Hypothetically Speaking of Ruby and Amber

While listening to some Lady Gaga on Thursday, I had an idea.
Now it has me wondering whether or not "Te Busque" can manage to remain Talia's story. As I brainstorm about Amber and her motivation as the story's antagonist, I'm finding her becoming more and more complex.

Is my story evolving into a multiple character story where I'll be writing about Amber, Ruby, Scarlet and Vanessa in great length instead of just Talia?

Vanessa is the only wild card I have because I'm having trouble coming up with any sort of back story for her. Do I have enough in my head to keep her where she is in Talia's social circle? Compared to Scarlet, she's more reserved, less emotionally charged, a "I'll give you the bottom line" kind of girl and practically her polar opposite.
The only difference is, regardless of that, they are close friends with Talia and each other.

Amber and Ruby on the other hand... not so much...

From a physical standpoint, Scarlet and Ruby are twin sisters, so they have the same build. Vanessa and Amber, on the other hand, are voluptuous, have curses and rely on sensuality rather than dance skill to impress.

I played around with the idea that Amber tried out for the dance troupe more than once and she was denied her shot because she didn't have quite what they were looking for. She met Alejandro at the try-outs and he encourages her to not give up because he sees potential in her. She takes it as a compliment and is smitten, but learns later on that he's involved with Talia.

While listening to "Just Dance," I thought of Amber auditioning with two male back-up dancers that I've imagined at her flank during Karmin's "I'm just sayin' "
Where these back-up dancers came from, I have no idea... that's just what comes to mind.

Her routine with them is very tame and that's the reason why it doesn't make the cut.
Then to show what they're looking for, whoever's running the try-outs asks Ruby to do the routine from her own audition.
To "Love Game"... the lyric "I wanna take a ride on your disco stick" invokes an image of pole dancing.

Not surprisingly, Amber is frustrated by this... this leads her to believe that Ruby is a very smug, self-assured individual... but she never openly admits this. I just know that to be true.

From there, the ideas just kept building and building.

I also considered Amber being a waitress at the club. She had a rough past that she's trying to get away from, but she's admired the dancers and the attention they get, she just couldn't resist. But her dancing is very unrefined and not quite sensual enough to be at the level of the others.
She loathes the fact that she'll have to lower herself to that, but is willing to do whatever it takes to come out on top.
In doing this, she quits her waitress position, changes her appearance and goes to her next audition under a new name... supposing I go through with that, that's where the name change comes in. Carmen was Amber's previous identity.

When she becomes part of the organization, she's thrilled when it seems like Ruby has lost her edge and her material easily trumps hers. Something that continues to go on until the night of the "Heavy Metal Lover" performance... which reopens old wounds and leads to a mental breakdown... potentially.

That'd be an interesting scene to write, but it most likely won't make it into the actual novel because it's an internal thing... the only way it'd work is if the story were told in multiple first person POVs.

Amber's motivation is ever changing. She has that vendetta against Ruby that's always kinda there in the back of her mind, but most of the time, she feels she's superior.

Then while bringing Alejandro back into the picture as a potential source of conflict... Amber discovers Talia is the girl he's interested in and that she's at the center of the organization, the dancing was her idea. For these reasons, she plans to take Talia down so she can control how the business runs... she really wants the focus to be on skill and look of the dance rather than the "sex on a stick" image.

But she plays along with the act for as long as it takes to figure out how to bring it down... an inside job. Hmm... that seems a little extreme... putting herself through all the things the girls go through in their business to prove a point...
i still have a lot of kinks to work out.

In the third act after the performance of "Alejandro" where Talia stages a proverbial "break-up" with him, she and Amber have it out...
They exchange a few words and Talia finally says that she knows that Amber was behind what happened, not Alejandro, and she asks why she did it.
She consents to explain herself because Talia threatens to fire her, not only for what she got Emilia into, but because she broke the code of conduct... the girls have to get along and more importantly, there can't be that kind of bad blood between them.
Amber confesses everything, even her previous identity. While she has every right to be mad at her, Talia reassures her that she understands where she came from, goes into her own back story.

The most sacred piece of the code of conduct is the rule that the girls will bring up their pasts at their own discretion... there's no pressure to explain anything or volunteer any personal information. So in most cases, the girls don't know each other's back stories unless they open up about it on their own.

In addition to her ongoing romance with Juan Paulo, this conversation opens a dialogue between the girls and Talia asks them if they still want to go the whole 9 yards about their business... the outcome of that meeting, I'm not quite sure yet, but I don't think Talia will be part of it no matter what the future holds.

What I'd ultimately like to do is try to write a 20 page back story for all the girls... get to know them as well as I can before start the actual story. But first, I'm going to devote a page in my spiral notebook to each of them, their songs, adjectives to describe, their varying styles.

In Need of a "Te Busque" Soundtrack WORD.DOC

Since the beginning of... whatever... whenever I started writing... God I'm bad at beginnings...
Music has played a HUGE role in my brainstorming processes, whether a song inspires a whole scene or a number of songs remind me of a special person.

I have a couple of mix CD's dedicated to these people...
the first is to my first "love," the one who got me into writing...
and his soundtrack had practically everything bubblegum pop that I was into between 1999-2001...
so there's Backstreet Boys, *NSYNC, Mandy Moore, and many others... I think I might have used several Backstreet Boy tracks with just 2 from NSYNC... 
one of the brightest gems there are my two techno tracks... you know how in that time period there were these techno songs on the radio that had very few legit lyrics, but you couldn't get them out of your head...
"Blue" by Eiffel 65 (I know all of you remember that :-P) and
"Around the World (La La La)" by ATC...
both one-hit wonders, both with very few legit lyrics, but I freaking loved them... great stuff

I have my 10th grade mix, most of which reveal around "David," my crush d'ans, as I like to call it, cuz each year of high school, I felt like my emotions revolved around a different crush...
I had a little bit of everything there... mainly Dream Street, Michelle Branch and Plus One (the rest of which wound up on Jonas's soundtrack)
and for kicks, I threw a bunch of Vanessa Mae tracks at the tail end cuz I didn't want to keep borrowing the CDs to listen to them

http://romantasyland.blogspot.com/2012/02/my-story-idea-of-wish-fulfillment-rebel.html
I got into more detail in this entry... I just remembered... 
so a lot of my discussion has since been erased because I'm just repeating myself now...

anyway...

At some point, I'm really hoping that I'll be able to go back to "Rebel Diana"... that story about wish-fulfilment and all that... really look back into the songs from that album and draw out the scenes I want in the story so they really will fit in there :-P

"Te Busque" has become a similiar case-in-point of me taking musical inspiration to the paper... er, word processing medium...
but this time, I really want to do things right... get all the songs I want to use, get down all the details and so on... I want to hash out as much as I can before I start writing the actual book.
This is to make up for all the other times where I did zero outlining beforehand and I'm scrambling afterwards to be sure everything shakes out all right.

I have all the brainstorming scattered in different places at the moment... I have an intial Word.doc where I started putting stuff down, but by no means is it organized...
I have this blog where I'd been adding stuff whenever I have a :lightbulb: moment
and I also have a notepad and spiral notebook where I'd added stuff

heck,
maybe I should do an Excel sheet as well... just to organize things a little better...
because I would like to, at some point, narrow down who I want to appear in which number,
the kind of dance style and which part of the plot it derives from...

right now, I'll probably just copy/paste my list of songs that I have so far
http://romantasyland.blogspot.com/2012/12/going-gaga-living-as-free-as-my-hair.html
add the newest additions and such... and put that in a brand new document so I can start really brainstorming this stuff

then when it comes to the actual story-writing, I can nail down the ones I really want to appear in the story and the others I can easily leave on the cutting room floor.

the other day I was listening to some more Gaga... and when it came to "Monster," I remembered that I had written down some ideas about what that scene would be like...
I just don't remember where I put it...
this sequence takes place after Emilia does her first VIP night with Amber, gets attacked by the patron she leaves with, and JP comes to her aid, patching things up with Talia in the process...

so, give or take a couple of months after this incident, Emilia returns to the stage and along with JP and Talia, they send a message to Amber, saying that they know that she was behind all this, and it comes out that she's been wanting to knock Talia off her pedestal/throne for quite some time...

I came up with the idea while listening yesterday that the choreography in that song should really be in time with the percussion because it is SO sharp
there is so much to keep in mind when it comes to how these things are staged and to be sure each number differentiates from one another

I also want that differentiation to be with each of the girls' dance styles...
although I can save a little time in saying that Scarlet and Ruby are very similar, because they are twin sisters and all that... Ruby won't be in the story as much as Scarlet, obviously, because Scarlet is one of Talia's closest cohorts alongside Vanessa...
Ruby will be mentioned at a couple points, but the most critical will be for the "Heavy Metal Lover" sequence... a night Amber plotted for months where she'd come out on top, but Ruby steals the show with that final number... I merely don't have enough time to go into it with all of the girls :-P

Vanessa is the one I know the least about.. still... all of the girls came into this business out of abusive situations, have a love of dance, but with little opportunity in that neck of the woods, they do this as well as sell themselves to patrons for a little extra cash...
Talia's reasoning (or lack thereof) behind it is that her stepfather had her believing she was only fit for this type of work... spending so much time with him, she didn't get much of an education in academia, which disqualifies her from pursuing college and such... and part of it I guess is out of subtle revenge... he didn't want her being with anyone else but him and by being in this business, she's rubbing his nose in the fact he doesn't own her...
doesn't make a whole lot sense, though, considering that he got killed for not repaying a debt...

by the same people she ends up working for, ironically enough...

My logic is still a little lax for this story... they say sex sells, but I'm kinda terrified about how I'm going to sell the idea of these girls dancing and selling their bodies for sex to make a living... afraid that anyone who knows me, my family particularly, would judge me for putting my mind in that place... let's just say it's not very nice or pleasant...

And the idea of the story started with choreography coming to mind while listening to Apollonia 6... the fact that's such a crowd pleaser and by dancing and doing things on their own terms, they feel empowered and work past previous struggles...
I'm hoping to somehow work the female empowerment theme into this just so it doesn't sound like a story about a group of prostitutes... 
the only time that really worked to anyone's advantage was the movie "Pretty Woman," but it was more of a starting point rather than a means to an end

The only issue I'll probably have writing this, logic aside... is how I put choreography onto the pages or at least attempt to make it a visual experience to read... I don't really know terminology very well with these Latin dances, although I could google and YouTube it...
I'd like to have some choreography and staging, but more often than not, I'd like my focus to be on the raw emotion behind it and how the girls relate to one another and come together onstage

like with "Monster," all of the girls are supporting Emilia as she's telling her story through dance (also, possibly, lip-synching the music, I'm still deciding on that)... she's acting alone while the girls dance around her, really sharp movements in time with the drumming. It is so awesomely pronounced that it'd be a shame not to use it. During the chorus, she'll have her eye out for Alejandro, singling him out in this attack, while the girls move to the music, then towards the end of it, she will jump them in perfect unison.
One crucial point I saw in another listen was during the bridge at the end, the memories of the "attack" come back to haunt her and she's falling to her knees, ready to hyperventilate... Talia is right there, asking if she's all right, and she quickly revives and gets back on her game, grateful for the concern

The latest idea I'd been playing around with, aside from the fact I now see Amber dancing with two guys while doing her Karmin-inspired numbers ("I'm just sayin' " and "Told you so"), is with Juan Paulo. 
He's in town with two of his friends. This is kinda their last big blow-out before he finishes up his degree in pre-med, and he's deciding which branch of medicine he wants to specialize in. Back in high school, and maybe into the first few years of college, he was in a band with his friends and they just got a spot to perform at a South American venue... he's recluctant to join them because he wants to leave the band behind and focus on medicine, but they more or less con him into it... something to the effect of "you can find yourself a couple of new best friends"...

the reason I'm leaning in this direction is the Green Day track "Extraordinary Girl"... before listening to that album, I heard Nelly Furtado's a number of times and with the chorus of "No Hay Iqual"... which is all in Spanish... tribal choreography comes to mind...
the beginning of "Extraordinary Girl" starts very soft, tribal drumming in the background, to the exact same number of counts as the previous choreography... 
and it all seemed to fit really well together

I see the songs being back to back on the soundtrack as the movie plays in my head...
JP tracks Talia down to her next gig, kinda at the suggestion of his friends who really believed she was flirting with him during the "Promiscuous" karaoke number where they first meet... but he starts to fall for her... hard... 
so even after she turns him down or the girls (at her request) tell him she's not interested, he leaves the venue singing this song... although at this point, he doesn't know anything about what really goes on with her business... so with the movie playing in my head, I'm thinking that this could almost pass for a musical... a very dramatic and risque musical, but I see the songs really playing a role in the story as a whole

so I guess in a way I can see JP and his friends forming a Green Day/Daughtry like rock band...
a couple of Daughtry songs come to my mind as well regarding JP

whenever I get the chance, I'll get on that word.doc right away and hopefull that'll help get the ball rolling... I put down all my thoughts and notes about the songs in one spot so I can go there to add more or make sure I don't repeat myself... should be fun 8-)

although it begrudges me to say this, I don't think this story will be finished anytime soon... I might even be a few years away from starting it... just as long as I don't lose interest (God forbid!), I look forward to continue adding notes to myself for this as they come

A Writer's Frustration: Much Ado about Prologues

It goes without saying that breaking into publishing is not an easy thing.
I've had all kinds of difficulties attributing to it and almost always, it's my ego and confidence that takes the biggest hit.

Regarding "Jonas," I must have sent a dozen queries and gotten half those replies back. 
An associate that worked with Stephenie Meyer's agent, he told me that the submission pile is so huge that I'm not likely to get a reply. That's one of the few things I really went through the trouble to make my query letter sound great because I actually knew this person and what her material was and so on.

After that, it's nothing but generic BS:
"not the right fit"
"we do not feel strongly enough about it to move forward"

the most thoughtful reply I got was: "I'm afraid I was just not hooked enough to want to ask for more. "

That at least gave me something to work with.
Naturally, this is not enough time in the day for anyone to give specifics about the rejections, if they bother to formally send them at all. I get that.

But how does one break into this business if you're not told how to improve?

In my inbox today, I got an article from one of my writer's subscriptions and it was on Agent Pet Peeve. Some of it I knew already. 
Agents want to be hooked right away and want to read more to see what happens. They don't want a lot of exposition to start something. They want it to be believable and for us not to fall until clichés.

It's when they attacked one of my go-to methods when I really lost my mind and sanity for a good 5 minutes.

I almost hate to say it, but Jonas's greatest strength IS his prologue, his origin story. I've worked with the first couple chapters, trying to add more to Nina, what she's like before she goes into uncharted waters... a brand new high school.
I meant for her to be a blank canvas that girls who read about her can see a little of themselves in her, so I really didn't give her too much definition. This is going to sound really bad, but I'm wracking my brain to figure out what I have defined about her aside from shoulder-length blonde hair and hazel eyes.

I'd been away from the project for so much. Right now, I just plain exhausted trying to think about it. Makes me want to quit moving forward.

Rejection is a very taxing thing, especially when I'm scrambling trying to revise what I think is leading me wrong. 

I refuse to believe that NO agent will take me simply because I start with a prologue. It's a backstory, an origin story of Jonas and the adversary he was summoned to defeat. That is the best part of my story for quite some time and my hope has always been that people will be so wowed by it that they'll continue forward with Nina, while being curious as to how that story fits into the grand scheme of things.

Sure, my prologue is long enough to be a chapter onto itself, but I really fail to see the sense in that. Chapter 1 taking place EONS ago, and Chapter 2 takes place in the present... the distance between the two points is so vast, how does that work other than having the backstory being in prologue?

Shortly after replying tearfully to that post, I thought about Harry Potter.
To be technical, the first chapter takes place 10 years before the story actually begins, with Harry on the verge of turning 11.
That transition ran fine. So technically, I guess I could turn the prologue into chapter 1... but it sounds much less epic... I hate even considering that idea.

Whenever I'm setting up a romantasy backstory with my characters, I need the prologue.
Orion, who I originally intended to be a distant cousin of Jonas, was reincarnated a number of times before his spirit took on the form it was meant to take. The first few scenes were inspired by the Greek mythology-inspired segment from Fantasia.
Then Orion, after being a faun and a centaur became this human who'd been wheel-chair bound since he was 3, finds his calling as a merman, something that happens completely by accident, but turns out to be the right form for him to take.

Although I find it a little ironic now, looking back, that Zeus made so many mistakes creating him and picking the forms for him to take... he's THE god of Greek Mythology, he doesn't make mistakes... unless of course you take his promiscuity into account... 

Chihiro's backstory is even longer... and I'd been considering toying around with it...
I'd just had very little brainpower to really work on my writing at all. I'd been so busy rereading some of short projects, reliving this and that. 

It's frustrating and even more exhausting... I'm still very exhausted right now and I really don't know why that is... that I want to be a writer, to make a living as a writer, really haven't aspired to anything else aside from getting published, and I'd been stuck in this rut for a very long time. 

At least when it comes to my movie blog, I have some to go back to every week. While I'm still going through this list of my favorites, I still have something going on.

Maybe the thing I'm frustrated with the most right now is I feel like my voice isn't being heard by anyone but the people closest to me. My friends and family know how much I want to pursue this and so on, but my voice is not being heard by anyone that can help me achieve much of anything. 
I'd been semi-active on Twitter, but nobody replies to me on anything, even when I'm paying all kinds of compliments. 
Sometimes I want nothing more to scream to all the people whose attention I'm trying to get:
"Acknowledge me, dammit!!" 

I realize it comes off really rude, I shouldn't be so pushy, etc, but I'm just frustrated right now.

I don't want to hear that agents hate prologues... it's the best storytelling/exposition device I have, and if I can't take that route, I really don't have much else I can do to get anyone's attention.

Girl Power: Exploring Female-Centric Storytelling

Going as far as back I can remember, everything I wrote had the same formula.
Girl meets guy that is usually very mysterious or simply is unlike anyone they'd ever known before. Whether it's the first time they're opening up to another person (Jonas), they're a softie under a tough exterior (Lucas), it's always the fascination about the guy that drives the story. Then it's something that has to do with them that propels it forward.
I keep writing to find out what happens to them.

At the same time, although there's always a love story in whatever I write, my focus is almost always on the guy. Like the guy is my main character and the girl is the observer who become a key source of inspiration slash love interest.

I've just always had this issue with writing female characters because they have a little too much of me in them. I see my flaws pop out in them, whether it's brashness I'd never act on in reality or my insecurities.
Just for the heck of it, in a few short stories/sketches I wrote in 2011-12, I vented through my character, who was caught up in some kind of depression, just so I could work through something I was feeling. After a while, though, I just got sick of it because it's always the same thing. Kinda like my life at this moment, but I'm hoping for things to shake up a little next week.

Another issue is the mere fact I didn't have that many female friends.
This is gonna sound super crazy, but I think I can literally count the number of girlfriends I'd had in my life on one hand.
Of those 5 really substantial girlfriends, we're all Facebook friends, but don't really talk all that much... we occasionally comment on each other's statuses (more common with some than most)
but the latest addition, Sam, who I met so many people/friends through... we still keep in touch semi-regularly and for her friendship, I'm extremely grateful. 

None of them were the kinds of girlfriends you see in the movies where there're always trips to the mall, trying on clothes, checking out boys and all that.
It's nothing like what they show in the movies. I enjoy my favorite movies despite the fact I don't have that in common in reality, but all the same, I wouldn't mind something similiar in addition to what I have.

Anyway, there was a reason why I was going into all this... and it does involve something I wrote. Unlike the previous short story I discussed, this one shakes out a lot better with the logistics and the storytelling and such. I thought it might be a good idea to try expanding beyond the usual stuff I wrote with a girlfriend-type story.

It'd bring into some small things from my own life, but I wanted a friendship between girlfriends to blossom through a time of crisis that makes them besties for life.
It was one of those many whispers in the back of my head of something I wanted to attempt, and it was a matter of the right muse showing up to get me started.

That muse happened to be American Idol Season 8 alum Alexis Grace.
So much time had passed now that... aw, who'm I kidding? I literally forgot every other performance of hers after she slayed Dolly Parton's "Jolene." 
I only remember her "Dirty Diana" cover the week before because it was the top 13... I have zero recollection of her semi-final performance or even what song she did, but she was labeled a dark horse after whatever song she did.

In my view, it was a perfect marriage between her and that one song, and I was shocked that she went home as quickly as she did. One of the most devestating American Idol eliminations I experienced... and I'd include Clay Aiken missing out on the title in that discussion.
The only thing substantially more difficult to swallow was Colton Dixon last season going home in 7th... and for the life of me, I couldn't get why Phillip Phillips got all the votes and went on to win... I didn't get him... I still kinda don't, but I have warmed up to his original material.

Another writing trend I went through in these past couple years, after I couldn't put forth the effort to write something of novel-proportions... is that something would come up, either on TV or in a movie, I'd get really attached to a character or person and something happened to them, and I put down on paper (figure of speech, it's always via keyboard) how I saw them so I don't forget what they were like.

This was the first time I went through that process.
I'm kinda amazed, and perhaps there will come a time where I'll kick myself because of this, that considering how much I missed Colton after his elimination, I didn't fall back into the same pattern... write a little something about him.
I might hate myself in a few years for not getting his essence down in paper in the form of a character, although I did write lengthy reviews after each week of American Idol and continually say that, even though I wanted it to be a girls' year, he made me fall for him week after week.
Luckily, he got a record deal and released an amazing album, so there is zero chance I'll forget him entirely.

With Alexis, several elements came together... and it started with her physical description and the few lyrics of "Jolene" I could remember, despite having listened to her sing it half a dozen times, between the performance night, the "save me" performance and on YouTube... 
going by the song as a whole, she could have turned into this girl of unsurpassed beauty that my character would develop a strong relationship with, but then a guy would come into the picture and his attention would be taken up by her...

other than "she was a beauty beyond compare," none of the other lyrics ever went into the story I ended up writing. the "Jolene" Dolly sang about had auburn hair, and supposedly was a bank teller that astounded her husband with her beauty, and she made a big thang about it by putting it in song. Somewhat of an overreaction, I'd say.

Alexis just had this look that set her apart and of course, she had a charming voice I adored. 
I guess you could say she'd go on to join a list of "girl crushes" I procured over the years.

Elements clicked into place little by little the story practically wrote itself over the course of almost 3 months
22 pages, 10,905 words

The end result that blossomed became more than I could have ever imagined. 
I found a pretty good vehicle for myself in Casey Carlton, who began this story as Nick Carraway getting glimpse of Gatsby, that type of narration. Then she stepped away from being the observer, going on about all these things about this girl Jolienne Carine (its a little redundant, both names are derived from words that meant pretty/beautiful), to seeing her for herself. The one time they meet, they hit it off right away, and suddenly she disappears.

Enter the meat of the story: 
Jolienne is hospitalized with leukemia, dropping the name she adopted (according to her, "I traveled abroad one summer for my French class and Pierre, one of the boys in my host family, gave me the name. When I first arrived, he kept telling me how I was ‘jolie,’ which is French for ‘pretty’ or ‘beautiful.’ Somehow, the name caught on and nobody’s known me as anything else.), and seeing as Casey happens to be a volunteer at that particular hospital, their friendship grows little by little.

Supposedly, her reputed popularity was an illusion. She got this reputation because nobody else in their school looked like her and she exuded this electric vibe everyone wanted a piece of. Now that she was off the map, though, her existence as "queen bee" was forgotten about.
Naturally, she is nothing like her rep, and is a down-to-earth, extremely sweet person that got dealt a bad hand with this diagonsis. 
Without Casey's friendship, she might not have survived all the treatments and such... heck, she might have been on the bone marrow donation list until it was too late to save her...
although in a later draft, I might have to change up a few facts cuz, supposedly, you have to be 18 to donate bone marrow, and I may have written them as high school freshman... 

Interestingly, they said that you must be 18 and due to the voluntary nature of this procedure, they don't allow a parent or guardian to sign a release form for it... you learn something new everyday. 

I doubt I'd ever be enough of a people person to follow the example of my character, getting in volunteer hours at the hospital to take down information, change IVs and such, and be a source of moral support to people who don't get regular visitors. Later on in another story, I write that she is gearing towards becoming a psychologist for cancer patients.
I wasn't aware at the time that people do do that kind of thing for a living. Anna Kendrick plays a character who has that exact position in that Joseph-Gordon Levitt film "50/50."

Casey's kind of a blank canvas that I could put in a number of situations. I'd even considered redoing this story so she and Jolienne/Alex were hospital room mates when Casey had her procedure done that would go on to inspire her decision to do the volunteer work and so on.
Taking a paper out of my own life, she had surgery to take care of her scoliosis.

Supposing I were to do it all again with that part of the story, Alex's leukemia came back years later, and only when they meet in the hospital again, under different circumstances, they recognize one another from years ago, getting all the more closer.
With all that, I could make the story twice as long as it is.

Or maybe years later, I could have a number of stories done with those two characters, with a few extra additions.
If I were to take it to the publishing routes, I'd have to change at least one name in process because when I reunited the two of them, I brought a character from "Less than Zero" along for the ride.... although the movie moreso than the book.
Speaking of things I had trouble getting over... but that's another story entirely.

Quite possibly, despite the relationship blossoms between my character and his, I could play with the idea of Alex/Jolienne and Casey going beyond friendship as well. Really playing up the "girl crush" thing and playing around with the possibilities of that.

Revisiting a Hack-Job: The Ghost of Leo (2005-7)

I'd been getting more in the habit lately of revisiting stories I'd written ages ago. 

on my movie blog, I'd been going through a list of what I consider my favorite movies... or at least some of them.
http://moviegoerconfessions.blogspot.com

Just in case I hadn't posted the address yet.
I'm up to #85 (out of 101) and it was the Reese Witherspoon/Mark Ruffalo romantasy flick "Just Like Heaven."

Great movie, especially if you've got a box full of chocolates.
Just kidding. But it is a pretty engrossing film that I personally enjoy a lot.

Going through the synposis and such, I remembered that part of it inspired something I wrote, if only the last page or so.

Shortly before I started college, I began a story that was originally inspired by "Danny Phantom." Man, that was a great series.
Anyway, I thought about this mysterious character with a ghostly outline and these glowing green eyes.
I started going from stream of consciousness more or less, but little by little, I put things into it that just sprang to mind.

Anyway, after a while, school happened, my interest and focus tapered off and I found my way back to writing fanfiction, this time about "InuYasha." Great animé series, I'd mentioned it a few times.

One year, I made it my mission to complete everything I'd written and if there was no chance, I was going to "throw it out" or in the case of the PC world, delete.
And I'll be honest. I regret throwing anything away nowadays.
However little sense it made and how much copyright I might have infringed, I wish I hadn't gotten rid of this one story... where this guy was the only member of his family to survive a house fire, he's taken in by his Aunt Clarissa, who runs an animal rehabilitation place. He's having these fantastical dreams about dragons and such, but really, everything that came out was from the Playstation game "Spyro the Dragon." Which I still play to this day, even though I'd been through it thousands of times.

The gist of it was that, supposedly, in the fire he'd forgotten his name. It is never mentioned, merely alluded to, but ultimately, his name would have been the same of the small dragon he'd dreamt about based on Spyro himself. 

As for Leo, I got so far with the story, then decided later on I would severely shorten it because I wasn't coming up with a lot of ideas.
To be fair, the logic in my storytelling was always really sketchy. That's what I get for writing a story from an idea that isn't fully realized. Heck, my logic with Leo himself was extremely lackluster. 

The first scene had him materializing the bedroom of this girl he was in a relationship with. Technically, this story is told from Tricia's POV more than his. She spends the first part of it trying to figure out who he is or was to her.
Supposedly they were separated by this big accident. He lost his life saving her from it, and meanwhile, she received so much damage in the accident that she literally lost the first 13 years of her life.
The only life she knows is of the last 4 years... she's 17, a junior in high school. She lives with foster parents and has no memory of her real family.

There's the trauma of the accident itself, but supposedly an air-conditioner fell on her head from a second story window, which accounts for the other half of her amnesia and loss of long-term her memories.
With that alone, how much sense does all that make? Honestly, I haven't the foggiest.

According to Leo, they were neighbors with degree of age difference between them... 6 years. Supposedly they met when she was 11 and he was 17... how much sense that makes, I really don't know. He talks about how he had feelings for her that he had to keep to himself because with the age difference, it would be frowned upon, but after a certain point, he didn't care anymore. 

An issue goes on throughout as to what Leo is. He appears to Tricia a couple of times when she's rendered unconscious, either at night while she's asleep, or when she starts blacking out for no apparent reason on a school day.
First she believes he's a spirit or ghost of someone she knew. Then she keeps defending the fact that he isn't a ghost. I had a severe lapse in judgement there, obviously.

During this school day where it all starts, Tricia kinda starts to realize the illusion of popularity. She's surrounded by all these girlfriends, but realizes she doesn't know any of their names or anything about them other than them being cheerleaders, volleyball players and whatnot.
The logic is that Leo managed to create that illusion so Tricia would have security and stability, something she lost in the accident. Not sure how much sense that makes either.

The only thing that she maintains from her popularity is the attention of this guy, Wes. Seriously, the first name that came to mind... at the time, I really liked the name, but I don't remember where I got it.
Geesh, that statement isn't even accurate. She had a crush on him for years, but they'd only said a couple of words to each other. Suddenly, it's as if they're close friends because throughout the disorientation plaguing her mind (with everything being an illusion and such), he has her back no matter what.

She falls ill and luckily, at this specific time, the school is evacuated because of a bomb threat.
This isn't completely random, though. I think in September or October of my first year of school, we had to evacuate, take the stadium seating and we were forbid to use our cellphones (easy to say for me cuz I didn't have one at the time).
This is is merely a vehicle for Tricia and Wes to bond, and he's a gentleman for driving her home. 

Supposedly Tricia has the flu and throughout this time, her memories are attempting to come back through Leo. But the logic completely falls apart when she immediately gets better the next day and Leo materializes. 

The story that follows is that Wes is distrustful of Leo, who apparently came back into Tricia's life out of the blue. He sees him as being a few extra years older than Tricia does. From a destination, to Wes, Leo exudes the age of 25.

After that, I drew from another source of inspiration from my life.
We had faulty fire alarms in the college dorms and it would go off whenever someone burnt popcorn. There was one night, 1/24/06, where I woken up in the middle of the night by the alarm, but I was so tired that I decided not to get out of bed.
As the alarm blared louder, I started to suspect after a while that there might be an actual fire and I might die... because I was too stupid and lazy to get out of bed.
Luckily, it was a false alarm. 

I put the idea of a faulty alarm in the story earlier on, and later decided to incorporate that incident into the story as its climax.
To get the proper setting, I decided that Tricia was doing so well in these advanced placement courses that she had the opportunity to study at a local private school where credits for the advanced courses counted towards college credits. 
Throughout this, Leo tells her that he has a bad feeling about that place, "people change" when they go here, and so on. She doesn't buy into any of it.

Again, all randomly thrown together.

Then in the climax, the fire happens. Tricia doesn't bother to get up and out because she thinks its a false alarm. Leo breaks in to save her life. But Wes, who decided to transfer there because his parents happen to be really rich but he decided to stick to public school until now (how convenient!), confronts him and says that he saw him light the fire himself.

Then comes the biggest load of crap I ever threw together... and at the last minute, no less.
Even more convenient, this is when Leo is revealed to be a ghost. Wes tries to throw a punch, but his fist goes right through him... and seconds earlier, Leo had carried Tricia out of a burning building.
Age comes back into question and Leo confesses that he should be 24, but he is 19 based that was his age when he died. So Wes got a vibe from him that he was older than 19, even though he appears that way... again, my logic sucks.
But to save time and more meandering on my part, I'm going to copy/paste this part so anyone who reads can judge its legitimacy for themselves.

While they waited for the fire trucks to come and put out the flames, Leo explained the story of what happened. In his later years of high school, he went to that private school, but rumor had it that it was cursed. It had been built on ancient Indian burial ground. Those were also the years where his feelings for Tricia were the strongest. Due to the influence of the cursed spirits, Leo felt like he was developing another personality, a dangerous one that could hurt Tricia. At times, he’d have blackouts and wake up somewhere, not remembering how he got there.

Several months past and the blackouts were getting more frequent and he couldn’t remember anything he did over longer periods of time. At the same time, arsons were happening in the area close to the private school. Leo found himself waking up closer and closer to the scene of the crime. A few times, he’d be out cold for days at a time. He started to check a map of the area to see if there was a pattern. He circled each of the targeted houses and noticed that they were at different points off of a circle of homes around the private school. When he drew a pattern, the four houses were part of a pentacle symbol with the private school standing in the middle of it. He looked at the point above the school and Tricia’s house was the one above it.

When he found that out, he told Tricia and her parents to take a trip out of town for the weekend. She asked what was going on since she was seeing less of him. He told her that he’s been checking into the arsons and it’s had him up for the past few nights. He worried that her house was going to be next, but she thought he had nothing to worry about. Luckily, they had already planned to see family that weekend. Before they left, Leo took her into his arms. She asked, “Leo, you’re shaking, what’s wrong?”

“Tricia, I love you so much and I’d die if anything happened to you. I couldn’t live without seeing your beautiful face.” He gave her a kiss before they broke apart. During that weekend, Leo looked around for evidence. He then went into the private school’s dumpster and found some of his old clothes in there. He found that all of them had been singed at one point. He gasped when he realized that he had been the one setting the fires. He rummaged through his things and found plans that apparently his dark side had sketched. He too had drawn the pentacle pattern in his blueprints.

To see if this had any connection to the private school, he decided to Google “pentacle”. He found that the tribe of Indians that lived in this area was cursed by another tribe. This enemy tribe was a bitter rival of the residing tribe and since they were unequipped to defeat them in battle, they used the underhanded tactic of hexes and curses. The curse could only be broken if a pentacle was burned into the ground where their territory once stood.

The Sunday that Tricia was returning with her family, Leo was experiencing headaches and he had one last blackout before night fell. He felt something foul was in the area and it was coming from the school itself. He sensed that the restless spirits wanted to take this into its own hands because his feelings for Tricia were so strong that he couldn’t bear to put her out of house and home.

He saw the headlights of Tricia’s parents’ car go by the school, but suddenly it was acting strong. The car started careening out of control, almost as if it were under the control of the spirits of the Indian tribe. He rushed out of his dormitory, quickly realizing that he wouldn’t make it in time. All of sudden, he felt a new sensation. He started running after the car, steadily gaining speed. He could barely comprehend what was going on, but he had caught up with the car. He knocked on the window, telling Tricia to roll it down. He urged her to tell them to hit the breaks, but they weren’t working. He followed alongside the car until it came towards Tricia’s house. In an instant, it crashed into the gas main and the car burst into flames. Completely acting out of instinct, he opened the left passenger car door, grabbed Tricia and dragged her out just as the car exploded.

He realized that he had taken the impact of the blast. Tricia slowly woke up while Leo was dealing with severe 3^rd degree burns. Not only that, but he was dealing with severe pain as well. She was all over Leo, asking a million questions at once. “Are you all right? How were you able to keep up with our car? Why’d you do that?”

Leo quickly figured out that the Indian spirits had possessed him in order to break their curse, but also to help him save the one he loved. He was cringing with pain that seemed inconsolable. Tricia realized that her parents had been incinerated in the blast and Leo was slowly dying from his injuries. His dying words to Tricia were that he wished only for her safety and her happiness. After he died, Tricia completely lost it. She didn’t want to leave Leo’s side and couldn’t believe that her family and her one true love had all died and she was the only one who was spared. So shaken by the incident, she was unable to move or sense that the trouble wasn’t over. That’s when the air conditioner came down from the 2^nd story window and hit her on the head.

Leo said to Tricia and Wes, “I didn’t want you to come back here because I thought I’d set another fire to finish breaking the curse.”

“But how were you able to come back?”

“It’s hard to explain, the spirits of this tribe have called my spirit to different parts of the country to break other curses. I wanted desperately to return to see you once more.” He stroked her cheek, “I’m so sorry for all of this, but all I wanted to do was protect you.”

“So, did these ‘so-called spirits’ help you fix things so Tricia would have the ‘perfect life’? Like with her popularity and everything?” Wes asked. Leo nodded, “Regrettably so. I wanted her to be happy because of this incident. She lost everything she knew in one night and I wanted her to get past that.”

“Now that your spirit has completed its mission, are you going to return to the spirit world now?” Tricia asked, on the edge of tears. Leo nodded, “I’m afraid so.” He stroked her cheek, “I was so glad that I got to see you once last time. I love you.”

“I love you too. I wish you didn’t have to go.” He nodded before kissing her once last time. The moment their lips lost touch with one another, he was gone. 

so there you go.
The story ends with Leo disappearing, Tricia and Wes have a relationship through college but go their separate ways.
The final scene is inspired by the rooftop scene at the end of "Just like Heaven." Tricia meets William, a native american man with glowing green eyes,  and the two have an immediate attraction as if they met in another life.
I know reincarnation doesn't happen that quick, but it makes a little more sense than some of the other stuff in here. If I had room, I'd post the whole thing here, but if anyone else wants to filter through my so-called logic, they can contact me and make of it what they will.

The story isn't all that bad, really. It has a lot of good elements that could be made better with a little more focus, but the execution of it all is just ghastly.
But to fix it and make it legit, I just wouldn't know where to begin.

[possibly] a new beginning for my "White Tiger"

For a number of reasons, and I'm sure I'm not the only writer who has thought/said this, I am hesitant to share what I write. Blogging is one thing where I can just go on and on about a topic. So what? It's a blog. I have very few friends and know few people, so few individuals I know will see what I write. Little risk is involved.
But it's an entirely different story (literally, cuz we're talking about lit, opposed to something that would be contrused as a memoir/journal). Maybe I'm worried that people won't "get" where I'm coming from. This sounds totally silly, considering how sensitive I can be of people's opinions of me, but I feel protective of my characters. I'm afraid others won't see them the way I do, so as much as I want to get out there, I shield them from prying eyes.

And naturally I'm hesitant to share this because this particular story/project was stolen once before. I could say, the more time goes by, the more I can believe that this person isn't a convincing identity thief type that would stop at nothing to have my work for themselves. 

I wrote the following over yesterday, between the morning and night hours... with the time in between being devoted to being at a family function. And so far, I have good feeling about this:

“What are you all doing in here?” The barrage of whispered confusion surrounding me immediately stopped. Their attention shifted to the new arrival, giving him away as their leader. His footsteps pounded into the cave, easily breaking through its renewed silence. Meanwhile, I fought to stave off unconsciousness and opened my eyes. Something about his voice was familiar somehow, but I couldn’t remember where I’d heard it.

Despite my instincts demanding I change my mind, I locked eyes with him. The highly decorated tiger gasped, but unlike so many others I had met these past several months, he seemed taken aback. I struggled to breathe, but even that proved to be too much. I coughed, gasping for air.

“Let me through!” The clan made way for him as he knelt beside me. His eyes never left mine as his hands examined me. The bruises on my arms and legs protested his touch, however gentle it was. He cupped my cheek after I managed a more substantial breath.

As if afraid to break his concentration, a voice within the clan hesitatingly asked. “Kohaku, do you know her?”

Kohaku kissed my forehead, staying in place for several moments. When he broke contact, he answered with a question he posed to me. “Chihiro…” My ears fluttered at the sound of my name. Nobody had called me by it in a very long time. Kohaku delicately took me into his arms. His body rose and fell with a sigh of unimaginable relief. “She is my goddaughter, the heir to my sister’s clan.”

Unintelligible conversation erupted once again. The same tiger responded on behalf of the rest of the group. “Kirakotsu had a daughter?”

He turned his head to face her. “After observing her countenance, do you understand why I kept her existence a secret?” Although he continued to address his followers, his focus was entirely on me as he cradled my head. “White tigers are extremely rare as are such individuals in other races. No one quite knows why this inflection occurs, but it is almost always seen in a negative light. No matter what the motives may be, that prejudice is why Chihiro likely spent months fighting for her life.” Kohaku traced the side of my neck in search of a pulse. When he found it, he nodded and dropped his voice to a whisper, “Chihiro, I need you to stay with me, all right? Everything is going to be fine from now on. I promise.” Whether it was relief or weakness, I couldn’t be sure. But at that precise moment, my consciousness slipped away.

However foolish it seemed, given my recent history, I believed him. Conflict rushed through his veins, pangs of anger and sadness—all for my benefit. Meanwhile, his calm gaze never wavered, as if to say he wanted his strength to become my strength. Little by little, Kohaku nursed me back to health. Fish stew came three times a day and he always made sure I had more than he did. At night, he kept me warm with several blankets. More were added as the winter months grew harsher.

But getting me to speak again proved to be his most difficult task. Not a day went by without him asking me once to tell him what I went through to get there. He did everything to reason with me. He assured me repeatedly that nobody in his clan, him included, would dream of hurting me. Likewise, nobody would track me down to retaliate for my confessions.

Then over three months later, Kohaku gave me a piece of advice that changed my mind: “It will help to talk about it with someone because it will give you closure. Having closure will give you the chance to move on from the pain and the hurt you went through.” 

I couldn’t help but agree, but one thing still troubled me. I swallowed, clearing my throat. “When I got here… what you said about me… the fact I am so rare…Have you ever come across anyone else like me? Not just our kind?”

“No, I haven’t, Chihiro.” Clearly, he was still getting over the fact I finally spoke. He managed to contain his joy and his composure relaxed. “Why do you ask?”

At this point, there was no going back. I had to tell him. I had to tell him about the white wolf. Even a year later, I still believed my encounter with him saved my life—despite the fact I saved his that very same night.

I don't know how much feedback I'm going to get, but this is here in case anyone is interested. 

I want to maintain first person POV, seeing as this is Chihiro's tale to tell. Part of me is worried that I didn't show enough or tell enough from her POV. Most of what I have is dialogue, which often saves me the trouble of having to go into great detail about stuff. 
I'd written a couple versions of this premise already with her being in various conditions. Here in particular, it isn't necessarily as dire as it had been in the past. She's on the brink of starvation, battered and still carries the bruises inflicted by her own kind... some simply because her appearance marks her as an outcast. Maintaining a little mystery is good, but hopefully this isn't so sparse that anyone who reads feels like they need more detail. 

But I will be going into plenty detail later, so it's not like there will be millions of unanswered questions... if anything, there should be less than 10. That's most desireable in this case. 

It's strange. I'd written a number of scenarios, what feels like, millions of times over. I know my characters extremely well... ok, maybe just Chihiro and Kohaku, who dominate my experimental files. But it's a matter of figuring out the choice of words I want to use to describe the situation. The one in particular I wish I could develop more is why exactly she can't speak... I barely even highlighted that fact in my passage. I just wrote in passing that she hadn't spoken since she arrived and perhaps hasn't in several months.
If I were to guess, it would be at least three months before finding Kohaku, right after this growth spurt occurs. The idea is put into her head that simply speaking results in unnecessary violence and quite simply, she's experienced substantial drama. Heck, I could have made the argument that finding her mother's dead body after the massacre was such a shock, it robbed her of speech, perhaps forever. But I think the story would be severly lacking in some spots early on if she didn't speak at all.

One thing I'd kinda noticed about my writing as of late is how I'd been keeping things neat and orderly. I'd tried to use different types of sentence structures and a fresh set of vocubulary so I don't repeat all the same words and phrases all the time.
And I think one of my other projects, which happens to be grounded in non-fiction, is where it all began. I want it to have a sense of professionalism, so I'm upholding off all these standards.
Now I can't seem to turn it off despite the fact I hadn't worked on it in months :-P

I'm also guessing part of me is keeping a lot in mind because I don't want my weekly email subscriptions to writer's digest to go to waste. 

As for where I'm planning to go after this:
Chihiro will tell Kohaku about when she first learned about the war, one last conversation she had with Kirakotsu before she went into battle. And of course the encounter with Lucas... the all important scene that gives her motivation to succeed in her goal: to find a new home where she can serve the purpose she was groomed for by her mother. 

Without that encounter, she would have given up right then and there. Either she'd have died of starvation or would have fallen victim to the first enemy she met. 

All the while, I'd like to keep the following in mind: Lucas is the spark that drives Chihiro forward, but I don't want this part of the story to be oversaturated with the mention of his name. Would it be possible to do that without making it seem like it comes out of nowhere in her next dire moment of need? He can't be the one thing propelling her forward. I also don't want anyone who reads to see his name pop up 20-30 pages later and wondering a) who was he again? and/or b) where did he come from? 
Then again his name will be mentioned in the synopsis, so I don't think that'll be a huge issue. 

Man, rejection has me feel annoyed with myself when it comes to making sure everything hits their mark just right.

Anyway, anyone who reads, feel free to leave feedback and I'll see what more I can come up with in the meantime. 

White Tiger: Toying with Biology and Flashbacks

Probably the worst feeling in the world when it comes to writing anything... whether it's writing the first draft, starting a brand new project or beginning again with a brand new draft... staring at the page and realizing that that "strong opening line" isn't coming to mind.

There are few things more important to a story than having a strong first sentence. Because that's what keeps the reader reading. Whether it addresses a person, what a person is feeling or what, there has to be a reaction like:
"Why does s/he feel that way? I have to read more to figure this out."
"Whoa! You've got my attention. What's going to happen next?"

With this story, my first draft began with a lot of exposition. A couple of years after I wrote it, looking back at it, it felt phony to me to start with "My name is..." 
The latest draft I did, which is going back to 2011, was a bit more dramatic: "Mother was worried. Something is coming." 

Now that's a beginning that could get a heart to skip a beat. I could keep going with that, but there's also the question of what I do next. I wrote a little bit of exposition to explain the kind of world this story takes place in, a little bit about tiger clan hierarchy, Chihiro's mixed heritage. The question that follows up in my head is: how long should I drag this out before going back to the first sentence? Followed by: Should I bother with the exposition at all? 

Because I really don't feel confident with "throwing away" my drafts, I know I'm going to have that information somewhere where I can pull it out if needed. If one thing comes up a lot in the querying process, it's the hook, snagging an agent's attention, especially if their submission guidelines include the first couple chapters/pages of the story. There has to be enough there for them to want to keep reading.

So while I work to answer those questions, I've moved onto another idea, a temporary Plan B:
Restarting the story in a completely different way-- we're at the penultimate event of Part 1; Chihiro finds her second home with her uncle/godfather. And while she's recovering, she retells the story of the journey she took to get there. 

But I hit another brick wall: Where to begin, with her arriving there or with her recovering there.
Obviously I need a clear head for all this and my eyes starting to go a little bit as I'm typing up this entry... it's not going to happen tonight. 

Last night I started on one of my badly timed brainstorming sessions. As soon as my head hits the pillow for me to go to sleep, my mind starts cranking out ideas, and I'm too comfortable to roll out of bed, grab my notebook and write it all down.
Once again, I started playing around with the idea of Chihiro being a white tiger because of a genetic mutation that only affects a handful of individuals, rather than playing around with man and beast consummating. But given the kind of realm this is, nobody will know what genetics is. When members of a species are born with white fur and blue eyes, they either believe it's a bad omen (because they don't understand why this difference exists) or it gives away a bond of dirty blood (royal bloodlines mixing with common folk) or, an even more ancient belief (adultery).

The other week, I determined that the cause of the massacre that destroyed Chihiro's way of life was nothing short of jealousy. Her mother had several suitors and she picked none of them in favor of someone else entirely. 
Heck, I could build up the fact that Silas, the eventual villain, vowed revenge because her refusal of him was an embarrassment to his entire clan and a blow to his reputation.

Chihiro's father could have been a nomad passing through and came across her mother in a time of need. She opens up to him about her predicament, marrying someone from another clan so they can bring their families together. But none of them feel about humans the way she does. They have been at peace in her region since she came into power and she didn't want to damage that trust. Slowly but surely the two fall in love, she decides she is strong enough to have no need of marriage. "You live your life and we'll continue to live as we have for a number of years." 

The one snag is whether Chihiro's feelings for Lucas are believable. Surely if I take the inter species relationship out of the picture, the idea of man-beast hybrids, members of different races can't fall in love because they obviously cannot reproduce.
But in my weird, twisted universe, I can technically make up whatever the hell I want to fit my situations. 
This could easily be something that can have the story go full circle. Kirakotsu chose love over fulfilling a "duty" to her species. Ultimately Chihiro makes the same choice, choosing to give her life for Lucas, forsaking the duty she'd worked so hard to be ready for... her goal throughout this story should be taking her place as the heir of her mother's people and wanting to be at her absolute best to do that duty to its fullest. Throughout her training and journey with Lucas, a shift starts to happen.
Providing a balance to everything is definitely going to be key here. 

Which just leaves the question of Lucas. Is his parentage similar? Did his father (his pack's alpha) consummate with an omega from another pack? Should his story remain the same it's always been? He and Chihiro developed a bond earlier on because their personal histories have similarities. 
Technically speaking, I guess Lucas could still be a bastard son because he came to be out of wedlock. And his mother, if she isn't human, could have human sympathies the way Chihiro's mother does with the human villages bordering her territory. Their relationship begins with his father's intrigue about human life and why this she-wolf allies herself with them.

All of these are ideas that need to be developed further, but I think I might have a foundation to work with.
The one thing that is for certain is that Chihiro's mother had immense trust and regard for the human race and for them to declare a war that results in an all-out slaughter... such a thing could only have been stirred up by dark magic. Which Silas only had recently perfected his craft in.

That is an important thing for me to bear in mind after all of this goes down. Chihiro's newfound distrust/fear of humans, as a result of this, leads to being caught between a rock and a hard place. Not feeling confident in seeking their help when, at times, they seem willing to offer it. And the hard place, of course, is being outcast by her own kind... which can only escalate from bad to worse. With humans, it'll fluctuate, but an uneasiness will always remain in some small way.