Reminders & Distractions—A Short Story

I’m deep in the midst of editing my most recent book—which occurs during the 1967 Detroit Riots. Even though it isn’t about the riots, it was a terribly difficult book to write, and is proving to be a difficult book to edit as well.

While there’s so much about this book I love, it has, at times, made me question whether I was done writing. But, as most of you know, I took a break from what I call “The Detroit Book” to write a novella and rediscovered that I actually can still write. More, I love to write.

And that has me all distracted with dreaming about the next book. For the most part, I’ve been careful not to let my mind play too much in the next world. But I sat down today intent on writing a short story for you all and ended up writing an early scene of the next book. It may never actually make it into the eventual book form. But this is how I typically start writing books.

The characters start talking to me. They demand I write a particular scene or capture a particular image for them. Then I start stringing them together into a cohesive whole.

The irony is that I wrote this short-story blog in response to the Five Minute Friday* prompt: Distracted. It was supposed to have been the character who was distracted. Instead it became an exercise in showing how I was distracted. Sigh. Please tell me I’m not the only one.

Regardless, I hope you enjoyed the taste of the book that’s forming:

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I lay still in the high grass, face toward the sun warming the tip of my nose. It had been what felt like a lifetime since the sun muscled close enough to the earth to actually put a dent in the winter air. It felt glorious despite the ominous date on the calendar—April 23, 1968—the day my life change three years back.

Somewhere in the distance a truck ground down the dirt farm roads that posed as major thoroughfares. The air breaks whooshed and released and part of me wanted to run after him, throw up a thumb and beg the trucker to take me with him. Take me anywhere but here.

Anywhere but a dusty farm town in mid-Michigan. Anywhere that didn’t bear the reminders of the life that used to be mine.

A fly landed on my fingertip and I shook it away. The house needed airing. A new border was set to arrive today. The new assistant preacher. As if our town needed another.

On Main Street a few businesses limped along the cracked pavement—the hardware, the grocery with limp vegetables for the few who didn’t grow their own, the barber shop—culminating in a corner with two church steeples. The Catholic parish with it’s attached living quarters for the priest. The Christian Reformed church with the parsonage tucked behind. Two places I could never enter again.

I pushed myself to standing and brushed the debris of my jeans. With one final deep breath, I kissed my fingertips and touched the enormous rock that served as a reminder of the death of the final child I could not save.

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As you all know, I absolutely adore most genres. But the ones in constant rotation have some form of historical flavor and what I call Book Club entertainment with a side of thinking. That last is obviously not an official genre you’ll find at the bookstore, but I think you know what I mean. I ran across a few other others that write this kind of mashup too and thought maybe you might enjoy some of these free books as well. I’d love for you to check them out over here: https://books.bookfunnel.com/fiction_new_books_may/r4jvdzzhqz

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* If you’d like to join the Five Minute Friday community, they’re an amazing group and you can find them over here: https://fiveminutefriday.com/. Oh and the rules are: write for 5 minutes and no editing (although I can’t stop myself a little. I am an editor after all. I also took a little longer writing it because I’m a rule breaker like that).

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