When Your Character Screams 'Fuck!'

I'm 26,059 words into Blood Sacrifice, but I swear to Anubis every time a character uses a swear word, some little kid is literally climbing over furniture to see what I'm doing.

I usually write for a couple of hours in the morning at the local B&N cafe. It's the quietest public place I can find with a corner table I can wedge myself into where three sides are covered. (I really don't like people reading my stuff until after the second editing pass.)

Invariably, some little kid wanders over to see what the lady with the weird t-shirts is doing. (Example: Yesterday, I wore one of my 'T-Rex trying' tees from the Houston Museum of Natural Science. In it, T-rex is trying to catch a butterfly that's landed on his nose, but he can't because of his pitifully short arms.)

Unfortunately, I didn't make it to B&N until after one p.m. I start typing and I'm in the middle of an action scene. The local Peruvian vamps are taking Alex and Phil to the city of Cuzco in pursuit of the bad guys. Tiny twin-engine plane. Flying through the Andes. At night. And a giant mummified pterosaur-like creature is doing damnedest to bring their plane down.

The situation call for a four-letter word because not even a vampire or a demi-goddess is going to survive impalement by a granite spire or a 10,000-foot fall, right?

So, of course, some six-year-old boy comes to the table, climbs on the chair opposite of me and literally contorts himself so he's hanging upside down over the top of my screen. Then he looks me square in the eye and says, "You know you can play Angry Birds on your computer."

Me: "Thank you for letting me know, but I don't want to play Angry Birds right now."

Boy: "Why not?"

Me: "Because I'm working on something else."

Boy: "But you should really play Angry Birds."

Me: "No, thank you."

Soon-to-be-dead Boy: "But you'll like it. I want to teach you how to play Angry Birds."

Me: "Isn't that your mom over there? I think she has a chocolate cupcake for you."

And to think, I go to B&N to avoid the "Mom, we're out of milk" and "Honey, where's the car keys" interruptions.

Sometimes, I wish I had Phil's ability to throw lightning bolts.