It has been pointed out to me that I never said which Christmas story was mine over at LDS Publisher’s contest. Of course, I did make that announcement over on my other blog, but I thought I made it here, too. Guess not.

Anyway, here it is.

My story for this year’s contest was A New End of It, based on the last chapter of A Christmas Carol. It was fun, and I enjoyed writing it. I’m quite pleased with the score I got on my feedback form.

It won’t be in the book, though.

However, my story from two years ago, Believe, Mr. Thomas, will be. So I’ll have my first ever bona fide publishing credit. Yay!

I just noticed that both years, my story was entry #19. Maybe I have a new lucky number. Hmm.

While you’re in the Christmas story mood, read this other entry at LDS Publisher. It’s not perfect, but I think it’s pretty well done, considering the author is my not-yet-twelve-year-old daughter.

I had a most amazing experience at our writer’s group last night. I’ve been obsessing over my first chapter lately, but I wasn’t sure if I was ready to give it to the group. I decided to take it, and I’m glad I did.

The new beginning was very well received, especially by those who heard my attempt two weeks ago. I got some good feedback. Several others read, including my daughter and a young woman who had brought a comic book she was working on.

After the meeting, the gal with the comic book handed me a drawing of a girl. At first I thought it was part of her comic, but as I looked at it and she explained it to me, I realized that this was a picture of one of my characters, illustrating the climax of the scene I had just read.

I was completely taken by surprise. My writing had made a connection with someone, and I was holding the evidence in my hand. Really, really cool.

I thanked her profusely, and picked up a frame at Wal-Mart on the way home. The drawing is now hanging on the wall in my office.

I’m so excited, I just have to share. Not the whole chapter – just the part in the picture.

George looked at the paper Mia had given him before he left. Her auntie’s name was Kehau Pulakaumaka, but George didn’t have much else to go on – just a phone number and a vague description. “She’s about my height with black hair about this long,” Mia had said, pointing to her shoulder. “You can’t miss her.”

As George scanned the arriving passengers, he soon spotted a woman matching Kehau’s description. In fact, it didn’t take him long to spot several dozen women about Mia’s height, and they all had shoulder-length black hair. George looked at the paper and read through the scant information again, hoping to find something that might help his search, but there was nothing.

He watched a group of kids in matching green t-shirts gather around a big man holding a sign that read Hana Elementary. With a sudden flash of inspiration, George walked over to a rental car counter. He smiled at the man behind the desk and said “Do you by any chance have a piece of paper and a marker I could borrow?” The man pulled a nearly-blank sheet from a stack near his printer, and then rummaged around in his desk before handing George a large red Sharpie.

“Here you go. I’ll need the pen back, but you can keep the paper when you’re done,” he said with a wink.

George returned the man’s smile and said “Thank you.” He then copied the name from Mia’s little scrap, starting out neatly but cramming the last half of “Pulakaumaka” against the right side of the page. He returned the pen and made his way to the baggage carousel for Kehau’s flight, where he stood with his makeshift sign, smiling at every middle-aged, dark-haired woman who passed. He got a lot of smiles in return, but nobody stopped.

As he looked over the crowd, he noticed a girl across the baggage claim eyeing him. She was about his age, and quite attractive. He smiled at her, and she smiled back, then turned her attention to her back pack, from which she produced a cell phone. As George continued his search for Kehau, he kept stealing glances back towards this girl. After a few minutes, she put her phone away and began wheeling her suitcase towards him. His heart began to beat faster. As she approached, George smiled and said “Hi.”

“Hi… George?” she said.

George wrinkled his brow. How did she know his name? He searched his memory frantically, but couldn’t remember ever meeting this girl before. He looked at her luggage for a clue, but without success, and he finally had to admit defeat. “I’m sorry,” he said. “What was your name again?”

The girl raised her eyebrows, and then smiled. She took the sign from his hand and held it under her chin so that the top of the paper brushed her black, shoulder length hair.

George had found Auntie Kehau.

We did a writing exercise at my new writer’s group meeting last night. We had ten minutes. The prompt was “and they lived happily ever after.”

I came up with this:

Tucker was the strong, silent, independent type. Alyssa was just the opposite – small, slow, and full of need.

And yet, somehow, Tucker saw something in this gal that captured his heart. Perhaps it was the way she stroked his head, spoke to him in sweet, loving tones, or tucked him in at night.

Maybe it was because she fed him so well.

But whatever the reason, Tucker – with his golden eyes and sandy hair – fell hard for this blue-eyed brunette. They soon became nearly inseparable. Bosom buddies. Best pals. A cat and his little girl.

And they lived happily ever after.

This is the last of the boot camp entries I plan to post on the blog.

This scene involves the same Kehau who broke George’s heart in the Showing Emotions excerpt, and it takes place much later. Things seem to be finally going well for our hero.

Kehau was already twenty feet away, swimming towards a cluster of jagged lava near the far edge of the cove. The sudden chill of the water made George catch his breath, but soon his body had adapted and he found himself crouching to keep his shoulders below the surface as he hurried after Kehau.

“Look, There are so many today,” she said as he approached. “I haven’t seen this many in years!” George watched Kehau use a knife to force a squat, conical shell little bigger than a quarter from the rocks and put it in the mesh bag tied at her waist.

“What is that?” George asked.

“Opihi,” said Kehau smiling, but George just looked at her blankly. “Don’t tell me you’ve never had opihi.” George shook his head and made a face. “Oh, come on. They’re so good. Here – you’ve got to try one.” Kehau pried another shell from the rock, then pulled out a lump that looked like gray-brown bubble gum.

She offered it to George, but he gently pushed her hand away, smiled and said “No, thanks.”

“Oh, come on,” she said, and popped the mollusk into her mouth. “Mmm.” Kehau closed her eyes and smiled in ecstasy.

Watching this, George felt a strange combination of revulsion and fascination. He looked at the bag and the dozen or so opihi that lay inside. “Are you going to eat all of those?” he asked.

“No, they’re for the luau at Mahina’s tonight. I don’t like them as much when they’ve been cooked, though.”

“So they’re going to cook these?” George asked.

“Unfortunately,” said Kehau.

“Well, maybe I’ll try one tonight. After they’re cooked.”

Kehau wrinkled her nose at him. “Chicken,” she said, and popped another in her mouth.

Kehau handed George the other knife, and he helped her pry the little limpets free. As they worked, Kehau kept giving George sly, sideways glances. It wasn’t long before the tide had risen up to her chin, and George noticed she was spending most of her time treading water. “That’s probably enough,” she said when the bag was nearly half full.

Kehau took George’s knife and set it on the rocks along with her own, and bobbed over to him with a hand behind her back. Putting her other hand behind his neck, she said “Close your eyes, George.”

George was surprised she would even try such an obvious trick, but decided to pretend and play along, closing his eyes but shutting his lips tightly between his teeth. He waited for her to try and force the cold, wet shellfish into his mouth, but she never did. Instead, he felt the soft, moist warmth of her lips as she pulled herself up out of the water and kissed him. George opened his eyes in surprise.

The kiss was quick but powerful. George shivered, and the hair on his neck stood on end. “Did you like that?” she asked quietly.

All he could say was “Yeah.”

“Would you like another?” she asked.

George raised his eyebrows. “Sure,” he said.

“OK,” she said, smiling. “Close your eyes.”

George complied, and she kissed him again. And again. Each kiss a little longer, a little firmer, and a little more open. But as George moved forward to meet her kiss yet again, she pulled back and quickly slipped an opihi into his mouth. Before George could react, she took his head in both hands and clamped her lips onto his. He struggled, but quickly gave in to her, and the longer they kissed the more he liked the taste.

After an eternity that ended much to soon, Kehau let go of George and backed away. “So,” she said in a quietly triumphant voice. “How was it?”

George cocked his head and gave her a wry smile. “I’m not sure. I think I’d better try another one.”

She smiled, placed another opihi in his mouth, and kissed him.

The feedback on these boot camp entries has been great. Thanks. This one was for the section on creating lovable characters. George is the main character. Mahina is a friend and coworker at his flower shop job.

“Why don’t I drop you and the flowers at the main lobby,” said George. “I can park the van, then run back to help you carry them in.”

Mahina looked back at the boxes of flowers and three large arrangement sections. “Good idea,” she said. “I wondered how we were going to get everything in there.”

George parked just outside the large, open hotel lobby and began unloading. “Hey, George,” Mahina said, “Just have the valet park the van. Then you no need go.”

Before George could raise an objection, she put her fingers to her lips and filled the air with a piercing whistle. “Hey, you! Valet! Ovah hea!”

One of the small, dark-haired men in the loud pink aloha shirts hustled towards them, and handed George a ticket in exchange for the keys. Turning around, George found Mahina wheeling a golden luggage cart towards their stack of flowers, a tall slender porter hurrying along behind her. “Here, look at this, George. Put everything on here.”

George shook his head, smiled at her mettle, and began loading the flowers.

Once they finally found the correct conference room, George helped Mahina arrange the three blocks of foam that bristled with protea, bird of paradise, anthuriums, and ginger. He then unpacked the rest of the flowers and greenery, and Mahina began filling in the voids, merging the three separate arrangements into one. Like a surgeon’s assistant, George handed her flowers as she called for them: Delicate sprays of white dendrobium orchids; broad, glossy ti leaves; and thin, delicate palms.

“George – hand me one of those ‘little boy’ flowers.”

George looked around, confused. “Which flower?”

“The red one. Anthurium.”

George picked up one of the blood-red blooms and examined it. He had seen the flat, glossy flowers hundreds of times, but with Mahina’s description he now saw the heart-shaped flower in an entirely new light. He smiled, blushing slightly, and handed it to her.

Mahina laughed at his reaction. “You never heard that before?”

“No,” said George. “But that’s good. I like it.”

“I love anthuriums,” she said, deftly placing the flower in the arrangement. “I’m going to have thousands of them at my wedding. Only ninety-seven more days!”

George shook his head. “You’re really going to do it, aren’t you? You’re going to wait the whole two years, and marry Robert as soon as he gets home.”

“Yes,” Mahina said defensively. “Why does everyone always seem so surprised by that.”

“Because it usually doesn’t work out, that’s why. When I went into the MTC, there were eleven other missionaries in my district. I was the only one who didn’t have a girlfriend. Sixteen months later, none of us had girlfriends.”

“Oh, wow,” she said. After working in silence for a few moments, she added “Well, maybe you were really the lucky one, then. The only one who didn’t get a broken heart in the mail.”

George gave a short, bitter laugh. “Yeah, that’s because everyone was in such a hurry to break my heart before I left. I guess maybe it was better that I didn’t have to deal with that in the field, but it still bothered me that I was the only one who didn’t have a girlfriend. It was like there was something wrong with me.”

“No,” she said patronizingly. “Besides, you’ve got a girlfriend now, right?”

“Yeah, I guess,” George replied.

“You guess? What’s that – trouble in paradise already?”

“No,” George replied, though without much conviction. “Everything’s fine. It’s just…” His voice trailed off, and he tried again to put feelings into words. “I don’t know. I just thought things would be different, you know?”

Thanks for all of the feedback on the last little bit of boot camp homework. Here is another segment. This one was for the section on showing emotion.

Did I describe the moment sufficiently? Or does the emotion fall flat?

George was disappointed but not surprised when Kehau appeared with her usual group of friends. Her laughter drifted on the cool night breeze in painful contrast to the dread growing inside him. With as much courage as he could muster, George walked towards her.

“Hi, George,” she said as he approached.

George felt himself go numb. His brain and his body disconnected, and he seemed to be moving and speaking by remote control. “Kehau. Hey, um, could I talk to you for a minute?”

The group stopped, and Kehau said “Yeah, sure.” Her friends shot each other glances and little smiles, but to George’s horror they made no move to leave.

An uncomfortable moment passed before Kehau turned to her friends and said “You go on ahead. I’ll catch up in a few minutes.”

Thank you, thought George as her friends smirked their good-byes and slowly walked off. They burst into a fit of giggles when they were several yards down the sidewalk, and George felt his confidence erode even further

A look of concern now replaced Kehau’s usual smile. Groups of PCC night show workers continued to stream towards them, and while George didn’t quite know what he wanted to say, he was sure he wanted to say it in private. “Can we walk this way?” he asked, indicating the open field between the old gym and the Canon Center.

“Sure,” she said, and they moved off together in an uneasy silence.

The field was not large, maybe an acre, and George’s thoughts were still a jumble of fear and pain when they reached the middle. Although unsure of what he was going to say, George stopped anyway so as to avoid the crowds at the far end of the field.

“Kehau, I, um…” George stammered. His mind was a mess of thoughts and questions, yet his mouth refused to use the words his brain gave it. I really care about you. Why are you avoiding me? Did we have something, or did I just imagine it?

No, there had been something – George was sure of it. Was it still there? Probably not, but he just didn’t know for sure. Not knowing was killing him. He had to ask.

He made himself look at Kehau, to search her eyes for some sign of hope. But in the harsh, dim light he saw only pity. George felt a sudden urge to disappear from the face of the earth. Just get it over with, you idiot.

Finally forcing his mouth to work, he managed to say “I like you, Kehau. I like you lot. And, um…” But the words failed him, and he had to stop again.

“I like you too, George.” Kehau reached out and took his hand in hers. “Really, I do. It’s just…” She paused, and the knot in George’s stomach tightened. “George, I’m really glad you’re my friend.”

There it was – the ‘F’ word! The knot in George’s stomach leapt and became a lump in his throat. “And that’s all, right?” George asked, trying to sound indifferent. “Just friends?” George felt light headed, and his eyes begin to water. He wanted desperately to leave before the tears could come and embarrass him any further.

“I’m sorry if I let you think there was more than that between us.” She tilted her head and smiled sadly. “You’re a great guy, George, and I would never want to hurt you.”

And yet that’s exactly what you’re doing. George wanted to vanish – to run and hide and forget he had ever met Kehau. But instead he put on his brave face and tried to pretend nothing was wrong.

“Don’t worry about it,” he said. “I figured that was the case. I just wanted to know for sure.” He was surprised to find by making believe he wasn’t hurt the tightness in his throat eased, and the tears that filled his eyes began to slowly drain away.

“Here, let me walk you back to your room,” he said. What? No! Are you crazy? Get out of here while you still can! But the words had already been spoken. George offered Kehau his arm, which she took after a brief hesitation. After a couple of steps, she changed her mind and let go. They walked in silence back to Kehau’s dorm.

As promised, I have posted below my first LDStorymakers Boot Camp writing selection. This also represents the first two pages of my MS. I think I’ve polished it up pretty well, but there’s no question it’s still far from perfect. Tell me what you think. Go on – I can take it.

Since we learned at the conference that sunsets are bad, I’ve chosen instead to start with a sunrise.

“So – what do you think?”

George McDonald glanced at the girl by his side. The warm light of sunrise bathed her face, but her expression was impassive and difficult to read. She didn’t answer right away, and George turned his eyes back to the waves gently rolling across the ocean.

Without taking her gaze from the gold and magenta sky, Julie finally answered him. “Very nice,” she said. “Very ro’tic.”

This was a new one to George. “‘Ro’tic?’ What’s that?”

“You know – ‘Romantic, but without the man.’”

George acted hurt. “What do you mean – ‘without the man?’”

Julie nudged him hard. “Sorry. Brothers don’t count.”

George smiled and put his arm around her. “No, I don’t suppose they do.”

“Now, see, if you just had a girlfriend, you could have brought her up here and I could still be in bed asleep.”

“Hey!” he said, returning her nudge. “Give me a break. I just got home.”

“You’ve been home almost a week – what’s your problem?” she teased. “A studly returned missionary like you should be practically engaged by now.”

George laughed as the stiff ocean breeze blew through his short blond hair. “Well, for your information, I already have dates with not one but two girls this weekend.”

“Really?” The genuine surprise in her voice irritated George. “Who? Not that girl you met in Washington – is she even still around.”

“No, I haven’t’ run into Rhonda yet,” George said. “Actually, I’m going out with Ambre on Friday, and Melanie on Saturday.” George tried to sound pleased with himself, although he didn’t expect anything to come of either date.

“But not Mahina?” Julie asked. George smiled and shook his head. “I told you you were wasting your time with her. She’s waiting for Robert, and that’s it.” Julie looked at him appraisingly. “Still, dates with two of the three flower shop girls – I’m impressed. Maybe there’s hope for you after all. And here I thought you took that job just to make mom mad.”

Smiling, George patted her shoulder. “No, making mom mad is your job. I’m the good kid, remember?” Then almost as an afterthought he added, “I was really hoping she wouldn’t find out.”

Julie grunted. “Yeah, like you’d ever be able to keep a secret like that here in Laie. Besides, you’re a big boy now, George. You can do what you want. You don’t need your mommy’s approval.”

George sighed. Julie was right, of course. It seemed she was always right.

George took a long look over the ocean panorama he had missed so much, then gave Julie’s shoulder a tug. “C’mon. My tummie’s still on Pacific time, and I need some breakfast.”

As they headed back to the car, someone yelled “Hey! Old McDonald!” George turned to find Scott Finai. Of all the people in the world, Scott was the last one he wanted to see.

Scott Finai was everything George wasn’t – handsome, athletic, and extremely cocky. Scott thought very highly of himself, a condition made worse by the fact that a lot of other people thought highly of him, too. As the star of the high school football and wrestling teams, he was Mr. Popularity, rarely without an attractive girl giggling at his side.

The pretty brunette running with him this morning was evidence Scott had not lost his touch. Always mindful of a chance to show off, Scott made sure George was looking before he grabbed his girlfriend and gave her a big kiss. She squealed and slapped his shoulder, then started to giggle again.