Jerry and Betty have been on my mind daily since I posted Part 2. My principal rumination swirled around “How long will this piece be?” liberally mixed with “How many characters are in this story?” (meaning principal characters, not single-scene walkons and such).
The latter led me down the POV debate; Who owns the story?
Readers following my Experiments in Writing know determining who owns what in a story is a big thing to me. Determine who owns the story, the chapter, the scene, the paragraph, … all important in keeping the reader focused on the story, on not letting the real world pull them out of or away from the mythic world you’ve created for them.
In the end I realized the story (in its present formulation in my head) has three main players; Dr. Koss, Jerry, and Betty, and each will own a scene or chapter, and (my present) guess is Betty’s POV will dominate as the story nears its climax.
Meanwhile, I looked at the First Section Rewrite I offered last week and my first thought was “God, that sucks!”
Let me explain. It’s a great improvement over the previous and has some nice touches. It’s also far from what I’d consider polished (it’s expositionally heavy to me). This is a good thing as last week’s entry was quite rough, and I write somewhat spontaneously, meaning I know what has to go in so I write it in. I know I’ll be reviewing/revising/rewriting it again later and write now (ha ha) the goal is to get something down on paper (or screen).
Which is also what I encourage people who work with me to do; get something down. Make it better later. Right now, just get the ideas down so you can figure out what works and what doesn’t.
With all that in mind, here’s Section 2. Let me know what you think.
How Jerry and Betty Became the Least Entertaining Couple in the Neighborhood (Second Section)
Betty watched Jerry emerge from the steam of the master bathroom, so much like an ancient Hellenic god borne from the mists, his towel wrapped around his waist and flung over this shoulder, broad, hairy chest, strong arms, long fingers, …
She stopped her inventory.
Jerry didn’t have long fingers. Like all astronauts, his fingers were shortish and their tips met evenly, not at different lengths, the middle finger longest, ring finger next followed by index then pinky then thumb.
She squinted and blinked.
No, a mistake. A trick of the mists. Only that. Nothing more.
She reached for her foundation. She’d always had her makeup lined up in the order they were applied; foundation, blush, eyeshadow, eyeliner, mascara, lipstick. One less opportunity for chaos in her life. Their lives. A military wife – especially the military wife of a military celebrity, the first human allowed to enter Thorine-7’s space, and their choice, not ours – inherits discipline from their husband’s doings.
She remembered being at a spouse’s mixer once and being shocked at the number of husbands in the room, and smiling and nodding politely when introductions were made.
None of them were leadership material. None of them could be trusted piloting the Wanderer ships, solo navigating deep space, waking only when the ship’s systems alerted him to a need, an emergency, something no one earthbound or experienced could or had predicted.
But her Jerry. He could do it.
Jerry loved her getting dolled up. She’d get dolled up, he’d parade her around at some function she couldn’t pronounce the name of, then get her back home and barely give her a chance to get on the bed.
But not since his return. No makeup, no perfume. Something happened while he was in cryosleep Koss said, some minor malfunction in the atmospherics of the system, and now he developed a rash resulting in a black burn, almost a charring of his skin, if she wore makeup or perfume and touched him.
Just simply touched him.
Her own husband.
Wasn’t it enough they’d been separated for four-point-three years and when he returned, he was a stranger to her?
She picked up her brush, a gift from Jerry, gold and blue sapphire and expensive for them at the time, something found in a Moroccan bazaar when they were young, before he was famous, when they could travel in something other than secured military transports, and ran it through waist length auburn hair.
Suddenly he was beside her, his hand on hers, and gently took the brush from her. “I remember finding this.”
She tensed for a moment. His movements so quick she hadn’t noticed them. Too focused on her own thoughts. That was it.
She looked at his reflection. He held the brush up to his face and frowned at it, turning it slowly in his hand, inspecting it as if it were a strange otherworldly creature found crawling on his gloved hand while exploring some distant, ancient world.
He would spend hours brushing her hair when they were young.
Now he handed it back to her and walked to his closet, turned on the light and walked in.
A puff of steam came from the bathroom and drew her attention. She almost thought she saw something in the steam.
Jerry emerged from his closet, his dress blues in a bag over his arm. “I don’t remember, am I suppose to wear my saber tonight?”
Questions or comments? Bring ’em on. They’ll help me craft a better story.
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