i would be feral abt t4t paldulcie
adds such a great layer to the ambiguously erotic long distance mentorship situation… dulcinea as a trans elder… i’m frothing at the mouth
SEE i wasn't thinking of Dulcie as a trans elder in this situation, I think Juno Zeta would put her her son on blockers aged 10 and be the kind of mom to have a toddler portrait tattoo redone to be like, still extremely binary but now the baby is dressed in blue with a baseball cap.
specifically I want to explore the experience of being trans and having these kind of... long distance, no faces, text only relationships where you can feel fully affirmed and the disconnect that then exists between your real world experience, and how this interacts with of course also being critically ill and not wanting anyone to see you because of that. the compounded body horror and also then, intimacy when there IS someone you trust to see you sick, see you naked, and the way that interacts with the vulnerability and exhaustion of sickness,
and there's another layer I really want to explore regarding how critical illness i.e. cancer can often impede or slow medical transition while ALSO drastically shortening the time in which one has to make these decisions. to quote my favorite movie "there is still time", but what if there isn't? what is there ISNT time? what if you're dying, and you want to die in the body you want to be remembered in, but you don't know if you'll get there? there's a horror in that. this quote from harrow the ninth:
"“The only thing that ever stopped me being exactly who I wanted,” she said, “was the worry that I would soon be dead … and now I am dead, Reverend Daughter, and I am sick of roses, and I am horny for revenge.”"
i think this would add to Palamedes' like... "i need to cure her i need to save her" and also heighten Dulcinea's rebellious streak (she wants cigarettes!!! she hates roses!!!) while also interacting with how she DID, in fact, decline Palamedes' proposal. she decided to stay where she was. there's so much here. im getting dangerously close to getting really personal here on tumblr dot com but im shaking the bars of my cage