Redemption Road (6) [This one is LONG] (1024 hits)
Category: NoneLabels: redemptionroad
Rating: 2 on 23 reviews (Rate this item) (V)
Submitted by Jack McCallum (View user info) at 2006-05-12 15:47:35 EDT
Redemption Road (1) http://www.ubersite.com/m/79291
Redemption Road (2) http://www.ubersite.com/m/81591
Redemption Road (3) http://www.ubersite.com/m/81716
Redemption Road (4) http://www.ubersite.com/m/82332
Redemption Road (5) http://www.ubersite.com/m/85951
[Note: This is the closest I've come to posting a novel on Ubersite, if not in length, certainly in terms of story and character development (this bastard is already 50+ pages in Word, and I'm about halfway to the end... I think). I hope everyone is enjoying this. I know I'm having fun writing it. The characters are really coming alive now, and I never know what they are going to say next.]
6 - Revelations
Ben Sugarman felt as if he was going to drown if the warm rain that tasted and smelled ever so slightly of piss continued to pound down upon them. He was struggling to hold a young woman by the arms, and her slick and slender limbs slipped out of his grip. She started to run, shrieking and waving her arms as if striking out at the sky. She was running blind, and heading for the edge of the road. Ben took a step in the near total darkness and nearly tripped over another much older woman in a pink retro waitress dress and apron. His shoes slipped on the greasy-wet asphalt of the broken road and he fell to his hands and knees as the young woman in the black jeans and tee dropped out of sight. Just beyond his splayed hands the road ended, and what had been a dry wash earlier was now a rising torrent of brown water and floating debris. Ben crawled forward and saw the younger woman clinging to the root of a long vanished tree jutting from the raw wall of earth under the broken road. Yellow, stuttering light came from somewhere behind him. As Ben reached for the woman he saw something else in the water, and he was more afraid than ever.
A hand settled on his shoulder and a voice with a southern twang said, "Gotcha covered, brother."
An arm clad in pink reached around Ben and down toward the water, and pulled the young woman out of danger.
*
It had been raining for two days when the bus reached the washout.
In the hours before the bus topped a rise and the passengers saw the churning dark waters rushing across their path a secret was willingly revealed, another secret was exposed, and a third, much darker secret remained hidden.
Quiet and civility ruled the first day and night of rain, but even then frustrations were building. There was little disagreement with the notion that the heavy downpour smelled suspiciously of urine. The rain has steady, warm and as Robbie said, stinky. Pee breaks were few, and when they were taken they didn't last long.
"It's sort of like you're pissing right on your own self," Whippet had said to Addison at one point, his mouth twisting in disgust. "Not that it's the first time I ever been pissed on, understand. But I never pissed on myself. On purpose, anyhow."
Addison had laughed so hard his gut hurt a little afterward.
Tim was to only one to get a little relief from the slowly escalating tension. He drove through the rain all night, in peace as the others slept behind him.
The following day the bus moved silently through the rain. Whippet and Addison took turns driving and dozing, napping out of sheer boredom. Dick Allen seemed to sleep an awful lot. Julianne noticed this, and still believed she had seen the meek little man somewhere once before. Garvin stayed in his same seat, muttering sullen curses and staring out the window, dark brows knotted together. When he nodded off late in the afternoon everyone silently welcomed his snores. Julianne played word games with Tim and Robbie, and she was proud of the teenager's efforts to keep the little girl amused, since Robbie would awaken Tim from his sleep whenever she was bored. Julianne and Robbie slept as well, waking up as most of them did, with a confused where-the-fuck-am-I expression that soon became a mask of bleak recognition.
Since everyone slept to some degree that day, most of the passengers were awake that night, or hovering on the verge of sleep. Tim no longer had the night to himself.
"How are you doing, son"
Addison had taken the front row seat overlooking the folding door of the bus, across the aisle from Tim.
Tim glanced over his right shoulder and then returned his attention to the road, seeing only darkness and diamond-streaks of rain in the headlights, the left weaker than the right, the right stuttering like a strobe.
"I'm okay, Mr. Addison."
"Pretty brave back there, kid. Pretty ballsy."
Tim shrugged.
"Especially for someone who hates the dark."
Tim looked up from the road, into the night. It was still creepy, this whole situation was scary as shit and would have been worse if he had been alone, but it didn't get to him like before, freezing him inside and making his ballsack creep up until it was an insignificant part of the physical numbness that engulfed him, and paradoxically left his mind sharp and aware and terrified.
"I think I died," Tim said.
"Oh," Addison said. He took off his glasses and closed his eyes. He saw himself standing in his kitchen, holding a small shopping list for the corner store and wondering why the lights were flickering. Then he was here.
It had been late morning when the lights had flickered in his kitchen. It had to be late morning because he always got up before six o'clock, had a cup of coffee, and wrote for a few hours. And if it was late morning, in the middle of summer in New York state, he wouldn't have had the kitchen lights on. His kitchen big windows looking out on a small garden, and the spacious room was blindingly bright all day long. If he didn't have the lights on...
Maybe it was me that was flickering, Addison thought.
"My mom and dad died," Tim said. His voice was so flat it was almost a dry croak. "I know that."
Addison opened his mouth, then closed it. Behind them the air was stirred by snores and soft, deep breaths. Maybe all the boy needed was a kind ear right now.
You always want your readers to shut the hell up and hear your voice when they open one of your books, Addison told himself. Why don't you zip it and listen for once?
"My dad was a manager with DMM, in Defiance."
Addison slipped his glasses on and thought, Ohio?
"That's in Ohio," Tim said. "Defiance Metal Manufacturing. My dad taught me how to drive a truck. That's how I can handle driving this bus."
They were on a slight upward grade now, and Tim gave the accelerator a little more pressure.
"DMM just built a brand new plant and they invited a bunch of families to a lunch there. A celebration. There were mostly moms and dads and little kids, but my dad really wanted me to go. So I went. Most of the group was in a big empty space as big as a football field that would soon be filled with big machines for stamping and cutting metal. They were listening to music and milling around and talking, all of them clustered around tables full of chicken wings and meatballs and cole slaw."
Tim closed his mouth and swallowed loudly. They had not eaten in days, and while they were not suffering physically and weren't especially hungry, the urge to eat something, anything, was still there.
Addison imagined a big bowl of Swedish meatballs and shook his head. That was the last thing he needed to start thinking about. His stomach gurgled loudly.
"Christ."
Tim gave him a wan smile.
"I was standing by one of the big bay doors. I was drinking a Sprite and thinking that this was definitely not the way I wanted to spend a Saturday. Then was a sound like a thunderstorm broke out inside the building, and it was coming up behind me loud and fast. Must be what being run down by a train would sound like. I heard some people yell. The ground started shaking under my feet. I spilled my soda and started to turn around and that's when something big and flat hit me and sent me flying."
Addison looked out the window, peering up into the night. At least there was one advantage to all this rain. It covered up the ever-changing stars overhead, and the defect which could be seen glimmering even on the darkest nights, an indistinct shimmer and gleam, like a pool of water floating beyond the clouds.
"When I got to my feet I was in the parking lot. There was most of one of the big tables from inside lying on the ground. I was really dizzy, and I had a bad cut and a bump on the side of my head. I saw that half of the building had caved in. Collapsed. The roof, and all the catwalks and gantries and chain hoists and everything else. It... it looked like something you'd see on the Discovery Channel. Like it had been stepped on. There was a dark cloud of dust coming out of the crushed doorway, and I could hear people screaming."
Toward the back of the bus Addison heard Whippet singing softly, as if serenading Julianne.
"Am I not pretty enough? Is my heart too broken? Do I cry too much? Am I too outspoken?"
"Oh God," Julianne mumbled sleepily.
"Don't I make you laugh? Should I try it harder? Why do you see right through me?"
"Please just be quiet," Julianne said, with an exasperated kindness.
"That's a song by Kasey Chambers, darlin' Julie. She's a goddess in my world. She..."
Whippet was silent a moment, snoring softly a moment later.
Addison was pretty sure Julianne might eventually let Whippet have his way with her if only to shut the man up.
"I went to the door where I'd been standing just a minute before," Tim said. "The whole doorway was now a hole about as high as my knees. The building was all shifted and crumpled, and that was the only way in I could see. People were still calling out. And I heard my dad."
The bus had drifted across the faded paint of broken yellow lines dividing the old two-lane blacktop, and Tim started as if just noticing. He turned the wheel and brought the bus back into the right-hand lane. The road was climbing a hill now, and Tim shifted into third gear.
"I heard my dad and others asking for help, some whispering and some yelling. I Got down on my hands and knees and crawled a little way inside. I heard something grinding and falling and some people screamed... and I got soaked in blood. I don't know what happened to them. I could still hear my dad calling for help. But it was dark."
Tim looked over his shoulder, and Addison realized he'd never seen such devastation in a face. He was tempted to voice some bullshit like 'It's okay' or 'Everything will be fine.' Instead he stood, took a step, and laid a hand on the boy's shoulder.
Tim's shirt was still dirty, but every time he went outside for a pee in the driving rain a little more blood was rinsed out of his clothes.
"It was dark," Tim said again. "I was scared. So I started backing up, trying to get out. Out into daylight. There were more noises, right in the mess of twisted steel over my head. Next thing I knew I was here, flat on my back right in the middle of the road. I walked a while, and found the bus. It was parked in the left hand lane, like it was headed in the opposite direction. I think I found you my third day here, and... and..."
Tim eased the bus onto the shoulder of the road, not there was ever any traffic out here going in either direction.
The boy looked up at Addison and whispered, "I killed my mom and dad. I was scared of the dark and I killed my mom and dad. I let them die."
Tim started to cry. He kept it quiet, grabbing fistfuls of Addison's shirt and twisting them.
Addison said nothing. He lowered himself into a squat, both knees popping like firecrackers. He let the boy cry on his shoulder. Not all of the old cliché's were bad ones.
Tim did manage to gasp out a few coherent words between slurs and sobs. He said, "Maybe all of us died, and that's why we're here."
And, "When Robbie got in trouble... I just couldn't stand the thought of her going through that twice. She's just a little kid."
After a while Addison said, "You okay to get us down the road?"
Tim wiped his noise and sniffed, making a loud ratcheting sound. "Yeah."
Addison leaned forward and kissed the boy on the forehead. "You did nothing wrong, Tim. Now let's get going."
Addison thought the kid was old enough to be more man than boy, needing just a little release and not a boo-hoo marathon. He was right.
"Look at this darn rain," Tim said. He grabbed the green metal stick of the gearshift and worked it like he'd been driving the bus for years. Then he got the bus back on the road.
Addison went a few rows back to give Tim some peace and to try and catch some sleep. Something in the aisle caught his eye and he bent down to retrieve it. It was Robbie's missing shoe.
"For Christ's sake," Addison whispered, seeing that the little girl was still had the other shoe, on the floor under her seat. The socks on both feet were now worn and dirty.
He reached forward to tuck the shoe safely beside its mate so Robbie would find it in the morning. Addison had just set down the shoe when a voice made him lurch back into the aisle.
"You disgusting fucking pervert!"
Julianne opened her eyes and saw David Garvin standing up and pointing an accusing finger at Addison, who was stumbling backward into the aisle, away from Robbie's seat.
"Leave that little girl alone, you fucker." Garvin was livid, his chest heaving.
Whippet came up the aisle running a hand through tangled strands of hair. "What the fuck's all the ruckus?"
Robbie sat up and rubbed her eyes sleepily.
Garvin was still pointing at Addison, as if holding the older man in place by force of will. "This walking sickness was doing something to the little girl. Either something sexual... or worse."
"Hell, Chi-town," Whippet said, "What's worse?"
"Murder's worse," Garvin snapped. "The murder of a child!"
Richard Allen sat up and yawned. "What's going on?"
Man, you sure can sleep, Whippet thought.
"Murderer!" Garvin wailed, still pointing at Addison.
The bus shuddered to a stop and Garvin lurched and grabbed the seat in front of him.
"Stop being a dick," Tim called from the front of the bus. "Mr. Addison didn't do anything!"
Garvin started nodding fast. "Yeah, see... see? Brainwashing these kids is how he gets them to do exactly what he wants. Probably memorized the NAMBLA handbook."
Addison got two words out. "I didn't—"
"I SAW HIM KISS THE BOY!"
Garvin shouted this last so loud his voice broke.
Whippet held up his hands and looked from Addison to Tim, hoping to hear what really happened. He'd believe he was Jesus Christ reincarnate and that he was doing one god-awful shitty job in the course of his own second coming before he'd believe a word out of Garvin's mouth.
"I told him how my mom and dad died," Tim said. "And I cried like a little kid. Mr. Addison let me cry and then gave me a kiss. Here." Tim tapped his forehead with the tip of one finger. "That's it."
"I'm SURE that was ALL," Garvin said. His voice had taken on a sneering, Snidely Whiplash quality. "And just WHAT was he doing with the GIRL?"
Robbie covered her ears and yelled, "Stop shouting!"
"Look, pard," Whippet said, "Addy's one of the good guys. He—"
Garvin whirled and snarled. "Fuck you, hayseed. I know for a fact that his kindly writer face is a façade and that this man you all think is just a grand old fellow somehow avoided doing any time for the murder of a child!"
Aww, fuck, Addison thought. He'd been right. Garvin did work for one of the firms seeking his head back then. Now the shit was gonna hit the fan.
In his mind he saw the open window, and the boy who was no longer there.
"He... misunderstood me," Addison said. "I was trying to help. To comfort him."
Garvin grinned. "Yes, tell it, Mr. Addison. Or should I call you Mr. Teague? Mr. Jonathan Teague?"
The name made no impact on the others.
Garvin sucked in a breath and screamed, "Don't you fucking IMBECILES ever READ the FUCKING PAPERS?"
"That's it," Whippet said, taking another step forward. "Any more name-callin' outta you, and I'm gonna punch your ticket, you fog-horning sumbitch."
"Jonah," Julianne said to Addison, "Tell us what happened."
Addison let out a breath. He moved down one row and sat on the edge of a seat, facing the aisle.
"Jonah Addison started out as a pseudonym... and became my name. I used to be Jonathan Teague."
He looked from Julianne to Whippet, from Robbie to Tim.
"I made a good living writing kid's books, not the off-kilter adult stuff I write now. After a few years I paid off the mortgage on my house. I always thought I should give something back, so I started going to children's hospitals. I was living in Ann Arbor then."
"Yeah, let's all listen really good," Garvin said. "Let's all listen to the killer's sob story and feel sorry for him and not the child who died at his hand."
Whippet shook his head. "I swear if you don't shut up I'm gonna wrap that tie around your neck until you're as blue my ball—" a glance at Robbie "—as the sky."
"I met this one kid at Mott Children's Hospital, in the UM Medical Center. His name was Kevin Raines. He was seven years old. He was fighting leukemia, bald as a cue ball. A great kid, a real fighter. He had a million questions."
Addison remembered the boy. The big brown eyes. The questions which would never be answered.
"He asked me about God. I'd set aside a week to read through a whole story for some of these kids, and every day I'd talk with Kevin in the room he shared with two other boys. One day he asked if I believed in God. I told him yes."
Addison shrugged, as if justifying his words with himself.
"It was bullshit, since I hadn't gone near a church in many years. College has a way of getting rid of beliefs like that. But I said yes, and I said that in the end, we all go to a better place. Sooner or later. Those were my exact words. Sooner or later, we all go to a better place."
Addison was quiet for a moment. The bus was at rest on the uphill grade, and the only sounds were the grinding of the engine and the rain drumming on the roof.
"The kid was dying. I figured a little false hope couldn't hurt."
Julianne sat down. Garvin remained on his feet, hands on the seat back in front of him. Whippet stayed close, certain the lawyer was going to flip out any second.
"We talked like that four days in a row. When I came by the hospital on my last day, a Friday, I'd missed Kevin by about two minutes."
Addison let out a dry, bitter laugh.
"Kevin had decided that he wasn't going to fight and be in pain any more. He had decided to go to that better place. He turned over a trash can, climbed up onto a windowsill, opened the window, and jumped out. I got to his room before his parents did. They were on their way. There was already a cop there, a young guy who looked as shook up as the rest of us. I saw nurses and orderlies running around. I looked out a window one over from the one Kevin had used."
Addison stared at the floor of the bus, as if seeing what he was describing.
"He was lying in a parking lot behind the building. Seven stories down. Blood had spread out from both sides of his little body, blood shining like liquid gold in the sunlight. It looked like wings, like angel's wings, and he was smiling—"
"Bullshit bullshit BULLSHIIIIIIIT!!!" Spittle flew from Garvin's lips. He looked, and sounded, like a madman.
"There was EVIDENCE! Tell them! TELL THEM!"
Robbie ran to the front of the bus to stand by Tim.
"Sit down, kiddo," Tim whispered. Robbie took the seat Addison had vacated.
Addison smiled. "Kevin left a note behind. The cop found it, the parents saw it, and lawyers like Garvin used it as evidence that I talked the little boy into committing suicide."
"What'd it say, man" Whippet was hanging on every word. "What'd the note say?"
"It said, 'Jonny told me this is the best thing to do.' A lot of the kids called me Jonny back then."
Julianne put one hand to her mouth. Garvin breathed loudly through his nose.
"Little guy wanted to go to a better place," Whippet said.
Addison nodded. "I was charged with murder in the third degree. Kevin's parents got all the legal help they needed, since it was a high profile case, in the Midwest, anyway. It took every cent I had to make bail and keep fighting the charge. A jury eventually declared that I was not guilty. But you know how people are. Life for Jonathan Teague was over, and writing was all I knew. So I moved out of the state, took up a pseudonym, and started writing a different kind of book. Novels. These days... I keep my opinions to myself."
He looked everyone in the eye, even little Robbie. "And that's my story."
Garvin shouted again, and this time he almost sounded like he was singing. "This is BULLLLLLLSHIT! BULLLLLSHI—"
His teeth clacked together as Whippet slammed him down into his seat.
"That's enough out of you for tonight."
"Fuck you, cowboy," Garvin said.
Richard Allen fought the urge to smile. He was still safe. For now.
There was a lull in the rain and no one spoke, until Robbie called out to them.
"Hey, look. There's another sign on the road."
It was only a few feet from the bus. Tim had been so furious with Garvin he hadn't noticed it when he stopped the bus.
Now everyone crowded forward to see it. Everyone but Garvin, and Richard Allen.
The stuttering headlight illuminated a slender length of sheet metal. Below a sideways figure-eight that looked like a hand-drawn infinity symbol was an equation.
3 + 1 - 1
"What the hell," Whippet asked. "Three plus one minus one?"
Before anyone could even begin to puzzle out the sign, they all heard a woman screaming, her voice high and terrified. Whippet reached over the steering wheel and cranked open the folding doors. He hit the ground running, only to discover that the bus was stopped on the crest on a hill.
When he topped the rise and looked down below, he broke into an even faster run through the warm, persistent rain.
*
When the girl was safe, huddled on the road in the rain, Ben became aware of an engine drawing close, and then shutting down. Headlights illuminated the area, one weak, one stuttering. The light was fractured by silhouettes.
Ben gave the newcomers a once-over. The woman in the soft-soled shoes was obviously a nurse or a doctor. She went right to the older woman in the waitress uniform. The wiry one who had pulled Betty to safety was now wearing his pink jumpsuit unzipped to his belly and rolled down, the empty sleeves tied around his waist like a belt. There was a hefty fellow with a beard that was more salt than pepper, and a man in a once fine and now very dirty three piece suit. Standing by the bus door was a teenage boy, a little girl, and behind them, a meek and pasty fellow who Ben took an instant dislike to.
Ben turned to the nurse/doctor and asked, "Is she okay?"
"No," the woman said. "She's dead."
Ben bowed his head.
"How 'bout you, darling?" The wiry man was looking at the twenty-something girl in the black jeans and tee with concern.
The girl looked up at him and said, "Please, I can't stand storms."
"Well, c'mon then," the man said, helping the girl to her feet and leading her into the bus.
The nurse/doctor followed them.
"Poor old woman," the bearded man said. He hunkered down, slow, the way older, heftier men do, the way Ben would have. "Anyone know who she is?"
"Her name was Alice Stein," Ben said. "She said that much, and that she worked at a diner in Kingman."
The bearded man held out a swatch of the old woman's apron.
FLAMEBURGER it read, ARIZONA'S HOTTEST FOOD STOP.
"That's right on the I-40," the bearded man said.
"Yeah," Ben said. "Before she keeled over she also said she hated open spaces. I believe they call that agoraphobia."
Offering a hand to hoist the bearded man up, Ben said, "Ben Sugarman."
"Jonah Addison," the bearded man said. They shook hands in the rain.
"The Asian girl said her name was Betty Takana. She said she was a web-designer. From Portland." Ben shook his head. "I guess we all appeared here at about the same time, just before the rain started... wherever here is. Don't mind telling you, sir, that I'm spooked right now."
"We all are," Addison said. "We're all in the same boat."
"And if this keeps up," Ben said, "We goan need a boat. Mind if we step inside?"
Addison moved aside and said, "This is our entertainment, Cullum Whippet."
Ben and Whippet shook hands.
"Didn't you used to be somebody?"
Whippet laughed and nodded. "In this place, we all used to be somebody."
Ben stopped in front of Garvin and held out his hand. "Ben Sugerman."
Garvin hesitated, just a hiccup and it was gone, and then he shook Ben's hand. "David Garvin."
As Ben was meeting the kids and Richard Allen, Whippet leaned close to Garvin and whispered to him.
"'Fraid to shake the black man's hand, huh? I bet I know what your favorite restaurant is." When Garvin gave him a questioning look Whippet said, "Cracker Barrel."
"Fuck you," Garvin said, walking to the edge of the broken road.
Whippet joined Addison, who was standing over the old woman.
"Hey," Whippet said. "That sign back there said three plus one minus one. Now I know I only ever used my maths to count up how much ass I got over the years, but doesn't that mean we're missing someone?"
Addison looked up, smiled wearily and said, "Not anymore."
Standing upriver and watching the road was a dog. It had its tail tucked between its legs and it gave out a fearful whimper. It was a hound mix, very thin. Its short coat was a mottled red and white.
Whippet squinted in the rain. "Am I lookin' at a three-legged dog?"
Addison nodded.
Whippet said, "Come on, then!"
The dog took a few tentative steps forward. They could see the dog was a young female, scared shitless.
"Looks like you've got a new friend," Addison said with a grin. "What are you going to call her?"
Whippet gave Addison a look that said, 'what the hell, man?' He hooked a finger and thumb in his mouth and gave a shrill whistle, and then yelled, "Rebel! C'mere girl!"
The hound came running as fast as her three legs would allow.
"Rebel?" Addison scratched at his beard. "That's no name for a girl."
"Writer-man," Whippet said with a grin, hunkering down and scratching the dog behind the ears, "You obviously never met my momma."
Whippet stood and the dog sat by his left boot, looking toward the river.
"Don't seem right," Whippet said, "This old lady just layin' out in the rain like this."
"No," Addison said. "It doesn't."
"Maybe we could give her a decent burial," Whippet said. "I don't know many prayers but we could sure send her off with a hymn or two."
Before Addison could reply Garvin shouted, "A burial? Fuck that! We have to keep moving! We have to get past this washout and get moving!"
Addison and Whippet started walking back to the bus. The dog named Rebel followed close behind.
Addison rubbed his beard. "What would we dig with?"
"Gotta be something we can use on board," Whippet said, glancing back over his shoulder. "I bet we— HEY!"
Garvin had dragged the old woman's body to the broken asphalt of the road. Before Whippet or Addison could reach him he shoved her over the edge, into the water.
Whippet grabbed Garvin by the lapels and shook him. "You outta your fuckin' mind?"
Addison and Ben Sugarman reached the edge of the road at the same time.
They all saw what Ben had seen earlier, moving deftly through the swirling waters. Rebel sniffed the piss-scented air and bared her teeth.
Snakes of varying lengths, from a few inches to a few feet, slithered through the water and around churning debris. There were other things that looked like eels, and great rolling ribbed bodies that could have belonged to earthworms, if earthworms were twenty feet long.
The more they observed this hellish scene, the more things they saw in the water. There had to be thousands of long, twisting bodies, up river and down, moving with the rushing waters.
"I do hate snakes," Ben said. "Hate them something fierce."
When the snakes near the dead woman became aware of her, they closed in on her. They began to eat.
"Whoa!" Whippet said, flinching. Rebel let out a few sharp barks. "Did that fucking thing just take a bite out of the old lady?"
"It seems so," Addison said.
They watched the snakes tear the old woman to pieces, some nipping at her ears and nose, others tearing great chunks out of her thighs and buttocks.
As her partially stripped bones bobbed and dipped and disappeared around a bend in the river, Addison raised a hand and pointed to where the broken road continued on the far side of the rushing waters.
"And that is where we have to be."
User Reviews
Submitted by spyder882001 (user info) at 2008-05-09 18:53:13 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Submitted by wookie (user info) at 2008-05-09 18:20:14 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
"No Comment" doesn't even cut it. This installment deserves more of a "Damn, Dude."
Submitted by wookie (user info) at 2008-05-09 18:20:14 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
"No Comment" doesn't even cut it. This installment deserves more of a "Damn, Dude."
Submitted by wookie (user info) at 2008-05-09 18:17:34 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by Jack_McCallum (user info) at 2008-05-08 15:18:53 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Submitted by X54 (user info) at 2008-05-08 01:13:24 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
"My dad taught me how to drive a truck. That's how I can handle driving this bus." Seems to conflict with (from part 2) "It had taken him hours to figure out how to work the gear shift on the old bus, but Tim had been faced with figuring things out on his own before, and he found the challenge of learning to drive the bus a welcome diversion from the fear that made him want to curl into a ball."
-
GOOD catch. Thanks!
Submitted by X54 (user info) at 2008-05-08 01:13:24 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
"My dad taught me how to drive a truck. That's how I can handle driving this bus." Seems to conflict with (from part 2) "It had taken him hours to figure out how to work the gear shift on the old bus, but Tim had been faced with figuring things out on his own before, and he found the challenge of learning to drive the bus a welcome diversion from the fear that made him want to curl into a ball."
Submitted by St_Jimmy (user info) at 2007-11-06 20:09:30 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
I'll admit, this was a little long, but I wouldn't go as far as to call it LONG.
Just my opinion.
Submitted by inion_de_trua (user info) at 2006-07-12 14:45:06 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
if i give this another 2 will you post more of it?
Submitted by nrduncan (user info) at 2006-05-16 09:33:24 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by CaptainThorns (user info) at 2006-05-15 08:42:02 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
WTF I'M NOT READING ALL THAT...
...until lunchtime.
Submitted by Brdn_Nkd (user info) at 2006-05-15 08:30:15 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
most excellent
Submitted by thecaes (user info) at 2006-05-14 02:40:03 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
[Note: This is the closest I've come to posting a novel on Ubersite, if not in length, certainly in terms of story and character development (this bastard is already 50+ pages in Word, and I'm about halfway to the end... I think).]
Bah. Talk to me when you hit part twenty four. Which, by the way, was all YOUR fault.
Addison's secret wasn't as horrific as I thought it would be...mostly because of Garvin's overeaction. Hopefully there's something deeper behind his dislike for Addison that you'll explain later, because his behaviour did not fit the scene for me. I mean, implying pedophilia and freaking out like that...he's totally irrational.
Submitted by FALLEN (user info) at 2006-05-14 00:51:01 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Got it, thanks.
I saw that movie a long time ago.
I will have to check it out again, I don't remember much of it.
Submitted by Nat_Nemcova (user info) at 2006-05-13 22:01:55 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Between this series and Mayfield you need to get writing......lol..Great read!
Submitted by Nat_Nemcova (user info) at 2006-05-13 22:01:53 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Between this series and Kayfield you need to get writing......lol..Great read!
Submitted by ghola (user info) at 2006-05-13 15:02:31 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
first thing i've read in a while
Submitted by FALLEN (user info) at 2006-05-13 00:28:21 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Hey Jack,
I give up.
Why is there a space between Lyons and Spikowski?
Submitted by Jack_McCallum (user info) at 2006-05-12 21:37:07 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Hahaha! Yeah, Bubba.
Uber's jusr an online pulp mag for some of us.
Submitted by Bubba2341 (user info) at 2006-05-12 21:19:32 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Actually, this is the sixth installment in six months.
Just like ya get in a magazine. . .
Submitted by Doodles (user info) at 2006-05-12 21:05:59 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Y halo thar redemption
Submitted by Bubba2341 (user info) at 2006-05-12 19:32:11 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Very good. I think I need to go back and read the whole thing from
part one forward. I could wait until the whole story is finished, but
I may not live that long. Bwahahaha!!!
Submitted by inion_de_trua (user info) at 2006-05-12 16:10:53 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
TOOK YOU FUCKING LONG ENOUGH!!!
Submitted by JonnyX (user info) at 2006-05-12 15:56:28 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Thanks for continuing this, man.
Submitted by Jack_McCallum (user info) at 2006-05-12 15:50:58 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
I hate it when paragraph spacing looks FINE in the preview but is FUCKED in the final result.
Only impacted one paragraph this time, but still.