It's Raining Words, or 15,000 of Them To Be Exact

I took yesterday off, but today I'm back with a vengeance.  It's me against good writing, and this time, it's personal.  I wrote 1,000 words during lunch, and this evening I'll write 1,000 more.  It will definitely include more than a smack of Indigo's ingenious excerpt at Buns of Steel, that's for sure.  Here's what I came up with so far:

Ellie had not stopped thinking about Carson Carrington since he had first angrily set foot in Penny Lane’s Bakery to yell at her about Gordon and his trickery.  She wasn’t sure if she had really smoothed things over with him after she had foolishly let on that she didn’t know him, and this bothered her. 

She usually didn’t care about what other people thought of her, which was an especially important trait to have as a sports writer in Toronto.  If she took to heart everything that was said about her, she definitely wouldn’t have been able to get out of bed every day.  If she took everyone’s advice about her writing, she probably wouldn’t be writing anymore, and at some point long ago she probably would have just given up to go fuck herself because she was such a moron.  She figured that this must have been a viable career option, since it was suggested to her so many times by helpful readers via comment sections and personal e-mails.  She especially had to ignore the gendered insults that were constantly hurled her way; being a woman and having the audacity to have an opinion on anything, let alone sports, and having the further boldness to think that those opinions were worthy of publication, was apparently an affront to the existence of many men out there.  Yes, having a thick skin as a Toronto hockey reporter was particularly important, and Ellie certainly had this in spades.  Or, she had at least thought that she did.  She didn’t like that she was so bothered by the possibility that Carson didn’t like her.  It wasn’t even her, she kept on reminding herself.  She knew that she wouldn’t get much blowback from the gaff anyway, since she would soon just go back to being Ellie Abbott, a sports journalist who would never cross paths with the sexy baker again. 

Oh, how she wished that she could talk to her friend Sharon about this predicament.  She certainly missed her, but she was sure that their friendship would continue as normal when she finally returned to her own life.

She was secretly hoping that Gordon would get up to his hijinks again to draw Carson back to Penny Lane’s Bakery, but apparently Gordon had been too busy hassling the staff at Forever 21 about the purple tie-dye harem pants that he was hoping would be back in stock to bother with Buns of Steel.  She had been wracking her brain trying to come up with an excuse to go over to Buns of Steel herself, but nothing was really coming to her.  She couldn’t exactly go over there to ask for a cup of sugar.

“Are you even paying attention?” Mick said, drawing Ellie out of her contemplation.  Damn it, she had done it again.  Her overly active internal monologue had once again taken precedence over a dialogue she was supposed to be having.

“I’m sorry Mick, I was just struck by inspiration!  I have a great idea for a cupcake recipe,” Ellie lied.

“I get that way sometimes too, with my furniture designing,” Mick said.  Ellie had no idea what he was talking about, but since he seemed to expect that she did, she opted to keep this a secret.

“Oh yes, your furniture designing, great stuff,” Ellie trailed off before awkwardly leaving the room.  Some things are best left behind.

It was a quiet and rainy Tuesday at Penny Lane’s Bakery, the perfect antidote to the heat that had persisted into October.  Ellie watched the raindrops hit the glass of the front window dreamily, thinking about her crush.  He would probably look pretty good if we stood outside in the rain, not unlike Usher in the “U Got It Bad” music video.  Upon second thought, this was a particularly apropos reference, since Ellie certainly had it bad.  She took a moment to wonder what it would look like if Carson was dancing in the rain only wearing a trench coat and jeans.  She immediately concluded that he would look great, but even then she was saddened by the reality that this was unlikely to occur today.  But what if it did, and she missed it because she hadn’t come up with an excuse to go over to Buns of Steel?  What if they had a tradition where they performed a sexy dance to “It’s Raining Men” while wearing vests every time that it rained?  She knew that she had to go over there, whether she had a good excuse or not.

She decided that she would claim that Mick had made an extra batch of red velvet cupcakes (which they were famous for), and that she had wanted to bring them over to apologize for Gordon’s behaviour.  That sounded plausible, right?  Of course it did.  She mentally high-fived herself, then did it again because she didn’t think that it was crisp enough the first time.