University of Southern Maine USM Digital Commons Stonecoast MFA Student Scholarship 2017 One Bruised Apple Stacie McCall Whitaker University of Southern Maine Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.usm.maine.edu/stonecoast Part of the English Language and Literature Commons Recommended Citation Whitaker, Stacie McCall, "One Bruised Apple" (2017). Stonecoast MFA. 29. https://digitalcommons.usm.maine.edu/stonecoast/29 This Open Access Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by the Student Scholarship at USM Digital Commons. It has been accepted for inclusion in Stonecoast MFA by an authorized administrator of USM Digital Commons. For more information, please contact [email protected]. One Bruised Apple __________________ A THESIS SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF MASTER OF FINE ARTS UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN MAINE STONECOAST MFA IN CREATIVE WRITING BY Stacie McCall Whitaker __________________ 2017 Abstract The Quinn Family is always moving, and sixteen-year-old Sadie is determined to find out what they’re running from. In yet another new neighborhood, Sadie is befriended by a group of teens seemingly plagued by the same sense of tragedy that shrouds the Quinn family. Sadie quickly falls for Trenton, a young black man, in a town and family that forbids interracial relationships. As their relationship develops and is ultimately exposed, the Quinn family secrets unravel and Sadie is left questioning all that she thought she knew about herself, her family, and the world. iii Acknowledgements To my incredible family: Jeremy, Tyler, Koralynn, Damon, and Ivan for your support, encouragement, sacrifice, and patience. I’ve learned more than I ever imagined in the course of two years, but no workshop or seminar could’ve taught me that success depends largely on a writer’s family. At times this was a difficult journey, and I couldn’t have made it without you beside me. Thank you for always believing in me. This thesis wouldn’t exist without you. –With Love and Gratitude iv Contents Preface ..................................................................................................................................1 One Bruised Apple Chapter One ....................................................................................................................18 Chapter Two ...................................................................................................................41 Chapter Three .................................................................................................................56 Chapter Four ...................................................................................................................79 Chapter Five .................................................................................................................103 Chapter Six ...................................................................................................................128 Bibliography ....................................................................................................................148 v Preface I was born a “navy brat,” which is to say that I was born into a culture of storytelling. The first page of my story began in 1980 in Norfolk, Virginia. My mother carried me two weeks past her due date and went into labor just moments after my dad’s ship, a guided missile destroyer, pulled into port. He’d been underway for six months. I was stubborn from the start, I was told—refused to come into the world until my dad returned. When the ship’s crew learned of a potential delivery on the pier, they retrieved my father from the engine room and the Captain ordered him off the ship. I was born at Portsmouth Naval Hospital, where I became the third of four children in my family. My father left the military when I was eight years old, but I can still recount stories today as though I were with my father in Spain or Greece; beside him in the stuffy engine room or standing starboard as the destroyer crossed the Prime Meridian; with my mother at another wife’s house when she cracked her husband upside the head with a cast-iron skillet for sleeping with a Mediterranean woman on a liberty pass. Though my parents didn’t write, they were the first, and most important, storytellers in my life. In the years after my dad left the navy, we moved frequently—occasionally fulfilling a full year’s lease, sometimes picking up again after just a few months—and our moves were often cross-country. My dad held a variety of blue-collar positions, and we went where he could find a job. When the work ran out, we did too. Books became a source of stability for me; characters were my friends and confidants. The people outside 1 of my immediate family lacked permanence or depth, and fictional characters provided that. In many ways, I viewed each move as a new story, not a new chapter, but a new story. Although the plot remained largely the same, the characters, setting, and language changed. I learned regional dialects, understood where and when to use which words: Pop or soda; couch or sofa; supper or dinner; howdy or hello; wicked or mad; go or come with; you guys, you’s or ya’ll. Words held more weight than their definitions. Syntax and diction and subtext were studies I conducted outside the classroom. These literary elements were an everyday part of my life even when I didn’t know the terms. I began writing at an early age as a way to make sense of the world, to understand myself and my life. At the start, my stories were just a revised version of my own life with snappier comebacks, happier endings, bigger houses, better food. But it was a place where I could speak without consequence. I have always felt as though I had my left foot in one world, my right in another, and that I occupied some static space in between. I never felt as though I truly belonged anywhere and I didn’t subscribe to the same set of beliefs that my family and neighbors did. My parents called me stubborn and rebellious, said I’d make a great attorney because I made it my mission in life to challenge everyone on everything, but it wasn’t defiance. I just didn’t believe what they believed, didn’t see the world as they did. I liked to create hypothetical situations and challenge their views. In fifth grade, I was elected as Secretary of Student Council. I quickly became bored with taking notes and reading minutes at meetings and decided instead to interview teachers and staff about world events, then write weekly columns for the elementary 2 newsletter. The first article, an environmental piece about what we could all do to preserve resources, went well. But I was demoted back to Secretary in week two when I tried polling teachers to determine how many were pro-life and how many pro-choice. My mistake might have been trying to use my hypothetical situations to persuade teachers. It might also have been that we hadn’t even taken sex ed yet and they thought it inappropriate to discuss abortion with a ten-year-old. Whatever the reason, I realized that like my parents, all adults, it seemed, became quickly agitated by anyone trying to challenge their beliefs. My (almost) two weeks as a journalist taught me that I wasn’t well-suited for neutrality. In tenth grade, however, I experienced my first puppy love: being on the debate team. Finally, a place where I could discuss critical issues and try to persuade. I’m not sure how debate teams work in most schools but our coach was also the creative writing teacher, and he encouraged my story-telling approach to arguing a point. Each person on the team had a role, so to speak, and mine relied heavily on emotional appeal. I only debated for one season because my family moved out of state shortly after the final competition, but I believe that experience shaped my writing. I enjoyed creating fictional scenarios but I didn’t especially love the time limits or public speaking aspect of the debates. At my new school, I enrolled in my first creative writing course which ultimately landed me in the guidance counselor’s office. The first story I wrote for the class was about a teenage girl who contracted AIDS from a blood transfusion after a car accident. The girl, who blamed herself for her parents’ divorce, moved with her mother to a new school for a fresh start. At some point in the story, the girl wonders if her parents would 3 reconcile if she were dead. As with most of my work, I wrote the story in first-person POV and my teacher believed the story to be true. At length I was able to convince the guidance counselor the story was fictional and by the end of the semester my teacher realized it too. My stories centered on topics of teen pregnancy, suicide, child abuse, poverty, and sexual orientation. My teacher’s feedback often focused on theme. I was repeatedly asked to “tone it down,” and she expressed concern over my “preoccupation with death, heartbreak, and tragedy.” I became very self-conscious about my work, didn’t write fiction for at least ten years after that. My poetry from that time reflected similar sentiments to my fiction. The titles, while not terribly inventive, are suggestive of the themes: “New Place,” “Confined,” “Insanity,” “Silence,” “Lost,” “Blind,” “Abandoned,” “Alone,” “Nobody,” and so on. There weren’t a lot of happy titles, but that’s because writing was my method of processing negative emotions. It provided a sense of control that I lacked in my life. I wrote primarily for myself and, after that creative writing course in high school, rarely shared my work. I didn’t always want to be a professional writer. I’m not someone who claims to know this was my calling from an early age. Though I’ve always written creatively, I did so because it helped me understand the world around me. I didn’t expect to share that with an audience. I was twenty-three years old—married with two children—before I enrolled in college. It was 2003, I was married to a U.S.