Enticing My Recaltriant Muse

[ladymirth]

 

Heck, everybody’s doing it, why not me? Seen at mrsmosley’s and annabtg’s livejournals.

When you see this, post a little weensy excerpt from as many random works-in-progress as you can find lying around. Who knows? Maybe inspiration will burst forth and do something, um, inspiration-y.

 

 Harry Potter and the Quest for the Holy Grail.

 

Harry Potter is, currently, that is to say, as this story starts, a not-quite-seventeen year old berk with a do-gooder complex and a ridiculously inflated sense of his own responsibility toward the well-being of the world and the whales. That is definitely going to change in the course of this story, but he doesn’t know that yet. At least, he doesn’t know that he is going to have a starring role in this story.

 

However, what sets him apart from the average individual at the moment, is that he definitely knows there’s gong to be a story about him, in the near future. As he lies on his back on his bed with the single shaft of moonlight that has successfully squeezed itself in through the narrow window grills illuminating his face, he seen to be staring at the ceiling with what an onlooker would have mistaken for lethargy, were it not for the almost palpable aura of tension that emanates from him. It practically bleeds out of his prone, too-still figure, like the atmosphere generated in the immediate vicinity of a well-coiled crossbow bolt half a millisecond away from embedding itself in somebody’s skull. It’s as if the air is strangely compressed, with all sentient minuscule matter trying desperately to crowd themselves into that one millisecond before the inevitable twang.

 

Of course, the twang is, among other things, inevitable.

 

Harry Potter sits bolt upright so fast it appears as though somebody’s misplaced the middle slide in a projector reel which should have featured the actual process of him having gone from prone position A to upright position B.

 ____________________

 

An attempted Monty-Pythonesque Harry Potter parody that never saw the light of day. Mainly because I was trying to copy Douglas Adams. Written before Deathly Hallows, but now that I think about it, it would tie in with the Hallows Quest quite well.

 

Reweaving Fate

 

             It really was quite romantic, Harry reflected, as he took in the courtyard. The heady fragrance of the flowers was wafting on the cool night air and the moonlight was bleeding silver all over the tiles. That coupled with the soft violin strains of the band playing inside the Hall created quite an ambience. And the graceful form of the dark-haired young woman silhouetted against the moonlight was the finishing touch.

 

            Harry observed Marlene McKinnon in silence. They were too much at each other’s throats most of the time for him to register it, but she really was quite beautiful. In a purely academic sense, of course, he hastened to assure himself. After all, Marlene was too cool and aristocratic for his taste. Not like his fiery red-headed girlfriend. And if he was taking a rather less than purely aesthetic interest in the way that red dress she had on clung to every curve he had ever imagined in a woman, well he couldn’t be blamed for being human. And very, very male. All the same, for once, Harry was glad Ginny wasn’t around and couldn’t read minds even if she were.

 

             “Why lurk in the shadows like a thief, Mr. Merryweather?”

 

            Marlene did not turn around, and Harry was sure he’d made no noise. Yet she had clearly sensed his presence. Harry couldn’t help but feel grudgingly impressed. He didn’t move though. No need to let her think she’d got the upper hand.

 

            “You don’t need to be a thief to lurk in the shadows. And even if I were a thief, I wouldn’t be green enough to do something so conspicuous as be furtive,” he rejoined.

 

            “Nice comeback. But you could be just as witty if you stepped out here and let me see you,” this time she did turn around.

 

            Harry stepped out. “Has anyone ever told you that you come across as pretty paranoid?,”

 

            “One can’t be overly cautious in these dark times,” said Marlene, “Although I really didn’t think you would curse me from behind.”

 

            Harry gave a mock bow. “Such trust is overwhelming,” he said sardonically, “I suppose you also don’t think I’m capable of cursing you up front?”

 

            “That wouldn’t be trust, that would be contempt, Mr. Merryweather,” said Marlene, “And I’d be foolish to doubt your capabilities, but I prefer to think you’d be smarter than to attack me twenty feet away from a roomful of Aurors,” she gestured towards the Great Hall.

 

            “Well, I’d like to think you were smarter than to think I’d attack you at all, Marlene,” said Harry evenly. “Do you really think you’re that important a personage that any Dark wizard would be fighting to get their hands on you?” Even as he said it, he couldn’t help but run his eyes surreptitiously over her curves, which were encased so snugly within the enticingly thin fabric of her dress. Woman, wouldn’t I want to get my hands on you! Bad thought. Remember Ginny…

 

            Marlene’s eyes flashed. “Death Eaters have a reputation for coming back to finish the job,” she said tightly.

 

            Harry hesitated. He had almost forgotten Marlene’s situation, and that did appall him somewhat. God knows he knew what it was like to have his family murdered and being pursued by the shadow of those murderers every waking moment. And despite Marlene’s apparent calm acceptance of her loss of memory, the nameless dread of not knowing anything about her past must haunt her more than she’d ever let on. Harry wondered why this fact didn’t make much of an impression on him. He did not consider himself a callous or insensitive individual. Yet he kept forgetting, why it was that Marlene McKinnon was so carefully guarded by the entire Hogwarts faculty. This disturbed him more than he cared to admit.

 

            “I’m sorry,” he said with genuine contrition, “I didn’t think…,”

 

            “You usually don’t,” said Marlene wryly, raising one aristocratic eyebrow. “But I think I’ll forgive you, Mr. Merryweather, seeing as it’s Christmas after all,”

 

            There it was again. Given the nature of his transgression, her reply seemed off to him, somehow. He would have thought Marlene would have been more upset about his thoughtlessness. He didn’t think anyone else would have taken being so appallingly slighted as coolly as she had just done. He had all too good reason to know how potent her temper could be. But she had not even glared at him.

 

____________

 

This has sat in my hard drive since 2005, and deserves an airing. It’s one of my favourite plot ideas, which means I shall keep at it once I get my Lily-voice back. A MWPP fic….kind of. A good deal of Time Travel is involved.

 

To Sam, with Love

 

It had been seven years.

 

Seven years since Sam and she had parted for the final time, outside her small shack in the small Columbian village where they had first met. They had gone their separate ways; he, to the city of Metropolis, where his duties as a superhero and the woman he loved lived, she, to the damp warmth of her hut, where she had to begin picking up the pieces of her shattered dreams and find something in them worth continuing to live for.

 

That had been the last promise Sam had extracted from her. To begin to live for herself again, and to stop running from her demons. She had learnt for herself that there was no corner of the world wherein she could hide from them, no matter how far she ran, and she had run far enough, Lord knew. Although, it was easier for him to say that to her, now. He would be returning to the one thing in the world that could give him all the strength he needed to face the future. And by doing so, he took away the one thing that would have done the same for her.

 

Him. His love.

 

But he had loved her, she reminded herself desperately. He had told her so. She had seen it in his eyes, even as her heart had broken at his words. He had told her he would never forget her, anymore than she could forget him. She would always be a part of him, as he was a part of her. He would always love her.

 

Just never enough. Never more than he loved the woman he had to return to.

 

Sometimes, in her darkest moments, she became angry at that, at him. That woman had thrown his love back in his face, treated him so callously, wounded him so badly that he had had to exile himself from the rest of civilization to save himself from the pain. She had been the one who had held him in her arms and healed him, made him whole. She was the one who would have treasured his love like the most precious gift on earth. She was the one who had been willing to give up the thing that made her happier than anything, so that he could make the choice that would make him happiest.

 

And yet, she was the one who had lost him to a woman who was obviously undeserving of his love.

 

She made herself drag herself out of her dark thoughts. She had made her peace with her choices a long time ago. After that first night, where she had cried her heartbreak into her pillow until there were no more tears left in her to cry, she had resolutely looked to the future. The choice to leave Columbia had been painful; she had formed many friendships and a strong bond with the villagers. She had loved them, and the work she had done there. As they had loved her. And because they had loved her, the pain of their parting had been eased by the knowledge that she would be happy where she belonged, at home, with her own family. As Jeff had said, it had been past the time for her to have moved on.

 

She had made all the splash she could have wanted when she turned up, unannounced and unexpected, on her parents doorstep at Christmas. The prodigal daughter, indeed. Her brothers had been there, with their wives and their children; her nieces and nephews. She had been at the center of a warm and loving familial embrace, finding there a security and sense of completion she had not felt since she and Chris had been children. Even Chris had seemed not absent, but lurking somewhere in a corner of the room, grinning at her while she was not looking. It had been her worst fear, that the absence of her twin would haunt their reunion. It seemed, however, that she had unknowingly conquered that particular demon, somewhere in the jungles of South America.

 

And yet, when the celebrations had quieted down, and she had found herself alone, watching the snowflakes dance outside the frosted windowpanes, it had not been the memory of her twin who had haunted her.

 

Everyone had suspected, of course, that her new melancholy had something to do with a new love. Her mother had actually worked up the courage to ask her, after a while, even being intuitive enough to hint at the references to Sam in her letters. She had evaded her, but she knew her mother had not been fooled.

 

Eventually, she had gone back to nursing school, gotten her license. She allowed herself to make new friends, and enjoy herself in the comforts of the first world without feeling guilty at the thought of the living conditions of her friends in San Pablo, with whom she kept in constant contact. She could never give up the Red Cross, though. She had remained a volunteer for quite a few years, until she had been persuaded to accept a desk job at Washington a few months ago.

 

If ever she happened to be working in some major disaster site, (which happened infrequently), she would find herself in the closest proximity to him that either of them had allowed since their separation. The bright figure in the red cape, with his aura of power and infallibility was unmistakable, whether in real life or on TV. Yet, at first, he had not looked like her Sam at all; instead, he was a god, omniscient and all-powerful. A being that held itself aloof from humanity. It seemed unthinkable to her that this was the same man who had played cards with her in the dark cellars of San Pablo, who had ridden on the back of her motorcycle in their excursions through the Andes valley. Who had made love to her as lovingly and gently as though she’d been as delicate as the butterflies that flew over the snow-capped mountains. 

 

Until she would chance a look at his face. Then she would see, under the stoic mask, the gentle brown eyes that ached with compassion for the suffering around him. They were the eyes of her Sam. She had ached to hold him in her arms, kiss away the lines of strain on his brow that she knew so well, and shelter him against the sorrows of the world. And know that she did not have the right.

 

She wondered whether the woman he had chosen did that for him. She hoped she would.

 

And searching the well-loved contours of his face from afar, she looked for signs that he was as happy as she wanted him to be. As happy as he deserved to be.

 

She wondered whether he had ever looked her up, surreptitiously, as she had often longed to. Unlike her, he’d know where to find her. He knew her name, the names of her family, her dog, her state. She, however, knew that he was awful at cards, was a font of useless trivia and loved puppies and children. But she didn’t even know his real name, having always addressed him by the name she had given him.

 

For seven years, that had been all she had of him. A name called Superman, which she had scorned in favour of her own name for him, and a delicate silver and emerald butterfly she always wore around her neck. 

_________

A fanfic based on a fanfic! How scary is that? I started this a year ago when I was all but fangirling Lynn M. Heck, I did fangirl her! She is brilliant and my favourite writer in the Lois and Clark fandom. Unfortunately she seems to have moved on to other interests. I loved her Butterfly Legacy, but the ending upset me so much that I decided to write my own Gillian story. However, I knew I could never put it up on the Message Boards because Lynn was out of contact and I couldn’t ask for her permission to use her characters and story. So I kind of abandoned it half-way. I kept it as a tribute to Lynn though, and over time grew to have a great fondness for it.

So folks, this is based on Lynn M’s story and Gillian is her property. I’m just playing with her toys 'cause she left them lying around.

The Marriage and The Mirage 

Ananda didn’t doubt that Savithri was his parent’s favourite choice. Her family wasn’t old and traditional like theirs, but it was a very respectable upper-middle class one whose members were all high-raking professionals of various fields. Neither was it overtly rich; they were very comfortable, by upper-middle class standards, with both daughters having been educated overseas and every intention that their younger brother should follow them. Their house was modern and state-of-the-art, if not overtly spacious, they had two cars and lived an easy and unpretentious lifestyle which appealed to Ananda. His mother and aunts had excused her lack of riches by reasoning that at least there would be no danger of that family holding anything over them, in the future.

 

“Marrying into wealth is all very well,” rationalized his mother to his aunt, “but who’s to say that she won’t cast it up to us, one day, that she was the one with the money and expected that we would ride in her family’s pockets? To be sure, Savithri is a sweet creature, a bit too independent, maybe, but quite well brought up. But you never know with daughters-in-law, Gayathri. It’s always best to be on even ground.”

 

Since Indira Weerawansa had spent the past thirty years lording over her in-laws by reason of having been born to a much more affluent background than the one she had married into, it was understandable that she feared her retribution may take the form of her own daughter in law. Indira’s sister-in-law Gayathri, who had incurred the family’s condescension by marrying an actor, had spent too many years enduring the patronage of her brother’s wife to be insensible of her thoughts. Neither was Gayathri’s mother.

 

“What even ground?” said the old matriarch sharply, “This family has been landed and titled one for seven generations! We are of the blood of senpathi Alagakkonara himself, don’t forget! We may not be a bunch of gilded fools, but there’s not a man or woman in seven provinces to whom the name Weerawansa doesn’t mean something! Anybody who marries into it, rich or poor, marries above them! Remember that!,”

 

And she withdrew pompously, with the comfortable assurance that she had had the last word in the matter.

 

It should not be overlooked, however, that Savithri’s dowry wasn’t exactly poor, either.

 

Frankly, Ananda had been surprised that such an ostensibly liberalist man as Savitri’s father would have thought of a dowry. Ananda’s father had had too much respect for Chandrasiri Samarawickrama to bring it up, even going so far as to assure him that it was not needed at all, much to the disapproval of his wife. But Chandrasiri had been adamant.

 

“I think of it as my last present to my daughter, Dharme,” he assured Ananda’s father. “Young folks need some help making a nest for themselves at first, and I think of this not so much a dowry as wedding gift, as I intend it not only for Ananda but Savithri as well. After that, of course,” he turned to Ananda with twinkiling eyes, “we old folks will need to stop interfering once and for all and let them go to hell in their own way,”

 

As much as Ananda found the Samarawickrama family a refreshing change from the pretentious strategies of his own, he didn’t quite understand why his mother was so dead set on the match. Oh, he had heard the list of her attributes, she was a summa cum laude graduate of the University of Pennsylvania, she had a decent salary as an anchorwoman at a Canadian media network, yada yada… But while these were concerns of his father, he wondered why his mother so favoured a woman so far removed from her own world of fancywork and domestic gossip.

 

Ananda didn’t realize that the problem was that he was the only one who hadn’t met his bride-to-be. He gained an inkling, once, during a conversation with some of his old friends. Chinthana was home from his stint in the University of Toronto.

 

“Getting married, at last, eh you old bugger?,” said Chinthana jovially. Possibly he was the only one of Ananda’s friends to bring up his impending engagement voluntarily and so unselfconsciously. He had been away too long to know about either Ananda’s affair with Punsara or their explosive separation. He felt oddly relieved about it. He was tired of skirting around the issue. He had loved a girl his family had decreed he couldn’t have, they had made him give her up and now he was marrying a “suitable” girl he hadn’t even laid eyes on like a good little boy. Ananda didn’t care anymore. Savithri sounded like a reasonably nice girl and once he was married to her, he’d finally have an excuse to get away from his insane family.

 

“That’s how the powers that be have decreed, yeas,” he replied, uncharacteristically sardonic.

 

Chinthaka looked sharply at him. “So it’s a family affair, is it? That’s not too cool. How bad is she?,”

 

Ananda shrugged, “I don’t know,”.

 

“Good Lord! That bad, is she?”

 

Ananda snorted. “I meant I haven’t even seen her, yet, man! Her family seems nice enough. Less insane than mine, at any rate.,”

 

“You think so?” Chinthaka looked at him keenly. “Seems I’ve missed out on a lot. C’mon! Give Uncle Chinthy the highlights,”.

 

“Highlights?”

 

“Yeah, you know the outline. Name, age, sex, dough, dog’s shampoo…the basic stuff. Well, not sex obviously…didn’t think you batted for that team, machang…,”

 

“My family wouldn’t allow me to, even if I did,” pointed out Ananda.

 

“Fair enough. But we can’t have you, the flower of our flock, hitched off to some monster bride. So spill it, sonny Jim!,”

 

Ananda shrugged. “Her name’s Savithri Samarawickrama. Father’s a Professor at Moratuwa, Mum’s a doctor, sister’s a medical student interning in the US, bro’s fifteen and at our own old Alma Mater. Not rich, but well off. No dog, the Professor can’t stand them, apparently. He’s a very modern, liberalist bird and I like him. He’s offering a sizable dowry to keep the females of my family from picking her to pieces later on. The girl actually has a top-notch salary in a Canadian broadcasting company. She’s working in Canada, you know. Some kind of anchorwoman. Can’t remember the company.”

 

“You know, I think the name sounds familiar. I used to watch a bit of TV in Toronto…”

 

“It’s possible. I think I heard she was a bit of a local celebrity. Anyway, at least that means she can’t be too hard on the eyes. Not that my mother would have put up with anybody who couldn’t compete with her cousin Lalit’s latest wife…”

 

“Saavithri…Samarawickrama did you say? A bit of a mouthful for the foreign types, you might say. She might’ve abbreviated it….Savithri…Holy hell!,”

 

“What?,” asked Ananda, startled.

 

“You can’t mean, Saavi Samara!  Host of Around the World In Ninety Minutes? I thought she was Indian but for her accent! Damn, but you’re a lucky bastard!,” Chinthana slapped him on the back and roared.

 

“What d’you mean?,” asked Ananda warily.

 

“Saavi is a babe of astronomical proportions, you dolt! She looks like somebody who’s gonna wipe Aishwarya Rai right off the map! Man! And you sit here moping! If this is you being unlucky, I want a hair of your rabbit’s foot!”

 

Out of sheer curiosity, Ananda went home and Googled the pseudonym of his future bride. He found quite a few pictures.

 

Savithri was certainly an eye-catcher, although Chnithy had exaggerated about her being the next Aishwarya Rai. But by Sri Lankan standards, she was an exotic beauty. Too beautiful. Hers was a modern, fashionable, Western beauty. It seemed to insult the simple countrified charm of his beloved Punsara. She was dusky-skinned, dark with matt-like exotic darkness. Punsara had been as fair as the milky-veined trunk of a plantain tree. Savithri had an athletic build, and long legs reminiscent of a catwalk model. He thought of Punsara with her slim figure and girlish curves and shy smile. There was nothing shy about Savithri. She smiled, nay grinned, at the camera with her head held proudly, her large flashing eyes glinting with a challenge that made men’s blood race. Other men’s. Not his. She wasn’t his type.

 

So this was the woman he was to spend the rest of his life with. A tall, glamorous, coldly perfect Amazon of theWest. He now could understand why his mother and aunts were so dead set on snapping her up. Not only was she a celebrity, she was also a veritable Helen of Troy. He could imagine the pride of wearing such a woman on his arm; a woman who would blot out all other women in the room. In the thinking of his family, such a woman should only be the prize of the Weerawansa clan.

 

The fact that he couldn’t care less about such social one-upmanship would never compute with his family, of course. Why would he care whether Savithri were a hag even? The woman he wanted was one as white and sweet and simple as the jasmine stars she sometimes tucked behind her shell-like ear. And she was as remote from his grasp as the moonlight under which they had once trysted.

 

_________

 

An original work that should have been a short story. I’ve set it within Sri Lanka, most unusually for me. The Weerawansas are an old family in denial of the fact that the affluence and status they have enjoyed for generations are fast being depleted in the capitalist climate of the 21^st century. They cling to their traditions while trying to balance it with their materialistic greed and Western infatuation typical of the Colombo upper-class bourgeiousie. The heir to this family, Ananda, falls in love with a simple, poor country girl, the family forces him to break it off and marry a girl of their own choice instead. Savithri, however, outwardly a proper Sri Lankan woman of duty and decorum, turns out to be the embodiment of liberal Western ideas and independence that incurs her in-laws displeasure and clashes with Ananda’s own ingrained sense of conservationism. An tale of how the cross-cultural divide can affect a union between families as well as a love story with an unusual twist.

 

I have a load of other plot bunnies but these are the only ones I’ve written down in a half-way coherent fashion.

 

So is my muse going to show up for this party or what? 

Comments

[inanera.livejournal.com]

Rather good imitation of Douglas Adams, I thought :P

Very much liked the last one too. Even though I'm completely hopeless as far as pronouncing those names...

And Reweaving Fate...So Harry's back in time I'm guessing? Unless you've created an OC with the name Harry Merryweather. Which, I'm telling you now...if that's the case, I'd advise you change it unless it has some sort of significance. But I'm thinking it's our dear friend Mr. Potter :P

Anyways. When you awake, dear, do send me a smoke signal, yeah? We haven't rambled together in forever!!! (My fault, I know. This whole Time concept continually eludes me these days...)

[ladymirth.livejournal.com]

Thanks! Yes, Harry IS back in time. That was supposed to be a plot twist, actually. See, we begin the story from Lily's POV, chronicling the entrance of Galatea Merrythoughts mysterious and handsome nephew into the ranks of the seventh-years...it gets a bit reversely Oedipal after that, before we unveil dramatically that Mercel is actually, *gasp* Harry! WTF, goes the readers. Oh, and this is a time travel fic, we tell them. Didn't we tell you?

Which is actually quite hard to pull off.

Anyway, about the smoke signal. I can't do any livejournaling at all today because,
a) I am buried under a research paper that I'm supposed to email tonight, and
b) My folks are celebrating their twenty-first year of successfully not killing each other, by inviting all our hordes of relatives to partake of our table and sup today. Mum has roped me in for kitchen duty.
But hold on, Houdini - er, Holly, dear. What we shall do is, we shall IM. I am currently just using gmail for chate purposes, but if you tell me what IM you're using and what your chat name is, I'll download it and get back to you tomorrow. Maybe then we can have a real coversation before you disappear in a puff of smoke.

=D

Vuws you more!

[inanera.livejournal.com]

annbee16 on AIM. Omg, a conversation in real time with Hasini!

I am speechless in anticipation!

*is speechless*