So last week, I started writing something for the Three Word Wednesday prompt. It truly is one of my favorite prompt sites; the words challenge me and at the same time, they fit my fictional style. It’s a good match, me and Three Word Wednesday.

Last Thursday, as I usually do (and mentioned already), I started writing something. And then I ran out of time because I’d done a whole host of other things before making time for my writing (bad Susan!).

I’ve worked off and on on the piece since then, and I think I’ve reached its conclusion. It’s short, under six hundred words — and as I got to the end of the page, I realized that it’s not something I can use on the blog. I definitely can’t use it as a short story, either in an anthology or a literary magazine, and definitely not as a standalone.

It’s a bridge piece, one of those things you blurp out as you figure out the story that needs to be told. One of those pieces that’ll never see the light of day but becomes a scene so vital to the whole that it’s not wasted words at all.

Sometimes, as writers, we don’t give ourselves permission to write these sorts of exploratory scenes. We’re so focused on publication and getting books and submissions out that we lose sight of the twists and turns in the road. It’s not always a straight path between here and there, folks.

As with everything else, take some time to deviate off the shortest point. Let yourself meander down an unknown road. I bet your fiction will be better for it.

Mine certainly will be.