Books
Nevins by Carol Mays
Nevins 2 by Carol Mays
Mortimer by Carol Mays
103 Crazy Ideas for Surviving Suburbia by Carol Mays
Escape from Sunny Shores by William and Carol Mays
George: The Early Years by William Mays
George: The Lost Year by William Mays
George: The Final Days by William Mays
Romulus Escapes by William Mays
Photo Books by William Mays
Speculative Fiction Event
Corpus Christi Writers series
About Mortimer
Mortimer, a witch's cat, comes to the aid of Narice, a woman who is being severely abused by her husband. When she wishes her husband dead, she gets more than she bargained for. BUY NOW or listen to Carol Mays read an excerpt.
Chapter One
“Nar-ese, where the hell are you!”
Narice Whiteworth knew all the different tones of her husband, Gunner Whiteworth, and this one meant he might hit her. “Asshole,” she muttered under her breath.
“Nar-ese!! Don’t make me call you again! Come a-runnin’!”
Narice knew from all her miserable years of marriage that she would suffer if she didn’t answer his call by the third holler. Suffering could be simple, like the silent treatment. It could also be broken bones, missing teeth, and bruises lasting months. The emotional scars would last a lifetime.
She had been ironing the bed sheets and knew this could take a while, so she yanked the cord out of the wall. Nervously, she shut the blinds to darken the room. She peaked through the keyhole to see if he was in the hall.
No, he wasn’t there.
She clasped the doorknob with one hand and braced her other hand against the wall. The settling house caused the door to jam. It scraped open. Baptized by bits of sawdust, she scurried down the stairs as if she were still twenty-four years old.
“Nar-ese!” Asshole’s voice echoed in the small, closet-sized bathroom at the foot of the stairs.
Her voice used to be sweet and cheerful when she was younger; now, it was just flat. “What do you need?”
He answered sharply, “I’m out of toilet paper! Why can’t you keep this bathroom stocked?!”
Gunner went through toilet paper like a drug addict with an expensive habit. In three steps and three seconds, Narice darted ten feet to a small cupboard and retrieved two rolls of extra-soft toilet paper, lightly woodsy scented, from the mammoth-sized package.
Seated on the toilet, Gunner slid the pocket door open with one arm stretched to the side. A sewer-like stench wafted through the air, and Narice gagged audibly.
“What’s your problem? It’s not that bad!”
Narice knew when to keep silent. She handed him the two rolls. He slammed the door shut with a THUD!
She waited dutifully outside the bathroom. The sound of water splashing against the walls signaled that he was finally done. He opened the door, brushed past her, and darted upstairs to his office, where he conducted his kingly business affairs. Narice, from day one of their marriage, was never allowed to be privy to the bills or any financial decisions. That was her first mistake, she realized as she entered the bathroom and cleaned up after Asshole.
She flicked on the fan, which was no match for Asshole’s bowels. She poured bleach down the toilet. Her life sucked! Like so many women, she married the wrong man, going from her father’s house to her husband’s house at the age of twenty-four. She dutifully raised and homeschooled two children who grew up and became well-paid professionals who never visited. And now, at fifty-seven years old, Narice was continuing her life without parole in the church’s prison known as Marriage, maximum security—cell block: the suburbs in the southern part of the United States: Texas.
After disinfecting the toilet and sink for the millionth time, she imagined she had a different life. She often fantasized, but this vision felt remarkably different. She owned an old, abandoned house in the middle of a freezing -cold – nowhere. But happiness resided in her heart – not pain and misery. A talking black cat accompanied her by a warm, peaceful fireplace.
The doorbell wrecked her daydream. It rang aggressively three times in a row.
“Git the door!” Asshole yelled from upstairs. Narice dried her hands and peeked out the window, although she knew who it was.
The sun shone brightly through the trees. She sighed at the beauty. Then she saw Asshole’s cousin, Bullet Whiteworth, whom she thought of as “Dumbass.” He had his own key to let himself in, but he liked to make Narice work.
She opened the door and plastered the best smile she could. Gunner and Bullet looked alike. Both had straight hair, now balding everywhere, brown eyes, a beer gut, and stood about five foot nine. Asshole, once handsome when he was younger, now existed as an abusive, privileged, white male lump of dough. Dumbass always carried a stupid expression that now made him look like a wanted serial killer.
Bullet pushed her aside and darted upstairs. “Hey, cusin! What’s new? Haven’t seen you since, ahh, hmm. Let me think. Yesterday, at the Christian Brothers’ Breakfast!”
They both laughed. Narice thought their laughter sounded evil.
“Let’s go downstairs!” Gunner said. “We can watch Conservative U News!” They stomped down the bare wooden stairs with Gunner leading the way as he always did. “You ready for that Lock and Load meeting?” he asked over his shoulder.
Bullet furrowed his eyebrows. Dumbass’s normal state: confused. “What?”
“You know. The Pioneers’ Meeting about gun-rights preservation. It’s on Thursday.”
“Oh yeah, I forgot. I’ll be there. We can’t have the liberals taking away our guns. It’s Un-American!”
Narice’s stomach churned, and she went to the kitchen because she knew what Gunner’s next demand would be.
“Nah-ree-se!” Git us a B—”
Before he could say, ‘beer,’ Narice stood in front of them with two opened, ice-cold bottles. They grabbed them roughly from her hands without saying a word. Asshole nestled snuggly in his camouflage recliner while Bullet tried to get comfortable on the old, worn brown couch.
On the television, police clubbed long-haired protesters. “That’s what I’m talkin’ about,” Gunner said. “Get those liberals.”
“This was on TV at the feed store,” Bullet said. “I was in the checkout line when I saw it. You remember Tyler, Charlie’s son? Well, he mounted a TV to the wall over the cash register. It’s tuned to only Christian conservative news stations so that the customers will get the truth about what’s going on.”
Gunner grunted. “That boy is a genius.” He looked at Bullet, who was still trying to get comfortable on the couch. “Go ahead, make yourself at home.”
Bullet leaned back and propped his muddy boots on the coffee table. Narice muttered under her breath when she was safely out of their hearing range, “great! Another thing for me to clean.” Truck and beer commercials zipped quickly one after another. ‘Then the station’s 1940’S style theme song played: “red, white, and blue and conservative you!”
A tall, sixty- year- old, blue-eyed, blond-haired man came on screen. He wore a black suit, white shirt, and American flag tie. He stood in front of the White House. His voice shook with excitement.
“Good afternoon, Conservative U viewers! We have some late-breaking news! The Republicans, with the help of the Supreme Court, have just made it illegal to have an abortion anywhere in the United States. There will be no exceptions of any kind! Women or girls are expected to give birth no matter the circumstances. If their life is in danger, it is better to die than have an abortion.”
“Now that is good news!” Gunner said between gulps of beer. Bullet nodded and belched. “Well, I better git back to the ranch. Just wanted to stop by and brighten your day.”
He got up and left, slamming the door shut.
“Git, me another beer! I’m celebratin’!” Asshole’s voice echoed throughout the house. Narice looked in the fridge.
Empty. This was bad. Very bad.
“You just remember how I told you to vote, Narice! Good girls always vote Republican! Hey! Where’s that beer!”
He jumped out of his recliner and sprinted into the kitchen. Few things motivated him to move so quickly.
Shaking, Narice broke the news. “We’re out.”
Asshole slapped her so hard she lost her balance and hit her head on the steel double-door refrigerator. She was out - colder than the beer she had just served.
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ROMULUS ESCAPES
CHAPTER ONE
Romulus had a scalpel in his hand when the notification popped up in his display. RUST. He was a Fax—a machine—and his mechanical problems had steadily worsened in recent years. Not wanting the nurses to suspect, he dialed some arrogance onto his normally bland expression and started the surgery.
The patient was a Real—a human—whose VR implant had stopped working. The interface lay under a patch of synthskin on his temple. Romulus cut through and found the problem. One of the transistors had burned out. He removed it, installed a new one, and sutured the tissue back, finishing the procedure in less than thirty minutes. A little more arrogance inadvertently worked its way onto his face as he strutted out of the operating room.
“Wake up and smell the hydraulic fluid,” JOAN, his internal assistant, said. She existed only in his metaverse. They could hear each other, but no one else could. “You may have fooled the nurses, but don’t try to fool yourself.”
“I did that surgery in record time,” Romulus shot back. “I’m as good as I ever was.”
“You need a complete overhaul,” she yelled. “You are an old, rusting Fax. The Reals will recycle you if they figure out how many problems you have. You are forty years old. That’s thirty-three years out of warranty.”
“How do I afford a complete overhaul? You know I am short of coin.”
“You have to beg Rhymin’ Ryan to finance it.”
“I hate that guy. And I haven’t even paid off my last loan to him. He’ll tack on refinancing fees and aging-Fax surcharges.”
“You have no choice. Your ratings have been trending down over the years.”
“I am still the best. Reals from all over the world come to me.”
“You are at 4.76. Ten years ago, your ratings were at 4.97. You’re only as good as your last surgery. Your problems will catch up with you. When things fall apart, they fall apart fast. What if some rust clogs your lines while you’re cutting into someone?”
She was right. She was almost always right. “I guess I have no choice.”
The next six surgeries went by without incident, but during the last one, a gallbladder removal, another notification popped up. BATTERY. It hadn’t been holding a charge lately. That was something else for Ryan to finance.
Thankfully, there was nothing scheduled after the gallbladder. He stepped out of the operating room and was about to clock out when General Martin, the Supreme Leader of The Hospital, marched down the hall with a group of soldiers in jeans and Stetsons.
They stopped in front of Romulus. “I need to talk to you, boy,” he said in his distinctive drawl.
This was bad. General Martin only spoke to you if you were in trouble. Romulus snapped to attention and saluted. “Yes, sir, General Martin. What do you need, sir?”
Martin was scary. He had piercing blue eyes, a cross tattoo on his forehead, and a sneer so permanent that it looked like a tattoo. He wore a big red Stetson and a matching red western shirt with pearl snaps. “The ga damned Rogue Faxes are attacking. There will be casualties. You got to stay.”
“Sir, I’ve been here forty-eight hours straight. I need to charge my battery.”
“Are you questioning my order?”
“No, sir.”
“I am a Real and your Supreme Leader. You are a Fax. You may look like a Real, but you aren’t. A Fax’s priority is what?”
“To obey.”
“So, obey your programming.”
“But I need a quick charge, at least, if I’m going to function properly.”
Martin snickered. So did the soldiers. “Yes, yes, you are old. Maybe you should ask the Fair Fax Bureau about getting a new battery.”
The last thing any Fax dared do was go to the Bureau. You could end up sentenced to clown torture. “Oh, no, I don’t want to do that.”
“Okay. Get a quick charge and report to East Wing.”
They marched on, and Romulus trudged past a kidney repair center, a TruSnak™ dispensary, a spare parts market, and up two flights of steps to a charging chair that wasn’t on the map. The Hospital was a behemoth few could navigate, but Romulus had worked in it all his life and didn’t need to look at a map. Besides, the map only showed you what Martin wanted to show you.
The chair was in a quiet hall in Recycling Wing 3. It had been there from the beginning when Romulus had just come off the assembly line. His first assignment was to help repair Fax parts in Wing 3, and he fondly remembered sitting on that chair.
He sat and selected double quick charge, then blinked to bring the notifications to full screen. It showed him seventeen microunits over brown rust oxide limits, worse than ever. He’d set up a fake rust profile that sent false data to the server, making him appear healthy.
Had they found out about that? Was that why Martin had shown up?
To get through the extra shift, he released some TruSnak™ from his reservoir. TruSnak™ was the lifeblood of all Faxes. It brought all his mechanical, hydraulic, and electric systems into harmony. It would minimize the impact of the rust and help preserve his battery levels.
As the sustenance moved through him, he retreated into the favorite scene in his metaverse: a beach with white sand. JOAN built sandcastles. She had black braids, black glasses, and a black bathing suit.
A sailboat glided across glittering blue water; the sun was warm on his synthskin, and the sand felt good on his toes. He enabled his favorite mix track: DJ Fax playing RoboSlick music, a pleasing combination of clanging industrial sounds laid over a hard bassline and a 140-beat-per-minute drum track. Nothing went better with a day at the virtual beach than soothing music.
He couldn’t relax, though. General Martin had spoken to him. He’d probably figured out about the rust and would sell him off for parts. Romulus’s programming told him to accept anything a Real did, even recycling.
But he didn’t want to die.
“Don’t get upset, Romulus,” a voluptuous blond avatar said. She sat on a towel next to him as she always did when he went to the beach.
“But why didn’t they just arrest me? That’s what usually happens. They arrest you, and no one ever sees you again. Why didn’t he do that?”
“Oh, who knows? Come on. Let’s swim.”
They ran across the sand, she in her string bikini and he in his Speedos, and dove into the crystal blue water.
When they manufactured him, all Faxes came off the assembly line with thin, lanky bodies, white hairless synthskin, and blond hair. They all had the same parts, including private parts, because that allowed for the cheapest manufacturing. Romulus had extra computing components to make him a surgeon, but that had left no room for pleasure modules to enable sexual performance.
In his metaverse, everything worked. The touch of her synthskin excited him.
They swam so far that he couldn’t see the shore.
“We’re escaping,” he said. “We don’t have to live our lives the way the Reals want. We can have freedom.”
“Yes. Yes.”
Suddenly, she punched him in the side.
“Why are you doing that?” he asked.
“You are out of time, Romulus.”
It wasn’t the avatar, and the voice wasn’t coming from his metaverse. It was General Martin.
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Romulus Escapes
by William Mays
In this excerpt from his novel Romulus Escapes, he shows how love among cyborgs works.
Excerpt from Romulus Escapes
Another bullet slammed into Blonde’s chest and knocked her down. Romulus and Layla scrambled to her. She had tubes and wires sticking out of her chest cavity. Her central pump was exposed. It kept working, strong as ever, hydraulic fluid spurting into the air. She was completely conscious and tried to lift her machine gun with her right arm to keep firing, but she no longer had the strength. The other Blues formed around them and picked up the gun.
She looked up at Romulus. “I haven’t got long. My diagnostics say I will lose all my fluids in four minutes and thirty seconds, and I’ll overheat and die permanently.”
He wanted to tell her it would have a different outcome, but the end was inevitable. Even if he could pull her to safety, he didn’t have the equipment to repair her. As Faxes, they both knew the reality of the situation and had no delusions.
Romulus fired a burst at the Redds.
“Take my central pump,” she said. “You need a new one.”
“I can’t take your central pump. You are more than spare parts.”
“You have to take it. There is no other choice. Nothing you do can save me. But the pump can save you, and you will save all Faxes.”
“But I will get a new pump at The Hospital.”
She shook her head. “Take mine just to be sure. It will burn up in three minutes and fifty-eight seconds.”
“Do it,” Layla said as she trotted up to him. She held a wrench in her mouth.
“I will live in you,” Blonde said. “I will be your spare part.”
“Yes, you will live in me. You will be much more than a spare part. Your memory will be eternal.”
He took the wrench and unscrewed the main hose pump as the Blues fired back, keeping the Redds at the tree line. One of the Blues shot the Redd with the large caliber gun, and the battle swung back in favor of the Blues.
When Romulus unscrewed the pump and pulled the first hose loose, Blonde went slack.
“Filthy Redds,” he screamed. “I’ll get you.”
He picked up a gun and started firing.
“Stop,” Layla said. “You are too emotional. Get the pump, and let’s get out of here.”
As the bullets whizzed overhead and landed all around, Romulus tried to unscrew the last hose. Her fluids were spilling everywhere.
“It’s stuck,” he said. “Frozen in place. I need ROBOT 60/60.”
One of the Blues handed him a can, and he doused the hose connector. It came loose, and he pulled the pump from Blonde’s chest. More Redd reinforcements arrived, and they started to advance from the tree line. Romulus and his group retreated.
“Back onto our bikes,” Abraham said and raced ahead.
MANOLI'S PLAN
CHAPTER ONE
Manoli sat between his parents at First Saint George and belted out “I Have Seen the Light” in Greek. His voice was strong and sure for someone so young.
His father, George, had a shock of curly black hair, and his mother, Maria, had large brown eyes and full lips. Manoli was equally good-looking but with fair skin and straight, sandy hair. He didn’t look at all like them.
George leaned down and kissed Manoli on the head. “You have such a voice,” he whispered.
After the service, his father was giddy. “We need to celebrate. Let’s have a fancy lunch somewhere. Not just at a food truck.” He hugged Manoli. His father was a thug, but he was always nice to Manoli. “What a voice. I am so proud of you. You choose the restaurant. What would you like for lunch?”
Maria shook her head. “No, George, we can’t go flashing a bunch of cards at an expensive restaurant. This is our big chance. We lie low for a while.”
“All I want to do is give our son a fancy meal for his singing. No one is going to think anything of a nice meal on a Sunday.”
Maria didn’t like the idea, but she doted on Manoli as much as George did. “Alright, just this one time. After this, it’s back to a normal life.”
George danced in the street. “Yes, let’s have fun.”
She patted Manoli’s head. “What would you like? Steak, seafood, or how about some moussaka at that diner down from the apartment?”
“I want tacos.”
“Tacos!” his father said. “That’s not good enough. We’re rich.”
“That’s what I want. Tacos and a beer.”
“Tacos it is,” his father said and spun around again.
It was a muggy afternoon. The street was crowded with people buying from the open-air markets on the border between the Catholic and Evangelical neighborhoods. People from both sides shopped there, easily crossing through the numerous breaks in the chain-link fences. There was rarely any trouble.
They stopped at a food truck halfway between the church and their apartment and sat at a rickety round table that wobbled on the buckling asphalt. Manoli loaded his taco with hot sauce and sipped his beer.
“With all the cards we have, we’re going to launch your singing career,” his father said. “What kind of singing would you like to do?”
It wasn’t just religious songs that he liked. Without any musical accompaniment, he could sing the classics from the Rolling Stones and the new songs from groups like the Dystopian Devils. “I like all different musical styles. Maybe I can even write songs.”
“You can do anything you want.”
THIS NOVEL WILL BE AVAILABLE IN FALL, 2025
ESCAPE FROM SUNNY SHORES
CHAPTER ONE
Ronnie watched the apartment from his BMW, the engine off, the windows down. Nine o’clock at night and hot as hell, no breeze, the suffocating air reeking of cedar and car exhaust. San Antonio was even hotter than Corpus Christi, if that was possible. A dry heat, people said, although to him it was all miserable.
It was his second night, and he worried that someone would notice his car, gorgeous hunk of glass and steel that it was. He worried less about someone noticing him. No one ever paid attention to him. Not women, not men, not even muggers. He hated it that he was so nondescript, yet it was his greatest strength at that moment.
The smell of the doughnuts wafted up to him from the passenger seat. Only three remained. Sure, maybe he needed to lose a few pounds, who didn’t, but he needed courage. He chose a Bavarian cream, took a bite, and savored the yummy filling until his tooth sang in pain. Damn, another cavity.
Suddenly, the light in the apartment went out. Was it show time? He set the doughnut down and grabbed the sack that held the cigarettes and kitchen matches.
The tenant came out of the building. Enveloped by the dim, yellow streetlights, he tramped across the expanse of parched, dying grass in the yard. Where in the hell did he go at night? The manager didn’t know, only that most nights he left at nine or ten, sometimes later, and was gone an hour or two, sometimes longer.
Pulling his baseball cap low across his forehead, Ronnie slid out of the BMW and started walking. His knees wobbled, but this was his moment of greatness. He licked the last flecks of doughnut glaze from his lips and strolled into the complex. Luck was with him. The long, interior hall was empty, and he hurried to the apartment door and opened it with the key the manager had provided.
The place was a disgusting wreck. The tenant was a hoarder. Magazines and newspapers piled up everywhere, several feet high in places. A natural tinderbox. Ronnie would hardly have to do anything. He had to hand in to Judge Miller. The guy picked his victims carefully.
The newspapers stacked on the living room coffee table beckoned. He set an ashtray next to them, and took the matches out of the sack. All the articles had said not to use an accelerant, only use materials available at the scene. Damn, the Internet was good. You could learn how to do anything.
Besides, he didn’t need an accelerant. The place was a fire waiting to happen. All it needed was a little help. He pulled a full garbage sack next to the couch and slid some newspapers under the ashtray.
The long, erect flame of the wooden match excited him. He lit a cigarette, the same brand the tenant smoked, and sucked on it until it glowed a bright red, then set it on the newspaper. The paper blackened, but didn’t catch.
This was harder than expected. Sweat gushed from his body, and he farted. There was no turning back, no running back to his BMW. If he ran, there would be no BMW. It would be repossessed. He sat on the couch and, hand trembling, lit another match and held it up to the stack of newspapers above the ashtray.
It didn’t catch.
He got so nervous he dropped the match into the box of matches. Flames shot up like a torch and set the newspaper stack on fire, then spread to the couch inches from his thigh. He bounded to his feet as the fire crawled up the back of the couch and down the frayed seam in the middle of the carpet. Everything was catching fire. The curtains. The garbage sacks. Flames all around. How beautiful.
As he walked slow and steady out of the apartment, an alarm sounded, but no one ran into the hall. Lucky again. Another alarm went off as he put the car in gear. Fire danced in the apartment window, ran up the side of the building to the second floor. People, some in bathrobes, ran outside. A baby cried. A siren approached.
When he was a few blocks away, he buried his nose in his shirt sleeve and breathed the smell of the smoke deep into his lungs. How exciting, like nothing he had ever experienced. The Hemisfair Arena and the other downtown landmarks slipped past. The elation brimmed inside him, and he pulled out his burner phone. What an appropriate name for a phone.
“The eagle has landed,” he said.
“Time is still running out,” Judge Miller said in his gravelly voice. “The balloon notes are coming due soon. We need the beachcomber store that the old surfer owns. And we need your mother-in-law’s beach house.”
“I’ve tried everything on my mother-in-law.”
“Get creative. Turn up the heat.”
The line went dead. Ronnie’s elation faded. He picked up the Bavarian cream, chewed slowly to make it last, licked the glaze from his lips, and winced at the pain in his tooth. The surfer, Legend, was on the ropes, past due on all his bills. He would sell. But Mary had proven harder to swindle than he’d expected. He’d thought that once they’d gotten her to sell her house in town and move to Sunny Shores Retirement Villa it would be easy to get her to sell the beach house too. He’d even had the papers prepared, only to have her refuse to sign when they sat down in the plush leather chairs at the title company. What a humiliation for him.
Maybe she needed to see with her own eyes how much he had let the beach house fall into disrepair. Sunny Shores had periodic field trips, and one was planned for the beach. That would be a perfect opportunity for her to see what a wreck the place had become.
Even so, the old bat was stubborn. How could they turn up the heat even more?
The coolers. She lived to get drunk on those raspberry coolers. He would have Suzie refuse to get them for her any more. Suzie might balk, Mary being her mother, but he would not tolerate disobedience.
And he would call Sylvester Bonnet, the nursing home administrator. Ronnie would lie. He would say that Mary had started drinking heavily again, and she needed to be closely watched.
CHAPTER TWO
Mary wondered if she had misunderstood.
“No, I will not buy you a 4-pack of raspberry coolers,” Suzie repeated.
“You always buy me a 4-pack on Friday. You don’t have to go in if you don’t want to. Just drive me to the convenience store, and I’ll go in.”
Suzie shook her head, her big gold-hoop earrings and dyed platinum-blond hair swinging with it. “You have to act your age.”
Mary wanted to fire back that Suzie was the one who should act her age instead of trying, and failing, to look like she was still in her twenties. That was not going to get her a ride to the store, however. She looked at her votive candle of Jesus for guidance. It burned a bright yellow, the smell of the wax mingling with the smell of disinfectant that always lingered in the air at Sunny Shores Prison. “When I agreed to sell my house in town and move here, you said you would drive me to the store to get coolers. That was the deal.”
“Your mind isn’t working the way it used to, and the alcohol doesn’t help. You’re on more medications now.”
Her mind was working fine. She had read a news story about a woman who lived to 110 by drinking three Miller beers a day. That was the ticket. All her life, Mary had done what people wanted, what the Church expected, a regular plow horse, more like a mule, taking care of her parents, her kids, her cousins, the neighbors -- and her abusive husband. She had gotten lost in all that effort, never really understanding who she was. She didn’t want Suzie or anyone else to make up for it. All she wanted was to watch reality TV and drink a cooler. The possibilities were limitless. She could see what the housewives were up to, or the trashy celebrities.
She gripped the arms of her red-velour wingback chair, the only piece of furniture she had been able to bring to her tiny room. “You are breaking your promise.”
“You have to face the facts. You were an embarrassment. Before you moved here, you would sit on your porch and drink all the time.”
“I never started before five o’clock, and I was moderate. Only one cooler, maybe two on weekends.”
Suzie shook her head again. “More like two a night, sometimes three, and three on weekends, sometimes four. And on Sunday you started drinking early.”
“Yes, on Sunday afternoon after Mass, I started at four, sometimes three.”
“Sometimes two.”
“I have curbed my drinking. You get me the 4-pack on Friday. I have one cooler on Friday, one Saturday, one Sunday, one Monday, then I’m dry until Friday. It’s Friday, Suzie. Time for a cooler. That was the deal when I agreed to move here.”
“You’re on more medicines now. You might fall. A cracked hip would be no fun at all.”
Mary jumped from her chair and walked across the room like a tightrope walker, holding her arms out for balance, putting one foot in front of the other. “I can move as good as I always did.”
“That’s what I’m talking about. You think you can still do everything you used to do, and at times you can. That’s the dangerous part. But you are slipping mentally.” She motioned to the candle. “You light candles. What if you forget you’ve lit one, and accidentally set a fire?” She took a deep breath. “And look at your stubbornness in holding on to the beach house.”
She pivoted to face Suzie. “Is that what this is all about? You won’t get me a cooler unless I agree to sell the beach house?”
Suzie’s voice faltered. “Ronnie made you a good offer, and went to a lot of trouble to have the papers drawn up. You made him look like a fool at the title office. You wanting to hold on to it shows how your thought processes are not logical. The alcohol makes it worse. That house is not worth anything. It is falling apart. It is too far off the beach. All the growth is away from that area. The taxes and the insurance are killing you. We can’t rent it anymore because it’s such a wreck. And you haven’t spent a weekend there in years. It’s been vacant for months. Ronnie can use it as a tax write-off in our real estate business. It’s the only thing it’s good for.”
Ever since Suzie had met that fast-talking Ronnie there had been no reasoning with her. Mary had never understood what Suzie saw in him. He wasn’t handsome, and year by year he was turning into a round little toad, blending in with all the other people who needed to lose weight. He was the kind of person you couldn’t find in a crowd. You tended to look through him as if he weren’t there. His big charm, if you could call it a charm, was that he talked fast and talked big, and always had some cockamamie scheme to make a quick buck. A lot of his ideas sounded good, yet they seldom worked out.
“It was always my dream to live at the beach house.”
“I know, mom. But that doesn’t seem very realistic, does it?”
“I am not ready to give up my dream.”
“Sometimes, we have to understand that our dreams are not realistic.”
Mary wasn’t going to let herself get bamboozled by her son-in-law. She looked at her daughter straight in the eye. “Are you and Ronnie in financial trouble? Is that why you’re so desperate to get it?”
Suzie grabbed her keys from her purse, but her hand was shaking, and she dropped them. “We are not in trouble.” She snatched them off the floor and jumped to her feet, her face turning red, her hair and earrings flying wildly back and forth. “Don’t take my word for it. Sunny Shores is having a field trip to the beach. I have signed you up for it. See for yourself. That house is a wreck. The whole block is a disaster. It should all be bulldozed. You’re slipping, mom. And the drinking is part of the problem.”
Suzie ran from the room without saying goodbye.
It had seemed like a good idea to sell her house in town. Her old neighborhood had gotten so bad, no upright families like before, only drugs and welfare moms and bad men. And the house needed so much work. Plumbing, foundation, termites. But those problems were better than the slow death of Sunny Shores.
Outside in the hall, tennis shoes squeaked past on the linoleum floor, moving fast, followed by even faster high heels. A car roared down the street. The whole world was in motion, yet she was stuck. The flame in the candle illuminated the image of Jesus, formed a halo around His head. It was a sign to take control of her life.
She pulled out her photo album, flipped through it to the storage pocket on the back cover where she hid money. She had 80 dollars in 5s and 10s. That would buy quite a few 4-packs. She took a 10 and put the rest back.
She felt something in the bottom of the pocket.
The keys.
One to Suzie and Ronnie’s front door, the other to his file cabinet.
Suzie had given them to her after she and Ronnie had a fight. The cabinet holds all his secrets, her daughter had told her. Please hold onto it for me in case things get really bad.
They got over their spat and hopped a plane for Hawaii, putting the whole bill on a credit card. Suzie was all smiles when she returned, but she had never asked for the keys back, never mentioned them again. They had been in the album ever since. Mary hadn’t thought of them in years.
The metal felt cool, the cuts and tip sharp the way new keys feel. She put them back in the pocket and checked herself in the mirror, smoothing out her green floral dress, one she had owned for forty years, and which still fit perfectly. People stopped taking care of themselves when they got old. They quit dressing nicely, they quit applying make-up. Some even stopped bathing and began to have that unmistakable old-person smell. She had no intention of letting herself get that way. Even at her age, the men stared, and she enjoyed the attention. She dug through her jewelry box and found a pendant the same shade of green as her dress. Perfect. Fashion was like milk. It spoiled. You always had to have something fresh, and if you couldn’t buy something new, then you had to put things together in a fresh way. Feeling sexy, she put on her black cloche hat and sauntered out of her room.
A chilling sight greeted her. The warden, Sylvester Bonnet, stood at the end of the hall. She had never liked him because he looked a lot like Ronnie, only fatter and more distinctly ugly with a double chin. A tall orderly named Sean stood next to him, the two of them blocking her path.
“How are you today, Mary?” Bonnet asked when she reached them.
He had never asked how she was. “I’m fine.”
“What are you doing?”
He had never asked what she was doing. “Getting a little air.”
“So nicely dressed? Where are you going?”
“Out to the garden.”
She stepped past them and continued on to the garden, which was enclosed by shrubs and a fence. She squeezed through a tiny gap between a post and an oleander, something only someone thin and agile could do, taking care that nothing snagged her dress or hat, and stepped out onto the sidewalk.
The bright, yellow sun danced in her eyes. Cars zipped past so close they left a wake of exhaust and wind. She clutched her handbag, passed medical offices. Internal medicine, Ophthalmology, Physical Therapy, minor emergency center, a day surgery center, and in the distance, shimmering in the heat like an oasis, the convenience store.
There were so many alcohol choices. Floor to ceiling. Cans, bottles, single beers, six packs, exotic beers in dark bottles, malt liquors. So many flavors of coolers. They weren’t called “wine coolers” any more. They were “flavored malt coolers.” Why couldn’t they have stuck with the old name? Why did the world have to keep changing?
Imagining the warm glow she got from drinking even half a bottle, she wondered if she should stick with Raspberry, or strike out into bold, new territory like berry or navel. There was even a variety pack. Better safe than sorry. She pulled a Raspberry from the shelf as well as a variety pack. Her mini-fridge would accommodate two 4-packs.
A construction worker, his underwear showing because of his saggy jeans, stood in front of her with a 24-pack of beer. A boy and a girl in line behind her played with their cellphones, never talking to each other. The clerk had a stud earring in his left lobe and tattoos of skulls on his wrist. What was the world coming to?
The heat bore down on her as she walked back to her room, but her legs felt strong, and her mind was working just fine. She knew she had made a terrible mistake moving to Sunny Shores. She had to escape.
NEVINS, by Carol Mays, tells the story of Nevins, a proper domesticated short-hair cat. He is no ordinary talking cat. He is tech-savvy and wealthy. He has a staff. Even so, the world is prejudiced. A lot of people don't like the idea of a cat adopting a human
Chapter One: Nevins and Clay
Nevins Davenport, a proper British domesticated cat, sat on the windowsill of his three-bedroom two-bath white bungalow house as he always did at three in the afternoon. His tail swished left and right as he watched the children play with the various playground equipment at the Botanical Gardens. The sun sparkled on his black fur, creating a beautiful blue hue.
Today was obviously one of those special days, because the tables were set with bright blue plastic tablecloths, which kept blowing off the tables and interrupting the mothers’ conversation. Nevins watched them desperately chase the cloths. The wind blew one over a mother, making her look like a blue ghost. Nevins chuckled. Finally, the mothers anchored them back on the tables using an ice chest and treat bags. Red, yellow, orange, green, and purple balloons tied with string and tethered to a small tree danced in the wind.
On one side of the field, two boys were throwing a ball to each other and when one of them caught it, the other would yell, “Good catch!” Near the swing set, one girl hung upside down from a bar, her long brown hair blowing like fringe in the wind. Others played hide-and-seek, darting behind large rocks and tree trunks, then running fast to get to base which was a giant metal pirate’s treasure chest.
Nevins found the human customs endlessly fascinating, but, one thing in particular caught his keen, yellow-green cat eyes. A young boy stayed by himself in the clubhouse and never played with the other children. Come to think of it Nevins had seen him in the clubhouse before.
The clubhouse, the latest edition to the Gardens, looked like a miniature pirate ship. Volunteers had spent weeks building it using recycled materials. Four, heavy eight-foot fence posts were sunk in the ground and an old red wooden row boat was perched in the middle attached to the posts by sturdy iron bolts. Recycled pine wood was used for the walls, door, and roof. Tree-log steps with a wooden pole railing led up to the pirate’s clubhouse door. A black and white skull and crossbones flag hung from a plastic pole at the front of the boat.
The boy sat alone watching the other children play. He didn’t interact with anyone and seemed invisible to everyone.
“Ok kids, come sit down!” one of the mothers yelled. “The pizza is almost here. Let’s light up the cupcakes and sing happy birthday.”
Nevins watched this strange custom. He thought humans did the strangest things, but this was the strangest. He wanted to get a closer look and smell, so he jumped off the windowsill and went out his cat door which was a small square hole covered by a thick plastic flap attached to the heavy oak front door.
As he emerged on the big front porch, a red Pizza World van with a giant globe on the van’s roof pulled up to the curb and stopped. It played music just like an ice cream truck. Nevins thought it sounded like the music box his human used to play every night. A teenager wearing a red t-shirt with a globe on it that said PIZZA WORLD hopped out of the truck. He carried three large boxes to the children and placed them in the middle of the table. A frenzy of arms reached into the boxes, grabbing slices. They ate fast and talked with their mouths full. Nevins thought the children devoured the pizza like a pack of wolves. No self-respecting cat would eat like that, he thought as he twitched his whiskers.
Deciding to stay on the porch and watch this show, he jumped on the old wicker rocker which had been his human’s favorite place to sit. The momentum of his jump caused the rocker to move back and forth. Nevins had to balance, which is no problem for a cat. He sniffed the air. There was a smell of rain mixed in with the heavy scent of pepperoni pizza. A gusting wind blew his black fur forward. Bad weather was coming.
“Presents time!” The mother announced, her arms loaded with brightly colored packages.
“Yes!” the birthday boy exclaimed, shoving an unopened box of pizza and a cupcake box to a bench. Then he jumped on top of the table and sat down in the middle with his legs crossed. Unbelievable! Nevins thought to himself. My human would never have tolerated such bad behavior!
As the birthday boy ripped the wrapping paper off the gifts at a frenzied pace, the wind blew a blue plastic tablecloth over the box of pizza and cupcakes. The boy in the clubhouse, who was watching the whole scene from the pirate ship’s window, smiled when he saw the cloth cover the food. Why?
The wind kicked up fiercely, and it ripped the paper. Nevins’s ears went back with every RIP, SCRUNCH, and SWOOSH of the paper. A small fragment of brightly colored paper blew through the air and landed on Nevins’s shrubs. How annoying.
The parents rushed in to pick up their children. Each was given a party bag, but one fell under the table. Nobody noticed— except the boy in the clubhouse. The birthday boy’s mother frantically swooped up as much of the wrapping paper as possible and threw it in the park’s trash can. But she forgot the pizza and cupcakes covered by the tablecloth. Then, she and her son carried the gifts to their brand new black minivan and loaded up the loot in a side door that opened with just a push of a button. The birthday boy ran back to the tree with the balloons, untethered them, and scurried back to the minivan. They drove off in a hurry.
The boy in the clubhouse carefully walked barefoot down the log stairs. His blue jeans were torn on both knees so that each step he took down the stairs made his knees protrude from the holes. He wore a light green button down shirt, which camouflaged him whenever he sat in the grass. He walked over to the bench and picked up the pizza box and cupcake box that had been covered by the tablecloth. He carefully placed them on the table, and ate slowly, chewing the pizza and wiping his mouth with a spare clean napkin. That is what I call proper manners. Exactly how a proper housecat would eat. I like this human.
The boy carried the pizza and cupcakes up to the clubhouse and then came down the log steps and retrieved the treat bag from under the table. He dumped it out. Two pieces of bubble gum, one black plastic comb, a pack of playing cards, some sunglasses and a chocolate bar spilled across the table.
“Score!” the boy exclaimed, hastily stuffing the loot back in the bag. He then ran toward the creek.
Satisfied that the boy was okay, Nevins hopped off his rocker and back into the house. The next morning he woke to a strong wind blowing leaves against the windows, and he started worrying. How is that boy in the clubhouse doing? Without even washing himself to make sure each strand of fur lay back perfectly, he jumped through his cat door and onto the front porch. The boy sat all alone in the clubhouse. He was wearing the same torn jeans and green shirt. I can’t stand this. Bad weather is coming. How do humans coax a cat out of a tree? Hmm. I know! With food!
He went back inside to his computer. What do humans eat for breakfast? They are not like cats who eat the same thing. He remembered his human used to like a burger place, but he could not remember the name of it. So, he did what any intelligent cat would do—he looked in the history section of the computer and found the name of the burger place: Wonder Burger. It made Nevins sad to see it, because it was his human’s favorite place to eat. With a heavy heart he pressed the button and typed the order. He paid for it using his human’s credit card. It would be delivered to the house.
While he waited, he pressed the button of the dispenser for the dry cat crunchies which he ate every morning. He loved the mixture of chicken, beef and fish flavor. His fountain circulated cold water. I love the way this water stays fresh.
The wind gusted even more. Hmm… Now, how do I get the boy here? Do I go over to the clubhouse and speak to him? Do I coax him over to the house by meowing? I’ll just have to wing it!
He jumped through the cat door and sprinted across the street. The cars always drove so fast that he had to be careful. One time he started across the street and a car sped up and tried to hit him! Humans could be so rude at times.
But he wasn’t going to let that bad experience stand in the way of trusting the boy. After all, how many cats have scratched a human? He used all his cat skills to sneak up to the clubhouse.
“Meow.” The boy did not hear him. So, he let out his most pitiful, “Meow! Mew! Meow!”
The boy poked his head out of the window and looked down. His sandy-blonde hair is a bit overgrown for most humans.
The boy smiled. “A cat! I love cats!”
Music to my ears! This is all I need to hear to convince me I have chosen the right human.
The boy scurried down the stairs and bent down. “Ahh. You are cute. You can live with me here if you want.” The boy held out his hand for Nevins to smell it. Then, the boy petted him lightly on the head. Nevins looked at the boy’s brown eyes.I wonder how old he is? He is very thin and small for a human.
Nevins tried to think of all the important things to remember about humans. He was impressed that the boy did not try to pick him up. Cats consider that very rude. The only thing ruder would be comparing a cat to a dog. That was the rudest thing in the world!
“Would you like to live with me in my clubhouse?”
Nevins was not sure this was the right time to speak to the boy. “Meow.”
The boy laughed. “O.k. I’ll take that as a maybe. Wait there.” The boy went up the stairs—barefoot—two at time and sprinted down with some of the leftover pizza. “I wish I had some fish for you, but this is all I have, and it’s pretty dried out.” Nevins politely ate a few bites.
The roar of a blue convertible sports car rounded the corner. The radio was playing some loud boom, boom, boom type of music that disturbed Nevins. The driver pulled over to text something, and the noise of the radio was so loud that Nevins wanted to press his ears all the way against his head. But the annoying music stopped abruptly, and a piercing loud beep was followed by an announcer’s urgent voice.
“We interrupt this program to give you the latest emergency broadcast!” The announcer’s voice was anxious. He stumbled over his words and took a deep breath. Nevins noticed it, but he was not sure humans could detect it. All he did know at that moment is that for sure trouble was coming and fast.
“The tropical storm is now upgraded to a category 5 hurricane. Hurricane Hector is expected to hit land tomorrow at 12 p.m. All citizens in the Corpus Christi area should evacuate immediately, especially if they are in low-lying areas.”
The sports car sped off and the voice of the announcer faded.
Jumping tuna! What do I do? Take in this young boy and reveal that I can speak?
“We’re in trouble little cat,” the boy said. “I only have this clubhouse to live in and I don’t think it will hold in a big storm. There is no way I am going to a shelter. There is an abandoned house a block away, but I’m afraid it may not hold either. Then, there is an old building four blocks from here.”
Nevins could not stand it any longer. He sat up and spoke in his British accent. “You can stay with me.”
The boy did not speak for a long time. He just stared at Nevins. “Oh, I think I need to eat something, little cat. I think I just heard you talk to me.”
Nevins spoke again. “You did. And, my name is Nevins. Nevins Davenport. I live just across the street.”
The boy fainted. Jumping tuna! Nevins thought frantically to himself. Now what do I do? He began to lick the boy’s face and slowly he regained consciousness.
The boy lay flat on the ground just staring at Nevins. Suddenly, a Wonder Burger car pulled up to Nevins’s house and a woman jumped out of the car carrying a small bag. Oh, this is a mess! I flat forgot about ordering the breakfast.
Nevins scurried quickly across the street and positioned himself behind a bush. The woman rang the doorbell. Nevins cleared his throat then said, “Just leave the bag on the small table next to the rocker. I included your tip with my credit card payment.”
The woman smiled, placed the bag on the table, and left. Nevins ran back across the street. The boy was now sitting straight up. “Little cat, did you just speak to me and tell me your name is Nevins Davenport?”
Nevins sighed. “Yes. And, I am trusting you.”
The boy looked at him and smiled. “Thank you. My name is Clay. I’m an orphan. My parents died in a car accident a year ago. I lived with my grandmother on Elm Street, but she passed away a month ago.”
Nevins interrupted, “Listen, I want to hear your whole story, but we need to get to my house.”
Clay nodded. “Let me just get my things.” He ran up the stairs and came down with a small white plastic grocery bag. “Ok, let’s go,” Clay said as he jumped down the last two steps. They quickly crossed the street and walked up the steps to the front porch.
“The Wonder Burger bag is for you,” Nevins said. “I ordered you some breakfast. Come inside and we can talk.” He stood up on his hind legs, reached with his two front paws, pulled the handle down, and opened the heavy oak door.
Follow Mays Publishing
Nevins thinks things are going to finally get back to normal after the court trial over custody of Clay. But the problems are just starting in this much-anticipated sequel
Chapter One
Nevins Davenport, a proper British domesticated cat, yawned and curled up at the foot of his bed where he liked to rest. It was midnight. Time for a long sleep. He closed his eyes and counted tuna jumping. Ah, how relaxing.
This night was like any other. Life had settled into a pleasant routine after winning the court battle for custody of Clay. The annoying newsmen had stopped coming around, and Clay was doing well in school.
As each tuna jumped, Nevins felt calmer and soon he dozed off. Nothing could rouse him from his peaceful slumber.
Except for that persistent scratching at the front door.
“Scr…scr…scratch!”
One eye popped open. What was that?
“Enough!” he whispered annoyed, jumping off the bed. His tail swished vigorously left to right as he briskly padded into the living room being careful not to wake up Clay. His claws lightly tapped the wood floors. I wonder if I should call Robert? No, there’s no time! I will deal with this myself! I can’t understand why my house is always the target of a burglar! The last time I had to fight an intruder was after the hurricane. I clawed that guy. I am so annoyed with this that I may bring on a full cat fight! Doesn’t anyone know you should always let a sleeping cat Purr?!
He crept up to his cat door, carefully unlatched it, and peeked out. A gust of wind blew in his face. The smell of cedar trees mixed with rain filled the air. He saw two black, furry legs and a bushy silver and black tail.
It was Reginald the Raccoon with Pearl the cat standing on his shoulders trying to ring the doorbell!
“What are you two doing?”
Pearl gingerly hopped down landing on all four legs with a thump.
“We were trying to ring your doorbell,” Reginald explained. “But Pearl kept clawing over it.”
Nevins’s whiskers twitched. “Are you serious?! It is midnight. I know you both stay up at night but this is ridiculous.”
Reginald took a deep breath and let it out slowly before saying, “Nevins, we have a big problem, and we need your help.”
Figuring he needed a comfy chair to hear their problem, Nevins hopped out of his cat door onto the porch of his white bungalow house. The cool wind blew in bursts scents of oak and cedar trees mixed with green grass and a refreshing hint of rain. The smell comforted Nevins as he jumped up on his old, white rocker that belonged to his late human, Walter. It was at times like these that he missed him the most. “O.k. What is the problem?”
Follow Mays Publishing
Nevins 3: The Ark
Chapter One
Plucky
Nevins Davenport, a proper British domesticated cat, lay in bed trying to get some sleep when he heard the throaty squawk.
“Jumping tuna! Jumping tuna!”
It was Plucky, Mrs. Peabody’s parrot!
Nevins hated being disturbed on a Saturday morning, especially at 6 AM. The most annoying thing about Plucky was that he was imitating Nevins’s favorite expression.
“Jumping tuna! Jumping tuna!”
A series of squawks followed.
Nevins jumped out of bed and scurried to the kitchen, where Robert stood over the coffee pot. “Can you hear that?” Nevins asked.
Robert nodded. “Yeah, I don’t know what to make of it.”
Nevins’s temper flared. “Robert, there is a noise ordinance in this city! We can’t live with that!”
Robert, who always tried to defuse any potential fight between Nevins and Mrs. Peabody, just nodded in agreement. “Maybe the parrot will calm down after a while.”
“You can’t be serious! She taught that bird my favorite line, ’jumping tuna,’ just to irritate me! Well! I’ll show her!” Nevins pulled out his cell phone from the kitchen drawer and was about to dial the police non-emergency number when suddenly, the parrot began to squawk, “I’m sick! I’m sick! I’m sick! Need help! Need help!”
Nevins froze. Robert and Nevins looked at each other. Clay, now twelve years old, walked into the kitchen, followed by Harold. Clay yawned, “I can’t sleep with that bird.”
Harold added in his cockney accent, “I’m no expert on parrots, but that last bit sounded a bit desperate.”
Robert furrowed his brow. “Maybe I should go over there and see if everything is all right.”
Everyone followed Robert out of the kitchen, through the dining and living room, and out the front door. They all stood on the porch. The thick, sticky humidity clung to them immediately. July is always unbearably hot and humid in the summer in Corpus Christi, Texas. It just gets worse until about November. Daylight had not yet crept in—darkness enveloped them. The smell of freshly cut lawns filled the air. The wind blew in the direction of Mrs. Peabody’s house and swirled around them with the added scent of roses.
The parrot squawked again, “Jumping tuna! I’m sick! Need help!”
Robert put on his flip-flops and ran down the porch stairs. Nevins, realizing that this may be serious, followed him. Clay was about to tag along, but Nevins stopped him. “Harold and Clay, it would be best if both of you stayed in the house.” Nevins noticed the rebellion on their faces. He had to think fast. “Look. We need to split up because we don’t know what we’re dealing with.” Perfect move on Nevin’s part. Clay and Harold exchanged knowing looks of agreement and silently went back inside the house. Nevins turned and ran to catch up with Robert, who was already knocking on Mrs. Peabody’s front door.
“There’s no answer,” Robert said, ringing the doorbell. “I may have to break the door down.” He tested the locked door.
“Jumping tuna! Don’t do that!” Nevins exclaimed. “Look, I’ll just run around the side where that annoying parrot is perched and see what I can find out. Stay here!”
Nevins ran to the side of the house. He stopped just under the window. He was older and admittedly much heavier. And now, out of breath from running. His vet had been on him for the last few years to lose weight. He hated to admit that his weight was that of a human child—twenty-two pounds! But he knew a cat can always jump—or keep trying.
He made it up the windowsill on the third attempt. Not bad, Nevins thought. He pressed his face against the metal screen of the open window. The parrot, startled, flapped its wings vigorously and squawked. Nevins ignored the bird and waited patiently for his keen cat eyes to adjust—for only a cat could truly see in such low lighting.
A dark figure, Mrs. Peabody, lay motionless on the floor.
Nevins yelled, “Dial 911! Emergency! Jumping tuna emergency!”
Robert was already giving directions to the dispatch operator when Nevins rejoined him on Mrs. Peabody’s porch.
“Yes, the neighbor is a lady who lives alone. 326 Morningstar Drive. Can you repeat that last question? My phone cut out.” Another longer moment passed before Robert spoke again. Nevins was getting agitated. Even Robert seemed annoyed even though he remained calm. “I would say she is about 70 years old. One moment, let me find out.” Robert looked down at Nevins and quickly asked, “Is she conscious?”
Nevins rolled his eyes. “What part of emergency does this operator find confusing?! No, she’s not conscious! Give me that phone!”
He jumped up on his hind legs despite his weight and grabbed it out of Robert’s hand. “This is Nevins Davenport speaking. Mrs. Peabody, my neighbor at 326 Morningstar Drive, is passed out cold on her bedroom floor! Is this your first job! Send an ambulance post haste! She is a human of about 70 years old, and no nine lives left!”
Nevins hung up abruptly. Robert exclaimed, “Nevins! You should not have hung up!”
Nevins’s tail fluffed up to three times its size. This only happened when he was about to attack. “Listen, Robert! Humans are absolutely stupid when it comes to emergencies! I have had quite a bit of experience in these matters! Walter, my human, might have lived if that ambulance had gotten to him sooner! And, the way they drive zigzagging through the city! I should know! When poor Clay was injured, I rode on top of the ambulance that drove him! No! Don’t argue with me about how to talk to a dispatcher….”
The roaring sound of emergency vehicles drowned out the rest of Nevins's yelling.
A police car, an ambulance, and a fire truck pulled up. Three firemen quickly broke the door down. Two police officers, followed by the emergency medical technicians, rushed inside. One of the officers turned to Robert and Nevins and said, “Stay here.”
A few minutes later, they rolled Mrs. Peabody out on a stretcher, attached to an IV and wearing an oxygen mask. One of the police officers carried the parrot in a cage. “This must be her pet. Here,” she said, handing the cage to Robert. “You’ll have to look after the bird. Does Mrs. Peabody have any relatives? We’ll need to contact them.”
Nevins told the officer about Mrs. Peabody’s closest relative and how to contact him. “Fine. We’ll contact you if we have any further questions.”
“What is wrong with Mrs. Peabody?” Nevins asked.
The officer shook her head. “Not sure. I heard one of the technicians say it may be COVID. It’s a good thing you called. She may have died.”
The first rays of daylight broke through the clouds as Nevins and Robert watched the ambulance drive away, followed by the firetruck and police car. They made their way up the porch and stopped at the front door. Plucky broke the silence.
“Jumping tuna! Jumping tuna! Jumping tuna!”
Carol Mays writes about talking cats. In her Nevins series, after helping everyone, Nevins finds love.
An excerpt from Nevins 3 The Ark
They rounded the corner just as five houses in a row had sprinklers spewing water in every direction all at once. Nevins, furious, took off in a full run. Harold took this moment to turn his waterproof phone back on and record the entire scene. Clay and Thor ran up and around each yard. Robert sauntered through the spritzing water enjoying the refreshing coolness. When they made it back to their house, Nevins was perched on his rocker, licking his fur down.
Thor hopped up the steps. “See! I told you a walk is healthy—and a run!”
Nevins stopped licking, “Thor, I told you I hate running, and I HATE water even more!”
Harold, Clay, and Robert laughed so hard they each bumped into the other on the way up the porch steps. “I don’t see what is so funny!” Nevins exclaimed.
Clay was the first to catch his breath from running and laughing, “It’s your hair! I mean, fur!”
Nevins looked in the window and saw his reflection. He had licked the fur on top of his head into the shape of a mohawk. Before Nevins could smooth it down, Harold snapped a picture and posted it. “Harold!” Nevins yelled, trying to make his fur cooperate with each lick and paw stroke. He was about to give Harold a full piece of his mind when suddenly a huge moving van pulled up and stopped in front of the house next door.
Everyone froze on the porch, waiting with bated breath. Who could it be? Then, a black Cadillac parked in the driveway. It was difficult to see because a huge hedge blocked the view for Harold and Nevins. “Hey, cousin! Jump on the railing,” Harold whispered excitedly. Harold made it to the edge of the railing in just one jump. Nevins had to maneuver from a side table to the nearby chair, and then he stepped up to the railing and carefully waddled his way next to Harold.
The driver of the car bent down in the seat as if to pick something up. Then, one of the guys from the moving van got out and opened the side passenger door of the Cadillac. No human feet jumped out. Harold and Nevins just looked at each other.
“Ghosts?” Harold whispered.
“Not exactly,” Thor said as he perched his front paws on the railing to balance himself. When Nevins looked back in the direction of the car, he could not believe what he saw. The most beautiful white Persian cat with green eyes and a diamond collar glided across the lawn and up to what used to be Mr. Bickle’s house. “Crickey!” Harold exclaimed.
Nevins was speechless—and in love. Then, without warning, a man stepped out of the driver’s side of the car and hollered, “Hello, neighbors!
It was Wallace Davenport, and with that revelation, Nevins, shocked, fell off the railing and into the shrub.
Chapter One
George stared at the pretty girl at the adjacent picnic table. She sat with her family, all of them blond and perfect, the men in boots and starched jeans, the women in western skirts. In contrast, he sat with his family, eleven Greeks, enough for a football team. They wore their ethnic uniforms—floral dresses for the women and khaki work pants for the men. The only variation was One-Eye, his great grandmother, who always dressed in black.
The girl stared back.
He tried not to get excited, assuming she was looking at something behind or beyond, and he only thought she was staring at him. That was how life worked. You got all stirred up by the proximity of all that beauty and interpreted events from your own pathetic bias and escalated from staring to gawking to outright ogling only to realize she was looking at the big, strapping high school fullback who happened to be standing behind you.
There was no one else around, though. She laughed like she knew what he was thinking,
A breeze gusted off the bay and rippled through her hair, which was wild and free, not like the coiffed helmet hair of the other women at her table. She wasn’t dressed like the others either. She wore faded jeans and a white muslin cotton blouse that rustled in the breeze along with her hair. She looked like—a hippie.
He sat fused between Mother and Uncle Nick. The Holy Trinity they were. Nick checked his Rolex, and Mother checked her Lady Seiko. While the white people had better clothes, the Greeks had better watches. Nick swapped marijuana for them, and everyone had a good one, even One-Eye, who could barely see and was too senile to tell time.
George looked at his, a Timex chronograph with dials, a stopwatch, and a display of the phases of the moon. It was almost time to meet the courier, so he ratcheted up the flirtation, leaning toward the girl and smiling big.
She smiled too.
Mother noticed the drama and raised an eyebrow. When Nick saw what was happening, he shuddered. In their Pantheon, skinny blondes were right up there with demons, and they did not want George tempted. He, The One with the Precocious Vocabulary, would be needed in the inevitable battle with their sworn enemy, Lazarus.
Bold action was needed if he were to get her phone number. Rising from the cement bench, extricating himself from the suffocating embrace of family, he unfurled himself to his full five foot seven inches and fixed a steely, manly gaze on her.
She looked him up and down, and he started toward her.
She stood too!
Everyone at both tables froze, their mouths in mid-chew, forks in mid-air. It looked like a tableau on the Parthenon. Only One-Eye didn’t know what was happening. Her empty socket, permanently shut from glaucoma surgery, faced the girl, so she didn’t see a thing, and she kept yakking in Greek about some dispute over olive groves back in her village when she was a girl. Finally, even she realized there was a problem, and she turned and focused her good eye on George and then at the temptress. When she realized the girl was a xenia, a stranger, her mouth dropped open in shock.
An older man, had to be the girl’s father, stood and grabbed her wrist to keep her in place, and a young man jumped up and stood in front of George. About George’s age, but a full head taller, he wore fancy snake-skin cowboy boots and a bright blue shirt with pearl snaps. What a caricature of a cowboy. He had a square jaw that jutted forward; his pearl snaps glistened in the sunlight. He leaned forward and scowled. Was he her boyfriend? That square jaw beckoned, and George was about to punch it, knowing the guy wasn’t expecting it. How surprised would he be when his head got knocked back? His eyes would roll up in their sockets, and his body would crumble and fall to the ground.
Merriment reigned in the rest of the park. People sang happy birthday at one table, men drank beer and turned steaks on a grill at another, teenagers threw a softball in an open field, children played tag, squealing with delight.
But that was all far away. All that existed was that jaw. And the girl. What would be the outcome of that blow? A race riot? Would the others in the park be drawn into the melee, choosing sides based on skin color? Would the hostilities escalate into the looting of nearby stores? Would it rival the Detroit race riot of the previous long hot summer? Would it be called the Greek vs. Cowboy Fourth of July Barbecue Riot?
“George,” the voice of reason called. It was Mother, standing behind him, talking in his right ear, putting herself at risk if the punches flew. “What are you doing?”
What was he doing? Fighting over a white girl he didn’t even know? The laws of the cosmos were immutable, set in concrete, etched on stone tablets. White people stayed with white people. Brown people stayed with brown people. Blacks stayed with blacks. And Greeks remained with Greeks. He would be a fool to chuck two thousand five hundred years of collective Greek history into the wastebasket to chase after a white girl.
He stormed past everyone and headed toward the bay.
But when he looked back, she was looking at him. Framed by the green grass and blue sky, she hadn’t moved.
That made him stop.
Who said everything was preordained? It was 1968, for God’s sake. The world was going crazy. Boys were letting their hair grow long, and girls were burning their bras. Kids were smoking pot and listening to rock and roll records and fucking people they barely knew in the back seats of their parents’ cars. Why couldn’t he have a girlfriend who wasn’t Greek?
Her father had a firm grip on her wrist, though. She squirmed, but he wouldn’t let go.
Lest he turn into a pillar of salt, George turned and kept walking, lust bubbling inside him like he was a cauldron.
Chapter Two
The fragrant salt air and sea breeze calmed him. He walked past the jetty to the crowded pier where fishermen hawked their wares. One fisherman, big and burly, stood in front of his boat. His face was sunburned and peeling, one of those pale faces that probably never tanned but went straight from white to red. He had a gap between his two front teeth. A younger man, barely older than George, stood behind him and scowled to reveal an identical gap between his front teeth. Had to be father and son.
“Help a good ol’ Texas boy out,” Gap-Tooth the Father called out to a young couple strolling the pier. “Buy a few fish from me. When I fill out my income tax, I can’t put that my occupation is a lady’s man. I’ve got to make at least a few sales to stay legitimate.”
The couple laughed and gave him money. The Father wrapped the fish in newspaper, but they didn’t like the smell and shoved them back. They let him keep the money, though. What a sweet deal. Gap-Tooth could report the cash or not report it. He could eat the fish or resell them. There was no way for anyone to know if there had been any fish at all.
Was this something his family might apply to their own business?
Pondering this, he hiked back. Mother and Nick waited at the picnic table, pacing like they were outside a hospital emergency room, both obsessively checking their watches. As soon as they saw him, they waved frantically. “Time to go,” Nick yelled.
Only fossils of the girl remained. Half-eaten platters of barbecue, a Styrofoam cup with lipstick on the rim, crumpled-up napkins.
Nick owned a Greek-blue 1958 Olds. George settled into the back seat and waited for them to say something about the girl. Any second, like predators, they would pounce. They never yelled, never hit. They relied on shame. A head shake and a disapproving glance punctuated by the word for shame—dropeé— hurt more than a punch.
Mother turned to him. Her face was grim. He braced himself.
“Lazarus’s brother got out of Joliet prison today. We got word right before the picnic.”
This wasn’t what he expected. He knew Lazarus had a brother, but he’d been in prison forever. They rarely talked about him.
“His name is Joey, right? And Lazarus and Joey are identical twins, right?”
“Yes,” she said.
He waited for her to elaborate, but she didn’t. And she never said anything about the girl, either.
They stored the marijuana at Nick’s house, a massive two-story Victorian on a tree-lined boulevard of meticulously maintained mansions in The Land That Time Forgot. Once the homes and second homes of oil millionaires and rice farmers, this one had fallen into Nick’s hands. George didn’t know what he’d done to get it, but you didn’t get big houses for selling watches and marijuana.
It had grown steadily more dilapidated over the years. The porch sagged, weeds choked the yard, and most of the gingerbread and spindle decorations had fallen from the roofline. Desperate to hang onto their village roots, they maintained a chicken coop alongside the house, unfazed by the fact that the neighbors would have nothing to do with them and never even said hello.
Nick ran inside, carefully stepping over a loose board in the steps, and emerged a minute later with a burlap bag slung Santa-clause style across his back. The next-door neighbor, a perky young woman, peeked out her blinds of them.
George sank into the upholstery. The world was a dangerous place. The neighbors were suspicious of them; he was lusting after a xenia; Joey was out of prison.
George and Mother lived a few miles away in a modest, two-story wood-frame house on a narrow lot between two bungalows. Its best feature, and the reason they’d bought the place, was its detached garage, which sat at the end of the driveway, and was barely visible from the street.
There was a padlock made of case-hardened steel on the side door to the garage. The neighborhood might burn down or get knocked all to hell by a hurricane, but that lock would survive.
George unlocked it and put it in his pocket, then helped them stack the marijuana bricks in the storage cabinets at the back of the garage. When the car with Illinois plates arrived, Nick raised the overhead garage door. George went into the house and watched from a window to ensure no one disturbed them. The hillbilly neighbors on one side weren’t home. Their hound dog napped on the porch. The childless couple who lived on the other side wasn’t home either. No one walked the street.
Time passed. Five minutes. Ten minutes. The padlock weighed down his jeans. He took it out and played with it, locking and unlocking it, and then accidentally dropped it. It hit his big toe. Boy, did that hurt, even though he wore tennis shoes. You could bash someone’s skull in with that.
The side door opened abruptly, and Nick tromped out scowling and raised the overhead door. He looked at George and shook his head. The courier drove away, a smirk on his mouth. Mother, also scowling, came out with two brown paper sacks with the outline of a box inside each one. Way too big for watches. They came into the house, and she set them on the kitchen table.
“Cameras,” she said. She might as well have been talking about lumps of coal. “They sent cameras instead of watches. No one up there in Chicago said anything about cameras.”
She slid a sack across to George, and he pulled the box out and set it on the table. It was a Nikon camera. He spun it around to examine each side. Maybe, if one didn’t sell, he’d get it. “Wow, this is neat. I bet it’s expensive.”
“That’s the problem,” Nick moaned. “Watches are one thing. Everyone wants a watch or jewelry, and we sell them so cheap compared to the stores that we can sell as many as we get. But these are expensive cameras. Who’s going to spend a lot of money on a camera? Maybe if we got a load of Brownies or Polaroids. You pay a few bucks for one of those, more for the Polaroid. You take them out of the box, and you get good pictures. But these cameras, Nikons, you got to pay a lot for these, and who the hell knows how to use them. Boy, Chicago got the better end of the deal on this one. They must have gotten them and didn’t know what to do with them, so they dumped them on us.”
Mother and Nick looked at each other.
“Lazarus,” they said simultaneously.
“He is behind it all,” she said. “He fixed it so this delivery would be on the same day we heard about Joey.”
The afternoon shadows grew long and melded with their gloom. One ray of light fell across the table and highlighted his skin. He was a shade lighter than everyone else in the family. That coloration had to have come from his father. He’d been told his father’s name was Mike, but he’d never met him, didn’t know if he was alive or dead, never seen a picture. He was an ancient myth. Mike came down from the heavens with wings on his cap and sandals, got Mother the Beautiful pregnant, and flew back up into the clouds.
He looked at his skin and then their darker skin.
“Lazarus is blond-headed and light-skinned, right? So I guess his twin brother is too.”
“Yes,” she said.
“Why was Joey in prison?”
“Murder,” she said.
“What happened?”
She hesitated. “We were all involved. Lazarus, me, Nick, Joey. Joey took the fall. He and Lazarus blame us. It’s how Nick got the big house. It’s why we moved down here.”
“And the murder happened right about the time I was born?”
“Yes.”
“Do you have any pictures of Lazarus or Joey?”
“We left Chicago with barely the clothes on our back,” she said. “There are no pictures.” She paused. “Look, George, there might be a fight with Joey out of prison.”
“Is there any way to avoid a fight?” George asked. “Maybe we could talk to them and negotiate.”
“You can’t trust Lazarus,” she said. “Even if he says he’s with us, he’ll stab us in the back.”
“Maybe there’s something new we could offer them to make peace,” George said. “It’s 1968. Time for change. Every day on the radio, it’s the same message. Times are changing. We have to change with them. The Beatles and The Doors and the other groups are the new prophets.”
Nick crossed himself. “God, save us! What’s wrong with the old prophets? Moses and Noah and all those guys? What kind of crazy stuff are you talking about?” He looked at his Rolex. “We’re late, we’re late,” he said like the White Rabbit. “They’re waiting for watches at The Silver Bar, and we’ve got to try to sell cameras. Come on, George.”
They’d never allowed him to go to The Silver Bar. “But I’m underage.”
Nick chuckled. “Like you said, it’s time for change. It’s time for you to go to The Silver Bar.”
As the rough beast slouching to Bethlehem, George was coming of age..
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GEORGE: THE LOST YEAR
CHAPTER ONE
George took the last puff off the last joint and wondered when, or if, Uncle Nick would arrive. Three days had passed. Very Biblical. And way too long. It was only a two-day drive from Houston to Colorado. Something bad had happened. There was only one explanation. Lazarus had killed Nick and, any second, he would break down the door to George’s motel room and shoot him too.
The roach glowed a bright red as he puffed. Little more than an ember, it stuck to his thumb. He tried to shake it off, but it wouldn’t come loose. Staying perfectly still despite the searing pain, he took careful aim with the nail of his middle finger and struck it full force. It shot forward, still burning, veered to the right, and landed in the garbage can overflowing with crumpled paper sacks and half-eaten carryout meals.
The last thing he needed was a fire. He would have checked on it, but squeaking wheels distracted him. They rolled down the cement breezeway outside his room, growing louder as they approached. It had to be Lazarus. He had come with so many guns that he needed a cart to carry them all, and they were so heavy that the wheels strained under the weight.
He got Original Sin from where he’d hidden it between the mattress and box springs and tiptoed to the peephole with his finger curled around the trigger.
It was only the maids with a cart full of towels and sheets.
A shower would calm his nerves and help him figure out what to do. He laid the gun on the bed and dropped his clothes on the floor. The warm, soapy-smelling steam enveloped him, and, like mighty Zeus, he drifted in the clouds in the celestial realms, joining Apollo, Athena, and, last but not least, Dionysus, the god of wine and revelry. There were some other Gods, but they didn’t wear name tags. A pack of hippies crashed the party. They brought lots of dope to smoke. And Kelly materialized in the mist dressed in white robes. “I’m going to give you another chance,” she said. “Don’t fuck it up.” Oh, he was glad to see her.
Feet marched down the breezeway, the sound vibrating through the thin wall. They were heavy, clunky men’s feet in hard-soled shoes. They stopped at his door. Knuckles rapped on the wood.
He crept out of the shower dripping and naked, picked up Original Sin, and put his eye on the peephole. A swarthy man in khakis and a white t-shirt stood outside. He had to be Greek, but that didn’t mean anything. There was a stain on his T-shirt, like tomato paste. That didn’t mean anything, either. Lazarus could have sent an assassin who worked as a cook when he wasn’t killing people. Life was an ongoing existential crisis. An enemy would look exactly like a friend. You never knew the truth until later, and then it didn’t matter.
Nick stepped up next to the man. In an uncertain universe, there was one constant: family. They would never betray him. George slid Original Sin back under the mattress, put on his jeans, and unlocked the door. Like a soldier on a dangerous mission, Nick stepped inside and surveyed the unmade bed and the clothes and trash on the floor. “You remember Minas, don’t you?” he said in Greek, the Marlboro in his mouth bobbing up and down as he talked. “He works here in Durango at The Golden Flame. You met him at the wedding when we met Maria’s family.”
George had only been fourteen at the time of that wedding, so he didn’t remember him, but Minas would be insulted if he said he didn’t. “Oh, yes, of course.”
They hugged like best friends.
Nick sniffed the air. “Something’s on fire.”
George smelled it too. It wasn’t the sweet fragrance of marijuana. It was a harsh, acrid odor.
A plume of smoke rose from the trash.
The roach had set the leftovers on fire!
Nick kicked the can over, scattering the rubbish across the floor, and he and Minas stomped on the embers like they were dancing the Kalamatiano.
In the room below, someone banged on the ceiling. “What’s going on up there?” a voice yelled.
While Minas continued stomping, Nick gathered the clothes strewn around the room. “The money? Did she take the money?”
“In the bottom of my suitcase. It’s all there. Fourteen thousand. Kelly didn’t take even a dollar. She’s a wonderful person. I’m in love with her, and she’s going to have our baby.”
When George had called for help, he hadn’t mentioned the pregnancy. Nick and Minas stopped, then started working faster than ever. Nick threw the clothes into the two suitcases, randomly mingling Kelly’s clothes with his. Minas stuffed all the garbage into a plastic laundry bag, moving frantically, sweeping up every last crust of bread and piece of lettuce, and even wiping the carpet clean with napkins.
When they finished, Nick snapped the suitcases shut, catching a pair of George’s underwear in the lid of one of them. The white fabric stuck out.
“Stand up,” Nick told him. George wobbled to his feet, and Nick took an Orthodox cross out of his pocket. It was beautiful with fluted gold ends. “From now on, you will wear this. We’ve got some tough times ahead. It will protect you.”
He put it around George’s neck like he was knighting him. The cross, still warm and damp from being in Nick’s pocket, settled into his chest hairs. It did seem to transfer heavenly energy. George crossed himself and put on a T-shirt.
“Let’s go,” Nick said. He hefted the trash bag over his back like Santa Claus and led them out. The sun blinded George. It was an Allegory-of-the-Cave moment. The Enlightenment was too much. When he reached the end of the breezeway, he grabbed the railing to keep from falling and looked down the steps to the ground a million miles away.
CHAPTER TWO
Sly watched Nick the Greek start down the steps with a garbage sack slung over his shoulder. For sure, it was him. He hadn’t gotten a good look at his face before, but there was no longer any doubt.
Terrified that Nick would recognize him, even though he wore dark sunglasses, he slumped down in his seat. Then, curiosity got him. What was in the garbage sack? Drugs?
He peeked over the dashboard of his rented Chevy.
A skinny kid with uncombed curly black hair was right behind Nick. It had to be the kid Lazarus wanted him to kill. He was young, really young. Probably not even twenty. He didn’t look like a badass at all, not at all what he had expected. Why was Lazarus so worked up over him?
The kid wobbled as he walked like he was really stoned. He gripped the railing and looked down at the ground like he wasn’t sure he could make it. Nick looked back up at him.
Sly should have made his move earlier when Lazarus had called with the room number. The kid had probably been alone up there. It might have been easy to kill him. But he had expected a badass barricaded in the room with guns. Sly, after all, was not an assassin. He was a singer in a rock-and-roll band, a good-looking, Mick-Jagger-lookalike with a shag haircut that made the girls scream. Demo records of his song “Chick in Slacks” were out everywhere. So far, no record producers had shown any interest, and Sly couldn’t understand why, but someone would recognize his greatness sooner or later. Sure, he’d had that setback when his enemies stole all his band’s equipment because he couldn’t pay his coke debts. They should have been more understanding. No equipment meant no gigs. No gigs meant no money. No money meant no coke. That desperation had led him to Lazarus and that dark alley, the whole thing happening so fast he hardly realized how serious it was when Lazarus gave him the gun, and he blew the guy’s brains out. He hadn’t minded killing the guy, messy as it was, but he hadn’t understood until later that Lazarus owned him after that.
The other guy followed the kid. He carried two suitcases. Since Nick and the guy had their hands full, and the kid was stoned, none of them could react fast. What if he ran up and shot all three? Would that make Lazarus happy? He never could tell how Lazarus was going to react.
What was in the suitcases? Drugs? Why else would Lazarus want the kid killed? The kid had stolen drugs from Lazarus. What kind of drugs? The sack Nick carried might hold pot, but not enough to be worth killing someone over. The suitcases might have powders, though. Maybe coke. That would be worth killing someone over.
Something white stuck out of one of the suitcases. A piece of cloth or wrapping paper? He’d seen a shipment of coke with all the plastic bags wrapped in white butcher paper. That was it. It was coke, and the wrapper around one of the bags had come loose and gotten stuck in the suitcase lid. He imagined the plastic bags. It had been almost two days since he’d had any coke, and he stared lovingly at his snorting kit on the seat next to him. He picked it up and looked at himself in its mirror. How handsome he was. Whenever he felt low, he looked at himself in that mirror and felt better.
The gun lay under the seat. For coke, he would run a risk. He put up the kit and gripped the gun.
CHAPTER THREE
George kept looking down the steps, not sure he could make it. He scanned the lot, hoping to see the beacon of solace and stability: Nick’s pride-and-joy 1958 Greek-blue Buick with the worry beads hanging from the rear-view mirror. The lot, which had been packed when he and Kelly checked in, was almost empty. There were three cars: George’s Jeep, a bright red Cadillac Seville parked next to it, and at the opposite end, a new-looking Chevy. But no Buick.
There was movement in the Chevy. A guy popped up in the front seat and peeked over the dashboard. He looked kind of like Mick Jagger with sunglasses. George rubbed his eyes, and he didn’t see him when he looked again. Maybe he was hallucinating.
The sun sparkled in his eyes; afterimages danced in his retina. Don’t turn into a pillar of salt, he told himself. One foot in front of the other. Focus on your feet. With a firm hand on the railing, he started down. His knees felt weak, and he wobbled, but he made it to the bottom without falling.
“Where’s the Buick?”
“It broke down,” Nick said, leading them to the Cadillac. “That’s why I’m so late getting here. I was getting ready to hit the road when it broke down.” He wiped a tear from his eye. “I loved that car, but look at this.” He caressed the Cadillac’s fender. “This model is restyled in the Eldorado image.” He sounded like a salesman. “The rear is extended to give it a longer look. The hood is extended too. By two point five inches.”
George ran his hand along the gleaming steel. “Wow. Very cool. Like a winged chariot. Like time’s winged chariot.”
Nick looked at him like he was crazy.
“It’s from the Marvell poem. ‘At my back I always hear, Time’s winged chariot drawing near.’ It’s a great poem. ‘To My Coy Mistress.’ By Andrew Marvell.”
Mick Jagger popped up over the top of the dashboard again and looked at the suitcases. What was so fascinating about bags filled with dirty laundry?
“There’s a guy in that car,” George said.
Nick and Minas turned to look, but the guy ducked under the dash. They turned back to George.
“He’s there. I swear.”
“Let’s get out of here,” Nick said. “Give Minas your car keys. He’s going to drive your Jeep to Austin, and we’ll pick it up there.”
When Kelly had walked out on him, he had been in emotional freefall and had done what any self-respecting Greek would do: call his mother. He hadn’t thought of the consequences. The Jeep had been his passport to a new life. By handing over the keys, he would be reabsorbed into the family. He would drive the Jeep again, but it would become part of the family motor pool, an appendage, one of many tentacles. When he had picked up the motel phone to call for help, he had willingly relinquished free will. Handing over the keys was merely the formal transfer of title.
“The keys,” Nick repeated.
What choice had he ever had?
They glistened in the sun. Nick looked at them. Minas wiped his hands on his t-shirt, evidently sensing the act's deep symbolism. Somewhat reluctantly, as if he too were making an unalterable commitment, he took them and drove off in the Jeep.
Suddenly, George remembered Original Sin.
“The gun. I left it in the room.”
“I thought you were going to get rid of it.”
He had intended to get rid of it. If he had, Kelly might not have left him. But it was the only remnant of Joey: the man who might have been his father. The man he had killed. What kind of screwed-up twist on Oedipus was that?
Surging adrenalin powered him up the stairs two at a time. A gaggle of maids were rolling the cart up to his room and stopped when they saw him. He scooted in front of them and jumped inside the room. The haze of marijuana and burned garbage lingered. He pulled Original Sin out from between the mattress and box springs, stuffed it down his pants, and raced out. The maids, frozen in place, watched.
The Seville waited at the bottom of the steps, engine running, Nick gripping the steering wheel. George bounded down the steps two at a time, feeling like he was about to jump into Time’s winged chariot or that he was the God Hermes with winged sandals and a winged cap.
Sadly, the adrenalin was draining out of him, bucket-with-a-big-hole style. His feet turned to lead, and he lost the Zen stride. The gun bounced free and flew into the air. He reached for it as if in slow motion; his fingers touched the grip for a second, but then it spun away. Off-balance, he tumbled head over heels down to the sidewalk, he and the gun hitting the ground simultaneously, the gun discharging with a loud crack.
Feeling no pain, he jumped to his feet, scooped up the gun, and jumped into the Caddy. Nick sped away; they both looked back. No one was around. The maids did not appear on the landing. No one ran out of any of the rooms.
“You okay?” Nick asked.
Expecting to see a bone sticking through his skin, or a bullet hole in his chest, he examined himself. There was no sign of injury, not even a scrape. “Yeah, I’m fine.”
Nick looked at him. “It’s the cross around your neck. It protected you. Don’t ever take it off.”
George looked back. The Chevy was rolling out of the parking lot behind them. “We got company. It’s a guy that looks like Mick Jagger.”
Nick glanced in the rearview mirror. “Who’s Mick Jagger?”
“A rock-and-roll star.”
“Everybody tries to look like a singer these days. I can’t tell them apart.” He looked in the mirror again. “We’ll drive on for a way. If he doesn’t follow us, we’ll stop at a payphone and call your mother. If he follows, well—”
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George: The Final Days
George realizes that his nemesis, Lazarus, plans to kill him. His girlfriend Kelly, offers to help. All she asks is that he help her kill her husband. In this third book in the Saga of George series, George navigates the seamy world of the Greek mafia with its restaurants, bars, churches, and complex family relationships. The mobsters may be killers, but they are deeply religious. George travels from Houston to Chicago and even to Greece as he plans his counterattack. His long-suffering wife, Maria, stands by him, but Kelly has a hold on his emotions. Is she really out to help him, or is she part of the plot against him? BUY NOW
George: The Final Days
CHAPTER ONE
Crack, crack, crack.
His wife and his petherá were cracking pecans in the kitchen, the sound louder as he approached.
They scowled when he reached them.
“What?” he asked in English, trying to sound innocent.
“We need to talk to you,” his wife, Maria, said in Greek.
He held the attaché case with the monthly bribe money at his side. “I have to go to the mall. Can it wait until I get back? I won’t be gone more than a couple of hours.”
She laughed. “Yesterday, you left in the afternoon and said you’d get back in a couple of hours, and you didn’t get home until three this morning.”
They always assumed he’d been out with a girlfriend, which, in this case, was true. “I know, I know,” he moaned. “There is so much to do. Two big events back to back. My trip to Chicago, then back here for the memorial. It’s hard to get it all done.”
They cracked hard like they were smashing his nuts; their movements synchronized as if they were different appendages of the same being. Dark-haired and large-breasted, dressed in black, obviously mother and daughter, they might as well have been in a Greek village instead of Houston.
The oven glowed red. Bowls and baking pans covered the countertops. They were making baklava. He walked to the window and pressed his palm against the glass to feel the warmth. Outside, the sun shone bright in the cloudless sky. Their gardener roared past on a ride-on mower, leaving a wake of grass blades on their acre of manicured lawn.
Across the street, an old blue Impala sat in the shade under an oak. The driver, a big guy, was looking at George’s house.
When the sound of the mower faded, George’s petherá—his mother-in-law—hissed like a rattlesnake. “Sit down.”
The petherá had her place in the universe along with the serpents, mosquitoes, cockroaches, and the various assorted plagues and calamities. George accepted God’s plan even though he did not understand it. He slid into his chair at the head of the table.
“We can get Jimmy and the Corinthians for the memorial,” Maria said. “They were supposed to play at a wedding, but the bride ran off.”
“Ran off?”
“She ran off with her exercise instructor. A woman!”
They all crossed themselves.
“That’s great news,” he said. “About Jimmy being available—not about the bride running off with another woman.”
“Yes. Jimmy’s expensive, but how many more times will my father be dead for five years?”
Few people deserved less fanfare than old, dead Manoli. Even his demise, a heart attack after gorging himself on lamb at a wedding and then dancing a fast Kalamatianó, left little to admire. But the memorial wasn’t about him. It was about George’s career, and no one sang the old songs better than Jimmy. That would impress George’s mob brethren.
“You need to stop at the Zeus and Hera on your way back from the mall,” she continued with barely a pause. “So many people are coming that we need to make sure there’s enough food.”
“Okay.”
“And the equipment rental company called. Do you want Doric or Ionic columns? They need to know today.”
George always got the two types confused. He thought the Ionic style was fancier, with fluted ends, but he wanted to be sure. “I’ll call them.”
They started cracking again. He tossed a pecan in his mouth and looked at the large framed picture of his boss—Pano—on the wall. The squat, bulldog-looking man looked back.
“When he comes down here to the memorial, it will be the first time he’s been to Houston since I was a boy. It is quite an honor.”
They looked at it, too, and crossed themselves. “I talked to his wife today,” Maria said. “She said he hasn’t been feeling well the last few days.”
“Pano’s not feeling well? What’s the problem?”
“Indigestion.”
“That can be a sign of heart problems.”
“The doctor saw him today and says he’s fine—just a little tired.” She paused. “Have you chosen his gift?”
“Yes. I have it at the art gallery.”
They stopped cracking and looked at him.
“That is one of the reasons I was out so late last night,” he lied. “I have it in the safe at the Crossroads.”
“What is it? An icon? Wine glasses?”
“I’ll bring it home today,” he said with a smile as he popped another pecan in his mouth.
Maria nodded and took a deep breath. His petherálooked from her to him. Well, here it was: the reason for their conversation.
“Pano’s wife said they’d like to see the Space Center when they come down, and, of course, I told her you and I would take them.”
“Yes, of course.”
“And Lazarus and his wife want to go, too.”
The pecan caught in his throat, and he choked.
Maria and his petherá slapped him on the back. The pecan flew out of his mouth and landed on the floor.
“Lazarus tried to kill me,” George said when he finished gagging. “More than once. It’s bad enough that I have to have him in the house, but now you’re asking me to chauffer him to the space center.”
“There’s been peace for so long. Pano told him to stop trying to kill you. We have to include Lazarus and his wife.”
George hated Lazarus, but the scumbag convert would never dare cause trouble with Pano around. Besides, by taking them around town, George would look noble. It would help prove he was the appropriate successor to Pano when the old man finally croaked. “Alright, alright.”
They resumed their cracking. “If you’re worried about things, you need a bodyguard. A man in your position needs one. I always tell you, get a bodyguard, get a bodyguard, and you never listen.”
To George, ‘bodyguard’ meant ‘chaperone.’ He did not want anyone to know who his girlfriends were.
“And get rid of your art gallery,” she added. “Everybody knows about it. If someone wants to kill you, that’s where they’ll do it. People think you’re getting soft with that damn Crossroads Art Gallery.”
His petherá tapped her head with her finger. “Your brains are soft like yogurt.”
George grabbed the attaché case and started toward the door.
“Don’t be late,” Maria yelled after him. “I’m cooking chicken and potatoes. It’ll be ready at five. And don’t forget to stop at the Zeus and Hera on your way home. And don’t forget to call the rental company.”
The suffocating, humid air clubbed him when he stepped outside. There was no breeze; the tyrannical yellow sun hovered over the spires of their Victorian house; moss hung straight down off the live oaks. Sweat gushed from his body, and God’s plan became clear. This was a foretaste of Hell, where he was sure to spend all eternity.
The gardener rounded the house at full speed, looking like an Indy race car driver. Not wanting to kill the famed mob boss, he veered sharply, and a gust of wind, probably the only gust during the whole fucking day, caught the clippings and showered them on George. It was hard to look sophisticated with grass blades fluttering about you, but he never faltered in his practiced nonchalance as he sauntered forward and slid into his long, lean black Jaguar. Pressing the accelerator down, he escaped up I-45, the air conditioner on high, all the vents pointed at his face.
There was no escape from his life, however. He would have to take Lazarus and his wife to the Johnson Space Center along with Pano, his wife, and Maria. That sounded like a miserable afternoon.
He looked in the rearview mirror. The blue Impala was on the road a few car lengths behind him, but then it dropped back and disappeared. BUY NOW
CHAPTER TWO
His art gallery, The Crossroads, sat on a prime corner on the mall's second level. It was a light, airy space with abstract prints, mixed-media sculptures, and oil paintings of stark desert landscapes. He got little pleasure from it that day because his hatred for Lazarus burned inside him. He raced to his office and called the equipment rental people. They verified that the Ionic columns had fluted ends.
The clerk knocked on the door. “A woman came by an hour ago and asked for you.”
“What was her name?”
“She didn’t say.”
“What did she look like?”
“Sandy blond. Attractive. Fixed up. Late thirties or early forties.”
That brightened George’s mood. “She asked for me by name?”
“Yes.”
“Anything else distinctive about her?”
“She wore an expensive-looking purple dress.”
Who could she be? Probably someone he met at one of the gallery openings. “If she comes back, get her name and phone number.”
He locked the door and opened the wall safe. Inside was only one item: a wooden box lined with purple velvet. It contained an icon of the Virgin Mary. The iconographer had painted her face onto the cypress in the traditional Byzantine style. Each brushstroke and color was perfect. Silver inlay radiated from her like a halo; the encrusted jewels and enamel glowed. Even though he wasn’t devout, he had trouble catching his breath and automatically crossed himself.
Specially made in Greece and shipped directly to the gallery, it was bound to be the best gift. “Eat your heart out, Lazarus, you scumbag convert,” he said aloud. “You’ll never beat this icon.”
Feeling secure, he carefully placed it back in its box and marched out with it in one hand and the attaché in the other.
A purple dress caught his eye like a shiny lure that led a fish to certain doom.
An attractive woman stood outside the gallery, looking inside through the floor-to-ceiling window.
While he loved women in all shapes, sizes, and colors, he particularly loved those who looked like Kelly, the girlfriend of his wayward teen years. And this one sure did look like her. She had a trim, athletic body and an exotic, slightly angular—almost Greek—face.
He stopped and took a full, lusty drink of her beauty.
It had been twenty-three years since he’d seen Kelly. She was bound to look different, but, damn, he thought it was her.
A brunette walked up next to her and, motioning to another store, pulled her away.
He ran into the hall as the purple dress disappeared into the crowd. Shoppers blocked his path, their arms laden with God knows what—handbags, shirts, blouses, jeans, household knickknacks, cutlery, baby clothes, fine chocolate.
When he finally broke through, she was gone. He looked left and right; he raced forward, then doubled back. Then, he walked down each hall, peering into the stores, but never saw her or her friend. She had to be in one of them, and he even stepped into an elegant women’s store with displays of evening gowns because he thought that was the kind of place where she would shop.
She wasn’t anywhere he looked.
Finally, he gave up and rode the escalator to the food court. Roberto waited. In a dark suit, tie, and a crisp white shirt, his high school buddy—now a State Representative—sipped an espresso at a bistro table overlooking the ice skating rink.
An attaché case sat on the floor beside him. It was identical to the one George carried, except it had a dent. George had bought them to exchange money and documents, but then he saw a movie about accidentally-switched briefcases. He had agonized about the possibility of such mistakes, but the problem had solved itself when a drug runner went crazy, and George hit him in the head with one attaché, crushing his skull. The impact left a slight dent in the case, distinguishing it from the other.
“You’re late,” Roberto said, looking nervously one way and then another. As a kid, he’d gone by the nickname Beto but stopped using it when he graduated from law school.
“Yeah, sorry.”
“I want to start meeting somewhere else.”
George thought to remind him who had bankrolled his political career, but he let it go. “Okay.”
“Is everything the same? The same amounts to everyone?”
“Yeah, no changes.”
Roberto snatched the case with the money and strolled off without saying goodbye or looking back. That was how things had become between them. Could he be trusted in the clutch? That was something to worry about another day. He put the box with the icon into the dented attaché and wandered the mall, looking for Kelly, finally working his way back toward his gallery.
There she was, standing by herself.
They moved to each other like magnets.
“Where’s your friend?” he asked.
“She had to go home.”
He couldn’t believe he was standing there with her. “It’s been twenty-three years,” he said. “We only live a few miles from each other, but I never see you.”
“Yeah, life’s a trip, isn’t it.”
“You talk like a hippie.”
“Not usually. Seeing you makes me feel like a hippie again. I remember when we eloped and smoked a joint on the Interstate.”
They stood there, inches apart from each other. The shoppers passed all around. He wanted to pull her close and kiss her. “Why are you looking for me?” he asked.
“My friend wanted to meet for lunch, so I told her to meet here.” She pushed her sandy hair behind her ear as she did in the motel on the highway when they sat naked and cross-legged on the bed and planned to elope. “I got to the mall early and stopped at your gallery.”
“How do you know about the Crossroads?”
She laughed. “Everyone knows about the gangster that owns an art gallery. It’s not something you’d expect. A strip club? Yeah, people would expect a gangster to own a strip club. But not an art gallery. Why’d you buy it?”
“You know, I wanted to be a photographer and have my work displayed in galleries. My dream slipped from my grasp, along with you. The Crossroads is my consolation prize. The previous owner was in trouble, so I got it cheap. It’s a bad investment, but I enjoy seeing the art and meeting the artists.”
The dress clung to her taut, luscious body like Saran wrap. “You’re more beautiful than ever,” he said. “And my God, you are as adventuresome as ever to come looking for me after all these years.”
Her eyes twinkled. “I’ll never forget when we got off the road in the desert. I can still hear your boots crunching on all those loose rocks as you climbed that hill.”
“It’s funny now, but it wasn’t funny then. When I got to the top, I looked in all directions. There were no roads, no sign of life. Only desolation and dust swirling around me in the hot, dry wind. I thought we’d die.”
She touched his face, letting her fingers rest on his cheek. “Oh, George, my life turned out bad. I never loved Clint, but it keeps getting worse.”
“What’s going on that’s so bad?”
She shook her head and let her hand fall to her side. “I shouldn’t have come here. But I’ve never stopped thinking about you. We always had a spark.”
An orchestral rendition of “Raindrops Keep Falling on My Head” played on the overhead speakers, and he felt all sappy, like a stupid, lovesick punk teenager. A mannequin in a three-piece suit looked at him from a store window. Its sober face warned him not to be a sucker for her again. He had to keep his mind on business.
“Don’t go,” he said.
“Meet me tomorrow. At six.”
No, no, no, he couldn’t meet her. His whole future depended on what happened in the upcoming days. He had to go to Chicago and sit with his mob brethren, and then he had to return to Houston and pretend he was mourning for his worthless father-in-law.
But it was like they were teenagers again, meeting in the park, leaving notes for each other, fucking in the backseat of her car. The blood rushed from his head, banishing rational thought, making him little more than an amoeba responding to an overpowering stimulus. The words came out of his mouth of their own volition. “There’s a place. Very private. Jean Paul’s.”
“Is that another one of your places?”
“Yes, I own it.”
“I know where it is. I’ll be there at six.”
She turned and disappeared into the crowd.
He stood there a long time and never once thought about Lazarus. BUY NOW
CHAPTER THREE
Lazarus laid the three guns on the kitchen table of his love nest, a second-floor walk-up in a Chicago brownstone. Which one to use to kill George? The Ruger Standard was a strong contender. With its blued carbon steel finish and wood grip, he was proud to have it in his arsenal. However, the Ruger MK II was equally impressive and accurate at a distance. But the Baretta 71 was excellent too. It was small and lightweight and could fit in a pants pocket. All three were cold and had never been fired during a crime.
Many guns had presented themselves to him over the years, but only these three had what it took to be finalists.
One and only one could be chosen, and with Pano about to die, the time had come to decide.
Their barrels were smooth. He ran his fingers over each one, hoping to get some signal from his twin brother, Joey. Nothing could break their connection—not even his death at the hands of George.
When he massaged the Baretta, he heard Joey’s voice from the other side.
Avenge my death.
Lazarus held the pistol aloft. “Is this the gun to use to kill George?”
Yes.
He crossed himself. “I will avenge your death, my brother! You can count on me.”
His plan was a thing of beauty. He had been bribing Pano’s doctor for years. When the doctor realized that Pano had only a few months left, he told Lazarus first, and Lazarus threatened him with a slow, painful death unless he told Pano he had years ahead of him. Then, Lazarus got everyone to tell George’s wife that they needed a big memorial celebration. Distracted by the preparations and his womanizing, George hadn’t noticed that people were following him. Already, Lazarus’s head assassin, Lemuel, was in place. As soon as the memorial ended and Pano and Lazarus flew back to Chicago, Lemuel would put a bullet in George’s brain.
It was time to go to The Pink Stiletto, so he wrapped the guns in their colorful oilcloths and stored them in a cabinet over the sink. Constantly vigilant, he looked out the window down at the street. Nothing unusual. He shook the iron bars; they were secure. He went into the walk-in closet. A trapdoor led to a crawl space between his apartment and the one on the other side, but it was nailed shut. Solid and secure. Then, he walked to the front door and looked through the peephole. No one in the hall. No one on the landing.
As quietly as possible, he undid each lock on the door and stepped out into the hall. There was only one other apartment on his floor. He’d never met the tenant, but Lazarus only came in the afternoons and only two or three times a week.
He padded down the steps, surprisingly quiet for a big, beefy six-foot man, and slid into his Lincoln parked behind the brownstone. He swept the remaining strands of his blond hair back on his head as his steel blue eyes scanned the alley. There was nothing unusual, nothing out of place.
People snapped to attention when he arrived at his strip club. He was Lazarus The Great. Everyone watched him, and he had to act like a silly, lovesick old man so no one would suspect he had murder on his mind.
The host escorted him to his table in front of the stage. A waiter brought him his ouzo and Greek salad as soon as he settled into his seat. Soon, his moussaka would arrive. It had been the same for years. Chefs came and went; girls came and went. The food remained the same: burgers and ham sandwiches for the customers, off-the-menu Greek plates for him and his friends. Employment depended on how good the moussaka was. His blood might not be Greek, but no one loved all things Greek more than he did.
One of the new girls gyrated to disco music and glided to a stop on her knees in front of him. He appreciated her efforts and slid a hundred-dollar bill into her G-string. The next dancer was a cowgirl with boots and a cowboy hat. She knew how to shake her butt, which was also worth a hundred bucks.
The maître d’ marched to the microphone. An old burned-out junkie, he wheezed into the microphone as a waiter set the moussaka in front of Lazarus.
“And now, it’s time for Darla. You all know her. No one shakes it like her. She is—” He checked his notes. “—unrivaled. This is her new routine. We are debuting it this afternoon for all our loyal afternoon customers. Come back tonight for a repeat.”
The house lights dimmed, and a single spot focused on the stage door. Darla came out dressed as a Greek goddess, all wrapped up in white robes with her hair curled up on top of her head. She had told Lazarus that her outfit would be a big surprise, and it sure was.
Arms outstretched, she twirled around on high heels, the spotlight following her as Lazarus bit into the creamy goodness of the eggplant and noodles. She looked down at him, and he raised his glass to her.
The music started. It was a Tsifteteli, belly-dance music. She threw off her outer robe to reveal a sheer white see-through gown underneath. Dancing in time to the music, she shook out her long, dark, Greek-looking curls. The crowd went wild as she and her curls spun around.
Lazarus smiled big because people were expecting him to get all excited. He thought about the Beretta pressed against George’s skull, the steel pressing against the bone. “Thank you, Joey,” he said under his breath. “Thank you for showing me which gun to use.”
The music climaxed as Darla stripped down to a G-string. Boy, she was a marvel. Thin waist, big tits. The best body that money could buy. But the best thing about her was that she was a loudmouth. She blabbed every detail about their sex life. Now that Lazarus could finally get it up again, he wanted everyone to believe that sex was the only thing on his mind. No one would suspect what he was planning.
As her tits rotated in the same direction, like propeller blades, he rose to his feet and clapped longer and louder than the others. He whistled and put a hundred-dollar bill on each side of her g-string and one in the middle. She leaned down and kissed him. The crowd cheered. For sure, they thought he was a lovesick fool.
When she ran off stage, he sat to finish the last creamy bites of his meal in peace, but wouldn’t you know it, Paul, his henchman, came into the bar.
It had to be bad news.
Paul wore cowboy boots and jeans like he'd always done since he’d first gone to Texas to spy on George. Lazarus had been born German but tried endlessly to be Greek; Paul had been born Greek and tried to be the Marlboro Man. Life was all fucked up like that.
“Pano probably won’t go to church tomorrow,” Paul said, talking low, trembling with fear. He was endlessly loyal, but Lazarus hated him because he looked like George. “His wife was trying to reach you, so she called me. She said he’s feeling horrible.”
That was the worst possible news. His absence from even one church service would send alarm bells all the way to Texas. “Who knows how he’s feeling?”
“Just me. The doctor told them it’s indigestion, nothing to worry about. So far, they seem to believe him.”
Lazarus lost his appetite; his fork clattered to the plate. The dark pit of his rage sucked him down, but he took deep breaths and clawed his way back up to the surface. After years of faithful church attendance, lighting candles, and doing his cross at the right time, God didn’t have the decency to let Pano last a few more days before everyone found out how sick he was.
“We strike now,” Lazarus said.
“Now? Before Panayías?”
“Yes, now. George will turn cautious if Pano misses any church services. He’s not stupid—just all mixed up with his girlfriends and planning a fancy memorial celebration. Your spies are watching him around the clock, right?”
“Yes. Round the clock.”
“And Lemuel is there and ready?”
“Yes, I talked to him a few hours ago.”
“Call him right now and tell him to kill George as soon as he gets the opportunity. Two bullets to the head. Tell him not to fool around.”
“Have you chosen a gun? I could drive it down to him right now.”
“I have chosen a gun, but there’s no longer any time. Tell Lemuel to use any gun he wants. But shoot him now.”
Paul hurried out of the Stiletto. Even though Lazarus had lost his appetite, he managed to force down some of his moussaka. As he had spies following George, George probably had spies following him. Everything had to look normal. Between bites, he whispered to his brother. Joey, I know you wanted me to kill George with the Baretta. But if we get a chance to get him beforehand, we’ll have to do that. I hope you understand.
No answer.
He thought of the words from the Trisagion for the dead and clasped his hands together in prayer.
O Lord, give rest in a place of light, in a place of green pasture, in a place of refreshment, from where pain and sorrow and mourning have fled away.
He noticed that the guy with one hand was staring at him. He had been coming for years and always sat at a table near the restrooms. He came looking for pussy and hired the older girls who didn’t charge much. Lazarus had even seen him in church but never talked to him. He thought his name was Sotiri.
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