quick readers, what do u think? |
Author: Linden Holidae (---.254.218.180.Dial1.Denver1.Level3.net)
Date: 07-08-08 19:53
I'm writing my first novel, been in my head for 7 years, here's part of chapter one, what do you think?
Chapter 1
Linden sat down in front of the old manual typewriter to begin writing, again. She flexed her fingers then wrapped a plaid wool blanket around her legs, but her eyes drifted from the untouched ream of paper to the window behind the typewriter. Snow blanketed hills and valleys stretched out to the horizon, and then blended into a thin grayness that covered the entire sky. The blurry ten o’clock sun tried, but couldn’t hide itself behind the gauzy clouds. She reached up a calloused hand to close the curtains a little; her torn fingernail snagged for a second, then she tried to refocus without the glare. The week before Christmas arrived, and she hadn’t even put one word on paper.
The week before Christmas, she said to herself. A pang shot through her stomach, dissolving in her throat. Everyone she knew and loved would be having Christmas without her, and she alone in her small RV among the plains of Montana. She had fought the panic of isolation before; it had become a familiar, unwanted companion and now it begun to well up inside. Linden took a deep breath and pushed herself away from the table. Not yet, she thought.
She kneeled in her jeans on the couch at the back of the trailer to look out the picture window. The foot of the Rocky Mountains stood beyond the creek that ran a dozen yards from her. She could still hear the water rush through teeth of ice. She felt like she was in two worlds-the dull, silent plains out one window, and the magnificent mountains out the back.
The small window over her kitchen sink faced row after row of wood she had stacked up in the fall with Brandy, the old rancher lady who allowed Linden to camp on her property. She stooped over her sink to look south into a haze of falling snow. The mountain peaks, with its woody skin barely dead for winter, steadily turned from slate black to white with the approaching grainy wash of flakes. The dense western clouds had finally managed to crawl over the crest, and now seeped towards Lindens’ diminutive home.
Linden pulled open the bottom drawer by the kitchen sink and took out a couple packages of hot chocolate, tore them open, and then dumped them into an oversized green mug. She slid a black kettle off the top of the woodstove which stood heavily across from the front door. She filled the mug then returned the kettle next to the other two pots. Her thick braid fell over her shoulder as she tipped her brassy blond head sideways to study them. The three enameled soldiers seemed to stand at attention with their broad black shoulders and sharp prominent noses. They weren’t worried about the storm; they could take whatever challenge that was hurled at them.
“Very well, men. Keep up the good work, and sound the alarm if the enemy approaches.” Linden chuckled at herself and patted them on their tiny lidded heads; a small dimple high on her cheek made one of its rare appearances.
Linden noticed the room become darker as the storm swallowed her in her little home, the enemy had approached. She stepped up the two stairs, in between her toilet and shower, then side shuffled around her bed-careful to not spill her drink, where she plopped down to stir the chocolate. Sipping from the mug, she watched the engorged mass above slide into the envelope of sky and land.
The water from the kettle cooled too quickly in the cold dish from the cabinet. She made a mental note to leave the mug in front of the fire from now on as she downed the last chilled swallow. It seemed the kettles had to be on the stove for almost two days before they were satisfyingly hot. Keeping the fire fed and the pots replenished with snow was a non-negotiable constant in her life now. The shelf with all the bowls and glasses remained untouched since she came back from spending the last week of November at the ranch. In fact, she recalled only reaching for the large mug during the three trial weeks in the RV before the break. She hated that she didn’t think of taking all those dishes back to the ranch before that moment. She realized she could have also gotten by with only one set of utensils, not a whole drawer full. The knife she had used up to that point was the one she carried around in her pocket, not any from the set in yet another wasted drawer. She should have used that space for more matches, or something. Well, there was no more going back to the store for supplies now. No more trips to town, no television, phones, or electricity. No more central heat, or…
The thought of running out of matches jarred the panic back to life. She inhaled suddenly through her slightly chapped lips, swallowing the wood smoke in the air. She had been through her stores of supplies many times, even separating them into days, weeks, and months. She had plenty of everything, and she knew it. Linden felt a new and different kind of urge to run. This time, instead of running away from the storm in her trailer on the freeways, she felt the urge to run out into it. It was getting harder, even at the cost of her own life, not to listen to the panic and dread that seemed to take every opportunity to jab at Lindens’ nerves. She forced her mind onto something else.
She glanced at her little calendar by the door after setting the mug in the sink. Did she remember to rip off today’s date? She didn’t want to lose her sense of time. No, she didn’t think she did, so she tore off the page that said December 18, 1998, then tossed it into the fire. As she watched it burn she thought, maybe she did take off today’s date earlier that morning. She wasn’t really sure; the days blended into each other. Then, what did the date matter anyhow? There was no time out there, no calendars or schedules. The land didn’t care if she lived or died, the weather didn’t consider her at all, for anything. She was nothing more than a barnacle on the ship of Who Cares.
She found herself staring into a pile of split Douglas fir in the living room. A dry stack lay on either side of the stove with a single layer of wet logs drying in front. In between the trailer door and against the wall of the coat closet stood a fourth, larger pile to pick from during the day. This stack of wood she built as high as she could, once in the morning and again in the evening.
When she started her first fire in autumn, she was so concerned about keeping the trailer clean of woodchips and sawdust. Now, the linoleum around the hearth and the front door was littered with a padding of woodchips and sawdust. It was a fire hazard to be sure, but Linden became so lax about those kinds of things, she found it wasn’t as easy to die as society would like everyone to believe. After all, weren’t most people born with a gag reflex, a sense of balance, a need to survive? It wasn’t like she was going anywhere, if a stray spark caught the sawdust on fire, she would be right there to do something about it. Excuses or not, it sorely needed to be cleaned up.
Linden pulled a small broom from the closet, swept up most of the debris into the dustpan, and then dumped it into the fire. Splinters covered the bottom of her stockings and she brushed them off as she checked the wood on the hearth to see if it had dried. Putting the broom and pan back into the closet, she noticed melted snow from the large pile had pooled around the bottom of the door, where it froze. She turned over a few split logs to see if they were snow free enough to put in front of the fire-Ugh! She was always checking on the wood and the fire, it became such an annoying habit; necessary, but irritating. She already tired of it and the worst of winter had yet to come. How much she depended on a land that really didn’t care.
The only other thing that moved on its own, besides Linden, was the hot orange flames that flickered and crackled behind the glass. She thought maybe it would have been wise to bring a rodent or some other kind of pet to talk to; another idea for the day that was a little late in coming. Linden had been anxious to escape from everyone, now she wished she could be with somebody, anybody. She picked up a small splintered log but then set it back down, she had only just filled the stove before sitting down to write. Anyhow, she was beginning to feel too hot; however it wasn’t the fire-the burning came from within.
Linden stooped to pick up a smooth fist sized stone used to hold the door open, and snatched a black marker from the pen cup by the typewriter. She drew a face of a mouse, and some ears, and an S shaped tail along the hind end of the stone, and then set it back on the floor against the wall.
“I dub thee, Lord Mousekavitch, ruler over all the lands buried under ice and snow.” She waived an invisible sword over the mouse, and then admitted that she was really stretching for more reasons to stall. At this rate, she would never get to writing.
She yelled out to no one in particular, “All right, no more screwing around.” She was drawing time out, hesitating the inevitable like a tapeworm from the gut of irresolution; she couldn’t get focused. The wooden chair by the table seemed too small, the kitchen cabinets leaned in over her head, the room was tightening. The door was a step away and beyond; a valley, a home, then people, and friends.
The snows came in thicker, harder, her world was shrinking. Lindens’ breath caught in her throat, her lungs wouldn’t expand. The mountains cut deep into the swollen storm above, tearing its guts open like a pillow, spilling thick featherlike flakes. The peaks almost entirely disappeared; the sea of white beyond was too vast, too much. Linden clutched for the mountains like crags on a cliff, she didn’t want them to disappear, her slight skiff was inadequate for the storm. Her head spun, blood rushed behind her ears; she was going to retch. She needed air, she had to get out.
Running to the door she threw it open, the trailer shook. Her heart raced as she reached a shoeless foot down to the first step; but her tight grip caught the threshold. The world was just too large, just too powerful, and she didn’t think she could handle it anymore. Regret overshadowed her confidence, helplessness overwhelmed; she threw her other hand to the doorway and held on even tighter, knuckles white.
“HEEELLLP mmmMEEEEeeee.” She wailed. Dormant tears exploded from deep brown eyes, her heart pounded, she wouldn’t let herself go. She threw a lifeline into her screaming mind, “You won’t make it, you will die-you will die. It’s just stupid to walk out there, you’re not stupid, don’t be stupid, Linden.” The cold wind wrapped around her hot neck, snuffing out the panic. She was close this time, too close. Brandy wasn’t kidding when she warned about the power isolation and panic can have over a person. Catching her breath, she shut the door behind her with one hand while the other clutched the buttons at her blue flannelled chest. Mouth agape, she caught sight of the typewriter.
This was where she would hear other voices, where she would feel, smell, taste, and could exist beyond her icy hold. She could exist; did anyone care that she was out there? She didn’t feel she existed, or belonged anywhere anymore. Only the old rancher and her ranch hands knew where to find Linden-if she didn’t come back in the spring. Flashes of painful memories stabbed behind her eyes; she needed to dig them out. So what if I didn’t make it, she thought. Then, I would be done with all of this, done with the mess of living. Where before she only believed she was, now she felt the solid presence of real loneliness.
Lindens life had been rich with happy family traditions. She used to be thrilled by the business of living; laughing easily, being alive and healthy, loving deeply and intensely. All she felt she was now was hardened. Just a bitter, hardened woman, that hated, just hated everywhere, anywhere, and anything. Resentment accompanied the hate and even the resentment itself.
Questions bounced in her mind. Even with the flood of consequences pushing her to separate from all she knew and loved; knowing now-would she still have loved him then? Would she have fought harder to keep him from falling for her? Was the memory of him really worth all of this? She was almost seventeen then, and he was barely twenty three. Between the two of them, he should have known better, he should have fought harder. How could she have known the stone of love they threw that summer would have rippled through the rest of her life? The thought of them together, their passion, it would have stripped the ties that bound their families if they had found out. Her mother would have a grudge against his mother, and the blame would be cast entirely upon him. Worse yet, the feelings of love they shared would have been belittled as some carnal preoccupation. Nobody would have looked at them the same, particularly him.
Awareness poured over the questions putting them completely out. She wasn’t sorry for what she did, not for anything. If she had to do it all over again she would still have been with him, she had no doubt about that. If she would have known then that that was to be the only time they had together, she would have made love to him more often, and more feverishly. Their time together was so short, and she believed with all her heart, so very worth it. The wet and drippy impulse of passion, the things he did to her-and she to him. How they fought to stay away, and were as powerless as the moth in a web. Linden knew she never would taste that kind of love again. A slight smile, she flushed, remembering.
Linden also knew it wasn’t just the passion, she grew up with him. She knew him, and he knew her so very well. She just couldn’t have him. Nobody would think it right, and certainly her family would have accepted no part of it. She never told anybody about him, and the thought of putting it down on paper was more proof than she ever wanted. She knew her hands would resist when she’d attempt to betray the memory to blank paper. She was there then, in her little trailer in the middle of nowhere, to dump it all out. The tenacity it took to keep the secret hidden for seven years blackened her soul. She was sick of that bondage, of that barrier. She heaved it off, “I don’t care anymore!” She shouted. With that, Linden felt the first taste of relief melt the frost of her solid soul. Still there was a long way to go.
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Re: quick readers, what do u think? |
Author: Wonky (192.250.49.---)
Date: 07-08-08 19:58
I think this belongs in the Writing Craft section.
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Re: quick readers, what do u think? |
Author: Patrick Edwards (63.240.53.---)
Date: 07-09-08 09:43
Also, break it down in paragraphs. Makes it easier to read, yo.
:)
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Re: quick readers, what do u think? |
Author: leslee (---.lsl-la.com)
Date: 07-09-08 10:50
Oh, I see. You just stuck it in almost every forum. That won't get you more attention. It's best to post where it belongs, in Writing Craft only.
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Re: quick readers, what do u think? |
Author: Gravity Fades (---.cinci.res.rr.com)
Date: 07-09-08 12:32
Agreed, that is one big ol' slab o' writin'.
Break it into paragraphs, please, or most folks will just give it a pass without reading.
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Re: quick readers, what do u think? |
Author: Rogue Mutt (---.com)
Date: 07-10-08 08:59
I'm sure it is in paragraphs it's just that the software here messes up the formatting. When you repost, put an extra line where your paragraph breaks are supposed to be and hopefully it won't screw that up.
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