i think the real takeaway from what happened to vax is that the love was there. it didnt change anything. it didnt save anyone. there were just too many forces against it. but it still matters that the love was there.

vax’s love for keyleth is so strong, so powerful, so unbreakable and unyielding, that they bet the success of a plan centuries in the making on him loving her too much to let her die there and it worked. and you know he would do it all again in a heartbeat — that if he’s freed and she gets put in jeopardy again with no one there that can defend her, he will be there regardless of what the consequences might be. keyleth is the perfect bait, really, because vax could never just watch her suffer that way.

he loves her beyond death and beyond reason.

eepers they eeping and cuddling and in love and they have taken over my brain again so have some doodles

bonus, they finally get up and Carlos makes coffee n tea for them. Cecil doesn't let go ever let go ever

I HAD A BROTHER.

it (2017) // maurice sendak // single dad laughing, daniel pearce // the good, the bad, and the grace of god, jep robertson // it, stephen king // the carnivorous lamb, agustín gómez-acros // erica e. goode // my name is memory, ann brashares // it chapter two (2019) // prodigy, marie lu // i wish i was, the avett brothers

something about you (just makes me feel guilty)

(or: bianca is a lot of things. she just isn’t lillian’s.)

Bianca is a girl of raven hair, of shining midnight and ocean eyes full of stars. It’s an oxymoron, but that’s all Lillian’s ever known her to be - constantly full of surprises, each one differing from the last. She’s never meant to be a contradiction, it’s just how she lives. It’s in her bones, alongside being an accidental control freak and the warmest person Lillian knows.

Bianca never asked for this, to be in command of their pseudo-detective group, but there’s a sparkle in her eyes as she teases Taylor for his crush, and that early morning blue clouds over to gray when Sam explains his situation. She says, when Lillian mentions it to her offhandedly, that it makes her quirky, and the sarcasm drips from her lips like maple syrup, warm and sticky sweet. Lillian laughs, and it catches in her throat somewhere, and she feels like choking on the bitter irony of her feelings playing tricks on her. Hasn’t she dealt with enough already?

Bianca is cherry and gunpowder, the most unpredictable person Lillian’s ever met. She’ll kiss a guy and shoot his stepmom not ten minutes later. It’s not a metaphor. Lillian wishes it was. Sam tells her about it later, bright eyes and more eager than Lillian’s seen him in a while. She tells him she’s happy for them, and it’s true but it still feels like poison coming out.

Bianca is her antidote.

(Bianca isn’t “her” anything.)

thinking about vayuya......

:3

going to bed but i wanna talk about my other ocs when i wake up

The math just adds up!

catalysts, protectors

really wanna draw naraina x rolan 🥺

I think so many people are so deeply alienated from themselves that they have no clue how to exercise their free will and autonomy. For some, this alienation runs so deep that they are afraid of their own autonomy and humanity. It is completely understandable why one would have those feelings, but it can be worrisome.

I want to help others who feel this way, so here are small things I have done to exercise my free will:

Add "guilty pleasure" songs to playlists and actually listen to them (I have a ton of late 1990s-early 2000s music I listen to now proudly that I never listened to in the past out of shame)

Getting the décor item, bath set, bed spread, ect. in the patterns you like, even if it's "childish" (I got a dinosaur-themed wastebasket from the kids' décor section and I adore it)

Taking a new route to get to a place you go to often

Eat dessert first

Celebrate well, and often

Collect things that are "odd" or don't seem like an "acceptable" thing to collect (somebody on my "for you" page collects dandelion crayola crayons and it was so cool!!!!!!)

Incorporate one new piece in an outfit you wear frequently (e.g., a new chain, a necklace, ribbons, bracelets, ect.). Challenge yourself to add onto the outfits if you feel up for it.

Sing along to songs without worrying that you sound "good" or your intonation is completely accurate

Read a book from a genre you weren't allowed to read as a kid (comics, thrillers, mysteries, anything!)

Walk without having a specific destination or goal

Pick up a new craft without expecting yourself to master it or to ever be "good" enough. Get your hands messy.

I don't want to shame anybody for not feeling as though they have free will or that they are exempt from exercising it. However, I wanted to give ideas so that you might read this list and find your own ways to express your intrinsic autonomy and will. You deserve to be a person, to feel alive, not just living. That is what our lives are for.

dont got much to offer for The Holiday but have these sillies!

happy valentines day :D

the thing is that they're so fascinated by sex, they love sex, they can't imagine a world without sex - they need sex to sell things, they need sex to be part of their personality, they need sex to prove their power - but they hate sex. they are disgusted by it.

sex is the only thing that holds their attention, and it is also the thing that can never be discussed directly.

you can't tell a child the normal names for parts of their body, that's sexual in nature, because the body isn't a body, it's a vessel of sex. it doesn't matter that it's been proven in studies (over and over) that kids need to know the names of their genitals; that they internalize sexual shame at a very young age and know it's 'dirty' to have a body; that it overwhelmingly protects children for them to have the correct words to communicate with. what matters is that they're sexual organs. what matters is that it freaks them out to think about kids having body parts - which only exist in the context of sex.

it's gross to talk about a period or how to check for cancer in a testicle or breast. that is nasty, illicit. there will be no pain meds for harsh medical procedures, just because they feature a cervix.

but they will put out an ad of you scantily-clad. you will sell their cars for them, because you have abs, a body. you will drip sex. you will ooze it, like a goo. like you were put on this planet to secrete wealth into their open palms.

they will hit you with that same palm. it will be disgusting that you like leather or leashes, but they will put their movie characters in leather and latex. it will be wrong of you to want sexual freedom, but they will mark their success in the number of people they bed.

they will crow that it's inappropriate for children so there will be no lessons on how to properly apply a condom, even to teens. it's teaching them the wrong things. no lessons on the diversity of sexual organ growth, none on how to obtain consent properly, none on how to recognize when you feel unsafe in your body. if you are a teenager, you have probably already been sexualized at some point in your life. you will have seen someone also-your-age who is splashed across a tv screen or a magazine or married to someone three times your age. you will watch people pull their hair into pigtails so they look like you. so that they can be sexy because of youth. one of the most common pornography searches involves newly-18 young women. girls. the words "barely legal," a hiss of glass sand over your skin.

barely legal. there are bills in place that will not allow people to feel safe in their own bodies. there are people working so hard to punish any person for having sex in a way that isn't god-fearing and submissive. heteronormative. the sex has to be at their feet, on your knees, your eyes wet. when was the first time you saw another person crying in pornography and thought - okay but for real. she looks super unhappy. later, when you are unhappy, you will close your eyes and ignore the feeling and act the role you have been taught to keep playing. they will punish the sex workers, remove the places they can practice their trade safely. they will then make casual jokes about how they sexually harass their nanny.

and they love sex but they hate that you're having sex. you need to have their ornamental, perfunctory, dispassionate sex. so you can't kiss your girlfriend in the bible belt because it is gross to have sex with someone of the same gender. so you can't get your tubes tied in new england because you might change your mind. so you can't admit you were sexually assaulted because real men don't get hurt, you should be grateful. you cannot handle your own body, you cannot handle the risks involved, let other people decide that for you. you aren't ready yet.

but they need you to have sex because you need to have kids. at 15, you are old enough to parent. you are not old enough to hear the word fuck too many times on television.

they are horrified by sex and they never stop talking about it, thinking about it, making everything unnecessarily preverted. the saying - a thief thinks everyone steals. they stand up at their podiums and they look out at the crowd and they sign a bill into place that makes sexwork even more unsafe and they stand up and smile and sign a bill that makes gender-affirming care illegal and they get up and they shrug their shoulders and write don't say gay and they get up, and they make the world about sex, but this horrible, plastic vision of it that they have. this wretched, emotionless thing that holds so much weight it's staggering. they put their whole spine behind it and they push and they say it's normal!

this horrible world they live in. disgusted and also obsessed.

listen there really was just something about how in the book, snow’s 3-page descent from hesitant lover boy to deluded psychopath happens entirely in his mind. lucy gray gives him no indication whatsoever that she suspects him, that she’s going to leave or betray him. he’s just sitting quietly in the cabin waiting for her to return when that seed of calculated suspicion, which he has needed to survive the capitol, takes a hold of him and chokes the life out of any goodness left inside him. it really drives home your terror as a reader that “oh my god did he kill her? did she escape? what happened to her? why would he even think that?” in a way that when the movie had to adjust for visualization it lost some of that holy shit this guy has lost it emphasis.

Thinking about the Bad Parents this episode because like, imagine your child, who's constantly burdened with the fate of the world, comes to you after school and says it's not enough. That they have to take the Last Stand exam and it's tomorrow. You have no time to take time off work to be with them, to be able to wait for them when they get home.

And then the next day you say goodbye in the morning, you kiss them on the head and tell them you love them. But you know that the next time you see them they will have died. You know that all the day you're at work, your child is fighting for their life in a drastic last stand. How do you focus with that knowledge? How do you move on, wondering if your child is already dead? That while your working or doing chores, your child could be lying on a sandy flood, dead, while all their friends fight for their lives?

How do you move past it? How do you live out that day?