#sorry i just kind of talked about my saddest wip (that's a lie it's the second saddest grief story is the saddest)

[retrogradedreaming]

can i hear about “every kind of grief in one fic”? :)

YES how did you know this is my Favorite Fic of the Moment?? I'm literally working on it as we speak

tw: grief, parent death, grandparent death

I started this fic when I found out my grandfather was dying a couple months ago, but it's kind of carried through the combined grief that goes with his death and the grief of a relationship that is an end but not a death. Because I have to project somewhere, y'know?

The story itself is basically a little (it's not little) side fic of my own characters, and since I write mostly h/c (and mostly sickfic even within that), it's about one character dealing with the death of his father, trying to reach out to a close friend he's lost touch with (and wants the comfort of), while sick and suffering. Since one of those things on its own wouldn't be enough. But here's a little snippet:

Will scanned the sea of black from the pulpit. The paper in his hands had long since become a crumpled mess, ink bleeding at the corners where he’d touched it with tear-damp fingertips. He’d practiced the words, said them over and over since he wrote them three days ago, until he’d memorized most of them. And yet now, with so many faces staring back at him and so many expectations attached to saying the right words, saying them without his voice cracking even as his throat had become scratchy with grief, they vanished from his mind.  He glanced at the paper, the letters swimming before him. He blinked. Swallowed. Looked up.

He surveyed the crowd one last time, noting the absence of the one person he’d hoped would show, despite the odds. He shouldn’t have gotten his hopes up—they’d hardly spoken in two years. It shouldn’t surprise him that Jasper had moved on. After all, the texts were more out of courtesy than an expectation.

I didn't really expect this fic to end up meaning as much to me as it does, but it's been a place for me to grieve and process. It won't be posted anywhere, probably won't even be shown to anyone, but right now it's 18 pages of Will getting through the funeral and then like 12 pages in, he finally gets the comfort he deserves.

#it feels so weird sharing oc fic here #don't get me wrong i like it but still weird!! #i didn't know how much info to actually include about it since they're mine and i didn't wanna ramble too much #but yeah this story is shameless projection #i'm proud of it but when i talk about it it sounds like such a dumb little thing #eli writes #also brooke are you still answering these for your own wips because i wanted to send asks when everyone was doing them #but it was 2 weeks of migraine hell and i just sort of missed it but would still like to ask if you wanna talk about them!! #sorry i just kind of talked about my saddest wip (that's a lie it's the second saddest grief story is the saddest) #death tw #grief tw