National Novel Writing Month...

Started on November 1st. I am taking part in it this year and have a goal of 50,000 words to write by November 30th. That means that I have to write an average of about 1,700 words a day. So far my grand total would therefore need to be 5,100. Well I wasn't so into writing on Saturday. So I'm not that far yet... I'm actually not even to two days worth of writing that much yet. But I'm getting really close. My total right now is 3,062 words. Yay me. Haha. So before I go to sleep tonight I have just under 350 words to write. I am confident that I will do so.

Anyway the point of this blog, other than introducing NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month, nanowrimo.org) is to show you a little bit of what I have been writing. I'm proud of it. It's just a prologue so you don't really get any real plot from it, but I think it's a good way to grab attention I think. I don't think I'll be posting the whole thing here, but if you're really interested I can send you what I have at the end of the month. So here it is:

Prologue

Come on Mike! Get up! Hurry, they're right behind us!" A tall and lanky red haired woman yelled to the dark haired man who was lying on the ground ten yards away from her. They were being chased by the police. They were in trouble. Together they had done something neither of them could ever have imagined and they were going to pay the price with their lives. Now they were on the run and Mike, the clumsy guy that he was, had fallen down. She ran back over to help him.

Mike was slowly getting to his feet. The woman grabbed his hand and pulled him up and forward. "Laura," Mike gasped. "They can't be that far behind us. I can't run anymore Laura. Maybe we can't get out of this." He was breathing heavily and limping as he ran. He figured he must have pulled a muscle in his right leg when he feel, the knees of his jeans were torn and the skin of his palms were scraped raw.

“We have to keep going Mike,” Laura, who was in much better shape, breathed. Her voice was not more than a whisper; it was as if she was trying to keep the brick walls on either side of the street from hearing them. “Giving up would here, now, would be giving up on our lives. I’m only nineteen Mike! I’m not ready to give up.”

Mike often thought that Laura was over dramatic, but of course an actor would be. Now though, he was sure she was speaking the truth. To stop running, to hand themselves over to the police would mean a lifetime in jail for both of them. He couldn’t deny that he did not want that for himself, but to say that he had what it took to run from the law would be the biggest lie anyone on the west coast had ever heard.

Suddenly it seemed as if there were a thousand noises around them. Police sirens and the roar of car engines were coming on their backs rapidly. Mike could also hear the voice and running steps of the police men who had begun chasing them on foot a quarter of an hour ago. ‘This is it.’ Mike thought, ‘we’re as good as dead now.’ He didn’t know why they were still running even. The cars would catch up to them any second, the men on foot not long after that, and then it would be suicide to keep going.

There was an ally just ahead of them and Laura pulled Mike’s arm as she turned into it. They flattened themselves against the wall and Mike thought that he might laugh if the situation wasn’t so serious. It was just like being in a movie. People always said not to trust movies because they were inaccurate but being chased by the cops was just like it was on the big screen, minus the helicopters.

They were both breathing heavily, their chests moving up and down faster than either could have ever imagined possible. They were safe. They had managed to find a hiding place where they could watch as the police ran right past them. Mike looked at Laura and saw the relief in her eyes. “I guess we won’t have to give up today, Laura. You were right. We did it.”

And they had… Almost. The cops were just about to go running past the ally when Mike’s watch alarm went off. Twelve o’clock midnight. It was an appropriate time, he thought, a great time to be caught. The dawn of the new day would see two criminals to jail, already the day was proving to be a safer one.

Laura’s eyes were squeezed shut as tight as they would go and tears were streaming from them. Mike was looking frantically around the ally for an escape. Laura had gotten them this far; it was his turn to make a move. Toward the end of the ally there was a door. He couldn’t be sure it went anywhere but he did know that if they got there fast enough the cops might just think that they had gone out the back, it was dark after all.

Mike shook Laura’s shoulder to get her attention. He pointed toward the door and watched as she looked from his face to wall he pointed at. She seemed to be confused for a moment before realization lit up her eyes. She nodded; all hope that they would live through the night had come back to her in a split second, making Mike feel very accomplished. He had managed to save her, or at least came up with a plan to do so.

At the same time they pushed off from the wall and sprinted toward the door. He could hear the police behind him but kept going anyway. “Come on, Mike.” Laura whispered, “We can do this!” They were only ten to fifteen yards from the door and getting closer with every second. ‘We can do this,’ Mike echoed in his head. ‘We are strong and we can do this.’

Laura reached the door slightly ahead of him and grasped the metal handle as if her life depended on it, which it did. She grabbed Mike’s hand with her free one before shoving the door open. One more second and it would be too late. They had to get out of sight now. She yanked him inside and slammed the door shut leaning against it with her eyes closed and trying to catch her breath.

Mike was sitting on the floor. He couldn’t quite tell what the room was because his head was swimming and he wasn’t really paying attention. He placed his palms flat against the ground on either side of him and found something that he had definitely not been expecting. Grass. His eyes flew to Laura at the door and found her looking around wide eyed and shocked. She was no longer against the door, but feeling it with her hands. It was wood. Not cold metal that it had been on the other side.

Mike looked to other side of himself and found that he had to squint because of the bright light. He shook his head slightly and looked around again. They were in what appeared to be a field that went on and on forever. Laura was leaning against the door of a small shack or a shed that looked more than abandoned, but not necessarily old.

“Where the hell are we?” Laura asked quietly. Mike had stood up and was coming to stand beside her.

“I have absolutely no idea.”

And on a side note: The October issue of the newspaper came out last week. I am very proud of it. My very favoritist twin did some art for the center page and it looks amazing. Plus I have two less than amazing articles. Woot!