Author Archives: Melissa

August 14, 2020

Your Update Link: Desperate Measures, Part 17

Not a lot to report today. Yesterday, I got a bit burnt out and took the afternoon off. Then, despite going to bed at a decent time for a change, I woke up with a massive sinus headache that is still lingering a little bit. I think it’s honestly because I’m staying inside so much, and I need to get my dad to change the filter on my central air.

Desperate Measures will be wrapping up next Wednesday, on August 19, and Darkest Before the Dawn on August 20. I’ll be back August 31 with the new round of flash fictions and the schedule. I have a lot of ideas so I’ll be letting my Patreons vote on the top two or three.

This entry is part 18 of 20 in the Flash Fiction: Desperate Measures

Written in 20 minutes. No time for edits.

Jason and Cameron weren’t alone in the waiting room for long — Carly showed up soon after they had with Joss in tow. Joss immediately flew to Cameron’s aside, the first she’d been able to see her best friend since the news had hit that morning.

Carly’s arms were tightly folded as she took in the blood on Jason’s shirt and hands. “Is there any point in asking you to get cleaned up?” she asked.

Jason shook his head wordlessly, then looked over as Drew walked in. Cameron shot his feet, glaring the man who had remained behind with Sam —

“What do you want?” Cameron demanded as Joss put a hand on his elbow. “No! I don’t want him in here! Or you—” he finally said, turning to Jason. “Neither of you deserve to be anywhere near my mother—”

“Cam—”

“What is that about?” Carly demanded as a pale Drew joined them, and Joss took Cameron aside. “What the hell—”

“He got a crash course in my—” Drew closed his eyes. “In Sam’s history with Elizabeth. And everything she’s done.”

“Done?” Carly repeated. She furrowed her brows. “What? I mean, I know she slept with Lucky while he was married to Elizabeth, but beyond that—” She looked back and forth between them. “Oh, is this something that’s going to piss me off?”

“It’s not important right now,” Drew said, dismissing Carly. “And none of your business—”

“Hey—”

“Sam’s been sedated,” Drew told Jason. “And Alexis is with her now. I just—I came to find out how Elizabeth is—”

“When were you going to tell me my son has cancer again?” Jason demanded, roughly. “Why didn’t you tell me—” He held up a hand to keep Carly from butting in again. He didn’t have the time or patience to rein her in at the moment.

“Sam wanted to—” Drew took a deep breath. “Sam wanted to keep it to herself, and after Julian refused to donate a second time—”

“He did what—”

“Carly, stop—” Jason snapped and she pressed her lips together in a mutinuous line. “I thought you said Sam left town—that you hadn’t heard from her—”

“That’s true,” Drew told him. “But Danny—I talked to Julian. I got Kiki to talk to him, and it’s already been—Danny’s already scheduled for the procedure, and Finn is confident he’ll go into remission again—” He scowled. “But I guess—I don’t know. If her condition came back, or maybe Julian’s refusal just sent her over the edge—then finding out about Franco—”

He rubbed his chest, then clenched his hand into a fist. “I don’t know,” he repeated. “She took off, and I’ve been trying to get in touch with her. If she’d just—if she’d called me—I could have told her—”

Carly opened her mouth, then closed it again, clearly trying to obey Jason’s order to be quiet.

“You did what?” Joss screeched, and Drew winced as the trio turned to the teens in the corner.

“She sure does take after you,” Drew muttered as Joss shot out of her chair, her hands on her hips.

“You snuck into the car, you stupid idiot—” Joss smacked Cameron hard in the shoulder. “What the hell are you thinking?”

“Hey—” Cameron lunged to his feet, glaring right back at her. “I was thinking that my mother was going off with two idiots who never ever fucking do anything to stop Sam from hurting her and I wanted to be there if she needed anything—”

His face crumpled then as he sank back onto the chair, his head in his hands. “But it’s my fault. Sam grabbed me. Mom came after me—”

Drew started towards him, but Jason held him back. “I’m the one that forgave Sam after she was part of getting Jake kidnapped,” he reminded him. “Everything else is on me, not you.”

“I have my regrets,” Drew muttered but let Jason walk over to Cameron as Drew stayed next to Carly who, mirroring her daughter, smacked Drew in the shoulder.

“She did what to Jake?”

Jason ignored them and sat next to Cameron. “Your mother would walk through fire for you. She would not want you to blame yourself for this—”

“She dared Sam to shoot her instead of me,” Cameron said dully. “It should be me in there—”

“No,” Joss shook her head. “No, Cam—”

“And then your mother would be out here, terrified of losing another son. Jake might have come back, but she—” Jason drew in a sharp breath. “She never would have forgiven herself if it was you. You know that.”

“How could you let her back into your life?” Cameron demanded. “How could you let her hurt my mother like that? Why did you stop—” He shook his head, looked away.

“I made a mistake,” Jason said slowly. “When I broke up with your mother after Jake was kidnapped. You were four years old, I don’t know if you remember—” He paused. “And by the time I regretted it, your mother had moved on, and I thought I had lost my chance. I was lonely. And I’m sorry.”

Cameron swallowed hard. “If you broke up with her to keep her safe, it didn’t work.”

“No, it didn’t,” Jason admitted. “I’m sorry, Cameron. I can’t—I can’t change what I did. I can only promise to do better.”

Cameron looked at him, must have seen something in his eyes that convinced him, so he nodded. “Okay. But I don’t care what happens to Sam. She doesn’t come near my mother ever again.”

“Agreed,” Jason said, though he wasn’t entirely sure how they’d make that happen. He looked over at Drew who was still being whacked in the shoulder by Carly — he must have explained Maureen Harper.

“It wasn’t me, damn it, Carly—”

“Oh, I will get him later, don’t you worry—I always knew she was trash—”

Joss rolled her eyes. “My mother. The hypocrite.”

The door opened then, and Griffin came in, frowning as he saw Carly whack Drew one more time before Drew got out of the way.

“Uh, I just came to let you know we finished the surgery,” he said, still casting a side-eye at Carly and Drew before focusing on Jason and Cameron. “Elizabeth’s in post-op and should make a full recovery.”

August 13, 2020

Your Update Links: Darkest Before the Dawn, Part 13 | If Wishes Came True

New Channel Videos: Mad World, Part 5 | Fool Me Twice, Part 3 and Part 4

Happy Thursday! I have a lot to get to in this post, so if you want to go ahead and just go read the updates and come back — that’s probably a good idea, LOL. We’re down two flash fiction series, so that’s good news. Both stories have about three parts left, so I think they’ll be wrapping up next Wednesday. I’m still taking off that next week to work out revision ideas and decide on the new series and schedule.

I finally finished the last episode tag in the trio I promised last week. This picks up midway through Friday, August 7’s show when Jason has had his motorcycle accident. I have some thoughts about a tag or two this week, but I want to see how the rest of the week works out in today and tomorrow’s episodes. If Wishes Came True is now available, and could probably fit into the universe of the other two tags, Strong Enough and This Is Me Trying. None of them are specifically connected but they don’t really contradict each other either.  I also finally updated the Alternate History, Alphabetical List, and Recent Updates page so yay for me on that score! I’m hoping to get back to the facelift, but for a variety of reasons it’s been a struggle.

I’m finally getting the video posts going. Mad World’s latest post has a transcript, but it’s messy, lol. Fool Me Twice has two new videos, posted on Tuesday and today, going over the final bits of discovery.  I’ll be linking them this way going forward — each page will have the embedded video, a playlist table of contents, a quick online summary and transcript. The transcript takes the longest, but I’m going to carve out some time this weekend to deal with them. There will be an official channel page at some point. I hope you enjoy!

In my final bit of news — Mad World, Book 3 is officially being separated into two books. As I was working on the beta draft yesterday, it became very clear to me that I had two narratives that are deeply interrelated, but still different stories. I have organized the new Book 3 — it’s 23 chapters. The new Book 4 is still in the process of being reorganized. It’s currently at 25 chapters. We’re kind of looking at the Book 1 and 2 situation — Book 1 opened the world and set me up for Book 2, and I feel like that’s what Book 3 is doing. It’s dealing with the fallout of Books 1 & 2 while setting us up for the final confrontations of Book 4.

What does this mean for scheduling? I’m not entirely positive at this time other than the fact that the October 6 date is set in stone for some sort of general release. I might drop Book 3 on October 6, then Book 4 in December — because then when Fool Me Twice Book 1 comes out in February, it’ll be a new book every other month. I might do a poll as I get through the beta draft and get some feedback on whether or not that works for you.

I’ll have more information for you in next week’s vlog post as I finish up restructuring the beta draft and get started on line edits for Book 3.

 

This entry is part 13 of 16 in the Flash Fiction: Darkest Before the Dawn

Written in 19 minutes. No time for typos.

Jason stared at Elizabeth for a long time before looking down at the envelope she’d placed in his hands.

They had stood here in late August, in the same positions—she looking at him with sober, sad eyes, holding out a stark white envelope with General Hospital’s logo and Patrick’s Drake name scribbled across the front.

She was still looking at him with sober, sad eyes and he realized, even before he had opened the results—before he had confirmed that her words were true—that she was expecting the same outcome as she had three months ago.

That Jason would rush off to tell Sam, bring home her son, and reunite, saving their marriage, and getting a fresh start.

Jason exhaled slowly, drew out the folded paper, and read it. He furrowed his brow slightly at the notification a few tests—he’d look at that more carefully in a minute, but—

Sam’s son was alive. At least, according to this test, he was.

“Why didn’t you tell me you thought Brad Cooper was lying to you?” Jason said. He folded it again, slid it back into the envelope, and tucked it inside his jacket. “Why did you go to Spinelli?”

“Because I wanted to be wrong,” Elizabeth admitted. She folded her arms, tightly, as if she could hold herself together. “And I’m terrible for that. Terrible for hoping that Sam’s son stayed dead. I have to live with myself, knowing that I feel that way—”

“Elizabeth—”

“I just—” Elizabeth’s eyes squeezed shut as she turned away from him, looked out over the skyline of Port Charles. “I can’t stop hating myself. I almost—” She sucked in the breath. “I was going to wait. Until the end of my shift. To keep putting it off. I’m no better than Sam was when she kept the truth about Jake—”

“Elizabeth, how long did you have these results?” Jason asked. He put a hand on her shoulder, turned her back to face him. “An hour? Two?”

“Ten minutes,” she said with a wince. “But I thought it—”

“And I thought about strangling Lucky Spencer every time he puts his hands on you or Jake,” Jason said in a low voice. “I didn’t do it. You didn’t lie to me, Elizabeth. And you didn’t let anyone walk away from Danny. You didn’t watch whatever happened—you didn’t see it happen.”

He paused. “And this isn’t August,” Jason continued. “Things are different now—”

“Jason—”

“I can’t tell you what would have happened if we’d…if we’d learned this back then,” Jason said slowly. “I can only tell you what changes today. And it’s nothing.”

She met his eyes, frowning slightly. “I—”

“I mean, we’ll take this to Sam, and let her handle it. And then I’ll go deal with Tracy because she had no right to do this—” Jason squinted. “And was there another test in there that compared my DNA to Franco’s?”

“Uh—” Elizabeth scratched her temple. “Yeah. Um, I guess Tracy wanted—you’re not Franco’s brother. I mean—DNA wise, there’s no blood—”

And that was a relief—a weight off his shoulders. “Okay. But that’s all that changes.”

“I—”

“I love you,” he told her quietly. “But I understand that you don’t trust that.”

“It’s not that I don’t—” She drew her bottom lip between her teeth, bit down. “It’s not that I don’t trust you—”

“You don’t trust me to stay,” Jason told her, with a shake of his head. “And that’s because I didn’t. When it mattered. It matters now. You did this, even worried that it meant I’d leave you. And that means—” He took out the test again. Really thought about the risk she’d taken—believed she’d been taking.

“I hope it means part of you does trust me,” Jason added, “but it also reminds me that I can trust you. To always be honest. Even when it might hurt us both. And that’s—” He hesitated. “That’s not something we’ve always shared.”

“No, I guess that’s true.” Elizabeth’s smile was tentative. “So—I mean—”

He leaned down, brushed her lips with his. “Nothing has changed for me. I love you. And I love the life we’re building together. I’m glad I get to tell Sam her son is alive, but I want to do that with you. She should know that you were part of it.”

“I can probably get Epiphany to cover the rest of my shift,” Elizabeth admitted. “I’d—I’d like to be there when Sam finds out.” She stood on the tips of her toes, kissed him. “I love you, too.”

——

Jason called Sam and asked her to meet him in the park — on neutral ground. Sam had seemed confused with the call, but he told her that he and Elizabeth wanted to talk to her about something.

He’d heard the pain in her voice as she asked him if he was telling her they were getting married. He assured her that it wasn’t the case, and she agreed.

Still — Jason wasn’t entirely unsurprised when Sam walked into the park with John McBain at her side.

Sam never liked to walk into any battle outnumbered—and everything was a battle to her.

“Jason—” Sam looked at Elizabeth, standing at his side. “What’s going on?”

“A few months ago, I met Tea Delgado’s son,” Jason told her. “And I got suspicious because her son was born the same night as yours—”

“Jason—”

“And there were other reasons,” he continued, “that I won’t get into right now, but I told Elizabeth about my theory. She arranged a DNA test.” He looked at Elizabeth.

“The first test came back negative,” Elizabeth told Sam, “but the lab tech who ran it was nearly fired due to budget cuts. Budget cuts that were solved by a donation from ELQ—from Tracy Quartermaine—”

Sam closed her eyes, her face pale, her hands shaking as she put them up. “What are you saying—”

“I was worried the tech had lied to me,” Elizabeth said. “So I asked Spinelli if he could track down the original test.”

She held out the envelope. “And the original test confirmed Jason’s theory. Tea Delgado’s son is Danny. She’s raising him in Llanview, but he’s—”

Sam gasped, choking on a sob. “What—What? Are you—”

“Danny is alive, Sam. Your son is alive.”

This entry is part 4 of 9 in the Vlog: Fool Me Twice


 

  1. It Starts
  2. Who’s In this story anywhere?
  3.  How do I do this again?
  4. Picking the Start of the Story

Topic

In this video, I discuss picking a starting point for rewriting Jason’s return in 2017. Do I start with Steve’s return in September and the escape from Russia, his return to Port Charles in October, or the revelation of which twin is which?

Transcript

coming soon

This entry is part 3 of 9 in the Vlog: Fool Me Twice


  1. It Starts
  2. Who’s In this story anywhere?
  3. How do I do this again?
  4. Picking the Start of the Story

Topic

In this story, I talk about how I start structuring my stories and approaching an ensemble piece with three central narrative conflicts and a variety of subplots.

Transcripts

Coming Soon

August 12, 2020

This entry is part 3 of 5 in the Wishes Came True

Inspiration

All this talk of Power of Attorneys on General Hospital recently made me wonder how I could make it slightly more interesting. I tried to think of a reason Carly couldn’t have POA or who else might have it. And I’m a Liason fan, so you know where that led me.

Timeline

If you haven’t read Strong Enough or This Is Me Trying, my other 2020 Episode Tags, both of those give in depth recaps. To save myself some time and space here — Jason asks Carly to have his power of attorney for medical decisions. This happened on, canonically on GH, the day before his motorcycle accident. He had a few reasons for not giving it to Sam. Elizabeth’s story on GH is non-existent so there’s really not a lot you need to know. This takes place during August 7, 2020’s episode — after Jason was brought to General Hospital in the accident. Enjoy!

If one thing had been different
Would everything be different today?

 Thursday, August 6, 2020

 General Hospital: Emergency Room

 There were few things that Diane Miller liked less than delivering bad news to clients who lacked the capacity to understand that screaming at the messenger rarely changed anything.

As her heels clicked on the linoleum floors of General Hospital, Diane girded her loins, touched her carefully coiffed red hair, and stepped up to the group of people waiting for her.

“It’s about damn time,” Carly Corinthos snapped, her eyes flashing as she whirled on the lawyer. Tears stained her cheeks. “I need to sign the paperwork—why couldn’t you just fax or email it—”

“Well—” Diane pursed her lips. “As you might know, Jason only asked me yesterday to draw up the new paperwork—he hasn’t signed it—”

“That shouldn’t matter,” Elizabeth Webber said softly. Diane turned to find the nurse standing at the hub, a clipboard in her hands. She looked nervously between Diane, Carly, and Sam Morgan. “Should it? You know his wishes, and it’s not as though the hospital would be liable—”

“Exactly—” Carly stabbed a finger at Elizabeth. “Thank you for being useful for the first time in your life—”

“Carly, shut up, and just sign the damn paperwork!” Sam retorted. “Diane—”

“Well, that might work if Jason didn’t already have a POA in existence.” Diane grimaced as Carly frowned at her. “POAs don’t expire,” she clarified. “Even if they were signed a decade or more ago.”

Out of the corner of her eye, Diane saw Elizabeth’s eyes widen briefly before closing in resignation.

“I don’t understand—I thought Sonny had Jason’s POA before—” Sam frowned, looking at Diane with confusion. “That doesn’t—I don’t—”

“He did have his POA until Jason was preparing to travel internationally in 2008 with another person to whom he did not share any legal ties,” Diane explained carefully. “As I said — they don’t expire—”

“Who was Jason going to—” Sam closed her mouth. She looked at Carly, who shook her head, indicating it wasn’t her. Then, in unison, they both turned to Elizabeth, whose cheeks were flushed.

“They don’t expire?” Elizabeth asked faintly.

“No, they don’t. So…” Diane set the paperwork on the table. “Here is the paperwork for the file, and I suppose you ought to sign that form you’re holding—”

“Wait, this can’t—” Sam scowled, then shoved herself forward, smacking the clipboard out of Elizabeth’s hand. “This can’t be—I was married to him—it should have been null and void—”

“Well, it might surprise you, but a spouse is only the default next of kin,” Diane said. She sniffed. “A person can name anyone they want to be in charge of their decisions—”

“Sam, this isn’t worth arguing about,” Carly hissed. “Just let her sign the damn form so Jason can go into surgery—”

Sam glared at Carly, then at Elizabeth before releasing her grip on the clipboard. Elizabeth hastily signed it and handed it to the waiting doctor.

“Good luck,” Portia Robinson murmured as she and Finn disappeared, leaving Elizabeth alone with Carly, Sam, and Diane.

“When Jason wakes up, we’ll get this sorted,” Carly told Elizabeth. “Don’t think this is your ticket back in.”

“No one wants a ticket to that circus, Carly,” Elizabeth said with exhaustion. “I will happily surrender this to you—I didn’t even know—”

“It wasn’t relevant prior to today,” Diane said with a shrug. “Jason had always been able to consent to treatment before now. Now, if you’ll excuse me.” She left the area, returning the elevator.

“I can’t believe this.” Sam folded her arms and stalked forward—she made it three steps before spinning and walking back those three steps. “Why would he do this to me?”

“Sam, I really don’t think this is a big deal,” Carly said. She eyed Elizabeth. “I need to go update Sonny. He had to step out and check on the nanny—”

“Yeah, sure, I’ll text you if there’s any news.”

Elizabeth looked over at Sam, who was staring at the floor. “Sam—I doubt Jason even remembered we signed that paperwork—I forgot it, too, which means I have to get my paperwork fixed—”

“It’s not even—” Sam exhaled sharply. “He just never seems to put me first,” she murmured. “Even now. It should be me. It shouldn’t be Carly.” She raised her eyes, red with tears. “You get it, don’t you? How would you feel if Franco had put Ava or someone else he used to love in charge of everything?”

“It would hurt,” Elizabeth said carefully, “but it’s not like Jason asked me to do this last week. It was twelve years ago, Sam. You and I both know things were different then.”

“Yeah. He still hated me and loved you.” Sam rubbed her chest. “But he chose someone else yesterday—”

“I know, but—”

“I just—can you text me when you know anything?” Sam walked away before Elizabeth could answer, and finally, she was alone.

With a lot to think about.

General Hospital: ICU

Jason’s surgery was a success, and he woke up twenty-four hours later. His first visitor was, naturally, Carly, who could not wait to tell him that his first priority would be fixing the paperwork.

“I mean, how could you not sign the paperwork before you got on the bike without a helmet?” Carly said with a roll of her eyes as she tucked Jason’s blanket in. “And why didn’t you mention it was a revised POA?”

“Carly.” Jason’s eyes closed as he winced from the pain. “I didn’t remember—I was dead for a few years—”

“You know, this is Port Charles. You only get to the play the I was dead card twice,” Carly told him. She turned when she heard the door open, finding Elizabeth in the doorway. “I called Diane. She’s on her way to get Jason to sign the paperwork.”

“Can’t wait to be in complete control, huh?” Elizabeth said with a smirk. Carly narrowed her eyes, then nodded.

“Can’t wait to make sure you’re out of his life.” She stalked out, likely to hunt Diane down and drag her in kicking and screaming.

Elizabeth shook her head, turning away from Carly’s exit. “Sometimes, I think about asking her why exactly she hates me, but I’m not entirely sure she’d remember anymore.”

“Carly rarely needs a reason,” Jason managed. He opened his eyes, found hers. “I’m sorry. I forgot—”

“Me, too.” Elizabeth checked his vitals and made a note on his chart. “I guess I didn’t even think about it because we never made it to Italy.” She paused for a moment as the pain of it passed again—the faint wisp of memory, waiting at the gate so close to the dream—

“I’m sorry,” Jason repeated, and this time it sounded more like he was apologizing for something more than forgotten paperwork. She looked at him.

“Me, too,” she echoed. She tapped her pen against the clipboard. “Your vitals are stable, so if you could avoid doing this again for a while, that would be great.”

“I’ll try.” Jason hesitated. “Did you go to Italy?” he asked.

Elizabeth shook her head. “No, I, uh, thought about it a few times, but it wouldn’t have been the same.” She went to the doorway, then looked back at him. “Get some rest. I’ll bring Jake to see you later.”

“Thanks.”

On her way down the hallway, she ran into Carly and Diane. “Hey, I guess you’re here to get Jason to sign the revised POA?” Elizabeth asked.

“I’ll meet you in there,” Carly told Diane. “I made sure she brought the paperwork for you to rescind yours,” she told Elizabeth. “Just a little favor from me to you.” She left and went into Jason’s room.

“I know she’s paid for a great deal of my designer wardrobe, but I really don’t like her,” Diane said with a sigh. She held out a clipboard. “Here is the revocation of your POA. Sign this, and Jason will no longer be responsible for your medical decisions in the event you can’t consent.”

Elizabeth took the clipboard from her and the pen. The tip hovered over the signature space, but for some reason—she couldn’t quite bring herself to sign.

“Elizabeth—”

“You know—” Elizabeth looked at Diane. “All things considered, I think I’d enjoy annoying Carly a little longer.”

“I’ve always liked you, Elizabeth Webber.” Diane smiled at her, then took back the clipboard. “Now, excuse me while I go get Carly off my back.”

“Good luck.”

This entry is part 1 of 1 in the Vlog: Mad World, Book 3

So this is the new format of my video posts, which I’m going to be working on when I have a chance over the next few weeks. I found a service that transcribes videos really cheap ($12 for two hours of footage) but the transcripts have to be cleaned up. This was my first attempt at cleaning up a transcript, lol. If anyone would like to take a stab at cleaning it up further, have at it. I didn’t want to spend my whole day working on it, to be honest, and, wow, my speaking style is…all over the place. I’ll work on that.

Eventually, every entry in a series will have a post — so the table of contents will be listed below, but doing the backlist is a lot less of a priority at the moment. I’ll have Fool Me Twice’s two posts done tomorrow for the update. This will also be the only time I cross list the video posts in the Site New update. In the future, the post will be ready and linked in the daily updates. It will also have a section on the site.  It just wasn’t ready for this morning. Hopefully this helps!

Mad World Vlog: Planning, Writing, Editing & Publishing

  1.  Why Are We Here?
  2.  Where Are We Going?
  3. So, Still Writing?
  4. This Is My Lex Luthor.
  5. We’ve Reached The End. Of Disc One.

Also featured in Camp NaNoWrimo, April 2020.

Transcript

(please excuse messiness — it’s my first time, lol, and my speaking style is very…all over the place)

Welcome back to Crimson Glass on YouTube. So this is part 5 of Writing Mad World. I finished the first draft yesterday. I want to get that out of the way and say now.  I’m pretty excited about it. I wasn’t sure if I would need to make another one of these before I actually got into revisions, but I thought well, I’m making a video about Fool me Twice Today. Let’s just get it done. So it’s done.

It ended up being 653 pages 235 thousand words. Um, it’s 41 chapters. I don’t know. I lost count. That’s the reason I don’t know how many chapters technically it is because I have 90 overall chapters in the trilogy and the first 50 of them are in the first two books. So I’m going to say yeah, that’s probably about 39 to 40 chapters and it’ll probably be more by the time we’re done. So the one–the thing I really want to talk about in this video is writing an ending to the story and approaching material with an eye of reminding yourself who’s in charge. So and this is a lesson that for some reason I have to learn like over and over and over again and I really can’t tell you why.

So what happened is that I got to Monday and I have been reading a chapter a day and I was like, yes, we’re going to finish I might not get the epilogues done on time.  But that’s alright. They can be finished during the beta draft that really it. They’ re just wrap-ups. It’s really not that big deal and then I finished on Monday and I realized on Tuesday. Oh my God. I don’t really want to write the ending of the story and I couldn’t decide at first if it was just like I’m really tired. I’ve been living with the story now for 66 days at that point because I started like daily on June 1st,
and I couldn’t decide at the problem if I was having was just that I was tired because sometimes you know, you get to the end of the project you get tired, so I try to like open it up and look at it and I started to write the first scene. I’m just like I really don’t want to I don’t want to do it and I think it’s because I realized that in order for the ending to work the way I had originally outlined because some things have changed-because Elizabeth was not going to be living in a house that they were supposed to have moved during Mad World Book 3, but it didn’t end up happening and never was never a moment on the page where it made sense for that to happen and they end up not having a huge time Jump. I was going to skip six weeks at some point and that I’m not doing that.

So for a variety of reasons Elizabeth is still in the–Jason Elizabeth are both in the penthouse at the end of the story. And that matters because I need something to have happened to Elizabeth that can’t happen unless she’s an idiot and I really can’t stand when a character does something dumb like, you know, when you’re watching a movie and your kid the characters just starts like she’s like,  like don’t go upstairs. You know what you did to open that door and don’t look up like Don’t Look Under the Bed like, you know, your starts screaming at the screen at your character. That’s how I felt. Like people would be thinking about Liz and Carly at this point and I was just like this is not working and, again I was not entirely sure if it was not working because I was just really tired and so my like my enthusiasm was just gone and if that’s true, like I just got to power through it and get it done.

But if it’s because of material’s not working, which is the same problem I was having in July which is the same thing I talked about in the last video, like, literally I just talked about how you got to make this decision. So I talked to Ang in DMs and I was like, I really hate the ending. I’m paraphrasing– but I was just like this is not working. I really hate it. She’s like what’s the problem was like well in order for the end of the work people they have to be stupid. And the this thing–this can’t happen if Liz is in the penthouse. She’s like, okay, why doesn’t Liz leave the house? Why does she have to be in the penthouse?

I thought well, she wouldn’t leave because you know the way the story works is–it’s a Monday in the story and Cam’s just come home from the hospital on Friday and he was a premature baby. So, you know, she’s he needs a ton of care of right, you know hands-on and Jason would be in Crimson Point. So like he’s not going to leave him alone with a babysitter to go have lunch. Like she’s not after the story I just told–not that she can’t do that–but I’m just saying it’s been it’s been less than four days since he came home. She’s not going to leave him with a babysitter just to go out and have lunch–like she’s just not there the point in her life.

That got me thinking — does Jason have to go to Crimson Point? Why can’t he be the one that stays home? After that I sat down my restructure my final chapters based on, you know, Liz leaves Jason stays. That was Tuesday.

I wrote two chapters hour and a half and then yes, Wednesday. I wrote the two chapters. And then yesterday I finished and I wrote the last chapter and it’s all done and it was just like that simple. It was just a matter of and for some reason being very very psychic and knowing exactly the right question to ask me. And me taking a moment to realize just because I outlined it some way–I mean, there are a couple of things that do get lost by it not being the way I anticipated. There’s a Michael thing that I was hoping–I really would have liked to have come full circle on but it’s okay that it’s not there. I think overall the things I get by making the change are better than the things I lose and I can still look for a way for that to be full circle later on, like in revisions. I was really–until I made that choice to make that change–I was really thinking about Why don’t I just write what I originally have outlined then I’ll fix it and revisions but in by fixing them like I would just I would basically have to rewrite it. And I’m just not in the mood right now to create more work for myself.

Like it’s one thing to write something get to the end of it and think that didn’t 100% work or een 90% work. Like that’s the way I feel about the middle part of the story–the middle 17 chapters that were written first but ended up being in the middle because they don’t fit now–I know how much work they’re going to need. So the last thing I want to do is create more. For myself, I don’t ever want to go into a scene thinking it’s alright, if it doesn’t work. I’ll fix it in revisions. I’d rather have that attitude after I’m done. Like there’s a Laura and Carly scene. I was really I wrote it early early in the whole draft and I was like, I thought that might be a relationship I could play with but they’re ended up not really being room for it. So when I go back through edits, I’m probably gonna end up removing that scene and that’s okay. Like I like that scene. I’ll probably post it somewhere isn’t it as a deleted scene, but I you know, it doesn’t really fit with the overall story ended up telling so that’s different though, because that was me playing around with that characters characters in a scene hat isn’t bad. It just isn’t going to fit the narrative I can cut that but it’s another thing to go into a scene thing. Yeah, this is not going to work, but I’m going to fix it in reisions. Anyway, like I don’t want to create that work for myself.

So mad world book 3 is done. It’s going to be released to the well done. I used on so subjectively it’s going into revisions. So it is Friday the day that I am filming that you guys are probably seen this on Saturday if This video worked because this is now the third time I filmed at the first time I messed up the audio. I’m not great at this. I’m using a new camera today as you can probably tell from the quality. So apologies and I’m messing up where I’m supposed to look because I have to look somewhere different now–apologies for that as well. I am not a professional, you know.

I’m taking the next few days off Friday and Saturday and on Sunday and Monday, I’m going to reread the whole thing and make like large scale notes about what are specific stories I missed. What are some specific things I want to do and then I’m going to go through a chapter. By chapter breaking it down making like I’m going to plant it chapter by chapter and then go through a chapter by chapter.

So I’ll check in with you guys next week because I should be kind of closer to getting into a full-scale edit. I really am thinking that the first 15 chapters are probably just clean up go for consistency–Spellings,  typos just stuff like that. There’s a couple of points. I want to hit a little harder. It’s the middle chapters that are probably gonna need the most work and I think that I’m going to make sure that I have at least 17 days of just working on them.  Alright, so today is August 7th. I’m taking off today and tomorrow so it looks fresher on the 9th and the 10th. I’m going to reread and then by the 16th, I want to start working. But now that I’m looking at that–that only gives me two full weeks to rewrite all those chapters in case I need to rewrite all those chapters.

You know what though? If I have to take part of September to go through the beta draft. That’s actually okay because I’m end up taking a whole week from revisions this point. So yeah, so that’s the goal is August 31st. If I don’t make it it is what it is. It’s okay. The better my beta draft is the easier that third draft is so the October 6th 8th shouldn’t shouldn’t change a lot. I’m not really I see no reason with the first draft being done in August whiBye.le you guys Not have it in October 6. All right, so that is part 5 of Writing Mad World. I will see you guys next week with part 6 in which we will have a better sense of how much work I’ve created for myself.

Your Update Link: Whatever It Takes, Part 16

Another series is finished and moves into revision. As I said last week, I wanted to finish all current series in progress, then take off the last week of August to get ready for the new school year. Once I know if I’ll be back to work full-time in September, I’ll work out a schedule and unveil the next set of series, one of which will include the sequel to Darkest Before the Dawn. I’m still working on revision ideas for An Everlasting Love — Mad World has eaten all my energy, lol. That’s another reason I want to take off the last week of August.

I started working on the beta draft for Mad World and we’re getting closer to the idea of splitting this into two books. I’m pretty sure I’ll know for sure after I complete today’s work. Each day, I’m taking ten chapters and looking over notes, adding scenes and chapters where they need to be. I’ve added plans for about six or seven scenes in existing chapters and then two more chapters — on top of at least five or six chapters I know have to be added to today’s batch of ten. That’s only the first half of the book — you see why I might be splitting it.

See you guys tomorrow!

This entry is part 16 of 16 in the Flash Fiction: Whatever It Takes

No time for typos. Written in 20 minutes.

By the time Jason arrived with the clean up crew, he found Elizabeth standing over Ric’s body. Blood was dribbling out of Ric’s mouth, and his eyes were still open, the film of death clouding them.

Elizabeth met his eyes when she came through the door. “Where’s Lily?” She tucked the gun she’d still been holding back in her purse holster, then strode over to him. “Is she okay? Where—”

“With Steven across the hall.” Jason took her by the shoulder as a few men came in and started to wrap Ric in the plastic tarp. He searched her eyes, then looked up and down—not a mark on her, a hair out of place—

He pressed his lips together, looked at Ric’s body, then back at Elizabeth. “That’s why you wanted to meet him alone,” Jason said, exhaling. “You were planning this.”

“He was never going to stop,” she murmured. She also looked back at her ex-husband, at the man who had never, ever accepted her right to say no, to walk away, and build a new life.

“I never—I would have done this—” His throat was tight. “I didn’t want this for you—”

“This was my battle to fight. Not yours. He came after you because of me.” Her voice trembled. “He stole our daughter because of me. I needed to finish it. I need to see her—she’s okay? You said she’s okay?”

“She is.” Jason put an arm around her shoulders and led her out of the penthouse, away from Ric Lansing for the last time. “She’s—she’s been called Isla this last year.” He stopped her before they went inside. “She’s in perfect health, but she doesn’t know us.”

Elizabeth closed her eyes, scrubbed her hands over her face. “Isla,” she repeated. “She’s—she’s not even a year old. We—we could—we could go back to—”

But now it felt wrong. Lily had been the name they’d chosen together for their little girl, their dream, for their future. She’d wanted to honor Jason’s grandmother, Lila—

This little girl didn’t know them.

“We could,” Jason said slowly. He tucked a piece of hair behind her ear. “Let’s just go inside and take it step by step.”

Elizabeth took a deep breath, twisted the knob, then opened the door. Inside, her brother was sitting on the sofa, the baby in his lap. She was smiling at him, a stuffed dog in her hands, an ear in her mouth.

The baby turned at the sound. She smiled. Elizabeth choked back a sob. It was her little girl, the little face she’d seen in the photograph—older now, the hint of fuzzy blond hair a little longer now—curling around her ears. She had her daddy’s sunny blonde hair, his blue eyes—

“She looks like you,” Jason told her. Elizabeth blinked, then laughed. “What?” he asked, his eyes crinkling with confusion.

“I was just thinking that she looked like you—your coloring—”

“She has your face.” Jason walked over and without a word, Steven handed the baby to him. “Hey, Isla,” Jason said softly, bouncing her slightly. “Remember me?”

The baby ducked her head, pressing it against Jason’s chest, then smiling at him. She babbled something, waved the stuffed dog.

“That’s right, that’s from me,” he murmured. Elizabeth recognized it now — he’d given it to her the day they’d learned she was pregnant. Baby’s first toy.

It had been sitting in the nursery for over a year, waiting for their daughter.

“This is Mommy,” Jason told her. The baby crinkled her eyes, shook her head. “I know, you have another Mommy—”

Elizabeth closed her eyes, her heart aching. Oh, God—it would be so easy for their daughter to adjust to Jason—she’d never had a father—no other person to replace—but she already had a mother.

“This is also your mommy,” Jason told her. He walked over to Elizabeth. “This is Elizabeth.”

“Hi, baby.” Elizabeth reached out, touched her skin. Oh, God, she was real. She was really—she was here. This wasn’t another waking nightmare. “Hi.”

She babbled, smiled at Elizabeth, then tucked her head against Jason to give Elizabeth the same smile she’d given Jason a moment ago.

“Your name, it’s—” Elizabeth swallowed. “You’re Isla.”

Something that sounded like yes emerged from the babble as Isla lifted her head, waved the dog ear at her.

“Can I give you a hug?” she asked. “I’d like—I’d like to hug you.”

“Dog,” Isla said with a nod. She held out her arms, and Jason transferred her into Elizabeth’s embrace.

And Elizabeth held her daughter for the first time. She held her tight, cupping the back of her head, pressing her cheek to her daughter’s. It didn’t matter what her name was—didn’t matter that today, Isla didn’t really know who she was.

She was holding her little girl.

Elizabeth opened her eyes, looked at Jason. “Thank you. For bringing her home.” His eyes were red, and she could see the tears clinging to his lower lashes as he nodded. He smoothed his hand down Isla’s back. Their first time standing together as a family.

—

A few hours later, they put Isla down for her first night in the nursery. Elizabeth had rocked her to sleep in the rocking chair, just as she’d dreamed for so long, Jason leaning against the door frame.

As Isla’s beautiful blue eyes closed, Elizabeth looked up at Jason. “We’ll have to take turns putting her to sleep,” she told him. “We have so much time to make up for.”

He nodded, then hesitated. “I never should have left six months ago,” Jason told her. “I never dreamed—I never thought she was—I wouldn’t have—”

“I know. Neither of us dreamed this might be possible.” Elizabeth bit her lip, letting her finger drift down Isla’s soft cheek. “It would be easy to hold on to the anger, to the bitterness. To the way I’ve felt for six months. The divorce is supposed to be final in a few weeks.”

She met Jason’s eyes again. “I’m not letting Ric steal more time from me. I’ll call Justus in the morning and withdraw the petition. We deserve—we deserve a chance to be a family.”

Jason walked over, then knelt beside the chair to kiss Isla first—her eyes crinkled slightly, but stayed closed. “I love you,” he told her.

“I love you, too.”