This Summer--July and August--on this blog...

photo by ldyck

Sharing my author journey...

I believe that we--authors and publishers and librarians and...--are all in this publishing

Callie Ch 3 by Leanne Dyck (inspired by the writing life) "The Voice"

Chapter Two: Why did the bookseller give Aurora that necklace? Why did he insist she take it? What is the strangest gift you've been given? Read chapter three...

Callie

photo by ldyck

Chapter Three

That night, outside my apartment building, traffic roared like ocean waves with a steady swish, swish, swish.

Inside? Inside all was quiet, until...

Loving Lisa

It's hard to breathe, think, move. It feels like one of my vital organs is missing--a liver, a kidney, a lung, my heart.

I didn't have a TV or radio. My computer wasn't on. Still, I heard the voice...

I knew it would help if I could cry, but I'm beyond tears. I'm numb--my brain's valiant effort to protect me from the truth.

But what is the truth?

I roll the gold band around and around on my ring finger. I walk over to the fireplace and take our wedding photo off the mantel.

Who is this young couple? They look so happy, so much in love--joined together by a promise. Has he broken that promise?

I figured that the voice must have been coming from one of the neighbouring apartments. I stepped out into the corridor. Though I listened carefully, I couldn't hear a thing.

I returned to my apartment and...

I replace the photo and find myself in the kitchen. Coffee mug in hand, I sit at the table and peer out the window to where his car should be.

I don't want to think I feel abandoned. I feel the distance between us.

But we've always been of different worlds. Me constantly in my head--analyzing, dissecting, categorizing, creating. I sit at my easel for hours. Paint splashes across the white canvas. He's always in motion--pumping weights, jogging, swimming, kayaking. He's a ray of light bouncing around the earth.

The coffee is hot against my tongue.

How he hates my dark moods.

"You should talk with someone," he often tells me, pushing me to treatment. I know what he thinks--fix yourself, you're broken. I'm not allowed to be negative, ever. He expects me to be perpetually happy. Well, that's not normal. It's fake. He takes my sadness as a personal insult.

He proudly hangs my paintings of sunshine and sweet things, but my darker, moodier creations are relegated to my studio.

"Why did you paint that?" He asks--judging, trying to censor me.

"You have no right," I tell him and we fight.

Did I drive him away?

It may sound odd, but I'd like to think that I was at least partially responsible. It gives me a sense of control. I'd rather believe that than...

Is someone else involved?

He's a good-looking man. I see how other women leer at him. They lick their lips like he's chocolate. Lately, I've noticed one of his students--a sweet, young thing. What's her name? Oh, yes, Lisa. I see how Lisa swallows him up with her eyes, then quickly looks away.

Where is he right now? Are they twisted together in silk sheets? Is he loving Lisa? What's the truth?

Even in my sleep-deprived state, it didn't take long to figure out that the voice was in my apartment. Was it a ghost? Was my apartment haunted? Or was it...the...necklace?

Chapter Four

Aurora hears a voice telling her a story. Where do you think the voice is coming from? Why do you think the voice has chosen Aurora?

Are you following me?

photo by ldyck

A tribute to a dear friend...

God bless the cheerleaders in our lives. Cheerleaders who go that extra mile to support our dreams.

Callie Ch 2 by Leanne Dyck (inspired by the writing life) "Surviving"

Chapter One: No job... No home... No boyfriend... No life... What would you do? What does Aurora do? Read chapter two...

Callie

photo by ldyck

Chapter Two

I'm a survivor. I found an apartment. Rusty brown water poured out of the kitchen faucet, cracked tile floor led to an orange shag carpet, and mold grew on the sliding glass door in the bathroom. Nothing like Ru's dream apartment but it was all I could afford.

The lump of bills hidden away in a compartment in one of the suitcases would just keep getting smaller. The race was on. What would happen first? Would I find a job or end up on the street begging for coins?

What should a person with a bleak future and meager finances do? I took my worried self shopping. Smart, eh?

I found my personal paradise--a bookstore. Bells chimed as I pushed open the door. I left the sunny day and became engulfed in gray fog. Giant towers of books surrounded me. Among them I was drawn like a magnet to On Writing by Stephen King, Bird by Bird by Anne Lamott, Writing Down the Bones by Natalie Goldberg, The Elements of Style by Strunk and White, The Art and Craft of Storytelling by Nancy Lamb, Big Magic: Creative Living Beyond Fearby Elizabeth Gilbert, The Artist Way: A Spiritual Path to Higher Creativity and The Right to Write by Julia Cameron. My arms weighed down with books I searched for the cash register. Once found, I unloaded the pile with a thud. The guy behind the counter eyed me like some kind of exotic insect. We are alone and his attention unnerved me--slightly.

"This will help," he said in a thick accent, waving a hand over the books. "But you must have..."

Against my better judgment, I followed him down narrow aisles and past towering stacks of books. I'd never felt claustrophobic, but I felt it then. Curiosity was stronger. I needed to know what hidden treasure he would unearth.

He moved with urgency like a rabbit scampering down underground tunnels to... He stopped in front of a collection of necklaces pinned to a corkboard. He removed and, after wiping off a thick layer of dust, handed it to me, saying, "You must have this."

The tarnished pendant bore an engraving of two snakes twisted around a pin. I knew that image. It had been on some of the papers I'd sorted through after my mother's death. She'd been a nurse. "I'm not a nurse or a doctor," I told him, handing the necklace back.

He forced my hand into a tight fist around the necklace. He said something like 'for-row'.

Huh...?

One thing was clear--refusing wasn't an option. I paid for the books but he wouldn't take a cent for the necklace.

Chapter Three

Are you following me?

photo by ldyck

Anxious, me? Well...

Anxiety is a by-product of dyslexia. You have one; you get the other--as a free gift. I manage my anxiety by going for long walks but...

Callie Ch 1 by Leanne Dyck (inspired by the writing life) "The End is The Beginning"

One woman's amazing journey to becoming who she was meant to be.

Callie

photo by ldyck

Chapter One

My boyfriend Rupert perched on the edge of the chesterfield--elbows on his knees, leaning toward the TV. His complete focus was swallowed up by the game--soccer, of course. On the opposite side of the chesterfield, I pacified my longing, my desire with poetry.

Devotion

She'd never been in love before

She feared it would never come

She feared she would spend her life alone -- heart withered and deformed

No eye would fill with the sight of her

No heart would beat for her alone

But then, but then he had found her

He -- the sight of him makes her yearn

He comes to her and her pulse races

His velvet voice stirs her blood

He draws her close and they are alone in the universe

The love for which she has sought

For which she feared would never come

Is born, breathes, and engulfs them

Why couldn't I write like that? I'd tried over and over but my words were dead on the page. I spent days filling recycling bins, endless nights chasing sentence fragments--pointlessly. My biggest problem was that I didn't have anything to write about. Writing magazines suggested that inspiration could come from the news, daily life, and family history. I tried that but all I got was boring who-cares crap. Twitter provided writing prompts and I tried to force words onto the screen but nothing came.

Alone in the universe... Why didn't Ru and I have a relationship like that? What was wrong with us? What was wrong with him?

I felt the distance between us. It felt like miles.

Something black caught my eye. Our tabby cat Princess pranced into the living room. She jumped into Ru's lap and began to purr as he rubbed her tummy.

"Ru," I purred. I tried again. Louder this time.

"Aurora, I'm watching," he roared at me without looking away from the screen.

When the game was interrupted by a commercial, I slid over to Ru and ran my fingers through his--

He jerked his head away. "The game's on."

"No, it's not. There's a commercial. You have time for our cat."

"I still love Princess."

"What do you mean? I don't under--."

"I said I don't love you anymore." It was like he was telling me we were out of milk.

Numb then crushed and then enraged, I swung my book back and--.

He caught my wrist. "There's someone else. All you do is read; she knows how to live. She's in. You're out. Go pack."

I stormed out of the living room and slammed the bedroom door. I shoved the closet door aside and it hit the wall with a satisfying thud. Ru's designer shirts, pants, and jackets all hung in a razor-blade line. He just loved expensive things. I tore his clothes from their hangers and tossed them out of the window. The big twirling ball of colour tumbled in the air. Suit jackets landed on trees, ties on telephone lines, and his shirts and pants landed in the garden. It was spring; there was mud. I felt like cackling.

Feeling somewhat vindicated, I filled a suitcase with my books and another one with my clothes. Before I left our bedroom, I hunted through Ru's top dresser drawer and pulled out a lump of cash. He owed me.

A gentleman would have helped me navigate my suitcase out of the apartment. He didn't lift a finger. My body was shaking as I navigated the suitcase down the corridor to the elevator and down to the lobby. A set of full-length mirrors by the door in the lobby revealed that my mascara had made raccoon eyes, but I didn't care--well, not that much.

I left the apartment building, heading to...

Some may have turned to their family for support. I didn't. There had been a misunderstanding, a difference of opinion, mistaken assumptions. I'd learned that I couldn't rely on them. I'm sure I disappointed them as well. I promised myself that I would never put myself or them in that situation again. I'm trying to forgive them; I hope they are trying to forgive me. It happened long ago. And I try not to dwell on those memories.

Friends? All of them were Rupert's. I'd worked as his personal assistant. My entire life had been all tangled up in his. He'd defined me. Without him, who was I?

I wrestled with that question as I stepped into the elevator, went down to the lobby, and out onto the street. Rain started to pour. I raced to the bus shelter and slumped on the bench. No bus in sight, I waited for the next chapter of my life to begin.

Sunday, July 17

Chapter One: No job... No home... No boyfriend... No life... What would you do? What does Aurora do?

Read chapter two...

Callie

photo by ldyck

Are you following me?