LITMIR.BIZ

      by

      Copyright 2011 John Schlarbaum,

      All rights reserved.

      Cover design: Hawksworth Designs© 2008

       www.hawksworthdesigns.com

      Published in eBook format by eBookIt.com

       http://www.eBookIt.com

      ISBN-13: 978-1-4566-0087-7

      All rights reserved. The use of any part of this publication reproduced, transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, or stored in a retrievable system, without the prior written consent of the publisher is an infringement of the copyright law.

      This novel is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

      ALSO BY

      John Schlarbaum

      WHEN ANGELS FAIL

      TO FLY

      “A Steve Cassidy Mystery”

      THE DOCTOR’S BAG

      A Sentimental Journey

      AGING GRACEFULLY TOGETHER

      A Story of Love & Marriage

      ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

      For many authors, the process of writing is a very solitary exercise. Sitting alone, staring at a blank piece of paper or computer screen, wondering how to fill them with a story that is usually not yet completely formed in their own head. It can be a very daunting task to undertake. Yet for me, with each book I write, I have found along the way, the storyline and characters take on a virtual life of their own, and I am simply the chronicler assigned to getting the details correct.

      I do however, derive great pleasure in writing with certain individuals in mind – people whom I know will connect with specific phrases or variations on real life stories, which we have shared in the past. Without these friends - both old and new - or family members, I am sure my stories would be much less entertaining to read and to compose. Therefore, I would like to acknowledge and thank everyone who continues to encourage me and enrich my life on a daily basis. I am certain that over the years you have made me a much better writer, and more importantly, a better person.

      July 2008

      John Schlarbaum

      DEDICATION

      For Mom

      A fan from Day One

      ONE

      FEBRUARY, 1997

      Monday

      “Steven.”

      My name has never sounded so poetic - so angelic - than when spoken from the lovely lips of Maria Antonio.

      I closed my eyes and squeezed my fingers around the bottle of beer in front of me. I didn’t - couldn’t - respond to her immediately. I wasn’t trying to antagonize her, but I needed a moment to steel my own resolve. It had been almost thirteen years since we’d last seen one another; all of them long and torturous - at least for me.

      I tried to conjure up the image of her that I’d stored in my memory. I saw her auburn hair blowing playfully in the breeze and her laughing at a now forgotten joke, as we sat on the back porch of her house. She was seventeen and the most beautiful girl I’d ever seen.

      Now I sat terrified at the reflection I’d surely see of her in the mirror behind the bar, if only I had the nerve to look up from my hands.

      “There was talk that you were dead.”

      Again, I didn’t know how to reply. Her mere presence mesmerized me. Her closeness. Her perfume.

      Suddenly the bar felt as still as death. Like an old black and white snapshot.

      What had possessed me to come back here? Sure I had a job to do, but was this current situation - one I had known would occur - worth the two thousand dollar budget I’d been given?

      “If you don’t say anything in the next five seconds, I’ll have to come to one of two conclusions,” she said defiantly. “That you’ve become an arrogant s.o.b. over the years and you have no intention of talking to me ever again. Or that you are as deaf as a tree stump. Personally, I couldn’t care less but I’ve got things to do, so the clock starts ticking down now.”

      “Can I assume you were the one who started the ‘Steve Is Dead’ rumour?”

      “The lump at the bar speaks! Someone call the Pope.”

      I pushed away the beer bottle, turned slowly on my bar stool to face her and braced myself for the deserving slap I knew would be coming.

      Yet when our eyes finally met something strange happened. I immediately saw in her’s the one emotion that I’d hoped I never would: Pity.

      The quick intake of air confirmed she had noted the three inch scar that ran down my left cheek, from the base of my eye to the jawbone. I could only imagine what her reaction would be if she saw the ten inch scar that ran horizontally across my stomach, where an irate gang member had attempted to gut me like a fish.

      The right words to say to her continued to elude me. I was simply too captivated by her to speak. The long flowing hair I used to love to brush away from her face was now cut short and very stylish. Her face still held that youthful cheerleader glow and she looked as thin and athletic as she had in high school.

      I thought it ironic that in good faith - probably matched with a certain degree of malice - she had come to confront me for past transgressions, but instead was now the one being confronted.

      “Oh, Steve,” she managed to say as her eyes involuntarily began to water. Then without hesitation she raised her right hand and caressed my face, tracing the scar with the backs of her fingers. “I had no idea.” Her voice then trailed off.

      I held her gaze and took her hand in mine, only to realize that she was clutching something in it. Even before she revealed it to me, I instinctively knew it was a thin gold chain from which a heart shaped locket hung.

      “I came here to give this back,” Maria said, regaining some of her composure as she opened her hand.

      “Don’t you mean throw it in my face?”

      She smiled for the first time. “Yes, that’s what I meant,” she replied as we both shared a brief nervous laugh together. “You always knew what I was thinking, even when I didn’t have a clue myself.”

      “What can I say, it’s a gift.” I looked at her hand. “Just as that was,” I said, as I gently folded her fingers around the chain. “It’s part of the past. Our history. And regardless of what a jerk I turned out to be, when I gave you that locket I loved you more than life itself. Nothing’s going to change that.”

      I could see that she was clearly distressed.

      “Look,” I continued, “I don’t have the right to tell you what to do. That chain and locket may hold the key to, or symbolize, everything bad that has happened in your life since graduation. So if you want to throw it in my face as a form of - what do they call it, closure? - then I’ll understand. Really. But in all honesty, I’d like you to keep it.”

      Maria looked if not confused,

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