Still Standing

So I realized last week that I had less out than I've had out all year. The trickle of rejections hadn't really registered as work coming in. So the last week has been spent sending shorts out again.

That and, well, starting another novel.

It's probably a bad idea. I mean, I have one not sold, one not finished an another outlined, but I have this thing in my head...it's why we write, isn't it?

It may be horror. In my head, it's hearkening back to the classics I read as a child. I don't know if I can pull that off, let alone if I can pull it off in contemporary publishing. But I know it needs to come out and be on a page.

I also have a new short story. I was going to have another go at "A Shattered Tear", because the lone image I have is beautiful, and fascinating. I know there is more to it than I had at the beginning of the year. This was my first shot:

A Shattered Tear

The roses were the last of the summer garden, saved from the first frost, given a life extension: one more week. Perhaps they would have chosen to be killed by the swift, cold hand of winter rather than Emily's warm caress. But she prolonged their slow decline into sweet-scented oblivion, avoiding the thorns with ease. Red blood on white flowers would fit her mood, but the roses were yellow and the thought of her own blood repulsed her. So she arranged the vase with practiced ease and pictured the stained flower as she worked.

A single drop of water fell from her eye. Colored lights played through it for the briefest moment before it shattered on the white tiles. Emily looked at the dead tear among the rose petals and longed for the numbness to return. He did this to her. Or she had done it to herself. Or they had done it together. Emily had been so sure that this longing was far behind her. This was never supposed to happen - she had promised herself she would be rational. Sublime. Independent. She rested the palms of her hands on the tiles, finding solace in their cool solidity.

A ghost of herself was reflected in the vase. She thought she looked pretty when she was out of focus. In her mind, he stood behind her. She hoped that a wish would have him there, at her side. In a moment the sweet smell of roses could be his clean sharp scent, a dropped petal the soft skin of cheek. The glint of the dead tear changed to the rare flash of his smile.

Emily remembered him in all his intensity. His need to care for her, to protect her. His need to do small things to please her. And he did please her, more than any man she had known, more than she had let any other man. By now he should have rejected her for being obnoxious or too ferocious in her independence. But he liked her, this man she called friend and thought of as lover.

Vase full, Emily started to clear the flower remnants, crushing petals together in her hand, relishing the moment of destruction. She tried to be a creative soul, but suspected that for every small thing she created she destroyed something else. Emily feared unintentional destruction more than anything. The end of the unknown, the death of a tear.

This man, he was worth the risk of destruction, he was even worth self destruction. Emily surprised herself with that thought, but that was what she was risking. And that was what she feared. Destroying herself before she had time to bloom, before the moment when the light would shine through the tear and let the colors shine.

And this was my second, or the start of the second:

Yellow roses scattered the kitchen. The last of the summer filled the house with the scent of decay. The grey outside the window tainted the petals with a deathly hue. It would freeze tonight.

Claire’s tears shattered on the tile, creating diamond fragments. She watched as they hardened, enclosing their continuously refracting rainbows. Despite the beauty, more tears fell. She wiped them away with the back of her hand, aware as she did it that much-needed money was being absorbed back into her skin. But Claire didn’t want to cry today. It was her time, her place.

The world became a distant place. Claire removed herself from the room, focusing on a petal, a yellow oval with a drop of moisture pulling it towards the tile. Her emotions dulled as the petal bent and the droplet fell from the petal, spraying the tears with a layer of water, softening their hard edges. She gathered the hardened tears and put them in her purse

So I think the second is more my genre, but the first more in style. I'll play with it later.

The one I'm writing until I work out what's going on is Science Fiction. I have to give a nod to Ann and Hesperia and Glory. She inspired the seed for the next bout of insanity. A man this time, and science fiction. It was a reminder that I don't have to be reliable, even if it is hard.

Electric Velocipede asked to see something else of mine. I'm going to bite the bullet and send them something I think is risky. Because you never know.