you sleep, and eat, and sleep again

looking for a woman to court and spark

Sat, 11 Nov 2006 03:01:58 GMT

((THIS IS NOT AN UPDATE))

It would seem that I have been accused of idea theft, and I'm terribly sorry to anyone who might think I would actually do that.

Suffice to say, I came up with this idea several days before Nano started, I plotted the entire story out, and have been writing according to my own plot, not anyone elses. Any similarities to anyone else's nano are entirely unintentional; causes for friending people who have similar plots include the fact that I adore their writing and wanted to see how their own idea differed from mine.

Also I admit that I wanted to know (if they read this) what they thought of my nano.

But there was no idea theft involved, and all similarities were/are happenstance and not by my own design.

There are many people nano-ing out there; some ideas were bound to be similar. I'm sorry that this particular one was seen as something very akin to plagiarism. (People who know me know that, though I do sometimes like taking the easy way out of things, taking ideas for writing specifically from someone else's work is something I would NEVER, could NEVER do. It would bother me ceaselessly, and I don't think I could even start reading anything with the intention of using it as my own.)

and it breaks my heart, breaks my heart

Wed, 08 Nov 2006 01:28:42 GMT

Untitled novel; projected wordcount: 50K, projected chapters: ten, plus prologue and epilogue. Projected plot: absent. About: fandom, girl obsessed with.

chapter one: shipping Bentley

Bentley Rogers, Lissa thinks, huddling over her Notebook Of Doom just so, so that the bitten ends of her rather messy curls brushed against her paper. Bentley Rogers, what can I write about you? She makes a careful note in the NOD (so carefully decorated with an appropriate Notebook Of Doom sticker, made especially for her, by a random person from the internet she never met in Real Life and only knew through fandom), then sticks the end of her somewhat desecrated mechanical pencil in the corner of her mouth.

She chews the eraser. Bentley Rogers, why are you so completely difficult?

The bell rings, and she flips the hair out of her face. She glances furtively about the room; when she notices that no-one is watching her, she shuts the NOD quickly.

It slams closed a little, and the people around her jump. Charleene Thomas looks like she's about to whine at Lissa again, so Lissa shoots off an apologetic 'sorry-didn't-mean-to' look, and twists her hair out of her face with her pencil.

The teacher comes in. Bentley Rogers and Mr. Tucker? she muses, then discards the thought. Bentley/Tucker is one of the more disturbing things she's considered in the last forever... Mr. Tucker has hair that comes out of his ears! Not that that's disturbing, no, she could slash him with Mr. Linny, anytime (squicky, but bearable, and it would make the best crackfic! Either that, or horror. She hasn't decided which yet) . It's just, Bentley doesn't work with Mr. Tucker.

Bentley doesn't work with a lot of people.

She considers making him the asexual uber-villian (or tragic innocent, perhaps) in her next High School: Real Life or Tragic Error? fic, but Bentley doesn't strike her as asexual, either.

She wonders if she should make him a girl!Bentley (like she used to make Blaise girl!Blaise) and ship him with someone. But no, she can't really envision girl!Bentley. She could write him as a her (she prides herself on being able to write anything, any pairing whatsoever, but she prefers to find the most ideal pairings in everyday life (even if they're crossovers! Bentley/Dr. Spock might... not work, never mind) and make them work), but she'd really rather not. Not Bentley...

The girl in front of her, Chauncey, passes back a stack of papers. She makes her trademark Eyebrow Of Disbelief face at it, then takes one and passes the rest back.

It's a pop quiz. Or, at least she thinks it's pop. One can never be too sure, not with quizzes... or Mr. Tucker, He's sneaky enough to mention a quiz just when she's not listening. (Perhaps she should write a fic based on that? Something about a teacher who has a sixth sense about when people are and aren't paying attention to him, a teacher who only says important things when he knows that the minimum number of students is listening. That could possibly be a lot like Mr. Tucker. Could it include Bentley...?

no, that would ruin it.)

She sneaks a look at Mr Tucker. He's droning on about something or another - answering the questions, dadada, not cheating, dadada...

She glances at the quiz. It's nigh on impossible, and of course she knows every answer. She may not have read the chapter, may not have studied for it, but she did write about some of the stuff in a fic.

Lissa always remembers her fics.

Once she's done with her quiz (Mr. Tucker seems a little surprised, a little disappointed that she's finished so quickly - she suspects a Grand Scheme or Plot or something on his part. An evil teacher, designing to take down the school from the inside! Take down the school in a way the students wouldn't like...), she drops it in the turn-in basket, then sneaks a peek at her peers.

Most of them are industriously taking the quiz. One or two others have finished, but they're on the other side of the room.

It's safe.

She takes her Notebook Of Doom out, opens it a crack. When no-one screams or makes a sudden movement or asks her to please put that away already, she smiles happily and pulls her writing pencil out of her hair, which tumbles down from the loose knot she had it in and covers her page.

No-one can read what she's writing now.

Which is good, because all her notes on this particular page are about how incredibly difficult Bentley is to ship.

She considers that Bentley may just be fated to genfic. It's somewhat disappointing, really, but not entirely unexpected.

After class, once the NOD is safely stowed away in her bag, Daniel taps her on her shoulder. She looks up and smiles at him.

"Liss, do you think you did well on that exam?"

Oh. It was an exam, not a pop quiz. Funny how things work out. "Yes, I do believe I excelled in answering those queries about our retainance skills. I wrote a fic called Simone d'Lancy once. It was a cross between a song and Simone deBeauvoir. It covered most of this."

Daniel laughs. "Lissy, you're crazy."

She smiles back at him, attempts to look half-crazed and wholly dangerous. "Howso?"

"You use so many big words at the most random times! It's funny. And you and your fandom..."

Lissa winks at him. "It all adds to my air of mystery, Danny boy. You know how I do so love my air of mystery."

He snorts. "Air, schmair. Whatever. It doesn't matter. Yes, Melissa, you are very mysterious. And frightening. Notebook of Doom, whatever will you think of next?"

"It's the Notebook Of Doom," she corrects him. "You didn't capitalize the oh in Of when you said it."

"And how would you know that?"

She smirks. "I'm just a genius." and he knocks his hip against hers. "Mac'n'Fleas for lunch, or did you sack-pack it?"

During lunch, of course, he has to remind her to finish her sandwich. She, of course, forgot all about it after opening the NOD and taking down her pencil.

"You know, you should really get a hair tie for that before you suffocate someone with it," someone says, and she looks around but doesn't see anyone who might say that.

She shrugs at whoever-it-was. "I like my pencil. Just don't stand around my hair when it comes down!"

The person doesn't answer, and she has the sudden terrible thought that she might've been remembering a section of fic, but also forgotten what the fic was. She starts, then sighs and relaxes back. She can go through her logs and bookmarks and saved excerpts and pages and pages of quotes (with links, of course) once she gets home.

No sweat.

But when she gets home, she searches for three hours and can't find any fic it might be related to. Sighing, she turns to her homework, finishes it as quickly as possible (six-page essay on the effects of pop culture in any aspect on teens, no issues there, she can just use fandom!), then takes out the NOD again.

Her Notebook of Doom has been her Notebook of Doom for exactly thirteen days (she runs through them--with different names, of course!-- every twenty days at the most), and it's already beginning to gain the less-comfortable feeling her NODs et al get as she finishes with them. (Her 'less-comfortable' feelings mean that she doesn't sleep with them under her pillow anymore, rather, on her nightstand.) This uncomfortable feeing is, ultimately, a good thing, as it parks her to write more, and more carefully.

Her fic tend to turn out better in the last five days of notebook life. Her NOD is no exception, and she suspects that she's only got a few more days left to it.

The thought both cheers her and makes her wince. She loves getting new notebooks, (yes, for they're like new books, new fandoms, gift!fics), but then again, she has to get used to them, has to come up with a new name for them...

She loves her Notebook Of Doom, loves the title (best yet!), and she always has trouble coming up with names (better names!) for her new notebooks.

She logs onto livejournal, posts a general query:

Hey, friends- list! Guess what? Second post in six days that isn't directly related to fic or meta or whatnot!

Just popping by to say, the NOD (that would be my Notebook Of Doom, remember?) has a rapidly decreasing life expectancy. (Yes, so soon! hahaha)

My life has been sooooo totally hectic! I had this huge test today (though I thought it was a pop quiz at first, LOL). So, of course, I've been writing more than ever! (haha, you know me!)

Unfortunately my quickened pace leaves me without an idea for a name for my next notebook.

The Notebook Of Doom has been my favorite so far... and now, I'm totally lost on what I could use next.

So! I come to you all, my most wonderful f-list

What sort of name should I have for my next notebook? If I pick your name, I'll get you something, I promise..

A fic or virtual gift or something, I'd imagine...

Thanks!

&hearts;, Liss

Comments start popping up within five minutes.

Daniel, of course, is the first to comment:
dandaman:
don't.

Lissa ignores it - Daniel is just being Daniel. (She pings him. They chat. They ignore the 'don't')

Within an hour, Lissa has thirteen comments. (She isn't terribly wowed by any of them)

But then there comes the fourteenth comment.

line_the_walk
Hey, I don't think you know me? I was just browsing journals and comms and stumbled across this...

I've sort of browsed through your entries-- you seem like a really cool person!

How about calling it The Thousandth Last Word? I dunno, the name just kinda sounds cool to me, but I don't really know you, so I don't know if you'll like it.

Anyways, you sound pretty cool- mind if I friend you?

At first, Melissa thinks, Oh, that's kind of dumb, and presses the 'leave comment' button but doesn't type anything.

But as she's putting a frozen pizza in the oven (cheese, but she's added green peppers and cilantro), she thinks back to it, and realizes that it actually sounds like a really good name. Notebook Of Doom is great - funny, and fitting, and makes her feel like she's some sort of superspy. But The Thousandth Last Word would be perfect for a more serious period of writing, perhaps some romance or just focus on her part.

If nothing else, she can give the title some uber-crack connotations, if it doesn't work out.

She shoves the pizza into the oven, briefly - briefly! checks to make sure the oven is on and functioning, then runs back to her computer

passably
omgsquee! That is like, the most perfect name! Thank you, thank you, thank you, line_the_walk! And yes, of course you may friend me, I hope you don't mind if I friend you back?

She waits, but line_the_walk doesn't reply, so she opens up another Update Journal page:

Why is Bentley so goddamned hard to ship?

She shuts off the computer, turns to her NOD, opens it. She reaches into her hair for her pencil, but it isn't in her hair, her hair isn't in her knot, the bitten ends are brushing against her again.

Sigh.

She reaches into her bag for another pencil, then thinks otherwise. Perhaps it's time to craft a little poll?

She turns her computer on again.

it's all relative, anyways

Tue, 07 Nov 2006 04:14:37 GMT

Untitled novel; projected wordcount: 50K, projected chapters: ten, plus prologue and epilogue. Projected plot: absent. About: fandom, girl obsessed with.

prologue: once upon a time is relative. (so is happily ever after)

Melissa Fowler always knew that she had a hold on everything. Everything. No doubt.

She knew that she could maintain her grades (somewhere around a 90% in each class, except for an 85% in Art History and a 98% in English, but those were to be expected) quite well, and she knew that her social calender was completely full. Daniel was quite enough of 'social', thank you, and anything lacking in Real Life was more than made up for on the Internet.

So what if she looked somewhat washed out? She knew the ins and outs of fandom. If someone were to go up to her and ask her which fic was the best in whichever fandom and whichever pairing, she had an answer. No exceptions. So what if she had a low participation score in most of her classes because she was asked questions while focusing on what was going to happen next in whichever fic she was writing? She knew how to write the fic.

Lissa wasn't obsessed with fandom. Not by any stretch of the imagination. She simply enjoyed spending every waking moment concentrating on it. Anyways, the dictionary definition of 'obsession' was Compulsive preoccupation with a fixed idea or an unwanted feeling or emotion, often accompanied by symptoms of anxiety. And her behaviors weren't at all unwanted.

Anyways, it wasn't like she spent every waking minute concentrating on the various (and many!) fandoms she prescribed to. She also spent time contemplating the fandom that was Everyday Life. This person could go well with that person, and then she'd write their fic.

It was a simple formula: create pairing, come up with an issue, write 2000-word fic (thirty minutes). Think of title (three hours). Post fic on appropriate site, or just email it to Daniel. Even if the fandom was from a fairy tale, she would never, ever use 'once upon a time', and even if it ended with trumpets and the Great Lovers riding off into the distance on a noble steed and with absolutely no trouble following them, she would never end it 'happily ever after'. And she always professed, if anyone were to write her life as fanfiction, she wouldn't stand for 'once upon a time' or 'happily ever after' blatantly stated, at all.

It would have to be in the subtext.

Anyways, she never considered that there'd be any reason to write her life as a fanfic. She didn't see the interest, and since she saw the interest in everything else, she didn't see that anyone else could see the interest.

Which was why she was so surprised when she ran into the whole snafu...

###

Once upon a time, Melissa Fowler had an OTF, which is like an OTP (One True Pairing), only with a fandom instead of a pairing.

She didn't usually have a habit of having OTFs (she was equal opportunities!), except for maybe Real High School, but she had, for some reason, made an exception for the month and decided to explore all the facets of the Harry Potter fandom (and maybe a little Baby Sitters Club, but not that much... and perhaps some CSI... some Naruto... and Prince of Tennis, and Lord of the Rings, but mostly Harry Potter). She hadn't been in more than one RP for awhile (X Men), so she joined a flurry of Harry Potter RPs, sucuumbed to several fic contests, and settled in.

Of course, she didn't realize that having an OTF would make it easier on other people to figure out her intrests...