Excerpt from Wide Asleep (CUnderhill and KKilgour)

Blurb:

Scrambled images and apparitions fill Jennifer (Jay) Delford's dreams, as she tries to untangle the clues that could safe a life; keeping her Wide Asleep 

Jennifer (Jay) Delford hadn't thought about her time at North Carolina University for nearly 50 years, memories of bulbous lecturers preaching that 'fashionable young ladies' have no place in academics and how she had met her sweetheart, the blue-eyed renegade seemed as though they could now be looked back on with mirth and irony, and yet these thoughts had been long buried with all other thoughts that allowed Jay to dwell on the unfortunate death of a young girl whose life could have been spared had Jay only been able to unscramble faster the clues her head played her each night as she lay in bed Wide Asleep. 

Now as her granddaughter Jenny, begins to wrestle with strange apparitions as she sleeps, Jay puts pen to paper to write down her memoirs of things she had long tried to forget. Knowing that to waste time could mean that another innocent life will meet an untimely death. 

Join Jay as she delves into her past and details how she was once very much a young woman, living in a man's world. 

Excerpt: Chapter 3, Fish Bowls can shatter in your hands. 

“Have we not proved that women will simply never be as strong willed or intellectual as men?” Professor Clark professed to a rowdy bunch of adolescent morons. I told myself that my unshed tears could have been some form of twisted victory, however pathetic it may have seemed. Even though the din created by the laughs coming from most of the boys in the room threatened said victory, that is until I heard a strong familiar voice daring to defy Professor Clark’s onslaught. I started to feel something when I saw my saviour stand up and at the time I rationalised it as a form of relief that he was willing to defy the cruel pack of snarling sniggers. The sinking feeling in my stomach began to turn into a rising sensation- I was soaring as a small shred of hope in men evaporated its way into a corner of my then shrinking heart. 

“I feel sir that what you cannot comprehend, is that women may be great orators, teachers, politicians and perhaps even one day Presidents. A woman Sir, it is possible can be as great, intelligent and knowledgeable as any man, and yet Sir, women will always be the rock that holds our great country together, as they possess something which no man could conceive, for with their knowledge and intellect unlike men of the same standing, they bring love, passion and patience, holding on to all hope after fickle men have moved on to their next conquest; the only men who do not accept authority from women are men who have little understanding of their own failings and are therefore wilfully ignorant and in no way worth listening to; Sir.”

At my time of life it is inevitable, perhaps even acceptable to be left with a few regrets. The fact that I did not have the courage to look up and see what kind of expression Professor Clark adopted after the blue eyed renegade's speech is one such regret. Many times I have imagined his chubby face to have rapidly reddened, showing his anger, frustration and unadulterated shock. His brow-mop would have been used to dab the ever-growing number of sweat beads surfacing on his forehead and I am convinced that all thoughts of the inappropriateness of mine and Maddie's involvement in the debate had vanished from his conscious. All thoughts and eyes, including my own, I'm sure would have been on Mr Later Comer. In clichéd terms, steam would have been coming out of Professor Clark's ears.  

My eyes seemed to linger on the figure that had occasionally given me a lift home, as I stared I once again took in his great stature, and perhaps for just a moment felt the weaker sex. Of course everything he had said was true, but as I stared, open mouthed at this strange man, I found an inner monologue trying to decide whether I would have done the same for him; and as I took in every inch of his appearance, my heart wrenched and fell with a thump, as I realised I wouldn't have sacrificed myself, the way he had. 

Suddenly it seemed my unconscious had taken in all of the man who had stepped in to help me; the indistinguishable figure of my dreams was abundantly clear. Mr Unacceptably late comer, Mr Women have weaker chests, Mr half smile, the blue eyed renegade; my saviour now had a name...