Once More, Toward the Light
Part 1: More than just a grade
It was the week of Thanksgiving 2020. The final assignments for my grad classes were due the following week. I resided in a college apartment in Morgantown, West Virginia, hellbent on finishing my short story, “The Light to Never Be Snuffed.”
After weeks of writing, workshopping with my peers on Zoom, and implementing final comments from my professor, I was stuck on the ending. Jack Grand’s spiral into madness just could not wrap up well. It is hard when you use ants as a plot device and very incompatible parents as the supporting cast.
As if in real-time, I felt resentment building with every line. This was just an assignment; a grade to receive. Granted, other stories I generated became published. Some—to this day even—have not been. Just rotting in my ‘Incomplete Stories’ folder. Would this ~6,000-word embellish a lit mag’s colophon? Or will it fester rent-free in my head for awhile?
The latter ruled supreme for the few days I was way. Up late on the first night, only to be awoken by a party. I was uninspired on day two. Agitation and apathy were tattooed on my skin. The hefty craft beers kept my brain groggy and my heart fluttery. The black characters on the white screen blurred together and gave me a migraine. Yet, I invested in coming here to finish the work, no matter how much I suffered.
On the third day, I swiftly performed the final readthrough. The spotty Wi-Fi worried me as I clicked, ‘Send.’ Once I received confirmation, I sighed deeply and felt all of my limbs tingle. I was hundreds of miles from home and virtually talking to no other human. I rejoiced in talking to myself, spewing positive affirmations to no one at all. Relaxation was on my mind henceforth.
I reopened Cherry by Nico Walker and completed it that afternoon. The day was still young, so I decided on a hike. I needed something grand, no pun intended. A few hours later, I was greeted with this scene. Somehow, I climbed all of this wearing old Nike trainers, in plummeting temperatures, and with steady rainfall on the ascent. Tired, wet, and sore, all of the words of Jack Grand washed off me. I was cleansed.
Weeks passed and an ‘A’ was achieved for the workshop. Registering my final semester and acquiring a new job, my life felt on the cusp of a new phase. I was taking life into my own hands, on my terms. I finally left that eponymous dead-end career and found one that aligned with my goals. The holidays gave me time to celebrate these milestones, too. Yet, the nagging sourness of Jack Grand haunted me. This character and his terrible life. The value of his sup-par finale was wrought with failure. Despite all the new changes before me, there was no escaping these feelings.
I could not leave Jack behind.
Once I graduated in May 2021, I was floating in a stew of ideas. The first iteration of “The Light to Never Be Snuffed” was calm—and a bit disjunctive—but not as intense as it could be. Jack Grand needed to suffer more. He is marginalized, but not impervious to struggle. Now, hold on. You may be saying, why, Josh, why? How can you continue torturing a broken child? Are you sick in the head?
It is not that I wished to do this. As with fiction, the characters and their environments transform on their own. It is just up to the author to guide them. Jack’s pitiful valleys needed counterbalancing with epic peaks. He deserved peace, not to be gaslit into psychosis and abandoned by his own flesh and blood. I promise you I’m not projecting here. The longer I waited, the more pressure built. And let me tell you, the relief valve was about to fail.
The next few months issued in radical changes for “The Light to Never Be Snuffed.” I obliterated the short story, picking up pieces that were vital to the characters and the plot. I gave settings a new paint job, birthed new characters, reimagined plot beats, and added a few Easter eggs. The desire to make a more cohesive story was there, and paragraph by paragraph, it welded together. The manuscript transformed into a novelette. Doubling in word count, and with much higher stakes, it was finally complete.
I could not believe that this was the story, sitting in me this whole time. My mind was illuminated. Begone grades, deadlines, and boisterous apartment ragers. I just needed a change in my reality to really uncover it. That little triumph of a story sat on a pedestal, until the fall season was well underway.
An interesting submission call presented itself. The theme was about the home. Vague at first, but it felt perfect. 85% of the novel takes place in a home. The main cast is a family. The word count minimum was achieved. A printed book and a meager advance was the icing on the cake. On the first anniversary of ‘The End,’ I clicked the Submit button once again.
And then the waiting began.
I will tell you one thing; the submission process was brutal. Major lit mags interested in long-form fiction? No thanks. The call that I was hoping would take it? Rejected. Well into the new year of 2022, I tried pitching it as a serial, hoping a daring literary mag would see the merit. The cold, dead winter morphed into the warm, lush spring. There was nothing but form rejections and the occasional ‘Good Luck’ that grew in my barren field of a spreadsheet.
This story, that I forged, then reforged like an ancient sword, was dull and rusty. The inspiration and excitement from months ago, was extinguished. The warming sun wasn’t welcome and I found myself often brooding in my darkened bedroom, thinking. Rejection was the catalyst and the byproduct.
I wish I could write Jack into my life. Buy him an ice cream sandwich and sit on my stoop. He would not understand this whole writing business. But he is familiar with losing. He gets frustrated with video games. Batteries are not cheap for his family, either. I’d let the ice cream drip onto the stoop; watch the ants congregate. “Just not our time, Jack-o,” I’d groan while rubbing his back. “I’ll buy you a Blizzard tomorrow.”
In June 2022, I drove out to the Wissahickon Trail in Philadelphia. I had an itch to hike again; another day trip to become one with the land. It was pointless to sit around and refresh my emails. The confines of my laptop needed a degree of separation from the confines of my laptop. I did have a goal in mind, thought. I desired to write little bits of the novella on pieces of paper. Leaving them around for people to find, or burying them in inconspicuous locations. I imagined Jack would enjoy the exercise.
Sweaty and fatigued under the early summer sun, I sat on a log to take a water break. Some people walked by me with dogs. I smiled and waved, placating a dog’s longing eyes with a head pat. With my phone briefly off airplane mode, I refreshed my emails. Typical messages from friends and memes ready to ingest. However, my email inbox contained just one message. And it ended up being the most important one in recent memory. I read the subject line once, then twice, just to verify that it was real. It was, so I read it aloud to no one at all.
“Acceptance and Contract The Light to Never be Snuffed”
I’m so excited to read your novella 👏👏👏