Page 45 of Muscle Cub

And it had been. I’d thought of him as my partner in all ways. My successes had been his.

When I’d looked back on all the times he’d supported me, I’d known his praise had been genuine. But the nasty look on his face when he’d read me for filth on his way out of my life…

It had played on a loop in my mind. For months, I hadn’t been able to make it through a day without reliving it.

It wasn’t only a story or a label that he’d flung at me; it was like he’d called up a demon to attack and possess me. Somewhere, in some deep vault, in some cage within my heart, it had continued to rage.

Charles hadn’t been a random anonymous keyboard warrior on the internet. He’d been my first love and my first reader.

There were some things that certain people had the power to say or do that you simply couldn’t forget.

I couldn’t unhear it.

I knew—intellectually—that he’d only been projecting, and that it couldn’t have been his real opinion.

But that hadn’t kept his poison from doing its worst.

I’d wanted to let it go, but deep down, I’d feared he’d known some truth about me that no one else could see.

Still, I’d written the second book to spite him.

Divining Virginia had been powered by sheer rage.

Impotent rage.

And when it had launched with a thud, my biggest fear had been confirmed.

Charles had been right.

Now I imagined Jim asking, Why does he get to be right?

Jim’s message at the bonfire ritual had spoken to me. And Austin had given me a glimpse of how quickly things could change.

I could see a way forward. It was banal and obvious and awfully unexciting compared to fire magic and tent sex, but the strategy had worked for me in the past.

I was a devout believer in the power of proprioceptive writing, what Julia Cameron called “Morning Pages” in The Artist’s Way. You simply wrote whatever came to mind without judgment.

I’d sworn that when I returned from camp, I would write every day.

Even if it meant sitting down and writing I don’t know what the fuck to write, I don’t know what the fuck to write, I don’t know what the fuck to write over and over again.

Eventually those pages of word vomit and blather would stray into actual ideas and fragments of prose I could use.

When I’d taken the sabbatical at the beginning of the year, the goal had been to write a book before the end of the summer. I was willing to settle for a first draft or at least a strong concept and a working outline I could pitch.

I’d already wasted five months. Half my time.

But the actions required hadn’t changed. I still needed to show up every day and write something.

Anything.

Starting today.

I sat at my desk, took a sip of my tea, set a timer on my phone, and started writing.

About Austin.

Because the thing I most wanted to think about wasn’t my work, and it definitely wasn’t Charles.