It’s TACO TUESDAY and look who got a post up! *Bows*

This challenge is sponsored by author A.C. Melody, and it’s not as easy as it sounds, but here we go!

Onions for Writer’s Menu: Not everyone cries when they cut onions: share an outside-influence type circumstance/object that caused a character to tear up – or – notably didn’t, when they should have.

Looking lost, Ranard moved towards the front door. Rubbing at his throat, he stopped and looked back at his children standing together with their arms around each other. He looked at his wife and saw her face clouded with contempt and hatred… for him.

Turning and taking the last steps to the door, Ranard reached out for the doorknob… and froze.

This isn’t what he wanted. This isn’t what he needed.

The last seven years had been one long nightmare. Always trying to stay ahead of the game at work. Hanging out with friends and coworkers he didn’t like… and who didn’t like him. Sleeping with any woman who said yes. Gilbert Porter going out of his way to find his youngest son every few weeks to tell him how worthless he was. He’d tell him how a real man would step up to the plate and reclaim his family… be the husband and father they needed him to be. Not some loser who can’t even remember his sons’ birthdays.

Ranard Porter wanted to fix his life, but he didn’t know how. He’d wanted to push his pride aside and admit his weakness. But he just couldn’t. Not to Lennie. She was so smart. Always confident and sure of herself. Even when he attempted to berate and degrade her, she rose above him and continued on. Not seeking or needing his approval. Not needing anyone’s approval… the way he did.

Approval he never found.

He turned to look at what he’d lost.

Myron stood with his arm around RJ’s shoulder and they watched their mother comfort Duncan. His teenage son who stood ready to defend his brother… from him. A man-child… already more of a man than Ranard was… or would ever be.

Ranard opened the door and slipped out into the loneliness of the night… where he belonged.

Deleted scene, Ranard’s POV, Free, a Novella

Onions for Reader’s Menu: Name a favorite book you read where a character was brought to tears by an outside influence (ex: poked in the eye, thick smoke, laughing too hard, etc.) -or- where a character was notably incapable of being brought to tears for any reason.

Going with the first book which comes to mind, I’m cheating a bit on this one – but the character is Rena Averest from my own In the Best Interest of the Child. This child haunted me and was not easy to write. Rena’s situation is the catalyst which forces Olivia Chandler to confront her own childhood demons… and makes sure Rena doesn’t suffer the same fate. There had to be enough similarities to push Olivia, but not so much that Rena became Olivia – broken and hiding.

So Rena doesn’t cry.

• Eleven years old, suffered multiple injuries in the car accident which killed her mother and left her father in a coma.
• Rena has daily physical and occupational therapy as she heals from the broken hip and ankle caused in the accident.
• She’s seen her father once since the accident, and of course, he was comatose.
• Rena is living with her godparents, who absolutely adore her, yet she worries about being extra work for them.
• When Rena speaks of her mother, whom she was very close to, it is only of her death.
• The first time Rena meets Olivia Chandler she believes Olivia has come with news of Rena’s father’s death.
• Rena and Olivia meet a man at the hospital who lost his best friend in the same multi-car accident which ripped Rena’s family apart. HE becomes emotional… but eleven-year-old Rena Averest does not.

Any of these situations would have made an adult weepy and teary-eyed, but Rena is stoic for much of the story.

There does come a point when Rena cries. Her tears are cathartic, releasing the pain, anger, loneliness, and sense of loss locked deep inside her for almost six months.

When Rena cries, she does not cry alone. Olivia cries… but her tears are not for Rena.

♥ Next week’s ingredient is…Tomato!

Tomato for the Writer: Embarrassment and/or ridicule often play a part in our character’s journey. What was one of your main character’s inescapable, red-faced moments?

Tomato for the Reader: Share a book you’ve read where you were so embarrassed for the main character by something they themselves did or where they were ridiculed so badly, it left a lasting scar impression on you.

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