To Torture or Not to Torture: Has your Main Character Suffered Enough?

by Hilde Garcia

I was talking to my dear friend recently, the only survivor to my coming out party, when we decided to go down memory lane or maybe we should call it Nightmare Street.

"Do you remember THE PARTY your mom forced you to have?” She asks me. Do I? How could I forget? In fact, I wanted to forget it so badly that when the same scene came up for my main character, I happily skipped over it.

Funny. You are supposed to write what you know and what was is difficult. Yet, I ran the moment I had the chance.

I still have nightmares about the dress, the kids at my party that did not want to be there, forced to go because my mother had made the calls to their mothers. I boycotted the entire process.

Then when no one asked me to dance, my mother got up and made an announcement.

“Who wants to dance with my daughter?” I was mortified. How delicious if I did this to my main character. Why not? If I suffered, she should too.

The boy who was brave enough to accept the dance request or just plain scared of my mother, proceeded to step on my toes and ruin my panty hose, my eyes were closed during the one photo of us dancing, and then promptly sat down with a look of relief. Oh, what a dance!

My hair was too short, my tan was to dark and I had just had my wisdom teeth pulled, so my face was still a bit rounder than I would have cared for. Ah, 15, such a good age. NOT.

I wanted to crawl under a rock. The party ended with three people in the pool, my brother sticking his hand in my cake, and my cousin running off to make out with the guy I did like, who happened to show up with a friend. If ever there was a party to live in infamy that was it.

Did I mention it was the recreation hall of our dumpy apartment building, which had yellow and orange floral wallpaper, worn carpeting, cheesy lighting and no air conditioning? My birthday is in August in Miami. No wonder everyone ended up in the pool.

Except for me. I was told to sit and be pretty. I did just that. I sat, but pretty was far from the photo.

Years later my mom always kidded me about it. “One day, you will laugh about this.”

After 30 years, there is still no laughter. I am still traumatized. I know for her, it was a great night. It was the party she wanted and never had. Maybe I should be over it? Nope, not going to happen.

So MC, watch out. I have a lot of torturing to enhance you with, but hopefully, you will find your voice sooner than I did and speak up and say NO to really bad parties thrown by your parents.

Push the envelope. Have you tortured your MC enough today? Really?

If you squirm as you write the scene, you are on the right track.

If not, get to it. Your MC will not torture him/herself.