WHEN THE MUSE STRIKES
(a fiction by Cella)
Last night, something very strange happened. It had to have been some sort of daydream or fantasy - I know I was awake - or was I? If it was a daydream, why did it feel so real?
Getting the third story in my series written was difficult to say the least. I had experienced writer's block before, but this spell lasted entirely too long. The storyline was there, but I just couldn't get the dialogue written. But something happened last night that changed everything. Something amazing. Something beyond amazing.
I wrote for hours. I wrote the entire night! I not only wrote scenes, but entire sequences. I couldn't type the story fast enough.
But that wasn't the half of it. How weird is it for me to tell you that...I had help. Well, I almost don't want to call it "help," because it was more like... Oh, Lord, you're gonna think I'm nuts.
There was this...presence...with me. Always behind me. It whispered to me, in my right ear. At first, I thought it was just that wonderful, sudden inspiration finally getting me over the hurdle. In the back of my mind, I dismissed "the presence" as an overactive imagination run amok; I was just so grateful to finally make progress that I didn't care what it was.
But...
I think nearly two hours had passed. It was late; I was tired; I knew I needed to get some sleep. I sat back in my chair and was just about to call it a night when...
You're not going to believe me!
I felt...an arm...wrap firmly across my chest, holding me to the back of the chair. It scared me; I thought burglar until I noticed that I couldn't actually see the arm. Suddenly, the presence made itself known.
"I'm not done with you yet," it said. "We have all night."
I swear I felt a sensation of...warm breath against my neck; it sent a shiver up my spine. I set my fingers back on the keyboard and its grip loosened, then the whispers picked up where they left off. The next thing I remember is sunlight coming through my windows. It was morning. I had fallen asleep at my desk.
The experience was at once thrilling and chilling, and strangely enough, exhausted as I was, it left me with a desire for more.
How can anyone not think me lunatic after telling such a story? I can't help but wonder if this was the way Van Gogh felt while he painted his masterpieces. Was it the “madness” one so often hears about that arises from extraordinarily creative minds, that makes the creator's heart soar and yet feel tortured? But, how can that happen to me? I'm just a plain-jane who writes little stories when “The Muse” strikes. I'm nobody special.
Or maybe. Oh, God. Maybe it was him. Maybe it was my Muse – that shadowy, auburn-haired figure of my fantasy that inspires me to write. The one who visits only when it so pleases him. The one I beg to come to me when I have writer's block. Maybe he realized I was desperate - more desperate than usual - more desperate than I had ever been. I've had so little inspiration for such a long time, and then this happens?
Wait a minute. Why do I suddenly get the feeling that he's been letting me suffer alone all this time; letting me struggle for every word. Could it be that my Muse enjoys my suffering? Enjoys my frustration? Lives to hear me beg? And just when there's nothing left of me, he...quite literally...spends the night and gives me what I need? Gratifies himself once in my suffering, then once again in my satisfaction?
Oh, holy. I just remembered something. When the “arm” finally released me, I rested my head on the desk. Before I fell asleep where I sat, I heard a faint sound in the room. It sounded like...giggling. And then, there was one last, warm whisper in my ear.
“You're welcome.”
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~Posted 12.9.2005~
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