party rock is in the yard tonight!

Young Ashlyn requesting the class reads a bad case of the stripes again because even though her 2nd grade class isn’t fond of them, she really relates to the character.

Young Ashlyn requesting to read the spider and the fly because even though it’s too scary for her grade, she is obsessed with the thrill of it.

Young Ashlyn requesting to read the girl with the green ribbon because even though it’s labeled horror, she likes the idea of becoming like that girl: someone who is able to hold their ground for so long

so i don’t know how other people feel about daniel clark but i personally don’t like him still. sure, he’s funny sometimes, silly sometimes, kinda a ditz. does that hide the neglect towards aiden? does it hide the fact that he forced aiden into his image as a child? does it hide the fact that aiden was genuinely pushed under the rug? i don’t think it does. daniel is an objectively bad parent. just because he defends aiden sometimes or is there for him sometimes it doesn’t make up for when he is not. i suppose most of this is my opinion so i’d love to hear your guys opinions on this! but i just feel like we are getting this wrong guys he is literally kind of a monster? and i do think he is a moneyholic (maybe not as much as jessica), maybe a workaholic more so. but one thing is that is don’t think that he is irredeemable. but he is not there yet. also i see people frame him as the better parent out of the two but aren’t they the same? they both do the same things to aiden.

besides maybe a few differences between them, their behavior is, as far as we know, the same. i don't think jessica needs more love in the slightest, she's horrible, but daniel deserves hate, too.

no, he's is not "baby-coded", that's a grown ass man with a wife and kid. it's easy to acknowledge that maybe he's a funny character at times, but that's no excuse for the neglect he put his kid through. did we forget about this ? :

aiden was noticeably rotting in his room, not even trying to hide it, and daniel's biggest concern was a publisher screwing up :

(they're talking about a kid dying here, mind you. how dramatic can you be without caring a bit about your son)

and all of what i've just said is what the fandom projects onto jessica alone. sure she might not be as "funny" as daniel is but why doesn't anyone acknowledge her "kindness" and use that as an excuse not to hate her ? :

oh, yeah, because she's not actually as kind as she's made out to be.

He couldn't help it.

He couldn't hold it in. But if he was being honest. He was happy he couldn't.

But he did hope she was at least asleep. So she couldn't hear his silent tears. So she didn't know how weak he was. He was so useless. He couldn't do more for them. He couldn't always be there at every moment she needed him.

When she was hurting, or angry. Or she had a bad day or a relationship had gone sour. And worse yet, he had no idea how to help with most of it.

He wasn't good with people. He never had been. Taylor was always the one dragging him along. To events or hang-outs, but even when she did get him to go he wouldn't talk to anyone. He pushed everyone away.

In a way he was even pushing her away. His sister, his twin, the one he did everything with. He hated himself for that. Why couldn't he be better, like dad had been. Dad had all the answers. But now they looked at him for the answers, the answers he knows he should have, but he doesn't have them. Why doesn't he have all the answers? Why can't he be good enough for them, for his sister, for his mom?

He was so wrapped up in his own thoughts he didn't realize his fingers were digging into his palms as he clenched them together and closed his eyes. His mind starting to become sluggish as it was filled with more questions just barely penetrating the fog of sleep.

Why couldn't he keep it together? Why was he such a mess? Why them? Why did it have to be them? Why did it have to be him? Why couldn't he be better? Why didn't he have all the answers?

Why could he not stay with her? Why did the world want her to lose another family member?

Why had he always been so useless?

Why couldn't he have been better?

Before he fell. Before the pain, and blood.