Adult Fiction Winners 2006

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A Thief in the Night

By Billy Middleton

All the astronomers in all the world just didn’t know what to make of it.  One night it wasn’t there; the next it was.  The first people to witness the newborn celestial body, suspended in the sky like a blossoming fruit ripe and heavy on the bough, were the inhabitants of the island nations of Tonga and Fiji.  These insular natives were understandably apprehensive following the crimson star’s sudden and seemingly random birth.  Soon, the star was also spotted in the pristine night skies over New Zealand and Australia.  To the indigenous aboriginal population, it represented a good omen; it was a protective ancestor spirit sent to keep the tusks of the bunyip at bay.  Most others, however, viewed the orbiting intruder in a less positive light.  As the reaching hand of nightfall slowly encircled the globe, people throughout the world reported a feeling of immense dread accompanying their initial viewing of the strange star.  During the brief tenure of this odd visitor’s presence in the twilight tapestry, its effects were felt even in the most far-flung of regions.  For example, at a small ice station in Antarctica, where the daytime sun perpetually shines and the only evidence of the star’s presence was an orange haze upon the crisp blue sky, the resident climatologists felt compelled to radio home to make sure everything was all right after seeing the titian blush staining the horizon.  According to them, they had a sense of something terrible hiding within that peculiar luminosity.

Pictures of that bloody bullet hole in the ebony flesh of the night sky began to circulate via the nebulous collection of 1’s and 0’s that make up the world’s telecommunications systems.  Cell phone pictures bounced off orbiting satellites that basked seemingly unaffected in the amber radiation of the new star.  Blurry digital photographs emailed to friends and loved ones on distant corners of the globe clogged the arteries of the world’s computer networks surer than any worm or virus ever had.  Sky News, Al Jazeera, and CNN all reported record numbers of viewers, people desperately seeking expert wisdom regarding the star’s unannounced arrival.  Instead, these viewers were treated to speculation passed off as fact.  The truth was that the most learned scientists, physicists, philosophers, and astronomers knew no more about this strange new star than the rest of the world.

But their ignorance was not for lack of trying.  Scientists wasted no time at all in using their most sophisticated equipment to measure and probe and examine the mysterious object.  With powerful and precise telescopes, they were able to pinpoint the star’s distance from the earth at about .29 Astronomical Units, or 43.5 million kilometers, almost precisely the same distance away as Venus.  Even so far away, the star still appeared nearly as large in the night sky as the full moon, meaning that it must have been absolutely enormous, and yet it produced almost no heat or radiation.  A body of that size should certainly have bathed the earth in flames, evaporating the oceans in the blink of an eye and reducing the ground and all that stood upon it to molten cinders.  The scientists were quite happy that they had somehow avoided death by incineration, but they were at a loss as to how such an immense body could produce such a negligible amount of heat and radiation.  They refused to accept the one glaring error present in all scientific explanations, calculations, and postulations:  there was no formula that could explain the unexplainable.

Devoutly atheistic, these astronomers dared to tempt the power of prophecy by dubbing this newborn celestial body Wormwood, after the accursed star written of by John the Evangelist in his biblical book of the Apocalypse.  Religious figures worldwide waited half in eager anticipation and half in quiet dread for a third of the waters of the earth to become bitter and poisonous. 

But it had not taken the prophetic naming of the star, however, to spur the horses of zealotry into action.  Mere moments after the existence of this cosmic oddity became common knowledge, spiritual luminaries worldwide began declaring the star’s appearance to be a clear and undeniable sign of the End Times.  In America, renowned religious leaders took to the airwaves.  “Behold, the third trumpet call!” they cried.  They summoned the devout to the churches and the synagogues and the mosques, where the hushed murmur of feverish prayer and the fearful cries of sinners seeking precious redemption echoed throughout the rafters.  Many lost souls were saved during these strange days.  The devout would argue that in this way, the sudden appearance of Wormwood in the night sky ultimately served God’s indomitable will.  Their memories, however, are selective.  They remember the lost souls that were found, but they disregard the found souls that were lost, and these are likely far more plentiful.

Case in point:  in the barren plains of Texas, in an isolated compound surrounded by dust and tumbleweeds, the persuasive patriarch of a sequestered cult led his followers in a final Bacchanalian orgy.  As reports of this ultimate celebration reached the mass media, the revelry grew.  Hundreds became thousands as countless eager participants arrived to join this burgeoning family.  For a week, that single manse standing like a wood and brick monolith in the flat plains of Texas was filled with a writhing mass of flesh of all races, colors, and creeds.  It was not long before the authorities arrived on the scene, certain that during these hedonistic festivities numerous state and federal regulations were being violated.  ATF agents surrounded the complex and began shouting over their bullhorns for the celebrants to put on their clothes and exit the premises in a calm and orderly manner.  Receiving no response, they prepared for a prolonged siege like the one that had gone so well in Waco a decade and a half earlier.  The desertion rate among the lawmen during this desert standoff proved to be quite high.  Dozens of the besiegers crept off during the dark hours, discarding uniforms and utility belts to join the revelers inside.  After all, if this was indeed the end of the world, then anonymous sin beat sitting outside during the sweltering days and balmy nights, eating pork and beans straight from the can, and playing penny poker with sweaty men who hadn’t bathed in days.  But on the eighth evening of the siege, something changed.  The house grew quiet.  The men outside became restless, and soon the order came down from above to storm the compound.  As the eager agents kicked in the doors, they found that the partygoers had partaken in one final blasphemous act of defiance against the crimson star newly suspended in the heavens, indulging themselves in a last supper of cyanide capsules and Hawaiian Punch spiked with industrial alcohol.

Such incidents of mass suicide were, in fact, no isolated occurrence during the days of Wormwood.  Although most lacked the scandal and therefore the newsworthiness of that standoff in Texas, there were countless tales of groups ranging in size from handfuls to hundreds killing themselves via immolation, poisoning, stabbing, suffocation, leaping from great heights, and a dozen other methods.  Some figured that if the world was going to end anyway, then they might as well go ahead and get it over with.  Others saw in the star a bearer of prophecy and portent that spurred them to take their lives.  Still others were filled with such dread at the sight of that ominous ball of gas that they just could no longer stomach the nervous anticipation of waiting to see what its purpose might be.  Take, for example, the inhabitants of Falealupo, a village on the northwestern peninsula of the Samoan island of Savai’i.  They were convinced that the star heralded the return of many powerful and evil aitu, spirits of the dead.  Like lemmings, hundreds of superstitious villagers hurled themselves into the sea from the Fafa, an outcropping of rock said to be the gateway to the underworld.  This was their desperate attempt to escape the grasp of their dead ancestors.  

The atheistic community was understandably disturbed by the arrival of Wormwood.  They were very protective of their dogma, and feared that the scarlet sphere hovering overhead might discredit their entire philosophy.  They became violently vocal, spewing red-faced antireligious bigotry on the television and radio waves day and night.  Atheist websites and organizations began selling t-shirts decorated with pictures of Wormwood accompanied by dismissive slogans such as “It Means Nothing” or “Just Another Star.”  But other than the most fanatical of nihilists, few bothered to purchase such merchandise.  As far as most people were concerned, the clearest proof of just how wrong the atheists had always been was hanging suspended like a Christmas tree ornament in the night sky.  

Perhaps the strangest faction to arise during these days were those who insisted on completely disbelieving the star’s existence altogether.  This group did not organize the way the hardcore atheists or zealots had.  In fact, since they refused to even acknowledge the existence of Wormwood, they didn’t feel like they had any reason to organize at all.  Members of this philosophy were easy to spot.  At night they stared straight ahead with rigid necks, refusing to look up for any reason.  They turned their backs on any news broadcast related to the existence of the star.  They quickly covered their ears and began whistling a loud tune when people nearby began discussing the earth’s peculiar visitor.  They figured that if they just ignored the source of their fears for long enough, it would eventually cease to exist altogether.

Some people had even less healthy methods of coping.  In the world’s largest metropolitan sprawls, riots broke out nightly.  People busily hoarded bottled water, canisters of gasoline, and nonperishable food supplies within their apartments or newly purchased bomb shelters.  Everyone wanted to be sure that they were the ant rather than the grasshopper.  The problem was that demand far exceeded supply.  There was only so much to go around, and people were willing to fight for more than their fair share.  Cars were burned.  Buildings were burned.  People were burned.  Police armed with Plexiglas shields and nightsticks were dispatched to disperse the rioters.  They were met with Molotov cocktails, makeshift clubs, and military weaponry collected by fringe lunatics in preparation for the day that society finally collapsed.  The streets ran red nightly with blood, and in the morning, the crowds dispersed on their own and went home, only to reconvene the next evening.  It was as if the presence of the star evoked a bloodlust, a sort of destructive lycanthropy in the rioters that quickly disappeared along with the scarlet globe at daybreak.

Weeks went by like this, and then the strangest thing of all happened: 

The star disappeared.

The fresh waters of the earth never turned to poison.  The apocalypse never came.  The religious devotees all took pause from their fervent prayers to step outside and look up expectantly at the sky.  But nothing else happened.  The atheists stamped their feet and cheered in triumph, for just as quickly as their beliefs had been discredited, they had come back into favor.  All this Judgment Day nonsense had finally been put to rest once and for all.  They could now get back to the important business of protesting the placing of roadside crosses at the sites of fatal accidents.  The scientists shrieked in frustration at the disappearance of their new obsession.  So many answers forever lost!  Those who had struggled so hard to altogether avoid acknowledging the star’s existence finally strained their stiff necks to look up at the night sky, wondering what it could possibly be that everyone seemed to be expecting to see up there.

Some waited eagerly for the star to reappear.  Others waited with great trepidation.  Everyone was completely convinced that eventually Wormwood would return.  Perhaps it was one of those rare cosmic events that occurred at random intervals like the Transit of Venus or a total penumbral eclipse.  Or perhaps it was a cyclical thing, appearing once every seventy-six years like Halley’s Comet.  Seventy-six years later, a future generation of scientists would still be waiting.  In fact, no human eyes would ever fall upon Wormwood again.  No one would ever know where it came from or where it went.  It would be wonderful to say that the star’s arrival sparked a great Renaissance in mankind.  It would be wonderful to say that the star’s seemingly random disappearance revealed to humanity how suddenly something can be lost, that time was too short to waste it hating, arguing, and disagreeing.  It would be wonderful to say these things, but it would also be a lie, for not even a month after the star came and went, people had pushed it to the back of their minds, replacing it with the next celebrity scandal and the next political hot topic.  And so it was that whatever message Wormwood may have been trying to send to mankind was forever lost in the depths of time and space.

Lily at the Sunflower

By Diane Sherrouse

My name is Lily because my mom loves flowers. Dad calls me Cookie, which is a pretty good nickname since my parents are chefs.

Our neighborhood in New York City is called Soho. Mom named our restaurant The Sunflower, and we live in an apartment on top. Our kitchen has a sunflower poster which says, Bloom Where You're Planted Mom tells me this every day just before Dad walks me to school.

In Soho, there are no yards, just buildings. Mom and I grow rows and rows of sunflowers straight up from our roof all summer. We pick them and put one in a tall vase for each table in our restaurant dining room. I like to walk through them and pretend I'm in a forest It's easy to hide up there because the stems are taller than my head and the flowers are bigger than my face!

Every night, about one hundred guests come for dinner. Our fridge stretches all the way across the kitchen wall. It takes a lot of space to keep 25 heads of lettuce cold. It's pretty funny to open the doors and get mooned by a big stack of chickens waiting to be roasted. We keep other things in there like fruits and veggies Dad carves into animal shapes. My favorites are his jalapeno hummingbirds and yellow squash goldfish. I help him smash raspberries to make puree, which we keep in a jar we call "monster blood." Mom makes me count the rows of decorated lemon tarts she makes with ruffled pastry edges like - you guessed it - SUNFLOWERS.

Every day of my whole life was happy until I went to school. That's when everything started. This year seemed pretty much like a disaster, too. One day, our teacher, Miss Prinkle, asked us to tell about our favorite food. "Lily, it's your turn," she said. "Well, I like lobster pate. It looks pink and tastes good on crackers. It's made from lobster meat and it's real soft like peanut butter but it doesn't taste like peanut butter," I said. The class was quiet. I felt a thousand eyes staring at me. Then I heard Megan's loud voice. "Why don't you eat real food?" She started laughing. Everyone in the room started laughing louder and louder - except Rose who is my best friend and the only other girl with a flower name. I sat down and wished I could become one of the pigeons on the window ledge. They always ate the same food together.

"Quiet! Boys and girls! We are learning about different foods. Do not speak until you raise your hand for permission," Miss Prinkle said. Then it was someone else's turn, but I didn't hear anything after that. I wanted to go home.

When it was time for my birthday, my parents made me invite the whole class to my birthday party and said I could choose any kind of cake. I decided to have the Flaming Sunflower, our restaurant specialty. Mom baked chocolate cake and covered it with lemon ice cream. Dad iced the whole thing in a meringue mountain and popped it into the oven. When it was ready, he carried it into the dining room with flames all over the top. WOW! When I finished blowing out the fire, Rose and I were the only ones who wanted any. She said, "I think they want a real birthday cake with candles, but I'll have a piece." We had a lot of cake left over.

Another big problem every day is that Miss Prinkle thinks I never tell the truth. In our science lesson she said, "Has anyone heard of a rain forest?" I raised my hand "Yes, Lily," she said. "We have a sun forest at my house," I said. The class laughed loudly. But Miss Prinkle didn't laugh. She frowned. Her eyebrows scrunched up and looked like the slimy slugs that make trails through the sunflowers on the roof.

I was glad it was time for lunch. Rose and I carried our lunch coolers outside. "What did you bring?" she asked.

"Bread shaped like a bowl. I fill it up with soup from my thermos. Want to trade?"

"What else?" she asked.

"Mom made me rose petal salad."

"What else.”

•'Dad made a banana clown with raisin eyes and a cherry mouth."

"What's that white stuff?” Rose asked.

"Sweet cream cheese so the eyes and mouth will stick. The marshmallow on top is a chef s hat," I said.

"I'll trade you two sugar cookies for the clown," Rose said.

Miss Prinkle walked past just as Rose and I were trading. She said, "Now, girls, I really don't think you should trade. Your parents go to a lot of trouble to prepare your lunches.

"It's no trouble for my parents," I said. "They cook all day. We have one hundred guests for dinner every night"

"One hundred guests, hmmm? Really, Lily, you never seem to run out of stories." Miss Prinkle rolled her eyes like she was watching pigeons fly from one side of the playground to the other.

When the last bell rang that afternoon, Miss Prinkle asked me to come to her desk. "Lily, I enjoy your stories," she said, "but what would your parents think if they knew you were telling us about sunflowers on the roof and one hundred dinner guests every night?"

"Well, I guess they wouldn't like it. I'm not supposed to brag," I said.

"Oh, Lily, why are you saying these things? No one has one hundred guests every night," Miss Prinkle said.

"We do. My parents own a restaurant called The Sunflower and that's where I live. My parents are chefs," I said. Miss Prinkle was smiling. I didn't know if she believed me, and I didn't know what else to say. I ran out of the room as fast as I could. Miss Prinkle called "Lily, Lily," but 1 just kept running. Having chefs for parents wasn't fun anymore. It wasn't different-special or different-cool. Just different-weird.

The next day Miss Prinkle announced the school open house for parents. She told about a contest for the best classroom decoration and a party for the winning classroom. Then she passed out papers for everyone to take home.

"What's cookin'. Cookie?" Dad asked when I came into the kitchen after school.

"Don't call me Cookie anymore. It's a stupid name," I said. I put the note about the open house on the counter. My eyes were getting watery and I couldn't stop. "I want to be like all the other kids. I hate my lunches. I hate living in a house with sunflowers all over the place. Why can't you work in an office like other parents?" My whole face was wet and my head hurt I ran upstairs to my room and slammed the door.

After a while, my parents came up to my room and brought special cookies called Cloud Kisses, a glass of milk, and a vase with a pink rose. "We read the note from Miss Prinkle that you left on the counter," Mom said. "We have an idea for the room decorating contest," Dad said.

I was tired of crying and felt hungry and thirsty. "We get a prize if we win the contest," I said. "The winning class gets to have a party."

After I ate the cookies and drank some milk, Mom took my hand and we all walked down to the kitchen. "Sometimes you get tired of parents who cook all the time. We get tired, too. But people depend on us. Our restaurant is where we work. We try to have fun and do our best," Mom said. "That's what this means." She pointed to the sunflower poster that said Bloom Where You 're Planted

Dad opened the fridge. There was a huge aquarium on the shelf. "The note said that your class is going to study the ocean next week. We can fill this aquarium with blue and green gelatin. I can carve fish, whales, seahorses, and other sea animals from fruits and vegetables. We can place them in the gelatin and they'll look like they're swimming in the ocean," he said. "Don't forget sea anemones," Mom said. "I know they're animals, but they look like flowers."

"All right!" I said. "I bet we'll win!" I hugged my parents and they hugged me back. "I'll phone Miss Prinkle to tell her our idea," Mom said.

We worked every day after school for the next week, I brought home a library book that showed where each animal lives in the ocean. Mom and I poured layers of gelatin, one at a time, and put the aquarium back into the fridge until each layer was set We couldn't let Dad's carved creatures sink to the bottom. They had to look like they were swimming. We'd pour, wait, add animals, pour, wait, add animals, until we poured the last layer at the top of the aquarium.

There were starfish made from carambola. There were schools of squash goldfish. In one corner was an octopus with banana peel tentacles, reaching out from a melon shell rock. Eggplant whales blew onion spouts from their blow holes. Radish and mushroom anemones waved from potato coral reefs. When I'm an adult, I've decided to be a deep sea diver during the day. At night, I'll be a chef.

We took the aquarium to school early on open house day. "Please place it beneath our class mural, Under the Sea," Miss Prinkle said. "The art teacher, music teacher, and vice-principal will visit each room as judges, and the winner will be announced tonight"

But my parents couldn't go to the open house because they had to work. The restaurant was full of hungry people again. The phone kept ringing. Mom took more bread from the oven while Dad grilled tuna. I ran to get the phone.

It was Miss Prinkle. When I yelled that our class had won the contest, everyone in the kitchen cheered.

At school the next day, Miss Prinkle announced that the celebration party would be on Friday and that there would be a very special surprise. We were counting the days.

At last, it was Friday, and time for the prize. "Clear your desks, boys and girls," Miss Prinkle said. The classroom door opened and I saw my parents! They were dressed in their chef uniforms, rolling a table with a cake as tall as I am. Boys and girls made out of icing held sunflowers and danced around and around the layers. The whole class held their hands up high over their heads and clapped and clapped. Miss Prinkle clapped, too. On the very top of the cake was a big icing sunflower with a smiling face. The ribbon under it said: Bloom Where You 're Planted

 

Glossary

Carambola - A fruit that looks like stars when sliced

Chef- A person who creates the dishes served in a restaurant

Cookie - You know what this is. What's your favorite?

Ingredients - All the things used in a recipe.

Jalapefio - A kind of spicy hot pepper.

Lobster - A sea animal with claw-like pinchers and a hard shell that turns red when boiled. The white meat inside is delicious.

Meringue - A fluffy, puffy mound of egg whites which have been whipped until the air expands them. They are baked in an oven and look like clouds.

Pastry - A light, flaky crust which holds a meat, fruit, vegetable, or cream filling. Pate - Meat and other ingredients ground into a paste.

Purejg - Smashed food. The baby food you ate from jars was puree.

Recipe - A kind of list and instructions for making each dish.

Tuna- A fish used in salad, sandwiches, or eaten as a "steak."

 

(Lily's Favorite Recipes (Ask an adult to help you)

Peanut Butter Surprise Sandwich

What You Need:

2 slices of bread

2 T. peanut butter (chunky or creamy)

1/4 apple, thinly sliced raisins (as many as you like)

What To Do:

Spread peanut butter on each bread slice. Top one slice of bread with raisins and apple slices. Place the second slice of bread over everything. The peanut butter glues it all together.

Lily's Tip:

This is great with a glass of milk.

Rose Petal Salad What You Need-Any kind of rose petals which have not been sprayed with a chemical lettuce (your favorite kinds) raspberry vinegar olive oil (extra virgin) salt and pepper

What To Do:

Rinse the rose petals and lettuce leaves in water and dry in a cloth or salad spinner. Tear the lettuce into a bowl and sprinkle with rose petals. Keep cool.

Just before serving, mix one part raspberry vinegar to two parts olive oil. Pour over salad with a pinch of salt and pepper.

Lily's Tip:

Tender, dark green leaf lettuce works best Pink rose petals are the prettiest. The petals you use should be from roses grown at home or purchased from a health food store to be sure they are safe to eat

Cloud Kisses

What You Need:

3 egg whites (room temperature)

1/4 tsp. cream of tartar

3/4 C.sugar

1/2 tsp. vanilla extract

 

What to Do:

Beat egg whites until frothy. (Allowing the egg whites to come to room temperature before beating them will make them puff up higher.) Add cream of tartar and beat until stiff, but not dry. Add sugar, a little at a time, beating each time you add some. Continue beating until the whole thing is stiff and glossy (kind of shiny). Fold in vanilla. (To fold means to mix very gently so beaten egg whites will stay fluffy.)

Cover a baking sheet with parchment (special baking paper which keeps cookies from sticking). Drop meringue into mounds with a teaspoon. (Each little mound looks like a puffy white cloud,) Bake at 275 degrees F. for one hour or until lightly browned. Turn off oven and leave cloud kisses in until they cool. Peel off paper and place on a rack. Eat a few while you are doing this. You have to be sure they are good enough to share. Lily's Tip:

You can get parchment paper at stores which specialize in cooking supplies. This paper gives excellent results with all cookie baking and helps prevent burned cookie bottoms. Cloud Kisses are yummy with milk or hot chocolate. I love them so much that I kiss each sweet little cloud just before it melts in my mourn! Take some to people who need cheering up.

The Halsted Street Incident

By Thomas Lynn

No longer a young man, Stuart Allen Jesup’s most recent birthday placed him on the downside of forty, and already he felt the cold loneliness of men twice his age. A loneliness developed during a lifetime of struggling against an overpowering host of enemies, some real, some imagined. He was an angry man, disappointed by failure in everything he tried to do and angry at the leather-lunged job bosses and blue-suited demons from Corporate — wherever that was — who held him in servitude. Angry because he had no one to turn to for help.

It was a few days before Christmas. January would soon arrive bringing another year of the same old stuff. More loneliness, more disappointments, more tax deductions.          Blustery winds blew in from Lake Michigan bringing icy pellets to sting his face as well as those of other poor souls trying to navigate the slippery streets. Chicago winters were unlike winters anywhere else  Nowhere else were there lifelines attached to light poles attesting to the dubious wisdom of city fathers who prepared in advance to save unwary strangers from their own folly in disregarding the seasonal danger.

Jesup, a veteran of Chicago, hunched his shoulders and tried to ignore the gusts threatening to lift him off his feet. From experience he kept one hand free to snag one of the lifelines if needed. He thrust his other hand deeper into his tattered Old Navy jacket and paused in front of a small store adorned with glittering silver tinsel and holiday decorations. He shrugged off the childhood memories that tugged at him, turned away from the holiday decorations at 63^rd and Halsted, and stepped into the maelstrom of frenzied shoppers shouldering and jostling each other homeward.

He enjoyed a secret smile at their expense. AWouldn=t they be surprised,@ he chuckled wryly to himself, Aif they only knew what I was gonna do?@ The idea filled him with elation.

Not normally a man filled with such personal emotion, he was on this occasion exhilarated.

Jesup’s fingers tenderly curled around the hard familiar contour of the Colt .45 resting now in the dark confines of his jacket pocket. Thoughts filled his mind of other times when he too eagerly anticipated the joys of the holiday season. Youthful times they were, toys and sugar treats, cookies and gaily-wrapped gifts under the tree. Then he grew up — strange how things work out. His feet shuffled through the deep drifts of snow, carefully planting themselves one foot after another on the treacherous sidewalk while trying to examine the eyes of the people brushing past. Strangers they were and none seemed to note his presence. They were all intent on their own thoughts and not one of them met his gaze.

That was all right. He didn’t mind being ignored. He was used to it and even came to expect it at this stage in his life. But things were about to change because he didn't need them. He sure as hell didn’t need any of them.

He hated the cheerfulness of these holiday shoppers, their voices merging with sounds of the El roaring overhead and the tinkling bells wielded by faux Santa Clauses in red and white. They were all heading toward their warm cozy homes to sip hot chocolate and lounge in front of the warm cozy fireplace. A comparison of his one-room apartment leaped to mind. It was only a few streets away, one flight up, overlooking the front of his building. His neighborhood was ethnically mixed, meaning no one was safe from the taunting teenagers with their twisted smirks and foul mouths. Christmas to them was merely a time to hustle whatever they could from visitors or random strollers new to the block.

He hated them too.

Walking along Halsted Street and peering through the various store windows heated his resentment and stirred his resolve to do something about it. It would be easy enough to walk into the nearest store alongside other people searching for bargains. His fingers tightened around the pistol in his pocket. The cold metal was soothing to the touch.

“I’ll have to be careful but I can do it with no problem.” He devised his plan.

The flashing neon sign caught his attention — ABC LIQUORS.

“Perfect,” he muttered to himself. Only a few customers were visible in the aisles despite the festive season. Jesup made his way to the back of the store, far from the cash register, until their numbers dwindled. Pretending to examine the different labels, he waited.

He had never done anything like this before. It was a new experience for him but strangely enough, his nerves were now calm and his breathing was steady. He watched as the store clerk wrapped the purchases and placed the money in the cash register.

“I’ll bet there’s a thousand bucks in that drawer,” he mumbled. He could certainly use it but it wasn’t the cash driving him. This was a new adventure. The adrenalin, however, hadn’t yet surged as he expected. Most hold-up men he had seen in movies were jittery, apprehensive and they perspired freely. He felt none of that, being comforted by the pistol in his pocket like a life preserver on a troubled sea.

“Excuse me, sir.” A woman elbowed past.

Why did she have to speak to him? He wasn’t in her way. Moving aside, he watched her make a selection and then begin rummaging through her purse while hurrying to the cashier. Was she just being polite or did she suspect him of dawdling for some reason? Customers left with their gift purchases just as new ones entered. This would never do. There were too many people to contend with. He would have to find another store, one less hectic with fewer customers to be concerned about.

His mind made up, he turned toward the door in time to see two young men come into the store. Their nervousness was strongly evident to him and he knew what they were going to do. He saw them glance at each other as one headed toward the front and the other walked toward the rear of the store. Jesup paused in fascination to observe how they planned to accomplish their goal. The second man appeared fidgety and it was plainly evident he was not a routine shopper. It was about to go down and Jesup decided he didn’t want to be part of it. These two reminded him of the young teenage toughs in his neighborhood. They had that same look about them, as if the world owed them a living, and they were ready to grab their share.

The lady customer left and he edged closer to the front door when he saw the first young man pull out a small blue steel revolver. The words were clear. “Let me have all you got, old man, and don’t make any sudden moves.”

Without thinking, Jesup’s hand emerged from his jacket holding his weapon. The second man saw the movement and turned toward him bringing his own gun into the open, and aimed it at him. Jesup fired first and saw his target go sprawling on the floor knocking over several bottles as he fell. His partner whirled around and raised his revolver as Jesup fired again. The bullet dug into the man’s chest and blood spurted out in a stream. His eyes glazed over and the revolver slipped from his hand. He too dropped to the floor, and Jesup heard a scream. He remained where he stood as a woman erupted from somewhere within the store and began crying. She ran to the man at the cash register.

“I’m all right, mama,” said the store clerk. “This man stopped those punks in nothing flat.”

Jesup stood looking down at the men he just shot, stunned and shocked at the carnage for which he was personally responsible. He wanted to leave, to get as far away as he could but the store clerk and his wife stopped him. “You have to stay and talk to the police. I hit the silent alarm and they’re on the way.”

He really stepped in it this time. How could he explain to the police having the pistol in his possession, and why did he have to get involved with shooting those two? It’s true he had planned to rob the store himself but they beat him to it. The only problem as he saw it was they weren’t smart. They never should have done anything while he was still in the store. He hated them for that.

“We owe our lives to you, sir,” the woman said. “I just know papa would have been hurt if you hadn’t been here.”

“Now, mama.”

“It’s true, and you know it.” She turned to Jesup. “He keeps an old gun behind the counter and I’m afraid he would have tried to use it if you hadn’t acted so quickly.”

He hadn’t considered the possibility of the clerk having a weapon. If things had been different, that might be him lying in the pool of blood on the floor. A crowd swiftly gathered to hear what happened. When the police arrived, he listened as the store clerk related the details how the two would-be robbers were halted cold in their tracks.

“Officer, this man is a hero,” the old man nodded at Jesup. “I am so thankful he was here and did what he did.”

His wife voiced her gratitude. “I don’t know what might have happened if he hadn’t been here.”

The crowd milled around smiling and slapping him on the back in gratitude. The police took his name and address for their report without asking why he had a firearm in his possession or if he had a permit for it. One of the officers volunteered the information that several businesses in this area of the city had been held up by two men who fit the descriptions of these two. “I guess this will slow the crime rate down a bit,” he facetiously remarked.

Jesup finally was able to leave the store with its adoring throng of onlookers, their hand shakes and well wishes for the coming holiday season echoing in his ears. The weather outside seemed warmer as he crossed over Halsted and trudged toward Princeton Avenue feeling the wind lessening as the earlier shards of ice turned into gentle snow flakes.

“Everything seems different somehow,” he told himself. People on the street nodded at him as they passed and appeared to be less hurried than before. Was it because they knew what just happened at the liquor store? No, they couldn’t know about that. Perhaps it was Jesup himself who changed. He would return to his job in the morning without conjuring up mean thoughts about his bosses or the fancy-suited dudes from Corporate — he still didn’t know where that was.

He caught the attention of the usual teenage hooligans as he neared his apartment building but never slowed his pace. His hand caressed the Colt automatic in his jacket pocket just in case, but they didn’t call out insults to him or approach him in a menacing manner. What was wrong with them? Perhaps it was his confident step that alerted these tough kids that here was a man not to mess with. Then again, maybe the Christmas spirit filled them with tolerance and respect for their fellow man.

He laughed at the latter likelihood. “The world hasn’t changed that much in the last couple of hours.” Climbing the stairs to his small apartment, he opened the door and entered prepared to spend another evening alone with his TV, a cold beer and left-over finger-licking chicken from the fridge.

A knock at the door startled him.

“I thought you might like some turkey, Mr. Jesup.” Angela Newberry, Miss Angela Newberry, his next door neighbor seldom visited but here she was bearing food and a warm smile. “After all,” she said, “it’s almost Christmas and I hate to think of you being by yourself at this time of year. I know how it is to be lonely.”

She was, like him, unattached and also disenchanted in her job. The two of them had that much in common. They previously exchanged pleasantries but hadn’t really become acquainted with each other. Perhaps this might yet be a merry Christmas, for both of them.

Cell Break

By Diane Miller

As Nora was putting the bags into the rear of the minivan, the one from K-Mart snagged on the latch and spilled its contents. Two cans of cat food, a toilet bowl brush, a package of picture hangers and a can of hairspray landed on the asphalt.

“Oh, bother,” she fussed, stooping to retrieve the can that had rolled under the bumper.

She settled grumpily onto the front seat and took out her cell phone. She figured she’d better call Sally Johnson and confirm for tonight. The standing date with Sally and Bill for Barnhill’s on Friday nights was almost never cancelled, but you never know. Lately they’d had to go earlier and earlier to beat the crowd and get in before the lunch prices were increased for the evening buffet. Along with the senior discount, they saved five dollars that way. It sure helped to be retired and available to take advantage of good timing.

She pulled out her phone and paused in surprise at the display. She had three messages, it said. She never sent text messages, didn’t even have it set up for that. She didn’t know how, anyway. But she had occasionally received messages, usually from the cell phone company, once or twice from her son. But three, all at once! Better see what’s up. It might be important. She accessed the inbox and selected the first message.

It said, i will send the key to paul on sat then u wont have to see me.

What key? Who’s Paul?

The next one said, forgot about the couches what do you want to do

And finally, just cut out the nonsense and lets settle this so we never have to talk again

Slowly it dawned on her. Someone was sending messages to the wrong number. Besides that, it sounded like a breakup. She felt a vicarious thrill. What intrigue! She wondered what they looked like, how old they were, whether they were really meant for each other, whether they’d get back together . . . Why, she had to do something. The sender needed to know it was a wrong number. She tried to reply to the text message. A red Stop sign flashed on her display. “Message not sent.” Well, she hadn’t thought it would work. It was just worth a try. The number was displayed at the top of the screen, though. She could just use it to speak to the sender.

 But instead of a ring, she heard a message. “This subscriber is not taking calls at this time.” Oh, well. So much for that. They probably realized they’d been sending messages to the wrong number and were too embarrassed by it to answer the phone. Nora felt a faint sense of disappointment. She decided to forget about it unless there were more messages.

The buffet that night was good, as usual, and they didn’t have to wait too long for the chicken. The spinach was a little salty and there was too much butter on the squash and some of the plates were a little dirty but overall it was good. She and David went over to Sally and Bill’s afterward and watched a video, then got to bed early.

On Saturday she did a little weeding and caught up the laundry and went to Sam’s Club for bananas and milk and a few other things. She used her cell phone to call home and ask David if he had anything that needed to be picked up at the cleaner’s while she was out, but there were no more messages indicated. She wondered idly if Paul got the key OK.

Sunday after church she and David went to lunch with Sally and Bill, and this time Pete and Agnes joined them. Later while David napped she wrote notes to her sisters and put them on the hall table to mail on Monday. She checked her cell phone display several times to see if there were messages, but there were none. Guess it’s time to let it go, she thought.

Monday she hardly thought about it.

Tuesday there were three more messages.

The first one said, hey what gives paul said u never picked up the key

And then: im glad u left the key i was mean n im sorry i hurt u n i want to come home rite me

Last: y r u doing this 2 me i luv u ill always luv u i want to come back pls ansr

Nora noted the time of the last message, 4:30 am on Tuesday morning. It was now almost 3:00 in the afternoon. With rising panic she realized that the message sender still did not recognize the mistake, and must think that the intended recipient was deliberately refusing to respond. I’ve got to do something! She thought frantically. I can’t be responsible for this!

She punched in the number and got the “not taking calls” message. She tried again to send a text message, without success.

What if the writer became desperate. What if she tried to harm herself?

Increasingly the writer had taken on a personality in Nora’s mind. She was certain it would be a young woman, quite pretty. She’d have long hair, strawberry blond. Green eyes, a slender build. Ordinarily the girl was upbeat and fun to be around, but this unfortunate turn of events had shaken her badly. She was depressed. At the very least she would give up on her lover and walk out of his life, once and for all.

The tragedy of it all was too much for Nora to bear. She bowed her head as fat tears slipped down her cheeks. All my fault, she thought.

At intervals throughout the late afternoon she tried the number again, without success. David came in from the garden when it started to get dark, and she still hadn’t started supper. She’d been too distraught. But she couldn’t tell David what was going on; it was too personal, just between her and the poor lovelorn young woman. Evie. That was her name.

“Shall I make myself a sandwich?” David asked, a note of irritation in his voice.

“Oh, no, no, I’m sorry. I’ll have supper ready in a jiffy,” she assured him. Her mind was still on poor Evie as she rushed to slice tomatoes and open a can of biscuits. She couldn’t decide what else to put with them, but finally she managed to get a meal on the table. She ate almost nothing, feeling the terrible weight of responsibility. David didn’t notice.

Eventually he left the table and went to watch his ball game. Nora didn’t even clear the dishes before she peeked into the den to assure herself that he was settled, and then she punched in the number again.

This time she got an answer. “Well, hello. So you finally decided to forgive me.” The voice was deep, decidedly male, sounding still wounded.

You’re not Evie! Why are you answering her phone? Did I get the number wrong? Oh. Something shifted, dissolved in Nora’s head. She shook herself slightly

Again the voice, “Hello? Aren’t you going to talk to me?”

Nora recovered enough to stammer, “You’ve been sending me messages but I don’t know you. I just thought you’d want to know you’ve been using the wrong number.”

A brief pause, then, “Thank you.” Calm, even voice, no emotion apparent.

“Well, yes, sure, you’re welcome. That’s all. Goodbye.” Feeling foolish, Nora hung up the phone.

She sat a minute and then began mechanically rinsing dishes and loading the dishwasher. She tried to envision Evie finally getting a phone call or a message, but the images were gone.

When she had finished, she joined David in the den where he sat before the blaring TV set. Settling herself on the sofa, she sighed and reached for her sewing kit. Might as well get some mending done while that ball game is on. Won’t get to watch a movie anyway.

Nora looked around her at the small, dark room and noticed for the first time that it really was dull and oppressive, downright ugly. The walls seemed to lean in on her as David began to snore softly, in time with her stabbing needle.

The Meriwether Lewis Letter

By John Francois

I created quite a stir today. While working in a dimly lit storeroom three floors beneath the National Archives Building, I came across something that first puzzled me, then raised my placid self into a rare state of giddy excitement.

First, you need to picture an enormous basement storeroom stacked to the ceiling with dry and dusty documents from various eras waiting to be sorted. Then if you can, picture a near­sighted clerk with thick glasses peering like some dusty mole through ancient papers. You may conclude that this unassuming archivist will never be famous, and will plod through his days like Sisyphus rolling his stone-unless he steals a march on the historians.

The "something" that puzzled me, then later elevated me to the aforementioned giddy state, was the discovery of a journal, a journal with its front cover ripped off with no indication of what the writing and entries therein were all about until I noticed a signature after several pages of notations and drawings. I have this thing about signatures. A gift, I call it, and I recognized it at once.

How one of Lewis's journals came to be lost in this room will probably never be determined, but that is not the issue, not the true cause of my elation. Lewis, of course, had filled many journals during his three years of exploration of the West (1804 though 1806) with the Corps of Discovery which he and William Clark co-captained. I had read all of them, and they were all in the upper chambers of the Archives. Except this one.

 

Alone in the room, I skimmed through the log of daily observations filled with never before seen data and drawings. It wasn't until I came to the back cover of the ledger that I found the letter. Folded in half, it had been slipped in a slit behind the facing paper of the back cover. The letter was addressed to President Thomas Jefferson, and signed by Captain Meriwether Lewis.

By its very nature I concluded that Lewis would not have hidden it. The letter would have been found in his room, perhaps on his desk. So who did, and why the obvious attempt to secrete it? And to what purpose? My mind wrestled with speculations. Was it maybe Clark, who, given the letter afterward, had determined its strange contents should not be known and so had placed it there? Given what we know of Clark's friendship with Lewis, it may be the only plausible answer, for he would not have anyone see the letter and think his friend mad.

With pounding heart I read the short letter several times before I brought it in shaking hands to my supervisor-but only after I made a copy for myself.

It is well-known, gentle reader, that Lewis died along the Natchez Trace while on his way to Washington in the fall of 1809. The method of his death, however, has long been a controversy. Some historians have held that Lewis was murdered for the money and goods he carried. Others have conjectured that the captain, known to suffer frequent bouts of deep depression, killed himself. This letter now settles all speculations as to the manner of death of this American hero, and thus my excitement at having found irrefutable proof of this.

Even if I be axed for doing it, I have reproduced the letter below with all the spelling deviations as Captain Lewis wrote them, and as are common to the era. Remember there was no dictionary of standard English at the time. I will wait for no historian, no academician to ponder weightily on this sad letter. It will see the light of day now. Read it and be transported to that night at Grinder's Inn, and feel the pain and despair of that great leader and explorer, the good Captain Lewis.

 

Grinder's Inn on the

Natchez Trace

11 October 1809

My Dear Mr. President,

I awoke this morning at 2 Ock A.M. from a Singularly Strange dream, so Strange that it has Shaken me to the very core of my Soul. This dream which I experienced was more like a vision, or perhaps, Mr. President, a vision in a Dream.

I am competed to describe it to you at once in these long dark hours while all else Sleep. In this dream, I found myself traveling among a large group of elderly people who were dressed like no one of this day, their clothing and accoutrements very unusual and made of finely woven material which was, as best as I can describe, neither cotton, wool, Silk or linsey. We were traveling at great Speed in some sort of mechanical Conveyance. I know not what powered it, for I could discern no poles, oars, Sails, or horses. And these travelers saw me not, yet I heard and Perceived them clearly.

At the very front of this Conveyance, a portly gentleman stood from time to time with a book and read from it into a short, black Stick which he held in his hand. His voice was immensely strengthened by this Strange device. I deemed him to be a Guide and in charge of the group. And the words he read were somehow familiar to my ears.

It was not until we were crossing a high bridge over a great river that I suddenly realized with astonishment the words being read were some of mine as I had penned them in my Journals and that the river we were crossing was the great and near endless Missouri. At once a boil of Memories overwhelmed me. It was some time before I was able to Compose myself sufficiently to control the emotions which roilled through me occasioned by hearing my own written words and those of Captain Clark spoken in such a Fashion. The Memories which assailed me were those of the Crew of Discovery working the Keel boat through the snags and sandbars of that river, of the vast and treeless rolling Hills of golden grass which ran alongside this muddy Confluence for hundreds of miles, of the towering thunderheads of approaching Storms all black against the far western mountains in the purple distance and later of the vast herds of grassing Buffalo and Elks we witnessed, the dangerous White bears on the upper Missouri and memories of my Scientific forays away from the boat with my ever faithful companion Seaman.

Other images flashed through me, of Captain Wm. Clark bent over his brass instruments forever measuring longitudes directions and distances, of faithful and dependable Druyard and his hunters filing out of the camp in the breaking hours of dawn to replenish us with fresh meat, memories of the great travails of portaging the five Falls of the great Missouri, of crossing the endless ranges of snowy mountains then descending wild and foamy rivers that finally took us to the great rolling Pacific Ocean, the final destination of our travels, its white waves breaking upon the black beach grating the rocks and giving an end to our proceeding ever westward.

All these images and more avalanche upon me at this moment, Smothering me with a longing for a time when I was happiest. And now my recurrent depression returns mote sorely and heavily than I can bare. It is only with the greatest of Difficulty, Mr. President, that I am able to continue to pen this correspondence to you.

It occurs to me that if my Dream was indeed a Vision of things to come, that if at some time in the future people will read the words of our Journals and remember what the Corps of Discovery did, that if people will travel along the very route where we struggled so mightily and terribly, yet proceeded ever on, then I am come to realize clearly the Point and Purpose of my life is over.

Through unmanly tears and by weak candle light, I pen these words to you. Should they reach you—(and here the following three sentences of his last paragraph are blurred beyond recognition, and thus are illegible until the end of the final sentence which reads)—heavy emptiness which fills my Soul is too great, and I can proceed no further. Forgive your humble servant, who only tried to do his duty.

s/ Meriwether Lewis,

Governor of the Louisiana Territory and

Captain of the Corps of Discovery, etc, etc.

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