For Reasons Wretched and Divine

When you love it

Notes:

From the perspective of the clubhouse

~0O0~

As time went on, laughter was heard less and less in the walls of the Club.

As decades passed and stakes heightened, as the hair got grayer and trust withered, numbers shrank, and alliances strained, the Clubhouse was witness to it all.

The Clubhouse saw a lot of things, if it were to be brutally honest, more things that any one place should be subjected to. Affairs and drugs, life-altering decisions in the chapel and marriage ruining decisions of the dorm, heartbreak at the bar, and a life of regret staring at JT's bike. The walls of the Club got to see it all, and it was relieved to hear the laughter again; it had been too long. Too long since they all acted like the family they vowed to be, too long since they all felt a semblance of safety.

Rows of dusty card tables pulled from storage were set up in the middle, pool table pushed out of the way, and everything shoved off to the side to make way for the feast table. Everyone that showed up got a heaping plate of steaming food and a place at the table.

For a few hours, the Reaper was forgotten, 'the cause' wasn't a thought in anyone's mind. The chaos and blood that had been woven into the very core of their lives were blissfully absent.

"You're invited to Thanksgiving, Sunshine," someone exalted, affirming noises of praise ringing out from full mouths through the makeshift dining room, and the woman haltingly accepted the compliments.

She was still learning to be loved, as they all were, in some ways. It's hard but possible.

The Clubhouse loved its people, every damaged and charred inch of them. Sometimes, the love wasn't deserved, and sometimes it was at the damage of the very building itself, but it loved anyway. Even when walls were punched and fires were started, when blood pooled on the floor, and the halls were filled with nothing but an aching silence. Even when the inhabitants were broken and vile, morally corrupted and greed-oriented, the smell of spent gun casings permanently flavoring their skin, screams following them like a haunted shadow.

Because, when is a monster no longer a monster?

When you love it.

And in these rare, beautiful moments, in front of a sumptuous meal created by someone selfless as they were wonderful, the Clubhouse was allowed to be reminded of it.

~0o0~

Notes:

I had higher hopes for this chapter, but I'm too goddamned tired.
I start college in three days, which means, the story is going to be affected, or not at all. Idk. We'll see, because I'm also keeping my job and doing school at the same time, so we'll see how this little cripple does with all of that in her life.
Fingers crossed but expectations are low.