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Hey y’all. Long time, no update. Looking at the changed title and fic summary, you may know what’s going on. But I still felt like I should write out an explanation/make an update so that you know about this and aren’t left waiting for a new chapter.
As some of you may know, The Sounds You Hear in the Dark (or TSYHitD) is very important and personal to me. It’s a fic about Varian struggling with psychosis, something I had just been recovering from around the time I started writing this story. It was a bit of a vent-fic more than anything, using an interesting concept and my primary comfort character to release all my feelings and let go of the pain I was going through. Even as I began to recover, I knew I wanted to finish this fic. I wanted to tell not just my story, but Varian’s story.
While this wasn’t my first fic I’d ever written (nor was it the first I’ve ever posted), it was the first multi-chapter fic I had posted and really committed to. It’s one of the fics I’m most committed to in general, even if I haven’t updated it in years. It is very dear to me, and I’m so proud of it.
I rushed out one chapter after the next, hyperfixating on it, excited to show people what I got. Jumping for joy as I read and replied to each comment I got. I thought it would be the start to a strong fanfic career.
Then I crashed. I crashed hard. I hit a wall, and while I was able to climb the hurdle once, the second was even further up. I knew I might not be able to make it, and I began to lose hope that one of my most cherished fanfics would never be finished. That I would disappoint all the people who had been following it and commenting on each chapter. I never truly lost hope, but I had lost direction.
Recently, I came back to visit it again, partially for the nostalgia, partially to see if I could maybe respark some inspiration.
Upon rereading it, I realized a few issues I had.
1) The “cast” of hallucinations was too big. They each served a role, but most of them could easily be fused together or have traits put into others. Some of them didn’t even really do anything, they were just “thematically important.” I wanted to actually explore each major hallucination, and the first couple of chapters were the ones I was using to try and dive into each.
2) (kinda part of 1) During my reread, I realized how much I disliked the first few chapters (besides Chapter 1. Chapter 1 was pretty good tbh). They lacked a proper flow and felt slightly disjointed from one another. It almost felt like I was missing quite a few chapters, but decided to just rush to where the main plot kicks off. That’s actually probably what happened. I think the issue was that I had such a cool idea, but after writing the first chapter, I had no idea where to really go next. So I did what I could, and while it was decently written in terms of prose, the actual plot was a little all over the place.
3) The depictions of the hallucinations weren’t authentic to my experience or what I was trying to portray. Nina and the whispering walls were pretty good and exactly the kind of thing I wanted to include, but the others were meh. My explanation for Panarava and Fred were based on something I had loosely experienced, but I didn’t quite capture them in a way that fit with the psychosis aspect of the story (aka the whole point of this fic). And the rest…interesting enough, but in terms of representation? Disgraceful. Curb Stomping the Willow Man and Icy Blue and Lilian because what was I even doing at that point. No, literally wtf was I even doing.
Icy Blue and Lilian were so redundant and made so little sense. Sure, Icy Blue had his own chapter, but his existence barely added anything to the overall story. Icy Blue and Lilian were meant to represent Varian’s trauma and the hurt child within him. But then they interacted with him a little too much and were a little too “real.” Maybe some people experience those kinds of hallucinations, but I haven’t, and thus I don’t want to write them like that. I want to write them true to me.
The Apener was okay and I liked writing “A Hurt Beyond Pain,” but it still slightly missed the mark and didn’t have the best buildup. And NightNight literally did nothing. Like, she literally isn’t even there. Why did I even add her in. What was the point.
And again, the Willow Man? Hate him. Hated writing him, regretted adding him, hated thinking about him, hated what he was meant to represent, just hated everything about him in general. Everything about him could have just been split between some of the other characters, like Panarava and Fred. Speaking of those two…
4) The names were stupid. Literally confused so many people with the “Fred” thing. Delete the names and start over again.
5) My earlier chapters left me stuck and lacking inspiration. All the problems for the early chapters and little things from the middle chapters had piled up and left me stuck in place. On top of that, there was 1 singular chapter I was just…stuck on. I knew what I wanted to do, but at the same time, I didn’t. The early chapters no longer sparked that passion in me and instead left me out of juice. Maybe I had generally just run out after writing so many chapters back to back in a row. I needed to have that spark reignited. I honestly needed to start over, even if it was just a little bit.
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After 4 years, I am a much better writer than before. My writing style is a tiny bit different, but I think it still holds up. I am also more confident, more precise, better at planning, etc. On top of that, I have the power of hindsight. I can see where I went wrong when I wrote the original. I know why I stopped writing it.
I was worried that I would never finish TSYHitD, that it would be on hiatus forever. But then I realized a solution. One that I didn’t exactly want to resort to, but I felt it was the best option. With a heavy heart, I decided to start a rewrite.
And guess what? I really like it so far! I really like the way the story flows, how I introduce each vision, how they add to the story, how they manifest/present themselves. How Varian reacts to things, his internal monologue. How the story as a whole is written.
Now, not every chapter will have a total rewrite. Some might stay pretty much exactly the same. That’s because they are good enough and fit with my vision. I might add a little bit of new stuff to them, but not a lot will be taken out.
I’m still leaving the OG fic up, since some of it will be pretty different, and some of ya’ll might like the OG version. I honestly like the OG version’s first chapter. So ya’ll don’t need to worry about that. On top of this, the later chapters will mostly be what I was already originally planning to do with the fic, so in a way, you’ll be able to see what's coming in the future during the rewrite.
I hope ya’ll are excited for what I have in store. Yes, it will take longer to update than the OG, but that’s because life's complicated (plus I'm no longer as aggressively passionate about TTS/RTA and have other fics I'm putting a lot of energy into rn) and the early chapters will basically be completely rewritten. But after the early hurdle, it will get less and less reworked, and the middle chapters will come out sooner (I wanna space them out, but I won’t make you wait pointlessly). You won’t have to wait forever for a new chapter to come out. I promise that this time, I’m sticking to it. Probably. Hopefully. Eventually.
I just hope y’all like it as much as the original, and that you are willing to read. Because I’m doing this mostly for me and my own piece of mind, but also for you. We may not be a perfect fandom, but the Varian side of the fandom has made me feel so supported and loved, and y'all were the first fandom community I truly called home. So I’m finishing this freaking fic, if it’s the last thing I do!