The Yellow Cottage

Jess looked at him keenly. "No, and why should she? I presume it was to help ensure you continued regarding her as your mother as you can be rather uncompromising at times."

Scott rolled his eyes and said that was an intelligent response. "No, his surname didn't appeal to her -- it's Morrow."

"Morrow sounds okay to me."

"Try Moira Morrow," Scott and grinned when seeing Jess's eyes widened as she said Moira Morrow to herself.

Scott did three hours work while Jess washed her hair and then settled down to continue reading the second thesis, knowing she was absorbing excellent background information to better understand some of the politics and issues involved in what she'd be writing about.

As sun disappeared behind the high hill behind them that largely sheltered their river flat from the southern and westerly winds, Jess felt on edge so decided to go for a walk. Scott said he'd accompany her so they walked slowly around the spit and on to the ocean beach, arm in arm and now discussing the character formation of Jess' hero.

"Have you read my profile notes?"

"No."

"Good, then I don't except you will have much to challenge in my concept of him."

"You construct him how you wish. My contribution, if any, will be to ensure he has the grit to complete the task ahead of him and be incapable of being a jerk to Sandy."

Jess revealed her concept of Nathan in depth, as if picturing him.

"Well?"

"A thorough character creation."

"And?"

"Jess, that's inviting me to pull him to pieces and you know it's only my view."

"Spit it out -- you are my coach and I trust your good sense and am sure you can now visualize him almost as good as I do."

"Oh fuck."

"Don't be vulgar. I require your opinion."

Scott lobbed her a hot one. "I don't like the name Nathan and suggest others will share my view."

"How many is 'others'?" Jess said, a red spot appearing on both cheeks.

"Who knows? But I guess you will portray his mom the Prime Minister as a Super-bitch and on hearing the name Nathan she'd curl her lip. Nathan Morgan sounds precocious, contrived or so named as his mum had visions of him becoming a male ballerina."

"Oh yes. Then make some suggestions."

"Cullen."

"Ha, Cullen Morgan. Sounds like Killer Morgan. Certainly not the name for a special envoy.'

"Bradley."

"Hmmm, Bradley Morgan sounds more like a diplomat. Not bad but not for me."

"Kingston."

"Now who's dubbing my hero with a precocious and contrived name? I bet he lifts his little finger daintily when he drinks coffee or sherry."

"Jesse, spelt J-E-S-S-E. Jesse Morgan sounds like a new age man to me, a hardened warrior-like guy under his diplomatic façade. The Australian's will wonder how the fuck did New Zealand come up with a guy who could take them on toe-to-toe."

"Jesse? All right, I was a bit iffy about Nathan myself. I'll change my hero to Jesse and trust he can keep it hard for Sandy."

"Don't be so coarse."

Jess smiled and said, "Look who's talking. Readers will think I've named Mr Morgan after myself."

"So?"

"I may consult my hostess on Saturday night if I get the chance and she asks me what do I do for a living. Anything else?"

Scott said her heroes and heroines were usually blonde and blue-eyed.

Jess opened her mouth to retort but it stayed open silently as she thought back and then said. "Oh damn."

"Easy fixed. Sandy's hair sounds more sandy than blonde so make Jesse's hair black and perhaps his mother or grandmother could be part Maori or Samoan. And don't make all the sub-characters good-looking with no one being over-weight or none having a weak bladder and/or none displaying a nasty disposition, hearing problem, a limp or only fuck to procreate.

Jess squeezed his hand and said good points. "You want me to inject more reality, don't you?"

"Yes, but I accept readers expect the two principals to grow on them as loveable characters so that implies being good-looking and even tempered for most of the time."

"Anything else?"

"Just one more thing for the moment. You describe Jesse as being the fifth child in a poor family of seven children. That could raise credibility problems with some readers and you'd have to write your butt off taking an underfed brat into becoming an outstanding international diplomat at the early age of thirty-eight. Consider making his father a former senior partner of a major law firm who specialised in business law before being appointed a High Court judge and his mother is a somebody such as an associate professor in, um, economics."

Jess was away. "And they have two children with Jesse's older sister being a gifted musician already known to Dame Helene Malone by name and especially recalling seeing her in live convert. Jesse's parents sent him to Oxford or perhaps Harvard after graduating LLB to study for his doctorate."

"Now you're smoking babe. Your central male character was destined to become a somebody from birth. You won't even have to make that point to your editor and readers. Sandy of course managed her parent's cattle station when her mother's political career began taking off and after gaining a business degree on-line she went to London to complete an MBA."

Excitedly Jess added, "Yes! And in London Sandy twice ran across Jesse and wished they'd had sex, not expecting to come across him again after her mother fast-tracked her into senior administration and eventually she emerged as chief adviser to the Minister of Foreign Affairs. She quickly became recognized for her outstanding ability in negotiating breakthroughs in political stalemates."

Scott winked at her. "Sandy, I mean Jess. If your mind continues functioning at this level you'll have the potential to breakthrough with a best-selling book."

Frowning, Jess swept her hair back and replied she was nervous, very nervous, that the project was taking her out of her comfort zone.

"Why is that?"

"I'm used to sitting and writing, allowing what's inside me flow out of my fingertips."

Scott picked up a small stone and threw it out into the sea. "Write at a comfortable pace, injecting feeling, and you'll be surprised what you create even when outside your comfort zone and remember you now consider yourself a professional writer. Write drawing upon research, and well considered thought and you've upgraded your base creativeness and that will simply be absorbed into you and tapped out as fast as your fingers can manage."

"Oh, that implies lifting myself above creating crap to producing learned output means I jettison my current readers and have to tempt the reading aristocrats to find if I'm worth adopting."

Scott smiled patiently. "That's one way of thinking but the reality is a writer can mature and uplift her or his loyal band of readers. Another reality is readers tend to seek out content, style, presentation and level of substance in the writing that they decide appeals to them. The writing style of the highest regarded authors at the top of the tree often is disarmingly simplified on the surface but the readers is constantly confronted with phrasing of wordage that appeals because of vitality and its freshness bereft of steady plod. Jess, I appeal to you: continue to write how it flows from you. Concentrate on adjusting the way you think and to build your information database from which you will draw upon when writing."

"Yes master."

"Come on Jess, just listen and think. You are being forced to create a more extensive database for this new novel, not be me, but by necessity. That's because you are venturing into an arena about which you previously had known very little."

"How right you are. I knew Australia was a federation of states but prior to this research work if asked how many states, I may have said five rather that answer correctly six and perhaps corrected myself to include the Northern Territory although it's name clearly identifies it as a territory and not a state. Previously I knew Western Australia was larger than Queensland, the next largest state but I didn't know that WA was the largest land mass, covering almost a third of Australia. I now know that if New Zealand became a state of Australia it would be the fifth largest state in terms of land mass, slotting in between South Australia and much smaller Victoria and on a population basis it would sit just above Queensland. Did you know all of that?"

Scott shrugged. "Most of it but hadn't been aware where it would slot in terms of land mass. New Zealand is about 270,000 sq km."

"Oh, very good -- 268,680 in fact compared with Australia at 7.68 million sq km and it's population of 20.6 million. New Zealand has around 4.1 million and Queensland 4.05 million. What about these questions Scott -- is New Zealand larger or smaller in area than the Northern Territory and what are the names of the other territories?"

Scott smirked and said, "The other territory is the small Capital Territory around Canberra. Dead easy."

"You missed one territory -- the smallest by far."

Snorting, Scott said Tasmania was the smallest state.

"I meant Jarvis Bay Territory."

"Never heard of it," he said. "Is it an island off the Northern Territory?"

"No, it's a small area on the coast of New South Wales, originally purchased to be the port for the Capital Territory. Ninety percent of the area is today under land claims by the Aboriginal people."

Scott grabbed a handful of ass. She squealed and he said wasn't she becoming a walking fact-file. He was so proud of her. That earned him such a passionate kiss that he had to back off, knowing there were other people walking the beach.

Her ardour cooling and rubbing her butt where his fingers had dug in, Jess said she was worried that the Australian land grab could take her a year to complete.

"What did you just say?"

"I said I'm worried that the Australian land grab..."

"You've just named your novel."

"What? Please don't divert...oh God I hear what you say. That title could be a cracker providing I write with that bias."

"Perhaps you should think about that. Usually the big guy wins. You're worried about taking a year -- it could take almost two years."

"Oh no, I wouldn't last out financially."

"What are your cash reserves?"

Jess replied without hesitation, "Eighteen thousand plus with publishing royalties dribbling in."

Scott scratched his ear while doing a mental calculation. "That's about $350 a week which means really frugal living. You were doomed, paying all the rent for this place before I moved in and now help out."

Jess frowned and said that wasn't true. She'd planned to have her next romantic adventure to her publisher within three to four months and the next one three months after that. "And then you came along and added all sorts of complications, but I'm not complaining. I'll stick it out here until my cash is almost done and apply for a teaching job."

"I'll lend you money."

"Thank you, that's very generous." Jess said, her lower lip in a bit of a wobble. I'll take your cock and friendship but not your money."

"Jess, please..."

The look Jess gave him silenced Scott for a second. Then a smile wiped away his frown. "I've got it. Put the land grab novel on the back burner for three months and use that time to whack off a pot-boiler good enough to lift you in the marketplace to initiate a good cash flow. I'll help stimulate you -- make it fact-fiction, based on you finding me and title it 'Love and Lust at Riverside Cottage'. Exaggerate what you have experienced with me, make half of the village up in arms about your evening and morning screams of sexual release but how you won over the village when the District Council attempted to impose new bylaws requiring a quarter of the cottages to be demolished within six months because of failing to comply with new building codes and every building including Mrs Murphy's rainbow coloured store to be repainted slate grey."

"You mean based it on this village and Mrs Murphy is Mrs Perkins?"

"Oh, what excellent thinking. Good girl. Cast grinning Razor as the village idiot dog but he becomes village hero when the Mayor arrives to close down the village store by decree as it's sited on residential land. Mrs Murphy takes to the mayor with a broom, which he grabs and snaps it across his knee. Razor darts in and almost bites right through the mayor's penis. The council's chief inspector pulls out an illegal pistol and shoots Razor who miraculously survives after a nine-hour operation by a veterinary team."

Eyes alight, Jess said, "Oh yes, and while the surgery continues the entire village watches the Mayor and Deputy-Mayor ridiculed on "Close Up' on national TV and a news flash ends the story saying the chief vet believes Razor will make it. So the entire village descends on the veterinary clinic to stand in a silent vigil in support of Razor. The news of that spreads and another 20,000 people from all over join them including a Queen's Counsel whose wife breeds terriers. That lawyer promises to donate his services to lead the charge to have the council's heavy-handed decisions affecting the village overturned by the Supreme Court."

"Ooh, darling. Now you are smoking. No more story line from me -- you're on your own by I am available for consultations and offer my services as a review editor as you finish each chapter."

"Oh darling, how can I reward you?" Jess asked slyly, running a palm hard over his left breast as if attempting to remove the nipple.

"Come on, back home at the double," Scott leered, pulling her into a jog.

On the sofa in the living room Jess took the hardening penis in hand and said, "I'll not have the mayor's penis become inoperative but he'll have to wear a splint for six weeks and pee through a bypass catheter."

"You are too kind Jess. Since you are holding my very healthy and very ready one, you decide what you'd like to do with it this time?"

On Friday evening Jess's phone went.

"It's Marion dear. I'm ready to come over for dinner as arranged but thought I'd check that the coast was clear."

"Oh he's not pounding me Marion. We finished that an hour ago."

"Er, just a yes or a no would suffice dear."

"Oh right. Everything's cleaned up and I've sprayed air-freshener."

"Er, right. Thank you dear. You are so kind. I'll be with you in five."

"Bring Razor Marion -- he's family."

"Thank you dear."

Jess smiled and wrote down some of those quotes in her writer's log. She was already almost finished the third chapter of her first draft. After reviewing the first chapter Scott had come to her sheepishly, his shorts tented, suggesting she better back off a bit as he'd place Chapter 1 as halfway between sexy and outright porn.

"Porn, I'd never write porn," Jess gasped, looking rather flustered. She took advice to work in some straight drama between the sex sessions and avoid mentions of exchange of fluids, genital sucking or at least little more than a casual lick and nothing in connection with anal or describing the room smelling like inside a brothel. She received a 'much improved' mark for Chapter 2 but it was suggested that writing, 'she was sprayed with half a litre across her torso' clearly suggested a bath and the fact was if it were more that a desert spoonful he'd be a rare man indeed.

Jess didn't say she doubted the amount of liquid volume but that same night held out a tablespoon in bed, sending Scott into near hysterics, leaving him a little limp.

CHAPTER 7

There were eight guests as the Dress in White dinner and when everyone arrived Linda Ewing asked her guests to parade and identify who they characterized. She was dressed as Marie Antoinette and there was Florence Nightingale, a Swan Lake ballerina (Jess), Marilyn Monroe (fiction commissioning editor -- Nadine Gosani) and a bride. Linda's husband Bernard was dressed as Elvis Presley, and there were Elton John, Emperor Maximus, Aristotle, Alexandra the Great and The White Rabbit (Scott).

Everyone received a bottle of quality wine as a prize and then Nadine was called up for the prize for the sexiest dressed woman and Linda called up Scott and said he won hands down as the sexist costumed male "because we all know what rabbits do". After kissing Linda he simulated stand-up sex against her, to the delight of everyone, including her much older husband. Before letting Scott go Linda told him quietly, "I especially invited Nadine and her husband so that you could introduce Jess to Nadine as I want her to open communication with you two with me not appearing to be involved, if you get what I mean."

"Very clearly and thank you. What a great pair of tits."

Scott introduced Jess to Nadine over pre-dinner drinks and wandered off, believing they'd get along well and joined Bernard and Nadine's husband Gary. Scott learned that Gary was chief executive of Bernard's printing company that specialized in over-printing film, cardboard and a variety of other flat materials used for packaging and they learned that Scott was an academic, specializing in teaching philosophy.

"My wife says you are doing something for her company without saying what."

"Ah, how very discreet. Perhaps I shouldn't say what."

"Just generalize, that will do."

Both men were interested to learn Scott was processing results of an intensive survey to try to determine what influenced the minds of browsers in bookshops when looking at fiction and non-fiction titles.

"How will that information result in increased sales?" Gary asked.

"It will if the survey sample is pretty accurate."

"But how?" Gary persisted.

"I'm not saying and I ask you not to tell anyone about the survey, not matter how vague you are about it."

"Okay, but I remain mystified."

Bernard growled that his wife was one smart lady and wouldn't waste time or money on a survey she didn't think would provide knowledge of substantial benefit. My guess is it's to establish motivational factors and hints towards possible trends."

Gary asked Scott was that the case and Scott said if he replied he'd have to shoot them both.

They all laughed and Gary nodded when Bernard said they could take that as confirmation he'd been on the right track. "I'm a substantial shareholder in Falcon and Salmon Publishing so won't say a word about what we've talked about to anyone, including Linda. I'll play dumb if she gets around to enlighten us as I am a director of her company."

"Thanks Bernard and Gary I'll appreciate it if you don't try to squeeze information from Nadine as I understand she sat on the survey design committee."

Gary suggested Bernard tell Scott about his big purchase during his latest trip abroad.

Bernard said the company was investing in equipment that could etch high-detail stainless steel designs including lettering created with a computer driven laser beam the size of a human hair. The process fused a superior black metal alloy to the stainless steel for permanent marking. The images were abrasion resistant and not affected by acids, solvents, cleaning solutions, salt water, oils, freezing or heat.

Gary scowled at Scott and said, "Unless you promise not say nothing about what you have just been told we'll have to shoot you."

They laughed and followed the call to the dining table where Scott was seated next to Nadine.

"Jess had undertaken to submit a proposal to me about her latest novel," Nadine said. "Do I have the same undertaking from you?"

"What's in it for me?"

"Nothing like what you have in mind," she giggled and whispered, "I'm chaste outside of my marriage."

"Good girl," Scott purred and breathed into her ear, as the hostess was seated on his other side, giving him a knee press. "Be kind to Jess with this pot-boiler because I'm working with her on a major fact-fiction novel that I'm sure will be a cracker and likely to attract Aussie readers by the thousands."