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juushikaGhost and Aaron: Master List | Next Update
Just a picture from the end of the day before.
Good morning, Mr. Butterfly.
Mr. Butterfly needed a name so: meet Marcel.
Ghost's painting has much improved, thank goodness—especially as he may become dependent on his art soon...
Cornelius objects to Aaron's housekeeping.
Aaron objects to Cornelius, full stop.
Cornelius has a point, though: this shit is nasty.
I nudge Aaron to a bit of housekeeping before Ghost has another meltdown.
(Aaron's hair is growing out. No worries, I'm sure Ghost'll chase after him with a pair of scissors before long.)
The evening boys go out to dinner for a change, and then settle down on a nearby bench to chat.
Aaron: So if, hypothetically I mean, some jewels ended up on that coffee table outside—
That'd be pretty cool, right? I'm thinking big jewels. Really big jewels. Hypothetically.
God help me, but I've grown fond of Aaron's mop-head.
Spontaneous cuddles please their creator because I'll be damned if that's not just the cutest thing.
The ghosts never do take well to one another, but they got along well enough for:
Hell yes, ghost v. ghost foosball. I have been longing for this since Gertrude first started playing.
There's no lost love between them when she kicks his ass. No love to lose, after all.
Aaron has the last of the leftover carbonara for breakfast and enjoys it—really enjoys it.
Ghost, making grilled cheese, would have him know that dude, he is not blind, and that is unnecessarily gross.
In the course of morning routines, the shower Aaron is using breaks, so he fixes it the old-fashioned way:
Violence which continues until function returns.
As soon as Ghost gets out of the shower, Aaron slips into the bathroom...
Wonder what he was thinking about during his own.
They're in there for a good long while, inches from the bedroom door...
And then Ghost's carpool honks outside.
Yeah, Aaron is not pleased.
Neither is Ghost. He goes into work just long enough to quit. This has been a long time coming.
No more coworkers to mock him. No more schedules. No more distractions from his boy or his art.
They'll scrape together the money somehow.
At home, they celebrate the good news.
Yeah, because this isn't creepy or anything.
It's odd—Cornelius was absent for so long but now he's around every night.
He appears and disappears about two hours ahead of Gertrude's 2am-7am schedule.
Ghost quitting his job is no reason for them to become hermits, though, so the boys pay a visit to the neighbors.
Asher and Dakota duke it out and Aaron thinks it is awesome—an argument he's not involved in, for a change!
Aaron is then accosted by this child-creature whose presence and speech confuses him.
Me too, actually. She came out of nowhere—the block is filled just with my own sims.
Meanwhile Nika, true to form, carries on an impassioned, largely one-sided conversation about, yeah, books.
Nika and Ghost got along really well, actually.
The boys hang out and socialize, make dinner for the family and grab plates themselves, and then:
Well I guess that solves the TV problem in the boys's household but seriously, Aaron.
What actually made it most amusing is that two people entered the room seconds after Aaron nabbed the TV. They sat down on couches, looked expectantly in the direction where the TV was formerly located ... and then got up and shuffled back out of the room.
Current klepto treasure trove: two outdoor chairs and a chess table, one armchair, one bench, two gravestones, one coffee table, one vase and one clock, a statue of the grim reaper, four lights, a television, and a car. Whew. Only the TV and car are stored in the house/garage; the rest occupy a convenient, surprisingly well-decorated sideyard.
The next morning with Aaron's hair growing increasingly shaggy, Ghost chases him down and demands that he cut his damn hair—but there's a bit of a battle over the style. The mop wasn't cutting it but Aaron had grown fond of having his hair in his face—and so they compromised.
They concur that this is a distinct improvement.
Then they play foosball. Lots of foosball. Because at the heart of this, what they are is best friends.
Stumbling towards a romantic relationship changes everything—but it doesn't change that.
Which is where I think I'll leave it for now.
I expected sex this time, I really did—but kept the boys busy and just didn't get around to it. It's odd—and here I ramble and go overly thoughtful considering this started with a video game (and this is massively navel-gazy and TL;DR. I am writing it because I need to screw my head back on straight. I will not be offended if no one reads it.): I went back and finally caught up on the comic Friendly Hostility, which I'd not read in over a year but, as the comic recently came to a close, completed over the weekend. And then I spent about two hours in tears and about twenty four hours feeling like I was trying not to think about a pink elephant except that the pink elephant was sitting right in front of me and also it had wild eyes and gigantic razor-sharp teeth and wanted to eat me.
(I joke a bit about what I call my obsessive personality type but in the end it really isn't all that funny. Obsessive thinking is the cornerstone of my anxiety—obsessive thinking is what I do. It's what I do with a new distraction or obsession, it's what I do with my most recent worry, it's what I do with my greatest fears. When something gets stuck in my head it will not leave, not on any schedule, not by any means. It will repeat and circle and haunt until I can think of nothing more and am shaking from the exhaustion of it.)
I've been reading the story of Collin and Fox back since the days of Boy Meets Boy. I identify in a lot of ways with Collin—his issues fitting in, his asociality, sometimes (crazy, I know) his asexuality. Fox for me has always been the means to Collin's end—not that he's a bad character but I just don't have much interest in him, don't identify with him, don't really care about him independently whereas I hold Collin very dear. And so towards the tail end of Friendly Hostility the relationship between the two of them starts to sour and derail, I had Collin's back. There's also the issue that development is interesting, status quo not so much: it is generally far more compelling to watch a relationship form than to watch one continue into its golden years. Long story short is that I was eyeing Collin/Arath, Collin and whoever his fit laundry-buddy is, for the thrill of new developments and for the sake of Collin's journey, Collin's improvement—
And all under the safe blanket that fantasy is fine where reality is secure, e.g. I can ship Collin/Arath because Collin has Fox, will have Fox; Collin is safe. And then I noticed that as I was approaching the end—that was no longer a sure thing. Collin was no longer safe. The comic may end on an ambiguous, hopeful note but what I felt was: Collin was not safe because I had taken his relationship for granted—and because I identify so with Collin, I felt unsafe. Fucking terrified is how I felt, actually. I take Devon for granted constantly and I hate it; our relationship has problems, always will (and knowing, objectively, that all do doesn't make it any easier); I would be devastated to lose him, for our sake, for his sake, for mine because I cannot function without him.
And then here I am telling the story of a couple falling in love, not being in love—with full knowledge that I probably won't continue telling it too much longer after they reach that plateau because what I'm doing is playing a game and the shiny attraction of new sims will pull me away eventually. I find Ghost and Aaron's story fascinating because it is new, semi-taboo, full of waiting and stumbling and nerves—precisely because it is developing, not status quo. But my total anxiety after completely Friendly Hostility has reminded me that a relationship is more than that. Does slashfic, told in pictures or otherwise, necessarily need to be? Of course not. But in my head it is right now very important that Ghost, that Aaron, be more than just two people falling in love because I find it exciting.
Sure, they're simulations. But (because of traits, programing quirks, projection) Ghost is a long-time outcast, an odd child, pale and restless and artistic, and a chronic failure. He goes to work and his coworkers mock him. He paints at home but doesn't have the heart to sell his work. He has lofty dreams of becoming a skilled painter, a proficient musician, but no confidence to ever achieve either. It is a huge step that he quit his job. Why? Because my key to happiness has been saying "fuck that" to expectations. I have no income and no education and survive on the goodwill of others and, sure, that's "failing"—but I can't succeed in the way that society expects, I tried that and I wished the whole time that it would kill me, and I'm done with it now. Now, I'm a loser. And I'm happy. I want that for Ghost.
Aaron is stronger than he thinks but not as strong as he acts: argumentative and impulsive, petty and destructive, and yet incredibly insecure. He wallows in his own mess, he pierces himself and dyes his hair, he kicks over trashcans because it lets him force his identity, unapologetic, upon the world—but it is also a shield he hides behind. If you offend someone you know exactly why they dislike you; if you befriend them only then can they can surprise you with betrayal. After all: if your family can do it, anyone can. He's worth the world. I know it. Ghost knows it. Aaron has no idea.
And then he went and kissed his best friend—a friend he takes advantage of, a friend he's lucky to have. And then he fell in love. Ghost loves him like a brother, rudeness and slobiness and all, and while he knows that this isn't the same sort of love it's as natural a progression as him for cutting their palms and sharing blood. But Aaron ... the progression of the relationship sits on his shoulders, and he's terrified of the weight. He constantly fucks up and offends Ghost because it's the only sure footing that he knows, and he fights wracking doubts with impulsive passion. He doesn't think he can pull this off but he can't not try.
It's not about quitting a job or falling in love. It's not about being best friends or lovers. It's about a life that contains all of those things and so much more in progression that doesn't end until they're both dead. I don't believe in perfect relationships or perfect endings, but I found out in reading Friendly Hostility that I want to—because what a pleasant surprise it would be to stumble upon both for myself! Development is as enticing as a fetish, it is why I'm so caught up in the story of this pair—and yet it's also fucking terrifying to remember that development never, ever ends. Aaron and Ghost's story will, Friendly Hostility did, but the characters persist because the stories that fiction tells us are very real.
Life is pain, highness. Anyone who says differently is selling something. Life is pain, and change, and risk. There are plateaus and it is too easy to take them for granted—but that action is also progression. It shook me like a ragdoll, the end of Friendly Hostility, because I wanted my enticing developing relationships and my safe stability, but movement and stillness cannot coexist, and it is stillness which is the illusion. This little sims-story of a nearly-autonomous romance isn't half so complex (and it's definitely not as big a deal as this epic-long ramble makes it seem). But I've been reminded that it's more than just my gay fetish played out in polygons. If these boys are telling a story, they're telling one not just about sexy kisses but about fear and imperfection and a surprisingly natural, beautiful romance despite the both.
Oh god, I'm sorry, I did not intend this to get nearly half as long as it is. I'll slip it under LJ-cuts but, yeah. I've been in odd headspace lately and I know no one may care about the boys and their under-the-covers woohoo except me, but: it's coming, it's important, it is not everything and it is not the end. (Even when this story ends.) Hot slash is awesome. I love hot slash. But Ghost and Aaron ... have become more than that, to me.
So where was I before I slipped down that unending spiral of words? Oh yes, hair! I love the hairstyle that Aaron had (and Ghost still does), but when I stumbled upon this new one I had to try it out. I intended it for Ghost but it looked awesome on Aaron—so I had to get him to the point of New Hair. It's nice to see Ghost and Aaron a bit more physically different but really what it comes down to is oooooh shiny hair. (But what really tickles me about the new hair—other than my outright love for it, of course—is that Aaron was inspired by a guy I know here in the real world and this hairstyle is eerily similar to one he used to have.)
But Juu, you say: We need portraits showing off Aaron's new hair! You never post enough pictures of him! Well, if you insist.
Call him emo and he'll probably punch you in the face.
Ghost and Aaron: Master List | Next Update
Just a picture from the end of the day before.
Good morning, Mr. Butterfly.
Mr. Butterfly needed a name so: meet Marcel.
Ghost's painting has much improved, thank goodness—especially as he may become dependent on his art soon...
Cornelius objects to Aaron's housekeeping.
Aaron objects to Cornelius, full stop.
Cornelius has a point, though: this shit is nasty.
I nudge Aaron to a bit of housekeeping before Ghost has another meltdown.
(Aaron's hair is growing out. No worries, I'm sure Ghost'll chase after him with a pair of scissors before long.)
The evening boys go out to dinner for a change, and then settle down on a nearby bench to chat.
Aaron: So if, hypothetically I mean, some jewels ended up on that coffee table outside—
That'd be pretty cool, right? I'm thinking big jewels. Really big jewels. Hypothetically.
God help me, but I've grown fond of Aaron's mop-head.
Spontaneous cuddles please their creator because I'll be damned if that's not just the cutest thing.
The ghosts never do take well to one another, but they got along well enough for:
Hell yes, ghost v. ghost foosball. I have been longing for this since Gertrude first started playing.
There's no lost love between them when she kicks his ass. No love to lose, after all.
Aaron has the last of the leftover carbonara for breakfast and enjoys it—really enjoys it.
Ghost, making grilled cheese, would have him know that dude, he is not blind, and that is unnecessarily gross.
In the course of morning routines, the shower Aaron is using breaks, so he fixes it the old-fashioned way:
Violence which continues until function returns.
As soon as Ghost gets out of the shower, Aaron slips into the bathroom...
Wonder what he was thinking about during his own.
They're in there for a good long while, inches from the bedroom door...
And then Ghost's carpool honks outside.
Yeah, Aaron is not pleased.
Neither is Ghost. He goes into work just long enough to quit. This has been a long time coming.
No more coworkers to mock him. No more schedules. No more distractions from his boy or his art.
They'll scrape together the money somehow.
At home, they celebrate the good news.
Yeah, because this isn't creepy or anything.
It's odd—Cornelius was absent for so long but now he's around every night.
He appears and disappears about two hours ahead of Gertrude's 2am-7am schedule.
Ghost quitting his job is no reason for them to become hermits, though, so the boys pay a visit to the neighbors.
Asher and Dakota duke it out and Aaron thinks it is awesome—an argument he's not involved in, for a change!
Aaron is then accosted by this child-creature whose presence and speech confuses him.
Me too, actually. She came out of nowhere—the block is filled just with my own sims.
Meanwhile Nika, true to form, carries on an impassioned, largely one-sided conversation about, yeah, books.
Nika and Ghost got along really well, actually.
The boys hang out and socialize, make dinner for the family and grab plates themselves, and then:
Well I guess that solves the TV problem in the boys's household but seriously, Aaron.
What actually made it most amusing is that two people entered the room seconds after Aaron nabbed the TV. They sat down on couches, looked expectantly in the direction where the TV was formerly located ... and then got up and shuffled back out of the room.
Current klepto treasure trove: two outdoor chairs and a chess table, one armchair, one bench, two gravestones, one coffee table, one vase and one clock, a statue of the grim reaper, four lights, a television, and a car. Whew. Only the TV and car are stored in the house/garage; the rest occupy a convenient, surprisingly well-decorated sideyard.
The next morning with Aaron's hair growing increasingly shaggy, Ghost chases him down and demands that he cut his damn hair—but there's a bit of a battle over the style. The mop wasn't cutting it but Aaron had grown fond of having his hair in his face—and so they compromised.
They concur that this is a distinct improvement.
Then they play foosball. Lots of foosball. Because at the heart of this, what they are is best friends.
Stumbling towards a romantic relationship changes everything—but it doesn't change that.
Which is where I think I'll leave it for now.
I expected sex this time, I really did—but kept the boys busy and just didn't get around to it. It's odd—and here I ramble and go overly thoughtful considering this started with a video game (and this is massively navel-gazy and TL;DR. I am writing it because I need to screw my head back on straight. I will not be offended if no one reads it.): I went back and finally caught up on the comic Friendly Hostility, which I'd not read in over a year but, as the comic recently came to a close, completed over the weekend. And then I spent about two hours in tears and about twenty four hours feeling like I was trying not to think about a pink elephant except that the pink elephant was sitting right in front of me and also it had wild eyes and gigantic razor-sharp teeth and wanted to eat me.
(I joke a bit about what I call my obsessive personality type but in the end it really isn't all that funny. Obsessive thinking is the cornerstone of my anxiety—obsessive thinking is what I do. It's what I do with a new distraction or obsession, it's what I do with my most recent worry, it's what I do with my greatest fears. When something gets stuck in my head it will not leave, not on any schedule, not by any means. It will repeat and circle and haunt until I can think of nothing more and am shaking from the exhaustion of it.)
I've been reading the story of Collin and Fox back since the days of Boy Meets Boy. I identify in a lot of ways with Collin—his issues fitting in, his asociality, sometimes (crazy, I know) his asexuality. Fox for me has always been the means to Collin's end—not that he's a bad character but I just don't have much interest in him, don't identify with him, don't really care about him independently whereas I hold Collin very dear. And so towards the tail end of Friendly Hostility the relationship between the two of them starts to sour and derail, I had Collin's back. There's also the issue that development is interesting, status quo not so much: it is generally far more compelling to watch a relationship form than to watch one continue into its golden years. Long story short is that I was eyeing Collin/Arath, Collin and whoever his fit laundry-buddy is, for the thrill of new developments and for the sake of Collin's journey, Collin's improvement—
And all under the safe blanket that fantasy is fine where reality is secure, e.g. I can ship Collin/Arath because Collin has Fox, will have Fox; Collin is safe. And then I noticed that as I was approaching the end—that was no longer a sure thing. Collin was no longer safe. The comic may end on an ambiguous, hopeful note but what I felt was: Collin was not safe because I had taken his relationship for granted—and because I identify so with Collin, I felt unsafe. Fucking terrified is how I felt, actually. I take Devon for granted constantly and I hate it; our relationship has problems, always will (and knowing, objectively, that all do doesn't make it any easier); I would be devastated to lose him, for our sake, for his sake, for mine because I cannot function without him.
And then here I am telling the story of a couple falling in love, not being in love—with full knowledge that I probably won't continue telling it too much longer after they reach that plateau because what I'm doing is playing a game and the shiny attraction of new sims will pull me away eventually. I find Ghost and Aaron's story fascinating because it is new, semi-taboo, full of waiting and stumbling and nerves—precisely because it is developing, not status quo. But my total anxiety after completely Friendly Hostility has reminded me that a relationship is more than that. Does slashfic, told in pictures or otherwise, necessarily need to be? Of course not. But in my head it is right now very important that Ghost, that Aaron, be more than just two people falling in love because I find it exciting.
Sure, they're simulations. But (because of traits, programing quirks, projection) Ghost is a long-time outcast, an odd child, pale and restless and artistic, and a chronic failure. He goes to work and his coworkers mock him. He paints at home but doesn't have the heart to sell his work. He has lofty dreams of becoming a skilled painter, a proficient musician, but no confidence to ever achieve either. It is a huge step that he quit his job. Why? Because my key to happiness has been saying "fuck that" to expectations. I have no income and no education and survive on the goodwill of others and, sure, that's "failing"—but I can't succeed in the way that society expects, I tried that and I wished the whole time that it would kill me, and I'm done with it now. Now, I'm a loser. And I'm happy. I want that for Ghost.
Aaron is stronger than he thinks but not as strong as he acts: argumentative and impulsive, petty and destructive, and yet incredibly insecure. He wallows in his own mess, he pierces himself and dyes his hair, he kicks over trashcans because it lets him force his identity, unapologetic, upon the world—but it is also a shield he hides behind. If you offend someone you know exactly why they dislike you; if you befriend them only then can they can surprise you with betrayal. After all: if your family can do it, anyone can. He's worth the world. I know it. Ghost knows it. Aaron has no idea.
And then he went and kissed his best friend—a friend he takes advantage of, a friend he's lucky to have. And then he fell in love. Ghost loves him like a brother, rudeness and slobiness and all, and while he knows that this isn't the same sort of love it's as natural a progression as him for cutting their palms and sharing blood. But Aaron ... the progression of the relationship sits on his shoulders, and he's terrified of the weight. He constantly fucks up and offends Ghost because it's the only sure footing that he knows, and he fights wracking doubts with impulsive passion. He doesn't think he can pull this off but he can't not try.
It's not about quitting a job or falling in love. It's not about being best friends or lovers. It's about a life that contains all of those things and so much more in progression that doesn't end until they're both dead. I don't believe in perfect relationships or perfect endings, but I found out in reading Friendly Hostility that I want to—because what a pleasant surprise it would be to stumble upon both for myself! Development is as enticing as a fetish, it is why I'm so caught up in the story of this pair—and yet it's also fucking terrifying to remember that development never, ever ends. Aaron and Ghost's story will, Friendly Hostility did, but the characters persist because the stories that fiction tells us are very real.
Life is pain, highness. Anyone who says differently is selling something. Life is pain, and change, and risk. There are plateaus and it is too easy to take them for granted—but that action is also progression. It shook me like a ragdoll, the end of Friendly Hostility, because I wanted my enticing developing relationships and my safe stability, but movement and stillness cannot coexist, and it is stillness which is the illusion. This little sims-story of a nearly-autonomous romance isn't half so complex (and it's definitely not as big a deal as this epic-long ramble makes it seem). But I've been reminded that it's more than just my gay fetish played out in polygons. If these boys are telling a story, they're telling one not just about sexy kisses but about fear and imperfection and a surprisingly natural, beautiful romance despite the both.
Oh god, I'm sorry, I did not intend this to get nearly half as long as it is. I'll slip it under LJ-cuts but, yeah. I've been in odd headspace lately and I know no one may care about the boys and their under-the-covers woohoo except me, but: it's coming, it's important, it is not everything and it is not the end. (Even when this story ends.) Hot slash is awesome. I love hot slash. But Ghost and Aaron ... have become more than that, to me.
So where was I before I slipped down that unending spiral of words? Oh yes, hair! I love the hairstyle that Aaron had (and Ghost still does), but when I stumbled upon this new one I had to try it out. I intended it for Ghost but it looked awesome on Aaron—so I had to get him to the point of New Hair. It's nice to see Ghost and Aaron a bit more physically different but really what it comes down to is oooooh shiny hair. (But what really tickles me about the new hair—other than my outright love for it, of course—is that Aaron was inspired by a guy I know here in the real world and this hairstyle is eerily similar to one he used to have.)
But Juu, you say: We need portraits showing off Aaron's new hair! You never post enough pictures of him! Well, if you insist.
Call him emo and he'll probably punch you in the face.
Ghost and Aaron: Master List | Next Update
