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As with last week’s column, Fiction is my Mistress, I’m again sharing snippets from short stories I’ve written in the past and am continuing to write as you read today’s column.

This week I’m sharing snippets from my short story collection:
Random Acts: Stories of Redemption

This snippet is from my story called Katie’s Castle:
His mouth dropped open.  “You don’t know,” he said.  “Didn’t Mommy ever tell you?”

“Tell me what?”  Though now she had a thread she needed to hear the whole story in order to complete the yarn.

“I understand why she wouldn’t burden you when you were young, but…”  He paused here and sighed “…well I guess it was easier to bury the truth after so long.  I couldn’t live with my actions, so early one morning before your mom was awake, I remember it as two-fifteen exactly.  You were away for the week visiting a friend, and I went downstairs and walked into the garage. I started the car. I never woke up.”

“But, wait a minute,” she said, now scratching her head.  “Mommy said you’d been in a car accident.” Now she frowned.

He nodded.  “Well, that sort of makes sense.  There’s a grain of truth in the story and I guess it was enough to satisfy her.  I’m sorry, Katie. I wouldn’t have said anything. I thought she would have told you by now.”  He grew quiet again and after another few minutes, Tom could no longer deal with the silence that hung between them.  “I’ve accepted my fate, Katie. I only came back here now because I see how much you’re still hurting. It really is unhealthy to carry all that anger around with you.  It’s amazing what death can do for you. You’re able to see things much clearer. I can see right into your soul, Kate. It’s dark in there and it shouldn’t be. You’re still young.  There’s so much for you to be happy about. Stan loves you but he knows you won’t let him in because of me.”

She was shaking her head now, and she almost laughed out loud.  “Stanley Weller?” she said now looking away. “C’mon.”

“Hell, he’d probably kill me if I wasn’t dead.  But you need to know this and God knows he wouldn’t tell you.  Think about it, Kate. Why do you think he bought you that gallery?”

Two snippets from Random Acts:

1. Frank took a seat in the den, admiring the decor, wishing he could afford even half the things this lady seemed capable of acquiring.

“So,” she said, walking to the bathroom, “how was work?  Did you miss me?”

Frank didn’t smile.  “That’s an odd thing to say.  You seem to have so many men coming and going I didn’t think you would notice when I’m gone.”

She peered out and said, “Hey, that’s not fair!  We never talked about an exclusive relationship.”  In her heart, that’s what she wanted though. But could she trust him?  In every 

other circumstance, she’d been hurt.  She swore it would never happen again, but there was a lot to lose by making a commitment to one man.  “I’ll be right out.

2.  “C’mon, Ellen.  You were gonna say something before.  We came here tonight because you wanted to talk.”

“Oh.”  She paused.  This was it. Would she tell him now and lose him?  She tried to think. There was an awkward moment when neither of them spoke.  But she finally said, “My family? You want to know about them?”

He nodded.  “It’s a start.”

“My parents were killed when I was just five, Frank.  I went to live with an aunt shortly after. When I turned twenty_one I left.  You see,” she said, “my parents left me a very large estate. I couldn’t take advantage of it until I turned twenty one.”

“Oh my, God,” he said, running his fingers through his hair.  

“It was a long time ago.  It doesn’t bother me telling you.  In fact, it’s nice to know that someone cares.  So I don’t really need to work as a cocktail waitress, but if I didn’t have this job at the nightclub, well I’d just die.”

And one from Ceremonies:
He was pouring his coffee when the phone rang.  Walter picked up the receiver and heard Mike Farlowe, the Scout master.  The mug crashed to the floor, sending shards of plaster around the kitchen upon hearing the scout master’s plea.

“Did you hear me, Walter?”  Mike was saying. “We know. Maybe you’d like you to come downtown, get this thing straightened out.”

Walter knew the day was coming.  Some nights he’d go to bed praying it would come the next morning, but now that it had finally arrived, he rebelled against it, choosing to ignore the Scout master’s plea.  He stood in the middle of his kitchen, the broken mug lying on the floor a symbol of what would surely happen to his life if he went downtown. He spun around and placed the phone back in its cradle and continued fixing his breakfast.

A moment later, the phone rang again.  Walter picked it up and said, “Hello?”
“Walter!”  the shrill echo said.  “All we want is to talk.”
“Fine,” he said.  “We can talk here.”
“You’re not making this easy, Walter.”

For those interested in reading the entire collection, the book is available on Amazon:
Random Acts: Stories of Redemption

Next week, more from my NEW collection I’m currently writing.

Be Happy!  Be Well! Be Positive!
Blessings to you.
—
Chris

Once you realize that life is eternal,
That our souls our eternal,
That we return to light and physical over and over;
We then lose all our distress
We then lose all our fear of dying.  For there truly is no end.