Story Chronicles: Ulysses’ Chapter 1

(Note: This is a revised draft of an earlier piece featured in the portfolio. If you wish to read the earlier version, check here.)

Get ready, Reader! You hold in your hands the ticket to a grand old show. Four stories in one book, all united by tales of the writer who wrote them! Yes, our main character for these pages will be a young writer. In fact, you’re going to see his first day writing. You’re going to witness the majestic phenomenon that is the birth of a writer. Now, as I said, get ready, I can see the scene setting in before us.

The door creaked open. Light entered the room. Faint rays moved across the cluttered bedroom floor. They floated over the clothes and blankets packed into the laundry baskets at the foot of the bed. The light made our main character squirm under the covers. His body was begging him to remain under that warm embrace. Why couldn’t he remain there forever? Why did the outside world have to exist?

Laughter entered the room. A firm yet caring voice announced, “Summer’s over, Pally. Time to get set for school.”

Our main character squirmed again. Why must life move forward? Why did the summer sun fade into the fall clouds? Why did the leaves have to fall from the trees?

The voice’s owner entered the room. She wore a black polo shirt. Her long blonde hair was loosely tied in a ponytail peeking out from under her hat. Her silver nametag read, “Samantha.”

In one powerful pull, Samantha yanked all the covers off our main character’s bed. “Schooltime, Ulysses! You’re not going to be late to my old stomping grounds. First day of fifth grade, let’s go! Chop, chop!”

The warmth was gone! What a cruel fate! Summer was finished. Soon the only hope for freedom would be long weekends and snow days.

Ulysses groaned, “Okay, Mom. I’ll get ready.”

Samantha smiled and nodded as she left the room. “You better.”

Ulysses tossed around his covers. He fought to sit up and scratch his head only to feel a great mighty, “THWACK!”

The poor kid blinked. There was the cast on his right hand. The thing had been there for weeks now. How could he have possibly forgotten it? Especially considering the stupid way he got it. He had been walking through kitchen one fine summer day, simply wanting to grab a glass of water. Next thing he knew, he tripped! Now, he did reach out his hand to catch himself. That much was his fault. Still, wouldn’t anyone have done the same? I mean, you’d think falling on a hand would be better than falling on your face, right? Well, not always apparently. Sometimes the force of such falls is enough to break a metacarpal. (That would be one of the bones in the hand. I believe you may even have some in your palm.)

By the way, this kid with the broken hand is indeed our main character, Ulysses Nlucky. We join him at the start of his fifth-grade year at Our Lady of Wisdom. It’s a nice little school well-known here in his hometown of Hawthorne, Michigan. Thing is, today is actually going to prove to be the start of something far bigger than one more schoolyear. If you’ve been paying attention, you should know just what I’m talking about.

After getting out of bed, Ulysses lumbered to his desk in his room’s far corner. His school uniform sat there atop books, notebooks, and videogame strategy guides. Our main character shuddered to grab the dreaded shirt. That purple polo was always a pain. Its fabric was itchy, its collar was scratchy, and its buttons always seemed too big for their holes. No one in the world liked it, yet Our Lady of Wisdom had been using that same stinking shirt for decades. No one knew why. It was truly one of life’s greatest mysteries.

The reluctant student did what he had to do. He worked his head through his shirt with only one hand’s help, and you can bet finding the head hole took him forever. He even wound up trying to put his head through his sleeves a few times. Collar took some time to fix too. The crazy thing wanted to fold every except down. It just had to keep popping up, practically screaming, “Look at me! I’m right here! You’ll never keep me down, Man!” Ulysses had to summon all his strength to make the collar look even somewhat presentable. Finally, he looked in the mirror hanging over his desk. Time had come to fix the bedhead out of his hair. He scrambled with his left hand to salvage the light-brown mop of a mess.

Now Ulysses was ready to head downstairs. He grabbed his school planner from his desk. Then he noticed something else sitting there too.

It was a blue notebook, a gift from when Ulysses first broke his hand. It was a present from his dad, a package given with great joy.

You see, Samuel Nlucky had been a real troublemaker growing up, always climbing trees and wandering through construction sites. One time around Ulysses’ age, Samuel tried jumping from a tree branch into his next-door neighbor’s house. He must’ve been trying to impress her. I guess it must have worked since he did eventually wind up marrying her. Still, that little stunt gave Samuel a broken leg and forced him to sit inside for all eternity. At least, that’s what it seemed like to him. Only thing which kept him sane was the daily journal for his creative writing class. He could take all his frustrations and channel them into something productive. If I remember right, his poem, “My Stupid Leg!” was a real hit with his classmates, a true tear-jerker. It even made its way to the school paper.

Thing is, Ulysses was different from his dad. He was an indoor kid. Biggest change to his daily routine was playing turn-based strategy videogames instead of fast-paced action video games. You know, he was going from two-handed button mashers to stuff he could handle with only one hand.

Any time spent “writing” in the journal was merely an attempt to spare Samuel’s feelings. In reality, his son was doodling cubes and cartoon characters. Truly, it was the hoax of the century! Now Ulysses’ cast was coming off in one week, and the journal had nothing worthwhile written in it.

For a moment, Ulysses thought about taking his journal to school. Destiny was calling to him in that moment. He was being pushed to make good on his dad’s gift. He felt afraid. His hand wavered in front of the journal.

Suddenly, Samantha’s voice boomed up the stairs, “Pally, get down here now! We’ve got breakfast on the table, and you’re running out of time to eat it!”

Destiny could wait. Mom was calling. Ulysses left the journal on his desk and ran out of his room. He dashed down the stairs, nearly diving down two steps at a time. At the final step, he planted his hand on the railing, leapt off the staircase, and swung around the corner into the kitchen. The journal could stay at home today. Its owner already had more than enough junk crowding his backpack. His mom was not someone to be challenged. Ever.

Now, if you think that bedroom was something, the kitchen was quite the scene this fine morning.

With one hand, Samantha was tearing old school assignments, vacation photos, and cards from the fridge. The morning rush seemed the best time to finally clear the fridge in preparation for new assignments, photos, and cards. Her other hand held both her sons’ backpacks. The weight of all the books and school supplies weighed her down greatly. That whole side of her body was halfway to the floor. Still, she managed to find new concerns to shout every few seconds.

“How did we ever let the fridge get cluttered like this! It’s a miracle the deed to the house isn’t on here!”

“Ulysses, good to see you down here. Now pull up a chair and get your breakfast!”

“We’ve barely got five more minutes to eat! Samuel, why did you ever think making breakfast today was a good idea?”

Samuel was grilling bacon and wiping the occasional grease splash out of his stubble. Breakfast was always his meal to make. After all, he left the house for work the latest most mornings. Today, he finished his last batch of bacon with a laugh and a hearty grin. “It’s tradition, Honey. This is how the Nlucky family has started the schoolyear since I was a kid. Also, morning, Little Man.”

Ulysses grabbed his plate on the way to the kitchen table. “Morning, Dad.”

Ulysses sat across from his older brother Bill. The seventh-grader had his phone front and center to his face. He was texting people to check who would be in his homeroom this year. Only greeting he gave his brother was some vague mumbling. Honestly, I think trying to translate whatever he said would be completely impossible with modern equipment.

Samantha stopped. She stared into her older son’s eyes, glaring deep into the darkest depths of his soul. “Is that how you greet your one and only brother in this fleeting world?”

Bill groaned, “Good morning, Bro.”

Ulysses chuckled. “Morning, Bill.”

Samantha raced to set her sons’ backpacks by the front door. She called into the kitchen, “Remember, I’ll still be at work after school today. You’ll have to head there right away.”

Bill shook his head. “The Sandwich Shop? That place is boring.”

Samuel laughed. “Come on, Bill. Your mom’s friends are pretty cute, and you know they always love to swarm you two.”

Samantha ran back into the kitchen to pour herself some coffee. “Don’t forget most of them are young enough to be our kids, Honey.”

Samuel rubbed the back of his head. “I’m more speaking for the boys’ sake.”

Ulysses chimed in, “Yeah, come on, Bill. You know Annie always makes those awesome hot chocolates for us.”

Bill crossed his arms. “I guess. Just don’t spill it on yourself this time.”

Samantha’s watch beeped. She dashed to the table and tossed her sons’ plates into the sink. “Alright, breakfast’s over! We need to go, go, go! Now, now, now!”

Bill grumbled and followed his mom to the family room. Ulysses took one more sip of his orange juice and ran after them.

Samuel sighed. He left the table and peeked into the family room. “Now, when I get home from work, I do expect to hear about your day at the best school in all of Hawthorne. We pay that place way too much to hear ‘Nothing happened’ or ‘I don’t know.’”

Bill rolled his eyes. “We tell you stuff. Like those two squirrels Mr. Snoozer caught in the cafeteria or that ghost story I heard in gym class last year.”

Samuel nodded along. “Those were some pretty good tales, but I mean I want to hear stories about you two. I want to know what you’re doing, and how you’re doing. After all, Ulysses has his journal now. He can jot down a few things.

Ulysses froze. There was destiny calling again. His journal could be denied no longer. Something would have to be written in there sooner or later. A writer would be born today. I mean, it’s the title of the book. It’s bound to happen at some point.

Samuel continued, “You remembered to grab it, right? You’ve been writing in that thing for half the summer now.”

Ulysses rubbed the back of his head. “You know it.”

Samantha sighed. She couldn’t afford to waste any time. “Go get it. We need to be out the door by now.”

Ulysses nodded. He ran upstairs and back into his room. He should’ve accepted destiny’s call and grabbed the journal earlier. Now he risked making everyone else run late.

Like This Excerpt?

It’s actually part of a three-part preview! If you want to read some stories Ulysses wrote, please check out Cubey’s First Day and Winzow and Dooz Pound a Parasite.

This story has a related blog post you can find right here.

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