novella

Today I inaugurated my senior library carrel. After signing up downstairs, I plunked into the perfect spot - the end of a row, facing the wall, with a window beside it for natural light. I sat, a hidden grin on my face, and slid my folder onto the smooth surface of the desk. Others settled in around me as well all tried to act cool and nonchalant, but I could see the giddy nervousness in their faces. We've all been told about this project from before we ever set foot on campus and here we are in our last semester. Do or die...or graduate.

Pulling out my laptop, I began integrating midnight scrawls into the word file, slowly weaving together a narrative that has been resting on my heart for several months now. I can track it from one desperate night when I needed a story I cared about...a story I wanted to tell.  A class demanded it but soon the story itself demanded to be heard.  Soon I was getting to know the characters through letters and words, sharp emotions and disconcerted yelling matches.

Three months later I have a completely different picture of them and where they are, but the same fears, the same desires, and the same struggles are still running through their lives and every day I learn more about how those same threads run through my own psyche.

An hour and a half and two pages later, I slipped everything back into my bag, wrapped myself in my coat, and walked down the stairs, mentally forming the ritual of the next four months of writing, editing, deleting, and writing again.