{"id":582,"date":"2013-03-14T16:07:36","date_gmt":"2013-03-14T20:07:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/stephaniesilberwordsworks.com\/?p=582"},"modified":"2013-04-07T11:01:12","modified_gmt":"2013-04-07T15:01:12","slug":"the-dark-side-of-time-an-excerpt-two","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hometeamproductions.tv\/wordsworks\/the-dark-side-of-time-an-excerpt-two\/","title":{"rendered":"THE DARK SIDE OF TIME: An Excerpt Two"},"content":{"rendered":"

Sunny is having a very bad day, and it’s barely begun.\u00a0 Sleep deprived from those dreams (nightmares)<\/em> she can never quite remember.\u00a0 The baby’s first birthday party to plan.\u00a0 A recently purchased fixer-upper cottage (that seems to have been waiting just for the Quinn family…and not in a welcoming way)<\/em>.\u00a0 Then there’s Shepherd, caretaker at the church complex next door and Sunny’s part-time handyman, ever more annoyingly ambiguous (and deeply strange)<\/em>.\u00a0 A low and bilious sky, a ceaseless pouring rain.<\/p>\n

Shepherd said, “You having a birthday party you need a dining room table.”\u00a0 He was putting the finishing touches to the trim.\u00a0 The cottage had begun to \"cottage<\/a>surrender its shabby, uncared for ambience to expanses of gleaming floors and linen white moldings and a color palette of sky and earthy greens and roses.\u00a0 Even in the murky day, Sunny could feel the transformation, and it heartened her.
\n<\/strong><\/p>\n

Of course, Shepherd was right about The Ballroom.\u00a0 Emptied of the clutter of the move, it seemed a vast and barren space.\u00a0 <\/strong><\/p>\n

“We’re probably going to get something from Ikea,” Sunny told him.\u00a0 “Soon.\u00a0 It’s been under discussion.”<\/strong><\/p>\n

“IKEA!”\u00a0 Shepherd was disgusted.\u00a0 “That shit has no style.\u00a0 I got something for you.\u00a0 I think you’ll like it.”<\/strong><\/p>\n

“We’re trying to keep to a budget,” Sunny said.<\/strong><\/p>\n

“Nah, this is free for nothin’,” Shepherd waved her off.\u00a0 “I saw it down the school basement, doing some organizing for Father.\u00a0 He said you could have it.\u00a0 Says he can’t use it why shouldn’t you?”<\/strong><\/p>\n

“Offer I can’t refuse.”<\/strong><\/p>\n

By the time they’d made a dash from the cottage to the rear of the convent, \"convent<\/a>Sunny was soaked, her voluminous poncho no match for the torrents of rain.\u00a0 Her hair hung plastered to her cheeks.<\/strong><\/p>\n

“We’ll just go through the old utility tunnels,” Shepherd said, motioning her down a short flight of stairs.\u00a0 “Why drowned in this mess?”<\/strong><\/p>\n

The stairs descended to a wide, dim hallway running the length of the convent on the Quinn’s side.\u00a0 “That’s my place,” Shepherd said, gesturing.\u00a0 A door there slightly ajar.\u00a0 Sunny heard movement inside, a muffled thud.\u00a0 An animal’s soft whine-?\u00a0 Maybe it was a television left on.\u00a0 Shepherd seemed not to hear.<\/strong><\/p>\n

“This is the housekeeping wing.\u00a0 In the old days?\u00a0 The kitchen was down here.\u00a0 My place was for the housekeepers over the years.\u00a0 Nice.\u00a0 Two rooms PLUS a kitchenette.\u00a0 It ain’t a palace but it works for me.\u00a0 My needs are few.”<\/strong><\/p>\n

He dug into one of the pockets of his carpenter shorts which clung dripping to his muscled thighs, withdrew a huge bundle of keys on an old-fashioned key ring.\u00a0 He glanced at Sunny, smiling.\u00a0 His eyes very bright.\u00a0 “You wit’ me?”\u00a0 A door across from his apartment.\u00a0 Another flight of stairs leading downward, steeper now.\u00a0 Sunny was freezing.<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"steam<\/a>The stairs gave onto a wide, low-ceilinged tunnel lined with pipes, lit by fluorescents.\u00a0 Greenish-yellow walls were peeling.\u00a0 The floor was cement.\u00a0 Their steps rang hollowly.\u00a0 The tunnel seemed to disappear at the far end, a vanishing point.\u00a0 The air was close and musty.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Ahead of her, Shepherd appeared even more enormous than ever.\u00a0 Ducking his head at intervals to avoid pipes.\u00a0 “You wit’ me?” he asked again.\u00a0 Turning, his flushed unshaven countenance rearranged itself before her astonished eyes, resolving into a wolf’s.\u00a0 Yellow eyes glowing, wild, primitive.\u00a0 Its tongue lolled.\u00a0 The lupine face grinned insanely at her.\"Shepherd<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

Sunny blinked, and it was Shepherd again.\u00a0 One of the fluorescents flickered overhead, with a sharp thrum of electricity.\u00a0 Shepherd laughed.\u00a0 For a third time he asked, “You wit’ me?”\u00a0 He was pulling out another key, another door, solid, ponderous, flung wide now.\u00a0 He flicked a switch within.\u00a0 That same concussive whump<\/em> of electricity.<\/strong><\/p>\n

School desks with built-in benches cluttered the cavernous space.\u00a0 The far walls lost in gloom.\u00a0 Old school<\/em>, Sunny thought dazedly.\u00a0 Did I go to school here when I was little? \u00a0<\/em>She felt a brain zap coming on.\u00a0 It passed violently and quickly.\u00a0 She wanted to spit out the sudden taste of iron in her mouth.\u00a0 She thought she may have bitten her tongue hard enough to draw blood.\u00a0 And then she saw the table.<\/strong><\/p>\n

A single pedestal, lion-clawed and massive, lustrous with age and rich with \"clawfoot<\/a>subtle detail.\u00a0 Pale yellow wood delicately grained.\u00a0 Shepherd grinned at her.\u00a0 “Knew you’d like it,” he said.\u00a0 Probably only seats eight, tops, but it makes a good start, right?”<\/strong><\/p>\n

“Right,” Sunny agreed.\u00a0 But all she wanted to do in this moment was get out of the yawning space, with its whiff of her old school and the giant’s perspiration, the shrouded shadows.\u00a0 “Where did it come from, do you think?\u00a0 The rectory?\u00a0 The convent?”<\/strong><\/p>\n

“Beats the living shit out of me,” Shepherd said in a conversational tone.\u00a0 “It’s yours now.\u00a0 Looks like it was made for your dining room, like, special.\u00a0 Don’t you think?\u00a0 Was I right or was I right?”<\/strong><\/p>\n

Sunny said suddenly, “Do you think you can close off the crawl space in my basement?”<\/strong><\/p>\n

“That’d be a negative,” Shepherd answered.\u00a0 Still smiling.\u00a0 “But I will<\/em> get the table over by this afternoon, you around?”\u00a0 He flicked his do-rag from his head and wiped his face with it.\u00a0 “You need access to your gas lines, plumbing and shit,” he told her.\u00a0 “Might could stack up some shit by the opening, it spooks you that much.”<\/strong><\/p>\n

“How did you know it spooks me?” Sunny asked.\u00a0 Little hairs rising on her neck and arms.\u00a0 Shepherd looking right at her, right into her thoughts.\u00a0 In the dim space his eyes really did look yellow.\u00a0 Feral.<\/strong><\/p>\n

He laughed.\u00a0 “Spooks me, too,” he told her.<\/strong><\/p>\n

DISCLAIMER:<\/span>\u00a0 Stephanie Silber owns the copyright to the foregoing and gives permission only for the writing sample herein to be distributed free of charge, and without alteration.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Sunny is having a very bad day, and it’s barely begun.\u00a0 Sleep deprived from those dreams (nightmares) she can never quite remember.\u00a0 The baby’s first birthday party to plan.\u00a0 A recently purchased fixer-upper cottage (that seems to have been waiting … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"yoast_head":"\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\t\n