When I was writing my first book,
Duffy Barkley is Not a Dog, I had a hard time writing for middle school and high school kids, but dealing with bullies and handicaps and a school shooting. The darkness was something modern kids live with, but still painful, and even though I knew I was working toward an ending filled with hope and renewal, I struggled with the brutal beginning. So I tried to rescue Duffy from the immediate agony by throwing in a kinder memory from his younger years.
So, after the school shooting, when his younger sister is taken by ambulance but Duffy is still waiting at the school, I wrote the following scene
Waiting
for the school to clear, Duffy had sat on the cement
steps
and leaned against the scratchy warmth of the brick wall.
His
teacher had glanced back reassuringly several times as he
moved
among the students and the parents milling on the curb.
Duffy
rarely moved. He sat tensely, with his crutches gripped
tightly
and positioned so he would be able to move quickly once
they
could finally go. He was holding himself just as tightly and
except
for those hiccups he didn't even tremble.
Suddenly a large
raven flew down and landed on the blacktop
where
the kids played four square. It turned its glossy black eye to
stare
straight at Duffy for a moment then it twisted its head to
check
the sky before hop, hop hopping to snatch up a piece of a
bagel
dropped earlier when the day had still been routine. The
raven
and the smaller crows seemed to know which days had
popcorn
sales and often only appeared just before lunch on
Friday.
Could it still be so early in the day? Duffy turned his head
to
watch as another raven dropped in and hopped about, trying to
get
closer to the prize.
Ravens, here was
something Duffy could think about without
crying
or screaming. Here was an ordinary, safe topic which had
nothing
to do with Izzy. Duffy wondered where the black birds
went
when it wasn't a Friday. Did they come every Friday, even
during
the summer?
Suddenly another
day with ravens and Skull filled Duffy's
memory;
They had been the second grade "big buddies" for a
class
of kindergartners. Their class had the job of hiding colored
eggs
on the playground for a hunt. As Duffy pulled his walker,
with
a dozen bright eggs nestled in the basket always velcroed to
the
crossbar, Skull rose up from behind a bush and barked wildly.
He
had tripped Duffy. Unbelievably, only one egg had broken.
Duffy
left it on the ground and walked resolutely away to scatter
the
remaining eggs. The muscles in his back ached from being
clenched
as he waited for another attack. A teacher called Skull
over
and made him sit alone on the bench. Duffy watched him
out
of the corner of his eye. "Odd," he thought, "He looks
as
lonely
as I am." Then Skull glanced up and met Duffy's gaze. For
a
moment Skull looked vulnerable, then his face hardened and he
pounded
the palm of one hand with his own fist. Duffy swallowed
hard,
and quickly glanced away.
When the eggs were
scattered among the bushes and swings,
Duffy's
class had lined up to go in and bring out their little
buddies.
The teacher suddenly pointed to a raven which had been
waiting
for them to leave. It hopped calmly over and gulped down
the
bits of broken egg. The class began to go in, figuring the show
was
over. Duffy and Skull were among the last in line and both
gasped
into startled laughter when the raven next hopped over and
picked
up an unbroken egg. It then hopped up with wings
flapping
to about two feet above the blacktop before letting the
egg
drop. The clever bird then began greedily gulping this second
treat.
Their shared laughter felt uncomfortable and Duffy and
Skull
glanced at each other, then turned quickly away. Both
hurried
after the class and never mentioned the sly bird again.
Duffy blinked and
the two birds on the empty playground at
lunchtime
grew tired of waiting for the crumb dropping children
who
weren't coming. They flew up to a wire, then jumped up and
flew
away. Duffy wished he could flyaway with them. He
shivered
and turned his head back toward the nervous
adults
on the curb.
I still think at times that the creatures out there are smarter than the people they share this world with, but Duffy reminded me that there is always hope.
As I may have mentioned, I grew up far from the sea, near Yellowstone Park, in the lakes and Rocky Mountains and High Desert of Wyoming. I loved that area, but even as a young child, the pull of the ocean and her beaches was always on me. I would stroll the rocky beaches at Yellowstone Lake, following the waves and watching the gulls and dream that I was Gidget, with a surfboard to ride.
