My stories start out as ordinary beans. I like to think of them as such.
I don’t know what I have, but I’m compelled to water these beans. Shoots then grow into stems and my beanstalk matures. Sometimes the stems die; the story loses life. Then I travel along my beanstalk and find new stems to explore. Eventually leaves grow and there is a flowering, as the organism that is my story comes to life, and the characters take shape, and I can see them and hear their voices.
Then they grow up and go off and do things I haven’t planned.