CatCFember- Day 18 -Only The StarsTurkentine/Bill - (written To This Song)

CatCFember - Day 18 - Only the Stars Turkentine/Bill - (written to this song)

'England, October 8th 1971. Two men share a silent moment in the dead of night, just to be.'

The night was dark, and bitterly cold. It often was in their humble town; the winters felt like they grew harsher each year, draining colour the streets could barely afford…

But not this year. This year felt different.

Perhaps he was still recovering in the wake of recent commotion- a candyman can only take so much- but he could have sworn the nights had grown warmer since October 1st. Like something had changed in preparation for a new era, like the streets were less dreary, the frost less numbing on his skin.

But there, then, as he sat in the middle of a pitch-black field, on the most remote hill, Bill did not care whether it was freezing ice nor scorching heat. There, then, as he sat under a sky with no moon, with a man deemed his sun: nothing else mattered.

David rested his head softly against his partner’s shoulder, a tired silence shared between the two. As they stared upon the horizon, both were lost more in their own thoughts than the silhouette sea of barely-legible houses. Other than the factory that never slept, no one in their right mind would be up that late; at least, no one with nothing to hide. No one like them.

The two older men were each other's secret, and only there, only then, in the dead of night on a pitch-black hill, could they find a moment’s safety in eachother’s cold embrace.

No. Out there, only the stars knew.

me, joking about a shitpost ship of the math teacher / the sweetshop owner from Willy Wonka: haha that's funny.

me, thinking about it: Yeah, but... Mr. Turkentine- a man who dislikes kids and sweets- complaining about his schoolkids to his partner. Bill- a man who adores kids and runs a sweetshop- softly teasing in response because everything he's saying is amusingly ironic, and he's heard the same complaints a million times before yet doesn't care because he loves him and that's just a part of it.

me, really thinking about it: Having to pretend they're 'good friends' because this is the dawn of the 70s, and being gay had only just been decriminalised, it was 2 years from being stricken as a disorder, and was still considered a 'deviation'. Two men who work primarily around children, would have to be so incredibly secretive about their love, only seeing eachother when there are believable excuses present, meeting only when the shop is closed for the night, but doing it anyway because that's just how it had to be.

me: ... fuck I think I ship it unironically.

Despite the other art, our musical wonka isn't a shitpost.

He's pretty complex, we just haven't posted about him yet. But he came about from the thought of "why are all Wonkas tall and thin? not all of them are going to have the metabolism of the gods." So suddenly our brain does its fixation thing and it turns out it was actually an alter we were taking inspiration from and we have this fabulous, complicated, messed up fellow owning our attention. This Wonka (He/She/It) is very prone to stress & spirals, and quite often finds himself obsessing over his own mortality. The way she presents herself on the tour, you'd mostly think she's just a bit of an asshole... until you realise she alliterates more when she's stressed, she keeps popping these little medicine candies in her mouth, occasionally she makes mildly concerning comments about death and temptation, and there's a Lazurus Room in the basement. "Memento Mori, Charlie".

Closing the factory was an overnight choice after she became paranoid that the world was out to get her. The tour was a choice after she obsessed over her own death during a sleepless spiral. This Wonka doesn't even want an heir, but it's yet another backup plan for when the night finally claims her. So he sets up a tour, and he trials them to the ultimate test: Temptation.

And when all is said and done, months into moving into the factory, Charlie learns the truth...

He looks to his new mentor, and he asks "You planned it, didn't you?" And she replies. "The hand of fate needs an arm, and I simply volunteered."

And that's not even getting into all the little details, nor the other characters: with such hits as Esports Streamer Mike Teavee only got his ticket cause 'Chat said it would be PogChamp', Tiktoker Violet & her Less Successful Tiktoker mom, Charlie Needs Therapy because his Mentor Refuses Therapy, Molly Bucket trying to protect her son and Accidentally Falling in Love With A Very Broken Person (aka 'Mr. Wonka is your dad now, Charlie'), the Oompa Loompa Night Shift, and Also Miranda Is Here And Wonka Pushed Her In. we love him a lot

We're still alive by the way,

turkenbill has consumed us also our turkentine introject from childhood woke up and there's been a lot of onboarding him into the system; it's a whole thing

also we need to do work because 1.4 of 'the Inner Worlds' is coming out on Friday and it is not finished

So we made our own musical wonka...

Me and my friends laughed at this image for like ten minutes last night.