WEBVTT - Exclusive: An Audio Preview of Dani's Forthcoming Novel! 0:00:02.360 --> 0:00:06.000 Hey, Family Secrets. Family. I'm here with a special treat 0:00:06.040 --> 0:00:08.719 for you, my way of thanking you for being such 0:00:08.760 --> 0:00:13.000 a wonderful, supportive and inspiring community. I couldn't do what 0:00:13.039 --> 0:00:16.880 I do without you. So without further ado, here is 0:00:16.920 --> 0:00:19.560 a special sneak peak of the first chapter of my 0:00:19.600 --> 0:00:22.960 new novel, Signal Fires. The book doesn't come out until October, 0:00:23.880 --> 0:00:25.319 but I wanted you to get a taste of it 0:00:25.400 --> 0:00:29.520 before anyone else. Everything I know about Family Secrets is 0:00:29.560 --> 0:00:31.960 in the story I'm about to tell. I hope you 0:00:32.040 --> 0:00:51.760 love it. August Sarah and THEO. And it's nothing really, 0:00:52.000 --> 0:00:54.880 or might be nothing, or ought to be nothing. As 0:00:54.880 --> 0:00:57.240 he leans his head forward to press the tip of 0:00:57.320 --> 0:01:01.520 his cigarette to the car's lighter, its sizzles on contact, 0:01:02.120 --> 0:01:05.680 a sound particular to its brief moment in history in 0:01:05.720 --> 0:01:10.000 which cars have lighters and otherwise sensible fifteen year old 0:01:10.360 --> 0:01:14.200 choke down Marlborough Reds and drive their mother's Buicks without 0:01:14.240 --> 0:01:17.240 so much as a learner's permit. There's a girl he 0:01:17.240 --> 0:01:20.959 wants to impress. Her name is Misty Zimmerman, and if 0:01:21.000 --> 0:01:23.440 she lives through this night, she will grow up to 0:01:23.440 --> 0:01:26.560 be a magazine editor or a high school teacher or 0:01:26.560 --> 0:01:29.720 a defense lawyer. She will be a mother of three 0:01:30.080 --> 0:01:33.960 or remain childless. She will die young of ovarian cancer, 0:01:34.400 --> 0:01:38.119 or live to know her great grandchildren. But these are 0:01:38.160 --> 0:01:41.959 only a few possible arcs to a life. A handful 0:01:42.000 --> 0:01:45.959 of shooting stars in the night sky change one thing, 0:01:46.319 --> 0:01:51.000 and everything changes. A tremor here sets off an earthquake there, 0:01:51.680 --> 0:01:56.360 A fault line deepens, A wire gets tripped, his foot 0:01:56.400 --> 0:01:59.760 on the gas. He doesn't really know what he's doing, 0:02:00.080 --> 0:02:03.120 but that won't stop him. He's all jacked up, just 0:02:03.280 --> 0:02:06.080 like a fifteen year old boy. He has something to 0:02:06.160 --> 0:02:11.040 prove to himself, to Misty, to his sister. It's as 0:02:11.040 --> 0:02:14.720 if he's following a script written in brail, his fingers 0:02:14.800 --> 0:02:20.760 running across code. He doesn't understand THEO slow down. That's 0:02:20.760 --> 0:02:24.760 his sister, Sarah from the back seat Misty's riding shotgun. 0:02:26.000 --> 0:02:28.320 It was Sarah who tossed him the keys to their 0:02:28.320 --> 0:02:34.040 mother's car. Sarah aged seventeen. After this night, she will 0:02:34.080 --> 0:02:38.040 become unknowable to him. The summer sky is a veil 0:02:38.200 --> 0:02:42.280 thrown over the moon and stars. The streets are quiet, 0:02:42.680 --> 0:02:45.880 the good people of Avalon long since tucked in for 0:02:45.919 --> 0:02:49.320 the night, their own parents are asleep in their queen 0:02:49.400 --> 0:02:53.280 sized bed under the plaid afghan knitted by one of 0:02:53.320 --> 0:02:57.280 their father's patients. His mom is a deep sleeper, but 0:02:57.400 --> 0:02:59.919 his dad has been trained by a lifetime as a 0:03:00.080 --> 0:03:04.440 doctor to bolt awake at the slightest provocation. He is 0:03:04.520 --> 0:03:10.440 always ready. The teenagers aren't looking for trouble. They're good kids. 0:03:10.440 --> 0:03:14.160 Everyone would say so. But they're bored. It's the end 0:03:14.160 --> 0:03:18.359 of summer. School will resume next week. Sarah is going 0:03:18.400 --> 0:03:21.560 into her senior year, after which she'll be gone. She's 0:03:21.560 --> 0:03:27.240 a superstar his sister varsity. This honors that bristling with potential. 0:03:28.160 --> 0:03:31.480 THEO has three years left and he's barely made a mark. 0:03:32.240 --> 0:03:35.760 He's a chubby kid whose default is silence and shame. 0:03:36.560 --> 0:03:40.200 He blushes easily. He can feel his cheeks reddened as 0:03:40.240 --> 0:03:44.360 he holds the lighter and inhales. Here's the sizzle, draws 0:03:44.440 --> 0:03:49.280 the smoke deep into his lungs. His father, a pulmonary surgeon, 0:03:49.400 --> 0:03:53.040 would kill him. Maybe that's why Sarah threw him the keys. 0:03:53.480 --> 0:03:56.040 Maybe she's trying to help get him to act. God 0:03:56.120 --> 0:03:59.240 damn it, to take a risk. Better to be bad 0:03:59.360 --> 0:04:02.560 than to be no thing. Misty Zimmerman is just a 0:04:02.600 --> 0:04:05.600 girl along for the ride. It was Sarah who asked 0:04:05.640 --> 0:04:09.120 her to come. Sarah doing for THEO what THEO cannot 0:04:09.160 --> 0:04:14.560 do for himself. Change one thing, and everything changes. The 0:04:14.600 --> 0:04:19.160 buick speeds down Poplar Street. Misty stretches and yawns in 0:04:19.240 --> 0:04:23.919 the passenger's seat. THEO turns left, then right. He's getting 0:04:23.960 --> 0:04:27.480 the hang of this. He flicks the directional then heads 0:04:27.480 --> 0:04:30.840 onto the parkway. As they passed the mall, he looks 0:04:30.839 --> 0:04:33.800 to see if Burger King is still open. Watch it, 0:04:33.960 --> 0:04:38.599 Sarah yells. He swerves back into his lane, heart racing. 0:04:39.200 --> 0:04:42.320 He almost hit the guardrail. He gets off the parkway 0:04:42.320 --> 0:04:45.479 at the next exit and eases up on the gas. 0:04:45.480 --> 0:04:48.719 This was maybe a bad idea. He wants to go home. 0:04:49.200 --> 0:04:54.080 He also wants another cigarette. Pull over, Sarah says, I'll drive. 0:04:55.279 --> 0:04:58.400 THEO looks for a good spot to stop. He has 0:04:58.440 --> 0:05:03.919 no idea how to park. Sarah's right, this is stupid. Actually, no, 0:05:04.080 --> 0:05:08.279 forget it. I shouldn't, She says. They're almost home. It's 0:05:08.320 --> 0:05:11.760 like a song in his head. Almost home, Almost home, 0:05:11.920 --> 0:05:16.400 Almost home, just a few blocks to go. They pass 0:05:16.440 --> 0:05:20.200 the Heller's house. The church offs as he leans forward 0:05:20.520 --> 0:05:23.760 The lighter slips through Theo's fingers and drops into his 0:05:23.839 --> 0:05:27.440 open shirt collar. He lets out a yelp and tries 0:05:27.480 --> 0:05:31.520 to grab it, which only makes matters worse. He arches 0:05:31.600 --> 0:05:34.800 his back to shake the burning metal sing loose, but 0:05:34.880 --> 0:05:38.360 it's wedged between his shorts and his belly. The smell 0:05:38.400 --> 0:05:42.760 of singed flesh, a perfect shiny half moon, will remain 0:05:43.640 --> 0:05:46.760 years from now. When a lover traces the scar on 0:05:46.839 --> 0:05:49.440 his stomach and asks how he got it, he will 0:05:49.560 --> 0:05:54.440 roll away. But now now they're futures shoot like gamma 0:05:54.520 --> 0:05:58.880 rays from the moving car. Three high school students. What 0:05:58.960 --> 0:06:01.840 if Sarah had got out with her friends instead that night? 0:06:02.560 --> 0:06:06.160 What if Misty had begged off? What if THEO had 0:06:06.200 --> 0:06:09.359 succumbed to his usual way of being and fixed himself 0:06:09.400 --> 0:06:12.320 a salami sandwich with lots of mustard and taking it 0:06:12.320 --> 0:06:16.520 with him to bed. The wheel spins the screams of 0:06:16.560 --> 0:06:21.479 teenagers in the night, THEO no stop, Jesus, fuck, Help God. 0:06:22.240 --> 0:06:25.280 And there is no screech of brakes, nothing to blunt 0:06:25.320 --> 0:06:29.359 the impact. A concussion of metal and an ancient oak, 0:06:30.000 --> 0:06:34.520 the sound of two worlds colliding. The fender and right 0:06:34.600 --> 0:06:36.840 side of the buick crumpled like it's a toy, and 0:06:36.880 --> 0:06:40.640 this is all make believe. Upstairs, on the second floor 0:06:40.720 --> 0:06:44.240 of Benjamin and Mimi Wolfe's home, a light blinks on 0:06:45.080 --> 0:06:48.480 a window opens. Ben Wilf stares down at the scene 0:06:48.480 --> 0:06:51.440 below for a fraction of a second. By the time 0:06:51.480 --> 0:06:54.360 he's made it to the front door, his daughter Sarah 0:06:54.440 --> 0:06:58.159 is standing before him. Thank god, thank god, thank god, 0:06:58.560 --> 0:07:02.200 her t shirt and her face splattered with blood. THEO 0:07:02.320 --> 0:07:04.919 is on all fours on the ground. He seems to 0:07:04.920 --> 0:07:08.239 be in one piece, thank God, thank god, thank god. 0:07:08.880 --> 0:07:12.960 But then there's a girl in the car. Dad, miss 0:07:13.000 --> 0:07:16.640 Tis and Ramann is unconscious. She isn't wearing a seatbelt 0:07:16.880 --> 0:07:20.160 who wears seatbelts, and there's a gash in her forehead 0:07:20.200 --> 0:07:23.240 from which blood is gushing. There's no time to call 0:07:23.280 --> 0:07:25.920 an ambulance. If they wait for E. M. T. S 0:07:25.960 --> 0:07:28.720 To get here, the girl will be gone. So Ben 0:07:28.800 --> 0:07:32.880 does what's necessary. He leans into the driver's door, hooks 0:07:32.920 --> 0:07:35.720 two hands beneath the girl's armpits, and drags her out. 0:07:36.760 --> 0:07:41.880 Your shirt, THEO. He barks Theo's belly royals. He's about 0:07:41.920 --> 0:07:44.679 to be sick. He pulls his shirt off and throws 0:07:44.720 --> 0:07:49.120 it to his father. Ben lifts Misty's head, then wraps 0:07:49.160 --> 0:07:53.120 the shirt tightly around her skull in a tourniquet. His 0:07:53.240 --> 0:07:57.600 mind has gone slow and quiet. He's a very good doctor. 0:07:58.360 --> 0:08:01.720 He feels for the girl's pulse. Mimi is on the 0:08:01.760 --> 0:08:05.000 front steps now, her nightgown billowing in the wind that 0:08:05.080 --> 0:08:08.560 seems to have kicked up out of nowhere. What happened, 0:08:08.800 --> 0:08:14.760 Mimi screams, Sarah THEO It was me, Mom. Sarah says, 0:08:15.480 --> 0:08:20.640 I was driving. THEO stares at his sister. That doesn't 0:08:20.680 --> 0:08:25.440 matter now, Ben says softly. Up and down Division Street. 0:08:25.600 --> 0:08:30.600 Their neighbors have awakened. The crash, the voices, the electricity 0:08:30.680 --> 0:08:33.959 in the air. Some one must have called it in 0:08:33.960 --> 0:08:38.080 in the distance, the wail of a siren. Ben knows 0:08:38.160 --> 0:08:42.640 before he knows, in that deep instinctual way he couldn't 0:08:42.679 --> 0:08:45.080 see in the dark. When he dragged the girl out 0:08:45.080 --> 0:08:48.760 of the car, he registered only the head wound, the 0:08:48.880 --> 0:08:54.400 uncontrollable bleeding. He now knows her neck is broken, and 0:08:54.559 --> 0:08:58.559 he has done the worst thing imaginable. He has moved her. 0:08:59.559 --> 0:09:01.280 In the day is to come, he will tell the 0:09:01.360 --> 0:09:05.079 story to the authorities, to the life support team, to 0:09:05.240 --> 0:09:10.520 Missy's parents. The story that Sarah was driving with Misty 0:09:10.640 --> 0:09:14.520 riding shotgun and THEO in the back seat will not 0:09:14.800 --> 0:09:20.280 be questioned, not this night, not ever. It will become 0:09:20.720 --> 0:09:25.680 the deepest kind of family secret, one so dangerous that 0:09:25.760 --> 0:09:35.760 it will never be spoken. This audio was exerted from 0:09:35.800 --> 0:09:38.840 the audiobook of Signal Fires by Danny Shapiro, who was 0:09:38.880 --> 0:09:41.480 read by the author, and courtesy of Penguin Random House 0:09:41.559 --> 0:09:41.920 Audio