Thursday, December 27, 2018

Shark’s Tooth Wilson


dontravis.com blog post #317
  
Courtesy of Pixabay
TO MY READERS: The “Contact” section has disappeared from my Web Site, so I have no way of reading or responding to your comments. Please make any comments directly to my personal email, dontravis21@gmail.com, until this situation is corrected. Thanks.

Pure nonsense this week.

*****
SHARK’S TOOTH WILSON
By Don Travis
My real name’s Bobby—well, Robert, actually—but everyone in high school called me Shark’s Tooth ever since our Algebra teacher, Mr. Langston, said I was as sharp as a shark’s tooth in class one day. Before I knew it, everyone in my world except my parents and this girl named Becky called me that. Guess I’m lucky he didn’t say sharp as a tack or else I’d be known as Tacky. Praise the Lord for small miracles.
But back to that one girl who still called me Bobby, the one known behind her back as Boxy Becky. To be honest, that sort of described her, but as a victim, myself, I tried not to think of her in those terms… as difficult as that was. My closest friends—my buds—who’d shortened my unwelcome nickname down to Sharky, claimed she was sweet on me, but all that did was put a twist in my shorts. Why couldn’t some of the other girls… the babes… be sweet on me, instead of Boxy Becky?
I managed to keep my distance from Becky—although I was always polite to her—until just before the winter prom my junior year. She caught me in the hallway and let me know she didn’t have a date for the dance. I felt my cheeks burn as I said I didn’t either and then rushed off to English class.
The prom was neat, and I managed to dance with just about all the girls, but I was constantly aware of Becky standing off in the corner with a couple of other girls the football jocks unkindly labeled as cows. Being sort of soft-hearted, I occasionally asked one of them for a dance, including Becky. By this time, she wasn’t carrying as much weight, so her old sobriquet wasn’t quite so appropriate. Still… a habit’s a habit, and she was still Boxy just as I was still Shark’s Tooth.
Somehow, I ended up with her for the last dance of the night. Finally noticing that she had pretty good moves, must have flustered me, because when she asked what I was doing after the dance, I blurted out that me’n some of the guys had plans.
“Do they include girls?”
My cheeks heated up again. That only seemed to happen around Becky. “Not… not that I know of.”
“I don’t believe it,” she retorted.
“Look, Boxy, I---”
Even in the subdued lighting of the ballroom, her eyes flashed. She puffed up like a tire on an air hose.
“S-sorry, Becky. I just….”
I was talking to thin air. She stalked toward the exit, the sway of her broad beam expressing righteous indignation. She didn’t speak to me again that term.


Over the course of the summer, I managed to swallow the shame of my indiscretion with Becky. In fact, between my temporary construction job and hanging with the guys, I forgot about it completely. But as opening day at school grew closer, I found myself composing apologies for my careless mouth.
First day eventually arrived and proved a busy one. Getting classes squared away and talking to old friends you somehow hadn’t seen for three months, turned it into a zoo.
Finally, I heard a familiar voice speaking to someone behind me. I whirled and butted into the conversation.
"Becky, I…."
My voice died in a constricted throat. Chill bumps played down my back. Despite myself, my eyebrows shot up. The girl who stood before me was Becky all right, but she was another Becky. Her face was still broad, but it had shape, definition, from violet eyes to cupid’s-bow lips. Her frame displayed curves that weren’t there before. I swallowed hard and tried again.
“B-Becky, it’s good to see you.
She smiled broadly, said “Hello, Shark’s Tooth, and swayed provocatively away, chatting and laughing with her companions.


*****
Life catches up with you, doesn’t it? I’m sure we can all recall something similar to this when we were growing up. Hope you enjoyed the reading.

Please buy a copy of my latest book, The Lovely Pines, and provide feedback on the novel. If you do read the book, please post a review on Amazon. Each one helps.

Abaddon’s Locusts is scheduled for release on January 22, 2019, and the first draft of The Voxlightner Scandal is finished and the second draft is about half done.

Now my mantra: Keep on reading. Keep on writing. You have something to say… so say it.

My personal links:

Facebook: www.facebook.com/donald.travis.982
Twitter: @dontravis3

Buy links to the Lovely Pines:


See you next week.

Don

New Posts are published at 6:00 a.m. each Thursday.


Thursday, December 20, 2018

Don Travis: That One’s Trouble

Don Travis: That One’s Trouble: dontravis.com blog post #315 Courtesy of Instagram TO MY READERS: The “Contact” section has disappeared from my Web Site, so I hav...

That One’s Trouble


dontravis.com blog post #315

Courtesy of Instagram
TO MY READERS: The “Contact” section has disappeared from my Web Site, so I have no way of reading or responding to your comments. Please make any comments directly to my personal email, dontravis21@gmail.com, until this situation is corrected. Thanks.

Another piece of flash fiction this week.

*****
THAT ONE’S TROUBLE

          “Seth Fortner,” the bailiff intoned in a bored monotone.
          A slender youth rose from the cluster of prisoners awaiting arraignment in Henry Salman Zamora’s Metro courtroom and shuffled forward uncertainly.
          “That one’s trouble,” predicted the public defender next to me.
          "How so?" I asked.
          “Too pretty.”
          Another lawyer scoffed. “The kid can’t be old enough for Metro.”
          As if Hizzoner were privy to the conversation, Zamora peered over his glasses. “What is this, Mr. Prosecutor? This young man belongs in Children’s Court.”
          The assistant DA promptly handed over some papers. “The prisoner turned eighteen two months ago, sir.”
          As a probation and parole officer for the City of Albuquerque, I had a privileged seat with a clear view of Seth Fortner in profile. I understood the confusion. The kid’s face was smooth, unmarked, and untroubled by a beard. He didn’t even look old enough to have suffered through acne. Tanned, resilient skin stretched tight with the freshness of youth. High cheekbones balanced his features perfectly. Smoky eyes that could have been drawn by a caricaturist—brooding, and vulnerable—glanced nervously around the small courtroom. Brown hair with blond highlights, wavy in front, smooth at the back, couldn’t have been improved by a visit to a two hundred-dollar stylist.
          But the kid’s frame reinforced the prosecutor’s claim. Although lanky, his torso was defined by broad shoulders and flaring ribs seldom observed on minors. Even in baggy jailhouse blues, the kid made me think of the guy back in school we called “High-Pockets.”
          Outwardly cool, the boy’s fear was apparent to anyone who looked carefully. Probably his first bust. Soliciting, the docket read. Young Seth had propositioned an equally baby-faced undercover cop.
          Things went about as expected. The kid’s public-pad mouthpiece pled him out, anticipating a simple fine. For a while, it looked as if Zamora might upset the applecart because Seth Bayless had no family or permanent address in the area. His problem became mine as soon as the jurist’s eyes lit on me.
          “I see Paul Govan in the courtroom,” Zamora announced gravely. I rose grudgingly. “Mr. Govan, are you willing to take this young man under your wing and find him a spot in a halfway house?”
          “Uh, my boss usually makes the assignments, your honor.”
          “My word carries no weight with you fellows down in Probation and Parole?” Danger lurked in that question.
          “Of course, sir. I’m certain it will be all right for me to accept the assignment.”
          Yeah, right. My boss would tear me a new one… but he wouldn’t take the kid off my shoulders. What was it the PD lawyer had said? “That one’s trouble.”
          It took three hours out of my busy day to locate a halfway house with room for Fortner, and another hour to get all of the paperwork done. Finally, I sat across my desk from the probationer, intending to intimidate him with a dead-level stare. I was immediately flummoxed. Some mortals are blest with either a fine profile or good frontal features; few have both. Seth Fortner was one of the few. His eyebrows; dark and pencil thin, dipped slightly before arching gracefully over his eyes. This guy was a looker, front, side, and back! If I was an Adonis like this kid, I’d probably be out shagging my ass, too, but I’d sell it to the ladies.
          “Okay, Fortner, you understand what happened, right? Judge Zamora gave you a six-month suspended sentence with supervision. A few ground rules. No drinking of alcoholic beverages and no drugs of any kind. You’ll be subjected to random testing for the six months your ass is mine. Got that?”
          The solemn, respectful youth nodded. “Yes, sir.”
          “And stay away from the rabbit run.”
          “Rabbit run?”
          “The place you were busted. That area out on East Central where the gays gather to sell their goods. Got it?”
          A nod this time.
          I ran down the rest of the list and told him to report tomorrow afternoon to get with the program. I hesitated before going personal. “You seem like a decent kid. Why were you out peddling your butt to a bunch of fairies?”
          “They like me. And they aren’t always queer.”
          My beetle brows climbed, although I don’t know why. After ten years in this business, there should be no more surprises.
          “Even that cop had me do him before he busted me.”
          The old eyebrows really reached for the hairline. “Come on, he—”
          An elaborate shrug. “He said you wouldn’t believe me. But he did. And he didn’t pay me, either,” he added bitterly.
          “I wouldn’t make accusations like that, if I were you,”
          “Not an accusation. Just the way it was.”
          “Well, you stay out of trouble. Understand? You need a ride to the halfway house?”
          “I can probably hitch one.”
          “No way,” I came back at him.
          He grinned, that wide, mobile mouth curling devilishly at either end and altering his face dramatically. He looked like a heart-wrenching male ingénue. “What’s the matter, you afraid I’ll hit on someone?” he asked.
          “Whatever. I’ll give you a ride. You’re not about to proposition me.” Jeez, that sounded like a challenge.
          His sudden calculating look let me know he’d taken it that way and sent a shiver up my spine. He was up for the game.
          Was I?


*****
Well, what’s the outcome of this story. Was the kid’s will stronger than the probation officer’s? You can fashion your own ending and have fun doing it.

Please buy a copy of my latest book, The Lovely Pines, and provide feedback on the novel. If you do read the book, please post a review on Amazon. Each one helps.

Abaddon’s Locusts is scheduled for release on January 22, 2019, and the first draft of The Voxlightner Scandal is finished and in the second draft as we speak! Hooray.

Now my mantra: Keep on reading. Keep on writing. You have something to say… so say it.

My personal links:

Facebook: www.facebook.com/donald.travis.982
Twitter: @dontravis3

Buy links to the Lovely Pines:


See you next week.

Don

New Posts are published at 6:00 a.m. each Thursday.


Thursday, December 13, 2018

Dinky-Dos


dontravis.com blog post #315



Courtesy of Wikimedia Commons
NOTICE TO MY READERS: My comments section has disappeared, so I have no way to read or acknowledge comments. Until this is corrected, please send comments directly by email to my dontravis21@gmail.com address. Thanks.

Don

A bit to total nonsense this week. Sorry, folks, that’s the way my mind works.

*****
DINKY-DOS

          Kate trailed Ellie out of the public swimming pool locker room Saturday afternoon, her hair still damp, her pink pedal-pushers clinging to moisture on her legs. Ellie was always in a hurry. She caught up with her friend.
          “Did you see Will’s swimming suit?” Kate asked, slightly breathless from all the rushing.
          “Hard not to. It was psychedelic.”
          “No… I mean… Well, the way it fit so tight. You could almost see his dinky-do.”
          “His what?”
          “You know, his dinky-do.”
          “Geez, Kate, how old are you?”
          “Nine. Just like you.”
          “Then don’t talk like a baby. Who calls it a dinky-do?”
           “I do, for one. What do you call it?”
          “What everybody else does. A thing.”
          “Thing?” Kate thought that over for about a dozen steps. “Have… have you ever seen a thing?”
          “Course I have. I’ve got a brother. You?”
          Kate shrugged. “How could I? I don’t have a brother.”
          “You’ve got a father, don’t you? He has a thing.”
          Kate’s gut rolled. “He does? Well… I guess.”
          “Sure he does. How else did you get here?” Ellie asked.
          Kate swallowed hard to quell a rebellious stomach. “I-I don’t like to think about that.”
          Ellie tossed her head. “Oh, grow up. And believe me, when a boy gets as old as my brother, it's not so dinky anymore." She smirked. "Did you see Peter today? He’s going to turn out to be a hunk like his brother.”
          “Probably.”
          “They call them that, too, you know.”
          “Call what?”
          Ellie drew a breath like she was dealing with a dodo. “Dinky-dos.”
          “They call them Peters?”
          “Without the cap.”
          “What?”
          “You know, small p peters.”
          “Oh. How does Peter… uh, Pete hold his head up?”
          “Doesn’t think about it, I guess. Can you imagine going around saying 'Hello, I’m Peter?'”
          Ellie laughed, drawing Kate’s chuckle right along with her. They walked half a block without speaking. Ellie broke the silence.
           "If you think Peter ought to feel bad, so should Richard."
           " They're called richards?"
           "No, silly. Dicks."
           "Kate blushed and giggled. "I don't think I'll be able to face either one of them again."
           "Not without laughing, anyway. They call them something else, too,” Ellie went on.
          “I know. Penises.”
          “That’s a medical name or something. They call them the C word.”
          “C word?’
          “Come on. Like in cock-a-doodle-doo.”
          “They call them cock-a-doodle—”
          “Just the first word.
          Kate spoke without thinking. “Cock?”
          Ellie giggled. “Ahmmm, you said a dirty word.”
          “Didn’t either.”
          “Did too! You said cock-a-doodle-doo without the doodle-doo.”
          Kate snickered. “You know, I think I like dinky-do better.”
          “So do I. Did you see that tacky bathing suit Mavis had on? She must think she has boobs, wearing a two-piece like that."
          The two walked down the sidewalk laughing and chattering like… well, like two girls.

*****
Like I said, a piece of nonsense this week. Hope you enjoyed the by-play. Ladies, don’t beat up on me too much for trying to get into the head of two little girls. Haven’t had much practice, you know.

Please get a copy of my latest book, The Lovely Pines, and provide feedback on the novel. If you do read the book, please post a review on Amazon. Each one helps.

Abaddon’s Locusts is scheduled for release on January 22, 2019, and the first draft of The Voxlightner Scandal is finished!

Now my mantra: Keep on reading. Keep on writing. You have something to say… so say it.

My personal links:

Facebook: www.facebook.com/donald.travis.982
Twitter: @dontravis3

Buy links to the Lovely Pines:


See you next week.

Don

New Posts are published at 6:00 a.m. each Thursday.


Thursday, December 6, 2018

Don Travis: Withered on the Vine (An adaptation of an original...

Don Travis: Withered on the Vine (An adaptation of an original...: dontravis.com blog post #314     Courtesy of Wickipedia Brother Bucky got a pot load of hits last week, but not many “likes.” Woul...

Withered on the Vine (An adaptation of an original story by Mark Wildyr)


dontravis.com blog post #314
  
Courtesy of Wickipedia
Brother Bucky got a pot load of hits last week, but not many “likes.” Would appreciate a few from my readers.

For this week’s short, short, my friend Mark Wildyr allowed me to adapt a story he posted on his blog on April 1, 2014. He wrote the story in homage to a friend he lost to HIV/AIDS. A recent article I read on the global health crisis known as Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome, prompted me to recall the two individuals I have known who succumbed to the horror more commonly known as AIDS. In the early days of the disease, it was almost always fatal. My friends depicted below were stricken in those days. More recently Antiretroviral Therapy (ART), has allowed many of the infection’s victims to live longer, less horrible lives. Let’s pray the affliction is soon wiped out.

At any rate, here’s my adaptation of Mark Wildyr’s April 2014 piece.

*****
WITHERED ON THE VINE

Shafts of sunlight piercing cloud-capped tempests. A slender oak sapling prematurely gnarled by drought. A plump young melon rotted from within… withered on the vine. We’ve seen them all.
A bright future never realized. A quick, mischievous mind laid waste. Wiry swimmer’s muscles emaciated and atrophied. Tanned, silken flesh suppurating and splotchy. An indomitable spirit piteously eroded. You’ve seen them all? Then you must have known my friends, one felled before his time and the other in his prime, by the poison whose name is whispered in fearful awe.
They were both as incandescent as that golden sunbeam, as tenacious as the fledgling oak, as sound as a prospering gourd. Joyful, flirtatious, puckish, engorged on sweet temper, sated by gentle good will, they shambled through life handsome and desirable, recognizing and reconciled to being different from their fellows. Too late, each put aside promiscuity born of lively curiosity and turned to steadfast fidelity. The hateful venom had been transmitted. Invaded from within, they began a long, horrid, inevitable diminuendo, complicated by tuberculosis and meningitis and bacterial infections that defied naming.
Struck down by God for abominable sin, the self-righteous proclaim. Nay, the libertines decry, there is no God. How could an Almighty permit the destruction of such humanity?
They are wrong… their certain knowledge as corrupted as my friends’ shriveled frames at the end time. They were not vexations upon the population; they were the most human of humans: a blend of perfection and fault, good and bad, noble and mean. No God of my acquaintance could be offended by their genial attendance. Challenged, perhaps. Unsettled, maybe. Enchanted…absolutely.
But if there is no God, then these terrible tragedies become meaningless, insufferable, interminable catastrophes. If He does not exist, then who will pluck those unique, harmonious souls from the wretched human detritus left behind?
Such horror must not be the end; cannot be the ultimate Omega.

*****
Such a tragedy.

Apparently, the virus was not originally carried by humans. It originated in champanzees, and somehow was transmitted to humans.

Please get a copy of my latest book, The Lovely Pines, and provide feedback on the novel. If you do read the book, please post a review on Amazon. Each one helps.

As previously noted, The Bisti Business was named as a finalist in the New Mexico-Arizona Book Awards in two categories: Best Mystery and Best Gay Book. Sadly, the book took no prize in either category.

Now my mantra: Keep on reading. Keep on writing. You have something to say… so say it.

My personal links:

Facebook: www.facebook.com/donald.travis.982
Twitter: @dontravis3

Buy links to the Lovely Pines:



Abaddon’s Locusts is scheduled for release on January 22, 2019, and the first draft of The Voxlightner Scandal is this close to being completed.

See you next week.

Don

New Posts are published at 6:00 a.m. each Thursday.


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