Gold Digger

by Frances Fyfield

on Tour July 1-31, 2014

‘Come on Thomas, come upstairs and look at the view,’ Di said. ‘Look at the clouds.”

She hugged him closer.

‘I’ll keep you warm,” she said. “Will you come with me? There’s this painting I want you to see. Thomas?”

The warmth of him, the glorious warmth was fading by the minute. She was sitting in his lap with her arms around him, cradling his head with its shock of thick white hair, talking into it, nuzzling it like a cat. She stroked his profile, a beak of a nose, the handsome, furrowed forehead suddenly smoothed and by that token, the very lift of his face, she knew he was dead. She had known the imminence of his death from the moment he came in, gave her the flowers and then sat in the chair and closed his bright blue eyes: she had known it for months of illness, and all the same, when it happened, it was incomprehensible. Because he was still warm, and she was realizing, slowly, slowly, that most of the warmth came from her.

She told herself not to be silly. He would wake up in a minute, give her the smile that lit him like a light from within and then he would start to teach, talk in rhymes or sing. Such a voice he had, such a lovely voice with a light rhythm, as if there was a song already in it.

‘It’ll be alright, she said to him. ‘Won’t it, love?’

There was no answer. She continued to speak, stroking his hair, still thick, but so much thinner than it had been. She straightened it with her fingers and touched his ears. Cold, but then the lobes of his ears were always cold, even when she breathed close.

‘A word in your shell-like, darling,’ she said, softly. ‘Do you know, you look just like a bird? All beak and chin, that’s you, not an ounce to spare. You’ve been on the wing long enough, you’re just tired, you are. You know what? That’s good. You’ve lost your voice, that’s all. But you can still hear, so you’ll know I’ll never say a bad thing about you, ever, because there’s nothing bad to say, and I don’t tell anyone anything ever. Any secret’s good with me. You know me, I’m good for that. Can’t talk, can’t tell secrets, except about what a good man you are. Mustn’t swear, you said, a waste of words, innit? Ok, Thomas? Shall we go upstairs and look at the view?

He lay, sprawled and twisted, his arm holding her because she had curled herself into him, and he made no response.
She began to cry, soaking his jumper. Then she got up and bound his knees with a blanket to keep him warm, backed away from him, got a drink and moved, lurching around her own house like a crippled ghost.

The Witchdoctor’s Bones

by Lisa de Nikolits

on Tour July

Beautiful, sexy, exciting, mysterious, dangerous and twisted. Those words can be used to describe not only the alluring locations depicted in Lisa de Nikolits’ thrilling novel The Witchdoctor’s Bones, but also some of the eclectic characters fatefully traveling together on a tour bus through South Africa and Namibia. A suspenseful page-turner that will bewitch you until the end.
Warning: You may get hungry reading this book. Some of the exotic dishes described in this novel sound so enticing you may want to risk being on a bus-load of crazy people to sample them.
– Alexander Galant, author of ‘Depth of Deception (A Titanic Murder Mystery)’

“Imagine you’ve signed up for a low-budget safari in South Africa and find yourself cheek-to-cheek on a battered van with the most bizarre travellers you’ve ever met – except in some ways they do remind you of characters you’ve encountered in a late-night screening of Moulin Rouge.

By planting her characters in the untamed landscape of the South African wilderness, de Nikolits has stripped away the niceties and rigours of polite society. You’re drawn in. Illicit love, rejected love, misfired love, machinations of all sorts, and all involving characters of dubious integrity and (in some cases) of questionable sanity. Such are the players in Lisa de Nikolits’s The Witchdoctor’s Bones, who’ve embarked on a journey that soon seethes with peril (physical and psychological), and not solely because of the wild creatures roaming the bush veld.

Sweet-talking Kate, the Canadian, is the closest thing you get to a heroine in The Witchdoctor’s Bones, proof that the best woman will be left standing.”

– Doug O’Neill, Canadian Living

Fascinating South African lore comes to life in The Witchdoctor’s Bones. De Nikolits gives us more than an intriguing mystery – a look at the dark side of the human soul and the healing power of love.
– D.J. McIntosh, national bestselling author of The Witch of Babylon and The Book of Stolen Tales (Quill + Quire’s top thriller for 2013).

Take sixteen travellers from around the world, gather them on a tour bus bumping its way along the rough roads of South Africa and Namibia, add jealousy, sexual obsession, secrets, violence, magic, poison, mental breakdown and the breathtaking arrogance of tourists treating Africa (and Africans) as their playthings, and you have Lisa de Nikolits’ psychological thriller, The Withdoctor’s Bones. As the travellers and their guides slowly reveal their true (and sometimes twisted) natures, the tension ratchets higher and higher in a narrative that draws deeply on African lore and history, with echoes of Christie’s classic Ten Little Indians, Katherine Anne Porter’s Ship of Fools and Chaucer’s The Canterbury Tales.
– Terri Favro, author of The Proxy Bride

Put together an international group of travelers, each with their own secrets, in a bus touring Africa and you have the makings of a very suspenseful tale! Lisa de Nikolits does a masterful job of drawing the reader in and not letting go until the last delicious word! Set against an exotic backdrop of Africa and Namibia, this story is a great read!
– Joan O’Callaghan, editor and contributing author of Thirteen

“A cast of intriguing characters is thrust together for an African adventure. What results is far more perilous than anyone could have imagined. Against the beautiful backdrop of South Africa and Namibia, danger and death lurk around every bend in the road, as the trip of a lifetime becomes the holiday from hell. Within the pages of The Witchdoctor’s Bones multiple mysteries emerge, as Lisa de Nikolits takes the reader on a suspense-filled journey that won’t soon be forgotten.”
—Liz Bugg, author of the Calli Barnow Series

Lisa de Nikolits has done it again. This time she shines her characteristically unflinching but loving and humour-filled gaze on the land of her birth, deftly weaving Africa’s ancient witchcraft practices, superstitions, breathtaking beauty and disturbing struggles into the journey of a group of modern-day tourists — whose motives for coming on the “trip of a lifetime” are in some cases highly suspect. The myriad conflicts between the characters are handled so subtly and the physical terrain of southern Africa painted so vividly, you won’t be able to tear yourself away from your own seat on the bus, even as the body count begins to rise.

– Brenda Missen, author of Tell Anna She’s Safe

What I really enjoy about Lisa de Nikolits is her refusal to be pinned down to a particular genre. Besides the fact that The Witchdoctor’s Bones is so different from all her other novels, it’s also incredibly difficult to classify it in its own right. Part travelogue, part psychological thriller, part sociological and anthropological study, The Witchdoctor’s Bones entertains, educates and fascinates all at the same time. It’s a gripping read that draws you into the heart of darkness, both in the literal and figurative sense; the action takes place in untamed Africa, but it’s the darkness in the human heart that de Nikolits portrays with such chilling precision. It’s a page-turner that will keep you biting your nails right up to the bitter end.
– Bianca Marais, http://biancamarais.com/ Musings of a Wannabe Writer

Kate and Marika made coffee and rejoined the others who were huddled around the fire pit while Stepfan and Charisse moved off to one side and were deep in a private conversation.

“So what’s the big discussion about?” Kate asked, sitting down.

“I’m trying to explain the difference between sangomas versus witchdoctors,” Helen said, sitting back on her heels. “I thought I knew but then once I started explaining it, I realised I’m confused. Jono, maybe you can help us out?”

“I can,” Jono said, accepting a beer from Richard. “Thank you. First, some facts. Eighty-four percent of all South Africans consult a sangoma more than three times a year and there are more than 200,000 sangomas in South Africa alone. A witch and a sangoma are not the same thing whereas a witchdoctor,” he emphasized the last word, “is the same thing as a sangoma but the term witchdoctor is considered to be a perjorative one that came from the European settlers. Sangomas are practitioners of complimentary medicine and they serve a long apprenticeship learning to become intermediaries between the world of spirits and the world of the living. Witches are a whole other thing, they are evil and dangerous and if they cannot be cured, they are stoned to death or buried alive.”

“Yes, they certainly gave Kleine Skok the heebie jeebies,” Richard stretched his feet towards the fire. “Poor fellow, he had this godawful lump of dried up rabbit’s blood and I asked him if that was something a witchdoctor would use and he nearly shot right off the mountain. I felt quite dreadful for asking.”

Jono laughed and took a drink of his beer. “Yes, I can imagine that frightened him in a big way. More than six hundred people have been killed in the last ten years in Gauteng alone, because they were accused of being witches, so even the mention of such a thing is frightening for many people.”

“Can you cure someone of being a witch?” Eva asked.

“Yes, but it’s not easy,” Jono said. “You have to call an isanusi, a professional who can smell out witches and get rid of them.

“There are many kinds of witches,” he continued, “one of which is the night-witch who is invisible during the daytime but then at night, changes into an animal; a crocodile, a hyena, a lion, a wolf maybe. Night-witches devour human bodies, dead or alive during the night and they can been seen flying at night, with fire coming out of their bottoms.”

“They fart fire?” Mia found this hysterically funny and the rest of the group joined in, laughing. “Oh lord, fire-farting witches, knock my bleedin’ socks off.”

“Isn’t it true,” Helen queried when the laughter died down, “that Western doctors found a high correlation between schizophrenia and epilepsy in individuals who have been accused of being witches?”

Jono nodded. “Which would explain the hallucinations they have,” he said. “And some of them have also been found to be manic-depressives and schizophrenics. But if you ask me, this does not mean that Western medicine has any kind of increased knowledge in this area, it’s just that you call your witches by a lot of medical-sounding names and find different ways to treat them.”

“Touché.” Richard exclaimed while Helen nodded enthusiastically.

“So,” Jono said, “we have the isanusi or shaman, or the witch-finder, who sniffs them out, and then you have the witch-doctor, an igqira, who can smell by moral, not physical means, the corrupt presence of the witch or sorcerer. The isanusi is the diviner, and he is called upon to explain the source of your misfortune and to see if you have a witch. The sangoma, which is a Zulu word by the way, is the one who will be invited to cleanse an entire village of witchcraft by giving them emetics, or sneezing powder or making incisions into which medicine is rubbed, or by many other methods.”

“How does the isanusi know what to do?” Kate asked.

“The diviners, or isanusi, receives his knowledge from the spirits and there are more than sixty documented methods to ask the spirits; reading the stars, throwing sticks, studying lines in the sand, observing the blood trickling from a victim, even by looking at how birds are flying or how they are sitting on a tree. A lot of people think that diviners are not good because they are trying to know God’s secrets before God wants us to know them, and we should not be attempting to steal divine secrets.”

“I’m divining that it’s high time for schnapps.” Mia got to her feet, and brushed embedded grass from her legs. “I’m getting the Archers. Go on, you lot.” She waved and walked across the grass. “Don’t wait for me.”

“Yes, carry on Jono,” Richard said, “Mia won’t mind, she’s not into this sort of thing.”

“I find it incredibly amazing,” Helen spoke up quickly, “I wish I’d had time to learn more. Well, better late than never.” She smiled at Richard who cracked open another beer and missed her meaningful glance.

“So the sangoma tries to cure the witch…” Kate reminded Jono where he had left off.

“Yes,” Jono said, “but curing witches is a very small part of what the sangoma does as his life’s work. The main function of the sangoma is to heal and protect people in the community.

“Are sangomas only men?” Eva asked.

“No, both men and women can be sangomas, and they are generally very respected members of the community. Even Nelson Mandela was circumcised by a sangoma when he was sixteen by a famous ingcibi, a circumcision expert. Sangomas conjure up potions, known as muti to make you better and muti is made from all sorts of herbs and things. Then the sangoma dances herself, or himself, into a trance, usually with his drum which also has a spirit, and this is how they contact the spirit. Then they will alter their voice and begin to talk, using two voices, relying on their powers of ventriloquism.”

“I was told you can recognize a sangoma by their dress which is covered in beads, and is very ornamental, in red which is bomvu, black which is mnyama and white, mhlophe,” Helen said, hoping to impress Richard with her knowledge.
Jono nodded. “The medicine the sangoma mixes can be based on colours also. The sangoma mixes opposite colours together, uniting them symbolically and then real life harmony follows. Light colours represent life and masculinity, dark colours are death and femininity.”

“I knew it.” Richard poked Mia who had returned with the bottle of schnapps and a sleeping bag, “you women are the death of men.”

Mia tittered, slapped him on the shoulder and wrapped herself in the sleeping bag. She opened the bottle, took a long swig and passed it to Jasmine.

“Is it true,” Marika asked, “that sangomas study for as long as doctors?”

“Yes. It takes seven years for the sangoma to study, and he, or she, studies a lot of things; techniques of divination, treatment of psychological, mental, physical conditions, animal and plant medicine use, the anatomy of the soul, ritual mastery, prayer and invocation, throwing the bones, trans-body, chant and song, channeling souls, soul ascension, case study, tradition and culture, and finally, techniques of investigation. Sangomas are also very good detectives and great historians and guardians of local culture and learning.”

“Impressive,” Kate said. “But the witches sound horrible.”

“They are. Witches operate on fear, superstition and rumour,” Jono said. “The evils of gossip. Nowadays even some of the churches use witchcraft to bring new worshippers, convincing them their problems are due to supernatural witch curses that only the church can cure. Some churches even preach that diseases like AIDS and leprosy, blindness, deafness, impotence and infertility are muti curses by witches.”

“Before we left,” Richard said, “I read an article about how Tanzanian witchdoctors have been killing albinos and harvesting their body parts because they think it will bring them good luck. What’s with that? Why albinos, why body parts for good luck?”

“What have you been reading, my friend, to hear that?” Jono asked and Richard’s expression became guarded.

“Oh, general research and whatnot. One’s interested in studying up before a trip, and what with the Internet, it’s astounding what one comes across. Some scary stuff actually. But why albinos, Jono?”

“Because they are considered to be very sacred. They are treated with deep respect because they are believed to be spirits born as human beings. And the whole muti body parts thing, well, that’s a whole other area, my friend, that is a dark thing for sure.”

“I’d be super keen to hear the whole bangshoot,” Richard said.

“Maybe you are, my friend but it’s not a discussion for the faint-hearted,” Jono warned. “And yes, Richard, I know the events of which you speak. At this time, nineteen albinos have been murdered in less than a year. But one last word on witches; they are also accused of inciting adultery, alcohol abuse and theft. Witches also have immense power to turn innocent people into witches and therefore it’s possible to become a witch without even being aware of it, simply by eating contaminated food or picking up an ‘impure’ object.”

“Oh, do not, for the love of God, tell Harrison any of this,” Richard said, “we’re all sworn to secrecy. Can you image what he’d be like if he heard these sorts of things? He’ll be rubbing everything, including us, in antiseptic.”

“All for one and one for all, we say nothing,” Helen assured him. “Jono, what about tokoloshes? I’ve tried to find out about them but no one would really tell me anything.”

“Ah,” Jono said, “the infamous tokoloshe. Helen, here is the secret to creating one – you remove the eyes and tongue from a full size corpse, then you blow a secret powder into its mouth and it is comes to life and will obey your every wish. But there is a high price for creating a tokoloshe, including the death of a relative within a year, because the spirits do not give life freely. If you are prepared to create an unnatural life, then you must be prepared to destroy a natural one.”

“An unnatural life,” Kate echoed and even the fire seemed to flicker and dim. Mia offered her the bottle of schnapps but she shook her head. Mia shrugged and passed the bottle to Jasmine.

“The tokoloshe,” Jono continued, “is a spirit in the households of witches and warlocks and they speak with a lisp…”
“Sofie’s a tokoloshi.” Mia sat up, giggling “I suspected it all along.”

“She’s not small and brown,” Richard objected.

“Nor does she have a penis so long it has to be slung over her shoulder,” Jono said. “Sorry Mia, but she falls short of many of the physical characteristics needed.”

Mia found this so hilarious she nearly fell into the fire.

“Easy there, cupcake,” Richard said, kicking a burning log further away from her.

“I’m fine.” Mia protested, “perfectly composed. It’s the thought of Sofie with a giant penis slung over her shoulder, lisping…” She and Jasmine hung onto each other, hooting with laughter.

“The tokoloshe,” Jono said, “is very unusual in that he has a single buttock. Apparently Satan was unable to replicate this uniquely human feature, of our lovely, well rounded bottoms. So if you wish to scare away the devil, you must bare your buttocks at him and he will be frightened by that which he cannot have.”

“Ah that’s why mooning is such a handy tool,” Mia yelled. “Never mind crosses for vampires, just pull down your pants to the devil. Go on Richard luv, show us your moon.”

“Yes,” Helen chimed in, “show us.”

“I respectfully decline the invitation,” Richard said, “go on Jono.”

“I am too worried to continue,” Jono said. “I am afraid this discussion is being a health hazard to Mia.”

“No, I’m fine,” Mia gasped, “but my stomach hurts from laughing. Oh bleedin’ hell, this is hilarious. Go on Jono.”

“Part of the tokoloshi’s duties,” Jono said, “is to make love to its witch mistress, which is why he was created so well-endowed. As a reward for fulfilling these sexual duties, the tokoloshi is rewarded with milk and food.”

“Milk?” Kate was perplexed. “Why milk?”

“Milk is considered a sacred drink in many parts of Africa,” Jono explained, “it has many healing powers.”

“Likes to suck on a bit of tit, does he?” Richard was thoughtful. “Sign of a good man if you ask me.”

Jono ignored this comment and continued. “If you do see a tokoloshe, do not annoy it by talking to it and most certainly do not point at it because it will vanish immediately.”

“How on earth can I not look,” Mia shook with laughter, “when its hung like a bleedin’ donkey?”

Despite having downed half the bottle of schnapps, Mia was surprisingly coherent, unlike Jasmine, who had abruptly fallen fast asleep and was snoring slightly.

Jono finished the last of his beer and looked regretful. “Well, everyone, I must go to sleep or I will be a bad driver in the morning. Thank you very much for listening.”

He looked at Kate who grinned at him.

“No, thank you,” Richard said. “You’re incredibly knowledgeable, Jono, and I look forward to more stories about muti and witchdoctor’s and the like. Anyone else like one for the ditch? Last call, people, last call.”

“I’m going to bed,” Eva said. “Thanks Jono, thanks everyone.”

“Yeah, we’re calling it a night too,” Kate and Marika said, getting up.

“Me too,” Helen said. “That was fascinating, thanks Jono.”

“I’ll have one more,” Mia said, “lay it on baby.”

Jasmine was still fast asleep and Mia patted her head.

-.-

The Insanity Plea

by Larry Thompson

on Tour May 19 – July 20, 2014

PROLOGUE

The alarm jolted the young blond woman out of a dream where she was surfing toward a pristine beach on Maui, which had mystically transformed itself into jagged rocks. She moaned, turned off the radio, tried to rub the sleep out of her eyes and forced herself out of bed. It was five a. m. Debbie Robinson had two hours before she reported to work as a surgical nurse in the operating room at John Sealy Hospital in Galveston. Nude, she shuffled to the bathroom and then to the kitchen where she made a cup of instant coffee before slipping into a jogging bra, sweatshirt, shorts and New Balance running shoes. A five mile run along the seawall was her usual routine to prepare for her day

She stopped at the front door to take her key from the entry table and glanced in the mirror. Even with no make-up, the mirror reflected a wholesomely attractive face with a sharply defined chin, full lips, light blue eyes and a nose that had been touched up only slightly by a friendly plastic surgeon at the hospital. After she pulled her hair back into a pony tail, she left her apartment, glanced toward the hospital two blocks over and started a slow trot down 8th Street toward the Gulf of Mexico and Seawall Boulevard. Reaching the seawall, she paused momentarily and gazed out across the Gulf. At this hour of the morning, the stars were still visible in the eastern sky.

Resuming her run, in a matter of a few blocks Debbie had settled into an eight minute pace, fast enough to get her back to her apartment in about forty-five minutes. As she approached the old Galvez Hotel at 21st Street, she heard footsteps coming up behind her. Early morning joggers were common along the seawall; so she moved over to allow the other runner to pass.

Suddenly, Debbie felt a strong arm circling her waist and a hand covering her mouth. She had trained in the martial arts for years and refused to surrender to her panic. Instead, she twisted and brought her knee up into the groin of her attacker who groaned but still succeeded in forcing her to the ground. Before he could pin her arms, she reached into her shorts and found her apartment key. Using it as her only weapon, she raked the key as hard as she could down her attacker’s left cheek.

The killer let a low moan escape his lips. “Damn it, you bitch, you shouldn’t have done that.”

The killer held her with his left hand while he retrieved a knife from its holster on his waist. He flipped open the blade and pulled it from right to left against the soft flesh of her throat. Blood spurted from both carotid arteries and spilled from her neck. She was breathing more and more slowly when she slipped to the concrete. Her fluttering eyes became fixed as life drained from her body. The killer smiled with satisfaction as he bent over and used his knife to slice the running shorts from her lifeless body. Being careful not to get her blood on himself, he picked up her body and tossed it over the seawall to the rocks below. When he started his slow jog back to the hotel, he felt a few drops of blood, trickling from his cheek. He used her shorts to stem the flow. I’ll probably have to explain a Band-Aid on my cheek to my audience this morning as a shaving cut, he thought. As he continued his jog, he smiled. She was number three. Forty-seven to go.

***

A boulder covered jetty extended out about a hundred yards in front of the Galvez. As the sun rose, it illuminated the silhouette of a man sitting cross-legged at the end of the jetty, watching silently as the orange hued ball broke through the fog overhanging the Gulf. Satisfied that he brought forth another day as the voices commanded, he rose and picked his way through the rocks back to the seawall.

He certainly was not a jogger. His gray hair was a tangled, matted mess that hung below his shoulders, and he scratched at a long, scraggly beard as if searching for fleas or mites. He wore four layers of clothes, all that he possessed, and a tattered brown raincoat found in a dumpster. When people passed him, they recoiled from the stench of urine, feces and filth that surrounded him. As he made his way back to
the seawall, he was waving his hands and shaking his head as if to reject someone’s direction. All the while he was muttering to an unseen being, something about wanting to be left alone.

He didn’t notice the jogger’s body until he tripped and almost fell on her. Even then he continued to talk. He bent over and peered into her face, expecting to find one of his fellow street people passed out below the wall. When he saw her neck and the pool of blood that had oozed from the gaping wound, he jumped back, horror framing his face. Looking around and seeing no one else, he stepped forward again, not realizing that his left foot was now in the blood. A second time he bent over the lifeless form and touched her left wrist, searching for a pulse. There was none. Instead, he found a diamond bracelet, paused as he glanced up at the seawall once more and took the bracelet from her wrist. Holding it close to his face, he studied the bracelet and found an inscription, To Debbie with love, Dad.

Now he became frightened that someone would find him with the woman. Glancing in all directions to make sure he was not seen, he stuck the bracelet in the pocket of his second layer of pants where it would be safe and started for the seawall. Abruptly, he stopped, listened briefly, nodded and returned to the body where he removed one of his coats and covered the woman’s head and shoulders. Then he climbed the steps to the top of the seawall where he saw an older couple out for a morning stroll. He turned his head to hide his face as he hurried toward 21st and the Salvation Army where he would join a line of other homeless ones awaiting breakfast. The couple heard him continuing his monologue.

“I know, I know, I shouldn’t have taken her bracelet,” he said,

gesturing as if trying to push someone away. “Look, she’s dead. She

didn’t have a pulse. It’s mine now. How many times do I have to tell

you to leave me alone?”

When the light changed to green, he picked up his pace and

crossed Seawall Boulevard, shaking his head. “I’m getting out of here

as quick as I can. You don’t have to tell me how to do everything.”

CHAPTER 1

Wayne Little loved every aspect of a trial except this

one…waiting for the jury to return a verdict. Until the jury retired to

deliberate, he could exert significant control and often take charge as he

maneuvered through voir dire, examination of witnesses, arguing points

of law to the judge and final summation. Once the summation was

concluded, all he could do was wait, often for agonizing hours, even days.

Of course he would win like he nearly always did.

Nonetheless, nagging doubts always crept into his mind as he paced the

halls of the Harris County courthouse. Often, he walked up and down

the stairway just to burn off nervous energy before he would return to

the courtroom, reassure his client and wander off again.

The questions were nearly always the same. Did he make the

right points on closing? Was he too easy on the expert witnesses?

Should he have struck that one juror who glared at him throughout the

trial and stared at the ceiling when he made his closing argument? And

inevitably the longer the jury deliberated, the more questions surfaced.

It had been three hours when Claudia Jackson, a new partner

in the firm and his second chair in the trial, found him at a table in the

basement cafeteria, cold black coffee in his hand.

“Wayne, I’ve been looking all over this damn courthouse for

you,” Claudia said, not trying to hide the exasperation in her voice.

Wayne looked up expectantly. “We get a verdict?”

“No, but I got a call from Grace. She said your cell must be off.

Wayne searched through his pockets for his phone, looked at it

and agreed. “Yeah, I turned it off this morning when we began closing

arguments and forgot about it.”

“Grace says the District Attorney in Galveston called. Said it

was a courtesy call since you worked for him before you joined Tod. I

didn’t know you had been a prosecutor.”

“Guess I never told you. I did three years there before Tod

talked me into leaving my hometown and moving to Houston. That was

about ten years ago.”

“He told Grace to tell you that your brother is in the

hoosegow.”

A cloud crossed Wayne’s face as he stared down at the floor.

“I don’t have a brother, Claudia. I haven’t had one since I’ve been in

Houston.”

Puzzled, Claudia continued, “Wayne, the D. A. said this guy’s

name was Dan Little. He’s apparently in pretty bad shape but mumbled

something about you being his brother. And he had a faded, dirty

business card with your name on it in one of his pockets.

“One more thing. The D. A. said to tell you he is charged with

capital murder.”

After the jury returned a verdict for his client, Wayne told

Claudia he would see her in the office the next day. He walked to the

parking lot where he dropped his briefcase in a blue Nissan Armada

and crossed the street to Tex’s Bar, a place he knew would be

practically deserted in the middle of the afternoon. Wayne was enough

of a regular that Tex, the owner and bartender, knew him by name and

knew his brand of Scotch.

“Gimmie a double, Tex.”

“Starting a little early with the hard stuff today, aren’t you,

Wayne? You just lose a case?”

“No. Actually, I just won one, but this isn’t a celebration. I’ve

got some personal issues to sort through.”

Tex had been a bartender long enough to know when a

customer wanted to be left alone; so, he poured a double Scotch on the

rocks, set it in front of Wayne and walked to the other end of the bar

where he continued to wash drink glasses.

Tex occasionally glanced toward Wayne, wondering what

problems were troubling him. Wayne seemed to have the world by the

tail. He carried a lean and muscular two hundred and ten pounds on a

six foot, four inch frame. His hair was black as the ace of spades and

his gray eyes sparkled when he told a joke or described his last win.

Yet, his easy-going smile hid an intense personality, a young type-A if

there ever was one.

In an hour or so, other lawyers began drifting into the bar.

Seeing Wayne, some tried to strike up a conversation. Wayne was

polite but his manner soon discouraged them; so they wandered off to

other parts of the bar to tell war stories and bitch about judicial rulings.

After enough drinks that Tex was concerned about his driving,

Wayne paid his tab, assuring Tex that he was fine.

Leaving the bar, he considered taking the Metro train which

stopped in Midtown only two blocks from his townhouse. Then he

remembered his Nissan would be too tempting if he left it overnight.

Once he crossed the street he was confronted by a homeless man.

“You got any spare change, mister? I haven’t eaten today and

sure could use a hamburger.”

Wayne usually brushed such requests aside. This time,

wishing it was Dan just asking for a buck, he reached in his back

pocket and pulled a five dollar bill out of his wallet. Then, he continued

to his car, climbed in and left the parking lot on the Fannin Street side.

Carefully observing speed limits and red lights, he drove south on

Fannin to his home. Wayne tried to push Claudia’s news out of his

mind, only the more he tried the quicker the thoughts returned. In less

than ten minutes he punched in the code at the complex gate, entered

the driveway and turned down into his garage.

Elective Procedures

by Merry Jones

on Tour July 2014

Don’t look down. Don’t look down.

I kept repeating those three syllables, a singsong mantra to steady myself and get through time, pushing through seconds and minutes until it would be afterwards and this nightmare would be over.

Don’t look down.

But I didn’t have to look. I knew what was beneath me. I could picture what was lying six stories down on the concrete beside the kidney shaped swimming pool, near the mouth of the alligator water slide. Under the glowing light of sunrise, I imagined a widening crimson puddle. A clump of arms and legs. A shattered bone protruding through flesh. Tangled hair matted into a cracked skull.

Don’t look down, I said again, and I didn’t. Instead, I aimed my eyes straight ahead focusing not on the brick wall in front of me, but on the air surrounding my head. I stared into it, straining to see my aura, looking for stains, for splotches of darkness. Was it possible to see your own aura? Was there even such a thing? If there was, I couldn’t see it, saw only inches of emptiness between me and the bricks, and, at the periphery of my vision, the railing. For the briefest moment, I had a lapse; I almost turned my head, almost looked down at my hand. Don’t look, I chanted. Don’t look. Looking would mean moving my head. And if I moved it–if I moved anything at all, I’d disrupt my balance and slip, and then, with a thud, there would be two blobs of bones planted beside the pool.

A pelican dive-bombed past me, the rush of air nearly knocking me over. I held my breath, holding steady. I called out again, hoping someone would wake up, but no one came. So I told myself to stay steady and thing of other things. Other times. I stared at the wall and repeated: Don’t look down don’t look down don’t look down.