Goddess Fish Party Pavilion

         

   Readers often ask how much of actual personal experience is used in our writing.  The answer is that we use quite a bit, although the personal experience is stretched and shaped to fit the character and the scene.  In  Kate and the Kid, Kate has a fear of heights that is very familiar to Anne.  At one point, in a fit of anger, the woman who is taking care of Jenny throws Jenny’s favorite doll out of the window.  It lies in a courtyard at the back of their apartment building that is only accessible by going down the fire escape – a prospect that is unthinkable to Kate.  However, rather than let Jenny go down alone, Kate overcomes her fears.  

When Kate got back to the bedroom, the girl was still on the fire escape, tiptoeing close to the edge, looking over the side for Miranda.

“Please, come in, Jenny,” Kate said. “We’ll have the superintendent next door help get Miranda. Really we will.”

Jenny shook her head and stared straight down over the railing at the courtyard below. Kate tried not to think about what Jenny was asking of her. Surely she knew this was not possible.

“I realize the Super’s not around now. But tomorrow he’ll help us. We’ll get up first thing in the morning...”

With a quick glance at Kate, Jenny started down the fire escape stairs.

“Jenny, no!! Please wait. Just wait.”

The girl hesitated, looping one arm over the railing. Her face was not impassive. Her eyes were not those of a zombie. Her face was alive with pain and confusion and determination. Kate swallowed hard, then lifted the window open as far as it would go. She took a deep breath. Her arms and hands were trembling as she eased out sideways, her rear-end first, followed by her right leg, her head and upper torso and finally her left leg. She was hoping to act confident, but as she reached the center of the metal slats, she began to shake. A breeze caught her hair. She couldn’t breathe. She began to cry. The world was a spinning blur.

Then she felt the girl beside her. A bony little arm was wrapped around her neck. Smooth cool lips were kissing the tears on her cheeks and on her eyes, over and over again.

“It’s okay, Katy,” the girl said. “We can help each other. We’ll do it together, Katy.”

Kenneth Hicks and Anne Rothman-Hicks
https://www.facebook.com/pages/Kenneth-Hicks-and-Anne-Rothman-Hicks/622272714477979

Authors of:
Kate and the Kid, (adult fiction)(Wings ePress)
Mind Me, Milady, (adult fiction)(Barbarian Books)

Things Are Not Wht They Seem, (‘tween fantasy/adventure) (MuseItUp Publising)
Stone Faces, (middle grade)(on the Apple iBookstore)
Hearts (no flowers) Signs of Love in the Gritty City (on the Apple iBookstore)