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“I want you as my graduate advisor.”
“What?” Carol’s hands fell from her bag. “You – what?”
Zosia smiled, teeth on display now. “I want you as my advisor next year. Like I said, I have been waiting for this class the entirety of my time here. I don't want anyone else claiming you before I do.”
So, Carol was fine. She was fine and the fact that she repeated that constantly, a mantra in her head, probably should have raised some red flags, but it didn't.
She published her books under her pen name, taught at the university, and did not let an unhinged graduate student blow up her life. Just for the fuck of it, it seemed like.
Bookmarked by alicekittridge (Tokay)
25 Jun 2026
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“The purple slipsand,” she continues with a shrug. “You could make it yellow. Or a horrible, bloody shade of red. Neon blue, maybe, or you could just make it a bright white that renders the crew of the Mercator blind to an incoming attack.”
“I can’t just change the colour of the sand,” she replies, scoffing.
“Why not?”
“Because the slipsand is–” She cuts herself off, shaking her head.
OR Carol has writer's block, and Helen goes about correcting it.
Bookmarked by alicekittridge (Tokay)
20 Jun 2026
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There was a cardboard box sitting on her office chair when she arrived. A yellow Post-It was stuck to the top, bearing the words “help yourself” in sloppy handwriting that Carol immediately recognized. She knew what she would find inside, but she opened the box anyway. Sure enough—it was a collection of business casual attire, clearly pre-owned but seemingly devoid of holes and stains.
Helen Umstead can go fuck herself, Carol thought.
or;
The story of Carol and Helen.
Bookmarked by alicekittridge (Tokay)
17 Jun 2026
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Helen was looking in the mirror when the stall door creaked open. Her eyes performed a full-body scan of Carol’s reflection. They lingered on the slight clench in her thighs, hardly noticeable under the stiff fabric.
Helen said nothing as she opened her bag, the sound of the clasp bouncing off the tiles. Her hand pulled out a thin square wrapped in noisy purple film and set it down on the sink, along with her bag.
Carol was expecting some sort of sarcastic remark. Perhaps a defeated acknowledgement that making her wear the stupid skirt had been a bad call.
She didn’t expect Helen to unbutton her slacks. “Switch with me.”
.
.
.During the final day of the Stormshadow of Wycaro Tour, Carol gets her period. Helen helps, as always.
Bookmarked by alicekittridge (Tokay)
12 Jun 2026
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Unfortunately, Carol could only watch helplessly as the garment fell away from the woman's flawless skin. From her vantage point, Carol could see the woman's breast in outline – taut skin, pink nipples, and a devastating lack of a tanline.
The two books in her hand fell onto her towel with a double thump. The woman's eyes slowly met her own in amusement. Carol immediately glanced away in embarrassment – it was a miracle she didn't give herself whiplash.
Europeans and nude beaches shouldn't mix – or, at least, that was Carol Sturka's opinion before a literal Polish model got her claws into her sunburnt skin.
Bookmarked by alicekittridge (Tokay)
01 Jun 2026
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BEEEEEEEEEEP.
The honk comes without warning. For half a second, Carol thinks she has been shot.
Then it keeps going. A sustained, unbroken, eat-shit honk. The kind LA people deploy when they want to fuck you up as a person.
The honking stops. The Range Rover's window comes down.
"Are you leaving the space or not." The woman says it flat, and bored.
Carol puts her own window down. Slowly, for the fuck of it.
“No, lady. I'm not leaving. I’m parked. This is a parking space, and I have parked a car in it. Like a human being is allowed to. Your response to that was to put your hand flat on a horn for what, an hour? What the fuck is wrong with you?”
or
A feud for the ages. Two strangers let a parking incident burrow into their minds and slowly consume their every thought and action
Series
- Part 3 of Close Quarters
Bookmarked by alicekittridge (Tokay)
01 Jun 2026
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Carol gets a little too friendly with a fan at a book launch. Helen intervenes.
Bookmarked by alicekittridge (Tokay)
24 May 2026
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Freedom of the Will and the Concept of a Person by bladeruiner
Fandoms: Pluribus (TV 2025)
20 May 2026
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Two years after the Unjoining, she saw Zosia in London, of all places – nearly unrecognizable in her winter attire – bundled up to her nose. But Carol felt her presence like a sawed-off shotgun wound to her stomach. The sight of her eyes peeking over the edge of her scarf, sparkling with mirth as she shouldered the woman she was walking with –
Well, it was fucking devastating.
‘Who is Carol?’ Spray-painted in canary yellow, stood out against the rain-darkened concrete of the building across the street from The Ritz where Carol was staying.
Bookmarked by alicekittridge (Tokay)
22 May 2026
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Carol Sturka, a reclusive and enigmatic author, is recovering from an alleged nervous breakdown in the quiet isolation of her English countryside manor. Zosia Nowak, a caretaker hired to help Carol heal, arrives with her own agenda and quickly becomes fascinated by the woman behind the pages. Her curiosity deepens as she tries to unravel the mystery of Carol’s collapse, but will the line between caretaker and patient begin to blur?
- Language:
- English
- Words:
- 5,559
- Chapters:
- 2/?
- Collections:
- 1
- Comments:
- 9
- Kudos:
- 74
- Bookmarks:
- 8
- Hits:
- 841
Bookmarked by alicekittridge (Tokay)
16 May 2026
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They have been in the store for forty-five minutes (forty-four of which involve various, grumbling complaints from Carol) before Helen notices the garden section.
“Oh my God, look at this thing,” Helen exclaims, coming to an abrupt halt in front of a plant. Carol, begrudgingly pushing the cart, almost crashes straight into her legs, but manages to catch herself before that actually happens.
She steps around to stand beside Helen, peering down at the plant. She looks at it, really looks at it, then looks back at Helen. “It’s forty-five dollars. For a flower. Forty-five, Helen. Four and then a five.”
OR sturstead get caught up in a hardware/garden store
Bookmarked by alicekittridge (Tokay)
12 May 2026
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There is an old, strange house by the sea which is hauntingly accommodating to Carol's every need. She carries her grief and two phones, calling one with the other just to hear a voice that can't answer back.
She spends her days chasing what is left of herself, trying and failing to write, and waiting for whatever is in the house with her to show itself.
Then her phone rings. A new voice on the line.
Her name is Zosia. She says she's here to help.Bookmarked by alicekittridge (Tokay)
07 May 2026
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After the death of her wife, nihilistic and closeted romance author Carol Sturka descends into a stupor of drunken depression which is only compounded when her fanbase finds out she’s a lesbian and erupts in outrage and deems her disingenuous. Her publicist has the perfect solution to rebuild Carol's public image and free her from the "romance slop" genre forever, but Carol isn't going to like it.
She's right. Carol hates it. (Until she doesn't.)
Bookmarked by alicekittridge (Tokay)
27 Apr 2026
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Carol writes to Helen.
Bookmarked by alicekittridge (Tokay)
21 Apr 2026
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“Hi,” says a gruff voice. “This is the Just-Been-Kissed PD. Anyone in your house who might’ve just been kissed?”
Carol laughs at the put-on accent, her toes curling against the carpeted floor. “Helen?”
Bookmarked by alicekittridge (Tokay)
21 Apr 2026
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She consciously ignores the memory of being introduced to Helen in the lobby a few weeks ago; doesn’t think about how her silver thumb ring had briefly skimmed over Carol’s knuckles when they shook hands. Or the smile that had crept up Helen’s full cheeks while they made small talk about Wycaro.
Bookmarked by alicekittridge (Tokay)
19 Apr 2026
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An Orchid Of One's Own by taweretsdagger for obsessivedaydreamer
Fandoms: Pluribus (TV 2025)
16 Apr 2026
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When Helen tags along with her client on a writer's retreat, she thinks fabricating her own writing chops will be the biggest challenge the trip has to offer. But the setting reminds Carol a little too starkly of things she'd rather not remember, and more than anything Helen is determined to protect her from them all.
Bookmarked by alicekittridge (Tokay)
17 Apr 2026
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Helen convinces Carol to have a baby. Maybe she shouldn't have.
Bookmarked by alicekittridge (Tokay)
16 Apr 2026
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Carol bit her lip and forced the words out, “Iwanttoroleplay.”
“What was that?" Zosia asked.
“Roleplay.” She wasn’t going to repeat the first part of that statement. “Uh. You be… Raban.”
Bookmarked by alicekittridge (Tokay)
17 Apr 2026
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Online, a friendship blossoms between two anonymous women.
In real life, an author and editor enter a contentious relationship that only sours more by the day.
The Sturstead answer to "what if beloved oomf hated celebrity you?"
Series
- Part 1 of Hearts Often Tack
Bookmarked by alicekittridge (Tokay)
15 Apr 2026
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A series of vignettes, in which Carol interrogates Zosia about her own life.
Bookmarked by alicekittridge (Tokay)
12 Apr 2026