Workshop 7

September 8, 2025

Kristina L. Wildes

Set the Mood First

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Opening Song: "Sacrifice" by Nevertel

This song is layered with grief and defiance. It simmers with the weight of choices made and the cost that follows. Every lyric feels like a wound, every beat like a memory that refuses to fade. This is not the sound of someone breaking. It is the sound of someone already broken, still standing, still fighting, still unwilling to let go of what mattered, even if it destroys them.

That is the energy you need this week. Because now we are diving into the most fragile and volatile territory of all: the space between people. Not the world around them. Not their internal monologue. But the relationship that could hold them together or tear them apart.

Where We Left Off

By Week 6, you were no longer writing placeholders. You were writing people.

Last week, we stepped inside the mind of a central character and built something with weight. Not just surface details or dramatic moments, but the interior landscape that defines how a character sees the world. You explored their fears, their memory, their deeply personal truths. And for the first time in this series, you paused the external plot to ask the hardest question in storytelling. Who is this really?

You wrote the internal compass that guides their choices. You dug into how they carry their past, how they move through a space, and what they choose to reveal or suppress. You also created a tangible character profile to keep everything consistent. No more shifting eye colors or inconsistent morals. You gave your story a spine by anchoring it in someone real.

Now, with that foundation built, it is time to look outward again.

Because no character exists in a vacuum.

They move in relationships. They are seen, misunderstood, challenged, supported, betrayed, or changed because of who they let close.

This week, we examine that tension, the pressure point where one character’s identity collides with someone else’s expectations. Where trust becomes something more dangerous than a lie. Where loyalty gets bent to the edge of breaking.

Whether it is romantic, familial, political, or situational, every great relationship in fiction eventually reaches a test. This is that moment.

This Week’s Prompt

Write the Scene Where Trust Frays

This is not just another emotional beat. This is one of the most pivotal moments in any narrative: when the illusion of safety in a relationship shatters. When two people who thought they understood each other, who built something that felt unshakable, are forced to confront the uncomfortable, unavoidable truth.

One of them has been lying. Or hiding something. Or maybe they were just never the person the other believed them to be.

Maybe they are exactly who they have always been, and that is the problem.

This is your opportunity to dig deep into the tension between characters. Not by making it explosive or overdramatic for its own sake, but by letting it ache in a way that feels real. Trust does not need to snap with yelling or fists. Sometimes, the most devastating betrayals come in quiet moments. In a silence that stretches too long. In a look that confirms what one of them feared. In a truth that was buried, clawing its way to the surface.

Write the scene where something cracks.

It could be a confession that cannot be unsaid. A secret that was supposed to stay buried. An accusation made without evidence, but with certainty. It might be a betrayal of action, or of inaction. A choice made that left the other person behind. Or maybe it is a revelation that one of them never really trusted the other at all.

Ask yourself:

• Who has more to lose in this moment, and do they realize it?

• What has been simmering under the surface between these characters for chapters now? What finally tips it over the edge?

• Is this a final break, or will this pain become a scar that binds them even closer later?

• And most importantly: what does this scene reveal that your characters could not say until now?

You’ve already done the heavy lifting of establishing who they are and what they want. You’ve shown us their past, their decisions, their consequences.

Now show us what happens when another person steps in front of all of that and says, “I don’t trust you.” Or worse, “I trusted you, and I shouldn’t have.”

Let it be complicated. Let it challenge the version of the story your protagonist thought they were telling. Let it echo forward.

This is not the end of the relationship, necessarily. But it is the moment where the foundation beneath it shifts.

Let your readers feel that shift in their chest. Make it undeniable. Make it hurt.

Let It Sink In

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Reflective Song: “I Miss the Misery” by Halestorm

This track is venom in velvet. It hits like heartbreak laced with defiance. This is not gentle grief or quiet regret. This is a character who’s angry they ever trusted someone, furious they still care, and haunted by the fact that they’d do it all again.

Let it pour into the veins of your scene.

This is the sound of unresolved tension. Of a loyalty that cracked under pressure but hasn’t shattered completely. Of a character who’s hurting, but isn’t ready to let go of the thing that broke them.

Close your eyes. Let the lyrics crawl under your skin. Then write the scene where everything that was once stable starts to splinter.

What is said, what is unsaid, and what will never be forgiven?

Your Goal This Week

First Requirement - Write three to five pages.

Not filler. Not setup. This week is about emotional payoff.

You are writing the scene that shifts the relationship between two characters in a way that cannot be undone. The kind of moment that changes how they speak to each other, how they think of each other, and how they move through the story from here on out.

Even if they remain physically in the same space, something inside them should move. A realization. A reckoning. A refusal. Something they can no longer pretend is not true.

This is not about dragging out a monologue or forcing melodrama. It is about pressure. The kind that builds through glances, silence, tone, posture, and what is not said.

Let the scene breathe, but keep it taut.

Use voice, how they speak, what words they choose, what they avoid. Use silence, where it sits, how long it lasts, and what it does to the other person. Let body language contradict the dialogue. Let subtext scream through a whisper.

Let their emotional state leak through the cracks in how they hold themselves.

This scene should mean something.

It is not a random argument or a throwaway confession. It is a moment that defines the relationship moving forward. Whether it is a friendship, a sibling bond, a political alliance, or a mentor and student. This moment carves something permanent into it.

Ask yourself:

• What do they want from each other, and why is that suddenly no longer possible?

• Who is trying to hold on, and who is already halfway out the door emotionally?

• What will never be the same after this scene?

When you write this, keep your pen steady. Let it sting if it needs to. Let it crack open something in your characters that they were never ready to face. The shift might be quiet. It might be explosive. But it should ripple.

Second Requirement - Relationship Map or Dynamic Chart

This week, you are not just writing the fracture. You are tracking the fault lines.

Your secondary task is to build or refine your relationship web, a visual map of how your characters connect, distrust, deceive, and depend on each other. This is not just a creative exercise. It is a structural one. If your characters are going to collide, shift, or spiral, you need to know exactly where they stand.

The relationship web is your emotional compass. It helps keep the tension sharp and the development intentional.

Include the following in your web:

• Who trusts whom and why.

  • Go beyond surface-level declarations. Look at the actions and shared history that justify that trust.

• What secrets exist between characters.

  • Identify what has been left unsaid, what is being deliberately hidden, and who knows more than they should.

• Where loyalties truly lie.

  • Move past dialogue and focus on what your characters prove through action and silence.

• What dynamics are shifting.

  • Examine who is starting to doubt, who is gaining influence, and who is slipping out of place.

This task is especially important now in Week 7. Your story’s emotional threads are beginning to tangle. Motives are shifting. Relationships are no longer clean or predictable, and neither is your plot.

You might think you know how everyone connects, but until you map it out clearly and honestly, there are likely tensions or connections you have not fully seen yet.

Use any format that works for your creative process:

• A digital diagram in Notion or Campfire

• A mind map on a whiteboard

• A wall covered with index cards and string

• A hand-drawn web in your notebook

The format does not matter. What matters is that it exists and reflects your current understanding of your characters’ emotional lives.

Keep your map somewhere visible and easy to access. Update it regularly. Return to it often, especially as your story begins to fracture under the weight of new truths, shifting allegiances, and consequences.

This map will become your anchor. It will help you write a story that not only moves but breathes, twists, and remembers where it came from.

Craft Focus: Writing Complex Relationship Dynamics

Some of the most unforgettable moments in fiction are not shaped by battles, betrayals, or plot twists. They are shaped by relationships. Not just romantic ones, but every tether between people who matter to each other. These are the scenes that carry weight not because of what happens, but because of who it happens to.

In Workshop 7, you are not just writing characters. You are writing the space between them.

That space is filled with tension, history, miscommunication, and meaning. It is shaped by unspoken agreements, past sacrifices, old wounds, and uncertain trust. It shifts with every word said, every word avoided, and every silence too long to ignore.

This is where nuance matters.

Write the pauses. The offhand comment that lands like a blow. The way one character reaches for something they never receive. The way another pulls away too quickly, or stays just a moment too long.

Let your dialogue carry emotional weight, not just information. What someone says in defense may really be fear. What someone laughs off may be guilt. Use body language and interiority to give your reader the full emotional truth, even if your characters are lying to each other.

And remember, relationships are rarely equal. Power tilts. Intimacy shifts. One person may need more than the other is willing to give. One may be protecting something the other is trying to break open. Let that imbalance breathe on the page.

This week, you are also visualizing your story’s relationship web. That is not busywork. It is how you track emotional continuity. Because no connection stays static. Mapping out who trusts whom, who is keeping secrets, and where loyalties fray allows you to write with consistency and emotional accuracy. Your readers may not see that map, but they will feel it in every interaction.

A good story does not hinge only on plot. It hinges on what people mean to each other. And what happens when that meaning changes.

Want to Share

This week’s scenes are emotional pressure points. Writing them might leave you raw, fired up, or somewhere in between. If you want to share, post a snippet where the tension cracks. Just a few lines of dialogue, a look that lingers too long, or a moment where the silence says everything.

Or, if you have finished your relationship map, show us what your story looks like underneath the surface. Who trusts whom. Who is lying to themselves. Who is about to burn it all down.

Remember, this is not about perfect prose. It is about connection. Yours, and your characters’.

Next Week: Workshop 8 Preview

You’ve tested the bonds. Now it is time to raise the stakes.

In Workshop 7, we cracked into the fragile space between characters. You wrote the scene where trust faltered, loyalty bent under pressure, or connection took on a new weight. You explored what it means for a relationship to be real, flawed, and uncertain.

Next week, we move forward from that moment with intention.

Workshop 8 is about momentum.

This is the point where someone finally acts. Maybe they lash out. Maybe they walk away. Maybe they decide to keep a secret or tell one. But no matter what they choose, it has weight. It changes what happens next.

Not every consequence is loud. Some choices come quietly, in a hallway or with a single sentence. Others slam doors and light fires. You get to decide how it looks. But the important thing is that the world responds.

This is the heartbeat of a real story. When characters stop reacting and start making choices. When agency replaces circumstance.

Think of Workshop 8 as the ignition point. Someone lights a match. Someone turns their back. Someone crosses a threshold and refuses to look back.

This is not about adding chaos. It is about consequence. Let every decision matter. Let every silence speak. Let every move create change.

You are no longer sketching a story. You are sculpting it.

And next week, we strike the chisel.

Final Thoughts

By Week 7, you are not just writing a story. You are weaving tension through connection. You are taking everything we have built so far and pushing it into the fragile, electric space between people.

This is where the emotional stakes become real. Not because of some grand battle or world-altering event, but because one person looked another in the eye and said something that cannot be unsaid. You wrote the scene where trust cracked. Where someone flinched instead of stepped forward. Where silence became louder than any shout.

And that matters. Because all the plot in the world means nothing if we do not care about the people moving through it.

This week’s workshop was about the fault lines in relationships. The pressure points. The scar tissue. These are the things that shape your characters just as much as their victories do. Maybe even more.

So keep going.

Keep writing characters who can love, betray, forgive, and fracture.

Write the grief between two people who cannot fix what was broken. Write the love that stays anyway. Write the tension that builds in the pause between sentences. Write the moment someone turns away, and the one left behind says nothing, because what could they even say.

This is the work that gives your story gravity.

And next week, we take all of this emotional weight and push it further.

Until then, keep going. Keep feeling your way through the story.

Keep writing. I’ll see you in Workshop 8.

-Kristina