Now For a Break In Our Regular Programming

I almost titled this post "A Shameless Plug for my Kid." But I decided to be more subtle, because subtle is better when I'm trying to convince you to do something (and it wont' cost a thing, I swear).

Before I start my pitch, though, I want to tell you a story about my oldest son, Max. He's always been a funny kid with a really novel take on life. A few years ago, when he was about 9 or so, Max and I came home to an empty house to find that the washing machine had flooded. This meant we had to pull everything out of the laundry room, move the washing machine and dryer, figure out what was going wrong, and then fix it. Max was at that awesome age when he was eager to help Dad with any project, so we started pushing and pulling and moving stuff around.

Then the Domino Effect kicked in. The outflow pipe came off the wall, the dryer vent was pulled free, and things went from bad to worse. At one point, like an idiot, I wanted to see if the pump was still working in the washing machine, so I turned it on without hooking up the outflow pipe and sprayed water all over the laundry room.

My wife picked that exact second to arrive home. She walked in, saw us with the laundry room taken apart, water all over the floor, dryer lint floating through the air, and asked, "What's going on?"

Max looked up and said in his completely earnest way: "Hi, Mom. We're formerly known as the disaster waiting to happen."

I had to stop and think about that for a second.

Anyway, Max is 15 years old now and he entered a writing competition at SparksNotes (the organization that helps students figure out what the heck books are supposed to mean). He was selected as a finalist in the category of "Most Unique." If he wins the voting round, he gets $500. Which is a fortune to a 15-year-old who keeps a list of toys he wants (drums, new iPod, car, music).

So here's my pitch: go check out Max's entry in the competition. Read the other two entries. Carefully consider who DESERVES to win.

And then vote for Max.

:)

Like a House of Cards

In the last two weeks or so, I've started and deleted more blog entries than ever before. Truth is, I'm in a rough patch, and I keep deleting blog entries because I like to keep my angst private.

In a nutshell, I finished the book I was working on. Throughout the book, the response was very good—and there are lots of things to like about it. But I realized when I finished that I didn't actually have a book. I had a set-up to a longer series. There was no plot. And most people like a plot in their book.

This, naturally, has provoked an intense round of soul-searching. What the hell? How could I make such a rookie, dumb error? How could I not see such a thing until readers pointed it out? This isn't my first book, or my second, or even my fifth. Anyway, in between moping and feeling like a moron and all that discouragement, I just couldn't find the heart to blog about writing. So I've been taking a break.

In my original plan, I would finish this draft and begin querying this summer. But that plan is shot now, and I had to spend a few days with the idea that this book was essentially worthless and could never be queried in its current form before I decided what to do.

Logic tells me I could easily move onto another project. But ultimately, when you get down to it, I'm just not that guy. I wish I could move on. I wish I could just shelve it and sit on it, let it go, and go onto another book. But I can't, even though I know I'm dangerously close to the line where determined becomes foolhardy and stubborn becomes self-destructive. I just hate giving up, and I WANT to get this story right. I've written two books about this same story now, not including all the world-building. It's like the story deserves a better writer than it got, but we're stuck together for now.

So I started over from a blank page. I started at chapter one and started rewriting another version of the same story, but I moved whole chunks of the story from future planned books into this one. I covered in the first five pages what took me 75 to cover before. I'm not even bothering to outline anymore. What's the point? I know the story and the world so well, it's like second nature at this point.

Anyway, I started out this blog entry to say that I was taking a vacation from blogging for a while. But ... I think I'll keep this version. Maybe one day, it'll make better sense.

Open Windows, by Erica Orloff

In my bottom right-hand desk drawer, I keep a bottle of Johnnie Walker Black. I keep it for celebratory cases, hard-won. I keep it for the God-awful cases that trail me home like shadows at the end of the day. The Marsh case was both.

I set the glass on my desk and poured it more than half full. My hand shook and the first sip raced through me. I imagined it purging my brain of the shadows. I took the second slip slower and shut my eyes. Another one for you.

Someone tapped on my glass. My assistant opened my door and stuck his head in. “There’s a woman here to see you, Joe.”

I glanced at my watch. “It’s been a long day. Can you take a message?”

He shook his head. “She says she has to see you. Today. Said her name is Grace Ann.”

I set the Scotch down unsure I could trust my voice. “How old is she?”

“About your age. Beautiful. Blonde.”

I exhaled. “You can send her in.”

When he shut the door, I downed the rest of the Johnnie Walker.

She walked in not three minutes later, tall, willowy, expensive bracelets on her wrists, and the scar. The little star-shaped scar on her forehead that she got the time she fell from my treehouse.

“Hello, Joe,” she whispered.

“Hello, Grace Ann. Sit down,” I gestured toward the chair. I wasn’t sure if I was even breathing.

“I followed the case, and . . . I saw your picture. I thought of coming here a dozen times and always chickened out. But . . . I wanted you to nail the bastard.”

Nail the bastard.

I’d spent fifteen years of my life atoning for not rescuing Grace Ann from the shadows on her wall.

“How are you?” I managed to speak. “Do you live in the city? What do you do? Are you married?”

“Do you cross-examine everyone this way? Good, yes, actress, no.” She smiled. Her eyes didn’t though. Sad eyes behind the flirtatious voice.

“Occupational hazard. I ask a lot of questions.” I blinked and I remembered a day in fifth grade when she smiled at me. Maybe the only time I ever saw her smile that way. A pure laugh. “So . . . It’s been what? Fifteen years?”

“Yeah. I . . . God, where to even start. I ended up, believe it or not, in L.A. You can fill in the blanks. I did some things I’m not proud of. A lot of things, actually. And I woke up one day and looked in the mirror and wasn’t sure who I even was anymore. So I took all my money, came east. Took real acting classes. Ever see that commercial for—”

“Oh my God,” recognition flooded through me. “You’re the toothpaste girl.”

She laughed. I saw a hint of the girl gazing at the stars. “Yeah. That’s me.”

I leaned back. “I didn’t recognize you.”

“And how about you, Mr. Prosecutor?”

I didn’t answer for a minute. Finally, I whispered. “I’ve spent my life going after bastards like your stepfather. It’s my penance.”

She bent her head. “Joe . . . you were a boy.”

“Doesn’t matter.”

“Yes, it does. You were so kind to me. I’ve held onto that night in the field my whole life. Kind of measured people up against you, Joe.”

How could I tell her I did the same?

She looked up from her lap. “So I just had to come say thank you, Joe. And shake your hand.” She stood up and put her hand out in the space over my desk.

I stood. “Do you want to have dinner, Grace Ann?” I took her hand and didn’t so much shake it as hold it.

“Considering how I left town and what you do for a living, Joe . . . I don’t know if that’s such a good idea. It’s sort of why I haven’t come before now. But this case, the Marsh girl. She might have been me.”

I’d actually thought about what would happen if I ever found Grace Ann. “How you left town doesn’t matter to me.”

“Maybe not now. But someday it might.” She withdrew her hand and started toward the door.

“Grace Ann . . .” I just couldn’t let her walk out.

Her back was to me, but she didn’t say anything.

“You were right, that night. I was spying on you. I could hear what he did to you. See what he did, through the open window. In shadows on the wall. My entire career has been about saving every Grace Ann there is. Every last one. I have something to show you.”

I opened my bottom desk draw where I keep the Johnnie Walker and took out the envelope.

“Here.” I walked to her and put it in her hand. She still didn’t move.

Then slowly, she opened it. A single Polaroid our fifth-grade teacher had taken of her and pinned on the bulletin board along with all our pictures. I had stolen hers and kept it until the colors faded to sepia tinges.

She turned around. “They say you are the prosecutor who never sleeps. That your assistants quit from exhaustion. That you’re driven like no one the city has seen before. You’re forgiven, Joe. Now you can sleep.”

“Don’t go,” I heard a panic in my voice I didn’t recognize.

She held my gaze, then looked down at the picture. We stood there like statues. Finally, she said, “All right.” She smiled at me. “Dinner, then, Joe.”

I nodded and opened the door for her. And for the first time for as long as I remembered, a shadow didn’t follow me home or come in echoes through an open window.

[AUTHOR’S NOTE: This is a companion story to the earlier Open Windows.]