Lake and I took our coffees into Ruth’s office.
“All right, where do we start?” he asked as he settled behind the large desk.
I had brought my laptop case from upstairs and started to set up my stuff on the corner of the desk where I would be close but wouldn’t crowd Lake.
“So, Maria told me you read the manuscript and had some thoughts,” I started, as I rummaged through my bag. I found my notebook and my laptop with a USB mouse and keyboard, which I plugged into the laptop. I had trouble writing with most laptop keyboards because I kept brushing the touch pad. Even disabling one wouldn’t make it feel any less awkward though, so I liked my plug-in things more.
“Yeah, I did. I’ve read the series about five times, I think.” Lake smiled, but there was sadness in his expression, too. “I wish I’d known she was my aunt, you know.”
I returned the look. “Ruth was a great lady. I only knew her for a few years, but we had a great working relationship.” I navigated to a notes file I needed for this and made a little “ah-ha” sound I couldn’t help.
I saw Lake smile from the corner of my eye, but he didn’t comment.
Deciding to turn on my mental work mode, I started with the obvious. “Here’s the thing: I don’t know exactly where she was with the manuscript, because I last checked in on her a couple of months before she passed, so I’ll need to do that first. But since you’ve read it all and you’re so well acquainted with the source material, why don’t you go ahead and make me some sort of a list of what you think might happen in the rest of the story while I read the rest of what we have?”
Lake cracked his neck and pulled his keyboard closer. “All right. I’ll send you the file and get to it.”
“Oh, and do a couple of things for me. Write down what you think as a fan and separately what you think she might’ve wanted.”
“What if those two are different from what I would want it to be?”
I smiled, loving the fact that he would even think of that. “Then you add that to the list, too.”
“I can do that.” He grinned, took a sip of his coffee, and started to work.
* * * *
I soon discovered that it was very easy and comfortable working with Lake. He had good ideas, but he also knew when to give me peace and quiet as I went through the stuff I hadn’t read yet. Then we discussed where we could see the rest of the story going, and we even felt pretty similarly about what we thought Ruth had wanted to do with it. We could make educated guesses based on how much of her text we’d both read over the years, but of course we would never truly know.
“Wouldn’t it be nice if she’d written a detailed outline of the whole story?” Lake asked at one point.
I laughed. “Yeah, it would be amazing. Sadly, she was a pantser, which of course worked perfectly for her, but boy would I love her to have been a plotter instead.”
At Lake’s confused look, I explained the difference. “Pantser is someone who just writes. By the seat of their pants, so to speak. Plotter is the opposite; they outline and plan more. There’s also plantsers which I guess is somewhere in between. I know after a couple of books in her series, Ruth started to go more plantser or even plotter with that, but I think it was because there was so much to keep track of.”
Lake shivered delicately. “I can’t imagine trying to stay on track with a whole series.”
“Me neither. I mean I knowhow, but I’m glad it’s not often my job to do that or even help authors with it.”
There was a knock on the door and Rey peeked his head in. “Hey, there’s sandwiches and salad in the kitchen. I’m going back upstairs to feed the babies.”
“Thank you.” I had already moved my gaze back onto my screen.
Lake and Rey chatted about lunch things while I made sure I was in a logical spot to pause.
Lake and I went to get ourselves plates and drinks. Lake suggested we could sit in the backyard.
I hesitated for a moment. I had never been keen on eating outdoors. I felt like there would always be pollution or bugs or something else icky. But then I decided I might as well embrace my environment because at least pollution wasn’t a factor here.
I followed Lake out the back door and we settled on the lawn chairs. I glanced around and smiled a little. It wasn’t…bad.
Then suddenly a horse whinnied, and I looked up from my plate, freezing.
“Oh, I didn’t realize there were horses there,” I mumbled.
“Yeah, there are a couple of paddocks there and more on the other side of the stable. That’s where the corrals are.” Lake nodded toward the building in the distance and started to eat.
We enjoyed our meals, and then it hit me that I didn’t know much about what the place was about. “I know it’s a rescue.” I hesitated. “But…like…what do you rescue the animals from?”
