#almostreadyregine

[radioregine]

i finally finished writing and notating the music for the zine <3 so what's left is to assemble the actual zine and scan it to my drive

[radioregine]

constantly oscillating between 'you should talk abt your stuff n hype it up' & 'dont talk abt your stuff more than you actually do it' so i never talk abt my shit but the newest WIP is quite fun. it's abt a 30 y.o. pianist named drew who joins a traveling music studio to get out of her parents' house + find love & fulfillment.

studio is run out of an RV & it's an experiment on the part of the owner, a late 30s/early 40s cellist named desiree drake.

dez used to do a normal commute to her students' homes and then found herself wondering if living on the road might fix some logistics shit, and maybe cut down on the loneliness/disconnection she feels when she comes home to an empty house (husband is in law enforcement and works crazy hours).

dez already had the RV (was an impulse purchase on the husband's part, it'd been sitting on their property unused ever since said purchase) and only needed to find some teachers willing to board with her. the trial run is about a semester long and will end w a recital

drew is a new hire alongside gus, another young pianist (he's about 20 and in school for STEM but has always done music on the side, wondering whether he wants to truly do both or if his heart is more in favor of the music; he's in all online courses this term so he can try out this RV living shit).

drew so far is a college dropout & Ambiguously Brown (i cannot decide what she is, i just have a v particular image of a brown woman with joan jett hair in my head) and heavyset and i keep picturing her in a black collared shirt, black dress pants, and a pink tie. she's affable, a bit spacy/scatterbrained, punky/impulsive, ultimately Outspoken. she thinks she's gonna fall in love with some parent or adult student while teaching but something keeps drawing her thoughts back to her crazy boss ...

gus is a dark skinned black guy so far but i'm still deciding on his features. what i know of him so far is that he quite likes the organ as well as the piano, he's not the best teacher, he's timid/soft-spoken, a bit intimidated by dez

dez never went to college. she is a petite black woman, i see her as medium/light toned, and i see her dressing like + having a similar attitude to the nbc hannibal version of freddie lounds -- the spunkiness, the unwillingness to be cowed by men, the crazy work ethic, the self-starter shit. just add in some capital n Neuroticism. dez personally teaches cello, violin, and piano lessons but is versed in a variety of other string instruments she doesn't teach. dez had an insane childhood and has been through several marriages. this latest was meant to be The One but dez is starting to not feel so sure abt the cop hubby ...

there are gonna be other teachers in the studio who opt out of the RV travel arrangement but are still seething at the teachers who ended up doing it. im still thinking through their descriptions/roles in the story

[radioregine]

inception of an idea on my oldass upright piano

idea morphed into this tonight on my keyboard. did you know - i don't have a mic stand yet so i recorded this w the mic in my bra

[radioregine]

that story about the entomologist/organ player & the traveling music studio . i think im calling it organ grinder

[radioregine]

why do i wanna follow the entomologist in my story now. i rly like my music studio ppl so far and i was rly excited abt having a 30 something protag in my girl drew the dyke but the entomology part is giving me so many ideas for gus bruh . idk if i wanna age him up or let his story speak through a 20 y.o.

[radioregine]

i think i've alluded to how i have an rpf thing and a showverse thing going on concurrently -- well im tryna finish them both this weekend. both are ot4 but when they're done they're both gonna have an overarching kendall/james lean🙈 WIP excerpts below :

[ > the modern day ot4 fic ]

Onstage, Kendall suddenly finds himself with Carlos pressed to his front. James and Logan approach and Kendall throws his arms around all three of them and everything outside of their bubble blurs and fades to a dull hum.

That was so good, Carlos says. It was; they all know it. Kendall says, We were all in sync, and James says they're all better than NSYNC, and that's so stupid, it gets Logan laughing harder than the rest of em; a saliva-down-the-wrong-windpipe moment. Dramatic enough that someone has to slap him on the back and play that it off to the audience as a bro-pat.

Ok, no more encores, Kendall says into the space between them right before they're about to break for final bows. Clearly Logan can't take anymore.

Kendall doesn't even mean for it to be suggestive, but --

No encores? Carlos is wearing the most put-upon devastation on his face, all wide brown eyes and upper register breathiness.

There really should be at least one, says James.

Logan, who's caught his breath by now, flashes bedroom eyes at Kendall. Yeah, he says, who's to say what all I can take?

-

I said we should get /horizontal/, Kendall says, because they're home and they're still /upright/ and locked in a ridiculous, disorganized attempt at a four-way makeout he's only just managed to take a breather from.

Oh, Kendall, what's the difference? Logan peels away and tilts his head back to look at his friend. His hair is longer than he’d ever kept it on the show all those years ago. It makes him look devastating. Especially when he says devastating things, like, Not like we've never done it against a door before.

Kendall holds his breath against the retort perched on his tongue – that was your bedroom wall, Logan, when we were like 23 and all tried to climb James like a tree and were too horny to let him up after he fell into the doorframe – and focuses on getting his tongue in Logan’s mouth the way Logan clearly wants him to. Logan laughs a little, then starts moaning into the kiss as Kendall steers it sloppy and wet.

You always do this, Kendall, Kendall hears James say somewhere to his right, past a panting Carlos. Try to orchestrate a perfect little orgy. But we can't predict everything when we're together.

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

[ > the showverse ot4 fic ]

Three albums into BTR's tenure at the Palm Woods, Kendall wakes in the middle of the night for a glass of the rosé he's been hiding from his mother. One of the Jennifers had pawned it off on him because her own mother was visiting and knew nothing of Jenn's extracurriculars. Kendall's own Jenn -- Mama Knight -- is sharp as they come, yet she has some blank spots of herself around Kendall's own extracurriculars. He enters the kitchen to find it terrifyingly Not Empty. No Jenn, but there's James. James at the counter in the dim light of Logan's battery-powered camp lantern. James in PJs and Jenn's pink dollar-store reading glasses. He's banging away at Carlos' gaming laptop, and, judging by the bottle with the broken seal -- he's drinking Kendall's rosé.

Kendall should tackle him.

It ever occur to you, Kendall says instead, calmly approaching, to, I don't know -- use your own stuff? He pulls up a seat beside him. He reaches for the rosé then stretches to get a glass from the cabinet and frowns when he finds it closed. James always forgets to shut things. Cabinets. Bedroom doors. Toilet lids. His big mouth. Sure enough there's no glass or cup of any kind on the table, and a big gob of condensation on the broken seal of the rosé. Have you been drinking straight from the bottle?

Weren't you just complaining about me being A User? James retorts absently. He doesn't look up from the computer as he says Glass is one less thing I've used.

Kendall rolls his eyes and swigs straight from the bottle. No backwash (thank fuck). Just sweet wine and a hint of James' lip balm.

Anyway, I would've used Katie's talents tonight too, but she's asleep. I thought evil geniuses didn't sleep.

She's a lazy honor student, not an evil genius.

Only those acquainted with the dark arts can ever hope to master Schmooble Sheets.

They both look to a mound of crumpled spreadsheets at James' feet.

What the hell are you even doing? The alcohol is starting to loosen up Kendall's limbs and tongue.

James pushes Jenn's glasses on top of his head. They hold his bangs away from his face like the world's gaudiest headband. He sighs. He says, very seriously: Trying to project the ramifications of a three-album run.

[radioregine]

im actually quite glad i took this screenwriting elective bc ive heard ppl say for years that trying plays/scripts when you're a prose writer can help break thru writers' block/give you a diff perspective on storytelling and this class is doing just that . i gotta report back after we've turned in the final screenplay but so far im enjoying the process . instructor + classmates have all given me valuable feedback ... like i havent rly rejected any of it so far cuz ppl have had a knack for locking into what's 'wrong' w my work + providing solutions that feel in line w my vision

[radioregine]

much like the process of getting a bachelor's degree -- writing is about getting thru a lot of intensive work and feeling like you know everything & nothing all at once. like goddamn i thought i was an expert on my characters but theyre revealing so many unforseen things to me now ... who knows how their story will unfold atp!!!

[radioregine]

i think i might completely change the setting of my novella 🙈

[radioregine]

i forgot who said it but the notion of the art we make being in conversation w the art we take in is such a mood. that's how you utilize influence. cuz this last riff was partially written b4 i listened to the btr comeback album and now it's v much influenced by 'superstitious' like if you're someone who knows anything abt scale degrees n shit you'll likely hear the similarities lmao! but it's still very much my own work. that's how you have a healthy relationship w your influences instead of agonizing over '100% originality' which p much doesn't exist

i need something to #focus on rn i think im gonna type up a bunch of the Springsteen quotes i annotated on my born to run reread

[radioregine]

new developments:

-> ive decided my boy gus is definitely an entomologist/ zoologist but specifically one that was terrified of all manner of Creature before

(also kept having dreams that he looks like lil nas x so. that's the current visual folks)

-> the traveling work arrangement gives him access to diff specimens for school. he also is the resident protector against creepy crawlies on the RV

-> drew lives with her dad (has a mother too but the mom travels so often for work that she's barely home/drew barely sees her/there's not much of a relationship there)

-> drew mostly attracted to women, and her exceptions tend to be all manner of Rockstar Guy (rockstars in the classical/chamber music world & beyond)

-> the music school operates within a specific radius in home state -- the team does occasionally travel out of state for special conferences/clinics/conventions. one time they end up at the st louis zoo for leisure while they're in the state of missouri for business. another time they find themselves at a county fair, an amusement park, and an arcade all on the same day while in another part of the midwest for business.

-> dez isn't beholden to one method/book series for teaching -- she mixes and matches techniques as she sees fit. also willing to be lax about posture rules as long as nothing injury-inducing is going on

constantly oscillating between 'you should talk abt your stuff n hype it up' & 'dont talk abt your stuff more than you actually do it' so i never talk abt my shit but the newest WIP is quite fun. it's abt a 30 y.o. pianist named drew who joins a traveling music studio to get out of her parents' house + find love & fulfillment.

studio is run out of an RV & it's an experiment on the part of the owner, a late 30s/early 40s cellist named desiree drake.

dez used to do a normal commute to her students' homes and then found herself wondering if living on the road might fix some logistics shit, and maybe cut down on the loneliness/disconnection she feels when she comes home to an empty house (husband is in law enforcement and works crazy hours).

dez already had the RV (was an impulse purchase on the husband's part, it'd been sitting on their property unused ever since said purchase) and only needed to find some teachers willing to board with her. the trial run is about a semester long and will end w a recital

drew is a new hire alongside gus, another young pianist (he's about 20 and in school for STEM but has always done music on the side, wondering whether he wants to truly do both or if his heart is more in favor of the music; he's in all online courses this term so he can try out this RV living shit).

drew so far is a college dropout & Ambiguously Brown (i cannot decide what she is, i just have a v particular image of a brown woman with joan jett hair in my head) and heavyset and i keep picturing her in a black collared shirt, black dress pants, and a pink tie. she's affable, a bit spacy/scatterbrained, punky/impulsive, ultimately Outspoken. she thinks she's gonna fall in love with some parent or adult student while teaching but something keeps drawing her thoughts back to her crazy boss ...

gus is a dark skinned black guy so far but i'm still deciding on his features. what i know of him so far is that he quite likes the organ as well as the piano, he's not the best teacher, he's timid/soft-spoken, a bit intimidated by dez

dez never went to college. she is a petite black woman, i see her as medium/light toned, and i see her dressing like + having a similar attitude to the nbc hannibal version of freddie lounds -- the spunkiness, the unwillingness to be cowed by men, the crazy work ethic, the self-starter shit. just add in some capital n Neuroticism. dez personally teaches cello, violin, and piano lessons but is versed in a variety of other string instruments she doesn't teach. dez had an insane childhood and has been through several marriages. this latest was meant to be The One but dez is starting to not feel so sure abt the cop hubby ...

there are gonna be other teachers in the studio who opt out of the RV travel arrangement but are still seething at the teachers who ended up doing it. im still thinking through their descriptions/roles in the story

[radioregine]

btw im still being Insane (complimentary)

i finally finished writing and notating the music for the zine <3 so what's left is to assemble the actual zine and scan it to my drive

[radioregine]

honestly wanting to retool this erotic thing i wrote abt fireflies ages ago into part of this story

why do i wanna follow the entomologist in my story now. i rly like my music studio ppl so far and i was rly excited abt having a 30 something protag in my girl drew the dyke but the entomology part is giving me so many ideas for gus bruh . idk if i wanna age him up or let his story speak through a 20 y.o.