DAY 3: TRAILER For Thirty Nights!

Good morning everyone!

An early morning in my household, as my hubby and I are volunteering at a church today.  First, my thoughts and prayers to all the victims and their families in Paris. It’s heartbreaking and I’m giving all my French readers a big hug and comfort. I hope you are all safe, and that you stay strong through this.  Lots of love from Portland, Oregon.

Second, to cheer you up a bit, here is one my favorite surprises we’ve prepared for you for Thirty Nights.  The Book Trailer!!!!! I love, love, love, love this trailer so much.  I hope you like it too. Thank you, Amanda and Samhain Publishing for creating it for me, and for all your hard word on the book!  There ‘re  only three days left. 🙂  I can’t thank you enough for all the support you’ve given me so far.  Have a good Saturday, with all your loved ones and families near and safe!

Thirty Nights Trailer:

Chapter 7 is up!

Hey everyone,

Welcome back and thank you for your general awesomeness. My geekery will show if I say that the last chapter was one of my favorite Elisa moments. So a million thanks to those of you who supported her in  that landmark moment. 🙂

For this new chapter, a lot of you have been waiting for a while (wow, that sounded like Yoda!).  There is a section here you have seen before – hopefully, now that you will see it in context, the puzzle pieces will fit. Also, please listen to the song because in this case, the song is part of the chapter. 🙂  Oh, and check out Aiden’s letters in  his own handwriting (or at least the only nongirly font I had available) on the side bar menu.

And a special thanks to those who are always there to help from British culture (Ariadne) to reviews to typos – it’s hard to list all the names or I will go on forever or worse, forget someone and torture myself while watching Game of Thrones (as if the show doesn’t tear your guts out enough).  🙂 Love you all!  Link, song, Pinterest below. Also, we have some wonderful writers among our readers here: check out Wattle on Fanfiction, Sasha Cameron, BG Holmes, Nanette Virden, Candiefloss on Fanfiction, and Perhaps Perhaps Perhaps on Fanfiction and her Tmblr page! I’m still discovering others in my three minutes of reading per day. 🙂  Love – Ani

For Whom Does Phosphorus Bark?

 

Song: Sleepsong, Secret Garden http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p_cdXNWD1VY&list=PLB52821BCF16067EF&index=1

New Pinterest: http://www.pinterest.com/anisurnois/90-days-of-hale/

New chapter is up!

Hey everyone,

Thank you so much for the outpouring of support at the last chapter.  I loved hearing all your theories, and have posted a lot of the answers to your questions on my FB page for efficiency but will add them to a list here on the side menu as soon as I have a minute.  And THANK YOU for all your comments and theories and guesses – there’s nothing better for a wanna-be writer than to hear from her readers in real time.

A special thanks and gratitude to Ariadne for British-proofing this chapter, Mr. Plemmons’ mannerisms, and all her advice on Snowshill and all things British.  I have the “best of British” luck in meeting her.  One day, I hope she will write a book of her own.

A kiss and hug from anyone who lives in Snowshill for letting me take liberties with your beautiful town.  🙂

This chapter is dedicated to two readers who have followed my journey from the beginning and who both suffered tragedy this week:  To S’s mom – may you rest in peace and may your soul shine like phosphorus.  To Purpleale – there is a bright road ahead, I know it!

Link, song, and Pinterest below 🙂

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“Let there be light” – Elisa Snow
Phosphorus Sand – this picture is real!

Song: Dark Paradise, Lana Del Rey http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6X3w-YmXZM8

Pinterest: http://www.pinterest.com/anisurnois/90-days-of-hale/

THANK YOU!!!

Chapter 2 of 90 Days is up!

Hello everyone!

Hope 2014 is off to a good start for you!  I know it’s been since before Christmas, but here  is the second chapter of 90 Days.  You’ll notice some changes in the website, too: now the sequel has its own tab above per your requests.  In addition, there are two new Pinterest boards, one for Elisa’s  new wardrobe and one for the sequel, which includes many things mentioned in this chapter, from the Cottage door to… well…  no spoilers.

I hope you enjoy it.  There will be more Aiden coming up, and more sequel.  Link, song, and new Pinterest boards below.  🙂  THANK YOU!!

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“The Cottage stands there, with the presence of soul and the absence of time.” – Elisa Snow, Chapter 2, 90 Days

Song: I Am Coming Home, Skylar Grey, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u-6Yg8RSRqw

Pinterest Fun: 90 DAYS,  http://www.pinterest.com/anisurnois/90-days-of-hale/  ELISA’S NEW WARDROBE, http://www.pinterest.com/anisurnois/elisas-new-wardrobe/

Happy Holidays and a surprise chapter!

Hey everyone,

I wanted to wish all of you Merry Christmas, the happiest of holidays, and a healthy, lucky, sexy, and loving New Year’s!  I was going to write about how special you have made 2013 for me, by following Thirty Nights from its very first chapter to its current journey through publishing houses.  I wanted to thank you for all your faith, support, and thousands and thousands of messages, comments, reviews, cards, and notes you have sent me.  But if I did that, I would go on forever.  So instead, I will say simply a BIG THANK YOU and give you what you like!  Some more writing. 🙂  Over the last several months, so many of you have asked for this scene.  It is set before Thirty Nights starts, and I thought  it was the most appropriate to post today, on Christmas Eve.  Not only to use it as a scene for hope and love for all of you, but also in a moment of self-indulgence because this scene is very close to my heart.  Some of you know that Javier was partly inspired by my own brother.  Well, this last week, I learned that the American Embassy didn’t give my brother a visa to come spend Christmas with me.  So, this is for the apple of my eye, “Andrew,” as well as for all you who have been my muses in this process.  Oh, and don’t panic. Aiden POV will return soon, too.  I’m just trying to upgrade the website to include more of his chapters.  THANK YOU EVERYONE!! HAPPY HOLIDAYS AND SEE YOU IN THE  NEW YEAR (my hubby is dragging me to Seattle for a family get-together).  All my love, xoxo, Ani

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HAPPY HOLIDAYS!!!! xoxo, Ani

NEUVO DIA, NEUVA VIDA

Christmas Eve, 2008

“Javier, hijo, ándale, ándale, neuvo dia, neuva vida!”

My mother, Maria, has been waking me up this way since July 2, 1994.  New day, new life, she said.  I remember her with a four-year old’s eyes.  Tall, even though she is only five foot two.  Plump, because she was wearing three wool sweaters—yes, in July.  Happy, because she was smiling.  Strong, because she was carrying two black, duffel bags full of our clothes.  And right, because she was my mother.  New day, new life, she said.  She put me in three sweaters, too, and a coat.  She gave me my Optimus Prime transformer that my father had sent me all the way from Oregon, America, and took my hand.  Vamos a ver a tu papá.  Vamos a América, she smiled.  I followed her with a four-year old’s steps.  Small, quick, and trusting—rushing to keep up with the rest of the world.

“Javier, ándale,” her voice drifts from our tiny, American kitchen, with the same urgency, the same faith as it held fourteen years ago.  But unlike fourteen years ago, I am already awake, even though it’s only 4:30 a.m.  Still, I let her believe she is waking me up because she likes that.  My mother is nothing if she is not the first face her children see in the morning and the last they see at night.

“Okay, okay, I’m up,” I say, my voice still thick from sleep.  The house is quiet except Maria’s soft footsteps on the linoleum floor.  My father, Antonio, already left for work to build The Nines Hotel downtown Portland.  My sisters are asleep.  I look at the small Christmas tree in the corner, covered in tinsel and pink lights.  No presents there yet.  But the stockings hanging on the coat rack are stuffed, most likely with Maria’s knitted socks and gloves.  I bet mine will be navy again this year.

I get out of our couch—that’s my bed.  No, no, don’t feel bad for me. This sleeping arrangement is by choice because I have converted my bedroom into a painting studio.  More about that later.  I fold my comforter and sheets, and stuff them in the matchbox closet in our hallway where they will stay until around ten tonight, when I get back from work.  Why 10:00 p.m.?  Because my boss is letting me out early.  Merry Christmas Eve, America!

I shuffle down the hall to the bathroom, stepping on two dolls and a pacifier, and nearly breaking my neck over a soccer ball.  My sisters’ toys.  Four sisters now.  Anamelia just joined us two months ago.  It was almost fun until I realized where babies come from.  Then I went through a phase of throwing up in my mouth every time I saw my mother pregnant.  But I grew out of it.  Now, I just blame the five of us on my parents’ love for each other—the love that conquered time, distance, and illegal immigration—but I also know there is a little bit of good ole’ Catholicism in there, too.  As faithful Mexican immigrants, we go forth and multiply, filling America’s schools, streets, buses, and homes with American citizens.  So they can have the life that we came here to find.  The American dream could be an ad for aphrodisiacs.  Save an oyster, find America!  Neuvo dia, nueva vida.

In the bathroom, I curse my stubble to the deepest pits of Mexico.  It grows like fungus after rain.  The painter in me wants to grow it out Van Gogh style but Antonio believes in three rules that make a man: a clean-shaven face, a good woman, and a back-breaking job.  I am two out of three.  I’ve been growing a beard since I was eleven.  I’ve been working not one, but two, back-breaking jobs since I was fifteen.  As for the good woman . . . well, I’ll just paint her.  See, it puts a real damper on dating style when you are eighteen and living with your parents.

Hello Miss American Pie, my name is Harvey Sellers.  No, not really, but I can’t tell you my real name because I am a criminal by your laws.  In fact, your peeps call me illegal. I’d like to take you out to dinner somewhere on a hilltop, if my Honda Civic makes it that far.  But it has to be around eleven because that’s when I get out of work.  Is that too late for dinner? I promise to pack my mother’s carnitas . . . or salad, whichever you prefer.  Once there, we can dance.  Do you tango? Vertical? Horizontal? And at the end of the date, I’ll drop you off.  I won’t give you my phone number because you may know Immigration and Customs Enforcement police . . . you know, ICE men.  So how about that date, Miss?

And that is why I, Javier Solis, do not have a girlfriend.

I slap my newly-shaved face, now softer than Anamelia’s bottom after a new diaper, and start putting on my work clothes.  We’re supposed to get an ice storm today.  Lucky for me as a landscaper, ice storms are rare in Portland, Oregon.  But when they come, they turn the world upside down.  See, Portlanders have no fucking clue what to do with snow.  They usually walk around like dingbats, calling off school and public transportation, wearing sleeping bags with holes for legs and arms, and discussing the merits of global warming.  As a native Mexican with the word Sun for a last name, I would join them wholeheartedly.  But Boss pays extra on ice storms, which means they’re better than sunny days.

I put on my long underwear—sexy.  Then jeans—hot. Then my work coveralls—even sexier.  Repeat the process with three layers up top.  Steel toed boots? Check.  A man needs toes.  Ear muffs?  For sure.  A man needs ears, too.  Coat? Two, please.  They’re out in the foyer.  Actually, foyer is what Maria calls it.  In reality, it’s a two-by-two space cluttered with the girls’ shoes.

I come out of the bathroom, sweating bullets.  I can smell Maria’s fried eggs and potatoes so I sprint to the kitchen.  She smiles when she sees me, her chocolate eyes twinkling like the Christmas tree.  In five seconds, she will hug me, bless me, and ask about my work schedule even though it’s the same every day.  Five, four, three, two, one.

“Bendito, hijo, bendito,” she says, marking a cross over my forehead.  Then she slides   three eggs and a mountain of hash browns on a plate with reindeers—one dollar, ninety-nine cents at TJ Maxx, a present from Antonio two Christmases ago.  I sit at the kitchen table and dig in.  Maria pats my cheek.

“You growing.  You need new jeans, hijo.” She smiles but in her voice, I sense the hesitation of math.  She is adding up the dollars in our checking account.

“Not really.  You know me, I’m a kilt guy,” I say because that will make her laugh.  She does and for a moment, I sense an echo of the four-year old boy.  That boy is long gone but there are some moments—rare, Christmas-Eve moments—when Maria’s laughter turns back time to Optimus Prime transformers, hot July days, trips to America, and a mother’s guiding hand.  Nuevo dia, nueva vida.

“So what is Boss having you do today?” Maria asks in English.  She always asks this question in English, as though to emphasize its importance.

“Going over to Reed College.  Gotta treat the rhododendrons around campus. Then off to Feign Art.  Someone ordered a replica of that Pursuit of Happiness series I did last year and I have to finish it by January third.”

“Oh, that’s nice, that’s nice,” Maria says, patting my arm.  I know her pats by now.  On the cheek to say hello or I love you, on the head to say behave, and on the arm to say maybe later.  She reserves this latter pat for my “art talks.” She and Antonio know that if we really want to talk American dreams, mine would be to have my own gallery, paint the land I see versus the land I want, and of course, collect money from it.  And they think that’s as impractical as a man can get.  Pointless concern because as an illegal, I could never own or operate a gallery.  So instead, I settle for ghost-painting for Brett Feign who sells my work under his name and gives me about a fiftieth of what he makes.  Fair? No.  Acceptable? Yes.  It puts food on the table and I get to do what I love.  Not many have that luxury.  Not even Americans.

“How much is Feign paying for the paintings this time?” Maria asks.

“Same as always. Two hundred bucks a pop.  There’re five of them though so that’s good.”

Her face softens and she pats my cheek. “Buen hijo,” she says. A good son.  “Someday, you will not have to work so much.”

She speaks the words with a far-away look, as though that is the only aspiration, the holy promise. Because it is. She pats my cheek again, takes my plate, and walks over to the sink.

I watch her straight back.  It breaks too, under loads of laundry, bending to clean, wipe, sweep, and mop Portland’s hotels.  Still, on any given day, life is better here.  Or if not life, the dream of life.  Somehow it feels closer, graspable, or at least more vivid on this side of the border.  I suppose, in the end, a vivid dream is better than a blurry dream, even if it never becomes reality.

I still have a few minutes before six o’ clock, but suddenly, the promise of Nuevo dia, nueva vida, rings both loud and mute.  I stand to leave.  Maria turns around and wipes her hands with a kitchen towel, covered with snowmen.  Two dollars, ninety nine cents at Crate and Barrel.  A present from me four Christmases ago.  Maria is nuts about Crate and Barrel.  Which is why this year, I’m getting her stocking-shaped mugs, in addition to a painting of her and Antonio.

“You leaving already? You still have a few minutes,” she looks at the cuckoo clock on the kitchen wall.

“I know. I want to drive slow.  Ice and all.”

She blanches at the word ICE.

“I meant real ice, Mom. It’s okay.”

I walk over to her and give her a hug.  The word ICE in our house is the same as the word muerte. It is never said unless it happens. Damn the genius who named immigration police ICE.  What the hell are we supposed to call real ice without causing heart attacks for our parents?

“How about we call it Aspirin from now on?” I say.

Maria’s color returns.  Almost.  “Aspirin?” she smiles.

“Sure.  Aspirin is supposed to prevent heart attacks.”

She laughs and pats my cheek.  “Ah, sí.  Okay.  Aspirin.”

“I love you,” I say, and kiss her hair.

“I love you, too,” she answers in English.

I put on my two coats, pick up my packed lunch, and go out to brave the Portland Aspirin storm.

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By 11:30 a.m., I have snowballs instead of testicles.  Reed College has more rhododendrons than ICE has cops on the Mexico border.  Why the fuck does any college need so many rhododendrons? Oh right, the college that gave us Steve Jobs, Wikipedia, the CD, and who knows what else.  I usually keep my eyes on the ground and away from the brainiacs that attend this school but the truth is I have crashed a couple of their art lectures while pretending to take out the trash.  I even wrote down their syllabus and have been saving for the books.  At my rate, I will have a better chance at buying them one chapter at a time . . .  and should have them all when I turn sixty.  Awesome! I continue covering the rhododendrons with plastic bags and spraying them with anti-freeze, whistling Johnny Cash’s “One Piece At  A Time.”

“Umm… hello?” A soft voice, almost a windy whisper, interrupts me right at “you’ll know it’s me when I come through your town.”  I look up.  And man though I am, I gasp.  Airless, I have a sudden urge to cross  myself.

A few steps from me, is a . . . girl.  I think.  But the word does not fit her.  She is almost transparent, as though she lacks substance, not form.  She is tiny, no taller than five foot four.  Her skin is pale, almost like onion skin.  It stretches over her prominent cheeks and upturned nose like the edges of her bones are about to break through the delicate film.  Her lips are white, chapped, and slightly parted as though she is barely drawing breath.  Her hair is long, past her waist, and almost black.  It is thin, and I suppose at some point, it must have been wavy.  It blows in the wind behind her like a sigil—dark and ominous as the flag death would carry if it were in the habit of announcing itself.

Standing out above and beyond the haunting sight, are the girl’s eyes.  They are an astonishing color.  A deep orchid purple, almost indigo blue. I have studied human eyes and colors for my art but I have never seen eyes like this.  They are large, too big for her drawn face.  Long, black lashes frame them but she blinks very little.  The lashes flutter in the wind, too, like feathers.  I watch her eyes closely, wondering if she is wearing lenses.  She is not.  Her eyes are real.  Yet despite their vibrancy, they remind me of a hearth after the fire has gone out.  No embers glowing, no warmth.  Only ash.  Like her hair, her eyes must have had some life in them but whatever specter has hollowed her, has extinguished them, too.

I tear  my eyes from her face and look at the rest of her.  She is wearing a man’s coat, too large for her.  It’s a dark brown tweed, the sleeves rolled a few times to expose her frail hands, locked together.  The coat falls to her shins.  She has a dark green man’s scarf wrapped around her neck.  Under the coat, she is wearing a pair of black slacks.  On her feet, some black pumps that look like they belong on a mother, not on a teenage girl.  Her feet shift on the frozen lawn.  It’s not until I see that slight movement that I realize why the word girl does not fit her.  She is not a girl.  She is a ghost.

I look back at her face.  She swallows once and flinches as if the act caused her pain.  She looks at the anti-freeze spray bottle and then back at me.  Her shoulders are hunched and another word pops in my head.  Waif.  She has that aura of an abandoned child, even though she is probably about eighteen years old.  I try to say something —anything—but cannot.  There was beauty in this girl once.  The kind of beauty you paint, immortalize. A beauty underneath, between reality and imagination.  A painter knows a pretty woman at first sight, and a beautiful woman at the thousandth.  The Mona Lisa’s, the Simonetta’s, the Dora Maar’s. The muses. What could destroy that type of beauty with such vengeance? Why?

“I . . . I can help . . . help you with the rhododendrons?” she whispers again.  Now I realize that, in fact, she is not whispering; she is talking.  Whatever evil drained her beauty, muted her voice, too.  But quiet though her words are, I notice a British accent in them.

She waits with an empty dread in her eyes, like she is afraid I am going to say no.  Maybe she is crazy.  As in true mental illness.  I watch her under this new theory.  She blinks once and looks at the rhododendrons again like they may hold the answer on how to weird out innocent landscapers.  Yes, ill.  Ill describes her.  But not dangerous, no.  Just . . . hurting.  I open and close my mouth a few times, blink for the both of us, and find some words.

“Hey, there.  Ah, you don’t need to help me.  I got this. Uh, is there anything I can help you with?”  Some food maybe? Or gloves?  Or rocks in your pockets so you don’t blow away in the wind?

The moment she hears my “no” she flinches again and her chest rises as if she is trying to breathe.  “Umm . . . you can help me if you let me help you,” she whispers.

What the hell does that mean? Oh, that if I let her help me, it will in turn help her? How on Oregon’s green forests will that happen?  This girl needs to be in bed, hooked up to some IV or something.  Not out in an Aspirin storm, treating shrubbery.

I shake my head.  “Honestly, I think you should go home. It’s getting bad out here. Just go be warm or eat or something.  I’m almost finished here.”

At the word home, she closes her eyes briefly, then opens them, looking at the rhododendrons in panic.  “But . . . but . . . But if you cover their roots with leaves, it will be better for them.  And the spray you are using is not effective.  It doesn’t have a surfactant ingredient listed on the bottle, and it won’t help.  If you want, I can show you how to make one that will help,” she whispers urgently.  “Please?”

Okay.  Either this girl has some serious, tree hugger kind of obsession with rhododendrons, or she invents anti-freeze and is trying to dupe me into buying some, or she is downright nuts.  Besides, I know what I am doing with the shrubs.

“Look, ah . . . what’s your name?”

“Elisa.  Elisa Snow,” her whisper drops so low that I have to lean in to catch her words.  She almost mouths her last name as if her vocal chords cannot support the sound.

“Right.  Okay, Elisa.  My name is Harvey.  Are you feeling . . . you know, okay and all?”

She nods slowly in a way that could mean only “no.”  Some strange current starts to crawl and zap in my chest the same way it does when Maria is crying or one of the girls gets picked on at school.

“You don’t seem okay,” I push.

She steps back, looks at the rhododendrons one last time, inclines her head at me once, and turns to leave.  Maybe she accepted defeat with the stupid shrubs, or perhaps gave it up in exchange for her silence to my question.  Before I know what I am doing, I run after her.

“Hey, hey! Elisa?” I call, but she tries to walk faster.  I catch up to her in about three steps and a half.  “Hey, don’t run.  I thought you wanted to help me out?”  I say, keeping my voice casual like I do when I tease my sisters.  Maybe this way, she will tell me what’s wrong with her.  I don’t know why it’s suddenly so important for me to know, but it is.

She looks at me, and blinks twice—a record for her.  “You’d let me help you?” she asks.

“Well, yeah, sure.  As long as you tell me why you’re so upset.”  I meant to make it sound like a negotiation but instead, it came out as a question.

She dissects my face, with a thinker’s look.  A flash of intelligence gleams in her empty eyes.  “And you will let me help you until you are all done?”

“Yes.”

“Promise?”

“Promise.”

She looks around.  What could be so momentous about telling someone why she’s upset.  Oh shit, maybe it’s a crime? No, she doesn’t look like a criminal.  No, this is something painful.  I know that.  That’s why I’m standing here like a dude’s Christmas tree: stiff, dead from the root up, and with a pair of snowballs.

“So, what do you say? A secret in exchange for hard labor?” I offer.  I hoped to make her smile but she doesn’t.  Perhaps she does not remember how.  Or maybe my joke was not that funny.  Still, for some nutjob reason, I keep going.

“I promise to make the labor really hard if that helps? You can do all the rhodies by yourself even.  And you can show me what the deal is with anti-freeze and the surf-whatever.”

She looks up at me.  For an instant, a shadow of life flits in her eyes, almost like recognition or trust.  To my utter astonishment, she nods only once.

“Yeah? Deal?” I ask, unsure that a nod really is a nod with this girl.

“Deal,” she whispers.

I smile and wait in what I think is a very nice-guy, encouraging stance.  Elisa locks her hands together tightly, as if she is looking for something to grip.  Yes, my chest is definitely acting up.  She is so fragile and the pain in her eyes so acute that, of its own volition, my hand extends toward her.

“You can hold on to me, if you want,” I say.  If any dude anywhere has had a weirder conversation with a woman, I’ll give ICE my real name.

She stares at my open hand in that blinkless way of hers.  I am about to withdraw it when her fingers relax a fraction.  I hold my palm closer to her, like one might when offering a hazelnut to a wounded, trembling squirrel.

She extends her hand to me slowly.  It shakes like the last leaves on Reed’s oaks.  The weird crawl in my chest creeps up in my throat, changing into an ache I have never felt about a stranger.  Something about her trust is transformative, like that right ray of light that makes the canvass a window, not a frame.

At last, her small hand rests on mine.  Her fingers are icicles, brittle and frail. I wrap my hand around hers gently, afraid that if I shake it, it will shatter into a million crystals.  She closes her fingers around mine. They are weightless, almost a caress, not a grip.  Still, the touch must do something for her because she looks up at me.

“Thank you,” she mouths.

“Sure.  See? Not that hard.  Now, all this shrubbery is yours for the treating, just tell me what’s wrong.”

Her fingers tighten slightly on mine.  I wait for a long time.  At least a long time by an hourly worker’s standards.  “You know, those rhodies will freeze by the time we’re done here.”

That does it.  Yep, definitely a rhododendron hugger.  Her lips move slowly as if she is testing the words in her mind first.  Is it possible she has never said them? Then she looks up at me.

“Do you have parents, Harvey?” she whispers, as if she just took her last breath.

I repeat her words in my head, trying to make sense of the riddle.  Why is she asking about my parents? My eyes flit to her clothes.  A man’s clothes.  An older man’s clothes.  A father’s.  And the shoes.  A mom’s shoes, just as I thought earlier.  I suck in a sharp, icy breath as it finally hits me.  She is asking about my parents because she has lost hers.

I don’t usually have time to study my insides but there are some changes, body and blood changes, that even the most practical, overworked, meat-and-potatoes, full-beard-by-lunchtime man notices.  That’s where I am right now.  A strange, thick burn— like I’m inhaling paint thinner on fire—blisters in my throat.  Without thought or plan, I try to pull her slowly to me.  She doesn’t move.

“Will you settle for a brother on loan?” I say.  As the words leave my mouth though, I feel like I have signed and sealed some summons from above.  Like her parents hailed me to this frozen lawn, on this Christmas Eve, with the missive of angels.  And even though I offer her brotherhood, to Elisa, I will always be whatever is written in that missive.  Brother, family, or whatever the skies have in order.

She looks at our joined hands, and then in my eyes.  She nods, but the motion is more fluid, somehow.  Not as stiff.  She doesn’t smile but that flicker of life flashes in her eyes. “Can I help now?”

I pat her small hand as I realize what she is asking.  She wants something to make Christmas Eve livable.  Something she can breathe through.  The bite of frost, the prickle of shrubs, perhaps even the idea of protecting something —a life form as simple as a plant—from the end.

I swallow to make sure my voice is not frozen.  It is, but her purple eyes melt it into the only words she needs.

“Yeah, you can help me.  For as long as  you want.”

“Thank you,” she says with so much feeling that I am not certain whether she is thanking me for the rhododendrons or for something else.  Her voice is a little clearer as if she put all her strength behind it.

I smile. “Sure. But if I’m a brother on loan, you should probably know my real name.  It’s Javier.  Javier Solis.”

She doesn’t ask me why I lied. In fact, she doesn’t look surprised.  “My . . . parents,” she swallows as she says the word.   “They called me Isa.”

“Well, Merry Christmas Eve, Isa.”

She looks at me for a long moment.  A few wisps of snow fall over us.  “Merry Christmas Eve, Javier,” her fingers tighten weakly on mine.  Then, she lets go off my hand and picks up the bottle of anti-freeze.  She walks to the next rhododendron in line and starts covering the base and upper roots with all the leaves she can find.  Her hair gets stuck in the branches but she doesn’t care.  She pats down the layers of leaves with an odd energy.  Almost dedication.  She starts to fold sleeves of plastic and tucks the branches in with a motherly edge to her delicate face.  At length, a faint, almost invisible pink tints her cheeks.

The Mona Lisa’s, the Simonetta’s, the Dora Maar’s.  And the Elisa’s.

I look up at the sky that sent me a missive, realizing it was not a commandment; it was a gift.  Every painter has a painting, every painting has some art, every art has a maker, but not every maker is an artist.  An artist exists only if he has a muse.

Snowflakes fall on Elisa’s hair.  Merry Christmas to me. 

Thirty Nights and all related materials © 2013 Ani Surnois

30 Nights Finale, a Surprise, and Happy Veteran’s Day!

Sometimes things happen by design.  Sometimes by accident… these are the words Elisa  uses to describe why Aiden and she came into each other’s life.  I never thought they would ring so true for my last post of Thirty Nights which, by accident, happens to be on Veteran’s Day.  Perhaps, as she says, accident will become meaning and plan.  Perhaps it’s a sign that the story should go on.  Or perhaps, I have gone crazy and am in a padded room somewhere.  Please indulge me for a few moments (crying a little over here…)

I wanted to do something special for you today!!  I spent all Veteran’s Day today taking pictures of the Reed Campus and all other moments referenced in 30N.  I wanted to put them together as Elisa ends this phase of her journey and starts a new one.  And – SCARY – I managed to make my first Youtube video for you – Thirty Nights from Aiden’s Camera!!  If you know me, you know how radical this is and how much I love you.  Computers and I don’t get along.  As you will see, I tried to take pics of the places that meant the most to them.  Just like Elisa wanted in her last wishes.  I hope you like it.  Hopefully, you won’t sob like I am right now.  You will see the first fan art (for Master’s Muse), The Immigration Building, their last wishes, the Solis home, and the last moments of silence is the ending… (I couldn’t figure out how to add sounds of tears there)….  Go easy on me, I am a Youtube virgin!

My last note for Thirty Nights before we continue Aiden’s Nights and 90 Days is to thank you!!  From the bottom of my heart.  In my blog stats, I have viewers from just about every country, from the United States (my home) to my birth country (my origin – though they don’t know they are reading a compatriot’s story).  To all of the Americans that gave me a home when I needed it, and to all those “originers” that gave me life – THANK YOU!  And thank you to all of you for reading, encouraging me, becoming friends, supports, critics, lovers, haters but always  putting time in 30N and me – THIS IS FOR YOU!

Thirty Nights comes down a week from today, at midnight (embargo night style).  Then we start Aiden and more – Aiden’s story will have new parts you have not read, including all skipped days.  Until then, trust me that I want these three happy.  All my love, Ani (video, songs, and links below).

THIRTY NIGHTS – AIDEN’S CAMERA  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1jMnVTk8AQw

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He is the dream, I am its meaning… Elisa Snow.

Song for Chapter 39, Only Time – Enya 

Song for Chapter 40, Star-Spangled Banner – Whitney Houston

Three more chapters up (getting there!!)

Hey lovelies… here we go!  Three more up.  I know these are hard:  but hopefully, among the hardship and tears, you will see the beauty of these three souls. My goal is to highlight the hidden terror of PTSD. We all get the terror of Elisa and Javier but Aiden, like most PTSD soldiers and Marines, hides it all inside. It was very hard for me to write his past through a third-person but I knew Aiden himself would never “tell.”  That’s the curse of PTSD – silence and judgment.  I hope to God that real people who live with it find as much love as Aiden has and allow themselves to accept it.  🙂

The last two chapters will be posted together tonight or tomorrow.  I thought it would be easier on you this way than rush through all of them.  Thank you as always for your support, messages, and encouragement – including those of you who commented for the first time!! Love hearing from you and it makes this process so much more enjoyable.  There’s no writer without a reader – that’s the truth.  And I have been blessed with the best readership I could have asked for. Truly!  As questions come up, feel free to email me.  It will take me a few days to get to them all while preparing everything else, but I will get back to you.

New and senior readers alike will find new things in these chapters.  Specifically, more of Aiden’s backstory.  Also, of course, I am keeping more surprises for the official version that gets published (whether by a publisher or me so there are things that will be new at that time.  This way, you feel like you get something new each time, specially those who know the story so well by now.)

Songs and links for all these chapters are below.  THANK YOU!

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Song for Chapter 36, Corpus Elisa – O Fortuna, Carmina Burana (the video contains the translated lyrics from Latin.  I can’t think of another song better suited for this chapter.) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FWiyKgeGWx0&list=PL53A75CD61DF4762D

Song for Chapter 37, The Way Only a Man Can – Paint It Black, The Rolling Stones, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n1zBG2TEjn4

Song for Chapter 38, Marshall – Bonfires, Blue Foundation, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iyJy1GLxYf0

Two more chapters (getting close to the end)

Thank you so much everyone for your comments and questions.  I will answer them all in the next couple of days.  We are getting close to the end, with the final chapters to be posted tomorrow and Monday.  I will keep them up for a few days to give you time to read, comment, ask questions.  Then we start Aiden, skipped holidays, etc.  Even senior TMM/30N readers will find something new in Chapter 35 – a bit of trivia that may become relevant in the sequel.  Thank you so much for following this journey with me!!  Song and link below.

For those of you who wondered what song Aiden plays for Elisa in the library (“bad, bad girl”), it’s Criminal, by Fiona Apple.

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Two Songs for Chapter 34,  From Clare to Here, Ralph McTell  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9B3_of9CY24; 30 Lives, Imagine Dragons http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vbZGtzC_yZo

Song for Chapter 35, O Children, Nick Cave and The Bad Sees, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_0dq6SL8WRc, Ave Maria, Celtic Woman http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kWV02z6JOaE

Chapter 30 of 30N/TMM is up :-)

Well, when you are sick and sleep 18-hours per day, you wake up at all sorts of ungodly times.  And since you can’t really think or write new material, you post old ones.  Hope you enjoy it!  Thanks for all the support on the last chapter.  You guys really like car sex.  :-).  Song (including Spanish translation) and link below.

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Song, La Vida Es Un Carnaval, Celia Cruz http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0nBFWzpWXuM

La Vida Es Un Carnaval (Life Is A Carnaval)

Everyone out there that thinks life is unfair,

Needs to know that’s not the case,

Because life is beautiful, you just have to live it.

Everyone out there that thinks they are alone,

Needs to know that’s not the case,

Because in life, there is always someone.

Ay, there’s no need to cry, because life is a carnival,

It’s more beautiful to live singing.

Ay, there’s no need to cry,

For life is a carnival

And pain evaporates through song.

Anyone thinking that life is cruel,
Needs to know that’s not the case,
That there are just bad times, and it will pass.
Anyone thinking that things will never change,
Needs to know that’s not the case,
smile to the hard times, and they will pass.
Ay, there’s no need to cry, because life is a carnival,

It’s more beautiful to live singing.

Ay, there’s no need to cry,

For life is a carnival

And pain evaporates through song.

Chapter 29 of TMM/30N is up!

Hey everyone!  Thanks for your patience.  I have been struck by the flu and these last few days have been pretty miserable.  My Aiden POV is a little late but it’s coming together.  In the meantime, here is another chapter.  I remember getting so many questions after Aiden disclosed his PTSD and memory about what he feels when he sees Elisa.  Hopefully, this chapter answers that.  Thank you again for all your comments and questions.  I owe a few of you some responses and will do so once I’m up and running.  Thanks!!  Song and link below.

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Song:  Peggy Lee, Fever  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4eIDtwcFXcI

Chapter 27 of TMM/30N is up (song, link, and new bits even for TMM pro-s)

Hey everyone!  Sorry for the delay.  Sometimes reality interferes even with the best escapes like this one.  But I hope to have an Aiden chapter for you soon.  In the meantime, even seasoned TMM readers will notice some new parts here – parts that were in my original story, not in FF, and that may change some hypotheses you had about the story.  I hope you all enjoy it.  I have a special spot in my heart for this chapter because it was after this that I was officially admitted to the secret FB group of FF writers.  Now, I have met some of my best readers, mentors, and friends there. Thank you all of you for your support.  Song and link below.  Love, Ani

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Song:  Some Nights, Fun http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5ho0y4en95Y

Chapter 24 of TMM/30N is up (link and song below)

Thank you everyone for reading and commenting!  I am so lucky to have such great readers.  A special shout out to Lyn R. this week for her helpful edit recommendations and sharp eye.  As promised, we will be moving quickly now.  Every day.  Chapter 24 coming up.  Also, by popular demand (which has shocked even me), I will incorporate book recommendations, reviews, etc., going forward.  Nothing big but I always get questions on what books I am reading –  perhaps because of the classics and the poetry references in 30N.  So I will keep them short and to the point so that those of you who don’t want to hear about them, can ignore them easily.  Those of you who want to geek out on books, the more the merrier.  Join the group, recommend anything you want.  Okay.  Hope you like this chapter!  And thanks to those who have responded on the Louboutin challenge.  Let me know if anyone else is interested and I will include you in the submission as well.

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Song.  This little tune is very rare and difficult to find.  But it’s a beautiful song and it often plays in my head when I think of how hard I fell for my hubby (that’s a different story).  The Moth and The Flame, Les Deux Love Orchestra.  They have it on spotify/facebook, not even on youtube!  Also on iTunes.  It’s such a beautiful song if you can find it.

 

Chapter 22 of TMM/30N is up (link and song below, and a little challenge)

Thank you everyone for following, reading, writing to me, commenting, and sharing this journey with me.  As always, you make the trip worth it.   The painting below is titled Snow Stars – given Elisa’s last name, I found it appropriate for this chapter.   See fun challenge below (thanks Analeyna!)

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Snow Stars.

Song:  This Is What Makes Us Girls, Lana Del Rey, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UGapatrKPWw  (one of my favorites – to all my girls out there.)

Fun Challenge:  A couple of you liked the Marine Corps Louboutins  on my Pinterest enough to suggest that we all try to write a little snippet about Elisa, Aiden, or ourselves involving the shoes (below).  It doesn’t have to be long.  No rules. I don’t have prizes except to offer that I write a snippet of 30N or 90D (except the ending) for the winner.  So this is just for fun.  If you feel up to it, here is the SHOE! I wish I owned this!  Let me know, and we can post the entries here.  Or you can do it anonymously too, if you’re shy.   Either way, you’re wonderful!

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U.S Marine Corps Louboutins

Chapter 21 of 30N/TMM is up (song and link below)

Hey lovies, I know these next chapters are a bit hard on the heart so I will post them quickly so not to keep you in suspense.  But, they are consistent with Aiden’s blind commitment to do what’s right.  Hang in there.  And thank you to Bunny Wallace for suggesting to me the payment structure for Javier.  Thank you also to all my usual readers and reviewers who continuously support me and remind me why I am doing this:  because you enjoy it.  All my love, Ani.

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Song:  Feist, Limit to Your Love http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kwjn8YaaB1Q

 

90 Days of Hale: Chapter 1- Amor Vincit Omnia

Hello everyone, this used to be the first chapter of 30N sequel but it has now been removed so that the story can be published.  Hopefully you will soon hold it in your hands.  Thank you so checking and hope to see you soon! – Ani.

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Song:  Suo Gan, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6lapculOfR0

Check out the images on 30 Nights Pinterest.  http://www.pinterest.com/anisurnois/30-nights-of-snow/

Thank you for the wonderful support!

90 Days of Hale ©2013 Ani Surnois

Ch. 19 of TMM/30N and the song that always makes me cry… This is for my dad (he would know why!)

It has been over 14 years since I cannot listen to this song without tears in my eyes.  This one is for my dad, who is Elisa’s father namesake and inspiration!  Love you daddy, even though you probably can’t read this!

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Song:  Adriano Celentano, Il Tempo Se Ne Va (Time Goes By) (about a father and daughter, see translated lyrics from Italian below) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=–dqleeZ43M

Lyrics Translated  “Time Goes By”

http://lyricstranslate.com

That dress, where did you snag it?
What an astonishment
to see you wear it,
if your mother sees you, you know
tonight, we will be in deep trouble.
It’s strange but it’s really you
14 years old, or maybe a little older
You haven’t held your Barbie for some time now
And your walk is that of a lady now.

The phone calls are always a secret,
how many words in a single breath
I’d like to ask you who it is
but I know you will be embarrassed
The door is shut badly and you
on the mirror, doing your make-up
showing your cleavage.
soon, you will go out at night
and on those nights, I will never sleep

And so the time goes by
and you no longer feel like a little girl
growing in fear of your age
I had not realized it before
And so the time goes by
among dreams and worries
lacy stockings have already replaced
the white knee-length socks

Becoming a woman is natural
but a daughter
is something special
Maybe you already have a boyfriend
how many times have you cried for him
The skirt a little short and then
Malice in some of your gestures
and soon, you will go out at night
those nights, I will never sleep

And so the time goes by
and you no longer feel like a little girl
growing in fear of your age
I had not realized it before
And so the time goes by
among dreams and worries
lacy stockings have already replaced
the white knee-length socks.

LOVE YOU DADDY!

Ch. 18, a poem, and a thought… thank you as always (links below)

I always read poems about a woman’s beauty, but not enough of them about the beauty of a man.  This poem is Elisa’s conception of Aiden’s beauty.  I hope you like it.  Song and poem below (the song’s lyrics are perfect for this).

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MALE

Your body knows no beauty that falls softly

Loosened as the moonlight on my skin,

Lilacs don’t bloom with your fragrance,

Petals don’t open at your whim.

Your beauty knows nothing of azure light,

Of droplets of dew or blossoms of cherries.

Suspended in your dense, perfumed breath,

I think of steel, not of lavender prairies.

You come with a violent beauty, like war,

One that tears through body and blood.

I crave no touch but your rough, iron hands,

As I lay sodden in your carnal flood.

Your beauty storms, beats, defiles,

Sharp tempests of air in my burning lungs.

I know my margins only from your fire,

My riverbeds and valleys only from your tongue.

Your skin doesn’t soothe, it flays me alive

I break under your fingers as morsels of bread

Clasped around your salty infinity

Your hardness shatters me like spume over crags.

I bear the brunt of your opulent being

Like this I love you, neither wrong nor right

But a man with clenched body and mind

The love I love loves me fierce and blind.

Song:  Une Femme Amoureuse, Mireille Mathieu (the words are PERFECT, translated below) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8GzICQ6_Cxc

Translated lyrics:

Time flies like crazy
But today it stops for us
You look at me and who knows if you see me,
But I see only you,
I have only one question,
Your eyes, my eyes
And I sing your name
If someone else comes
I’ll drive him away and I will protect myself.

Chorus:
I am a woman in love
And inside me burns the desire of building around you
The walls of my life,
It’s my right to love you
And to want to protect you
Above all.

Yesterday, today, tomorrow
Are only one day, when you hold my hand
It’s like a fantastic plan made in heaven
For the love between us,
To be together for a long time
Or separated by oceans.
If danger comes
I’ll eliminate it and I’ll protect myself

30 Nights Poems ©2013 Ani Surnois

30 Nights of Snow ©2013 Ani Surnois

Aiden’s Letters… (this is the first letter he wrote to his son’s mother)

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Letter 4

My All,

To whom else does a man write on a day like this?  Not to his son – there are no lessons or answers to give.  Not to his mother – she would only weep.  Not to a friend – he already knows.   He writes to his woman – because she forgives.

I should write to you about how you have kept me alive.  I should say that these nights, I only fall asleep if I synchronize my lungs to yours.  You breathe like the Moonlight Sonata.  At first slowly, softly, like a butterfly on my lips.   Then, because I can’t fall asleep unless I am inside you, your breathing changes, now like a humming bird’s wings under my hands.   Your body rises and trembles, and yet you never leave my lips.  You hold on to them, as I breathe the air that you create faithfully.   And that’s when it happens.  For a blind instant, your breathing stops and it becomes a single word.  My name.  That’s how you come.  That’s how you go.  With my name on your lips, blindly, maddeningly, and for me alone.  

As you fall asleep, your breathing slows.  Deepens.  I feel an instant of jealousy for whatever dream pulls you away from me.   But your lungs let in and out a steady airflow, as if they know that without it, I am nothing.   It takes 15 of your breaths for me to fall asleep.  

I should write to thank you for breathing…  But instead, I write to add to the burden that you already carry on your delicate alabaster shoulders (I have kissed them a thousand times). 

It’s done, love.  Baghdad is razed to the ground.  Only 35 out of 650 animals in the zoo survive.  Almost 170,000 Mesopotamian artifacts are missing from the National Museum.  The National Library and all manuscripts over 7,000 years old burned down.  I don’t know how many men, women, or children are dead, or how many of them from my hand. 

Yet, there was a moment I reveled in it.   We raided a marble palace with golden doors.   You may have seen it on TV.   That is where Saddam’s son, Uday, lived.  Marble, gold, silk, milk-filled pools.  Around it, homes with no running water.  Stray dogs.   Children playing soccer with an American helmet quoting Joshua 1:9, For the Lord my God is with me wherever I go.   Blood danced in my veins as we stormed the golden doors.  I laughed at the carnage.  I whistled as we searched for bodies in the marble ruins, hoping one of them was alive so I could end him myself.

Marshall asks God for forgiveness, but I have no God with me, I have only you.   Still, every man needs an altar.   Mine is the taste of your lips and the glow of your skin.  And your soft eyes that are neither tearful, nor sad.  They sparkle with the light of open doors.  The only doors that welcome someone like me.  I suppose this letter is my knock.  And because you are not real, you let me in.

Yours,

Aiden

Ani’s Note:  Some of you may have wondered why Aiden asks Elisa “not to leave his lips” the first time they make love.  Perhaps this letter will give you  one of the answers.

30 Nights of Snow ©2013 Ani Surnois

Chapter 13 of TMM/30N is up (link below)

Thank you everyone who is following and commenting here.  And welcome to all the new readers and followers (almost 400 in the last week)!!!  You are wonderful and I cannot thank you enough for the appreciation you have shown me.

After a short break from 30N with the prologue for 90D last week, I’m continuing to post the remaining chapters of TMM/30 Nights, as promised.  As before, each chapter comes with the painting I think represents it best, a poem I have written for it, and the song that played in my head when I wrote it.    As for 90D, there will be some additional teasers off an on…  Thank you so much!!  Links below.

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Cinderella found.

LIFE-KISS

Of your open mouth,

I have learned to expect

the ocean air that keeps me alive

the cinnamon scent that spikes my dreams

the rose’s bloom that laces your smile.

From your parted lips,

I crave too much

A tempest of words that will set me free,

The soft music that mutes battlegrounds,

The sighs that lullaby a man to sleep.

From your open lips,

I desire salvation,

Benediction of my infinite days

But should you wish upon me condemnation,

I want your lips to burn me to the stake.

But of all the burdens I place upon your mouth,

Of all that I crave, and all that I miss,

It goads me love, something profound,

that your petal-lips remember this.

When next they open, they let fall

like crepuscular snow into the abyss,

the secret knowledge, the primal call,

from flesh to ash, they scorch me kiss by kiss.

 

Song:  Nina Simone, Feeling Good http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OfJRX-8SXOs

30 Nights Poems ©2013 Ani Surnois