A Spindle Splintered

Maybe the universe doesn’t naturally bend toward justice either; maybe it’s only the weight of hands and hearts pulling it true, inch by stubborn inch.

I see her choosing now whether to make her love into a cage or a key.

Sleeping Beauty is the worst fairy tale, pretty much any way you slice it. It’s aimless and amoral and chauvinist as shit. It’s the fairy tale that feminist scholars cite when they want to talk about women’s passivity in historical narratives. (“She literally sleeps through her own climax,” as my favorite gender studies professor used to say. “Double entendre fully intended.”)... ..Even among the other nerds who majored in folklore, Sleeping Beauty is nobody’s favorite. The romantic girls like Beauty and the Beast; basic girls like Cinderella; goth girls like Snow White. Only the dying girls like Sleeping Beauty.

I should have spent more time thinking about your life than worrying about your death.

let’s not pretend girls with swords don’t get shit done.

I never stopped trying to save you, so don't you fucking dare stop trying to save yourself.

If you like something, like it hard, because you don't have a lot of time to waste

Their love has hung above me like the sun, a burning brightness I could survive only if I never looked straight at it, never flew too close.

I'm turning away when Prince Harold says, his voice thick and fleshy through his swollen nose, "I don't understand." His eyes are on Primrose and Charm, on the place where their hands are joined together so tightly they look like a single creature. "Well, Harold," I say gently. "They're lesbians.

Hey, it's okay, alright? I'll walk with you, every step. You won't be alone." We might not be able to fix our bullshit stories, but surely we can be less lonely inside them, here at the end. "Just go to sleep. I'm right here.

In that moment he reminds me of Charm’s parents, or maybe my own: a person whose love is a burdensome thing, a weight dragging always at your ankles.

I don't know about the moral arc of the universe, but our arcs sure as hell don't bend towards justice. Unless we change them. Unless we grab our narratives by the ear and drag them kicking and screaming towards better endings. Maybe the universe doesn't naturally bend toward justice either; maybe it's only the weight of hands and hearts pulling it true, inch by stubborn inch.

This is a stone-cold lie, but I don’t call her on it. Some lies are important.

Even among the other nerds who majored in folklore, Sleeping Beauty is nobody's favorite. Romantic girls like Beauty and the Beast; vanilla girls like Cinderella; goth girls like Snow White. Only dying girls like Sleeping Beauty.

I riffle through my mental box of inspirational quotes and come up with a Dylan Thomas line that I actually know from Interstellar. “Do not go gentle into that good night, princess.

I’ve always resented people for trying to save me, but maybe this is how it works, maybe we save one another.

Strangers tend to imagine that sick people are looking for ways to die with dignity, but mostly we’re looking for ways to live.

I hope you find your happily ever after, or whatever." "Already did. I'm just looking for a better once upon a time.

It's one of the rules for dying girls: if you like something, like it hard, because you don't have a lot of time to waste.

This time, when I press my finger to the end of a splintered spindle, I’m smiling.

I can't remember if they did the "speak now or forever hold your peace" thing in Medieval times, or if it's one of those Victorian inventions, like brides wearing white or homophobia.

I'm at least three-fourths straight, but her lashes are very long, and very golden, and I'm not made of stone.

You know it wasn't originally a spinning wheel in the story?' I offer, because alcohol transforms me into a chatty Wikipedia.

All of them stepped out of their own narratives to save someone else

Instead of just trying not to die we should be trying to live.

Princesses grow up to be Queens.

I saw a marriage you did not want to a husband you could not love, who would not care whether you loved him or not. I saw a slow suffocation in fine sheets, and a woman so desperate to escape her story she might end it herself.

pam's corner closet & more. Pam's is the nearest flea market to our old high school and an extremely unlikely place to purchase an accursed or enchanted object. It's mostly just used vacuums and Beanie Babies perched on moldy piles of National Geographics.

But suddenly I saw her as my mere reflection: a girl with a shitty story. A girl whose choices were stolen from her.

Do not go gentle into that good night, princess. I beg of you.