Purposefully Accidental

Thank You Notes

So... it's a wrap.

Insane, right?! It feels surreal to finally finish this story after everything that it's been through, but it's also relieving!

I wrote Accidentally on Purpose when I was, like, seventeen. I didn't have a plan, an outline. I had a few scraps of ideas and I managed to stitch them up together, writing words out of thin air every night, losing sleep/falling asleep in class—and somehow I finished writing the entire story in the span of three months, and it was the best thing I've ever done in my life, my best accomplishment, my most precious work. And then I decided to write the sequel, a couple of years later, because I couldn't bring myself to part with my characters.

When I started writing this story in... I think it was 2017? I had a completely different storyline planned out. Purposefully Accidental was supposed to be a short, 15-20 chapter novella where, after breaking-up post high school graduation, Hannah and Jonah are reunited again, prompting her to impulsively invite him to her brother's wedding. And that was it. That was supposed to be the ending—they kiss at Tony's wedding, and it's happily ever after.

Instead, I went through—well, some tough stuff—while I was writing the first iteration of the story. If anybody remembers the old version of the story, you'd probably noticed how the last few chapters were very, very somber. Safe to say, I went off track while writing the story because I was too consumed by my own personal heartbreak 😂😭 Well, other than that, I was also very busy with college and choir and everything else that was going on in my life that I ended up losing the inspiration to continue the story, so I just... gave up.

I kept trying to continue writing it, even a while after I stopped updating it. When COVID struck and I got stuck in the house, I spent hours and days and weeks staring at the old draft, willing myself to continue the story. I see your comments, asking me to keep writing, and a part of me hated myself for being unable to do it. For letting everyone down.

And then... last year happened. I got my heart broken again, but this time the pain became an inspiration. No, I didn't go through the same things that Hannah did in this new version of the story—but I'm channeling what I'm feeling into this new storyline instead, and what was supposed to be a novella turned into the first part of this version of the story.

I knew, when I was brainstorming the new storyline, that I wanted to incorporate the pandemic into the story. We've all been affected by it, we've all grieved the loss of loved ones—friends, family. Some of us are still recovering from it. It broke my heart to have to kill Tony off—but I didn't regret the contrast between the last chapter of Part I and the first chapter of Part II. We went from attending his wedding to visiting his gravestone. Cruel, right?

Now, onto Freddie. In the old version, he was supposed to be a minor character, a mere tool to get Jonah jealous during Tony's wedding. What was going to happen was simple: Jonah was supposed to see Hannah in Freddie's arms and in desperation, he begs for forgiveness, and Hannah would easily take him back. The end.

But... I then realized that the simplicity was exactly what made me stuck, all those years ago, trying to finish that story. I love drama. I love complications. I love misunderstandings and lost chances and big, fat heartbreaks, which would make the happy ending feels even more rewarding.

So I made Hannah marry Freddie, for shits and giggles. I'm kidding, I'm kidding. The idea just jumped out of me and I embraced it. My first vision for this new version of the story was one scene that ended up being the scene during Archer Gala. Except, at first it was going to be at the reunion. Hannah attends the high school reunion with her billionaire husband, not expecting that her long-lost ex would show up. But when Jonah did show up, she was simply going to pretend like she wasn't married, because she realized that she's still in love with her ex and she wants him back. It was vaguely something like that, in my head.