the reason why the doctor and martha never worked out romantically is because you gotta be a little deranged for the doctor to like you like that. martha had good self care, a healthy level of self love, and no predisposition towards codependency whatsoever. put more simply, she was way too good for him and he knew it 😭

I can't imagine the pain.

Word Count: 3,262

TW: child loss, grief and grieving, discussion of death. See AO3 for complete tags.

Special thanks to @angelfishofthelord and @shirtlesscastiel who both asked for a part 2, as well as @featherasscas , who's reblogged part 1 more times than I can count

Companion to this, + also on AO3. [Masterpost]

Castiel stayed on the ground, broken, for what felt like hours, lacking the strength to look away from the devastation of his grief.

He stayed there so long that the Winchesters gave up hope. They mumbled something about Chuck and the end of all things, of the ghosts that Cas’ total grief had obliterated and how they might not have been all that was released. Castiel didn’t care. He didn’t have it in him to, and maybe the Winchesters saw that. Dean tried to touch his shoulder, maybe even offer an apology, but Castiel shot him a look that ended the conversation they had been dancing around for years. They left him in that graveyard with what was left of his son.

He almost prayed, but what could an angel do to reverse God’s will? No, he needed to do something else. He was desperate enough to try anything he thought would work.

Bargaining. Maybe he could strike up another deal. Whatever the price was, he would pay it happily. He would give his life in a heartbeat, just like before, if it would bring Jack back.

He reached out to Death directly.

He felt Billie’s presence before he saw them and slowly turned as they offered a laid back “Hey.”

“Bring him back.”

“Can’t.”

“Can’t or won’t?”

“Both,” Billie replied. They raised a brow as Castiel drew his blade. “Killing me again? That seems a little redundant.”

“If you won’t bring him back then maybe your replacement will.”

“Everything has its time, Castiel and everything dies.”

“And it wasn’t his time! His story isn’t done!”

“God said otherwise.”

“You’re going to let God do your job? Kill Jack and wreck the order?”

“God isn’t wrecking anything. Every story has different endings. This was one.”

“Then change it.”

“It’s already happened. It can’t be undone.” Billie’s voice was gentler than Castiel expected when they continued. “It’s not fair, or kind, or right, but it’s life. You need to make your peace with that.”

“No.” Billie’s brows drew together and if Castiel didn’t know better, he would think that it was from pity. Even as he spoke, he felt the tip of his angel blade drop. “I can’t accept this, he can’t be...”

“He is. And nothing you do will change that, regardless of what your time with the Winchesters has taught you.”

Castiel felt the lurching ill sensation rise up again.

“What if I go to the Empty directly?”

“Then you die. It keeps both you and Jack. But you know how the Empty works.”

“I still won’t get to see him...say anything...”

Billie touched his shoulder, a rare gesture of remorse from Death incarcerate. “He’s gone, Castiel, but he can live on in you.”

Castiel didn’t answer, and Death left him to grieve.

Even as time ticked by, Castiel was at a loss for what to do. In the dust, he drew the Enochian sigil to create a portal to Heaven, paid it enough attention that for a moment he could pretend Jack was sitting in the truck playing on his phone.

Castiel almost called his brothers and sisters down to open the portal, to take both Jack and him from the Earth, to let them rest for the first time in years. He wanted Jack to know the peace that used to exist in Heaven, the safety of the place he had once called home. More than that, he wanted to be at peace, to quell the anguish and anger writhing in his chest. It would be easier to go back to proper angelhood, forget what it was to feel.

Emotions had never brought him anything but trouble. They’d lost him his family, his home, his friends, his life…

Still, his tongue wouldn’t speak the words to bring his siblings down. He remembered how they’d treated Jack, and him. The angels had manipulated Jack just as the Winchesters had, and they would do so again if given the chance.

Even dead, Jack could still be used as a weapon. His body harbored the remains of not only nephil grace, but also that of the archangel Michael. Those were both cosmic; they would endure longer than his body.

As much as it sickened him, Castiel realized a hard truth.

Not only was Jack unable to come back, but it wasn’t enough to simply lay him to rest. His body needed to be destroyed so completely that he could never be manipulated again.

He only knew one person he could even start to trust with something like that.

“Hello, tweetie pie,” Rowena answered. “Is this a social call?”

“No, I need your help.”

“Now as much as I’d like to, I’m busy. Tell the Winchesters—”

“This isn’t for them,” he said, words coming out harsher than intended. He took a breath and added a gentler, “Please, this is important.”

“More important than—”

“Yes. Can you meet me at...” Castiel faltered. The Bunker wasn’t an option, and he certainly wasn’t going to stay where he was, surrounded by death, destruction, and his son’s wings scorched into the earth. “Uh…”

“I’ll need some time to tie things up in Nevada. Could you perhaps meet me halfway?

“Yes.” Castiel breathed a sigh of relief. “In Colorado? Grand Junction?”

“Alright,” Rowena agreed. “Now tell me what it is you need so I can prepare.”

“I need you to help me burn a body.” He risked a glance to Jack, feeling bile rise up. “So completely that he can’t come back.”

“Dearie—”

“I can’t talk more; I’ll see you tomorrow,” Castiel blurted, hanging up before what little control he had over his emotions could slip.

The drive was even harder than watching him die.

He talked and played music, anything to avoid the screaming silence, the way Jack was growing cold and stiff beside him. It didn’t work. His mind still repeated the horrified knowledge of “this was your child,” a broken record he feared would never stop.

Neither of them would recover from this.

He arrived after Rowena and nearly cried as she offered him a smile in her prim and proper way and asked if Jack would be joining them or staying in the car.

He didn’t know what gave it away. The unnatural stillness and silence of the car, one that he’d grappled with for hundreds of miles, perhaps. Maybe it was a witch’s intuition, since she’d seen enough over the last several hundred years. Maybe it was because he couldn’t answer her, or even look her in the eyes.

“Oh,” was all she said before embracing him. He couldn’t return it. He couldn’t tear his mind from the hug he had given Jack in the graveyard, how he hadn’t hugged back, how he’d kneeled rather than fight, and how he’d died even when Dean couldn’t go through with it. How it felt to hold Jack, limp and soundless in his arms.

The dam broke, and all that pain and grief and anger nearly brought him to his knees.

Rowena saw it: how broken he was, how broken he’d always been. He didn’t know who he was anymore if he wasn’t a father or an angel, yet he was neither anymore. What was he supposed to do now?

Maybe she understood that. She had suffered the loss of a loved one, too. She knew what it was to watch the world die around her, to lose herself for a time.

When Castiel was able to collect himself, pull the broken shards of his being back together, Rowena asked something that almost tore him apart again.

“Dearie, are you sure you want to…”

“I can’t bring him back. I talked to Death, and I can’t bring him back,” Castiel said softly. “I can’t have someone take advantage of what’s… left.”

“But something so permanent…”

“I would do it myself,” he offered, “but I seem to have fallen.”

Rowena gave him a strange look, the likes of which he hadn’t received in years, so he explained.

“I felt it. Something in me breaking. The emotion growing stronger. I don’t know how to describe it… It felt like when the angels fell. The same kind of desperation.”

“My dear, you’re still an angel. You still have your powers.” She looked him up and down. “Maybe you’re not as powerful as you once were, and you’re a smidge weaker than last we saw each other, but you’re far from powerless.”

Castiel looked away, lost.

“Maybe you can’t do it because you don’t want to,” she offered gently.

“What I want is for him to come back. But he needs to be….” He couldn’t bring himself to say it.

Rowena nodded, understanding.

They found somewhere private, somewhere quiet outside the city. The trees stood tall and proud and vibrantly alive. A felled one became the pyre.

Castiel placed Jack on it, still wrapped in the trenchcoat.

The flames that swallowed him were brilliantly red, orange, and gold like the ochre rocks on the horizon.

It took hours, even with the help of magic. Castiel stood by Jack’s side for all of it, even long after the embers had cooled and all that was left was a small pile of ash and smudges of soot. Rowena collected it up in a jar as the sun rose, and Castiel took it in his hands.

It never should have ended like this.

The day carried on as if Castiel’s world hadn’t ended hours ago. He was grateful to Rowena for what she had done, but even sitting in her kitchen he was too lost in grief to thank her.

Standing by a whistling teapot, she finally asked, “Would you like to talk about the wee boy?”

“It hurts too much.” Castiel bit into his lip, hard. What did it say about him, that he could hardly even say Jack’s name? Shame bubbled up, hatred of himself swift to follow.

“It hurts because of how much you loved him.”

“I still love him.”

“Yes.”

The pair fell silent for a long while and Rowena set a cup of hot tea in front of Cas before settling into her own seat.

“Rowena…”

“Yes, tweetie pie?”

“When did losing Oscar stop hurting?”

Rowena bowed her head, and Castiel knew the answer.

“It didn’t,” she finally said. “Just as losing Fergus hasn’t stopped hurting.”

Castiel’s instinct was right. This was something he would never recover from, would he?

“It’s a different kind of hurt, with time,” Rowena offered. “It stops being so keen. You survive and you try to carry on without them, because that’s what they would have wanted.” She stared deep into her tea. “You learn to talk about them, and to them, even though they’re gone.”

Castiel nodded and held his tea closer. He couldn’t see that happening, not with how much it hurt, but she was right: he would survive. With Jack gone, his deal would never come due. Happiness wouldn’t kill him because he would never feel it again.

Rowena offered him a place to stay for a few weeks, but Castiel declined. He couldn’t stay there, not where the earth was scorched and the air still smelled faintly of smoke. Instead, Castiel drove for hours, not paying much attention to where he was going until he found himself parked outside of the Bunker.

It wasn’t where he wanted to be, not by a longshot, but he had something he needed to do. The door creaked as loudly as it always had, and Castiel was halfway across the library before a voice called out to him.

“Cas.”

Dean.

“I’m here for his things. Then I’ll be on my way.”

“Cas, hey. Stop for a moment, would you?”

Castiel did.

“Look, alright.” Dean walked over until they could look each other in the eye. “I’m not proud of how everything went down. And I’ve given what you said some thought. You’re right. It is our fault, but it’s Chuck’s, too, man. You gotta see that.”

“What I see is that you’re finding any excuse you can to get the blame off yourself.”

Dean’s eyes darkened.

“Chuck has been toying with us—”

“No, you made the decision to kill him, just as I made the decision not to. You told me to get onboard or walk away, and I left you and Chuck both of my own choice. Because you taught me that people and families and love are worth fighting for, and I was going to fight for him!” Castiel tried to keep the waver out of his voice as tears brimmed in his eyes. “Chuck couldn’t have changed that even if he’d tried.”

“Maybe he didn’t want to, huh? You think of that? Maybe he wants us divided.”

“You should have thought about that before you tried to execute him in front of me.”

“Cas—”

“You had a choice and you made the wrong one.”

Castiel left him there in the library and locked himself in Jack’s room. Almost instantly, it proved to be too much, and he slumped down against the door, sobbing.

The room was holding its breath, waiting for Jack to come home. A half-read book sat on the desk, a few stray papers underneath. A pile of clothes waited patiently to be returned to a drawer. The nightstand was bare save for a pencil. One good deed….

Castiel packed it all away. He hated himself for destroying the illusion, for leaving the room as empty as his chest felt, but what he was waiting for would never happen. Jack would never walk through that door again. The decoder ring in the drawer would never be used. Everything had fallen into ruin.

He managed to get the first box into his truck with no issues, no run-ins or confrontations. The second box was smaller, and he rested it on a hip as he closed the bedroom door for the last time.

This time, he wasn’t so lucky. Dean watched him cross the room and quietly said, “You’re not the only one grieving him.”

“It’s not the same, Dean. You never felt his soul. You never took the time to know him: you spent your time trying to make up for wanting him dead. Well, you got what you wanted.”

Dean flinched at that, but Castiel didn’t care. His son was nothing but ash and a box and a half of belongings. Anger flared again.

“You think angels can’t feel.” He laughed bitterly. “Even though I’ve proven that wrong. Did you think killing him wouldn’t kill me, too? As if I haven’t given more for him than you could possibly imagine. As much as you’ve given for Sam. My life. My happiness… I signed away my future in a heartbeat so that he could come back and I would do it again. I tried to do it again.”

If only it would have worked.

“Wait, what?”

“I made a deal to save him. When I’m happy, the Empty will take me forever.”

Dean gaped at him in horror.

“Cas, what’ve you done?”

“What I had to. What any father would do. Don’t give me that look. You’ve done worse for Sam.”

“And it’s always come back to bite me in the ass.”

“Well, I haven’t been happy in years, so don’t worry about the deal.”

“You shouldn’t have made it in the first place.”

“Oh, so now only you get to make deals to save the people you love? Only you get to cheat death time and time again while the rest of us suffer?” Castiel looked at him incredulously, anger seeping through him. “Do you know how many brothers I’ve lost? Sisters? Friends? Now Jack. Why can’t I save them? Why should they stay dead when you and your brother have been raised so many times?”

“That’s not what I meant and you know it. We would have figured it out without making the deal!”

“We didn’t have the time! If I hadn’t made the deal I would have lost him forever, right then and there. I couldn’t stand by and watch him die!”

It would have killed him. And it had.

“We would have figured it out,” Dean maintained. “Like we always do!”

Castiel shook his head. “Then you figure it out. If you bring him back, I’ll be back, but until then…” Castiel looked around the wide expanse of the Bunker with a strange longing. This had never been home, but it could have been, just as his friendship with the Winchesters could have been more. He was leaving behind an almost.

“Jack’s dead. Chuck’s gone. You and Sam have each other. I think it’s time for me to move on.”

“Cas, wait.”

As angry and tired as he was—as they both were—Castiel wanted to. A decade of comradeship, of camaraderie and pining, did that, made him reluctant to leave. Then he remembered standing between Dean and Jack, realizing that if that gun went off, he’d lose them both. He knew now that he’d lost them both long before that.

“Goodbye, Dean.”

It was years before they saw each other again.

It took longer than Castiel could ever admit to find peace.

He still ached for Jack to come back, felt the pain in every drawn breath, but Rowena was right. Billie was right. The anger lessened and the pain dulled. He missed his son but Jack would have wanted him to try to move on. He would have wanted Cas to be happy, despite the deal still hanging over his head even if Castiel couldn’t see it ever coming to fruition now. He owed it to Jack to try to be happy.

And he would. He had to. No matter how much it hurt, even if he still wanted nothing more than to bring him back or follow him in death. Jack survived through him, in his memories and his love. He couldn’t let what was left of his son go like that.

He’d moved to Washington, made a home of where Jack had been born and Kelly had died. Where he had burned. It was a little too empty, full of broken promises and loss and regret, as if it, too, struggled to let go. One day it would. Another family would come and clean it out, fill this home with love as it always should have been. Children would run out to the sand, oblivious of the ash mixed in, while their parents painted over Kelly’s mural and took down the pale yellow curtains that had reminded Cas of honey.

One day, all memory of Jack and the world his parents had tried to give him would be gone. But it wouldn’t be today.

Castiel made his way outside, stood where the rift had first appeared. If he looked closely, he could still see the imprint of wings in the earth. This was where he and Kelly had both burned.

Cautiously, Castiel looked to the sky, the twinkling lights of stars against an unpolluted sky. Jack loved space. He would have loved it here, able to see the stars every night without fail.

It was time to let go.

Gently, Castiel let the ash catch in the breeze, wander everywhere it liked and more until it was gone. Jack was gone.

Castiel swallowed hard and tilted his head back up to the sky, to the light of a thousand stars. If he looked hard enough, he could see the golden twinkle of Jack’s grace reflecting back, his eyes glowing against a sea of blue.

“Hello, Jack.”​ 

Why do I think Resume will end up with Volturi - an attempt to explain Bella/Renesmee relationship

As within the fandom nobody likes Renee (no wonder why) I'd like to make an attempt at explaining to y'all what's like to have a parent like her (because I've got the same problem) and why this is going to cause problem over the years between Bella and Renesmee. This post will include such things as explaining:

why being in a relationship like this is so tiresome

what kind of effect has it on Bella

why Bella is just the same towards Renesmee as her mother was to her

why Bella and Renessme dynamics as mother/daughter aren't as fantastic

why is it so probable that Renesmee will eventually join the Volturi and what may be her reasons to do so.

1. Someone, who's never been in the kind of relationship that Bella and Renee have, is not going to catch up quickly with the point that I'm making in this post. Why? Because it's hard to imagine yourself being in an abusive or neglectful relationship with a person, who is a close relative of yours. You never want to acknowledge that something is wrong and instead, you're trying to find excuses for the person's abusive behavior. Fandom agrees on the fact, that Renee is, at best, neglectful of Bella, while at worst, she's downright abusive. I agree with both statements and in a moment you'll know why. You also need to know that everything I'll write here is from my experience from being in such a relationship hence it doesn't mean everyone will have the same experiences as myself. Now, why is such a relationship so tiresome and you struggle to find your true self in it? In my case, very similarly to Bella, I became responsible for things I shouldn't be responsible for at a very young age. I didn't have the time to actually be a kid because I needed to handle "adult responsibilities". When you have adults' responsibilities you lose something beyond reclaim. You'll never go back to your childhood and be a child once again. I was forced, not only to handle myself, but also my brother and mother, and our household. I didn't have time to do most things that kids do cause I was taking care of my brother, or my mother, or doing chores, or anything that was supposed to be done by adults, except it wasn't. While all of this made me extremely responsible, it also made me anxious, bitter towards my parents and I suffered from depression for a long time. I read somewhere that Bella is exaggerating and it's normal to help your parents within the house, to have responsibilities. The problem here is that Renee is Bella's responsibility in the same way my mother and brother were mine. You cannot give this up because you're too responsible but it also eats you from the insides. Also, if I remember correctly, Bella says somewhere in the book that she doesn't mind this because that's how things are for a long time. That's exactly what I'm talking about! When such responsibilities are forced on you at a very young age, you accept it and think it is natural. It isn't. Adult are adults, and kids should be kids, not kids forced into adulthood.

2. + 3. When you don't have time to be a child and you're forced into the adult world, there's always going to be some consequences that you cannot foresee prior. To Bella it ended actually sadly - we can see in the book, as well as in the movie, that Renesmee is almost as an accessory to Bella. Sure, Bella dies for her, but what else? Renesmee is described as mature and serious, she doesn't want to do things that kids usually do. Why? Smeyer made her this way, yeah, but apart from that, it's because Bella cannot handle a kid. The idea of full family appeared to her because she never had it herself. And while she admits that she doesn't even want children in Eclipse, suddenly in Breaking Dawn we see her change her mind completely. All she ever wanted was a) Edward and b) to be a vampire. So when she has these two goals achieved, why would she even bother with Renesmee? So Resume is mature enough and growing up quickly to relieve Bella from the burden of maternity.

4. Also, I'm not saying that Bella doesn't love Renesmee. Of course she does. Renesmee, also, loves her dearly. It's the same dynamics as between my and my mother, and between Bella and Renee. Bella loves Renne but needs to take care of her and be the responsible adult™. It also tires her, as she needs to think about how to handle the business in the most effective (and cheapest) way.

I think we can establish by now that love has nothing to do with this. So, because of her childhood and the poor illustrations of how relationships should work, Bella is exactly the same towards Renesmee as Renee (and partially Charlie) was to her. She thinks Renesmee is able to handle herself fine - she's constantly throwing at us proves that Renesmee is mature enough to do almost everything adults do. It's bullshit, of course, but Bella isn't aware of that. It's how she was brought up (or it's rather the lack of bringing her up by responsible adult) and she thinks it's the best way to fulfill parental duties.

As I said earlier, Bella is all smiles because she's got what she wanted - Edward and immortality. Yeah, it's great she has a daughter too, but like... hello, it's Edward and her and they have forever so why to bother with a child. It'll somehow work itself out. I will not ponder here on Edward being a father and how I see his relationship with Renesmee, however, I don't think it's pretty healthy either. Also, I need to add here, that Renesmee at least, has others (I mean other Cullens) who have probably more patience and time to actually raise a child. I think, and it's only a headcanon so take it easy, that Renesmee has excellent relationship with Rosalie. Rose will not treat her as adult - she'll prolong Renesmee's childhood as much as she's able to. She has time, patience, will and all love for her, so I think they're pretty close, and it would be a good, as well as a healthy relationship.

5. The older Renesmee will get, the more she'll be able to understand. Maybe the Cullens (and I hope it would turn out this way) would spare her this "being a premature adult" thing but her relationship with Bella will never be as close as she'd probably wish to. Sometimes, love isn't enough to keep up with the relationship and the shit that's going on around you constantly. One day, Renesmee will go to high school, then to university and then? Who the hell knows. She won't necessarily be with Bella. Sure, she'll be always her daughter, but she's not her property. At some point, Renesmee'll be mature enough to decide whether she wants to stay with her family, or travel, or join another coven. What I think, is that Bella won't be happy about it at all. Right now she has her fairy tale. She sacrificed nothing. She's living the life of her dreams with a man of her utmost desire. She has a child, even though vampires aren't suppose to have ones. What will happen if there will be a crack in her tale? Long, nasty cracks, throughout the wall. This is when I get to the point that Bella has no fucking clue what mess she got herself into (but that's for another post).

6. Holy Grail now. Lord, I'm always making this so long, this was supposed to be brief. Okay. So why do I think Renesmee will end up with the Volturi? A few reasons off the top of my head:

※ at some point Jacob will die and Charlie will die, and she'll now what's grief and how hard it is to go on. Yeah, yeah, I know that Jacob is also immortal right now, but he'll probably be killed while protecting Renesmee or Bella. I always think of their relationship as brother/sister because I cannot stand the imprinting shit Smeyer gave us. Also, I think I don't need to explain Charlie here. Renesmee will be devastated by both of these deaths and she'll have to come to terms with herself eventually. I guarantee you that she'll not be the same after that.

※ relationship with her parents. I briefly explained what I had on my mind when it comes to Bella. Renesmee loves her mother but that doesn't mean they'll have healthy and exemplary relationship. Sure, they can work on that, they have eternity but I think that at one point Renesmee will be fed up with the way how her mother is in love with eternity itself. Her relationship with Edward, as I said, is for another post, however I think with time it can get pretty hard. Could you live with the thought that your own father didn't want you? That he regretted that you exist at all? I don't think so. (Yeah, I'm simplifying, but I need to, so don't hate me for this).

※ Cullen coven can break or partially break. @therealvinelle talked about it here a little bit but that's also what I have in mind. Cullens are fairly young coven, with pretty unknown dynamics as we don't get to know them that much through saga (thanks Smeyer for not dwelling on it further). It isn't said anywhere that they'll last next century, not to think about more time passing.

※ she'll be fed up with constantly living with the humans. Imagine you need to constantly move, go to school/college and abide the rules that you didn't agree on in the first place. At first its great, Renesmee has time and reasources to flourish but she can also do that without anoyone else.

※ she has rampant hunger for knowledge. Where to find more books and more knowledge than in Volterra? Simple as it is.

※ she may not find vegetarian diet... sustainable for her. Remember how she was delighted when she drank first Bella's blood and than human blood in general? I think she can go on for some time on vegetarian diet plus/or human diet (if she was to attend i.e. med school which of course I think she would) but after some time, maybe a century, maybe less and maybe more, she'll eventually come to terms that she enjoyed drinking human blood. That's it. She's half vampire by descent. I don't think she'll be able to resist that much , also because everyone taught her from day one she could have what she asked for in a blink of an eye (remember Esme's spoons?).

AND most important (at least for me)

※ her worldview will completely change after a few/a lot of tragical experiences. Sorry, that's just common knowledge. Life is brutal, people are vicious and ruthless. She'll probably work or go somewhere, where she can see what humans are capable of (both in good and bad ways) and what one can do to achieve their goal. I think she'll go to Volturi to simply find comfort there. They've been alive for three thousand years. They can teach her things Cullen's aren't even aware of. Besides, I think it would be a great political move. We all know Aro wanted to know her so bad. If he would, she'll probably be able to influence him to some extent and spare her loved ones if it'd go that far. That's it! Of course, it's fucking long as hell. Sorry for that. Comment if you wish. I cannot wait if you think the same, similar or if you disagree completely! But no hate, please. Professionals have standards™.

𝐇𝐨𝐭𝐞𝐥 𝐌𝐨𝐨𝐧 𝐋𝐢𝐠𝐡𝐭 | 𝐓𝐰𝐨

an: in conclusion i suck at writing, this took far too long to write and i'm not impressed. fingers crossed that the next chapter will make up for it 🖤

leave a comment! i'd appreciate it a lot :))

CHAPTER THREE

The doors creaked open, screeching into the frosty silent of the night, before snapping loudly against the wall. In contrast of the dark night, the full moon shined proudly, its light gently twinkled through the glass ceiling of the room.

Followed by were firm footsteps, shoe soles tapped against the hardwood floor and fainted into the distant. He collapsed onto his arm chair, a sigh of relief washing over as he shifted his weight back.

A knock was heard twice, followed by a steady pace of footsteps that visited the room. Kangtae averted his vision to the man– no, the ghost. Polished in his neat blue uniform, reflecting against the moonlight was a silver half-moon shaped pin tucked above his chest.

"Mr. Moon, you're back." His voice emitted softly as he stopped right in front of the desk- exactly four feet away– accompanying in this hotel for over seventy years– the longest person aside from Kangtae yet to stay, he had his own merits. Jin Hyun paused reluctantly, his wrinkles creasing from concern, eyes wide alert. "What happened to your hand?"

At first a bit muddled, but realization crept after him and Kangtae sighed. Glancing at his blood-clothed hand– scenarios of red winded up in his head. "Ah.. this?"

That impulsive woman.

"Just some accident." His reply was simple– like the man he was and unlike the moon guest house's previous owner, he was, you can say, far less complicated.

Kangtae peeled at his clothed hand, anticipating as the blood wrenched skin morphed back to what was before, clean flesh took back its place. "Where's Manager Lee?"

He then reached for his whiskey decanter, filling up a quarter of the lowball glass. "Isn't she back yet?"

Jinhyun hesitated. "About that, I'm afraid to tell you that there had been a major issue regarding your latest purchase. But do not worry sir, Manager Lee will inform you once she has discussed with the–"

"Tell her to take the day off tomorrow." Kangtae spoke and sipped his glass, embracing the scorching burn that drained down his chest. "I'll manage it myself."

Although struck in confusion, the old spirit knew better than to question his boss's command. Jinhyun nodded reluctantly, made sure he would address the message to the mortal being.

"It's the full moon today, so I think we are expecting many guests."

Kangtae drained his glass and set it back on the table, jaw clenched at the comment– though it was swiftly masked away with his poker face. "Open for business, but don't accept the ones whose death were so gruesome. They're a pain in the ass."

Suppressing the urge to tell him that discriminations shouldn't be allowed, instead Jinhyun bowed, no interest to provoke any further into his bitterness. "I will take special care, so they won't get in your way."

He left with another steady bow, footsteps fell into the distant and Kangtae picked on the red stained cloth that layed flat on his desk. A blue flame lit up on its end, he watched waves of blue consumed all of it, before golden ashes swirled and vanished into thin air.

One speck however, did not follow and he reached out, trapping it between his pincers.

"Ko Munyeong, what should I do with you?"

Munyeong slapped her phone shut.

Frustration built up like a ticking bomb as she threw it behind her. It landed with a loud thud, but she could care less. Yesterday's event had bittered her enough and Sangin's repeating missed calls since 6 a.m. weren't brightening her mood any better. Tires screeched against the waxed floor as she struck a sharp turn into the parking slot, the reserved for CEO sign knocked into nowhere.

In her new prized possession, Munyeong stomped through the building, brave less employees– who ever barely had the guts to look at her on a usual day, shuddered twice as much–

"Good morning Ms. Ko!" The tiny body wiggled its way to block her off. A weary smile is served from Sangin's pesky assistant.

"Move aside."

Seungjae shuffled, hands suspiciously frantic as she spoke. "Mr. Lee just informed me that he will be here soon–"

Munyeong hissed. "And?"

"..And that you should go wait in his office." She finished meekly, unsure of her tone.

"Why would I wait there?" She pointed her finger foward. "The meeting room is right here."

Not intrigued for her reply, Munyeong nagged the girl's shoulder, rather she'd figure it out herself.

"Move."

She strolled across, then paused within her pace, eyes captivated by a figure. Leaning onto the metal rail, Prada purse dangling in the air, she hummed in her own favor.

Ah. Him again.

"What a sight." Munyeong said as she stepped down in her extravagant red mini dress, ballooned sleeves cuffed tight at her wrists, a plunging neckline where she proudly presents her new gold necklace. True to her words, he appeared just as fine. Black slacks– which to her favor, did an incredible job in displaying his godly thighs. Cuffed sleeves of his button up accentuated his broad broad shoulders, and the spectacular waistcoat that hugged his chest.

"You look more dashing in these clothes."

The man teared his eyes away from The Witch's Rose– another of her cash-claiming pieces. A work of watercolors and actual blood splayed onto the canvas, everyone who has seen it ends up in complete awe.

However his gaze was not purely admiration, rather laced with criticism– certainly something she never enjoyed from anyone. But there are some exceptions for some specific people, aren't they?

"I thought you were different, but I was obviously wrong." She crossed her arms. "How much did he offer you?"

His voice was rough, almost coarse even. "If you can't talk politely, at least try to not be so cryptic."

"Ah. Look at you talking so casually."

Munyeong raised her chin and barged into his space, weaklings would have already shown signs of discomfort, but surprisingly he was remarkably unbothered. She dragged a finger along his shoulder, the curve of his skin firm beneath her touch, and tapped his bicep. "I practically stabbed you."

He swiveled around, this time his body directly faced hers. "What about it?"

"How much did Mr. Lee offer you to compensate and make sure your mouth stays shut?"

A short spur of silence fell before he let out an cocky ahh. "I'm guessing that method always works."

Her smile dropped. "Verbal consolation is bullshit, money is best."

"You really think so?"

She shrugged. "Then what do you want?" Eyes wide as she suggested. "Sex?"

In a swift moment he had drowned closer to her. His gaze burned at her, brushing at her lips and froze. "Is it worth that much?"

Admittedly he was good at getting on her nerves. Too good, though she'd never lose to anyone, including him. Munyeong let out a scoff.

"If you're not here for money nor sex, then what do you want?

He cocked his head slightly, his prominent eyes playing innocent and for a second Munyeong forgot that they were bickering. "A refund?"

A snap back to reality, her face laced with confusion. "What refund?"

He dodged her question and looked over her shoulder. "Ah. There it comes."

She turned around to see a Sangin entering with a box of not-so-secret cash in his hands.

"Good afternoon Mr. Moon Kangtae. I deeply apologize for what happened, what can we do–"

As usual, meetings with her always began with Sangin's devastated face– knowing all the trouble she is going to cost him– but today it did seem particularly worse.

Kantae lifted his hand, as if it was a sign to stop. "Let's cut to the chase– I want my money back."

Sangin's smile dropped, though immediately replaced by his appealing mask. "Yes, I understand–"

Kangtae stared at Munyeong, a smirk rising on the corner of his lips. "Including our little incident, I say it'd be 11 million."

Tragically, Munyeong had not noticed by the consequence of the appalling numbers. She snapped at the man to her side. "What the hell is he talking about?"

Sangin sighed. "Munyeong-ah, you see.. your little smashing session. It had wrecked The Nightmare Garden, therefore, we will have to repay our client. Mr. Kangtae is here to–"

Client?

Her eyes shot at him again, impossibly wider. "What do you mean client? Then who was that snobby lady?"

"Ms. Lee is my representative." Kangtae stepped in. "But it doesn't matter. The fact that you jeopardized my painting with that cheap wine-"

"I'm not giving up my money!"

"Well, there's nothing you can do." He smiled– devilishly and yes Munyeong would kill to wipe it off his charming face.

"You'll be hearing from my lawyers in a few days." Kangtae reached for his box of honey money, which was sheepishly handed from Sangin. "Until then, I'll take this."

With another amused– and irritatingly handsome smile, and piles of cash he headed off. Left in silence was a raging pit of fire and its hopeless manager.

Three hours and seven corspe employees later, Munyeong crumbled the paper cup in her hand. Furious was an understatement. How could she give her money back to him? She was set, eyes on her prize but just like a fucking clownery it vanished into thin air.

"Aish Moon Kangtae, that bastard." Munyeong trampled at the crumbled trash, letting out on a slice of her frustration. It was his choice to interfere with her, no one forced him to.

"Oh my my, you're a such a pretty girl." A squeaky voice giggled, penetrating into her quiet atmosphere.

She glanced at the lady, head to toe. Dressed in a horrifying shade of hot pink. Her frail grey hair was topped by a floppy hat- also in the same absurd color. She seemed to fond pearls, as it was accented everywhere, including on wrinkly her fingers where she had slotted a card in between. "Mr. Kangtae had asked me to pass this to you."

Her high-pitched voice rang like bells as she added. "He also said that he'd be willing to compromise, if' you go visit his hotel."

Munyeong raised an eyebrow. "Is that so?"

With a delighted smile, the lady nodded along and Munyeong promptly snatched it, ambiguous eyes interpreted onto the cursive blue lettering.

"Hotel.. Blue Moon?"

A condescending smile played on her lips. More so amused by the piece of paper and unaware of the soft breeze that swept past her.

Fine. If he wants to play with her, she'll play with him.

✰ 057 | if only

la vie en rose ━ in which lee aera, a girl who has been crushing on choi soobin for a long, long time, is starting her junior year and her friends decide that its time for her to make her move.

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✧∘* ೃ ⋆｡˚.

Aera rushes outside to meet Sanha as soon as the bell rings. It had been long enough since the two had last seen each other, and if Aera was being honest, she really missed her San San.

During the summer the two spent nearly everyday together, always sitting in the park, enjoying the scenery and calmness of nature. Sometimes, Sanha would bring along his guitar and the two would sing together with the birds chirping in the background and the warm sun hitting their skin.

Aera didn’t anticipate having a summer buddy, someone that she could do anything and everything with throughout the two and a half months that they had a break from school. On top of that, the last person she thought would be her best friend was Sanha, but she’s glad that he was so adamant in getting to know her back then.

The hallways were crowded, multiple people pushing through the halls to either get to their buses on time or to leave school since they’d been there long enough. It didn’t cross her mind that she had forgotten to tell Soobin goodbye, but Aera knew that Soobin wouldn’t take it to heart. After all, he wasn’t really talking to her much right now since he needed to ‘figure things out’ since the first time they texted.

It worried Aera, because if him ‘figuring things out’ meant that they wouldn’t be able to talk anymore, then she didn’t want him to figure anything out. Not being friends with Soobin wasn’t an option, not after she came this far.

Aera soon came to a set of double doors, pushing them open and being welcomed to the outside world and the school buses. It wasn’t hard to spot Sanha since he practically towered over the entire student population, but Aera noticed that he wasn’t alone.

Huening Kai was just as tall as Sanha and was standing right beside him, seemingly complaining to the older boy about something. Jeongin was also there, standing behind Huening Kai with an annoyed look and his arms crossed.

Aera contemplated for a bit, internally deciding whether or not she should approach the three boys. Whether or not she was prepared to meet Sanha’s friends.

She stood frozen for a bit, multiple people pushing around her to bypass her, but she soon concluded that it was now or never and she took a step forward. The walk to Sanha was so brief that Aera didn’t have much time to overthink and backout before Sanha spotted her and reached out to her.

“Sweet pea,” Sanha exclaimed, effectively shutting Hyuka up and turning the younger boy’s attention to her. “You ready to go?”

She nodded, but Hyuka furrowed his eyebrows. “Go where?”

Aera opened her mouth to answer, but Sanha cut her off.

“None of your business, Hyuka. Leave us alone.”

“Hyungggg,” Hyuka whined, stomping his feet. “Don’t be mean.”

Jeongin stepped forward, inserting himself into the conversation. “Hyuka let’s go, Soobin is waiting for us.”

“Soobin?” The question left her mouth faster than Aera could actually process what she did.

The three boys went silent, shared a look, and then looked down at Aera.

“Yeah, why?”

Hyuka was the one to ask, with a lifted eyebrow and his right hand holding the bottom of his chin. His eyes twinkled with a curiosity that sent a nervous roll through Aera’s stomach, but she didn’t let it show.

Sanha also stared at Aera’s face, an unsettling feeling coming into his stomach. With Soobin’s previous confession still in the back of his mind, Sanha somewhat disliked the way that Aera’s outburst held a sense of fascination to it. Almost as if Soobin was important to her, or that the mention of his name intrigued her.

“Nothing, no. Nevermind,” Aera brushed it off, making sure to keep her face nonchalant. “San San we can go now.”

The three boys said their goodbyes, Jeongin being sure to tell Aera that it was nice to meet her before Sanha and Aera began their walk to the nearest cafe to their school. But as the two were leaving, Hyuka made sure to keep his eyes on the back of Aera’s head, not believing in the slightest anything that Aera just said.

The walk started off comfortable, a silence looming over the duo that felt complete and whole and something that Aera didn’t mind having as they made their way to the cafe. Sanha on the other hand despised the silence, but he was too nervous to break it himself. His head was going in multiple directions with possible conversation starters. Yes, he is more than comfortable with his Sweet Pea, but he wanted things to change. He needed things to change.

Before Soobin had voiced his crush on Aera, Sanha had felt like he had an ample amount of time to work up his confidence in telling her how he felt. But now that was nonexistent. Soobin wasn’t the type to hesitate when he had feelings for someone, and especially since it was so rare for him to actually have feelings for someone.

The last thing Sanha wanted to do was make dating Aera a competition, not with Soobin. He cared way too much about his Sweet Pea’s feelings and her wellbeing to ever reduce her to some type of trophy because he and Soobin couldn’t reasonably confess to her.

But this was potentially his chance to finally man up and confess. Maybe this was Sanha’s chance to get the girl and not regret it later in life.

“Sweet Pea,” Sanha spoke, somewhat forcefully scaring the smaller girl. “Sorry, I just—”

Aera quirked up her eyebrow at the short pause that Sanha took. They slowed their steps, Aera feeling like Sanha wanted to say something important and Sanha wanting to take his time so he could voice his thoughts.

He cleared his throat, “I-I know that this may sound abrupt and out of left field completely, but I-,” he closed his eyes and took a deep breath. “I really like you, like a lot.”

Aera keeps her eyes focused in front of her upon hearing the words, the girl's heart beating too fast for her to look Sanha in his eyes. Sanha on the other hand eyed his feet, too nervous to look at her. An awkward silence ensued, the both of them not knowing what to say next.

Sanha regretted everything he said the second he finished speaking, it left him with anxiety as he waited for Aera’s response but there was none. He didn’t know if she felt the same way or if she was completely thrown off from the entire situation.

“Uh,” Aera muttered, grabbing the straps of her backpack as she nervously fidgeted. “Sanha, look-”

“Sanha? What about San San,” the taller boy attempted to joke, desperate to ease the tension.

It seemed to work, since Aera giggled a bit before continuing to speak,”San San, I-I don’t know what to say. I, you never acted like you had feelings for me, I just thought you were being nice.”

“I was,” he nodded. “But over time I realized that I really liked you. It’s kind of hard not to.”

“Since when?”

“The last day of summer,” Sanha shyly spoke.

A look of realization came across Aera’s face, her eyes widened as she turned to point at the boy. “So the picnic was so you could-”

“Yeah,” Sanha nodded. “So I could confess.”

“I-” There were so many things that the smaller girl wanted to say. She didn’t expect this at all, not in the slightest when Sanha had asked her to hang out. Was this why he wanted to hang out? So that he could confess?

It all threw Aera into a spiral, on one hand she didn’t want to hurt his feelings and tell him that she didn’t have feelings for him but for one of his best friends. But on the other hand, she wanted to keep things the same, and she doesn’t know if things will ever be the same after she rejected him.

Rejects, no, gently lets him down. No matter what way she voiced her true feelings to Sanha, things would change. If she went along and said that she liked him too then she’d be lying and then theyd be dating. But if she told him that she liked Soobin then maybe Sanha would be mad and they wouldn’t be friends anymore.

In Aera’s mind this was a complete lose-lose situation.

But she opted for the truth, Aera didn’t want to lie to him. “Sanha, I don’t-” she took a deep breath. “I don’t have the same feelings for you.”

Her voice was laced with sorrow and something that sounded almost like guilt but she continued,“You know that I have feelings for someone else and I-I don’t want to lead you on, give you any type of false hope.”

Sanha remained silent, an inevitable feeling of devastation falling over him. “But, you won’t even give us a chance.”

“I, I don’t know. Feelings won’t just disappear overnight, San San. I can’t make myself like you that way,” she sighed. “I don’t want to ruin our friendship either, I just think that if we were to date we would never be this close again.”

He understood where she was coming from, but it disappointed him nonetheless. He had serious feelings for her, something that he was sure if she reciprocated them they would’ve been happy together. But he can’t force something on her, especially if she already has feelings for someone else.

Sanha stared into Aera’s eyes, nodding quickly before he said,“I understand. I’m sorry-”

“You dont have to apoogize.”

“No, no I’m sorry for springing this on you out of nowhere. I just,” he sighed and began walking again, slowly so Aera could keep up. “I needed to make my feelings known.”

“I understand,” she softly spoke. “I really do, and I’m flattered that you like me that way. If only things were different.”

“Yeah,” he chuckled. “If only.”

P.S: I'm Mated With The Cursed Alpha!

Chapter Four

Hey guy! Don’t forget to Like, Comment, Review, and Follow for more updates! My apologies in advance for all the grammatical errors. Book will be professionally edited when completed.

The screams of horror rose to the roof as a flock of rogues suddenly emerged onto the scene.

As the enormous black wolf came charging my way, everything around me ceased to exist. The only thing in my view was the vicious beast, rapidly heading towards me with his large, dangerously sharp teeth bearing at me.

My mind was screaming at me, telling me to run, but my legs remained fastened to the ground. Like a deer caught in headlights, I was too traumatized to move.

“Joel!” Someone screamed at me from the raging chaos.

Just when I had thought something terrible had happened to her, I quickly snapped to my senses.

That gowling scream I had bottled up inside me was unleashed within an instant. I screamed with fear and terror to the top of my lungs.

Sarah collides against me hard, pushing me out of the way from the oncoming monster just in time. The beast lost control, gliding and crashing its huge body against the bar.

“S-Sarah!” I called her name, choking up with fear as a streak of blood drained down her forehead. “SARAH!”

She blinked open her eyes, trying to regain her strength from the hard fall.

“Jo’! She pitched up suddenly, grasping her aching head. In and out she breathed harshly as I crunch down to help her up.

“S-Sarah! What’s happening?” I panicked.

“T-they’re... Rogues!” She grunted in pain. “I knew we shouldn’t have to come! We have to get out of here, Joel! NOW!”

I wrapped her arm around my shoulders, giving her support as we made our way through the crowd.

" T-the car keys...” Sarah grunted, holding her head as we made it safely to the car. “Do you have the car keys?

“Y-yes, I—

I paused mid-sentence, staring at my hand holding Sarah’s pouch, but her car keys were nowhere present.

“Oh my goodness!” I whimpered sharply, looking everywhere around my feet. “Where is it? Where the hell is it?”

“Oh no! Did you lose it?” She asked, resting faintly against the car door.

A loud, deep growl rippled from the tavern throughout the parking lot. Its sound was filled with terror.

I could feel my heart speeding up. My mouth starting to dry up as I breathe in the drafty air, re-tracing my steps to find the car keys... I could find it anywhere.

My mind was racing with fearful thoughts of the huge monster coming after me again. Those long, sharp, fangs tearing me apart, limb by limb. Those eyes...those terrorizing sinister gold eyes. I’ve never in my life seen a werewolf-like him ever. But why on earth did he charge after me?

I’ve spotted it. Shimmering in the grass just a foot away from me. I clenched my fist and took a deep breath and dashed as fast as my feet can take me, snatching up the car keys in my hand. When I turned around, my shoe slipped off my feet and fell hard on my injured arm.

I groaned and whimpered in agony, feeling the sore pain jotting through my body. “Oww!” I said through clenched teeth.

Slowly I turned over and lift my aching body off the ground, looking ahead of me.

There he was...standing at the entrance of the tavern, back in his human form with his eyes fixed on me. His nostrils flared open as his breath vaporized in the chilly air with every harsh huff he took.

My heart stopped as I watched his sharp jaw, clenched intensely. His stare alone could keep anyone in his hold. Though they were dark and terrorizing, there was something mysterious and surprisingly soft about them.

He took another stance and gradually lowered himself back on all fours.

I snapped out of his hold and ran for dear life, not caring if I was in agonizing pain. Getting far away from him was the only thing on my mind.

When I finally made it back to the car, Sarah was already sitting in the driver’s seat with all the car glasses broken through.

Claw marks were over her shoulder blade and arms. Her blouse was torn through, stained with blood.

“S-Sarah!” I gasped, opening her door. “What...what happened to you?”

“A rogue...attacked me—

I watched as she coughed weakly, groaning in pain.

“Rogues...their marks are infectious...” I said recalling the notes I’ve written in my nursing course about them. “We’ve got to get home fast before the infection spreads!”

Though being in pain as well, I couldn’t imagine what she was going through.

“Look Sarah, we have to get out of here!” I said looking around me.

I didn’t understand it...out of everyone here, why was he after me? Why?

Just thinking about it was driving me insane. Taunting me every second that goes by.

“Go over... I’ll drive!” I breathed sharply.

After she struggled to move her weak body over to the passenger side, I heard a tig snapped behind me.

A rush a fear came over me as I slowly looked over my shoulder.

There his massive, black wolf stood tall with its eyes fixed on the only thing in his path... Me.

Quickly, I leaped inside the car, panicking as I fought to stick the key into the ignition.

“Hurry Jo’!” Sarah cried, shaking in her seat. “It’s going to kill us!”

When I finally managed to get the key in the ignition, I start up the car and shift the gear into drive.

With my feet heavy on the gas pedal, I drifted out of the parking lot onto the main road.

Not looking back, I stared out at the empty highway ahead of us, zooming past the tall pine trees.

Making at least 80 miles per hour, trying to get us away as fast as I can, mentally, I felt as if we weren’t moving anywhere.

The cool wind gushed in my face, making my mouth even more dryer than it already was. I glanced at Sarah, hearing her breathe in and out heavily.

“Joel?” She panted, holding her hand gently over her pulsing wounds. “Are we there yet?”

“Don’t worry, I’m getting us there as fast as I can.

“H-how far... are we?” She asked.

“I’m going as fast as I can... I know it hurts. Just a few more minutes.” I choked trying to keep my composure when suddenly my mind went to mom.

I sighed aloud, biting my bottom lip anxiously. This would definitely make her look down at me. All I ever do is cause trouble. I couldn’t bear to see the scornful, disappointing look on her face. It’s one thing getting in harm’s way, but to see a friend suffer from what I’ve caused is devasting.

It’s always me bringing shame on the family’s name. What makes it even worse, I’m not even their biological daughter! The least I could do is be unproblematic, and grateful that I have a family who goes out of their way to care for my well being.

I couldn’t help the tears from falling, thinking about all the trouble I had caused.

“Sarah... I’m so sorry.” I cried, squeezing my hand tightly around the steering wheel. “I should listen to you and let us leave when we had the chance.”

She sighed deeply, closing and opening her eyes for a moment.

“It’s ok Joel... really!” She said.

“No, it’s not!” I shouted a bit too harshly than I suppose to. “I confess!”

“Confess?” She said confusedly.

“Yes!” I replied, trying to hold back more tears.

“The only reason I said we should still go to the stupid party was that I wanted to see Jackson...” I whimpered, feeling more guiltier as I confessed. “This whole week he’s been so busy. I-I was looking forward to at least seeing him out there.”

Still, in so much pain, I could tell she was upset and slightly irritated at my confession.

“Really Jo’?” She said. “A-all you had to do...was ask me if—

“I know, I know,” I shook my head, not wanting her to make a fuss out of all this.

“No, you don’t!” She insisted that I finish listening to what she’s trying to say. “When since have we started keeping things from each other, Jo’?”

“Sarah I—

“Let me finish!” She said in a more serious tone. “If you want to know something?... Fine! Yes, I was kinda hurt that you didn’t tell me about your first time... I thought that’s what best friends do. Tell each other everything!”

My cheeks were hurting by how hard I was trying to hold back my emotions. Sarah was right. From little kids, we promise that we would tell each other everything. Now here I am not only being a disappointment of a daughter, but I’m also a friend who went back on my promise.

“Sarah... I’m sorry!” I huffed, wiping away my salty tears with the back of my hand. “I-I promise I’ll make it up to you!”

She sighed softly, and like always with a forgiving heart, she accepted my apology.

“It’s ok, really...” She cleared her throat. “All that matters right now is getting away from those rogues and that gigantic wolf.“Why is it after us?” She asked, but I was just as clueless as she was...

Suddenly, it came to me. I finally started to put it all together.

“It’s after me,” I said.

“It’s after you?” She gasped. “Why?—How?”

“I should have seen this coming. Everything Mom was doing was to protect us from things like this.” I said.

“What do you mean?” She asked. “Do you think it’s because you’re the daughter of a well-known Alpha?”

“Yes!” I swallowed, looking through the forest trees as we sped by. “Ever since he laid eyes on me, he looked as he knew who I was. His stare was so intense.”

Sarah paused for a moment, puzzled and weary her countenance had become after hearing what I said. Then, her eyes suddenly widened.

“Joel...you don’t think, there’s a possibility—

“What?” I asked.

“Maybe he’s your m—

The car engine suddenly shut off. I floored and floored the gas pedal over and over, but the car refused to speed up.

Sarah began taking deep breaths.

“W-what...what happened?” She panicked.

Trembling with fear, I looked at the empty gas range and instantly my heart started ramming against my chest.

“No! No! Come on!” I cried, turning the key in the ignition repeatedly, but it only gave us a few hopeless cranked, refusing to turn on. “Damn! We’re on empty!” I said, taking shaky breaths.

We both began to panic, realizing we’re stuck on an empty road surrounded by a dark forest with a pack of rogues and a monstrous wolf on our trail.

“Jo’!” She blurted out with fear in her voice, “What are we going to do!!!

A loud howl came traveling through the spooky woods in the distance. They sounded even closer than we thought.

“Sarah, we have to run!” I cried.

“What!” She said in an unsure tone.

“Yes! It’s either we run now and make it on the pack’s territorial grounds in time or stay here trying to start up the car and get ambush.”

Without having second thoughts, we ran out of the car and shift into our wolf. I always envied Sarah’s wolf’s dark chocolate fur. Mines is just a plain, light, chalky brown color. I hated everything about it.

“Sarah!” I said through mind link when the sounds of growls and ruffled bushes caught us off guard behind us.

“Our border’s right ahead. Once we cross, they can’t harm us!”

We took off into the woods. We sprinted as fast as we can across the wet forest floor as the cool breeze swept our fur. The rogues were right on us.

Finally, we came in view of the pack’s borders only a few feet away. But though we were getting close, he was much bigger, faster, and even more determined to get what he wanted.

We shifted back into human form. Thin layers of sweat and splattered mud covered our bodies as we tried to catch our breath.

Tired and aching with pain, we stared at the wooden, six feet border.

“We have to climb over!” I said as Sarah faintly collapsed against it.

“I can’t, Jo’!” She groaned, holding her wounded shoulder.

“No! No! NO, Sarah!” I cried, helping her to her feet. “Climb up, hurry! They’re coming!” I squealed, watching as their shadowy figures came closer and closer!”

I clutched my arms around her legs and push her up with all the strength I had left. One of my stitches popped and I watched as blood started to drain down my arm. She finally reached the top and crossed over.

“Guards! Guards!” Sarah shouted aloud to the nearby guards. “Come on, Joel!” She panted, with on-hand reaching over for me and the other grasping her wound. “Hurry, grab my hand!”

As I hurry to climb, I slipped on an algae-covered log and fell back, landing hard on my bottom.

“JOEL!” She cried as the guards made their way over.

I crawled back over on territorial grounds just in time as the flock of rogues, all different colors and sizes, gathered me, growling viciously. Though they were so eager to attack, they couldn’t, because I was safe on my rightful territory.

I trembled in fear as they bear their sharp teeth at me. Sarah cried aloud, clutching her arms around me through the border.

“Don’t worry, Sarah!” I gasped, trying to calm her down. “They won’t harm me... I-I’m on our grounds.”

Slowly and carefully, I took my time and made my way up without slipping out of bounds. Suddenly his wolf leaped out of nowhere, raging in fury.

The rogues quickly moved out of his path as he shifted back into his human form and stalked my way.

His intense, blazing, green eyes were fastened on me as he strutted closer. They were like flaming darts, piercing through my soul. His muscles were swollen, covered with a thin coat of sweat, glazing in the moonlight with his long straight hair was plastered over his neck and shoulders.

Just like the others, I knew he won’t harm me now, knowing he would be trespassing onto territorial grounds, but boy was I wrong.

He made his way over, not giving a damn if he was on territorial grounds or not, and launch up after me. But I managed to land safely over in time before he could hold me captive.

“Joel!” Sarah cried, embracing my trembling body tightly.

I turned around and stared up at him as he took harsh, deep breaths. His clenched jaw was twitching uncontrollably. Frustration and defeat were smeared over his face as he stared silently down at me through hooded eyes. The tension was so thick between us, we could have cut it with a knife.

Still overly petrified, feeling my heart about to leave my chest, I was so lucky and relieved I got away on time.

I don’t know why I did it, but the smallest smirk gradually crept on my face as I took deep breaths to calm myself. That alone set him off. He widened his eyes and flared his nostril in rage. My little smirk faded away instantly as he growled deeply, bucking his taut chest against the border towards me.

As the guards came closer, that was when I made the wrongest mistake ever. One wrong move, I turned around and stumble back slightly. He reached his muscular arm through the log, locking his large hand firmly onto my puff of hair.

“Joel!” Sarah screeched.

My lips parted, but I couldn’t make a sound. I was too in shock that I had let my guard down so carelessly. His grip tightened and I whimpered, squeezing one eye close feeling the slight pain.

“LET HER GO!” Sarah shouted, clawing his hand, but he reached out his other arm and slapped her hand away.

“Step away, or I’ll snap your freaking neck!” He growled threateningly at her. “And you...” He said, pulling me closer to the border towards him.

I quivered hearing his deep, raspy Alpha voice for the first time. It was deeper and more boisterous than any male wolf I know.

He took a deep sniff of my scent and groan loudly, sending chills through my body. “I thought I saw a smirk a few seconds ago... Where is it now, little girly.” He said in a menacingly low voice.

When I didn’t answer, he tightened his grip on my hair and growled.

“That wasn’t a mistake you made letting your guard down...it was destined to happen!” He said slowly. “You can’t escape what was meant to be.”

“L-let me go!” I manage to muttered, grasping my much smaller hand over his grip. “P-plea-se...”

He let out an empty chuckle and coldly replied, “You can’t be talking to me.”

I whimpered, feeling the tears starting to build up in my eyes, streaming down my face.

“I’ve been waiting too long for this...” He said intensely. “Seven years... too long!”

Read Chapter Five (Click the link below)

Words Can Wait

So....I did something...and fandom hopped again. I keep getting suckered into the shows my kids watch!!! And Adrienette...is so very yummy. :)  Being a superhero wasn’t supposed to feel hopeless.

It was supposed to be inspiring, exciting, fulfilling and a million other optimistic words ending in “ing.” Being a superhero was something almost everyone, at some point in their life, wanted to be - living an exciting life, fighting crime and being an inspiration to millions.

And yet...here he was, living that life, chosen to protect, and feeling hopeless.

Cat Noir sighed, leaning against the railing of the widow’s walk on an old Victorian he’d stumbled upon one night when he’d chased an akuma outside the boundaries of Paris. The house itself was old and abandoned, holding its structural soundness regardless of the fact that no one was there offering any kind of upkeep.

Chat had no idea how long it had stood empty. No one was ever here when he was but he’d only been coming for a little over a month, finding an odd sort of comfort in distancing himself from the city he continually protected which also held him an unwilling captive when he wasn’t scaling rooftops as his superhero alter ego.

Here, he could be silent. Puns could take a back seat and he could reflect on his life as Adrien Agreste without feeling trapped by the solid walls and floor to ceiling glass surrounding him. He could watch Paris without hearing it, far enough away to enjoy the lights of the city but close enough to return to it if he was needed.

Luckily tonight, he wasn’t needed. Or at least he wasn’t needed at the moment. Whatever quiet he could get, whether it was short-lived or not, he would take.

A cold breeze, whispering the coming of fall, teased the curtains of the open french doors leading out to the widow’s walk from a wide turret. They’d been open every time he was there but he’d never been curious enough to trespass and find out what was behind the doors.

Tonight, he wasn’t exactly curious. More reckless.

It was that recklessness that had him walking towards the doors, pulling them wide open.

The turret housed a simple room with large windows overlooking Paris. The floors were bare wood, scuffed and aged. The floral wallpaper was starting to peel away from the walls and dried leaves were scattered over the floor, small piles building in the corners.

The damp scent of mildew hinted from underneath the crisp burn of the autumn leaves, tucked into forgotten corners. Wind caught the few that remained in solitary confinement, gently pushing them with their fallen comrades, their dead corners scraping quietly over the hardwood. In the middle of the room sat a grand piano that had clearly, at one time, been gorgeous. Now, a layer of dust had settled over it and with the fallboard closed, the beautiful instrument looked sadly abandoned. 

Oh, how I can relate, Chat thought as he approached it. 

Who kept a grand piano in a desolate turret of a house? He thought the house had been abandoned for a few months. He could now clearly see that he had been wrong, however. The house had been left alone for years. Opening the fallboard to the yellowing keys spoke almost as loudly to the houses lack of inhabitants than the failing wallpaper did. 

Chat pulled the bench out with the toe of his boot. He stared at it for a moment, hesitating, then sank down and spun to position himself at the keys, his fingers finding middle c by memory alone. He hadn’t played a piano since his mother had disappeared. Sure, his father instructed Natalie to make him practice. Natalie never stood over him to ensure that it happened, though and you could convince people of anything as long as it was done behind a locked door and the sound quality on your cell phone was good enough. But actually playing a piano...that he refused to do.

The piano his father bought was nothing compared to the modest upright that had belonged to his mother. The grand piano was an eyesore that took up too much space and made him extremely uncomfortable. He did everything in his power to avoid it. What he wanted to play was his mother’s piano, but his father had made certain that would never happen. Not long after she disappeared, so did anything that would serve as a reminder of her. All that remained were pictures - pictures of the perfect family, of scripted shoots and instructed poses...and cold detachment from a man that Aiden could only refer to as “father.” Sometimes...sometimes he wondered if his father really cared that his mother was gone. Or if he only cared that the woman who fed his powerful image was no longer around to keep a constant flow of interest and influence flowing into the business.

His fingers ghosted over the keys, pain etching itself deeply in the recesses of his heart where his mother’s spirit existed as strongly as if she were still-.

Adrien closed his eyes against the bitter sting of tears, hanging his head. 

She was alive. Somewhere she was alive. 

He just didn’t know where.

By memory and will alone, his fingers found the keys to a song he would never forget. He didn’t need to practice it to remember, didn’t need it ringing constantly through his head to know what keys followed the ones before them. It was her song. Christophori’s Dream...he started slow, not entirely sure how he felt about playing something that was so significant. It was painful, devastating and yet there was a comfort there in the in the notes as they drifted into the stillness of the night. A freedom that no one was around to take away from him or reign in. He kept his eyes shut against the tears, trying to force them back, to lose himself in the poignant melody. The tempo steadily increased as he poured his anger, fear, desperation and frustrations into what he was doing, letting them be swept away, willing them to stay away so he could breathe. So he could stop forcing smiles, stop living through the pain and escape it just for one damn moment. He lost himself to it all, not noticing the soft tread of footsteps behind him or the blue eyes that watched him. 

His fingers flawlessly  pounded over the crescendo. Tears tracked steadily over his mask, down his cheeks. He didn’t care. He just wanted it out...wanted every draining emotion, every hopeless thought gone. But as the last note drifted into the stillness of the night...it was all still there. Like his father, he couldn’t escape it. He couldn’t escape any of it.

And apparently, he couldn’t escape her. 

“How did you find me?” he asked, feeling her presence behind him. “You know how,” Ladybug murmured. 

Of course he did. Like he was drawn to her, she too was drawn to him. It had nothing to do with emotions. Nothing to do with how much he loved her. It was their Miraculous. One couldn’t be active without drawing the other out eventually.

She joined him on the piano bench, sinking down beside him and facing the opposite direction.

“Chat-.”

“Do you ever wish that who we are now was who we were always?” he asked, not looking at her. He couldn't. Not if he wanted to say what was hurting him so much.

“Stay Ladybug?”

He nodded. “And Cat Noir. Some days...some days I just want to stay...like this and not go back to being who I am.”

She inched closer, keeping that cautious space between them. That “just friends” space that left no room to really hope for something different. Where he had always disliked that space, today he hated it with a deep ferocity.

“What’s so bad about who you are?”

He sighed and looked away from her, watching the dried leaves tucked against the wall twitch restlessly as a breeze whispered over the floor. “Everything,” he snapped, standing abruptly and slamming the fallboard closed. He walked away from her, into the shadows on the opposite side of the room. To her credit, she stayed where she was, unflinching, watching him cautiously.

“Who I am, who my family is, the way I’m forced to live this life without making my own decisions. There’s nothing about my civilian life that I actually want to return to. Ever. And honestly, every time I transform, it gets harder and harder to give a damn about returning to what a joke my real life is.”

He felt her gaze slide away from him.

“I guess...I never really wanted to get away from real life that badly. Or...at all, really...”

Chat sneered a little at that. He wasn’t angry with her. Funneling that emotion into anything regarding Ladybug was pointless. She had a better life than him. Most people did. “Lucky you.”

“You have friends though, right?” she asked. “People who actually understand what you’re going through and can help?”

“I have...friends-.” He hesitated on the word, still slightly foreign to him. Yes, he had friends - Nino, Alya, Marinette...even Chloe on occasion, he could stomach when she wasn’t acting entirely stuck up and looking down on the rest of the general population. “I don’t really talk about what they don’t see. It’s not something I want to talk about.”

She was silent for a moment, then rose and closed the distance between them, her fingers hesitantly brushing his shoulder. “If you don’t talk to anyone about it, how are they supposed to help you through any of it?” she asked, her voice so careful and cautious, plucking at a sense of guilt.

He looked at her then, searching for answers in the comfort of her gaze. “I don’t want help through it. I don’t want it. I haven’t been able to escape it for years. How is talking to anyone supposed to get me out of it?”

“I’m your friend. You could talk to me. I could-.”

He shrugged her hand away, feeling the cold bite of injustice. He wanted so much more from her that friendship. Her reminder of that, though not intended to come across as hurtful, made him feel even more alone in the world. “You could what?” he bit out. “I can’t tell you a damn thing without outting myself. Aren’t you the one who’s always pointing out how we can never know who the other really is? You can do about as much to help as anyone else can which is nothing. Just-,” he took a step away from her, shaking his head, “Just forget I said anything.”

He started to leave. Ladybug grabbed his hand. “Chat, wait-.”

“I have to go-.”

He pulled his hand away and felt the give of his ring, felt it slide over the fabric of his gloved hand and made no attempt to stop it. He could have clenched his hand, could have curled his fingers to ensure the safety of his identity. It would occur to him later that he hadn’t really wanted to - that deep down he needed her to know who he really was.

She gasped, he stumbled and in a sweep of green, he stood before her as Adrien Agreste.

Neither of them spoke. Even if he knew what to say, he wouldn’t know how to say it. She stared at him wide-eyed and he stared back, his lips set in a firm line, panic riding the edges of silent defiance.

Finally, when he couldn’t take it anymore and had firmly convinced himself that her silence was some form of rejection, he held out his hand. “I need that back, please.”

She blinked and looked down at her hands, her brow furrowing, like she couldn’t quite understand what she was looking at. Then, those wide blue eyes were back on him and she dropped the ring in his open palm.

Adrien slid it back into place, clenching his hand. “Well, I guess you get to keep your secret at least.” “Tikki,” she whispered and he went still, caught off guard. The air around them shifted, electrified with the impact of that one simple word. “Spots off.”

Glittering pink and white swirled around her. Red lycra gave way to denim, a rose colored top, a purse he would have recognized anywhere because it was an original, designed by the one who wore it.

Gone was Ladybug and in her place, her cheeks a vibrant pink, was Marinette.

Ladybug was Marinette.

Silly, wonderful, always so kind to him Marinette who tripped over her own feet, created beauty effortlessly, owned anyone who dare challenged her in video games, and couldn’t string more than a few words together around him.

Marinette who now knew the hell he was living in.

Marinette who knew the secrets he kept.

The relief he felt brought a new wave of tears, a gratitude that went so deep that it left him feeling weak.

Of course it was her. Moments of familiarity suddenly made sense. Every friendly touch, certain looks, the conviction that ran so strongly whether she was herself or Ladybug.

“I’m so sorry,” she whispered. “If I would have known...or even understood what you were going through-.”

He caught her around the waist with one arm his other hand cradling the side of her face and effectively stopping the flow of words. They would have plenty later, he was sure of it. Secrets to put to rest, lives to reveal. But words could wait.

He ran his thumb over her cheekbone, traced the curve of her jaw with his fingertips. “I’m...so glad it’s you.”

He wouldn’t allow her to question why he was glad. Instead, he caught her mouth with his, kissing her tenderly. She gasped and he curled his hand around the base of her neck, deepening the kiss. She turned fluid against him, the tension melting away as she clung to him. It was empowering to know he could do this to her, just as empowering as it was humbling.

“I love you,” he murmured against her lips. “Love me? Or love-.”

He pulled away and used his hand to stop her words, grinning and shaking his head. “You Marinette...Ladybug...you’re the same person. I can’t believe I didn’t see it sooner.” Her mouth twitched at the corner and he kissed the very tip of her nose. “But I see it now. I think that needs to count for something.”

Instead of agreeing with him, her expression turned serious. “I love you too, Adrian. I’ll help you through this. I promise.”

He believed her.

Nothing seemed as bleak anymore. Nothing about life seemed to hard to overcome. Not with his lady by his side in every aspect of his life.

They could face any demons together, the invisible ones that haunted him included.

“I know, my lady. Thank you.”

And he kissed her again...because really, those words could wait.

NSFW #2.2: Chum

The crescent moon shone in the clear, star-dotted sky above. The warm air blew in a soft breeze, and all around were the whooshing of waves. The scent of salt gave the air a not-unrefreshing tang. And on this beach, far from home, the waves broke over Mike McGuire’s ankles, the Bronx Brawler wearing a black sports-bra like top under a gauzy vest of orange fabric they’d picked up at a trip to the marketplace along with black shorts that went about halfway down to their knees. Along with the moon, a few inflatable lanterns were placed strategically in a semicircle into the sand, giving the scene an air of quiet ambiance. There were thoughts running through their head, thoughts that were totally untoward with the serenity around them. They were bottled, for now, like a storm confined to a teacup ready to be unleashed at the proper time. But for this second, they breathed it in. “Mom used to take me to the beach as a kid. Pool, too. She taught me everything she fuckin’ knew and I took to it like a duck. Not as good as her but most people ain’t.” They sighed, and looked behind them to the person they were speaking to. “Sometimes I really wish I was a fuckin’ shark. I’d just swim all day and eat stupid shit-talking bitches alive.” John Bishop Church was near, also dressed for the setting, in a simple black tank and matching board shorts with green racing stripes down the sides. His arms folded over his chest and he frowned as his mind clicked through how to respond to such an admission. His shoulders slumped as nothing came through. The camera phone, set on a tripod, framed them both in the picture clearly. The scene faded to black. There were precious seconds in this blackness before a voice, John’s, chimed in, “That about sums it up, right, Brenna Gordon?” The picture came up again. A few more lanterns had been thrown in quickly, the inner LEDs glowing orange and green, the lighting a bit brighter now. Mike shook their head, letting out a harsh sigh. “You know what? I am fuckin’ disappointed. I mean, I could go with the standard ‘I thought we were friends’, but I’d just be kidding myself. I thought you were cool enough but facts’ facts, I didn’t really know you all that well. But I did think pretty good of you, enough to know you ain’t to be fucked with, you’re dangerous as shit in that ring, even enough that I didn’t think you were the kind of person to fuckin’ regurgitate the same tired BS already crapped out by silly douchenozzles I pictured you a better caliber of person than. Shows how the fuck much I know.” Their shoulders shrugged in a distinctive ‘oh well’ manner. “To say we haven’t heard all of that before would be an understatement. But I get it,” John nodded, “This is a new audience and so the old idiom of ‘If I haven’t seen it, it’s new to me.’ applies here.” John stepped further back into the water. “So let’s dive in,” his tone was dry but with a lilt of borrowed sarcasm, “This big conclusion, Brenna? I agree with Mike. Whether it's two malcontents in a department store, a braggadocious silver-tongued Texan, or YOU, Brenna Gordon, it all sounds awfully familiar. Because we say we aim to be the best, that we claim to be the best - we are self-righteous,” his gaze narrowed, “So tell us. How are we supposed to approach this?” He turned to Mike. “Mike, I hope we can manage to win. It’d sure be nice but if not, oh well, losing is just as fun.” “Golly gee willikers, Church, that it would. Also I’m sure glad we don’t have any aspirations about leaving this tag division or any others better than we found it. Who wants to elevate the game when the status quo is just peachy fuckin’ keen?” An exaggerated wink, accompanied by an ‘OK’ gesture. The pinky and ring fingers are then lowered as Mike’s cheesy expression melts into a glare. “And just as a side note, a heavy chunk of our merch proceeds go to shit like the Trevor Project, Project Innocence… you know, not that it matters but since we’re apparently playing Selfless Good Guy Bingo here thought I’d educate your lily-white ass. Not like it’s right there on our website or anything.” John stepped back to Mike. He put a hand on their shoulder. “I understand what this is about, though. Doing anything to blur and obfuscate what this is about. With your infinite knowledge, you try your damndest to stake claim to what we are, what we aren’t.  But we are here right now to put this ship back on course. Brenna, your partner Berlin seems to have the right idea. Tag. Team. Wrestling.” “See, I like him. But then, I liked Brenna, so I’m kinda not in the position to trust my initial impressions of people right now. If Brenna’s effect on you is to make you more like her? I’d head for the hills, my dude, before you start acting like you’re perpetually on the rag. But let’s play harpy’s advocate here for a minute. Let’s pretend that we really are writing you off because you don’t meet our standards for what a tag team should be. We’d be walking into an ass kicking. You know why? Because I see something. Something I don’t see very often unless I’m watching tapes of me and Church. Last time I saw it in another team we lost our straps, so you two had better believe the last fucking thing we’re gonna do is underestimate you. But I wonder… do you know what to do with that? Has your chemistry been tested and galvanized like ours has?” “Don’t know. We didn’t know much about Berlin’s history but thanks to him, we have somewhere to start,” and then John raised a finger up, “and yes, one of our golden rules is to never underestimate our opponents. That doesn’t mean we don’t listen and observe. Like what exactly stops Berlin Anderson from learning about us on his own instead of waiting for hearsay from a person who has never shared a ring with us before? Another thing, the greatest tag teams ever? They stood together, brothers-in-arms, and they did not speak at cross purposes.” “Are we one of the greatest tag teams ever? Nah. Despite what you may think we think, we ain’t that full of ourselves. Maybe one day we’ll stand with the Foundations, the Legions, the Busters, the Express. The same dedication to the art flows through our fuckin’ veins, after all.” Another wave broke around their ankles, perhaps a bit shallower as the moon pulled the tide back little by little. Step by step, they emerged out of the water. They both crouched in front of the camera. “One final thing, Brenna Gordon, only my friends call me John. You’ve made it abundantly clear what you are.” “Opponent. Adversary. But most importantly? In our way. Later, chum.” Grinning like a great white, Mike reached toward the camera and cut out the picture. Mike sighed as the extinguished light on the phone signified that their words and actions were once again private. They helped gather up the lanterns, turning off the lights and deflating them until just a couple were still lit. Holding onto one, they sat down on the sand, looking out to the water as it rose up to lap at their toes. “I thought we were done with this bullshit. I know you said we weren’t here to make friends, but not being treated with fucking disdain by somebody I thought was cool - again - would be nice.” Brenna’s words hadn’t been as devastating to them as other words and actions had been in the past. Still, though, it wasn’t pleasant. John sat down beside them. His hand squeezed around Mike’s wrist lightly, “I didn’t want to say but she never was going to get us. She doesn’t know us. Doesn’t need to.” “Does anybody?” It was a gloomy thought, they supposed. But who did they have but each other? Now that they thought about it, they could really count their friends on their fingers and have digits left over. Their fanbase was loyal and always nice to have, but Mike knew better than to equate fandom with friendship. John didn’t think about that too much. He liked what he liked. To a fault, whatever routine he was given, he would adhere to. For better or worse. And so their circle was tight. He deflected perhaps the morass nature of this query, “Sure. But present company excluded, this business isn’t much for that. And maybe we were accountable for some of that. But outside of that? Your family, I’d consider them friends foremost.” Mike smiled up at him in the way they wouldn’t consciously do if there was a camera on them, and scooted a little closer, their head resting on his shoulder. Something crossed their mind then, something they’d asked about once before. They’d gotten a little information then, but something in them always craved a little more. Anything that could get them closer to him. “...can you tell me a little more about yours?” There was an extended period of silence between the two. “Not much to say…” John trailed off. He wasn’t ending the conversation. However, it’d been so long. He had shared with Mike about the lack of contact. Relationship trends would indicate that the little notoriety that John had obtained in the last year in something other than what used to define his existence would draw that sort of attention. John was sure he had extended family. He didn’t live in a vacuum. But, he wasn’t sure. He couldn’t really remember who they were. And while it had been many years since he really thought about her, his mother, always seemed to understand who he was - even if he didn’t. As if in mid memory, he blurted out, “I didn’t want to join the wrestling team in middle school. My mother insisted. Said I had the right mind for it.” He didn’t want to admit that he could barely remember her face. His ties to that life had been washed away. John’s mother may have planted the seed but she never saw her son succeed and grow to love the sport of wrestling, in all its forms. The following tendencies may have sounded familiar to Mike. “I’d fill up notebooks for each event I’d compete in…” He cut himself off, clamming up. Internally, something utterly devastating pushed against him. It was an impossible desire to have something that he could never have. And while the details were blurry due to the passage of time, he could envision the enormity of that very moment that brought this on. John remembered clearly lamenting to his mother that she was the only person who seemed to understand his line of thought. She laughed at that notion. She said that it wasn’t too hard. And that she would hope John could find that elsewhere with someone else. A different bond. He was too focused on the breaking of his routine to attach any credence to what she said. And it was too late to share his enlightenment now. He lowered his head, the impact of that void finally hitting him after all these years.     Mike almost said something. The last few minutes had been nothing but the night wind and the steady sound of the ocean. Someone else might have been confused or annoyed at the drop-off, or have said something by now. They just pressed themselves a little closer. They wouldn’t invalidate his feelings by telling him not to be sad, especially about something like this, but there was no reason he had to be sad alone.

Doctor Who Reviews by a Female Doctor, Season 3, p. 1

Previously on Doctor Who: The stellar first season was followed by a pretty subpar second one, but this second outing did give us a chance to meet David Tennant’s quirky, charming Doctor. The show struggled to land on a consistent storyline for the Tenth Doctor and Rose, but it did embrace the joy and energy that both characters brought to their travels. That joy ended in tears, though, as Rose was trapped in the parallel universe with her family, leaving the Doctor once again on his own.

         As this season begins, he is still very much in a state of grief over his separation from Rose, and this heightens his general sense of loneliness. The seasonal arc highlights this lonely state, as it relies heavily on his awareness that he’s the last of his species. The meticulously-planned Master plot works exceedingly well in bringing out this side of the Doctor, or at least it does until the last episode turns everything into nonsense. The Doctor’s obsession with his own aloneness doesn’t exactly help his relationship with his smart new companion Martha, though, as he tends to treat her like she’s getting in the way of his lamentations over his lost favorite. The Doctor can feel alone even with Martha standing right next to him, which is a good indication of the Doctor’s state of mind but is understandably frustrating for her.

        In general, this season is erratic in terms of episode quality; the first couple of episodes are solid, then there’s a lengthy slide into mediocrity, then we get five great episodes in a row, and finally everything crashes and burns in the finale. On the whole, I like more of this season than I did of the last one, but the brilliant, thoroughly unappreciated Martha feels mostly like a missed opportunity, and that prevents this from reaching the heights that Davies’s first and fourth seasons attain.

The Runaway Bride: Some viewers find Donna annoyingly screechy in this episode, which I think is a bit harsh. She’s picked up at her wedding and flung onto the TARDIS without warning, which is enough to make anyone do a lot of shouting. To be fair, the episode occasionally encourages an uncharitable reading of Donna; the Doctor’s long list of reasons why she’s a surprising target, including the notion that she’s not special or powerful, is uncharacteristically mean, and the sequence in which she tells the Doctor of Lance’s insistence on their wedding while the camera cuts away to her begging Lance to marry her is especially unfunny. Still, to me she’s already a likeable presence, and her oversized personality feels appropriate for an extremely fast-paced and frequently ridiculous episode. Her efforts to pull the Doctor away from some of his “big picture” thinking also make a decent case for taking her at least somewhat seriously. The beautiful last scene mostly makes up for the mean-spirited jokes; Donna’s right, the Doctor does need someone to stop him sometimes, and the fact that she is the quickest to challenge him is one of the reasons why I see Donna as the Tenth Doctor’s best companion. This is definitely not her best episode, but we get plenty of glimpses of the marvelous character who will return in Season Four.

        The other controversial element of this episode is the silliness of the plot, which is intensely goofy even by Doctor Who standards. The first third of the show, in which robot Santas kidnap Donna, is silliness done well. The car chase, which features the TARDIS pulling up alongside a Santa-driven taxi, is an especially fun sequence, and the two delighted children watching from the back of a nearby car make it even better. The Empress of Racnoss, however, is silliness done badly. She’s not quite as awful a monster as last season’s Absorbaloff, but she’s bad enough that I’m physically uncomfortable watching her scenes largely out of embarrassment for the actress playing her.  It’s like the director told her “Do a bunch of different random goofy evil laughter things, and then we’ll pull the best ten seconds and cut the rest” and then they forgot to cut anything. We keep cutting back to this poor woman, covered in a giant spider costume, wriggling about and making weird sounds, until finally she shrieks “My children!!!!” about twenty times and then she dies. It’s completely cringeworthy, and I spend the whole scene just waiting for it to be over.

         The serious side of the episode takes the form of the Doctor’s grief over Rose, which is generally very effective here. His memories of her from “New Earth” that are set off when he watches some dancing at the reception seem a bit random, but these moments are otherwise integrated believably into the story, and they reflect a form of grief that seems plausible for the Doctor’s personality. He’s clearly sad, but he hasn’t lost hold of his belief in Rose, and his assertion that she is “so alive” as he convinces Donna to leap into the TARDIS is a lovely display of his continuing love for Rose even in the midst of his sorrow. His angry response to the harm done by the Torchwood Institute is still very present, though, and his destruction of the Racnoss children just about makes sense in light of his devastation about losing Rose. The Doctor tends to get very self-righteous about the destruction of other species, even when they are trying to end the world, so it’s always jarring when he goes so definitively against his own principles like this. (Giving the Empress the choice to leave doesn’t really absolve him of all responsibility here in the way that he suggests, since he couldn’t give a similar choice to her children.) However, if we look at this as a release of the rage and sadness he’s been burying throughout the episode because he’s had a lot of crazy nonsense to take care of, I can understand why he would indulge in violence as much as he does here.

        This is a pretty uneven episode; some of the humor works fantastically well, but other pieces of it fall completely flat. I do think that it’s the best portrayal of the Doctor’s sense of loss this season, as the episode gets across his distress without making him treat Donna with the fairly dismissive approach that he later extends to Martha. In the end, this is a significant episode mainly because its events give Donna a reason to go looking for the Doctor later on, something for which the Doctor and everyone else should be exceedingly grateful. B+/B

Smith and Jones: The first twenty minutes or so of this episode are an absolutely sensational debut to the regular season. We get a very charming glimpse of the Jones family dealing with an ordinary minor crisis, we watch rain going the wrong way, a hospital gets relocated to the moon, the Doctor is somehow even more charismatic than usual, and Martha keeps her head to an impressive extent in spite of being whisked away from Earth without warning. And then the Rhinoceros Police turn up! (I know that they’re called Judoon, but there’s hardly ever an opportunity to say Rhinoceros Police, so I’m not passing up the chance just for the sake of getting the right name.) It’s a glorious setup, both for Martha herself and for this story.

           The rest of the episode doesn’t quite match the beginning, but it’s still a fun story, although the moon itself is disappointingly dull. I enjoy the Plasmavore, who calmly commits murder with a straw. The contrast between the hospital staff, who panic loudly, and the Judoon, who methodically catalog everyone with a cross on the hand, is also pretty funny. The Doctor gets a lot of comedic material in this episode, most of which works. There’s a tedious scene in which he hops around trying to get rid of radiation for what seems like half an hour, but his shouting about “Rhinos! On the moon!!” in an attempt to look human is adorably hilarious. Most importantly, Martha gets a lot of opportunities to show her scientific knowledge, probably more so here than in any other episode. She immediately impresses the Doctor with her understanding of how air would work on the moon, she makes a complicated machine work by reading the manual, she figures out what the Doctor has done to the Plasmavore, and she revives the Doctor when he seems to be dead. She is clearly excited to see the surface of the moon, but she’s much calmer than Rose, and she’s thinking more carefully about what she sees rather than just reacting emotionally. She’s definitely very different from her predecessor, and while she doesn’t quite have Rose’s immediately captivating presence, it’s exciting to see a companion who responds to a crisis by reading the operator’s manual.

           I do think that the ending of the episode is a letdown in several respects. The Doctor’s supposed death gives Martha a chance to put her medical knowledge to use, but is still one of the dullest fakeout deaths we’ve seen on this show. Both the business with the scanner and the last-minute return to Earth as the hospital runs out of air fall pretty flat for me, and Martha’s family gets reduced to silly squabbling instead of the much more engaging tensions that we saw in their earlier scene. The Doctor’s effort to prove that he’s a time traveler by going back to that morning and taking off his tie is a fabulous moment, but Martha’s actual TARDIS entrance is pretty underwhelming. The camera seems to be going for a pan of the control room, but somehow lands on jumping into a corner of the ceiling and staying there, which doesn’t exactly support Martha’s “bigger on the inside” moment. Once she gets into the TARDIS, the Doctor suddenly decides to stop being the lovely, charming figure he’s been all episode in favor of treating Martha like an intruder. I can understand that he might feel conflicted about inviting another woman into the TARDIS after losing Rose, but I’m not sure if the Doctor has ever shown quite this much resentment toward the new companion at any point in the show’s 50+-year history. (I guess he’s a bit annoyed with Jo at first because she’s not a scientist and she ruined an experiment, but he has an immediate change of heart, so it plays very differently.) It’s wonderful to see the first black companion on the show, and I’m thrilled that she gets a generally very strong debut episode, but it’s unfortunate that the first companion of color is the only one to be told “You’re not replacing her!” as she comes on board. Then she awkwardly flirts with him as a scowls at her, and I’m just left wondering if there’s a parallel universe out there in which the Doctor didn’t kiss Martha in his attempt to elude the Rhinos and this whole unrequited love plot was never set in motion. A full season of awesome, science-knowing Martha would have been much better than watching sad, mopey Martha wait for the Doctor to fall in love with her, and the origins of that storyline make for an irritating end to this otherwise great episode. Still, the most important thing for this episode to accomplish is the establishment of Martha as an interesting individual, and in spite of this unfortunate interaction with the Doctor, I would say it succeeds very much in that regard. A-

The Shakespeare Code: This marks the second installment of “The Doctor and Companion meet a dead writer in circumstances that resemble that writer’s works,” something that was nearly an annual tradition during Davies’s time on the show. The portrayal of Shakespeare is not as good as Simon Callow’s work as Charles Dickens two seasons ago, but he’s an enjoyable presence, and while the script sometimes goes obnoxiously overboard with the references, it’s fun watching the Doctor quote Shakespeare to the man himself. (A lot more than 57 academics would have punched the air if they saw Shakespeare flirt with the Doctor, though. Like, really a lot more.) As in “The Unquiet Dead,” the portrayal of the writer himself is better than the rather awkward incorporation of characters who resemble his own creations; the witches are entertaining enough, I guess, but keeping them for most of the episode as two clichéd hags and a generic attractive woman is not exactly an imaginative approach to these characters.

       The story does pick up, though, when it focuses on the power of words, which is both a nice individual storyline and a good piece of foreshadowing for the season finale. The Doctor’s explanation of why words hold so much power is especially lovely: “a theatre’s magic, isn’t it?...Stand on this stage, say the right words with the right emphasis at the right time. Oh you can make men weep, or cry with joy. Change them. You can change people’s minds just with words in this place.” Martha’s observation that the theater is like the TARDIS, containing power that exceeds its apparent dimensions, is smart enough that the Doctor manages to be impressed with her in spite of his unappreciative behavior elsewhere in the episode. The climactic scene, in which Martha helps to banish the Carrionite by realizing that “Expelliarmus!” is the perfect rhyme that Shakespeare needs, is an absolute delight, made even better by the Doctor’s jubilant exclamation of “Good old J.K.!” I love that this Shakespeare-focused episode finds so much joy in language and performance, and this scene encapsulates that joy perfectly.

       It’s a shame that this, probably their most appealing interaction, is placed into an episode that otherwise makes it difficult to enjoy them as a Doctor/Companion pairing. The previous episode ended on an unpleasant note, but featured a lot of great moments between them before that. This episode solidifies the problems, including the Doctor’s completely oblivious approach to racism. It makes sense to me that the Doctor might not quite grasp some of the nuances of Martha’s identity as a black woman; he’s seen so many species and been to so many times and places that I can imagine it would be difficult to keep track of exactly what power structures are in place at a particular moment in Earth’s history. Still, he’s spent a lot of time on twentieth and twenty-first century Earth, so his complete lack of awareness of her fears feels like a step too far. Responding to Martha’s concerns about slavery with the quip that “I’m not even human!” and the advice to “walk around like you own the place” is startlingly tone deaf—he may not be human, but he looks like an attractive, well-dressed white man, and that gives him an ability to swagger around that isn’t as available to Martha. It’s completely worth pointing out that there are more people of color in sixteenth-century England than we tend to see in movies, but using two extras with no lines to make this point, and then returning to Martha’s race only as a joke about the Shakespearean-era terms constituting “political correctness gone mad” is not the way to do this. The Doctor’s inability to quite grasp certain human things is worth exploring, but having him come across as completely unaware of the existence of racism just makes it look like he hasn’t been paying attention at all in his travels on Earth. The dynamic between these two gets even worse as the Doctor continues to treat Martha like a downgrade from Rose. It’s entirely possible to write a good unrequited love story; one-sided romantic feelings happen, and I don’t think that portraying a character as having these feelings necessarily weakens that character in any way. Framing an unrequited love story around jealousy of another woman is almost always going to go badly, though, and the Doctor’s unkind remark that “Rose would know what to do” sets in motion Martha’s understandable resentment toward her predecessor. During their interactions with Shakespeare, both characters show themselves to be wonderful, charming, witty people, but this episode does such a terrible job of setting up the relationship between them that it’s difficult to get excited about watching the two of them together. B

Gridlock: New Earth wasn’t very exciting to me the first time we saw it, but at least that episode had Tennant and Piper doing Lady Cassandra impressions (and Lady Cassandra herself being entertaining) to distract from the dullness of the planet. That’s gone here, in favor of “floaty vans get stuck in traffic.” It’s not a completely unworkable premise, but if I have to spend much of an episode trapped in an unmoving vehicle, I at least want to be trapped with interesting characters, and Martha and the Doctor manage to land in vehicles driven by the blandest beings of New Earth. Some of the other vehicles seem to contain more memorable individuals—I particularly liked the elderly lesbian couple keeping a close watch on the motorway’s many vehicles—but the four main minor characters are almost completely devoid of personality. The most interesting trait that I can think of to describe them is “child-bearing,” which is enjoyable only in the brief moments when we get to look at some kittens. Novice Hame doesn’t make much of an impression either, as I barely remembered her from “New Earth,” so her redemption didn’t mean anything to me, and the whole theme of “drugs are baaaaaaad” creates an awfully lukewarm center to the story.

       The Face of Boe scenes make more of an impression, but I have trouble making sense of them, given the revelations later in the season. If this really is Captain Jack, as is strongly hinted at later in the season, why does this particular secret have such significance for him? If a character has a final truth that they need to tell before their death, I expect it to be something that’s meaningful to them, or at least to the person being told. Here, though, Jack spends his final moments giving the Doctor an unintelligibly vague clue about the existence of the Master, which the Doctor doesn’t really understand at this point and is going to find out about very shortly anyways. After everything that Jack’s been through in his life, the Doctor’s encounter with the Master later in the season doesn’t seem like something that would be resonant enough to Jack to form the center of his last moments before the death that finally sticks. It’s an interesting moment for the audience, as we are left wondering what the Face of Boe’s words mean, and it serves as an important clue to Yana’s identity in “Utopia,” although the Doctor could probably have pieced things together on the basis of the drumbeat and the watch. As the possible death scene of a beloved character (albeit one who was still alive and kicking on his very own spinoff) it just seems unsatisfying to frame it around the confession of a secret that doesn’t have a lot of personal significance to Jack and is too vague for the Doctor to understand.

       Pieces of this story are somehow duller than actually being stuck in traffic, but the redemptive final minute prevents this from being a total disaster. As the people of New Earth sing a beautiful hymn, Martha convinces the Doctor to open up to her a bit, and he gives her a heartfelt description of his grief over the loss of his planet. He does genuinely seem to realize that she deserves better than the halfhearted welcome she’s gotten from him so far, and so the scene both lends a sense of specificity to New Earth that otherwise eludes it in this episode and gives us one of the best interactions between the Doctor and Martha. One scene can only do so much to improve a generally weak episode, but at least Martha’s first trip into the future ends on this stunningly hopeful note. C+

Daleks in Manhattan: The first time I watched this episode, I assumed that the TARDIS had somehow landed Martha and the Doctor in some parallel universe or a future era that was trying to reconstruct Depression-era New York, and that the climactic reveal would be their realization that they weren’t where they thought they were. The performances and production values are just so unconvincing that I figured there must be some sort of plot twist explaining them, but this is, in fact, just a poorly-realized story. It’s unfortunate because it’s the debut episode for writer Helen Raynor, the first woman to write for the reboot and, sadly, the only woman to write for the first eight seasons. Her script is mostly unimpressive here, but it’s made far worse than necessary by the completely incompetent direction. Doctor Who frequently deals with trying to do special effects without enough money, but most directors have either managed to somehow make the episodes look good, or to use the low-budget feel to create a sort of charming, B-movie atmosphere. Season One’s “Dalek” looks particularly low-budget, but the director makes it work amazingly well. The classic series had even more struggles with money, and while sometimes this results in disaster (i.e. “Underworld”), most of the time the cheap sets create a lovely, whimsical world for the Doctor and his friends. (“Invasion of the Dinosaurs” features dinosaurs that look like an elementary school art project, and it’s still one of my very favorite classic episodes.) Here, it looks like the director tried to film the episode on about 10% of the necessary budget and did nothing to account for the lack of money, and everything just looks shoddy. The acting is also weaker than usual here; the minor characters come across as forced attempts at campy humor, and the comedy just looks so effortful that it’s never actually funny. Worse, this two-parter is the one story in the reboot in which the Daleks don’t scare me even a little bit. Even in “Victory of the Daleks,” where we get the stupid color change, they are at least frightening in the earlier scenes of the episode. There is usually some sort of magic that makes Daleks terrifying in spite of being big pieces of metal with plungers and whisks attached, but here they actually come across as harmless and ineffectual as that description sounds.

           The problems don’t lie entirely with the direction, as Raynor’s script has plenty of clunky moments. We begin with the Doctor’s efforts to explain the concept of homelessness to grown woman Martha Jones, and then we meet Obvious Moral Man, who pontificates on subjects like “I learned in the war that it’s important to stick together” and “It’s confusing that some people have money while other people don’t have money.” He’s not wrong, but the show usually manages to get across life lessons with a little bit less sledgehammering. Throughout the episode, the dialogue is pretty bad, weighed down by misguided attempts at 1930s colloquial speech and even worse attempts at irony (like Tallulah’s observation that men are pigs, but not her Laszlo, who has been turned into a pig. Yikes.) We also get some more attention to Martha’s unrequited crush on the Doctor, although at least it’s pretty brief here. As this first part draws to an end, everything is terrible, and there is still another half of the story left to go. D

Evolution of the Daleks: This one is not quite as bad as the first part, although it’s pretty close. We have to sit through the Human-Dalek, which delivers stilted dialogue in the most grating voice imaginable. We have to watch more of Tallulah, who is pretty much the pinnacle of blandness. We have to endure the Doctor shouting aggressively at the Daleks while thumping on his chest in what is arguably Tennant’s worst performance in his entire run on the show. (It reminds me, somehow, of the scene in The West Wing in which Josh starts shouting at the Capitol Building—a moment similarly grounded in an apparent desire to just throw lots of ANGRY! at a talented dramatic actor and hope it works out.) We have a plot that seems awfully reminiscent of the Dalek being corrupted by Rose’s DNA in season 1 but that is worse in every way. We have to hear another entry in the list of Martha’s laments about how the Doctor liked Rose better than her. We have to listen to Andrew Garfield’s terrible accent. And, in the end, it’s all for an experiment in linking Dalek and human DNA that makes them look utterly ridiculous and doesn’t properly work, resulting in the destruction of the whole project. After sitting through two whole episodes of the Daleks putting together this plan, it’s an awfully underwhelming conclusion, and calls into question whether it was worth trotting out the Daleks just to have them engage in this poorly thought-out adventure. There are a couple of nice moments, especially Martha weaponizing lightning against the pig people, but on the whole the story is a major disappointment. D+

As Republicans Cheered Obamacare's Repeal, The Law's Beneficiaries Worried About Survival

On Thursday afternoon, by the narrowest of margins, Republican lawmakers passed a bill to repeal and replace Obamacare. Pleased with their victory, they popped Bud Lights and abruptly took buses to the White House to celebrate with President Donald Trump in the Rose Garden.

Meanwhile, those actually dependent on Obamacare were anxiously wondering what happens next. Some of them were following the action on the House floor while in their doctor’s offices receiving treatment.

The House bill will almost certainly not become law in its current form. But its passage portends a sharp turn away from the patient protections and coverage subsidies that they have come to rely on in Obamacare’s brief existence. The bill dramatically cuts Medicaid coverage, to the tune of $840 billion less. It also undermines the provisions that prevent insurers from discriminating against those with pre-existing conditions by allowing states to seek waivers that would eliminate rules prohibiting higher premiums for people with serious medical problems.

For those who stand to be hurt by these reforms, Thursday left them both fearful about their own medical futures and motivated to act politically.

These are their stories.

Coverage After The Loss Of A Spouse: Marianthe Poulianos, Florida

A self-employed attorney, Poulianos and her two children relied on her husband’s health insurance plan until he died unexpectedly at the age of 41. Her kids were 7 and 10 years old. They all relied on COBRA to get by. When that ended, so did their insurance.

“Obamacare came along at just the right time,” she said. Without it, she would either have had to take a job in a law firm or change careers. But finding a new job with less flexibility would have been tough, since her kids “really needed me.”

Poulianos says her current insurance coverage is reasonably priced with quality care provided. As she watched the House vote, she felt “demonized.”

I’m not sure why I should. I went to school, got married, had kids, worked, employed people, made my children my priority. My husband died and today I feel as if my family is being punished for that. I hear more tragic stories than ours ― people with sick children, pre-existing conditions etc. But I believe that my type of story is part of what’s really devastating and wrong about today as well.

‘I Keep Wondering Why They Want To Kill Me’: Jacqueline Church Simonds, Nevada

In 2010, Simonds began having bizarre, scary health episodes. She was hospitalized for five days but lacked insurance; she and her husband ran their own business, and his pre-existing conditions made him uninsurable. She was able to negotiate down the $42,000 bill, but she still needed her parents’ help to pay the remaining $18,900.

The following year, she became sick again. Her surgeon told her she needed a couple of feet of her colon removed or she would die. When she told the medical staff she simply wasn’t able to pay for such an operation, they informed her about the Affordable Care Act. She signed up for coverage and had the operation. To this day, she remains sick, recently receiving the diagnosis of Crohn’s disease. And she suspects she will need more operations.  

I keep wondering why they want to kill me.

Why are rich people so much more important than I am that their tax cuts are more important than my health? How can people vote to “improve” healthcare, but make themselves immune from the effects? So, you want to know how I feel about AHCA? I am thoroughly, implacably angry.  

I would be out in the streets with a pitchfork and torch, if I felt well enough to leave the house (but I don’t). So I will sit here at my computer and figure out ways to get out the vote.

How Could Christians Do This?: Stacy Jarrell, Florida

“I’m somewhere between totally pissed off and sick to my stomach right now. And I’m scared,” Jarrell told HuffPost shortly after Thursday’s vote. She’s 54 and widowed and petrified about losing her health care. Years ago, she said a doctor misread a mammogram that allowed insurers to label her as having a pre-existing condition. Obamacare came along and gave her solace. She makes under $40,000 a year and gets a subsidy to help purchase insurance on the Obamacare exchange in her state.

As a Christian I can’t understand how these people that claim to follow Christ could support, let alone pass, a law that will kill people. While I believe in a separation of church and state, I also believe that as human beings, moral and ethical people need to take care of those that can’t take care of themselves.

The last thing I’m feeling is resolve. If they think there was a resistance before... they have absolutely no idea how this vote has motivated us.

‘I’m Fucking Terrified’: Bill Petrich, New York

At 21, Petrich was diagnosed with non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma. Treatment was in 2010 and 2011, and Obamacare allowed him to stay on his mother’s private plan. Now 28, he lives in New York and must fend for himself. He has a job as a contractor with no benefits and pays $600 a month for his insurance coverage. It’s a hefty price tag. But it’s a good plan.

Petrich hopes the bill stalls in the Senate. But he’s afraid that Republicans won’t deny the president an accomplishment.

I’m fucking terrified. I can feel the foreboding in my stomach. I’m literally shaking a little bit right now, I was really hoping this wouldn’t pass. I know that, for the rest of my life, I will be seen not as a human being but as a pre-existing condition by private healthcare providers. ...

I already live with a baseline of fear about getting cancer again. Now, it’s terror. Financial ruin at best, death at worst. I’m already imagining a world where I’m starting a crowdfunding campaign to pay for my imagined future treatment.

Medication That Wasn’t Available Without Obamacare: Annie Agle, Utah

Agle, 28, has a rare disease called mastocytosis. She actually receives insurance through her employer, but she’s benefited from the provision under the Affordable Care Act that increased funding for research into diseases. Agle ― who was in treatment Thursday while following the GOP repeal effort in the House ― said that there were several promising medications that weren’t brought to market until the health care law passed because they weren’t considered profitable by the insurance companies.

Under Obamacare, a lot of insurance carriers were forced to present packages and coverage for medications that wouldn’t have even been available to us in the first place. I owe my life now four times over to an immunotherapy drug that didn’t exist before Obamacare and probably wouldn’t have existed without that piece of funding. ...

It’s very disheartening. It’s hard to come to terms with the fact that 50 percent of my country doesn’t feel like that I matter or don’t have a right to live. The difference between treatment and no treatment for me is fatality. It’s not a grey area.

Putting Her Children First: Jill Thompsett, New York

In 2004, Thompsett delivered twins at 31 weeks into her pregnancy. Her son and daughter were in the neonatal intensive care unit for six weeks. Her daughter came home with an apnea monitor because of complications with breathing, while her son underwent three surgeries over the next 18 months. Thompsett’s health insurance plan, which she paid for out of pocket, spiked from $600 to $1,200 a month. She had to drop it.

New York state’s child health care plan allowed her to get coverage for her kids. But it wouldn’t be until 2008, when she took a job at the YMCA, that she was able to buy coverage again for herself. When Obamacare became law, the eligibility for Medicaid expanded to higher income levels. Thompsett, earning $23,000 a year and spending nearly every penny on health insurance and child care, qualified.

That the expansion is suddenly endangered enrages her. For now, Thompsett is making doctor’s appointments to take advantage of Obamacare while it’s in place. Down the road, she wonders what will happen to her family if there aren’t protections for pre-existing conditions.

My twins had a very rough start to life, but I am pleased to say they are smart, funny, honor roll 7th graders. ... I now feel like I am living in a nightmare that gets worse with each passing day of this administration. Somebody please wake me.

Chemotherapy During Repeal Vote: Laura Packard, Nevada

Packard, 40, recently moved to Las Vegas and noticed she had a cough. She didn’t have a doctor in the city yet, so she searched around and found someone. After additional trials and visits with specialists, she was diagnosed with Stage 4 Hodgkin’s lymphoma. Self-employed, she gets insurance on the exchanges and had her first round of chemotherapy on Thursday, as Republicans voted to repeal and replace the health care law.

My treatment schedule is eight months of chemotherapy, which will take me right through the end of 2017. If there is still cancer in my lungs, I will need radiation. If the chemotherapy doesn’t take at all, I may need immunotherapy. So there are all kinds of good options in my health, but I may need them in 2018. ...

If Republicans truly believe that Obamacare is some horrible blight on our country, then the thing to do is to work with Democrats to make health insurance better, rather than start with the premise that you need to give the ultra-rich a tax cut and try to figure out how to fudge it for people who need health care to make it the least terrible on them.

‘This Sucks’: Sam Alcabes, California

Alcabes had health care coverage after college through his job in Los Angeles. During that time, he had surgery to repair a herniated disc. When he left his job to attend law school, he was denied health care insurance because of his pre-existing condition. So he entered a high-risk pool run by the state of California, which was expensive and limited in its coverage. After the Affordable Care Act, he got insurance through Kaiser and continues to receive it now through his employer.  

I recently gave notice at my job to move on to other things. Now I am concerned that I will lose my ability to obtain insurance from Kaiser or anywhere else for that matter.

I feel like I’ve played the game the right way my whole life. Luck of the draw on having a bad back.

This sucks.

What Happens When You Lose Your Parents’ Coverage?: Kathryn Poe, Ohio

For the past two years, Poe, 20, has been in the hospital on a regular basis, fighting for her life after being diagnosed with three autoimmune conditions. She’s lucky enough to be able to stay on her parents’ health care plan for now but worries what will happen if she turns 26 and the protections for pre-existing conditions currently under the Affordable Care Act are weakened.

It’s incredibly hard to be positive...when you know that the health care legislation that’s passing is just not in your favor. ... At least in my experience in college, people will talk about it and really will have no idea what the essence of the bill means. Oftentimes [people don’t realize] what the real world ramifications are. People are so focused on this Republican dream of Obamacare being repealed that they forget what the real-life implications are for people like me.

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As Republicans Cheered Obamacare's Repeal, The Law's Beneficiaries Worried About Survival

On Thursday afternoon, by the narrowest of margins, Republican lawmakers passed a bill to repeal and replace Obamacare. Pleased with their victory, they popped Bud Lights and abruptly took buses to the White House to celebrate with President Donald Trump in the Rose Garden.

Meanwhile, those actually dependent on Obamacare were anxiously wondering what happens next. Some of them were following the action on the House floor while in their doctor’s offices receiving treatment.

The House bill will almost certainly not become law in its current form. But its passage portends a sharp turn away from the patient protections and coverage subsidies that they have come to rely on in Obamacare’s brief existence. The bill dramatically cuts Medicaid coverage, to the tune of $840 billion less. It also undermines the provisions that prevent insurers from discriminating against those with pre-existing conditions by allowing states to seek waivers that would eliminate rules prohibiting higher premiums for people with serious medical problems.

For those who stand to be hurt by these reforms, Thursday left them both fearful about their own medical futures and motivated to act politically.

These are their stories.

Coverage After The Loss Of A Spouse: Marianthe Poulianos, Florida

A self-employed attorney, Poulianos and her two children relied on her husband’s health insurance plan until he died unexpectedly at the age of 41. Her kids were 7 and 10 years old. They all relied on COBRA to get by. When that ended, so did their insurance.

“Obamacare came along at just the right time,” she said. Without it, she would either have had to take a job in a law firm or change careers. But finding a new job with less flexibility would have been tough, since her kids “really needed me.”

Poulianos says her current insurance coverage is reasonably priced with quality care provided. As she watched the House vote, she felt “demonized.”

I’m not sure why I should. I went to school, got married, had kids, worked, employed people, made my children my priority. My husband died and today I feel as if my family is being punished for that. I hear more tragic stories than ours ― people with sick children, pre-existing conditions etc. But I believe that my type of story is part of what’s really devastating and wrong about today as well.

‘I Keep Wondering Why They Want To Kill Me’: Jacqueline Church Simonds, Nevada

In 2010, Simonds began having bizarre, scary health episodes. She was hospitalized for five days but lacked insurance; she and her husband ran their own business, and his pre-existing conditions made him uninsurable. She was able to negotiate down the $42,000 bill, but she still needed her parents’ help to pay the remaining $18,900.

The following year, she became sick again. Her surgeon told her she needed a couple of feet of her colon removed or she would die. When she told the medical staff she simply wasn’t able to pay for such an operation, they informed her about the Affordable Care Act. She signed up for coverage and had the operation. To this day, she remains sick, recently receiving the diagnosis of Crohn’s disease. And she suspects she will need more operations.  

I keep wondering why they want to kill me.

Why are rich people so much more important than I am that their tax cuts are more important than my health? How can people vote to “improve” healthcare, but make themselves immune from the effects? So, you want to know how I feel about AHCA? I am thoroughly, implacably angry.  

I would be out in the streets with a pitchfork and torch, if I felt well enough to leave the house (but I don’t). So I will sit here at my computer and figure out ways to get out the vote.

How Could Christians Do This?: Stacy Jarrell, Florida

“I’m somewhere between totally pissed off and sick to my stomach right now. And I’m scared,” Jarrell told HuffPost shortly after Thursday’s vote. She’s 54 and widowed and petrified about losing her health care. Years ago, she said a doctor misread a mammogram that allowed insurers to label her as having a pre-existing condition. Obamacare came along and gave her solace. She makes under $40,000 a year and gets a subsidy to help purchase insurance on the Obamacare exchange in her state.

As a Christian I can’t understand how these people that claim to follow Christ could support, let alone pass, a law that will kill people. While I believe in a separation of church and state, I also believe that as human beings, moral and ethical people need to take care of those that can’t take care of themselves.

The last thing I’m feeling is resolve. If they think there was a resistance before... they have absolutely no idea how this vote has motivated us.

‘I’m Fucking Terrified’: Bill Petrich, New York

At 21, Petrich was diagnosed with non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma. Treatment was in 2010 and 2011, and Obamacare allowed him to stay on his mother’s private plan. Now 28, he lives in New York and must fend for himself. He has a job as a contractor with no benefits and pays $600 a month for his insurance coverage. It’s a hefty price tag. But it’s a good plan.

Petrich hopes the bill stalls in the Senate. But he’s afraid that Republicans won’t deny the president an accomplishment.

I’m fucking terrified. I can feel the foreboding in my stomach. I’m literally shaking a little bit right now, I was really hoping this wouldn’t pass. I know that, for the rest of my life, I will be seen not as a human being but as a pre-existing condition by private healthcare providers. ...

I already live with a baseline of fear about getting cancer again. Now, it’s terror. Financial ruin at best, death at worst. I’m already imagining a world where I’m starting a crowdfunding campaign to pay for my imagined future treatment.

Medication That Wasn’t Available Without Obamacare: Annie Agle, Utah

Agle, 28, has a rare disease called mastocytosis. She actually receives insurance through her employer, but she’s benefited from the provision under the Affordable Care Act that increased funding for research into diseases. Agle ― who was in treatment Thursday while following the GOP repeal effort in the House ― said that there were several promising medications that weren’t brought to market until the health care law passed because they weren’t considered profitable by the insurance companies.

Under Obamacare, a lot of insurance carriers were forced to present packages and coverage for medications that wouldn’t have even been available to us in the first place. I owe my life now four times over to an immunotherapy drug that didn’t exist before Obamacare and probably wouldn’t have existed without that piece of funding. ...

It’s very disheartening. It’s hard to come to terms with the fact that 50 percent of my country doesn’t feel like that I matter or don’t have a right to live. The difference between treatment and no treatment for me is fatality. It’s not a grey area.

Putting Her Children First: Jill Thompsett, New York

In 2004, Thompsett delivered twins at 31 weeks into her pregnancy. Her son and daughter were in the neonatal intensive care unit for six weeks. Her daughter came home with an apnea monitor because of complications with breathing, while her son underwent three surgeries over the next 18 months. Thompsett’s health insurance plan, which she paid for out of pocket, spiked from $600 to $1,200 a month. She had to drop it.

New York state’s child health care plan allowed her to get coverage for her kids. But it wouldn’t be until 2008, when she took a job at the YMCA, that she was able to buy coverage again for herself. When Obamacare became law, the eligibility for Medicaid expanded to higher income levels. Thompsett, earning $23,000 a year and spending nearly every penny on health insurance and child care, qualified.

That the expansion is suddenly endangered enrages her. For now, Thompsett is making doctor’s appointments to take advantage of Obamacare while it’s in place. Down the road, she wonders what will happen to her family if there aren’t protections for pre-existing conditions.

My twins had a very rough start to life, but I am pleased to say they are smart, funny, honor roll 7th graders. ... I now feel like I am living in a nightmare that gets worse with each passing day of this administration. Somebody please wake me.

Chemotherapy During Repeal Vote: Laura Packard, Nevada

Packard, 40, recently moved to Las Vegas and noticed she had a cough. She didn’t have a doctor in the city yet, so she searched around and found someone. After additional trials and visits with specialists, she was diagnosed with Stage 4 Hodgkin’s lymphoma. Self-employed, she gets insurance on the exchanges and had her first round of chemotherapy on Thursday, as Republicans voted to repeal and replace the health care law.

My treatment schedule is eight months of chemotherapy, which will take me right through the end of 2017. If there is still cancer in my lungs, I will need radiation. If the chemotherapy doesn’t take at all, I may need immunotherapy. So there are all kinds of good options in my health, but I may need them in 2018. ...

If Republicans truly believe that Obamacare is some horrible blight on our country, then the thing to do is to work with Democrats to make health insurance better, rather than start with the premise that you need to give the ultra-rich a tax cut and try to figure out how to fudge it for people who need health care to make it the least terrible on them.

‘This Sucks’: Sam Alcabes, California

Alcabes had health care coverage after college through his job in Los Angeles. During that time, he had surgery to repair a herniated disc. When he left his job to attend law school, he was denied health care insurance because of his pre-existing condition. So he entered a high-risk pool run by the state of California, which was expensive and limited in its coverage. After the Affordable Care Act, he got insurance through Kaiser and continues to receive it now through his employer.  

I recently gave notice at my job to move on to other things. Now I am concerned that I will lose my ability to obtain insurance from Kaiser or anywhere else for that matter.

I feel like I’ve played the game the right way my whole life. Luck of the draw on having a bad back.

This sucks.

What Happens When You Lose Your Parents’ Coverage?: Kathryn Poe, Ohio

For the past two years, Poe, 20, has been in the hospital on a regular basis, fighting for her life after being diagnosed with three autoimmune conditions. She’s lucky enough to be able to stay on her parents’ health care plan for now but worries what will happen if she turns 26 and the protections for pre-existing conditions currently under the Affordable Care Act are weakened.

It’s incredibly hard to be positive...when you know that the health care legislation that’s passing is just not in your favor. ... At least in my experience in college, people will talk about it and really will have no idea what the essence of the bill means. Oftentimes [people don’t realize] what the real world ramifications are. People are so focused on this Republican dream of Obamacare being repealed that they forget what the real-life implications are for people like me.

-- This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website.

from DIYS http://ift.tt/2peRhv9

As Republicans Cheered Obamacare's Repeal, The Law's Beneficiaries Worried About Survival

On Thursday afternoon, by the narrowest of margins, Republican lawmakers passed a bill to repeal and replace Obamacare. Pleased with their victory, they popped Bud Lights and abruptly took buses to the White House to celebrate with President Donald Trump in the Rose Garden.

Meanwhile, those actually dependent on Obamacare were anxiously wondering what happens next. Some of them were following the action on the House floor while in their doctor’s offices receiving treatment.

The House bill will almost certainly not become law in its current form. But its passage portends a sharp turn away from the patient protections and coverage subsidies that they have come to rely on in Obamacare’s brief existence. The bill dramatically cuts Medicaid coverage, to the tune of $840 billion less. It also undermines the provisions that prevent insurers from discriminating against those with pre-existing conditions by allowing states to seek waivers that would eliminate rules prohibiting higher premiums for people with serious medical problems.

For those who stand to be hurt by these reforms, Thursday left them both fearful about their own medical futures and motivated to act politically.

These are their stories.

Coverage After The Loss Of A Spouse: Marianthe Poulianos, Florida

A self-employed attorney, Poulianos and her two children relied on her husband’s health insurance plan until he died unexpectedly at the age of 41. Her kids were 7 and 10 years old. They all relied on COBRA to get by. When that ended, so did their insurance.

“Obamacare came along at just the right time,” she said. Without it, she would either have had to take a job in a law firm or change careers. But finding a new job with less flexibility would have been tough, since her kids “really needed me.”

Poulianos says her current insurance coverage is reasonably priced with quality care provided. As she watched the House vote, she felt “demonized.”

I’m not sure why I should. I went to school, got married, had kids, worked, employed people, made my children my priority. My husband died and today I feel as if my family is being punished for that. I hear more tragic stories than ours ― people with sick children, pre-existing conditions etc. But I believe that my type of story is part of what’s really devastating and wrong about today as well.

‘I Keep Wondering Why They Want To Kill Me’: Jacqueline Church Simonds, Nevada

In 2010, Simonds began having bizarre, scary health episodes. She was hospitalized for five days but lacked insurance; she and her husband ran their own business, and his pre-existing conditions made him uninsurable. She was able to negotiate down the $42,000 bill, but she still needed her parents’ help to pay the remaining $18,900.

The following year, she became sick again. Her surgeon told her she needed a couple of feet of her colon removed or she would die. When she told the medical staff she simply wasn’t able to pay for such an operation, they informed her about the Affordable Care Act. She signed up for coverage and had the operation. To this day, she remains sick, recently receiving the diagnosis of Crohn’s disease. And she suspects she will need more operations.  

I keep wondering why they want to kill me.

Why are rich people so much more important than I am that their tax cuts are more important than my health? How can people vote to “improve” healthcare, but make themselves immune from the effects? So, you want to know how I feel about AHCA? I am thoroughly, implacably angry.  

I would be out in the streets with a pitchfork and torch, if I felt well enough to leave the house (but I don’t). So I will sit here at my computer and figure out ways to get out the vote.

How Could Christians Do This?: Stacy Jarrell, Florida

“I’m somewhere between totally pissed off and sick to my stomach right now. And I’m scared,” Jarrell told HuffPost shortly after Thursday’s vote. She’s 54 and widowed and petrified about losing her health care. Years ago, she said a doctor misread a mammogram that allowed insurers to label her as having a pre-existing condition. Obamacare came along and gave her solace. She makes under $40,000 a year and gets a subsidy to help purchase insurance on the Obamacare exchange in her state.

As a Christian I can’t understand how these people that claim to follow Christ could support, let alone pass, a law that will kill people. While I believe in a separation of church and state, I also believe that as human beings, moral and ethical people need to take care of those that can’t take care of themselves.

The last thing I’m feeling is resolve. If they think there was a resistance before... they have absolutely no idea how this vote has motivated us.

‘I’m Fucking Terrified’: Bill Petrich, New York

At 21, Petrich was diagnosed with non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma. Treatment was in 2010 and 2011, and Obamacare allowed him to stay on his mother’s private plan. Now 28, he lives in New York and must fend for himself. He has a job as a contractor with no benefits and pays $600 a month for his insurance coverage. It’s a hefty price tag. But it’s a good plan.

Petrich hopes the bill stalls in the Senate. But he’s afraid that Republicans won’t deny the president an accomplishment.

I’m fucking terrified. I can feel the foreboding in my stomach. I’m literally shaking a little bit right now, I was really hoping this wouldn’t pass. I know that, for the rest of my life, I will be seen not as a human being but as a pre-existing condition by private healthcare providers. ...

I already live with a baseline of fear about getting cancer again. Now, it’s terror. Financial ruin at best, death at worst. I’m already imagining a world where I’m starting a crowdfunding campaign to pay for my imagined future treatment.

Medication That Wasn’t Available Without Obamacare: Annie Agle, Utah

Agle, 28, has a rare disease called mastocytosis. She actually receives insurance through her employer, but she’s benefited from the provision under the Affordable Care Act that increased funding for research into diseases. Agle ― who was in treatment Thursday while following the GOP repeal effort in the House ― said that there were several promising medications that weren’t brought to market until the health care law passed because they weren’t considered profitable by the insurance companies.

Under Obamacare, a lot of insurance carriers were forced to present packages and coverage for medications that wouldn’t have even been available to us in the first place. I owe my life now four times over to an immunotherapy drug that didn’t exist before Obamacare and probably wouldn’t have existed without that piece of funding. ...

It’s very disheartening. It’s hard to come to terms with the fact that 50 percent of my country doesn’t feel like that I matter or don’t have a right to live. The difference between treatment and no treatment for me is fatality. It’s not a grey area.

Putting Her Children First: Jill Thompsett, New York

In 2004, Thompsett delivered twins at 31 weeks into her pregnancy. Her son and daughter were in the neonatal intensive care unit for six weeks. Her daughter came home with an apnea monitor because of complications with breathing, while her son underwent three surgeries over the next 18 months. Thompsett’s health insurance plan, which she paid for out of pocket, spiked from $600 to $1,200 a month. She had to drop it.

New York state’s child health care plan allowed her to get coverage for her kids. But it wouldn’t be until 2008, when she took a job at the YMCA, that she was able to buy coverage again for herself. When Obamacare became law, the eligibility for Medicaid expanded to higher income levels. Thompsett, earning $23,000 a year and spending nearly every penny on health insurance and child care, qualified.

That the expansion is suddenly endangered enrages her. For now, Thompsett is making doctor’s appointments to take advantage of Obamacare while it’s in place. Down the road, she wonders what will happen to her family if there aren’t protections for pre-existing conditions.

My twins had a very rough start to life, but I am pleased to say they are smart, funny, honor roll 7th graders. ... I now feel like I am living in a nightmare that gets worse with each passing day of this administration. Somebody please wake me.

Chemotherapy During Repeal Vote: Laura Packard, Nevada

Packard, 40, recently moved to Las Vegas and noticed she had a cough. She didn’t have a doctor in the city yet, so she searched around and found someone. After additional trials and visits with specialists, she was diagnosed with Stage 4 Hodgkin’s lymphoma. Self-employed, she gets insurance on the exchanges and had her first round of chemotherapy on Thursday, as Republicans voted to repeal and replace the health care law.

My treatment schedule is eight months of chemotherapy, which will take me right through the end of 2017. If there is still cancer in my lungs, I will need radiation. If the chemotherapy doesn’t take at all, I may need immunotherapy. So there are all kinds of good options in my health, but I may need them in 2018. ...

If Republicans truly believe that Obamacare is some horrible blight on our country, then the thing to do is to work with Democrats to make health insurance better, rather than start with the premise that you need to give the ultra-rich a tax cut and try to figure out how to fudge it for people who need health care to make it the least terrible on them.

‘This Sucks’: Sam Alcabes, California

Alcabes had health care coverage after college through his job in Los Angeles. During that time, he had surgery to repair a herniated disc. When he left his job to attend law school, he was denied health care insurance because of his pre-existing condition. So he entered a high-risk pool run by the state of California, which was expensive and limited in its coverage. After the Affordable Care Act, he got insurance through Kaiser and continues to receive it now through his employer.  

I recently gave notice at my job to move on to other things. Now I am concerned that I will lose my ability to obtain insurance from Kaiser or anywhere else for that matter.

I feel like I’ve played the game the right way my whole life. Luck of the draw on having a bad back.

This sucks.

What Happens When You Lose Your Parents’ Coverage?: Kathryn Poe, Ohio

For the past two years, Poe, 20, has been in the hospital on a regular basis, fighting for her life after being diagnosed with three autoimmune conditions. She’s lucky enough to be able to stay on her parents’ health care plan for now but worries what will happen if she turns 26 and the protections for pre-existing conditions currently under the Affordable Care Act are weakened.

It’s incredibly hard to be positive...when you know that the health care legislation that’s passing is just not in your favor. ... At least in my experience in college, people will talk about it and really will have no idea what the essence of the bill means. Oftentimes [people don’t realize] what the real world ramifications are. People are so focused on this Republican dream of Obamacare being repealed that they forget what the real-life implications are for people like me.

-- This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website.

from DIYS http://ift.tt/2peRhv9

As Republicans Cheered Obamacare's Repeal, The Law's Beneficiaries Worried About Survival

On Thursday afternoon, by the narrowest of margins, Republican lawmakers passed a bill to repeal and replace Obamacare. Pleased with their victory, they popped Bud Lights and abruptly took buses to the White House to celebrate with President Donald Trump in the Rose Garden.

Meanwhile, those actually dependent on Obamacare were anxiously wondering what happens next. Some of them were following the action on the House floor while in their doctor’s offices receiving treatment.

The House bill will almost certainly not become law in its current form. But its passage portends a sharp turn away from the patient protections and coverage subsidies that they have come to rely on in Obamacare’s brief existence. The bill dramatically cuts Medicaid coverage, to the tune of $840 billion less. It also undermines the provisions that prevent insurers from discriminating against those with pre-existing conditions by allowing states to seek waivers that would eliminate rules prohibiting higher premiums for people with serious medical problems.

For those who stand to be hurt by these reforms, Thursday left them both fearful about their own medical futures and motivated to act politically.

These are their stories.

Coverage After The Loss Of A Spouse: Marianthe Poulianos, Florida

A self-employed attorney, Poulianos and her two children relied on her husband’s health insurance plan until he died unexpectedly at the age of 41. Her kids were 7 and 10 years old. They all relied on COBRA to get by. When that ended, so did their insurance.

“Obamacare came along at just the right time,” she said. Without it, she would either have had to take a job in a law firm or change careers. But finding a new job with less flexibility would have been tough, since her kids “really needed me.”

Poulianos says her current insurance coverage is reasonably priced with quality care provided. As she watched the House vote, she felt “demonized.”

I’m not sure why I should. I went to school, got married, had kids, worked, employed people, made my children my priority. My husband died and today I feel as if my family is being punished for that. I hear more tragic stories than ours ― people with sick children, pre-existing conditions etc. But I believe that my type of story is part of what’s really devastating and wrong about today as well.

‘I Keep Wondering Why They Want To Kill Me’: Jacqueline Church Simonds, Nevada

In 2010, Simonds began having bizarre, scary health episodes. She was hospitalized for five days but lacked insurance; she and her husband ran their own business, and his pre-existing conditions made him uninsurable. She was able to negotiate down the $42,000 bill, but she still needed her parents’ help to pay the remaining $18,900.

The following year, she became sick again. Her surgeon told her she needed a couple of feet of her colon removed or she would die. When she told the medical staff she simply wasn’t able to pay for such an operation, they informed her about the Affordable Care Act. She signed up for coverage and had the operation. To this day, she remains sick, recently receiving the diagnosis of Crohn’s disease. And she suspects she will need more operations.  

I keep wondering why they want to kill me.

Why are rich people so much more important than I am that their tax cuts are more important than my health? How can people vote to “improve” healthcare, but make themselves immune from the effects? So, you want to know how I feel about AHCA? I am thoroughly, implacably angry.  

I would be out in the streets with a pitchfork and torch, if I felt well enough to leave the house (but I don’t). So I will sit here at my computer and figure out ways to get out the vote.

How Could Christians Do This?: Stacy Jarrell, Florida

“I’m somewhere between totally pissed off and sick to my stomach right now. And I’m scared,” Jarrell told HuffPost shortly after Thursday’s vote. She’s 54 and widowed and petrified about losing her health care. Years ago, she said a doctor misread a mammogram that allowed insurers to label her as having a pre-existing condition. Obamacare came along and gave her solace. She makes under $40,000 a year and gets a subsidy to help purchase insurance on the Obamacare exchange in her state.

As a Christian I can’t understand how these people that claim to follow Christ could support, let alone pass, a law that will kill people. While I believe in a separation of church and state, I also believe that as human beings, moral and ethical people need to take care of those that can’t take care of themselves.

The last thing I’m feeling is resolve. If they think there was a resistance before... they have absolutely no idea how this vote has motivated us.

‘I’m Fucking Terrified’: Bill Petrich, New York

At 21, Petrich was diagnosed with non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma. Treatment was in 2010 and 2011, and Obamacare allowed him to stay on his mother’s private plan. Now 28, he lives in New York and must fend for himself. He has a job as a contractor with no benefits and pays $600 a month for his insurance coverage. It’s a hefty price tag. But it’s a good plan.

Petrich hopes the bill stalls in the Senate. But he’s afraid that Republicans won’t deny the president an accomplishment.

I’m fucking terrified. I can feel the foreboding in my stomach. I’m literally shaking a little bit right now, I was really hoping this wouldn’t pass. I know that, for the rest of my life, I will be seen not as a human being but as a pre-existing condition by private healthcare providers. ...

I already live with a baseline of fear about getting cancer again. Now, it’s terror. Financial ruin at best, death at worst. I’m already imagining a world where I’m starting a crowdfunding campaign to pay for my imagined future treatment.

Medication That Wasn’t Available Without Obamacare: Annie Agle, Utah

Agle, 28, has a rare disease called mastocytosis. She actually receives insurance through her employer, but she’s benefited from the provision under the Affordable Care Act that increased funding for research into diseases. Agle ― who was in treatment Thursday while following the GOP repeal effort in the House ― said that there were several promising medications that weren’t brought to market until the health care law passed because they weren’t considered profitable by the insurance companies.

Under Obamacare, a lot of insurance carriers were forced to present packages and coverage for medications that wouldn’t have even been available to us in the first place. I owe my life now four times over to an immunotherapy drug that didn’t exist before Obamacare and probably wouldn’t have existed without that piece of funding. ...

It’s very disheartening. It’s hard to come to terms with the fact that 50 percent of my country doesn’t feel like that I matter or don’t have a right to live. The difference between treatment and no treatment for me is fatality. It’s not a grey area.

Putting Her Children First: Jill Thompsett, New York

In 2004, Thompsett delivered twins at 31 weeks into her pregnancy. Her son and daughter were in the neonatal intensive care unit for six weeks. Her daughter came home with an apnea monitor because of complications with breathing, while her son underwent three surgeries over the next 18 months. Thompsett’s health insurance plan, which she paid for out of pocket, spiked from $600 to $1,200 a month. She had to drop it.

New York state’s child health care plan allowed her to get coverage for her kids. But it wouldn’t be until 2008, when she took a job at the YMCA, that she was able to buy coverage again for herself. When Obamacare became law, the eligibility for Medicaid expanded to higher income levels. Thompsett, earning $23,000 a year and spending nearly every penny on health insurance and child care, qualified.

That the expansion is suddenly endangered enrages her. For now, Thompsett is making doctor’s appointments to take advantage of Obamacare while it’s in place. Down the road, she wonders what will happen to her family if there aren’t protections for pre-existing conditions.

My twins had a very rough start to life, but I am pleased to say they are smart, funny, honor roll 7th graders. ... I now feel like I am living in a nightmare that gets worse with each passing day of this administration. Somebody please wake me.

Chemotherapy During Repeal Vote: Laura Packard, Nevada

Packard, 40, recently moved to Las Vegas and noticed she had a cough. She didn’t have a doctor in the city yet, so she searched around and found someone. After additional trials and visits with specialists, she was diagnosed with Stage 4 Hodgkin’s lymphoma. Self-employed, she gets insurance on the exchanges and had her first round of chemotherapy on Thursday, as Republicans voted to repeal and replace the health care law.

My treatment schedule is eight months of chemotherapy, which will take me right through the end of 2017. If there is still cancer in my lungs, I will need radiation. If the chemotherapy doesn’t take at all, I may need immunotherapy. So there are all kinds of good options in my health, but I may need them in 2018. ...

If Republicans truly believe that Obamacare is some horrible blight on our country, then the thing to do is to work with Democrats to make health insurance better, rather than start with the premise that you need to give the ultra-rich a tax cut and try to figure out how to fudge it for people who need health care to make it the least terrible on them.

‘This Sucks’: Sam Alcabes, California

Alcabes had health care coverage after college through his job in Los Angeles. During that time, he had surgery to repair a herniated disc. When he left his job to attend law school, he was denied health care insurance because of his pre-existing condition. So he entered a high-risk pool run by the state of California, which was expensive and limited in its coverage. After the Affordable Care Act, he got insurance through Kaiser and continues to receive it now through his employer.  

I recently gave notice at my job to move on to other things. Now I am concerned that I will lose my ability to obtain insurance from Kaiser or anywhere else for that matter.

I feel like I’ve played the game the right way my whole life. Luck of the draw on having a bad back.

This sucks.

What Happens When You Lose Your Parents’ Coverage?: Kathryn Poe, Ohio

For the past two years, Poe, 20, has been in the hospital on a regular basis, fighting for her life after being diagnosed with three autoimmune conditions. She’s lucky enough to be able to stay on her parents’ health care plan for now but worries what will happen if she turns 26 and the protections for pre-existing conditions currently under the Affordable Care Act are weakened.

It’s incredibly hard to be positive...when you know that the health care legislation that’s passing is just not in your favor. ... At least in my experience in college, people will talk about it and really will have no idea what the essence of the bill means. Oftentimes [people don’t realize] what the real world ramifications are. People are so focused on this Republican dream of Obamacare being repealed that they forget what the real-life implications are for people like me.

-- This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website.

from DIYS http://ift.tt/2peRhv9

As Republicans Cheered Obamacare's Repeal, The Law's Beneficiaries Worried About Survival

On Thursday afternoon, by the narrowest of margins, Republican lawmakers passed a bill to repeal and replace Obamacare. Pleased with their victory, they popped Bud Lights and abruptly took buses to the White House to celebrate with President Donald Trump in the Rose Garden.

Meanwhile, those actually dependent on Obamacare were anxiously wondering what happens next. Some of them were following the action on the House floor while in their doctor’s offices receiving treatment.

The House bill will almost certainly not become law in its current form. But its passage portends a sharp turn away from the patient protections and coverage subsidies that they have come to rely on in Obamacare’s brief existence. The bill dramatically cuts Medicaid coverage, to the tune of $840 billion less. It also undermines the provisions that prevent insurers from discriminating against those with pre-existing conditions by allowing states to seek waivers that would eliminate rules prohibiting higher premiums for people with serious medical problems.

For those who stand to be hurt by these reforms, Thursday left them both fearful about their own medical futures and motivated to act politically.

These are their stories.

Coverage After The Loss Of A Spouse: Marianthe Poulianos, Florida

A self-employed attorney, Poulianos and her two children relied on her husband’s health insurance plan until he died unexpectedly at the age of 41. Her kids were 7 and 10 years old. They all relied on COBRA to get by. When that ended, so did their insurance.

“Obamacare came along at just the right time,” she said. Without it, she would either have had to take a job in a law firm or change careers. But finding a new job with less flexibility would have been tough, since her kids “really needed me.”

Poulianos says her current insurance coverage is reasonably priced with quality care provided. As she watched the House vote, she felt “demonized.”

I’m not sure why I should. I went to school, got married, had kids, worked, employed people, made my children my priority. My husband died and today I feel as if my family is being punished for that. I hear more tragic stories than ours ― people with sick children, pre-existing conditions etc. But I believe that my type of story is part of what’s really devastating and wrong about today as well.

‘I Keep Wondering Why They Want To Kill Me’: Jacqueline Church Simonds, Nevada

In 2010, Simonds began having bizarre, scary health episodes. She was hospitalized for five days but lacked insurance; she and her husband ran their own business, and his pre-existing conditions made him uninsurable. She was able to negotiate down the $42,000 bill, but she still needed her parents’ help to pay the remaining $18,900.

The following year, she became sick again. Her surgeon told her she needed a couple of feet of her colon removed or she would die. When she told the medical staff she simply wasn’t able to pay for such an operation, they informed her about the Affordable Care Act. She signed up for coverage and had the operation. To this day, she remains sick, recently receiving the diagnosis of Crohn’s disease. And she suspects she will need more operations.  

I keep wondering why they want to kill me.

Why are rich people so much more important than I am that their tax cuts are more important than my health? How can people vote to “improve” healthcare, but make themselves immune from the effects? So, you want to know how I feel about AHCA? I am thoroughly, implacably angry.  

I would be out in the streets with a pitchfork and torch, if I felt well enough to leave the house (but I don’t). So I will sit here at my computer and figure out ways to get out the vote.

How Could Christians Do This?: Stacy Jarrell, Florida

“I’m somewhere between totally pissed off and sick to my stomach right now. And I’m scared,” Jarrell told HuffPost shortly after Thursday’s vote. She’s 54 and widowed and petrified about losing her health care. Years ago, she said a doctor misread a mammogram that allowed insurers to label her as having a pre-existing condition. Obamacare came along and gave her solace. She makes under $40,000 a year and gets a subsidy to help purchase insurance on the Obamacare exchange in her state.

As a Christian I can’t understand how these people that claim to follow Christ could support, let alone pass, a law that will kill people. While I believe in a separation of church and state, I also believe that as human beings, moral and ethical people need to take care of those that can’t take care of themselves.

The last thing I’m feeling is resolve. If they think there was a resistance before... they have absolutely no idea how this vote has motivated us.

‘I’m Fucking Terrified’: Bill Petrich, New York

At 21, Petrich was diagnosed with non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma. Treatment was in 2010 and 2011, and Obamacare allowed him to stay on his mother’s private plan. Now 28, he lives in New York and must fend for himself. He has a job as a contractor with no benefits and pays $600 a month for his insurance coverage. It’s a hefty price tag. But it’s a good plan.

Petrich hopes the bill stalls in the Senate. But he’s afraid that Republicans won’t deny the president an accomplishment.

I’m fucking terrified. I can feel the foreboding in my stomach. I’m literally shaking a little bit right now, I was really hoping this wouldn’t pass. I know that, for the rest of my life, I will be seen not as a human being but as a pre-existing condition by private healthcare providers. ...

I already live with a baseline of fear about getting cancer again. Now, it’s terror. Financial ruin at best, death at worst. I’m already imagining a world where I’m starting a crowdfunding campaign to pay for my imagined future treatment.

Medication That Wasn’t Available Without Obamacare: Annie Agle, Utah

Agle, 28, has a rare disease called mastocytosis. She actually receives insurance through her employer, but she’s benefited from the provision under the Affordable Care Act that increased funding for research into diseases. Agle ― who was in treatment Thursday while following the GOP repeal effort in the House ― said that there were several promising medications that weren’t brought to market until the health care law passed because they weren’t considered profitable by the insurance companies.

Under Obamacare, a lot of insurance carriers were forced to present packages and coverage for medications that wouldn’t have even been available to us in the first place. I owe my life now four times over to an immunotherapy drug that didn’t exist before Obamacare and probably wouldn’t have existed without that piece of funding. ...

It’s very disheartening. It’s hard to come to terms with the fact that 50 percent of my country doesn’t feel like that I matter or don’t have a right to live. The difference between treatment and no treatment for me is fatality. It’s not a grey area.

Putting Her Children First: Jill Thompsett, New York

In 2004, Thompsett delivered twins at 31 weeks into her pregnancy. Her son and daughter were in the neonatal intensive care unit for six weeks. Her daughter came home with an apnea monitor because of complications with breathing, while her son underwent three surgeries over the next 18 months. Thompsett’s health insurance plan, which she paid for out of pocket, spiked from $600 to $1,200 a month. She had to drop it.

New York state’s child health care plan allowed her to get coverage for her kids. But it wouldn’t be until 2008, when she took a job at the YMCA, that she was able to buy coverage again for herself. When Obamacare became law, the eligibility for Medicaid expanded to higher income levels. Thompsett, earning $23,000 a year and spending nearly every penny on health insurance and child care, qualified.

That the expansion is suddenly endangered enrages her. For now, Thompsett is making doctor’s appointments to take advantage of Obamacare while it’s in place. Down the road, she wonders what will happen to her family if there aren’t protections for pre-existing conditions.

My twins had a very rough start to life, but I am pleased to say they are smart, funny, honor roll 7th graders. ... I now feel like I am living in a nightmare that gets worse with each passing day of this administration. Somebody please wake me.

Chemotherapy During Repeal Vote: Laura Packard, Nevada

Packard, 40, recently moved to Las Vegas and noticed she had a cough. She didn’t have a doctor in the city yet, so she searched around and found someone. After additional trials and visits with specialists, she was diagnosed with Stage 4 Hodgkin’s lymphoma. Self-employed, she gets insurance on the exchanges and had her first round of chemotherapy on Thursday, as Republicans voted to repeal and replace the health care law.

My treatment schedule is eight months of chemotherapy, which will take me right through the end of 2017. If there is still cancer in my lungs, I will need radiation. If the chemotherapy doesn’t take at all, I may need immunotherapy. So there are all kinds of good options in my health, but I may need them in 2018. ...

If Republicans truly believe that Obamacare is some horrible blight on our country, then the thing to do is to work with Democrats to make health insurance better, rather than start with the premise that you need to give the ultra-rich a tax cut and try to figure out how to fudge it for people who need health care to make it the least terrible on them.

‘This Sucks’: Sam Alcabes, California

Alcabes had health care coverage after college through his job in Los Angeles. During that time, he had surgery to repair a herniated disc. When he left his job to attend law school, he was denied health care insurance because of his pre-existing condition. So he entered a high-risk pool run by the state of California, which was expensive and limited in its coverage. After the Affordable Care Act, he got insurance through Kaiser and continues to receive it now through his employer.  

I recently gave notice at my job to move on to other things. Now I am concerned that I will lose my ability to obtain insurance from Kaiser or anywhere else for that matter.

I feel like I’ve played the game the right way my whole life. Luck of the draw on having a bad back.

This sucks.

What Happens When You Lose Your Parents’ Coverage?: Kathryn Poe, Ohio

For the past two years, Poe, 20, has been in the hospital on a regular basis, fighting for her life after being diagnosed with three autoimmune conditions. She’s lucky enough to be able to stay on her parents’ health care plan for now but worries what will happen if she turns 26 and the protections for pre-existing conditions currently under the Affordable Care Act are weakened.

It’s incredibly hard to be positive...when you know that the health care legislation that’s passing is just not in your favor. ... At least in my experience in college, people will talk about it and really will have no idea what the essence of the bill means. Oftentimes [people don’t realize] what the real world ramifications are. People are so focused on this Republican dream of Obamacare being repealed that they forget what the real-life implications are for people like me.

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