AS IT SHOULD BE - Blog Posts

Jackken is such and underrated ship 💔

So, The Glass Scientists by Sage Cotugno is one of my absolute favourite Jekyll and Hyde stories and I would highly recommend it.

It has the same tone of lighthearted silliness mixed with genuine tragedy which I loved about the original novella

I gives Jekyll and Hyde both ample screentime so you get to see both of their perspectives, and get to know them both as people

It doesn't play the "Jekyll's pure good, Hyde's pure bad" card, which I appreciate

The character designs are great and Hyde's facial expressions are priceless!

It keeps in the queer narrative, which is a major part for many people reading the novella but I haven't seen other adaptations do it very well

It has a werewolf, and he's a very nice and sweet young man

And it's Webcomic, so it's free to read on the internet!

the fact that that meme is literally how I get any important news nowadays just reaffirms something I noticed a little while ago

humor has been everyone's coping mechanism for the last two generations

at some point when they were growing up the millennials decided to laugh instead cry and it just hasn't stopped

Happy third anniversary to Tumblr's emergency announcement system

My room is a mess in an organized fashion.

as it should be

“Yellow is fake,” says Lilac to Oleander. “It is because I say so.”

Lilac tilts their head and keeps staring at the setting sun, squinting to see the colours. Oranges and yellows blended together and draped around the clouds like the most perfect curtains to ever exist, natural and ugly.

Fake.

“And all of the clouds must be paintings.” Oleander has never understood Lilac. Maybe they never would.

“What do you mean?” Lilac traces the sky with a gentle, steady hand, the clouds just barely shifting and twisting, gliding instead of pulling like a current in a river. Impossible, incomprehensible.

“Why are black and white not colors, but yellow is?” Lilac questions. Lilac has an awful lot of questions. They’ve always been curious. Not so much that they never look before they leap, but just enough to look over the edge and decide it isn’t that far of a drop.

That doesn’t mean that they would be right, however.

Oleander has always been the kind of person to never leap in the first place, let alone look. The varying perspectives is exciting the main diffference between the two.

Oleander responds, “Because black and white aren’t part of the rainbow.”

Lilac furrows their brow. “But we’re just humans. If we were mantis shrimp, and we had sixteen color receptors, then maybe black and white would be colors in the rainbow.”

Lilac gestures at all the fake colour. It dances around in streaks, brush strokes painting lines stolen right off the rainbow. “Why are we allowed to judge that if we can’t know for sure? Why can’t I declare that yellow is fake, like black and white?”

“Because we want labels.” Oleander is becoming annoyed. “We want labels, because we want to have purpose and meaning. We want to be defined. Purpose is having a place, a contribution to something. That gives us purpose, or whatever we think is purpose anyways.

“We all want purpose, because without it we don’t have meaning.”

“But why can’t we have no labels and still have meaning and purpose?” Lilac runs a hand through their hair, squeezing their eyes shut and staring at the yellows in the backs of their eyelids instead. Comforting fireworks of golden sparks, raining down in waves. An ocean of fiery yellow. It’s fake. “Labels don’t indicate worth. Labels aren’t a purpose. They’re a box. People can’t fit in boxes. I mean, I haven’t ever tried, but I don’t think the shapes would match up.”

Oleander may never understand Lilac, but they will always listen, in case one day, they find an answer in the horde of never-ending questions. In case one day, Oleander figures out why Lilac keeps them up all night when they’re not even there.

In case one day, Oleander won’t have to strike through their thoughts anymore.

“Because boxes are comforting. They’re a safe place. A shelter. And people aren’t always comfortable in their own selves, so sometimes they’ll put themselves in shelters. They’ll make a home in a label because they can’t find one in their own mind.” The words are spilling out of their mouth, clumps and pieces jumbling together. “They don’t feel comfortable with who they are, so they try to make themselves someone they like because they think that they’ll be comfortable with someone else. With a cliché.”

The words stop flowing. They drift off instead, and Oleander tries to catch them, tries to fit them in their fists. It barely works. They only snatch a single sentence. “But they never are.”

It’s a grey sentence, Oleander knows. Shiny silvery grey, colourless. It’s a truthful group of words, honest. Nothing is really black and white. Black and white sentences aren’t lies, really, but they’re always mistaken.

Grey is the only honest colour.

Oleander wonders what the least honest colour is. They think that maybe, just maybe, it might be yellow.

Lilac thinks that Oleander is right. Lilac also thinks that when they look up and open their eyes, all they can see looks like paint on the water, and their focus shifts once more.

“Crystal clear water,” they murmur. “And acrylic.”

Oleander is not following. “What?”

“The clouds,” Lilac explains. They’ve got a sleepy look on their face, and eyes like stars. “I’ve decided they’re paint on water. They can’t be real.”

Oleander wishes they could be Lilac, and see the world as simple as they do.

Just for a second.

A single, sweet second of understanding.

Oleander think about the comparisons of the both of them frequently. It’s glaringly obvious that they contrast each other greatly. One might even say that they complimented each other well.

Lilac smiles slow, small, and sweet, and Oleander doesn’t smile much at all anymore. Lilac is fantastical and creative. Oleander doesn’t even like anything other than non-fiction. Lilac always has an idea. Oleander can’t remember the last time they thought of something new, original.

Oleander wants to contribute to something. Maybe Oleander needs meaning as well.

“Maybe oil pastels on acrylic,” Oleander offers.

Lilac stretches their arms out on the grass below them, digging their fingers in the warm dirt and getting it under their nails. Wet earth stains their hands, but they don’t care. “On a canvas,” they add quietly.

Lilac feels like they could just melt into the ground, close their eyes again without looking once at the explosions of fake colours, and just fall.

Fall intangible through the core of the world, and through the other side.

Maybe even fall through China instead of digging their way there.

Fall into the sky.

Fall asleep.

And they do.

Oleander goes on to stare at the moon. And the clouds go on to being oil pastels on acrylic, and yellow goes on being fake.

Everything is wrong.

As it should be.

look at this sweet gender bent iron man design

Ian's in timeout.

Our bugsona designs courtesy of @anonymous-utility ! Please go check them out. They art very good.