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By Cathy Jewison
Copyright © Cathy Jewison,
2004. All rights reserved.
People
sometimes ask where I get the ideas for my stories and how I go about
developing them. Here’s how I came to write “Diamond Girl,” a short
story published by
Black Moss Press in North by North Wit: An
Anthology of Canadian Humour.
*****
One afternoon,
several years ago, I was sitting in the food court of the Edmonton
Centre mall, munching a taco and watching people wander in and out of
the public rest rooms. I hadn’t made a deliberate decision to spy on
the bathroom habits of the food court habitués – but like any food
court on the planet, no part of it holds much in the way of visual
appeal and I just ended up facing the washrooms.
As I dabbed hot sauce on my taco, I noticed a young blonde woman in
jeans and a red T-shirt heading to the ladies’. Moments later, a man
in a suit hurried for the gents’. A woman in a summer dress and
sandals, who had been sitting nearby, tossed the remains of her egg
salad in the garbage, slung a large bag slung over her shoulder, and
also made her way to the public conveniences. My taco was half-eaten
when Jeans-and-T-Shirt Woman emerged; I was making good progress on my
Mexi-Fries by the time the Dress Lady re-appeared, and was slurping
the bottom of my iced tea when Suit Guy surfaced. There were others
who came and went, of course. And like any conscientious writer, I
scrutinized each one and indulged in unsavoury speculation about who
they were, why they were in the mall, and what ghastly secrets lurked
beneath their insipid exteriors.
As I nibbled the icing on my dessert empanada, it occurred to me that
they probably were as boring as they looked – after all, they came and
went with utter predictability. Wouldn’t it be fun, I thought, to nip
down to the Bay and buy a red wig, a pair of shades and a light
jacket? If I hid them in a tote bag, I could enter the public washroom
as one person, and leave as another. I’d seen it done in the movies
umpteen times. And when I exited the washroom, would I melt unnoticed
into the crowd, or would the man two tables over stop chewing his
fried chicken and stare after the mysterious redhead who materialized
out of thin air?
I never bought the wig, and I’ve never tried a quick change in a
public washroom. But the idea has stuck with me, and if I’m too
cowardly to live my fantasies, there’s always the next best thing –
living vicariously through the characters who populate my short
stories. After that day in the mall, I started to build a character
for whom subterfuge is a way of life. Since I write humour, I couldn’t
create a character who actually was a spy . . . so I came up with a
courier named Gerald who felt his job demanded the protection of
frequent costume changes. And anyone who’s seen a James Bond movie
knows that any operative needs the tools of the trade – a secret
camera or a clandestine recording device, at the very least. While
James Bond has access to a lab where spy gadgets are turned out like
toys at Santa’s workshop, where would a freelancer like my Gerald get
his accoutrements? Radio Shack, of course. Every time I received a new
flyer, I’d go through it, gleefully taking note of the newest gadgets.
So when the
Ladies’ Killing Circle, an Ottawa writing group, called
for stories for a new crime anthology, I already had a protagonist
crying to make his literary debut. The anthology required each story
to be named after a song, so I chose Johnny River’s “Secret Agent
Man,” in honour of Gerald’s personality quirks.
My character,
however, was in
desperate need of a plot. Since I set my stories in Yellowknife, I
didn’t have to look far for a crime for Gerald to foil – a diamond
heist was a natural. And a leisurely review of Canadian Diamonds
magazine gave me an idea for the perfect target – an elaborate
necklace, the signature piece in my imaginary diamond company’s
jewellery collection.
With a rough idea
of the plot, it was time to give more consideration to Gerald’s
character. Let’s face it – a Yellowknife courier who thinks he’s
always being followed by malefactors has an extraordinarily rich inner
life – a sure sign that his outer life isn’t going so well. A stint in
the food service industry taught me that waiting tables is probably
the most thankless job around. I assigned Gerald to the banquet staff
of a local hotel so he could make some money while getting his courier
business up and running. Sadly, the banquet job would not pay a lot,
so he'd still be living
with his mother.
James Bond’s way with
the ladies is a key aspect of his character, and something that Gerald
needed to emulate . . . except that he would be ridiculed, rather than
admired. A low-rent Lothario, he starts the story unable to relate to
women, objectifying them à la James Bond. As a means of showing
character development, I dress him as a woman part-way through the
story. It was during this process that I changed the title of the
story to “Diamond Girl.”
I finished the story
a couple of days before the anthology deadline, and sent it in. It was rejected (with good reason). In the
meantime, I had seen a note soliciting material for another anthology
called North by North Wit. A new market. I sent the manuscript to
writer-pal extraordinaire
Anita Daher, who provided me with many, many
comments and questions. Problem was that I had no idea how to
reconcile all the points she raised. Then she asked one key question. Why was
Gerald so obsessed with James Bond? She suggested that maybe Gerald’s
father had left the family when Gerald was a child and, unable to face
the truth, he decided his dad had been kidnapped by spies. As I tried
to figure out how I would integrate that into the story, all the
pieces fell into place, and I knew how to resolve my outstanding
issues. I sent “Diamond Girl” to North by North Wit, and was notified
of its acceptance within days.
Most of my stories start this way – with a well-fleshed-out character
desperately seeking a plot. There are more of these people rattling
around in my brain. I hope they all eventually make it onto paper.
*****
An abbreviated version of this article was published in the
Territorial Writers’ Association Spring 2004 newsletter.
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