Picking Up the Pen

So I've only ever written using a pen and paper when I was around 13-ish, just silly little stories featuring my friends to make them laugh. Actually, no. There was that one comic strip(recurring) about the adventures of the can of tuna.(With wings and a halo)

In Junior college, I'd while away the lecture time writing rubbish fake-articles about little glass prisms or bottles of hydrochloric acid taking over the world, sprouting little legs and destroying the college building, giving me much-needed vacation time. But recently, after trying so hard to understand what I need to be a 'grown-up' writer, I've completely given that up. And of course, even the fiction I used to write and put up somewhere on the net was all written in word documents.

Now, when I try to start something new, I open Bean and just start typing. I love the freedom, but I wonder if maybe a pen and paper would work better for me. I've tried, writing one part of a short story in a Classmate notebook on a rainy day before giving up. And nothing annoys me more than not being able to come up with words. Nothing. Whatever kind of screen it's on, whatever medium it's going to be read on, I hate not being able to keep the words flowing. And it almost never happens to me. But somehow, when I try and write on a book, I stop. I cross out. I over write. And it just... comes down to crap.

Also, looking at my rubbishy scrawl, maybe I feel like I can't take myself seriously. Maybe that's it.

 How can someone whose writing looks like this ever write anything of any value?

Maybe it's never going to work out. But I never know until I try, right?

Trying hard,

K

Weekly Fic #2: Supply and Demand

Title: Supply and Demand

Genre: YA

Word count: 447 words.


"Are you guys sure?"
My friends, girls to the point of idiocy, giggle and give me a victory sign each.
"Don't worry, someone's already told him about you-just go over there."
"Okay, okay."
I'm incredibly nervous. I've never done anything like this before, and if it weren't for some guys we overheard talking in class, I might never have thought about it.
The delinquent--I've always just assumed he was a delinquent--is leaning against a handy set of rails. I wonder if he's just trying to be picturesque--
"What?"
"Huh?"
"What? Why are you over here?"
I give him a weak smile. Damn my inability to converse properly with strangers.
"I'm--"
"No names. I know who you are and what you want."
"So," My voice drops an octave. "Can you supply me with... what I want?"
"Can I?" He mocks. "Do you want it or not?"
I nod. Then I nod some more, just to make sure he gets the point. He gets tired of it after a while.
"Hand it over."
I duly hand the pendrive over to him.
"When will I get it back?"
"When I'm ready."
"So... tomorrow?"
He just gives me the evil eye.
"Day after? Sunday?"
"When I'm ready."
"-because I'm not in campus on Sundays," I rush to reassure him.
"Monday morning. Fine?"
Before I can splutter my 'yes's or 'thanks', he's slinking down the stairwell -just like a real delinquent.

---------

It's bright and early Monday morning, when I walk past the same spot three times. Each time, I notice he isn't there. I'm beginning to worry for my pendrive. It's not like I had stuff on there, because, as an obsessive-compulsive password setter, I backed up and deleted all the data before giving it to an unknown hoodlum. But still.
Finally, in the break between the last two classes of the morning, I see him.
I take in a breath. His hand is in a cast.
"Um..."
"Here." He tosses the pendrive in my direction. I flail a bit before catching it.
"It's got-"
"Yeah, yeah," he interrupts. "Just give me the payment."
Looking surreptitiously from left to right, I put a hand in my bag. Rummaging around, I give him a faint smile. "It was here this morning. My bag's like a sack, just gobbles everything up and- ow!" I pull out my hand and examine my finger--it's bleeding from the pin of the Rolling Stones badge I'd dumped in there.
His patience is probably running out. I do not want a delinquent mad at me.
"Ah! There you are, paid in full."
He grabs the chocolate bars from my hand and does the slinky thing with the stairs.

---------

Note: This is probably a part of a short story I just decided to write... like just. Like ten seconds ago. I'm not sure where this is going to lead, but I've a start and a finish. It should work out.(probably)

Weekly Fic #1: Giving up on a dream

Title: Giving Up on a Dream

Genre: Slice of life

Word count: 552

The guitar's been lying in the corner of my room for a while now. I pause and try to recall just how long a 'a while' is, and wince. It's been longer than I thought. I want to go right over there and start making music, but I can't. I have somewhere to be.

It's been like this for a long time now, me putting everything else in front of my music. I can still remember the times when I would stay up all night, with my parents safely asleep in their room, trying to come up with a tune to capture what I was feeling. It didn't seem to matter if the next day was a schooldays, ir even if the day held more than that, like an exam or a competition, I felt like I just had to play, and that's all there was to it. It's strange, that I've always been called lazy or doesn't apply herself in school, but when it came to teaching myself the guitar, learning to compose, crafting lyrics and reading poems, I've never had to force the concentration. It just came naturally. That's why I had those fights, when all the adults around me told me that a musical career wasn't worth it, wasn't, in fact, even possible for me. And that's all I wanted to do.

"Play for us."

It's so common now, something like a usual refrain, that I only blush and stutter and wave it aside. I haven't played for anyone. Never. Sometimes, I like to let people hear me play, when I'm already practising. Most people don't understand, though. How do I expect to be a musician if I don't allow anyone to hear my music? I don't tell them the truth, that I've been putting up my music on MySpace forever, ever since I listened to the other amateurs, back when I was a kid. And I didn't get much recognition. A few fans, here and there, who asked me, almost immediately, to fan them back. And the truth is, their music sucked. So yeah, I never thought I was anything special back then, and I was right. Listening to it now makes me laugh. The crap I put up. Of course, there's still some of that in my music today.

"Are you free today?"

Yup, not a thing to do. Was planning to just compose and weed out most of the crap today, but I can always postpone that, to do something totally fascinating, like walk along the lake, chatting, with you. (Do I even know you?)

The guitar's been lying in the corner of my room for a while now. I pause and try to recall just how long a 'a while' is, and wince. It's been longer than I thought. I want to go right over there and start making music, but I can't. I don't have anywhere to be, or anything to do. But I still ignore it and walk out of the room.

Now the bitter truth hits me, that it has nothing to do with my other commitments, that the fact is, I can't face my guitar anymore. Nothing comes out, or if it does, it's stilted and unsure. I'm unsure.

Do I give up on what was, after all, a lifelong dream?

New Format :)

Qwertyuiop. Don't mind me. Just checking out this cool iPad I've been ordered to finish the net balance on. Aren't I lucky? Anyway, this is going to be a short post, just to inform you people(if anyone is indeed listening) that I plan to update weekly from now on, following a strict schedule which will, likely, be broken for half-a-dozen reasons. But I will try. I promise. My posts, along with the ordinary, infrequent ones about things I love and real life(though I was never supposed to mention it at all) will be me writing fiction, but about things I've experienced. I feel like I have experienced quite a bit, though I haven't been around all that long. But this way, I figure at least I'll have a reason to write, and at regular intervals, too. First one when I get the "proper" net back. Tomorrow, possibly. But most probably Sunday. Till then, Ciao. BdK