A Mariner's Tale by Joe Palmer

Author:Joe Palmer
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Koehler Books
Published: 2020-07-31T17:42:30+00:00

When Margie got to her boat, her son was sitting in the salon playing his video game as if nothing had happened. She snatched the game from his hands, dropped it on the deck and stomped on it. Then she leaned over and slapped his face, leaving a red palm print. He stood up, glared defiantly and she slapped him again.

“Wipe that goddamn look off your face or I will with the back of my hand. If I ever, I mean ever find out that you’ve done anything like that again while you’re still in my custody, I won’t send you back to your father. I’ll stick your ass in a juvenile facility and let him worry about getting you out. Come tomorrow, you will take your snobby ass over there and make a sincere apology to that young man in front of your brother, Merkel and me, as witnesses. Now pick up this goddamn mess and go to bed.”

She was walking across the yard with her guitar case in hand when she heard the sound of a fiddle playing. She laughed and walked faster, anxious to get there. She found Jack sitting on a three-legged stool sawing his fiddle. He made a silly face and waggled his eyebrows. He took a break to rosin his bow while she tuned her guitar, then tucked the old fiddle under his chin and began to play. She finished tuning just in time to join him on the song. Within moments, Doug and Seth were stomping their feet and singing along.

Jack, who had closed his eyes when he began drawing his bow across the strings, opened them again, looked across his fiddle at Margie and joined her in harmony for the tune’s ending. They clung to the last note like it was a treasure and smiled at each other. Margie sent him a slow wink. He caught himself a breath away from returning it and smiled shyly instead.

“Do we make beautiful music together or what?” she said.

“I think maybe we do,” he said, softly. “All of us.”

That night, while Morgan’s Island slept, Hurricane Brenda reawakened in the Gulf of Mexico, whirled eastward and charged with a murderous fury at little Punta Gorda, Florida, and its 16,000 unsuspecting, vulnerable residents.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.