Adulting Requires Cheesecake (Book 4, Lonstino & Greenwood Series)

Chapter 13 - Rejected

MICHAEL

After knocking on Luke's door, I don't hear an answer, but I know he's in there. He's probably asleep. I will just get what I need and return to my room. When I open the door to his room, I find him with headphones on and with his reading glasses almost perched on the tip of his nose as he reads a book.

"Holy crap! You scared me!" He clutches his chest and the book lands at the end of his bed.

"Sorry, really sorry. Can you give me a cigarette?"

Luke takes his headphones and glasses off and stands up to turn his bedroom light on. He then watches me in a way that I find uncomfortable.

"What's going on? Since when do you smoke?" He points at his bed for me to sit while he grabs a chair for himself, but I'm too upset to sit.

"Since now. Can you give me one?" I stretch out my hand, but he watches me with disbelief.

"I won't give you one. I'm trying to quit smoking, so I won't get you started. What the hell can be so bad that you want to smoke?"

"Twenty..." My mouth goes dry before I can say anything else.

"Twenty what?"

"Rejections in a day. No one wants my sample manuscript."

"But Michael, you only came back three weeks ago. People sometimes work years on their manuscripts. What did you submit then?"

"About ten short stories. I took notes in a diary during my travels and turned some pages into them. Most agencies and publishing houses wanted the pitches to have about forty pages, so that's what I sent."

"Surely there must be other places you can pitch it to. This isn't the first time you get a rejection. Or is it?"

"I thought I had a good manuscript. I've been working day and night on it since I got back."

"Then go back at it and make it better!"

"It's not only that..."

Feeling defeated, I take a seat on my brother's bed. I go through my writing process in my head and can't figure out where I went wrong. The anecdotes of every place I visited were charming, funny and full of interesting, genuine characters. The chapters had flawless grammar, and I had a kick-ass introduction email. I was hoping for someone to pick it up so that I could fine tune it while living from the advance. Usually, it takes weeks to hear from anyone and now it was a cascade of rejections in my email. Some of them came back with feedback, and it said that what I did has been done already and that my kind of humor is not what they are looking for.

"Then what? Self-publishing could also be an option," Luke says.

"You barely earn anything with that. I would have to put money I don't have into marketing. Most of the inheritance is gone. I used it for travel, to pay for my second-hand car and my share of the rent for the next months. I got a few copywriting jobs through an agency, but I can't count on those coming often."

"You could go back to the magazine to write the lifestyle columns. You earned a decent salary then. I'm sure they will have you back."

A deep sigh escapes me.

"What did you do?"

"My editor-in-chief didn't agree with me taking a sabbatical until they got a replacement first. It was taking too long for my taste, and I left before they found someone."

"Burned the bridge..." Luke says and I nod.

"The first time I could connect with my laptop, I had received an email from him. It was basically a confirmation that I had been sacked. Also unwanted advice."