Cemetery Side Road

By R.M. Ferrier

At once nostalgic and gripping, Cemetery Side Road tells the story of a man's obsession with a tragedy that happened in his youth, one that he never forgave himself for letting happen. In the blink of an eye he lost that which was most precious to him. 
 
Even after moving away to escape the painful memories, he continues to spend years reliving that day, searching for answers and finding only dead ends, while he spirals deeper into the abyss.  
 
Consumed with unearthing the truth, his very life depends on him finally solving the mystery that has plagued him for decades. With a desperate need for closure, Rowan Fitzpatrick returns to his childhood home in the Lanark Highlands where it all began and where it all ends.

A story of love and loss of innocence that will haunt you long after you close the book.

• Language: English
• Publisher: R.M. Ferrier
• Release date: Dec 4, 2015
• ISBN: 9780994821416

Book preview

R.M. FERRIER

CEMETERY

SIDE ROAD

Books By R.M. FERRIER

The Crow Flies South For The Winter

The House Of The Black Goat

Cemetery Side Road

The Crow’s Nest Lies Beneath The Snow

Murder Down The French Line

Kentucky Rose Garden

Road Kill

Copyright © 2015 R.M. FERRIER. All rights reserved

Cover art/design Copyright © 2015 Steffany Sinclaire

ISBN – 9780994821416

NO PART OF THIS PUBLICATION may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise without the prior written permission of the publisher.

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

DEDICATION

I dedicate this book to the whistling wind...

CHAPTER

1  Bethany

2  My Signpost

3  My Rotten Family Tree

4  The Dark House

5  The Glorious Summer

6  Ella

7  Our Macabre Bliss

8  If I Never Said I Loved You

9  The Stranger by the Grave

10  Mr. White Sox and the Blue Shoes

11  Digging Up Bones

12  Bethany and Rowan Forever

13  A Face from the Past

14  The Glass Room

15  Coffee Shops, Old Mistakes and Questionable Sources

16  The Ghost by the Grave

17  The Deconstruction of a Heart

CHAPTER 1

BETHANY

SHE WAS BEAUTIFUL. Her eyes were blue and they shone like the stars. When she looked at me, it felt like she could see straight through my flesh and bones – right into my very heart. Maybe she could, because she knew me better than anyone. Her hair was dark and silky and flowed all the way down to the middle of her back. She was tall - as tall as I was, and her eyes sat level with mine. We used to have the best staring contests. Neither of us would win. I will say that I came the closest, but she would probably beg to differ, and she was generally right about everything. We only spent one summer together, yet those precious months changed me forever. I’ve never been the same since. You see, I’ve never been able to let her go.

Bethany was staying with her aunt that summer. Ella Schonburg was a widow who didn’t have any children of her own. Her husband had died years before in a car accident, and I think she was glad just to have someone around for company. She lived in a big yellow brick house about a mile down the road from my family. It was on the outskirts of Watson’s Corners and practically in the middle of nowhere. For that matter, Watson’s Corners was practically in the middle of nowhere. It consisted of about fifteen houses - depending on how generous you were with the town limits, a church, a garage and an abandoned feed mill. There used to be an old inn where the feed mill stood. The inn had burned down long ago, and, apparently, it was the reason for the settlement in the first place. I guess the powers that be at the time thought a feed mill would be the next best thing. Perhaps they were right. It had served the local farming community faithfully for years before shutting down its grain grinder when I was still young enough to be in diapers. I have only known it as an abandoned relic from the past. It was a place to play in as a kid and throw rocks through the windows when I got a little older. I remember how my sister and I used to come out of there all covered in dust.

We thought it was the greatest thing to play hide and seek in the grainery. We would slide down the grain shoot and into the bin. We looked like we had just crawled out of a flower sack by the time we were finished. Our poor mother used to have fits. She would take us out back of the house and make us strip down to our undergarments and turn the garden hose on us. We didn’t mind; it was all part of the fun. Seeing her fume only added to the excitement.

After the feed mill shut down, Watson’s Corners carried on pretty much as before. The houses were already there, and no one living in the hamlet depended upon the mill for their livelihood anymore. Most residents were either retired or worked over in the nearby town of Almonte about a half hour’s drive away. The closest attraction to Watson’s Corners was Ox Head Lake. It was called Ox Head because it was shaped like a cow’s skull. It was only a ten minute bike ride from my house - I could do it in seven with a good wind at my back. Besides having a campground and about two dozen rental cottages, it also boas-

ted a gas station, a general store and its very own drive-in theatre. Evenings spent watching movies there are some of the fondest memories I have from my childhood.

My father was an alcoholic who ran out on us when I was eleven, but before then, one of our favourite things to do as a family was watch movies at the drive-in. We had an old Chevy pickup with a cap on it, and my mom, dad, sister and I used to lie in the back like four pigs in a blanket and watch movies till three in the morning every Saturday night all summer long. It’s hard to find those kinds of memories, especially from a childhood like mine; we didn’t make them everyday. Not long after my dad left, we stopped going. It just wasn’t the same without him; we weren’t a whole family anymore.

Having Ox Head Lake and all it had to offer so close at hand made living in Watson’s Corners bearable. When I wasn’t riding the bus back and forth to Almonte District High School, I did odd jobs for neighbours and worked part time for Mr. Osler at the campground. He owned everything around Ox Head - the campground, gas station, general store and drive-in theatre. He was a short, bald man with a big moustache and a quick temper. Most people found him difficult to get along with. I didn’t mind him so much; I knew enough not to argue with him. I learned that from living with my dad for the first eleven years of my life. My mom, my sister, Jess and I learned it the hard way. When my dad was drinking, he communicated with his fists. It’s always better not to argue. 

I was cutting Mrs. Schonburg’s lawn when I met Bethany Rothensal for the first time. I saw her up in her bedroom window looking down at me. I smiled at her and she smiled back, and, somehow, I knew right there that we were going to be the best of friends.

It was another week before I met Bethany officially face to face. It was the first day of summer vacation and it was my absolute favourite time of year back in those days. No more school, which I hated! I was too much of a loner to fit in with the other kids, and I just wanted to get out of there as fast as I could. I was always the first on the bus at four o’clock, and I played hooky as often as I could get away with it. It wasn’t beyond me to come down with a fever or a bad case of stomach cramps on a fine spring day or a warm autumn Monday. I had more three day weekends than any other kid I knew.

With school out of the way, I was free - free to do whatever I bloody well pleased! Besides working at my various jobs, I spent my time swimming and fishing in Ox Head Lake. I would grab a couple of bottles of Orange Crush and a package of strawberry Twizzlers at the general store and head up to my secret spot on the far side of the lake. It was hidden in a little inlet and had a great arching rock that rose out of the ground and slid down into the lake. The rock was shaped like a turtle’s shell, and I would lie on it in nothing but my skivvies and sun myself and daydream for hours. I don’t think anyone else knew about it. If they did, they weren’t bothering me. There was no one around to mess with my world. I was king there. On that big old turtleback rock rising out of Ox Head Lake, I believe I dreamt up some of the craziest notions any boy has ever imagined. Oh, the things that I was going to do with my life! How I was going to change the world.... oh, how the world has changed me. At least I have my memories.

I was standing outside the Ox Head Lake General Store trying to sell copies of Monster Magazine on the fateful day I came face to face with Bethany Rothensal. Selling magazines on commission was another thing I dabbled in. Mr. Osler had given me the okay to pedal them outside his store. Well, actually, he didn’t exactly know about it. I only did it when he wasn’t around. Mrs. Comstook, the store’s cashier, wouldn’t say anything, and I’m sure Mr. Osler wouldn’t have minded anyway. After all, who was I hurting?

When I saw Bethany ride up on her bike, I pretended I didn’t recognize her and gave her my best sales pitch. I told her there was a double monster movie bill playing at the drive-in that weekend and the latest edition of Monster Magazine had a feature on the monsters that would be appearing in those two movies. It was part of a special Double-Double; they were showing the monster flicks as the warm up for the real features - Roller Ball and One Flew over the Cuckoo’s Nest. I told her that if she wanted to have the inside information ahead of the other kids at the movies and, therefore, impress all her friends, she had better buy the magazine. Never mind that she had just moved there and hadn’t made any friends yet, she was no fool; she was quite aware of the fact that she could extract any information she desired to know from a very willing source - me!

She didn’t buy the magazine, but she told me she adored monsters and would love to see the double bill at the drive-in. Before I knew what I was saying, I babbled something about how I was the guy to come talk to if she needed anything cleared up about the truth behind monster