I definitely did not write yesterday, but I did. You may recall my post about the loooong scene I wrote; you know, the one that has little bearing on the story, yet it went on and on. Well, yesterday in the shower I figured out how to writes its denouement (and frankly, how to dump three characters ~ no, I didn't kill them off), so I pulled up my manuscript and typed it out before I forgot it.
If you've been reading along, you know that my main character has been sent on a disastrous tour of small clubs by her record label. They hired her two (two!) musicians, and the three of them plus MC's manager set out for the Midwest by car. Every possible thing that could go wrong, did. And by this point MC almost does want to kill these people off; well, two of them. After two hellish days stranded by a snowstorm in Iowa, for a gig that the label forgot to book; after their car sliding off the road, forcing them to walk back to their rented room of horrors; after the lead guitarist winds up in jail, they finally get moving again. But when MC tries to fill up at a truck stop she finds that her credit card has been canceled. And none of the four have any money. She texts her cousin and begs him to Venmo her a small loan. On her way out of the restroom she almost tips over a Greyhound Bus sign, and now that she's got money in hand, she makes an impulsive decision. She buys two bus tickets to Nashville, hands them to the two offenders and thanks them for "their service".
Now it's only MC and her drummer, but when she assures him they can play an acoustic set at their next venue, he hesitates. Though he can't bring himself to say it, he's had enough. MC gets it. She can't blame him; she'd quit, too, if she had the option. Trouble is, she now has very little money left to offer him. The drummer says he can hitch a ride with one of the many truckers parked in the lot, but that seems pretty cold, considering he was the only one of the group who held things together. So MC feigns a miscount of her cash, tells him she's got plenty left after all, and gives him bus ticket money.
Now all three are gone, and MC has exactly fifty dollars left to her name. What is she going to do next? Having enough gas to get to the venue is not a problem, but moving on from there will definitely be one. I'm fairly certain she's going to drive right past that club, but she has two choices ~ scamper back to her hometown where her mother and cousin are, or take a detour to her adopted hometown of Chance.
Chance is more ripe with possibilities, whereas back home she'll essentially be hiding out in her childhood bedroom, dodging frantic calls from her record label. (Well, she'll be doing that either way.) I'm leaning toward Chance, though (or because?) she's left a lot of fractured relationships there. Maybe she just wants to see the town one more time, to confirm that her decision to take the record label's offer was the right decision, but once she's there, she won't have the money to leave, so then what? Plus, she no longer actually believes she made the right decision, not after all the terrible things that have happened. She really doesn't know what she believes. Part of me says you can't ever go home again (the realistic part of me), but another part asks, what happens if you do?
Even if she somehow stays in Chance, at least until she clears her head, there are going to be some pretty angry and/or worried people searching for her. By breaching her contract, she knows the label will sue. She also knows that she'll be dissolving any shred of self-respect she's managed to achieve. Does someone talk her into returning to Nashville? Do her former friends in Chance begrudgingly welcome her back? Which pull is stronger?
Somehow, with this unintentionally exhaustive scene I spent days writing, I led myself to a logical next step. I can't explain how that happened. I was beginning to wonder if that scene would ever end; if I could manage to fight my way out of it. Weird things sometimes happen in writing.
I don't know how things will play out ~ all the more fun for me! But I think I just might have stumbled upon something.
No comments:
Post a Comment