#I have zero concept of paragraph control when I’m just copying and pasting from my literal texts oops | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

1doesnotsimplyhavejust1fandam · 1 year

Text

Can you IMAGINE if Sirius and Harry had been truly reunited the night Harry ran away after blowing up Aunt Marge? I feel like the two of them would've been SO chaotic together. 13 year old Harry fresh from inflating his non-blood aunt and seething over the Dursleys' words about his parents, teaming up with 33 year old Sirius fresh from 12 years in Azkaban, basically frothing at the mouth to rip Peter apart and protect his godson. They would be SO fucking fun for the Wizarding World to deal with (NOT). I'm imagining a world where Harry recognizes Sirius' magical signature or some bullshit as Padfoot and isn't immediately terrified when Padfoot suddenly turns into the murderous ex-con he just saw on the news had escaped. They're both just suddenly on the run from the Ministry bc Harry is like ??? WHY DO I RECOGNIZE YOU??? And Sirius is like I'M NOT LEAVING THIS KID AGAIN LIKE I DID THAT NIGHT!!!! So they're running around Britain and Harry's getting the 411 on Peter's betrayal and cute Marauders anecdotes and Sirius is losing his mind bc OMG it's his best friend and best friend-in-law (it's a thing, OKAY!?)'s son and he's so big and sassy and angry. And then Sirius is trying to figure out where they should go, and ends up deciding to go to fuckin Moony's place even though that's the first place people who knew them back then would check bc idk luck is on their side for once idc. So Remus has the absolute pleasure of opening the door to Mr. Harry James Potter in the company of a terrifyingly familiar black dog, and Remus' alarms are firing in his head as Sirius transforms from Padfoo t back into himself and he's shouting at Remus to LET HIM EXPLAIN, while Harry is doing his best to not let Remus fire a spell at his newly discovered godfather. Eventually Remus just lets Sirius explain on his front porch steps like they're a bunch of barbarians bc he refuses to let Sirius inside or let his guard down for a single second, and then Sirius tells him the whole story and Harry pulls out the Daily Prophet, and suddenly Harry has two absolutely FUCKIN FURIOUS Marauders on his hands, and they both want to chop Peter's head off and roast it on a stick, but Harry is oddly enough the most reasonable bc he's suddenly got a godfather that he doesn't want to lose bc hey, dude's kinda really great and also doesn't hate his guts like the Dursleys do, so of course he yells at them that they can't do anything yet bc Sirius would be carted back to Azkaban and probably Remus (who is still currently this random man to him ngl but also apparently the other loyal bestie his dad had at Hogwarts, so Harry doesn't want him chucked in Azkaban either) as well. So they devise a plan that involves kidnapped the fuck outta Scabbers as soon as Ron and Harry board the train together on September 1st, and Remus already has the DADA job, so he can help w that (although he still falls asleep bc I think Moony is absolutely iconic for that). And then the three of them just chill for about a month til it's time to board the Hogwarts Express, in which everyone at the station is suitably horrified when Harry just rolls up to the train with his brand spankin new pet dog Snuffles like nothing happened and he didn't just disappear off the face of the earth for nearly a MONTH, but Harry just ignores all that shit bc boy is on a MISSION and that mission is to destroy the bastard who got his parents killed and also started the catalyst of events that led to him growing up in an abusive household for like 10 years. Which is a thing he discussed at length w Remus and Sirius because Dumbledore is a manipulative piece of shit who TOTALLY KNEW the Dursleys were awful people and still decided to place him there :))))

Basically what ends up happening is Harry asks Ron to hand Scabbers over for a minute under the pretense of idek checking his lil rat toes or some shit bc he saw one was missing ???? And then Harry kicks Remus awake to do the spell, which he does, while Ron and Hermione are becoming deeply confused and disturbed by Harry's one-track mind and clear hatred for this stupid little RAT, but they let it happen bc Hermione sees the Professor part of RJ Lupin on Remus' briefcase (which, SCORE 1 for the Marauders definitely pranking him by getting him that briefcase at some point bc they WOULD and he had never been a professor before then so ???), and Ron and Hermione don't have a problem with authority figures, that's fuckin Harry. And Remus turns Wormtail back into Peter, and we get the whole Peter begging the Trio for mercy before Sirius turns back into himself from Padfoot, at which time Ron and Hermione start yelling about the escaped very dangerous convict in their TRAIN CAR, while Harry tries to convince them that Sirius isn't a danger to anyone in the tiny space but the fucking RAT, at which time Ron is like WELL HE'S NOT ACTUALLY A RAT ANYMORE NOW IS HE HARRY???!!! And Harry has to go with the short version of HE BETRAYED MY PARENTS RONALD!!!! while Peter is cornered by Sirius and Remus. And no, nobody has heard the yelling yet bc obviously Remus cast the Muffliato Charm or something, of course he did, I wouldn't forget that people have EARS. And then all of the sudden, the train car starts getting all cold, so Remus starts yelling at Sirius to change back to Padfoot bc the dementors won't sense a human that could be Kissed if he's not in human form, and Sirius does, but Peter also tries and Ron realizes what's happening and knocks him out (why Ron? Idk, why NOT him honestly, it's what he deserves after letting that creepy motherfucker live with him for the past few years bc YIKES I would be so freaked out) before Peter can turn back into a rat. The dementors come into the train car and Harry has his fainting spell which makes Sirius and Remus suitably LOSE THEIR MINDS bc WHAT THE FUCK JUST HAPPENED TO THE KID?!!??!! and Remus uses the Patronus Charm to repel them even though it means Peter won't be Kissed and Remus really wants revenge.

So Harry wakes up and is immediately accosted by his best friends, Sirius back in human form, and Remus trying to force chocolate into him. Ron and Hermione have been suitably informed of the situation, so they've closed the curtains, and nobody even knows what's happened besides those in the train car with them. Sirius doesn't have his wand, but he resolves to sit as Padfoot, staring at an unconscious Peter for the rest of the journey to Hogwarts, and the other four join him because no way in HELL are they letting that MF escape after Harry and Remus have managed to explain everything (and even before bc Ron and Hermione are the best and all they needed to hear was that Harry's parents died bc of Peter to determine that they would fucking the rat UP if he tried anything at all). So of course this weird fuckin quintet shows up to Hogsmeade's station with the real traitor and have to wait for everyone else to exit the train before traipsing up to the castle with the still unconscious Peter (Ron may not have cared all that much about being careful with head injuries from knocking bastards out bc of the whole ya know TRAITOR thing). Remus manages to send off a Patronus message to McGonagall (her bc of the aforementioned Dumbledore is a shithead thing) and they all head to Remus' new office with Peter in tow. Minerva shows up to Sirius as Padfoot, but an unconscious man who is CLEARLY Peter Pettigrew, and she's immediately like WHAT THE HELL??? and calls in some Aurors to deal with the trash. The Aurors are all suitably horrified but clear out soon bc they're not important to this story (sorry, kisses Aurors😘), and Minerva starts raging about Sirius being innocent and how DARE Peter, to which the Trio are extremely horrified bc they've never seen her lose her shit QUITE this much and it is highkey terrifying, but Remus is enjoying the show bc at least SOMEONE AGREES and Padfoot is wagging his tail and panting happily before Sirius realizes that Minerva can KNOW and he transforms back into himself, giving the poor professor half a heart attack. And because I think it would be hilarious for me personally, Snape walks in at the end of this lil story to see where tf Remus is bc he and Minerva are BOTH missing from the Welcome Feast, to Minerva McGonagall hugging the life out of a beaming Sirius Black while Remus looks at the two of them with a huge amount of relief bc THANK GOD she accepted his innocence, that could've been so bad for them lmao, they couldn't even Disapparate away at Hogwarts if she decided he wasn't innocent after all. And then Snape sees the Trio right beside Remus, also watching the hug and grinning like fools, especially Harry bc this meant Sirius was going to be FREE and also Harry would never have to deal with seeing the Dursleys or dealing with the fact that he literally blew up Dudley's aunt ever :)))

#harry potter #Harry Potter and the prisoner of Azkaban #texts to my bestie #although it is a different bestie but I am obsessive about my sorting tags so whatever #okay did y’all know that there is limit to how long paragraphs in posts could be?#because I certainly did NOT #it wouldn’t like me put this all into 2 paragraphs so everyone say thank you tumblr for not making you read a huge blob #I have zero concept of paragraph control when I’m just copying and pasting from my literal texts oops #sirius black #remus lupin #ronald weasley #hermione granger #ron weasley #I tagged him as Ronald and physically CRINGED bc it felt so weird #yes #even tho I called him Ronald in this very post #leave me aloooooooooooooone #minerva mcgonagall #severus snape #almost tagged Snape before McGonagall and would’ve had a breakdown over it bc I hate Snape sm :)#albus dumbledore #LISTEN #I know he doesn’t show up but my hatred for that man PERMEATES so he’s getting a tag anyway #sorry y’all #deal with it #anti jkr #not relevant but needs to be said especially during Pride Month because fuck her🏳️‍🌈#anti jk rowling #anti albus dumbledore #ig I should tag that too??

14 notes · View notes

n1ghtcrwler · 4 years

Text

So there is a post that I recently saw that I just don’t want to add notes to for a number of reasons, not least of which being that I’m about to go on a significant tangent, so I’ll just say what I needed to say about it here.

The post is screenshots of a tweet thread about how bad “Cuties” actually is, from someone who claims to have watched it, and that’s fine. I haven’t seen the movie, I have no input to give on that matter. My concern arises in a reply offered by one user, who goes into more detail about how disturbing it is to consider that someone had to, at minimum, be comfortable putting the underage actresses in the situations depicted for the sake of filming them for the movie, and again, that is probably a valid point. But they ended their tirade with this:

“If you didn’t believe it before, the fact that this movie was even released and is being defended by the elite is proof that there is a deliberate plan to normalize and eventually legalize pedophilia and child porn.”

And that, my friends, is some QAnon bullshit.

See, this is a great example of how conspiracy theories work. We tend to only think of them in terms of their major propositions and the implications of those propositions--that the Earth is hollow, your average garden-variety antisemitic caricature of a shadowy society controlling you, that sort of thing--instead of talking much about how people fall into that hole in the first place. And, in our day-to-day lives, it’s really where the theories start that we need to be vigilant about more than where they end. Where they end is important, obviously, but no one buys the end product immediately. They get there through a process. And the user who posted the above quote is playing into that process.

Here’s the process that I want you to see in that paragraph, and to look out for elsewhere:

0: ‘Facts’ that are viable, and possibly even true

Step Zero is not to lie or even to introduce new information. I call it Step Zero because it isn’t automatically part of a conspiracy theory; obviously, if we’re going to talk about the impact of anything on the world, we have to talk about what is actually happening. But I point it out because conspiracy theories always start with a premise that you can accept. Always. Every time. You cannot assume that you will recognize a nonsense theory based on immediate nonsense. No one starts there. They start in the real world. As above, where they are describing very real or at least realistic consideration for the ways filming such a movie can groom young actresses and audiences.

1: Framing facts through key concepts

A good conspiracy theory begins not in the facts provided, but in the way they are provided.

Consider the bit of the paragraph I copied where it said, “the fact that this movie was even released and is being defended by the elite.” Who are the ‘elite?’ See, the use of that wording is intentional. What the user has done is frame the delivery of the fact or near-fact (that the movie and its mode of production are abhorrent) in a way that an elusive enemy is embedded in the fact or near-fact itself (that the elite are defending the abhorrent thing, making ‘them,’ whoever they are, also abhorrent) such that it is difficult to separate that idea from the rest of the fact or near-fact. In fact, I expect that if anyone wishes to argue with me about this post, they will do so by framing my dismissal of a mythical elite with being part of their work; that is, the primary means of arguing against this post, based on the way people have argued with me about similar things in the past, will be to hold that if I doubt that part of the sentence I must doubt the whole sentence and doubting the whole sentence means not finding pedophilia abhorrent and that, by extension, must make me either a pedophile myself or a man comfortable with pedophiles.

I’m sure you’ve seen that play out before in some context or another. This is why it plays out that way: the fact or near-fact has been married, unsuitably, to a claim that sets up Step Two.

2: Using the altered fact or near-fact to demand a pre-determined conclusion

Here’s the thing. If there is an elite who are actively trying to make and promote and defend “Cuties” (which is a highly suspect claim already), then the logical question is why they are doing so. Well, by golly, our friendly neighborhood conspiracy theorist has an answer! See, it’s “proof that there is a deliberate plan to normalize and eventually legalize pedophilia and child porn.”

That conclusion is not demanded by the agreed-upon facts. That is, if I agree with the theorist that the movie is, indeed, a work that grooms actresses and audiences, there are actually a variety of conclusions we can draw about why the movie was made. Maybe it was filmed with entirely different intentions and the end result is because of editing, or license taken by questionable cameramen. Maybe the version shown at Sundance or whatever was not actually the version currently on Netflix, so the people defending it were defending something other than what the twitter thread author saw. Maybe the producer really did have terrible motives but managed to convince someone at Netflix that that was not what was happening. Some or all of these may be false. I have no idea. But here’s the thing: neither does the person who posted the paragraph in question. The facts given in the post are actually pretty sparse as far as coming to a certain conclusion about intent are concerned. You need more information to know what is really going on here.

But see, that’s why they added information in Step One. By making it a behavior of that conspiracy’s boogeyman, they can easily come to a conclusion. The facts or fact-adjacent statements made in the body of the post, paired with a conspiracy-based understanding of who the elite are and what they want, is enough information to come to a conclusion. And it’s a conclusion that is only reasonable if the elite are real and are who the conspiracy says they are. See, the goal of getting you to believe the bigger conspiracy isn’t by telling you who the elite are, but by getting you to accept something that requires them. Which is why

3. Frame the delivery in a way that hides the conspiracy

The post leading up to the quoted paragraph is actually fairly long (admittedly, not as long as this post), and every part of it fits the conversation that has been had about the movie and is presented in a way that makes sense. So while the average tumblr user is scrolling along, if they read through, they’re being hit with a lot of sensible discourse about a movie they probably haven’t seen but have seen more discourse about, and then that bit of QAnon is just kinda slipped in without any major change to wording and presentation. It’s bolded for effect, but the content itself seems to flow naturally from the rest of the post. It’s only in stopping and thinking seriously about what has been said that the diversion away from a discussion of facts gets noticed.

The point is to be distinct enough to set up the conspiracy theory, but subtle enough that you accept it as part of the rest of the post’s claims. See, because, what happens there is that if the rest of the post makes sense to you, and you aren’t thinking about the fact that the post has taken a left turn, you accept the conclusion being given as a natural part of the post. And accepting the conclusion requires that you have, maybe without realizing it, accepted the claims about the ‘elite.’ And that sets you up.

4. Go Deeper

Because once you have accepted the conspiracy’s claims about the elite, preferably without recognizing that there was a claim about the elite, you are ready to accept other things that connect to that. Someone comes along and says something that also sounds plausible, and also ties into the conclusion that the elite are trying to legalize pedophilia. Well, because you’ve already accepted that this was a reasonable conclusion elsewhere, and it seems reasonable enough here, you accept it here as well. And this is solidifying in your mind the idea that it is known that there is an elite working toward that goal. But the questions remains of who the elite are. So, when someone finally comes along and ties the ‘elite’ to a specific person or group of people that you do recognize (usually Jewish people or some caricature thereof), and offers some evidence that is pretty flimsy but plays very nicely with claims you’ve already accepted, you buy it. Or you don’t, but you’re so deep now that you have to provide an alternative if you want to reject the answer you’ve been given, and so you start to spin your own theory.

Either way, the end result is the same: you are convinced of a claim that would have sounded crazy to you a year ago, and your family is trying to tell you how crazy it sounds to them now, but they just don’t know! They haven’t seen all the facts! You should probably show them the facts. Ideally, by starting with something they already know to be true. And the cycle continues.

Please. Be careful out there, folks. Don’t be that guy.

32 notes · View notes

villa-kulla · 7 years

Note

DVD commentary: Could you write about the first chapter of "Desert Sands" when Billy buys Goody a drink after Goody saves his life?

Thank you so much! And for sure!

(***copy-paste disclaimer that this is NOT under a readmore because my blog’s black background makes reading long things a chore, so SCROLL FAST IF YOU’RE NOT INTERESTED!***)

Okay before I even get started, 2 things about this fic/scene:

1. In in hindsight I don’t find this scene very credible haha, mostly because of Billy’s reactions. I was publishing each chapter as I went along, and while I was writing chapters 1 & 2 that bit of backstory about Billy having been an indentured servant who killed two of his masters HADN’T EVEN BEEN SAID YET. Lol I wrote and published chapters 1 and 2 of this, and THEN LBH chose to share that bit of information, and then I had to scramble to make it work somewhere in chapter 3. But yeah all this to say, had I known Billy used to be an indentured servant I probably would have written him as much warier of Goody in this chapter. He’d ultimately have been charmed by him, but they might not have been quite so buddy-buddy right off the bat. But maybe it’s a good thing I wasn’t too caught up (okay, make that ‘aware at all’ lol) of their canon character histories because…

2. I intentionally wanted to write a different first meeting for them than what we hear in the movie. Partly because I thought it would be cool if Goody’s movie story about how they met was made up to a certain extent, partly because I’d only seen the movie once and didn’t really remember it that well lol, and partly….I was feeling creatively selfish haha and didn’t feel like writing that exact meeting just because it’s what Goody said in the canon. So yeah, while in hindsight I’m not sure how credible this scene is, at the very least I find it fresh, and I liked the thought of them clicking right off the bat, which plays against reader expectation a little. Would I have written it differently had I had better ideas of their characters/backstories at this point?? Probably. But on the other hand, maybe it’s good that I didn’t. Not feeling too weighed down while writing this fic is one of its strongest points. This was only the second Mag7 fic I ever wrote lol, I wrote it suuuper fast, like cumulatively in about 4 days, had zero writer’s block the whole time, and was just feeling really confident about this fun, light-hearted western romp, and I think this fic has a nice organic breeziness to it. So if the sacrifice was some believability then so be it lol.

TLDR: This particular scene feels pretty clumsy/unlikely in hindsight but oh well, on the whole it was probably for the best

Goodnight sat at one of the saloon’s low, wooden tables, idly looking around. He’d already seen to getting a room for the night, and had taken his horse some water. He’d gotten her fixed up in one of the spare stables, ignoring the stares of his new acquaintance as he’d soothingly rubbed her down.

Goody was definitely talking to the horse, and Billy was definitely already thinking ‘this is excessive’

Now he was just sitting here waiting at the scuffed table, suddenly feeling awkward about the whole thing. But before he could make sense of what he’d just done, Billy was returning with two frothy mugs of ale.

“Here,” he said, setting one in front of Goodnight. It was the one with the least amount of foam. Goodnight’s hand curled around the glass handle.

polite!Billy giving Goody the fuller glass. Least he feels he can do lol

“Cheers,” he said, raising his glass and taking a sip, flicking some of the foam out of his whiskers. He looked back up at the man seated across from him, finally getting what felt like a proper look at his face.

Goody’s whiskers are a goldmine for filler actions aren’t they

It was smooth and angled. Riding in the sun had given it a slightly bronzed look, but it was hardly weathered. The man could have been anywhere from his mid twenties to almost forty. But Goodnight guessed the man was somewhere in his thirties, if only because of the cropped black facial hair around a wide mouth. Not to mention the faint lines beside the man’s eyes, which were were inspecting Goodnight from under the thick black hair that fell in his face.

While technically they’d be in their early 30s in this fic, I never actually pictured a set age for them here. And I kind of like that it’s not specified, because it gives it more of a ‘timeless’ feel. That being said, they’re always the exact same age in all my fics, partly because LBH and EH are the same age, but also I like how it makes them ‘equals’ in that sense. There’s this one LBH interview where he says kind of delightedly about EH ‘We’re the same age!’, which is actually really significant in Korea. There’s a huge age hierarchy in Korea, and even if you’re one year younger than someone you automatically have to defer to them, and if you’re one year older you’re at perfect liberty to boss them around. Someone born in the same year as you however is your ‘chingu’ which is actually the Korean word for ‘friend’, but it goes deeper than just ‘friend’. Even if you have a friend older than you, they can be your friend, but they can’t be your ‘chingu’. Most close friendships, or opportunities for close friendships happen with people the same age, so I thought it was a nice coincidence that the actors were the same age, and I like aging the characters accordingly to make them equals in every sense

“Are you Korean?” asked Goodnight because he suddenly and uncharacteristically couldn’t think of anything else to say.

P.S. as I’m sure we’re all aware by now, the concept of a ‘Korean’ empire didn’t really exist at this time, as Korea was still the Joseon dynasty. Not actually sure when exactly the English word ‘Korea’ even made an appearance in Western language, but it probably wasn’t realistically in Goody’s vocabulary:P But like I said in the notes, I was living in Korea at the time while writing this, and writing Billy as ‘Korean’ was kind of a fun way to engage with the culture I was so immersed in. So historically accurate or not, Billy is always ‘Korean’ in my fics, which has been great in terms of being able to picture his background

Billy nodded as he took a sip of beer. He did it casually, but Goodnight could see the tension in the man’s broad shoulders like he was waiting for some kind of judgment.

But Goodnight just asked: “How long have you been in America?”

I feel like this part sticks out too much in a ‘look how nonjudgmental Goody is’ kind of way. I wasn’t trying to establish that - and hopefully that already would have been clear by now lol - but I just feel like it comes off a bit that way

Billy shrugged. “Most of my life. Came here when I was ten.”

“But not to Texas,” said Goodnight, thinking out loud. “You must have landed somewhere west if you came from Korea and then worked your way inland, no?”

Billy stared at him. “Landed in Oregon if you need to know. Went down to California pretty soon after. Stayed there until I was a bit more grown up and then spent most of my time in Arizona and New Mexico. Been in Texas a couple years now.”

It was the longest sentence Goodnight had heard him say so far. He liked the man’s accent, his control of English absolute, but with a peculiar inflection like he was tasting the words in his mouth before trying them out. It was a hell of a lot more appealing than half the turkey’s gabble that Goodnight had heard so far in this state. In some ways it reminded him more of the gentle, polished drawl he’d heard growing up in Louisiana, when visiting his cousins in the country on their plantation, sitting under the trees and having conversations and late summer picnics beneath the Spanish moss.

I think this is my favourite paragraph in this section. I also quite like the slow reveal of Goody’s character history in this chapter, and the pacing of the little bits of backstory that are dropped here and there as we learn more about him.

“That’s quite a trail,” Goodnight said. “You do this the whole time?” he asked, jerking his head towards the door, referring to the fast draw competition they’d just left.

“All kinds of things,” Billy said, eyes narrowed.

“I don’t mean any offense,” Goodnight said raising his hands amiably. “That was just some fancy throwing I saw back there. I mean hell, they’re probably still working Baldy out of that fence you pinned him to. Seems like a guy like you could be doing a lot more specialized work with those skills, rather than scamming every backwoods’ hillbilly from here to Oregon.”

He met Billy’s eyes which were staring at him hard, like Goodnight was accusing him of something definite.

“No judgment,” Goodnight felt compelled to breezily add.

Billy leaned forward, eyes fixed to Goodnight’s. “The knives you saw? That’s what you want to know? Okay. For the right price, and the right mark, that used to be for hire. Got it?”

okay is it really believable that Billy would just casually be like ‘yah dude, used to be an assassin, cheers’ to a total stranger? I didn’t think anything of it at the time, but later found this to be totally unbelievable. I take comfort in telling myself he could have just been trying intimidate Goody and letting him know not to mess with him lol.

(Actually Billy’s assassin past was pretty clumsily handled by me in the first couple chapters of this fic:S I think I just figured ‘eh, better work in an assassin angle for him ‘cause that’s what the trailers said he was’ and didn’t really think too hard about it (Also again with LBH only saying how Billy used to be an indentured servant after I’d already written chapter 2). I like what I came up with/hinted at in chapter 3, where we learn Billy killed rich men who were enslaving people like him to free them from the same situation he was in. But like I said, Billy’s assassin past was not really thought-out here yet, and I told myself I’d expand on it in a Billy-centric sequel, i.e. River Grit.

Goodnight nodded silently and Billy leaned back, lifting his mug of beer. He raised it to his lips, when he suddenly paused.

“But for Baldy it was for free,” he added thoughtfully, his lips twitching up. And Goodnight was surprised enough to let out a huffing laugh.

“You pick up all that fancy silverware spinning yourself, or someone teach you?” he asked curiously, between sips of beer.

I regret not making ‘silverware’ more of a running joke in this fic lol, but I did bring it back for Ashes which is technically part of this universe, although in a strange order

“Myself,” said Billy. The he was looking at Goodnight seriously. “And now I have a question.”

Goodnight was suddenly nervous as he took another sip, waiting for it.

“You always this fucking nosy?” Billy finally asked, with a quirk to his mouth.

“Oh no, I used to be much worse,” Goodnight said cheerfully. “I find in my old age I’ve really discovered the virtues of silence. I’ve picked up a lot of patience.”

“And what, stared at it and put it right back down again?” Billy asked, snorting a little, and Goodnight finally felt more relaxed.

okay let’s be real, puns are an extremely unlikely form of humour for one’s second language, and this is a lame line anyways, but I couldn’t resist lol

“Something like that,” he said smiling. He went to take another sip, and noticed with a start that his mug was empty. So was Billy’s.

Billy noticed too. “I got it,” he said, already standing up.

“You don’t have to do that,” Goodnight protested insincerely.

“twist my arm, why don’t you”

“You saved my life, I think I can buy you another drink,” Billy said dryly. Goodnight chuckled as he watched him approach the bar, holding up two fingers to the innkeeper.

When Billy came back the drinks, Goodnight felt a hell of a lot less awkward than he did the first time he’d waited for the man to approach.

“Gamsahamnida,” he said, taking the proffered drink. And he looked up just in time to see Billy’s eyebrows shoot all the way up to his hairline.

“You speak Korean?” he asked incredulously as he sat down, in the most open show of surprise Goodnight had seen from him yet. He seemed more shocked than he had when Goodnight had told him about the men trying to kill him.

“I do not,” Goodnight said. “But the town where I grew up had a Korean laundryman. So I can say hello, thank you…and don’t wrinkle my dad’s shirts or I’m the one he’ll be giving a whipping to.” He looked at Billy deadpan.

Billy stared back at him until finally the corner of his mouth curved up. “No you can’t.”

“No I can’t,” Goodnight agreed, raising his fresh glass to his lips, fighting against the laugh that was bubbling up. “But I fucking wish I could, I’ll tell you that right now.”

Billy burst out laughing and so did Goodnight, glowing a bit at finally having gotten the man to crack.

I feel like the ‘finally’ implies that making Billy laugh is what Goody has been trying to do all along. He wasn’t consciously trying to do so, but let’s just assume that trying to make people laugh is a reflexive action of Goody’s

Billy was covering his mouth as he shook with laughter, and Goodnight took another sip of beer through his grin. He swallowed and added, “But I can say hello and thank you though.”

“Alright,” Billy said, settling down, still with the ghost of a smile on his face. He twirled his glass around on the table before taking a sip. He looked back a Goodnight, seeming a little more animated.

how long has it been do you think, since Billy’s had a good conversation with anybody? I can’t buy that he never had a friendly relationship with ANYBODY before meeting Goody, but he certainly would have led a very solitary life. So maybe it’s not unusual after all that he opened up to Goody fairly quickly here. Actually there’s a bit in River Grit that I consider to be the ‘Billy POV’ of this first meeting: ‘Billy normally put up walls with everyone because it was just safer. But when Goodnight had come along and seen nothing strange about Billy’s strangeness, he had loosened Billy’s foundations so blithely that Billy knew any walls he tried to build would have just crumbled anyways. And so Billy, curious, charmed, and - if he was being brutally honest with himself - lonely, had done what he hadn’t allowed himself to do with any new experience in this country: enjoy it.’

“Robicheaux…you French?” he asked.

“My grandparents on my dad’s side,” Goodnight said. “I’m from Louisiana which is where they met. They never got my daddy to learn much of it though. Insisted he only speak English.”

I was a little haphazard about Goody’s Cajun heritage in this one and probably could have included a more interesting cultural history, but honestly I think I was more focused on his war past in this than anything else.

“What about you?” Billy asked. “You speak any?”

“Used to,” Goodnight said. “But not with them. Mostly with my nanny. Well, our main nanny,” he corrected himself. “She was a true Louisiana Creole and only spoke French with me and my brothers and sister.”

I always felt pretty early on that Goody would have been the baby of the family. It just seems so right somehow

Goodnight suddenly felt a bit gauche by having admitted to a nanny. Billy had come here on what was likely some tin can of a cargo ship, and here was Goodnight talking about his family with multiple servants like the rich townie that he was.

I love the use of ‘gauche’ here lol, partly because it’s just a funny word and feels in-character for Goodnight, but it also works thematically:P

But Billy just looked amused. “So you learned Korean from your laundryman…French from your nanny…don’t tell me you learned Spanish from your gardener?”

I know I say this a lot but: Billy, you minx. I’m not sure when the stereotype of a Spanish gardener started, but I felt this was a very droll thing of Billy to say lol. I enjoy giving Billy an ironic sense of humour, and am glad I seemed to do it right from the get go. Certainly makes banter scenes easier:P

Goodnight shook his head. “Nah,” he said, already losing against the fresh wave of laughter that was swelling. His lips twitched as he looked at Billy. “He was from Kentucky.”

okay I’m not imagining that this is genuinely a very funny line, am I? At least I think so haha, but I’m biased:P

He and Billy lost it again, bent double over the saloon’s table laughing, until the other grizzled patrons started glancing over their shoulders at the two strangers from out of town.

can you imagine them as boys in the same classroom? My god they’d have been an adorable nightmare to teach

“Shut up, everyone’s looking,” Goodnight said, trying not to laugh as he handed Billy his handkerchief for the man’s drink, which had sloshed onto the table a bit from his laughter.

oh yeah, later Billy mentions how he used Goody’s handkerchief to lure his horse out of the stable, so I had to quickly go back and find a good opportunity for Goody to have given him one in this convo

Billy got himself under control, wiping up the bit of beer that had splashed out, and pinching his mouth almost like he was trying to squeeze the corners together to stop from smiling. Goodnight looked away in case it set him off again.

Billy reached out for his mug, still grinning a bit. “So I’ve heard your thank you,” he said before taking a swallow, the line of his throat bobbing. He set the glass back down, staring intently at Goodnight. “But what about your hello?”

Goodnight knew he was asking about Korean again. He cleared his throat.

“Annyeonghaseyo,” he said, trying to mimic the exact enthusiastic inflection he’d always gotten from the laundryman every time Goodnight would walk in with a large pack of clothes slung over his back that his daddy had insisted ‘built character’.

okay but this bit makes me feel things because I have so many headcanons about Goodnight’s childhood and this is one. Personable little Goody trying to speak Korean to this one man, because he’s curious, wants to learn new things, and it just seems like the polite thing to do, doesn’t it? I’m sure the man would have been beyond delighted but yeah, the idea of little Goody learning to say ‘hello’ in this store gives me feelings. While I feel like Goody’s childhood was fairly charmed and people really delighted in him, I also feel like he might have been a little lonely in his way, and just wanted to find someone to connect with

Billy raised his eyebrows. “Good,” he said, sounding impressed. “You never learned goodbye?”

“Never could quite catch it,” Goodnight admitted. “He’d say it when I left, but it just sounded like ‘hello’ again, with a bunch of extra junk at the end.”

tbh this one rolls off the tongue a lot less naturally than ‘hello’, and even though I lived there for two years, I feel like my goodbye was a ‘mumblemumblemumbleKESEYO’ right up until I left

Billy snorted. “Similar. Depends on if you’re staying or leaving though.”

Seeing Goodnight’s confusion, Billy pushed his drink aside, leaning forward and sketching it out with his hand. “If you are staying and I am leaving, you tell me annyeonghi-kaseyo. If am staying and you are leaving, then you say annyeonghi-keseyo.”

Goodnight stared at him. “Pal, I hate to break it to you, but you just said the exact same thing.”

ME. when an actual Korean is saying these fast, they are virtually indistinguishable lol. People would sometimes speak to me in top-speed Korean and I’d be like ‘are you kidding me, SLOW DOWN’, and I had to BEG people to over-exaggerate their pronunciation when teaching me a word. So yeah, Goody’s line there was very much me and my English ears being salty haha

Billy rolled his eyes. “You stay? Annyeonghi-kaseyo. You leave? Annyeonghi-KEseyo.”

In Korean, Goodnight felt like he could finally hear the man’s true vocal inflection. It was richer.

Isn’t it SUCH a difference though when you’ve only heard someone speak in one language, and then hear them speak their first language? I know this is such a ‘duh’ observation lol, but it’s really interesting to see the way someone’s whole energy changes

“One more time,” he said.

“Stay? Kaseyo. Leave? Keseyo.”

“Kaseyo. Keseyo,” Goodnight repeated to himself, taking a sip. “Kaseyo, keseyo, kaseyo, keseyo, kaseyo, keseyo…”

Billy watched Goodnight’s attempts. “So which one is it?” he asked, interrupting Goodnight’s repetitions.

“Pardon?” asked Goodnight, derailed.

“Which one is it?” Billy repeated, amused. “You staying or leaving?”

Whatever else Billy makes of Goody at this point, he definitely feels a) not a threat, b) kinda weird, c) funny and my god it’s been a while since someone’s made him laugh

Goodnight hesitated. “Right now?” Billy nodded.

Goodnight looked at the man’s face.

“Staying,” he said. And he reached for his mug and the two clinked glasses.

if you’d like some angst, picture this exchange happening in Rose Creek the night Goody wants to leave town, and Billy asking him tightly ‘Which one is it? You staying or leaving?’ and Goody with his eyes down saying, ‘Leaving.’

……but of course it’s okay, because like he also said in this fic, he’ll always come back for Billy, and he does. ~ROMANTIC SIGH~

But yeah, now that we know more about the characters, in hindsight this scene feels somewhat flawed, BUT…….it feels charming and it works in the context of the rest of the fic, and I DO love how this fic turned out. This fic felt like a pretty lucky break the whole way through actually. It doesn’t have my most ‘sophisticated’ writing (whatever that means), but it was a good idea at a good time, and I wrote it with zero sense of ‘fandom expectation’, and it has a nice easy-breezy quality as a result. This fic is pure, good old-fashioned, cheesy Western, feel-good entertainment, so while it may not be PERFECT or what it could have been, I think it’s exactly what it SHOULD have been. If I had been trying to make it perfect, maybe it wouldn’t have been special at all. So yeah anyways, this fic tends to feel like ‘my baby’ haha, writing it was so much fun, I’m glad it makes other people smile, and I’ll always have good associations with it:)

Thanks so much for the ask!

#anon #asks #writing #long post #dvd commentary

5 notes · View notes