NaNoWriMo Week 4 Check In & 2012 Excerpt

Ack! *Muppet arms*

There’s only two days left of NaNoWriMo and I don’t know about you, but I was in danger of FAILING. Then I chained myself to my chair and pretty much wrote 11k words in three days by mostly doing 15 minute sprints. This year’s story was a real sh*teous work of art and it was like pulling teeth to finish. I kept veering off and coming up with ideas for short stories and new novels.

But I did it anyway. It’s done. It’s craptastic, probably my worst #NaNoWriMo yet. Hopefully, you fared better and are kicking back with some sparkling apple cider or a winter ale and laughing at everyone else who is scrambling to make deadline. Note: Is this how real  professional writers feel?

As promised, this is the raw beginning of this year’s NaNoWriMo novel, another YA piece, though this year I decided to make it harder and write the damn thing in two voices (both 1st person) in present tense. It’s a lesbian love story with an “unprom” as the backdrop and a lot of drama.

It sucks.

CHAPTER 1

APRIL 10th,

AVERY

I can’t escape Madison Shea.

She is everywhere.

Her bubble-letter posters advertising Student Council/Prom Committee meetings adorn every hallway in this godforsaken school. In the entrance to the office there’s a giant picture of her and her blond hair in that swishy ponytail grinning at the camera and holding the soccer team’s state trophy over her head in celebration. Go Lions! The captain of the football team doesn’t even have his photo in that display case and he’s the principal’s stepson.

She is forever leaning against the locker next to mine, in her perfectly worn Levis and oxford shirt and pink flip flops, laughing at her friends. She’s constantly smiling that toothy grin. It;s like her face is frozen that way and she’s all teeth and bright, shiny eyes.

God, those eyes. It’s like looking into the frickin Gulf of Mexico. I goddamn drown every time I catch her gaze. Shit.

I can’t even call her a bitch or hate on her because she’s nice to everyone. Everyone. Even Keesha, this asshole cheerleader who once called me a dyke in front of our entire Spanish II class. It’s not like it’s a secret, but it was pretty fucking awful, especially when Senora Catalana said, “En Espanol, por favor.”

Jesus Christ.

At least Madison didn’t laugh when that happened. She just gave me a sympathetic look and went back to conjugating verbs.

I think that smile killed me more than that dyke comment.

God, Madison.

She’s involved with everything. Everything. I swear her picture will be on every club page in the yearbook, even on the African American Student Union page. I can see it now, her blinding blondness among group, the token white girl, smiling like she belongs there. Like she belongs everywhere.

I about peed my corduroy pants when she came to the inaugural Oak Bluff High Lion Pride meeting last winter.Yeah, it’s a student Gay-Straight Alliance, but I figured she had enough on her plate. She didn’t need this too.

But I guess she felt differently, because right now Madison Shea is sitting across the table from me, talking about smiling as she tells us that the Student Council rejected our idea for a “Purple Prom.”

“I’m really sorry, Avery,” she says to me, all solemn and sweet. “I know how much you guys wanted this, but the prom committee really wants to go with the theme ‘The Time of Your Life.’ They really want to play that old Green Day song.”

“But that song is like a hundred years old,” I argue. “It’s prehistoric. Why can’t we do something from this century?”

She just shrugs and glances down at the take wood table in the middle of the Drama room. I stare over her shoulder at a giant poster of Wicked on the wall as she says, “Look, I tried, but the committee was practically unanimous with their decision. I’m sorry, but it’s a no.”

Madison lifts her head up and I meet her ocean-colored eyes. All I can do is stare at my girlfriend.

My girlfriend.

 

——————

That’s it. Now if you’ll excuse me I’m going to work my way through a bottle of wine and forget that I even wrote anything for NaNoWriMo.

How did you do?