What Is Undone:
undone is the product of NaNoWriMo 2009. not only did i meet my goal of 50,000 words, but i made it early. alas, it was no where near finished - or even respectable - when november ended, so it's an ongoing effort. at the moment, the story line - what story line there is - is being re-worked into something that might pass for a piece that still retains at least some of my dignity.

What Is It About?:
that's the hardest question i've ever had to answer, and everytime someone asks, i either give them a copy or evade the question. part of the reason is that the story is still developing. part of it resides in the fact that i'm not entirely comfortable with the story as it is and part of it is that it isn't about anything. then, i've never been great shakes at summarizing things anyway.

Can I Read It?:
god yes, absolutely. with the exception of the tremendous amount of hand-holding my bestest wiritng buddy, linda, had to do to get me through the thirty days of hell that were november, no one else has really looked it over. there are a few people that read it or read bits and pieces and extended a nanowrimo amount of feedback (read; 'you're doing good - keep it up. only ten more days to go!') unless of course i know you particularly well or value your respect for me, in which case the answer changes to 'oh hell no' because, lets be honest, i can't take that kind of rejection. if you're interested, for whatever reason, in reading it or offering your opinion, feel free to contact me and i'll be happy to send (the most current copy of} it over.

Excerpt:

“Oww, it bruised!” she whined, pulling up her t-shirt and poking at her ribs for dramatic effect. Cooper was meandering out of the bathroom, running his hand through his wet hair then shaking the water droplets off onto the floor. His answering apology was more laughter than mea culpa, but she accepted it anyway, extending a cup of coffee to him.

“Truce?” he asked, taking the mug.

Rebecca considered him for a moment, pretending to mull it over while pouring herself a cup and sitting down at the table. “Deal,” she answered finally. “When are you leaving?”

Cooper looked confused for a few moments before noticing her glance toward the pile of gear on the bar. “I’m not,” he answered, dumping a heaping spoon of sugar into his cup. “I called in.” She opened her mouth to apologize but he waived her off. “You never say you’re sorry, Bug. Don’t start now.”

“Ouch,” she said, forcing a laugh. Cooper’s words had a uniquely cutting quality – entirely unlike her own. Where her words were intended to be sharp, Cooper never meant to hurt anyone.

“I’m sorry,” he apologized immediately, spinning one of the kitchen chairs around with his free hand and sitting down. “I didn’t mean that. How about you make it up to me?” he asked, his tone abruptly shifting from genuine remorse to mischief. Rebecca raised an eyebrow, mid swallow. He smiled. “How about I agree to forget that I burned a perfectly good favor on a hangover if you tell me what’s really going on?”

“What is going on, Cooper?” she asked innocently, not sure how to articulate her argument with Brandon or why she’d avoided both her apartment and his in favor of Cooper’s lumpy mattress.

Cooper eyed her warily, watching as she pushed herself back from the table defensively. “Don’t give me that,” he started – his voice much gentler than his words. “Tell me why we polished off a bottle of tequila last night and I still ended up sleeping on the sofa.”

The two of them stared at each other for a long moment while she absorbed the nuances of his expression – the sincere concern in his furrowed brow, the open eyes and the slight hint of an encouraging smile. The man was good. Her therapist’s words ran through her mind as she tried to form a response to his questions but she repelled them handily. “Cooper,” she said slowly, forcing her voice to assume a foreign soft tone. “Do you want to know what the best thing about me really is?” He didn’t answer but she finished anyway, getting up and backing away from the table in earnest now. “It’s not that I never apologize, it’s that I never explain.”

“Rebecca,” he started softly but she was already halfway to the door by the time he hit his second syllable. He caught her by the wrist as she passed, stubbornly refusing to let her go.

“What?” Her delivery was scathing – her mood moving from mild irritation to fury in the span of time it took him to stop her. “What do you want me to say, Cooper?” she asked again.

When he didn’t answer, she jerked her wrist, trying to free it. He held fast.

They stared at each other for a few long moments – him determined not to let her go until the conversation she’d been avoiding was had and her resolutely opposed to the same. On the threshold of irrational tears, she struggled to keep her mind blank – to erase his concerned expression from her thoughts. It was moments like these that made her long for Nicole’s simple friendship, wondering why she’d come here at all.

Cooper broke the charged silence, his jaw set in an almost angry line. “We can have this conversation at gun point if it would make you more comfortable,” he offered, not entirely sure if he was kidding.

“There’s no conversation to have,” she sighed, her voice heavy with defeat.

“Rebecca…” When he repeated her name this time, it wasn’t an admonition, with each syllable labored over for effect – it was a lament, practically an apology as her shoulders began to shudder with inexplicable emotion. He released her immediately, only long enough to get up and wrap his arms around her, despite her protests. In the decade they had known one another, she’d broken down like this only twice. She’d cried before - when she shattered her ankle, when she got her first paying job as a photographer, when she lost that job two weeks later and was dragged into the family business, when her grandmother died and at his graduation from the RTT program - but these frantic, rolling sobs were something entirely different and far more foreboding.

His t-shirt was soaked with tears before she regained enough control to stop herself from trembling. He didn’t let go of her immediately and she permitted herself to remain there, breathing in the scent of his cologne as he held her tight to his chest, trying to absorb every ounce of the solace he offered. “What are the odds I’m going to get out of here without explaining that one?” she asked, her voice child-like as she tried to laugh and cry simultaneously.

“Not high,” he teased, freeing one hand enough to brush the tears from her cheeks. She banged her forehead against his arm in frustration before letting him drag her into the living room.

Neither of them said anything for a long while, Rebecca spinning the remote in her hands idly. It wasn’t an aversion to telling him what was wrong that inspired the silence; she simply didn’t know what to say. “Rip it off like a Band-Aid,” he urged, elbowing her.

“I’m not being difficult,” she replied, more than a little sadly. He snorted a sarcastic laugh. “No – I just…. Brandon and I had an argument and I needed a little time off from the melodrama.”

He eyed her suspiciously, trying to appraise the honesty in her words while knowing, regardless of what she was willing to admit to herself, there was something more at play. “So you decided a strip tease in my kitchen, a bottle of tequila and a sleep over would bring things to a middle?”