Backstory Excerpts for Hardcore Fans, part 6

It’s been a few months since the last installment of Channing’s Memories, the cut backstory scenes that helped to shape the characters of Firetender. But first…

A Writing Update

I’m currently doing major revisions on Chalice Book 3, The Fire of Your Love. I have rewritten some sections, added scenes, and revised others. I think the story’s continuity is better now, and I am nearing the end of the book and revising the major conflict towards the end and then all the nice happy ending parts. This third novel takes place over eight years and is set (mostly) in a Catholic seminary. It contains lots of drama and some intense action scenes (and Dallas gets a new scar, of course).

I will soon be needing beta readers for this novel! I am grateful for anyone who will volunteer to read and offer feedback. I am especially interested in having at least one seminarian or relatively new priest reading it to give me pointers on how to make the seminary aspects of the story as accurate as they can be. If you want to beta read, please let me know so I can add you to my list! Also, if you know anyone else who would be interested - particularly males ages 18-30 - please send this to them!

I plan to get back to annotating Firetender soon, to be sent as a digital book to anyone who has purchased the novel and wants to read the behind-the-scenes details: how characters came to be, nerdy facts about Dallas’s car, a playlist and where I would envision each song were Firetender a movie, map details, research notes, and more! It’s a slow process but has been fun to put together!

Keep Up to Date on my Instagram

Backstory Excerpts

The following excerpts are for those who have read Firetender and want more background details. I don’t recommend reading these Backstory Excerpt posts unless you’ve read the book, but I also can’t stop you if this is the way you’d rather meet Channing. None of these scenes further the plot, but they give insight into who the characters are and what shaped them into who they became. All this unpublished writing served me well: I got to know my characters better through this exploration of their backstory. So these are unpolished excerpts, not final published quality. You may notice I do a lot of telling of facts about Channing’s background and not as much showing of how he is in each excerpt based on influences from his past. Like I said, not revised to publishing quality, but very good for giving me insight into my own character. If you want to start at the beginning of these memories and missed the first installation, find it here.

A side note - if you have read Firetender or are planning to do so, please leave a review on Amazon if you enjoyed the story. Book reviews help small authors so much in spreading the word about their books. The more reviews, the more likely Amazon is to make the book more visible to people browsing their website.

Buy or Review Firetender Here

The following two memories are of Channing at around ages 13 and 14, in 1992/3 and 1993/4. If you’ve read Firetender, the railroad flashback scene with the fight against the bullies comes chronologically in between these two excerpts below. Both of the following scenes were titles in my “Channing’s Memories” list on paper from way back in the beginning, but I wrote most of this in 2020. You will notice Channing’s toy Matchbox car in the second memory, which appears in a few scenes in Firetender and at the beginning of Enkindle in Me. You’ll also pick up on a few things that I pulled from these scenes and used elsewhere in Firetender.

BY THE RIVER

Channing sat on the bank, watching as the brown water sluggishly passed in front of him, with the occasional tree branch or piece of garbage floating by on its way downstream.  He let his mind wander on a steady course towards its destination, but unlike the river, that destination was yet to be determined.  As a matter of fact, his source was not as clear as that of the river, which he knew from having found it on a map.  The map of life was more complex, Channing was discovering.  But just like this river, it had to be tangible, be real.  If I myself am real, Channing thought, then there must be real answers, real reasons for things.

The red circle is around where I imagine Channing’s neighborhood to have been, and the red arrow points to where I imagine he sat on the riverbank. However, the bridge crossing the river in my story is in the neighborhood itself, not such a wide/busy road.

He had made his way down to the riverbank late last night, in the dark.  At nearly midnight, his mother had taken it into her head to berate Channing because they were out of toothpaste.  She had insisted that Channing must have used the last of it.  He’d offered to buy some more in the morning, to walk the few blocks to the store.  She had been drinking, too.  She was even less reasonable in that state than was typical.  She’d thrown everything at him within her reach while cursing him for wasting things, for using up everything in the house.  In truth, Channing hadn’t brushed his teeth in two days because he couldn’t even find the toothpaste.  He had taken refuge from her onslaught by locking himself in the bathroom, listening to her rage coming through the door at him.  She’d actually kicked the door in a few minutes later, resulting in a knot on Channing’s forehead where it had hit him as she’d forced her way in.  She’d felt badly a few minutes later, crying and trying to get Channing to hold ice to the bump, finally collapsing on the couch, crying and shaking.  From past experiences, Channing knew that if he made any attempt to comfort her, she would do a 180 back into a rage against him.  He had felt a tinge of pity for her, but he also remembered being slapped several times in the past when trying to show compassion to his unstable mother.

She had calmed down after a few minutes and resumed her typical indifferent, cold attitude toward her 13-year-old son.  After finding the toothpaste where she’d apparently left it herself, in her bedroom, she had handed Channing a twenty dollar bill and said, “Go to the corner store and get me some cigarettes.  And I guess you can have the change; I haven’t given you money lately.”  Channing had recognized this as a lame attempt at making up to him.  After bringing back a pack of cigarettes, he’d left the house with the rest of the money and a paperback book in his back pocket.  He’d started sleeping in the bushes by the river when things had gotten tense late at night, when he felt it was too late to show up on Dallas’s doorstep.

An Elko gas station not far from Channing’s neighborhood

He had woken with the sun and climbed up the bank only to buy a cup of coffee from the nearby gas station where he’d gotten his mother’s cigarettes.  Now he was back at the edge of the river, planning to spend much of the day there.  He pulled the book from his pocket. It was one from the stack of used books he’d gotten from the public library’s used book sale a few weeks prior.  They sold a bag full of books for a quarter, and Channing had selected books randomly but in part based on the titles.  He was more likely to select a book if he didn’t know what some of the words in the title meant.  This one was called Orthodoxy by G. K. Chesterton.  He was halfway through the book now.

Channing had used reading as an escape for as long as he could remember, since he’d taught himself to read at age four through a combination of newspapers, signs, and any print appearing on television.  Lately, he was finding reading to be a source of deeper thinking, of reason and answers, in addition to being just for pleasure.  He’d spent countless hours in the library over the last year, reading whatever he could.

 He sipped his coffee as he pondered a particular line from the book: “I will not call it my philosophy, for I did not make it.  God and humanity made it, and it made me.”  Made, Channing thought.  Yes, he’d been made, everything had been made.  Created somehow from somewhere, not just by human actions.  The matter had to have come from somewhere initially.  And why else would somebody make something if not because it had some purpose, some importance?  For years Channing had felt as if he were nothing, important to nobody, completely insignificant.  But if this philosophy assigned him meaning and value simply by being a created member of humanity… Channing was hungry for more.

Maybe his parents didn’t determine his worth, Channing mused.  Maybe he wasn’t a nothing just because his father had repeatedly told him so in his first six years of life.  What if his goodness wasn’t simply determined by his willingness to do things for his mother such as fetching her cigarettes, but merely by virtue of his humanity?  But so many other people… kids at school who called him a loser.  Teachers who had been exasperated by his questions and reprimanded him for “daydreaming” or not turning in his homework.  But no, there had been his kindergarten teacher.  But his peers… that situation was only getting increasingly worse as the years went by.  Whereas they had simply ignored or teased Channing verbally in elementary school, they had begun to actively seek him out for ridicule – and worse – in the last few years.  If practically all the boys in the eighth grade were pushing him around, tripping him in the cafeteria and the hallways, waiting to jump on him after school to take his books and money, to knock him down, to insult him in any way possible… and the girls in his grade, who would act as if he were a leper whenever he was near… Surely it’s true what they say about me, if they all agree, Channing thought.  But there’s Dallas… he acts completely differently from most others in school.  If I’m really objectively worthless, a nothing loser, then why doesn’t Dallas think so?  Channing determined that there had to be something deeper going on.

“Why does Dallas like me?” Channing wondered aloud.  Dallas had said as much, but he hadn’t explained why.  Dallas didn’t really actively “like” many people anyway.  Maybe Dallas himself didn’t really know why he liked Channing.  Maybe it didn’t really matter anyway.

Channing looks young for his age, so I’m going with this stock photo

Channing read for awhile longer, barely noticing the growing physical hunger pains for now.  His mind captured page after page of print, filing it away effortlessly for quick retrieval.  When he’d finished the book and set it aside, he lay back on the bank, hands folded behind his head.

The world sure was beautiful, Channing thought as he gazed at the clouds drifting overhead.  Amid all the hardships and turmoil of life, there was this unchanging, ever-present beauty and rhythm of the natural world.  And there was beauty in the manmade world too, Channing recognized.  Orderly beauty.  How could humans have accomplished such complicated feats?  Just that bridge over there… the design of it, the functional beauty of it… And the book he had just finished.  Some of the thoughts expressed in it were sheer genius, a testament to the complexity of the human mind.  There was amazement all around if you just looked for it, he thought.  And he was finding it everywhere lately.

okay, so the water is a little too rough to be the Humbolt River here…

A couple of crows had alighted in a nearby tree and sounded as if they were conversing together in hoarse, calm voices.  Channing looked up at them and studied the bright eyes, the sheen of the feathers.  A breeze picked up and started the tree branches to bobbing gently up and down.  Across the river, the ecstatic giggling of a young child could be heard.  An airplane flew overhead, a picture of perfect symmetry, its contrail cutting the sky in two along a perfect line.

Contentment, thought Channing.  Taking pleasure in all the little things in life.  Gratitude for the beauty and wonder in the everyday things in life.  For truly, these commonplace things that seemed so mundane and simple – each one was in reality a complicated miracle.  This whole great world, the abilities of humanity, it’s all here for us, thought Channing.  “Surely there must be a God,” he said aloud.  The crows paused in their croaking caws and looked down at him as if they agreed.

Channing felt a great lightness in his body, a swelling happiness surging up within him.  When he was out here, he was free – free from worry about being tormented by his mother or her boyfriends, from his classmates… from everyone and everything that had replaced a childhood with anxiety.

“I didn’t really have much of a childhood,” he said softly up to the crows.  “But I can.  There’s still time.  There’s so much to wonder about and so much to take pleasure in everywhere!  Well… not at my house.  Not at school.  But there’s so much more of the world out there.”

Channing stood up and called out loudly, “The world is my playground!”  The startled crows took off across the river with surprised parting caws.

“Sorry, corvids,” Channing said sheepishly.  He grinned at his growing new perspective.  He didn’t have to be a slave to his past.  He could set out starting now with a determination to enjoy all the little things that he’d always noticed but couldn’t devote the emotional energy to fully appreciating. 

I’m through with being scared, Channing thought.  I’m old enough to not let my mom or my situation run my life.  The thought of Dallas entered Channing’s mind.  Dallas, who had told him he could always come over and stay with him any time.  A great way to avoid his own homelife, Channing thought, and to focus on better things.

too many trees to be Nevada, but the river is about the right size

Channing stood up and skipped a few rocks onto the surface of the river.  He watched the perfect circles spreading out on the surface of the water where the stones sank, a beautiful miracle.  Then he watched some ants at work near the spot where he had been sitting.  They were industriously carrying food into their home.  Channing allowed himself to become immersed in watching them.  He sat there, transfixed, for awhile longer, and then finally broke the spell by glancing at his watch.  Dallas would be home by now.  He’d gone that morning to get his learner’s permit, having just turned 15 a few days previous.

The actual Humbolt River near Elko, the Nevada town I picture as Dallas and Channing’s hometown

Channing climbed up the embankment and skipped along the edge of the road.  His light-hearted mood continued as he traveled towards Dallas’s house.  He noticed the lettering and color scheme on the Gulf gas station sign.  Somebody somewhere designed that, Channing thought.  Without even trying to, he felt thankful for whoever that person was.  He began to whistle as he approached the turn for Dallas’s street.

FLEA MARKET

There was an atmosphere of bustling energy in the large steel-framed building, but the noise and the people went unnoticed by Channing.  He had slept leaning against the wall under the awning at the entrance to the building the night before, awaiting opening time early Saturday morning.  Now he walked as if in a trance through the crowded stalls, eyes searching the goods on each table.  He’d bought a cup of coffee and a doughnut as he browsed, and paused occasionally to take a sip of the now-lukewarm liquid.

Channing had developed the ability to tune out everything around him quite easily and without conscious thought.  Already an introverted and quiet personality by nature, his upbringing – or lack thereof – had required that he withdraw mentally from external situations.  His emotional survival had depended upon it.  He was quite aware of the reasons for this but had no need to dwell on them now.  His withdrawal into his own world was an automatic response at this point.

Many items caught Channing’s eye as he moved from table to table.  He had eight dollars and some change in the back pocket of his maroon corduroys.  He had no specific item in mind for purchase but thought that he would know it instinctively when he found the right thing.

Cheap plastic Happy Meal toys were attractive to him, yet not quite enough to part him from the little cash he carried.  He recognized many of them from McDonald’s commercials of his early childhood.  He’d never owned any of these toys; his unstable life of relative poverty had afforded him that.  Yet he remembered each distinctively.  There were a plastic Bambi and Thumper, Disney movie toys he had once coveted, and as the words and images of that commercial replayed in his mind, Channing felt halfway tugged towards their purchase.  He hesitated, though.  He had already seen several other similar toys that had evoked memories of past desire.  He’d seen the plastic McNuggets Buddies – the policeman and fireman, specifically.  1988, he’d subconsciously said to himself.  Mama Bear and her shopping pushcart, of Berenstein Bears’ fame… He’d also found Sister Bear’s red wagon, but no Sister Bear.  Upon asking the vendor at that stall if the Sister figurine was available as well, he’d received a blank stare.  A McDonald’s “changeables” box of hotcakes was another toy he half-considered.  He noticed a couple of Flintstones drinking glasses and thought, “Pizza Hut, 1986.  When I was six years old.”  His mind went to his earliest memory of fast food restaurant toys: the plush Lady, the dog from the movie Lady and the Tramp, and the Bambi as well, both available at Hardee’s.  It had been a very rare occasion when his mother had a few dollars to spare and had taken Channing to Hardee’s for fried chicken.  The family in front of them in line had two children, and they were given a choice between these two stuffed toys.  They had both chosen Bambi.  Channing could still hear their voices conversing in his head about how they would pretend that one of them was Faline, Bambi’s wife.  Channing’s inner voice said, “1985.”  He decided that if he came across one of these animals, his earliest restaurant promotional toy memory, he would certainly buy it for that significance.  He had not spotted one among any of the merchandise, although he’d seen a couple of other stuffed Bambis.  He would instantly recognize the Hardee’s one if he saw it, he knew.  This was just the way Channing’s brain worked, and it took no extra effort to remember these kinds of details.

If you remember any of these fast food kids meal toys, then congratulations —you’re about as old as me. Hope you enjoy the nostalgia! Did you have any of these? The Hardee’s stuffed “Lady” was so much cuter in my six-year-old memory… I have no regrets for choosing Bambi. Yes, the kids in Channing’s memory are based on my brother and me.

Just then, Channing’s eye was drawn immediately to a small blue Matchbox car on the edge of a shelf.  He stared in disbelief.  “My BMW,” he murmured, picking it up.  The familiar weight in his hand, the gliding motion of the wheels as he flicked them with his index finger, the detail of the raised spoiler on the back of the car… yes, the very same toy BMW he had cherished as a child.

Channing had just turned six; he’d been running the little blue car along the dashboard in front of him as his father drove along Route 225.  Channing could still pinpoint the exact location.  In a typical fit of unexplained anger, his father had become enraged at the repeated sound and motion, and had snatched the car from Channing’s left hand and thrown in out the driver’s side window in one rapid movement.  Channing had stifled a single whimper and dared not make another sound, dared not give any further reaction.  Later that night, unable to suppress his sorrow over the loss of his favorite of a very few meaningful possessions, he had broken down sobbing into his pillow.  Unable to make his cries silent, though, Channing had then endured a severe beating when his father had heard him.  He still had a faint scar above his eye from that particular incident where he’d been shoved against the edge of a shelf.  The events of this day had been some of his final moments with his father before he’d abandoned Channing and his mother for good.  “The day any last dream of my childhood went out the window completely,” Channing reflected ironically as he clutched the tiny diecast memory.  He suppressed the memory with all his will as he felt his body tensing up with tremors that he fought to keep under control.  They didn’t overtake him this time.  The desire to be able to buy the little car was strong enough that he overcame the emotional breakdown that had tried to take over his body.  He sighed with relief and smiled at his victory.

Although it only cost a dollar, Channing would have eagerly handed over all his money for the car.  This was what he wanted, needed; it was the item intended just for him.  He felt as if he’d bought back his childhood.  Driving the little car along the edges of tables and counters, he contentedly made his way through the remainder of the flea market, enjoying just being there, alone inside himself amid the crowd, taking in all the sights and smells.  He felt as if he’d almost found perfection.

After the flea market closed, Channing nestled himself among the bushes behind the giant cow-shaped sign that pointed out the market’s location.  He finished the boiled peanuts and the funnel cake he had bought with most of his remaining money and fell asleep there, happy, content.

Idea for the cow sign came from this flea market I visited in Georgia in 1996

At first light he awoke and immediately became aware of the feel of the car in his pocket.  He eagerly pulled it out, expecting the same euphoric feeling of rightness, of… it was a slightly incomplete rightness, it slowly dawned on Channing as the sun rose that morning.  He had bought back his childhood in the reclaimed toy car which he had made himself believe was the very one that had gone flying through the window all those years ago, the same car he’d years later wandered back to search for in vain among the tall grass along the side of the highway.

Dallas tolerates Channing driving the replacement toy car along the dashboard, unlike Channing’s father

But something was still hollow inside him.  Channing was still searching through the overgrown grass for a little something more.  The car was a part, but it was not the whole he craved. 

“I guess you can’t ever truly go back,” he said aloud to himself with a sigh.  “Still, I am glad to have you back,” he said to the car with a little smile.  Channing felt like he was slowly finding his way to somewhere.  He hoped he could complete the puzzle someday.  Remembering that Dallas would likely be wondering about him, Channing rose to be on his way.

Until next time!

Erin

Find me on Instagram

Erin's Author Website