fairandfatalasfair

One of the things I’m missing the most when I think about not getting a season 2 (and, by the same token, one of the things I love seeing in fanfic) is getting to see more of Crystal and Edwin growing into a relationship.

I think their back-and-forth would start to be a real point of entertainment for both of them, still with sharp edges but with a thread of warmth underlying it that belies the snippy tones. I think Crystal would start to keep a mental list of all the things that she can tweak Edwin’s tail about that will genuinely annoy him, but not cause any real harm (and a parallel list of things that aren’t funny, that make him shut down for real or retreat into stiff formality or foist her off on Charles until he can get himself together.) I think they would slip effortlessly back and forth between snarking at each other and ganging up on the rest of the world (Charles and Niko excepted) while Charles watches with stars in his eyes.

I want to see them showing up for each other, defending each other with words and with magic and with the right piece of information at the right time. I want to see them looking to each other for honesty, because they both know how to be cruel when they have to, and sometimes you need someone to just tell you the truth. I want to see them both understanding what it’s like to be someone who doesn’t think of themself as kind, or likeable, or good, but is trying.

I have so much love for snarky characters who are kind and generous and caring, but not necessarily nice or comfortable. I adore the kind of complicated friendship where you know you can trust their kindness because you’ve seen them at their most ruthless. They make me crazy. They could be so good for each other. They are so good for each other. I want to see where it goes.

It’s not entirely clear from the filming of the hell sequences whether there are gaps between, e.g. the curtains in Limbo and the rotating section of wall in Lust. My sense is that the intended interpretation is that doorways in hell are more like interdimensional portals, and how they look on one side has nothing to do with how they look on the other, in which case maybe the hole behind the claw game in Gluttony and the door with the exit sign in the Doll House are just different sides of the same portal and the difference in appearance is aesthetic.

But I am choosing to ignore that interpretation because the angst potential of Edwin finding a sign in the Doll House that claims to be an exit and diving through the door only to find a blank wall that he has to carve his way through with his own bones in order to get out is just top tier.

Hell demanded ruthlessness from Edwin.

He had to push himself past the limits of human endurance, to set aside his own pain and horror because they couldn’t help him. He had to dodge past the tormented souls in Gluttony and Lust and ignore the weeping frozen faces in Limbo, because there is nothing he can do for them and trying would cost him time he can’t spare.

(How many times did he try? how many times did he stop, try to reason with them, and die for it, before he concluded there was nothing to be done?)

We see flashes of that ruthlessness in the show. He’s immune to Emma’s attempts to play for sympathy. He insists Niko “do better” and provide them with useful information, because if she doesn’t she’ll die (like he did, over and over and over, until his efforts were finally good enough.) He zeroes in on the problem in the Devin house - the murder mystery or lack thereof - rather than consoling the client for her loss.

I think Charles softens that side of him a lot - not just in the way he catches him and reminds him of his bedside manner, but in the way he holds space in Edwin’s heart, the way that having Charles welded to his side makes it impossible for him to cut himself off from the world.

He stumbled out of hell after 73 years of having to shut down any consideration for his own or anyone else’s suffering… and stumbled into a boy his own age, the victim of bullying just like him, dying unjustly like he did, a boy whose relentless friendliness even as he’s dying manages to draw a smile from him. A boy he can comfort, whose pain and fear he can actually do something about, because this is not hell, and kindness here will not get him killed. A boy who deserved better, who died defending others in a way Edwin probably hardly believed possible anymore, who inspires him to see the good in the world, someone who would gently remind him about his bedside manner when his mind is telling him that caring about other people is dangerous.

Thinking about the scene of Edwin and Charles on the cliff at the end of Ep 4, and how painful it is watching Charles shrug off that attempted offer of comfort. How it feels so obvious as a viewer that Edwin just needs to push past that initial flinch to be there for Charles…

But Edwin and Charles have a really clear pattern of not pushing each other on painful topics. Charles badgers Edwin about the Cat King, but drops it every time Edwin starts to get defensive. Charles brushes Edwin off about his dad, and Edwin changes the subject. They keep trying, but they don’t force the issue.

I suspect that habit of stepping lightly around each other’s pain, that willingness to leave each other’s scars alone, was essential in the beginning, when Edwin was freshly out of hell and Charles was recently murdered and only slightly less recently living with an abusive parent. I think if Edwin were someone who made a habit of pinning Charles down on things that hurt - Charles whose main coping mechanism is to paste on a smile and look for the bright side, who needs more than anything to feel in control and trusted and like he’s doing something good in the world so that he doesn’t have to dwell on the bad shit - they’d never have made it to this point.

And I do think in that moment on the cliff that Charles needed someone to push past his apparent rejection and tell him that they’ll love him no matter how hard he pushes them away, as Edwin belatedly manages to do at the end of Ep 5.

But I don’t think it was going to happen under these conditions. That’s the tragedy of it - that from our omniscient position, having seen what Charles just experienced, we can guess he might need that extra push. That after 30 years, Edwin could probably get away with that in a way that he couldn’t have in the beginning, in the way that Crystal has been failing to get away with all episode.

But 30 years of habit doesn’t break that easily.

I have so many feelings about Charles Rowland.

His home life was shit. His dad taught him that nothing he could do would ever be enough. That he should expect people to hurt him. He went to a school where he would probably have been a minority on multiple fronts, and I would assume that the “friends” who tried to commit a racist hate crime in front of him never let him forget it. He was beaten so badly he had potentially fatal internal injuries and then driven into a frozen lake and had rocks thrown at him. His murder was covered up - can’t let those nice rich white boys face consequences after all. He never saw an ounce of justice.

He fought so hard for the joy in his life. He fell in love with music and bought tapes that he probably had to scrape for pennies to afford, and recovered posters from shows so that he could have something in his room that made him happy. He learned to let harsh words roll off him, to pick himself up and dust himself off and keep going. Everyone likes him eventually. He’s a good sort of chap. He had hopes for the future. He wanted to live, to grow up, to have a life with all it’s possibilities.

And then all of that was stolen from him, and he picked himself up, and dusted himself off, and kept going. He keeps smiling, because if he lets himself stop he’s afraid of what will come to the surface. He’s carrying around an ocean of grief, but he still has a purpose. He has his most important person, and work that gives his afterlife meaning, and most days that’s enough. He never got justice, so he fights for justice for other people. He never got to grow up, so he’ll keep other people safe if he can.

I just… this boy kills me. He loves so fucking hard, and he gives so fucking much, and he deserves the world.

A few years ago I ran across a post talking about flood gifts - things that come out of a terrible experience that are nonetheless good and valuable to you.

I think about that a lot in relation to Charles, because Charles very much strikes me as someone who has made a life (or an afterlife) for himself out of flood gifts. I’m fascinated by the contradictions of him, the way so much of his character consists of things that are fundamentally good and valuable and beautiful, and that come from such heavy and tragic experiences.

His protectiveness, which grew out of the experience of never being safe at home, of being determined to protect his mother even though he was a child and deserved to be protected himself. But that protectiveness is something he’s proud of and should be proud of, something that keeps him and his friends safe, a gift that he gives to the people around him.

His skill with people, which he needed to survive in a house where things could go south at any moment, and to navigate a friend group that ultimately turned on him for being brown and working class and daring to step out of line. But that skill is still worth having. It makes him good at the work he’s chosen to spend his afterlife on, balances Edwin’s brusque manner and puts people at ease, allows him to create warmth and family and safety with people who push others away without even trying.

His relationship with Edwin, who only met him because he was dying. Charles didn’t want to die. He had a life to live, dreams and goals and joys yet to be attained. That he died at sixteen, with so much of his life still unlived, was a tragedy. And also, his death was the start of the most important relationship of his life, with someone who means everything to him and loves him in ways he never was while he was alive. He can grieve his life, and still know he wouldn’t give up his partnership with Edwin to have it back.

There’s a lot to love about Charles Rowland as a character, but this is one that I keep coming back to in my head, the way he made and continues to makes good things out of the horrors and tragedy of his life.