Progress!

Finally, I’m getting somewhere. Remember that “let’s write a half-ream on my characters” thing, where I ran screaming into the street? Guess what, it’s starting to work! Even though I have only 39 pages so far.

I have also been think a lot about Kay’s motives in Carter’s character sketch, since I am still having a hard time understanding how she could be so generous to Carter while on some level realizing that this whole relationship was not working out.

Now that I have some momentum, I’m starting to enjoy this delving into character. And the Rogers quotes are really helping out by giving me a number of starting points.

What's even better is that this weekend, the inlaws ran off with my daughter, and since my husband was at work, I had the whole house to myself. Well, me and the mopy bulldog. And I was finally able to make progress on the novel itself. I am now done with chapter 16 for good (at the present time of course)! Got two new chapters arranged and written. Oh! Do you know how good that feels? I buzzed through a few chapters (I'm trying to get this out the door for a critiquer) and now I'm on chapter 25, "Vortex of Swans." So, yeah, I'm feeling better.

Here's a little excerpt, just for fun. It's a Carter and Kay scene today.

That night, he told me about his 'dark side.' Told me how much he needed me to help him fight his demons. He believed I could do it, because oh how he loved me, and he knew I loved him too.

I loved the nobility of my sacrifice. I would be an angel, wrapping my wings around him, though I wore the ashes of my old love on my forehead, invisible and pure. I would raise him up, I would make him a new man, I would save his life.

Except the next morning I woke up depressed. At breakfast I shunned people and glowered at my cereal alone. I kept going over last night, hoping to revive that sunshine-and-roses feeling I’d had, but my heart was too busy sinking through the ocean to help. Why had I nearly fainted when he told me that story? Out of pity? Why that excited laugh from Carter?

After breakfast, I came out of the Union. The sunlight slanted through the sycamores like light through a cathedral, and through dapples walked Carter, wearing his black overcoat because it was a little chilly. He smiled and changed his path to meet me. As I walked toward him, I opened my arms to honor his pain.

Except I suddenly felt that my show was fake. That I was lying with my whole body. I fought to ignore it, to keep smiling, to keep my arms open. He was going to see that I honored him, that I would sacrifice myself for him, whether I liked it or not.