Today's special: A double feature!

Hey there!

Glad to have you back again!

Yesterday I promised you another fragment. I decided on making it extra special: you will be given TWO (2) fragments instead. That is: two separate fragments, from different stories!

Which stories?

A fragment from Perfect Summer, which includes the previous fragment. Just adding an additional set of paragraphs. And one from my unpublished story Familiar.

Here they are. Do enjoy! (As for me: I enjoy doing this. I love sharing!)

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Familiar

The names of the streets in that part of the old colonial city were dates. Days in numbers and the months written in full in Spanish but long names abridged.

The name of the street of his hotel had not been shortened. The date of this street was his

mother’s birthday and Nicholas took a room. He squinted looking up at the white on blue street sign, shading his eyes with his hand, and turned the corner onto the promenade.

The shopping promenade was void of cars. Taxi drivers crowded the corners of the streets

that ran perpendicular offering their services as did the prostitutes who clung onto the arms of prospective clients.

Other semi-professionals, young women in their early twenties, stood in the promenade

advertising services and products sold in the front sections of the stores. They offered back

section services once the tourist unbeknowing to the procedure was coaxed inside and lead to the rear.

Men peddled the same authentic prints of paintings lined up in front of the hurricane shutters

of vacant buildings.

Nicholas passed the old cathedral, crossed the street where the horse-cabs stood, and farther the two art academies that faced each other. Construction went on in the building left of the academy on the right. Two sheets of plywood in the entrance hung side by side hinged with the soles of six sneakers, on one sheet hung a sign with the name of the new restaurant.

At the end of the passage he walked down the wide stairs of this part of the old fort wall. He turned right onto the sidewalk along the avenida where the general’s statue was still kept

impeccably clean. He put on his shades after wiping the sweat off his forehead with a handkerchief. The day grew hotter, but past the bend that takes the avenida to the Malecón, the breeze emerged.

Nicholas climbed the walled steps opposite the monument of the bishop martyr on the other

side of the avenue. An old man wearing a beret and a roll of canvas tucked under an arm passed him on the steps. The park at the top of the bulge had a handful of trees at the front and as many old worn-down benches.

He sat down and the breeze brought the conversation from the bench in front of him. A man

asked his female companion when she would be ready to receive him. The breeze stopped when she started about her kids.

The higher bridge across the Río Ozama had its usual fill of cars; everyone had somewhere

to go.

At the other end of the park the street was bare but for two delivery boys carrying groceries

on motorbikes.

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NOT SUITABLE FOR ALL READERS!

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Perfect Summer

She cried, but she kept quiet. She said nothing as she lay there. The ground cold beneath her, the grass nicked her skin, and pebbles prodded into her back.
The first man ripped her panties with one swift pull. He shoved her skirt up to her hips and the other two pressed her hands and feet hard into the grass and sharp pebbles. Tears flowed along her ears. But she said nothing. And her silence continued when this man on top of her shoved up her pullover and bra.
The girl turned her head sideways and looked away. The grass grew under the shrubs and along the slope to the walls of the channel that dropped straight into the water. Morning clouds hid the Sun, the autumn chill had begun and the young girl’s exposed skin showed this.
The first man’s words were unintelligible. He breathed heavier and ended with a loud groan.
The man grabbed the girl’s wrist and thrust the back of her hand into the pebbles as he withdrew.
He fumbled and zipped his trouser up with the other hand.
The thick boxwood hedge hid them well from the street. The footpath they dragged her to, behind the brush, led to a bridge far enough from the busy streets where merchants and early clients debated prices.
“Man,” the big one said, “See those?” He gazed at the girl’s bareness as he groped himself, pushing her legs open. The girl lay still, soon her body jerked with the man’s movements.
“I told you all she was right,” the first man said.
“Yeah,” the big man said. “She is.”
This other guy was larger. A lot larger, with large tattoos on his lower arms as far as his knuckles, but the girl remained silent. She still looked away. The clouds stood unmoving, vapid and thick, the Sun remained hidden behind them. In the gray shade of the grass, an army of ants marched between blades carrying the cadaver of a ladybug. The girl looked as the ants disappeared between the grass blades.
The girl’s right cheek had swollen much more now since the fall she had made when this big man had thrown her on the ground. Her cheek had hit a fist size rock as she went face first.
Even now the girl maintained her silence while her second assailant continued grunting, his breathing erratic and strong, and his large hands pressed her thighs wider open. And he ended.

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You can read more here: Suddenly Death.

Do take care and be good and a million thank yous for your time and attention.

~Roland~