The primary aim of the "Novel Excerpts" blog category is to showcase my creative writing, specifically from the novels I've written. Hopefully, these posts will provide a glimpse into my storytelling style, themes, and narrative skills. It's an opportunity to share my artistic expressions and the worlds I've created through my novels.
The Boaz Secrets, written in 2018, is my third novel. I'll post a chapter a day over the next few weeks.
Book Blurb
Fifteen year-old Matt Benson moves with Robert, his widowed father, to Boaz, Alabama for one year as Robert conducts research on Southern Baptist Fundamentalism. Robert, a professor of Bible History and new Testament Theology at the University of Chicago’s Divinity School enlists Matt to assist him as an undercover agent at First Baptist Church of Christ. Matt’s job is to befriend the most active young person in the Church’s youth group and learn the heart and mind of teenagers growing up as fundamentalist Southern Baptists.
Olivia Tillman is the fourteen year old daughter of Betty and Walter Tillman. He is the pastor of First Baptist Church of Christ. Robert and Matt move to Boaz in June 1970, and before high school begins in mid-August, Matt and Olivia become fast friends. Olivia’s life is centered around her faith, her family, and her friends. She is struck with Matt and his doubts and vows to win him to Christ. Over the next year, Matt and Olivia’s relationship blossoms into more than a teenage romance, despite their different religious beliefs.
June 1971 and Matt’s return to Chicago comes too quickly, but the two teenagers vow to never lose what they have, even promising to reunite at college in three years after Olivia graduates from Boaz High School.
The Boaz Secrets is told from the perspective of past and present. The story alternates between 1970-1971, and 2017-2018. After Matt left Boaz in June 1971, life happened and Olivia and Matt’s plans fell apart. However, in December 2017, their lives crossed again, almost miraculously, and they have a month in Boaz to catch up on forty-six years of being apart. They attempt to discover whether their teenage love can be rekindled and transformed into an adult romance even though Matt is 63 and Olivia is 61.
In 2017, Olivia and Matt are quick to learn they are vastly different people than they were as fifteen and sixteen year old teenagers– especially, when it comes to religion and faith. Will these religious differences unite them? The real issue is the secret Olivia has kept. Will Matt’s discovery destroy any chance he and Olivia have of rekindling their teenage relationship?
Chapter 18
December 17, 2017
The walk home from Warren and Tiffany’s had the opposite effect than my earlier walk to their house. I was almost sweating as I reached my front porch and unlocked the door. No doubt in my mind, Rickie’s words, “Rumor was she was pregnant by John Ericson,” had pierced my mind and heart like a flaming arrow.
I didn’t sleep at all. For hours I tossed and turned on my sleeping bag. I finally got up at 3:30 a.m., made a pot of coffee, and sat in my ‘Alabama’ beanbag chair. My mind was spewing out every imaginable what-if scenario it could, even attempting to go rouge on me offering up little tips on how to find the truth. ‘Sit in the Alabama Crimson Tide chair. It knows the truth, it knows because John spent four years at the University of Alabama.’ It was crazy stupid. By sunrise I had solid proof that hearing an unexpected statement could throw one’s seemingly organized, structured, and predictable life, into a tailspin. One, almost like falling out of an airplane without a parachute.
By 8:30 a.m., I had drunk more coffee than any one person should consume. I think it helped to counter the illogical leaps my mind was experiencing and offered some direction. It may not have been the coffee at all.
John, Paul, and I had exchanged cell phone numbers before we all went our separate ways outside the Cracker Barrel in Trussville. The two of them had even invited Olivia and me to come join them for a few days as they hiked the Appalachian Trail. Olivia had quickly declined saying that she was too afraid of bears and snakes. She didn’t care if it was winter. I had indicated to John and Paul some interest in spending at least one day and night with them out on the trail.
John answered on the second ring. Even though it was almost 10:00 a.m. in Georgia, they were not yet hiking. John laughed saying that he and Paul were not as tough as they used to be. In fact, yesterday afternoon they had left the main trail and hiked into Ellijay and found a Bed and Breakfast. Within five minutes I had spoken to both John and Paul and had arranged to meet them, where they were, in four hours. Google Maps said that it was less than a three-hour drive, but I wanted to allow myself plenty of time.
I had called Olivia before I left Boaz. I told her about my spur of the moment decision. At first, I started to tell her a little fib about what I was doing or where I was going, just to not raise the possibility of her becoming suspicious, but I realized that it was more than possible for her to be talking with her two boys. Anyway, she knew John, Paul, and I had discussed the possibilities of me joining them for a day or so. As I drove for nearly three hours I attempted to plan my every move. Of course, I wanted to spend quality time with my boys. I still clung to Olivia’s story. What reason would she have to lie to me? If I was not the father, why would she tell me I was? Maybe she didn’t know. Maybe she thought I was the father. She could think this even if her and John had had sex themselves. I simply couldn’t wrap my head around the notion of her and John being intimate. It didn’t fit at all. I had almost a perfect memory of Olivia when we were teenagers, her in the ninth grade and me in the eleventh. I was certain she would not have been having sex with John. Anyone. Then, it dawned on me. What if I was wrong? What if her and John had had this dirty little secret? They were sexually active. And, what if they had safe sex? I hated that phrase. Meaning, John always used a condom. And, I hadn’t. The night before Dad and I had left for Chicago, Olivia and I had had unprotected sex. The situation had surprised us both. Not the being alone, but our feelings knowing we would likely not see each other for months and months, possibly up to three years. Our emotions had taken over and, I remembered Olivia’s words in response to my concern that “I don’t have a, you know what.” It was the most awkward statement I had ever made. She had said, “Matt, I know this is wrong, but I also know it is right. We are already one in spirit. I want to make us one in body.” It had surprised me. It hadn’t sounded like the Olivia I had known for nearly a year. As I neared Ellijay I concluded that someway Olivia knew beyond all doubt that John and Paul were our children. I was their father. Ericson wasn’t. As I parked and walked toward the front porch of The Martyn House Bed and Breakfast, I knew that my love for Olivia would have no trouble forgiving her even if she had sex with John Ericson.
John and Paul were, as agreed, waiting for me in the great room. The Inn was a huge log cabin structure with probably the biggest fireplace I had ever seen. It was massive. It’s rock face stretched the entire width of the far wall. John and Paul were sitting at a table next to a row of floor-to-ceiling windows along the rear of the lodge. They saw me as I stood looking at the fireplace and walked over. We exchanged our man-hugs and they invited me to join them. They asked about Olivia and relayed their disappointment that she hadn’t come. “Please know it’s not anything personal. If anything, it was my fault. I didn’t really give her a chance. If she had known that hiking wasn’t on the agenda she would have killed me to come.”
The three of us spent thirty or so minutes updating each other on our careers. John seemed especially interested in my genetics research. Paul sit silent as John and I talked about how uncanny it was that Charles Darwin’s theory was proven correct even though he had no knowledge at all about genetics. Paul finally interrupted his brother and said, “even if Mr. Darwin’s theory was correct, although I totally doubt that it was, it changes nothing. God created Adam and Eve just as Genesis says. That’s where humans began. Please don’t tell me that I came from an ape.”
I was anticipating a big row between John and Paul. I had read quite a bit on Lee Berger’s discovery in the Rising Star cave in South Africa sometime in 2014. The many bones found deep in the cave shared similar characteristics with both humans and apes. John had said enough about his work with Berger when Olivia and I had met him and Paul in Birmingham. I knew John had played some role in Berger’s bone recovery project. The man, ape, man/ape had been dubbed, Naledi. I was surprised when Paul smiled at John and said, “Matt, don’t worry that John and I will kill each other. We have a unique relationship. We can argue till the sun goes down or it falls out of the sky, but we won’t get angry and we won’t love each other any less. We both know we will never change each other’s minds, but we still try nonetheless. We just like to argue. He makes stuff up and I simply stick to the facts.”
John couldn’t resist. “Paul is the typical Bible thumper, the typical Christian fundamentalist. He has read only one book, the Bible, and thinks it holds all the information he will ever need. He is a spitting image of an AD 90 desert peasant.”
I didn’t know what to say but I knew I had to say something. “I think it is wonderful that you two are so close and can agree to disagree. Let me go ahead and confess that I don’t believe in God and that I fully believe in the truth of Darwin’s work, evolution by natural selection. It’s the best theory ever offered for how life emerged and has continued to change over millions of years.”
“You and your son John may think you can gang up on me but I have God on my side.” Paul said. Seriously, but then burst into a laugh.
“Brother, how many times do I have to tell you that you didn’t come from an ape. The truth is that humans and apes have a common ancestor. It is a ridiculous argument for someone to say, “if I evolved from an ape, why are there still apes?” John asked.
“The problem you never want to address is that all the fossil discoveries, what you and your peers consider to be evidence that humans have evolved from, for simplicities sake let me say, an ape-like creature, doesn’t truly address homo sapiens. Those fossils deal with animals not humans.” Paul said standing up and turning towards the tall windows behind him.
“Paul, your belief that God, in an instant, created Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden defies all logic and reason. And, scientific fact.”
I decided to just listen. I wanted to witness whether these two, my sons, could so clearly disagree but continue to respect and love each other.
“John, you have absolutely no proof that an ape-like creature turned into a human.”
“Actually, we do. The fossil records prove this.” John added. I know you will never look openly and honestly at the facts, the evidence I speak of. By the way, take the time to read up on Naledi. What are you afraid of? What you keep your head in the sand over is the huge problem you would have to recognize that there never was an Adam and an Eve. What you know, even though, again, you will never admit it, is the absence of an Adam and Eve destroys Christianity. If they didn’t exist, there was no ‘Fall’ as you call it. If there was no ‘Fall,’ there was no need for Christ to come and save mankind. Paul, my dear brother, your Bible, its credibility, now rests on the tip of a pinhead. Science has filled gap after gap, the holes you and your peers have tried to use in arguing the believability of your one and only book. Here’s something for you. I admit, your good book is holy. It is wholly, that’s with a w, wholly man made.”
Paul turned and looked back at John and me. “The Word says, ‘in the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.’” He then stopped. I could tell he wanted his and John’s conversation to continue. I suspect Paul had a belly-full to lay out, here, something akin to a sermon. However, he put all that aside to say, “John, you and I can continue this discussion after Matt leaves tomorrow.”
But, John acted as though he didn’t hear Paul and kept going drilling further and further. It was getting old.
For the next fifteen minutes I listened as John and Paul went back and forth, almost like a football game. John on offense, Paul defending. Then the ball changed hands.
Finally, John said, it’s nearly 6:00, let’s go to the dining room. They’re having Buffalo T-Bone steaks.”
“I’m ready to share a meal with my two boys.” I said, glad that the two hadn’t come to blows.
John looked at me. “I want to hear why you and Olivia never got together.”
We three did enjoy a great meal. The Buffalo steaks were perfect, having been cooked over a wood fire. I savored every moment with my two boys. Over an hour passed with John and Paul appearing to savor every word I shared about my love for Olivia and how she had terminated our relationship. By the time we each finished a huge slice of coconut pie, in remembrance of our dear Olivia, we were stuffed.
As we got up to leave the almost empty dining room, John and Paul turned away towards the entrance long enough for me to use each of their cloth napkins to grab the forks they had used during our meal. After I reached my room, I removed them from my pants pockets and sealed them separately in two plastic zip-lock bags (I thought of them as a policeman’s evidence bag) that I had retrieved from my suitcase in Boaz. In two days, my lab at the University of Chicago would be conducting DNA analysis.
The first step of my plan was unfolding. I had to know whether I was the biological father of John and Paul Cummins.
The Pencil-Driven Life 