 |
| Gregory Norman Bossert |
DONALD
MAASS WRITE TIP #97
In your
story what love is forbidden? Make it more impossible in 3 ways. Then make it
happen.
“So
you say Immortal," Deena said. “I say Undead.”
“That’s….
way different!” Constantine said, and he nodded.
"You
snack from the pumping-iron end of the juice bar.”
“Hah!
That makes you safe. With your craving for lettuce, what have you got that I
could sink my teeth into?”
Wrapping
her arms, along with her cardigan, around her stomach, Deena nodded, much too
slowly, "OK."
"I
crave platelets with my plasma.” Constantine waved his hand in her direction.
Deena
moved her mouth until it formed a crooked kind of smile. Anything else would
take too much effort. “As long as we – both - know.”
Constantine
blinked and stared at her as if she was suddenly unrecognisable. "What did
I say?"
"You
don’t like like me, of course,"
she explained trying to keep her voice from breaking. "I’m such an idiot.
Subtlety is the worst form of defence. You should have just said." She
aimed for sophisticated but crashed somewhere just above pathetic, and then
settled for that. Deena knew her cheeks were a riot of colour that no BB cream
was going to tone down but she was more worried about the clenching in her
stomach that went with the need to be violently sick.
Stumbling
over the tuftless carpet, Constantine moved closer. "You’re sad? No! I
just... Hell. Not that. I... See, Deena, you’re like porcelain.”
"I'm
porcelain?" Deena said looking down at her sizeable curves.
“Too
me– Yes. You’re delicate… fragile."
"Underneath
all this padding, I’m all hard bone and sharp angles. You're the delicate one.
Scream! Argh! No… not the sunlight! You’re all desperate, and craving, and
skulking about in the dark.”
He
froze. “You think I’m a cross between a tick and a rodent?”
“No.
Oh, Great and Immortal Being… Come on, you know how you look."
"How
do you think I look?" He sounded relieved. Smiling, he held his hands so his fingers
hovered over her arms as if something there already reached him.
She
sighed. "As monsters go, you’re fairly passable."
“No--You
think I’m hot.”
Deena tried to keep her lips resolutely closed. Hot just did not do him justice. "Cold. And not human either." Perfectly so. It was
undeadly unfair.
"No?"
he asked, but he was smiling so wide his teeth glinted in glow of the
downlighter.
"You
did that deliberately didn’t you?"
He
shook his head.
"You’re
a freak," Deena said uncrossing her arms.
“Yeah,”
he said, “but, you love me anyway.”
IS THERE A DEFECT THAT WOULD MAKE A CHARACTER IMPOSSIBLE TO LOVE?
Hmm. good question- I guess there could be based on perception.
ReplyDeleteYes, everything depends on your perception- and to recognise the difference between need and desire.
DeleteBased on many teenage girls of my acquaintance, being a vampire is a requirement for love.
ReplyDeleteI'd say make the guy covered in oozing pusstuals. That's pretty revolting. Ron Weasley barfing slugs -- yep, how could Hermione kiss that mouth?
Sorry -- I'm a little punchy this afternoon. It's been a long week.
Hi Erin
DeleteI think I could make a good case of oozing puss boy being loveable - the barfing slugs never held Ron back in the romance department ;)