Posting the outline, from the beginning

I'm posting the full outline of New World For Old, to let people see how the story's planning out. I'd started to do this the beginning of the year but stopped. Now I'll be going all the way through. Here are synopses of the first three chapters, out of what has grown to 29 of them.

Rebirth 

Brendan slowly emerges from a stupor. He does not recognize where he is or understand why everything is so different from Derry. He is at an upstairs window and a half-eaten sandwich is on the sill. Memories crash in on him and send him into a painful panic mode. He has a mantra to calm himself and has to use it, over and over, then his mood grows angry and he destroys a line of ants that were taking away the remains of his sandwich. 

He realizes he is in the attic of a house. Below are the back yard, pool, pool house, and a separate garage. He focuses enough to go into the bathroom and recalls being tended to by a couple of men. Looks in a mirror to find his hair cropped close, his beard patchy and himself haggard. Overwhelmed, he collapses. 

Aunt Mari finds him, takes him back to his bed and lets him know he was brought to her house in Houston. He has been in an akinetic catatonic state. Hit with memories, he realizes Joanna is dead and now food for ants...and passes out. 

Rejoining 

Brendan wakes late in the day. Lying in the bed, he forgets where he is, for a moment, then hears voices and smells food and is very hungry. He makes himself get up and go to the bathroom to brush his teeth. It exhausts him, and the taste brings brutal memories of Joanna kissing him at the circle fort. 

He finds he is in an attic room that is somewhat hidden. There is a large space filled with boxes and junk, and a hallway winds around to the stairs. He quietly winds his way down and is met near the bottom by his uncle Sean and the family dog, Angus. Brendan has a memory of Uncle Sean bathing and dressing him, and finds the man has a slow Texas way of speaking. He's taken to the family room to meet his cousins, Brandi and Bernadette, both around ten years of age and always arguing. He remembers them complaining about his crying, and recalls a son named Scott, who helped Uncle Sean.

Brendan learns he was brought to Houston in late October, and it is now April, 1973. More memories jolt him until Scott returns with a friend, Jeremy, whose family lives close by. Both have a hint of pot's aroma on them. Jeremy leaves and dinner is served. The girls mess with Brendan by claiming to be each other. Irritated, he snaps at them that he's mad as a march hare so be careful. They grow quiet. He's given a small amount of food on his plate due to not having been eating much, told he has a doctor's appointment in 10 days, accepts what has happened and says a prayer for those long dead. 

Moving On 

Brendan explores the attic but mainly stays in his new room, clinging to memories while slowly assimilating to the family and their relative wealth. Scott is off to University in Austin, soon. Brandi and Bernadette are 10 months apart, in age, and agree on nothing except that Brendan is a carnival attraction for their friends. He calls them the B-girls and is wary of them. Aunt Mari runs the house and refuses a maid. Uncle Sean owns three Irish bars in town that are very successful and is considering buying a fourth. Jeremy is like a second son and is headed for a kibbutz in Israel, for a year. The B-Girls think he and Brendan look like brothers. 

Brendan reads books he finds in the attic, which helps make the slashes of memory fewer and farther between. He is always in pajama bottoms, then one day he is drawn outside to help Uncle Sean work on his old Volvo. It won't start, until Brendan sees the issue and gets it going, surprising the man. While catatonic, Brendan had automatically repaired a fan that was squeaking in his room but Uncle Sean and Aunt Mari had shrugged it off as unexplainable. Ma had never told them he could fix anything, once he'd seen how it went together. Brendan tells his uncle, "She thinks me simple." Then he heads back into the house. 

He fixes a sandwich, amazed at the wealth of food in the fridge, then naps. Finally he showers and dresses in some of Scott's old clothes, which fit him poorly. He explores the house and then the back yard, where he finds an iron Aunt Mari was throwing out. He plans to fix it then hears a voice comment on old habits but no one is around and realizes he was talking to himself. He wants to look around the front of the house but the driveway gate is closed and the walkway gate has a lock. He starts to back away but tells himself Joanna would not hesitate to climb it...so he does, still holding the iron.