Things got a little slow tonight working on NaNo, so I decided to try a little “conflict” exercise.\u00a0 Too often, I avoid conflict at all costs, and it weakens my fiction.\u00a0 Tonight, I made up two characters on the fly who were told to remain on the couch by their author while she went to work.\u00a0 They decided to show their author just how much conflict they could cause without ever leaving the couch.\u00a0 Here’s what’s come out so far (disclaimer — first draft material not even re-read for typos or anything).\u00a0 I think you can see the direction it’s taking:<\/p>\n
“Shari, why do we just sit around her gabbing all the time and never doing anything?”
\nShari picked up her coffee cup and threw it across the room, “That’s easy, Wanda.\u00a0 We have a wimpy writer who is afraid if she lets us get up and move around that we’ll engage in conflict, and she hates conflict at all costs.”
\nWanda raised her eyebrows in devilish delight, “Is that so?”\u00a0 She picked up the fork beside her plate, and gauging it carefully, sent it soaring toward the ceiling. “Yup.\u00a0 I can still stick ’em in the ceiling with the best of ’em.\u00a0 Remember that time our senior year when I spelled out “Seniors Rule” in the cafeteria ceiling that day at lunch?”
\n“I do.\u00a0 And nobody ratted out on you either.”
\nWanda grinned, “That was the amazing part.”
\nShari slid open the end table drawer and pulled out a small tube of something. “Watch this!”\u00a0 She removed the cap from the tube, lifted table legs, and spread a small amount of the substance before pressing down on the table.”
\n“Oh!\u00a0 Super Glue!\u00a0 Gimme!”\u00a0 Wanda was all over this prank.\u00a0 The book on her end table was quickly stuck to the table top, and she was looking around for something else within reach.”
\nShari cautioned, “Don’t forget, we can’t leave the sofa.\u00a0 It might cause conflict.”
\n“Ohhh.\u00a0 We can’t have conflict!\u00a0 Not in this innocent little missive.”
\nWanda placed her index finger on her chin, thinking, “Mild-mannered Shari and Wanda, sharing a coffee and some snacks.\u00a0 What could possibly go wrong?”
\nShari began whistling an off-key tune that didn’t resemble anything anyone had ever heard before, repeating, “What could possibly go wrong?\u00a0 Oh, dear.”\u00a0 She picked up the table lamp and heaved it toward the glass picture window.\u00a0 “Take that, Dear Author! Figure out how that happened at your unassuming little afternoon tea party.”
\nWanda brightened, “Did you say, ‘party?'”
\nShari giggled, “I did!”
\n“Now, why didn’t I think of that.”\u00a0 Wanda whipped out her smart phone and composed a quick text, sending it to nearly everyone in her address book. Glancing at Shari, she said, “We won’t have to set foot off these couches.\u00a0 Our party is on it’s way. ”
\n“But Dear Author locked the door when she left this morning.”
\n“Shari, Shari, Shari.” Wanda pointed at the hole in the plate glass window.\u00a0 “They can come in there.”
\n“Through the window?\u00a0 That’s ingenious.\u00a0 They’ll need something to protect them from the glass as they climb in.” Shari began to search the room for something suitable.\u00a0 She pointed, “There.\u00a0 That afghan should help, once they clear the debris away.”
\n“Oh, yes,” Wanda agreed, “Dear Author’s favorite aunt made that for her.”
\n“Before she passed away last year,” Shari amended.
\n“Even better.\u00a0 How do we get it to where they can reach it when they arrive?”
\n“You know, technically, only one person needs to climb though the window.” Shari said, “Dear Author didn’t use the deadbolt today before she left.”
\n“Her loss,” Wanda was distracted as she gauged whether a couch cushion could be thrown with enough force to go through the broken plate glass window.\u00a0 As she was preparing to hurl it, the doorbell rang.\u00a0 She doublechecked to make sure nobody was in front of the window, and let the cushion fly.\u00a0 It crashed through the glass, landing on the hedge outside the window.
\nAlex poked his head in the window,\u00a0 “Some people just answer the door.”
\n“We can’t, it’s locked, and we have to stay on the couch.” Shari called out.
\nWanda said, “Yeah, climb through the window and unlock to door.\u00a0 Bob should be here any minute now.”
\nAlex eyed the window, gauging the safety factors involved.\u00a0 Picking up the couch cushion, he put the side with glass embedded in it onto the window sill, jumped up, and rolled over the sill into the living room, nicking his elbow in the process.\u00a0 Clasping his hand to his elbow, he stood up and walked to the door to unlock it and pull it open allowing Bob, who’d just walked up with the barbeque to enter.\u00a0 Alex wandered off to the kitchen to treat his bleeding elbow.\u00a0 Bob tossed the barbecue onto the coffee table, saying, “You said there was a party?”
\nCindy poked her head inside the door, “Hey, is this where the party is?”
\nShari shouted, “Yeah, come on in. Bring your stuff and set it up.”
\n“Well, that’s easy!\u00a0 I brought the candy.” Cindy headed to the kitchen to get some bowls out of the cupboard and proceeded to place several bowls of candy around the house for party goers to grab at their leisure.”
\nShari checked her phone, “Doug should be here any second,”
\n“What’s he bringing?” Wanda asked.
\n“Donuts, of course.”
\n“Naturally.\u00a0 What about Erica? Edam cheese?”
\n“Oh, Wanda, you’re so silly.\u00a0 Erica brings the Everclear.”
\n“Of course.” Wanda slapped her forehead, “That’s sure to ratchet up the conflict.”
\nAlex poked his head back in the room, “Hey, Feliz called.\u00a0 He can’t bring the French Fries this time.\u00a0 He’s bringing the firearms instead.”
\nShari looked and Wanda.\u00a0 Wanda looked back at Shari before saying, “Uh, do we want that much conflict?”
\nShari shook her head, “No.” She began furiously texting, then punched the button to call Feliz.\u00a0 Impatiently, she waited for him to answer before shouting, “No, Feliz.\u00a0 No firearms.\u00a0 If you can’t bring French fries for the barbecue, just bring Fritos.”\u00a0 She paused.\u00a0 “Yes.\u00a0 Fritos.”\u00a0 She waited again before emphatically stating, “No.\u00a0 Absolutely no firearms.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Things got a little slow tonight working on NaNo, so I decided to try a little “conflict” exercise.\u00a0 Too often, I avoid conflict at all costs, and it weakens my fiction.\u00a0 Tonight, I made up two characters on the fly who were told to remain on the couch by their …<\/span> Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[60,4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6800","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-nano2013","category-writing"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jeanschara.com\/pmtoo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6800","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jeanschara.com\/pmtoo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jeanschara.com\/pmtoo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jeanschara.com\/pmtoo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jeanschara.com\/pmtoo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6800"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/jeanschara.com\/pmtoo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6800\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jeanschara.com\/pmtoo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6800"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jeanschara.com\/pmtoo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6800"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jeanschara.com\/pmtoo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6800"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}