✭ MORALCOMPCSS ─── a study in nature versus nurture in the battle between good, evil and everything in between. penned by elle for maggotcreek, a private roleplay. ( pinterest / playlist / intro ).
summer was so close she could taste it on her tongue. like most educators, lettie was counting down the days. she loved her students, their curiosity and quirks, but there was so much that she wanted to get done this summer. devaux house had spent too long in disarray, and she was determined to continue breathing life into it.
tapping her pen against the table as she reads through a list of books to be weeded, her gaze shifts to the man in front of her. "good morning, mr. brightman." perhaps there was a potential suggestiveness to his words, had they been heard by another library patron, but lettie's mind doesn't even go there. she stands up, tucking in her chair before stepping around the desk. "lead the way. i have," she trails off, checking her watch, "about fifteen minutes until the first graders arrive."
"the first graders have to wait, they don't know what it's like to have a sleepless night in the bad way yet," tone light as he springs backwards, the motions fluid as he turns so they can make their way out of the front, various balls bouncing in the netting with each cheery step. you would have never guessed he barely slept a wink. "it's shaping up to be a pretty good summer around here," met with some surprisingly in tune whistling as he heads towards the makeshift coaching trailer (put in place when the gym was undergoing work to hold barely 15 kids at a time). he opens the door to lead her in, ridding himself of his sporting goods as he releases the pink floral furnace and two travel cups, splashing the tea into it with barely a glance, "they're getting a new maths teacher. that's what i heard, apparently she finally retired."
it was that time of year, the fleeting jokes when he signed a yearbook with lucky, the good byes to those that wouldn't return next year, streaming sunlight through the window earlier and earlier. there were moments that he could almost forget the signs, overlook the circling crows and the wilting greenery that should have at least had chance to turn to the sun, open armed. the first break is in place and he's wandering into the library, net of footballs thrown over his shoulder as his hip slings against the library desk, a knock of his fist to catch her attention. "i've been having visions all morning… it's hazy but i'm pretty sure that i saw you, me," raise of an eyebrow, "an amazing chamomile tea."
in his earlier years, kaden had resigned to the fact that he might not ever have a best friend, so easily repelling through friendship groups with no true attachment. he had never imagined a lifetime when he would be so attached, so interlinked with another person that he would have felt that there wasn't enough in the world that he could do with them. there were times when he wondered how over the past six years, he had been given the first true luck of his life when it came to being given the gift of being close to someone like xingyu. the worst day of his life had led to one of his strongest bonds; it was crazy how life worked.
standing on the doorstep, the cake tin balanced in his hand, the rapping on the door not unfamiliar from him even at this hour, especially on this day. the years had fallen away, barriers that had existed no longer existed and kaden was sure that on this day... just for one more... he wanted to be human. to live in a world where the only thing on his mind was the person that he loved the most and seeing a smile on his face, seeing him understand how important he was. he couldn't believe there had been a time when this was just any other day...
when the door opens, free hand moves to adjust the lid, revealing beneath a strawberry cheesecake (or what may be considered as one), whipped cream hiding the sins of bad craftmanship. pink sticky note taken from his nieces stash and the final version of many crumbled trash can versions reading a simply happy birthday. "i know i'm early, but i couldn't wait for you to get here," he jokes, the grin on his face spreading when he announces, "happy birthday, xingyu."
as if he couldn't stand the seriousness, eye contact broken momentarily, "well, in one minute and 39 seconds…"
✧ THE COMPASS. STEPHEN KALYN. MALE. HE/HIM. ⸻ can you feel it, LUCKY “KADEN” BRIGHTMAN? it’s starting again. something’s coming up the creek bed — and soon, there’ll be nowhere left to hide. but i can tell by your eyes, you’re not the running type. yeah, you’re too COMMITTED and ANXIOUS for that, aren’t you? just about what i’d expect from a HUMAN. so you’ve been in magnolia creek YOUR WHOLE LIFE now? word travels fast in a small, dying town like this — i hear you’re TWENTY SEVEN years old and MOTEL NIGHT CLERK & SCHOOL COACH. don’t think that’ll help much in a fight against the hunger, but at least you’ve got your INTUITION. that’s more than i can say for most. i’ve seen this cycle turn before, and i think i know how it ends. you think it’ll end DIFFERENTLY? well. we’ll see. i’d love to be proven wrong in all this.
DISCLAIMERS !
body image difficulties, generalised anxiety/panic, depictions of death and violence.
BASICS.
FULL NAME : lucky kaden brightman / NICKNAMES : kade , kb . / BIRTH DATE : may 28th, 1969. / AGE : 27 / STAR SIGN : gemini (gemini sun, aquarius rising & capricorn moon) . / PERSONALITY TYPE: ENTP - extraverted, intuitive, thinking, perceiving / CHARACTER COMPARISONS: stiles stillinksi (teen wolf), patrick jane (the mentalist), the master (dr who), shawn spencer (psych), seth cohen (the OC), robin buckley (stranger things), chandler bing (friends) / ORIENTATION : bisexual & biromantic . / RELATIONSHIP STATUS : single . / OCCUPATION: motel night clerk & seasonal coach at magnolia school / FAMILIAL CONNECTIONS : coral murphy, florist, alive (mother). malcolm brightman, motel owner, alive (father). gillian and terrance brightman, motel owners, deceased (grandparents). kevin brightman, preacher, alive (paternal uncle). cloud murphy, grifter, status unknown (maternal aunt). heaven and ocean murphy, students at magnolia school, alive. (maternal cousins).
BACKGROUND.
long before magnolia creek was a place that you came to die, the brightmans found their place in the world, burrowed between the creases of petty crime and the perfect place to sell dreams to tourists. when the motel opened, it was the only place to stay and terrance brightman made sure it stayed that way. rumours swirled for decades to come about all the ways that he would find to ensure that he stayed on top... even if his top, was the bottom of a barrel when it came to the greater world. the motels doors stayed open day in, day out, to every sordid guest, rent by the hour.
malcom, the eldest son of their booming enterprise, did the one thing that his father had always told him not to... fell in love with a guest. she wasn't just any guest. a traveler, fleeing from who knows what, who knows where, a name that never quite made sense amongst the pages of their ancestry and despite it all, she became malcolm's wife. his parents, against it not for reasons of lineage, for the sake of wanting their son to remain indebted to them, came around when they saw a glimmer of prospect. coral murphy never took a new last name, the marriage was never written down on paper but ordained by malcolm's brother in the chapel where they ignored the drip from the roof or the sparrows circling five times before one dropped dead at the verge of the wedding car. they drank whisky in the back as tins rattled through the creek, the bells of a new union forming... one that would never be broken.
they wanted to have eight children but, they only had one. after over 24 hours of vigorous labour, pains that coral would describe for years, their baby boy was born, blue and lifeless, umbilical cord wrapped around his neck. coral didn't even see her baby breathe before she was carted off for emergency surgery and blood transfusions but malcolm would always remember that as the longest minute of his life awaiting the sound of a piercing cry. later, when coral was stable, they would finally hold their baby in their arms and upon seeing him, she would announce, "lucky, that's what we'll call him," it didn't cross their mind that they were naming him after the local gas station until six weeks later when they carted him through town.
colourful drapes, painted bumble bees and the sun beating down. he remembered his earliest childhood with the insight of somebody that always longed for the past... when things had been easy. his father had hoisted him onto his shoulders and his mother had arranged flowers in their dining room every day, the smell of lavender one that comforted him wrapped in her arms. in those early days, he was protected in a way that he couldn't quite name. the world didn't expect anything from him and he was allowed to expect everything from him in return, he still had his dreams, his childhood and those wide blue eyes, absorbing everything that he came into contact with. he remembered so much of his childhood that sometimes even now, he could close his eyes and try to burrow between the memories to save himself.
he must have been five or six when his grandparents noticed that he had a gift in the form of perception. by eight or nine, it would be more than a gift of observation in their eyes and more of a talent that could be exploited. he learned card tricks, cheap parlour turns like palm reading and the pretence of predicting the future; no one really believed it but they humoured it in the hotel lobby, paying a few dollars for the family and a scoop of ice cream daily as his own payment. he had a photographic memory, the ability to recall specific details and he became very good at reading people's faces but his personality... that was where the flaws developed as he got older. he was far less palatable than his family hoped for a supposed boy wonder. in those days, he was oblivious to the real magic and mischief that might have existed in the world... it was all fun and games.
at fourteen, his grandfather passed away and a new era began with the head of the helm his own father. he took pride in his job but more than that, he took pride in his one and only son whom he pedalled more than ever. the motel opened up for more guests, hourly rent was pushed up and lucky sat amongst chainsmokers and grifters for illegal poker games where entry was always paid. he was a lucky charm when things were going well and he was a curse when it wasn't. these were the years when he noticed his parents wearing at the edges, that they became more than idolised figures and more like humans who cut him with the sharp corners without even noticing. he was their love, he was their hate, he was their success and their failure and beyond all of that, he didn't know who he really was at all except for someone who didn't know when or how to close his own mouth. he always found a way to get himself into trouble and among his peers, he wasn't popular... he wasn't anything, putting one foot in front of the other socially felt impossible and he ricochet through friendship groups, never getting close enough for others to see the flaw of never having fully developed his sense of self.
on one fateful night when he was rounding up to fifteen, a poker game went sour. the table was flipped, glass shattered everywhere as whisky splashed on the ground and in the crossfires, he climbed inside a large chest in the lobby, closing it and feeling safety in the darkness where he would be shielded from the crashing, colliding and brutalities. it would later transpire that in the closing the chest, he had made one fatal mistake. he had locked himself inside. only when all went quiet had he realised what he had done, the only source of oxygen the small locked keyhole, air more reduced in all of his panic as he clawed at the lid until his fingertips were raw, the beds of his nails leaking crimson blood and his lungs feeling dry from screaming; forgotten, unheard, his parents having assumed he had ran out into magnolia creek to hide as he had done so many times before, playing silly games or waiting for them to hunt him down and tell him to come home. just as he thought that it was over for him, his own breath shallow as he almost gave up on escape, the box had cracked open and an unfamiliar face peered back with curiosity. he never remembered her face but he did remember how she had screamed at the top of her lungs and his father pulling him out like a ragdoll and trying to shake him back to reality. he would never forget the way he felt... so suffocated, so hopeless... empty.
he didn't know when it happened, if it was really to do with being in that box or something else but something inside of him seemed to break and the unyielding confidence was dented. he woke most nights with nightmares, screaming so loud that he must have woken the neighbours from time to time, audible shifting from their bedrooms which were seperated from his by one wall. his mother would run in to comfort him, sing him back to sleep but his father would just roll his eyes, get angry at the disturbances with commentary as he walked through the hallways late at night, "you're meant to be a man, not a little boy," "you need to stop babying him, that's the problem," each of the comments internalised. his father felt that the answer was competitive sports and less time doing things that diminished his masculinity, claimed that he just needed to "toughen up." a part of him believed this was true, that it was something he could just get over if he pushed hard enough, spent enough time around normal boys... bruised himself a few times on the football field or hit enough home runs. he did it all and never complained.
late at night, he would go through the same motions, tired and bruised as he undressed in front of the mirror, staring at his body and pressing at the darkening spots without even a wince. he never saw what was really there, he never felt that he was anything other than disappointing and wondered how he would ever live up to what he was meant to be or exactly, how he figured out who that was at all. his nights would be filled with panic attacks, disrupted sleep and staring at the ceiling. he tried to stop but over and over again, the voice in his head just told him the same thing: something very bad is going to happen.
HALLOWEEN, 1990.
a college senior, those sleepless nights weren't as unusual anymore... the study of human biology something that you could get behind. it interested you how the body worked, how fragile they could be; you had stayed away from psychology for a reason, not wanting to learn more about the human condition than you had already established. being a night clerk at the motel showed you enough about humanity for one lifetime (if you had looked closer, it might have taught you more about other entities too).
you couldn't shake the feeling in those autumn months that things were getting worse. you didn't say it out loud, no one would have believed you anyway... anyone who was close to you was already sick of your anxieties and tangents, the things you told them that hit too close to home and all the things nobody wanted to hear. you tried to ignore the crows circling, the wilting flowers that your mother had once taken pride in and a swelling feeling of worry in your stomach — the place was filled with bad omens or maybe that was what your mind was trying to tell you. you were used to it creating false narratives but there were patterns, as if things were dying... rotting at the very core... you distracted yourself with your books, with late night walks and thinking about how close graduation was. you wouldn't be here for much longer.
/ ... /
if things had been different, if he walked away remembering nothing then he could have lived. in the latest hours, he thought about a world where he had seen that night as a second chance at living. he had gone on to leave, fly to the other side of the world or rebuild somewhere new. there was another version of him that might have been born if he had the sheer luck or not being the one who remembered every scream, every contorted broken body part, the blood that splattered all over the football field. it was a massacre. no one called it that in the newspapers or the town, not the magnolia creek mayor, not his school friends, not his mother, not even him. but it was.
and there he had been, in his embroidered shirt, benchwarmer of the season, called to finally make his play and god, what a play it was going to be. never once had he been chosen first by anything, anyone but for some reason, he had been chosen by the hunger. summoned in a way that he couldn’t resist because his body betrayed him at every turn and he became something scarier than true evil… a prisoner inside his own body as he watched every unholy act through a smokescreen; protected only vaguely by the impossibility that he bore witness to. he remembered the way it felt as it crawled inside of him until he felt his soul, grasped by darkness, pulled and pushed to make space for something new — a darkness, a terrifying, all consuming darkness that put out the sun, turned everything in introspect dark, smoky, grey. he would never be able to put that pain in to words and he would never be able to forget it but worse was the knowledge his own fingertips tore through the relic that could have saved them all.
the moments after were the worst to recall, the feeling as it crumbled into dirt and ash under all his dirty strength. he hadn’t left a piece behind. he had spent years searching, hoping, digging until exhaustion, tears in his eyes as he collapsed with only the moon to hold him through his sorrows. he had prayed that there was something, one shred or morsel of that thing because he was terrified that they weren’t protected and more, he was terrified that meant the darkness might find a new way to infiltrate his body as he were just a puppet, not a person, not a human being, not even a man.
THE AFTERMATH.
it was clear to you in the years after that your pretence of prophecy growing up had been an imitation of something greater that might exist out there. your mind was consumed with knowledge and thoughts of the supernatural, the unnatural and the crippling realisation that even the fears you once had were nothing in comparison to what was really happening in magnolia creek. for a while, everything collapsed and you spent weeks in your room, folded into a ball with your hands wrapped around your knees... terrified of the world outside. if you had any cognition then, you might have been surprised by your fathers reaction because this time he didn't tell you to get back up; he and your mother exchanged knowing looks and cared for you like you were just a boy again, coaxed you from your grief and anxiety over a period of months until you could go outside again. everything had changed... you looked through new eyes at the world, seeing the ugliness, the beauty, the entanglements of it all and the burden of guilt that was a lump in your throat that you could never swallow. you vowed that you would try to find a way to understand what you had done and if you could, how to put it right.
usually goes by kaden rather than lucky as he believes that lucky is part of a bad omen. most people that have lived here for a long time know his name is actually lucky as it was a point of great interest when he was growing up and people had less than positive views about some of his families money making tehcniques.
despite everything, he did go back to college and graduate a year later which led to him achieving qualifications that he uses for coaching. his original thought process was to go further afield and study something to do with sports, exercise and recovery however he put a pin in this due to his feeling of being bereft over his part in things and needing to set them right.
his aunt has been missing in action for the past four years leaving his niece and nephew in the custody of his family. kaden acts as a care taker for them at times, taking them to school and making sure they have what they need; his own parents enjoy being involved in their lives and he wonders if this has given them a chance to parent a normal child (many of his thoughts are exasperated by insecurities that have built up through his life).
you have no marks, no calling, nothing to justify your presence here. so why are you still in magnolia creek, and what does it cost you, every day, to stay in a town that is quietly trying to consume everyone in it?
no mark. no calling. just the hands of destiny wringing around his neck time and time again. there were days when he felt that what happened to him was worse than those who had some kind of fated connection with darkness. he wasn’t spared in all of his humanity, something that seemed now to only make him weaker to a force that was way beyond anything that he could have comprehended as a college senior (or even now). the act of existing, the rebellion of survival had already cost him everything but luckily for them, his everything was nothing at all to most and therefore, it went unnoticed how much of himself had been lost out there on the field.
growing up, his father had encouraged him to get into sports, wanted him out there with the best of them. he had never been interested, dreams aligned with other things that he would never be allowed to try. he had worn the kit, been a certified bench warmer who was nobody’s first pick, read comic books from the sidelines and pretended he wasn’t there… he’d never imagined that his memories of football would one day turn from boredom to sheer anguish. these days even the sight of a game could leave him with weeks of shuddering, sweating night terrors… clawing at his own flesh to try and get the darkness out. even his mother avoided him for days after, pretending she didn’t hear those chilling screams night after night. no more lullabies.
eyes, shallow and blue, searching for someone to be on his side, to offer a justification for his presence as if existing wasn’t enough. the guilt of what he had done, a constant reminder that he could never go back… even if he didn’t know how to go forwards. “this is my home. this is where i’ve always been. one way or another, i’m tied up in all of this… so why shouldn’t i be here?” words that echoed more confidence than really held.
halloween, 1990 changed something in you, the way it changed everyone who was there. but you didn’t come out of it with powers or a calling or a destiny. you came out of it with the memory. what did that night make of you? how did it transform you?
“it changed everything. i remember it all.”
if things had been different, if he walked away remembering nothing then he could have lived. in the latest hours, he thought about a world where he had seen that night as a second chance at living. he had gone on to leave, fly to the other side of the world or rebuild somewhere new. there was another version of him that might have been born if he had the sheer luck or not being the one who remembered every scream, every contorted broken body part, the blood that splattered all over the football field. it was a massacre. no one called it that in the newspapers or the town, not the magnolia creek mayor, not his school friends, not his mother, not even him. but it was.
and there he had been, in his embroidered shirt, benchwarmer of the season, called to finally make his play and god, what a play it was going to be. never once had he been chosen first by anything, anyone but for some reason, he had been chosen by the hunger. summoned in a way that he couldn’t resist because his body betrayed him at every turn and he became something scarier than true evil… a prisoner inside his own body as he watched every unholy act through a smokescreen; protected only vaguely by the impossibility that he bore witness to. he remembered the way it felt as it crawled inside of him until he felt his soul, grasped by darkness, pulled and pushed to make space for something new — a darkness, a terrifying, all consuming darkness that put out the sun, turned everything in introspect dark, smoky, grey. he would never be able to put that pain in to words and he would never be able to forget it but worse was the knowledge his own fingertips tore through the relic that could have saved them all.
the moments after were the worst to recall, the feeling as it crumbled into dirt and ash under all his dirty strength. he hadn’t left a piece behind. he had spent years searching, hoping, digging until exhaustion, tears in his eyes as he collapsed with only the moon to hold him through his sorrows. he had prayed that there was something, one shred or morsel of that thing because he was terrified that they weren’t protected and more, he was terrified that meant the darkness might find a new way to infiltrate his body as he were just a puppet, not a person, not a human being, not even a man.
what are you willing to sacrifice to end this? and what would you refuse, no matter the cost, no matter who asked?
the question makes him uneasy. who was he to decide what could be sacrificed and where to draw a line? half of the time he found it hard to decide what time to sleep, to fight the urge for one last chapter of his book on runes and relics, one last late night hunt for answers, scribbling in his notebook like a story teller from some other era (once it had been the object of his tall tales, dreams of a colourful future… now it was about undoing certain doom and all the things that would never work). he thinks of the people he loves, even when they hurt him, desert him… push him… his mother, his father, his high school girlfriend and her brother who always remembered his milkshake order… his next door neighbour who has became more. he couldn’t say he was willing to sacrifice anything or anyone, harm a hair on their heads because even in his disconnection, he cared.
“myself. that’s all,” the admission is tainted, a quiver in his voice that could never be hidden… a tremble from deep inside. he isn’t scared of dying, not in the way that most people are. that fear left him the day he saw those bodies, broken and distorted… watched the carnage and grief that followed. the thing that scares him most is being left behind with the knowing again, to live with the guilt of being feeble enough to be controlled by the hunger a second time. would he rather be sacrificed or have to live with that? he’d known the answer for a longer time than he wanted to admit.
“i can’t choose for anybody else… that’s not fair,” and even if they felt they could, he didn’t want anyone to choose for him. he wanted there to be a way they all lived, breathed for many more years, that nobody ever had to leave. “we’re going to figure out how to change it this time,” but in the pit of his stomach, a seed of doubt continued to sprout, growing vines wrapping around his internal organs and every so often… they squeezed tightly, coiled until he struggled to breathe, wondering if he would make it to that final day at all.
pixelskylines
areudirty
gracieabrams
yousharknotpass
romaincrisis
2087
germansingergirl
