I found myself running back to the beginning in the story last night, filling in a scene that's really the probable opening of the entire story when it comes right down to it. A tortured soul, worst day of his life, wondering where his friend is.

And I began to realize as I did a quick scan of it this morning that I'm beginning to fall in love with this story.

I suppose that's a danger when something of this nature finally strikes. At some point, you forget that you have to create quality and start seeing only the positives and have a hard time being critical enough to be negative. The thought of setting it aside and coming back later, something I've done with smaller works countless times to create separation and clear-headedness, frightens me. Like I'll forget the nearly movie-like quality of the visions I witness and miss details in second passes if I don't keep treading forward.

And the bigger fear looming - what happens when it's done?

Mrs. NFB asked me that the other day. She'd seen interviews with authors of best sellers and the like and they all seem to have a different perspective on that. Some of them say when they're finished with it they hate it, just want it to be over, like a horrible breakup. Some say they have a hard time just saying, "it's done" because they dwell so completely in the story during the work.

I have a feeling I'm going to go through a major bout of separation anxiety, like a parent sending a child off to college. When you pour your heart out into something every day, every free moment, for a period of time greater than a week or two, it begins to feel like it's a part of you. At this point, nearing the month mark since I first starting slapping together notes for this journey, seventy-thousand words behind me and several thousand more to come, something that, in many ways has been with me for almost twenty years, I don't know that I'll be able to give it up easily.

This fantasy, this other world, living in my head has so fully drawn me to it that the time I've spent there is beginning to feel a little bit like home.

Yet I know the time will come where the word "done" will ring out. I imagine it'll be a lot like the end of that scene last night, as she stood at his door, rain soaked, tired, and looking like a goddess in his eyes. Tears, joy, familiarity spilling into something other.

"I can't believe I left home."
"Are you going to go back?"
"No, I'm here now, with you."