Bones In the Tree

By Tim Greaton

What were her parents thinking when they opted for burial in the backyard? Karen didn't know but finds herself talking more and more to their tombstones as her personal life descends into chaos.

Her marriage in flames and dating life little more than one catastrophe after another, she finds herself turning to a furry, acorn-throwing neighbor for solace.

Can the fresh air and slow pace of life in Menyon Falls heal her broken heart, or will returning to Maine be the biggest mistake of her life?

Come find out in this quirky and surprisingly emotional novella from "Maine's Other Author"(TM)Tim Greaton.

13,500 words (41 pages)

• Language: English
• Publisher: Focus House Publishing
• Release date: Jul 5, 2011
• ISBN: 9781612720456

Tim Greaton

I live in Maine with my beautiful wife and three amazing children. We share 7-acres with 1 dog, 2 cats, and a population of ducks that varies with the weather. I'm a full-time corporate writer and novelist. My fiction, non-fiction and advertising work has appeared in forums all around the globe. A few months back, my novel "The Santa Shop ̈ was republished to Kindle and Nook. My pre-release novel "From My Cold Young Fingers ̈ (soon to be final-released as "Ripped From My Cold Young Fingers ̈) is also available on Kindle. "Zachary Pill, The Dragon at Station End, ̈ "Heroes With Fangs ̈ and my horror novel "Ancestor ̈ will also be available on Kindle in the next few months. My brother's publishing company refers to me as "Maine's Other Author TM ̈ but I prefer just Tim :-).

Book preview

BONES IN THE TREE

(a 13,500-word, 41 page novella)

from

Maine’s Other Author™

Tim Greaton

NOVELS BY TIM GREATON

From Focus House Publishing

The Santa Shop

(book 1 in The Santa Conspiracy)

Available Now

From My Cold Young Fingers

(collector’s Advance Reading Edition)

Available Now

Ripped From My Cold Young Fingers

Summer 2011

Zachary Pill, The Dragon at Station End

Summer 2011

Ancestor

Summer/Fall 2011

Heroes With Fangs

Fall 2011

BONES IN THE TREE

(a 13,500-word, 41 page novella)

from

Maine’s Other Author™

Tim Greaton

Copyright 2011 by Tim Greaton.

Published by Focus House Publishing at Smashwords

This is a work of fiction. The names and the characters are fictional. Any resemblance to living or dead individuals is purely coincidental.

All rights reserved. No part of this story may be reproduced in any form, including digital or audio sampling, internet display or download, or any other form of digital or physical display or transfer, excepting only brief excerpts for use in a literary review, without expressed written permission from the author.

Published by Focus House Publishing

Bones In the Tree, a novella

Cover graphics by Wizards Prism Art & Media

BONES IN THE TREE

(a 13,500-word, 41 page novella)

from

Maine’s Other Author™

Tim Greaton

Focus House Publishing

Wilton, Maine

BONES IN THE TREE

Tombstones in the backyard. Uck!

Trust me, I know how creepy that sounds, but it’s true. Somehow my father and mother got permits to have their own private cemetery seventy feet from their back deck. In Pasadena, California something like that would have been unheard of, but apparently the State of Maine doesn’t do things quite the same way as the rest of the world. I guess when you live on a hill in the Maine woods, nobody really cares what you do.

It had been almost a year since my mother died of the same disease that took my father–lung cancer. My brother Ray and I had so far been spared, which was miraculous given that my mother used to smoke four packs a day, which basically meant she had smoke coming out of her mouth from the time she got up in the morning until the time she went to bed at night. My father, on the other hand, had never smoked a cigarette in his life. Thanks to my mother, though, he had inhaled the smoke from thousands of them over their thirty-seven years of marriage.

I wondered if she had died first, would he have had nicotine withdrawal, maybe enough to need the patch? Since he wound up occupying space under the backyard tombstones five years before she did, we would never know.

I settled into my father’s Adirondack chair, the last one he built before his ruined lungs made it too hard for him to walk up and down the stairs from his basement workshop. For some reason, his chair seemed a lot more comfortable than the ones he had given Peter and me nearly a decade before at his cookout. I could still see my father wearing that silly John Deere chef’s hat as he expertly flipped grilled burgers and hot dogs during our one visit back to Maine.

Eat, eat, I remember him saying to me several times that weekend. It’ll put a little meat in those…pecks.

I smiled. My dad knew I had been insecure about my chest size, mostly because of a certain jerk of a husband who couldn’t keep his eyes off from anything larger than an A-cup. Little did my dad know that it wouldn’t be his burgers, but a surgeon named Andre, that would finally solve that problem for me.

I chuckled at the irony and winced. I was still a little tender from having the damn implants removed almost three months to the day after Peter left me for one of his undergrad students, a flat-chested girl with hair as orange as a crayon. I lifted my arm, stretched my left shoulder and gently massaged the narrow scar under my breast. It was getting better, but I wouldn’t be playing volleyball anytime soon.

That caused another solitary chuckle.

Volleyball in Maine! That was about as likely as cell phone service north of the Auburn/Lewiston area, which is to say not likely at all. Horseshoes and square dancing were about the only two things to do in Menyon Falls, Maine, and I wasn’t all that sure about the square dancing. From what I remembered, what little exercise most people got around here was from either making kids or chasing them. Fortunately, I had left in time to avoid making any, though the Robinson brothers and I had sure done our share of practicing.

Had anyone been able to hear my thoughts, I would have blushed.

An acorn struck the deck.

I glanced up in confusion. The only tree in our yard, a large oak, was twenty feet away, just far enough that no branches actually overhung the deck.

I kicked the nut off into the grass and returned to thoughts of the twisted childhood love triangle that still made me feel like a tramp. Though I had never dated both Robinson brothers at the same time, I used to swap one for the other on a regular basis. It made for some high drama in Menyon Falls; that much was sure. The brothers had sent each other to the emergency room more than once because of me.

When I finally hooked up and moved away with my college writing professor, the brothers were still at war. I knew I probably should have felt guiltier but, born almost nine months apart to the day, the brothers had been beating the tar out of each other as far back as anyone could remember. And since I hadn’t dated either of them until we were in the fifth grade, I figured their problems were less about me, and more about just plain hating each other. I often wondered if it had something to do with how much alike they looked. That’s how Jason first got me to swap from Johnny to him, by fooling me into thinking he was Johnny one night. After a while, I learned to tell the difference but most people couldn’t. I’ve since met identical twins that didn’t look nearly as much alike as Jason and Johnny.

It was hard to believe that fifteen years had passed. The brothers were probably both married and sharing family vacations by now. The thought came with a certain sense of relief. In the last two years of high school, their fights over me had gotten out of control. More than once, I felt certain that one of them was going to kill the other.

Then I started attending classes at the University of Maine…and met Peter!

Just thinking his name made me want to scream! How had I let him pick me up like some novelty at a Maine gift shop? I’d never know. Worse was the way I had let him discard me the same way.

Oooo!

Two more acorns fell at my feet.

Not caring where they came from, I kicked them off the deck like a soccer star. The jolting motion sent two spike-like pangs right into my surgery scars. I massaged under both breasts and wondered what kind of a man would want me after I’d maimed myself for that womanizing bastard!

Damn him!

At least back here in Maine, Peter wouldn’t have a front row view of my failure to replace him. I leaned back in the chair that suddenly didn’t feel as comfortable and stared up at the old oak tree that shaded most of my parents—now my—back lawn. Ray had generously deeded his half of the house to me before probate had even finished with my parents’ meager estate.

It was especially great of him since he didn’t yet own a home of his own.

Ray had been in medical school for my entire adult life and was now finally working on his residency at Maine Medical Center. Given how much even novice doctors made, I suspected he could have purchased a nice home anytime he chose. Though he never said as much, I got the impression his roommate—lover—George was the reason he had been putting it off. Apparently, George was still playing the field, which sent Ray into jealous fits. When the two of them had picked me up at the Portland Jetport, the tension was unbearable. When, two hours later, we finally pulled up the long gravel driveway to my parents’ hilltop house, I was beyond relieved to get out of a car. Next time, Ray would either transport me alone, or I would take one of those scary four-seat airplanes from Portland to the tiny Farmington airport. After all, I figured a plane crash couldn’t be any worse than the wreckage that Ray and George’s relationship had become.

I was still staring up into the oak tree when I heard chattering and saw an acorn come sailing out at me. I ducked and the little nut smacked loudly into the back of my father’s Adirondack chair.

Hey you! I yelled, trying to peer up