Show me you really care!

[extemporally]

This is not so much a post, as a couple of things which are delightful.

• From The Ashes is delightful! So I was just like, "la la la, I will submit an application cos Mik said I could and I'll take an insanely long time to reply to emails and get everything together" and -- well okay it is STILL DELIGHTFUL. Hijinks! Chess! Age-reversals! This is the part where I beam all around. We need some The Like representation, though! Z at Hogwarts. Tennessee at Hogwarts. :D? :D?
  
  
• Speaking of Z, this picture
  
  
  
  Well I could call it delightful, but I can think of some other words that would fit as well. >:D
  
  
• So I was on holiday when my parents were like, "I wonder what happened to the gramophone!" and I said, "WE HAVE A GRAMOPHONE??" and they said, "Well, yes. It's in storage!" Now it has been retrieved! And there is a record store whom, when I called, had a copy of The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders From Mars. Hi, David Bowie, hi. I find the way you scream on Moonage Daydream relentlessly endearing. Soon I will be able to listen to it, ON THE GRAMOPHONE
  
  
• Work is good! I have an off day tomorrow, which is also good.
  
  
• I have been toying with writing some more original fic lately. Lately I've been thinking about a girl named Zelia. Studying languages in university -- hopelessly impractical, she's afraid. On her year abroad, she's a language assistant in France maybe (definitely). The small flat she rents is a little bit (a lot) cramped, so she heaps blankets and pillows on her landlord's long dining table and sleeps there, and hopes to God she won't roll off. Her best friend has had a baby. She's a little bit in between things, a little bit lonely. In the story it's never really specified where she comes from. Likes: long beaded jewellery.

Comments

[egelantier.livejournal.com]

you should definitely talk more about this high school au now >:D

[extemporally.livejournal.com]

SO. She and Tennessee and Laena and Reni (or you can go old-school and say, Charlotte) are in the same high school! But because the world is unjust and wrong in too many ways, and possibly also because they are too weird and clever to fit in quite safely, they have no friends other than each other! And they get bullied. And Z gets into fights. :(

Some days she mouths off at the older girls who think it's fun to put them down, but sometimes she's forced to use her fists. And if Z is very honest about it, that doesn't require much forcing either.

[egelantier.livejournal.com]

that's beacause she's fierce and protective and would never stand down. is there some fussing over her by other three (four) in school bathroom afterwards? do they spend evenings together in somebody's bedroom, planning revenge and mass destruction? do they make some other weirdo friends after all or just stop talking to anybody but each other?

[redbrickrose.livejournal.com]

I would read epics about this. ♥

[extemporally.livejournal.com]

Oh man, so much fussing! After a while they'd just go "Z" and Z would say, "Okay, okay, next time --" and they're never quite sure if she means, next time I'll beat them, or next time I'll stick to mouths, not fists.

I think weirdo friends are in order! (RYAN ROSS HINT HINT.) But I would like a good long bit about them being fourteen years old and being self-consciously weird in the way fourteen year olds are (OH MY GOD, SO WEIRD), speaking their own language, and maybe only making other friends in, say, sophomore year.

[egelantier.livejournal.com]

ha, your hints got my hints. but yeah, nowhere to hurry! five people are pretty much enough to make your own world and don't are about everybody else.

(consequently: are you doing bbb? what are your thoughts on your bbb(s)? :D? :D?)

[extemporally.livejournal.com]

Or even just four of them, at the very first! Being all awkward and weird about boys -- not romantically, mind you, but even just how to talk to them normally, b/c that gets weird and awkward for loser girls after middle school, especially when you're bad with people generally. I am most charmed by the thought of someone like Tennessee being the first to talk to a boy (RYAN ROSS), and Z being all "uh, hi" until they hit it off properly.

(I probably will sign up! I haven't yet, but that's because I am just not at all sure what I want to do: complete something longstanding, or write something new? DECISIONS. I had better hurry though, b/c of the signing up deadline. So basically: :D there-is-no-punctuation-mark-for-being-tentative!)

[egelantier.livejournal.com]

little they would know that ryan ross and his friends are weirdos in their own right. but oh, what shenanigans could they have, before and after.

(HA, THIS IS WHY BBB HAS TWO WAVES. one for old and one for new! *tempts*)

[extemporally.livejournal.com]

"So," Z said, brazening it out because she still wasn't really sure about this whole thing, talking to boys, "Yesterday, we had a sleepover, and we made a shrivelled cake."

Ryan's eyes widened. "Shrivelled cake?" he said, sounding alarmed. He didn't speak very much or say things very expressively but at least that's how he sounded. Or maybe he was interested, Z couldn't tell.

"Yeah, uh," Z said. "We made a cake and we put it in the oven, then we turned off the oven and left it to cool, but then we forgot it was there? And we left it until the morning, when we opened the oven and -- shrivelled cake!" She grinned slightly thinking about how they'd laughed themselves sick.

There was a pause. Ryan was looking at her confusedly.

Z made a mental note: RYAN ROSS: DO NOT TALK ABOUT CAKES and felt humiliated. "Moving on," she muttered. She wished Tennessee were here. Goddamn Tennessee, having classes which made her end school later than the rest of them. Ryan Ross was her friend.

[egelantier.livejournal.com]

RYAN ROSS: DO NOT TALK ABOUT CAKES

i've just choked on my tea and only barely didn't snort it all over my friend's long-suffering laptop. you should tell me more now that i've put the tea away!

[extemporally.livejournal.com]

"Hey," Tennessee called, hurrying across the hall towards Z and Ryan. Z felt relieved. Saved by the bell! Saved from not having to talk to weirdos like Ryan, oh my god. Even though she guessed the whole cake thing was kind of a weird thing to tell to people who just didn't get it. She felt kind of grumpy.

"So," Ryan said to Tennessee, face deliberately turned away from Z, "Yesterday Spencer -- you know Spencer, right? My best friend, who goes to another school --" Z had only heard of Spencer a couple of times, but she was pretty sure Tennessee knew who Spencer was, so she thought what, "He put pants on his head and he didn't say anything for thirty minutes. It was really funny."

Over Ryan's shoulder, Tennessee gave Z a startled look. Z shrugged in bewilderment and tapped the side of her head gently, and because Tennessee gave her a reproachful look for that she said loudly, "So, what are you doing for English class now, Tenn?"

[egelantier.livejournal.com]

you know, z and ryan, people in glass houses shouldn't be throwing stones. or shrivelled cakes. also talking directly to each other help! awwww, they all are so adorable. mooooooooooooore.

[extemporally.livejournal.com]

They're all like "TALKING TO PEOPLE HELP" and bwahh, social things are hard sometimes. DO NOT JUDGE OK :(

(Also Spencer the dudebro dork. You know this is true.)

Tennessee gave Z a look. "Flowers for Algernon," she said. "You know that."

"Guess I just forgot," Z said, as lightly as she could. Of course she knew it. Actually, she was doing the same text, she'd asked that for the sole purpose of making conversation. Tennessee just wasn't making this any easier.

Ryan lit up. "Hey!" he said. "I've read that! Did you like it?"

"I guess," Tennessee said doubtfully. "I liked reading it, but it's hard having to talk about it and write essays, you know what I mean? Sometimes I feel like I have thoughts but I don't know what they are."

Z knew what she meant. But maybe this wasn't the best thing to say around Ryan Ross, because she knew Ryan Ross was supposedly this big shot at English, had won a couple of prizes last school year, so if he said anything condescending god help him --

Ryan was nodding sympathetically. "Yeah," he said. "I know what you mean, sort of. I just take out the bits I liked and try to talk about why I liked them, you know?" He threw a glance over at Z, almost like he was asking her something, and Z felt oddly gratified.

Z cleared her throat. "Isn't it going to be harder," she said, her voice cracking because she was kind of nervous, "Because I heard the version we've got is the condensed version, without any sex and everything."

"I didn't know that," Ryan said. He sounded mildly impressed.

[egelantier.livejournal.com]

ah-ha! the trick is to find the right topic! (also mannn, flowers for algernon. i've only read the short story, but it haunted me for years, seriously. it's so awesome).

[extemporally.livejournal.com]

Dude, I know, right. Although I first read it when I was twelve. The main message I took away from it was, "I WANT TO BECOME SMARTER TOO." Uhhh, it is highly possible I was not taking away the same message it'd been intended with.

But anyway. Yeah, it's something I reread pretty frequently, maybe once a year. Charlie :(

[egelantier.livejournal.com]

i still remember this moment when he smartens up enough to realize that people at his workplace were mocking and bullying him all the time. and later, when he's unable to read the books he loved. ugh, so much heartbreak.

[softlyforgotten.livejournal.com]

Oh my god, I want this so much. MORE HIGH SCHOOL AUs ABOUT THEM, PLEASE.

RYAN ROSS: DO NOT TALK ABOUT CAKES ♥♥♥

Also, the bit at the beginning about Z getting into fistfights: so much yes. Her hair getting yanked so hard that she wants to cry -- that's why she cuts it short, in the end -- throwing her fists around and coming out bloody and bruised, lip swollen, black eye forming, and her knuckles bleeding.

[extemporally.livejournal.com]

So I keep thinking that someone's going to write more soon, right? Soon?

RYAN ROSS DOESN'T WANT TO HEAR ABOUT YOUR STUPID CAKES. >:(

And yes yes yes -- Z never cries, that's a huge sign of weakness.

[softlyforgotten.livejournal.com]

I finished my ghostfic, if that helps! It'll be off getting betaed for a while, but 16k of high school AU sooner or later?

Tennessee hates that she doesn't, though, Z clenching her free hand into a fist, fingernails digging into her skin and leaving white marks while Tennessee bandages her up. "It's just me," she says, "I don't mind," but Z never does.

[extemporally.livejournal.com]

Duuuuude, ghostfic!! That is a great help indeed. *grabby hands*

Tennessee doesn't know where Z learnt how to fight. She supposes that one doesn't learn, exactly, one needs and needs and needs to learn by getting beat up again and again until suddenly one knows how, the same way that a baby who's tossed into the ocean learns how to swim. Z always starts the fights with these girls, though, the ones who make mean remarks and would be content to let the buck stop there, them vaguely on top and Z & Tennessee vaguely at the bottom, only Z doesn't let it go, has to plunge herself into fights until she's bruised blue-black and scratched bright red.

She always gets in the worst trouble afterwards, too, because there's no denying (Z never denies it) that she always starts the fights. "Elizabeth," the head says, "what will we do with you?" and once Tennessee'd been in the office too, seen Z give the man a baleful stare through her swelling eye as if to say, you tell me.