There Once Were Two Lovers

Hey you internet people who read this blog (My estimation is five), here is just a little update on the lovely BIG story that I am writing at the moment. Notice how I don’t call it a book. Yeah I have an issue with that. I’m not even sure what it is that I am writing. Sometimes it seems like a collection of a billion short stories. Sometimes it feels like a novella. And sometimes it feels like a bunch of literary vomit that manifests itself onto a page.

Even though I swore that this story wouldn’t be like grade ten. (Aka the awful time were I ‘tried’ to write awful books about princesses and dragons) even I had my own doubts. To be honest, I didn’t think I could keep it up. Heck! I didn’t even have much of a plotline, just characters that I really liked. Well today I am proud to say that I have impressed myself and defied all of my expectations, because as of this moment my word count for May Be and Al Most is… wait for it…wait for it.

10537

That’s right 10537 big ol’ words. Considering industry standards for the average paperback is 250 words a page that’s….

42 pages

I know! I can’t believe it either. I plan on splitting the story up into five parts.  These parts are called (cronilogically)

How the end began, Tin Soldiers, How they met themselves, How they met each other, How the end ended.

I plan on seventy pages for each part. I’m more than halfway done my first part. EEEEKKKK!!!

As a means of celebration, here is another short excerpt from the story. In context with the book/story/vomit, the main protagonists are being told a fairy tale (simultaneously) by their siblings both named Val if I haven’t mentioned that before ( I refer to the two of them as the collective Val for a lot of the story). It relates implicitly to my last post From the Memory of Conrad Dalton but I think you need to know the big picture in order to get theat. Anywhoo! Here it goes.

.-._________________________________.-.________________________________.-.

The Story as told from the collective Val.

There were once two lovers, but they were thrown into the flames. This is the story. As you know, the things that we call stories are really just an end to something. So, there once were two lovers but they were thrown into the flames. This is a story. It does not have a beginning, or a middle, those things are not necessary. What we often think of as the beginning, is really just the beginning of the end. Motion has already been set in place. Time waits for no one. We think that time will change things. Take away things- sorrow, pain, all feelings. Time-all things in time.

Time is like a lightning bolt, it waits for no one. Time is like a story, only the ending exists.

So- there once were two lovers, but they were thrown into the flames. This is how the end ended. Now listen, let me tell you how it began.

It began with a the words “Look! Tin Soldiers!” as a small boy clasped his hands together on his birthday. The tin soldiers, all five-and-twenty of them, looked around in their boxes and found what the boy said to be true. There were tin soldiers, five and twenty of them, and each one had just woken up from a dream in which they had been casted from a tiny tin spoon.  

One of the tin brothers, the one to open his eyes last, looked a bit different from the others. The tin spoon had been short, and he had been cast last of all. This was the soldier that had only one leg.

He was the last of many things. He was the last brother to be cast, he was the last to be painted, and he was the last to open his eyes,therefore didn’t see the little boy who placed him on a ledge behind a snuff box. What he did see however, was a lovely paper ballerina with a bright sparkle tied to her waist.

These were the two lovers, but they were thrown into the flames.

It began with the words “Look! Tin solider!” From the twisted mouth of a Jack emerging out from his box like a spider. “Keep your eyes to yourself”. The soldier pretended not to hear. He only continued to stare at the beautiful dancer and marvel that she stayed posed on one leg as did he.

“You’ll be sorry” Said the evil Jack.

And he was, in the end. He had been staring at her from his side of the ledge, and she at him.But alas, time is like a lightning bolt, or the flickering orange of a fire place. 

The tin soldier was thrown into the flames with the paper ballerina. She flew like a sylph, straight into the fire, blazed up in a flash, and was gone. Only the sparkle that had been tied to her dress remained. The soldier melted into a tiny metal heart. After all, time waits for no one.

This is how the end ended. With a tiny metal heart and a charred sparkle. Of course I have skipped a great many things, but this is the story, and as you know, the things that we call stories are really just an end to something.

So, there once were two lovers, they never said a word too each other, not once. But they were both thrown into the flames.