I walked out of the ornately decorated door of my babysitting charge’s house, Mrs. Thompson calling thanks after me. After a short, fifteen minute walk, I got to my house; a simple, gray brick with blue accents and a black front door of my mom’s choosings. I entered the house, and found my mom flipping pancakes on the griddle.

“Wash up, Lia!” Mom yelled.

“I already am washed!” I said.

“Delailia.” I knew my mom’s tone: it meant, do as I say, or else. She almost never used that tone

I hurried to my bathroom and washed my hands. I was busy trying to fix my kind of long brown hair when Mom yelled at me dinner’s ready.

Quickly, I whipped my hair into a ponytail and sat at the dinner table. In front of me, Mom set a glass of milk and a plate piled high with pancakes topped with maple syrup, apple syrup, and fig slices; my favorite. Mom was trying to butter me up, but why?

“Where’s Dad?” I asked.

Mom stayed quiet. I felt my stomach do a nervous somersault. Was he okay? He had to be okay. We were going to do something once he got back from  a trip on one of his many ships.

When Mom didn’t say anything for a while, I dug cautiously back into my pancakes. My stomach tried to reject the food, to tell me something was wrong, but I was hungry and I didn’t listen.I got halfway through my pancakes, when my mother turned to me. “Lia, I have something to tell you.”

My stomach flipped at her serious tone. “Yes?” I squeaked, swallowing another bite.

“Delailia,” This must be serious. “Your father…” Mom trailed off.

“My father?”

Mom took a deep breath. “Your father is lost at sea.” Before I could say anything, she continued. “He was off the coast of Japan on the Stinging Wasp.” Mom looked like she was going to cry. “The captain hit a reef, and the ship went down.

Mom cursed. I blushed. I’d never heard her curse before. “I told him not to go. I told him that darned captain was untrained. I told him…” Her face contorted. A few tears escaped, and she buried her hands in her face.

I watched her for a few minutes, feeling nothing.

Then, a few tears rolled down my cheeks. I dropped my fork. A flame of sadness, anger, and grief washed through me. Pushing out from the table, I quickly stood, knocking down my chair in the process.

Mom looked up and reached for me. “Lia…”

“Is he…?” I couldn’t finish.

Mom looked stricken. “They haven’t found a body yet. All they know is he was on the ship when it sank. There’s no proof.” Mom hesitated. “Yet.”

I walked numbly to my room. “Good night.”

Mom seemed like she wanted to say more, but she didn’t. “Good night, dear.”

I flopped on my bed and stared at the ceiling. Father couldn’t be dead. He shouldn’t be! He did nothing to deserve to die!
    I heard sobs from the kitchen. That squeezed my heart even more. After an hour or two, my tears dried up.

All that time, my thoughts had swirled around in my head. After many more hours, school clothes and all, I was asleep, dreaming of crashing ships and oceans.

Many times that night, I woke up in cold sweat or screaming for Daddy. My mom tried to comfort me, but that ended up in us sitting together on my blue covers, sobbing our broken hearts out.

A.N. So, I edited it and *hopefully* slowed the plot down a tad. If you read this, please give me advice or critisism or whatever. In the past, I've never ploted a book, so this will not be my best work. For those who have read it before, is this better?

Bye for now, lovelies.

-Cal