[stylist] One more go at "the heart of it" chapter 1.

Wed Oct 7 02:27:35 UTC 2009

You duplicated why they were in South America and I think you forgot an h on 
south once.
Otherwise, I like it.
Barbara

Snow is God's way of reminding us that beauty can be found even in the 
coldest hearts.

--------------------------------------------------
From: "Alan" <awheeler at neb.rr.com>
Sent: Tuesday, October 06, 2009 8:14 AM
To: "Writer's Division Mailing List" <stylist at nfbnet.org>
Subject: [stylist] One more go at "the heart of it" chapter 1.

> Hi everyone,
> I was thinking about what James said, and I knew I had to fit a 
> description of Michael and Anna's work into the first chapter.  So, I have 
> given that a go.  Let me know what you think.  I also have chapter 2 
> almost ready.
>
> The heart of it
>
> By: Alan Wheeler
>
>
>
> chapter one
>
> Heart Break
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> BUMP!!
>
> Michael looked up from his section of the Sunday Chicago Sun Times as he 
> and Anna sat in the front of the first class section of the airplane. The 
> jolt of turbulence brought Michael back to his distracted thoughts. He and 
> Anna  weren't moving, no real "turbulence" for them,  they were 
> stagnating, standing still, and it drove him mad.
>
>
>
> Oh, they loved each other, that wasn't the problem.  It was communicating; 
> communicating their love for each other to each other, communicating 
> without putting the other on the defensive all the time.  Those were the 
> problem areas for them.  They both knew it.  Yet, neither Michael or Anna 
> took steps to remedy the problem.  It had become akin to that proverbial 
> elephant in the living room that no one speaks of, but rather walks a wide 
> circle around, simply to avoid it.
>
>
>
> Michael had hoped their trip to South America would nudge them out of this 
> routine, cause them to break down barriers, but it didn't happen that way. 
> No change occurred at all, in fact.
>
>
>
> He looked over at her as she read her Stephen King novel, and his heart 
> seemed to stutter in his chest, as if beating every other beat.  He loved 
> her so much, and yet felt so far away.  It hurt him; hurt him deeply.  He 
> caught her looking at him out of the corner of her eye, and the look on 
> her face told him in no uncertain terms she was thinking about the very 
> same things.  He saw the love in her eyes, but he also saw a seemingly 
> bottomless sadness and loneliness there, too.
>
>
>
> He wanted to throw down his newspaper, tell her just how unreservedly he 
> loved her and demand she say what she was thinking.  It was futile.  It 
> was futile because Michael knew that he would balk if she made the same 
> demand of him.  She was no magazine model, no cover girl, but that didn't 
> matter to Michael.  Anna's inner beauty, her sense of happiness and peace 
> manifested itself in her glowing skin, bright smile, lush black hair and 
> made her outshine any model on any magazine. He had tried to open up, 
> tried to get past the barriers he felt between them. To Michael it was 
> like body-slamming a brick wall.
>
>
>
> All he could bring himself to do was brush a lock of her long, black hair 
> out of her  soft slightly rounded face.  It was a gesture of affection, to 
> him, anyway, but she just vaguely glanced at him out of the corner of her 
> eye, and continued to read.
>
>
>
> ***
>
>
>
>
>
> Anna felt Michael's lightly callused hand brush the loose lock of hair. 
> She really did love him.  He was like no man she had ever known, let alone 
> loved.  Even now, looking at him made her heart stop for a moment, her 
> breath silently hitching.  So many female friends of hers had commented on 
> how, if his reddish hair was just a slightly different color, he could 
> pass for Brad Pitt.  He, of course, had laughed this off. Brad Pitt wasn't 
> thick around the middle was Michael's argument. He also didn't have brown 
> hair. Anna always thought that Michael could put any matinee idol to 
> shame, especially Brad Pitt.  That is how much she loved him, inside and 
> out.
>
> Yet, for her it seemed like her head was extroverted and her heart 
> introverted. She could talk with him about their work in South America, 
> the impact that work would have back in the states, and do so for hours. 
> They both had found a job that was tied to their deepest compassion for 
> people in need.  It fed people in the remotest villages in Sot America, 
> and shamed the United States government, what with the current 
> administration making rhetoric-filled promises to help these villages 
> devistated by bad weather starvation and disease.  The organization they 
> worked for did more in one week than the U.S. did in a four-year 
> presidential term.  Anna loved seeing Michael work with his hands as he 
> did handyman-style jobs around the village.
>
>
>
> On the other hand, ask her to express her love for him, and it as if she 
> were pathologically shy, or mute.
>
>
>
> Ask her to talk about some way, big or small in which Michael may have 
> hurt her, even just with a unintended sleight, and her emotional throat 
> closed up and her voice was silent.
>
>
>
> She hated herself for it but she kept waiting on Michael to be the one to 
> open up. She knew she should take the first step since it seemed Michael 
> never would.  Unfortunately, she seemed too mired in it all to take that 
> step.  She recalled how she once thought being a better housewife would 
> tilt  the balance, and cause them to open up to each other.  But, it was 
> like the lyric she had heard in a song by the band Wilco says, "keeping 
> things clean doesn't change anything."
>
>
>
> They both had found a job that was tied to their deepest compassion for 
> people in need.  It fed people in the remotest villages in South America, 
> and shamed the United States government, what with the current 
> administration making rhetoric-filled promises to help these villages 
> devistated by bad weather starvation and disease.  The organization they 
> worked for did more in one week than the U.S. did in a four-year 
> presidential term. They both loved watching the other work.  Anna often 
> just sat and adored Michael as he did various handyman chores around the 
> village.  Michael caught himself pausing, quite often, in his work to 
> admire Anna from afar as she sat under a tree, teaching children from the 
> village how to read English. For both of them, the key word was "afar." 
> They were like two islands that depended on each other with no bridge 
> between them, and no open shipping lanes.
>
> They both sat, mutely gazing at each other. They both knew something had 
> to break, and both silently wondered if it ever would.
>
>
>
> ***
>
>
>
> abruptly, for Michael, something did.  It had nothing whatsoever to do 
> with their relationship.  It was pain, starting from the left side of his 
> chest and slowly radiating down his arm.  For the love of everything holy, 
> was he having a heart attack?  Here?  On this airplane?  He squeezed 
> Anna's small, silky hand, almost violently.  His eyes registered her shock 
> and horror as she realized something was wrong, then everything faded to 
> black.
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