3 Years Later

Daniel is now 16 years old.

He's writing his fourth novel.

It's the only novel he's felt good about.

He started it around 3 months ago, but he had the idea around a year ago.

Daniel spent a lot of time planning it out and revising the original draft.

Although, Daniel still had his doubts on how effective he was at getting his message across.

𝘐𝘴 𝘵𝘩𝘪𝘴 𝘳𝘦𝘢𝘭𝘭𝘺 𝘨𝘰𝘰𝘥 𝘦𝘯𝘰𝘶𝘨𝘩?

Daniel constantly wanted to get better.

To a certain extent, he would long for the feeling of hopelessness when he wrote something horrible, this would make it a good challenge for him. He loved to mold the junk in to something beautiful, or at the very least something palatable.

It was therapeutic to make something bad he wrote in to to something that he found worthy. It would fill him with glee whenever he improved his writing with his own two hands.

Daniel felt like he could do anything as long as he set out to do it.

He could make countless worlds, as big as the galaxy or as small as a coffin.

He enjoyed making something that no one else could, to explore an idea that no one else had thought of. And he could do this infinitely, there was no shortage of ideas.

********************************************

After 3 more months of grueling revisions, Daniel finally sent in his novel to 3 publishers.

One of them was the biggest publisher in the country, PolarBear Publishing. The other was McAllister Publishing. Then, the third, was a smaller publisher, that's a subsidiary of PolarBear called Warriors Publishing.

The title of Daniel's novel was called "The Quiet Man."

The novel, starts out with a man, who is sitting quietly, on a bench in front of his apartment.

The man begin to list everything that is dear to him.

Items in his apartment.

Material things

He talks about their placement in his apartment, as he has memorized the position of everything in it.

Not everything is tidy or straight, but he knows their exact position.

He doesn't like others knowing about this obsessive trait of his.

They would probably think that it was weird.

He talks about some of the people he sees in his daily life.

Many people are then depicted or talked about by this man.

He talks about the daily lives of a selected few who walk by his apartment.

He talk about his co-workers, what they hate, what they love, he knows very intimate things about them.

They don't know how much he knows about them, they think that he is just a normal man.

Just someone who likes to keep to himself.

And, they would be right, if he were not a murderer.

Even now, as he sits on the park bench, he thinks about the man lying is in his apartment, dead.

𝘏𝘦'𝘴 𝘱𝘳𝘰𝘣𝘢𝘣𝘭𝘺 𝘴𝘵𝘪𝘭𝘭 𝘭𝘺𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘳𝘦, 𝘪𝘯 𝘩𝘪𝘴 𝘰𝘸𝘯 𝘸𝘰𝘳𝘭𝘥.

𝘞𝘪𝘵𝘩 𝘧𝘳𝘦𝘴𝘩 𝘣𝘭𝘰𝘰𝘥, 𝘵𝘩𝘢𝘵'𝘴 𝘱𝘳𝘰𝘣𝘢𝘣𝘭𝘺 𝘳𝘶𝘯 𝘤𝘰𝘭𝘥, 𝘳𝘶𝘯𝘯𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘥𝘰𝘸𝘯 𝘩𝘪𝘴 𝘯𝘦𝘤𝘬. 𝘚𝘰𝘰𝘵𝘩𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘣𝘢𝘤𝘬 𝘰𝘧 𝘩𝘪𝘴 𝘩𝘦𝘢𝘥, 𝘢𝘴 𝘪𝘵 𝘴𝘭𝘰𝘸𝘭𝘺 𝘮𝘢𝘬𝘦𝘴 𝘪𝘵'𝘴 𝘸𝘢𝘺 𝘥𝘰𝘸𝘯 𝘩𝘪𝘴 𝘣𝘢𝘤𝘬.

𝘐'𝘥 𝘬𝘪𝘭𝘭 𝘵𝘰 𝘣𝘦 𝘭𝘺𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘥𝘰𝘸𝘯, 𝘭𝘰𝘰𝘬𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘶𝘱 𝘢𝘵 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘤𝘦𝘪𝘭𝘪𝘯𝘨, 𝘸𝘪𝘵𝘩 𝘰𝘯𝘭𝘺 𝘮𝘺 𝘵𝘩𝘰𝘶𝘨𝘩𝘵𝘴 𝘪𝘯 𝘣𝘦𝘵𝘸𝘦𝘦𝘯 𝘮𝘦 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘩𝘢𝘳𝘥𝘸𝘰𝘰𝘥 𝘧𝘭𝘰𝘰𝘳.

𝘕𝘰 𝘸𝘰𝘳𝘳𝘪𝘦𝘴, 𝘶𝘯𝘤𝘰𝘯𝘤𝘦𝘳𝘯𝘦𝘥.

𝘉𝘶𝘵, 𝘯𝘰𝘸, I'm 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘰𝘯𝘦 𝘸𝘩𝘰 𝘩𝘢𝘴 𝘵𝘰 𝘥𝘦𝘢𝘭 𝘸𝘪𝘵𝘩 this mess.

𝘜𝘯𝘭𝘶𝘤𝘬𝘺, 𝘪𝘴𝘯'𝘵 𝘪𝘵?

He thinks about all the mundane things that he has in his life, and he decides that he likes them too much to just let them go.

*****************************************************

There were many clever aspects about Daniel's book, the most interesting was the relationships the main character had with those that were close to him.

Often times, the main character would leave hints for people regarding his obscure nature, but no one ever catches on.

His friends would just laugh it off.

*************************************

Warrior Publishing

"..."

Carl Jacobs was reading a manuscript sent in by a newbie author. His name was Daniel Hernandez.

"A Quiet Man"

This novel had been in the backburner for 2 weeks.

The whole office had been backed up with new manuscripts ever since one of their novels blew up all over social media for its crass and less than favorable view of women in the US.

This was also partly due to the author being a young woman, only 23 years old.

They had been quite excited about its release, but it even blew 𝘱𝘢𝘴𝘵 their expectations. The book, "Caterwauling," even made it on the best sellers list. They were expecting it to get in to the top 10.

But, that's not what took Carl Jacobs attention at the moment. What had Carl glued to his seat was the book he was holding in his hands, as it was so unbelievable, he had trouble understanding if it was a newbie author who wrote this.

Every part of it was filled with information, that made you want to understand more about the story. Every single aspect of this novel made you interested.

Even the details about mundane things, like a comb on top of a desk, was interesting to him.

He figured that whoever wrote this must have been writing for quite some time.

Immediately, after reading it, he decided to contact the author, rushing to be the first before this manuscript was snatched up.