it a tad too enjoyable seeing his best friend so at place amongst the rest of his family. Will was always a welcome presence, all of the Party was without a doubt, but Mike couldn’t stop thinking about how natural it was for him to picture Will at the table every night. This was a thought he never had about El who was still something of a secret, would always be a secret as long as she had to hide who she truly was concerning her past and her powers.

Mike took the opportunity to bike Will back to the Byers to get some fresh air even though he would be spending the next ten minutes with the reason behind his turmoil. His mom reminded him not to linger, his sister told him to pass along a hello to Ms. Byers, and his dad grumbled wordlessly from the head of the table while reading his newspaper. The bike ride itself was calm and mostly silent, letting the wind say what she needed between the two. Mike spared a glance toward his friend ahead of him and biked over a pebble in the process after catching the way the breeze tousled his hair back from his face. Mike was so screwed, so fucking screwed. They talked once during the ride to confirm plans for sneaking into the theater to watch Day of the Dead before Dustin returned and Mike didn’t allow himself to speak more than affirmatives, both to keep himself from saying anything that could be detrimental to their friendship and also because he was a bit winded from the ride anyway.

Ms. Byers was grateful as ever that Mike returned Will safely and mentioned in passing that it had been a while since she last saw Mike in the first place. Mike felt a little guilty about how the summer had passed but he could do little to change it at this point. Even still, when Will went inside after a soft see you later and equally gentle wave goodbye, Mike was struck with the urge to find El and reaffirm whatever was happening between them. Reaffirm that El was his girlfriend and he liked her and whatever affection he wanted from and had for Will wasn’t the same type he had from and for El. It wasn’t the same at all, it shouldn’t be the same. And when Mike returned home to find his dad ranting to his mom about how the military’s continued discharge of homosexuals was bettering the defensive powers of America, telling her how if it wasn’t war that would kill them then “nature’s revenge on gay men” as Bucannan said certainly would, Mike knew it couldn’t be the same.

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#byler #byeler #mike wheeler #the party #lth fic #yams writes #lth #learning to heal #lth interlude the progression #otp: palaric

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candidcanine · 5 years

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A Sadness Runs Through Him

I listened to this song right here and was gross sobbing at the thought of 2D dedicating this song to a certain bassist. Couldn’t help myself; had to write a fic inspired by the lyrics of this song. Enjoy I guess :P

Fic Summary: 2D has always had a front-row seat to the self-destruction of Murdoc Niccals.

You're Stuart Pot, and you can't make heads or tails of the man named Murdoc Niccals.

Your story starts off with your typical weekday shift as a minimum wage store clerk in a music shop: no customers in sight for hours on end. You've done nothing but stock shelves for the day. You're dangerously close to nodding off when a group of passers-by outside the shop scatter in panic like a herd of wild gazelle.

Then it happens.

The bright glare of car headlights blinds you. There's no other warning; just a millisecond-long flash of a driver's sharklike grin behind a steering wheel. The bumper of a battered Vauxhall Astra shatters the display window of your shop, colliding painfully with your skull. Your vision fades to black.

The next thing you know, you're waking from unconsciousness with your face pressed to the pavement and both of your eyes hurting like no pain you've felt before. Slowly you sit up, finding yourself sitting in a circle of strangers gaping at you in shock. Your confused gaze lands on a car with a broken windshield whose driver side's door opens. A strange man steps out of the car and saunters toward you.

He stops right in front of you and appraises your appearance openly.

Your world slows. Your vision is muddy, your joints are screaming for reprieve, and you are missing teeth you swear you still had the last time you checked, but the man standing in front of you is wearing such a hungry look in his eyes that it grabs your full attention despite your immense pain. You assume you look about as good as you feel right now, but he's staring at you like you're a celebrity who's come to personally give him a winning lottery ticket.

"Little Stuart," the stranger drawls, hooking an arm around your waist. "Finally back in the land of the living, I see. You look great with both of your eyes in the same color again."

He tells you that ten months had passed since you were last awake. That you were in a car accident that put you in a coma. That you were in another car accident that put you out of said coma. You don't question how he had known your name or why he was so nonchalant while giving you these details because you're caught off guard by the cheeky smirk that's on his face.

"If I hadn't had your head smashed in again, who knows when you would've woken up?" he said. "Be grateful I didn't leave you a vegetable for too long."

Then he pats your back and walks away like he's expecting you to follow.

You're instantly starstruck.

You naively assume he had saved your life by waking you up, and he does nothing to dispel the notion. Instead, he takes to the farce like a newly hatched duckling takes to water, stealing your misplaced gratitude and returning it by (barely) tolerating your existence and responding to your adoration with well-timed punches to the gut. He humors you at first, likely interested in you because of your unique pair of onyx eyes and blue hair, but gets so tired of your endless babble that he tells you that his "community service" has been "rendered" and he doesn't need to "babysit someone who clearly needs to be checked in a psych ward."

But then you sing for him in a last-ditch effort to gain back his interest, and he discovers exactly how musically talented you are.

His personality does a quick 180. He starts entertaining you again, showing you a charming side to him that you had never seen directed at you before. He subtly compliments your skill. He mentions that he had been in a few bands with keyboardists that didn't even have a fraction of the talent you have. He rambles about a band he wants to put together, which is sadly lacking a vocalist that it desperately needed.

He had to have you on board his still-nonexistent band. Never mind that you had a life, a home, and a family; never mind that you had plans for the future that did not involve music in any way, shape or form. You were useful to him, so you had to go, no questions asked. His perseverance is anything if not unparalleled. Soon enough, the conniving smooth-talker convinces you to pack your bags, nod to your skeptical parents, and set off to build a future with someone who was barely an acquaintance at the time.

It isn't completely his fault: you had chosen to go of your own accord, completely dazzled by his endless theatrics and his impenetrable personality. He is a man so confoundingly contradictory— from his blasé attitude to being threatened with bodily harm, to his intense need to be recognized for his talents by virtual strangers, to the way he seemed to simultaneously attract and repel people with his mere presence— that you, a fresh young face at twenty years old, couldn't help but idolize and desire to get close to him. Even when all signs had pointed to him being an individual more unpleasant than first meets the eye.

He dangles the promise of fame as your motivation to join his band. He thinks you want the same things he does— it's as if it never occurred to him that anyone would want otherwise. Fame and fortune is all he thinks and dreams about. You never cared much about fame, though, instead you care more about getting into the skin of the man who "saved" you; to befriend this interesting person who seemed not to know if he wanted other people to love or hate him. He craves recognition yet loathes commitment; he is aimless in direction yet focused with his goals. He seems to you like a man just tiredly going through the motions, like a puppet strung along on strings forced to dance the scripted beat of an unknown master. It's so fascinating that it made you want to take him apart and see what made him tick.

You want to understand him.

"If you want t'get famous, don't you have to make people like you first? Maybe don't be so... you, and start trying to be... likeable?" you suggest to him hesitantly. You cringe away from his returning glare.

"The day I change my ways is the day I start praying to God. Why in hell's name would I change to ingratiate myself to some cocks who I don't even know?" he informs you. "Why make people like you when you can get them to worship you?"

When Russel and Noodle later join the band they give you the same advice: stay away from him, whatever drivel he feeds you about owning your soul shouldn't be an excuse for the daily abuse he lays on you. But you don't listen. You're unconvinced. He was rough around the edges but you had thought that maybe a good friend would dull them and bring out his shine. So you stick by him, expecting that your loyalty would be enough to get him to stop treating you like shit.

It isn't.

You're Stuart Pot, and you're starting to get tired of Murdoc Niccals.

Years have passed. And as the seasons change, so too do you hope he would. You hope that time would quell that rage in him that always caused him to lash out unexpectedly at the nearest available, convenient target (which, more often than not, happens to be you). You hope that an intelligent, street-smart man like him would learn to apply his goddamn knowledge to social situations and stop pissing off the wrong people. You hope that when, finally, he had fulfilled his dream of worldwide acclaim for his music, he would sooner or later stop finding unexpected ways to drive your opinion of him down further into the dirt.

But he doesn't change. Instead, he disappoints you. Every. Single. Time. He disappointed you when he took your girlfriend Paula away in a show of spite, he disappointed you when he got himself arrested during the time Gorillaz had broken up, he disappointed you when he chose himself, time and time again, over the band that he claimed to prize more dearly than his life. He wears his newfound fame on his sleeve; uses it as an excuse to be even more self-centered and vicious. Gorillaz' release of two record-albums, widespread global appeal, and a movie deal that almost comes to fruition hardly hampers his destructive tendencies.

Your patience wears thin. And that little spark of something that you feel for him before becomes tainted, ever so slowly, by the very aspects of his personality that you were so fascinated by in the first place: his capricious attitude, his magnetic attraction to every single thing that hints at trouble, his admirable skill in provoking other people into action... his instinct to hurt people who get too close to him. There was no use being friends with someone so determined to make you their enemy.

You wanted to give up. But, like you always did, you soldiered on.

And then, eventually, you come to be aware of one simple fact.

In the years that you've known this man, you've never heard a single thing about his past or his family. Not one thing. You're straining to remember even one instance of when he had brought up the subject voluntarily. He never mentions them, and if he does, it's with a strained sort of flippancy that's obviously staged. As if he's hiding something.

So of course, upon this observation, you wonder: Was he hiding anything about his past? Maybe it held the key to understanding anything that went on in that mind of his.

You want to find out.

He regards your burgeoning curiosity with guarded suspicion and deflects attention from his past with practiced ease. He's a steel barrier, a wall of defense mechanisms and layers of hostility and snark. When all else fails, he simply gives in to an anger so intense you shy away from asking him the right questions.

But there are cracks; he's not as thorough as he believes. After many failed attempts, it got you thinking. When he empties those liquor bottles he loves, the alcohol loosens up his tongue so much that he scarcely seems like his sober self anymore. So if sobriety prevented him from divulging any details, would his drunk self—?

You take advantage of this one evening after a Demon Days concert, when he's plastered enough to lure you into his Winnebago under the impression you were one of his fans. He begins to reminisce.

You learn about the 'nice' diner lady he knew at age nine. You learn about his mother who abandoned him at birth. You learn about his apathetic brother. You learn about his friendless, bully-ridden childhood spent cowering in empty rooms and hiding in supply closets. You learn about his violent and larger-than-life father, who he spoke of with so much fondness that it made you sick to your stomach when he recounts the 'fun' times he had spent with him.

His shared memories paint such a bleak picture of neglect that it had been no wonder to you that he subconsciously adopts the traits of his abusers, even seeking similar people out and perpetuating an endless cycle. It was no wonder that he had initially despised you; he had probably seen himself as a child when he first came across your seemingly amicable, simple and defenseless personality. You were, to him, a mirror for the easy target that he once was before he had been hardened from years of living.

"You know how to listen," he slurs, oblivious to your realization. He stares at you with melancholic eyes and wraps his arms around you tenderly like you were a lover who he hadn't seen in years. "You're not like the other birds. Thank you, I needed this."

By the time morning comes he had seemed to have forgotten the whole night, refusing to meet your eye as you attempt and fail to strike up a conversation on the topic. You move on from trying to confront him and instead go for a more indirect approach. But still he shuts down every time you stretch your hand out to him in a show of kindness and understanding. The harder you try to draw closer to him, the more he did his best to pull away from you.

He knows that you had cracked his mask.

But you think he appreciated your gestures, in his own way. He seeks you out instinctively when he's in one of his fouler moods. He touches you often enough, gently enough, that it gives you the urge to wrap him in a consoling embrace. He gives an infinitesimal smile at you whenever you laugh at his jokes or praise his keen attention to detail in music. It's such a nice change of pace from your normally volatile dynamic that you seek it out like a crazed addict.

To you, everything was different now, you knew why he acted the way he did and you knew what was responsible for his nature, you could understand him now, and maybe you could steer him into getting the help he needed. But everything was also the same, because he still treated you the way he had always treated you, he made no effort whatsoever to acknowledge that there might've been anything that he needed help for. It was okay, it was alright. He clearly needed time and a bit of prodding. You'll be there with him, as his friend, and maybe you could work things out...

If Noodle didn't die in the aftermath of El Mañana, and you didn't remember who had angrily insisted that she did the shoot.

He did not show remorse at the news.

You feel your faith in the man finally shatter into a million pieces.

You're Stuart Pot, and Murdoc Niccals is someone you don't know anymore.

Russel had disappeared off the face of the Earth mere weeks after Noodle's death. You know why he had gone so quickly— being constantly reminded of the death of someone who was like a daughter to him would not have been a good idea. It was alright though; you didn't mind him leaving since you follow hot on his heels. There's no use in staying in a band with most of its members gone, and you would sooner grow your brown hair back than stay and be reminded of what had happened to Noodle. So you set off on a journey, a retreat of sorts, to clear your head of the fiasco that was Demon Days. Goodness knows you deserved it.

As for him, you have no intention of knowing. He had left before you could even hold a funeral for Noodle. You don't want anything to do with the man and would be content to never hear from him again for the rest of your life. It was all ancient history to you now.

Until it wasn't.

One moment you're basking in the view of Beirut, the next moment you wake up groggy, lightheaded, and shrouded in complete darkness. You emerge from the dark confines of a suitcase, oxygen-deprived and seasick, and are graced by the baffling sight of a plastic island painted in an eye-searing color of hot pink. A terrifyingly familiar face smirks at you, with an expression that you instantly read as a mixture of derangement and malice. The expression on his face is so foreign and disturbing that you feel a shiver crawl down your spine.

"Welcome to Plastic Beach," he greets you, grabbing a fistful of your shirt collar and pulling you down to his eye level. You didn't feel very welcome.

What followed were some of the worst months of your life. He locks you in a tiny bedroom beneath the ocean, with no way to entertain yourself save for learning the sheet music he threw at you and forced you to practice. There's a keyboard in the room, a bed with warm blankets, and so much junk strewn on the floor, but nothing else that seemed to indicate that he expended more than the bare minimum to prepare this prison as a temporary home for you.

You've never gone so many days without your painkillers, but this time you go weeks without your precious meds dampening your experience of this nightmare-turned-reality. Your insomnia worsens by the return of your migraines, your rare sleeps are plagued by nightmares. But why would you want to sleep, anyway, with the ever-present eye of a monstrous cetacean lurking outside the porthole of your room? So you cease sleeping. There's no meaning to your nights and days, anyway, save for when he occasionally yanks you out of your room to record the vocals for his new songs or force-feeds you after you attempt a hunger strike to protest your living conditions. He sends that hunk of metal that was an insult to Noodle's memory every damn time he had to fetch you from the bowels of Plastic Beach, and the instant you hear her metal hand knocking on the door you automatically freeze up in fearful anticipation.

He becomes more cruel. So very, very, cruel. Whereas before, he had chosen to hurt you with offhand remarks on your intelligence and personality, now, his insults have become barbed with the real intention to humiliate and degrade you. If before, his beatings were done with little to no ill intent (if not done with the goal of amusing himself or others), now, his strikes and punches are heavily laced with meaning, as if screaming that this was all your fault, you caused him to hit you like this, why hadn't you stayed away?

You bleed more from the sharpness of his insults than the bluntness of his fist. He's not just a barrier anymore, he was a fortress, completely fucking impenetrable and armed to the teeth with a brusque and vicious attitude tailor-made to drive other people off. You can't even begin to place how he was doing mentally anymore; every single time you talk to him guarantees you of the surety that he had gone off the deep end and was left to fester in the confines of his ruined mind.

So you try to distance yourself from him for your own protection. You shut yourself off to him, you try to allow yourself to feel your own resentment and anger that had been simmering quietly beneath the surface, you try to refuse even the tiniest urge to empathize with him whenever he looked at you with those goddamn eyes that were still filled with a quiet melancholy. You focus on delivering the vocals for his songs, hoping that with the completion of the album, he would grant you your freedom and you could put the whole ordeal behind you.

But then you read, really read, the lyrics to "On Melancholy Hill", and you're left awestruck for the first time by anything he's written since your reunion. You get your hands on "To Binge", and you're left staggering by the loneliness practically wafting from the song. He shows you "Broken", and its imagery was so telling that it left you contemplating everything you knew about the man.

He wrote like a lost man who fell in love and was bitterly trying to change for a person who was no longer around to appreciate it.

You don't know what to feel. Did he fall for someone while the band was broken up? Maybe he fell in love with a(n) (un)lucky person after you and Russel had left him. Maybe that was why he had become so unfailingly cruel. The mystery lingers at the back of your mind. You begin to take your assumptions as fact. You start resenting this mystery person, hating them, even, for breaking his heart like this and leaving you to be the one to pick up the pieces. You keep silent, but your suspicions grow with each passing day until you couldn't take the agony of not knowing anymore.

You confront him and steel yourself for a beating by asking him point blank who it was for. At first he reacts the way you expect him to, by punishing you with imprints of bruises all over your body, but he relents one night after you had steadily chipped away at his defenses by sheer persistence.

"Tell me the fucking truth, because I deserve to know," you yell at him in frustration. "because I'm singing your damn love songs. Last time. Are these songs about someone, and are they the reason you've gone off your rocker!?"

"Sod it," he curses after downing a whole bottle of rum and gripping your neck. "I don't care anymore."

He kisses you.

He tastes of tobacco ash and alcohol and spice, but you don't pay attention to this because holy fuck, he's kissing you. He's kissing you and you don't know how or why or what had prompted him to do this. Your mind goes blank. You freeze up like a deer in headlights but he doesn't even notice; he keeps his lips pressed to yours until he loosens his grip after a mere five seconds. But the damage is done, five seconds is enough to upend your entire world view. He watches you stutter uselessly while reaching out to caress your face, then says to you with an indecipherable look on his face:

"It's not that hard to guess, faceache. Yes, it's about someone. I wrote love songs about someone I used to know. See, I didn't value his friendship enough and took it for granted. I used him for years."

His thumb grazes your cheek. "This pillock had insisted on getting too close to me, even after I tried aaaaaaall the ways I could think of to get him to leave me alone. But he never let up. So I got too comfortable. Started to enjoy having his annoying face around me. When I started to... feel things for him, I couldn't take it. I locked those feelings right up like some hormonal bird does with her private diary. So when I disappointed him by committing the biggest fucking mistake of my life, I panicked and left him. Do you understand?"

You do.

And you're petrified.

So you run away from him, and barricade yourself in your room for so long that he had to have Cyborg Noodle drag you out.

You never bring up the incident and he obliges you by sharing your silence. The two of you never speak of it again. He starts treating you with more care, letting you roam around the island freely now, but he also avoids you like you've got an incurable disease. The sudden change makes you so conflicted that you almost prefer his old self. You aren't used to such a quiet side of him; aren't used to going entire days without being called down to his studio. At least he had spoken to you and you could guess what he was feeling, but now you don't get the chance. You barely even see him anymore.

You're confused, your heart was in shambles, but you were forced to drop the thought because you both soon find out that Noodle was alive, she's at Plastic Beach and back from the dead; Russel was back, he'd arrived at Plastic Beach too and he was fucking enormous for no reason. They are alive and you are happy; so, so, happy that your friends are back after all these years. They both hug you and laugh and ruffle your hair playfully, and you are overjoyed. Your worries are banished from your mind.

A lot of things happen and all of you leave Plastic Beach together. Almost like a family. For the first time, you're unbothered by the kiss that had overshadowed your mind for weeks.

You think that maybe this time if the four of you would be able to last some time together. You think that Gorillaz might have a bright future ahead. You think that a few days back in the company of other humans might be enough to clear your head, maybe help you understand what exactly it was you did to make him fall for you and why exactly you weren't so opposed to that idea.

But you hadn't noticed a certain someone shattering your hopeful reverie, ripping himself away from the group, until he's already vanished as quickly and as quietly as waves rolling over a plastic beach.

You're Stuart Pot, and Murdoc Niccals had once again crashed into your life like a car into a music shop.

He shows up at your steps after nearly a half a decade has passed. He had seemed more subdued. Not quieter, not more thoughtful, and certainly not less vulgar, but more...stable. You don't know if the years he had spent by himself had been enough to unspool the massive tangle of issues swimming around in his head, but his new demeanor had been a complete 180 from what you were used to. You were stunned into silence when he asked you— instead of ordered you— to work with him on a new Gorillaz album. He gives you a slight smile as he waits for your reply, as if he had already anticipated the "no" that threatened to slide past your lips.

He immediately lights up when you accept his request instead.

You gather the rest of the band and quickly set to work, all the time observing him as he interacted with you and the others. You felt like you had time travelled back to the early 2000s again with you, him, Noodle, and Russel all in one house, together again, and working on new songs to unveil to a fanbase that hasn't seen you in years. So many things had changed, and others had not: you had gotten a lot older, a little more tired, but your passion for music remains the same. He's no different from you in that aspect. He's genuinely happy to work on creating new music for the band again, vibrating with the energy and enthusiasm of someone half his age.

You debut your album to overjoyed multitudes. The world may have kept turning after Gorillaz had gone on another hiatus, but it certainly did not miss you any less because of it. The four of you soon announce a global tour, formally kicking off the Humanz era. Your fans go wild.

The tour reignites your love of your profession. It's always been intoxicating to you and always will be. You own the stages of your concert venues with an aura that your twenty-year-old self would've envied, filling stadiums with the hypnotic sound of your voice. Your body slips into the beat with calculated grace aimed at a euphoric crowd; drives them into near anarchy. You lure entire audiences into a trance and listen to them sing the lyrics back to you. You're the ringmaster, the showstopper, the conductor of this beautiful orchestra. You're the frontman of your band, and you are born for this role.

He's always at the corner of your eye, plucking away at his bass as he watches you charm your fans with each and every song you sing. He doesn't attempt to hog the stage like he used to and instead goes for a more muted presence; a far cry from his old self.

Occasionally he directs a smile at you with a strange mind-numbing tenderness that whispered of an unplanned confession, a hand wrapped around the back of your neck, and the feeling of dry, chapped lips on your own. Whenever that happens, you zone right the fuck out and almost miss a verse of the song you're singing. Then the moment is gone; he's wearing another, more devilish smirk and directing his attention elsewhere.

He still hasn't brought up that night.

You wonder if you would ever get any closure on the subject. You two continue to dance around each other like you're both threading on eggshells; you attend interviews with him and pretend you're fine, you shoot music videos together with the band and think you're fine, Noodle and Russel start noticing and you both gesture that you're fucking fine.

But no, you're not fine, you're both lying to everyone, each other, and yourselves without saying a single word. You're frustrated and you know he's frustrated that you both can't seem to restore your relationship back to something that even resembles the casual (albeit abusive) one that you had in the past. But what can you do about it? You're terrified and he is in denial. So you choose the next best thing to addressing an elephant in the room:

Addressing a slightly smaller elephant in the room.

"What happened to you after El Mañana? After Noodle almost died." you inquire one day, taking the chance to bring up the topic when you had both been left alone in the house.

He raises an eyebrow at you. "What a completely tasteful and subtle segue to a delicate topic, Dents."

"Just answer the question."

"I left."

...when I disappointed him by committing the biggest fucking mistake of my life, I panicked and left him, the Murdoc in your memory echoes back to you. You banish him from your mind.

"I know you left," you enunciate slowly, knowing he was being deliberately difficult. "But why did you leave? You didn't even stick around for her funeral. You just up an' went, like you didn't even care."

His eye twitches. "I did care. Just didn't think it was worth sticking around when there's more useful things I could be doing."

"If you did, you woulda manned up and stayed. Instead you left like a coward."

"Shut up," he says with restrained anger. "Don't start spouting off nonsense. You don't know shit 'bout what I went through."

"You didn't even cry," you accuse. "Even when you were the one who made Noodle do it. Even when those people in the helicopters came after her because of you. I saw you hours before you left, you didn't even look sorry, you didn't even want to talk to Russel an' me—"

"SHUT UP!" he yells so loudly that you're stunned into silence. "Just fucking shut your gob before I do it for you."

He exhales, then, as if bracing himself for something, starts slowly. "I get it. I fucking get it. I was a prick for leaving you and Russel like that. But I didn't mean for anything to happen to Noodle. I didn't think that she'd be in any danger. I've done a lot of idiotic things, got in hot water with all kinds of unsavory blokes, but I'd never had someone I cared for killed because of me. I've never fucked up to that extent."

"Still doesn't explain why you bolted."

"I'm getting to that, D. When she died, I was in shock. I tried to wrap my mind around the idea. But I couldn't accept it. I couldn't attend her funeral knowing we hadn't even found her body from wherever the fuck she died. I tried everything I could to bring her back. Or even know where her soul was. Even went to hell, y'know? But I found nothing." There was a faraway look in his eyes. "I think that's what made me go mad. Just the thought of not knowing. Then couple that with you an' Russel both hating my guts and our band breaking up again. It just broke me. I'd just started warming up to the idea of having you all around, after our band broke up the first time. And just like that, I was alone. Again. Like I was back in that sodding prison in sodding Mexico—"

He stops abruptly.

"I've always known I've got a few screws loose," he continues tiredly. "I know I'm sick. But that doesn't mean I'm heartless. I'd missed Noodle terribly and if there was a way for me to turn back time and stop her from ever doing that damn shoot, I would. But it happened. It's done. And that's the biggest regret of my life."

"Are there... any other things you regret?" you ask hesitantly. The sensation of a gentle kiss tingles at the back of your mind.

He stares at you like he's seeing the exact same memories play out in his head.

"No. Maybe. I think I regret being a complete git to you for so many years." he paused. "I'm going to try to change. Put my ways behind me. For the sake of our... friendship."

Silence.

"Okay."

You don't know if his answer was the one you wanted. Or even what you asked for.

But you still want to believe him.

You're Stuart Pot, and you're reeling after the absence of Murdoc Niccals.

He's gone. You don't know what to think anymore. He got himself arrested again for drug possession. He claims he's innocent, but no one believes him. You don't know how long he's going to stay in jail this time but it'll likely be for months judging by his track record.

He's been complaining to his fans on social media for months now, weaving an incredibly dubious sob story that included, of all things, the very same bar that you shot Strobelite in, a mysterious man named El Mierda, a business card with a fake address, and a drug syndicate with ties to the Mexican mafia. Oh, and being framed for his crimes, of course.

You're just completely confused by his tale. Who the hell was El Mierda? Who was he trying to fool with this charade? Didn't he promise you he would change? Why the fuck would he do this to you again???

You wonder when you'd get sick of it. You wonder if you'd ever get sick of the cycle of getting your hopes up by empty promises, then being inevitably disappointed when he continues further down the path of his own self-destruction. Why the man insists on walking that path when he had people who cared about him constantly trying to veer him in the right direction, you don't know.

All you know is that he had let you down again. You want to berate yourself for being well aware of his faults, but you know that no amount of mental self-flagellation is enough to keep you away from the man. His allure had always been irresistible to you, and as soon as he was out you'd be attracted to him like a moth to a flame.

You're just as much of a fool as he says you are.

Your heart clenched. No, fuck what he says. Whether he stays in jail for a hundred years or a hundred days, you will not let his absence or presence in your life dictate how you lived your life. You've wasted over half of your life hoping that this unapologetic man would change his ways when he's proven, time and time again, that he would never be capable of doing that. It was best for you to give up.

So you did.

And to show to the world that you were turning over a new leaf, you announce the arrival of a new album made without the input of your band's bassist. To your glee, the album was met with resounding success from both critics and fans alike, further solidifying the fact that you hadn't needed him at all. You are perfectly capable of leading a project by yourself without him around. You aren't a useless knob who just sat around waiting for someone else to start the job for you. Russel, Noodle and Ace were the only people you need.

If only the mere suggestion of his presence wasn't enough to trip you up. If only the mere hint of his name wasn't enough to trigger you to overreact and defend yourself a little too aggressively.

You see his tweets to fans urging them to mobilize for his freedom. You tell your fans to stop contacting him.

You know he thinks you're short a bassist. You replace him with another (arguably better) one.

You find out he's started a popular movement while you're on tour. You turn your eyes away from the ever-present mob of fans holding up signs reading "Where is he?" and "Free him!" in your concerts.

You take care to mention as frequently as possible how much better off you were without the presence of a toxic individual poisoning every facet of your life. You show to the world that you're fine by hanging out with the rest of the band in public. You try to ignore that feeling in your chest when he claims to the world that he's doing well in prison because you know otherwise; his body is painted in hues of black and blue and his eyes look like it's devoid of the soul it once had.

Your whole life has been set back on track. With him in prison, there was no reason anymore to think about your unresolved relationship.

You shouldn't miss him.

But you do miss him.

You think of his absence when you skate to the beat of Humility.

You think of his impact in your life when you sing Kansas.

You think of his regrets when you listen to the somber melody of Fire Flies.

You think of his sad eyes when you write the lyrics to Souk Eye.

Your entire album is the result of your unspoken longing to mend an irreparable relationship.

You're Stuart Pot, and for some strange, unfathomable reason, you want Murdoc Niccals next to you despite the man he was.

Read this fic in its original format on AO3

#2doc #niccalpot #studoc #in which I attempt to give you the feels through 2D's pov across the phases #I refuse to write their relationship as anything but an irreparable mess #my writing

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inktae · 7 years

Text

a rant on the writing community.

Since it was fanfiction writers’ appreciation day very recently, I feel like contributing to this in a different way, and aim my appreciation to a very particular group of writers. Now, keep in mind that I am in no way belittling anyone and that I support every single writer who works hard on this website. These are just thoughts I’ve had for a long time, and even though it has been talked about plenty of times before, I still feel the need to express my feelings when it comes to this topic in particular, which is heavily related to the writers’ community of tumblr in the kpop fandom. Not gonna lie, this is something I feel kinda salty about and it might get a bit long, so please bear with me :D

If you know me and my writing, you will know that most of my stories, if now all, lack mature content and tend to focus on every genre except smut. I also have to say that I am very fortunate to have a stable readership and that I get an amazing amount of feedback, which I will always feel immense gratitude for.

Now, this is something I am very proud of, but what is also very unfortunate is that is was VERY difficult for me to establish myself as a non-smut writer. This fact alone is more than frustrating for me, because it shouldn’t be so hard to get your writing recognized just because there is no sexual content on it. And even with the luck I’ve had and despite how thankful I feel towards the readers that stick with me, I still feel incredibly inadequate most days because of how unfitting my works seem amongst the entire writing community. A significantly smaller percentage of people seem to show the same passion and excitement towards stories that focus more on the development of a story rather than the amount of smut they contain, which often leads me to think if it’s even worthwhile to put so much effort, so much of myself and so many hours of my time into works that will never reach a bigger audience.

Now, I understand that it’s normal not to be fond of certain genres — I am not criticizing that. People are in their right to like what they like. But when 80% or more of the community only focus on the smut genre and do not even blink twice when it comes to other types of stories, when people openly express that they “only read smut” and are not looking to expand their horizons, you have to understand that it does get frustrating and discouraging for us.

You see, writing is a hard process, and I am sure most people are aware of this already. Smut or no smut, there are hours upon hours of hard work behind a published story, there is passion and excitement and perseverance. And now that that’s settled, my question is — why are people still NOT seeing this, even though it is so obvious? Why are people still choosing to give all the spotlight to smut, and leave everything else in the shadows? Why are people not showing the same amount of support even though non-smut writers CLEARLY deserve it?

I am aware that some writers and readers simply prefer smut. There is nothing wrong with that. All I’m saying is to please, please give other genres a chance and start supporting these kind of stories — because when this affects the confidence of so many non-smut writers, when a situation like this starts to make people (young people) feel obliged to include smut in their stories to get more readers, when it makes a writers’ experience turn bitter when it should only be filled with motivation and excitement, it is time we contributed to make it better. It is time that we not only praised smut writers but also people who are trying to write something new and different, something refreshing, be it angst or fluff or drama or whatever other genre — it is time readers stopped belittling writers for straying away from smut (yes, it does happen — writers get hate for not writing smut. Please let that sink in for a moment, and see how ridiculous that is) and it is time the community included them — us — and made us feel like our writing is just as valuable, just as worthwhile. Help us feel like we are on the same level, not below. Help us feel like we are doing something meaningful here.

The worth of our writing and hard work shouldn’t rely so heavily on the incorporation of sexual themes. I can speak for most writers here when I say that we care a lot about the plot, the characters, the development and the world we have created, and we do not like to see these universes we love so much getting stomped on just because we did not make the characters get involved sexually (explicitly, at least). If you understand this, then you will see how unfair this situation truly is.

I felt the need to speak up about this because, even though I already have a readership I’m very grateful for, I know most cases are not like mine. I have seen SO many non-smut writers wanting to quit simply because smut is not their thing, and for me it is very angering and disappointing when a writer is driven to that point because their tastes are not the same as everyone else’s.

So, I repeat myself: all I’m saying is to give these writers a chance. Read their stories, give them feedback, include them in your recommendations. Instead of saying “I only read smut” start saying “I mostly read smut, but I want to try and include other kind of stories in my reads”. Let them see that their writing can be praised just as much as the writing of smut writers. Encourage them and show them that it’s okay if their writing doesn’t have smut in it — because believe me when I say that every single writer who posts a story that focuses on another genre, will definitely worry and feel insecure about it. I can vouch for this.

To sum up, and this goes for everyone, readers and writers alike: please keep an open mind, try to expand your horizons, explore and discover more writers who are trying to find recognition through fluffy or angsty stories, see all the effort put behind every story, smut or not, and allow us to have just as many chances for success as smut writers do. We work just as hard, I promise. Thank you. :)

#please signal boost and share!!!#I will self reblog as many times as needed lol #personal

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practicingpossible · 7 years

Text

Practice Love Loudly

How will the fear subside if we only tell horror stories? How will judgement cease if we keep criticizing? How will anger dissipate if continue yelling?

WHOSE SIDE ARE YOU ON?? THEY SHOULD/SHOULDN’T HAVE...!

SILENCE IS VIOLENCE! YOU ARE NOT WELCOME HERE! WE ARE AGAINST…!

WE ARE OUTRAGED!

I don’t know anyone who is truly motivated by shame, who rises to their best, who feels alive and whole, and who immediately responds with kindness after being yelled at. My sense is that shame is a behavioral application of the millennia-old unconscious and physiological fight/flight response system. It’s some purgatory we get trapped in (and as children were taught by the adults around us, who were taught by the adults around them, who were taught…) when there is a sense of danger but our well-being is not actually threatened in that moment. This response is so conditioned, so automatic...though I’m beginning to experience that it doesn’t have to be.

What if there was another tool available to us? What if instead of fighting, fleeing, or shaming we were trusting, kind, and loving?

I’ve been heartened by the national outpouring of love and acts of kindness in the wake of the devastation caused by Hurricanes Harvey, Irma, and Maria. I’ve been wondering, what if this was our response to the acts of violence we saw in Charlottesville a few weeks ago?

To be clear, I very much experienced the fight/flight response after Charlottesville, and the subsequent emotional reactions--I felt overwhelmed, horrified, and angry. I felt devastated by the extreme level of hate that lives in some people’s minds, so much that it has clouded their hearts. I felt heartbroken that people can be so out of touch with love, so full of self-hate that they are able to commit such violent actions with their words and their bodies.

I felt hopeless that such self-hate is manifested on racial and religious lines and is projected out and perpetrated against so many beautiful humans. I felt afraid that this fear and anger and hate will keep spreading and destroy humanity.

And... I also felt confusion, concern, trepidation about the response to it. I felt upset by the yelling, shouting, condemning. I felt heartache for everyone.

My mind grappled with how to respond to violence nonviolently. (I felt especially tormented by the word condemn, as it feels violent to me. And I wondered, am I inherently condoning if I’m not condemning? I don’t know...)

I felt afraid people would think I didn’t understand the magnitude of what happened, that they would think I’m a sympathizer. I worried that they wouldn’t feel loved or attended to for the pain and anguish they are experiencing, and for the pain and anguish experienced by their ancestors. I felt afraid that it would be received as white privilege, as denying past atrocities.

Yet, as I sat with the fight/flight sensations in my body, my heart was so clear--I wanted to be for love. I wanted to act with kindness. And I wanted to trust that this was enough. I wanted to be, as cliché as it can sound, what I want to see in the world. I didn’t want to give my energy to any fear, judgement, or anger. My heart was being called to be for something because being against something maintains the separation; it maintains the other.

I grappled with this alone for the first several days because I was afraid to say it out loud. I felt afraid to share my feelings because I worried that doing so would feel like betrayal to my friends and neighbors. I heard condemnation, and anger, and a lot of fear. Though I felt all those things too, I could not betray the Life within me that wanted to act from trust, kindness, and love.

As the week crept on, I started to notice the whispers, the quiet conversations...

Person A: Pssst...hey...what are you thinking about the march on Saturday?

Me: I have been having a lot of feelings. What are you thinking?

Person A: I want to go but I want to focus on love.

Me: Me too!

Me: Hey, how are you feeling?

Person B: I learned that there are folks who will be holding love and healing spaces.

Person C: Hey, is there anyone organizing a group focused on peace and love? I want to be in solidarity.

Me: I haven’t heard of any groups specifically. Join us.

Suddenly, I realized many of us were whispering! And it occurred to me--we are in big trouble if we are afraid to speak our love loudly and clearly; if we are afraid to share our love!

It reminded me of a speech outgoing Governor Deval Patrick gave on the stump during his last two months in office. He shared how he had snuck out of the house without security early one morning to go to home depot. Not as incognito as he had hoped, three people spotted him in the store and quietly pulled him aside, one at a time, and whispered their gratitude for his willingness to find homes for children fleeing from Central America. Then, as he was checking out, one person began yelling at him, so all who were around could hear, for helping the children. And he asked the crowd listening to his speech, “Why is it that we yell when we disagree but whisper when we have something nice to say?”

It made me wonder, why are we whispering our love? Why are we scared to show our love? Why does it seem more painful to express love? Why, when it seems that love is what we need now, more than ever?

I’m starting to suspect that it’s, at least in part, a result of the unconscious fight/flight response system at work in our bodies. Over the last few years, through meditation practice, I have become very familiar with how sensations move through the body. Anger and fear are emotional reactions, mental labels of the conditioned fight/flight response. With the perception of danger, we are physiologically hardwired to escape or battle. In some cases, this safety response system serves us; it keeps us alive. Yet, most of the time, we are over-relying on it. It is activated throughout the day and we react automatically. We withdraw or engage. It seems, we’re running on auto-pilot toward self-destruction and we’ve no idea.

I am starting to see a possible way out, however. I believe, we can practice bringing this response system into consciousness; we can disrupt the pattern through small behavior changes; and we can create a new response.

I believe this may be one of our evolutionary challenges: under perceived, but not imminent, threat, can we channel and act out of trust, kindness, and love rather than fear, judgement, and anger?

This is no easy task, as sensations and histories/lifetimes of emotional reactions and traumas course through our bodies. It is not for the faint of heart. It will take courage and stamina unlike anything we have probably experienced.

But it is a simple practice, and I do believe it is possible. In everything we do--our thoughts, our words, our actions--can we begin to practice trust, kindness, and love?

To be clear, I am not declaring that we all must go hug those who perpetrated physical acts of violence in Charlottesville (though I did ponder that too, in this post); I am offering that we start with ourselves, then within our own circles of influence, practicing small acts of trust, kindness and love. I am suggesting that through such practices, we will start to break the conditioned response during times it is not needed.

This is only possible if we are willing to practice. Each of us can start by practicing turning away from the daily moments of fleeing and fisticuffs and turning toward resting and self-care. And it’s a personalized practice, taking shape based on our own history, our own life experiences. Consider….

What is the smallest step you are willing to take today? Here are some possibilities:

Giving yourself a hug

Resting when you need a break

Taking a break to play (outside, with playdoh, with paint…)

Spending an hour or two in nature

Noticing how you use language; are there words that aren’t serving you or others?

Releasing the shame or guilt for what your mind says you should have done

Allowing the fear and anger, rather than resisting it; AND describing it rather than reacting from it

Listening and clarifying rather than interrupting and criticizing and defending

Asking for something you need

Forgiving a so-called mistake, you think you made today; and if you’re feeling adventurous extending the same to a co-worker, friend, or family member you think made a so-called mistake

Smiling and saying hello to a stranger on the street or the train

Saying out loud to yourself, “I love you no matter what”

I believe we each have our own steps to take, and each of those steps matters immensely.

If we are willing to practice, some days will feel like a breeze, some days it may hurt like hell, may feel impossible. We simply notice and give the trust, kindness, and love we want from others to ourselves.

With people willing to practice this, I wonder…

Can we sustain this practice diligently and willingly so that trusting, being kind, and loving become the evolved conditioned response to perceived danger?

I believe we have the most incredible opportunity, right now, to change the course of our lives, and perhaps humanity. And there is strength in numbers, in practicing together. I am starting a Love in Action practice group. If you want to join, please DM, email, or call me and we can practice together.

Trust will grow when we are sharing the stories of goodness happening around us. Kindness will emerge when we take care of ourselves and in our actions. Love will amplify when we are speaking it and practicing it loudly, with all our might.

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