She who would write
Chapter 1: The story of Maeve
“So how do I write a story if I don’t know what it will be about?” asked Maeve.
“My girl, you just begin to write and see where the pen takes you!” exclaimed Mrs. McGregory.
“Alright, I’ll give it a try.”
Mrs. McGregory smiled, nodding to the girl, then spun on her heel and continued walking.
Maeve watched her go, feeling a mixture of excitement and consternation. Surely writing couldn’t be that easy… but Mrs. McGregory was an accomplished word-smith by all accounts. A trip to the book store would prove that much, if you knew where to look. But where to start?
Back home, at her desk, Maeve set a stack of paper before herself and sat for a moment with a pen poised above the page. It seemed almost a shame to ruin the pristine white paper with a stroke from her pen, but it was now or never.
One stroke, two; a letter, then two more.
– The –
The pen halted, dithering about the word to follow.
You could start many sentences with “The.” Everything from “The quick brown fox…” to “The day of…” and yet, what would it become?
Maeve rested the tip of her pen lightly against the page, resolving to just write the next letter… an S. As if a lightbulb went on she knew what the next word was. “Shetland” she wrote.
– The shetland –
Pony? It seemed too obvious. Not only that, Maeve was one of those girls who, oddly among those she’d talked to, had no particular affinity for horses. Could shetland be something else? Or perhaps she should write about ponies anyway — a way to broaden her horizons, or some such.
A story flashed into her head and then went away again, leaving a feeling in its wake. Maeve knew that the story was a good one but the remnant feeling immobilised her hand and sapped her energy.
She didn’t want the writing to end. She was afraid that if she got started writing, she’d eventually not have her stories anymore because they’d all be written.
*sigh*
Realisation out of the way, Maeve took a breath, renewing her resolve to write and then swore. Her page still read “The shetland” and she had completely forgotten the story that had just flashed past.
“Stupid realisations!” she wrote in a huff.
– The shetland –
– Stupid realisations! –
Deciding she may as well continue, having ruined the page anyway, she wrote
“Stupid ink pen!”
“Stupid page”
“Stupid desk”
“Stupid bare feet on the cold floor distracting me from writing!” Maeve finished, already suppressing a giggle.
She stood up to go fetch a pair of socks. It might not be the next “Harry Potter,” but it was something.
Sock-slippers, pyjamas, bath robe, wine, paper, hard-bound book and pen.
Maeve lit a fire in the hearth and curled up on the couch to write. A new page lay before her. Calmed, she simply began writing whatever popped into her head in neat script. What emerged was an exposé of her relationship with writing. An anecdote. Soon she knew more than before about her likes and dislikes about writing.
Somewhat later, Maeve awoke to embers and the sound of rain and wind. The time was just past two in the morning and she decided it might be a good idea to go to bed.
Shifting her makeshift writing table so that she could stand and stretch her cramped muscles, an oddity about her text caught her eye. The overall shape of her missive seemed different to how she’d written it. She bent to examine the paper closer in the dim light of the still-glowing embers. To her amazement, the page contained what appeared to be the beginning of a story.
Maeve realised she couldn’t actually remember what she thought she’d written about, but she was almost certain she hadn’t been writing a story… And yet.
