Exercise 1

Exercise: Start a piece with "She touched the little box in her pocket and smiled."

She touched the little box in her pocket and smile. Although her life as she knew it seemed a short yet distant past, having even a small piece of it gave her comfort.

Jocelyn sat in the back seat of the sedan, getting slapped in the arm by her little brother from his car seat. He was giggling and smiling as always while perching in his high seat of superiority to his sister. She wished she could share his innocent bliss and fanciness of the simple pleasures of height. She was torn between her desire to be furious with him for his happiness at this time of dread and her relief in his state of bliss due to his obliviousness to the shattered world they now lived in. She hesitated, then realized what she actually felt was jealousy. She yearned for his world of innocence.

Mrs. Parkens looked back, "Jocie, are you doing ok?"

"Yes, Ma'am" Jocie replied. Inside her head, she bellowed her true response. "NO! Of course I am not ok. How could I be ok? My parents are gone, my family is gone. I am being taken from my home, to who knows where. Are you really that stupid to ask such a question? How can I be ok when my life just ended!"

She clasped her hand tightly around the box. No longer did the box bring a smile, she held back tears. She hoped Mrs. Parkens wouldn't ask her how she was anymore. It took everything within her to keep her emotions down when she had to speak. Silence was easiest. She looked at her brother and again with envy.

She wouldn't cry. She had done enough of that.

When she was seven, her cat Lisbeth was hit by a car and killed. She cried for days. Then, her father came into her bedroom and spoke with her.

"We own our emotions. Emotions are part of who we are. But there is a time to claim them as your own. You have shared your feelings of loss with everyone, and you still feel them. It is time to make your sadness for Lisbeth your own, part of you. To stop crying for her will not mean you love her any less, it will just make that sorrow part of you. It will let you move on. It will always be a part of you. When you think of her, you will be happy when you think of the good memories and sad when you think of the loss. It will be yours."

She found her smile again and clutched the box, "It is mine."