Hi! This is my writing blog, where I will be posting fic and commissions (currently open). Feel free to ask about my writing anytime. Nix, they/them pronouns.
Writing books often exhort you to “write a shitty first draft,” but I always resisted this advice. After all,
I was already writing shitty drafts, even when I tried to write good ones. Why go out of my way to make them shittier?
A shitty first draft just kicks the can down the road, doesn’t it? Sooner or later, I’d have to write a good draft—why put it off?
If I wrote without judging what I wrote, how would I make any creative choices at all?
That first draft inevitably obscured my original vision, so I wanted it to be at least slightly good.
Writing something shitty meant I was shitty.
So for years, I kept writing careful, cramped, painstaking first drafts—when I managed to write at all. At last, writing became so joyless, so draining, so agonizing for me that I got desperate: I either needed to quit writing altogether or give the shitty-first-draft thing a try.
Turns out everything I believed about drafting was wrong.
For the last six months, I’ve written all my first drafts in full-on don’t-give-a-fuck mode. Here’s what I’ve learned so far:
“Shitty first draft” is a misnomer
A rough draft isn’t just a shitty story, any more than a painter’s preparatory sketch is just a shitty painting. Like a sketch, a draft is its own kind of thing: not a lesser version of the finished story, but a guide for making the finished story.
Once I started thinking of my rough drafts as preparatory sketches, I stopped fretting over how “bad” they were. Is a sketch “bad”? And actually, a rough draft can be beautiful the same way a sketch is beautiful: it has its own messy energy.
Don’t try to do everything at once
People who make complex things need to solve one kind of problem before they can solve others. A painter might need to work out where the big shapes go before they can paint the details. A writer might need to decide what two people are saying to each other before they can describe the light in the room or what those people are doing with their hands.
I’d always embraced this principle up to a point. In the early stages, I’d speculate and daydream and make messy notes. But that freedom would end as soon as I started drafting. When you write a scene, I thought, you have to start with the first word and write the rest in order. Then it dawned on me: nobody would ever see this! I could write the dialogue first and the action later; or the action first and the dialogue later; or some dialogue and action first and then interior monologue later; or I could write the whole thing like I was explaining the plot to my friend over the phone. The draft was just one very long, very detailed note to myself. Not a story, but a preparatory sketch for a story. Why not do it in whatever weird order made sense to me?
Get all your thoughts onto the page
Here’s how I used to write: I’d sit there staring at the screen and I’d think of something—then judge it, reject it, and reach for something else, which I’d most likely reject as well—all without ever fully knowing what those things were. And once you start rejecting thoughts, it’s hard to stop. If you don’t write down the first one, or the second, or the third, eventually your thought-generating mechanism jams up. You become convinced you have no thoughts at all.
When I compare my old drafts with my new ones, the old ones look coherent enough. They’re presentable as stories. But they suck as drafts, because I can’t see myself thinking in them. I have no idea what I wanted that story to be. These drafts are opaque and airless, inscrutable even to me, because a good 90% of what I was thinking while I wrote them never made it onto the page.
These days, most of my thoughts go onto the page, in one form or another. I don’t waste time figuring out how to say something, I just ask, “what are you trying to say here?” and write that down. Because this isn’t a story, it’s a plan for a story, so I just need the words to be clear, not beautiful. The drafts I write now are full of placeholders and weird meta notes, but when I read them, I can see where my mind is going. I can see what I’m trying to do. Consequently, I no longer feel like my drafts obscure my original vision. In fact, their whole purpose is to describe that vision.
Drafts are memos to future-you
To draft effectively, you need a personal drafting style or “language” to communicate with your future self (who is, of course, the author of your second draft). This language needs to record your ideas quickly so it can keep up with the pace of your imagination, but it needs to do so in a form that will make sense to you later. That’s why everyone’s drafts look different: your drafting style has to fit the way your mind works.
I’m still working mine out. Honestly, it might take a while. But recently, I started writing in fragments. That’s just how my mind works: I get pieces of sentences before I understand how to fit them together. Wrestling with syntax was slowing me down, so now I just generate the pieces and save their logical relationships for later. Drafting effectively means learning these things about yourself. And to do that, you can’t get all judgmental. You can’t fret over how you should be writing, you just gotta get it done.
Messy drafts are easier to revise
I find that drafting quickly and messily keeps the story from prematurely “hardening” into a mute, opaque object I’m afraid to change. I no longer do that thing, for instance, where I endlessly polish the first few paragraphs of a draft without moving on. Because how do you polish a bunch of fragments taped together with dashes? A draft that looks patently “unfinished” stays malleable, makes me want to dig my hands in and move stuff around.
You already have ideas
Sitting down to write a story, I used to feel this awful responsibility to create something good. Now I treat drafting simply as documenting ideas I already have—not as creation at all, but as observation and description. I don’t wait around for good words or good ideas. I just skim off whatever’s floating on the surface and write it down. It’s that which allows other, potentially better ideas to surface.
As a younger writer, my misery and frustration perpetuated themselves: suppressing so many thoughts made my writing cramped and inhibited, which convinced me I had no ideas, which made me even more afraid to write lest I discover how empty inside I really was. That was my fear, I guess: if I looked squarely at my innocent, unvetted, unvarnished ideas, I’d see how bad they truly were, and then I’d have to—what, pack up and go home? Never write again? I don’t know. But when I stopped rejecting ideas and started dumping them onto the page, the worst didn’t happen. In fact, it was a huge relief.
really loved this– just a shift in the way we think of rough drafts, which is helpful for perfectionist brains like mine that don’t resign themselves to “shitty first drafts” very easily!
*takes the hand of a period drama writer gently* A queen consort is not a queen regnant. A dowager queen is not a queen regnant either.
There is very little intrinsic institutional power in queenship. The power a consort, dowager, or queen mother has depends mostly on how much the reigning sovereign (usually a man) is willing to grant her. Needing a queen to serve as regent is exceptionally rare, and the regent is more often a male relative.
Queen regnant: woman who rules in her own right, not on behalf of someone else.
Regent: Someone who temporarily assumes the powers of the monarch on account of the monarch being too young or too incapacitated to govern.
Queen consort: Woman who is married to the monarch.
Dowager queen: Woman who was married to the monarch. The monarch is dead, and she is owed support as his widow.
Queen mother: Woman who is the mother of the monarch. Usually the dowager queen, though there are exceptions if there isn't a straight line of succession.
You bored, or feeling artsy but don’t have any inspiration...? *updated!*
Do you need to distract yourself? Or are you simply bored? Here are some great websites to make the time pass.
create pixel art
Awesome photo editor and art program, all free…!
Totally free transparent textures
make a cute chibi
draw some cool generative art
be a graffiti creator
create a picassohead (you don’t need to be a picasso to do so)
paint online
another awsome site to create pixel art on
and another one
create your own mandala
or color one
create an avatar
or you can try creating your own superhero
here you can interact with organisms in different environments to see how to music changes
here’s a website that translates the time into hexidecimal colours,
Here is a website where you can travel along a 3D line into the infinite unkown
here is a website where you can listen to rain with or without music
Need a model in a certain pose for drawing? here
Want to build your own planet
here is a website where you can create your own galaxies
make your own pattern (very useful if you need a new background)
create next hit comic
make a city which looks like something from 90′s games
draw a mandala like design
jig saw puzzles
more jig saw puzzles to solve
create a stunning HTML5 animation - no coding!
make a movie
create and dress up dolls
play a piano
you can also play a guitar
create sounds
another sound creator
create a logo
design your dream home
sketch rooms
explore fashion trends and create your own sets
build a website
try this app for building a website
Or maybe start learning how to code!
design your own t-shirt or a beanie or sweatpants and order them
design your own phone case
pretend to be a graphic designer with this cool online tool
Make your own Glitch art
Here’s another glitch art maker
And another!
Holy hell, here’s a third!
make an image look like it was created by a commodore 64
freaking cool text generator!
Easy to use word processor
Make up really cool patterns or run your photos through it :)
Write an essay on anything with no hassle
Wanna see how something you write would look like if it was on JacksFilms YGS((Your Grammar Sucks videos on YouTube))?
Make pictures out of text
ASCII word generator
Need an idea for some fanart-here :D
Still haven’t found something that would float your boat? Try these:
watch a documentary
learn to code
do something yourself
workout with the help of this great youtube channels
learn things
play pokemon or zelda or other awesome old school games
waste your time on miniclip
play games at additing games
or try games at agame
calm your thoughts
the quiet place
it will be okay
vent or listen to someone
pour out your soul
explore the sky
look at art from around the world
virtually visit museum of iraq
explore world with arounder
create a music playlist
list through rare books
scroll useful science website
create sand art
brain games
try out tastekid and discover new favorite band or movie or book
interactive 3D anatomy
random street view
post a secret
create a family tree
find our what’s the difference between x and y
help scientists and become volunteer researcher
create your own font
read a classic short story
In the mood to read, but not sure exactly what book to go for?
scribble on maps
listen to letters
play with acrobots
listen to podcasts
make a bucket list
Ever want to see the most truly useless websites in creation?
Prank a friend with this blue screen of death!
Zone out watching the colors drip down
Maybe none of these peeked your interest-maybe you’ve been wanting to create an o.c, but never really knew how to start-or you just enjoy making O.C’s….
This masterlist is to help you in making your own OCs….it can also apply to developing RP characters i suppose! (´ヮ`)!
How to Write Better OCs:
basic tips on how to make your oc even better
tragic backstory? learn how to write one/make yours great
writing specific characters
a wordier, great guide on how to develop your character
kick out those vague descriptions and make them AWESOME
Character Development:
how to actually make an OC
Q&A (to develop characters)
more Q&As
giving your character a backstory
how to write an attractive character
Need an Appearance idea?
Humanoid generator? check
Here’s another one
and maybe if you didn’t like those this’ll work
Need Monsterpeople?
Well, then here ya’ go
Maybe you need Cats?
Diversity
adding more racial diversity
avoiding tokenism, AKA, how to add diversity to your cast not just because you “need” it
writing sexuality and gender expression (doesnt include non binary, if you have a good ref to that, please add on!)
masterpost on writing more diversity into your story
cultures of the world
guides to drawing different ethnicities (not just a great art reference, but also really helpful in appearance descriptions!)
Mary Sue/Gary Stu
Test to see if your character is a Sue
Explains subdivisions of Sues/Stus
Powerful Characters Don’t Have to Be Sues
Villains
villain generator
need an evil sounding name for your evil character? bam
villain archetypes
what’s your villain’s motive for being a villain?
Relationships
character perceptions (What your character thinks of themselves and what others think of them)
how to write strong relationships between two characters
8 ways to write better characters and develop their relationships with others
OCxLove Interest Handbook
develop your couple with good ol’ Q&A!
how to write realistic relationships
how to write relatives for your characters (this is more OC related to a canon character, but will help in writing family members in general)
ARCHETYPES
12 common archetypes
8 archetypes for male/female characters
female archetypes (goes pretty indepth from two main categories)
a list of archetypes
NAMES
how to name your character
random name generator
most common surnames
surnames by ethnicity
APPEARANCE
tips for better design
basic appearance generator
pinterest board for character design (includes NSFW and images of skeletons/exposed muscle (?) so tread carefully!)
clothing ref masterpost
Clothing generator
Another clothing generator
More clothing generator
Aaaand even more
Steam punk clothing
Char Style preference
Dress Generator
DETAILS
give your character better powers
a list of professions
proactive vs reactive characters
positive and negative traits
interest generator
skills generator
motivation generator
123 ideas for character flaws
list of phobias
Oh shit someone died
Backgrounds and stuff? yep
Quirks
Personality. you need that shit
Need something fandom related?
City generator hell yeah
location? got ya
World-building?
make your own god damn laws
Landscape.
Need Item names?
Fantasy/sci-fi/etc. medicine names
Stuff to make things more interesting.Weapons, clothes, treasures… whatever your characters need.
THAT FIRST SITE IS EVERY WRITER’S DREAM DO YOU KNOW HOW MANY TIMES I’VE TRIED WRITING SOMETHING AND THOUGHT GOD DAMN IS THERE A SPECIFIC WORD FOR WHAT I’M USING TWO SENTENCES TO DESCRIBE AND JUST GETTING A BUNCH OF SHIT GOOGLE RESULTS
Have you ever been writing some historical fiction and wondered "hey, I wonder if my characters would have been able to pop an ibuprofen in 1977?" Well, you're in luck, because this post is all about when common medications became available:
Acetaminophen: 1950
Albuterol: 1969 (UK) 1982 (US)
Allopurinol: 1966
Alprazolam: 1981
Amitriptyline: 1961
Amlodipine: 1990
Amoxicilin: 1972
Amphetamine/Dextroamphetamine (together as Adderall): 1996
Apixiban: 2012
Aripiprazole: 2002
Aspirin (first NSAID): 1899
Azidothymidine (first antiviral): 1987
Barbital (first barbiturate): 1903
Bupropion: 1985
Buspirone: 1986
Calcium Carbonate (TUMS): 1930
Captopril (first ACE inhibitor): 1981
Chlordiazepoxide (first benzodiazepine): 1960
Chlorothiazide (first thiazide diuretic): 1957
Chlorpromazine (first antipsychotic): 1952
Cyclobenzeprine: 1977
Diphenhydramine: 1946
Furosemide: 1959
Fluoxetine (first SSRI): 1988
Gabapentin: 1993
Glipizide: 1984
Hydrochlorothiazide: 1959
Ibuprofen: 1969 (UK) 1974 (US)
Insulin: 1923 (though many types of insulins would become available over the next century)
Imipramine (first tricyclic antidepressant): 1959
Iproniazid (first antidepressant (MAOI)): 1952
Levothyroxine: 1927 (though desiccated pork thyroid was used for the same reasons as early as 1890)
Lisinopril: 1987
Lithium: 1949
Losartan (first ARB): 1995
Lovastatin (first statin): 1987
Naproxen: 1976 (Rx) 1990 (OTC)
Nitrogen Mustard (first chemotherapy agent): early 1940's
the "came back wrong" trope except like... they didnt. like this mad scientists wife died, and so he studied necromancy, brought her back, and she came back and it all worked. like she came back exactly the same as she was before with literally no difference. but the scientist guy is like "oh no... what have i done.... shes Different now!!!! she came back Wrong!!!!" and shes just like. chilling. reading a book. cooking dinner. shes just so so normal but in the guys mind hes like "oh shes soooo weird" but shes just normal
Recipient of a third-degree burn in front of witnesses. IE, "I won't take that shit from a man dressed like a ghostbuster"= "Gostbuster" or "Buster"
A distinctive personal feature or quirk. IE, "Have you noticed how that new guy is always eating bell peppers?" = "Peppers", or "That chick has a massive forehead" = "Forehead".
An embarrassing thing you said or did. IE, "Did you seriously call Dale "Dad"?" = "Junior", "Baby boy", "Sport"
A game of name-mutation telephone. IE, "Donny Clyde" = "Bonnie 'n' Clyde" = "Bonnie" = "Bon-bon".
Irony. IE, calling a tall person "short stack" or a particularly dour person "sunshine".
A 'wrong place wrong time' one-off incident. IE, "He spilled oil on his pants and had to borrow a pair that were way too big and Jim saw him with the waistband pulled up to his nipples and called him 'Parachute'"
A batman-style origin story but not in a cool way: "One time she hit a deer with the company car and when she called the boss to tell her she was crying so hard we thought she was dying" = "Bambi"
The incredibly rare 'admiration' nickname, bourne only once a millennia under the light of the blood moon: "We saw him lift a truck once so now we call him 'iron man'"
Character motivation advice? I need my character to be in a city for reasons relevant to the plot, but I feel his motivations for being there are weak (especially considering he has family in another country). I’m trying to write more character-driven than plot driven, but I don’t know how to strengthen his motivations
Going on the assumption your character resides in this city and isn't just a visitor, I've compiled a list of ideas.
Reasons A Character May Live in a City
1. work—either it's the best place to succeed in his chosen career, he has strong financial ties to a physical place of business there and cannot commute, his primary customer base lives there, or wages are high there
2. education—his preferred school, university, intern/apprenticeship, etc. exists in the city
3. relationships—he made friends there, or friends have moved there, or there is/was a romantic interest there that drew him to the city
4. circumstance—whether he used to go to school, work, or live with friends/lovers in the city but that's now all in the past, he's settled down and doesn't feel leaving would be worth it
5. family—either he likes independence from his family, needs to be away from them due to conflict/trauma, or earns money in the city that he sends back to them
6. medical—he or a nearby loved one has to stay near a hospital or other medical center in this particular city for their own health
7. culture/lifestyle—he just likes it there. his "people" live there and not in his home country. maybe his personal tastes and interests are better catered to in this city than anywhere else.
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I love characters who dont think they deserve to be loved. Maybe they've been hurt, maybe someone has convinced them theyre evil, maybe they've hurt people in the past... and when someone comes along who loves and cares for them, they just dont see it as something they deserve
Sometimes you hear a song and a fic pops into your head full formed. This is a trap. The fic may be fully formed in your brain, but you still Have to write it down. This is an important step that most people forget about.
Grace pokes at the faint mark on his knee. He’d run ahead of his mom’s outstretched arms, but his little feet, still unsteady on dark hardwood, couldn’t handle the uneven sidewalk.
He'd chipped two of his little baby teeth; the sidewalk had a pinkish tint to it for the rest of summer where he'd torn up his tiny knee.
The neighbors had thought he'd broken something with how he was wailing.
That little mark is the only sign left of how messy his knee was. He remembers picking at the scab and his mom slapping his hands away from it.
He's got a million of these flat little spots on his skin, the ones Rocky can't 'see'.
One on each arm from being stabbed with a pencil–Jenny L. and Matty in third and sixth grade, respectively. Jenny L didn’t mean to stab him, and they both cried over it. Matty would have just stabbed him a second time if he’d cried, so instead Grace had yanked the pencil out and set it on Matty’s desk.
It’d bled a lot for such a small wound, but the look on Matty’s face was really funny.
Grace traces a couple more on his legs–several are from falling off of his bike. Racing with the other kids had been fun, but they’d all taken their turns way too fast.
Mild burns from spilling hot water, oil splashes, and chemicals getting through his labcoat without his knowledge.
He had his appendix out when he was twenty-one: his first-ever surgery. He’d been more worried about missing class and assignments than the potential of sepsis and death.
He’d been so focused, then, on his goals. Before they changed entirely after he was laughed out of academia and went back to school for his education degree.
continue reading or finish on ao3
There’s a pinkish L-shape on the inside of his left wrist from the end of his first year teaching, when his students had rushed him on the last day of school. Turns out, when faced with the pressure of twenty-eight thirteen year olds, the marker rack under a whiteboard can do a bit of damage.
In the grand scheme of things, Grace doesn’t have that many scars. He nicks himself shaving, sometimes, but those don’t leave anything visible behind.
Even the appendix scar healed up nicely, leaving a thin diagonal line on his right side. He runs his fingers over it, but through his shirt, he can’t even tell it’s there. It must be warmer in here than he thought, or maybe he’s just sweating a lot today, because his fingers come away damp.
He pokes at the weird spots in the back of his mouth with his tongue–his wisdom teeth came in fine, but they must have removed them before they put him on the Hail Mary.
Does that count as scar tissue?
He can’t decide.
Grace inspects his arms again for anything small that he might have missed.
Nothing.
He runs his fingers over the biggest scar he’s ever had–the one he loves the most, because it means Rocky had been able to save him.
The one he hates, because it means Rocky was hurt saving him, and he hadn’t been aware of any of it until after.
He keeps his touch light. Anything more would be overwhelming.
Grace has an extensive first kit, but even he doesn’t have all the proper burn care materials.
He’s never needed them before.
This scar hasn’t quite lost its shine yet, but it doesn’t hurt anymore. He doubts it will fade in the way the others have–it will stay raised and angry.
Rocky can ‘see’ it better, that way. Grace hasn’t asked him if he prefers the raised scar tissue to his normal skin yet.
That’s the last one. The biggest one, the worst one.
It’s not the only one that matters–the kids in his first class are all grown up now. Some of them are probably dead. Some of them might have kids. Most of them probably don’t have the career they wanted when they took his class, but maybe a couple of them do.
Even the kids he left behind to work on Project Hail Mary are adults now. He doesn’t have any scars from them, though. So the L-shaped scar has to represent all of the classes he ever taught.
Would he still be teaching if he were on Earth? It seems unlikely he would be able to return to his previous position, with the way he took off in the middle of the school year, but maybe he would have found another school if he’d stayed.
Or maybe he would have gone into hiding, never to be seen again. Stratt probably wouldn’t have broadcasted his cowardice to the whole world, but she certainly wouldn’t have covered for him.
Grace lays back and lets his hands settle over his stomach now that he’s finished going over his scars. He’s always achy these days, but looking over his scars helps some. It stretches his muscles out, loosens things up. Moreso when he’s standing than when he’s sitting, but he’s too tired to stand today.
“Grace, why are you leaking, question? Not from head, statement.”
“I’m fine, Rocky,” Grace waves him off. He’s not leaking… he’s not so tired that he wouldn’t notice wetting himself.
And he’s not crying, either, but he touches his face just to confirm.
“Grace leaking, statement.”
“Grace not leaking, statement,” Grace mutters back. He can hear Rocky moving closer in his ball.
“Grace side leaking,” Rocky says, getting as close as he possibly can, “Grace has not gotten out of bed today. Why Grace leaking, question?”
Grace is not leaking. He’s just gotten comfortable, barely, so he doesn’t want to get up and prove it to Rocky that he’s fine.
“I’m good, Rocky. Just one of those days.”
“No. Grace not good. Grace needs to stop leaking.”
Grace sits himself back up with more effort than he’d like. That’s what he gets for only eating slurry these days.
When he can stomach it.
He pats himself down again, quickly, just to show Rocky that he’s not leaking. His hand comes away wet again on his lower right side, but he’s just warm and sweating.
“Grace! Leaking!” Rocky taps hard on the inside of his ball, like he can force Grace to see something that’s not there. “Leaking there! Side!”
Grace looks at his wet hand.
It’s red.
Huh.
It’s not supposed to be red.
“Grace!” Rocky is going crazy, now.
Right.
He’d known this might happen.
“Remember when I explained scurvy to you, bud?” Grace could let Armando handle this, but it’s one spot. He’ll be fine. “One of the consequences of scurvy can be that old scars and wounds reopen. The collagen doesn’t hold up anymore.”
He’ll have to refresh himself on scurvy again–it feels like he read about just the other day, but he needs another crash course if he’s going to continue like this.
He lifts up his shirt to get a better look. It takes him longer than it should to peel it away from his appendectomy scar, which means it’s been bleeding for a while.
“Grace leaking!” Rocky screeches.
“Yeah. I’m leaking,” He stares at it for a few seconds, or maybe it’s a few minutes.
He feels the now-familiar slide of a needle into his arm, and he doesn’t get to figure out how long he’s been watching himself bleed before he’s unconscious.
Unlike the first time he woke up–months or maybe years ago now–Grace doesn’t immediately remove the IV from his arm. There’s a tautness to his right side that tells him his wound has been bandaged, but he doesn’t care to check it just now.
“Grace wake, question?”
“I’m awake,” Grace says, slowly. He’s too tired for this. He’s always tired, now. Cold, too.
Rocky has noticed, of course, but it’s not like Grace wants to tell him that too much more of this might actually kill him.
Going back into a coma until they get to Erid isn’t possible, either. It would be cruel to Rocky. Rocky can’t make his taumoeba slurry, and he doesn’t have enough food left without it.
“Grace is not well.”
Rocky doesn’t even say statement this time. That’s okay.
“Grace was leaking from side. Grace is not supposed to do this.”
“It’s alright now, buddy. All patched up.”
“Grace get up.”
“Later, Rock. I should probably go back to sleep.” And let whatever IV he has in run its course. Antibiotics, he suspects, if they still have any left. An infection out here, right now, would be a death sentence for him.
“Grace get up. Statement.”
“I’m fine, Rocky.”
“If Grace fine, Grace get up.”
“I’ve got an IV in, I’m going to let it finish.” Grace explains, hoping that it will satisfy Rocky.
“Then Grace get up.” Rocky’s not going to let this go, so Grace sighs and agrees.
He brings his blanket with him–the one Rocky likes, because he can ‘see’ the raised embroidery patterns.
“Grace… hurt self? Why Grace leaking?”
“Okay, where did you learn about self-harm?”
“Mary reads to me when you are sleeping.”
“Alright. Good to know. No, I didn’t hurt myself. I had to have an organ taken out–it’s fine, it wasn’t crucial–and the place that was bleeding is where they cut me open to remove it.”
“Yes. Scurvy. Mary explained this again too. But you eat.”
“I do eat, yeah. But I’m missing some nutrients.”
Rocky rolls his ball back and forth. “Grace eat right nutrients, statement.”
“I can’t, Rocky. We don’t have them, and I can’t make them.”
“Grace going to get worse, question?”
He can only lie to Rocky for so long.
“Yes, probably.”
He doesn’t have that many scars. The flat ones, the ones that have mostly faded away–he doesn’t think they’ll open up again. But he can’t be sure.
Once Rocky goes to sleep, he counts his scars again. This time, none of them open up.
Grace's assumptions are correct: most of his scars, the flat, long-healed ones, don't reopen. A very good thing, because he nearly runs out of gauze to pack the appendectomy scar on his side. The L-shaped scar on his wrist oozes blood when he’s working with his hands a lot, but not enough to be an issue.
The constant tang of blood in his mouth only makes eating more difficult–Grace is nauseous all the time, now–but he manages, if only because Rocky worries. Loudly. Frequently.
He gets a few new cuts while he's working on Mary before they get to Erid, and none of them heal.
The wound on his stomach–because he can’t keep calling it a scar when it’s stayed open–only heals up properly again once they’re on Erid and he’s recovering from his malnutrition. It’s a lot easier to eat when he’s not swallowing blood every other minute, and when it's not the taumoeba slurry.
His new scar is a lot messier. Thicker, raised, bumpy even to his eyes.
Rocky hates it.
He won’t say that outright, but Grace knows him well enough by now to know it’s true.
If Grace isn’t wearing his jacket, then it’s ‘visible’ to Eridians through his shirt.
Even through the barrier, it’s easier for his young students to ‘see’ him if they can grasp onto a shape. Most of them track the scar on his arm, because it’s still bigger than the appendix scar. The other little scars on his arms help with that, too. They're not nearly as large or well-defined, but they stayed open for so long that healing cleanly was impossible.
He doesn’t get hurt much on Erid. There’s not much in his bubble that can hurt him.
Grace isn’t a fan of pain. He didn’t know many people who were, on Earth. Not personally, at least.
But he knows that Rocky wants him to meet more Eridians–what good is that if they can't see him?
The first few really are accidents. The water temperature in his bubble is a little too high, at first, and he gains a new burn scar on his arm when it splashes him as he stands on the shore.
He's trying to get used to the weight of the new cutlery set the Eridians have made him when he slices his forearm open.
He's unsteady on his feet, even in the soft ‘sand’ as he takes his first steps in the bubble. Rocky tries to catch him, but his round ball doesn't make that easy. He splits his chin open in the initial fall; his shoulder when he tries to push himself back up and falls again.
The scar on his chin is tiny, but there. All of the others are slightly raised, and Grace notices quickly what a difference they can make. Rocky, who knows him well, can always track him now. Adrian and his ‘care team’ suddenly have less trouble determining where his limbs and face are when he's in motion, and he’s sure it’s because they lock onto the scars.
But it's not until he realizes that his students are doing the same thing that he gets the idea.
And, well, Grace is a teacher. His job is to help his students as best he can. So he hatches a plan that any psychologist back on Earth would tell him not to go through with.
Too bad for them, because he's on Erid now.
Grace takes great care not to cover up any of his old scars, especially not the ones from his childhood on Earth. He has to take it slowly, too, or Rocky will get suspicious.
He starts with his legs–easier to hide, since he's almost always wearing pants. He makes little patterns out of the cuts. Grace can't get tattoos on Erid, so all he's really doing is DIYing it.
That's what he tells himself, anyway.
He does notice a difference in his students’ focal regions after that, and continues his plan as the old cuts heal into scar tissue.
His upper arms are next–his lower arms have scarring on them already.
Again, there's a shift in focus as his students register the new texture on his body.
Grace acts like he doesn’t notice.
He slows down for a while–Rocky hasn't brought it up yet, but Grace isn’t naive enough to believe he hasn't noticed.
There's no physical or emotional relief for him, when he creates the scars. It's all clinical. Grace is–has to be–sure of his place on Erid, knows that Rocky and Adrian and his students want him around.
It's not dangerous. He’s not trying to kill himself.
There's no reason for anyone else to be concerned, so Grace deflects, blaming his clumsiness when Rocky or Adrian or anyone on his care team asks.
If he tells them the real reason, they'll make him stop.
“Grace hurt,” Rocky says, not entirely out of the blue, because this has been coming for a long time. Grace has just been trying to avoid it.
“No, I’m alright, Rock,” Grace tries.
“Grace has new scars.”
“Humans scar pretty easily.” Especially compared to Eridians.
“You did not have this many scars on Mary.”
“New environments, even on Earth, are always a learning curve.” The last thing Grace wants to do is make Rocky feel like this is his–or the other Eridians’–fault in any way.
“Scars are neat. Not random. Accidents would be random,” Rocky points out, stubborn as ever, “I have read some human papers. You want to die, question?”
“No, Rocky, I don’t want to die. It’s not like that. It’s–have I told you about tattoos? Those are made with a needle and ink. They’re not always colored, but they can be.”
It’s so easy to slip into teacher mode–it’s not something he’s always been to reach for, but it’s helpful now. It’s a steady feeling, one that lowers his heart rate a little. That’s something Rocky will notice for sure.
“I can’t get tattoos here, of course. People get them for all sorts of reasons, sometimes to mark a big event. And my life, lately, has been a bunch of big events right after the other, yeah? So I’m kind of DIYing my own makeshift tattoos.”
“Grace is lying, statement.”
Well, fudge.
“I’m not lying, bud, that’s what I’m doing.”
“Grace is baby, statement. Babies do not get tattoos.”
“I’m young by your standards, Rocky, but I’ve been an adult for a long time by human standards.” He’s not even sure how long. How many people died on Earth before the Beatles got there?
“You are not giving yourself tattoos. You do not like needles.”
“Well, I’m not using a needle.” And he’d never trust himself with that, even if he had the supplies to tattoo himself properly.
“Give utensil,” Rocky pokes at his leg, “Stop lying or no more, statement.”
“Rocky, I’m not giving you my utensils. I’m fine.”
“Truth, truth, truth.”
Rocky doesn’t repeat many words thrice anymore.
Grace closes his eyes. Rocky can tell when he’s lying, better than anyone Grace has ever known. Of course he’s not buying his excuses.
He should have practiced in the mirror.
Somehow, Grace doesn’t think it would have mattered.
“Truth, statement.”
Grace breathes, as deeply as he can–when he first moved into the bubble, he’d done it as often as possible. He could sit for hours just watching the waves and breathing until chest ached from over-expansion.
Then he exhales on a low note.
“It’s so you can ‘see’ me better. You and everyone else.”
Grace explains what he’s noticed–he has notes, as well, because what kind of scientist would he be if he didn’t write his observations down?–and how the scarring helps his students focus on him. Helps his care team.
“Does not help Grace,” Rocky says, when he’s done explaining. Grace hasn’t even described his charts yet.
“It serves a purpose,” Grace says.
“No. No purpose. No more. Do not need scars to find you.”
“You don’t, Rocky, but you know me really well.”
“No more scars, Grace. Promise promise promise.”
“I–” Grace doesn’t know why he hesitates. It should be an easy yes. “I won’t. I promise.”
“No crossed fingers?”
“No, my fingers aren’t crossed, see?” Grace does jazz hands, but Rocky doesn’t reciprocate like he usually does, “No more scars, I promise.”
“Rocky watches.”
“I know you will.”
It’s harder than Grace thought, at first, not making new scars. But Rocky stays true to his word and inspects Grace every day for the next month, at least.
He’s not sure how long it takes–the day and night cycles in his bubble vary from the day and night cycles on Erid itself, to keep things as similar to Earth as possible for him–but he eventually wakes up and doesn’t think about his scars at all.
@whumplovers-collaborate
The important thing about wool is that it continues to keep you warm even when it’s soaking wet.
Other natural fibers don’t do this. In fact, quite the opposite. Campers and boaters are usually familiar with the phrase, “cotton kills.” If you’re wet in cotton or linen, your clothes actually sap heat from your body.
If you sink in a lake in late October like I did today, staying warm is important. I was rescued long before I would’ve actually died, but cold makes your muscles seize up, which isn’t good if you have to swim to land.
Which brings me around to life jackets. If the water’s cold enough, you may only have five-ten minutes until your muscles seize (today I probably had 40-60, more than enough time to get to land if I hadn’t been picked up), and you’ll drown.
In a life jacket, even in extremely cold water, you can float semi-conscious for perhaps another 30 minutes or so before you actually freeze to death, which is usually when someone rescues you.
What’s more, you probably know that moving around on land warms you up. Jumping jacks, jogging in place, etc.
In water, moving actually makes you colder. You need to stay still curled up in a ball, which you can only do in a life jacket.
In wool AND life jacket, you’re warm, and your head’s above water, which is pretty much your only and entire goal.
If you’re allergic to wool, synthetics are available specifically for this purpose. I know I always say natural fibers are the way to go, but when it comes to safety, wear what protects you!
Yep! A really simple “experiment” I learned as a kid and now use in my own courses is sticking your hand in ice water. Compare moving it around in the water to curling it up in a fist. The contrast is stark!
To increase your survival time in on cold water, you want to curl up! If you’re with others, you want to huddle!
Again, both are only possible when wearing a life jacket!
I know a lot of people are reblogging this for writing reference, but I like to believe that 7,000 people on this site were actually continually living in fear about this specific situation and that when the time comes, I’ve prepared them with what they need to know to survive.
