by Jake Barnes
One of my high school classmates married a local farmer who was a few years her senior. They had four children, all boys. Some years later, her husband died. My old friend Charles told me about Red. I was visiting my mother at the Home that summer. He just up and dropped dead one day, Charles said. Pretty tough on Karen, I opined. Charles looked the other way.
One day I ran into Karen downtown, and we had coffee at the Norseman Café. Karen told me that her husband had always said he didn't want to live if he had a heart attack or stroke. He didn't want to be a vegetable. If she saw him go down, he said, count to a thousand, then call for help.
So that‘s just what she did. She found him in the barn one morning. He was unconscious. Out like a light. Karen went back to the house, poured herself a cup of coffee, and sat down at the kitchen table. When she finished her second cup, she called for an ambulance.
When I told Charles what she told me, he smiled and nodded. He got what he had coming, he said. Charles said Red was an asshole. Mean as a rattlesnake.
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A story about bravado, justice, and the human animal.
This story, like most of yours, has a wonderful sense of drama and theater. LIked it a lot. *
This one has teeth.*
Real? Doesn't matter. Feels real.
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Nice, Jake. *
Really like the way the piece shifts in the second half. Nicely done. A good read. Made me think of a Tom Waits song - "Murder in the Red Barn". *
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Huh. Well told.
Deft as always.
I love the insights into the characters...the writing gives me just enough to let my mind race with possibilities *
I'd like to see and read more of these folks.