Grinding into life

I eked out about 500 words yesterday, amid the slow grind of mental machinery firing up again. It seemed best to start writing down the fresh scenes that are bouncing around whole in my head, regardless of where they belong in the tale, just to get them out and into the world as objects I can mess with. That indicates, I think, a kind of narrative critical mass: I can manufacture certain parts before the overall structure is complete, because I know where those parts are going to be needed. It's a flaky way to build something, but it seems to be working, and the more I do it the more it happens.

Like so:

          So what do you do when the head of the guy who's about to blow you explodes? What's the etiquette? That depends on whether you're alone or not, and I can't tell you what you should do if your incipient face-fuck blows up while you're at a party or in a shared box at the opera. Here, instead, are my recommendations for those who find themselves in this situation, alone.

          First: yell, "Fuck!" It's important to get this right. You can choose another exclamation if you must, but it should be short and punchy, because you're not going to have a lot of time before the red laser dot skitters across the latticework of the gazebo, seeking your skull. Next, hurtle yourself backwards over the railing, just before another ffft! happens and a burst of wood chunks and fibrous splinters erupts from where you were just standing. Make sure you get your landing right. The adrenaline will help some, but if you put a rock into your kidney you're going to spend valuable seconds with red-dimmed vision, staring up into the dark leafy canopy overhead. Then, run. Fast, and away, and try not to think too much about whether you'll feel the bullet puff your head into mist. Trust me, it's distracting.

          Keep running, and don't worry if you run right off the path and into the dark forest. You may surprise a few couples getting down to business behind this bush or that, but you'll be at speed so you won't disturb them for more than a moment or two. Head towards the lights you can see glimmering through the trees, and don't stop until you find something you recognize, like the seventy-foot tall granite obelisk from the reign of Thutmose II that's behind the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

          Pause here. Then remember that there's someone behind you who's trying to kill you, and run off to the right, around the south end of the Met, until you burst onto Fifth Avenue near 79^th and bounce off the hood of a cab. If you've executed all of this with exceptional skill, the cab will be unhired, and you can simply roll around the side, yank open the door, and clamber inside before the driver notices your blood-spattered shirt and jacket.

          To finish it all off with panache, make a quip to the driver so that he'll grin and forget your peculiarity. "The Costume Institute Gala is appallingly dull this year. Drive!"

          So he did. Down Fifth avenue's diode-illuminated length, while I stared at the cab touchscreen's dancing advertisements, my heart throbbing in my chest, pumping tingling blood to my fingertips and the soles of my feet, every inch of me alive, thrumming with keen panic, all thoughts stopped and vanished save one: faster. Faster. Faster.

Now, I just have to keep doing that, bang-bang-bang: build the various components and weave them together, pull the setups in the new first and second chapters through the other eleven chapters I've already written to bring everything in line with the revised narrative, then sail out into uncharted territory once I've reached the end of the current material.

Lotsa fun, if you can stand hours of solitary work with no promise of any reward beyond simply finishing the thing.