commentfic [sharp_teeth]
A quote from the new year: "He's a sexually liberated cactus!"
Yes, it makes just about as much sense out of context as it did in context.
In other news, I was writing up an enormous rec post for sharp_teeth and Yuletide and miscellaneous exchanges when I suddenly realized I had neglected to archive my sharp_teeth fills at my LJ (I am kind of OCD like that). Commentfic is not my forte, I have concluded--the inability to edit after writing up a mishmash of words in a comment box is absolutely maddening to me--but it was a fun experience, nonetheless. Cleaned up a bit from my original postings.
Supernatural | let's play - Claire Novak
Originally posted here. Prompt: The tree outside Claire Novak's bedroom window casts shadows on her wall. They look like claws reaching for her.
Her mother always puts the olive oil on the bottom shelf of the cupboard second from the right. If Claire leans forward on the balls of her feet and curls her fingers up just enough--well, she doesn't need to do it often, and she's gotten better with practice. The hinges on the window in her bedroom don't squeak anymore.
Claire, Daddy says at dinner, you don't even climb the tree anymore. School, huh? He crosses his eyes when Mom's not looking.
She giggles, folding her hand over her mouth because it's not proper to show others half-chewed food decorating gums and teeth. Does it palm facing in, so the thin red scratches aren't visible. Just math, she tells her parents. Mrs. Lee makes it sound so boring, Mom, you teach it so much better.
Claire, says Mom, listen to your teachers.
She does the math later. Puts aside the multiplication practice sheets and figures things the real way, with weight and distance and the force of the mind.
-
By midnight all the lights are turned off, so the only thing tracing out the boundaries of her vision is the moonlit outline of black tangled branches against her wall, shifting with the wind's rain-sodden moan.
She smiles to herself, padding over to the window and letting it click noiselessly open. It's a great game, and she sort of wishes it wasn't her own, except her parents would freak out. And then. So not every night, obviously, because dark circles under the eyes are a giveaway, so she's told, and her skin isn't that immune to the bruised ridges of bark.
She pokes her head over the windowsill; follows with the rest of her body, pulling it along though it's awfully annoying to bother. Her room has the largest window in the house, because Mom had decided from the start that Claire would get the most sunlight, and the most moonlight, and had told Claire that the tree would always watch over her, watching her.
But the lightning--
It'll strike the tree first, Claire. Don't be afraid. When she was young, she remembers, Mom had said the same.
She blinks but keeps herself from wiping her face. Okay, she thinks, this isn't so bad.
The tree reaches out through the dark with its little twigs at the end drooping down. It looks like a drowning swamp rat, except twenty times bigger and starved into a gnarled trunk. Dad always laughs at how it's never going to have a pot belly. What does it eat? she'd ask, and he'd say, I'm not a tree, I wouldn't know.
It only makes sense to ask someone who would.
She says, You'll catch me, won't you? I'm not going to fall?
No. I will not fall. You can practice some more.
Where would you fall anyway, gosh, Claire says, gosh and not God. Geez, we aren't chopping you down.
(When she leaves the windowsill for the tree, the branches rise up to embrace her, scraping along her knees and tightening around her chest.)
Supernatural | trick of the sunlight - Sheriff Mills & Bobby (sort of)
Originally posted here. Prompt: There are many bodies buried in Bobby's junkyard.
She's already driven this route so many times she swears her tires start groaning whenever the gravel bites into the grooves of his driveway. Bobby Singer, she thinks sourly, is an ass. According to the neighbors, though, this past week it's been worse than ever. The smell of fire, the loud banging noises. If she hadn't already made a sweep of his place before, she'd think he was cooking up unsavories in his kitchen rather than hoarding old antique books. What a strange hobby to have.
She bangs her knuckles against the door unceremoniously, and curses. Knocks again, then rubs her thumb over the back of her hand to sweep away the lingering ache.
Singer pulls the door open. "Sheriff," he says. He looks grumpy. This is nothing new. "What now?"
At least he knows the drill as well as she does. "Look, Mr. Singer," she says, "I've been getting complaints from your neighbors--"
"I'm fixing stuff up," he says, strolls right past her and off to the ramshackle mess of cars next to his house. "You can talk while I'm working."
Bobby Singer is an ass, she has to remind herself again as she follows him. He disrespects everyone in law enforcement, which is better than ignoring her just because she's a she. But that doesn't mean she'll take it. "No," she snaps. "You can keep quiet and listen while I'm talking."
"Make it quick," Singer says. "Or I'll make it quick. My two boys just called, said they're coming in an hour."
"Never said you had sons," she says, and wrinkles her nose. The air in Singer's junkyard is laced with a smell she can't trace, sharp and rotten and singed by smoke.
Singer says, "They're good as," and his mouth curves up. He actually looks pleased, for once.
"Look here, Singer," she tells him. "Fact is, there's no reason for your neighbor living way down over to be calling in to my office about all this racket you're making. I don't know if you're fixing your cars in the middle of the night or starting up your machines, but--"
"Not at all," he rumbles. "Nothing to do with the junkyard. He put up a good fight, like he thought he could win. Even though I always get the last word."
What the hell kinda fight are you talking about, she wonders. "Sure you do," she says slowly, and steps away. Of course it would be her luck to drop by when Singer's finally snapped. Great, he must be hallucinating ninjas in the corners.
Then she glances down. It's barely noticeable, but within the shadow cast by the nearby truck a sliver of red dribbles out sloppily. Gravel upended and not smoothed down, still disturbed like a newly dug grave. She doesn't stare, her gaze moving past the truck to the next car, swinging back to Singer.
The beat of her heart shudders up into her throat, flickering fast like a snake's forked tongue.
"Mr. Singer," she says. "Like I said, sorry to bother you but you'll have to come with me--"
"Ah," Singer says. "I didn't clean up as well as I should've. Doesn't matter if you'd seen or not, I wouldn't let you go anyway. Gotta have something to do while I wait on the boys."
She hisses a breath out, goes for her gun, but Singer doesn't even lift a hand, just tilts his head and looks--
--she hits the hood of the car so hard that she can feel the windshield fracture and fall out underneath her till she's going backward and down, glass biting at her hands and face. "What the fuck, Singer?" she shouts--she was just flying, she'd just been shoved like she'd been hit by an invisible battering ram.
And he hadn't even lifted a hand.
"There's still an hour left," he says. She can't hear the sound of his steps; she tries to lever herself up but gravity or something like it wraps around her and pulls her down, tight claws on her neck. His face is entirely in shadow but she can still see his eyes shining bright yellow. A weird trick of the sunlight, must be, must be--
Bobby Singer is an ass, she knows. But this, this is not--
Her blood is cool and gentle when it trickles down her forehead and drips in her eyes. He says, he sings, "We'll see how long I get to pretend when they come."
He smells like rotten eggs.
Velveteen Rabbit | A History Lesson - the Skin Horse & the Rabbit
Originally posted here. Prompt: "The Skin Horse."
That afternoon, Nana tidied the room and set the Rabbit down with a thump next to the Skin Horse, the rough fall cushioned by his bottom. The Rabbit took some comfort from this, as even Timothy the wooden lion would often land in place with loud clacks and clunks which spoke of nothing but pain, and foretold inevitable grumbling.
The Skin Horse was in a reminiscent mood and drew his mouth up round his teeth politely as he exchanged pleasantries with the Rabbit. “You are not yet so worn,” the Skin Horse said. His ears were ragged and his back was peppered by seams which peeped out like rows of tiny, unblinking eyes. “I came here as part of a set a long time ago. We matched each other well, for I was brown and the others were black and white, and the Boy’s Uncle used to race the three of us all at once.”
“Why then,” said the Rabbit, “how did he tell you apart? You could not all be called Skin Horses.” Here he twitched his nose, rather embarrassed, because certainly now there was only one Skin Horse, and not three.
“Oh, he did not call us by anything at first,” the Skin Horse said. He did not look irritated at all as he flicked the remaining few strands of his tail. “He did not much care for us, but he took us outside to play after a few days and tossed us around. It was unfortunate,” and the Skin Horse sighed, “for he forgot to pick us up and left the three of us alone on the ground at dinner time.”
To the Rabbit, who had never set eyes upon the outside, this was a terrifying thought. “All alone!” he exclaimed. “Only the three of you!”
“Not even us three,” the Skin Horse said. His tiny square teeth showed as he talked. After all the years in the nursery they still gleamed, sturdy and tough. The Rabbit had seen the Skin Horse use his teeth to tear at errant bits of paper more than once. “We were scattered, and though I tried my best I could not find the others even after many hours. The Boy found only me later and the both of us despaired terribly. I was bruised from the fall, and I don't think the marks will ever disappear. If you look here-“
The Rabbit looked, and indeed, on the Skin Horse’s right haunch he could see tiny harsh impressions, where pebbles must have dug into the coat. The shapes were so precise that the Rabbit wondered at how they almost resembled hoof marks. Then he chided himself for such a silly thought, because surely the Skin Horse wouldn't have spent his lost time kicking himself to look like he was in a fight. He couldn't have been able to kick himself anyway.
“I would not like to have been left alone,” the Rabbit said. How cold and terribly open it must have been. Here in the nursery, he was at least among other toys.
“It was a long time ago,” the Skin Horse said. “The Boy was kind to me after that, as I was the only horse he had left, and grew to love me. That love was enough.” He smiled, very quietly, very secretly.
How very Real the Skin Horse was, the Rabbit thought. How very wise, and knowledgeable, and kind. He wriggled a little closer, as if he too could also grasp something of the Skin Horse’s memories, being loved wholly by the Boy’s Uncle when the Uncle himself was a Boy, a love born out of such distressing loss.
The Rabbit said, “How wonderful that he loved you so much!” He gazed at the Skin Horse. The back of his brown coat had been stroked so often that it had worn thin; below, he could see patches of black and white. They stretched over his back oddly, rather ill-fitted.
“Yes. It was then that he named me,” the Skin Horse said, and the Rabbit thought of that moment where a horse became the Skin Horse, repeated out loud, “Skin Horse,” and let the words roll around in his mouth, soft and gentle.
“My skin doesn’t hold for long, I admit,” said the Skin Horse. “I've had to replace it in some areas from time to time. It's fortunate that I have reserves; they kept me going until I became Real. But regardless of the color-why, it doesn’t matter anymore. He loved me as his Skin Horse, his only horse left, and made me Real, and when you are Real-“
His eyes were very bright beads, set in his shabby head, and when the sunlight was caught by them they shone dark and content. "You will never be ugly to the one who loves you, even if you are not made of all you used to be."
Rec post going up later, once I finish all the HTML coding for it. (Because I do not care for rich text editor at all, grrr.)
Yes, it makes just about as much sense out of context as it did in context.
In other news, I was writing up an enormous rec post for sharp_teeth and Yuletide and miscellaneous exchanges when I suddenly realized I had neglected to archive my sharp_teeth fills at my LJ (I am kind of OCD like that). Commentfic is not my forte, I have concluded--the inability to edit after writing up a mishmash of words in a comment box is absolutely maddening to me--but it was a fun experience, nonetheless. Cleaned up a bit from my original postings.
Supernatural | let's play - Claire Novak
Originally posted here. Prompt: The tree outside Claire Novak's bedroom window casts shadows on her wall. They look like claws reaching for her.
Her mother always puts the olive oil on the bottom shelf of the cupboard second from the right. If Claire leans forward on the balls of her feet and curls her fingers up just enough--well, she doesn't need to do it often, and she's gotten better with practice. The hinges on the window in her bedroom don't squeak anymore.
Claire, Daddy says at dinner, you don't even climb the tree anymore. School, huh? He crosses his eyes when Mom's not looking.
She giggles, folding her hand over her mouth because it's not proper to show others half-chewed food decorating gums and teeth. Does it palm facing in, so the thin red scratches aren't visible. Just math, she tells her parents. Mrs. Lee makes it sound so boring, Mom, you teach it so much better.
Claire, says Mom, listen to your teachers.
She does the math later. Puts aside the multiplication practice sheets and figures things the real way, with weight and distance and the force of the mind.
-
By midnight all the lights are turned off, so the only thing tracing out the boundaries of her vision is the moonlit outline of black tangled branches against her wall, shifting with the wind's rain-sodden moan.
She smiles to herself, padding over to the window and letting it click noiselessly open. It's a great game, and she sort of wishes it wasn't her own, except her parents would freak out. And then. So not every night, obviously, because dark circles under the eyes are a giveaway, so she's told, and her skin isn't that immune to the bruised ridges of bark.
She pokes her head over the windowsill; follows with the rest of her body, pulling it along though it's awfully annoying to bother. Her room has the largest window in the house, because Mom had decided from the start that Claire would get the most sunlight, and the most moonlight, and had told Claire that the tree would always watch over her, watching her.
But the lightning--
It'll strike the tree first, Claire. Don't be afraid. When she was young, she remembers, Mom had said the same.
She blinks but keeps herself from wiping her face. Okay, she thinks, this isn't so bad.
The tree reaches out through the dark with its little twigs at the end drooping down. It looks like a drowning swamp rat, except twenty times bigger and starved into a gnarled trunk. Dad always laughs at how it's never going to have a pot belly. What does it eat? she'd ask, and he'd say, I'm not a tree, I wouldn't know.
It only makes sense to ask someone who would.
She says, You'll catch me, won't you? I'm not going to fall?
No. I will not fall. You can practice some more.
Where would you fall anyway, gosh, Claire says, gosh and not God. Geez, we aren't chopping you down.
(When she leaves the windowsill for the tree, the branches rise up to embrace her, scraping along her knees and tightening around her chest.)
Supernatural | trick of the sunlight - Sheriff Mills & Bobby (sort of)
Originally posted here. Prompt: There are many bodies buried in Bobby's junkyard.
She's already driven this route so many times she swears her tires start groaning whenever the gravel bites into the grooves of his driveway. Bobby Singer, she thinks sourly, is an ass. According to the neighbors, though, this past week it's been worse than ever. The smell of fire, the loud banging noises. If she hadn't already made a sweep of his place before, she'd think he was cooking up unsavories in his kitchen rather than hoarding old antique books. What a strange hobby to have.
She bangs her knuckles against the door unceremoniously, and curses. Knocks again, then rubs her thumb over the back of her hand to sweep away the lingering ache.
Singer pulls the door open. "Sheriff," he says. He looks grumpy. This is nothing new. "What now?"
At least he knows the drill as well as she does. "Look, Mr. Singer," she says, "I've been getting complaints from your neighbors--"
"I'm fixing stuff up," he says, strolls right past her and off to the ramshackle mess of cars next to his house. "You can talk while I'm working."
Bobby Singer is an ass, she has to remind herself again as she follows him. He disrespects everyone in law enforcement, which is better than ignoring her just because she's a she. But that doesn't mean she'll take it. "No," she snaps. "You can keep quiet and listen while I'm talking."
"Make it quick," Singer says. "Or I'll make it quick. My two boys just called, said they're coming in an hour."
"Never said you had sons," she says, and wrinkles her nose. The air in Singer's junkyard is laced with a smell she can't trace, sharp and rotten and singed by smoke.
Singer says, "They're good as," and his mouth curves up. He actually looks pleased, for once.
"Look here, Singer," she tells him. "Fact is, there's no reason for your neighbor living way down over to be calling in to my office about all this racket you're making. I don't know if you're fixing your cars in the middle of the night or starting up your machines, but--"
"Not at all," he rumbles. "Nothing to do with the junkyard. He put up a good fight, like he thought he could win. Even though I always get the last word."
What the hell kinda fight are you talking about, she wonders. "Sure you do," she says slowly, and steps away. Of course it would be her luck to drop by when Singer's finally snapped. Great, he must be hallucinating ninjas in the corners.
Then she glances down. It's barely noticeable, but within the shadow cast by the nearby truck a sliver of red dribbles out sloppily. Gravel upended and not smoothed down, still disturbed like a newly dug grave. She doesn't stare, her gaze moving past the truck to the next car, swinging back to Singer.
The beat of her heart shudders up into her throat, flickering fast like a snake's forked tongue.
"Mr. Singer," she says. "Like I said, sorry to bother you but you'll have to come with me--"
"Ah," Singer says. "I didn't clean up as well as I should've. Doesn't matter if you'd seen or not, I wouldn't let you go anyway. Gotta have something to do while I wait on the boys."
She hisses a breath out, goes for her gun, but Singer doesn't even lift a hand, just tilts his head and looks--
--she hits the hood of the car so hard that she can feel the windshield fracture and fall out underneath her till she's going backward and down, glass biting at her hands and face. "What the fuck, Singer?" she shouts--she was just flying, she'd just been shoved like she'd been hit by an invisible battering ram.
And he hadn't even lifted a hand.
"There's still an hour left," he says. She can't hear the sound of his steps; she tries to lever herself up but gravity or something like it wraps around her and pulls her down, tight claws on her neck. His face is entirely in shadow but she can still see his eyes shining bright yellow. A weird trick of the sunlight, must be, must be--
Bobby Singer is an ass, she knows. But this, this is not--
Her blood is cool and gentle when it trickles down her forehead and drips in her eyes. He says, he sings, "We'll see how long I get to pretend when they come."
He smells like rotten eggs.
Velveteen Rabbit | A History Lesson - the Skin Horse & the Rabbit
Originally posted here. Prompt: "The Skin Horse."
That afternoon, Nana tidied the room and set the Rabbit down with a thump next to the Skin Horse, the rough fall cushioned by his bottom. The Rabbit took some comfort from this, as even Timothy the wooden lion would often land in place with loud clacks and clunks which spoke of nothing but pain, and foretold inevitable grumbling.
The Skin Horse was in a reminiscent mood and drew his mouth up round his teeth politely as he exchanged pleasantries with the Rabbit. “You are not yet so worn,” the Skin Horse said. His ears were ragged and his back was peppered by seams which peeped out like rows of tiny, unblinking eyes. “I came here as part of a set a long time ago. We matched each other well, for I was brown and the others were black and white, and the Boy’s Uncle used to race the three of us all at once.”
“Why then,” said the Rabbit, “how did he tell you apart? You could not all be called Skin Horses.” Here he twitched his nose, rather embarrassed, because certainly now there was only one Skin Horse, and not three.
“Oh, he did not call us by anything at first,” the Skin Horse said. He did not look irritated at all as he flicked the remaining few strands of his tail. “He did not much care for us, but he took us outside to play after a few days and tossed us around. It was unfortunate,” and the Skin Horse sighed, “for he forgot to pick us up and left the three of us alone on the ground at dinner time.”
To the Rabbit, who had never set eyes upon the outside, this was a terrifying thought. “All alone!” he exclaimed. “Only the three of you!”
“Not even us three,” the Skin Horse said. His tiny square teeth showed as he talked. After all the years in the nursery they still gleamed, sturdy and tough. The Rabbit had seen the Skin Horse use his teeth to tear at errant bits of paper more than once. “We were scattered, and though I tried my best I could not find the others even after many hours. The Boy found only me later and the both of us despaired terribly. I was bruised from the fall, and I don't think the marks will ever disappear. If you look here-“
The Rabbit looked, and indeed, on the Skin Horse’s right haunch he could see tiny harsh impressions, where pebbles must have dug into the coat. The shapes were so precise that the Rabbit wondered at how they almost resembled hoof marks. Then he chided himself for such a silly thought, because surely the Skin Horse wouldn't have spent his lost time kicking himself to look like he was in a fight. He couldn't have been able to kick himself anyway.
“I would not like to have been left alone,” the Rabbit said. How cold and terribly open it must have been. Here in the nursery, he was at least among other toys.
“It was a long time ago,” the Skin Horse said. “The Boy was kind to me after that, as I was the only horse he had left, and grew to love me. That love was enough.” He smiled, very quietly, very secretly.
How very Real the Skin Horse was, the Rabbit thought. How very wise, and knowledgeable, and kind. He wriggled a little closer, as if he too could also grasp something of the Skin Horse’s memories, being loved wholly by the Boy’s Uncle when the Uncle himself was a Boy, a love born out of such distressing loss.
The Rabbit said, “How wonderful that he loved you so much!” He gazed at the Skin Horse. The back of his brown coat had been stroked so often that it had worn thin; below, he could see patches of black and white. They stretched over his back oddly, rather ill-fitted.
“Yes. It was then that he named me,” the Skin Horse said, and the Rabbit thought of that moment where a horse became the Skin Horse, repeated out loud, “Skin Horse,” and let the words roll around in his mouth, soft and gentle.
“My skin doesn’t hold for long, I admit,” said the Skin Horse. “I've had to replace it in some areas from time to time. It's fortunate that I have reserves; they kept me going until I became Real. But regardless of the color-why, it doesn’t matter anymore. He loved me as his Skin Horse, his only horse left, and made me Real, and when you are Real-“
His eyes were very bright beads, set in his shabby head, and when the sunlight was caught by them they shone dark and content. "You will never be ugly to the one who loves you, even if you are not made of all you used to be."
Rec post going up later, once I finish all the HTML coding for it. (Because I do not care for rich text editor at all, grrr.)