#thank you phin mwah

[paintedvanilla]

i’ve been thinking about marla an INSANE amount these last few days. specifically about the relationship between her and the narrator (i love their little toxic frenemie schtick they’ve got going on).

would love to hear some more headcanons for them/ how you’d imagine their relationship progress over the years if you’ve got any🤭

YEASSSSS OKAY HAIIIII PHIN thank you for sending this ask I’m gonna EXPLODE

Okay so like. One of the fics I’m working on (I told you about this on our DM’s…) has to do with Marla and the narrators dynamic immediately after he and Tyler get together and how their friendship actually like. Calcifies into something bearable to him. Because like. Really genuinely prior to this. The narrator could not stand Marla. And then the events of this fic happen and he like. Ctrl alt delete and manually operates his empathy for a few hours and comes out of it being like… actually this woman is my friend. And I care for her. He still acts like a hater to keep up appearances tho.

I think a lot about the way Marla is characterized in the book. Particularly the scene where she’s giving herself cigarette burns and the narrator describes her as a woman who’s afraid to commit to the wrong thing so she doesn’t commit to anything. That makes me want to chew glass. ALSO. IN THE BOOK SHE ACTUALLY HAD CANCER?? I FEEL LIKE THAT WAS KIND OF BRUSHED OVER. BUT ANYWAY.

I’m of the firm belief that the narrator and Marla hang out pretty regularly. She’s the only person the narrator talks to who like… isn’t Tyler. So he can talk to her about things he can’t talk to Tyler about (or just doesn’t want to). This gives him an avenue to bitch about Tyler from time to time (Marla can corroborate his bitching because she’s also dealt with Tyler). But also he talks to her about other stuff. I think she’s the only person who knows he wishes he’d studied literature in school. I think he shares the literary magazines he reads with her and tells her which stories he actually likes (he gatekeeps these from Tyler)

Additionally, Marla talks to him about her stuff. She talks to him about all her boy problems (I love in the book Marla’s “I used to have a boyfriend who…” talk, she has an ex-boyfriend for every occasion and the narrator finds this kind of fascinating). She talks about her home life and her history with him (she’s originally from New Orleans, she wanted to move to New York City but only got as far as Connecticut). They go to the thrift together. They go to lunch together (the narrator pays). Sometimes the narrator goes grocery shopping with her (he still pays).

They talk about sex. They talk about their childhoods. I think the narrators dynamic with Marla reminds him of the dynamic he used to have with his sister, where she’d just talk and he’d just listen. Marla doesn’t care if the narrator doesn’t respond to her, she knows he’s listening.

I think one of the reasons their relationship works so well, and in particular one of the reasons the narrator keeps crawling back to her, is based on one simple foundation: they talk to each other and really listen, they don’t just wait for their turn to speak. They picked that up in the same place, and they always employ it with each other. Tyler sometimes doesn’t do that for the narrator. But marla always does, and the narrator does the same.

They still go to support groups together, sometimes. Marla did drag him to debtors anonymous. Sometimes they go to the testicular cancer group for the sole purpose of catching up with Bob (I think the narrator genuinely likes Bob. Like. As a person). Marla told him that the narrator got himself a boyfriend and he had to jump through hoops explaining that one (he can never admit to this man he never actually had cancer).

Sometimes they go to groups and make up elaborate backstories for one another and use fake names. Marla likes to go and pretend they’re having marital problems, the narrator reluctantly plays along sometimes. They go see movies together. They go to museums together. Like. They’re besties. They bicker, but they’re besties. The narrator would kill for her (or, at the very least, beat a man to the brink of death, castrate him and pull out his molars for her to make into earrings).

#op #fight club #vomit-fanta #oh I wrote a lot huh. hm. #thank you phin mwah