we don't have to do it: turn the lights off ramble

Hi! Naarel here once more! It's been almost a week since you heard me ramble last! Did you miss me? Probably not, but let's assume you did. We finally arrived at the ending, didn't we? And it's a pretty good one! So, let's get into the game and all, and maybe some overall reflections over the trilogy and its reception. There might be mentions of triggering content related to the entries in this, so, be careful.

Once again: the background

This part was definitely the hardest to write. This might feel a little counterintuitive, considering the content of the first two parts is much heavier than in this one, but that's just the truth. I won't even be telling how many times I cried over this script, mostly because I lost count at some point. I suppose this part, for me, was a cathartic experience. A piece of reassurement. Maybe a bit of a manifestation, sent into the universe.

This part, just like the previous one, is a bit of an answer to the media I encountered as I grew up. There's a particular trope that I kept seeing: love being able to fix everything. It's everywhere. A bad boy changed his wicked ways after falling in love with a soft girl. Curses being lifted after a kiss from the beloved. And, of course: trauma disappearing right after you meet someone that's right for you. Suddenly, all of the past dissolved and all of the years of being regularly destroyed, rebuilt, then destroyed again were nothing but a long gone memory. If you met the right one, they made you forget everything. If you met the right one, they made you feel so good that you simply never came back to the bad times. Love was a cure-all, a panaceum that scrubbed all of the filth in your brain that you couldn't reach yourself.

I guess I don't need to say that it doesn't work this way, but I'll say it anyway: it doesn't work this way. I may not have the same type of trauma as Narrator does, but I know that some things stay with you. I know there are places I can't go to without dissociating. There are ways in which I can't be touched without freezing and things I can't think about without feeling nauseous. And I know it will, most likely, stay with me unless I'll get help for it. Even if I had a partner right now, they wouldn't be able to fix it, no matter how much they'd love me. Love, of course, can help you heal, but it's not the medicine. It's a devastating thought. There's no fairy tale ending with a magical cure, even if you have your prince(ss) charming right before you. I think it's a really hard pill to swallow for some people - it definitely was for me.

But this isn't to say that there is no hope at all, or that it doesn't matter if your partner is supportive or not. No. The thing is: opening up is one of the first steps to healing, and someone who's understanding and nonjudgmental can really help with this particular step. It's incredibly hard to admit that you've been hurt, even to yourself. I remember sitting by my phone around a year ago, notes app open, staring at the blinking cursor as I finally decided to admit this to myself in poetry for the first time, and I just couldn't write the first word. Saying it out loud, writing it down - it makes everything real. It's no longer something that resides within your head, but an actual event with lasting consequences. Until it becomes real, you can deny and minimize it, and while it doesn't fix the problem, it feels better than opening this whole can of worms. But I guess you can't get the worms out of the can without opening it, can you? Sometimes, you need to let it out to someone else. Someone who'll understand you.

While let the lights bleed was inspired mostly by Ethel Cain's Gibson Girl, turn the lights off was written mostly to another Ethel Cain song, Crying During Sex, specifically verses 3-4 and the chorus that follows. I listened to it, staring at the green lights - I kept turning them the right colors while writing the trilogy - and I just felt all the right feelings. It's just the right song for it. Hits the proper vibe I wanted.

In the end, I wanted this entry to be a bit softer and more... hopeful than the other two parts. It's a good ending, but not quite a happy one; rather, I'd say it's bittersweet, at least for me. The trauma still lingers. It's a complex issue. Things aren't fixed, but they are on their way. Narrator is treated right, but the mindset that Partner ingrained in them won't magically disappear. It will take time. A lot of time. I think this is where I want people to make up their own ending and wonder: where does it go from here? Did they heal from it? Did they get professional help? Was it all okay, in the end? Or maybe it was just a honeymoon phase, after which everything fell apart? I'll leave that up to you. I like to think that everything was okay, though.

All the fun story and mechanical stuff

So, since we followed the RGB - or rather RBG - system, we remained with green. I think it's a great color to end on, considering the themes present here. Green is, after all, the color of growth and healing. Green light is a "go" signal, which is even more meaningful when you consider that we began with red, which is the opposite. But as I explained in my previous devlogs, colors that are used here tend to have both positive and negative meanings, and this is no exception. Green is often associated with toxicity - and Partner essentially poisoned Narrator's mind with their manipulation, and the poison is still present.

I hesitated a little before writing this entry. I wasn't sure if changing the "you" here is a good idea after establishing who "you" is in previous two entries. The first drafts included Narrator still talking to Partner - comparing them to Lover (which is how I call Narrator's current partner, in order to differentiate the two), maybe telling them that they miss them and their terrible ways. But it didn't hit as it should; it was, in fact, quite frustrating. Also, it would break my unwritten rule of not defining genders in the whole configuration - sooner or later, I'd probably have to disclose Lover's pronouns, and I'd rather avoid doing this in text. I'm using they/them for everyone involved in the devlogs, but it's out of convenience. Narrator does use they/them pronouns, as I see them as a transmasculine nonbinary person (like me, yay representation), but Partner and Lover can be anyone. I see Partner and Lover more like concepts than actual people; they're an abstract representation of abuse and healing, and those aren't gender-bound. Of course, due to how abuse is portrayed in the media, many people will imagine them as cis men, but I recognize that abuse and healing can come from anyone - I experienced both from a variety of people. I won't be correcting people on Partner and Lover's pronouns, although I need to say that I don't see them as men, women or any other gender beyond or between.

I finally settled on Lover being the "you". It felt more natural. But from here, a new problem emerges: how do I refer to Partner? I can't say "Partner", can I? Ding ding, here comes a solution: ■■■■■■■ (pronounced like this). It looks believable enough: there could be a name underneath, name that doesn't deserve to be mentioned. I remember reading somewhere once that Western (as much as I dislike the term) names tend to be somewhere between 6 and 7 letters long; simply putting a square for each letter in "Partner" would look kinda right, then. I generally dislike censoring information as a writing gimmick - it tends to be just a lazy way to not have to come up with things (and reminds me of this meme), but I give myself a pass when I know what lies underneath the censorship. It's just "Partner". That's all.

This entry breaks the "mantra"/"intrusive thought" flow of things, and it was also a decision that I had to think through. I wondered if turn the lights off isn't drifting too far away from the established format. At first, I kept the format in: the phrase for this entry was meant to be "it's okay", compared to "I'm so cold" and "It's just a body". But as you can imagine, it didn't feel right. It was... artificial. It felt wrong for Lover to repeat things like this, especially after I already connected repeating phrases to abuse and its consequences. I realized that breaking the format would actually be the thing that makes sense the most. Just saying "it's okay" was hollow: reassuring that things are okay with other words and actions was a far better approach. It serves as a bit of a strange counterpart to "choices" in let the lights bleed in my head: while in let the lights bleed, the "choices" were Narrator internalizing Partner's manipulations, in turn the lights off, it's the moment where Lover, unknowingly, plants the seeds of a healthier mindset. Lover is open to a conversation, while Partner "states facts" that cannot be debated with. 

Obviously, I have to talk about the last choice, because this is legitimately one of my favorite things: turning the lights off. The entire trilogy begins with "you" - Partner - turning the lights on (since you start the game by clicking on, well. "Turn the lights on"). From this point on, they're a silent witness to Narrator's abuse and its aftermath. Partner never turns the lights off - they don't care about what happens to Narrator after they, forgive me for saying this, "use" them. When Lover turns the lights off as the last thing in the trilogy, they're symbolically ending what Partner started. Of course, this doesn't mean Narrator will be fine from this moment onwards, but it's a beginning. And I won't deny, I was crying a little when I finally wrote "Turn the lights off" in my script. It just hit different. It just... really felt like closing the worst chapter in Narrator's life, in a way.

Now, onto the technical stuff. As one commenter noticed: yes, the green light background is more symmetrical, compared to the red/blue ones. This is on purpose, so I'm glad someone noticed! The "corner" is vaaaguely in the middle (I didn't check. I don't know if it's really there, I don't particularly care, either) and it's basically a sign of a more "balanced" partnership that Narrator is now in. Briefly about music: I came back to the 69 BPM, like in let the lights bleed, and I still used vaguely the same melody, although modified. That being said, I totally need to mix this one again because it sounds horrible and I don't like it. But yeah, it's just the guitar and the bass, it's pretty simple. It's also the longest track out of the whole, uh... soundtrack. Which, by the way, will be coming out! I just need to redo this one because. Yeah, sounds terrible. 

I think that's all on this front. Now, onto the next section...

The Impact

While the Internet is filled with horrifying bullshit that we have to navigate daily, I love that it allows me to share all of this with you. Making the entire trilogy was a bit of an impulsive decision, but I'm glad that we're here now. I didn't think that so many people would read it or comment on it. I could never predict how many people will come to say "I felt it", "I've been there", "I hope you're alright". I keep tearing up while thinking about it, not only because I'm moved by the support I received, but also because those experiences are far more common than they should be. It's such an obvious thing to say, but nobody should have to relate to this. Nobody should be in those comments, telling me that they know exactly how it feels.

Still, I'm glad I can provide someone with some temporary comfort by showing them that they're not alone. I'm glad that I can write all of this, sitting by my cheap laptop somewhere in rural Poland, and that it might reach someone who needs it, somewhere on the other side of the world. It's a rough series; it wasn't easy to write, it isn't easy to read. But all of this emotional work was worth it, in the end. 1500 words of breaking and mending.

In many ways, this series brought me to feel better with what I went through as well. I talked certain things out. I got closure on stuff. I feel less alone with what I went through, even though I'm not Narrator and I didn't go through the same things. And I don't want to sound like a pretentious prick, but I think this trilogy is important; not just for me, but also for others. I may sometimes feel like it's too "low effort" to qualify as a "valid" work, but it's an absurd thought. It left an impact, both on me and other people, and what else do you need as an artist? Don't say "money", this is a valid answer, but you're kinda ruining the moment. 

Thank you to everyone who took their time to appear in the comment section to talk about their own experiences. Thank you to everyone who left a review. Thank you to everyone who approached me on Discord servers and appeared in my DMs to tell me what they thought. I really hope we can all be okay. I really, really hope so.

Turning the lights off?

The Lights trilogy is done. Technically, I have ideas for complimentary stories - Yellow, Magenta and Cyan - which would act as companion pieces and touch upon the mindsets of people other than Narrator at points between entries. But I'm not sure if I should do that. Would it be too much? Does that read as trying to milk the series dry? Is it necessary? I don't know. Should I? Shouldn't I?

Either way, the primary color trilogy is done, and I'm happy about it. Narrator sleeps cuddled up with Lover. The lights are turned off. And Partner can eat shit. Things are right in the world, even if just for a moment.

Once more: thank you for being here with me for this journey. I really appreciate you all. Take care of yourself.

Yours, Naarel