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Fae gave me the neatest thing. Gwendle. She?s a she, not really a thing. Fae was wandering through the planes, she said, and when she got back, found that Gwendle had kind of tagged along with her.
Planar spiders usually make me a little leery, but she?s not one of those. Gwendle isn?t, I mean. She?s only about the size of a fifty cent piece, and looks like spun glass. I put her into my greenhouse, and every night, she weaves these fantastic webs, they?re ... I can?t even describe the beauty.
I don?t know if it is beauty anymore. It?s emotion, looking at them in the moonlight.
...Like the frozen web.
Webs.
But... Well. The webs melt in the morning. I run in now, into the greenhouse, right before the sun is up. So I can see that moment they have before they melt. ...Festoons of rainbow and moonlight and silver and gold, it... I almost can?t bear it. Sometimes, I just stand there... For hours, if Teddy didn?t come and get me to get ready for work.
It?s so beautiful
I don?t know, maybe it?s synchronicity, or... Father believes in Fate, and that the moment you think she?s a hissing snarling bitch with it out for you, she turns around and shows you, all along, she was just preparing you for the grace you earned.
I wonder if that?s what I have behind me, before me. I?ve never seen Fate, but I?ve felt her. Sometimes behind me, sometimes, as if she has my hand. Other times... I don?t know.
The Spirits are parent to Fate, well... to them all. I don?t know. I wonder if this is all there will ever be for me. Surviving, and eternally ducking under the next fall of the ax. A spiritual stranger in a reality where old souls all ready know and seek each other, new ones are making contact, the others are working with their karma as it was made...
And I?m just here.
Fae told me, it was all different, when I stopped just watching. It?s all different.
I still feel so far away.
I want to touch, and I can?t. I want to ... I... I want to mean. I want to feel, I...
The times I ... I know I?ve touched, that I know I?ve been touched... I don?t know, I guess I want more. A moment, a moment a... It?s only ever a moment.
When I thought it was more, it was all a li
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Webs. Webs. I touch them, Gwendles? are chilly and lay on my hand a moment and melt... What am I supposed to remember?! I swear, sometimes, I feel like I?m insane.
It nearly caught me, don?t forget the web. It was frozen. It was beautiful. Still.
All of its purpose was spent, a spiders web is only sticky a day or two. All that was left was some archetecture the spider forgot, never cared for save for how well it caught bugs, and left behind to
Stronger than steel. Spiders silk. It?s
I don?t remember. I don?t Why it?s just a web, it?s
remains
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I had a horrible nightmare. Why is this winter so hard? What does it want from me? I gave it offering of trust, of acceptance, of appreciation for the beauty and the rest, but it?s so... it?s so hard. It?s not the wolf clawing at the door, it?s the coyote nosing open the latch.
I feel like I must have forgotten something, but the Solstice was so bright and I never have before.
...But I have forgotten something. I just don?t know...
I ask the Spirits, but they rest under the ice. It?s too cold for me there. I wake up shivering and blue and it?s warm in the house. Teddy finally asked me this morning, please, stop. He?s afraid he won?t get me back.
So, I?ll just learn it.
The nightmare. It was... I don?t usually fall asleep like that, my mind, my soul, it stays awake. But I must have. I was standing in the ice.
Ice, snow, it was... everywhere. A sweep as vast as the ocean. There was only white. My eyes burned. The sun was overhead, and it was... just white.
But I saw Zane. She was toiling through the snow. She was... slow, weak, alone. And then, the ice and snow, it broke out from under her feet, and ...
It swallowed her. I screamed, I screamed until I was hoarse, I couldn?t move...
I woke up screaming. I?m still shaking. I went to her place, but she?s still gone. She said, she leaves sometimes, and comes and goes and... She has, a while, she didn?t really say but well, I wasn?t surprised that she had, considering ... considering everything, Alec, Zip, all that...
Even me, probably.
Everything she trusted wore her to death and then gave out from under her feet.
I can?t find her.
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I... I know it?s really just ... way too soon, but... I can?t help but ...wonder. A lot. ...Want. I... I don?t know. Want, I guess, is the right word. Want. When I see Shadow, I mean... She...
She talks to me. She tells me what she thinks, and feels, and fears and dreams... She talks to me. To me. She wants to know what I think. And sometimes, I can see, what I?ve said, it... It matters to her.
It ... I I really matter. I... I can?t ... Just what I say. It has to be that. I mean, why...
Sometimes, we?ll be talking, and something I say will just... light her up and ...
I ...I find myself trying to think up things that will. But I know better. I...
I just wish. I know I shouldn?t. They never come out right. I hope and ...
I wish I didn?t.
I try to remind myself. It?s just getting to know a friend better. It?s just wanting to have someone that will listen, that will talk, that will share. It?s...
not very much, I guess.
Why is it so hard to have?
I made a lot of hats. Silly things. Yule trees, Christmas, they were decorated and had little lights. I gave them to Paige, to Thorn, Patricia, Shadow... We played with them all night.
Shadow kept coming to me. ...I ...I wonder. So much. She was... right with me. I...
I wish I wouldn?t keep doing this.
I... Well, I went through the databases. You can find new stars there easier than any other way, really. It?s what I do anyhow. Sifting data to find the points where there is a star, and cross referencing for existing data.
I found one for her. But I don?t know her last name. It?s visible to the naked eye, but I found an old telescope in a junk shop. So I?m fixing it for her.
I just remembered last summer. So... Shadow Dances in the Summer Woods. Well. I know they hate it when I name stars because it?s often long. But it?s got it?s number, too.
I spent all night telling it about her. Everything I knew, I gave it. I could feel it before dawn. Then the Beemises took me home. It doesn?t bother them when I do things like that there. They know it?s my faith.
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I met a very odd man. Peculiar. His hair was all in spikes, like... I don?t know, a Mohawk gone horribly wrong. He had bells tied to the end of every spike. He had an eyepatch, but the eye was still there.
Some sort of hunter, he seemed. Zaraki. He ... Well. He seemed nice enough. He didn?t mind our questions, anyhow. Mine and Paiges. But... It was just so... so...
He does these things to handicap himself.
I...
I can?t understand it. It just... I mean... It?s...
Incredible.
How can you be normal and then do these things to ...
I don?t know whether to fear or pity or be furious with him. He can?t know. He can?t know what it?s really like. It?s just a game to him. Showing that he?s so good, he can still do it all with no depth perception and hair that rings.
It?s ...
It?s damn unprofessional, but... It... I don?t know. It bothers me.
But. He seems nice. I asked him for a bell, and he gave one to me. It?s purple. I gave him flourite, in return. Because flourite laughs and rings, like bells do. I guess, I ...I don?t know. Maybe because the bells should ring, and they don?t.
I mean, I learned when I was a baby, practically, how to walk without ringing the bells on my shoes, or around my neck. But it was so much more fun, to run down the hallways, ringing.
I remember that. I remember... My feet, on the wood floor, and stamping along and the bells would sing out... I was so little. But I was going one into two for so long... I guess about four or five years. So I can remember at least for the last year of it.
I wonder if it was a pain in the ass, for Mom and Dad. To have a baby who was a baby for so long. But all the photos and films, they seem so happy with me.
I was so happy. I didn?t know any better. I never have known anything else.
I guess I was a cute baby.
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Paige recruited me, Cam, and Shadow to ... desecrate, is all I can say, Ricks truck for Christmas. It was actually really fun. It was kind of a Nightmare on Elm Street Christmas thing.
He was handing out these funny little action sets. Avenging Unicorns. They come with little people to impale, which I thought was great. So I made one big. And rigged a few motors and cables, so the stuff would move. It was pretty awful, I guess, but shiny and funny.
Paige said she?d take the heat for it, but I know that I?m going to get my head jammed in his armpit again pretty soon. Blah.
I?m trying, so hard, to just let everything be. I ... It?s hard but... I can?t constantly be reaching for everything that?s out of my grasp. What I?ve forgotten, what caught me, everything. I... It?s just too much.
It would be nice if I
Well. The greenhouse is doing very well this winter. I really get a kick out of the surprise on peoples faces when I bring in a lot of fresh produce. The tomatoes in all colors and shapes, and peppers, herbs, green beans all that. In all those colors. I... Well, I kind of got hooked on that. Finding seeds for plants that would be different. White eggplant, purple carrots, striped beets...
They?re good, I mean, so much better than the market. I guess because it?s right there. It doesn?t sit anywhere but in my ice box or in my pantry.
I love watching Jessica light up when I bring her the stuff for salsa. Because she does. It?s different from when she?s lit about something gory or violence. It?s different, but I like it just the same. Thorn gets so thrilled, she?ll start eating stuff out of the basket. And then naming off what she?d make of it, if there?s any left.
It helps me a lot, in there. I can hear the faint crystalline song Gwendel hums when she?s weaving, at night. During the day, Charlie hangs out in there because it?s warmer. And she sings for me.
Sometimes, I feel like there?s some ... I don?t know. Maybe a ghost that forgot itself. Just a presence. Kind. Glad of the growth even in winter. I guess it is some against the natural flow of things, but it?s everything I miss so much in winter, even though winter gives me so much to miss in the summer.
Well. If there is a ghost in there, I?m sure it?ll eventually remember itself with so much going on. It might be an elemental, or a fae or something, but it?s so faint. If it is, I?ll have to help, all that iron would keep those things trapped. But if it?s happy there, then I guess it doesn?t matter.
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[found visions]
Upon coming home, he may note a rather unusual amount of light coming from the graveyard.
Coming closer, one could hear the sound of a secondary hum; another generator tucked politely to the side, while cheery little fingers of lights, thirty or more extra outdoor candles had 'mysteriously' sprinkled themselves all through out solemn headstones jutting out from snow.
Tinsel, respectfully tied around the bases of some headstones (so as not to obscure the writings on them, whether time had rubbed them out or not) giggled the soft yellow orange 'candle' glow across pristine snow marked with someone's foot prints which tracked and re tracked many times from the generator, back to candles, along chords hooked into the mild puttputtputt of engine.
Beside the generator were the usual red canisters of extra fuel, though tucked underneath one corner of the fuel canister was a..zip lock baggie? Yes, inside the clear plastic baggie was a note. Its hand writing was childish in its stubborn, harsh press with pencil to paper. As if whomever wrote it was determined to make it legible in its scrawl. In print, not written.
Nova,
I lied when I said I'd only bought six. I bought thirty. But I knew you only had one generator, so I talked to Cam about it and about the Wall Mart, and she said with this really odd dreamy look in her eye she'd help me buy one another one of these loud things, so she did.
Its a nice graveyard, really! Though I swear I kept thinking someone was watching me. I hope they, nor you mind. I kind of like it though, its real pretty on the snow. Cam won't explain who they are -- I'm pretty sure it's ghosts but I don't ask 'cause you know she's always busy plugging her ears incase someone says towel...Oh man, am I rambling?
Hey, I got some extra gas too for the generator. Stuff stinks to high heaven. Don't make anything explode okay?
Oh. Right! Merry Christmas Desdenova!
Love,
Shadow
Anna met him before he could see anything unusual. The ghost-girl was all smiles and giggles, insisting that she had already spooked someone at her bridge and was ready to come home. That didn't cause the youth to suspect anything, not even when she asked Charlie to fly on ahead and make sure that the oppossum that frightened her so wasn't near her grave.
Even the dead had their own fears, after all, and oppossums looked like enormous rats to Anna.
The restless spirits were quite so, Desdenova noted, curious, as they neared the cemetary. If he didn't know any better, he'd suspect they were having a loud and rowdy holiday party.
Then, he saw the lights. Stunned, lashes flickering, he stopped short and stared. Anna burst into laughter and seized his hand in her cool grasp, dragging him through the gates. Dancing and spinning away, joined with the younger spectors in a gleeful dance of misty apparation over lit snow, tinsel fluttering in their wake, it was bizarrely beautiful in the flickers of ectoplasm.
All the lights. ...Shadow, yes, he recalled, and followed the insistant tug of one of the oldsters to the generator placed beside the first. The note, he picked up and opened to read, a slow flaring of smile shining over his usually solemn features. His gaze turned over the spirited spirits, oh, very pleased they were, and he. Mercy Dale Cemetary was all faiths, and the candles reminded each of the deceased of their respective winter celebrations in life. The tinsel, it was just fun to flitter around.
Teddy finished muscling Desdenovas' smaller hand-cranked record player to the porch and dusted his hands off with a pleased hissing and rasping. Moments later, he had an album of dance music playing, and clapped paws to encourage the spirits to celebrate. Anna pulled the youth for an energetic reel, ignoring the oldsters pretended disapproval as they gathered for their figures and quadrilles.
Desdenova would light the candles for them each night till the New Years, yes, and so would the spirits. Just in their own way.
I can?t believe it. I... I just ... I?m... I?m so ... I?m overwhelmed, I... I came home, and
Lights! Everywhere! All over the cemetary! Lights! I... It was... I was just so... I...
Those... Candles. Christmas candle lights, the big ones, they were everywhere! And tinsel and garland and... I... And a whole other generator! A new one, five hundred horse power, not like the old two fifty I salvaged out of Ricks boneyard! I... I wow.
And music! Teddy was out on the porch, playing old Christmas records, and... Oh, the ghosts were so happy! They were dancing, and playing, and Charlie was diving through the tinsel and Anna throwing snowballs and
I... I was... it just... I
Shadow brought it all. She said, Cam helped her get the generator, that was from them both, and ... I...
She did that for my cemetary. ...For me...? I...
<font color="#95542E" size="1">[ August 06, 2006 04:13 PM: Message edited by: Desdenova ]</font>
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What does she SEE in that overbearing pointy headed muscle bound FREAK?! She doesn?t even KNOW HIM! I?ve known him longer! He?s a -- I can?t BELEIVE IT!
I -- I just want to scream, I was... I ... I was so stunned, I ... And I have to be polite! I can?t say ?Oh SPIRITS Shadow, you are TOUCHING HIM? and I UGH. She did. She sat in his lap, she KISSED him!!
I...
...I wanted to ... I didn?t want to scream. I ...felt like crawling away. With no where to go. I?m so tired of crying. I?m so tired.
But. I can?t do that, I have to be the gentleman, I have to ... sit there and watch and be glad I have Mobius syndrome because the hurt won?t show all over my face.
And now I?m sitting here. I Home, I mean. At my desk.
I... I ...
she was so ... she never lit like that for me. Never like that. I?m such an idiot. why would she?! how could she? I?m not ... I?m not anything like him. I?m not a mature man. I?m not big and muscular, I never will be. I?m not ...
So I watched a while. All I could stand. All the ... I mean, it was a lot of emotion and vibration I can?t even give name to. I could see, she was excited just to see him. Thrilled. More than I?ve ever seen from her.
More than I could ever gain from her.
He... he accepted kind of like it was his just due. That it was inevitable that she should fall to his charm and charisma and big lumpy muscles.
Merry Fucking Yule. Loser.
-
So. I ... well. What can I do? I... I want to try and ... compete, I guess, but ... why? It?s a lost cause. I?m the brother. I wish I could just get that through my head again. Why did it go out? Because some stupid bitch thought I was sexy and managed to figure out every one of my buttons?
Is this getting older? Will I go from eighteen to nineteen finally? Mom smiled and said, no, honey, this is still stuff from thirteen.
Well it hurts, I hate it. I?m... I?m so tired of it.
Now she?s living with him. And his daughter.
He has everything. A nice house, an interesting life, family, he?s got a daughter all ready, he has...
the ability to be something to someone. Someone I care for. I should be happy that she?s not trying to pull something from nothing. I should be happy she?s so happy.
She is. It kills me as much as I want to see it.
I made some lame remark that gee I guess I can?t ask you out again. Because I wanted to. I was going to. HELLO ZARAKI. She laughed and said, oh, I?d go out with you anytime.
Because it wouldn?t mean anything. Just ... going out with good old Des. Nothing to worry about there.
I read too much into everything. It all meant so much to me. ...so much...
But, it?s just Shadow being happy and enjoying life and I shouldn?t take it so seriously.
She?s a grown woman. I?m just a boy. A child. I shouldn?t forget that as much as I do.
Well. I gave her the stuff for Christmas. Telescope, star, charts... I gave her five of Barnabus?s cards, i?d signed them. She can give them to the street rats she really thinks wants to work, he?ll hire them. Give them a chance. Told her I could get more when those were gone.
I even sent stuff for him and the kid. What a nice guy I am. Zip keeps saying that the bad guy never gets the girl. Neither does the nice guy.
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I ...could feel it shatter, that time. Last time. I could feel it... just... break. Glass. Ice. It hurt. A lot.
Funny thing was, I know Shadow was trying to make me smile. Make me happy. Guess she?d noticed how depressed I was. Didn?t notice why. Why would she?
She... Well. Llyluna was there. She insisted on curling around us. I guess that?s okay. So, Shadow gave me a late Yule present. A necklace. A ...tiny glass carnation petal. She explained... it was loyalty, fragility, beauty, strength... and... and...
I was such a good brother.
I... Just... I couldn?t stop it that time, it was all too fresh, and I just started ...crying. I... I could feel it. Like a bullet hitting. Slow. Smashing. All to pieces.
All I could say was I didn?t want to be your brother. And ... Then I realized I?d said it, and ... Oh, Spirits. I... She didn?t even notice! I?d been agonizing every time I saw her. Every time. Does she want me to pay more attention, will she let me hold her hand, will she let me be closer, can I be any more close, she tells me everything, I tell her everything...
She didn?t notice. How could she? What am I, anyhow?
It hurts. I mean, Nathanial had said, I should say when I didn?t want to be the brother, that I meant something else, and I said I didn?t want to pressure or... but ... Okay, so I did say it, I didn?t mean to, but I did, and it was worse.
Oh, no, I have no idea you?ve been hoping that I was being so kind so close so ... ... No, a brother. It wasn?t anything but that to her. And here I am, dumping what I shouldn?t on her. I mean, I know it wouldn?t change anything. I?m... just... outside again.
Chest feels empty. Kind of crushed, I guess. Maybe just the ribs, I don?t know.
i?ll never make anyone shine like i saw her. never. never.