Local Writers and Special Guests

Jason Bond is a Corpus Christi native and teaches fourth grade. He lives with his beautiful wife, Rose. When not taking care of his cat and dog, Jason loves to read and write. His hope and dream is that someone else enjoys his imagination. 

Brian watched Timmy reach as far as he could under his bed. Imagining his chubby fingers tiptoeing like spider legs over dust-bunny covered Cheetos or long-lost Lego pieces or whatever else might be under there.

“Got it!” Timmy whispered and pulled the tattered shoebox out into the light of the flashlight he had resting on his lap.

The black and yellow box was covered in sunflowers. Although all of that was almost impossible to see through the layers of Scotch tape and endless yards of twine that Timmy had placed around it. Brian, unfortunately, had to help his mom wrap Christmas presents last year and knew all about how much tape to use and where to hold his finger so his mom could tie the bow. But Timmy’s box looked nothing like that.

“It’s in here. I had to wrap it up pretty tight. I didn’t want it getting out. I mean, what if it can get through the cracks somehow, or worse, pop itself open like a Jack-in-the-Box.” Timmy’s voice sounded excited and out of breath even though the two of them were just sitting there quietly on their sleeping bags. 

Timmy clutched it tight. Little beads of sweat were making their way down the side of his cheeks. Brian wanted to reach out and grab it out of Timmy’s hands and rip it open to see its contents. Another part of him wanted to either hide under the folds of his sleeping bag and zip it up like a human pupa, or run out of the bedroom and not stop until he was safe across the street and back in his own bed. Finally, after sucking up as much courage as his seven-year-old body could contain, he reached out and asked to hold it.

“Hold on. Let me tell you about how I got it first, and if you still want to hold it, I will let you. But you have to promise me that if you do hold it, you will hold it like it’s a bomb or something like your life depends on it.” Timmy said seriously. His eyes stared at Brian, never blinking. 

Brian nodded.

“Ok then. I was out behind my house, you know where they are putting in all those new apartments. And I was just looking around for stuff. You never know what you might find when they start digging things up. Well, I was hoping to find an arrowhead or maybe some like cool animal bones, when I hear a voice coming from one of the buildings. The walls were barely up, and you could see all of the wires and pipes like the intestines of a huge robot. My dad would tan my behind if he caught me snooping around there, and I was about to high-tail it back home, but there was something in that voice that I just couldn’t walk away from.”

Brian didn’t say a word. He was no longer looking at the box in Timmy’s hands but instead staring into the frightened look on his best friend’s face. The dim light of the flashlight teased the shadows and turned the cozy bedroom into an endless labyrinth of shadows. Brian could hear the air conditioning and the steady rhythmic squeak of the ceiling fan overhead, but other than that, the house was dead silent. 

Timmy continued, “I had seen where the workers had been earlier in the day. The place was littered with cigarette butts and Styrofoam cups. That was when I heard the voice of a girl about our age. Sounded like she was playing by herself around the corner. Her voice changed the closer I got to it. Brian, I ain’t kidding. The closer I got to her, and the deeper I walked into the back end of that building, the older the little girl seemed to get. And another thing, it wasn’t getting louder. Before I knew it, I had walked beyond the middle of all that wood and nails and stuff, and still, instead of her voice getting louder and clearer, it was the same faint sound coming from just beyond wherever I was turning.” 

Brian now wished that he had gone with his second option and just ran home when he had the chance. It was too late now. He was in deep. Timmy had been his best friend since kindergarten, and he had never seen him like this. The whole time he shared his story, Timmy’s voice was never above a whisper, but Brian didn’t think that it had anything to do with Timmy’s parents downstairs. The fact was that he had never seen his friend scared. 

“The old lady, that’s what the voice sounded like at the end, wasn’t talking to me.” Timmy looked down at his box but still told his story to Brian, “It was talking about this. ‘Keep it safe. Keep it safe. Keep it hidden.’ It just repeated those words over and over again.”

Timmy held out the box to show Brian the patch-work taping job that he had done. In barely a whisper, he said, “There is another box inside this one.” He looked around the room cautiously as if someone or something might be trying to listen in to their conversation. 

“Wh-wh-what d-d-oes it l-l-look like?” Brian stuttered. The shoebox seemed to shake in Timmy’s hands, and Brian couldn’t tell if it was it was because his friend was scared or whatever it was inside was trying to get out.

“When I turned the corner around a huge stack of lumber, I found the shoebox. The old lady’s voice was whispering about it until the very end, I mean right until the second I saw her. I ain’t kidding Brian. I think I saw her. She was just a mist. She was like the opposite of a shadow. For the life of me, I couldn’t breathe, and my legs wouldn’t move. I was paralyzed, and I could feel my heart beating. I could hear it too. That was when she moved.” His body had become a little ball. He had curled into himself, trying to be as small as he could.

It was Brian who was now paralyzed. His friend’s words hung in the air like a noose, and Brian was afraid that if he did manage to screw up enough courage to look to his left or his right and into the darkness, then whatever was hiding just beyond would reach out, and he would disappear forever. 

“Then she turned to look at me. She looked right into my eyes. ‘Never open it. Keep it safe. Keep it hidden,’ she told me in her creepy old lady voice. Then, she just wasn’t there anymore. It was like the wind just blew her away. Not really away, more like apart.”

“So, what’s inside?” Brian asked. 

“A smaller box, only it’s not made out of wood. I don’t know what it’s made out of. It’s like it’s made out of like some kind of white stone or rock or something. It was dirty, and it had like this wax seal over the opening. I didn’t know what to do. It was getting late, and I knew that my mom was going to be calling me in for dinner pretty soon, so I just grabbed it and started running. I didn’t stop running until I was inside and upstairs. Mom yelled something to me about running in the house and slamming the door, but I wasn’t listening. I just ran to my room and put the box on my bed.”

Timmy’s posture relaxed a bit, and he leaned back letting a few rays of the flashlight’s beams come between him and his friend.

Brian relaxed too. “So why did you wrap it up like this if it was already sealed up?” 

“That’s the thing. The ivory, or bone, or whatever it is made from is cracked all over the place. I was staring at it on my bed, and all I could think about was what if it cracked, or I dropped it? So that is when I came up with this.” Timmy said and held up the box. 

Brian didn’t know what was hidden in the white box that was held in the taped and mangled shoebox, and after Timmy’s story he was quite sure that he didn’t want to know, that was until it started to whisper to him in the dark. It had taken what Brian had thought were hours before he was able to fall asleep. He could hear Timmy’s slow and steady breathing from the sleeping bag not too far away and knew that his friend was sound asleep. This was Brian’s first sleepover, and he was so excited that his mom and dad had said yes. His mom thought that he was too young, but his dad had convinced her that he was getting old enough to sleep across the street without the world coming to an end. As Brian lay there sleepless in the dark, he was pretty sure that his mom may have been right.

 “Please help me.” the mysterious voice pleaded. Brian sat up straight with the sleeping bag still zipped up tightly around him. To him, it sounded like a child. He couldn’t have been more than three or four. “Let me out.” the toddler’s voice pleaded. Timmy’s light snoring was unaffected by the tiny whisper of a voice coming from the deep corner under his bed. Brian, on the other hand, was wide awake now. The little boy’s voice continued to talk to him.

“Brian, your friend was so nice to bring me home. Please let me out. I’m so scared in here all alone.” His faint words floated like a cloud. No, like a mist. 

Brian slowly unzipped his sleeping bag. He should have been more afraid. In fact, he should have shaken his best friend like a cup of Yahtzee dice so they could both have gotten the hell out of there, but instead, he crawled toward the sound. His knees made a shuffling sound across the dark blue nylon of his bag, and he stopped just short of the edge of Timmy’s bed. 

“I just want to be free and go home. I miss my mommy and daddy so much. Please, Brian, let me out.” His voice sounded older now. Not louder or stronger, but now he sounded like a boy that could have sat next to him in Mrs. Nelson’s class. 

Brian now understood why Timmy had been drawn to the voices that he had heard in the empty construction site. The curiosity drove him forward. No matter how logical it might have been to just run away or wake his friend, the only thing Brian wanted was to get to that box. Luckily, his arms were much longer than his friend’s, so he had no trouble reaching under the bedding and into darkness. Brian looped his index finger around the loose twine and pulled the shoebox to him. 

“Timmy lied to you. He opened the box. He just didn’t tell you what was inside, because he didn’t want to share it. He wanted to scare you away from it, so you wouldn’t even try to open it.” The voice became the voice of a teenager. “It’s filled with gold coins. That’s right! It’s filled with gold coins that Billy the Kid himself stole off a stagecoach. It’s worth a fortune.”

Brian had no choice. He had to open the shoebox. He wanted to see what was inside for himself. He wanted his half of the treasure that his so-called best friend was hiding from him. He began to pull and tug on the string that was knotted and bent in around the sunken cardboard. Once he pulled so hard that his elbow hit the corner of the bedpost, and his funny bone screamed back in anger. Brian was afraid that the noise was going to wake Timmy, and his friend would angrily grab all of the coins for himself. When Brian had removed all of the string and had tossed it behind him, he started to work his way around the edges of the box to where Timmy had layered the tape. The tape bunched and tightened as he pulled, but before too long he could see the tiniest of slivers inside revealing the corner of the alabaster container. 

This time it was the voice of a man, a voice that reminded Brian of his father. “That’s it, son. You are almost there. I am so very proud of you. You are so brave. Don’t stop now.”

The whispered sounds of the man filled the dead silent bedroom. Brian thought for sure that it would wake Timmy from his deep slumber, but his friend lay there corpse-like. If it wasn’t for the steady movement of his chest, Brian wouldn’t have been too sure. He tossed the mangled black and yellow shoebox on the bed triumphantly and held the cracked treasure in his hands. “What am I doing?” Brian whispered to himself. For the first time since he had been awakened by the eerie voice of a small boy tempting to help him, he realized what he was truly doing. He was just about to toss the box across the room having it shatter and splinter into thousands of minuscule pieces when the spirit spoke to him again. 

“Not just gold, but a secret,” the elderly voice crackled. “That’s what this box contains. Don’t turn chicken on me now, boy. Just break the seal, and all will be yours and yours alone.” 

Brian had never been good at keeping secrets, and more so, he hated to be called a chicken. He no longer cared about the misty figure that had shown his friend the box and the warning that it had whispered to him. He no longer cared about making too much noise and waking Timmy up as he slept soundly just two feet away. All Brian DID care about was getting to the golden treasure and the secret that he now held in his hands. In fact, the more he thought about it, the more upset he got knowing that Timmy was trying to keep it all to himself. So much for his so-called best friend. 

When Brian broke the seal, immediately the ivory box began to glow, first a wonderful golden yellow, and then a bright white. “It’s the gold!” Brian thought. The once dark room filled with radiance. “It’s beautiful.” And then the box began to feel warm, not just warm, but hot. The wax seal began to melt and drip like a candle onto Brian’s sleeping bag. Finally, Brian couldn’t take the searing heat any longer and dropped the box at his knees. That was when he noticed the thin white mist that seemed to slowly swirl and circle. It originated from the bright white rectangle and like a ghostly tornado quickened and swirled clockwise to the ceiling. 

“Yessssss! Freeeeee!” the entity hissed. 

The objects on the shelf behind Brian began to shake slowly and then more rapidly and then after teetering back and forth, fall off the edge. T-ball trophies and books crashed to the floor. The lamp on Timmy’s desk rattled and then fell onto the carpet. The specter wailed and spun around the room. It seemed to float through certain objects and smash into others. The tail end would turn to a fine mist and pass through the bedding, while other parts would throw clothes and toys like projectiles toward the bedroom walls. 

“What did you do?” screamed Timmy. Now wide awake, his eyes were transfixed on the ghost that filled the room. “What did you do?”

“I-I-I wanted the gold coins. You w-w-weren’t going to share.” Brian mumbled. 

“What are you talking about? Brian, what did you do? I was supposed to keep it safe.” Timmy was yelling and tears streamed down his reddened cheeks. 

The spirit seemed to solidify the more and more it flew around Timmy’s bedroom. The blue and white striped sheets on the bed were caught up in the swirl of mist. The room became a roaring echoing tornado of debris. There was a frantic pounding on the bedroom door as Timmy’s mother and father tried to get inside to protect their little boy, but it was too late. Their muffled screams coming from the hall seemed miles away. Timmy’s parents were helpless. 

Brian picked up the open box at his knees and held it up to the sky as if the creature would have somehow changed its mind and returned to its prison. Although the sides of the box burned his hands and begged him to let go, Brian held fast and determined. At the same time, Timmy stood at the door in his pajamas turning and twisting the doorknob in every direction hoping against hope that it would open as tears blurred his vision. 

“I’m sorry! I didn’t know!” Brian yelled to Timmy from across the bedroom.

Everything seemed to happen at once. The ghostly spirit shattered the window causing shards of glass to shoot around the room almost blinding Brian. He screamed at the entity and managed to cover his eyes with the sleeve of rocket ship pajamas. The bedroom door burst open as Timmy’s mother and father fell into the room almost crushing Timmy underneath them. Timmy thankfully had his soaking wet hands slip off the knob causing him to fall on his tailbone into the soft padding of his sleeping bag. 

Then the room went silent. The cool night breeze from outside blew the curtains inward and chilled the sweat on Brian’s brow. Timmy’s father helped Timmy to his feet, and they all stood to stare at the broken window. His mother bent down to pick up the alabaster box with the broken wax seal. 

“Keep it safe,” Timmy said, but his voice trembled, like he knew it was too late.

I was back at the same old Stripes Market trying to find something, anything with a label. Anything at all that I didn’t have to spend thirty minutes prying open just to find out that it was filled with mushy yams or even worse, cranberry sauce that looks like the inside of the can when you shake it out. They used to say to never eat from a dented can because somehow that makes all the dangerous lead or tin or whatever leak out into the food, but now that is all that is left. I didn’t make it through all these months just to die of lead poisoning or tetanus.

She was right outside the window. Sure, the window was filthy, but I could still make out her gentle child-like smile and the way she focused that smile at me before she disappeared. Her raven hair was matted, oily, and thick, but so beautiful in the way that it still managed to blow in her face. 

Deep Breath. Everything is going to be okay. I AM NOT GOING CRAZY! I know she is real. She has to be. 

After I saw her, I carefully placed the can of “mystery meat” back to the dust-covered shelf and as quickly as I could, made my way to the front entrance. I remember when they would magically open with a swish when you stepped on the mat as if you were a brave knight entering an ancient castle filled with mystery, but there is no more magic and all of the mystery leads you straight to horror. Now as the noon-time slipped quickly into the afternoon, I had to slide myself sideways through the cracks in the shards of long broken glass. I reminded myself that you can’t make too much noise. That’s the way they find you. That’s how you end up one of them. But all that silence was for nothing because she was nowhere to be found. Not even footprints in the dirt of the empty sidewalk. I could have sworn that she pressed her hand against the glass, but not even a fingerprint. How is that even possible? 

Read the rest in Corpus Christi Writers 2020

 Jimmy Willden is an award-winning writer and filmmaker. He is also an American musician and composer. After beginning his career in music in 1998, Willden has since forayed into the world of filmmaking, winning several festival awards as director and screenwriter. He is also an accomplished journalist. 

At some point, the alcohol in my bloodstream subsided long enough for me to become

slightly coherent. I found that I was in some small inn, somewhere in Colorado, sitting in a chair

by the window. The blinds were open, and I was just staring off at the open Colorado skies that

lay beyond Interstate 76.

I blinked, and rolled my head around, but my useless body couldn’t stand the weight of it;

it fell to rest against my shoulder, as I stared at my feet. On the floor next to my bare feet was an

empty liter of whiskey. I tried to breathe, but the rotten smell of dried vomit permeated my sense

of smell, and instead, I gagged.

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 Hailing from humid ,sunny southern Florida, John's interest in the strange, melancholy, and macabre began when he chanced upon a copy of Bram Stoker's Dracula at the local library at age 12. More books would soon follow starting with Edgar Allen Poe's works and the bizarre, dark realism of Kafka. It was H.P. Lovecraft that most gained Mr. Balfour's attention, however, upon leaving him quite unsettled after reading "The Call of Cthulhu". Later, he realized it was because of the bleak implications for humanity present in Lovecraft's work and the impressively oppressive mood he was able to create. John seeks to emulate the philosophy of cosmic horror in his own writing by creating characters whose horror comes just as much from the mundane world, as the metaphysical one.  buy his work

Martin Gerber was a small man, always dressed in a white shirt, grey pants, and a rather ugly green tie with pictures of golf clubs covering it that his wife had gotten him. He did not like golf, or any sport for that matter, but it had been a birthday present, and he had little care for fashion, so he wore it exclusively in appreciation as much as apathy. Large black-framed glasses were the only thing that stood out on him, though they were not really large so much as they only seemed so on his face. His accounting job and routine schedule to and from it completed the picture of an uneventful life.

Now, small, unassuming men need not have small, unassuming minds. And an observer might believe Martin to have a fantastic intellect, or imagination despite his appearance. They might believe such a thing as they stared at Martin drinking a cup of tea on the bench in front of the bookstore where he spent his lunch hour, his line of vision fixing on nothing in particular for very long, inevitably ending up somewhat north of his dull brown shoes, and they would be completely wrong. There were no great gears turning under his thinning hair and no big ideas bursting out of his tightly-shut mouth. He had little to say on any subject outside his work, of which he was not that interested in discussing, and did not feel inferior because of this. Everything was as it should be in his eyes. One had to be economic not just in action but in thought, and if anything he said could be classed as a real opinion, it was that people wasted life on pointless thought. In this way, he largely ignored everything superfluous to his little corner of the world.

His most effective way of accomplishing this was a decision to never consider anything outside his home and office too closely, which, on this particular Tuesday, he went against. It was a normal day in all respects; he had finished with his numbers and was on his way to the bookstore, stopping first at the cafe next to it for his tea. What made him stop and examine the bench was the sign placed on it stating that it was wet with varnish. Wet. With. Varnish. For some reason he could not process the meaning of those words and stared at the bench uncomprehendingly, realizing after a minute that he had never actually looked at the bench he sat on every day, thinking of it as a thing with a name. It was just something hard he sat on. Now he could not stop looking.

 Not only could he not comprehend the words, but the bench was something utterly alien as well. What was it? Tentatively, he reached out and gripped the backrest, then pulled away from its cool, sticky surface, wiping his hand absently on his white shirt, leaving a crimson stain. Martin did not notice the manager of the bookstore looking at him from the door, nor the woman behind him trying to decide if she should attempt to get by him or not. He did not notice anything but the bench with his handprint on it, and could not stop wondering why it existed. The only thing clear in the quickly forming fog invading his mind was that he would not be getting back to work.

Jody Heymann is a fiction writer and has been living in Corpus Christi, Texas for most of her life. She is a retired Emeritus Professor from Del Mar College. Jody taught English Literature for over 42 years. Jody and her husband, Dr. Hans Heymann have contributed greatly to the community in which they lived. Dr. Heymann even brought the first blood bank to Corpus Christi. Jody’s books,  Greystone’s Dilemma and The Lady Killers: A Thriller are entertaining reads.  

When a popular Texas State Senator running for reelection hires an assassin to solve his problem with a demanding young lover, he gets more than he bargained for--a murderer who enjoys his work, a media eager to exploit the scandal, and two detectives hired by the coed's parents to find their daughter...  

Read more in Corpus Christi Writers 2019.

Joshua Espitia is an award-winning author of short fiction, playwright, journalist, and former managing editor of The Windward Review. You can find his political commentary, satire, and God-awful attempts at comedy in The Vent Daily on a semi-regular basis. His poetry can be found on the digital journals South Broadway Ghost Society and Spank the Carp, and in the upcoming issues of Voices Arts and Literature Journal and The Windward Review. Joshua resides in Corpus Christi, Texas, where he works as an educator with the Corpus Christi Museum of Science and History.

Please insert or swipe your card.

Wait that breathless few seconds

for approval or denial, validation

of your financial well-being, your

fiscal responsibility, an adulthood

confirmed by your ability to buy

this fancy loaf of San Francisco

sourdough instead of plain, white

Wonder Bread for that sandwich

waiting to be built in the kitchen

of the efficiency you worked so

hard to afford-

Transaction declined.

Oh, well.

The buck eighteen in loose change

jingling around in your jean pocket

will buy store-brand sandwich bread.

And the rent isn’t due until Tuesday. 

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Jill Hand is an award-winning fantasy writer. Her novels include White Oaks, Rosina and the Travel Agency, and The Blue Horse. Follow her: https://www.amazon.com/-/e/B06Y4K5JWC?fbclid=IwAR0LkfrwNwKqlHAxuFF6WU6fLAifZrc3itMhE4AZ47nnzwMDt6CcHycqht8

One Thanksgiving my mother made a turkey out of Spam. I'm not sure why she did it; she could have gone to Hinck's and bought a freshly killed turkey the way she always did, but instead she chose to craft one out of multiple cans of Spam. She may have got the idea from one of the women's magazines that flourished at the time.They had all kinds of weird recipes back then, things involving aspic and fondue and marshmallows stuck together to form snowmen with chocolate chips for eyes and licorice whips for scarves. It was food as art rather than things intended to be eaten, and my mother was an amateur artist, the daughter of a portrait painter and a clothing designer. Art in the blood, as Sherlock Holmes noted, is liable to take the strangest form. In Mom's case it took the form of crafts, crocheted ponchos and macrame plant-holders and quilts and upholstery and once, notably, a Spam turkey. While it looked uncannily like a roast turkey, carved drumsticks and all, it tasted like Spam, which wasn't what the rest of us wanted for Thanksgiving dinner. There was an angry scene, with tears and recriminations and then we all went to a restaurant. It has since become one of my favorite Thanksgiving memories. Happy Thanksgiving, everyone!   

Facebook thread started by Jill Hand, with comment from Mary Holland.

JILL HAND: While working on the new book I think about books that don't exist but I I wish that someone had written. Here are two:
-- Michael Makes a Friend (For ages 8 and up) Michael is lonely until he accidentally summons the demon Askanzel. Together they have many adventures as Michael mercilessly slays his enemies with Askanzel's help.
-- Christmas at Holly Berry Farm (Romance) Shy Jennifer Pollard leaves her job as a paralegal at a New York law firm to take over her Aunt Daisy's New Hampshire book store. She meets Sheriff David Clifford, a handsome widower, and together they embark on an exciting project: producing exceptionally pure methamphetamine for the grateful citizens of Cobbs Corners. 

MARY HOLLAND:I’d like a book where the old grandmother turns out to be the Chosen One. She and the dragon run off together, open a coffee shop, and live happily ever after. No one saves the world but meh, who cares. 

Chapter 1: The Road Rocket

Three days before the murder a lemon yellow Lamborghini Aventador SuperVeloce swung into the parking lot of Buzzy’s General Store in Cobbs, Georgia, at fifty miles per hour, trailed by a plume of blood-red dust. Crows perched in the loblolly pines cawed in panic and took wing, startled by the throaty shriek from the exhaust and intake at 4,000 rpms.

The car slewed sideways as the driver fought for control. For a moment it appeared it might keep on sliding until it smashed into the police cruiser parked in front. Sun glare on the windscreen made it impossible to see who was behind the wheel. Whoever it was drove like a madman. What sort of emergency could have occasioned such haste?

The Lamborghini lurched to a stop a scant three feet shy of T-boning the cruiser. A fan of gravel kicked up by the big Gallardo tires clattered against the side of the cruiser with a sound like shrapnel hitting a tin roof.

The store’s screen door flew open and smacked against the ice machine, which was situated too close to the front door when it was installed, back in 1983. Gordon Buzzy had considered moving it, but he died before he could get around to it. His son, Gordon Jr., inheritor of his father’s kingdom, which amounted to the decrepit general store and the living quarters behind it, likewise thought of moving it a little farther to the right.

It goes without saying, Gordon Buzzy, Jr., not exactly being a coiled spring of industriousness, that he too would die without moving the ice machine, as would his son and his son, and so on, until either Buzzy’s went out of business or the world came to an end, whichever came first.

Boyce County Sheriff’s Deputy Ewell Haskins emerged onto the wooden porch, primed for action. In his left hand was a partially consumed moon pie. With his right he unsnapped the leather guard over the Smith & Wesson M&P .40 in his service holster. The screen door thwacked shut behind him. Above it a hand-lettered sign warned anyone having the effrontery to take the Lord’s name in vain not to expect a warm welcome at Buzzy’s, where bait, tackle, beer and sundries could be purchased between the hours of 7 a.m. and 6 p.m. every day except Sundays and major holidays.

Haskins stood open-mouthed, staring at the yellow roadster.

It looked like something from a future century, at once sleek and angular. “Hot damn,” he whispered, spying the orange and black New York license plate. A Yankee! Driving recklessly! Perhaps the Yankee speed demon was under the influence of drugs. From what Haskins understood, a large percentage of the Yankee population customarily went around hopped up to the eyeballs. If such was the case he would soon be a very sorry Yankee indeed.              

Haskins licked his lips like a dog smelling steak. The deputy still felt the sting of the conflict that a certain type of white Southerner refers to as the War of Northern Aggression. Arresting a rich Yankee who was endangering the citizens of Cobbs by ramming the roads in what amounted to a deluxe hot rod would soothe that sting considerably. It might also put Haskins in line to become the next sheriff, when the current sheriff either retired or dropped dead of the heart attack that must surely be coming to a man who weighed close to four hundred pounds and who stuffed his face with fried chicken like it was about to be banned by the FDA. Haskins rolled his eyes heavenward and offered a silent prayer to the almighty to please bring about a vacancy for the position of sheriff as swiftly as was convenient. Thank you and Amen.

Haskins squinted at the mysterious vehicle through a shimmer of heat. It was such a bright yellow it made his eyeballs throb. Who’d want a car that gaudy color? Cars should be black, white, gray, or blue, in that order. It was permissible for pickup trucks to be red; that signified a certain self-confident, assertive masculinity, but red sports cars were looking for trouble, their drivers just begging to be given a speeding ticket. A yellow road rocket like this one was utterly and flagrantly wrong, to Haskins’ way of thinking.

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