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 Schoolteacher, written in 2018, is my fifth novel. I'll post a chapter a day over the next few weeks.
Book Blurb
In the summer of 2017, Katie Sims and her daughter Cullie, moved from New York City to Katie’s hometown of Boaz, Alabama for her to teach English and for Cullie to attend Boaz High School . Fifteen years earlier, during the Christmas holidays, five men from prominent local families sexually assaulted Katie. Nine months later, Katie’s only daughter was born.
Almost from the beginning of the new school year, as Katie and fellow-teacher Cindy Barker shared English, Literature, and Creative Writing duties for more than 300 students, they became lifelong friends.
For weeks, Katie and Cindy endured the almost constant sexual harassment at the hands of the assistant principal. In mid-October, after Cindy suffered an attack similar to Katie’s from fifteen years earlier, the two teachers designed a unique method to teach the six predators a lesson they would never forget. Katie and Cindy dubbed their plan, Six Red Apples.
Read this mystery-thriller to experience the dilemma the two teachers created for themselves, and to learn the true meaning of real justice. And, eternal friendship.
Chapter 33
Cindy was absent from school Thursday and Friday. With the school week finally over, I dropped Cullie off to spend the night with Alysa and as she was getting out of the car I told her that next Friday night she had to stay with us. I sent a text to Cindy that I would call her later just as I had done Thursday evening. As I drove home I recognized the reason Cullie loved staying at Cindy and Steve’s. They were a real family. Steve was an in-the-flesh father. By the time I turned off Sardis Road and onto Wayne’s long driveway, I felt sick about something I had to do. Cindy wasn’t the only one harboring a secret. I had to tell Cullie the truth about how she was conceived. It was the last thing I wanted to do.
Yesterday afternoon before taking Cullie to Cindy’s I had dropped by Wells Fargo Bank and removed my copy of Darla’s journal from my safety deposit box. For weeks I had been feeling the need to complete my review. There were whole sections I had not read.
After my early morning writing session and eating a cold pop-tart seated at the kitchen table reminiscing over Sammie’s Saturday morning pancakes, I returned to my hobby room. I had followed Karen’s lead, Wayne’s deceased wife, in naming the smallest of three bedrooms on the west end of the sprawling ranch. In a sense, our hobbies were similar. Karen had cross stitched. Her pictures were scattered along walls and tabletops all over the house. Both hobbies included the use of thread, weaving threads throughout the framed picture and creating patterns. The patterns told a story. For Karen, it seemed she loved weaving together country scenes. Writing, especially novel writing, if it was any good at all, used many threads, some brightly colored, to weave together various story lines that intersect to form patterns, the main ones always altered the lives of everyone they touched. After considering this analogy I decided to call mine and Karen’s little room, The Threader.
I had read Darla’s journal for nearly an hour before she introduced a new thread. It’s funny how prior thoughts sometimes linger. It seemed I had split my concentration over the prior sixty minutes between an almost insatiable desire to continue the cross-stitching and writing analogy, and Darla’s equally strong need to capture the exploits of her husband. I had found it interesting that Raymond had been so open with Darla about what he and Walter Tillman, David Adams, Fitz Billingsley, and Franklin Ericson were doing; at a minimum, all activities involved shady business dealings. However, it was clear that she either didn’t know the full details or chose not to record them. I concluded it was probably some of both. By the time I finished Darla’s 2015 entries, a new thread appeared. It had to do with Cynthia Radford, Raymond’s first wife, the woman he abandoned for the beautiful Darla Sims who was a full generation younger than the fading Cynthia.
In Darla’s January 1st, 2016 entry, she wrote, “New Year’s Day was a disaster. Raymond, normally brilliant, but often stupid, invited the subtly-callous Cynthia to join the two of us, along with Rachel and Randall and their families. Randall’s daughter Riley spoke loudly above the blare from the Rose Bowl game asking Raymond if he would pay for her college if she chose Stanford. Cynthia had spoken up and said, ‘dear, please don’t ask me, I’m a pauper. If granddad cannot cough up the dough, I bet sweet Darla will. She’s loaded, unless the aging giant kicks over before she turns eighty years old.” I hadn’t seen Raymond in years, probably a decade or more. I guess, even in Cynthia’s eyes, he was, in more ways than one, a big man.
Apparently, Cynthia’s statement had set off a major blow-up between Raymond’s two women. The last sentence Darla had written after spending nearly two pages describing, in detail, how Riley’s question had spawned a verbal cat fight between her and Cynthia, caught my attention. It read, “how in the hell did Cynthia know the details of mine and Raymond’s prenuptial?”
Throughout Darla’s 2016 journal were scattered entries that documented the escalating tension between the two women. After noticing an absent Cynthia from Darla and Raymond’s Thanksgiving festivities, I took a break for an hour, reviewed fifteen or twenty Facebook comments by my tenth graders related to Monday’s vocabulary word, ad Hominem, and made a pot of coffee. When I returned and read the first December entry, Friday the 2nd, I froze. Darla had written, “Per Raymond, the Texas lawyer, Thomas, called and said Cynthia had agreed to his offer. He (Raymond) told me, “Cynthia knew too much. I didn’t have any choice.” The next part of Darla’s entry was disjointed at best, but it seemed to indicate that Raymond had changed his will leaving the vast portion of his estate to the last to die of Darla and Cynthia. No doubt this had made Darla mad. Towards the end of the entry, she had written, “the stupid man can’t see that Cynthia now has a motive to knock me off.” Apparently, Raymond’s statement, “Cynthia might be a bitch, but she’s no killer,” did little to appease Darla’s worrying.
For nearly two weeks Darla didn’t write anything else concerning Cynthia or the deal Raymond had made with her. Then, on Tuesday, December 13th, she wrote. “The bitch said I was looking old. Raymond will be looking for him something younger if he hasn’t already.” Apparently, this statement was made before a meeting took place in Raymond’s study at his and Darla’s Country Club home. Darla only recorded the highlights, but Cynthia was there with her attorney, a man by the name of Clayton Thomas. She had my attention. Darla, for whatever reason, had taped his business card to the top of the following page where her description of the meeting continued. I noted Clayton’s firm was named Thomas and Thomas. Then, I saw it, the second member of the firm, the second partner, was named Clifford Thomas. The firm was located at a San Marcos, Texas address. It had to be the same Cliff Thomas that was representing Nathan Johnson, the man who probably had killed Darla (and the same man Cindy and I had likely seen Wednesday night as we peered over the brick wall into Warren’s basement). I was shaking; I could hardly sit still. I managed to scan the remaining paragraph of Darla’s entry. Raymond had made her and Cynthia, in exchange for him changing his will and the two cats’ mutual promises to call a truce to their bickering, sit down together and sign a written document. It was not attached or included in Darla’s journal, but she had summarized its contents. If either one of the women initiated an altercation between them of any kind, Raymond would disown both.
After leaving The Thread and walking to the kitchen and pouring another cup of coffee, I pulled my iPad from my book bag that was still sitting on the bar where I had left it yesterday afternoon after arriving home from school. I pressed the Google icon and typed in “San Marcos and Google Maps.” After finding the address for Thomas and Thomas I expanded the map. I almost closed the iPad but then I saw Fredericksburg to the west of San Marcos. A synapse or two connected. That’s the city listed on the back of the candy bar wrapper Ralph Williams had given me just a few days before he had died. Fredericksburg was less than seventy miles from San Marcos. There had to be something relevant at work here. I shook my head as though trying to clear my mind of the cobwebs that had fogged my thinking. Finding a link between Raymond, Cynthia, and Nathan Johnson was already relevant, significant in fact. Something was telling me there was yet more to discover. As I closed my iPad I couldn’t help but believe that Cliff Thomas had once again traveled to Alabama on Cynthia’s behalf, this time trying to eliminate a threat to her well-being as well as that of Raymond’s. I walked outside onto the screened-in back porch and speculated that Cliff Thomas had some connection to the Lone Star Candy Company. My thought was a stretch.
Cindy came over around 2:30 p.m. I was sitting at the pond at the end of a long pier. Wayne had two chairs secured to the wood slats by a lightweight chain. I wondered who the second chair was for. I saw her drive up and yelled at her when she exited her car. As she walked through the pasture gate and along the pier, I could see the stress she was carrying. She kept her gaze downward. Of course, this could be because she was being careful walking an uncommon path. But, it was her hands that betrayed her. She kept clenching and unclenching her fists. Finally, when she sat down beside me I noticed the tell-tell sign. Her normally light green eyes had a vivid yellow tint. I had seen her on more than one occasion with dark green eyes, but this was different. It was like an abundance of blood had mixed in with the green, yielding yellow. I didn’t know if this meant she was being extremely cautious or she was tasting blood.
“Are you feeling better?” I might as well ask a dumb question.
“I’m great. Steve and the kids went fishing at Henderson’s pond. He encouraged me to get out and maybe come see you.”
“I’m glad he did. I’ve missed you at school. It’s not the same when you’re not there.”
“I’ve been thinking and researching. Not all vasectomies are foolproof. I read that only about two percent of women get pregnant after her husband or partner has a vasectomy. I have a plan. I’m going to be open with Steve about my pregnancy. He’ll have the typical questions, but I can convince him that it happens and that I’m one of the two percent. I’ll rave and cry and express my excitement over having another child. Steve’s the type that won’t investigate to determine if his doctor screwed up the procedure. He’ll just think it was God’s miracle.”
“That sounds good. If it works. But, what if word gets back to him that contradicts your story? You know some men like to brag about their conquests. Cindy, it might be ten plus years from now, but you need to recognize what I’m saying isn’t too far-fetched.”
“You haven’t heard the second half of my plan.” Cindy said scanning a text she just received. “Steve says hi and that Cullie just caught a big catfish. I won’t read the rest.”
“Remember, you can’t do that. We’ve agreed, if you start something you have to finish. So, what else did Steve say?” I hated it when someone said stuff like, ‘I’ll tell you later’ or ‘No, I better keep that to myself’ as they ponder some world-changing rumor they just heard.
“It’s kind of private but you caught me. He said he wants us to make love in the back of his truck beside Henderson’s pond, out under the stars.”
“Darling, you are one lucky woman. Now, tell me the remaining part of your brilliant plan.”
“Wilkins has to disappear.” Cindy said as though she was a veteran mob boss.
“As in die?” I figured I already knew what she meant.
“Sort of, probably. If he can’t talk or communicate then I’m not at risk, Steve is not exposed to learning the truth.”
“That’s assuming he is the only other person in the world who knows he impregnated you.” I started to be much more graphic but decided that would just inflame Cindy even more.
“That’s a risk I’ll have to take. Even if someone other than Wilkins told Steve about the rape, I would deny it, saying it’s a despicable rumor.”
“I think we are avoiding the elephant in the room. Murder isn’t some screen-saver prank. It’s a horrible crime, virtually the worst, and it carries with it the strong likelihood that you will spend the rest of your life in prison. Do you actually want to take that risk?” I said, mentally recapping how the Six Red Apples project was cruising headfirst towards the precipice of the Grand Canyon.
“It won’t be murder. It will be a killing, a justified killing. You know, justice. And, we won’t go to prison if we aren’t caught.”
“There you go with that ‘we’ stuff again.”
“I thought we were way beyond this silly conversation. Remember, Six Red Apples?” Cindy asked.
“I do and I’m not going back on my word, but we, I at least, have not quite developed a murdering mind. The worst I’ve considered is some type of extortion, blackmail, whatever, making the five bastards pay real money along with a written but uncirculated apology.”
“I’m a little surprised that even after your Faking Five killed Darla and Nanny, your two mothers, and attempted to kill you and your own daughter, you wouldn’t be ready to blow their brains out, saw up their bodies into little pieces, and feed the remains to the wolves.”
“Truthfully, you’re close to the truth, but I reckon I’m a scaredy-cat.” I said.
“Then, we’ll have to create such a foolproof plan that your nerves will take a long nap.” Cindy said typing a return text, no doubt to the loving Steve. I stopped myself from asking her how she had responded. That’s when the fantasy blasted across my mind. Steve’s suggestion had triggered a foreign feeling, one I hadn’t felt since before my attack. Walt had me pressed against one of the giant oaks I was seeing beyond the pond, the one closest to his little cabin I could barely make out. Our lips were locked in a long and sensuous kiss. Then, I chuckled to myself. It wasn’t Walt doing the pressing and kissing, it was Wayne.
For the next hour Cindy and I semi-planned how Patrick Wilkins would disappear. She shared how he managed to stay in such good shape. He was a slow-jogger, fast-walker type. Someway she had learned that the criminal asshole Wilkins spent an hour before school every morning jogging and walking. Cindy labeled it his right-road routine. She explained that when he left his Country Club, Lindo Drive home at 5:00 a.m. Monday through Friday, he only made right hand turns until he returned home. She clearly had done her homework because every turn easily rolled off the tip of her tongue. Right turns on each of the following streets and roads: Lindo Drive, Highway 205, Aurora Road, Tarvin Road, Pleasant Hill Cutoff Road, Pleasant Hill Road, Highway 205, and Lindo Drive. Cindy said, “this is his routine. At least it was Thursday and Friday mornings. Also, on Saturdays, at least today, he goes at 8:00 a.m. to the Therapy Plus Fitness Center next to the hospital. It was after 10:00 this morning when he left.
I didn’t ask Cindy how she had gotten out of her house to go sleuthing the last three mornings.
The Pencil Driven Life 
Apples
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