Disruptions

By P.B. Cannon

There’s no telling who you might meet in the park. A ghoul, a dentist... Cady has occasion to meet both.
On a nice day in May, she is on a family picnic in the park, when she and her teenaged daughter, Annamae, begin a trek down to the public restrooms.
What can go wrong?
Well, running up on a ghoul bent on having you for a meal, for one.
From there, not only is the nice day ruined but it opens up a slew of unwelcome events guaranteed to disrupt the spell of tranquility the paranormal community in Matthews, N.C. has been enjoying for the last three years.
But, the dentist comes in handy.

• Language: English
• Publisher: P.B. Cannon
• Release date: Feb 15, 2019
• ISBN: 9780463812853

P.B. Cannon

P.B. Cannon was born and raised in Charlotte, NC, and though she has visited other cities and states, she has a preference for Charlotte and expects to live there for the rest of her life.She is a teller of tales who enjoys concocting yarns of science fiction, fantasy, paranormal, and other stuff. She relishes reading, drawing and painting, walking, working crossword puzzles, and she likes to dance.She is a retired electronics technician and admits to having worked at a variety of other jobs during her life, including being a dishwasher, a busgirl, a housemaid, a motel/hotel maid, working in a fast-food joint, a telephone operator, and a store clerk. There have been other, even-less-glamorous jobs.She also daydreams a lot.

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Disruptions

P.B. Cannon

Disruptions Copyright© 2019 by P.B. Cannon

Edited by Ainsley Morris

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License Notes:

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form by any electronic or mechanical means including photocopying, recording, or information storage and retrieval without permission in writing from the author.

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. It may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient.

Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

Image used in the composition of this cover courtesy of Pixabay contributor ArtTower and used under Creative Commons CCO.

Title layout and design by P.B. Cannon.

This is a work of fiction. All characters and events portrayed herein are imaginary, and any resemblance to real people or events is purely coincidental.

Contains some instances of profanity and violence.

Table of Contents

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Other Works by the Author

About the Author

Chapter One

I met Benjamin Frist one day a while back at the end of an afternoon at the park, and it happened that meeting him turned out to be right handy.

When I met him, I didn’t know he was a dentist, and he thought I was a dog--but wait, I’m getting way ahead of myself. It’s gonna take a minute to get back to him, but it’s best to start at the beginning because that afternoon at the park ended rather stressfully and set off a slew of unwelcome events designed to disrupt the lull we’d had for three years…

***

It was Memorial Day weekend. I didn’t have to go in to the barbershop, and Sam didn’t have to go to the massage parlor, so we took the opportunity that Saturday to go picnicking in the park. Annamae and I were on our way to the john when a man stepped out from behind a large willow oak and directly into our path, forcing us to either run into him or stop.

Annamae, looking down at her cellphone and texting with a friend, gazed at me puzzled when I caught her by the shoulder and stopped. Then, she noticed the man blocking our way. She looked up at him with narrowed eyes.

He struck what he undoubtedly thought was a badass pose: legs spread apart with arms crossed over his wide chest. He sported a heavy black leather jacket with matching pants tucked into his black, calf-hugging boots. The hot afternoon was in the process of segueing into warm early evening, so he was overdressed for the weather.

I could tell he thought he was the shit as he stared down at my daughter and me. He flipped his shoulder-length, straight black hair back and narrowed his dark, red-rimmed eyes to a slit.

Aw, crap. Can’t even relax in the park without some ugly asshole showing up and trying to ruin it. A big, smelly, ugly asshole. The guy reeked and looked to be seven feet tall. Of course, from my non-imposing height of mumble, mumble, just about everybody looked like giants, so I could’ve been wrong about how tall he was.

Ghouls don’t feel heat or cold, but they love leather, and no matter the weather, that’s usually their preference for outerwear, but I would’ve known what the guy was even if he’d been barefoot and wearing cutoffs and a muscle shirt. Regular humans can’t smell them unless they’re practically nose-to-nose, and if they’re unlucky enough to encounter one that’s a predator, by then, it’s too late to run. But they put out an aroma that’s apparent to anybody of the paranormal persuasion. Which, of course, includes me.

Ghouls. I wish Hell could quit spitting them out since most of ‘em just lumber around serving no real purpose anymore except to cause trouble. However, there wouldn’t be any problems if they all stuck to doing what they’re here for, which is to redeem themselves for some injurious sin committed while here on earth. But nooo, instead of getting on with trying to do that, or at least hanging around cemeteries like a decent ghoul should, a while back, some became malicious dipshits that took to stalking people.

They bag them, and because they can’t eat fresh meat, they take them to some isolated place and bury the body. They dig them up after they’ve been in the grave for a couple of weeks, and only then do they indulge in their ages-old practice of devouring human remains--bones and all. Their excuse for not waiting for a natural demise? They got tired of having to refill and tidy graves so no one would notice they had been disturbed, and here’s the kicker--they don’t like the taste of embalming fluid. I suppose that one’s understandable, but hey, they could go for wild animals, but they don’t want to do that, either.

Maybe I was wrong, but I had a feeling this one was of the stalking kind. There hadn’t been any incidents in recent years, and I hadn’t ever heard of any being in this park before but, first time for everything.

I sniffed the air to see if there were any others around. Didn’t smell any. I glanced at Annamae. She clutched her phone and scrunched up her cute little nose at the offending fumes wafting off the nasty bastard. I drew her close to me because he was only five or six feet from us, and although she could shift now, her fight training wasn’t