The Christmas Roses Must Not Die

Richard Shields

Description

"...life is mocked by death, and we are the fools." --Justin Chance
Is this the despairing conviction of an eighteen-year-old boy haunted by personal demons pursuing him as he runs from a tragic past? Or were these words uttered in ignorance of the real demons seen by supersleuth Benjamin Wade as the Baby-Boomer parents of Michael Weston and Michael's betrothed Erin Jennings. When the friendship of Michael and Justin metamorphoses into romantic love before the fireplace on a snowy Christmas Eve, their lives suddenly change forever. Michael, a successful software entrepreneur at the young age of twenty, must now choose between Love and Love and can only watch helplessly as his world begins to collapse around him. A story of two boys who are coming of age in a Baby Boomer-dominated society and who find themselves suddenly faced with all the great questions humanity has perpended for millennia--questions about love and life and fate and who we are as participants in the social order, indeed as members of the human species--it is an indictment of the Boomer generation and the world that generation has created. As Michael and Justin struggle to understand the great personal and societal forces bearing down heavily upon them and to do what they each believe in their young minds is the right thing under impossible circumstances, their superior intelligence can find little guidance in the accepted wisdom of their country. A cast of colorful characters animates a story of deep emotion engaging the reader, a story whose suspense rivets as it builds toward the dramatic climax.

Sujets

• Coming of Age
• Fiction

Informations

• Publié par: Outskirts Press
• Date de parution: 09 février 2015
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781478753483
• Langue: English

Extrait

This is a work of fiction. The events and characters described herein are imaginary and are not intended to refer to specific places or living persons. The opinions expressed in this manuscript are solely the opinions of the author and do not represent the opinions or thoughts of the publisher. The author has represented and warranted full ownership and/or legal right to publish all the materials in this book.

The Christmas Roses Must Not Die
All Rights Reserved.
Copyright © 2015 Richard Shields
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Cover Photo © 2015 thinkstockphotos.com. All rights reserved - used with permission.

This book may not be reproduced, transmitted, or stored in whole or in part by any means, including graphic, electronic, or mechanical without the express written consent of the publisher except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

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PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
The Christmas Roses Must Not Die
“E xcuse me, Mister, can you spare a quarter?”
Their eyes locked and in those moments something—a feeling, a quantum of psychic energy, a metaphysical truth, maybe—passed between them, leaving them both confounded.
As they stared at each other, their silence became palpable. Finally, “Mister” spoke. “You can’t do very much with just a quarter.”
The panhandler, who looked no older than sixteen or seventeen, fidgeted. It was kind of hard to tell, though, because he stood with his arms wrapped around himself shivering. And no wonder: He was hopelessly underdressed on this cold, snowy December evening. And in an odd getup: A light, black windbreaker with a good-sized rip in one of the sleeves, exposing a gray shirt beneath; gray pants; black brogans; and a cheap, white towel wrapped around his neck. He wore no gloves and no kind of head covering. The lazy snowflakes that fell were beginning to accumulate in his long brown locks as he stood there silently.
“So how much do you really need?” asked the one who had been tagged “Mister,” a handle that seemed more than a little ironic, considering that he himself looked scarcely older than the beggar boy. It must have been the business habiliments—the long overcoat, the exposed portion of the four-in-hand, the black oxfords, the shoulder bag, the briefcase—that elicited the curious form of address.
“I-” The kid shifted and then looked down the street—a furtive look, Mister noted, the look of one who wanted to get away and was estimating his odds of succeeding if he made a run for it.
Mister frowned.
“You’re not from around here, are you?” he asked, having twigged the East Coast accent with which the kid had made his solicitation. New England, he judged from the way the r ’s had sounded. “Mister” had come across as Mistuh . “Quarter,” quawtuh .
The kid’s head swung back around sharply, and their eyes locked once again. This time, Mister saw orbs that appeared tired and on the verge of tears. They spoke in wounded tones. Somehow he knew they were saying to him, pleading: Why are you doing this to me—interrogating me like this? All I want is a quarter!
Later that night, Mister would lie in bed, long contemplating this strange, and as it would turn out, momentous encounter and would wonder: Maybe it was the enchantment of all the sights and sounds of the Christmas season on this downtown street—the ubiquitous strings of blinking colored lights festooning the storefronts and the streets; the Christmas music, Deck The Halls emanating from one storefront speaker, Jingle Bells from another; Christmas trees sprouting up everywhere with marvelous trimmings; Santa Claus clones walking hither and yon, spreading joy and candy canes to the young and the young at heart; the unflagging bells of The Salvation Army kettle ringers; shoppers bustling past with armfuls of presents and bug-eyed kids in tow; bids of “Merry Christmas!” echoing all around; a gentle, steady snow painting the set. And the gamin. Appearing from out of nowhere, it seemed. Standing there before him in the freezing cold, begging for a quarter. It all seemed so . . . Dickensian.
Maybe it was the brotherly instinct he seemed to feel (even though he had no brothers—or sisters, for that matter—and therefore no legitimate idea what a brotherly instinct actually felt like), a sense that the kid was in some kind of difficulty, perhaps even real trouble, and like a big brother, he had to protect him.
Or maybe it was an altogether different impulsion that had moved him to set his briefcase down in the snow, retrieve two one-hundred-dollar bills from his wallet, and stuff them into the jacket pocket of a boy he didn’t even know and with whom he had exchanged but few words.
Whatever the reason, he was aware only that something had happened to him during those moments, something utterly inexplicable.
Mister picked up his briefcase and with a light clap on the kid’s shoulder, admonished him to buy some winter gear immediately. “You shouldn’t be out here in this weather the way you’re dressed. And it’s going to get really bad tonight: There’s a winter storm warning out—did you know that? So duck into a clothing store and buy yourself a winter coat, a neckscarf, a cap with earmuffs, and a pair of warm gloves. After that, I’d head straight for home—or rather whatever hotel I imagine you and your parents are staying at—if I were you.” He glanced at his watch and then took an extra-long look at the kid before proceeding on his way.
Dumbstruck by what had been pure happenstance, the slip of a boy watched with jaw dropped as his benefactor padded off through the snow that was rapidly thickening on the sidewalk.

This was not going to be a good night for St. Louis, Missouri. A monster winter storm was bearing down on the city and was expected to dump more than two feet of snow. The impending event had been the talk of the town all day long as the local prophets of weather watched a winter storm front moving down through Iowa and Nebraska. They had been issuing the same ominous forecasts on all the area television and radio stations since early morning, prompting the city’s snow crews to be called in before dawn to begin loading the salt trucks and preparing the massive plows.
But it was a slow-moving storm, they had declared expertly, and would not hit St. Louis until late—between 10 p.m. and midnight “according to all the models.” And so, many of the city’s natives, particularly the procrastinators of Christmas present, concluded by a quick calculus that they could squeeze in some increasingly urgent Christmas shopping (it was now only three days until Christmas) after work and be home before the roads became unsafe. Michael Lee Weston, a.k.a. “Mister,” had been one who so thought.
But the snowstorm had defied the weather wizards when it unexpectedly picked up momentum in the late afternoon and began invading the city some three hours sooner than what everyone had been led to believe. The clock on the corner of the 705 Olive Street Office Building across the street from where Michael Weston now stood read twenty minutes to eight. The light, gentle snowfall that made for a winter fantasyland little more than an hour ago had quickly metamorphosed into a howling, biting arctic beast. The magic of the evening was gone. The beat of the street was now frenzied as apprehensive shoppers began to seek out their cars instead of more Christmas presents.
Michael Weston stood behind a mash of pedestrians on the corner of 7 th and Olive, waiting for the Don’t Walk Hand to change into the Walking Man. The infernal thing, like the bodies in front of him, seemed frozen. In addition to the briefcase he’d been carrying in his left hand, he now toted in his right a shopping bag brimming with Christmas presents he’d just bought. He was glad he’d remembered his winter cap and gloves as he was heading out the door this morning to go to the office; the temperature was now dropping rapidly. It was his exposed face that was taking the brunt of the frigid wind gusts, which fired the now fine, powdery snow like needles into his skin. He dreaded what was certain to be a slow, arduous, and treacherous drive home, a roughly five-mile journey across town to the city’s Central West End. The hard-blowing snow meant heavy drifting, and the snow crews would be hard pressed to keep the main thoroughfares clear.
“Mister! Hey, Mister!”
The cry, coming from some distance behind him and blunted by the whipping wind, was nevertheless unmistakable, and his head cocked involuntarily. Turning around abruptly, he saw the street arab, beating his way forward through the snow.
“What in the world-?” Over an hour had elapsed since their first encounter, and except for the driblet of snot depending uncertainly from his left nostril, the kid still looked the same—that is, still underdressed, Michael noted with some consternation—and the weather conditions were rapidly worsening. His face and ears, though, were now beet red, and he shivered uncontrollably. “What are you still doing out here? And why are you still dressed like you are?”
“I-” The kid looked suddenly frightened, as though he’d been caught flagrante delicto for a capital crime. He nervously swiped his nose with the sleeve of his windbreaker—just in time, too, for one more second and the gobbet of snot would certainly have dropped.
“I’ve- I’ve been trying to find you.” His teeth chattered from the cold as he spoke. “I followed you to try and catch you, but you were too far ahead of me, and you were walking very fast. I saw you go into Macy’s department store here but didn’t see you again—until now. I kept waiting, hoping I would see you when you came out. But so much time passed that I figured maybe I missed you or else you left the store through one of the other doors. When it finally looked