Kyle Michel Sullivan's Blog: https://www.myirishnovel.com/, page 81

A bit more of the outline...

Continues from what I posted, yesterday.------ Awareness 
Brendan tears his jeans climbing the gate and the gravel drive sets rocks in his sandals, still he is overwhelmed by the wide residential street and sizes of the homes and cars. It's so peaceful and calm, it's like he's in a whole different universe. Aunt Mari returns and has to honk at him to make him move out of the driveway. 
She has a massive Chevy station wagon packed with groceries. He helps her take them inside and as she puts them away, she reminds Brendan he has a doctor's appointment. He had forgotten but then has a flash of a memory of a woman toying with him, at the office. He shakes it off and works on the iron to keep his mind busy.
Aunt Mari points out that he hasn't been listening to her as she talked to him, and he's apologetic. Then she reveals Eamonn was one of three men arrested for the bombing and others are unhappy with him, so he is not returning home anytime soon. If ever. Shaken, he passes out, hitting his head. Aunt Mari tends to him, then he goes up to change. He goes over what probably happened and comes to believe he's been set free from Derry and her past...and is ecstatic. He asks Aunt Mari to explain how she got him into the US, but she's reticent, making him wary. 
Houston
Brendan is taken to the doctor's appointment and is amazed at the size of Houston, the building going on, and how flat the land is. He is told, en route, his uncle contacted people in NORAID and Aunt Mari flew to Northern Ireland to bring him back to the States. He was hidden outside Strabane to give him time to heal before travel. His rucksack having clothes in it cushioned his fall enough so he was only injured -- broken arm and ribs, but also the beginning of a heart attack due to a congenital heart defect. The doctor he's going to see is a heart specialist. Father Jack drove them to the airport in Manchester, and he was brought into the US under his own passport. Ma was shocked he had it. He was under sedation when passing through Customs, and they were told he was simple. 
At the doctor's office, Brendan has flashes of an uncomfortable memory about the doctor's assistant, Carla. But she tends to his injury, gives him a tetanus shot in his butt. Then she points out he's torn his jeans, almost suggestively just before Dr. Gilbert comes in. The elderly man is so kindly Brendan tells him of his confusion over the memories and reveals more than he intended to about himself, including who Joanna was thanks to her name tattooed on his shoulder. Dr. Gilbert offers him a referral to a therapist, then says he is healing well and everything will get better. 
Dr. Gilbert leaves and Carla comes in to tell Brendan he can go, and to watch him pull on his shirt. She touches him, suggestively, and he grabs her hand, angry at how she could mess with him knowing his condition. She claims she meant nothing by it, but he wipes his fingers over her lipstick, then smears it on his face and gives Aunt Mari the hint something happened. She reveals Carla got him to answer question so she was the one who always handled him. Alone. He knows she did something to him and hates the woman...but wonders if he wants to see her, again. 
Catch Up  
Brendan reads letters from Mairead about how rough things are in Derry. Ma and Rhuari were arrested for a short while. Eamonn was tried under the Special Powers Act and sent to prison for 20 years. But Colm and Danny have not been touched. Ma is getting a phone, thanks to Mairead, and Mai is happy her family lives in a forward-thinking town like Toronto...and is about to have child #4. 
Brendan starts doing repairs around the house...and then for the neighbor's housekeepers and gardeners. He learns Uncle Sean has had visitors from Ireland, once of whom was Da's brother. He can find out nothing more and Aunt Mari is tight with information now. But Brendan overhears them discussing a position at a bar Uncle Sean just bought, called The Colonel's, and asks if he can take it. He's paid under the table to restock, keep the place clean and, since he cleans up the kitchen in the back, cook as need be. Three nights a week for $20 a night. 
He gets along with Todd, the bartender, who gives him a ride home, buys him a beer and lets him smoke some of his pot. The main waitress is Raquel (Rocky), who is all business and whom he has trouble understanding thanks to her twang; a second waitress is three nights a week, Lorraine, but her drawl is easier . Then Brendan finds out Uncle Sean has plans for a row of shops next to the bar, and he feels settled enough to wonder if he might be able to take one over as his own repair shop...even though he's still just 17.

Up to date...

Some of the outline for APoS - New World For Old --

-----

Rebirth

Brendan slowly emerges from a stupor. He is at an upstairs window and a half-eaten sandwich is on the sill. He does not recognize where he is or understand why everything is so different from Derry. Memories crash in on him and send him into a painful panic mode. He has a mantra to calm himself and has to use it, over and over, then his mood grows angry and he destroys a line of ants that were taking away the remains of his sandwich. 

He realizes he is in the attic of a house. Below are the back yard, pool, pool house, and a separate garage. He focuses enough to go into the bathroom and recalls being tended to by a couple of men. Looks in a mirror to find his hair cropped close, his beard patchy and himself haggard. Overwhelmed, he collapses. 

Aunt Mari finds him, takes him back to his bed and lets him know he was brought to her house in Houston. He has been in an akinetic catatonic state. Hit with memories, he realizes Joanna is dead and now food for ants...and passes out. 

Rejoining 

Brendan wakes late in the day. Lying in the bed, he forgets where he is, for a moment, then hears voices and smells food and is very hungry. He makes himself get up and go to the bathroom to brush his teeth. It exhausts him, and the taste reminds him of Joanna kissing him at the circle fort. 

Wary, he quietly winds his way downstairs but is met near the bottom by his uncle Sean and the family dog, Angus. Brendan has a memory of Uncle Sean bathing and dressing him, and finds the man has a slow Texas way of speaking. He's taken to the family room to meet his cousins, Brandi and Bernadette, both around ten years of age and always arguing. He remembers them complaining about his crying, and recalls a son named Scott, who helped Uncle Sean.

Brendan learns he was brought to Houston in late October, and it is now April, 1973. More memories jolt him until Scott returns with a friend, Jeremy, both with a hint of pot's aroma on them. Jeremy leaves and dinner is served. The girls mess with Brendan by claiming to be each other. Irritated, he snaps at them that he's mad as a march hare so be careful. They grow quiet. He's given a small amount of food on his plate due to not having been eating much, told he has a doctor's appointment in 10 days, accepts what has happened and says a prayer for those long dead.

Moving On

Brendan stays in his new room, clinging to memories while assimilating into the family and their relative wealth. Scott is off to University in Austin, soon. Brandi and Bernadette are 10 months apart, in age, and agree on nothing except that Brendan is now a carnival attraction, for their friends. Brendan calls them the B-girls and is wary of them. Aunt Mari runs the house and refuses a maid. Uncle Sean owns three Irish bars in town that are very successful and is considering buying a fourth. Jeremy is like a second son and is headed for a kibbutz in Israel, for a year. The B-Girls think he and Brendan look like brothers.

Brendan reads, which helps make the slashes of memory fewer and farther between. He is always in pajama bottoms, but one day he is drawn outside to help Uncle Sean work on his old Volvo. It won't start, until Brendan sees the issue and gets it going, surprising the man. Ma had never told them he could fix things. Brendan tells him, "She thinks me simple." Then he heads back into the house.

He fixes a sandwich, amazed at the wealth of food in the fridge, then naps. Finally he showers and dresses in some of Scott's old clothes. He explores the house and then the back yard, where he finds an iron Aunt Mari was throwing out. He plans to fix it then hears a voice comment on old habits but no one is around and realizes he was talking to himself. He wants to look around the front of the house but the driveway gate is closed and the walkway gate has a lock. Nervous, he wants to back away but tells himself Joanna would not hesitate to climb it...so he does, still holding the iron.

Cut and destroy...

I dumped 4 pages of chapter six. There are questions that need answering, but Brendan doesn't want them answered yet, so I ain't gonna. His one real concern -- that he might have been responsible for Eamonn being jailed, along with two of his Chinas -- got tossed out while reading his sister's letters, so he just accepted the rest. 

His goal becomes reclaiming his life...starting over...and the best way to do that is by doing what he did in Derry -- fix things. Save money. Make plans later.

He's also found his best source of information about what Aunt Mari's family is up to is his young cousins, Brandi and Bernadette. They argue about the facts and exaggerate things...maybe. But thanks to them, he gets clues that his uncle is involved with NORAID in more ways than just sending them money, and also finds out Da might not have been an orphan but got cut off from his family for getting Brendan's mother pregnant before they were married. It being Ireland in 1950, that would be a big deal.

He finagles a part time job at a bar his uncle bought. Three nights a week, $15 a night, which is a bit over minimum wage, at the time, and he's paid under the table. It has a kitchen that isn't used, so he cleans it to where it's viable, his subconscious thought being as a place to hide if he ever needs to. He's making decisions half on instinct, now, with a lot of wariness thrown in.

Brendan keeps telling me, Let this part be messy. It works better for me, because my mind is in chaos. Gotta grant him that. I was being too neat and precise in how it was unfolding. Too explanatory. With a dollop of Hollywood still getting worked in.

Eventually, Brendan will realize Uncle Sean would never jeopardize his family or business by getting too involved in anything shady, but the man is capable of playing hardball and skirting the law. He has a good lawyer with contacts in both Austin and Washington DC, so it's best not to mess with him.

Meaning, of course, that Brendan does. Eventually. The little scamp.

Don't fuck with me, Brendan...

I spent the day working up a section of chapter 6 where Brendan reads letters his sister, Mairead, sent from Toronto, trying to catch up on what's been happening at home. He learns Eamon's been arrested and jailed under the Special Powers Act. He learns his youngest brother, Kieran who's six, is already chucking stones at British patrols. And he notices she never refers to him by name in any of the letters and it confuses him and it has confused me, as well.

If Brendan came into the country legally, there's no need to be cute about keeping him quiet. So did he or didn't he? I finally reached the point where I had no idea. I broke away and followed some of the GOP meltdown over electing a Speaker of the House, which is a real fiasco, and checked up on how Ukraine is doing against Russia's terrorism...and they are kicking Russia's ass. Then I came back to what I'd written and read some of it and it's nonsense.

And that little fuck is laughing at me. He led me into this ridiculous area that will now be cut and pasted out of the story and I'll go back to square one. A complete waste of time. Granted, this was going to be a big re-write on this chapter. It originally was where Brendan found out he was snuck into the country under a false name and no one knows where he is even as the British are looking for him and it's all gone by the wayside. Hell, it might be best if I just cut the full chapter.

But I liked some of it and wanted to work it in, which that bad boy don't give a shit about. My story; my telling. So listen, peasant. I guess this was his way of kicking me in the...pants. I'd had a glimmer of a thought of an idea that I should just dump the letter-reading but tossed it aside, thinking I could work it out. Apparently, that was unacceptable and lessons will be taught.

So I'm taking the rest of the evening off and getting back onto it, tomorrow. And away it goes.

Look who's not in control of what he's doing.

Cruelty bred not born...

Something Brendan has said to me -- something I will need to work into the story in some way, be it Book Two or, probably, Book Three -- is that evil is not banal, like Hannah Arendt famously claimed: 

“Evil comes from a failure to think. It defies thought for as soon as thought tries to engage itself with evil and examine the premises and principles from which it originates, it is frustrated because it finds nothing there. That is the banality of evil.”

It may be Everett who mentions that to him, and he dismisses it. He comes to see evil as common and childish and lazy, not tedious or trite, because he was living through it. He sees it not as a failure to think or engage in consideration of what evil is; it's just easier to be evil than good. Especially because far too often a society will define that which is evil for others as good for itself...and in truth we are all basically products of our society.

For example, what Russia is doing in Ukraine is, to most of us on the West, quite evil. Bombing homes and hospitals and schools to kill as many men, women and children as they can in their war. Not soldiers; civilians. But in Russia, it's considered great and good and they laugh about it. They do not believe the people of Ukraine are worthy of human consideration, which would make it hard as hell for anyone in Russia to say, "No this isn't right." The few who have got carried off to jail, straightaway. How do you fight that when even your church overtly supports the slaughter?

This is also what happened in Northern Ireland. Ian Paisley, a Presbyterian ministers, a man of God, howled for the death and destruction of Catholics, and even threatened any politician who disagreed with his radical attitude. He whipped up riots and attacks and was a large part of the reason thousands died during the troubles. There was no one similar on the Catholic side, but the Protestant majority felt it was right and good to bomb Catholic pubs and kill Catholic women and children. And then they were infuriated and horrified when the same was done to Protestants by one of the IRA's branches.

As Jean Renoir once said, Everybody has their good reasons. And that is truer today than it was in 1939 on the cusp of WW2, at the beginning of Germany's happy establishment of the Holocaust. It's like it's man's true nature...and Brendan senses it and slowly sees himself joining in with it.

That is what he did not want when he was in Derry, and he thinks being in Houston will let him just be who he wants to be...and slowly learns it will not.

Something's different...

...And I mean about me. Not sure why it's happened, just yet, but my attitude has shifted about APoS and I'm just letting it go as it goes. I'm not pushing or as worrying about getting it done as I was. I know there will be some intense changes through Books Two and Three, but what matters is Brendan seems to be letting me in more...seems almost to trust me not to fuck him over. Or let him fuck himself over. So it's working in a bit easier.
He's going to make mistakes and be a an asshole, sometimes; that's already established. He's both lost and focused as he rebuilds his life, if that makes any sense, but he can lean on me because I'm no longer freaked out about being exactly right in every detail.
I'd grown too focused on making sure everything was so correct, the people who'd lived through those times would think it was written by someone from the area...and that twisted me in knots. But suddenly that's gone and it's nice to know I can also trust myself, again.
Something I've finally noticed I did was tell Book One as if it's all coming from Brendan's head, so all that matters, really, is attitudes and phrases. He's not precise about anything in Derry because he's lived it his whole life. When he gets to Houston, it's all completely different and a bit scary, so he slips into more detail...but he's also fighting his way back to sanity and knowing his surroundings helps anchor him. And when he returns, the town is completely different even as enough of it is still the same, so it's disturbing to him.
But the change is not just with my writing. It's something more within me...and that's where I'm a bit unsure as to what's going on. The last few weeks have been a rollercoaster of emotion, for me, but it seems I've entered a long flat space of a breather and find I'm just not worried about people seeing things as I see them, or justifying myself to them.
I don't know if I'm putting this right. I was already at the point of blocking idiots on Twitter and Instagram and Tribel when they came at me with their bullshit. But that was only one of the stepping stones to this feeling I've got that my deepest wants and needs have changed.
I've enjoyed writing my gay erotica (which everyone but me calls porn) but now it's part of what I used to do. At the moment, I don't know that I will ever complete Blood Angel because it's locked into my wants, needs and desires of that past...and I'm headed down a different path.

When I'm done with APoS I'm returning to Dair's Window and writing about two men who find each other, lose each other through death, and work out a way to continue on despite that loss. In order to do that, I want to finish APoS this year. All three books. And get them set with a publisher. That is my only goal for 2023.
I know this post is a mess of thoughts and considerations, but I now know that it will all come together as it should, in the end. I know it will.

APoS settling in...

This is the part where Brendan is given an idea of how he got out of the country. It's the beginning of Chapter Five in New World For Old. Still a bit chatty, but workable, now...and sets up an issue for later in the story.

------

The city she drove me through was a tangled mass of homes, commercial buildings, wide car parks and massive streets. Aunt Mari pointed out everything she could as we went, but my head was pounding and the cloth with ice got paid more attention to. At least it had stopped the bleeding. 

I know we passed Rice University, and that it was across the road from a large, shabby park cut through by another boulevard. Behind us was the city center with its sudden office towers and cranes aiming to build even taller ones. Ahead of us was another mass of high-rises she referred to as the medical center, and I couldn't believe the size of it. Altnagelvin was a county clinic in comparison. But what struck me hardest was how flat the land was. Never-ending flat. Streets that went on forever and drove straight into nothingness. 

This is to be my new home? That, I was not yet so sure of. 

There was room enough in her barge of a car for me to lie flat in the rear seat, if I’d wanted, and it floated like we were riding on water. The seats were as fine as I’d ever sat in and the air conditioning blasted icy enough to give you a chill. 

Aunt Mari was not exactly forthcoming with the information, telling only enough to calm my questions. She thought. What she actually did was provide me with a path into understanding what had happened. 

To start, while she never said so, I figured my rucksack was still around my shoulder when I was dragged away and, in fact, it was the reason I was not more severely injured. For I hit that wall hard, breaking my left arm and three ribs, so it cushioned me, somewhat. I also had plenty of cuts and bruises but here's the stunner -- I was halfway into a heart attack. Colm striking me cold probably saved my life. 

The reason I know this happened? It was my passport used to take me out of the country. No need to mention the hundred-and-fifty pounds I'd also had; without question that wound up in someone else's pocket. 

I was taken to a safe house that had a doctor available, and despite arguments from others, I was attended to. Given a nitroglycerin tablet! Little bomber boy. And I was kept there to heal. Under medication because I was still close to hysterics, until I was finally nothing but numb. 

It was a passing comment Aunt Mari made that told me why I'd been given the opportunity to live and not be buried. 

"When Mairead called with the news," she said, "I had your uncle talk to some people." 

I'm sure my shock registered in my voice as I said, "He has contacts in PIRA?" 

"NORAID. Then I flew over, and when you were ready we were taken across by the ferry and down to Ringway to fly you here." 

"Taken?" 

"Father Jack drove us." 

Of course. Cannot avoid him, can we? "You had no problem with the army or customs or...?" 

"Not between your British passport and my American one. It was something of a shock to your mother that you had it. And she showed me your letter. Brendan, what did you think you were doing?" 

"Off to work on a ship. I had an offer." 

"Without a word till you were off?" 

"Seemed a good idea at the time. And I could've sent money home." 

"How? The way the British are being with the mail?" 

To be honest, I hadn't really thought about it beyond that. So I just shrugged. 

"Well, it's better that you're here. And I think I've talked your mother into opening a bank account so I can transfer money it. It's expensive and is reported, but if it's needed..." 

I nodded, which was a mistake. It made me feel a bit weak in the stomach. So I swallowed and said, "Ask Mr. O'Faelan or his missus about that. They have one with the savings...um...the Catholic, no, credit union...I can't think of the name..." And my head was back to pounding. 

"Is that the one set up by John Hume?" 

"Yeah. Yeah." 

"Father Jack mentioned them. He sent me their information and said he'd work with Bernadette on it." 

"Aunt Mari, it's been six month." 

She sighed and nodded, then said, "I know." 

Good ol' Ma. Won't be pushed into a thing she doesn't want to do, no matter how smart it might be, or helpful. And money should never be sent through the church, for they'd surely take their part. Something Ma seemed to finally understand. 

My head was back to merely hurting, so I asked, "When you brought me...I feel like I was...well, was drugged up the whole time?" 

"You were on sedatives. For the pain." 

That last sentence was said a bit too quickly for me not to understand it was just to let me know enough said about that. 

"So how'd you put me over?" I asked. "Coming into America?" 

"Told them you were simple." Then she cast me a wink. 

And that did shut me up. Details not needed. Just bringing the idiot child with me for a bit of a change. 

However, what all of this told me was, the Brits did not know I'd been caught in the blast. Perhaps not even that I was there. Which was a massive relief. They couldn't have used me to get to Eamonn. Something else must have happened and the bomb was their excuse. Obviously, Scott and the B-girls, as I now called them, had been filled in on none of it beyond I had suffered a shock that had brought on a heart condition, so I was here to let that be handled. In fact, the doctor we were off to see was a heart specialist who'd been treating me. But the divorce from my past now seemed to now be permanent and the smile on my face was not from relief, as I'm sure Aunt Mari supposed, but joy. Still there was one last thing needed to be known. 

"You said Eamonn's in jail," I said. "Do you know the names of the other two lads?" 

Aunt Mari sighed. "It was in one of Mairead's letters, but I paid it little mind." 

"May I read them?" 

"If you like." Again, said in a voice meant to silence me on the matter.

Still moving forward

 I made it through another chapter of APoS-New World For Old, as well as the outline. This one is where Brendan realizes he's been banned from returning to Derry...and is thrilled. It took a fair amount of reworking because this was the one where I'd worked up all the machinations used to sneak him into the US and hide him at his Aunt and Uncle's...but that's no longer valid. They just bring him in, under medication, and present him as simple. Meaning mentally deficient.

Research into getting a medical visa for him showed it would have to be done through a US Consulate, at the very least, and would require notes from the NHS and a physical by a doctor of their choice. So the hell with that. Also gone is him getting a new identity to be snuck in. He's still Brendan, who just winds up overstaying his visa by 8 years. 

Officially, he wouldn't have an issue departing the US when he does decide to leave or, probably, getting back into the UK. A guy I knew in Houston had a problem like that with his new wife. She had moved to Houston to be with him and overstayed her visa by a couple of years. When they finally got married, it was back in Newcastle-Upon-Tyne, where her family was. She slipped back into the UK, fine. They assumed once they had a marriage certificate she could come back with him, just as easy.

Nope. Took nearly a year of paperwork and investigation by the embassy in London and interviews out the wazoo for both of them before she was even granted a visa. After that, it took her five years to get a green card so she could legally work. Didn't stop her from working...but she couldn't get a Social Security number till she was legal. At least that's something Brendan doesn't need to worry about; he's not returning to the US.

But that's in Book Three, The Return...which is a bland subtitle. I gotta figure out something better.

Bad mood...

 Rough day. Headachy. Managed to get groceries but had to keep to the Kenmore area because Buffalo is still shut down. Made a peach cobbler to cheer me up since no-place in this pathetic town sells one...and it was okay, enough. I should have drained the canned peaches and covered the casserole dish for half the time it was cooking.

Think I'm gonna watch Glass Onion, again.

Tomorrow maybe I'll be better. Maybe. But I am feeling very cranky, right now. Very...unsure...

Writer gripes

Sometimes it's close to impossible for me to make myself sit down and just do the work on my stories that I know I need to do. Distractions pop up, like tweets about Ukraine and the latest GOP travesty (AKA: George Santos, who claimed to be Jewish but swears he only meant he's Jew-ish, or something dumb like that) and then I get going on tweeting and deciding to make a meatloaf...just crap stuff. So I'm lucky if I make it through a chapter a day.

Which I did, today. Chapter Three of APoS-New World For Old. That also went off on a tangent when Brendan discusses his two female cousins and how they harass him. They actually suggest he's not really part of the family because he looks more like Jeremy, their brother, Scott's Jewish best friend. I had to follow through to the end and found it actually added to Brendan's turmoil, at the time...so will probably keep it.

This brings the full story up to 110,000 words and that's before I get into the parts that need expanding. However, there will also be some cutting with the new direction the story is taking so it may not be too bad.

What's fun is, Brendan suddenly revealed he's never had a cheeseburger, which I hadn't realized. But Jeremy admits he doesn't keep kosher because he loves them too much, and promises to bring Bren one from Champs. He would just take Brendan there but Uncle Sean won't let him. First indication that the man is hiding something and doesn't want Brendan out and about.

Doesn't help that I've built up a near-headache and I seem to be diving deeper into a form of dyslexia. I keep reversing letters in words or flat out scramble-spelling them. Which may be old age or simple lack of focus. I haven't left my apartment since Friday, except to take out the trash. I'm fine with food and such, and don't really feel the need to go anywhere, but I am tired of cooking my own meals.