Tag Archive for: AB Plum

Entering a Time Capsule

By AB Plum
Remember those long summer nights as a kid when you lay outside and stared at the stars and moon moving across the velvet sky?

Tracking the moon’s movement, I felt some vague, inexpressible awareness of time passing. Not much, though. My aunt and uncle’s farm in the back hills and hollers of Southern Missouri existed in a time warp. Sunset marked the end of day. Darkness meant night. Morning came with birds twittering just before sunrise.

The Rhythm of Each Day

Daily chores: caring for the animals, tending the huge vegetable garden, preparing meals, cleaning the house, washing clothes, ironing . . . and more filled every day with its own rhythm. 

During “free” time, my aunt and mother would take us kids to wade in the nearby creek—always on the lookout for copperheads. Saturdays, we went “to town” with produce and fresh berry pies with the flakiest-ever crusts baked by my aunt the day before.

Sundays, we attended church, then came home to fry chicken for dinner with half a dozen invited relatives. Of course the day of rest began with caring for the animals. Bringing in the cows for the afternoon milking and closing the chicken house marked the beginning of night’s approach.

This summer life seemed idyllic and lasted until my eleventh birthday when my aunt and uncle moved off the farm to work in the city. By then I’d pretty much stopped lying outside to count the stars or marvel at the moon. I had a better grasp of time and place—though I never imagined setting a book in Finland during summer when the sun never really sets.

Time Is All About Perception

In my novels, time often presents a challenge. What details get left out may be as important as those left in the story. What happened in the past plays a big part in the present time of the story. Ideally, scenes give sensory clues to the passage of real time. In The Lost Days, the two young boys can’t rely on the sun and moon rising to mark how long they’ve been lost.

The challenge was to convey the sense of time dragging without writing scenes that went on and on and on with nothing happening. Time didn’t stop, but it certainly crawled. That crawling passage of time increased, I hope, the tension of a struggle to survive in a hostile environment.

Ironically, I drew on memories of those long, endless, and happy days on that isolated farm. I recalled time was more fluid, but spotting a copperhead slinking off the creek bank could send my heart racing and time flying.

Reading Bends Time

For me, storytelling and reading bend time. I can escape from the here and now just as I did watching the night sky, long, long ago.

What speeds up your day? Do you read to slow down the frenzy? What unexpected circumstance affect your perception of time?

AB Plum lives and writes in Silicon Valley, where time runs at a break-neck pace. Her latest book The Lost Years becomes available on Amazon on March 17–which will be here before she blinks.
















































































































in the past plays a big part in 

Bubblegum + Paper Bags Lead to . . .

By AB Plum

Bubblegum + Paper Bags Lead to . . .
Ruination.

Last week with several deadlines looming and promo tasks lurking, I screwed up.
  

Uh-huh, right in the middle of a frustrated, stressed-out, hair-pulling cycle, I got distracted.

By bubblegum.

None of my characters chews bubblegum. Why not? I asked myself. As a kid, I’d loved the sweet, caries-inducing rubber glob I could chew until my jaws ached. 

Against strict parental mandates, I’d slap down my few pennies, inhale the indescribable scent of sugary fruit, pop the pink ball in my mouth, and chew away—lost in a world where I imagined blowing a twenty-inch bubble.  


Surely, even a properly raised eleven-year-old Danish boy—my main character with a dark soul—might discover bubblegum? 

TO Dos wailed. I shoved the question in the back of my mind and went to work scheduling my blog posts. I had two due within a week of each other.

Then, don’t ask me how, I got distracted again. Who invented the paper sack? How could John Pavlos of MoMA, consider that mundane thing “the smartphone of the 19th century”? 

What? Before texting, did people pass written messages back and forth on those smooth, brown surfaces? Did kids hold paper bags, attached with string, against their ears and talk to each other from yards away? Smartphone of the 19th century?
C’mon.

But you can see how I screwed-up, right? Posted one blog a week early.

Not a history-changing screw-up like Napoleon marching into Russia without adequate winter provisions.

Not a mistake like the sinking of the Titanic—on a different scale than Napoleon’s blunder—but an unforgettable snafu by someone in charge of planning for enough lifeboats.

My screw-up only led to my own embarrassment unlike the poor Tampa patient years ago whose surgeon removed the wrong leg and left the poor guy in worse shape than he started.

The public aware of my mistake was minuscule compared to the Super Bowl audience witnessing the ‘wardrobe malfunction’ on live TV in 2004. (Not to mention all the re-runs).

When I reexamine the above list and consider all the screw-ups we’ve seen in the past few chaotic weeks of political transition, I think I’ll change my mind.

My screw-up really falls into the category of messing up.

Messing up vs screwing up.

Uh-huh. I can live with messing up. I’ll depict screw-ups in my fiction (some of which carries a definite autobiographical note).

For now, I’ll forget that none of my characters chews bubblegum or uses brown paper bags. No more distractions.

“Experience is the name everyone gives to their mistakes.” – Oscar Wilde

How about you? Made any mistakes lately?

*****************
AB Plum lives and writes just off the fast lane in Silicon Valley. Unless she gets totally distracted, she plans to release on March 17 The Lost Days, Book 2 in The MisFit Series, her dark psychological thriller about the childhood of a psychopath.



EXCERPT from The Lost Days
The sun’s eerie summer glow disoriented me as much as the headache hammering my skull. Or maybe my confusion came from the man seated next to me, his foot placed at the top of my foster brother’s spine. I gritted my teeth. Dimitri lay crumpled face down in the space behind the driver’s seat. His legs were folded under him like a penitent waiting for absolution.
The man in the front seat turned and flashed a mouthful of piano-white teeth. His piercing blue eyes glittered. I stared. His copper-colored hair glowed in the golden evening light.
He laughed as if I’d said something funny. “For a boy who killed his mother three months ago, you have a face that borders on transparent.”
“You-you’re not American.”
“And you’re not Finnish—despite your mother.”
Involuntarily, I snorted.
Nostrils flaring, he cuffed my right temple with his knuckles. “I already know what you think of your mother.”
My ears rang. Involuntarily, my fingers flexed and twitched as if I’d been electrocuted. I wanted to hit him. Smash his face. Kick his Finnish teeth down his throat.
“We are going to see,” he said, “just how tough you are.”


















































Foresight and Hindsight

Aunt Edie was a hypochondriac.

The wife of my father’s older brother, Aunt Edie earned her reputation in my large, extended family of aunts, uncles, grandparents, first cousins, in-laws and outlaws. No matter the clan-gathering occasion, no one asked her how she was. Because . . .


Because she could bore you to death with her aches and pains in two minutes flat. 


Like a spider, she never let her victim escape in less than half an hour’s recitation about her medications, her insomnia, her indigestion, her aching feet, her hair loss, an undiagnosed medical condition so rare it belonged in medical books.  


A hang nail, so the gossip went, would send her to the hospital in a flash.


In my nuclear family, my parents and five siblings rarely admitted to feeling unwell. Going to the doctor cost money we didn’t have, so we went for required vaccinations and for visits to treat the scary convulsions my youngest brother began having in early infancy—and outgrew by the time he was toddling. (This condition was not one mentioned outside the immediate family. We were not Aunt Edie. We kept stiff upper lips).

When my two children were diagnosed as adolescents with Type I Diabetes, I  fought the instinct to keep the disease a secret. But because I didn’t want my kids to feel ashamed or guilty—or succumb to the temptation to deny their diagnosis—I tried to speak openly with them, friends, and family about their treatment.

Sometimes my stiff upper lip wobbled, but I figured crying was allowed.

My husband grew up in a family not too dissimilar from mine regarding illness and admitting illnesses. So, for the first thirty years of our marriage, he rarely acknowledged even a sniffle. When he was diagnosed with TIAs, we consulted a good neurologist, followed his common sense and adjusted, taking in stride fifteen years later the need for three cardiac stents.

Now, we’re facing the likelihood of a cranial shunt to rebalance the fluid surrounding my husband’s brain. At first, like Aunt Edie, my husband told everyone he met—or so it seemed—about NPH (Normal Pressure Hydrocephalus). Friends and family listened, asked intelligent questions, and offered support. I feel very grateful that we live in an age when opening up about health concerns has become more “normal.”

In
hindsight, I wish I’d had the foresight to benefit from current insights:

 

  • Not everyone is fortunate enough to enjoy good health throughout life.
  • Listen to others whose misfortunate is to be sick for short or long periods.
  • Aunt Edie, we ‘done’ you wrong!

How—about you? Are you a parent who doesn’t want to worry the kids? Do your adult kids let you know after the fact about a serious illness affecting them or their spouse and kids? I’d love to hear your thoughts on this topic.

Finding a Moment . . .

By AB Plum

At this time of the year, bloggers often:

·        Review accomplishments or missed marks during the past year.

·        Set goals, accomplishments, and hopes for the coming year.

·        Or, intermingle both approaches.

Here’s a quote I think does all three—leaving, as do all good stories, much to our imaginations. 

“But Mary kept all these things and pondered them in her heart.” (Luke 2:19 KJV).

Ponder, for me, is the key—and is implicit in review, set goals, intermingle. Theology aside, this single, lyrical statement conveys, I think, one of the most poignant stories in the English language.

Pondered grabs my imagination while tugging at my own heart. I know the Sunday-School backstory. Yet even out of context, universal feelings of fear, uncertainty, and anxiety hover just below the surface. The vagueness of things—unspecified here, but known to Mary—imbues them with the potential to overwhelm this child-woman.

If we know the backstory’s bare bones—a young girl engaged to an older man, discovering she’s pregnant in a society hostile to such an embarrassment and even more hostile to the theological heresy—we can feel our whole being ache for the looming complications.

In the mid-twentieth century, one of my best friends revealed her unexpected pregnancy. Unexpected but admittedly because of her own actions. Her devout Lutheran parents banned her from their home. She was sixteen, living in Middle America, facing no good choices.

But if we’re not familiar with what “all these things” were that Mary kept, we can still empathize. We can admire that she doesn’t fall apart or rail against the incredible maturity she’s asked to demonstrate. We can grieve for the tumultuous events we know she will face in the days immediately ahead and the heartbreak that will come too soon.

Theology, culture, ethnicity, age, historical time frame—all fade as we read that Mary pondered … in her heart. In her heart—not in her head.

As the craziness of Black Friday and Cyber Monday and Last-Chance-Sale-Today escalates, I hope to find time to ponder. May you and those you love find joy and peace in a few quiet moments.

AB Plum lives and writes psychological thrillers in Silicon Valley. Her latest book, The Early Years is available https://www.amazon.com/-/e/B01M8MGL2X.  Look for Book 2, The Lost Years in mid- to late January, 2017!

Gratitude Inspired by a Psychopath

By AB Plum

Some time ago, The Stiletto Gang Bloggers gave two thumbs up to the idea of choosing a subject to blog about every month. We also agreed that if the idea didn’t grab us, we could write about something that did.

In the past, I’ve written on and off-topic. This month’s theme, “gratitude” really grabs me. So thanks, Bethany, for the reminder . . . and challenge.

Challenge, because I’ve scheduled Book 2, The Lost Days in my psychological thriller MisFit Series for release the day after Thanksgiving. I am, from time to time questioning my sanity on this decision as well as the decision to write the whole dark, disturbing series.

Focus on gratitude gives me pause to rethink. 

Eleven-year-old Michael Romanov, the character at the center of the series, is a psychopath. We all have childhoods, right?

Michael feels no sense of attunement with anyone . . . except, perhaps, a thread-thin regard for his only friend, Dimitri. Dimitri is the one person with whom Michael has ever experienced any familiarity. Their real affinity is their differentness not just from their peers but from the human tribe.

Michael claims his mother rejected him at birth. How is that possible? What could he have done to deserve her refusal to express affection toward him? Praise him? Touch him? 

Ultimately, gratitude boils down to social connection. Michael feels only resentment toward his bullying brother. His father’s too frequent business trips allow no time for bonding—if his father even cared.

Uber-smart and handsome. Michael has no visible physical deformities. He lives a life of privilege. Yet he finds nothing for which to feel grateful since no one acts on his behalf. No one offers him protection from his brother’s intimidation or his mother’s neglect. He is a misfit. An outcast by those who should include him in their circle.

Although this character is a creation of my imagination, I’ve met people with varying degrees of his alienation and lack of gratitude. Like you, I’ve read about young men (almost always men) with dark hearts who kill innocents—often children. Regret doesn’t come up on their radar.

When I meet these people or read about them, I am grateful for a mother who taught me to read early. Who did her best to encourage my curiosity. To protect me if I followed that curiosity to extremes. To love me with all my imperfections.

Michael’s mother is the antithesis of mine, but in the case of psychopaths, I don’t think ‘blame-the-mother’ peels back all the layers of the onion. In Michael’s case, I know as the author that brain damage plays a significant part in his inability to retrieve emotional memories—the basis for learning from mistakes. Additionally, he teeters on the edge of pubertya period when the brain becomes a huge chemical cauldron.

Nature and nurture (none in his case) intermingle to wire his brain differently. No surprise he feels no empathic connection with others.

So, I am grateful after writing these six books to realize there exist humans whose full stories I will never know fully. Mostly, I am thankful for a healthy brain. I give thanks every day for friends and families and memories and stories that keep me from jumping that divide Michael crosses.

Here’s an excerpt from The Lost Years:
The sun’s eerie summer glow disoriented me as much as the headache hammering my skull. Or maybe my confusion came from the man seated next to me, his foot placed at the top of Dimitri’s spine. I gritted my teeth. Dimitri lay crumpled face down in the space behind the driver’s seat. His legs were folded under him like a penitent waiting for absolution.
The man in the front seat turned and flashed a mouthful of piano-white teeth. His piercing blue eyes glittered. I stared. Without the baseball cap, his copper-colored hair glowed in the golden evening light.
He laughed as if I’d said something funny. “For a boy who killed his mother three months ago, you have a face that borders on transparent.”
“You-you’re not American.”
“And you’re not Finnish—despite your mother.”
Involuntarily, I snorted.
Nostrils flaring, he cuffed my right temple with his knuckles. “I already know what you think of your mother.”
My ears rang. Involuntarily, my fingers flexed and twitched as if I’d been electrocuted. I wanted to hit him. Smash his face. Kick his Finnish teeth down his throat.
“We are going to see,” he said, “just how tough you are.”
****
Scary comic books, nineteenth century American literature (especially Poe, Hawthorne, and James), plus every genre in-between have influenced AB’s writing. Teaching adolescent boys and working with high-testosterone Silicon Valley tekkies opened up new insights into neuroanatomy and behavioral psychology. She lives in the shadow of Google, writes and walks daily. She participates in a brain-building aerobic dance class three times a week.
This link takes you to The Early Years on Amazon.

A Fix for Your Post-Halloween Fog

By AB Plum

Late, late morning after Halloween, the doorbell rings.

You’re still recovering from handing out candy to eleven-ninety kids (including teenagers who should’ve been too embarrassed to show up with their hands out). You shamble to the door. Despite repeated vows last night, you sneaked a chocolate treat here and there. Fog encircles your brain. Bracing yourself, you crack the door open and peer out.

No one yells, “Trick or Treat!”

Not a single Hillary Clinton or Donald Trump plasticized mask in sight. No Star Wars Jedis with drawn light sabers that cost $100 and up. No Cinderellas in gowns rivalling Disney’s creations with tiaras sparkling more brightly than many diamond engagement rings.

“Take this.” Your neighbor, dressed for jogging in the light mist, shoves a paper bag at you and pivots away, calling over her shoulder, “I bought way too much Halloween candy. Save me from myself.”

She speeds away before you can protest.

You close the door and open the bag. It’s brimming with the good stuff: M&Ms, Kit Kats, Snickers and Reese’s miniatures. Small means you can eat more, right? 

The mist pings off the window. Fortunately, you aren’t working today. Jogging’s a drag. What a great day to crawl back into bed. You’re an adult. You don’t need permission.

You succumb to temptation, candy sack on your chest, and open your ereader to the psychological thriller you downloaded last night as your own treat.

But you didn’t count on the doorbell interrupting—
from dusk right up until your bedtime.

Thunder rumbles. You shiver, pop a Snickers bar, and start reading the blurb . . .


An eleven-year-old prodigy morphs into a monster far scarier than any vampire or zombie or other paranormal misfit. Bullied by his older brother, rejected by his icy mother, and ignored by his absent father, Michael Romanov retaliates with the canniness of a budding psychopath.

You nod and fish around in the paper bag and read the first page . . . lost for the day.

In case you missed downloading your own Halloween treat? The Early Years is free now through November 3 at
Coming next Tuesday: A sneak peek from my late-November release of Book 2, The Lost Years, in The MisFit Series.


******
AB claims scary comic books ruined her for reading Dick and Jane. (She started reading at age four). Lots of other authors have left their imprint as well. She lives in Silicon Valley, where in 2016, she read at least one novel by Neil Gaiman, J.K. Rowling, Rachel Abbott, Kimberley McCreight, Stephen King, Jonathan Kellerman, Chelsea Cain, MJ Rose, Scott Nicholson, AB Plum, Jenny Shortridge, Katherine Howe, Jodi Picoult, Garth Stein, Emma Donoghue, C.B. Kline, Cynthia D’Aprix Sweeney, Paula Hawkins, and Dot Hutchison, M.L. Stedman among other great reads.

Hearing Voices

By AB Plum
I hear voices in my head.
Most of the time.
Not every minute of the day or night. But . . . in countless places, at lots of moments—some inappropriate, such as:
·         While conferring with my tax-guru husband about my business expenses
·         While reviewing my latest marketing plan
·         While creating a FB ad
·         While struggling to grasp using video in FB ads
·         While listening for half a second to political callers (usually at dinnertime)
·         While zoning out in front of TV
·         While falling asleep

And . . . mostly, while writing at my computer. 

E.L. Doctorow said, “Writing is a socially acceptable form of schizophrenia.”

When the voices stop—especially when I’m at my computer—I’m in trouble. Major trouble.
Which means I’ve taken a wrong turn somewhere in my story. (My characters absolutely refuse to be forced into a situation or action or thought that contradicts who they are). Ignoring me is the quickest way to get my attention.

Two years ago, though, I got hit by the flu. Not the coughing, sniffling, aching kind of flu. The kind that hospitalized me for ten days. I spent seven days in ICU, totally unaware of my surroundings or my brush with death, I heard neither the voices of the medical staff, my husband, nor my characters.
On Day 8, my doctor sent me to quarantine in the Continuing Care Unit. Coughing occupied most of my day and night, and I had the energy of wilted lettuce. I wondered if I’d ever feel ‘myself’ again. Excellent nursing, support from my husband, and my insistence on getting out of bed several times daily helped.
On Day 9, one of my characters popped into my head in the middle of a wobbly circuit around my room. A couple of more showed up before the doctor came by. They hung around after he left. Did I plan to loll around for another nine days? When did I plan to resume telling their stories? Didn’t they deserve a little empathy for their patience?

By the time the doctor returned that afternoon, I made the argument to go home.
And I did. The next day. Late on Day 10. With a cast of characters filling my head with their music.
What about you? Had your flu shot yet? Do you hear that little voice shouting, “Do it!”
Me? I’m scheduled for October 20 because the voices in my head believe in prevention.
AB Plum was born reading—according to her mother.  She started writing shortly thereafter. After publishing two romantic comedies and two romantic suspense novels, she has turned to psychological suspense. Look for release in late October of The Early Years, Book 1 in The MisFit Series.

Four Reasons to Include Dogs and Cats in Adult Fiction

By AB Plum






Writing noir stories short on violence, but long on psychological darkness, I often take a break to read something light or uplifting. I recently finished The Art of Racing in the Rain by Garth Stein (https://www.amazon.com/Art-Racing-Rain-Novel-ebook/). I cried often.

When I finished the last sentence, I closed the book and thought about why I include dogs or cats in my romantic comedies and also in my darker psychological thrillers. 

1.  Dogs and cats bring out the best in my male characters. The four-legged characters have all come from shelters or “adopted” the hero.

Subtext: These guys—or in two instances young boys—vulnerable for many reasons, caring for their furry companions, show the reader they also take time to care for someone besides themselves.

2.  Dogs and cats can increase or decrease tension—especially sexual tension between the Hero and Heroine. In two of my novels, old, abandoned cats fall for the Heroine just like the Hero does.      


Subtext: Woe unto the Heroine who doesn’t like the Hero’s feline.



3.  Dogs and cats offer unconditional love to kids caught up in the twists and turns of the plot. Little boys can play Frisbee or chase with a dog and forget his parents’ divorce or his father’s disappearance. A teen-age girl, on the other hand, prefers a cat because they—frankly— smell better.

Subtext: Cats are a lot like teen-age girls: Wannabe divas. Dogs are a lot like five-and-six-year-old males:  Seekers of physical distraction.



4. Dogs and cats provide lots of chances to inject humor—often physical. Even on the darkest pages I write, I want to offer at least a ray of light. 

Subtext: A smile or a chuckle often works as well as a belly laugh to give the reader a bit of relief.
What about you, do you prefer all your characters to be human[oid]? Shoot me a yes-or-no reply:  ab@abplum.com. I answer all my email.

******************  
Accompanied by canine-companions in Southern Missouri, I developed a love of walking fast. Disregarding my Creative Writing prof’s advice, I wrote about the death of a favorite dog and received a C+. Maybe I’ve found the origins of this blog.
Coming in mid-October, The Early Years, the first serial installment of The MisFit Series. No dogs or cats until Book 4.

Delusional Logic Behind New Psychological Thriller

Remember when you were little and had your first tough argument with your BFF?

No matter what insults or barbs you hurled at each other, none hurt like being told she no longer liked you. One of you undoubtedly twisted the knife deeper by adding, “I don’t want to be your friend anymore. I don’t like you.”

Ouch! As children, we lived to be liked. Being liked—by teachers, adults, acquaintances, other kids, and even strangers mattered. If we were lucky, we could take parental and family love for granted. Being liked—not at all.



Recently, during the Republican and Democratic National Conventions, I heard the political pundits throw around the concept of the candidates’ likability quotient. From time to time, I heard both 2016 presidential candidates were the ‘least-likeable . . .  ever.’

Is there a road back from the label unlikeable?

Writing my psychological suspense series, The MisFit, I extended the above question: Can stories entertain and grab readers’ attention with a major unlikeable character?

I certainly hope the answer is yes. Because I’ve invested two years and more than a thousand words developing such a character. Michael Romanov is Einstein-smart, Olympic-star confident, fearless, driven, and a psychopath from birth if he listens to his mother. Conflicts with his parents and older brother convince him, by the time he’s eleven, that he’s unlovable. Unlikeable, too, since he has no school friends among the students and faculty. He finds a way to claim justice . . . which is where the story begins.

Arguments hurt our feelings. Leave us feeling vulnerable. Often goad us to over-react. This is certainly the case with Michael. As I wrote his opening scene, flashes of that quarrel with my BFF flickered at the edge of my mind. 

Wow! Writing opened a door to reframing that long-ago memory into a novel of psychological suspense.

What about you? How’d you deal with the hurt from that first BFF-argument? Shoot me a note:  ab@abplum.com. I’ll respond. Who knows, maybe there’s another story lurking in your reply. 

AB Plum writes dark, chilling psychological suspense just off the fast lane in Silicon Valley–where the sun shines nearly every day. Coming soon, The Early Years, the first MisFit Series installment.

Unexpected Consequences of Reading Too Well

By AB Plum

Summertime and the reading was easy. For the three lazy months before I entered first grade, I read and read and read. I finished Little Women for the fourth time. Whizzed through the first three books in the Black Stallion series. Devoured the first two volumes of Anne of Green Gables. Ramona kept me out of my mother’s hair for several more weeks. In addition, I read dozens of my cousins’ comicsallowed because my mother “couldn’t walk me to the library every other day.”

So, imagine that first reading group. After recess. My excitement stoked to sugar-high levels. Yet, a secret fear nagged. What if I mispronounced a word? What if I didn’t know all the words?

Miss Martin—my mother’s first-grade teacher—sat in the circle between the lucky girls. (I sat at the opposite end). Miss Martin passed out individual copies of Dick and Jane with the reverence of passing out tickets to enter heaven.  She kept her closed copy on her lap and extolled the adventures reading would open up.

Open stuck in my ears. When she turned to speak to one of the lucky girls, I slid my finger between the covers and cracked the first page. Miss Martin looked up immediately. I shifted in my little chair, and the book slalomed to the floor. 

Seven pairs of eyes stared. Miss Martin glared. I flushed a color I could feel was crimson—the shade of guilt. I lowered my eyes. My insides trembled, and my hands slicked the spine of Dick and Jane with sweat. Time stood still until Miss Martin resumed explaining that reading in a circle followed a protocol—at least in her first-grade class. She paused.

My hand shot up. “Do us listeners have to drag our fingers under the words and read along, too, Miss Martin?”

“Of course, AB.” Her tone froze my toenails. She continued, “Without speaking, of course. Without helping if the reader stumbles.”

Not a word about reading ahead.

In the time half the readers had finished their turns, I could’ve read Little Women again. Involuntarily, I yawned. Surely, Sally, Spot, Dick and Jane could not run one more time. Surely, their vocabulary would increase by the middle of the book. Surely . . .

Silence brought my head up.

Do you know the first word, AB? It’s your turn. 

My turn to die a thousand deaths. I swallowed. No idea of the first word since I’d long since finished the primer. Heart pounding, I croaked, “I’ve lost the place, Miss Martin.”

“Because you read ahead?”

Guilty. “Yes, Miss Martin.”

“Please stand, AB. Leave your book. Come with me.”

No. No. No. Please. Not  the principal. Not on the first day. My legs wobbled so hard my knees knocked. I passed the lucky girl on the right. She put her hand over her mouth and rolled her eyes. I didn’t know about Marie Antoinette at that moment, but I raised my head and followed Miss Martin like a condemned queen.

At the cloak room, she opened the door and took me inside. Hot air squeezed my lungs. She pointed to a chair—which I collapsed on.

“You will sit here, think about your rude behavior, AB, and tell me later if you deserve a place in the advanced reading circle.”

She left me there with the sweaters and art supplies and thoughts about never reading in her circle again. I’d never come back to school, either. I’d run away with the three books I owned—Little Women, Peter Pan, and The 500 Hats of Bartholomew Cubbins. I’d find a teacher like Anne and . . .

I cried . . . until I heard Miss Martin’s footsteps.

How about you? Have you ever sat alone in the cloak room waiting for your sentencing to Hell? Did you laugh it off? Or cry? Contact me at ab@abplum about your experience. I’d love to hear from you. I will answer.

Go here for a look at DJSS.  https://www.amazon.com/Dick-Jane-Reading-Collection-Volumes/dp/0448437104