Page 11 of Palingenesis

I should be pounding out chapters of spice by now but the main love interests haven’t even met yet. They’re too busy living their lives and being traumatized by their pasts to see the stranger right in front of them.

Goddamn creative block.

It’s another thing that I’ve mistakenly hoped would get better with time and distance and immersing myself into a similar setting as the story.

At least, that’s what I told myself when I picked out Bearcreek on the map.

Yet here I am again, proving myself wrong with only a few thousand words staring back at me through my muted reflection on the screen.

Leaning forward in my chair, I scroll back to the beginning and start reading what I have, even though I know that I shouldn’t. The time it’ll take to comb through it all should be spent diving deeper into the plot or scraping every word I can manage to tack onto the next chapter to keep things moving.

Eyes scanning, I ignore that inner voice and start reading.

“You can’t start a story with ‘once upon a time.’ This isn’t a fairytale, dude. I should be pissing myself by now.”

The round of chuckles seem amplified against the constant buzz of insects, multiple sets of glassy eyes on me, and I clear my throat.

“Fine. There once was a—”

“Bro!”

A gentle, humored huff releases from my nose and I scroll to the next page–which contains way too much descriptive prose about a campfire and not nearly enough dialogue or action.

Maybe I should switch the campfire out for an orgy. That’d be one hell of an opening.

“Who the fuck is Avery?”

I jolt hard enough that my mouse flies across the desk and clatters to the floor behind the desk where all the cords live.

“You scared the shit out of me,” I hiss, flattening my palm over my racing heart. “What did you ask me?”

Henry’s glare narrows on me, his cold eyes scanning me from the doorway in a way that makes me squirm in my seat and a flush rush to my face.

“I asked you—” He tosses my phone onto the desk, uncaring of the timeline I had there that’s now skewed to the left, “—’who the fuck is Avery?’”

My jaw snaps shut and I blink against dry eyes.

“I’m confused,” I say quietly, hands moving on autopilot with the signs at the same time before I can think to hold back.

“Don’t patronize me with your—” His hands flutter in front of him in a wildly inappropriate and offensive show of sign, “bullshit. Why the hell do you have some guy calling you?”

Scrunching my brows, I slowly pick up my phone, glancing at the screen when it lights up. There’s nothing in the notifications claiming any missed calls or texts, just a bunch of spam emails. It sours my stomach to see the lack of anyone reaching out from the outside world. Hell, I can’t even recall the last time I looked at this thing.

Slowly, I set the phone down and return my gaze to where Henry stands, closer now than before, his sharp eyes boring a hole through me.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

He scoffs, his hands thrown up and all. “Check the fucking call log, Shannon. He called you.”

Sighing, I force my fingers to still as I reach for the phone again, opening it up to see that I did get a call. Right there in green is the baker’s name, time stamped for about thirty minutes ago.

My skin feels too tight, my mouth gone dry.

“You fucking answered it?” I blurt out, too pissed to appease him right now. I slam my phone down so hard that I hear a crack. “Why didn’t you bring it to me?”

Henry’s jaw drops, that fake tan on his face reddening by the second until I’m sure his head will pop like a cherry.

“Am I your errand boy now? Fuck you mean bring it to you? So you can talk to your fuck buddy while I’m in the next room? You’ve got to be fucking kidding me.”