#guess what i did this week instead of working on my nano novel
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EXPEDIENCE
asoiaf, jaime x sansa, (mostly) book canon
set after a dance with dragons
explicit, 31k
read on ao3 >
#my fics#jaimesansa#jaime x sansa#asoiaf fic#expedience#guess what i did this week instead of working on my nano novel
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dreamwidth update: isolation
(content warnings: i just talk about the shit that's going on rn cause i gotta, but if any of it is triggering for you, be careful or scroll past)
so, as it turns out - as anyone could have predicted - i'm behind AF on nano.
look, a lot of it is that the first week of november got tied up in the hellhole that was america's election. fuck. i had done a lot of research and i knew what to expect and i STILL DIDNT KNOW WHAT TO EXPECT. that entire week was draining as fuck and even the relief of them finally calling it for biden was destructive and devastating in its own way. (i cried. i dont ever cry. i fucking bawled.)
and some of it is another lesson in preparation. i have a great outline for this novel! i know all the plot beats for all three plotlines! but i didn't practice getting into either character's voice, so while im still writing, it's very third-person-onmicient type, very distant, rather than the third-person-intimate that im going for.
and ive become STUPIDLY hung up on that! LIKE, ITS STOPPING ME FROM WRITING. i realize i just need to forge ahead and i'll find their voices eventually, but like, brain matter no go. head empty no thots.
SURPRISINGLY, though, if i count all words i've written (including nano, patreon, work words, fanfic, etc) i am on pace to hit the 50K. guess what I might be doing, rather than focusing entirely on the nano words. fml. etc.
my two oldest nieces are coming this weekend for their birthday celebration. when they were young i decided that instead of birthday gifts, what each girl got was a weekend alone, just with me, where we would do super fun things and they get to have all of the focused attention from their aunt and uncle. it's worked great, but this year, because of the rona, their schedules are all fucked up (you would not BELIEVE what my bro and SIL have had to work out to manage both of their jobs with 3 children under the age of 7 at home; it's crazy), and we wanted to limit the travel as well. so both girls are coming together to stay with me, to celebrate together. i'm very excited, but wow, that's also been a whirlwind.
i had to clean the entire house. the thing is, when you've been in house since march, and you're already disabled, and you're depressed, and you're tired, and you have 5 cats, the house can quickly get to a pint where you really give no more fucks about it. hugely. bigly. i had to summon my mum, Crown, and murder husband to help me out with it, but now the house is gorgeously clean and i am happy. doing all the work at once was kind of a sledgehammer to the face tho, RIP me, but i did it.
fought with Crown over a bunch of stuff too. it's resolved and we are in a better place after having it out, but that also hit me like a fucking pickup truck, thanks.
also didnt help nano.
isolation is weird. i dont mind being alone - i love being stuck in my house alone, that's like, my dream world - but i feel like i've hunkered down here in other ways as well. friends i used to talk to daily, i check in like once a week. a BIG part of that is, well, having nothing to really say. my new contract remains in covid limbo, my other work continues, and my desire to write a novel to sell is just aksjdlkasdjggs, so like, ??? why bother to talk, there's no news here, etc.
im also just not very good at staying in touch because of (reasons) and the situation is compounding that and really doubling down on it. how can i reach out to people when im spending most of my mental energy not going completely batshit??? "hey demons. it's me. your boy."
i mean i also feel like other friends are pulling back as well, probably because none of us really have anything new to say. it's just an interesting side effect of isolation, i guess?
plus it's the jazz hands depressssiioooonnnnn ~! for all of us!
i really just exist on discord these days. honestly.
ANYWAY.
i haven't yet given up on the novel, nor have i given up on trying to grow my kofi and patreon to help me out in these terrible times. (crankyoldman, thanks so much for the Kofi! that covers this month's entire Chewy order! <3 <3 aaaaaaa ILU and i miss you guys!!) it's just such a bizarre fucking time to be a conscious thinking creature and that's weird, i guess.
went to target and bought a bunch of men's shirts for the winter. sorry but for what i want men's clothes are vastly superior. you can't get a women's t-shirt that's long enough to go over hips or really be tucked in unless you find a "tunic length" and they're like $25. i got 3 mens tees for $18. i also now have a giant hoodie with thumbholes. bless.
plus big ass sports bras. i just want my tits to be comfortable. dont always bra them, but like when im cleaning they gotta be held. gently. softly cupped in place so that they don't get tossed around too much. i dont know where im going with this.
i just want to be comfortable here in my private cave.
the stasis of isolation. such an odd year it's been this last month.
Ko-fi for the cats || Patreon for CYOA and the novel || Sev's Pub, my creative works discord || carrd for the rest
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Nanwum IV toolboxkit
I have a love/hate relationship with the word “tool”. On the one hand, tools are awesome. I like holding a big screwdriver and thinking about all the screws I can loosen with it. I ordered a thing at work yesterday and I can’t wait for it to arrive. There’s a rush of power in knowing some object will solve a bunch of problems. Look out, screws.
On the other hand, it annoys me how people use the term “tool” in a more abstract sense, like statistical “tools” or using a flow chart to figure out what to do. I can’t hold any of that crap, so calling it a tool feels like a bait-and-switch. But I can appreciate the power of the term. If you can liken a thing to a power drill, then you have my attention.
Anyway, this weekend is for making preparations for National Novel Writing Month, which starts next Sunday, so I thought it would be useful to go over the stuff that I use to get me through it.
1) The NaNoWriMo website.
Back in 2017, I seriously considered not even bothering with the website, because I figured it had nothing to offer. I’m the one doing all the work, right? But tracking progress is an effective motivator, and I like being able to see a chart that shows how well I’m doing. There’s some bugs in it. For some reason it doesn’t show my Camp Nano April 2018 as being complete, and when I tried to fix it, it doubled the word count instead.
It’s also useful for where I’m at today. Now that I’ve done this thing a few times, I can measure current performance against past years. November 2018 was my personal best, so I’m going to use that as a model for this year. I don’t need to beat 2018-me, but I do need to remind myself that I’ve performed this well in the past.
2) George R. R. Martin motivational desktop wallpaper.
I started doing this as a joke, but looking at this dude sitting at his computer, not writing is a much more powerful motivator than I ever thought possible. The idea is that if I minimize the writing window to do something else, I have to look this dude in the eye before I can look up Robocop clips on YouTube. I’ve had months where I was struggling to meet the goal, and then I went “Oh, yeah, I forgot to change my desktop pic, and it pushes me over the finish line. It’s like Popeye eating spinach.
Now the Tone Police will take issue with something like this, and call it arrogant. “How dare you put down a highly successful fantasy author just to make yourself feel confident,” they’ll say as they wag their finger. “Don’t you care that you might be making procrastinators feel bad?” To that I say: fuck’em.
See, I’m a world-class procrastinator in my own right. I have to get hyped for this stuff every year, because that’s the only way I can build up enough momentum to see it through. Like all Sith Lords, I have to call upon all of my emotions -- fear, anger, pride, fernweh -- to fuel the creative monster. I don’t make a dime on this, so if I can’t take some bloody satisfaction out of it then what’s the point?
I’m pretty sure George doesn’t even know I do this, but in case he’s reading this, let me address him specifically: George, I’ve cranked out three of these Nanwums and you still haven’t finished Winds of Winter, which is well on its way to becoming the Duke Nukem Forever of modern fantasy. I don’t know if you got soft, like Rocky in Rocky IV, or maybe you’ve lost your confidence like Rocky in Rocky III, but you have to kindle a fire under your ass, even if it’s a silly fire, like fear of dying before the book goes to print, or getting it done just to spite assholes like me. But find something and use it.
3) Kenny Omega vs. Sonny Kiss, AEW Dynamite 10/21/2020
youtube
This was a first-round match in a tournament for the right to challenge for the AEW World title, and it was Kenny’s big return to singles action, so I guess the idea here was to make him look strong by having him crush Sonny Kiss in under 15 seconds. I’ve seen blowouts in wrestling before, but this one speaks to me on a different level, and I’m sorely tempted to swap out my GRRM image with this shot of in-the-zone Kenny Omega.
Because I feel this right now. This isn’t like last year or the year before, where I got behind working on stuff in October so I wasn’t fully prepared. I got all caught up a few weeks ago, and I have eight days to get ready. I haven’t written a thing in weeks, and I’m itching to get back to it. I want a big Day One total to start the month off, and seeing this match makes me want to aim even higher than 7000 words. Can I hit 10,000 in one day? The Cleaner sure thinks so. Clapclap-clap clap clap.
4) Focus Writer
You can check it out for yourself at https://gottcode.org/focuswriter/
The main selling point for Focus Writer is that it can be used for “distraction free” writing, in that it’s default setting makes it tricky to minimize the window to do other stuff. But I turned that off a while back. For my purposes, I just need the word counter.
One thing I learned while editing work instead of writing from scratch is that you can just set the word count goal to 100 words. That way, the percentage displayed at the bottom of the screen will keep track of how many words you’ve written in that session. So if you write 1275 new words, the counter will say 1275%.
I used to set actual goals, like 3500 words for the day or whatever, but I found myself constantly trying to calculate what 53% of that is, and that ended up being a huge distraction in itself. So now I just stick to the 100 word “goal” and use it to track my actual progress, rather than setting lofty goals that I may not need to actually hit. The Nano website does that for me anyway.
5) The Adventures of Dumplin
I’m essentially adapting the events of Dragon Ball Xenoverse 1 into this story, so I could break out my PS3 and play it through again to remind me of all the stuff I wanted to use from 2015, but it’s a lot easier to just watch someone else play it instead. Team FourStar’s playthrough of the Xenoverse games is some of their best material, as far as I’m concerned, and knowing this is one of my go-to references is going to make this November pretty awesome.
I’m not sure I could, or should, work Dumplin into my fic. If I did, he couldn’t be the same guy who saved the day in this LP series, because I’m having Luffa do all that. Early on, I envisioned a scene where she wakes up one morning after a night of heavy drinking and finds Dumplin in bed with her, but that seemed a little too goofy to use. But I want you to have that mental picture anyway, so I’m writing about it here.
6) Diet Pepsi
Straight Edge, Hard Core. Stephen King’s a wuss for using cocaine to help him write.
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POST NUMBER 100
That’s right, Ladies, Gents, and Robutts, the Disrepair House Askblog has just hit 100 posts. I don’t even know what to say about that, except “here’s a celebratory Fashion Mag foldout, apparently”. Taking all your winter robot-y goodness and putting it outside in the snow.
Uh.
Other than that... idk, I guess I’ll do some blabbering under a read more here:
I’ve been working on this story for like 3 years now and the second arc is about to start going up. It took me approximately 2 years to write the first arc, 2 years of pain and agony trying to make sense of the Sonic 06 timeline, and now I’m onto the second arc. I will not take me nearly as long to finish it. For a multitude of reasons. But most importantly because I’m not trying to follow literally the most confusing garbage known to man.
As for the second arc, itself... well, as I mentioned in a previous post, I decided to write it for NaNoWriMo this year, both because it won a twitter poll, but also because I kinda wanted a break from my big, intimidatingly important stuff. (i.e. my novel series) I decided, if I wrote this second arc for NaNo that I would literally just have fun with it. I wasn’t going to overthink every tiny little detail (AH HAHAHAHAHAHAHAAAAAAAAA) and just write whatever for shits and giggles.
Turns I literally cannot do that. But! I did still write it entirely out of my normal, more intense, tragic style (which, debatably made it so much more difficult) and instead decided I wanted to try a more light-hearted, slice-of-life comedy kind of thing. Turns out that’s harder than breaking people’s hearts. Who knew.
But, either way, progress is being made. I’m learning to write in a whole new genre and I think it’s going surprisingly well, all things considered.
I’m going to be spending the first week of December editing the chapters I have, so expect the first one to start going up around the 8th or so. After that I’m going to do my best to keep to a weekly upload schedule. As of the moment I have 11 chapters built up so that’ll hold me up for some time and I don’t intend to start any other writing projects until I finish this one so... fingers crossed I can keep it up.
And that’s most of what I wanted to say, I suppose. The new arc will be a shift in tone from the first and mid-arc stories, and, at the suggestion of my bf, I’ve (hopefully) written it in a way that you don’t necessarily need to read the stories before to understand this one. If you want, you can just start at the second arc. So there’s that.
In the meantime, as usual, the askbox is always open (and currently empty) so... you know... go bug the residents while I get the chapters ready for posting.
And that’s enough blabbering for me.
tl;dr - We’ve reached 100 posts, the second arc is now being edited and will start posting around the 8th on a weekly basis. Askbox is always open.
Thanks!
#Disrepair House#Metal Knuckles#Metal Sonic#RK#Itara#Robo-Knux#Winter#winter fashion#snow#mydrawing#art#fanart#sonic#sonic fanart#askblog#sonic askblog#post 100#milestone#update#broken robots#rogue robots
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Asks and Things.
First off, I greatly apologize for not being around very much this past week or so. It’s been rough, and I’ve put a lot more focus onto my editing in order to maintain some mental stability. I’ll try to answer some longer asks this upcoming week, but I can’t guarantee anything yet.
If you want to send some character related asks, there’s a higher chance I’ll get through those. Otherwise, stay tuned for a post about my nano novella in the next week!
Ask topics covered:
Worldbuilding with sensitive topics.
Sticking with a story.
Solitary heroes.
As well as a few kind anons <3
Worldbuilding with sensitive topics.
Anon asked: Do you have any advice on how to worldbuild sensitive topics, and how to figure out if you've struck the right balance between creativity and respecting the those readers who might be affected by that topic?
I would love to give you a list of steps or rules to follow, but in all honesty, there isn’t one. The only way you can truly write a book that doesn’t run the risk of offending someone is to not write about any* sensitive topic. Of course, we don’t want to do that, because it’s both cowardly and disrespectful in and of itself.
So do research ahead of time, and then get sensitivity readers.
If you tried your best not to be offensive, there will be plenty of readers who’d love to double check your work and make sure you didn’t miss anything.
* There are definitely some sensitive topics which you should leave for ownvoice writers. If you’re worried your worldbuilding might cause an issue, go ask the people you think it might offend, and if they tell you it’s out of place, then listen to them.
Happy day!
Anon asked: If you receive this, you make someone happy! Go on anonymous and send this to ten of your followers who make you happy or some that you think need cheering up. If you get some back even better.💖
Aw, thank you :)
Sticking with a story.
Anon asked: Okay, so I love writing, but the problem is I have ADHD and it's insanely hard to stick to one story. I will literally start one story and then half a page later I have another idea, and I HAVE to start that other story. I got like 20+ unfinished story's on my Docs. And I guess my question is, how do you focus on finishing your story?
I don’t have ADHD, so I can’t give you the most solid advice, but I do know that there are many, many times when my depression or dyslexia or a host of other things makes me want to stop writing the thing I’m working on, and the only real cure for that is just to teach yourself how to push forward.
It will definitely be hard at first, and there’s no shame in not being able to do it right away, or every time. But if you set small goals (”I know I want to switch to this other story now but I’m going to write the one I was already working on for half a page longer and then switch”) it will eventually build into a habit.
Other helpful things:
Visualize the scene you’re currently working on. What is really cool about it? Why did you like it in the first place? Can you add something new to it to re-attract your attention?
Find things that motivate you positively. Reward yourself with those things if you achieve the small, reasonable goals you set for yourself.
Don’t start writing anything the moment inspiration hits you. Inspiration is a lie. ALL good stories are born of writers pushing forward after the inspiration has left, and finding the roots of what makes the story good instead of relying on what their happy feelings tell them is good in the moment.
Solitary heroes.
lunarcanine asked: I need some advice. My character in my book, has been transported into some sort of hell/limbo and is completely alone. No real people will be there and accompany him throughout the journey, only sub-characters who disappear. How could I make it sound less boring, and more interesting and catching with his solo adventures through the land? What’s your take,
I’m not a good person to ask this, as I’m always bored by stories with that plot structure. There are plenty of readers who enjoy them though. (I believe one of the more popular fantasy novels right now has a traveling, solitary hero, and there are countless other examples throughout various genres and mediums).
My advice would be to consume a bunch of books/movies with a similar style plot, and figure out what you enjoy seeing from them. What makes the story interesting to you? What makes you want to follow the solitary main character through their journey? On the other hand, what makes you lose interest?
I would put specific focus into the development of the main character in these stories and how that plays a part in your enjoyment of it, as well as what aspects of the story create suspense.
<3
Anon said: Your blog is so lovely, I started following you for when I need writing advice but I learnt so much about gender non-binaries and categories I didn't know existed! So thank you~
Thank you so much! That’s what I’m here for <3
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Post-NaNo Debrief
TGIO though of course I’m a little sad to be done. This was my 11th NaNoWriMo. Before the event, I had outlined up to the midpoint but wasn’t sure where the story was going beyond. So I knew I would have to take some time early on to figure it out (I could have also just written until I ran out of outline and see where I went from there, but ultimately decided that wasn’t what I wanted to do).
November started on Sunday, and I wrote 5K on day one. After finishing Act I on day 3 or 4 I decided to go back to my outline and re-work everything from the midpoint so that when I eventually reached Act III I had an idea of what would happen.
In week one, I was happy with the way things were going. I enjoyed writing about a woman in her mid twenties trying to create healthy boundaries with her parents while also going against their wishes. (DEFINITELY not a self-insert, don’t be silly) Nia is also a lot more confident than I am, though I did give her some of the anxiety symptoms I’ve been feeling for the past 3 months. It’s fineeee.
Around mid-month, things changed. First, my hands and wrists started to hurt. I had, of course, heard about this happening to people (especially overachievers) and even No Plot? No Problem! talks about quitting typing at the first sign of numbness, but I didn’t think much of it. I guess I never assumed that it would happen to me, and when it did it sucked. I was frustrated and uncomfortable. Even though it was close, I never needed to borrow my boyfriend’s wrist braces. I was able to manage wrist pain by easing up on the chaturangas and narrating some words in g docs on my phone instead of typing them.
Then, it was an offer for work from a client who wanted me to ghostwrite a novel in time for Christmas. I accepted a small gig to outline his story and when it became clear that what he wanted was unrealistic given the time frame, I had to turn down the project. Even though I HATE having to disappoint someone (even a stranger online) I’m proud of myself for realizing that I had other priorities.
Lastly, I continue to be Really Going Through It right now (see: my IHMAWTD post) and when shit hit the fan in my personal life, I realized I just… didn’t care about my story anymore. I wrote the third act of my novel on autopilot, writing the plot points but not much else, with vague descriptions and almost no continuity between scenes/chapters. I wasn’t excited so my words weren’t very good.
Overall, when I consider the novel, I’m not really happy with it, and when I accidentally deleted the last 1600 words, I was not nearly as upset as I would have been if I put real effort towards it (I mean I did lose perhaps the most explicit sex scene I’ve ever written, but eh, it wasn’t my best work I just needed some words).
I do enjoy my characters though, and I’m celebrating the end of NaNo the usual way, with a manicure (shitty DIY because covid) and a new sims 4 expansion so I can play with my characters and avoid editing forever. I’m excited to blog about playing the sims while I recover from burnout/general depression.
TL;DR Good things that happened during NaNo 2020 (glass half full, y’know?):
There was a real “aha!” moment where the plot kind of came together
I wrote along with a couple of authortube live streams
I donated and received my thank-you gifts
The lovely people in the ToNaNo group sent me some stickers!
Rocked my Word Slayer sweater all month
Hazel (my cat) supervised my writing (by sleeping curled up beside me)
Clover (my other cat) got in the way of ahem supervised my yoga
Bob Ross word crawl!!!
I wrote dangerously with a friend over zoom
And arguably the most important good thing that happened during NaNoWriMo 2020:
I felt balanced as I worked towards my goal and found a routine where I could incorporate yoga every morning plus a walk/run in the afternoon in addition to writing my words. Previous Nadia would have sat in front of her laptop for hours, writing away at the expense of her social life, health, chores, and other obligations. I think working part time really helped me with this, but it proved that it IS POSSIBLE to take care of myself while working on an ambitious project. And since I haven’t really been writing since NaNo 2019, the chance to write another novel and prove to myself that I AM A WRITER even if I’m currently on hiatus/in hibernation/survival mode/figuring my life out.
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it’s november, so here’s my regularly-scheduled nano writing post that nobody asks for and yet everyone gets anyway
- my theory about nano is that it works best for three types: people who are naturally good at binge writing, people with extremely wordy prose styles, or people who have their story fully planned and just need to pound it out. professional writers are maybe a fourth type, but i’m not sure i know any who do nano, since i believe the point of the challenge is to get unpublished people to confront and defeat a big work
- the problem is that a lot of writers aren’t in a place where they can do that, or at least not in a furious, wheezing bender over the course of 30 days. every year i hear about other young people who get excited to finish their first novel, and stumble out a week later, battered, stressed, and thinking they don’t measure up. it sucks. it bums me out to see it. all i can offer are options and moral support
- for context, i’ve been writing since i was in elementary school. i’ve been conditioning myself to write every day about since i graduated from college. in 2017, now that i work for voltage, i have a routine of about 1000 words a day. under deadline pressure, i can have a 2000-word day once in a while, and they tire me out. maybe i’ll grow into it later, but that’s where i am for now.
- therefore: if you’ve never embarked on a novel-length project before, you might run into problems. you might run into more than one. you might not be able to sustain writing almost 2000 words a day. you might get a third of the way into your plot and not know where to go next. you might just feel overwhelmed, or afraid of failure, or realize your day job leaves you too tired. it happens. you haven’t failed. you'll just have to adjust your parameters for success
- just to be pedantic, i’ll repeat myself in bold: don’t be upset if 2000 words a day isn’t something you can handle yet. if you’ve mainly been poking at fic or writing some oneshots once in a while, that’s a huge, potentially unreasonable amount to expect of yourself. don’t let it get you down! i know the “writing is a muscle” metaphor is played out by now, but it’s true. also, when did i care about cliches? i don’t. anyway
- if you can’t, ask yourself instead: “what can i do every day?” what does your schedule allow for? can you start with 200 words? do you think you could manage 1000 words a day for 2 months, or 500 words a day for 3 months? what feels possible to you? where are you not afraid to start?
- “just write, let your writing suck!” is, i guess, a philosophy that works for some people. it doesn’t work for me. i’ve always had to edit as i go
- same thing with word sprints, word count drills, the pomodoro technique, or anything else people recommend to make you focus better or break up the dreaded word count. these techniques can be great, but they take practice to implement. if you have something like ADHD going on, they might not work for you at all. at the end of the day, suggestions like these are just tools. if they don’t work, don’t feel obligated to use them
- on the other hand, if you find your own weird method, by all means, milk it for all it’s worth. i love my homebrew outlining method, i’ve used it on at least two novel-length stories now
- proclamations from famous authors about how much you should be writing a day are like, maybe helpful, maybe not, probably just discouraging for you to hear right now. these are professionals who’ve found a method that works for them and used it for years, if not decades, and i don’t like normative statements anyway. instead of should, let’s see where you are, and go from there
- seriously, don’t compare yourself to stephen king, he’s been writing longer than i’ve been alive
anyway, if doing nano works for you, don’t let me get in your way. i’ve never been able to, and these are things i needed to hear several years ago. many successful writers don’t adhere to the pacing that nano puts forth, and if you find that you can’t either, it doesn’t mean you’re “not cut out to write.” one of the things we all like about creative writing is that there’s no one right path.
if you made it to the end of this post, thanks for hearing me out!
#long post#shitpost#i may delete this if people take it the wrong way but#i really just don't want anyone to get down on themselves#writing
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to have a friend, chapter three: $60
on ao3
1 | 2
remember when i said i was doing nano? yeah so one day out of frustration i changed my nano novel to this so. *jazz hands*
side note: their town/school is ENTIRELY based on my own. i straight up just dropped them into my high school. therefore there is quite a bit of complaining but mostly thats about cafeteria food being shit and we all know it really is
warnings: discussions of mental health, anxiety, anxiety/panic attack, mentions of suicide/suicidal thoughts
Connor meets Evan by Evan’s locker. It was easier to find than Connor’s, who couldn’t even tell Evan the number when asked, and more secluded than most. Slipped into what people not so fondly called the “secret hallway” near the library, Evan’s locker is one of the few in this section of the school and he’s one of the few students who even uses his locker. He only uses it because he has so many textbooks, and because it’s sometimes nice to step away from the more crowded parts of the school. If he had to guess, he’d probably say that less than a third of kids in the school use their lockers.
Why spend time putting your books away when you only have five minutes to get to class? Time better spent pushing through the hallways or making out with a significant other in a corner or eating a snack really quickly because your next teacher has a strict no food policy and once taped a banana to the whiteboard when someone tried to eat it in class.
The hallway has a strange assortment of classrooms. A lost english room, with its windows covered in posters and playbills and pictures and quotes, multiple rooms for computer and technology classes, and the math room of the one teacher that everyone dreads because he is too smart to be teaching high school. Evan had had him sophomore year for geometry and even though Alana Beck had somehow gotten him through it, his hands still sweat when he thinks about going back there.
He’s unlocking his locker when Connor appears next to him, seemingly out of nowhere. Evan almost drops the english book he’s holding and has to start his combination over after messing up.
“You lock your locker?” Connor asks, raising an eyebrow.
Evan huffs as he resets the lock. “Y-yeah. Just…better to be safe. I don’t know.”
“New question.” Connor leans against the locker next to Evan’s. “You use your locker?”
Evan rolls his eyes. “You already judged me for this.”
“That I did,” Connor agrees. “I’m not done judging you though. Fuck lockers, who needs them?”
“M-me?”
Connor scoffs. “Sure. Suffer with the rest of us, Hansen. We’re supposed to leave high school with fucked up backs.”
Evan puts away his textbook before he turns to look at Connor. “Do you even carry books around?”
Connor whistles lowly. “You’ve got a bite this morning.”
Evan shakes his head and puts his backpack on the ground, pulling out a binder he won’t need until after lunch and putting it on the floor of his locker.
“And you’ve caught me,” Connor admits. “I’m never prepared for class.” He flicks a bill into Evan’s locker. It lands on Evan’s binder and Evan stuffs it into his pocket quickly. He shoots a glare at Connor. It’d be nice if Connor were a little more discreet.
The two of them had straightened out their stories the other day at Evan’s. Connor had decided Mondays would be the best day for him to pay Evan because it would force him to show up to school for at least the beginning of the week and it would be harder to forget Mondays. They also established when they started talking, basic likes and dislikes about the other, and the fact that the way that Connor eats pizza is weird. Who starts with the crust?
Connor only stayed a few hours and then walked back home in the dark (Evan definitely didn’t make him text him when he got home to say he was safe) but somehow those few hours made Evan feel infinitely more comfortable around Connor Murphy. Probably a good thing because they’re playing at being best friends.
Evan has gotten enough weird looks and questions about the ‘Connor’ scrawled across his cast without the two of them being awkward and uncomfortable around each other.
They just have to fool…everyone.
Easy enough.
“You good?” Connor asks.
Evan glances up at him. “Yeah I’m— it’s all good.” He grabs a random book and shuts his locker. He glances at the textbook as he pulls his backpack on his shoulders. AP Environmental Science. He doesn’t have that class until the end of the day, but now he’s stuck carrying it around until he gets another chance to stop at his locker because there is no way in hell he’s opening his locker after just shutting it.
“Where are you headed?” Connor asks, stuffing his hands in his pockets.
“English.” Evan gestures toward the stairwell. “So I’m— I’ll go this way. You?”
Connor scrunches up his nose. “Chorus. But I’ll come with you, I have to go down anyway.” He pulls open the door to the stairwell for Evan.
“You s-sing?” Evan asks as he passes Connor.
Connor laughs. His voice echoes in the stairwell. “Fuck no. But I needed an arts class and this was as lazy as I could get. I sit in the back and don’t pay attention.”
“What are you?” Evan moves closer to the railing as two kids rush past them up the stairs.
“Uh…human?”
Evan frowns and looks back at Connor. “What? No that’s— I meant vocal part.”
Connor blinks. “Oh. Tenor, I think. I just move my mouth and pretend.”
Evan shakes his head and opens the door at the bottom of the stairs. “You know that people can tell if you aren’t singing, if you’re just lip syncing. They used to tell us that all the time in middle school— that and the fact that just saying watermelon softly doesn’t work.”
Connor shrugs and stuffs his hands in his pockets. “I just need to pass.” He stands at the edge of the next set of stairs. He has to go down another flight to the music wing, Evan has to keep walking straight. “I’ll see you… Whatever, I’ll see you.”
Evan nods. “See you,” he mumbles as Connor descends down the stairs, pushing through a group of students blocking the way.
Evan takes a deep breath and turns away. One morning down.
Who knows how many more to go.
—«·»—
Between second and third period, Zoe corners Evan by nurse’s office. He was just trying to stop by his locker before calculus, but now he doesn’t think he’s going to get the opportunity.
“You’re friends with my brother,” she says.
Evan blinks at her. “Y-yeah we’re— Connor and I are friends, we’re friends, yeah. Why?”
Zoe frowns and her eyebrows draw together, making her forehead crease. “Why did I never see you two around school together before…” She motions to Evan’s cast.
Evan grabs his cast with his other hand. “Because—” They talked about this the other night but now Evan’s words are getting caught in the back of his throat. “Connor— he didn’t want us hanging out together. At school. Just at school.”
“Why not?” Zoe asks sharply. Evan steps back. “Because he’s embarrassed of you and is a bad friend?”
“N-no?”
“Why did you go along with it?” she presses on. “Are you scared of him?”
“No? I just— I respect his boundaries?” Evan picks at his cast. “I don’t— I-I was fine with it. He didn’t— there was no pressuring or anything that like it was just something that he asked and I was fine with it I didn’t mind.”
Zoe searches his face like she’s trying to find some secret code in it and Evan tries not to collapse under her scrutiny.
The warning bell rings.
“Okay,” Zoe says shortly. “Okay.” She turns on her heel and starts walking toward the band room. “I’ll talk to you later, Evan,” she says over her shoulder.
And Evan dreads it.
—«·»—
Evan glances to Connor as he passes him in the hallway. Connor lifts his hand to acknowledge Evan. Evan forces a smile.
Smiling at other people in the hallway instead of just looking at the ground. He can do that.
Jared squints at Connor. Evan doesn’t even bother wondering when Jared caught up to him, Jared just appears sometimes. “Since when do you and the rejected emo talk?” He pokes Evan’s cast. “We both know you don’t have friends, I thought this was a fucking joke.”
Evan winces. “It’s nothing.”
Jared doesn’t look entirely convinced, but he shrugs and moves on. For now. They really need to get Jared in on the lie before Jared somehow tells the entire universe and everything goes to hell. “Whatever, acorn.” Jared points to Evan. “Insurance?”
“Yeah, whatever.” Evan stops at his locker and grabs the lock.
“Nice. I’ll be— oh, hey. Alana.”
Evan glances over his shoulder to see Alana standing next to Jared, stack of textbooks in hand.
“Evan!” Alana exclaims. “You’re friends with Connor, right?”
Jared raises an eyebrow.
Evan swallows. “Y-yeah? Why do— what’s up?”
“Oh well, Connor doesn’t seem to like talking about his personal life with people and I was wondering how he’s doing.” She adjusts the books in her arms.
“He’s— he’s fine,” Evan stutters.
Jared rolls his eyes.
Evan quickly turns back to his locker and starts stuffing books inside.
“Do you think you could get him to talk to me about it?” Alana asks.
“No?” Evan doesn’t really know what’s happening, but he knows there’s no way in hell he could get Connor to talk to Alana about this stuff. Or any stuff. He probably can’t get Connor to do anything. “W-why?”
Alana takes a breath and Jared makes a face.
“Well I was just thinking that his story might be good for other people, specifically students, to hear,” she explains. “There’s such a heavy stigma around mental health and I’m sure other people are struggling like he has. I think that it’s really important for people to hear these personal stories so they know they’re not alone.”
Evan shifts uncomfortably. He glances to Jared, who shrugs. “I… I don’t…think he’d really, um, want to do that,” Evan says slowly.
Alana’s face falls. “Oh.”
“I-it’s a great idea!” Evan adds quickly. “I— That sounds like a really great idea! I just— Connor’s a pretty private person and I don’t— that might not be something he wants everyone to know about. Or know…more about.”
Alana purses her lips. “I see. I’ll have to ask him myself,” she says. “Thank you, Evan!” she calls out as she hurries down the hall.
Evan stares at her as she steps into the crowd.
That was not the outcome he wanted.
“Smooth,” Jared mutters. “Don’t know what the fuck is happening, but I know that you just dug yourself into a nice big hole.
Evan grimaces. “Come on, Jared.”
Jared pats Evan’s shoulder. “Good luck. You’re going to need it, ‘cause I think you just got moved to the top of Murphy’s hit list.”
Evan wants to melt into the floor and die.
Connor drops down into the seat next to Evan. “Hey.”
Evan looks up from his sandwich in surprise. “Oh, you— you have this lunch?”
Connor shrugs. “Don’t usually come to it, but I didn’t eat breakfast today.” He puts down the lunch tray and pokes at the mixed vegetables with a fork. “This looks nasty.”
Evan looks to his own lunch. A chicken patty that looks…unappetizing. “I didn’t even think about lunches, honestly.”
“Fucking rotating schedules,” Connor mutters. He stabs a carrot with his fork and tries it. He makes a face.
“Not good?” Evan asks. He picks up his chicken patty.
“It’s really mushy,” Connor says after a moment. “It’s disgusting.”
Evan takes a bite of his sandwich.
“How do people think this is food?” Connor looks to the main part of his meal, a really sad excuse for spaghetti. “I changed my mind, maybe I’ll just starve to death.”
Evan chews slowly. “At least it’s not freeze burned hot dog,” he says once he’s swallowed. “That happened to Jared in second grade.”
Connor gags. “Okay, yeah. I hate this place.”
Evan gives him an amused look. “When was the last time you actually came to lunch?”
Connor squints. “I don’t know…sometime sophomore year? I don’t eat lunch like…what’s the fucking point of sitting here when I could be,” he looks around, “not surrounded by this?”
Evan follows his gaze. This is a smaller lunch, so usually Evan sits at a table by himself. Some seniors are sitting outside at the few tables that are the remains of their senior privileges. There are people crowded around tables, sitting on chairs with their lunch trays on their laps. There’s too much laughing and talking and occasional screaming. All of the tables have food from previous lunches on them, the floor is uncomfortably sticky in some places, and it smells like bad cafeteria food and too many teenagers.
“That’s fair,” Evan mumbles.
Connor sighs and keeps eating. “The mashed potatoes aren’t bad,” he says after a moment. “Dry as fuck with no seasoning but I won’t die. The turkey is weird and possibly fake. But it’s better than my mom’s current vegan shit so.”
“Vegan?” Evan asks.
Connor nods. “She’s on a vegan health kick. Sometimes it happens. I just sneak out and get fast food if it’s bad— it’s usually bad.” He gives Evan a look. “If you get invited to dinner, don’t come it’s not worth the free food, believe me.”
Evan blinks. “Don’t invite me then.”
Connor looks at him for a moment. “Point.” He opens his milk, smells it, and then pushes the bottle away. “No. There’s no fucking way.”
“What?”
Connor picks the bottle back up again and looks at the date and then gags. “Hansen, what the fuck.”
“Is it spoiled?” Evan checks the date on his own milk. “Mine looks fine.”
“Smell this.” Connor shoves the bottle at Evan and Evan almost falls off his seat leaning away from it.
“What?! No!”
Connor narrows his eyes. He takes another careful sniff and makes a disgusted face. “I’m never skipping breakfast again.”
Evan slowly pushes his milk toward Connor. “Good plan.”
Jared crosses his arms. “So…Connor?”
Evan closes his locker. “Don’t you have class?”
“I am walking to class,” Jared says. “You just happened to be on my way.”
Evan sighs. “What about him?”
“What the fuck happened there?”
Evan weaves through the crowd. He’s not trying to lose Jared, but if he did, that would be great.
“No seriously.” Jared takes a few quick steps to get in front of Evan, spinning around to face Evan and walking backwards.
Evan ignores him. “You’re going to trip.”
“I know what I’m doing,” Jared says as he glances back over his shoulder. “But we both know you just hung out with trees all summer. How the fuck did you go from Murphy yelling at you in the hallway to being his best friend for ever and ever and ever.”
Evan grits his teeth. “I— he was yelling at you, Jared. That was your fault.”
Jared shrugs. “To-may-to, to-mah-to. Whatever. There’s definitely something going on here.” He raises his eyebrows. “Is it a sex thing?”
Evan stops walking. “Goodbye, Jared.”
“Oh my god, it’s totally a sex thing!”
“Go to class!”
Evan actively tries to avoid Zoe the next time he sees her walking his direction, but the universe has this funny habit of doing everything it possibly can to make his life miserable.
“You’re invited to dinner,” she says, cornering him in the science wing.
“W-what?”
“Dinner,” Zoe repeats. “Mom has been on Connor’s ass about it all week but we both know he won’t ask you.” She narrows her eyes at Evan.
Evan shrinks in on himself. “Dinner dinner? Like…dinner?”
She furrows her eyebrows. “Yeah. Dinner. What are you doing tonight?”
“Nothing?” Evan mentally slaps himself. “I mean—”
“Great then you can come have dinner at ours tonight.”
Evan shakes his head. “Do you re-really think that’s a good—”
“It’s a great idea,” Zoe interrupts with a flat voice. “It can’t go wrong in any way at all.”
“Ah.” That’s incredibly comforting. He squeezes the straps of his backpack. “I-I mean I don’t want to— you shouldn’t go out of your way to—”
Zoe crosses her arms. “My mom wants you there.”
“Oh.”
“Please.” Zoe gives him a desperate look. “She just… God, she just wants to make sure you still exist. That’s all. It’s not an interrogation, it’s dinner.”
Evan glances around the hallway. “I-I guess that it’s— I mean if you really want me…to…”
“She does,” Zoe insists. “It’ll get her off of my back. And Connor’s. I think she’s still in shock from finding out that Connor has actual friends.” She flicks her eyes up and down Evan’s body. Obviously her mom isn’t the only one in shock.
This is going to be an absolute disaster. Evan’s stomach is already turning and his head hurts a bit.
“So you’re coming?” Zoe confirms.
Evan nods, because that’s all he can manage.
“Great,” she says. Evan doesn’t think either of them think that it’s great. “Here,” she grabs Evan’s good arm and pulls a pen out from the side pocket her backpack. She uncaps it with her teeth and scribbles her number on Evan’s skin. She drops his arm and puts away the pen. “If Connor refuses to give you the address because he’s being a dick, just text me. Dinner’s at like six thirty.”
Then she turns around and hurries down the hallway. She weaves between a few people before Evan loses track of her.
He stares at the number on his arm.
Shit.
Evan takes a few slow breaths like Dr. Sherman always has him practice and reaches for his phone, his hands shaking.
From: Evan
To: Connor
Im s o rry
Ims soryr Zo e conretd me and inviedme ot dinner and I apnaciked nad said ey s aso now I’m goign to dinner a t yrosu tongith? ? im soryr
Evan tries not to think about dinner as he gets through his last class of the day, but he keeps seeing Zoe’s number on his skin and it makes him feel like there’s a heavy anchor on his chest. He keeps checking his phone under the desk, desperately waiting for a response from Connor. The only problem is that he’s in a practically dead zone of the school service wise, so he might not even get Connor’s text until later.
His phone vibrates in his hands three minutes before the final bell.
From: Connor
To: Evan
fuck
—«·»—
Evan is surprised to find Connor standing next to his locker. “Uh…h-hi?”
“We needed to talk,” Connor murmurs.
Evan nods slowly and reaches for his lock. His hands are shaking and he keeps messing up the combination. “I— About dinner tonight I, I mean I didn’t— Zoe just…” He wipes his hands on his pants and resets the lock.
Connor makes a frustrated sound in the back of his voice. “It’s…fine. Zoe’s a bitch—”
“D-don’t call her that.”
“—and my mom’s been harassing me about it all week. I was trying to avoid this shit.”
Evan can feel Connor’s eyes burning into him as he fumbles with the lock again.
“You-you told me I shouldn’t— that dinner was a bad idea but I still said yes which was really, that wasn’t the best, I should’ve just said no but I panicked and saying no— I’m really bad at saying no.” Evan takes a deep breath and stares at his lock. The numbers are swimming in his vision.
Connor nudges him. “Move.”
Evan jumps away from him with wide eyes. “W-what?”
“I can do it.” Connor spins the lock. “What’s the combination?”
“Three, fifteen, fourteen,” Evan mumbles. He should be able to open his locker. He should be able to open a lock. He should be able to do this.
Connor pulls the lock open. “There.” He steps aside so Evan can put away his books. “Zoe already told my mom you were coming tonight. Got a bunch of excited text messages from her during class.”
Evan avoids looking at him as he opens his locker and starts emptying his backpack.
“Just…” Connor sighs. “Listen, it’s going to be fucked.”
Evan glances up at him. “Why? Because I’m—”
“No, because my family is fucked. We’re fucked up. We all hate each other and there is literally nothing but our ‘good name’ holding us together. It’s going to be shitty. The food will be bad, the conversation will be bad, and there might be yelling.”
Evan takes a shaky breath. “Oh. That’s— um, it’s not…encouraging.”
“I’m warning you.” Connor blows his bangs out of his eyes. “Don’t go in expecting the perfect American dream family, that’s just what my mom wants you to think.”
“Are you trying to get me to not go?” Evan asks, forcing a laugh as he pulls his backpack on.
Connor meets his eyes with absolute sincerity. “Yes.”
—«·»—
Evan doesn’t have to text Zoe for the address, Connor sends it to him without prompting. Followed by a text that says ‘dont get mauled by a deer’. Evan tries to take it as a joke — it should be a joke, Evan remembers everyone yelling in third grade because there were a couple of deer outside their classroom window — but he’s freaking out too much to take anything lightly.
He scrubs Zoe’s number off his arm without even writing it down and he doesn’t know if he regrets that or not. He changes his shirt four times before putting one on that’s almost identical to the one he was wearing at school. He doesn’t know what to do with his hair.
Zoe had said “like six thirty”, but Evan doesn’t know what that means. So he leaves earlier than he has to and follows the instructions he wrote down on his phone. He’s almost definitely going to be way too early and he’s not sure how he’s supposed to deal with that when he gets there. Maybe he can hide in the bushes or something until it’s a reasonable time to knock on their door.
He finds himself standing on the edge of a driveway at 6:03. It’s not too dark yet, but the sun is beginning to set. He stares up at the house. The number is right but he wants to check.
From: Evan
To: Connor
Your ho use is ti blue ? Like sorta darkish maybe grayish?
From: Connor
To: Evan
yeah its blue and theres this huge ass tree in front of it thats a pain int he ass
Evan looks up at his phone. There is indeed a large tree.
From: Evan
To: Connor
It looks liek a nice tree
From: Connor
To: Evan
you know you can come inside instead of standing out there like a stalker right
From: Evan
To: Connor
Im early
From: Connor
To: Evan
and?????
we need to game plan hansen get inside
fuck it im coming to you
Evan is about to ask him what he means when the front door opens and Connor steps out, closing it behind him. Evan is suddenly very glad he didn’t ask, because that would’ve been a silly question, and things are already tense enough as it is.
Connor makes his way down the driveway, tugging down the sleeves of his sweatshirt as he does so. “Do you like couscous?” he asks.
Evan blinks. “I…don’t know?”
“Okay, well my mom was saying something about couscous earlier, so that’s happening.”
Evan frowns. “Um, okay.”
Connor raises an eyebrow at him. “Were you just going to stand out here until you thought it was a good time to come in?”
Evan looks at the ground. “No. I just— I was just. I’m early.”
“Cool. You made it, though. Welcome to hell.” Connor gestures to the house.
“I thought school was hell,” Evan says.
Connor snorts. “That’s the hellhole. This is true hell. Because my family is there.”
“Do you—” Connor turns his attention back to Evan and Evan hesitates. “Are things really…that bad?”
“I don’t have a door,” Connor says after a moment. “Larry took it away after I tried to off myself.” Evan takes a shallow breath. “Him and my mom fight all the time. Don’t know why they’re still together sometimes. I once threatened to kill Zoe while I banged on her door when I was high so honestly it’s no surprise that we barely talk. But it could be worse,” he says in an almost mocking way that’s almost jarring after his calm and steady tone. He looks at Evan with an empty look in his eyes.
Evan thinks now is when he’s supposed to be afraid.
But Evan is afraid of everything, and for some reason, this doesn’t make him any more anxious than usual. Connor doesn’t make him any more anxious than usual. The idea of a family dinner, yes. But Connor himself, no.
Maybe it’s because he tried to fix things after he shoved Evan. Maybe it’s because Evan’s already snapped at him. Maybe it’s because he’s paying him twenty dollars to do this.
But Connor Murphy doesn’t scare him.
“I’m sorry,” Evan says softly when the silence has stretched thin.
Connor scoffs. “Why?”
“I…” Evan shakes his head. “I don’t know.”
Connor moves on. Evan is glad. “I can do most of the talking or whatever tonight. Hopefully my mom sticks to the basics. Zoe and Larry don’t even want to be doing this, so we should be okay on that end. If my mom asks too many personal questions I’ll tell her to fuck off, but mostly she’ll probably just ask you what you want to do in college.”
“Uh…”
“Exactly,” Connor says knowingly. “I hope you’re ready to face the fires of hell.”
—«·»—
The Murphy’s house is big. That’s the first thing that Evan thinks.
There are three floors and an office and a living room and a dining room and Connor just waves it all off as he gives Evan a quick tour of the first floor, gesturing to the basement door and the stairs to the bedroom, and Evan is completely and totally overwhelmed. There are too many rooms and really the only one he needs to be able to find is the bathroom, there are multiple of those he knows that because Connor mentioned two upstairs, but Evan has gotten lost in the hallways and rooms and—
He’s just going to follow Connor around like a lost puppy. Because if he tries to go anywhere in this house he will get lost.
“Kitchen,” Connor says, pointing toward a doorway. “I think my mom and Zoe are hiding out in there right now. Larry’s probably in his office because he’s always in his office. And dining room.” He gestures to the table. “There you go.”
Evan nods. Sure. He didn’t give Connor a house tour when Connor visited the other day. He wonders if that’s the polite thing you’re supposed to do or just something that Connor is told to do.
Zoe steps out of the kitchen with an armful of plates stacked with silverware. “You’re setting the table tomorrow,” she says to Connor as she puts down a plate. “Since you weaseled your way out of it tonight.”
Connor rolls his eyes.
“D-do you want help?” Evan asks, twisting the bottom of his shirt with his hands.
Zoe gives Evan a pointed look. “No it’s fine,” she says, still staring at Connor. “I can handle it.”
“You’re too nice,” Connor grumbles when Zoe disappears back into the kitchen.
Evan laughs awkwardly. “I just— I don’t know how family dinners work?”
“You’re lucky.”
An older woman, Evan assumes Connor’s mom, comes out of the kitchen with a pot and Zoe follows closely after with a serving bowl. Evan thinks he may vaguely recognize her from elementary school, when PTA was a thing and when parents were always in the classroom helping with parties or snack time or library days— at least, the stay at home moms were.
“Evan, my mom,” Connor says flatly. “Mom, Evan.”
Evan waves awkwardly. “Th-thanks for having me, Mrs. Murphy.”
She lights up. “Please! Call my, Cynthia!”
“Oh, okay.”
Zoe puts the bowl down on the table. “I’ll get Dad.” She pushes past Connor without a word and Connor glares at her back.
“Connor, sweetie, help me with the rest of the food.” Cynthia gestures for him to follow, which he does with a begrudging sigh.
Evan follows, not really wanting to stay in the dining room by himself. The kitchen is big and and clean and well lit and everything is stainless steel and fancy. There are pots one the stove and dishes sitting in a dish rack and a patterned dish towel by the sink and Evan doesn’t know the last time him and his mom made a home cooked meal. He doesn’t remember the last time he made something more complicated than mac n cheese.
“Do you— can I help?” Evan offers, because Connor is grabbing a pot and a potholder because he’s part of this family, even if he doesn’t feel like he is.
“You can take this, if you’d like.” Cynthia motions to a bowl with carrots in it. “It’s sweet of you to offer.”
Evan follows Connor back into the dining room, putting the bowl down on the table where there’s space and hoping there’s no order or specific placing to where things go. Zoe wanders back in from the back of her house, sliding her phone into her pocket.
“Dad’ll be in in a sec,” she says, pulling out a chair. “Finishing up a call.”
“Whatever,” Connor says. He drops down into a chair and points to the next one when he meets Evan’s eyes.
“I was talking to mom,” Zoe says shortly.
Connor just takes a long sip of milk.
Evan sits next to Connor. He tries to focus on the fact that the seat of the chair is comfortable and significantly higher quality than the old wooden chairs him and his mom have in their kitchen— old and battered and scratched up on the legs from when Evan was little and would run toy trucks into them over and over again.
Larry comes in and sits down on one end of the table, between Zoe and Connor. Somehow, that makes Evan nervous. He glances to Evan and looks at him like he can’t really believe he’s there. Valid, Evan can’t believe he’s here either.
“Nice to see you again, Evan,” Larry says.
“Y-you too,” Evan mumbles, looking down at his hands. Just get through dinner just get through dinner.
Connor moves his silverware around.
Cynthia sits down and everyone reaches for food. Evan stars as hands reach for spoons and bowls. Zoe starts talking as if cued. Larry gives short responses, Cynthia asks her questions, and Connor ignores her. Connor offers Evan a spoonful of something and Evan nods because he doesn’t know what it is so might as well try. Besides, it’d be rude to refuse food when they invited him for dinner.
“It’s so nice to really meet you, Evan!” Cynthia says suddenly. Maybe not suddenly. Maybe Evan is paying even less attention than he thought he was.
“It’s ni-nice to meet you too,” he stutters.
Zoe raises her eyebrows at him. He can’t read what that’s supposed to mean.
Evan swallows and picks at his food. He’s barely eaten all day and he should really eat now, but he can’t bring himself to bring food to his mouth.
“So how did you two meet?” Cynthia asks. She looks between Connor and Evan.
Evan and Connor exchange a glance. This is fine. They’ve talked about this. They just have to stick to the story. They’re fine.
“School,” Connor says. “Last year, partway through second semester. I couldn’t figure out how to add a printer to the computer in the computer lab, so Evan did it for me.”
“It’s— the adding a printer thing is…unnecessarily complicated,” Evan says. “It’s just…”
“Annoying,” Connor finishes.
Zoe narrows her eyes at Connor. “I never saw you two hanging out around school together,” she says, pushing food around her plate. Evan puts his hands under the table and digs his nails into his palms. They’ve already talked about this, which means she’s just doing this to antagonize Connor.
Evan glances at Connor out of the corner of his eye. Connor tightens his jaw. Evan looks away.
Zoe points her fork at Evan. “I’ve only ever seen you hang out with Jared Kleinman, and he’s an asshole.”
“Language,” Larry says, reaching for a bowl in the middle of the table.
“No she’s right,” Connor says. “He is an asshole.”
Evan makes a face. “I-I mean—”
Connor turns to him and gives him a flat look. “Are you saying he’s not a jerk?”
Evan stares at Connor for a long moment. “Didn’t say that.”
“Jared?” Cynthia asks. “Do we know him?”
Larry shrugs.
“God I hope not,” Connor mutters.
Cynthia gives him a pointed look before she looks to Evan. Evan’s stomach twists. “You should’ve come over during the summer! We would’ve been happy to have you.”
Evan smiles weakly. “I-it’s fine! I was, um, I worked this summer. I-I was an apprentice park ranger at, at Ellison State Park? So I was— mostly I just…worked and slept.” He laughs awkwardly. “It’s fine.”
“You had a job,” Larry says. He sounds almost impressed and Connor goes tense next to Evan.
“Y-yeah. It was— I like trees so it was fun. Connor and I, uh, we just talked over email.” Evan stabs something with his fork and stuffs it into his mouth. He needs to stop talking immediately.
“Emails?” Zoe laughs. “Are we in the stone age?”
“No,” Connor says slowly. He looks to Larry with a flat glare.
Evan bites down on his bottom lip.
Larry meets Connor’s glare. “Email isn’t that outdated,” he says calmly.
Connor scowls. Evan thinks that something is going to snap. It’s just a matter of who.
Cynthia clears her throat. “So Evan, do you have plans for college yet?”
Fuck.
To be fair, Connor did warn him. Evan had just been hoping that maybe…
“Uh… I…I want to go to college,” Evan says carefully. “Just…um. I don’t really know— I mean I haven’t really decided…” He looks down to his plate. “My mom has been, uh, having me do lots of scholarship stuff? I like…” What does he like? What can he make into a career? Shit. “Writing. And uh, nature. So maybe…something to do with one of those?”
He looks up and Cynthia smiles at him. “That sounds nice,” she says. “It’s fine if you’re undecided right now, I was undecided for a very long time.”
Zoe raises her eyebrows like she’s heard this hundreds of times before.
“Applications are soon,” Cynthia muses. “Any idea where you’re applying yet?”
“Um—”
“Mom, come on,” Connor interrupts. “Can we not talk about college right now?”
“Yeah, cause you’re not going,” Zoe says.
Everything stops.
Connor clenches his hands tight around his silverware, burning holes into the table with his glare. Larry stops eating to look at Connor. Cynthia pointedly does not look at anyone. Zoe stares at Connor with cold defiance in her eyes.
It’s hard to breathe. The room is getting very small and Evan’s dish is swimming before his eyes.
He wants to be anywhere other than here.
“I think it’s admirable that Evan is going to college,” Larry says. He cuts something on his dish and the noise of the knife on the plate grates Evan’s ears and makes him cringe. “He’s making a future for himself. Building a life for himself.”
Connor scoffs and Evan sinks back into his seat.
Larry looks past Connor and at Evan. Evan feels like he’s suffocating. “Zoe’s already looking at colleges,” Larry says. “Maybe you two should compare notes.” There’s a joking tone in his voice.
Evan feels sick.
“What?” Connor asks. “Not going to outright tell me I’m throwing away my entire future tonight?” His voice is almost shaking and so are Evan’s hands. “Sorry I can’t be perfect like Zoe is.”
Zoe slams her silverware down on the table. “Don’t bring me into this! It’s not my fault you gave up on everything!”
Evan’s breathing is getting more and more shallow and he’s just trying to take slow breaths but his head is spinning and he feels like he’s going to fall over.
“Please,” Cynthia says softly. “We don’t—”
“You were always part of this!” Connor snaps. “You don’t get to write yourself out of my life!”
“Fuck you!” Zoe shouts.
“Connor,” Larry says harshly, “calm down and stop blaming Zoe for things you could have fixed yourself.”
Evan squeezes his eyes shut tightly.
“Fix it myself?!” Connor grits his teeth. “Don’t you think I fucking tried that?!”
In. One, two, three, four, five. Hold.
“Point out one time you tried,” Larry spits.
One, two, three, four, five. Out.
“It would’ve been easier for you if I just died,” Connor snarls. “Maybe I should’ve.”
Evan’s eyes snap open.
Someone inhales to say something.
Evan stands up. “I— Wh-where’s the bathroom?”
Cynthia forces a smile, shaky and fake and unnatural. “If you go down the hallway to the lef—”
Connor pushes his chair away from the table. “I’ll bring him.” He starts walking and Evan follows.
Evan’s legs feel like jello and the colors of the world are muted. There’s a heavy weight on his chest and he can’t breathe anymore he can’t breathe.
Connor brings him up the stairs and Evan focuses on not collapsing.
“Here,” Connor says, opening a door at the end of a hall.
Evan can’t even say thank you, he just brushes past Connor and leans against the nearest wall, trying to stay standing. His knees go weak and he slides to the floor. He puts his head between his legs and tries so hard to breath to just calm down to just stop everything needs to stop.
“Evan?” Connor asks.
Did he close the door? He doesn’t think he closed the door. Everything feels weird and out of place and he can’t breathe he can’t breathe he can’t breathe—
“Evan.” Connor’s voice is louder now. Closer. The door clicks closed. “Evan do you need me to do something?”
Evan shakes his head. He shakes it a few more times. He’s okay. He’s okay. He feels nauseous and terrible but he’s not going to throw up. He’s going to pull himself together and he will be fine. He will be fine.
Eventually he is more fine. His breathing evens out, his heart stops trying to beat out of his chest. His head hurts, but he’s less lightheaded. He’s not crying and he’s not choking back sobs.
It’s okay. He’s okay.
He looks up from his knees to see Connor sitting on the bathroom floor across from him. Connor studies him for a minute before he stands up and turns one the sink.
Evan sniffs and wipes his face with the back of his hand. He doesn’t know when he started crying. It doesn’t matter anymore.
“Here,” Connor says softly, handing Evan a cup of water. It’s one of those paper cups that they used to use back in elementary school when they did flouride. It has turtles on it. Evan wonders who bought them while he takes a small sip of water.
His hands are still shaky but they’re a little bit better.
“I’m sorry,” he says after a few more moments of silence. The water is half gone. Once he finishes it, he’ll probably keep holding onto the cup. Crumple it up in his hands. Rip it to pieces. Do something with his hands so he doesn’t lose it. “I-I didn’t—” He stops himself when Connor sits back down across from him.
“Don’t be sorry,” Connor says. “I’m sorry. For my family. For me. For fucking…all of this.” He gestures around them. Around the bathroom that still looks like it belongs to little kids with it’s colorful shower curtain and flower and monkey patterned towels and turtle patterned cups. A bathroom that belongs to two kids. Not two people who can’t even eat dinner together without yelling at each other.
Evan looks down into the cup.
“I should’ve tried harder to stop you from coming,” Connor mutters. “I knew that it was going to end up like that.”
“It’s— I-I wanted to come,” Evan says. “It’s not— d-don’t blame yourself.”
Connor eyes him. “Fine. Then you aren’t allowed to think you ruined dinner. Because that was my entire family’s fault. We’re the reason that you’re—”
“I’m fine.”
Connor’s expression gets almost sad for a second. “Okay. You’re fine.”
Evan drinks the rest of the water. “D-do they—? Are we supposed to…”
Connor sighs and looks away. “It doesn’t matter. We don’t have dinner together as a family for a reason. Zoe and Larry certainly don’t expect me back.”
“Oh,” Evan whispers.
“That extends to you,” Connor points out. “You’re my guest. Trust me, we can stay here until they coast is clear.” He glances to the door. “You can see people leaving the house from the dining room. I fucking hate open house plans.”
Evan forces a laugh. “I-I guess that’s— that’s a fair reason to hate th-them.”
Connor smiles a little and flicks hair out of his eyes. “They probably won’t be too much longer. I can go down before you, scout it out.
Evan picks at the rolled edges of the cup. “D-do— do you sneak out? Often?”
Connor shrugs. “Sometimes. Depends. I mean…not much point in being here.” He raises an eyebrow. “I can just go get high in the park.”
Evan takes a deep breath. “I guess. M-my mom’s never home so…” He shakes his head. “No reason to leave when you’re— when you’re already alone.”
Connor nods and they sit in silence for a few minutes. “I’m going to go check,” Connor says, pulling himself to his feet. He opens the door a crack and slips through it, closing the door behind him.
Evan crumples the cup up between his hands and then attempts to straighten it out again.
Connor knocks once on the door before saying “It’s me” and opening the door. “Coast is clear.” He offers Evan his hand and pulls Evan up from the floor.
Evan sways a little bit as he takes a step forward and Connor puts a hand on his shoulder.
“Are you okay?” he asks, eyebrows furrowing.
Evan nods. “Fine. Just…tired.”
“Right. Come on.” Connor leads him down the hall.
Evan hesitates in front of a room with a doorframe but no door. He glances inside and sees Connor’s bag on his desk.
Connor wasn’t joking about having no door.
Connor opens the front door and steps outside with Evan. “Want me to walk you home?” Connor asks. “It’s kind of dark.”
They both look up at the sky. Evan will have to go mostly by the setting sun and weak streetlights.
Evan shakes his head. “I’ll be okay, but thanks.”
Connor opens his mouth and then closes it. “Okay. Just…I don’t fucking know. Text me when you get home or something. Try not to get by a car. Or a deer.”
Evan gives him a small smile. “D-do you really have this many deer on this side of town?”
“We’re only a fifteen minute walk away from each other, Hansen,” Connor points out. “But yes. Watch out for those motherfuckers.”
“I will.” Evan walks down the front steps and then looks back at Connor. “I…thanks.”
Connor scoffs. “For nothing.”
Evan shrugs and walks down the unnecessarily long driveway. He takes out his phone and pulls up maps and puts in his address. The sun is setting faster and it’s starting to get colder and there’s a deep tiredness in Evan’s bones, but he’s okay. It’s okay.
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Usually, I feel like the months simply fly by, but the start of April seems like such a long time ago! I had quite an ambitious plan for April: I was going to participate in the Magical Readathon and try to write 30,000 words for the novel I’m working on during Camp NaNoWriMo. Those two events happened to be in the same month and instead of being sad about having to choose one of them, I decided to do both. Spoiler: I only succeeded at one and failed quite spectacularly at the other one. But that’s okay because we’re all about having fun here at Books Baking and Blogging, and I did have a lot of fun! So much so that I decided to tell you all about it. I don’t normally write wrap-ups, but I figured this month deserved one!
Camp NaNoWriMo
For those of you that don’t know, “NaNoWriMo” stands for National Novel Writing Month, during which the goal is to write a novel of 50,000 words. I guess the “national” part isn’t all that relevant anymore because people from all over the world (including myself) participate each year. The official NaNoWriMo is in November, but for a couple of years now they’ve also been organising “Camps” in April and July, which are a bit more relaxed than November since you can set your own word goal.
I decided to participate this year because I’ve been working on a novel for quite some time now and I really want to finish it this year – preferably sooner rather than later – and Camp NaNo could help me out with that. I set my word goal to 30,000, which I figured would be challenging yet doable. Well… I started out really well and even made a tiny bit of a headstart during the first week. The second week went alright as well, but then it all went sideways. I got a bit stuck in my story and I didn’t know how I should continue.
The trouble with having to write 1,000 words a day on average is that you don’t really get any room to breathe, take a step back and do some more plotting if necessary. I decided to do that anyway when I got stuck, and I did figure out how to keep the story going, so that was good. However, that pause, as well some life things that had me unable to write much, caused me to be so far behind on my word goal that I kind of just… gave up, I guess. It doesn’t really feel that way, though: it doesn’t feel like I’ve failed. I managed to write over 12,000 words for my novel, which is way more than I would’ve done in April otherwise. So, that’s definitely a win! I’m much closer to finishing now, and that was the main goal after all. It would’ve been cool to actually write 30,000 words, but I’m fine with how things went. In fact, I’d say I’m quite proud of myself!
Magical Readathon
Now, for the success story of this wrap-up; the Magical Readathon! The Magical Readathon is a Harry Potter-inspired readathon created and organised by G from Book Roast – and it is amazing. You can watch her video explaining everything right here. Basically, it’s a readathon inspired by the exams all students at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry have to take. You have the O.W.L.s, taken at the end of the fifth year, and the N.E.W.T.s, taken at the end of the seventh year at Hogwarts.
G has turned this into two readathons: one in April (when you take your OWLs) and one later in the year (I believe in August) for the NEWTs – and I think she hosts a few shorter ones in between as well. She has set reading prompts for every OWL you can take. This means that, for example, if you want to pass your Transfiguration OWL, you need to read a book with a red cover. This year, she’s also devised a whole career system. If you want to go into a certain career after you leave Hogwarts, you have to pass some specific OWLs related to that career. It’s a fun extra feature that helps you decide which OWLs you want to go for, and it also adds an extra challenge. G goes into way more detail in the video, if you’re interested.
I decided I want to be a Librarian after I leave Hogwarts, which meant I had to pass 5 OWLs, namely Ancient Runes, Arithmancy, Defence Against the Dark Arts, History of Magic and Transfiguration. And I managed to pass all of them! In fact, I even passed one extra exam (Herbology) because I still had some time left in the month. Here are the prompts and the books I read for them!
Ancient Runes: Retelling
The Boy Who Steals Houses by C.G. Drews
Arithmancy: Work written by more than one author
Saga Volume 3 by Brian K. Vaughan and Fiona Staples
Defence Against the Dark Arts: Reducto: title starts with an “R”
The Rest of Us Just Live Here by Patrick Ness
History of Magic: Published at least 10 years ago
If on a Winter’s Night a Traveller by Italo Calvino
Transfiguration: Sprayed edges or red cover
A Study in Scarlet by Arthur Conan Doyle
(Bonus!) Herbology: Plant on the cover
Bloom by Kevin Panetta and Savanna Ganucheau
I was planning on also doing mini-reviews in this post, but it’s already so long that I’ll write a separate post with my mini-reviews for all of the books I finished in April. I hope to get that up this weekend!
I had so much fun with the O.W.L.s this April and I’m so impressed with G for managing to think all of this up and then organising it as well as she did too. There were amazingly detailed events on Twitter where you could earn house points (shoutout to my fellow Ravenclaws!) and there’s a giant list where everyone could enter the books they’d finished. Together, all of the participants have now read over 3.6 million pages! And that’s just all of us who’ve entered our books into the spreadsheet! I can’t wait until August, when the NEWTs are happening. This readathon made my reading month so much fun and I also think I’ve read more than I would have otherwise. It’s a win all around!
Let’s chat!
How was your month? Did you participate in Camp NaNoWriMo or the Magical Readathon, too? How did you do? What books did you read? I’d love to chat with you about all of this in the comments!
I did a lot of writing and reading this month and I want to tell you all about it! Usually, I feel like the months simply fly by, but the start of April seems like such a long time ago!
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Tools for The Writer
So, you’ve decided to try your hand at writing but you’re not sure what you need to get start. Don’t worry you’ve come to the right place. A lot of newbie writers get caught up on the idea that you need specific things to be a writer. They want to know what the perfect desk is or the perfect chair. What programs you need and so on. I’m here to tell you that you don’t need anything special to get started. There are a lot of writers out there who just need paper and a pencil. James Patterson is one of these authors. His writing tools consist of a legal pad and a pencil. He uses these to outline and write his novel. See I told you that you didn’t need a lot. Here are a few things I recommend to get you started:
1. Novels
Why novels? You need novels because reading is also a part of being a writer. Reading helps you build vocabulary and will also help expose you to the genre you plan to write for. It’s also a good thing to do when you’re taking a break from writing. I personally like to write a bit and then read some.
2. Software
I see this question asked a LOT and every time I see it I scratch my head wondering why. I don’t know I guess people think that being a writer requires some super fancy program. The truth is it doesn’t. Here are a few programs that you can use and guess what…a few of these are free.
Word
Word can be free if your school or work uses Office 365 and you can use the online word app if you have a Hotmail account. You could buy it but I recommend staying away from the subscription versions only because well it’s a subscription you’ll end up having to pay to use it every year.
Pages
Pages is a free word processing program that comes built into the Mac OS. You can write your novel and save it as a Word doc for Word users. It will also open Word docs.
OpenOffice
OpenOffice is a free office suite that you can get from Openoffice.org. It works just like Microsoft Office. You can open Microsoft office documents and save your OpenOffice documents so they can be opened in Microsoft Office. I used this program for some time before I got Microsoft Office free through my work. I recommend this if you’re looking to not spend any money on an office program. It also runs on Windows, Mac OS, and Linux.
Scrivener
I have seen a lot of writers recommend Scrivener. Until recently I used Microsoft Office but I decided to give Scrivener a try. I do like how it can organize everything in one place instead of having to open multiple documents at one time. I won’t lie there are somethings that I wish it did but so far it meets my needs. The only downside to it is the price. I’m not made of money and I had to purchase it for my MacBook and my iPad.
Scrivener is available to try for 30 days. That’s 30 days of you opening the program not 30 days from the time you open it. They are also sponsors of NANOWRIMO so in November you can give it a go for longer and they also offer a discount to winners of NANO.
You can give Scrivener a try at https://www.literatureandlatte.com/scrivener.php and learn more. If you find you enjoy it the program is currently on sale (at the time of this post) for $26.99 and is normally around $40.00. The program runs on both Windows and Mac but prices vary based on platform. If you’re looking to use the program on both Windows and Mac, they offer a bundle for $65.95. If you’re looking for a mobile option, they offer it for iPad for around $19.99. It also works on your Iphone and I don’t think there is an additional cost to use it on your Iphone and iPad.
3. Backup Method
I don’t know if I can stress this enough and it might just be the tech support specialist in me but one of the most important things you’ll need in your tool kit is a backup method. This one thing is more important than any other tool. Anything can happen to your computer. Your hard drive could die and when that happens you’ll lose everything. I can’t tell you how many people I work with have lost their files because they saved them to their hard drive and didn’t back them up anywhere else.
There are so many options out there for you to use and I recommend backing up in more than one location and to at least two different types of media. For example, back up to OneDrive but also put it on a thumb drive.
Here are a few suggestions:
OneDrive
GoogleDrive
DropBox
Thumbdrive
External Hard drive
4. Notebooks
Okay I’m going to say notebooks can be optional it depends on your preference. Personally, I use notepads to jot down some ideas while I’m researching or when trying to name characters. For A Love to Kill for I’m hand writing it because I found the computer to be distracting. I did a lot of planning in notebooks and used legal pads to outline and a journal to write in. Personally, I think it’s good to have a notebook with you always in case an idea hits you. I usually have one but I also have Scrivener on my phone so I use that as well as the Notes app. This just depends on your preference. As for the type of notebook I’ve seen writers suggest Moleskin. Honestly, I can’t justify the expense when a simple composition notebook works just as well.
5. Motivational Inspiration
I seriously recommend writing inspiration. I have memes that encourage me to write hanging on the wall in front of my desk as well as a candle because it helps me relax. Here is an example of what I mean:
6. Writing Groups
A great way to find inspiration and help in your writing journey is to connect with other writers. The lovely Kim Chance has put together a Facebook group called Chance2Connect. You will need to have a Facebook account but once you do you can join the group with this link https://www.facebook.com/groups/chance2connect/?ref=group_browse_new. Kim also hosts weekly Chance2Connects via twitter. Join using #Chance2Connect.
Twitter is another great way to connect with writers. Many writers use the hashtags #writerslife and #amwriting and you can follow these on twitter.
Another option is to browse the internet and look for writing groups in your area. I try to post as many upcoming writing events as I can on my website under Events.
7. The internet
I know it might seem a little stupid to include this but a lot of people don’t know or consider that the internet is probably one of the best tools to have. You can find just about anything on the internet making it almost unnecessary to visit locations your writing about (I still recommend traveling to locations you write about when possible).
8. Craft books
I’m a little on the fence when it comes to craft books since I have yet to find one I really like. That being said I have seen a lot of writers recommending Stephen King’s On Writing to new writers. I have not had the chance to read this but I’m planning on it. If you’re interested you can get it here https://www.amazon.com/Writing-10th-Anniversary-Memoir-Craft/dp/1439156816/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1485046991&sr=8-1&keywords=On+Writing
9. Optional:
Here are a few optional items you might want to considering:
Headphones
Something fuzzy for stress relief
Caffeine
Tissues
For some more ideas on the tools a writer might need check out Kim Chance’s video on Tools Every Writer Should Have in Their Toolbox.
youtube
Until next week happy writing!
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3. What is your favorite/least favorite part about writing?
My favorite part is the very last five hundred words of writing 3k in one day, because in theory I could keep going, but it’s better long term if I save some for the next day.
My least favorite is when I get bogged down in a boring scene and take too long to work out how to make it less boring.
4. Do you have any writing habits/rituals?
I usually have to “finish” things before I start writing- read my whole dashboard, a book, my previous writing from the last day. I also like purple gel pens.
24. Do you remember the moment you decided to become a writer/author?
Oh, jeez. Yes, I do. Pretty vividly actually.
I had just finished re-reading twilight for the seventh time- stick with me here- and I was just so frustrated. This was before I read a ton of vampire books and saw there was still hope left in the world. There were some parts about the book that I loved (vampires, romance) and other parts (the writing) that I did not love in the least bit. There were so many aspects that I would have done differently that I struggled to write a letter complaining to the author which is completely unlike me, seeing as I saw criticism as the highest compliment. I sat and stewed in my anti-twilight haze for weeks. Some of it was spent reading people’s (feminist) complaints in her forum. Finally it dawned on me: I was a writer, why couldn’t I write and publish something better, completely tailored to whatever I wanted in a novel?
Then I wrote my first novel in the July of that summer for Camp NaNo and even though it was garbage, it was still better garbage to me than twilight. The lesson here is to hire editors. And listen to them. Or don’t, and create queer feminist authors instead, I guess.
I had been writing a long time before I decided to commit to it, and pretty much always have been a writer, but that was when I became a novelist. And yes, my entire novel writing career so far has been driven by pure spite.
Thanks for asking, anon!!
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