#not chapters

part two

The temple would be close by. But the main objective was getting as far away as possible.

And maybe he was exaggerating by saying close by. It was in two cities over. He would need to change to another bus. They could easily deduce that he had taken this one, and find him.

Then he'd be taken back to the school, put under a stricter watch, and then where would he be?

He'd be screwed, is what he'd be.

So, no it was best to avoid people for a while. Or was it best to just work on getting as far as he could? He had planned it, but.

He couldn't help but feel like there were too many variables to control.

No matter. He'd find a way. He always did. He had gotten this far. The thing to do was to just keep running. If he did get caught, he didn't want to know that he hadn't tried to get as far as he could.

He rode the bus as the sun went down, the world becoming greyer and greyer. He smiled as he looked out the window. It seemed fitting.

Eventually the bus came to the end of the line and he got off.

He didn't have a ticket, so he went and bought one in cash before waiting for the second bus.

It was a light rain as he waited by the bus stop. The sky was white and the light was strange. It was beautiful.

His outfit would attract attention. School shorts and shirt? The logo wasn't doing him any favours. He looked behind him and found a second hand store.

The bell of the shop rang as he walked in nodding to the lady at the counter as he went.

There were grey sweaters and black pants. He couldn't wash them, but that was a minor thing. Probably. He picked a black t shirt to go with it, then hesitated and grabbed a white one too. He was meant to be thinking about balance.

On the way to the counter he saw a necklace with beads on it. All brown, with a brown string. Well, some were red, some had patterns. He looked at it and grabbed that too.

He had a hundred dollars to his name. Before this he had a hundred and four. He left with his things in an old plastic bag and changed in a public bathroom. He looked at his face in the mirror. He didn't look different... but he did. This was a new person, now. He smiled wanly at himself and took a pair scissors to his hair. He cut some of it off. Then most of it. A little at the top and the front but still. Mostly gone. It looked nice.

He started at the mirror for a long time before grabbing another wet paper towel, wetting it to wipe up the hair that hadn't fallen neatly on the first. He left it in the bin, along with his uniform.

He buried it with a few more paper towels.

A special thanks to:

@dolphin1812 for brilliant exhaustive chapter-by-chapter daily meta throughout 2023!

@cliozaur for other engaging well-written daily analysis!

@pureanonofficial for lovely chapter-by-chapter daily gifsets of various adaptations, covering over half of the book!

@bobcatmoran for their daily comparisons to the Arai Manga in the early months of the readalong!

@lesmisscraper for their gifsets comparing Shoujo Cosette to the chapters in the original novel!

@pilferingapples for various fun analysis posts, and for participating in the older “Brickclubs” that helped lay the foundation of our tagging system!

@gavroche-le-moineau and other French speakers for giving insight into the pieces of the story that aren’t conveyed in the English translation!

@patron-minette for interesting background and analysis, especially analysis related to Patron-Minette!

@everyonewasabird and @fremedon for the archive of older daily Brickclub posts that helped provide more to discuss!

- and many, many others who shared art, writing, and more throughout the year! Thank you to the people who reblogged and interacted with the fandom even if you never posted, and for the people just read along. I am aware that there are a great many users that I have not mentioned in this post, particularly the people who were more active on Discord than they were on Tumblr, and I am glad for all the conversations we were able to have.

Feel free to shout out anyone you want to appreciate in the comments, and I hope you join us for the next round of daily chapters in 2024!

CODY CAN POST MEMES HERE NOW

A pitch for my webcomic adaptation of The Hobbit! I made a similar post years ago, but I’ve updated it with the art as it appears in the final comic :).