Sweeping the Cutting Room Floor
A peek at the editing process via deleted scenes
Unlike my last post, which was a full chapter and thus had it’s own narrative arch, this one is a few choice bits and pieces trimmed from a chapter that was just too long. I’m going to share a few vignettes with brief explanations of why they were cut. A few sentences may yet appear in the final book. : )
In this chapter, Isla, Scottsville’s New Business Liaison, is trying to help Dave find a place to open a yoga studio. The options she offers him are. . .a bit out of the box. They’re just leaving the first property, a house in the woods, when Isla gets a text.
Isla’s phone vibrated as they got back in the car. She read the text and made a face.
“Everything ok?”
“Yeah, I just…” she hesitated. “My parents can’t find the key to their car and they’re sure I moved it. They’re just down the road, would you mind if I swung by? I’m sorry; it’s so unprofessional.”
“Oh I don’t mind at all.”
“Ok, thanks. I’m so sorry.”
“Seriously, no worries. It doesn’t matter at all.”
“I doubt my boss would say that. I know there are reasons for these things, but it’s a sad world where you have to worry about that. In my opinion.” They drove quietly for a moment. There was starting to be more space between houses and a few farms. “It used to be all farms out here,” Isla broke the silence, “Or so Mum says. I can’t say that I remember. But I remember more open fields, and then all this new construction starting, all these big houses with swimming pools. It kind of embarrasses me now to give my address, haha.”
“I think it’s beautiful.”
“Well...I can’t tell a person living in a trailer with a leaky roof that I get where they’re coming from, and then let slip that I live out here.” Isla was slowing down and putting on her blinker at a peeling old farmhouse that sat close to the road. The driveway led to a middle sized barn; the yard was surrounded by stone walls.
“I’ll just be a minute,” Isla said, and he watched as she dashed up some steps that were listing slightly to one side. He looked around; the yard had been mowed, but various weeds and brush sprung up along the foundations of the house and barn. Dead flowers were in the flower boxes. Tires leaned up against the barn. The home had a certain shabby, old-fashioned charm, he charitably concluded.
<<Taking longer than I thought.>> A text from Isla came in.
<<I’ll come help.>>
He was already standing in the kitchen when he read the text that said, <<No, please just wait.>>
The kitchen was all pine. There was a long wooden table, books and papers shoved to one end to clear a small spot for eating, and a wood cookstove, in addition to more modern appliances. A white enamel sink, full of dirty dishes, sat below a window whose sill was cracked and a bit grimy. It framed a view of the backyard and an empty birdbath. The refuse of several meals sat on the counter--empty cartons and plastic bags, crumbs, and a smear of jam. A door to his right was closed, but to his left an open doorway showed Isla at a table with an enormous pile of purses in front of her. She was fishing around in each one and then setting it aside.
“Can I help you look?”
Isla’s expression said that this was going from bad to worse, but just then an elderly woman came down the stairs.
“Mum, this is Dave. He’s a client that I’m trying to get around to helping today.”
“Nice to meet you, Dave.” The woman smiled genuinely, ignoring Isla’s barb. “I’m afraid we have a little situation. Won’t take a minute.”
“It’s already taken more than a minute, Ma.” The woman hung her head and scurried off again. “Just wait in there,” Isla said to Dave, nodding towards the living room.
Dave obeyed, but thought he might as well try to help if he was there. He scanned all of the surfaces. Several small tables were scattered with photographs in black plastic frames. Many were of Isla as a child and teen, missing teeth, pigtailed in overalls, or looking bored in a bridesmaid dress. She grinned from a picture where she and several freckle-faced boys held up fish they’d evidently just pulled from the lake behind them.
But there were no keys. He started looking around the furniture, amongst the dusty stacks of old magazines and wadded up tissues. He instinctively started gathering the latter and putting them in a small plastic trash can.
He became aware of low, tense words in the dining room.
“I didn’t lose them, Mum. I never had them.”
“I have to get Dad to his doctor’s appointment. We’re going to be late.”
“I know Mum, I don’t want that but I’m working. I wish I could help more, but I just don’t know where they are. Let me call Uncle Mike.”
“Uncle Mike doesn’t have our keys.”
“He can take you to the appointment. We’ll worry about the keys later.”
“Why should I bother Uncle Mike?”
“Why should you bother me...I’m working…,” Isla’s voice moved off towards the kitchen, “...Hello? It’s Isla. Hey, could you… “
Isla’s mom came in to where Dave was sitting on the couch that was upholstered with some kind of scratchy polyester tweed.
“Sorry about this.” She smiled at him, but looked at the floor. “Isla’s a good girl. She takes good care of us. My husband needs to get to the doctor, you see. It’s not an emergency...just regular care.”
Isla came in. “Uncle Mike is coming. Let’s go,” she said brusquely to Dave.
“Oh, are you sure?”
“He’ll be here in a second. We need to go.”
“So nice to meet you,” Dave said to Isla’s mother, following Isla to the door. As they crossed the dooryard, a big green truck rattled up just as an old man emerged from one of the cars parked by the barn.
“Linda, we need to get going,” Pete Campbell said.
“Can’t find the keys,” Linda said, “They’re just not anywhere.”
“They’re here in my hand, Linda,” he said, “For heaven’s sake.”
“Are you even kidding me?” Isla’s eyes drilled her mother and father in turn. “I cannot be doing this. I can’t. Let’s get going.” She tapped on the truck window as a shoulder inside pumped to wind it down, “Sorry, Uncle Mike. Dad had them all along! Sorry!”
A puff of blue smoke and a little Def Leppard came out the window. “No worries, girl. It’s all good.”
“Thanks. See you later!”
“Absolutely.” The green truck rattled away again.
Isla and Dave got back into her car. She put her head on the steering wheel and slowly let out a long breath, then silently started driving, occasionally shaking her head.
“Unbelievable,” she finally said, “Yet oh so believable. That just went from bad to worse, didn’t it?”
“It’s ok.”
“It really isn’t. But thanks. Let’s just move on, Isla,” she said to herself, “Just move on...I guess now you know me better now, since you know where I live. Only fair since I know where you live, I guess.”
“It’s nice. I love how homey those old farmhouses are.” Isla rolled her eyes. “Your parents seem nice,” Dave went on, “I saw a lot of family pictures in there. You must be close.”
“Oh, we are, I guess. Especially Uncle Mike and his family. They’ve always lived nearby, well, except for a few times. They’ve got a trailer on the lot next door; inherited land from my grandfather. I’m glad they’re nearby, in the unlikely event that I ever get a life and move out.”
“What’s a life, if not what you have?” Dave asked. Isla didn’t answer.
My editor didn’t like it that Dave, a mere acquaintance, entered Isla’s home. I don’t think Isla liked it, either. What do you think? Unrealistic? I still like the scene, realistic or not, but I agree about cutting it for better flow.
Next, Isla takes Dave to the “sawtooth mill.” This is a real place:
Isla headed back into town and pulled up next to a huge vacant mill building, not one of the oldest ones that were made of brick and had a kind of solid dignity, but a later one that was more squat and squalid with some parts thrown together from cinder block.
“So, the funny thing about this place is that it’s for sale, and $100,000 gets you the whole place, thousands of square footage for less than a house. But...you have to pay for the upkeep. Part of the adjacent mill, the smokestack, fell down a few years ago and killed a couple of squatters. So it’s no small responsibility.”
The inside was cavernous and lonely, cold, dirty, empty.
“I just don’t see this happening,” he told Isla.
“Good. It was such a good deal that I had to let you know, but I think you’re right. Let’s move on.”
At one time, the real mill was selling for less than the tiny house that we lived in at the time; years ago, the smokestack really did fall down, although I don’t think anyone was hurt. I worry that details like that, easily recognizable to anyone from my hometown, will mislead people into thinking that the book is based on reality, but plot and character-wise, it really isn’t, although you can never escape the fact that you’ve known real people and you couldn’t write real people if you never knew a person. So a scruffy voice here, a distinctive stance there. . .somehow, somewhere, I’ve observed that people have these characteristics.
From the sawtooth mill, Isla takes Dave to a prime location on Main Street, but tells him it’s probably too expensive; he agrees, and thinks some people may be uncomfortable doing yoga in front of big windows that people can easily look into. They move on:
“I have one more place to show you today and then you can go home and think about the pros and cons,” Isla glanced at her phone, “It’s pushing 2, though. Want to grab a sandwich at the market up there?” Isla indicated a small brick grocery store that had something of a vintage look about it, with ads for custom cuts of meat covering its big windows.
“Sure, that sounds great.”
A bell jingled as they passed through the door. Isla led Dave past rows of chips and down aisles of Hamburger Helper and cereal. He saw a small produce section and a dairy case, and they stopped at a row of large deli cases. “You want an Italian?” she said, “Two Italians!” she called to the man behind the counter. Dave had taken a number even though there was no line, and he now crumpled it in his hand.
They were third in line at the checkout. At the front was a small bearded man with a winter hat on, work boots, and a dark blue sweatshirt with the name of a towing company printed in white letters on the back of it. A little girl with long blond hair was scampering happily around his knees. Behind them an elderly man in a green windbreaker and baseball cap stood somewhat uncomfortably, like his knees hurt.
“Can I get her some ice cream?” he asked the slight man in a whisper that everybody could hear. The man was a bit startled, a bit confused, but the girl’s eyes opened wide with excitement. “Pick one out over there,” the old man said to her, “It’s ok, isn’t it?” The girl’s father nodded, still confused but slightly smiling, as he went to help her with the cooler. She carried a pint of ice cream back to the register. “Now you put that on mine,” he said to the cashier, “Every little girl deserves ice cream.” She rung it up and handed it to the girl, who thanked the old man as she skipped out.
“She would pick the most expensive ice cream there,” the cashier said dryly as the elderly man shuffled his white sneakered feet forward.
“Aw, it’s only money. You can’t take it with you. It makes me happy. I don’t get to do much for my own grandkids. Don’t get to see ‘em much.”
“Well, you take care, John,” she said as she finished his order.
“You, too, deah.”
Dave was moved; the stranger reminded him of his own dad. “They make great sandwiches,” Isla was saying as they left, less involved in the interaction in front of them. “I’ve been going in here since I was a kid.” Isla sat on a bench and handed him his sub. “Don’t know if I see any of those people doing yoga, though. See, that’s what I’m saying.”
Yoga had been the farthest thing from Dave’s mind at that instant. He just nodded and started eating his sandwich. It was good, seasoned with salt and pepper, oil running in little rivulets into the paper.
I really wanted to put this real-life incident into the book somewhere, because one of the themes is community, artificial vs. organic. However, it didn’t fit anywhere naturally; I knew it, and my editor said the same thing. So it’s here instead.
I hope you enjoyed this little peek into the developmental editing process!
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