A little backstory first: back in the summer of last year, I'd started writing a short romance story sort of inspired by a movie pretty much nobody has seen (not that the story itself had much resemblance to that movie). It was... bad. Explosively bad. But then, to my utter surprise, it morphed into a supernatural horror story with a prominent romance arc instead. It was still about as convincing as the fanfiction I wrote for a high school assignment once (the less said about that the better), but it was something interesting to work on, until I lost my drive for it by late autumn.

I reread what I'd written of it a couple of days ago and found the writing painfully undercooked, but the basic concepts and some of the character dynamics had something going for them... so I decided to change some things up and try writing it again. It's currently sitting pretty much unread on Wattpad, so I thought I could share it here, in case some folks are interested. Hatching is a horror story and deals with some Blacklist stuff (most prominently, body horror, people being preyed upon, danger to children, and fire imagery in one particular chapter), as well as generally spooky and disturbing themes, adult situations and lots of swearing. The plot itself is about a small town being shaken up by strange deaths and sightings, while a schoolteacher in a crumbling marriage and a lonely librarian struggle with their feelings for each other. It has a bisexual heroine and my first try at writing a black male protagonist, as well as a cast I hope I can write in an interesting way, because they've really grown on me.

Anyway, you can check it out here in case you're interested. As always, feedback would be very appreciated.

Update: Chapter 2 is now out! Warnings: a brief fire mention and a paragraph discussing adult themes, but most of the chapter is perfectly safe for consumption. Also, many thanks to my three betas working on these two chapters, Cicada, OrangeFox and Damian Thorne. Seriously, folks, do tell me if you read this - I'm not fishing, I hope, but it's a lot harder to keep working on a story that goes unnoticed than one that gets a reaction from even just one reader.