April 20, 2003
*sigh* So I dunno. Maybe
*sigh* So I dunno. Maybe my post last night about Jake was a premonition of sorts. I've never had a character of mine die in game. There were several who almost died, there were several who clearly died after I stopped playing them, but none who've ever died in game. So I'm not sure how it feels to have a beloved character go away.
Until now. At the risk of sounding like a freak, Jake said goodbye to me tonight while I was driving to my Werewolf game. The noise I was making about her having a theme song for this upcoming chronicle was apparently her swan song. I'm not quite sure how I realized it, but I did. So, one of the first sessions of the next chronicle will involve her passing her sealskin onto Aislinn and vanishing mysteriously, something like what's here. I'd always planned that to happen when Aislinn was eleven--but oddly, rereading that story (the first thing I ever got published, interestingly), Aislinn's voice and Elen's voice are both much much younger than their stated ages of 11 and 19. I never saw that before now.
I'm not sure if I can run that scene for my players, as much as I'd like them to have a part in Jake leaving this world. I'm just not sure I can run it without crying. I'm not (too) ashamed to admit, I cried a little tonight when she said goodbye. She's been my alter ego for five years, the first roleplaying character I ever truly connected with. But she's gone through a lot (THERE'S an understatement), and I think she's ready to rest.