Just Dance... or not

I'm having trouble finishing the story.  Maybe more than trouble.  

I started writing what I would later come to call 'Just Dance' about a year ago.  I wrote down the first notes for it on the day after Christmas last year (read up on that early idea here), and the first saved portion a few days later.  

A quick aside on how I write these longer stories.  I want the ability to go back and read what I did earlier, but at the same time I want the ability to just go back and edit something out.  For instance, let's say I write about a guy's brother teasing him into a dress.  That situation gets out of control and he has to go to his sister's all girl school for a few days and ends up dressing up again as his femme persona.  The next day while writing, I might want to change the brother out to the sister and just have the two siblings, so I go back and make those edits.  BUT, I don't want to lose how I wrote the brother.  So that first draft would be 'BroAtGirlSchool01.doc' and the next day's writing would be 'BroAtGirlSchool02.doc'.  On the next day I pick up the story and don't make any edits and instead just make a couple pages worth of forward progress.  This isn't worth making a 'BroAtGirlSchool03.doc' so I just save over the 02 file.  Just Dance right now is up to version 16.  That's how I have the vague idea of it's first draft as the first save I have is from December 30.   BUT I might have started it a few days before if I didn't make any edits.  SeehwatImean?

Anywho, I made decent progress on it with new versions saved on December 30, New Year's Eve, and January 18.  I hit a lul then have new versions on March 20, 21, 23, and 28.  April 11, 18, and 19 came next.  Then May 8 and 20.  Then June 13 and 20.  August 15 and 21.    And then nothing for months.  My last version (which feels like I JUST wrote it came on December 19.  And I know that was a fairly minor edit and maybe a half page of forward progress.  

You see, I can't get into it.  I initially was going to have a short write up here then point you over to my other blog but instead I'm going to keep writing here.  If you want to see what I wrote about this earlier today you can read it here (it's at the bottom of that post).  The story of Just Dance so far goes like this:

Our hero/heroine (Andy) graduates dancing school and moves to the big city with his friend from college (Merry).  She gets sweet gigs while he barely scrapes by.  There just aren't many jobs for male dancers and he doesn't have the built up physique that would keep him in competition for the jobs.  Merry's dance troupe doesn't even take men and that gets under both of their skins.  So, he dresses up like a girl, practices a femme dance routine, and auditions just to prove the point that male dancers can do just as well.  Two things happen at the audition.  First, they actually let men in, so Andy (now Andi) has to perform in front of 'other' men as his femme self.  Second, there's a film crew there.  

The crew is there filming the auditions for the TV dance competition show 'Just Dance' and they let the troupe in.  But they only let them in with the caveat that both Andi and one of the guys get to join as they'll focus their B story on the new dancers.  Andi agrees begrudgingly and we're off to the races.  He keeps finding problems and the solutions are further feminization at practically every step.  His fellow new dancer, Damon, starts falling for him/her and she's encouraged to let that happen by both the production company and the dance troupe leader.  His idea of simply wearing a pumped up sports bra for breasts and very tight dance gaffe for a smooth crotch don't work long term so he gets a, admittedly very sci fi, procedure done that gives him real (temporary) breasts and a near permenant gaffe that keeps him locked under an incredibly realistic looking pussy.  Without the relief he was getting from Merry (they'd had sex with him en-femme) he was now constantly horny.  That, and the fact that Damon was taking him out on dates and kissing and holding him/her was really pushing him over the edge.  

There are several great scenes that were fun to write and hopefully would be fun to read.  Like Damon teasing Andi and Andi chasing Damon out of their combined dressng room around the studio, only for Damon to catch her into a hug and carry her away.  She's pissed at being carried like that until he sets her down and says her robe was open and she was dispalying her breasts for everyone to see.  Including the cameras.  Another scene, more graphic, was the producer insisting she keep Damon sexually satisfied and 'shows' her how to give head.  A forced blow job, with the pressure to perform another blog job on her 'boyfriend'.  A great scene where they go out on a date all over New York as a young semi famous couple.  And the most recent scene is them in another club where Andi is practically forced by several dance members to give a sexy show of taking a blow job shot (the drink).  They're competeting against a fellow dance troupe and each person takes it up a notch with Andi going last.  She wins as the sexiest, but only with the help of Damon (I'll let you imagine how that goes).  

Yes, that's only three paragraphs, but it's almost as long as Thesis.  It's 74 pages in MS word and just under 42,000 words.  And I feel like it's about 3/4 or 2/3 the way done.  There's plenty more to write.  I want a more thorough emotional journey for Andy/Andi.  I want to get to the show's finale whether they win or not.  I want them to have to deal with the manipulative producer.  And ultimately, I want there to be more contrast between male Andy and female Andi while at the same time having him/her realize that many things are just the same.  Like he's not treated this way because he's female, he's treated this way because of his slight size or the voice he's using.  I'm not 100% sold on it, but I'd also like to explore sex beyond oral.  Anal?  That's most likely as I've clearly put that his fake pussy can't have sex.  But maybe a sex change?  I don't know.  At the last part I've written, Andi is no where near wanting a sex change.  He still wants out.  

But I don't know how to get there.  When I've written longer things like this (Thesis, Maid to be his, Opels and Perals) I just go where the story tells me to go.  I have a vuage ending in mind, but I didn't expect Thesis to end like that.  If you remember, I went in a different darker direction at the end, but made myself pull back quite a bit and re-write the ending.  So it doesn't feel right to me to just make a roadmap.  Andi's at the club and gets saved from date rape by Damon (that's the scene I just wrote involving him getting slipped a roofie).  

• Next is the competition where Damon saves him from a fall, ending up in a romantic pose while the camera crew take their time filming it.  
• That leads to Andi realizing Damon has been nothing but good to him and that he actually has feelings for the guy.  
• Then after a hard won victory with Damon admitting he always celebrates with sex, Andi gets him to come back to her room and she forces herself to give him head (knowing the producer is keeping tabs on her AND Damon would get recognized going out to get some available tail).  
• She has a hard time sleeping in his arms, both because he's getting hard behind her as they spoon but mainly becasue she realizes it makes her happy that she pleased Damon.  
• They have another date and Damon shyly asks for more oral which Andi gives. 
• Another victory, but now Damon offers to go down on Andi.  She has to convince him that she wants to retain her virginity and gets pleasure going down on him.  Which she's afraid to realize while looking up at him... she DOES get pleasure from the act.
• Andi tries to have a heart to heart with another dancer, but gets into a fight as the other dancer is anti man.  Andi shocks herself by arguing it's perfectly natural to love men and that they're not mean.  
• They get into the semi finals and both Andi and Damon are incredibly nervous as they have to play out their relationship in the next dance and the sexual tension is getting to high... so Andi comes up with the idea of having sex.  Anal sex.  She finds some small amounts of physical pleasure, but is amazed at just how loving Damon is during and especially afterward.  
• They get into the finals but the producer tells them that he has a better offer from the other team and will 'let' them win unless Andi and another girl have a full night of sex with him.   Andi's almost ready to make the sacrifice but the girl admits to being a virgin and not attracted to men at all, so she instead blackmails the producer.  
• With the advantage gone, they compete with the other team on fair grounds.  The other girl tells the troup want Andi did so she's celebrated and cheered, but they all know it will still be tough to win.
• ..........

That's all off the top of my head.  I've thought through many of these scenes, or scenes close enough to these to be the same, before but the problem is that when I try to follow a path like this the story leads me somewhere else.  It takes me off the path and I end up liking the new direction better.  And just like that, my map forward is gone and I have to either start over or just keep moving forward.  Or worst of all, I try to make it all work and get frustrated with the result and just stop writing. 

Stopping and abandoning a cap is bad enough.  Stopping and abandoning an obscura sucks, but I've done it.  But a story?  A 74 page story?  

And to add a cherry on top of this fail sundae, I talked about the future time travel story.  That's occupying a lot of my creative juices as I imagine scene after scene.  Most won't make it in, but it's where my mind wanders instead of to Andi and Damon.  And scenes involving a wife being properly spanked each morning by her husband because it's only proper that she make him breakfast with a bright red ass doesn't really transfer over to this 'on the sweet side' story.  

So what do I do?  I have some ideas, but I'm not sure any feel right.  

• Shelve it 
• Just stop writing, save what I have, and come back to it later when I am in the mood
• Stop, throw a polish on it, and publish it as is
• I'd leave it as 'unfinished' and have to write to a more significant ending point but I could make this a story with a cliff hanger
• I'd still have to portion it out.  Thesis taught me it's just not worth posting this long of a story in one go.  
• Keep plugging away
• Just keep doing what I'm doing.  Eventually I should make ground enough to finish it either with the ending I think it deserves or at least to a point that's "good enough" to publish. 
• Put it up here and here alone?
• Basically don't put it up on Fictionmania, but put it here so it can at least get read
• A corollary to this is don't put a polish on it and let those here read the 'raw' version with hopes that I'll later clean it up and finish it for publication to Fictionmania

I think the third option is the least likely.  I'm just done and have written the scene between the blow job shot competition and the roofie since August.  I think I've picked it up at least a couple dozen times with little to no progress.  

I really don't like putting it up raw.  At the very least, I sometimes write notes to myself in the text (highlighted to find easily) and I 'd have to take those out.  

So, if I take those options out, I have keeping it to myself, or getting what I have ready and putting it up as an unfinished story.  Again, neither feels right.  I just think if I put this down, I won't pick it up at all ever again.  And if I publish it as is, I'm stuck with what IS here.  No more going back for an edit that will help the whole story (take the family out and make him an orphan.... change him from Indiana to Texas... add a wig that's expertly worked into his hair and can therefore come off at an inopportune moment.  Stuff like that.  

So, that's why I'm writing this here.  Let me know what you think.  Understand, I'm not just saying that as an every day "Hey, throw me a comment below" type thing.  I need help on this.  I'm lost.  Maybe something you're thinking of, but don't want to put down, is something that will spark me into an idea or be THE idea itself.  So don't be shy, tell me what you think.  

Thanks!