Which I am even now thinking is overly-ambitious to be written in a month, but I'll see where it gets me.
Reason number one why it's so ambitious is that it has four narrators. Now, let me explain something: in the past, using multiple narrators has been an excellent way to move a story along and avoid writer's block. If one person's tale isn't pulling me in, I can switch to another person's. In my 2005 project Glimpse, for example, I had two narrators, Fiona and Lucy, both of them seniors in high school. They were not-especially-friendly Bekanner whose stories sometimes intertwined, but most often did not. So working on one of their stories did not mean having to deal with the other one's drama. This also worked in a 2006 story that I can't remember the name of--four different stories happening at four different times, in a few different worlds. If I didn't like writing about Brooke's circa-2005 romantic triangle, I could switch to Georgia's circa-2002 sexual awakening/battle training, or Oji's circa-2000 tragic love story/rebellion, or Cara's circa-2008...whatever. All four girls knew each other--in 2008. But not in a few of the narratives, particularly Oji's. (And hers is the one I'd like to return to the most. Lesbian love affair in a different world, on the backdrop of a revolution. Oji's full name, by the way--Ojidiliji Sipfasutepo. OH-shee-dill-EE-shee SIP-fass-OO-tepp-oh)
For this one...
We've got Joanna Maarkuvi, who's basically me (see the Sami last name?). Pro-choice escort. Doing what she believes in, fighting the good fight, becoming more and more political as the days go by. Unlike me, she's getting more than her fair share of fallout from it on-campus, including having some rumors spread about her personal life.
Patrice Dannenmayer, the teenage daughter of an evengelical anti-choice protester. Her brother Marcus attends the same school as Joanna, and they were on opposing sides of an editorial feud the year before this is set.* Extremely indoctrinated into the abstinence-only lifestyle, but beginning to question it.
Carlos Flores, a gay male nurse at an abortion clinic.** Carlos is notoriously unlucky in love, which has pushed him into workaholic mode. Then he meets the man of his dreams, without realizing it for a while. (Carlos is into more thin, feminine men, the other dude, Dixon, is a bit of a bear.) Anyway, he's a very caring person, and also very political, and likely to piss off the antis.
Danasha Solomon, a computer nerd/community college student who falls in love with a southern Poli Sci student at Case who is canvassing the neighbourhoods to get people to vote for Barack Obama. She ends up getting pregnant after they've been together for a few months, she decides to keep the baby, they decide to get married eventually, and then in her fifth month she discovers that complications with her diabetes will prevent her from carrying the baby to term.***
And yep, Carlos is Latino and Danasha is black, and this isn't a "token" thing as much as it is that Cleveland is a somewhat diverse city. Writing a Cleveland-centered story about four white people would be very boring and not true-to-life. So we've got a white person, a white/Sami person, a black person, and a Latino person.
*I was actually involved in such a feud last year, but there have been no repercussions and furthermore I have no idea what the dude's family was like, it's just easier to combine characters.
**I'm well aware that "gay male nurse" is a bit of a stereotype of both gay men and male nurses, however:
- I wanted a male narrator, because dude-voice is very fun for me.
- I love Bikini Kill's song 'RIP,' and I wanted to use the song as one of the bases for this story. There therefore needs to be a gay man. And he needs to be in a dangerous position. And yes, he will die.
***And yes, Danasha is based on what I think the woman in my poem 'To the Woman Whose Name I Do Not Know' might be like. Here's the poem:
To the Woman Whose Name I Don’t Know
Out of all the stories
from four days ago
and three weeks ago
two chilly sunny mornings
over in those East Cleveland Parking Lots
it’s hers that’s sticking to me.
Roughly my age and exactly my height
skin the color of almond shells,
with a pink scarf on her head,
and a hospital gown
covering her slightly rounded belly,
a cigarette held between her lips
possibly to relieve the stress
that, looking back, must have been
a constant part of her life.
She sneered at the officious mob.
"I would love to have this baby,"
she said, "but it's a major
health risk."
And as I looked again at her stomach
I saw her last few months,
which she probably spent saving money
to buy the usual strollers,
onesies, blankets, and bottles,
the things all infants need
only to be told, probably during a routine doctor’s visit
“you can’t use them, not now.”
Yet to the men on the sidewalk,
and the mocking politician on TV,
she was still some demon harlot
as she did what none of them ever could.
I think back to her
and receive both sadness and anger.
(October 15, 2008)
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