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maccreadysimp · 3 years

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breaking down this anti-ian article bc it bothers me ( from the child of a bipolar mother and a male teen with same sex attraction ) while also providing valid reasons ian sucks ( from someone who likes ian )

ive had this drafted for a while so i dont think i cover anything from season 11

tw for i^cest and r^pe

he was with a married man

in this point it points out that he was with kash and he continued his relationship with kash even after linda put cameras in the store

“Ian didn't seem to care about how wrong his affair with Kash was or how much it could hurt Kash's wife Linda, whom he saw at the store regularly. “

that is a quote from that part.

ian gallagher was fifteen in season one, kash was an older man who bought him gifts and payed attention to ian ,, that was not on ian , none of that was ian fault because he was a child

ian wasnt open with lip

“ Ian didn't tell Lip about his preferences and forced Lip to figure it out on his own. Lip was instantly accepting of his brother's truth and even offered to help him figure out any confusion he might be harboring, so it's really strange that Ian wasn't just upfront with his closest confidant from the start.”

no , lip wasnt forced to figure it out on his own and he also wasn’t instantly accepting.

in this point it mentions that ‘they’re extremely close ( bestfriends and brothers ) so its strange ian didnt tell him’

like point 1 , ian is a fifteen year old boy, growing up on the southside , and thoughout the show it has mentioned multiple times that the southside isnt that accepting

back to lip -- lip wasnt accepting, sure he was fine but ‘helping your younger brother figure it out’ by having a (female) classmate give him a blowjob isnt helping

he secretly dated his best friends brother

“Most friends have an unspoken rule about not dating each other's siblings, but Ian broke this rule by secretly entering into a relationship with Mandy's closeted brother Mickey.”

the only thing i have to say about this is , he was still with kash and mickey was a boy in his age group who was gay , growing up in the southside ian probably thought he was the token gay so of course hes going to chase after mickey

he stood by as kash attacked mickey

“Ian didn't do anything to stop Kash from shooting his new lover, and didn't even tell the police about his boss' over-the-top display of jealous action so proper justice could be served.”

okay. because two men he had fallen for had gotten into a fight, there was a gun involved and he panicked, in the end after mickey got shot he went to him

now to address the quote, he didnt say anything to the police because he probably knew that that would bring shame onto kash and his family, along with mickey and his family who are very homophobic

oh yeah and it was like 2011 and cops suck and THEY LIVE ON THE SOUTHSIDE

he and lip tried framing terry milkovich

oh the homophobic and racist dad of his boyfriend and bestfriend who tried to kill him and r*ped his daughter ?

yeah , shit man , that was real bad they shouldn’t have done that /s

he dated jimmy-steves married father

“Ian didn't bother telling Jimmy the truth about his father and didn't end his relationship with Lloyd upon finding out that he had a secret wife and family, either.”

at this point ian is probably sixteen but that doesnt matter bc i wont even address that

he met him at a club and then used his relationship with ned to make mickey jealous which was one of the reasons he kept seeing him, he didnt tell jimmy-steve about the relationship or his father bc he shouldnt find out from him he should find out from his father , again like kash, ned was an older man who payed attention to ian and ned later did develop feelings feelings for ian

he stole lips identity to enlist in the army

he enlisted because he didnt know what to do with himself, its implied/stated that the army timeline was the start of his bipolar

“While impersonating Lip, Ian had tried to steal a helicopter and then proceeded to go AWOL.”

this is because of the bipolar he suffers from, it is referenced later in the series after he gets back and hes manic

ian refused to accept being bipolar

of course he didnt accept it, it is made very clear that his family thinks lowly of monica so of course if hes the lucky duck to get what his siblings demonize her for, of course he’ll not want to be it

“He refused to take medications that could alter his personality or mood.”

okay. this is why im making this whole post, this goes along with part 15 ( or so idk ) ,,

my mother , my dear mother, who is bipolar and doesnt take her meds because they are mood altering , my mom doesnt take med because she told me once that they make her feel like shit, she told me that a little after i was born she started taking them but realized she felt nothing, she felt nothing for my dad or for i ( making her numb )

she told me anti deppresents dont help either because when shes on them and manic it pushes her past productive and into angry

my dad told me that when my mom was on bi polar medication she would seem angry most of the time

he wasnt faitful to mickey

“Ian's bipolar disorder made him very reckless and impulsive and led him to be unfaithful.”

lets break that down.

ians. bipolar. disorder.

this plot point i actually didnt like, mainly bc ian never addresses it so ill give the article a point. but then i take away 2 because they have more of a problem with his bipolar messing with him rather than the fact he never apologized and they never worked it out

ian stole yevgeny

before i start quoting i should mention because his boyfriend, who has supported and helped him is suddenly telling him he needs help, he was helping raise yev so he’ll see yev as his own

“Ian failed to recognize just how crazy he was acting...”

cuting you off right there , he was in a bipolar state, he wasnt ‘crazy’ and isnt ‘crazy’

he cant even keep count of his number of partners

just slutshaming i see

he helped throw frank off a bridge

“His relationship with Frank was understandably never the same after that, as Frank struggled to get over this act of betrayal and cruelty.”

‘was never the same after that’ frank never liked ian, ian was probably his least favorite and that point is very apparent

also , it wasnt just ian , his siblings and his boyfriend caleb

he left a healthy relationship to be with mickey

he fell in love with mickey at 15 , mickey was a comfort and always someone to fall back on, when mickey was taken away and no longer in the picture his heart still obviously was with mickey and when mickey came back he didnt know what to do

he told mickey he had a boyfriend but because mickey has been such a constant in his life he finally has back of course he couldnt resist

he liked trevor, i could tell he did but trevor wasnt the one he watched get r^ped by a russian prostitute, he wasnt the one ian was secretly dating bc it would be a death wish other wise, he wasnt the one there when ian was manic or depressive ( at the start )

he tried blackmailing an old client for money

“Instead of raising the money in an honest manner, Ian chose to visit an old client from his time working at the Fairy Tail and blackmail him into funding the shelter.”

because he felt indebted to trevor and wanted to make it up to him, it would have taken longer to do it in ‘an honest manner’ when his sister would have gotten it instead, he knew how much gay youths like he once was needed a safe place

“He grew up wanting to be nothing like his father, but this whole money-making scheme was straight out of the Frank playbook”

because thats all he knows, he grew up with that ‘playbook’ so of course hes going to take a page out of it, he is nothing like frank , franks money making schemes are selfish and for his own greed while ian wanted the money to help build a safe space for lgbt youth

he let fame inflate his ego

of course he did, hes a southside kid who was destined to fail

also it is very apparent that during the gay jesus era he went off his medication which didnt help

“Before long, he just completely forgot about his ex and focused solely on being a deity”

as much as yes, he did let it mess with his head, he was trying to still help lgbt youth and was going against anti gay churchs , in the end it didnt work out for him because he was off his meds and went over board

he stopped taking his meds

see previous point and ‘ian refused to accept being bipolar’

he actually wanted to stay in prison

because he was doing good in there

ian was helping others and was spreading awareness about lgbt with in the prison , and as him and jail scenes go , we can see people were listening to him and he was trying to make it safe sane and consensual

he let down his army of followers

“Ian admitted that most of his actions were completely irrational and the mere results of his bipolar disorder.”

he didnt want to, we can see this, because he knew he would let down everyone, his family were the only ones to ever ground him and they knew it would be the best option for his own mental health

during the gallavich wedding we can see that a lot of his supporters still have his back because they must know how hard it was for him to put all of that success on something he can’t control

he constantly wasted his potential

this is actually the only point in this article i actually agree with , so only 1/20 i agree with

his relationship with mickey wasn’t actually great

“Mickey spent the first several years of their relationship denying his feelings for Ian.”

he was raised by a homophobic and racist father who he knew would react the way he did when terry had caught the two that one day

“Even after he finally embraced his true self, Ian's bipolar disorder kept them from becoming truly happy together.”

yes but mickey was there for him the entire time and helped him through it, he told him he loved him which was really big for him and did his best to care for him

“They couldn't seem to remain faithful to each other for more than a few weeks.”

back to the point about ians bipolar but for mickey he wanted monogamy , now that scene in s11 may say otherwise but it is very clear that he wants a monogamous relationship with ian and ian ( after getting help ) wants one too, and in the later seasons they are monogamous

“When Mickey asked Ian to run away to Mexico with him, Ian refused.”

he wanted to, it’s obvious, but ian has his family and didnt want to abandon them again, i think part of him knew he would see mickey again because they always find eachother, he gave mickey all of his money and wanted mickey to have a good life

“Their relationship was simply never healthy.”

no it wasnt, but thats why the ship is great in its own way, the gay closet kid raised by a homophobic man is obviously going to have a lot of baggage , and ian who is bipolar and struggling with himself will also have a lot of baggage , but in the end they love eachother and that really shows in season five and season seven specifically

that is all lol ,,, this is long sorry

now, i am not a ian apologist , i love ian but hes a dumbass sometimes

actual valid reasons ian sucks

genuinely believes frank is worse than terry

yes frank was definitely abusive but terry is definitely worse ,,

mentally/physically/sexually abusive , the whole nine yards

terry hired a prostitute to r^pe his son , threatened to kill him and ian on multiple occasions , r^ped his daughter who ended up pregnant and is actively racist

frank on the other hand will make gay jokes but in the end doesnt give enough of a shit , he has attacked his children on multiple occasions but not to the brutality that terry has ( this isnt me excusing it )

sorry ian , terry is worse

never apologized

he never apologized for all the shit he put mickey and his family through, never apologized to mickey for cheating on him , never apologized for all the manic and depressive episodes mickey endured with him

never apologized for walking away when he couldn’t handle it, in hall of shame mickey actually acknowledges this saying ‘its youre whole MO’

debbies sexuality

he has constantly made statements saying debbie isnt gay and that bothers me because , why does it care ? as a gay man and as a gay man who soent time with a lot of lgbt youth wouldnt he support his sister even if shes just ‘experimenting’?

in the recent season he doesnt seem to care and doesn’t say anything but it still bothers me

mickey only getting like 80% of his heart

okay look , i get what ian means when he says this , everyones hes been with has made him who he is but fucking hell dude ,, shut up , thats your husband , thats the love of your life you shouldnt be saying shit like that , especially to him

and then this man had the audacity to say mickey probably feels the same about past flings when he knows that ian is the only one hes probably ever been with/serious about

obviously there is probably more but those are the main ones that come to mind

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before anyone brings up the trans or bi thing im going to explain my thought process for him

like ive probably mentioned multiple times he grew up southside and obviously only ever grew up with lgb and not t ,, trevor did inform him a lot and ian became supre accepting of everyone,, sexual preference isnt transphobic but i do think he approached the matter badly

now the bi thing , legit all i think is that he doesnt hate bisexual people its just that the man he really liked slept with a woman and never expressed any heterosexual attraction so it probably just suprised him and pissed him off because caleb did cheat on ian

—

if you read this far HOLY SHIT THANKS LOL ,, im not adding things that i think are pro about ian this was just me breaking down that article and giving my two cents :)

feel free to message me and talk to me or send me articles like this about any other character/relationship and i will totally break that one down too lol

thanks for letting me rant

#mine #shameless #ian gallgher #gallavich #mickey milkovich #text post

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thetravelerwrites · 6 years

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Commitments: Part 1 (Gargoyles Fanfic)

Rating: Teen Fandom: Disney’s Gargoyles Relationships: Goliath x Elisa Maza Additional Tags: Marriage, Proposal, Engagement Trigger Warnings: Light Language, Sex Mention Words: 3996

Takes place in the years 1998-2000, and pertains to the Commitment Ceremony that had been planned for future comics between Elisa and Goliath. There will also be Brooklyn/Katana and Broadway/Angela moments thrown in. Please leave feedback!

It wasn’t going to be a wedding, not exactly. Gargoyles had no need to marry; once they gave their heart to someone, they were bound to that person until death or until they decided they were no longer compatible, which frankly was an uncommon occurrence among Goliath’s people. The severance of his union with Demona was, although perfectly understandable under the circumstances, exceedingly rare.

Gargoyles trusted their feelings far more than humans did theirs. On the whole, they didn’t often succumb to insecurity about their own love for their mates or the love of their mates for them. Perhaps that was why humans needed the security of marriage, the notion that they controlled their own emotions and not the other way around, to give them a sense of certainty about their feelings. Tokens, legal documents, and ceremonies were all trappings of humanity’s desire to make something as simple as loving another person complicated and tedious, and to Gargoyles, unnecessary.

The ceremony had been Goliath’s idea, though. After the Masquerade two years ago at the Xanatos Building in which Thailog had nearly killed Goliath, Elisa had sat down with him sometime later, nearly a month, and they discussed their relationship at length over coffee, laying out what being together meant for the both of them and if they felt it was still worth pursuing. They both agreed that it was.

Elisa told him that she had come to terms with the things about their lives together that would always be out of their reach and seemed content to lay them aside, having made the personal discovery that being with Goliath was worth far more to her than a normal human life. Goliath wasn’t sure he completely believed her but decided not to push the matter. He was simply happy to have her back.

After they had talked, Goliath had flown back to the tower with his thoughts in a roil. Being with him shouldn’t rob her of everything she had wanted in a mate. Surely some middle ground was to be reached in this situation. He had taken seriously the things Elisa had said during the brief period when they had separated. There were things he knew he’d never be able to give her: the house in the suburbs with the white picket fence she had spoken of. Gargoyles didn’t believe in money, and they had little to no interest in physical property, so buying a house was out of the question. Goliath suspected, however, that this specific desire was an optional one.

It was children that would be the biggest issue for Elisa and Goliath was keenly aware of it, even if she said it didn’t matter to her anymore. It wasn’t the same for him; Gargoyles did not have daughters or sons, nor fathers and mothers. The children of the clan belonged to the whole clan. That was simply the Gargoyle way.

Though he had to admit, this was no longer true, at least for the Manhattan Clan. Brooklyn was deeply devoted to his and Katana’s hatchlings. Goliath knew Angela and Broadway had been privately discussing laying their own egg. Goliath himself had come to love his only biological daughter as any father should, and while Elisa loved Angela very much and treasured their friendship, he doubted Elisa would ever consider her a daughter. They were too close in equivalent age for that. A child was one thing Elisa would never have with Goliath, and though it was a matter they both regretted deeply, nothing could be done to change it.

It wasn’t until he was back at the tower and overheard Owen talking about plans for Xanato’s anniversary that it clicked. There was one thing he could do for her. He could, officially and in public, surrounded by friends, family, and clan, declare his love for her. Become not only her mate, but her husband, and she his wife. Human terms though they were, Goliath didn’t mind them so much if it would make her happy, and he dearly wanted her to be happy.

Goliath was unfamiliar with the specifics of the ritual and resorted to asking Elisa’s brother, Talon, for help in planning it. One aspect was talking to the parents and, in some cases, asking the father for permission. Talon laughed at this, amused at the thought of the progressive, independent Elisa furious at both Goliath and her father for discussing her like she was a commodity for which they could barter.

Goliath did think that talking to Elisa’s parents about his intentions was appropriate. He wanted them to be there for the ceremony, as they would become part of his clan. Diane accepted it immediately, though Peter had needed a bit of convincing. Diane had given Goliath a ring that had belonged to her grandmother; a silver band with five inlaid sapphires. In return, Goliath asked Diane to officiate the ceremony. Diane cried, accepted, and hugged Goliath around the middle, an embrace Goliath awkwardly returned.

Another aspect of the ritual was, as Talon had put it, to “pop the question.” And one couldn’t just come out and ask, either, it had to be done in a special way with forethought and meaning. Talon had told Goliath about New Hope in Pennsylvania, which was an hour and forty-five minutes by bus, but much faster by air, which he knew from taking Maggie there a fair few times. There was a wildflower reserve there that Elisa had visited often as a child, but she hadn’t been back since she had entered the academy. Goliath thought it sounded perfect.

He kept his intentions quiet from everyone else, waiting for the right moment to ask Elisa and get her answer before mentioning it to anyone besides her family. It had taken time, more than a year, for him to work up the nerve. One thing or another always seemed to get in the way; her work, their missions, villains, new threats, all seemed to pop up just as Goliath was attempting to pull her away and ask.

One night in July of 1999, he finally had the chance he was waiting for. Elisa had three nights off in a row, the city was relatively quiet, there were no pressing matters to attend to at the castle, and despite the summer heat, the nights were pleasantly cool. Thinking this could be his only chance to do things properly, he made his plan to take her out to the reserve swiftly, before something could stop him. Goliath had only told her they were going somewhere special and left it at that.

That night, he reached her apartment and let himself in through the open window. He found her in the kitchen packing a picnic basket with various things, looking up at him with a beaming smile as he came closer. She was draped in a lovely pale blue dress, knee-length and flared at the hip, as practical as it was pretty.

She abandoned her task long enough to jump into his embrace, her feet dangling from the floor, and plant a kiss on his lips, which he returned with a gentle smile.

“It’s good to see you, too,” He said.

She laughed. “So where are we going?” She asked, still clutching his neck and running a finger up and down the place where his back curved into his neck, feeling the strange, minuscules scales that made up his skin, so fine and small that you had to be looking very close to see them at all. Rough when caressed one way, smooth if rubbed the other.

“It’s a surprise,” Goliath said as he released her. Her hands slid down his chest as she was set back on her feet and moved away to finish packing. “But we must go soon. It is quite far.”

She smiled and nodded, picking up the basket and a blanket that had been thrown over a nearby chair, and allowing herself to be lifted up and cradled in Goliath’s arms. Then they were off.

The trip took the better part of forty minutes, and they whiled away the time by talking about one thing or another. It was so much better now that it was all out in the open and they didn’t have to dance around each other as they had done in the first two years of their acquaintance when they couldn’t admit their feelings. Now things between them were easier, effortless, like talking with your best friend. Because Goliath was her best friend; the best she had ever had.

Elisa had been talking about plans for her sister’s graduation next year when she looked down and stopped mid-sentence.

“Wait!” She said, shifting a little to get a better look. “I know where we are! The wildflower reserve! Goliath, how did you find out about this place?”

“Your brother mentioned it to me,” Goliath said smugly. “He said this place was special to you.”

“Aw,” Elisa tutted. “I should visit him and Maggie soon.”

“I have no doubt you two will have much to discuss,” He said.

“What do you mean?” She asked.

“Nothing. There’s a deck there where we can land. Hold on.” He dove downward quickly, flattening his wings against his back as the ground rose swiftly to meet them. He unfurled his wings with enough time to slow them without scrambling their insides before landing gently on the wooden patio sitting in the middle of the field, surrounded by the colorful, fragrant plants as far as the eye could see. Talon had been right. This was the perfect place.

Elisa handed him the quilt, which he shook out and laid down over the wood. Elisa knelt and went about setting the things she had packed out onto the fabric. Goliath sat down cross-legged and assisted.

The basket had contained sandwiches, cheeses, and fruit, as well as water, wine, and if Elisa was feeling particularly festive, a bottle of whiskey.

“You didn’t have to go to all this trouble, Elisa,” Goliath said, looking over the spread she had packed.

“It wasn’t any trouble. I just threw some stuff in a basket. You’re the one who lugged us here in forty minutes with no break.” She handed him a glass of wine and a small plate with food, which he accepted with a smile. “I’m glad you suggested we do this. I love New York, but it’s nice to get away from the city for a while and spend some time with you alone.”

“I agree,” He replied. “This has been long overdue.”

She poured herself a glass of wine and settled next to him, leaning into him and sighing contently. He enjoyed the weight and warmth of her body against his. They ate and drank in relative silence, but not an uncomfortable one. They were not the type of couple that felt the need to fill the void with inane chatter. Simply being alone with each other with no sense urgency or distress was reward enough.

After a while, when they had eaten their fill and drank enough wine to make them feel very at ease, Goliath sat up straight and reached behind him.

“I have something for you,” He said, pulling out a thin, long blue box in roughly she shape of a book, complete with a bow. “A gift.”

She narrowed her eyes. “Where were you hiding that?”

He smiled a wide, toothy smile that was most unlike him, and presented the box to her. She took it with a furtive glance at him.

“You’ve never given me a gift before,” She said, intrigued.

“No,” Goliath admitted. “Gift-giving is not a typical Gargoyle practice. Tonight is special, however.”

“Special, how?”

“You shall see.”

Quirking an eyebrow at him, she untied the bow and lifted the lid. It was, in fact, a book: a photo album. The covers, back and front, were plain and bound in a midnight blue canvas. She opened the cover and gasped. The very first picture was of every person she loved standing together; her parents, Derek and Maggie, all of the Manhattan Clan, including Brooklyn and Katana’s hatchlings, tall Nashville and tiny Matsuko, and the newest edition, Broadway and Angela’s egg, which they proudly held between them. Lexington had little Alexander on his shoulders, now three years old but looking much older. Even Beth was there, smiling and standing with her arm around Derek’s waist. Goliath was also there, standing head and shoulders above the rest, square in the middle with his hand on Angela’s shoulder, a crooked smile on his normally grim features.

“Oh, my God,” Elisa breathed, flipping through the pages only to find more photos of her family and the clan interacting. There was a picture of Alexander playing with Matsuko, with Bronx laying belly up next to them. There was one of Derek, Maggie, Beth, Diane, Peter, and Matt Bluestone all playing cards together. There were tastefully shot photographs of the Gargoyles as stone in the sunlight, both in greyscale and in full color. There was even a sneakily obtained shot of Elisa sitting with all of them last year when she had managed to get them together for Christmas dinner, taken without her knowledge. She marveled at each page, a wondering smile lighting her face.

“How?” She asked. “How did you do this?”

“Your sister, Beth, helped me put it together. I wanted to do something special for you. She gave us all disposable cameras and asked us to take pictures, and she developed the film herself.” He was delighted by the pure joy in her expression. “You like it?”

“Goliath, I love this. I love it so much. It’s beautiful.” She kept turning the pages, stopping at each one to admire and smile at the candid shots of her family, of Angela sitting quietly and cradling her egg with Broadway hovering protectively nearby, of Katana and Beth laughing over tea with Matsuko in Beth’s lap, laughing along with them. Of her father and Hudson reclining in easy-chairs, talking somberly over a glass of bourbon. It was the most beautiful thing she had ever been given.

“Thank you, Goliath,” She said, holding the book to her chest. “I love it so much.”

“Keep going,” He said with a smile. “I saved the best for last.”

She grinned at him and kept turning pages until she reached the back cover, where rested a small, plain, white envelope.

“What’s this?” She asked, holding it up.

“Open it,” He replied. His smile was gone and he seemed to tense suddenly, though she was unsure why. Puzzled, she slit open the top of the envelope with her fingernail and peered inside.

“What is that?” She asked quietly, as if to herself. She tipped the envelope over and the silver ring tumbled into her hand. At first, she didn’t react, trying to comprehend what she was seeing. She looked up at him, a stunned expression on her face. He was looking at her very seriously, all trace of playfulness gone.

“Goliath,” Elisa said slowly, turning the band slowly in her fingers, examining it as if it were a riddle to be solved. “This is a ring.”

Yes,” Goliath answered simply, watching her face with rising apprehension.

She looked up at him, her chest tight. “For humans, when a man gives a woman a ring, it means something.”

“Yes, I am aware of this,” Goliath replied, his eyes still locked on hers. “I’ve spoken to your family. Your mother gave me this ring. To give to you.”

Elisa was finding it hard to breathe. Surely he didn’t mean… he wasn’t… “Are… are you…. Goliath, what does this mean?”

Goliath reached out his hand, and Elisa laid the ring into his open palm.

“Elisa,” he began. “When a Gargoyle chooses a mate, they pledge themselves to each other, much the same as humans do. But for our kind, it is a private matter that takes place between the two souls in love, away from prying eyes. After the pledge is made, it is acknowledged within the clan that the lovers are no longer two separate souls, but one soul that resides in two bodies, living for and within each other.

“Ceremonies and celebrations are not the Gargoyle way,” He continued. “We find gladness in the union of our friends and rejoice in their happiness, but there are no festivities to mark the occasion. That is a human custom.” Goliath looked long at the ring sitting cold and smooth in his hand. “But if I am to take a human woman as my mate, as I intend to do, I must come to accept her people’s customs and adapt to them. For her people will become my people, as mine have already become hers.”

Elisa sat staring wide-eyed at Goliath, her mouth open in shock.

“Therefore,” Goliath continued, taking a breath and reaching for Elisa’s left hand, which she offered. “I, Goliath, willingly offer to pledge my life and love to you, and ask you, Elisa Maza, if you would willingly pledge your life and love to me. Do you accept this offer?”

She seemed too stunned for speech. Her breathing was shallow and uneven. A tear spilled over her eye and down her cheek.

“Elisa?” Goliath asked in concern, brushing the tear away. “Are you alright?”

She nodded, another tear falling. She held his hand to her face and managed to find her voice, though it came out rather strangled. “I accept.”

A smile started to spread across his face. “Yes?”

“Yes,” She said, wiping her cheeks and laughing. “I accept. Nothing else on earth would make me happier.”

She took the ring from his palm and put it on her left ring finger, then pushed herself up to her knees to wrap her arms around his neck and kiss him. His arms encircled her waist and squeezed gently.

The kiss deepened became more urgent. Elisa fell back, pulling him with her so that he lay next to her on the blanket. Their arms wrapped tightly around each other as they explored each other’s kiss. She boldly flicked her tongue into his mouth and over his teeth, sharp enough to bite through steel, with no fear or apprehension. He responded in kind.

He gently caressed her face with one hand and the fingers of his other hand traced the skin up and down her spine. She had always marveled at the level of control it took for a person who could literally tear a car apart with his bare hands to touch her so tenderly. His claws were made for penetrating stone and metal, to climb and carry the immense weight of his body, yet in all the times he had touched her, he had never once left a mark.

Taking his hand from her face, she moved it downward to touch her breast. Goliath stiffened and pulled away.

“Elisa,” He started with a sigh. “We have discussed this.”

“Goliath,” She replied in a slightly exasperated voice. She sat up. “Every time I try to initiate intimacy with you, you push me away. Ever since that night we decided to stay together, you’ve brushed me off. I always figured it’s because you’re just old-fashioned, but I really think we are past the point of propriety here, don’t you?”

“It is not about that,” He said, pushing himself up into a sitting position as well. “When you first attempted to engage with me, we had just repaired our relationship. It was new and fragile, and I felt it was far too soon to be intimate with you.”

“I can understand that, Goliath, but we’ve been together for over two years now. Our relationship is more solid than it’s ever been. Besides, we are both adults, and we’ve done this before. Not with each other, obviously, but we have both had sexual partners in the past. Neither of us are exactly virgins.”

“That is not the point,” Goliath said. “Humans treat this subject with far too much indifference. There is no such thing as a casual encounter among Gargoyles.”

“Do you really think that’s what I’m trying to do?” Elisa said, mildly annoyed. “We literally just got… I don’t know… engaged? Betrothed? This isn’t exactly ‘casual’ for me.”

She folded her arms, looking away into the distance and growing quiet, as though she had suddenly realized something deeply unpleasant.

“What is it?” He asked, watching her expression shift.

“Nothing, it’s not worth mentioning,” She said dismissively, though she wouldn’t look at him.

“Tell me.”

She sighed, tilting her head in a begrudging way and refused to meet his eye, looking out over the field of flowers.

“Well,” She started slowly. “I had thought… I mean, I know Gargoyles don’t exactly find humans physically attractive. I thought, maybe… you didn’t think of me… in that…” She trailed off, visibly embarrassed.

It took a moment for Goliath to comprehend what she was saying. “Oh! No, Elisa, it isn’t like that at all. I have wanted to…” He struggled for wording that wouldn’t be vulgar. “To be with you in that way many times while we have been together.”

“Then why haven’t you?” She asked, looking at him. She was definitely upset.

“You must understand, to my kind, the act of making love is a promise in and of itself. To do so before now would not have been… appropriate.”

“So why not now?” Elisa asked him, her arms still folded. The ring he had given her noticeably glinting against the dark skin of her hand, drawing his eye.

He took her hand and held it in his, bending down to kiss her fingers. “Elisa, I love you,” He said gently. “To me, this is as miraculous a thing as seeing the sunrise with my own two eyes. After what Demona had done, after all the betrayals my clan had suffered by not only humans, but from my own kind, I had sworn that I would never trust or love again. You were the one to change that. The fact that you are human makes no difference; I desire to…” If a Gargoyle could blush, Elisa believed he might be. “To touch your body and lie with you and show you the depths of my longing.

“I wish to give you all that you desire and more, but I wish to do so the proper way. Though our methods may be different, both humans and Gargoyles set aside a time in which they make their pledge, after which they consummate the union. For my people, it is a private matter, but humans have a ceremony in which all the people they love gather to be a part of the celebration. As I understand it, the consummation takes place after the festivities have ended. ‘The wedding night,’ I believe it’s called. I want for you as normal a life as I am capable of providing. It is important to me that we observe the human ritual of marriage as well as we can, including the consummation ritual.”

Elisa had to laugh at that. “Honestly, Goliath, I hadn’t pegged you for the ‘saving myself for marriage’ type. But that part of the marriage is usually for people who are religious, and you and I both know neither of us are what you might call devout. In this day and age, it’s at most an optional aspect of the wedding.”

“Even so,” Goliath said, smiling. “I believe it is the right thing to do.”

Elisa sighed. She stood briefly and then settled in his lap, her arms around his neck. “You’re really going make me wait, aren’t you?”

Goliath returned her embrace. “I’m afraid so. But I promise you, it will be worth the wait.”

“It had better be,” She said dangerously, tracing his lips with her finger. He caught her hand and then kissed her again. She grumbled around the kiss but relented. He definitely wasn’t making it easy on her.

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luxexhomines · 5 years

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Hello! I was reading through your blog and wanted to ask if you could write for Tsumugi with a female S/O who is the Ultimate Witch? In or out of the V3 universe is fine. Thank you!

Hullo, anon! Thanks for the request!! Although Tsumugi isn’t my favorite character, I so enjoyed writing this. I put it out of the V3 universe, so there are no spoilers for anyone wondering. Wasn’t sure if you wanted the reader be doing “real magic” or magic tricks, so it’s a little vague, haha.Icon credit to 64pxs! Also wow my third request finished in one day although it’s past 1AM & technically a new day here now!

Guess I’d classify this as fluff, too. It’s not that long, so it’s not under the cut. Here you go!

Tsumugi x Female! Ultimate Witch! S/O

You knocked on her door and grasped the doorknob, fully intending to open it and peek in the gap, but your plans were abruptly foiled by her voice.

“Don’t even try,” she cackled. “The door’s locked and I’ve got a chair keeping it closed, you know?”

When you tried to turn it, it was true. It wouldn’t budge an inch.

“Oh, come on, Tsumugi!” You whine right outside the door, making sure she could hear you loud and clear. “I haven’t seen you leave that room for a third day now! I know that you’ve got snacks and a bathroom connected to your room, but that can’t be healthy,” you beg. “Please come out…”

Either she’s ignoring you, or she’s ignoring you. Two perfectly possible options. You could even hear her plaintively humming a random tune, a tune that seemed reminiscent of a folksong–but what did that matter now, when part of her reasons for doing so was to drown out the sound of you?

“Can I at least come in, Tsumugi?” You knock on the door again, but you’re soundly rejected.

“No! You’re not allowed in here for the rest of the week, even if I do come out of the room,” she says firmly.

She was getting strangely obsessive about hiding the contents of her room from you, and you were extremely worried. The only times she ever pulled stunts like this was when she hadn’t finished preparing a cosplay for a con coming up soon, but the problem was that there were no cons coming up soon. As you understood it, she had taken a leave from work to do whatever it was she was doing in that room, and you had no clue what was so important that she’d take a week off of work to do it. She thrived off of that income to make living wage and make cosplays in addition to all her the money from her sponsors.

You could only sigh at the plain white door and walk back to your own room, resigned to your lonely fate for the rest of the week. It was anyone’s guess what she was doing or why she was hiding it from you, including your own, despite being her girlfriend.

You supposed you’d go practice your magic for the upcoming magic show you were holding while Tsumugi did…whatever it was she was doing. There was no time to waste at her doorway, calling her name to a silent answer or pounding on the door in exasperation.

You took a deep breath and gathered your focus for the first act, a rather simple attention-getter with birds flying from your sleeves like colorful ribbons spewing from them. Somehow, it was always the easiest magic that was easiest to mess up, so you ended up practicing the act for at least an hour, worried about the possibility of success in a live performance.

Falling back on the bed, you pant slightly in exertion. Who said magic was as easy as waving a wand? That’s only what magicians wanted other people to believe, after all. If the magician was dropping dead from exhaustion, no one would enjoy the show–no, it was much better for them to believe that the magician possessed unlimited amounts of mana and could continue performing magic for an entire day but just ended it at around an hour for the audience’s scheduling convenience.

But even magicians weren’t immortal. You decided to take a break and walked to the kitchen, grabbing a drink of water to hydrate yourself before returning to practice, throwing a bitter, yearning look toward Tsumugi’s closed door.

It was going to be a long week, just you and your magic.

On the day of the magic show, you hoped Tsumugi would emerge from her cave, maybe make an appearance. But it was fifteen minutes before the show, and she still hadn’t come.

You let out a sigh of disappointment and return to your dressing room as you pick at your ratty, ripped seams of what used to be a smart looking, black long-sleeved tailcoat and matching pencil skirt. You’d had it since your very first show, and you liked it very much, but it was ready to retire and had been for a while now.

In fact, you were surprised Tsumugi hadn’t commented on it–she usually would make note of any clothes you owned that were no longer serving a functional and aesthetic purpose and bring you out to buy new ones. Speaking of Tsumugi, your dressing room just burst open with a long, blue-haired girl in spectacles and carrying what looks like a newly pressed outfit in black.

“Tsumugi! You’re here,” you gasp. “I thought you weren’t coming.”

She rushes over to you, out of breath and frenetic.

“Oh, good, you’re in your dressing room! Take this,” she thrust the plastic protected outfit at you along with a box of what you assumed to be shoes. “Sorry I’m late, it took me so long to finish this. Go change, your show is starting in ten minutes!”

You look at her in confusion, but do as she asks. You’re used to her frantic nature, even if she was rather laidback most of the time. When you finish dressing, she claps her hands together in delight, and swooning.

“Oh, I knew you’d look great in this! I’ve had this idea for forever, I’m so happy I finally get to see you wear it. I can die happy now,” she declares passionately, almost drooling with excitement, her blue eyes glimmering brightly.

You examine the outfit, which includes a pair of white gloves, black heels, a black top hat, and a similar black tailcoat, black dress shirt and pencil skirt, along with a tie of your favorite color wrapped snugly around your neck that curves over your bust gently.

“Tsumugi, you made this for me?”

She nods proudly.

“I think I did a bang-up job of it, too! It’s absolutely perfect for you,” she beams at you, as lovely and warm as the golden sun, and you can only grin like a fool in response.

“You sure did. You sure did,” you repeat, amazed by her accurate, neat needlework and toiling dedication she had offered you in making the outfit.

“Now, go out there and amaze the crowds,” she encourages you, giving you a light push on the back and going out to join the audience below.

The magic show goes splendidly–you don’t know if you’ve ever done a better job, and all kinds of flowers, roses, daffodils, daisies, skyrocket toward your lone figure standing at the center of the black stage, hoping to be caught by you. You wave at the audience happily and skip on and off the stage to the standing ovation before exiting for good.

Luckily for you, Tsumugi is waiting at your dressing room, so there’s no need for you to push through the masses to find her, and you immediately envelop her in a hug, tackling her, and her breath leaves her with the impact you’ve come at her with. She wraps her arms around your back, and you can feel her pride for you simply seeping out like radioactive waves.

You don’t let go of her for a long, long time, and when you finally let go of her, you smile at her in a daze. You can’t believe your girlfriend is this gorgeous, kind, devoted, thoughtful girl standing in front of her.

“I think I’m in love with you, Tsumugi,” you say, staring straight into her eyes, endless pools of blue.

She smiles back, pushing her spectacles up slightly.

“A good thing, too, because I think I’m in love with you, too. That is, if you couldn’t tell after I spent over a week cooped up in my room to make this ensemble for you,” she replies, gesturing at your outfit.

You pat her on the head.

“Yes, yes, I know, good girl. But I was so lonely,” you pout. “Did you have to leave me alone like that for such a long time? I could have died of loneliness!”

She simply laughs full-heartedly.

“I suppose we’d be in trouble if you were a rabbit, huh? But there’ll be no more loneliness on my watch. That sounds rather presumptuous of me to say, but you can trust me on that,” she smiles charmingly as she puts a hand on her hip.

You laugh back at her, sharing in her joy and playfulness.

“You’d better live longer than I do, in that case,” you tease.

Tsumugi bends toward you and places a small kiss on the tip of your nose.

“Your wish is my command, royal magician of the court,” she chuckles.

You smirk and slip a hand around the small of her back, pulling her in closer so that both of your bodies are pressed against each other, and kiss her on the lips deeply.

“Then, my first command is that thou shalt stay at my side for the rest of our mortal lifespans.”

You can feel the corners of her lips stretch out and upward at this, and you take that to be her response as you draw her in for many more sweet kisses.

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writingguide003-blog · 5 years

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How should young women react as #MeToo moves into dating? Female writers discuss | Anne Perkins, Iman Amrani, Marie Le Conte, Rachel Shabi and Ash Sarkar

New Post has been published on https://writingguideto.com/must-see/how-should-young-women-react-as-metoo-moves-into-dating-female-writers-discuss-anne-perkins-iman-amrani-marie-le-conte-rachel-shabi-and-ash-sarkar/

How should young women react as #MeToo moves into dating? Female writers discuss | Anne Perkins, Iman Amrani, Marie Le Conte, Rachel Shabi and Ash Sarkar

Five female commentators share their views on how Aziz Ansari and Cat Person are taking the #MeToo debate into todays dating scene, showing gender disparity and raising consent issues

Women

The panel

How should young women react as #MeToo moves into dating? Female writers discuss

Aziz Ansari and Cat Person are taking the #MeToo debate into todays dating scene, showing gender disparity and raising consent issues

Anne Perkins, Iman Amrani, Marie Le Conte, Rachel Shabi and Ash Sarkar

Wed 17 Jan 2018 07.48EST Last modified on Wed 17 Jan 2018 17.54EST

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I recognise that by blaming Graces response, I am also saying that on one level Ansaris behaviour is OK. Photograph: Cassie Wright/WireImage

Anne Perkins: Being young is the time when you should be utopian in your views

Part of me wants to give Grace a really good shake. What did she expect, dating Aziz Ansari, a man 10 years older than herself and famous enough to have an overdeveloped sense of entitlement, whatever his public reputation as a thoughtful and considerate person fully signed up to #MeToo. The message of his haste to leave the restaurant, the food barely finished, the wine untasted, and race her back to his apartment is so blatant it might have been written up in one of those neon bubbles.

Her failure to tell him where to go once things went pear-shaped when she was there is even more worrying. Sure, she indicated that it was not what she wanted. A genuinely thoughtful man of course would have responded appropriately. He didnt. She should have left. That is level one in elementary social skills.

But I recognise that by blaming Graces response, I am also saying that on one level Ansaris behaviour is OK. Thats what men do. Its down to women to handle it. Get used to it.

And the point of telling stories like this is to say to other women, and men, its not you, its him. To say, check your ideas about consent. Consent is not the absence of rejection. It is not a tense silence. It is not passive. It should not be capable of being misread.

Utopian, perhaps. But whats the point of being 23 if you dont refuse to get used to stuff thats wrong?

Anne Perkins is a Guardian columnist

Iman Amrani: Bad experiences should not be lumped with serious assaults

There are three main things in my experience that can expose young women to exploitative or uncomfortable situations. First, money. Whether its keeping a job or a roof over your head, the need for it can push some women into circumstances that they wouldnt freely choose. Second, ambition. Drive can lead to women feeling forced to put up with things that they know are unacceptable, in order to achieve a greater objective.

Both of these factors expose women to abuses of power as we have seen in many of the cases of workplace harassment, from Hollywood to Westminster to all the women contributing to the #MeToo movement. Its this power struggle that adds weight to the stories about hands being placed on womens knees or unwanted advances, and its important this movement continues.

The third trap is the desire to be liked. There is a societal pressure on women to be attractive, friendly, and grateful, felt most acutely in young women. Aziz Ansaris accuser, Grace, and the narrator of Cat Person fall into this one. The latter might be fictional, but both accounts resonated widely with many young women. Both feature women in their early 20s, who found themselves in circumstances they didnt want, but felt unable to fully vocalise that they had reached their comfort limits.

Part of dating and sex as a young person is finding our boundaries, learning to protect them and develop the confidence to tell people who overstep, in no uncertain terms, where they can go. Not many people are born with this confidence, and it isnt something you can learn in a two-hour workshop on consent, but through making mistakes. Some of the situations that contribute to our experience may be unpleasant or regretful, but that doesnt necessarily mean that they should be grouped with assault, harassment or rape.

There has to be room for both men and women to make mistakes, to create a space where real dialogue can happen and where people can learn what is and isnt OK. Lumping all these grey-area stories in the wider #MeToo debate about rape, assault and the abuse of power only serves to drown out the voices of women whose stories should be focusing on this week, such as Simone Biles, and the countless other women who are bravely speaking out.

Iman Amrani is a Guardian multimedia journalist

Marie Le Conte: Men can no longer be seen as guided by their sweaty crotches

I had a conversation with an older feminist recently and she asked why women of my generation seem to hate men. We never stop criticising them, find endless examples of objectionable behaviour, and will gleefully turn on any man deemed not good enough by our precious standards.

She wasnt entirely wrong our expectations are undeniably higher than they used to be but my response was that it was, at least from my viewpoint, the exact opposite.

We expect more from men because we want to have more faith in them.

I refuse to see them as foolish animals, clumsy and to be pitied because life isnt easy when one simply cannot understand the complex and confusing women around them, choosing instead to be guided by their sweaty crotches.

This is why some of the responses to the claims about Aziz Ansari felt puzzling sure, we could have an argument about why the woman didnt leave, but why not talk about why he felt the need to keep trying it on?

Why can so many men feel so comfortable trying to sleep with women who dont want to sleep with them? Why do so many men think they can plunge their tongue down a womans throat before making sure its wanted?

Incidents which to some feel too small to be scandalous actually reveal the way men see women, and if they have no trouble crossing womens boundaries once or twice, where will they stop?

Weve been raised to see men as the superior intellectual gender, so spare me the idea that they just dont know what theyre doing.

If women can go through life without lunging at men, groping them, and treating their bodies as property, then surely we can expect men to do the same in return.

Marie Le Conte is a French freelance journalist living in London

Rachel Shabi: Older women wondering why millennials dont walk away have forgotten dark times

These stories have forced light into another area where it is sorely lacking: the stark lack of parity over sexual agency, expectation and desire. Its there in harsh, excruciating detail: the distorting and damaging ways in which heterosexual men and women are socialised about sex.

This isnt about a generational divide, despite some of the responses to such stories. Doubtless this terrain is thornier for younger women who, on top of the usual biases, are also navigating complications imposed by a certain kind of porn culture, and the image- and confidence-twisting burdens of social media.

But maybe the older women wondering why millennials dont just walk away from horrible sexual encounters have forgotten the times when they also stayed, rather than dealing with the awkwardness, risk his angry response, or navigating the paralysing weight of confusing expectation. Because women are socialised to be polite and accommodating, and are under constant pressure to be passive pleasers in every way, to the extent that our own desires and ambitions are routinely subjugated.

Such is the pervasive social messaging around gender and sexuality, such are the ever-present biases, that a woman asserting her own will or expressing a preference risks being labelled as unpleasant, unattractive or aggressive as it is in the boardroom, so it is in the bedroom. And thats before we even get to the men in the equation, with all their socially conditioned expectations, damaging biases and toxic assumptions.

Its messy and awkward and all tangled up, but if this #Metoo discussion is bringing us on to the question of what genuine equality in sex and relationships might look like, then good. In that spirit as with all parts of this debate we could do with less judgment and a lot more listening.

Rachel Shabi is a freelance writer and commentator

Ash Sarkar: A divergence in perception between men and women must be addressed

Theres a truth to the Aziz Ansari story which extends beyond whether or not he behaved in the manner alleged; that all too many of us have had sexual encounters in which one persons comfort is subordinated to the urgency of anothers desire.

Traditional feminist discourse from Susan Brownmillers Against Our Will to more recent discussions prompted by the Harvey Weinstein revelations has focused on a figure of the rapist as monstrous and malevolent. However, nearly one in three women have experienced sexual violence at the hands of an intimate partner the archetypical perpetrator looks less like a grotesque outsider, and more like a familiar neighbour. We hold him in affection and esteem. We trust him. We might even desire him.

Whatever we wear, wherever we go yes means yes, and no means no! The old Reclaim the Night slogan misled a generation of feminists into understanding consent as binary, and violation as self-evident. Were supposed to announce our consent (or lack thereof) like were entering a plea at trial.

But yes, in a context of mutual respect, might be a joyful wordlessness; no might come in the guise of not now, maybe later, or even well, OK then. In a society where sex is often seen as something to be extracted from partners like a mineral or an ore, a soft no is just so much social sediment to be worn away.

A rigidly legalistic model for understanding consent doesnt encourage men to shift the parameters of how they understand sex. The Ansari allegations show us that the task isnt to get men to see themselves as rapists, but to see their partners pace of desire as being of equal primacy to their own. There is no god-given right to orgasm: even a one-night stand requires patience, empathy and a capacity to interpret more complex cues than what is accepted in a court of law.

For what its worth, I believe Grace in her account of events. I also believe Ansari when he says: It was true that everything did seem OK to me, so when I heard that it was not the case for her, I was surprised and concerned. Its precisely this divergence of perception which men need to address. That starts with viewing consent as the beginning of a social process not a verdict at the end of a long process of litigation.

Ash Sarkar is a senior editor at Novara Media, and lectures in political theory at Anglia Ruskin and the Sandberg Instituut

Read more: http://www.theguardian.com/us

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kennethherrerablog · 5 years

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Second Baby Checklist: What to Reuse and What to Buy

While becoming a parent is one of the best things that ever happened to me, it was something that I never knew I wanted. I wasn’t one of those kids who dreamed of being a mommy. In fact, I didn’t particularly like children.

But that changed when I was faced with a positive pregnancy test. My daughter Rose was born in April 2015, and while I found it hard to adjust to life as a parent, I knew that my life was more complete with her in it.

Then, in 2017, my husband Ben and I decided to try for a second baby. This time we knew what to expect. We’d saved all Rose’s baby things, so we knew we wouldn’t need to stock up on as many essential items. However, I found out that didn’t mean we wouldn’t need to spend any money on baby items.

Both before and after our son Liam was born in August 2018, we stocked up on some essentials we knew from experience we would need — and a few we hadn’t anticipated. Here’s our second baby checklist, and what some of my second-time (and third-time and fourth-time) mom friends, needed.

Yes, the Double Stroller Is Worth It

As a working mom, I didn’t get to use my BOB jogging stroller as often as I would have liked with Rose. But when I did use it, I loved taking her out for walks and runs, and she enjoyed being outside.

I went back and forth on buying a double jogging stroller when I was pregnant with Liam. I wasn’t sure how much I would use it now that Rose is too independent to ride in the stroller very often.

But some of my mom friends with kids closer in age said that they couldn’t live without their double strollers. My friend Naomi Sohaba got great use out of hers. “A decent double [stroller made] it easier to get out and about, because that’s easier than staying at home with two littles,” she told me.

Rather than splurging on a new double BOB, Ben and I bought a secondhand double stroller from some friends. It can also be used as a bike trailer, so we’ll get extra use out of it that we wouldn’t have gotten with the BOB. While Rose is reluctant to ride in a single stroller, she’s happy to hang out in the double to go for bike rides.

You May Need Different Bottles

I kept the bottles from when Rose was a baby, but as any parent will tell you, there was no guarantee Liam would like the same types of bottles. Regardless, I stocked up on new nipples for the bottles I had so I would be prepared.

Second-time mom Sara Frank found out how picky babies can be when it comes to bottles. “Owen wouldn’t use the same bottles as Amelia, so we had to buy new ones,” she told me.

Sadly, Liam wasn’t a fan of Rose’s bottles. We bought a different brand and he gave them the thumbs-up (though not literally).

Invest in a Better Diaper Bag

The main thing I looked for in a diaper bag for Rose was style. I wanted something Ben would be happy carrying around, so I went with a cross-body bag called a Diaper Dude. I soon discovered that the cross-body style was impractical and uncomfortable, so we opted for a backpack instead.

But when Liam was born and I dragged our old diaper bag out of the basement, I discovered that mice had been munching on some leftover snacks in the bag and left behind their calling cards (i.e., their poop). I threw the bag out and bought a new one, sticking to the backpack style.

As a mom of three, Kathryn Dowell splurged on a diaper bag the second time around. “I think mostly I upgraded to what I actually wanted [with my second baby],” she said. “[With] the first, I was guessing and going off other people’s experience. After that, I knew my parenting style and was willing to buy nicer versions of what I knew I needed, [like a better] diaper bag.”

Most of the moms I asked agreed. They either needed bigger diaper bags for two children close in age, or better versions of the ones they used the first time around.

Baby Carrier

A baby carrier is one of the biggest essentials for any parent, in my opinion. A good carrier allows you to hold a needy baby while leaving your hands free to grocery shop, make dinner or do chores. With a second baby, I’ve found that a carrier becomes even more essential, as it allows you to play with your other child while holding the baby.

With baby number one, most parents don’t know the wide range of baby carriers out there and will settle for what’s available at their local box store.

With Rose, I registered for a Moby Wrap and called it a day. But as I got more involved with babywearing, I realized how many options were available and upgraded to a soft-structured carrier. I used the carrier until Rose was about two and a half and refused to be carried anymore.

With Liam, I sold my pink LILLE baby carrier and opted for a black and white one instead. I also purchased a quality ring sling to keep in the car for grocery shopping and other quick trips.

Don’t Rely on Hand-Me-Downs

If you have two children of the same gender, you might be able to get away with reusing the same clothing — unless they were born in different seasons.

My friend Halie Best’s two girls are 20 months apart, so she had to buy winter and spring clothes for her second baby rather than reusing her first daughter’s summer clothes. She also purchased another set of swaddle blankets for her second daughter.

Although I had saved all Rose’s baby clothes, there weren’t many I could use for Liam. I bought some clothes for him and received others as gifts or hand-me-downs, for which I was extremely grateful.

“Fortunately, people gave us boy clothes,” said Frank, who has a three-year-old daughter and a one-year-old son. If you have friends who have babies, ask if they have any clothes they would be willing to give (or even lend) you to save money.

Look Into Subscriptions and Memberships

Rather than having to go to the store every few days for baby items, Amanda Margraf signed up for an Amazon Prime Pantry subscription, which offers $6 off orders containing five qualifying items. Amazon currently offers existing Prime members a 30-day free trial of Prime Pantry, and it’s $4.99 per month after that to subscribe.

Margraf’s essential items included sanitizing wipes, Diaper Genie refills, baby wipes and diaper cream. Now that her babies are older, she still uses the subscription for household items like toilet paper.

You can also sign up for subscriptions for diapers and wipes through The Honest Company and other similar websites. In addition to saving you money, a subscription service means you don’t have to remember to buy these items from the store, as they are delivered directly to your door.

Ben and I bought a Costco membership when Rose was a baby, which paid for itself in formula purchases alone. We still have our membership, and luckily, Liam tolerates the Kirkland brand of formula, so we are able to save in the same way we did when Rose was little. If you use disposable diapers, those savings only increase, as you can buy in bulk to save money.

Whether you’re expecting your second, third, fourth or fifth baby, there are always items to add to the baby checklist, even if you kept everything from your other kids. But stick to the essentials and your new addition doesn’t have to mean breaking the bank.

Catherine Hiles is a proud mother of two adorable kids. She freelances in her spare time, in addition to reading, running and cooking food containing hidden vegetables.

This was originally published on The Penny Hoarder, which helps millions of readers worldwide earn and save money by sharing unique job opportunities, personal stories, freebies and more. The Inc. 5000 ranked The Penny Hoarder as the fastest-growing private media company in the U.S. in 2017.

The Penny Hoarder Promise: We provide accurate, reliable information. Here’s why you can trust us and how we make money.

Second Baby Checklist: What to Reuse and What to Buy published first on https://justinbetreviews.tumblr.com/

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meanwhileinoz · 7 years

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People On Reddit Share The Dark Secrets That Could Destroy Their Marriages

We’ve all got secrets.

Things we are afraid to tell anybody. People will judge you, especially if your secret is messed up.

That is why we have the Internet. To post our secrets anonymously, facing no criticism and getting it off our chests as well. A Reddit thread revealed people sharing their darkest secrets, which could potentially ruin their lives. Read them below:

“Years ago my gf (we’ll call deb) and I were out with her friend (we’ll call Sara). This one day Sara had to pin unlock her phone each time to take one of many pictures….out the corner of my eye I saw her pin. I saved it in a note. Months later sara and deb were at my place and went to the pool. Sara left her phone indoors. I used her password and hit jackpot. Nudes, videos, message logs with some guy she was talking (well call jeff) to, along with tons of dick picks and videos of him jacking off…

With this goldmine of pics and vids I concocted a slow plan…..very slow. Slowly I broke off with deb but kept in touch with sara. I then created a alter ego online (we’ll call it Vanessa). For months I worked this identity so it looked real. This identity started following Sara on all social media (Sara accepted any friend requests). Vanessa blackmailed jeff. Jeff was given 2 days to stop talking to sara or his dick picks got leaked. He was chicken sh*t and dropped her like a hot potato. But Sara was strong willed…when Vanessa threatened sara to stop talking to jeff or her pics get leaked she protested…so I knew I had to change tactics. Vanessa disappeared for a while until I could get Sara’s phone in my hands for a bit. One day sara was over and ‘lost’ her phone at my place. I ‘found’ it for her the next day…. Not before I installed a spy app that let me keep track of her everything. A few weeks later Vanessa came back but now armed with the conversations sara was having with everyone. While tracking Sara’s reactions and suspicions, I made it show that Vanessa wasnt real….

Now all my friends know me as being pretty tech literate. One day im talking with Sara and she breaks down crying telling me how she been long distance sexting this guy and somebody hacked his or her phone and now shes being blackmailed by some stranger she doesn’t know. So she askes me if I could help her. Long ending short I made it look like jeff was Vanessa. I made it look like he created this person so that he could blackmail Sara into f*cked up sex stuff. Sara left him and guess who was the hero? Me. I caught ‘Vanessa.’ Sara was now safe because of me. Once we blackmailed the guy, ‘Vanessa’ disappeared… You know…for realism. Sara and I now had this tragedy…this hurdle that we overcame together. We started dating not long after. She was never going back to long distance relationships and wanted to try local….4 years later were married.”

“My father never had anything other than boys, and my mother always wanted a girl. Try as they might, they just had tons of boys. When I was 6 they adopted a girl of also 6. Everyone was pleased, and she was quickly included into the family by everyone and we all took an immediate shine to her. Especially me.

We started playing ‘doctor’ at 9. This progressed to fooling around by our early teens, and into actual sex shortly thereafter. We’re both over 30 now. We have sex whenever we see each other. We also like to pretend we are twins when we do have sex. We’ve both had our shares of girlfriends and boyfriends, but we always kept it up even while in those relationships. She’s actually married now.

We still have sex about 2 times a month, more when the family gets together for holidays. I can’t even imagine the bricks that would be sh*t if anyone ever found out. It’s been close a few times, especially when we were younger, but nobody’s ever caught on.

#3 From a divorce lawyer who goes by TheLadyInReddit:

“Client is an elderly gentleman, some type of retired professional. His son is a pastor. Everything about his situation seemed very normal in terms of income, property, etc. However, it turns out he had a pretty serious porn hobby and he was concerned his wife might find out and use it against him in the divorce. However, as I mentioned above, I assured him that was pretty run-of-the-mill these days and unlikely to affect anything. He then asks if I feel the same knowing the porn is not ‘mainstream.’ I asked what he means and he looks very nervous. I wanted to make sure he wasn’t referencing CP, so I pushed him on it.

The guy was into goats.”

“My friend inherited a beautiful diamond engagement ring. The stone was worth $20K. His fiance was thrilled to receive it and flaunt it. Now his wife of 25 years, it’s still one of her most precious possessions.

Only I (and you 4 million) know that she does not own the original diamond. My friend sold the stone for $15K and an equal sized, substitute diamond on the day he picked it up from being sized to fit her…

The value of the ring was learned at appraisal, and was actually appraised a bit higher. The $20K was the number he knew he could get from a wholesaler in the district. It is still insured for the higher amount. The stone that was substituted is a diamond – and I couldn’t tell the difference. The money was mostly used to clear debts.”

“I’m an atheist. I’m also a deacon in an evangelical church. I’m not exactly proud of it but I try do my part to convince people to live like Jesus because even if he wasn’t god, he certainly had some good ideas about loving other people.

The problem for me is my family. I’m married with a one kid and another on the way. I believe that such a revelation would be devastating for my wife. I’ve tried to tell her in subtle ways but I can’t bring myself to just come out and say the truth. I love my wife and I don’t wish to harm her emotionally in that way.”

“I am a gay man married to a woman who has no idea I am gay.

How is my life? It’s great. It’s pleasant. I have two beautiful children who I love more than anything. I have a successful job and a lovely home. My wife is one of the most amazing people I’ve ever met. So that is my life.

Myself, however, the way I feel inside is not so good. I feel disgusted with who I am. Growing up in a Catholic household had me living in fear of being banished by my family for revealing my sexuality. That’s not something I’m afraid will happen, that is something that is a well known fact in my family. I would love more than anything to be honest to everyone. I am a coward though…

As ridiculous as it sounds I thought that getting married and settling down etc would make these feelings I had about being gay go away. Before meeting her I was constantly struggling with the fact that I might be gay. My upbringing made me believe that being gay was wrong and so I always tried to convince myself that that’s not who I was. For awhile it worked. I think I wanted so bad to be straight that I just made myself believe I was. I got married to my wife at 23 and for a short time after our wedding I was relieved. I thought ‘Yes, I knew it. I knew I just had to find someone who would clear all this up for me!’ That just came crashing down. We started having sex more to try and get pregnant and that caused me realise [sic] that I am a gay man. I’m not remaining in the closet because I’m too scared of my wife’s reaction. In fact she would probably be the most forgiving. I have decided not to come out because of my family. I’m not exaggerating when I say that they will disown me. They wouldn’t think twice about it. I wouldn’t be happy. I would be lost. Now that I have children that just scares me even more. I wouldn’t ser [sic] them much at all and that’s not an option for me… There are many things I wish I had done differently but I do not regret any of my choices because they’ve all led me to where I am today. My son and daughter are these amazing little people. I live in a great house with a loving and sweet little family. Our marriage (sham marriage as some people have pointed out) is a good one despite my sexuality. Our marriage is healthier than some that I know about and hear about. I have accepted that I may never come out and I’ve learnt to be okay with that. I will consider going to therapy too. This is the most I have ever talked about it. Up until now I have not told a soul and so I have really swept everything under the rug. It is amazing what you can block out if you really try.”

“I once helped out my a female friend’s family by taking care of their cat for a week. Every day for a week, I would go over there and snoop around their house. I found my friend’s diary, and proceeded to read the entire thing. I used this information to get her to like me, and she is currently my wife.”

“I have lesbian sex with my best friend about once a month. Neither of us say anything to our husbands. We drink a good bottle of wine, get tipsy, get nasty, and fall asleep. When we wake up, we laugh, kiss, and go about our lives.”

“No ones going to probably find this comment, but I have an addiction to prostitutes. I can’t control myself. I’m also married and my wife has no idea. I spent $2000 on our credit card while she was overseas for 3 weeks. I lied and told her that I had a gambling problem, that’s why I spent so much. Little does she know, I was bringing hookers home.”

“I’m a guy with a foot fetish. And I -never- told my wife even though she has amazing feet. BUT it gets worse – I have a weird twist to my foot fetish. I’m really into ‘pedal pumping’ (i guess that’s the closest way to describe it) and I’m mortified to tell her or anyone else, and never have. When I was a little kid we spent a LOT of time at church during the week for mom’s choir practice and there was a decent looking piano player lady who would kick off her shoes and play the piano barefoot. And even though I knew nothing of my sexuality, I remember Saturday afternoons, being up on the stage/pulpit during boring choir practice, laying on the carpet, playing with Matchbox cars and trying not to make it seem glaringly obvious that I was transfixed watching this lady’s bare foot pushing on that piano pedal…

I was totally transfixed, and it continues to this day. Women playing pianos, organs, driving barefoot, using a sewing machine barefoot. My fantasies usually always involve me imagining myself as the pedal, and the woman has a sexy bare, nylon, or sock clad foot. If it’s a smelly foot even better. I feel guilty and stupid to this day. Why on earth would a fetish like that develop when I was a prepubescent kid?”

“When i was in 8th grade i fell in love with my girlfriend. I never thought it would be possible for someone so young could have such strong feelings. The relationship didn’t last more than three months because my mom and step-dad divorced and i had to move. I thought about her every day since i moved away. I met another person and have been married for 20 years now. I have four kids and have no complaints about my wife. Five years ago through social media i was able to correspond with 8th grade girlfriend. It turns out that she still has feelings for me too. I have been faithful to my wife for our entire marriage but want more than anything to be with my first love.”

http://ift.tt/2xOOyzD

#ENTERTAINMENT

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topsolarpanels · 7 years

Text

Know Your Enemy: Celebrating 50 Years of the Forever War

Robert Sammelin

No one drank more than the scientist. Every night, after whatever patriotic black-tie gala marriage played props at, he could be found at the hotel bar, trying to extract existential meaning from a banana colada. It was an odd drinking of option for such a serious human, but only once did he respond to our interrogations about it.

It pleases the nerve fibers, he said, all baritone to his voice, before disappearing into the chilled yellow muck again. We were in New Tulsa, debriefing after a grueling dinner with a bunch of white-haired solar energy exec. Wed been on the road for months, and morale used to go the way of the glacier. I ordered a round for the table, and we toasted to the hustle. Heroes of the nation, peddling war bonds by day, drinking like froufrous by night. Our drill instructor would not have been proud.

Maybe it wasnt New Tulsa. Maybe itd been in Charlotte after the fund-raiser with the nanofinance douchebags. Anyhow.

There were 11 of us on the bond drive, 12 if you included the JngerBot. The Forever War had just entered its sixth decade, and our politicians didnt pretend they were going to end it anymore, even during elections. They couldnt. Wed tried everything: nation-building, nation-destroying, sending terrorists and their families to the Mars penal colony, sending the rebel Young Siberians to actual Siberia. Nothing had worked. We were at war because we always had been. We were at war because we always would be. We were at war because we were at war.

Matt Gallagher

About

Matt Gallagher is the author of the novel Youngblood and the Iraq memoir Kaboom: Embracing the Suck in a Savage Little War.

The government decided to celebrate the Forever Wars golden anniversary with loud, shiny bombast. We were part of that bombast. AMERICAS HEROES, TOGETHER AT LAST, ran the tagline. We were like a roving assortment act, but without name recognition or singing or sex appeal. Without anything, truly. Just pasts wiped clean with the antiseptic of narrative. So we stood there and smiled and waved while other people told our tales to the crowds. The crowd cheered. We waved again.

After the coladas, I settled the tab and excused myself. The younger veterinarians night was just beginning, but mine was nearing its end. In the queue for the teleporter to the rooms, a human about my age waited behind me. He wore a rumpled dress shirt and an overlong tie-in and a goatee on the brink of coherence.

He was looking everywhere but my hoverchair. People with legs always do that. It reminds me of the route some men used to try very hard not to look at my cleavage when I was younger. The endeavor simply underlines the fixation.

Thank you, he said. For what you did.

Thank you for your supporting, I told, a answer as hollow as it was practiced. He mustve been at the event earlier.

Cancan I tell you something?

Sure, I told. Women in military uniforms have this impact on men in dress shirts, for some reason. If youd like to.

I wanted to be a recon marine when I was a kid. He said it like it was a church confession, something hidden away in the lost rifts of his soul for decades. Did the recon workout at the gym for years, he continued. Stupid, I know.

I nodded, both because it was stupid and because I knew.

Youre a bona fide hero. The men segue was as graceful as a startled dog, but it was late. That scientist, though. Hes killing people. And not only the enemy.

I thought about “the mens” words. They were true enough. So what would you do? I asked. If you were him.

Me? The man stroked his goatee. I wouldnt even know.

Pragmatically, I told. Youre the scientist. You live in this country. The wars happening. You can perhaps aim it or not. Either style, people succumb. What do you do?

II object to the question. And to the idea. Im not him. The human voice had a quiver to it now. Not an angry quiver, either. A frightened one. I was just sayingI dont think its right. Thats all.

OK, I said. Night. It was my turning at the teleporter. I get in and went to my room. I didnt begrudge the man his opting out. We all had in some manner. Even us.

Especially us.

The Federals had discovered me at my sisters, on the porch, scrolling through a holopad article about the rabid lemur thatd killed Justin Bieber Jr. Furious George Howls With Delight! read the headline. Its always spooky when sons succumb the same way their fathers did. The past comprehend us all, eventually. Even Biebers.

I was on my seventh year of an indefinite visit, still sleeping in a bare guest room. A potted flower or framed scene would have felt like marks of permanence, somehow. Id been living in increments since high school and wasnt about to stop simply because I couldnt figure out what to do with the rest of my life.

Theywell, welived at the top of a windy mound in a suburbium of a suburbium, wedged between a stand of wild honeysuckle and a pond shaped like a swollen snout. It was green and quiet. The kind of place where big flags hung from porches with humility. I taught painting at the community center and took my nieces to soccer practice and spend my Saturday nights at the one townie bar that served ros.

The life didnt induce me happy or anything, but it could have. Maybe should have.

There were three of them. They all wore jeans and plaid shirts of differing blandness. Id have expected suits and black sunglasses, but the decay effects of after-empire were reaching and vast.

Chief Warrant Officer Valerie Speer? one said. Well, asked. I didnt look my part, either. Female veterinarians tend to cut a certain mold. A liter-sized gremlin in a gardening hat wasnt it.

They told me about the bond drive. About how it would inspire patriotism again in the hearts and minds of the person or persons. About how it would get everyday citizens invested in the wars again.( Like they ever were. I knew the history .) About how the governmental forces needed the money, how 50 years of blowing up things in strange, faraway places had taken its toll on the budget, especially since the geothermal insurgency in Blue Russia began eating away at Uncle sam foreign trade.

About how the bond drive needed a woman on it, because they had an old guy, a blexican, a mexipino, and a robot, and showing that heroes were as diverse as the country mattered.

I laughed. A female. I danced my metal fingers through the air. In the right sun my prosthetics could look like flesh. We werent in it. Thats why you need me.

That made the two men in jeans and plaid look down at the ground, but the woman Fed just stared at me.

Youre Valerie Speer, she said. The tone in her voice sounded so earnest it snapped. Do you know what you mean to my generation of status of women? I joined the agency because of you.

She was lying about that, I was almost sure. But shed appealed to my pride. I danced my fingers through the air again and took in all the green, all the quiet. Seven years here. Seven years that had induced me soft. Did people my age go on escapades anymore?

I requested information about financial compensation.

Heres the thing about being labeled a war hero: You either love it or hate it. Theres little space for mixed impressions. Take the scientist. Invented a drone mosquito that gives people the runs, sold it to the military, and stopped the Arabican conflict practically overnight. You cant fire a rifle when youre crapping out your brains. But some of the mosquitoes werent as specific as billed. During strafes, they bit foes and civilians alike. Which wouldnt have mattered much had we been fighting in the developed world. We werent, though. Outbreaks of dysentery and super-cholera followed, and the last UN estimate I watched numbered deaths in the tens of thousands.

The bond drive needed a woman on it. They already had an old guy, a blexican, a mexipino, and a robot.

The scientist had ended a war all with his mind. Yet the only thing he wanted in the world was to return to his lab, to his anonymity, and forget any of it ever happened.

The JngerBot seemed to resent the attention for other reasons. It didnt know what to induce of people, and truth be told, people didnt know what to attain of it. They could handle robots, had been dealing with them all their lives. Even the rough-and-tumble behaviour of a regular InfantryBot could be explained away. But an elite InfantryBot 5000 upgraded with the transcendental heroism and philosophical musings of decorated German World War I soldier Ernst Jnger? That caused some issues.

The anarch wages his own wars, the JngerBot said at a fund-raiser to a journalist whod would like to know whether it missed battle. Even when marching in rank and file.

Before a boxing prizefight, the JngerBot felt it necessary to remind the crowd what was what. Furrow opposing is the bloodiest, wildest, most brutal of all, it said to 70,000 drunk revelers in Vegas. Of all the wars exciting moments , none is so powerful as the session of two cyclone troop leaders between narrow trench walls. Theres no compassion there , no going back. The blood speaks from a shrill exclaim of recognition that tears itself from ones breast like a nightmare.

And then there were the children.

It told a 10 -year old with a JngerBot poster on his wall that killing an adversary would be a finer tribute. And when a bank presidents “girls ” pointed to us and asked if we were heroes, the JngerBot objected as only it could TAGEND

Heroes deeds and heroes graves, it said. Old and new you here may assure. How the Empire was created. How the Empire was preserved. It paused. We sought the death of heroes. There is no lovelier demise in the world.

The little girls face paled to glass as her father resulted her away. We all laughed about it , no one harder or longer than Dizzy. Dizzy was a walking, talking debate for breeding the remaining cis-males out of the gene pool, if only he hadnt been so pretty. Drone pilots. They think theyre so starfish because they can laser insurrectionists dead from space. And Dizzy was an superstar. He adored every minute of the bond drive, “members attention”, the parties, the hoverfloat rides, the certain type of female patriot who wanted to see the view from his hotel balcony. Beats going back to Pueblo and coaching CrossFit, hed tell, before unleashing that smile of full, fluoride shine. God, he could charm the sorcery underwear off a Mormon.

Would try, at least.

Hed earned the Silver Star in the Iraq war. Well, the Iraq war before the last one. Maybe it was three Iraq wars ago.

Dizzy and the younger vets on the bond drive are always privateersmercenaries if youre the protest, virtual-petition kind. WarriorCorps and Foreign Legion Inc. and Armed Humanitarianism Limited and the like. I was hybrid: part contractor but also part national military, before that ran extinct during the Whig Revolt of 36. Merely Emo Carlos was old enough to have been GI from beginning to end. Hed earned the Silver Star in the Iraq war. Well, the Iraq war before the last one. Perhaps it was three Iraq wars ago. Anyhow. We asked Emo Carlos about it over sushi, after a parade in Cleveland.

Jumped on a grenade at a checkpoint, he told, defining down his chopsticks with a shrug. Didnt go off.

We hollered and banged the table just because we could. Itd been a couple decades since anything but a bot had been close enough to a grenade to do anything like that. Even the JngerBot conveyed its admiration.

Defective? I asked.

Emo Carlos nodded. One in a million, they said.

What happened then? Dizzy asked.

The creases in Emo Carlos forehead folded into one another like papier-mch. He usually never talked about anything but drumming for his old-man punk band. Theyd served together back in the day and were known across the greater Rochester area as the Infidels. Geriatric humor.

Stood up, he said. Dusted off. Looked down. Realise Id pissed myself.

We hollered and banged the table all over again.

An elderly couple came over to us subsequently. Theyd overheard our conversation and wanted to say thank you. They said they had two grandsons in privateer training.

I know our thanks is a small thing, the spouse said. He and his wife looked so cute in their nice old-people clothes, khakis and sweaters and thick-rimmed glasses. They looked like other peoples grandparents always look. But sometimes its all those of us here can offer.

The wife nodded. Were all involved, she told. We believe that. As taxpayers, as citizens, thats how it is. Were with you.

We thanked them for thanking us and they left the restaurant.

What did she mean, Were all involved? Dizzy asked. No theyre not.

There were echoes of agreement and deliberation over what the old woman had meant, and not just about the word involved . Also about the word we .

Yo, Emo Carlos told. The table hushed. Theyre from my hour. When wars had objectives. When citizens tried to keep up. America used to be young. Thats what she meant.

Then say that, Dizzy told. Taxes? Who the fucking cares.

Emo Carlos shook his head again. He was trying to clear himself of frustrations, either with himself or with us. Then he pointed at me. Sent her to the damn moon. Supposed to save us all, putting the wars up there. Preserve the land and resources, remove civilian demises. Be tidy and simple. That was the plan.

And no one ever went back, Dizzy told. The game changed.

Well. Emo Carlos giggled. Military lesson numero uno, son, he said. No plan survives first contact.

The rest of us chuckled along with the old wisdom. Everyone but the scientist, who sat off by himself in the corner. He looked up at us with something between sadness and ferocity. It was hard to decide which.

Tidy and simple, he said. I like that.

When my nieces turn 12 and gain access to FreedomNet, they will find these three paragraphs about their aunt, etched into the digital histories forever and ever TAGEND Valerie Jade Speer( born May 2, 2011) was a chief warrant officer( air) and assault pilot in the United States Army and later the privateer organization Star Spangled Security. She was awarded the Star of Valor in 2042 for her actions during the Battle on the Moon, of which she was the only survivor . Deployed to the moon as part of the NATO coalition during the course of its South Seas dispute, Speer flew a Flying Yeager fusion helocraft during the battle, destroying five Chinese Federation space-helos and two Young Siberian cosmo-planes. Struck by an enemy dwarf ballistic, Speer crash-landed into the Titius Crater. She was thus sheltered from the amaze thermonuclear strike carried out by the Young Siberians that killed all other fighters and blew the hole in the moon now known as Putins Smile . Initially presumed dead, Speer was found during NATO recovery operations two days after the end of the combat. She lost three extremities, suffered burns over much of her body, and survived over 90 surgeries. President Natasha Obama told Speers life and narrative are a testament to the American spirit at her Star of Valor ceremony at the White House .

Words can be funny beasts. Her actions suggest some sort of agency, even control. Destroy is such a clean term for such messiness. Struck by defied my memory of it. Same with crash-landed.

Less so with lost. And suffered.

Testament. As if enduring were a selection. I did what anyone would have. There are no atheists in moon craters. And there are no fatalists in survivor wards of one.

I was thinking about that ward as I zipped up my suitcase in my sisters guest room for the bond drive. Thinking about the long stills of quiet during the nights. Guessing about being “ve called the” Burn by nurses who guessed I couldnt hear them. Supposing about the full-thickness graft done without anesthesia.

You sure about this, Val? My sister stood in the doorway. Her posture betrayed opposition. She was four years older and had always asked me questions that she already had answers for. You have options.

Shed said the same years prior, before Id left for the moon.

I am, I told both times, even though I wasnt both days. Id always detected power and resolve in ambiguity, though. Most people werent like that. My sister, for one.

Youve done more than your share, she continued, moving to the bed and putting her arm around my shoulder. So much more. I leaned my head into her and tried to hold in some of the familial warmth. Id miss it, I knew. Only sisters and nieces hug people like me. I dont think its right.

I smiled at that.

Its not, I told. But. If not me, then who?

Even running can be its own form of opting out. I didnt know that the first time. But I did the second. The last night in the guest room, as I tossed and turned in bed, I thought about that. Then I thought about the survivor ward again. And the long stills of quiet during the nights. And being “ve called the” Burn. And the graft.

Somewhere between Omaha and Tesla City, I began to realize just how different the younger vets were. It wasnt simply that they were privateers, either, or that they called adversary combatants pixels as an insult. Dizzy and his crew, they crowed about their service. Owned their superiority, then basked in it.

Do soldiers think theyre better than citizens? Of course. It has nothing to do with what did or didnt happen in their service, either. It has to do with the very notion of joining up. Americas been at war since before most of us were born. We joined because we wanted to go. Wed been told we were special from day one of boot camp, doing something the rest of our nation couldnt. Or worse, wouldnt. Too fat. Too selfish. Too lazy. Which made the realization after we got out that citizens think were beneath them all the more shocking. If theyre fat, selfish, and lazy, then whats worse than that?

We werent supposed to say any of that, though. My generation didnt, at least. We were taught that part of our service was biding quiet about it. To rise above, because thats what Jesus and George Washington and Beyonc wouldve wanted.

Thats what I did. Or tried to, at the least. Let the citizenry think what it wants, ran the logic. All part of being a republic.

Maybe we had it incorrect, though.

I wondered about that the night the protester confronted us. We were in Washington for a gala. Ordinarily “were in” ushered in through side or back door for events, but the organizers of this one had us walking in on a red carpet, through a galaxy of flashing lightings and holographic cameras.

Finally, Dizzy told, pausing to adjust his bow affiliation and lick his front teeth. The treatment we deserve.

Why the protester chose the JngerBot to cream-pie, Ill never know. By the time the uproar had reached my ears and Id floated around in my chair, the JngerBot had the young man by the throat. Request order to remove home-front adversary, it said, which was funny, and then not.

We got the young man free of the JngerBots prongs. He was reed-thin and had thick brown curls with eyes as dark and mad as the moon. I didnt know what to think about him or his pie. People didnt protest war in person anymore. It wasnt sane behavior.

Youre not heroes, he told. His terms were shaky. Its never easy coming face to face with people youve demonized. Or cockpit to cockpit. Youre tools of empire. Fuck you. Fuck all of you.

The cameras along the walkway started popping off like mortars. We all only stood there, waiting out his denunciation, because we were there to be seen and applauded , nothing else. His anger dazed me, and the others too. Not Dizzy, though.

Get bent, joker, Dizzy told, intersecting his arms for the cameras. War is bad? No shit. But it wont go forth just cause we want it to. Last month, two brigades from the same base get deployed. One goes to Kurd Mountain, saves those households from the horde. The other goes to Blue Russia, blows up some insurrectionists. Ones a humanitarian mission. The others combat. Both involve destruction.

Id never heard Dizzy speak with eloquence and passion before. He was good, and he knew it. He pressed on.

This JngerBot is a goddamn national gem. I dont know what brought you here tonight, and I dont dedicate a single fucking. We went so you dont “re going to have to”. Suck my hero balls.

The arrogance. The entitlement. The narrowness of thought. I loved it all, and I wasnt the only one. The red carpet explosion with applause. Dizzy even took a bow. But the acclaim wasnt universal.

After the protester had been escorted away and wed run inside for the gala, the scientist saw Dizzy. Dont do that again, he said. He loomed over the younger human like an angry parent. That guy is not your adversary. Neither is anyone else youve met on this stupid tour.

He aint a friend. Dizzy was trying to sound unbothered, and he leaned back in his chair and set his feet on the table. So what is he?

Only morons speak in absolutes, the scientist said.

Dizzy changed tactics. You know what he likely thinks about you? he asked. What all these people say when they think we cant hear? I had a woman tell me she didnt think we were whole human beings. Fuck her, and fuck that protester. Fuck all of them.

I wondered what the answers were to Dizzys questionwhat did people say about us? When they thought about us at all. Beyond the pomp and rite of the bond drive, we werent anything, I supposed. Just ciphers with tales people believed in, or didnt believe in, even before they heard them.

So. What. The scientists voice turned to iron as he responded to Dizzy. Thats the job. We have consequences.

Dizzy opened his mouth, but the scientist cut him off. You did . You did when you didnt “re going to have to”. Thats enough. It has to be. Then he stormed off, presumably for the hotel bar.

The scientist opted out that night. The rest of us did too, by doing the job. We stood there and smiled and waved while other people told our stories to the crowds. The crowd cheered. We waved again.

We walked back to the hotel as a group after the jamboree. We stopped in a park with green lawns and a marble fountain and joked about the protester, giggled about the scientist. The scientist had been right, but so what? What did being right have to do with anything? Dizzy had regained whatever force-out it was that sustained him and began chatting up a pair of young women who considered themselves patriots. I watched it all and thought about the ward and then my sisters home. The JngerBot came up beside me.

You managed that pie well, I told it. It didnt say anything, so I continued. Waiting for an order, I mean.

Here is our kingdom, the best use of monarchies, the best republic, the JngerBot told. Here is our garden, our happiness.

What a random thing to tell, I thought. Even for a robot. But subsequently, after considering it more, I decided otherwise.

The Fiction Issue

Tales From an Uncertain Future

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