The second-best benefit to writing books for a living is that you get to set your own hours (the greatest benefit is not having to wear pants at work). This is especially awesome for me because I believe I was born without the ability to sense time. And I don’t mean just when I’m having fun. I don’t know, maybe I was a dog in a previous life and I entered this one with that holdover trait that makes me think Here and Now is all there is. When I was younger, I wore a watch to keep me kinda-sorta on track, but since I’ve pupated into my adult form, I’ve bunged up my wrists with the carpal tunnel syndrome so badly that I’m pretty much always in wrist braces, and I can’t wear a watch anymore. And I know all of you out there are now wondering why I don’t just check the time on my phone, to which I reply, my phone is used for exactly two purposes and that is for taking pictures and for being cast aside in Ludditic derision, and that is all. And yeah, I suppose I could get a watch on a chain, but for that, I’d need a belt and probably a waistcoat and a leather holster for my teacup and saucer, and it turns into a whole thing.

Anyway, the whole reason I bring any of this up is because it is presently 11.30 on Friday night and I just realized it’s, well, 11.30 on Friday night, and what’s more, it is Upload Night and I have been blissfully futtering around all day–taking Dobby on long afternoon walks through the warm grass under a gentle sun, tending to Breaddicca, my newborn sourdough starter, doing juuuuust enough housework so that we can relax in a comfortably lived-in home and not wallow in squalor and despair, taking Dobby on long evening walks with the first summer fireflies sparking all around us, and pretty much doing everything except editing my chapter so it’s ready to go up. In fact, I was hard at work on this…

Click the pic to go to The Art Sherpa’s channel for this and more awesome tutorials!

…when my eye chanced to fall on a clock, then the date, and then the hammer of time-management panic knocked down on my happy head and here we are.

So I’m a little late, but I did eventually manage to get my act together for another fortnight and a new chapter of my FNAF fanfic is uploaded over at archiveofourown.org and fanfiction.net for those who are reading it. And if you’re not reading it yet, you probably don’t want to start with this chapter, because at three-quarters of the way through the fourth book in a five-book series, things are dark and only going to get darker. This chapter’s snippet comes from one of the lighter moments left in the book…

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Chica had the cakes ready when Ana returned to the pizzeria with her truck and she wasted no more time, not even to change her clothes. A little sawdust and primer wasn’t infectious and was a perfectly normal thing for someone to be wearing on a weekend. She drove to St. George, careful not to let her nerves push on the pedal, because the only thing that could make this day any worse was a speeding ticket.

This was a naïve thought. Things could, and would, get so much worse.

She’d forgotten it was Halloween until she arrived at the Tranquility Recovery Center, where garlands of fake autumn leaves dusted with black and gold glitter ran along the walls and cotton webs full of friendly spiders hung in every ceiling corner. The reception desk had been trimmed with decorative gourds and a bowl filled with brand-name candy, spooky stickers and glowsticks. Kids in costumes chased each other up and down the halls. The cafeteria had ‘yummy mummies’ and ‘bat wings’ on the menu. The casual bongo elevator music had been traded out for the Monster Mash and the car itself decorated with a friendly Dr. Frankenstein tightening the bolts on his smiling monster’s neck.

Faust was not expecting to see her, but seemed pleased and agreed without hesitation to her suggestion of a walk around the landscaped gardens as the autumn sun set. She walked, anyway. An orderly brought him a chair rigged up for his leg and helped him into it. She supposed that must hurt, although he didn’t show it. Even when he’d been lying broken at the bottom of the stairs, he’d shown only the most peripheral signs of strain, but she shouldn’t kid herself. His face was pale and there were beads of sweat on his brow in this cool room; he smiled and his tone as he chatted with her in the elevator was pleasant, but he was hurting.

She was hurting him.