NOVEL NEXT 241: People Assume I’m Touched In The Head
"Crash! Boom!" More thunder. The morning was dark, and it was too early to get up, but I couldn't sleep anymore, so to the kitchen I went.
Coffee hit the mug in seconds and was down my throat, warming me from the inside out and clearing the fog of sleep from my brain. It was barely morning, and it was too dark to even think about what lay ahead of me for the day, so I flicked on my pad to find messages awaiting me.
HC: HAAAAAAAAAAAA
That put a smile on my face. He got a kick outta my poem— good! My mood was better already, but the damn pad kept binging, so I turned the sound off.
SassySword: You okay? The cat thing; it was funny, right?
Ayela: Yeah, hilarious. If I can't laugh at myself, I'll die crying. I'm going to spend the day thinking of stupid shit I can do on Discord so people will just assume I'm touched in the head and find me endearing.
SassySword: We already do.
Ayela: lol. Thanks, great way to start my stormy day. 😆
SassySword: Have a good one! Gotta get back to work. 👋
Ayela: 👋
A second cup of coffee washed down a bagel, and the sky was turning slightly lighter instead of the pitch dark of a stormy night, but the rain didn't let up. I sighed and got dressed, dragging my pad with me and flicking through all the Special Streaks conversations.
Hells, they were chatty, but what were they even saying? Something about Midnight Ride? Some game, I assumed.
Then a bunch of feet pictures— definitely fetishists, each and every one of them. Oh, and more male body part discussions. Ew. Some guy was called GingerBollox because he had red hair and, ugh, I did not want to read the rest of that conversation.
Jump to Present.
SpiritdeCacao: it's rakija all day and all night
Ayela: WTF is rakija?
HC: brb- stream searching "rakija"
SpiritdeCacao: It's plum liquor. Strong. National past time.
Balmichi: my wife and I once had a holiday in France
Luna_phile: I met my partner in an eclipse
Balmichi: that sounds like a good story
Luna_phile: come to DND night, and I'll fill you in
Balmichi: sign me up
ArlenKnight: we need one more player for Friday
The author's narrative has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.
HC: Ask @FallingMoon
FallingMoon: can't
ArlenKnight: anyone else?
SpiritdeCacao: make it earlier, and I'll do it
ArlenKnight: can't. work schedules in the US
Luna_phile: same
CarlaCee: I'm free Friday.
ArlenKnight: then we're set. details in #gaming
Balmichi: 🎉
Yes! I participated in a conversation and didn't make an ass of myself. I clicked the app closed so I wouldn't have to keep hearing the bings and pulled on my rain boots and jacket. Yep, it was that kind of morning. The kind where I ran to work in the rain.
Seven blocks later, I was at the twins' house, but not soaked through thanks to my outerwear. I hung up my coat and propped the boots up to dry, waiving goodbye to the night-shift nanny.
Ayela: DUDE! I do not want to hear about your hairy nads anymore. New topic of conversation, please.
GingerBollox: LOL. Get over it, Ayela.
Hey: linked image of a cat
OMG, it was the fluffiest, cutest cat, and I wanted so bad to fawn all over it, but I stopped myself.
Ayela: @Hey, is that bait for me to make a fool of myself?
Hey: I dunno. Is it?
Ayela: It is, isn't it?
Hey: Only one way to find out.
Ayela: walks slowly away from data pad
HC: @Ayela, I can confirm, that is in fact, @Hey's actual cat
Ayela: OMG, @Hey, you have the most adorable fur baby! What's its name?
Hey: She's called Nala, and she loves you back.
Ayela: 💋
Whew! I did it! I made it through an entire conversation looking almost cool. I participated, joked, and walked away with my pride intact. Smiling, I headed to the basement with lunch for me and the twins to enjoy in the fort. They fell asleep after they ate, so I just left them lying on the piled up cushions for nap time and opened my pad again.
I still had four chapters of HC's book to beta-read, so I charged right in.
Damn, the book was so touching. Holly flirting with Ariel who had no idea she was an object of affection for the gal from the coffee shop. I tried not to get choked up, but something about those words on the page evoked real feelings in me. Every time I read HC's stories, it was like that.
Did that happen to people when they read my book? Did it reach into their hearts and souls and connect them to something real? I wanted it to. I wanted to be the kind of writer who could make people laugh so hard they forgot their bad days then next thing they knew, they'd be crying their eyes out with their hearts wide open.
But no one ever said anything in the comments about my stories, so I don't know if I affected them. They kept clicking "Next Chapter," though, so I reminded myself to take comfort in that fact. Then I resolved to keep reading more stories and commenting my ass off. That way authors would know that their words mattered.
Because they did. Stories were everything to people who were lonely or tired or scared and just wanted to feel like someone understood them. It didn't matter what those authors were writing about— if it was punchy-punchy fight scenes or leveling-up evolution— as long as readers found a home in the pages, those books made a difference. So, I'd keep supporting Purple Road authors in the only way I knew how.
Wait— what was that? A low-rated Review? Fucker. I looked at the Review, and it was stupid as hell. War, then.
I wasn't one for battles or gunfire, but the pen was mightier, wasn't it? So, I waged war with the hater who'd down rated my new friend's book. I wrote comments a plenty and a review for the ages, filling that book up with positivity so I could bury the bad guy's review. Turned out he was one of those types that did that all the time: opened up perfectly good books and rated them low without leaving any comments, just to take out his bad mood on someone else.
Mean. I hated those mean guys, and I'd had enough of them.
Alright, any one of my new friends who got a low review was getting comments and a thorough review from me to balance out all the shit people threw their way. I was a lover, not a fighter, but I could do some good when I got the chance.
The kids woke up in the middle of my fight-back scene, and since the sun was out, we made it through the rest of the day having a good time outside and forgetting the stormy morning. But I didn't know the true storm that awaited me until much, much later.
