You sit shoulder to shoulder in the auditorium. Your scratchy black suit rubs against two arms wrapped in finer material. You shift in your seat, moving uncomfortably in the plush chair beneath you. Your leg is shaking; you are anxious for the show to begin. The massive room rumbles with murmurs of conversation—inquisitions about how the show will be, complaints of hunger, protests of too-tight clothing, and ties choking necks. You are silent.
September 6, 1981
Louise trudged up the dusty gravel path towards her home, a rotted trailer perched atop a steep hill. The bus driver never ventured up the path, leaving Louise to trek the quarter mile herself. She stopped momentarily and watched as the yellow bus sped away; the shadow of a lone hand waved her goodbye. She waved back, too late for anyone to see it, “Bye, Miles.”
Her house stank of cigarette smoke. The soft shag carpet collected to odor, spitting it out with every step. The windows and walls were yellowed with nicotine. The trailer was quiet; the constant droning of the radiator was the only thing to be heard. Louise set her backpack down and walked into the kitchen to make herself dinner. Her mother wouldn’t be home for several hours, and school lunch was never enough.
After Louise ate a measly bowl of microwaved leftover Kraft, she sat down to do her homework. She pulled out the math sheet they had gotten that day. Numbers shifted and combined; they peeled off the page and swam around her. Louise needed help. She dialed a number she knew by heart. The line rang.
“Hello?” a woman’s voice answered, her voice slightly distorted through the phone.
“Hi, Mrs. Wilson,” Louise said in a timid voice.
“Hi, Louise,” Mrs. Wilson’s voice softened, “I’ll get him for you.”
Louise heard her muffled yell, “Thank you, ma’am.”
“Hey Louise! What’s up?” a boy's voice asked.
“Hi, Miles. Have you done your math homework?”
“I’m doing it right now.”
Louise stretched the cord to where she sat at the table, “Great.”
The lights dim, and silence washes over the crowd. The curtains part. Fifty people in tuxedos sit on stage, various instruments in hand. The conductor stands tall. He introduces the orchestra, lifts his gloved hands, and the music begins.
March 9, 1983
“You’re still coming, right?” Miles questioned nervously.
“Yes, Miles, I’m still coming,” Louise rolled her eyes before smiling at him.
Miles relaxed a little bit, “Okay, good.”
Miles had mousy brown hair that was cut short. His dad had served in the military, so he thought this boy should have a ‘man’s haircut.’ He was tan even in the wintertime. He had bright hazel eyes that glowed electric green in the sunlight. Louise was about an inch taller than Miles, a fact she was immensely proud of.
The pair walked down the school hallway. It was Friday. Wonderful, glorious Friday. Louise rejoiced in the days that she didn’t have to come into school and pretend she liked people— pretend she liked anything, really. She hated the teachers, her peers, the hospital grey of the walls. She liked Miles. He ignored the cigarette stink of her clothes and the rudeness of her tone.
Today was Miles’ birthday. He’ll be ten. Miles had invited everyone to the party; there would be a bounce house. He’s ‘going all out for the big one o’ as he kept telling Louise. She was nervous about the party; her gift was okay at best, and she dreaded the disappointed but polite smile she knew Miles would pull.
“My mom will be here right after school to pick us up. You know what my mom’s car looks like, right?” Miles asked.
“Yeah, I remember.”
Lousie walked out to Mrs. Wilson’s car, a sleek, silver Porsche; Louise felt like a celebrity when she rode in it—rich and important.
“Hi, Louise,” Mrs. Wilson smiled, “How was school?”
“Hi, Mrs. Wilson. It was good.”
Louise settled into the plush leather seats and set her backpack in front of her. They sat in silence for a moment, the soft drum of the radio filling the air. Miles ripped open the door, excitement lighting up his face. He sat down, his position mirroring Louise’s.
“Hey, buddy. How was your day?” Mrs. Wilson asked.
“It was great, Mom,” he smiled.
She smiled back warmly, “Well, that’s good.”
Mrs. Wilson pulled out of the parking lot, Louise and Miles chatted idly about school and the party. After a short while, they pulled up to Miles’ house—a two-story white house with columns in front. Louise loved it. Sometimes, during sleepovers, late at night, she pretended it was hers. She quietly walked down hallways, running her fingertips across the smooth wallpaper. She felt the soft carpet on her bare toes and imagined it knew the shape and weight of her foot. She opened the fridge and pretended not to be surprised at the selection of food that awaited her. Then, she would return to Miles’ room and lie down next to him in the sleeping bag he lent her, stare up at the tiny glowing stars stuck on his ceiling, and pretend it was her and her mom that put them up— that it was her mom that held the step stool for her so she wouldn't fall.
Louise and Miles hopped out of the car, ran up to his room, and plopped their bags down. They still had a few hours before their other classmates would arrive. They sat on the ground and leaned against the bed. Louise pulled out Miles’ gift from her bag and handed the small gift bag to him, “Happy Birthday.”
“It’s not time for the party,” Miles said, confusion evident in his voice.
Louise shrugged, “I wanted to give it to you now.”
Miles smiled at her before gently taking the tissue paper out of the bag and reaching in. He pulled out a light blue paper swan. Lousie had spent hours getting the folds just right so the paper was sharp instead of rumpled. It was beautiful.
“Louise,” Miles started, his face curved into a slight frown, like he was about to cry, “Thank you.”
“Do you really like it?” Louise asked nervously; she fidgeted with her fingernails.
Miles set the swan down gently and dove towards her, wrapping her in a hug, “I love it.”
The party was a hit. Louise nearly made herself sick from the combination of an ungodly amount of candy and jumping in the bounce house. Almost everyone from their class was there, shoving presents in Miles’ hands before running to the snacks and entertainment. Night fell, and Louise climbed in the Porsche again, though it was just her and Mrs. Wilson this time.
“Did you have a good time, Louise?” she asked, making eye contact through the rearview mirror.
“Yeah, it was awesome. Thank you for having me,” Louise responded, polite as ever.
“Oh, you are always welcome, sweetie,” Mrs. Wilson smiled.
Louise looked out the window for the rest of the drive, the stars blurring against the black night sky. They pulled up to Louise’s house; her driveway was empty.
“Are you sure you are okay until your mom gets here?” Mrs. Wilson asked.
Louise smiled fakely, “Yeah I’ll be alright. She should be home soon.”
“Okay, sweetheart.”
Louise climbed out of the car and walked to her door. She looked back before stepping inside—Mrs. Wilson’s face was a mirage of pity and sympathy. Louise waved and stepped inside, choking down guilt as she did.
The sweet sound of a violin fills your ears—a lone instrument bellowing a quiet tune. It starts slow—soft, like a warm hand caressing your face, a mother wiping away your tears.
You forget yourself for a moment; you are back in your childhood home, where your bed is indented with your shape. You smell your favorite meal being cooked downstairs. You hear your mother humming her favorite song from the kitchen. Your father isn’t home yet. You are excited to see him.
You wish it were real.
It is not.
June 11, 1984
Louise was having a terrible day. Her mother was off work and slumming around the house— she was like a ghost in her own home, and she had nothing to do. They didn’t have cable this month, so Louise’s options were to sit in her bed and do nothing or visit Miles. She chose the latter. Louise bid her mom a short goodbye, telling her where she was going and not much else, and peddled off on her bike. She was drenched by the time she arrived at Miles’ house. So she ditched her bike in the grass and ran to ring the doorbell. Mrs. Wilson answered.
“Oh. Hello, Louise,” she smiled.
Mrs. Wilson was a nice woman, and Louise absolutely loved her. She was as thin as a twig but had a motherly warmth about her that Louise itched for. Miles was the spitting image of her, matching her tanned skin and bright eyes.
“I’m afraid Miles isn’t here,” she continued.
“Oh,” Louise said, disappointment swirling around her tongue.
“I’m sorry, hun,” Mrs. Wilson gave her a sympathetic look, “He’s out with his dad fishing for the day.”
“That’s okay,” Louise lied and started to walk back to where she abandoned her bike.
“Wait a second, sweetheart,” she called, “Do you want some lemonade? I’d hate to just send you home after you rode all this way.”
“Sure, Mrs. Wilson. Thank you.”
Louise followed her into the kitchen and sat down at one of the barstools to wait. It wasn’t long before she had a nice tall glass of lemonade in front of her and a bag of chips in her hand.
“You can go watch TV if you want,” Mrs. Wilson smiled at her, “I’ll be out in the garden if you ever need anything.”
“Okay, thank you,” Louise said.
She wandered into the living room, and the plush carpet under her feet felt amazing. She flicked on the television and turned it to her favorite cartoon station. She did feel strange behaving like she lived there, especially when the house was empty, but her desire to relax in the air conditioning trumped the feeling. She mindlessly watched Jerry outsmart Tom in the comfort of a home that wasn’t her’s.
Louise finished her snack but didn’t feel like returning home; she knew her mother would be there, heating the house with cigarettes and sex. Mary had moved on from Steve quickly. So, she laid down and continued watching television. At some point, she fell asleep. Louise woke up to the soft voices of Miles’ parents talking in the kitchen. Someone had turned the TV off and taken her dishes. She could hear the shower running upstairs. Louise had no idea what time it was; the sun was now visible in the living room windows, the sky was orange. She was about to get up and ask Mrs. Wilson when she heard her name. Miles’ parents were talking about her. She got up as quietly as she could and snuck closer to the swinging kitchen door.
“Is there something we can do?” Mrs. Wilson asked her husband in a concerned tone.
“I don’t think so, Jenny,” Mr. Wilson responded, “She just has a hard life, that’s all.”
“I feel like we should do more for her.”
Mr. Wilson sighed, “We can only help her when she’s here. You know what Mary thinks about handouts.”
“Oh, poor Mary,” Mrs. Wilson said, her tone sympathetic, “I should call her and tell her Louise is gonna stay the night.”
Louise heard footsteps sound in her direction. She ran as softly as she could back to her position on the couch, feigning sleep. Mrs. Wilson swung open the door and picked up the phone that hung on the wall next to it. Louise heard the click-clack of buttons being pressed, the muffled ringing, and then her mother’s voice on the other line.
“Hey, Mary,” Mrs. Wilson said, “Is it alright if Louise stays here tonight? She passed out on the couch and I don’t think it’d be smart to have her ride home now.”
Lousie couldn’t hear her mother's exact words, but she must have said it was fine because the next thing Louise knew, she was being picked up and carried up the stairs. Mrs. Wilson set her down in a room she was unfamiliar with. She figured it was the guest room. Mrs. Wilson kissed Louise gently on her forehead and told her goodnight in a whispered tone. Louise missed her mother.
The room was bird-themed. The walls were painted a dark navy, and a thin metal peacock stared at her from where it hung. A copy of the NATO phonetic alphabet was hanging, too. It must have been Miles’ old room. Louise remembered when he came to school in second grade and told her he was moving into the attic. There was an opening to the roof up there, and Miles was in love with the idea of sitting up there and watching the sun set and rise.
Miles was in love with a lot when he was little— the sun and sky, the warmth of his mother’s hugs, iced tea on a hot day. Louise didn’t think she was in love with anything. She didn’t think she ever would be. Louise was almost asleep, the plush, silky sheets lulling her into another bout of slumber. Her door squeaked open. Miles’ small frame was a shadow in the doorway. He looked so small. He didn’t walk into the room, choosing to loom in the entrance.
“Goodnight, Louise,” he said in a small voice.
“Goodnight, Miles.”
When you were little, you thought everything was perfect. The world was alive with hope and magic. Everyone got along, and there was nothing wrong.
Of course, now you know that is not true. But a part of you, a little tiny part, wants to go back to when you didn’t know. When life was good, and you didn’t know better.
That’s how the music sounds. Like you are an innocent kid sitting on the front porch eating a red cherry popsicle. The juice runs down your face. It looks like blood.
July 15, 1984
Louise was once again sitting in the back seat of the Wilsons’ Porsche, but this time, she was without a backpack-- sans her school clothes. She wore the itchy Easter dress her grandmother had gotten her two years prior. Louise wore it to her funeral. She stuck out like a sore thumb, a pastel beacon amongst the waves of black. It was Sunday—the Lord’s Day, as Mrs. Wilson had told her. Louise hadn’t been inside a church for a good reason—she’d never been to a regular Sunday mass. But last night, she had stayed the night at Miles’, so she was on her way to church. There were no ifs, ands, or buts about it.
They pulled into the parking lot, the ancient steeple looming over the car. Louise could recognize that it was a beautiful church, but the body of Christ hanging in the stained glass window did nothing to settle her nervous stomach. The pop of car doors sounded; there was no going back.
The wooden pew was uncomfortable, the kneelers even more so. She listened to Miles’ soft whispers of direction and did as he said. She fell and rose when she should; she crossed her arms instead of taking communion, she shook hands with strangers, and mumbled, ‘Peace be with you.’ And then it was over, and Louise was waking back to the car, her white flats cutting into her feet.
“What did you think, Louise?” Mrs. Wilson asked in a kind voice.
She shrugged her shoulders, “It was okay. I didn’t really know what to do.”
“You’ll learn,” Mrs. Wilson responded, a promise on the tip of her tongue.
Louise was silent on the ride back; she leaned against the window and watched as trees blurred together in a mirage of green. Louise didn’t know what it was like to believe in God. She thought she felt it there for a moment-- a quiet tingling in the back of her mind. But then she remembered that she wasn’t with her family; the Wilsons were not her parents. She remembered her mom was working a double today so they could have electricity. And what God would think that was fair? Not one Louise wanted to believe in.
The music sounds like the church hymns your mother made you sing. She meant well; she thought she was giving you the gift of her religion. You couldn’t tell her you didn’t want it. It was all she had ever known.
What child betrays their mother?
May 21, 1985
It was the summer after sixth grade. Lousie and Miles had biked to the pool in town, a desperate attempt to escape the heat. The air was thick and humid, and sweat sprouted from Louise's skin, dampening her shirt and shorts. The sun beamed down on her back; there wasn’t a cloud in sight. The pair parked their bikes out front and ran into the small building. A bored-looking teenager accepted their fifty cents each and let them in. The air reeked of chlorine, and the painted concrete was slick with warm water. Miles and Louise threw their towels down and began to shed their swimsuits. Louise’s hands were shaking with anticipation; she hadn't been to the pool in so long.
“Race you,” Miles said, darting towards the water's edge.
“No fair,” Louise groaned as she kicked off her flip-flops and ran after him.
Louise heard a distant whistle ringing and a call that running wasn’t allowed before she splashed into the blue depths. The cool water encapsulated her, and goosebumps formed on her skin. She bobbed to the surface and saw Miles climbing out and heading towards the diving board.
They stayed until the sun was beginning to set; Miles’ mom didn’t like him being out that late on his own yet, so they peddled back home soggy clothes and pruny skin.
When Louise returned to her house, it was dark. She could see the kitchen light shining out onto the brown lawn. Steve was home. Louise’s mom, Mary, had picked him up a few months back. He was a short, fat man. His breath always smelled like beer, yeasty and vile. He had dark hair and a beard to match. Her mother claimed she really liked him, but Louise knew she just needed someone to help pay the bills.
One of the few good things about having kids as young as Louise’s mom had her is that she never had a hard time finding a sleazy older guy to keep around. Being pretty also helped, and Mary sure was pretty. Mary was tall and slender, with long, curly auburn hair. She was covered in freckles and had eyes that glowed emerald green. When Louise was young, Mary would smile often, but as her eyebags grew, her smile faded. She could fake it when needed, but it was never like Louise remembered.
Mary and Louise could have been twins— minus the smile lines she didn’t think she’d ever have the chance to earn. Maybe that was why, when Louise walked into her kitchen in nothing more than a bathing suit, Steve forced himself on her.
You clutch the armrest on your chair, digging your nails into the fabric. The music is screeching, a distorted version of what it once was. You want to cry. You think your ears are bleeding. You bite the inside of your cheek, hoping to distract yourself from the perverted disgust mess of noise assaulting you. Your mouth tastes like metal. The urge to stand and walk, no, run, out of the theater is so strong you can hardly bear it.
You do not get up.
May 22, 1985
Miles called and asked if she wanted to go swimming again. Louise didn’t have the heart to tell him she never wanted to go swimming again, so she lied and said she was sick. Miles was at her door an hour later with a container of homemade cookies and Guess Who.
The two sit on the floor of Louise’s bedroom, the soft blanket she put down covering the scratchy carpet. Louise’s room was small and dingy. The walls were cracked and stained; she lived out of one small bureau that had been unceremoniously shoved into a corner of the room. Last Christmas, she begged her mother to help her hang lights on the ceiling. They were still up, casting a rainbow glow over the room. It was the only source of light she used. She had a small nightstand piled with pencils and markers; she had long since stained her light pink sheets while drawing. Cookie crumbles littered the floor. Louise was losing the game; most of her people were still up, while Miles only had about five people left to choose from. He chewed his lip in concentration. Louise usually laughed at him for it; he always seemed to take the board games they played too seriously. This time, she didn’t notice he was doing it.
“Does your person have brown hair?” Miles questioned.
Louise didn’t respond. “Louise? Are you alrigh—”
“Do your parents ever touch you?” Louise said, eyes trained on the floor.
Miles’ face scrunched up in confusion, “You mean like hugs?”
“No.”
“What do you mean then?” Miles questioned.
Louise’s eyes fogged up with tears, “Never mind. Let’s just play the game.”
Miles eyed her with sympathetic confusion before realizing what she meant, “Louise…”
He moved to hug her, but she flinched away from him. Miles sat back; he wasn’t touching her but was close enough for her to feel the heat radiating off of him. Louise sniffled, trying desperately to contain her emotion.
“Do you want me to leave you alone?” Miles whispered.
Louise turned to look at him, her face pale and puffy, “Please don’t.”
Louise and Miles sat like that for a long time. When the sun set, he got up and called his mom, begging her to let him stay the night. Louise didn’t hear the conversation, but Mrs. Wilson must have agreed because the next thing she knew, she was being guided to bed, and Miles was settled on the floor next to her, leaning against the bed and holding her hand.
The music turned sweet. It drifted through your ears pleasantly, passing over the cracked, dry blood. A chorus of flutes is playing, light and soft.
It feels like the pillow in your dorm room, childhood mixed with freedom.
You know this feeling won’t last. But right now, in this moment, you lay your head down and pretend the world is new.
May 17, 1986
Miles and Louise had biked miles to the movie theater. Miles had begged Louise to see the new movie coming out, one that Louise was less than excited about. He had been to the movies some months before with his mom and had seen the trailer. The next day, he begged her to see it with him when it came out, and she agreed, not knowing anything about it.
Miles was practically giddy with excitement. His eyes glowed with it. The theater was packed; they stood in the line shoulder to shoulder with what must have been every other kid in town. Louise clung to the red crushed velvet rope that segmented the line for dear life. The feeling of so many people pressed up against her was nauseating. She screwed her eyes shut, pushing down a wave of oncoming dizziness. Before she knew it she was being pulled along to the ticket stand. Miles produced them with a broad smile on his face, “Two for Top Gun.”
He then bought a giant thing of buttery popcorn and two glass Cokes. They made their way to their seats and waited for the movie to begin. Miles shoved popcorn in his mouth, salty yellow kernels going everywhere. Trailers for various movies played on the big screen— Miles leaned over nearly every time and asked Louise if she would go with him. She said yes every time.
The movie was beautiful. It was nothing like Louise had ever seen before; it made her yearn for the sky, the feeling of freedom unlike anything she would ever know. And then it was tragic, and she was crying in her seat, wailing over someone she didn’t know. Begging him to wake up.
They left in silence, walking to the bike rack to a chorus of shoes against pavement. They stalled for a moment before getting onto their bikes and parting their ways.
“What would you do if I died?” Miles said, his eyes trained on Louise’s.
“I don’t know,” her eyes were red and puffy, “I don’t think I could go on.”
“Me neither,” Miles agreed.
Miles stared at her for a beat before getting on his bike and peddling home. Louise imagined her life without Miles on the way home. Sharp metal against skin, blood seeping into water. She didn’t think it would be much of a life.
When you were in 6th grade, you played the clarinet. You always had a fondness for them.
They were the only ones playing, the dulcet tones of a wooden reed against black plastic. The song was picking up pace, like a heartbeat.
In 6th grade band, you sat next to a girl you liked. She was better at the instrument than you. You didn’t care. You remember taking her to the winter formal and carrying her shoes when her feet got sore. You remember your dad giving you the talk before you went.
You haven’t seen her in years. You wonder how she’s doing.
The clarinets are done with their solo. You forget about her again.
August 21, 1987
This year, Louise’s birthday fell on the first day of school. She dressed nicer than usual, an attempt at vanity that made her hate herself. Miles had given her a music box that played You Are My Sunshine. Louise had told him that she missed it when her mom sang it to her before bed. She cried in the bathroom.
At lunch, she stood in line with a group of girls in her PE class. Miles was a few feet ahead of her, and the kids in her school took cutting in line more seriously than she thought was necessary, so she stayed put. She stood silently while the girls talked about a teacher they didn’t like, choosing instead to eavesdrop on the conversations around her rather than contribute to the one she was in.
Brian Miller’s voice sounded broken and raspy, like a kid with money for cigarettes and not much else. He was a stereotypical bully, big and tall, with an ugly look plastered everywhere he went. He couldn’t stand the thought of someone not being in pain. He was talking to Miles, his voice loud enough for Louise to hear from where she was: “Why do you hang out with that poor girl all the time? Does she give it up easily?”
His lips were curled in a cruel sneer, showing off his yellow teeth. Miles looked at him, barely visible to Louise over the people between them. Then, suddenly, he wound up and punched Brian square in the face. Louise heard the crunch of his nose being broken— blood spurted on the floor and onto the onlooking students. Brian grunted in pain, bringing his hand to touch his bloodied face slowly before launching into a vicious returning attack. He only got a few punches on Miles before the nearest teacher pulled him away. Louise pushed through the crowd that had formed, leaning down at Miles’ side. His face was nearly unrecognizable; bruises were starting to form already.
“Why did you do that? Oh my god, Miles, why did you do that?” Louise choked out, tears fogging her vision.
“I love you,” Miles tried to smile, blood staining his teeth.
A teacher pushed Louise out of the way, assessing the damage. What felt like seconds later, an ambulance appeared, along with Mrs. Wilson. She was frantic; her hands were shaking with fear. Everything was silent. At some point, everyone had cleared out except Louise. She was standing here like an idiot, staring at Miles’ bloodied face.
Louise felt a strong hand grab her arm, a mother’s hand, “Come on, Louise. You can ride along.” Mrs. Wilson stood in front of Louise. Her eyes were red, but she had composed herself. Louise’s voice came out as nothing more than a whisper: “Okay.”
She let herself be pulled into the ambulance; the siren was the only thing she could hear. She watched as the EMTs worked, their skilled, gloved hands dancing over his body.
“Louise, he’s gonna be okay,” Mrs. Wilson whispered in her ear, “Come here.”
She pulled Louise into a hug, hiding her view of Miles. Louise closed her eyes against Mrs. Wilson, willing her breath to slow. They stopped abruptly at the hospital. Louise and Mrs. Wilson climbed out and watched as nurses and interns swarmed Miles’ gurney. They were ushered to the waiting room and sat down on hard, terribly patterned chairs. At some point, Mrs. Wilson called Louise’s mother to tell her where she was. A doctor brought them to Miles’ room after over an hour. His face had been cleaned and bandaged, and his nose was clearly broken.
“Louise,” Miles said, his eyes lighting up.
“Miles,” Louise responded, “Are you okay?”
“I’m right as rain,” he tried to smile but winced.
“Don’t lie to me, Miles.”
“I’ll be okay,” he reassured her, reaching up to squeeze her hand.
They stood like that until Louise’s mom came to get her. Louise crawled into Mary’s beat-up Sedan and slumped in the seat.
“Are you okay, baby?” Mary asked her.
“Mom, what if he died?” Louise ignored the question.
Mary sighed, “Sweetheart he’s fine. He’s just got a concussion and a broken nose.”
“I know,” Louise said, “I know he’s fine.”
The bags under Mary’s eyes seemed heavier today, and her face seemed more wrinkled. Louise looked more like her every day.
The music takes on a somber tone. Long, drawn-out notes fill the air. You think of your mother again, the way she looked sunken in her hospital bed— decaying before your eyes. You remember the feel of her bony, pale hands wiping away your tears in her final moments.
It was the first time you saw your dad cry.
The wail of violin chokes you.
December 17, 1988
Louise was lying on her back in Miles’ bed. He’s had the same one since they were kids; the box springs creak under their weight. Miles was above her, his eyes boring holes in hers. His parents were not home, the house was eerily quiet— the ambient creaking distracting Louise. His record player sang sweet music from his desk. His room was cluttered with dirty clothes and various knick-knacks. A blue paper swan sat on his bookshelf next to his worn copy of The Hobbit. His closet was open, casting weird shadows along the walls. The lights were off.
The soft touch of Miles’ lips trailed down her chest to her stomach. She tried to push down the nausea— make her body stop squirming. Her hand clutched his shoulder tightly. He had asked if this was okay. She had said yes.
Louise felt another article of clothing being slid off her body. She was cold. Her eyes shot to the ceiling. One glowing star was still stuck on the popcorn texture. Miles had taken them off the year before. He had missed one. Louise felt the heat of salty water run down her face into the soft pillow. She hated herself.
‘Dear God,’ she thought, ‘if you can hear me please, please just let me be okay. Let me want this.’
She didn’t receive a response. God wasn’t listening. It was just her and Miles in a house too big, in a world too small.
“Louise?” Miles said, his voice laced with concern, “Hey. Are you okay?”
All she could muster was an ‘I’m sorry’ before getting up, running into the bathroom, and emptying her stomach into the toilet.
The air stunk of sour yeast.
The music bounced up and down, building up to its crescendo. Excitement filled your chest, the entire orchestra almost all playing now.
A chorus of brass filled the air—French horns and trumpets battle for dominance on stage. Your eyes are wide in anticipation; you have waited the entire night for this.
You are sixteen, and you and your friends sit around a fire, passing a bottle of Jack around. It is the Friday before school starts. You wanted one last night of summer fun before your life filled with books and assignments.
The whiskey burns a path down your throat. It makes you nauseous. You get so drunk you can’t stand up. Your vision blurs as you stumble into the surrounding woods. You are alone. You vomit more than you thought was possible. You think you are going to die. You miss your mom.
You haven't drank since.
You don’t think you ever will.
August 4, 1989
The granite bar was cool under Louise’s fingertips. She sat in Miles’ kitchen, spinning nervously on the metal bar stool. She was chewing her lip; her mouth tasted like blood. Miles sat next to her, his demeanor the exact opposite of Louise’s.
“I mean, come on, Louise. What are you gonna do with your life?” Mrs. Wilson lectured her.
“I don’t know,” Louise mumbled.
Mrs. Wilson sighed, “Miles has wanted to be a pilot since he was eight. What do you want?”
Louise took a deep breath, “I don’t know. I’m sorry I can’t be like Miles. But I’m not your fucking kid so leave me alone.”
Louise stood up and stomped up the stairs. She heard Mrs. Wilson yelling her name, but she didn’t turn around. She buried herself in Miles’ bed, wrapping herself in his soft comforter. Louis heard the stairs creak with weight and then a knock on the door.
“Louise, I’m sorry,” Miles said, walking into the room.
Louise sat up, her face dry, “Why are you sorry? You didn’t yell at me.”
“I still feel sorry,” he said as he sat down next to her.
Louise took a deep breath and leaned on his shoulder. Miles rested his head against hers, “She loves you, you know.”
“I know.”
“She just wants you to do well,” Miles said.
“She wants me to be better than my mother,” Louise corrected.
“Is that so bad?”
The music doesn’t matter right now. You are fifteen, and your father is yelling at you about your future. You don’t know what you want to do. You want to be better than him.
He backhands you.
The arm of the person next to you brushes against yours. You jump. The conductor's hands are blurry with movement. The theater is alive with sound.
You miss your dad.
February 14, 1990
Louise and Miles sat across from each other in a restaurant that was too nice for the amount of money they brought. Louise ran her fingers across the laminated menu, fidgeting nervously with the edge of the paper. The restaurant was packed, Miles had made the reservations months in advance.
“Do you know what you want?” Miles asked.
Louise pursed her lips, “I think I’m gonna get the chicken piccata.”
Miles eyed the menu, “That looks good.”
“What are you gonna get?” she returned the question.
Miles smiled, almost boyishly, “The steak.”
Louise hummed in response. She set her menu down and reached for her water glass, running her finger across the rim. Condensation dripped down outside the glass, her fingerprints marking the surface.
“Are you excited about prom?” Miles asked.
Louise laughed a little, “Do we really have nothing else to talk about other than a dance in two months?”
Miles rolled his eyes playfully, “I guess not. What did we talk about when we were kids?”
“I have honestly no idea,” Louise smiled, “I don’t think we talked a lot. We mostly played.”
“We did play an ungodly amount of Donkey Kong.”
Louise chuckled, “God, was that game even good? Or were we just kids?”
“I honestly have no idea,” Miles smiled.
The waiter came by and took their order, collecting their menus and refreshing their drinks. It wasn’t long before their food arrived; the plates were decedent and beautiful. They left the restaurant with doggy bags in hand and significantly poorer than when they walked in. Louise clambered into Miles’ truck and waited for Miles to start it. But he didn’t. He was staring at her instead.
“What?” she asked incredulously.
He smiled at her, “I have something for you.”
Her face fell in surprise, “Miles, you told me the dinner was a gift.”
“Well,” Miles shrugged. He reached into his pocket and produced a small velvet box. She took it gingerly into her hands, excitement boiling in her chest. She opened the box softly and found two silver rings. One was engraved with ‘Miles,’ and the other said ‘Louise.’ Miles picked up the one that said his name and handed it to her.
“This one is for you,” he looked at her with huge puppy-dog eyes, “And the other one is for me.”
“Miles…”
“Do you like it?” he asked nervously.
She melted, “I love it. I love you.”
“I love you, too,” he said, leaning in and kissing her sweetly.
“Are your parents home?” she asked against his lips.
“No, they won’t be home in hours.”
This time was different than the first. No bile rose up into Louise’s throat; she didn’t have to repress her squirming body. The air smelled like clean linen— fresh and new.
You are crying, and you don’t know why. The music sounds more like singing now, wrapping you in lyrics and hugs. You feel warm and fuzzy. Like you are a little kid who just got home after swimming all day. You are tired in the perfect way. You sink into your blankets and fall asleep.
A humming noise wakes you up. You are in the theater. There is music playing. You aren’t a kid anymore.
You had a drink at dinner before the concert.
You swallowed it with ease.
March 20, 1990
The hum of the radio filled the sweet night air. Louise and Miles lounged in the bed of his beat-up pickup. It was his father's old farm truck, a janky, rusty thing that only ran when it felt like it, but Miles loved it. It was his pride and joy. Any weekend he wasn’t with Louise, he was fixing it up; he would spend hours under the body of that thing, coming into the house reeking of oil and exhaust. Mrs. Wilson hated it; she feared for the safety of her nice beige carpet and the cleanliness of his jeans.
It was freshly spring; it was dry and warm for the first time this year. They were laying on his mother’s old picnic blanket, something she probably wouldn’t care for if she knew. It was pitch black, the only thing that illuminated them were the stars and the faint light of Louise’s kitchen light. They had returned from cruising around town, and neither wanted to go inside yet. They had been lulled into a comfortable silence, their hands knotted together perfectly. And then, suddenly, Louise had a question.
“Do you hate me?”
“Louise…” Miles sighed.
Nervousness leaked into her tone, “I was just making sure.”
“That I don’t hate you? Even though we’re dating?” Miles scoffed, “Why would I be with you if I hated you? What would I gain from that?”
“What if you were using me?” Louise said, her voice small.
“Oh my god,” Miles sat up and put his head in his hands, “‘What if’ Louise, when have I ever, in our entire lives, used you?”
“I don—” she started.
“If you are basing your fear of our relationship on ‘what ifs,’ maybe we shouldn’t be together. You are so absorbed in your past that it's like you aren’t even seeing me, not now, not in the present,” Miles shot at her.
“That’s not fair,” Louise said, her voice breaking with emotion.
Miles took a deep breath, “I’m sorry for what happened, and I get that healing is a hard and long process. But, Louise, I’m tired, too. ”
Hot, stinging tears rolled down Louise’s face, wetting the blanket, “I know you love me. Sometimes I’m just scared.”
“Why are you scared?” Miles whispered.
“I don’t know,” she sniffled, “I am what I am.”
“You are what you are,” Miles repeated, “And I’m tired of pretendning I can change that.”
“Then stop.”
Louise wiped the tears off her face and climbed out of the truck. Her receding footsteps echoed in Miles' head, a pounding that sounded eerily like his heartbeat— fast and hard. Miles sat there for a long while. The radio was still on, blasting The Smiths.
Trumpets blast loud, then louder. You think your eardrum might burst. Then, the music lulls to a stop. The lights do not come on. It is like the entire world has stopped to take a breath. One big inhale. You fill your lungs. The air smells like honeysuckle.
You are a child running in the yard with your dog. You are barefoot. You step on a bee. You limp into the house and cry to your mother. She puts your foot on ice.
You will never feel the grass on your bare foot again. You do not need to learn the lesson twice.

Does anyone else's brain pull up random information about something that you didn't think about or anything?
Like today I was out with my family looking at farm babies at our zoo and my sister in law and wife saw a horse and asked what it was.
Out of nowhere I blurted out shire horse and I was correct.
Or another time I was thinking, How do I say, what are you up to in Italian and my brain fired back ce cosa mi racoonti and I remembered the phrase from a lesson I saw a long time ago.
or I started singing this French song, and I had the lyrics correct and pronounced it correct but I don't remember ever learning it.
It's weird, it's always random stuff too, I don't really do it on demand. I don't how or why I remember it or anything.

I've been hooked on Walkabout MG for a long time. And it got me interested enough to read reviews of other golf games... so I finally got curious enough to try Golf+.
You have to understand that I know absolutely nothing about golf and have never played it, and only been dimly aware that it's a big-deal sport with tournaments and stuff. You say "golf" to me... and I think, "Arnold Palmer","Tiger Woods" and maybe "I read that Trump cheats at golf" or a comic song by Sondheim, and that's about it. I know they whack a golf ball around an expensively manicured course using a variety of expensive specialised clubs, and sometimes it gets stuck in sand, as in comedy movies. Always looked really boring to me.
But after an hour or two fooling around in Golf+ I see the point of the game, I have a whole new admiration for skilled golfers and can understand why this is a challenging and enjoyable sport... and this leads me to acknowledge something that is special about VR. In a limited yet engaging way, it can give us insights into an activity or sport or skill that we have absolutely no previous experience of -- and without a huge investment in equipment or lessons. I would never have thought I had any interest in or sympathy with golfers, I would certainly never have made the effort to take lessons or visit a club, yet now I feel like I "get it" --I see how you could get into this activity if you had the time and money. I can whack that golf ball and watch it arc through the air and feel the satisfaction if it goes where I wanted it to (or the momentary despair of the ker-plunk into the water trap).
I'd be interested to know if there are stories out there of people trying a sport or activity in VR and then seeking it out IRL because their interest grows as they play the sim. I don't think this will happen for me with golf -- for one thing, it's too expensive a hobby for me. But it makes me wonder whether VR experience might not be the "sales pitch" for engagement in IRL activities in some cases.
Anyway, I'd like to see way more sports and activity sims in VR, and the more realistic and less toony the better. Golf+ is slightly toony -- but just realistic enough to be immersive. I'd love to see polo (the kind with horses), badminton, fencing, jai alai, archery... all kinds of sports that are traditionally kind of elite and impossible for most people to participate in, yet are interesting to explore. Physically active gaming is the bee's knees -- and I'd love to see a foot-tracking walking mode that would let me actually stroll around the links instead of lazy teleporting.
Real golf players of course may have a good laugh at my naive post, because to them the VR sim is not a bit like real golfing (as a small boat sailor, I know that MarineVerse Cup is not really much like real sailing). But I feel like it's close enough to give me a real appreciation for a sport that previously I would have dismissed as absolutely boring and uninteresting.

So I'm in my early 30s my girlfriend is moving out of state to come be with me. We both met in my home town 3 years ago, dated but I wasn’t quite over my divorce. We parted amicably but two years later I never got over her. I moved away. We stayed friends. Finally I approached her after she mentioned feeling like she might move back home, home since she had nothing tying her there anymore. I jokingly said “is it cause I’m not there?”. She said it was a big reason. I then said something to the extent “well it’s not like I could convince you out on the east coast to give me another chance?”. Long story short 10 months of long distance and she moves out here next weekend.
My mom knew who she was when we first met. Made a comment about not liking her tattoos. But got used to the idea of us being friends at least.
My mom has never been very accepting of me coming out. She wasn’t a huge fan of my exhusband either. No joke after we got a divorce made a comment, “Thank god you didn’t have kids”.
This Christmas after being very blunt about the concept of I’m not dating men again and her saying “don’t let him ruin men for you” we got in an argument. Part of me wishes she’d just outwardly be angry or something. But the subtle jabs are driving me insane. So I finally was blunt about it instead of her just changing topics. She said I’m "making the choice to have a harder life". I said, “Being gay isn’t a handicap. What about feeling proud that you raised a daughter who has the courage to be authentic in a world that isn’t welcoming”.
Next day we were looking at old pictures of my late dad. And my ex was in a few of them. She goes, “Too bad you didn’t have kids. You’d always be connected”. Exact opposite of what she's said the last 3 years I wanted to scream.
So my girlfriend is moving out here next weekend. I no longer share my love life with my mom. And I’ve skirted around the idea of telling her just the extent of me and my girlfriend’s dynamic. But I asked if she’d grab a few things to bring on the move from my old house I rented from my mom. So her and my mom meet up and I get this message from my girlfriend.
“So a picture of you and him is on full display in your house. She told me she found it in stuff you were throwing away… and took it out so it didn’t get thrown away
And it’s hung up now.
I’m not mad… It was just a really awkward/ comical moment for me
We were in the guest house looking for your stuff and I stopped at the book shelf and noticed the picture…
She was like
“Oh yeah isn’t that cute, she tried to throw it away but I saved it”
Or “It was in stuff she was throwing away”
I can’t remember exactly
As she smiled and touched the photo”
My mom doesn’t do that shit even with my late dad’s photo. She never really liked my ex at all. And I’m just trying to grapple with it all. She doesn’t know my girlfriend is my girlfriend and not just a friend but she knows we dated. And I can’t help but think it was a passive jab. A warning if you will.
I’m just struggling with how to manage my mom and this. I don’t want to bring it up to her. But I know at some point I’ll have to tell my mom she’s my girlfriend and that I love her and intend to have her in my life for a long time.
I’m an only child and I lost my stepdad and dad and she’s all I have as family. She used to be my best friend. But this has caused such a huge rift. My damn ex husband is more supportive than her. Given he has been an amazing support.
"Yeah, that’s hard without your own mother’s support. And it breaks my heart that you don’t have that in the way you need. But, I’m here for you however I can be. I hope you get the acceptance you need from her one day. And in the meantime I hope you know that a lot of us, your friends and family that love you no matter what, do see you being courageous"
Thoughts on how to handle my mom?

So I'm in my early 30s my girlfriend is moving out of state to come be with me. We both met in my home town 3 years ago, dated but I wasn’t quite over my divorce. We parted amicably but two years later I never got over her. I moved away. We stayed friends. Finally I approached her after she mentioned feeling like she might move back home, home since she had nothing tying her there anymore. I jokingly said “is it cause I’m not there?”. She said it was a big reason. I then said something to the extent “well it’s not like I could convince you out on the east coast to give me another chance?”. Long story short 10 months of long distance and she moves out here next weekend.
My mom knew who she was when we first met. Made a comment about not liking her tattoos. But got used to the idea of us being friends at least.
My mom has never been very accepting of me coming out. She wasn’t a huge fan of my exhusband either. No joke after we got a divorce made a comment, “Thank god you didn’t have kids”.
This Christmas after being very blunt about the concept of I’m not dating men again and her saying “don’t let him ruin men for you” we got in an argument. Part of me wishes she’d just outwardly be angry or something. But the subtle jabs are driving me insane. So I finally was blunt about it instead of her just changing topics. She said I’m "making the choice to have a harder life". I said, “Being gay isn’t a handicap. What about feeling proud that you raised a daughter who has the courage to be authentic in a world that isn’t welcoming”.
Next day we were looking at old pictures of my late dad. And my ex was in a few of them. She goes, “Too bad you didn’t have kids. You’d always be connected”. Exact opposite of what she's said the last 3 years I wanted to scream.
So my girlfriend is moving out here next weekend. I no longer share my love life with my mom. And I’ve skirted around the idea of telling her just the extent of me and my girlfriend’s dynamic. But I asked if she’d grab a few things to bring on the move from my old house I rented from my mom. So her and my mom meet up and I get this message from my girlfriend.
“So a picture of you and him is on full display in your house. She told me she found it in stuff you were throwing away… and took it out so it didn’t get thrown away
And it’s hung up now.
I’m not mad… It was just a really awkward/ comical moment for me
We were in the guest house looking for your stuff and I stopped at the book shelf and noticed the picture…
She was like
“Oh yeah isn’t that cute, she tried to throw it away but I saved it”
Or “It was in stuff she was throwing away”
I can’t remember exactly
As she smiled and touched the photo”
My mom doesn’t do that shit even with my late dad’s photo. She never really liked my ex at all. And I’m just trying to grapple with it all. She doesn’t know my girlfriend is my girlfriend and not just a friend but she knows we dated. And I can’t help but think it was a passive jab. A warning if you will.
I’m just struggling with how to manage my mom and this. I don’t want to bring it up to her. But I know at some point I’ll have to tell my mom she’s my girlfriend and that I love her and intend to have her in my life for a long time.
I’m an only child and I lost my stepdad and dad and she’s all I have as family. She used to be my best friend. But this has caused such a huge rift. My damn ex husband is more supportive than her. Given he has been an amazing support.
"Yeah, that’s hard without your own mother’s support . And it breaks my heart that you don’t have that in the way you need. But, I’m here for you however I can be. I hope you get the acceptance you need from her one day. And in the meantime I hope you know that a lot of us, your friends and family that love you no matter what, do see you being courageous"
Thoughts on how to handle my mom?

So I'm in my early 30s my girlfriend is moving out of state to come be with me. We both met in my home town 3 years ago, dated but I wasn’t quite over my divorce. We parted amicably but two years later I never got over her. I moved away. We stayed friends. Finally I approached her after she mentioned feeling like she might move back home, home since she had nothing tying her there anymore. I jokingly said “is it cause I’m not there?”. She said it was a big reason. I then said something to the extent “well it’s not like I could convince you out on the east coast to give me another chance?”. Long story short 10 months of long distance and she moves out here next weekend.
My mom knew who she was when we first met. Made a comment about not liking her tattoos. But got used to the idea of us being friends at least.
My mom has never been very accepting of me coming out. She wasn’t a huge fan of my exhusband either. No joke after we got a divorce made a comment, “Thank god you didn’t have kids”.
This Christmas after being very blunt about the concept of I’m not dating men again and her saying “don’t let him ruin men for you” we got in an argument. Part of me wishes she’d just outwardly be angry or something. But the subtle jabs are driving me insane. So I finally was blunt about it instead of her just changing topics. She said I’m "making the choice to have a harder life". I said, “Being gay isn’t a handicap. What about feeling proud that you raised a daughter who has the courage to be authentic in a world that isn’t welcoming”.
Next day we were looking at old pictures of my late dad. And my ex was in a few of them. She goes, “Too bad you didn’t have kids. You’d always be connected”. Exact opposite of what she's said the last 3 years I wanted to scream.
So my girlfriend is moving out here next weekend. I no longer share my love life with my mom. And I’ve skirted around the idea of telling her just the extent of me and my girlfriend’s dynamic. But I asked if she’d grab a few things to bring on the move from my old house I rented from my mom. So her and my mom meet up and I get this message from my girlfriend.
“So a picture of you and him is on full display in your house. She told me she found it in stuff you were throwing away… and took it out so it didn’t get thrown away
And it’s hung up now.
I’m not mad… It was just a really awkward/ comical moment for me
We were in the guest house looking for your stuff and I stopped at the book shelf and noticed the picture…
She was like
“Oh yeah isn’t that cute, she tried to throw it away but I saved it”
Or “It was in stuff she was throwing away”
I can’t remember exactly
As she smiled and touched the photo”
My mom doesn’t do that shit even with my late dad’s photo. She never really liked my ex at all. And I’m just trying to grapple with it all. She doesn’t know my girlfriend is my girlfriend and not just a friend but she knows we dated. And I can’t help but think it was a passive jab. A warning if you will.
I’m just struggling with how to manage my mom and this. I don’t want to bring it up to her. But I know at some point I’ll have to tell my mom she’s my girlfriend and that I love her and intend to have her in my life for a long time.
I’m an only child and I lost my stepdad and dad and she’s all I have as family. She used to be my best friend. But this has caused such a huge rift. My damn ex husband is more supportive than her. Given he has been an amazing support.
"Yeah, that’s hard without your own mother’s support. And it breaks my heart that you don’t have that in the way you need. But, I’m here for you however I can be. I hope you get the acceptance you need from her one day. And in the meantime I hope you know that a lot of us, your friends and family that love you no matter what, do see you being courageous"
Thoughts on how to handle my mom?

When winter came to my house in these hills, the town would often send a boy every once in a while to make sure I was ok, especially before a snowstorm. Often, they would send one of the William’s boys, usually the youngest one, Jim. Jim was a bright eyed boy of around sixteen that looked just like his grandfather. He was a kind boy, and would always let me sit and ramble about times past as us grey haired folk tend to do.
“Jim! it's great to see you.” I say to him, eyes beaming with a happiness, eager to have company. He had the glow of youth you forget you lose as you age. “Hell, it's damn cold. Let’s get you warmed up.” I commanded, first closing the door and then guiding him to the chair by fire. As I sat down in the seat opposite, he asked, “What’s up pop? How is life up here, need anything?” His face was a mix of curiosity, and concern. The face you make when any older person is talking, I suppose.
I took a deep breath, and dismissing of pleasantries, I realized its about time for a tale almost as old as me. When I asked if he wanted to hear a story, he nodded his head, and i began. I started telling him the story of the Manahouc Holler, staring into the fire.
Manahouc was the name of the tribe that lived here in these hills long before the white man came. They were a proud and mighty people, who fought for their land, who knew the secrets of this land and the things within the woods. In a rare case, the US government did not see the need in anymore fighting for such a small piece of land, they made a deal with the natives. The small remnants of the tribe were to have one holler for themselves. Now obviously, they gave them the smallest and most useless one they could find.
When my father moved from Ireland as a boy, his father had just enough money to buy a small patch of land to feed his family, right beside the Manahouc Holler. Being from Ireland, he had a soft spot in his heart for the natives, as he could sympathize with the English intruding. He only left because they had pushed him to via starvation. He taught my father to treat them with respect because they knew the land more, which may become a valuable friend in hard times. A lesson my father taught to me.
That’s why, at age 20, when I saw a native man lost in a freak blizzard, I got him in, fed him some of my wife’s warm food, and let him stay until the storm had passed. I didn’t think nothing of it, but after that they started treating us real well. They would give us occasional good deals, gifts, the like. We got to know our surprise visitor real well. His real name was some native word for "foolish" I cannot remember, lost to time I suppose. The name he said I could call him, after butchering his real name a couple times, was Brother John. He picked that name after a book character he liked.
Brother John was the main farmer for the dwindling tribe. Everyone farmed, but it seemed he was the only one making money off it for them. Despite reported bad soil and a small overall operation, he always outproduced everyone around him. Droughts, floods, it didn’t matter.
That is what angered the rich white farmers the most, that a supposed “dumb savage” was outproducing them. They would often discuss what to do, in their mansions and estates. But none was ever so bold as to try anything. Eventually, they sent two “good ole boys” to sabotage their crops a time or two. But no matter what they tried, it either failed or the damage that was done, was minimal.
Soon, rumors started going around town as rumors tend to do. I heard everything from a blessing to soothe the past, to black magic revenging it. Reported signs of mythical beasts prowling the shadows, stealing chickens. From native tales to folklore from the motherland. I never believed any of it though. Brother John was kind, and helpful. I couldn’t see him partaking in anything nefarious. I assumed they just knew the plants and land better than we did.
Well, about 10 years after i saved Brother John, prohibition came to the county. It was graciously accepted by the elites. Most of them were Southern Baptists and saw it as a way to control the predominately Catholic and Presbyterian common folk. An added benefit was that prohibition allowed them to spread rumors about moonshine stills in Manahouc Holler as a way to divert from their moonshine stills. Then force them out by acting on these claims.
With the support of the elites, Sheriff Connolly and his 20 new deputies went into Manahouc Holler. The word from the reputable elites was that the whole tribe had been involved in crime. When "men of the law" came into the grouping of huts that was the tribe, they found no one, alive nor dead. Not even a sign of life. It was like only the huts had ever existed there.
When they spread out to examine the property, they were picked off one by one. Beasts of the forest, ranging from wolves and stags to cougars and bears were taking these men into the shadowy forest. From the scream, it sounded like the animals hated these men, taking their time with them. A young man brought in to be a helping hand to the posse was Chester Russell, and he was also the only man left alive. Chester was a black man and was a sharecropper on the property of James E. Alexander, the richest man in town. He saw the carnage begin and bolted right out of the camp. As he fled, he could hear animals chasing him. He had never ran that fast, almost like he was being helped by the wind, he would claim later.
He made it to the property line and looked back, seeing the animals stop at the tree line. According to Chester, they just sat there, growling or grunting. Most thought Chester was lying, either to cover up the truth, or to gain attention. I knew Chester pretty well, and knew when he was lying. Awful poker player, that man. I knew he was telling the truth.
He would only tell me the details if I bought him a bottle of whiskey, though. He claimed that remembering it was like asking to be punched in the face. The way their red eyes looked at him, as if knowing exactly who he was. The stench, the pack smelled of death, of rotting, of decay. He swore that further behind property line, there was a beast that towered over the others, hidden in the shadows save for the giant, blood red eyes.
I knew he was telling the truth, but it didn’t matter what I thought, at least not to the rich. See, after a year without word from the natives, the rich landowners agreed to split the holler amongst themselves. Each would receive an equal part. As time went on, however, these families would start to experience hardships. They would either rack up heavy debts and then end up paying off them off by selling all their possessions, or they move out west. Either way, these families faded into obscurity.
Eventually, even the Alexanders would face hardships. They were the richest, and the last ones of those elites. The only surviving Alexander would hang himself in his mansion losing all his money on drugs and women, which was back in the 70s. Since then, there hasn’t been a buyer, it is technically property of the state.
No one ever saw the Manahouc again.
After concluding my story, I leaned back, and took a long gulp of the water Jim had poured me. He sat there for a while without speaking.
“I think I believe you,” he said, breaking the silence. “but why tell me this?”
“Jim, you see, Brother John’s father was the medicine man for the tribe. When he heard what I had done for his son, he personally visited us. He blessed me with the ‘gift of life and vitality of two men’. I didn’t know what to say, so I just accepted it. I didn’t think he ever actually blessed me with longer life in that encounter for years and years, but now I am sure of it.” I leaned in real close, as if trying to whisper in a room that had a crowd in it, not just Jim and I.
“I tend to hide my age, and I beg the few that know my age to keep it a secret. You see Jim, this story took place in the 1921. I am 144 years old, and I feel that my time may be finally coming to an end, and someone young needs to know this story."

I have been bing watching @ zoey 101 Recently and almost done with season 2. I forgot how funny it is. It’s so related. You have chase clumsy the boy next door who’s in love with the smart and beautiful girl next door Zoey. You have Nicole the crazy ditzy boy lover. Dana the sports star and bad attitude girl. Logan the spoil rich kid concede jerk. Micheal the fun but best friend who gives good advice and very supportive. Lola the actress. Quinn the loveable bier eccentric nerd. Dustin the younger brother. Also Mark the comic but dumb comic relief. All the actors and actresses have chemistry together. Also I like that learn lessons on each episode. It’s one of the more authentic shows from Nickelodeon.

The show has heavily 70s/80s vibes which made sense since the creator was a kid in the 70s. As a 2000s kid I thought it was in the 70s-80s cause of the lack of modern technology and the furniture being very retro and timeless in a way that you can't guess the decade. It's also that one surfer rock song being played whenever they "party", and Eddy wearing a 70s disco suit when dressing up.
Eddy lives in his brother's bedroom. The bedroom looks too grown for a kid but cool for its time. He can't even reach the record player but is upset when the other kids break them.
I've seen the sad discussion here about Ed which is exactly what I think and don't want to repead it again. I just want to add that the way Sarah screams at him is probably the same way his mother treats him. Ed also seems autistic cause he can't hold a conversation, says random words that doesn't make sense, the part where he could't talk with Johny without a script, becomes awkward when forces to be "normal", can't act properly around people and is fixated on sci-fi comic books. Still a very funny and lovable character but I can't ignore these things.
Edd has controlling parents and is a germaphobe and a perfectionist because of them. I doesn't seem abusive. Edd had a crush on Sarah in the first episode but I never seen it again. It would be better if they kept it.
The Eds are being sexually assaulted by the Kankers. Meanwhile they're nit creapy at all around Naz. The Kankers are fatherless and who knows where their mother is.
Johny used to be annoying when I was little but now seems like an awkward kid who can't communicate his feelings and needs without Plank. Edd in one episode basically explained the reason behind his behavior. He also seems to be the most likely to be friends with the Eds. I'm still on season 1 and I wish he was included more as a side friend.
Now I finally understand Ralph, as a kid who barely understood English Ralph spoke gibberish but I still understood what he meant and was one of the funniest characters. I'm kind of baffled how he has a farm/homestead in the middle of the suburb, but the whole cartoon defies all laws and kids don't question that stuff.
It's funny how I never saw Eds as outsiders when I was a kid cause the other kids were playing but did't seem close to each other except Jimmy and Sarah, while the Eds were close friends which mattered more to me.

Thought I'd share this one with you, as I had a few flashbacks while trying out the game this weekend.
A small group of experimental historians/archeologists spend one year in a certain role (mostly peasants) and time-period, it's all set in the UK, but can easily be compared to medieval Franconia.
I watched all different series and all episodes and gotta say, it was quite fun to and Iearned a lot. If you are a history geek like me, it's a must see in my opinion. I'm a docu-freak, to my knowledge there is nothing else like this on the 'market'. ;)
They really experience all the tasks you have in this game by hand, plowing, sowing different crops, experiencing weather issues, herding pigs, sheep, goats, cattle. And processing all those... Building stuff ofc...
You will see the REAL diet of those people. All the hardships...experiments...and they have NO team to help them with the work or such. No easy fixes allowed.
It's actually quite a while back this was produced, the series started with:

Tales from the Green Valley

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0478958/
in the 1600s (lots of stuff is just similasame as in 13th century Franconia), a must-see...the start of this series. You loved the old, slow-paced docus with lots of infos, beautiful filming and nice REAL people? Watch it...and you will WANT to see the next series. Trust me. ;)

A Tudor Feast at Christmas

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1232802/
I'll just copy the text here, it's a one-episode special (set in OUR time period...kinda):
'A group of historians and archaeologists prepare a Tudor feast as it would have been over 400 years ago, including the use of period clothes, recipes from the era, food sourced from the land and the absence of modern conveniences.'
We go on with

Victorian Farm

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1372211/
Set in Victorian Times on a Victorian 'Manor Lord's' ( ;) ) Land, they need to fulfill the tasks actual tenants of the Land would have to. I'll just include it in here, as it's really a highlight of the series and super-informative. A lot of the stuff you will see here...will have existed in some form way back in the 1300s...If you watch all of he series you get a real sense of how all this 'tenant-peasant-villager'-thing evolved over time.
Next we have two more modern farm series, anyway, watch those if you want the full picture of how things evolved and you'll be AMAZED how much of those early techniques made it slightly all the way up to the 20th century. ;)
They are called Edwardian Farm and Wartime Farm...
But now we get to the real stuff...

Tudor Monastery Farm

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt4103600/
This is PRETTY close to our times and techniques, instead of a Manor Lord it's the Monastery...the tenant situation is the same.
Watch this, if you want to actually see a LOT from this game in real life experiments over a longer period with people who really get into the stuff and have time to show you what it really was like.
I'd call it a blend of Reenactment, reality-TV in a good way and Documentary/History Lesson.

Secrets of the Castle

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt4388710/
'Historian Ruth Goodman and archaeologists Peter Ginn and Tom Pinfold learn about living in the medieval world and help rebuild a castle.' Pretty much what we have in our game. It's set at that castle-plot of Guedelon, this project in France trying to rebuild a castle using only means from back then. You will surely have heard about it.
This series focuses on jobs around the castle, including food, clothing, artisan/craftmanship. Worth to watch and to round up the picture.
There are a few more with more or less the same group..Victorian Pharmacy or smth about the invention and development of railways in Britain...all worth watching and the all have a rating of close to 9 on IMDB.
Also quite easy to find..youtube, dailymotion..or your favourite...docu-streaming site. ;)
Have fun watching... ;)

I got my hours fully cut at work last month. I was doing good, but my boss/the owner of the store is a huge misogynist and liked to make me feel stupid and incapable of doing a simple sales job at a comic book store. I never made any major mistakes.
He changed my whole work schedule and I was effectively jobless as soon as he hired a man to replace me.
Then he got rid of the girl that would work at the store when she was back in town during breaks from college.
And now as of yesterday, my friend & former coworker (also a woman), has also informed me that she just had all of her hours fully cut out of nowhere. I helped with the resources she needed to file for unemployment in our state.
Now it's all men working there — every single one.
The owner of the place sucked. Huge control freak, but he couldn't even do anything right. He always made mistakes that made my job harder, but he never took responsibility or admitted to it. A lot of customers said he was a douche. Former car salesman, if that tells you anything about him.
I can't even count how many ideas I pitched to him that he later fully implemented and took credit for.
He only paid me $12 p/hour — then I pushed for a dollar raise. He said at the interview that he would give a dollar raise to me until I met my previous pay, and then went back on that promise claiming that "he expected my work quality to be better."? Also didn't realize that him asking about my previous pay at the interview was illegal in our state until later.
The other girl got a whole 50¢ raise and made 12.50. The men all made at least like $15 or $16. He also discouraged people from talking about their pay, when that's our legal right as workers.
When I first started, he asked me what I liked to do. I said I liked doing cosplay (mind you, I would usually do crossplay as guy characters, but I didn't mention that). He responded "I can tell you dress up in sexy cosplays." Didn't know how to respond to that.
He also seemed weirdly annoyed that I had a boyfriend, despite my boss being my dad's age and also engaged (I had no idea until his fiancee dropped by the store to give the employees pies for Thanksgiving). My coworker also noticed this, and said he would always bring up me having a boyfriend and act really salty about it. I think he expected me to break up with my partner after we met for the first time (long distance), but we just had our first anniversary and are planning to get married lol.
He also got really drunk at our Christmas party; he was really touchy and kept trying to hug me, and was following me around everywhere. I kept having to wander off and hide from him. Apparently he drunk drove to his hotel after that — and he was sloppy drunk when I left.
I think after months of me not reciprocating (and sometimes outright rebuffing) his advances, he got fed up and cut my hours — and expected me not to know I could still get unemployment lol.
Learned my lesson after that — I worked with all women before this job, and was so much happier. Never working for a man in retail again, if I can control it.
Edit to add: He also refused to schedule me at the same time as my friend. Not entirely sure why, but I only ever worked two shifts with her. I don't think he actually wanted us to become friends, for some reason.
Edit 2: He also has a yet-unresolved mouse problem in the store. The backroom is infested with them — droppings literally everywhere. I got in trouble for not wanting to work back there due to health hazard. There's a high chance that anything someone touches on the sales floor has also touched mouse poop/pee. One time a mouse actually went on the sales floor and a lady had to help me catch it and put it out. Not good for a store that's literally in a hospital-town full of healthcare professionals and immunocompromised people.
Final edit: I have a lot of people telling me to report him to multiple agencies. Trust me, I have. I was reporting him even when I was still on the schedule. I was studying law in college; I know my rights and what I can do to protect them.

And boy howdy, that final boss was tough. I sailed through their story without farming materials or stat gains whatsoever, but I had to take about about an hour and a half to beef up my equips and techs a bit.
Word of advice, for those interested: plan for elemental defense, bring Unblockable moves, and utilize threat management w/ damage-nullifying counters. …all lessons from Scarlet Grace I forgot for this game.
The boss has some badass animations, btw! Perfect mixture of “oh lord, I’m gonna die” and “damn, that’s cool sword.” Curious if it’s the same for other protags…?

Marvel and DC stories are never meant to end and characters are always meant to remain in their "iconic" personalities, if they ever change they always end up going back to their "evergreen" setting eventually. Like how Batman keeps going through arcs where he learns not to be a paranoid lunatic that mistrusts everybody, only for him to forget all about it when the next writer comes along and he has to learn his lesson all over again. Or the most common example: heroes who break bad eventually go back to being good, and villains who reform usually go back to their villainous ways.
But sometimes the changes made to an established character actually end up sticking in the long-term. For example, Loki before his "death" in Siege and the Loki after his rebirth are very different personality-wise, and this is actually brought up in-universe. Loki is no longer a pure evil villain with selfish goals, but a more complex character who does tricky things but for what he believes is the greater good and he actually cares about his brother and Asgard instead of loathing them out of petty jealousy. Part of this could also be MCU synergy, but his character development made sense in the comics and actually stuck.
Eddie Brock similarly is absolutely nothing like what he was back in his first appearance as Venom, a jerk who hated Spider-Man for the dumbest of reasons, and he's also evolved quite a lot since his "Lethal Protector" days.
Flash Thompson started out as a bully jock whose only redeeming quality was that he was a Spider-Man fan, but eventually joined the army and actually became friends with Peter. And of course, he changed forever once he became Agent Venom and later Anti-Venom.
Nova/Richard Rider went from a teen hero and later young adult in the vein of Spider-Man, to a battle-hardened cosmic war hero. Similar things happen to a lot of former teen heroes I've noticed.
And pretty much every female character Stan Lee ever created eventually became more independent and assertive when later writers came along.
What are some other examples of character development that actually stuck long-term?

Housing was a mystery when I started Manor Lord's, I'm loving the game, it is a great system, but confusing! Here is a summary share of what I learned in early access, please add your own brainstorm tips:
Basic Brainstorm.

• When? You start with five (5) families. I built a Logging Camp (timber) > Hitching Post (transport) > Gatherer (berries) > Granary (stores starting food, before it rots) > Storehouse (stores everything else) > then three (3) houses, > then the last (2) houses. They are called 'Burgage Plots', old language term. 1 house = 1 family. These 5 houses sort everyone at the start, and then the tents will disappear. Then build a well nearby for easy +happiness, with underground water.
• Size? When setting out Burgage Plots you want to see three (3) grey different symbols (see SCREENSHOT), if the the plots are large enough. The main houses, and two "optional" areas part of that same house. A 'backyard' (house + hammer) and an +'extra residence' (house + plus symbol). Once you select area area you can rotate the front facing, and make the plot have more or less Burgage Plots before you place it (you can have multiple in one area). If you misplace, just demolish (top right tower with fire symbol) and rebuild. You lose nothing it is very forgiving.
• Size+? I would aim for first 5 plots to have a +'residence' and +'backyard'. They do not need to be large. Once built, I would invest in chickens in the 'backyard' immediately on one of them with starting cash, called regional wealth (with other starting cash going to an oxen for your second hitching post). Chickens make eggs, which is free passive food, AND its free happiness. I would say strongly not to invest in vegetables. I like my labourer families to labour. Vegetables means they do less of this labour, they spend time ploughing, planting etc the vegetables, meaning where-ever else they are assigned is less useful. You only have 5 families to start so labour is super limited. You can get hides from hunting at the beginning, so goats are less useful - but again they are passive. You can get happiness/food elsewhere at the beginning most efficiently than vegetables. However, some people love vegetables as they ignore soil fertility.
• Upgrade? Get the +Residence size (house + plus symbol), means 1 house = 2 families. Why wouldn't you do this? The second family seems to get only a small outhouse, but hey maybe that's where the kids live? They seem happy enough.
• Upgrade+? Get Level 2 Housing Plots when you can, you get passive Regional Wealth (cash) from them. You can also if you allowed space for +residences add space for additional families.
• Don't Upgrade++? However, do not upgrade the 'backyard' industries to anything other than chickens, chickens, chickens or goats without serious thought. Don't get me wrong, the others are super useful, but be aware you lose ALL of that housing/burgage families for labour. All of it!! I suffered massive labour shortages upgrading breweries/blacksmiths/vegetables etc and it took me a long while to realise why. Even if you pause the industries, the family is idle - as far as I could tell I couldn't get them to do anything else useful.

Advanced Brainstorm.

• Chickens? You can never have enough food/eggs and it is nice to have something other than berries in your granary. Chickens over Vegetables imho, because its passive.
• Tannery? One communal tannery should make your hides from hunting into leather (which is sold for clothing, peasants make their own). Making clothing industries less of a priority at the start.
• Bakery? I cannot yet see any point in bakeries in Burgage plots, a communal oven can roll through your flour store in a few months and then you can reassign the workers. This to me makes a Burgage baker a waste of a useful family.
• Blacksmith? One (1) blacksmith plot in a burgage can produce all the weapons/tools you need. It can only produce one type at a time, you switch between this in 'general' tab in the blacksmith. The bottleneck here is iron slabs and planks. I cannot yet see any point in a communal smithy, unless you desperately need tools at the start. A communal smithy seems to only produce tools presently. I've not seen tools used much.
• Joiner? One (1) Joiner is easily sufficient to produce shields (small/large), a single Joiner burned through all my planks super fast and I ended up with a hundred shields. The bottleneck here is planks. My view is they could be great to sell, instead of planks.
• Tailor? When you have farming up, a Tailor's can produce Gambersons from flax (grown in fields) when it has been made into linen (which also is sold in markets for clothes). Gambersons are cheap armour for your militia, I spent a lot of my Region Wealth importing these until I realised how to make them. My view is they could be great to sell.
• Mistakes? I have not found a way to delete an industry (except chickens/veg/goat) within a Burgage Plot, without removing the whole plot. Choose wisely.
• Size? I would aim for small housing plots near your central storehouse/granary/market but only just big enough for +'residence' and +'backyard'. Cram them in. These start as chickens, and then move up to industry when your village is larger and can survive the loss of labour. This is so they have easy access to resources/planks/malt/iron/linen. You can make large Burgage plots for vegetables etc elsewhere. I do not believe size of backyard yet affects industries or it is only minor.
• Build Order? The 4 first industries I would set up are Blacksmith > Joiner > Brewery > Tailor's. This gets you a decent militia + level 3 (with a church/tavern). I would slow down at this point and focus your labour on everything else, that is 8 families labour you lost (if you've +residence'd your Burgage plots).

I'm not saying the above is META, but these lessons learned worked well for me and what I would aim for on new play throughs.
Any tricks and tips please feel free to add them, I'm curious on others experiences of early access!

It's clearly against the spirit of the event for players to use blue mage to farm fates. These players should be banned! They are griefing other players who are working hard for their weapons and mounts all while they press a few buttons to get an easy instant kill on the fates. Teach these players a lesson square enix. Show them that this behavior is not tolerated within our wonderful community. Players who cheat at events like these do not deserve to play the same game as the rest of us who work at clearing the right way. I worked extra hard on my weapon because of these people ruining the event. Please punish them Square, don't let them get away with this.
If you are one of these people please do not reply in my thread. We know who you are.

Welcome to another Indie Sunday! This event starts at 12 AM EST and will run for 24 hours.
Please read the below guidelines carefully before participating. If you have any questions please don't hesitate to send us a modmail.
A reminder that Rule 8 is not enforced during this event for submissions which follow the participation guidelines.

Submission Restrictions

• Games may be unreleased or finished
  
• You must provide video footage of the game in action. This can be a prototype, alpha, beta, etc. Images and concept art are nice but you must include a trailer or video of gameplay footage of the game.
  
• No key/game giveaways
  
• Only developers may make submissions for their games - if you would like to highlight a game on your own, please do so in this hub thread
  
• The same game/developer can not be shared more than once every 30 days.
  

Submission Format

• Submission must be a self-post (No direct links)
• Title: Game Name - Company (or individual) Name - Short description (for example: "classic turn based RPG" or "platformer inspired by Metroidvanias")
• Flair: Indie Sunday
• Body: Any links to trailers/footage, a description of the game, plans for release (platform, target date, etc), any additional information you'd like to add.

Weekly Spotlight

• Soviet Soldier - Go Up Gaming - Story Driven FPS with Multiple Endings set during WW2 and the Cold War
• Demiurges - Berih - discover a twisted fantasy world, develop mighty heroes, recruit a giant army of creatures, and build majestic towns in the mix of "Slay the Spire" and "Heroes of Might and Magic 3"
• Dragonero: The Rise of Draquir - Operaludica - Old-school turn based combat RPG + Game master mode
• Pest Apocalypse - Kikimora Games - Deliver pizza, Survive the horde, Drive like a maniac!
• Trace Hunters - Moon Mantis Games - Third-person shooter with sci-fi vehicle combat!
• Knight Runner: Blade and Bolt - Barkitect Games - An arcade, endless runner with hints of bullet-hell
• Undercover Speed Dating (with Wolves) - Shminkle - A survival game about small talk
• CritterGarden - Minjonia Studios - Creature Collector meets Farming Sim - Like Viva Piñata, but in pixel art
• Dethroned - Irid Games - Army builder Roguelike with open world exploration 🐲
• Arcania - Slash Games - Action-RPG Roguelite inspired by Diablo but in a medieval fantasy world
• The Book: Gunsmith's Battles Echoes - Steph Indie Games - A fantasy adventure first-person shooter.
• Atomic Exile - Inferno Muse Interactive - 2d Extraction Shooter
• Movies Tycoon - PixelCraze - Indie Tycoon game about building and running a film studio
• Sodaman - Tape Corps - Action roguelike game with a sense of humour - Releasing This Summer
• Goeland - Maarti Games - play as a mischievous seagull in this sandbox open-world
• Reus 2 - Abbey Games - You are a god, you can control giants and decide the fate of mankind. Will you give them a chance?
• Bug & Seek - So Peculiar - Creature Collector, collect real bugs who make jokes and run a bug zoo
• Fishlets - Pixlin - Semi-idler, collect pixel fish, decorate aquariums, and destroy aquatic threats
• ARTIFICIAL - Ondrej Angelovic - Portal & Half-Life inspired physics-based puzzle platformer set inside of a huge asteroid floating through space
• Contraption Maker - Kevin Ryan – Added Gravity Bomb and Bomblets parts to CM (a The Incredible Machine type of game)
• Musgro Farm - Metal Games - 3D Incremental Factory Game
• Shalnor: Silverwind Saga - Johnny Ostad - Action-packed RPG game with focus on gauntlet-style combat.
• SMASH BEAR - Greg Austin - Bear Roguelike, eat humans, smash everything.
• Metropolis 1998 - Yesbox Studios - City Builder - 90s Aesthetics
• Lost For Swords - MaxBytes - roguelike dungeon crawler: simple to pick up, yet deep and tactical
• There's Always a Madman: Fight or Flight - Sunny Demeanor Games - A spy thriller interactive novel where your wits are your weapon just released last month
• Beneath - Camel101 - Action horror beneath the waves , a mix of F.E.A.R / Resident Evil / Dead Space
• Vague Lizards - Setone Games - A comic parody action thriller in an old Slavic setting.
• Urban Jungle - Kylyk Games - a plant-placing puzzle inspired by Unpacking and Islanders set in tiny apartments and houses ⋆｡°✩🌿⋆｡°✩
• 9th Dawn Remake - Valorware - Large hand-crafted Openworld RPG full of dungeons, loot, monster-taming and secrets - part of the 9th Dawn RPG series!
• Recycling Center Simulator - Balas Games - A Job Simulator About Recycling and Manufacturing
• First Dwarf - Star Drifters - Action RPG, Colony Survival, Base Building and Tower Defense in the fantasy world of Driftland
• HeroSquare - Akseli Virtanen - Colorful Retro Metroidvania, inspired by games like 'Adventure' on Atari 2600
• Times of Progress - Pressing Thumbs Games - Isometric City-Builder set during the Industrial Revolution
• AFK Chess - Skimsi - A PvP chess auto battler!
• IT Startup: Tech Fodder - KupilasMedia - a Dev 💻 Themed Deckbuilder with employee burnout mechanics [Steam Demo]
• Deep Dark Wrath - CraftedCircuitry - A Hand-drawn Card collecting Dungeon Crawler where you fend off enemies and find their source with the help of powerful Enchanted Cards
• Eko and the Bewitched Lands - Twin Studios - Adventure Roguelite inspired by old top down games.
• Dice & Fold - Tinymice - Dice-Roguelike, Attack enemies with Dice
• Flow of War - Rongcon Games - Warcraft 2 meets Age of Empires in Automation RTS game
• Towerful Defense: A Rogue TD - MFG - Action roguelike tower defense, free prologue coming very soon
• Don't Die, Collect Loot - Dan Makes Video Games - Loot-based action RPG meets fun, arcade-style gameplay

Previous Indie Sunday

Feedback

Feel free to ask any questions in the comments below, or send us a modmail if it is urgent.

Discussion

• Any of these games catch your eye?
  
• Any games you want to personally highlight that haven't been shared yet?
  
• Any projects that have had interesting development journeys?
  
• What indie game recommendations do you have?
  

hi! my account looks bare i know, but i would really appreciate any help ppl can offer so i can know where to improve my application.
Demographics: female, chinese-american junior in Iowa at a rural public school - first-gen immigrant, my parents both have masters from state school in America Major in Environmental Science and a minor in music (violin) SAT: 1540 first time, I'm retaking in June bc I'm way better at digital format and aiming for a 1580! 3.88/4.00 UW, no W GPA and our school doesn't release ranking but I guesstimate I'm in the top 20 at my school Coursework:
10th grade: AP Calc AB and BC (4), Phys I (4)
11th grade (haven't taken exams yet obvs): Calc III (A-), APUSH, AP Lang, AP Lit, Phys II, self-studying APES 12th grade (projected): AP Chem, linear algebra, some environmental courses from local uni Awards:
Seal of Biliteracy (Chinese), Lumiere Research Scholar, Pioneer Research Scholar, voted school's Changemaker of the year (2023-24) + featured in school newspaper Extracurriculars:
Founder and prez of my school's environmental club, have led a thrift shop project that serves impoverished communities and students at my school, working on a school/community garden project in conjunction w/ local botanical garden that will donate veggies to local food corps, hosted statewide earth appreciation event that drew 100+ participants, club members contribute 100+ hours annually doing club-related activities
Piano and violin lessons for 11 and 13 years respectively, piano I competed at state level in 2024 and placed 5th, named 1st violin at All-State for 3 years consecutively (and likely 4th yr as a senior)
Summer 2022 I was a Pioneer Research Scholar and wrote a paper on desertification in Beijing and the Gobi Desert, not published
Summer 2023 I was a Lumiere Research Scholar and wrote a wind farm proposal for rural Iowa, self-published
I also write and publish a blog on environmental science and its relations to my own interests that averages 100 monthly readers (not a lot ik :( it's hard to find time)
Volunteer at local botanical garden helping K-12 kids appreciate the environment, hoping to get to 300+ hours this summer
I'm also working on starting a nonprofit that will plant trees and create green spaces downtown for more integrated infrastructure and incorporate renewable energy
Likely irrelevant but I construct/solve crossword puzzles in my downtime and have submitted a few to newspaper publications Essays/LORs/Other: obviously I haven't written them yet, but I have pretty strong writing skills so...also my school doesn't allow students to take APs in 9th grade and most school related extracurriculars are only open to 10th+, also my grandpa died in the middle of 10th grade and my family had to go to China for his funeral so it obvs disrupted my studies Schools: my dream school is MIT, but it's obviously a reach-other reaches w/ good env science programs r Stanford, Harvard, Peking University in Beijing (my dad is an alumni), Oxford, Cambridge, Yale, UMich
thanks in advance for any help u can provide! i appreciate it a lot :)

Hello, honestly I'm very curious to know my mom's type, she has disorders like intermittent explosive disorder and obsessive compulsive disorder, that's why I understand that this may be an inconsistent analysis and that's why it may be complicated to type her.. but sorry I can't hide how intrigued I am, so I appreciate any comment that can give the closest type, or any idea.
Ok, here I go, sorry if this will be very long, I just want it to be complete and that nothing is taken out of consideration, in order to know the function preference (sorry for my English too):
-Is very respected and admired, she's honorable. Has had success and recognition and takes pride on that.
-She's full of pride, has a lot of knowledge, that's why I don't like to talk to her deeply about anything because she then will let me know that she knows more than me and then will talk for hours. Honestly no one can beat her in a discussion.
-The information that she obtains can be changed or built in new or more unique ways. She's got a vision.
-Wants and seeks knowledge, she's a master in many fields/topics, but just in what will benefit her and not out of pure randomness or similar. She's brutally honest.
-She cares and is interested in charity, originality and be revolutionary.
-She feels exhausted with many people or at parties, she needs to recharge energy. She's good at public speaking and can do well but can't do it too much. She's also good at teamwork and cooperation, but she likes to work alone in private because she works better that way. She doesn't like to depend on others.
-She always makes people become the best version of themselves, she makes them improve, with her they put effort. She's good at mentoring and inspiring.
-She doesn't focus on touching/emotional topics or how people feel when problem solving. She focuses on the main problem and not people. She can be quite direct and take obstacles out of the way.
-She interacts with the outer world looking for ordering or organizing things that seem out of control or wrong
-When someone does something she doesn't like or something wrong, she just stares in a serious way, if she's far from them she stares with crossed arms. If she's close, she will stare subtly. With this, they notice that they shouldn't have done that. They don't like to look at her in the eyes. She focuses on correcting others, others mistakes
-People rely so much on her, because she takes them to the right path. Actually, they expect her to take charge of situations. That's why we can tell that she's a leader.
-Is very disciplined. She takes her medications at the exact hour, she eats very clean at the right hour, she's never late, she works and finishes tasks first and then she does something else
-She likes to write, she spends time on her notes app building words or messages she will send for example. She reads and re-reads till it convince her enough. That's why she takes so much time when it comes to reply messages or when someone asks for advice.
-She's very serious than the rest of her surroundings, especially when it comes to take decisions. She take decisions slowly, and they may have no patience for her sometimes but she will always come with the best decision
-She focuses on the future, almost never on past or present. She plans for the future, she plans even for things that will happen in a long time, she prepares for it.
-She doesn't really improvise or something like that.. she's creative, but everything that she does is somehow coherent or connected.. something that she does makes things flow well.
-Is sweet with very close and beloved people that she can even put them first and can forget about her own necessities and may feel embarrassed to admit she needs something, but in general she's serious and reserved. Has a death stare, that's why at first sight she doesn't seem like someone very nice. She doesn't have the image of someone very outgoing or too charismatic.
-Is very strict, sarcastic, perfectionist. Has very high standards. Because of this, she's not that interested in love or just not like other people
-Many groups and things wouldn't function without her, they need her or else results wouldn't be good
-She's a tomboy, she likes things that are "heavy" or "rude", like rock/metal music, action or suspense movies, comic books, action figures, playing instruments like electric guitar, etc. If her image requires something more feminine/soft/delicate then she will be like that, but she's naturally "rough".
-She's good at chess, sudoku, languages, puzzles, etc. Even if she's good at sports and has fashion sense, mental stimulation it's where she's happy most
-Has a good memory, she had perfect grades at school, and basically was one of the best students
-Has a big desire of being perfect and doing things the best way possible. Thanks to this and pushing her body for accomplish things she got sick with time. She has an image that she values and keeps
-When plans fail, she feels useless. She takes reflection, but then takes it as a lesson and basically never talks about that topic again or doesn't like when people mention it. Or maybe she just forgets..
-She doesn't cry easily, and if she does she cries in private. She doesn't let things affect her too much, she receives the cruelty, hits or rawness of life, but she then stands up and continues like nothing happened. She accepts things, she faces things.. she's not a coward or anything. If she gets sick, she doesn't like when people feel sympathy.
-She's not afraid of jumpscares or screamers, even if she's close to the screen or the volume is high she won't flinch or something. Because she says that it's basically that.. an screen, not something real, that's why it's not scary for her. She was afraid of heights before, she also had stage fright, but not anymore.
-She will always fulfill a promise, if she promised you something, she will always fulfill it, no matter what. It seems that her sense of duty is very strong.
-People or characters she admires: Eleanor Roosevelt
Even if she's not interested in MBTI, I made her take tests, and all tests in its majority agreed that she was INTJ (1w9), TJ is always clear, but results sometimes show high preference for both extraversion and introversion, and intuition and sensing. That's why I want to be sure and consult with the ones that actually know, if it is true, because results also showed ENTJ (8w9) sometimes. You can say and correct anything and I will take it into account. Thank you for reading.

This is sort of a sequel to my previous post on here where I talked about "Stories of Jedi and Sith" in regards to Barriss and Tales of the Empire. I wanted to discuss the Maul story this time around because I just really love it and wanted to share my thoughts somewhere. Spoiler marked the post because I'm basically going to go through the whole story and don't want to ruin it for anyone who wants to read it for themselves. If you've already read it or aren't going to them stick around!
The first thing I really like with this right off the bat is that this takes place from Maul's POV after the events of the Siege of Mandalore Clone Wars arc. This is very unique because for whatever reason the books and comics usually don't touch Maul too much outside of pre Episode 1 material (Son of Dathomir being the one big exception outside of this). It was really nice to get a rare introspect into Maul's POV especially during this time period.
Anyway the story has Maul venturing to an ancient Sith temple with the hopes of finding something he can use to wipe out his enemies (particularly Obi-Wan and Sidious). Shortly after breaching the temple he is barraged with various visions of people from his past. The first one being Savage Opress his brother. Savage immediately attacks Maul and rages at how his life was wasted by his brother's undying desire for power and vengeance. How Maul failed as both a brother and a master. From Maul's POV we see a rare glimpse of his regret because deep down he knows that the specter of Savage is correct. He even tries to reason with Savage briefly before realizing that he's fighting a fantasy and angered by this revelation he quickly overpowers Savage and stands upon him lightsaber down at his brother's chest while Savage begs Maul to "not waste his life again." Maul stabs him and sees his own corpse lying on the ground. Surprised, Maul immediately leaves the chamber and presses further into the temple.
It's not long before Maul comes across the next vision of an old enemy. This time it's everyone's favorite asthmatic cyborg General Grievous! Quick info dump for those who don't read the comics: Grievous killed Mother Talzin right in front of Maul in the Son of Dathomir comic. Hence the beef between them and why Maul sees him here. They end up fighting as well while Maul taunts Grievous for already being dead and simply appearing as a vision. To which Grievous acknowledges that this is indeed true however Maul was not able to take vengeance against the cyborg. Instead, his old adversary Obi-Wan Kenobi was the one to steal Maul's revenge. (Go ahead and add another check on the list for Maul's beef with Obi-Wan). Grievous then tells Maul that his quest for vengeance is futile and he will forever be doomed to have his desires for revenge go unfulfilled just like when Obi-Wan instead of Maul killed Grievous. Maul beats the Grievous phantom but immediately realizes that his victory is hollow because as with Savage he knows that the Phantom wasn't really wrong. Nevertheless he presses into the central chamber of the temple.
This is where he encounters the final specter. This one is far worse than what he encountered before. Savage and Grievous both wanted to hurt Maul. Maul is a Sith. He can understand hurt. What he can't fathom is that someone who Maul wronged in the past didn't cling to vengeance and instead seeks only what is in his best interest. This is why the most troublesome of the Phantoms to deal with is none other than Qui-Gon Jinn. Qui-Gon doesn't fight Maul at all. He just asks Maul a very simple question: "Why?". He proposes the scenario of Maul succeeding in his quest of killing Obi-Wan and Sidious and asks him what Maul will do once he accomplishes this goal. Maul of course doesn't have a good answer so Qui-Gon proposes another idea: Maul can leave the Temple. Abandon his pointless endeavor. See who he can become without constantly clutching to the chains of his past. Maul of course tries to brush all this off saying that he already killed Qui-Gon once before but the Jedi Master waves this off and continues to ask Maul to leave behind his desires for revenge. When Maul remains stubborn Qui-Gon warns that this path can only lead to one place and tells Maul he already knows where that will be. Maul finally having enough stabs Qui-Gon (again) who promptly vanishes.
Leaving Maul to finally claim his reward. The thing he fought all these ghosts of his past to attain. Nothing. The Temple has nothing of use. Maul returns to his ship in a rage and resolves to keep searching the galaxy until he finally discovers something he can use to destroy his enemies. Thereby proving all the specters correct and failing the lesson that the Temple was trying to teach him.
As said before I love this story. It provides a rare and fascinating view into Maul's psyche and overall serves as an examination of Maul's ultimate downfall being his outright refusal to ever let his petty desires go and thereby allow himself to grow as a person. Maul can never learn this and so he dies in a futile attempt to take revenge while being held by the man he'd despised more than anything for decades. The specters all tried to warn Maul of his fate in their own ways but of course Maul has set himself on his path and has made it so that death is the only way he can truly be free.