Kzine Issue 5 by Graeme Hurry et al

Author:Graeme Hurry et al. [al., Graeme Hurry et]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fiction, Crime, Horror, short, story, SF, Fantasy
Goodreads: 20994556
Publisher: Kimota Publishing
Published: 2013-01-22T00:00:00+00:00

TAKING CHANCES

by Michael Haynes

The night of July 5th was hot and humid. Sweat ran down Arlene’s face as she retrieved a shovel from its dusty resting place in her garage. This was the shovel she used to nurture decades of gardens. It was the shovel she used to plant the trees in her front yard. Arlene and her late husband Frank had also used it to dig the tiny graves for their daughter’s childhood pets when they died. The grave it would dig tonight would be much larger.

She knew she was doing what had to be done. This was necessary to protect her way of life. Still, she couldn’t help reliving the events which led her to this moment…

The neighbor boy sped down the road on his bicycle. Arlene Morris sighed and shook her head at his wild pedaling. Every day, it seemed, she saw him at some reckless endeavor. Not that anyone else appeared to care. His parents took as little notice of him as they could manage. Since his two much older siblings had moved away to college, he was unsupervised more often than not.

She took a sip of her coffee and grimaced. How she hated instant coffee. There was a time when she wouldn’t touch it but now the mess and bother of a coffeemaker was too much. She’d dropped a pot several years ago, scalded one of her legs, and cut her hands cleaning up the glass. That was it for Arlene and coffeemakers.

A slight breeze did little to make the June evening more comfortable. The boy, Luke, whizzed back along the edge of her property. She could hear his parents as they laughed and cavorted in their pool. Arlene was disgusted with them, with her coffee, with her old bones and muscles. She slowly stood up and went inside to pour the remaining brown liquid down the drain.

Her cup rinsed, Arlene went into the living room and flipped through channels on TV. Most of what she saw didn’t interest her. Eventually, she settled on a repeat of Law and Order. One of the early ones, when the show was more likely to deal with street crime than with kinky teenagers. During some commercials she drifted off to sleep. When the phone woke her, a movie was showing. 10:30, the clock said. The phone rang again, jangling Arlene’s nerves as she recalled other late-night calls and the bad news they almost always conveyed.

‘Hello?’

‘Grandma, it’s Kyle. Hope I’m not calling you too late.’

Her pulse slowed fractionally. At least no one was dead or in the hospital. Still, Kyle’s calls were rarely pleasant. ‘It’s just as well that you woke me. I’d fallen asleep in my chair, with the television on.’

‘Oh, well, that’s good, then.’

‘What’s on your mind, Kyle?’

A few seconds of dead air passed. ‘The car insurance is due tomorrow. Normally, I’d let it go a few days until I get paid. But the last time I did that I got this nasty letter from them saying they’d cancel my policy if I was late again.

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