Tag: love-story

In the Quiet After Slaughter

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excerpt

She was waiting for a table in a Nassau restaurant, a frumpy, frazzled
woman with a peeling snout, saying to him, Haven’t I seen you
on the Sunrise?
They’d returned from the shore excursion together, he lugging
her shopping bags while she propelled her wheel-chaired mother
along the island’s potted beach road. Later that night she turned
up at the piano bar, drained a Mint Julep, then exited. Buddy
sought her out the following day. She invited him along to a lecture
on seabirds.
– Remember what the boss say, Sam cautioned.
The cruise line had always been ambiguous about the help fraternizing
with guests. Inappropriate friendships, as such romances were
called, could be cause for dismissal. But if shipboard dalliances
resulted in the booking of additional holidays— if a passenger went
home with a smile on her face—who’d complain?
This woman wore unfashionable clothes, sensible shoes and little
makeup. While others took elaborate measures to conceal
their weight, she flaunted hers. Had he passed her on the street
Buddy wouldn’t have afforded her a second look. Yet in her presence,
that sunburned nose, the nectar breath, she wielded the
power of a sorceress. For the first time in his life the piano player
was beguiled.
– This one, he confided in Sam, is different.
One morning over coffee he was doodling on a coaster. As though
in a trance, he wrote, Her eyes look inside my head and see everything.
He underlined the last word.
At the card table behind the engine room they had a diagnosis for
Buddy’s affliction: Man Overboard. It’s what they called it when a
player fell for a passenger. So named since a despondent Filipino
waiter, having been rebuked by a flirtatious diner, jumped from …

https://draft2digital.com/book/3562874

https://www.amazon.com/dp/0980897971


Wellspring of Love

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excerpt

The early morning sun shone into Tyne’s eyes as she steered her
Chevrolet at unlawful speed through the town of Emblem, and headed
east up the hospital hill. The cloudless sky foretold a spectacular June
day, but Tyne paid no heed. Impatiently, she yanked the visor down
to shield her eyes, and through her rearview mirror, caught sight of a
police cruiser bearing down on her, its lights flashing.
“Oh no,” she moaned aloud, “I’ve no time for this.”
She pulled to the curb and stopped, and the police car pulled up
behind her. With both hands grasping the steering wheel, she lay her
head on it in resignation. In moments, there was a tap on her window.
She looked up and cranked it open to face the young police officer.
“Could I see your license and registration, please, ma’am?”
Tyne produced both with shaking hands and waited while he
examined them. Without looking up he said, “Do you know why I
stopped you?”
She sighed. “Yes, I was speeding.”
“Fifteen miles over the speed limit, ma’am. Not good.”
“I know that, Officer, but I’m on my way to the hospital. My aunt
has just been admitted and I don’t know what’s wrong, and I’m very
worried, and ….” Tyne stopped when she realized she sounded silly,
as if begging for mercy, when all she really wanted was for him to give
her the inevitable ticket and let her go.
“I’m sorry to hear that, Mrs. Cresswell,” he said as he handed the
documents back to her. “I’ll let you be on your way, but please be more
attentive to your driving. It isn’t going to do your aunt any good if you
end up in the bed next to her.”
Tyne saw a fleeting look of compassion on his face, and she smiled
in gratitude. “Thank you,” she murmured as he backed away from …

https://draft2digital.com/book/3562917

https://www.amazon.com/dp/1926763327

Straits and Turns

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excerpt

So, Mike went to the little shack, his kingdom for the next hour,
his isolation for the next hour, and after he fired up the burner and
shovelled some good shovelfuls of sand into the cylinder to let it dry,
a process that would take about ten minutes or so. While waiting for
the ten-minute process, Mike sat on his stool and tried to compose
his thoughts about what he could write for the next ten minutes, a
paragraph perhaps of his novel, which he had been trying to write
since his arrival in this huge country called Canada. Endless subject,
his book, which referred to his experiences in the new lands, what
he has lived up to now and other things that he imagined, images he
usually wrote on a piece of paper out of the roll they used to wipe their
hands, yet that didn’t stop him, since he usually re-writes everything
daily, using an old typewriter a friend of his gave him for free. An old
manual machine, yet good enough for the use he had for it, after all, a
free typewriter was always a good thing since it didn’t cost Mike any
money, which was very small and counted twice before being spent.
He started writing, in Hellenic, of course, still the only language
he could master in this country.
“Both of us were born close to different seas, mine was the blue Mediterranean
and yours the grey Pacific Ocean, yet we bleed the same red blood; we
feel the same inexplicable brotherhood, and we also feel the same grief in front
of sickness and disease. We haven’t walked the same paths, and we have never
worn the same shoes, yet we both follow the same ascent to the mountain top.
I, searching for the land with the asphodels where the blessed ones exist while
you search for your tear and its meaning before the orphan and the destitute,
Yes, we create the same footprints through the dark passages searching for the
song of the wind and for the shaking off the eagle’s wings before he commences
his soaring up in the sky, Yes, the same heartbeat guides us both when we hug
the old man and we love the same torch that lights the dark pathway before the
wind extinguishes it and we both feel the same nostalgia for beloved persons…

https://draft2digital.com/book/4250839#print

https://www.amazon.com/dp/1926763866
who float in the absence of sorrow…”

Jazz with Ella

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excerpt

While the unlikely duo of Hank and Lona had been parting company, Jennifer and Volodya had also stood in the shadow of the exit sign once again making their goodbyes.
“Lona offered to take me to New York with her,” Volodya told her, “but I refused…”
“Of course,” Jennifer replied stiffly. “It would mean yet another border crossing and you don’t want that, now do you?”
Volodya’s face creased in a huge grin. “That’s not the reason I refused, my amazing woman,” he said.
He was teasing her, she realized. He doesn’t know what thin ice he’s skating on.
“She said she will contact me when my painting is sold. Ech, but I don’t think she will—if the painting sells for more than she paid me, then why would she let me know? She’s a business woman, right?”
He took Jennifer’s hands in his, kissed them, hoisted his backpack onto his shoulders and walked backwards through the automatic doors still holding her gaze. Then he vanished into the humid Montreal evening.
In Vancouver, it was obvious that some of the baggage had been inspected yet again. Jennifer saw almost a full roll of sticky tape covering the top of Chopyk’s suitcase as if the bag had not closed properly after the Customs had poked through it. She couldn’t help but feel sorry for him. One student missing and three artworks smuggled. Whatever happened, it had been the trip of a lifetime—though just not a lifetime she would care to repeat.
“Whoever goes through first should look for our bus,” called Chopyk. “Probably the driver will hold up a sign.” It seemed like yesterday when she had been the first one through the gate at Sheremetev and the adventure had begun. This time, she lagged behind, reluctant to face the world. Carefully, she propped her things up on a baggage cart. When she finally passed through the sliding doors right behind Linda, she noticed someone waving, someone with black bristly eyebrows and an armful of flowers. The man was not waving at Linda. It had been so long since they had been together, and so much had happened to her in the last three weeks, that she almost did not recognize her estranged husband.
“Michael, what are you doing here?” Despite herself, a full, warm feeling dispelled the black cloud, if only for a moment.

https://draft2digital.com/book/3562892

https://www.amazon.com/dp/1926763246

The Unquiet Land

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NINE
Finn MacLir lay in a plain wooden box in the dark, still winter of death. He wore his navy-blue fisherman’s jersey and trousers and his best black boots. Harry and Ted Robinson, the undertakers from Lisnaglass, had laid out the body and, with Michael’s help, had carried the heavy coffin down the stairs. It stood for three days on trestles in the sitting room where the sofas and chairs had been pushed aside to make room for it. Mother Ross and Finn’s twin daughters had held vigil over the corpse, with Finn’s closest friends in attendance. It was a quiet, solemn wake for one renowned—and excoriated—for his regular parties.
Now the coffin lay on two ropes beside the open grave where the two Robinsons and two of their assistants stood silently, heads bowed respectfully, hands clasped in front of them. Around the grave men stood in sombre suits and black ties, hats in their hands, their tanned faces clean and almost shining, like those of boys going to Sunday school. Some spoke to neighbours in hushed, reverent tones. A cool breeze blew in from the sea, shivering the short grass of the old graveyard behind the ruins of Killyshannagh church where sheep grazed unconcerned at a distance from the men assembled around the grave. A polished granite headstone bore the graved inscription, Roisin MacLir, neé Corrigan, 1858-1892. Finn’s name would be added later.
Dressed in a black suit with a knotted black tie, Clifford Hamilton stepped forward. “I have the duty and the honour of saying a few words about the man lying in death before us.” He glanced around at the faces of the forty or fifty men standing in front of him. He felt that the unfortunate Padraig, Finn’s adopted son, should have been here, making this farewell speech to his earthly father. Or Seamus Slattery or Ignatius Sweeney who had known Finn for so many years. Or the more experienced, respected Dr Starkey. “I say ‘honour’,” he continued reluctantly, “without hesitation or qualification. Because Finn MacLir was one of the greatest men it has been my honour to have known. He was a close friend of my father and my father’s family, but he was a friend of rich and poor. Whether a man was a lawyer, a banker, a farmer, or a fisherman made no difference to Finn.

https://draft2digital.com/book/3562888

https://www.amazon.com/dp/1926763203

Fury of the Wind

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He stopped abruptly as a male voice from amongst a group of
men near the door hailed him. Looking decidedly relieved, he excused
himself to Sarah and hurried away.
She stood in the middle of the room, unaware of the people moving
around her. The day was not going at all as she expected. She
wished she hadn’t come. Perhaps Ben had been smart, after all, to
stay at home. Whatever he had done to alienate the people of Nimkus
had obviously cut deeply. But she could not understand why
they should take it out on her.
She became aware of people staring at her so she walked away,
and eventually made her way outside to the fair grounds. No one,
except a little oriental-looking man, spoke to her. Struggling to
manoeuvre a table through the door into the agricultural hall, he
flashed Sarah a huge smile. “How do, missy.”
Sarah vaguely remembered the sign on a shack at the end of the
main street, declaring the presence of Pong’s Laundry. She felt the
urge to run after the man whom she knew must be Pong, and offer
to help him with the table. After all, apart from Will, no one else
had shown any friendliness towards her this morning.
With nothing better to do she decided to go back to the livestock
area and watch Dave show his animals. Picking her way through
the people gathered on the fairgrounds, she noticed a group at the
grandstand near the ball diamond. She walked over to have a look.
Young men, some in their late teens and others a little older, had
already begun a game of baseball. They wore no uniforms, and the
few baseball caps amongst them did not display any team logo so
Sarah could not tell which districts they represented.
A man leaning on the end of a bleacher seat smiled and moved
aside to let her get a better look. Sarah, interpreting his move as
a friendly gesture, dared to speak to him. “Can you tell me what
teams are playing?”
“Colson and Ryerson districts,” he said, turning to look at her.
“You not from round here then?”
“Yes, I live in the Colson district, but I haven’t been there long.
I doubt if I’d know anyone on the team. Are they the ones at bat
now?”
“No, the ones in the field. They have a pretty fair team…

https://www.amazon.com/dp/0981073530

Small Change

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THIS IS DEEP MEMORY. Childhood. The South Beach summer house on Staten Island. Late light fades from the sky, the window, the upstairs bedroom where Rick lies under a cool sheet, watching the stars come out, listening to silence.
Slowly, as his mind opens, the heavy stillness after rain dissolves into small sounds. A breeze sweeps through the willow and sighs off over the glassy skritch of crickets, tree frogs like a troop of wet grace notes, the faint hiss of traffic on wet pavement from Hyland Boulevard, and beyond that, far away, but close, too, like the pulse of a double bass, the sea builds to a rush and subsides, again, and again, with a soft crash that makes him think of God and time without end.
Then, below the open window, it begins. Tentative chords from his father’s guitar. Three clear notes. A fourth. A fifth. A melody takes shape, picked up by his uncle Vincenzo’s mandolin. It’s lazy at first, until his mother’s clear soprano joins the strings. A male voice comes under it, then another, and a song rises to full strength, steered off and back by the wind. He smiles to himself. It’s what he was waiting for. He rides that comfort into dreams.
Rick sits at the oval table in the kitchen with his colouring book. He is trying to keep the slippery crayon tips inside the lines. At the other end, his father and his uncle Vincenzo are playing a game called briscola. They study their cards then slap them down hard enough to make them bounce off the coarse grain of the wood. Sometimes they shout at each other, but he knows it’s for fun and their raised voices pass over him without breaking his concentration.
As he works, he can hear his grandfather, Arsenio, talking back to the radio in the front room where his wife, Theresa, argues good-naturedly

https://www.amazon.com/dp/1926763157

In Turbulent Times

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‘So there you have it, Michael. A rather sad or maybe a tragic story. I’ve had lovers myself, but nothing serious. And I’ve always insisted on Durex. I was caught once before and I was determined not to get caught again. I thought I was safe with you. I wanted sex with a man without a condom for a change. You don’t mind me saying that, do you?’ She smiled. ‘You let me down, but I forgive you. It wasn’t your fault. I’m actually enjoying being pregnant again.’ She squeezed his hand and reclined again in the armchair.
‘You’ve had a baby then?’
‘When I was sixteen. Much too young to be a mother. So I gave it up for adoption.’
‘So no children with Robert.’
‘No, and none likely. The father of my first baby was an eighteen-year-old boy. He’s a fisherman in Lisnaglass now. Married and has four sons.’ Connie looked at Michael again. ‘Poor Michael. I think you would have liked to have had four sons yourself.’
‘I’d have been happy with one,’ Michael said, then paused in silent reflection of the fickle trickery of nature. He took his first drink, then, returning Connie’s look, he asked, ‘What will Robert say or do when he finds out you’re pregnant?’
‘Probably nothing. I am nothing to Robert now. The sad thing is that I love him. I truly love him.’ Her voice faltered, and she let her head fall back on the chair again, her eyes closed. ‘But I think it’s only a matter of time before there’s talk of divorce.’
‘Did Frank and Kathleen have any children?’
‘A son. Five years old now. Little Bobbie. Robert is very fond of him. Spoils him really.’
‘Will you tell Robert that I am the father of your baby?’ The question secretly thrilled Michael. He was going to be a father. He was not a sterile mule after all. He was a whole man. Able to father children. And Nora. The chances were that Nora really was his daughter. Not Padraig’s. Praise be to God, he thought. What a happy, happy day. He drank with a greater feeling of elation than he had ever experienced. He felt like getting drunk, but his glass was empty and he wasn’t bold enough to ask for a refill.
‘No, I won’t tell Robert that you are the father of my baby,’ Connie was saying. ‘No need to. He thinks you’re sterile, remember. There’s a man I see in Belfast. Robert will think the baby is his, and I won’t tell him otherwise. Least said, soonest mended, Michael. Don’t worry. He won’t be challenging…

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https://www.amazon.com/dp/1926763270

Wellspring of Love

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…moment to gaze at the peaceful faces. Susie’s light brown hair lay
entangled, partly over the pillow and partly over her freckled nose.
Just like when she’s awake, a little wild even in sleep.
Katie lay face up, her lips parted slightly as though a pleasant
dream had made her smile. Darker hair than her sister’s framed the
doll-like features in smooth waves that would probably be just as
unruffled when she awakened in the morning. Tyne shook her head
in wonder at this serene child of hers and, as she turned to leave, marvelled
anew at the difference in these children who had been formed
together in her body.
At Bobby’s door she hesitated a moment, not wanting to intrude
without knocking in case he was still awake. But when she heard his
gentle snore, she looked in. He lay, as he always did, with arms over
his head. From the light coming in from the hallway, she satisfied
herself that he was covered and sound asleep, no doubt to remain that
way until his alarm clock told him another school day had arrived.
Down the hall, Tyne heard a radio playing softly – if the songs
the Beatles belted out could be described that way. Now, now, Tyne,
don’t be old fashioned. Old fashioned or not, she thought, as she quietly
pushed open the door to Rachael’s room, I still prefer Sinatra and
Como and Pat Boone, and oh yes, Elvis is pretty good, too.
Tyne quietly crossed to the bed and looked down on her sleeping
daughter. Rachael lay face up, her arms akimbo, her smooth cheeks
smeared with traces of tears. Tyne sighed, her throat filling as she
recalled another night almost ten years ago when Rachael lay just like
this with tears drying on her face. The day that she and Morley had
to tell Rachael and Bobby their mother would not be coming home
from hospital had seared itself into Tyne’s memory forever.
But what could be distressing the girl so much at this time in
her life that she had cried herself to sleep? What had happened on
Saturday night that had made Rachael so troubled and morose as she
had been since then?

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https://www.amazon.com/dp/1926763327

Jazz with Ella

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Volodya hung back to the end of the line. Jennifer knew now that he would not flee; he would brazen it out. Besides, he had the passport. Soon David was there beside her, as always, to support her.
“Pull yourself together,” he urged her, glancing at her worried frown. “You haven’t been implicated in anything.”
“They’ll ship him back to the Soviet Union.”
“No, I think it’s Lona that’s going down today.”
She was just beginning to calm down when one of the Americans approached her with a shout. “Hey, Jen. Why are they beating up on your guy?”
She could feel the blood rush away dizzyingly. “What do you mean?” Her voice had faded to a whisper.
“They’ve got him by that desk as if he’s gonna be there for life.” The man laughed crudely. “He doesn’t look like a terrorist with that little pointy beard.” With a huge sense of relief, Jennifer realized he was talking about Chopyk as “her guy.” Not Volodya. David let out a long breath. He was thinking the same thing.
The time crawled by. The line snaked through the shabby building with most of the passengers being released to mill about on the apron in front of Jennifer.
As Jennifer remained at her post, Volodya finally appeared from the building walking carefully, nervously, but his eyes held that same light of triumph as they had just a few brief hours ago. He joined her, wordless. David shook his hand.
The very last people to exit the building were Chopyk and Lona who had linked arms. Her face was crumpled like that of a pouty child. Chopyk stared straight ahead and explained nothing as he passed the group. They were ushered to their plane. Volodya resumed his seat beside Jennifer. The plane took off.
Once again, someone had spoiled the party and the tension filled the stuffy cabin. A swarthy young man—Kazak or Uzbek, maybe—walked down the aisle, stared at Lona with interest and finally addressed her in thickly accented English. Jennifer could not hear the exact words but soon the man had insinuated himself into the vacant seat beside the blonde who still looked dazed. He’s either security keeping an eye on her, or she’s found yet another admirer. At least, this time, the trouble was not about her, Jennifer thought with relief.

https://draft2digital.com/book/3562892

https://www.amazon.com/dp/1926763246