strange and unusual times | dusti & rusti

[Deleted]

@dusti & aurelia edith flint

looking back, he failed to pinpoint the moment this had become normal. when spending time with his siblings hadn't been something he'd needed to be forced to do, other than their brother of course. but his sisters? while their parents had been alive he'd be able to count on both hands the number of times he'd willingly put himelf into a situation with them. it had changed now, somewhat anyway. he didn't think they'd ever be the type of family that went on vacations together, spent all their holidays in each others pockets and were generally close but there were changes happening within the family that surprised him.

the fact he was spending time with his sisters tonight was something he thought would be a step in the right direction. it was almost like they were all getting used to each other now they weren't living under their parents influence anymore, without that constant target between their shoulders, there was an ease about their family now. at least in the sense that marcus and pansy were thankfully gone. in other ways it was as complicated as ever, but he didn't think their family would ever truly be normal, he'd given up wanting that when he'd been five.

waving his wand he uncorked a bottle of red wine in the kitchen of his apartment. it was modest in comparrasion to the house he'd grown up in which might have surprised some people but the last thing he'd wanted was to live in a place that reminded him of the house that now stood empty, void of anything that might have made it a home. he poured a glass and wandered around his place while he waited for his sisters to arrive.

[Deleted]

Late October 2025
@raleigh & aurelia edith flint

The Flint siblings were.. complicated to put it simply. For onlookers and to themselves. They'd been raised in a extremely volatile household, and each had coped in their own way. They'd done what they had to to survive. As adults it seemed they were "healing", at least sort of. Slightly. Again, in their own way. Though could they ever fully recover from the trauma of their parents? Probably not. It hadn't helped that their parents had had a great many secrets that had made things even more complicated. While part of Dusti was glad her parents were dead (good riddance) she was also extremely bitter that they got away with everything. That after everything they'd done, they were gone, and she had to figure out how to piece together this shitty world.

So while many parts of her life were still horrible messed up, there were a few points that were.... improving. The fact that they now actually interacted with Raleigh. Intentionally. That was an improvement. A few years earlier she never thought that she would have had any sort of "relationship" with her older brother (half brother, but that was a can of worms that made her bristle). But out of all the siblings, he was probably the most similar to her. THey were both sour, bitter, and angry. While their other siblings could be as well, they weren't nearly as bad as the two oldest. This shared trait had been a point of contention growing up, but now it gave them a mutual understanding.

This month in general had been... rough. Dusti's head kept spinning from all the drama. So an evening with her brother and sister would be a nice distraction. At least she didn't have to think about the whole Elliot situation, because god forbid, she wasn't ready to figure that mess out yet. She knocked on the door of Raleigh's apartment, announcing her arrival.

[aurelia edith flint]

▲

Apparently the entire month of October was meant for having dinner with her ridiculously expanded family members. Half-siblings here and there, and all the nonsense that entailed. She wasn’t sure where she stood yet on the Macmillan part. They were still hurt because their perceivably normal dad had betrayed them two decades earlier (or at least that was how she viewed the situation). Lucky them. She would have swapped places with them at the drop of a hat had it meant being able to skip out on all that happened within the Flint household. She knew it wasn’t healthy to compare traumas like that, since she didn’t know how Ernie actually hurt his own kids, but she and Dusti had gone through worse.

Maybe that was why she was quicker to respond to Raleigh’s invite than she had initially been to the Macmillans. He understood more than the other family did, or at least what they allowed themselves to understand. And Dusti was likely to be in a better mood in his company too. Literally anything was better than suffocating under the emotional baggage of the Macmillan family. At least at Raleigh’s place they could unload without having horrified reactions from anyone else. If they needed to, of course. She wasn’t going to prompt that if it didn’t need to be brought up. Completely ignoring their childhood was just as fine in her opinion. That chapter was done, as far as she was concerned.

So she followed her phone to Raleigh’s apartment, finding herself to be the last to arrive, since Dusti was standing outside the door knocking on it. “Hey,” she muttered as she stepped up next to her twin. “This should be a lot easier than the other day.”

@raleigh & @dusti ● 291 ● Graceland Too by Phoebe Bridgers

MADE BY VEL OF GS + ADOX 2.0

[Deleted]

@dusti & aurelia edith flint

he stood at the window overlooking the city surrounding them. he rested his hand on the silver frame while the other rocked the wine glass back and forth softly, keeping the wine inside from settling too much. he heard the knock on the door, the sound just reaching to where he was, the sound soft in the air and he pushed himself away from the window and walked back through his apartment so he could open the door and let his sisters in. opening the door to see the faces of his sisters staring back at him, he pulled it open wider before taking a step back, letting them in. "wine's on the counter. glasses are in the cabinet and if you want something stronger, help yourself." he said in lieu of proper greeting. it might have seemed callous and cold to some but in their family there wasn't such a thing as a very warm greeting. at least not to him. they'd never been an affectionate family and while they were making strides to actually spend time in each other's company there were things that were going to take a long time to change and some things that would never happen.

he took a sip from his glass as he walked back into the main part of the apartment and he set the glass down on the table, the glass clinking against the stone tabletop. he knew they'd all treated the money they'd gotten from their parents in vastly different ways. rusti had brought a florists shop and he was something of a regular customer when it came to replacing the few vases he had around the house, he'd brought his apartment but he didn't know what dusti had done with hers. he wasn't going to ask her though, prying wasn't really part of his forte, at least now that their brother was old enough he didn't need someone making sure he was okay. "how's business?" he asked rusti as he took a seat at the table.