WIPpet Wednesday: Stringing You Along

Dance is over for the year. I’m both happy and sad. The recitals were fantastic. I haven’t gotten the videos all up on YouTube yet, but as soon as I do, I’ll post the link.

On to this week’s WIPpet. As you may recall, I was working on a Top Secret Project. The reason I kept it under wraps is that my next novel, Passing on Faith, isn’t due out until November. However, this project is no longer hush-hush because I committed to it, and it’s now all official. I’m going to be very busy for the rest of this year—I have three novels with projected dates for 2016.

If you looked at the link, you could probably make a guess about which one I kept hidden. Some of you who have been doing WIPpets for a while might remember this lovely character from last year:

Micah nearly jumped out of his skin. He turned around slowly and came face-to-face with a gingery-blond young man. He was average height, perhaps an inch or two shorter than Micah, and had a wiry build. There was a dusting of freckles across his pale skin, and he had a row of small hoops down one ear. In the other ear, he wore a dangling earring that looked like some kind of leaf. He had on a trendy pair of black knee-length pants and a fitted white t-shirt with a rock band logo Micah didn’t recognize. His gray-green eyes were wide and held a spark of mischief, and his mouth curled upward in a charming smirk.

No, not Micah, who is the POV character in Passing on Faith. For those of you who weren’t here, the cute, freckled redhead is Cat. He’s more or less the personification of my muse, in case anyone wondered. Anyway, I felt he deserved his very own story, so I wrote a prequel for him. It’s in round one edits, so technically it’s a work-in-progress. Here’s just a tiny bit of the draft.

WIPmath: 17th = 1+ 7 = 8 paragraphs.

There was a knock on Cat’s door, and he got up from his bed to open it. He could tell something was on his sister’s mind, but she hesitated on the threshold. They’d been close once upon a time. It wasn’t as though they’d had some huge falling out; it was more a gradual slide while LR became more studious and he rebelled against the entire previous eighteen years of his life. Now here she stood, biting her lip and looking for all the world like she had no idea how to talk to him. He motioned her in, and she accepted, walking into his room to sit on his bed. She crossed and uncrossed her legs several times before clearing her throat.

“I wish you would talk to us, Cat,” she said.

He flopped onto the bed next to her and lay back, staring up at the ceiling. Her words didn’t justify an answer, not even in the form of a prayer.

“It’s just…well, we don’t know how to help you.”

Cat huffed. He didn’t need help. Couldn’t they see that? He was perfectly fine. He was going to spend the rest of his life doing penance for getting into so much trouble, and that was as it should be. Keeping himself healthy was the top priority anyway. He could maintain his vows indefinitely, just like being in a religious order but without the actual monastery. Much simpler this way, and he could still help out in his mother’s cafe.

LR let out a tiny breath. She lay back too, and her fingers found Cat’s. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw her turn her face toward him. “I love you, big brother. I miss shopping with you and painting our nails and picking out just the right lip gloss for you, if not for me.” She leaned in and kissed his cheek. “If you change your mind, they’re having a sale at Linder’s Drugs this week on flavored gloss. I’ll bet you’d like the pineapple one.”

Without another word, she rose form the bed and slipped out of his room. For a long time, Cat stayed in the same position, wishing he could tell her he missed all those things too.

Next week, Trevor and Andre will be back. I just couldn’t hold onto this news any longer. I may post a bit more from this one in the future if I can find enough that isn’t spoilery. Here’s a link to the full summary.

Many thanks to K. L. Schwengel for giving us space to share. If you want to read more or join in, here’s the link. To add your own, post a bit of your work in progress, connect it to the date, and link up. Happy reading and writing!