An Excerpt From An Untitled Work

Almost two months ago I set off on a journey to write a book in 30 days. I did not complete the challenge, but I worked at it, enjoyed it, and learned a lot.

You know it’s crazy that I learned little things, some I already knew that were driven home while others were completely “aha” moments. I think NanoWrimo; even though I wasn’t a winner, was a huge personal success. I did something I was literally terrified of doing. And that’s awesome.

Without further ado I give you, another excerpt from this project:

She smiles and her soft brown hair cascades down her shoulders and she looks at me, sweet. Johnny, hating your father until the end of eternity won’t bring me back either. It’s not what I want her to say. I want her to tell me that he should burn. He should have died instead of her. Instead she tells me that love is what created me and that if I’d let that love in, I’d be more like her than him.

The tears start to swell up under my eyes and before I can stop it I’m crying. Denying aloud that I’m anything like that beast, the murderer. The evil bastard incarcerated the majority of my life. As my anger swells she’s smiles and looks at me, asks me why I can’t open my eyes and see.

And I do exactly that. I open my eyes and scream as fistfuls of grass and clods of dirt come out in my hands. Pounding at the ground, terrified by her betrayal. I wanted her to tell me that it was ok, that I could go on hating and it wouldn’t do a thing to me and that he deserved whatever punishment he got, guilty or not.

What? Guilty or not? Where did that come from? Crazy thoughts, I just can’t think straight because there’s too much to face. I throw the grass and run. Tears streaming down my face, I swipe at them with my sleeves and fumble for the keys. Unlocking the door and bolting myself inside.

Pounding the steering wheel I feel like someone’s just unleashed a bull and the site isn’t going to be pretty. Push to start, crank the music, pull away from the cemetery like I’ve just seen a ghost. But I have. And she’ll never stop following me.

The sounds of my visit trail behind me with a little Chevelle pouring out the windows with bass blowing intensity.

“…Lawful, vengeful, awful, friendship, misfits
Bits of feelings, thieving, fits inside revealing
Time to censor, censor, realize
Censor, Censor, no friend of mine…”
Chevelle, Same Old Trip

p.s. the picture included with this posting is an accurate depiction of how i felt through much of this experience 🙂

An Excerpt; NaNoWriMo Day 4 November 2012

As many of you know all of my writing focus is going toward NaNoWriMo this month. 

Today’s post is an excerpt from whatever this thing is that’s being created over the next thirty days.  Are you writing for NaNoWriMo too?  Share your experiences with  me!

Character: Johnny

…I put the daisies down next to her headstone, like I have every year since I was a small child.  Accompanied by a rock and a note from Gram.  She’s getting to old to come out here on her own.  I sit down and toy with the grass, stroking it like an abandoned dog.  Plucking the random weed here or there.  Digging the dirt from between the words, polishing without polish.  It’s a ritual that helps me come to that place where I feel like it’s ok to talk to the dead.  If I just wanted to talk to her I could do that, but today is different.  Today I need to see the truth of what he did with the evidence buried beneath my feet.

I lie back, stretched on her grave, arms forming a pillow beneath my head, and look up into the bright sky.  They tell me she died at midnight.  To me it always felt like morning.  Morning is when my mother died in my memory.  Morning is when they told me.  So I always come at the same time, ritual.

Feeling for her memory deep inside of me, the way she used to hold me, the sound of her voice.  I close my eyes and extract it until she’s sitting next to me.  Johnny boy, she’d call me, stroking my hair.  Johnny boy tell me what’s on your mind?  Bantering back and forth at such a young age I try to recall the words she used, the inflection of her voice, things I never thought to think of until they became more creations and dreams than actual memories.  The creation of my mother’s voice echoes in my head…