Give Me Something To Sing About

Some days, the writing sings.

 

The dialogue writes itself. The banter snaps. The tension drips. I can feel the Green Man breathing beneath my fingertips—the floor sticky, the music perfect, the air thick with longing and sarcasm. Rupert says one thing, Pippa rolls her eyes, and I feel it. That thrum of something inevitable.

 

It’s not writing. It’s divination. I'm channeling something.

 

The scene lands so hard I have to stand up and pace. I fist-pump at my own keyboard. I want to text my husband in full caps: RUPERT JUST SAID ‘YOU NEED A FUCKING HOBBY’ AND I THINK I ASCENDED.

 

That’s the high. That’s the hit.

I sit down to write, and nothing moves. The spark is gone. The scene won’t land. The plot beat that should carry the entire chapter suddenly feels like it belongs in another book. Another genre. Another life.

 

I stare at the page and wonder how I ever thought this mattered.

I reread old scenes that once made me grin and now I just wince.

I pick apart every line, every pause, every choice—and it all feels wrong.

 

I had it. I had it.

Now it’s just silence.

 

And the worst part? It’s not just the words that are broken. It’s me.

 

Because I’m not writing a neat little romance.

I’m writing Blackmore.Pembroke.

I’m giving the ghosts inside me somewhere to land. Somewhere to stay.

 

Rupert Blackmore isn’t just a brooding vampire with a Peter Steele jawline.

He’s a love letter to the ones who didn’t make it.

A second chance in fangs and black t-shirts.

A refusal to let the story end the way it always does.

 

And Pippa?

Pippa Pembroke isn’t just angry and tired.

She’s running on spite and caffeine and the quiet ache of never being enough.

She jokes instead of crying.

She fixes things so she doesn’t have to feel them.

She tells herself it’s fine until the fridge screams like a demon and a vampire calls her out mid-emotional collapse.

 

She doesn’t break down. She burns out.

 

And then she gets up. Again.

 

And writing her—dragging her through this mess—hurts like hell.

Because every scene is a dare. Every page is a reckoning.

And right now?

 

I’ve lost the thread.

The beat is broken.

The music is gone.

 

And I’m not just blocked—I’m hopeless.

The Bad Guys Close In and I don’t have a way out.

Not for me. Not for them. Not for anyone.

But no matter how dark it gets, there’s always a Buffy meme around, right? That one line from Once More, with Feeling hit me sideways this morning: 'Give me something to sing about.'

 

It’s not just a lyric. It’s a plea. A prayer. A scream into the static.

So today, I put on the shirt: Sunnydale High, Class of ’99.

 

Not because I feel powerful — but because I remember what it felt like to be.

To sing. To write. To burn.

I'm staring down the silence with a glass of wine and a playlist full of songs that used to save me.

 

I’ve still got the bones of the scene.

I’ve still got a folder full of dialogue that once sang.

 

And until it comes back? 

I’ll sit in the silence.

I’ll let it ache.

I’ll let the story breathe until it tells me what I missed.

And then I’ll write like hell.

 

– Joyce Barnacle

(currently on fire, and not in the good way)