Relationship Values

The earlier you wake up thinking you have a hangover, the earlier you will have it. It’s not even if I drank enough water last night or more alcohol, it becomes the shrouded loneliness with all the assumptions and configurations to make everything sane go wrong. Loneliness was becoming a craft where I had no idea to pin myself down and where. Everything seemed to be scattering by leaving all stores open and all friends lost by the end of the night, that inspiration would only rattle at the night of a toy store. It had started getting out of hand for me, everything seemed to be made for one, as if he had never lived here and I had decided to keep the marriage ring around my neck even if it had been years ago and we had been married for several. 

The mailbox with letters is barely ever pleasant and they’re never filled with news you never want to hear, so maybe that’s why I collect them as early as possible and if needed I just retreat back to bed, to lull on them, mostly due to old divorce papers as all was done at a ridiculous distance neither of us wanted, but did anyway. 

But it wasn’t even about that, it was about finding harmony within oneself and managing through the days without such bitter sour misery. I grabbed the letter, yanking it open, wondering at the official sense of it. Reading it through, I closed it, feeling my body shake and knowing why I hadn’t been contacted by phone and I would need this letter anyway and I was sure that the last days which were given to me without knowing were far from a gift for me to keep sane, but the desire to avoid me for even more days. 

At times you don’t even know if you should even feel sorry, because you never really cared about the person, even if they’re dead and the memories are all wrong for recollection. And I had to speak out if I wanted to keep the house, which I had kept for myself anyway, 

something given but never written in my name. As I walked back into the house, I grabbed my phone, seeing the battery long dead and wondering how long would it even take to turn on. It took a boiled kettle and some coffee to make me even more alert and paranoid, as I felt my shoulders jerk in a sob which I wasn’t even aware of. I leaned against the window, watching some birds chirp easily at the seeds which were left from winter and I wondered what would even be the sign of my own death.

“Lana?” I say, as soon as my sister picks up. I tap my nails against the window. “Yeah. I just got the letter.”

I don’t even ask her regarding why did she not tell me anything and what was holding her down, when I seem to know all the answers anyway and she tells me that she would be over tomorrow and to prepare some bedroom for her, since the process should be over soon, not saying what outcome she had wished on the house and the parent’s house and how the money would be split.

The fear of everything gone wrong is more than the strike of a lightning.

And too many loves become a grape branch, each and every one becoming the same problem as the rest as every single person you’ve loved has stolen your heart and it’s as if every time you grow a new one, for someone else to steal. And it gets worse by calling him, with the belief that his regrets run just as deep, sitting on the floor makes nothing better, as I recall him smoking and drinking wine, as I tell him that I prefer stories left ambiguous, which allow you to know that not everything is told and makes sense in the end, you never know who truly loved you or why you had never confessed besides the daft explanation that fate works like a clock, man-made and senseless. 

And being alone always means exorcising your own demons and it takes me a good few phone calls to even go through to him, with all the words fleeing from me and whatever he would say would make my hands shake, as I can hear him exhale smoke and I can see him, as he would on every morning and I just close my eyes on my own desire to be alone. I know where I land and what I had chosen because I just couldn’t take it anymore, our anxieties clashing far too often. We both listen to each other’s silence as he speaks out once I get the ring from under my shirt and I put it on, as if that would make Jamie finally speak to me verbally and not just through letters, as if his living is more important than some parent’s death which would bring some small fortune for a day. Like in the King for a Day episode of Top Cat.

“Yeah, mom died.” I don’t even sob and I keep looking ahead. “I just needed some help with the papers, since Lana wants her half as I understood, but I need-”

“Can’t you hire a different lawyer?” He sighs and I hear barking in the distance, before he shouts at Archie to calm down. If I was in a different mindset, I would tell myself that the dog misses me too. I shake my head. 

“I know you’ll bother with it-” And I cut him short, my fuse far shorter than his these days even with myself in the room, alone and head between knees, I would destroy the whole room if I could stand up. 

“Yeah, well, I don’t want to bother with you.”

“So you’d give up the house I grew up in, is that what you’re willing to do, Jamie?” I snarl, clutching the phone harder, I can see him tapping his fingers against his table, pulling his lip afterwards. I hold my mouth, so that he doesn’t have to be reminded. He holds his silence. “The house which I took you in and-”

“Fine.” He snaps.

“I’ll need you after the funeral. Appreciate if you could be at the fun-”

“Yeah, I got an invite too, don’t worry, but can we-”

“Yeah, we will meet after the funeral, don’t worry.” I swallow and then we say our goodbyes and I drop the call, feeling blood leave my body and I just lay under the kitchen counter now, looking at all the scribbles I’ve done, recalling Jamie’s taste all of a sudden, trying not to open a box of memories

because a lost lover consumes less than a tattered family.

I know I’ve given you my heart and you have it, but I don’t see you or my heart for that matter.

-

This story frankly was born because I was sulking too much from Poison the Rose ending and yeah, I've still got to scrap the remains of my soul and publish the last chapter, in the meantime, have this (at this point of existence I have no title for it, I should have it by the end of the backstory xD) 

I was really depressed because I enjoyed the whole androgynous Alison with Lana and some fucked up Jamie backstory so yeah xD I just got sad and I tend to take couples or something and then develop in a different way, I guess an AU fanfic of an AU fanfic? But I really can't say they're much related besides that to be very honest xD 

My mental state has been odd to be honest, so just like I was really depressed while writing the last chapters of Poison the Rose, same happened here and the thoughts of a plot. I was musing because I really wanted a new Alison/Lana and I thought for a few days what could crawl into my head even if I was telling myself to fuck off xD I know, I have a bunch of ongoing stories, I know, I know XD

I still have no title ideas. Anyway, onwards.

Also I was thinking that I do touch death very very often and wills and etc, but I never went on the process or fights if you must regarding if there's no will and etc. So I kind of wanted to touch that topic first and foremost to be honest, then I was either napping or falling asleep and I started thinking of how frankly I wanted a fucked up story, that's how frankly the weirdest things get ever written, so this is supposed to be awfully odd and I guess that's where we touch the incest topic here. In general I like discussing controversy if you must and I've written the oddest of stories back then and I've writen incest before, mostly requests, but either way, I kind of wanted something fucked up and kind of dig on a fucked up family, I'm not one to speak of family as a whole in a bright light besides some people, so that kind of is also one of the backbone's and how I don't think families really work well unless you actually get a good bond over time, but in general it's really fucked up because you're obliged so yeah. 

Another thing which oddly inspired me heavily in to write Alison was she had this interview with junk magazine, I think? It's the one where she talks and has photos of her house and it really struck me as solid solitude, whether it was happy or not it was debatable but that really struck out to me and inspired me ever since I read it to pick up her character even if I'm not fond of her current state and frankly the interview was a terrible disaster, but the solitude struck out to me and the 11 p.m. Toys 'r' Us shopping session not the mini truck and tire tracks, but those things still got to me, even the weirdest of things inspire me and smallest as well. I can get inspired by a milk carton for all I care xD

I don't even recall how exactly I came up with it just now, I just sleepily thought of a sort of cover or whatever with Lana and Alison holding puzzle pieces in their mouths and I was thinking of something puzzle-related, but instead Relationship Values popped in my head because it matched the image and the story, so yeah x) I think it matches it but I get anxious always about titles, so moving on xD

I get dizzy or my head spins rather often when I'm tired and I didn't really have a hungover, but hey, I stylized it for the beginning and I just started writing the story then with that thought xD and yeah, I'm anxious as usual about this story so it's taking me a while to describe everything in the backstory and whatnot xD

Letters may be pleasant or not, but y'know a good letter is always good and you get those, so yeah, but here's kind of looking at the flipside. Only good letters to all by the way xD 

I have no idea where I got the ring around the neck, I had a few images in my head and now I'm like wait, Jamie Hince wears rings around his neck, so yeah xD Anyway, I just wanted the image of some broken metaphor really. 

I guess being a divorce child or whatever category I've been placed in, I don't really touch divorce too often and I kind of I guess wanted to ruffle through my own demons for this story regarding family, divorce, inheritance and etc. Also just fuck things up as usual 8)

I guess maybe some push was Looking's lastest episode where they call Doris to announce the death of her father, but briefly. I think I wrote the story before the episode? My sense of time is fucked over. 

Sometimes I think of backstories or my feelings and thought in perfect sentences in my head and they end up in a stylized way on paper, like the demons thing which Alison thinks of. 

Kind of touching not my nostalgia and memories but rather Alison's backstory or whatnot for some reason the only episode I can recall of Top Cat which I watched as a child was the King for a Day one, I dunno why it sort of went in my head through the years, inspired me by the end even if it were just a line or rather a comparison, so yeah. 

I think Jamie has the biggest diversity of jobs in my story specifically for someone who's spoken loudly about 9 to 5 jobs x) 

I use many tropes and this is... the third story where Alison took Jamie in her house? 

I get angsty obviously on my own reasons and that's where the last sentence slipped in, as I didn't even bother making a direct address on who Alison was thinking of, so yeah.

Tell me if you liked it ;D

I hope you enjoyed it and thank you, honestly, thank you so much

<3

Jamie