The countdown has begun for the release of my second novel, "Popstars, Friends & Lovers: a dreamer's tale. It's the second book in the Burnouts series (with a third looking very likely). Popstars works as a stand alone, so you don't have to read book 1, but it helps make the story richer.
So, for anyone who may have been thinking about reading Burnouts book one but hasn't started yet, I'm putting the first chapter here, on my blog, today. I will post chapter two next week and chapter three the week after that. This will give you a sample of my writing and hopefully help you decide that you want to read my work.
*Note* My writing is for ages 17 and older. There is cursing and sexual content (but no violence. I don't do violence.) It isn't erotica, the story is not based on sex, it's a love story that contains a sexual element. So, without further ado, may I present chapter 1 from Burnouts, Geeks & Jesus Freaks: a love story.
Chapter One
Carrie twisted the
knife in her hand and took another swipe at it. Maybe if she used a lighter
touch with her swirly strokes she could bury the crumbs that had pulled off the
cake and worked their way to the surface. She looked again at the photo of the Yellow
Butter Cake with Chocolate Frosting and her heart sank more. Martha Stewart’s
cake was tall, and straight, and perfect. The stunning guests at her perfect
party would love it. Carrie’s cake was
lopsided, had crumbs, and there was really no one to eat it.
Her
bottom lip started to tremble again. She
swallowed down the lump in her throat and breathed deep ‘til she could will
back the sting of tears wanting to form. She was not going to let her win this
time. This was her god-damned 16th birthday, and her mother was not going to
take this one from her too. She leaned over the counter and put her head on the
cold granite and worked to steady her breathing, listening hard for sounds from
her parents’ bedroom. None. She had no idea what her mother did when she locked
herself in there. Maybe wait for someone to break down the door so she could
continue her show. Well, good luck with
that, lady. No one here but you and me, and I’m not playing your game. She
listened for sounds from her brother’s room. None. Christopher must still be
napping.
Carrie pushed the plate holding the
slightly-lopsided yellow butter cake with crumbly-chocolate frosting to the
center of the kitchen island and rested her head on her stacked fists to study
it. Why had she made it? Did she really hold out hope that this would be the
year that her Dad remembered her birthday, and he would come home to have cake
with her? She huffed and shook her head at that ridiculous idea. So, why take
almost four hours to make a whole cake from scratch for just her, her mom and
two-year old Christopher? ‘Cause someone
had to do it. Just because she lived in the house of crazy didn’t mean she
didn’t get a birthday. If her parents couldn’t get it together to have one for
her, she’d just do it herself.
As
she stared at the cake, thinking how much she didn’t want to eat it after all
that batter-bowl licking and icing tasting, she noticed a steady pop, pop, pop,
swish sound from outside. Usually Ben shooting hoops in his driveway drove her
nuts, but tonight the steady cadence was soothing. Always three dribbles, pop,
pop, pop, then he would shoot, swoosh. Never four dribbles, never two, always
three. Sooo Ben. Carrie rolled her
eyes, but listened again, sure enough, pop, pop, pop, swoosh. Predictable Ben, boring Ben, irritating Ben …
but, usually hungry Ben. Last summer, while he was away at camp, Ben had grown
really tall. He was a total bean-pole, over 6-feet tall, and all gangly arms
and legs. Now he looked like a cross between Dennis the Menace and the Jolly
Green Giant, but he could eat a lot of cake.
Carrie silently opened the door to her brother’s room. Christopher
was still sound asleep, sprawled sideways across his big-boy bed, held in place
by the safety railing. He had been sleeping almost two hours. That was a long
afternoon nap for him. Probably a growth spurt going on there too. Maybe he and Ben could make a dent in the
cake together.
###
Pop, pop, pop,
swoosh. Ben didn’t stop shooting when he noticed her. She scanned her memory
for the last time she talked to him. Had
she pissed him off? It had been so long, she couldn’t remember. They went
to the same school, were in the same grade, and usually sat by each other when
they had class together because their last names were close in the alphabet,
but their high school lives were worlds apart.
He was wearing one
of the ugly ‘Class of ‘99’ tee shirts they had been selling at school. Carrie made a mental note to talk to him
about how un-masculine the purple tie dye looked.
She stood on the
edge of the driveway waiting to be noticed, careful not to get in his way. Pop, pop, pop, swoosh. He was definitely ignoring her. Shit. She wished she could remember what he could
be mad about. The problem was that it was
so easy to make him mad. They had so many fights and make-ups over the years,
it was just one big blur to her now.
She finally called
out to him, “hey.” Pop, pop, pop, swoosh. She considered just going back to her
house, but years of experience had taught her that one apology would put her
back in Ben’s good graces. As soon as she was the one to admit fault, they were
good again.
“Sorry.” She wasn’t
sure what for.
Ben stopped between
rounds and finally looked at her, “what for?”
Did he actually
expect her to remember? She was sure he remembered. You would think he could use his Mensa brain for something other than
remembering every little thing she did wrong.
“I’m sorry I made
you mad.” That should cover a lot of territory.
Ben started his
dribble pattern again and turned away from her but not before she saw his smile.
He wasn’t really mad, he was just giving her a hard time. OK, that was kind of
funny. She needed that today.
“Want some cake?”
“Sure,” He paused to
consider the offer, “why?”
“’Cause I made a
whole cake, and there is no one to eat it but Two-fer and me.” Ben had started
calling Christopher ‘Chris-two-fer’ on his last birthday, which was now
shortened to just Two-fer.
“You made a cake for
no reason?”
She wasn’t about to
tell him about her birthday. She didn’t need a pity party. “Yeah, I saw it in a
magazine, and I just felt like making it.”
Ben set his
basketball in the grass on the side of the driveway where it couldn’t roll
away. He took care of his stuff like that. Carrie was sure it was the same
basketball she had given him for his birthday when he turned 8. Back then they
were always invited to each other’s parties.
###
Ben sat on one of
the tall stools at the kitchen island, near the cake. “Yellow cake?”
“Yep.”
“My favorite.” Ben pulled the whole cake in front of him and
perched a fork over it.
Carrie pulled it
back to her, “my favorite.” She cut a large slice for Ben and tried to lift it
on to a plate. The icing-heavy top tumbled on the counter, and the soft cake
broke apart over the side of the plate. Her mother’s voice in her head
admonished her; wrong knife. Why didn’t
you use a cake knife? Oh my God, Carrie, what a huge mess. Ben won’t want that
piece of cake. It’s ruined. She was staring at the mess, drifting into
morose, when a large hand with long fingers scooped the cake off the counter
and onto the plate. Ben was standing behind her, using his fingers to scrape
the rest of the icing off the counter. He returned to his stool while licking
the icing from his fingers.
Carrie noticed his
warmth leave her back. It had felt nice. She wanted it back. She took a breath
and shook her head. She must be really strung out from her shitty day. This was
Ben. Sure he was taller than her for the first time in their lives, but he was
still Ben. He was her geeky neighbor who always talked too much about the Army
and had to dribble the basketball three times before he could shoot it. She
cautiously looked up, hoping her weakened brain would only see Ben the geek. Sure
enough, he had put a blob of chocolate icing on his nose to make her laugh. Carrie
rolled her eyes but felt better seeing the Ben she knew, her sort-of, sometimes
friend. Ben saw she was staring and crossed his eyes to see the icing on his
nose. Dorky or not, he was funny; Carrie smiled, but only briefly.
“So what’s up with
you? Why are you so …” You could see Ben’s quick thought process in his eyes as
he found his answer even before he finished the question. “Oh,” he said quietly
as he looked down at the cake. He figured it out. “It’s your birthday.”
Ouch. It felt like a
punch to her gut. It was one thing to know it, another to hear it out loud,
from someone else. Carrie looked down at the icing still stuck to the counter
and started picking at it with her finger.
“Where’s your
mom?” He knew better than to ask where
her dad was.
Carrie
looked over at the closed door to her parent’s room. Ben’s eyes followed hers
and he asked, “Is she OK?”
There
was no need to try to pretend with Ben. He had already seen her mom go all
bat-shit crazy over little stuff through the years. She could only keep up the
façade for so long, and Ben had been around too long. “She’s pissed at me.”
“On
your birthday? What did you do?”
“I
made a cake.” Carrie laughed softly at the absurdity of the statement. “She
came home from the store with a cake mix, and I was already making this cake. She
threw the cake mix at me and said I hate her and I hate her cakes and I’m ungrateful
and, I don’t know … stuff like that.”
Ben
looked over at the bedroom door again like he was assessing the odds of her
coming out. “Did you know she was planning to make a cake?”
Carrie
sat down on a stool and continued picking at the icing. “I never know what she
is going to do.”
Carrie
and Ben both jumped a little when they heard door hinges squeak in the hallway
near the bedrooms. Christopher was standing in his doorway, still dazed from
his long nap. He stared at Ben, then lit up and smiled like Santa Claus had
come. Ben scooped his little buddy up then planted him on his lap in front of
the glob of cake and icing he had been eating. Christopher settled his drowsy
head onto Ben’s chest as his short arm stretched to reach Ben’s shoulder. He
said, “cate,” and Carrie was glad that at least he recognized what was on the
plate.
Carrie made a sippy
cup of milk while Ben fed Two-fer bites of cake and icing from his fork. When
she put the cup down on the counter Ben held the fork away from Christopher’s
mouth, “what do you say to your sister?”
Sometimes Ben was
such an old man. Not only did he always follow rules, he made others follow
them too. The lost look on Christopher’s face assured her that Ben had not
passed on this geeky trait to Christopher yet. Ben leaned down and prompted,
“thank you.” Christopher mimicked, “taint tu,” and smiled up at Carrie for her
approval. Geeky or not, it was cute.
Carrie sat down with
a fork and dug into the rest of the cake. She looked up into Ben’s disapproving
eyes. “Wha?” she said through her mouthful, “it’s not like anyone else is going
to eat it.” She shoved another forkful in to spite him, then chewed with a
smile on her face, her cheeks full.
“So where is MG?” Ben
was referring to her best friend who was grounded, at least for today.
Carrie thought about
answering him and letting the cake fall out of her mouth, but she was enjoying
his company and didn’t want to razz him too much. She held up a finger till she
swallowed then said, “grounded.”
“She got caught going out with a 22-year old
guy.” Ben didn’t need that information, but it was always fun to shock him a
little. Carrie’s own sometimes boyfriend, Chuck, was 21; another fact that Ben
would, no doubt, not approve of. But Ben
didn’t seem fazed, or really interested.
Why did she always feel the need to press his
buttons? Because you are a mean girl,
her mother’s voice in her head chimed in.
Carrie put down her fork as she felt the storm clouds of guilt
rain on her little birthday parade. Focus
on the other person, don’t always talk about you, said the mom-tape running
in her head. “So, are you still going out with Joelle?” Carrie knew he was. Ben
and Joelle always walked around school holding hands. Joelle proudly displaying
her purity ring between their clenched fingers. People in Carrie’s group, the
druggies, would gag and make retching noises when they walked by.
His answer was a strangely weak, “yeah.”
“What?”
“Nothing.” Ben filled his mouth with cake so he wouldn’t have to
talk then focused on giving Christopher another bite. Carrie kept watching him,
looking for more details than his lukewarm answer. Finally after swallowing Ben
said, “You don’t like her much, do you?”
Carrie wondered if her feelings about Joelle showed on her face.
She hoped they didn’t because she was going to lie to be nice to Ben, “She’s alright,”
she said with a shrug. Ben wasn’t buying it. “OK, no, I don’t like her much,
but I think the feeling is mutual.”
That seemed to get
his attention, “What are you talking about?” You could hear his shock that
Joelle Welker, purity ring-wearing President of the Right to Life club and
outspoken Christian would have anything bad to say about anyone. Carrie knew
better.
“She talks about us,
about me, and MG.”Carrie paused to read his reaction, so far neutral. “More
than once I overheard her and her friends calling us whores. She calls my friends drug-addicts.”
Ben raised his
eyebrows, “Aren’t they?”
Now it was Carrie’s
turn to get defensive. “Some of them do drugs, but not all. Most just dress
different, ‘cause they’re creative. So people judge them, people like Joelle.”
Ben carried
Christopher into the living room and dropped him on the couch. Two-fer giggled.
Ben picked up the remote and turned the TV to cartoons, distracting him from
their conversation. “Is that why you hang around with them?” he asked as he walked
back into the kitchen, “because you’re creative?”
“Yeah, I guess so, and they’re nice.
They don’t judge.” She raised her eyebrows, challenging him.
“You’re kidding,
right?” Carrie knew he was referring to them gagging when Ben and Joelle walked
by.
“They only give it
back to those who dish it out.”
Silence. Damn it. They
were getting along ‘til she had to bring up this mine-field of a topic.
“Do you want some
more cake?” Christopher popped up and looked over the back of the couch,
“cate?” They both laughed.
“Not you Two-fer. I
asked Ben if he wanted more because some little monster ate all his cake.” Christopher
laughed and said, “meee.” Then he turned and plopped back down to watch TV. The
uncomfortable tension between Ben and Carrie was still there.
Ben picked up his
plate and fork, took them to the sink and rinsed them off. Carrie was surprised he didn’t load them in
the dishwasher. “Thanks for the cake. It
was really good.” He walked over and stood directly in front of her, crowding
her space. “I’m sorry I forgot your birthday,” he almost whispered.
Carrie backed up
into the counter. She didn’t want him to be nice, it was too real, too honest,
too much. Joking and teasing she could take, distance was good too. “Why would
you remember my birthday?” she smirked. She was too raw for this today.
“Because I went to
every one of your parties since we were 6,” he said as if he was pointing out
the obvious. Ben was looking down at her, studying her.
“What?” she said,
exasperated and irritated by his scrutiny.
There was pity in his eyes, and it was rattling her cage.
“Was this your only
party? For your sweet 16?”
Oh, a swift kick to
the heart. She couldn’t let him see how much it all hurt. “Yeah, well, I’m not so sweet.” She tried to
diffuse the tension.
Ben was standing
over her, trying to look into her eyes, like he had something important to tell
her, something he wanted to make sure she heard. “You deserve better than
this.”
Shit he was direct.
That last hit was her undoing. A tear she fought all afternoon while she made
her cake ran down her cheek. She looked away from him and tried to turn away in
the small space between two stools, the counter, and Ben.
But he didn’t move. He
stayed in her space, blocking her in, witnessing her humiliation. Carrie worked
to shut down her pain and turn it into anger. She was about to shove Ben out of
the way or say something rude when he crushed her thin defense. He reached out
and hugged her.
“I’m sorry.” He spoke quietly into
her hair. “I just say stuff. I think just because it’s true, I should say
it.”
Carrie’s body
tensed. Her brain spun trying to make sense, trying to process, trying to find
a reference for his comfort. She felt a small warm spot in the pit of her
stomach, and it felt amazingly good and god-awful strange at the same time. She
tentatively bent her arms and touched his waist.
“I’m sorry I made
you cry.” He said over the top of her head.
Carrie tried to
respond but couldn’t talk past the ball of emotion caught in her throat. She
was about to tease him about wanting to hug her because that’s all he and
Joelle did, but she fought the urge to make him angry. It felt too good. He was
tall, and warm; there was so much Ben surrounding her. And his jacket smelled
like fresh air and laundry detergent and fabric softener. She felt the lump in
her throat melt and the breath it had been blocking all day eased out of
her.
“Ben?” her mother’s
voice was raspy from crying and registered shock at him being there or them
hugging, she wasn’t sure which.
Carrie jumped and
pulled quickly away from Ben, but he did not back away. Still standing too close
he said, “Mrs. Gould,” acknowledging her in a strangely confrontational tone
from over Carrie’s head.
Lana Gould ignored
the hug and Ben’s tone and went into hostess auto-pilot. Spotting Carrie’s cake
on the table she started opening drawers and cabinets, gathering the proper
serving supplies. “Did Carrie offer you any cake?” Ben was about to answer when
he and Carrie turned toward her to see her look of disgust. “Carrie, did you
eat off the cake?” she questioned with controlled anger. The tension in the
room spiked.
Without answering
Carrie took her fork off the counter and pushed past Ben to rinse it off. Lana
spun in a slow circle, following Carrie’s path, berating her as much as she
dared with Ben present. “That is disgusting, Carrie. Why would you do such a
thing?” She turned her attention back to the cake and didn’t wait for Carrie to
answer. “Well, we’ll just have to pitch the whole thing now. What a waste.” She
picked up the cake and dramatically dropped it in the trash can. Her last
sentence was punctuated by the metal clank of the trash can lid closing.
Carrie spun around,
dropping her fork in the sink. Her shock at seeing the blank space on the
counter only registered for a moment, her anger for a flash after that. She
sucked in a calming breath, shot Ben a look of apology and walked toward the
stairs to her room, her face defiantly blank.
Lana watched her leave, then turned to face Ben.
“I’m sorry, Ben, she’s rude like that now.” She turned to the sink to finish
rinsing off Carrie’s fork. “I think her friends are a bad influence on her.” She
placed Carrie’s fork in the dishwasher along with Ben’s plate and fork, clearly
not needing Ben’s input in the conversation. Lana noticed the knife still on
the counter, as she reached for it she acknowledged Ben again. “You know MG,
don’t you?” she turned to rinse the knife. “What do you think of her?”
Ben hesitated while
he tried to decide if he was going to be given time to answer. “I, uh, I really don’t know her very
well.”
Not acknowledging
his answer she continued talking as she sprayed cleanser and wiped the counter,
“Have you seen the way she dresses? And
her mother?” Lana rolled her eyes. “She’s
divorced, you know.”
Not wanting to get
sucked into the conversation, Ben bent over the back of the couch and picked up
a very quiet Christopher who turned and buried his head in Ben’s neck. “Gotta go, bud,” Ben said into his hair. Two-fer
clung tighter, “wat wif me,” he pleaded.
“Can’t watch TV
today. We’ll play basketball tomorrow, OK?” Two-fer nodded then slid down Ben’s
chest and landed on the sofa with a bounce.
Lana resumed their
conversation, following Ben through the kitchen to the back door. “I haven’t
seen your mother at the Ladies Sodality in a while.”
Ben debated his
reply. Surely Lana remembered that his parents were divorced now. It was
gossips like Lana who made his mom avoid the meetings. “She’s just really busy,
I guess,” he blurted out as he reached for the door handle. But before he
escaped home he couldn’t resist one parting shot, “thank you for the cake, ma’am.
It was fantastic.” Then he shut the door behind him before she had a chance to
respond.
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