I'm Back...with plans!

I am really excited about the story I’m working on!  I’ve finished my rough draft and intend to do some more research before editing.  Here is a teaser from my rough draft:

We walked in silence for awhile, but it was a pleasant silence.  The sun peeked out at us between the buildings, casting long shadows across the street.  Then we would pass into the shade again and, as if on cue, a cool breeze would greet us.  It was warm, for April, almost like a summer evening.  I enjoyed it, and I enjoyed being with James.  I knew he wouldn’t judge me.  He was judged too often by others to wish it on anyone else.

 

            Following that train of thought, it occurred to me that I could be blatantly honest with James.  He wouldn’t care.

            “To tell you the truth, James…”  He looked at me expectantly, but my voice sounded loud, even above the noise of traffic.  I took a deep breath.  “To tell you the truth, I’m intrigued by you.”  The corner of his mouth twitched.  “I’ve found you…interesting to me.  Most people are depressingly boring, but you…”  I couldn’t explain the hold he had on me—even to myself.

            “You’re the first person in a long time who really seems to care about me,” he said.  “Lots of people take pity on my and…force themselves to be nice to me, but you…”

            I suddenly realized we had both trailed off the same way.  It made me feel that maybe James and I were more alike than I’d supposed.

            I linked my arm through his and asked, “What are your goals in life?  Your dreams?”

            “I don’t understand,” he said.

            “What do you want? If you could be anywhere in the world, where would it be?”

            “I want to be right here with you, with your guitar in my hand.”  We stopped walking and turned to face each other.

            I laughed.  “Why with my guitar in your hand?”

            “Because as long as I’m holding it, you can’t leave.”

            I probably blushed.  He took a step closer to me, so that the toes of our shoes were almost touching.  He leaned in closer, and closer…  We were going to kiss!

            If it had been anyone else, I would have kissed him right then.  But two thoughts made me step back and turn my head: one, He’s thirty-two! and two, I can’t take advantage of him.  Of course he liked me—I’d been kind of him when everyone else shunned him.  But I, knowing it could never really work, shouldn’t string his heart along any further.  I couldn’t use him like that.

            But aside from all these gallantries, my heart ached when I turned away and I had to fight not to cry.  Why did I have to be such a crybaby?

            “I’m sorry,” he said, sounding as if he were apologizing for high treason.

            “It’s okay, I’m really—“  Fine.  I couldn’t get it out, though, because my sobs threatened to break loose.

            “I’m so sorry,” he said again.  “I…I understand.”  He held out my guitar, I took it, and he walked away.  I turned the other way and headed back to my car, holding my chin high and taking deep breaths to cool my spirits.  By the time I reached my car, my vision was clear and my breath smooth.  I put my guitar in the back and drove home, trying not to think too much about what had just happened.

   

The Last Andrew

Note: if you’re familiar with Twelfth Night, this story will be more entertaining.
  
        Whether it was a movie or a play, she always fell in love with the actor playing Sir Andrew Aguecheek.  Twelfth Night was, in her opinion, Shakespeare’s masterpiece, and whenever she had the opportunity to see it, she did.  Since the first time she’d read the play in high school, she had been in love with Sir Andrew, and now she was smitten with actors who played him.

            For two weeks, she stalked Richard E. Grant, from the movie Twelfth Night, until she saw a production of the play at the local middle school.  That was awkward, since Sir Andrew was played by a 7^th grader, but only three days later, she saw a youtube video of a college production from 2001.  She moved to Pittsburg to be near Jake Collins, who was now a paralegal.  He was going to get a restraining order against her after she crashed his stag party, but she promised to leave him alone.  After that, she cultivated the art of disguise.

            Every few months, she encountered a new Sir Andrew and fell violently in love.  Though it grew tiresome, she simply couldn’t help it.  She even very nearly got married once, but three weeks before the wedding, her fiancé foolishly brought her to see a local production of Twelfth Night, probably trying to remind her of the night she met him.  But the new Sir Andrew, ugly and scrawny though he was, tore her heart away from her fiancé.

            And so her life continued for years, until she was so sick and tired of it all that she did her best not to go see Twelfth Night anymore.  But her intense love for the romantic comedy was not easy to keep down.

            One snowy evening, she was standing outside a movie theater.  A new version of Twelfth Night had come out, but she was a dollar short on cash.  A dollar!

            “Please, sir,” she said, approaching a rather hideous-looking young man standing there.  “Have you got a dollar?”

            “Sir?” he answered.  “Am I a sir?  No, I’m Andrew.”

            “Sir…” she began.

            “Andrew,” he corrected her.

            “Sir Andrew?!” she gasped.

            “Yes?” he said, confused but wanting to please the fresh face before him.

            “Sir Andrew Aguecheek?!”  She was smitten.  “Please,” she said.  “Marry me and take me away from all these productions!”  After all, she thought, when Olivia asked Sebastian to marry her, he agreed even though he’d never met her.  But then, she was beautiful…

            “Take you away where?” he asked, taking her hand.  Her heart fluttered.

            “Away,” she said, “away from all the other Andrews.”  This was enough for him.

            “I have a cabin in the mountains,” he said.  “We don’t even get radio.  And the City Hall is just down the street.  We could get married now!”

            “Oh, Andrew!”

            “I suppose I ought to know your name,” he said as they set off.

            “Call me…Viola.”

            And they lived happily ever after.

Cat and Mouse

            A young, twig of a girl with blond hair and a serene expression was taking a stroll by the wall.  He looked down at her from a second-story window, studying every movement she made.  He watched the way the wind blew her hair, the way her hands rested on her hips, the way her body moved with each step.  My, but she was a pretty girl!  He walked into the next room and continued to watch her out the window.  His breath fogged up the glass.

            He was on her mind, too, though not before her eyes.  But his face was in her head, and his voice, and his expressions.  Her lips moved silently; her eyebrows quivered.

            Suddenly, her knees buckled, and she collapsed onto the grass.  He wiped the glass clean and watched her lie there, his forehead wrinkling.