Tag: ato writes

Creative Choices

I’m at that stage with this epilogue where I have a few creative choices.

1. Burn it.  It’s all crap.  I finished the story, this is just 10k words of icing that’s ruining a good cake.  Seriously, I thought this was a idea, but I’m totally doubting that now.  I and probably could have accomplished what I intended in like 2k words, but I did research and added details and then a tragic back story and dialogue and yeah.  Here we are.

2.  Flip the end and make it a bait and switch with tragic and unsatisfying (but memorable) ending.  I actually considered doing this.  I think I would get hate mail.

3. Slog through to the end I intended, which at this point feels so meandering and unfocused I can’t imagine why anyone would care.

Six(ish) Sentence Sunday

Progress, perhaps.  Though as I wrote in that rules for writing meme, I feel like I keep writing more but don’t get closer to the end…I’m just asymptotiing out, and “to infinity and beyond” has somehow become the chapter length.  But anyway… CLEAVING.

They sat there a moment in the bank of cheerfully colored plastic chairs bordering the hospital hallway, Nathan slowly recovering on Zach’s lap.  They would need to leave soon.  Get on with their evening, distract themselves from the fact that their lives might be changing significantly over the next day or two, and they probably wouldn’t get any more input.  They’d made their decision.  They just had to wait for Leah to make hers.

“We could write a letter,” Chris said quietly, as if he could read Zach’s thoughts.  “People do it when they want a house; this is way more important.”

“Maybe,” Zach agreed.  “She thanked me for not pressuring her, though.”

“Right,” Chris said with a sigh.  Zach leaned over and kissed him on the temple.  Chris was usually the more patient of the two of them… trusting the universe to pay back his positive attitude and kindness.  It wasn’t like him to want to push things.

“So what should we do with the rest of the evening?” he asked, finally, wanting to pull his boys out of their brooding.  “It’s too late to make pizza, but we could go to Stella Barra on the way home.  What do you say, Nathan?  Sausage pizza and a side of crispy brussel sprouts?”

Nathan shook his head against Zach’s chest.  “Side of ‘tato chips,” came the muffled counteroffer.

Zach bit back a smile and looked at Chris.

“How about both?” Chris suggested, rubbing Nathan’s back.  “We need some veggies, I think, but it also seems like a house-made potato chip kind of night.”

Nathan nodded, his face still hidden against Zach’s chest.

Zach stood, still holding Nathan and expecting Chris to follow, but he startled and dug his phone out of his pocket.

“It’s Monica,” he said, reading a text.  “Wondering if we’ve left yet.”  He quickly texted something back and then looked up at Zach hopefully.  “She says to wait.”  

squid’s laws of fic (not inclusive)

sacrificethemtothesquid:

first law: write the fic you wish to see in the world aka goddammit do I have to do everything myself around here

second law: it’s going to be longer than you think. much longer. hahaha so long. why are you crying 

third law: the time spent writing is inversely proportional to the amount of smut present, dammit

fourth law: flesh out your secondary characters. make them real people. have them take over. oh god. put them back. somebody please help 

fifth law: the time spent researching canon is directly proportional to the amount of time you’ll spend altering your plot. that one person on the internet 

sixth law: the time spent researching in general will eclipse the time you spend writing. the nsa agent monitoring your internet search history is curled up in a corner. his boss wants to know if you’re a threat. “I don’t know,” the agent sobs. “I just really don’t know.” 

seventh law: at some point, someone will ask what your favorite hobby is. you will feign a heart attack to get away

They forgot: The closer you get to the end, the longer it will take to write the chapter, until you asymptote… never quite reaching the end,

Top 5/bottom 5 meme

I needed to write it, Rules: tag the person who tagged you, always post the rules, answer the questions, and add the date!

I was tagged by my dear friend  @rycolfan​- <3<3<3

I’m just going to use my ato-the-bean acct on AO3, which means this is all pinto fandom.

What are your five most popular works? (starting with the most kudos)

  1. A Bleary, Hopeful Shade of Blue
  2. Assumptions 
  3. Revelations 
  4. Cleaving

  5. The Layover

What are your five least popular works? (starting with the least kudos)

  1. Brokenhearted 
  2. A Walk Through the Park 
  3. The Weight of a Gaze 
  4. Premieres 
  5. The Other 364

Are you surprised? Why?

Not in terms of the popular ones.  Bleary is obviously my most popular work, and Cleaving is connected to it.  Assumptions and Revelations are linked as well, and the Layover is Christmas fluff, and who doesn’t love that?

As for the unpopular ones, A Walk Through the Park and The Other 364 are both mini fics from Bleary!verse…small enough that it’s not surprising they don’t have many kudos.  Brokenhearted is sad, and short, and borderline exploitive, perhaps.  Not surprising people didn’t like it.  Premiers is newish and short… I guess it’s not surprising that it doesn’t have many kudos.

The biggest surprise and disappointment is The Weight of a Gaze.  It’s part of the Assumptions/Revelations verse, and kinky as shit, and I thought the fandom would like that but  ¯_(ツ)_/¯

Optional: If you want to calculate this, what are your works’ average number of notes?

I only post drabbles and snippets on tumblr, so nah…

Today’s date, so you can see how your results might change if you do this again in a year.

11/08/2017

I don’t really know who’s been tagged, so if you’ve already done it,, feel free to ignore.  I’ll tag @a-forger-and-a-point-man, @drgrlfriend, @entrenous88, @zjofierose, @elisa-pie, and @suedescripture.  Only if you want to.

WIP Meme

Tagged by my very dear @rycolfan​ – thanks, bb!

Here’s the meme:

Put
the last sentence down from your current (or one of your current) WIPs,
and then tag the number of people that corresponds with the number of
words in the sentence.

“Okay.  She can come too.”

I too have no idea who who’s actually writing atm, but I’ll tag…

@drgrlfriend, @moitmiller, @lesbianchrispine, @seepunkrun, and @suedescripture

Feel free to ignore!

Few Words Wednesday

From Cleaving Chapter 10– Epilogue

“Daddy!”

Zach looked up from the script he was marking to see Chris approaching, carrying a squirmy Nathan who was squiggling like a fish to get down.

“Well if it isn’t my two favorite boys!” Zach said, waving to them from the edge of the set.  He turned to Tobias, the assistant director who was giving him the shoot sequence for next week.  “Anything else?”

“Nope.”  Tobias closed his script and retreated, saying, “Have a good weekend, Zach,” just as Nathan plowed into his legs.

“Hey, Little Man,” Zach said, bending down to scoop Nathan up.  “How long have you guys been here?  We ran a little late.”

“Not long,” Chris said, placing a hand on Zach’s waist and giving him a quick kiss.  “But we caught the last scene.  It’s looking good.  I didn’t think you were filming the argument until next week.”

“We’re ahead of schedule.  My scenes really clicked today,” he said, grinning at Chris because it felt so good to be acting again…Snowden had gone well, but the role was small. This was something Zach could really sink his teeth into.  And Chris seemed happy being a stay-at-home dad between his own projects. They were each doing one or two projects a year, traveling with each other as necessary to keep the family together.  Thankfully, Zach’s current project was filming primarily in LA, and they were enjoying a few months of routine.  “In fact, I’m getting Monday off because they’re shooting some scenes with just Emma.  So I get a long weekend.”

“Were you sad, Daddy?” Nathan asked.

“Nope.  My character was upset, but I’m happy.  I was just pretending for the camera.”

“‘Quiet on the set’,” Nathan mimicked, putting his finger over his lips.

Zach grinned and put his arm around Chris.  “Did you have to be quiet in the sound stage?” he asked Nathan, starting toward his dressing room.

“We were good, weren’t we, Babbo? No talking.”

“We were,” Chris agreed, shooting Zach an amused look.

“You’re a pro,” Zach said.  “I’ll just get out of my costume and makeup, and then we can head out.  Did you guys pick out a movie for tonight?  Is the pizza dough made for Nathan’s Home Pizzaria? You didn’t get dough on the ceiling again, did you?” he asked, nuzzling Nathan’s neck and making him giggle.  

“No pizza,” Nathan squealed, squirming away and hiding his neck.

“No pizza?  Change of plans?” he asked, turning back toward Chris, whom he now saw was dressed a bit more formally than movie night would typically require.

“Yeah.  Well, maybe,” he said, motioning to Zach’s dressing room.

Zach was immediately alert.  If Chris wanted privacy for this conversation…

Once the door was closed behind them, he asked,  “What’s up?” setting Nathan down so he could scamper over to the pile of children’s books on the small sofa in the corner of the room.

Chris rubbed the back of his neck.  “Well, if you’re up for it — not too tired — we should head over to Children’s Hospital.”

“Children’s Hos… what happened?  Is Luca okay?”

“Fine.  Everyone’s fine.  Well, not everyone, but I shouldn’t have led with that.”  He took a deep breath and pulled out his phone.   “I got a call this afternoon.  From the County.”

Oh.  Oh.