I've been writing a story. It's coming along in bits and pieces over time. Rodgers and Hammerstein once said that the very beginning is "a very good place to start." So here's the very beginning of my story and the only part of the story with which I'm completely happy and/or comfortable sharing here:
Prologue—1979
It was story time.
Dustin was still trying to figure out what he was doing in this
asylum. Why had his parents abandoned him to be with these other
five-year-olds? The adult woman who seemed to be in charge led them
to the center of the room where they were all told to sit “Indian
style” on the floor. Dustin had no clue what that meant, but he
saw a few of the other kids sit down and cross their legs under them,
kind of like the girl on the butter box. He awkwardly tried to
position himself the way the children around him had. He noticed the
adult woman in charge seemed to have the presence of mind to sit in a
chair. He wondered what made her so special that she didn't have to
sit on the floor.
Dustin tried hard to
concentrate on the story. It was a good story, but the tingling in
his right leg was incredibly distracting. He began to wonder how
Indians could abide sitting in this position for extended periods of
time. Suddenly, the story that the adult woman was reading became
irrelevant. As the tingling in his leg turned to numbness, further
distracting him from the story, he looked around the room for
something to distract him from the tingling and numbness.
His eyes landed on the
little girl seated next to him. There was something about this girl.
Dustin didn't know what it was. Had he been any older he might have
worried that he was staring at her. Fortunately for Dustin, he was
only five and most five-year-olds don't have the most developed sense
of social etiquette. Consequently, he stared at the little girl.
Even more fortunately for Dustin, the little girl didn't notice that
he stared at her. Had he been any older, he might have interpreted
that as a sign of things to come.
Dustin couldn't figure
out why he was suddenly fascinated by her. Maybe it was her red
hair. Maybe it was her glasses—she was the only person other than
his sister and grandmother who wore bifocals. Maybe it was the fact
that she seemed as disinterested in the story as he was. Staring at
her had caused him to forget the numbness in his leg—maybe that's
why he was entranced by her. He decided it was the bifocals and
tried hard to resuscitate his leg.
The only thing he knew
about her was that her name was Kathy...
