CHAPTER 34
Phoebe’s Novel Gets Under Way
The following Saturday morning the forces of nature, her genetic makeup, the hidden influences of muses, and whatever else was stewing in the pot of her personal creativity caused Phoebe to really start her novel.
She felt suffused with a new feeling. Previously she had liked the general idea of writing a novel and the specific idea of her all-girl band story. She relished the idea of being an author, of seeing her book in shops, of catching a glimpse of her likeness on the back cover. She also quite enjoyed the actual writing, though not when it wasn’t going well—which, it turned out, was disappointingly often. All in all, she would have said that she had been working on her novel for some weeks and had made a “fair start.” This Saturday morning she knew better. That had all been preamble.
Today something was flowing in her with the intensity of an ice-white river powered by glacial melt. She felt cold, not hot, and distracted, not focused. It was a feeling the very opposite of what she supposed “really creating” must feel like. Yet she understood why this was so. She was distracted because plot lines were zipping by like asteroids past a starship, whizzing by as she sorted possibilities and made decisions.
How did the band get to the island? Why had they brought acoustic guitars with them if they only played electric? Who were they? Were they more like the Go-Gos, the B-52s, or the Bangles, three ancient all-girl bands about which Phoebe knew everything. What threats would she put in their way? Would the dangers be self-inflicted, arising out of personality conflicts—everyone envying the lead singer, say, who, it turned out, could not only hit the high notes but make fire—or would they arrive from the outside—volcanic eruptions, pirates, poisonous lizards?
These thoughts were zooming by even as she wrote the opening scenes, having to do with the band’s dynamite last concert on their doomed cruise ship. She had her laptop booted up and she was typing furiously. “Fame meets Titanic,” Phoebe said to herself as she pounded away. Her thoughts leaped ahead as she made plot decisions, invented villains, created the ferns and bamboo groves of her island, foreshadowed the last several plot twists without which her thriller wouldn’t thrill. Phoebe was humming.
She didn’t notice the bevy of muses present. The frog and the bee were playing cribbage in a corner, occasionally exclaiming things like “Fifteen for two, fifteen for four, and a pair for six!” Melanie Caterpillar was nibbling on a leaf she must have brought in from outside, there being no flora in Phoebe’s room. Harold Spider was reading a musty old book that Phoebe had purchased at a library book sale, a collection of travel anecdotes by famous writers. Other muses came and went, some leaving to do their laundry.
Phoebe had been writing for almost an hour when a serious doubt crossed her mind. “This is mere ENTERTAINMENT!” she heard herself exclaim. “Where’s the depth? Where’s the BEEF?”
The muses stopped what they were doing. This was the kind of thought that could stop a novel for a month or a lifetime. They held their breath. Suddenly Phoebe laughed. “But a young girl is entitled to write one entertainment. I can write Crime and Punishment when I’m fifteen or sixteen!”
The muses sighed. Crisis over!
Fifteen minutes later, after she’d mangled a sentence, Phoebe exclaimed, “What pitiful prose!” Her faced turned pruney. She reread her morning’s work and wanted to vomit. “Bad writing everywhere!” she cried. “No power! No resonance! I have been BORING!”
This was worse than the previous crisis. The muses waited nervously. But Phoebe laughed her accusation away. “Get real, girl! Everybody knows that writing is rewriting!”
Phoebe resumed her wild typing. The phone rang. The muses would have liked her not to answer, but they understood that for most people not answering the phone was quite impossible. Phoebe grabbed her portable phone.
“Hello!”
It was Wanda. “Will you come shopping with me at the mall? I have to buy—”
“Sorry! I’m working on my novel today! See you on Monday!”
She hung up unceremoniously.
A minute later the phone rang again. This time it was her writer friend Abigail, a real grown-up writer.
“We’re taking the boys on a picnic to Zaca Creek. Want to come? I made a pasta salad with green olives and pine nuts—”
“Sorry! I’m working on my novel today!”
There was a pause on the other end. “So am I! What was I thinking? Who has time to picnic?”
Phoebe felt a pang of guilt for having ruined the picnic for Rory and Raymond, Abigail’s sons. But of course that wasn’t her fault. People like Abigail had to decide for themselves when they would write, when they would picnic, and whether their children mattered. Phoebe returned to her furious clacking.
The phone rang again. Phoebe shook her head and almost didn’t answer it. But what if it happened to be a literary agent who, by magic, had become aware of Phoebe’s novel and its greatness? She couldn’t risk turning such a call over to voice mail. She hit the talk button.
“Hello!” cried a familiar voice. “This is Margot. Remember me? I’m the girl who was fired from dance class. The girl you wouldn’t join in the fountain. I’m out of the hospital now and I’d like to come by. I have quite a story to tell you!”
“I’m sorry, Margot. I’m working on my novel today and every other spare minute I’ve got.”
“I could help you with your novel! Let me come over. We could collaborate!”
“I’m sorry, Margot. Why don’t you write your own book?”
“Thanks for nothing!”
Margot hung up. Phoebe shook her head. She didn’t understand Margot’s mania, for which the poor girl had been hospitalized. Her own mild mania was clearly a cat of another stripe, just passion and excitement raring to go. Without giving Margot another thought, she returned to the cruise ship ballroom where her all-girl band was playing its last killer concert.
Unbelievably, the phone rang a fourth time. This time Phoebe answered angrily.
“Hello!”
“Is Mr. or Mrs. Barlow there?”
“They’re not! Can I take a message?”
“Maybe you’re able to make decisions about refinancing your home mortgage? Because rates have never been lower—”
“Mortgage rates were MUCH lower right after World War II,” Phoebe interrupted, as she had done a paper on the subject for history class. “And no, I am not able to make such decisions. And I really must go!”
Phoebe tried returning to her novel. But suddenly nothing was there. She squinched her face up and tried to picture her ballroom scene. Suddenly Harold Spider sneezed.
“Musty book I’m reading,” Harold Spider apologized. “Mold.”
“Thank you very much!” Phoebe cried. “I’m trying to concentrate! What kind of muse are you, sneezing when a person is thinking!”
“Sorry,” Harold Spider said. He sneezed three more times and apologized three more times.
“Wonderful!” Phoebe cried. “My concentration is broken. My spirit is broken. Plus I’m hungry!”
“A little sneezing—” Harold Spider began.
Phoebe crumpled onto her beanbag chair. She sat there, arms and legs akimbo, for several seconds. Then she popped up. “Well!” she exclaimed. “I had a glorious start to this novel-writing day and a very ignominious finish. Should I call this a good day or a bad day?”
The muses waited anxiously.
“I’ll make myself a snack and then decide,” Phoebe said. She had a sudden thought. “Creating is one emotional roller coaster! Who knew?”
No one—not muse, man, or beast—could have said whether Phoebe would return to her novel that day, that week, or ever. A black cloud scudded over Gold Strike but the sun beat it away. Another black cloud scudded by. So it would be until the end of time. Novels would commence; some would be finished; many would not. Phoebe made herself a snack plate of baby carrots and golden raisins and listened to loud music through her headphones.
LESSON 34
There will always be interruptions. How will you handle them?