The Kids Have Grown Up

I finished the sequel two days ago, the day after my last post. i had honestly thought i had maybe two more days of work, but it was winding down quickly. And even though i came home early from work before i could hit the end i still sat down here at home and wrote the final scene. The End, just as i'd promised.

And i'm stunned at how completely shut out of the story i am now. It used to be i'd spend the time waiting for sleep, or waiting for a red light, or washing my hair in the shower to break things down and work them over. If ever i was idle my mind was not. it was off in those other worlds working up a sweat. I did not expect to be completely locked out once it was finished. i can't even open the door.

I shouldn't really be surprised. This happened with both Shade and Shadow and the Third Bed. I can go back and clarify my ideas, fix my grammar and spelling, move a paragraph around. But i cannot change anything. I cannot change what Svanir or the Foxen do to the girls. I could not for all the money the world give proper names to the him and her who love each other so. i'm locked out. those things are now beyond any control i ever had.

I suppose it's good for that, at least. my prediction that i could edit once i had it anchored seems to be true. It's just so strange to be unable to visit those places anymore. Last time i said it had taken up four years of my life, but that's not quite right. I came up with the main characters of the first two stories in middle school. Over half of my life has been spent writing their adventures and lurking in their strange and wonderful universe. I've known most of them since their own childhoods and those i met as adults are no less real.

At times over the years i've wondered which character in that story i am. I know that i'm a little bit of everything. Anka's my tomboyishness, Carrie/Jo has my curly hair. Loki is my reasonablness and Sol that grumpy brooding part. Both Nesris and Anka posess my fear of parenthood and Carrie/Jo is my love of it. it wasn't until i wrote some lines near the end that i realized who i'd been this whole time. I'm Milah. Though she only really appears in the Monstroscity (with a cameo in the prequel and Daniel talks with a imaginative version of her in the spaceship story) her actions are felt throughout the whole epic.

she set these events in motion in order to reach the conclusion.

i set these events in motion. and now it seems my children have grown up.