Ah yes, I knew it was going to happen sooner or later – the book and the plan have parted company. Publicly they’re saying it was a mutual decision, that they’ve both decided to pursue separate projects, and that they wish each other nothing but success. But secretly we know that there’s more than just creative differences at the root of it.
The plan wanted to keep going straight ahead, while the book wanted ‘some space’. i.e. it wanted to see 'other people'. People not in the plan. And it wanted them to do things. DIRTY THINGS! (OK, so technically there were dirty things in the plan already, but they were lowercase dirty, not uppercase. And it makes a difference.)
So as things stand, the plan gets to keep the first 60 or 70 pages, but the book’s been awarded custody of the rest. It fluttered it’s eyelashes for the divorce court and now gets 89% of the remaining pages. Personally I think the plan got screwed. Should have gotten a better lawyer. But that’s the way the cookie crumbles these days – the book gets all the pages and the plan’s lucky to see them on weekends.
Sure, there will be the odd page that will miss the plan, but most of them will grow up never knowing its warm parental embrace.
And tonight the book is dressing up slutty* and going out, looking to pick up a new plan to be the father of its pages.
The sad thing is, I know that even if the book does find someone new, it’s going to get bored before too long, and then it’ll be back to the divorce courts and the bitter recriminations. And the whole sad, shameful cycle will start all over again.
My pages are the product of a broken home!
* Incidentally, my version of Word doesn’t recognise the word ‘slutty’, suggesting I use ‘suttee’ or ‘sludgy’ instead. NEITHER of which is even close. Especially not ‘suttee’ which is Indian for some seriously freaked-out scary shit.