Through the drapes

Karen had told me I had to get inside my characters’ bodies, but as this Round Robin session has demonstrated, it’s tough as shit. So instead I decided to hide behind the drapes and watch a couple of them have a scene.

This time I placed myself in a scene near the end of the book and hid behind the drapes in the back kitchen. All right, it’s a stretch to believe the kitchen has drapes long enough to conceal my six-foot frame and those big feet (you know what they say about big feet: “big feet, small brain”). But it’s my narrative and I’ll set the scene any way I like.

Agnes is sitting at the table, her face white as paper, and Norman is sitting on top of the table, swinging his legs. His back is to me (meaning the drapes) and his chest is heaving. Okay, I’m having him give us a heavy cry, something he hasn’t done in this narrative up to this point. That’s because it’s a signal moment.

“I know the real reason why, Norman,” Agnes says, a bit of dialogue I’ve enjoyed writing, since she’s dead calm about it – as Agnes would be. “You don’t want to be married to me.”

So Norman goes into his diatribe about not wanting the responsibility, even though that’s been his modus operandi since page one. And, as you probably know, they decide to go at it one more time. Couldn’t help myself, especially with the kitchen table there. Pretty hot sex, I observed – and congratulated myself. Why can’t it be that good in real life?

So there they are, sitting naked on the floor, enjoying the afterglow. I notice that Agnes had an ugly brown mole on her left thigh. Could this give me a cancer angle in the final chapters, I wonder? And then she shrieks.

“Norman, no!” Agnes says and covers her expose middle. “Someone’s watching us from the drapes!”

Norman squints in my direction and laughed. “It’s only Jim, no worries.”

“What’s he doing here?” Agnes asks, still upset and trying to conceal her privates. “The last round robin session isn’t until tomorrow. That’s when we all get together and discuss what he’s learned about us.”

“I think he’s just trying to get in a cheap thrill.”