@light-nyagami how dare u. u come into MY inbox and ask ME to answer for the ONE MAN I DIDN’T WANNA ANSWER FOR--
....as if i don’t have a ship playlist. ugh okay i guess i’m outing myself with this one. shut up shut up shut up shut up--
EMPIRE & THE SUN by THE MOTH AND THE FLAME
i was going to answer with “murder” by mako but um....we will touch on that at a later date. i could have also answered with “QUIXOTE [i am alone, and they are everyone]” by crywolf, which is where the ship tag name is from (”am i awake // i ask myself // who do you think you are?”), but hear me out for a second.
is now a good time to say that the arranged marriage thing is applied to thomas and aubrey? i feel like right now is a good time to admit to that. aubrey has spent several years working with the shelby family in their life and they fell very quickly, so when they end up taking lizzie’s place as tommy’s spouse? oh, they’re very scared because they assume tommy couldn’t give less than two shits about them. thomas does care, in his own way, but of course he is hesitant to really let anyone in after all that he’s experienced, all that he is a part of. it’s just getting to the point where the two of them converge in their approaches and thomas lets someone else in again that is the hard part.
since the show already has a pretty alternative rock-esque and indie inspired soundtrack (i fuckin see you with fka twigs and arctic monkeys on that shit mr knight), i wanted to keep in that vein with the ship playlist. i don’t entirely know how i want to explain this song, other than the little bits that feel like when you are taking a bath and put your head underwater, and how this song feels like a house that you occupy that still feels like you’re alone. self-isolation around other living bodies because of how much time you spend in your head.
These walls don't run from anything
These walls don't run from anything
They stand
Still
thomas won’t let anyone in anymore. he has only ever been met with a slight against his ego at best and painfully being abandoned at worst. he will not budge against the coaxing of someone who genuinely cares and he will not actively go out of his way to enter into someone else’s world.
'Cause you're the Empire and the Sun
You're the voice that calls me home
And you're the place that makes me want to stay
But your walls I cannot climb
You are, you are
the chorus, the words of a man who knows that maybe this person that he is stuck with could possibly be a new beacon of light to him. they’re someone who gives him a small bit of hope and makes him feel something stirring within his heart at the darkest hours, but no matter how enticing the idea is, he is so exhausted that the idea of trying to reciprocate has him stalling in his tracks.
I'm a house on fire, and everyone is leaving
I'm a house on fire, and everyone is leaving
Me
calling into question how thomas feels about everyone around him, how he feels like no one is ever listening to him, how they don’t see that everything that he does is for them, the self-doubt tripping him over and over and hanging in his head like a spiderweb. his entire person is just a disaster, no one will ever love him the way that he wants to be loved--
I could never love someone who could love someone like me
Someone like me
Like me
and yet he will acknowledge that he knows aubrey does love him, albeit with words of doubt. how could anyone possibly love a man who knows that everything he touches ends up cursed, or dead, or leaves him? how could anyone possibly love a man who is just surrounded with death, and inflicts pain on people, endangers the ones he wants to keep close, makes deals that inevitably backfire on him?
how could he allow himself to love someone that wants that in their life? it’s disgust directed at himself through the disdain of someone else’s actions.
I could never love someone who could love someone like me
Anyone falls, anyone falls
They run away
these lines are actually playing over each-other, like they’re both calling and answering. he’s still disgusted, but....he could be vulnerable. he could fall again, or he could keep running.
and with aubrey’s unwavering patience and understanding, what do you think he chooses?
