I thought I didn’t have an excerpt to share, but I thought I’d share this part because this was totally unplanned. I never thought I’d include Facebook in my novel, but I ended up doing so — my character was sort of stalking, but without the gps. If ever I do edit this manuscript, I don’t know if I’ll include this part. Haha.

Anyway, I’m still 6000+ words short, and I’m planning to cram it all tonight. Sooo I should be writing, like now. Which I will do. Like, now.

So excuse the randomness of this post, and the blah-ness of the excerpt below — totally unedited, so don’t be surprised if you find something that did not make sense there. :P Excerpt after the cut!

After my mom had calmed down enough after our agreement, she drove away to the mall to “window shop” for some shoes and accessories for me. She asked me to go with her, but I begged off, saying that I was tired and I need some rest.

The truth was, I was doing some stalking.

Right after lunch, I holed myself up in my room, opened my computer and logged on to Facebook for the first time in a month. I was never the one who got addicted to social networking sites unlike other people I know, but I have my share of accounts if only to keep in touch with relatives, high school friends and other missionaries I’ve met from different mission trips I have been to.

When I logged in, I had to wade through a ton of comments and notifications before I could actually see what I wanted to see. I could have just ignored them all, but I had a sudden spell of obsessive-compulsion, so I clicked through all my notifications before jumping to the status feed. I mean, come on. What is it with Facebook and why is everyone playing some kind of game or whatever in this thing? I ignored ten invitations to Farmville and Farm Town, and about twenty invitations to Mafia Wars — what is that, anyway? I approved a ton of friend requests, and friend-suggestion requests, and ignored those who were adding me but I had no idea who they were. And what are these quizzes?

I clicked over to the news feed and was immediately accosted by Rain’s face. Rain’s line of work makes her need to be updated in anything that is related to computers. She practically has an account in every single online thing that needs an account. I wasn’t sure if she already has a job now, but she is almost always online in Facebook. Like now.

Her last status simply said, “I miss you.” Who was she referring to here? Was she referring to me?

As if by psychic connection, a small chat window opened at the bottom of my screen and it was Rain.

“Faith! I’m glad I saw you online!” was her message.

Do I answer her? After a week of not talking to her as much as I used to, I realized with a start that I have missed her too. Rain is talkative and with the way she over thinks, she can ramble on and on and on and make me forget about what’s happening in my life. I missed her loudness, her tendency to over analyze and her way of dealing with things.

Maybe I should talk to her.

But then she was starting to type a message so I waited for her to finish it first before I reply. It was a habit I could not get rid of. When I saw her reply, though, I wanted to log out.

“Hm. This is odd. Why is Martin’s status single in Facebook? Did someone play with his account or something?”

Is she playing with me? Is she doing this to me on purpose? Why don’t she just ask me outright if we have broken up or what?

But wait. Martin’s Facebook status is single? That means…

I clicked to my Profile and saw that my status was also Single. My primary profile picture was still me and Martin on the last time we went out and drove to Tagaytay, but my relationship status was glaring at me. I searched for his profile, clicked his name and saw that it was not only his status that changed, but his picture as well.

His picture, which used to be the same as mine, was no longer that. It was a picture of him with some skateboarding friends, and beside him, with a full grin on her face, was Annie. He had an arm around her shoulder, and I noticed that she is the only girl among the group.

Curious, I clicked on Martin’s friends and looked for Annie. I found her immediately and was disappointed to see that her profile was hidden from people who are not her friends. So I clicked back to Martin’s profile. His latest status message said something about how fun the Youth Night was, and there was a series of comments after agreeing with it. I was relieved to find nothing from Annie.

I sat back on my chair, a bit perplexed and a bit stinging from the change in status. What is going on with Martin and Annie? Is there any truth in what Abby told me? Why were they acting so intimately during Youth Night? Maybe he’s just close to her, too? Like a sister, maybe, but not a girlfriend?

I have to know.

There was a beep from my computer and I saw that Rain had entered a message again. “Anyway, Faith, I have to log off now to meet Mark. =) I’ll see you on your dad’s birthday on Friday!”

My dad’s birthday. Yes. I glanced down at my desk and saw Martin’s invitation on top of the other invitations that my mom produced for my colleagues. I toyed with the idea of bringing the invitation to Martin’s place this afternoon. I suppose I can give it to Rain to give it to him, but that’s kind of pushing my luck…and seeing Rain would mean I would have to explain my avoidance to her, and I am not ready for that yet.

So maybe I should go there now. I’m just going to drop the invitation to him, nothing else. If we would talk, then we would talk. But if not, then…I hope we can talk.

I can go there.

I grabbed the invitation and my car keys and rushed out of my room, almost like there was a fire inside. “Dad? I’m going out for a drive.”