aithne | Writeathon Progress: badda-boom, badda-bing

Wrote about 1600 words on the creepy doll story, wherein I figured out what it's about and who the protagonist is. I think I'll be adding another 500 or so words to bring in the story at about 4300 words. The story is still untitled; it's currently called "Doll Parts" but that is by no means the final title.

Have also, over the last few days, done about 7500 words on the Wrong Project.

Excerpt from the doll story:

I come to the first of the thirty-two coordinates. It’s a pullout at the side of a road which clings to a mountain, valley falling away on the other side. The air bites at my hands and I blow on my fingers, then rub them together. Eve Jimenez. She’s here somewhere.

Glancing to either side, I cross the road with her doll to the rocky verge on the other side. I put one hand on the metal guard rail, then pull back; it’s nearly rusted through. Could I get tetanus? I’m not sure. Just in case, I balance without touching the guardrail, and peer down the slope. Grey-green shrubs cluing to the dirt visible between rocks and scree. About fifty feet down, I see a scrap of dull material, some sort of camouflage drab. The bundle is smaller than I expected.

The human skeleton, devoid of flesh, packs down into a space about the size of a small suitcase. I’ve found Eve.

I place her doll by a splintered post, wedge one foot into a crack. I gave her one of the clenched fists I have in my stock of spare parts. I didn’t know why at the time, but now she shakes that fist at the sky, deep brown eyes staring up at one of the many things taken from her untimely.

You don’t end up with your bones tossed over an embankment in the middle of nowhere if you died of natural causes.

Then I hurry on.