Not too long ago I was searching for markets that would fit my existing unpublished short stories, and I ran across a submissions call for stories featuring aromantic and/or asexual characters–oh hey, whaddaya know, one of my specialties!–and they also wanted them to be related in some way to outer space. Well, I had a story of that description that I could have sent them. But I already sold it. (Good problem to have, I guess?)

I thought, hey, maybe I could write a story for this anthology? I don’t typically love writing to a prompt, no matter how vague–I was looking for markets for stories I’ve already written–but it’s such a special interest of mine (aces in space???) that I wasn’t sure I could resist. Also, I’ve had decent luck with it the last two times I wrote a story specifically because of a prompt. The first one sold to the market I wrote it for. The second one didn’t, but later sold elsewhere.

And then there was the fact that I’M ALREADY ABSOLUTELY DROWNING IN WRITING PROJECTS. I’m 45,000 words into a book I’ve only been writing for a month, firehose-style, and I’m knee-deep in querying and story submissions. Do I really have time to stop what I’m doing and work on a completely new project?

Well, guess who did it anyway?

“The Wagon” is about six friends (why am I obsessed with “six friends” lately?) who became inseparable during their college years and have significantly moved their lives around so they could happily live and work on the same space station. But when one of them disappears without warning on a mission to pursue a cure for a deadly illness in a dangerous corner of the galaxy, the rest have to track her down with few clues in case she’s in over her head. And in the midst of dealing with this incredibly serious situation, the main character has to wrangle a coworker who is determined to marry her because she beat him at chess.

It’s a story about relationships, entitlement, sexist nonsense, and most of all, the importance of friendship.

And because I’m the author, I have a core team of six characters with FOUR of them being queer this time. I have two gay guys (Gerry and Tuan) who are a couple within the friend group, a lesbian (Sadie) whose girlfriend exists but isn’t in the story, and the main character (Lora) who is ace/aro. The other two are straight girls (Aimee who’s dating around, and Juana who has a boyfriend).

The first draft was completed August 17, 2026 at 13,151 words over the course of seven days (but only five of those days were writing days). I plan to hack it down to under 10,000 because I’d really like it to be, ya know, more publishable.

We’ll see.