First Chapter First Paragraph Tuesday Intros:Stay by Catherine Ryan Hyde

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Stay by Catherine Ryan Hyde

Part One: Then
Summer 1969

Chapter One
The Tipping Day

Is it just me, or does everybody have a day in their life like the one I’m about to retell? I’m talking about those days that act like a fulcrum between everything that came before and your brand-new life after.

It feels a little something like this: When I was a kid, I used to like to bust a move on the playground. Boy stuff, I suppose. I’d run up to the teeter-totter and jump on the “down” seat. The one that was resting in the dirt. Then I’d trot up to the middle- the part that sits safely on the bar. And then, when I kept going, I’d hit the spot where my weight would tip the thing. You know it’s there, you anticipate it. You slow your step just a little bit, knowing it’s soon and you’re about to find it. There’s a delicious little moment of fear in there, but it’s manageable. Next thing you know, you’re being dropped safely back to the dirt, but on the other side. This day was something like that. It was the summer of 1969. was fourteen.