One

Introductory chapter in Life of a Klutz

Alice Walker once said, "Expect nothing, live frugally on surprise." To tell you the truth I really don't know who Alice Walker is, but she's a smart woman. I have been living this statement way before I ever heard it. For me, every single day holds surprise and adventure. I'm not really sure I live 'frugally' on it, since it happens so often.

I really expect very little from life, I learned early on that life will not be kind to you always. Things won't always work out for you and you just have to take it all in stride. It's much harder then it sounds, but, nothing's impossible right?

My name is Charlie A. Harper; the A. stands for Ann. And yes that is my real name. My parents were crazy when they named me that, but I kind of like it. I'm twenty-six years old with a love for life. There's just so much out there to explore and enjoy! It's full of surprises and joy that are just waiting to be discovered.

Ever since I was a kid I've always liked Nancy Drew. I would go to the Borders at Madison Square Gardens every week and try to find another book. It was my goal to read every single mystery that she went on with her friends. I don't recall if I ever did read all of them, I do that I have a number of them in my bookshelves at my apartment. Back when I would read them I would go around our apartment at home and try to find hidden passages and treasures.

I always ended up hurting myself though. I would climb up on something, lose my balance and fall off, break something and have to get stitches. Of course this is the story of my life. It all started when I was born. My mother was having complications and so she had to have a C-section. The doctor who was preforming the opperation nicked me with the scalpel on the cheek. Now twenty-six years later I still have that scar on my left cheek. Things only continued to get worse. I was constantly falling down and tripping over things that regular people just seemed to be able to avoid. 

When I was three, my cousins and I were playing at my grandma's house on the Fourth of July. She lives out in Brooklyn and had a yard. We always loved to go there because we weren't confined to the apartment and we didn't have to keep being told not to run around. So on this bright sunny day we were jumping over the garden tools that my grandma had left out. Ricky and Sam-twins-who were five at the time had come up with the idea. They were my role models and of course I would do whatever they did. Grand idea.

When it was my turn I made it over the garden tools with no problems. It was when I lost my balance that caused all the issues. I fell back and hit my head on small garden rake that was left up. Four stitches at the base of my skull fixed the problem, at least for a while. The doctor said it was a miracle there wasn't going to be any permanant damage to my brain. Although, some people have wondered if that blow to the head did mess me up some.

By the time I was ten I had given up trying to find secret passages and such. I figured that there probably wasn't going to be any such thing in the apartment that we lived in on Manhattan. So I decided to make up my own stories. That's when the adventure really began. I created stories of my own about secret clues and adventure. I took little ideas from the other books I read and changed them into something new and completely different. When I was fifteen I knew that I wanted to be a writer.

My first book was published when I was eighteen. I decided not to have a picture on my books, not even a bio on the inside jacket. In my mind it was a way to enjoy life without having to answer questions all the time when people saw me. So I remained annonomys. Everyone thought that the author was a man, partially due to the name, but also the content.

My books aren't lovey dovey, feel-good-about-your-life-with-an-earth-shattering-kiss-at-the-end kind of books. They are classified under the horror genre. My close friends think it's hilarious that quote, "Someone as happy as you just doesn't seem the kind of person to write about stuff like this. Murder, violence, immenent death, it just isn't you." I know they aren't really reflective of my personality, but it's what I like to write about, what I like to read.

In every single book I write the main character always dies in the end. A tragic death that one feels deep within their soul. Whenever someone asks me why I do this, I tell them this, "Not everyone is going to have a prince on a white horse come riding to their rescue. In most cases the ending isn't happy. I like to have some reality in my books, and adding those types of endings just wouldn't work." They are placated after this, although they still aren't very happy. But the thing is, my books always make it on the New York Times Bestseller List. Every single time. I'm that good.

Truth be told, I'm a true romantic at heart. I have a locked cabinet in my apartment that's filled with feel good cry a lot movies. No one knows what's in this cabinet, and I prefer to leave it that way. If I were to let people know that everything I tell them about how I feel about relationships is a lie, then I'm setting myself up for questions I don't really want to answer. I guess you could say I'm afraid of love, afraid of what will happen when my heart gets broken.

I had one experience with love, and it was rather nasty. I was eighteen, and he was the perfect man. Or so I thought. The wedding was planned, everything was arranged, my wedding dress was on and I was at the alter, holding hands with him. He stopped the priest and said he had an announcement to make. "There won't be a wedding today." He'd said. I had looked up at him, confused. "I'm sorry,"He'd said, "I just don't love you. I was deluding myself the whole time thinking I did, and I just can't do it. I'm sorry." And he'd walked away.

Since that day, I have never been on a date, never even felt the desire to try again. It's the one thing in my life that I'm pessimistic about. And oh, how I wish I'd have punched him when he left me at that alter. I locked myself in my room for three days and when I came out I had the resolve that I wasn't ever going to fall in love. It's worked out well for the past eight years.

My first book came out six months after that catastrophe. In it unfaithful grooms turned up dead. The killer was a man who believed that love was artificial and that was his way of proving it to the world. It sold very well and my readers were hooked from that day on. None of my books have ever had trouble selling, in fact each one sold better then the last.

I now have seven books out and I'm almost finished with the eighth. I just have to write the tragic ending. If only I knew how it ended myself...

Author's Note

Please ignore the spelling. Please review, though. I want to know your thoughts on the writing. I hope you have an idea of what Charlie is like. I hope you get to know her as much as I do. (:

Reviews

[deer-heart]

This caught my interest, the beginning particularly. Your writing is very expository, which is something I don't usually like, but it works with this kind of monologue. The flow of "speech" feels a little unnatural for it, though; I feel like it's not really the character speaking how she really would. This feels like it should read the same way it would sound if she were talking straight to the reader.

My mind is already being led to wonder where this is going... is it going to be about Charlie moving past her aversion to love? About finding the ending for her new book? It leaves me wondering where she's headed and how. You might think about including a few 'hooks' ... things that catch interest but aren't altogether explained, which draw the reader in and make them want to keep reading. I know I always like it when, over the course of a book, I can draw threads from one part of the book to another, a 'lightbulb moment' so to speak.

Overall, nice start, and keep writing! I hope somewhere in the midst of my babbling you found something useful =)