Page 65 of By the Book

“A girl’s shoe,” my mom said. “Mary Janes.”

“Only they weren’t for a human girl. They belonged to a doll.”

“One of those life-sized dolls.”

“Ew,” I said with a laugh—only in part becauselife-sized dollswas about the most generous euphemism I could think of.

“She’s the victim,” my mom said. “The doll. That’s how it starts.”

“But somehow it’s also tied to a real murder.”

She was smiling, her eyes still fixed on the spot where sea met land. The rumble of a diesel engine grew louder out on the water. Then it faded away again.

“Do you know why I don’t outline?” I asked.

My mom made an unflattering noise—not quite a snort, but close. “Because, my child, you are your father’s son, and you’re genetically incapable of outlining.”

I burst out laughing, and to my surprise, a smile curved my mom’s mouth—or a shadow of a smile, maybe.

“You never wondered why we don’t co-write?” my mom asked drily.

“But you did, didn’t you? I thought you wrote that standalone thriller together.”

“And it almost cost us our marriage. The day we finished that manuscript, I packed my bags and spent six weeks in a motel outside Atlanta trying to become a documentary filmmaker.”

More laughter rolled out of me.

“I was terrible at it, as you might imagine,” my mom said. “For some reason, documentary audiences do not appreciate unreliable narrators.”

“Oh my God,” I whispered.

“Your father was kind enough to take me back,” she said, and it was impossible to tell if her little laugh meant she was joking. “He’s always been kind. I’m glad you got that from him.”

“My best writing,” I said slowly, trying to talk my way to what I wanted to say, “and I’m using the wordbestloosely, always seems to happen when I get out beyond my comfort zone, when I’m doing something new, or something that’s just frankly terrifying. When I’m living in the moment of making something, and I feel connected to it, even if I don’t know what the whole thing is about. I’m sure plenty of people still do that kind of work even with an outline, but for me, it doesn’t happen that way. That’s why I don’t use an outline.”

“People who don’t use outlines have more frequent problems with plot holes. And they run into dead-ends.”

“Oh yeah, one hundred percent. But my point is that this is my life, and I’m in the thick of it, and Ifeelalive, if that makes any sense. I know from the outside it looks like I’m flailing, but I’m not. Or at least, not all the time.”

That made her laugh again. “I was always slightly surprised you didn’t spend more time on outlines. There’s an entire subspecies of writers who have perfected the art ofprocrastination by outline. People spend their whole lives not writing a single word because they want to have the whole thing planned from the beginning.” She slanted a look at me. “But I suppose those same people don’t walk out the door one day and move to the other side of the country.”

There were a lot of things I could have said to that. I finally went with, “No, probably not.”

“You’ve always had so much courage, Dashiell. You’ve always been so determined to be true to yourself. Those are rare and admirable qualities.”

“Thank you.”

“I could wish, however, that those qualities translated a little more frequently into action,” she said with a wry twist to the words. “Although having seen what you go through in this town, I’m not sure I want you to have any more action of any kind. I’m half-tempted to throw you in the RV and take you back to the farm against your will, just to keep you safe.”

“Nowhere is safe, Mom. That’s pretty much the point of every book you write.”

“Why,” she asked with that same wry twist, “do you think I write so often about mothers?”

Water splashed beneath our feet. The fog rolling in was damp against my cheek.

“Bobby seems like the kind of person who would use an outline.” My mom’s attempt at crispness broke the silence. “Not that he would get bogged down in it. But he seems very…structured.”

“Are you kidding? He has an app on his phone that he only uses to track his workouts. There are so many numbers, Mom. So many grids and columns and—andgoals.”

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