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Displaced
by Doug Hewitt
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The following is an excerpt from Displaced. For access to the entire story, sign in or create an account to purchase this issue. She frowned. “I don’t know.” “You didn’t touch it?” “No, sir.” “First the fish, now the stereo. I’d figured that the fish jumped out. But there was no fish on the floor. That bothered me, but I let it pass. Now the stereo’s gone! Do you think someone broke in and took it?” “It was there when I came home.” “You’re sure?” “Uh huh. I came in to feed the fish because I forgot the fish were gone. Anyway, I thought I heard a noise. It was coming from the stereo. That’s how I noticed it was there.” “What kind of noise?” “It was humming. Hummm. Like that. But there was another sound. Crackle crackle crackle. Like crumpling sheets of paper.” “The power was off?” “I don’t know. I didn’t touch anything.” “All right. Go back to your room and do your homework.” “It’s done.” “Then read something.” She looked like she wanted to say something. Her mouth opened, but then she spun and rushed upstairs. Harry was struck by the resemblance between Trudi and her mother. Her mother had often looked like she wanted to say more than she did—nothing bad, not like she was holding back criticism. More than likely Abigail had wanted to discuss something like the immortality of the soul, the nature of God, or some other topic that Harry held no interest in, and very little patience. She’d known she had married a good man, but a man who distrusted metaphysical mumbo jumbo. Show Harry a calculator and a straight edge and he would show you how the world was put together. An hour later, Trudi came downstairs for the rest of the evening. Harry believed she was pulling out of her funk. Harry had the same positive effect on her mother, who was prone to depression. Harry believed his influence resulted from his approach to life, rock solid reasoning, something that could be depended on. When one goes off into speculation about life after death, the seeds of despair are sown. And so Abigail found comfort in Harry. So did Trudi. He didn’t think about the stereo (knowing such thoughts would be completely unproductive) until the next day when he parked at the end of the driveway again. This time he parked there for another reason. Astonishment at what was missing. Excerpt from Displaced © Copyright 2009, Doug Hewitt
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© Copyright 2010, Zefram Media LLC |
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