The Art Of Procrastination

     "You're okay, aren't you, pet?" asked Kai, checking him up and down, before sliding him from her arms. "What started this one?"

     "She said my stories are stupid, and I'll never get published in the Neopian Times," the Purple Draik answered, his voice bitter as he remembered the unkind comment.

     "I don't believe that. What are you going to submit this week?"

     Eudony balked. "I-er-well- it's a surprise!" he blurted out, before beating a hasty retreat to the sanctuary of his room.

     What was he going to write about? He had the beginning of that story about Make Some Noise, he had some characters that would have an argument about the Smugglers Cove, and that perfect opening sentence for something about a Baby pet. Maybe they'd all work in the same story? Maybe not, that would be a little much to fit into twelve hundred words.

     Eudony threw himself onto his bed and stared up at the ceiling, thinking hard. I have to focus, he told himself. I have to finish this today so it can get into next week's edition. But ten minutes later he realised he was still staring at his ceiling and considering how high it was.

     Chiding himself, he rolled off the bed and landed on the floor with a thump. Right, he thought, in his best no-nonsense tone of thoughts. That's it. I'm going to sit down right now, and not move until I've finished it. In a business-like manner, he gathered a stack of paper, a number of pens and pencils, and settled himself at his desk. He lined up the paper squarely in front of him. Then the pencils, in decreasing size order, on his right hand side. Now the pens, he thought, concentrating fiercely as he moved them a centimetre apart on the left. Good. He stretched. I've been here for ages, he thought, glancing at the clock.

     TEN MINUTES! He looked guiltily at the blank page in front of him. Ten minutes and what do I have to show for it? His thoughts continued along a glum, self-hating route. Maybe Lorelai was right, maybe I'm not a writer. I mean, I can't even put pen to page! Another swift check of the clock on his shelf showed him that his self-pitying train of thought had wasted another five minutes. His head flopped into his hands and he groaned.

     Eudony shook himself. I can do this, he said, almost believing himself. I can. I think I can. No, I can. I have to think positive. And with that, his thoughts disappeared along another track leading away from his ideas, as he remembered fondly his old tutor who had believed that thinking positive could change the world.

     ANOTHER five minutes? HOW?!?!

     Eudony grabbed a pen, and stared intently down at the page, full of the fires of good intentions. His back ram-rod straight, his eyes focused, his tail swishing with purpose, he stared at the white paper. And stared. And stared, and stared until his eyes went funny, and he gave up.

     Twenty minutes, I stared at that piece of paper, he thought. Twenty minutes and nothing. He slumped in his seat. Stupid, stupid, stupid! he told himself, again and again, getting angrier and angrier, until he roared in frustration and forced his chair away from the desk and flung himself backwards onto the floor.

     "So, you don't want pizza for supper, then?" came an amused voice from the doorway. Eudony stretched his head back on the floor until he could see his brother standing there, grinning at him.

     "Did you know, that upside down, you can see right up your nose?" Eudony mused aloud, and the grin on Lafayetts's face grew even bigger.

     "Really? Nice view, is it?"

     "Lovely." Eudony groaned his reply, as he rolled onto his stomach.

     "So. How's the writing going?" asked Laf, in a voice designed to irritate in its chirpiness. For an answer, Eudony dropped his face to the carpet and whimpered.

     "So, not, then, is that right?"

     The Draik mashed his face against the blue carpet as he nodded.

     "Have you written anything?"

     He shook his head, rubbing his nose painfully in the process.

     "Do you want a hand?"

     Eudony stayed very still for a long moment, and then slowly, raised his head. The grin had gone from the Chocolate Kougra's face, his brother was deadly earnest.

     "Yes, please," his voice a whisper, the purple Neopet finally asked for the help he knew he should have asked for ages ago. "Please can you help me?"

     "No problem!" Closing the door behind him, Lafayett pulled his younger brother to his feet and pushed him onto his bed. He scanned the startlingly white pages scattered on the desk and floor, and turned back to Eudony.

     "You've written nothing?" he queried, and laughed as his younger brother flung himself into his pillow with a wail of despair.

     "So melodramatic." Lafayett tutted, as he hauled the Draik up. "Let's start from the beginning. Tell me about your characters."

     Eudony shrugged. "Haven't got any," he sulked.

     "Wasn't asking if you had any, now, was I? Tell me about them."

     Eudony stared balefully.

     "Oh, Fyora save me from suffering artists!" Lafayett exclaimed, jumping to his feet in agitation.

     "Okay," he said, starting to pace. "Okay. Is one of your characters an Eyrie?" Eudony nodded. "Good start, now male or female?"

     "Female," muttered Eudony, eyes fixed on the floor, in a marked, self-pitying manner.

     "Good, what colour is she?"

     "Fire." He raised his eyes a little.

     "Good. Does she have brothers or sisters?"

     "One brother."

     "Older or younger?"

     "Younger. A baby." Eudony volunteered the information, the gears in his head starting to turn at speed as he mapped out his characters' life and journey. "A baby Pteri, and her brother gets kidnapped, by the Beast in Tyrannia, because she thinks he's her baby. So she goes to Tyrannia, with a friend, to get her brother back, and then, then, because she feels sorry for the Beast, she goes to find the missing baby."

     "What is her friend?"

     "A cowardly Bori, who's custard."

     "I like it," approved Lafayett, and he grabbed a pen from the desk to start taking notes.

     "So, they go first to Faerieland, to see if one of the faeries can help, but they don't, because they haven't done a quest, so they go instead to Meridell, to see Illusen, but because they'd already asked Jhudora, she was in a mood with them and wouldn't help them out. So then..."

     As the story came to life in Eudony's mind, he raced to speak his precious words aloud, to get them out in the open. Lafayett, his tongue bitten in concentration, made the pen fly across the page to keep up with the torrent of ideas coming from the pacing Purple Draik.

     In ten minutes, the basic storyline was mapped out. In another ten, the characters lives were fleshed out, and their flaws exposed. In a further twenty, there was a paragraph plan for the story, and another ten after that had bullet points outlining sentences and feelings.

     Kai tiptoed back down the stairs, not wanting to disturb the brothers. She knew that if she interrupted them, they would never get the flow of ideas back that had been stopped.

     "We'll start without them," she announced to the rest of the family, who were all wearing the faintly dangerous facial expressions of hunger. As she dished out the pizza and salad, she smiled, thinking of her two boys upstairs, creating a new world together. "They can have the pizza cold when they're ready for it."

The End