"Come on," she said. "Let's go for a walk. It'll clear your head."
"I guess I need help getting my bearings."
"You need a lot of help, buster." She smiled. "That's what I'm here for."
She stood outside in the cold sunshine, her hands in the pockets of her coat as she waited for him to lock the door to his house. He joined her on the sidewalk.
"Where to?" he asked.
"See," she grinned. "That's your problem. It doesn't matter. Look at where you're standing." She gestured up and down the sidewalk. "You can either go right or left. Pick a direction, and start walking."
He smiled slightly. "It's just that simple?"
She poked him in the shoulder. "Pick a direction."
He turned to the right and started walking. She fell into step on his right hand side, and the two of them walked down to the corner.
"Now," she said, as they waited for the traffic to clear before they crossed the street, "I think the problem is that you're starting too generally."
"Really," he muttered, his hands in his pockets as they crossed the street.
"Yes, really." She looked over a squirrel running up a tree. "You have a man and a woman, maybe. It's hard to tell from what you've put down so far. They don't even have names. It's hard to tell what their relationship is." She looked up at him. "I think you need to give them names, and you need to make them as real as possible."
"But I don't know them."
She shakes her head. "That doesn't matter. You will know them, because you are creating them. Just make them, put them on the page, and then let them figure out where they need to go, and what they need to do. The sooner you put them down and let them run, the sooner you'll be out of this morass that's captured you."
He sighs. His shoe catches on a crack in the sidewalk and he stumbles. "I don't think it has anything to do with the writing." He looks up at her, frowning. "I wish it did. I think it's just happening again, the way that it always does."
She nods. "It always does. And you always get better." She reaches out to take his hand. She gives it a slight squeeze. "It will get better. Just ride it out."
