Don't You Know Who I Am?: Day 7, and 14,020 Words

I started today off feeling extremely unsure of what I envisioned would happen between Nora and the Wickham(ish) character, who I named Wynn David. Since I decided that their story would not be the same as the classic Elizabeth and Wickham one, I have felt so unmoored! But I keep reminding myself that it's okay to not know what is going to happen in my book yet. I'm only 14,000 words in! I am hoping to have some moments like the one Jill described early on, where something happened that she didn't plan but it felt right for the characters.

Anyway, I had fun writing this scene. I hope you enjoy it as well.

“I’m Wynn David,” he said, shaking her hand.

“Is your first name Wynn and last name David, or do you have two first names?”

“Just Wynn. I’ve been called David a lot though. I guess it could be worse.”

“I’m Nora Zimmerman,” she replied. “First name Nora, last name Zimmerman.”

“Nice to formally meet you, Zimmerman,” Wynn grinned. “Please tell me what it is that you are working on. Anything that can get someone like you focus so hard on it is something that I’m jealous of.”

Nora blushed in spite of herself. Wynn was being forward. Very forward. It wasn’t the kind of thing that she usually liked in a strange man, but he was finding a way to be very charming about it.

“I’m working on a movie screenplay. It’s based on one of my books, Pride and Prejuwitch.”

She waited for him to start making fun of her book title. That had been happening so much to her lately. In fact, boys and men had been making fun of her for the things that she was interested in for her entire life.

But he didn’t. He expressed interest in her work and asked to learn more. He was impressed that she was writing a screenplay, because of how popular her work must be, and also how challenging it would be to cut down a beloved book into something so much shorter.

He listened with interest as she described the joys and hardships of writing a screenplay. She admitted to him that it was hard. Not to mention the fact that she had been looking at her book with a different eye this time than when she had initially written it and gone through the editing process. Sometimes Eliza seemed too naïve and careless. The men in the novel seemed too gross. She wasn’t sure if she could live with this, especially in light of the ways that the world had changed with regards to the treatment of women. She also wasn’t sure if she could live with the anger that men seemed to hold for women who dare to speak out in public; neither Doug Ford, the ghost of Rob Ford, or the men of Gamergate seemed to accept her right to take up space in the public square.

He told her about the books of short stories that he had authored, about boyhood and loss and coming of age in the Maritimes, where he was born. He’d left Halifax for the first time after graduating from Dalhousie University, and had never quite gotten used to the pace and anonymity of Toronto. After having grown up in a city where all of his family lived, it was hard to have entire days where he would realize that he hadn’t spoken a word out loud to a single person.

They both understood the inherent loneliness of writing as a profession. How everything is in your head and that it difficult to explain to anyone what is happening there when you’re the only true inhabitant of that world. Then there are the days when nothing is in your head and the page stays blank, along with your feelings of self-worth.

He was thrilled to hear about her feud with Doug Ford, as he too had been incensed about the proposed cuts to libraries and the supposed plans for public book-burnings. He had recently gotten into a scrape of his own with a Ford administration official, when Member of Provincial Parliament Lisa MacLeod, who also happens to be the Minister of Tourism, Culture, and Sport, confronted him when he was trying to enjoy a Rolling Stones concert.

He had been trying to enjoy himself with his friends and family, when out of the corner of his eye he noticed that someone was jostling through the crowd. No one had ever jostled to meet him, so he figured that some other celebrity might have been in attendance. All of a sudden, a woman wearing a “LOUD AS HELL Festival 2019” hoodie with bright orange hair and an unhinged look on her face started yelling at him, “Do you know who I am?” He honestly replied that he did not, to which she responded “I am your minister and you’re a f—ing piece of s–t and you’re a f—ing loser.” He had not yet met his local member of parliament, so at this point he was more bewildered that she had correctly identified him as a fucking loser. Things really went off the rails, however, when she said “Let me set the record straight. I am giving you some feedback and I apologize if I sound blunt. But I have serious concerns about the state of our beloved Ottawa Senators! We need to get our team back on the road to winning the Cup!”

At this point he started to wonder if she in fact knew who he was, since he was not even an Ottawa Senators fan, let alone someone who had any influence whatsoever on the state of the team. He began to suspect that she had mistaken him for the owner of the Ottawa Senators, Eugene Melnyk, who looked like him in no way. He said so, causing her to slink off and leave him more befuddled than he had ever been in his entire life.
He wasn’t sure what was most unsettling about the woman: the fact that she was shouting “Do you know who I am,” the fact that she had somehow mistaken him for the 60 year-old owner of the Ottawa Senators and was airing her grievances towards him at a Rolling Stones concert, or that she had apparently attended a music festival where the headliner was a band called Goatwhore.

When the rain stopped and the sun started to break through the clouds once more, Nora knew that she needed to take the short walk home. She found herself wanting to see Wynn again, and was surprised to hear herself say so. He said that he felt the same way.