Exercise: Emotion + Character

The exercise this time was to combine an emotional experience with a character trait. We did the "pass to the right" method to generate a starting point: first, everyone wrote down an emotional experience they'd had in the recent past (for example, elation at finding something you'd thought was lost). We passed the index cards to the right, turned over to hide the written part, and each person came up with a character trait to write down (e.g., stubborn). The card was passed once more to the right, and the person receiving it had his assignment.

I got "Pessimism" and "Pleasant surprise at experiencing something familiar done in a new and exceptional fashion." As seems to be usual for these exercises, I've no idea where this one came from. The first line came to me out of a dream or something; I woke up in the middle of the night with it in my head, and thought that something needed to be written around it. It wasn't enough for a story, but it did fill out the scene nicely.

  Satan's girlfriend was dying.
  “What do you want me to do about it?” I said. “This always happens. You know this is going to happen.”
  He was in his all-black form, the one that looks like a negative image of Michaelangelo's “David.” With cute nubbly horns and a beard. It's his “feel sorry for me” form. “This time is different,” he said.
  “You always think that and it never is.” I turned to the minor imp whose one-on-one Satan had interrupted. He was staring at the Prince of Darkness, wide-eyed. “Tony,” I said, “good work this month, but you need to get the new souls worked into the rotation faster. Some of them are getting bored. This isn't Purgatory, it's Hell.”
  “Yes, sir,” he said, and snapped out of existence to the Fourth Circle.
  “Sorry,” Satan said, again.
  I waved a cloven hoof. “You know I'm not going to be able to do anything, right?”
  “This time is different.” He reached out.
  I really prefer to transport myself, and the Dark Lord knows I've been to his office enough times to go myself, but you don't really refuse the Big Boss when he offers you a ride. “What,” I said, to stall. “Is she dissolving into yellow slime instead of black this time?”
  “Just come on,” he said.
  I put my hoof in his hand and winced inwardly as he destroyed my corporeal form and rebuilt it in his office.
  “Why don't you fall in love with a demon, someone who could stand your powerful essence?” I had fingers now instead of hooves. Only nine, too. Plus I was about half a foot shorter and my tail was limp. He always does this when He's depressed. I wouldn't fix it until I was back in my office, though. If I drew attention to it, he'd just get more depressed. Probably start crying. Then we'd have acid tears eating through the floor, Asphodel coming up to see what was the matter, and I did not want to be in the middle of that. My day was bad enough already.
  Not as bad as Lucy's. Satan's latest girlfriend sat crumpled on the floor in a familiar pose, the kind they always get sooner or later. I walked over to look at her. “Or even one of the angels,” I said. “Imagine that. You could pine from afar. Unrequited love. Star-crossed lovers. It'd be beautiful. And far less messy.”
  “I know, you're right,” he said, watching me. “But there's something about these mortal souls. I just can't resist. They're all shining with hope.”
  I snorted, but didn't reply directly to that. The only reason he calls me whenever his girlfriends start to dissolve is because the rest of his executive staff makes fun of him for his mortal girlfriends. I don't see the point in making fun of him. I'd rather just convince him that all love is hopeless so he could get on with the business of running Hell. “I guess this means if I have anything for you to sign, I'd better do it now. Are you going to go into seclusion again when she dies?”
  “Just look at her,” he insisted.
  I knelt down. “What am I supposed to be looking at?”
  “Touch her.”
  Bloody hell. Of all the things. I sighed and reached out with my four-fingered hand and touched her arm, preparing myself. She was probably just one touch away from slime city.
  Unbelievably, my fingers passed through her essence. Not without feeling her, but she felt like she were made of the thick smoke we choke our souls with down in the Industrial Polluters division. No matter how I waved my fingers, though, she didn't disperse.
  “Weird,” I said, and then noticed the position of her hands. I jumped back, holding my four-fingered hand out in front of me. “What. Is. She. Doing.”
  Satan came closer, and his expression softened. “Aw,” he said. “She's praying.” He wiped a tear from his face and shook it to the floor, where it hissed and smoked. And the floor, by the way, is the hardest diamond we can get. My stone floor would've cracked in two.
  “She can't...it doesn't...He can't hear...” I sputtered, keeping an eye on my hand. If it started to smoke, I would have to get over to Medical right away. It seemed to be fine, though.
  “See what I mean, about hope?” he said. “None of them ever did this before.”
  I shook my head. “It's not the praying,” I said. “It can't be. It's just some...wait, is she a woman or did you just make her a human shape?”
  “What?” He turned to stare at me. The air grew warm.
  “Well, if she's a cat or something, she might be going to—okay, no! Clearly a human! Cats don't know how to pray!” I broke off that line of thought before my skin blistered.
  He turned back to her. “I think she's Ascending,” he said.
  I shook my head again. “No. That's impossible. It...uh...” I had to stop talking then, because Lucy was starting to sparkle. There was no other way to describe it. Small white lights flickered on and off inside her form, more staying on than flickering off. At the same time, her form drifted up toward the ceiling.
  “Hey, stop her!” I said, but Satan put a hand on my arm.
  “Let her go,” he said quietly.
  I looked at the ceiling. “She'll go right through Delipheon's office.”
  He shook his head, eyes fixed on her. “He's one over. That's just a storage closet.”
  I guess he would know. I watched, speechless, as the girl's slight frame straightened until she appeared to be standing in mid-air, hands clasped, eyes closed. Her whole form was shimmering now, the light warm, but not in the same way Satan's glare was. It was more like the warmth of coming in ahead of projections for the year, of having all my managers graded positively, of having Satan or Asmodeus pat me on the wings and say, “Good job.” It was the warmth of the end of the day, the weekend, of the first day of vacation. Of course, my days don't end, and I don't have vacation, and none of that other stuff ever happens. But for a moment, watching her rise through the ceiling, I thought that perhaps it might.
  I'm not sure how long it was we stood there staring up. Satan put a hand on my shoulder and said, “Now you see?”
  “Not really,” I said. “I mean, why remind yourself that there are good things out there that you'll never get to touch? What's the point, just to make yourself more miserable?”
  “That is my job,” he said. “And yours.”
  “Oh,” I said. “I see.” He smiled, a sad smile, but at least he didn't seem about to start crying again.
  “Want me to take you back to your office?”
  “No, no, I can make it,” I said hastily. “Just do me one favor. At least wait a week before falling in love again? I've got reviews coming up that you're going to need to sign off on, and I'd like to get them in before the next eon begins.”
  “Done,” he said. “But I might just take a look at some of your new souls coming in...”
  I groaned and went back to my office, rebuilding my form properly when I did. For a few minutes, I checked in on the numbers in the various divisions to make sure everything was still running smoothly. That settled, I pulled up the torture list and checked “false hope” to see what else we could develop along those lines. When it comes down to it, Satan might be a soft heart, an incurable optimist, and a lousy manager, but he's a brilliant innovator.

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Movie Plot: Old Maids

The idea for this exercise was to distill a movie plot down to its essence (you may have seen these in the theaters: "A burn victim tries to reconnect with his two children" as "Star Wars" boiled down), then write a scene from that boiled down plot. It was a fun little two-part exercise, but I'll reverse it here: the writing first, then the plot summary, and last, the movie I used as inspiration.

  Victoria's hearing wasn't so good these days, but Madeleine's was, so it was by Madeleine's liver-spotted hand suddenly lifting from her shoulder that Victoria knew that Jerrold had entered the room. She turned to her left and adjusted her wire-rimmed spectacles until the black-and-white skunk came into focus. “I'm leaving,” he said, looking down his long snout at the two humans, which was impressive for a five-foot creature even though Victoria was seated.
  Madeleine had taken a step back and folded her arms, her creased face now blank of emotion. Victoria carefully closed the photo album, keeping her finger on the page of their Bermuda holiday. “What do you mean, “I'm leaving”?” Madeleine's voice tended to shake, so Victoria did the loud talking when loud talking was to be done.
  “Just that,” the skunk said. “I've collected my things. I've cleaned the upstairs this morning and I've just now finished the kitchen. This room,” he waved a paw at the floor-to-ceiling shelves crammed with treatises, tomes, trinkets, and tchotchkes, “you can clean yourselves.”
  “Now, see here,” Victoria said, though she'd heard most of her words, “do you mean to say you're just up and leaving, without even the courtesy of giving notice?” She looked to Madeleine, who nodded.
  “This is my notice, and it's more than you deserve.” He smoothed down the wrinkled tan shirt he was wearing. It took Victoria a moment to recognize it as the one he'd been wearing when they'd hired him.
  “Just a moment, just a moment.” She pushed herself to her feet, still keeping her place in the photo album. “We have treated you as well as you could ask for--”
  “Ha!” The vehemence of Jerrold's sharp interruption was like a slap in the face. She recoiled, blinking. “You think I don't know what's going on? The tomato-juice bath oil? The 'special' cleaning products you insist on me using? Your house rules about my friends and family?”
  “What on earth are you talking about?” Madeleine cut in. Victoria wished she hadn't. She sounded like a frightened old woman.
  “I don't know why you're doing it, but I won't have any more of it. I can barely recognize my own scent anymore, there's more and more fur left behind every time I take one of your baths, and I swear my claws are getting softer.”
  “You're imagining things.” Victoria had no trouble hearing him now, his words shrill in the relative quiet of her world. One of the reasons she didn't wear a hearing aid was that she liked the muted quality of the world. Sounds only intruded when nearby, and she was attuned enough to Madeleine that they never had any trouble communicating.
  “Well, then, all the more reason for me to leave. You wouldn't want a delusional skunk in your house, living in your tiny servant's room. Who knows what I might imagine next.” He snorted and turned to leave.
  “Wait, wait!” Victoria lost her place in the photo album in her haste to move forward.
  Jerrold shook his head. “No, I don't think I shall.” He turned in the doorframe.
  “Where will you go?” Victoria called. “Back to the Kennel?”
  “If they'll have me.” Jerrold lowered his head. “That's what you've wanted, isn't it? To tear me away from my people.”
  “To elevate you above your station!” Victoria took another step forward. She lifted her arms as though raising the skunk's body.
  “My station.” Jerrold laughed. “What do you know or care about my station? What would you have me do once I've been 'elevated,' as you put it?”
  “Everyone should aspire to rise above their circumstances,” Victoria fixed his eyes with hers. He wavered; she pressed her advantage. “Think of that gutter where you live, the squalid houses, the filthy streets. Don't you want something better?”
  He looked back at them for a long moment. “Better? To sit in this ossified museum—yes, I've picked up some of your words, how could I not?--and hide your feelings under layers of dust and varnish, to pretend you two are only old friends? Is that 'better'?”
  Victoria heard Madeleine's sharp hiss behind her. She ignored it. “Jerrold, these personal insults are better than you, we thought. If you want to leave behind all we have to teach you, then by all means, walk out that door.”
  He hesitated, so that for a moment she thought she'd reached him. “I don't want to know any more of what you think is worth teaching,” he said finally. “I'll miss your money. That's all.”
  “Stop!” Madeleine called, but her voice no longer had the power it once had, something she still hadn't grown used to. Victoria couldn't think of anything more to say, and in the space of her indecision, Jerrold left.
  “Well,” she said, turning to Madeleine. “I think we'll agree that that was inconclusive.”
  “Inconclusive?” hooted the taller woman, her palm out. “Victoria, my darling, he was going back to his wretched hole despite all our efforts to make him completely unsuitable. I believe that means I win.”
  “We didn't finish,” Victoria argued. “You could hardly tell he was losing fur.”
  “He could tell.” Madeleine said. “And he was still going back. Come, come, Victoria, you won the wager on dear old Callahan's consumption. Don't be a poor sport now.”
  “You didn't pay that one until we were at the funeral,” Victoria grumbled, but she dug her small wallet out of her purse.
  Madeleine's wrinkled hand closed over the bill. “Callahan was a trickster. It would be just like you and him to fake his death. I wanted to be sure.”
  Victoria watched the bill disappear into Madeleine's purse. “You know,” she said, “the greengrocer said the apples will be in late this year.”
  Madeleine's bright eyes fixed hers. “How late?”
  “Well,” Victoria said, “he thought September 22nd. But I think it might not be until October.”
  Madeleine smiled. “I trust the grocer,” she said. “Would you like to make a small wager?”
  Victoria sat down in front of the photo album again, and smiled. “Of course, darling.”

Recognize the movie yet? Okay, the plot synopsis was:

A stuffy professor and his live-in colleague decide to ruin a woman's life on a bet and are surprised when she objects.

(I switched the genders around for the story.)

The movie, of course, was "My Fair Lady," though I realized while I was doing this that "Trading Places" has essentially the same plot. Both of them also share the distinction of being terrifically entertaining movies that come slightly unhinged at the end, though in different ways. In "My Fair Lady," I think they found they'd written themselves into a corner and needed the two main characters to get together somehow even though the story basically demands that they don't. In "Trading Places" I think they just got a really good batch of, um, inspiration and snuck the scene past the director by saying "we have two brilliant comedians in this movie, we have to let them Be Funny!"

Regardless, both of them have endings that are better than the previous scene.

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Two Scenes - The Hunt

Here's my take on the two scenes exercise. I'm not sure where this came from apart from a desire not to do what we'd talked about as an example in the workshop: guy acting different with his wife than with his friends. So I started thinking of what the conflict could be that the guy was dealing with, and I got a couple germs of ideas and they all came together.

  He'd run those rooftops a hundred times, a thousand, even, and never slipped before. Whatever god had possessed him to come out for one more hunt on a rainy night must have been looking out for him, though. He stepped back from the crumpled form of the antelope and stared at its companion, willing his features into a snarl. “What're you looking at?” he growled, claws flexing in and out of his paws. “You want to be number two?”
  The antelope didn't move. His nose told him that it was female, so probably he'd just killed her husband. “You know how the hunt works, right?”
  She nodded, slowly, and whispered, “If they catch you, they'll kill you, too.”
  He thought about his wife, a spotted pelt on some antelope's wall now. “They haven't caught me yet, not in twenty years.”
  “You fell.” He could hear her voice over the rain without straining, now. She held a purse, but wasn't reaching for it; the confidence came from within.“I saw you land.”
  “I broke his neck. You should thank me. It was quick and painless.”
  In her eyes, he could see his own reflection, dripping fur, yellow eyes shining with the reflected streetlight. “You won't take him.”
  “Lady,” he laughed, tasting rain on his tongue, “you don't know the rules.”
  “I know enough.” The street was empty, but he would have to get going soon. The patrols would come by, or someone else would raise the alarm. “Haven't you lost someone? Wouldn't you rather they were buried on your land?”
  “We don't care,” he growled. “To die in the hunt is honorable.” But the image of her lovely fur, stretched out, gnawed at him. He shook his head, spraying water. “My family has to eat.”
  “My family had to live,” she said. “Little enough that mattered.”
  “Stupid woman,” he said, and took a step toward her. His arms were heavy with more than water. He remembered every antelope he'd ever killed.
  When they'd hunted together and brought down a couple, it always made her happier. One of them doesn't have to go on without the other, she'd say. He took another step, nearly in claw's reach of the antelope's throat now, and his foot skidded on the sidewalk.
  She watched, impassive, as he regained his balance. They stared at each other again through the hissing rain. “If you were going to kill me,” she said, “you would've done it. Just go. Leave me my husband.”
  He hated them, in all their trappings and clothing, with weapons and vehicles, the city an affront to God and nature. But he could not kill her. The energy of the hunt had left him, and he had made the mistake of talking to her, a cub's mistake. Hunt with your heart, not with your head.
  He picked up the antelope's body—her husband's body. His arms were tired, his back straining under the weight he'd lifted so easily in years past. He looked up at her again, and let the body slip to the dirt.
  Engines sounded through the rain, but by the time they came into view, he had made his way up the side of the building to crouch huddled on the roof, looking up at the moon through the veil of rain and fog.
  

  And the second version...

  He'd run those rooftops a hundred times, a thousand, even, and never slipped before. Whatever god had possessed him to come out for one more hunt on a rainy night must have been looking out for him, though. He stepped back from the crumpled form of the antelope as his granddaughter landed beside him, sinking her teeth into the throat of the fallen creature.
  “It's dead,” he told the cub. “You can let go.”
  “You were good,” his granddaughter said. She stood, all lithe muscle and grace, her tail lashing through the rain. “I hate this weather.”
  “Years of practice,” he told her. “Now let's get the clothes off. Quickly, quickly, before a patrol shows up. They haven't caught me yet, not in twenty years, and I don't mean for this to be the night.”
  He ripped the garments from the cooling body, tearing along seams to save energy. The cub, more energetic and less experienced, just shredded until they came easily away. He smiled. Once he'd had that energy, and that hatred for the antelopes and their industry that polluted the landscape and the waters. But the clothes made them run slower, so there was that, at least.
  He hefted the body over his shoulder. As it came away from the sidewalk, a small cloth wallet fell to the ground, open to a picture of two antelopes and a young fawn. His granddaughter picked it up.
  “Look, 'pa,” she said. “He has a family too.”
  “Course,” he said gruffly. “What did you think?”
  “We-ell...” She held the wallet. “What will his wife think?”
  “She knows the rules.” The weight of the body came up with him, heavier than he'd remembered. He should make her carry it, but no, it was the job of the hunter to carry his or her quarry. She was along to learn, too young to hunt on her own yet.
  “What rules?”
  “We hunt them. They kill us if they catch us.” He grunted with the effort.
  She swung up beside him easily. “Will his family know what happened?”
  “They'll figure it out.” He got to the roof, threw the body over it, and followed it, panting.
  She crouched beside him, yellow eyes reflecting the moon. “Like we did with 'ma?”
  “Yes.” He stared back at her and cuffed her suddenly. She fell back on her haunches, staring resentfully, tail lashing. “Never think about that,” he told her. “Hunt with your heart. If you start thinking about their families, or getting revenge for our lost ones, you'll be caught as sure as night after day. You understand?”
  “Yes, pa.” She shook herself, spraying him with water.
  “Right, then.” He looked up at the moon and stretched, thankful for the light even through the driving rain. “Next one's yours.”

I still think it's a little too easy, for lack of a better word--of course he's going to act differently when confronted with the wife of his victim rather than his granddaughter. But maybe that's the whole point. I dunno. In any event, I feel like I want to make something more out of these scenes, maybe a slightly longer short story. Anyway, it was a lot of fun to do, and people seemed to like it.

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Welcome!

This is the blog for the New Fables writing group, writers of fabulist stories in the Bay Area, with a strong preference for the animal and anthropormophic animal themes. We'll also be posting news about the New Fables journal, published yearly (for now) by Sofawolf Press.

I'll let the others write their own introductions, but here's mine: I've been writing for years, and blogging about it for months. I help publish as well, through Sofawolf Press (and I contribute to their journal). Though I do enjoy the publishing side of it, writing remains my first passion. I recently released my first novel, Common and Precious, through Sofawolf, which was a very exciting process, especially since selling the novel to my editor was easy.

The New Fables project--both the writing group and the journal--is near and dear to me, and I look forward to having some fun writing in this blog. Hope all you readers like it too!

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