Death

I didn't want to believe it. I refused to believe it, wrote my post yesterday completely convinced that it was a cruel trick. But it's not.

August St.Claire is dead.

Fuck, saying it like that... I can't hardly stand to look at it. But it's the truth, and he wouldn't have wanted us to hide from it. He was the best of us, a beacon of love and hope in the midst of all the tragedy of the Stalked. A lost, broken boy, who decided to make meaning for himself out of helping the rest of us.
And just like Emma and Cam before him, a monster laid him low to try to destroy us.

Steele has already made the threats I want to make. I'm sure he and the rest of them will be able to say better, more beautiful things in memory of this man that took such good care of us all. Eulogies will be made, a lot of tears will be shed, because the world has lost some of it's goodness without August around to mother us all.

But August... he knew what I was long before the rest of you. He made friends with Cam and wore a dress to his wedding to make us smile. Fought in it too, to defend people he'd never even met before.
He drove halfway across the country on a moment's fucking notice to try and rescue me, a woman he'd only met once and barely talked to.
He took all my late night phonecalls, when I was drunk and crying or angry or whatever other reason. He talked me down and gentled me and told me that I was a good fucking woman and that I really could make Cam proud.
He somehow found my fucking birthday and made me a goddamn feast to celebrate, without being asked, just to try and make me smile.
He held me while I cried, more times than I can count.
He let me use his fucking bedroom when I was scared and lonely and Spencer was... not himself.
He cheered me on while I fought for Star, and when I attempted the impossible task of setting up a safehouse.
He talked me down when I was piss drunk and scared
He came down to help settle in Richard, Elliott, and Alex, because after what they'd been through they needed all the gentle they could get.
He was the one I called when Hope was falling down around my ears and I didn't know what to do.
He was the one I turned to when I got back to the House and I was too far gone to even register anything but loss.
He was the one that mothered Emily when I couldn't fucking do it, and she was hurting as badly as I was
He made no complaint, merely held me and apologized when I tried to kill myself.
He was the one that always made time for me if it was physically possible, no matter what.
And in the end, I didn't realize how much I'd come to rely on him until I was talking to Lori on the phone because I couldn't believe he was gone until I'd heard it from her.

He will be missed. And Writer, you're fucking retarded if you think this will go unpunished.

Despite What Spence Thinks

It's time to pay my respects to a good woman. Rachael is dead. She was a damn good friend to me, took me in right after Cam died, helped try to save Shrody when I couldn't. She helped gentle Joel when he was a Wolf, and she stepped in and took a very sad, lonely little girl who'd forgotten how to be a child to Disney World.

It's a little hard to imagine, a woman as full of life and determination as she was when I last saw her, gone. She was fighting so hard for her own salvation, trying to earn the right to the peace she wanted more than anything. Unlike some of us, she wasn't an engrained fighter-she fought out of desperation, something that went so very against the nature of the poor gentle woman I was honestly amazed she did so well.
She was a softhearted woman who once chose to slice into her own flesh over and over to avoid doing harm to a runner, when the urges got too strong.
And now she's dead. By the hands of the very man she'd risked everything to protect. I hope she's found some peace.

In other news. Elliott's gone off to visit Richard again, said not to expect him back for a while, so it's just Em and I. And a new companion, at least temporarily. A couple more notes, nothing particularly interesting, they've just been on the windshield of my car. Either my stalker has run out of ideas or they're plotting something big.