Dear, guys – Welcome back to Letters From Liz!
So, if you’ve been on the blog for the past couple of months, you would see that a lot of my posts have been… scenes of some sort. I’ve been in a really creative place as of lately! My best friend, Ro, finished writing their first book (which took 2 and half months, like wow) and being in their writing universe during the process has made me inspired to get back and explore my own universe! So, I just wanted to talk about some of the stories that have been living in my head, rent-free, for months on end.
The “Something” Series:
These days, my baby is something called “The Something Series”, which is what’s being published on the blog these days! At first, it was just me throwing ideas on paper about some characters that I loosely played with. The more I wrote in this universe, the more I was captivated by these characters and the more I wanted to explore them out. It’s no 300-page book like Ro’s (haha) but it’s just something that keeps me writing and motivated during the times when I’m in major writer’s block. Anyway, let’s start off by talking about the main characters of this series; the something series.
So, Grace Ashmore is a 25-year-old woman that we were first introduced to in “What Do You Have to hide, Grace?” a scene about Grace working on her very first case with her partner, Max Harper. We left them off in a very… difficult situation, and well fast forward a little over a year! Grace is living in the city as a defensive lawyer at the same law firm she was interning in, and now she’s officially working on her first case! The difference this time around is that, well… she’s not with Max. Max actually left the firm once the trial case was over due to personal reasons and decided to move to the outskirts of the busy city. What made him quit his job, you ask? His daughter. Max had a daughter? Oh yeah, Willow; Grace’s daughter as well! Too long didn’t read, Max and Grace were extremely close to getting married, with their daughter, beginning their lives together. But, Grace is the daughter of Mollie Sue Castro, and the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree.
But she’s trying. She’s trying to balance the responsibilities of motherhood by co-parenting Willow while still making a name for herself in the law firm. But, things are not always the way she wants them to be. Falling into her mother’s footsteps, she feels like she’s only capable of hurting the people she has in her life and ends up running away, to her safe space; which is her work.
While going through the craziness that is her first official case as a defense lawyer, she meets a man one day at the cafe near Central Park. This man, Jamie Kim, is a lawyer working a case overseas with his own firm for the next couple of months. Grace instantly captivates Jamie, who ends up helping Grace with her disorganized paper work that falls onto the ground in the cafe. After noticing her papers are case files, he instantly offers to help her, and Grace being Grace, she naturally allows Jamie to sit at her table, and well the rest is history.
They both most of their time together these days; Grace working on her case while Jamie chimes in and helps her out while he does his own work. Two lawyers, one apartment (it begins with hers, then gradually goes to his) and a ton of paper work. Grace appreciates the company that Jamie gives her, even on the weekends that she has to take care of Willow.
While things seem to be going great for them, they are both avoiding talking about things to one another; Jamie is avoiding the fact that in a couple of months, he’ll be leaving the United States and will have to leave Grace behind, while Grace is afraid to allow another man into her life, in the state that she’s in, terrified to break another man’s heart and soul. Max Harper, one prime example of how broken a man’s heart is.
Speaking of Max, he’s now teaching Law in a university instead of being a lawyer. He decided this decision when Willow was born, possibly one of the only things in his life he feels like he has to be great for. Coming from a small family of untreated mental illness back in England, his only mission in his life is to be as present and supportive and as great of a father he can be for his daughter; because of that, he sacrificed a lot of his life for her.
Max was immensely in love with Grace. He wanted her to be his wife and to be a family with her and their child. He cared for Grace, was there for her in her lows and highs and everything in between; he been though the toughest days when Grace was incapable of taking care of herself when she was pregnant. He still has so much love for Grace; he wishes that he could work things out with her, to have faith in her for one more chance to get it right, but deep down he knows that no matter how hard he tries to make grace into the person he things she can be, Grace will never conform into that. He’s accepted the fact that Grace will always be Grace, and she’s going to do whatever she needs to do for her.
Jamie, being the youngest and the only boy in his family, feels the need to exceed and be the best he can be in the field that he’s in. In a lot of ways, Grace and Jamie are similar; Jamie feels like the harder he works, the better he will be at his job. He’s come to terms that because of his job, a life outside of it doesn’t exist, hence why even for the holidays, he’s not back home, with his family, celebrating like he would. It’s like he has to prove himself in a way. But man, Grace is just different. He may not completely understand Grace’s mindset, and he wishes that she was able to see that despite everything, she’s still radiates light, and it’s the type of light he didn’t realize he needed in his daily life.
So, they’re definitely digging each other… but extremely avoiding it. Not really well, but they are just… vibing.
I really enjoy writing these characters because it’s one of the first stories in a really long time that hasn’t been rushed. To explain things further, I find myself wanting my characters and their love interests to immediately get in their feelings and just do the deed, but I’ve been really wanting to play around with this idea that characters need to fall in love with each other and still feel scared of ruining things through sex; especially these two. Grace and Jamie are characters that although they like each other, their interactions come off as platonic. They hang out, talk to each other like friends, yeah they’ve kissed after going out on a first date, but for the most part they don’t talk about that day and they act as if nothing happened. They are characters that feel like the people they are somewhat involved with are better off with someone else, even though they know deep down they don’t want to be a reality. They are… definitely interesting characters to play around with and the circumstances are definitely much different than what I imagined in other characters I’ve created. Nevertheless, it’s interesting to go through these scenarios and see how these characters behave.
So, yeah! It’s been something I’ve been working on in my spare time within the last couple of weeks! I’ve taken a page out of my best friend’s book of writing inspiration and actually made a playlist of music that reminds me of my universe or music that helps me write in it! We’re definitely going to have more of The “Something” Series later this week and month, so if you’d like to catch up on the story thus far, here’s how to read them:
The “Something” Series:
- Something in Common
- Aware of Something
- Something in Me
- Something About Him
- “Say Something”
- “Tell Me Something”
- “Let Me Ask You Something”
Letters From Liz. 