Olympia: Part 3

The day Valentine Abernathy was to marry Cooper Smith would be one of Olympia’s biggest to-dos in nearly a century, an excuse for everyone in town to celebrate a big occasion if nothing else. Nobody could pretend that Valentine and Cooper were a perfect match, nor were they a well-suited one, nor a completely consensual one. But for today they would dress up in their best suits and brightest smiles and pretend that they were there to share in the happy union of a couple who loved each other.

The ceremony was to take place on the sprawling grounds if Rex and Harriet King’s faux antebellum mansion on a mild and sunny spring afternoon, perfect for the rapidly growing crowd roaming about the lawn in search of the best vantage point. Everyone in Olympia was in attendance, though they were a small number in comparison to the amount of people who had travelled across the state for the occasion. Most of them were Valentine’s admirers, and their presence, along with the vibrant bouquets of white and blue roses, must have sent a clear message to the poor groom that he was quite out of his depth.

The bride and her entourage were tucked away inside the house, using one of the guest bedrooms as a bridal suite. Valentine sat in front of a mirror, eyes closed and lips tight, while her bridesmaids –who were more attendants than anything else– attempted to make an already beautiful woman even more so. They curled her blonde hair, applied her rouge and lipstick, and generally sang her praises in hopes of mollifying her on an already stressful day. Cora, the flower girl for the ceremony, sat on the bed with her legs crossed observing their skittering and half-listening to their talk until she finally spoke up.

My Process: Reality Check

I’ve been a bit lazy the past week with no excuses to absolve me. U haven’t been doing much writing and I’ve been trying not to do much thinking about Olympia outside of actually working on it. Instead, I’ve started various TV shows on Netflix and gone to bed well before midnight. It’s been a nice, relaxing existence, but I’m eager to push forward and be productive again. After all, how can I prove to myself that I can actually finish something if I’m not actively working on it?

So, I’m beginning to realize the potential issues that could arise from writing a serialized work. Of course I’ve done my preparation, I have my outline and my forward direction, but because I’m writing and publishing it one part at a time I could inevitably include scenes that don’t do much to add to the plot’s momentum. I should probably continue reminding myself that however nicely polished my little updates are, they are still part of a larger, unfinished rough draft. Once it’s all done and ready for the actual editing process, it could look very different. Actually, I’m sure it will.

So this is me, changing my perspective on this project. Olympia is a work in progress, the sum of its parts and not the parts themselves. I will continue to post as I go, and hope that people will continue to read and enjoy. And whenever I finally come to the end, I’ll go from there.

Olympia: Part 2

To her mother, she was life. She was springtime. She was something new and unpredictable in an endless cycle of seasons that had started to look much the same year after year. To her father, she was a necessary secret. Naturally. It would hardly be a smart thing for one of the state’s most influential politicians to claim paternity of another illegitimate child and destabilize both a hard-bought political career and an already antagonistic marriage.

Cora Lee’s existence —despite the vague details surrounding her conception— was hardly considered a scandal by the inhabitants of Olympia township, at least not to the standards set by its more colorful inhabitants. At the time of her birth there was a war raging on the European continent, and all attention was intently focused on the not-so-discreet exchange of letters between Marcus King, the mayor’s only son sent overseas, and Valentine Abernathy, the town socialite newly-engaged to another man. The discreet delivery of a quiet girl to a single mother hardly raised eyebrows or caused ripples of gossip in comparison.

Olympia: Part 1

It was the state coroner’s official ruling that Governor Richard King had died from a self-inflicted gunshot wound to the head. A colossus of state politics priming for a run at the White House come the end of his term, his suicide naturally came as a shock to the larger state population who had worshiped him as much for his larger-than-life personality as for his over-arching social reform.

Of course, when shocking things happen, rumors always tend to spiral around like vultures to a fresh corpse. There were whispers that Richard King, Sr. was the victim of a finely executed conspiracy chiefly orchestrated by his three sons. The whispers even went so far as to claim that it was Richard King, Jr. who pulled the trigger. Of course, no one would ever be able to prove the speculation even if they dared to. The King family had an untouchable air about them; a fine balance of outward charisma and ambiguity that everyone just knew meant danger beneath the surface.

Genealogies of mythical characters can get complicated.

I finally got around to copying the mess of writing from my dining room mirror into my notebook. It’s probably best to assemble all my scribblings into one place so I stay organized and look less like a crazy person.

Not that it’s at all a bad thing.

The Gods…

They give so much credence to the existence of choice.

Perhaps they know to believe in the unpredictability of events is to be false, but perhaps they find the pretense of ignorance to be far more convenient. It allows them to flaunt their fallibility while still collecting the accolades of their admirers who live a ways down the road. Few of them, however, can hide from the scrutiny of each other. And when the three old sisters from Rowan County invite themselves for the occasional afternoon tea, none of them can deny themselves any longer. When the sober truth of their own natures is woven into a nicely-patterned shawl draped over hunched ancient shoulders, it reminds them how little control they actually wield in the scheme of things.