Chapter 1
Carleigh closed the door behind her and stopped mid-stride when she recognized the heavy footsteps. Her body tensed, then began to tremble. The brassy taste of fear filled her mouth. She slid her backpack around, pressed it protectively against her stomach, and became statue-still.
Appearing to concentrate on the bare floor in front of him, a man with a weathered complexion and muttonchops tramped down the hallway. His right hand clutched a Budweiser, left hand a cigarette.
Dean.
She took a step backward. A floorboard creaked. She sucked in a sharp breath.
Dean's head snapped up and he slowly arched one eyebrow. “Well, now.”
Carleigh squeezed her backpack and focused her eyes on the wall behind him.
Dean inhaled a long drag from his cigarette and came to within a foot of where she stood. “Didn’t hear you come in, precious.”
The stench of nicotine and alcohol assaulted her nostrils. But she held her position, feet and hands frozen in place.
Dean tucked the Marlboro between his lips, reached out a calloused finger, and stroked the side of her face. “Where you been?”
Recoiling from his touch, she jumped sideways. Hatred lurked behind his eyes, as obvious to Carleigh as his gold-capped teeth. He pulled back his finger. “That how it’s gonna be?” He took another deep drag and drained his beer. “Don’t think so.” He held up the can and crushed it. “Listen here, young lady, we ain’t finished. Not by a long shot.”
Carleigh flinched, but kept her gaze steady. She thought about running but knew
it would be futile. Even inebriated, he’d catch up with her. She’d learned that the last time he came home wasted. A shudder ran down her spine. She lowered her gaze to a spot on the floor.
Dean exhaled a cloud of smoke in her face. With a snicker, he chucked the beer can across the room.
Carleigh looked up and saw him heading toward the door. Good riddance.
But before he reached the end of the hall, he paused and turned to her. Carleigh could hear her heart pounding. He folded his arms across his chest and shot her a razor-sharp look. “You tell your momma, I’ll be back. Tell her we got…unsettled business.”
Carleigh's throat muscles constricted. Business, no doubt, meant money or drugs. Regardless, Dean certainly would return. She tried to swallow, but her mouth was too dry, the room too warm.
Two men appeared at the door. Muscular. Bullnecked. Matching Neanderthal brows. “That everything?” one of the men asked.
Dean motioned toward the kitchen with his thumb. “Two more. Rest is garbage.” He let out a soft laugh. “Let ’em have it.”
Carleigh looked down and dug her fingernails into her palms. After everything Dean had done, did he have to shame them as well?
The men went into the kitchen, and each came out carrying a large cardboard box. As they walked through the foyer, she heard them mutter something about her and share garbled laughs. From the corner of her eye she caught them gawking at her breasts, just like Dean always did. She hunched her shoulders, moved her backpack to cover her upper body, and kept quiet. Experience had taught her the less she said to adults, the better.
Dean finished his cigarette, flicked it onto the floor, and crushed it beneath his heel. While it smoldered he pulled out another smoke and popped it between his lips. Outside, a loud car horn honked repeatedly. He pushed back his sleeve and checked his watch. “Time to go.”
But instead of leaving, he walked back to Carleigh in what to her were agonizingly slow steps. When he was inches away, he leaned down and whispered, “Don’t forget what I told you.” He pressed his finger against her cheek and ran it alongside her mouth.
Carleigh remained still as Dean moved his ragged fingernail across her neck, her collarbone, then lower. He was so close, she saw the gray roots in his beard. His hand paused in the valley between her breasts. She felt his breath hot on her shoulder. Her legs quivered but she willed herself to remain steady, her heart not to beat as it slammed in her chest, her diaphragm not to expand as her lungs filled with air, her hands not to shake. She closed her eyes and forced down the panic rising from her abdomen.
Don’t move. Don’t even breathe.
She felt him pull away.
“Remember what I said,” he snarled as his boots slapped the linoleum on the foyer floor. “Tell your momma I’ll be back.”
___________________________________________________________
Robert L. Bacon
theperfectwrite.com
For authors, The Perfect Write® is now providing
FREE QUERY LETTER REVIEW AND ANALYSIS.
Post your query to mailto:theperfectwrite@aol.com (no attachments)
and visit the Sample Letters Page for examples of successful query letters.
The Perfect Write® offers comprehensive editing services, from manuscript critiques to complete revisions, including line-editing, along with query letter design and composition. For pricing, send your project requirements to mailto:theperfectwrite@aol.com.
For business applications, The Perfect Write® also offers advanced services, from designing sophisticated sell sheets to crafting investor-appealing business plans for start-up enterprises. For a customized quote, please send your detailed project requirements to mailto:theperfectwrite@aol.com
Monday, May 30, 2011
Monday, May 16, 2011
BARRY FLYNN
Opening-Chapter Critique
By Robert L. Bacon
Barry Flynn Opening-Chapter Critique
by Robert L. Bacon
April 26, 2011
Hello Sterling,
If every opening chapter I received was in the condition of the material you sent me,
I wouldn't have a job. (You'll notice I wrote "was" and not "were" as the verb in this subjunctive clause, since what I'm stating is unassailable, ha ha). You're obviously an accomplished writer, and very much so, I might add.
Of course it's impossible to know the strength of a plot by an opening chapter, and literary fiction has a great deal more leeway than many other genres with respect
to pacing necessities, especially when the writer does a superb job of presenting a character with inherently redemptive qualities, such as how Barry came across to
me. (You old enabler, you.) So I can't offer anything remotely negative about your narrative, except to state that I'd like to have had something more happen with the
trio on the beach other than Barry wondering if he could latch a ride off them. And
I guess there are a few commas I might delete, but this is tomato/tomato stuff and
not even worth throwing spit at.
I'm curious what you've done with this story. Did you already have it published and just wanted to test me, ha ha? Or are you currently querying it? If you are looking for an agent, I might have one or two in mind, but I don't want to get the cart in front of horse if you've got a game plan firmly in place. Regardless, I want to wish you the very best of luck with your story. You're a dandy writer.
Regards,
Robert L. (Rob) Bacon, Founder
The Perfect Write®
Barry Flynn
PART ONE
CHAPTER ONE
Although he’d have sworn he was earning a living, Barry Flynn was out stealing again. Crabs this time, since the eel pots were empty. Blue points all of them, beauties, the color the sky might have chosen if given a choice. But of course it had no choice, and Barry would have said he hadn’t one either. He’d have said many such things, mostly bullshit, with the truth sprinkled here and there. Now though he said nothing, unable to hear himself with the motor so loud. It hung beside him on his garvey’s stern as if trying to climb in, growling an angry waah! as the boat swerved round the river’s
bend. His flat-bottomed girl, that’s what Barry called his garvey. Flat-chested too, he sometimes added. For once he wasn’t lying. The boat hadn’t a girlish curve anywhere, but was built like a box—a shallow box skidding from the bend toward a floating white jug.
Despite the tide rushing in, the jug didn’t move. It pointed down river, toward the brown bay, cutting a V in the current. Coming near, Barry twisted the throttle and the waah! subsided. The garvey’s bow lowered, and he scratched his bearded face. It was a young face, but weathered. Tired, you might say. Actually, Barry and his boat looked in about the same condition. As the boat needed paint and showed scrapes and gouges, Barry’s clothes needed mending and his hands and arms showed scars. This Flynn and his garvey, it seemed, were of the same tough Jersey cedar, but in need of an overhaul.
After drifting to the jug, the motor huff-huffing, Barry stood and reached out with his boat hook, snagging the rope tied to the jug’s handle. He tugged upward and the jug arose dripping, half white, half black with algae. For a moment he stared, as if he hadn’t noticed its two-faced appearance before. He seemed about to say something, but instead dropped the jug to the floorboards and began hauling up the rope. Soon a rusty trap broke the surface.
“Morning, friends,” he said, swinging the trap onto the gunnel. Barry smiled down
at the crabs clinging inside to the wire. “Interrupt something?” Sometimes he hated barging in on them, especially when they were eating. These crabs appeared in deep communion, and ignored him.
“Be that way,” Barry snorted. He heaved his anchor over the bow, yanked the line to set the flukes, then shut off the motor. “Be whatever you want,” he said, opening a red cooler near the stern. “’Cause soon you’ll be sautéed.” He snatched up a beer can and popped the tab. The can hissed, and dripping foam on the crabs he took a long drink. Sighing, he took a longer drink, then crushed the can and tossed it in the water. It began floating upriver.
Barry brought out two more cans, opened them, and flopped back in the stern with
a can in each hand, sipping from one then the other. He raised the brim of his greasy cap, exhaled contentedly and looked around. The Egg Harbor River was wider here near the last bend before emptying into the bay. No houses bordered the bank; just marsh, then trees. The sky was as grey as the paint on his boat, and across it, far ahead, rising from a single pale stack, stretched the plume from the power plant. It veered to the north hard and white, then spread and was gone.
“Gone where?” Barry asked. Lips pursed, he took a right-hand sip of beer. The sip continued and he felt its icy flow spread like the plume. “Everywhere!” he belched, and tossed the can.
Smiling, he turned on his portable radio. A favorite song was playing, black girls shouting, a wild saxophone, and Barry sucked down his left-hand beer and flung the can over his shoulder. From inside the trap a crab stared up at him, its mouthparts working silently.
“Don’t wait so long,” Barry sang. He stood and opened the trap. “Got to have it,” he whined, pumping his hips. The music quickened and Barry reached in and grabbed the crab. “Let’s dance!”
Holding the crab by the points of its shell, he rocked round the boat to the music. The crab tapped its claws as if keeping time. “Can you hully gully?” Barry cried, shuffling his feet, wagging his heels in and out. He scrunched his bearded face, moaning “ooh mama yeah.” Then he lowered the crab and hopped around the floorboards. The radio crackled and the black girls sang. The crab clicked its claws, the saxophone howled, and Barry’s bottom swung like a sack full of clams . . . against the trap, knocking it off the gunnel.
“Cheeses!” he yelled, lunging for the jug as the crab pinched his finger. “Cheeses Christ!” Flicking his hand he flung the crab upward, then watched it spin as it climbed through the air. At the top of the arc it hung for an instant as if grabbing hold, reaching out with its claws like a crabby star. But immediately came its tumbling drop, its awkward splash.
“Hully sea-gully,” Barry said, standing there holding the jug. The song stopped and he switched off the radio. He hauled up the trap and set it once more on the gunnel. All but three crabs had escaped. “Lucky bastards,” he muttered. Then he flipped the trap and shook it. The crabs fell into the river.
“Go on—beat it,” he said. “Old Curt Madison won’t miss you.”
After fastening the lid, Barry dropped the trap over the side. The jug leaped after it and flopped on the water. Only its white half showed again. Then Barry smiled toward the galvanized tub under the bow seat. “But you guys ain’t going nowheres.” He pulled out the tub and winked inside. Hundreds of blue crabs lay piled on one another—damp feathery crabs, bubbles at their mouths. He kicked the tub under the seat.
Kneeling at the stern he yanked the cord and the motor started. Then he pulled up
the anchor and the motor stopped—it idled, coughed and died. Barry swore loudly and threw out the anchor. He stomped back to the motor and squeezed the siphon ball on the gas line. The motor was fifteen years old, a ’60, so anything was possible. All the same, this wasn’t how he’d planned to spend his morning. “Don’t do this to me, you bastard.” He pulled the starter cord, nothing happened, and he punched the gas can, shouting, “I’m warning you,” and pulled the cord once more. The motor sputtered to life. “That’s better.” He brought in the anchor.
Soon he was heading down river. Behind him the bleach jug bobbed. The motor now released an undeviating howl and Barry, grasping its steering arm, guided the garvey around the last bend. An egret watched one-eyed from the bank. With a cry Barry couldn’t hear, the tall bird lifted its white wings and swept itself into the air, its serpent neck curved and thin legs straight, and flew slowly across the marsh. Then Barry surged out of the bend and could see, distant to starboard, the massive blue power plant, all straight lines and corners, with at its center the tall stack, and the white plume rising from the stack before catching the breeze across the bay. Beneath the plume stretched a line of grey electric towers, and beyond them, where the bay narrowed before spreading again, two shadowed bridges. Each familiar image aligned snugly
in his mind, and he was heading for the towers, cruising down the center of the bay where it was wide and deep, no longer a river, telling himself he was almost home, when the engine died again. First it made a puffing noise, “unh uh,” as if saying no.
Suddenly the bay was quiet, with only the sound of water lapping the hull. Barry sat saying nothing. He sniffed, seeking the scent of gasoline, but instead smelled the salt
of the ocean filling the bay. The tide, he knew, would be against him for hours. With
a groan he looked out over the water, toward the electric towers. He thought about crabs crawling deep beneath them, immersed in their concerns. He thought about Curt Madison’s crabs, and wondered briefly if it was wrong to steal them. Of course, he didn’t exactly steal them, or clams either, because he just took a few when needed. But he wondered if taking them was related to his engine not starting, or to other things for him not starting. “That’s stupid,” he said. “Crabs and such belong to none but theirselves.” That settled, he brought out the oars.
Apart from the slowness, there was one big problem with rowing a boat. It was something Barry had never gotten used to, although his father, Big Barry, when Barry was young, made him row boats in the rain, the cold and the heat, on the theory that a bayman should be able to extricate himself, under his own power, from any situation. “The predicaments of life,” Big Barry had said, “will sneak up and grab your posterior, and your posterior had best be prepared.”
So now a fly in the fuel line, or maybe a fouled plug had stopped Barry’s outboard, sneaked up on his posterior, and Barry was ready, could row to Atlantic City if he
had to, but he would have preferred to face forward. That was the problem—the backwardness of rowing, not seeing where he was going. Backward, maybe nothing could sneak up on you, because you were already looking back, but you could sneak yourself into a predicament just the same.
He rowed. Seated on the red cooler, with the outboard tilted up and one foot braced against the stern seat he rowed the wide cedar boat toward the power lines, toward the reach between the fourth and fifth tower . . . and farther north toward Patcong Creek where he would turn and keep rowing until he reached the boat yard. That was miles, with the tide coming in and the wind picking up. Everything was pushing against him and he felt the muscles in his back and his breath in his throat. It made him thirsty. So he opened another beer, and rowed and drank, while the waves hit the bow with a smack, smack—little shoves. The wind whistled. Then he heard something and turned to see under the power lines a cabin cruiser heading fast in his direction. “Holy shit,” he whispered, spotting the insignia of the marine police. “The bastards wanta help me.” He couldn’t allow that. Yanking in the oars he stood and waved the police away. But they came near.
“You okay?” a skinny officer shouted, standing by the transom as the boat slowed. Barry knew him—Sergeant Brochard.
“Getting my exercise!” Barry shouted back. “Fitness first, I always say!”
“Need a tow?” Brochard yelled.
Barry with a smile gazed down at his feet. “Nah—I got all ten. You go chase some robbers.”
Something about the joke made Brochard grimace. “Right,” he said. He gave a nod to the helmsman and the boat sped away.
“And while you’re at it, fuck yourselves!” Barry called after them, snapping a jaunty salute.
He sat down and picked up his beer. Taking a long drink, he felt the tension drain
away. That had been close. But those crabs in the tub weren’t branded like cows,
he reminded himself. “Ain’t no robbers out here, or cattle rustlers neither.” He was guiltless—Barry the Blameless, as innocent as the day he was born—and with that certainty he gazed toward the distant towers. The sun was appearing now, burning away the overcast and lighting up the water. The bay sparkled around him, and he lowered the brim of his cap as something caught his eye. Far off on the left bank, a short beach stretched in front of a big brown house. A small white house sat nearby. Three figures were leaving the brown house. They ran to the beach and seemed to jump. They merged, then separated again.
Barry watched them awhile. He finished his beer and lobbed the can toward them, then began rowing once more. He watched them as he rowed. He had seen people
on that beach before but ignored them. Now they seemed to want his attention, and
the sun was hotter, and the beach was closer than the boat yard. He turned his garvey and headed for the beach. Maybe someone would give him a lift to Vanderbilt’s.
_______________________________________________________
Robert L. Bacon
theperfectwrite.com
by Robert L. Bacon
April 26, 2011
Hello Sterling,
If every opening chapter I received was in the condition of the material you sent me,
I wouldn't have a job. (You'll notice I wrote "was" and not "were" as the verb in this subjunctive clause, since what I'm stating is unassailable, ha ha). You're obviously an accomplished writer, and very much so, I might add.
Of course it's impossible to know the strength of a plot by an opening chapter, and literary fiction has a great deal more leeway than many other genres with respect
to pacing necessities, especially when the writer does a superb job of presenting a character with inherently redemptive qualities, such as how Barry came across to
me. (You old enabler, you.) So I can't offer anything remotely negative about your narrative, except to state that I'd like to have had something more happen with the
trio on the beach other than Barry wondering if he could latch a ride off them. And
I guess there are a few commas I might delete, but this is tomato/tomato stuff and
not even worth throwing spit at.
I'm curious what you've done with this story. Did you already have it published and just wanted to test me, ha ha? Or are you currently querying it? If you are looking for an agent, I might have one or two in mind, but I don't want to get the cart in front of horse if you've got a game plan firmly in place. Regardless, I want to wish you the very best of luck with your story. You're a dandy writer.
Regards,
Robert L. (Rob) Bacon, Founder
The Perfect Write®
Barry Flynn
PART ONE
CHAPTER ONE
Although he’d have sworn he was earning a living, Barry Flynn was out stealing again. Crabs this time, since the eel pots were empty. Blue points all of them, beauties, the color the sky might have chosen if given a choice. But of course it had no choice, and Barry would have said he hadn’t one either. He’d have said many such things, mostly bullshit, with the truth sprinkled here and there. Now though he said nothing, unable to hear himself with the motor so loud. It hung beside him on his garvey’s stern as if trying to climb in, growling an angry waah! as the boat swerved round the river’s
bend. His flat-bottomed girl, that’s what Barry called his garvey. Flat-chested too, he sometimes added. For once he wasn’t lying. The boat hadn’t a girlish curve anywhere, but was built like a box—a shallow box skidding from the bend toward a floating white jug.
Despite the tide rushing in, the jug didn’t move. It pointed down river, toward the brown bay, cutting a V in the current. Coming near, Barry twisted the throttle and the waah! subsided. The garvey’s bow lowered, and he scratched his bearded face. It was a young face, but weathered. Tired, you might say. Actually, Barry and his boat looked in about the same condition. As the boat needed paint and showed scrapes and gouges, Barry’s clothes needed mending and his hands and arms showed scars. This Flynn and his garvey, it seemed, were of the same tough Jersey cedar, but in need of an overhaul.
After drifting to the jug, the motor huff-huffing, Barry stood and reached out with his boat hook, snagging the rope tied to the jug’s handle. He tugged upward and the jug arose dripping, half white, half black with algae. For a moment he stared, as if he hadn’t noticed its two-faced appearance before. He seemed about to say something, but instead dropped the jug to the floorboards and began hauling up the rope. Soon a rusty trap broke the surface.
“Morning, friends,” he said, swinging the trap onto the gunnel. Barry smiled down
at the crabs clinging inside to the wire. “Interrupt something?” Sometimes he hated barging in on them, especially when they were eating. These crabs appeared in deep communion, and ignored him.
“Be that way,” Barry snorted. He heaved his anchor over the bow, yanked the line to set the flukes, then shut off the motor. “Be whatever you want,” he said, opening a red cooler near the stern. “’Cause soon you’ll be sautéed.” He snatched up a beer can and popped the tab. The can hissed, and dripping foam on the crabs he took a long drink. Sighing, he took a longer drink, then crushed the can and tossed it in the water. It began floating upriver.
Barry brought out two more cans, opened them, and flopped back in the stern with
a can in each hand, sipping from one then the other. He raised the brim of his greasy cap, exhaled contentedly and looked around. The Egg Harbor River was wider here near the last bend before emptying into the bay. No houses bordered the bank; just marsh, then trees. The sky was as grey as the paint on his boat, and across it, far ahead, rising from a single pale stack, stretched the plume from the power plant. It veered to the north hard and white, then spread and was gone.
“Gone where?” Barry asked. Lips pursed, he took a right-hand sip of beer. The sip continued and he felt its icy flow spread like the plume. “Everywhere!” he belched, and tossed the can.
Smiling, he turned on his portable radio. A favorite song was playing, black girls shouting, a wild saxophone, and Barry sucked down his left-hand beer and flung the can over his shoulder. From inside the trap a crab stared up at him, its mouthparts working silently.
“Don’t wait so long,” Barry sang. He stood and opened the trap. “Got to have it,” he whined, pumping his hips. The music quickened and Barry reached in and grabbed the crab. “Let’s dance!”
Holding the crab by the points of its shell, he rocked round the boat to the music. The crab tapped its claws as if keeping time. “Can you hully gully?” Barry cried, shuffling his feet, wagging his heels in and out. He scrunched his bearded face, moaning “ooh mama yeah.” Then he lowered the crab and hopped around the floorboards. The radio crackled and the black girls sang. The crab clicked its claws, the saxophone howled, and Barry’s bottom swung like a sack full of clams . . . against the trap, knocking it off the gunnel.
“Cheeses!” he yelled, lunging for the jug as the crab pinched his finger. “Cheeses Christ!” Flicking his hand he flung the crab upward, then watched it spin as it climbed through the air. At the top of the arc it hung for an instant as if grabbing hold, reaching out with its claws like a crabby star. But immediately came its tumbling drop, its awkward splash.
“Hully sea-gully,” Barry said, standing there holding the jug. The song stopped and he switched off the radio. He hauled up the trap and set it once more on the gunnel. All but three crabs had escaped. “Lucky bastards,” he muttered. Then he flipped the trap and shook it. The crabs fell into the river.
“Go on—beat it,” he said. “Old Curt Madison won’t miss you.”
After fastening the lid, Barry dropped the trap over the side. The jug leaped after it and flopped on the water. Only its white half showed again. Then Barry smiled toward the galvanized tub under the bow seat. “But you guys ain’t going nowheres.” He pulled out the tub and winked inside. Hundreds of blue crabs lay piled on one another—damp feathery crabs, bubbles at their mouths. He kicked the tub under the seat.
Kneeling at the stern he yanked the cord and the motor started. Then he pulled up
the anchor and the motor stopped—it idled, coughed and died. Barry swore loudly and threw out the anchor. He stomped back to the motor and squeezed the siphon ball on the gas line. The motor was fifteen years old, a ’60, so anything was possible. All the same, this wasn’t how he’d planned to spend his morning. “Don’t do this to me, you bastard.” He pulled the starter cord, nothing happened, and he punched the gas can, shouting, “I’m warning you,” and pulled the cord once more. The motor sputtered to life. “That’s better.” He brought in the anchor.
Soon he was heading down river. Behind him the bleach jug bobbed. The motor now released an undeviating howl and Barry, grasping its steering arm, guided the garvey around the last bend. An egret watched one-eyed from the bank. With a cry Barry couldn’t hear, the tall bird lifted its white wings and swept itself into the air, its serpent neck curved and thin legs straight, and flew slowly across the marsh. Then Barry surged out of the bend and could see, distant to starboard, the massive blue power plant, all straight lines and corners, with at its center the tall stack, and the white plume rising from the stack before catching the breeze across the bay. Beneath the plume stretched a line of grey electric towers, and beyond them, where the bay narrowed before spreading again, two shadowed bridges. Each familiar image aligned snugly
in his mind, and he was heading for the towers, cruising down the center of the bay where it was wide and deep, no longer a river, telling himself he was almost home, when the engine died again. First it made a puffing noise, “unh uh,” as if saying no.
Suddenly the bay was quiet, with only the sound of water lapping the hull. Barry sat saying nothing. He sniffed, seeking the scent of gasoline, but instead smelled the salt
of the ocean filling the bay. The tide, he knew, would be against him for hours. With
a groan he looked out over the water, toward the electric towers. He thought about crabs crawling deep beneath them, immersed in their concerns. He thought about Curt Madison’s crabs, and wondered briefly if it was wrong to steal them. Of course, he didn’t exactly steal them, or clams either, because he just took a few when needed. But he wondered if taking them was related to his engine not starting, or to other things for him not starting. “That’s stupid,” he said. “Crabs and such belong to none but theirselves.” That settled, he brought out the oars.
Apart from the slowness, there was one big problem with rowing a boat. It was something Barry had never gotten used to, although his father, Big Barry, when Barry was young, made him row boats in the rain, the cold and the heat, on the theory that a bayman should be able to extricate himself, under his own power, from any situation. “The predicaments of life,” Big Barry had said, “will sneak up and grab your posterior, and your posterior had best be prepared.”
So now a fly in the fuel line, or maybe a fouled plug had stopped Barry’s outboard, sneaked up on his posterior, and Barry was ready, could row to Atlantic City if he
had to, but he would have preferred to face forward. That was the problem—the backwardness of rowing, not seeing where he was going. Backward, maybe nothing could sneak up on you, because you were already looking back, but you could sneak yourself into a predicament just the same.
He rowed. Seated on the red cooler, with the outboard tilted up and one foot braced against the stern seat he rowed the wide cedar boat toward the power lines, toward the reach between the fourth and fifth tower . . . and farther north toward Patcong Creek where he would turn and keep rowing until he reached the boat yard. That was miles, with the tide coming in and the wind picking up. Everything was pushing against him and he felt the muscles in his back and his breath in his throat. It made him thirsty. So he opened another beer, and rowed and drank, while the waves hit the bow with a smack, smack—little shoves. The wind whistled. Then he heard something and turned to see under the power lines a cabin cruiser heading fast in his direction. “Holy shit,” he whispered, spotting the insignia of the marine police. “The bastards wanta help me.” He couldn’t allow that. Yanking in the oars he stood and waved the police away. But they came near.
“You okay?” a skinny officer shouted, standing by the transom as the boat slowed. Barry knew him—Sergeant Brochard.
“Getting my exercise!” Barry shouted back. “Fitness first, I always say!”
“Need a tow?” Brochard yelled.
Barry with a smile gazed down at his feet. “Nah—I got all ten. You go chase some robbers.”
Something about the joke made Brochard grimace. “Right,” he said. He gave a nod to the helmsman and the boat sped away.
“And while you’re at it, fuck yourselves!” Barry called after them, snapping a jaunty salute.
He sat down and picked up his beer. Taking a long drink, he felt the tension drain
away. That had been close. But those crabs in the tub weren’t branded like cows,
he reminded himself. “Ain’t no robbers out here, or cattle rustlers neither.” He was guiltless—Barry the Blameless, as innocent as the day he was born—and with that certainty he gazed toward the distant towers. The sun was appearing now, burning away the overcast and lighting up the water. The bay sparkled around him, and he lowered the brim of his cap as something caught his eye. Far off on the left bank, a short beach stretched in front of a big brown house. A small white house sat nearby. Three figures were leaving the brown house. They ran to the beach and seemed to jump. They merged, then separated again.
Barry watched them awhile. He finished his beer and lobbed the can toward them, then began rowing once more. He watched them as he rowed. He had seen people
on that beach before but ignored them. Now they seemed to want his attention, and
the sun was hotter, and the beach was closer than the boat yard. He turned his garvey and headed for the beach. Maybe someone would give him a lift to Vanderbilt’s.
_______________________________________________________
Robert L. Bacon
theperfectwrite.com
For authors, The Perfect Write® is now providing
FREE QUERY LETTER REVIEW AND ANALYSIS.
Post your query to mailto:theperfectwrite@aol.com(no attachments) and visit the Sample Letters Page for examples of successful query letters.
The Perfect Write® offers comprehensive editing services, from manuscript critiques to complete revisions, including line-editing, along with query letter design and composition. For pricing, send your project requirements to mailto:theperfectwrite@aol.com
For business applications, The Perfect Write® also offers advanced services, from designing sophisticated sell sheets to crafting investor-appealing business plans for start-up enterprises. For a customized quote, please send your detailed project requirements to mailto:theperfectwrite@aol.com
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