There are three of us in the class. Me, a sweet nerdy man from Toronto, and a distractingly beautiful former beauty editor who grew up Mormon in Utah and now lives in Los Angeles. Our teacher is a talented writer adjacent to / part of the Dimes Square scene (at least I think he's talented... I order his latest novel after class. More to be revealed.) Our teacher says he knows us all from Substack, or at least has some nodding acquaintance. I've been aware of the existence of our teacher for some time now from said downtown scene and arrived at his class by way of some podcast, although I can't remember exactly which now.
It's a little awkward, at first -- the four of us on Zoom together. I try my best not to focus on what I look like in the camera, although that's always difficult to fully put out of my mind. Especially when the other woman on the call is a distractingly beautiful former beauty editor! I get over it though, eventually, and immerse myself in the conversation.
I'm the only one of us who's come to class with pages. This class is meant to be generative, anyway. You can come with nothing and leave with a good chunk of your novel done and dusted. Our teacher skims the 50 pages I sent over, looking thoughtful as he mulls them over. "Your narrator has a little too much power in the story," he tells me. "She should know less than she currently does. Take a little more control over her and show us the camera making the documentary." I nod along, knowing just what he means, but unsure exactly how to execute on that.
We on the call commiserate that we don't like being conflated (as authors) with our narrators. We admit -- or at least I do -- that it's my tendency to do the same to other writers as I'm reading their books. Of his latest novel, our teacher explains, everyone wanted to know which character was a stand-in for him. Because of course, one of them had to be him. He monologues here for a little bit about ethics, and I again, nod along, although I don't follow his thread entirely. It's a lot of shit to make up on the spot for three hours every week. I'm not entirely sure mine is solely a comprehension issue.
The distractingly beautiful former beauty editor asks me whether I've read Yoga by Emmanuel Carrere, which I have. "Why are you only asking her? Is this a gender thing?" Our teacher feigns offense. He turns, metaphorically, to the only other guy in the room and jokingly asks whether he's read The Brothers Karamozov. I know why she's asking me though. It's a novel about bipolar -- and an excellent one at that -- which is what I'm trying to write. Not about bipolar per se, but bipolar as it relates to motherhood, as it relates to mother loss, to grief, and recovery. I'm grateful to the distractingly beautiful former beauty editor for reminding me of that book though, as the last time I read it I had no idea I was touched by said affliction, and certainly hadn't intended to write my own about it.
The sweet nerdy man from Toronto has neither pages nor a concrete idea of what he wants to write, so we really don't focus on him. All I really glean is that he wants to write something about systems. What exactly that means, I'm not entirely sure. More to be revealed.
The distractingly beautiful former beauty editor is working on concept still, but paints a picture of a book I would love to read. She wants to write a Lynchian LA novel. Something about a sex worker. Perhaps a couple whose marriage is in decline. Something about freedom. Something about control. Our teacher has ideas for her. Describes the novel as a formal puzzle: how can we make two distinct storylines come together as one? He does this, in front of us, in real time with her concept, and it sounds like a halfway fleshed out novel concept. I'm kind of amazed. "I hate that novel," the distractingly beautiful former beauty editor says. He tells us about a couple in a natural wine bar in Silver Lake, how their relationship is on the rocks and they call in a sex worker to keep the spark alive. I ask her what she hates about it, and it sounds like the whole natural wine bar in Silver Lake thing hits way too close to home. "I'm way too nostalgic for that," she says.
Class wraps, in the way that Zoom meetings always do. Suddenly. There's no walk home in the cold. No transition between class world and my own. My apartment is empty and I am alone. I shut my laptop, then quickly open it again. My pages. My pages! Need to start working on my pages for next week.
