I want to draw your attention to this short passage from the epilogue to A Good Man…
“I went through a lot that first year at university. It changed me. So by the time we met, I was a different person than I was at the start of that year. I wasn’t a nice person when I got back from America. I hurt people that cared about me. I made some bad choices. And I got worse before I got better.” I chuckled. “Hey, maybe you might not have hated me so much the first time we met if things had been different.”
“I didn’t hate you.”
I gave her a questioning look.
“Okay, I did hate you. But it wasn’t so much you as your gender. If you see what I mean. I wasn’t big on men at the time. You know, what with…”
It’s the part after I Chuckled that I want to talk about today.
This is a conversation between protagonist Paul and this (at this point unnamed) wife which takes place in “the future” about the time they first met.
A Wounded Heart is primarily about that time and some 36,000 words into writing the first draft, I’ve now introduced the character who will ultimately become Paul’s wife.
And she doesn’t like him.
I’ve not revealed why she hates him at this point, but it’s quite clear that she doesn’t. And now all I have to do is write the one-eighty change in their relationship. So, I’m asking myself a few questions
- How long does she continue to hate him?
- Why does she hate him?
- How does he react to her hating him?
- What does he do (if anything) to change her mind?
I’ll happily admit, I think I’m really looking forward to the next one hundred thousand words or so.
