DEAD DREAMS
BY EMMA RIGHT
Genre: YA CONTEMPORARY PSYCHOLOGICAL THRILLER/MYSTERY
Synopsis
Eighteen-year-old Brie O’Mara has so much going for her: a
loving family in the sidelines, an
heiress for a roommate, and dreams that might just come true. Big dreams—of
going to acting school, finishing college and making a name for herself. She is
about to be the envy of everyone she knew. What more could she hope for? Except
her dreams are about to lead her down the road to nightmares. Nightmares that
could turn into a deadly reality.
Chapter One
IT STARTED ON a warm April afternoon.
Gusts of wind blew against the oak tree right outside
my kitchen balcony, in my tiny apartment in Atherton, California. Sometimes the branches that touched the side of the building
made scraping noises. The yellow huckleberry flowers
twining their way across my apartment balcony
infused the air with sweetness.
My mother had insisted, as was her tendency on most things, I take the pot of wild huckleberry, her housewarming gift, to my new two-bedroom apartment. It wasn’t really new, just new to me, as was the entire experience of living separately, away from my family, and the
prospect of having a roommate, someone who could be a best friend, something
I’d dreamed of since I finished high school and debuted into adulthood.
“Wait
for me by the curb,”
my mother said, her voice blaring
from the phone even though I didn’t set her on speaker. “You need to
eat better.” Her usual punctuation at the end of her orders.
So, I skipped
down three flights of steps and headed toward the side of the apartment building to await my mother’s gift of the evening, salad in an á la chicken style, her insistent
recipe to cure me of bad eating habits. At least it wasn’t chicken soup double-boiled till
the bones melted, I consoled myself.
I hadn’t waited long when a vehicle careened round the corner. I
heard it first, that high-pitched screech of brakes wearing thin when
the driver rammed his foot against it. From the corner of my eye, even before I turned to face it, I saw the blue truck. It rounded the bend where Emerson Street met Ravenswood, tottered before it righted itself and headed straight
at me.
I took three steps back, fell and scrambled to get back up as the vehicle like a giant bullet struck the sidewalk I had only seconds ago stood
on. The driver must have lost control, but when he hit the sidewalk it slowed the vehicle enough so he could bridle his speed
and manage the truck as he continued
to careen down the street.
My mother arrived a half minute
later but she had seen it all.
Like
superwoman, she leaped out of her twenty-year-old Mercedes and rushed toward me, all breathless and blonde
hair disheveled.
“Are
you all right?” She reached out to help me up. “Yes, yes,” I said, brushing the dirt off my yoga pants.
“Crazy driver. Brie, I just don’t know about this business of you
staying alone here like this.” She walked back to her white Mercedes, leaned in the open window, and brought
out a casserole dish piled
high with something green. Make that several shades of green.
I followed her, admittedly winded. “Seriously, Mom. It’s just one of
those things. Mad drivers could
happen anywhere I live.”
She gave me no end of grief as to what a bad idea it was for me to live alone
like this even though she knew I was going
to get a roommate.
“Mom,
stop worrying,”
I said.
“You’re asking me to stop being your mother, I hope you realize
this.”
“I’ll find someone
dependable by the end of the week, I promise.” No way I was going back to live at home. Not that I came from a bad home environment. But I had my reasons.
I had advertised on Craig’s
List, despite my mother’s protests that only scum would answer “those
kinds of ads.”
Perhaps there was some truth to Mother’s biases, but I wouldn’t
exactly call Sarah McIntyre scum. If she was, what would that make me?
Sarah’s father had inherited
the
family
“coal”
money.
Their
ancestors had emigrated from Scotland (where else, with a name like McIntyre, right?) in the early 1800s and bought an entire mountain (I kid you not) in West Virginia. It was a one-hit wonder in that the mountain hid a coal fortune under it, and hence the McIntyre Coal Rights Company was born. This was the McIntyre claim to wealth, and
also a source of remorse and guilt for Sarah,
for supposedly dozens of miners working for them had lost their lives due to the business, most to lung cancer or black
lung, as it was commonly called. Hazards of the occupation.
And
then there were cave-ins, which presented another set of
drama
altogether, Sarah said.
I sat across from her, the coffee table between us, in the small
living room during our first meeting. “So, that’s why you’re not on talking terms with your family? Because
of abuses of the coal company? ” I asked.
We sipped hot cocoa and sat cross-legged in the crammed living
room, which also doubled as the dining space. I’d never interviewed anyone before, although I’d read tips on the Internet.
“I just don’t want to be reminded anymore,” she said, twirling her dark ringlets round
and round on her pointer finger.
“But, it’s not entirely your dad’s fault those people died of lung problems.”
“I guess, but I just want to get away, you understand? Anyway, I’m almost
twenty-one now. That’s three years too late for moving out and establishing my own space.” She took tiny sips of the cocoa, both hands
cupping the mug as if she were cold.
I walked to the thermostat and upped the temperature. A slight draft still stole in from a gap in the balcony sliding door I always kept open a crack to let the air circulate.
“So,
your family’s okay with you living here? In California? In
this
apartment that’s probably
smaller than your bathroom? With a stranger?”
“First off, it’s none of their business. Secondly, you and I won’t stay strangers.” Sarah flashed me a grin. “Besides, I’m tired of big
houses with too many rooms
to get lost in. And, have you lived in West Virginia?”
I shook my head. The farthest I’d been was Nevada when we went for our family
annual ski vacation. “I heard it’s pretty.”
“If you like hot, humid summers
and bitter cold winters. So, do I pass?
As a roommate?”
She looked about at the ceiling.
I wondered if she noticed the dark web in the corner and the lack of cornices and crown moldings. I was sure I smelled mold in the living room, too. But I wasn’t in a
position to choose. Sarah was.
“As long as you’re not a psychopath and can pay rent.” I returned her smile.
“I don’t know about the psychopath part.” She shrugged
and displayed her white, evenly-spaced teeth. “But here’s my bank
account.” She tossed
me a navy blue booklet with gilded edges and
with golden words “Bank of America” on the cover.
I fumbled as I caught it and was unsure what to do. “Should I peek?”
“Go on.” She gestured, flicking her fingers at me as if I were a
stray cat afraid to take a morsel of her offering. “No secrets. I can well
afford to pay rent. And, I’m a stable individual.”
I flipped the first few pages and saw the numerous
transactions
in lumps my parents, who were by no means poor, would have gasped at. The last page registered the numbers: under deposits,
$38,000. My eyes scanned the row of numbers and realized that the sum $38,000 came up every sixth of the month.
My mouth must have been open for she said,
“You can stop
gawking. It’s only my trust
fund. It comes to me regardless of where I am, or where I stay. So, do I make the cut?”
I handed the bank book back. We discussed the house rules: no
smoking; no drugs, and that included pot; no boyfriend sleepovers or
wild parties, which was a clause in my landlord’s
lease; and Sarah was to hand me her share of the rent, a mere $800 a month, on the twenty-eighth
of every month, since I was the main renter and she the sub-letter.
She didn’t want anything down on paper—no checks, no contracts, and no way of tracing things back to her, she’d stressed
a few times.
She fished in her Louis Vuitton
and handed me a brown paper
bag, the kind kids carry their school lunches in. I peeked inside and took
out a stash of what looked like a wad of papers bundled together with a rubber band. Her three-month share of the deposit, a
total of twenty-four crisp hundred-dollar
bills. They had that distinct new-bank-notes-smell
that spoke of luxury.
I gulped down my hot chocolate. “Why all the secrecy?” I asked
as I wrapped up the interview. I could understand not wanting
parents breathing down her neck, but as long as they didn’t insist on posting a guard at the door, what was the harm of them knowing where she lived?
Sarah glanced about the room as if afraid the neighbors might have their ears pinned to the walls, listening.
She leaned forward and,
her
face expressionless, said softly, “My parents are dead.”
📕📕📕📕📕
LORILYN: What made
you want to write, and why Christian books?
EMMA: I have always enjoyed spinning
a yarn for my friends, even from as young as eight years of age. But right
after college, and before I had kids (the B.C. days I call it), I worked in
advertising, writing print and TV ads, and I really enjoyed copywriting. Some of
my ads won awards. I don't even know where I keep those dust
collectors! But that was ages ago.
It occurred to me that I should
write some of the stories down. Despite everything happening around me, I
always think about different plots and story lines whenever I have the time—usually
before I doze off after a long day.
So, I guess I'd always wanted
to be an author. I never really consider one particular point in time when I
made that decision. Writing is a part of life—of communicating. It's just a
means to get the stories from my brain into someone else's head.
Also, I feel called to write
the stories swimming in my head. I hope they will touch some people positively
and draw them closer in their walk with God. My stories are not
overly Christian, but I do approach it from a Christian point of view and leak
some of the lessons I’d learned from the Bible or by being a Christian into the
fiction I write.
LORILYN: When was
your first book published?
EMMA: Last year,
in May 2013. I launched it with the John 316 group and “Keeper of Reign”
reached the Amazon Kindle best seller’s list.
LORILYN: Does God
play a big part in your life?
EMMA: Hugely!
Every hour of the day! Apart from Christ I am nothing. And also another verse I
live by: “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.”
LORILYN: Are you
married and have children?
EMMA: Yes, for
more than two decades—to the same man! And we have five kids. And also numerous
pets—who take up as much time as the kids, on some days.
LORILYN: What is
your greatest advice to a writer?
EMMA: I don’t know if this the greatest
advice but it’s one I follow and I’d read it somewhere else. Write a million
words, then, read, read, read, and write a great story that's been trying to burst
out of you. Read as many books as you can on crafting great fiction that deals
with all the elements of a great book. Writer's Digest has plenty and I
practically spent thousands of dollars trying to educate myself and soak in as
much as I could when I had to re-revise “Keeper of Reign”—about 17 times.
And never give up on your dream no
matter how many problems life throws at you! If a person is called to write she
will know this in her bones, even if it's something she has been pushing aside
due to life's commitments. Don't give up. You'll eventually get published if
you keep trying.
As a Christian, I always plead my
cases to the King of Kings. Without His help, I truly, couldn’t accomplish much
at all.
LORILYN: Are you
working on another book?
EMMA: I am currently writing “Keeper of Reign Book 2,” a Middle
grade/YA adventure fantasy, hopefully out by Summer 2014. Some readers have
asked me to write a prequel for “Keeper of Reign.” I might. I am also working
on “Dead Dreams 2” and hope to finish this by the end of Summer of 2014.
LORILYN: Where can
readers get your books? Are they all on Amazon?
EMMA: “Dead
Dreams” will be free from April 3rd - 6th for four days.
Both the paperback and the e-book versions are only available on Amazon. “Keeper
of Reign” is available on Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and all other major
retailers.
FREE ON KINDLE THROUGH 4-6-2014
Title: Dead Dreams
Author: Emma Right
Series: Dead Dreams #1
Publication: August 26th, 2013
Category: Young Adult (YA)
Genre: Psychological Mystery Thriller
Emma Right is a happy, Christian housewife and homeschool
mother of five living in the Pacific West Coast of the USA. Besides running a
busy home, and looking after their five pets, which includes two cats, two
bunnies and a Long-haired dachshund, she also writes stories for her children.
When she doesn't have her nose in a book, she is telling her kids to get theirs
in one.
Right worked as a copywriter for two major advertising
agencies and won several awards, including the prestigious Clio Award for her
ads, before she settled down to have children.
