For the get to know you author ask: 25) copy/paste a few sentences or a short paragraph that you’re particularly proud of?
Oh my god, someone actually responded. I am pleasantly thrilled, thank you, anon <3
So I’m gonna go with something from the third chapter of the current Soulmates fic (which desperately needs an update I know but it hasn’t been abandoned it’s just over 20k words at the moment nobody hates me over that wait time like I hate me for that wait time).
Ahem. So, chapter 3, May, December, and Some Romance.
Therese was still clicking away when the burst of fireworks split the daytime sky.
It was not the loudness of the sound that truly caught Therese’s attention, nor the brief flare of color that came with it. She was used to working around all the unexpected distractions of New York. It was Angie’s curse word that threw her off. Angie getting up so fast from their shared chair that she knocked into Therese. Some of her beer sloshed over and hit Therese’s arm, her camera, the rest of it spilling into the sand at their feet.
The sudden cold on her skin made Therese gasp, lower the viewfinder. Her reflexive horror at anything unwanted touching her camera was quickly overtaken by the intensity of the scene in front of her. Peggy, playing happily with Jake the moment before, was now stiff as a board, her body curled around his. She had an arm around his belly, another around his chest, covering him, holding him in her lap. Jake was fussing, but it was just as likely due to being pulled from his game as it was to the way he’d been pulled.
Therese wondered why Angie wasn’t there with them, until she saw what was happening further down the beach. Unlike Peggy, Steve wasn’t even partway sitting up. He was in the sand fully, the abandoned beach ball nearby. It took Therese another second to find the girls, to realize they were hidden under Steve’s bigger frame. The muscles in his bare back stood out, even at this distance. His wet hair almost touched the sand, he was curled that tightly over the girls. Therese might not have known they were there at all if not for glimpses of Rindy’s bright yellow swimsuit.
Therese reacted without thinking. Putting the camera down with none of the necessary care, she stood, ran after Angie, who was halfway to Steve already.
“Therese,” Carol said, somewhere behind her.
Therese ignored her, some base instinct of concern for Rindy overriding anything else. She ran to catch up, noting that, bizarrely, Angie slowed down as she got closer. By the time she was within touching distance, she’d gone to almost a walk, which made it easier for Therese to close the gap. She was close enough to hear Angie say something indistinct, presumably to Steve, who was still doing whatever the hell he was doing.
Therese hadn’t processed any of it. She didn’t know what she was looking at, what she was even thinking, except that something was very wrong here. What she would’ve done about it became a question unanswered because suddenly there was an arm around her middle, causing her to stumble in the sand.
“Don’t,” Carol said, pulling her closer than was probably wise, no matter how spread out the beachgoers were.
“Rindy,” said Therese, impatient as she went to get out of Carol’s hold.
The sharpness in her voice brought Therese up short. If that hadn’t done it, Carol’s nails pressed into her stomach, over her bathing suit would have. Not enough to hurt, but Therese felt them, felt a warning. The shock of it held Therese still as much as Carol’s arm, still in place and promising to tighten if necessary.
Was that way too long and self indulgent for that question? Probably. Anyway, some of you around these parts know that I’m a whore for PTSD, the ghosts one brings back from war, trauma, etc. Or maybe everyone knows because I have no chill in my writing. Regardless, this was a scene that was sitting in my head quite awhile before I wrote it, or even decided on a place to write it. I just knew I wanted to do it, for a long time. I was going for a kind of slow motion car crash vibe, which I think comes through in the finished scene. A lot of the Stegginelli scenes in Soulmate (say that 5 times fast) end up written from Carol or Therese’s perspective. Part of that is because I like seeing them through civilian eyes. Like, Belivaird are friends with them, they have things in common with them, they’re family, but they’re also people who both lived through all the Cap propaganda, saw it from the perspective of the average person. And they’re people who, despite being family, are still on the outside in certain respects. There’s plenty of stuff they’re not a part of, whether it’s officially classified by the government or not. Which is an interesting place to write from, and why I really wanted to do this scene in particular. Almost all of what Carol and Therese have been privy to when it comes to Stegginelli has very much come from Stegginelli. They’re given only as much access as Stegginelli want them to have, and they know this. Except here, where they’re witness to a very private, personal moment...that just happens to be happening in broad daylight on a semi-crowded beach.
And that, that explanation was so very self indulgent, Jesus, this is why no one asks you things you dope.
