Does she look like a wolf, a dog, or something else?
wolf
dog
something else
Voting ended onNov 25, 2025
I've been practicing this character's design, she's practically one of the most important characters in SOTS. I need you to be honest with me (I'm open to suggestions).
For writting idea : the double date with the deetzes and maitlands!
Oh my god this is so bad im so sorry Nimara. This was based on something i started a few days ago but never finished, the plot doesnt really go anywhere and it feels empty but fuck it i gotta write something even if its bad. So here you go!
---
The house had a weird energy that Thursday night. Lydia had gone out with a friend she had made at school and that left the two couples alone in the house.
They sat on the couch in silence. One couple to each. In a shared house, one would assume that they would talk often. But without lydia, the Maitlands found themselves silent, same with the Deetz.
"How about a double date?" Delia spoke in the silence, "we can have our own fun and go out to-" her words trailed off as she stared at the ghostly couple, "oh… sorry."
Barbara shook her head, "No no! Its fine. I think it's a great idea! Maybe there's something in the house we can both do?"
"Dinner?" Charles spoke up, all four responding in unison,
"Not it!"
"Well then we can just order! There's a Cantonese place down the way i can call-" Delia started and paused for any interjection, the other three gave a nod and Delia went over to the phone.
"Do you guys do anything for fun?" Charles asked boldly, the couple in question was taken aback.
"Well… yeah!" Barbara defended, "We mostly… clean the house when we're bored." She realized the nature of her sentence as she spoke it, slowly quieting with each word.
"We took a lot of classes when we were alive!" Adam added on trying to aid Barbara's defense.
"Any class that could help us tonight?" Charles implored as Delias voice was heard asking for food in another language.
The Maitlands both took a moment to think, pottery was too messy, they didn't have the supplies for glass blowing, break dancing was out of the question for many reasons.
"Ballroom Dancing?" Both said at the same time. Charles eyes lit up as he glanced towards Delia.
"Is it romantic?"
"Well duh!" Barbara laughed, "it's the whole point."
"And we can teach you and Delia… if we can remember the moves." Adam added, soon after the sentence Delia joined the group.
"I heard dancing!" She cheered, "I spent many years dancing before my company abandoned me of the side of the road for three days." The Maitland's exchanged a nervous glance, "But those days are behind me! Lets get dancing!"
Soon after, the two couples were standing in the open area. Adam trying to describe what to do with absolute failure. Delia took it upon herself to twist Charles in every gymnastic move she could muster.
Barbara got distracted easily by Charles exclaims of pain and stepped on Adams feet.
"God. Y'all can't do anything together without the kid around." Beetlejuice's gravelly voice rang through the house, gaining a groan from all four, Charles falling to the ground from Delia's release.
"Why are you here?" Adam questioned, annoyance in every word.
"If I tell you everything about me then I leave nothing to the imagination" Beetlejuice laughed while adding a pelvic thrust to his motions. Barbara and Adam felt disgusted, "besides i'm here to ruin the date night.. which im now realizing you don't need help doing. So now i'm here to just annoy you"
While Beetlejuice's most chaotic powers were gone, he still had all the capabilities of a ghost. He let out a chaotic laugh as thunder began to crash outside.
"What are you going to do?" Delia asked, terrified.
"Oh you'll find out soon enough." Beetlejuice imitated her voice with the sentence, scaring Delia more. With a flick of his hands, smoke crowded the room and he disappeared.
The four coughed and waved their hands around dismissing the smoke.
"God! I hate that man" Charles exclaimed from the ground. The other three nodded in agreement.
"We're gonna have to get rid of him.. Again" Barbara sighed," there goes our date night."
Delia thought for a moment,
"Maybe if we team up we can make him want to leave?"
"What do you mean?" Charles asked his fianceé.
"Maybe if we team up to thwart his plans then he'll leave!"
"Delia might be right!" Adam said cheerfully, "He's gonna hate the fact that we aren't scared and leave!"
The four agreed and began planning. Beetlejuice laughed quietly from the hallway next to him, Lydia's request had been weird and different but he was determined to make her proud. In his hands he held a paper scratched with what Lydia wrote to him before she left.
Can you bring Dad, Delia and The Maitlands closer together?
Summary: A drunk Simba visits Mufasa’s grave on the night of Mufasa’s death. Nala and Kiara try to save him from himself.
SIMBA:
The Lyons mausoleum was in the very center of Swynlake’s graveyard, the rest of the graves having been added afterwards, ever expanding outwards. The further into the graveyard you got, the older the graves, many of the stone faces crumbling, the statues in disrepair after years and years and centuries of neglect—families long having died out or left. Sometimes people tried to restore certain pieces, but the headstones that were illegible were just left to disintegrate.
Not the Lyons mausoleum, though. It stood proud and gleaming. Made of impressive white marble, it shone like a beacon from the hill on which it sat. Of course, it was kept in immaculate condition. Leaves were swept away that managed to slip through the wrought iron gate and pile themselves in corners. Any chips were repaired, fresh flowers filled up many of the holders next to the various square markers that lined the walls with names and birthdates and deathdates and epitaphs on them.
Except for tonight. Tonight, there were flowers and bits of paper that had been torn with grieving fingers, now being blown about by the chilly night wind that came sweeping in through the gate.
When Simba had arrived, drunk, with another bottle of whiskey in his hand—it had taken him a few tries to get the lock on the gate undone with the key he kept on his keyring. Morbid, but he’d lose it otherwise and then how ever would he pay his respects to the man he killed?
He’d fumbled his way through, got the gate unlocked and then locked it up behind him. It would just be him and his father tonight. No one else. It was dark out, Simba having slipped from his house after he knew everyone else was sure to be done visiting the grave of a man they barely knew. There were gray clouds moving quickly across the sky. They promised rain but didn’t deliver. Figured.
Once he’d stepped inside he’d felt his way through the dark, hitting his hip against the great stone coffin that lay in the center of the floor. “Ah, Grandpa Mohatu.” Simba had pat the top of the coffin drunkenly. “Didn’t see ya’ there.”
Moving around the tomb, he made his way towards the back wall. Kicked something across the floor about halfway there. Squinted in the low light. It was a bundle of flowers. Simba began to laugh as he looked up and saw the dark mound that he realized was a massive pile of offerings to a dead man. A great man.
Then, he began to cry.
And then, he’d ripped them all apart. Meticulously, till his hands were bleeding from the cuts of paper and thorns of roses. Until he couldn’t laugh or cry any longer. By the time he reached his father’s square, third up from the bottom, he had no tears left to cry as he rested his forehead next to Mufasa’s name, smeared blood on the space near the ‘M’.
“Hey, Dad.”
He’d sat like that for a while. And then, he’d turned and slouched against the wall, drank half the bottle of whiskey he’d bought himself while rambling on and on—he didn’t even know what about, couldn’t tell you if you asked.
His eyes closed and when he opened them, he was laying on top of Mohatu’s stone coffin, staring up at the skylight carved in the roof. Just a single square, like Mohatu could look up into the sky the way Simba was doing. The grey clouds were still moving swiftly—or maybe his head was just spinning. Either way, it bothered him that he couldn’t see the stars. The night his father died it had been very clear. He could remember that.
There were footsteps approaching, though he didn’t realize it till they were almost upon him. He didn’t move. It’s not like the sexton could kick him out, he owned the bloody thing. His name was on the stone outside. His name would one day be on the stone inside.
Besides, this wasn’t the sexton anyway.
“Go away, Nala.” He didn’t know how he knew it was her. He just did.
NALA AND KIARA:
There was no getting through this day.
When Nala opened her eyes and saw the sunlight, she wanted to banish it. She wished for once in her life she could just roll over, throw the covers over her head, and give in. Each year, when May 20th came around, this kind of sickness crept over her steadily until, on the day itself, it was so big and heavy she would swear it was a physical cement block sitting on her chest. Her feet were concrete too--her blood no longer knew how to pump its way through her body. She just wanted to sleep, so she wouldn’t have to think, so she wouldn’t have to remember, so she wouldn’t have to feel so vividly and all at once everything she had lost.
But each year, for three years, Nala had gotten out of bed. Later than usual, yes. Slower than usual, yes. She sat with her feet on the carpet, stared out the window, still and silent for minute upon minute, until she moved aimlessly, and started her day. Today, it was harder than ever, because Simba was back in her life, but also still very much gone. Their friendship was broken. She’d given up on fixing it. And still, he was all she wanted today. Him-- or Mufasa.
She truly wished Mufasa was here, to give her one of his large hugs and tell her that it was going to be okay--- that she, Nala Calame, was strong enough.
She still imagined his voice sometimes, telling her that: Nala Calame, you are strong enough.
So she went on.
Perhaps she wouldn’t have truly been able to, though, if it weren’t for Kiara, who was in the kitchen making oatmeal for the both of them, who had already packed her lunch and had her backpack ready to go, who turned around when she heard Nala’s bare feet pad across the tile, and flung herself around Nala in a hug. For Kiara-- this was all new, and strange, and scary, but she hadn’t known Mufasa like them, and so she could make herself stronger than even Nala. Nala had clung to the girl-- gripped her hard and long, kissing her head and crying silently into all that blue hair.
“I bought strawberries last night,” Kiara said too. “For the oatmeal. I know you love them, so I-- thought it would be a nice surprise.”
That made her cry too.
For Kiara, Nala went to work. For Mufasa, she made the calls, double- and triple-checked her lists, attended the meetings she needed to, to make sure the memorial was set and everything was going to go perfectly. At lunch time, she picked up Kiara from school-- they were taking a half day-- and went to the mausoleum to pay their respects. Kiara had cried for the man she didn’t really know, and held Nala’s hand. They’d walked the grounds quietly after, then sat in the park. Kiara did her homework quietly. Nala watched the birds.
The memorial came and went, and helped, actually. Nala cried during it, the whole way through-- even ended up accepting a hug from Taka Lyons after it, so moved by the beauty, so grateful for Mufasa’s brother for bringing it together. Exhausted, she’d slept through dinner--would have kept sleeping too, straight on to the next day, to May 21st, which would kick off another year in this strange, fuzzy Mufasa-less world-- but she woke with a start as if she’d been kicked in her sleep.
Nala darted up, clutching at her chest. Something was wrong.
She didn’t know what. She stared at the clock and out her window, the feeling pervasive, making her shake. She had to go wash her face in the sink, but still the feeling persisted and persisted, until it pushed its way to the front, the feeling turned into words-- Simba.
All day, the entire day, she’d been repressing it. Him. Thinking about him. She’d moved through every item on her list-- check check check-- as efficiently as she could, and she’d ignored Simba on her heel, crying out, in pain, lost, alone. She’d just ignored it. She had to ignore it. She knew that today, she wouldn’t see him, that he’d not want to be found, and Nala had chosen-- before this day-- to respect his privacy and distance, because there was nothing she could do. But like a horrible sickness, he’d manifested inside of her, and she could not shake him. Her sobbing was loud and terrible as she sank over her sink, crying out his name. She didn’t even hear Kiara flock to her side, just felt the girl’s arms close over her as she tried to make it all better.
“He’s there,” Nala wept then. “H-he’s th-there-- we-- I-- I need to go see him-- “
And so she got on her shoes, and Kiara did too.
By the time they got to the mausoleum, Nala had stopped crying. She had Mufasa’s voice in her head. She was actually positive it was him, in the end, who came to her, who was swiftly pushing her forward now with the night wind toward Simba, who wanted her to do what she always did best. Be strong.
Hearing Simba’s voice just made her more resolute.
“No,” she called back to him, though her voice did shake, just a little. “No, Simba. We’re not going anywhere.”
“Simba,” whispered Kiara from her side. Kiara’s eyes filled with tears and she ripped from Nala’s grip, scampering fast into the mausoleum. “Simba!” she said again. Nala moved slower, and so by the time she arrived, Kiara was already by his side.
Nala approached cautiously. The smell of whiskey was so thick in the air she thought she was going to be sick to her stomach. The wind couldn’t reach in here either, to clear the air-- but Mufasa, of course, was closer than ever. Seeing Simba like this tore at her insides again, each second another claw. But this was where she was supposed to be. In fact, Nala was certain she had a mission, and it wasn’t, even, to make nice with Simba and hold him while he cried. She wasn’t naive enough to think that was how this was going to go.
Her mission was to take the bottle away from him.
Her mission was to make sure he lived through the night. That’s why Mufasa had called on her.
SIMBA:
Of course Nala would have a key.
It made him bloody fucking angry, felt the feeling in his veins, though it was sluggish and muddy with alcohol. Who was she anyway? To have a key?
He felt his fingers curl tighter around the neck of the bottle, which was hanging down by his side, and the squeezing cracked the scabs that had started to harden on his knuckles. The stone beneath him was rough and rounded, aching his back but he didn’t feel it. Felt nothing. Taking a deep breath, he expelled it all out in the air.
Simba wanted to become as hollow as a skeleton. He wanted all his insides to disintegrate into nothingness the way his ancestors’ had, returning to the earth and sky. Wanted to exist as nothing else but organic matter. Something about that sounded very peaceful. Simba would get to burn bright in the darkness for others. Would feed the earth that fed him for so long.
Except, he wouldn’t be able to do that, because he’d be buried in stone.
At least he’d still be a star.
His eyes were closed. They had been when he’d shouted out at Nala and they remained that way when her voice called back to him. The only confirmation was the wind that brushed gently against his skin, carrying the sound of her on it. He practiced becoming a skeleton, emptied himself of any feeling. Exhaled through his nose and then held his breath—but he could feel that too. It burned in his chest, even that nothingness aching for oxygen. Weak and pathetic mortal body that needed things like oxygen. So needy. Needed air and blood and a heart and a brain and emotions and sensations and love and family.
Kiara’s voice called out to him next, this one coming in on a great gust that had him flinching away from it. His head spinning slightly. No, no, no, not her too, can’t have her here. Immediately that subdued anger crashed over him in another wave. His hand twisted around the bottle tighter, his breath became harsh. Nala had brought Kiara along.
Even drunk as he was, he knew that wasn’t good. She couldn’t see him like this. Shouldn’t see him like this. There were so many terrible things he might say: You left me. You left. You just left. You were gone. You didn’t come back. You left me all alone and I wanted to die!
Well—maybe just one terrible thing he might say to her.
He felt the words burn in his throat.
They were both standing over him, he could feel them hovering. Looking down at him, like angels. Or, maybe, people at a viewing for a funeral. Simba cracked his eyes open, saw Nala first. She was so dark, she almost blended into the shadows, except for the silver-white glow of the stars, diluted through the clouds but still managing to rest on her cheeks and forehead and twinkle in her eyes. Kiara’s hair was brilliant blue, thick and unruly. She’d just woken up. They both had. Kiara was closer to him and he could make out the red line of a pillow crease on her cheek. She always had pillow creases in her cheeks when she woke up.
Their eyes were sad.
They were looking at him like they were afraid of him. Or afraid of what he might do.
He remembered when his grandfather had died and he’d been so still in his casket that little Simba had been sure he was just going to start breathing, or pop up like they did in all the scary movies. It had terrified him but he had clutched Nala’s hand tightly and stared bravely ahead because Nala had been afraid too, and he had needed to be brave for her.
Simba wondered if this is what dead people would see, if they could see people staring down at them as they lay in their coffins, pumped full of sticky, unnatural preservatives. He wondered if they could see through their waxy eyelids and look up at all the faces passing them by. He stayed very still as he imagined this, but the faces didn’t move away. It was only the three of them.
And Simba was not dead.
Drink to that.
Putting the bottle to his lips, he sloshed some of the whiskey onto his face, winced and took a pull, coughed and spluttered a bit and yanked away when Nala made a grab for the alcohol. He tried to growl at her, but the movement also made him lose his balance, slipping off the rolled top of the coffin, onto the other side of it, away from them. Simba’s feet just barely managed to catch himself and he scraped his leg against the ground, one of his shoulders smacking roughly against the stone.
Righting himself he leaned onto the tomb, looking at both of them with hard eyes. “Welcome!” he bellowed loudly, his voice curled in a snarl. “Did you come for a show? I’m sorry to disappoint ladies, but you rolled out of your nice, warm beds for nothing. I’m just spending some qual-ITY time with my dad, isn’t that right, Dad?’ Simba swung his head around towards Mufasa’s square.
What a joke. That great, big, wonderful man reduced to a square.
He started to cackle, the voice bouncing around the stones like a poltergeist looking to scare the shit out of anyone that stepped over the threshold.
“Aw, why so silent, Dad? Don’t be such a square, say something to the ladies! Oh, that’s right, you can’t because you’re dead because I killed you. And now you’re a bloody fuckin’ square.”
It was hilarious, really, when you thought about it.
NALA AND KIARA:
Kiara wanted to reach out. Her hands had gripped at the stone, nails scraping against it, as she felt her body vibrate with the need to help. She’d woken with that need-- her eyes had flown open before her alarm had even gone off, and she’d darted out of bed, everything inside her telling her to act and do. She’d tried her best to prepare for this day and thought maybe she’d done an okay job, done her part, paid a little something back to Nala, after everything Nala had done for her-- but all her success had evaporated at the sound of Simba’s broken, drunk voice, and the sight of his limp body, stretched out like he was waiting for someone to come along with a wooden stake and pin him to the slab for good. Kiara’s feet told her to scramble onto the slab with him, fling her body on top of his and with the force of a hug alone, bring him out of his stupor. She barely resisted. And when she did reach out-- because of course she did-- her hand flinched back as Simba twisted his body and basically fell off the stone.
“Simba, please, stop--” Her girlish voice pitched even higher than normal, ringing out like bells in the chamber, off these cold walls. Simba shouted over her at once, like he didn’t even hear her.
Tears sprung to her eyes and her heels slid back on the ground. Nala caught her, a firm hand on her shoulder squeezing to remind her that Kiara wasn’t alone.
But it didn’t matter. For all of Kiara’s strength today, she hadn’t expected to return to a crypt and see Simba in shattered moonlight. The dark transformed her cousin. She could barely hold onto the Simba she knew-- the one that had rescued her from his very doorstep those many months ago-- because the creature in front of her had a twisted face, swung his limbs wildly, had a voice with all the anger and fear of a wounded, dangerous animal. She was scared of him, she was, even if Nala wasn’t. She half expected him to leap across and spit in her face.
She wanted to burst into tears. The water gathered in her eyes, stinging with salt, and a few trickled down her cheeks in silent streams. When Simba laughed, she didn’t know if she should cower or push through the fear and run to him again. Just jump-- leap before he leapt at them, pin him down and smother him with love before he tried to scare them with more yelling, more snarling, more fear.
She took that step forward she’d lost in the initial retreat. “S-Simba, please-- please, you’re hurting yourself,” she plead. Nala gripped her shoulder even tighter, the strongest, sturdiest thing in this entire creepy place-- except for, perhaps, the stones themselves.
SIMBA:
Simba felt like he was going to burst out of his skin. Like whatever was inside of him, all this rage and sadness would unfurl its wings and take off from him. It would lift out of his throat and beat in the air, perhaps it would claw at his eyes, or scalp or shoulders. Maybe it would erupt from his chest, cracking his sternum and leaving his ribs flailing in the carnage.
The feeling didn’t leave. It just expanded and expanded in his chest until he was sure he was going to choke on it. The pain of it was sharp as if someone had filled him with poison, like every breath he took in was poisoned too--he’d never breath fresh air again. Every molecule of oxygen was filled with this poison, like bubbles, he swallowed them and they burst in his esophagus, in his lungs. They blew through his bloodstream, burst in his heart with every thump of it.
He wanted to laugh and he wanted to cry and the two feelings got all mixed up inside of him until he had to do both. The manic laughter turned less crazed, came out in gasping breaths as he looked at the two women--no the woman and girl--no the girls standing before him, with a coffin in between. Which was both literal and figurative at this point and if that wasn’t just fucking hilarious.
Kiara spoke and stepped towards him. Simba reeled back, knocking against the opposite wall. He didn’t want her near him. His darkness was out and ready to sink its claws into someone, he had no control over it, it was too big for him. He had lost control of it a long time ago, but it had laid in wait, biding its time as most evil things did. And he did not know himself anymore, did not know what he would do if she came near him; if she tried to touch him with all his skin peeled back and the exoskeleton of his sin exposed.
Simba wouldn’t hurt her, he wouldn’t hurt her, he wouldn’t hurt her.
He started laughing again, quieter this time, and tears fell from his eyes. “Am I?” he asked--voice breathless like he couldn’t quite believe it. Then, he tilted his head back and let it smack against the stone. “Am I?” Thwack. It jarred in his brain, loosened some of the tightness in his chest that made him feel like he was going to explode.
“It’s what I do. It’s what I do.” Thump. Thump.
NALA AND KIARA:
Nala saw everything one moment before it happened, just enough to prepare herself, not enough, really, to ever stop it from happening.
Simba smashed his head back, and Nala saw it coming. She saw Kiara about to lunge—and so she caught her by the forearm, iron-grip, drawing her back to her. She winced at Kiara’s desperate sob, as her own eyes filled with still more tears. She didn’t fight them though. She’d learned to let them leave her body, because only then could she turn her grief into strength. So as Kiara cried out, cried loud, Nala cried quietly, each tear shed for her best friend.
Everything inside her was screaming too. Everything inside her was telling her to be just like Kiara. Lunge, act, do something. And she did have to do something, if only so Kiara wouldn’t—because Kiara couldn’t. She was just a girl.
“Simba, stop,” Kiara sobbed. Nala gently let go of her arm, but only so she could brush in front of her. Kiara didn’t move—her shoulders had slumped and she had only enough energy, it seemed, to cry.
Not Nala, though. Her grief was carrying her forward. She rode on its rivers. There was grace to her grief, and she’d give it to Simba.
Or she’d use it to protect him from himself.
She didn’t get too close, not yet; she stopped an arm's length or so away. She held up her hands, palms open and fingers open, to show she meant him no harm, that she wasn’t going to come any closer to him. “Come home with us,” she said to him. “Please, come home.”
Her heart thumped. She wasn’t expecting a yes from him. She was expecting him to yell or cry or mock her, but he’d backed himself up against a wall and he wouldn’t move faster than her. She thought she felt the air around them curling, both of them caught in the same current—Mufasa here with them, looking over both of their shoulders. Simba must feel him too. Deep down, if he pushed past the whiskey, he’d find his father’s voice, and he’d find himself again, and Nala wouldn’t have to snatch the bottle from him. Simba would give it to her.
She was giving him a chance, anyway. She had a little bit of faith, anyway.
“Please—Mufasa wouldn’t want this,” she whispered with the last piece of it.
SIMBA:
See, Simba had locked himself up in this mausoleum for a reason. Because he did hurt himself, all the time. He hurt himself every time he looked at Nala--it was a stab in the heart. Every time he pushed Kiara away he felt like he was peeling his own skin off. Every time he lied to Tink with smiles that didn’t matter, he felt it curdle in his stomach.
And Ber. He couldn’t breathe when he thought about the way he hurt Ber. All the air just stopped existing inside him. Every blood cell was sucked of oxygen. It made him so weak he wanted to just crumple to the ground and not move. Just a pile of bone and tissue, or maybe shrivel like the flower petals that blew across the stone floor in shreds. That had cut his hands all up, or had that been the stems?
He’d done it for a reason. He didn’t want anyone close to him tonight when he felt himself teetering on that edge of dead and alive, balanced precariously on the sharp tip of a knife. Anyone who came too close was bound to get torn to shreds and he couldn’t stand that.
But, of course, Nala had ignored his warning her to leave. All the signs, all the snarled words. He should snarl at her now tell her to get the fuck away from him, leave him the fuck alone. That had worked last time. Sorta. For a minute. He should snarl at her to take Kiara and get far away from him, leave Swynlake if they had to. That’s what Ber had done. What a smart decision that had been. Simba always knew that he was so smart.
Thought Nala was smart too, but she just crowded closer. Simba’s foot scraped against the stone as he pushed himself back into the wall, turning his head. His breaths came fast and sharp, like someone was trying to resuscitate him while he was still alive. The weight of it was going to crack his ribcage. Kiara was sobbing, even though it was quiet it echoed around the room, no where to go, no where to escape. Each sob piled up and up and up and pressed down and down and down until Simba was drowning in them.
He was a starved lion backed against the wall of his cave. There was no muscle in him left to fight with. But he still had teeth, he still had claws. He let Nala’s words slash into him viciously, let his father’s name seep into his wounds like salt.
“Yeah.” His shoulders shook in a weird shrugging-jerking motion that didn’t really make sense to him. “There are a lot of things my dad wouldn’t want. To be dead, for one.”
Me to be dead, for two. Simba was silent, but he thought it. The only thing that stayed his tongue was he knew what that meant. And what it would mean for Nala. Still, he thought it very loudly and very fiercely.
Sniffing, he looked up and stared Nala directly in the eyes, curling his lips back in a snarl. “Quit trying to pretend like nothing has changed,” he begged her desperately, voice hard. “I don’t have a home. At least not one with you. Not anymore.”
He went for another swig of the bottle, drinking to that long forgotten place where home was in Nala’s arms, or his mother’s, or his father’s. A hand reached out to push Nala away, though his fingers merely brushed against the sleeve of her coat.
NALA AND KIARA:
Nala had been holding onto her heart too tightly to simply let it plummet. She kept it from doing so now, remembering her purpose in all this-- knowing that though her years of being Simba’s trusted confidante had reached its end, he would never truly shake her from being his best friend. She’d been raised right alongside him with the same values and principles, seeing the world in the same light-- had always known her place in it, even if Simba had tried to rock the foundation throughout the years. She’d guided him back on track. She’d reminded him, over and over, why InterPride was important, why being a Lyons was important, why they were blessed-- not burdened.
Now, her job had changed. Now, all she had to do was convince Simba not to drink himself to death. Not even convince-- just stop him.
So Simba could disappoint her, but he could never disappoint her so deeply to make her give up. She kept that tight grasp on her heart, and when Simba raised thee bottle, she pounced. His hand posed no obstacle. He’d made himself defenseless, reduced to maybe 10 percent of his original strength and coordination. And Nala had only gotten stronger the past years she had been away from him. Stronger in every way. Perhaps too strong-- perhaps she was more statue than human now, perhaps she no longer remembered how to have fun, how to unwind, perhaps he’d made her too stern-- but better be unbreakable, Nala thought. Better be invincible, untouchable, a storm of a woman. If that’s what she needed to be to him, she’d be it.
Nala had always done what she needed to do.
She yanked the bottle away. When he lunged toward her, she moved out of the way, her hand still clutching the warm, wet neck of the bottle, until she was safely behind the tomb again, by Kiara’s side.
She was prepared to just hightail it outta there if he continued to pursue. Which would work, actually-- not the way she wanted to get Simba out of this place, but she’d take it.
“I’m sorry,” she apologized, surprised to find she was a bit breathless-- that her heart was racing. “I am, Simba, I’m sorry, but I’m doing all of this for you, I promise. Ple--”
She started to beg again, but his voice bellowed over her.
SIMBA:
He didn’t get a chance to strengthen his armor again against all the toxicity in his head. Of course, the real toxicity, the root of all these deep, dark, ugly thoughts was the very alcohol that was ripped away from him. But that wasn’t how he saw it.
Nala stripped him of his armor and he was left reeling from it. Though, Nala taking alcohol from Simba was not a new thing. Not by a long shot. That had started sometime when they turned sixteen and Simba found out how alcohol made him feel more invincible than he already was. And Nala had decided that was just too much power for Simba to obtain. She grew more generous over the years as she learned Simba’s limits--the difference between a Simba who could destroy at beer pong and a Simba who thought breaking a window sounded like an awesome idea.
This was different though. They were different. Everything was just different and Nala taking the alcohol sent Simba into a tailspin. He felt out of control immediately, panic seizing his breath in his chest. What was he supposed to do without alcohol’s soothing blanket over his wounds? What was he supposed...what was he going to do?
Didn’t she know? Didn’t she get it? That alcohol was the only thing from keeping Simba from thinking breaking so much more than a window sounded like an awesome idea.
Simba just kind of--stood there in shock for a moment. His eyes frantic, his hand still raised and opened where the bottle had been yanked from him. And then he felt a way of fear-turned-anger rise up in him and he went to swipe it back but Nala was too quick, had anticipated it and he merely stumbled forward, catching himself against Mohatu’s grave.
Her words just strangled his heart further, like someone had hung it up and kicked the chair out beneath it.
“You’re not doing ANYTHING for me! You’re just helping yourself!” Simba growled, voice strained. “I don’t need your help! I don’t need anyone’s help! I was perfectly fine before all of you came around and forced yourselves down my throat! Get out! I don’t need you! Get out! Get--out!” His voice cracked and he very nearly burst into tears.
But he didn’t, he couldn’t because that would mean they might try to wipe them away and he couldn’t stand the idea of them coming closer. He’d just wind up hurting them somehow. Why couldn’t they just see that he was no good? Not worth it? He wasn’t worth it.
NALA AND KIARA:
Kiara sobbed harder at the sound of Simba’s voice, the sobbing making her tremble, her sadness a cold, violent storm inside of her she had no control over. And Kiara had to feel in control. Or she needed to be bigger, wilder than her pain. Otherwise, she spun out, she lost herself-- she, like Simba, turned to yelling, smashing things, cutting up her hands on glass. She resisted the pull of this spiral now and shook her head, shook it adamantly, and tried to rush toward Simba to fix it.
Nala didn’t let her. Nala grabbed her with her free hand and tugged her back as Simba railed on, each word more distorted than the last.
“Simba--” she plead and tugged against Nala.
“No, Kiara, we have to go--” she said with a voice too calm-- much too calm, robot-calm. Kiara felt her despair lash out at Nala too.
“We can’t--”
“We have to go!”
She was being pulled the next second, her converse scratching against the rough ground, her feet nearly tripping her up. Her shoulders still shook and her sobs echoed loud and ugly, but she didn’t wiggle out of Nala’s grip or bear her feet down. She didn’t have the strength to do that, even though she couldn’t stand this-- leaving Simba behind. Giving up on him.
The gate slammed behind them, chain rattling on the iron. Nala’s grip let go of Kiara’s forearm, and Kiara fell back onto the gate, barely supported by her wobbling knees. She pressed her palms against her eyes.
“W-we ca-can’t just leave him.”
She felt Nala’s hands grip her shoulders again, this time meant to be soothing. “Kiara, we have to.”
“No we DON’t. We DON’T have to-- he was RIGHT, you’re just doing this for yourself!” Kiara yelled at her. Her hands fell from her face and fisted at her sides. “He’s Simba. He needs--”
“He’s not Simba-- not right now,” Nala said firmly. “I can’t let him hurt you.”
That stunned her quiet.
Simba wouldn’t.
Her surprise lasted this half-second of frozen fear. Then Kiara’s face twisted again. “He’d never do that, you’re wrong--”
“I know, baby, I know, I want to be wrong, but even just staying in there with him, right now--” The moonlight had sliced Nala’s face in half, and so she could see the tears gathering in one eye only. “Kiara, words can hurt. There are things he could say, things you shouldn’t hear.”
“He can’t be alone.”
“Kiara--”
“He can’t. Be. Alone.”
“We can’t do anything to help him. He won’t listen.”
And Kiara knew that was true. She blinked and blinked, trying to clear the blurriness from her eyes as her mind raced with this, grit her jaw as hard as she could and shook her head too-- but it didn’t make Nala any less right and it didn’t make her any more useful. There was nothing they could do. There was nothing.
Her hands scrambled into her pocket then, clumsy fingers punching at her phone’s screen.
“Kiara--”
“No, n-no, I-- he can’t, I won’t let him be alone, I won’t,” she whispered. “I’m calling Berlioz.”
