:
Tim Montgomery crept into the front room, flattening himself against the wall by a window.
He saw her taxi pull up out front and sighed with relief. Through the dusty slats in
the blinds he saw her, that petite face grinning joyfully in the winter sunlight. She had
her books piled high and he knew, he just knew she'd sharpened all her pencils first thing
that morning. He imagined her, propped up in bed with an X-acto knife, pencil shavings speckled
all over her fluffy white quilt. The evening before she had told him, clearly and dispassionately,
that chapter one was awful. Nothing happens, she had said, picking at her teeth with a toothpick. "Where, for the love of God and man, is the narrative arc?"