Enigma

3

"Dude... you lost me there"

"Yeah... I lost me too" I replied, munching on the last of my pringles. I tilted the bowl to see if there are any more crumbs left, but sadly there's none. I opened another set of pringles at the snack rack beside my bed and poured it in the bowl, munching chips once again.

"Where's the stalker girl?"

"I dunno..." munched another chip...

"Then is she still stalking Darcy?" 

"I dunno..." and another...

"Is she gonna be fine?"

"I dunno..." and another...

"Vi!! work with me here!!"

"Your imagination's your limit, my friend."

I dodged the pillow she threw at me and pouted in the corner of my bed. I knew she was petrified by the thought of stalking. She's not one to love being stalked. Her face looked dejected, maybe from my character's pasts or their present occurrences. I handed her the bowl of pringles, she glared at me as we both munch chips on such a rainy afternoon. I felt determined with my last story that she'd react the way I want her to react, but I couldn't shake the thought that my readers wouldn't react the same as Maisy would. 

"So... Alessa's abroad, but Darcy still feels her presence still stalking her as if Alessa was really there?"

"Ehhh... maybe?"

"Come on, what kind of writer would write a story with holes?"

"Let me remind you that the ones I'm telling you are just main ideas and flows that I've been thinking of, not the actual book I'm going to write... so of course there are holes... I wouldn't want to spoil even YOU with the ending how I wanted, right?"

"Still... is she there or no?"

I narrowed my eyes on her as if she didn't understand what I just said. But, of course, even she needs an explanation. My editor did when I showed her my manuscript for the latest book I published. I opened yet, another pringles and poured all of it into the bowl. Maisy said I'm overeating junk foods, but even once in a while you'd love to be unhealthy. But for me, I'm always unhealthy, even as when we were kids. That's not something to be proud of though...

"As Darcy narrated, Alessa's not there anymore. She's still ongoing therapy, so of course, she'd still have remnants of the past follow her around. It's like having this trauma with you every single day that even when nothing's there, you'd still claim to see something."

"Like aftermath?"

"No... kinda like flashbacks. She might sometimes lose awareness in present surroundings, like when she's walking alone to her new apartment like she used to back in her old studio. During that unawareness of hers, she's living through her past trauma with the stalker as though it were happening again. The following, the taking of pictures, those events."

"Ohhh... I see... I get it now" she muttered. The rain poured like endless showers; raindrops could be heard pit pattering on the roof, loudly yet softly. The house felt filled with the sound of the rain, traveling around the house. The coldness of the weather was the perfect temperature for me to just lie down on my bed and sleep until the rain's over. But, as of right now, that I can't do. I could hear Maisy's unending complaints about why I kept giving my characters ill-fated experiences or stories. She feels for almost every character I write. Well, even I thought they're too unfortunate, and I sometimes doubt myself whenever I put them to such extremes.