A Lingering Muse
I'm just this guy, you know?
To expand on that, I am also the following...
- A former ficly member who is 38 years old and is schizoaffective (depressive type)
- Into creating languages and fantasy worlds from scratch
- A listener of audiobooks & good tunes
- Always too hard on myself
A wholly imaginary girl appeared at the end of his desk as he typed. His mind immediately jumped to the word "girl" but she was in fact a "woman," by any real definition. He had just always thought of her as youth personified. A late teen for all eternity, decked out in a denim skirt that had seen better days and a pair of black chucks.
"You're not real," he muttered and went back to his keyboard without really missing much of a beat, except for misspelling the word "misspell" which he chalked up to a common misconception and not to either the "girl" that had suddenly blurted into existence or the half empty fifth of good Irish whiskey next to his mouse pad.
"Am too." she exclaimed in a terse manner, but with a smile that could melt a kitten into a pool of happiness and love.
"Oh, come on. You weren't even real when you were real. And THAT, my dear, was reality."
"You aren't making any sense now and should either stop drinking or drink more, I haven't decided."
He banged his head on the desk.
Prequels
No prequels yet. Why not write one?
Sequels
Comments (6 so far!)
Average reader rating 5.00/5
ElshaHawk LoA
I wrote about my muse in the past.. https://ficlatte.com/stories/40690/ and she was dead. However, right now she is on the fritz. I'm thinking of a sequel of some sort where she comes back to life but has glitches. :)
- #1963 Posted 8 years ago
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Robert Quick
"You weren't even real when you were real" is very telling and I can empathize a whole lot. How do you feel about constructive criticism? No worries if you don't want/don't need it. We're all here for different reasons.
- #1970 Posted 8 years ago
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TheCheshireChris
Robert --> I do and I don't want some constructive criticism. Haha.
I do, because objectively it will make me a better writer in theory and I want to be a better writer.
I don't, because I'm afraid that all my mental illness will see is that I'm a failure who isn't doing yet another something right and I won't want to write anymore. ;-P
So, I guess yes, but be gentle? And I'll try to come back to read it sometime when I'm feeling brave.
If that all makes sense. :-)
- #1971 Posted 8 years ago
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Robert Quick
Well don't feel bad. First, constructive criticism is like a buffet, unless it is coming from your editor (and possibly even then?), you take what you want and leave the rest. I am sure that with all the different minds here, people will disagree with each other. I've certainly ignored my share and I am not saying I am any kind of authority. If you don't believe me read one of my latest Ficlattes "Haunted" and look how many times I use the word dark. You'd think I didn't have access to a thesaurus. Second, I think the majority of your content here is good. If I didn't think so, I wouldn't bother trying to fix a small part, right? Duct tape over a pile of trash is still duct tape over a pile of trash. My two cents for this one is that this "exclaimed in a terse manner, but with a smile that could melt a kitten into a pool of happiness and love." feels out of place. I think it's because you are reaching the end of the 1024 limit and are squeezing too much in. Also I think that you like the image of the melting-
- #2155 Posted 8 years ago
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Robert Quick
(Speaking of limits, I ran out of space there myself. Ahem.) -kitten and want to use it even though it is out of place. Taking a note from Stephen King's advice from On Writing and countless others about killing your darlings, I think just have the muse exclaim and then smile as separate sentences. It would flow better and stay more grounded. But like I said, take what you will. Good luck and keep writing.
- #2156 Posted 8 years ago
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Fantasist
Oooooohhhh how I loved this piece. You put a grin on my face. Poor man. Lol!