This novel, my new work in progress, was not the original choice to fill this space on Tuesday’s NOVEL WRITING posts. It is not like novels I have written before. It will be longer, deeper, and probably more controversial. It will also probably not be a stand-alone story/ It will be deeply intertwined with When the Captain Came Calling, Snow Babies, and Sing Sad Songs, my previous Valerie-Clarke novels. The Cantos will not be short and will be titled with Classical music. An emphasis will be placed on thematic development and character development. And I may not do more than a few Cantos here.
Prelude and Opening Movement
Just because you cannot see someone knocking on your front door anymore, it doesn’t mean they are totally gone from your life. In fact, sometimes the most important people in your life are the ones that you can’t touch anymore… the ones who don’t sit down at the dinner table with you anymore… the ones you can’t talk to and have them actually give you an answer anymore… the ones who will never actually kiss you ever again.
That’s why Valerie Clarke was crying in her bedroom. It was why she was awake with her eyes closed early into the wee hours of the morning. It was also why she hadn’t really been aware when the racing thoughts and weepy sighs turned directly into a conversation with her angel. It was as if Michel Volant was a part of her every-day living world.
“Why are you crying, Mon Cher? What solace can I give to thee?”
He flapped his large white wings only once, and the swirl of cool night air helped draw away some of the heat on her face because she had been crying, and cooled her body down just enough to drain away the tightness and stress.
“Because they’re all gone, Michel. I have nobody left.”
“Who has gone? You mean Mary and Pidney because they have gone to College in Cedar Rapids?”
“Yes, my two best friends from high school are gone far away. But not just them.”
“Danny Murphy because he has fallen in love with the Bates girl?”
“Yes. He was never my boyfriend. But he made me laugh. And he doesn’t have time for me anymore because of Carla. He’s deeply in love with her, and won’t risk making her jealous. I had no closer friend when I was twelve and he was thirteen.”
“But surely there are others…”
“No. Really, there are not.”
“You mean?”
“You I know. But…” Valerie’s eyes were open, but seeing only the darkness of the bedroom. “I was in love with him too. And he was… he never got to… Oh! I can’t even say it.”
“But I was him and he was me… for a time. So, I know he was deeply in love with you. But he had no choice. A hematoma in the brain that the doctors had missed…”
“And before him it was Tommy. He came with the blizzard, and left with…”
“But you knew he had a mission in life. He had to go. And perhaps he will return one day.”
“He never asked me if I would let him go. Or if I wanted to go with him. Now, I don’t even know if he’s still alive.”
“He is. That boy was made of iron. He was stronger than any adult you ever met. At least, stronger of heart.”
“And I have lost so many adults in my life too.”
“Your mother is still here. And Uncle Dash.”
“But there was Catbird.”
“The old hobo from the blizzard? The man with the crazy-quilt for a coat?”
“He was so wise and so good. But when the blizzard was over… he was gone.”
“And who else did you lose?”
“My cousin Stacy. I could talk to her about anything. And Uncle Dash drove her away because…”
“Because she fell in love with the Toad, Brom Brown.”
“Yes… And don’t forget Ray Zeffer. He simply disappeared. Remember how he saved me when the Voodoo Guy was tricking everybody?”
“The first boy who ever saw you naked.”
“Well, the first non-cousin boy.”
“And before that?”
Valerie’s eyes were blurry with tears. Did that mean this wasn’t a dream? Do you get blurry vision in a dream?
“Daddy…”
“Yes. You found him in the barn…”
“And the gun was still there…”
“Oh, Ma Belle, I’m sorry to make you remember.”
“Why did he do it? Was it because of something I did wrong? Was it my fault?”
“This I do not know. But I think not. And you must remember, the pain of losing someone is caused by their value to you. If it hurts that much…”
“…Then that’s how much you loved them. I know. The pain will never go away. He left me without ever even trying to tell me why he had to go.” She could say nothing more. Her whole mind was full of tears. She laid her head on his soft bare shoulder, and he folded his wing around her. And then she realized that she was awake. It was not so much a shoulder as it was a damp pillow. And she desperately needed him to come back. Her heart was broken. Even her angel had left her behind.
Can I do this? This is going to be the hardest novel to write that I have ever yet written. I had to write it to answer critical questions I have about my own life. But reading this through for the fifth time, I still had to stop and cry three times. It’s worse now that both my mother and father have died. But if I can mend Valerie’s broken heart before this story is over, then it will more than be worth it.
Catch a Falling Star 
Made-Up People
I often get criticized for talking to people who are basically invisible, probably imaginary, and definitely not real people, no matter what else they may be.
The unfinished cover picture is from the novel The Bicycle-Wheel Genius which I finished the final rewrite and edit for and then published in 2018. All of the characters in that book are fictional. Even though some of them strongly resemble the real people who inspired me to create them, they are fictional people doing fictional and sometimes impossible things. And yet, they are all people who I have lived with as walking, talking, fictional people for many years. Most of those people have been talking to me since the 1970’s. I know some of them far better than any of the real people who are a part of my life.
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These, of course, are only a few of my imaginary friends. Some I spend time with a lot. Some I haven’t seen or heard from in quite a while. And I do know they are not real people. Mandy is a cartoon panda bear, and Anneliese is a living gingerbread cookie. I do understand I made these people up in my stupid little head.
But it seems to me that the people in the world around us are really no less imaginary, ephemeral, and unreal. Look at the recently replaced Presidentumb of the Disunited States. He is an evil cartoon James Bond villain if there ever was one.
Animated cast of OUR CARTOON PRESIDENT. Photo: Courtesy of SHOWTIME
People in the real world create an imaginary person in their own stupid little heads, and pretend real hard that that imaginary person is really them in real life. And of course, nobody sees anybody else in the same way that they see themselves. Everybody thinks they are a somebody who is different from anybody else who thinks they are a somebody too, and really they are telling themselves, and each other, lies about who somebody really is, and it is all very confusing, and if you can follow this sentence, you must be a far better reader than I am a writer, because none of it really makes sense to me. I think everybody is imaginary in some sense of the word.
So, if you happen to see me talking to a big white rabbit-man who used to be a pet white rabbit, but got changed into a rabbit-man through futuristic genetic science and metal carrots, don’t panic and call the police. I am just talking to another fictional character from a book I finished writing. And why are you looking inside my head, anyway? There’s an awful lot of personal stuff going on in there. Of course, you only see that because I wrote about it in this essay. So it is not an invasion of privacy. It is just me writing down stuff I probably should keep in my own stupid little head. My bad.
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Tagged as characters, imagination, the Bicycle-Wheel Genius