Time Heals All Wounds...

...but most of the scars never fade.

It was quite an unfortunate coincidence that August was the month it came time to kill off someone very important in Kylie's (the main character in my story) life. Losing Bandit (the first boy we had to put down) became a very real life experience I had the misfortune of being able to use for my story. But it was so raw, so fresh, it took me over a week before I was able to even begin to think about writing it. Then we lost Ashton.

I hadn't been looking forward to killing this character to begin with- I even had some threats (*clears throat* Anna). The biggest loss I'd had in my life was my grandfather several years ago. I wasn't quite sure how I was suppose to write about this massive, life changing loss, but I knew I'd figure it out. Life offered me more assistance in that than I would ever wish on anybody.

Suddenly, I doubted my story. How could I do this to my fictional character? How could I do it to me-I had to write it and live it as I did. So I procrastinated and wrote a few pages then deleted them, knowing it wasn't enough and I wasn't doing it justice.

So today, two months after I lost my precious boys, we finally picked up their remains from the vet. What an awful word- remains. These two playful, active Italian Greyhounds who lived and breathed and cuddled and loved are reduced to ashes that fit into a wooden box smaller than what most people put their jewelry in. I will never hold them, smell them, play with them...they will never play with my children (when I have them) like I always envisioned they would.

Now, I'm stuck with this female character who has lost someone who was her future, someone she envisioned a whole life with. She's captured by the enemy, tortured, beaten, and is trying to stay strong and hold true to his memory. But how much a part of this new part of her life do I make him? How much is too much? Not enough?

I think about Bandit and Ashton daily. Miss them, not as much as I did a month ago, and my heart aches from their loss. At what point do I have Kylie's wounds begin to heal? That red tissue that shows blood is coming to the wound, beginning the healing process. The scab formation as the tissue knits itself together beneath. And eventually the scar.