For the third and final short story I had to write for my Fiction I class, things were a little different. The first two stories we wrote had to be read aloud to the whole class. Then we’d have a verbal critique session and get back written comments from the professor and our classmates. Our third stories—once again 8-10 pages long, size 12 Times New Roman, double-spaced—went straight to Professor Williams.

Based on his responses to my previous stories, I shied away from trying another action-filled adventure. But I was still determined to practice the kind of fiction that would help me write the novels I had in mind.

Once again, I returned to the world I created for my would-be attempt at NaNoWriMo. But I didn’t exactly pick different characters to focus on. Something about the main character of “Jailbird” stuck with me. The comments from my classmates had a common theme: they wanted to know more about her and how she ended up arrested.

That gave me an idea.

In novel-length stories, there are often flashbacks and dialogue exchanges that go over things that happened off the page. Whenever I tried one in my early manuscript attempts, I bored myself. Giant bricks of text weighed down the pacing. Did I cover everything I needed to, or did I put in too much? How do you make sure necessary exposition is engaging?

I decided this 8-10 page story would focus entirely on character interaction and telling the events if a story through and memory.

One thing I had learned from reading the other stories out loud: certain names are exhausting when they’re repeated as often as they are in a story. I barely made it through the first page of “Jailbird” before I started regretting using the name Adelaide. And the made-up city name “Belensia” looked good on the page, but was similarly annoying to say out loud. In “The Second Story on Her Arm,” I started shifting to fewer syllables and, hopefully, easier made-up place names.

That said, I remember browsing Irish or Scottish names at the time and went down a rabbit hole of random Gaelic words. It led me to create the name “Caisri” for a character in this story, which sort of means “king of cheese.” I’m almost 100% positive this is linguistically wrong, but it was a fun inside joke for myself since I was nervous about Professor Williams’ reaction.

Themes in the Story

This story mainly explores character development and how to make a criminal character someone people would root for. It starts with a pretty typical take: the thief who steals to support their family. Often, you see that kind of character getting roped into “one last job,” or else they’d pursue a more noble career if only they were given a fair shot at one. People like the criminal with a heart of gold who wants out.

So what happens if you take that character and they want to go further in?

What if this thief decided to become the most notorious and successful criminal simply because it was profitable and they were good at it? What if power had absolutely no appeal to them?

I wanted to discover through writing this story how much it matters if the original motivation is altruistic, but the character isn’t reluctant or regretful of their crimes.

Inspiration From Other Works

I took some inspiration from the Mistborn series by Brandon Sanderson for this one. The scars on Kelsier’s arms mark him as the first person to ever escape the death camp mining operation at the Pits of Hathsin. Whenever he wants to let his reputation as the Survivor of Hathsin speak for him, Kelsier keeps his arms bared.

I thought about other body markings that can function the same way, like war paint, scarification practices, and tattoos. It gave me the vague idea for a martial arts tradition where tattoos are part of the training process to hone the mind as well as the body. I liked the idea of these markings being a widely-recognized sign of a practice someone studied, but the exact skills they had remained a mystery. Definitely a bigger concept than the bounds of this short story.

I also drew some inspiration from Sazed, another central character in the Mistborn books who is a religious scholar. Up until this point, most of the characters I wrote were almost exclusively action/adventure hero-types. They solved problems by punching, shooting, and generally being cleverer than everyone else. Even my villains were like that.

This was a tentative step toward diversifying my writing, albeit a very small one. Caisri is still a master of his martial arts practice, but he’s subdued. Rather than use that skill to take action, he passes on his experience.

How I Feel Rereading the Story Now

When I first assembled my list of stories for the Legacy Collection, I sighed looking at “The Second Story on Her Arm.” The title alone feels boring and uninspired to me now. In my memory, the whole story felt that way. I didn’t really want to publish it because, deep down, I knew it has the same problem as a lot of my early stories in this collection: it doesn’t stand well on its own.

Considering how I used many of these assignments to develop my skills for novel-writing, that’s hardly surprising. Part of me wishes I had deviated from that path sooner.

At the same time, I couldn’t help getting excited when I reread this one. I still think the story itself is kind of meh. But looking at what I was doing when I wrote it so I could write this reflection? Oh man. I love seeing the tiny seeds that have been growing ever since. This piece is another narrative experiment that helped me grow and discover the larger themes I like to explore in my fiction.

See you back here Wednesday for the full story.

Set the Mood

If you like creative add-ons to fully immerse yourself in a story, I have some suggestions. While I didn’t necessarily have these on hand when I wrote the story, they’ve definitely enhanced my experience rereading them.

Soundtrack

When I think about music for this story, I think about Mumford & Sons. I think I was listening to the Sigh No More album when I wrote “The Second Story on Her Arm.” If I had to pick three songs from the album I associate with the story the most, it would be:

• Timshel
• Dust Bowl Dance
• Thistle & Weeds

Scenttrack

I wish I had a candle that captured the scents and mood of this story. The characters share a glass of whiskey, but I have yet to find a satisfactory whiskey or bourbon candle. Most of the ones I’ve tried are overpowered by cinnamon or vanilla. If you know a good whiskey-scented candled, let me know in the comments! I’ve been looking for one for years.

However, if I had to describe the scent of the story, it would smell like a hot morning breeze coming through the window, stirring up dust in the back of an old wooden cabinet while new friends talk about old memories over a glass of whiskey.

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