Day 21: Have a Teaser

She clung to her legs and squeezed her eyelids together.  Come on, she said to herself.  Come on, if I can just get back there one more time, I know I can figure it out.  She imagined the field.  She could almost taste the sweet air that had once filled her lungs.  A bird flapped its wings.  She opened her eyes and stared at the graffiti covered door in front of her.

Jess swung her leg out, kicking the toilet paper dispenser.  The force of it reverberated in the walls and sent a shock wave through her leg.  Her nose scrunched as the repugnant smell from the toilets reached her nostrils and nestled there.

Her head spun, the ground fell away from her feet.  She floated on nothing, and the turning of her stomach wouldn’t stop.  Jess hopped down from the toilet and threw the lid open, just in time to retch her stomach bile into the stained toilet.  It only made her gag more, seeing that spill out from inside her.  

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Though a part of me is disappointed, I am grateful my manuscript is no longer "hanging in the balance."  I received a solid "No," which means I have more places to submit it to!  I have never received a rejection, other than for short stories, because I've never submitted.  The fact that I had the strength to submit, finally, only gives me more hope for myself as a writer.

And besides, there were only 30 (35?) winners out of 300 - and there are some brilliant, unpublished authors out there.  RUHE may not be the strongest piece of work by me, but it is the first finished piece.  It is coherent, and it does have a decently strong female lead, but it is more of the typical coming of age.  

But I'm very excited for Soul Therapy (again, I still need a new title) because it is less typical, and my main character suffers from huge anxiety - see excerpt above.

I think she touches on something that a lot of people overlook.  Panic disorder is a real thing, something that many people struggle with, myself included.  Granted, I'm not nearly as bad as Jessica is, but I find it hard to control my own emotions.  A surge of fear sweeps over your every cell, the hairs on the back of your neck stretch upwards and you can't explain it, you simply are worried, panicking, over everything.  You think, this is it, this is the end of the world, the end of my life.  Your breath outruns you and your body starts to act like your are drowning on air.

It's heavy, it's frustrating.  And a lot of people don't discuss it.  Hell, a lot of people think that it is "normal" to have some anxiety.  There is a difference between a stressful situation versus being unable to breathe, move, or function because you are shaking so much.

If I had known panic attacks existed when I was younger, I wouldn't have assumed that it was "normal."  I would have realized that there was something different about the way I see the world.  And with that knowledge, I might have handled a lot of things in my teenage years in a very different manner.  Though, I must say, my curling up into a ball underneath the covers with my teeth chattering because I was freezing in 100 degree weather certainly makes for a good character.  Jess is the pinnacle of that:  Someone who is afraid of disappointing anyone with massive anxiety attached.

And I love her, probably a little bit too much, because she is so close to home.  RUHE was the opposite.  I had no knowledge of that girl's life, I had never been in her shoes - I still think her story is interesting, but I didn't have such a connection with her.  Jess is different.  We're kindred, and because of that, I think Soul Therapy will be my stronger piece, and possibly, the first piece I get published.

Day Three Teaser

Safely settled at just over 10k words, I would say that this has been a very successful three days.  I completely a few word wars tonight with some good friends on G+.  I must say that G+ has probably changed the face of writing for me forever.  It is still a solitary act that happens entirely within me, but I can challenge myself and boost my creativity by enjoying the conversations with others that are like-minded and competing toward a similar goal.  Not to mention getting and giving advice has never felt so nice.  It's a great community, and I'm very happy to consider myself not only a writer, but a NaNo participant.

With that being said, here's the teaser from earlier today.  It's a dream sequence:

His mouth morphed, skin flicking off of it. His tongue rolled out from inside, and his jaw snapped as it dislocated. Teeth stretched out of his bloodied gums, growing into sharp knives and his eyes turned to blood lust. He growled at Jess and took a step forward, claws growing out of his shoes, his clothes disintegrated as he grew fur and grew twice the size. He took another step and reared back on his legs. Kroags launched himself at Jess, and she could almost hear the tearing of her own flesh over her high pitched scream.

Flash Forward

All the hairs on my neck raised as I watched the ice crack towards me.  It was too far back to the shore, and I wasn’t any good at skating.  So I got down on all fours and prayed, begged, whatever kind of existence there was beyond this world for help.  I moved myself inch by inch, hearing sickening pops from underneath each of my palms.  I concentrated on each breath, not wanting to move suddenly, but focusing on each breath as if it was my last.

Everything I had promised myself, every piece of my life that had been left undone because I had time, no worries, plenty of time, I was only 26 years old, came bounding through my eyes.  I saw myself skydiving for the first time, feeling weightless while the goggles pressed deep creases into my face, the pullback from the shoot as it opens in the sky above me.  I saw myself horseback riding through a field with some unknown, but beautiful partner, a backpack full of picnic supplies.  I saw myself getting married, watched the ceremony and I never looked happier.  I blinked the tears out of my eyes, as I saw me hiking up to the highest mountain and seeing the beautiful view below.  It was like something beautiful, something out of magazines.  I felt myself breathing in the fresh air.

My hands fell through the ice first.  That was the last thing I remember.

Dark, Pretty Things

The world was not meant

To gaze upon such light

Darkness prevails throughout the night

If meant, there’d be more stars

More pieces and parts

To make our eyes view shapes

There’d be less creatures, sounds

Howling at the moon

Less nightly, dark things

More sunshine, light from within

If the world was meant

To gaze upon such light

There’d be no fear

Of those dark, desperate things

But no passion, desire

Nothing to motivate the light

To work, adjust, conquer

But sometimes, unseen

Unknown, is the beauty

In those forgotten places

Pieces of the darkness left behind

To show the world how grand

Such mystery, vastness contained

Within dark, pretty things.

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I used to write poetry a lot when I was younger - to help deal with my SAD (yes, it's a real thing - don't believe me?  Try living in cold weather where it's dark, snowy and rainy for 6 months out of the year and you'll understand).  I've since decided that my poetry isn't really worth sniffing about - but hey, attempts are attempts are attempts, and maybe someone would like it - out there, in the darkly lit places.  :)