Celebrating an actual writing day
I have been buried in Gilbert Perez research for weeks. Plus, there's been the plague. But this evening I did some actual writing, several small scenes. Here's one, which may someday be the opening to Act II.
So. Feet.
I was hot and sick and I was looking at feet.
They were a woman’s feet, I could tell. Toes as round as river pebbles made little dimples in the dust that filmed the white-wash floor. Insteps rose up to heels in an arch of muscle. A plain white skirt swung between ankles the color of molten bronze. The woman was crouching beside me.
Having found her I tried to find myself. I was lying in a little room shaped like an upturned boat. It was hot -- so hot that the stones of one curving wall were glowing. I was limp with sweat and I was naked.
And I had no idea who I was. I might as well just have been born.
“Gilbert,” the woman was saying. “Gil. Gil.”
My name. Gil. I remembered something about being chained in darkness. And something about pigs.
“Can you see me?” said the woman. “Can you hear me?”
I tried to look at her. Her face was the same strong metal color as her legs, and shiny with the heat in the dimness. Two braids of glossy black hair was twisted around her head, ending in two little points that stuck out above her eyebrows, like the brow whiskers of a cat.
“By the one whose breath moves the sun,” she said. “Oh Gilbert.” Her dark eyes grew soft. “I thought I’d lost you.”
“Who are you?” I said.
***
Found some great Aztec books. Everyday Life of the Aztecs (despite the fact that it depicts human sacrifice on the cover, which, give me leave to doubt they did that every day) is invaluable. Buddy Levy's new Conquistador is a masterpiece. Bernal Diaz's first-person history makes me want to write a book called Last of the Conquistadors instead.
Now I need a crash course on the Phillipines in the 16th century. Suggestions?
So. Feet.
I was hot and sick and I was looking at feet.
They were a woman’s feet, I could tell. Toes as round as river pebbles made little dimples in the dust that filmed the white-wash floor. Insteps rose up to heels in an arch of muscle. A plain white skirt swung between ankles the color of molten bronze. The woman was crouching beside me.
Having found her I tried to find myself. I was lying in a little room shaped like an upturned boat. It was hot -- so hot that the stones of one curving wall were glowing. I was limp with sweat and I was naked.
And I had no idea who I was. I might as well just have been born.
“Gilbert,” the woman was saying. “Gil. Gil.”
My name. Gil. I remembered something about being chained in darkness. And something about pigs.
“Can you see me?” said the woman. “Can you hear me?”
I tried to look at her. Her face was the same strong metal color as her legs, and shiny with the heat in the dimness. Two braids of glossy black hair was twisted around her head, ending in two little points that stuck out above her eyebrows, like the brow whiskers of a cat.
“By the one whose breath moves the sun,” she said. “Oh Gilbert.” Her dark eyes grew soft. “I thought I’d lost you.”
“Who are you?” I said.
***
Found some great Aztec books. Everyday Life of the Aztecs (despite the fact that it depicts human sacrifice on the cover, which, give me leave to doubt they did that every day) is invaluable. Buddy Levy's new Conquistador is a masterpiece. Bernal Diaz's first-person history makes me want to write a book called Last of the Conquistadors instead.
Now I need a crash course on the Phillipines in the 16th century. Suggestions?