Recently in Fiction Category

The following is from the first chapter of a new story I'm working on:

Josh awoke with a start. He let out a strangled gasp before his mind began to process his surroundings. He looked round, finding himself in his own bedroom. His sheets were pushed off to one side, probably due to him moving around in his sleep. He took a few deep breaths to calm himself. He willed his heart to return to a slower rhythm. "It was only a dream. Only a dream," he whispered. "It doesn't mean anything. Guys dream about all kinds of things."

He knew that was true enough. He had done a bit of research online, and found that a lot of young guys dreamed about having sex with other guys and still grew up to be heterosexual. He'd even read that some experiment with male friends before going on to get married. So he tried to reassure himself that this one dream didn't mean he was one of those terrible homosexuals.

However, his mind kept nagging at him. This wasn't just one dream, after all. He had been having a few dreams like this since he turned fourteen nine months ago. He wondered if there was a point where it quit being something any normal teenager might experience and starting being the sign of something more serious.

"And it's not just the dreams," he whispered to himself as he lay there, confused and frightened. "After all, I've been getting those feelings when I'm awake too." He thought back to that afternoon he and Tim went skinny-dipping. While it had been innocent fun when they had actually gone swimming at age eleven, it morphed into something more sinister-seeming whenever he thought of it now. Tim had even suggested they go skinny dipping again this past summer. But the thoughts and feelings it stirred in Josh kept him coming up with excuses to put off such an excursion.

Josh lay there, feeling more miserable the more he thought about everything. He wondered how his parents, who raised him to be a good little Baptist boy, would react if he told them he was attracted to other guys. He wondered if they would send him to counseling or even disown him. He was too afraid to find out.

And yet, he yearned to tell someone, anyone. He hated having to keep this secret. It felt like a terrible burden - a burden he didn't want - to carry alone. And yet, he didn't know anyone he could tell. He was pretty sure everyone he knew would react badly.

"No, you're on your own on this one. Just try to make the best of it," he told himself. Then he added in a quick prayer, "God, please help me. And forgive me. I don't want to be gay. I want to do what you want me to." He rolled over and waited for sleep to claim him again, to give him a break from all his worries and doubts.

If you like it, please read the rest of the chapter and follow the story using the links above.  I hope to write more soon.  And of course, feel free to check out the rest of my portfolio on Writing.Com.  Though I'll warn you that some of the other stories are sexually explicit.

The old woman continued her weaving.  Her slender, gnarled fingers deftly moved along the loom, positioning threads and locking them in place.  She studied her handiwork for several seconds before speaking to the younger man who stood behind her.  "What's on your mind, Jeffrey?"

"You make the most beautiful tapestries, Grandmother."

"Thank you.  I've had many years to practice."

"And yet, it takes you so long to finish a single one."

The woman frowned and her hand paused in its work.  "Good craftsmanship takes time and patience, Dear."

"Perhaps.  But there are machines that would allow you to work faster, Grandmother."

"And those machines would rob me of the joy I find in my work.  Working faster would be a poor substitute for the care and love I put into each tapestry."

"But working faster would mean having more tapestries to sell."

The woman sighed and turned to face the forty year old man.  She noted that he was still in the dress pants and shirt that his job required, though he had taken off the tie and jacket.  "And that would mean more money."  She smiled as his pale face flushed at her words.  "Yes, I thought you might be coming to that.  It usually does with you."

"Grandmother-"

"No, Jeffrey," she said in a soft, firm tone.  "Listen to your old grandmother.  You are a good man.  You're smart, and your business sense has provided much for our family.  For that, I am proud of you.

"But sometimes you seem to only think in terms of money.  And for that, I feel sorry for you.  Because some things are more important than money.  And my weaving is one of those things.

"You're right.  I could buy machines that could help me produce a single tapestry in a few days, rather than the weeks it now takes me.  And if I was doing this for the money, it would make perfect sense to do exactly that.

"But I don't do this for the money.  I have money enough as it is - as hard as it may be for you to believe that.  Instead, I weave for the love of weaving.

"When I weave, I create something beautiful, as you already noted.  I create it thread by thread and row by row.  Each move I make is an act of love and creation, a chance to pour another ounce of my soul into each tapestry.  That's something I cherish.  It's something that the money from a thousand machine-produced tapestries could never buy.  And I'm not willing to give that up just to collect money I don't need.  It's too high a price to pay."

"But what of the things you could buy?  Things that would make your life easier?  More comfortable?"

"An easy life is overrated, as are excess comforts.  I have comforts enough.  Any more would make me value my life less, I imagine."

"Are you saying I have it too easy, then?"

"That's not for me to say, Dear.  I'm merely saying what's right for me.  You'll have to decide what's right for you."

"Oh."

The woman paused a moment.  "I do admit that I worry about you at times, though."

"You do?"

"Yes.  I sometimes wonder if you've lost sight of why you became a businessman."

"What do you mean?"

"I remember when you first went off to college.  Yo were so excited to learn about business management.  The first time you came home, you talked incessantly about your classes.  I didn't understand most of what you said, but I loved your passion and excitement.

"You took that passion and excitement into your first job, too.  You spoke of the challenges you faced enthusiastically.  You loved the problems and puzzles you solved.  Back then, it was about the adventure.

"But at some point, it seemed like you began focusing on the money.  And the passion changed.  Some days, I wonder if it's there at all."

"I see."  The man sat down heavily.

"Do you, Dear?  Don't misunderstand me.  Money's not bad.  And you've always made a lot of money doing what you do, which is right.  But before, you thought of the money as a side effect of doing something you loved.  And now, it seems as though the money is your main motivation - maybe even your only motivation.  And that change seems to have stolen something from you."

The pair sat in silence for a few moments.  Finally, Jeffrey spoke.  "I think I need to ponder this some more."

"I hope you do, Dear.  I'd really like to see that fire in your eyes again when you talk about your latest venture or investment.  It's a wonderful sight."

"It's a wonderful feeling, too.  I think I'd forgotten that."  He walked to the door, then paused.  "Grandmother?"

"The old woman looked up from the weaving she had returned to.  "Yes, Dear?"

"How did you ever get so wise?"

"Years of living and learning."  She paused, then added, "And weaving."

"Weaving?"

"Yes, Dear.  When you pend this much time in front of a loom, you have plenty of time to think."

He chuckled as he left the room.

Recent conversations over at Slacktivist have increased my interest in writing again.  Hopefully this will lead to some actual writing in the near future.

The main conversation that has gotten me thinking was the discussion about Mary Sue's taking place in the comments section of Fred's latest Left Behind post.  Wikipedia defines a Mary Sue thusly:

A Mary Sue (sometimes just Sue), in literary criticism and particularly in fanfiction, is a fictional character with overly idealized and hackneyed mannerisms, lacking noteworthy flaws, and primarily functioning as wish-fulfillment fantasies for their authors or readers.

The discussion of Mary Sue's made me wonder about my own writing and my own characters.  I began to wonder if I have been creating any Mary Sue's.  So I ran three of my characters through the Universal Mary Sue Litmus Test.  All three came out with a score that fell in the "most likely Not-Sue" category, though they were all on the high end of that range.  And a separate litmus test did suggest that Berit may be shading into "Borderline Mary Sue" territory.  This is a fair assessment, I think.  As such, I'll be watching her character and how she affects the story somewhat carefully.

I think that what gets me about Mary Sues is that one of the seemingly primary traits is their ridiculous degree of perfection and capability.  Cactus Wren offers a powerful example of this trait when she describes a Mary Sue from a particular Harry Potter fan fiction author:

Callmebuck always reminds me of a particular Pottersue, a fifteen-year-old transfer student from America who was impossibly beautiful, slender yet curvy, had an IQ of 520 and ten given names, and besides being a more talented witch than Hermione was a brilliant actress and singer and stage director and filmmaker and was friends with all the characters from CardCaptor Sakura. (Who just happened to also be studying at Hogwarts.) And she was rich (her family had "estates" in about eight countries) and fluent in a dozen languages. Whenever anyone pointed out that this character was just too perfect to be tolerable, that she needed some flaws to keep the rest of the cast from killing her, the writer wailed, "But I can't think of anyyyyy!"

Now personally, I can't imagine writing such a Mary Sue, at least not that one extreme.  None of my characters are masters of every trade out there.  Nor can I picture them being so perfect.  I like my characters to be more human than that.  After all relatively ordinary human beings are what I find most interesting, personally.

Of course, reading through the litmus tests, I do find myself wondering if I'm not in danger of writing my characters as all being too likable and too agreeable.  After all, a story needs conflict, and personality clashes offer a great source of conflict.  So maybe I need to think a bit more about actually showing the conflict between Berit and Brother Jens that I've imagined all along.  Perhaps I need to work on those grating personality traits.  And of course, I need to working on having characters respond appropriately when those traits manifest.

It gives me a few things to think about.  And all this thinking is creating a desire to do some writing.  Now that's a bonus.

Recent conversations over at Slacktivist have increased my interest in writing again.  Hopefully this will lead to some actual writing in the near future.

The main conversation that has gotten me thinking was the discussion about Mary Sue's taking place in the comments section of Fred's latest Left Behind post.  Wikipedia defines a Mary Sue thusly:

A Mary Sue (sometimes just Sue), in literary criticism and particularly in fanfiction, is a fictional character with overly idealized and hackneyed mannerisms, lacking noteworthy flaws, and primarily functioning as wish-fulfillment fantasies for their authors or readers.

The discussion of Mary Sue's made me wonder about my own writing and my own characters.  I began to wonder if I have been creating any Mary Sue's.  So I ran three of my characters through the Universal Mary Sue Litmus Test.  All three came out with a score that fell in the "most likely Not-Sue" category, though they were all on the high end of that range.  And a separate litmus test did suggest that Berit may be shading into "Borderline Mary Sue" territory.  This is a fair assessment, I think.  As such, I'll be watching her character and how she affects the story somewhat carefully.

I think that what gets me about Mary Sues is that one of the seemingly primary traits is their ridiculous degree of perfection and capability.  Cactus Wren offers a powerful example of this trait when she describes a Mary Sue from a particular Harry Potter fan fiction author:

Callmebuck always reminds me of a particular Pottersue, a fifteen-year-old transfer student from America who was impossibly beautiful, slender yet curvy, had an IQ of 520 and ten given names, and besides being a more talented witch than Hermione was a brilliant actress and singer and stage director and filmmaker and was friends with all the characters from CardCaptor Sakura. (Who just happened to also be studying at Hogwarts.) And she was rich (her family had "estates" in about eight countries) and fluent in a dozen languages. Whenever anyone pointed out that this character was just too perfect to be tolerable, that she needed some flaws to keep the rest of the cast from killing her, the writer wailed, "But I can't think of anyyyyy!"

Now personally, I can't imagine writing such a Mary Sue, at least not that one extreme.  None of my characters are masters of every trade out there.  Nor can I picture them being so perfect.  I like my characters to be more human than that.  After all relatively ordinary human beings are what I find most interesting, personally.

Of course, reading through the litmus tests, I do find myself wondering if I'm not in danger of writing my characters as all being too likable and too agreeable.  After all, a story needs conflict, and personality clashes offer a great source of conflict.  So maybe I need to think a bit more about actually showing the conflict between Berit and Brother Jens that I've imagined all along.  Perhaps I need to work on those grating personality traits.  And of course, I need to working on having characters respond appropriately when those traits manifest.

It gives me a few things to think about.  And all this thinking is creating a desire to do some writing.  Now that's a bonus.

Just a bit of short fiction for a change in pace.

The crescent moon rode high in the sky as Lukas approached the old cemetery. He softly padded through the grass, carrying a shovel over his left shoulder. He avoided the stone path, not wanting to make the slightest sound. One of his sources told him that this graveyard still had a caretaker on duty at night. All accounts indicated that the man who filled the job was old and probably would never see or hear the grave robber. But Lukas wanted to take no chances.

Once he made his way past the first row of tombstones, Lukas began to wave among the markers, bending near the more worn ones to read them. He had compiled a list of names of wealthy people who had been buried here between two and three centuries ago. He knew that graves dug for members of those family at that time held the most promise for obtainable booty.

After ten minutes, the grave robber smiled at the tombstone he had just read. It bore the name Anselm, a name that was high on his list. He took a step back, put the blade of his shovel to the ground a few feet from the headstone, and stepped on it to drive the shovel into the dirt. He then pried the shovel and dirt from the ground.

He was about to repeat this process when he heard a low, gravelly voice behind him. “I do hope that you are digging your own grave. It will save others the trouble of doing it for you.” Lukas spun around to confront the undertaker, only to receive the shock of his life. He stood frozen, his mouth slightly ajar as he stared into the crimson eyes of a dragon.

The creature’s scales were black with a slight sheen. The dragon’s hide seemed to blend into the blackness of night, only betrayed by the moonlight glinting off it. After a few seconds of shock, the wyrm spoke again, “Well? What do you have to say for yourself?”

At that, Lukas took several scurrying steps backwards, falling over the tombstone in the process. Both he and his shovel fell to the ground, each making a soft thudding sound. “Be careful, you fool!” the dragon hissed. “You almost broke the oldest marker in this cemetery.”

Lukas finally found his voice, though it was strained and tenuous. “W-what are you?”

“I should think that is obvious.”

“What do you want?”

“At the moment, I want to know why you’re seeking to disturb my treasures.”

“Your treasures?” Lukas asked. His brain wheeled in fright and confusion.”

“Yes, my treasures. This graveyard is their home. Not all dragons hoard their treasures in caves, no matter what the story books say.”

“I…see…Are you going to kill me, now?”

“The thought has crossed my mind. I don’t take kindly to grave robbers.”

“Please don’t!”

The dragon sniffed derisively. Lukas watched as a small stream of smoke escaped each nostril. “I don’t see why I shouldn’t. You were trespassing. You invaded my home. An you were about to disturb my treasures.”

“I didn’t know it was your home!”

“I don’t see why that should matter. You were still someplace you do not belong attempting to take something you have no right to.”

“I’m sorry.”

“You’re sorry you were caught. And you’re sorry that the consequences of being caught may be dire. But you’re not sorry for doing wrong.”

“Please! I beg you!” Lukas cried, more terrified.

The beast sighed. “Oh, very well. I will spare you this time. But do not return, or I shall devour you without a second thought!”

“Yes! Yes! I promise I will never return! I’ll never rob another grave!”

The dragon snorted. “I should hope not! Now be gone!”

Lukas leaped up and ran towards his home, never looking back.

---

Another figure stepped from the shadows as the grave robber fled. The dragon spoke, not turning to greet this new presence. “And how long have you been watching.”

“I arrived just in time to hear you scold the young man for tripping over the tombstone. By the way, you surely realize that it’s not the oldest tombstone here.”

“Of course I know! But for some reason, that statement always puts them more on edge.”

“Ah, then the dramatics of terror outweigh accuracy.”

“Only when it comes to protecting my treasures.”

“You realize he’ll tell everyone in town about meeting you, right?” The old man asked after a moment’s pause.

“Yes.”

“And you realize that some will come out here some night to check it out for themselves?”

“They usually do.”

“I didn’t think you liked nosy people any more than you liked grave robbers.”

“I don’t. But at least they’re less of a disturbance. Besides, I felt I needed to make my point as strongly as possible with this one.”

“Fair enough.” The caretaker paused. “Of course, you also realize that he probably now thinks there’s even more gold and jewelry here than he had first imagined, right?”

“So you figure he assumed I consider such trinkets my treasures?”

“Well, that would be in line with the story books.”

The dragon sniffed at that. “You humans are so foolish. Well, if he thinks such nonsense, then so be it.”

The caretaker chuckled. “Yes, I suppose so. But it’s late and I’m tired. So I’ll leave you to your horde of souls and the collective wisdom entombed here.”

“Very well, old friend. Good night.”

“Good night to you, as well.” With that, the old man began the walk to his home on the far side of the cemetery. The dragon watched him for a few moments before fading away.