How to Write a Novel

by Melanie Sumner

  By lunchtime, the sun was out, and any Lab student who had remembered a jacket that morning had discarded it. Several were tossed over the bushes that lined the stone path to the dining hall. Anders walked beside me, trying to step on the shoe that proclaimed “God Isn’t.” I allowed this because he was a fan. Also, his hair was growing out of the hedgehog cut. I’m not saying he was cute, just saying.

  “It’s been proven that Christians live longer than non-Christians,” he said. “That’s because they’re happier.”

  “Don’t start.”

  “I don’t even need to say that Jesus Christ is your savior, because you know that. Even if you deny it, you know it in your heart.”

  My foot slipped on the path, accidentally kicking him in the shin.

  “Go away, Anders.”

  “Why?” he asked, limping to catch up with me. “Why should I go away?”

  “Because.” I spun around to face him, spitting mad. “My heart is none of your dang business.” We were right beside the fishpond, and I almost pushed him in. “Why don’t you try this? Replace the words ‘Jesus Christ’ with ‘My Ego.’ Go ahead, say it. ‘I want to share My Ego with you. I follow My Ego. I believe in My Ego. My Ego is my savior.’ ” I stared him down and then stomped away.

  “Someone is hormonal,” he muttered as he followed me, doglike, into the dining hall. He flopped into the chair beside mine. With a dejected frown, he unpacked the lunch his dad had made for him. Once, Mr. Anderson had mistaken a can of Coors Light for a can of ginger ale. “My dad sort of has his eyes closed in the morning,” Anders had mumbled as the entire table laughed. Today he had two Snickers bars and a can of SpaghettiOs—the kind you have to open with a can opener. And no can opener.

  While he watched, I unfolded the cloth napkin Diane packs for me and put it in my lap. Then I spread my lunch out, rather invitingly, so that we could negotiate a trade for one of those Snickers bars. He read the sticky note Diane had attached to my plastic bag of carrot sticks: “I am so proud of you. You are majestic, ma-demoiselle!”

  “What’s she proud of you for?”

  I shrugged. “She just says that.” At the sight of her handwriting, a wave of guilt passed through me. Had I really mailed her journals out to strangers that morning? Why had that seemed like a good idea?

  “Half a peanut butter and cucumber on whole wheat for a Snickers?” I offered.

  He picked up my sandwich and examined it. “Why do you look so guilty?”

  “I don’t look guilty. It’s just a dumb candy bar.”

  “No, I mean it. It’s all over your face. What did you do?”

  I looked him straight in the eye. He looked back. I didn’t blink. He didn’t blink. I didn’t blink. He didn’t blink. We stayed that way until the bell rang.

  As I was leaving the dining hall, Ms. Chu waved and slipped into step beside me.

  She smiled, looking at me as if I had a new haircut or something. Softly, she said, “I like your novel.”

  “Really?”

  “Yes, really.”

  All of a sudden, it was a beautiful afternoon at the Lavender Mountain Laboratory School. In the fishpond, goldfish shimmered under a slant of winter sun. Afternoon shadows cut across the straight pines in the woods behind the chapel. A few deer were grazing on the chapel lawn, watching us with their sweet dark eyes as we walked along the path.

  “It’s brilliant,” Ms. Chu whispered.

  I savored that moment—with the goldfish glittering, the deer gazing, Ms. Chu’s skirt rustling as she walked beside me on the curving path of polished stones. Brilliant.

  “It’s not too small?” I asked her. “Too ordinary? The Orchard? Chutiksee County? Kanuga, Georgia?”

  “Small is good,” she said. She told me about William Faulkner’s little postage stamp of native soil in northern Mississippi, how he said he would never live long enough to write about it all.

  “I thank you kindly,” I said; it’s a phrase from the hills of Kentucky that Grandma uses only on special occasions.

  “Now,” Ms. Chu said, “I have a question for you.”

  “Yes?” I was watching a doe out of the corner of my eye, having faith that she wouldn’t run away. I was at one with nature, God, and man.

  “When is your protagonist going to face a situation she can’t handle, the outcome of which will change her life?”

  “Well … ,” I said, smiling bravely. I had just died.

  My body was there, of course, but it was the glove without the hand. She was criticizing my novel! She hated it! She was trying to be nice, but she hated it. I hated it too. I hated myself for writing it. There was nothing to do but defend it.

  “I thought I might make it a literary novel,” I said. “Slice of life, you know?”

  She didn’t say anything. The glow of the afternoon had faded away, and the doe was gone. The air had the greasy, sour-milk smell of Lab lunch. The lovely Ms. Chu took on a hard look, braces glinting.

  She whispered, “Something terrible must happen.”

  All afternoon, I expected the police to knock on the door. I know, I know—why would the police care if someone mailed out her mother’s journals? This is what guilt does to your mind. When Penn knocked twice on the door and came whistling into the hallway, I felt my heart hit the inside of my chest. Clearly, I was going insane.

  “Don’t you dare bark at me,” Penn told Hiroshima, who was dancing in a circle, yapping her head off. “What are you barking at me for?” Bending down so she could jump into his arms, he said tenderly, “I would never bark at you.”

  “It’s taco night tonight,” Diane said as she whizzed by to get her traveling coffee cup. Evening classes require a caffeine jolt, but she was already pretty wired. She is always happier when Penn comes over. “I found a soft-taco kit with whole wheat tortillas,” she said proudly. “Can you believe it?”

  “Didn’t we just have taco night?” asked Max. “How about a roast beef? Normal families have roast beef with mashed potatoes and gravy.”

  “The soy crumbles taste just like ground beef,” she replied, tousling his hair. She sped past us, scooping up a pile of jackets without breaking her stride, and disappeared into the bathroom.

  When she was gone, Penn explained to Max that soy crumbles come from Japanese soy cows, which are just like our beef cows but are green.

  “Green cows?”

  “It’s weird, but you get used to it.”

  “You’re fortunate I’m looking out for your cholesterol,” Diane said as she trotted back into the room, looking for her keys.

  “Y’all are so fortunate,” said Penn, when she was out of earshot again. “Y’all are blessed.”

  At the door, Diane bent her knees and hiked the heavy briefcase farther up on her shoulder while holding her coffee cup with a straight arm so it wouldn’t spill. Her high heels swung from their straps on her wrist because she can’t drive in them. Penn jumped up to get the door for her, and I made a mental note to put a belt on her the next time she wore that baggy dress.

  At least she had remembered to walk through a spritz of Amazing Grace. In case you wondered, perfume is layered with head notes, heart notes, and base notes. We were at the head of Amazing Grace now, a lemony “hello.” The scent lingered faintly in the air after she was gone, and it made me sad as I listened to her car backing out of the driveway.

  “I don’t have any homework,” said Max. “I’m practicing my talent.”

  “You’re not doing anything,” I said.

  “I’m emptying my mind. If you get rid of every thought in your brain, you will rise three inches off the ground. I saw a YouTube of it.”

  “You haven’t moved.”

  “When you doubt me, I get stuck.”

  “Have you considered time travel?” asked Penn.

  “Yeah, I do that all the time, but no one can see it.”

  “You’ll need something called a wormhole. It’s a shortcut connecting two different points in space-time. Albert Ein
stein and his buddy Rosen came up with it.”

  “I know where one is in the yard,” said Max. “I think I can find it.”

  “Let’s study your spelling first,” said Penn as he stirred soy crumbles in the skillet. “Spell ‘excitement’ for me.”

  “E-c-x,” Max began.

  “E-x-c.”

  “That’s what I said. I promise! You didn’t hear me.”

  “Try again. It’s a weird one. Aris, what are you studying?”

  “American presidents,” I lied.

  “Have you gotten to Eugene Debs?”

  “Not yet,” I said. I tried to distract him by ripping open a bag of organic blue corn chips and then crunching loudly, but Penn wasn’t as easy to divert as Diane. I’ve noticed that about men in general; they don’t have as many things on their minds.

  “Well, you probably won’t get to him,” he said, watching me closely.

  “That’s not a president,” said Max, whose odd little brain had memorized all the American presidents when he was seven.

  “Eugene Debs was the Socialist Party candidate for president in 1900, 1904, 1908, 1912, and 1920,” said Penn. He flipped a tortilla in the skillet with one hand. “You should know that he ran his final campaign from prison. He was arrested on charges of sedition. Sedition is the ‘crime’ of speaking out against the established order. You probably thought we had a constitutional right to free speech in this country. Well, think again, Lab rats. Eugene Debs was antiestablishment, and for that reason, you won’t see much of him in your textbooks.”

  “He’s like the silent ‘e’ in excitement,” said Max, and then he knocked over the salsa with his elbow and called Lucky over to lick it up off the floor.

  After dinner, Penn did the dishes while Max and I built a fire in the fireplace. Max brought out his cards, and we all played Liar. We had to explain the game to Penn: After you pass out all the cards, the youngest player places a card in the middle, faceup. You take turns laying down the next card in the sequence, facedown. You can cheat, but if someone guesses that you’re cheating, they can say, “Liar.” You show your card. If your accuser is right, you have to take the whole pile of cards. If your accuser is wrong, he takes the whole pile. If you cheat and don’t get caught, you say, “Peanut butter.”

  “I’m not saying ‘peanut butter,’ ” said Penn. “I’m saying ‘bullshit.’ ”

  Penn is allowed to cuss because he was in the navy. Diane says taking the cuss out of a sailor is like taking the shine out of the sun. He has a terrible, terrible tattoo that he got one night when he was drunk with some other sailors, but he won’t let anyone see it, not even Diane. In the summer, when he takes us to the river to jump off rocks, he blackens it with a permanent marker. I’m always trying to imagine it.

  “Just give me a hint,” I said once.

  “It would fit right in with your Garden of Earthly Delights poster,” he said.

  If you’ve done something really bad, like mailing your mother’s journals out to the whole country, I don’t recommend playing Liar afterward. Each time I added my card to the pile in the center of our circle, I felt Diane’s glance, even though she wasn’t there. How long would it take her to find out what I had done?

  On his next turn, Max slapped his cards down and let his face freeze.

  “Max,” I said, “try to act bored when you’re lying.”

  “I was!”

  “Liar.” I slid my cards over to his pile. “Your turn, Penn,” I said languidly, but inside, my guts were churning. I was picturing Stanley Elke getting his journal in the mail. Maybe he was a fat little man with a big nose who surrounded himself with Labradoodles. He’d lean back on his couch, pat a Labradoodle, and open the manila envelope. What is this? Someone’s diary? He’d check the return address, then open it up.

  THINGS I HIDE

  1. Tampons.

  2. The fact that I failed fourth-grade math and can’t calculate a fifteen percent tip in my head.

  3. Chocolate.

  4. Attraction to a man who may not be attracted to me.

  It was Max’s turn. He raised his hand. He does that sometimes, forgetting he’s not at school. “Yes, dear?” I said.

  “Do I say ‘peanut butter’ if I lied and you didn’t catch me?”

  “Yes, honey.”

  “Peanut butter!”

  TIMES I’VE CONSIDERED SUICIDE

  1. Age 13.

  2. College. I used to wake up on the floor with an empty bottle of Four Roses bourbon and a knife, slowly remembering that I planned to cut off the pinkie of my left hand as a reminder never to drink again.

  3. After Joe died. Kill the kids and then myself.

  A car turned into the driveway. It was too early for Diane to be home, but the dogs were doing their Merm is back bark, and they never lie.

  “Sounds like your mama is here,” said Penn, reaching into his back pocket for the pouch of Bugler. “I’m going to step outside for a minute.”

  Through the window, I watched her get out of the car, staggering under the weight of her briefcase, her purse, and the cooler that carried her Lean Cuisine, fresh fruit, and Diet Cokes. My heart was going thumpety-thump, thump-thump-thump! As Penn stepped toward her with his arm outstretched, ready to take a load off her shoulders, she shook her head.

  “She’s crying!” shouted Max, looking out the window with a stricken face. He rushed to the door, but I stayed where I was, staring into the fire. I imagined her cocking her head as she answered an unknown caller on her cellphone. Yes, this is Diane Montgomery-Thibodeau. You received what in your Amazon.com package? My diary?

  “Move out of the way so Mama can get through the door,” Diane was saying. “It’s okay, Max. Hush, now. Let me get in the house.” Penn came in behind her, ready for action but silent in case it was a personal problem.

  “Hi, honey,” she said, glancing at me with red, swollen eyes, but she didn’t break her stride as she walked through the house putting everything away: cooler in the kitchen (trash in the can and dirty fork in the dishwasher), briefcase on the shelf beside her desk in the bedroom, purse on the coffee table where she could easily reach her cellphone and nicotine gum. When the shit hits the fan in our house, we clean up.

  “Hi!” I said too brightly. “You’re home!”

  My heart had basically stopped. We were at the base note of Amazing Grace now, and I didn’t like it. It smelled too personal. Her heels went click, clack, click, clack. Take everything out of the car as soon as you get out—that was her rule. Put everything away immediately. Click. Clack. Everything has a home. Click, clack—like pages rolling off Grandma’s old typewriter.

  “Okay, everybody,” said Diane as she started to clear our junk off the kitchen table. “Here’s the deal. I lost my job.”

  I’ve never had a real job, other than writing, but I know what it feels like to lose one. It’s like the Turkish Twist at the Chutiksee County Fair, a rotor ride that spins you so fast you’re still stuck to the wall when the floor drops out beneath you. You keep asking yourself, Why did I take this ride?

  Watching the family drama in the living room when Diane got canned was more than I could handle, so I went to my room and rolled under the bed. Bad choice. It was EMPTY under there without Diane’s journals. A few loose papers that had fallen out of the notebooks reminded me of the sin I had committed. I could hear every word in the living room.

  “You got fired!” yelled Max. “We’re poor now, aren’t we?”

  “We can sit down and talk about it in a minute, but I can’t think straight with all this clutter,” said Diane. She was picking up our cards from Liar, muttering that you can’t play anything if you’re missing even one card. Losing one card makes the entire deck useless.

  “I’m going to kill KCC,” Max sputtered. “Kill that stupid boss for firing you.”

  “Bang!” went the gun app. “Bang-bang-bang!” I heard the front door open and then Penn’s voice.

  “Give me that, Max.” The shootin
g stopped. “Diane, sit down for a minute. I’ll make you a cup of tea.”

  “No, I’m fine. Where’s my gum?”

  “I’m sorry, Mom,” said Max. “I’m really sorry. Let’s make a treaty.”

  It got quiet. I could hear the fatwood crackling in the fire. Diane had probably pulled Max into her lap. Maybe she was stroking his hair, and he was nuzzling her neck in that one silky spot that smells like home.

  “It’s not as bad as it sounds,” she said. “They didn’t actually fire me. Apparently, the dean’s brother-in-law works in the police department. I can’t remember his title.”

  “Asshole, probably,” said Penn. “Sorry for interrupting. Go on.”

  “I don’t think he’s the one who arrested Charles, but I’m not sure. Anyway, he found out that I was helping Charles write his defense statement.”

  “The crime of sedition,” said Penn. “I knew it.”

  “They told me I could finish out the semester. I told them good luck finding someone to teach my class tomorrow.”

  “You quit?” demanded Max. “You’re a quitter? You wouldn’t even let me quit swimming.”

  “She resigned,” said Penn. “On moral grounds. She was transformed through Christ at Kanuga Christian College, just like the sign says.”

  “Where’s Aris?” asked Diane.

  “Probably hiding under her bed,” said Max. “Do you want me to get her?”

  “No, leave her alone.”

  I came out from under my bed and flopped on top of the mattress, where I could get more air. I could have used my mad bomber hat; I always think better in my hat. I checked my social media sites, but that was depressing because everyone was flirting. Consumed by guilt, I had forgotten it was almost Valentine’s Day. Billy’s “cousin,” who was popping up in more pictures lately, posted a dumb “Does He Like Me or Like-Like Me?” quiz. Kate was sharing fun facts about the execution of a Christian saint named Valentine. In his latest mug shot, Anders wore a Snoopy T-shirt with a heart on it. Someone replied, “Dude, settle. R u in love or what?”