I write speculative fiction. No, it’s more kind of a dystopian thing than that. No, no. Post-dystopian. But it’s not like The Walking Dead, it’s more… optimistic?

Optimistic Post-Dystopian.

With queer characters! Can’t forget about them. Us. Queer characters.

Minorities of all kinds, really, because the point is that

We survive.

(… right?)

My dad died in 2025 from a disease I might inherit, and there are ways to test for it, kind of, sort of. There are other things I might die from, still, too, though. No way to test for a drunk driver or a rogue lightning strike.

Unsure what I mean by that.

There was a time when I was very young when I read a lot, and by a lot I mean constantly. I was bullied often, and unpleasant enough that it was hard to feel bad about it. Books were my escape, my blissful stop in life, my otherness. If I could’ve shot them up, I would’ve.

I wanted–so badly my teeth hurt–to be in a book. To have something incredible to focus on, instead of this onward trod each day, this more-of-the-same, and then death.

Being the autistic ass mf I was, I logic’d that the thing the main characters all had in common was tragedy. That if I had a struggle, a real struggle, not loneliness, but something concrete–I would survive, I would thrive, I would be main character material. I used to hope for disaster. Pray that nuclear war would take us back to the dark ages. Step purposefully, heavily onto shaking grates, drag my feet past abandoned houses caving into their own decay. Hope for a kidnapping, a lightning strike, a drunk driver. Woeful lament that I was not an orphan–those fuckers are like candy to a plot, they always ended up being main-ass characters, fucking incredible shit happened to them.

My mom got diagnosed with brain cancer. 0 to 100 on the plot scale within 24 hours. Yet it felt less like a beginning and more like an abrupt, static halt.

I don’t blame that stupid kid, I really don’t.

(Not anymore)

They didn’t have the power to do anything different.

Yet I’ve been climbing out of that void ever since, and sometimes I just want to stop.

There are other kinds of main characters, you know. Road trip buddies, or something. Women who live in the woods and fuck hikers, whatever, I see you, Barbara Kingsolver. Books where, sure, I wouldn’t want to spend any kind of real time with the author, but it does sound nice to have quiet, and to not be afraid.

Maybe that’s not what they get, though.

Whenever I look too quickly at any story, the plot doesn’t have time to get complicated, the characters haven’t put on their flesh yet, and I see it again and again:

This story is about being afraid.