We need a new term for when your understanding of major canon is sound but the stuff you create that leaves said canon untouched is comprised of deep cut characters and/or ocs that you genuinely forget do not exist beyond your inner world. Like. Phantom Narrative or smth
I love Patricia Johnson so so much I hope we see her in future HF content. I've been wanting to make her card for forever. She's the second I've made in the collection of the Anointed, aka characters Blessed or Cursed through their entanglement with the Black and White's entities. And PJ is THE Blessed.
I love the idea of her teaming up with Professor Hidgens and having Doc + Marty-esque escapades except on a fucking cataclysmic scale. Hidgens trusts very few individuals, and even for those he does trust he ends up screwing them over to achieve his own objective. Since her summer internship PJ has been his favorite pupil and ends up being a reliable colleague, so in most timelines she doesn't end up on the receiving end of his deceptions. She Gets him, and that earns her a lot of his respect. But she's always vigilant in the instances he does turn. At some point, the apprentice supercedes the mentor. That's just how it goes. And she feels no guilt over this.
So much of her character came out of lore I've been leading up to in my writing (the actual fic series involving her isn't for a while but the lore spans every story; and the seeds are there in what I have published!) and somehow she ended up becoming a foil to Grace--and by extension, her eventual crossing of paths with Miss Holloway foils Wilbur in the timelines he corrupts Grace.
Grace is guilt-ridden. The world is full of temptation and sin. People are sinful, she is sinful. She suppresses, she projects, she needs a higher being to devote herself to. Otherwise what was it all for?
On the flip side, PJ doesn't assign morality to these weighty dilemmas. To her, the world--the UNIVERSE--is meant to be explored. She is meant to be proven wrong, to search until she finds scientific truth. Turns out, that scientific truth ends up being more eldritch-y than she initially thought. But she doesn't scoff at it or deny it. It's simply new information.
I love imagining her path and Miss Holloway's colliding for any given reason. She receives her guidance, and sometimes literal protection in the form of this very special amulet. Holloway "doesn't have this in every timeline" but the ones she does, she got the best of Wilbur every time. In giving it to PJ she risks that fifty/fifty chance of losing to him again, but PJ herself will never be harmed. It contains a very powerful charm, thanks to the power of Light Entities, i.e. Webby and [redacted]. Should Holloway die, PJ manages to get her hands on The Black Book and learn to use it to her advantage.
In general, PJ holds dear all of these new truths about the universe she's told. And yet! She is unafraid of suggesting Miss Holloway could be wrong about things.
PJ is a very hopeful person. Not "head-in-the-clouds" hopeful, but. For every bad ending, every painful loss, every inevitable apocalypse, there must be an equal, opposite outcome. Successes. Glitches in the matrix ensured by Chaos Theory. That's just simple fact!
And she doesn't need to be "chosen". She's not, really. She would never want to be. She just Happens to be there. And she's free from fate's constraints. If she can do anything in her power with her special talents to find answers--better yet, a more permanent way to save Hatchetfield and the world--she'll do it. Is she going to be successful? Maybe, maybe not. If she can't, another PJ in another time and another place will get it right. In telling Miss Holloway all of this, sat across from her at Miss Retro's, Holloway tells her, "PJ, you say you're just another girl with no major part in any of this. I think you just proved yourself wrong. You may be the most important girl in the whole universe."
Maybe. Maybe not. PJ will still try. PJ will hope.
: an ardent follower, supporter, or enthusiast (as of a religion, art form, or sport)
Lyssa Warren hates her life. She hates that she’s stuck in this backwater town. She hates that she can’t seem to find a job. More than anything, she hates her father. The fact that she has to rely on him until she finishes college. The fact that he married someone only four years older than her, less than a year after her mother died. The fact that if Lyssa wants him to continue paying her tuition she has to do what he tells her, including attending her snotty step-brother’s birthday party at Pizza Pete’s.
But that’s what she does, with a scowl on her face. It’s when she’s wandering around said party, ruminating on her anger, that she sees it (hears it). A rundown old claw machine, tucked away in a corner. It can’t be explained, what draws her in; why she would bother to waste any of the little pocket money she has trying to win a stupid stuffed toy. But she does.
It’s surprisingly easy to wrap the claw around the weird little green creature and get it into her own hands. And as Lyssa Warren stares into the creatures eyes, trying to decipher what exactly she’s looking at, something else happens. Something….. wonderful.
It speaks to her, the toy, inside her mind. Wiggog Y’wrath, Wiggly, he calls himself. And he says such wonderful things; how he understands her rage, her wrath. He says that he can help her, if she wants him to, as long as she helps him in return. And why wouldn’t she, it’s not like the people in this town had ever offered to do anything for her. No one besides her mother, Stella Warren née Foster. But she was gone now, and Lyssa was on her own.
At least she was; now, she had Wiggly. And so, she did as He told her. She followed her father into the restroom, slit his throat with his own pocket knife, and took his car keys. She went into the Witchwood, where He instructed her to dig. She took the book He led her to, and it felt like a lost treasure had been returned to her.
Then, once all her arrangements were made, Lyssa messaged one of the pining idiots in her women’s studies class, and lured him to the old Waylon Place with promises she had no intention of keeping. He would be a sacrifice to her lord; He would need a vessel after all. And once He had arrived….
Well, they would be able to unleash beautiful chaos all across Hatchetfield and beyond.
Credits to @giussepimezzoalto for the awesome card template!
Can you guess the ending of this tale? Hint it ends in tragedy, it always does. The Tactician knows that, but tragedy is only a matter of perspective, and with the right skill, you can always be on the winning side. You don’t need supernatural powers to twist the odds to your favour, you just need wit and a willingness to accept good enough. The Tactician is in full control of their life, even if from the outside it may not appear so. But, they’ll be laughing when the curtains close, and they are the last one standing.
Meaning: The Tactician represents Resilience, Tragedy, Plotting, and all manners of trickery. That may seem bad, but really it’s anything but! Tragedy is a part of life, and only fools try and hide from it. With enough resilience, spite, and scheming you can turn misfortune into success. It won’t be flashy, but it’ll be more than many others have.
——
Meet my Hatchetfield OC Resire Jacques.
They’re basically Pokeys Uncle Wiley. Someone needs to figure out how to get a meteor past PEIP and that’s them! They’re perfectly content with just being a stagehand in the grand scheme of things. Unlike Wiley who lusts for power above all else, Resire is happy with less supernatural power. Because to them, true power is the kind that keeps you alive.
Resire and Wiley are, antagonistic towards eachother, but not outright hostile. Resire thinks Wiley is an idiot blinded by a lust for power, and Wiley thinks Resire is just a foolish puppet of pokotho.
- Background accents in gold, silver, black, and white
- Basic gradient backgrounds in blue, purple, gold, pink, and green
Happy drawing ✨️
(DISCLAIMER: ALL TAROT TEMPLATES ARE MODELED AFTER THE DESIGNS OF THE ORIGINAL HATCHETFIELD TAROT DECK CREATED BY MATT LANG AND ILLUSTRATED BY NICOLE RODRIGUEZ. I DO NOT CLAIM TO BE AFFILIATED WITH THE ARTISTS OR ANY MEMBER OF TEAM STARKID. ALL CREDIT GOES TO THEM FOR THE ORIGINAL DESIGNS.)
Picking back up my Hatchetfield OC Tarot rampage with Richie's father and previously Sycamore High's coolest closet nerd. Him and Paul's sister, Olive, were on-again/off-again throughout high school but friends since middle school, even throughout the off periods.
As a kid, his parents pushed him more into sports and this affiliation with the popular, athletic kids briefly made him a major douchebag. But Brady's friendship with Olive softened him, and he secretly excelled in his English classes, so he became something of a cheerleader for the underdog. Then he got into DnD and from there it all went downhill. Now instead of wreaking havoc as a high school bully, he channels that energy into wreaking havoc on his players when DM-ing for all the freshmen.
All his football buddies are too dumb to realize that he's hovering around the nerds and new kids like Paul not because he's being tutored by them, but because when not campaigning he helps them study for their History and Literature classes.
And Paul doesn't mind being occasionally lugged around. He never gets hurt by Brady bc when he hoists him up it's more like when a mother cat picks up their kitten so bro is chilling he never needs to walk to first period lmao
I haven't decided yet where Brady's tale goes, all I know is in most timelines Richie never meets him and has a lot of complicated feelings abt him. But like Brady's things, he usually keeps those feelings tucked away in a dusty drawer.
There's no couple more cutie silly in Hatchetfield than Chip Fleming and Deandra Suarez, I'm sorry!!! That's just the truth!!!!!
Much like how Richie's dad was the closet nerd of Sycamore High, Dee was the "weird girl" hidden in plain sight. She never tried concealing it, but the only people who really knew were her closest friends and a handful of suitors who couldn't handle a girl having a personality lol.
The teen years were exceptionally merciful to her, and so because she was bubbly and pretty she wasn't relegated to the loser crowd. She was in the journalism club, had a decent circle of friends, etc. But she started doing this thing after one too many guys asked her out without knowing anything about her or caring about her other than what they saw on the outside. She'd rapidfire recount anything she could remember from whatever Star Trek episode she'd last watched, and all the behind the scenes fun facts she knew. This scared a lot of guys away, which she was glad for. Best to weed out the jerks who don't like her for her. She thought it was going to be more of the same when Chip got the nerve up to finally approach her, only for her typical dorky schpeel to completely backfire lmao they talked for hours
Chip thought Dee was the coolest girl ever. He still thinks she's the coolest girl. Where Olive and Brady were very alike from an outside perspective but at the core an "opposites attract," Ruth's folks seem to run in different circles, but their interests have tons of overlap. Chip loves making music and writing plays, Dee's all about literature and writing. The two give one another much-needed insight during artblocks and a loving "YOU'RE STALLING, WORK ON YOUR THING!!" to get the ball rolling again. Chip's surprisingly extroverted (he was the popular theater kid for a reason) while Dee relishes those pockets of quiet at a party that allow her to take out her little notebook and write anything on her mind. They just get each other! They're each other's best friend!!!
Chip and Dee want Ruth to be as Herself as she wants. They do their best to be supportive of her, but Ruth has a hard time accepting it. She doesn't think she's "done cooking" yet. She's sure she could get up on a stage and be the star of a show! She could be center stage! She has to become effortlessly flawless like her mom first. She has to lose the stage fright cause her dad has none. But to "try harder" is to defeat the purpose of already being a natural from birth. She has to hope it'll just happen for her one day. Otherwise she'll have to apologize to her parents for the rest of her life for being raised in greatness only to turn out a total failure.
The Fleming household actually went no and low contact with a lot of family members for some time in Ruth's teen years. They knew at this point she was queer, she was definitely ND and like her folks she had a lot of niche interests. Coupled with her anxiety, relatives who held high expectations for Chip and Dee put these on Ruth's shoulders, too.
One too many times had they heard comments from their family that boiled down to "your daughter is being a person wrong (and liking the wrong people)" and one day Dee, who usually has a very long fuse, blew up about this. She regrets how she made no efforts to conceal this confrontation from Ruth, there was no way her daughter couldn't hear her from down the hall, but they don't get to decide how they raise their daughter. Anyone who isn't Ruth doesn't get to decide what a Ruth is.
They don't always understand her, either, and she gets angsty and closed off, but Dee has to remind herself (and Chip) that being a teen girl is like being in a psychological horror film 75% of the time lol. And Chip always backs Dee up. Sometimes people try and provoke him, they're like "So you're just gonna let her stir up family drama? Seriously?" and he's like "Uh yeah so she doesn't need me to 'let' her do anything because I don't control her, you're all the problem and need to get a fucking grip"
I love them a lot and am restraining myself so hard from writing twenty more paragraphs on the nerdy prudes' mothers dynamics with one another but I'll cap it off with if you need any extra backup for the Ruth Protection Squad, hit up Olive Lipschitz she will make the PTA meetings entertaining and call the principle a spineless idiot to his face
The masses have voted and they chose correctly: lesbians! Let's go, lesbians!!
The schpeel:
Skyler ditched her ex-husband's surname as soon as they split, but back in Hatchetfield some still refer to her as 'that cheating Mrs. Jagerman'. Unsurprising. Max's father did everything in his power to poison Max against her-- said she ditched them for Clivesdale because she's a selfish, attention-seeking cheater.
In reality, she's a woman who realized she was gay late in life and fell in love with someone who loved her back. Cracks had already been showing in her marriage even before Max. Her husband never hit her or her son, but he was damn good at degrading her, isolating her, making her feel stupid and like a bad mom. She started volunteering at the Starlight to help make props and paint sets for shows just to get out of the house and have something to do (this also marks the origins of my version of the 'Max is a closet theater kid' headcanon lmao he'd have to sit around after school at the Starlight till she was done helping out, he now knows too much Sondheim against his will). This is where she met Lily.
Lily is a Clivesdale resident who served as her town theater's dramaturg, and though that put her Master's in Literature to use, she found the environment to be far too stuffy. So she makes the trek to the Starlight to bring a little of her literary editing prowess to stage managing. Skye makes the trek worth it. This is sorely needed for Lily who, ever since leaving New York, has found life a little lonely. She didn't feel like she fit in anywhere. But Skye sees her. Makes her feel seen. What a scary thing for both women-- and what an absolute light in the dark it is. The gift of a kind, knowing love.
When their affair is found out, she's all but kicked out and served divorce papers. Her ex makes it as difficult as possible to see Max, and every year that she sees him become more of his father, believes more and more of his lies, the more her heart breaks. She lives with Lily in Clivesdale for most of Max's teen years and performs an unsuccessful balancing act of embracing her new life while trying to save what's worth saving from her old one.
In better timelines Skye and Lil move back to Hatchetfield together and live in a sick as hell cabin on the outskirts of town, where Lil indulges in her other passion-- animals-- and opens up a dog sanctuary :'-) They do all this earlier than expected because Max's father dies of a heart attack after his senior year. For a long time Skye has been anticipating her son's inevitable post-high school "my life is over" crash out and after a very (VERY) bumpy start, living with his mom and Lily helps sort of stabilize his worldview and massive ego. I could talk at length about their whole overdue mother-son bonding arc but that's a WHOLE thing and I need to be crazy abt it in a separate post. But I hope these two images summarize the bare bones of that arc well enough for you
Am I recycling that one drawing of him from the other post? Yes it's my favorite and I can do whatever I want forever
Longer bio under the cut bc I didn't realize I had so much to say about him jfc so I will Spare you that and give my best summary in the style of Jean Ralphio:
Late two thousands. Mutual friends. Travelling speech therapist who hates ABA and annoying parents. ND-affirming work with a little Richie. Gay and mean to Paul's sister Olive. Gay and mean to Paul. Vendetta. Enemies to friends? Bisexual crisis. Sisters and coworkers being incredibly unhelpful about it. Friends to lovers? Three year relationship, good times, a mutual split when the work took him elsewhere. 2018 Paul and Emma right place right time, Ex and Emma meeting, gab sesh over sacrilege breaking of pre-cooked noodles.
Okay now for the nitty gritty
Caleb Mantovani and Paul don't meet in every timeline. They'll cross paths just as often as they don't. It all hinges on if Paul's relationship with his sister is in good standing--and a few other factors.
Caleb grew up in the Bronx but had a few Hatchetfield connections that he made while at school. The one he got closest to and kept in touch with after receiving his Master's was a fellow queer person named Al, who struggled with the reality check of returning to a small town. (This person will more than likely be getting their own card in the future)
The small-town experience as a queer individual is an isolating one. Al didn't give up very easily, and he put on a brave face, but it was still a lot to deal with on his own. He knew he wanted things in life to change, but just didn't know where to start. This is where Caleb Mantovani metaphorically rolled up his sleeves and said, "Fuck it." A friend shouldn't have to suffer in a dark space alone. He'd bring a flashlight and help that son of a bitch outta there.
It was no inconvenience. It was part of his occupation. He was a speech therapist that brought his work wherever it called him. A small island in the Midwest wasn't top of his list, but for all of his "IDGAF I'm from New York" sensibilities, it was the move he needed to make.
The work was valuable no matter what age range he worked with, but he really loved pediatrics. His approach was ND-affirming; the goal was for every kid he saw to have the tools to communicate and minimize their frustrations in daily interactions. Kids loved him--but their parents didn't lol. His role was to improve the kids’ quality of life and not coddle the adults’ feelings, so he couldn't give two shits about them being rubbed the wrong way.
Like fuck was he going to "correct" harmless behaviors unique to the child. "Why is my child still rocking in his seat all the time? Shouldn't you have taught him to sit still?" "Does him rocking in place get in the way of his speech?" "I can understand his speech better now, but--" "Then I did my job. Those things on either side of your head--yeah, the two holes where sound comes in--your job now, is to use 'em."
He got himself in trouble with the school board a lot but they were like, "We spent too much fucking money bringing this guy in to improve the image of the Hatchetfield school system just to fire him. The faulty traffic lights can wait"
One of the kids he saw at the time was an itty bitty Richie! His mother understood him just fine, because he was more at ease at home, but he faced some communication barriers at school that stress would exacerbate. He'd talk too fast and start stumbling all over his words, then get very worked up about it. “Mr. Cal” got it. It's tough being a little guy knowing what he wanted to say but having trouble getting there. He worked with Richie on mitigating that frustration so he could slow down. As a result, Rich would over-enunciate certain words. But it got him to slow down, and it made him happy to be heard more clearly!
Richie once asked him, “What if I talk too slow and people get mad?”
Mr. Cal said, “That's their problem. What you want to say matters, bud. People who don't have time for that aren't worth your time.”
That was huge for Richie. Having someone to advocate for him, being taught to advocate for himself. Mr. Cal gave him a lot of confidence!!
Olive is a thousand times more well-meaning than a lot of the other parents who just want to be pissed off over their kids stimming or exhibiting literally any harmless behavior that doesn't inhibit communication. She wants Richie to express himself however he needs. But it's the late 2000s, and she doesn't know everything lol. She also worries about the smaller things, bc she's so in her head about how other kids treat him already and she knows anything can be fuel to the fire for those little bullies.
“So you want to be the big bully that looks down on him before they can?” Caleb had asked her. He's a very “tough love” kind of guy.
Caleb's remark got to her, of course it did. When Olive complained about her meeting to Paul, he offered to go pick up Rich in her stead at the next appointment. His M.O. is to go, "Damn, that sucks," and move on, but he was rebuilding things with his sister little by little and resigned himself to helping her out with this one. "I'll go talk to him for you. Surely it's a misunderstanding. Maybe he was just having a bad day, etc. etc. I'll vouch for you Ollie"
Caleb had a LOT of fun getting under Paul's skin. Conversely, after sitting with it for some time Olive respected the figurative kick to the ass and put her trust more willingly in Caleb’s hands. So Paul came back to Olive who was finally like, “Okay the guy’s kind of tough but I get it, I’ll cut him some slack” but now Paul was like, “I need this man to leave Hatchetfield forever actually. I hate him and he was mean to me”
And it's just his luck, bc Caleb’s HF connections have him and Paul floating by each other in the same spaces. At the Woodwards, at the school, even some CCRP related action. It drove Paul insane. People like his sister or Bill were baffled because they were like "you never want to go out to these things why are you going now when you know he's gonna be there" and he's like "I just. Need to give him a piece of my mind. I can't let him have the last word. Yes this is definitely the reason" <- (100% lying to himself)
This vendetta cooled off with time and Caleb found out he’s actually very much on Paul's wavelength. Like Emma, Caleb and Paul were starkly different in a lot of ways, but there were all these little connections that made it easy to just get each other.
Casual, civil conversation became playful banter became going out and getting coffee together and learning about each other's lives. Paul never spared much thought to his own sexuality; he knew he liked women. He'd never liked a man strongly enough to consider an earnest attraction to more than one gender.
It wasn't a huge reckoning for Paul once he finally identified the feelings. No major crisis or shame about it. Moreso just one of those things where he complained to Olive (who is also bi) a lot. “I gotta deal with this now? When I have errands and bills and such?? I don't have time for bisexuality Olive there's other things going on in my life” “There's literally nothing going on in your life. Go date that gay therapist and stop whining.” Long story short he does lmao
He and Caleb were together for three years. It was a wonderful relationship! But Caleb became a travelling SLP for a reason. He liked being on the move. Other job opportunities came his way elsewhere, ones he felt really passionate about, and he and Paul had a long talk about next steps. He loved Paul. He loved their relationship. But he knew Paul was content living where he was. Moving elsewhere, potentially frequently, wouldn't make him happy. Caleb's act of love (from his perspective) was making sure his partner was as happy and well-cared for as possible. Even if that act of love meant splitting so Paul could be with someone who could give him everything Caleb wasn't able to.
It was, ultimately, for the best. For both of them. But the breakup still sucked. It's not fun to split from a good partner. Paul had his Wallowing Period which Olive helped him get through with lots of ice cream and movie nights lol. After some time to heal the two still touch base every now and then. Caleb likes to know how Richie is doing, he never forgets his kiddos :’’)
And by the time Emma enters Paul's life, he's been back to his typical aloof self, little interest in going out to things or meeting new people romantically. It's not the first thing on his priority list (he doesn't rly have one to begin with lol). So that's how he knows Emma is special to him. She calls out to him in a way Cal did. Different, but the same. He can't explain it. But she very much Sees him and Understands him in the way Caleb was able to.
To me it sort of feels like being the puzzle piece in the middle of the picture; there's other pieces that don't look the same but slot perfectly into what each side requires. Fitting together regardless of if it's the exact same shape as another piece.
Caleb adores Emma. He’s passing through HF every now and then to visit his other connects and finally gets to meet her! They all hang out, trade stories. Take a little time to roast Paul in solidarity. Caleb still holds some feelings for Paul. But he's also loved being able to take his life the direction he wanted, and appreciates that Emma's in a time in her life where staying in place is her next “adventure”. Caleb's a little envious; he'd like to be content being more “in place”. Either way, they get along swimmingly and talk a lot on social media now.
To me, Caleb's the smartest out-of-towner. He never outright listed this as a reason for his moving out of HF, but something about the town gave him the fucking creeps. He's the guy you never see in the horror film, where when he sees the freaky haunted house from a distance, just goes, "Nah," and keeps driving. Caleb's described it as such before, and followed it up with, "Know why you never see that guy in the film? 'Cause he doesn't go into the fuckin' house."
