Alone For Now {a phanfic}

Meet The Author [PART 1]

Dan woke up to the sound of thunder, and the flash of lambent lightning illuminating his desolate room for split seconds at a time. He huffed at glanced at his clock on his bedside table.

4:27 AM

"Damn it..." He grumbled to himself. He rubbed his eyes and finally sat up, looking out the window. His eyes were drooping as he contemplated actually getting up or maybe being able to fall back asleep and wake up at a normal time in the morning.

Nah.

He reached to his bedside table and grabbed his laptop, which he had left there for these kinds of occasions. He sighed in contentment as he opened it and saw his writing program, already open and ready for him. He was so happy he always left it open.

He began typing away right from where he left off, the characters in his book were like his children by now. He adored them. It feels like it had been only yesterday when he first planned them out, and now they are both fully developed characters. Ah, the memories.

He had been writing this book for quite a while now, about a year this week. He was almost done with his final chapter and he's gotta say;

He's quite nervous.

Dan Howell is a famous writer, he's published about 20 books; 6 of them being worldwide hits. Still, there's no shaking the anxiety of being not good enough.

6:39 AM

He's been writing for a few hours now, and he couldn't happier. He's almost done. He's on the last page of his book. He's been planning this ending for days, perfecting it and constantly brainstorming better ideas. And he's finally here. There's not a single thing in his way.

Suddenly, as he is typing and hyping at the same time, he realizes; he's about to write the last sentence. For the first time in two hours, he takes his hands off the keyboard. As he stares at the screen, he just can't help but feel proud. It's been a year of tireless writing, over 500 pages worth of suspense, romance and tragedy, and he's about to write the very last sentence. He finally takes a deep breath and tapped out those last few words.

"And then he was gone."

Dan smiled gently, and promptly saved the document, closed his laptop and looked out the window. The soft morning light hit his face and made him feel all warm inside. He always felt this way after writing a book. He finally broke out of his trance and decided to get up finally, maybe go on a walk or do something productive.

12:04 PM

So, it was already noon and Dan had done nothing productive. Rather than doing something healthy or social, he had decided to put on some sweatpants and watch some movies. All. Morning. 

Once he had run out of good movies to watch on Netflix, Dan sighed and looked at the clock. I guess I could just try to finish up the entire book now. Dan thought to himself. You see, there's a lot more to publishing a book than just writing it. You have to get a publisher, some reviews from critics and a front cover. Since Dan already had a signed publisher, and he can't get reviews until he has a cover, all he can do now is get someone to do a cover.

He used to have a trusty cover designer, but she recently retired, so he's gotta find a new one. He shambled to his room and plopped down on his bed. As he opened his laptop to start his search for a designer, he envisioned what he would want the cover to look like. A forest would be nice, since it takes place there... Maybe a hand drawn one! 

He decided to find an artist by letting them come to him, since he's too lazy to scour the internet for one. So, he put up a post on his official Facebook page that went a little like this:

"Calling all artists! I have just recently finished my latest book 'What Happens in the Forest When a Tree Falls.'; my newest romance novel, and I need a digital artist to make a cover. PM me with your portfolio information and we will talk about payment there."

Immediately after he pressed 'Post' he got dozens upon dozens of notifications. LIkes and comments from fans, and messages from artists.

He spent the next hour looking at mediocre art portfolios. He appreciated them all, they just weren't book cover worthy. Just as he began to give up hope on his fanbase, he came across one artist who's drawing struck him as particularly.... Beautiful.

He looked upon the significant number of amazing art, most of them being astonishing landscapes, but even his portraits were eye candy. The artist's name was Phil Lester, a 29 year old art grad living in Manchester. Apparently he's been a long time fan of his work ever since my first publish.

After looking at his history for a while, Dan decided this was the artist he wanted for his book cover.