New Story Idea:

I have been working on my book lately.  It's slow going, but I'm steadily make progress. My muse is a kinda a dick.  She often gives me great inspiration at the most inopportune time, or in the wrong direction. Suddenly I am inundated with all sorts of ideas, but none that fit into my current work. See? Dick!

She's in prime form today.  I been listening to a playlist that someone named Obsession/Possession, while doing my day job and suddenly, BAM! Idea!  The words came spilling forth, like I was channelling a spirit. I'm going to put this below, for you to preview. I have no idea where she's guiding me with this, which is often the case.  I also want to reiterate that the following is a character speaking and not my inner, rambling, dialogue.  I think this character is borderline sociopath, which, rest assured, I am not.

I created this blog to post my work, in it's different stages.  I have not done so to date. Please remember that this is not even first draft, but merely a genesis of a story.

Obsession starts small. You notice him at work, at a get together, or in school. Sometimes he's the barista at your favorite coffee shop, the neighbor boy, often he is a complete stranger you spotted on the bus. He's cute, or stunningly handsome. Sometimes it's not even about his looks, it's about his hands, or the timber of his voice...or even...his laugh. Before social media, you had to work to find out more about him. You made excuses to sit near him, never close, or with him, but near enough to overhear bits of information that you could put in that mental file cabinet, a little drawer that belonged to only him.

Like a social engineer, you have done your research to optimize success in constructing the best possible circumstances to eventually become part of his inner social circle. It's not even about sealing the deal romantically, although this option would not be rejected, but it's more about being close to him, becoming important to him. Close, but at a distance. Because too close can ruin the fantasy. That's what it is really about, the fantasy.

If you could have posters made up, you have him plastered all over your wall, like you would a favorite actor or singer. Instead, you have a scrapbook filled with photos, doodles with Mrs. and his last name, book ending your first name. You save napkins with silly drawings he made, the drink stirs from the first drink he bought you, a lock of his hair that you snagged after his last trim.

As you age, you add to your recon, it's no longer just the scrap book or souvenirs, but it's now a hidden file on your computer, filled with every possible piece of information you can gather on him. Every picture he has put up on social media. Pictures you creepily took while he was sleeping. You become an expert on him. You memorize every aspect about him, right down to the way his lip curves up on one side, in that slightly crooked smile that your find so damn endearing. You know him better than he knows himself.

You anticipate his needs and stealthy become someone he relies on, never realizing that he has been carefully maneuvered to do so. You become his best friend, his confident, his #1 cheerleader, his confessor, his safe place. And it's only after accomplishing this, that you finally feel secure. That is, until some other female becomes a perceived threat to your ranking in his life. It doesn't have to be a girlfriend, a lover, or his wife. It can be his mother, a sister, or a cousin. Sometimes, it's just another friend, male or female, it matters not. They've upset your applecart and then it all starts to unravel. Your insecurities start to show. You become jealous, petty, and desperate to re-establish the status quo. But this only shines a spotlight on the real freak within. The crazy one, the obsessive, the stalker and finally he sees past the mask, past the dog and pony show, to see the real you that that lies beneath, and disgusted, he leaves...

This has been my pattern. This is the only way I know to love. In my desperation to be important in someone's life, I construct artificial relationships, never allowing anyone to love the real me, only the manufactured me, the me that in the end, is always rejected. I want to change. I want to be loved. I just wish I knew how to stop. Is it even possible to stop this pattern now? Where do I even start? Do I even know who I really am anymore?  

Creepy, huh? I would like to think that this will be a story about redemption, but I go where the characters take me.  Who knows what path they may take me down.  Wish me luck.  And if I start to act kinda dark, remind me to sit under my phototherapy lamp.  That usually brings me back to my usual sunny self.  Namaste.