AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Unless you like stick figures, that is. Snickering at my own thoughts, I sit in the camping chair I brought out yesterday and sip my wake-up juice while I enjoy the birds singing and the sky changing color with the dawning of a new day.
“Maybe I’ll put Sassy’s harness on later and take her on a walk.” Since she’s a spoiled, pampered princess, her outdoor time is now reduced to a leash and harness, but she doesn’t seem to mind, and there are several marked trails that lead down to the water’s edge.
Once the sun has risen, I head back inside to make breakfast so I can tackle any work that’s come in. Already I feel as if the weight of the world has fallen off my shoulders.
No, all my problems haven’t miraculously disappeared, not by a longshot. But being around some good, kind, giving people these past few weeks has reminded me that not everyone is an asshole out for themselves, like Patrick.
“I don’t know about my picker, Sassy,” I muse as I scramble eggs. She’s curled up on the table looking out the window but turns her head and meows at me. “Yeah, you’re right, hedidsay all the right things, and I was just so darned lonely with Grampy gone.”
It was definitely a low time in my life, that’s for damn sure. Once Grams passed, we found a new normal, working on fixing up the RV, although it wasn’t in bad shape to begin with, planting the garden, tending the chickens. He used to have a small stand down at the local farmer’s market, and the farm fresh eggs plus the vegetables he brought were always well-received. I would often make loaves of bread using Grams’ tried and true recipe, and I can still see him in my mind’s eye, walking through the door practically giddy. “Rory,” he’d say, each time I made the bread, “sold outta the bread in five minutes, girlie!”
“Damn, I miss you, Grampy,” I whisper, my eyes welling up with tears. “You and Grams didn’t have to take me on, that’s for sure. You were older and had already raised your family, but I remember you yelling at that social worker that I was your kin, your blood, and you didn’t give a damn what they thought, I was coming home with y’all. Best years of my life, hands down.”
When I was younger, before I went to live with my grandparents full-time, I spent a lot of time there because my mother was flighty and would take off to follow her dreams at the drop of a hat. Unfortunately, she got tangled up with the wrong crowd and it led her down a dark path to drugs and domestic violence. Theonlyreason the authorities found out what happened is because I was supposed to be dropped off at their house and when I wasn’t, Grampy went on a tear, demanding a welfare check be done.
Because regardless of how out of it my mother got, shealwaysremembered to drop me off with her parents. I like to think she knew I’d be safe and well-taken care of, but since she’s dead, I can’t ask.
When the police arrived, they found me, at six, hiding in a closet with my mother’s dead body on the couch, the needle still in her arm. Thankfully, I never saw that; I was in the closet because the last thing I remembered, she told me to stay in there and not come out because some people were coming over. Unfortunately, as best as they were able to determine, I was alone for nearly four days.
But Grampy and Grams didn’t care. I reeked to high heaven because I wet myself more than once, I was hungry, dehydrated, and sick, but my grampy held me close and carried me to the ambulance, having ignored the officers when they advised him to wait. I ended up spending a week in the hospital while the officials tried to figure shit out and my grandparents never left my side. Well, Grampy did so he could ‘give that social worker a piece of his mind’, which he did, several times. I think he finally wore her down because when I was discharged, I left with them in his old pickup truck, and never went back.
“Y’all taught me so much,” I murmur, plating my food. Still lost in the past, I sit at my small table, which can double as a bed if needed, and begin eating.
I learned how to be a farmer, as Grampy said, and got some ‘good old Christian learning’ every Sunday when we’d pile in the truck and head to the small church in town. They taught me right from wrong, how important it was to treat others the way I wanted to be treated, and did everything they could to shower me with love and affection.
“It’s because of y’all that I’m not a screwed-up mess, isn’t that right, Sassy?” I ask, as I slide my leftover eggs toward her, which she quickly gobbles up.
Once I have my breakfast dishes washed and put up, I sit at the table with my ever-present notebook and a pen, and start making my list of things I need to do with respect to Patrick. Sighing as I look it over, I decide a walk will do both me and Sassy some good. She’s not a huge fan of the harness, but doesn’t resist too much. Grabbing a bottle of water, I head outside, being sure to lock my door since I’m a woman traveling by myself. I already have my gun on me, grateful that Grampy showed me how to be a responsible carrier. He strongly believed that a woman should know how to protect herself and now that I’m traveling by myself, I’m glad he insisted I learn how to shoot.
At the water’s edge, I can’t help the giggles that escape as I watch Sassy begin chattering. There are some fish who are jumping up then splashing back into the lake, and she’s absolutely fascinated, even though I know she doesn’t have the first clue what to do with a live fish. No, hers comes from an aluminum can. Once I’m done with my water, I gently tug the leash and we start meandering back to our campsite.
* * *
“Shew, that was a hot mess,” I mumble, hitting save on my laptop. One of the offices I do billing for apparently had some kind of glitch in their system, and I spent three hours trying to fix things so that the duplicate invoices didn’t get sent.
Because that would’ve created a shitstorm of epic proportions for the folks at the office. Satisfied that everything is now back on track, I stand and stretch before heading to the refrigerator to see what I can rustle up for lunch. Glancing around, I notice Sassy sunning herself, her tail twitching as she dreams about things only she knows about. “Silly girl,” I say, before fixing myself a sandwich. I notice it’s gotten dark outside so check my weather app to see a severe thunderstorm is headed toward me.
“Fantastic,” I grumble, putting my food down and heading outside to bring in the stadium chair I had near the small fire pit. It’s a nicer one, with cupholders and a small table that flips up and I definitely don’t want to lose it to the winds that are already whipping up. Once it’s safely tucked underneath the RV in the storage compartment that Grampy added, I look around to make sure there’s nothing else that might cause damage to my vehicle. Satisfied I’ve done all I can do, I head back inside, lock the doors, then make sure I’ve saved all my work before I send a quick email to my boss letting her know that once the storm passes, I’ll jump back in and finish my assigned tasks.
She’s actually pretty cool, as long as we get the offices we oversee taken care of, she doesn’t care what time of day we work, or if we push to do it all in one day so we’re ‘off’ the rest of the week. I get a quick response telling me to be careful and smile.
I may feel a bit disconnected from everything right now, but Shanda is one person I can always count on to check on me, which she’s steadily done since I sent her the email letting her know of my present situation. She suggested I get a post office box, which I took care of online, putting Jolie from Dr. Zack’s office on it as well so she could pull my mail and advise of anything important I needed to address. That was a pain in the ass, because I had to go into each of my online accounts and update my information. The thing is, I wantnothinggoing to the farm right now with Patrick staying there, which Jolie confirmed when she drove by and saw his car in the driveway.
“I’m sorry, Grampy,” I whisper as a crack of thunder rumbles overhead. “But I don’t know how to make him leave, and I won’t risk myself or Sassy again.”
As if I conjured him up, I can hear him in my head saying,“Rory, girl, it’s just a house. You and that four-legged baby of yours are what’s most important. Buildings can be replaced but people and the pets they love can’t.”
“You’re right, Grampy,” I reply out loud. It’s become a habit to talk to myself, or Sassy, since I’m now on my own. I’m sure if people saw me, they’d think I was crazy and maybe I am, at least just a little bit. Who isn’t these days, right? The world’s going to hell in a handbasket, so if folks can’t realize there are bigger issues, then they’re the problem, not me and my ramblings.
Grabbing my plate with my sandwich on it, I climb up to my loft then snag my e-reader from the charger. Might as well read for a little bit and maybe take a nap while the thunder rolls.
Banshee
By the timewe make it to the Cedar Creek clubhouse, I’m beyond road weary and I know Scythe and Kracken are as well. Two long, hard days on the road with minimal stops has all three of us aching and out of sorts. So, when we pull into their parking lot after the prospect opens the gate, I have to bite back my groan when I see what appears to be a party going on.
“Fucking hell,” I mutter, backing my bike in where another prospect motions, Scythe and Kracken following suit. The last thing in the world I’m in the mood for is partying, although a couple of cold beers wouldn’t go amiss.
“Yeah, same,” Scythe retorts, and I realize they both heard me through our helmets. Smirking, he pulls his off and locks it into his saddlebag, before swinging his leg over and standing. “Fuck, I’m getting too old to ride like that.”
