Devil in the Words. Книга для практики английского языка

Peter took off his street clothes, put on his home T-shirt, took a mug with some coffee left in it, and went to the kitchen. There he turned on the TV, and sitting down at the table, began to switch channels, looking for something interesting. He stopped on a channel that showed a series about witches, which he really liked. He again began to think about writing a book about witches. But he immediately discarded them, because he was already writing a book, and he decided for himself that there would be no witches, no werewolves, or aliens in it.

Peter sat in the kitchen for about an hour while his sister watched bloggers on his computer. He drank two mugs of coffee, and even got tired of the chair he was sitting on. Sitting in a chair at the computer was much more comfortable and pleasant, and my back didn’t get tired there.

– I’m done. – said the sister, going out into the kitchen. – You can go to the computer.

– Excellent. – Peter called, and got up from the table, took a mug of coffee, and went to his room.

Entering the room, he immediately sat down in a chair. All muscles relaxed. He put the mug on the table, opened the office program, and continued writing the book. He remembered walking in the park and wrote it all down. It was extremely difficult to come up with something fictitious, at least for Peter; he clearly had no talent for original ideas.

He wrote until the evening. Word by word, sentence by sentence. By the time his mother returned from work, he had finished the third chapter and, sighing with relief, closed the office program and leaned back in his chair. The plan for the day was completed. Logging into his social network page, Peter turned on the music and indulged in dreams of the time when his book would already be sold in millions of copies, and he would be a rich and independent person.

CHAPTER 4. Meet Sveta

Peter woke up when everyone had already left, his sister went to school, and his mother went to work. For some time he lay on the bed, looking at the ceiling, and trying to gather his thoughts so that he could throw off the blanket and get up. There was no desire to get up. Peter imagined as if he had to get up for work every day, early in the morning, and then you won’t lie in bed, won’t soak under a warm blanket, get up, and that’s it.

Having thrown off the blanket, Peter abruptly jumped out of bed, telling himself that this had to be done, otherwise he would lie in it until lunch.

The room was cool.

Peter put on a T-shirt and went to the toilet to relieve himself. Then he went to the bathroom. There he turned on the tap, washed his face, brushed his teeth, and carefully looked at himself in the mirror, trying to understand how talented or untalented he was. It was difficult to judge talent, or lack thereof, by appearance.

Walking out into the kitchen, he turned on the electric kettle and reached into the refrigerator to look for something he could eat. In the refrigerator he found eggs, sausages, cheese and ketchup. This was enough for breakfast. There was still cottage cheese on the top shelf, and there were yoghurts, but it was impossible to take them. My sister ate yoghurt and cottage cheese, and if Peter had taken them, he would have received a beating from his mother in the evening. But since there was no desire to participate in scandals, Peter did not take anything from the top shelf.

Taking eggs and sausages, he went to the stove on which there was a frying pan. Having cut the sausage into the frying pan, Peter turned on the gas and began to wait for the chopped sausage to fry. The frying pan began to gurgle. Taking two eggs out of the package, Peter beat them one by one into the frying pan. The frying pan began to gurgle louder. The eggs immediately turned white and began to bake. Having closed the pan with a lid, Peter put the eggs back into the refrigerator.

The water in the kettle boiled and the kettle turned off.

Peter took a mug, poured coffee and sugar into it, and then poured hot water from the kettle over it all.

Putting the mug on the table, he took milk out of the refrigerator and added it to the coffee, stirring it thoroughly again.

Having put the milk in the refrigerator, Peter turned on the TV and turned off the gas under the frying pan in which the scrambled eggs were being fried. He took a clean plate and placed it on the table, and then dumped the scrambled eggs from the frying pan into it. Putting the empty frying pan back on the stove, Peter took out the ketchup from the refrigerator and squeezed some into the scrambled eggs, after which he put the ketchup back into the refrigerator. Breakfast was ready.

Sitting down on a chair in front of a plate of scrambled eggs, Peter switched the channel to the one where his favorite series about witches was playing, and began to break off a piece of baked yolk, smeared with ketchup, with a fork. Having broken off a piece of scrambled eggs, he immediately popped it into his mouth, without taking his eyes off the TV.

– So many episodes for one series. – Peter thought. «And all the action takes place in one house.» This series was made by talented people, there are more than a hundred episodes, and each, in fact, is different from the others, even though all the actions take place in the same places. I wish I could learn how to come up with things like that. That would be cool. I could then easily write any book, even if its events took place only in one apartment.

Peter carefully watched what was happening on the screen, chewing his scrambled eggs.

– You need to understand the formula by which scripts for TV series are written. – he thought. «Having understood this, I can write any work without any problems.»

Peter thought about what needs to be taken into account when writing long stories where the characters are in a limited space. And at the same time, write in such a way that it does not look boring and tiring. You can describe every action of the characters, but in the end it will get boring, and if you describe everything in a nutshell, you won’t be able to write a long text.

– Or maybe the texts in these series are not long at all, how do I know how many pages one episode takes? – thought Peter, continuing to look at the TV and chewing scrambled eggs with sliced sausage. «I guess I read too few books.» If I had read more, I would not have had any questions about what to focus on when writing a book. And I also want to become a writer, having read only a couple of books in my entire life. To write well, you need to read dozens, hundreds of books, so that the texts are imprinted in your mind, so that you know what to pay attention to when writing a text. Yes, I’m unlikely to be a writer. – something seemed to click in Peter’s mind. – Damn, what are you thinking about, you have to tell yourself that everything will work out for you, that you will write a book, that it will become a bestseller, that you will earn a lot of money from it, that you are generally a talent and a hero of our time. Enough of this whining that you won’t succeed and that you’re not capable of anything. Get ready and go write!

Having finished the scrambled eggs, Peter put the plate in the sink, took a mug of coffee from the table, and went into the room, to the computer.

Entering the room, he turned on the computer, sat down in a chair, and placed a mug of coffee near the monitor.

The computer booted.

Peter connected the Internet and opened his page on the social network. Then he opened the office program in which he wrote the book. Scrolling to the very bottom of the text, he began to think about a new chapter, but no thoughts came to mind.

– We need to come up with something. – Peter thought, looking at the white sheet frozen on the monitor.

He switched back to the social network page. But even there he did not find any ideas.

– These are only fragments, short moments, literally one paragraph, or even worse, one sentence, but you need to write a whole book. – he thought. «You can’t write a whole book with only one paragraph.» Yes, I went to a social network. I can write about this, but it’s one sentence. And if I start describing in detail what buttons I pressed when I went to the social network, then the publisher will not like it, and he simply will not accept my book for publication. The book should be interesting, and what is interesting in reading about what buttons the main character presses to enter a social network. I already overload the book with descriptions of actions in order to somehow fill the chapters with text. Now I can only envy those who easily write books of five hundred pages and use a minimum of descriptions. Where do they even get the text from if they don’t really describe anything, and at the same time use a minimum of dialogue? Maybe it’s all about actions? More action. My hero is like a plant, sitting at the computer, and I’m trying to stretch these gatherings over a whole chapter. And in those books, by those writers, the heroes are constantly in action, events are constantly changing, developing, something is constantly happening there. But on the other hand, I’m writing a boring book, which means I shouldn’t have any action. It’s just a boring book, that’s what I intended, that’s what I want. A book that girls will hold in their hands and get bored with it, sitting over the text. And the text itself will be boring, repetitive, and formulaic. No originality. Yes, that will be the motto of my book: «No originality.» Why should I invent something that has already been invented a long time ago? If I can’t write compelling stories, that means I’m untalented, and then I either shouldn’t write at all, or I should write the way I know how to write. I’m not a writer. I just want money, I want to get rich, I wrote a boring book. This means that I don’t need to try to stand out with the originality of the text. I’ll just write a boring book, so boring that even the publisher will tell me: «Your book is the most boring and boring book I’ve ever read.» And then I will answer him: «It was planned that way.» «Really?» – he will ask. «Yes, of course,» I will answer, «It’s a classic.» And it is true. All the classics are boring. And for me, modern classics. And in general, it seems that I am starting to feel depressed.

Peter turned his attention to the social network. He typed the phrase «Depression» into the search, and he was given several dozen groups dedicated to depression. He chose the most popular group and joined it.

Posts hung on the monitor, to which various photographs were attached, with captions. The photographs were gray and dull, just like the mood of those who entered this group.

– What am I doing here? – Peter thought.

He started reading posts and comments on them.

Under one of the photographs, he saw a comment from a girl named Sveta, who was talking about her experience of struggling with depression. Peter carefully read the comment and decided to ask her.

– What to do if you think you are getting depressed? – he wrote in the comments to the photo, addressing Sveta.

The answer came within two minutes.

– First, try not to think about the fact that you are depressed. Thoughts about depression intensify the state of depression itself.

– I don’t even think about her, I’m just writing a book, but no thoughts come into my head, and because of this, it seems to me that I’m starting to feel depressed. – Peter answered in the comment.

– What is this book about? – asked Sveta, writing in the comment.

– Well, it’s about a writer. About how a guy writes a book.

– Interesting, I guess.

– I don’t know, the readers will judge.

– If you don’t know what to write about, then take a break and rest. This should help. Distract yourself from something else, watch a movie, or listen to music.

– Yes, you’re probably right. Need to watch some movie.

– Go chat in private messages. – one of the guests of the group wrote.

Sveta wrote to Peter in private messages:

– Hello, if you want, you can write to me. By the way, why don’t you have friends?

– I don’t know, I don’t communicate with anyone.

– Can I add you?