#maybe even dialogue or description practice...trying to get character personalities down etc....

[littleplantfreak]

I'm trying to get into writing properly again!

So I think I'm gonna post my practice stuff even if it's not good! If you don't wanna see it, I'll be tagging it as #mari's.writing.practice but otherwise, I hope it's enjoyable!

[wolf08]

Hi ! How are you ?🌸

For many years I've been wanting to try writing fanfiction, but I get so intimidated and don't where to start.

So I wanted to ask, how do you write a fanfic ?

Could you break down the process into steps?

Ps: I haven't been into sasusaku lately but I will definitely draw smth for a twist in time 😤 or your new story maybe 👀🌸

Very excited for your new story !

Hi! First of all, I am a superfan of your art and I was so excited to receive this message from you. ❤️

Second of all, this particular question made my day. I will kick-off with a few disclaimers:

There is no right way to write. I am very much a planner when it comes to multi-chapter stories (as opposed to a pantser) because my brain finds comfort in structure and feeling in control of where a story is going. But a lot of writers feel the very opposite and find hyper-planning stifling and stressful.

I’m extra. I’m using my current fan fiction WIP as practice for writing novels in general. So, I’m taking the process way more seriously than I have to, but I’m finding that element of it so fun. But, if you are just trying to get into writing and any of these steps don’t sound fun, you absolutely do not have to do them.

I don’t follow this process for one shots/short stories. At least, not as strictly. If you are looking to dip your toes into writing for the first time, one-shots might be a good place to start, where you can practice your style and voice without being bogged down by as much planning.

Okay, with that out of the way, here is my attempt to articulate my current multi-chapter/novel writing process. *cracks knuckles*

Step 1: Brain dump

As soon as I get a story idea, I write down anything and everything that comes to mind for it. And I mean anything: what if scenarios that would be fun to explore, snippets of dialogue, specific settings, physical descriptions of characters, names of characters, anything. I don’t organize it, just dump it somewhere (usually a note in my phone).

Keep that note handy because, if you are like me, the ideas could hit at literally any given moment (while I’m falling asleep… while I’m at work… while I’m watching a movie… while I’m in the middle of a conversation…), and I have a tendency to forget things if I don’t write them down right away.

Also, this step actually never ends. I am continuously brain dumping throughout the entire writing process.

Step 2: String it together

This step begins the moment I realize I’ve got enough material and am excited enough about an idea to attempt to turn it into a full-fledged multi-chapter story. I start by pulling the good parts out of my brain dump notes and thinking about how to string them together in a story.

Then I write a short synopsis of the story that answers questions like: What’s the story about? Who is the main character? What is their goal? What are main themes for the story? I usually start thinking about titles for the story around this stage (or a working title), but that can certainly happen later. Then I organize everything into a one-pager working summary of the story. I try not to get too attached to this summary because it will almost definitely change (many times) during the upcoming steps.

Step 3: Build the world

Even for fan fiction-writing based in a pre-existing world, I find it helpful to think about the context and settings more deeply. Things like the environment, the weather, the living conditions, the overarching mood, etc. I also like to make short profiles for the main characters to capture important details about their motivations, challenges to overcome, appearances, abilities, and relationships, as applicable to my story.

There are tons of character profile and worldbuilding templates out there, with varying levels of detail. I personally like to keep mine high-level, even for OCs and new settings, or else I will get stuck in an endless rabbit hole of world-building procrastination and never get to the actual writing lol. For real, I have been so stuck and frustrated with this step for previous WIPs that I’ve completely abandoned them.   

Step 4: Plot the story

At this point you could probably start writing. But, at this stage, my brain is often a scattered ball of excitement that jumps around between different story points, so I like taking extra time to map things out.

This is when I create two key documents: my story overview and my master outline. The story overview is a more polished version of my working summary. I like to use a framework to structure it. A popular and rather fool-proof one for adventure stories is the Hero’s Journey (it’s what I’m currently using for my WIP). But there are tons of options out there. I also organize my world-building and character profiling notes into the story overview. The goal is for this document to contain an organized snapshot of… well, everything.

Then there’s the master outline – the main planning document. This is a fleshed-out version of the story overview, which describes specific moments and sometimes even fully-written scenes that I came up with in the brain dump. Here is where I start to think of where story arcs and chapters may start and end.

For me, both of these documents are very much ongoing products that I keep on adding to, revising, and even rewriting throughout the whole story, so try not to get too bogged down with making them perfect. Be open to the fact that you’ll probably get some of your best ideas while you’re actually working on the story and that these ideas might even flip your outline upside down.  

If this just sounds cumbersome and horrible to you, then just don’t do it lol. Working from clean and current outlines just makes my brain happy and helps remind me of the story’s big picture.  

Step 5: Plot the chapter

Now it’s writing time, right? For some people, probably. But for me, I like to make chapter outlines first. Basically I extract the chunk of the master outline that I want to capture within the specific chapter I’m working on, and flesh it out in as much detail as I can. This helps me figure out the order I want things to happen and think more carefully about how they’re going to flow.

Another reason I like making chapter outlines is I find them easier to work from during the actual drafting than my bulky-ass master outline.

I am horrible at estimating how many words it’ll take to write a scene (I tend to underestimate). In my WIP, I’m working to keep chapters a relatively consistent length (3k-4k words). So, I try to keep that in mind when developing chapter outlines.

A bonus of writing a chapter outline is, if you make it detailed enough, you might even consider it the chapter’s first draft.

Step 6: Write draft 1 of the chapter

And now it’s time for both my favourite and what is often the most frustrating step: writing the first draft of a chapter. I open the chapter outline in one side of my screen, a blank document on the other, get thesaurus.com queued up, and then run with it. It isn’t always easy to find that sweet spot of having the right amount of motivation, energy, and time for this step to come easily. But when it does – oh boy. That’s the real bread and butter of this whole thing.

I do find this is where being a planner comes in clutch. I always know what’s going to happen next, which does wonders for preventing writer’s block.

Some advice from my experience (that I am actively working on) is don’t self-edit too much in this step. Do not expect perfection. In fact, you might straight-up dislike the first draft (I usually do). But there will be plenty of time to edit and fuss and workshop it into something you do like in a future step. For now, your goal is simply to make your story exist (in any shape or form).

Step 7: Edit, Edit, Edit

If, somehow, your first draft is in excellent condition, this could be a very quick step. But, if you’re like me, this step often turns into a total rewrite of the chapter. Once the first draft exists, it makes it so much easier to see what doesn’t work and needs to be fixed, and to think about things like pacing and flow.

You can spend as much time on this step as you’d like. On average, I find myself editing chapters about 3 times, with the first step sometimes being a full rewrite, and the last being more of a stylistic touch-up. I also find it helpful to read my work out loud during the last edit.

I honestly love this step. I’m all about nit-picking and wordsmithing, especially when it comes to my own work, and find it so satisfying to see the chapter finally coming together how I want it to.

This is also a great place to get feedback on your story, like from a beta reader, or really anyone willing to give it a read.  

Step 8: Rinse and repeat

Now that you’ve got a chapter done, it’s on to the next one! While it’s probably easier to write an entire book from start to finish before publishing any of it, I love how fan fiction gives you an opportunity for ongoing feedback/reactions, so I enjoy publishing chapters as I’m writing.

BUT… (and my WIP is the first time I’m doing this) I give myself a buffer of 3 to 4 chapters, between the chapter that I publish and the one I’m working on. This gives me space to go back and make changes to chapters, plant foreshadowing, make ruthless edits, etc. before I’ve published them.

So, what my writing process tends to look like in action is that I’m always working on 4 different things at the same time:

Brain dumping ideas for current and future scenes into a note in my phone;

Plotting/organizing my master outline or a chapter outline;

Writing a chapter’s draft; and

Editing the previous chapter’s draft.  

The beauty of having different tasks on the go is if you’re ever not in the mood for one of them, you’ve got other options! This helps me so much with writer’s block; I’m less likely to feel stuck or tired of doing one thing.  

Step 9: Post the chapter

Oh, the very best time for me to spot typos in a chapter, no matter how many times I’ve edited it, is after I’ve posted it. 😊

General points

You can ditch the outline. If the outline feels daunting or just not working for you, ignore it and write what you want. Sometimes the best ideas happen that way, for me. BUT I am still Team Outline because even if I don’t stick with it, having one helps me reflect on whether what I had intended to write should move somewhere else or could be scrapped.

I write chronologically. This happens inherently with writing fan fic, where you publish one chapter at a time. But it also helps with character development. For example, sometimes I’m planning for something to happen at a certain time, but when I get there, realize the characters aren’t ready. Like planning for a kiss scene but realizing the romantic chemistry needs more building, or planning for a character to hit a breaking point but realizing you need to torment them some more first lol.

Don’t micromanage. Word count goals do not work for me. Neither does blocking off specific times to write, at least with my current life schedule. I do need some goals though, especially if I’m trying to build writing into my regular routines. I prefer setting broader goals for myself that are more flexible, like writing 2 chapters per month. And if I don’t meet my goals, I try not to get worked up over it.

Take breaks when you need to. Taking breaks to recharge and do non-writing things is as important as any of the above steps, for me. Immerse in things that inspire and excite you. This could mean doing totally different hobbies, socializing with people, or even writing other things. I find prioritizing my mental health helps protect my creative spark. And, likewise, that spark helps with my mental health.

Write what you want. Write what you’d want to read. This is your hobby. You likely aren’t getting paid for this. You are doing this because you love it. Being canon-compliant or even finishing a book isn’t the goal – you enjoying the process of writing is.

Well, that answer might have been a bit extra (on brand with my writing process I guess LOL). But that was super fun and actually really helpful for me to articulate. Thanks sooo much again for that question! Always happy to answer any questions about writing or my WIPs or anything at all! ❤️

PS: Omg yes yes I am so supportive/honoured if you ever wanted to make art for any of my stories!

[phyrestartr]

any tips for new writers

YUH BOI I have a lot lol

Write what you like. You will naturally put more effort/passion into something you're writing for yourself/smth you're writing for fun. Don't do it for clout, and don't write JUST to post. Also, don't write things just because ppl tell you to/request you to. Itsk to let stories perish if they're not working/you don't like it (you might figure out a way to save said story after some thinking, too)

If you read a fanfic/book and really like it, try to figure out why it spoke to you. Did you like the dialogue? Did you like the descriptions? Did you like the stylization? Then, try to incorporate that into your own writing in your own way

If you read a fanfic/book and you really DON'T like it, try to identify what you didn't like LOL. It really helps with crafting your style/story if you identify and avoid shite you personally think is cringe/uninteresting/overdone/cliche-y in a bad way/etc.

Accept that first draft is gonna be clunky and probably kinda bad. You pretty much just gotta get the story down even if it doesn't flow too good because then you can go back, reread, figure out what does and doesn't work in terms of prose and flow and character interactions

Don't feel like you need to write something super long and detailed. Detail and flowery descriptions are good when used in the correct moments, but don't harp on something meaningless for too long if it's not really important in the theme/moment. Writing short stories is the most fun and the best practice for getting into writing since it just has to be like one scene or a very short arc before ending. Lots of readers like the long fics (I mean, same) but they're really hard to write, so don't feel like you need to write a novel or anything. keep it short and sweet for a while!!

Use a thesaurus. Helps you learn new words and new ways to describe something

Themes are helpful for keeping a story feeling coherent. Ex. I use lots of 'godly' descriptors and comparisons of natural disasters (storms, forest fires, earthquakes, tsunamis) to describe how dangerous/powerful a person or feeling is, and I try to stay in that theme to build a better picture of someone/something

Show, don't tell! This is kinda based on your preference, though, since sometimes you just wanna say "bro was mad." It depends on the situation imo. Generally, describing the way someone is physically feeling instead of emotionally is more impactful and lets the reader think and make choices based on the info you've given them. Not everything needs to be spelled out--readers are quite smart and can put together their own conclusions even if it's not what the writer initially had in mind. (Ex. "John felt fury boil in his blood" vs "John's veins ached with heat and his face flushed an angry colour")

It's ok to make mistakes/not perfect a scene. Sometimes you just wanna move on lol

Have fun! If you're not having fun, what's the point homie u-u

hope that's at least a little helpful! LMK if y'all have any other questions/specific Qs or anything. I'm not a pro writer so maybe this is all useless idk LOL

[florencemtrash]

i love love love your work and reading it has gotten me back into my love for acotar (and azriel shhh). im so inspired/tempted to start writing my own fics on here but i have no idea where to start or how to maneuver anything lol .do you have any tips?!

WRITING FANFICTION - my thoughts on how to get started (and others please feel free to chime in in the comments)

AHHHHHHHH YOU SHOULD TOTALLY DO IT!!! I encourage everyone who is interested to write fanfiction, even if you don't want to post things online, because I feel like fanfiction is the perfect avenue to a) have fun and b) practice any and all aspects of writing in a low stress way.

*cracks fingers* get ready for a brief rant about the glories of fanfiction writing

Fanfiction is such a beautiful way to get invested in a story. We already have our own interpretations of how characters look/act/their inner turmoils and struggles that might not get a lot of page time in the canonical works, AND for me personally, I'm always trying to find ways to insert myself into any media I read so fanfiction just feels like a natural extension of that and it honestly has improved my daydreaming skills for better or for worse.

It helps me escape my own thoughts and any troubles I have and I feel like I can grow as a person through the characters I read and write about.

Fanfiction is also great because you can pick and choose what aspects of writing you want to focus on improving. For me personally, I've always had issues with writing dialogue, but if I were to write something from scratch I would have to go through the efforts of creating a whole universe/characters/plot etc. etc so I would always get overwhelmed and just not write at all.

BUT! With fanfiction writing I can just take existing plots/characters etc. etc. and only write the dialogue for a scene I could make up in universe. AND because I'm writing existing characters that I "know", I have a framework for how they speak and can better gauge whether what I am writing sounds natural/realistic. Sometimes if I'm getting stuck on the dialogue I'll just write the lines for each character so I don't lose momentum and then later on I'll go back in and add the setting descriptions, dialogue tags, actions.

More concrete tips/steps you could take

So, I suppose if you're looking for a place to start and have a specific aspect of writing you have trouble with, you could always write short blurbs focusing on that skillset.

If you have issues with dialogue, just write dialogue. No descriptions/scenery. Nothing. If you have issues with describing settings you can always take the dialogue/actions from a scene of a book verbatim and then write around them. OR maybe if you have issues with characterization you could also take a scene from a book and then write from a different character's perspective. I just think it's a neat way to practice and something I've done in the past.

2. Write shameless self inserts. You know yourself better than anyone else and if you're interested in writing fanfiction, you're probably already a chronic daydreamer who's imagining what you would do in a fictional universe. May as well just write it down for the practice.

3. Start with short oneshots - I only started posting online about 7-ish months ago but I've been writing fanfiction since I was in middle school (so about 10 years now) and that's how I got into writing... and also I started out by handwriting the beginnings of trilogies but never getting past page 10 because I realized I was just copying the Hunger Games.

4. Don't be precious with your writing (see #3) and especially in the beginning I think people should prioritize quantity over quality. I think my writing has drastically improved since graduating college because I now consistently have time in the evenings to just write, even if it's "bad" writing. I also have a document titled "Dump it into the fires of Mordor" for my shittiest ideas and bits that I've cut out from other writing projects.

Other Tumblr-specific tidbits

Keep a google sheets to organize fics/taglists. I like to organize this way because unless you have a masterlist (which most people don't in the beginning), tumblr just has everything on one long scroll. So to get around this I have a google sheets where each column is one writing project with one row dedicated to links to the tumblr page, one row to commonly used tags, and the rest of the rows in the column are a list of anyone on my taglist for that project

Include more paragraph cuts than you think you'll need. This is a personal preference of mine, but because I read fanfics on Tumblr predominately on my phone where the width is narrower, extra paragraph cuts a) help me keep track of where I am in the story better and b) look more visually appealing - at least in my opinion

I'm still getting used to Tumblr myself and everyone approaches writing and using the platform differently.

BUT PLEASE DO WRITE IF YOU FEEL INSPIRED TO! Writing and posting fanfiction, and generally getting to interact with people, has been so much fun and I highly encourage anyone and everyone to do it.

Hmmmm, this ended up being a lot longer than I thought it would be. Whoops. Hope it was helpful though!

Love,

Florence B.

[thatdesklamp]

Hi! I looked at your writing advice page and I think it was really good advice and has helped me a lot, but I was also wondering if you have advice on how to write dialogue?

Because I don't want it to sound boring and cheesy, but I also don't want my characters to be spewing pure Shakespeare lol.

When I read your works, I think you do really well and make things balanced and interesting, with even 3 word sentences :)

Do you have advice?

yo yes I kind of do.

I struggled with writing dialogue most out of anything when I started writing--I'd have to force myself to write it, instead of writing paragraphs upon paragraphs of internal monologues--and so developed a 'Beginner's Method' that ended up working for me:

Talk to yourself as the characters and then write down what you end up saying

For me, this involved pacing around my room and muttering to myself like I was slightly deranged, and then pouncing on my laptop every few minutes to speedtype anything good I came up with. It works best when there's an exchange between only two characters, and you have a general idea of where the scene should go.

Now, this may be the theatre kid in me, but 'acting out' what the characters should say helped me figure out their characterisation better, as well as their vocal mannerisms and inflections to try to make each person 'sound' unique, as well as figuring out how the conversation should flow naturally. It's easy for things to sound forced when you're sitting down and staring at a laptop, so actually getting up and moving actually helped a lot.

Only write out what the characters say, nothing else

At the beginning, I only ever wrote the dialogue. It was just lines and lines that looked like this: I don't think you're right about this made-up conflict we're going to be talking about / maybe i'm not / what do you mean / i mean maybe i agree with you, i'm not right about this made-up conflict / yes you're not

This helps so much with figuring out the flow of the dialogue: you don't get bogged-down in making the writing flowery, or figuring out a really clever way to 'show' that a character is sad without 'telling' they're sad... firstly, just figure out what they're saying.

Add in the flowery bits afterwards

Adding in the 'Person A said' / 'She stared at him' / 'His voice wavered, like [blah blah blah words input here]' after you've written out dialogue helped me loads in the beginning. It then helps you structurally: you can look at your work 'zoomed-out', and make sure you're not clogging your writing with too much description, or too little description, or too much blank space, or too little, or... etc. Nowadays I don't need to really do it like this, as I've got enough practice in that I can figure out the 'flow' as I go (haha) but there are still loads of times when I have a fab idea for how I want a scene to go, and so I just whizz out the dialogue as quick as I can, with only a few markers to help me figure out what I want the characters to be doing. Let me have a look in my notes app to try to see if I've got any IW examples.

[EDIT: HUZZAH!!! I FOUND ONE!!! Here’s literally proof of me doing this for a scene in Chapter 19 of ‘Intrinsic Warmth’:

Which was then expanded (by a biiiig degree!!) into this:

In the first one, I didn’t care about formatting, grammar, anything like that. I’m just concerned about getting the words onto the page, as I know I’ll be able to go over it later.

Other general tips:

Nothing is ever solved in one line

The reader's eyes skip over two lines of dialogue (Person A speaks / Person B responds) so, so quickly. I always noticed that it was like two lines were pretty much redundant until I padded them out with just... more lines. For something to seem significant to the reader, or for there to be a purpose for you to include it, I go with a general rule of four lines minimum.

This is because nobody's mind ever really changes in one or line of dialogue. People don't work like this:

Person A: I'll give you £5 for that dress.

Person B: No way. Minimum price, £10.

(Person A is now convinced and will pay £10)

There needs to be some more back-and-forth, for 90% of people. It's very rare that you'll ever find someone so naturally persuasive that they can change someone's mind in one line, or that someone is so easily convinced that their mind can be changed in one line. Most of the time, it'll look something more like this:

Person A: I'll give you £5 for that dress.

Person B: No way. Minimum price, £10.

Person A: I don't know... I've only got £10 in my purse, and that's for everything today.

Person B: Don't worry, Person A. You know I wouldn't cheat you out of your money!

(Person A is now convinced and will pay £10)

However, each line should still add something new. It could be that Person B tries a new method of convincing Person A, or that Person B tries again, saying essentially the same thing but in a different way. That 'different' way should convey something: are they more irritated, more casual, more angry?

Essentially, don't be afraid of writing more dialogue than less. This doesn't mean you should write random stuff, or dialogue that doesn't serve a purpose, but people talk a lot more than you think. Let them talk.

Use single lines of dialogue, it's okay

As in, the bits in italics:

"Hello," Person A said.

"Hello!"

"Heyyyy. What's up?"

Your reader can keep up with who's saying what, especially once you work on developing each character's 'voice'. I used to get so bogged down by making sure every line of dialogue had the character's name attached to it, but in truth you can write these 'single lines' much more than you think. It helps speed the writing up, and it stops your reader from getting that bored, imo.

I don't know what I'm doing to be so fr

Here's the truth: I don't think dialogue is one of my strengths, at the moment. I've spoken a lot about all of your characters finding their 'voice', so you could basically look only at the character's dialogue and you could know which character it is solely from the words that they're saying. It's important for character development, with dialogue being such an important tool to characterise your characters!

But I honestly don't think I'm the best at that. It's something that I'm consciously working on, and I think writing things other than IW will help me stretch those muscles, but it's honestly not something I've got cracked yet. Which is fine--I'm developing as an author! Everyone is, constantly--and I guess a way to say that I'm not tip-top at this, but as long as you're willing to put yourself out there (as in: start writing, start putting words on paper, that's all) then you're going to improve. And that's great! Ha-haaaa

[goldiesflag]

Writing things I found out by writing a lot 🥺

Correct me if I’m wrong 🤷‍♀️

1) Don’t put multiple strands of dialogue in one paragraph of text. It’s confusing. Start a new line when a new character speaks. Please.

2) When describing characters, try not to just describe them by hair or eye color. Use literally anything else: clothing, vibes, scars etc. This gives way more information about your character, regardless of if it’s fanfiction or not. Even if it is fanfiction and the reader is familiar with the character, the description of how they dress or their expressions can give away the impression you want your story to give the reader.

3) do not write with a word count in mind. Just write. That’s going to force you to add things you probably don’t need to add. Just write as you’d like, then go back to check the pacing and add/take away from there.

4) Write the simplest outline you can possibly make. Don’t put in too much details. Personally, I just write down whenever the setting changes. That usually gives me the idea of the things I want to happen. Ex:

1. House

2. Meadow

3. House

4. Tower of death

5) if you’re stuck on a scene, ignore it. Write another scene. Come back when you’ve came up with an idea for it. This may be tricky when you decide to write the scene you’re currently struggling with differently and that means you’d have to change the scene you’ve already written, but hey, practice :)

6) show personality and friendships through dialogue and action. It can get across more emotion when it’s shown this way instead of being described by the narrator. I’m going to cry more if someone dies after reading our narrator a lullaby, not after an infodump about how much they mean to the narrator.

7) last one cuz I’m sleepy. Change your font when you proof read. It makes it easier to catch mistakes you would’ve usually overlooked. 🕺🕺

If you think I’m wrong then maybe I am. I am mostly a fanfic writer with no beta reader. I learn by trial and error lmao.

[redstaratmorning]

Headcanons and Musings of Pirate-y And Plunderous Proportions: Astarion Says What

Synopsis: Random musings and ramblings regarding and spawning from the differences between how Astarion says just one word, depending on your choices—“What?” This got very long and touches not only on Astarion’s difference in presentation in aforementioned moment, but also some discussion-thoughts to chuck onto the dashboard regarding some other elements of Astarion’s content thus far in Early Access, and some thoughts to add onto others’ speculations and wonderings (I did not save sources so pardon the lack of proper citation, oops. We’re going informal here anyway.) Spoilers for Chapter 1 BG3 scenes, plot, etc, under the cut in case someone hasn’t filtered out the tags. Trigger warning/content warning: some discussion of heavy topics is mentioned and explored, including starvation, abuse/torture, and trauma. Other topics of note for summarization include speculation on Astarion’s largely unknown as-of-early-access background and a touch of his possible pre-vampire morality leanings, possible mental state/trauma reaction in a couple of scenes, and vague speculation on Larian’s gameplan for Astarion’s arc ending. Gather thy party and venture forward, for here be dragons and lots o’ text, matey! [/stereotypical pirate accent]

“What?” Just that one word, between the goblin party and the tiefling party. If Larian keeps the body language and tone presentation more or less where it’s at now in Early Access, they are worlds apart and delightfully up for interpretation of just what’s going on in our favorite vampire spawn’s head. This won’t be an in-depth post about all the tonal and body language differences, just picking out a few due to personal constraints (ie too broke to buy this game currently.) Edit: And also a lot of other thoughts and ramblings tacked on, lol. On the one hand we have him at the goblin party, where he seems much more superficially comfortable there, knows what’s going on and knows what to expect—it feels like he’s done this kind of scene a hundred times before. The comfort of familiarity. Did Cazador throw “parties”, much like how he “invited” Astarion to dine with him? I wouldn’t be surprised if he mingled at regular dinner parties either before his turning, or perhaps after when he’s ordered to hunt for Cazador’s evening repast. I doubt the goblin party has anything as potentially horrific as what Cazador would have lined up on the nightly basis, which is why Astarion isn’t aggro’d: he’s in a position of power at this party after all, not a powerless one. A conquering hero, as he describes the MC. A Precarious position, as it turns out.

Circling back to that one word though, the way he says “what” in that scene after he propositions the MC and the MC picks the “Maybe. If you say please” line feels like Astarion’s response could be interpreted as pretty abrupt. On guard, perhaps, squaring up, offended, even perhaps lowkey challenging/hostile. Expressing social displeasure and possibly staring down the MC mayhaps? Could be, especially if Astarion’s body language remains as it is rigged now in-scene with that step forward, his shoulders shifting, the lack of a smile, that assessing glare, all combined with that flat tone of voice. The animation could just be temporary and subject to change, but if it does end up as more or less the final version of that moment’s depiction, it’s pretty interesting as a shift. I’d read it as potentially “not actually truly comfortable in this situation, just familiar and numb to it all”, especially when combined with some of his other earlier potential lines at the goblin party, such as the following: Astarion: So, what are we drinking to? Other than a pile of corpses. MC: That’s not funny. Astarion: Oh don’t be so sour - It’s a party. You did what you had to. Don’t be ashamed that you did it well. MC: I wish things had turned out differently. Astarion: And I wish I was drinking out of the skulls of everyone who’s ever wronged me. Life is tough. Although that’s not to say we can’t have a little fun. This supports the whole “has been through his personal hell and has adapted to survive it albeit not unscathed” story Larian seems to be going for with him quite nicely in the little tells and details. A sort of “take what joy you can even amidst the dark situation surrounding us” trauma-induced adaptation, coupled together with actual enjoyment on his part for killing. It’d be easy to say Astarion is moreso in his element at the goblin party, and to a degree he is—it’s one he is well practiced with in his current mindset. Compare now how he acts at the tiefling party—we can all agree he’s not having a good time, our friendly neighborhood vampire sulking in particular over the fact that “there’s a worm in [his] brain, [he’s] surrounded by idiots, and all [he] has to drink is wine that tastes like vinegar.” But the delightful thing is he’s complaining so vividly about it. The wine likely is worse at the tiefling party, seeing as they’re refugees, and the goblins had previously captured a duke whom they likely stole loot from and under orders from Minthara et al stored said goods elsewhere for a later date (likely some of said goods were consumed at the party if it happened. Edit: Shadowheart’s drunk dialogue at the goblin party mentions the goblin’s wine there being good, poor dear. Fascinating hints at her story and character in that scene though.) This is assuming Astarion is drinking wine at the goblin party, of course. He may very well be drinking something red and full-bodied there, just not made from grapes. But even in his complaints and presentation, he seems arguably more relaxed and less on guard compared to his demeanor at the goblin party. Let’s be honest, he doesn’t view goblins as equals or stimulating company judging by his various voice lines expressing his disdain, distrust and overall low opinion of them as vermin among other things. The fact that he’s willing to call the tiefling refugees idiots while in earshot of them? Definitely doesn’t respect them as a group—though he has a less negatively opined line regarding them earlier on if the caged goblin (Sazza) is killed,—which is not surprising given that MC and company at the time of the party just saved them from certain death. Astarion’s reaction however also reads as potentially at ease enough to say what he’s thinking. He’s not going to get murdered for saying so, and there aren’t any punishing power games at play with the refugees and do-gooders he’s found himself surrounded by. There aren’t any hedonistic shenanigans going on and the drinks are terrible, so it’s not an entertaining party for him, but one could make an argument that Astarion might actually be feeling more secure or at least less threatened-as-is/was-his-accepted-ongoing-norm there. Which might mean he’s feeling quite out of place, or even just not...entirely engaged with what’s going on around him and even within him as far as emotional states go. Would he casually pull the same stunt at the goblin party? If you’re a bastard to him, yes, but that’s not in the same emotional vein as his dialogue during the tiefling party at all. Loyalty from the goblins is fickle, the goblins worship the Absolute and those that are chosen by the Absolute—so long as said Chosen remain powerful enough to subjugate them and is in favor. Astarion knows this kind of power structure well: ruling by fear and power. With the tieflings? It’s not superiors-and-subordinates, it’s just...people. People celebrating surviving an event that could’ve very well and most likely would’ve ended in their deaths. Will he get to celebrate like that one day? That could very well be a painful and bleak thing to consider, and not something he wants to contemplate as of yet, based on his dialogue lines that demonstrate his fear of Cazador. How’s he supposed to get lost in the fun and revelry if the wine doesn’t even taste good to him? I don’t know wines, but I’m guessing from what little I do know and what I’ve read of flavor descriptors for wines hyped as good, it might actually be bad wine based on the adjective “sharp” when mixed with the rest of the description if the MC takes a sip. Sharp seems to suggest too many tannins, or maybe improper storage so the wine actually did turn to taste a bit more like vinegar, or maybe not enough sugar in the grapes used, perhaps? To be fair, I do believe there’s a non-conversation line somewhere of Astarion’s regarding solid food tasting terrible to him, but I can’t verify that so a pinch of salt there. Still, if his taste buds are aligned with regular living mortal ones for wine at least, RIP Astarion, he’s stuck with a terrible drink for the foreseeable night. Unless, of course, you know. ;D Compared to the tieflings, the goblins as a whole? As a group they’re a scraped together army of pillagers hungry for destruction and spoils. They don’t have ANY loyalty to you—in addition to being willing to betray you via murder immediately despite working with them when Sazza first brings you back to meet Minthara, there’s also when Minthara potentially opts to try to kill you post-goblin-party. If you persuade her not to, Minthara does mention “do not return to the goblin camp, as far as they were concerned you were destined to die tonight.” This is not a group to get chummy with, obviously. Doesn’t say good things about the Absolute’s followers in general, either, or the Absolute depending on if Minthara’s being honest about the Absolute intending that the MC dies after razing the grove. Minthara could just be lying to serve her own ends and is out to destroy any rivals for the Absolute’s favor, after all, I can’t verify that from dialogue exploration at present. So it’s not surprising that this is not a group Astarion is going to let his guard down around I’m sure, or around an MC that sided with the goblins, because fortunes can shift like the wind in a scene like that, and I think his utter lack of surprise at Minthara trying to kill you all (whether or not the MC had a romp with her) is potentially spawned because he recognizes this fact. He’s been here before, in another time, another place, with different faces, but he’s seen this play before. And the MC is just another face for the same old role of a player in this rat race for power when they side with the goblins, aren’t they? The difference this time though is: will they succeed and make it to the top? Is Astarion betting on the winning horse, or not? Far less reason and far more motivation to not be emotionally invested in anyone or anything around him because it’s survival of the fittest, and the most ruthless will be the ones who win—the MC just reinforced that perspective for Astarion, in slaughtering the tieflings. But Astarion isn’t fully corrupted yet, despite however much Cazador has twisted and tormented him so. Isn’t it fascinating, that the MC, one of the first people Astarion can actually interact with relatively freely without Cazador’s puppeteering influence hanging over him quite so acutely, is someone who might very well and very likely will have a huge impact on how Astarion develops and sees the world? For better or for worse, the MC will shape all the companions’ futures and perspectives it seems, depending on their choices. On a meta note, isn’t that thrillingly fascinating and engaging work by Larian Studios? Bravo, honestly. Continuing, for Astarion this could very well just feel like a better but complimentary and thematically continuous segment of the nightmare that is his existence under Cazador as it goes on: he’s a vampire now, and the world is only ever a power struggle between the strong and the weak, and he knows better than to ever be weak again. Kindness and virtue belonged to Before. Before he died, before he turned, before he was taken. Those are things in stories and fairy tales now, that belong to other people, other places and times, other lives—things that belong to the living, not the undead. Sentimentality, more universally-accepted morality, all of those Good™-aligned or softer feelings can feel like they have no place in his world now, on this darker path. But he knows what they are, not just in theory I think, but also perhaps knowing from memory and experience, however distant and faint. The way he speaks on many occasions has subtext that could very well suggest he wasn’t without a better side through implication and emotion. Which is not to say I think he was a shining paragon of virtue before he died—guessing based off of the dev team’s writing of him so far, I’m expecting nuanced and complex but ultimately very human (or elf if you’re being fantasy-based technical) morality with both merits and flaws, for polarizing opinions in the fandom. That being said, I’m holding off judgment on what kind of person he was before he was turned for now despite reading about pre-early-access, preliminary ideas the dev team had for his background. The reason I’m waiting to see what the dev team puts into the game for his backstory of Before, is because some of his datamined lines could be taken in a couple of different ways, and some of his emotional responses as is currently don’t track as truly Machiavellian or I’d say malevolent in nature for manipulation or otherwise. Granted, not all Evil™ acts stem from intentions to be malevolent. Sometimes people do evil both in-game and in life without really intending to, or recognizing that they do, nor seeing the harm they have caused or will cause (I’m looking at you, Mayrina.) Manipulative yes, but so far it’s looked like it’s for defensive purposes in a world that is out to hurt or kill him if given any opportunity whatsoever. Personally I actually wouldn’t even say he’s been really manipulative at all, but your mileage may vary. He lies because he’s afraid you’re going to murder him for being a vampire, and because he doesn’t want to reveal the cause of two centuries’ worth of trauma to someone he just met and likely can’t predict if they’re emotionally safe for him to interact with. Note: “emotionally safe” does not necessarily denote being sympathetic here, so much as “will their response cause me pain in some fashion?” from Astarion’s point of view, which does not necessarily require the MC to be mean to him though obviously that wouldn’t help. We touch upon why sympathy can hurt later on in this essay. And why would he expect sympathy in the other instance, regarding revealing that he’s a vampire? How often would we not murder strange vampires we just met in DND-worlds? Is that not a common response and practice in Faerun for the most part? They’re on the list of acceptable prey for a monster hunter to be kidnapped and taken to who knows what fate (probably nothing good we’re sure), and who would come rescue them? In all actuality: No one. If he wasn’t a companion he’d easily just be one more random encounter to kill—as he and all the companions are in the right circumstances, *cough cough* like when sacrificing anyone to Boooal *cough.* Astarion’s had little cracked moments where he seems to be showing genuine vulnerability, and I’d say he likely displays real genuine emotion plenty of times, just not all the time. While the vulnerable moments could be a ploy, were he the type to actually be fully acting, I’m disinclined to bet that he’d act in the way he does during those moments if he planned them out or even improvised. It could be a mix of both, where it’s both true but also an act of manipulation. Were it the last option, that would require more exploration of his character in various situations to determine imo. I still doubt that though. I think he’s a little too raw and real in his pain, anger, and aggression to say he’s being malevolently manipulative at the end of the day, at least thus far in chapter one. The MC’s choices may change and influence that, on the Evil™ route. I’ve been following some of the fantastic dash discussions on Astarion’s reaction to when the MC tries to comfort him (because of course I have, I’m here for BG3 content and Astarion content especially, aren’t we all here for the same party in his tag? Also hello fellow Astarion stans! :D I hope everyone’s having a good day), and if some of these datamined lines from Pjenn’s blog post are actually implemented and kept as canonical [link], specifically the ones Astarion says regarding heroes, I do think it ties in very strongly with some of what other folks have said regarding his recoiling reaction. Copy-pasted the potential dialogue lines of interest below: Astarion: Heroes. |said with disgust| Astarion: Heroes had two centuries to save me from my torture, but not one came knocking. Astarion: The strong had two centuries to pluck me from torture, but no one came. No, it was the mind flayers that rescued me. Astarion: I spent centuries as the victim of a corrupt man. It was the mind flayers that plucked me away from that. I very much enjoyed all the takes on Astarion’s potential motivations in his response, and I do want to chuck another idea into the fray that supports the vein of ideas that have him being truly afraid and then angry at the MC in that scene, with the speculation including those possible hero lines above as influence. Specifically, I’d like to bring in an outside comparison to part of Molly Grue’s reaction to seeing the Unicorn from The Last Unicorn animated movie for the first time, transcribed below: The Unicorn: I’m here now. Molly: [Bitter laugh] Oh? And where were you twenty years ago? Ten years ago? Where were you when I was new? When I was one of those innocent, young maidens you always come to? How dare you. How DARE you come to me now, when I am this. [begins to cry, heartbroken] Consider Astarion being shown kindness when he is now away from Cazador, not fully free or safe yet but not currently actively fully suffering Cazador’s torment all up close and personal. Consider that only on that very night before he was snatched up by the mindflayers, which might’ve been anywhere from only a day to a handful of days before this conversation about his nightmare, he was going out to falsely smile and lure some innocent—(“No innocents. You have my word.”)—or perhaps not so innocent, beautiful soul back to Cazador’s mansion to very likely die or be turned. How often must he do so? Is it every night he is ordered to go out and condemn someone else to that unfortunate fate? Do you think Cazador killed them cleanly? Quickly? Why would he, instead of agonizingly grinding out any last traces of sympathy his spawn might have through the guilt that they are the ones who “choose” who suffers and likely dies at Cazador’s hands that night? To give the illusion of choice is one abuse/torture tactic that can be used to break a soul that we see often in games: choose who suffers or dies. Cazador is unquestionably a personality who enjoys the psychological aspect of tormenting his victims, as evidenced by giving Astarion the “choice” to be either flayed or to “dine” on a rotting, dead rat, as well as other mentions of how he puts thought into torturing those around him. Astarion is still so fresh from his torment,—torment that is still technically on-going with the very real threats of resuming once more—he is emotionally bleeding enough arterial blood at the seams to fill a sea. His actions, words, and emotions so often metaphorically smell of blood, and not because he’s a vampire and the traditional role of a vampire being a predator among humanoids ironically enough, but because being a vampire spawn means Cazador. And Cazador means horror. Astarion has survived, yes, and it’s been hell. He’s still in hell, because he isn’t free yet. Not truly. It’s a desperate gasp of air, this taste of freedom, to dream that he could be free of Cazador. Imagine his feelings when he’s now in something like freedom, a reminder of what could be, what his life might’ve and likely was like once upon a time, an uncertain here-and-now where he has the possibility—just a possibility, and an unlikely one at that for most ordinary or less-than-ordinary people, not a certainty—of being free, and he’s just admitted to the horror that is Cazador. Admitted in this moment how much Cazador frightens him, how much just the thought of Cazador frightens him, how much the possibility he might be sent back to his master and having his previous tormented existence resumed truly frightens him. And the MC reaches out in sympathy. In acknowledgement that what Astarion has been through is horrifying. To look at this horror and say it is pain, and terror, and awful, that it isn’t normal. It isn’t something to ignore. It isn’t something to pretend is just everyday same old, same old, to numb and take off the edge as much as one can. That Astarion’s pain and fear aren’t to be sought out for entertainment or at best to be willfully neglected in an act of malice. That stark moment of contrast, like night and day, could bring the pain of two hundred years crashing down inside his head, all compressed into one moment. Feelings he tried so hard to survive through, ignore perhaps, suppress: fear, helplessness, loneliness, misery, anger, sorrow, hatred, pain, anxiety, distress, need. Memories, of so many instances that hurt in that moment and then continued to hurt for so long afterwards. How much must it hurt him, wound him, to lift his head for air and have a perspective outside of his suffering that is sympathetic...but knowing that nobody came to save him.  That perhaps, no one ever will, if he loses this so-called freedom and is dragged back under. That those that care, cannot help you. And that those that can help, do not care.  Why would anyone help him at this point after all? He’s a vampire spawn. A classically defined monster in the eyes of society, and he knows it. (”I’m not some monster!” / ”At best, I was sure you’d say no. More likely you’d ram a stake through my ribs.”) He must have been truly desperate in his starvation to chance anyone finding out he’s a vampire in the party. Not surprising, he can’t rest at the end of the day like the other companions can. He has to expend extra energy at that point to find food discreetly after fighting all day, and subpar food at that. (”Animal blood tastes like muck.” verification needed, it’s a conversational line in some branch of the morning-after he asks to bite the MC the first time) He’s not eating breakfast, snacks or lunch during the day, and he isn’t guaranteed to find food while hunting in the woods. Game might be scarce, he can be wounded or exhausted after a long day of fighting, and he wasn’t starting out in the peak of health to begin with either. He is a vampire spawn yes and apparently can take down large game such as boars to drain them, but that is a rough existence to condemn anyone to mechanically speaking. He knows what he’s risking, regardless of his int stat. But he takes that risk anyway. The character who is so survival driven, risking a very high likelihood of expulsion at best or death as the much-more-likely worst outcome of this attempt? His bite isn’t painless, and pain can wake a person up readily enough if they aren’t a deep sleeper, and how deep a sleeper are most people when in an uncertain and unfamiliar wilderness, potentially while hungry and cold, with the fretting fear of a agonizing death looming over their head? Even accounting for a lack of mental clarity from hunger and exhaustion and other factors, I find it deeply unlikely that Astarion is unaware of how big a risk he’s taking with the odds are stacked against him, rogue class or not. And even if he’s just thrown out of the group? He’s alone. Vulnerable. A target to be hunted by a much bigger, meaner predator. One that won’t kill him quickly, we can guess. His odds are much lower, on his own. Specifically his odds of not being dragged back to Cazador...assuming the MC doesn’t just turn him over to Gandrel. How terrifying is it to imagine that your suffering will never end, to be told it will never end, and then you are reminded of what it is like to not suffer for a time. To have felt the painful hope that maybe there is a possibility that you could escape an existence of torment...but knowing you very well might not? It is desperately bleak. It is no great leap of the imagination to hear Astarion saying—(or more likely thinking because this would be terribly vulnerable...but he might say something when pushed because he’s so full of sharp edges and bleeding insides still)—something similar to Molly Grue’s line in his own fashion, is it? Astarion: “[Bitterly laughing, mockingly so. As he speaks his tone breaks, an edge of raw, desperate hysteria slipping through, attached to centuries of pain turned to anger] And where were you two hundred years ago? A hundred years ago? Where were you when I still desperately thought in the deepest parts of my heart that someone might come? When I still had hope?  Astarion: [his voice turns low and venomous, raising in volume and accusation before finishing with a break on the final word “this”, a tonal admittance of how distraught and self-aware he is of what he’s had to do, of what he’s had to become to survive] How dare you. How DARE you say this to me now, when I am this.”  (the above lines are entirely fictional and are not from any in-game, data-mined, or otherwise official source or content) He’s been made to do so many terrible things, even just based off of the few lines we have heard in early access he’s been through so much horror. An hour of torture, a day, a month is so incredibly long. It can have such lasting impact on a person—PTSD, as we know it in this day and age. A year? Five years, ten, twenty, fifty, a hundred? An elf he may be, but from a human perspective...he’s been tortured for lifetimes. Even as an elf, two hundred years is a long time. More than long enough to seriously alter how someone’s brain works—people are both amazingly resilient, but also so incredibly fragile. Cazador has had all this time to play with Astarion’s brain, honestly I find it impressive Astarion has any sense of self left after all this time. That he’s still driven to survive, that he still feels anything at all. (”It doesn’t look broken. But then again, none of us do.”)  It doesn’t surprise me that he’s intensely bitter when encountering the “paladins” of Tyr—(ie Anders and company if you know who I mean—and was that a Dragon Age 2 reference? If not that is an amazing coincidence with the whole Anders-Justice-Vengeance-Demon thing there)—if the MC asks something to the tune of “Don’t you wish someone had helped you when you needed it?” Oh. Oh that had to be a painful question for him. Astarion had his basic needs denied and abused, to ask if he wished that someone had helped him when he needed that and more, and no one came? Why was he denied but the paladins get help? Why does he have to be the hero when no one came for him, when no one very well might come for him when he might still very well be in dire straits in the near future?  I can see the possible desire to inspire sympathy intended in the question from the MC, but it can be so utterly without sympathy to ask that in some contexts, and in Astarion’s case it is. He was being abused and controlled without any way out—Anders and his cohorts opted into the deal with Zariel for personal reasons, not as far as I know under threat of imminent death, and they are relatively capable of fulfilling their end of the bargain barring their current injuries at the time. They certainly have more freedom of choice than Astarion and other vampire spawn ever did, and they were not being tortured right then and there. Warlocks, referring to Anders and co., might even have the option to get out of deals, a la Wyll’s personal questline hook thus far. Astarion can’t get out of his servitude from Cazador. Cazador holds all the cards, makes all the decisions, has all of the power. To compare Astarion’s situation to his face with that of the “paladins”? I’m surprised he wasn’t spitting fury, honestly. They still have normal elements to their day to day life, despite their devil’s deal. They are not being tormented on the daily—yet. They are not in hell—yet. They can get out. They have the possibility. A possibility Astarion didn’t—until now. And isn’t that the most fucked up thing, that it wasn’t a force of Good™ that saved him, but an even bigger monster than Cazador himself? He was saved—by mindflayers, intending some fate that was likely worse for him than before. Even when the Absolute’s hand begins to be revealed in all this, he is still a pawn among monstrous masters. What heroes there are in the world, won’t come for him. They never did before, and they didn’t now. Heroes are for other people, for realities aside from his own. They are for other people, living Other lives. Not his life. Forces of Good™ swooping in to save the day, to correct the wrongs of the world and to make things Right™ just isn’t his normal. Not anymore, if ever it was. His normal was warped by Cazador a long time ago. Is it a stretch of the imagination that if Cazador twisted “dinner” to be a choice between consuming a rotting, putrid rat corpse or being flayed on a nightly basis, turning “poetry” into the memory of a “sonnet” carved into Astarion’s back with a razor over the course of an entire night full of Astarion’s own pained screams? Is it hard to imagine that Cazador also took pleasure in turning other ordinary situations one might encounter in normal life into nightmare versions as well for Astarion and his other spawn? One illithid mind-power option shows Cazador controlling Astarion by holding his chin, though without any further context. Cazador wouldn’t have had to do more than that to invoke terror, after a certain point in time. It seems highly unlikely the gesture wasn’t followed up with more pain, though. Perhaps in that moment when he speaks of his nightmare in the first conversation and the MC reaches out to him in sympathy...Astarion was reminded of something. Multiple somethings, multiple moments, when Cazador reached out to him oh so casually, and it ended in pain and terror. The way the camera is framed as of the current time in early access, the way he flinches away crying “No!” so quiet and low, his eyes wide and staring just so, how he goes so far as to pull back almost entirely out of frame and the camera slowly pans to follow him? Perhaps that is just a stand-in scene, but as it is, even now, it emphasizes that he is I would argue genuinely afraid, and reflexively responding in what is likely his first opportunity to freely respond to his traumatically induced fear. The first opportunity where he wasn’t supernaturally compelled to do exactly as Cazador ordered him to, the first opportunity where he was likely not going to be tormented further for expressing his fear, for having his main tormentor laugh and delight in his distress. The first instance where he for a split second let his guard down, and didn’t expect to be hurt—until the MC reached for him, echoing possible memories of what happened last time someone (Cazador) did that. It’s not Cazador reaching for him. But...it is not Cazador. He doesn’t have to worry about Cazador hurting him right that second, but...will the MC hurt him, like Cazador did? Will they make it look like they’re going to help him, that he can trust them, and then betray him? (”How can you be so cruel?” / “It [Raphael playing games] reminds me of Cazador, taunting his slaves with hope when he knew the game was rigged.”) But they scared him. They scared him, and perhaps for a moment he was back there, in another time and place, where he knows, where he remembers, vividly, perhaps even recently, what normally would have happened to him. And how dare they make him feel that. (“I can do without reliving that particular night, thank you.” [Nightmare about Cazador dialogue, a separate scene if you miss the insight check from the first post-nightmare camp discussion I believe.]) He’s so raw and upset, both aggressive and defensive when he speaks about his nightmares in quite a few of his lines, asking and waiting to explain just why his nightmares are truly so terrifying, especially in the second-nightmare conversation. The way he speaks there, and in other scenes, makes me very disinclined to interpret him as actively intending evil in general so much as having been shaped to be ruthless through a centuries-long trial by fire that he isn’t free and clear of yet. Based off of how he reacts on more than one occasion, I’m personally inclined to take a leaf from Wyll’s book and say I do think he has more than just potential to be good. “Good™” being relative of course to his situation and undead-life—Astarion has GREAT potential as a character to explore not only what it means to be Evil™ aligned, but also what people on the meta perceive as evil, as well as what prejudices we may carry from that labeling.  He is I think very much an excellent walking morality test and ironically a mirror for the player’s character. What kind of person is the MC, in how they treat and interact with him. He is a complicated and morally-entangled character, and it is so very easy to only read him in the here and now within the stark, daylight context of societal’s average norms without looking at the very real, very recent nightmarish Twilight Zone reality he’s lived in that echoes through his words and story thus far. It’s a marvelous bit of echoing reality and real life here by Larian, truth be told: how do you tell people about your life, when it’s been a ceaseless, unending nightmare? With smiles, witticisms, and the occasional polished lie that bleeds out pain, for some folks anyway, including Astarion. He says he’s having more fun at the goblin party, but at the tiefling party? That’s probably the first time he’s been at a normal party where he hasn’t had to obey and fear Cazador’s orders and inevitable torment during or afterwards. That’s the first time in his entire undead existence when he’s been in a social situation like this without being afraid, hurt, or manipulated. It’s not a fun party on its own by his standards, but it is a safe party for him. In a way though, safety can be boring. A luxury, yes, but in this case? For him, boring. And boring...might very well be irritating, in an anxiety-turned-irritation fashion, because he’s not being tormented right this very moment. He should be finding something to enjoy, because in his normal everyday routine? In the day to day that he would expect, that his subconscious expects out of habit? Opportunity for any form of enjoyment must be rare indeed, twisted and tainted by Cazador’s ever looming shadow over every minute of Astarion’s vampiric existence so far. It could be anxiety-inducing, to not seek pleasure or some form of happiness or comfort while there is opportunity for it, in what one perceives as a respite from constant, on-going suffering. (”Why do you insist on exhuming the past?” - when you ask about his past in camp, after you know he’s a vampire. An unpleasant reminder of an unpleasant past, why would he want to dwell on it? He has enough pain to last him multiple lifetimes. Literally.) From the deep, deep depths of prolonged suffering, it can potentially take a great deal more intensity of sensation to feel anything at all, let alone something approaching happiness. (”For the first time in two hundred years, I felt happy.” [presumed Astarion-origin line after drinking from a sleeping companion] / “I feel strong. I feel...happy!” [after MC succeeds in persuading Astarion to stop drinking from their neck after giving him permission to do so.]) This isn’t even taking into consideration how vampirism might have impacted Astarion’s psychology on a metabolic/biochemical level, so to speak. Where Larian goes with that is still to be determined, though my money’s on they give him more a murderous edge and natural inclination—not unlike a Beast-lite version of bloodlust from Vampire: The Masquerade— but still keep his core traits very much human rather than supernaturally-alien/2D-cut-out-monstrous. (Or elvhen, if we’re being fantasy-world-linguistically technical here again.) Touching on the matter of monstrous behavior though...It is a powerfully understated moment of casual cruelty that Larian allows the MC to decide once and once only, if Astarion may also drink from people or only animals. It’s so fitting I don’t believe it to be coincidence that he was a magistrate in his backstory—isn’t the MC passing a judgement too on him, a sentence to change his life for the foreseeable future, possibly forever without realizing or perhaps not caring about the full extent of their actions? And one cannot forget Wyll’s comment about the rat diet. Oh, can you not hear the resonating parallel real life pain from how those ignorant of another’s hurts might unintentionally mock the person and hurt them so? How some might apply their own morality from their own life experiences, without looking at the full extent of the consequences of their actions? A life and perspective that more likely has never been tested under the lash and upon the rack of some of life’s worst possible realities? Even if Wyll and the MC don’t mean to be, it is so very, very cruel. It is beautifully painful, Abdirak and the goddess Loviatar would be proud. (”My mind is finally clear. I feel strong. I feel...happy!”) To be denied not just better food, but the ability to think clearly, to feel well, the actuality of being happy as a norm? It is so very hollow an existence to feel so constantly weak of both body and mind, and oh isn’t it just the richest thing, that an MC might echo Cazador’s choice and power over Astarion thusly? It’s enough to make one laugh an Evil Laugh™ of appreciation at just how unthinkingly, horribly cruel a person can potentially be while playing a Good™ character. This is actually a level of genius on Larian’s part that I wonder how many in the audience will actually look at and appreciate the subtle horror of. The horror that we do this too, in real life, sometimes without ever knowing the seemingly small, far-reaching ripples of harm an unthinking phrase or comment can do when we don’t take another’s reality into consideration—that we don’t know what it is we don’t know. It is a fine piece of storytelling, to offer up a story with so many facets to reflect upon. It’s so beautifully crafted that Astarion speaks and dresses like a noble, that he can so easily be perceived as a person of privilege at first glance should one merely look at some of his surface behaviors and inclinations—remnant trappings of his distant past most likely, from once upon a time. It’s a delightful reveal and subversion that he, I think we can safely say, isn’t that. Perhaps he was, once, but he isn’t at this point in his life, not anymore. Appearances are deceiving, and doesn’t that just tie so nicely right into some of Astarion’s potential themes and behaviors? The lies that crack open as truth and pain come bleeding out from underneath? I do wonder how many of Larian’s audience have known hunger—and not known when the next meal will happen, what it might be, if it will have strings attached? The kind of hunger that follows you everywhere, that roots down into your bones and hollows out a home there forever more? It changes how a person sees things, how they act, how they think, even when they’re removed from being hungry all the time. One doesn’t need to be skin and bones to feel like one is starving constantly,—(I very much enjoy that headcanon just to clarify, I’m not intending to throw shade in any of this or future rambling)—to be kept on a hollow diet of empty calories that are enough to keep your heart pumping, but your body struggles because it doesn’t have the nutrients it needs in the amounts it needs? To feel your mind fog over with exhaustion and blanketed despair, a primal and low level desperation whittled down into a tired and numb, anxious background static from adrenal fatigue? Miscellaneous aches, pains and problems that seem unrelated but in reality, if only you knew, were because your body can’t function the way it should ideally, because you don’t have what you truly need? A very real problem in real life, for far too many people. And oh, the beautiful, casual, so very human monstrousness Larian lets us exercise here, knowing or unknowing. It is such a powerful, understated cluster of ideas. And I think Larian knew—someone on the dev team did their homework on both traditional starvation but also what one might call masked-starvation as no doubt other tumblr folks have also speculated, just based off of what we’ve seen and because of that Happy buff Astarion gets when he uses his Vampiric Bite ability in combat. It fits right into his whole theme of “what makes a monster and what makes a man?” (Sing the bells of Notre Dame~♪) But not necessarily asking that question only of him. Rather, asking it also of the MC. This fits into the game’s whole theme with the tadpoles, the choice of using the power and turning into “Something More Beautiful” as Minthara put it, of taking the darker path, it all fits so very well. I just want to applaud this because it’s not a major story-beat moment. It’s a companion-side-quest moment. It’s going to be for the most part seen as a combat-game-mechanic and head-canon defining moment, deciding if Astarion may feed on people or not. I doubt we’d see Larian actually changing Astarion’s demeanor much in how he delivers lines with a “allowed to drink people blood” code flag, as cool as that might be. It very well could factor into later outcomes but for voice acting I doubt they’ll make an entire second/third/etc set of each line spawning from that one seemingly small choice. It makes me very hopeful that Larian can handle such weighty themes so deftly thus far—we’ll have to wait and see if they can stick the landing once the game is finished, but boy oh boy their nuance and delivery so far is strong as steel and sharp as a double-edged sword right out of the gate. The studio is in a fantastic position to explore and to challenge people’s thoughts and ideas regarding character builds like Astarion’s imo, depending on how the dev team chooses to play it out. Seeing some of Gale and Shadowheart’s dialogue trees from the goblin party, I have high hopes that the dev team will allow a great deal of exploration and flexibility all across the moral spectrums, not only allowing us the option to drag the more seen-as-good-aligned characters down paths of moral corruption,—(note: I’m including Shadowheart in more neutral-ish territory for now but the fact that she seems to feel emotionally ill—guilty, one could say—at the goblin party and is busy trying to get drunk to drown that feeling out suggests to me she Definitely does have a more good-aligned moral compass to a nuanced degree)—but also the chance to drag more seen-as-evil-aligned characters along the path to more traditionally good endings and persuade them to see the benefits of playing nice with others per more classic Good™ societal rules (subjectively speaking ofc.) But Larian is also in a very precarious place too—speaking strictly of just the one character as the focus of this essay, Astarion resonates very easily through that very real fear, pain, anger, bitterness and so many other emotions as a result of what he has survived, is still surviving through, and struggling against: trauma. How bitter indeed would it be should a character—that people with very deep, real pain can relate to—not get at least the option for a well-crafted, hopeful and merciful epilogue? Oh the sympathetic pain that Larian could reap could be pain of the very worst kind, if they condemn him to only death and darkness with bleak endings that lack nuance and care. I’ve seen some posts where people worry about Astarion not potentially having a good ending, with possible unspoken implications that he might be railroaded into betraying the MC. I’d like to say that I think a lot of his subtext, even looking at the instances where he lies and the datamined details of the voice-acting-directions, would run counter to railroading him to only ever betraying the MC. I think straight betrayal is going to run as mostly antithetical to his core themes in a way. He might betray your MC—but it will likely be because the MC betrayed him first in a myriad of small ways, or in a big way. Approval-rating-system based choices are a very real possibility too, separately or as a part of the equation naturally, in addition to your major in-game choices. That would also include the scenario of betrayal through using the tadpole powers enough to be mind-controlled into having no will of his own, much like the other characters, including the MC. I do think we have plenty of good, solid reason to be very hopeful that he will have a possible good continuation—not ending. A continuation where he manages to free himself from Cazador with the help of his companions or perhaps dare he even say friends, manages to begin the process of healing the immediate pains of his trauma and learning how to truly live with all that he’s been through and all that he’s done, to have the possibility of not only living but living both happily and well for the most part? Who knows what else Larian Studios might have in the works for him and the other companions, as well as the MC and the story of Baldur’s Gate 3. But good outcomes for all seems like it very likely could happen, for all of the companions. His wiki page’s summary tagline hook in particular offers up that implied promise from the developers to the audience, I would say, “Astarion prowled the night as a vampire spawn for centuries, serving a sadistic master until he was snatched away. Now he can walk in the light, but can he leave his wicked past behind?” What that promise is, varies from creator to creator. In this case, based on the wording, I would say that potentially implies a satisfyingly well-crafted and engaging story wherein we find out and determine if the answer to that question is yes or no, and in a DND-based RPG full of choices that have an impact on the people and world around you? In a game genre that has a history of multiple, varied endings for your companions based on how you play? That checks out. Larian so far has been handling things admirably well in my opinion, and I’m willing to invest emotionally in this story they’re telling with the trust that they will deliver a good continuation and conclusion. But on the off-chance that somehow Astarion’s endings all turn out painful and tragic on the meta for the fanbase, that the associated intentional or unintentional messages wound and grieve those who recognize and resonate most strongly with the pains he has felt? On that off-chance, in that instance where we are left bereft and disappointed because of what happened to him or any of the companions or the story itself should somehow things go awry, then it would be your right to ask Larian the very same question Astarion asked you once: How can you be so cruel?

[hood-ex]

Can you give any pointers for fanfiction writing? It's something I've considered trying, but I've never done creative writing and it's a bit intimidating. I'm mostly interested in writing Nightwing, and maybe having other characters (Batfam and Titans) but still always having Dick as the center.

Welcome to Fanfiction 101! I’m here to keep you from making the same mistakes I’ve made in the past. 

Pre-Writing Process

There are some people who enjoy outlining the shit out of their story, and then there are people like me who just kinda make the story up as they go. Whatever you decide to do, try to at least have an ending planned out. That way while you’re writing, you can start to craft the pieces you need to get to the ending you have imagined. You can even work backward and plan your story out from end to beginning. 

For example, let’s say I want my ending to be Dick and Damian hugging in a hospital. Okay, what pieces do I need to get to that point? Well, if they’re in a hospital then one of them needs to be hurt. Who do I want to hurt? Let’s go with Dick because I want this story to show how much Damian cares about Dick.

Great. Now how does Damian find out that Dick is hurt/how does he save Dick? Let’s say Damian is in the cave when the batcomputer gets an alert from Nightwing’s suit. The alert shows that Dick’s vitals have gone haywire. Damian panics, tracks down Dick’s location, and then both him and Alfie take the flying batmobile to save Dick. They find Dick and take him to the hospital. 

Cool but how does Dick get hurt in the first place? Hmm, well, Dick usually always rides a motorcycle, right? So let’s say Dick gets into a motorcycle accident. How does he crash his bike? Maybe it’s because of the weather or because a baddie crashes into him. I don’t want to write a huge action scene so let’s say Dick accidentally drives over black ice, spins out, and crashes in a ditch. 

And there you have it. A whole story right there from end to beginning. You can plan things out in a more detailed way before you jump in and write if you want. A basic outline like that ^ is usually enough for me to go off of. The details just come to me while I’m in the process of writing. Try and see what works best for you. 

One-Shots vs. Multi-Chapter Stories 

If you haven’t done a lot of creative writing, I would suggest you start off by practicing with one-shots. Now, one-shots can be shorter content, but on the flip side, there’s also one-shots that are like 50k words. Totally depends on what the author is willing to put into it in terms of plot, description, character development, etc. 

I personally have a hard time finding the motivation to finish multi-chapter stories, which is why I usually stick to one-shots. Short one-shots can be easier because they don’t have to be super fleshed out. The action is quick, the dialogue is impactful, and the scene is memorable. 

You can also just jump into the action when it comes to one-shots. You don’t have to do as much build-up. For example, I could jump right into a scene of Dick having trouble breathing like this: 

Dick’s having a hard time making sense of things. Vaguely, he can hear Bruce shouting for Alfred. He can feel hands on him. His vision is going in and out. Then, suddenly, there’s silence. Dick wakes up, confused. Tim is sitting at his bedside, holding his hand. Bruce is close by, and when he realizes Dick is awake, he immediately goes over to him. Bruce explains that Dick had a bad reaction to a drug he was injected with. Bruce cards his hand through Dick’s hair to comfort him, and Dick reflects on when Bruce used to do the same thing when Dick was a kid. 

End scene. 

Okay, so, obviously a real story would have way more description than that, but you get what I’m saying, yeah? That whole scene could be the entire story and it would be enough. But if you have the motivation to do way more than that with a ton of character development and what not, you totally could prolong that one-shot into 50k words. Or just break everything up into a multi-chapter fic. 

The problem with writing one chapter at a time for a multi-chapter fic is that it’s hard to keep the motivation to keep writing each chapter. You write one chapter and then put the story to the side for a few days, and suddenly, you keep making excuses about why you don’t want to write the next chapter. To be fair, this can also happen with a basic one-shot, but yeah, tis the life of a writer. Don’t be discouraged if it happens to you. Trust me, it will at some point. 

Character POV

Listen, I love writing in first person. In other fandoms, I used to write a lot of my stories in first person POV. I’ve got some bad news for you, though. Generally, people don’t like to read fanfics that are in first person POV. They just don’t. Nowadays, even I tend to skip over stories that are written in first person POV. 

Third person POV is going to be your best friend. Get comfortable writing it. 

Admittedly, sometimes it’s easier for me to grasp a character’s voice if I first write the story in first person POV. I then go back and change all the “I’s” and “me’s” to he, his, her, hers, etc. That’s just a little trick I do sometimes if I’m having a hard time getting a story started. 

Characterization

If you’re not 100% sure how to write a specific character, try and figure out a few facts about them. Like if you want to write Dick then think about some key qualities of his. Sprinkle those traits throughout the story to make the character sound more authentic. 

For example, I know Dick doesn’t like cucumber sandwiches. Sometimes I’ll have him or other characters mention this in the story. I also know Dick can struggle with perfectionism. I can make that something he has to struggle with in the story. It doesn’t have to be what the whole story revolves around, but if I just throw in some things here and there about how Dick is mad at himself for failing about something then that makes him feel more in character. 

Character Interactions

At first, writing multiple characters interacting at once can be really difficult. It can fuck up the pacing of your story, it can be hard to insert each character enough to make sure they aren’t ignored, and it can be hard to make sure each character is getting a chance to speak. 

If you find yourself struggling with this, try and just stick to two characters at first. Once you’re comfortable writing a conversation between them, try adding in another character. And another. And another. 

The more you practice, the more you’ll be able to write multiple characters interacting in a scene in a way that feels more natural and realistic. 

Genres and Tropes

When it comes to figuring out what you want to write about, you need to know what kind of content your audience wants. For example, fantasy niches (fairies, vampires, etc.) can be harder to “sell” in this particular fandom. There are people like myself who enjoy those niches, but just know that they may not be the most popular niches within this specific fandom. 

What are some niches that the majority of fandoms do like? Hurt/comfort, sick fics, whump, fluff. Those kinds of fics are always in demand. People love it when their favs get hurt. People love it when other characters worry about their favs. People love it when their favs get hurt while protecting others. People love it when their favs are getting along and being affectionate with one another. 

Go on AO3 and sort the fics in this fandom by “most comments” or “most kudos.” Now look at the most popular fics that come up and look at the tags they use. See what kinds of things those authors are writing about. Read their summaries and try to get an idea of what the stories are about. 

Once you get an idea of which kind of genres and tropes are most popular, try and write a story that includes those genres/tropes. People will be more likely to read stories that have tropes they usually like to read about. 

Now, of course, you can also just write whatever the hell you want without trying to appeal to your audience. This is what I do a lot of the time. Turns out that the things I like to write about tend to fall more in line with the tropes that are already popular in this fandom. 

Spelling and Grammar

People really hate to read stories that have tons and tons of spelling and grammar mistakes. Make sure before you post anything, you put your story in Word or Grammarly (I use the free version) to check for spelling, grammar, and punctuation mistakes. Trust me, your readers will thank you for it.

Practice, Practice, Practice

I’ve been writing creative stories since I was 11 years old. The stories I wrote back then are absolutely shit compared to the stories I write now. So please don’t get discouraged if you write a story and you don’t feel like it’s very good. 

Keep trying! Just like with anything else, the more you do it, the better you’ll be at it. There are so many things you’ll learn as you continue to write. Seriously, just recently, I realized I wasn’t always putting a comma in my compound sentences to break up the independent clauses. But hey, hey, now I know. 

Pacing, characterization, and plot are also things that will improve the more you write. Writing drabbles (stories with maybe just a few hundred words) will help with this. It will help you learn to choose the most important scene or dialogue and write it in an impactful, emotional, and compelling way. 

Okay, class is dismissed! If you have any other questions then feel free to send me another ask! 

[paulfwesley]

Crash (Ethan Ramsey x MC)

Pairing: Ethan Ramsey x f!MC (Dr. Claire King).

Chapter Rating: T

Word Count: 6000+

Description: There’s been an accident. Will they make it? 

Disclaimer: Characters, storyline, and parts of the dialogue are taken from Pixelberry’s Choices’ Open Heart. They fully own the characters, dialogue, backgrounds, etc. MC Claire King’s background is my own creation, based off of MC in-game’s personality.

Author’s Note: ALRIGHT this is the fic that I was thinking when y’all encouraged me to write it, so PLEASE don’t let this flop lmao. Please leave comments and let me know what you think!! 

I’m tagging the people who told me to write it so y’all can see it!! 

Tag list: @silverlitskies, @lifeof-liv, @northschild,  @xxdangerouscapri15xx

Enjoy!!

Smoke.

It was the first thing Claire King could sense. Her head was pounding, her vision was spotty, and she couldn’t feel her right leg, but the only thing she could focus on was the smoke she was choking on. She deeply inhaled which led to a coughing fit. All of her years of training caused her to instinctively bring the crook of her elbow to cover her mouth, and her pulse skyrocketed when she saw the back of her hand swathed in bright crimson. 

She blinked blearily but finally brought herself back into focus. She was laying sprawled against the dirty, snow covered road. The chill of the late February air seeped into her body, replacing the warmth in her veins. She craned her neck to see the remains of their damaged car laying on its side, and the severely damaged front of the truck that must’ve hit them. 

Mass Kenmore was understaffed, so they called Edenbrook to ask to borrow a few residents. Naveen thought it would be a great idea (only because he wanted to simmer the rivalry between the two hospitals) so he sent Sienna, Elijah, Aurora, and Claire. Claire didn’t really want to go; she had been upset because she and Ethan had shared another “moment” at the hospital after Claire had gotten upset over a patient. The hurt and rejection made her think that  maybe some distance would do her some good, so she got into Sienna’s car with her friends. But the roads were so slippery, and the truck came out of nowhere. They didn’t see it coming. 

Claire coughed, blood rising into her throat. She swiped the combination of blood and saliva from her mouth before pressing her hands to the glass covered ground. She winced at the tiny cuts in her hands, but she pushed. Her arms shook from the effort, but she managed to get herself in a sitting position. She leaned back against the severed door, trying not to pass out again. 

She was too scared to look at her leg but she had to pull the bandage off. She quickly glanced over at it, and relief flooded her when she just saw a large piece of windshield sticking out of her thigh. This she could work with. 

Her heartbeat quickened when she remembered about her friends. “Sienna!” she called out, her voice cracking. She cleared her throat and tried again. “Rory! Elijah!” 

Her chest stuttered when she didn’t immediately hear a response back, but she heard a weak, “Claire?” coming from where the car was. It was dark, but when she squinted, Claire could see Sienna laying with half of her body on top of the hood of the car and half still in. The car was upside down, so she was sprawled awkwardly through the ruined windshield, glass surrounding her body like a halo. 

She glanced back down at the glass in her leg. It wasn’t that big, and it also wasn’t that deep. Biting her lip, she took her scarf off and wrapped it tightly around the glass. It was going to be hard walking around with it in her leg, but she didn’t want to risk bleeding out when her friends might be in even worse shape. She grabbed onto the discarded door and hauled herself to her feet. She leaned heavily on her good leg, but she still had good motion in her bad leg. Slowly, she limped over to the smoking car. “Sienna!” she called out weakly.

Claire practically collapsed against the hood when she got to Sienna. “Are you okay?” she asked. She immediately began to examine her friend. Deep gash in her head, blood mostly dried but still trickling out and sliding down her face. Bruises bloomed on her skin. When Claire got closer, her stomach dropped when she recognized the windshield wiper sticking out of Sienna’s side. It must’ve gone through her abdomen. 

At the horrified look on her face, Sienna said through gritted teeth, “How...bad… is it?”

Claire swallowed thickly. “It’s… bad,” she finally allowed. “But you’re going to be okay. We’re going to be fine. Just… don’t move.” 

Without tilting her head, Sienna’s eyes went to the top of Claire’s face. “You’re bleeding.”

“Huh?” Claire’s hand went to her forehead and came back sticky with blood. She ran her arm along the wound, spreading more of the blood on her face. “I’ll be fine. Do you know where the others are?”

Sienna weakly pointed her finger to the back of the car. “I think they’re still in the car.”

Claire rounded the car and gasped when she saw Aurora crushed underneath, the weight pressing down into her chest. Blood crusted her lips and stained her clothes, but she still had a weak smile on her face. “Are you… okay?” Aurora choked, her hand twitching. As her chest moved, blood pooled backwards into the hollow of her throat.

Claire fell to her knees in the slush. “I’ll be fine, but we’ve got to get you out!”

Aurora’s hand flopped against the seat. “Elijah too,” she croaked. “He’s still in the car.”

Claire crawled forward and leaned over Aurora to see that Elijah was indeed still in the car. He was still unconscious and also had cuts on his face from where the broken glass had sliced him, but he looked otherwise okay. No obvious injuries or foreign objects stuck in him. “Can you check his pulse?” she asked Aurora. “I can’t reach him from this side and I won’t be able to reach him from the top.”

With a loud groan, Aurora stretched her arm out as far as she could. Elijah’s arm was close enough for her to touch, and she rested two of her fingers against the inside of his wrist. “It’s there,” she finally said, and relief flooded Claire. “It’s not strong but it’s not weak either.”

That was better than nothing. Claire dragged herself back out of the car. As she did, her eyes went to the damaged truck still tilted on the side. “I’m going to go check on the other driver. I’ll be right back, okay?” At the last second, she stripped off her jacket and laid it across Aurora’s chest. “Everything’s going to be okay.”

The cold bit bitterly into Claire’s arms, snaking under her scrubs and grabbing her in a vice grip, but she tried her best to ignore it as she limped her way over to the truck. Her legs buckled with each step and her lungs screamed for rest, but she didn’t stop until she was at the driver’s side. 

The entire truck had crashed on its side, and the driver was still buckled in his seat. He was unconscious, so Claire stuck her fingers through the shattered window and rested them on his neck. His pulse was weak but it was still there. She slapped the man’s face a few times, and he groaned. Blinking hard, his eyes struggled to focus on Claire. “Wha-what-”

“It’s going to be okay,” she immediately said, her doctor training kicking in. “We’ve been in an accident. Can you tell me your name?”

“Ah-Ahmed,” he managed. “My name is Ahmed.”

“Nice to meet you Ahmed, I’m Claire,” she introduced. She rested a hand on her chest. “I’m a doctor, but I can’t see you very well in the dark and I don’t want to move you. Can you tell me where you’re hurt?”

“My… my legs…” he grumbled. “I can’t feel my legs.”

Claire peeked through the window, but she growled. She could barely see through the darkness. She reached through the window. “Sorry about this,” she said before she started tapping his pants. It wasn’t cold or wet from the snow, but it did feel sticky and warm. 

Damn it. That meant blood. A brilliant idea crossed her mind, and she felt her pockets for her phone. She pulled it out and groaned when she recognized the spiderwebs of a cracked screen. She ran her finger on the screen, but it wouldn’t move. She wouldn’t be able to make a call with it, but after a few tries she finally managed to turn on the flashlight. She shined it on the driver’s lap, and her breath hitched when she saw that the front of the truck had been crushed backwards into his legs. 

Ahmed looked up at Claire’s face and his eyes darkened. “What? What is it?”

Claire glanced back down at Ahmed’s terrified face. “Look, just don’t move, okay?” she advised. “Do you have a phone I can call for help with?”

“It’s in my bag,” he murmured, lazily lifting a hand and pointing to the back of the car. “But I don’t think you can reach it.”

“Damn it,” she growled. She looked back over at the car where her friends were incapacitated. She turned back to Ahmed. “Okay, I’m going to go find a phone.”

“No!” he protested. He reached a hand out and clutched Claire’s tightly, almost cutting off her circulation. “Don’t leave me, please…” His eyes shined, his lower lip wobbling. “I don’t want to be alone.”

Claire reluctantly pried his fingers off of hers. “If I stay here, I can’t call for help,” she gently reminded him. “No one knows that we’ve been in an accident, we’re in the middle of nowhere, and we’re all injured. I need to go make the phone call.” She gripped his shoulder. “But you need to stay awake, okay? No matter how cold you are, no matter how tired you are, no matter how tempting it is, stay awake.” Her eyes wandered to the space beside him, and her eyes brightened when she recognized a blanket. She dove for it and draped it over Ahmed. “There. Try to stay warm. I’ll be back to check on you, okay?” 

He reluctantly nodded, and Claire made her way slowly back to the car. She bent a little so she was eye-level with Sienna. “Do you have your phone?” 

“I accidentally forgot it at home today,” she said, her voice barely above a whisper. She spoke the words slowly, one at a time. Her eyes fluttered shut before snapping back open several times. “We… we were late this morning… “

Claire clapped her hands in front of Sienna’s face, and Sienna’s eyes widened. “I’m sorry that was abrupt, but you need to stay awake,” she informed her friend. “No sleeping.”

“Right.” Sienna nodded weakly. “Awa...awake…”

Reluctantly, Claire moved on to Aurora. “Where’s your phone?” 

“Po-pocket…” she chattered, her teeth clicking loudly. 

Claire carefully reached into Aurora’s pocket and pulled her phone out, but like hers, it had been crushed. She managed to open it and get it to the call screen, but there was no signal. Claire raised the phone as high in the air as she could, but still nothing. She almost threw the phone on the ground in her frustration but refrained from breaking someone else’s phone. 

Now that she wasn’t working, her leg’s scream for rest hit her full blast, and she finally obliged by slipping to the ground. She sat down next to Aurora, resting her back against the car and sucking in deep, cold breaths. “We’re going to be okay,” she whispered, her voice carried along the strong wind. The cold nipped at her nose, turning the tip red and making her nose runny. “We’re going to be okay…” 

“How?” Aurora said through gritted teeth. “No one knows we’re here.”

But he did. And Claire knew that as soon as he realized something was wrong, he’d find them. He’d find her. Just like he always did. 

                                                           ***

Dr. Ethan Ramsey was good at a lot of things. 

Practicing medicine. Scolding interns when they were being stupid. Keeping a cool head in stressful situations. But man, was he bad at lying to himself. 

Two months. Two months he had spent in the Amazon to get away from her, but they hadn’t been worth a damn. Because the minute he saw Dr. Claire King sitting in Donahue's, her long blonde hair in a ponytail and showing off her breathtaking face, he knew that he was in far too deep. 

Since his return a few months ago, there had been stolen glances. Hand brushes. Near kisses. But through it all he told himself that it was all strictly professional. The glances were just him checking to make sure she was keeping up with the discussion on the diagnostics team. The hand brushes were ways to reassure her that she was doing well. The near kisses… okay, he had no excuse for those. They were moments of weakness, moments that he always caught before they could go any further. 

Of all the lies Ethan told himself, there was always one thing that rang true: he cared about Claire, and if he truly meant that, he would steer clear of her. He spoke to her only when professionally necessary. He kept a respectable distance between them whenever they did speak. He ignored the spark that spread up his arm whenever their fingers touched when sharing a patient file. 

 Of course, then there were times where he would round the corner and see Claire laughing at something the surfer-looking surgical resident was saying, the sound so incredible that he couldn’t help but wish that it was him making her smile like that. There were times where he would catch her looking at him as if she wanted nothing more than for him to gather her in his arms and kiss her senseless. And if Ethan was being perfectly honest, he looked at her like that too. 

God, he didn’t want to look at her like that. He ran away to the freaking jungle so he wouldn’t want to look at her like that anymore. But one glance at her face, one laugh from her voice, one whiff of her perfume turned him into a lovesick idiot. Which he wasn’t. He wasn’t.

He was still bad at lying to himself. 

Then today happened. Today was one of his weak days. She had worn a skirt to work despite the February chill, and the sight of her long bare less were enough to make him turn and walk away from her the minute he laid eyes on her, because if he had spoken to her nothing would’ve stopped him from pulling her into a nearby supply closet and taking her right there. 

But they still had to work together. The patient that day had been particularly bad for Claire; an eight year old girl. Claire said once that she always hated working with kids, because her heart always broke for them. This particular girl had brainstem glioma, a highly aggressive brain tumor that didn’t have the best survival rate. Claire had been all smiles for the little girl, who was tired and sick but obviously happy with the games that Claire had played with her during her check up on her. But as soon as Claire stepped outside of the patient’s room she excused herself, going down the hall and disappearing around the corner.

Despite his better judgment, Ethan followed her. He eventually found her in a supply closet, hiding behind a large shelf and huddled on the ground. When he opened the door, she abruptly snapped her head up from where she had buried her face in her knees, her eyes bloodshot and tears staining her cheeks. She sniffled loudly and wiped at her face. “I thought I locked the door,” she croaked. 

“That’s why you always double check,” Ethan said, trying to make light of the situation. As he shut the door behind him, he caught the smallest smile tugging at the corner of her lips, and he counted that as a win. He slowly came and sat down next to her. “How are you holding up?”

“She’s just…” Claire hiccuped, rubbing at her eyes again. The makeup that she must’ve so carefully applied that morning was now ruined, smeared all over her face. “Jeannie’s so young. It’s not fair.” She ran her hands through her hair, her fingers getting tangled. “And I know, I know we can’t attach ourselves to our patients for this exact reason, but I can’t help it. All I see when I look at her is a future she most likely won’t get to have. And sometimes I just can’t help but wonder what I’m doing here. If we’re all going to just die anyways, why prolong it? Why prolong the pain? Why make it so much worse?” 

“Rookie…” Ethan sighed, and the use of his old nickname for her made her look up at him. He reached a hand up and gently brushed his knuckles against her tear stained cheek. “Getting attached to patients isn’t always a bad thing. It can drive you to want to be better to help them. And you wouldn’t be human if you didn’t feel bad for them. But you can’t let that pain wear you down. You need to spin it into something that will inspire you to help them, and help others.”

Claire had sat silent through his whole speech, and then she cautiously leaned over and rested her head against his shoulder. He visibly tensed, and he should have moved away, but like a coward, he didn’t. He let her keep her head there, moving ever so slightly towards the crook of his neck, her nose brushing against his collar. Her eyes were tightly closed, her lower lip wobbling.

 He swallowed the lump in his throat and tried not to deeply inhale the scent of her jasmine perfume. “As doctors…” he started, his voice slightly raspy. “We always have to remember that there are just some people that we can’t save. But we can’t let those people deter us from wanting to save the ones we can. And it’s true; we all die, and the work we do here is just fighting the inevitable.” He glanced down at her, and when he did he realized that her brilliant blue eyes were trained entirely on him, hanging onto his every last word. “But we get to help people decide how they want to fight. We give them the one thing diseases and accidents always take from them: a choice.” 

Claire’s body slightly shook against his own. She moved even closer to him, so close that her lips brushed the sharp stubble of his jaw. If he turned his face, he’d be kissing her. He just had to turn his face a bit. He just had to… 

He cleared his throat and pulled away from her. Every nerve in his body screamed at him for doing so, but he just focused on the voice in the back of his head saying, You’re doing this for her. You’re doing this for her. “We should probably get back to work,” he said, not looking at her. 

He got to his feet and offered her a hand. He finally looked down at her, and his throat tightened when he saw the mask she had drawn over her face to hide the hurt. It was one he recognized well; he couldn’t count the amount of times he’d seen it on her face whenever he gave into his weakness and shared a moment with her. 

This had to stop. He was doing more harm than good to her at this point. “I overheard Naveen saying they needed some more hands at Mass Kenmore in the hall,” he said, his hand still awkwardly hanging in the air. “Maybe a little bit of distance will make you feel better.” 

It would also make him feel better, but he wouldn’t say that out loud. As if any amount of distance from her would do him any good. Two months in the Amazon proved that. 

Claire quietly sniffled but she ignored his outstretched hand and hauled herself to her feet. “Great, I’ll look into it,” she said, her tone guarded and closed off. She kept her face cold and even as she brushed past him, walking out of the closet and not looking back once. The door clicked shut, the sound echoing loudly against the walls of the tiny room. 

This is what you wanted, Ethan repeated to himself. But as he watched her go, her back stiff but her shoulders shaking from concealed tears, he couldn’t help but think that this was also exactly what he deserved. 

                                                           ***

Exhaustion was starting to settle deeply in Claire’s bones. She had gone to check on Ahmed twice, but the pain in her leg grew so steadily unbearable that she knew she didn’t have the energy to get back up again. So she settled for calling to him every so often, relieved when she got a weak call back. 

Her eyes drooped heavily, and just as she let her chin dip forehead she caught herself, pulling her head back up. She blinked hard several times and slapped her cheeks. “Come on Claire,” she whispered to herself. “You have to stay awake.” Looking down at Aurora, she put her hand on her friend’s shoulder and gave her a good shake. “No sleeping!” 

Aurora lazily blinked. “I’m not sleeping, so get your hand off of me,” she said. 

Claire pulled her hand away “If you’re snarking at least I know you’re okay.”

Aurora smiled a bit but it took too much energy. Her lips relaxed as she stared up at the starry sky. “I’m trying to stay awake by counting the stars. You usually can’t see them in the city.” 

“At least you have stars to count,” Elijah, who had woken up some time ago, called from his spot in the car. “The only thing I’m counting are the pieces of glass in the car.” 

“At least there are more of those,” Aurora pointed out. 

“Aurora?” Sienna called weakly from her spot on the car. “You know your peanut butter cookies?”

“You mean the ones from the bakery across town?” Aurora clarified.

“I did eat them,” Sienna sheepishly admitted. “I was up so late studying, but I was too exhausted to get up and bake myself, and I just saw them there and I--”

“I knew it!” Aurora exclaimed. Despite the pain she was in, the validation of knowing she was right was like an adrenaline shot. 

“Also, Claire, it was my turn to do the laundry this week,” Elijah added. Claire frowned and looked down at the direction of his voice. “But I was so engrossed in my episode of Battlestar Galactica that I didn’t want to get up.”

“What is this?” Claire asked, looking between her roommates. “Are we all just confessing our sins?”

“If we’re going to die out here, I want to die with a clean conscious,” Sienna explained. Her words were sluggish and slow but she got them out one by one.

“Same here,” Elijah said. 

Claire rolled her eyes and wrapped her arms tighter around herself, sticking her hands underneath her armpits. “Listen guys, no one is dying. Doctor Banerji or someone at Mass Kenmore is going to realize that we never made it there and will call for help. We’re going to be okay.” 

“I was the one who broke the iron,” Aurora suddenly spoke up. “I just blamed it on Bryce, and he’s always breaking stuff in our apartment so he just assumed he had broken it too.” 

“Aurora!” Claire scolded, looking down at her. “What did I just say?”

Sienna weakly tapped her fingers against Claire’s cold shoulder. “Your turn. Confess something. You don’t want to die with secrets, do you?” 

Claire was sure they weren’t going to die at all. But there was a tiny, tiny doubt tugging at the back of her mind that they wouldn’t be found. They’d all bleed out or freeze to death, whichever came first. And no one would know. No one would know how she felt. She leaned her head back against the car, staring up at the black sky. Tiny snowflakes fell down to the ground in flurries, disappearing as soon as they touched her. They reminded her so much of Ethan; how he always came to her and then shut down whenever they touched. So much, in fact, that when she thought of a confession, her words were slipping past her lips before she could stop them. “I’m in love with Ethan Ramsey.” 

“What?” Aurora practically bellowed before dissolving into a coughing fit. 

Sienna ignored Aurora’s incredulation. “Uh, Claire? That’s not exactly a secret.” 

“What do you mean?” Aurora questioned. “It’s a secret to me. Did you know?”

“Yeah,” Sienna said.

Elijah waved his hand. “I knew too.”

“How?” Aurora wondered. 

Claire winced, picking at the dried blood under her fingernails. “They may have caught me… sneaking Ethan out of our apartment.” She looked over her shoulder at Sienna. “And it is a secret. It’s a secret I’ve kept from the hospital, from you guys, from Ethan himself.” She looked back up at the sky. “And I think it’s a secret I even kept from myself.” Her voice grew hoarse with unshed tears. “Because I think if I really let myself feel the extent of how much I love him, I would never be able to be in the same room as him. And I think… I think being away from him is so much worse than being with him. Those two months he was in the Amazon… all I could do was think about him. If he was safe. If he was healthy. If he was thinking about me.” The corner of her eyes turned warm, and she wiped at the tear that escaped. “And every time I take one step forward with him, I know it always comes with two steps back. But I would rather step back if it meant that I was still getting close to him.” She sniffled deeply and hung her head. 

After a few silent moments, Elijah spoke up. “That… really sucks.” 

Claire chuckled despite her tears. She curled her knees into her chest. “Tell me about it.” 

                                                             ***

Ethan had been walking down the hall when he saw Naveen and Harper huddled at the nurses’ station. Now, there was nothing out of the ordinary about that, but the concerned looks on their faces made him turn his feet so he walked towards them. 

“And you’re absolutely sure?” Naveen asked the redheaded nurse sitting at the table.

The nurse nodded. “They said they called their personal phones but no answer,” he explained. “That’s when they called us.”

“Shit,” Harper cursed under her breath, bringing her clenched fist to her mouth.

“What’s wrong?” Ethan asked, coming to a stop behind them. 

Harper and Naveen both immediately exchanged worried looks between them. “Nothing,” Harper insisted. “Everything’s fine.”

“Don’t take me for a fool, Harper,” Ethan said. He crossed his arms over his chest. “Who called us?”

He looked to Naveen. They were more family than colleagues, and Ethan hoped that their closer relationship would mean that he would tell him what was going on. 

At first Naveen wouldn’t meet his eyes, but after a few seconds he sighed and relaxed against the counter. “Okay, but you have to keep calm-” He held his hands out to Ethan. 

“Why wouldn’t I keep calm?” Ethan asked, perplexed. Why was Naveen pushing this off? 

Naveen lowered his hands. “Because the car with our residents never made it to Mass Kenmore.”

As soon as the words left Naveen’s lips Ethan was spinning on his heel and running for the parking lot. He ran into other doctors as he sprinted down the hall, but he didn’t care. He needed to get to Claire. 

                                                              ***

Two hundred and twenty… nine? Was it twenty-nine? Claire really didn’t want to start recounting the stars again and her head was killing her, but if it was what was keeping her awake, she’d do it. 

“I can’t stop thinking about you banging Dr. Ramsey,” Aurora murmured as her eyes drooped. “You know he dated my Aunt Harper, right?”

Claire grimaced, recalling the conversation she had with Ethan in his car when they went to get the little stuffed frog for Dolores’ son. “I don’t need that reminder.”

Aurora tilted her head to the side. “You know what? This actually… kinda makes sense now.”

“What does?” Elijah asked. 

“Well, Aunt Harper mentioned that one of the things she was looking forward to after going back to being head of Neurosurgery was resuming her relationship with Dr. Ramsey,” Aurora revealed. “She said one of the reasons they broke up was because she became his boss. After she was no longer his boss, she tried getting back together with him, but he said no. I guess it makes sense that he said no because he was already with you.”

“Okay, first of all, we only slept together after he quit and I was suspended, both things that happened before Dr. Emery stepped down,” Claire pointed out. “We weren’t together after we came back to work. But…” Claire bit her lip, trying not to smile.

“But it’s cute that he still loves you so much he didn’t want to be with anyone else,” Sienna finished, a hysterical giggling erupting from her chest. 

“That’s not what I was going to say,” Claire said, but the smile wouldn’t leave her face. She had to remind herself that it still meant nothing could happen between them. Ethan was too damn stubborn, a trait she loved but also hated about him. She just hoped that his stubbornness would save them. 

                                                             ***

Ethan didn’t even wait to hear any other information. He slid into his car and roared it to life. Not even bothering to waste time to turn on the heat, he pushed on the gas pedal and left the parking lot. 

She could be fine. She was fine. Just because they hadn’t heard from her didn’t mean something bad had happened. He tried to shove the memory of Naveen’s face aside as he had to break the news to him. Naveen didn’t exactly know what had transpired between Claire and himself during her intern year, but he clearly knew enough to realize that if Ethan had even gotten the slightest impression that Claire could be hurt he’d lose it. And he was right. 

He kept replaying their last conversation in their head. Looking at her beautiful, tear stained face. The smell of her perfume sticking to his clothes as she rested her head on his shoulder. The warmth of her breath against his neck. Watching her sad face turn into one of stone from his cold rejection. Watching her stand up on her own, leaving his hand hanging there. Her stiff back as she stomped out of the room. The way he immediately missed her presence as soon as she was gone.

And that was when he remembered one crucial detail, and the revelation made him nearly swerve on the road.

He was the one that told her about the Mass Kenmore switch. And if he knew her as well as he thought he did, she had taken the position to get away from him. If anything had happened to her, it was his fault. 

And he’d never forgive himself. 

                                                            ***

St-stay… aw-awake… 

Claire repeated the mantra out loud to herself at first, until her lips were shaking too hard, turning blue. Her body had slipped from its position on the car to crashing to the ground, and she couldn’t find the energy to get back up. So she continued to lay there, teeth chattering and then stopping, whispering to herself, until she finally lost the energy to speak. Then she just turned the words over and over in her head. 

She wasn’t going to die here. She wasn’t going to die here. Ethan would find her. He would find her. 

But really… how sure was she? Sometimes she thought she saw the same flicker in his eyes from her intern year. The pride whenever she outsmarted him. The laughter when she did something to amuse him. The tenderness from when they first kissed in Miami… 

But in the next blink the look was gone, replaced by the professional stare of an employer, and Claire was left wondering if she had really seen it or if it was just her mind playing a cruel joke on her. 

She came to Edenbrook to learn from the Doctor Ethan Ramsey, the greatest diagnostician in the country. She didn’t expect to fall in love with just Ethan, the guy who liked to go to the opera and read historical non-fiction to relax.

She just didn’t know if he loved her too. Every time he got close to saying something similar to it, he would always change the subject. She didn’t want to die not knowing if Ethan loved her. And she didn’t want to die without Ethan also knowing how she felt. But with each cold, slow, passing second, her hope withered, freezing from the bitter cold that settled into her. 

Her eyes were getting heavier and heavier. Each time she blinked it was much harder to open her eyes again. She looked up at Sienna, whose eyes were closed. She glanced at Aurora, who wasn’t moving. She couldn’t see Elijah from her spot, but judging by the silence everyone was either asleep or didn’t have the energy to speak anymore. 

Maybe she should sleep too. Just for a few minutes. A few minutes couldn’t hurt, right? Just as her eyes fluttered, she breathed, “Ethan…”, and let the winds carry away her voice. 

Before her eyes could close, the earth rumbled under her. What was that? Where was that coming from? 

Ignoring the agonizing pain, Claire pushed herself into a sitting position. She let out a loud cry, but kept going until she had pulled herself to her feet. She side stepped towards the road, and her eyes blinked against the harsh yellow of headlights. Her eyes widened in relief and she waved her arm frantically. She could barely speak from the cold, and her arm felt like it weighed a ton, but she couldn’t give up. She wasn’t a quitter. 

                                                           ***

Ethan rammed his foot against the brake, and the car had barely skidded to a stop before he was pulling off his seatbelt and jumping out of the car. 

There she stood. She was pale, drenched with snow, covered in blood, a large piece of glass was stuck in her leg and she looked utterly exhausted, but there she was. Claire.

Claire’s mouth turned up into a slight smile. “E--Ethan,” she said, and without warning, her smile dropped. Her eyes rolled into the back of her head, and she collapsed, her body hitting the cold, unforgiving ground.

His feet were moving before he could even think. “No!” he cried out, catching her just as her knees hit the ground. “Claire? Claire! Wake up!” he pushed her hair out of her but her eyes were still shut. 

No… No… Claire… 

                                                         ***

The sound of machines beeping creeped into her ear, and Claire’s face scrunched up. Slowly, she opened her eyes and gazed around the room. 

Thankfully she was in a hospital room. An IV was attached to her right hand, and she was covered in layers of blankets. Her hand felt extra warm, though, and when she looked down at it she was shocked to see her fingers entangled with none other than Ethan Ramsey, whose body was hunched on top of her bed. His even breathing suggested he was lightly dozing. 

Carefully, Claire removed her fingers from his, but she ran a hand through his soft, thick hair. At the movement, Ethan stirred, and then he quickly sat up. He grabbed her hand, twining their fingers and bringing the back of her hand to his lips. “Thank God,” he murmured against her skin. 

“How did I get here?” Claire asked, her voice hoarse from extended disuse. “The last thing I remember is seeing you in the road.”

“I called for an ambulance,” he answered. He still held onto her hand. “The signal was bad but I just managed to get through to someone.” He sighed and brought their tangled hands to his mouth again. “I… I thought I…”

Claire swallowed thickly. “Me too,” she whispered. 

Ethan abruptly looked up at her, his eyes bright and intense. “I love you, Claire.”

Claire’s stomach swooped. “What?” 

“I love you so much I can’t breathe,” Ethan continued, gaining momentum with each word. “You’re the first face I think of when I wake up, and the last when I go to bed. Every time I turn a corner I hope that you’re standing there. Your laughter is the best sound I’ve ever heard, your mind the most beautiful. And when I heard that you couldn’t be found, and when I saw you fall…” He cut himself off, too choked up to continue. “For a terrifying second, I thought I’d lost you. And it was only then did I realize how stupid I was being. To hell with ethics. To hell with responsibility. I love you, Claire, and I want to be with you.”

His words made her chest tighten and her stomach clench. She sat up the best she could, and she rested her hand on his cheek, letting his stubble scratch her fingers. “I love you too, Ethan,” she said, and the grin on his face at her words was the most beautiful thing she’d ever seen. “When I was out there, all I could think about was that I was going to die without you knowing, and without knowing if you loved me back. That was what was keeping me going--seeing you again.”

“Well, rest assured, my word vomit certainly proved otherwise,” he said, the tips of his ears turning bright pink. 

She giggled, and when Ethan leaned forward and pressed his lips softly to hers, she was sure she had died and gone to heaven. 

He pulled away after a long beat and rested his forehead on hers. “I’m so sorry I even suggested that you should go to Mass Kenmore,” he said. “If something really bad had happened to you…”

Claire gasped. The excitement of pouring out their feelings momentarily made her forget. “What about my friends? Are they okay?!”

“Elijah’s fine,” Ethan reported. “And so is Sienna, but Aurora’s still in surgery to fix the internal bleeding. The surgeons are hopeful, though.”

Claire deflated, leaning into Ethan. He reached up and cupped the back of her neck, circling his thumbs on the soft skin there. Claire rested her hands on his shoulders, clenching her fists around his white coat. “So where do we go from here?” she whispered. 

Ethan smiled. “Wherever we want, Claire. Wherever we want.”  

[a-cat-in-a-funky-hat]

Ok listen up y’all, strap yourselves in and sit back because I will now teach you a few lessons in creative writing

1. This might seem obvious but I’ll say it again because some people just need to hear it: KEEP WRITING. KEEP PRACTICING. It literally doesn’t matter how fucking bad it is or whether it’s your original work or a Gandalf x Obama fic, just W R I T E

2. Here’s sort of an ‘order’ in which I write my stories:

First draft. Forget every single rule of writing ever. Grammar? Out of the window. Sentence structure? Fucking unimportant. Physical descriptions? This is not the place. Setting the scene? L a t e r. Write the basic plot down that’s literally it (Just fyi, I do actually pay attention to that in my first draft, because I’m a fucking perfectionist and I try to take some work off the editing process this way but you literally just have to write the very basic plot out).

Time for physical descriptions of character and setting scenes. You can already pay attention to grammar and sentence structure, but you totally don’t have to, that’s what the next steps are for

REWRITE. Just pull up an entirely new document and rewrite your entire story; make it 120% better. I know this seems like a lot of work but it’s honestly so much better than just changing parts of your first draft. This is honestly the best writing advice I ever got, I’m not even kidding. In this step you should start paying attention to grammar, sentence structure etc. It’s important to think about how you want to make your sentences sound. Decide when it’s best to use long sentences, short sentences or a mix of both. Word flow is also important. You have to really think about the effect your sentences have. I also like to play with formatting but that’s another story altogether right now.

Edit the shit out of it. You are going to have to re-read your writing several times and that can take a long time, so plan ahead that editing will most likely take up most time. If there are scenes you’re not 100% satisfied with then change them up until you are. If there are any inconsistencies then get them out of the way. Once again, pay attention to sentence structure & word flow.

Final edit. Make little adjustments until your properly satisfied.

Boom there you go, bomb story.

3. Know that not all of your work is going to be great. Especially when it comes to older works. I myself am cringing myself to outer space and back when I read stuff just from even two years ago.

4. Learn some grammer rules. What I especially struggle with is dialogues and how to properly write them so they are gramatically correct. I try not to put too much thought in when I write my first draft. Another thing: don’t forget to hit enter when the scene changes, no one wants to read a huge block of text, interest is lost. That was something I used to do until like two years ago and my writing has greatly improved by simply doing that. Also hit enter whenever a new person is speaking, I also used to do that wrong.

5. Read. Reading other people’s writing can greatly increase the quality of your own if you pay attention to what they are doing. Now I’m not saying you have to immediately be on Stephen King or John Green level. But it will surely help.

6. Don’t worry too much about not being original. How many versions of the Hunger Games exist? Exactly, people are still gladly reading them.

That’s all I got for now, maybe I’ll add more if I come up with anything else :)

[commander-rahrah]

RESIDENCY: SECOND CHANCES (AN OPEN HEART FIC): PART TWO

Pairing: MC (Jordynne Holland) X Ethan Ramsey X Bryce Lahela; MC X Bryce; MC X Ethan. Please note that both pairings are present in this fan fiction — off & on, at the same times, and the relationships do ebb & flow. Please keep this in mind. Thank you.

Masterlist: Click Here

Chapter Rating: T (drinking, swearing)

Word Count: 5000+ (its a big one) 

Description: Bryce and Jordynne have time together to explore what everything happening between them means, since Ethan is away in the Amazon finding his own answers.

Disclaimer: Characters, storyline, and parts of the dialogue are taken from Pixelberry’s Choices. They fully own the characters, dialogue, backgrounds, etc. MC Jordynne’s background is my own creation, based loosely off of MC in-game’s personality and provided with more details.

Author’s Note: Well this took much longer than expected! With everything happening in the world, I found it harder and harder to take that personal time for myself to get away and write. But I eventually carved out time for it, and it felt nice to get back into the perspectives of Jordynne, Bryce and Ethan. This fic has a lot of little moments and memories from Book 1 (and fic 1) that can turn into big moments for these characters in the future <3

As always any likes, reblogs and comments are very appreciated. If you would like to be added/removed from the tag list please just let me know! I have always had issues with the tag list as well (people not receiving notifications) so if you do receive a notification if you could let me know that would be great! Or if you have any tips for why it wouldn’t be working? 

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Previous Updates: Residency — Part One Part Two Part Three Part Four Part Five Part Six Part Seven Part Eight Part Nine Part Ten Part Eleven Part Twelve Part Thirteen Part Fourteen Part Fifteen Part Sixteen Part Seventeen Part Eighteen Part Nineteen Part Twenty

Residency: Second Chances -- Part One

Chapter 2

The golden liquor coated her pink lips, turning them shiny. They pursed together, licking the excess off as she lowered the shot glass to the table with a loud bang.

The sound snapped Bryce back to reality — and he swallowed hard as she watched Jordynne throw her head back and laugh.

She was in full force tonight. Her big laugh echoing in the bar. Her perfect, wide smile drawing everyone in. Her wild, blonde hair being thrown over her shoulder.

Sometimes he wondered if she was really from this world.

“Let’s get more!” Her voice was much higher than usual — a good note that she was getting more and more intoxicated.

“C’mon Jordy, let’s pace ourselves.” He suggested, grabbing onto her wrist gently.

“Pace ourselves?! Do I look like a beginner to you? Come on!” She put out her bottom lip at him, looking up at him with giant puppy dog eyes.

It was like a punch to the gut — she could get whatever she wanted with that look. Dammit.

Before he could reply, Jackie came to the table with a tray of more shots and Jordynne greedily grabbed two of them.

“Whoa, Holland’s on a roll tonight,” Jackie said as she slid into the booth, passing out the remaining glasses.

“She’s on something.. that’s for sure,” Sienna said to them, a hand in front of her mouth.

At the sound of the next song coming on, she jumped onto her leather seat in the booth. “This song! This song!!”

He couldn’t even hear it over the crowd. But he couldn’t help but let out a chuckle at her excitement.

She crawled over Sienna and jumped out of the booth, landing with surprising dexterity for the amount of liquor she had consumed. “Come on dance with me.” She stretched her tan fingers over to him, “Please.”

“Okay,” He agreed — maybe a little too easily.

He grabbed onto her warm fingers, letting her pull him to the dance floor with surprising strength.  

He watched her jump up and down for a moment — her blonde hair flicking around wildly. He let out a laugh, before mimicking her movements — his tan arms raised above his head as they danced recklessly in the crowd.

She joined in with his laugh — flashing her white teeth at him in a brilliant smile. He gulped as she moved closer to him. He could still smell her, even in the old bar — orange blossoms, vanilla, and jasmine. He could get drunk off of that scent.

His heart fluttered as she grabbed onto him casually, pulling him into her to dance more closely. Bryce was suddenly overwhelmed being this close to her — he felt dizzy, and it wasn’t from the liquor.

Jordynne Holland was intoxicating. And addicting.

His dark eyes settled on her mouth, how much closer it was getting to his as she swayed in front of him.

“Jordy...” He breathed out, stepping away from her.

“What?” Her eyebrows furrowed slightly as she looked up at him — her green eyes fluttering. She stepped forward and carefully wrapped her arms around his neck. “I just wanna have some fun. You’re fun. You like fun. Remember fun?” Her pink lips stretched into a smile.

He felt his stomach twist and tug and flutter all at once.

Bryce so badly wanted to give in — to crash his lips onto hers, to hold her back. But he didn’t know where all of this was coming from. Things were still so messy — and right now, she was messy. There had to be something that caused it.

“I know — I just —,” He hesitantly put his hands on her waist, steadying her movements, “Are you sure, you’re okay?”

“I’ve never been better Bryce Lahela. Now dance with me.” She replied, tightening her hold on him as she pushed her body up against his.

_____________________________________________________________________

Ethan watched the light through his window dim as the plane flew into a series of clouds — the pages of his book in his lap suddenly becoming harder to read. 

Letting out a sigh, he put his head back on his headrest — leaning against it as he looked over his shoulder and out of the window.

He eyed the empty spot next to him — a placeholder for his leather bag this time. He tried hard to not go there — to think about the last time he was at the airport, on an airplane, who was with him. If he started down that road, it would make everything harder.

So he ignored the subtle reminder — repressing the memory and averting his eyes from the empty chair.

“Hi sir,” A brunette flight attendant pulled a cart up near his seat, “Due to the length of the flight you will be provided an in-flight meal. It will be arriving shortly. Would you like a beverage to go with it? Spirits? Wine?”   He gestured to the cart.

Ethan swallowed as he eyed it — the little bottles of alcohol clinking together as the flight attendant shifted the cart.

It was tempting. It could be another way to repress memories in the long flight. To calm any gears that started winding.

He cleared his throat, putting on a polite smile, “Can I actually just have a coffee?”

“Of course, sir.” He poured the hot beverage and carefully passed it to him. “I’ll be back with your meal.”

Ethan took a sip and grimaced slightly. It was terrible. And he had to force another thought down as he thought of who else would grin and bear it with him.

But it was just a coffee. He’ll get over this.

He can get over this. He could do this.

_____________________________________________________________________

The slightest crack of one of her eyes caused Jordynne to groan in pain. Her head was pounding — and even the little trickle of light coming through the blinds was killer.

Blinking over and over, she finally was able to open her green eyes fully. She was in her bedroom — how she got there? She wasn’t entirely sure.

The previous night was a blur. She remembered taking an uncertain amount of tequila shots and dancing. So much dancing — her feet were killing her.

Letting out another groan, she shifted onto her side but froze when she felt resistance next to her. Moving her head, her eyebrows raised as she saw Bryce laying next to her — sleeping soundly. He was still wearing his jeans and t-shirt — his arms folded around himself carefully as he slept on top of her white duvet.

Her eyebrows furrowed together — a deep line forming in her forehead. Now that she didn’t remember. Peaking under the duvet, she realized she was still wearing clothes — her boyfriend briefs and shirt were clinging to her body. Her mind started whirling as she attempted to connect the dots.

“Hey,” Bryce’s groggy voice whispered next to her, “You okay?”

She chewed on the inside of her cheek — praying that it was too dark in the room for him to see how embarrassed she looked, “I’m— I’m pretty rough.”

“I would imagine so. You consumed enough tequila to get you, me, and Sienna drunk.”

“Ugh.” She groaned.

“And I’m sure spending two hours on your bathroom floor probably didn’t help.” 

“Nooo...” Her face felt hot as it flushed with embarrassment.

He let out a quiet chuckle, “Oh yeah. Held your hair back and everything.”

She wasn’t sure if she had ever hated herself more then that moment. “Ugh, I’m so sorry Bryce.”

“Don’t be — I didn’t mind.” She gulped as she felt his practiced hand rub her shoulder.

“I’m sure that’s not what you signed up for when we decided to go out last night.”

“I mean, I went to hang out with you. And we did hang out..” His voice trailed off for a moment, “I just didn’t imagine it would be on your bathroom floor with your head hanging off your toilet.”

“Haha,” She hesitated for a moment, “Did we — Did I say anything? Or... I dunno, try anything?”

“Oh yeah,” He let out a little chuckle again, “Drunk Jordy is chaaaatty. And handsy.”

“Oh.”

“I didn’t — we didn’t do anything. You just tried to kiss me a couple of times.” He mumbled a little.

“I’m sorry.” She apologized again.

“People have done crazier things then try to kiss someone while drunk on Tequila.” He reassured.

“I know, I— But we never—“

He interrupted her, “S’okay Jordy.”

“Thanks for staying with me.” She whispered. And she meant it. As complicated as it was, she was glad Bryce was there. He was always there for her.

She felt the bed shift as he turned on his side to face her, “What kind of doctor would I be if I didn’t take care of you?”

“I live in a house full of doctors.” She could feel how close his face was to hers.

“Ha — right.” She could see his sheepish smile in the dim light. “I just needed to know you were okay.”

There was a beat of silence before he spoke again. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah, of course.” She lied — a little too easily.

“I just — I haven’t seen you like that before. You were drinking hard. Did something happen?”

She shook her head against the pillow, “I just wanted to let loose. Celebrate surviving my first week back. I just went a little bit too hard.”

“That’s the only reason?”

“Yeah.” She did her best to hide the lie, suppressing the memory of Ethan walking away in the parkade, “So what to do I gotta do to convince you to drag my ass out for some breakfast?”

“No convincing necessary.”

_______________________________________________________________________

 He fell into a routine a lot easier than he thought he would. The repetition was nice — satisfying after the continuous curve balls life had thrown at him over the past year.

There was still chaos here — it was still a medical crisis. But it wasn’t anything that Ethan couldn’t handle.

He spent most of his days in their temporary clinic — diagnosing cases. In the evenings he would spend time with other team leaders, discussing measurements and tactics for preventing further cases. During their free time, he would usually see himself to his room — avoiding the socialization hours around the campfire. He rarely spoke to his colleagues in Boston, why would he do it in the Amazon.

One of the local doctors had told him his Portuguese was improving. A compliment that Ethan heartily took as he was teaching himself from the little pocketbook in his messenger bag and repetition with the locals.

Most nights by the time his head hit the pillow he was too exhausted to think. For the gears to start winding. For memories and thoughts to resurface from the far depths of his mind. And if they did — he forced them away. Closing his eyes with knitted brows, until sleep overcame him. And then he would wake up to do it all over again.

_______________________________________________________________________

“Wow, it’s been a while since I was in here,” Jordynne smirked as she stepped into a familiar supply closet.

Bryce had texted her during her break — asking to meet her there. She didn’t have to ask which one he meant — she knew. The supply closet from the first day they met. From where she had dropped all of her usual guards and kissed a stranger.

The smirk fell off of her face when she saw Bryce’s expression. It was serious — his usual megawatt smile was nowhere in sight. “Wh—what’s going on?”

He took a steadying breath before he spoke, “Jordynne, when did you know?”

“Know what?” Her eyebrows furrowed.

“That Ethan was gone. That he was leaving again.”

Her mouth opened slightly, but nothing came out. She didn’t know what to say.

He let out a sigh — taking her silence as an answer. “Is that why you got like that? At Donahue’s? You literally drunk enough to make yourself sick.”

“I— I was upset.” She explained, stepping a little closer to him, “I didn’t know what else to do — I just didn’t want to deal with it.”

“Have you dealt with it?” He asked back, his voice sharp, “You lied to me. I asked you what was really going on. And you lied.” His brown eyes stared deeply into her green eyes — studying her.

“I— I can’t talk to you about him, Bryce.” She wrapped her arms around her torso, folding in on herself. “I know you tell me I can but I— I just can’t.” Her eyes dropped down to her shoes.

“Why not?”

“Because it isn’t fair!” She raised her voice, her jaw clenched tightly, “Bryce, every time something bad happens with Ethan I run to you. When I didn’t want to admit to myself how I felt about him, I went to you. When he rejected me, when he quit, when he flew to a different continent literally just to get away from me. I keep boomeranging back to you Bryce. And it’s not fair.”

The small space of the supply closet turned quiet as they both thought.

Jordynne broke the silence as she finally looked back up at him, her voice croaking out, “So no I don’t want to talk to you about Ethan. Because it reminds me of what an atrocious person I am.”

“You’re not a bad person Jordynne.” Bryce shook his head at her, reaching a tan hand out and brushing a piece of her hair away.

She closed her eyes at his touch, doing her best to not lean into it, “I am Bryce. I have been to you.“

“I think... I think that you’re human. And things got complicated. And that I decided it was worth the complication — your feelings and relationship with Ramsey included.” He used a knuckle to raise her chin, putting her attention back on him, “But I need you, to be honest with me. Is there something between us? Or did I just invent that?”

“No.. of course there is Bryce. But I... but there’s something between Ethan and I too. Or there was.” She grabbed onto his hand, holding onto it as she took a deep breath. “You’re one of my best friends Bryce. And you’re more than that. And that’s why I need to say this. I think we should stop the “more” between us. For now. Until I — until I can figure how to stop complicating everything. And I can’t do that if we ...”

“Okay.” He said, interrupting her with his honey voice. He was nodding at her — his dark eyes focusing on her as he placed his steady hands on her shoulders.

She let out the breath she was holding, staring up at him in disbelief, “Okay? Just like that. Why are you so agreeable?”

“Puppy dog remember?” He gave her a half-smile, his long hair falling into his eyes as he looked down for a moment. “I’d thought you would’ve figured out by now I’m not going anywhere, Jordy.”

_____________________________________________________________________

Ethan hesitated for a moment — looking at the group of people sitting and chatting by the fire. He could join them — if he wanted.

Shaking his head, he plopped himself down on a stool on the edge of the campsite. Tucked away, and out of sight.

He pulled out the pocket-sized translation book from his chest pocket and started thumbing through it in the dim light from nearby lanterns.

“May I?” A voice asked from behind him.

Ethan stifled the sigh that almost escaped him. Straining his neck, he turned to see Dr. Adébáyọ̀ standing sheepishly, waiting for his response next to the empty stool beside him. He grunted in response, closing his book and slipping it back into his pocket.

The pair sat in silence for a moment, staring off at the distant campfire and taking sips of their drinks from their steel water bottles.

“Do you mind me asking why you came here, Dr. Ramsey?” The other doctor's voice broke the silence.

Ethan furrowed his brows, “Why?”

“I’m curious.” He shrugged, looking over to him.

“Curiosity killed the cat.”

“But satisfaction brought it back.” The man retorted quickly. “Humor me.”

Ethan remained silent — keeping his eyes on the lid of his water bottle.

“Okay — I’ll go first. I came here to practice, of course. Help with research. But I came here for selfish reasons too.” Dr. Adébáyọ̀ settled into his seat as he spoke. “My family emigrated from Nigeria when I was 8. We lived in the UK, Canada, America. We traveled all over the world. But never South America. My father died last Spring. He always wanted to come here. So I signed up for him. It’s sentimental but — I’m glad I did.” He smiled up at the night sky that was glittering with white stars.

“I’m sorry about your father.” Ethan finally replied, looking over at his comrade.

“Me too,” He nodded, a sad smile on his face. “So are you going to tell me why the Ethan Ramsey left his fancy office in Edenbrook for tents in the Amazon?”

The Ethan Ramsey.

He hated that.

He hid his white-knuckled fists at his sides. “I am a diagnostician. I came to diagnose and treat Malaria and other ailments.” He used his practiced voice.

“And that’s it? You are a doctor and nothing else. What are you running from?”

Ethan remained silent for a long moment. He had been avoiding thinking about it this entire time. Why he had flown all the way out here. Abandoned his regular life to sit in a tent all day in the Amazon.

Out of sight, out of mind.

But he could feel his stomach twisting — a gnawing.

“Not what.”

“Hmm?” The other man was so shocked at him speaking, he barely heard him.

“Not what. Whom— whom I’m running from.” He let out a heavy sigh.

“I see. And this person... They are family?” Dr. Adébáyọ̀ asked with a raised brow.

He shook his head.

“Ah, I see. Matters of the heart.” He span around on his stool, so he was facing him more, “You are not together anymore?”

“We — we never got the chance to be together in the first place. Not really. She — we’re coworkers.” He admitted.

“That could be complicated.”

“And when I get back I’ll be her boss.”

“That’s more complicated.”

“Yes.” His voice was barely a whisper as he admitted this all out loud.

“What are you going to do? Coming here is doing what?” He questioned — his eyebrows furrowed as he studied Ramsey in the dim light.

“Delaying the inevitable.” He took a swig from his water bottle, gulping it down, “I’ll have to face her eventually.”

“And when you do?”

He avoided the question, “I just keep thinking to myself what if things were different. If she worked at a different hospital, if we met at a conference instead...”

“Do you want to hear something that was told to me? The universe sends us exactly what we need, right when we need it.”

Ethan let out a sad laugh, remembering Teresa saying the same words to him. “A patient told me the same thing once.”

“And is she? What you need, right when you needed it?”

Ethan thought to the past year. He couldn’t have handled Delores without her. She helped him process and navigate the Naveen situation. Hell, she saved the man too.

She grounded him — brought him back down to Earth. Yet had never had more ups and downs in his life before meeting Jordynne Holland.

He couldn’t have planned for any of it. But he wouldn’t take it back either.

“She — she’s everything I need that I never knew I wanted.“

“It sounds like you have an answer.”

“I don’t — because I’m not what she needs.” Ethan hung his head back for a moment, pursing his lips as he looked up at the inky black sky.

_______________________________________________________________________

She had forgotten how easy it was with Bryce Lahela.

How contagious his smile was. How infectious his laughter was. How easy it was to fall for him.

She was starting to remember why it had been so easy to make out with him in that closet after only knowing him for a few hours. What those early days were like — sneaking away together, watching movies in bed, remembering each other’s burger orders. Before she had made a mess of things.

The entire group was laid out on a couple spread out blankets at the park across the street from the apartment. They had packed some snacks and music — and were all basking in the sun, enjoying each other’s company.

Jordynne was sitting with her knees to her chest — smiling down at the blanket as she listened to Bryce’s warm chuckle reverberate through her. He was sprawled next to her, teasing Sienna about Danny.

Jackie, Elijah, and Aurora were in the blanket next to them — arguing over who has the best taste in music as they passed the speaker around.

She knew what she and Bryce had decided. And they had honored that over the past month. They were still friends — after everything the pair had gone through in the last year, she felt like she could always rely on that fact. They still hung out altogether, and a few times alone too. But sometimes she would catch herself staring at him a little too long, or laughing at his joke a little harder than anyone else.

The tune of an ice cream truck nearby snapped her back to reality as her friends buzzed with childlike excitement. “Ooo! Let’s get some for dessert!” Sienna jumped up, a wide smile on her face.

“Good idea,” Bryce stretched his arms behind him to push himself up, the hem of his shirt pulling up just enough that beginnings of his tan abs were revealed. Jordynne bit her lip as she watched him get up, “What does everyone want?”

“Chocolate!” Elijah said eagerly, his eyebrows raising up on his forehead.

“Gotta go classic — vanilla please Lahela.” Jackie gave him an unusually warm smile as she looked up at him.

“Got it. Mint chocolate chip Jordy?” He asked, looking down at her expectantly. 

“Um, yeah. Thanks.” She blinked in surprise at him knowing before a small smile spread across her face. Bryce Lahela knew her way too well.

Once they had returned with their frozen treats, the group sat together in a circle. Eating fast as the treats started melting over their fingers on the sunny summer day. Bryce had sat next to her again — his bare knee touching hers as they sat crossed legged. It was comforting. And maybe a little distracting.

Jordynne dared a glance at him, to only find him already looking at her. Her breath caught a little as he let out a little chuckle.

“Oh, you gotta little’,” He pointed his finger at his mouth, indicating she had something on her own, “Here I’ll get it.

He reached forward, his hand moving up to her face — his thumb gently swiped at the corner of her mouth, wiping away the melted ice cream. Jordynne unconsciously parted her lips as his thumb traced the curve of them. Their eyes finding each other during the few seconds — holding each other’s gaze.

Sienna coughed awkwardly — breaking the moment.

“You get it?” Jordynne asked, blinking herself back to reality.

He smiled sheepishly at her, “Yeah, I did.” Her eyes fell to the ground before his did, her face flushing a deep pink.

Sienna grabbed onto Jordynne’s shoulder, turning her attention, “Hey Jordynne, I need to wash my hands. Come with me?”

“Oh,” She tried to hide the surprise on her face, “Sure.” She followed Sienna’s quick march to the public restrooms across the park.

“Uhhh, so I thought you guys were gonna cool it?” She asked with one eyebrow raised as they entered the restrooms.

“What? We are — nothings happened.” She shrugged in reply as she headed to the sink.

“Suuuuuure,” The word dragged on with a tone of disbelief, “You looked like you were about two seconds away from sucking each other’s face.”

She shook her head, “We’re just friends right now Sienna.”

“Mhmmm.” Her friend sounded like she still didn’t believe her.  

“I mean it.”

She watched as Sienna turned on her heel and headed into one of the dark green stalls. “I’m just saying friends don’t look at each other like that.”

“You should talk. Aren’t you and Danny “just friends”?” She retorted. She grinned a little when she got no reply.

As she waited, Jordynne pulled out her phone from her back pocket. Her thumbs swiped over her keyboard quickly as she replied to the lengthy group chat between Kenzie, Carter and Jason. God, she missed them.

She started scrolling aimlessly through pictogram, liking photos of friends and scenery back home. Her homesickness was starting to become intolerable.

Her eyebrows furrowed as she scrolled passed a photo quickly — not quite believing what she saw. Scrolling back up, she felt a pang in her chest as she realized she saw it right.

It was Ethan.

The World Health Organization had posted it — whom she followed long before he volunteered with them and flown off to a different continent. He was in the corner of a white tent — his mouth pressed in a firm line as he listened to the slightly out of focus patient sat in front of him.

He looked more rugged — his stubble darker and longer than she had ever seen it. His skin had a golden tinge to it from spending time in the Brazilian sun. It was weird to see him out of his usual button-up shirt and jacket — he was wearing a soft henley instead, showing off the lines of his neck and shoulders.

She swallowed her feelings down as she realized the most important thing about the photo. He looked fine. His usual Ethan Ramsey self. He wasn’t torn up about leaving. He clearly didn’t look like he was having sleepless nights, worrying about what happened to them, what was going to happen to them.

Not that she was doing that anymore.

Well, not as often. She was trying.

Jordynne blinked away at the tears welling in her green eyes — staring up at the tacky fluorescent lighting in the public restroom.

“Hey — you okay?”

She felt Sienna’s warm fingers grab onto her wrist gently. Her coffee coloured eyes were filled with worry.

Jordynne mustered on a smile, squeezing her eyes shut to get rid of any lingering tears. “Oh, yeah yeah. I’m fine.” She reassured — sliding her phone back into her back pocket quickly, “Just my allergies with all the pollen.”

Sienna looked up at Jordynne, her eyebrows still meeting in the middle a bit from concern, “Okay.. you good to head back to the others?”

“Of course. Everything’s good.” She lied through her teeth, forcing a smile onto her face a lot easier then she thought she could.

_____________________________________________________________________

 A couple of days off in the nearby port town did Ethan a lot more good than he had expected.  Santarem was gorgeous — it had been a long time since he had been able to visit somewhere new as just that, a visitor. Not a doctor — he had no busy conferences or meetings or lectures to attend. And there were definitely no tents for taking RPDs for Malaria — thankfully he got to take a break from that.

He could barely remember the last time he had just gone somewhere to enjoy being there.

That’s why when he saw the sign for motorcycle rentals, he had marched straight towards the shop.

Now he was riding along the coastline — the wind wiping around him as the fine machine purred down the road. The green leather jacket he had purchased was still a little tight — it needed to be broken in. But he had liked the way he felt in. How he felt on the bike.

A little jolt of pain went through his face — and Ethan realized it was because he was smiling. So wide that it was hurting.

Pulling over on to the side of the road, he used the toe of his boot to put up the kickstand. Maneuvering around a few rocks he made his way to the shoreline.

He stood there for a moment — putting his hands into his jeans’ pockets and soaking in the Amazon river in all its glory.

Pulling out his phone he took a photo of the scenic view of the river. He hadn’t touched the device since he came to South America — airplane mode staying on constantly to stop any reminders of Boston to come creeping in. Then he twisted around and took a picture of his rented motorbike. The only photos of his trip so far — and they were moments he would want to remember.

Without the wind wiping around him, he felt hot in his leather jacket. Shrugging it off, he laid it out onto the sand and sat on it — his arms resting on his knees as he looked out at the water.

And then it hit him.

Miami.

Sitting on that beach with Jordynne — sharing the tiny space of his tuxedo jacket. Closing his eyes he could still remember the feeling and weight of her resting her head against his shoulder.  Or the way her green eyes had stared into his — trying so desperately to read him, to see if he was feeling the same things as her on that quiet beach.

Snapping his eyes open again, he let out a loud sigh — his eyebrows furrowing in anger with himself. He had been enjoying himself — finally, he had a moment of solace and he let that memory creep in to ruin it.

Why had it taken him so long to find that solace? Over a month of being here — away from all of it, Boston, the hospital, Naveen, her. And still, he was battling it. Constantly — every day.

His body twisted with want, and anguish and frustration.

It — they — she had so much power over him still. Even 3200 miles away in a different timezone, a different continent. And that’s what scared him the most. It terrified him. 

Ethan took a hard swallow, trying to stop the emotion that was climbing up his throat making it harder to breathe.

Part  3

[quidfree]

hey do u happen to have any writing tips,, i'm a big fan of a bunch of your works

oh my god this is the sweetest ask ever

1) thank you!!

2) that’s a v layered question! i’m not particularly qualified to give out tips bc all i have to my name is some semi-decent fic, but i do have a lot of nitpicks in writing so i’ll give this a shot.

first and foremost, sorry to say, the n1 tip is just to write and read a lot. read anything that sounds good, and write even if it sounds bad. literally write your dumbest self-insert wish-fulfilment nonsense, if you like. the more you can see your own writing on a page the more you get a feeling for what you like about it and what you don’t. i have a lot of really bad fic floating around the internet, and i often question some choices in even my most recent works. so read, write, and reread; it’s THE most useful thing to do.

second of all, if my style is something you like, here are some of the things i keep in mind while writing:

first of all, dialogue- probably the key factor when it comes to fic, which are principally character-driven. does it sound like actual people talking? cut out any filler that sounds fake, keep in pauses and hesitations and missteps. use speech descriptions for tone rather than over-specify speech. also, can you picture x character saying it? if not, rephrase it so it sounds in character. if you can read a dialogue blind and know who’s saying what, that’s always a good sign.

descriptions! probably my fav. remember to constrict to perspective. don’t let the characters notice or know more than they should, but if they’re observant know how they observe, what they’re noticing. for me it’s often a double game where characters notice a lot without necessarily understanding, so it’s about how they misconstrue what they see. a lot of the times the bias implies the character’s true thoughts about something. i also like to have the style of inner thoughts match the character, so you can vary between succint, rambling, poetic, dry, etc. you’ll have noticed my tone depends a lot on my point of view character and their state of mind.

world-building: something i am always drawn to. whatever the focus of the story, it always grounds it when you flesh out the outlines. so maybe the character is primarily thinking about x, but remember to mention his minor interactions with people, or his mundane habits, or what his room looks like. if it’s a bigger setting, think about the practicalities, expanding on what you have- so if it’s a war, who have they lost? if they’re a professional, who handles the less glamorous parts of the job? they never mention their parents? why? for everything you never mention, have a reason prepared- doesn’t need to come up, but it’s fun to keep in mind as you write.

little stylistic quirks: i like natural sounding flow; if people wouldn’t stop talking mid-thought or mid-sentence i let the sentence grow until it seems finished. i also like to repeat or stress parts of sentences where something intense or emotional is happening, or line up a lot of sentence fragments, to convey urgency or disorientation. never be afraid of matching the physical cadence/look of the text to the emotions driving it. if my structure is too repetitive or boring to convey what i want i often just cut half out and save the relevant bits for a summary paragraph to move the action along.

third, and this is ofc subjective, but here are some things i really dislike and thus try to avoid in my own writing:

ooc!! easier said than done but god nothing puts me off a fic sooner. if you’re struggling w characterisation, go read through content that gets it right and write all of the traits down that come through, and flesh out the character with mundane elements of their personality. so, for example, ask yourself how they would act in scenario a or b. once you have the basics down even putting them in the wildest au shouldn’t alter that. beware of falling into fandom tropes and changing a character to fit fanon or some weird watered down version of themselves.

bad structure. space your paragraphs out! have nice clean dialogue! don’t shove it all together! it reads so much smoother if you don’t.

as someone who was once a cringey tween writer: don’t use words you just learnt. it never sounds good.

punctuation is such a big deal! getting it right really makes or breaks the flow of the story. get some commas and some semi-colons going. it reads dry as fuck otherwise.

show don’t tell!!!!! cannot stress how quickly i nope out if fics get this wrong. i don’t mean you can’t describe things, but explaining every aspect of a story sentence by sentence makes it horrific to read. eg if your character is heartbroken and depressed by some news you don’t have to say “chara a was heartbroken and depressed by this news”; it’s a very obvious sign of youth imo. show chara a heartbroken, instead. let it be clear in their actions and state of mind. the same applies to any information of this kind. if it’s not in the character’s general thought process or emotional response, steer clear from spelling it out.

in a similar vein- pace things out and let your story tell itself. you don’t need to pack a story with “suddenly” “then” at every turn. whatever the tone is, if you describe the events properly the tone will follow without it needing to be reminded at the start of every sentence etc.

ok, that’s quite a lot already, and i’m not sure how helpful this is without concrete examples, but i hope it’s somewhat good guidance for you? if you ever want me to cast an eye over something you’re writing real quick just for directions i would be delighted to- no matter how bad!

[rigelmejo]

Things I can confirm with my personal learning experience are possible:

1. Yes learning up to HSK 4 materials within a year is possible. I think as long as some effort is put into ensuring that material is part of what you study, it can be worked through within a year. I read one persons claim that they learned up to HSK 4 with their self-made flashcard study materials in 8 months. I can believe that... it took me roughly 10-11 months to learn up to that amount of HSK 4 material. If I’d been studying primarily FOR HSK levels, I probably could have covered that material in 8 months. So I do think the goal of getting from no knowledge to HSK 4 in a year is achievable and not necessarily an extreme goal.

2. Yes achieving that can take as little as 1 to a couple hours a day of study on average. Some days I studied 15 minutes, some a few hours, some I didn’t study. I probably averaged around 1-2 hours a day of ‘Chinese adjacent studying.’ By that I mean: some study was grammar reading, sometimes flashcards, sometimes intensively reading some Chinese novel, sometimes studying Hanzi reference books, sometimes extensively trying to read, sometimes trying to chat in chinese with people or browse on Chinese social media, sometimes reading a manhua page or two, sometimes trying to watch a show with no English sub, sometimes watching a show with dual English-chinese subtitles and just consciously stopping to note to myself some new words I wanted to know (usually by pausing and rereading Just the chinese subs to try to understand the line, looking up the chinese words I wanted to know in Pleco and saving them). I am only now... finally.... also incorporating listening to audio only stuff more sometimes.

But basically - I just did a little of whatever, whenever, amongst the activities above. Most days I did Something, some days I spent more time than others. But I was by no means studying a ton. I probably studied as much as I exercise a day or less. Also a lot of my ‘study adjacent’ activities could easily just be part of my regular hobbies - using some of my reading time in a week for chinese, using some time I usually watch shows/YouTube for watching chinese shows, using some time I listen to music and dance to play chinese music and dance, etc. I use some down time when I’d goof off on social media to do flashcards (when I manage to do flashcards).

3. Things I think for me, based on my experiences, help me learn a language much more ‘easily’ than if I didn’t do them: reading a grammar guide super early on!!! (It’s brutal but it helps, just chugging through one quick! The overview helps!)

Learning the 1000 most common words ASAP!!! (It helps me so much and I put off doing this longer in chinese than I wish I would have in retrospect, comprehension went from ??? To me getting at LEAST the gist of nearly everything in chinese.)

Practicing trying to read ASAP and then regularly as in once every couple weeks (again it seems brutal, but helped my French tremendously, and likewise I think it really motivated my chinese study/helped me set goals/helped me improve faster).

Practicing trying to watch chinese shows in only chinese (also brutal at first, I didn’t do this until 5ish months in, but its been tremendously helpful for me and the more I did it the more it helped, so doing this regularly as in a few times a week helps a LOT).

Practicing listening ONLY regularly. (I didn’t start doing this until maybe 10 months in, but I have noticed it’s helping my inner ‘reading voice,’ my listening comprehension, and my feel for how to say things, a ton. I’ve looked into Repetitive Listening lately and I think it may benefit me to try that, regardless I can say listening-only practice is definitely helping my listening comprehension a LOT).

Studying the first 500ish Hanzi from a mnemonics source. (I used a book, and that starting point carried me all the way to where I am now - I probably need to do more of this soon, either with a book or Heisig mnemonic flashcards etc. With my books I literally originally used No flashcards for Hanzi I just read a mnemonic reference book - the Tuttle 800 characters one - about halfway through in chunks of 1/2 to 1 chapter a day. That’s it. And occasionally I’d flip through the book and read random Hanzi entries, and look thru it to highlight Hanzi I’d learned since the last time I’d opened the book. Probably the lowest effort way to do this, if u hate flashcards and can tolerate reading like me - however I was often watching chinese dramas with English and Chinese subs, so I was ‘seeing’ Hanzi I’d studied regularly in my shows, which probably helped me remember them.)

In summary: reading a grammar guide fast, learning high frequency Hanzi ASAP, learning the most common words, and immersing often Even in the earlier months when it was harder for me (with reading, shows with only chinese subs, shows with dual subs while looking up words I noticed, and with audio only like audiobooks/songs). I genuinely think reading from like months 2 onward while BRUTAL helped so much, just like it did with French. It helped a lot with comprehension and grammar ‘clicking’ in my mind, with learning wordsz Probably the Most importantly it motivated and helped me really measure my progress, and also helped me pinpoint my goals then set them regularly.

It’s kind of rough trying to read early on when your comprehension Might genuinely be at like 20%. But for me it really helps so much it’s worth doing. I did it on a whim for chinese study, because it’s basically the main way I studied and learned French. And wow am I glad I tried to apply it to chinese. I’m so glad I didn’t get so intimidated by the hanzi that I didn’t... try. I think me trying so early also made the difficulty curve always feel Rewardingly and Refreshingly easier constantly, even though it’s still difficult lol. But never as difficult as the time before, etc. Which is always a nice feeling.

—-—-

Yeah I read an article recently, by a man named Timo who made (a very nice) 3 part Anki deck for Chinese (I’m using his HSK deck since it has example sentences - and visual images of the sentence scenes - for every word, something my memrise decks lacked, but helps a ton with context and proper usage). His decks also included a grammar guide deck fbut another person made a version that displays better of that kind of deck which is what I’m using). Anyway, In his article he said he learned to HSK 4 in 8 months with his decks.

I’ve been mulling over if that’s reasonable, when I realized I also basically did that it just took me a couple more months since I didn’t even focus primarily on HSK level material coverage until I Was 8 months in already. In retrospect, I think it’s definitely a goal that’s attainable. It’s not so wildly difficult that only aspiring polyglots or intense studiers could manage. I think he studied like roughly an hour a day too, so likewise his study habits were pretty normal and not extreme time-wise.

—-

Now, this last bit is pure rough opinion based on what i think the levels match up to based on what I can comprehend versus what I could in French. So take everything below with a huge amount of salt. To be fair... I think HSK 4 really is a reasonable goal to aim for. I think it feels a lot like B1 level in French was - I can start to read most things for at least bare minimum gist of the main ideas, and some things in topics I’m familiar with (or with more common words/phrases) I can understand 90-100% of including all the specific details.

Basically, it gets me to where I can start picking up the meaning of at least some things in context, and the point where i can at least guess what a sentence is doing a Bit based on its grammar clues. like noticing the adjectives, verbs, tenses, nouns, and at least being able to guess if the unknown words could drastically affect the meaning of the sentence - example: I can tell if it’s a descriptor of location in a scene I could possibly Skip and still follow the plot, or an adjective I could guess means something similar to the previous more noun-heavy description, or if it’s a noun being interacted with/verb doing something I need to look up to follow the plot. HSK 4 also gets me to where I can start to follow most everyday basic convos, and some more specialized ones as long as they’re on topics I know some words for/or use common words. Examples: most shows for at least 50% of the dialogue, small talk, Internet comments, basically stuff surrounding context is usually related to. And i can talk about some of that comfortably (this is my weak spot, as it is in French, cause I need to practice more to expand my active vocabulary).

So, convos now can be followed and at least understood (and sometimes participated in) like when I was in maybe 1st or 2nd grade in English. I can engage with a lot of topics, Especially if most words used are common words, but once things get specialized I have a lot to either ‘learn/lookup’ or need to ask clarification about. Reading/watching is a bit easier then convos, since often the material provides enough context for me to ‘guess’ some of that specialized stuff’s meanings as it comes up.

But I say kind of comparable to B1 because... well for me french at this level was usable, but not ‘easy’ and not fully functional to the point I could say I can reasonably rely on it for any general needs/wants. I think B2 is more when you start being able to comfortably write/speak on most any topic at least to some general capacity, and can comprehend enough you feel comfortable following and catching main points and most general details (so not needing to look up 20% of what you hear/read for a decent chunk of certain clarification). And I do Not think HSK 4 (at least my own coverage of it) is able to do that B2 kind of stuff. I can do the ‘B1 kind of stuff’ with weak spots in production (just like in French, because I don’t practice those skills enough).

[zannaleejoy-blog]

15 Tips For ACTUALLY Writing ✍🏼

Disclaimer: Some of these tips are ones I’ve come across on social media and some are from my own personal experience and research. These tips don’t necessary apply to novel writing just really for any kind of creative writing such as: comics, fan fictions, essays, scripts, etc…

Tip #1 Reward Yourself

 Working is a lot easier when you know there is something to gain from all that work. Whatever that may be. If you are someone who has an income and at least 20-100 dollars they can set aside. Pay yourself to write, for as many amount of pages, words, or scenes you write, pay yourself and use the money to buy yourself whatever it is your heart desires. And for those of you who don’t make much money instead- reward yourself with something you love to do. Maybe it’s playing video games for the rest of the day, or watching a YouTube video, or even taking a nap or just some time to yourself. Personally, I have a piggy bank that I put all spare money into and for every page I write at the end of the month I get that money. So if I write 15 pages in the whole month I’ve got 15 dollars to buy whatever it is I want, maybe more pencils or snacks!

Tip #2 Hold Yourself Accountable: 

If you are someone who gets embarrassed easily or who has a lot of guilt find a family member or friend who can make sure you are writing. For example: If you let them know your word goal everyday is 100 words have them ask you about it and be honest with both them and yourself. Heck, a friend on the Internet or posting on your favorite social media platform your success or failure can go along way to make sure you stick to your goals. I tend to post how many words I write in a day on Twitter. My followers tend to congratulate me on my success and I like to have that positive reaction daily so I stick to meeting my goals.

Tip #3 Writing is Practice:

 If you’re are scared that your writing is bad I can tell you first hand that not writing or being scared to write something bad is the worst thing you can do if you are fearful of sucking because you’re going to at least for a little while but the best part about humans is that if we were to do any one thing for days upon days we will inevitably get better at it. So if you write constantly than you are 100% guaranteed to get good. I have an old fan fiction that's been left on the Internet for years and I constantly go back to it to see my massive improvement and it excites me to think that I will continue to get even better.

Tip #4 Track Your Progress:

If you follow me on Twitter than you already know that I have a planner that has stickers for every 500 words I write in a day. I originally got this idea from Alexa Donne’s sticker method here on YouTube and have altered it slightly to fit my personal writing journey. I really like putting more stickers in my planner and it fulfills the child in me to see visually how much I’m achieving as well as I will purposely write more if I am close to receiving another sticker. Tally marks, or a spreadsheet on excel can also do wonders or anything that allows you to visually see your progress.

Tip #5 Set Low Low Word Counts: 

On days that I feel shitty I usually only expect me to hit 250 words because I know on my worst day I can achieve that- Also if I hit 250 I am only halfway to my regular word count of 500 so I strongly advise setting something stupidly achieve able. 20 words? 50 words? You can write that! So do that and when you've got the hang of it build it up. Just understand that the smaller the word count the longer it'll take to write it.

Tip #6 Writing Sprints: 

Writing Sprints are probably the only thing on this list I don’t practice mainly because time limits stress me out and I tend to work quickly anyway. However if you need that extra push or have very limited time to get some writing done than I encourage a writing sprint. 10 minutes to write 300 words? Or 20 minutes to write as much as you can. It prevents that critical side of you from coming out because like sonic you gotta go fast.

Tip #7 You’re Not Writing A Book:

 Now for my aspiring authors like myself understand that you, especially if you are on your rough draft, are a long way from publication and that's drafting is just putting words on paper, bad words, good words, little notes of incoherent babble. It’s a mess and you are the only person who will ever have to see it. It’s a story and it’s like telling one verbally you are just trying to convey the general message it’s sloppy and you’re mumbling and stumbling and repeating and backtracking. But as long there is a complete story no matter how sucky it’s still complete.

Tip #8 Quantity is 10x’s Better Than Quality: 

To add on to last point I suggest in prewriting and drafting to just put whatever the fuck comes to mind down. Especially in the prewriting phase when you are brainstorming and outlining just fit as many wild ideas as possible because in those times where nothing seems to be coming that will be your saving grace every single time. Because having too many ideas is better than none. When I was brainstorming I sat with my boyfriend when he was playing games and generated all kinds of ludicrous ideas but also came across a lot of awesome and happy accidents. You have to be brave and just dump whatever out and save it for later and dig through the trash.

Tip #9 Give Your Book Some Essence: 

Your book has a certain feel that only you know this comes from playlists for scenes, characters, and plot- you've got aesthetic boards for your characters, maybe you have vines that remind you of your characters. Find those things and jot them down, put them in a folder or document and hold them close. I have Pinterest boards for my characters and settings. I’ve got playlists, and these things fuel my writing and creativity. I understand my book and I am reminded that no one can write it like me.

Tip #10 Nothing is Set In Stone: 

Unless you are carving your book in a stone tablet or writing your book across the walls in sharpie than you can always go back, you can always fix and delete. We often rewrite from paper or go back into our word documents and mix things around. Write shit until you have the courage to fix it.

Tip #11 Write With A Person/Person(s) In Mind:

Writing for an audience is hard to envision for me, so instead I write for a person or a couple people in mind. Which falls in line with my writing, I’ve always written for people whether it be classmates, friends, or people on the Internet and soon when I write a book for everyone to read. Writing for me has always been about writing for others and getting through drafting and writing in general is trying to get reactions, laughs, and smiles out of my readers. If you write for someone who loves you then you will always feel comfort in pleasing them and that no matter what you write it doesn’t matter what others think because they will love it regardless. I often write for my boyfriend, mother, brother, and my best friend. The four people who are close to me and are guaranteed to enjoy my writing and I can guarantee that you too, have someone that will love what you write and you’ll want to please them.

Tip #12 Write For Children/ Write Silly:

If you feel like you have to write a story that needs to have complex prose and have subtleties and be nuanced which is nice and all but if you are struggling it’s okay to just write like you are writing for a young one, someone old enough to read but young enough to understand basic storytelling. And if writing once upon a time puts you in the mood to write more than all power to it. You can always delete that once upon a crap later. Just tell us the story. Hell I use to do this kind of stuff with outlining which was fucking hard for me at first when I was a hardcore pantser sometimes I would write really silly. For example, Henry eats food, and he falls dead, the village knows the food is bad, food is suspicious, main character Zora will find it out, it’s the storm the storm has ruined the food. Oh no! This is just a simple way for me to get many thoughts down and to easily expand and not feel like I need to write something perfect.

Tip #13 Write Dialogue First and Finish The Rest Later: 

It’s pretty self explanatory but you need to just get dialogue done first. When I wrote Dragon Age fan fiction this is when I first used this. It was a sure fire way for me to get words on paper because Dragon Age’s dialogue is a big part of the dragon age experience if you aren’t already aware. I usually get distracted by dialogue tags and description and slows me down significantly so write all the dialogue and figure the other stuff later.

Tip #14 Surround Yourself With Positivity: 

If you’ve got friends and family who support you like I am lucky enough to have people who support me, even if you don’t have people in your everyday life who support you then it’s a good idea to join a writing community whether it be on discord, Instagram, Twitter, whatever find your writer friends and hold them close because having some friends to cheer you on, support you, and fall back on does all the good.

Tip #15 Character and Setting Visual Stimuli: 

Because I am horrible with description of people and setting I found that have pictures of my characters and settings is the easiest way to describe when I can see it somewhere other than in my head. I strongly suggest utilizing this because you also add on your own little things if the picture doesn’t fit entirely.

[delfiend423]

For Those Who Want to Get Better At Writing And Were Told “Just Write” And Don’t Know What To Do With That Advice

Just like one cannot get better at painting without painting, or sculpting without sculpting, or drawing without drawing, one cannot get better at writing without--you guessed it--writing.

But!

I don’t know about you, but telling someone to “just go write” is too abstract of a command for me to follow. So, here and now, I will break down some very simple very clear very tangible things you can do to become a better writer (in my humble and personal opinion, that is).

1.) Writing is Private. Keep It To Yourself.

Listen, I’m sure I’ll get some backlash from this sentiment, but its honestly what I personally feel to be the healthiest way to write, whether that be at the very start of your writing journey, or very late stage. When you share your writing with someone, one or more of the following is likely to happen:

- you’ll receive criticism from the reader. It could be something you can actually take and use, but more often than not it’ll be something you can’t do much about, such as “Idk I just don’t like this style of writing”. Criticism, especially when given at a stage where you yourself don’t have a lot of confidence in your creation, can be the poison that kills all motivation to improve.

- the reader will never actually get around to reading it. This happens a lot, more so with original works than fanfics. And it doesn’t matter why they never read it, be it deliberate or they just totally forgot: it’ll hurt. And it’ll be disheartening. 

- they will read it, and they’ll love it! They’ll be really into the story! They’ll want more!! And believe me, you won’t be able to deliver. Either you just aren’t writing at a clip of a pace, or the writing you are getting done just doesn’t feel good enough to share. Either way, this will grow guilt onto your writing project and cause you to lose motivation to keep writing

We live in an age of oversharing, where if you do anything interesting of or make something you're proud of, you immediately expect the world to see it and appreciate it at the same level you personally do. Art is not meant for this kind of exposure, be it drawings, paintings, writing, anything. Art and writing are a private venture, an expression of the soul. Sometimes, you’ll produce a piece so exceptional in which you are unshakably proud of in your own right you can share it without expectation of praise nor fear of criticism. For writing, this will be after at least a second draft or seven, never your first time through writing a piece.

So don’t share. Keep your writing to yourself. It doesn’t matter if people think it’s “good” or not, because it’s not for them. So write whatever the hell your heart desires! Write something totally weird! Write something that doesn’t make sense! Write trash! Write self-inserts! Write a fictional language without any linguistic basis! You should enjoy what you’re creating, free from the concern over whether it will be enjoyed by anyone else. But that leads me to my next point...

2.) Writing Isn’t Always Sunshine And Rainbows

It’s work. Let me say it again for those in the back: writing. is. work. Because let’s face it, Thomas Eddison hit the nail on the head when he said: “ Genius is one percent inspiration, ninety-nine percent perspiration.” And by genius, he means any sort of pursuit of creation, be it creation of the light bulb, creation of a landscape in acrylic on canvas, or, yes, creation of the a story. If you truly want to be better at writing, you have to write even when it’s no longer a cinch. If you truly want to be happy with the way your writing reads on paper, you have to write even when it’s no longer a cinch. If you want to type up the next novel sensation to sweep the nations, you have to write. even. when. it’s. no. longer. a. cinch.

I am probably the worst offender of this piece of advice. If the words aren’t flowing from my mind to the keyboard keys to the word doc like a river freshly un-dammed, I shut the computer and go eat half the kitchen. Which leads me to point number three:

3.) There’s Writing As Creative Flexing. And Then There’s Writing To Practice.

We all want writing to be this wonderful time of sitting down and crafting beautiful and unique plots and characters and moments from the fabric of our own mindscapes, but it can’t always be if you ever want to climb the steps of improvement. Sometimes, you have to write something that you don’t love, that’s totally been done a million times before, something that gets at nothing and leaves no lasting impression. Let me explain.

When I was in middle school, at a time in my life where writing was this shiny new talent I had discovered, a time where I was convinced writing was what I wanted to do when I grew up, when I was convinced that aside from this super eloquent kid named Joey, I was the best writer to grace the planet, I joined a writing club called Power of the Pen. Power of the Pen was this organized sort of writing competition, where the middle-schoolers would go, they’d receive 3 writing prompts over the course of the competition, and for each prompt they have like 30 minutes (maybe an hour??) to write a complete work that responded to the prompt(s). So, during our weekly meeting after school, us kids in the Power of the Pen club were given a sample prompt by our teacher, were given the 30 minutes to write a piece, and then we shared what we wrote with one another and gave compliments and advice to one another. 

None of these short stories I made were ever anything spectacular or even really that great, but they were a very instrumental in improving my writing. I learned to keep track of my thoughts as they occurred to me and were inked into the page, learned to mind the clock and hit that full beginning middle end in the time allotted to me. The more I wrote, the more I was able to experiment with the voice I used in my writing, and by trial and error learn how to use a multitude of voices in appropriate contexts. 

My point being: not everything you write is going to be your passion project, and it shouldn’t be. Google writing prompts, set a timer, pull out a notebook or open a new document, and get to creating. Not all of them have be complete short stories; a lot of the prompts in practice were meant to make us work on a specific aspect of writing. One prompt I remember was to describe a scene as if we were there with our eyes closed. Another could be to tell a story with nothing but dialogue, the back-and-forth of two or more folks. You could also use these prompts to practice outlining, and come up with a full story--beginning, middle, end, plot twists, etc--without writing the whole thing out. Think of it like an artist filling a sketchbook page with a bunch of hands, so as to get a better grasp of how to draw hands in various ways. This type of writing should be no-strings-attached, it should let you focus on what you need to get better at (and that can be a little bit of everything!). But like the artist and their hand drawings, don’t just create a bunch of identical hands: change it up, try and write with a different tone and voice each time, play around. Write very formally, then write like Chuck Palahniuk, then do something else! 

Just because this type of writing is classified as the grind, as the persperation of your genius, doesn’t mean it can’t be fun! Don’t take yourself too seriously when hashing these out. Or you’ll come to hate it, and you’ll never do as much as you should!

4.) Make Time For Writing. Be Ready At Any Time For Writing

If you’re anything like me, you live and write by the mindset of “when I’m feeling in the mood, I’ll write,” and then you’re hardly ever “in the mood” or at least “in the mood” while you’re not in the middle of the busiest week of your life. While there’s absolutely nothing wrong with writing while you’re inspired to write, if you really want to make some headway in your writing journey, you’re gonna need to write far more often than that. In Suggestion #3, I already talked about how you should take the time to do timed writings to work out your writing muscles and add build up your armory of writing instruments. Both this type of practice writing and working on material and ideas that inspire you are perfectly good uses of your time as a writer, but they have to happen to be of any use to you.

That’s why I’m suggesting the unthinkable: schedule your writing.

Yes, I know, it’s horrendous. But hear me out! Think of your writing as a workout. For those who aren’t too familiar with workout culture, those who workout regularly usually keep a pretty hard and fast schedule. They usually allocate which days they are going to workout in a week (and at what time), what sort of muscles/sorts of techniques they are going to work out on which days (i.e. leg day, arm day, core day, pull day, push day, etc), and what machines they need to spend time on and for how long. 

So! Let’s apply that mentality, that structure, to our writing! Find time in your week, a day or two at least, where you have a free hour or two (in case the heat picks up, and you need the extra time to carry through with that writing momentum to its fullest potential). Block that time out to write. Now! Get even more structured, like the workout folk! Jot down what kind of writing exercises you are going to do on which days. Timed prompt writing for 30 minutes, then practice outlining for 30 minutes? Work on one of your writing projects for 30 (writing literally anything! See Suggestion #5), then do some 10-minute bursts of writing each focusing on a specific element in the story (i.e. dialogue for 10, descriptive for 10, plot-driven for 10).

Now that I’ve gone and made you ready to write at specific times on specific times when it’snot and convenient for you, I feel obligated to burst this bubble: the urge to write can and will come to you as unpredictably as the wind. And when this happens, you should do whatever you can to entertain the inspiration while its there. If you’re lucky enough to be free, grab a pen and paper or computer and get to it!! If you’re not so lucky, and this urge to write hits you at 3 in the morning, or in the middle of work, or heaven forbid in the midst of midterms or some time comparably as hectic... be prepared! The worst thing you can do is think to yourself: “I’ll remember these thoughts and take to the computer later”. Because you won’t remember them when you get to the computer later, if you even manage to sit your butt down to write at all. If the urge is accompanied by ideas and inspiration, jot those down on whatever scrap of paper you have, or into an email to yourself. Try to include lines of dialogue you hear going through your head, any sort of inkling of context if you have any, the weight/importance of this bit of story to the overall plot, and anything else that might be important to recall later. So even if you don’t get the privilege of working on your writing with these ideas freshly hatched, you won’t lose the ideas for when you have the time to sit down and get the writing you’ve scheduled in advance. 

5.) Leave Perfection, Chronological Order, and Omniscience At The Door. You Don’t Need Them Now

Listen. I violate every one of my suggestions, but this one I violate the worst. I want to write my stories from start to finish, filling in every gap as I reach them, and I want my writing to be publishing-ready the first time through. All these things are impossible expectations. Let me repeat, so it sinks in: these things are impossible expectations to have for yourself. Stephen King said something to the effect of this: the first draft you write for yourself, the second draft you write now knowing what the story is you are trying to tell. Ergo, when you write a story, it’s experimental, it’s a project of discovery. You may not know everything single scene that will occur from the start to the finish. You may not know how it will end, or perhaps how it will start. Maybe you won’t know the plot twists, or really know the characters to the full depth they’ll come to embody. 

But don’t sweat it! You’re not supposed to know! The point of writing is to bring a whole universe from out of your mindscape, piece by piece like a puzzle. Sometimes, you’ll have a sequence of pieces that all fit together nicely. Sometimes, it will be a scattering of bits from across the big picture that for now have no relation to one another. You’ll need to do a lot of writing before you’ll excavate enough pieces to realize what all the pieces are making together, realize the whole, and from there you can rewrite and revise and write anew to better tell the story that eventually came together.

So! My point being: when you sit down to write, don’t be confined by any the principles above. You’re writing need not even be prose if it doesn’t want to be at the moment, which is especially doable considering we’re not showing your writing to anyone other than yourself (Suggestion #1). It need not be final draft quality writing; the sentences can be choppy, the dialogue can be all back and forth like a screenplay with no spice whatsoever, heck you don’t even have to write a scene if its not coming to you, but instead insert a block that plain and simple hashes out what happens in this space of writing you have yet to craft. Don’t feel like picking up where you left off, then don’t! Write a random disjointed scene that you’re more inspired to create, write the death of one of your characters, write whatever whenever its to happen in the story! Don’t know what’s going to happen? Don’t sweat it! Make anything happen, because you can always just cut that chunk out if you don’t like the direction later on. No one will know your characters had a 20-page  shopping spree if you don’t tell them that was the original direction! 

These 5 Suggestions should help get all you folks looking to write more or write for the first time off the ground! Feel free to add your own suggestions in the reblogs and all that jazz!! I might add more later, myself. 

Happy Writing Everyone!!!

[hood-ex]

Dude, I love reading everybody's fan works, but I myself cannot write for my life. I have so many ideas but it just seems impossible to actually put any of them on paper past a couple of notes. Do you have any tips for getting any stories done, even if it's just a really short one? (Also, Happy New Year!!)

Happy New Year! 

Sure, yeah! I’ll list a few tips for ya! 

If you haven’t written a lot/at all then consider starting off with either a drabble (100 words) or a one-shot (typically 1000+ words). The action here is supposed to be fast. You won’t have to worry about super descriptive details and things like that. You can just get out the main points of the story. 

I’ll give you an example of something I’ve written that’s only about 200 words or so. This fic is very short but it still manages to tell a story because it follows a very basic plot structure. 

The paragraph that builds up to the action is very short, and this paragraph is the entire exposition of the story. It introduces the main character (Dick), and it tells us what Dick is doing. This sets the scene so the reader can now picture Dick sitting on a couch with his pizza.

The rising action is Dick describing the pizza he got, and the reader getting a sense that something about the pizza is wrong based on the way Dick freezes at the sight of it. 

The climax is Dick realizing he ordered the wrong pizza. He got Damian’s pizza order, and this is where the reader realizes that Damian is dead.

The falling action is Dick putting the pizza away in the fridge next to all his other untouched meals. This is the effect from the climax, and it lets the reader know that Dick is still grieving over Damian. 

The resolution is Dick going to the shower to cry. The fact that Dick is going to the shower to cry tells the reader something about his character and gives him a little more depth. 

Notice how I stick to the very basics. There is no long, descriptive introduction that builds up the scene like you might see in other stories that start off by describing the gray clouds, the pouring rain, all the Gotham residents bundled away in their homes, etc. There are no lengthy descriptions about what Dick’s apartment looks like or what he’s initially feeling. Nope. It’s just Dick sitting on his couch to eat his pizza because he’s hungry. Super basic, right?

This is kind of what I mean when I say that sometimes I just jump into a scene and write. It’s the same as starting a story with dialogue rather than a descriptive paragraph. Dialogue immediately throws you into a character’s conversation, and dialogue is much easier and faster to write than wordy paragraphs. 

This fic of mine is an example of a story that is essentially just dialogue. Sure, there are a few descriptive sentences here and there to help the reader visualize the scene better, but most of the action is the dialogue. And we can apply the same basic plot structure to this story as well. 

Exposition: The Titans are in the car. Dick is tired. 

Rising Action: The Titans think Dick is going to fall asleep during the movie they’re going to watch. Dick says he’ll be fine, and he asks what movie they’re going to watch. 

Climax: Gar complains about the movie Kory picked for them to watch. Vic suggests watching another chick flick. Gar is not happy about it. 

Falling Action: Dick confuses Dinah with Diana. Donna gives him shit for it. 

Resolution: Gar thinks Dick is adorable and asks if he can be like this more often. Dick says something to make Vic and Donna laugh, and then Dick finally falls asleep. 

The plot structure is something we learn in school that we usually associate with novel length stories, but you can see in my examples that the plot structure can also be used for very short fics. Personally, the rising action and falling action are things that I don’t really plan out. They kind of just occur naturally when I’m writing. The exposition, climax, and resolution are usually the things that stick out in my mind the most (and it’s totally normal to just picture one or two of the three before you start writing). 

As a beginner, filling out the plot structure with the few notes you have will help you turn your notes into full sentences and dialogue. Let’s test this out just by filling in the plot structure starting with very little information.  

For example, let’s say I want to write a fic and all the notes I have for it consists of:

Jason (as Red Hood) is crying

Dick (as Nightwing) comforts him

Alright, well now I need to build a scene around those two notes. So now let me fill in some information for the plot structure. When I’m filling it out, I want to keep things like the characters and setting in mind. 

What I end up with is: 

Exposition: Dick and Jason are being held as prisoners on an alien planet. Dick and Jason are in a cell together. The cell is small and cold. They don’t know why they’ve been taken in as prisoners. They can’t understand the alien’s language. All they have is each other to rely on. Dick is keeping watch while Jason leans against him, asleep. 

Rising Action: Guards come to Dick and Jason’s cell. They are really fucking big. Way bigger than humans. Jason wakes up, startled and disoriented. He sits up. The guards start speaking. Dick has no idea what they’re saying. He tenses in anticipation.

Climax: All hell breaks loose. The guards make a grab for Jason. Jason defends himself. Dick attacks the guards to protect Jason. The small cell makes it hard to fight. The guards crowd Jason and harshly restrain him, making Jason cry out. Dick tries to free Jason. One guard uses a device to shock Dick in the head. This causes Dick to have a seizure. Dick can hear Jason going ballistic. Jason’s screaming for him and cussing at the guards. But then Jason’s voice gets further away, and Dick is left to ride out the seizure on his own. 

Falling Action: Dick’s seizure passes. His head is foggy, he’s got a horrific headache, and his body feels sore. The more time passes, the more tired Dick feels. He’s in and out of sleep, his anxiety for Jason’s safety keeping him from sleeping fully. At some point, the guards return with Jason slumped between them. He’s still conscious. The guards dump Jason on the ground. Once they leave, Dick crawls to him. He starts to ask what happened, having a vague idea that torture was involved based on Jason’s demeanor. He stops after noticing that there are tears on Jason’s cheeks. Jason looks away and his shoulders are shaking. 

Resolution: Jason hisses through his teeth when Dick tries to gently sit Jason up against the wall. Jason mumbles that he’s too sore for sitting and he just wants to lie down. Jason uses Dick’s thigh as a pillow and curls up into himself. His shoulders are still shaking, and Dick hears him sniffle. Dick tries to comfort him by rubbing small circles into Jason’s back. Jason lets out a shaky breath and falls quiet. Dick keeps doing it until he starts to nod off, completely drained from the seizure. They both fall asleep in pain, but with the knowledge that at least they’re together. 

Okay so see how I was able to flesh out the two original notes into something more in-depth that turned into actual sentences? That’s something you can do with the notes for your stories. Put all your ideas for each part of the scene into quick, short sentences. 

Filling in the plot structure like this helps you flesh out those brief notes into an actual scene that you can build off of. And if you look at what I wrote, you’ll notice that there are sentences I came up with that I can actually use in the story when I’m writing it.

Does that make sense? Basically what I’m saying is just come up with short sentences to describe each part of the plot structure. These short sentences will form the bigger picture of your story. Then you want to use those sentences you wrote to help you build the beginning, middle, and end of your story. 

I think that part of what makes writing a story so hard is simply just starting the scene. For me, it’s usually always the hardest part. You can make it easier for yourself by jumping into a more action filled part of a scene or by starting the story off with dialogue. For example, if I want to start off the Dick and Jason prisoner story then I can be like:

“You made my arm fall asleep,” Dick mutters under his breath. 

Jason, who’s currently treating Dick’s right side like a damn body pillow, answers with a soft snore. Between the cold floor of the prison cell and Jason’s body weight slowly crushing him, the snoring is just the cherry on top of this whole shitty situation.

The dialogue allows me to introduce the characters and the setting. Just from the first line, I know that Dick is in this story, he’s uncomfortable, and someone else is with him because he said the word “you.” This gives me the perfect chance to introduce Jason as the person Dick is with. It also gives me the chance to explain the setting by letting the reader know that Dick and Jason are in a cell. Now are prison cells usually pleasant? No. So I made sure to mention that the cell is cold. Now the reader knows Dick is uncomfortable, cold, and he’s stuck in a terrible situation. 

And the story just keeps building and building from there. 

Tbh, a big part of this is just having the will to start writing. You just have to make yourself type something even if it’s shit. And it’s totally fine to play around with sentences! Just try it out by writing maybe three sentences. Don’t like it? Erase. Tackle the scene from a different angle. Change the dialogue. Start the story from a different location or with different characters. Don’t like it? Erase.

Keep practicing. You’ll eventually come up with something that’ll just click in your brain, and before you know it, you’ll have typed a paragraph of two. And your brain and your hands will work together, and you won’t have to think so hard about what you’re writing. Your hands will just go once you’re in a groove.

But yeah, dude, that’s all I got for you right now! I hope that was somewhat helpful to you! Lemme know if you have any other questions!