The Box of Secrets, a novel by Jamie Holland Hull

This novel was born out of a two-page assignment when I was in the Jenny McKean Moore GW class with Carole Maso. That was over 10 years ago. I wrote about a hundred pages, not knowing what it was or where it was going, then I put it aside and worked on another novel. When I came back to it, I was ready to dive in.

Am currently seeking a publisher for this book.

Chapter One

The summer my mother announced that we were leaving Maryland for the wilds of Wisconsin I had the worst nosebleed of my life.  I’d been trying to convince her to let me see a psychiatrist when it started.

“A psychiatrist?” she said. “Why would you want to see a psychiatrist?”

I didn't know why I wanted to see a psychiatrist, but at twelve, I could picture the woman clearly in my mind: blonde hair to the shoulders, a warm smile. She'd nod a lot, especially when I’d tell her that I always felt there was something wrong with me. And again when I’d say I wished our family could say “I love you” more than once a decade.

That was the kind of kid I was: nosebleeds, zits, fantasies about psychiatrists, and only one best friend in the world who, in a week’s time, I’d never see again in my whole life.

“Well that’s just crazy,” my mom said. “Kids don’t need psychiatrists.”

I looked up at the leaded glass windows, noticed a bird flitting around a holly bush and bam! There I was, on the floor, the red sea spilling out over my yellow Lacoste shirt that my mom got at a thrift store for 50 cents.

She stepped over me.  “I'll get you some Kleenex,” she said.  “Then I want you to pack up your room.”

“Isn’t it a little early to be packing?” Blaire said.

I turned so I could see her. She stood in the doorway wearing her tennis whites, her hair in a high ponytail. She had a ski-jump nose that peeled every summer and a smooth, tan face. She was popular, had a boyfriend and looked like a Seventeen Magazine model.

“Oh, it’s never too early to get rid of things,” my mom sang from the kitchen. I heard the clank of silverware like she’d just dropped a bunch of clean forks into the utensil drawer. Then she came into the dining room, where I was lying on the floor and where Blaire stood, biting the side of her thumb.

“You have no idea how wonderful this move will be!” my mom said.

“I’m not going,” Blaire said. She was 16; I was 12 and wouldn’t dream of talking back to my mom.

“I was thinking that when we get there, you girls can go on a shopping spree.”

Even though I was flat on the floor with my nosebleed, my ears perked up at this. We never went shopping. If we really needed something, it was thrift stores first and then the sales racks at Lord and Taylor.

“One hundred dollars each,” she said, enticing me even further. 

Blaire’s chin got all trembly the way mine did when I was about to bawl my eyes out. “I can’t believe this!” she screamed. “This is totally unfair!” She ran out of the room and up the stairs to the room we shared.

That was when my mom called me resilient.

“You’re like me that way,” she said looking at me on the floor. “We’re resilient. That’s a good quality to have, Martie. Resilience.”

Resilience. It sounded like a perfume. I would hold onto that adjective for years, remembering how she turned it in her mouth like a spoonful of coffee ice cream.

She glanced upstairs to where Blaire was, and said, “You should thank your lucky stars you didn’t inherit your father’s genes.”

I was about to say, Which jeans? but she said, “The emotional genes. The bad ones.”