Writer's Toolbox Day 5: The Protagonist Game

 
Here's another writing from a long, long time ago (February 2009) that I wrote using The Writer's Toolbox. It was my fifth time "playing" with it. I played the protagonist game and was cut off by the time limit. I still wonder what would have come next.  After the date, I listed the prompts I got from the game. I'm posting it all here to submit to the Write on Edge Weekend Link-up. I hope you enjoy it.

Febraury 19, 2009

Protagonist: Liz who reviews books

Goal: to be young again

Obstacle: Fred, the monster

Action: does research at the library

Every book has its story. Liz knew that every author was trying to say something important to them, but someone has to sort out the good from the bad. "It is not that the story is bad, it is simply that the teller has not yet found the right voice," is what she would always say. For twenty-three years Liz has reviewed books for The Chronicle and as she attempted to rip open a new shipment from Scolar Publishing she felt her age weigh upon her - the arthritis was taking its toll on her hands. Liz wished for her youth once again as she rubbed her hands together in a moot attempt to loosen her joints. Luckily, she didn't really need those joints to read, Father Time hadn't figured out yet how to steal that joy from her yet.


After pulling a knife from her drawer to open the package, Liz was surprised to find only one book enclosed. She checked the packing slip to find out which agent had taken so much time to ship only one book - she was used to four or five at a time. On the printed slip there was no agent identified, but inside the box was another piece of paper with some writing on it:

Dearest Liz,
I do hope this book finds you well.
I have an extreme amount of respect for your literary opinion.
I think it is high time that you read the enclosed publishing...
Please take your time with it, this book will change your life.
Respectfully Yours,
Fred

While it was not uncommon for an agent to enclose a private note to a reviewer, the tone of this note seemed off. In all of Liz's experience, she was never asked by an agent to take her time - agents wanted reviews, especially good ones, at lightning speed. They wanted their author to be written about, buzzed about and most of all they wanted quotes for their dust jackets. She also didn't remember anyone by the name of Fred over at Scolar, so it seemed odd that he would think they should be on a first name basis. Besides his off-putting delusion of grandeur, "this book will will change your life," Liz had to hand it to this mysterious Mr. Fred - he had intrigued her. She decided it was high time for her to read this publishing, so she set off to the kitchen to make her ceremonial first cup of tea for beginning any book.

Liz turned off her phone, grabbed her softest throw blanket, turned on her favorite reading lamp next to the edge of her couch and set down her tea on her coasters from Italy, inset with Morano glass. "Okay, Mr. Fred," she began as she set the book on her lap while taking another sip of her tea, "this had better be worth it."

She began with a survey of the cover, it was not much to look at yet, but she knew better to judge the entirety of the book by its pre-first edition cover. The title, The Lost Time, was simple, and not quite telling and the fact that it was written by Abernathie Stone told even less. Liz suddenly became weary of this entire experience - an unknown author solicited by an unknown agent toting that this book would change her life - Liz fought off the negative vibes she was feeling, and decided to dive right in.

On the first page, there was a quote from the American author Carl Sandburg:

"Time is the coin of your life. It is the only coin you have, and only you can determine how it will be spent. Be careful lest you let other people spend it for you."
~Carl Sandburg

The Writer's Toolbox Day 4

Here's is another writing from ancient history (February 2009) that I wrote using The Writer's Toolbox. It was my fourth day playing with it and I think I got carried away. I don't remember which game I used here, but I can't imagine that I obeyed the time restrictions given the length of this piece! I'm posting it here to submit to the Write on Edge Weekend Link-up. I hope you enjoy it.

February 18, 2009

There she was, Amy Gerstein, over by the pool, kissing my father. I couldn't believe my eyes, my mom had told me the story a thousand times in the last month, but to see it, with my own eyes projected on our living room wall in that authentic-looking 8mm film was more than I could handle. Ms. Gerstein was my teacher, how could she have dated my father?! My mother laughed at my bewildered expression, while my father just grew impatient, "Danielle, is this really necessary? She has to see Amy on Monday!" Eww! Why did he have to call her Amy? If he wanted to be casual he could call her Ms. G, but that's as far as it goes!

My mother just laughed, turned off the projector and sashed out of the room with a grin from ear to ear. She planted a kiss on my father's head on her way to the kitchen. He grimaced and turned to me, "Honey, pay no attention to your mother, she is terribly amused that Amy, I mean Ms. Gerstein, is your new teacher," he rolled her eyes, "It was so long ago, but she was the last girlfriend I had before your mother, so your mom always feels the need to remind the world that I chose her."

"And," Mom called from the kitchen, " I need your daughter to know that her teacher may still have a crush on her father!"

"Eww! WHAT?!" I couldn't believe what my mother was saying, here are the things I know:
1. Teachers do not have first names (unless they teach nursery school, Pre-K or Kindergarten in a very liberal school)
2. Teachers have no lives outside of school, checking my homework, and maybe, sometimes they will use a phone or e-mail to contact parents of their students.
3. Teachers were never young once - they never dated or did normal things - they are either married or painfully, eternally single; how they get to either of these lifestyles is not for any student to understand.
and
4. Teachers don't have crushes.

My mother was working very hard this weekend to breakdown all of my rules, but I refused to believe that Ms. Gerstein had a crush on MY father!

"Jesus, Danni! Enough! It is only October, she has to be in her class all year, don't start anything," my father was laughing when he said this, so it became obvious to me that I was the only one taking this seriously at all.

I got up to go to my room, they were both getting way too giddy for me, "Call me when dinner is ready." My dad was in the kitchen tickling my mom - this was going to be a long year.


I missed most of what went on in class on Monday, I was too busy daydreaming about the adults in my life. When I got to class on Monday I could not get the projected image of the young Ms. Gerstein out of my mind. Her skinny little body, with long black hair tied up in a ponytail kissing the young image of my father. She was in a little red bikini, although the color was faded on my living room wall from the film's age and projection surface. My father had spiky hair and yellow swim trunks, he was missing his glasses, his salt and pepper dad hair and, most notably, my mother! Who were these adults in my life? Really? Did the Amy Gerstein of the past, that 8mm ghost, imagine that she would someday be a single teacher having to deal with ex-boyfriends at PTA meetings? I am guessing: no. She probably had plans, big plans, some that may have even involved my father... what happened to those plans? Where do big plans go when they are unfulfilled? Which then led me to thinking about something else quite profound... who am I going to be? What are my big plans? Should I even bother to make any? Am I to be the Amy Gerstein of tomorrow? Or will I be more like my mother?

I was snapped from my stream of consciousness by the recess bell. I had zoned out for nearly the entire school day. A quick glance at my day's notes would tell the tale: a few sentences here and there and then random doodles of girls in bikinis, boys in swim trunks and lots of question marks. I went home happy that I hadn't been caught unaware during class, and slightly annoyed at my mother for starting all of this nonsense in the first place. I decided on the walk home that I was not going to think about it anymore. I would go back to my normal routine: naïvety. I would call Becky when I got home to find out what the heck went on in school today, get my assignments and go back to normal. My parents already seemed to do so, nothing had been mentioned about the illicit affairs of my father or teacher since the night of the film's premier, so this should be easy, as long as I allowed it to be.

If only Ms. Gerstein could have been in my head on the walk home Monday afternoon to hear my resolution. On Tuesday she asked me the most peculiar question. "So, Vicki, how's your dad's car doing?"

I blanched. I was on my way to the cafeteria, looking for Becky, "W-w-what do you mean?"

"I saw him at Ray's on Sunday. I figured something was up. Is everything okay?"

I needed to get out of this conversation quickly, "I guess so, he had it today," I spotted Becky, finally, "Hey Beck! Got to go, Ms. Gerstein," I practically ran to the unsuspecting Becky Miller, my best friend for as long as I could remember.

"Vick, you okay? What happened with Ms. G? You looked completely freaked out! You did the homework, right?"

"Yea, yea, no it's nothing, I guess. I just didn't see her coming," in more ways than one - I wanted to talk to Becky about it, but we weren't alone, and I wasn't sure if I was overreacting. I needed some time to mull it all over. I was happy we had a big group at lunch, I could be relatively quiet without being noticed. Becky and friends were enraptured in a discussion about the upcoming holiday ball that was announced this morning during announcements. It is a pretty big deal at our school, so the cafeteria was all a-buzz with dance chatter, in fact, Ms. Gerstein had a hard time reigning in our class after lunch due to the overwhelming excitement. By about 2pm, she gave in and chimed in with her own dance duties, "Alright, alright... Class. Since you can't stop talking about it anyway, let's get through with all of the formalities now. I was going to wait until just before recess, but I can see you are hopeless."

A series of cheers erupted in class, some from legitimate joy about dance discussions, and some from joy of class distraction. I often wonder if teachers can decipher between the two. Either way, my class did not give Ms. Gerstein enough time to decide, they hushed quickly to hear the news.

"First of all, Principal Lindt asked that we help decide on a theme by next week, some of the ideas were: Holiday Earth: A Global Celebration or Dancing for a Cause." Ms. G circulated around the room handing out a sheet of paper with both themes and brief descriptions below, of course Principal Lindt also had a brief list of Causes he wanted us to select from. The chatter erupted again, I was sure Ms. G had lost the class for good this time when she declared in her best teacher-voice, "Ladies and Gentlemen, that is not all," she paused for effect, and it worked, "Principal Lindt also informed the faculty that there will be no dance if there are not enough chaperones, so it is time to enlist your parents' help!" for a moment I thought Ms. G had glanced right at me. She came around the room again with a parent volunteer form, when she got to me, she stopped, still gripping my form as I tried to take it from her, and addressed the class, "Class, this is not just a ladies' affair, remember your dads like dances, too." She looked down at me, winked and released the form. I could hear or see no more. All I know is that by the end of class there were two more forms on my desk and the class chatter had become a near-roar. I also knew that I needed to talk to Becky because I was not overreacting.

Leora

Another piece from the Writer's Toolbox archives. I played the "protagonist game." There are four wheels: one with protagonists, one with a goal, one with obstacles, and one with an action. Each wheel is spun and then, using the four choices you must write for the allotted amount of time. When the time is up, the writing is done. Here's how it went for me:


 
February 17, 2009

Protagonist: Leora, who loves to visit Israel

Goal: to be the strongest

Obstacles: Don, the jailbird

Action: gets special training

The sweat dripped down past Leora's brow and into her eyes - she had been on the treadmill for a straight 45 minutes non-stop. It was about time that one of the gym trainers should come over and tell her to either slow down, stop to get a drink of water, or simply be blunt and tell her to get off so one of the impatient super-moms could get a chance to squeeze their workout in before their little rug-rats made a scene in the play area. Leora wished she was in Israel again, Americans seemed so plastic, so fragile, so shallow.

She was ten years old when she took her first trip to Israel. The sun, the sand and the community were all wonderful, but what Leora loved the most was getting to know her "foreign" family. She couldn't believe she had gone ten years without ever meeting her maternal grandparents, her two aunts and Uncle Hymie. Her cousins Brenda and Leo were unlike her "American" cousins; they seemed to have a depth to them and a strength that was unmatched by those she had grown up with. Leora did not have a lot of friends back in Brooklyn, she considered herself a "shy girl," and did everything she could to avoid being picked on each day: the strength she saw in her foreign family members was not only something she wanted to emulate, it was something she needed to emulate. Since that first trip, Leora took every opportunity possible to return and over the last seventeen years that amounted to over twenty trips, with another one planned for this summer.

After a glare from Lydia, the gym manager, Leora got off the treadmill, stretched and made her way over to the showers. She planned on running once she got home anyway, she could never get a full workout in this place, not what she needed. She felt weak, although her physique would be enough in any debate to let that argument fail. No matter how much she ran, swam or worked out, Leora still felt like that weak little girl fighting not to be picked on. It was a ridiculous notion at her age and with all her experience: she was 27 years old, a graduate of the New York City Public School system, with honors, a graduate of City College with a B.A. in Jewish Studies and a minor in Sociology and, to top it all off, for the last five years, Leora was working the streets as a beat cop for the NYPD after graduating "Top Jock" of her female Academy cadets. Leora had no reason to feel weak, no reason to think she was weak, but it was never enough for her to be strong; Leora needed to be the strongest.

As Leora left gym she was annoyed to find she had missed two called from Josh, her new partner from work. He was cute, confused and way too excited about his new job - she remembered those feelings, but that didn't make them much easier to deal with. He probably saw some story about a pickup on the news and wanted to know her opinion on the way it was handled, what she thought he should do in that situation and then he'd probably want to bounce a couple of ideas about how this crime could have been prevented off of her; this kid had no idea how to take a day off. She decided to just call him back without even listening to his voicemail, "Hey Josh, what's up?"

"Did you read the blotter today?" of course. Leora wasn't surprised: shop-talk.

"No, I try to actually take the day off, Josh. You know there is such a thing as burn-out, you need to be careful," she tried to put her mentor tone on, but was pretty sure some of her aggravation was leaking through.

"No, I know, Lee, I know I've got to take the time, but this is different. They picked up Don last night."

"What?" Leona heard the anxious tone in Josh's voice, but still had no idea what he was talking about.

"Lee," Josh continued, exasperated, "two weeks ago... Don, Donny, Gutu... the shitbag that we collared outside of O'Malley's..."

Leora paused.

"Lee? He threatened you. He was back in Brooklyn last night and, if they still have him he's still here," it was quickly becoming obvious that Josh was worried.

Leora needed to reign him in, with only two months on the job it made sense that he still took every threat to heart, but this boy needed to grow a thicker skin, "Josh, listen to me carefully, " she paused for effect, "stop reading the god-damn papers. Stop taking every-fucking-thing every wacko says to us to heart and for the love of god let it be."

Josh was confounded, "But I..."

"Enough Josh. Go do something. Do something that has NOTHING to do with you being a cop. Give yourself the night off and I'll see you in the morning."

"Lee?"

"What Josh?" it took everything in Leora not to hang up on him right there.

"I don't like this guy."

And that was it. She hung up on him. Poor Josh, so much like little weak Leora from elementary school, maybe he should be sent off to Israel. Even so, he did have a point, there was something different about Don - the way he waited for Josh to be off interviewing a witness, the way he turned on her, looked her in the eye and pushed his body up against her as he spewed out the words that had, as much as she didn't want to admit it, haunted Leora ever since, 'Pretty Officer Carter should watch her steps in B-Town. Donny owns this place, Donny knows her face and Donny's real good at e-rase.'" As she relived the moment, Leora felt the goosebumps rise up her back.

The Green Dress

Another piece from the Writer's Toolbox archives. I used the sentence sticks for this one. The bold sentences are the ones I selected and then wrote until the timer ran out.
 
February 16, 2009

He swore on his mother's grave, but then he swore on just about everything. Jon was only six and still thought that "swearing on" something was enough to make it all feasible. Rhonda, his older sister was exasperated by this behavior, "Enough Jon! Just tell mom what the hell you did to her dress!"

"RHONDA!" her mother yelled.

"Of course I would get in trouble now," thought Rhonda, "the little brat uses Mom's favorite dress as a prop in his latest battle fort and I get in trouble..."

"What?!" she yelled back at her mother.

"Stop cursing! You're a Lady!"

Ugh! How did Rhonda not see that one coming? Then the kicker - Mom changes from her reprimanding tone to parental, caretaker as she turned to Jon, "Now, Honey, what happened to my pretty green dress?"

"It was for the tent outside. It was camoflauge. I needed it. Otherwise the bad guys could see me," his sincerity was sickening to Rhonda, but seemed to ease their mother's increasing blood pressure.

Through gritted teeth, still maintaining some of the motherly sing-song required in conversations with a six-year-old, their mother continued, "Jon, why didn't you use the throw cloths I left you in the shed?"

"They weren't green. They were all the same, I decided."

Mom was just about at her breaking point with this one, "You decided?" Rhonda was pleased with her mother's increased aggravation.

"Yeah, the guys found me last time, and since they were all the same they would just find me again unless I got some camoflauge! You wanna see it?" his excitement was palpable. Jon truly did not understand the issue here. His smile was as wide as the time he caught a fly ball in his first tee-ball game. He was simply incorrigible!

They decided to see the fort as a family. It was easy to see where Jon's pride stemmed from - this was a six year old boy's dream. Which also meant, of course, it was his mother's nightmare. The dress was torn into pieces. The arms were fashioned into two separate camoflauged periscopes, one at either end of a hugely extensive tunnel system propped up by lawn chairs, a garbage pail and the beach umbrella. The skirt was torn into two long pieces and then separated from the inset slip to actually create four long panels of green roofing for the stronghold. The bust of the dress was also torn into two pieces, they were the doors taped to the fortress using duct tape.

Writer's Toolbox Day 2: The Senses

This is another blog post imported from my old fiction blog. It is from the second day of using my new tool for writing inspiration called the Writer's Toolbox. I recommend it to anyone who is looking for some new writing challenges.

I believe the "tool" or game used to write this post was something to do with the senses. I picked out prompts dealing with a dirty microwave, Paris in August, the taste of toothpaste and bats circling in the sky. Here's what I wrote based on that:

February 16, 2009

Why can't anyone clean the damn microwave?! God damn bunch of animals. I can't even identify some of the gunk stuck up on the top of the microwave and forget about the smells. I have been working in this shit-hole for way too long. God knows I deserve better than this. I feel as though this microwave is representative of the life I find myself stuck with these days: smelly, dirty, uncared for, and just plain gross. I've got to find a way out of this. I can't believe I am having this epiphany because of a damn microwave. It is always the most mundane shit that makes us see reality.
I've been saving up for nothing it seems, but what the hell - I am going to Paris in August. I will give my son-of-bitch (and I mean that literally) boss his two weeks notice and then I am getting out of Dodge! I remember reading those Eloise books when I was little and always thinking Paris was the happiest place on Earth. This is it. This is a life-changer. Life begins in Paris. I could probably afford to stay a couple of weeks, maybe more. I hope I learned more French than I thought in Madame Renoi's class in high school. Why the hell did Jack have to be in that class, anyway? I might have paid attention more if I wasn't so busy trying to flirt with that stupid ass. Ah, but the smell of spring always brings back those memories of Jack... his curly black hair, his dark brown eyes, his ridiculous French accent. I wonder what he's up to these days.
I start thinking I'll look him up on facebook as I stare at myself in the mirror the next morning while brushing my teeth. I love the taste of toothpaste, only Colgate paste, of course, but I do love it. The minty clean and fresh taste makes me feel free to try anything, to taste anything. I imagine that the air of Paris smells and feel the way my toothpaste tastes: fresh and new. I can't wait, two weeks and counting. Today I am going to tell my boss.
I find him at his desk, of course - I've never seen that man move his lazy ass more than one foot radius around the desk at any point between nine and one and then again two through five. I walk right in, no knocking, no "excuse me"; not today, not now, this is going to be fucking monumental - I am quitting this shit. He barely notices me enter over his disgustingly sticky raspberry yogurt - are men supposed to eat that shit? That seems like such a feminine snack. He must be on, yet another quick-fix diet. They never work. He is a fat slob. I wouldn't be surprised if he is the asshole who dirties up the microwave and never cleans it up. I should ask him, right now, I've got nothing to lose.... I decide against it and just dive in. I make up some bullshit story that I got accepted into some study abroad program through the local community college. He eats my shit up. This is way too easy. He starts prattling on about some "fabulous" experience he had back in his college days and I quickly regret my tale. Was he just talking about bats? Bats circling in the sky? Where the fuck did this guy study abroad? Transylvania? Shit. Now I wish I was listening.

Writer's Toolbox Day 1

This is another blog post imported from my old fiction blog. I had found a new tool for writing inspiration called the Writer's Toolbox which helped me write most of the posts for that blog that followed. I recommend it to anyone who is looking for some new writing challenges.

Writer's Toolbox tool/game of the day: Sentence sticks - each bold sentence represents a sentence stick I was given to write with. The only rules: the first stick had to be my starting sentence and every stick had to be used. I wrote for a set amount of time, so if it seems like there is more to this story - there is, but my time was up.

February 15, 2009

We were drinking champagne and losing our shirts. No big surprise; it was Friday night and the Ladies Book Club always turned into this cock-eyed poker game. Sherry swore that she wanted to make this a serious venture, but, if so, why serve champagne? I should have known better to carry any extra cash - I can't ante-up if I have no money on me. So here I am, staring down a pair of deuces as my only shot of redemption. I could tell by the looks on Mary and Linda's faces that they weren't doing much better than me and thinking that a conversation about the new Stephanie Meyers book would be much less painful than our current situation.

"Tell your husbands that the price of meat went up again!" Sherry explained after our pitiful losses, "It's not like they won't believe it in this economy!" I hated that she was right, but I also hating losing. I am not coming back next Friday. I don't really like this book anyway. And if she really wants me to enjoy this champagne she should invest in a better brand or at least bring some strawberries... Mary and I left after that last hand, of which Sherry took the pot, and left Linda to fend for herself. Sorry, Girl, you need to figure your own way out - get a backbone and get a-walking!!

"I don't need this," Mary started. She seemed a little more aggravated than the situation called for.

"Don't fret about it, Sherry's right, Dan won't even realize the lost money."

"It's not that, it's Charlotte, she is sick again and I can't control her anymore!" she explained.

"Is it really her fault that she is sick?" I couldn't believe she was this exasperated that her daughter was sick!

"Nicole, Charlotte ate green peppers all day long." I had no idea what she was talking about, so I asked her what she meant. " I mean that all day, while I went to work and cleaned around the house and worked on the garden my daughter was up in her room eating green peppers non-stop!" she shouted.

"Alright, Mary, I can see how that's weird and even a little off-putting, but did you ask her why?" I know Mary has a tendency to fly off the handle at the smallest of things without looking back.

Now she seemed to get angry with me, "You must be kidding me? Ask her why?... Why bother?! First it was the lemons, then the turnips, why the hell not eat green peppers all day?!"

Lemons? Turnips? What the hell is she talking about?, I thought, but didn't dare say. I think she read it on my face.

She stopped walking and looked me in the eyes, "Nicole, don't tell the others about this, okay?"

I stared silently for a moment. What the hell would I say? What was so bad about strange eating habits? If she didn't want me to say anything, I wouldn't, but I didn't understand why. "Okay..."

"Charlotte thinks she has magical powers. I have scheduled an evaluation for her next week and not even Dan knows about it yet. He won't even talk about her behavior with me. He thinks if we ignore it, it will go away, but he hasn't even talked to her since she started it," she started to cry. "My husband won't even talk to our only child! She needs our help and he won't even address her! This has been going on for three months!"

"Three months, Mary! Jesus! And you haven't told anyone about this?! We could help. I don't know how, but something..."

We talked for three hours that night before Dan called my house looking for Mary. We told him we were looking at pictures from that last barbecue and lost track of time. He bought it, this time. I caught a glimpse of Dan's attitude toward his daughter on the phone, "Tell Mary Charlotte is sick and needs her," he said. When I asked him how serious it was he said, "You know how it is, Nicole, she's a girl, I am her dad, I don't think it is any of my business." I wanted to scream at him right then, but I knew I had to play it down for Mary's sake. "Sure, Dan, you're probably right. I'll send her right over."

It took some convincing, but I got Mary to agree to come over with Charlotte on Saturday afternoon. I sent all the boys out of the house and thought it would be helpful if just the three of us could hang out, to see how Charlotte would act around me. The excuse was simple: I needed help baking. The plan was cookies, ice cream and a cake for Bobby's birthday party on Sunday. It was true, I did need help with all of it anyway, and so did Mary and Charlotte.

Mary walked in first, looking abashed. I wondered what had caused this look around me. No matter what was going on she had nothing be ashamed of in my presence! And then Charlotte came in behind her. I hadn't seen her in probably about a month and a half, maybe two, but the difference was striking. Charlotte is 13 years old, so I expect changes to be happening all of the time, but so much of her change seemed to be internal instead of external. Her eyes were sunken which made me wonder if she had been sleeping and her arms fell to her sides in a tension that can be best described as cat-like, waiting to pounce. She seemed to be ultra-aware of her surroundings and her smile was uneasy and forced. "Thanks, Aunt Nickie. I don't think I am much of a baker, but I'll watch out for the windie-flakes when we get to the cake-making."

Mary jumped, "Charlotte, 'NO! Don't get started with that again!!" and tears started to well up in her eyes, "Nicole, I am so sorry. This was a mistake. We will go."

Granted, I had no idea what "windie-flakes" were, but there was NO WAY I was about to endeavour to do all of this baking on my own. "Don't be ridiculous, Mary. I will take whatever help you can both offer!" I felt for both of them. This was going to be a strained afternoon, but the secrets in this family flowed deep.

I handed out aprons, head scarfs and reviewed the recipes for the day. We agreed we should started with the cookies. I gave Mary charge of the wet ingredients, Charlotte charge of the dry ingredients as I began to prepare the equipment. Mary came over to me at the counter, away from Charlotte, "Thank you," she whispered, "...and I'm sorry. It has been a bad week. The strange stuff she has been talking about has been increasing exponentially. I try to stop her the minute she gets started, but it is getting worse by the day." I swore she was going to start crying again.

"Mary, we'll figure this out. Let's give her some time today to just be and let's see what happens. I won't tell anybody, you won't tell anybody, she'll feel safe and you'll have more information by the time the evaluation comes up."

And then we heard Charlotte whisper into her mixing bowl, "'There you go, making up lies again.' That's what they told me. But I wasn't lying, Marcelo, I swear! I was just doing what I was told." Her eyes skirted toward us at the counter, where Mary tensed and I became extremely interested in the oven temperature. "Excuse me, Aunt Nickie, do you have any beets?"

"No, Honey, I'm sorry just sweets today, no beets. Why?" I had a feeling I already knew, but I figured I'd ask.

"No biggie, I was just looking for something to nosh on. I'll hold out." She continued sifting the flour into the bowl.