#18 was so long but oooooooooooooooo man it felt good to revisit

[toastytoaster22]

18, 21, 22 for the writer asks !

Hi Abysslll! <3

(18 ended up really long so I put it under a cut at the bottom so I wouldn't clog up peoples' dash)

21. Could you ever quit writing? Do you ever wish you could? Why or why not?

I think I could, though at this point I have so many WIPs that I would be eternally bummed to not see the stories through. I don't ever find myself wishing to not write anymore, no. For me, writing is just a fun way to explore characters, interactions, and experiences. Every story is a big playground for me to run around on and try out new swings and seesaws. I don't see any reason to stop playing, though at times I get really busy with life events and have to slow down or pause.

22. How organized are you with your writing? Describe to me your organization method, if it exists. What tools do you use? Notebooks? Binders? Apps? The Cloud?

Oh man. I've answered this question a couple times so I might try to pull up my more detailed run-downs of my writing process, but I can give a short overview here.

All my fic ideas start in my head as daydreams that slowly marinate and change until I think they have enough elements to be a full storyline. Then the idea gets outlined in one of my notebooks (I have probably a dozen right now). I let it sit in there for a little while and jot down missing info or questions that I need to answer before starting any writing. Once those questions, and any more that crop up, are figured out I usually run it by a friend or my husband, and then will transfer all notes to a word doc.

All my WIPs are well organized in my computer with reference art, background info, notes files, and outlines, along with completed chapters and in progress ones.

18. Choose a passage from your writing. Tell me about the backstory of this moment. How you came up with it, how it changed from start to end.

Under the cut bc its LONG

From chapter 15 of Issho:

“Six,” Teru found himself saying, a bitterness swelling in his throat.

“Huh?”

“I was almost three when I awakened. I think they cared about me until then. Once they knew I was a psychic they gave up on me. That’s what my dad said.”

Teru didn’t know where these words were coming from. They hurt. Like little fishhooks yanking themselves up and out of his heart. A sharp sting and a coppery aftertaste, and then they were gone.

“Holy shit.” Reigen breathed out roughly. “He said that?”

Teru nodded.

“To your face?”

Another nod. “Yeah. When I was in the hospital.”

Reigen bit back a swear. “Any other trauma nuggets you want to share? Might as well get them all out there while we’re at it.”

Would that help get rid of the dense little ball that gave him stomachaches all the time?

Teru reached down and wrapped his fingers around another fishing line. Like ripping off a band-aid, right?

“My mom yelled at me in front of the police once,” Teru said, peeking up to see Reigen’s reaction.

His foster dad didn’t move, his eyes fixed on the road.

“My hands got hurt and she didn’t help me. She said she was going to clean them in the morning, but she went to work before I woke up.” Teru rubbed his palms together and wiggled his fingers. There were no scars. No evidence of that negligence. No evidence of how long it had taken him to scrub his scrapes out in the bathroom sink, trying not to cry.

He curled his hands into fists. Something was trickling out from all these pinprick wounds in his heart. Each fishhook he tugged out allowed something hot to escape. It was collecting in his chest and expanding, filling every nook and cranny inside of him and making his breath come fast.

“And she didn’t talk to me for three days after Claw burned my arm and I broke everything in the apartment. I think-“ This was the biggest fishhook. The one that was stuck deep and took a lot of courage to even think about, let alone touch. He grabbed it and yanked anyway. “I think she wanted to leave me then. I think she was thinking about it because she didn’t look at me and she didn’t clean anything up and she didn’t get anything fixed. Except then we lived there another month.”

Reigen whistled.

Teru turned his eyes up to his foster father. Reigen’s knuckles were white on the steering wheel. They had turned into the parking lot, but the car was still running. Reigen was a statue in the front seat.

He didn’t like the face Reigen was making, but now that he had started talking, Teru couldn’t stop.

“I’m mad at her.” The heat in his chest flared at the admission. “I didn’t- I didn’t want her to fix everything. I didn’t think she could make Claw go away. She’s not magic. I- I never asked her to save me, I just wanted her to care! I just wanted a hug!”

This wasn’t the boiling, desperate fury that had come over him at the children’s center. It wasn’t a mad scramble to cover up a gaping, empty hole. This feeling that was coming over him was strong and solid and real.

Teru was angry.

The MobDonald’s bag beside him shimmered.

“How could she do that? I was hurt and scared, and she left me! She didn’t even say goodbye!”

The bag beside him lifted into the air, as did the spare umbrella and the box of Reigen’s new business cards. Teru let them. For once he didn’t care that he was making a scene. He was free from his parents’ judgment. He was free from them and he was furious and-

“If that makes you yell once in a while, that’s okay too.”

“If they were going to get rid of me why did they wait so long?” he shouted. “If they gave me up when I was three, I could’ve- I could’ve-“ Teru couldn’t have been with Reigen. He would have only been in high school. Would Teru have spent all that time at a children’s center? Would Claw have ever found him? There was no way to know, and it was endlessly frustrating. “I don’t understand!”

---------------

Whew. This section still kicks me in the teeth every time I read it. There isn't a whole lot of backstory beyond that I was trying to get Reigen and Teru to have a civil conversation in the car and no matter what I did, no matter how many times I tried to keep Teru quiet, his dialogue KEPT GETTING AGITATED. And when that happens and I cannot stop a character from acting a certain way?

Time to let them BE THAT EMOTION. They clearly NEED IT.

So I finally, FINALLY let Teru go off. It was time for him to vent. To be frustrated and solidly, POWERFULLY angry with his parents for putting him in the situation they did. It was so important to finally let him get these horrifically heavy things off his chest, to someone he KNEW he could trust with the information. It took 7 chapters for that trust to build though, and with it, Teru's thoughts on what happened to him and what his parents were putting him through by acting the way he did.

He is only 9 here. Teru is still so much a child, but he isn't stupid. He saw so much and feels SO MUCH and in the end, no matter how he tried to use his 9 years of intelligence to figure out the WHY behind his parents' behavior, despite being "explained to him", HE DIDN'T UNDERSTAND. (and as the reader we know its bc it Doesn't Make Sense. His parents were not acting like responsible, rational adults and they hurt him. There is no way to make that understandable.

And Reigen IMMEDIATELY validates that. He doesn't understand either. He lets Teru know that its not that he is a child, its not that he can't Get It. It's OKAY. It's okay to be angry and confused, Reigen is too, on his behalf. And that, beyond everything else, is what Teru NEEDED to express and hear at this point in the story.

DAMN I LOVE ISSHO

#TAHNK YOU FOR ASK! #18 was so long but oooooooooooooooo man it felt good to revisit #abysslll! #writers asks! #chapter 15 issho breakdown!