Plagiarized
Authors: Marlo Williams,Leddy Harper
This book is a work of fiction. References to real people, events, establishments, organizations, or locations are intended only to provide a sense of authenticity, and are used fictitiously. All other characters, dead or alive, are a figment of the author’s imagination and all incidents and dialogue, are drawn from the author’s mind's eye and are not to be interpreted as real.
Copyright © 2014 Marlo Williams & Leddy Harper
All rights Reserved.
No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission of the author.
Edited by
Switzer Edits
Formatted by
Switzer Edits
Cover Design by
The Final Wrap
I have learned more about life since becoming an author. More than I ever knew about action and reaction, cause and effect. I have learned that everything has a lesson to be learned. Had I known this when I was younger, I would have taken
The Boy That Cried Wolf
more seriously. I would have taken it for what it was, a moral teaching story. I would have listened to the real moral of
Pinocchio
instead of thinking of it as a joke that a wooden boy’s fucking nose would grow when he lied.
Instead, I read the words but didn’t actually process them.
I pronounced the syllables of the words as I was learning to read, instead of hearing the truth when I should have been comprehending the words to learn the lessons of life.
I wish I had learned these things, these valuable lessons, as a child.
Instead, they had been learned later in life, during times when they could never be undone.
I had to learn the hard way.
And unfortunately, my book can’t be read to small children in order to teach them valuable lessons. Mothers and fathers can’t sit on the couch and read my words as bedtime stories full of life lessons.
No.
My book is full of my life lessons. Lessons learned far too late and taught in the worst way imaginable. And there was no way I could go back in time. I would never be able to undo what had been done.
The words “The End” that I had typed with such enthusiasm, meant so much more now, than I could have ever imagined.
It was
the end
of the book.
It was
the end
of my career.
It was
the end
of my
life
.
Type… type… type. Delete.
Try it again.
Breathe.
Read.
Delete.
That was all I had done for nearly a week. Everything I fucking typed I ended up deleting part, if not all of it.
My typical day looked something like this…
My alarm would sound at six in the morning, waking me after only maybe five hours of sleep for work. Work. That was positively the worst idea mankind had ever come up with. I hated work. Work was the only four-letter word I detested; I used the other four-letter words regularly in my vocabulary. I more or less didn’t like waking up before the sun, no delete that, I hated it with a fierce passion.
I’d make it to the school at a quarter to seven, when I should have been there by six thirty. But let’s face it, that’s a pipedream. Making it there before seven was a miracle in itself. Principal Tucker will more than likely say something to me again at our next staff meeting, but really…
what could she do?
I was the only teacher in the building that spoke fluent Spanish. She’d be fucking stupid to let me go. In fact, I challenged her to try and find another fluent Spanish teacher to teach these dumb wits.
After teaching rowdy and annoying students all day, talking over their loud-ass mouths, I’d finally make it home just after six. Yeah… I left the house before the sun and came home after. The American Dream. Well, if you ask me, the American Dream could go fuck itself.
I’d make dinner for my husband, Thomas, and myself. No. That’s a lie. Thomas made dinner. But no one needed to know that. It would make me look bad if people knew my husband cooked dinner every night. So as far as everyone was concerned, I worked all day and then came home to slave over a hot stove to dutifully cook my husband dinner.
The next set of events would depend on whom you talked to.
If you talked to Sage Roby, my everyday name, Spanish teacher at Rosemary Academy, I’d eat and then go to bed with my laptop. I’d spend hours typing and deleting before picking up my e-reader and losing myself in another book.
However, if you asked Author S. Roby, aspiring author, she’d clean the kitchen and pick up the rest of the house before going to the bedroom and sitting on Tom’s face. She would successfully achieve at least four orgasms, gifted by her gorgeously sexy husband, before writing three more chapters in her bestselling book. Everything was perfect in S. Roby’s life. Every goddamn fucking thing.
Yup… I lived two very distinct lives. My private life that few people were rarely allowed to see, and then there was my very public author life where I had my own Facebook page where I posted every day. I uploaded pictures of myself pursing my lips sexily in the rearview mirror while driving in the car, posing in front of the bathroom mirror while I readied myself for work, and even shared some of my amazingly hot husband. Us going out on date nights, us sitting by the fire, and looking hopelessly in love. I also loved to post our anecdotal conversations together. The women would nearly swoon. They followed me religiously and loved it when I gave them a peek into
our
everyday
life
. As did I.
Problem was… the guy that was in the pictures, comments, and fake conversations, he wasn’t my husband. No, the half-naked man I posted was my lover. No one wanted to see pictures of my husband. Trust me! If I’m completely honest, which I rarely am, I didn’t even want to see those. But as far as my fans in the Facebook world were concerned, Author S. Roby was married to a man who should have been a model.
Living two lives wasn’t as difficult as one might think. One was online, for people that I had never met and would never interact with in real life. And the other was in my small hometown of a thousand people, Chesapeake Grove. I had lived my whole life there, all thirty years of it. The whole town had just thrown a party for reaching over one thousand residents! That was major news in these parts! As if!
I wanted out. I wanted out so desperately that I decided to write a book. My dream was to put something out there, become famous, and then leave the disgusting town for good. I just knew that one day people would talk about me. I would be a household name, everyone would know me. I would be on television and my face would be everywhere. I just knew it.
I didn’t
love
to write, but I knew it was a good way to make money and ultimately become famous. I didn’t mind writing, but most authors spoke of writing like this magnificent outlet for their imagination. They talked non-stop about the voices they heard in their heads… to me, that was just crazy. If you hear voices, you should probably be committed to an institution. But for me, writing was a means to an end. It was all political anyway. All about whom you knew and who would toot your horn when your book was published. I had it all figured out. I had been researching for close to a year, thus my massive following on Facebook.
So, I continued to type and delete until I got it right. Until I made it abso-fucking-lutely perfect.
Problem was, writing was much harder than I originally thought.
I read a lot. And by a lot, I mean at least one book a day, sometimes even two or three a day on the weekends. I took my e-reader to work with me and read while the pains in my asses did their assignments. I read on my lunch break in my car, as I took a few hits of my secret stash of weed. And as I laid in bed and hit the delete button for the last time, I read some more. It was all I did. I’d lose myself in the world of others. The words of others. It was the only way to survive my real life and it made me want to write something someone else could get lost in.
I didn’t think it would be hard to do. But as it turned out, it was.
I had a friend, Missy Ludington. She and I went to school together starting from the seventh grade on. But unlike me, she was able to get out and escape this town right after graduation. I envied her for that. But as fate would have it, she was back. And I couldn’t have been more thrilled at the thought of her suffering in this hellhole with me.
Call me a bitch; I really don’t care. In fact, I viewed it more as a compliment.
I had spent most of my life envious of her, and here she was, back in the same town she swore to leave and never look back on. It was a pleasing feeling to know that she wasn’t more successful than I was. It was comforting to know that fact. As I laid my head on my pillow next to my husband, she was laying hers next to a cold space. It was a soothing feeling to know that Thursday afternoons when I went to see my boyfriend, she was waiting in the line at the grocery store with her food stamp card in hand.
Yeah, I’m a bitch. So what?
Anyway, it was Saturday and I was on my way to have lunch with her. She had called me a few days before and I happened to mention that I was in the process of writing a book. She told me that she had so many ideas for books but had a hard time putting them on paper. So of course, I offered to have lunch with her. I told her it was to talk to her about writing. I figured if I met her with the illusion of helping her, maybe I could pick her brain and find a muse for the blank document I stared at every night.
So as we waited for the inefficient waitress behind the counter to bring us our food, I told her all she needed to know about writing a book.
“It’s so time consuming,” I told her. “These authors literally shit out a book every ninety days, which means they’re practically writing all day every day. I barely get any sleep as it is between working and writing. I would quit my job in ten seconds flat if I knew I could make enough money from my book, but you never know these days. There are so many new authors on the scene every day that it’s becoming harder and harder. Not to mention, you usually have to have a few books out first before you really start seeing any money coming in.”
“How much does it cost to put a book out there?” she asked.
I contemplated her question for a moment and took a deep breath. It was the beginning of my plan, where I would lay down the foundation. It was important that I get it right. “Well, you have to have a cover made. I have an amazing cover designer, but she is doing mine for free. She usually charges about three hundred.” That was such a fucking lie. I didn’t have a cover designer since I didn’t even have a book, but she didn’t know that. Not to mention, most designers were around a hundred. But I wasn’t going to tell her that, either.
“And then you have to have it edited. You want to make sure you find someone good. I know a girl that spent a fortune getting hers edited, and then once she put it out, she found out that the woman ripped her off. Then she had to pay another fortune to have it edited again. I was told to typically expect anywhere from twelve hundred to two grand for editing.” Another lie. It felt amazing, reeling her in. As I felt the lies roll off my tongue, I could already feel her buying the shit I was selling.
“Really? That much?” Her eyes were wide as I matter-of-factly rattled off the specifics.
Granted, they were lies, but she didn’t know that. It was all part of my plan.
“How much do authors usually make for a book? Like, do they get their money back?”
“It depends. Sometimes they do if they hit it big. But with so many newbies coming out every day, the market is getting more flooded. You would not believe the blogs I have read. Some people put their books up for sale and sell a measly two copies in three months, one copy to their spouse and one to their mother. To get noticed right off the bat, you should put your book up for ninety-nine cents. But even with that, you’re only making about thirty cents per book. That means you would make a total of seventy cents in three months!” She looked so depressed at the news I was giving her I almost stopped. Almost. “Like I said, you have to have several books out there to start seeing the payoff.” I held back the smile as I saw her hopes and dreams fall from her face.
“Damn,” she huffed out, sounding depressed. “I guess there’s no use then.”
“But you never know what could happen if you don’t try.” I didn’t want her to lose interest just yet. “Why don’t you tell me some ideas and I’ll tell you if they will sell or not. I read a ton, so I’m pretty good at predicting bestsellers.”
Her eyes lit up. Hook, line, and sinker. She fell for it all. And before I knew it, she was giving me the first chapter of my book. All of it. The characters, the places, the scenes. The best part was the plot. It was a sick book that I knew would sell. I could already see the header,
New York Times Bestseller
, in bold letters just above my name. I was literally salivating at the idea of seeing my name in bright lights. By the time she figured out that I wrote her book, it would be too late. I would be on talk shows, all over the internet, and no one would listen to some small town loser when she tells them the tale of me stealing her idea.
All I’d have to do is say it came to me in a dream.
And they’d eat it up like candy. I heard that oldies song, “It’s Like Taking Candy From A Baby,” play dramatically in the background as I grinned.
My followers already ate up my posts and the hype I created about my debut novel—which so far was only pictures of half-naked people with lines I had hoped to use in steamy sex scenes—like their favorite dessert. I could only imagine how much of an icon I would become when I’d finally put it out there.
A woman scorned, kills lover in throws of passion
. Fucking Bestseller. My fingers began to itch for my computer keyboard before we even finished our meals.
“That sounds like an amazing book, but I think there’s already one out there like that.” Lie. There wasn’t a story out like this. I couldn’t think of anything like it. “If you really want to be successful, don’t be cliché. No one likes cliché.”
She nodded as I spoke. She was eating up every lying detail I was spinning.
“They are always looking for the next book that has never been written before. They want a story that has never been told before.”
“Yeah, I understand,” she sighed as she pushed her plate away in defeat. “Well, if you ever need help with your book, just let me know.”
I smiled, knowing I had her exactly where I wanted her. “You got it!”
And off we went.
She headed back to the dump she had told me she was staying in, and I headed back to my four-bedroom house. I had tons of information jammed in my head, the perfect combination of the story she gave me while intertwining it with my life. Of course, I wanted it to be mostly about me, but the stuff she gave me will add the exciting twists and turns that my plot required. I quickly sat down at my computer where I planned to type without deleting.