Page 147 of Vicious Kingdom

It was overwritten, sentimental, the kind of line I’d mocked in a book, but after 104,000 words, I’d earned the right to leave a little melodrama on the page.

This was my rewritten draft, the one that might finally grow teeth. The first had been full of immature ideas, conceived in the half-light of too little worldly experiences, midwifed by desperation, and a project I was glad never saw the light of day. The characters had started as escapism, now they were closer to being birthed into the world.

I rested my hands above the keyboard and just looked, blinking away the blue haze of fatigue, weighing whether the heroine’s sacrifice felt earned. There was a ritual to this. I’d read and re-read the final confession, holding my breath to see if it could make me cry yet. If it could, I knew it was ready.

The first time, it hadn’t. Just a little throb behind the eyes, a professional’s respect for the attempt. The second time was worse—flat, perfunctory. I’d poured so much into the setup that I couldn’t even feel the payoff. But this morning, something in the air—maybe the rain, maybe the reminder that endings were only ever borrowed from beginnings—made the words hit home. My chest went hollow, then full, then nothing but a pulse of something raw and inevitable.

I was staring at the cursor when the woman at the next table made a theatrical show of coughing, like she was auditioning fortuberculosis in a student film. I half-glanced at her, then away, pretending to scroll, but I could feel her watching, the silent rebuke of someone who thought Starbucks was a church and all laptops should be set to mute.

Picking up my mug again, I let the warmth bleed into my fingertips and resolved to finish this damn story before noon. A promise was a promise—my editor was in for the shock of her life when I sent this instead of the next best-selling thriller.

I toggled down to the epilogue, reread the heroine’s closing line—three times, just to be sure—then deleted a comma, reinstated it, and deleted it again for good measure. After a last-minute tweak to the love interest’s sign-off—I softened his final retort; too much salt and the shippers would revolt—I saved the file, shot a backup copy into the cloud, and snapped the laptop closed with a satisfaction that bordered on violence.

For the first time in years, I let myself lean back and not immediately reach for another tab or another to-do list. My whole body stung, like I’d just uncurled after a twelve-hour flight, but it was a good ache. The kind one felt after climbing something tall and ugly, just to say it was accomplished.

My notebooks—one gridded, one ruled, one scattered with colored tabs—sat in a gentle heap beside the mug. I opened the newest, the one I reserved for revision triage, and wrote three bullet points in a row:

• Revise character arc (heroine: more flaws??)

• Tighten magic rules (make consistent)

• Romance: raise stakes! (do not chicken out)

Underneath, in a fit of optimism, I scribbled:Fall publication, if I don’t lose my nerve.

It was surreal to write something my heart truly wanted. But there it was, done, and for a moment I let myself smile.

A half-heard jazz solo meandered into a cover of “Blackbird.” Somewhere near the front, the barista’s laughter ricocheted offthe pressed-tin ceiling. I looked up from my notes, and for the first time all day, the world didn’t feel like it was closing in. It felt like it might even, with a little bribery and a lot of revision, let me belong.

The phone was on silent. I liked it that way, a tiny act of rebellion against the relentless pinging of chaos and updates and…family. But the screen lit up anyway, casting a jittery square of light over my scribbles. The name on the caller ID hit like a fist to the sternum:Mom.

I watched it pulse, watched it threaten to buzz straight off the table. I wasn’t ready—not for congratulations, not for questions about whether I was coming to the next event, not for whatever fresh disappointment she’d conjured up since our last stilted call.

But I owed her an answer. She was alone in that big mansion.

With one last look at the closed laptop, the safe harbor of my finished manuscript, I picked up the phone.

“Hi, Mom,” I said, forcing my voice into the shape of a smile.

The storm, as always, waited for me to invite it in.

Mom didn’t waste time on pleasantries. She came in hot, the line rattling with the force of her breathing. “I can’t believe your husband!”

If I was religious, I would have crossed myself. She’d read the article. In the Percolator’s gentle lull, her voice sounded like a fist pounding through drywall.

“What’s up?” I tried to keep it light, like this wasn’t the day I’d atom-bombed my family’s reputation in the city’s biggest newsfeed.

“Thoselies! They’re outrageous!”

“You saw it?” I winced.

“Of course, I saw it. Everyone’s seen it.” Her syllables vibrated with shock, then steeled into accusation. “Your uncle’s phone hasn’t stopped. My phone hasn’t stopped.”

I tucked away my own joy deep in the recesses of my mind where it wouldn’t be touched by her poison.

“Mom, calm down—”

“Do you know what this has done?” She was doing that thing where she pretended her voice wasn’t trembling, but it gave her every sentence a serrated edge. “He’s ruined your father’s memory, Anna. I’m appalled. Appalled! That little exposé, it’s in every morning briefing and every political blog.”