Intermission - Feedback and shared interests.

“I have a couple of stories here on my phone,” Fernanda said.

“Send them to me. Add me. Here.”

Just like that, Grace now had Fernanda’s number. Sarah would bet she beat Oliver to it, too. Only moments later, Grace received two text documents.

“Please don’t feel rushed. Just read them when you have time,” Fernanda said, nervously.

“I have time now. Oh, they’re only 10K words each. Give me 15 minutes?”

“Wait, what? 15 minutes?”

“I told you, Grace devours books,” Sarah said, grinning. “She reads insanely quickly.”

The conversation suddenly stopped. Grace was busy on her phone, eyes scanning from left to right as she read Fernanda’s work. But it wasn’t like she was going to get distracted even if they talked next to her. After all, the only problem with Grace being as smart as she was was that she used to lord it over everyone. Now that that little issue was gone (for the most part), Sarah was free to feel proud of her friend’s talents.

“By the way, I’ve been wondering what else there is to do in this place,” Sarah said. “You know, other than bathe in the pools or swim in the river. I only ever came here years ago when I was a child, so I don’t know if they have anything new.”

“Oh, I saw a padel court!” Fernanda said, excited for once. Sarah liked that tone a lot more. But…

She frowned. “What the hell is padel?”

“You don’t know it? It’s pretty popular in Brazil, at least. It’s like tennis, but you use different rackets, a smaller, softer ball and the court has walls, so the ball is allowed to bounce off them.”

Sarah blinked. “Oh, that sounds like fun. Do you play? Mind teaching me? I used to play tennis, so I should be alright.”

Fernanda smiled. “Really? I’d love to. I play with my mom sometimes. Ah, but the court is made for doubles. Though I suppose we could still play 1v1…”

“No need, we have Grace here, and… Why don’t I invite Diana? I think she used to play tennis, too.”

Fernanda’s eyes widened. “Y-You think she’ll want to?”

“Sure, why not? She looks scary at times, but she’s actually really caring. We haven’t known her for that long, but she already feels like an older sister to us.”

“...” Fernanda chuckled. “I… I think I see it. Hey, can I… ask you a question?”

“That’s a question already, but I’ll give you another one for free,” Sarah teased. It made Fernanda laugh.

“You’re all… dating the same guy, right? How… How does it work? Actually, DOES it work?”

“Oh man, that’s not easy to answer.” Sarah blinked. “Actually, no, it is actually pretty easy. Yes, it works. It works perfectly. How? Um… With blind trust?” Sarah grimaced, not happy with her own answer. “It’s not exactly blind, but you’ll have to believe me that it’s something like it because I can’t say anything that’ll make you believe me. All jealousy is harmless. Like, even I was jealous that Noelle was the one who got to be carried all the way here yesterday. We also get along well. Hell, more than well. I would kill for any of these girls, you know? Or at least beat the shit out of anyone who hurts them, but that is if Oliver doesn’t get there first.” Sarah grinned. “He’s… amazing. The best. And weird, very weird. Very special. If it’s him, I don’t mind sharing. He’s more than I could handle alone, that’s for sure. There are six of us now, but I don’t doubt there’ll be more in the future.”

“M-More?”

“Yep.”

“And you… don’t mind?”

“We encourage it.” Sarah snickered. “I guess that also makes us weird.”

“Done,” Grace said, putting her phone down.

“Those weren’t 15 minutes,” Sarah pointed out.

“Well, the writing style was… basic,” Grace said.

Fernanda swallowed. “And… What did you think.”

Grace crossed her arms, glanced up to the ceiling and then back down at the table. “First, I’d like to know why you wrote these. Fantasy setting, kid on a farm, village gets attacked, kid learns he has some magic power inside him, goes on a journey to get stronger. The other is a basic roman coliseum-type setting that’s obviously there to be the reason to have plenty of fights. As a story, there’s nothing actually there. There are a million of these out there, so why choose them?”

“I… I like fantasy settings. I’ve always wanted to draw a story with swords and magic, knights and dragons… Things like that.”

Grace nodded. “That’s what you know and like, so that’s what you made. I get it.” Grace took a moment to gather her thoughts again. “I called the writing basic, but that in itself isn’t an issue. You’ll be drawing the stories, not writing them, so it’s fine if the stories are more of an outline than a novel. You don’t need to worry about prose.”

Fernanda nodded and patiently waited for Grace to continue, but she was quiet for a long while.

“It was really bad, wasn’t it?” Fernanda finally asked.

Grace sighed. “The issue it’s not that it's bad, it’s that it’s boring.”

Fernanda tilted her head in confusion. “How is that different?”

“Being boring is worse than being bad. A bad story is one that fails to accomplish its goal, but maybe it had a decent idea. A boring story was never interesting to begin with.” Grace tapped her finger on the table. “There’s a lot I could say, a lot of advice I want to give you, but I don’t know where to begin or how much I should actually say. Fernanda, what are your inspirations?”

“Huh?”

“Where do you get your ideas from?

“Um… I, uh… A-Anime?”

Sarah snickered. “Why do you sound like you’re ashamed? A friend of ours made us watch a few shows and they were pretty good.”

“Yeah, nothing exactly wrong with anime, but…” Grace sighed. “Look, there are plenty of free resources out there that will teach you what, in theory, makes a good story. I could regurgitate it all for you if you wanted me to, but I’m sure you don’t. The best advice I could give you is to focus on writing good characters. Good characters can carry a boring plot and setting. Hell, my favorite books to read are romances, especially of the… spicy variety.”

Fernanda seemed to blush, but with her skin being a bit darker, it was hard to tell.

“When you think about it, romances are pretty predictable, right? But people still read them because it’s fun to see the chemistry between the characters. I’d recommend reading romance books to get an idea, but most importantly, really try to analyze what makes a story good, think about what it is that makes you enjoy it beyond what’s at surface level.”

“Do you… have any specific recommendations?” Fernanda asked.

“No, Grace, don’t…!” Sarah interjected.

“I won’t recommend her erotic books, Sarah!” Grace said before glancing at Fernanda. “Unless she wants to.”

“...I wouldn't mind.”

Grace’s eyes shone as she fist-pumped. “Yes! Finally someone with good taste! I’ll send you a list of my favorites!”

Oh, boy. Well, Sarah had been duped into reading a couple of those, so she could at least accept that they were… engaging.

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