"Love & Friendship", a new original story by Gratiana Lovelace, 11/26/12

"Love & Friendship", Ch.1-2: New Friends/Roommates, 11/26/12

“Love & Friendship”, Ch.1-2:  New Friends & Colleagues; New Roommates, 11/26/12 Gratiana Lovelace

An Original Story Copyrighted by Gratiana Lovelace (all rights reserved)

[From time to time, I will illustrate my story with my “ideal” actors cast in these roles:British actor Richard Armitage and American actress Diane Lane and others.]

[(1ab) Story Logo]

Author’s Mature Content Note:  “Love & Friendship” is a romantic love story set amidst contemporary times.  As such there will be some passages in this story involving heartfelt love scenes or other sauciness (R rated) and some passages involving highly dramatic moments.  I will label the maturity rating of those chapters accordingly.  Otherwise, the general rating for this story is PG or PG-13 due to mature situations and topics.  If you are unable or unwilling to attend a movie with the ratings that I provide, then please do not read those chapters.  This is my disclaimer.

Prologue:   Who is to say where friendship ends and love begins?  And is one preferable to the other?  Those in love would say, yes.   Those who are merely friends, might say no.  But in reality, can a man and a woman remain friends when they find that their friendship is not enough?  And how do you make that bridge from being friends to being lovers?  Because once you are lovers, there is no going back--there is only going forward, one day at a time.  The path from friendship to a lifetime of love is at the heart of our story.

“Love & Friendship”, Ch. 1:  New Friends & Colleagues

New beginnings allow us to dream of the possibilities and to start our lives on a new path.  For the lovely and talented story writer 48 year old Lydia Baker pursuing her new screenwriting career is her goal when she flies over to London, England on a chillingly crisp first day of November 2010, a Monday.  Professional screenwriting is a new career adventure for her--risking all for a new life.  Lydia is both excited and filled with dread.  The what ifs run through Lydia’s mind endlessly as she tries to distract herself from thinking that she is flying in a metal tube that could fall out of the sky at any moment.  What if they don’t like her script stories?  What if they like her script stories, but they don’t want her to be the one to rewrite them for film production?   What if the one person she wants to meet most in the world, is too busy to take a meeting with her?  What if she doesn’t pursue this opportunity?   Ah, see that’s the thing.  In Lydia’s mind, regret for not trying would be more grievous than trying and not succeeding. 

Besides, pessimism is not Lydia’s style.  She is a perpetual optimist.   And if he does deign to take a meeting with her, Lydia hopes that her admiration for her muse—the extremely talented and oh so handsome 40 year old British actor Robert Kensington [(2) right]--might blossom into a working relationship with him as colleagues, and maybe more. Well, you have to suspend your disbelief in stories.  Right?  So, suspend away.  

Of course, meeting one’s creative muse in the flesh is not necessarily something that everyone is able to do—nor that they are prepared for.  The inevitable stage fright sets in because you so want the moment that you meet to be memorable--but in a good way, not in a I fainted and became a puddle of womanly essence at his feet and drooled way. So, Lydia tries not to let her mind wander over into wish fulfillment territory too much--lest she psyche herself out of meeting him, Robert Kensington.  However if “dreams are wishes that your heart makes” [(3)], then Lydia has big dreams and a caring heart full of wishes.