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amtrak12 · 1 year ago

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Fanfic Meta: First Draft vs Final Draft w/ Examples (2/2)

Part 2 of my meta post on first draft vs final draft using Chapter 10 of my Lucifer fic “Can We Keep Her” as an example. Part 1 can be found here.

Scene is below the cut. Bolded text is a part I wanted to specifically reference in my commentary at the end. The text was not bolded in the published version.

Despite her repeated reassurances this morning, Chloe was late returning for lunch. Thankfully, Rory didn’t notice. Her stomach had declared lunch two hours earlier, and so, full and happy, she played with Trixie’s old toys, unconcerned with who was and wasn’t there. When Chloe did finally arrive, she rushed off the elevator looking stressed and tossing out a dozen apologies for each step she took.

“I’m sorry! I’m so sorry, we had a last minute interview that, of course, could only be scheduled over the guy’s lunch break, never mind my own.”

Lucifer felt a pang of jealousy that she’d interviewed another suspect without him, a pang that deepened when the Detective’s gaze skirted right past him to search for the infant.

“Rory? I’m back — whoa….” Chloe spotted the large blanket fort that had taken over his living room. “You two have been busy.”

“The infant doesn’t have an off switch,” Lucifer dryly replied. His sarcasm was upstaged by said infant crawling out of the fort and squealing at Chloe.

“Mommy!”

Chloe grinned. “Monkey!” She dropped to her knees as Rory sprinted over to tackle her in a big hug. “Ohhh, I’ve missed you so much!” She squeezed Rory tightly. “Have you been having fun with Daddy?”

“With Lucifer,” he instantly corrected her. “Get her to say my name.”

“Right, sorry.” The Detective glanced up at him with more of an eye roll than an apology.

Rory giggled. “He’s silly.”

“Oh, just so silly,” Chloe agreed in that tooth-achingly sugary voice.

Lucifer wanted to argue. Better yet, he wanted to rage and vent. Between the two of them, couldn’t Chloe tell he was the one in distress? Certainly not the pampered infant. But before he could even utter an indignant ‘excuse me’, he realized how fruitless it would be. The Detective’s attention was focused exclusively on Rory. In fact, she looked relieved to see the girl which made matters so much worse.

Had he been too quick to believe her when she’d said she’d still trusted him? Was she not stressed over work but over the infant’s safety after leaving the girl in his care? But there was no interrogation, no pointed questions, no checking the infant over for injury. Chloe and the girl simply chatted the way Chloe would chat with her daughter after a school day. Nothing more, nothing less.

The revelation hit him like the reluctant understanding of the damned. Chloe really had missed the infant this morning. That’s why she was so relieved to see her now. She wasn’t patronizing the girl. She’d truly, honestly missed her.

As baffling as that was (Lucifer was quite sure he would never, ever miss the girl and wished she would disappear from the face of the earth right now), a second, more unsettling, thought slithered into his mind right behind it. Someone else should be missing Rory, too. If — as impossible as it was — his father hadn’t made the girl after all… if Rory was actually his daughter… then somewhere out there she had a mother. Someone who had taken care of Rory before the girl was dropped on his doorstep, someone who must have loved her very much given how healthy and spoiled the girl was. Was she worrying about Rory at this very minute?

Lucifer tried to shove the thought away, but it clung to him as tightly as the infant’s sticky, pinching hands.

“Oh, guess what?” Rory announced. “I got a new car seat.”

“You did?” Chloe said.

“Yeah, it’s almost as good as ours,” the girl said. “But it’s orange so it’s also better.”

“You got an orange car seat?”

“It has orange straps,” Lucifer clarified. “But she still had to play Goldilocks with the dozen other models at the store before she decided the orange one was the best.”

Chloe grinned like the infant’s fussiness was a delightful discovery.

“You’re picky, aren’t you?” she teased the girl.

Rory giggled at the tone and, far too proudly, replied, “Thank you!”

The Detective laughed and stood up with the girl in her arms. “Have you eaten lunch yet? Are you hungry?”

All smiles evaporated as Rory fell into a serious pout. “No, I haven’t eaten at all.”

“Liar!” Lucifer said with a scowl. He told Chloe, “She ate a peanut butter and banana sandwich the second we got home. She insisted on it.”

“Well, maybe she’s still hungry,” Chloe said.

“Well, maybe she shouldn’t have her thrown her plate of snacks on the floor,” Lucifer countered.

Chloe frowned, but, infuriatingly, it was his actions she questioned, not the three year old’s. “How many snacks did you give her?”

“One of each just like the Urchin suggested,” Lucifer said. “She declared fudge-striped cookies was the winner before she’d even sampled half of them. Then, when I wouldn’t hand over the rest of the package like she requested, she got pissy with me and flipped her plate right off the table.”

Chloe bit back a smirk. “Wow, that is so much funnier when it’s not my kid.” She turned to the infant and said, “Rory, we don’t throw things to get our way. That’s not how it works, okay?”

The manipulative infant curled sadly into Chloe’s shoulder. “But I cleaned it up.”

“After I made you! And I still had to go back over it myself,” Lucifer said. To Chloe, he added, “She’s terrible with a broom.”

For some frustrating reason, Chloe’s smirk grew. “Wow, look at you doling out sandwiches and punishments.”

“Because I’m the Devil.”

“So, you make peanut butter and banana sandwiches?” Chloe teased.

“So, I punish people!” Lucifer finally snapped. “That’s my job! I’m not a bloody father!”

The teasing slipped off the Detective’s face, but it did nothing to appease his anger. Then, the damn infant opened her mouth to make a fool of him once again.

“I think Daddy needs a nap.”

The corner of Chloe’s lips twitched upwards again, and Lucifer slammed his hands down on the bar.

“That’s it, I’ve changed my mind.” He glared at Rory. “Feel free to go out on the balcony any time you like, infant — in fact, please, let’s head out there now. Maybe you’ll tumble over the railing and I won’t have to see you anymore.

He marched off to the balcony. For the first time in days, he unlocked the doors and stepped outside. A blast of dry wind hit him and grabbed him by the chest. It felt like he hadn’t been outside — truly outside — in days either. Stepping out to run errands with the infant didn’t count. Lucifer needed space to breathe, space to be free. The penthouse wasn’t safe anymore, not with the infant around. It didn’t belong to him. Nothing belonged to him lately. Not his relationship with the Detective, not his home, not even his own bloody body now that his wings were back. It was all Dad’s, Dad’s, Dad’s.

He glared up into the cloudless sky. “You’re probably laughing it up right now, aren’t you, Dad?” The urge to throw or punch swept over him, but there was nothing around to hit. “Fuck!”

Chloe walked out onto the balcony, and Lucifer cursed again.

“Oh, perfect. What’s the lecture this time, Detective? Don’t curse in front of the infant? Don’t raise your voice?”

“I’m just checking on you,” Chloe said calmly.

“Right,” Lucifer scoffed. “You left the infant alone, you know.”

“She’s picking up her toys so we can eat lunch in the blanket fort.”

The damn brat really was picking up. Lucifer could see her through the window. He didn’t know why he was surprised by that. Of course, she would be cleaning up; the infant always listened to what Chloe said. In fact, Chloe should just take the girl to live with her since they got along so well. She could have two daughters, and he could go back to having none. It would suit him just fine.

He shook his head and stared out over the balcony railing.

“Lucifer, what happened?” Chloe asked. “Has Rory been acting out? Did she cause trouble during your therapy appointment?”

“Oh, she certainly did that,” he said. “The little worm broke Linda and made her completely useless to me again. And then she accused me of not listening!”

Chloe frowned. “Rory or Linda?”

“Rory,” Lucifer snapped. “Who do you think has been driving me up the wall all day? It’s all Rory, Rory, Rory!”

In a neutral tone, Chloe said, “Yeah, three year olds are a lot of work.”

“Work I’m not supposed to be doing, because she’s not supposed to be here!” Lucifer said. “Dr. Linda couldn’t wrap her head around it. Kept asking me how a baby angel happened, like I have all the answers. Well, guess what, Detective? I don’t! I don’t have any bloody idea how or why there’s a baby angel walking around on Earth. You know who probably does? My Father!” He turned and shouted up at the sky. “But of course, you won’t share that answer with us, will you, Dad? Because when do you ever do that?”

“Lucifer—“

“You’ll just sit up there, watching from on high, judging us as we all fuck up whatever plans you made.” He gave a wild laugh. “Or worse, we’re all playing right into your hands again. Is that what this? Another game?”

“Lucifer!”

The heat of Chloe’s hand on his arm froze the breath in his throat. He looked back at her, still shaking with too much rage.

“Stop,” Chloe said. “There’s no point in yelling at your Father. He’s not here right now.”

“Exactly why I’m yelling at Him!” Lucifer said. “He’s screwing with my head again, and I’m bloody sick of it!”

“Rory is the one who’s here right now.”

“But she isn’t supposed to be!” Lucifer argued. “Baby angels don’t exist. Fact. End of story.”

“And yet she does! And she’s inside, right now“

“She’s a mutant,” Lucifer said. “Or an experiment or a mistake that my Father—“

“Stop it!” Chloe cut in. “Stop trying to explain it when we don’t have an explanation.”

Lucifer threw his hands up in the air. “News flash, Detective, that’s exactly what everyone is doing! Every single person including you keep insisting that she’s my daughter. Well, what makes that explanation any more true than mine?”

The frustration slipped from Chloe’s face. The argument halted.

“You’re right.”

“What?”

“We are all jumping to conclusions,” Chloe said. “None of us actually know what’s true.”

Was she really agreeing with him? That was… disorienting.

“So… Rory’s not my daughter now?” he asked. “We’re going to stop assuming she is?”

“We’re going to stop assuming anything,” Chloe said, “and instead treat this like one of our cases.”

Lucifer’s confusion deepened. “The infant hasn’t murdered anyone. She’s just annoying.”

Chloe replied, “No, not treating it like a murder. I mean just in general. If this was a case, then we would need to back up and start gathering evidence with an open mind instead of only looking for the evidence that fits our theory.”

“Your theory is impossible!”

“Every theory for Rory’s existence sounds impossible,” Chloe argued back. “God creating a toddler angel for the first time in all of history? That sounds ridiculous.”

Petulantly, Lucifer said, “It could’ve been my mother.”

“Which is as equally impossible as an angel having a child, by the sounds of it,” Chloe said. “So, we should stop looking for what is or isn’t possible and instead focus on figuring out what explanation best fits the evidence.”

Oh, he did not like where she was going with this. The only evidence they had right now was Rory’s white wings and the DNA results.

“But that just brings us back to me being her father.”

Chloe nodded. “So, we pursue the lead.”

“That’s not a lead. It’s slander,” Lucifer said, but the Detective ignored him.

“If you’re really Rory’s father, then that means she has a mother,” Chloe said. “A human mother right here on Earth that we can track down.”

“If there is a mother to track down.”

“I know, but we have try.” Chloe asked him, “You don’t happen to have a little black book somewhere listing everyone you slept with about 4 years ago, do you?”

He didn’t. But he could easily make one. Lucifer didn’t forget a face, but in this moment, he wished he could.

“It’s a long list,” he warned, on the needle-thin chance the Detective would balk at pursuing this line of investigation.

But even that needle-thin chance was destroyed when Chloe simply shrugged. “Yeah, I remember how long your list of sexual partners was for eight weeks. I can estimate what a whole year is going to look like.” She turned thoughtful. “But we might not even need the full year if Rory knows what her birthday is. Have you tried asking her?”

“Even if she did, there’s no telling we can believe….” He trailed off as he glimpsed Rory through the balcony window. The girl had her face pressed up against the glass, mouth spread open, as she made distorted faces at them.

“Rory!” he barked. “Knock that off! You’re smudging the glass.”

The infant jumped back from the window. She tensed when Chloe looked over as well and clasped her hands behind her back to feign innocence.

But Chloe didn’t scold the girl. Instead, she wrinkled her nose with a conspiratorial smile and beckoned the girl outside. Rory brightened into a grin and ran for the door.

��Don’t actually let her out here!” Lucifer complained. “I didn’t mean what I said earlier.” But he was ignored. Rory excitedly ran onto the balcony, and Chloe picked her up to carry her on her hip.

“Hi, monkey. Did you finish cleaning up?”

The infant pointed at the city skyline behind Chloe’s shoulder and cooed, “Pretty.”

“Yeah, it is pretty,” Chloe said. “Lucifer has a really nice view, doesn’t he?”

“Yeah.” Then, Rory’s face fell into a perfect mimicry of pitiful sadness. “Daddy, I broke a blanket.”

Lucifer had already grown accustomed to not understanding seventy-five percent of what the girl said, but this wasn’t fantastical imaginings or potential fortune telling. It was just run-of-the-mill infant nonsense.

“You broke a blanket,” he repeated. Nope, it didn’t make any more sense when he said it.

“Yeah, it fell down.”

He rolled his eyes. “So, you broke the blanket fort.”

“Aw, well we can fix that for you,” Chloe said. She kissed the girl’s cheek which earned her another grin. “Are you ready for your second lunch now?”

“Yeah! I’m so hungry.”

“Oh, you’re so hungry. You poor thing,” the Detective baby-talked to the girl.

Joy once again radiated from Chloe as she carried Rory inside. Lucifer’s mood, though, darkened. He understood why Chloe was so determined to find the girl’s mother, and it wasn’t to gather more evidence to explain the girl’s existence. No, Chloe saw a lost and helpless child who’d been abandoned, and she wanted to get justice for the girl.

But Lucifer wasn’t convinced it was the girl’s mother who should be punished.

------------

My Thoughts:

Okay, we see the difference here, right? The scene is certainly longer, yes. (2525 vs 1936 words) And while some of that is just the difference between how I write first drafts vs final drafts (again, *points to self* underwriter) — the main reason, the final draft is longer is simply because Lucifer has more to contribute to the story at this point in time. His version is meatier. There’s more going on. There’s more conflict -- which I did not expect, honestly. Like yes, he’s more conflicted about Rory at this point in time, but I didn’t realize he was going to snap in the middle there even though it fits into the larger picture of this chapter.

These things always seem obvious in retrospect, but my initial thought process was:

Ugh, my brain is tired from rewriting Linda’s scene for the fifth time. I have no idea what this last Chloe scene needs :/

Wait… should I maybe write this from Lucifer’s POV? Would that help me?

*plays with Lucifer’s POV in my head, considering the ways it shifts the scene until Lucifer gets frustrated and I realize “OH” there’s something here.*

And that’s when I rewrote it from Lucifer’s POV. I like strong emotions. Strong emotions typically mean I’m onto something. Strong emotions that don’t resolve themselves mean I’m missing something, and I definitely couldn’t resolve Lucifer’s frustration initially. I had the bit about Rory and the snacks, Chloe teasing Lucifer, and Lucifer snapping. I had him ranting on the balcony, and I knew it would still resolve with the decision to search for Rory’s birth mother (now decided in the scene and not already decided by Lucifer before the scene). But that transition from rant to resolution wasn’t there. I thought Chloe needed to talk him down somehow, and it just wasn’t working.

And then I found the pivot point which I’ve bolded above. Chloe doesn’t calm him down or make him see reason or convince him of anything. She’s the one who gives in. Lucifer’s making good points. Rory’s impossible, we can’t make assumptions — okay then why does everyone keep assuming she’s his daughter? And I already wanted to make the comparison to how they work their cases. I included that in the original draft. But this version is better. It’s not just suggested this time, it’s a solution to an argument. Lucifer’s conflict isn’t fully resolved still, but it’s not supposed to be at this point in the story. All this scene needed to do was move them to the next step of the plot (searching the wrong year for Rory’s birth mother). Both versions do that, but this one also supports Lucifer’s emotional journey.

It also still shows Chloe’s parental feelings for Rory, and probably shows them better than the first draft. 1) They are strong feelings, and like I said, I do find strong feelings easier to show through an outside perspective. And 2) Lucifer is very observant of Chloe and every little thing she does or says. He may not interpret them correctly, but he sees them. (Unrelated to this example scene, but this is also why I use his POV to show similarities between Rory’s and Chloe’s mannerisms and facial expressions. Chloe wouldn’t notice them because she doesn't see her own facial expressions on a daily basis -- but Lucifer does, and he'll notice when Rory makes some of the same expressions. So, I've had fun slipping those extra time travel/Chloe is Rory's mother clues into his POV.)

The final, big improvement: even more Rory cuteness. I love her making faces against the balcony window. I love the info about her throwing her plate because Lucifer wouldn’t give her more cookies. Saying “I broke a blanket” when she knocked over part of the blanket fort is way more ‘three year old’ than saying “fix it” when the TV show stops playing. And I absolutely adore her exaggerated play-acting to get her way. I’ve demonstrated that trait in previous chapters because it’s a fun clue to Rory’s origins that also doubles as a red herring for the characters. It seems like she inherited Lucifer’s charisma, but it’s actually the acting gene from Chloe’s side shining through. But I don’t just use it for the dramatic irony. A not-insignificant part of the time travel reveal is them realizing how they misinterpreted this specific clue and feeling like they should have realized Chloe was Rory’s mother so much earlier. So, the more chances I have to emphasize Rory’s acting skills, the better.

I think the only thing I lost when switching POVs was the info that Chloe wasn't late for lunch because she was interviewing a suspect (which is what Lucifer assumes). She was late because she was interviewing a family member of the victim (which Chloe knew and could share with the reader when it was in her POV). I wish I had still found a way to convey that info in Lucifer's POV, but it doesn't truly affect the plot. All that information does is confirm Chloe isn't making headway on this case which helps justify Pierce taking it away from her in Chapter 11. But that doesn't exactly need justification. Since this is a canon case, the reader already knows the second victim was never killed so Chloe is missing the connection to Lucifer that she would need to solve the case. And also Pierce doesn't take the case away from Chloe because she's being too slow at solving it. He takes it away from her to prevent her from solving it since murdering people Lucifer did favors for no longer serves his goals.

Final note, I believe there are still improvements I can make to this scene, however I'm posting this WIP on a set schedule and I just ran out of time. With all the rewrites Chapters 8 and 10 required, Lucifer's version of this final scene didn't get to incubate as long as I would like so I haven't quite worked out why it still feels a little choppy and how to fix it. I think the transition to the balcony needs work. I think there should probably be a more explicit agreement from Lucifer about searching for Rory's birth mother. Little things like that. The content is all there. The scene does it's job. It's just not quite as polished as I like my scenes to be before I publish them.

Still, I hope it demonstrated the difference between a first and final draft. I also hope my insights into why I wrote both versions the way I did were helpful, whether you're reading it the day I post it or years in the future. :)

If I find other examples or topics I want to talk through, I will certainly make posts about them. If you have specific writing meta topics you'd like to explore, feel free to ask me. I may not have proper answers because I'm just a fanfic writer. But also I've been writing/trying to write fanfic for like 20 years, so I do have some experience to pull from ;)

Oh and if you remember that large-ass table of meta links from LiveJournal, please for the love of the old school internet, can you send me the link or the wayback link or anything you might have? There was some good shit there :( Thank you!

#my meta #my fic #Can We Keep Her meta #long post #for real long post #the example scene is 2500 words on its own #if I do more of these meta posts I might look into an old school blogging site to host it #because Tumblr doesn't allow for much formatting anymore which makes long posts like these difficult to make

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