“Every time…” he said with a defeated tone. “Every time I put my pen down, my mind goes blank.”

Sitting at his desk, Lee spun around in his old, worn-down chair. It was 12 o’ clock in the afternoon and he had sat down to write four hours ago. He glanced at the bin, filled to the brim with crumpled papers. “I need to buy a bigger one,” he said. He leaned back, staring at the ceiling with blank, dead eyes. What was left of the sunlight - after being blocked by the blinds - hit his face. He closed his eyes, trying to force out a few thoughts.

It had been weeks since he’d written anything final. He still had six months before the book was due, but those six months felt as they were only six weeks away. He sipped his coffee slowly. He had time to waste sipping coffee. He had nothing but time. Too much time. ‘Maybe I should take a break,’ he thought. ‘I didn’t sleep well last night, I’m just tired is all.’

Lee stood up from his desk and took the bin with him to the kitchen. ‘At least I’m helping to recycle’ he thought to himself as he threw away papers from his small bin onto the larger pile of papers in the bigger bin. The rest of the apartment felt dark, isolated, and eerie. It was just him and the noise of cars driving by outside. The neighbours were at work doing what he called ‘real jobs’. Meanwhile, he’d been sitting at home all day ‘scribbling’. He called it ‘scribbling’ because it wasn’t really writing. Writing is when you write, not when you throw away your writing. Writing is when you get it right, scribbling is when you try to get it right. Sometimes he was a writer, but most of the time he was a scribbler.

He took out a few slices of leftover pizza and put it in the microwave. He watched it spin round and round, with the repetitive drone sound of the microwave buzzing by his ears. The light of the microwave was the only light in the apartment that was on. Until the microwave stopped, the room reverting back to darkness. He ate his pizza like he sipped his coffee, wondering about how strange the word ‘author’ is, and how it sounds vaguely like the name ‘Arthur’. “Arthur the author,” he said to himself, smiling. He found the thought amusing.

Sitting back at his desk, he felt a wave of fear looking down at his pen and papers. His first book deal had been signed last year, the first time anyone had ever paid him for his writing (scribbling). All he had to do was write it. “Six months,” he said. “If only I had more time.”