5 October 2022

I think in addition to the slump I mentioned in the previous post, I also was really exhausted this day. Barely wrote 20 minutes. I also had no idea what to write about, so I pulled a random prompt from online; it talked about walking Cerberus. I thought it was fun. I didn’t finish, and I’m not sure I ever will, but it was a fun one to write.

After getting the letter, Rachel had half-expected to wind up just off the island at som massive, hidden mansion in the Jersey woods, but the address actually brought her to a very sleek, modern high-rise. The security guard let her in, and she was not surprised to see her client lived on the top floor. Most of these types tended to; Rachel wondered if they enjoyed looking down on the masses below them.

Soon enough, the elevator arrived and Rachel knocked on the door to the penthouse. “Hello? It’s Rachel Durmont, for Ms. Hecate le Fay. You asked me to walk your dog?”

“Oh, thank the Fates,” a woman’s voice cried out. The door opened to reveal a thirty-something woman with short, dark hair. Based on the bags under her eyes, it’d been ages since she’d gotten any sleep.

And it wasn’t hard to see why; behind her, a dog was tearing into a very expensive-looking throw pillow. That, Rachel could handle; she’d seen worse since she started this business. No, the problem she had was the two extra heads the dog had, all fighting for the pillow. She peered in, half awe-struck and half terrified. “Is that…”

“A puppy Cerberus? Yes, yes it is. And it’s just as horrible as that sounds.”

Rachel absently felt for the gloves in her coat pocket. She had a feeling they weren’t going to be enough this time.

Ms. le Fay continued, “Yeah… The big girl downstairs finally settled down and had a litter. Perse loves the lot, but even she has limits, so they foisted one off onto me. What gives? Anyway, I don’t really care what you do with it, just give me two – no, even one hour would be heavenly, where I don’t have to worry about it. That’d be a huge help.”

The gears in Rachel’s head struggled to click into place. “You want me to take that,” she pointed at the puppy, “and go out in public for an hour or two. Is that right?”

4 October 2022

It was hard to write over the 4th and the 5th. I think I was in a slump because of how frustrated I was with the last chapter of Ella and Kal’s story. I still had Cinderella on my mind, though, so I wrote up a quick one shot detailing another way I thought to break it. Why is Cinderella one of the easiest fairy tales to twist, I wonder? Or does it just seem that way because it’s the most common one to get twisted?

“Hm? But I don’t want to marry the prince.”

Marge, freshly-minted fairy godmother, couldn’t believe her ears. “You don’t want the prince?” She didn’t know what to do; the manual hadn’t covered something like this!

“No way. I’ve never met the man; why would I want to marry him? No, I’m after Thomas, the baker’s son from two streets over.”

Marge knew that bakery. Their jelly tarts were divine. But this wasn’t the time for that. “I… I… I don’t know what to do about that.”

Cinderella cocked her head to the side. “You’re my fairy godmother, right?”

“Of course!” Marge squared her shoulders.

“Then, it’s your job to help me find happiness, right?”

“Yes…”

“So if my happiness is going to be with a baker’s son instead of a prince, you should help me achieve that, right?”

That made sense. “So how do I do that? The manual focused almost exclusively on princes.”

Cinderella rubbed her chin. “Well, the baker’s son isn’t the problem; I’ve got that covered.” She beamed in joy, then glared in the direction of her step-mother’s room. “No, if there’s a problem… Could you get me away from the witch and her two daughters?”

“Witch!?” Marge had heard about those; nasty business. Sleeping curses, transforming into dragons… Marge might need to get help if there was a witch involved.

Cinderella rolled her eyes. “I just mean my step-mom.” Under her breath, she added, “At least, I don’t think she’s actually a witch. Wouldn’t surprise me, though…”

Fortunately, Marge hadn’t heard that, and breathed a sigh of relief. Then she thought for a moment. “Erm, maybe I could make you a carriage? I noticed a lovely pumpkin I could use growing out in the garden. The two of you could elope. That’d be so romantic!”

Cinderella wavered a bit, then finally said, “It’s an option. I’d like to leave it as a last resort, though; I don’t want to take him away from his family and his bakery if I don’t have to.”

“Oh.” Marge hemmed and hawed for a bit, but she couldn’t come up with anything. “I’m sorry. In most cases, once Cinderella marries the prince, he takes care of the step-mother for her.”

“Say, there’s an idea,” Cinderella said. “What if I got the prince to just owe me, instead? Then he can cut my ties with the old hag, and I’m good to go!”

“What kind of favor?” Marge asked.

Cinderella pondered for a moment. “Is the prince in love with anyone?”

Marge cocked her head. “Isn’t he in love with you?”

Cinderella groaned and facepalmed. “Like I said, we’ve never even met, so I certainly hope not.” She eyed the glass slippers. “You said they change size so they won’t fit anyone but me?”

“That’s right.”

“Go take them to the prince and find out if he’s fallen in love with someone. If he has, make the shoes fit that person instead, and offer them to the prince in exchange for his help with my step-mother. Sound good?”

Marge didn’t think it sounded good at all. It sounded like a lot of trouble, and who knows what could happen? But she didn’t have any better ideas, so she took the shoes and headed for the prince.

24 September 2022

This was fun. I loosely based the MC of the Elsenaia story off of my own head, since that’s what I have access to, and I have a lot of weird and/or terrifying characters running around in there. So what would happen if she ran into one?

I come back to this idea and revise it later; I think the idea that she was utterly cut off from fiction to be unlikely, so later I took time to map out more of what her life looked like and what she’d been through.

The rest of my journey through the palace hallway was an interesting experience. I could feel Elsenaia pouting at me; she was trying so hard to be angry and indignant, but it was all undercut by the embarrassment I could feel all around me. 

I was not surprised by her fondness for cute things, not that the weekly day where the public could petition her for things was tedious as all get-out. What surprised me was the way she entertained herself during those days; she’d try to imagine whatever conflicts were brought before had happened in ridiculous situations, like underwater, or by taking the point of the conflict to its extremes. This did, unfortunately, backfire on her, as thinking outside the box meant she came up with solutions that weren’t always immediately obvious, and people began flocking to her court over the others.

Meanwhile, she poked around in my head, trying to ignore all the memories I was sifting through. She spent a great deal of time looking at D&D things; the idea of playing out another character’s life, especially with other people, fascinating, even if she did spend a long time ranting about the elf stat blocks.

Another time, I was poking around to see if Elsenaia had anything she actively enjoyed doing, rather than felt obligated to do, when I heard her scream from my mind.

I popped over, only to find Elsenaia running desperately from a hulking skeletal figure wearing ominous black armor and wielding a scythe.

“Why do you have Death wandering around your head!?” Elsenaia screamed, and she headed straight for me.

I sighed, and with a small smile I walked past her to the reaper. He raised his scythe to swing, but I just reached up and flicked him in the forehead. “Oi. Knock it off. You’re scaring her.”

When the reaper started looking obstinate, I folded my arms and raised an eyebrow. “Would you rather I called Life over?”

The reaper flinched and sulked off. I turned and flashed Elsenaia a smile.

She just stared at the reaper, jaw gaping. When she finally looked over at me, she asked weakly, “Life?”

“His wife. Or maybe his wife-to-be? His crush? I dunno; depends on what part of the story he’s from. Time’s weird in here.”

“You have an aspect of Life in your head.”

I shrugged. “Well, sure. Why not? They’re not real; they’re just characters I made up for a story I’m writing.”

Eslenaia’s legs gave out from under her, and she plopped to the ground.

“Hey, wait, are you okay?” I crouched down and reached out to her.

“Yeah. Yeah, I just… need a minute.”

I shift so I’m sitting down properly, and we stay like that for several minutes. Finally, she spoke. “They’re… characters in a story, you said?”

“Yep. Or, well, a group of stories, I suppose. You know I want to write, right?”

Elsenaia nodded. “But I’m not sure I understand what that means.”

“Well, look.” I opened my mind to scenes of my wtiting, and to the “How Writers Become Authors” blog. “Basically, I want to tell stories for a living. Isn’t there anyone in your culture that does that?”

Elsenaia moved to shake her head, then stopped herself. “I’m… not sure. I never had time for things like that.”

I blinked, and materialized a movie drawer so I could start sifting through my memories.

“What are you doing?” she asked.

“You need a chance to relax. Time’s meaningless here, right? I figured I could show you a movie or something before you go.” I growled at the drawer of DVDs. “If there’s even any I can remember the whole way through, that is.”

Elsenaia’s eyes were drawn to one; the Hobbit collection of movies. An image of Tauriel flashed across like a mini preview. “What’s that one?”

“Oh, that’s the Hobbit, based on the book by J.R.R. Tolkein.” I noticed her expression and asked, “I don’t remember it very well, but do you want to watch it?”

She nodded, and I began letting it play. When she first saw Fili and Kili, she complained, “Those aren’t dwarves.”

“Agreed. They’re definitely men.”

“They don’t even look like dwarves.”

“Hm. But at least Fili has a cool beard.” I glance over at her. “Have you met many dwarves?”

“Only a couple.”

Sensing a bit of awkwardness, I peeked into her memories to find one of a dwarf catching sight of her for the first time, only to immediately propose as dramatically as possible. The rest of his fellows came and dragged him off while the leader of the group apologized profusely, and explained that this was “the young lad’s first time abroad, so he hasn’t gotten used to the sights yet”. The whole thing had made Elsenaia feel very awkward.

I laughed, but rather than the indignant reaction I’d expected, Elsenaia just told me to hush.

When I glanced at the screen, it was the parts about Tauriel’s romance with Kili. Elsenaia was completely enraptured by it. At one point she asked, “Do you think I could ever have that?”

I shrug. “Why not? I mean, I don’t know how anyone else will react, but I think the choice should still be yours.”

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