Daltons part 4

PART ONE: http://thewriteaddictions.blogspot.ca/2013/04/a-daltons-short-story.html

PART TWO: http://thewriteaddictions.blogspot.ca/2013/07/a-daltons-short-story-ctd.html

PART THREE: http://thewriteaddictions.blogspot.ca/2013/07/daltons-part-3.html

Hunter sat in the diner twirling something in his hand as he thought to himself. He really didn't know why he'd done this, taken her ring. It had been some sort of weak and desperate attempt to make sure she had to see him again. Pathetic and if there was one thing Hunter did not consider himself it was pathetic. This girl, he didn't know what it was about her but just thinking about her was driving him crazy, he'd tried to find her when she'd left the bar but she'd vanished so quickly he had been starting to wonder if she'd been real at all. The ring was the only hint that she'd existed, he'd slipped it out of her pocket as she'd pulled away from him. He'd watched her slip it in there as he walked up and somehow, it seemed important, important enough that she'd come back for it, for him.
"Hunter!" the shout pulled him out of his trance as he glanced up to see a couple of his buddies looking at him with expectation "We're supposed to be driving those girls out to that party... like ten minutes ago come on"
"What?" he asked with confusion then he searched his brain, oh right, he'd sweet talked a group of girls a few nights earlier into coming out with them to some beach bash the local radio station was throwing, now those girls were the farthest from his mind, not that they're really occupied it for more than a couple minutes. "oh... yeah just go without me not feeling it now" he stated and they stared at him as though he had just told them he was from another planet.
"I'm sorry, I thought I just heard him say he wasn't feeling going to the beach with a group of hot girls.." his friend said the disbelief obvious in his voice. "Someone better call 911 he's got a concussion or something"
"Shut up" he said with a grin but he was seriously hoping they didn't press it. "Just thought I'd actually give you guys a chance to score this time, you know instead of hogging all the attention"
"and there he is... for the record we do just fine without your help but quick lets go before he changes his mind" they joked and with that were out the door in a matter of seconds. They were right, maybe he had hit his head or something but he couldn't stop thinking about this girl. He'd passed up about twenty opportunities to flirt in the past night alone which for him was insane, he never missed an opportunity to flirt. He didn't do just one girl, he'd never been that guy. He had always been impulsive, resourceful, but monogamous? Never. He'd also never been so blatantly rejected like he had been either. He still didn't get it, she wasn't interested in him? It really wasn't possible, he was tall, good looking, fit, what was there not to like about him? Then she'd kissed him, just grabbed him and kissed him like that with no abandon just to walk away. She had felt something she had to, even if it had just been half of what that kiss had done to him, it was enough for him to pursue. He had never wanted to be different, he'd never had an interest in proving anything to anyone he did his own thing and whoever didn't like it could go screw themselves. That had been before last night, he had never met a girl like her and he wasn't willing to leave her alone without making sure she at least gave him a chance to prove himself.

*****

"What do you mean you lost the ring?" Tristan asked in disbelief into the phone. "You promised me you'd take care of it, that it wouldn't 'get into the wrong hands'!" he ran a hand through his long dark hair frustration and worry obvious on his face. That ring was it, all he had to figure out where his father was and what had happened to him, and this girl who had been lecturing him about taking care of it went and let it slip from her grasp. "Oh well as long as you know who has it, do you happen to have their address too?" he said sarcastically. This was unbelievable. "No of course you don't" he muttered. He just wanted to throw the phone at the wall. He needed to stay calm, he knew that he could just have easily have lost it, or had it taken from him but that would have been his own fault, no one to blame but himself, now he had somewhere to place the blame. "Oh good well as long as your brothers are out looking for it" again sarcasm, he didn't even know her brothers what good was it to him whether or not they were on the case. He'd known this girl for less than twenty four hours and she'd already turned his world upside down. "Where are you? I'm meeting you" he said moving to the door to grab his keys and he stopped. "What do you mean no? This is my ring you're looking for or have you forgotten that?" course he wasn't exactly sure he wasn't to piss her off, his neck still hurt from the counter attack she'd used on him. He gripped the keys tightly in his hand as he fought every fibre in his being to argue with her. "FINE" he stated tossing the keys back down by the door "But I swear to God Miss Dalton if I don't find my father because of this I will be holding you personally responsible" He threatened. 

Dalton's Part 3

PART ONE: http://thewriteaddictions.blogspot.ca/2013/04/a-daltons-short-story.html

PART TWO: http://thewriteaddictions.blogspot.ca/2013/07/a-daltons-short-story-ctd.html

Lia had spent the past hour talking with the guy who had identified himself as Tristan Cromwell. He hadn't run and there had been no need to shoot him. She had listened as he explained the story, his father, a British businessman, had gone missing recently. The only thing that Tristan had found at the scene out of place was that ring. The cops believed his father had just taken off on some sort of vacation but he hadn't heard from his father in weeks, something evidently that was not normal in their relationship. He had not put it on, there was some comfort in knowing that for she knew that placing the ring on your finger was the equivalent of summoning the demon it had been made for into your body. After some convincing and a promise that she would help him find his father, if she could, he had let her hold onto the ring for further study they would meet again in two days and hopefully she'd have something to offer him. She feared this wasn't the only ring to be found, which meant there was something coming for them she didn't even want to think about. Now, sitting at the bar drink in front of her she twirled the golden ring in her right hand as she waited for something to speak to her, some sort of lightbulb to go off in her brain. As she continued to stare at the ring a shadow stepped up beside her blocking the already dim lighting.

"Can I buy you a drink?" a guy interrupted her train of thought
"I'd rather you just gave me the money" she stated slipping the ring into her jacket pocket before lifting her eyes to meet the guy who had spoken to her. She had not been expecting someone so tall. It was made all the more noticeable by the fact that along with his towering height he had the build to match. With dirty blond hair and tanned skin to match it was obvious along with the slight hint of a southern accent that he did not belong in town anymore than she did. He laughed at her surprise to her snarky comment before he signaled the bartender to bring her another drink. Well so much for that theory. 
"You're not from around here" he observed and it was all she could do to roll her eyes at the obvious statement.
"And neither are you" she stated. Perhaps she was being a bit rude but the last thing she needed on her plate right now was some Frat boy fishing for a hook-up and wasting her time, and his.
"I bet I've been here longer, I could show you around after you finish that drink" he offered. God he was transparent, truly and normally she might have flirted a little back but she had other things on her mind and she wasn't about to occupy any of it with him. "Not interested" honestly she just wanted to be alone, she'd been ignoring her brothers calls and so far they hadn't managed to find her, for one night she just wanted a few minutes to herself.
"...wait what?" he seemed genuinely shocked that she'd just turned him down.
"you heard me right, not interested" she repeated. 
"Why? You have a boyfriend or something?" he asked
"No, you're just not my type" not that she had any idea who, or what her type really was she just knew it wasn't the guy standing beside her.
"I'm everyone's type.." the hesitation in his voice was almost humorous, she could hear the fact that he sincerely thought he was hot stuff and a little confused at the idea that someone might not think the same.
"Well that's not conceited at all" She said sarcastically "And you're not mine, sorry I don't know what to tell you" she said turned her attention away again. There was nothing more to it, she simply wasn't interested and a honestly a little busy at the moment. As a silence fell she thought he'd walked away but a few seconds later she heard the voice again. 
"Come on... you can't be serious. Lets go out I'll pick you up here tomorrow" he offered and it was her turn to be confused. Was he being serious? 
"What don't you understand about not interested?" she asked and focused her green eyes again on the guy for the second time. He was, she supposed, attractive enough but she could tell he thought so too and that was enough to turn her off.
"I just think you're lying..." he accused and it actually caused her to laugh. 
"Okay sorry to shatter your reality buddy but there are just some people that don't find you irresistibly attractive okay, and I just happen to be one of them, I'm sure your ego will recover and you'll be fine" she assured him before she stood up to go. He stepped to the side and stopped her and she couldn't help but smile. She wasn't getting threatening vibes from him, just seriously annoying ones, not to mention the fact that she thought about how funny it was that despite his size she knew she could take him down in a few swift motions. She stopped trying to get past him and just stared at him for a moment, wow he was really tall, she noticed the difference more now that she was standing in front of him the top of he head probably only came just above his shoulders and she was slightly taller than average.
"Just one date, what harm can that do?" he asked suddenly more determined than ever.
"With you? I feel like a lot more than I'm willing to risk" she said not that she meant it. "You don't even know my name" she pointed out, or how old she was for that matter, anything about her other than what she looked like and that she was definitely not interested in him. 
"Fine what's your name?" he asked
"None of your business" she responded still smiling moving to step past him again. For some reason this was a lot more fun than she had ever thought it could be. He moved in front of her again and she sighed.
"I'm Hunter" he offered and she nearly laughed again. Talk about irony. 
"That's nice" she was determined not to give him her name, not that she thought he could do anything with it.
"Oh come on if you don't give me a name how will I find you again?" he asked with a stupid grin on his face.
"Hopefully you won't" she started and her green eyes were drawn quickly to the door of the bar as she watched her brothers walk in. They were undoubtedly looking for her and she'd been ignoring their calls since she'd left the diner. The last thing she needed to deal with was them catching her talking to some random guy in the bar and them making a big deal out of something that wasn't really an issue. "shit" she muttered and did the first thing she could think of to hide, grabbing the guy by the collar of his shirt she pulled him in and kissed him. Her brothers, skilled hunters as they were would glance right over the sight of a supposed couple making out at the bar and move on. After a few seconds she forgot her reasoning as he kissed her back and for a brief moment she actually allowed herself to get lost in it, her heart was racing  until the snap back to attention pulled her into reality again, this wasn't her and despite how date starved she was, she was not the type of girl to hook up at the bar. She pulled away and stared up at him meeting his eyes just for a few seconds, boy were they blue. She was speechless both in the fact that she'd just done that and well, he might have been a little more her type than she had initially thought he was. As he leaned in to kiss her again she moved away. "See..." she started her voice catching slightly as she first spoke "nothing there, oh well we tried right bye" She said and actually managed to slip past him this time and toward the exit.
"Wait-" she heard him start and it was just enough to get her to turn around and look back. 
"It's Lia...by the way" she offered with a smile before she turned and made her way back to her car.


Part 4 Here: http://thewriteaddictions.blogspot.ca/2013/07/daltons-part-4.html

Not so Original, Original idea?

I have this problem where I find there is no such thing as an original idea. Or, if you do have an original idea, as though there is a chip in your mind a few years later someone comes along and you see your idea spread out for all to see. Problem? You didn't get any of the credit it! Writing seems to be a medium where this happens a lot for authors.

I can't even tell you the amount of times this has happened to me and it's starting to become a running joke, to the point where I don't even bother telling people my ideas anymore because on some strange unconscious level there is a paranoia that just speaking it will ensure it's stolen. Serious crazy town set up going on in the mind, but what then do we classify as an original idea? How do we protect our mind from penetration. Not literally of course, after all Inception is not real...right?

As a writer and aspiring novelist my biggest fear is being just another book on the shelf. I have already, once had to completely rework my novel because a TV show emerged baring a frighteningly exact same storyline and character layout more or less. Ironically the story line was, loosely based on a series of books I'd never even heard of let alone read (though strangely enough the show was not much like the show or so I'm told). So, my exciting story became the victim of my frustration as I tore apart the foundations and completely reworked the idea. 

It still had similar basis as far as amount of characters and what they were because that was just a fundamental part of the story I could not, and would not change. It did however turn to work in a surprising idea I had not expected to work out at all and completely turned the direction of my story entirely backward. Though I am inspired and interested by the turn which my story has taken it is proving to be a lot more work in research and back reading. This original idea is not so original in the fact that it is drawing from and alluding to mythology and literary works of Irish pagan culture and folklore. So I have now a possibly original (who really knows at this point stay the hell away from my mind!) idea, filled with inspiration from my heritage and culture.

Is my story then unoriginal? Or is it still original? Where is the line and what defines it and how on earth are we supposed to create an original idea in a work full of creative minds and centuries of published ideas and stories. At what point as we drawing literary allusion and just plain old copying?

A Dalton's Short Story ctd...

A continuation of the first part of my short story about the Dalton Family.  Part 1 can be found here http://thewriteaddictions.blogspot.ca/2013/04/a-daltons-short-story.html

There was nothing quite like celebratory burgers with her brothers, especially when she was vegetarian. Finding a half decent veggie burger in any place was hard, but in a rinky dink town like this one, it was next to impossible. The road life made her nutrition choices slightly more difficult than average, most motels didn’t have a place to cook and fast food wasn’t the kindest to vegetarians, not to mention the fact that hunting didn’t exactly pay well, or at all for that matter. Day to day they made it by on their inheritance (which had not been very much and practically extinct) and running successful credit card scams. It wasn’t something she was proud of, but it was how they lived. It was their job to protect people where they couldn’t protect themselves, even if it meant struggling to get by. Sitting there watching her brothers as they scarfed down the meat like wild dogs she wrinkled her nose slightly in disgust. “Alright while you too savagely enjoy yourselves I’m finding a bar” she muttered standing up from the booth and slipping outside before either of them could utter a protest. They had stopped by the motel before eating to wash off the vampire blood. The general public didn’t take kindly to strangers covered in blood, while the motel didn’t seem to be able to tell the difference. She knew that they'd passed a bar on the way and the only thing she'd wanted to do was get a drink. The life was hard for anyone but when you kept losing the people you cared about, it suddenly become that much more difficult to deal with. She knew her brothers hated when she went out alone, deemed her 'prey' for guys and all she could do was roll her eyes at the idea. She was trained to a military grade and beyond with all sorts of tricks up her sleeve to blindside someone, she knew that it was really a lot less about her safety and a lot more fear of her getting a date.  Over protective didn't even begin to describe her big brothers. Over baring or smothering perhaps were better terms. Since had been 8 years old they'd never spent even a day apart, they'd been stuck in the same car, the same room. Privacy was just not a world that entered into the Dalton vocabulary not matter how much she desperately craved it. Twenty-two, she was twenty-two years old and never been on a real date, it was pathetic really but at this point she had accepted that it was just her life. She knew James was in the same boat and it brought her a bit of comfort at least to know she wasn't completely alone. Jake, did not have the same problem, being the oldest he pretty much did what he wanted to do and somehow seemed to find girls around every corner, they didn't seem to be intimidated by his siblings the way the way the guys were of her brothers, he got around so much in fact she wouldn't have been surprised to find they'd left a little Dalton running around somewhere along the way. Double-standard was a word she liked to throw around a lot in his face but it didn't matter how much she fought she still never seemed to find a minute alone except brief moments like this one.

 

 

It was fine, truly she knew dating wasn't really a feasible option for her lifestyle anyway. She was never in one place long enough and she risked her life every second of the day, dragging someone else through that was just unrealistic and cruel, something Jake apparently didn't seem to care about, not that she would exactly call what he did dating. Moving quickly through the street she kicked her worn cowboy boot at something shiny on the ground before she stopped suddenly and stared at it for a moment. At first glance she'd thought it was nothing but a quarter on the ground but as she looked closer she realized it was a ring, a very distinctive one at that. The intricate designs on the band clicked something in her memory. The words were in Latin Tenebris resurrexerit Darkness Resurrected and she felt her throat begin to tighten as the memories started to flow. Tenebris resurrexerit, she had studied it, the saying of a demonic secret society that relished in creating whole communities of demons, controlling the outcomes of society through powerful leaders. The Fratres Mortis, brothers of death, were infamous but they were long thought to be extinct. Throughout history theory and speculation fluttered around the great and vicious rulers, all under the control of demonic possession and no one any wiser than the next. As she reached for it a voice suddenly stopped her.

 

"Touch that only if you have a death wish" the voice came from the Alley to her left and she moved to her feet again quickly just in time to counter an attack. He made the mistake of grabbing her arm which only gave her the advantage. She flipped herself around and bent to swing her leg behind his knocking him down to the ground. She rested her knee on his chest her arm bent placing pressure on his neck holding him into place.

 

"Don't touch me" she said simply. She didn't like it and her reflexive instincts always kicked into high gear. Her green eyes stared at him intently looking for some tell-tale sign of supernatural but there was nothing. A puzzled look passed through her eyes as she loosened her hold on him just slightly. "You're human..." she said surprise obvious in her voice, she hadn't expected that.

 

"Yeah-" he coughed clearly trying to catch his breath from having been slammed hard on the ground. "But clearly you're not" he said a hint of sarcasm in his voice as he spoke and also a hint of an accent, he was British. The accent had caught her off guard for just a moment but she quickly snapped back into hunter most. She pressed her arm down harder on his throat maybe he'd be less of a smart ass if he had even more trouble breathing.

 

"Where did you get that ring?" she demanded, it wasn't just a general possession someone carried around with them, and judging but how easily she'd dominated him she had serious doubts about his status as a hunter, at least a decent one that would know anything about the Fratres Mortis.

 

"Bought it at a thrift shop" he said and she pressed her knee down harder now and watched as he winced. "Okay- Okay lay off will you.... you're a charmer you know that" he added sarcasm still evident but she didn't really care what he thought, she was far more concerned about how he had ended up in possession of something she'd only even seen in old photographs and paintings. As she let her guard down slightly she actually took in the appearance of the guy. He was about her age, maybe a little older but the similarities between them stopped there. His eyes were dark, black nearly and if she couldn't clearly have seen the difference between the pupil and the iris she might have suspected he was possessed his hair, black as night hung long around his face just above his shoulders. His skin was darker, but not like hers her fair skin, even at its best tan was nothing more than a gentle glow, his olive skin suggested a hint of Spanish background, a faint hint perhaps but it was definitely there. "Are you going to let me up or just check me out all night?" he asked and it pulled her attention back quickly.

 

"Don't flatter yourself" she muttered but part of her couldn't deny the fact that she had been slightly checking him out even just a little bit, but the comment had still caught her off guard. "I'll let you up when you answer my question" she added and for a moment they just stared at each other waiting to see if the other would give in, if there was one thing about Amalia Elizabeth Dalton, it was that she almost never, gave in.

 

"Do we have to talk about it here?" he asked "on the ground?" No, she supposed they didn't but letting him up risked the chance that he would grab the ring and run, and a ring like that in the wrong hands was a dangerous artifact.

 

"No, but I'll tell you one thing, if you so much as think of running; I'll shoot you"

Part 3 Here: http://thewriteaddictions.blogspot.ca/2013/07/daltons-part-3.html

A Struggle of Emotion

The creative mind it's not an easy thing to live with. Inside your head are so many different worlds and characters, pain and emotions that don't even belong to you. As an artist you look around you see the hurt the struggles of others and you guilt and worry. You can be overly sensitive to the things around you and its so easy to go over the edge. Look at the correlation between artistic, creative talent and mental illness and the results are astounding. Looking into the history of so many of them you find a coping mechanism of alcohol or substance abuse. So many historically dealing with depression and as you look into the strength and personal drive and struggle it takes to create and immerse yourself another world it's not that surprising. I've found so many studies to have looked into it claiming a correlation, though others have tried to disprove it. One study claimed 71% of famous 20th century writers had alcoholism 71%! That is almost 3/4 of the writing population. That's an insanely high number. It begs the question of what to do about it. To drown out the emotions that drive you is to squash your creative talent all together.

 "Write drunk; edit sober.” - Ernest Hemingway

 Are we really two drastically different people when we write? There is such a difference between the inspiration that drives the creative flow and the person who has to read it over again. Personally when I'm writing and really writing, there's no stopping me until everything in my mind has been placed on the page. It's part of the reason I write in such a chaotic manner. I don't write from beginning to end, I write beginning, end, middle, more middle, end again. I need to get my ideas out while they're still there, still fresh and interesting. To go back and try to remember produces a lesser product. If it means dropping everything to run and write it all down, I do it. I can only write in a chaotic state, if I'm too calm, too distracted analytically nothing will flow, it's the time to read back over my work and find all the flaws I couldn't notice when I was writing.

 "There is nothing to writing. All you do is sit down at a typewriter and bleed." -Ernest Hemingway

 Writing especially fiction would seem as though it's less personal but despite what you've written on the page, real or not allowing others to look at it it is allowing them to look into your soul and experience the emotions  the terror, the fear, the worry that you feel. You're translating it into your characters. Though you may never have literally been hanging on the edge of a cliff for dear life, it's a reference to your emotional state.

 They say to write what you know, and what you know may not be life as an adopted 16 year old witch who holds the power to fall between good and evil...beneath the base of the story is your life, your hopes and dreams, your beliefs and morals. It's all there for the world to see if anyone truly wants to look. Maybe I should stop quoting Hemingway as an example of a great creative mind dealing with the struggle as his didn't exactly end happily ever after. I was reading a book the other day where two writers were having a correspondence that went 'I now know why Hemingway shot himself' which was responded with 'Yeah, because he couldn't drink himself to death fast enough'

 It's not to discredit a horrific end to a beautiful mind, it's to show that the stress of dealing with it is something so many can relate to. Every human being is different, we feel different, love different, hurt differently.  What causes stress for one person may be nothing to another. There are so many factors, personality, age, mental state, upbringing, even genetics. The fragile breaking point is different for everyone.

 “And even if somebody else has it much worse, that doesn't really change the fact that you have what you have. Good and bad.” - Stephen Chbosky The Perks of Being a Wallflower

 To say 'it could be worse' is always true but does that really make it better? When you're feeling so strongly over something, it's true, and life could always be worse but it doesn't make a difference to how you are feeling about yourself, about your life. Thinking of the misfortune of others, having it thrown in your face just adds to it. The upset and pain you feel living in a relatively good life and to have to think, and imagine the pain of someone worse off than you. How do you not feel it, not care. You don't dismiss your own pain, you add to it and you keep adding.

 “It's strange because sometimes, I read a book, and I think I am the people in the book.” - Stephen Chbosky The Perks of Being a Wallflower

 If that is true for a reader, if you can become the book, the character, believe that these things are happening, feel and experience the emotions that have been placed on the page for you, think of those who have sat back and pulled these things from their own minds, their own lives.