Freddy

 

Chapter 3 introduces the character of Freddy.

Click here to read Laramie, Chapter 3.

This is a heart-breaking chapter, as we feel the circumstances of two people that are so right for each other, but the love is “not to be.”

When I first wrote this chapter, it wasn’t necessarily my intention to make Freddy a principal character, but even though they say goodbye at the end of the chapter, we haven’t seen the end of Freddy just yet. I don’t say that as a spoiler but as a point that oftentimes previous loves can remain true friends in people’s lives. I am grateful that my first love is still one of my closest friends. We text frequently each week.

Life can be cruel, so I tried to write that painful unfairness into this chapter.

Three books ago, I had readers pleading for Lance and Trent to get together. Lance was in a similar situation. Had Trent never walked into Mike’s classroom, the two very well could have ended up together. Fate had other plans.

I should point out something here that really separates Laramie from the previous five books: specificity. When I began the first story, I didn’t have any long-range plans to keep writing them (that’s for sure), but when I opted to post it publicly, I realized I didn’t want a real city. Jackson Bend became a convenience because I never wanted anyone to read my work and say “I live there, and it isn’t like that at all.” Part of me regrets that, but I realize it truly is of no consequence either way. By the time Coffee at 9 was winding down and I knew I really wanted to do Laramie’s full story, I became aware that it would make much more sense if I put actual years to chapters, so people could follow along and file things away in context. With that, I made a very specific reference (a movie) in Coffee at 9 that placed that book in 2022. Once I opened that box, I needed to continue it with this story.

There are mentions of early iPhones, and when I placed a year on the chapter, it astonished me that iPhones are still relatively young in the grand scheme of things.

There is a serious drawback to putting actual dates on things. I’m going to eventually pinpoint the present day. When writing the Jackson Bend series, I wanted it to exist in its own fictional world. Now, with it actually being in a calendar context, my plans of keeping it “timeless” is fractured somewhat. I still don’t want to enter politics into the story, nor do I want to make the global pandemic an intrusive plot point. Readers are going to have to forgive me in that regard. It’s not like I wish to gloss over the reality of so many tragic family circumstances the pandemic brought, but it just didn’t move the plot as I desired, so perhaps this is more of a COVID-free multiverse thing.

But back to Freddy. We’ll see him again. With each chapter, we see new people shaping Laramie’s life. It makes the complete story multifaceted. Freddy and Laramie weren’t just a hookup or “exploration.” They formed a deep love, a real bond, that I wasn’t just going to let go.

Stay tuned.