The Amazing NaNo 2007 Nook of Xiv

[♥ Xivvy]

Oh dear :3 I have a thread. I feel special. So. Here's my NaNo outline, briefly.

Summary: Meghanne Black has just moved to Indiana from Kentucky to pursue her own private carreer. She likes her job, but she's homesick, a little lost, and it turns out that the apartment building she's living in is creepy, run-down, and full of odd characters. But then, it gets worse. Meghanne starts getting mysterious letters all addressed to her, but obviously from someone she doesn't know personally. Meghanne panicks, believing that she's being stalked. But there's no proof, and the police can't do anything. She's on her own, and the letters keep on coming. Furthermore, they're from a guy who claims to be a ghost and lives in the apartment with her. Out of sheer desperation and confused, Meghanne finally begins returning the letters, striking up a unique correspondence with the dead.

There. That's my NaNo. Sounds rather boring, doesn't it? Hmm ... it's going to be fun, though

[Shadaras]

It doesn't sound boring. It sounds rather cool, actually. And you have an idea of where you're going with your NaNo, which is better than what I have. Good luck with it, Xiv.

[Ginz ❤]

It sounds really interesting to me, Xiv! Cool idea. I hope you have fun writing it. =D

[♥ Xivvy]

I've passed the 20K mark, just to let you know ^^ And to celebrate, here's part of Chapter One:

It was a grey day. Rain beat down on the cars which stood immobile in a line, strung out along the wet, rain-shining bridge. The rain beat down on the trees overshadowing either side of the long bridge which stretched out over the grey, heaving waters of the reservoir like some solid concrete vine. Only the bright red lights of the cars shone out in the darkness, like a double sting of flickering Christmas lights. At least, that’s what it must have looked like from space. In the center of the string of car lights, however, there was a flashing pinwheel of color. Blue, red, and white lights spun, flickering, flashed in a continuous circle of blinking lights. Three police cars were pulled up in the middle of the traffic, their black and white bodies blocking both lanes of traffic. No one was in the cars except for one female police officer, who was holding one of the police radios up to her mouth, and urgently saying something into it. What she was saying, who could tell? The rain drowned out everything except for the constant, grating wail of the police cars. The rest of the officers were standing around a hole in the side of the wall that kept cars from sliding off the reservoir and into the tossing grey water, when the bridge was slick like it was today. The thick concrete wall had been broken through completely; it must have been cracked or flawed, because it was designed never to break under any circumstances. But there was a gaping hole in the wall; a huge chunk of the concrete wall had been broken through, torn from the rest of the wall.
Eye-witnesses all agreed on the course of events that had broken through the wall. A black SUV had been driving along the bridge, probably going a little too fast for the wet, slippery conditions. Then something had happened; the car had blown a tire, or it had slipped on an oil spill, or the driver had just lost control for some reason unexplained. In any case, the SUV had not only swerved, but had suddenly accelerated, and hit the wall with a fatal crunch. The SUV must have been going 80 when it broad-sided the wall; it had accelerated that quickly. It had either been the worst luck in the world, or just ill-fate, but whatever the cause, the SUV hit the cracked part of the wall precisely. The wall had crumbled, split, fallen as the hunk of hard metal had slammed into it. The SUV was a good deal taller than the wall; there was a good chance that it would have flipped even if the wall hadn’t broken. But as the SUV hit the wall at an angle, and as the wall gave away, the black car had flipped over sideways, and had tumbled into the freezing grey, rain-whipped water of the reservoir, far below. Some one had called 911, and now, here were the cops, 35 minutes later, completely blocking two lanes of busy traffic, keeping everyone stranded in the rain as they surveyed the scene. They stood around the hole, making notes of the obvious as one of them radioed for backup of any reasonable sort or variety, while the rest stood around, helplessly gazing down into the churning water.

[Shadaras]

Ooh. Pretty writing, Xiv. Sounds really cool so far. And at a guess, is the person who drove the SUV off the bridge the ghost?

[♥ Xivvy]

WHOA. I've broken 40K! SO. Clip time, Baby. Many clips, actually.

Even in the slowly darkening light, Meghanne could read the words scrawled on the envelope. The writer hadn’t taken the time to make the writing neat.

Your apartment? Who ever said that it was your apartment? We share it, don’t we? Don’t get cocky and claim what isn’t really yours. And the letters? Merely gestures of welcome. People here are crazy; I thought you would be the first to appreciate some help. After all, you’re a single girl hundreds of miles from home. Rather frightening predicament, isn’t it, Meghanne? As to killing me … your threat falls rather short, actually. You cannot kill me. You would have to find me first to kill me. And then you would have to have some way to kill me successfully, and I don’t think you’ve planned that far ahead. And I bet you couldn’t do it even if you wanted to, which you don’t. But mainly, you couldn’t kill me because - funny enough - I’m already dead.

[♥ Xivvy]

MORE CLIPS.

As soon as she stepped out, she slipped on the unexpected water, and only by barely catching herself on the door and banging her shin again against the counter did she manage to keep herself from falling onto that wet floor. Meghanne was now very glad that she had put her clothes up on the toilet, out of reach of the water that now swamped her bathroom. Brushing her dripping blonde hair back from her face, Meghanne opened her eyes and gasped. The air was almost as cold as the water. “Great, just great,” she muttered, teeth chattering. Meghanne turned and transitioned her clothes from the toilet to the sink. She needed to sit down to be able to change. Meghanne sat down on the icy porcelain toilet seat cover, and was just beginning to try to figure out how to dry herself when she saw a sopping wet note, the black ink smudged, lying in a puddle of water on the floor. She bent down and scooped it up.

1. Your d--n alarm clock is still going off.
2. There is water coming out from under your bathroom door. Did you know that?
3. That alarm clock is waking up the neighbors. Darrel is awake, and Mimi is getting ready to come down here and cuss you out. You don’t want that.
4. Your cat is beginning to yowl, which isn’t making anyone happy either.
5. To get hot water from that shower, you need to turn the cold water faucet to the left and then turn the hot water faucet to the right. I know, I know. Faucets weren’t made to turn to the right, but this one is broken (obviously). If you don’t do that, you’ll be taking cold showers every morning at 6:00.
6. Good morning.

[♥ Xivvy]

And one more - the more profanity-laded part of my NaNo so far ...

“And I’m sick and f------- tired of carrying your d--- stuff for you. I’m not gonna do it, do you hear me? I’m not gonna do it! So you can get some other b------ to carry your-” Meghanne winced as the man screamed the profanity as loud as she could. She could hear the word echoing off of the stair well. Every in all 7 stories must be hearing this. She winced, shrinking back against her door frame. Her palms were sticky; this guy looked like he could go ballistic at any moment. The old lady was even more angry, though. Her shrill, shrieking voice was joining in with his, and Meghanne could hear the words coming thick and fast.
“You’ll do it, you b------, and you’ll like it! I don’t care what you f------- think, but you’re gonna do this, do you hear me?” She howled. The ugly words rang in the air, dark and menacing. Meghanne wished that she was back inside of her apartment, but she couldn’t seem to tear herself from the scene. Camera Man couldn’t either; he was standing stock still, the camera taping every gruesome detail, recording every ugly word. Meghanne thought he was crazy to be saving this.
“I said I wouldn’t do it, and I won’t!” The man shouted, his face almost as red as the old lady’s stilettos. Without another word, he turned and ran down the stairs, the metal steps rattling as she ran.
“You f------- coward!” The old lady screamed after him, leaning over the landing’s rail and howling threats and profanities after him with frightening passion. It was hard to believe that a 60 year old lady could scream and cuss with so much energy. The old lady was in a rage; her whole body was actually trembling with fury as she straightened up from the railing. She saw Camera Man and Meghanne, standing there, wide-eyed. In all honesty, Meghanne was the only one with wide eyes. The camera’s eye was unblinking and the same as ever. “What are you looking at?” The old lady yelled at them, her eerily dark eyes blazing with ferocity. Camera Man didn’t answer her; he just trained the camera on her face. It seemed like a challenge, in a way. It was funny how he could say nothing, but still be threatening this hostile, wrathful old lady. “Darrel, you b------, you get that camera away from me!” The old lady screeched, holding up one crumpled fist. Only one finger stuck straight out of that fist, and she defiantly shook at the immovable camera. Then the eyes turned on Meghanne. “So you’re the new-” Meghanne cringed as the word slapped her like a blow, “-who’s moved in!” The old lady turned the finger on her. “Go to hell!” With that, the lady turned and stalked away, her stilettos slamming loudly on the floor.


XDD The funny thing is that I didn't really want to bleep out the actually F-word, and so the words beginning with F that are bleeped out are really 'freaking' and 'frigging'. Yea. .. weird me XD

[♥ Rain]

...I don't know about the rest of those letters, but from the sounds of it, Ghost is one of the most sarcastic people I've ever met in a story. >__>

[♥ Xivvy]

rain said:

...I don't know about the rest of those letters, but from the sounds of it, Ghost is one of the most sarcastic people I've ever met in a story. >__>

if you were dead, wouldn't you be sarcastic?

[♥ Rain]

elvenguardian said:

rain said:

...I don't know about the rest of those letters, but from the sounds of it, Ghost is one of the most sarcastic people I've ever met in a story. >__>

if you were dead, wouldn't you be sarcastic?

Depends on what I could do. He can write notes. So I think that I'd go and mess up a few things instead of be sarcastic in letters. Unless he can't go out of the apartment.

[♥ Xivvy]

YAY!!! I got over 50K!

And my story isn't done yet. New goal: to get at least 70K by the end of November AND to somehow manage to finish my story by then. SO.

The pressure is on.

[♥ Rain]

Yaaaay 70k! Go Xiv-chan! You have to do 2223 words a day. It'll be easy awesome. ^_^ *cheers you on*

[♥ Xivvy]

I have finished Letters To and From a Ghost
Final Count: Slightly over 80K, 113 pages.

Oh man. I love NaNo.

[♥ Xivvy]

Here's some clips from the finished NaNo:

Dear Meghanne,

So, is that your Question Number Six? he teased on the paper. Seriously though. No, I don’t think that I would mind just … talking. I miss just talking to people, I guess. That’s the thing that sucks the most about being dead. But I think that you’d enjoy the conversation more if you ate some of that ice cream that Cassidy just left outside your door.

Ghost.
Meghanne turned around to look at the door; she hadn’t heard anything. She got to her feet and walked over to the door, unlocked it, and looked out. Sure enough, a half gallon of vanilla ice cream was sitting on the floor outside of her door. A note on the top read “Danny told us about your cat. I’m really sorry - Cassidy”. Meghanne had to grin to herself as she bench down, picked up the ice cream, and shut the door with her foot. She paused on her way to the kitchen to scribble,

Ghost,

How on earth do you do that!? in the notebook, then straightened up and headed to the kitchen to get a bowl of the treat. By the time that she had put away the rest of the ice cream and was settled back on the floor with bowl and spoon, Ghost had written back.

Dear Meghanne,

Uh, because I’m psychic? Actually, it’s just because I’m dead. We ghosts have this ‘see all, know all’ thing going for us. It’s like a built in ‘You’ve Got Ice Cream!’ alert.

Ghost

Aaaand ... one more:

. Meghanne suddenly realized that she was shaking with sobs, and that tears were streaming down her face. One hand was still clamped over her mouth to hold in the scream of horror. Meghanne forced herself to turn away from the window, to turn away from the sight. Then her legs buckled and she slid down the wall onto the floor, trying to hold in her racking sobs. The cell phone was still clenched in one of her hands, and she could hear a voice saying repeatedly, “Hello? Hello? Can I help you? Hello?” Her hand shaking so badly that she could barely move it, Meghanne lifted the cell phone to her mouth.
“Please,” she started, her voice shaking from the suppressed wave of tears. “Please come quick. There’s been a shooting and .... I think someone is dead … ”


Oh. I wonder who died >>