How to Say I Love You Out Loud (26 page)

HW: Where did you get the idea for this particular book?

KC: I’ve worked with students with disabilities for a long time and over the course of that, I’ve spent a lot of time working with their families as well. The
sibling dynamic in those families has always interested me because many kids are forced to be mature from such a young age, and at times their needs are going to have to come second because there
might be someone with more pressing or immediate needs. That’s something that even adults struggle with, so I think for a child that can be especially difficult. I was also thinking about how
we really do define ourselves in relation to our families—specifically, how their identity is defined by the fact that there’s a person with a disability in their family. How does that
make them feel during adolescence, a time of so much insecurity? How does that impact every relationship in their life? I just thought it would be interesting to explore. And I always liked writing
about things in the context of romance, so I just took it in that direction.

HW: What was getting the edit letter like?

KC: The edit letter was kind of like an even better version of the constructive criticism from the site. Once you do the first read-over like, “OK, how bad is it going to
be?” you realize, “OK, there’s nothing that terrible. These people do like this book and do want to work with it.” Pretty much every point I read through, when I took a
minute to think about them individually, I felt like, “Yeah, I can see that, and I can see how that would make the book stronger.” You want to make your first book as good as possible.
After taking a few minutes to process, I was just really excited about it. It was a learning experience for me.

Typically, when I’m writing stories, my beginnings tend to be slow, and it’s just sort of a personal preference for how I like things to unfold. But really thinking about what that
means from a marketability perspective or the idea of getting people to pick up the book and want to read past the first chapter, then you start challenging yourself to do things in different ways
and do things better. When you take it from that perspective, it’s a learning process, and everything you do after that point can incorporate what you learned along the way. And, a lot of
that came from the first edit letter. So it was pretty cool in the end.

HW: How does the revision process work for you?

KC: I definitely like to work with a hard copy. I like viewing the manuscript as a physical thing and, in terms of considering connectivity between chapters and constancy within
characters, I like being able to flip back and forth through pages versus scrolling up and down on a computer. I like to have the entire manuscript in a binder in front of me. I went through after
getting the edit letter and made notes on the pages or sections that needed to be worked on. And then I sort of divvied it up in terms of what was most important, what I needed to target first, and
what was going to be the most time-consuming and started there. And then the minor details I worked on afterwards, with the thinking that if I was changing major things in another section, there
was no point targeting the minor details until all of that was taken care of and I could go through and make sure everything lined up. I also knew I’d feel better fine-tuning small details
and thinking more about individual wording once I got the bigger work or the harder work out of the way first. So I tackled it that way.

HW: I’ve found that that’s a really logical way to do it. When I’m doing edits, I always ask, “OK, what is the biggest thing?” Then,
“What are the medium things?” Then, “Are these things so big that all the little things that I have here should wait until the next draft?”

KC: My mind definitely works that way, too.

“The Writing Life”

HW: Where do you write? Do you have any writing rituals or do you write in a specific spot?

KC: No. I’m happy to write wherever I can set up my laptop. Surprisingly I do my most productive writing in busy places. If I can set up at a coffee shop, when
there’s some level of distraction, I actually can be the most focused on my story. While if I’m sitting in an empty, quiet room, I find it harder to concentrate. That’s the only
ritual I’d actually say I have. If there’s a little bit of distraction going on, that’s where I enjoy writing the most.

HW: What’s your process? Are you a plotter and an outliner, or do you just make it up as you go along?

KC: I’m definitely an outliner to the nth degree. I really feel I need to know where characters are going, and knowing where they end up really impacts where they start.
I’ve written stories where I haven’t done that, and then I get to the end, realize what the character’s motivation was, and it doesn’t sync up with where they were at the
beginning. That’s really how I’ve decided to start outlining.

So, I’ll start with my overall plot outline and really try to think through not only what’s happening, but where the characters are at and probably will be. I’m more character
based, so I tend to focus more on where the characters are at than the plot. Then I go through on a chapter-by-chapter basis when I’m writing and write a general outline of what’s
happening and bits of dialogue without punctuation or capitalization. Just sort of free-flow typing as it comes out. And then I’ll go back that third time, start at the beginning of that
chapter, and actually write it out. So it gets a little more specific each time I look at it.

HW: What is the very best writing advice you’ve ever heard?

KC: I can think of two pieces that I usually try to use to guide me. Number one is the old “Show, don’t tell,” and it’s something you have to remind
yourself all the time. Let the readers know what’s happening through how the characters are talking and what they’re doing in the moment rather than giving them the lengthy description
of what’s going on.

And the other really great piece of advice, I think, is “Write what you know.” With
How to Say I Love You Out Loud
, it was a culture that I’ve just been immersed in
for over a decade and I felt confident in what I was writing about and that I could do a realistic portrayal versus trying to talk about something that I had no experience with. I also think of
Katie van Ark with
The Boy Next Door.
Katie was so clear in the writing that this was a culture that she was really a part of and it made the book a lot more realistic to me as a
reader.

Partners for life or just on the ice?

Will their new romantic skating program be the big break Maddy’s been waiting for, or the big breakup that Gabe has always feared?

A love story? This is some sort of deranged joke. Except Igor doesn’t crack jokes. He barely knows how to smile.

I glance at Mad going all starry-eyed next to me. I’ve heard correctly. I look back at Igor and hold my eyes steady on him, but my insides are shaking worse than when I told Kurt I was
quitting hockey just before the bantam travel team championships.

Igor nods his head toward our water bottles at the boards. “I leave copies of the music there. You listen at home tonight, yes? For today, we see what we have to begin.” He cracks
his knuckles under his leather gloves. “Death spiral again. Before, you skate for audience. This time? No audience. Only Madelyn and Gabriel. You understand?”

“Yes, sir.” I understand, but there’s an ice rink’s chance in hell that I’m actually going to do what he wants. I take the lead and set my pivot, looking at the
empty bleachers. It’s been
Madelyn and Gabriel
for longer than I can remember. I let her hack off all my hair in preschool. I quit hockey for her. I broke my arm for her.
There’s nothing I wouldn’t do for her . . . except this. She’s like my sister, the way we read each other so well. Sib closeness, I can deal with. That’s where it stops.

On the exit, I push out so my back is facing Igor and I stare over the top of Mad’s head. Epic fail on my mission to fool our coach. “Again,” he says. “You must look,
Gabriel.”

This time, I watch the skate on Mad’s free foot as she circles around me. Igor is skating toward us before we’ve even finished the move. He nods at Mad. “Good, Madelyn. I have
changed my mind. We listen to music now. Put it on.”

Mad skates off, leaving me alone with the KGB. “I do not believe,” Igor says. “
Make me believe.
”

I kick at the ice with my toe pick. Disrespectful, yeah, but a trip to the penalty box is sounding like a winning idea right now. I’ve known this day was coming. Known it since I first
made myself look away from Mad’s arched chest and . . . “I can’t.”

Igor steps closer, and I stop. I’m not sure what he’ll do if I accidentally kick
him
but I’m sure I don’t want to find out. His breath makes warm puffs of air in
my face. “Do not tell me, ‘I can’t.’ ‘I can’t’ is not part of plan.”

For years, I’ve trusted Igor’s plans. For good reason. He’s coached me and Mad to the national junior pair title and three Junior Grand Prix medals, including a fourth-place
finish at the final last year. But . . . “This is Mad.”

Igor’s stainless steel eyes glint at me. “You want to win, yes?”

“Yes,” I whisper. Mom’s medals gleam in the back of my mind. I
need
to win.

“So you pretend. You need me to, what do we say, write it out?”

I don’t need Igor to spell it out. I know how to get a girl going. Trouble is, I’m not so hot at
keeping
things going. Mad returns and I ease her into the move once again,
this time to the long desperate notes of the music. I look at her face. “Sister, sister, sister,” I chant to myself. But there’s a cartoon red devil on my shoulder reminding me
I’m an only child. Okay then: “Friend?”

My feeble attempt only spawns another devil. They slap each other five. “With benefits!” they chorus.

Where the hell are my angels? “No.”

I must’ve said it out loud, because Mad startles. She slips off her edge and falls out of the spiral. She was only a few inches from the ice, but still. Stupidest move in the world to fall
on. Even juvenile pairs do it in their sleep. I help her up. “Sorry.”

“Madelyn,” Igor says, his voice as sickly as a tornado-warning sky, “please go work on your brackets for a moment.”

Igor’s temper usually blows on Chris’s shenanigans, but today, I get the twister cloud eyes. “I see you. All those girls, under bleachers at hockey games. What is problem
here?” His gloved fingers curl, now black claws.

I look at Mad, zipping through her brackets. She attacks the twisty turns, the determination fierce on her face. She puts so much power into the pattern that she almost slams into the barrier at
the end. That’s the problem. I’ve compartmentalized my life for so long, but Mad has no fear of the barrier.