I was sent a link to an article from Townhall.com by mom, who claimed I was being prophetic when I wrote in Times of Trouble about the new Health Care system in the novel wanting to purge our society of “genetic freaks” such as children with Down’s Syndrome, etc. In the novels’ world, the Health Care Administration requires all women to have an amniocentesis and fill out paperwork when doing all sonograms to ensure there’s a baby that will contribute to society at large, and if it doesn’t the baby would be aborted. In the novel, the Atwoods ignore this because of religious belief (and not really knowing any of this is happening, since a lid is kept on any news about it), and their doctor helps. Unfortunately, their baby ends up being taken away to be “processed” later and the Doctor is punished for his lack of following regulations. At the time I was writing it, I figured this was one of those things that Eugenicists were always harping about, but were never really taken seriously. This article covers Seniors, Babies, and those with Down’s Syndrome.
What the articles says, in regards to Down’s Syndrome:
“Down Syndrome Eliminated – So much attention has been focused on the birth control entitlement, many of us missed the latest in Obama eugenics: A Down Syndrome free USA. This administration is sending you the bill for the $1000 + prenatal test to find where all the babies with Down Syndrome are hiding and target them for elimination from the gene pool. As an adoptive parent of a beautiful child with Down syndrome, I take special offense at this Mengelean expenditure.
Mark Leach, an attorney and fellow parent of a child with Down syndrome put pen to paper on this one:
Fiscally, public funding of prenatal testing for DS just does not make sense. There are an estimated 2.4+ million pregnancies each year eligible for Medicaid-funded prenatal care. Down syndrome has a birth rate of 1 in 691 pregnancies, with an estimated incident rate, i.e. the number of pregnancies carrying a child with DS, being equal to that. This means that of those 2.4 million pregnancies, only about seven thousand actually are pregnant with a child with DS. Yet, current medical recommendations are to offer both screening and diagnostic prenatal testing to all pregnant mothers. Therefore, the millions of pregnancies not carrying a child with DS may nonetheless accept the testing and thereby incur the cost to the Medicaid system. Current diagnostic testing costs over $1,000. That results in a possible exposure of $2.4 billion to the Medicaid system. All for just 7,000 pregnancies actually carrying a child with DS.
Let me spell this out. Over 90% of babies with Down syndrome are aborted already. Columnist George Will has labeled the aggressive screening a “search and destroy mission”. The Obama administration has targeted the Down syndrome babies of the poor for elimination, obligating taxpayers to a $2.4 billion liability. Presumably the entitlement means now we will pay for their abortions as well. How long before the Obama administration mandates insurance pay for screening for the entire population and their abortions?”
I’m currently working on my next novel, which will be in the same time period as Times of Trouble, but not a direct sequel. I’m not sure if this would be considered a series though. Of course, the characters will be in the United States and have Collins as the President of the U.S., but they will not know the Atwoods, the characters from Times of Trouble. I don’t have a title yet. Sometimes it comes to me before I write it, sometimes in the middle of writing, but very rarely does it come to me at the end. While this won’t be finished nearly as quickly as Times of Trouble, it will be done sometime (I hope) before May or June, since I made a resolution to have at least two novels written and published this year.
The main characters are the Tylers. The father is a pastor of a once thriving Independent Baptist church in Tucson, but due to varied reasons, he now has 30 people left in the congregation, mostly people over 65, but that soon goes down to 24 near the beginning of the novel, when the song leader and his family leave for a community of Christians in the Wyoming mountains who decide they’d rather wait for the Rapture (or Doomsday, since that was what the town originally prepared for) than to participate in society at large. The mother takes care of the home-bound members of the congregation and also write Christians novels on the side. Their two teens are kicked out of school, mostly because the school’s principal and the school district say that they’re disruptive influences as Christians.
In Times of Trouble, it was from one characters’ point of view, but this one will expand on what President Collins was doing behind the scenes and what he orders that will eventually affect the Tylers. The Tylers will realize that the song leader and his family were right to leave when the Tylers end up in FEMA Camps with other Christians and even some Jews that the government consider threats. The mountain community of Wyoming will be attacked and we see what happens to cause the military to want to have Collins removed from office.
A sub plot is the Tyler son having dreams of a girl he had never met, but started having those dreams when he turned sixteen. He works on taking control of his dreams by trying to make them lucid dreams and he finds out that she’s real when he meets her at the FEMA Camp. They struggle to survive as the novel grows closer and closer to Christs’ return.
Stay tuned for possible updates or whenever the novel is ready for sale.
Baker & Taylor, Inc., the world’s largest distributor of digital and physical books, together with K-NFB Reading Technology, developer of the Blio e-reading application, have announced a distribution agreement with Smashwords that will bring nearly 100,000 independently-published ebooks to the Blio store.
Blio is the feature-rich ereading application allowing readers to experience ereading in a new way, using their digital library across multiple devices. Smashwords is the leading distributor of indie (self-published) ebooks, offering a catalog of over 100,000 original titles representing 37,000 indie authors and small presses around the world.
“Now that Blio offers the Smashwords catalogue, there is a really exciting opportunity for readers to discover the best in up-and-coming and independent authors and to have a great digital experience reading those books,” said Bob Nelson, president of Baker & Taylor’s Digital Group. “Our agreement with Smashwords expands the Blio library, offering new works across every genre.”
The agreement will also bring Smashwords ebooks to public libraries that subscribe to Baker & Taylor’s new Axis360 digital media platform. Axis360, which was launched last year, has been deployed by several top public library systems in the U.S. Dozens more libraries are converting to the platform as well.
Using Blio, readers can sample and purchase Smashwords books, create digital libraries for purchased and sampled titles, publish text or YouTube video book reviews, and “favorite” their chosen authors, publishers and titles.
“This agreement expands the global reach of the Smashwords distribution network,” said Mark Coker, founder Smashwords. “Blio offers a rich digital reading experience for our reflowable books, and is widely accessible across a range of devices and operating systems. I’m also pleased to see our books gain increased exposure to library patrons as Baker & Taylor rolls out its new Axis360 digital media platform to libraries in the months and years ahead.”.”
Authors whose books are being sold through Smashwords have the opportunity to opt out of the Blio store, if they so choose.
Here is the sample from Chapter 1 of Times of Trouble, an End Times novel. Buy links are at the end.
Chapter 1 My wife, Lynda, was about to give birth to our third child, but she seemed to be having a lot of complications, so I was incredibly worried about her and the baby. For the fourth time in what seemed to be as many days, she said she felt like she was going into labor. We’ve lived in Omaha for the past three years, so now I was taking her back to the hospital to see if my wife was actually in labor.
Doctor Ryan was telling me: “Brian, we’re going to have to induce labor,”
Since I was worried about Lynda anyway, this sent my imagination off on a wild goose chase, and I could imagine all sorts of potential problems. Questions of all sorts ran through my mind, but I asked, “What will that involve? Will it be dangerous?”
“No, it won’t be dangerous; it’ll mostly involve a lot of drugs. Don’t you worry, your wife is safe in our hands.”
“Thanks, Doc.” I went to sit down on a couch, because as incredibly nervous and worried I was about this, the hospital staff decided that my wife shouldn’t feed off of my nerves, because they didn’t want to cause complications to the birth of the baby. I made my wife nervous the other two times she gave birth, which is also why I’ve never seen my other two children born.
In times like these, I tend to reminisce and think about how we’ve come this far. My name is Brian Atwood. I’m thirty-four years old, the middle child of three, married to Lynda, and we have three children, including the one that’s being born. I currently work as a field agent for the FBI in Omaha, after having served as a military policeman in the Air Force at Barksdale Air Force Base in Louisiana. Both of us are originally from a little tiny town in northern Nebraska, closer to Rapid City, South Dakota, than we were to our own state capital. My grandparents moved there right after my grandfather was mustered out of the Army after Vietnam. He wanted to try his hand at farming, which didn’t work out, because he ended up selling John Deere tractors to the farmers in that part of the state.
My parents met at our Baptist church, got married in the same church, and shortly afterwards, the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001, occurred. My dad felt it was his patriotic duty to join the military campaign to rid Afghanistan of the Taliban, which took a whole lot longer than anyone even anticipated, but he came home three years later with a Purple Heart for getting shot up. Fortunately, he was missing no limbs, but did have a problem with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder for a few years afterwards. He followed his father into the selling of farm machinery, until he and my mother died in a car wreck four years ago while I was attending classes to be an FBI agent. The business landed in Frank’s, my oldest brothers’ lap, who had worked with my father since he was sixteen. My sister, Melissa, is the youngest. She’s currently living in Dallas, working for the Dallas Mavericks as one of their public relations people.
Lynda’s family settled in Nebraska in 1870, five years after the Civil War, since Nebraska had become a state three years earlier. They dropped stakes, built a couple of buildings, named it Delaney, which is their family name, and began farming. The Delaney’s lived fairly close to Sioux lands, but the Sioux never troubled them, even during the Indian Wars, because the Delaney’s treated the Sioux fairly. The Delaney’s continued to farm through wars and depressions, and even through heavy-handed government regulations. Even now, her brother, Mike, who is the youngest, continues to farm the land, claiming he makes a lot of money off of all those people who still think ethanol is the future of fuel.
My mom and Lynda’s mom were best of friends from the moment they met in school. Her mom met her dad as a teenager, when they were introduced at a church social. Lynda’s parents married after 9/11, and her father was sent to Iraq for combat. He went on four tours of duty, and each time he visited home, nine months later another child was born, Lynda was the third of the four. Unfortunately, her father was one of the last killed two months before the withdrawal of Iraq by the United States military. Lynda’s mom never re-married, and still lives on their family farm. Lynda’s other brother, the second oldest, is Paul, who is in the military. The oldest is Heather, she lives in Colorado, and is the webmaster for Focus on the Family’s website.
My wife and I have known each other all of our lives, since our mothers were best friends. She is a year younger than me, so we never had the same classes together in school, but we always saw each other while waiting for the school bus, at church, and other events around town. Before I left to join the Air Force, I saw her as a good friend, and that’s about it. While I was in the Air Force, she went to Pensacola Christian College in Florida to get a teaching degree so she could teach in Christian schools.
I returned to Delaney after my four years in the Air Force, and Lynda returned to town the same time during a summer break. We laid eyes on each other at church for the first time in four years, and I fell instantly in love with her. Some people think that was just weird, but it’s the truth. She eventually told me she felt the same way when she saw me that first time in years.
The best description I can give of her is that she looks almost like the actress who plays Scarlett in Gone with the Wind, only prettier. She is five-five, chestnut brown hair, blue eyes, tanned because of the Nebraska sun, and is slender. While I’m an introvert, she is an extrovert, and can talk about anything under the sun with no trouble at all. Most people sometimes wonder if I even talk, but she assures everyone that I’m a chatterbox when I’m comfortable with people. She loves children and loves being a teacher.
She claims that I look a lot like that guy who played Greg in that old 1990’s sit-com, Dharma and Greg, and he also played an FBI character in the crime drama Criminal Minds that was on when we were kids. I don’t know about that. While the character and I are both FBI agents, I think the resemblance ends there.
We were married a year later, I was recruited by the FBI, so we moved to Omaha so I could work in the office there. Lately, I’ve heard rumors that the Treasury Department wanted to recruit me to work on the President’s security detail, as a member of the Secret Service. That would be a great opportunity, even though I didn’t vote for the man, but I think I could lay my politics aside to protect a President of the United States. Of course, that’s only a rumor, so nothing may come of it.
While I was waiting for news about the birth, I picked up my Kindle to read one of the novels I recently downloaded. I’ve had this Kindle since I was a kid. I’ve never felt the need to replace it with the smaller ones with the streaming capabilities and all the high tech gadgets that are currently available on it. All I’m doing is reading, so for everything else, I either use my computer or TV.
My nerves had finally settled, when three hours later, Doc Ryan came out, shook hands with me, and said, “Congratulations, Brian, you have a baby boy. There are some problems, however,”
My happiness went to concern in a matter of seconds, “What’s wrong?”
“Your son had the umbilical cord wrapped around his neck, which is why your wife had false labor a couple of times. He came out blue due to lack of oxygen, but appears fine otherwise. There’s also another issue,”
I knew that babies have died from being choked by their umbilical cord, so I was glad to hear that he was fine, but Doc Ryan saying there’s another issue seemed just as grave. “What is it?”
“He has Down’s Syndrome. He can live a normal life, but you need to know that the United States Health Administration is on the look-out for children that will cost them a lot of money. Normally, I’m supposed to report this, and I know you’re FBI, but they’ve taken way too many children and it needs to stop,”
“The USHA takes kids?” I had never heard that before.
“Yes. Ever since the health care bill became effective in the mid-2010’s, the government has taken newborns they think will cripple our economy. I’m sure the only reason you haven’t heard about it, is because parents are threatened, and there’s a tight control of what’s said online about it. I just thought I’d warn you of that possibility,”
“Thanks, Doc. Will your nurses support your decision?”
“Yes, they feel the same way. Be lucky that you found me as your Doctor. Would you like to see your son now?”
“You bet.”
Doc Ryan led me to my wife’s room, while I thought about his warning to me about the government taking away sickly children. I decided not to tell Lynda for now, because I know how upset she gets with most of the government’s policies, and I really didn’t want her to worry about something that may not even come to pass. Maybe old Doc Ryan was just paranoid.
I walked into my wife’s room to see her beaming with pride and holding our baby. I walked over to her, gave her a kiss on the forehead, and asked, “How are you two?”
“Other than being tired and sore, I’m wonderful. What do you think we should name our son?”
“How about Joshua James, JJ for short?”
“After our dads? I like that idea. I like the fact that we left this as a surprise. Getting a sonogram would’ve left all the fun out of it. Doc, when do we get to take him home?”
“Would tomorrow suit you?”
“Are you sure it wouldn’t harm her?” I asked with worry in my voice.
“Yeah, don’t worry about it. This is the wonders of modern medicine; mother and baby get to go home within twenty-four hours. Lynda, we need to let you get some rest, so we’ll put little Joshua here in the nursery and he can get some sleep too. Brian, why don’t you go home and get some rest? You can come back to the hospital bright and early tomorrow to take them home,”
“Can’t I just stay here?” I protested.
“Doctor’s orders. Your wife needs her rest and sleep. If you stayed here with her, she’d probably worry more about you. Go on now.”
I went home only because Doc Ryan insisted on it. I couldn’t get my brain to stop running a thousand miles an hour, so I stayed up past midnight watching old movies from the 1990’s. At eight in the morning, I discovered that I had fallen asleep watching the second Jurassic Park movie. I shaved, took a shower, ate breakfast, and then went back to the hospital to retrieve my wife and son. My other two kids were staying with their grandma back in Delaney, so I didn’t have to worry about feeding them or sending them off to school, even though this was summer vacation. Next week, Lynda and I will drive to Delaney to introduce the family to JJ and bring the kids back to Omaha.
Lynda was dressed and waiting for me when I arrived, and one of the nurses went to the nursery to retrieve JJ. Lynda was told to sit in a wheelchair, since that was hospital regulations, and the three of us left the hospital for home an hour after I had arrived there. I put JJ in the safety seat in the back of my car, and helped Lynda into the front seat. I waved at the hospital staff and Doc Ryan, who were outside watching us leave, and they waved back. I put my car into gear and drove home.
ISBN-13: 978-1469964799
ISBN-10: 1469964791
BISAC: Fiction / Christian / General
Kindle ASIN: B0075CNFFI
In my previous post, I described what Times of Trouble is about. Here are the current locations to buy the novel on all Kindle locations, Nook, and Smashwords. It will be on Apple, Sony, etc whenever Smashwords distributes it to them. Paperback is in the process of being finished on Createspace.
ISBN-13: 978-1469964799
ISBN-10: 1469964791
BISAC: Fiction / Christian / General
Kindle ASIN: B0075CNFFI
Times of Trouble is my sixth novel, which will I will upload to Smashwords, B&N, and Createspace sometime in the next few days. It’s a Christian speculative fiction thriller. I’m aiming for the group of Christian readers who read the Left Behind series back in the late 90’s, and I’m hoping they’ll enjoy reading this novel.
What it’s about:
In the near future, the U.S. government has turned into a tyranny as the government agencies known as the EPA and TSA grow with ever more power, taking away the liberty many Americans had known for over two hundred years. They’re joined by a government agency, the Health Administration, which was put together in the mid-2010’s to regulate healthcare.
Told in first person point of view, Brian Atwood, our main character, is a field agent for the FBI in Omaha. His work involves mostly cyber terrorism and actual cases of potential real world terrorism. Eventually, his wife gives birth to their third child, who has Down’s Syndrome, which does not please the Health Administration because there are rules and regulations set-up in cases like these to prevent “genetic freaks” as they like to call them, from sucking up a lot of Health Admin money. Because the Atwoods are born again Christians, they never considered aborting the baby, so now the Health people have to take him away to deal with the problem later.
Meanwhile, the Secret Service decides to recruit Brian to be the personal agent of POTUS due to his great work involving a case that dealt with terrorism that would’ve involved Offutt Air Force Base. Brian’s faith is tested every day as he deals with a man that has no morals from what Brian can see, and is tested even more when his wife finds out that she’s dying from a fast growing form of breast cancer. Trouble in the rest of the world occurs as Iran attempts to nuke Israel, which fails spectacularly, so Israel takes care of the problem. This brings condemnation from everyone, including the US, which takes the side of Iran.
When the re-election of POTUS doesn’t turn out the way he wanted it, he and his people declare the election nullified because of supposed “irregularities” with the ballots. POTUS claims that the new President-elect may take the seat sometime in the middle of next year, if everything looks to be sorted out. POTUS purges his staff of what he considers unloyal people, including Brian. At the same time, he loses his wife, but regains the son he thought he had lost.
Brian moves back to his family home in Nebraska, where we follow what happens as the country slowly falls apart. Events play out as Brian and his family sees the End Times approach.
Now that I’m pretty sure I have all the sales numbers in for all platforms, I’d like to share how many novels I sold or had downloaded last year as an independent author, to give encouragement to those that aren’t sure they can do it. I’ve been doing this for about 4 years, 1 1/2 of which I’ve actually put any effort at trying to promote my novels, since I’ve written three in that time span. Last year, I sold or had D/L’s of 24,151, in 2010 – 520, 2009 – 68, and in 2008 – 37. Here are the numbers for 2011 for each book and where, from first book or short story published in order to latest:
Virtualbookworm.com (original publisher of Don’t Mess With Earth paperback) Don’t Mess With Earth – 7
So, with a lot of hard work and determination, this is what I sold. I know, not the #’s of some of the bigger names in indie publishing, but I feel like I’m accomplishing something.
Since I finally have something new to share for Sample Sunday, here’s the Prologue to my newest novel, New Frontier, which is a alternate history speculative fiction novel. The Prologue will be expanded on in Book 2, when the starship that leaves at the end of the novel encounters problems while trying to find a missing starship that lead them back to the 1960’s…. Available on Apple, Nook, Kindle, and Smashwords for $2.99,and paperback for $9.99 (links at end of post).
Prologue
“We choose to go to the moon. We choose to go to the moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard, because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one which we intend to win, and the others, too. It is for these reasons that I regard the decision last year to shift our efforts in space from low to high gear as among the most important decisions that will be made during my incumbency in the office of the Presidency…”
President Kennedy stepped off of the stage after his “New Frontier” speech at Rice University, when he was asked by Texas Governor Daniel, “What did you mean about doing those other things after you said we would go to the moon?”
“That was a mistake. I was going to fill that in by saying that we would eventually explore the rest of our solar system after we take our first steps on the moon, but I forgot about it. Anyway, in the grand scheme of things, who’s going to remember one little paragraph in a speech? All that matters is that I have a vision of what our future holds. The American voters will eat that up.”
“That’s why you’re the President, and not that yahoo, Richard Nixon.”
“I’m sure the American people are grateful for that. Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to get back to Washington.”
As Kennedy stepped off of Air Force One at Andrews Air Force Base, he was met by FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover, who was never eager to converse with any of the Kennedy family, but this time he had to. “Mr. President, I need to speak with you in private.”
“What do you want?”
“Like I said, in private.”
“Oh, all right. Follow me to my car, we can speak there.” When they were situated in the back seat of the Presidential limo, Kennedy asked, “Ok, what’s so important that this has to be in private?”
“I’m sure you’re aware of the death of Marilyn Monroe last month…”
“What’s your point?” interrupted an impatient Kennedy.
“The point is that we have her killer in custody.”
“Didn’t the coroner rule it a suicide?”
“Well, someone told him to rule it that, but it really wasn’t…”
“Would you please get to the point already?” interrupted the President again.
“Fine. The FBI was informed that your brother, Bobby, was seen leaving Monroe’s house the day she died. After an exhaustively thorough investigation, it was concluded that Bobby was indeed the person responsible for the death of Marilyn Monroe. He’s now in custody, where he will be put on trial very soon.”
“You can’t do that.”
“Why? Because he’s a Kennedy? Your father may have gotten away with many a thing years ago, but he also had many friends in high places. With him retired, you and your brothers don’t have that luxury, since you are the people in high places. I’ve got so much stuff on you Kennedy’s, all I would have to do is go to the Press and give them everything available. You would be finished in no time. So, yes, I can have your brother put on trial for murder.”
“What can I offer you to withdraw the murder charge?”
“Bribery, eh? Are you sure you really want to try that with me?”
“What do you want from me?”
“Simple, really. You and your family stay out of my way, and I won’t air all of your dirty laundry. When it’s publicly announced that Bobby killed Marilyn, you will be shocked to hear it, and you’ll reluctantly announce that he will no longer be Attorney General of the United States. If you or your family sends your mob goons after me to silence me by killing me, my will has a provision in it that all the documents I have that are related to your family will be released to the Press. Either way, you’ll be ruined. Do I make myself clear?”
“Crystal.”
“Good.” Hoover stepped out of the car, leaving the President to his thoughts.
A year later, on a campaign stop in Dallas, with President Kenendy’s motorcade on its way to Dallas Trade Mart for a luncheon, gunshots rang out while passing through Dealey Plaza. Kennedy heard the bullets whiz by him, but then he heard a sickening sound next to him. His wife had been shot in the head. In the front seat, Governor John Connally, who had just been elected Texas Governor, appeared to have also been shot by the assassin’s bullets. Kennedy started to panic, but really had nowhere to run if an assassin was still trying to shoot at him. The Secret Service rushed in to protect Kennedy, surrounded the car, and the motorcade rushed away to Parkland Hospital. Both Jacqueline Kennedy and John Connally were pronounced dead within an hour of arriving at the hospital. The FBI announced they would begin their investigation.
After the funeral, Kennedy summoned Hoover to his office. “Did you have anything to do with what happened in Dallas, Mr. Hoover?”
“No, but if I did, you can bet that you would be dead, not your wife or the Governor. Unfortunately, we have no suspects. Too many of the witnesses claim that they heard gunshots from one of the buildings or from the grassy knoll that the motorcade was passing, but no one saw a shooter. Whoever may have tried to assassinate you was professional enough to cover their tracks. The FBI and I have run into a brick wall, and have decided to close the investigation. I’m truly sorry for your loss.”
“I’m sure you are. Thank you for coming.” Kennedy summarily dismissed the FBI Director from his office.
Five years later, after John F. Kennedy was no longer eligible to run for President again. He and the rest of the nation learned that Barry Goldwater won the Presidency of the United States in his second try after trying in 1964. Hubert Humphrey, the Democratic challenger since Lyndon Johnson decided to retire, had been assassinated by Sirhan Sirhan six months before the election, so the Democrats ran George McGovern, who was the Vice Presidential candidate, as the replacement. Goldwater soundly defeated McGovern.
While the world was waiting for Apollo 11 to land on the moon, John and Ted Kennedy were having a party on Chappaquiddick Island with their girlfriends the day before the scheduled moon landing to celebrate the fact that John had helped push NASA in that direction. Ted, and his girlfriend, Mary Jo Kopechne, decided to leave because Mary Jo needed to get home. “Teddy, you should stay here, you’re too drunk to be driving.” protested John.
“I know what I’m doing. Just because you’re my older brother doesn’t give you the right to act like dad.” slurred the drunken younger Kennedy.
“Ok, fine, but if you get into a car wreck, don’t blame me. I tried to warn you, you know.”
“Yeah, yeah.”
“Bye, bye Jack.” slurred the drunk Mary Joe, as she waved at him.
John waved goodbye to them as the two drunkenly got into Ted’s Oldsmobile and drove away. The next morning, Edgartown Police Chief James Arena knocked on the door of the house, John answered the door, and asked the Chief, “Can I help you?”
“Mr. Kennedy, I regret to inform you that your brother and his escort were found dead inside the Oldsmobile at Poucha Pond. It appears they didn’t see the end of the bridge and the car kept going. Due to how the car settled in the water, the two died from drowning. A pair of fisherman on a fishing boat noticed the car earlier this morning, informed us, and we managed to bring the car back up an hour ago. Unfortunately, I need you to come down the Station to ID them so we can officially record that the family knows about it. Can you come with me?”
“Yeah, I’ll come with you. I knew he shouldn’t have left while he was drunk. I knew something would happen, but he refused to listen to me. Now look where it’s gotten him…”
Even though John was hung-over, he was in shock at the news of his brothers’ death, and he was increasingly getting depressed over it. Of the four boys in his family, he was the only one that was left, and he wasn’t sure how his father, Joseph, would handle having yet another son not on Earth. Joseph had ambitious dreams for all of his children, yet of the nine children, four were no longer living. John was beginning to wonder if his family was cursed.
He went with the Police Chief, identified the bodies, and spent the rest of the week organizing a funeral. John wondered why all of this tragedy was happening around him, but not to him. He decided he needed to focus his energies now on his two children, before anything else happened to anyone else in his family. So, he decided to withdraw from public life, because it seemed to him that his immediate family would live longer that way. Four months later, Joseph died at the age of 81 of natural causes.
You must be logged in to post a comment.