Ruth Writes

“She runs to the nearest bathroom and crashes through one of the stall doors, landing in front of the toilet just in time. She throws up into the bowl and then stands quivering and holding her tender stomach. That’s the third time in only a couple of hours that she’s vomited. Instinctively she takes her phone out from her pocket and checks her calendar. She’s late and she feels all of her blood drain out of her face. She rubs her stomach with her hand as it drops and adds the vomiting and the lateness together to get a crazy answ..”

She stops typing and leans back against her chair. It doesn’t feel right. She thought impregnating her main character would work for the development of the plot but as she writes it, it’s not right. Her readers will hate it-not many people enjoy an unexpected pregnancy trope especially with a book and a half left in the trilogy.

Her eyes dart across the page and she finds herself hating every part of this plan. She rips the page out of the typewriter and crumples it into a ball. She spins around in her chair and shoots a free throw into the bin. It hits the edge and there’s a moment where she thinks it’ll fall out until it tumbles into the bin bag. She punches the air at her little victory and turns herself back to face her typewriter on her desk.

As her mind runs through all of the possible next big things to happen to her main character she moseys around her apartment. She makes a fresh cup of coffee with the fancy machine she still can’t quite figure out that her sister bought her. She picks a fresh candle from the set of three she got from her mother. She places it beside the coffee on her desk and lights it, the soft smell of baby powder mixing with the freshly ground coffee beans. She organises her drawer of pens, scribbling on a scrap of paper to see which ones should be thrown out.

Eventually, like a microwave bings to let you know your food is ready, her brain flicks a spotlight on the idea that will work the best. An excited thrill runs up and down her spine. She throws herself into her chair, flexes her fingers as they hover over the keys and then she furiously starts typing away. The heavy thump of each letter being printed on the page makes her heart sing. For her, there’s no better sound. She lets herself become completely immersed in the world she is creating with her words and the character that is completely changing with every tap of her finger. Adrenaline is flooding her veins and she finds herself giggling giddily as she writes.

Happy. That’s all she is feeling right now. Stupidly happy. She takes a second before she enters the last full stop on her page that signifies the end of her first draft.