Fast Draft - Warm up exercise

Fast draft, they say, a warm-up challenge, 40 minutes. It's late; it's 10:57 on the 25th of April, ANZAC Day. 

StoryADay, well, they're just starting out, ten hours behind me, so midday there maybe. Here it's crickets and distant car noises, hotted-up cars and other noise. 

It's quite noisy, actually, the dog getting comfortable in its beanbag, my daughter watching a video on her projector in her room. I'll need to go ask her to turn it down. If I can hear that out here, my wife, who is trying to sleep, will surely be frustrated.

Does that count as part of the forty? Had to go ask to get it turned down; it didn't make sense to yell across the house. I'll count it. So what am I writing? I'm writing for forty minutes; it's a warm-up.

So, here I sit at a temporary desk, established days ago when I ducked home from work so my partner and I could make a call together. It's stayed, and I've started doing other stuff, like preparing for the Story a Day in May writing challenge.

I've done it before, several times. I think I first did it back in 2017 and have since done it at least five times with varying degrees of success. In the majority, though, I've managed to hit the 31 days, and even gone beyond that. The missed years were most probably because of work. I'm not a professional writer in the sense that I don't write fiction for a living. I do do non-fiction business writing, though again, only part of my job; the rest is meetings and talking for a living.

So, that's seven minutes. I imagine I should try to turn this into something other than simply a writing exercise, with 32:40 to go.

So, what is writing to me? In some ways, it's a distraction; it stops me from being a workaholic. I do have a novel in the works; I've had it in the works for eight years now. By that maths, I started it back in 2018, though I suspect it was earlier than that. I completed a writing course with the Australian Journalism School. It was good; I wrote a short story there. That short story would go on to be the opener for the novel, which is now sitting at around 47,000 words. My guesstimate is there's another 30-odd thousand in that.

That's not why I am doing Story a Day, though. Why Story a Day then? I enjoy the challenge, and it is a challenge. I think when I first tried it, I did some of the lead-up and preparation, but was not quite as prepared as I could have been. Now I have a backlog of 68-plus story ideas and growing, so I'm not stuck for a spark this year. The challenge, though, is getting the words out of my head and onto the page.

Some days, that will be super easy; it will flow out. Other days are much harder, an effort, a chore. What works for me is writing in the evening and posting it, sometimes, more often than not, to be honest, posting just before midnight, making the mad dash for the finish line of the day.

Even when you do that, it's not the end. Story posted, comments lodged, then a quick look maybe for tomorrow's idea. Is it the leverage of the StoryADay prompt, something from the ideas backlog, or something else entirely based on a random inspiration? Who knows. It's key, though, as it starts the process for the next day.

Sleeping on it is good, having it in my mind through the working day, into the evening, over dinner, and then the writing begins: a mad sprint to the end. I do think it has changed over the years, though, the approach has, or how I capture ideas at least.

Walking now, walking the dog gives an opportunity to start a form of writing through dictation and transcription. That gets me some of the way. What's interesting though, is I find the act of writing, no, typing, is key. I'm typing this now; the physicality of it, the flow of words from my brain to my fingertips, is part of it.

Thank heavens I can touch type.

So, twenty minutes to go. What I can tell you is I type considerably slower than when I was a kid, learning to type on a teletype of all things. Yes, a teletype, a machine straight out of the black-and-white movies covering World War 2. It even had hole-punched tape.

Back then, I could type 100 wpm at 98% accuracy. That would mean 10 minutes, 1,000 words. Now I'm 21 minutes in and only 803 words done. Is it that I am slower, or that back then I was reading a script, signal or message straight from the page to teletype keys via my eyes and fingertips? I actually think the art then was to not think and simply be a conduit.

I remember learning, keyboard covered: "A now. B now. C now." That's how they started you. Then your accuracy increased the speed, then you eventually out-typed old "A now" and graduated onto standing at a teletype and thumping on the keys. Anyway, I'd say I'm well under 100 wpm these days. I suppose we'll know at the end of this.

And accuracy, the page is riddled with yellow and red underlines just now. Back then, I didn't have that luxury; I couldn't even see the words I typed. There were holes on the ticker tape, and I typed so fast the tape punch ran on for 30 seconds to a minute after I'd finished. Such a fun thing.

Now, though, the timer will go off at 40 minutes and I'll Grammarly all the red and yellow away. Such a luxury. The reality that I can see the words, the underlines and all, as I type is really incredible, and it gets me to the technology curve that has been my career.

I joined the Royal Australian Navy at the age of sixteen, fifteen actually; I was successful in the recruitment process, yet they wouldn't take me until I was sixteen, a few months later. I joined the electronic warfare in submarines. Funny, when I went to sea on a sub for the first time, a year and a bit after joining, there were only two computers on the submarine: mine and the captain's. God rest his soul, he was a good bloke.

There's a funny story there. Anyway, the technology curve, at 16, subs, electronic warfare; now 39 years later, I am the Chief Technology Officer at a university, a place that consumes laptops at the same rate as I eat a packet of Smiths with an ice-cold beer. That technology is assumed now. It's artificial intelligence that is my current consideration, and this is within a lifetime, from Beta, then VHS, to being part of the AI divide, working in an environment where it's at my fingertips, literally.

This also gets me back to how writing changes, and doesn't. The trick is, we will still call it writing for a long time yet. Purists, old-school curmudgeons I imagine, would say it's not writing if you don't labour over the grammar, the spelling, the repairs. To me, that is not the case. I have no problem with Grammarly or even Claude tidying up my writing. Dare I say, though, I do care if I lose my voice to the machine, to the AI. That is what you need to be careful of.

This also takes me back to why I write, and more importantly, why I do Story a Day. In Story a Day I can play with all my voices, all my prose and genres. I'm a gamer, as you can imagine, I'm a D&D kid. I grew up in the days of the Satanic Panic, and I went into computers. I'm a nerd, a geek, and yes, I write fantasy. Story a Day, though, I'll try fantasy, poetry, spoken word. I'll read a book to see if I can emulate the writing and powers of description of the classics and even the pulp.

For me, it's about the thinking, the creativity, the perspective and the prose.

So, with a little over three minutes to go, what have I written? I'm not even sure I'd know what to call this. Is it a diary entry, an observation, or otherwise? I don't know. Maybe I'll ask Claude. It doesn't matter; it's the ramblings of a slowing typist.

It's quieter now. Even in those 38 minutes, the soundscape has shifted. Now I've got the hum of the dishwasher, possums fighting in the distance, the dog scratching at one of the room doors to get in, and the cat's bell jingling about the place. My wife is awake now. "What are you doing?" What timing, 14 seconds to go. Going, going, gone. 38 wpm.

Day 30 - Container

It's the quiet moments that you both hate and love the most. The times when everything around you falls silent. It's good in that everything else stops—the movement, the noise, the emotions of others, and your own. There is peace.

But then comes the pain, the sorrow, the sense of futility. When the chaos of others is absent, your own chaos bursts forward. It's a silent chaos, a turmoil within you, filled with guilt, remorse, inadequacy, lacklustre, and a loss of purpose.

It's times like these that thoughts come to you of fleeing, ending it. You've had these thoughts long enough to know what they look like. In some ways, you toy with them, dare them, lure them. You know what ideation is, you recognise it; you've been on the edge of it many times. You live with it every day.

You know all the antidotes, placebos or otherwise, to these moments. To think of others, of those you would hurt, to list out the reasons to stay, to live. Distraction, movement, or any of these things. 

Talking to someone, putting it out into the universe. Seeking help.

These are the things they say to do.

You don’t.

You keep it to yourself, tell no one, and simply get on with it. You keep yourself busy, tell yourself it’ll pass, and it does, or you deflect it. You distract from it and throw yourself into things. Work, hobbies, conversation, communication and activities. If you can fill the void that comes with silence, you’ll keep it all at bay.

You've learnt to avoid damaging, destructive distractions, having done enough of that before. Although the insidious destructors boil along insipidly adding more.

You're OK. Or that's what you will say.

Even when someone asks you, "R U OK?"  The second Thursday in September, is a high-probability day.  Although a question, that should be used every day.

But for you to answer 'No' on any given day is a peril best kept at bay.

To answer in such a way would take your silent moments away.

Day 29 - First Person

The chair scraped immediately to my right, dragging my attention momentarily. It was the waiter. He smiled at me, conveying several things but one. I glanced back at my coffee; it was two-thirds gone, not finished. Looking across the street, the piano bench was still vacant, although it was starting to fade. It was 5:30 p.m., 29th of May, the closing days of Autumn. It was getting dark; he’d arrive soon.

“Excuse me, Miss.”

I looked up, smiled, and dropped a fiver on the table. “Thank you.”

Taking the cup, I gulped down the last of the coffee. The cup rattled on the saucer as I stood, a lipstick smear marking its rim. I pulled my coat tighter around me, feeling the chill of the encroaching evening. The air carried the scent of rain and fallen leaves, a bittersweet reminder of the year slipping by.

He’d be here soon,  I looked left and right, stepping onto the street.  I needed to get to the nook before he started before he saw me.  I glanced at my watch, it was 5:45 p.m. He’d be here at 6, on the dot, I always wondered how he did that.  I moved up the stairs, into the shadow of the stoop.  My vantage point, I looked down upon the piano now.

Then I saw him, I couldn’t help but look at my watch, 6 p.m. 

A car turns onto the street, its headlights sweeping across him revealing his silhouette in its entirety.  He walked with a limp, it looked painful, it looked worse than the day before, maybe it was arthritis, the cold impacting him.

I’m sure he knows I’m here.

He sits at the piano bench and lifts the lid. Tapping, tinkling a key or two, getting his ear in.

He starts with Beethoven, Chopin, and Rachmaninoff. The classics.  Then Einaudi, Tiersen, Amalds, all contemporary, all international, Italian, French, Icelandic, how is that even possible?

It ends, and I’m freezing, I’ve been shivering for his last two songs, I can’t leave though. I’m sure he knows I’m here but then he doesn’t, I don’t know.  He’s stopped.

I look down, I watch worried at first that he hadn’t seen it, but he had, of course he had, I’d been leaving it in the same spot for weeks. He takes the twenty, pockets it, and then he is gone.

I descend the steps from my perch, stepping to where he’s just left resting my hand on the piano, watching his back as he returns the way he came, turning the corner and disappearing.

I know who he is, I remember, his repertoire might have changed, but it’s him.  The way he sits at the piano, gets his ear in, strikes the keys, moves.  I remember him, I remember him.

It’s my father.

Day 28 - Another Opening

The prompt for this day 28th of May 2024 was:

Take an opening line from a book you love and rewrite it to create a similar, but different opening for your story

That said, an opening I’ve liked in the past, so much so I’ve taken inspiration from the genre on two previous occasions Day 13, 2019, and in a longer short story ‘An Explanation’ in March of the same year. The following is an example opening paragraph from ‘The Big Sleep’ by Raymond Chandler.

It was about eleven o'clock in the morning, mid October, with the sun not shining and a look of hard wet rain in the clearness of the foothills. I was wearing my powder-blue suit, with dark blue shirt, tie and display handker-chief, black brogues, black wool socks with dark blue clocks on them. I was neat, clean, shaved and sober, and I didn't care who knew it. I was everything the well-dressed private detective ought to be. I was calling on four million dollars.

And here is my take. Similar, but different:

The chair scrapped immediately to her right dragging her attention momentarily, it was the waiter, he smiled at her conveying several things but one.  She glanced back at her coffee, it was two-thirds gone, not finished.  Looking across the street the piano bench was still vacant, although it was starting to fade, it was 5:30 pm, the 29th of May, the closing days of Autumn, it was getting dark, and he’d arrive soon.

‘Excuse me, Miss.’

She looked up, smiled and dropped a fiver on the table, ‘Thank you.’

Taking the cup, she gulped down the last of the coffee. As she stood, the cup rattled on the saucer, a lipstick smear marking its rim.

She pulled her coat tight, flinging her scarf around her neck as the chill of the evening descended upon her.

Day 27 - A Retelling

‘What are you doing, woman!’ he screamed, spittle flying as he turned beetroot red and frothed at the mouth. ‘Out of my way!’

Marianne had run between the knight’s horse and the forest looming before him, blocking his path.

‘Stop! The creature has done nothing to you!’ she yelled, turning her back to the woods and waving her arms.

The knight pulled hard upon the reins. The grey horse stopped moving forward and pranced on the spot, its iron-shod hooves cutting divots into the sodden earth. Pulling the reins to the left, he caused the horse to spin anticlockwise as he whipped his head around, looking down at the woman before him.

She was small, or appeared so from his mount, dressed well, not wealthy nor a pauper, her long dark hair pulled back from her face and held by a leather thong. Hands raised, imploring him to stop. Fear and uncertainty showed on her face.

The two faced off, the knight getting his mount under control. He could feel it was still tense and anxious, its nostrils flared, pulling upon the reins, trying to loosen them to get its head free. He glanced beyond the woman into the shadows of the forest behind her, but saw nothing.

‘Move aside, woman!’

‘NO! Why are you here?’ she asked, glancing over her shoulder.

‘I’m to kill the beast! To rid the village of the nuisance!’ he called again as he pulled the reins to the right, turning the horse again, trying to break its focus to calm it. The rump of the horse passing close to Marianne caused her to jump clear, closer to the forest behind her.

‘It’s not dangerous, leave it be.’

‘I can’t. I’m told it is taking stock, causing havoc for the village. They want to see it dead. I must free the village of the creature.’

‘It’s not killing the stock. It is harmless; it eats nothing more than the branches and leaves of trees.’

‘Rubbish, woman, that is not what the village says.’ His horse finally stopped, as the scare of the woman blocking its path faded, to the point that the knight sat into the saddle, easing the grip of his knees, further calming his mount.

‘They lie. They know it’s not the creature killing their stock,’ she pleaded. ‘They’ve seen the creature; they know it is not this creature that does the damage.’

‘I’ve seen the remains, girl. The cattle and sheep have been gorged, their throats ripped, fur and skin flayed by the beast.’ He scanned the forest behind her, trying to see and spy the creature. This was where the villagers had said it would be, in here, where the woodcutter's path entered the woods.

‘It’s not this creature, I swear. If you could see it, you would realise it is not possible.’

He looked down upon her, weighing up the situation, thinking. He’d gotten the village, in their fear, to agree to submit to the word of his god if he was to rid them of the beast. Yet here she stands, declaring its timidness, its innocence. How was it possible? Is she in league with the beast? His mind whirled as he tried to reconcile the bloodiness of the livestock they’d shown him with the woman standing before him.

‘Show me.’

Without asking, she turned and walked to a hedge at the edge of the path they were upon, reaching into it and snapping, tearing a branch free, a clump of leaves coming off with it. Walking towards the nearest tree on the edge of the forest, she thrashed the branches against the trunk and whistled, calling into the woods. ‘It’s okay, little one, you can come out.’ She shook the branch.

After waiting a minute, he was about to speak and declare enough, and then it appeared, extending towards the clump of leaves—a creature's head, easily the same size as his horse’s. Before the creature could bite the head of leaves from the branch, Marianne stepped away, taking the branch with her.

The creature stopped momentarily, its head tilting a little, and began to move forward. Revealing a neck that went for three to four feet before revealing the true bulk of the creature, it was enormous, its girth as large as two horses, its shoulder broad and an easy 18 hands high, higher than his mount, towering over the woman in front of it.

The horse's ears flattened to its head, whinnying. Again stomping, pulling at the reins, trying to get its head—to flee or attack, he did not know. He reined it in again.

Marianne shook the branch again, cooing, luring the creature further from the shadows of the forest. ‘See,’ she spoke over her shoulder towards the knight in a calm, semi-quiet tone, ‘no claws, not even teeth. There is no way this creature could have done the damage you’ve seen.’

The knight leant forward, patting his horse, talking to it quietly, calming it.

‘Can you lead it to the village?’

She looked at him. Could she trust him? ‘Why?’

‘If you want the creature to live, we need to show the villagers that it is not the killer. The most expedient way to do this is to show them.’

He looked alien to her, sitting atop the grey, his plate armour polished, the long pole rising 10 feet vertically from where it rested in the stirrup next to his right foot. His face, though, was human. She studied him.

‘You will need to help.’ She doubted it, what she’d heard of him before she even sighted him. Rumours said he did little; it was his lackeys, his squire, that did it all for him. Even now, she could see the squire in the distance, waiting, simply standing, watching from afar.

‘How?’

‘Go ahead, leave branches, lucerne, hay, anything you think would tempt a horse or cow. Leave it in the path, and we will follow.’

Without a word, an assumption of an unspoken command, he pulled the reins to the left, turning the horse, and walking it back towards his squire.

Marianne pulled the branch from the beast, having to tug it away, taking the opportunity to remove it as the jaw slackened whilst chewing. She began walking, following the direction the knight had taken. As she arrived at the point the squire had been standing, a carrot lay on the ground.

Breaking it in half, she held her hand out flat. The creature took it, crunching and eating, stepping forward, approaching her, nudging her, clearly wanting the second part of the carrot. Marianne smiled and walked on.

The carrot was followed by another, and as they passed through the orchards, apples took their place. The knight and his squire were nowhere to be seen, just the treats for the creature. This is how she proceeded, heading back towards the village.

Arriving mid-morning, she was surprised to see the fields leading to the town were unusually vacant, with no one working the fields, no driving of ploughs or drays, empty, as if it was the seventh day, the day of rest.

Getting closer to town, it became apparent why. The villagers who should’ve been in the fields were gathered in the town square, silent, waiting. In the middle of the square stood two troughs, one with water, the other burgeoning with heads of lettuce.

The creature paused at the sight of the crowd. Although they stood still, it sensed their presence, sniffing the air, hesitant. Marianne grew worried it would flee.

Standing to the right of the trough containing the heads of lettuce stood the knight, bereft of his horse, plate armour and lance. He stood in a padded leather doublet, trousers and fine boots, a sword sheathed over his left shoulder.

He bent and grabbed a lettuce, tossing it to her feet. ‘See if he likes lettuce.’

Marianne looked at him. He looked more human now, out of his armour and at the same level as herself. She nodded thank you to him, bent and picked up the lettuce. Turning, holding it high, she shook it towards the creature, which in its alert state had risen to its full height, three feet above where she held the lettuce.

The movement and the scent of the fresh lettuce grabbed its attention again, distracting it from the presence of the stilled crowd. It bent and took the lettuce whole in its mouth, returning upright, surveying the crowd, the sound of the lettuce crunching audibly as the creature chewed. Swallowing the lettuce, it sniffed the air, trying to discern the scents about it, searching for more of the sweet smell of lettuce amongst the smell of humans all about it.

Suddenly, it stopped sniffing, looking directly towards the trough of lettuce, and for the first time, broke from Marianne's lead and trotted about her directly towards the trough, bowing its head to take another lettuce. Again, returning to full height, looking about, surveying the crowd.

Swallowing, it bent down again and took another lettuce, returning upright to scan the crowd.

And another.

As it bent towards the trough again to get its fourth lettuce, the knight struck. Decapitating the creature in one fell swoop, severing its head immediately behind the skull.

The crowd broke into shouts and screams of horror, none louder than Marianne’s.

The knight shouted above the din, ‘IT IS DONE!’ thrusting both hands into the air, as if calling for the crowd's adulation, or upon his god for recognition.

‘IT IS DONE! NOW AS AGREED, YOU’LL BEND YOUR KNEE TO ME, YOUR LORD AND SAVIOUR, SIR GEORGE!!’