Here's some more unedited words from my NaNoWriMo project which is closing in on 39,000 words!
The deck’s door
opened with a crash. Both men looked over in surprise. Patrice snickered under
his breath. “No way, they’re letting Billy carry out the food? Wait a minute.”
Patrice rose and rescued the about-to-tip-tray from a muscular man who looked
like he had run into a wall a few too many times.
Patrice set the
tray down and grimaced. “He’s already bitching about not receiving a tip.”
“He needs to look
at it this way; if he had dumped the food in my lap, it would be worse.”
“I like your
logic.” Patrice arranged the plates. They ate in a companionable silence broken
by the occasional comment on the food. Patrice devoured his chowder and
attacked his trout in zealous hunger. He fell to eating in great dedication. No
wonder he had a cute round belly. Hindy wondered if Patrice like cooking
anything beyond breakfast? It seemed like a question he wanted to save until
later. His breakfast talent encouraged Hindy. In Hindy’s view, if a man knew
how to cook breakfast, surely he knew other culinary tricks, correct?
Hindy appreciated
how Patrice didn’t feel the need to fill the air with aimless chatter. That was
one of Tim’s worst habits, not letting silences exist as needed pauses in life,
well, that and keeping secrets.
Hindy halted in
chewing his fish and glared at the silent lake. He felt surprised that steam
didn’t puff into the air.
“Stop thinking
about Tim.”
Hindy whipped his
gaze to Patrice’s frown. “Aren’t you the perceptive one.”
“It’s obvious. You
go all weird and still like someone just punched you in the stomach.”
“Odd, Nate said
the same thing about me. He mentioned how my face went still.”
“Go me. Maybe I should
be a profiler. No way. I can’t stand murder and mayhem.”
“Then how do you
manage to draw your comic?”
“That’s not real.
It’s fantasy. Fantasy can’t hurt me. I can read a horror story for a thrill but
I know Dracula isn’t going to drop from the sky and attack me.”
“Fair enough.”
They saluted each other with their glasses and finished eating. The trout
seemed a little dry but Hindy decided not to complain. The far-off sound of a
jet soaring overhead briefly disrupted the air.
As he reached for
his wineglass, a strange whistling noise sounded above them. Their fellow deck
dwellers looked up in alarm. They scrambled from their seats toward the
building. The sound grew more pronounced. The high-pitched whistle reminded
Hindy of an old War World Two world movie starring Greer Garson.
Patrice jumped
from his seat. “Hindy, move it. Now.”
Hindy peered up in
confusion. “What the hell is…”
Patrice grabbed
Hindy’s arm and pointed up. He pulled Hindy back to the deck’s overhang. The dreadful
noise increased until Hindy saw the descending shape. He and the others tracked
the movement until an object the size of a large loaf of bread barreled down to
smash into Hindy’s chair.
He stared in
shock. Better the chair than his head! He blurted out his logic question. “What
the bloody fuck hit my god-damned chair?” Ouch, a touch too much hysterical
tainted his tone. No wonder! His brains could have been sprayed across the
deck.
“Damned blue ice.
It’s happened before.” Patrice shivered.
Arnie came
crashing through the back deck doors. His frantic stare bounced between Hindy
and the smashed chair coated with melting blue ice. “Are you all right?”
Cold sweat rolled
into every damned crack and crevice on Hindy’s body. Long wet streaks rolled
from temple to jaw. He tried to remember when he had felt this bloody
frightened. His memory reported maybe back when he was in Japan and a few men
cornered him in— common sense slammed any memory into the closet.
Not the time to
wander in his dark mental alley. He regarded Arnie in sheer disbelief. “Well I
don’t have a bloody piece of blue ice embedded in my skull, which qualifies me
as being all right.” Wait, had his voice just soared over octaves? Any pretense
at regal presentation swan-dived into the cold lake. Imagine that, lying lovers,
skateboard punks and near death cracked Hindy’s legendary composure.
Comprehension
forced his voice to rise in further disbelief. “Hold on, you mean that fucking
airplane dropped chemical shit at us? What is this, a bloody shit warzone?”
Arnie stared into
the sky. “I swear they think it’s okay to release when over the Addies. This
ugly event happens way too much around here.”
A man sporting a
dense red beard capable of housing a flock of sparrows shook his fist in the
air. “Last year one of those fuckers punched a hole in my roof!”
Another man
stomped his pink-sock-and-brown-sandaled foot in high petulance. Hindy blinked
at his deplorable fashion sense. “One of those blue ice chunks hit my Honda’s
windshield.”
“Has anyone
reported this problem?”
Arnie frowned at
Hindy in fine “duh” expression. “Yes, and they laugh at us. Claim there’s no
way of tracking the problem. They warn the airlines to check their lines.
Liars.”
Hindy tossed his
hair in rage. “Fuck, would they laugh if I had been killed by that falling
mess?” He stared at the hovering Patrice. Suddenly rainbow feathers swirled in
the air around the thin black braids. The shape created a colorful halo around
Patrice’s head. Reality kicked Hindy’s mind. “You dear man, you saved my life.”
Hindy lunged forward and kissed Patrice in full-throttled passion. He vaguely
heard the cheers surround him. He hugged Patrice close until only a dragonfly’s
wing separated their chests.
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