I have a list of possible topics to blog about, culled from several sources as well as my own original ideas. Honesty, I don’t go to the list all that often, but for today’s piece I decided to.
I don’t know if this is considered cheating or not in the “blogosphere”, but one of the prompts was “Share an excerpt of your writing”. I almost dismissed it out of hand, but then I figured it might be a good way to introduce my writing to people who only know of me through this blog. So here, without further ado, is the prologue to my novella, “Cornflower Road”, from my book, DARK GLASSES and Other Tales. Enjoy & feel free to comment.
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JUNE, 1965
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It was an unusually hot June day on the island, the fourth in a row in which the temperature soared to over ninety-five degrees. Storm clouds gathered in the western sky, and the freshening breeze indicated the heat wave was nearing its end. Police Chief Billy Aubin was out patrolling on the eastern side of the island. He had just left the marina and passed by Archie’s bait shop. As he did, he raised a hand to two men in the parking lot, then continued to the intersection of Marina Avenue and Cornflower Road. He made a right onto Cornflower and drove toward the island’s cemetery. As he passed by it, he saw two boys standing next to a parked car in front of a long driveway: The Rock Estate. As he got closer, he could see that one of the boys was Landon Rock, Jr., who lived in the huge house up on the bluff. He recognized the other, a summer resident, but he didn’t know his name. Aubin was like most of the year-round islanders; he didn’t much care for the ‘summer folk’, as they were known. He pulled his unmarked cruiser to where Rock’s car was sticking out into the road from the end of the driveway. He hauled his bulk slowly got out of the car, then pulled a handkerchief from his pants pocket and wiped the sweat off his brow. Hitching up his gun belt, he approached the two boys, who were circling each other in front of the car. The Rock boy had what appeared to be a crowbar dangling from his right hand while the other was empty-handed.
“What’s going on here, Landon?” the Chief asked.
“Nothing, Chief. Just gonna teach this boy a lesson.”
“Is that so? Well, it seems to me that you have a distinct advantage.”
The second boy glanced away from Landon long enough to read Aubin’s expression. In that instant, he knew the chief had no intention of intervening in a fight between a local and an outsider. And just at the exact moment he realized that, Rock swung the crowbar. It caught him on the left side of the head, but it wasn’t well-aimed; it was a glancing blow. It was enough, though, to send him crashing to the ground. As he lay there, momentarily stunned, he saw two shiny black shoes and the bottom of a policeman’s pants legs inches in front of his face. Aubin squatted and looked at him closely, his sweaty moon face momentarily taking up the boy’s entire field of vision. He could see the broken blood vessels in Aubin’s nose and smell alcohol on his breath.
“I don’t think you finished the job, Landon,” he said.
©2012 Rick Marchetti - All Rights Reserved
