sunshine revival challenge #2
Jul. 9th, 2025 09:41 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
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Tunnel of Love
Journaling: The romance of summer! What do you love? Write about anything you feel sentimental about or that gets your heart pumping.
Since this is what I did most of last Sunday, I'll talk about how much I love baking. I love to bake. It's something I've done since I was a child. My mom was the one who taught me, with box mixes and canned frosting to begin with, before I moved on to making cakes from scratch. I remember taking a whole tray of cupcakes for a surprise party our class planned for our teacher in elementary school (okay, it was the girls. I vaguely remember us thinking the boys couldn't be trusted to keep their mouth shut so we left them out. I think we were, like, 10 or 11?). I also remember making birthday cakes and father's day cakes for my dad. I remember taking things for all sorts of class parties throughout the years really. When we had a project in elementary school on teaching the class "how to do something", I chose baking a cake and I remember switching from mix to wanting to do a scratch cake. My dad carefully measured out the ingredients in the morning before school so it would save me time. So much of my baking memories are tied to my family.
Baking is something that calms my mind. There's a precision to it that I appreciate. I'm someone who likes really exact instructions, which is why even though I have learned to like cooking, I do like baking more. You stick to a recipe and outside of mild variables, like the oven timing, it should come out right. And I like the results too! I have a sweet tooth, but I do like when people around me enjoy my baking. I am not great with taking compliments, but I like hearing them (who doesn't, right? lol)! I do like pretty things so it's been fun learning and practicing decorating as well.
People have made jokes about me starting a bakery in the past, and while there are many reasons I wouldn't, I do just like some thing just being an enjoyable hobby. And I will keep doing it. It's a nice way to spend an evening or a weekend. Doing what I love and sometimes, for the people I love. Because they're the reason I learned to do this in the first place. :)
( cupcakes )
NSFW art!
Jul. 9th, 2025 09:24 amartemisdartThe artist who messaged me on Discord went ahead and created two drawings based on the final chapter of my fic "Non Sum Dignus." I'm so excited!
They are NSFW, and they are magnificent.
They are NSFW, and they are magnificent.
Sunshine Challenge #3
Jul. 9th, 2025 06:08 pmscripsiJournaling prompt: What are your favorite summer-associated foods?
Creative prompt: Draw art of or make graphics of summer foods, or post your favorite summer recipes. Post your answer to today’s challenge in your own space and leave a comment in this post saying you did it. Include a link to your post if you feel comfortable doing so.
My favourite sumer food probably sounds very boring, but if one takes care to use the best quality possible, it’s delicious. Boiled white fish with new potatoes, clarified butter and chopped hard-boiled eggs. When I was a child the fish we used was northern pike, which my father or grandfather had just caught, but nowadays we usually buy fresh cod. The new potatoes come from the garden. The clarified butter must be real butter, and organic eggs taste the best. One can mix the butter and the eggs, but we prefer to keep them separate, so each can take after taste.
Also, for me this tastes best eaten outside the summer house, on dishes called “Grön berså” (green bower) by the Swedish designer Stig Lindberg in 1960.
(no subject)
Jul. 9th, 2025 04:25 pmquillpunki have a cold and a fever, but i'm signed up to this years ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}
battleshipex so i'm focusing on the hype for that. also i still haven't started my justmarriedexchange fic but i'm not very worried about that. i feel okay with it.
i just finished a rewrite of a story, too, that i'm bonkers pleased with. the level of disatisfaction i had wtih the old version just rose and rose and rose, and now it's pretty functional! not perfect! definitely need polishing! i sacrificed artistry a bit in lieu of finishing it faster. but i'm pleased with it, and i'll take a little break and then edit it! :D
i'm currently reading Hero of the Imperium by Sandy Mitchell, which is the first Ciaphas Cain ominubus, and am greatly enjoying it. it's got tropes i just adore: accidentally accidenting your way into more and more power and respect, people mistaking your very selfish actions for selfless heroism, and trying to navigate a sitation your way out of your league with without letting anybody else (who has total faith in you!) finding out how your just bumbling ahead... yeah, it's great. and the prose is easy to read, and unlike Horus Rising, despite knowing nothing about Warhammer lore, i'm finding it easy to follow <3 cain is just a really fun character!
also! i've joined librarything! i've made multiple attempts with storygraph because it's like the most popular alternative to goodreads (at least in my internet sphere) but there's something about the visual designs that bother me. somehow it's all very off-putting to me. my main reading log is on bookwyrm which technically is a part of the fediverse, but i just ignore that and log my reads) and i'm not really looking for a replacement. but it does get a bit... isolated? so librarything. anyway, so far i really like it!
Incest Bingo Card
Jul. 9th, 2025 09:30 pmevandar| Dream | Smarm | Unexpectedly encountering family member in a sexual context | Seduction/pursuit by younger character | Taboo |
| Serial incest | Rarepair | Mythology/The Classics | Offspring enters world as adult/rapidly ages to adulthood after being born | Age difference/Age gap |
| Time Travel - sleeping with self | Incest to characters but not audience | FREE SPACE | Estranged/separated relatives | It's not incest if you're not in love |
| MILF/DILF character | Multiple generations of incest | Disguised/mistaken identity | Incest to audience but not characters | It's not sex if... |
| Flaunting taboos | Relaxation | Not talking about it | Seduction | Contact with estranged family member forbidden/discouraged |
Sunshine Challenge - Day 3
Jul. 9th, 2025 09:03 pmevandar
Journaling prompt: What are your favorite summer-associated foods?
( Read more... )
Creative prompt: Draw art of or make graphics of summer foods, or post your favorite summer recipes.
( Read more... )
Chapter 3 of Master Detective Archives!
Jul. 9th, 2025 08:35 amdoreygOnto (with the slightly panicked vibe of a woman realising that she forgot to post several entries she totally planned to) chapter 3 of Master Detective Archives!
( Read more... )
That was another very good chapter! This game does fascinate me, even more now that I’m playing with the aid of beta blockers that are reducing my anxiety/depression haha. I think when you take it as a more straightforward mystery game it’s really good at laying out both that atmosphere and those mysteries, and I am definitely enjoying that. And am now over halfway through! So looking forward to seeing what comes next.
( Read more... )
That was another very good chapter! This game does fascinate me, even more now that I’m playing with the aid of beta blockers that are reducing my anxiety/depression haha. I think when you take it as a more straightforward mystery game it’s really good at laying out both that atmosphere and those mysteries, and I am definitely enjoying that. And am now over halfway through! So looking forward to seeing what comes next.
more fandom events
Jul. 8th, 2025 11:21 pmsvgurlflashexchanges is running size difference flash, a multifandom flash exchange featuring size differences. Nominations/sign-ups close on July 9th, 11PM UTC.sedoretuex, an exchange dedicated to celebrating the sedoretu (a specific organization of a poly marriage created by Ursula K. Le Guin), is accepting nominations until July 12th, 11:59PM EDT. More info, including the schedule/FAQ can be found HERE.raremaleslashex, a multifandom fic/art/podfic exchange focused on rare m/m ships, has opened sign-ups until July 13th, 8PM UTC.relationshipping, a gift exchange for incest ships (ships that are not canonically related are welcome for incest aus too), is open for nominations until July 13th, 9:59PM EDT.enemiestoloversex, a multifandom gift exchange focused on the "enemies to lovers" trope (though all ships are welcome, not just ones fitting that dynamic in canon), is accepting nominations until July 14th, 10PM UTC.austenexchange, a fic exchange focused on Jane Austen works, is open for nominations until July 15th, 10PM UTC.dreams_mayhem is running Hodge Podge, a multifandom challenge where each week players will fill prompts to score points by writing fics, creating poetry, or making graphics. Sign-ups are open until July 19th.fallingforyoufallexchange, a fall multifandom freeform exchange centered around ships getting together, is open for nominations until July 21st, 8PM EDT.scaldinghotcibingo is running Consent Issues Mini Bingo. Claims can be made until January 4th, 2026.Get to know me!
Jul. 8th, 2025 09:37 pmrynrose4Hello!
I'm Ryn (she/her) and I'm a fanfic author on AO3 under the tag Rynrose4. Valcarol is my number one pairing and Captain Marvel is my primary focus.
Tumblr: Ryn-Rising-44 (Aka Ryn_around_the_Rosey)
I am currently scouting out communities and hoping to get more involved with writing challenges/exchanges/drabbles, and other events!
I'm Ryn (she/her) and I'm a fanfic author on AO3 under the tag Rynrose4. Valcarol is my number one pairing and Captain Marvel is my primary focus.
Tumblr: Ryn-Rising-44 (Aka Ryn_around_the_Rosey)
I am currently scouting out communities and hoping to get more involved with writing challenges/exchanges/drabbles, and other events!
Habit Tracking: Week 26 (June 29 - July 05)
Jul. 8th, 2025 10:16 pmmistressofmuses
I was really quite happy with the color scheme this week. This is another sticker from the Atomic Pixies, a bee and a representation of the dance they do to convey information to each other.
This was a good week. It was the first time in quite a while that I'd had a chunk of time off of work (minus the memorial service earlier in June.) Over the course of the week, I managed to go out and do things every day that I had off, which was satisfying. Also doing okay on reading. Less so on creative stuff. I'm feeling really discouraged on writing, and I think I will take a break from it for a while. Quite happy with the hiking and such, though. Need to spend some time catching up on other things, though!
Goals for the week:
- I did read more of (and finished) Dead Silence (though then immediately started it over to read with Alex, because we needed something to do on the fourth while we waited for fireworks...)
- I started reading Hummingbird Salamander
- I did write up the books I read in June
- I got together with Taylor on Saturday
- I did post my writing goals, such as they are, for July
- Alex and I solidified the time off plans
- I did my getyourwordsout check-in (12334 words for June, year to date is 70817)
- We got plenty of outdoor time!
- I put my laundry away
- We cleaned the apartment (YET ANOTHER "annual inspection"; there have been three since the last time I complained about how many there were.)
- We celebrated the fourth of July... not for patriotic reasons, but as our 16th anniversary
- We bought our fruit and I made our fruit salad
- I did not finish the chapter of my WIP
- I did my July tracker grids
- I paid the car insurance
- We didn't really look at our subscription stuff
- I did not work on my pin boards
Tracked habits:
- Work - 2/7 - we were closed on Friday, and I took Thursday and Saturday off
- Household Maintenance - 6/7
- Physical Activity - 4/7
- Wrote 500/1000+ Words - 2/7 - one day of over 500 words, one day of over 1000
- Wrote on 2nd+ Draft - 0/7
- Meta Work - 5/7
- Personal Writing - 5/7
- Other Creative Things - 3/7
- Reading - 7/7 - mostly reading Dead Silence, though Alex and I read some of Duma Key, then we also started reading Dead Silence again lol, I started Hummingbird Salamander, and Taylor and I finished Installment Immortality, then started reading Witch King
- Attention to Media - 7/7 - Sunday listened to an episode of Re: Dracula and news coverage Alex had in the background; Monday had paranormal videos in the background, and then another ep of Re: Dracula (shovel day!); Tuesday we watched a couple episodes of the new season of Alone, though I dozed off; Wednesday had some background stuff Alex was watching, an ep of Re: Dracula, and listening to music; Thursday had storm chasing and paranormal videos in the background; Friday I listened to music in the morning; Saturday listened to music after Taylor went to bed.
- Video Games - 1/7 - Taylor and I played some Final Fantasy XIV and finished the fourth part of Shadowbringers, and started on Endwalker (getting through the first questline that sends you to fantasy!India.)
- Social Interaction - 4/7
Total words written: 3793 on book reviews and writing plans
Fannish Tuesday
Jul. 8th, 2025 10:39 pmcornerofmadnessI have no idea where the time is disappearing to but it's making me anxious.
Today I got a hair cut. I'm not too sure about it but my hair was such a mess I had to get rid of it. Don't get me started on the color. It WAS violet and last week it turned this color...for the second time with two different purples from two different companies. My hair dresser said well you can get color safe shampoos with violets and then it dawns on me, omg I think MY color safe shampoo is auburn. gah.
The author's virtual meeting today didn't go well for me. I couldn't concentrate. My total word count is what I usually write in a 25 minute session. Sigh. But hey if you write chillers or thrillers and want to join PM me and we'll talk (ditto if you'd like to join my by email writers critique group)
So it's Fannish 50 tuesday and I'm back to the women of fandom. I'm now going back to my older fandoms in no particular order. I'll be starting with Fullmetal Alchemist but it's SO hard to pick one female from all the great ones in this, Riza Hawkeye, Winry Rockbell, Izumi Curtis, Olivier Armstrong Gracia Hughes just to name a few. Riza and Winry are probably the two more or less main characters and the best well rounded (along with Izumi)
I'm going with Riza for this because a) she was my favorite b) even though this was written by a woman, Winry was written for the male gaze and had a lot of that loud screamy nonsense as part of her character. (I still can't believe this started over 20 years ago. My god!) A lot of Winry's traits were very common back then when targeting the main audience teen boys.
Riza on the other hand is quiet authority. She is amazingly competent and loyal and smart. That she is deeply emotionally intimately entwined with Roy is clear in all the things she does (and she is not blind to his faults). I DID want more out of her back story with her father and why she follows Roy into the military. I wish she had had time to give Riza's back story more flesh.
It's clear that the rest of Roy's men know to obey her, that she's the default secondary ruler of their little group. Riza's hand gun expertise is pretty cool but on the other hand she barely has a life outside of work and that is sad. Arakawa said in an interview somewhere that Roy and Riza would never get the chance to be together and that's pretty sad too.
Even sadder, Bing brought up like ONE picture of Riza that wasn't fan art (okay okay I know it's old but really?) Google had a few more. I chose this one with her and Hayate.
I miss writing her. I miss the heyday of the Roy/Riza communities
Today I got a hair cut. I'm not too sure about it but my hair was such a mess I had to get rid of it. Don't get me started on the color. It WAS violet and last week it turned this color...for the second time with two different purples from two different companies. My hair dresser said well you can get color safe shampoos with violets and then it dawns on me, omg I think MY color safe shampoo is auburn. gah.
The author's virtual meeting today didn't go well for me. I couldn't concentrate. My total word count is what I usually write in a 25 minute session. Sigh. But hey if you write chillers or thrillers and want to join PM me and we'll talk (ditto if you'd like to join my by email writers critique group)
So it's Fannish 50 tuesday and I'm back to the women of fandom. I'm now going back to my older fandoms in no particular order. I'll be starting with Fullmetal Alchemist but it's SO hard to pick one female from all the great ones in this, Riza Hawkeye, Winry Rockbell, Izumi Curtis, Olivier Armstrong Gracia Hughes just to name a few. Riza and Winry are probably the two more or less main characters and the best well rounded (along with Izumi)
I'm going with Riza for this because a) she was my favorite b) even though this was written by a woman, Winry was written for the male gaze and had a lot of that loud screamy nonsense as part of her character. (I still can't believe this started over 20 years ago. My god!) A lot of Winry's traits were very common back then when targeting the main audience teen boys.
Riza on the other hand is quiet authority. She is amazingly competent and loyal and smart. That she is deeply emotionally intimately entwined with Roy is clear in all the things she does (and she is not blind to his faults). I DID want more out of her back story with her father and why she follows Roy into the military. I wish she had had time to give Riza's back story more flesh.
It's clear that the rest of Roy's men know to obey her, that she's the default secondary ruler of their little group. Riza's hand gun expertise is pretty cool but on the other hand she barely has a life outside of work and that is sad. Arakawa said in an interview somewhere that Roy and Riza would never get the chance to be together and that's pretty sad too.
Even sadder, Bing brought up like ONE picture of Riza that wasn't fan art (okay okay I know it's old but really?) Google had a few more. I chose this one with her and Hayate.
I miss writing her. I miss the heyday of the Roy/Riza communities
A Bit About Me
Jul. 8th, 2025 07:49 pmnansliceI haven't done one of these in a while and now seems like a good time. Stolen from a_natural_beauty, original by sound_of_silence
1. First Name: Amy, although all of my friends call me Nan irl.
2. Age: 39
3. Location: PNW baybeeeeee, specifically Seattle.
4. Occupation: funemployed while I figure out what my silly little brain is doing.
5. Significant Other: I'm married tocypher, also known in this journal as Will. We've been together since 2019 and got married this past April! I love them deeply. <3
6. Kids: None!
7. Brothers/Sisters: My sister from my mom's first marriage! I have three brothers and a sister from my dad's first marriage but we're not close; that sister died and I found out four years later. :\
8. Pets: Four cats: Penelope, a tuxedo; Spicy, a tortie; Waffle, a tortie; Nugget, a void. And my baby lil dog, Selphie, who I adopted when she was 5 weeks old and she's now 12 years old, omg, how does time fly like this? ;o;
9. List the 3 biggest things going on in your life:
3 -battleshipex! I'm extremely excited to make this my entire personality for a while, lol.
2 - Homesteading! I thought I was done starting new things, then I started (indoors) 18 rattlesnake pole beans, 12 cranberry beans, 6 Sadie's horse beans, about a million of two different kinds of amaranths, and a bunch of zinnias, lol. Our tomatoes are loaded down with both green fruits and flowers, the 8 Sadie's horse beans that are already out are doing wonderfully (and have little bean pods forming aaaaaaahhhh), we've been eating zucchini with dinner almost every night this week, and the pumpkins are slowly growing little guys. ;3;
1 - Dealing with this ADHD diagnosis and mental health stuff. Which is going okay! Maybe!
10. Where and for what did you go to school? I dropped out of high school and got my GED, then went to a trade school and got my associate's in applied technology (a hopelessly dated degree lol), worked for a while, then went a private college and got my bachelor's in art. I only went to the private college because, as a non-traditional student (I was 26 when I started), my tuition and fees were basically cut in half.
11. Parents: My dad passed away of cancer eight years ago. I miss him every day. My mom is around and in pretty poor health (breast cancer); we live on opposite US coasts but talk almost every day.
12. Who are some of your closest friends? Will is my very bestest friend. My niece C is a very close friend, although she lives several states away. My cats and dogs, because who said friends had to be the same species. My immediately, physical circle is pretty quiet, and I will not lie, I am terribly lonely a lot of the time lmaooo.
a_natural_beauty, original by sound_of_silence1. First Name: Amy, although all of my friends call me Nan irl.
2. Age: 39
3. Location: PNW baybeeeeee, specifically Seattle.
4. Occupation: funemployed while I figure out what my silly little brain is doing.
5. Significant Other: I'm married to
cypher, also known in this journal as Will. We've been together since 2019 and got married this past April! I love them deeply. <3 6. Kids: None!
7. Brothers/Sisters: My sister from my mom's first marriage! I have three brothers and a sister from my dad's first marriage but we're not close; that sister died and I found out four years later. :\
8. Pets: Four cats: Penelope, a tuxedo; Spicy, a tortie; Waffle, a tortie; Nugget, a void. And my baby lil dog, Selphie, who I adopted when she was 5 weeks old and she's now 12 years old, omg, how does time fly like this? ;o;
9. List the 3 biggest things going on in your life:
3 -
battleshipex! I'm extremely excited to make this my entire personality for a while, lol. 2 - Homesteading! I thought I was done starting new things, then I started (indoors) 18 rattlesnake pole beans, 12 cranberry beans, 6 Sadie's horse beans, about a million of two different kinds of amaranths, and a bunch of zinnias, lol. Our tomatoes are loaded down with both green fruits and flowers, the 8 Sadie's horse beans that are already out are doing wonderfully (and have little bean pods forming aaaaaaahhhh), we've been eating zucchini with dinner almost every night this week, and the pumpkins are slowly growing little guys. ;3;
1 - Dealing with this ADHD diagnosis and mental health stuff. Which is going okay! Maybe!
10. Where and for what did you go to school? I dropped out of high school and got my GED, then went to a trade school and got my associate's in applied technology (a hopelessly dated degree lol), worked for a while, then went a private college and got my bachelor's in art. I only went to the private college because, as a non-traditional student (I was 26 when I started), my tuition and fees were basically cut in half.
11. Parents: My dad passed away of cancer eight years ago. I miss him every day. My mom is around and in pretty poor health (breast cancer); we live on opposite US coasts but talk almost every day.
12. Who are some of your closest friends? Will is my very bestest friend. My niece C is a very close friend, although she lives several states away. My cats and dogs, because who said friends had to be the same species. My immediately, physical circle is pretty quiet, and I will not lie, I am terribly lonely a lot of the time lmaooo.
News & Views
Jul. 8th, 2025 06:18 pmstonepicnicking_okapi1. It is day #2 of my job and I had to call #911 for my client. Talk about being thrown in the deep end! He's okay and I'm okay but it was still a wild second day.
2. Also Minisculus woke up with neck pain enough to make him sob and scream, and I had to leave him. I am being thrown the working mom angst right from the start.
3. But Minisculus placed 7th in his race at the regional club championship so he got to stand on the podium and a bronze medal the size of a dinner plate.
I'm trying to figure out my routine. I will add a second client on Thursday so I suppose I am waiting for that to figure out what I do when (like grocery shopping). I am reminding myself to take it easy and just handle one enormous shift at a time. Being a working mom fand having my kid be a latch key kid is enough for this week.
2. Also Minisculus woke up with neck pain enough to make him sob and scream, and I had to leave him. I am being thrown the working mom angst right from the start.
3. But Minisculus placed 7th in his race at the regional club championship so he got to stand on the podium and a bronze medal the size of a dinner plate.
I'm trying to figure out my routine. I will add a second client on Thursday so I suppose I am waiting for that to figure out what I do when (like grocery shopping). I am reminding myself to take it easy and just handle one enormous shift at a time. Being a working mom fand having my kid be a latch key kid is enough for this week.
Omens of Death: From Broken Clocks to Butterflies
Jul. 8th, 2025 03:26 pmdannye_chaseOn this day in 1822, the poet Percy Bysshe Shelley died. A few weeks earlier, he reported he’d seen an omen of his own death: his doppelganger, or double. Strangely enough, the double was seen by someone else as well.
People like to know what’s coming, even (especially) if it’s bad. It’s said no one wants to know the hour of their death, but if that were true, we wouldn’t have a whole list of death omens. Traditionally, signs of impending doom are found in two places: the natural and the supernatural. So come have a seat by the fire, and let’s hope we don’t cast headless shadows. (No, really.)
Check out the blog post for the whole story and some ominous writing prompts, such as:
When you believe it, then you will see it. Most people don’t believe in death omens, or at least, they say they don’t. But that doesn’t mean death omens can’t be dangerous. If you’ve got a character who really believes in this stuff, then they’re at risk of a self-fulfilling prophecy. In other words, if they’re convinced they’re going to die, they might take foolish risks, stop eating, or refuse treatment for an illness. But what if the signs pointed to someone else? Say you’ve got a character who truly believes Aunt Grizelda has been marked for death—and they stand to inherit her fortune. What might they do then when she stubbornly remains healthy?
DannyeChase.com ~ AO3 ~ Linktree ~ Weird Wednesday writing prompts blog ~ Resources for Writers
Plot Bunnies! Nooooo I don't need another one!
Jul. 8th, 2025 03:42 pmmelagan
I'm drawn to the idea of Rodney being ordered back to Earth. Only he doesn't want to leave, so he doesn't go back to Earth.
Why not? Because various Pegasus cultures step in. They recognize his value and put up a bidding war for McKay.
I want to see the SGC have to enter the Pegasus bidding war to get Rodney back (because we know the SGC will come to realize that Atlantis can't or won't function without him).
Which begs the next question. What would John do to get him back? The brain ponders...
*weeps* I don't need another bunny right now. How about you? Got any plot bunnies that are jumping up and begging for attention?
Do you side-eye them and pretend they aren't there? Kick them under the bed? Give up and feed them chocolate?
LJ Idol - Wheel of Chaos - Wk 3 - Ecco
Jul. 8th, 2025 07:32 ambleodsweanThat shattering glass, not a windshield but a doorway of shock and awe, into another place. As though she had left a place for the sole reason of arriving at another place. No wandering in between. She had never been good at telling a story, not like Daddy could be around a fire, but if she had survived then perhaps, she would have been able to say out loud those moments in a way that would capture the sheer impossibility of a human body in flight. Not falling but flying, the propulsion of her skeleton, all bone projectile, into the headlight lit darkness. The impact of her head with the windscreen was the killing blow, of course it was, yet she traveled onward still alive, through the glass, over the crumpled hood and into the forever night. Leaving both sneakers behind as she went. Did she see the stars in their firmament? In this strange leave-taking she lingered on a while, the air above and surround her insubstantial, the pavement solid beneath her, the summer scorched heat of it a small comfort to her cooling body, the bloody halo of her long blonde hair creating a vision of such suffering, such loss, hers a miraculous martyred death. Our Teenaged Lady of the Automobile Collision. The shattered shoulder bones, the leaking skull. The impossible sense of soaring passing through her nerve endings, dissipating through her pores. Simultaneous departure and arrival and departure. The touch and go of her short life.
The afternoon of the day had grown hot. Morning spent working in Daddy’s garden. It was time for the leafy branches to be snipped off close to the stem to allow the lengthening buds all the sunlight. He didn’t pay her out, they had nothing extra for allowances, but after the harvest late in the fall, just before winter, he could be generous with the crumpled bills that began to stuff his pockets. She’d walk her brothers to the store, cold winds blowing through them, and buy the boys candy bars and herself a fashion magazine.
Daddy had two other daughters before she was born. One lived up in Alaska with her own momma and the other one of them lived in an old camp trailer on Daddy’s property with her baby. She was her momma’s oldest, after her came four more, all boys and of course Daddy was partial to them on account that they were boys, but he was good to all his children and just the day before this day Momma said she was expecting another one come springtime. She whisper prayed that it would be a girl, a sister, another sister.
Now the day was bending open the bars that held her prisoner, soon she would be freed. It was just gone noon. She had made sandwiches for her brothers, cleaned the kitchen and Momma told her she was allowed to walk down the road to the swimming hole. She longed to go on her own and Momma said that was fine, too, but only on account that two of her brothers seemed to be suffering from the heat and Momma wanted to keep a closer eye on them. It was hot and had been hot for going on a week. They’d taken to sleeping out of doors on the wood slatted porch, but the night before a bear had woken them up pawing through garbage and the compost and Daddy said they had to be back inside the house until he either could get a decent shot off or someone else on the hill got him first. Dressed bear in the chest freezer would be a treat.
She was fourteen years old that summer day. Highschool in the fall and she couldn’t imagine what that would be like. Tried and failed. Thought she might be more than what she was, if such a thing was possible and even then, couldn’t tell you accurately what that more looked like. Knew that somewhere out there more was waiting to be had, one just needed to get to where it was at. Arrive with eyes wide opened and announce themselves with attention.
Cut off shorts and a bikini top, knock off Converse low tops, and her waist-length hair swinging over her shoulders, near white it was so light colored, and she swung it back and forth with a practiced toss of her head. Girl we known it was you from way down the road, he said to her when he pulled over. Driving his uncle’s truck leaning out the window at her diesel exhaust smelling so dangerously sweet and another boy she didn’t know jumped out and opened the passenger side door for her like they’d been expecting her and no one but her, and she climbed up into the cab and knew her daddy wouldn’t be at all happy because he said Levi’s family was one to steer clear of whenever mannerly possible. But Levi had his hair shorn short dagger sideburns delineating his jaw line and a swagger in his long-legged stride. On the bus, he sat way at the back while she had to sit in the front with her younger brothers, sometimes holding Caden’s hand to keep him from crying, which he was prone to doing because the only thing he wanted in the wide world was to be home in the kitchen with Momma. The high schoolers got off the bus first stop and when it came springtime, Levi started tapping her on the shoulder as he walked past and then that last week of school he sat himself down right behind her on the way home every day and caught the ends of her hair in his loose-fisted palms. Sometimes his fingers, dirty and sticky with cannabis oil would tap tap the knobs of her spine. You’re real skinny, he would tell her in a voice so quiet and low it could only be meant as a secret of some kind. And the nerves would explode across her shoulders and at night in her bed she would think about the heat of his fingers and roll over onto her stomach believing that wings could be coaxed out of the two thin blades in her back. Those shoulder bones were a storehouse inside her body for all that tingling sensation caused by his fingers on her flesh.
Now she was sitting on the bench seat right up next to him. Don’t be shy girl he laughed. Bet you ain’t brave enough to jump off that high rock. The other boy had his window rolled down open too and he craned his body out of it and whooped loud. Levi gunned the big truck and black exhaust rolled out of the dual pipes and he fishtailed a bit and she gasped but the boys laughed. And soon she was laughing too.
They raced one another down to the swimming hole but the boys veered up the narrow path to the high rock. She kept on down to the rocky beach, looking up. Can you see me from there? He called down to her and she nodded. What? He yelled. I can, I can see you! She visored both hands over her eyes and watched him watching her as he leaped off the rock.
There was no way not to be alive that afternoon.
She felt no pain outside the hurt of leaving. She couldn’t close her eyes as though to sleep; her soul was exiting through her vision itself. What’s the time, she asked. Her world spinning now, the dizziness of the calling fade. No more thought everything a retinal remembering.
That day in the rain when I was almost turned sixteen telling him I had missed that month and he began to speed down and down the winding dirt roads? Or later while we raised up three young’uns and he had a bad spell with liquor and somehow it all came to a screaming head that afternoon in the truck? Or was it only the two of us again, that morning of such sadness, driving in the snow back from the hospital? Or before all that, the first sweltered day of summer when he drove us down to the swimming hole, before ditching his friend because he said he had something he wanted to show me, just him and me, and I knew without knowing how that this was my arriving.
That day in the rain when I was almost turned sixteen telling him I had missed that month and he began to speed down and down the winding dirt roads? Or later while we raised up three young’uns and he had a bad spell with liquor and somehow it all came to a screaming head that afternoon in the truck? Or was it only the two of us again, that morning of such sadness, driving in the snow back from the hospital? Or before all that, the first sweltered day of summer when he drove us down to the swimming hole, before ditching his friend because he said he had something he wanted to show me, just him and me, and I knew without knowing how that this was my arriving.