Writing In Future Tense Novels & Stories

I’m only human, after all. So I want to give myself time with this one. Time to marinate in all the changes I’ve made over the course of writing it. Marinate in the future, despite having certain scenes finished, there is so much between that hasn’t been said or every built. I don’t want to end their story when they still have growing to do.

There, in the hush of late afternoon, I rolled in a fresh page and started typing. Not a book. Not a proposal. Just a letter. A letter to the me I might be one day. Or to the girl I used to be. Dear Future Me, If you’re reading this, it means you’re still here. Still showing up. Still choosing breath over silence. I hope you remember the way your fingers trembled when you typed these words—not because you were afraid, but because you knew they mattered. I hope you haven’t forgotten the way River looks at you across a room full of strangers and makes you feel like the only one that matters.

Inside were all the love letters Anthony had written to me over the years, along with tickets from trips we had taken. Then, I lit a candle and tossed it into the box. Thick black smoke billowed out immediately, and I began to cough from the choking fumes.

The future was unwritten. But for tonight, and maybe forever, that was enough.

“It is a token so that you can be granted a permission to enter in my tower.” “Your tower? But it’s not like I knew what your tower looks like and I’m not even sure if I can see it in my whole life“ You shall not say something as those because all the future holds something that we can never be sure of knowing about. Even the story that is written on the papers of the goddess can be change in just a snap of a finger. Your future was hold by only you and you alone. So if you say something like that, I guess you are just going with the flow of life and that is something that is not right. This is your life, this is your rule. The only one who can change ut is you. Also… If you say such thing

“It kind of is.” “No. Helpful would be a giant label.” I pointed dramatically at the page. “Past.” Then pointed to the opposite side. “Future.” I shook my head. “That’s helpful.” She laughed harder than before. I do believe she even snorted a couple times. The journal didn’t explain how far into the future the visions could extend either. Hours. Days. Months. Years. There was no explanation. Just a lovely little note informing me that future visions existed and then absolutely no instructions afterward. Typical. No damn explanations at all. This definitely isn’t white wolf 101 for dummies. That’s for sure.

The specific, careful process of someone finding the words for something that does not have obvious words, that exists in a register where language is not entirely adequate but must be used anyway because it is the available medium. "Before you," he said. "Before you came to this packhouse — I had stopped believing in this." He looked at Seren. "Not in children specifically. In — the future. In the forward direction of things. In the sense that what comes next is worth the cost of arriving there." I was very still.

Then, more playfully, he added, “If you finish writing, I’ll take you somewhere special in a few days. Sound good?” My ears perked up. Did this mean my return date was near? I couldn't help but smile. "Okay." I moved to another bench, settling into my seat. Jason watched me with an unreadable expression before shaking his head with a small, knowing smile. We both began writing. Letters to our future selves—five years from now. What would I even say? I let my pen glide across the page, allowing my thoughts to spill out in ink. Neither of us knew what the other was writing.

Keith caught more than a thief in that alley. He caught a future. Our future. And I can't wait to see where it takes us.

Why? That future is his why.