Friday, November 13, 2009

Fiction Fridays

On Fridays I present excerpts, in order, from a collection of stories I've written entitled Central, Remote. As it is serial I hope you can come back every week and pick up where we all left off.

BB arrived before them. A flat hot breeze trickled in from the west bringing with it the smell of cow manure and blood. It was a smell most found repugnant, but BB had lived her whole life a mile from Dickie’s and to her it recalled many summer afternoons past. She enjoyed a child’s momentary flirtation with nostalgia, even though she knew where the train of thought would bring her. She’d spent the better part of two summers coming to this spot, a forgot wooden lean-to that at one time held tools and extra feed for the old farmhouse that was torn down to accommodate the new set of rails Dickie’s required to ship in and out the goods of the day.

She’d taken to smoking cigarettes with Willy and George Jr. last summer. George had discovered his father’s cartons of Pall Mall filters in the bottom of George Sr.’s sock drawer. Each morning his father would grab a soft pack along with his daily choice of thick white athletics. George bragged to BB how he learned to time his thefts on the days when there were less than eight packs left but more than four. Never been caught once, never will, he’d said.

A month went by and BB became quite accustomed to their afternoon smoke. Willy would bring a juice box or a beer if he could score it from his older brother and BB would bring some sort of snack, a trio of Gala apples, a packet of trail mix, or a box of candies stolen from her Grandmother’s crystal bowl put out whenever entertaining company. The three would lounge on old wooden crates ducking the sun slicing through the slits in the wood, sip on their beverage, and share drags of the cigarette in between mouthfuls of chocolate or tart oranges.

One day, to the surprise of all, George Sr. showed up to their afternoon soiree. Upon seeing the truck pull up in the gravel, George Jr. cursed and grabbed the cigarette out of Willy’s mouth. The cherry popped off and landed in his lap burning a small hole through Willy’s Dungarees. Willy swore and George swore and BB sat stock-still and wide eyed and they all heard the work boots approach their fort and George Sr. call out, Junoir!

Obviously caught but unsure of the gravity of the situation, Junior hesitated in responding to his father’s call. Junior, gimme a smoke!

BB’s heart sank as she immediately projected the inevitable string of events that would lead to sitting in her bedroom waiting for Daddy to come upstairs and whoop her with the belt upon discovering his daughter was a smoker.

I don’t have any of yer smokes, sir!

Junior, if I have to open up the door I will take your entire pack, or you can just man up. open it yerself, and perhaps I’ll only take a couple.

Junior paused and looked at his compatriots. Willy shook his head. BB was sure it was a trick to get them to admit they were smoking. She wasn’t accustomed to lying but knew how to convince herself of a half-truth well enough to escape the consequences of previous misdemeanors. But Junior was something of a stubborn little shit (another of her father’s favorite phrases) and he stood up, squeezed the soft pack open and removed three of the six cigarettes left in the pack, opened the door and presented to them to George Sr.

George took the cigarettes from the boy, put one behind each ear and methodically placed the last one in his month, reached into his shirt pocket and removed the nickel plated liter with the emblem of a 18 wheeler on it and lit it. Well? He said.

Well what, sir?

You’re welcome.

Thank you, sir.

Don’t let me catch you corrupting little miss Boughlugsby again with this filth.

Yessir.

And you figure a way to buy your own damn smokes from now on, you hear?

Yessir.

And that was the end of BB’s adolescent smoking career. George Jr. later told them as it happened that day his father’s delivery route had taken him by Dickies and, having been delayed through lunch earlier, he had been unable to return home to procure a second pack of cigarettes. Apparently their secret clubhouse was well known to George Sr., who, to BB, seemed to know just as much about the town and it’s people as the sherriff and the preacher.

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