1st 5 Pages October Workshop- Kuder Rev 1

Name: Lisa Kuder

Genre: Young Adult Thriller

Title: Dangerous Dreams

    
Chapter 1

Lan flipped the lock to the door of Uncle's home office and gently closed the door. Feeling light-headed and on the verge of passing out, she ran to the glass door and burst out onto the balcony, gulping in the cool, moist air that flowed off the San Francisco Bay. 

Collapsing onto a patio chair, she slowed her breathing until she had calmed herself enough to think straight. Even then, she was so flummoxed that it took her a few seconds to remember what was in the file folder clutched tightly in her hand—the folder that she had just stolen from Uncle’s office. But had she really stolen it if the documents in it were rightfully hers? 

Lan hadn't started out the day planning to go through Uncle’s filing cabinet. Ten minutes ago, she had been enjoying a cup of tea on the small balcony off the dining room of the luxury condo, watching the morning fog slowly drift westward as it played peek-a-boo with the sunlight that danced off the wind-swept waters of the Bay.  

Sitting out here, listening to the buzz of the city, and reveling in the soft breeze on her skin, the events of the past year seemed so distant and surreal. It was as if the girl who had left her rural Chinese village to live with her Uncle and Auntie in the US a year ago had been a completely different person from an alien planet.

She had been so idealistic back then, so full of dreams. Little did she know that she was heading for a life of washing, chopping, serving, and cleaning 12 hours a day at her uncle’s restaurant, punctuated by a half day off once every couple of weeks--the only bright spot in her otherwise mundane life. 

She definitely wasn't living the glamorous life of American school girls that were portrayed in the Chinese-dubbed VCR movies that she watched over and over on her family’s ancient TV set. Before coming to the US, she had spent many hours daydreaming about becoming the heroine of Mean Girls or Clueless as the cool, smart immigrant girl who would become best friends with Lindsay Lohan or Alicia Silverstone her first week at school. But that obviously wasn't going to happen any time soon, mostly because she had spent a grand total of zero days in school since she had arrived in San Francisco.

After half an hour of escape from reality, she noticed goosebumps forming on her bare arms that were exposed to the elements by her short-sleeved t-shirt.  So she went inside to get a sweater.

As she turned to head toward her room, a door in the hallway to the right of the kitchen caught her eye. It was the door to Uncle's forbidden home office, which she had been told repeatedly to stay away from. Not that she could get into it even if she wanted to – as far as she knew, he always locked the door when he left the room.

But now, for some reason, she couldn't keep her eyes off the door, as if some magnetic force was pulling her toward the office. She walked cautiously over to the door, afraid that somehow Uncle would sense that she had been in the vicinity of it. 

But Uncle was at work and Auntie was at the beauty salon. How could they possibly know? What would be the harm in just trying the doorknob? Of course it would be locked, and then she could go on enjoying the few delicious hours of freedom that she had left and put it out her mind.  

Her hand grasped the knob of the door to the office. She twisted it, and to her shock, the knob moved! She jumped back as if shocked by an electric current flowing through the doorknob. How could it not be locked? 

Lan stood there for a minute, thinking maybe it was a trap. Did Uncle purposely leave the office door open to see if she would disobey him? It seemed unlikely - he didn't seem to pay much attention to what she did. It was Auntie who was more obsessed with her following all the rules of the house. Then it dawned on her. Jing, the Chins’ housekeeper had been in earlier that morning. She was allowed to go in and clean the office, and she had probably forgotten to lock the door when she left.

Lan pushed the door gently forward and found herself standing in the doorway of a room full of sleek metal and glass that echoed the theme of the rest of the house.  A massive glass-topped desk commanded the room, balanced on top of curved metal crisscrossed legs, a high-tech office chair sitting at attention behind it. Two tall ebony filing cabinets flanked the window displaying a view of the city, and the wall to the left was lined ceiling-to-floor with glass bookshelves.

Lan shivered in both fear and anticipation. There was something thrilling about being somewhere she wasn't supposed to be. Her heart pounding, she ran a tentative hand across the smooth expanse of the desk. Like everything in the Chins' house, it looked very expensive. 

She knew she should turn around, leave the office and shut the door behind her. But she couldn't ignore the feeling that she was meant to be here. Why else would the door be unlocked the very same day she had felt undeniably drawn toward it?

Chapter 2

Henry heard his mom's voice drift up from downstairs to his second-story bedroom where he was working on Chemistry homework that was due the next day. He heard his name, but he couldn't make out anything else she was saying. 

He opened the door to his room and started down the stairs, happy for the excuse to take a break from his attempt to memorize formulas that refused to stick to his brain. 

His mom called out to him again. This time, he heard her loud and clear.

“Henry, there’s someone on the phone for you!” 

What??

Confused, he stopped on the landing one-third the way down the stairs. No one ever called for him on the landline. There was no way this was good--he was pretty sure that the school was the only place that had his home number.

Dang! He should have studied more for the Geography test. He had probably flunked it, and now his teacher was calling his parents. The last couple of years, he had been successful in maintaining a fragile balance between the time spent honing his gaming skills and keeping up with his schoolwork. School had always been pretty easy for him. But one month into his Sophomore year at his academic magnet high school, it was obvious that he would have to work harder to keep his grades up so as to not jeopardize his carefully laid-out five-year plan.

By the time he slumped into the kitchen, he had convinced himself that Mrs. Mitchell had already told his mom about the test and that his teacher now wanted to scold him directly. So he was surprised by the look on his mom's face when he entered the room. Her forehead was scrunched up in an I'm-not-sure-what-to-think expression, rather than a red-faced-I'm-going-to-kill-Henry expression.