Old stories, associations

I've been writing for as long as I can recall. I just haven't always been writing particularly well.

While googling about today I stumbled on an excerpt from a Stephen King story, as yet unpublished: "The Gingerbread Girl." I have zero interest in the story, but the title suddenly sparked off memories of year 2 at Fadden Primary. I was just getting into R.L. Stine, and was planning a horror series of my own, all based around bad horror puns. The first title was "More Fun than a Hole in the Head," being a story about a man who kills with a drill, the cover featuring a terrible sketch of a man screaming with a gaping wound opened in his forehead. My teacher called them disgusting and told my parents. It didn't go down too well.
I can't remember what the other story titles are, but one of them must have had something to do with gingerbread men. Why else would I have made the association?
I've been writing since I was four. I just wish to God I'd kept all those stories.

A strange image;

The restaurant is Chinatown chic, red lanterns standing sentinel at the entrance and a chinadoll waitress with her black bob cut straight standing behind the counter asking Lobe whether he has a reservation. He waves her off and steps over the rope, over to the buffet.
The man behind the buffet is one of the tech fashionista, buzzcut sprinkled with flecks of gold, mirror-finish goggles pulled up tight over his forehead. He wears a silk shirt hanging open to his waist, embroidered with dragons and lotus leaves. There is a slit running across his bellybutton, like an old surgical scar.
Lobe takes a plate. "Help yourself, sir," the man says, and bows. As he bends over, the skin of his belly slit bends and folds, and Lobe has the slightest twinge of nausea as he catches a glimpse of what seemed like the mans guts.
No, not guts. Noodles. Egg noodles. The man is an android. In his stomach cavity is a swirling stir-fry of mushrooms, bok choy and ba mee. It's like throwing your dinner into a washing machine. "Any chicken?" Lobe asks. The more he watches the tumbling, the more his own organs want to do the same.
The 'droid reaches down, digs both hands into his stomach and stretches it wide open. The noodles whirl. "Take what you'd like, sir," he says. "The serving tongs are by your left hand."
Lobe runs for the toilet.

Chapter 6 done, halfway through Chap 7... shit.

Okay, I'm getting scared now.
I'm very nearly done with my final chapter. Yeah, first draft only, I know. It's still scary. A novel is a big thing to finish. What do I do when it's all over? (besides start the next one).
One of my teachers for an Industrial Design elective is a short story author, so I'm hoping she can give me some advice on the editing and publishing process. Gahd, now I need a new goal. Second draft finished by 2009?
Also, Boilerboys should be going to print soon in the PAX Steampunk magazine. My first published (kinda) short story. I'm reigning in the anxiety by drinking a lot of tea.

--------------------------- Weathermen, Ch 6 ------------------

Aus mumbled as he walked. The others kept their distance, as if his grief was contagious and fatal. Only Alix stuck by his side through the days, speaking to him in hopeful tones of times to come. They could not avoid him at night, so they spoke to him as much as he spoke to them, which was very little.
He was often the first to fall asleep, so Marissa would lead Pal and Rei off a distance and they would whisper to one another of their plans. Sometimes Alix would join them, and sometimes not. Many nights she chose to curl up beside Aus, brushing his hair from his eyes or offering him her tummy as a pillow. They kissed every night and every morning, and as far as the others knew that was as far as they went in expressing their love. Marissa had used to raise an eyebrow or drop a snide comment when they brushed lips; now she simply looked away.
“How much longer?” Pal asked every night. Marissa always gave the same answer: “I don’t know. Not too long now.” After the fourth or fifth rebuttal, he began to press. “We should be able to see it by now, right?”
“Perhaps. We couldn’t see Seventeen until we were right on top of it.”
“Yeah, because it had fallen down. And we were in a forest. And it was foggy.”
“You’ll see it soon.”
Pal rolled onto his side, trying to find the most comfortable position in which to sleep. “You keep saying that. Maybe we’re going the wrong way.”
“I’m not going the wrong way,” Marissa insisted. “I’ve done all the calculations.”
“Still,” said Rei, leaping to Pal’s defense. “We got pretty turned around going through the hills… the city. What if that threw us off course? You said, sometimes…”
“We’d still be able to see it,” Pal muttered. “If we were going the right way.” He curled up and closed his eyes, trying to ignore how the midnight wind raised hairs along his forearms. “I really hope we are. I really do.”
They all slept restlessly, but only Marissa awoke in the early hours, blinking away nightmares of being buried in maps upon maps upon maps. She held herself tight, scraping away layers of dirt and terrified sweat, rocking back and forth until the skies lightened and the sun rose to keep watch over her dreams.
Two more days they walked, and two more nights Marissa woke with her throat so tight she could barely breathe, flailing in the darkness for her blankets or the lamp beside her bed. Every time she had to remind herself that they were long gone, and she would sit and think on all the things and people she had lost. She listed the names of Gods she had never believed in, and prayed to them all.
Please let me be going the right way. Please don’t let us be lost. Please.