Pie's Punishment Post, Part 3: Fantasy Evolution

I wanna talk about evolution. Not about real evolution though, but like... fantasy evolution I guess. I've been thinking a lot about Cinnamon and White Island and all it's creatures and as a person who takes things way too seriously I started thinking about how fantasy creatures became that way.

Now I mentioned in the story that there are several types of trolls, like mountain trolls and forest trolls and so on. Hizi and Pessi are both a part of the troll family, but different species, y'know (Hizi being a goblin and Pessi a menninkäinen or whateverthefuckIcalledinthestory, a forest troll or whatever). And I was thinking, just like humans and apes are all descendants of the same ape-like ancestor, all the (humanoid) fantasy creatures are descendants of.....dundundunnn, humans! That could explain why the Queen is a human even though all the other creatures are you know, more powerful and stuff. It would also explain the lack of humans in White Island, they have evolved! Maybe the Queen is super old, like she cast an immortality spell on herself or something.

Also on a side note, there are occasionally portals to different worlds, right? Like the one Cinnamon came through. Well maybe sometimes it goes the other way around, and creatures from White Island end up in our world and other worlds. Which is why it seems that there are creatures from all sorts of mythologies there. It's just that creatures from White Island are actually in all sorts of mythologies, you get? For example, say a minotaur went through a portal and ended up in ancient Greece. Hence minotaurs in Greek mythology. And time works differently in White Island, I think so it's all good.

Anyway, so all humanoid creatures are evolved from humans (and all animal creatures from animals, like talking lions and shit). Here, I made a thing.

Now, I'm probably missing a lot of creatures there, but that's just the basics. There is also a lot of variation in the groups, like different kinds of centaurs, merfolk with different fish as the base, and pixies is an enormous group of species. I'd like to point out that house elves are just forest elves that just bum in people's houses. Also sun beams aren't literally sun beams, they just use light based magic and I have yet to come up with a better name for them.

I'm not gonna go into the animal based creatures, like hippogriffs and stuff, 'cause that's too complicated for me right now, sry.

But yeah, that's it really. I thought I'd have a lot more to talk about this, but I guess not. Hm. Thoughts? You are the one who wants to study biology. I just wanted to ask if this makes sense. Also I need a brainstorm buddy, so let's do this!

Pie out.

What is life, baby don't hurt me

Hi. Pauliina came yesterday. That's pretty cool. I have 11 days left. That's insane. Wow. What even happened.

I don't really have anything to say here. My punishment posts are on the way, the first one will come tomorrow and the second on Sunday. I think. I haven't finished all the pictures for that yet so assuming we're coming back from Canada on Sunday you will get it then. If we don't come.... I apologize and you will get it when we do. No internet is so stupid.

So yeah, we're going to Canada. There's gonna be this fair and it's gonna be cool. I also have a lot of drawing to do and I have to watch In the Flesh. Oh, did I tell you, I made Leila an Elsa-dress. It's pretty good, considering I didn't actually have a pattern. I mean, I bought a ready-made pattern for it, but then afterwards I noticed I'd gotten the grownup size instead of the kids' size. So I knew what shape the pieces should be, but I had to draw them free-hand. But it fits, I think. The armpit/sleeve area is a bit... small?, but otherwise it's good. I mean, she said that it hurts, but she didn't specify when I asked how it hurt. But I can fix it.
I have no idea if I actually have a university place now.... I mean, I think I told them I'm absent, but I don't know if it worked? Also weboodi won't let me get my login. Soooooooo idk. Not that I was really planning on studying anything until Christmas, really. Basically I have no idea what I'm doing. I suppose I could just not do anything for a while, start school next year. I mean I have enough money to pay my rent for a year and then some (I'd probably have enough to eat too, woo), but I really don't wanna use all my au pair money to pay the rent if I could get student aid and use that for rent. Although we can get housing benefits, right? Is that what it's called in English? Idk, I'm not used to worrying about money... ugh, can I just keep living at home? I guess I can't since I made a lease. 'Sides, I don't think Tiinu is studying either. Although she probably has a job, so......... ARGH, I DON'T KNOW.

Sorry.

Woah, zoned out there for a sec, anyway.

Basically I still don't know what I'm doing with my life. I just wanna chill and not worry and make cake for my friends, is that too much to ask? I guess it is when you don't have an actual income... God I'm tired.

I don't really have anything else to say. Stay tuned next for a reality that cannot possibly match expectations, and as always...
Pie out.

Bookshops

Good morning.

Today I'm continuing on the route I started last week of talking about annoyances. Just instead of talking about something human rights- or climate change-big, I'm going to talk about something a lot smaller.

Bookshops in Finland.

I'm going to talk about them while drinking tea that tastes vaguely like coffee, because apparently I didn't wash the pot quite as well as I thought before making tea in it.

Anyway. I've noticed this during the last couple of years. It doesn't really matter to most people, because most people don't read fantasy books, and even if they do, they don't read then with the rate of three in a month. Well, I don't read quite that much either, but you get the point.

The problem with the bookshops is this: they don't have fantasy books.

I mean, obviously they do have some, and considering the amount of all other books in the world, the shelf for fantasy books isn't even too small, compared to the size of an average bookshop.

The problem is this: half of the fantasy/scifi bookshelf is filled with A Song of Ice And Fire. Then there's a few copies of Twilight, maybe a couple of books from Terry Pratchett, some Alastair Reynolds (never read any of his books, but for some reason there are relatively a lot of them in the bookshop), JRR Tolkien (frankly, I don't think you can be takes seriously as someone selling fantasy books if you don't have at least a couple of copies of each of The Lord of the Rings in your shelf the whole time. And The Hobbit). Then there's a bunch of books I have never heard of from authors I probably have never heard of, and on top of all the books that happen to be in the shelf are probably second or third books of a series, so if you do happen to find a book that looks interesting, there's no point in buying it, because you'd need the first books first. This is something that happened to me when I spotted The Rogue by Trudi Canavan in a bookshop. I was like "Hey, that's a book I could read. .... Ok, it's the second part of the series. Where's the first one? Oh, you don't have the first one? Well, never mind then. I could have bought both the first and the second, but I guess I'll just leave this here then."

Someone please explain to me how it's good business keeping a copy or two of the second book of a series in the shelf, but none of the first one.

Anyway, I suppose you get the idea behind this. There are too few different fantasy books in Finnish bookshops. And the ones that are there, are probably books that are famous because they've just been made into movies or are on TV Like the whole Song of Ice and Fire -series. I mean, seriously, there's a bunch of copies of each of the five (well, six, cause the third one's in two) books in both Finnish and English, but you can't find a single book from Neil Gaiman, who is a huge superstar in the fantasy circles.

This tells me one thing: they want to sell books to people who watch TV, not to people who read books. Because people who really read fantasy books end up getting their books online, because you simply can't get them in the bookshop. Unless you order it from there, in which case it can easily be at least a week or two or three before you actually get your hands on the book. Anyway, I'm pretty sure people who read books buy more books than people who watch TV.

This has lead me to thinking maybe I should put up a bookshop myself, selling fantasy and scifi books. So that it would be possible for a person to go somewhere where you can find something other than A Game of Thrones.
I'm not actually serious about that, because even though it might be cool to own a bookshop, there's a big bunch of things that I'd like to do in my life that are simply impossible of I'm running a business at the same time. I'm just wishing someone else would do that.

The reason I'm talking about this right now is that The Broken Eye came out today. It's the third book to a series called The Lightbringer by Brent Weeks that I started to read when I was in Australia. So I've been waiting for that book for a year and a half, and now that it's out instead of getting to read it I have to wait for another couple of weeks (at least) to even get that book.

And that sucks.

And it's not even a book I've been waiting super-super-excitedly. It will suck a big deal more when they won't have The Providence of Fire or The Doors of Stone in the bookshop the day they're published. The Winds of Winter I'm almost certain they will have (or then they've screwed something up big time), so that won't be a problem.
But still it seems to me most amazingly good fantasy books just don't find their way into Finnish bookshops.

~matu

Fandom stuff and my life

Hi. It's been a while since I've written the post so late the day has changed in Finland. But I didn't really have time earlier, Kaija wouldn't take a nap.......

Today's topic iiisssssss....... I don't really have a topic, sorry.

Doctor Who starts tomorrow! I am pretty excited. Peter Capaldi seems like a super rad guy, and after being cast he apparently has made a point of refusing to act scenes that were in his opinion too sexist or not-Doctor-like. Which is brilliant, because the direction Moffat has been leading the show is very.. not-Doctor-like. And kinda sexist. Anyway, tomorrow!

Also, they have announced that the 200th episode of Supernatural will be a musical! How awesome is that? We get to see Becky again, and she's been producing a musical based on Chuck's books and it will be hilarious oh man. Also demon!Dean apparently won't be around for very many episodes. Which honestly I can't say I'm surprised, because it would really make monster-of-the-week episodes kinda difficult. It's not like soulless!Sam, because that was still Sam, kinda, but being a demon doesn't really work as well in the same concept. And we didn't find out about Sam's soullessness until like halfway through the season, and after that he had like two episodes until it was fixed? Or something.

Oh, I just realized something! You probably don't care, but I have nothing better to talk about, so deal with it. When Cas became a human the fandom talked about how it was the first time he saw Dean and Sam's real faces because angel's only see people's souls. I never really believed that, because he was practically graceless in the end of s5 so there's that, but I also just realized that angel's can't see people's souls anyway, because Cas would've seen Sam's soullessness in s6 if they did. Also Cas had to stick his hand into that one kid to see who had branded him (in the ep Balthy came) and if he could see the soul surely he wouldn't have had to do that?

I finally started watching Buffy: the Vampire Slayer. And my god I regret every day I hadn't watched it. It is brilliant. I mean it's kinda old, but it is brilliant. I've noticed that tumblr is kind of a good and a bad thing when it comes to series you haven't seen because you find a lot of series to watch but also you get to know a lot of things that will happen and it's kinda stupid. Like before I watched Firefly I'd seen a gifset of the end of Serenity with the comment "the only white dress a girl like Zoe would keep is her wedding dress" so I kinda knew what had happened but not really and when it did happen I was like OH MY GOD WHATTTT NO WHAT'S HAPPENING and now I'm emotional again sorry give me a sec..... So now I'm watching Buffy and I already know things, y'know. I know that Willow will date a girl at some point, and I can't remember who it is but I know it'll end bad, and I know that Angel will leave at some point, because he moves to LA where he has his own spinoff show, and it's kind of distracting, you know. Because I'm constantly on the lookout for those things as I watch the show.


Anyway. What else, uhh....

Pauliina is coming next Thursday. And I'll be coming home in 18 days. Well 17, since I guess you'll be reading this tomorrow. So that's wacky. A little over two weeks and I'll be out, it's crazy. Also good, because I just ran out of chocolate. And I miss you guys too, but you know. Chocolate. Do you want me to bring something for you? Aatu wanted skittles and Iita wanted a... sprite bottle I think? Do you want something? So, my plane is on 9.9. around two I think. I go from Boston to NYC where I have a few hour layover and then I have a straight flight to Helsinki, where I will arrive at like ten on Wednesday morning. Then I will proceed to sleep for two days and then I will go to Tracon on the weekend. I'll come by your place maybe (since it's in Tapere and all)? Oh right, mom? I forgot my ticket at home so Tiinu or someone will come by at some point to get it, k. It should be in the little green basket on my desk. Or somewhere near there. I might also need my pink wig which is on the desk, so I'll tell her to take that too.

I'll probably come to Kuopio to get some stuff the next week. I signed as absent into uni and I don't actually have any courses taken so I think I don't have anything to do until next semester? I'm not 100% sure how this works.......I'll probably go through high school math stuff until I have actual classes.

Well, I can't really think of anything else to say. I'm working on those punishment posts, but I got kinda distracted and drew completely different things instead. But I'm working on it! I guess I'll see you on Tuesday.

Pie out.

Gay marriage

Ok,

so you updated me on some news about what's going on in the US (they do talk about what's going on in Ferguson in the newspapers some. Probably not nearly as much as there.) so I thought I'd catch you up with what's going on with the equal marriage law here in Finland. I don't remember when I've done that before, and I don't know how much you follow Finnish media, so I'm not sure how much of this you already know. But I thought I'd catch you up with this, so you can be properly pissed at our parliament when you get back. Because the bottom line is this:

It doesn't look good.

Ok, so starting from a year ago spring. This you know, because you were still here. They started gathering names for a civil motion (or what ever they call it in English), which was a new thing back then. The point is, that if it gets over 50 000 names, the government starts to actually think about making it into a law. Doesn't necessarily mean it will become one one day, though.

They reached 50 000 names in two days, if I recall correctly. I was in Australia at the time, so I'm not sure.

They handed the motion into government bureaucracy in the fall, with 16 000-something names. This I did mention to you.

Ok, so during the time since, the committee that prepares the motion to be voted about in the big hall with all the members of parliament present has listened to a lot of experts and advocates of some religious communities (which is pretty pointless, since nobody cares whether or not churches are willing to marry people or not. Not in this case, anyway.) and some other people. Not sure who all, but a lot of people.

Then they voted on whether or not they think the motion should pass and be made into a law. And I'm talking about a bunch of about 20 people or so. To the last moment it looked like it's going to be a tough vote, but that they'd probably vote for making a recommendation to the parliament to pass the motion.

On the day of the vote, there were 16 people present.

They voted against the motion 10-6, because a handful of people who would've voted for it were missing.

So, even with this setback, they're taking it into vote in the parliament some time in the fall. For a long time it has looked like it's going to be a tough vote, but that maybe there are a few people who are voting for it more than those voting against, so the motion would pass.

(Also, there's been some trouble with Perussuomalaiset, because Timo Soini had decided that even though this is a matter or personal opinion, everyone in their party should vote according to the party's official opinion: against. And everyone else was like "Dude, you can't do that. This is a matter of one's conscious, you can't force them to vote against that. No one else does either. Though I'm not sure how many of them is voting for it, anyway.)

And then.

And then came the the elections for the European Parliament.

As a result, a bunch of people from the Finnish parliament leave, and go to the EP instead, and the next in line from their party takes their place in the Finnish parliament.

Three of those are people, who were voting for the law to pass, have people voting against the motion taking their places. So now it seems like that those three people might be enough to turn the vote around, so that the motion will be denied, and people of the same gender still won't be able to get married.

So we're waiting.

And the most ridiculous thing is that at least in the law committee the reasons for voting against were stuff like "I can't vote for same-sex people to be able to adopt", or, even worse "This bill isn't done well enough. It's missing some vital information and assessment about how passing this ill will effect our country. It is coming straight from the people, and they don't know how to make a proper bill."
Yeah, well, you know what. That's your job. You take that thing that a bunch of people have worked their asses off and make it into a form that you can pass in the parliament. I mean, it does come from the people, of course it not a perfect and ready bill that you can just vote on! They're practically complaining about bad phrasing.

And at the same time, polls say that most of the Finnish population is all for the law. The parliament just doesn't seem to hear. Or care.

The crappy thing is, that it seems like Keskusta will be the biggest party in next year's parliament election, and they're a party that gets their most votes from the countryside, meaning older people that in Finland on average, meaning there's a good chance the bill won't pass as long as they're the biggest party. Which means it's either now, or the chances are it will be at least 5 years before a chance to get it through again.

So, I got annoyed by all this, and started gathering arguments for and against this in Opasnet. (It's in Finnish). It's still missing a bunch of stuff, because I just put that first stuff up there an hour ago, and then started writing.

So, yeah.
We're doing great here in Finland too.

~matu

PS. I apologise for the misused vocabulary. I'm not all too familiar with the terms having to do with this kind of stuff (even in Finnish), so I've probably used "bill" and "motion" and "law" all in wrong places or when I mean one of the other. So sorry about that, I hope you still understand what I mean!

Ferguson

Hi.

Tell me, when did life get so complicated? I mean, I am a very optimistic person, I try to stay positive, but sometimes the world is just so full of shit that I just want to crawl into my bed and sleep until the world is a less terrible place. Of course I can't, and turning a blind eye just makes the problem worse in the long run. "Be the change you wish to see in the world", but it's so terribly hard sometimes. I feel so inadequate because I'm not in a position of power, I'm young and not very charismatic or a good speaker (not to mention I'm a woman, and women are historically taken less seriously when talking about serious things) and it's so flipping hard to make any kind of lasting impact on anything let alone real, big, terrible issues of inequality.

But this is not about me. This is about Ferguson.

Now, I don't know how much media coverage there has been about this in Finland, but I doubt there's been a lot since there's barely been coverage here in the US.

Ferguson is a city(town?) somewhere in Missouri and it is not a happy place right now. It all started, I believe, with the police killing a young black man called Michael Brown last Saturday. He was unarmed and walking home with a friend from a convenience store. The police say there was a scuffle, but eyewitnesses tell that he was shot while attempting to surrender. I do not know why they apprehended him in the first place, but I think it was because they thought he robbed the store. I don't think he did.

The next day there is a candlelight vigil to honor his death, but it escalates into looting and vandalizing local businesses. More than 30 people are arrested. The following week is filled with protest with varying amount peacefulness to bring justice to Brown. Police use excessive force, including teargas and rubber bullets to disperse the crowds. Wednesday evening the police force media out of the city and arrest two reporters who refuse to leave. Yesterday night's protests were peaceful, with officers of the Missouri Highway Patrol joining the marches. Most of the changed atmosphere can be credited to Ron Johnson, who is the commander of MHP. The local police have been accused multiple times of inflaming the situation on purpose and the state police have taken control of the situation, with Johnson in charge. The name of the police officer who killed Brown was finally released this morning.
(Here is a more detailed time line of what's happened.)

Basically the police are being racist and it is terrible. Because the reporters were kicked out there has been little media coverage, but this thing is all over social media. Twitter, vine, tumblr, idk facebook probably. There was also another incident during a protest where another African-American young man was shot in the head. He is in critical condition at the moment, but he might pull through. The officer who shot him claimed that he was carrying a firearm in the protest and Jon Belmar, the St. Louis County Chief of Police, stated that he had no reason to doubt the officer's version of the story.

And it just, UGH. I'm so angry and sad and disgusted that something like this can honest to god happen it's 2014 people WOULD YOU PLEASE GET IT TOGETHER!!! That's basically what happened, but here's a few links to some articles and stuff. (Also a petition against police brutality, in case you wanna sign it idk.)

I'm gonna go look at some cat gifs now, before I get even more depressed.

Pie out.

P.S. I have a plan for the punishment posts, but I request that I get some more time to do them (they will involve a lot of pictures I have yet to draw you see). And you know, I was offline for two weeks, so maybe they didn't count?

P.P.S. In case you didn't do it already, watch Firefly. You will like it and then love it and grow terribly attached to the little fucks just in time to haVE IT STAB YOU IN THE CHEST. I'M A LEAF IN THE WIND DON'T TOUCH ME.

Pictures

Today I wanted to do something different, so instead of telling you about stuff, I took pictures of stuff that's going on right now.

So here:

 I bought a puzzle. The picture is from Rio de Janeiro.

 I still have some blue to do...

 You really should read The Kingkiller Chronicle.

 I've only read the introduction so far, and then I started thinking about how much easier it must have been to come up with stuff back when all the basics of science wasn't yet known.

You can try and guess what this will become. Maybe I'll post a picture of it next week.












~matu

PS. Weren't your two extra posts due next week Monday, meaning 18.8.?

20 fun facts because I really need to go to bed

Hi. I'm tired. I need to go to bed. So, I'll just make a list of cool shit, because it's cool. Bye.

1. Our brain reacts to poetry the same way it does to music. (Which makes sense if you think about it.)
2. Fasting for 16 hours will reset your body's natural sleep/wake cycle.
3. 
4. We experience withdrawal symptoms at the end of a love affair that mirror chemical addiction.
5. Some stars in the universe are cold enough to be touched by humans. Which is super rad I wanna touch a star!!
6. A group of bunnies is called a fluffle.
7. Candles can be lit by their vapor trail.
8. Former US President Calvin Coolidge enjoyed "buzzing for his body guards and then hiding under his desk as they frantically searched for him."
9. Dean is a terrible liar and that's why he relies on Sam to get them out of awkward situations.
10. Caterpillars literally melt into a sack of fluid cells and then construct the butterfly body from scratch.
11. Jesus encouraged people not to pray out loud, but to practice religion in private. 
12. Oscar Wilde said: “Finnish is easy. You will learn it with no effort at all in 400 years”. Which makes me kinda proud to be Finnish haha.
13.  Tiger's legs are so strong it can stay standing even after it has died.
14. Emma Watson was 9 when she started to work on Harry Potter and was 22 when she finished.
15. France is the only agriculturally self-sufficient country in Europe.
16. There are more synapses in your brain than there are stars in the galaxy.
17. Crows are fucking awesome. They can use tools, solve 8-part puzzles, they visit their parents even after they've left the nest, they can be taught to speak, they can remember faces and theyr brain-to-body ratio is like the same class as a chimpanzee.
18. A man tried to blow up the Eiffel Tower because the light was shining through his window and he couldn't sleep.
19. Goats have rectangular pupils. As do sheep.
20. Misha Collins smells like cinnamon and watermelon. Or so I've heard...

Ok, I'm going to bed now. Good bye from Me From the Past. I won't see you again, but Future Me will. Ciao.

Pie out.

Ecology and tropics and the Arctic

Hello.

Today I want to talk to you about ecology. Studying in IB, we didn't really do much ecology. Instead we concentrated on human and cells and stuff. Which is probably a big part of why I failed to get in to study biology, since ecology seems to be a big thing in Finland.
Also, I seem to think that ecology is wholly the most uninteresting part of biology. Which is weird. I think it's because when I say ecology, what I think about is studying how ecosystems in Finnish lakes work. About a third of the ecology book for the high school course was about the nature here in Finland, and I get that's important and all, for people living in Finland, but somehow I don't find that interesting.
In biology what I do find interesting is genetics, and evolution, and how things change and react and how a system like a living creature keeps working day in and day out. And biodiversity. It's amazing. How something small and simple (well, depends on how you define simple, I guess) can become something big, and something small, and something everything. How a tiny bubble of molecules has developed over billions of years to be everything we see today.
Everything.
Ok, I'm getting overwhelmed by the amazingness of DNA and all this again.

Moving on.

Then I stop and think, and realise that in fact evolution and biodiversity is pretty much what ecology is about. Kind of. It's a lot more than that, obviously, but the things I'm most interested in are a part of ecology, and in fact the rest of it is pretty amazing too. It's just that Finnish ecology isn't interesting. It might be that it's because I've grown up in the middle of Finnish ecology, so it's perfectly normal. But when I move from Finland to South America of Australia, it all gets so much more interesting in my head.
And I think I've found also another reason for this that Finland being common:

There's simply so much more everything in the tropical areas.

And that everything, and the fact that there's so much about that everything that we don't yet even know that there is to know is what fascinates me.

I have a lot of hippie friends who are regularly posting stuff on facebook about saving the Arctic. And every time they do that, I feel a little guilty, because I can't get myself to care about the Arctic areas as much as I feel someone in my social group should. There is a simple reason for that.
If the Arctic melts, polar bears are dead. And arctic foxes, and maybe a few fish species, and a handfull of other animals. But if we hack down the rainforests, a huge amount of species we didn't even know exist go extinct, alongside with all the thousands of species that we know live there. I'm sorry, but as horrible as it would be if polar bears died off, I'm more worried about the warm, tropical areas, the hot spots in the world.
 I know that the Arctic is a unique area in the world, no other like it, and we must preserve it because otherwise there isn't anything like it anywhere any more. But honestly, the biodiversity and amount of life would very likely increase in the Arctic areas if the polar caps melted. So it would in a way be good for the area if it got a little warmer there. Just not for the animals living there right now. But there aren't really that many.
Also, of course, there's the point that as the area covered in ice on the North pole decreases, the amount of light reflected back by that white, bright snow also decreases, and instead all that warmth gets sucked into the ocean, which probably isn't good for the species living in warm areas either.
But still, trying to preserve the Arctic by telling people to save the polar bear seems... I don't know, I don't like it. Trying to preserve the Arctic because of it's nature doesn't seem too important to me. There's far more amazing and lively and diverse nature elsewhere, and I think trying to preserve that is more important. Simply because there's so much more to preserve.

And it's that so much more in there, in the tropics, that truly hold my interest when talking about ecology. When talking about almost anything, really.

I had this pretty much same conversation with dad on the phone a few hours ago, and his comment was "If you're going to get into researching biodiversity in the rainforests of the world, people will have a hard time figuring out if it's you or your aunt who has written a paper." because apparently we have the same initials. And last name. And I was like "oh, well."

Ok, see you next week.

~matu

PS. Speaking of the Arctic, this just popped up on my facebook feed. So yeah, preserving the Arctic is still important, even if the nature wasn't particularly interesting.

Caged bird

Hi there. This is a short story I wrote to this one competition at my school back in........... 2011? Second year of high school. I won third place with the original story - a whopping 30€ - and it's been rewritten and rerewritten since then. I actually got a review for it from an actual professional author at one point and she liked it so aaaa. I'd forgotten about that. Can't remember her name, but she came to visit our creative writing class last year and I missed the actual visiting lesson, so my teacher emailed the story to her and she wrote back with a review. I have it somewhere back home, I should try to find it...

Anyway! The story was originally in Finnish, but I though I'd translate it because why not. Enjoy!

Pie out.

~x~

October rolled around, cold and harsh. Wet as well, although the relentless rain of the past several days had finally ended and even the occasional shimmer of sunlight could be seen from between the thick grey clouds. The river running through the city had swelled up from the rain, its stream faster and rapids stronger.

The overbridge was deserted, which could be attributed to the time of day; most people were at school or work, and the cold autumn weather shied away all who weren't. Well, nearly all.

A lone figure of a teenage boy stood on the bridge. He was clutching the barrier and staring down at the black water. The line of his shoulders seemed heavy and he sighed, his tired grey eyes following the layer of froth as it swirled around, around, around on top of the water. A gust of wind whipped past, ruffling his brown hair.

He inhaled deeply and squeezed his eyes shut.

“'S gonna be cold.”

Nick spun around, eyes wide, looking for whomever had spoken. Another boy, somewhat older, was sitting on the railing on the opposite side of the bridge, staring up at the sky.

“The water, that is.”

“The... What?”

“Wow, I didn't realize I was being that unclear,” the older boy said with a grin. He still didn't look down. “The water. It's cold, yeah?” Nick scowled at him.

“I know that—it’s October, you twat. Who the hell're you?”

The older boy raised his eyebrows and jumped off the railing to the bridge, stalking over to stand next to the other. He peeked over the edge, at the blackness of the water below and Nick glanced down as well. It was a long way down.

“Let's just say... I'm your personal guardian angel. Temporarily,” he said with a grin, finally turning to look at Nick. His eyes were awfully blue. “What's your name?”

“None of your bloody business,” Nick snapped, tearing his gaze away, opting to turn back at the river again. He could feel the blue eyes on him, assessing him, but he ignored it and crossed his arms.

They were quiet for a while.

“Nick.”

“Sorry, what?”

“My name is Nick,” he said, louder this time. He refused to look at the “angel”. His eyes were unnerving, like they were somehow older than he appeared.

“Nick, huh?” said the angel. “Not bad. I like it.”

“Hmh,” said Nick.

“Ok, sweet. I'm gonna tell you a riddle,” the angel continued after it became apparent Nick wasn't going to comment further.

“I always run ahead,

and you can't catch me.

I am certain, but uncertain,

yet you must depend on me.

You can never truly see me,

but still you try.

Here is the question,

who am I?”

Nick blinked. He blinked again. Then he frowned. The angel watched him with an amused smile.

“Ugh, I don't know,” Nick finally huffed. “It's too confusing.”

“It is a riddle, chump. That's the point.” Nick made a non-committal sound and rubbed his eyes. He was still frowning.

The silence stretched out for several minutes this time.

“Do you want to talk about it?”

Nick turned to look at angel in surprise, the familiar responses of “I'm fine” and “Piss off” on his tongue, but when he saw the look on the other's face he stopped. Angel was no longer smirking, but his expression was solemn and serious. And his eyes... His eyes weren't sad like mum's, or pitying like the teachers', nor were they confused or, god forbid, annoyed, like most of his so-called friends'. They were kind, understanding almost. Nick looked back at the river and shrugged.

“It's not a particularly interesting story,” he began quietly. “It's my dad, and... well. He's always been a drinker, but then he got sacked and it just kept getting worse and worse. Nowadays he's more often drunk than sober, just lying on the damn sofa. Mum has to work for the both of them, and when she's home she also has to cook and clean and do everything else as well. And dad is an aggressive drunk, and I mean very aggressive, one wrong move and he gets fucking violent. And I – I try not to get in his way, but it's damn near impossible! And – and he.... he...”

Nick inhaled sharply. He could feel tears stinging behind his eyes, hot and insistent. He gritted his teeth, trying to will down the volcano of emotion on the verge of eruption inside him. He was shaking now, his knuckles white from his grip on the barrier and a loud sob escaped his throat. He couldn't take it any more, he simply couldn't, it was too much, it was –

A warm hand wrapped around his shoulders.

He blinked up in surprise. Angel pulled him closer, giving him an encouraging smile. His thumb flicked across Nick's wet cheek and Nick lifted his hand to rub at his eyes again. When had he started crying? He drew in a shaky breath and exhaled deeply.

“Sometimes,” he said, quiet again. “Sometimes I feel like I deserve it. I feel like, like a complete failure, like what he does to me is somehow justified. And I hate myself for it, because I don't deserve it, no one does. Sometimes I want to fight it, but I can't. It's just, it's so much, y'know. It's like I'm choking, like I can't breathe. I live in constant fear that when I do something he will... It – it's like a fucking cage. And I can't, I can't live in a cage any more, so I just thought...”

He fell silent, the words meaningless at the back of his tongue. He gazed down at the river.

“Go.”

“What?”

“You need to go. Somewhere safe. To your grandparents', aunt's, uncle's, friend's place, it doesn't matter as long as you feel safe. There is always someone who wants to help. Because you have to get your life back, and you can't do it, not when he's around. And you can't let one person ruin your life, even if it is your father. You can choose for yourself. So choose to be free.”

Angel's words were calm and insistent. He was looking at the sky again. A small flock of birds flew overhead, migrating south, out of the way of the cold, unyielding winter.

Angel's hand fell down Nick's back before dropping off completely. Nick found himself missing the warmth and steadiness. He looked up at Angel and Angel looked down at him, a small smile on his lips. Nick found himself smiling as well, warmer and realer than he remembered smiling in a long time. Angel's smile grew into a full-blown toothy grin as he noticed Nick starting to smile.

They stood there for a while, face to face, grinning like lunatics. Then Angel nodded and turned to leave.

“Hey, wait!” The words were out of Nick's mouth before he could stop them. He quickly pulled back his hand that had started to reach out. Angel turned to look back with an amused expression. “I uh, I mean.” His heart was hammering in his chest as he tried to think of something sensible to say. “W-well, what was it? The, the thing I must depend on?”

Angel grinned wide.

“The future.”

~X~