Write a story that builds to a tone and an outcome

Grade 11 Reading Worksheet

Circle the best answer.

1. Read this first

   Dryer Seven (first-person story draft)

   [1] My aunt Odalys owns the laundromat on Brannock Street and pays me eleven dollars an hour to sit behind its counter from nine until midnight, which she calls supervision and I call watching other people's socks. [2] The regulars arrive in a fixed order, like the stops on a bus line, and the last of them is always Mr. Sokolov, who takes dryer seven because it is the only machine in the building that has never kept a coin. [3] He puts in one load, a blue work shirt and a gray towel, and sits on the folding table with his hands on his knees, and he does not look at a phone, mostly because he does not own one. [4] On the shelf behind my chair the lost-and-found box held eleven single gloves, a child's rain boot and a laminated card whose name I had stopped trying to read. [5] I had decided that Mr. Sokolov was the dullest man I would ever know, and I was in the middle of being wrong about it.

   [6] That Thursday the laundromat was full and loud, and I was tired and bored. [7] At ten past eleven the power flickered, dryer seven shuddered to a stop with the shirt half turned, and Mr. Sokolov was off the table faster than I had ever seen a man his age move. [8] He did not look at the machine; he looked at the shelf behind me, at the box, for the length of a held breath, and then at the floor, as though he had been caught at something.

   [9] I carried the card across the room and put it in his hand. [10] It was his, in small block letters beneath the photograph of a thin young man in a sailor's collar, and he turned it over twice with the care of a person checking a coin. [11] He said it had gone missing nineteen years ago, the week he had washed his only good coat here, and that he had never asked after it, because asking would have meant admitting that he had lost it. [12] The dryer restarted on its own, and the shirt resumed its slow circle behind the glass.

   [13] I wrote his name on the whiteboard where my aunt keeps the schedule and put a star beside it, which was against policy. [14] The next Thursday he arrived at the usual time, took dryer seven, and for the first time sat with his back to the shelf.

2. 1.

   Kira wants a short paragraph from Mr. Sokolov's point of view to follow [7]. Which paragraph adds what the narrator cannot see, without knowing too much?

   • On the folding table, Mr. Sokolov watched the lights flicker and the dryer stop with his shirt half turned, and he saw the narrator look up from behind the counter at him across the whole noisy room, as though it were a stage.
   • On the folding table, Mr. Sokolov kept his eyes on the dryer door, as he did every Thursday, and counted the floor tiles between his shoes so that they would not drift to the shelf behind the counter.
   • On the folding table, Mr. Sokolov sneered at the flicker and decided that the sullen kid at the counter was too lazy to see to a simple fuse.
   • On the folding table, Mr. Sokolov knew that the narrator would soon find the card, that nineteen years of waiting were about to end, and that he would say nothing about it.
3. 2.

   Noah sees a gap after [8]. Which scene should come next so the events build toward the card handed over in [9]?

   • The narrator takes the laminated card from the box, holds it up to the light and sounds out the block letters until the name becomes one the narrator knows.
   • The narrator steps into the back room, finds a tripped switch on the fuse box and flips it, so that dryer seven starts turning again before long.
   • The narrator decides that the box is full of rubbish, tips it into the bin and phones the aunt to ask whether anything on the shelf is worth keeping, since most of it looks like rubbish to her.
   • Mr. Sokolov crosses to the shelf himself, lifts the card from the box and pockets it, and the narrator goes back to the crossword without a word.
4. 3.

   Pia marks sentence [6] as flat. Which revision gives precise detail in the narrator's dry, tired tone, using only what the narrator can sense?

   • That Thursday the laundromat was crowded and noisy, and I was so tired and bored that I felt restless and sorry for myself, and I wished I were anywhere else.
   • That Thursday the washers thumped like a slow parade, someone's change rattled down a machine for the third time, and I read the same line of my chemistry notes until the words stopped being words.
   • That Thursday the laundromat was warm with the smell of dryer sheets, the washers turned like slow planets, and a quiet golden contentment settled over the whole room, as if the whole building were taking one long, contented breath.
   • That Thursday there were many people and many machines, and it was a long, busy night in which a lot of laundry got done, though I did not pay much attention to it.

5. Third Gear (first-person story draft)

   [1] My grandfather taught me to drive a stick shift in the parking lot of Hollis Cemetery, on the theory, which he stated as though it were an established principle of engineering, that nothing there could be hit that would reasonably object. [2] The truck was a 1988 pickup the color of weak tea, with a clutch that had to be pushed nearly to the floor before it would consent to anything and a gearshift knob worn as smooth as a stone from a riverbed. [3] He sat in the passenger seat with his cap balanced on his knee and his window cranked down, and every time I stalled the engine he tapped the dashboard twice with one knuckle, in the unhurried manner of a man tapping a barometer that he has owned for years. [4] By the end of the first hour I had stalled nineteen times and had counted every one of the taps, which I kept to myself as carefully as a secret. [5] He never explained what the taps meant, and I never asked him, because I suspected that the answer was a good deal shorter and plainer than anything I was prepared to hear.

   [6] On the second Saturday I was nervous and the truck was hard to drive. [7] The lot had a gentle rise at its far edge, where the old maples began, and he told me to take the truck up it without letting it roll back, which cannot be done by anyone who has not yet learned to let the clutch up as slowly and deliberately as a held breath. [8] Halfway up, the engine caught the wrong note, shuddered and quit, and the truck began to slide backward toward the gravel and toward the gray stone with the small iron lamb on it.

   [9] I got us stopped, though not smoothly, and for a long minute neither of us said anything at all. [10] He looked out of his window at the lamb, and I looked at the gearshift, and the engine ticked quietly as it cooled in the enormous silence of the cemetery. [11] Then I started the truck again, found the bite point, and let the clutch up so gradually that I could feel the engagement in my teeth. [12] The truck climbed the rise and rolled onto the level grass without a sound, and I did not dare to breathe until we had stopped.

   [13] He did not tap the dashboard, and neither of us remarked upon it. [14] He put his cap back on, and for the first time that month he looked at the road ahead of us and not at my feet.

6. 4.

   Luz wants a short paragraph from the grandfather's point of view to follow [8]. Which paragraph adds what the driver cannot see, without knowing too much?

   • In the passenger seat, the grandfather felt the truck roll backward toward the gravel and the stone lamb, and he watched the driver's hands go white on the wheel.
   • In the passenger seat, the grandfather knew that she had counted each of his taps and was too proud to ask what they meant.
   • In the passenger seat, the grandfather pressed his right foot against the floor where no brake was and kept both hands on his knees, having decided long ago that a hand on the wheel teaches nothing.
   • In the passenger seat, the grandfather decided to say nothing more, certain that she would climb the rise on the next try and that he would not need to tap again, and he let his shoulders drop at last.
7. 5.

   Zee marks sentence [6] as flat. Which revision gives precise detail in the narrator's nervous, self-mocking tone, using only what the narrator can sense?

   • On the second Saturday the clutch pedal pushed back against my sole like something alive, the cab smelled of hot vinyl and cut grass, and my palms left two damp prints on the wheel.
   • On the second Saturday I felt nervous, afraid and unsure of myself, and the whole truck seemed hard and frightening to me as I tried to drive it, as though the whole afternoon had been arranged to test me.
   • On the second Saturday the clutch pedal pushed back against my sole, and in the passenger seat my grandfather was remembering the day he had learned to drive it himself.
   • On the second Saturday the sunlight fell in gilded bars across the maples, the engine hummed a bright and eager tune, and my heart rose as lightly as a kite.

8. Advantage (third-person story draft)

   [1] The league paid fifteen-year-old referees twelve dollars a game, which Casimir Duda considered a fair price for being shouted at by a stranger's mother. [2] The Saturday under-eights game began quietly, with the whistle he had practiced on until his lips went numb, a rulebook folded small in his back pocket and, in his head, the one sentence the instructor had made them memorize: the referee sees what is, not what is wanted. [3] By the second half the blue team, who wore their shirts outside their shorts in a spirit of general indifference, led the green team three to two. [4] A woman on the green sideline, in a coat the color of a traffic cone, had begun to address him by his first name, which she could have learned only from the sign-up sheet taped to the snack stand. [5] He ignored her, which in his experience was the same as being slow, and which his instructor had warned would feel exactly like being rude.

   [6] The game was close and the air was tense, and the whistle felt heavy in his hand. [7] Four minutes from the end a green player tripped over the ball, fell, and lay on the grass looking more astonished than hurt, while a blue player scooped up the loose ball and dribbled unopposed toward the open goal. [8] The woman in the traffic-cone coat shrieked that it was a foul, which it was not, and the whole green sideline took up the sound at once, like a flock of geese settling on a lake.

   [9] He let play go on. [10] The blue player scored, and the sideline's noise rose to a pitch that Casimir felt in his fillings, and only then did he blow the whistle, jog to the fallen child and kneel beside the boy with enormous care. [11] The child sat up and asked whether the game was over, and Casimir said that it was nearly over, and when he looked up, the woman had come onto the field and stopped exactly at the touchline, as though an invisible wall had risen there. [12] "What rule is that?" she demanded. [13] "That I see what is," he said, "not what is wanted," and he heard his voice crack on the last word.

   [14] The game ended four to two, and in the parking lot afterward she pressed a folded twenty into his rulebook pocket without a word, which was not covered by any rule that he had been taught.

9. 6.

   Ari wants a short paragraph from the woman's point of view to follow [8]. Which paragraph adds what the referee cannot see, without spoiling the ending?

   • On the green sideline she gripped the fence until the wire printed her palms and watched her son lie on the grass without lifting his head, because he had asked her not to come.
   • On the sideline the woman already knew that she would end the day pressing money into the boy's hand and admitting that he had been right.
   • On the sideline the woman saw the green player fall, the blue player take the ball and the referee wave play on, and she was furious at the whole sequence.
   • On the sideline the woman laughed at the skinny referee, thought the boy had no business with a whistle and hoped that someone would take it from him, and hoped, loudly, that someone would take the whistle away.
10. 7.

    Kira sees a gap after [5]. Which scene should come next so the events build toward the decision in [9]?

    • During a stoppage he decides the job is not worth twelve dollars and tells the league coordinator that he will not referee the rest of the game with a surprising amount of dignity.
    • During a stoppage he takes the rulebook from his back pocket, finds the rule about letting play go on, reads it twice with his lips moving and folds the page down.
    • In the second half the woman calls him by his first name again, and he ignores her again, which he knows is the same as being slow.
    • During a stoppage he buys a juice box at the snack stand and talks to the green coach about the drainage of the field.
11. 8.

    Pia marks sentence [6] as flat. Which revision gives precise detail in the referee's tense, restrained tone, using only what the referee can sense?

    • The game was exciting, with a lot of movement and noise on the field, and the players seemed to care very much about what happened next, though no one could say exactly what was at stake.
    • Sunlight poured over the field like warm honey, small cleats flashed like jewels, and everything felt gentle and unhurried and sweet.
    • The score hung at three to two, the whistle was slick against his lip, and a dozen small cleats ground the center circle into something between mud and mulch.
    • The score hung at three to two, and behind the fence the green coach was quietly deciding to blame the referee if his team lost.

12. Table Nine (first-person story draft)

    [1] The county fair's pie contest had never had a judge under thirty until the year the regular judge's knee gave out and the committee, in a spirit it called inclusion, drafted me. [2] I was seventeen, I knew pie only as something one ate while grateful, and I was seated at Table Nine between a former mayor and a man who sold insurance, with a scorecard, a plastic fork and twelve numbered slices on paper plates. [3] The rules said to judge crust, filling and presentation on a scale of one to ten and to score without knowing whose pie was whose, which would have been easier had I not recognized, from forty feet away, the gleam of Mrs. Halloran's lattice. [4] Mrs. Halloran lived next door to us and had fed me every Thursday of my childhood, and her lattice was the work of a woman who measured with a ruler.

    [5] Slice nine tasted of lemon. [6] I was nervous and the room felt small, and I held the fork too tight. [7] The lemon should not have been there, because the card said apple, and beneath the lemon was something sweeter that I could not immediately name, and I understood with a cold click that I had been fed this pie before, on a Thursday, with a glass of milk.

    [8] I put down the fork. [9] The mayor, seated to my left, scored it a nine without hesitation. [10] The insurance salesman wrote an eleven, then crossed it out with the embarrassed thoroughness of a man correcting a policy. [11] I looked at the card for a long time, at the little ruled boxes that seemed to be waiting for a conclusion, and wrote seven for the filling and ten for the crust.

    [12] At four o'clock the committee posted the ribbons on the corkboard by the main entrance, and third place went to slice nine. [13] Mrs. Halloran found me by the lemonade stand and did not mention the pie, the ribbon or the scorecard. [14] She asked if I had eaten, which was the question she had asked me for seventeen years, and I said I had, and she handed me a paper plate with a wedge on it anyway, and the wedge was apple, only apple, and exactly as good as the lemon had made me fear.

13. 9.

    Bo wants a short paragraph from Mrs. Halloran's point of view to follow [8]. Which paragraph adds what the judge cannot see, without knowing too much?

    • Across the hall, Mrs. Halloran knew that the girl had tasted the lemon at once and would score the pie honestly, whatever it cost her and would not say so to anyone in the hall.
    • Across the hall, Mrs. Halloran smirked, certain that a seventeen-year-old could not tell lemon from apple and that the judging was a joke.
    • Across the hall, Mrs. Halloran folded a paper napkin into smaller and smaller squares and kept her eyes on the cake table, where she could watch Table Nine without seeming to.
    • Across the hall, Mrs. Halloran was already planning the plate of apple pie that she would press into the girl's hands that afternoon.
14. 10.

    Tala sees a gap after [4]. Which scene should come next so the events build toward slice nine in [5]?

    • The narrator scores the first eight slices, privately resolving to give Mrs. Halloran's pie no more and no less than the rest, and saves slice nine for after the eighth.
    • The narrator compares the lattices on slices three and four, wonders aloud whether one baker made both, and the mayor wonders too and neither of them reaches a conclusion.
    • The narrator spends the break reading the fair program, learns when the tractor pull begins and decides to attend it with the insurance salesman.
    • The narrator turns the plates over, finds Mrs. Halloran's name under slice nine and decides at once to give it a ten.