LONG PIG.

dante.   ( cw: dubious consent mention )

[Charlie didn’t stick around, but Charlie was a fully grown adult, not an impressionable child. Well – Charlie was impressionable in his own way, but he’s wilful. He plays this game as he wants to, not as anyone else asks him to.

He doesn’t know Lissy well enough to say whether her feelings towards her ‘rescue’ are more Stockholm Syndrome or honest truth, but either way she’s clearly changed. She clearly regrets it now, and that counts for something. ] 

Okay, here’s an analogy for you. It isn’t a terribly comfortable one, but I hope you’ll see what I’m saying. Imagine there’s a couple, and one of them really wants to have sex, while the other isn’t in the mood. The first person cajoles and says pretty please and mentions how important intimacy is, or whatever else they can think of. Eventually the second person does have sex with them, whether because they really feel their mind changed or because they want to get the first person to stop trying so they just get it over with. Maybe they even enjoy it. Did the second person actually consent to having sex?

[It’s not an exact analogy because that hadn’t been the nature of Lissy and Orla’s relationship. But in a way it can be harder to examine the boundaries of friendships than of romantic relationships. Romantic relationships are defined everywhere in so many ways, and the boundaries are more easily identified. People seem to struggle more with applying those boundaries to other relationships; with Lissy’s age and lack of life experience, it’s likely she doesn’t have a good understanding of boundaries in any sort of relationship.]

[[ Not ‘terribly comfortable’ is one way to describe it. The moment he mentions sex she purses her lips, can’t hold his gaze. It wasn’t like that. Their relationship was... complicated. An older sister. A best friend. A leader. A pseudo-mother. A crush. Lissy never said that last one out loud, never admitted to her childish crush on the charismatic cannibal leader for obvious reasons.

Lissy listens. She hates it. Picturing this conversation with any one of her friends, she’d be aggressively on the front that the second person had not consented. Change the concept from sex to cannibalism; Person One to Orla, Person Two to Lissy and... ]] it’s different.

It wasn’t a one time thing... I mean. At some point it’s— [[ ‘Maybe they even enjoy it.’ She shuffles uncomfortably, scratching at the back of her neck. ]] It’s a choice. I made the choice. Over and over and—

annie & felix.​

[Something about the way she describes the details makes Felix giggle—he’s not sure if its how sweetly virginal ‘he touched my boobs’ sounds, or if it’s the accent or the fact that she’d done it in the baths, which somehow seems like, a pretty pornographic setting for someone who’s enthralled by having their boobs touched—but whatever it is, he chuckles, fingers coming up to touch his lips, shading the flash of teeth. But he’s not laughing at her—he’s laughing with her, (he hopes), because her energy is infectious, and he’s sure that bubbly, nervous need to laugh is coming from her. 

At the next comment, Lissy voices the same thing Felix had been thinking. What does not ‘trying’ anything have to do with it? Then again…] She’s right, you know. I don’t see how like, not ‘trying’ something after just one date is like, at all an indicator. But I do understand how you feel. Like, Alois and I have hung out a bunch of times, and we’ve snogged and stuff, but well—that night at the party, I might have suggested we leave together, you know… [he figures the context is implied.] And he actually said he’d rather wait. Like, until he could take me on a ‘proper date’. Whatever that means, these days, [he adds with a bit of a laugh.] 

[He’d not been planning on telling this to the girls, because he’d worried it would make him look bad, or undesirable, but now, in the context, he can use it as a way to be encouraging to Annie, and make himself feel better at the same time. And talk about himself again. It’s a win-win-win.] And at first, I was a bit worried, what it meant that he didn’t like, immediately want to take advantage and take me home. But I think that’s just a sign that he’s like, a proper gentleman and doesn’t feel the need to rush things. And maybe it’s the same thing for this Benji bloke. Like, trust me, honey, I’ve had those first dates where they try to get in your pants like, two minutes in. You don’t want those. Those ones are usually pricks who aren’t worth your time. 

[He’d had to learn that the hard way, to be honest. And they aren’t mistakes (plural) he’d wish on anyone else. Especially anyone of the LGBT+ community, because self worth and confidence is already hard enough for them as it is.] 

@annie-perrault​

[They have been over it, like a million times in the dorm, but Lissy manages not to sound too exasperated by Annie’s insecurity. She knows that Lissy is right really, and it’s the same stuff Annie would say if their positions were reversed. Annie just always fears the worst.

It’s surprisingly reassuring to hear that Felix was actually in a similar boat with Alois, though. For some reason Annie would assume that when people like Felix Tee and Alois Van Asch are together, they must be having sex. But evidently not; and it makes Annie aware that she’s probably a bit too hung up on it. And it’s nice to hear that Fee had felt insecure about it, because if someone like him feels insecure then it’s way less isolating to think of her own insecurities. She nods along, because she completely relates to the worry of what it means when someone doesn’t immediately want to take you home. Her face does fall at his conclusion, though.]

But what if you want them to try and get into your pants two minutes in though? [Annie balks.] I mean– sorry, I’m not trying to be like, weird and gross. I know it’s good that he’s being respectful. I’m just… impatient. The kissing is so nice, and there’s this whole other world of nice, fun stuff that I would like to see. But like… all in good time, I know. It’ll happen. And I’m sure everyone in the dorm will be so glad when it does, because maybe I’ll finally shut up about it.

[She shoots Lissy an apologetic grin. She’s definitely been a bit boy-crazy lately, which she’ll blame on the fact that she’s sort of on the cusp of maybe having sex, but not actually having it. It’s a very frustrating place to be, but Lissy and the others have been so patient listening to Annie rant about it.]

[[ The fact Annie thinks Lissy, in anyway, could be bored of this conversation is laughable. It’s the most high stakes yet actually not-high-stakes-at-all sort of drama that stops life becoming a long, mindless blur of days. Annie’s trying, putting herself out there and getting hands on her boobs. (Must be nice.)

Lissy listens, intently. Giving Felix a curious look at his phrasing. Felix was worried about a guy not wanting to take advantage? Its the idea of taking advantage that has some of the laughter leaving her. It’s an inscrutable look, Felix doesn’t know her well enough to read the silent look of stony faced concern. As though it didn’t happen, she turns to Annie, shaking her head and looking up to the heavens. ]]

Once it happens you won’t shut up about it, because I will just ask you for every single detail! If you do stop talking like, all this build up to leave us with nothing! No follow up! That’d be worse. [[ Lissy jokes. Half-jokes. Maybe? ]] Have you, like, asked him? Just. Straight out said Hey: I wanna bang. [[ She puts on her best smarmy slash smooth sexy (?) voice. ]]

dante.

[He’s glad to hear her say it, unpleasant as it is, because of course she cared. It doesn’t mean she’s a bad person. Love is irrational, and sometimes you find you care deeply for people you know you shouldn’t. Dante is certainly the last person to cast judgement for love pushing you to immorality. He nods, no trace of judgement in his expression.] 

She was telepathic? That must have been intense. It can be overwhelming having someone in your mind. [Dante’s certainly not overly comfortable being communicated to telepathically.] Do you think it was easier for her to influence you because she had that uniquely private way of speaking with you?

[[ At the admission, her confession, he nods. That’s it. Accepts it. Lissy’s frown is minute, her gaze a little sharper as she tries to see if there’s anything else going on. Maybe, just maybe, there isn’t. ]]

I guess... [[ Lissy chews her lip, she hates having to re-explain it all but going back to Wren makes her uncomfortable. Dante at least seems unflappable, like what she tells him won’t haunt him. ]] She did it to Charlie. He didn’t... and he didn’t stick around. [[ They’re not here to talk about Charlie. With a deep exhale she continues before he can tell her as much.

annie.

[She doesn’t doubt for a second that Lissy would go full bulldog to defend Annie. She’s easily the most fierce of their group – though the phrasing makes Annie laugh.] 

Pinky promise. [Annie agrees, hooking her little finger around Lissy’s with a squeeze, swinging their hands back and forth. She’s glad the brief blip of awkwardness passed quickly. It always does, any time something comes up like that, but there’s always the brief panic that it might not. With a sigh Annie lies back in the hay, finger still twined with Lissy’s.

She’s not… sure if she wants to talk about it. Annie doesn’t often go into any sort of detail when it comes to her relationship with her body. The girls know the basic things: how self conscious Annie is of her height, how she clings to cute skirts and pink things because they validate her, how stressed she gets in changing rooms. But the deeper stuff, she never really gets into it.

It’s funny – sad funny, not ha ha funny – that it seems to be such a universal feminine experience to have body image issues. While Annie isn’t totally sure why Lissy would be scared to be seen, she doesn’t doubt it. It’s just weird to think about because Lissy is so pretty, and she’s got the really nice soft, feminine curves that Annie is desperately envious of.] 

I don’t know. I think it’s all just a lot more unknown for me, and it’s scary because of that. So I kind of want to do it to like… figure it out? And see how it actually works. Because most of what I know about sex comes from movies, where it’s mostly straight cis people. And I never really watched porn much because I was always so scared that I’d get a computer virus and my parents would disown me and I’d get arrested or something, but from what I saw, trans girls were always really like… objectified. I mean, it’s porn, it’s all objectifying, but trans women it was always like… gross transmisogynist language and she’d always top and it’d be like, about her ability to do that rather than anything else. So in the end I don’t even know like, how I’d have sex? Like what parts are going where? And if it’s with someone with a penis then it kind of has to be anal, which feels crazy advanced for a first time but I don’t know what else there is.

So like… yeah. I don’t know. I guess I just want to figure out what experiences are even available to me. 

[[ Lissy lays down too, pinkies still entwined, Annie still holding on. And Lissy simply listens. It doesn’t feel like enough, even though it’s all she can do. She’s Annie’s friend, not a therapist, not a mentor not... just not someone who can solve or help solve any of this. It doesn’t feel like enough, even if sometimes Lissy knows all she needs is someone to listen.

Lissy picks up their hands by the pinky, looks at their fingers. Annie has nice fingers, long and slim. Really nice nails (perfect for larger manicures) and she hums in thought. ]]

I... Yeah. That does seem like a lot for a first time, I guess? But. Like. There’s like. Hands...mouth? I never watched any porn, so it's a total mystery to me. Like, in movies they cut off at the waist! What is happening down there! [[ Lissy jokes, even as there is truth to it. Thankfully once small mercy about the group was that their only transgressions were cannibalism, in fact they seemed to punish anyone who was lecherous. Especially if it were someone she'd brought in for them, someone who fell for her act as bait. Sometimes, and Lissy would never tell anyone, she thinks those people at least deserved it. ]]

wren.

I’m so glad to hear you’re all still friends. {Wren remembers well and with much fondness the day Lissy had arrived at their session with bright eyes and a smile to match, excitedly launching into telling him all about the two girls she’d befriended before he’d managed to properly close the door. He’d been so happy to see her progress yield results, so proud to see how much more confident she’d appeared.

He’s still proud now despite no longer acting as Lissy’s therapist. Seeing patients regain parts of themselves previously thought lost is one of the best things about his job; every day he can go to sleep knowing he’s made at least one person’s life a little better and brighter. Most days that’s enough. It has to be.

Lissy flips the question and Wren smiles. It’s a tactic he faces at least three times a day, but he decides to humour her.}

Oh you know me, I’m always good at keeping myself occupied. It helps to have a task to focus on when things get rough. {The question lingers at the tip of his tongue but he swallows it again.} I find that even the most mundane of activities help me keep my thoughts straight. Folding laundry, dusting my office, organising books… that sort of stuff. Have you discovered any good books lately? I remember you saying you wanted to get back into reading.

[[ He’s so genuinely pleased for her still being friends with the other girls that she can’t help the slight pink flush of her cheeks. It’s embarrassing in a nice way. Having someone just so simply on her side. The pride he has in her extends past the time as his therapist. Sometimes, Lissy thinks she really should thank him properly one day. Not that she knows how. Would a card be silly, she thinks? Annie’s probably the right person to ask. ]]

Yeah, yes. It’s been really good to have a friend group. Again. Wish I knew Annie when we were both at school!  [[ As her voice ticks up in volume, Lissy’s eyes go a little wide. She looks around, it is a funeral after all. People aren’t exactly entirely remorse but not too jovial. ]] This is my first funeral—is it rude to be, like, audibly happy?

wren.

{It’s been a while since he’s spoken to Lissy, but Wren is pleased to note that she seems to be doing well. She looks a far cry from the skinny and terrified little girl he’d met during their first session; eyes brighter, cheeks fuller, posture more confident.

Initially he’d been a little jarred by her sudden transfer request to another therapist, especially since she’d left with little explanation, but she seems to be thriving under her new doctor’s care and that’s all he really hopes for. Pressing her for answers would be entirely inappropriate and unprofessional and no matter how bad he wants to know just what it was that he did wrong, he remains quiet about it, instead offering a sympathetic smile.}

I can’t say I knew him all too well either, no. He was never my patient and we didn’t stop to chat in the corridors that often. But one doesn’t have to have known a person to be sad about their death. It’s only natural to feel a little vulnerable. {Wren’s more worried about his patients’ reactions to Kaiser’s death than actually upset about it, but it’s easy to get swept up in the general sadness in a small community like the one at Col22.}

It’s very kind of you to be here to comfort your friend, I’m sure she appreciates it. I hope you have someone who supports you in return?

[[ He never turns off, does he? Makes sense, in a way, when she saw him in his office. clearly on something. Lissy’s smile is a little broader because she does still like the man, even if she can’t picture telling him more about her thoughts. If he can barely cope, how the hell could she expect him to bear the extra weight of Lissy’s fucked up time in the wastes? She started to worry that she might be partly responsible for it. ]]

Yeah, yes. The other girls are there for me, and we’re all here for each other. We’re still doing really good. Me and the ‘CalGals’ [[ Lissy throws up a hand to make some air quotes, their silly little group name she’d been very excited to share with Wren at one point. Of course, she’d stopped seeing him soon after that.

annie.

[Annie won’t argue with Lissy any further about not being crushed on at school, because it’s the kind of thing she knows will turn into a loop: of course people crushed on you!– no, they really didn’t – but you’re so pretty – well they just weren’t interested anyway. But she does frown in a jokey, pouting sort of way that suggests she thinks Lissy’s full of shit. Some girls are easier to confess your feelings to than others, and Lissy does have that sort of intimidating thing about her, so maybe it was just that people found her friends easier to approach.

And yeah, the age thing is fair. None of them in the dorm had really had much time for any grand love. Accepting the wine back, Annie distracts herself with a slow slip, eyes casts down when Lissy apologises for the hormone thing. Yeah. She’s really jealous of cis girls, that don’t need to worry about that stuff. Everything just does what it should. Annie feels like she doesn’t have the body she wants, but the body she has doesn’t work as it should either now, and it’s just… weird. Mostly she loves being trans and is grateful for the fact that she’s been able to explore her gender in a far more thorough way than cis people ever do, but she does get insecure around cis girls sometimes.

Even Lissy’s descriptor of Annie as ‘the most feminine girl I know’ makes her feel kind of weird because sometimes Annie thinks she performs her gender too hard, like she’s overthinking it all the time. She just doesn’t know how else to be; she’s always overthought everything, not just her gender. But she really appreciates the sentiment anyway, and Lissy’s total and utter passion for fighting anyone that disrespects Annie. ‘They wouldn’t deserve to see any part of you!’ sounds like a line from a studly hero to a swooning Regency era lady.] 

Thanks. I will bear that in mind. If someone hurts my feelings about it I’ll message you right away so you can come busting in like a knight in shining armour to beat them up for me. But I don’t know if that’s like, an imminent worry anyway, I mean… sex kind of feels like a big step. Like, I want to, but it… I don’t know.

[It’s been on her mind lately, a lot. She doesn’t really know when the appropriate time is. How do you know when you feel ‘ready’? Is there a widely accepted amount of time that a person should wait between kissing and sex? How is she meant to choose who to do it with? It feels silly worrying so much about it because it’s not really real, but it’s been so long now that Annie has to treat every decision with care because it’s been years. The consequences of her actions will impact her for as long as she stays here.]

[[ Lissy bites back on another round of apologies when Annie looks a little put out when Lissy realises her mistake regarding hormones. It’s probably worse if she harps on about it. As much as Lissy loves Annie, and has done her best to try and understand how her being trans changes things, it’s out of her own personal experience. There’s always things like that with friends, though, isn’t there? Each of her friends minds (and her own) intricate little puzzle boxes she can never quite solve. ]]

Good. You gotta promise you’ll message me, You know I’d go full bulldog for you! It’s the anxiety override we always talk about it. Pinky promise! [[ Lissy holds her hand out, little pinky stuck out.

They talk about crushes and kissing and occasionally sex in the dorm. It’s difficult not too. Sometimes relationships feel like the only thing anyone in the Colony has any semblance of control over, with days scheduled to the second, where else can they find freedom? Even the conversation, more of a gossip with Felix was another in a long line of these conversations.

This though feels like it’s teetering on something more real, something Annie has been keeping to herself. ]] The way everyone talks about it makes it seem like a really big step. I know it’s different for me and you and I’m, like not pretending to get it. But. The thought scares me sometimes. I don’t know. Bodies are weird and being like seen—

dante.

[The ‘I guess’ is very vague, and doesn’t tell Dante much. If he knew Lissy better he might be able to guess whether she simply disagreed but didn’t want to say so, or if she just needed time to process everything, or something else altogether. It doesn’t really answer his question, though she does manage to expand on her thoughts.

And this is where the tenuous nature of morality becomes increasingly apparent. Because yes, not wanting to upset your friends factors into your decision making process. But there’s a world of difference between something like blagging your way into a pub with a fake ID, and coaxing people towards their death. Dante thinks it’s interesting that Lissy doesn’t make that distinction, given how keen she seems to be to think the worst of herself. He would have anticipated her conclusion to be more along the lines of, if you care what someone thinks then you want to make them happy, but there should be limits to that.

Instead she trails off, as if embarrassed she’d admitted to caring. It’s too late to backtrack now, so Dante encourages her to finish the sentence:] 

If you what?

[She’s allowed to care. While they had done awful things, from Lissy’s perspective they had saved her. In a world of fire and death they kept her safe, made sure she had food, treated her kindly. She’d been a child, and it’s not a crime to have a narrow and selfish world view when you’re that young. By the time she was old enough to ‘know better’, she’d been indoctrinated, which was a separate problem all of its own.]

[[ Dante won’t let her have that, won’t let her backtrack. A very simple response, not really giving her a chance to hook into something else. She exhales heavily and looks at her hands hidden in her sleeves as she confesses. ]]  I cared about her. About them. So, yeah. [[ She can’t look up at him. ]] I was worried about how they’d react if I didn’t do it. But...

[[ This is why Charlie doesn’t trust her, Lissy thinks. She genuinely cared, Orla pretended to be her older sister and Lissy didn’t have to lie a lot to play along. She did love Orla. It’s still difficult some days to reconcile the fact that she cared about Orla despite it all. Sometimes, she even misses her. ]] I guess I think of it how like, um, at home. Like you don’t wanna make your parents mad.

wren.​​​

{As the day of the funeral progresses and people start gathering for the wake, Wren starts to feel increasingly more uneasy. He hadn’t had much contact with Kaiser and therefore can’t really relate to those in mourning, although the rumours surrounding his death have left him rather rattled. No, the worst thing about the entire situation is the helplessness. Wren feels entirely and utterly helpless and he hates it.

Aside from wanting to impress his parents and keep up the overachieving legacy of his family, Wren had become a doctor for one very simple reason: helping others. It’s cliché and earns him dumbfounded looks whenever he mentions it, but it’s the truth. What other motive could he possibly have had for putting himself through the hell of med-school if not to achieve something close to his heart? He could have quit after the accident - and maybe he should have - but he hadn’t. He’d continued onwards, dragged himself across the finish line on all fours, because he’s always known deep down that there’s nothing else for him.

The funeral had been miserable but the wake is even worse. Everywhere Wren looks he sees suffering, resentment, pain. It engulfs the room, suffocating and heavy; a suitably morbid atmosphere for a group mourning not just the loss of a man but the loss of a voice. It’s almost enough to make him wish he were high, just to ease some of the guilt.

At some point, from the corner of his eye, he catches a flash of blonde hair. As he makes to turn, he finds himself face to face with a very familiar frown.}

Ah, Lissy. Hello. It’s good to see you again. How are you holding up?

[[ It’s the first funeral she’s ever been too. Lissy never thought she’d see one, after experiencing death so many times, a memorial simply felt off. Out of place when so many others lost their lives unceremoniously.

Lissy has decided she’s not a fan of them, or wakes for that matter.

Kaiser, from the way everyone speaks about him, reminds her uncomfortably of Orla. A sort of magnetism and charm people almost feared but felt incredibly special and seen when he deigned to turn his gaze upon them. It makes her worry about what he said to Annie to make her care about him. She’s the only reason Lissy even turned up. Her and the other girls are taking shifts, of sort, to be at Annie’s side and hold her hand.

Maisie had taken over hand-holding duties for now. There is very little for her to do. Eating feels wrong—in the wastes a death was always followed by a feast. She can’t help but think of all the food as someone coming from the man himself. Lissy has instead got a glass of wine to hold more than drink. Hiding in a corner with a frown, someone turns to face her. Oh.

‘It’s good to see you again.’ The frown dissipates into a little ‘o’ of surprise. She likes Wren. The first person here that she actually felt safe around.

 Dr. Philips, or Wren as she more comfortably called him, was a good therapist. Kind, patient, and never horrified by Lissy. Besides the CalGals, he is the only other person here who's seen her completely breakdown, been told every detail about her time in the Wastes and more. Told him about the guilt she carried. It seems impossible, but it used to be heavier than it is today. The weight used to crush her, stop her doing anything and some days she couldn't even leave the dorm.

Wren would knock on the door, enter with his usual soft smile and gentle words. He seemed to always know the right things to say. She really liked him. Until she couldn't trust him.

annie.

[It definitely feels like a billion emotions; more than usual even by their standards. It’s nice having friends that are as much a nervous wreck as you are, but it does mean that emotions tend to run high sometimes. They bounce off each other like perpetual motion toys winding each other up – although as always, there is a climax and then a laugh as they realise they were taking everything way too seriously.

Annie would like to believe that’s the effect of maturing in a post D-Day world, but she has a vague suspicion that she and Lissy would have been like that anyway. At least, Annie knows she would. Difficult to say for Lissy, but given her conviction that nobody ever crushed on her before, it seems a fair guess that she’d always been an overthinker.] 

I’m sure that’s not true. [People don’t always, or even often, confess their feelings to their crush. Just because nobody ever told Lissy, that didn’t mean they didn’t have the feelings. There’s someone for everyone so Annie is generally of the opinion that everybody gets crushed on at least sometimes, and especially girls like Lissy that are so pretty and cool.

Well, she seems cool to outsiders, very quiet and mysterious. In private, she asks again about the lipgloss thing and immediately gets flustered. Annie hands back the bottle of wine, laughing. None of them really know anything about sex – Maisie was the only one that had even done it before, but even she wasn’t super experienced.] 

I mean… I don’t know. I’ve never really thought about it before, like, for myself. I don’t know if I’d be comfortable with it, or if it’d even like… work, you know, like I’d probably need pills. And that seems totally unsexy, right, like ‘hang on just before I take my panties off let me just my take medication real quick’. And I think a lot of people would be like, not into that with me anyway, because I’m a girl, and it wouldn’t exactly be super feminine.

[She’s still laughing, but it’s more through insecurity just now. She really wants to have sex but she’s just not sure what the procedure is for trans girls, and there’s nothing helpful in the library, and the only trans person she knows here is Ajay and it’d be hard to broach with him because she actually really wants to touch him, to get touched by him, so she doesn’t want to get all biological and unsexy about it.]

[[ Lissy wipes at her eyes, still watery but thankfully it doesn’t take much to clear them up. Lissy shakes her head at the insistence it’s not true. ]] My friends were like, always the ones people liked, you know? And I mean, I had secondary school and then a year here, like, not many chances for crushes to happen. [[ Plus, young ‘tweens’ didn’t exactly think her raspy deeper voice was a good thing. She had to mature into that. Lissy takes a heavy swig of the wine before passing it over to her. ]]

Oh. [[ She grimaces, mentally berating herself because of course it could be a tricky subject. All of the CalGals have their own neurosis and insecurities. ]] Ah, shit. Sorry, I didn’t think about how hormones and stuff would change things for you.

dante.​

Of course. [Dante inclines his head.] It’s something different people do to different extents. [This is one of those careful balances where you have to reassure a person that their feelings and behaviours are normal, without trivialising them.

His expression remains neutral as Lissy guesses at the ages of those in her group, though the line of his lips does tighten just marginally. It’s unsurprising, all things told, and it does send a pang of sympathy through him. She’d been intensely vulnerable, and a group of adults had taken advantage of that, and used her for their own purposes. It’s very telling that they’d asked her to play damsel in distress; capitalising off an innocence that only comes with childhood.] 

Wants can be manipulated, the same as anything else. In fact that’s an incredibly insidious sort of manipulation: making a person think your idea was their’s all along. Obviously I’ve never met any of the people you were with, so I can’t really comment with any certainty, but it’s quite a red flag that a group of full-grown adults kept you around and asked you to do these… tasks for them.

However mature a teenager is, there’s always a power imbalance in situations like this. The adults have life experience, which is something the most precocious teenagers can’t replicate. You say you never wanted to say no to their requests: was that a purely personal choice, or did their potential reactions factor in?

[Dante’s not terribly precious about age gaps, in general. Obviously – he’s currently entangled with a man ten years his junior. But there is always context, and murderous cannibals put themselves in rather an unforgiving one.]

[[ ‘Incredibly insidious’ is a very fancy phrase that makes Lissy wonder if she’s exaggerating now. Was it really that bad? They never hurt her, not really. It was... implied. Or verbal. Nothing bad ever actually happened to her. They did awful things to other people, of course, she isn’t disagreeing with that.

He tells her wants can be manipulated. That it’s a red flag. That there’s a power imbalance. It’s a lot in one go. Lissy tries to think about how they treated her. They treated her like a child, she thinks. Like they should? As though they were all extended family: aunts, uncles, sisters. ]] I guess. [[ She says simply so it sounds like she’s agreeing with him.

Dante calling it ‘tasks’ make it seem like he’s trying to say something else. Like it’s so bad he can’t describe it for what it is. She was bait. Bloody good bait, actually.

annie & felix.

[He’d said ‘making out’ was American, not ‘snog’ (a point to which Annie makes a perfect example of, by using it three seconds later), but he’d been too eager to set the record straight with Annie about his ‘types’ or lack there of, to really have clocked Lissy’s comment properly until it was a bit too late to respond. Which bothers him a little, because he doesn’t like people correcting him over things that he was right about. He tries to shake it off. 

Fee’s expression folds a little at Annie’s elaboration—it’s not her theorizing about her choking in the face of such a confident proposition (because yeah, he can imagine she would, no offence girl), it’s at the talk about formal wear.] Tuxedo Mask? What’s that? Is that like, some sort of masquerade thing? 

[Lissy makes a drawling, understated comment about dancing with a couple of blokes, and though she sounds anything but braggy about it, Felix turns to her, eyes widening.] Ooh? Who? Do tell, please. I’ve told you all my boy-things, and you two are just still being evasive bitches. Said with love, of course. But spill, or I’m really going to start thinking you’re both just tricking me. [He grins, but his eyes are hungry for names.] ​

[Oh, god. She had kind of hoped Sailor Moon was like, a relatively popular nostalgia thing and it was just coincidence that none of the girls in the dorm had seen it, but Felix being confused really drives home the fact that it was definitely not a cool thing to watch.] 

Oh, uh, no, he’s just a character from a show I used to watch. [She shrugs it off fast. Annie had fixated on cartoons a lot as a kid, because they were easier to draw than real people. She could draw herself as Usagi, or Roxanne from the Goofy Movie, or whoever else, and it was like a fun way of exploring her gender expression before she really worked it all out.

Annie is surprised that Lissy volunteers the dance information, because she’s usually so private with people she doesn’t know well – but when Annie glances at her she sees the small, fleeting expression of regret. It’s barely noticeable, but Annie knows Lissy too well by now to miss it. She doesn’t want to expand on her scandalous dances, so Annie jumps in to take the fall. It’s the nice thing about their friend group: they’re all anxious wrecks sometimes (well, apart from Mira), but if one of them is more stressed, the others will unlock the mom-friend-override and access confidence they wouldn’t otherwise have.] 

Well, I, uh, made out with this guy Benji a couple of times. Like, in the baths. And he touched my boobs. [Annie glances around, wondering if she can see him in the dining hall, though it occurs to her that pointing him out to Felix would be an awful idea because she just knows he’s the kind of person that you say ‘don’t look!’ and he’ll do a full body swivel and ogle. She does see Ajay on the other side of the room, and though Annie doesn’t point him out, she does lean in and lower her voice conspiratorially.] And I went out for drinks with this guy, Ajay, but he didn’t try anything so I don’t know if he’s like, super interested.

[[ Lissy thinks she maybe should join in. What’s the harm in sharing names? With Felix, maybe, something might actually happen. Lissy’s been too chickenshit to find either Lake or Draco. Draco at least it was simply nice but with Lake? She’d lied to him, started to try and turn him against Charlie. She doesn’t want to have to face that again. There is plenty of harm in sharing, then.

Annie, always being in Lissy’s corner, takes the fall. Or, Lissy thinks, she simply gets a chance to talk more about it. Lissy’s happy for her, truly, she’d talked about Benji and Ajay in the dorm and it’d been fun. Light-hearted. Sometimes, Lissy thinks she’s just vicariously living through Annie. Lissy shakes her head, laughing at Annie. Just a little bit. ]]

Again, Annie, just because he didn’t try anything probably means he’s, like, taking his time. Why wouldn’t he be super interested in you?

annie.

[Lissy saying that she’s still a mess (while Annie is ’like, hot’) makes her laugh in that subdued, thick way that catches in your throat when you’re halfway to tears. Annie’s got no idea how to respond to that – except maybe with a fragile joke about her questionable taste in crushes, given her track record – so she’s relieved that Lissy doesn’t linger on it, and carries on. Annie doesn’t want to think about Lissy thinking she’s hot.

Annie’s always so self conscious around the dorm. Even though she feels safe and comfortable around the others, things like getting changed just feels difficult around cis girls. It just makes her acutely aware of how different she is, like she can never be as feminine as them no matter how many pastel miniskirts and pink sweaters she wears. She just doesn’t think the girls should think she’s hot. It’s difficult enough for Annie to think about her attraction to girls (it’s so much simpler with guys), so girls being attracted to her is right off the table. This whole conversation has been mortifying enough.

She laughs again, this time a little less mournful, when Lissy asks if this is what wine does to people.] 

No, I think that’s just us. [As far as Annie was aware, wine was meant to make you feel sexy and sophisticated. Neither of those descriptors feel particularly applicable today.] You know I’d never think bad stuff about you, right? Not even about the stuff before. Urgh. Sorry. [Annie rubs her face, takes another sip of wine.] I feel like it’s going to be awkward in the dorm now. I didn’t mean to, um… like, yeah. Can we just forget the last five minutes and go back to talking about lipstick or something?

[Ideally, Annie would love to just… brush all of this under the rug, permanently. If they could just never discuss this again, she’ll be happy.]

[[ Annie does laugh, which is something good, she thinks. Even if Annie doesn’t answer or respond to the ‘hot’ comment, it’s simply glossed over. Glossed may be the wrong choice of words. Her cheeks feel warm, Lissy’s still thinking about it. Still wonders if the lip gloss connection is true or works... ]]

We’ve gone through a billion emotions in like, a minute. [[ An exaggeration for sure. It’s been a little longer than a minute. Annie says she’d never think anything bad about Lissy and there’s another emotion thrown into the mix. A little bit of disbelief, even though Lissy doesn’t think Annie’s ever been capable of a lie. Which means the crush was real.

What changed it? Lissy shouldn’t be thinking that, about what she did wrong to make Annie change her mind, because maybe they simply became friends and that was enough. ]]  It won’t be awkward. [[ She says with far too much confidence and a lingering teary sound to her voice. ]] I think you’re the first person to, like, crush on me. Which is nice. Like, yeah. It’s nice. That it was you.

dante.

[The way Lissy describes her behaviour sounds like she thinks she’s manipulative, changing who she is to get what she wants with people. It is interesting, he notes, that she says with Annie she can be weird, but with Felix she feels like she has to be cool.

Dante’s mind skips to possible diagnoses, which is a habit he always tries to stem. If you have an idea of what diagnosis you might end up with, you’ll end up falling victim to confirmation bias. Still, he finds himself thinking: narcissistic personality disorder. Borderline personality disorder. They often lead to that sort of behaviour.

There is also, however, a far more simple explanation, if one compounded by the unique complexity of Lissy’s experiences.] 

Putting on different masks for different people in many cases can stem from a place of insecurity, or anxiety, as people search for ways to control their environment. It’s not a bad thing inherently – we all do it to some level. If a colleague asks me how I’m doing on a day when I happen to feel rotten, and I say I’m fine, that’s me manipulating them and their perception of me. The problems start when that behaviour begins to prevent you from connecting with your authentic self, which it sounds like is what’s happening with you.

You say that you were ‘told’ to be someone he could save. That’s not a choice you made. And obviously you weren’t in a position to argue. How old were the others in your group?

[He’s going to go out on a limb and guess Lissy was the youngest; she was still a child when D-Day happened, still so vulnerable. A teenager being convinced by a group of adults to act as their honeypot, as it were, sounds far more like grooming than it does Lissy being villainous.]

[[ Insecurity and anxiety are two words that neatly sum up her existence. It does make sense. Lissy has no real control, she thinks, so if she can get people to behave how she wants them too? It makes sense. Logically. Dante continues, saying how everyone does it.

That’s when he begins to lose her.  Lying about your day is different from putting on an act with a goal. A better example might be Lake. Where she lied about what Charlie was to her, played a part to get what she wanted. ]] I guess. Makes sense. But I don’t think it’s the same. Exactly. Sometimes... it’s a bit bigger than saying I’m good when I’m not.