The Word Cloud

One of my (or any author's) biggest gripes about publishers is the awful catch 22 which afflicts us when it comes to marketing. On the one hand, our beautifully crafted novels are regretfully declined because publishers don't think there's a market for them. On the other hand, those same regretful publishers almost never say what they think there IS a market for. So we authors are reduced to throwing darts at a board, hoping that an acquisition committee somewhere will allow one of those darts to stick. Trouble is, each dart takes a year or so to throw, and if the dart ain't sticking, there ain't nobody paying.

So all the more cheering, then, to see that Scholastic is telling us what's hot in children's publishing. Paranormal romance is still in (though moving beyond vampires). Humour's in. Myth is in. So a comedy vampire snogging Hercules should be about right.

Of course, what Scholastic is doing here is telling us what's succeeded in 2010 and what they expect to do well in 2011. Trouble is, if you're starting a novel now, you really need to know what's going to be all the rage in 2012/13 ... and you can be pretty sure that, by then, the hottest fires aflame now will be largely burned out. Which takes us back to where we were.

Darn it. Still: at least Scholastic are trying, so they deserve a mince pie or two for that.

Brave, sensitive and very well-written blog about what happens when your agent can't sell your book:

http://betweenfactandfiction.blogspot.com/2010/12/what-happens-when-it-is-you.html

Emma

I had a call this morning to say that a friend of mine had broken her hip and was in hospital.  Painful, but that's only the beginning of the story.  She has a severe learning disability and no speech.  It is beyond confusing for her to find herself in bed on a drip in a strange place.  And confusing for the hospital staff who don't know how she communicates.

And there's more.  She has no contact with her family, Fiona and I are the only 'non-professional' friends who keep in touch (and we are ex-professional carers) and worse than that, the staff of the home where she lives are not payed to visit her in hospital 14 miles away.  That won't keep them away, because they care, but it won't help her.

So there she sits.  I spent an hour or so with her today, aware that she didn't really want me there, but definitely didn't want me not to be there.  Just sitting in the room.  In that time, I was able to show the nurses the way to tempt her to take her medication, but not much more.

And why am I writing this?  Because the first shock in my novel is a view of hospital from inside the head of my protagonist, who also happens to have a learning disability (albeit with the power of speech).  In the story, Amy has a broken ankle, and her night alone in the hospital is a nightmare that prefigures other nightmares in the book.

The book was written from experience – I have seen the effect of a hospital stay on a number of people – but it was still both frightening and strangely familiar to find myself inside the plot of my own book.  And it reminded me why I wrote the book in the first place.

There was discussion last week at our writing group about historical novels playing around with history to the point of being unreliable as a reference. Someone was unhappy about Hilary Mantel’s Thomas Cromwell, who apparently was not such a fine character in real life. Others didn’t care because Wolfe Hall was a marvellous novel and Cromwell a wonderfully drawn character; if it’s fiction, it’s OK. Clearly, some veracity has to obtain otherwise why write about the subject in the first place? But how much? 

 

Anyway, lighter discussion ensued about titles of novels/films that might offer a very different view of history. How about: Ivan, The Really Rather Nice? Do Clouders have any more suggestions?

What is ‘Literary Fiction’?

I suppose, not being an intellectual, I struggle with the concept of the categorisation of books as 'Literary Fiction'.

A few months back there was a discussion on one of the groups on LinkedIn when I asked the question what is 'Literary Fiction?' The question was a serious one as the issue had been exercising me for sometime.

As an author of fiction, I spent a long time concentrating on looking for an agent rather than a publisher as the conventional wisdom is that an unknown author of fiction will never make it passed a Trade Publisher's 'Slush Pile' (that mountain of solicited and unsolicited dreams sent in by aspiring authors) unless it has effectively been pre-filtered by an Agent.

The theory is understandable; Agents make money based on a percentage of the author’s earnings. If the author earns nothing then the agent earns a percentage of that nothing, which is of course still nothing. So if the agent is respected, a publisher may take a more serious look at a book if the agent feels there is sufficient potential revenue from the author to make it worth his while.

There is still no guarantee the publisher will take the book on of course, but it raises the prospects.

But whether an author is talking to a potential agent or publisher the question of genre will certainly crop up.

It seems to me that people are obsessed with genre - and if you get it wrong, well you are pretty much banjaxed!

People are often very prescriptive - call it the wrong thing and many people will just refuse to read it! "I don't read - (horror/Sci-Fi/thrillers/crime/historical/romance)” - enter almost any genre you can think of - is often a knee-jerk response.

I called my book "a historical, supernatural thriller" my publisher called it "horror" - but then I think that's because he is a wimp!

Bookshops insist on knowing what genre it is - apparently unless they are told on which shelf to put the book, booksellers can be seen marching up and down their shops with a book in their hand not knowing what to do next until they collapse from starvation.

Then of course, what genre a book is, is very subjective anyway. Often people will tell me 'Clan' is fantasy. I try to explain it isn't - I don't even like fantasy, successful though they are Terry Pratchett and Tolkein leave me cold - I did struggle through The Hobbit once and I have read a Terry Pratchett - but I can't remember which one because it did very little for me - but at least I tried!

I have a deep respect for all writers - I know how hard it is so I feel the least I can do is finish it. I always feel I must get to the end even if I'm hating it - it is some kind of masochism I was brought up with - like finishing the food on your plate because children in Africa are starving. I even finished a Jeffrey Archer once - that's how dedicated I am!

You will see therefore I am the same as all other readers - by declaring "I don't like fantasy" I am making generalised and sweeping assumptions that I have no doubt will lead to me missing some excellent writing.

(Incidentally the difference between fantasy and supernatural for me is that fantasy creates entirely fantastical worlds, Middle Earth, hobbit languages and all that kind of thing - supernatural is about strange things happening in the real world - hence SUPERnatural)

So genre is a minefield - but even that is not as difficult as this concept of so-called 'Literary Fiction.'

Agents and publishers will often tell you they are not interested in your book because they only handle 'literary fiction'.

So what is my writing - 'Illiterate fiction’?

That may sound a little defensive and maybe it is - but there is no doubt that the term is often used as some kind of intellectual snobbery. Ask twenty people what 'Literary Fiction' is and you'll get twenty different answers, I know because I've tried it. 

Some will say it is beyond genre, it is about beautiful language rather than plot and story, it is cross genre, or simply that it can't be good if people actually want to read it - that's commercial fiction, no intellectual would be seen dead reading something that was actually enjoyed by the hoi-polloi. Popular means bad.

Some people have never forgiven the BBC for using Nessun Dorma sung by Pavarotti as the theme for a football tournament - God forbid that some builder/soccer fan should enjoy the tune without having dressed up in a dinner suit and paid £200 for a seat at the Royal Opera House!

There are still people who say Stephen King is not a "proper writer" because before he became one of the World's most successful writers he submitted short stories to Sci-Fi magazines. Whatever next!

One of my favourite quotes is by Robert Benchley "It was fifteen years before I realised I was no good as a writer, but by then I was too famous to stop."

So - until somebody can come up with real definition of 'literary fiction' that actually has to do with something other than intellectual snobbery I will continue to claim I write literary fiction as well as commercial fiction, thrillers, mystery, crime, romance, horror etc - even if in the end - they are actually all the same book!

So I think we should let readers decide what they like and spend a little less time trying to categorise things.

I have recently been in touch with a guy called Dan Cafaro who is founder and publisher of Atticus Books a new publishing initiative in the USA who has similar objectives of bringing good books and readers together - you can read his take on it here!

 

It looks like a very good anthology - I know some of the names, and they're terrific writers - and I may well buy it. I'm all for e-books and p-books, and anything which will publish my work. But I had to laugh at the details of how to get hold of this e-book. Who said the glory of the e-book is how simple and straightforward it is?

http://chamberfour.com/anthology/

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DOWNLOAD IT

(just click the bolded links to download any format below)

Download the PDF – Choose this format if you want to print the anthology out, or read it on your desktop. This is our hand-designed PDF: it’s the prettiest format, but it doesn’t reflow well, meaning it’s obnoxious on an ereader. You can print two pages per sheet—every program does this differently; if in doubt, download Adobe Reader for free here, click File -> Print, and make your settings look like this on a Mac, or this on a PC. The links (those gray boxes) will automatically disappear when you print.

Download the ePub – Choose this format if you want to read the anthology on an ePub-compatible ereader, like new-model Sony Readers, or the Kobo, or the Nook (you can also download it through Barnes & Noble). This ePub was converted by the Smashwords Meatgrinder.

Download the Mobi – Choose this format if you want to read the anthology on a Kindle. Amazon doesn’t let us distribute free books over the whispernet, so you’ve got to copy and paste by hand. This Mobi was converted by the Smashwords Meatgrinder.

For smartphones and iPads – We recommend the Stanza app for iPhones, iPods, and iPads. Inside Stanza, go to Catalog -> Smashwords, search for “Chamber Four,” and download it; it’s that easy. For Android phones and all devices that don’t start with “i,” we recommend the Barnes & Noble Nook app. Search for “Chamber Four” and download the anthology inside the Nook app itself. You have to link a credit card to your B&N account even to download our free ebook—it’s a drag, but literally every other Android app we’ve tried has had woeful formatting issues. If you have trouble or suggestions, please email us at info@chamberfour.com.

Elsewhere - You can also download the ePub version of the anthology at Barnes & Noble and Diesel eBooks. And you can find the anthology at Smashwords in Palm format (pdb), plain text, and the old Sony format (LRF). We’re also listed at the Kobo store, but we’ve had terrible formatting problems with their version (which is the same version, so that’s confusing); we don’t recommend downloading it there.

Paperback - Coming soon. Check back or subscribe to our RSS feed—we’ll definitely make an announcement when the anthology’s available for order (you will have to pay the bookstore for printing costs, but we don’t profit on sales). Also, feel free to email us at info@chamberfour.com, and we’ll let you know when it’s available.

It was our first Valentine’s Day, and we - or he - did it properly. Jewellery, champagne and dinner in a restaurant that barely anyone goes to as an every day occurrence. And that, as a Tuesday, was just the beginning.

On Friday night, we threw our weekend bags into the back of the car and ticked another first off the list: our first weekend away. Or our first mini-break, if you want to get all Bridget Jones about it. Anyway, we drove up from Edinburgh to a sprawling, eccentric country hotel, with a wide, sweeping drive, turrets, a crazy-golf course in the back and a giant stuffed bear in the lobby, forever frozen mid-roar.

The list grew ever shorter, as ‘things one should do on the perfect romantic getaway’ were ticked off. We lounged around wearing only fluffy bathrobes, drinking more champagne. We wallowed in the gigantic bathtub. We ate too much dinner, and drank too much wine. The next day, we walked in the grounds, and visited a ruined castle, then childishly but competitively painted our own dessert bowls in a pottery.

Back at the hotel, feeling as if no further luxury was attainable, a final surprise was proudly announced. I padded happily to the spa in my soft, white slippers for my full-body massage: a final hour of bliss before a last decadent dinner. Entering the little treatment room, waves crashed from the CD player in the corner, and soothing stringed instruments washed relaxation this way and that. The masseuse was young, about my age, and friendly. I got undressed and lay under the towel, feeling tranquilised at the very thought of being tranquilised. She began. As I drifted off into knot-relieving luxury, she asked me about my weekend. I mentioned a few of the details, not wanting to sound smug. Was I imagining it, or was the pressure of her massage getting ever so slightly more intense? She asked some more questions, I was slightly more effusive. She inquired once more, with polite but definite interest and, I thought, an oddly wistful tone. As I enthusiastically ran through the whole chain of events, my shoulders became unmistakeably besieged. Wincing slightly and wondering when to say something, I asked her what the day had held for her.

"I got dumped," she said flatly, before bursting into tears and summarily exiting the relaxation suite.

Chapter Seven
   
    I crept up the stairs that led to the door of my house. I tried as quietly as possible to open and close the door, and although my mom was a deep sleeper, I couldn’t take any chances. I shut the door carefully behind me, locked it and padded quietly up the stairs to my room. When I got in my room, I climbed out of what I was wearing and into some pajamas and tucked myself in bed, not worrying about my hair or teeth, just wanting to make sure that I was in bed before mom woke up at 5 to get ready for the day-- and the job she applied for the minute she found out that dad would be gone for more than a month.
    I eventually fell asleep, which took some effort. I kept thinking about Galena and my dream, and wondering if it wasn’t really a dream and if  Galena had used her poltergeist powers to erase it all. I had to remember to ask Griffin if they were capable of that sort of thing tomorrow morning when I saw him next.  I dreamed about absolutely nothing until later that morning, when the sun shone through my windows and woke me up. I rolled from my back to my stomach to look at my clock. Ten in the morning, which made sense since I hadn’t laid down until four in the morning.
    I got up and poured myself a bowl of Frosted Flakes, realizing for the first time how strange it was to not hear my dad coming down the stairs to make sure I’d done my house work. I drowned the sugary brown cereal in whole milk - something my dad saved for himself, though I have no idea why - and stuck my spoon in it. I crunched on breakfast for a few minutes, then I went to the living room to watch 30 Minute Meals, but then I realized I didn’t have to cook dinner for a month, and I flipped through the channels before deciding on just plain morning cartoons.
    The park is just down the street from my house, I remembered Griffin saying earlier that morning. I trudged back up the stairs to my room and pulled on a pair of black skinny jeans and a gray and white striped Henley. I laced my black Converse high tops over short white socks,  and jogged down the stairs. After I shouted to my mom that I’m going to be out for a while, I slipped on my thick, dark green winter coat and went out the door into the cold winter day outside. I twisted left and right through the near-desolate winter streets, heading toward the park and wondering which house was Griffin’s.  I slowly pulled my feet  along the gray, hard asphalt.  After walking up and down the cold street about 3 times, angelic white flakes began to dot the street. I could barely tell the minutes from the hours, and barely felt the muscle pain in my legs because of the numbing cold of the snowy day. I stopped in my tracks for a minute and looked at the pale gray winter sky, watery snowflakes dropping endlessly on my face.  I looked down at my feet, melted snow seeping in through the sides of my sneakers and my socks. I wiped a few loose droplets of water from my face, flinching at the  sudden touch of my cold hand against my slightly warmer cheek. I noticed also that the snow was creeping up to my shins, soaking my pants as well as my feet. My teeth began to chatter, but I hugged myself and kept pressing on up and down the street for no reason. I just felt safer knowing that Griffin was here somewhere... knowing that if something went wrong he would see it.
    And he would see me.  
    My legs and arms ached with a merciless pain that swam through my body, a headache screaming and pulsing in my brain, but I kept pressing on. Three hours bled into four, which bled into five, and the minutes still began to tick by, as my long legs continued to trek up and down the near-deserted street, keeping time with a rhythm that I created in my mind. I hugged myself tighter, but finally the pain in my body became to much to bear, and cold tears slipped down my pale cheeks.I dropped to my knees in the cold snow of the January afternoon, closed my eyes and slumped forward. I lay there for a few seconds, but eventually pick myself up again to power through the silence of the winter back to my own house.  I doubled over for a second, but when I finally regained my balance, my heart skipped a bet when I heard a click and a creak from a door opening from one of the houses in front of me and brought me to a standstill.
    I looked toward the row of neat and tidy houses laid out in front of me and saw one towards the end of the road with the door open, a confused and slightly adorable Griffin peeking out, his black hair ruffled left and right like he’d  just rolled out of bed.
    “Cadence?” Griffin called down the road. “What are you doing?” I made my way to his house, taking it all in as I did so. The walkway up to his house was lined with black tar that was getting wet from the snow. The dark, bare tree off to the left of his house was covered in a thin layer of ice, the tips of which were pointing effortlessly to the snow-covered ground.
    “I was taking a little walk and looking for you.” It came out more as a question than an answer, but he didn’t tease about it like he usually would have.
    He rubbed his eyes and stepped out into the cold winter light,  his voice tired and slightly angered, although I could tell he was trying to be as nice as possible to me. “Well, you’ve found me. What d’you need?”  I could barely believe it was him speaking, his voice wasn’t as smart as it usually was. I guess, like he said, I was dumbing him up. The thought made me blush for a second.
    I realized then that I had no idea why I’d wanted to find him so bad, and I didn’t do or say anything but fidget with my fingers and stare at Griffin for a few seconds. He was wearing black, baggy, plaid pajama bottoms and a semi-tight plain black shirt. “Well, uh. My parents aren’t here right now, so... Do you want to come inside for a bit?” I blinked in surprise, then nodded, shoving my hands in my coat pockets. He stopped out of the doorway leaving enough room for me to step inside, head bent. Before I could go all the way into his house, I brushed the loose snow from my pants and coat, took off my shoes and socks and sighed in the leisurely warm air that his house blanketed me in. I turned around and closed the door behind me, slumping against it for a minute.
    And then I saw his house.
    Parts of the wallpaper in the small living room where I then stood were peeling off of the wall onto a dirty wood floor with several scratches littering it, along with empty beer cans and broken glass. A small table in the kitchen that was dotted with holes was home to two mismatching plastic chairs that looked like they belonged to an elementary school. Yellow tile covered the floor of the kitchen, but was pulled up in some places to show a dirty brown surface that at that time, I didn’t really want to know what it was. I felt my heart scream in silent agony for the boy standing in front of me. Now that I knew what his house was like, he seemed like a stranger. “Well, uh. My parents aren’t here right now, so... Do you want to come inside for a bit?”  If they were home, what would I have seen? I walked further into the house when I noticed Griffin looking at me quizzically.
    “What’s wrong?” he asked, sticking his hands deep inside the pockets of his baggy pajama pants. I snapped back into reality after hearing his familiar voice, and sat down on the black leather couch that sat behind a red-brown wooden coffee table.
    “Oh, nothing, just...” my words fell apart, and before I could piece them back together, Griffin interrupted me with, “Hey, listen, I’m just gonna clean up around the place a bit, you just... make yourself comfortable, okay?” I nodded to him and sprawled myself long across the couch, burying my head into the arm of the couch. I sat up for a minute, headache still pounding strong in my head, and unzipped my coat and took it off, only to lay back down and curl myself up in a tight, warm ball under my coat, which I used as a blanket.
    “Cadence. Hey, Cadence, wake up!” My eyes slipped open when I woke up to a quiet Griffin whispering to me and shaking my shoulder to break me from my sleep. I couldn’t stop myself from smiling when I saw his face, and I sat upright and stretched. He backed up, and I surveyed the room, beer cans off the floor and not a shard of glass in sight.  He cleaned up his place for me, I thought to myself. “Yes. Yes I did,” He joshed, smiling coyly at me. I smiled back and punched him lightly in the stomach. I noticed that he had changed out of his pajamas into a black shirt with a faded AC/DC logo on it over ripped faded blue jeans. His hair wasn’t as nappy as it was earlier, so I guessed he had brushed it, just not as well as he should have. “So,” he began, “Did you have any more dreams about Galena?”
    I shook my head happily. “Nope, not a thought about her went through my mind about any of it. I just conked out, as my mom would say.” He laughed again, turning around and looking out the window as the snow continued to fall into a deep white blanket covering the ground.
    “It’s beautiful...” I watched as the color in his eyes changed from blue to a deep teal, glittering with sheer joy. “Yeah.... it is....” I said to him, sighing and taking in the beauty that the sun created when it made the snow sparkle. I stood up next to him and we looked out the window for what seemed like forever. We looked at each other for a moment, and suddenly all time stopped. I looked at his eyes, which changed again from the teal to a bright green. We leaned in closer, and I could feel his hot breath on my face. My heart began to beat faster, and I could feel a cold sweat breaking out on my forehead.  I could feel my face blush up, and right at the last moment, before our lips touched, I shied away, afraid of the consequence. I turned my head away and tucked my chin into my chest, pushing my hands into my jean pockets. I sat back down on the couch, my heart wrenching as I watched the look on his face turn into pure hurt, his eyes changing once again into a sad, dripping blue.
    “So.....” I said, trying not to make things awkward. I spun a piece of my long brown hair with my finger, trying to think of what to say.  I tried my hardest to slow down my heart, but every time I tried I would only miserably fail. “When did you say we were going to meet again? 3:30 AM?” I tried my hardest to make him laugh. “Or is that too early? Should we make it 3:45?” I smiled, trying desperately to make him do the same, which he did. He turned to face the large window in front of the house when he heard large black tires crunching over the freshly fallen snow, and I saw the blood run away from his face and his eyes change to a deep gray when someone stepped out of it and made their way towards the door.

Chapter Six

    I arrived at home and entered cautiously, hoping to avoid collision with my mother. Sadly, luck was not on my side and I ran right into her while looking over my shoulder for her.
    "Where have you been? You left over two hours ago!" I wasn't sure if the look on my mom's face was worry, anger, or both.

    "I walked to the park, and saw a school friend there." I tried to push past to get to the safe haven of my room where I could drown feelings out with music, but my mom stepped into my path, cutting me off. "Come on, Mom. I just want to go lie down. My head is pounding and I'm freezing." I realized how stupid it was of me to go to the park in the middle of January, and that Mom would probably think I was lying, but the strange thing was, the entire time I was sitting next to Griffin I was completely warm. Either that or I just didn't notice I was freezing my butt off.

    "Funny. Tell me the truth, where did you go? Some boy's house? That ditch I told you not to go in? Where?" Mom knit her eyebrows together, and now I could definitely tell the look she had was anger.

    "I told you, Mom. The park. Yes, in the middle of winter. I didn't notice I was cold! There isn't any snow on the ground either, I had a jacket on, and I had on my sneakers. I was perfectly fine, but on the walk home I got cold. Let me go to my room, I want to go to sleep." She tried to stare me down again, but I returned her glare with equal force, if not more.

    Finally she sighed and looked away, then back at me. "But you haven't had dinner yet."

    "I'm not hungry."

    "Don't starve yourself, honey."

    "I'm not starving myself." I went to the other side of the hallway and before Mom could step in front of me again I pushed through and raced the few yards it took to get to my room. I shut the door behind me and locked it all in one swift move.

    I started to make my way to my black radio that has been plastered with stickers of my favorite bands, but then I remembered the whispering voice and I stopped and made my way to my bed instead, never turning on the light. I kicked off my black Converse as I pulled my covers over my head, concealing myself in a blanket of total darkness.

    I quickly fell asleep, not worrying about what I was going to do when I woke up. I slept soundly, peacefully and restfully until I heard something small drop to the ground. My eyes snapped open, and I scanned the room. I saw, on the ground, my large blue dictionary. I glanced up at the bookshelf from which it fell and noticed straight-away the black, gaping hole that it left among the other, much smaller books. I pulled the covers off of me lazily and walked across my room to bend over and retrieve the book. I watched around my dark room for anything that might give me a clue as to why the book fell. After that, I felt a cold breeze sweep over my room. I shivered and walked back to the other side of my room to turn on my light. I felt my heart begin to be faster, Thuthump, Thuthump, and watched in horror as I saw an invisible blade cut through the lime green walls of my room a message in scraggly letters and read it aloud to myself as the work was being done .
YOU WILL PAY
   I grabbed my door handle tightly and furiously, my hands almost shaking from fright too much to actually get a good hold on it. I ran out of my room, cold sweat breaking out on my pale face and stringing together my thick brown hair.  I didn't turn back until I reached the doorway, where Galena's strong, scary face awaited me. I screamed and sprinted away from it, the cold of the house growing with every second. My adrenaline pounded through my veins with my blood, almost becoming a part of my being.  I watched as the invisible blade once again cut through the walls of my small house, writing a long line through the paint right next to me as I ran. Out of nowhere, I tripped on lord-knows-what, burning my knee on the carpet of the large living room.  I ran back to the back of my strangely still and silent house and tried to open the back door fiercely, the reassuring sound of my quick, unsteady breaths to tell me that I’m alive. I fell again, and I give up. I flip myself onto my back and stare up as a ghastly Galena Ann Morris towers over me, expression dead-serious (no pun intended), a large glass lamp poised over my head. She brought it down to my face, her expression not changing, and I screamed.

And then I woke up.

I sat upright in bed, clutching the covers over me tightly, as if to make sure that I was alive and actually capable of doing so. I ran my fingers through my sweat-soaked hair and around my forehead which was dotted with large droplets of more sweat.  I looked at the clock on my bedside table and read the time to myself. “1:29 AM,” I wheezed, thoughts flooding through me, memories of my dream flashing through my brain. Whenever I blinked, I saw Galena’s pale face, looking behind the same thick glasses that I had broken, with cracks zig-zagging through the left lens.

I sat in the dark for a minute, listening to the uneven sound of my heart as it pounded in my chest.  I slowly threw the covers off of my body, got up and turned on the lights to examine my wall. There were no lines, the dictionary was safely in it’s place on the bookshelf, and the message that the invisible blade imprinted on my wall was completely erased. It was just a dream, it was just a dream. That didn’t happen. I told myself, trying to ease my thundering heart.

Knowing that the words weren’t there and the dictionary was on my bookshelf made me relax slightly, but I didn’t put my guard down. Every little noise outside set my heart to jumping, threatening each time to break out of my chest. I laid back down on my bed without turning off the lights and I pulled my dark purple cotton comforter up to my chin, eyes scanning the room for any sign of danger. I swallowed, my mouth dry. I started to think of Griffin to get my mind off things and hopefully make me fall asleep, though I knew that I wouldn’t be sleeping again that night.

Griffin’s face calmed my bouncing heart considerably, which worried me. “I don’t like him like that,” I told myself, though I knew that was beginning to be a lie. Then I made a decision. I had never been more scared in my entire life, and I really didn’t care who was asleep, but I walked quietly to the living room and picked up the house phone off it’s charger on the coffee table by the couch. I walked with it back to my room and sat on my bed in the still silence, still listening to my heart. I sighed, thinking about how stupid this was. I picked up the slip of paper off of my bedside table and dialed the number on it. It ringed three times before I heard a tired and confused, “Hello?” from the other side of the phone.

“Hey.... did I wake you,” I replied to the voice, concerned.

“Um. Just a bit.” He paused. “Who is this...?”

“Oh, it’s Cadence. You told me to call when I could.... and something really.... frightening just happened.”

“...What happened?” I could tell he thought it had something to do with my dad.

“I just had this dream... Your stepsister.... I think she’s out for me....” I could feel the lump in my throat inviting me to cry, but I held the tears back and tried to keep my voice as normal and non-squeaky as possible.

“Crap.” Griffin said, a touch of anxiety to his voice before he sighed. “What makes you think that...?”

“She wrote a message on my wall, and she chased me through my house and she hit me in the face with a lamp.....” I could feel the fearful tears come and paint my cheeks with clear, salty liquid.

I heard him swallow over the phone. “Well... Didn’t you say it was a dream...?” He sounded like he was trying to make up some excuse for this not to be true.

“Well, yes, but it was so real... and on my radio a few days ago, the music changed to static, right? and it said something like, ‘ou ill ay’ or something, and on my wall in my dream it said ‘You will pay!’” And so I spilled all about the dream all that happened, all that’s happened before that could be linked to the dream, and what I thought.

   “Mhmm. Can you meet me someplace? I can sneak out--”

“Sneak out? I don’t think of you as the type to sneak out.”

“You’d be surprised, but listen, can come or not? Because I can explain two things to you if we meet up.” I could almost see him with his eyebrows raised, testing my toughness.

    “Alright, I’m in. But where are we even going to go?”
     “The park? Can you do that?  It’s just down the street from my house, so... That one bench in the park, maybe?”
    “The one from yesterday? Sure,  sounds good, but I’m changing into something lighter than the thing that I’m in so that I don’t look like a serial killer walking around to a park in nothing but black and red.”
    He chuckled shortly and replied, “Okay, but don’t wear anything too bright.” Then he hung up.
    When I could no longer hear his bittersweet voice, I could feel sadness rush up into my throat. I pulled myself out of what I was currently wearing and into a pair of skinny jeans and a pink and black Abbey Dawn hoodie. I walked out of the door after I laced up my sneakers and closed the door to my house quietly behind me, tiptoeing through the empty black streets towards the park in the middle of January at 2 in the morning.
    I twisted through several streets and when I finally arrived to the street on which the park was located, I began to have second thoughts. What if my mom had awaken and was looking for me? Would she be waiting for me when I got home, her rare wrath set on me? I was already next to the park, looking around the large space at the entrance, thinking about whether or not to actually go in.
         “So,” his voice scared me, and like someone in a horror movie, hood pulled over his face, he stepped forward, out of the shadows, hands in his pockets. He bared dark blue skinnies and a deep blue hoodie, light enough but not too light. “You think you can handle what I’m about to tell you?” he took his hands out of his hoodie’s pockets and took his hood off his head. I nodded, unsure. I stared at his bright blue eyes, glimmering in the dim, awkward light of the streets.  The two of us walked silently to the bench where we saw each other the day before and sat down slowly.
    “Okay, well... Galena wasn’t a normal kid, you know.” Griffin began hesitantly.
    “Well, I know that. She was picked on daily and everything that goes with that.”
    “No, I mean, she wasn’t like a normal human.” The confusion must have shown on my face, because he sighed at me and his eyes changed to a dark gray before he continued. “She was telekinetic, so she could move things with her mind. In death, someone who was telekinetic in life can move things in death by touching them - a poltergeist.”
    I looked at him, not knowing how to reply. I could feel strong feelings bubble up inside me, although I really wasn’t sure what those feelings were-- were they relief? Anger? Depression? Fear? At that point, I really didn’t want to know what they were. “Okay, so can you tell me anything else?” I tried to keep my voice as low but as audible as possible.  
    “Yeah. When she says you’re going to pay, I’m sure you know now what that means. But with Galena, chances are it will be ten times as bad as what a normal poltergeist would do... Mainly because she was actually very strong in life, even if she wasn’t at school.” He paused, thinking. “Oh, she might try and kill you, too.”
    “Ki-kill me? You’re really good at pep talks, Griffin. I appreciate you trying to calm me down.”
    He shrugged, then bit his lip. “Well, I can help you out, you know. I... I have some powers of my own, you see.”
    I didn’t say anything, I just looked at him, confusion once again showing on my face. “What?” It sounded more like an unbelievable statement rather than a question. “What powers?”
    “Well, I’m a medium, for starters.”   
    “And that is...?”
    “It means I can communicate with the spirit of someone who’s dead.” He paused, waiting for my reaction. My reaction was my heart lifting and dripping with hope. A shadow of smile appeared on my face, and he returned it before going on. “I also have empathy.”
    “Isn’t that where you share in with another person’s pain, or whatever?”
    “Yeah, but in the psychic version, its the ability to feel the physical or emotional feelings of someone else, either in person or with a person miles and miles away. It probably won’t help with this though, but it’s how I’ve known how you’ve felt this entire time. Like, just a few seconds ago you felt relief and hopefulness. However... I can only feel the emotions and things of people I have a close connection to.”
    For some reason, I took this as flirting and I blushed. It probably had something to do with the fact he just said he is really close to me, even though we’ve only really been friends for two days. I hoped that the lack of light hid my blush.
    “You might want to know I can read minds, too...” I drop my head clap my hand over my forehead, but he just laughed.
    “Anything else?”
    “Well, yes.” He pulled the chain that held his crystal out of his hoodie and showed me the pendant. “This changes color when the spiritual energy in the air rises. On Friday, do you remember when it was purple?” I nodded to him, signalling him to continue with his explanation.  “Well,  that meant that the spiritual energy was rising, and I cursed because the color was too dark to be a safe amount of energy.”
    “The spirit was Galena, wasn’t it?”
    “Yeah. She wasn’t strong enough to do much more than knock things over, but her energy was growing at an above-average rate for a poltergeist. She has a lot of hate fueling her.” He paused. “But that’s not all my pendant does. It also strengthens my power to see people’s auras. I’m still a teenager, obviously, and that means my powers aren’t as strong as adult aura-readers. So this necklace not only warns me when a spirit is near and how strong it is, but it helps me see people’s aura’s until I’m old enough and strong enough to see them perfectly without help.”
    “Oh. Well, how can you help?”
    “I can talk to her, for starters. She’s probably really strong now. It’s been about a month... Have you seen any signs of her besides her appearing in your dream?”
    “Yeah. She knocked over my vase and then the trash can... I’ve heard her voice over the radio, saying ‘You’re going to pay.’... I’ve also felt her presence. I was sitting in my mom’s car yesterday morning and it suddenly got really, really cold. The cold even got through a super-thick cotton blanket that I hid under.”
    “Be careful... If that’s all she’s doing, there’s a chance she’s not as strong as we thought. But then again, she might just be doing little things to scare you so that she doesn’t use up all her power in one go. The big thing might be coming, so be careful, okay? I don’t want you getting hurt.” He put his head down like he’d blushed, and I blushed too. When the two of us brought up our heads, we smiled awkwardly and continued to talk. After about an hour of talking about things that don’t have to do with Galena, we decide we should probably be heading back home... and if my mom were to wake up at three-thirty in the morning, wondering where I was, she would go all ‘dad’ on me, and that isn’t what I wanted. There were a few times that she turned into a second dad, and those weren’t the best times that I had ever had.
    I got up to leave and started to walk away, but just a few seconds later I heard his footsteps behind me. He grabbed my shoulder lightly and turned me around. “We should meet here again, tomorrow. How about one-thirty again?” I looked at him and knitted my eyes together, puzzled. “In the morning?” He nodded, a worried look on his face, although I wasn’t sure why he would be worried, then I turned around and kept walking to get home as quickly as possible.

Chapter 5

    "Hey, Cadence." Griffin said to me, closing his sketchbook without looking at me.
    "How did you know it was me?" I inquired.

    "Well, you're wearing socks that have 'Cadence' embroidered on them. I only know one person named Cadence - you." Griffin replied, looking at me over his square glasses, his eyes flashing into a vibrant green.

    "Oh." I said, looking down at my knee-high red and gray striped socks that I use to keep my legs warm in the winter since the girls' uniform is a skirt year-round. "By the way, your eyes did that weird color changey thing again."

    "What eye color changey thing?" He winced. "I think you're dumbing me up. Changey? Really?" He shook his head, laughing and pinching the bridge of his nose.

    I rolled my eyes. "I'm not dumbing you up!" He gave me a look that said, 'Don't lie to yourself, Cadence.' I laughed. "And I'm sure you know what eye color changey thing I'm talking about. Your eyes are green when seconds ago they were navy."

    "I still don't know what your talking about, but oh well..." He said, looking down at the cover of his sketchbook.

    "So, whatcha drawing?" I asked, reaching for the book. He pulled it away and I put on a pouty face. "Aww, come on, lemme see!" I lean forward and grab the book from his hands before he could pull it further away. I open it up to the first page and I see a very detailed drawing of an eagle silhouetted against the hot desert sun. "Wow," I murmured, turning the page. The next picture was of a butterfly drying its wings after crawling out of its chrysalis. I began to turn the page, but he caught my wrist.

    "Uh, I think that's enough..." I shook his hand off and continued to the next page. He ran his hand through his hair and sighed, knowing he wouldn't be able to stop me from looking at whatever was on the next page. I took one look at the drawing and knew why he didn't want me to see it.

    It was of me. It was from that first day he arrived at school. I was sitting in my chair first period, smiling and looking down at my desk where my notebook was laid. I must've been looking at the picture of that griffin.

    "Yeah..uh, pretend you never saw that, okay?" He grabbed the book from my limp hands and blushed.

    I blinked then blushed as well, ducking my head. "That's gonna be hard...But, if it makes you feel better, you just made my day."

    He grinned. "Yes, that does make me feel better. Thanks." He opened his sketchbook back up to a blank sheet, then looks at me. "You gonna keep smiling like an idiot or give me a real smile?" I laugh and blush again before putting on a semi-bittersweet smile, looking at my socks.

    The minutes tick on by, and my gaze flits from his face to the drawing to the kids playing on the jungle gym and back to my socks, repeating the process while my thoughts run freely. I th0ught back on my conversation with my mom, and I wondered why she completely ignored the fact that I killed Galena. Was it her way of saying I didn't kill her, it was the boys that made a worse decision than I did? That it was my friends' fault for pushing me into it with threats? Because neither were true. I didn't have to do what my friends told me to. I could have ignored them, found better friends. Shoot, I could have befriended Galena. And while the boys that touched her did something wrong that they shouldn't have, they wouldn't have ever done that to her if I hadn't broken her glasses. While most people would try to blame it on other people to avoid the guilt they deserved, I always pinned the blame on myself. Sometimes I blamed myself even when I hadn't done anything wrong.

    "I'm done." Griffin's voice brought me out of my deep thoughts, and I jumped with surprise.

    "How long has it been?"

    "A little less than an hour, why?" He handed me his sketchbook so I could take a look at his drawing, which I was sure was going to be amazing.

    "No reason, I was just wondering." I took the notebook carefully to avoid ripping any pages by accident and I study the picture. It looks so realistic, it could pass for a real picture in black and white, well, if it weren't in a sketchbook, anyway. I sighed.

    "What? Do you not like it?" His eyes changed from the vibrant green to a blue tinted with worry and curiosity.

    "No, no, I love it. Uh...Would you..Would you mind if I kept it?" I asked tentatively.     "Of course not. I drew it for you. I drew them both for you." He did a quick little scribble on the back of the page and ripped it out slowly and precisely so as not to tear into the drawing, then he flipped back to the picture of me smiling at my notebook and ripped it out. He looked at them once, as if making sure again that they were worthy of me, then handed them to me. I shuffled them together so that the corners lined up perfectly, then I laid them on my lap.

    "So, what have you been up to?" I asked him, my head cocked to the side.

    "Nothing much, really. What about you, Cadence?" He questioned me, continuing the drawing of the tree he had been working on earlier.

    "Oh. Um." Could I trust him enough to tell him about my dad? "Well, my.."

    His hand froze, pencil poised over the page that he was drawing on earlier, and he turned his head to look at me. "Yes? What?" It was like he knew I was nervous, hurt, scared, and everything, even though I was sure it didn’t show in my voice.

    "My dad... He... He got into the hospital."

    He raised his eyebrows, wrinkling his forehead. "What happened? Is he okay?"

    "He's fine."

    "...Are you avoiding the first question for a reason?" His eyes flashed red for a split second, then went back to blue.

    "What...?" He was strange, that was for sure. "Well, I guess..."

    "...You can tell me, I won't tell anybody, I won't do anything except talk to you about it. However... If you really don't want to tell me, then you don't have to... I just want to be here for you." He was pretty good at using the guilt trick on me. If I chose not to tell him, I'd feel guilty for not telling him because then he'd think I didn't trust him enough and I'd end up spilling. If I went ahead and told him, he might go back on his word and tell social services or something.

    I told him everything on the spot. My father beat me, my mother was a passive lady who didn't fight back, and even about what happened that put him in the hospital. He listened intently the entire time I talked, and that made me feel good, like I was worth listening to, unlike what I've been used to with my father. I talked about it for a good half-hour, and when I was finished, he nodded and asked me if I wanted him to do anything.

    "No! Um. No." He raised his eyebrows, as if daring me to be doubtful of my seemingly solid answer. "No, don't do anything. The most it'll do is piss him off."

    "Really? That sucks. I could..." The look I gave him shot down anything he had to say before he said it, and he fell silent. "Well, just know I'm here for you, and everything that goes with that." He looked at his watch. "It's five-thirty... I'd better get home. We've been here since three."

    I widened my eyes. "Five-thirty? Oh no... Knowing my mom, she'll have sent my name into that Amber Alert thing." I got up and brushed anything that might've been on the back of my skirt off, then I started to stretch, but I stopped before I did. "I forgot, do you have a phone number? I was wanting to call you some time ago, but...yeah."

    "Oh, yeah. Of course." He gave me his cell phone number and told me to call whenever.

    "Okay, thanks. I can't give you mine though because of my--"

    "--Dad. I know, no worries. Just call whenever you get the chance. I hope your dad feels better, and it really sucks you have to deal with that on top of Galena's suicide." He grinned. "See you." Then he turned around and walked away, pencil in one hand and his sketchbook tucked under his arm, right after I realized the darkness of the purple crystal around his neck.