worth it
barbara gordon x gender neutral reader. 367 words.
notes: my first take on babs for @batwngs birthday (a few days late 😮💨). hope it was incredible and this year is a great one!!
warnings: n/a, as far as i can tell!
this part was easy.
you watched barbara turn the page of her book, a calm focus evident in the way her eyes raced across it.
she was a world away, but she was relaxed. her shoulders were loose, her brow furrowed in curiosity instead of the stress that so often- too often- found a home there, and her right pointer finger trailed down the edge of the page ever so slowly, prepped and ready to flip it as soon as she finished scanning it.
you were pretty sure it was a murder mystery.
the fun kind, with fictional homicide.
you were very sure that watching her was more interesting than the story itself.
the fun kind, without the strain of oracle lingering in her features.
she handled her work well, carried it with grace, but the stakes of it all got to even the great, battle-hardened barbara gordon. who could blame you for enjoying the sight of her enjoying a morning off?
you watched as her eyes sped across the page and back again, over and over, as though the words may escape before she could get to them. as though anything could escape her pull.
you sighed quietly, happily, and she glanced up at you in that very barbara way that convinced you she was an oracle, that she could predict your next moves.
"can i help you?" she asked, fond amusement thick in her voice.
"i just love you, is all."
she chuckled. "oh, that's all. a small thing."
"you know what i mean."
"i do," she said, her smile crinkling her eyes (and sending warmth to your heart like an arrow finding a target). "i love you too."
every moment of stress and exhaustion and worry was worth it, you decided. every single one. you would relive every single stressful night her "job" had brought her, if it brought you back to this.
she hadn't dropped your gaze yet.
you wondered if she knew what you were thinking.
it must have shown on your face, because her smile softened and she set her book down. "come here."
you did, and found yourself being kissed with a warm hand on your cheek.
yeah. worth it.
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when u go to write a mentally ill person in ur story you are presented two options. the first option is to write your mental illness realistically as you actually experience it with all the ups and downs and people who are like you will resonate with it and feel seen. except every person who reads instagram infographics on mental health that uses the phrase narcicisst for anyone who does anything that crosses them and unironically call themself a dark empath will call you scary and tell you that youre demonizing mentally ill people
the second option is to lie and write inspiration porn for those people to get hard to
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lead balloon (the tumblr post that saved me)
if this comic resonated with you, it would mean the world to me if you donated to this palestinian family's escape fund.
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no creative notes because this isn't that kind of comic.
I know I don’t owe any of you anything but I still felt compelled to write about my long term absence. And I feel far enough away from the dangerous spot I was in to be able to make this comic. I have a therapist now, and she agreed that making this could be a very cathartic gesture, and the start of properly leaving these thoughts behind me. I am still, at seemingly random times, blindsided by fleeting desires to kill myself. They’re always passing urges, but it’s disarming, and uncomfortable. I worry sometimes that my brain’s spent so long thinking only about suicide that it’s forgotten how to think about anything else. Like, now that I've opened that door for myself, I'll never be able to fully shut it again. But I’m trying my best to encourage my mind in other directions. We'll see how that goes.
I am still donating all proceeds from my store to Palestinian causes. So far, I've donated over $15K, not including donations coming from my own pocket or the fundraising streams which jointly raised around $10K. In the time since I made my initial post about where this money would be going, the focus has shifted from aid organisations to directly donating to escape funds.
If you'd like to do the same, you can look at Operation Olive Branch, which hosts hundreds of Palestinian escape funds or donate to Safebow, which has helped facilitate the safe crossing and securing of important medical procedures for over 150 at-risk palestinians since the beginning of the genocide.
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As a reminder that good exists out there, a coworker recently confessed to me that he found out his child is questioning their identity (kid's gender redacted for this post). The kid is keeping it from him, so he can't say anything to them or show that he knows, but he's doing his best to get mentally prepared and educated so that he'll be ready whenever his kid does feel comfortable enough come to him.
For context, this guy is a big, bulky middle aged dude who loves sports and typical outdoor "manly" activities. As his coworker and friend, I know he's a kind and sweet teddy bear of a person, but his kid probably views him as a stern, authoritarian figure, the way most teenagers view their parents. His family lives in a conservative area, so I'm sure between that, their dad's looks and interests, and the fact that their dad is a Figure of Authority, the kid is worried that they won't be accepted.
But you know what? When he found out about his kid, the first thing he did was reach out to his closest queer friend and ask for resources for parents of questioning children. His biggest fears are that his kid will be bullied or discriminated against and won't feel comfortable enough to be themself. His second action was to find himself a mentor in another parent who went the same situation (kid coming out in a conservative town). The other person is preparing him for some of the struggles his kid may face and the fights he may need to take on as a parent to make sure his kid is safe and treated well.
Something I want to emphasize for people focused on language as the primary method of allyship is that when we spoke, he used some outdated terms and thoughts about gender and sexuality. That does not make him bad. These were the terms and thinking used about questioning teenagers when he was growing up and he never needed to learn more current ones. But now that he does have that need, he's throwing himself in head first because that's his kid and he's darn well going to make sure that his kid feels welcomed and has a safe place to be themselves even if they never come out to him.
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