dreamwriters: a pencil at a diagonal with Just Write in the lower left corner (Just Write)
[personal profile] dreamwriters
Title: Mending What You Can
Rating: G
Word Count: 298
Prompt: Mending What You Can ([personal profile] ysabetwordsmith's title prompt for [community profile] crowdfunding Creative Jam June 2015 on Broken Relationships), "eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth" ([community profile] getyourwordsout's The pig in a poke proverbial writing challenge)
Original/Fandom: Fandom: Welcome to Night Vale
Content Warnings: unhealthy relationships (borderlining dubcon in one, borderlining neglect in the other), martyr complex/drive-to-fix, compassion fatigue
Summary: Carlos might be back in Night Vale, but he’s not sure if he’s made the right choice: is it really mending when you replace one broken relationship with another?
Notes: This is Carlos-introspective angst headcanon set after the most recent anniversary episodes of Welcome to Night Vale (70A Taking Off and 70B Review). This is this session's freebie.


Optimistic speech of “home is where the heart is” and a long night of discussion with Cecil aside, Carlos still isn’t sure he’s right.

Night Vale, Desert Bluffs and the Desert Otherworld all live by “an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth” but even if Night Vale is home because it’s where Cecil is, he can’t believe that’s the right way to deal with problems he wants to solve. A scientist asks questions and then solves things even if he doesn’t know the mechanism of action yet.

In his quest to mend his relationship with Cecil, he’s had to throw Kevin under the bus. Set boundaries he’s not sure are healthy to begin with. And he knows how lonely his boyfriend’s double is. Every time Cecil complained about missing him, asked again if he’d find a door and he’d promise tomorrow again and again, Kevin would echo Cecil’s desperation with an equally desperate “don’t leave me”. It was terrifying how much the two mirrored each other’s begging.

Carlos had thought that maybe if he stayed one more month, Kevin would get better. That maybe by staying he could fix everyone. That he could stop the Masked Warriors from fighting the many other armies marching in different directions across the desert. That he could save Kevin from himself. Instead, he’d found himself running out of capacity to listen to Cecil and help him because he was so busy firefighting everything in the Desert Otherworld and finding the only solace in trying to desperately distract himself with his research which ultimately turned into the longest and most fruitless timesink in the history of his scientific career.

It’s been a long year of mistakes. But is it really mending when you replace one broken relationship with another?

Wow!

Date: 2015-06-21 07:25 pm (UTC)
ysabetwordsmith: Cartoon of me in Wordsmith persona (Default)
From: [personal profile] ysabetwordsmith
*wince* Yeah, I think a lot of people go from one broken relationship to another, because they don't stop to fix what's wrong with themselves in between.

Re: Wow!

Date: 2015-06-22 02:31 am (UTC)
ysabetwordsmith: Cartoon of me in Wordsmith persona (Default)
From: [personal profile] ysabetwordsmith
I think it's cool when a show sparks conversations like that.

About Me

32/bigender or polygender, presenting feminine/lifelong learner, reiki practitioner, writer.
passionate about animals, words, and helping human and non-human animals

March 2021

S M T W T F S
 123456
78910111213
14151617181920
21222324252627
282930 31   

Most Popular Tags

Page Summary

Style Credit

Expand Cut Tags

No cut tags
Page generated Jul. 9th, 2025 12:42 am
Powered by Dreamwidth Studios