"What, missing the end of the film because of sex on the sofa?" Harry's face is pallid blue-green, lit by the paused screen of the television set, and he grins slyly, licks the corner of his mouth.
Adam sometimes feels giddy after, but now he is melancholy. They've brought a blanket from the bed but now it's on the floor; he sweeps an arm down for it, then covers himself. Harry pulls on his grey joggers but leaves his shirt on the back of the sofa.
"No," Adam says softly, and considers not saying it aloud. He's had enough melancholy conversation for a lifetime. "Maybe I'm mad and you're not even real. Maybe I dreamed you. Or I'm dreaming you now."
"Oh, this this," Harry says, with another quirk of a grin Adam wishes he did not wear. "Just glad I don't make you feel sick. Fevers and all that."
"Have you ever heard of it? I mean, of course there's a million stories, but. . ." He has never said aloud the most obvious words. They talk around it. There is a veil of grief around them like fog, and something more like trepidation than curiosity, and they are still just at the beginning of the fall--the leap of faith, the flutter in the belly, stories and new shared experiences, each perfect in the other's eyes--and neither wants to say or do anything that might break them out of their reverie and shove them back into the harsh, awful real world.
Harry shakes his head, smiles another different smile, touches Adam's face. "Maybe we've been in a simulation all along," he says lightly, with a shrug. "Maybe we're in an infant's dream, or one of us blinked and spun us off into a parallel universe."
Adam closes his eyes longer than a blink. At least twice a day, he does feel mostly certain he has, in fact, gone mad. Worse than that, he cannot will himself back to sanity, which leaves him feeling lost and small and more frightened than ever. He does not want to brush his questions away. He will for now, but he cannot for much longer.
Harry treats it lightly, but with finality. "Even if nothing is real, we believe it is, so what difference does it make? Maybe this has never happened to anyone. Maybe it happens to everyone and no one talks about it." He holds Adam's hand and Adam lets him but his worries weigh heavier on him now that Harry is refusing to share them. "Maybe we'll never know. But we were never going to know everything, anyway. There's always some dark mystery or other."
"Yeah," Adam says, "Guess you're right." He sighs as he reaches for the remote, aims it at the TV and restarts the film. They settle close together, and even though Harry is holding him, Adam feels the knot in his chest tangling up again, tight as ever.
Season 4 Episode 1
Featured on: SiIvaGunner's Highest Quality Rips: Volume AI
Ripped by Krizis
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It's hard to put into words, sometimes, just how much a good mashup can do for the soul. Mashups come in all forms and sizes from all sorts of artists, be it the absurd-yet-genuinely-banging quality of putting VGM together with rock and pop music a la Triple-Q and Planet Wisp Mashup Medley, or putting together songs purely for the comedic value they'd hold together a la Loopdeloop Griddy or Dr. Soulja. But amidst all these is the most treasured kind - the mashups that feel meant to happen, like two puzzle pieces coming together to form pure excellence. The rips that are more than the sum of their parts. The rips like in love with madeon.
The music of Celeste already holds a special place in a lot of people's hearts, and is one of the best modern soundtracks in recent memory. Above all of its other qualities, though, part of what draws me to it is just how "indie" it all still feels. They're all professionally produced, of course, but the artists behind them - Lena Raine, Christa Lee, 2Mello, they're all so intimately in touch with the community of players who listen to their music. The composer for Golden Ridge (Golden Feather Mix), in love with a ghost, is no different, and even shared in love with madeon to her Twitter audience upon discovering it. Even though I'm not too familiar with their music, there's a sense of human connection present in Golden Ridge (Golden Feather Mix), one that's only enhanced through in love with madeon.
Really, it is a very simple mashup, its two songs that naturally go together - but even with that, I was shocked at just HOW well they go together. The presence of You're On from Madeon inherently makes the track noisier, of course, more busy in its constant vocals and added instruments, yet the vibe of the original track is completely preserved. Even with their differences, their similarities attract as to form the perfect harmony - the echoing, fading vocals in You're On in particular lend themselves so perfectly to the fading, distant feel of the original track.
Everything comes together so, so beautifully, and I'm so happy SiIvaGunner is filled with people just as focused on making soothing masterpieces like this, as it is with people aiming to make us laugh. The channel's status as a big melting pot truly is just a win-win for all of us.
Three years later and I know you've grown. You text me after months to ask about a philosopher I quoted once. You want to write about him in a paper. Three years ago you thought the philosophers I quoted were arrogant old men. Now you're studying classics and you know now that you had it right before. The thought makes me smile.
I am in love with a memory.
I still visit you some nights in my dreams. In the images my mind conjurs I can still smell you as you lay against my chest counting my heart's uneven beats. There, in my dreams, you are exactly as you were. You smell like warm vanilla and freshly dyed hair. There's a dull ache when I wonder if you still wear that same perfume, and I realize I might never get to know.
I am in love with a ghost.
I told you once that love meant watching someone die. It was a quote from a Death Cab for Cutie song. I don't know if I ever admitted that. I never thought this would be what the death of us would look like. Still awake four hours before my alarm is set to go off, wondering where you are in the world and if you ever wrote that paper. Wondering how life has shaped you in all the moments I've missed. Knowing that the girl I loved, the girl I still love, is no longer real. Knowing that I have changed too, and the girl I am now could have loved you better. If you met me today, would you love me again?
I am in love with all of our yesterdays.
And it is a special kind of agony knowing we will have no more tomorrows.
“I have fallen in love with a ghost. I have fallen for the haunting shadows of someone who used to shine as bright as the sun. You are a fraction of what you used to be, but I can not help but continue to love you all the same.”
Two tokens of Rosana, my current Player Character in a JJBA campaign. She is the user of 『in love with a ghost』, which lets her take on the form and personality of the dead, based on the memories of those who knew them in life. One can only wonder why such an optimistic girl would have such a morbid power.
While the most recent token (right) is miles better than the funko pop lookin' ass that is the original art, I'm still baffled at past me's decision to make her eyes this freaking big. Luckily I have a new version in the works, so maybe one day I may avert the ever-present gaze of the aye-aye.