Reflections

Reflections

AJ Mullican

There it was. The mirror that Mummy and Daddy hid in the attic. They’d told Jane she must never play with it, for it was old and heavy and might fall on her. Much too dangerous for a child.

Jane’s nanny had fallen asleep, and Jane had snuck into the attic to find it. Now that it was in front of her, she was almost afraid to touch the dark cloth that was draped over it. How could an old, dusty mirror be dangerous? Surely her parents were more afraid of her hurting the mirror than the mirror hurting her.

After several minutes of debate, Jane reached for the cloth with shaking hands, half expecting the mirror to reach back and grab her. When nothing of the sort happened, she gained confidence and pulled at the cloth with all her strength.

The cloth came free, and Jane stared in awe at the elaborate carvings on the frame. She was so enamored of them that she forgot to look into the mirror itself.

She was not alone in the reflected image in the glass.

Jane whirled around to look but there was no one behind her. She looked back into the mirror and saw him again. A little boy, about her age, dressed in his Sunday best and wielding a large kitchen knife.

Every time she turned back to tell the boy to leave, he was gone. Every time she faced the mirror, he was back.

“Leave me alone,” she said to the mirror, hands planted firmly on her hips. “This is my mum and dad’s house. You need to go away.”

The boy said nothing.

“I’m serious. When my mum and dad get home and I tell them about you, they’ll be really cross.”

In the mirror, the boy seemed to move closer.

Jane trembled with fear. This mirror-boy would not go away. Instead, he inched towards her, knife in hand.

From the open attic door, Jane heard her parents come home.

“Mum! Dad! There’s a strange boy up here!” she yelled down to them. “Come make him go away!”

The mirror-boy smiled. By this time he was so close to Jane that she imagined that she could feel his breath on her neck. She spun around, waving her little arm to try to hit him, but there was no one in the attic with her.

Jane turned back to the mirror just in time to see a thin silver blade tinged with red emerge from the stomach of her reflection. She looked down to discover that her jumper was covered in blood.

Wedded Bliss

Wedded Bliss

AJ Mullican

Mara stood in front of the mirror, checking every last detail. Makeup: perfect. Hair: glorious. Cleavage: hell yes. Just one final touch before she could go downstairs.

The veil.

She’d been waiting for this wedding her whole life. From a tender young age, her mother had told her stories of how wonderful her wedding night would be. Fantastical tales of what a young woman can expect from her first taste of marriage. It all sounded so delicious.

Stepping into her delicate heels, Mara glided down the hall to the spiral staircase, every step the picture of elegance. Tiny crystals woven into her gown glittered in the lights from the sconces. Every nerve ending quivered with the knowledge that she was about to join an elite society of matriarchs, an unbroken line stretching back centuries.

As she crossed the threshold of the cathedral, the organ played a beautiful yet haunting tune. Not quite a traditional processional, but then again her family had its own traditions. Mara had no father to give her away, so she marched alone down the aisle with all the grace and poise demanded of a woman of her stature. A woman on the verge of marriage was considered quite powerful in Mara’s family.

She reached the altar and turned to face her soon-to-be husband. Her excitement was such that she nearly forgot her vows.

To love. To honor. To become one with this glorious male specimen before her.

The priestess—one of Mara’s cousins—finished the ceremony and declared them husband and wife. All five hundred attendants rose in unison. Five hundred of Mara’s closest family members.

The kiss was announced, and Mara’s new husband lifted her veil. She smiled, exposing razor sharp, sparkling white canines, and gave the terrified man the last kiss of his life.

All in all, it took less than twenty minutes for Mara to clean the flesh from his bones. She used her veil to wipe the blood from her mouth as more than a dozen generations of women applauded her new eternal life.

Dark and silent

The new apartment is much more spacious than our last, but it’s definitely in need of nightlights or something. I also need to find the extra lamp I have, so I don’t have to use the bathroom light to see in the guest bedroom/craft room. Once the sun comes up it shouldn’t be too bad, though, because there’s a nice window that I can open up.

Later today I’ll share a couple pieces of flash fiction that I wrote last week but didn’t get around to posting because of all the moving madness. Right now I’m going to try to see what I can do with my work in progress. Not feeling very motivated or inspired right now. Maybe this futon is just too comfortable. 😉

Moved on up to the west side

Almost everything is moved (we left most of the cleaning supplies at the old place to clean up for the walk through). A considerable amount is unpacked thanks to #booksbyliz and we’re about to go find some foodstuffs before we crash.

Tomorrow is clean clean clean and maybe more unpacking and rearranging.

Back to our regularly scheduled writing & art related posts in a few days 🙂

I (don’t) like to move it, move it

I’m both happy that I’m starting my move today and dreading it. I hate the process of moving but will be glad to be out of this nightmare of an apartment and into a new, nicer one that will have space for me to be creative.

I’m up to 25k words in my work in progress. That’s half of a NaNo novel, but my goal is at least 80k words, so I’ve still got a long way to go. I’m trucking along though, and am determined to finish my first draft by the end of the year.

Later today, if I’m not completely exhausted from the move, I will try to post some more flash fiction that I’ve written. I may also start posting some “Twiction” that I’ve been doing (fiction that uses a max of 140 characters, like a tweet).

Filling in the blanks

After adding a couple hundred words to the latest chapter of my work in progress, I have decided to spend the rest of my free time before work today to look back at what I’ve written so far and see where I need to add more character development. I can see areas where I’ve left some secondary characters flat and one-dimensional, so making them more realistic might help with both my word count problem and also my writer’s block problems. If I get stuck, I’ll just go back and find a character that needs more “umph” and build them up.

My problem is that I see them in my mind as fully-developed characters, with lives and back stories, but I’m not putting any of this into their part of the story. It’s like I’m saying “here’s so-and-so, this is what they look like, now back to our regularly scheduled programming.” Boring.

So time to bring more of my creations to life (cue dramatic music with a Dr. Frankenstein-like maniacal laugh).

Hemingwaying it

I’ll admit: I’ve been drinking this evening. I got a another thousand or so words added to my work in progress, which is great. Unfortunately, I still hit a road block.

I’m not meeting even half of the word count requirement for this to be a novel. Sure, I could make it a novella, but I’m determined to write a novel. I think I can do it, but it will take a lot of revision. I see places where I could improve, where I could add more detail or character development into the story, but I worry that it still won’t be enough.

My goal for the first completed draft was the end of the year. I still have a little over eight months, but this story is screaming to be let out. Maybe if I can just get it out to begin with, then go back and elaborate where needed, I’ll hit a respectable word count.

Morning musings

To get the laptop out for an hour or to procrastinate a little more? It’s not Shakespeare, but it’s the question I’m facing right now.

Most mornings, I wake up hours before I have to get ready for work, giving me ample time to get some much-needed writing done. However, this morning I have to be at work much earlier and don’t really know if I want to drag the computer out for less than a half hour of typing.

I think today will be a rest day. Tomorrow I’m off all morning and should have plenty of time to catch up 🙂

Advancement

Plugging along on my novel. I’ve gotten another couple thousand words written in the last couple of days. It’s going to be difficult to get much more written in the next week, because what I really need to be doing is getting ready for our move across town.

I’ll be glad when it’s over, but that just means unpacking and getting situated, so I probably should say it’s going to be difficult to get much writing done in the next couple of weeks.

Hopefully once the move is over with I can also get back to crafting and drawing/painting. Maybe that will open up the creative floodgates and also get me out of this funk I’ve been in.