12 Again: List 3

by Sue Corbett
After making a birthday wish, forty-year-old Bernadette wakes up as a twelve-year-old — and attends seventh grade with her son Patrick.

This list covers Patrick's story, Thursday Afternoon, October 15–Bernadette's story, Monday, October 19.

Here are links to our lists for the novel: List 1, List 2, List 3, List 4
35 words 8 learners

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Full list of words from this list:

words only definitions & notes
  1. bound
    move forward by leaping
    He was upstairs for an hour or more before he heard Kevin calling him, then heard him bounding up the stairs.
  2. venture
    proceed somewhere despite the risk of possible dangers
    Bernadette spent the remainder of daylight in hiding, scared of the scene outside her mother’s home, scared to venture into town, scared to think.
  3. poultice
    a medical dressing spread on a cloth and applied to the skin
    Her mother knew the names of all the plants and would often suggest a hike when she was low on a wildflower or weed she used for making poultices or headache cures.
  4. dawdle
    waste time
    She had no place to go, so she dawdled, looking around and down, searching the ground cover on both sides of the path for wild blooms and sleeping fairies, who, her mother said, often used empty acorn shells for beds.
  5. coax
    influence or persuade by gentle and persistent urging
    The October sun had coaxed the oxeye daisies and aster out for their last show of the season, and the woods were freckled with white and purple flowers.
  6. consign
    commit forever
    Bernadette knew a lot of people came here to exercise, though it was a place she had consigned to childhood memory.
  7. sliver
    (figurative) a small or narrow piece or slice
    It was full dark by that time, but for the light from a sliver of the moon, and she had to guess which house was her mother’s.
  8. interim
    serving during an intermediate interval of time
    It was a single sheet, marked “Interim Report.” There were two columns, one that listed the classes she was taking and another titled “Projected First Quarter Grade.”
  9. revulsion
    intense aversion
    What could she tell her? That math made a lot more sense after years of keeping a budget and balancing a checkbook? That her original revulsion at science—dissecting frogs? gross!—seemed a tad silly after she had given birth by C-section?
  10. gaunt
    very thin, especially from disease or hunger or cold
    When his father came in the front door, Patrick noticed how gaunt he looked. Maybe he wasn’t eating enough fruit.
  11. sober
    completely lacking in playfulness
    Kevin was sober. “Yeah, but who took the wallet? And don’t you need a password, Dad?”
  12. impound
    take temporary possession of by legal authority
    On Thursday, the sheriff's department impounded McBride’s 1994 Volvo station wagon, which had been parked outside her mother's house on William Street in North Massapequa, since her disappearance.
  13. efficacy
    capacity or power to produce a desired result
    The medicine men believe firmly in the efficacy of their art and often refuse payment for its exercise.
  14. vulgar
    lacking refinement or cultivation or taste
    Of course, what was science—written, acknowledged, and accepted science—two centuries ago is now pronounced vulgar error and popular superstition.
  15. unabated
    continuing at full strength or intensity
    Yet the practice of it continues unabated in the countryside, despite the introduction and availability of modern methods.
  16. adhere
    be a devoted follower or supporter
    Another chapter explained the tradition of May Eve bonfires, held on April 30, to welcome the onset of warmer weather, and this, too, was a practice she was now sure her mother had quietly, but rigidly, adhered to.
  17. inept
    generally incompetent and ineffectual
    The candle sale would have to wait until tomorrow, although Bernadette briefly considered whether she’d have better luck getting inside the house with this inept woman in charge.
  18. haunch
    the upper part of the leg of an animal, often used for food
    He pried the key out of the dirt just as a small black rabbit hopped into view. It perched on its haunches, watching him.
  19. blare
    make a loud noise
    The loudspeaker was blaring “Candy Man,” by Sammy Davis, Jr., an awful song she had not heard in years until recently, when she had heard it more than once on the radio in her mother’s kitchen.
  20. entrails
    internal organs collectively
    On every counter there were keyboards, monitors, hard drives, many of them with the entrails spilling out.
  21. overhaul
    make repairs, renovations, revisions or adjustments to
    There were a few working models for sale, secondhand machines the man had probably overhauled.
  22. pristine
    immaculately clean and unused
    In the leather slot where she had put the money from the ATM—fifteen pristine twenty-dollar-bills—there was no money.
  23. slog
    walk heavily and firmly, as when weary, or through mud
    Bernadette slogged home in the rain.
  24. essentially
    at bottom or by something's very nature
    There was something so essentially loving in the way her mother made snacks for her, and she thought about how much she liked to make sugar cookies or cupcakes for her boys—how much pleasure it gave her when they gobbled something down she had whipped up.
  25. calibrate
    make fine adjustments for optimal measuring
    Bernadette didn’t say anything, but her mind worked like a microscope, her thoughts calibrating to bring the object under glass into focus.
  26. rotary
    describing or moving in a circle
    She still had a rotary-dial phone (Patrick and Kevin thought that was hilarious) and the same television Bernadette’s father had bought so he could watch the Mets in the World Series—the 1969 World Series.
  27. pallor
    an unnatural lack of color in the skin
    The rain had ended, but there was still a gray pallor over everything.
  28. complexion
    the coloring of a person's face
    The slug’s color would indicate the lover’s complexion, and the slimy trail it left in the grains would spell out the first initial of his name.
  29. refract
    subject to change in direction of a propagating wave
    She carefully slid out a crystal goblet—a Waterford glass her mother had gotten as a wedding gift from her own parents. She twirled it in the moonlight, sending splinters of refracted light around the dark room.
  30. gingerly
    in a manner marked by extreme care or delicacy
    In the kitchen, she gingerly set the glass on the counter.
  31. gild
    decorate with, or as if with, gold leaf or liquid gold
    “Good afternoon,” said the woman in the shop, a slight hint of a brogue gilding her welcome.
  32. sieve
    a strainer for separating lumps from powdered material
    Fairy meal! You need the real stuff. Flaherty’s Fine Sieve Oatmeal.
  33. ethereal
    characterized by lightness and insubstantiality
    Her mother was standing in the doorway, backlit by the low lamp in the living room. She looked ethereal.
  34. addled
    confused and vague; used especially of thinking
    “I’ve been addled, I’ll tell you, but I think I’ve figured it out now. You need to get back to your family, true?”
  35. extravagant
    greatly exceeding bounds of reason or moderation
    Oh, people think magic is some extravagant thing. You focus the mind on what you want and use nature to help.
Created on Thu Aug 19 11:10:19 EDT 2021 (updated Wed Aug 25 10:06:44 EDT 2021)

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