First off, today, 14 March, is Pi Day. It is Pi Day because, if you use month/day/year notation, today is 3/14, and tomorrow is 15, and if you still don’t get the 3/1415 thing, then you need to get your butt back into math. Also, don’t vote: you’ll make the spirit of Bob Heinlein very upset.
So, with that out of the way, what else do I have for ya? I have another chapter down, that’s what I got.
It did take some doing, but Chapter 44 of Transporting is history. It is finished, done, complete . . . whatever. I got the last period in place, and sat back with . . . well, no smile on my face, but I was pleased.
But it was a hard chapter.
For all the time I spent thinking about what I wanted to write, for all the times I knew how the scene would look if you played it out visually, it took a lot of work to get those simple images and statement out and upon the page. That’s writing for you: you think it’s going to be easy, but it’s never easy. What makes you think that?
Most writers are familiar with the Nathaniel Hawthorne quote, “Easy reading is damn hard writing,” and last night was a perfect example of that expression. It’s one of the hardest things in the world to take a very simple image from your head, and show it to someone. I think I do a pretty good job of it, and there are a lot of people who do it far better than me. But this is also the main reason I don’t believe in offering up a published work for free: because it takes a hell of a lot of work to make those word show the pretty pictures you want others to see.
Writers deal in the visual medium. Yes, we do; stop shaking your head. Think about it: when you read a story, and are suddenly hit with a scene that simply grabs hold and doesn’t let go, what do you do? You see that scene in your mind. You put faces to names, you green screen the scenery, and you turn that scene into your own private recollection. You can’t help it, because the brain is really pretty visual when it come to the way memories are stored.
So all the times people are saying, “Show, don’t tell,” that’s what’s going on. To cop a line from Mark Knopfler, you’re making movies on location. You’re putting out the pretty pictures. With this new knowledge, you, the writer, has to ask yourself, “Who do you want to be?” You wanna be Martin Scorsese? You wanna be Christopher Nolan? Or do you wanna be Uwe Boll? The choice is all yours.
To help me write last night, I was digging out some music from YouTube. I was in an 80′s mood last night, and even though some song from outside that era crept in. So to give you an idea of gets my writing juices flowing, here is a list of the songs I played last night:
Brave New World — Michael Penn
No Myth — Micheal Penn
Don’t Answer Me — Alan Parsons Project
One Night in Bangkok — Murray Head
West End Girls — Pet Shop Boys
Listen to Your Heart — Roxette
Take My Breath Away — Berlin
Waterloo — ABBA
Dancing Queen — ABBA (Stop laughing!)
Total Eclipse of the Heart — Bonnie Tyler
The Killing Moon — Echo and the Bunnymen
Under the Milky Way — The Chruch
Head Over Heels — Tears for Fears
This is the Day — The The
Distant Sun — Crowded House
Don’t Change — INXS
Love Leads to Madness — Nazareth
Sowing the Seeds of Love — Tears for Fears
Wuthering Heights — Kate Bush
Home by the Sea — Genesis
And there you are: my musical tastes, or lack there of.
Because I’m in a good day–and because I’m nuts–I’m going to lay out for you, warts and all, what I wrote last night. This is it, just as I put it down, so when you find things that seem clumsy, you’ll know that this is just the first draft.
And just to see the scene: one of my main characters, Cytheria, is floating–yes, floating–in mid-air about 5 meters away from my other main character, Audrey. That way it makes more sense.
Here you are, an excerpt from Transporting, Chapter 44, Copyright 2012, by Raymond Frazee. Have a great day . . .
“Come, join me.” She waved, encouraging Audrey.
It wasn’t that she couldn’t levitate. After she cleared Cytheria’s mental block, Audrey had levitated up to the balcony to comfort her Twin. But that had been a matter of doing something because she needed to get somewhere in a hurry, and floating straight up and over the railing had been the fastest way.
But now, she was standing at the railing, one foot upon it, and there was 25 meter of emptiness before reaching the ground. She didn’t need—
No, she thought. You need to do this. You need to get the goddamn fear out of your head. You need to step off and join her—
Audrey pushed off the railing and floating the 5 meters to Cytheria.
She kept her eyes locked on Cytheria, never daring to look down. Audrey didn’t panic; seeing Cytheria there, she somehow kept whatever anxiety she felt might take over tempered. She didn’t throw her arms out so she could latch onto her confident Twin, but as she floated into her arms, Audry thought she might have clutched Cytheria’s arms a little too hard . . .
“Got you!” Cytheria threw her arms around Audrey and held her tight. She gave her a huge smile. “You okay?” She stared directly into Audrey’s eyes.
“I’m fine.” Audrey flashed her brave face smile. “I got this.”
“You sure?”
Audrey nodded. “Yeah. I’m good.”
Cytheria felt Audrey’s emotions; she saw her aura. She was a bit fearful, but she was telling the truth: she wasn’t that bad. “Do you still trust me?”
Audrey nodded. “Yes.”
Cytheria gently moved Audrey away from her body, until they were holding on to each other by one outstretched hand. Without warning, Cytheria began to rise into the night sky, pulling Audrey along.
It had been years since she’d been this free, to feel like she was an integral part of the night sky. As she flew, she looked to Audrey, who was looking straight up, her eyes on the stars. For a moment Audrey sensed she was being watch, and took the time to glance over and grin broadly. If she’s scared, Cytheria thought, it’s not showing.
Soon they slowed, then Cytheria brought them to a stop. Handing dead in mid-air, the only sound was the low hum of the wind. “Look around,” she told Audrey.”
Slowly Audrey turned her head, taking in the scenery—or lack of such. Everything around them was dark, hemmed in by the solid blackness of the mountains that stood on either side of the Kreson Valley. She looked down between her dangling feet and saw the lights of the town directly below her.
“I’m guessing we’re about five hundred meters up,” Cytheria said softly.
Though there was a touch of fear in her eyes, Audrey’s spirits were up. “You enjoy being high, don’t you?”
“This is like a natural environment for me—only, I haven’t done something like this since I was young . . . since I was twelve.” Cytheria floated around and faced Audrey, still holding onto her hand. “The last time I did this, I was with a friend: a girl I used to play with. She lived in the estate next to ours.”
“So, neighbors.”
“Well, yes.” Cytheria’s face began to lose it’s smile as she spoke. “I played with her from about the time I was five. We were very good friends. For the most part, whenever we could be together, we were.
“I was diagnosed as a Talent not long after my 11th birthday, and I progressed quickly. I picked up telekinesis first, and levitation soon after. I was flying around the estate after six months—” She chucked as she remembered something. “I used to scare the hell out of my mother. She was certain I was going to come crashing down in the yard at any moment.
“My friend knew I was a Talent, and that I was developing. She thought it was all very interesting, very fun. I’d show her some of the things I could do with telekinesis, and I’d also read her aura. Once I even picked up some surface thoughts from her. I was very good, you know.
“One day I thought I’d show her something special, so I took her hand—just as I have yours—and I levitated us both into the air. Not very high: maybe ten meters. Then I started flying us around one of Mother’s gardens, just in circles, but we did that for about twenty minutes. She thought is was great fun; she was once never afraid. In face, we spent most of the time laughing.
“Next day, her father comes over to speak with Father. I was told later that I could no longer play with my friend, because . . .” Cytheria’s eyes misted up, but she didn’t cry. “Her father was afraid something would happened to his daughter, to my friend.” She closed her eyes for a moment; when she opened them she turned away quickly. “I was never allowed to play with her, ever. Not after that day.”
Cytheria glided in towards Audrey, drawing her hand to her breast. “I need you to understand something, Audrey . . . I can’t ever have something taken away from me like that again, never. It hurt too much. And it would hurt the same way to love you. Even more so.
“So know this: I will always love you, Audrey. I will always be there for you. I will support you. I will keep you standing when you look to someone for help. I will hang on tight . . .” Cytheria began slipping backwards slowly, without hurry, and as she floated away from Audrey, she released Audrey’s hand, leaving her hanging in mid-air on her own. “I will never let you fall.”
Audrey stared at her own hands, then looked around at the emptiness surrounding her—surrounding them. “Am I doing this?”
“I’m afraid so, love!” Cytheria shot upwards about three meters, then leaned back and looped around, coming to a stop about a meter from Audrey. “Oh, I feel so damn . . . alive!”
Audrey couldn’t help but laugh; it wasn’t the expression on Cytheria’s face, which was that of a person who was perfectly happy for the first time in a very long time, but for another reason . . . “That loop showed a little more than you might have wanted to show. Maybe we shouldn’t have worn dresses.”
After she stopped laughing, Cytheria looked about, as if expecting someone to appear. “Oh—” She made a rude noise. “As you say—fuck all that.” She shot up and away, stopping some six meters away. “Come on!” She held out her hand. “Come fly with me!”
Floating in mid-air, Audrey knew she was doing something that she’d told herself dozens of times she’d never be able to do. She was with someone who would never judge her too harshly, never let her fall . . . never let her be alone ever again.
Audrey looked to Cytheria, her smile bright in the darkness. “Oh, hell yeah!” she exclaimed as they shot towards her Twin, then past her. Cytheria caught up, and they flew down the length of the valley, in the direction of the observatory, gaining altitude as they left Kreson behind.
There was no more fear; Audrey had dispatched it completely. There was no need for it, not any more—
She needed the room for love.
One last thing: analyzing that except shows it was written by a woman, and she writes like Stephen King. Bwah, haha!
