When the voices tell you that you screwed up.

On Saturday my two week turned two month re-write project became complete. And if there is one thing I learned from the experience is that if the voices are still going after the story is done it's because of two reasons: there may be another story there, or I did something wrong.

Seeing as how this was a prequel, I couldn't possibly see it going anywhere else. This is what prompted me to dive back into so soon after the original completion (Originally finished in December, I started re-writes in January).

It didn't take me very long to realize I made one ginormous mess of the thing, which is sad, because the characters were some of my favorite creations. Not only did I not do their earlier story justice, but I may have screwed up their personalities a little too.

 Was the guy a little player-esque back in the day? Yeah, but that didn't mean I had to turn him into the biggest, egotistical man-whore that walked the (fictional) earth. Was she a little shy and quiet? Sure, but not to the point that she would have been impossible to engage. And I could have kicked myself for how many gaps and holes I'd put in their lives. Needless to say, it's clear now how the whole thing took me a little longer than two weeks to complete.

In the end, I've add more words than I deleted. The original word count was around 120 000, the new version is 193 835 words. I've removed entire story lines, characters, and replaced them with others that fit better. The whole original ending, which was emotional and I liked a lot, became something entirely different and fair more true to the original story and far more satisfying.

The voices of the characters aren't in my head anymore, and I honestly feel like I can now truly say their story is over. It's nice, it makes me feel all warm and fuzzy inside, and the best part is I learned something. Instead of trying too hard to make it a continuation of a story, I needed to let it breathe and become its own entity.

And, when I will undoubtedly have a recurrence of some form, I just have to remember something one of my favorite musicians, Matt Nathanson, said: "If I fuck it up, it's cool. That's art."