tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-42876653086599715002024-03-13T08:07:54.690-06:00Skull Valley...a place of dreams and voices.Mcravenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01983341903661185935noreply@blogger.comBlogger65125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4287665308659971500.post-40268610583989056082014-11-18T14:15:00.000-07:002014-11-18T14:15:13.356-07:00It's a New Month, and time for a teaser...Wow! Where has the time gone? It is November already and the New Year is looming on my calendar. I was looking at the stats to this blog and saw that friends from Europe were the most plentiful viewers in the last two weeks. I just wanted to remind you that "Ghost of the Black Bull is available at all Amazon outlets in Europe and I believe that it is available on Barnes and Noble there as well. Thanks for being such loyal followers.<br />
Here is a short excerpt from "Black Bull":<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-rz9WR25LRsU/VGu2haiEnkI/AAAAAAAAAL8/bcjNSnN0HM4/s1600/BlackBullyay%2Bcopy.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-rz9WR25LRsU/VGu2haiEnkI/AAAAAAAAAL8/bcjNSnN0HM4/s1600/BlackBullyay%2Bcopy.jpg" /></a></div>
<br />
<i> "Pappy went to the mine because he knew that although JR was strong enough to work there, he was terrified of being underground. It wasn’t just the damned stories that miners told while he was around, Tommy Knockers and such, but on one trip underground the miners had put their lanterns out. It took all of them to hold JR down after he started screaming and running into the walls of the mine."</i>Mcravenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01983341903661185935noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4287665308659971500.post-25231573352234841552014-10-29T14:17:00.000-06:002014-10-29T14:17:27.208-06:00<h2 style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: large;">The Black Bull is Loose! Rampaging on Amazon and Nook.</span></h2>
<h2 style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: large;"> </span></h2>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-OHOX1xwzhh8/VFFKKNQTabI/AAAAAAAAALs/YUQyT6-NHcc/s1600/BlackBullyay%2Bcopy.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-OHOX1xwzhh8/VFFKKNQTabI/AAAAAAAAALs/YUQyT6-NHcc/s1600/BlackBullyay%2Bcopy.jpg" height="240" width="320" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-size: small;">The Ghost of the Black Bull is a story of bad luck and trouble for two families that have little in common. Yet their lives intersect in a collision that will leave you breathless. The Black Bull is a real and ethereal symbol of evil and violence that haunts them until the shocking conclusion. Available at <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Ghost-Black-Bull-Michael-LeFevre-ebook/dp/B00O32MMHA/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1414613227&sr=1-1&keywords=ghost+of+the+black+bull">Amazon </a>& <a href="http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/ghost-of-the-black-bull-michael-d-lefevre/1120428243?ean=2940150375512">Barnes and Noble </a></span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-size: small;"> </span> </span></div>
<h2>
<span style="font-size: large;"> </span></h2>
<br />Mcravenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01983341903661185935noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4287665308659971500.post-89382939733562981642014-10-03T23:30:00.000-06:002014-10-03T23:30:35.285-06:00<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-thY1wz4sweQ/VC-CfWJKgcI/AAAAAAAAALM/Vhgfz_Sv6qU/s1600/BlackBullBookCover2%2Bcopy.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-thY1wz4sweQ/VC-CfWJKgcI/AAAAAAAAALM/Vhgfz_Sv6qU/s1600/BlackBullBookCover2%2Bcopy.jpg" height="320" width="213" /></a></div>
Undaunted Publishing, LLC is proud to announce the release of "Ghost of the Black Bull" a novella by Michael D. LeFevre. He is a native of Utah and incorporates the awesome geography and rich history into his stories. The following is a short synopsis of the story.<br />
<br />
Bitter memories of Mrs. Burnett’s past come to her mind as she stands on her porch. Recollections bring tears that quickly evaporate in the hot, dry air of Skull Valley. Miles away, JR, a big, thick kid is running to shelter behind his beloved Pappy, a fat chicken swinging from a thick fist. Cruel fate pushes the two families together in a shocking collision that will test the universe, its ironies and whims. Four people with a life of sadness, grief, and death. And yet, happiness can and does intrude into their lives, only in small and rare flashes. <br />But, you take joy where you can find it…don’t you? <br />
<br />
The Black Bull is finally on the loose! You can pick up a copy in the Amazon Kindle Book store and through Barnes and Noble's Nook store. Both of these booksellers are online. Readers of this blog may recognize portions of the story from posts under the title "Death in the Valley. I think that you will like the finished story.<br />
<br />
Check out <a href="http://undauntedpublishing.com/">Undaunted Publishing</a> webpage. Just click on the highlighted text and follow the link.Mcravenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01983341903661185935noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4287665308659971500.post-82782099501876251032014-04-24T16:08:00.001-06:002014-04-24T16:26:27.648-06:00And GOD said...<style>
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<h3 class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: large;"><br /></span></h3>
<h3 class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: small;">#1</span></h3>
<h4 class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: x-small;">Short play adaptation from 2001</span><span style="font-family: Arial;"> </span></h4>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">From out of nowhere, the
voice of GOD, sounding suspiciously like James Earl Jones, said, </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">“<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">LET THERE BE LIGHT!!!”</b></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">James and Chris sat at a
small round table in the food court of the Mall. On the table in front of them
was two cups of lemonade, refreshment against the extreme heat of outside. They
jumped a mile at the voice and both started to say “DID you hear…” and then realized what
they were about to say. Two mouths clicked shut in unison. Nervously they
looked around. Surely everyone else had heard that, but everyone else was going
about their own business as if GOD hadn’t spoke at all, if indeed HE <u>had</u>
spoken. Shaking off their confusion, they sipped their lemonade.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">James changed the subject,
“Whew! It sure is a hot one out there!” Gesturing towards the windows in the
far wall, “This lemonade really hits the spot.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Well, Chris, who was still
shaken from the faceless voice, didn’t quite catch the context that James was
striving for. “What spot is that?” he said, looking around.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">“You know…the spot!” James
was now becoming confused at Chris’ wandering eyes.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">This really messed with Chris
whose mind was racing for a way to save face. He continued on. “Man, I don’t
know what you’re talking about. What spot?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Suspicious that Chris was
messing with him, but a bit irritated as well, James forcefully answered,
“Jeez, are you being obtuse on purpose or what? The spot! The spot! The place
where everything is just right! A giant figure of speech. The spot! This
lemonade hits the spot, it is so friggin’ hot out there!” His voice almost rose
to a shriek, then thinking the other people in the food court were looking at
him, he lowered it to a normal volume but still forceful.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Chris had focused on the “on
purpose” part of James’ tirade. He decided to play the clown as he so often
did. “You are so easy, I was just screwing with you. Hell, bro, I think I
invented that figure of speech. If not me, then somebody I know.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Indignantly, James retorted,
“Yer ass! You can barely talk, let alone invent a figure of speech.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Chris’ hands went to his
chest and he slumped in the chair, “I’m wounded! Skewered by the barbed tongue
of my best friend. Oh the pain!”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;"></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">This drew a smile from
James. He was well acquainted by Chris’ shenanigans, but even so, they were
almost always funny. He often fell into the verbal trap of being the butt of
Chris’ quick wit. He had decided that he could play the straight man in the
joke. James thought that maybe he could change the subject so he asked, “So,
what’s up?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Chris straightened up, running
his hand through his hair trying to tame the spikes raised when he rolled around
in his chair, he answered with a shrug, “Just hanging out, waiting for Fall
semester to start.” </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">“How’s your folks?” James
carried on.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Chris grimaced, “The same.
Nothing changes there. They are always gone to work or at the club after work.
I sometimes wonder if they will ever have enough bread, money I mean.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">“I hear you. Mine haven’t
changed either, I thought they might fly the coop after I moved out, but no,
they’ll be here for the rest of time. Ha! Mom read one my essay’s for English
class last semester. She just shook her head. I asked her what that was for and
she said, “I wonder where you came from.” James paused, “I didn’t think I was
that weird.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Chris jumped on this, “Weird!
Man, you’re the strangest cat I ever saw. Bent, real bent.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">“You know the pot shouldn’t
call the kettle black. You’re not the straightest arrow in the quiver.” James
snorted.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Chris chuckled, “Speaking of
pot…You ever? You know, inhaled?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">“Me?” James said with a
poker face.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Chris leaned forward
intently, “Yeah, you.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">“Like ol’ Cheech says, ‘a
little magic dust for you, a little magic dust for me, a little more magic dust
for me…’ then Farrrrr out, man.” James laid it on thick for effect.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Chris wasn’t impressed with
the act, so he asked again, “So?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">“I made the mistake of my
life. It’ll never be the same, my life I mean.” James’ eyes settled on a point
over Chris’ head, up towards the ceiling. He kind of drifted off like he was
somewhere else.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">“So?” Chris waited for James
to tell his story.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">James snapped to and looked
Chris in the eye. “You never let up do you? Remember the kid we called Fats?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">“Wasted dude, real skinny?”
Chris squinted trying to remember. There were a lot of kids they hung out with
that were not on the “A” list. School had been pretty well segregated by class
and clique. He and James had been on the borderline of the “B and C” list. They
had had friends in both groups.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">James went on, “Yeah, he
convinced me to smoke with him. He told me to hold the pipe stem up to my nose,
then he blew on the bowl…mainlined the smoke right up my nose. Almost the last
thing I remember…”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">“Almost? What do you mean?”
Chris was eager now, to hear the rest of the story,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>James was still in that place up near the ceiling, he went on
automatically, “Well, I got to feeling funny. I decided to leave, and I ran
into Julie who convinced me to go to the movie with her. It was bad, real bad.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">“Julie? The movie?” Chris
interrupted.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">James hardly paused, “The
movie…it was Jonathon Livingston Seagull. I steer clear of ‘em to this day, I’m
afraid they’ll start talking to me and lead me off into another dimension.
Besides I couldn’t breathe.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">“Couldn’t breathe?” Chris’
mind was racing again, trying to find a way to make a joke of all this.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">James took a deep breath, as
if remembering that smothering feeling, “Yeah, my lungs felt like they were
two walnuts dangling on a string in my chest. Never again.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">“It didn't affected me that
way.” Chris said confidently.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">James came out of his past,
now curious what experience Chris had had. “Really. So did you get high?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">“So high, I could see T’peka.”
Chris smiled in anticipation.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">James took the bait,
“Topeka, Kansas?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">“I’m tellin’ you, you are
soooo easy! I think I invented that figure of speech too” Chris laughed at his
own joke, pointing to James while he did.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">James shook his head in
chagrin, “Damn you.” </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">“Let’s have another lemonade
before we go back out in that heat.” Chris patted his friends arm.</span></div>
Mcravenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01983341903661185935noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4287665308659971500.post-58071846476071997862014-03-01T22:09:00.002-07:002014-03-01T22:09:18.291-07:00<h2 style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: "Courier New", Courier, monospace;"><i>The Exotic Woman Book 2, Part Deux</i></span></span></h2>
<h3 style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: "Courier New", Courier, monospace;"><i>An Irrational Dream continues...</i></span></span></h3>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: "Courier New", Courier, monospace;"><i>
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<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;">
My feet started moving of their own
volition, walking directly over to where she sat, willing me to come to her
with her eyes.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I felt as if I had
no control.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I arrived to stand in
front of her and reached down and took her proffered hand.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“Her skin is like silk”, I thought as I
helped her to stand.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As she did, I
took her other hand in mine and looked deeply into those dark eyes.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“What am I doing?” in wonder, I gently
pulled her to me.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I leaned
toward her, intending to kiss those scarlet lips. Just as our lips were about
to touch, she lifted her head so that I kissed her chin.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Startled, I jerked back with a question
on my face.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>She chuckled low in
her throat, lips curled in a smile.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>She then let my hands go and took my head in hers and pulled our lips
together.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>An electric spark
literally exploded fireworks in my brain.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>The sweet fruity taste of the ruby lipstick filled my head, temporarily
overpowering the clean, womanly aroma of her skin.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I wanted to crush her body to me, full length, welded
together lips to knees; one hot, seething nuclear power-plant of desire.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>I
held myself in check, I don’t know how, and pressed my lips back to hers a bit
firmer and opened slightly.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>She
didn’t respond at first so I let the tip of my tongue caress her soft, scarlet
lips and as she relaxed, our tongues touched in the real duel of love. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>When our lips had first met, my eyes had
closed in reflex to the bliss that had spread through out me.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As our kiss deepened, my eyes opened
and found her looking at me, eyes dark, deep, and unfathomable.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Who knew what thoughts were
flashing in their depths.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>As
the desire in both of us increased to just this side of unbearable, our hands
started roaming in a more passionate embrace of…how to describe what this
was.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Out of nowhere, a rough hand
grabbed my shoulder and jerked me away from this woman, rudely pulling our lips
apart, leaving a tingling, yearning, coldness where only heat had been
before.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As I stumbled back from
the force of the hard treatment, my right arm drew back in an instinctive,
defensive act, fist clenched hard, ready to pound the intruder.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“Get away from my woman!” this
stranger’s harsh voice ground out.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>“What in the hell are you doing?” he asked of her.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The
woman stepped in between, preventing us coming at each other.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>My clenched fist ached to drive through
the stranger’s face, it vibrated with the effort to restrain it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The woman looked at me, shook her head
slightly and turned to the stranger. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>She grasped his hand and turned to go.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He turned and muttering threats, dragged
this beautiful woman off like so much baggage.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>I
watched them go; the clenched fist relaxed and my arm dropped to my side.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The stranger and the woman swept
through the exit doors and at last, she turned and looked straight at me.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Her lips that had so recently held mine
in an embrace of love mouthed the words, “I’m sorry.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Silently spoken, loudly received.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>My shoulders slumped and my head drooped so that I was
looking at my shoes.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“Oh my God
Mike, who was that woman?”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Marla
asked.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I looked back at the empty
doorway, sorrow on my face, “I don’t know, but she called my name.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
Mcravenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01983341903661185935noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4287665308659971500.post-84590064146027180952014-02-20T22:46:00.002-07:002014-02-23T21:40:58.524-07:00An Irrational Dream Begins… <style>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">The EXOTIC
WOMAN Book 2<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span></span></b></div>
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<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;"></span></i></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 200%; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span></span></b>I
had gone to the theater with a friend, some trendy new play.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The type of play that seldom came to my
home-town.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The kind of play that
was original, verbal, situational and smart as opposed to glitzy, dopey
musicals featuring a frustrated insane, physically repugnant monster with a
nice baritone and an obsessive love for the hot chick.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You know, the ‘re-run’ that everyone
pretends to “love”, but only because they really dig the music and ignore the
dialog and plot.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Thank heaven this
play hadn’t been like that.</div>
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<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>I
was still sitting in my seat thinking about the quirky ending to the play when
my friend got up to go.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“Going to
the whizzer, see you outside, OK?”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>I shook my head to clear the echoes of the last scene and nodded, “Yeah,
I’ll see you in a minute.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As my
buddy left, I stood and stretched the stiffness out of my legs and back.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Turning to go, I saw my friends, Marla
and her husband Dean talking to Phil, another of our group at the back of the
theater.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Waving, I climbed the
aisle and walked up to them, said hello and hugged Marla, shook hands with the
guys, “How ya doing?”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They
replied, “ Fine, Fine, Fine.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Small
talk broke out, each of us catching up on recent events, grandkids, dogs,
gardens and the like when out of nowhere I heard my name spoken.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“Mike”.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In the noise of the conversation I couldn’t tell where the sound
had come from or if it was real.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>“I must be hearing things”, I told myself.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And then it came again a little louder and more insistent,
“Mike”.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I looked around, trying to
pinpoint the origin of the calling.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>It had become important to find out who was calling to me, who owned
that voice; that silky, alluring voice.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>I scanned my memory for that particular sound, that exact tone of ‘come
hitherness’.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Then, again the voice
reached out to me, inviting, full of want and desire, “Mike”. </div>
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<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>At
that moment the exiting crowd thinned and revealed a woman sitting in the aisle
seat of the back row and <b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">she</b> was
looking directly at me.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I was
startled, even though I had been looking for whoever had been calling my
name.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
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<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The
woman was beautiful, much too beautiful to be looking at me <u><i>that</i></u> way.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So naturally I turned around to see if
someone else was standing behind me, someone else that she had to be looking
at.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I was sure that I was
misunderstanding her gaze.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>No one
was there, except my friends who were looking at me, puzzled at my
actions.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I looked back at the
woman who smiled slightly, just a quirk of the lips really, and she lifted one
eyebrow in an invitation…question?</div>
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<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>She
was gorgeous, sitting there a bit sideways, legs crossed at the ankles.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“What ankles”, I thought and continued
to look her over.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“Lips”…had I
said it out loud?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Lips, full and
generous, red. Red with that favorite shade of lipstick that I like; the <u>only</u>
lipstick that I like on a woman’s lips. Her hair was black, black as a raven’s
wing, soaking up the light like a black hole, glistening only where the light
was strong enough to escape the pull of the darkness. It was thick, and cut in
a short flip that looked natural and inviting.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Her almond eyes were dark too, and from where I stood I
couldn’t tell how dark, but they seemed to be saying, “Get over here you fool,
I have got something to tell you.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Just one more glance I thought and…”Oh my!” I sucked in my breath, “OH
MY!”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>My glance slid from head to
toe and back again, “OHH MY! and in a yellow dress too. “<br />
<br />
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...to be continued... </div>
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Mcravenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01983341903661185935noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4287665308659971500.post-20707531026928769102014-02-17T15:20:00.001-07:002014-02-17T15:26:37.856-07:00<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: large;"><b>Dread Prevents Action...?</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><b> </b><span style="font-size: small;">Have you ever been faced with a chore that you are absolutely dreading, and because of that dread you procrastinate until your dread builds and builds until it turns into anxiety? This is a bit dramatic I know, but this is what I am faced with right now as I come to the end of "Death in the Valley". Since the story has a real life ending and I can't bring myself to gloss over that in the fictionalized account...well, I know what's gonna happen. </span></span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-size: small;">I once attended a writer's conference where Richard Dutcher (GOD'S ARMY, BRIGHAM CITY, STATES OF GRACE) was a keynote speaker. Afterwards, he signed copies of the book God's Army, that he had written from the movie screeplay. As my turn to get my copy signed I asked him if he had trouble writing the real tough scenes in his work (the loss of one elder's testimony, the death of Doc, etc.) and he told me that on the contrary, he reveled in them as it enabled him to experience the very real emotions of his characters who might be fictionalized to you and me, but to him, their creator, it validated his creation. </span></span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-size: small;">I hate sad endings to stories. Even the ones that have a redeeming quality to them. Let me repeat, I hate sad endings to stories. You'll hear me repeat this often if you continue to read my stories and posts. The kicker is that most of MY stories have sad endings or sad endings in the middle before a new beginning (the redemption). There, I have said it, now after <i>that</i> spoiler alert, I still expect you to read my work.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-size: small;">Back to Death in the Valley. I have to finish this story and I am dreading the telling of it. I have procrastinated for over 5 days now, working on other stories, prettying up my social networking sites, etc. But every time I have sat down to the computer, the words describing the ending scenes of this story run through my head demanding to be birthed on to the computer screen. And <i>every</i> time my heart aches and my hands shy away from typing the awful words. </span></span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-size: small;">The story will end, even if it is through teary eyes that I watch the rest of the story unfold. I hope you'll buy it (I am jumping the gun) and read it and appreciate the story even though it is a sad one. It has to be told. It has bugged me for many years.</span></span></div>
Mcravenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01983341903661185935noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4287665308659971500.post-87257155353815476062014-02-12T12:32:00.001-07:002014-02-12T12:32:14.731-07:00Personal Essay<!--StartFragment--> <br />
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">Starshine<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span></span></b><span style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">The morning rushed up like a steam locomotive, as the sun disk peeked over the Wasatch Mountains.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Golden sunlight rushed across the valley floor, chasing the mountain-shadow eastward at a thousand miles an hour.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>A large, dark-haired man gathers up the hand of a young boy and walks him over to a battered old pickup truck.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>After opening the dented, scratched door, the man bends down and engulfs the boy’s torso in his work-roughened hands, “Up you go, move on over.” he mock growls at the eager child.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The boy just smiles as he slides across the brown naughahyde, wincing slightly at the chill of the seat, “Where’re we going Uncle Arnie?”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>This day was preceded with a night that has been repeated countless times, but not, I must say, with the same eyes, ears, and brain as then.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I had been given the opportunity to spend a week with Uncle and Aunt, and jumped on it just as, well, just as a duck jumps on a Junebug.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>My father was 10,000 miles away easing his divorce pains on a Navy destroyer in the western Pacific Ocean.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I lived with my Mother and little sister and had the man-hunger that all little boys have after a long sentence of exclusive female association.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Trucks, tractors, barns, machinery, irrigation ditches, hedges like castle walls, quail, and pheasants, all have greater attraction than a mother’s tender hugs and caresses.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Scraped knees, frogs, dogs, and bloody scabs, almost always, have more power to attract young male attention than dresses, sweet-smelling hair or soapy baths do.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And Uncle had all those things at his finger tips; he ran Grampa’s orchard.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I don’t remember Grampa being around much in those days, he must have been there, but the vivid memories of time with my mother’s older brother linger until today.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We played tag and catch with Babe, a velvet eared German Shorthaired Pointer bitch (there’s no greater sop for a child’s tears than the floppy soft ears of a dog- - others have verified my long standing belief), waiting for the day to pass.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“Do you want to go irrigating tonight?”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We get our turn at eleven.” Uncle breathes those magic words.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Words that no sane boy could ever turn down.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“What about my bedtime?”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I wonder aloud.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“I’ll wake you up when it’s time to go.” he answers.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Hurray, Hurray!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>After supper, the pre-daylight savings time day came to its natural end.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>My head sinks down, I wonder if sleep would ever come.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Of course it does, as after every typical kid day.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I was afflicted with that inexorable gravitational pull on fatigued eyelids.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As soon as I fell asleep it seemed like Uncle was shaking my shoulder to get up.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“Better take your jacket, it’ll be chilly on the ditch bank”, Uncle gently guides my sleep numb arms into a lender jacket (a loaned heavy shirt of Uncle’s).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We go out of the house, into a pool of porch light that barely holds the dark at bay.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Uncle lifts me into the truck shooing me over so that he has room to slide in behind the wheel.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We drive a short distance to the orchard, past the farmhouse, the ruby trunks of the cherry tree; driving on down by the barn, rolling past row after soldier row of MacIntosh, the Red Delicious and finally making a left turn down between the ordered ranks of the Roman Beauties.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The incandescent yellow light thrown by the pie dish headlights, bores through the thick darkness of these fruitwoods.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Startled, small birds flutter barely out of the path of the truck.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Suddenly, a right leg stabs at the brake pedal, “Whoa! don’t want to get us stuck in the mud.” Uncle reaches out and turns off the headlights.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Immediately the dark gathers around us like my coat, head to toe, wrapped tight around our chests’ tight enough to make breathing a burden, all of a sudden.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He turns the truck engine off and the silence adds its’ load to the darkness.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Suddenly apprehensive, I slide closer to the warmth of Uncle’s large frame, but in vain, as he steps out of the truck and gathers up his shovel and my hand.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“Come on boy, we don’t want the neighbors to take our water.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And we’re off, gliding through that black velvet darkness, serenaded by the back scratch/fiddle playing insect residents of the orchard.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Five year old legs pump furiously to keep my toes from dragging furrows in the dirt.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Uncle saunters unconcerned (that my legs will surely be worn off right up to my knees) through unseen thickets snagging at my Levi’s, flashing his light here and there, unerringly moving to some pre-determined coordinate in that grid of living applesauce.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Although I now know the magician’s trick of finding your way across a familiar tract of acreage, it was a mystery to me then.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I was wondering what would become of me if somehow my hand became separated from the giant warmth of Uncle’s grip.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Would I wander endlessly through mega-acres (just 40) of Grampa’s kingdom, what would I eat (especially eat!), did anyone even love me anymore (where was my daddy?).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>When, of a suddenness, my mind’s perambulations were brought up, just as short as those five year old legs, at the edge of a wet smelling, gurgling dark void.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The warm golden beam of the flashlight struck leaden jewels on the surface of the ditch that had looked so inviting in the daylight.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Now, the shining just seemed to be some malevolent invitation to stay away.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“I’m going over there, and it’s real muddy.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Why don’t you stay right here and I’ll be back in a minute.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>OK?” Uncle asks me.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>My head does a fair imitation of one those rear car window dogs, describing a side to side, up and down wag/nod, as I stammer out<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>my nervous agreement, “OK”.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The darkness gathers in around me as that warm spot of light moves off, up the flow of waterway.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I long to be with that small glow of security instead of standing by myself in the night, not knowing where my next meal is coming from.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Restlessly, I shuffle my feet in a small dance of childish fear of things unknown.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The serenade that seemed so great just moments ago, now seemed dirge-like as the reality of my aloneness washes over my slight frame.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I glance around as if I could see the cause of my discomfort through the inky blackness.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>For some reason, I glanced up.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“Oh, My GOD!” my childish brain screamed, “Look at all them diamonds in the sky!” <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"></span>The clear night air of Utah Valley magnified the dome of stars that shone so intensely in the absence of Sister Moon.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They put the crystal brilliance of gems to shame that night.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>My uneasiness faded away beneath the warmth of icy bright stars, millions of eons away.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The dance of fear turns instead to the primal beat of a dance-step known to every human being born on this planet, if only in the genetic code of their chromosomes.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Head back, mouth opens wide, or even slightly, hands at your sides, left foot steps sideways and right slides to meet the left in a twirl of bewitched circle.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Around and around, counter clockwise, Orion, Pleides, Big Dipper, Little Dipper, North Star..........Orion, Pleides, Big Dipper, Little Dipper, North Star, on and on until you think you may fall down full length on your back, star-struck and mute.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I revel in the wash of starlight that night.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Never before and certainly not since have “i” felt so small.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>My reverie is shattered as the suck and splash of size 12 gum boots intrude,<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“Ready for home?” and my slack right arm jerks fishing-line taut as the missing warmth of Uncle Arnie’s big rough hand gathers mine up and heads for that old, battered pickup and home.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>My interrupted sleep is quickly resumed as I am tucked into my spare bed nest.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>My dreams change from frolicsome dogs and thrown balls to the cold, distant shimmer of stars.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I am changed, and I know that I am.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I will see hundreds of awesome night skies in the years that follow but never again with those five-year-old eyes.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">Michael D. LeFevre </span><span style="font-family: Symbol; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-ascii-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt; mso-char-type: symbol; mso-hansi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-symbol-font-family: Symbol;"><span style="mso-char-type: symbol; mso-symbol-font-family: Symbol;">ã</span></span><span style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"> Copyright<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>24 April 1995</span></div>
<!--EndFragment-->Mcravenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01983341903661185935noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4287665308659971500.post-19228367923998705882014-02-10T19:52:00.002-07:002014-02-10T19:52:18.902-07:00NewsFamily, friends and readers, there is news that affects this blog. I have joined with Derek Siddoway in a venture to publish e-books. The company is named UNDAUNTED PUBLISHING. You can find it at http://undauntedauthors.com or undaunted_books on twitter. If you go to the webpage there are two more links to undaunted publishing sites on Pinterest and google+. Check us out, Derek has one book published and on the website to view and buy if the mood strikes you and we all who are involved with the company have books in the works. We are at the intersection of indie and traditional publishing. We are approaching publishing like the process we would like to encounter so, if you have a story that you would like to see published contact us through the webpage it has all of the information to get started. Thanks for checking in to see if I have new stories here. There hasn't been for a while but promise there are many more to come.Mcravenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01983341903661185935noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4287665308659971500.post-27154087074804084232012-05-31T13:37:00.000-06:002012-05-31T13:37:06.977-06:00<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Birdie</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"> </span></span>It's been a while since I have posted to this blog, but the itch is getting worse. The itch to share a story. I entered this little tale in a contest last month, but unfortunately, it didn't win. Tell me what you think.</div>
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<u>BIRDIE</u></div>
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She closed the book, placed it on
the table, and finally, decided to walk through the door. That opening had
haunted her all afternoon, overshadowing the pleasure of reading the book. Now
she stood and squared her shoulders, ignoring the shiver of dread that shook
her, and stepped into the hallway<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>beyond. </div>
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<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“Watch
where you’re going Birdie!” Fat Sally almost knocked her down. Birdie ducked
her head and scuttled out of the way. Murmuring “Sorry” as the large woman
hurried past her and down the hallway. They called her Birdie here, but her
grandmother had named her Little Bird Woman when she first got her monthly
flow. None of her family had called her anything else.</div>
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<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Her
rubber soled shoes squeaked, as she walked down the highly waxed concrete
floors, further irritating her peace of mind, the “Birdie” comment stirring
those feelings first. Her grandmother, Far Seeing Woman, would chide her for
letting the world disturb her harmony, for distracting her thoughts of the book
that she had been reading. Far Seeing Woman often corrected her behavior. She
wasn’t called Far Seeing Woman for no good reason. Often, out of the blue, she spoke
sharply to Little Bird Woman, pre-empting some bad act. Little Bird Woman was
sometimes confused by Grandmother’s<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>foresight. At other times she was grateful for the help.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>No
one here knew why she was named Little Bird Woman. Grandmother said it was
because the little birds of the forest loved her. They flew about her whenever
she walked in the woodlands of her homeland. They would land on her hands or
her shoulders and look at her, twisting and cocking their head so that they
could look her in the eye. The birds would chirp quietly as if they were
sharing some daily gossip with Little Bird Woman. And maybe they were. She fed
the little birds of the forest crumbs from the bread that her mother made from
the seeds and grains that she gathered. Sometimes Little Bird Woman would find
a special sweet green that she would tear into small pieces and share with her
friends.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>These
memories calmed the irritation that the squeaking shoes and Fat Sally’s cheeky
disrespect. Although the shoes continued to squeak as she continued down the
hallway to her room.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Little
Bird Woman walked slowly and deliberately. She knew that the faster she walked,
the sooner her daily freedom would end. Every six steps would bring her to a
doorway, openings to a room. Sometimes a woman would call out to her in
greeting, saying “Hey, Birdie…having a good day?” Or if she passed groups of
women, they would nod or speak or make rude gestures trying to provoke her,
either to laughter or to anger. Little Bird Woman had little of one and plenty
of the other.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“Squeak,
squeak, squeak…” her shoes counted that nasty cadence, each squeak bringing her
closer to her room and captivity. Tension quickly built in her as the figure of
Yellow Haired Mary came into focus. She was standing by the door of Little Bird
Woman’s room.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<span style="font-family: Cambria; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: Cambria; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“In
you go, Birdie. It’s that time.” Yellow Haired Mary called, pointing towards
the waiting door. Little Bird Woman growled softly as she entered her room. She
turned so that she was facing the door and backed slowly until her back touched
the far wall. Giving Mary one more angry look, she turned and faced the barred
window. A pair of beautiful rosy finches awaited her, perched on the windowsill.
Little Bird Woman smiled as the steel door clanged shut behind her.</span>
</div>
<br />Mcravenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01983341903661185935noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4287665308659971500.post-48598612637256750172011-09-20T20:44:00.000-06:002011-09-20T20:44:03.089-06:00New Short StorySorry to jump around so much, but I guess it just mirrors my brain lately. I have been thinking about a lot of different things this summer. I am working on the other stories so I won't leave you hanging. Getting out of College only has one more chapter...but that's the kicker...it is the most emotional one for me. Even if it is only a story. Nate and Josephine is about half complete but has plot issues, so I am thinking about that. If I have lost you as a reader because of the interlude, I am real sorry. Please come back. As usual, if you have comments, please feel free to share.Mcravenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01983341903661185935noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4287665308659971500.post-19017408964470285022011-09-20T20:38:00.000-06:002011-09-20T20:38:06.957-06:00The Hummingbird Man<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <o:DocumentProperties> <o:Template>Normal.dotm</o:Template> <o:Revision>0</o:Revision> <o:TotalTime>0</o:TotalTime> <o:Pages>1</o:Pages> <o:Words>921</o:Words> <o:Characters>5255</o:Characters> <o:Company>Home</o:Company> <o:Lines>43</o:Lines> <o:Paragraphs>10</o:Paragraphs> <o:CharactersWithSpaces>6453</o:CharactersWithSpaces> <o:Version>12.0</o:Version> </o:DocumentProperties> <o:OfficeDocumentSettings> <o:AllowPNG/> </o:OfficeDocumentSettings> </xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:WordDocument> <w:Zoom>0</w:Zoom> <w:TrackMoves>false</w:TrackMoves> <w:TrackFormatting/> <w:PunctuationKerning/> <w:DrawingGridHorizontalSpacing>18 pt</w:DrawingGridHorizontalSpacing> <w:DrawingGridVerticalSpacing>18 pt</w:DrawingGridVerticalSpacing> <w:DisplayHorizontalDrawingGridEvery>0</w:DisplayHorizontalDrawingGridEvery> <w:DisplayVerticalDrawingGridEvery>0</w:DisplayVerticalDrawingGridEvery> <w:ValidateAgainstSchemas/> <w:SaveIfXMLInvalid>false</w:SaveIfXMLInvalid> <w:IgnoreMixedContent>false</w:IgnoreMixedContent> <w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText>false</w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText> <w:Compatibility> <w:BreakWrappedTables/> <w:DontGrowAutofit/> <w:DontAutofitConstrainedTables/> <w:DontVertAlignInTxbx/> </w:Compatibility> </w:WordDocument> </xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:LatentStyles DefLockedState="false" LatentStyleCount="276"> </w:LatentStyles> </xml><![endif]--> <!--[if gte mso 10]> <style>
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<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Lucida Grande";">Chapter 1<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Lucida Grande";"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>A ruby throated Hummingbird flitted by the old man’s window, straight for the fancy copper and art glass feeder hanging on the outside of the window. It was hung just right so that the old man could watch the little birds. In the summer that is. Later, when the birds made their annual flight to the southland to escape the cold of winter his grandsons brought a little cedarwood seed feeder so that he could watch a whole different set of birds.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Lucida Grande";"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The old man looked up when the motion of the little bird caught his attention. He watched as the rapidly beating wings carried the bird up and down, side to side, until it was sure that there was no threat. Then it slowly slid forward and dipped its long beak into the faux flower blossom and sucked the sweet liquid. A dark streak flashed in from the side and the gaudy ruby throated cock bird backed out of the fake flower and chased after the dark bird. They flew in dazzling circles and zig zags, both trying to intimidate the other.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Lucida Grande";"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“Damn, if they wouldn’t fight so much they both could get a bellyful of syrup. Just selfish, that’s what they are. Just like people.” The old man grimaced and shook his old bald head in disgust.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Lucida Grande";"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The door to his room flew open. Hummingbird man! Let’s get your sorry old ass into your chair and go to supper.” The wild looking young man who was the attendant for the men in the ‘home’, walked over to the closet where the wheelchair sat waiting.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Lucida Grande";"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“Shut the hell up, and bring the chair over here! And quit calling me the Hummingbird man.” The old man swung his tired old stick legs over the side of the bed where he sat. Legs that had carried him over tall mountains and many miles in search of far horizons, now wouldn’t hold him to walk across the room, let alone to the dining hall. Arms and shoulders that had lifted 1000 bales of hay in one day, now could barely push the wheels on the chair. But there was nothing wrong with his mind, well not too much anyway. He did have a hard time remembering some of his friends’ names but, he never forgot his family.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Lucida Grande";"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“Hurry up! <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Wait, take me into the bathroom first. I got to go.” The old man said impatiently. He secretly liked the boy, but he didn’t let on that he did. The attendant was strong as a bull and he handled the old men in the home like they were made of cardboard. He was a happy-go-lucky kid, but he had a smart mouth. It got him in trouble with some of the other old farts in here, but the old man liked it. It kept his mind sharp, trying to keep up.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Lucida Grande";"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The old man reached out his hands expecting a pull up and an arm around his shoulder to help him over to the bathroom, but the kid bent down and picked him up with an arm under his legs and one around his back.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Lucida Grande";"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“Man, you’re as light as one of those hummingbirds that you watch. No wonder I call you ‘Hummingbird Man’.” The young man carried him easily to the bathroom and set him upright next to the toilet.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Lucida Grande";"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The old man was embarrassed, he was the guy that used to show off his strength. He had carried his father exactly like this in the last days of his life. The thought of that gave him a chill that travelled up and down his spine.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Lucida Grande";"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“What do you think you’re doing! I didn’t tell you to carry me like a baby! Get out while I go to the bathroom! Now!” The old man used anger to cover up his embarrassment.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Lucida Grande";"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“Do you need help with your zipper?” the young man offered.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Lucida Grande";"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The old man sputtered in outrage. “No one but me has touched my zipper since I was a tyke. Except in fun. And you ain’t gonna be the first. Now get out!” <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Lucida Grande";"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The young man smiled at the old man’s feistiness. He nodded and turned his back to the old man so that he could have some privacy, but the rules wouldn’t allow him to completely leave the room with the old man standing as wobbly as he seemed to be. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Lucida Grande";"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“I’ll be right here, but I won’t look, rules you know. Say something if you feel like you’re about to fall.” <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Lucida Grande";"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The old man grumbled, but he went about his business. When the dribbling sounds of the old man’s weak stream stopped, The young aide turned back and helped the old man to his wheelchair. As they were wheeling down the hall to the dining room, the young man started whistling like a bird. The warbling rose and fell in a lively rhythm.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Lucida Grande";"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“What kind of bird is that?” the old man queried.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Lucida Grande";"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“Shitbird.” The young man deadpanned.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Lucida Grande";"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“For Hell’s sake, you are a smartass aren’t you. For real, tell me.” <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Lucida Grande";"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The young man smiled broadly. He wanted to laugh. But that wouldn’t be cool. So he deflected the old man’s attention.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Lucida Grande";"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“Look there’s your girlfriend, Mrs. Terwilliger. Do you want to sit next to her?”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Lucida Grande";"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“I don’t have a girlfriend.” The old man growled. “Just friends that are females. Yeah, take me over there, I might as well have some company that isn’t so full themselves like some I might name.” He said this last bit pointed right at the young man.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Lucida Grande";"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“Alright Hummingbird Man, here you are. Howdy there, Mrs Terwilliger, looking for some company?” the young man pushed the old man up to the table in the place next to the woman. He left him there and went after his other charges.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Lucida Grande";"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The old man smiled nicely at Mrs. Terwilliger. “Good evening, Melanie. Is it alright if I sit next to you?”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Lucida Grande";"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Mrs. Terwilliger snorted indelicately. “It’s a little late to ask for permission isn’t it? You’re already here.” Then with a smile, “ Of course it is okay. How are you today?” <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Lucida Grande";"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“Just fine, thank you. And you?” the old man winked at her. They had a close friendship. Friendships in the ‘home’ were hard to maintain at their age. Between illness, senility and death, time to develop relationships was often short. Melanie and the old man, had both been in here for about 4 years. They had the good fortune to be alert and mostly well, even though they were both approaching 95 years old. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Lucida Grande";"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“Why does that young man call you the Hummingbird Man?” Mrs. Terwilliger asked.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Lucida Grande";"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“I don’t know, everyone knows that I feed the birds. Hummingbirds in the summer, all the other little birds in the winter. I like watching them better than looking at TV. Maybe he has a nickname for everyone in here.” The old man looked perplexed at that. He hadn’t thought of that before.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Lucida Grande";"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“I don’t think so,” Mrs. Terwilliger offered, “I haven’t heard him call anyone else by a nickname, just their real names. Have you?”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Lucida Grande";"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“No I don’t think I have.” He answered. The staff started to serve supper. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div><!--EndFragment-->Mcravenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01983341903661185935noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4287665308659971500.post-75815837042133620282011-08-31T20:37:00.002-06:002011-08-31T20:37:41.212-06:00Death in the Valley-Chapter Three <!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <o:DocumentProperties> <o:Template>Normal.dotm</o:Template> <o:Revision>0</o:Revision> <o:TotalTime>0</o:TotalTime> <o:Pages>1</o:Pages> <o:Words>856</o:Words> <o:Characters>4883</o:Characters> <o:Company>Home</o:Company> <o:Lines>40</o:Lines> <o:Paragraphs>9</o:Paragraphs> <o:CharactersWithSpaces>5996</o:CharactersWithSpaces> <o:Version>12.0</o:Version> </o:DocumentProperties> <o:OfficeDocumentSettings> <o:AllowPNG/> </o:OfficeDocumentSettings> </xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:WordDocument> <w:Zoom>0</w:Zoom> <w:TrackMoves>false</w:TrackMoves> <w:TrackFormatting/> <w:PunctuationKerning/> <w:DrawingGridHorizontalSpacing>18 pt</w:DrawingGridHorizontalSpacing> <w:DrawingGridVerticalSpacing>18 pt</w:DrawingGridVerticalSpacing> <w:DisplayHorizontalDrawingGridEvery>0</w:DisplayHorizontalDrawingGridEvery> <w:DisplayVerticalDrawingGridEvery>0</w:DisplayVerticalDrawingGridEvery> <w:ValidateAgainstSchemas/> <w:SaveIfXMLInvalid>false</w:SaveIfXMLInvalid> <w:IgnoreMixedContent>false</w:IgnoreMixedContent> <w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText>false</w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText> <w:Compatibility> <w:BreakWrappedTables/> <w:DontGrowAutofit/> <w:DontAutofitConstrainedTables/> <w:DontVertAlignInTxbx/> </w:Compatibility> </w:WordDocument> </xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:LatentStyles DefLockedState="false" LatentStyleCount="276"> </w:LatentStyles> </xml><![endif]--> <!--[if gte mso 10]> <style>
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<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Didot; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">Chapter Three<o:p></o:p></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Didot; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span></span></b><span style="font-family: Didot;">Mrs. Burnett had finished making dinner and setting the table. She walked out onto the porch staring up the hill to where her husband was plowing. Or had been anyway, a cloud of dust marked his progress towards the house. He seemed to know exactly when supper was ready and showed up, tired, sweaty and hungry. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Didot;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>As she watched the drifting dust cloud, she thought of how they had come to be here, in the valley. How she was still excited to be living on their own place, working for themselves, not some miserly owner who begrudged even the little bit that they were paid. Her thoughts drifted back over their life…<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Didot; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span></span></b><span style="font-family: Didot;">The Burnett’s had been married for a long time. Long enough to raise two girls and a son. The boy had been killed by a bad bull on a hard scrabble ranch in Nevada. The two daughters had married and been carried away by their men to far away Colorado where they both worked on the Denver and Rio Grande Railroad. Mr. Burnett was a hard worker, he knew how to plow a field or castrate a litter of pigs. Usually for someone else, seldom for his own benefit. Mrs. Burnett couldn’t complain however, he had always worked enough to keep the wolf from the door and shoes on the kids. She worked hard too, there was a hot meal on the kitchen table every night when Mr. Burnett came in from a hard day at work. Mrs. Burnett washed their clothes by hand in a washtub every Monday scrubbing the worn clothes on a corrugated board that often wore the skin from her knuckles, leaving her hands raw and bleeding for most of the week. She maintained their clothing so that the work clothes were more of patches than the original fabric. She was skilled with a needle and thread. She sewed all of the girls’ dresses when they were at home. Mrs. Burnett teased them that they wouldn’t have caught a man if it hadn’t been for the pretty dresses that their mother made for them.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Didot;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>One day after the girls had been married for a year, Mr. Burnett came home with an exciting proposal. How would she like to have their own place? The boss had told him about a ranch, just 100 acres over in western Utah, Skull Valley, that had belonged to his wife’s brother.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The lazy so-and-so had planted a dozen apple trees and built a lean-to shack for his wife and kids then skipped the country. The boss had bought the property from the woman and sent her back to her folks over in Manti. He offered the place to the Burnett’s for just what he had paid for it; they could pay him some every year when they sold their harvest.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Didot;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Mrs. Burnett took about 30 seconds before she grabbed Mr. Burnett in a bear hug and asked him why he had even waited to ask her. He should have shook the boss’s hand before he changed his mind and sold it to someone with cash. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Didot;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The next day they both went to see the boss and accept his offer. They signed a note for $2000 and shook his hand. Joyfully making plans they went home and started to pack their meager belongings. They had accumulated an old grain wagon with a canvas cover that looked like an old prairie schooner. Two middle aged geldings to pull it, a riding horse for Mr. Burnett to use when the boss had him chase the wild cattle on the bi-annual roundups. Mrs. Burnett had a half wild milk cow that gave enough milk for their meals and to sell a little butter made from the cream. There was a calf every year to sell, and her two dozen hens laid enough eggs that the extra was sold to add to her kitchen fund. Mrs. Burnett’s household goods were old and worn like their clothing, the only furniture worth anything was the marriage bed that Mr. Burnett had made for her and the beautifully carved Hope chest that her Scottish father had given her on her thirteenth birthday, no doubt goaded by her mother into action. He had used his considerable skill to make a wonderful chest that she had cherished all of her life. She had protected it from 3 rambunctious children and a dozen moves.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Didot;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Mr. Burnett asked his wife to help push the wagon from its’ place by the shed to the front of the little cottage where they could load it with their belongings. They tugged and pushed to get the heavy wagon rolling, then Mr. Burnett rushed to lift the wagon tongue and directed it so that the rear of the wagon was even with the doorway.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Didot;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“If we get it loaded today can we leave tomorrow?” Mrs. Burnett asked. She was eager to move to a place of her own. She had lived in line shacks and old cabins at every ranch that they had worked at since they were married. She couldn’t count the dirt floors and empty window frames that she had fixed to make a home for her man and her children. Their only son was buried on a lonely ridge overlooking the ranch where he had died. The owner had felt so bad that he had ordered a white limestone marker for her son. He had slaughtered the bull that killed him and placed the severed head on the grave, Two days too late, but there it was. After things were settled and they were sure it would work out, maybe she would move his grave to the new place so that he could lie next to her and his father when their turn came.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Didot;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Mrs. Burnett shook her head; the thoughts of the past had taken her mood down. Or the heat, she couldn’t tell which. Where was that old man? Supper would be burnt to a cinder if he didn’t get here soon. She searched for sign of him getting closer, the dust trails were settling. “I guess he’s behind the barn” she said to no one in particular. The sudden sound of a whistling old man trying to sneak up on her caused her head to swivel. “You couldn’t surprise a marching band you old coot! Not with that tune.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Didot;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Mr. Burnett laughed. “Damn! I was hopin’ to catch you sleeping.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Didot;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“Not likely. If I didn’t hear you, I could smell you a mile away. Why don’t you wash off and put on a clean shirt, supper’s ready.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Didot;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Mr. Burnett laughed again, “I will ol’gal, just for you!” He slapped her behind as he walked past. “Just for you!”</span><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Didot; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div><!--EndFragment-->Mcravenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01983341903661185935noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4287665308659971500.post-45521483591375607592011-08-21T21:11:00.000-06:002011-08-21T21:11:30.549-06:00I'm Back!Hey, here is a new story. It is based on true events that occurred a couple of miles south of where I now live. I have misplaced the rest of the story (it is hand-written), so this is it until I find the notebook where it is written. Please let me know what you think. I found out a while a go that I have an unexpected connection to the events. The names have been changed and the details have been fabricated as the actual murders have never been solved as far as I can tell. So, Here it is "Death in the Valley".Mcravenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01983341903661185935noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4287665308659971500.post-44491300890068827822011-08-21T21:05:00.001-06:002011-08-21T21:07:11.026-06:00Death in the Valley <b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Didot; font-size: 16.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">Death in the Valley</span></b><br />
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</style> <![endif]--> <!--StartFragment--> <div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Didot; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">Chapter One<o:p></o:p></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Didot;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>It was a hot August afternoon in valley. Mrs. Burnett had opened all of her windows and doors hoping for a cross breeze that might cool the house off. The only drawback to that was the flies seemed to congregate in the house hoping to escape the heat of barnyard and maybe score a bite of the supper that she was making for her husband. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Didot;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Mr. Burnett was out in the south field plowing the wheat stubble under hoping that the late summer thunderstorms would settle the loose dirt before winter. His team of horses were working hard even though the soil was sandy, with a little gravel. There was no big rocks. The horses perspired freely and hot dust stirred up by their feet stuck to their wet hide making muddy streaks around the leather harness. He decided that they had worked enough for that day and kicked the lift pedal that used the mechanical force of the McCormick sulky plow to lift the plowshare from the earth. When the plow was up, he turned the team and headed for home.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Didot;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The heat of the stove almost unbearable, Mrs. Burnett had made only enough fire in it to fry some potatoes and warm up the left over chops from breakfast. The rest of the meal was fresh vegetables from the little kitchen garden that she worked so hard to make produce. Mr. Burnett seldom helped in it, usually just helping her with the spring cultivation and hauling fertilizer from the corral. He did grow an acre of potatoes that they used for their winter storage. She set about putting out the plates, knives and forks on the square table that was situated on the cool side of the house. Mrs. Burnett made a trip outside to the little spring box that Mr. Burnett had dug out in the shade of the north side of the house. He had directed the small stream of water that had been brought down the hill in a ditch dug by a horse drawn plow and cleaned up with a shovel. It fed the spring box and the watering trough for the animals around the home place and she irrigated her kitchen garden with it. They had dug a shallow well in the yard for their drinking water.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><br />
</div><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Didot; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">Chapter Two<o:p></o:p></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Didot;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Carl Schwartz, Jr. was big, 25 years old and built heavy. He looked like a man but he was still a boy in his mind. Carl, his father called him JR because of the Jr. that his Ma had tacked on, was full grown and thick. Thick in body and in mind. He looked just like his Pappy, but Pappy was old and smart. Carl Schwartz Sr. said he was smarter than JR so that made it so. It must have been true because when JR was hungry, Pappy brought food, and when his boots wore out, Pappy brought him some new ones. Well, new to him anyway. JR could tell that somebody else had worn them from the rancid sock smell. He didn’t worry too much where they came from, just so they fit and and he couldn’t feel the rocks through the soles.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Pappy took care of JR.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Didot;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>He said it was his bounden duty ‘cause he had promised JR’s Ma that he would. She was real sick when Carl Sr. made the promise. Ma had died, JR guessed that was true because they had put her in a hole and stuck a cross made from some crooked sticks in the soft earth after she was covered. A preacher came and said some words about Jesus and how Ma was just sleeping until the morning of the ‘rez-r-wreck-shun.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Didot;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>This had caused a big to-do when JR started crying and wailing, saying, “If she is just sleeping, then wake her up! I want my Ma!” Over and over again. Pappy had said a cuss word, then gave the preacher a dollar, a paper one, not silver, and then he grabbed JR and shook him until he stopped weeping.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Didot;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“JR” he said, “your Ma is dead and she ain’t gonna wake up. That damned preacher shouldn’t have said that!” Then lower, he mumbled, “At least he said the right words over your Ma and he ain’t one of them damned Mormons hereabout!” <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Didot;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>They wandered a bit after that. One boomtown or mining camp after another. They would stay until something happened that would make Pappy curse, then sigh; every time he would say, “JR pack up your kit and kaboodle and let’s mosey.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Didot;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>One time, he had whined for an hour about being hungry, so Pappy told him to go find something to eat. So JR did. Down the road a piece, Old Lady Jones had a flock of fat hens that were nearly tame. Whenever anyone walked by the house the chickens gathered at you feet looking for a handout. JR was getting angry at trying to wade through the flock so he raised his foot, ready to kick them over the roof an idea flashed through that thick head. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Didot;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“Hungry…food…chicken…food…hungry!” Instead of booting the feathered annoyances out of the way he lowered is foot and bent down to grab the first begging<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>chicken that he could reach. By the head. He lifted it up squawking crazily. He gave the whole bird a twirl around his meaty paw, separating several vertebrae and severing its spinal cord. Amazingly, to JR, the squawking stopped abruptly to be replaced by a frenzied flapping of its wings. JR watched curiously. So did the living hens. A horrible screeching came from the house where Old Lady Jones lived and the door was flung open by a bellowing woman. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Didot;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>She didn’t stop hollering until she came to a stop face to face with JR. He looked dumbly back at her. The noise brought Old Man Jones from the back shed where he had been sampling Booter’s latest try at brewing beer. Alarmed at all the noise he imagined that a stinking coyote had gotten into the old woman’s chickens. So he grabbed a long handled shovel to bash it in the head.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Didot;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>When he turned the corner of the house, he saw that big thick kid of Schwartz’s standing in the road with a limp chicken in his hand and the old woman dancing in outrage and shrieking curses at the poor dummy. JR caught the motion of Old Man Jones running towards him with a raised shovel in his hands and for once his brain worked fast enough to realize that he had better run on home.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Didot;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Home was a shack on the edge of the mining camp about a hundred yards away. When he thundered into the dooryard, Carl Sr. looked up to see his frightened thick son running towards him holding a dead flopping chicken in his big beefy hand and realized at once the source of his son’s fear. “Go inside and shut the door JR.” Pappy told him, “And don’t come out unless I say!” JR usually did what Pappy said to do. Fifteen minutes later, Old Man Jones and the town Marshal walked into the dooryard and started yelling at Pappy. They pointed at the shack and yelled some more, but Pappy just shook his head. Then they left walking back the way they came, Old Man Jones turned and pointed his finger at Pappy and yelled at him to “do something about it!”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Pappy just shook his head again and watched them walk away.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Didot;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>When they were gone, he called JR out and pointed at the dead chicken that his thick son was still holding by its broken neck. “Pick the feathers of that bird and pull its guts out, then pack up your kit and kaboodle and let’s mosey some.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><!--EndFragment-->Mcravenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01983341903661185935noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4287665308659971500.post-36354200633437500932011-07-31T21:46:00.000-06:002011-07-31T21:46:05.798-06:00More of Lord, Lily shows off!<!--StartFragment--> <br />
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-align: center;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">ACT 7<o:p></o:p></b></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span></b>Lily had last of their belongings packed and her tears were dry when Lord went back into the room.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Her eyes were reddened from the crying but there was a determined set to her jaw that hadn’t been there earlier.</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“Let’s go.” She said flatly and carried her stuff out to the pickup.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Lord picked up his bundle and the guitar and followed her out. They climbed into the truck after loading their stuff into the bed and drove out of the motor court. Lily saluted the nosy motel clerk with a raised single finger as they passed the office. Lord chuckled, but he didn’t want anymore trouble so he told her, “Hey, easy there, we don’t want the ‘bird’ police chasing us down. We’re good.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Let’s drive for a while and find somewhere to eat later.”</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Lily gave him a dirty look, but she nodded in agreement. They hit the highway headed north. Lily took in the scenery on both sides of the road. She had never been this way before. The desert gave way gradually to taller brush and more grasses and the land began to rise.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Lord didn’t gawk too much as the truck wandered a bit and he had to concentrate on keeping it between the lines. He did let his mind wander back to Lily’s situation and his experience along the same lines.</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Slick drank so much and so often that if he and Charley timed it right they didn’t have to see much of the son of a bitch. Mom didn’t have that luxury. Lord thought that she diverted his attention whenever she could so that her boys didn’t get in his way and suffer for it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Reflecting on it now, Lord wondered why she put up with Slick. If Lily met Mom now and then I explained my experiences with a violent step-dad and his abuse of her, Lily would have a hard time believing it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Mom had regained her dignity and strength but it had taken a lot to get her there. <o:p></o:p></i></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Lord had run afoul of the sheriff one afternoon. He was wandering through the drug store, fingering the candy, touching the sunglasses, just generally acting like he was casing the joint for a shoplifting run. Old man Jones had spoken to him twice about looking and not touching but Lord ignored him.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He didn’t ignore Lord, he called the Sheriff’s Office for some help.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Unfortunately for Lord, Sheriff Olsen answered the phone. He came right over. Sheriff Olsen was a big, blonde, blue-eyed, not-so-dumb second generation Swede.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He had hands as big as a catcher’s mitt and the biceps to lift anything that they grabbed a-hold of. That day they grabbed a hold of him.</i> <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><o:p></o:p></i></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“Boy, I need to talk to you.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Mr. Jones can I use your office?” the sheriff dragged/led him back into the office when Mr. Jones nodded yes. When they got in there the sheriff shut the door with a crash. Lord jumped. “Turn your pockets out, then turn around.” he barked. “Put your hands above your head.” Lord did what he was told. His legs began to shake as the implications of this getting back to Mom, and the beating that Slick would give him if he heard of it. The sheriff watched as Lord did as he was told and then stepped up behind him, pinched his hands together and stretched him up so that he was on his tiptoes, and then patted him down, carefully not touching any private areas.<o:p></o:p></i></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“Now, tell me why you were trying to steal Mr. Jones’ merchandise. He told me that he asked you not to touch and you disobeyed him. Twice. What do you think you were doing?”<o:p></o:p></i></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“I was just wishing I had money to buy something, so I was pretending to be shopping!” Lord’s emotions finally got the best of him, he broke down and cried. The sheriff let him go until he stopped and dried the tears and wiped his nose on his forearm before he said, “Tell me what’s going on at home.” And Lord did, everything, except about Slick’s violence.<o:p></o:p></i></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The encounter with the deputy had distracted them from their hunger and so Lord had just driven. Lily had been silent for about an hour then broke the quiet, “I got to pee, can you find a restroom? And hurry please.”</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Lord jumped, startled out of his dreaming. He chuckled nervously. “You spooked me. I was thinking of something else.”<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></i>He looked over at her, her hands were holding her pregnant belly and she grimaced, like she was in pain. “Are you all right?” Lord was suddenly serious, he hoped it wasn’t the baby’s birthday.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>What did he know about that?</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“The little beggar is kicking like a mule, I am trying not to wet myself, so hurry! Lily was rubbing her stomach trying to calm the baby down.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“HURRY!”</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Lord was desperately looking for signs of a rest area or truck stop but all he could see was greasewood and cholla . He decided that the brush would have to do. He slowed the truck and pulled off on the shoulder and stopped. </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Lily looked over at him with a question on her face. “What?” she asked. </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“The bushes will have to do, there isn’t anything in sight. I won’t look.” Lord grinned, after he turned his head. She was going to be lucky if she hurried, the traffic was pretty thin today.</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Lily’s lips pursed in a pout, but she knew that she had no choice. She decided that rather than wandering out in the spiny brush, she would stay close and lean against the side of the truck.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Looking both ways for oncoming cars and seeing nothing but empty road, she undid her jeans and squatted.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Relief was instantaneous, the pressure of her bladder and the baby kicking it like a football had been nearly unbearable. Just as she was about to stand up and pull her pants up, a semi-truck crested the little hill behind them with a roar. Scrambling, stumbling, she struggled with the reluctant jeans. Lord watched the trucker in his side mirror, the driver’s eyes widened as he took in the scene of the skinny pregnant girl struggling with her pants that were down to her knees. Lord saw his left arm raise as he grasped the string that controlled his air horn. “WWWWAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH! The horn wailed in appreciation of Lily’s dancing try at covering her bare behind. </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Lily cursed. </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Lord’s ears burned.</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The truck passed with a couple of tributary toots as it sped on its way.<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"> </i></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Finally clothed, Lily climbed back in the pickup grumbling all of the way. “Let’s go. I’m hungry, aren’t you?” she changed the subject.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>When she didn’t get a response from Lord, she poked him in the arm. “Let’s go!” </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>He put the truck in gear and let the clutch out, checking for traffic in the side mirror. “Toot Toot” Lord couldn’t resist the joke. He broke out laughing as the truck started to accelerate down the road. He chanced a look at Lily, she was smiling broadly. For some reason Lord thought this was hilarious and he laughed harder, nearly missing his shift to a higher gear.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Lily let loose and laughed with him.</div><!--EndFragment-->Mcravenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01983341903661185935noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4287665308659971500.post-40605391092709557582011-07-26T20:18:00.000-06:002011-07-26T20:18:05.711-06:00Next<!--StartFragment--> <br />
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-align: center;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">ACT 6<o:p></o:p></b></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span></b>Lord woke as the sun rose in the eastern sky. It was like there was a scraping sound as the bright yellow disk lifted above the horizon. The astral noise never failed to wake him. He lay still for a few seconds listening for sounds of Lily, he needed to get up, the bathroom beckoned. Feeling that it was safe, he whipped the sheet off of him and he stood, reaching for his levi’s. He tried putting them on as he hopped to the toilet. After he was finished relieving himself he decided he better comb his hair and brush his teeth so that he could go out and get a cup of coffee and something sweet. His stomach still ached from yesterdays sickness, but pangs of hunger rumbled there too.</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>He peeked out of the doorway, making sure that his clumsy dressing hadn’t brought Lily out of her sound sleep. She was still breathing deep and regular. He hurried over to his bed and found a clean shirt, but had no luck with socks, so he unwadded the dirty pair stuffed in his boots and pulled them on, then the boots. Lord tiptoed to the door and went outside.</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Lily smiled, then opened her eyes. She had been awake since Lord had drawn the bedcovers back and sat up. She had learned to be a light sleeper around her father. She and her sister had never known when he might come into their room and start screaming at them and lashing out in a drunken fury. They had to be prepared to escape his ranting. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Now, she wouldn’t have to worry about him again.</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>She decided that it was time to get up, Lord probably wanted to get going early. As early as they could anyway. She wouldn’t hold him back, after all, he was generously giving her a ride to…well somewhere. A sudden kick by the baby inside her reminded her that she had to figure something out soon. </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Lily was drying her hair with the thin towels that were provided when Lord let himself into the room. She watched him set two cups and a small sack on the desk.</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“Donuts” he said when he saw her look at the sack. “I hope you like coffee.””</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Lily grimaced, “It will do until I can get some milk. And some eggs, bacon, toast…lots of jam. Can we get breakfast Lord? I’m real hungry. It’s the baby, you know.” </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Lord grinned, “I guess, but let’s get down the road a ways. Maybe, we can find a good café instead of a drive-in. It looks like the baby is getting all of the food.” </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Lily blushed at the thought of him looking that close at her swollen stomach. She couldn’t do anything about it, “Right now, that is.” she thought. “Can I have that last donut?” </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Lord laughed and handed it over.</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They finished their snack and Lord took his turn in the shower. He opened the bathroom door to let the steam out. He looked in amazement at the scene before him. Lily had dumped his bundle out on the bed and sorted the clean clothes from the dirty ones, which she had bundled in a pillow case and set it by the door. The clean clothes were still piled on the bed waiting for him to choose what he would wear for the day. She had separated his toiletry items into a pile on another pillow case. “Wow! What have you done? You didn’t have to.” Lord told her.</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Lily sat on the side of her bed nonchalantly watching his expression. Her bundle was neatly packed and sitting by the door waiting for him to load it. She said, “I know I didn’t but I thought it might speed things up for us this morning and make it easier tonight when we stop. You about ready?”</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Lord didn’t know what to say except to acknowledge her logic, “Yeah, I guess you’re right, I was in a bit of a hurry yesterday, Thanks…a lot.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That was real nice of you Lily. I’ll be done as soon as I grab some clean socks and brush my teeth.”</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>When his morning ritual was finished Lord slipped his boots back on and picked up an armload of stuff and motioned for Lily to open the door. He walked out into the sunshine and to his old Chevy pickup with his load of clothes. He lifted the bundles of their belongings over the side of the pickup bed and onto the wooden floor. He straightened up and turned to go back for another load and ran face to face into a deputy sheriff. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“What you think you’re doing there, boy?” The officer asked.</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Lord didn’t know what else to say, “Getting ready to hit the road. Got a long way to go.”</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The deputy acted like he hadn’t said anything, but asked, “Have you got a girl in that room with you?” He didn’t give way so that Lord could go anywhere.</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“Yes sir, not a girl, a woman. She’s just a friend that I’m giving a ride to.” Lord was suddenly worried. He had asked her age, and she had said 18, but he hadn’t really seen proof of that.</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The deputy’s right eyebrow raised, “Well let’s just see about that.” He turned and walked into the room. When he spied Lily, the other eyebrow raised at the pregnant belly and the black eye that was now fading to a glorious green and yellow. He spoke in that serious law enforcement voice. “Ma’am what happened to you, did this man hit you? Are you alright, do you need help?”</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Lily’s eyes grew as wide as the deputy’s. She stammered, “I’m OK, really. My father hit me the other day. He’s a drunk. Lord is my friend. It’s OK, really it is.” Her voice wavered, like she might cry.</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Lord stood in the doorway, feeling helpless. This was getting to be unfunny. He hoped that black eye would fade a bit faster. The deputy raised his hand, like that would stop the tears like it stopped traffic. Lily didn’t recognize the gesture and took it as unbelief. She sobbed and the tears began to flow. “Really, I’m not lying, if it wasn’t for Lord, both eyes would be black. Please, don’t do anything to him.”</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The deputy was alarmed, he hadn’t wanted to make her cry. “Wait, don’t cry! I’m just checking on you, the motel clerk called me this morning. Now, just quit crying and show me your identification. We’ll sort this out.”</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Lord reached in his hip pocket and lifted the wallet out. His license was right in front, he removed it to hand to the officer. Lily was still sobbing, but she started rummaging through her pack. She stirred through all of her belongings with no luck. Feeling desperate, she dumped the bag upside down and poured the contents out on the bed. She was crying outwardly now, tearing at the ‘stuff’ on the bed, throwing it aside if it wasn’t her wallet.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Lord stepped towards her in order to help, but the deputy held out his arm to stop him.</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“I’ll help her, you stay by the door.” he said. He walked over to her side. “Now, just calm down there, little girl, what is it we are looking for?”</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“Mmmm….mm…my wallet.” Fresh tears coursed down her cheeks. “It was in here last night.!”</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;">The deputy reached down and picked up a thin leather wallet, “Is this it?” He held it up for her to look at.</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>With her eyes full of tears she held out her hand and the deputy gave her the wallet. She opened it and pulled out her Drivers license, and gave it to him.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He looked it over and looked at Lord’s as well.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He handed the cards back to Lily. The deputy’s hand went to cup his face and he turned and walked to the door. He stopped in front of Lord, still holding his face and looking at the floor. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“Son, do you know what you’re doing?” he said as he lifted his head and looked Lord in the eyes. Lord looked steadily back at him. The deputy turned and looked at Lily and asked, “Do you trust him to take care of you? He won’t hurt you? Or the baby?” he pointed at her belly. </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“Yessir, I trust him like a brother. You see, I got no one else. I can’t go back home. I won’t.“ <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Her jaw was rigid with determination. The tears dried up and a fire burned in her eyes. “Dad hit me the last time two days ago, and I won’t be mistreated again.”</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The deputy nodded, “OK, you’re old enough to know what you want.” He turned back to Lord, “Walk with me out to my car.” He pushed by Lord and walked. Lord followed, noticing that Lily still stood defiantly watching the men.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>When the deputy reached his car, he paused and held out his hand, there was a business card in it. Lord tried to take it, but the man shifted enough to grip his hand and hold it, the card held between. “Call me or write when you reach where you’re going. If she doesn’t stay with you, let me know where she is. OK?” </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Lord nodded, “Yessir, you can reach me through the county sheriff at home. If you don’t hear from me, call him…he’ll know what’s up.” They shook hands in agreement. </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“Take care of her, she needs someone.” The deputy got into his car and drove away. </div><!--EndFragment-->Mcravenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01983341903661185935noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4287665308659971500.post-62305273187574426612011-07-22T21:06:00.000-06:002011-07-22T21:06:01.380-06:00Lord of this World Act 5Dear friends, if you are a dedicated reader of this story blog, you will recognize this story. I am sorry it has been so long since the last installment, but some other stories have interfered. Act 4 was published in June. I hope you will enjoy this chapter. Thank you for sticking with me. There is more to come. Much more.Mcravenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01983341903661185935noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4287665308659971500.post-71185658632530444262011-07-22T21:00:00.000-06:002011-07-22T21:00:35.627-06:00Lord of this World Act 5<!--StartFragment--> <br />
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-align: center;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">ACT 5<o:p></o:p></b></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Lord returned with a sack full of food and two shakes. He handed them through the window to Lily and got behind the wheel. He was ready for supper and about a century of sleep. He was that tired. As he started the truck down the highway he noticed a shabby old motor court with a vacant sign blinking by the road.</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“Let’s stay here, I’m exhausted, I don’t think I could drive another mile.” he pulled into the portico and went in. “I’ll be right out.” he told Lily. Then he stopped, he turned and looked her straight in the eye. </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“I can’t afford two rooms, I should’ve asked first. I’m sorry.” Lord was distressed. “Is it alright? To share, I mean.”</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Lily stared right back at him. Boldly, for her (he thought), she firmly said, “Of course, I trust you.” </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>He smiled and went in to pay for the room. He returned shortly and drove into the courtyard to a door marked “13” and parked. Lord got out and opened the door to the room. He came back and lifted his bundle and guitar out of the back of the truck. </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“Can you bring the food, I’ll get your bag next trip?” </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Lily agreed and carried the sack of burgers and drinks into the room and turned on the light. Lord dropped his bundle and set the guitar against the bed. After he collected her bag and locked the truck doors for the night, he went in to the room and shut the door behind him. There was a little desk and a rickety chair by the window. He collapsed into the chair and kicked his boots off. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He heard the rush of water as the toilet flushed. Lily opened the bathroom door and went to the burgers. She laid them out on the desk in front of him. “Time to eat.” She picked up one of paper wrapped hamburgers. He picked one for himself and began to unwrap it but he was distracted by Lily. She must have been ravenous, the sandwich disappeared in a flurry.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>She turned and went back to the bathroom and ran some water into a glass and took a sip. She walked back out to the desk and selected another hamburger and unwrapped it and set to demolishing the second one. It was a little less dramatic this time, but still just as determined.</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>They finished their meal and put the wrappings in the trash. Lord was thinking how amazing it was that a little girl like her could eat so much.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It was like the baby inside her was taking his nourishment directly from what she ate or maybe those skinny legs were hollow. His eyes began to droop from the fatigue of driving and leftover hangover. </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Lily shook his shoulder, “Lord, will you go outside while I get into bed?” she pointed to the twin bed closest to the bathroom. “I’m tired.”</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Lord nodded in agreement and went outside. The evening was warm, almost hot even though the sun had been down for a while now. He stood by his truck and leaned on the hood. Thoughts<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>of home and Bree ran around his skull tormenting him. “What would he do now?’” he thought. His plans were blown all to hell and he hadn’t considered a ‘Plan B’. The scenes of this morning replayed once more in his mind. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He thought of Lily and bastard father of hers. This led right back to his boyhood and his abusive step-father.</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">He had sat on that porch for most of an hour when Slick pulled up in the driveway. The man swayed a bit as he strolled up to the porch where Lord sat. “What the hell you doing kid?” he slurred the words.<o:p></o:p></i></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Lord looked at this man who had taken his father’s place, not in Lord’s eyes, but in his Mom’s. Even though he had hit her, using his fists to show her what a big man he was, she still hadn’t said anything against him. Lord wasn’t going to put up with that behavior, after all, he thought his father would want him to defend his mother.<o:p></o:p></i></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“Waiting for you.” he said flatly.<o:p></o:p></i></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“Oh…is that right. What do you want me for?”<o:p></o:p></i></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“Don’t hit my mother again.” Lord looked him directly in the eye.<o:p></o:p></i></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“Or what?” Slick grinned at the thought of Lord trying anything.<o:p></o:p></i></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“Or you’ll be sorry.” Lord held his ground.<o:p></o:p></i></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Slick cuffed him up side of his head. Lord flew off of the porch and onto the grass. He laid there, dazed.<o:p></o:p></i></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“Looks like you ain’t gonna do much are you?” Slick smirked and walked into the house, hollering “Where’s my supper woman? Or do you need a tune up like that smart mouthed brat of yours?”<o:p></o:p></i></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Lord didn’t hear her reply but Charley came out and helped him up. Lord’s eyes were watering from the force of the blow and there was a ringing in his ears. Charley asked, “What happened Lord? Why’d he hit you?”<o:p></o:p></i></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Lord spit the iron tasting blood/saliva onto the grass, licking his lips to clear them. “I told him not to hit mom anymore. So he hit me.” Lord held his head in his hands trying to stop the ringing.<o:p></o:p></i></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“This ain’t right Lord. Dad wouldn’t put up with someone like him. He always said that real men don’t hit girls. What should we do about it?” Charley was letting his fear creep into his voice. The sound of it worried Lord. He was supposed to watch out for his little brother. Mom said.<o:p></o:p></i></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“I don’t know Charley, I‘ll figure something out. Let’s go get some supper before he throws it out.” Lord led the way inside, watching warily for an ambush.<o:p></o:p></i></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Lord’s thoughts were interrupted by Lily’s voice telling him that it was his turn to get ready for bed. He entered the room carefully, not wanting to invade her privacy. Seeing her slight form under the thin cover on the bed that she had pointed to earlier, he turned and locked the door again. He went to the bed where his gear was piled and rummaged through it, looking for his toothbrush. After going through the jumble of stuff in the sheet that he had rolled up earlier he discovered it near the bottom of the pile. “Found it.” he said and went to brush the crud out of his mouth.</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Finished, he turned of the light and walked to the bed, worried that she might be offended if he took his levi’s off in front of her.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He needn’t have worried, he could tell she was already asleep by the soft snoring that came from the from under the covers. </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“Goodnight, Lily. I hope tomorrow’s better for the both of us.” Lord turned the light off, undressed<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>and climbed into bed. He was asleep before his head hit the pillow. </div><!--EndFragment-->Mcravenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01983341903661185935noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4287665308659971500.post-63676211655296043162011-07-10T19:38:00.003-06:002011-07-10T19:38:14.879-06:00Dreamscape - The End<!--StartFragment--> <br />
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Papyrus; font-size: 18.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">DREAMSCAPE<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;">EPISODE #4<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Wiley growled at me, “Are you ready to die…right now? Because you will you know, if you attract the raider’s attention. They don’t fool around!”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“NO, I’M NOT!” I shouted back at Wiley and gave a dirty look to the savage as well. “I AM JUST SICK … and tired of being confused. Today started out OK, but then it started to rain. And…and…”, I finished lamely. “And that savage cut me with his spearpoint!” <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Coimircoer scowled at me and lifted the point of the spear in my direction, he shook it. The translation came across loud and clear, “You’re lucky I didn’t spit you like a chicken!”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Wearily I nodded. “OK”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Coimirceor peeked over the ridge, he stood and gave a thumbs up. I thought I knew what it meant without the translation, you know, “A-OK.” But no, the savage’s interpreted voice spoke, “The coast is clear.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>He smiled and resumed his march. Intoit rose out of the tall grass and followed, resuming his position on the left flank. The gargling croak of the raven rang out from above. Wiley turned and looked my way. I arose and shouldered my pack and moved out. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Wiley kept pace with me. He assumed that superior canine grin that was becoming irritating. We walked and walked. Intoit’s hackles raised when we crossed the track of the raider’s. To tell you the truth, my hackles raised too. The thought of iron-clad knights led by the Son of the Morning Star, the hero of the Little Big Horn, dead though he may be, frightened me to no end. Coimirceor snorted at me and Intoit. He didn’t look left nor right. He trudged on. What choice did the rest of us have? We followed.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Did I say that the rain continued? It did, if anything it rained harder if that was possible. The light was cut further and the clouds rolled and twisted. But our feet were dry, the rain didn’t spot my spectacles. We climbed and descended ridge after gully, over and over. Out of the blue, a sharp pain blasted me starting in the angry red scar and radiating outward until it met itself in my back. A dry hacking<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>cough <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>over took me and I bent at the waist, trying to catch my breath. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Coimirceor stopped and looked back at me, his hands flashed in a series of signs. “You ready? We have to get you to the other side before the bad guys know you’re here.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Intoit snuck in behind me and goosed me with his nose. Then he growled. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“Yikes! What was that?” I said as I stood straight up. The raven gargled his laughing croak. “Shut up you stupid bird!” I let loose. Gasping for breath I started walking again and the savage turned and continued. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>We trudged on for about a mile, when the light began to fade and the clouds got darker and darker. I was beat, it seemed that we had walked for days, not hours. Just as I was about to call for a rest, we left the brush and tree line,<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>into a wide open meadow. The grass was about waist high and the most impossible green I had ever seen. It drooped from the weight of the rain. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Coimirceor stopped. I wasn’t paying attention to him and ran right into his back. He grunted but didn’t move. The raven cawed in alarm and flew away, Intoit growled.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Wiley said, “What have we here?” I looked at him, he was looking beyond Coimirceor. I did too. My mouth dropped open.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The knights were arrayed shoulder to shoulder, blocking our way. Their lances were leveled at us. Sitting his athletic bay stallion, directly in front of us was the Custer look-alike. He was smiling ear to ear. So much for fooling<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>the bad guys. Coimirceor grunted in agreement but didn’t take his eyes away from the threat in front of us. He held his nasty spear in a ready, but threatening position.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>He<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>barked out a string of gibb…er, words and shook the spear for emphasis. Not surprising, I didn’t understand a word of what he said.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And there was no translation either. The Custer look-alike sat there without responding to the tirade. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“I believe…HE (Custer pointed at me) will come with us.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The savage shook his head, “NO, I am the guardian of the vale, the VOICE assigned me to watch over him as well. You may not have him.” <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Coimirceor had spoken and I understood him! What the…what! “Why did we have to go through all of the sign language rig-a-ma- role?” I tugged on his rabbit skin cape. He ignored me.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The Son of the Morning Star barked out an order and the knights came to attention, raising their lances.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He barked another, they backed their horses ten steps. Custer backed his stallion almost to the line of his knights and reined him into a spin, right 360</span><span style="font-family: Symbol; mso-ascii-font-family: Papyrus; mso-char-type: symbol; mso-hansi-font-family: Papyrus; mso-symbol-font-family: Symbol;"><span style="mso-char-type: symbol; mso-symbol-font-family: Symbol;">°</span></span><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"> then back the other way. When<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>the horse stopped, Custer pulled the reins back. The stallion rose on his hind legs in a picture perfect ‘Levade’ and held it for a ten count. Custer let him down, and walked the stallion forward until he was just out of reach of the deadly spear. He stopped, drew his saber and pointed it at me, ignoring Coimirceor, “YOU…you think you have escaped me, and I allow that you have this time, but I will have you in the end.” He spun the stallion, and spurred away. The knights turned as one unit, formed into columns and followed their leader.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>I was dumbstruck. “What the HELL was that?” I asked.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Intoit was sniffing the tracks that were left from the raiders. He lifted his leg and squirted Custer’s track. Wiley watched with amusement, I could tell from his lolling-tongue grin. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Coimirceor turned to me, scowling he lifted the spearpoint so that it was pointing up. He let it lean on one shoulder and proceeded to explain in sign language. “They are the collectors of the vale.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Any one who tries to cross the vale are their prey.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Sometimes the VOICE assigns us to protect the travelers, sometimes we just take them to the raiders.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s your lucky day. We gotta ways to go yet, so pack up and let’ go.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>We walked for about another mile and the rain fell steadily, but it didn’t get any darker. I guess that it was dreary enough. We had been crossing the tall green grass flats and I was happy that the land was mostly level. I was beat. Wiley spoke up, “You have just a little ways to go and you will be across. The last bit will be the toughest, since you are so tired but, you can make it.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><!--EndFragment-->Mcravenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01983341903661185935noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4287665308659971500.post-91193285134844848332011-07-10T19:38:00.001-06:002014-02-17T15:26:45.880-07:00Dreamscape - The End<!--StartFragment--> <br />
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Papyrus; font-size: 18.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">DREAMSCAPE<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;">EPISODE #4<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Wiley growled at me, “Are you ready to die…right now? Because you will you know, if you attract the raider’s attention. They don’t fool around!”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“NO, I’M NOT!” I shouted back at Wiley and gave a dirty look to the savage as well. “I AM JUST SICK … and tired of being confused. Today started out OK, but then it started to rain. And…and…”, I finished lamely. “And that savage cut me with his spearpoint!” <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Coimircoer scowled at me and lifted the point of the spear in my direction, he shook it. The translation came across loud and clear, “You’re lucky I didn’t spit you like a chicken!”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Wearily I nodded. “OK”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Coimirceor peeked over the ridge, he stood and gave a thumbs up. I thought I knew what it meant without the translation, you know, “A-OK.” But no, the savage’s interpreted voice spoke, “The coast is clear.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>He smiled and resumed his march. Intoit rose out of the tall grass and followed, resuming his position on the left flank. The gargling croak of the raven rang out from above. Wiley turned and looked my way. I arose and shouldered my pack and moved out. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Wiley kept pace with me. He assumed that superior canine grin that was becoming irritating. We walked and walked. Intoit’s hackles raised when we crossed the track of the raider’s. To tell you the truth, my hackles raised too. The thought of iron-clad knights led by the Son of the Morning Star, the hero of the Little Big Horn, dead though he may be, frightened me to no end. Coimirceor snorted at me and Intoit. He didn’t look left nor right. He trudged on. What choice did the rest of us have? We followed.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Did I say that the rain continued? It did, if anything it rained harder if that was possible. The light was cut further and the clouds rolled and twisted. But our feet were dry, the rain didn’t spot my spectacles. We climbed and descended ridge after gully, over and over. Out of the blue, a sharp pain blasted me starting in the angry red scar and radiating outward until it met itself in my back. A dry hacking<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>cough <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>over took me and I bent at the waist, trying to catch my breath. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Coimirceor stopped and looked back at me, his hands flashed in a series of signs. “You ready? We have to get you to the other side before the bad guys know you’re here.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Intoit snuck in behind me and goosed me with his nose. Then he growled. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“Yikes! What was that?” I said as I stood straight up. The raven gargled his laughing croak. “Shut up you stupid bird!” I let loose. Gasping for breath I started walking again and the savage turned and continued. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>We trudged on for about a mile, when the light began to fade and the clouds got darker and darker. I was beat, it seemed that we had walked for days, not hours. Just as I was about to call for a rest, we left the brush and tree line,<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>into a wide open meadow. The grass was about waist high and the most impossible green I had ever seen. It drooped from the weight of the rain. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Coimirceor stopped. I wasn’t paying attention to him and ran right into his back. He grunted but didn’t move. The raven cawed in alarm and flew away, Intoit growled.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Wiley said, “What have we here?” I looked at him, he was looking beyond Coimirceor. I did too. My mouth dropped open.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The knights were arrayed shoulder to shoulder, blocking our way. Their lances were leveled at us. Sitting his athletic bay stallion, directly in front of us was the Custer look-alike. He was smiling ear to ear. So much for fooling<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>the bad guys. Coimirceor grunted in agreement but didn’t take his eyes away from the threat in front of us. He held his nasty spear in a ready, but threatening position.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>He<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>barked out a string of gibb…er, words and shook the spear for emphasis. Not surprising, I didn’t understand a word of what he said.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And there was no translation either. The Custer look-alike sat there without responding to the tirade. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“I believe…HE (Custer pointed at me) will come with us.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The savage shook his head, “NO, I am the guardian of the vale, the VOICE assigned me to watch over him as well. You may not have him.” <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Coimirceor had spoken and I understood him! What the…what! “Why did we have to go through all of the sign language rig-a-ma- role?” I tugged on his rabbit skin cape. He ignored me.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The Son of the Morning Star barked out an order and the knights came to attention, raising their lances.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He barked another, they backed their horses ten steps. Custer backed his stallion almost to the line of his knights and reined him into a spin, right 360</span><span style="font-family: Symbol; mso-ascii-font-family: Papyrus; mso-char-type: symbol; mso-hansi-font-family: Papyrus; mso-symbol-font-family: Symbol;"><span style="mso-char-type: symbol; mso-symbol-font-family: Symbol;">°</span></span><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"> then back the other way. When<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>the horse stopped, Custer pulled the reins back. The stallion rose on his hind legs in a picture perfect ‘Levade’ and held it for a ten count. Custer let him down, and walked the stallion forward until he was just out of reach of the deadly spear. He stopped, drew his saber and pointed it at me, ignoring Coimirceor, “YOU…you think you have escaped me, and I allow that you have this time, but I will have you in the end.” He spun the stallion, and spurred away. The knights turned as one unit, formed into columns and followed their leader.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>I was dumbstruck. “What the HELL was that?” I asked.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Intoit was sniffing the tracks that were left from the raiders. He lifted his leg and squirted Custer’s track. Wiley watched with amusement, I could tell from his lolling-tongue grin. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Coimirceor turned to me, scowling he lifted the spearpoint so that it was pointing up. He let it lean on one shoulder and proceeded to explain in sign language. “They are the collectors of the vale.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Any one who tries to cross the vale are their prey.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Sometimes the VOICE assigns us to protect the travelers, sometimes we just take them to the raiders.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s your lucky day. We gotta ways to go yet, so pack up and let’ go.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>We walked for about another mile and the rain fell steadily, but it didn’t get any darker. I guess that it was dreary enough. We had been crossing the tall green grass flats and I was happy that the land was mostly level. I was beat. Wiley spoke up, “You have just a little ways to go and you will be across. The last bit will be the toughest, since you are so tired but, you can make it.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><!--EndFragment-->Mcravenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01983341903661185935noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4287665308659971500.post-23667481422820102232011-07-10T19:37:00.001-06:002011-07-10T19:37:11.808-06:00The End - Part Two<!--StartFragment--> <br />
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><u><span style="font-family: Papyrus;">PART TWO<o:p></o:p></span></u></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>I nodded and grunted in agreement. I put my head down and trudged on.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>We came to another sudden stop and I nearly ran into the savage again. I stopped in time and raised my eyes to see what the interruption was. All I could see was Coimirceor’s back, so I stepped to the side. I gasped. We faced a long steep hillside that seemed to go on forever. I couldn’t see the top from where we stood.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“It looks like a pyramid” I offered.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“Can we go around?”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“Guys…”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Coimirceor began to sing. I couldn’t understand the words and there wasn’t any translation, but the rhythm was like a marching song.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He beckoned us forward with the spear and he began the long trek up the long slope. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>I watched, but not for long, Intoit goosed me with his nose and Wiley growled out, “Let’s get going.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>I heaved a long sigh and began the ordeal.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>We climbed and climbed, the slope became steeper the farther that we went. My heart pounded like an old steam engine, I wondered if the others could hear it, it beat so loud in my own ears. My breath roared in and out. I was just at the point where I was about to collapse, when Intoit and Wiley moved closer and put their heads beneath my hands.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“Hold onto our fur and we will help you.” Wiley said. I couldn’t say no, my breathing was too rapid to speak. We went on. For about another 50 yards. Then we topped the brow of the hill so suddenly I lost my footing and fell on my face. The coyotes used their noses under my arms to help me rise.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>When I got to my feet and raised my face, the sight before me was so amazing, my mouth dropped open. My eyes widened to their maximum size, I am sure, for they were barely able to ‘see’ what stood before me.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The most beautiful tree that I have ever seen rose to the sky. It was covered with large leaves of every shape and every color imaginable. The tree stood in the exact center of the flat top of the hill and spread it’s limbs in a huge circle that shaded the largest part of the space. Birds flitted in and out of the limbs and spaces between the leaves, their song in perfect harmony with Coimirceor. Intoit and Wiley began to sing the coyote song and it harmonized as well. The sound swelled in volume, I tried to match it, but could not.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The song came to a sudden end, the silence was deafening after the crescendo. A sudden pain ripped my chest along the angry scar and a tearing cough forced its way past my lips.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Coimirceor turned to me, his hands flew in a blizzard of signs. “You have crossed the vale, I have met the expectations of the Voice. I hope we do not meet for many turns of the wheel of life yet to be. If we do, the trip across the vale may not be so easy. Try to learn some things before you come to this place again. It will make our job easier. Thank your brothers for their help before you leave us.” He spread his arms in a sign that had no translation, then he made a chopping motion with his spear hand. “Enough!”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>With that he grasped the spear that he had leaned on his shoulder and raised it in to the air, a sudden “Ky-yi-Yippee-i-oooo” burst from his lips and he was off at a fast trot.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>As I watched his form disappear over the edge of the hill, Wiley said, “Follow me”, and he led me across the hill top under the tree. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>As we reached the other side and left the shade thrown by the huge tree, I asked the coyote, “What is this place?”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Wiley let the superior canine grin cross his face before he answered, “You don’t recognize it? You have been here before you know, only going the other way.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“NO, I don’t recall being here.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“This is the Tree of Life” Wiley said this with some seriousness and reverence. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Scared, I asked, “Have I died?”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“Not this time, if you had, you would be riding with the knights of the vale and that goofy Yellow Hair. Instead, you got to hang with the savage.” With this, Wiley burst into coyote laugh.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“What’s next?” I asked somewhat relieved.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“Follow me” and he led me over the edge of the hill. I slipped and started sliding down the grassy slope. Wiley and Intoit raced beside me as I gained speed. I slid forever, I gained so much speed that I began to leave the coyote’s behind. I saw that I was heading toward the edge of a drop off and I tried to slow down by spreading my arms and grabbing at the grass. It slipped through my fingers, the scared feeling<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>returned, I cried out.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“Don’t fight it, just let it happen…don’t fight it…”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>I slipped over the edge and fell.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“Don’t fight it…”, and I hit the bottom in a flash of light. My eyes flew open, and slammed closed again when the bright light bored into my eyes. I opened them carefully to see an angel in my face, she was pulling a tube from my throat.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“Don’t fight it…cough…harder”.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>A racking cough rumbled in my chest, it felt like hell, I couldn’t breath. Then pop, the tube was free, I coughed and gasped. My chest hurt.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>I looked at the nurse, then saw other angels standing around the room. They had tears in their eyes, I wondered why. The first one said, ”What do you think of this.” She pointed to my chest.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>An angry red scar/cut marked my chest from throat to the bottom of my ribcage. It throbbed. I closed my eyes, the room faded for an instant. The fading echoes of a yipping coyote song teased my hearing.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Then Wiley’s face floated in front of me, grinning that damned canine grin. He barked like any other coyote but the yips translated into, “Do you understand now?”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>I groaned, and opened my eyes. “How bad was it?” I croaked.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;">Just like that damned raven.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;">THE END<o:p></o:p></span></b></div><!--EndFragment-->Mcravenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01983341903661185935noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4287665308659971500.post-58642984665280174272011-07-06T20:54:00.002-06:002011-07-06T20:54:35.543-06:00Getting Out of College, #4<!--StartFragment--> <br />
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span style="color: #595959; font-family: "Comic Sans MS"; font-size: 18.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">FOUR<o:p></o:p></span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><br />
</div><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">We cried when You slipped away,<o:p></o:p></span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">that morn’ early.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">When finally I think you yearned<o:p></o:p></span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">for the journey.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Mike and Shane walk out of Mom’s Café picking their teeth and rubbing bellies that are tight from breakfast. Biscuits and sausage gravy topped with two fried eggs and a handful of smoky bacon had been ordered, admired and ate. They wobbled over to the baby blue Ford groaning at the pressure that their belts put on their gut as they sat in the car. Shane tries to continue their discussion of the future as he gets the car headed back north and home. “So, when are you going to see the draft board?”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Mike avoids the subject, “Shane, look another Burma Shave sign...”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“C’mon Mike, no more Burma Shave signs.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Come clean, what are you going to do?”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“Well, I guess I’ll take an afternoon this week and go see them.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>God, I hate to.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I really am scared, if I go over <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">there</i>, I don’t think I’ll come back.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The last is said in a quiet voice. Mike finally cuts the clowning around, but it puts him in a low mood.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“Enough of that shit, you’re tough, the Cong are just little skinny bastards...remember when you took that running back down at the homecoming game?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You ate his lunch, rolled his ass like a bowling pin.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You’ll make it through ‘Nam.” Shane is positive that nothing bad will happen to his pal.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Quietly Mike thinks on Shane’s reply, then says, “I did kick his butt on that one didn’t I?”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“Damn straight! You did, he heard footsteps the rest of that game.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Mike is quiet once again, he is thinking and says what he is thinking out loud, “It’s a bit different with hand grenades and AK47’s.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I hate it when I hear bullets flyin’ by my head.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“I just had a thought.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Remember that one scout trip out to Fish Springs?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The one that we put the firecracker in the firewood? Shane was excited, he evidently had a thought that would bring Mike around.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Mike chuckles, “Doc Willis put it in the fire and when it blew up, he said ‘Who put the firecracker in the fire?’”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Together, they answer Doc’s question, “You did Doc!!”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Mike laughs but is puzzled, “Yea I remember, what about it?”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Well, that night we sat in the tent and it was raining outside, Don telling us not to touch his old man’s tent with our fingers and making it leak…remember?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It leaked any way, haha, fell down on us too.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Later.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“Yep, I remember that trip, almost broke my toe in the hot springs. Memories of that trip come flooding back into Mike’s mind. There were memories of many trips like that one. They had camped all over the state.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Shane continues, “We decided we’d be blood brothers, remember?”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Mike’s eyes fly open, “And Don too!”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“Sure! You couldn’t bear to cut your wrist so we pricked our thumbs with that dull old scout knife of yours.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The tremendous trio.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Through thick and thin.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I think Don got a deferrment for being married....I mean....I didn’t mean to bring that up.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“That’s ok, lucky him.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I remember the blood brother thing.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I always thought we were brothers anyway. Even a little fighting.” Mike said. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Shane said jokingly, hoping to break the mood, “Thank God, not too much fightin’...I’m a lover not a fighter.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Mike snorted, “Braggart!”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“You wish!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Gettin’ back to the subject.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If you get drafted, I’ll sign up and we’ll go together. That way, you won’t be alone.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Mike was startled at this, “No! You can’t!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Your number is too high, you don’t have to go!”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“Mike! Ease up buddy, It’s up to me.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If you have to go, I’m going too.” Shane is adamant.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Mike turns away, facing out the side window. He was resigned to the fact that he was being drafted, and when he was called up, well, Viet Nam was the next stop. It was all so dark. He had a premonition that something bad was going to happen to him. He couldn’t stand the thought of his buddy facing the same fate.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“Then I hope they won’t take me.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I would die if you followed me and something happened.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Shane continued with his cocky confidence, “They won’t know what hit ‘em if we both go over there.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Besides, I’m a better shot.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“You are not!”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“Am too.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The guys have a long standing argument about this. They shoot every chance they get. Ever since they were allowed to hunt together without adult supervision they had burned up cases of .22 cartridges and shotgun ammo. It probably was a tie, but Mike conceded a half victory.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“Well maybe, with a shotgun, I’ll kick your butt with a rifle any day.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You don’t have to go.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It would be better if just one of us has to do this.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Shane smiles at the easy half-win, but then, “Better for who?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I ain’t doing anything, now that I got my money back from Dixie College.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“Anything would be better than going to that hellhole.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Shane says, “It’s settled then”<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“It is not!”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>They pause, both look away, wishing they could change the subject.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Mike breaks the silence, “Look at that sign!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“Welcome to Rooster Valley”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>cockle-doodle-de dooo! Hahahahahahaha”. He laughs wildly.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Shane looks across the car at his buddy, wondering if everything they have talked about has caused Mike to lose his marbles. Maybe the pressure of the draft notice has gotten to him. He asks, “What’s so funny about that?”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Mike started crowing like a rooster, over and over, then laughing like a madman. “Er-er-er-errrrrr!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Rooster Valley!”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Shane chuckles in sympathy, then asks again, “What’s so funny?”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Mike can hardly stop laughing, but finally he gets out, “What’d the hen say to the new rooster? I don’t know what you’re crowing about, you ain’t nothin’ special- - -any cock’ll do!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Hahahahahaha.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Shane laughed along with Mike and they chanted in unison, <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">“Cockle-doodle-de-dooooo!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Rooster Valley!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Hahahahahaha”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They laugh long and hard, barely keeping the car on the road. It was like they needed the emotional release of a good laugh, since crying was out of the question. Their generation wasn’t the first to be drawn into a war that was unpopular. They weren’t the first to be inducted involuntarily into the Army. But, the subject of Viet Nam had dominated their young lives. And the guys they knew who wanted to go into the service were either nuts or it would be their best chance at getting an education. The rest of the group would go if they had to, but wouldn’t join otherwise.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Mike fell silent first; the laughter had worn him out. He said, “Let’s go see Wanda at B Y Woo, where the girls are girls and the boys are too!” He remembered that Shane didn’t believe that a beautiful girl like Wanda would have anything to do with him. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Shane thought about it for a second then, “Yeah I guess, we don’t have to be home ‘til tomorrow anyway.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>What day are you going to the draft board, maybe I’ll go with you?”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“You really don’t have to go.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Maybe I’ll be 4-f, I could take a purse, you know.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I got flat feet, and I piss enough protein to feed a third world family for hell’s sake, almost didn’t get hired at that copper mine last year.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">Any way, I been thinking...if I have to go, why not join first and get my choice of what to do?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>My old man says he can get me into Annapolis, I will have to do prep school first though, I flunked Algebra.” Mike was trying hard to convince his pal to stay out of the war. He just didn’t have a good feeling about it at all.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Shane kept on, “Maybe you will.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Be 4-F, I mean.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I wish we could know the future, know what to do.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s so fucked up, with the draft and all, how can you plan for anything until you know?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I’m going if you are, so that’s that.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS"; font-size: 8.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">Michael D. LeFevre <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(Adapted from a Short Play of the same title)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Copyright 5 June 2001<o:p></o:p></span></b></div><!--EndFragment-->Mcravenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01983341903661185935noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4287665308659971500.post-77320383531876204512011-06-24T15:58:00.002-06:002011-06-24T15:58:47.006-06:00Waking Dream- - one more after this.<!--StartFragment--> <br />
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Papyrus; font-size: 18.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">DREAMSCAPE<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;">EPISODE #3<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The voice continued, “No further may ye go without thine guardian.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It would be too dangerous for thee. Coimirceoir has agreed to lead thee to the other side of the vale.” The savage stood and turned to face out of the cave. He lifted his arm, the one formerly holding the spear that pierced my chest, and made a sweeping<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>wave that took in the dismal scene. Although the view was mostly hidden by the falling rain, I got the sense of what that grand gesture encompassed. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“The vale.” The voice pronounced.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The savage echoed the voice in the gib…uh, language of his fathers. He turned back and grinned humorlessly at me. He flashed a series of hand signs that magically transformed to words in my head.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“Pack your shit and let’s get going.” <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>I was startled and I guess it showed, because the savage threw back his head and laughed, long and loud. Then he moved his hands two more times. “Move it!” <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>I just looked at him.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Two more hand signs, “MOVE IT!! And he picked up the deadly spear and stepped out into the rain. I hurried to put my pack on and picked up my rifle and followed.<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The rain parted around me as I followed the savage. Even though the ground was soggy and slick, our footing was solid. I wondered at the mystery. I didn’t know it then, but, there would be far greater mysteries to come. The first was a large black raven that appeared above us. I could hear the wind whistling through his wing feathers, louder when he flapped, softly as he glided between wing beats. The rain moved around it as well, the raven cawed twice. Then he croaked, it sounded like my buddy gargling whiskey at the bar on Friday nights. The raven then spoke to me, “You better keep up or Coimirceoir will stick you with his spear again.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>I looked up in surprise, my hand involuntarily went to the bright red scar on my chest. It throbbed. The raven laughed with that gargling croak that ravens use to taunt humans.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>My feet picked up the pace, I didn’t want that spear to touch me again.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>We walked, the rain fell, the gloom got darker and darker. Coimirceoir seemed more alert than he had been. Out of the misty rain, Wiley appeared and took up a guard position on our right side. He glanced at me and then beyond. I followed his gaze. Another coyote appeared out of the half light. Wiley nodded as he took up a similar guard position on our left. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>I looked back at Wiley and commented, “Hey, I thought you were gone. What’s up?”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Wiley looked at Coimircoeoir, then replied, “He called me,” and indicating the other coyote, “and my brother, Intoit. We’re going with you across the vale, just in case.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“Intoit,” I looked his way, he looked back with a toothy canine grin. “Just in case of what?” <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I asked.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“Just in case of varmints” Wiley quipped back.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>I patted the slung rifle on my back, “I’ve got this.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Wiley shook his furry head and gave a sigh, “Won’t work here. I thought you understood.” <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The raven laughed his raven laugh again.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Wiley barked, “Shut up you smartass bird. Who asked you anyway?”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Intoit just yipped.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Coimirceoir turned and scowled at all of them.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He hardly broke stride as he shook the spear at them and then with his free hand, put his pointer finger to is lips in the universal sign to be quiet.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>I heard, “SHUT UP!” in my head. I nodded in agreement and trudged on.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Every 30 minutes or so, the rain would lessen, then renew it’s force. But it didn’t seem to matter; the rain didn’t touch any of us. It didn’t affect the ground that we walked on either. It wasn’t muddy or slick, it didn’t squish or stick to my shoes or the others feet. How could that be I wondered. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“All things are possible in thine own dreamscape. All things are possible here, as I have said before.” The voice in my head answered my query. I nodded my head, “I know, I know. I should have remembered.” I was talking to the voice in my head. “Is that a sign I am going insane?”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There was no answer to that question forthcoming. From the voice anyway. The savage turned back and nodded, then grinned widely. Wiley and Intoit gave me the superior canine smile and the raven gargled long and loud.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>I shook my head in confusion and trudged on.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>We walked up and down the numberless ravines and small canyons that had been hidden from my viewpoint at the cave. Though the vale seemed to be flat, it was riven by these ravines that would have looked like well-wrinkled skin, if seen from the right perspective. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“You do know that this creation is pretty old, right?” Wiley turned to look at me to ask this question. His coyote face taking on an expectant expression. “Well…right?” he went on.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“You said ‘creation’; didn’t you mean ‘this accident of existence that has evolved from some quirky non-existent beginning’?” I replied to Wiley.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The superior canine smile returned to Wiley’s face. “RRRRIIIIIGGHHHTT! He said this sarcastically. The raven gargled long and loud.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“Then you really meant ‘creation’?” I was trying to keep up with Coimirceoir and reason out this new fact about the dreamscape at the same time. Intoit suddenly growled and raced by Coimirceoir to the top of the ridge in front of us.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>When he reached the apex, he stopped and flattened himself into the tall grass. The savage stopped at once, he raised his hand like a traffic cop, and his ‘voice’ echoed back, “STOP!”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;">Wiley joined Intoit in the tall grass and the raven croaked in alarm and flapped frantically away to disappear into a thicket of evergreens. I followed Coimirceoir’s example and squatted so that my profile wouldn’t show above the waving grass on the ridgeline.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Wiley crept backward out of the grass and slinked down to us. He jerked his head back towards the ridgeline, “Raiders.” He said. “A bunch of them, too.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Coimirceoir hissed in his language, his hands moving,<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>interpreting for me, “Follow me, crawl on your belly, go slow and whatever you do…keep your head down until I tell you to look.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>I nodded quickly. The savage crawled up the slope to the ridgline. He moved like a serpent, a snake in the grass, barely moving the individual blades to mark his passage.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I am afraid to say that I wasn’t so competent. But when I reached the top and slid into place alongside Coimirceoir, he signaled to me to look across to a column of cavalry about a quarter mile away. They were trotting in a line, two by two, side by side, from right to left across our planned route.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>At first, I thought that it was odd that they were in medieval armor.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Their horses were large; they had to be to carry that weight. The armor was a rusty brown, not shiny like the movies. They sort of blended in. All of the riders carried their lances upright, but a few of them had pennants waving gaily from the tips. Like I said, I thought this was odd. But then I realized that wasn’t the oddest thing. At the head of the double column, a mid-nineteenth century cavalry soldier rode an athletic bay stallion. The horse’s mane flew wildly as the horse tossed his head up and down, bobbing in a rhythm that only he knew. The soldier rode ramrod straight in the saddle, the fringe strings of his yellowish leather jacket tossing like the horse’s mane. His slouch hat covered longish yellow hair. The soldier never looked left nor right, but he guided his mount through the mounds of tall grass with ease.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>I cursed under my breath, “My Hell, what is going on? Is that George Custer leading a column of knights?”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“Man, you are so whacked.” Wiley commented in my ear.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Coimirceor pointed his right index finger at the side of his head and described a circle; he crossed his eyes as well. “Yep, you’re whacked.” The interpretation of the savage’s sign echoed in my head at the same time.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“This has got to end!” I said this and made to stand and wave to the column. Coimirceor hissed angrily and grabbed the collar of my jacket and pulled me back down before the distant knights noticed me.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Papyrus;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The big voice in my head was also angry, “Has thee lost thy mind? Thou cannot mess with the time/space continuum here. The consequences would be monumental!”<o:p></o:p></span></div><!--EndFragment-->Mcravenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01983341903661185935noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4287665308659971500.post-32495310206956845082011-06-17T21:34:00.002-06:002011-06-17T21:34:19.418-06:00I miss you Dad<!--StartFragment--> <br />
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Copperplate Gothic Light"; font-size: 16.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">DAD IS GONE<o:p></o:p></span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Copperplate Gothic Light";">The hole in my chest where<o:p></o:p></span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Copperplate Gothic Light";">My heart used to be<o:p></o:p></span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Copperplate Gothic Light";">Is <o:p></o:p></span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Copperplate Gothic Light";">Matched only by the silence in <o:p></o:p></span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Copperplate Gothic Light";">My head where your<o:p></o:p></span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Copperplate Gothic Light";">Voice<o:p></o:p></span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Copperplate Gothic Light";">Echoed.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Copperplate Gothic Light";">A man don’t hit women. Give the man a full day’s work for a full day’s pay. Respect your Mother, Son. Be brave. Thank god. Be kind to dogs and kids. Shoot straight, don’t waste your bullets.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Copperplate Gothic Light";">These were words that <o:p></o:p></span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Copperplate Gothic Light";">you made sure<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I <o:p></o:p></span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Copperplate Gothic Light";">Heard, <o:p></o:p></span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Copperplate Gothic Light";">to forge the copy of Manhood <o:p></o:p></span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Copperplate Gothic Light";">that had <o:p></o:p></span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Copperplate Gothic Light";">made <o:p></o:p></span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Copperplate Gothic Light";">You.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Copperplate Gothic Light";">If you fill up the back of the shovel, the front will take care of itself. I want the weeds in the ditch gone when I get home from work. Watch over your sister, (and he booted my butt when I lost her). Take care of your pennies and your dollars will take care of themselves. No man is worth a million dollars a year. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Copperplate Gothic Light";">DAD is gone…<o:p></o:p></span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Copperplate Gothic Light";">The hole in my chest where<o:p></o:p></span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Copperplate Gothic Light";">My heart used to be<o:p></o:p></span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Copperplate Gothic Light";">Is filled only by his last words to me,<o:p></o:p></span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Copperplate Gothic Light";">“And after all, remember…<o:p></o:p></span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Copperplate Gothic Light";">I love you son.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><br />
</div><div align="right" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: right;"><span style="font-family: "Copperplate Gothic Light"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">Michael D. LeFevre<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>31 March 2011<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span><span style="font-family: Symbol; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ascii-font-family: "Copperplate Gothic Light"; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt; mso-char-type: symbol; mso-hansi-font-family: "Copperplate Gothic Light"; mso-symbol-font-family: Symbol;"><span style="mso-char-type: symbol; mso-symbol-font-family: Symbol;">ã</span></span><span style="font-family: "Copperplate Gothic Light"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;"> COPYRIGHT<o:p></o:p></span></div><!--EndFragment-->Mcravenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01983341903661185935noreply@blogger.com0