People in Trouble

By Chris Kristensen

These stories are basically about some unusual people and their interactions. Hope they provide some amusement and surprises.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Page Publishing, Inc.
• Release date: Nov 13, 2020
• ISBN: 9781644622049

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People in Trouble

Chris Kristensen

Copyright © 2018 Chris Kristensen

All rights reserved

First Edition

PAGE PUBLISHING, INC.

New York, NY

First originally published by Page Publishing, Inc. 2018

ISBN 978-1-64462-203-2 (Paperback)

ISBN 978-1-64462-204-9 (Digital)

Printed in the United States of America

Table of Contents

My Friend

RADCLO

Mr. Gordon and Sedgewick

The Bejeweled Case

Son of a Bitch

Heidi the Faithful

A Visit to the Ladies’ Room

The Smile

Rendezvous

Father Knows Best?

Recalling Rita

To my son, whose merciless editing improved these stories immeasurably, and to my daughter who convinced me to submit them to Page Publishing.

My Friend

Midafternoon t’waren’t the usual time for us to be goin’ to town. I doesn’t care to go there at all, lessen I has to, and early is the best time. But today, Boomer, my big old huntin’ dog, had a yearnin’ to roam in the woods, so that’s just what we done ’stead of goin’ to town. Maureen, she left me, so now I only has to answer to Boomer, and we almost always gets along. Boomer and me, we just does what we wants when we wants. It’s not a bad life we got. Boomer loves ridin’ in the truck, hangs his big ole head out the window, and ears a-flappin’ in the wind.

As we got near town, I got to ponderin’ on how it had growed. I heerd tell that there was more’n’ thirty thousand people there now’days. That new furniture place is the problem. Y’see, all this change ain’t good for us hill folk (that’s what they calls us). They just don’t take to us drivin’ through town, guns in the back of our trucks. There’s a new school now, and I ’spec’ they don’t want their youn’uns lookin’ at the likes of us and our guns.

Screw ’em! I needs my gun, you know. I had a bear on my front porch a while back. What these townspeople want me to do, go after him with a slingshot? I ain’t heerd of a person bein’ shot in these parts for years. The only shootin’ I ever knowed of was a in a bar over twenty years ago, when poor Tillie accidentally got shot by a drunk who was a-playin’ with his gun. This is a peaceful place, or at least it used to be. These new people doesn’t have guns, but they cause more trouble than us hill folk ever done.

Just to show you what I means, a little while back, I got into a nasty tiff with some town folk who was madder’n hell ’cause I was driven through town with my rifle a-hangin’ in my back window. Seems as though they was tryin’ to get a law passed again that. Well, I was in a bad mood, and I gave it back to ’em pretty good. I told ’em how much better off we was ’fore they came, and they calls me somethin’ from another millennium (whatever that is).

Anyways, back to our trip to town. It were a late fall day. Most of the leaves had already fell. It was getting dark and sort of scary. As we pulled into town, it was more crowded than I’d ever seed. The reason was that school had just ended, and there were youn’uns everywhere.

We was slowly turning a corner when Boomer and me was involved in a terrible thing. A little girl runned out ’tween two cars. I can’t stop in time, and we hits her! She couldn’t be hurt bad. I was hardly movin! ’Fore I could get out of the truck, the little girl was surrounded by townspeople. Screamin’ filled the air. Get a doctor! Get the sheriff! Get the mother! All three arrived quick enough. The child were put in an ambulance with her weepin’ mama.

We have a murder here! yelled one man.

You’ll pay for this! yelled another.

Damn hill folk, why didn’t you just shoot her? I’m sure these crazy folks ’membered me from the trouble of the other day, and that made ’em all act like they was raised up on quick lightnin’, making no sense at all.

Then, the sheriff shushes the crowd. In the first place, we pray that the little girl is not badly hurt. In the second place, the truck was going very slowly. In the third place, this will be handled in court where it belongs.

While the police was fiddlin’ with my truck, the sheriff said to me, Come with me, Ezra, I need to get your statement. He drove me to the station, where I ’splained as best as I could what had happened. I knew Sheriff Jay McCoy from the old days, when we used to go a-huntin’ together. He said to me, Ezra, this shouldn’t even go to trial, but these people would hang me if it didn’t.

I understands, I said.

When we got home that night, Boomer and me cried for hours. I hadn’t done nothin’ wrong, but a little girl was hurt, and people had already hated me ’cause of what happened the other day.

Turns out, it was far worse than I thunk. Sheriff McCoy called me with the terrible news that the little girl had met her maker on the way to the hospital. Something ’bout the way she hit her head when she fell. Then, calls of hatred started coming in. I had to take the phone off the hook. I never wants to see that town again!

Course, I had to. No gettin’ out of it. Day before trial, I had to go to town to sign some dern mumbo jumbo legal papers. When I leaves the station, I sees what they done to my truck. Soaped it up, slashed the tires, and it ’pears like they tried to break the windshield. Some of the police watched my truck while Sheriff McCoy took me to get new tires. Then, in a much ’preciated show of friendship, they helped me change the tires.

There weren’t much to the trial. The facts showed that I weren’t guilty, and the jury said so. But that didn’t seem to matter to most people. If looks could kill, I’d been a goner. Then a most surprisin’ thing happened. The mama asked to speak. She said, There has been a terrible tragedy. My little girl is gone. None of you can feel as badly as I. But this man, pointing to me, is not to blame. My little daughter would not want you to harass him, and neither do I. In fact, I wish to help him, if I can. After this, there weren’t a sound. I tried to get her ’tension, but she just looked away.

Then, things started to quiet down, but the hurt inside Boomer and me was somethin’ fierce. One day comes a big surprise. The mama of the dead girl were at my door. She said she wanted to see I was okay. We spoke for a bit, but what could I say, ’cept how bad I felt?

She was some sort of a highfalutin teacher, and her speechifyin’ confused me. One thing, we shared. She had been a single mama, so she was alone like me, ’cept for Boomer. That gives us something to share. My feelin’s for her are all confused. I doesn’t want to see her, yet is so grateful for her support.

I knowed for sure that she was a good lady when Boomer liked her. She even played with him. Perhaps it made her think about how she had played with her daughter. She had kindly bought us some food. After a short while, she left.

Couple days later, what I’d been a’feerd of happened. Some bastard killed Boomer, left him on my doorstep, one night, with a bullet in his head. I got a call tellin’ me that things was at least a little more even now. I thunk of gettin’ another pooch, but I knowed there’d never be another Boomer. ’Sides, they might kill him too. I were a empty vessel, talkin’ to nobody.

Then my mama friend comes to visit again. Somehow, she already knowed about Boomer and told me how sorry she was. Now, we have both suffered the same. We have lost everything, she said with an expression, which was more than just sadness. Then she said that she was leavin’ town. She had got another teachin’ job. Sure didn’t seem ’cited ’bout it. Her face were wrinkled and sad. It just ’bout tore me apart.

"I wish there were more that