The Ghostwriter

by Julie Clark

“When history repeats itself, only the fool stands around and watches it happen.”

This is the consequence of speaking out as a woman. We are labeled hysterical, emotional, unreliable, and finally, incompetent.

“You’re a survivor,” he says. “Remember, no regrets, no looking back.”

The truth lives in people’s actions, their unguarded moments, not in the lies they tell.”

There’s a reason historians rely so heavily on primary sources. Because human memory is flawed.

I told you at the beginning that lying is a nonstarter for me. You lied about your family. You lied about a job. I can’t be with someone I don’t trust.

I’m beginning to realize that once you lie about your past, you wall yourself off from the present. From the people who care about you.

“He never showed up for me.” Jack gives me a sympathetic look. “Relationships aren’t transactional.”

“Every chapter has to have a point. Even if the reader can’t yet see it. Every story told must serve two purposes—to allow your reader to know your characters better, and to push the narrative toward the conclusion.”

When people get defensive, I know I’ve hit something they’d rather not talk about.

“Fear is a tool of the patriarchy,” I’d told her. “It’s how our parents control where we go and what we do. The majority of people in this world are good.”

“When you get to be my age, there will be many moments—many decisions—you’ll wish you could go back and make again. Choose a different path. That’s one of mine.”

That you can make up whatever you want to be the truth and you can live your life as if you’ve sealed it off forever. But, like a heartbeat behind a wall, the truth is always there, holding you hostage. I’m no different from my parents—refusing to acknowledge or speak about difficult things. And yet, I’m this way because I was raised to be this way. Their weaknesses are my own.