Short Story Excerpt: For Everything, A Season

 

Do we have free will or is everything predetermined by Fate? Maybe it’s just the big life events that Fate controls while leaving us free to make minor choices that won’t really affect the direction of our lives. This is the theme I wanted to address in For Everything, A Season.

This urban short story starts by introducing Elmira Trumble, a single mother who works full time and struggles to give her twin daughters the best possible lives. Confronted by a mysterious stranger, Elmira soon learns that her efforts may all be for nothing. Fate seems to have different plans for her small family.

Can Elmira and her daughters fight Fate? Even if they can, should they? Or would it be better for all of them to simply give in and let Fate have its way?

Find out which path Elmira takes with her daughters in For Everything, A Season.

 

     “Pick someone. You point them out and I’ll take their life.”

     She sank back down on the hardened bench, not quite sure what to believe. “Look, you’re a fucking nut. I know that…”

     “But, if I’m not, you don’t want to be responsible for someone’s death?”

     She just nodded, unwilling to give voice to the slight chance he might be what he claimed.

     “Don’t worry about that, child. Someone in this bar is scheduled. Heart failure, if you’re curious.”

     “I wasn’t…curious, I mean.” Her heavy sigh could be heard above the music as her eyes darted back and forth among the patrons -most of them regulars- seated at the bar. “Who?”

     “You tell me.”

     She sat there only out of confusion. What should she do?

     Leave?

     Report him to the owner?

     Call the police?

     Believe him?

     “Pick someone.”

     “Fine.” She looked at the bar once again, ignoring those out of her immediate eyesight. A slovenly man seated at the bar with his sizable buttocks hanging over the edges of the stool brought a smile to her lips. He was sweating quite heavily, although he sat directly beneath the cool air circulated by the ceiling fans. Even from such distance, she could tell his breathing was labored. Anyone, including someone as uneducated as herself, could see that he had a heart problem and that cigar smoldering between his fat lips wasn’t helping matters.

     For all she knew, Gabe was that man’s doctor.

     She looked further down the bar until another customer caught her eye. Barbara; everyone called her Babe. She was twenty-three years old; maybe twenty-four. She fanned secondhand smoke away from her face, just as she always did when she took a seat at the bar, and sipped from her wine glass. Blond hair, striking blue eyes, and athletically toned. Her rather small breasts, looking that much smaller in that tight sports bra, were perfectly proportioned to her spandex-encased hips.

     “Her,” she mumbled to herself.

     “Beg your pardon?”

     “Her.” She pointed at Babe. “The girl in the pink shirt and blue shorts.”

     Barbara fell backwards even before Elmira’s voice faded, pulling several drinks and a stool on top of her. The woman lay face-up on the dirty, beer-soaked floor, dampened with spilled wine, as a crowd gathered around her still body. The barmaid, young and terrified, was already calling for an ambulance. Elmira stayed in her seat as Gabe arose and approached the crowd; she wanted to be able to see his every movement. It looked as though he spoke to someone at the outer edge of the gathering crowd, but no one responded or even looked in his direction. Intrigued by this man, she continued to watch him, doubting the events unfolding before her. Gabe kissed the air as though someone stood slightly above him and had bent down to accept the affection. Next, he pointed his boney finger at an upward angle. It looked as though he was directing someone towards an unknown destination. Unable to move, she waited for him to return. As he walked back towards their table, she silently gawked at him with feelings of both disbelief and awe. “Are you…God?”

     His laughter was hearty enough to draw leers from some of the other patrons, while many of them watched the paramedics wheel the body out of the bar. “No, Elmira, I’m just Gabe. I told you that already. When I claim a life, I greet them with a kiss, so the powers that be -God- will know that this death wasn’t in error. I then send them along their path in the afterlife.”

     “The girl?”

     “The girl.” He smiled as though he’d expected her confusion. “First, let me tell you that the man you’d assumed I’d come here to claim won’t die for a very long time. In fact, it won’t be heart failure at all. His great granddaughter will shoot him.” He obviously planned to say no more, but Elmira’s grunt prompted him. “An accident.”

     “Oh. Well, I suppose that’s a little better.”

     “As for the girl, Barbara, heart problems are hereditary in her family. She also had asthma; she followed her doctor’s directions to the letter. Unfortunately, diet and exercise can’t save you if you spend every night in a smoke-filled bar, downing red wine by the bottle.”

 

Experience all nine stories in Whispers From Hell: An Anthology of Horror & the Supernatural.

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