I’m grateful for my chance to Mentor Killian, a gifted 15-year-old at Bishop Gibbons High School. We are getting comfortable with one another, he doesn’t try to breathe deeply when talking to me, and I don’t walk on eggshells to avoid upsetting him. His confidence is growing, as is his innate creativity and sense of plotting.

We have bridges to cross. I told him it was time to start typing and not writing in longhand, which he prefers. He likes writing his stories in a notebook, but it’s not easy for the Mentor to edit or read. I urged him to take pride in his writing and present it well.

He got it and instantly agreed.

Killiam and I have finished the first task happily and successfully. He’s written an ingenious horror story that gave me chills without turning my stomach or causing nightmares. He has a natural gift for plotting and, beneath the shyness, is an imaginative and bold writer with many ideas.

He needs encouragement, praise, and support, and he gets those and responds to them. My goal as a mentor is that when I am long dead,  Killian will remember me as someone that gave him the strength and confidence to be the writer he very much wants to be (and already is.)

For me, that was not a teacher but a librarian in my local library. I’d like to do that for him.

But he’s on fire now, eager to write more, committed to doing the hard work of writing.

His teacher Trish White was wise to get us working together, we both hung in there, and he has produced a piece he ought to be proud of. I’m not sure he thought that was possible.

The hardest part for me was getting Killian to trust me and believe I wasn’t going to dump on his writing. It is a beautiful, even sacred, thing for me to encourage a kid with some talent.

We work easily and well together, without tension or confusion. It almost feels like we have worked together before.

We are already talking about this next piece, which looks like a Horror Story set in a Boy Scout Troop out camping in the woods. I told Killian it’s helpful for new writers to write about things that spring from their own lives.

His first story with me, which I will post on my blog, is set in a bowling alley. Killiam loves to bowl almost as much as he loves pop music from the 70s and 80s.

Killiam and I have both expressed a desire to keep working together. This week, and before Halloween, he’s ending me a typed version of his bowling alley horror story, and I will give it a final edit and send it back to him for his final approval.

Then I’ll put it up on the blog, and Killian will be a published author. That makes both of us very happy.

Killian thanks me often for working with him, but I sincerely thanks him. He’s give me a great gift. The story will be up here sometime next week. I’m honored.