I had an idea for a college au (uni) where berena met at albies and serena became an honourary flatmate to bernie raf and fletch (in this world she lives at home, with adrienne). It would be a slow bern, the kind where it's a friendship with blurred lines, that ties in some of the canon but I'm not sure how much yet. The issue is that I really love berena but have not seen holby city, and as such am worried about continuity and character relationships and behaviours and such. therefore I have been working on an angsty little one-shot within this world but focusing on just the two of them, which I will post a bit of below the cut. Was just wondering if anyone with better knowledge of the wider context of the show would like to pick my brain on this idea/ work off of it/ some third option? If so do let me know! Also let me know if I should finish the one shot? (It may also be good daydreaming/headcannon material, idk)
...
"H-Hello?"
"Hi? Serena, it's Bernie. You... you called me? Oh shit was it a pocket-dial, have I woken you up?"
"Um...no, I-I meant to call you. I hoped you'd be up, but when you didn't answer I thought maybe-"
"I'm up, sorry, my phone was on silent. What's up, are you okay?" Bernie could hear shaky breathing on the other end of the line.
"Um... well... no, not really."
"Shit, 'Rena, has something happened?! Are you hurt??"
The pause that followed made Bernie's heart drop to her stomach.
"Can you let me in? I'm outside the flat."
Bernie instantly put down her plate and rushed (quietly so as not to wake anyone( to the door, hanging up as she reached it. Pulling it open revealed a shivering Serena sat on the doorstep, arms crossed around herself. Upon seeing Bernie, she began to speak, in a harsh voice. "I'm sorry, I didn't know where else to go." To Bernie's horror she began to cry silently, tears spilling down her cheeks. She dropped to her knees and took Serena's cold face in her hands, thumbs stroking her cheeks as her eyes roamed her body, searching for any visible injuries. Upon finding none, she straightened up, holding out a hand to get the other woman up, helping her to her feet and leading her back into the communal kitchen.
Bernie didn't let go of Serena's hand until they were both sitting on the sofa, facing each other. She desperately wanted to ask what the matter was, but Serena's body language was telling her not to push. The other woman was slightly hunched over where she sat, her back not touching the sofa, as though she were afraid of taking up space, something Bernie had never seen from her before. Serena was wringing her hands in her lap, something Bernie had only seen her do when approached by creepy guys in bars, something that unfortunately happened quite regularly. Well, of course they would want her, Serena was gorgeous. Even with eyes red from crying Bernie still found her the most beautiful woman she had ever met.
"I don't want to go home tonight."
Serena's voice was gravely, and as she spoke she seemed to shrink impossibility further into herself. Bernie couldn't help it: she felt an intense need to comfort her best friend, and reached out to rub her shoulder in an attempt to convey support. The second her palm met the fabric of Serena's top, she let out a small yelp and flinched away. It was a sound of pain, not discomfort, and Bernie was immediately back on red alert. She motioned for Serena to turn so she was facing away from her on the sofa, and as she did so Bernie couldn't contain her gasp at the spots of blood that had seeped through the thin material of her shirt. Serena spun back, refusing to make eye contact, her head lowered. "It's not as bad as it probably looks."
"Serena, who did this to you?"
"I can't, Bern. Please."
"Serena's tone was pleading, and as she spoke she made direct eye contact with Bernie. That, combined with the pet name, signaled her earnestness.
"Okay. We won't talk about it right now. But will you let me look at that for you? I'm not exactly a doctor but I want to help."
👻 🦇 🎃 Still thinking about yesterday’s zoom and how the good company certainly made up for the bad films. Great costumes and make-up, lots of laughter and at least both films ended up with the creepy men being ditched for women.
Thanks again for joining in - it certainly was the most fun virtual Halloween I ever had. 👻 🦇 🎃
Pretty much everyone is looking forward to this year ending but while the virus wreaked havoc, some good things also happened. Tell us about a good thing that happened to you that you want to remember this year by?
And feel free to forward this to your friends, anonymous or not - we could all use some good memories from this year to balance out the bad.
Thanks for the Ask, Anon.
Two good things happened to me this year of the hellish Pandemic.
1 - I joined the Berena fandom and as a consequence made some very good friends. I am hugely grateful to them.
2 - I quit my job-from-hell. My ex-boss has spent the last 7 years bullying me, screaming and swearing at me (causing me, on more than one occasion, to literally walk out of my workplace as the only way to escape it), and treating my health as unimportant despite the fact I’m semi-crippled, asthmatic, and diabetic. It was terrifying to quit without another job to go to and especially at a time when the entire world is a Hellscape, but turns out that being told ‘Go to Hell, asshole’ was the final straw that broke the camel’s back. And despite the ongoing financial hardship (mitigated in large part by the aforementioned friends in the Berena fandom), I cannot regret walking away. For one thing, my mental health improved massively (I’m only having the occasional panic attack now, instead of 3-4 a day while I was working during the Pandemic).
I’ve mostly stayed out of the discussion/discourse (re: Berena, Holby City - as a show and re: cast members) for various reasons, and I hope that I’m able to convey that with some degree of coherence. These points are not listed in any specific order or degree of importance.
From a personal standpoint, since that is really all that I can rely on - same as anybody else - lived experiences colour our interactions, and one’s views of a particular storyline are no less valid than somebody else’s. Our places within various communities (geographical, familial, emotional, shared belief systems, shared interests) shape us, whether we choose them, or they choose us.
I’m a 45 year old single introverted lesbian with ADD tendencies. I’m a night shift geriatric long-term care nurse by choice. A photographer, love to travel. Most of my interactions with LGBTQ+ community are online as I don’t have a community here that I interact with much aside from Pride parade festivities once a year. I did more in my 20s but not as much in the past 10 or more years.
And I do like shows with lesbian and bi-women representation, BUT more than half of the time that is not the only draw to a tv show/film. There are a LOT of shows/films that have had a decent/semi-decent LGBT storyline (from reviews/social media commentary/clips), but the storylines themselves, the characters, actors, have not drawn me in, or it’s poorly written/performed that I can’t be bothered (I’m picky). There is no rule that all lesbians/bi-women have to be interested in the same stuff.
Keeping in mind, that I have not seen the past five episodes of HC (due to work/family/life in general - and HC is not the only show I’m terribly behind on), I have read through much commentary via social media (Twitter & Tumblr) - to a certain degree of the various Berena fandom that I follow, which is by no means extensive. Within the past two to three weeks, I have also avoided searching through/scrolling through Berena or Holby City specific tags for my own sanity. I will say this: I do think that Holby City and BBC should take into account many of the experiences and hurt (of the cheating/break-up sl) that the lesbian an bi-women communities as a whole have made them aware of. Will it make a difference in the long run, I don’t know, but I can hope. I recall the backlash after Delia’s cycling accident in S4 of Call the Midwife and the killing of Kate McKenzie in Last Tango in Halifax. So, I do hope they can learn from this Berena storyline how much it has hurt many in the community.
Aside from personal lack of time for viewing shows at a regular time-line, there is another element that has kept me from the past few weeks of HC viewing, and its not specific to what’s on-screen - but rather off-screen within the HC/Berena fandom. As I said above, each person’s view points are valid because it comes from our own experiences. As a fandom, we cross different ages/generations, sexual orientations, genders, different countries, different backgrounds - it makes us unique. And, as we know and have seen, it also results in disagreements at times. I’m not taking any sides here. However, the downside of these disagreements/arguments has temporarily soured my interest in Holby City as a whole. Right now there are a lot of hurt feelings going around for a myriad of resasons that I’m not going to wade into. Suffice to say, this distancing myself from the overall negativity is something I can afford to do at the moment. That’s not to say fighting for improved representation, especially for lesbians and bi-women 40+ & 50+, is not an important thing it do, it very much is. I can send notes to BBC/HC, but for my own sanity/piece of mind, at the moment, I need to back off HC on a temporary basis.
Which is a shame, because even as I came to Holby City back in early 2016 (and subsequently went back to watch everything from Serena’s entrance onwards (S14), full episodes, not just character storyline clips) with interest in the developing Berena friendship to love storyline, there was so much to the whole of the show that kept me engaged, that made me care about most of the characters over the past six series. It’s unfortunate because there are some good storylines going on at present - Sacha’s depression, Hanssen’s depression, Jac’s recovery post-Gaskill, Mo mentoring Nicky, and others. I will get back to Holby at some point and marathon the lot I’ve missed (Heck, I did manage to marathon 195 eps btw summer/autumn of 2016, still not sure how I did it except for sleep deprivation).
When you get distracted and come back to your fanfic a few hours later to find you left a sentence unfinished and you have no clue what you were going to write next
