So, as the exciting release of the book Twylite Epiphany Experiment comes closer I have a few sneak peaks for everyone!
Here; for you all to enjoy is the first chapter!
If you like what you see; let me know – I would love to hear from you
Monday, December 1st 1: 06 am
3374 Rosewood Blvd N, Crooksdale, Minnesota.
Former seasoned homicide detective, Joe “The Saint” Peabody, crouches to peer out the bottom of a fogged window in a small shed. His forty-five-year-old knees crack in protest while his eyes lock on the house that shares the yard. City streetlights in the distance and the moon’s reflection off the snow are his only light.
He holds a pair of binoculars in one hand and a tape recorder in the other. He is determined to record every movement in the house.
The snowstorm rages and he tries to find an unobtrusive but comfortable spot while the visibility diminishes to nothing. The falling snow reflects a morphed vision of himself instead of his outside surroundings. His breath is visible, his face bright red, and he feels the pain of the sub-zero temperatures. Suddenly, another deeper pain emerges, and he turns away from his reflection.
He unzips his parka and pulls a flattened pack of cigarettes from the pocket of his tweed business suit. After lighting one, he pulls a large flask from inside the parka and swallows half the contents. The alcohol loosens his tight weary eyes only slightly.
Without moving his eyes from the frozen dirt floor, he sits on a rotting work bench. The scanty walls tremble around him. High-pitched howls push through the cracks in the shed. Joe is impervious to this because he has traveled to a world of his own thoughts.
After a couple minutes of silence, he lifts the recorder to his bearded chin. “I don’t know what it is…”
He takes a drag of his cigarette and blows the smoke into the arctic air. “But, something is very wrong. I feel it in my bones. Something big is happening, but I just can’t understand what it is. I’ve never felt this way before. I don’t know how to describe it. It’s like… it’s hard to think through this fog.” He pauses as he looks at the dim light coming from his slowly deteriorating cigarette.
“It’s like it’s at the tip of my tongue, just waiting for me to remember. There is something I must have forgotten, or something I’m supposed to know. But I… it just doesn’t make sense.”
He takes a deep, contemplative breath and the inhalation of tobacco combined with the moment of silence refreshes him. His brown eyes and wrinkled brow tense as thoughts pass. Placing the recorder to his thick, brown beard, he resumes talking as a cloud of smoke escapes his lips.
“It’s December 1st and this is today’s 3rd logged entry on the Van Heart case.”
He leans against the rotting walls of the shed, and his eyes point blankly to the opposite wall. “It’s 1 a.m. and the blizzard shows no signs of clearing. Hopefully, I can straighten some things out in my head until the subject is in view again.”
“Anyway… on a hunch, I decided to return to the subject’s shed. I was cautious at first, but by the looks of things, she still has no idea I’ve been visiting her property. The entire lot has gone to hell. With the exception of a couple rodent prints, I’d say that nothing alive ever comes here. There’s an overwhelming feeling of death. I’m not the only one who feels it. All her neighbors say they’re uncomfortable with the house.”
“The windows are boarded up. It’s hard to know what’s going on in there. The subject is only visible through the glass patio doors facing the backyard. The top floor gives the best view of activity inside now because her curtains hang by threads. I was surprised when I first saw it, but at least I am able to discern the subject’s condition. It isn’t good.
“She looks like I feel. I don’t know if I can bring myself to watch like this anymore. I may have to call that bat-shit crazy girl, Lovell, and tell her I can’t just sit on the sidelines anymore.” He pauses and his eyes dart around the shed as he is hit with a profound thought.
“Lovell… Lovell Soul, that crazy banshee has to have a purpose for hiring me to watch this unfold. Three months ago I was happy to take her check. But now? I’m not sure what good the money is going to do me if I keep living this way.” He pauses and lights another cigarette.
“I feel dead. The only thing that keeps me going is this case. I can’t even remember what my life was like four months ago; everything is a blur.”
“So, Lovell keeps paying me crap-loads of money to record Van Heart’s every move, but for what? I thought it would be easy. I would cash her checks and report everything. I didn’t have any clue what I was getting into. Everything Lovell says is borderline crazy. But now, as I start to think about what she’s said, some of it starts to make sense. Everything keeps leading to bigger things.”
“I don’t think I could walk away now, even if I tried.”
He takes another drag of his cigarette and talks slower. “Now I feel as if every single moment of my life is somehow tied to this case. I eat, sleep, bleed, sweat, and dream this case.”
“I’m not the same person anymore,” he says with a troubled expression. “This case has changed me. I don’t feel right. I feel so bad that last week I walked into the free clinic downtown. The doctors were backed up with people, so I talked to an intern. She doesn’t even know me, but she says I look horrible. Whatever; I’ve been called worse. At least she was willing to listen, even if she was inexperienced. I told her how I can’t sleep because of nightmares. I think it’s affecting my brain. I also told her about my bypass, so she tried to take my pulse. After twenty minutes you’d figure she’d find what she was looking for, but she couldn’t find a pulse. She even had another intern check. But after the third person, I figured that was enough, and I left.
“I think I would know if my heart wasn’t beating…” The realization of his mortality pushes into his mind and sparks less pleasant thoughts. His eyes point vacantly to the ceiling and he whispers, “But, death isn’t as scary as it used to be. Hell, it sounds a lot better than this.
“I’m ready. I just have to figure this case out. Once I have that down…” His eyes swell slightly as thoughts of grief burden his speech.
“Finally, I could be with my perfect angel, Olivia, and my beautiful wife, Myrna. I think they’d be proud.” He sighs, “Sometimes, when I’m watching the scumbags surrounding Van Heart, I see the faces of the men that took them from me.”
Pausing, he swallows the remaining contents of the flask, and drops it to the ground. “I’m going crazy. I don’t have any other explanation for what is happening to me. I’ve started to see things. Things that make me doubt my sanity.”
“Sometimes, late at night, I see Myrna and Olivia. It’s so real I can smell and even feel them. They speak to me like they never left. We talk about my day. We talk, but it’s weird. They only seem interested in this case. They only appear when I’m dealing with it. Then, if I want to do something else, they vanish, as if the case is the only thing keeping us alive.” The thought makes him wither into his seat.
The more Joe droops in his seat, the more lost his expression appears. His eyes seem to focus only on internal pain. “I’ll do anything to be with them again,” he says with a raspy voice. “Maybe this case is keeping us alive… or, maybe I’ve truly lost it…”
The gravity of his last statement conjures an explosion of emotions. His expression constricts with the memories of his grief. He quickly covers the emotion with anger. “I don’t care if I’ve lost it! It feels real enough, and it’s all I have! I’m gonna cherish every insanity-soaked minute of it.” As the words leave his mouth, he suddenly realizes how disturbed he sounds.
“I don’t know what the hell’s going on,” he continues with a more rational tone as he ascends to his feet. “All I know is that the subject, Destiny Van Heart, is surrounded by chaos. I’m not sure if she knows what’s really going on, but it would be hard to believe she knows nothing.”
After
a couple moments of contemplative silence, Joe stops recording. An unpleasant
feeling slowly rises from his gut and he returns to the frosted shed window.
Visibility is still less than a foot, but the view is no longer paper-white.
Strange, dark debris begins to graze the window and Joe’s hair stands on end. A
strange odor permeates the shed and Joe finally reacts. He jumps to the door
when a terrifying rumble freezes him. A blinding bluish light flashes across
the window. Unable to look away, Joe sees the view change from cold white to a
warm orange.
Joe yells in fear but the sound of the roaring
fire impedes any chance of being heard.
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