#authorwriting

It's just not doing what the writer wanted it to do yet.

Sometimes the scene is good.

The emotion just isn't landing.

Or the pacing is a little off.

Or the character isn't coming across the way they exist in the writer's head.

That's my favorite kind of puzzle to figure out.

New Story: All Rights Reserved to D. M. Brightwell

“Time is a thief,” 

I told him, my eyes filling with tears as the walls I tried so desperately to build, to hold together, came crumbling down in a million pieces. 

“Time is a thief and it has stolen everything from me. I cannot stand it anymore.”

His hands shot out, so gently, grabbing my face like I was as delicate as a blossoming flower in the middle of spring. 

“Time is a prison for me. It has trapped me in a cell made of bars that are stronger than me. It has forced me to watch those I love and care about fade away into dust.”

Tears poured down my face as I looked up at him and into his steel colored eyes which almost seemed to glow as he stared deeply into mine. I have never felt welcome. Never felt I belonged anywhere but, for the first time, it felt as if, in his hands, this was where I was meant to be.

“Time will not steal me away from you,” 

he said gently, quietly, his voice almost trembling. 

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED TO D. M. BRIGHTWELL

Here is another sneak-peak at some manuscript-exclusive details, Frank's tattoos are different than what they were originally 😏

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED TO D. M. BRIGHTWELL

Sometimes I wonder if I’ve made the right choice.

I know I did. I know in my heart and soul that I did but my brain…my brain just plays cruel, unusual tricks on me. Forces me to think about scenarios and things I shouldn’t be thinking about. Forcing me to second-guess my decisions and riddle my blood with regret and guilt and shame. 

He won’t be the only man that will love me. He will be the only man from this point onward that will love me with so little. He will be the last one to treat me like a necessity, like an object, a personal bank, sex doll, personal punching bag. 

And yet my brain, god my brain, is telling me “No. You threw away your only chance at love and now you will truly be alone.” 

And then it turns into a tug-of-war battle between my brain and my heart, in which my heart will say “No, that’s not true. That is not the love we deserve. We deserve more, we deserve better. We didn’t deserve what he did to us.”

“But what if he was your only shot? And you threw it away. You threw it away.”

“No. No, you didn’t. You were protecting us. We deserve someone who will truly love us without there being a price tag on it. You didn’t throw it away.”

“He was the only one who loved us!”

“That wasn’t love!”

My heart runs cold, now. Like ice, cracking under the pressure but so painful to the touch from the piercing cold. Sometimes I wonder if it’s even there. Maybe my burning rage melted it, leaving my chest empty and heartless. Or maybe it's shattered into a million pieces, scattered across my body in every other place but where it is meant to be. I very well could’ve misplaced it too, tucked away on a dusty old shelf, in a place for safe-keeping that I soon forgot where. 

I hope you find some piece of mind in this lifetime.