They Want Something

There was a statuesque couple on the subway last week. Their icy blue eyes glinted behind stylish rimless glasses, even in the feeble light of the train. Both had fair skin that seemed bisque-like against tawny fur and amber leather. They were so magnificently tall that they could have descended from Norse gods with powerful names like Thor, the god of thunder, and Radgrid, one of the female Valkyries.

The pair seemed even more extraordinarily out of place since the car was filled with the slumped, weary passengers who were regular fixtures on the red line at the end of any given New York workday. It was a fresh out-of-placeness that conjured chill breezes and snow-bound tundras, and it had something to do with how incredibly chic they were—their fur boots, laced up to their knees, crimping their pale blue jeans in a furry flourish.

When their gazes flitted around the car, they mastered the unengaged stare adopted by most subway riders, but their expressions softened intimately when their eyes met. A slight curl would just barely touch the corners of his lips and she would tighten her hand on his sleeve ever so slightly, her manicured nails impressing the spongy leather. I wanted them to speak so I could hear their voices—would their utterances have been staccato sentences or fluid phrases? If they had spoken, what would she have asked of him; he of her?

In Ann Hood’s book Creating Character Emotions, she writes, “Description, no matter how brilliantly crafted, cannot carry a reader forward.” A character, quite simply, should want something. “Desire is the driving force of human nature and, applied to characters, it creates a steam of momentum to drive a story forward.” As I recorded my fascination with this Nordic couple in my writer’s notebook that day, I asked myself, “What would Thor and Radgrid want?” I’ll tell you the story I concocted if you’ll share with me the tale you would tell to illustrate what it is they would passionately desire?