Magnolia Blooms & Sakura Petals
By
Rebecca Anna Coleman

-8-
Inspiration to Write Again

I once again had the whole house to myself. My sister had a date with her boyfriend and my mom was once again working the overnight shift at the King’s Daughters Hospital. Leaving me alone to keep the home fires burning. Not that it bothered me much, it just meant that I could explore being “Heather” more. And once more I felt myself trying to write while Adult Swim played in a never-ending loop in the background. What a night to spend as my true self. 
Tonight was a classic all night, late night anime session. Starting the night off we had Sailor Moon followed by Dragon Ball which would be followed by Dragon Ball Z which would be followed by Outlaw Star which would be followed by Lupin The Third and then rounding out the night we would have always dark, and depression cult class of Neo Genesis Evangelion. After that would come the anime movies, Sailor Moon R was the first moving on the early morning slot, followed by Neo Genesis Evangelion: Death & Rebirth and finally a random Pokemon movie.
After that the programming would switch to something more suitable for kiddos. I would maybe be  asleep by then or cooking breakfast and heading out to mow a few more lawns to earn a few more dollars.

But right now, I had the house all to myself and a new issue of “Shojo Kaiden” and “Shojo Beats” to enjoy. “Shojo Kaiden” loosely translated meaning “Girl Ghost Stories”. The whole idea behind the magazine was girls would send in their personal ghost stories, or drawing, or manga images of the supernatural. The magazine was a semi-monthly publication that was printed and published in Atlanta, Georgia. Atlanta was considered by all to be the “Anime Capital of the South” because the city hosted two massive anime conventions, the first was “MomoCon” and the second was “Anime Weekend Atlanta (AWA)” both of those anime conventions pulled in massive numbers.
I liked “Shojo Kaiden” because unlike “Shojo Beat” they often published ghost stories the readers sent them and also paid them. I think the going rate was ten cents a word. Most of the stories they published were what I would call for a lack of better words Japanese classic ghost stories with a Southern Gothic feel. Most stories focused on paranormal encounters readers had at home, or at school or on an overnight camping trip with their family.

Beside getting their accounts published, which was cool enough, “Shojo Kaiden” would pay writers, their going rate was only five cents a word. I mean a nickel a word was kind of cheap, but still twenty words would make a dollar. And I was surrounded by ghost stories, us southerners love to tell ghost stories. And then I noticed something “Shojo Beat” was now offering to publish stuff its readers sent in. The key factor though the story had to be “Shojo Themed” which I took to mean it had to focus on things like first dates, school events and maybe school drama. Clearly they wanted to hook the teenage crowd by feeding them a never ending stream of drama. Because nothing screamed “Shojo” more than having your boyfriend stolen by your best friend who you pranked by swapping her favorite bottle of shampoo with a bottle of Nair. And you gleefully pointed and laughed while large clunks of her hair fell out of her head and she shrieked in terror. Teenagers, am I right?

And so sitting there, half paying attention to Sailor Scouts dealing with the monster of the week in the normal way, an idea started to form in my head. Why not do both? I could research ghost stories, I mean Greenville was crawling with ghost stories, all waiting for some intrepid explorer to uncover them and record them and then send them off to publication. And if I was going to “Heather” more and more often I'm sure she would have her own share of adventures to share.

And that nickel a word, well I planned on opening a high-yield savings account soon. Each nickel I earned writing those silly ghost stories and those drama filled write ups would go right into that high-yield saving account and maybe when I was too old to write I could have something to fall back on. Or maybe like my closet that would be a “Heathers” account.

Like how I'd divided my closet into two halves, one side belonged to “William” right now and the other side belonged to “Heather”. I could do the same thing with my banking accounts, have the main checking account my sister wanted me to open up as the account that belongs to “William” and the high-yield savings account belong to “Heather”.

“I could become a published writer.” I said, smiling a little. “But I need a name, a pen name.. something Japanese..” I mused out loud. I knew a little Japanese. Most of what I'd known or learned about Japan came from my immersion in anime, manga, J-pop, and J-horror.

“I was born around Thanksgiving and that in the Autumn.. And the Japanese word for autumn is 'Aki' and add 'Ko' to that it means 'Autumn Child' and that is a classic feminine name.. add 'Chan' to that used to denote 'cute' in females.. so.. that means my pen-name would be Akiko-Chan.” I said smiling. “Or I could go with 'Aoi' which means 'Blue' and that is my favorite color..” I paused. “ I think 'Aoi-Chan' has a nicer ring to it.” I took a deep breath.

“Then again I could go with 'Sakura' but there are millions of 'Sakura's online..” I shifted my eyes around. “Plus there will be a million girls sending in stories with the pen-name 'Sakura' I mean just look at Fanfiction.Net..” I said it again to nobody but myself.

“I think I will settle on 'Aoi-Chan'. Because that is the kind of girl who would write to 'Shojo Beat' about sharing a lunch box with a cute boy, or getting detention because she was late for class and she ended up sharing detention with a handsome boy. Or maybe she'll write about getting elected for homecoming queen or princess. And in the same breath she'll share with you a local legend that will give you goosebumps.” Again I said this to nobody but myself.

End Chapter 8