Dasey icon made by amortentia_ (a.k.a) disarrayy!

Wow, I hadn't realized I left this completely open and empty this whole time.

Alright, so I'm Amanda and my penname is actually a tribute to my best friend Thad, who was sadly killed in a car accident by a drunk driver running a red light in 2005. A lot of my reviewers have asked me how I write angst so well and how I'm able to write such dark themes in stories like "For Marti," and I actually started the story while I was dealing with the death of Thad. It was a sort of cathartic relief for me. It was a dark period in my life, one that hasn't full passed and I found writing Casey and Derek's pain really helped ease it some for me.

I'm twenty years old and I've been writing for about six or seven years. I currently have three stories loaded, all of them having to do with the Life With Derek category. I'm personally a Dasey shipper through and through and any story I write will center around that ship. My first story, "The Secret," is finished and has a sequel, "What Happened To Happily Ever After?", that is currently paused, but will be updated as soon as I finish, "For Marti," which was formerly known as "Marti the Matchmaker."

I realize that I haven't updated FM in quite some time and I apologize for the overdue submission, but the next chapter is already half done and still in the works. Please understand that personal interferences have caused the break from the story, but I will see it through to the end.

I can't thank my readers and reviewers enough. They've been so good to me and I really do appreciate everything they've written, both having to do with my stories and passing on their own personal experiences that understand my situation. It's reading how many other survivors of lost friends and family that makes it a little easier to face another day and I truly appreciate their concern and understanding.

I've been asked if the passage in chapter 10 of "For Marti" is from my personal experience after the death of my best friend and I'd like to reply on the whole by saying, "Yes." My father and I had a conversation that was exactly as portrayed just the night I wrote that chapter actually. Losing someone you love has to be one of the hardest parts of life. It's emotionally taxing, physically painful, and just overall something I wouldn't wish on my worst enemy. And there's so little people can say. So very few things that really break through that shell that we put up when we lose someone. In fact, to consider for even a moment that it won't hurt is unfathomable. To believe that they're gone and in a better place feels wrong. To try and make friends or get close to others feels like we're replacing them, that we've somehow marred them with the simple idea that somebody could be as important as them. For nearly two years I've dealt with the, "I'm sorry's," and the "I understand's," and of course the "it was part of God's plan," and I appreciate them, later when I'm able to think that they were just being sympathetic, but those words are so meaningless sometimes. Am I right? Overall, the pain sticks. It eats away, it scars, it burns for eternity. There is a black hole that will never fill. But I guess that sometimes, through the darkness, through the pain, something good of it does come. My dad was right. In some painful, unjust, totally unjustified way, I was given the ability to write the pain I feel into a story that numerous others can relate to. And for that I'm thankful.

I owe my gratitude to my best friend. For his life, for his love, for his death, and for every day that he stays with me. I love him. I will always love him. And I thank him daily for giving me the few precious moments that I had with him. And I hope that in future, I can walk away with a sense of completion somehow. That I can look back at my stories and know that other people felt it too. That they felt like somebody finally got it. That's all I can really ask.

So that's my profile. That's who I am and what I do and what I think. I'm not a superb writer. I'm not a genius at the computer. I'm a regular person who suffered. A person who could put feeling to computer keys. I thank everyone for reviewing and telling me that they feel like I really got down to the grit of it. That I explained their feelings justly. Death and loss is such a huge subject, such a mind boggling concept, that so few can truly capture it. I hope I've down Thad proud. My painter, my equal, my best friend. Rest in peace and forever love.

To drink and drive is a fool's action.
To believe yourself immortal with that bottle falling from your lips, is stupid.
To sit behind that wheel, turn the ignition, and find no fault in your actions, is murder.
Don't drink and drive, it might just save a life; possibly your own.

oBigDaddyThaddyo

P.S - For Marti has been nominated at the UFO Awards!