When we get home, I retreat to my room. My mind is buzzing. It craves a cool, quiet, dark space. I take my hat off and call to Prim. Nothing happens.
I call again a little louder, “Prim?” The sound echos into the hat. Prim, prim, prim…
I tentatively reach my hand into the hat. It disappears into the darkness, finding nothing but air. I reach a little farther and a littler farther until the brim of the hat is up to my axilla. I wave my arm around in every direction, trying to find the edges. Emptiness.
When I’m about to give up, my hand brushes against something metallic. I grasp my fingers around a cold, rigid rod. When I pull it out of the hat, I examine it under the light. It’s the pen that Thomas left at the Cosmic Cafe. It twirls between the fingers, almost of its own accord. I tentatively uncap the pen, revealing a silvery nib shimmering with ink.
I pull out my journal, opening to the next blank page. Guilt chokes me. My last entry was dated over 10 days ago. Time slips through my fingers like water through a sieve. Though I’m tired and my head hurts, writers must write.
My inner critic sits front row center tonight, scoffing at every line. Ravena looks at me with obsidian eyes. She lets out a cackle that sound like bones splintering. “You have no plot.”
“I have a plot.”
“Prove it,” she mocks.
“I have a plot, but if I tell you now then that will spoil the story.”
“Humor me.”
“You tire me, Ravena. All in due time, you’re being impatient.”
“Sure, sure, can you just remind me where we left off? I seem to have forgotten.”
“We are at the part where we are introducing the main character. In this case, it’s a magician named Thomas. He finds an injured rabbit and hides her away in his hat.”
“Forgive me, I’m just waiting for the part where something interesting happen.”
“Life doesn’t have to be so dramatic. Sometimes it can just be playful with a lot of little joys.”
Ravena throws her head back and starts coughing. She opens her beak wide, exposing her gullet. She regurgitates a worm. “No one wants to read that. It’s boring.”
“That’s too bad because that’s my story. It’s a cozy novel about a magician with little worries.”
“Magic by any other name would be just as delusional.”
“The world could always use a little more magic. Now if you’ll excuse me, I’d like to continue on with my writing.”
“Yes, of course. Please proceed.” She yawns and pretends to look away, preening her feathers.
“Thank you,” I say. The pen hovers over the page, as I contemplate my next words. I search and search my mind for a thread of inspiration, and yet it is completely blank. I grip the pen so tight that a drop of ink falls onto the page, creating a growing smudge on an otherwise empty page. Like a black hole, my hopes and dreams of being a writer gets sucked into it.
Ravena looks at the splash of ink and cackles again. “Just as I suspected. Blot, no plot! Blot, no plot!” She caws.
“Are you going to do this all night?” I say, slamming my pen down, splattering more ink stains across the page. Bitterness and anger boils beneath my skin. I feel my eyes growing hot with tears. I know she’s right, but I’ll be damned to admit it.
“I’ll stop when you write better. Blot, no plot! Blot, no plot!”
“That’s it. Go! Get out of here!” I stand up and wave my hands towards the bird, scooting her towards the window. She hops across the table, puffing up her feathers and screeching in protest. I eventually force her out the window and slam it shut, making the glass rattle in its frame.
Slumping back in my chair, I let out of huff. With renewed determination I again set pen to page. Though my cursive scrawls and scratches across the paper, Ravena continues to taunt me from outside. Try as I might to ignore her, the incessant rapping of her beak against the windowpane drives me to near madness. I pretend I don’t notice her, and I press on, trudging my way down the page, line by line, for better or worse. I obsess over every word, trying to find the right rhythm, tone, and lyric. If memoirs are songs of the heart, then this one feels off beat and out of tune.
Eventually, the words stop. I cap my pen, close the notebook, and head to bed. Writing will be better tomorrow, I tell myself. Tomorrow is a new day. One that I’ve never seen before.
When I finally drift off to sleep, I dream of water — violent, intense dreams of the ocean. I witness a tsunami. I stand on the shoreline, and I see the wave coming from a distance. I run to the nearest building and climb to the roof. I watch others do the same, heading for higher ground. A few remain on the beach, preparing to surf the giant wave, apparently unafraid. It feels as if I’m not the only person having this dream tonight. It is as if everyone I see in my dream are other people asleep in their own beds, yet we all got pulled into the same current. The water raises higher and higher. It reaches the roof, and I have no place to go. I’m terrified, and all I can think to do is yell for help.
I wake up to the sound of me trying to scream, paralyzed to the bed. I am drenched in sweat. My heart rumbles and booms. I feel it pounding in my head. Lights flash in front my eyes, and spasms shoot down my neck. The pain makes me nauseous. I get out of bed and stumble to the kitchen for some seltzer and aspirin. It’s another night of thunderstorms and migraines.
Writer Body and Soul 