“The Frog Principal” 1: Don’t Look Down Draft

Several years ago, Krissie and Lani and I started talking about a new collaboration based on fairy tales called Fairy Tale Lies. We brainstormed and did some worldbuilding, but we were all swamped with other things, so while we kept talking about it off and on in e-mail and in Campfire, we didn’t do anything on the book.

But for the first time, I was caught by a world. I kept adding things, running it by them, shifting things, drawing maps, thinking of economies and customs and countries. I’d say, “Okay, this is an alternate history world and we’re going to set it in 1910, okay?” and they’d say, “Sure,” and go back to whatever they were doing. I’d say, “There are going to be mountains to the north, and we’re going to call them the Sleiping Mountains, okay?” Sure, sure, whatever. And eventually, I started to write. I couldn’t help it. The people were so marvelous and the voices were there. Among other things, I made a plan for a novel composed of chapters that were complete stories in and of themselves, like episodes in a TV show. One of them, “The Frog Principal,” was the third story in the book, but it introduced a new character, Petulia, the secondary heroine, who becomes entangled with the hero’s best friend, the secondary hero. The draft below was one of the pieces of that story that I wrote back then.

Then the voices went away and I just played with the world when I had a few minutes. I still loved all the characters but, hey, no voices, so I just THOUGHT about them for a couple of years. Then several weeks ago, I posted this long, self-indulgent post about the voices going away just to finally get it out of my head. And a couple of weeks later the voices started to come back.

I was cautiously happy. Hey, they could leave again. But I’d been obsessing about Petulia so I decided to go back and look at the first draft of her first scene. Result: Lots of juice, but generally awful like most of first drafts–too fast, too slick, too smart ass. So I pulled the keeper stuff from that draft and rewrote it and then rewrote it again and again and again …

When we did the “Cold Hearts” rewrite series, the scene the betas got was still pretty raw. This time, I’m putting up the original first don’t-look-down draft from several years ago so you can see where I started. Then tomorrow, I’ll put up my and the twentieth or so rewrite I did. At that point, it was solid enough that I could start poking at it with a stick, so on Thursday, I’ll post the final-rewrite-before-the-betas with the notes at the end, a rewrite, I might add, that vividly shows the dangers of overthinking. On Friday, the beta critiques go up with the latest rewrite, although the scene may go up in a second post that day because that would be a long entry.

This project is a big departure for me in some ways–different world, magic, etc.–and not in other ways–smart-ass characters and an oh-hell-not-you love story. No idea how my voice works with this much fantasy. But hey, comfort zone, moved out of. So here’s the first draft. Yes, I know it’s lousy, I know characters appear and disappear, I know some of the continuity is off. It’s the FIRST DRAFT.

Note: Geoffrey is Lani’s character, including and especially the “I like to give back” line and the bit about talking to school kids. I’m just borrowing him for this scene.

Second Note: This is the first scene of this story, but the story is the third chapter in the book. Even though some of these characters have been introduced before, this has to stand on its own.

“The Frog Principle”, Scene One, Draft One

Petulia smiled at the EMT and checked to make sure the frog was still there.

“Take your time,” the EMT said. The patch on his uniform said “Tank” which was odd since he was built like a blond drinking straw, but Petulia was in no position to judge his name or the fact that he’d brought his pet chicken along to an emergency call. “Just give us the basics.”

“He kissed me and then he turned into a frog.”

Tank nodded and pointed to the flagstone edge of the spring. “That frog?”

“Yes,” Petulia said. “His name is Colin.”

“So you kissed him and–”

“No, he kissed me.”

“Did that upset you?”

“No, I was all for it,” Petulia said. “I participated. I just thought you’d want me to be accurate. He leaned in and kissed me, and I kissed him back and then he wasn’t there and I looked around and he was gone and there was the frog.”

“Uh huh. And how do you know this frog is, uh, Colin?”

“It looks like him.” Petulia looked down at the frog again. He looked green and angry but in the world of frogs, he was probably hot. Colin had been. “I mean, he was very good-looking, not frog-like at all, but this frog has the same vibe, you know?”

“Sure,” Tank said.

The chicken, who had been standing next to Tank, toddled over to the stone edge and bent to look at the frog.

“He’s not going to eat him, is he?” Petulia said.

The chicken looked up at her and said, “Oh, please.”

Petulia swallowed. “The chicken talks,” she said to Tank.

“He’s not really a chicken,” Tank said. “Geoffrey, is it human?”

“Definitely,” Geoffrey chirped. “And it stinks of magic. Not Valden. Cold magic. The mountains maybe.”

“So,” Tank said to Petulia. “Magic.”

“I don’t know anything about magic.” Petulia took a step back. “Or chickens. I was at a party, and it started to get dark, and my step-mother doesn’t like me out at night, so I excused myself to walk home, and Colin asked if he could walk me, and I said yes, and then he wanted to come inside but I knew my stepmother wouldn’t like it, so I brought him into the garden and he kissed me and then he turned into a frog. That’s it, that’s all I know.”

“Stepmother,” Tank said, exchanging knowing glances with Geoffrey.

“What do you mean he’s not a chicken,” Petulia whispered to Tank.

“I’m right here,” Geoffrey said.

“He’s an EMT,” Tank said. “Tried to defuse an old magic dump, things went sideways, and now he looks like a chicken. But it’s still Geoffrey.”

“Damn straight,” Geoffrey said.

“You’re handling it very well,” Petulia said to the chicken.

“If life gives you lemons,” Geoffrey said. “Gives me a chance to give back to the community. I talk to school kids, tell them not to mess with magic, if they find any old dumps, call the EMTS, they don’t want to end up like me.”

“That’s wonderful,” Petulia said. “I hope Colin takes being a frog that well.” She remembered Colin, tall, dark, handsome, arrogant. “Although I doubt it.”

“We’ll see what we can do,” Geoffrey said and then looked around. “Where did he go?”

Petulia looked at the edge of the spring: nothing but naked stone. “Colin?” she called and the name echoed through the twilight of the garden.

“About your stepmother,” Tank said. “Would she have a reason to stop your romance?”

“No, she’s a big fan of romance,” Petulia said, still looking around. “Colin? Come on, this isn’t funny.” Which probably wasn’t the best thing to say, she reflected. Colin hadn’t seemed like a glass-half-full kind of guy even before he’d turned into a frog, so she doubted he was playing games now.

“Does she lose an income if you marry?” Tank said.

“What? Who? Oh, my stepmother. No, she’s hellbent on getting me married. She’d have loved Colin.” Petulia stepped back again and then froze when she trod on something. She picked up her foot gingerly but it was just a clump of dandelion. “Come on, Colin, get back to the stone before somebody steps on you.”

“Does she practice magic?” Tank said.

“What? No. Good grief, no, she practices gong ki and the piano.”

“Gong ki.” Tank exchanged glances with Geoffrey again. “That’s pretty heavy stuff for an old lady. I know guys in the Protectorate who haven’t mastered gong ki. Is she good?”

Petulia frowned at him. “She’s excellent. Call her an old lady to her face and find out; she’s in her fifties not her nineties. How is this getting Colin back?”

“Get a cage,” Geoffrey said and Tank headed for the garden gate and beyond that, the white truck with Emergency Magic Technician Squad painted on the side.

“So you’re the boss,” Petulia said, trying to talk to the chicken with respect.

“I have seniority,” Geoffrey said. “The reason Tank was concentrating on your stepmother is that we’ve found in the past–”

“She’s not that kind of stepmother,” Petulia said. “She’s on my side. She’s been on my side for fourteen years. She’s all the family I’ve got now, and she’s wonderful, and you’re not going to pin a frog on her because she’s from an unfortunate demographic.”

“Of course not,” Geoffrey said, looking past her. “Excellent, you’re here.”

Petulia turned and saw Tank and then forgot him because of the guy striding along beside him. He actually did look like a tank; not fat but solid, average height which was the only average thing about him, moving across the grass with purpose and what looked like a permanent scowl, his dark shaggy hair falling into his eyes which were now fixed on her with deep suspicion.

“Hello,” she said.

He nodded at her. “Ma’am.” He looked down at the chicken. “Geoff.”

“Good to see you, Wy,” Geoffrey said. “Thanks for coming. Miss Potter, this is Wyland–”

“So you turned somebody into a frog?” the guy said, scowling at her. His scowl had shifted a little, heavy with disbelief now.

“No,” Petulia said. “Who are you again?”

“He’s plain clothes Protectorate,” Tank said, putting a small blue box on the stone edge of the spring.

“Plain clothes,” Petulia said, looking at the guy’s beat-up leather jacket and worn canvas pants.

“Yeah, I dress to blend, princess,” he said and she started.

“You okay?” Geoffrey said to her.

“I’m having a hard day,” Petulia told him, thinking He can’t possibly know, and then looked back at the ‘tec.

Plain clothes. He was wearing a badge now that she looked closer at his jacket but it was hardly the first thing you noticed about him. “Don’t you guys usually travel in pairs?”

“My partner’s busy. If you didn’t turn anybody into a frog, what am I doing here?”

“He turned into a frog on his own,” Petulia said. “Don’t they give you guys training in how to talk to the public? Because you’re not good at this.”

“That’s why he has a partner,” Geoffrey said.

“So this guy just turned into a frog,” the cop said. “For no reason.”

“He didn’t mention one,” Petulia said. “He kissed me and then he turned into a frog. How many times do I have to tell this story?”

“You still haven’t told it.” The cop looked around. “Where is this frog?”

“He appears to be missing,” Petulia said.

“You turned him into a frog and then you lost him?”

His scowl shifted again, this time flavored with disbelief. It was like the Ephesians who had a hundred words for sand. This guy probably had that many scowls.

“I didn’t turn him into a frog,” Petulia said. “And it wasn’t my day to watch him, so no I didn’t lose him. I don’t think you should do this kind of thing without your partner.”

“I saw the frog,” Tank said. “So did Geoffrey.”

The cop looked down at the chicken. “Big deal. You saw a frog.”

“Magic,” Geoffrey said. “It was human once. She didn’t do it.”

“Who else was here?” the cop said, evidently finding it easier to believe a chicken.

“Nobody. I met him at a party, he walked me home, he kissed me, he turned into a frog. That’s all I know.”

Tank leaned down and put a blue metal cage on the stone edge of the spring.

“What’s that?” Petulia said.

“It’s a stability box,” Geoffrey said. “It has a force field that keeps whatever is within it in the same condition indefinitely. If you find Colin again, put him in the box and call us. It’ll keep him from degenerating until we can restore him to humanity.”

“Colin?” the cop said. “This is the guy who’s a frog now?

“Degenerating?” Petulia said.

“Magic makes the things it touches deteriorate.”

Petulia took another look at Geoffrey. “You’re doing pretty well.”

“This is my stable state,” Geoffrey said. “Until we find out what Colin’s stable state is, it’s best to keep him in his present condition. We don’t want him to degenerate.”

He’d looked kind of degenerate to begin with, Petulia thought. That had been part of his attraction.

“God knows what he could turn into,” Tank said.

“Fabulous.” Petulia lifted her voice. “Colin, did you hear that? It could be worse than frog. Get in the box.”

“It’s perplexing that he moved on,” Geoffrey said. “Generally victims of this kind of spell are transfixed in terror.”

“He seemed to be pretty fast on the uptake,” Petulia said, remembering tongue on the first kiss. .

“Call us if you find him,” Tank said.

“Believe me, you’ll be first,” Petulia said, and watched them walk away together, the beanpole and the chicken, tragically not the weirdest thing she’d seen that day.

“Colin?” she called one last time. “I’m sorry about this. Whatever happened, I’m sorry.”

The garden was silent in the dusk, and she gave up and went inside, leaving the door to the cage open.