Since I’m in a note-making phase right now, I don’t really have a work-in-progress from which to clip. I remembered notes to a story I had, and a scene I had written and thought I would work well for a snippet this week. But wouldn’t you know, if I ever actually wrote it (and I really think I did), it’s lost. This would have been at least 4 years ago, I guess, and it’s possible even that it was written longhand and never made it onto whatever computer I was using then. So I was bummed. But I had nothing else for this week and really needed something for the launch of WIP Clip Wednesdays, and the idea was firmly set that this was this week’s clip. So I decided to just write it out. And wouldn’t you know it, as soon as I started to write it I realized that I didn’t remember it as well as I thought. But at least it’s done.
Ok, so what’s it about? This is a flashback scene from very early on in the story. Basically a woman is rescued from a mugging by a homeless man. He’s injured in the struggle, so she, not thinking very clearly, takes him to her home. They guy is, in a FANTASTIC leap of faith in the workings of Fate, her high school lover, but he is so changed that she doesn’t recognize him. He has his own mental health problems and doesn’t really react to seeing her again either. Until she starts crying and he says, “Come on, Jayce. Don’t cry,” which sparks this following flashback for both of them of when they were like 12 or 13 or so.
[Copyright, common decency, don't steal, don't copy, don't post, links only, yadda yadda, thanks a bunch]
“Aw, come on, Jayce. Don’t cry.”
“Just go away.”
“What’s the matter?”
“I don’t want to talk about it.”
Ben stuffed his hands in his pockets and rocked on his heels. He didn’t know what to do. Plenty of times, Jayce had come to the tree-house and found him crying. It was almost like she knew when to come, and she always knew what to do. But now it seemed like everything was different. Everything just…felt strange, and Ben didn’t know if he was supposed to go sit next to her or just leave her alone or what. He sort of wanted to leave, but he really wanted to know what she was crying about.
“You should just tell me. I always tell you stuff.”
Jayce wiped her eyes on her sleeve and took a deep breath, but she still rested her head on her forearms. He couldn’t see her face and he could barely hear her muffled voice when she answered, “Paul Kennedy asked Sarah.”
Ben waited a beat, thinking there must be more, but there wasn’t.
“What, to the dance? So what? You don’t like Paul anyway.” You don’t, right?
“No. But she was the last one of my friends besides me who didn’t get asked.”
“Oh. Well, you could-”
“That’s not all of it,” Jayce interrupted, burying her face even deeper in her crossed arms. “I totally shouldn’t even tell you this.”
“You tell me everything.”
She looked up then, with her red-rimmed, blue eyes bright with tears. “Yeah, I do.”
“So? Spill.”
She looked at him for another moment, catching her lower lip in her teeth as she studied him. Ben felt his stomach flutter nervously, wondering what it was that had really caused all this drama.
“It happened at lunch. Paul came over and just, like, asked her. In front of all of us. Sarah said yes, and then Paul went back to his table, right? Well, Sarah was all happy, but Carrie could see that I felt kinda bad, you know, so she gets up and walks over to Derrick’s table. And I didn’t think anything of it. She sits down and talks to him for a few minutes, gets up, comes back. You know what she did?”
Jayce and her stories. Everything’s got to be a story. “Um, no.”
“She asked Derrick why no one asked me to the dance.”
“Nuh-uh.”
“Yeah she did. Like the humiliation of just not getting asked wasn’t enough. Carrie is so clueless, I swear.”
“So what did Derrick say?”
Jayce dropped her eyes from his in a way that made Ben nervous all over again. “He said…He-” She hid her face again. “You should just ask him what he said.”
He couldn’t help the frustrated noise he made. Jayce had been his best friend for as long as he could remember. But sometimes she drove him nuts.
“If he made you cry, I’m going to have to kick his ass first and ask questions later, so you’d better tell me why I’m doing it first.”
She took a very deep breath and her next words came out in a muffled rush. “He said no one asked me to the dance because I’m your girl.”
It knocked Ben back a step, and in the little space that was their tree-house, that brought him up against the wall. He leaned back.
“Oh.”
“Yeah. Oh.”
They were both quiet. What the heck was he supposed to do now? Offer to go tell all the guys in school that it wasn’t true? Try to get one of his friends to ask her to the dance? That seemed like a bad idea in more ways than he was ready to think about. It was like he knew what he needed to ask, but the words were stuck in his throat by the same thing that was making his face so hot. Just spit it out. Don’t think about it, just do it and get it over with.
“Are you my girl, Jayce?”
“Am I?”
That is so Jayce, to answer a question with a question. Ben crossed his arms over his chest so he wouldn’t pull his own hair or something dumb like that.
“Do you want to go to the dance with me or not?”
“Yes.”
“You do?”
“Yes.”
“Fine.”
“Okay.”
“I gotta go.” He was halfway down the ladder before he took a few steps back up to poke his head back up through the opening. “You okay now?”
“Uh-huh.”
Ben climbed down the ladder and headed off through the woods toward his house. When he realized he was grinning ridiculously, he tried to stop, just in case he ran into somebody. But it kept coming back. He was going to the dance with Jayce.
Because Jayce was his girl.
So this isn’t what I’m working on right now, and I don’t know what this story is or is going to be. You may feel free to offer critique if you like, though. Don’t forget to sign the Linky box so I can find your romance WIP clip.
Ah junior high…when. What am I saying? I remember feeling this way all the way through college! Nicely done. Of course now I would like to see what happens AFTER the flashback…
This is really charming. You’ve got such nice little character details!
Definitely got my interest! I’d love to see you write the rest of this story some day. Already I like the characters.
Thanks guys. Sadly what I have realized through writing this is that this is still the way I talk.