117 lines
9.8 KiB
Plaintext
117 lines
9.8 KiB
Plaintext
{\rtf1\ansi\deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\fnil Helvetica;}}
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\f0\fs24 Scene: Scene 12\par
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Model: anthropic/claude-sonnet-4.6\par
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Character UUIDs: 46F0331E-D357-4989-8FC2-3D7D62BCA2D7,F90ECDD8-FBB2-44D5-96A5-EC16818FF442,497498CD-85FE-48E9-B852-18E043365DB6,6C5E6DB4-1A28-408B-BDF9-B3C09F5F1733,9D202BFB-AFF3-4C37-8BEB-E46D5CDE4D30,131DF043-CF40-4C70-B3BB-15CABC26383E,4C148851-817E-40D3-89A9-DBB93CA82C25,D9A89DE0-558A-46FC-B52C-60D538991268,F3A0BCE3-9F1F-4EB2-9490-F185AF944E53,EC970280-C7C1-4B26-B531-4D083A6626FB,DE370E46-CBAB-4C99-9D5F-45FF0AA2FAEE,CA099051-6C98-4DFF-BCFF-86B96AC3B704,E3BCC7D7-8DBC-4A37-AFCE-73851FCFD0CA,703B03BF-51F9-4BEA-A388-126886494B96,DD8A5DEA-9396-4B98-9D1F-E84EED0A2923\par
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Accepted for editing: 2026-08-27T17:25:02-05:00\par
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\par
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### STYLE\par
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The style of the novel is in the style but not substance of Ken Follett. Each scene is in third person from the perspective of one of the characters.\par
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\par
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### LEXICON\par
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(none)\par
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\par
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### STORY\par
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From her vantage point at Emma's birthday pool party, Mai Lin flirts with and is dunked by Tyler Marsh (who earns approval by handing her a towel), participates in a chaotic chicken-fight collision engineered with Emma, and observes from across the yard that Lizzie Hayes is in an absorbed, animated, apparently mutual conversation with Hannah's date Will\u8212?a development Mai Lin notes is already on Emma's radar and files away as something clearly just beginning.\par
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\par
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### CHARACTERS\par
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Andy Hayes\par
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Father and husband. Works as an aviation maintenance technician at American Airlines out of the Fort Lauderdale Airport. Is a union member with nearly 30 years of experience. Scratch golfer. Large extended family, two brothers and a sister live nearby. Tall and handsome. Goes by Andrew (Andy). Tall, handsome, sun-darkened face with a creased look and gray beginning at the temples. Recently started wearing reading glasses.\par
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\par
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Elikapeka Hayes\par
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Wife of Andy Hayes, of Hawaiian origin. Stay at home mom. (eh-lee-la-PEH-ka)\par
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\par
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Continuity update from Scene 10:\par
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Organized Emma's sixteenth birthday party with careful logistics; the cake was two-tier chocolate with real buttercream and a hidden raspberry filling, chosen without telling Emma. Shares a private, wordless shorthand with Emma across a crowded room.\par
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\par
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Ella Hayes\par
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Oldest daughter. To be a high school senior. Highly skilled golfer looking for a college golf scholarship. Tall, haughty, proud, smart. Prefers male friends to female friends. Has never dated and rarely attends parties or after school activities other than golf. Taught golf primarily by her father, a scratch golfer. Daddy\u8217?s girl. Usually impatient with others and likes to play fast.\par
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\par
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Emma Hayes\par
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Middle daughter. High school junior. Social butterfly with dozens of friends.\par
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\par
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Continuity update from Scene 10:\par
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Turned sixteen at her backyard birthday party, attended by approximately thirty guests. Cried openly and unselfconsciously during the birthday song, and spent part of the evening observing Lizzie's unexpected connection with Will Fontaine.\par
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\par
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Elizabeth (Lizzie) Hayes\par
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Youngest daughter. High school freshman. Bookish girl, very pretty, very shy. Met Will Fontaine at Emma's sweet sixteen party.\par
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\par
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Bobby Carpenter\par
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Best golfer on the boy\u8217?s high school team and Ella\u8217?s perpetual weekend playing partner. Forever in Ella\u8217?s friend zone.\par
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Age seventeen. Tall, rangy build, still growing into himself. Natural athlete with an effortless ball-striking grace; hits irons on a flat, boring trajectory with a draw.\par
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\par
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Mai Lin Wen\par
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Emma\u8217?s best friend and always up for lounging in the pool at Emma\u8217?s house.\par
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\par
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Alex Carpenter\par
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Father of Bobby Carpenter. Lean man with a quiet humor. Repairs cars for a living. Plays golf to approximately a two handicap. Regular weekend playing partner of Andy Hayes in the same group as their children.\par
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\par
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Susanna Barnes\par
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Friend of Emma Hayes. Varsity cheerleader since sophomore year. Maintains a thorough mental catalog of every boy in their class and takes anything involving boys with focused, game-day intensity. Brisk and efficient when going through names. First person Emma called when building the boys list for her party.\par
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\par
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Hannah Eliot\par
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Peer of Emma Hayes, maintained by Emma as a frenemy for strategic reasons. Comes from significant money with its own social gravitational field; moves through high school social life accordingly. Emma finds her exhausting in the way overly confident people are exhausting. Unavoidable, like weather.\par
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\par
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Daniel Park\par
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Quiet boy recommended by Mai Lin Wen for Emma's party guest list. Described by Mai Lin as extremely interesting and very good-looking.\par
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\par
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Harrison Webb\par
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A senior, suggested by Hannah Eliot for Emma's party guest list.\par
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\par
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Susan Carpenter\par
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Wife of Alex Carpenter and mother of Bobby Carpenter. Competent, decisive, and low on surplus motion; a trusted presence in the Hayes household.\par
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\par
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Michelle Hayes\par
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Andy Hayes's sister-in-law, arriving with the Hayes cousins Travis, Corey, and Derek for Emma's party. Warm and affectionate.\par
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\par
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Will Fontaine\par
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A boy at Emma's party, introduced to Lizzie by Hannah Eliot. Sun-bleached blonde hair, blue eyes, compact and muscular build; last name pronounced Fon-TEN. A genuine Tolkien reader who engages seriously with the books.\par
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\par
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### RECALL\par
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(none)\par
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\par
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### PREVIOUS\par
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She was mid-examination of this theory, and also mid-examination of Tyler Marsh, when she caught something at the edge of her peripheral vision and looked over.\par
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\par
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Lizzie Hayes was standing at the far edge of the pool deck, at the quiet end near the fence, with the blonde boy Hannah had brought. Will something. She hadn't paid much attention to him when he arrived\u8212?he was cute but Hannah had claimed him in that territorial way Hannah had\u8212?but now he was completely absorbed in talking to Emma's little sister, and Emma's little sister was completely absorbed in talking back.\par
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\par
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Mai Lin paused.\par
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\par
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She knew Lizzie. You couldn't be Emma's best friend for three years without knowing Emma's sister. Lizzie was the one with the books. Lizzie was the one who showed up to things with that gentle apologetic expression that meant *I love you but I am here under mild duress*. Lizzie was extremely pretty in a way she didn't seem to fully understand yet and extremely smart in a way she understood completely but tried not to flaunt.\par
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\par
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Lizzie was not usually standing close to boys, talking fast, using her hands.\par
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\par
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But she was doing that now.\par
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\par
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She was doing that right now.\par
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\par
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Mai Lin watched Lizzie shake her head at something the boy said, very definite, very certain, and say something back that made him look like she'd surprised him in the best possible way, and she thought: *oh, interesting.*\par
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\par
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She filed this away. It was clearly something, and the something of it was clearly just beginning, and she thought Emma probably needed to know about it, and then she remembered the expression on Emma's face earlier\u8212?that wide, wondering, full-warmth smile\u8212?and realized Emma had already seen it.\par
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\par
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That was good. That was Emma being a good sister. Emma was good at that.\par
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\par
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She turned back to Tyler, who was looking at her in the way that boys looked at her when they were trying to figure out what she was thinking.\par
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\par
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"More cake?" she said.\par
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\par
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"I could eat," he said.\par
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\par
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"Come on then," she said, and they went toward the table in the warm evening light, the pool behind them still glittering with chaos, the music from the patio threading through everything, and somewhere across the yard Lizzie Hayes was still talking to a boy named Will as if they were the only two people at the party, which Mai Lin thought was maybe exactly what they were.\par
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\par
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### NOTES\par
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Early evening, Friday, mid June, 2000. Emma's birthday.\par
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\par
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### BRIEF\par
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This scene is told in third person from the viewpoint of birthday girl Emma Hayes.\par
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The party was winding down. Emma had her coverall over her red bikini and stood in the doorway of her house amidst the mess of the gift unwrapping. Her mother had made her keep a careful list of who gave her what during the unwrapping, and now, as the party concluded, she accepted birthday wishes as the party goers made their way out the door. It had been the greatest event of her life, exceeding even her own high expectations, and she could barely hold back the tears as she bid them goodbye.\par
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She\u8217?d gotten kissed. Or rather, in the chaos of yet another chicken fight in the pool, she\u8217?d surprised Tyler with a peck on his lips. The look on his face had been priceless but another girl had climbed onto his back before she could get any other reaction and that was that. It would have to serve.\par
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The front door was barely shut when she heard a commotion in the kitchen. She arrived just in time for her sister to yell out, \u8220?I kissed him, so what!\u8221?\par
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Lizzie was mad as a hornet, glaring at her mother. Her father was holding a beer and quite obviously trying not to burst out laughing. Ella was there, too, more shocked than even her mother.\par
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Lizzie turned around and stalked up the stairs. Emma was stunned. Little miss \u8220?boys are stinky\u8221? had kissed a boy! That was the craziest thing she\u8217?d ever heard. And then she was jealous, just a little, as Will was quite a handsome boy. Whereupon an argument ensued between her mother and father, on why he thought it was funny that Lizzie had kissed the boy. Then Mai Lin came down the stairs and wondered why she\u8217?d seen Lizzie crying. Emma could barely keep from shrieking with laughter as her mother charged up the stairs. Emma filled her in on the drama.\par
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\par
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### DIRECTIVE\par
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Maximum of 1500 words. Keep the scene comical.\par
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\par
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### SCENE\par
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} |