#sunkate

austen’s manuscript is decent, sun decides, and’ll probably bring in some decent cash for the daddy-issues crowd. (can she call it a crowd if she’s part of the demographic?) but she’s being paid to fix it, so she can criticize it, which is such a relief, because the word choice here is so damned cliché.

she never sees austen’s face, for the first month or so-- sun is busy travelling, busy with personal matters, kate is busy, well, sun doesn’t know-- writing more, maybe? dating? austen has a lovely voice, succinct in her word choices out-loud.

monday is where they’re meeting, at some small coffee shop in la that one of sun’s friends, sun forgets which one, never shuts up about. 

and austen looks-- disheveled isn’t the right word, austen looks like a hot mess. sun’s business-casual-- neat blouse and a skirt, she considered wearing a blazer. kate is wearing cargo pants, and clearly hasn’t brushed her hair in a few days, but she still exudes an energy that sun envies-- she’s resilient, it’s in her everything.

“i have notes,” says sun.“can i order, first?”“i can pay,” says sun, instinctively.“it’s no big--”“i’m going to spend the rest of this meeting being mean to you, you deserve some kindness as well.”kate laughs, relaxes her already-bad posture, “i’ll have a cappuccino, then,” she says.“sure.”

“so,” says kate, “can you give me the good parts first?”“the plot’s decent and the characters are charming and relatable. you have a consistent voice, and your prose is lovely.”“sweet of you.”“the plot is also a little... disorganized.”“how?”“you need to keep continuity in mind.”

kate contests each of her points, one by one, usually with some variant of “that’s the point,” or “you don’t see what i’m going for,” and with one point, a yelled “you don’t know me!”

which is cute, sun thinks, in a strange way. sun doesn’t have a type, she doesn’t think, but if she did, it would probably be kate’s-- loud and strong, confident and effortlessly charming.

oh, well.