Revising Ghost of You

**Revison Summary**

Scarlett hasn't been lucky in love to say the least, but being single in 2021 was a nightmare. With the rise of dating apps and social media it made finding love was nearly impossible. One night after getting her millionth disgusting message on a dating app she vowed to be single forever. When she fell asleep she had a dream about the last time she saw Trevor Ramirez, the person she believed was the love of her life. It had been 14 years since they last saw each other, things hadn't ended on good terms. After waking up from the dream Scarlett took a trip down memory lane of her and Trevors infamous love story. The question remained, would they ever reunite?

A few months ago I submitted a story "Ghost of You" (linked if you want to read it). I submitted it to the Fiction Awards here on Vocal. I did change the story quite a bit so it would fit in with the guidelines of the competition. While I liked the direction I took the story, I do feel that I rushed it. I have made several attempts in the past to write, the truth is I am still new to it. For some reason I feel drawn to write out the full story. Even if it's just for me personally, but I hope others enjoy it.

While this story is a fictional story, I have used real life events that inspired the story of Scarlett and Trevor. Like many creative people I haven't had the most success in the love department, but I have had some things happen that almost seemed like it came from a movie. Just without the happy ending of course! That is what I love about writing, you can use real life inspiration and then twist it to make how you wished it would have been.

Ghost of You will be the first installment of Trevor and Scarletts love story. This will be about how they met that weekend at the beach, as I told in the version I previously wrote. The difference will be that instead of them saying goodbye at the beach and not seeing each-other again for 16 years it will take you through the ups and downs of what really happened between them. They will still part ways, but not on the best of terms. Then the story will pick up again 14 years later in a story I've already started working on called "The Dance." I might change the title, and there is a lot of work to be done. But I am very excited to be writing both stories.

I've found a lot of therapy as weird as that sounds in writing this story, as I have kept journals about that time in my life. It gives me a chance to not only relive these events, but also look at them from a different perspective now that I am older. I hope with writing this story it will not only give me some sort of closer, but also help me develop in writing. I may never be Jane Austen, Charolette Bronte, Emily Bronte, or modern authors today such as J.K. Rowling and Anna Todd. But I still want to try. I saw something today that said something along the lines of following your dreams, even if you aren't the best at what you're doing. It went on to use a musical instrument as a reference, how you're usually not great when you start but with practice and patience you get better. As with most things in life I expect to just pick something up and it be the best thing I've ever done. Of course that is simply not true, and really if you think about it what would be the fun in that anyway? Everything in life is a journey, and if it was easy none of us would have these great stories to tell in the first place.

Even with Ghost of You I started planning over a year ago, and I started writing notes of it in a journal and as I look back at them for reference on certain scenes I wrote I see just how much has changed from that moment all the way up until I published a version here on Vocal. I hope whatever your dream or passion is that you have the guts to go after it. The results may not be exactly what you thought they would be, they could be better. Either way at least you can say you tried.