My mama set a lone plate for me on the sideboard in the kitchen. That was truly the first time I felt unwanted in my daddy’s family. My daddy hadn’t even bothered to tell me himself not to sit at his table. He had left that to my mama, and I resented not only him for it, but her too. “You sit down,” my mama said, “and I’ll fix your plate.”

“You don’t have to fix me anything,” I said, pouting.

“It’ll be the same food I’ve cooked for your daddy.”

“I don't want it.”

“Paul, you hafta eat.”

“Not in this house,” I said, and left.

“Paul-Edward!” she called after me. “Boy, don’t you go no farther’n them steps! You hear me?”

I heard her, all right. I just didn’t admit I did. I walked the back side of the veranda, out of my mama’s view, and leaned against a post and looked out across the backyard to my daddy’s forest.

—The Land,
Mildred D. Taylor

What is the conflict?

Why does the conflict happen?

What will it take to resolve the conflict?