Writing is hard.

Inherently, it is an irrevocably and deeply personal act.

It requires, in order at least to be anything “good,” a unique sort of bearing of the soul that is less necessary within some other art mediums. Save for scientific papers written purely to convey information to the public or a board of well learned professors and researchers; divulging the many secrets of the world to groups who merely wish to peer in and gaze in rapturous wonder at things that they cannot comprehend, as well as those who are knowledgeable enough to call out anything that strikes them wrong as dogshit; anything written that does not in some way divulge the heart of the creator is rightfully and quickly discarded.

There is no other true metric from which to distinguish good prose from bad prose. It is abstract in its entirety. Words on a page are nonsensical scribbles on a white canvass, scrawling out some form of meaning that our brains spend thousands of calories every second to decipher and comprehend. Assuming that the person in question can even read, or knows the language the words are encoded in.

Truly, prose only really exists within the mind, and as such the meaning of any specific piece is subjective to every person who consumes it. According to some thinkers this is a given; that media in general -much less a written work- is a dance between the creator and the consumer. Both work together to generate what is hopefully a beautiful routine, that which we call a creative work’s meaning, through a delayed sort of communication.

In short, “just be yourself,” is the best advice anyone can be given.

So inauthentic prose is worthless. A cynical attempt at appealing to a larger market a creator thinks will hear them if they speak a certain way; if they would adopt an unfamiliar dialect that is appealing to their target’s ear. Altering the cadence of their tongue to draw the attention of others less intimate than a friend or a lover.

Not that this is wrong; as I have done it myself, and I am hardly capable of making mistakes, or committing any wrongdoing. But that when it is done badly, it is painfully clear to anyone; even those fools with the media literacy of a half dead frog.

Think for a moment of Lovecraft; a pitiful worm who played at being a man for a time, or this century’s latest hack; an deviant who’s more obsessed with the bodies of women out of her league, than in figuring out more creative names than nigh racial slurs for her characters. Both of their works, steeped in their creator’s respective worldviews, and boosted largely due to the luck of being discovered by just the right people at just the precise time to spread the most. Even as riddled with horrendously bigoted presumptions and errors in critical thinking the creations these two authors have wrought are, their creations do still resonate and have resonated with billions of people on this earth.

The works written by these two specifically encompasses an earnest part of their disgusting hearts. These words are fully and completely theirs before they are anyone else’s. Lovecraft’s work captured a deep, unconscious terror shared by many humans; of the unknown, and anxieties about the potential that the pursuit of knowledge had to shed light on things better left alone. Cosmic monstrosities and unfathomable horrors were made manifest as metaphor and parable for the ‘terrors’ of brown people, and because he wrote so honestly from his own self- because he spun his tale with earnest, focused, confidence that he had something new to say- his creations resonated with the heart of the world.

And that is all you need to create truly. To believe you have something new -conducive- to say, and then speak.

She-Who-Wields-SLAPP-Suits-Most-Disingenuously’s tales did the same with their tones of found family, and love; a pitifully shallow understanding of justice, humanity, and the world at large -though it was an honest show of what little she knows-; and just barely filtered racism against seemingly everyone she could think of. The (supposed) desire to reach a child’s heart with warmth and grant them grand adventures of sorrow and triumph; filtered honestly, even through the disgusting lens of a deeply sad individual; has enraptured most of a generation worldwide, and would have lived on long after her if she hadn’t stripped away the only good parts of what she had to say when opening her mouth again.

They are artists whose popularity speaks darkly of the world their creations reside in, because of how much of themselves lies in their work. Because in order for a work to reach someone’s heart; that heart must reflect that work in some way. So, what horrible a place this must be that such cowardly and pitiable words could spread so far; that they could so powerfully resonate even now that we know of the depth of their author’s natures, that the powers of privilege gave such people the opportunity to fill pages with their shit.

The way one must meld their heart with a page in order to produce such works requires an intense amount of vulnerability that simply isn’t possible for many writers, much less anyone else.

Curiously, the same qualities of the world that allowed the works I mentioned to resonate so well, are the same that make this kind of vulnerability impossible to achieve.

There are so many gates that bar it.

Anxieties within a creator around their ability to skillfully realize their own heart; fears of both success and failure and the pain that either can cause; manifest as powerful bindings against an author’s hand.

Manifested self-loathing and devaluing of one’s thoughts, kill many a magnum opi before even the first completed daydream of a work can be had.

Scintillating stars are stamped back to soot by comets, screaming their pain wildly, and with insistence; through stormy nebulas troubled with stress disorders. Minds that would otherwise have shone on our world for generations upon generations long after their own, if not shone immortal, are cut tragically short.

Still more growing creators fade without fanfare, not even a formal finale; because the earth that held their seed was too barren, too dry, too acidic, too cold, too loose, too harsh; for them to take root, much less flower. These are smothered, externally by one’s material conditions.

It is possible to create before besting these gates. It is possible to create work that displays a true mastery of the craft. It need not bear your soul. High skill can still be flat and soulless, and sometimes even something that will sell. But to reach even one other’s heart from through these barriers is an impossible dream for most, because sales and good work are not always synonymous.

And when your belly is far from full you can be hard pressed to choose the latter over the money and food from sales.

Disturbingly, those who have the unique luck to have been able to ignore these barriers often take precautions to ensure no one else is afforded the scant few opportunities to catch up to them that may exist. Or else they are possessed with a perverse need to behave as though their success is borne completely from their own strength; to model themselves a hero who has overcome the barriers that have stopped or killed so many others before them, rather than the truth. That they are one of the few able to have skipped the crushing barriers most of us face entirely. This is always done either intentionally, or as byproduct of acting from pure personal interest.

The tale of the underdog and overcomer, is the most appealing to those who have not needed to overcome anything. Oft, in my opinion, out of guilt for not having needed to. Though a more cynical reading implies a far greater malicious intent. For if the prevailing line of thought of a society supports the idea that any can escape the barriers I’ve referenced on their own if they would just work hard enough — if they would just self flagellate harder for their work- then the true successes through these barriers become mundane, norms, unworthy of praise, while failure becomes shameful.

If these odds ‘aren’t real’, if overcoming them is easy, then they cease to be considered odds. The barriers become accepted as a simple part of life, and if they are just life, why change them? Why fix what ain’t broken?

So, today when we are all so aware of all of these issues that I can paraphrase and only hint at their existence here and there, layered through uncomfortably and needlessly complex prose, and still not lose my audience-

What are we supposed to do?

I wrote this text with the intent to wrap it up in a neat, and uplifting bow. To make something full of sparks, bright and shimmering; that stung maybe a little upon first being opened, but ultimately was supposed to fill you — dear reader- with a rejuvenated will and energy to create. Or at least, that was my intent.

But when I started this piece, it was in the midst of a hunger fueled depression. Food insecurity and malnutrition have been a perpetual issue for me throughout my life, and only the salience and knowledge that adulthood brings, taught me just how much this has affected me through my most formative and even recent years.

How hunger, the kind that comes while knowing you can’t ever be full; lest you deplete too quickly today whatever you have left, or wind up taking the last of what little lingered to be passed around from another’s mouth; affects you when it is an ever present staple in your life.

How that gnawing hole in your psyche warps the person you are; lensing your psyche while it absorbs most of the finer details that make up you, until very little is left. Just like hunger, the rest of these barriers I’ve mentioned ‘lens’ a person. The parts of them that make it out of the influence of their struggles are damaged and distorted, often to the point of being indecipherable. Imagine trying to write; to create anything; under these conditions.

Now this written work is one of the first, if not only times, these conditions have borne something more than an intangible despair and bitterness for me. What little else I’ve managed to make since this began has been thanks to the nature of my most recent job or acute assistance from friends, gifting me food so I could think clearly long enough to write anything.

Awareness of the fact that many people; not only do not even have this much aid at their behest- but that every bit of aid I have been given, most against my will, takes resources that friends of mine might have been able to use for themselves; has made it impossible to leave behind the despairing tone of this written work.

More upsetting, there is no amount of hard work by an isolated individual that can overcome these barriers. There are no special chosen ones, or “Great men/women” who rise up in the face of adversity, no “Übermensch.” Those are fairy tales used to placate people not lucky enough to be more than a member of the exploited class. We conflate doing back breaking work without complaint with high moral fiber in this world, to nothing but the detriment of anyone who listens to it. The social pressure this creates is nothing more than a whip, and one that has beaten billions of lives into meaningless deaths.

It is frustrating that the American dream is not dead, but rather an idea like the man Oz the Great and Powerful. The pressure to work oneself to death while only being able to operate at less than half one’s capacity; in service of chasing an unsustainable and wholly unreasonable past ideal; is as cruel to perpetuate as it is stupid.

There is no way to reword this alphabet soup into something uplifting without losing the honesty I need to speak with here. There is no resplendent resolution, the chord I sing is simply a minor one.

Another way of saying that, in short:

Circumstances outside of all of our individual control subtly ‘conspire’ to bring about disaster from multiple fronts; Racism, queerphobia, misogyny, xenophobia, the halo effect, selfishness and greed, and most versatile- class/casteism. All of these ruin lives before they start- overt malice optional. All of these, horrid flavors of abusive magical thinking that have been passed down from one generation to the next; a sick game of hot potato trailed on over millennia and ‘cross oceans, mountains, and deserts. Each enforcing the idea that deviation from the; white, cis, neurotypical, fit, straight, model is a mortal sin unquenchable; punishable by exponentially mounting degrees of suffering unto death for each compounding deviation made from the mold. Each additional layer of suffering leads to mental anguish and turmoil, that can make a mind difficult to navigate for the one possessing it.

So a medium that explicitly requires maintaining strings of complex thought, consistently; while weaving in enough of one’s personal expression to be enticing to an audience starved of personal connection and gain a following -much less be considered decent- becomes extremely difficult to partake in. Even for one that might be particularly talented in using said art form.

Or in short: Writing is hard.

I’m a djinn with really bad manners and extremely nimble fingers. I upload my thoughts, both dirty and profound here, and on my blog page below. Soon, I’ll whisper them into your ear for you. If you’re into that, clap and follow me. Better, subscribe to my email list so you never miss a post. Even if I mysteriously disappear.

Originally published at http://belledjinn.com on March 10, 2022.

This is a factual and simple statement just as much as it is a clever rhetorical slogan, and if you’ve been on the internet for long enough you’ve probably heard it thrown around once or twice. There is no way to ‘consume’ or spend in a way that is morally correct, on an individual level, under the conditions of [late-stage] capitalism. Any purchase you make under the system of capitalism does little but feed into the system as is. Buying from “Ethical company A” who’s products are more expensive than normal because they use a less harmful way of producing their products as opposed to “Badcompany” who is cheaper because they use filler in their products and produce them with child labor, won’t save the world and end capitalism. This is because the market still provides “Badcompany” with more than enough buyers who don’t care about the moral depravity of the firm, and even still more who simply can’t afford to buy from Ethical company because their jobs don’t pay them enough to afford anything else.

In fact, this becomes just as bleak even for the “middle class” and privileged individual. Because we live under “late-stage” capitalism as described by economist Werner Sombart in his book Der Moderne Kapitalismus published in 1902, (is essentially a point in capitalism where the “free market” has all but dissolved) both “Ethical company A” and “Badcompany” may be both owned by “Bigcompany” which completely denies even the choice between them.

The market forces at play are far larger than any one person can affect on their own by simply being a conscious shopper. The system is too big now, too robust against injury for a pinprick to matter.

This seems bleak, but the statement is often intended to be one of comfort, something to help those who care about issues such as this steel themselves when uttered by responsible socialists, anarchists, and the like. It’s useful as a warning against becoming paralyzed with choice anxiety over something that cannot be controlled alone, and an encouragement to simply focus on stretching your currency as best as you can.

This however says nothing of collective action, or many thousands of pinpricks at once so to speak; and it is this issue which brings me to the point of this article, which is to issue a suggestion to allies and activists online.

*Stop using this phrase out of its proper context to sneer at “liberals” for not being radical enough like you’re winning a race. It’s not helpful, it’s just counterproductive to our movement as a whole, idiots.

“There is no ethical consumption under capitalism” speaks to the actions of unorganized individuals acting alone for the reasons described above. In spite of this though, I can’t scroll a whole screen across a social media platform without someone complaining about Gen Z “wasting time” on trying to “cancel” Chick-fil-A for being homophobic.

Online “leftists” love throwing out the phrase in the face of people actively organizing online who have no group directing them. Their assumption being that, because it’s just people on the internet organizing in a decentralized way instead of the good old folks at the IWW* or other organizations dedicated to assisting the proletariat(working class(middle, upper middle, poor, blue collar, white collar class workers) people), the efforts being made are somehow less valid or worthwhile because there is no clear leader.

I see it too often and quite frankly, it’s the most irksome and unhelpful take(opinion or perspective on a topic that is held by a person) one could have as any kind of anti-capitalist(someone who does not agree with, and works to act against the economic system Capitalism). Thinking like this, or rather, refusing to think further than the surface of this phrase; serves no purpose to anyone besides absolving the speaker of their responsibility to act on the basis that no one has “started the revolution.”

The revolution need not be “professional” nor tidy. It need only be effective, efficient, and accessible.

In our current age, that largely means the main hurdle to organizing -outside of radicalizing people to act in their own best interests in the first place- is establishing the communication necessary to make it happen. To this end, the internet is an exceptionally useful if not the only, depending on location, tool available; and this is true for a number of reasons. The most obvious of which is that, at least in the U.S, physical transportation is not easily accessible.

And it’s no wonder. Decades of lobbying against public transit initiatives from automotive companies and systematic divestment from public infrastructure have ensured that the average American has pretty much no way to travel around the land they call home, on a local, state, or national level without a personal vehicle and (depending on location and destination) a massive time investment. A large chunk of us who’re able-bodied between the Z and Y generations don’t own cars or have full licenses since the oldest of us are only just barely entering our 20s, and for millennials who can drive gas prices and the time investment I mentioned are too prohibitive to manage for non work related trips or very rare excursions.

At the time of tertiary editing, filling a 45 gal tank can put you out almost $200 USD (According to AAA on 8/17/2021)

This is of course doesn’t even mention the worldwide plague ravaging the planet right now. Nor the effects of climate change tearing apart communities and homes across the globe. Both sets of environmental factors that have largely restricted most reasonable, lucky, and living people to their homes or otherwise prevented them from physical travel.

Additionally, unreasonable hours and subpar pay press a mental toll on members of the working class across all generations. When one is constantly stressed from work and the uncertainty of our ability to afford basic necessities, in addition to the complexity that mental health problems besides depression can add, there isn’t much mental energy available for traditional organizing as well. ( 2019 rates of treatment for mental health, Increases in depression since the start of the 2020 pandemic)

To be clear, I am not writing this to say that decentralized efforts without a clear figurehead are the only viable or even the best form of political organizing because among the benefits to organizing digitally like this; besides-

1- Digital organizing without figureheads or clear “leaders” is more sustainable to the revolution as a whole because there is no singular person or group of people whose guidance the movement is reliant upon. Ergo, if one or a segment of activists “disappear” as has happened historically so often ( A handy list of some of the *known* murdered activists in the original Civil Rights era) and is still happening even today ( An article on the “Mysterious deaths” of Ferguson Activists); then the movement as a whole can be relatively undamaged. No momentum will be lost as result of a single member being taken from us, or even some members falling away from activism as a whole for unknown reasons. In addition to the boon of energy that rallying behind fallen allies can bring for those locally connected, the show continues without the taint of a personality cult, regardless of set back.

2- Digital organizing with or without figureheads is significantly safer for everyone involved.

It is a well known fact that our government acts to silence singular activists and organizations who grow prominent enough for people to rally behind them out of fear of the tangible change their continued influence would bring ( Afro Post Modern’s take on the topic, Stanford U’s historical summary on the topic). Adding the layer of anonymity that digital spaces allow to our activism makes it that much harder for pigs and their associates to locate and harm us while we plan. Fake accounts and emails on social media sites have to be sifted through for legitimacy, chatrooms on encrypted channels, firewalls have to be worked around and bypassed, and sensitive information can be faked or deleted as necessary.

The odd mix of activists and trolls that made/make up the collective “group” Anonymous used techniques like this for much of their most prominent time in the 2010–2014 era, and much to the chagrin of their targets was largely unaffected by our unjust law enforcement’s attempts to discover and catch them at any stage of their activity, much less during the organizing phase. ( A short list of 8 events credited to Anonymous, a more complete dramatized timeline of their exploits)

3- Many of the systems that oppress us have digital aspects or are entirely online. Organizing in the same space cuts out travel time, and makes our activism more effective when it involves these aspects of the machine we rage against.

4- Organizing like this simply requires less energy depending on the nature of the actions being taken. Digital activism that involves getting people riled up on Twitter into boycotting a movie or company for (x) infraction, takes less than two minutes for anyone writing a tweet, and can propel upwards of billions of people into action. Because it’s simple and easy, and when it works it feels good.

Small wins like that help get people excited to work on small but slightly bigger and bigger projects that can be extremely helpful to the working class as a whole; and that’s in addition to pulling more people into activism! Which, ultimately, should always be the goal.

-There are some potential downsides.

Working in a digital space effectively can be difficult for our more technologically challenged allies, and the internet is not always available everywhere that direct action is needed yet. Furthermore, asking allies who are comfortable doing nothing but paying lip service to a cause and fantasizing about a revolution they refuse to start themselves; to do the bare minimum like avoiding a company’s products where possible, might upset and require them to think a little more critically about their consumption habits.

And we wouldn’t want that, now would we?

But it is undeniable that it is an effective tool; and that fact remains true whether the particular bit of action being discussed is roleplaying Anonymous’ greatest (helpful) hits, or cajoling people on social media into following through on a boycott for a specific “Badcompany.”

So, maybe think a little more critically about how you use slogans, Comrade.

Thoughts, concerns, or counters? Drop ’em in the comments as long as you can be cordial, I might address them later with a response.

I’m a djinn with really bad manners and extremely nimble fingers… For writing. And lots of ideas. My favorite colors are lavender on obsidian, and my favorite animals are cats, crows, ravens, and tentacle monsters. Fun fact, I’m a tiger in the Chinese zodiac.

Originally published at http://belledjinn.com on March 8, 2022.

In the forefront of the room, obviously having been turned around to face the fire, was a couch with a pair sharing a book. Only one was truly focused on the story by now though, the other -a tall brown-skinned woman with box braids down to her waist, wearing a cream colored nightgown- was sneaking glances at the flame tender.

“Mhmm…” Her thin brows furrowed beneath the bangs her braids made.

The man crouched over the fire said nothing. Either she hadn’t gotten his attention, or was too subtle to be heard.

She tried again. “Curious! But okay.” A little more obnoxiously this time.

“Oh, is the game afoot Sherlock?” He taunted, not turning around.

“Mhm. It’s the case of, the non-girl scout who played with fire and burned, the house that isn’t paid off yet, down.”

“Oh wow, that sounds amazing. I hope you figure it out.”

“Sure is. I’m working on figuring out the motive, right now.”

“Y’know.” The other person lying on the couch suddenly snatched the book from the woman’s hands, not that she noticed. “You two could just play spades again to tie break!” They sing-songed while they settled back into reading.

“No way!” The man was immediate and firm in his protest, snorting as he made another fruitless stab at the logs, trying to coax them into a stable flame. “I beat Jamie and won fair and square, so now I get to be the fire kee-”

“I wouldn’t have agreed if I thought you were serious! I’m not just goofing off when I’m tending the fireplace, it’s a technical skill!” The woman fumed, flinging her hands about. “You keep fucking around with it and you’re gonna burn yourself, or the house down, and we don’t have insurance on either of those.”

“It is not! You’re just mad you lost, and now you won’t teach me the trick to it!” This time the man spun around to squabble back, whipping his raven locks around his face in the process while he tried to keep finagling with the fire behind him.

“There is no trick to it, Jackson! It’s just a ski-”

“That’s alright- Keep your secrets! “ He turned back around, waving his free hand dismissively.

Still listening passively while they read,Mill let out a snort at this while Jamie ground her teeth. It didn’t take longer than a second for petty, cosmic retribution to kick in though.

“I’ll figure it out myself-! And Mill and I will be warm in the New Year.”

No sooner did he turn back and those words passed his lips, than- “Shit!” And the clang of metal on cobblestone followed.

Jamie froze first and cut her eyes at the man, now sucking on his burned fingers. First, out of worry he’d been hurt, and then after letting go of a quiet breath -with the kind of conceited smirk that she couldn’t have been any better worn than by a self satisfied cat-. “Oh no, poor baby. Your fing-ies.” She said, saccharine.

Jackson stared back, caught somewhere between a pout and indignance, before he rolled his eyes and stood up. “Yeah, I think I’m gonna ice ‘em.” He sighed. “You wanna take over the fire Ja-”

“-Sure!” Braids streaming out behind her like a victory flag, the amazon vaulted over the couch and sailed to a stop in front of the fireplace, promptly scooping up the hot poker and tongs like a child with a new toy. “I was wondering when you’d ask.”

“Wiseass.” Jackson stuck his tongue out.

Jamie responded in kind, tugging her bottom lid too, before she turned back around to tend to the flame.

Defeated, in a way, Jackson began stalking towards the bathroom to find a rag to use for ice. As he passed by the couch, he caught the tail end of Mill snickering again.

“Find a comedy or something?”

“Just a pair of dweebs.” He said, eyeing Jackson out of the corner of her eye.

Jackson made a face like a bowl of sour milk on cold cereal. “Dweeebs?” He dragged the word out like a kid with a wilted vegetable. “Who the fuck says ‘dweeb’? You sound like fucking millennial.”

“Dweeb is not a millennial word! That’s like… Gen X’er at best.” Mill shot back, straining to keep his face straight.

“No no, that’s like Mean Girls 2000’s era shit- dweeeeb” Mason dragged the word out again as he threw it back. “And now you owe me an apology for subjecting me to that trauma.”

“Wha- Trauma?”

“Yes! Trauma, for assaulting me with that early 2000’s cringe bullshit.” He waved his burnt fingers in front of Mill’s face. “My delicate, injured, sensibilities make me exceptionally susceptible to cringe. I could faint at any second.”

“Curly and Moe! ” Jamie snapped, her face burning profusely. “I am still in the room!”

This sent both of the ‘stooges’ into a round of giggles.

“Okay, Mom! We’ll pipe down after our nuggies.”

More raucous laughter erupted from the pair at this, eliciting a snort of further annoyance from Jamie.

Now with tears pricking her eyes, Mill said, “No no no babe, Mummy’s right. We have to respect our elders.”

“Oh yes right of course, our wise old elders must be protected from harm or slights against their ever growing and vastly ancient pool of knowled-”

“Boy, I am literally five years older than both of you!”

This only kicked off another round of laughter.

“Shaddup! And go put some ice on those roasted sausages already, Mr. Patient!”

“Hey! I’ve got a serious injury here!” Jackson thrust his hand out with another pout, then wiggled his two -barely first degree burns- daintily for added effect.

“Then go soak them in an iced towel and quit moaning about it.” She huffed.

Mill snickered again. “You can soak things in a towel?”

“Must be her dementia setting in, what a sad, terrible, horrible, soulfully egregious fate for our darling sweet littl-”

“GIT!” Jamie roared, finally turning around to throw a twig from the kindle box at the man.

“Aiie! I’m too hot to be throwing those coals at, we’ll spark and set the house on fire!”

This finally drew -almost- drew a laugh from her. Jamie snorted and covered her mouth at his comment, but when Jackson started to open his mouth again though, she still raised a fistful of twigs/firewood as a warning. Unwilling to be stuck picking the twigs out of his hair later, the man stuck out his tongue and skittered away.

Now victorious, Jamie “Harrumphed” to wipe the grin off her mouth, and turned back to the fire. With Jackson gone, Mill was without material, and so they tried to catch their breath again while the girl scout turned back around to her flames. Then, it was quiet for a moment.

Just as Mill managed to pick back up their book again though, tragedy struck.

Jamie muttered under her breath, “Hooligans.” And immediately -naturally of course- Mill died.

Jamie, their unwitting killer, turned around to see what had wrought such terrifying -and cacophonous- devastation. “Oh, now what?”

Barely able to get the words out while they cackled wildly, Mill managed; “N-nothing, just the ever present march of time and your aging mi-”

“Oh my god, shut up.”

Another cackle, this one starting as a shrill shriek before breaking down into throaty howls, leapt out of him. “Wh- ho-who says-” Her laugh overtook their taunting before they could finish, and they dropped his book again. “Hooliga- you fuckin’ geezer!”

A moment passed, punctuated by Mill’s laughter, and methodical scraping from the Jamie working at the fireplace. Then-

“Alright, chuckles. I get it now.” The fire, now giddily roaring, was abandoned as Jamie stood up and cracked her knuckles.

“Y-you’ve- HA! Finally accepted your-”

“Yup! I’m an ancient being with knowledge from before the age of stars.” She advanced on the couch with a sneer on her lips, and her fingers splayed and a wriggling. “And so, more than a match for a young upstart who has barely seen their first millennia.”

“Huh?”

The CRASH that followed, was muffled partially by the couch, just like Mill’s new cries of- “Help! Help oh gods help!” Were. Mill’s cackles turned to shrieking laughter, and Jamie’s campy “Evil Queen” performance was almost drowned out by them.

“There is no one who can save you now wench! You asked for this! Demanded it- this rage this ire! You brought it upon thee, if only thee had not been such a sniveling wretch!”

“Agh! Qui-quit! Jackson! Get her, I’m gonna pee-ah hahaha!”

Jamie, and her long, spindly fingers, had Mill trapped on the couch under a tickling assault, pinning her down to the tiny space with her powerful thighs. “Aahagh! You can’t do th-wagh-is! I have rights!” They yelped, fruitlessly.

“Says you~!”

“-Hey y’all! Did we really put everything in the wash this morning?” Jackson called, seemingly summoned by Mill’s cackling and whining.

Jamie looked up casually, unimpressed with Mill’s futile attempts at resistance. “Yeah, wh-” And then suddenly froze.

Mostly relieved to no longer be under siege, Mill waited to catch his breath before they looked up too. “Ah- my faithful her-Oh…”

Jackson stood, no longer wearing the unbuttoned shirt and jeans he’d worn most of the night; at the edge of the couch in a French maid’s uniform. An authentically made uniform rather than a cosplay, it was layered and everything sat stiff as he moved, its crisp make adding… Something else to the fit.

It was Mill’s though, and so didn’t fit. But the way the white ruffles stretched over his pecs, and the sleeves strained around his arms made it not really matter that much.

“oh-”

“Legs~.”

Jackson looked down, and then back up with a sheepish expression. “Ah, right. Uh, I spilled water on me when I was getting the ice and had to change, but I can’t find any of our jea- ”

Jamie and Mill exchanged a hungry look.

“Maid’s don’t need pants, come here.” They both commanded, their speaking in unison giving their voice an odd and uncomfortable quality.

“Your wish is my command~” Wearing a grin now, Jackson shuffled forward.

Too slow for her, Jamie dragged him onto the couch impatiently by the hips. Then slipped her head beneath the petticoat of the dress , and the man’s cock into her mouth- in one motion, drawing a groan from his lips.

“H-hungry, huh-?”

Positioned as he was now, Mill’s mouth was breaths away from the cake his borrowed costume had been hiding, and they made quick work of using it to help quiet his sass. “Shhhummmmp-” they mumbled into him; the hum of their lips sending electricity rippling up the man’s spine.

Around his steadily hardening rod, Jamie swirled her tongue. Soft, it was small enough that the whole of it fit comfortably into the small of her mouth where she could play with it like a toy. Keeping her lips pressed to his base, she slid her tongue up and around Jackson’s shaft as if she were hand stroking it. Her tongue wrapped around him like a vine halfway up a pole, and she tugged firmly, coaxing him to grow and slide deeper into the wet recess of her throat.

“Gahhgh, f-fuck y’all-” He moaned; while slowly, steadily, he filled the woman’s throat. As he did, Jamie sucked in a deep breath and backed her way off of his cock until he was erect, and his tip sat pressed against the soft crest of her lips. Mill’s eating below, made him jerk slightly, pressing himself back past them. Graciously, she accepted the small intrusion and pursed her lips around the tip while she let her tongue work to free his spongy head from the foreskin holding onto it.

This elicited more moans and shudders from him, so Mill and Jamie had to hold his hips down to keep him pressed tight against both of their sucking, teasing mouths.

The sounds of wet slurping, Jackson’s moans, and the imperceptible patter of drool on fabric, -and then skin- as it ran down Jamie and Mill’s chins, soon overtook the happy roaring and crackling of the fire nearby. The holiday’s warmth had been forgotten in favor of heat.

Gradually, Jackson’s back stiffened and his grunts and groans grew more intense. Until at the apex, his eyes flew open and he cried out- “Ahhhhghh- Wait!” And slipped from the ensnaring envelope of mouths enveloping him, onto the floor, with a resounding POP! As he pulled free from Jamie’s lips.

“Huh?” Mill half mumbled, half whined in protest. Whereas Jamie did not so much complain aloud but simply give the man a look, that even with her mouth covered by her hand while it wiped away her spit mixed with Jackson’s leftover pre-cum, read impatience clearly through her narrowing eyes.

“I don’t wanna cum yet, I just thought about-” He paused to catch his breath, his dick jumping awkwardly around with each exhale. Clearly it was not excited about the edging either. “The candles-” He panted out.

Both Jamie and Mill stared at him confusedly for a moment, Mill going so far as to tilt her head owlishly to the side while Jackson stood, held up a finger to say; “Be right back!” And then disappeared into the house again.

An awkward few seconds passed before he returned, excitedly wielding an unspent, muted cherry colored candle on a plate. In his other hand, the candle’s presumed wrapper and a box of matches. Mill’s eyes lit up.

“Wax! You remembered!” Mill, upside down and still beneath Jamie, threw their arms up excitedly.

Jackson beamed; then caught sight of Jamie’s barely contained death stare. There had been a plan to reveal the wax on New Year’s Day after they had all awakened and surprise Mill together with wax and rope play together.

“Oh wow, what a great idea!” It had also initially been Jamie’s plan.

“Uh-ha heh… Y-yeah! I just thought it’d be cool since we’re already in the mood and the fire’s here…”

“Alright well hurry up!”

And so he did.

The next hour and a half came and and went with the tolling of the grandfather clock on Jamie’s phone, and satisfied sighs from the three.

“Fuuck…” Shuddering breaths escaping Mill seemed to deflate them, like a balloon sputtering into a pancake. When they started to take a breath, Jamie’s sharp cry-

“Aaa-h!” Stopped them cold, before they noticed the look of strained rapture caught on Jamie’s face, just inches above them. “D-don’t squeeze, I’m still g-go-Nngh!”

“Oh-heh heh, sorry baby.” Grinning, Mill pulled her down for another kiss, gentle but insistent. “I forgot how whiny you are when you’re not in charge.” Then clamped down on Jamie’s twitching, now oversexed, cock, just enough to draw another twitch and whimper out of the woman.

“Nnh, captured again by Kong, how cruel a fate.”

“Hehe”

Behind the both of them, Jackson bent down plant a kiss of his own on Jamie’s shoulder, then pressed her into Mill with his weight, to reach their forehead. “An enviable if cruel one.”

“Mhmm… Though it is one I shall endure-” Jamie smiled. “After all, they were very good for us tonight.”

“I was?” They asked leadingly, relaxing just enough to let Jamie’s sensitive little lady slip free.

“Oh very good indeed.” Jackson pressed down on Jamie’s hips, earning another small moan and squeeze from the girl that made him suck in a shuddering breath. When he bent down to plant small kisses along her shoulder and neck, she began to relax again. “Daddy and Mummy are both very proud at how much you took for us.”

“Nnnnhm, yeah… You were so-oooh, obedient. We’re not even gonna make you clean up your mess.” Jamie shuddered again as Jackson slid his dick free, and then leaned back against his chest to ride out the rest of her orgasm without teasing from Mill’s ‘kong’.

After planting another kiss onto Jamie’s shoulder, and then another onto Mill’s cheek while she panted, Jackson continued. “Yeah in just a second, we’re gonna give you a little bath, Baby.”

Jamie shifted, and wrapped her arms lazily, backwards around his shoulders. “Mummy… Just needs to time out for a little ‘for she can move.” She mumbled, truly slumping down into Jackson’s arms, exhausted. “That was… A lot for me too.”

With Jamie diminished and twitching intermittently; both Mill and Jackson exchanged glances, and then looked up at the lit candle drifting lazily through the air. It’s wax matched the splatters of cooled red on all of their skin, though now -despite being lit- not a drop slipped from the sparkling pool at it’s head.

“So, definitely enchanted then?” Mill asked.

“Oh yeah, for fucking sure.”

“Agh, we don’t have to go and figure out our houses now do we?” Jamie whined, slowly pulling herself free from the couch.

Jackson laughed. “I sure fucking hope not. I don’t look good in green.”

“Pfft, everybody looks good in green.”

“Did you forget last christmas’ Elf costume?”

Jamie cringed. “Okay, but that was a lime green. The snake bunker or whatever is fores-.”

“-I thought you looked hot!” Mill piped up, reaching their arms out as Jamie bent down to scoop them off the couch bridal style.

In unison, Jamie and Jackson said- “You don’t count.”

“Wha-?”

Shifting him in her arms to put them over her shoulder while she walked, Jamie said. “You still don’t get why we bought that dress had to die last year.”

“It was pretty! And you’re not supposed to burn that kinda stuff”

“The planet can forgive a small evil for vanquishing something far greater.” Jackson solemnly put his fist over his heart.

Jamie mirrored him, opting to palm Mill’s naked butt instead with her free hand.

Mill rolled their eyes. “Do we still have that red and blue hair dye?”

“Mhm?” Jackson raised an eyebrow.

“I’ve got a cosplay idea for next month.”

Puzzled, but undeterred, Jackson and Jamie brought Mill to the bathroom tub, already filled with lavender bubbles, and steaming.

“Ohoho, masterminds!”

“Something like that.” Jamie said, shooting Jackson a small approving look.

Of course he returned it with nothing but arrogance; setting his fists akimbo and flipping his hair indignantly. ‘Of course I got the bath ready, early. Gimme some credit at least!’

“Don’t stand around gawking at it, it’ll get cold y’all.” Is what he said though, sauntering past and sliding into the pleasantly scalding water carefully, turning himself into a living dream in the process. The pastels in the water in tandem with the cream of his skin giving him an ethereal quality; his long raven locks shimmering from being wet only added to the picture.

He shot the both of them a wink and smile.

Mill and Jamie both rolled their eyes, and after Mill shimmied from Jamie’s arms, they waded into the water as well. The both of them seeming to glow in the water beneath the dim lighting of the room, the soft brightness of the petals and bubbles on the water contrasting beautifully against their warm browns.

“Look at us, fine as life in a tub. We oughta be on playboy.” Jackson said with a grin.

Mill returned the smile. “I mean, if we did some digging I’m sure we could get in with ‘em.”

“Yeah well, lets get you clean before we think about anything else.” Jamie said, turning her head to hide her embarrassed look on her face before tossing Jackson a loofa and picking up one of her own.

Mill nodded, and obliged.

Jackson pulled them into his lap and went to work with his hands. He gently kneaded their shoulders with fingers, and began slowly working his way down their arms. Press and pull, press and pull following the steady rhythm of Mill’s heart as he went.

Wax slid off his body in tiny chunks while Jamie worked her thighs and legs, each bit releasing a bit of pressure as they let go of her skin and were enveloped by the steaming water. They caught the pieces as they slid off and threw them away.

After a few minutes, the three of them were clean, and they had the warm tub to relax in.

Content, Mill released a deep sigh. “Happy New Year, Jackson, Jamie. This was really fucking relaxing.”

“Happy Birthday.” Jamie corrected, popping a bubble lazily. “Don’t forget you’re twenty-eight now.”

“Shit you’re right.” Mill sat back and frowned, thoughts swimming in her head.

“The march of death comes for us all~” Jackson intoned, wriggling his fingers.

Absentmindedly, Mill nodded. “Something something, we all die?”

“Yeah, so quit callin’ me old-! I don’t like thinking about it!” Jamie stuck her tongue out. Then turned back to Jackson and jabbed her finger out. “Especially you! We oughta get you memory boosters after this.”

“Oh c’mon twenty-five is plenty old, I can have a memory lapse or two!” Jackson grinned and piled a mass of bubbles onto his hair.

“Wait- So that wasn’t planned?”

“… Ah, well-”

A digital commission artist, dutifully dressed in her uniform. Tangled, raven hair that hadn’t seen a pick that morning, tumbled over slight, brown shoulders. She wore a black pajama top with “The Sunny State” printed in bubbled blue lettering and little else, and the shirt itself was too big for her. So much so, that when she leaned forward, a dark brown nipple and the freckled boob it sat upon slid free from the top when the shirt shifted. The artist didn’t care much though.

Worrying her bottom lip between her teeth, she contemplated her computer screen and drawing pad.

Four days ago she’d gotten the request through Hublr, the strange love child social media site made from a pair of earth-based companies merging a few years ago. The request read:

Can you draw like… A um… Y’know, like just a porn scene for me? … It’s for my boyfriend.

Ever vigilant, the artist pressed for details. For her troubles she got a full color and shading, a better description of the scenario, and an unwanted reference photo to use on the fifty dollar commission.

Considering how much effort it’d taken to get the lady to actually say what she wanted, the sleep-deprived scribbler was a bit frustrated with herself for letting the awkward woman haggle her down from her normal price. She justified it to herself by deciding she needed the practice. Honeymoon or not, she’d promised her readers a new page of her comic by next month and she’d be damned if she had to read another, “why’s the cum look so weird” comment.

“I suppose I should be happy I’m getting paid for this at all.” She grumbled, furiously shrinking a blob of cum into oblivion with her eraser tool.

“Well that doesn’t sound like a very confident artist.” Said a yawning voice from behind.

Startled out of her focus, the artist jumped in her chair, knocking over her sketchbook and flinging her pen across the room.

The voice laughed at this and as the artist whirled around in her chair to see her snickering audience, the frown on her face slipped into a sheepish look of shame as the speaker came into view. A slightly taller woman with long, kinky, crimson hair, coffee brown skin, and blue eyes.

She wore little more than long white socks and a black shirt that matched her own and hovered just halfway down the woman’s hips, meaning her thicker pair of lips and the lemon tattoo that sat on her mons flitted in and out of view beneath her pyjama shirt with each step.

“I thought we agreed, nothing but house work on the honeymoon, Kitten.” Her wife teased, drawing close with a large and steaming mug of coffee.

“What, this? Safira, this s’not work.” The artist sputtered while the hot cup clacked into a resting position against her work desk. “It’s… Practice.”

Safira snorted and leaned over the raveonette’s chair so her breasts pressed against the smaller woman’s neck. “Mmh, awfully detailed for a practice sketch this early in the morning, kitten.”

“It’s certainly not making quality mon-” She stopped her griping short and froze, caught in her lie. “Er-”

Safira set her cheek against her wife’s neck and spoke in a husky voice. “Well then you won’t mind taking a little break then will you?” Safira said, brushing her lips gently against the woman’s ear as she spoke..

The corner of the artist’s mouth twitched, and she fought the urge to gasp, even as her nose rapidly turned burgundy. “We ah, kinda took a long break last night didn’t we?” She asked, and pulled Safira’s coffee to her lips and sipped the hot liquid.

“We did but…” Safira’s blue nails slid beneath the hem of the raveonette’s shirt and ran across her navel, sending a shiver up her partner’s spine that made her sit up straight and drew a soft moan from her full lips. “That doesn’t necessarily mean we need to stop, Cynah~” The redhead’s voice trailed off as the memory of nimble fingers and sweaty, slick, and desperate hips from last night returned to her mind, and a shameless grin stretched across Safira’s rosy pink lips.

Her wife’s impatient tone snapped her back to the present though.

“Still there mizz Space Cadet?” She said, having set down the halfway drained coffee cup and detailing the stretched curve of a woman’s breast being drawn into the mouth of another, past nibbling teeth that were stretched into a wicked and hungry grin. The girl being teased had triangular ears poking out the top of her head, and was sitting in a puddle while her lover drew her into her lap .

Cynah herself was hotter to the touch than her work. Afterall, Safira’s hands never left her partner’s skin; instead she had been absentmindedly trailing lines across her belly, often coming tantalizingly close to the woman’s breasts and drawing shudders and huffs and hisses of frustration from her kitten while she had been daydreaming.

She always underestimated how sensitive she was to Safira’s touch.

Safira’s eyes flickered to Cynah’s art for a moment as her eyes refocused and the heat building in her hips graduated from a warm coal to a hungry flame. She wouldn’t let her wife off the hook that easily though, not now. “I thought you wanted to practice?” She said, feigning surprise and starting to pull her hands out from the sitting woman’s top.

“I!” Cynah suddenly grabbed a hold of Safira’s hand through her pyjama shirt to hold it against the top of her hips but let it go again just as quickly, flustered. “I- Could be convinced to take a break…”

“Oh really?” Safira breathed her tease into Cynah’s ear, then took hold of the narrow tip between her teeth and bit down gently.

This produced a surprised squeal from the woman and turned her sweetly abused ear a deep red to match her nose. “Nnngh… Maybe.”

Safira bit down harder.

Cynah’s back arched so that her head nearly rested against Safira’s shoulder and squealed again. “Nyah-fuck! I mean, please Saffie?” She tried to trap the redhead’s hands under her top again and pull them to the swell of her chest, but Safira batted her hands away sharply.

She let go of the feline woman’s reddened ear for a moment to speak. “Sit still and I might be convinced too then, Kitten.” She commanded.

Cynah pouted at this for a second, then Safira bit down on the woman’s ear again, and her mouth fell open with a sharp cry. Safira bit harder this time and kneaded it between her teeth slowly while her fingers went back to tracing over her navel, and now brushing against the underside of her boobs intermittently while she worked the woman’s ear harder and harder between her teeth.

Cynah with her back straight in her seat, gripping it’s sides tightly while she tried her best not to squirm under her wife’s punishment and be obedient. Pitiful whimpers and moans flowed from her mouth freely though. Each one growing steadily in volume from the last and far more desperate for forgiveness. Gone was her snark, she was Safira’s Baby girl, her Kitten now, and what she most desperately wanted was her treat.

Occasionally, Safira would stop biting the woman’s ear to plant a small kiss against the nape of her neck. Though it would quickly turn into another bite even there, and a dark hickey against the brown of her skin in moments. Then she would be back to attacking the woman’s ear again dragging a new whimper out of her mouth and warming her skin and throwing juice to the twitching fire between her thighs.

Only minutes of punishment went by, but they seemed like hours for Cynah. Especially since anytime she was about to finish, Safira would stop suddenly, and let her stew in the stifled orgasm until it abetted before she would continue. Six releases were slain this way, each set the poor woman twitching and shuddering in her hair so her clit ground against the unforgiving pleather in a teasing union of pleasure and pain.

Starting from just a damp spot in her pyjama top, to a slickness that spread between her thighs. Punishment didn’t end there though. No, Safira didn’t finally stop until her wife’s shirt and the stool were so sopping wet that the artist’s squirming produced a wet slap against the pleather.

When she did, Cynah collapsed forward against her desk, both of her ears blood red and marked with purple teeth mark shaped bruises, out of breath, and twitching weakly.

Wet as she was, the woman’s top clung to her ass and her folds tightly, making them clear for Safira to see while Kitten caught her breath.

Safira caught her bottom lip between her teeth, then reached for Cynah’s hips. “Are you gonna keep breaking the rules baby?” She teased, tugging on Cynah’s hips so she sat up and set the artist’s head against her breasts.

Cynah nodded slowly and met the redhead’s hungry gaze. “No more working on honeymoon, I promise.”

“Good girl, now come here.”

Obediently, Cynah tilted her chin up and Safira met her lips with a gentle kiss and reached down with her free hand to cup Cynah’s kitty. The exhausted woman let out a weak moan from the touch and spread her legs in the chair as offering. She was ready for her treat.

Safira grinned into the kiss, then slid her tongue across and then past her wife’s lips as her fingers began their delicate task of handling the tired kitten in their care. Swirling her fingers steadily around the woman’s clit, produced soft moans from Cynah’s throat that tasted sweet on Safira’s lips. She would not tease her this time though, this was a treat. So the redhead slowly ramped up her pressure, rubbing around the swollen nub in steady circles that darkened Kitten’s pyjamas even further, until Cynah broke the kiss in a shrill cry that raised her hips off of the stool in savage bucking motions.

She threw her head back so it rest on Safira’s shoulder and cried out until she could spend no more breath from her lungs. Each time her hips bucked a short spray of juice leapt from her sex, and it poured down her thighs in a torrent until everything from her ass to her knees were soaked. Every orgasm Safira had confiscated from her as punishment ripped through her body now in force, and if it weren’t for her shirt, the juicy mess would be all over her computer desk. Instead, by the time that Kitten finished, she was wearing more pussy juice than she was top and the floor around her chair was nearly as sopping wet as she was.

Safira herself wasn’t soaked save for the slickness coating her thighs that had come from her own heat. Though she was definitely sticky with her favorite flavor of juice.

Even after Cynah stopped squirting, her hips still bucked and spasmed while Safira began to mash her clit with her thumb. When Safira began to tease at her entrance with her middle finger, Kitten mewled desperately. “Safira please, I-I can’t-!”

“Hm? What was that, Kitten?” Safira reached down with her free hand and pulled Cynah’s shirt up over her breasts so the soaking brown teardrops bounced free. “I don’t think I heard you right~” In that same motion, that hand’s thumb and pointer finger caught one dark brown nipple in a vice and tugged.

Cynah cried out, bucking hard into Safira’s hands and knocking falling out of her stool. Safira caught her by her hips before pitching forward and thrusting her ass backwards against Safira’s hips. This time her legs went ramrod straight and she squirted again, producing a short and powerful stream that soaked Safira’s hips and her socks so thoroughly they threatened to slide off of her long legs.

Then Cynah collapsed again, legs twitching uselessly while Safira held her up.

“L-lemons Ga-! Daddy, lemons! Please, lemons…” Cynah mumbled desperately. “I can’t take anymo-Nhn!” Another, smaller orgasm rippled through her right after and cut the woman off, prompting a small laugh from her wife.

Pulling her hands away from Cynah’s tired sex to help hold her upright so she could lean against her body, Safira crowed at the woman lovingly. “Good girl! You remembered this time! How about we get some water so you don’t forget what the rules are for the rest of the month again, hm?”

“Smartass.” Cynah mumbled sourly.

Safira pressed a soft kiss to the tip of her kitten’s sore ear, producing a shiver from the smaller woman, and continued. “And make sure you clean up that mess too.”

Cynah turned away with her face twisted into a pout.

“Okay…”