anyway!! if youāre a gentile wishing you received more education on Judaism in your school system, i would recommend checking out jewfaq.org. itās free and a great introductory resource, even if the design looks a little datedĀ
this also goes for Jews who did not receive a Jewish education or did not receive as much Jewish education as they would have liked. you are not aĀ ābad Jewā for not knowing things about Judaism/Jewishness, and you have a right to know more about your roots.
iām kicking myself for not putting myjewishlearning.com on this post, and think both websites are extremely valuable (with somewhat different viewpoints). iād love if people would reblog this version of the post with both links but suspect the cat may be out of the bag at this point
How to write fic for Black characters: a guide for non-Black fans
Donāt characterize a Black character as sassy or thuggish, especially when the character in question is can be described in literally ten thousand other ways..
Donāt describe Black characters as chocolate, coffee, or any sort of food item.
Donāt highlight the race of Black characters (ie,Ā āthe dark manā orĀ āthe brown womanā) if you donāt highlight the race of white characters.
Think very carefully about that antebellum slavery or Jim Crow AU fic as a backdrop for your romance.
If youāre not fluent with AAVE, donāt use it to try to look cool or edgy. You look corny as hell.
Donāt use Black characters as a prop for the non-Black characters youāre actually interested in.
KeepĀ āunpopular opinionsā about racism, Black Lives Matter, and other issues pertinent to Black folks out the mouths of Black characters. We know what the fuck youāre doing with that and need to stop.
Donāt assume a Black character likes or hates a certain food, music, or piece of pop culture.
You can make a Black characterās race pertinentĀ without doing it like this.
Be extremelyĀ careful about insinuating that one or more of a Black characterās physical features are dirty, unclean, or ugly.
Be wary of making Black characters seem animalistic, uncivilized, or subhuman in comparison to white characters. Watch out for: comparing us to monkeys, gorillas, chimpanzees, apes, and other animals.
Words like Negroid, colored/colured, Negro, and the n-word do not belong in the mouths of contemporary characters you want to portray as sympathetic.
Not all Black people are African American.
Africa is not a country but the second-largest continentĀ on earth with some 54 different countries with thousands of ethnic groups and 1,500 to 3,000 languages and dialects.
Resist the urge to make a Black character seem uneducated and ignorant compared to white characters.
Capitalizing Black shows that you recognize that the word unifying people of African descent, particularly the diaspora, should be described using a proper noun.
Do your own homework instead of expecting, asking, or demanding Black fans to do it.
Before approaching that Black person you admire so much for being so articulate about race issues (this is sarcasm) to beta read your work: 1) make sure itās something theyāve expressed interest in doing, and 2) you offer something in return for their time and expertise.
Be prepared for fans to have issues with what you came up with and open to suggestions.
Having only one Black character in a story that takes place in a huge city, country, or galaxy looks weird. Really, really weird. Scary weird.
Donāt use a Black characterās death to motivate a white character.
Portray Black characters with complex and multifaceted identities. We are more than just Black. We are also women, LGBT, Jewish, disabled, neurodivergent, immigrants, etc.
There is a huge chasm between hypersexual and desexualized.
Remember: whatās progressive for a white character is not necessarily progressive for a Black one.
They drink, and they breathe, regardless of if they need to, sitting in bar stools that spin in circles; circling, always circling each other even though they know that the only way this ends is with calamity.
Theyāve been circling each other - always circling but missing each other by a hairās width, so close; an impending collision.
They date the same girl, they drink at the same bar, they save the world - doing it all inches away from each other, seconds away from colliding. Fate is biding it's time for it to happen at the least opportune moment, for the world to fall apart and for Jace and Simon to smash into each other so hard they both shatter.
Jace acts like he is made of marble - carved by a talented sculptor, and maybe that's why he was so drawn to Clary way back when, before they knew the world was ending and before they knew each other, like Jace was searching for whoever put him together now that he was starting to feel the weak points. He wanted Clary to fix the cracks in him - but he is not made of stone, no matter how much he pretends that his heart is, and Clary is a painter - if she had tried, she would have just covered them up in strokes of cadmium yellow.
Simon feels like heās made up of a cloth stretched too tight over a loom - woven and pulled, and woven and pulled, and woven and pulled, until he started to fray, and itās not why him and Clary were best friends but it definitely helped him to see that someone could always be a Fray and not rip apart. Clary is a painter, not a weaver - if she had tried, the fabric of his life would be filled with messy threads that would choke him.
Clary is not a bad person; Simon and Jace are not bad people. People are just not made to fix each other - and they had to learn that the hard way because Life does not give them hints or clues, give handbooks or cheats. Life lets life happen as it may and the dice will fall where they do and theyāll just have to deal with it.
They grow towards each other - the same bar and the same girl, saving the world with their elbows inches away from each other's on the counter top where itās sticky no matter how much Maia wipes it down, the distance closing and closing while they wait for their car-crash ending, wrapping each otherās hearts around metaphorical lamp posts, because with their luck this will only occur in disaster.
Jace always laughs like its startled out of him, like he's always surprised, like he's never laughed before. Simon watches him throw his head back, catching a blush in the dim light of the Hunterās Moon where the regulars still glare at them.
Simon laughs like itās the default, like Simon always starts on giddy and goes from there with it. Jace peeks glimpses of Simonās teeth while he giggles as they walk back to his apartment on a cool night in January, knowing theyāre feinting something innocent when really they are Simonās greatest weapon.
Circling, circling - always circling, waiting for a swipe or a hand or a blow or a something else, neither knows; both braced but leaning in towards affection because soldiers are probably the loneliest of people, wanting to be touched but so staunchly against it that sometimes itās what ends up killing them.
They both died by the hands of people they had loved, or thought they loved at one point - Camille poisons him with her venom, soothes him with the bite and tosses him aside when his body gives up; Valentine stabs him with his knife, and cradles him as he falls to the floor, as if he even cares at all about the child he stole.
Theyāve both visited the place that they both somehow remember and donāt-remember - the cool, quiet dark where they had loitered, fate as yet undecided. Theyāre both living on time Clary borrowed for them, brute forced out of the hands of the Reaper as it hovered over their prone bodies, by lakeside or under dirt.
The irony being, of course, Clary gives them borrowed time, and she's the one who gets taken first. In many ways, in all the ways that even seem to matter anymore, she is dead. She's still alive out there, but she doesn't know what her past held and what her future could have been, if only the Angels were more forgiving to the people who are only trying to fix the world instead of fixing themselves, even if those worlds were small enough to just be singular people.
They save the world by dying, and it means that their grief gets overlooked, shadowed in the celebration of the world not ending even though they had ceased to exist, for minutes or hours, but yes, they were gone, and tomorrow continued to come without them as if theyād never been there in the first place, as if it didnāt even matter. The world did not need them unless it needed them to save it.
Simon and Jace would not say they are the same - but history tells us otherwise because there they are, together, lives plummeting along similar tracks; they live, they die, they love - the order doesnāt matter, because they hit the same beats, trains at the crossroads where they keep missing each other by fractions of somethings that are slowly getting smaller and smaller with each pass.
They drink, and they breathe, regardless of if they need to, sitting in bar stools that spin in circles; circling, always circling each other even though they know that the only way this ends is with calamity, with tragedy, as if this is a deviation from the norm - theyāve been tragedies all their lives, walking in the wake of old blights, their own little end-of-the-world that never quite comes.
And so they march on towards hell or something like it, because they both believe themselves to be damned, shouldering too much for young men who only ever wanted to tumble fingers along piano keys and make melodies that are known only to them themselves, private little pockets of notes written nowhere and committed only to memories and lost as soon as they stop sighing in the air.
Circling each other, so close they could almost reach out and -
āItās too quiet,ā Jace says instead, looking back over at Simon. He looks paler than ever, washed out and more sickly than even some of the corpses that are in the morgue. But he isnāt a pile of dust, so that counts forā¦ something.
āI complain all the time about how he never shuts up, and now -ā Jace curls impossibly more into himself. āNow itās just too quiet.ā
(Alec tries to be helpful and hopes he succeeds.)
āWhen are you going to tell him?ā Alec asks, leaning against the doorframe of the small private area in the infirmary.
Jace looks up at him with a kind of fear in his eyes that Alec has seen a hundred times before - the quiet kind, the kind none of them will ever talk about because they all feel it, the internal kind that they pretend isnāt there every time they look at each other, or their mission, or their weapons.
Jace looks down and away, like he can pretend that Alec didnāt say anything at all, that this conversation is not finally being had.
āItās too quiet,ā Jace says instead, looking back over at Simon. He looks paler than ever, washed out and more sickly than even some of the corpses that are in the morgue. But he isnāt a pile of dust, so that counts forā¦ something.
āI complain all the time about how he never shuts up, and now -ā Jace curls impossibly more into himself.
When Jace had dragged Simon back to the Institute hours ago, both of them were absolutely covered in blood - mostly Simonās. Alec still doesnāt really know what happened; between getting Simon to the infirmary and making Jace change out of his blood soaked clothes, Alec decided that heād have to pick his battles.
āNow itās just too quiet.ā Jace turns his head even further away from Alec, sniffling in one awful loud sound. He looks exhausted and raw. He had been hysterical earlier, but somehow looking at him like this is worse; itās like the fight in him is gone, like everything inside him has deflated, like Jace is staring at his own heart lying on the bed in front of him.
Alec supposes he might just be.
(Alec tries not to think about sitting at Magnusā bedside, in the midst of everything going to absolute shit, how it felt watching Magnus sleep on after his body started rejecting Lorenzoās magic. The world was quite literally on the brink of ending, but somehow Alec knew it would end early if Magnus ceased to be. His chest had hurt so much with this glass-cut feeling, like he was being slowly sliced open from the inside.
He tries not to dwell on the memory, but sometimes he pulls Magnus closer to him in the night when he canāt sleep because heās reliving the all-encompassing terror in his chest of holding Magnus while he seized. Heās comforted by the steady sated thrum of his heart under his skin, but he knows Jace will never have that with Simon.)
āMagnus says heāll be back on his feet in a few hours,ā Alec tells him. Magnus has a soft spot for Simon - it make have taken Alec along time to understand why, but he thinks now he does. Something about his babbling and sunny disposition started to grow on Alec, somewhere along the line.
Theyāve worked together a lot as they pilot new programmes to make Downworlders more involved in the running of the Shadow World at large. Simon is always ready to try - whether it be training or liasioning or something else, he takes a good stab at it. Alec can respect that, respect his ethic and commitment, and along the way he came to respect the man too. Still finds him wholly irritating at times, but itās easier.
Jace doesnāt answer him, doesnāt acknowledge him. Alec tries to reach out to him, send something even vaguely comforting along the bond, but the only thing heās met with is muddled confusion, pain, and the kind of numbness that doesnāt make you stop feeling things but only makes the inside of your head feel fuzzy and ice-cold. He pushes, harder, and something stirs in Jace, the equivalent of hands intertwining and holding like one of them might just drift away and be lost at sea.
He should have guessed a long time ago that this was coming - how easily Jace had given himself over to save Simon, made the cut himself and encouraged Simon to drink even though theyāve grown up knowing the consequences of vampire venom. All the tiny little things that Alec has seen and heard, and undoubtedly the ones he hasnāt seen or been told about.
āWhat do I do if I lose him?ā Jace asks, still mostly turned away from Alec. āHow do I - ?ā He swallows. āWhat do I do?ā
(Alec doesn't want to think about the way pure unadulterated panic had bled across to him, overwhelmed him while standing in Magnusā apartment earlier that evening. Heād dropped a glass - one that had a spindly little stem and the shallow but wide top. It had shattered on the nice rug Magnus had picked out that morning.
Alec doesn't want to think about the weight of Jace just holding onto him after he lead him away from the infirmary to clean up, heavy but as far from solid or sturdy that Alec had ever felt. It was like he was shattering apart in Alecās arms, just like the cocktail glass, trembling so deeply that it seemed to be radiating out of Jaceās very bones.
Alec doesnāt want to think about how maybe emotions are a hindrance in this line of work, doesnāt want to doubt what he risked everything for. Feeling Jace's pain everywhere, all over is almost too much, but he thinks of how it feels in his chest when he catches Magnusā eye across a room, and he knows he must take the bad to deserve the good.)
āI donāt know,ā Alec tells him. He canāt condense the fear he has that one of them will have to live without the other, that Magnus (and Simon) will be at their death beds and have to go on without them forever, down into words that exist. Alec isnāt good with words; heās better now than he ever has been but he still isnāt good. Jace and Magnus and everyone heās close to has just had to learn Alec, learn him and know him and understand him because Alec had never been able to articulate anything other than strategy and battle plans up until about a year and a half ago. He swallows. He doesnāt know.
āBut you need to tell him.ā
Jace scoffs, a wet tired sound half strangled in his throat. āYeah, that always works out so well for me.ā He sniffles into the sleeve of the first clean smelling sweater Alec had managed to pull out of his closet. Itās grey and soft and has something embossed across the front that has long since faded into being illegible. Alec is pretty sure it isnāt even Jaceās.
āHe - jumped in front of me. Tonight,ā Jace tells him. Alec is glad that he doesnāt have to pry it out of him, but is aware that Jace is just trying to change the subject. āA vampire, young, starved - she went for my throat, but Simon got in front of me first. He knocked the wind out of me and when I was able to get back up she was slashing at him. Got his neck. Then he just wasnāt healing, and I couldnāt - I couldnāt do anything.ā Jace looks back at him sharply. āHeās so stupid.ā
Alec lets out a surprised huff of laughter. āTell him that.ā
āI tell him everyday.ā Jace slumps impossibly further into his chair, half a mirthless chuckle on his lips. āBut I donāt think I canā¦. I canāt tell him.ā
āHe loves you.ā
āYeah, Alec, I know,ā Jace rolls his eyes. āI know. Itās Simon. He couldnāt hide it if he even tried.ā
Alec doesnāt ask why he doesnāt just tell Simon if he knows. Itās never that simple. Theyāve been put through so much, walked through so much hell that they did it quite literally. Jace has a mantra carved into the walls of his skull in Valentineās handwriting that heās been fighting for years. Nothing is ever easy for them - not like this, in this way.
They lapse into silence then, just three bodies breathing in a room. Itās late. Alec longs to be with Magnus, knows heās somewhere in the Institute, but he also knows that if he was with Magnus, heād be worried about Jace. Magnus gets it, puts up with far more than Alec deserves. Alec doesnāt think he would have survived if he hadnāt breezed into the wedding like an on-coming storm.
āWouldnāt it be worth it?ā Alec asks quietly, spinning his wedding band around his finger. He doesnāt look at Jace, just tracks the steady rise and fall of Simonās chest. āIf you hadnāt gotten here fast enough, would you be able to live with never telling him?ā
Jace stays quiet. The bond blooms with pain and fear and anger but also love and hope.
Simon, of course, chooses that moment to start waking up. He blinks heavily and unseeingly for minute, eyes ghosting over Alec before finally settling on Jace, clearing and looking blearily at him. āUgh, you look like shit,ā he tells Jace, immediately followed by: āAre you wearing my sweater?ā
Alec stands up to get one of the medical staff, quietly paying attention to Jace launching into a rant about how stupid Simon is, an absolute fucking moron, Iāve been trained to fight for my whole life, you idiot!
Alec canāt help but smile a little to himself, and sends a little bit of something he hopes is encouragement along the bond, before finally leaving to find Magnus.
anyway!! if youāre a gentile wishing you received more education on Judaism in your school system, i would recommend checking out jewfaq.org. itās free and a great introductory resource, even if the design looks a little datedĀ
this also goes for Jews who did not receive a Jewish education or did not receive as much Jewish education as they would have liked. you are not aĀ ābad Jewā for not knowing things about Judaism/Jewishness, and you have a right to know more about your roots.
iām kicking myself for not putting myjewishlearning.com on this post, and think both websites are extremely valuable (with somewhat different viewpoints). iād love if people would reblog this version of the post with both links but suspect the cat may be out of the bag at this point
the stars choose their lovers | simon/jace | 1.5k | ao3
"Did you know that there's robots on Mars?" Simon tells him, suddenly brimming with delight. Jace did know that - he knew it the way he knows a lot of mundane things: vaguely, with little context.
"Why?" He asks instead.
āFor science!ā Simon exclaims in a way that is far too excited and loud for the quiet stretch of off-road theyāve pulled onto. Some birds leave their roost in the nearby trees. Heās grinning while he does it though, so Jace doesnāt think itās that bad.
(Sometimes you've just gotta look at the stars and try to feel alright.)
Theyāre lying on the roof of Simonās van, far enough outside any city boundaries that they can see the stars above them. Itās a mild night in April, the slightest amount breezy, and the sky is inky and black behind the twinkling stars overhead. Jaceās mind feels clear for the first time in a long time.
Driving with Simon is - interesting. He talks so much, mostly to himself because Jace had said so little on the several hours theyād driven. He sticks his tongue out sometimes when heās concentrating or he furls his brow. He sings along to songs that Jace doesnāt know and will probably never hear again, and talks back to the random ads playing on the radio as if they can hear him.
Something about it is so - easy. Simon is so unafraid of making noise - heās loud. He shouts at asshole drivers, like a New Yorker through and through, he hums and taps his fingers on anything and everything, and itās all just so uncontained. Simon is messy. Jace feels like a spring coiled so tightly all the time - the only times he ever gets to feel loose is when he sits in the Hunterās Moon with daggers glared at the back of his head, or when he goes to the bathroom in the middle of the night and catches sight of his reflection in the mirror over the sink and he sees the monster he feels inside and he only vomits up bile because he skipped dinner again.
Jace thinks they're somewhere in Pennsylvania from the bits and pieces he actually paid attention to on the road. Four hours out of New York and with every mile that passed under them, Jace felt the knots in his chest loosen.
(Him and Clary have been weird ever since they broke up. It's always tense, an undercurrent of an unspoken fight between them as they stand at opposite sides of the Ops table, but they're civil and curt and professional.
He doesn't know where they went wrong. Maybe they were doomed from the start - that's how things tend to go for Jace. They dove headfirst into a war together holding hands as if that was a substitute for a relationship. They were only ever curious about each other, dazzled by the sight of something so new, so unknown that they had to chase it. There was no other choice.
And nothing even happened - no screaming match or bust up or whatever Jace thinks should have warranted him feeling the need to run away so intensely. He saw the back of Clary's hair; it was so vibrant and fiery in the midst of the white digital glow of the Institute's ever-growing collection of screens and interfaces. She didn't even turn around, didn't even know he was there at all. And yet the lump in his throat formed and the back of his eyes burned like he was looking directly at the sun.
He hopped in Simon's van and told Simon to drive since they were something resembling friends now, somehow, without Jace's permission. The look on Jace's face must have told Simon not to ask why, and he hit the gas while talking so much about almost nothing.)
"I think that's Mars over there," Simon says, one hand pointing vaguely at the sky. The other is resting under his head, ankles crossed and just hanging over the edge of the roof.
He resolutely doesn't think about Valentine teaching him to navigate by the stars, leaving him for a few days out in the wilderness at nine years old.
"It is," Jace tells him. He activated his Vision rune after he climbed up, so he can probably see almost as many stars as Simon can. The sky is void of clouds, one endless plane above them as they lie back on the cool metal under them. Jace feels small. He finds he kind of likes that.
"Did you know that there's robots on Mars?" Simon tells him, suddenly brimming with delight. Jace did know that - he knew it the way he knows a lot of mundane things: vaguely, with little context.
"Why?" He asks instead.
āFor science!ā Simon exclaims in a way that is far too excited and loud for the quiet stretch of off-road theyāve pulled onto. Some birds leave their roost in the nearby trees. Heās grinning while he does it though, so Jace doesnāt think itās that bad. āHumans have spent their whole existence looking at the stars. People created whole gods and religions around the stars, used them to find their way home and sail to new lands. And then we managed to figure out a way to get up there.ā
Simonās hands are batting back and forth, gesturing wildly as if to make their own point. Jace doesnāt know what it is, but he looks away from the stars to watch the way Simon gets lost in his own words, hands gracefully stumbling along up his spiel, trying to keep up.
ā- And you can talk about mundanes being useless, but we managed to do a lot of cool shit while you were protecting us from demons and monsters.ā And then quietly, a lonely little afterthought: āThem.ā
Jace makes a questioning noise, looking back up at the sky when Simon settles his hands flat on his belly.
āWhile you were protecting them from demons.ā
It clicks for Jace after a moment. Simon isnāt a mundane - not anymore. He sounds so - sad, having to exclude himself from humanity. Jace wonders what it feels like to be one thing for your whole life and then be thrown by the reality of no longer being that thing - but then, of course, Jace gets it. Itās a smaller scale, sure, because a surname and a species change arenāt the same thing, but itās probably in the same sphere of things. Itās the same shape, even if itās a different size.
āWhat do the robots even do?ā He asks, because Simon has deflated in on himself now. Before, he was vying to tell Jace all he could about space, but now the fight is gone out of him.
(Jace would never admit it to another living soul, barely admits it to himself, but he likes Simon. Too much for comfort, too much that way but even just in the reasonable friendly way. And Jace has always been far too empathetic for his own good, though he tries to pretend he isnāt along with the myriad of all the other things he pretends he isnāt. So when he has to blink away the image of his falconās glassy eyes when he looks at Simon, asking about fucking space robots, he maybe has to accept that him and Simon - theyāre friends, or something damned close to it.)
āTheyā¦ they mostly take pictures, I guess. Test the soil and atmosphere. Tell us thingsā¦.ā He goes quiet for a minute, and Jace doesnāt look over but in his mindās eye he can see the way Simonās whole face crinkles when heās thinking, lip caught in between his teeth and his eyebrows turned downwards. āButā¦ the Curiosity Rover sang happy birthday after itās first year on Mars. And when the Opportunity Rover was officially taken offline, the internet was really upset. It was just a robot in space but people really gave a shit, yāknow?ā
Jace looks across at him then, his face filled with something he doesnāt know how to name. Itās like hope and pain and relief and everything else. It strikes Jace somewhere in his chest, makes him yearn and twist and ache.
āSo, yeah, mundanes probably seem really dumb to Shadowhunters with your angel blood and divine whatever-the-fuck, butā¦ we spent a few thousand years figuring out how to go to space, and then named the robots we sent there things like Curiosity. I donāt know.ā
Theyāre silent for a moment. Thereās no hum of electricity or traffic or even another soul for miles around. Just the two of them, breathing, the gentle rustling of the trees around them.
āI guess mundanes donāt sound so bad when you put it that way.ā Thereās the edge of a tease that Jace hopes is just right. He doesnāt know, isnāt sure about anything anymore. The only thing heās sure of is Simon at his side, the van under his back, and the faint, far-off flutter of Alec laughing four hours away in New York.
Without thinking about it at all, without comprehending anything heās doing, he reaches across the foot of space between them, the metal cold to the touch, and links Simonās fingers through his. Simonās hand jerks, but then squeezes and holds on. It feels like opportunity. It doesnāt feel like curiosity.
Theyāre two very broken-down people in a breaking-down world. They donāt know where theyāre going. But the stars will still be there, wherever they end up.
So i just realised that the other half is showing up as being posted on the 16th of may when it was posted on the 26th of may and i think that might be part of the reason it has so little trafficā¦ā¦. hmm
So i just realised that the other half is showing up as being posted on the 16th of may when it was posted on the 26th of may and i think that might be part of the reason it has so little traffic....... hmm
the other half | simon/jace | 11k | ao3Ā | based on this promptĀ
He reaches up to brush some of the curls out of Simonās face, then he places his hand along Simonās jaw, thumb gently caressing his cheekbone. Simon shifts and pushes into the touch, slowly surfacing from sleep before his eyes finally blink open. It takes a second for his gaze to focus on him, but when it does Simonās face splits into a massive bright smile, his eyes crinkling and bright. Jace canāt help but smile back at him, in the glow of Simon.
Simon drops his forehead down to Jaceās chest, the smallest laugh escaping him. āYou didnāt leave,ā he whispers quietly, beautifully, gratefully.
(Jace and Simon, in no particular order.)
part two of from hello to goodbye | part one
Ā Ā Ā Ā 1. As a hello
(three and a half years)
Simon presses a swift kiss to the corner of Jaceās mouth when he arrives at the front door.
āAre you heading out?ā Jace asks as he shrugs out of his jacket to hang on the hooks lining the wall. Simon is putting on his sneakers.
āRaphael called - he needs a consult on something that apparently canāt wait. I donāt know if itās Downworlder Liaison related or something else but he really did not seem to be in a good mood.ā Simon zips up the front of his jacket.
āIs Raphael ever in a good mood?ā Jace asks as he starts undoing the laces of his combat boots.
āIf you catch Raphael in a bad mood, you will know about it, trust me.ā Simon leans in to kiss him again when Jace straightens up. āI love you, donāt wait up!ā he says as he slips out the front door.
Ā Ā Ā Ā 2. With a hoarse voice, under the blankets
Ā Ā Ā Ā 3. A scream
(eight years)
It never gets easier, is what Jace had come to learn. Theyāre both active in the field (Jace moreso, but Simon has enough hours logged in his own right), so injuries are things they deal with. An iratze, a blood bag, some good old fashioned rest.
Getting back to the Institute isnāt a problem. Simon can walk on his own two feet, and heās lucid though clearly in pain. The problem is that Simon is a vampire and has advanced healing and the only pain management they can safely offer vampires is magic, and of course itās a day that Magnus canāt portal over and help as much as Jace knows heād want to.
(Magnus has a soft spot for Simon, Jace knows. Maybe itās just that Magnus adopts every down-trodden Downworlder he can within a ten mile radius, and Simon at the start of their acquaintance had just become one, but Jace gets it; over the years, heās earned snippets and hints to Magnusā past, of being lost and alone and afraid, as well as some awful things he was manipulated into doing by people he thought cared for him. Every time he meets a young Downworlder in Magnusā apartment, it becomes even clearer to Jace that Magnus has a heart that does not give up and that he feels like he has sins heāll never be washed of.
Jace doesnāt know how to say, and does know that it is not his place to say, that anything Magnus did or was made to do was wiped from the record a long time ago.)
The hardest part is Simon letting out a choked off scream when the medic has to break his arm again because vampire healing means it healed wrong in the time it took them to get back to the Institute from patrol. The hardest part is that the only thing Jace can do is hold Simonās other hand. The hardest part is being able to heal his own broken fingers from Simon squeezing so tightly while watching Simon have to go through his pain unassisted.
The attending medic leaves them alone to get Simon a bag of blood, and Jace reminds himself to send her a fruit basket or something. A thank you for taking care of my husband gift. Simon probably knows what a good gift would be.
(Theyāve come a long way in the last decade with how Shadowhunters treat Downworlders in the New York Institute, but some people are set in their ways. So the gift is also a thank you for respecting us gift, a you didnāt bat an eye when we came in gift, a I wish I didnāt still feel afraid gift. Thinking about it makes Jace feel tired.)
Jace kisses Simonās knuckles from the hand still curled in his own. Simon gives him a little smile from his bed. It never gets easier. But itās always worth it.
Ā Ā Ā Ā 4. Over a cup of tea
Ā Ā Ā Ā 5. Over a beer bottle
(minus one week)
Simon may not want to admit it, but in a way Jace has become a kind of anchor in this new scary world he lives in. Heās been a constant presence in his life as the tide of the Shadow World washed in and out around him.
In - Simon gets kidnapped by vampires. Out - Simon gets rescued. In - Simon dies. Out - Simon becomes a vampire. Heās seen it all now. (He most definitely has not seen it all but to assume that he has stops him from speculating and overwhelming himself. Itās a pretty foolproof plan.)
It feels like the Shadow World has tried to drown him at every turn, and yet here he is, still alive - or unalive, he guesses - and drinking the finest alcoholic O-Negative in Magnusā apartment; itās abuzz with life, filled with colourful characters in every genre of Downworlder, and heās out on the balcony alone, waxing poetic about some dumb blonde.
There are a lot of things he doesnāt want to admit about Jace. He doesnāt want to admit that sometimes when he looks at Jace, he still feels hungry, like he can already taste his blood on his lips; itās been months, but the feeling of flying towards the sun is just on the tip of his tongue.
Someone steps up to the wall of the balcony to interrupt his melancholy.
āHow can you be a vampire and still be so easily startled?ā says Jace, leaning with his elbows up on brick next to Simon. Heās holding a half empty beer bottle in his hands.
āHow can you be such an asshole and, uhā¦ā Simon starts, and in his peripherals he can see Jaceās eyebrows go up, his lips faintly betraying a smirk. āYeah, I got nothing.ā Simon swallows a mouthful from his glass.
Jace chuckles. He seems to be in a good mood. Simon watches him as he takes another sip, follows the swoop of Jaceās bangs falling into his face all the way down to where he drinks from the bottle, then down further to where his Adamās apple bobs as he swallows. Simon looks away quickly after that.
There are a lot of things he doesnāt want to admit about Jace. He doesnāt want to admit that sometimes when he looks at Jace, he still feels hungry, but not necessarily for blood - sometimes itās that Simon wants to push up against him, hold on and touch and feel. Jaceās voice rings in his head as the man himself stands next to him unawares: no, never.
āItās a nice night out,ā Simon says, because he feels tipsy and stupid.
āThat why youāre out here alone when everyone else is having a good time inside?ā Jace asks, gesturing to the empty balcony widely with the neck of his beer bottle. Under the teasing, thereās something to it that takes a second for Simon to identify. Concern, it seems like.
Simon sighs. āI guess Iām not in the party mood,ā he says, looking down into his glass of blood.
Jace hums for a second, head tilted up towards the sky as if he could see the stars. āDonāt tell Magnus that,ā he jokes lightly. He seems so relaxed, much more so than Simonās ever seen him; he keeps rolling the glass bottle between his hands like he canāt keep still, a small, casual and mindless movement. Jace spends so much time holding himself together, tucking in the fraying edges and hiding his scars; itās nice to see him like this, loose and quietly jovial.
āI donāt know, I might just go home. I have a song I want to finish for my next gig.ā Simon downs whatās left in his cup and sighs again.
āWhen is it?ā Jace asks, taking another sip of his beer.
āUh, Thursday night. Izzy and Clary are coming.ā And then, because the alcohol makes him a little braver than normal: āItād be nice if you came too.ā
He looks at Jace, and he has that faint smirk on his face again and his eyes are bright and looking at Simon so unashamedly, like heās really seeing him, seeing right through him, the way he always does -
āMaybe,ā Jace says casually, looking away and out into the horizon. āIf Iām not on patrol.ā
āCool,ā Simon says lamely, but Jace looks back at him, and Simon feels a little bit dizzy when he meets Jaceās eyes.
There are a lot of things he doesnāt want to admit about Jace. Thereās the lust and the bloodlust, but thereās also a part of Simon that always feels like heās just been struck in the head when he looks at Jace. Like heās flying further and higher than the blood could ever achieve.
Ā Ā Ā Ā 6. On a sunny Tuesday afternoon, the late sunlight glowing in your hair
Ā Ā Ā Ā 7. As a thank you
(five and a half years)
āI was thinking,ā Jace starts, looking across at Simon in bed. He hates that his voice sounds nervous already.
āDonāt hurt yourself,ā Simon immediately replies, but puts down his phone where he was watching cat videos, and turns more bodily towards Jace. He then places his hand over Jaceās, and waits for him to talk again. Jace really does love him.
āWhen we get married,ā he starts over, and Simonās face gets a soft, dopey look to it. He always gets that expression whenever it comes up, and it makes Jaceās heart flutter. āWeāre supposed to take each otherās names and -ā
ā- And youāre worried because Iām going to have to take so many names?ā Simon jokes, interrupting him the way he always does. Jace is used to it by now - Simon interrupted him at the exact point in the sentence Jace expected him to because Simon is predictable and Jace is entirely too endeared to him to be annoyed by it anymore. āHi, Iām Lewis, Simon Wayland-Morgenstern-Herondale-Lightwood-Lewis.ā Simon gets that little glint in his eye that tells Jace heās about to launch into a complete and utter tangent, and as much as Jace loves him, he does actually have something to say.
āSimon, listen to me,ā he laughs, and Simon snaps back to reality, squeezing his hand for a second as if to apologise.
āSorry, what were you saying?ā
āInstead of having that problem, why not just stay Simon Lewis?ā Jace asks slowly, āAnd I could be Jace Lewis.ā
Simon stares at him for a second. And then keeps staring at him. Rendering Simon speechless is a rare but enjoyable experience usually, but Jace starts to feel the trickles of doubt that Simon doesnāt want that, and that Jace is screwing it up -
āAre you sure? Is that what you want?ā Simon asks, his eyes big and round. āI was joking but -ā
āSimon,ā Jace says, curling their fingers together properly. He can feel his own ring pressing into the skin of his finger. He takes a breath to compose himself and figure out how to explain it. āEvery time I got a new name, it was someone else giving it to me. Valentine, my grandmother -ā he sighs as he uses his free hand to push his hair out of his face. āIf I take your name - and just your name, I get to chose. The names are - itās about repute and prestige and I donāt need that. I donāt want to drag you into that. Itās pointless. But if Iām a Lewis? Itās because I love you, and I picked you.ā
Simon is looking at him through his whole spiel like heās the most beautiful thing in the world. āWell, then, I guess weāll both just be Mr. Lewis.ā Simonās smile is bright and beautiful, and Jace gets to marry him, and he loves him so deeply that it almost hurts.
Jace leans across to kiss him, mumbles thank you against his lips so softly that if Simon wasnāt a vampire he probably wonāt have heard it. Simon kissing him harder tells him that he did.
Ā Ā Ā Ā 8. As an apology
Ā Ā Ā Ā 9. When baking chocolate chip cookies
(eleven months)
Jace isnāt sure how their kitchen got commandeered for Izzyās birthday surprise. Simon has flour in his hair, Clary has it all over her shirt, and their counters are dusted in a fine layer of it like fresh snow.
Simon canāt even eat.
āWhy chocolate chip cookies?ā Jace asks as he throws the dish towel over his shoulder, and joins the whole room in being covered in flour. It puffs out of the cloth like a rug having the dust beaten out of it. He doesnāt know why he didnāt expect it.
āBecause Izzy told me she liked them,ā Clary tells him as if itās the most obvious thing in the world. She pours even more chocolate chips into the bowl of sticky brown dough.
Jace rolls his eyes, and then sees what he thinks is flour on the ceiling. How do you get flour on the ceiling?
āHow do you get flour on the ceiling?ā he asks incredulously.
āAre you going to keep asking stupid questions or are you going to help us?ā Simon asks, not looking up as he measures parchment paper to a baking sheet.
Jace shrugs and gets to work.
Ā Ā Ā Ā 10. Not said to me
Ā Ā Ā Ā 11. With a shuddering gasp
(five months)
āYouāre so sweet like this,ā Simon laughs into the crown of Jaceās head. Jace makes a noise that sounds like a disgruntled kitten, which does but reaffirm Simonās point. Jace snuggles further into Simonās chest.
āWhat, Iām not allowed cuddle with my boyfriend after we have sex?ā He mumbles against his skin. āStop being a dick.ā
Simon presses his smile into Jaceās hair and just holds onto him tighter.
Ā Ā Ā Ā 12. When we lay together on the fresh spring grass
Ā Ā Ā Ā 13. In a letter
(after)
Theyād forgotten to buy more post-it notes, so Jace had just written his note on a scrap of paper torn out of a lined notebook. He pinned it to the refrigerator under the simple Batman logo magnet Simon had impulse-bought about three years ago.
Si,
Alec called me in about an emergency in London.
I might not be home until tomorrow night,
Do not watch the next episode without me!
Love you,
- J
Jace doesnāt make it home. Simon never watches the next episode. The note stays pinned on the fridge for a very long time afterwards.
Ā Ā Ā Ā 14. A whisper in the ear
(eight months)
When Simon was a kid, young and still naive about the world, he liked to imagine that one day heād live in a nice house with a white picket fence when he was grown up. Heād wear a tie to work like his dad, and come home to his wonderful, although faceless, wife and family - because at this time, he had not met Clary or figured out that he sometimes loved boys yet - two kids and unimpeded happiness.
His dad dies. His mom turns to alcohol. Somehow those things donāt change his mind.
Jace presses against his back in the little apartment they now share, which is mostly empty of furniture as of right now because itās only day one of moving in and everyone is on assignment (Clary and Izzy) or working (Maia and Luke) or in Hamburg, Germany, of all places (Magnus and Alec). Simon keeps washing the dishes, and Jace doesnāt demand anything more from him than the flat of his back and the span of his waist. His breath just caresses the shell of Simonās ear warmly, and his heart beat is steady and relaxed. Itās domestic, Simon thinks.
Itās not a white fence - they donāt even have a balcony, let alone a yard - and itās a bit early to decide on kids, and he doubts heāll ever have a true nine-to-five job, but - heās happy. Itās a flighty feeling, and their lives are not the least bit stable but heās happy. Heās happy.
Ā Ā Ā Ā 15. Loud, so everyone can hear
Ā Ā Ā Ā 16. Over and over again, till itās nothing but a senseless babble
(two months)
Jace knew theyād have to tell the others, at some point - Alec was getting suspicious about who Jace was spending his free time with, and Clary had apparently starting bugging Simon about always being busy. Jace knew they were running out of time keeping him and Simon to themselves.
Telling them this way, however, was not what Jace had planned.
Simon, of course, gets kidnapped. They joke about it being a common occurrence, but itās the first time in a while, and Jace swears his heart is going to hammer out of his chest. Alec keeps giving him these looks as if he can feel Jaceās heart palpitations; parabatai bonds donāt work like that, but these days it seems like anything is possible. Itās probably just the fear and anger bleeding across to him no matter how much Jace tries to quell it but he clearly isnāt succeeding.
The only reason they even know anything right now is because whoever got the jump on Simon did it while he was on the phone to Clary, and then didnāt dispose of his phone, leading them directly to the docks. Izzy proposed that they were just amateurs, Alec thought maybe it was a trap since Simonās known to hang around Shadowhunters, and Clary suggested it was someone trying to get the secret to becoming a Daylighter.
Jace contributed nothing to their conversation because it felt like the rage in his chest was rattling. The part of Jace thatās been trained to be a soldier for twenty-something years is being overridden by the part of Jace thatās been in love with Simon for a few months, and he doesnāt care about the motive, he doesnāt care who did it - only that he can save Simon and kill any son of a bitch who hurt him.
The warehouse by the docks is condemned. They find Simonās smashed phone on the ground, and Jace reminds himself to shake Simon for being so stupid to go for a stroll after dark on the docks in the direction going away from the Jade Wolf.
Naturally the warehouse is filled with demons. Theyāre ugly bastards but not that smart and clearly summoned by not the most powerful of beings. They scuttle on six pointed insect-like legs and surge towards them as soon as Alec pulls the door open like cockroaches suddenly exposed to light. Jace is really glad that these ones canāt fly.
Jace has barely just broken a sweat as he cuts through the last demon like butter, the whole thing disappearing into a cloud of dust, when one of the doors towards the rear of warehouse opens more fully and Simon steps through followed by Clary. He seems shaken and he has blood on his forehead from what was clearly a blow to the face, and Jace -
Itās like something in Jaceās heart breaks - smashes, really, and his emotions burst out and saturate everything. Thereās blinding anger, and sweet relief, and slowly dismounting horror, but mostly itās molten hot love.
If to love and be loved only ends in destruction, then heāll have been honoured to go out messy for Simon; cut himself open every time Simon needs to feed; bleed out for Simon. Itās the most painful, beautiful kind of love heās ever felt - and he told Simon before when it felt sweet like honey and soft as down feathers, he said it when he never thought heād be able to, and meant it fully, and Simon knows, but looking at Simon limping out of a back room in the warehouse, holding onto Clary like a comfort blanket, Jace doesnāt think about his siblings and Clary standing there. He just acts.
He crosses the floor in a few strides and grabs Simon and smashes their lips together. Itās like coming home and a roaring fire and the adrenaline is still pumping through his body but this is what makes him feel the most alive. It takes a second but he realises heās mumbling I love you, I love you, I love you against Simonās lips, over and over again, not even kissing anymore. Simon seems just as content as him to stand there, with him in their little bubble.
Someone clears their throat behind them, and Jace knows that theyāre going to have to explain themselves, but he really, really just wants to keep his forehead pressed to Simonās right now. Jace sighs, resigning himself to many questions he doesnāt think heāll ever feel equip to answer and pulls away from Simon.
Alec looks vaguely amused, and Izzy and Clary are trying to push down their smiles. Jace wraps his arm around Simonās waist to steady him.
āSimon, do you know what the kidnappers wanted?ā Alec asks, steady as ever. Part of Jace knows that Alec isnāt foolish enough to demand the details of their relationship while being out in the open, somewhat vulnerable to ambush, but heād still been waiting for him to ask. He lets out a deep breath he didnāt realise heād been holding.
Simon clears his throat. āOh, yeah, uh - some vampires, not a part of the clan. They wanted to know if I really was a Daylighter. I think they heard you coming and got spooked since - they all seemed really young, they didnāt have the power to take on four Shadowhunters. They mentioned something about needing to pay a warlock? Who I guess summoned those demons, I donāt really know.ā
Alec nods. He looks around the building, towards the rafters and then back towards the door they entered through. āIf thereās a warlock whose willing to summon demons for fledglings, then we should probably leave. Anyone who does something like that shouldnāt be taken lightly.ā Alec turns back and looks at Simon. āSimon, you should come back to the Institute and get checked out. Iāll check in with Magnus and see if he knows any warlocks who would agree to this.ā
They start to head out, Jace holding onto Simon even if his steps seem less burdened by the second, when Simon mumbles under his breath, āThat went better than expected.ā
āWhat,ā Jace replies, hand firmly clasped on Simonās side, āYou getting kidnapped, or us coming out to my siblings and our ex-girlfriend?ā
āBoth,ā Simon tells him, far too positively. Jace represses the desire to roll his eyes at him.
Ā Ā Ā Ā 17. When the broken grass litters the floor
Ā Ā Ā Ā 18. From very far away
(four months)
Simon bites his lip. The hand not holding his phone to his ear is gripping the upper arm of the one that is, fingers just resting in the bend of his elbow. He looks out the window of Alecās office as the rain flows down. Itās like someone is pouring one endless bucket of water over the glass, one unending sheet of wet.
It feels wrong that Jace isnāt here when things are starting to kick off. It feels wrong standing in Alecās office, listening to Jaceās tinny voice over the receiver. It feels wrong, wrong, wrong, and Simon doesnāt know what to do.
ā- And any approval from the Clave to take me off this mission will take hours to be processed,ā Jace is saying, so far away in fucking Copenhagen and Simon canāt touch him or kiss him, or just - Simon doesnāt know. He misses him, especially now.
Alec slips back through the door, and Simonās eyes stray from the window for seconds to take him in. Clary and Izzy donāt follow.
āOkay,ā Simon says into the phone, nodding even though Jace canāt see him. Heās looking out the window again. The sky is a dark grey and it seems angry as the thunder rolls in the distance.
āI have to go, but Simon -ā
āYeah, donāt do anything stupid, I know,ā he canāt help but smile fondly, relish in the familiarity of the sentiment just for a second like he can pretend that their world isnāt threatened once again.
āI love you,ā Jace blurts out, voice quick and sharp. He sounds scared, almost desperate. Itās far from the first time heās said it, but somehow it still feels like it.
āI love you too,ā Simon replies. He doesnāt look back at Alec. It feels too urgent to not say it back, and Simon knows deep down that Alec is a man who understands that. All that heās been through with Magnus, he has to.
His shoulders slump when the line finally goes dead, and he sighs as he turns around to face Alec. He doesnāt think heās ever been alone in a room with Alec before, and he also feels uncomfortable standing in this office now that Jace isnāt in his ear.
Itās not the same office, but - itās close enough. It has the same kind of chairs that Valentine tied him down to, and it looks the same. He wonders if they managed to get his blood out of the carpet and the seat, or if they just replaced them. He figures the latter.
Him and Alec have been silent and facing each other for about thirty seconds, and now Simon feels kind of awkward. āWhere are Clary and Izzy?ā he finally asks.
āTheyāre going to talk to Luke to see if the pack can give us any more information on these attacks. Now that we know that theyāre related to the attacks on vampires in Bushwick, we think there might also have been attacks on other Downworlders that werenāt reported.ā Alec sounds as no-nonsense as always, on the ball and ready to lead them into battle.
(Simon thinks it might be silly that he still feels in awe of Alec sometimes. He hasnāt known him for long, but itās long enough that the feeling should have faded. It makes Simon feel a little embarrassed, to tell the truth. But he knows deep down that he managed to arrive just in time to watch Alecās life turn around, a perfect spectator in the events that touched every facet of Shadowhunter society and made the Clave sit up.
He feels giddy when he remembers Alec charging down the aisle at his own damned wedding to kiss Magnus in plain view of the whole Institute. At the time it was just beautiful, but Simon sees the legacy of that every time he looks at Alec. Him and Magnus smashed that glass ceiling and laid the way. Him and Jace are lucky that theyāll only had to walk it after. Man and man, Shadowhunter and Downworlder.)
Simon sighs, pinching the bridge of his nose for a second to try and offset the headache he can feel coming. āOkay, what will I do?ā
Alec is standing at ease by the door. At first it always seemed so unnatural to Simon for Alec and Jace to stand like that, but over time heās gotten used to it. Itās just a part of their body language, the unspoken signals of their day-to-day. Simon actually thinks now itād be more unnatural for them to have bad posture. āYou should go talk to the vampires in the clan, see if anyone has noticed anything unusual, if thereās been any transient or unfamiliar Downworlders in the area recently, anyone they didnāt recognise. That could help us narrow down a motive or suspect.ā
āIāll have to wait until sundown - no one will be awake right now.ā Simon gestures vaguely towards the window, where the rain continues to pour.
Alec nods. āMagnus asked Raphael to relay how important it is for the clan to stick together right now and possibly avoid going out at all.ā
Simon purses his lips. āThey wonāt be happy about a curfew.ā
Alec acknowledges this with a slight nod. āItās not a strict curfew, only a suggestion. Theyāll likely be more cooperative this way.ā
Simon nods, arms crossed, and turns back to face the window. Itās torrential; Simon canāt imagine how committed you have to be to your evil plans to still want to do your ill-will in weather like that. Simon would much rather be at home educating Jace on mundane pop culture, but then again Simon isnāt evil. Not being evil definitely puts a damper on your evil plans.
āYou really love Jace,ā Alec states all of a sudden. Simon looks back at him where he stands, still at ease but with his head tilted just so, like heās considering Simon. He doesnāt sound angry or disgusted - which is great because Alec could kick him out of the Institute very easily, or even kill him. But itās deeper than that because - Alec is Jaceās brother, his parabatai, the person heās closest to in the world. Alecās approval means a lot to Simon.
āYeah, I donāt think - Iāve never loved someone this much,ā he says, haltingly. āI thought I loved Clary for so long but - this is different.ā He hopes that Alec gets it. āHeās just - heās it for me, I think.ā
Alec, as a man, does not mince his words and does not say more than he needs to say. Heās the stoic and silent type (except when he looks at Magnus, and itās like he melts), and when he says things, itās like heās carefully plucked each word out, considered it carefully and put it on his tongue at the ready. Him and Simon are so different that way - Simon doesnāt think he could sort his words like that even if he tried.
So when Alec says, āIāve never seen him love someone the way he loves you,ā itās kind of a surprise. The words are still picked one by one, Simon can tell, but theyāre softer around the edges.
If Alec is stoic and silent, Simon is emotional and babbling. Simon grew up with a little too much self-depreciation to be healthy, has been left behind enough to know that sometimes people leave - if he has his doubts, and is sometimes weak to them, thereās precedent.
Which is why he says: āWhat about Clary?ā He knows as soon as he says it that heās being stupid. But still, part of his mind wonders in those moments when Jace feels a little too far away for comfort, for assurances.
Alec softens; he canāt explain it but itās like the parts of him that seem so sharp suddenly soften until Alec isnāt Alec, Head of the New York Institute, or Alec the Shadowhunter. Heās just Alec. Thereās no supernatural fighting, no war - heās just a guy. Heās a guy who loves his brother so much heād probably tell his brotherās boyfriend to his face if he thought he was in anyway unworthy.
āSimon,ā he says, āJace doesnāt love very easily. It takes him a long time to let people in. When he was with Clary - his heart wasnāt in it. Heās a lot happier with you. I can feel it.ā
Simon lets out a breath he didnāt realised he was holding, and nods, looking anywhere but at Alec, who clears his throat as if to forget he said anything at all. He doesnāt look soft anymore, he just looks awkward. Simon guesses being bad at emotions is a Lightwood Family trait.
Simon finally looks at Alec, looks him in the eye, and says in a voice more emotional than he would have liked, āUh - Thank you, Alec. That - that means a lot. To me.ā He clears his throat too. Then he says, āI was expecting you to be the one to give me the shovel talk, but Isabelle beat you to it,ā because he has to make a joke.
Alec laughs - or laughs as much as he ever laughs, barely an upturned lip and exhaled breath. Still, Simon feels like he earned it.
Ā Ā Ā Ā 19. With no space left between us
Ā Ā Ā Ā 20. As we huddle together, the storm raging outside
(minus two months)
Maybe Simon is thinking too hard along the lines of pathetic fallacy, but he thinks that the rain really is apt for the mood right now. The Institute is a sturdy old building, plus whatever shit that the Shadowhunters did upon moving in means itās not in any danger of blowing away, but even at the centre of it, Simon can hear the way the wind whips against the old gothic spirals. It might just be the vampire hearing though.
The training room is filled with Claryās grunts and strikes as she works on one of the bags, beating it mercilessly. Her hands are bound and swinging swift and hard like the bag personally offended her.
āHey,ā he says and tries to sound casual, failing completely.
She looks are him, chest still heaving, sweat soaking into her shirt. āHey,ā she says, also trying for casual and failing too. She moves to the side and drinks from her water bottle.
āSo I just saw that Candyman 2 got added to Netflix,ā he says, looking at her knowingly, eyebrows raised just the slightest. āFarewell to the Flesh.ā
Her face curls into a grateful smile. She looks down and laughs before starting to unwind her hand wraps. āIs it bad?ā
āIt has twenty-nine percent on Rotten Tomatoes,ā he says confidently.
They curl up in her bed with Claryās laptop across their knees, making fun of the movie. Six months ago, this would be the norm. Now itās a rarity, something he knows Clary undoubtedly needs; an hour and a half of bad slocky nineties horror, popcorn, and no questions.
Heāll ask why she broke up with Jace tomorrow. Tonight is just for them.
Ā Ā Ā Ā 21. Over your shoulder
(ten years)
It takes Simon a long time to reconcile the fact that he destroyed his motherās life. Jace tells him he was protecting her, that getting her messed up into their world would have been worse for her, but even so, he ruined her life.
He made peace with that years ago. His mom thought he was dead by way of enchanto, Becky knew but kept her distance at Simonās request after their mom completely flipped, and they moved to Florida to be close to his Bubbie in her retirement. It was what was best, but it tore him up inside when April came around and he couldnāt wish her a happy birthday, or spend a night drinking tea in their kitchen when he canāt sleep and talking about nothing at all, it always seemed. He misses her fiercely, deeply, like a tear that can never be sown or an ache that can never be cured.
Until.
Of all the ways to spend his first proper day-off from his duties to the Shadow World in literal weeks, he didnāt expect this one.
It starts with him watching the next episode of whatever amazingly-shitty scifi show him and Jace have been watching, even though Jace warned him not to watch on without him. It starts with him lounging in his most beat up sweatpants (that used to be Jaceās) on their couch, content to do nothing all day until Jace came home and they could curl up together. It starts with a furious pounding on his front door.
Theyāve never been stupid - Simon working as a delegate or a diplomat or a liaison, whatever his title is these days since they keep changing it, his duties may make enemies of rogues in all genres, and the apartment is covered in wards placed and maintained regularly by Magnus, High Warlock himself. If this was someone with any true ill-intent, they wouldnāt be able to step ten feet within the door.
But still; Simon is cautious. He puts down his laptop, balls up the blanket over his knees and runs to the door. When he looks through the peep-hole, he thinks if his heart was still beating, it would have stopped.
āMom?ā he says, as he finally wretches the door open. There, in all her vaguely frazzled glory, stands his mother with her greying hair, soft cardigan and bright eyes, tracking him with a sort of wonder heās never seen before. Sheās beautiful. Sheās the most beautiful thing heās ever seen.
āSimon?ā she manages to say, still one moment and moving in the next. Her arms are like a vice around his ribs, holding on so tightly that she may never let go. Her face is buried in his neck, fists tangled in the back of his shirt and sheās warm, so warm, and she smells just like she used to - Chanel No. 5 and her fabric softener, and the salt of tears. He holds on fiercely, as tight as he can without hurting her and even maybe tighter but she doesnāt complain, just weeps into his throat like heās just come home from war.
He has the wherewithal to drag Rebecca into the hug too, his big sister looking at him with the same kind of awe he saw on his mother, so grown up and yet so familiar. It feels like his heart could burst. He feels full, filled with something he didnāt even know he was yearning for. The ache aches even more, but in the best way, like a workout, like a prayer.
They all blubber in the door for a minute, shameless in their reunion, but eventually they go inside, wiping their eyes. His mom wipes her nose in her sleeve and a laugh bubbles forth from inside Simon somewhere, thinking of all the times she scolded him for doing the same when he was sick.
They sit around the couch, and take a few deep breaths to calm themselves. He doesnāt know what to say, just wants to bask in the glow his mom gives off, breathe deeply, purposely and burn her into his memories this way. Heās seen photos of her over the years, ones that Rebecca sent him, but to see her with his own two eyes, itās like - itās like home.
āWhat -? How -?ā he tries to ask but everything he wants to ask seems irrelevant.
āI, uhm,ā his mom starts, wiping her eyes one last time, sniffling until her voice is level, āI was doing some cleaning out, and I found one of your old shirts at the bottom of a pile in my closest and it hit me like a ton of bricks,ā she tells him, her eyes wide and still wet but not spilling over. āYou - you telling me that you died in an accident and the blood in your room and the rat,ā both his mom and Simon shudder at the memory, āI just remembered all of it. And I knew I had to come and see you, and tell you how stupid you are!ā She takes a deep breathe, and really seems to get fired up then, angry, and Simon knows she has every right to be upset. āYou made me think that you were dead, you tricked me, Simon, how could you?ā New tears spill over, streaking down her cheeks, as her breathing hitches again.
Simon hangs his head, grasping one of her hands in his. āMom, Iām - Iām so sorry. I - I canāt apologise enough. It broke my heart to do that, but - if youād stayed, you - there was a lot of bad stuff happening and if people found out where you lived, then they would have hurt you to hurt me. Killed you even.ā
āOther vampires?ā His mom asks, and Simon flinches. She doesnāt say it like sheās disgusted anymore, but coming from her mouth, it makes something in his stomach turn. He nods.
āAnd you were so upset when you found out, you called me a monster, Mom, you pointed a knife at me. You - you couldnāt handle it, and I couldnāt live with you hating me or being in danger, so I had to let you go. To keep you safe.ā
She takes a deep breath, and nods. She puts the hand that Simon isnāt holding on Rebeccaās knee. āI guess we both did things we regret,ā she says somberly. She pulls both of them towards her, Beckyās arm around their Momās back to hold onto Simonās shirt, her cheek against the back of her shoulder on the soft pilling wool of her cardigan. Simon presses his forehead to his motherās, her arm around his shoulder with her hand on the back of his neck, her other hand holding Beckyās. Theyāre just a tangle, so close that Simon can feel their heartbeats, and he never wants to let them go.
Simonās not sure how long they sit there, just holding on, but he can hear the front door open (with no keys since Jace uses his unlock rune, that asshole).
āHey, Simon,ā he calls out as he shuffles out of his shoes. Simon can hear the crinkle of a paper bag, followed by the light waft of pad thai from the Jade Wolf. āI picked up some B-Positive on the way home. Maia says hi.ā Heās sauntering down the hallway towards the living room. āI was thinking we could watch the next episode of -ā He rounds the corner and stops dead in his tracks, looking caught off guard by the company.
āJace, hi,ā Simon says, sniffling. āMy - my mom is here. And Becky.ā He turns to his Mom, āMom, you remember Jace, right?ā
āOf course I do,ā she gives him a somewhat watery smile, āSorry, Iām -ā she gestures vaguely to herself, referring to how much of a mess she must feel.
āNo, itās fine, donāt worry.ā He finally budges from being frozen in the doorway and sits next to Simon. āItās good to see you,ā he tells her, soft and sincere. His mom melts a little. He looks at all three of them. āWill I make some tea?ā
āThatād be good,ā Becky says, looking from her mom to Jace to where Jace has his left hand on Simonās knee, smiling a soft little smile. Simon nods.
Jace stands up and grabs the bag of pad thai from the end-table beside the couch. Simon looks at his Mom and says, āIām just going to -ā gesturing weakly. Both his mom and his sister nod, and he follows Jace into the kitchen.
Jace is filling up their one and only teapot, given to them by Magnus as a wedding present. He places it in the microwave and sets the time, before turning towards Simon and leaning back on the counter. Simon opens the cupboard where Jace keeps all his assorted teas and brushes them aside to find the forgotten box of earl grey just behind the varieties of peppermint and chamomile that Jace prefers. He holds it for a second like itās precious, considering the box as his thumb smooths over the slightly raised lettering. Maybe he always knew his mom would come back.
āHave you fed?ā Jace asks quietly, and Simon looks over his shoulder at him, takes in his relaxed posture, his loosely crossed arms, his eyes as vivid as the first time he saw him. Theyāve been together for ten years, but Simon doesnāt think heāll ever be over the fact that Jace loves him back.
āNot yet,ā he tells him, crossing the kitchen to take the pot out of the microwave. He puts the teabags in the pot and swirls, watching them diffuse into the water as Jace takes out an opaque cup with a lid and fills it from the bag. Generally heād drink straight from the bag, but he doesnāt think his mom or Becky could handle that yet. Jace is clearly on the same page.
Jace wraps his arms around his waist for a second, face tucked into the nape of his neck. āIām so happy for you,ā he says, whispers really, into the skin there.
Simon closes his eyes and breathes in for a second, Jace and earl grey and pad thai and Chanel No.5 and just savours all of it. āMe too,ā he whispers back. Jace pulls away after a second and takes the tray out to the living room.
It never felt like he was choosing Jace (and the Shadow World) over his mom and Becky, but now heās quietly hopeful that after all this time, he will be lucky enough to have both in his life, have everyone he loves again, after spending so long thinking he could only have one.
Ā Ā Ā Ā 22. Muffled, from the other side of the door
Ā Ā Ā Ā 23. Through a song
Ā Ā Ā Ā 24. Without really meaning it
(minus three months)
He doesnāt even realise heās been stabbed at first. It feels like heās been punched, and Valentine has his hand around his shoulders to cradle his neck, and time seems frozen, just for a second. Then he looks down, and sees the knife sticking out from over his heart, buried all the way to the hilt.
Valentine looks apologetic, calls him son in a tone of voice that bleeds guilt. What for, Jace isnāt sure, because it canāt be for this. It canāt be for the stab wound in his chest. Valentine doesnāt have the capacity for regret anymore. Heās a monster; you forfeit regret when you stop being a person.
It starts to hurt when he pulls the blade back out, and Jace knows that heās going to die on the shore of Lake Lyn. His hands are slippery with his own blood when he touches his leather jacket.
Clary hovers over him, and he takes a moment to wonder when exactly he came to be lying on the ground, and sheās talking with her eyes so wide and brimming with tears, trying to be calm but utterly failing as he nods. He isnāt listening to her. Everything is fading.
āI love you,ā he mumbles, because he thinks itās the right thing to do. He doesnāt know that itās true, only that he should say it.
His eyes close. The void swallows him, dark and empty, and blessedly quiet.
Clary screams but he cannot hear her.
Ā Ā Ā Ā 25. In a blissful sigh as you fall asleep
Ā Ā Ā Ā 26. Broken, as you clutch the sleeve of my jacket and beg me not to leave
(four and a half years)
Heās not sure what changes, or when it changes, or if anything even changes at all. Both him and Simon were good, they had everything they needed. They have their apartment, they have their jobs, they have each other.
Itās just that - neither of them have been sleeping great, theyāve been so busy the last few months, is what Jace keeps telling himself. Theyāre fighting demons, theyāre training new Shadowhunters, theyāre convening with Downworlders, theyāre consulting, theyāre advising, theyāre -
Theyāre exhausted. Thatās what Jace keeps telling himself.
He comes home from the Institute early. Alec said he dismissed Simon already and told them heās putting them both on leave for a few days. He doesnāt have it in him to argue because he knows deep down that Alecās right
āYou look exhausted,ā Izzy had told him when he came into the armoury at around noon. He was expecting her to chew him out for breaking his stele again, not for her look at him with her big eyes filled with concern. Iām fine, he told her.
āMagnus said Simon looks exhausted too,ā she added delicately. Sheād put her perfectly manicured hand on his wrist and kept going. āIf you and Simon are having problems,ā she had said, āYouāre allowed to talk about it. Simonās my friend but youāre my brother, Jace.ā
Alec had called him into his office soon after that.
Being home in the middle of the day is a bit bizarre to him. He hasnāt been in a while, and he guesses that the given situation might be why. It makes him feel guilty - but guilt doesnāt help them right now.
Simon is lying on the bed. Fully dressed but for his sneakers which are kicked to the floor. He has his back to the bedroom door, on Jaceās side of the bed. Jaceās heart is already aching, but seeing him on Jaceās side makes it feel like a fissure is running down the centre of his heart. Itās like heās trying to be close to him, but he doesnāt know how anymore.
He sits down on Simonās side and unlaces his boots. Then he lies down, curled up facing each other but not quite touching, just looking.
āAlec is giving both of us some personal days,ā he tells Simon. He tries to swallow. He doesnāt succeed. Simon just keeps looking at him with tired red-rimmed eyes. āTo - figure this out.ā Simon nods, but doesnāt say anything. āWhat going on, Simon?ā
Simon opens his mouth, and tries to say something but canāt get the words out; Simon Lewis not being able to talk sounds like the cruelest irony of all.
āI donāt know,ā he whispers eventually, barely audible. Tears leak from his eyes. He curls his fingers into the sleeve of Jaceās leather jacket like its a life line, like he might fly away, like he might drown. āI donāt know,ā he repeats, now with a crackle in his voice. āI just feel - hollow. Itās like everything I do - Iām just fading away. Like one day Iāll reach out and nothing will be there anymore. Everyone will be gone.ā
āIām not going anywhere,ā Jace promises him, earnest and sincere. āIām right here, Simon. Iām right here with you.ā
Simonās face twists and twists and then crumples, and he lets out a sob. Jace hauls him close, and prays to the angels, prays with every ounce of his being, his soul, every drop of Ithurielās blood in his body, every drop in Simonās, that for once Simon could just have some sort of peace.
Ā Ā Ā Ā 27. A taunt, with one eyebrow raised and a grin bubbling at your lips
(seven months)
The training room is bathed in diffused early morning light from the window at the rear.
Theyāre using the whole floor-space to train as they go back and forth, side to side, almost like a dance - a dance of clashing batons and near hits and crouchs. Heād been hesitant when Jace suggested they trained together, though now he canāt imagine why; heās hardly the best or most elegant fighter, but itās definitely a lot of fun.
The only way Simon can describe their training sessions is cheeky; they play fair most of the time, but even then itās flirtatious and spent grinning and talking smack. Thereās opportunistic gropes - or even moreso, strategic gropes to throw the other off.
Jace holds the stick against the side of his neck with a smug grin, having gotten the upper hand.
āYou know, Iād have kicked your ass already if youād let me use vamp speed,ā Simon tells him when he breaks out of the hold, gesturing at Jace with one of the sticks.
āYouāve gotta learn to fight correctly first,ā Jace tells him, reorienting his weapons in front of him, āItās not all about speed.ā With that, theyāre fighting again, the air filled with colliding sticks.
Isabelle joins them for her own morning session, and they keep the radius of their fight smaller now. Simon manages to catch Jace on the ribs and heās far too pleased about it.
āJace, stop going easy on him,ā Izzy calls from over where sheās set up with a punching bag. āYou obviously let him win that one.ā
āI did not!ā
āSimon spent that whole fight favouring his right side, you had so many chances to get a hit in.ā
āOh, so youāre going easy on me, Lightwood?ā Simon taunts, his mouth pulled up in a grin. He takes the opportunity of Jace looking back at Izzy with a glare to jab the stick lightly into his stomach. āCāmon, for real this time.ā
āAre you sure? I wouldnāt want you to get hurt,ā Jace says as he turns back to him, a glitch of something in his eye, and heās so fucking cocky; a year ago it would have irritated Simon to no end - but now? Simon is not nearly as ashamed as he should be admit that itās kinda hot.
āCome at me,ā Simon dares him, batons extended from his body, his bent elbow level to his ribs.
Jace gives him a mean smile, and theyāre back into the fray.
Ā Ā Ā Ā 28. When I am dead
Ā Ā Ā Ā 29. Slowly, the words dripping from your tongue like honey
(ten months)
Having an apartment just to themselves is still kind of novel to Jace. Heās spent the last eleven or so years living in the Institute, and to spend every day there and then go home to Simon, to their own little space they carved out together away from demons and Clave politics and so many people.
Technically, active Shadowhunters are supposed to live in the Institute, but Jace is grateful every day that Alec managed to work something out for him. It probably helps that Alec moved into Magnusā as soon as the dust fully settled after Valentineās death and Jaceās quiet resurrection, and knows how much better it is to live outside the Institute with your loved one.
It means that he gets to wake up like this: Simon is curled up against his back, one arm under Jaceās neck and the other draped over his hip, breathing softly in quiet little snores. Simon refuses to acknowledge that he snores, absolutely steadfast in his denial, and something about it is so funny to Jace especially in these moments when heās met with unquestionable evidence.
He rolls over, slowly, careful not to jolt Simon awake. Heās wearing a laundry-soft faded Star Wars shirt, ratty but very loved. Jace still doesnāt really get the whole Star Wars thing but it clearly makes Simon happy.
Simon is always so adorable while in the middle of waking up, all fluttering eyelashes and unintelligible words. Jaceās heart feels filled with something thick like honey and just as sweet, cloying and perfect.
Jace pushes his face into Simonās neck and breathes the smell of laundry detergent in deeply, and decides five more minutes.
Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā 30. Too quick, mumbled into your scarf
(minus two years)
Heās pretty sure he doesnāt even make the decision to do it - itās like the decisionās already been made by the time heās getting out of his van, like it was never even his choice to begin with. Heās rash, this is rash, he knows - but if he doesnāt do it now then he may never do it, and Simon is not brave.
The closest heās ever gotten was when he knocked Tommy Weismann out with a blow of his elbow in the fourth grade, but even then - he wasnāt brave; he was just trying to protect his new glasses, but he became King Of The Nerds in the process. He doesnāt think he can ever admit to Clary that it was an accident, because she looked at him like he was a hero, like he was worth something, like she was seeing him for the first time. That doesnāt make him brave - it makes him a coward.
So bursts of bravery? Uncommon. Nearly non-existent for a guy like Simon Lewis. He unlocks his front door with a kind of buzzing confidence, rattling defiance, like he could vibrate out of his own skin. Heās seventeen, dammit. He can come out to his mom.
Of course, sheās home, and standing in the kitchen drinking earl grey as has become the routine, and she looks at him bowling in the front door with the same kind of look she gives him every time he does something a little clumsy. But then her expression twists when she sees his face, and heās frozen in place, and Simon isnāt brave, he isnāt, but maybe he can be, if he just tries -
āIām bi,ā he manages to blurt out. He had a speech planned that he wrote in his head on his way from Claryās house to here, but itās gone now. Itās the bare bones of the thing, thatās all that matters. āIām bi, and I like boys too and Iām the same person Iāve always been and -ā
- And his motherās arms are around him, tight and firm, and heās not sure when he started crying but he is, just a little.
āI love you,ā his Mom is mumbling into his shoulder, into his scarf, because itās winter in New York and he couldnāt put off his emotional coming out moment long enough to take off his winter layers. āI love you so much,ā sheās repeating.
Itās like a wall has broken, a floodgate, a dam, an entire ocean is spilling endlessly out of him, crying on his Momās shoulder in the hallway of his childhood home, and wondering when he got so tall, when he grew up.
He pulls away after a time, his nose running and skin blotchy. His Mom cradles his face in her hands so carefully like he could break, uncaring of his wet cheeks because hers are wet too. She looks him in the eye, and tells him, āI love you. Nothing could ever make me not love you.ā He wraps his hand around her wrist and just holds on. She wipes away fresh tears with her thumb. āThank you for telling me.ā
His breathing is still uneasy, but he feels so free. He feels brave.
Ā Ā Ā Ā 31. In awe, the first time you realised it
(one month)
It dawns on Jace slowly, over the days and weeks that he spends with Simon. They do nothing and everything; they see movies that Jace doesnāt really understand but enjoys nonetheless, and they go to bars where no one knows them, and they have sex. Over the month, it feels like something in Jaceās chest is blooming.
When he was a teenager, bitter and angry - meaning, really, traumatised and angry, yes, but mostly deeply afraid in the exact same way that Alec must have been - people said that Shadowhunters loved for life. They said it with such sureness, such conviction like they were trying to convince themselves, and Jace, ever his own personal cynic, condemned them the only way he knew how: by deciding to never fall in love. It doesnāt make sense now, like how most teensā spiteful plans never really do, and paired with the lies Valentine beat into him, he was sure heād never love, never marry, never do anything of the sort.
Things change, as heās come to learn.
When Clary and Simon basically fell into their world with their hearts on their sleeves, they changed something irrevocably in all of them. Alec defied his own destiny, Izzy became stronger in the face of the things that threatened to drown her, and Jace - he learnt many things but mostly that to love is not the weakness heād feared it to be but a well of untapped strength he didnāt know was there.
Love doesnāt overwrite all the pain heās endured, all the years spent hurting, but it does soothe it. Itās the cast on a badly broken bone - even when it heals, it will always will have been broken at some point or another, but love is the thing that helps it to heal.
As it slowly crept up on him, he canāt say it was a surprise, or a shock, or that he didnāt expect it. He hurts like a smile, he hurts like blinking awake, he hurts like a meal after training - which is to say that right now, it doesnāt hurt at all.
So when he says, āI love you,ā aloud for the first time, interrupting Simon babbling about the movie they just saw, caught between the streetlamps in the dark, itās perfect. Simon gives him that shining grin, and kisses him right there in the street.
āI love you too,ā he mumbles close, barely a breath between them, and that? Thatās all Jace needed to hear.
Ā Ā Ā Ā 32. In a way I canāt return
Ā Ā Ā Ā 33. On a post-it note
(two years)
Itās still dark out when his phone goes off. He knew it would be because, yāknow, vampires. He should be used to it - him and Jace keep odd hours a lot of the time.
Simon rolls over, still half asleep and stares for seconds at the ceiling, the darkness only broken only by the electric tinge of the streetlamp across from their apartment. Heās alone, he realises. He puts his hand on the mattress, towards the bedroom door and feels the cool bed sheets on his skin. They forgot to draw the curtain again, even though they nag each other about it all the time, and the light outside casts across the sheets in distorted squares where Jaceās hip usually would be.
Itās not unusual for him to wake up alone - sometimes Jace gets called into the Institute for emergencies. Not like emergency-emergencies, but things that canāt wait until morning. Time zones really are the most fun thing in the world.
He eventually gets out of bed and throws on the clothes he picked out for the meeting he needs to attend. Heās a responsible adult who leaves his clothes out the night before and sets alarms and goes to important political meetings at ass oāclock. A real grown up.
(Being twenty-one is fucking terrifying to Simon, rest assured.)
He can smell recently brewed coffee when he enters the kitchen, and something about it feels so homely. He doesnāt miss coffee as much as he used to, but he does wish theyād gotten up together so that he could steal a sip from Jaceās mug and watch the little furl in his brow as he does it because Simon takes pride in annoying him in the smallest, most meaningless of ways.
On the door of the fridge is a little post-it note, stuck with a magnet to insure it stays up because Jace bought the kind of post-it notes that have shitty adhesion.
Incident at the Dublin Institute.
Should be home by dinner.
- J
Simon smiles at it, holding the paper between his fingers. Itās a lurid yellow and pinned by what was apparently the tackiest magnet that Magnus could find in Alicante; the Spanish city, not the Shadowhunters one. Magnus has a great sense of humour.
He folds the little square up and puts it in his pocket, then opens the fridge for a bag of blood.
Ā Ā Ā Ā 34. Before we jump
Ā Ā Ā Ā 35. As a goodbye
(one day)
Jace thinks he feels so happy he might burst out of his skin. He feels warm and pleasantly sore and content just wrapped up in Simonās bedsheets, the man himself half draped over his body.
Itās simple like this. They could be anyone, any two guys who found each other, at any time or any place. It feels like they would have always ended up here - in every world, the two of them always find each other (and heās seen the proof of that first-hand too).
So of course itās the perfect moment for his phone to go off. It takes a lot of effort to reach across to the crate thatās been repurposed as a bedside table without disturbing Simon, but when he does, he sees that Alec is the one texting him. He lets his head drop heavier into the pillows and sighs.
Simon looks so peaceful on his chest that he almost doesnāt want to wake him, but he doesnāt want to just slip out quietly. He thinks that would look bad, especially after confessing his feelings for Simon last night.
He reaches up to brush some of the curls out of Simonās face, then he places his hand along Simonās jaw, thumb gently caressing his cheekbone. Simon shifts and pushes into the touch, slowly surfacing from sleep before his eyes finally blink open. It takes a second for his gaze to focus on him, but when it does Simonās face splits into a massive bright smile, his eyes crinkling and bright. Jace canāt help but smile back at him, in the glow of Simon.
Simon drops his forehead down to Jaceās chest, the smallest laugh escaping him. āYou didnāt leave,ā he whispers quietly, beautifully, gratefully. Then he stretches up and kisses Jace softly, oh so sweet, in direct contrast to how hurried they were last night. Then he kisses Jaceās chin, and then his jaw, the underside of his jaw, all the way down to the hollow of his throat, and Jace loathes to make him stop.
āWell,ā he says and then sighs softly when Simon keeps going, āI have to go back to the Institute. Alecās already bitching me out for not being back yet.ā
āTell him to fuck off,ā which is very brave of Simon to say since heās still kinda afraid of Alec. He keeps kissing his skin softly. Heād be worried that heās so zoned in on his neck if he didnāt trust Simon completely.
Jace laughs, putting his hand on the nape of Simonās neck to get him to look up. āI really have to go,ā he says biting his lip.
Simon looks up at him, sighs. āOkay, okay,ā he says as he pulls away. Then he ducks down to press a few more little kisses in rapid succession onto Jaceās throat.
It takes him a while to find all his clothes, which are littered all over the boathouse. Simon comes back with a to-go coffee and some breakfast for him as heās lacing up his boots.
When he stands he takes the paper cup, and pulls Simon in close by the shirt and kisses him, savouring the last bit of peace heāll probably have for the rest of the week, given the way his life tends to go. Simonās free hand settles open-palmed on the small of his back, and it makes Jaceās stomach jolt the tiniest bit.
āJust -ā Simon starts to say when he starts to pull away, āWhat will we tell the others?ā He licks his lip and looks into Jaceās face with an open and raw kind of honesty. There he is; Simon Lewis with his heart on his sleeve.
Jace takes a deep breath and pushes in closer to Simon, his free hand going from being fisted in Simonās his shirt to resting on the side of his neck. āTheyāll want to know everything and this is just - itās new, and we still have to figure it out.ā He looks at Simon, searching his face. āWeāll tell them. I just want it to be you and me for a little while longer.ā
Simon nods and presses his forehead into Jaceās. āLetās be selfish,ā he agrees.
Jaceās phone goes off again, and he sighs. He pecks Simon on the mouth one last time and pulls away, taking his breakfast and walking towards the door. āIāll call you,ā he promises before he leaves, and Simon smiles at him, crooked like heās trying not to, radiant in the dim light that shines through the upper windows of the boat house.
Jace slides the door shut behind him, and he thinks, hopes really, that this is the start of something beautiful.
Caring for natural (curly) hair in a setting with no access to modern hair products
So itās the apocalypse. Your curly-haired character is on the run.They find themselves on a sudden adventure in a strange world.Ā Itās the whatever-eth century and theyāre in an environment that doesnāt exactly accommodate curly, coily haired types.Ā
Either way, manufactured hair products are far and few between, or theyāre simply not made for afro hair. Considering how your Black character handles their hair in this environment makes their circumstances more realistic and relatable.
Topics Featured in this Guide:
Hair Products found in Natural Environment
Hair Oils - Benefits and How To Extract
Protective Hair Techniques & Styles
Curly Hair Types & Hair Needs
Hair Routine Samples
Hair StraighteningĀ
FAQ
There is a writing takeaway at the end of each topic.Ā
Brief descriptions provided after images. Contact me for fully accessible version.
Hair Products found in Natural EnvironmentĀ
Consider the essential needs of afro hair: water and fat.
Water (or liquid) is essential for nourishing the hair.Ā
Fat (hair oils, creams, butters) is essential for both growth and protection.
Many curly-haired folks already use natural resources and plants to care for their hair - aka DIY hair-care. So characters concocting their own products should not be a strange concept. (I personally buy most of my natural hair products, and create my own hair masks, protein treatments, and oil blends.)
What they could use would depend on environment, time, and availability.Ā
Hair Healthy ProduceĀ
Coconut -Ā The all-purpose hair aid with multi forms, from oil to solid cream. Hardens in cold weather; best not to use when environment has freezing temps.
Banana - Typically removed after use (hair masks, conditioners)
Avocado - Ā Applied as hair products, masks, and oils.
Strawberry - Mashed and applied directly to hair or mixed with oils.
Hair Healthy Proteins, Plants, Fats
Eggs - Hardens when dry. Strong odor. Removed after use. (protein masks)
Honey - Pulls moisture from air into hair - avoid during the dry winter!
Shea Nuts - Ā Made into shea butter. All-purpose hair and body care.
FlaxseedĀ - GelĀ made by boiling & straining flax seeds. Many DIY videos online.
Hair Healthy Herbs and Flora
Hibiscus - Sebaceous = oil-producing gland. Flowers crushed into paste or oil.
Peppermint - Can rub out oil from leaves. Often used in oil form on scalp.
Lavender -Ā Often used as an oil directly applied to the scalp, or brewed as tea.
Rosemary -Ā Often combined with olive oil in use with hair; can be used alone.Ā
More Hair Healthy Herbs and Flora
Aloe Vera - Succulent. Can extract sap directly from leaf and apply like gel.Ā
Burdock - Contains essential fatty acids and phytosterol compounds.
Dandelion - Can use the roots, stems, leaves and sap for hair and skin.
Rose - Common use is rose water: steep roses in boiling water to create.
Hair Healthy Products (rare or require effort to make/find)
Apple Cider Vinegar (ACV) - Diluted before use and often washed out after.
Bentonite Clay - Aged volcanic ash. Combined with ACV for best activation.
Oils - Key component for sealing moisture. See the next discussion.
Yogurt -Ā Base of many DIY hair products like masks and deep conditioners.
Oils for HairĀ
Oil is a key componentĀ to afro hair care. It nourishes and seals in moisture. Letās discuss common hair oils and extraction methods that could, more likely, be done using homemade or historical equipment.Ā
Oil Extraction
If oils arenāt readily available to purchase, the person would need to find or create tools to either extract the oil via pressing or heat the nuts or seeds. Consider the basic tools that have been around since ancient times. For example, the mortar and pestle. What creative use can be made out of existing tools in the personās environment?Ā
Hair Oils and BenefitsĀ Ā (by potentialĀ ease to extract.)
FYI: These arenāt the only methods or necessarily professional means of extraction. I also left off hair-healthy oils that seemed complicated to extract without high-grade equipment. So, this isnāt an all-inclusive list of oil or methods.Ā
Natural Hair Product Creation
So what exactly would your character create? Hereās some natural hair products and potential main ingredients. May be used alone or combined.Ā
Leave-in moisturizers: Plain water, coconut water, rose water
DIY Recipe Search:Ā Try keywords like āDIY natural hairā +Ā ācurly hairā āAfro hairā or search all natural hair products and read over the ingredient list. Try small home business and independent sellers (Like etsy)
More Sources:
15 DIY Hair Recipes for Almost Every Step in Your Regimen
14 Homemade Leave-in Conditioner Recipes
Best DIY Recipes for Naturally Curly Hair
Product Storage:
Most homemade products last everywhere from a few days - weeks
Extend the life of spoil-prone products via the cooling system in the work.
Honey does not spoil. Be mindful if itās mixed with spoil-prone ingredients.
Oils can usually be kept at room temperature and last a long time.
Keeping a small bit of ready made supply may prove time-efficient. If impossible, they may opt to use products that donāt require much time and effort, and are worth their time to make in small batches or to potentially dispose of after.
With just the above compounds, I can see creative naturals being able to create styling products and moisturizing leave-ins, shampoos, conditioners and hair masks.
Do consider the following:
How simple or complex can their regimen be?
Would they rely more on protective hair styles in their situation?
What is the natural environment: what products are accessible?
How will they store products or must they make a new batch each use?
Can items be purchased by craftsmen or found in abandoned locations?
Can they afford to use edible plants if food is scarce? Food scraps and non-edible plants (like the flora) might be what they rely on.
What are their specific hair care needs? -Discussion on this later-
Natural Hair and StylingĀ
LOC Method as base style
Moisture, sealing in the moisture, and protection are the basic needs for natural hair.Ā The Liquid, Oil, and Cream (LOC) Method, or a variation of the steps, fulfills those basic needs. It can be treated as both a care routine and a style in itself. Personally, if my hair is not in a protective style, I use it every week.
Liquid - Liquid opens hair cuticles to allow moisture to enter hair strands.
Oil - Once cuticles are opened, the oil penetrates hair & seals in moisture.
Cream - Cream further locks in the moisture, and can be used as a styling agent as well to shape and define curls.
Should you use the āLOC methodā by name in your work?Ā Ā
A modern setting? Sure. But donāt assume readers know what it means.
A fantasy setting? Probably not, unless earth and its terms carry over.Ā
A historical setting? No. It is a newly coined term.Ā
Protective Hair Styles
Protective hairstyles protect the hair by tucking ends away from the elements. For example, heat, air, hand and fabric manipulation. While not forever solutions (except maybe locs which are a permanent style) thereās many benefits to your characterās wearing them.
Benefits:
Hair growth retention
Saves time styling hair
Helps prevent damage and keep hair healthy
Ideal for any natural (the best style itself may depend on hair type)
Lessens hairās need and dependence on moisture and hair products
Eliminates some hair maintenance activities (such as detangling)
Considerations:
Hair more difficult to wash and dry thoroughly.Ā
Dryness (unable to access all tucked away hair to moisturize)
Styles kept in too long accumulates dead skin and product build up.
Uninstalling styles can be time consuming, and should be done gently.
Style gets frizzy from growth overtime and/or getting soaked in water.
Protective Styles Short-term (lasting days to weeks)
Afro puff(s) or bun(s)
Back Tuck or Roll and Tuck
Bantu knots
French roll Ā
Pompadour
Roller set
Two-strand twists
Wash and go (low manipulation style)
Protective Styles Long-term (lasting weeks to months+)
Braids (endless styles and patterns. Typically smaller braids last longer)
Cornrows
Dreadlocks/locs (permanent style, research the hair care)
Extensions
Flat Twists /Twists
Head wraps and hats (endless wrapping styles, colors and patterns!)
Wigs (unless glued, hair maintained underneath or often put in braids)
Writing Takeaway - Protective Hairstyles
Protective styles are an amazing way to protect the characterās hair and would very likely be the go-to for any natural in an uncertain or fast-paced environment. Just in everyday life theyāre highly worn so it would especially be the case! Just remember the character needs to eventually undo whatever protective style they have installed to do some hair maintenance (washing, detangling, etc) and give their strands a rest. Also, even hair in protective styles need some attention.
Curly Hair Type and Associated Needs
Determining your hair type is important to knowing its needs. Certain ingredients work best for certain hair types. However everyone is unique and there are more factors to consider than just curl pattern (Also, most curly folks cross into a mix of hair types). There is hair thickness (width & density) and how much moisture and product your hair absorbs (porosity) to consider as well.Ā
I will only cover curl pattern and the commonly associated needs here. To learn more about porosity, width, and density check out the FAQ under the read more.
naturallycurly.com is a great resource and is the source for the images, terms, and information provided below.Ā
Curly Twirly (3A)Ā
Defined loopy āSā pattern. Curls well defined and springy. Big, loose and shiny. Size: Sidewalk chalk size.
Best Products: Ā Gels and creams with light moisture and curl definition.
Curly Spirally (3B)Ā
Well-defined, springy copious curls that range from bouncy ringlets to tight corkscrews.Ā Size: Sharpie size.
Best Products: Ā Gels and styling creams with extra moisture and frizz control.
Curly Kinky (3C)Ā
Voluminous, tight corkscrew curls. Either kinky or very tightly curled, with lots of strands densely packed together. The very tight curls are usually fine in texture. Size: Pencil.
Best Products: Ā Styling creams, butters, and oils. Needs gentle care.
Coily Springy (4A)Ā
Well-defined āSā Pattern.Ā Tight, coily, and the most fragile curls.
Size: Crochet Needle or smaller.
4A Best Products & Tips:Ā Styling creams, butters, and oils.Ā
Clarify scalp with tea tree or jojoba oil during washes
This hair needs extra moisture and tender care
Be gentle when handling and detangling hair to avoid stress & breakage
Use thick moisturizers like mango and shea butters to maximize styles
4B Best Products & Tips:Ā Styling creams, butters, and oils.
Add moisturizing oils before washing (pre-poo/pre-shampoo) with coconut or castor oil to help retain the natural oils in scalp
Do heat-free styles on stretched hair for maximum definition and less frizz
Air-dry hair whenever possible, or use soft cloth to gently dry.
Terry cloth will strip hairās natural moisture and cause tension on strandsĀ
Coily Ziggly (4C)Ā
Tight, coily, fragile curls. Curl pattern wonāt clump without styling. Little to no visible definition.
4C Best Products and Tips:Ā Styling creams, butters, and oils.
Use a cleansing conditioner with slippery elm or marshmallow root
Use a creamy humectant [like honey] as a leave-in to maximize protection
A curl defining custard or gel can stretch the coils safely for styled looks
Read the full guide here:Ā Curly Hair Guide: Whatās YOUR Curl Pattern?
Writing Takeaway - Hair type and needs
While hair type is just the start of all the intricacies of natural hair needs, itās definitely a goodĀ start. There are other important parts to consider for real life naturals, but going off from hair type and the commonly associated needs should be enough for a story. (But read the FAQ under the read more to keep learning)
Do not get lost in the details, especially for a story that wonāt need to cover tons of it. Learn enough to know what youāre talking about and can describe hair care accurately for situations that would affect hair.
Writing Takeaway - Overall:
You donāt have to be lavish in detail, but acknowledging how hair is handled here and there or in a dedicated section is thoughtful and satisfying to see included. Itās also a neutral way to show race without the use of micro-aggressions or racism. Finding the time and means for proper hair care would be a part of their life and potentially a stumbling block on the adventure, so mentioning how hair is handled during these circumstances is a fine idea.Ā
Itās also a great means for representation.
āMod Colette
Additional Info:
The following information will be nestled under the read more:
Hair Routine Samples - One super simple and one complex hair routineĀ
Hair Straightening - Not ideal to maintain in survival situations, but also was a means of survival and daily living during some historical contexts
FAQ -Ā Would any of this matter during the apocalypse? And what about natural products that attract bugs? Plus more.
my parents are jewish but secular and never raised me with it. I identify as jewish and have struggled to find any way into the religion for so long until I followed you and thanks ellen. do you know any important facts about the religion that people don't know about much? for example, I didn't find anything about mezuzahs until I watched Mrs Maisel!
i was raised in an assimilated home so i totally get the struggle. soooo many jews have this experience and come to adulthood wanting to know who they are and what their culture means. this was me too. iāve read tens of thousands of pages on the topic since so iāll see what i can do! apologies for any inaccuracies, n.b. im not a rabbi or a scholar in jewish studies, just another jew.Ā
some common terms and concepts:
-torah: means āteachingāāthe first five books of the jewishĀ ābibleā, aka the books of moses. they are genesis/bereshit (a book of creation and ancestral narratives), exodus/shemot (moses and the jews in egypt), leviticus/vayikra, numbers/bemidbar, and deuteronymy/devarim (chronicle post-exodus events and lead up to entry to promised land; list commandments received by moses at sinai).Ā
-tanakh: an acronym that refers to the hebrew scriptures in entirety, from the torah to neviāim and ketuvim, or TNK. in jewish tradition and in temples, the tankah appears in hebrew on a scroll with two handles rather than in a codex or bound book, altho jews own personal torahs in book form too. oftenĀ ātorahā andĀ ātanakhā are used interchangeably to refer to the entire hebrew bible.
-neviāim: the books of the prophets and second segment of tanakh. prophets in jewish tradition do not predict future events like seers, tho they are frequently misunderstood as such. this section also includes theĀ āformer prophets,ā the books joshua, judges, samuel, and kings, which differ quite dramatically from the rest and are histories of israel starting w conquest of canaan thru exile and kingdoms.Ā
-ketuvim:Ā āwritings.ā here we find two major sections: theĀ āpoeticā books (job, proverbs, psalms) and the five megillot (including esther, ecclesiastes, etc.)
-megillot: a single-handed scroll containing one book from the tanakh. on purim, for example, ppl crack out their megillat esther.Ā
-mezuzah: (i guess u already know this!) a decorative and ritual encasement for a small scroll of torah, hung/nailed at an angle on the door frame of jewish homes. less common for non-orthodox jews, but you find them all over. sometimes jews put a mezuzah by every doorway in the home as well.Ā
-halacha: jewish religious lawĀ
-g-d: jewish tradition emphasizes one, infinite, non-physical g-d who cannot be described, divided, or represented by human beings. indeed, g-d can only be described in terms of what g-d is not. yet jews also believe g-d cares deeply about human beings and human affairs, and that the jewish ppl have a special relationship with g-d who has given us special responsibilities on earth. and although we consider g-d the powerful creator of the world, jews are encouraged to doubt and to challenge g-dāa tradition traced back to the very first book of the bible. today, many jews, esp reform jews, say they do not believe in g-d or that they are agnostic, which may appear confusing or contradictory to non-jews. welcome to judaism! we are not forced to believe shit.
-hashem:Ā āthe nameāānote jews take the power of g-d seriously when transcribing it to language so not to convey a lesser meaning. some sayĀ āhashemā, prob the most common title for g-d. our g-d has a name (called the tetragrammaton) that christians pronounce but that we NEVER say aloud!! when reading scripture we say hashem instead. and when handling the name in written form, great respect must be taken, and if it must be destroyed for whatever reason, thereās a protocol for this as well.Ā
-prayer or davening: jews pray too!! many recite blessings and prayers in hebrew aloud at specific moments in the day, week, or year, like before rising or going to bed. other prayers are recited under special circumstances, like when someone is sick or you have come in good fortune. our blessings have a beautiful sing-song quality when recited. many jews also practice personal prayer, and this resembles a meditative practice for working thru emotions or problems. we do NOT pray so g-d will solve or problems or give us shit.Ā
-siddur: a jewish prayer book; contains prayers and blessings.Ā
-tallit: jewish prayer shawl, which feature fringe (or tzitzit), worn when davening.
-tefillin: small, black leather boxes containing pieces of torah, connected to straps that are wrapped around the wearerās arms, which the box is placed against the forehead. in orthodox communities, they are only worn by men when praying, but many jewish women have taken up the practice too.
-shema: perhaps the most noted and important prayer in jewish tradition
-kippah or yarmulke: skullcap head covering worn primarily by jewish men (but also by jewish women)Ā
-tichel: womenās scarf used to cover the head, esp when married
-tznius: jewish customs relating to modesty (esp dress)
-mitzvah (plural: mitzvot): a commandment, the enactment of a commandment, or general good deed done out of jewish ethical or religious duty.Ā
-sabbath: the day of rest, beginning on sundown on fridays and lasting until sundown saturday. observant jews refrain from behaviors characterized halachically asĀ āworkā and attend special dinners and services. in general, we use this day to step away from worldly concerns and focus on more important things.Ā
-shiva: jewish mourning period.Ā
-kashrut: jewish law that categorizes food as kosher or non-kosher. rules include not eating certain foods, separating meat and dairy products, and preparing food and drink a certain way. the kosher diet is not morally superior or followed for better health but rather to elevate the banal act of eating to spiritual significance.Ā
-rabbi:Ā āteacher.ā a person ordained in jewish tradition who acts as a halachic authority, leader of services, and community resource. note until the late 20th century, women could not be ordained as rabbis in any branch of judaism.
-rabbinic judaism: the mainstream form of judaism that arose after the destruction of the temple.Ā
-talmud: large collection of rabbinic jewish commentary and interpretation of the torah. there are two talmuds, the babylonian and the palestinian. the talmud features a great diversity of topics, stories, and interpretations. note that like jews today and always, the rabbis disagreed with one another constantly. this debate or dialogue serves as a foundation for jewish religious thought.
ā¢ interrupt a line of thought with a sudden new one
ā¢ say āuhā between words when unsure
ā¢ accidentally blend multiple words together, and may start the sentence over again
ā¢ repeat filler words such as ālikeā āliterallyā āreallyā āanywaysā and āi thinkā
ā¢ begin and/or end sentences with phrases such as āehā and āyou knowā, and may make those phrases into question form to get anotherās input
ā¢ repeat words/phrases when in an excited state
ā¢ words fizzle out upon realizing no one is listening
ā¢ repeat themselves when others donāt understand what theyāre saying, as well as to get their point across
ā¢ reply nonverbally such as hand gestures, facial expressions, random noises, movement, and even silence
All of this. I get a lot of compliments on my dialogue and this list pretty much covers what I do (but some of it, I didnāt even realize I did, lol). I highly recommend reading your dialogue aloud (or imagining it in realtime like a movie scene) to see if it feels natural, which is what I do when editing.
Cheep and easy ways to find a basis for your plot.
When you have characters:
What does your character aspire to do or become? Making that aspiration really hard for them to reach.
What does your character love? Take it away from them and make them earn it back.
What does your character hate? Bind them too it and make them work to get rid of it.
When you have a world:
What is the most chaoticĀ thing that can happen to this worldās politics? Find the character this chaos would effect the most and see what they do about it.
What is the most dangerous thing that can happen within this magic system? Figure out who would come to stop or reverse it and see what they do.
Who is the most damaging person in this world and what are they doing? Figure out who of those they hurt might rise up and defeat them.
When you have only spite:
What story do you absolutely hate the execution of? Take the very basic concept of its plot and build it into the story you wish it produced.
What plot structure do you enjoy but wish writers would be more original with? Take it and then throw a dozen spins on it.
** Remember to mix and match for more elaborate plot structures. Carry on this format with your own tricks to digging up basic plot structures!
(Also for that person who will undoubtedly go ābut you cant take another bookās plot thatās plagiarism!ā#The basis of your plot is not original#it never is and it never will be#itās not about which plot you use itās about what you do with it and how you execute it
I justed wanted to add one thing to this: When we brainstormed the story for our (on hiatus) game, we literally looked up typical plot structure. Literally googled it. We found a page that used a super old but super popular story as an example for a certain plot structure and we ended up building our story not only on the plot structure but on that very story. (Canāt specify anything yet, sorry.) Itās basically a retelling, but we put so much of our own spin on it that you probably wouldnāt even recognise its relation to the original story. And it was so easy because of that pre-built plot structure. Iāve never created a plot that makes sense so quickly. Took us a few hours at most. (And Iām usually extremely slow with creating plots. Extremely slow. Iām talking years here.)
Getting stabbed is an experience that no one in their right mind would want to have. But, what if you do get stabbed? What would that feel like?
It usually feels like youāre being punched.
The description of being punched really hard comes up a lot when people describe the experience. One woman said she didnāt even realize she was being stabbed, she just thought her attacker was punching her as hard as he could. Many people donāt feel the actual puncturing, just the force of the knife hitting them.
You might feel nothing at all.
This wasnāt as common as the feeling of being hit, but some people said they literally felt nothing. One person said they felt nothing, but their brain started racing and their fight or flight kicked in. Another didnāt realize someone stabbed them until they saw that they were bleeding profusely.
Occasionally, it feels like you got shocked.
A few stab wound survivors described it as a very quick, but powerful, electric shock. One person described it as static electricity, while another said it was like lightening hitting them. The pain of the initial shock goes away as quickly as it occurred.
Eventually, over time,Ā itās probably going to hurt.
Of course the location of the stab wound effects how much it would hurt. Getting stabbed in the arm isnāt going to hurt as badly as a stab that punctured a lung. But after a while, you will most likely feel some pain. If the person wiggles the knife while itās still in you, the pain may be more intense.
Itās okay to decide you arenāt going to work on your wips for a few days.
Itās okay to choose to lower your goals for the month.Ā
Itās okay to pause your rough draft for a week of silly au creation.
Itās okay to ignore everything about your wip for a weekend and binge read something you love.
Itās okay to take take deliberate impromptu breaks.
More than okay:Ā itās necessary and important to know yourself and your personal mental health and to know when you need to take time off from the things you want to accomplish in order to take care of yourself.Ā
You are the most important part of your writing.
You cannot write unless you take care of you first.
On this note, remember to take breaks the better way!
Worse way: āI just didnāt write anything the last couple days, I donāt know whatās wrong with me. Iām going to wait until my inspiration returns.
The better way: āIām mentally tired right now so Iām going to set an easy goal of 100 words for today and tomorrow and then on the third day Iāll return to my normal writing goals.ā
Worse way: āI just canāt work on this project anymore, I quit for now!ā
The better way: āSince Iām having trouble with this project, Iām going to finish the scene/chapter/etc Iām currently working on, and then Iāll write the rough draft of a short story to let my mind relax and re-calibrate.ā
Worse way: āI keep feeling sick so Iām going to binge watch more tv.ā
The better way: āIām coming down with a cold, so instead of writing tonight Iām going to bed 45 minutes early to help my body recover quickly.ā
Worse way: āIām so depressed right now Iām going to wait until I feel good to write again.ā
The better way: āSince Iām having a depressive spell, Iām going to take a week off from writing to focus on self-care, and then on this day next week Iām going to write 300 words.ā
Worse way: āMy motivation is gone, I canāt write anything until it comes back!ā
The better way: āBecause my motivation is abnormally low, Iām going to stop writing for the weekend and reread my favorite book to analyze and learn from it.ā
Worse way: āIām tired and busy so I canāt write until my schedule is better.ā
The better way: āThis month is very busy for me, so Iām going to schedule in a few hours to write here and there as well as schedule break days for the times I know I wonāt be able to write because I have too many other responsibilities.ā
Tl;dr
Worse way: āI have a problem thatās preventing me from writing so I guess I just wonāt write.ā
The better way: āI have a problem thatās preventing me from writing so Iām going to figure out where this problem is coming from, how much time I need off from writing, and when Iāll begin writing again, and then stick to that plan unless further issues arise and I have to re-evaluate.ā
