I would really love to have help with establishing a friendship with my characters that turns romantic. My characters Michael and Vanessa they're both not interested in getting into any relationship. And this is in 1985. They're both awkward individuals. Michael is not too fussed with relationships - friendly with everyone he meets - people often think that he is very serious - focused on his studies - doesn't mind mingling with people, but likes to have his alone time - has a few close friends. Vanessa has only been in one relationship in her life, but it was an abusive one, and that has left her never wanting to get into another one - left her ex in the middle of the night - moved with her older sister to avoid her ex - gave birth at the age of 19 with her ex's baby - is only open to a select few people, is a friendly person, but has built up a wall around herself, so she doesn't get hurt again. Michael is busy studying at University, is part of the Drama Society, Tutors once a week after uni, attends church on Sunday, Sunday dinner with his family. Saturday is usually his only free days Vanessa works morning or afternoon shifts at a cafe during the week, weekends are free, and is busy looking after her toddler. I have already put up a post about this, and only one person responded, and I got very impatient waiting for another response. But the person who answered said something about 'conflict leading to them to get together.' So, this is what I have 17 days before they meet, Vanessa would meet Mike's stepmother Anna first. Anna would have a son around Vanessa's child age, and they have both enlisted their sons to have swimming lessons on Monday afternoons. Mike and his sister Raquel take turns once a week to pick up their younger siblings from school and babysit them until Anna comes home. Anna would befriend Vanessa after noticing that she doesn't interact with the other mothers, as Vanessa feels judged. Mike comes into the cafe where Vanessa works with his friends to have lunch a week before uni classes start for the year. Vanessa serves their table; nothing happens. Mike and his friends start coming to the cafe the next week to study before classes. They would become regulars. After 4 weeks of swimming lessons, Anna has to take her son John to a child psychologist. Mike steps in to take his little brother Egan. And to be honest, I don't know how to get them to interact with each other and form a friendship. I'm awful with any relationships in general, but I wanted to write this story for myself since January, but I always get stuck on how their friendship would start and how they would like to become boyfriend and girlfriend. Here are some of my ideas so far when they see each other at the swimming lesson for the first time They would recognize each other from the cafe and are surprised. The other mothers would be older than them. Mike and Vanessa are in their early 20's. The kids' ages are between 6 months and 2 years old. Each lesson, the parents/guardians are required to be in the pool. Every time I get stuck with this, I tend to move on to something else that would happen later on in their story. Back when I was in school, I really struggled with creative writing and needed a teacher's aid to help me. This is the first time I'm writing for myself, and I would appreciate the help and the suggestion. And feel free to ask any questions that you may have.
Is Vanessa a student at the University too? If not, maybe she decides to enroll to pursue a degree so she can find better work. She needs a tutor for a class she's struggling in, and ends up with Mike as her tutor, where they recognize each other from the cafe. Now that they have some common ground, they can begin to have a regular conversation, get to know each other, and romantic feelings blossom. Although that scenario has been done before, there's a lot of latitude in your characters to play with it and have something unique happen.
Since Mike is comfortable with child care, what about a babysitting arrangement for Vanessa's kid? Anna would be a great reference and might even be the one to bring it up? I know he's busy, but even with the schedule you've outlined above he could swing at least one shift a week.
No, Vanessa doesn't attend uni and has no desire to attend, but they share some of the same interests. Mike is actually great around kids as he grew up in a large family and is studying for his Bachelor of Education. Vanessa already has babysitters in place. Her sister Toni has Mondays off and looks after him while Vanessa is working a morning shift. The cafe owner has become a mother figure to her and takes care of her son Coby when Vanessa is working (Tue-Fri). Her co-worker/friend Denise is a backup if Toni or Grace cannot babysit. Vanessa rarely uses babysitters when she is not working and is usually a homebody. Well, Vanessa only has a few friends. After the second week of swimming lessons on a Saturday night, I supposed it could be where her friend Denise has been wanting to go to a concert with her. And here are some ideas Her sister Toni is out of town attending the wedding of a friend. The city fair would be open within 3 weeks, and the owner of the cafe (Grace) is busy with the preparation of the influx of people and decorations for the cafe. Her neighbor/mum friend would not be home. Vanessa has been looking forward to the concert but is upset that she doesn't have any babysitters for Coby. Was about to call Denise to say that she's not going until she thought of Anna On the third week of swimming lessons, Vanessa would ask Anna if she could look after Coby. Anna would say that she cannot, but she gets either Mike or Raquel to babysit. Denise and Vanessa would have an early dinner, an hour before the concert. The concert starts at 7.30 pm.
As part of the Drama Society, does Mike act in University theatre productions? Does Vanessa have an interest in performing arts? Maybe one day at swim lessons, Anna and Vanessa are chatting and Anna invites her to a play that her stepson is in. Vanessa recognizes Mike on stage. The next day at the cafe, she sparks a conversation with him about the play and then they both realize they have that common interest. Later, Mike sees her at the swim lesson. That would be three different locations/instances where they connected. Surely that's enough to begin a friendly chat, and it can evolve from there...
Have you written much or is all of this in an outlining/planning stage? Seems to me as if you've but a lot of work into the characters... including their daily schedules and a day by day breakdown of what they're doing. I'd think that figuring out how to get two characters into a room together would be the easy part. Have them reach for the last box of cornflakes in a grocery store if you have to.
Yes, Mike does act in University theatre productions, but that won't happen until 3 or 4 months later. And if Vanessa did go, Anna would've given her a shove instead of a push. I did originally have Anna teaching Vanessa how to knit as to break the ice while their kids had their lessons, and when Mike takes Anna's place, he will teach Vanessa to knit, but that would be no use since they would be in the pool for all of the lessons. Vanessa likes bead weaving. Anna has taught all of the kids to knit, crochet, and sew, well, most of the kids. I have thought about them bumping into each other but wasn't sure if that would go well.
People bump into each other all the time, so that would work. Hell, two friends of mine just celebrated their 20th anniversary and how did they meet? They literally bumped into each other at a restaurant. They already at least recognize each other from the cafe. So you could have them run into each other literally anywhere else and naturally, one of them would likely say something like "hey, I see you at the cafe!" It's practical and believable.
I hereby bequeath upon you the permission to use any macguffin, deus ex machina, or other whimsical plot device of your choosing to get these two lonely souls to meet, and get on with writing your story! - MC
THis - a thousand time... don't get bogged down in all sorts of irrelevant detail about characters who you haven't written yet... the needs of the story should drive the detail not the other way round... e.g if you need mike to be babysitting her kids then change the thing about her sister being a baby sitter.. none of these people are real so you can alter any detail you need to to move the story forward In terms of how they meet think about how you meet people in real life (or if you don't how other people meet in real life) .. mike goes into the cafe she serves him, but don't make it - nothing happens, that's boring, something has to happen to make him remember or vice versa they sit next to each other on a bus they reach for the same box of cornflakes she asks him to get something off a shelf hes behind her at a til and shes short a pound for her shopping so he pays her child drops its toy in the street, he picks it up and returns it to her. I mean I know a couple who first met because he stopped to help her with a flat tyre in the rain , and another who first met because they started talking through their car windows when they were stuck in a long and boring traffic jam If the relationship is the story then maybe buy some comparable books and see how their authors did it
i am a dnd player/ dm so most of my story telling is in hard fantasy. but from what i see here you have a good foundation, what i would do is on their first meeting at the diner have the 2 characters do a passing that guy/girl is cute but think nothing of it. then as they become regulars you can have them converse as a group, from personal experience at retail you would tend to get chummy with your regulars, and they can get to know each other a bit but nothing super personal. you can have michael thing vanessa is his favorite waitress, and venessa have michal be her favorite customer. (you can have her be attentive to him like a good waitress. and have him give good tips and be real cordial with vanessa) so by the time they meet at the swimming lessons they can be well acquainted and can actually get to know a little more personal info about one another. and you would have at least a good friendship from there. and you can have her see hes a good big brother/ father figure. You could even have a situation where vanessa has an emergency and michael has to babysit her toddler since he does so with his brother on occasion, or you can have her ask Anna during the swimming lesson if she knows a babysitter and she can recommend her son and that can be their first time meeting each other outside of the cafe. and just have her kid have a really good time with michael as hes a good big brother/ babysitter. making her be thankful or fond of him.
something important on the weekend she cant take her child to or well anything similar doesn't necessarily have to be life or death just an inconvenience. or i dont know who you have that normally watches her toddler when shes working during the week, have them have an important thing to take care of which would force vanessae to find a last minute replacement babysitter if u wanted to go that path. i mean she works the night shift most day cares are not open, so if its one of her family members you can have them say they are going out of town for a week which forces her to struggle to find a babysitter and you can just have her mention that to anna and there u go a shoehorn babysit reason
I think this is one of the most difficult transitions to make in a romance type story. I say that because to me it mimics life. A stranger is one thing because everything is new, exciting and different, but between friends, they already know your character flaws, and so they can be wary of getting romantically involved. And in real life, doing so with friends (in my experience) there has been a lot of dead ends regarding getting friendships to romance, and so I am very hesitant to start that. It gets equally that way with co-worker friends. There is a lot more at stake, and experience has not been kind in those regards. For the reader, this means it has to be well executed by the writer to be believable, because their first thought would be...'I would be hesitant of that', and you see it all through romance books. Instead of taking this difficult road of taking friendships to lovers, they just use the just-met-stranger-angle, or the just-take-me-now, situation. I think they do so because it is easier. As for how to make the transition from friends to lovers, I think to make it believable, it has to mimic real life. It really takes building bridges slowly, creating a sense of trust, that this will work and not blow up in our faces. But that takes extra work, words and settings. I applaud you for trying to navigate this difficult transition. I think it is the classic case of 'show, don't tell'. In having a stranger, or having a 'just-take-me-now' transition, those are "tell" scenes. It is far more difficult to show how friends bridged the gigantic gap that exists between friends and lovers sometimes.
You, my good man, need to play a bunch of old school japanese dating sims. Love can blossom in any way imaginable. All it needs is time. Frequenting one or more places, having similar routines that cause them to come across each other often, an event that draws their attention towards each other... Then boom! Friends! If you think the friendship is dragging along a bit slowly, remember that it's 2021 and women take the initiative too. Keep in mind guys are not great at picking up on hints, even obvios ones, and don't be afraid to make things super awkward. The best part about a relationship is the build-up and anticipation. Slow and steady wins the race.
So...Vanessa and Anna become friends? Mike is Anna's step-son and appears to me he's involved quite a bit in helping her with the kids. Mike and Vanessa already have something in common. Anna. Develop Vanessa and Anna's relationship first and then input Mike. There's all kinds of situations you could put them in where they might interact. Looks like you've got a good start. Let the story develop from there. Life is unpredictable. Don't be afraid to think outside the box. Good luck.
