nevernever

nevernever @ 2007-11-09T23:21:00

2007-11-10T07:23:55Z

i am, for the moment, not going to be very good at updating this. i'm neverneverfic on livejournal, feel free to find me there.

The Academy Is...made of awesome

2007-09-02T23:23:36Z

This is The Academy Is...

From left to right they are Adam Siska, Michael Guy Chislett, William Beckett, Mike Carden and Andy Mrotek (better known as The Butcher). They are awesome.

The Members

William Beckett is the lead singer of the lovely band. I find him to be ridiculously pretty. here are a few reasons for that. Bill is kind of a drunk, has grand ideas about his music and has admitted to be depressed and anxious in the past. Interviews with him are highly entertaining. Or sometimes kind of sad. For those of you fond of such things, he could totally be a woobie. I don't have much of an urge to woobify him but yanno, the source material is there

The band has a video podcast called TAI TV. In it, William "acts". It's pretty awesome.

Adam Siska, aka Siska, aka Sisky Business is the bassist. He's adorable. He and Bill knew each other in high school and sometimes they talk about it.. He is the youngest member of the group and joined when he was like 15 or something. He loves shoes. He has had some of the most entertaining hair in the band. I *heart* him.

Mike Carden plays guitar. He is, as evidenced by the picture above, cute as a button. Even when smoking in the bathtub or playing his guitar he remains cute as a button. Initially I did not find Carden that appealing, and then I started watching TAI TV and totally fell in love with him. My favorite episode with him is probably this one. They are all eating gross things and being all manly and swallowing them and then Carden takes a bite of something and has to spit it out. In a way that I find incredibly endearing. That is also a fucking great episode for The Butcher who we will talk about next.

Andy Mrotek, aka The Butcher is the drummer of this lovely lovely band. He is goofy and fun and also a damn good artist. Watching him being all serious and arty and stuff pretty much cemented my love for him (that and the ep linked above in the Carden section.) I *heart* Butcher like woah.

Michael Guy Chislett is the final and newest member of the group. He joined in 2006 replacing Tom Conrad on guitar. Chislett, like all the members of this group, is made of awesome. He's hot, he's funny and he's a good sport about devoting a whole episode of TAI TV to him being hard to understand because of his accent. William has referred to him as the final point on the bands creative star.

The Music
I've uploaded some of my favorites for your listening pleasure. If the links go dead let me know and I'll re-upload.

all

Slow Down - You kiss me like an overdramatic actor / who's starving for work
Season - So show me something we haven't heard yet / But I'm not convinced and your heartless songs won't stick
Checkmarks - You get me out of the rain, you get me out of my clothes. You hope I don't make a sound, you hope that nobody knows.
We've Got A Big Mess On Our Hands - I’ve got that lefty curse / Where everything I do is flipped / And awkwardly reversed
Neighbors - Sit back, get my palette wet, / Getting mentally prepared for the consequences
Bulls in Brooklyn - Don't say you miss me, you probably don't / Well I been crossing some lines, that most folks won't
Sleeping With Giants - Oh, we stood there, awkward and youthful, we tangled; / A piece of my soul escaped.

Okay, so all of the emo boybands are kind of gay. That's their thing right? Redefinition of masculinity, wearing eyeliner, kissing each other onstage? TAI is less gay than many bands in bandom, but they are still pretty fucking gay.

William seems to bring it out in people:

William cuddles with Travis from Gym Class Heroes while onstage.

Travis kisses him on the cheek.

Gabe Saporta of Cobra Starship does dirty things to William's stomach.

Mike Carden gropes William while he's sleeping.

Brendon Urie calls William a very sexy man in an interview.

Miscellaneous odds and ends
Mainly this is just a plug for TAI TV. Most of my favorite episodes have been linked throughout this, but two more that deserve attention:

Episode 17 features Ryland Blackington as Guy Ripley interviewing the boys from The Academy Is... about the rivalry between Ryland Blackington and Michael Guy Chislett. Highlights include Ryland interviewing Ryland and Ryland asking Chislett if being from a country founded by criminals made it difficult to be accepted into the western music scene.

Episode 26 another Ryland as Guy Ripley episode. This time he's behind the scenes at a music festival trying to find TAI to interview them. Hilarity ensues. Highlights include hitting people in the head with mic cords, Ryland looking like a sad puppy when the band interviews and William attempting to sound excited when he clearly cannot act even a little. Bonus cameo from Ryro at the very end.

Now. Seattle kids. Who wants to come with me to their concert on Sunday Sept. 16th?

Why does this feel like I'm cheating on JC?

2007-09-01T06:30:38Z

I committed bandslash. It was a teeny commentfic in exsequar's journal and I'm reposting here for posterity and stuff.

Though there are really only two people on my flist who would like this and one of them is exsequar and the other in Turkey. *grumbles*

Anyway. Written because Brendon Urie (of Panic! at the Disco) gave an interview wherein he said that William Beckett (of The Academy Is...) was sexy and also really gentle and he said that Gabe Saporta (of Cobra Starship) snores. And thus was born this teeny ficlet.

The Rockstar Lifestyle
Brendon/William

It wasn't a sex thing. Or it didn't start out that way. It was more a 'too wasted to make it out of this hotel room or off this bed thing'

Brendon started partying with The Academy boys and because his band was still mostly pretending they were wholesome capri sun drinking folks too pure for the demon alcohol.

Bill Beckett pretty much never pretended to be too pure for anything.

So they would drink, in various combinations in various hotel rooms and then passing out together in a pile of BrendonWilliamButcherSiskyCardenwhoever. Waking up hung over and pressed between Andy Mrotek and Mike Carden should not have been pleasant, but Brendon mostly just thought it was exhilerating and rockstarish.

One night it was just Brendon and Bill and Gabe and a bottle of Grey Goose. After they were done talking about their place in the universe ("You don't understand Urie", Bill had said, listing slightly to the left and leaning heavily on Gabe. "We will be remembered by history. We will go down as being part of a truly epic phase in music history. We are dismissed as 'emo' and 'for teenies' now but we will be lauded. Oh yes. We will be lauded." And then Gabe had laughed for ten minutes straight while William pouted) they fell asleep on one of the double beds with William in the middle to the soundtrack of Gabe snoring lightly.

Sometime in the night the light snores become giant fucking loud snores that were impossible to sleep through. For Brendon. William was either too drunk or too used to it to be awake.

Brendon should have gotten up and gone to his own room. It was early enough that he might be able to sneak in without Ryan noticing and making betrayed faces.

But what Brendon ended up doing was staring at William. He did that a lot lately. Probably more than he ought to given the platonic nature of his relationship with William. But he couldn't help it. Bill was just so fucking pretty. He was all lips and hips and fucking great hair and Brendon just wanted to hold him down and lick him. Or at least touch him in highly inappropriate and non-platonic ways.

Brendon was busy contemplating the non-platonic way he wanted to suck William's cock and so he didn't notice that the man in question was waking up. When he did notice he flushed and Bill grinned.

"You little shit. You totally want me."

Brendon shook his head. "Um...no?"

"BS Urie. You so fucking want my hot body."

Brendon was searching for some plausible way to deny this when William rolled on top of him and stuck his tongue in Brendon's mouth.

"But...Gabe?" Brendon gasped around William's tongue.

"Sleeps like the dead. Won't be up for hours."

Brendon thought about pushing William away, or at least trying to get him to move to the other bed but then William worked his hand into Brendon's pants and Brendon grinned.

Being a rockstar was so fucking awesome.

I'm not like them, I won't buy in

2007-08-24T22:48:39Z

I'm reading bandslash these days. I am so ashamed of myself.

A little more than a year ago I was discovering popslash. I was distressed and ashamed but also sort of exhilarated. There was something intoxicating about it all. So much fic, so much canon. Such sparkly sparkly boys.

Now I find myself falling into another shameful fandom. It makes me feel dirty and slightly gleeful. With this particular fandom though the shame is far more than the glee. I either dislike the music (Panic! at the Disco, much of My Chemical Romance) or I am ambivalent to it (Fall Out Boy, some MCR). The only group I reall like is The Academy Is which is a far rarer bandslash band than the others.

I realize that to many of you bandslash and popslash seem not at all different but to me they are. For one thing my foray into bandom demonstrates that pop is not a fluke. That, in fact, have zero cool-hip-indie music cred. Which, okay, doesn't bother me that much. I listen to Fergie and JC, I'm pretty over the need to be cool musically (plus, I also listen to, like, The Magnetic Fields and Kimya Dawson).

For another thing, it is one thing to like music that was mainly beloved by middle schoolers when the middle schoolers in question were of the same generation as you. It's another to like the music that the angsty middle schoolers at the school you worked at were in love. Like, if I were to go to an MCR concert I would DEFINITELY run into some of my kids from last year. One of them was on the freaking MCR street team.

So, yes. Shame. But also, um, I totally love the fic for all the bands and I totally love The Academy Is like woah.

Hopefully the last thing I will say about LJ/SA exodus etc.

2007-08-19T21:11:53Z

But first, a funny conversation from today:

Me: You got "Heart & Music" stuck in my head.
Roomie: It's better than giving you an STD.

Now, onto LJ:

I am not leaving. I do not think that the execution video is a reason enough for me to go. There isn't evidence that the folks who have been deleting fanartists knew about the video and so I don't think that the two can be compared.

I will, when I remember, cross post to IJ. I am partway through uploading my icons to IJ. I will follow my IJ flist and will follow other flists when I remember. I am nevernever on IJ and JF and nevernever82 on GJ. If a critical mass of fannish folk move together I will go wherever they go. Thus far that has not seemed to occur.

Fic: Not At All According to Plan

2007-08-16T03:02:43Z

This morning entrenous88 posted a call for fannish glee. I am having a kind of emo-cakes day and decided the best way to cheer myself up was to write some schmoopy Spike/Connor fic.

So here is some fic. It's a sequel to Blame it on the Tequila

Almost 900 words. Unbeta-d. Overly schmoopy and self-indulgent.

Spike never thought his life would be like this.

When he was soulless his mental vision of his future involved wreaking havoc across the globe with a good woman by his side. First it was Drusilla, then later Buffy, but he was open to anyone with bloodlust.

When he got his soul he thought his future involved eternally fighting the good fight –not in a poncy, angsty, bad haired kind of way—but being independent. Or maybe being with Buffy. Fighting and fucking and making the world safe for puppies and Christmas or whatever.

In no way did his vision of the future involve a soppy and romantic relationship with a not quite human lover. It didn’t involve knowing anyone’s favorite kind of ice cream and going to the all night grocery store to get it when said lover had a bad day. It didn’t involve enjoying staying in and playing scrabble as much as he enjoyed going out to kill things – thank God it was strip scrabble or Spike might have had to kill himself. His vision of his life didn’t involve being woken up for a goodbye kiss when his lover went to register for classes after he’d transferred to stay close.

And it certainly didn’t involve EVER meeting anyone’s parents.

--

“Please?” Connor tried making puppy dog faces but Spike was determined to stand firm.

“No. No way. Not happening.”

“I really think that meeting you will soften the blow of ‘mom, dad, I’m bisexual and also dating a much older man.’”

“I don’t think meeting the much older man will soften anything. If your other Dad is anything like Angel it will make him get out his shotgun. And I don’t think either of us are ready for the awkward conversation about why the bullet doesn’t kill me.”

Connor bit his lip. “Look, I can’t promise they will love it, or love you, but I love them. And I already do so much lying to them, I want to give them something true.”

“Oh, so you’re planning on owning the fact that I’m undead are you? And you are going to tell them how we met through your real father, the vampire who made a deal with the devil and had you implanted in their brains? Is the fact that you aren’t really theirs “true” enough for you?”

Connor took a step back and Spike felt something in his stomach twist at the expression on his face.

“Nevermind. I’m going to visit them this weekend. I’ll see you when I get back.”

--

On patrol that night Spike was paired with Illyria who spent most of the evening watching him with her head cocked. The only time she spoke was as he was leaving to go home.

“It pains you to be without your human. Why do you not go to him?”

He shook his head and walked away.

--

He spent Saturday moping and overeating. He was halfway through the blood supply in the fridge when he realized that Connor had bought him a special otter & mink blend that they only sold in a butcher shop an hour away.

At sunset Angel showed up.

Spike swore when he opened the door.

“Something confusing happened to me yesterday Spike. Connor called in the morning and told me that neither of you would be ablet to make it to patrol all weekend. And then later Illyria mentioned that she went out with you. And that you were upset.”

“I can see where it would be confusing being pathologically incapable of minding your own business.”

Angel grabbed Spike’s collar and shoved him against the door. “I’m only going to ask once Spike. What the hell did you do to my kid?”

Spike shook him off. “Mind your own damn business Angel.”

“Whenever anybody hurts my son it’s my business.”

“I didn’t!”

“Then why aren’t you with him? Did you forget the conversation we had about you dying if you ever upset him?”

“I just didn’t want to go see his parents. Is that a crime?”

Angel sagged. “He wanted you to meet them?”

Spike nodded.

“Like, hey Mom and Dad this is my boyfriend?”

Spike nodded.

“So…it’s serious?”

Spike groaned. “How many times do we have to have this conversation? Yes it’s serious. God, we’ve lived here together for a year and we shared a room in your place for months before that.”

Angel grimaced. “Right. Serious. Okay.” He squared his shoulders. “Then you have to go meet his parents.”

“What?”

“If it’s serious. If you…”Angel swallowed, “love him. You have to do this.” Angel moved to give Spike his keys and then pulled them back. “You can borrow Gunn’s car.”

--

Spike arrived at Connor’s parents house a little after 11. He called Connor from the driveway.

“I don’t want to talk to you right now.”

“Look outside the front window.”

There was silence and then Connor swore softly and the line disconnected.

A grin split Connor’s face as he walked out of the house.

Connor whispered “You came” right before kissing Spike. Spike smiled against his lips.

“Connor?” A woman was standing in the doorway of the house and Connor pulled back.

“Mom.” He took Spike’s hand and laced their fingers together. “There’s someone I want you to meet.”

Fic: Bodies In Motion (BtVS)

2007-08-13T20:50:36Z

Hey it's my Lynnevitational Fic! Huzzah!

Title: Bodies in Motion
Rating: Adult
Pairing: Dawn/Lots of People, Dawn/Xander
Timeline/Spoilers: Post both series, spoilers for all. Does not include comics canon.
AN: This is a prequal to Collision aka the Connor/Dawn strap-on fic.
AN2: Many thanks to sweptawaybayou for the fabulous beta and to germaine_pet for hosting the Lynnevitational which kicked my ass into writing this.
Summary: After the end, you move towards the future.

Buffy must have learned something from the last time she tried to protect Dawn because this time Dawn didn't wake up in a car -- she woke up in one of the emergency bunkers Giles had shown her when they first came to London. The air was stale and smelled of sweat and anxiety.

It took her a minute to get her feet under her, her limbs felt clumsy from disuse. She made her way into the main room and found Xander staring blankly at a TV screen displaying disaster footage from LA. He had several days worth of beard growth and his clothes were rumpled and sweat stained.

“How long have I been out?”

“Five days.” Xander didn't look away from the television.

She watched the TV silently for a few minutes with a growing sense of dread.

“She's dead isn't she?”

“They all are.”

She stumbled like she'd been punched and she slid to the floor, eyes fixed on the TV as she watched the city burn.

--

They hadn't all died. A few people survived the battle and there were a few who, like Dawn and Xander, had gone underground so that the Slayer line and the council knowledge wouldn't die in LA. Xander smiled sadly when he recounted the arguments Buffy had had with some of the girls.

“You should have seen her Dawnie, she was all power Buffy. She was like 'We didn't spend so much time defeating the First so that the Slayer line could end because one of my ex-boyfriends fucked up. You WILL get in those bunkers or I will knock you unconscious and put you there.'”

Dawn grimaced.

“Urgh. Sorry Dawn.”

“Buffy was all about taking away people's choices in this battle wasn't she?”

“Dawn...”

“Don't Xander. You two made all my decisions for me. You didn't give me any choice in my future and that sucks.”

“We didn't...”

“Shut up, you did. You and Buffy stole my last few days with all the people I love.”

“And what a great few days it was. Do you want to know what you missed out on? You missed 48 hours of Buffy getting tenser and tenser and quieter and quieter. The only times she really spoke were when she was snapping orders at everyone. You missed Willow going into seclusion with the coven to gather her strength and you missed the phenomenal fight Kennedy put up when we wouldn't let her go say goodbye. You missed Giles shaking with anger at Angel and yelling at Buffy and everyone else in range. You didn't miss out. You didn't need to see everyone like that.”

“Maybe I wanted to, I'm not a little kid. I should have a choice. And anyway maybe I could have helped.”

“No, you couldn't have. It wasn't a time for research, it was a time for pure power. The best thing for the non-super folks like us to do was just to get out of the way.”

Dawn let out a long exhale and hung her head. Xander reached out to touch her shoulder but she shrugged him off and shut herself into the bedroom.

--

Eventually the call came that it was time to come out of hiding and start to rebuild. Dawn and Xander were suddenly in great demand as two folks who'd been with the council longest. They moved into a tiny flat a few blocks from headquarters and started working to train the remaining Junior Watchers and Slayers in what it meant to fight the good fight.

Dawn hated it. She hated any reminders of Buffy or Sunnydale or the way life used to be. Every night she dreamed about running and every morning she checked airline prices. She figured Buenos Aires would be a good start. Her Spanish was excellent and she could easily disappear in a country that was famous for letting people hide.

She stayed because Buffy would have hated it, Buffy always wanted her to lead a normal life and deciding not to do that was the best way to say fuck you to a sister who didn't want to say goodbye. Besides that, she wasn't sure how to leave Xander. He would never even think to leave while the council needed him and it was clear to Dawn that he needed her. He spent every night drunk, slumped on the ugly gray couch they got second hand, watching old episodes of Star Trek.

Dawn couldn't really fault him for the drinking, she rarely got through the day without a little liquid help to numb her. She was just better than him at keeping it together. She never blacked out. Most of the time she remembered to eat. She never threw up. She made sure Xander ate and that he drank some water every night before he stumbled off to bed.

She wasn't particularly upset with Xander for the way he chose to deal with grief. Everybody had their vices. That's what kept them all from killing themselves.

Dawn's vices, outside of the mid-day drinks, were more social. Most nights she'd find a sleazy-ass club and a sleazy-ass guy and she'd fuck until she forgot. Often it was a quick screw in the bathroom or an alley but sometimes she'd go back to their place. She liked it hard and fast and intense enough that all she had space for in her head was the feel of them against her and inside her. She liked guys who'd pull her hair and call her a slut. She liked the feel of gravel against her knees while somebody shoved their cock down her throat. She liked threesomes and foursomes and being fucked so raw so that it hurt to sit down the next day.

One night she fucked a vampire in an alley, let him push her against a brick wall, let him push her skirt aside and shove into her body, let him scrape his teeth across her neck. She staked him with shaking hands before either of them came and she never went back to that club again.

--

And then Xander started to pull himself together and everything got harder. She still went out, but she had to leave later and come home earlier. Sneaking in drunk and sore at 5AM was not on her list of favorite things to do. She fabricated a few friends and occasionally told him she was spending the night with them. A few times Xander tried to talk to her about how she was doing, what was going on in her life but she always shut him down and then hid in her room until he fell asleep and she could leave.

Somewhat miraculously, she got away with it for a full two weeks. Then one morning she came home to find Xander sitting in a chair facing the door with a stack of photos in his lap. She walked in and stopped breathing.

“Xander, hi, I can explain...” He stood and handed her the stack of photos without a word.

She looked down and saw herself braced against a brick wall being fucked from behind. In the next picture she was on her knees unzipping a fly with her teeth. She flipped through the photos and saw image after image of herself with man after man.

“Fuck.”

“Is that all you're going to say?”

“You had me followed?”

“I tried following you myself but you walk surprisingly fast in stripper heels.”

“Why would you do that?”

“I had to know where you were going, Dawnie. You wouldn't talk to me and you were always sneaking out. What was I supposed to do?”

“Um, not have me followed?”

“I had to know, I was worried.”

“Well now you know. Does that make you happy? Was it worth the fact that I will NEVER trust you again?”

Xander pinched the bridge of his nose. “No, this doesn't make me happy. How could you self-destructing make me happy?”

“Oh please. Me self-destructing? I'm surprised you could pull yourself away from your beloved Jack Daniels long enough to give a shit what I'm doing.”

“This isn't about me. This is about you and the fact that you've been slutting it up all over London.”

She put down the pictures and walked towards her bedroom. “Fuck you Xander. I need to get some sleep before work.”

--

At the end of the day there were two Slayers waiting for her outside the council library.

“What's up guys?”

One of them, Sarah or Susan or something – Dawn stopped trying to learn names after LA – answered. “Mr. Harris says we should walk you home and wait with you until he gets there.”

Her jaw dropped. She contemplating arguing and then decided it would be better to take it up with someone who couldn’t snap her in half with barely any effort so she squared her shoulders and walked silently home flanked by the Slayers.

When Xander got home Dawn was overflowing with anger and frustration.

“You've got to be kidding me! Slayer babysitters?!”

“I needed to make sure you didn’t go anywhere.”

“You think I'm gonna sneak out for a quickie at 4 o'clock in the afternoon?”

“I don't know! Clearly I have no idea who you are anymore.”

“Bullshit Xander. You know who I am even if you don't particularly want to know.”

He stepped towards her, laid a hand on her arm. “I will always want to know you.”

She jerked away from him and stomped into her room.

Later, when she tried to sneak out, she found a Slayer posted at the door to the flat. She went into Xander's room and slammed his door to wake him.

“Why the fuck is it so important to you that I not get laid?”

He slumped against the wall by his bed. “It's not about the sex, Dawn. It's about the fact that you aren't dealing with your grief.”

“I'm dealing,” she sputtered, “I'm dealing great! I'm a festival of dealing!”

He shook his head. “You aren't. I wasn't either at first, but I'm trying now.”

“I'm dealing fine. Buffy and Willow and Giles and Andrew and everyone are dead. I can say it! They aren’t coming back, I can’t change it and everything is going to be fine. See! I'm totally at stage five acceptance.”

“Dawn. You're not. I think talking about it will help.”

“Go to hell.” She stormed into her room.

--

After a week of constantly being babysat by Slayers, Dawn felt like she was going to vibrate out of her skin. Xander had emptied all the liquor bottles and she was never without an escort long enough to go buy something. Xander checked in at odd intervals during the day so she couldn't sneak off to get fucked by any Watcher trainees.

There was nothing she could do that was distracting enough. Everyplace she went she saw Buffy, everything she did, she heard Willow.

She was losing her mind.

When he got home that night she begged him to let her out. He looked at her -- literally on her knees in front of his chair -- with sad eyes. “Dawn, why do you need this so badly?”

She shook her head, “I just do, do we have to analyze? Can't we just cut me a break here?”

“No. I'm sorry.”

She crawled closer to him and put a hand on his knee. “Please Xander, I just need out of this apartment. I'm going crazy in here.”

He shook his head.

She sat back on her heels and sighed. Then she sat up “Is it the sex? Are you jealous that I'll have sex with someone who isn't you.” She put her hand on his knee and slid it toward his crotch. “Is that it? Do you want me, Xander?”

He caught her hand in his. “No Dawn. I don't want to have sex with you. I do want to talk to you.”

She pulled her hand back and stood, leaned over him putting her chest at eye level for him, “I could make it really good for you.”

He shook his head.

She stepped away and flopped onto the couch. “I hate you.”

“I know. I just...I wish you would talk to me about what's going on for you. Why is it so hard for you to talk about it? Especially with me when you know I’m going through the same things. Why do you feel like you need to fuck or drink it away?”

She shook her head and looked away.

He moved so he was sitting next to her on the couch. He put his hand on her shoulder “Please Dawnie, talk to me.”

To her horror, her eyes filled with tears. It had been almost four months since Buffy died and she hadn't cried once. She'd been proud of that, it was the one way that she was staying strong the way Buffy wanted her to be. She couldn't seem to stop now though, with Xander rubbing her back in the first gentle non-sexual touch she'd felt in weeks. She started crying and she couldn't stop. She turned into Xander's embrace and clung to him, sobbing.

He rubbed her back and stroked her hair and made comforting noises in her ear.

When she pulled back she saw that his eyes were wet too. “I just miss them you know?”

He nodded.

“I don't know how to go forward missing people this much. It's like the summer after Buffy died-- times a million.”

He nodded again.

“I hate it.”

“Me too.”

She leaned her head against his shoulder. “I'm sorry for being a huge drunk whore instead of talking to you.”

He laughed a little. “I'm sorry for drinking myself into a coma every night so that I didn't even notice.”

She leaned in to kiss him, gently, on the mouth.

“Dawn...”

She leaned in again and kissed him longer this time, opening her mouth against his and sliding her tongue out to lick at his lips.

“This is a bad idea.”

This time when she kissed him, he kissed back and she threaded her fingers through his hair. She pushed him back against the couch and settled on top of him, still kissing. When she guided his hand to her breast, he started to shake his head and pull away but she whispered “Please” against his lips and he acquiesced.

It was slower and quieter and softer than any sex she'd had in months. When she was naked and slowly sinking down on his cock he bit his lip and sucked in a sharp breath. She tightened her muscles to draw another inhale from him and then she started to move. She placed soft kisses all over his face, his lips, his nose, his good eye, the skin around his eye patch. He came quietly inside her and then worked her with his fingers until she came as well.

When she lay cuddled against his chest, he started to speak and she shushed him. “Please don't say this was a mistake. Not tonight. Please.”

“Okay. Okay.” He kissed the top of her head. “Do you want to move to my bed so we can sleep better?”

She nodded and stood. He took her hand and led her to his room where they curled up together and slept.

--

When she woke the next morning she was still tucked tight against Xander and he was gently stroking her hair.

“Dawnie are you awake?”

She murmured a yes and he kissed the top of her head.

“We should talk.”

She nodded, unwilling to meet his eyes.

“Last night was a mistake.”

Dawn felt nausea swirl in her stomach.

“It was a spectacularly enjoyable mistake, but still definitely not something we should have done.”

She swallowed hard. “Why, exactly?”

“I shouldn’t be encouraging you to use sex to avoid your feelings.”

She pushed away from him and sat up. “You know what Xander? Fuck you. I talked to you last night. I fucking cried with you last night. When I go out and screw strangers that’s avoidance. Last night was different.”

He gave a short laugh. “Really? Because from where I’m sitting it seems like last night was your way of escaping a difficult conversation.”

“Jesus Christ! What part of me sobbing on your shoulder wasn’t difficult? What exactly was I trying to escape?”

“Fine. Not escape maybe, but end. You wanted a quick out, and I was too weak to say no.”

“A quick out would have been me standing up and going to my room. Me kissing you was…comfort. Closeness.”

He closed his eyes. “How do I know that? How do I know that you aren’t just trying to replace all those other guys?”

She quirked a smile. “Well, for one I didn’t ask you to pull my hair and call me a slut.”

“Dawn.”

She put her hand on his chest. “I just needed you Xander. You. Not sex. I needed you.”

He bit his lip was silent for a minute and then he nodded. “Okay.”

--

Dawn still struggled, still ached with loss, still hated the council, still plotted her escape to Argentina, but now she slept in Xander’s bed most nights and she made a genuine effort to tell him how she felt. Whenever it got too much and she thought her grip on sanity would slip she would find him and they would fuck and she would start to feel human again.

It wasn’t perfect, but it wasn’t awful and that was enough for Dawn to get through.

IBARW: Hi. My name is Meg and I'm racist.

2007-08-11T20:32:37Z

One thing my previous posts for IBARW have been lacking is much emphasis on the personal. It is much much easier for me to try to engage with the ideas abstractly than it is for me to say “this is my shit, let me show it to you.” But I think that it’s important to bring the personal to the table because so much of undoing institutional racism involves undoing the individual racism of the participants in the institutions.

And so much of effective anti-racist work is learning to own your issues, to look at the problem of racism and say “this is what I need to work on” rather than “this is what I need to teach other people to work on.”

But still, it’s hard to talk about. Especially in a public forum with readers who are all over the map in their race philosophies. My racist shit is ugly and it’s deep and showing it to other people is hard. I’m going to try. We’ll see how it goes.

Hi. My name is Meg and I’m racist.

White privilege has benefited me enormously in my life. I was encouraged to achieve from a very young age. I went to private high school and private college and no one ever questioned my right to be there or implied that I was only there to meet diversity quotas.

I was part of the racial diversity club in high school and went to meetings about increasing diversity in college. In both of those groups I was seen as “one of the good ones” the white folks who want to make things better damnit. People rarely questioned my right to be there or my own level of racism despite the fact that at several points I said or did things that I now find cringe worthy.

I have an enormous amount of institutional access. I worked in the police department for a year. I have done street outreach in neighborhoods that are predominantly inhabited by PoC. No one questioned my right to do either of those things. I’m in social services and when I go work in “underserved communities” (read: communities of color) I’m viewed as a good person who is going to help those less fortunate. Very few people question whether I should be there or whether I know what is best for those communities.

If I choose to do so, I can put away thoughts of race and racism. I did for years. I was aware that racism existed and that it was bad. I viewed myself as non-racist, as part of the solution and I went on to work on other social issues that I viewed as more important. I had little to know understanding of the way racism impacts other social movements and the ways that other social movements marginalize PoC.

My racist BS was largely unconscious. I was very well meaning, but by not confronting my biases I was perpetuating a truly fucked up system.

I was raised to think that there was a right way to do things, that I could figure out what it was, and that once I figured it out I had a moral obligation to get other people there as well. I was raised to see myself as superior and to see folks of color as needing my help.

And I still think that way. I’m working on it, but it’s in me. And that’s fucked up.

Speaking of fucked up:

When I see young black men on the street I get tense, particularly if it’s late at night.

I associate poverty with folks of color despite the fact that the majority of poor folks in the US are white.

My first thought when I heard that there had been several last minute interviewees for a position I applied for with an explicitly anti-racist organization was “they must be black.” (all the previous interviewees were white)

For a long time whenever someone called me on something oppressive my default response was “that’s not what I meant” instead of “I’m sorry.” That is still often my kneejerk response even though I don’t say it anymore.

My previous job used to have fairly regular conversations about racism. During some of our early conversations if white folks were doing most of the talking I used to say something about it. Something along the lines of “I’m uncomfortable with the amount of space white folks are taking up in this space.” I never considered how much pressure that put on the folks of color. I never considered how much space I was taking up when I said that.

For a long time whenever someone brought up racism I brought up sexism and homophobia. Intersectionality is important for sure, but white folks often use their oppressed identities as a “get out of racism free” card. It took me a long time before I could sit in a racism discussion and discuss race without feeling the need to play my own oppression cards.

Now that I am explicitly working on my racist shit I sometimes find myself trying to impress PoC with my anti-racism. Maybe if I can get [x] person to see how smart I am and how hard I’m working on this they will see that I’m one of the good white people.

This is not a comprehensive list of all the ways I’ve benefited from racism or of all the fucked up things I’ve ever thought or did. But this is some of them and I hope that putting them out there illustrates some of the ways that internalized racial superiority plays out in my life.

IBARW: On Making Mistakes

2007-08-11T04:59:00Z

So here’s a secret: Nobody is perfect. Perfect, in fact, doesn’t exist.

I know this is hard for some of you to hear. White culture in this country relies pretty heavily on feeding us all the myth that perfection is out there, it is in your grasp and you are a failure when you fall short. (Note: saying something is part of white culture does not mean that only white people have/value/are afflicted with something. I’m not saying only white folks are perfectionists. As Tema Okun says “Because we all live in a white supremacy culture, these characteristics show up in the attitudes and behaviors of all of us -- people of color and white people.” For an overview of white culture try this article by Sharon Martinas and for more specifics on how it manifests (including specifics about perfectionism) try this article by Tema Okun)

We all grow up with this myth of perfection, that it’s out there, that it’s within our grasp and that myth is incredibly destructive to nearly all aspects of our lives. For white folks, one of the places that it is particularly destructive is in our attempts to do anti-racist work.

The only way to completely avoid saying or doing anything racist is to completely avoid interacting with or talking about folks of color. Which, ps, is a pretty fucked up racist thing to do.

Most white folks don’t like to think about the fact that we are racist and we don’t like to admit it when we do racist things. Part of that is because we care about other people and we don’t want to hurt them and it’s not fun to realize that you have been doing so for quite some time. Part of it is because it doesn’t fit our self-concept to be so fundamentally flawed.

But we are flawed. We’re really flawed. And other people can see it and are impacted by it.

If we are spending all of our time trying to avoid mistakes, trying to achieve perfection, we will be completely paralyzed. You can’t act, you can’t work for change if you are so terrified of saying or doing something wrong.

Also, if you are so terrified of fucking up, when you inevitably do fuck up and are called on it you are a million times more likely to be super defensive and crappy about it. And that defensive crappiness is incredibly hurtful to the folks who have called you on your shit (which isn’t easy to do).

If you hit someone in the face you should apologize. Don’t tell them they were imagining it or tell them you didn’t do it. Even if hitting someone in the face is something you do so often and have done for so long you aren’t consciously aware of it you are still responsible for the action. If you hit someone you should apologize. And if you don’t notice you hit them until they say ouch you should apologize and then think about why it is you could hit someone without noticing you were doing it.

Many people of color have a lot of very justifiable anger at white folks. That anger is often present when a POC calls a white person on their shit. As white folks, it’s our job to figure out how to take it gracefully. I’m not saying let someone treat you badly. If someone is abusive to you of course you should walk away. But if someone is angry, let them be angry. Part of owning your mistakes is taking responsibility for the consequences of those mistakes.

Anger can be very uncomfortable to be around, especially for white women who are generally raised to avoid anger at all costs. It doesn’t matter if it’s uncomfortable for us, because when someone is calling us on our racist shit our comfort isn’t what’s important. We have made an error. That’s okay, we are still good people, but we have made an error and now we need to try to make it better. That means we need to listen to them and we need to let them feel however they feel and we need to do the things that they ask us to do.

I think part of the problem we often have in taking responsibility for our mistakes is our conflation of making a mistake and being a mistake. Screwing up does not make you a bad person (it doesn’t even make you a bad anti-racist white). Despite what you were raised believing, your actions and your being are different. You are still a good person, you don’t have to be perfect.

This is all a process. Making mistakes, being imperfect, isn’t going to magically become comfortable for you. I still spend a good chunk of my time terrified of saying or doing or being the wrong thing and then somehow being tagged as a bad anti-racist white person. It’s important to try. It’s important to lurch messily toward graceful mistake making and owning. It’s important to try to let go of your perfectionism.

You and the people around you will be much happier.

nevernever @ 2007-07-19T15:36:00

2007-07-19T22:39:45Z

this exists so that when lj fucks us over too much and we all leave, i have someplace to go.