Lies and secrets your characters is keeping/has kept

[Leyelle]

Does your characters keep secrets, or have they told lies, maybe even to their friends and loved ones?

How do they justify these lies in their own heads? It's interesting to think about, even if you never hear the justifications they've made for these things.

For the most part, Alicia hasn't lied to anyone except for the classic "i'm fine" but she has kept a lot of secrets. She didn't tell her little brother what was going on when she realized that their mother was on drugs, she also didn't tell him about the car accident, about her horrible breakup, etc. She loves her little brother to death, so in her mind, it was best to protect him from all these things that would devastate him, even if that meant basically cutting him out of huge portions of her life.

The whole of "Damsel in the Red Dress" is one big secret on Kattar's part, and there are a lot of other secrets Alicia kept from Mrs. Moon and such. Actually everybody's been keeping a lot of secrets from each other. Not a very healthy way for people to live.

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“Mrs. Moon…” I whisper, my heart pounding like a death toll.

“Hmm, darling?” She smiles without looking over, flipping the mirror back into place.

“I-”

No - don’t!

Please don’t! Alicia-!!!

She’ll never call you “Licia,” again.

She’ll never call you “darling.” Never call you to ask about your paintings, or your holiday plans when she knows-

Read Damsel in the Red Dress :: Crooning in Aquamarine | Tapas Novels

There’s a flash like the moment before a light bulb blows - a fraction of a smile before it evaporates into anxious paralyzed worry.

“Um…Lise…” he starts to say, but the words trail off, and he stares at me, mouth open but speechless.

“What?” I ask, feeling my heart sink into my stomach, “What’s wrong?”

“N-nothing…just,” he tries to smile but fails. There’s a moment before he can make himself start again, and when he does his tone worries me.“I don’t - I don’t mind if you tell anybody else that we’re…anything but…”

He stares at the blankets like he’s trying to burn a hole in the endless white - almost trembling - then he shakes his head quickly like he’s trying to wake from a bad dream.

“But whatever you do, please don’t tell my mom. Please. ”

Read Damsel in the Red Dress :: Playing House | Tapas Novels

As for "Hushabye Prince" well, there are secrets there too, but that's a secret I can't share lol.

I will say that Jinny's mom doesn't know he can get to the beer.

Read Hushabye Prince :: Mini 04 | Tapas Comics

[yumeryuu]

It’s revealed that Silas’ very first collection was Sky. She didn’t know this.

Read THE SOUL COLLECTORS | Tapas Web Novels

[AmysGames]

Mine's a superhero comic, so secret identities/secret keeping is a pretty strong recurring theme, haha.

Not even the villains are exempt!

Read Niji Chikara | Tapas Web Comics

[TheBlacKat333]

Kid is a little too stupid to lie, but he could easily lie by omission if needed. Hugo probably inflates his achievements and most things he says are just to get the reaction he wants from people. Unfortunately, the only people actively lying a lot or in a more meaningful way, haven’t been introduced yet =P

Read ClockLark | Tapas Web Comics

[BoomerZ]

My comics so full of lies and secrets it drives the storyline. Everything from what the main character (Baul) is to the motivations of the factions. Letting these secrets come to the front of the story is the point.

[willmarstudios]

Well if I shared them here, that wouldn't be fun would it? ;D

Read NULLED | Tapas Web Novels

[Leyelle]

Lol, that's why I couldn't share the one's in "Hushabye Prince"

[vapidink]

Dreamseer is the story with the most secrets and lies. Most of them from Aster just because he knows more than anyone else thanks to his dreams. He lies about why he needs to marry Calixtus and about who he is at the very start. Then he keeps his ability to see visions of the future through his dreams a secret until he trusts Calixtus. The biggest secret he keeps is that he'll be murdered in six months. Still hasn't come clean about that, lol. There's a bunch of other little lies and secrets he keeps, mostly because he's not used to being honest but also because he thinks it's better for others to not be so involved with him for their own safety.

Read Dreamseer | Tapas Web Novels

[Bella_Artz]

Aside from every magic user keeping the larger existence of demons from the regular people, Troy hasn't revealed his visions of the city's destruction to anyone.

Read Keeper of Demonic Forces | Tapas Web Novels

[Animal508]

Pretty much every character in my story harbors some sort of secret.

[xstarx07]

Well, particularly my 2nd favorite character in Sky Diver is canonically a "man of many mysteries" - an enigma that doesn't necessarily need to be lying, but there's a bunch of stuff he's not outright telling, which - depending on how you look at it - can, however, be considered lying sometimes.
In non-spoilery terms, Shadedancer holds many secrets to himself or his closest allies. Most of them include a bunch of hidden knowledge about people and overall lore (as it befits most mentor characters) and his actual name.

As for very mild spoilers, which will explain the character more a few more chapters down the road

Despite of the role he is seemingly playing, Shadedancer is not one of the bad guys. It's the whole opposite, actually, and also quite the sad tale.
He does make questionable decisions and acts quite shady for sure, fully aware of which skeletons he has to put in his closet to reach his own goal, but he genuinely cares about the people around him. And that's the one thing that makes him act a certain way towards them. He tries to form bonds, be it for information or help for his cause, but does not want to get too close to people because he's fully aware of what happens to those who get too closely affiliated with him.
To sum it up a little, the man has witnessed a lot in his life prior to the events of the story currently playing out.

The whole scope of his backstory, which gets revealed here and there even after Part I, is also one that makes him the most complex character in the whole project, as the events of his life before meeting Josi all solidified the role he has to play in all of this to reach this very important goal.

[Leyelle]

Pretty much every character in my story harbors some sort of secret.

I think this is the case for almost everyone on earth. Dicken's has a quote about it, that I then referenced in my novel lol

[ThunderChicken]

Wild Nights, Hot and Crazy Days is a coming of age/coming out story, so the MC (me) was keeping a big secret right up until the end, when he came out

In Finding Daecon’s Way Daecon finds out that his entire childhood was a lie, so there are some big secrets there, too

[Leyelle]

Finding out your childhood was a lie is an existential crisis in the making.

[ThunderChicken]

Especially when you find out that a big part of that lie was being raised as a human when you’re not.

[Leyelle]

Yeah, quite seriously, so many people have parts of their childhoods they have to unwrite.

My character Kattar has to unwrite so much of what his mother taught him, because he's basically been raised to believe that men are by nature a waste of time, and it's only because she's made him her special project that he's not and he has to fight very hard to not fall into the category she places all other men in. Also that his emotions are a waste of time. He's basically never had a childhood for that reason because she refused to 'baby' him.

Meanwhile Alicia has been keeping parts of their childhood out of her little brother's knowledge to try to 'protect' him but those are the "white lies made of silence" that make everything worse.

[2DLenzy]

Bit early, and still very vague on backstories(where most secrets are kept), but I'll give some vague hints without revealing who has which secret.

-someone knows how to fight - like been in training.
-someone is adopted, but they themselves don't know.
-someone is a spy.
-someone is a god (beside me, lol).

Each "someone" is a different character that you've seen(this includes the chickens too).
Yeah, I got a lotta dumb drama planned for future arcs. It's gonna be great!

[Leyelle]

XD, like an actual god, or more chicken worshipping people stuff?

[2DLenzy]

An actual god, based on real mythology.
If I manage to make more series, he'll be the guy who ties all my BS multiverses together.

[Leyelle]

lol, I have a few series I intend to tie together, but in much more subtle ways, just because they exist in similar areas. most of my American stories are set in Maryland, so they can have easter eggs with each other