The Woman in the Car

The retreat promised clarity, discipline, and breakthroughs. On the brochure, it showed a lodge framed by pine trees, perched above a lake like a sentence waiting to be written. The twelve attendees, selected by blind submission, were told to leave distractions at home. No phones. No Wi-Fi. Just notebooks, laptops, and the urge to write something real.

Jayla arrived with two suitcases and a six-month case of writer's block. Her debut novel had made modest waves, enough to land her on panels and under pressure. She hadn’t written anything good since.

At dinner the first night, the group gathered in the main lodge. Long wooden table, mismatched chairs. Bowls of venison stew, thick with carrots and thyme. Crusty loaves of sourdough, still warm. Someone brought a bottle of red wine — earthy, peppery — and poured it like they meant it.

“Let’s do introductions,” said the retreat director, a wiry man named Florian with a salt-and-pepper beard and the energy of someone who microdoses mushrooms. “Say your name, your genre, and your biggest fear about this week.”

The circle buzzed with nervous laughter.

When it came to Jayla, she stood. “Jayla Siciliano. Literary fiction, apparently. My biggest fear is that I don’t have another book in me.”

Someone gave a theatrical gasp. Florian raised his wine glass. “To honesty.”

*******

Each day started the same- 8 a.m. breakfast, 9 to noon writing block. Lunch, optional workshops, then another writing stretch until dinner. No one enforced the schedule, but people followed it anyway, like monks in a secular monastery.

On day three, Jayla got up early and walked down to the lake. The morning mist still clung to the surface. She opened her notebook and stared at the blank page until her coffee cooled beside her.

"Staring isn’t writing," came a voice.

She turned. A guy in a hoodie and cargo pants crouched a few feet away, skipping stones. He tossed them with practiced ease, each one skimming the surface like punctuation. "Depends what you're staring at," Jayla said.

"Fair. I'm Mark. Flash fiction mostly. What's your excuse?" He held a small, battered notebook in one hand — the cover fraying, corners dog-eared. A stub of pencil tucked behind his ear.

She shrugged. "Same as everyone else's. I thought this place would fix me."

He didn’t smile. Just nodded like he understood that kind of broken. “I’ve got a whole notebook of half-metaphors that tried to fix me. ‘Regret hangs like a wet coat.’ That one’s terrible.”

Jayla laughed — the first real laugh she’d had in weeks. “I don’t know. I’ve worn that coat.”

*******

In workshop, they critiqued each other's pages. Jayla submitted a few paragraphs from something new. A woman sitting in her car outside her ex’s house, debating whether to go in. It wasn’t plot, just tension. But the group responded.

"This is a whole novel," said Shannon, a young poet who always wore headphones around her neck. "You could live here for a while."

Florian scribbled something in his notebook, then looked up. "You didn’t resolve the scene. Why?"

"Because I don’t know what she does yet."

He smiled. "That’s how you know it’s worth chasing."

*******

Nights were looser. People read from their favorite books. Someone started a fire outside. Mark played guitar. Jayla listened more than she talked.

One night, after too much wine, Florian cornered her in the kitchen.

"You're holding back."

"From what?"

"From yourself. There's something you're not writing. Maybe you're afraid it's too small, or too ugly. But that thing? That's your novel."

She stared at the open fridge, unsure whether she wanted juice or an excuse to leave.

"I don't think it's fear," she said. "I think I just don't believe in it yet."

He nodded, serious now. "Belief comes after. You write it first."

*******

The last night, they had a reading. Each writer shared five minutes of work. Jayla went near the end.

She stood with her printed pages, heart pounding. The overhead lights buzzed faintly, silver on paper. Someone shifted in their chair, the quiet clink of a fork against porcelain. Jayla read the scene — the woman gets out of the car. Walks to the door. Knocks. A child answers.

Gasps from the group. Jayla looked up, startled.

For a moment, no one said anything. Just the hush of breath held too long.

She hadn’t known she’d gone that far — not until the words were out. But now, they settled around her like dust after a collapse.

It felt right. Not clever, not planned. Just true. Inevitable, somehow.

Someone whispered, “I didn’t know she had a kid.”

Neither had Jayla. Not until now.

She felt it bloom inside her — a quiet blooming, like a bruise or a birth. The story had cracked open.

She smiled.

*******

The next morning, they all exchanged emails and promises to keep in touch. Jayla packed slowly. Before she left, she walked down to the lake one more time. Mark was there, of course — crouched on the same rock, notebook beside him, skipping stones like always.

He nodded. “You gonna write it?”

“I already started.”

He tossed a stone. It skipped four times, then sank. “Good. Don’t stop.”

She didn’t.

*******

Back home, the city felt louder than she remembered. Car horns, sirens, someone yelling at a delivery driver. Jayla unpacked slowly, dropping socks into drawers, shampoo onto the bathroom shelf. Before she even zipped the suitcase closed, her hand reached for the notebook, thumb brushing the worn leather cover.

Each morning, she wrote. Some days she hit a rhythm. Other days, she stared and scribbled and tore pages out. But she stayed with it.

Mark sent her a link to a flash fiction contest, along with a photo of one of his notebook pages- 'She carries hope like loose change — not worthless, just easy to lose.' Below it, he’d written- Too much? Jayla smiled. She emailed back- Not enough. Shannon emailed her a poem she’d written at the retreat, inspired by Jayla's character. Florian mailed everyone a copy of his handwritten notes, with a post-it stuck to hers- “The child changed everything.”

Weeks passed. Chapters formed. The woman in the car became Barbara. The child was hers — but she’d left him years ago. Now she was trying to come back. The novel grew teeth. And tenderness.

One night, stuck on a scene, Jayla walked out into the street and just kept going. Past lit-up windows, the rattle of dishes, the sharp tang of burnt toast curling into the air like a memory. Somewhere, a dog barked twice, then fell silent. She ended up at the river. Leaned against the railing and let the quiet settle in.

She didn’t need a retreat anymore. Just a reason. Just the story.

It was coming together. Finally.

She went home. And wrote.

*******

Three months later, Jayla had a draft.

It was uneven. Parts sagged. Others cut too deep. But it lived.

She printed it out on thick, ivory paper — the kind that smelled faintly of heat and ink — and read it in one sitting, red pen clenched between her fingers like a lifeline. Somewhere near chapter seven, she began crossing out entire pages. Somewhere near chapter twenty, she stopped breathing. The last line landed like a held breath finally exhaled.

She sent it to her agent the next morning with the subject line- “This one matters.”

Days passed. Then a reply.

“I couldn’t put it down. Let’s talk.”

*******

When the book sold, Jayla didn’t cry. She just stared at the email, then walked to her desk and opened the notebook that started it. The first line, written in blue ink, read- She watches the house from the car, like a thief or a ghost.

She kept the notebook open beside her as she began the second draft.

She had another book in her after all.