#august esposito

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Brain worms got to me and now I’m making a WHA x GAC AU because yeah I’m normal. I light fix up these atelier uniform designs later but so far I’m pretty proud with them :3

I’ve no clue how much of this I will be sharing purely because a lot of the lore I’m building here is based heavily on canon GAC lore I’ve not shared yet. But who knows! Maybe this AU & posting about it will incentivize me to post more lore related stuff here!

Anyway this is all for now.

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Little comic strip about the twins featuring an actual excerpt from my current book WIP!

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HAPPY BIRTHDAY MAY AND AUGUST ESPOSITO

On this day, August 13th, we celebrate two twins stuck to each other’s side by a curse that upheavals earth and plant if they’re so much as five feet apart from each other.

May

The older twin, the more sadistic one. Though she didn’t start out that way. Her parents created a timid girl, with a weak backbone and a belief that if she was complacent she would be safe. The streets took that girl and created what May considers someone stronger—someone cut-throat, violent, not afraid to land the first and final hits. Self-serving, but in an entirely different way. Science is the only way she makes sense of this world, and the thing she considers to be what helps her survive in this world. She feels safest when she can apply the laws of science to the fucked up, unpredictable world around her.

August

The younger twin, the more apathetic one. Though he didn’t start out that way. His parents built a rebellious kid, one that knew he and his siblings deserved better than the life they had been handed. The streets tore that all apart; misery upon more misery, and even when things got better more misery appeared anyway. Life, in a lot of ways, was starting to appear meaningless.

The Twins

They’re a packaged deal. They started off that way. Bound by a curse since birth that made it that being independent people would be impossible to accomplish. Twins can be close, but this level of closeness just becomes suffocating.

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Janette: We call that a traumatic event Janette, turning to August: Not a "bro moment" Janette, turning, to May: Not a "major L" Janette, turning to Jack: And not an "oof, lmao"

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The Twins!

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☀️GIFTED AND CURSED🌑

The Espositos—8 kids trying their best to survive in this world that seemed to be against them since birth.

Born with what they dubbed “gifts and curses” the Espositos have to navigate while keeping this secret…

… and while running from a shadow woman.

GIFTED AND CURSED is a book series following eight siblings, their foster mother, and friends along the way as they battle against a dark shadow spirit attempting to steal the second youngest, Lily.

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Symphonies & Stories on Saturday!

Where I take songs I heavily relate to GAC and discuss it.

First song for this: Bubble Wrap by Precious Pepala

This is a song that has themes & undertones of religious trauma stemmed from overzealous parents, and it represents breaking away from that. And for that reason, I relate it to my characters, the Espositos.

The Espositos (shown right below) are eight siblings who have what’s known as gifts and curses—otherwise known as power with a downside (I can probably touch on that in a different post).

My story is a low fantasy, taking place in our world, so this magic is uh… not exactly normal nor expected! And for the two Catholic parents of the Espositos, this is unspeakably nightmarish. They are under the belief that their children got this magic from the Devil, and as a result treat them as so. They treat the children inhumanly, referring to them as demonic scum, & prohibiting them from going outside as a means to keep them from being seen from the outside world and henceforth associating the Esposito reputation with demonics.

They essentially grew up with the idea that they’re hell born being ingrained into their mindset.

And that relates very well to the song :3

I’d imagine it’s the Espositos’ internal struggle after they run away from their parents. They want to find against everything they’ve been taught, but at the same time struggle with believing it’s true. After all, they’re an outlier in society and, as far as they know, the only people with gifts and curses in this world (haha untrue).

The ongoing verse that’s repeated three times has different inflections and tones each time and goes as:

If I get to those golden gates

And he turns me away,

Well then you can say “I told you so” and

I’ll burn forevermore

Like the sun that’ll rise

Even after I die

The first time the verse is sung is the softest version of itself, and to me it feels like the Espositos that don’t put up much of a fight for varying reasons. Beverly because she’s more of a mediator and caretaker than a fighter, Wolfgang because he can never truly find it in himself to defend his own humanity since he hardly believe he has any, August because he’s quite numb and really accepts any pain he’s prone to, and Lily because she’s a timid child.

The second time this verse is sung, it’s with more intensity in the voice, and that reminds me of the more fighter or angry Espositos. Tess because of her generally defensive nature mainly to protect her younger siblings, May because she’s learned that having a hard exterior as a form of protection, Jack because he’s so confused why they can’t be accepted as normal, and Benjie because he’s been hardened by witnessing the suffering of all his older siblings and himself.

All the Espositos internalize this message their parents scorned into their ears, and it’s made them all types of ways: most importantly, fearful. Fearful of acceptance from the world that they’ve been told hates them. And this can mainly be exemplified in how they fear rejection from their foster mom, Janette O’Reilly.

And I imagine that most with the third verse, when in my mind it’s a shift from the Godly imagery that the song itself is representing to a comparison to the Espositos fearing rejection from the only source of parental affection they’ve had.

“Golden gates” instead of referring to the Heavenly gates, now may refer to the gates of Janette’s home. “Turns me away” refers to a fear of Janette rejecting them; tied to that misbelief that they’re unworthy of love, especially that parental love. If this one, singular chance of hope turns them away, then what the Espositos have been told their whole lives would be true. They’d be nothing more than demonic spawns, unfit for society, and unloved by all but each other. And that final verse represents all that is on the line for them in my relation to them and the song.

And that’s all for that! Gonna hopefully do another next Saturday!! Bye.

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August: Screw holding hands for romantic reasons. Hold hands so that if one of us trips on an icy sidewalk, we both eat shit