Armand

profile by Thespian || background from patternvomit

hello treasure friends toyhou.se goodbye

◄ the writer ►

"writer" in quotation marks i mean

alright so this lad armand hanley here is an author. he writes shitty novels nobody every buys but he's a stubborn chap who won't go back on his dream of becoming an author!!
until the money runs out

so the money runs out and armand finds himself in a situation where he either goes back to being a bricklayer (he didn't last 2 months the first time around) or figures out some other way to make money, and his editor friend suggests writing something "without any integrity, shamelessly commercial"

porn. the editor suggested armand write porn and the madman actually did it!!

somehow the erotic novella sells like hotcakes even tho critics rip it to shreds. the editor suggests armand keep pumping out that kind of stuff to pay the bills and no matter how much critics tear him down, that garbage keeps selling

ofc armand published them all under a pen name because he's embarrassed af. he's also salty af because his other "proper" writing doesn't sell and is also not overly popular with critics
poor guy just can't win lmao ᕕ( ᐛ )ᕗ

his cats be like

◄ envy for oneself ►

Stuck in traffic, Armand allowed his forehead to rest on the steering wheel when his exasperation reached its peak. He had only just taken his gaze off the road when someone behind him honked. Armand straightened his posture with a start. His eyes glistened, ready to hit the acceleration, only to be met with the same, unmoving car before him, and the same unmoving car before that one, and another unmoving car before that one…

He sighed and his forehead once more touched the steering wheel. None of the people who had, years ago, pressured him to start driving classes as soon as he hit eighteen – assuring him that driving was the ultimate freedom – had warned him about Greylake’s traffic; suddenly, being limited to public transportation did not seem like such a condemnation. At least the subways are moving, Armand muttered with another sigh. Accepting that he would be late for the appointment regardless, the man decided to turn on the radio and, hopefully, drown out the boredom.

“… Regardless of the harsh critiques from book critics, the novella, second from debuting author G-” The honking from the car behind Armand’s interrupted the radio host. He considered sticking his head out the window and giving the honking maniac a scolding, but controlled himself. “… Is fast-approaching best-seller status, topping even their debut novella, The-” Again, honking. Armand rolled the window down and stuck his head out – he almost shouted something but noticed the thickness of the man’s neck and fury in his eyes and, following his better judgment, forced a smile and frantically rolled the window up again. “… Now, what do the critics say? Oh, oh, am I even allowed to say this on air?” The presenter chuckled, cleared her throat. “It’s porn, plain and simple, that’s the title of the review which ends in a one out of ten rating.” Armand snickered. How does that kind of garbage even get published? People have no taste, he thought. “Heart of the Heist is-” It was Armand’s turn to interrupt the radio host with a swift turn of the radio knob. His cheeks flared up. Armand hated to hear people talk about his work like that.

“Sorry I’m late!”

Armand barged into the office panting, his forehead revealing faint droplets of sweat. The editor behind the desk smiled. He gestured for Armand to take a seat at the usual chair, the enthusiasm of his arm’s movement poorly concealed.

“It’s fine.” His eyes turned to a childlike excitement as soon as Armand sat down. “Did you see the sales? Heart of the Heist is already selling like hotcakes!”
“Yeah but-”
“And the media’s all over it! Everyone’s covering it! Well, mostly everyone, I don’t think Good Morning Varemo! would ever cover it…”
“I mean sure, but-”
“Who needs those guys anyway, eh? Armand we’re gonna make a fortune!” “That’s great!” Armand’s lips retracted to show his teeth in a smile faker than his enthusiasm. “But what about the critics? They hate it.”
“And who cares what those presumptuous airheads say?!”
The man behind the desk relaxed his posture. The dreamy, half-closed eyes and head tilted back reminded Armand of the expression his cats made after he fed them.

“Whatever.” Armand sighed because he knew nothing would come of pursuing the topic. “I brought the revised manuscript. I haven’t figured out a title yet, but I added that scene you asked for-”
“Did you make the main character more depraved?”
Armand sighed again. A hand massaged his temples.
“I guess? Listen man, there’s some things I just… Would rather not write, you know?”
The editor had already began reading through the new manuscript with voracious appetite, red pen in hand. In moments such as those, Armand could not help but lament what that friendship had become. Maybe it was partly his fault, he thought, because he had spent months wishing their editor-writer relationship could be more professional, a professional friendship, only to find that the taste of money had turned a friend into, well, an editor.

At least his cats would never change for money. Whitney mewed and rubbed her head against Armand’s legs as soon as he walked in through the main door – her affection increased exponentially when Armand walked to the kitchen and began opening a can. Gentian, with the regal pride of a king, sat atop the cat tree and quietly observed the can being opened. Armand announced dinner was ready and placed both bowls on the ground. Gentian leapt off his perch and, never betraying his elegant self, gave a single, approving meow.

It was the editor who, months prior, gave Armand an ultimatum: write something that sells, or go to a different publishing house. Admittedly it was worded much more softly and with explanations on shareholders and staff meetings and senior staff and many other terms Armand could not understand. The editor’s ultimatum came right after the ultimatum Armand gave himself: write something that pays rent, or go back to bricklaying. Before that point, Armand had published three whole novels with that editor and through that publishing house – three whole novels that elicited bad-to-lukewarm reviews and did not sell.

The editor had said, at the time, it’s three strikes, like in baseball, and Armand heard him but was too preoccupied with pacing around the office to reply right away.
“Four. Baseball has four strikes.”
The editor’s brows furrowed at Armand’s statement.
“No, it’s three. Strike one, strike two, strike three.”
“No, no, no, it’s four. Strike one, strike two, strike three, and then strike out.”
The editor’s confusion grew.
“There’s no strike out. Strike three means you’re out.”
“Please, just give me one more chance!”
Armand sat down, suddenly, and leaned over the desk with pleading eyes. The editor breathed in, then out. Once again he mentioned the senior staff and meetings and what else so Armand pleaded again. And again. And again and again and again until the editor smiled through defeated eyes and granted Armand one more chance. Forget about the art, write something commercial had been the editor’s last piece of advice.

When The Stable Boy not only paid Armand’s rent but allowed him to buy a new cat tree, he and the editor celebrated with a round of drinks. That night, the editor lavished praise onto Armand and assured him he had always believed in him, always stood up for him during staff meetings when the senior staff insisted on getting rid of Armand. Then, at the end of the praise (and with a drunken slur), inched closer to Armand to ask the question.
“Hey man, what’s up with that Gentian Whitney stuff?”
“The pseudonym?” Armand laughed and downed another shot. “You’ve read the book! I’d never put my name on that!”
“Can’t fault you.”

The editor could also not fault Armand when he returned to his office late, again.

“Bad traffic?”
Armand slouched in the chair, his messenger bag seemingly slouching with him.
“Someday I’m going back to taking the subway.”
He would have wanted to continue the small talk but the editor had other plans and slammed a stack of paper on the desk.
“Read through the changes!” Eagerness dripped off his words. “Oh and for a title, how about,” he made a grandiose gesture with this hands, “That Promised Love that Never Happened.”
“It’s too long.” Armand began leafing through the revised manuscript. “How about something like, The Promised Love, or even just The Promise?”
“No, no, it has to be more poetic.” He touched his chin thoughtfully. “Storm: Love that Never Happened.”
Armand did not lift his eyes off the manuscript.
“Too long.”
“Well, I’m talking to Armand Hanley, aren’t I?” He smirked. “Mind putting Gentian Whitney on the line? Hear what he has to say on the matter?”

Armand’s thoughts drifted to Gentian Whitey while stuck in traffic that morning. The lack of a honking maniac behind him allowed his mind to wander back to a simpler time, an adolescence characterised by the thrills of sneaking out past curfew and trying to cheat the school system. Those years were also characterised by an inoffensive presumptuousness – like that of a cat. Armand had convinced himself of his own intellectual merits but that was not enough and he had to convince everyone of said intellectual merits too. Writing in solitude did not satisfy him, he wrote in cafes he felt suited and artiste such as himself and all the masterminds of literature he felt looked down on him. Armand’s favourite photograph from those years was in black in white; he copied Kerouac’s pose from the back of an On the Road copy he borrowed from the library. Nobody thought he looked anything like Kerouac, but to Armand the two were identical. Those years he frequently fantasised – envisioned – the fame he expected to attain someday – the fame Gentian Whitney threatened to whisk away.

“Oh, dear god…” Armand lifted his eyes from the manuscript only to meet the editor’s bafflingly comedic expression. “I’m not adding this. I don’t even know how I would go about writing something like this-”
“Use your imagination!” His voice had a chime-like ring to it. “I think it would really… Benefit the work as a whole.”
Armand allowed his head to roll back and a groan to leave his throat. Critics had already shredded both of Gentian Whitney’s novellas so, truthfully, did it matter if they shredded a third one too?

The meeting with the editor grew quieter as the two discussed the manuscript. Noticing Armand’s lack of energy, the editor allowed his expression to soften.
“Hey, want to go out for drinks one of these days? Like old times.”
“Sure!”
Armand perked up visibly. Maybe his sudden success had not changed too much, after all. “Oh, actually, that reminds me!”
Before the editor could say anything else, Armand began digging in his messenger bag until he produced a spiral notebook and slammed it on the desk.
“Would you mind reading through this sometime?”
The mere thought of presenting something Armand Hanley had written – not Gentian Whitney – for the first time in months made his heartbeat accelerate.

“Of course!” The editor smiled but the smile swiftly turned to smirk when he eyed the other manuscript. “Anyway, going back to The Promised-”
“I’m not adding that scene!”
“Come on!”
The editor laughed.
“No!”
Armand laughed too. Gentian Whitney was nothing more than a stepping stone, something temporary that preceded the inevitable best seller Armand Hanley would write, the bestseller that would be his homerun.