Updates, updates, updates and an excerpt…

Let’s get the boring part out of the way first…(updates)…

1. Dean. He’s being worked on (still, I know). If it were up to me that book would have been published months ago. The thing is, I cannot and will not put something out that I’m not okay with (at least OKAY WITH bc I’m not always “thrilled” about what I publish). I love his story, but it comes to me slowly. Sometimes while I’m in the shower I get a little glimpse of his days and write it down. A lot of days I’m stuck in darkness when I think about him, which makes sense. Point is, I have a lot of it written, but I can’t force myself to write. I’ve always written what comes naturally to me and I can’t turn that switch on and off. It’s either there or it isn’t. And unfortunately, in Dean’s case, a lot of times it isn’t. I’m dying to finish his story, I’m dying to publish it…but I won’t force it.

2. While Dean has been ignoring me, I started working on something that I’ve been wanting to write for a long time now. This is a story that came to me when I was writing There is No Light in Darkness. I love this story, and because I love it, I’ve been hesitant to write it down. I get like that. Catch Me was easy for me to write. It was cathartic, it was a story I had to get off of my chest. The one I’m working on is my favorite kind to write because it’s the type of story that takes over my life. I don’t know if you know this, but I have bad anxiety (I’m not going to bore you with my mental health history though). When you mix my anxiety with a story idea I love, you get disaster. Like, a disastrous house, mismatched kids, no cooking, just a disaster (and my husband is BIG TIME OCD, so this is obv not something he deals well with). Anyway, this story…yeah…I feel anxious and I get shaky if I can’t work on it. I don’t want to say what it’s about because I like to keep my things top secret until I’m almost finished with them (I’m super paranoid, you see why I’m a psychologist? You know what they say about us, right?…believe it lol). I don’t want to say exactly what it’s about until I feel more comfortable BUT I will share a collage of photos later (when I get to my computer, my work computer is a pain in my butt).

Here is an excerpt from Prisoner (for my Dean’s Chicks)…**This has not been edited…at ALL**

The Pier

I took a drag of my cigarette and exhaled slowly, throwing my head back as I did so, so that I wouldn’t blow any smoke in her face.

“Those will kill you,” she said. I could feel her eyes on me as she spoke. I wanted to turn to her and answer, “You’ll kill me,” but I figured that was a bit harsh, considering all she did was fill my heart with happiness. I could’ve argued that she did to my heart what cigarettes did for my lungs, but Harlow would surely find a huge flaw in my argument, so I kept my mouth shut and nodded.

I flicked the cigarette away instead and stared out into the pier before my hand found hers and latched on. Despite the constant negative thoughts that flickered in my head, the ones that reminded me that the only thing I would do was break her, I wanted her to be my savior. I wanted her to be it for me, the reason I gave it all up, walked away, and finally lived. For once, just lived.

We walked around hand in hand, rolling our eyes at the overly excited teenagers and laughing at the awkward first dates we saw. Harlow’s smile, the way her eyes smiled when she looked at me, her lively giggle. If there was ever a heaven, one that I believed in, it would have all of those things in it. They would all be encased in jars, and they would all be labeled: Happiness. Real Fucking Happiness.

“Oh no,” Harlow said, giggling and pulling my arm. I was walking toward one of the booths that we’d been making fun of earlier.

“What? I want to win one of those big yellow things for you,” I responded, smiling. I was always smiling when she was around.

“I don’t need one of those yellow things, Dean,” she said.

I shrugged. “Okay, I’ll win it for Butter then,” I said.

At that, Harlow laughed loudly, joyfully. “Oh god, Butter would tear that up in a second,” she said. That should have put me off, but the rays in her voice made me want to win it that much more.

I paid the attendant five dollars; I figured that would be enough tries. If I didn’t get the ball into the hole with that many chances, I would have looked like a moron and should have probably gone home anyway. I threw the first one, missed. Harlow laughed; I growled, she laughed louder.

“Uh oh, I don’t know what Butter’s gonna say about this, Dean,” she chided.

I glared at her and threw the second ball. I missed again. Fucking ball. I glared at the attendant. “Is this game rigged?” I asked him. “Seriously, does the ball even fit into the goddamn hole?”