Future: The shadow monster accident

"Got your shadow!"

Augustine lifted her arms to turn her shadow into a monster that swallowed her daughter's shadow whole. Rica squealed with delight and ran off along the grass, Augustine chasing her with arms in the air. That was when Rica ran right into a bush.

She plopped down on the ground, surprised for a second before she started to scream. The guards that watched them but usually kept out of their way so that Augustine could pretend things were normal, hurried up to them. Augustine waved them off to give her a minute, wanting her to feel the pain and to discuss it.

"You okay, Rica?"

She waited for Rica to make the first move. Rica turned towards her, eyes shimmering, a large red mark between them that scratched along her face. "No…" and then she started to cry again until Augustine picked her up and kissed it better. There'd be no hiding that mark from Eddie. He'd be pissed when he saw it. Her stomach roiled. No used projecting that onto her daughter.

"Be brave," she whispered. "You're tough, aren't you?"

Rica sniffed. "I'm not tough."

"Yes, you are. Just like your father. You know, when you were first learning to walk, every time you fell down, you got up again. You were so focused on your goal. Because you're so tough. Like your father."

How much of that did Rica even buy? But she wanted to believe it. She wanted to be like her father, so strong and tough. "I'm really like dad?"

Augustine smiled at her warmly, pulling her in for a hug. "Of course, you are! So smart and so tough!"

A part of her hated the manipulation, but she had to make her daughter want to be tough because the other option was to be too soft, to let herself be nothing but protected which Augustine instinctively knew would stunt her emotions. Ed and his people were too quick to shelter her and protect her from everything to the detriment of other people. Already, Ed would be pissed about her being hurt, and if Rica noticed, saw the power in her own being to control a powerful individual such as her father, she was bound to push it as far as it would go. Someone would be hurt, and she, if she were truly like her father, might enjoy it.

Her daughter poked at her own wound, giving a small start. Augustine held her hands. "Don't worry. We'll clean it up, so it won't sting too much, okay? But you can't touch it."

Ed would be mad when he saw it. He'd want to know who caused it, another child? Some thoughtless adult who pushed her? What would he say when he realized that it had been her who'd ultimately caused it? Maybe he'd laugh about it unless he was having a bad day and then he'd more likely be annoyed.

Reworking for the millionth time

I am rewriting this thing again. Again, again, again. I've started to think that rewriting this thing is all that I'm going to do. You're supposed to get out one draft at first, I hear, but I haven't even been able to complete a draft because I get to a point where I find myself feeling off in some way, disconnected from the story. And I would know exactly why.

It's gone from being too YA, which it was never meant to be, to too gritty then too silly. I hit points where I not only didn't know what to do with the rest of the story, I realized that I'd failed some elements or characters I'd created. The path I was trying to head down was just wrong. All wrong. And in the back of my head anyway, I always have all those writer suggestions as to how you're supposed to structure things, what people expect to read, how to cater to your audience.

But that isn't what this story is. This story may never be published. I don't know. The earlier entries I've posted are not what this work is meant to be, but they worked to discover what I think I want to do. Of course, those times I thought I knew what I wanted to do, and I was proud enough to start this blog.

I've had to try and break this thing down. What am I trying to do? What is this story meant to be? How am I supposed to tell it? What is even my strength as a writer? It's not plot, I can tell you that much!

Now I think I've figured it out. We'll see. I'm daring, after a few attempted outlines, to try not working with an outline again. I've written this story so much, and I have quite a few outlines by this point, so I think I can wing it again for a bit and see how the story shapes up. Where do the characters go? Hey, the setting is supposed to be a character too. Everybody counts! They all need to be represented as I tell this thing.