A little bit of writing

So yesterday, I said I would post some writing. Below is the 85th draft of the first chapter of the novel I've been writing since I was in 6th grade. Some form of this story has existed in my head/in countless notebooks since I was 12 or 13. This version contains a large amount of swearing, just so you know. I'd like to know what ya'll think. :)

From the Center of Our Universe (I may be changing this)


“Let’s get fucked up and die,” Rio sang horribly off key from atop his grey beast of a car, a Buick Century he rather sarcastically called “The Pearl,” not because of its boat-like shape and driving style. He just thought calling it “The Diamond” was overdoing it.


“I’m speaking figuratively of course!” I joined, from the hood. We were sixteen, but we could smell seventeen from that mid-September day. Both our birthdays were at the end of October. Nothing could stop us from living the lives we wanted then, Rio especially. We were carefree and innocent, as carefree and innocent as any high school junior could be. He spun onto his stomach and stared down the windshield at me, an almost full moon reflected off it into his face, making it hard to see his eyes.

“Like the last time I committed suicide,” he whispered.

“Social suicide,” Motion City Soundtrack finished. Rio never said that particular lyric. I didn’t understand why, it was one of the thousands of little quirks that Rio had.

I stared into his crayon green eyes, unblinking as the song continued, a sly smirk growing across this face. I’d fallen in love with that smirk in the summer before our seventh grade year. I don’t remember exactly why I remember the date, but I knew that at some point it would be of critical importance.

I had every detail of his smile memorized; the gap where his older brother, Harper, had punched out one of his eyeteeth peeked out at me. I giggled and spread out over the hood of his car. We listened in silence to the rest of the song. The best part was the beginning; there was no point in singing the rest of it. When it ended, and the sound of crickets was the only thing making noise around us, I felt Rio climb in through the driver’s window of The Pearl.

There was something oddly peaceful about our lake at night. The way the floodlights on the backside of the school, across the mirror black water lit up the middle school playground, making it glow almost heavenly. It was almost as if the chain link fence was covered in glitter at night. The moon even made a nearly perfect reflection into the lake, slightly distorted, but nearly perfect.

“Teagan,” Rio called from the driver’s seat. “It’s nearly ten, I should get you home. Your mom may change her mind about Layla’s party if I’m late getting you back again.”

“Fuck it, River,” I yelled, disturbing the peacefulness of the croaking frogs and crickets.

No one ever called Rio by his given name, not even his parents. He liked to pretend that he’d given himself his nickname because someone that dressed like him, in a beat up and burned jean jacket, with jeans cuffed to meet the high top of his red Chuck Taylor All Stars, didn’t have a “pansy” name like River. Being “Rio” was his slap in the face of society and self-fulfilling prophecies. His name wasn’t going to dictate the rest of his life.

Honestly, the story he made up was a lot more interesting than his mom’s mild insanity. His mom had named him after River Phoenix, but apparently, it’s bad luck to name your child after someone who dies of a drug overdose. She figured it would lead to a similar fate for him. Giving him the Spanish equivalent was the best thing she could think of, because calling him by his middle name, Gregory, would be excessively complicated, a lot of paperwork to file with the school district, or something.

The driver’s door of The Pearl slowly opened, making a rusty sound. I don’t really think rust actually makes a noise, but that’s what I thought of when that door opened, rust rubbing on rust. Rio climbed onto the hood next to me. “The lake does look quite pretty tonight,” he said

“It’s the moon. It’s always makes everything look more amazing.” I answered as his arm came to rest around my shoulder. My stomach did that sickening I-have-a-crush-on-him-but-shhhh back flip it always did when Rio got too close to me. “I’ll just tell my mom that we were on our way back and my phone was on silent so I didn’t know she called. She can’t get too upset being five minutes late on a Friday night.”

“If you say so,” I heard his voice through his crocked smile. “She’s just looking out for you, you know, being out at night with the dangerous Davenport boy. You never know what kind of shenanigans I’ll get you involved in.”

I placed my head against his chest, letting the knot in my stomach tighten. “It’s not like I haven’t been hanging out with you every day since we were five. I mean, she should get by now that you’re not going to kill me.”

“Parents are hard to convince sometimes,” he said in a way that made me believe that there was nothing Rio didn’t know, like he’d lived a thousand past lives. “Maybe in another twelve years she’ll start to trust me.”

“Maybe, you can never tell with Rebecca, though. How long has she been pissed at your mom now?”

“Like twenty years,” Rio laughed. “Old cheerleading rivalries die hard in Kurtwood.”

I heard my cell phone vibrate on the passenger’s seat of The Pearl, then turned Rio’s arm to see the time: 10:02. A deep sigh escaped my lungs.

“If you don’t answer that, your mom’s going to send a search party out for you,” he said taking his arm back and sliding off the car. I rolled my eyes, as I slid off the opposite side.

My mom had always been strict about rules: home by eight on school nights, ten on weekends, call even if you’re going to be ten seconds late. It was ridiculous. My sister never had to deal with the crap my parents did to me. I’d never done anything that would lead her to distrust me, but then again I was best friends with the middle Davenport boy.

“Just drive, Rio. We’ll be back before she calls again.”

“If she tries to murder me with a spoon for kidnapping you, I hope you’ll jump in front of me.”

“I always do.”

I turned to watch him as he drove. It was painfully obvious how I felt about him, yet he seemed to ignore it. I guess he didn’t want anything to change, in a way I didn’t really want it to change either. It would have messed up our whole relationship. I mean, we’d been friends since preschool. I couldn’t go around playing with relationship that runs deep like that. We were friends before boys and girls were even supposed to like each other. But there is always something that draws the messed-up kids together. Not that we were actually messed up when we were five, but I think, subconsciously we knew our families would drive both of us completely insane.

Rio slid The Pearl seamlessly around the sharp curve and into my driveway.

“I’ll see you in the morning,” I whispered, opening the door. “Layla’s birthday party is a little bit more important than whatever my mom’s going to make me do. I’ll escape.”

“Don’t do anything stupid, Teag,” Rio warned, as I closed the rusty door. I stood by our never used basketball hoop as he backed out of the driveway, watching the headlights as they slowly moved down my body and out into the road, turned, and illuminated the trees and rocks across the street.

____

If you would like to read more I have it posted online here: http://www.webook.com/project/From-the-Center-of-Our-Universe-1

AND THAT IS THE END OF THE STORY
Today is awesome because I'm one chapter closer to actually finishing a complete draft of "Universe," and I actually like it. :)

Books read 36
Currently between books.

Life Update

Since the last time I talked to you, blank white word doctument page that I'll soon be copying and pasting into blogger and making a blog post. I was about to embark on a media free day. I have to say that it went very well. I hung out with Keith and played board games with my roommates, it was a pretty good day. I want to have more days like this in my life, and fewer spent on the floor at Barnes and Noble using their internet.

I think I have mentioned before that I am writing again. I have re-made my webook page and there will be a link to in the parentheses that follow this sentence (http://www.webook.com/project/From-the-Center-of-Our-Universe-1). I would really enjoy it if you checked it out and analyze the heck out of it.

I have also become a Monday. I know, it's weird, being a Monday. I don't know all the details yet, we're still working on a start date and rules and stuff but we should be ready to go in about a week. I'm excited. It's five girls, including Noelles, who has taken on the Wednesday role of this collab, and three other Nerdfighters from the Ning. I'm excited to try this collab thing again with people I don't know. I loved doing Sassy videos; I miss the days of no stressful Sassy weeks. And I'm hoping that this will work out. We all seem to be really into making it work and getting it off the ground.

When I get more information on the collab, I will update you.

On the job front, things are looking as dismal as ever! I really, really need and want a job. I as much as I love my roommates and our apartment, I want to leave it, and go somewhere else for five hours at a time and bring home money from that place. It would be golden, but alas, the work does not want me. Believe me, I've been trying to get a job like you don't even know.

I guess that is it really. I will be making a YouTube video sometime this week I think. I just need an idea for one. I'll think of something.


AND THAT IS THE END OF THE STORY


Today is awesome because of the woman currently at Barnes and Noble wearing lime green tights, one purple Chuck Taylor high top and one powder Blue one, a plaid white and blue striped skirt and a plaid jacket.

arg!

So I have some dilemmas, the first is kind of an academic one. Mostly by the 30th of April I have to have a 140 page novel written, of which I've written 77 pages. So yea, I'm mostly stuck on where to go from the point that I'm at.
The book is mildly based on my emotional feelings, and at this point in the story, my main character has sort of passed my current emotional feelings, so I don't really know where to go next. It's hard to explain without giving away major moments of the book, and since I want to, like, do something with it eventually, I feel giving away major plot points may be a bad idea.

Secondly, is phone calls. My friend Jen, who currently is the only subscriber to this blog, keeps calling me to talk about important things. I as a friend, want to talk to her about these important things, because she did the same thing for me, however, I'm always hanging out with my friends, or at wal-mart,or a very special episode of House is on (I thought it was a repeat this week, but it wasn't. It was an important episode as far as television show episodes go), or sleeping when she calls and I feel bad because I can't have a regular conversation about what's going on. And I feel bad, and like a bad friend.
I mean I'm not trying to be a bad friend, I want to be there, but it's like I also feel bad saying no to my other friends that also want me around, and to convince them that washing your hair with bar soap isn't good. But I also need to be there for Jen in her time of need. And I'm kind of being a jerk to her, and I don't want to be. :( I is sorry Jen. I will call you later.

I've never been in the position where I have more that like 3 friends at a time, so friend time management isn't a skill I possess. When I had 3 friends we all hung out together, and only really hung out when we were at school or volleyball. Now I'm 22 and most of my friend live in the same building as me. And trying to make it so that I don't upset people by making plans with everyone when one friend really needs me and I don't want to be a jerk to my other friends that I'm physically hanging out with by talking to my other friend on the phone. And they get mad when they know I'm just sitting alone in my room doing nothing. But I'm normally not doing nothing because I have to write 70 pages in the next month!!! If I wasn't so damn weird in high school...

Thirdly, I really want a kitten, but the people I will be living with next year, are allergic to cats.

In an unrelated area... why do boys think its okay to wash their hair with bar soap? Seriously?
Why doesn't it occur to them that it's a bad idea? What do they think shampoo is for?

And that is the end of the story

Today is awesome because: I used body wash that smells like fruit loops today :)

goal for April: figure out how to put pictures in my blogs

Welcome to day to of BEDA!

I haven't made a video on my personal channel on youtube in like 2 months, so I think I'm going to do that tomorrow. Mostly telling people that I'm doing this, that seems like a plausible idea. (http://www.youtube.com/misuseofairqoutes if you're interested)

Yesterday I found 2 Hillary Duff CD's in my desk. This is mostly awesome, because now, way after her prime, it's a lot cooler to own them, like owning Hanson's Middle Of Nowhere album now, whereas it was not cool to own it in 1997.

I also found a photo I took my senior year of high school the day that the sprinklers didn't work so we got to go home early. It's pretty epic, five people sitting on skateboards going down a hill, three of which I don't talk to anymore. I feel the more pictures like this I find, the closer I'll get to the one I'm actually looking for. Which I'm in so I definitely didn't take, considering I was in fourth grade at the time.

I really want to find this picture, I think it will help me with writing my novel. Not that it like has magical powers or anything, just that I think having it in my hands will bring back the crazy emotions I really need to get through this part of my book. I'm pretty sure I'm stuck right now mostly because I'm not at my school desk where I normally work. There I have all the evidence I need staring me in the face. Maybe I'll head up the street tomorrow, since the snows all melted. Maybe going to the site of the accident will bring back enough to get me over this hump I'm stuck in.

Not that I want to go up there. I would rather spend my life completely avoiding the top half of this road for the rest of my life. My novel isn't even really about what happened in December. I started writing it way before then, I just think it makes it that much more real in my mind that I have that kind of experience to lean on.

Hopefully that makes at least a little bit of sense to someone randomly reading this that doesn't know what happened...



Well, I need to go find some clean socks and head off to work. Oh what fun.

Happy writing Beda-ers

And that is the end of the story

complaining, cuz that's what I do best.

I am writing a novel, link here: http://www.webook.com/project/From-the-Center-of-Our-Universe

I'm partly doing it for a class I'm taking, but I also really love this story idea so I've been building on it. I think it's working out nicely. I have 14 posted chapters and a prologue on webook. I suggest you check it out and leave comments. I enjoy criticism.

However, I do not enjoy this kind of criticism: one that tells me that the entire point of my novel (What you miss in a person's eyes if you only look at how pretty they are and not what they are trying to say) is over stated because I talk about eyes too much. THIS IS THE EFFIN' POINT OF THE WHOLE EFFIN' NOVEL. But apparently symbols and motifs aren't good literature now-a-days.

ALSO on my edited draft the teacher circled the words "dirty blond" and wrote cliche. WTF is cliche about a hair color? I'll tell you: nothing, because its a hair color, not a cliche. hqityietyurweit <- that is anger.

I can understand saying "He appeared to weigh 98 pounds soaking wet," is cliche, because it is, but what he doesn't see, is that the story is being told through the eyes of a, yes fairly bright, but still, 17 year old girl. I have to be in her world and speak like she speaks to make the story work, I can't say ridiculously profound things every other sentence because people don't speak that way, especially 17 year old girls.

I'll have more to complain about on Thursday after class when I read more. Because he's going to be annoyed with the symbolism of the whole seen and how I only have a name for one chapter and feel the need to keep it that way.

I need your opinion. Please help :)

So this a a small part of From the Center of Our Universe that I just wrote and wanted to know if it made any sense. Please let me know. What I think of things, and what they actually sound like are normally two completely different things. :)


Around midnight the next night, I sat at the dinning room table wearing my pajamas; a dirty, sort of pink tank top, and blue gym shorts, my dirty blond hair pulled loosely into a pony-tail, cramming for an AP chemistry test that had crept up on me with all the drama in my world.
A knock on the glass sliding door broke the complete silence of my house. I froze in my chair as I listened to the door open and someone step inside. Robbers don’t knock first. I thought. Maybe murders do though. I pulled my chem notebook over my face, like a little kid does with their hands in an open field during hide-and-seek, if I could see them, the murderer wouldn’t see me, and move on.

“Teagan?” the murderer said, I could tell from his tone he had that grin across his face, his green eyes had to be shining.

“I thought you were a murderer,” I said, throwing my notebook in his direction.

“Why would a murderer knock before they come in?” Rio asked, placing my notebook back onto the table.

“Maybe it’s their MO or something,” I answered, still shaken. Finding out the person sent to murder you is actually just your best friend visiting at some ridiculous hour doesn’t slow your heart rate as quickly as I was hoping.


ALSO:
If you don't mind telling me what you're best guy friend smells like... please.

more novel drama

So I think I have figured out my major issue with From the Center of Our Universe (which is my novel). Mostly its that the big important event hasn't happened yet, and therefore I feel nothing is happening. In reality, a ton of stuff has happened to forward the plot, but it's not to the part that I really want to write yet. But I can't just start at that part, because the story wouldn't make sense.

It's also becoming increasingly difficult to type with this broken thumbnail. It's starting to grow back which makes it hurt even more.

Also in related novel news: yesterday I was supposed to go to this bar in town with the other 5 people in my class and discuss our work. There are several issues with this. First I think I'm the only one that takes my work seriously enough to see that $3 pitcher night is not the best day to sit and discuss literature. Second I'm pretty sure my classmates don't like me. And third, I'm not about to sit and watch people I know drink and a bar when we're supposed to be working and then get in their cars and drive back to campus. It's not happening, I'm not going to be involved in something like that, and I don't want to have to deal with all that again.


So anyway, I still think my book sucks, but I also think that most people don't really like what their writing in the first draft anyway.