Lightning in the Clouds: A Collection of Stories Featuring the Novella The Note

By Glenn Trust

It is always there, the lightning, sometimes hovering over our heads flashing in the clouds…sometimes distant, below the horizon. But it is always there. No one escapes, and when it calls...we will go.
'Lightning in the Clouds' is a collection of short stories dealing with the journey and passage that we all will take...alone
The genre of stories ranges, from Mystery, Suspense, Murder, Human interest, Social Issues, and pure Bad Luck. Glenn Trust takes the reader on an emotional journey of laughter and tears, triumph and defeat, fear and anger at the lightning hovering over us all.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Glenn Trust
• Release date: Feb 17, 2021
• ISBN: 9781393566229

Glenn Trust

Glenn Trust is a native of the south but has lived in most regions of the country at one time or another. Varied experiences from construction worker to police officer, corporate executive to city manager, color and provide insight into the characters he creates. His stories are known for detailed plots, solid research, and realism. There are no superheroes or knights in shining armor in his stories. According to Trust, knights are for fairy tales. His books are gritty and based in the real world with characters who face their frailties while dealing with their roles in the story. The heroes are average people doing the best they can. Also missing from his stories are any references to vampires, zombies, supervillains, or other assorted monsters. Trust's monsters hide behind the smiling faces that pass us on the street. They look like us, and this makes them more frightening. He is the author of the bestselling Hunters, Blue Eyes-The Journey, and Sole Justice Series of mystery/suspense/thrillers as well as stand-alone novels and short stories. Today, he writes full-time and lives quietly with his wife and two dogs, Gunner and Charlie. You can find all of his work on his Book Bub author page, or check out his Facebook Page - Glenn Trust Books where you can sign up for his email group to receive updates on new releases and upcoming book promotions.

Book preview

The Lightning

It is always there, death, the lightning in the clouds, sometimes hovering over our heads flashing in the clouds ... sometimes distant, below the horizon ... but it is always there.

We wait for it, knowing that all will face it. It is as certain as being born, more certain, in truth, because once we are here, no one escapes. In that way, it unifies us.

Rank and status grant no exceptions. Wealthy or impoverished, free or slave, conscious of it, or not, we all prepare for the lightning ... the one universal life event ... the end of life ... death. Our journey and passage here require it.

Some may fight, deny, become enraged, weep bitter tears, or pray for deliverance. It changes nothing. In the end, the lightning wins. It is a certainty that there will come a day when we will no longer walk on this earth.

What world this would be if we understood that we are all connected by the moment when each will take the passage alone? Knowing that we are linked in this way, by the eventuality of death, it seems reasonable that we would not waste the time we have, or squander the lives of others. Sadly, this is not the case.

There are many ways to gauge the quality of a human life. One, I believe, is the manner in which a person faces the journey and the passage, our personal, solitary encounter with the lightning.

There is no pretension intended that these stories contain any answers or suggestions that will benefit others about the matter. They are not intended as a statement of philosophy or religion. They contain no hidden truths unless some truth is awakened in the reader.

If the stories entertain, perhaps bring a smile, or a tear, provoke some thought ... that is good enough.

~Glenn Trust~

Lightning in the Clouds

Why do things die, Papa?

The boy held the small glass bottle to his eye and squinted through it expectantly, waiting. Lightning flashed and flickered with strobe-like intensity, illuminating the porch and the child’s face. He smiled and shook the little bottle in front of his eye.

Look! The pee pee fly!

The wicker creaked as the old man shifted in his chair and looked down. It’s a tsetse fly, Bud.

Grinning, the boy looked up. I know. Mom doesn’t like it when I say pee pee. He shrugged as if that were explanation enough. Where did you get it?

You know where. Dad gave it to me. He brought it back from the navy.

Tell me again.

And so he did, sitting on the porch in the dark, the rumbling flashes of the gathering storm throwing bright yellow-green light over them intermittently. Then their world turned black again until their eyes adjusted to the dark.

The story told for the thousandth time, he settled back in the wicker, waiting for the next flash.

Papa, why do things die?

He sighed. He had hoped the boy would forget that he had not answered.

Damn good question, Bud. His eyes stared into the black night. I don’t know. Everything just does.

Me too? Like the fly?

Turning his head, he smiled gently at the boy. Not for a long time, he said, then turned back to the night, peering into the dark.

You too, Papa?

The light flickered, dim, then brighter until it lit the towering clouds from the inside, rising in the dark like the tall, puffy parapets of some sky castle way up high. He waited, letting the question and his unspoken answer drift away in the darkness.

The boy would not be denied. Carefully selecting from the bowl on the porch, he picked up one of the eggs his mother had sent him to gather. He held it up, squinting, waiting. The lightning flashed.

What about this, Papa? The egg, is it dead?

He looked down at the boy seated cross-legged on the gray porch planks. A smile crossed his face.

Not dead, Bud. Not quite alive either. Not really, anyway.

No? He squinted hard at the egg, trying to see into the shell at the mystery inside. Doesn’t it make chickens?

He smiled again. The boy always made him smile. Yes, it does. It’s kind of in between, I guess. There might be life in it, but it’s not hatched yet.

Multiple, rapid flashes lit the boy’s puzzled face. He wanted a better answer. The old man had none.

The clouds scudded and swirled, piling up on the horizon. The storm was close. The flashes showed them racing along, churning and whirling.

He stretched in the chair, feeling the aches. Sitting in a chair was enough to make him ache, he thought, a wry smirk on his face. God, he was old.

More lightning flashed in the tall clouds. They spun, and rose and churned closer. The storm would be there soon.

He watched them, the clouds, spinning when the lightning flashed. He was like the clouds. Living, whirling, fast at first, then wobbling, losing his spin, like a toy he played with as a child. The cord wound tight he would fling the spinning top to the ground where it spun so fast on its point. It was so fast it was just a blur of twirling color. Then all at once, its energy was used, the top wobbled, swayed and toppled over.

He looked at the boy. How could he be so young? They had grown up together, brothers. His brow furrowed. No, not brothers...something else.

He was confused. It was the storm. The storm was confusing. The boy looked up at him. What was his name again?

The spring on the screen door creaked behind them.

Storm’s coming. You boys need to get inside now.

Standing, the boy cradled the bowl of eggs against his chest. Rain misted across the porch, dampening their hair. Thunder rumbled nearby.

Turning in the wicker chair, a question crossed the wrinkled face. Lightning flashed. She looked familiar.

Who are you?

I’m Beth, she said softly, placing a hand on his arm. Come inside, Dad. She looked at the boy. Bud, bring your grandfather in.

A Line of Dust

The line of dust billowed across the horizon, rising rapidly like the exhaust from a rocket engine. It drifted behind the speeding pickup, dissipating slowly in the morning breeze.

Squinting into the sun, the old man stared across a mile of cornfields at the old truck racing along the graveled section-line road. Too fast, he thought. He always drives too fast.

At the junction with the farm road, the pickup skidded a few feet and then turned towards the old house, fishtailing in the loose gravel before straightening out and accelerating again. It roared in, the dust rolling thickly behind it and settling on the green corn.

The old man leaned back in his rocker, shaking his head. Always too fast. He does it on purpose, he thought, driving too fast, just because he knows it bothers me. Just like him.

Reaching the driveway, the pickup slid again and made another swerving turn, racing the four hundred feet to the house. It rocked to a stop in the yard, beside the old garage, under the shade of a cottonwood.

The tree was old, at least fifty feet tall. It would have been higher except the top had rotted and fallen off after a lightning strike a few years back. That was when the old man could still get around the property. He had meant to take the tree down, but he never got to it. Now, its rotted limbs hung precariously over the pickup.

The young man got out, looked up at the tree over his head, and then turned towards the old rocker on the porch. His lip and cheek lifted on one side in the wry grin that the old man could never understand. It always made him feel that he was laughing at him in his own way. Even when he was a boy, the half lip grin could make the old man feel that his son was laughing at him. Maybe he was. It didn’t much matter now. Boy...son...young man, now...he was here. The old man was glad to see him...and the grin.

He reached in the pickup’s bed and took out a small ice chest cooler. Still grinning he walked to the porch and placed it beside the steps. He looked towards the rocker and shook his head.

For later. After chores.

The old man nodded and smiled. For later.

He worked through the morning, his father watching from the porch, unable to help. First to the barn, where he started the tractor. The diesel roar and puffs of black smoke came out through the large, open door. A few minutes later, the tractor bounced through and across the yard moving fast, leaving a puffy trail of exhaust behind.

Too fast, the old man thought. That old tractor hasn’t been run in a while, best to let it idle first, warm it up. It was old. He knew about old things. He was old, and that tractor was too. Best to let it idle first and not run it so hard. But he didn’t say anything. There was no use saying anything. Words wouldn’t change anything.

His son sat straight and tall on the seat. The old man watched him and forgot about the old tractor and letting it idle. He was a good-looking boy, the old man thought. Confident, and strong, and young.

Not all that young, he thought. Thirty-eight with a wife and three children of his own. He didn’t bring them by much. The old man wished he would, but his son only brought them on special occasions. Christmas and Easter, they would stop by...sometimes on his birthday. He would meet them there on the porch.

They always stopped in on his wife’s birthday. They would stand by Mary’s plot out behind the little wrought iron fence beside the pasture. The children would run around the grave and over it and play while his son stood with his wife and talked softly, remembering.

The old man would watch from the porch, annoyed at first that the children were allowed to run over his wife’s grave. On one visit, he felt her whisper to him in a warm spring breeze that passed over him. It was all right. She liked them there...the children. Running and playing, and laughing. She loved all of it. He could feel her smile in the whispering breeze and knew that the children there made her happy. After that, it didn’t bother him to see them playing there where she was buried. He didn’t smile much, but the children there with Mary, made him smile.

But mostly his son came alone. He would work quietly, efficiently, doing the chores the old man could no longer do.

They didn’t talk. There wasn’t much to say, anyway. Words between them had never been smooth. Conversation had always been rough and bumpy, full of pot holes that jarred them, rattling their teeth and their feelings. Not talking suited them both.

Besides, talking brought back the memories and that always soured both of them.

You’re too hard on him, Mary had told him.

The world is a hard place. He would point at the boy out mowing the grass, or cutting wood or fixing fences. It is toughness, being able to stand up to the hardness of the world that will get him through.

Still, he’s a boy.

He will be a man, one day.

It’s summer time. His friends want him to play ball. There will be time enough for chores later.

There is time now. He would shake his head stubbornly. There will be time enough for play later.

You’re wrong about this. She shook her head. You’re a hard man. And Mary would walk away sadly, occupying herself with some task in a far part of the house away from him but near a window where she could watch their boy toiling under the summer sun.

So, they didn’t talk. Mary was right. There would have been time enough for chores later. Maybe there would be more talk now between them if he had listened to her.

But maybe not. Somewhere inside, he couldn’t give in completely. It still gnawed at him, all these years later. The world was a hard place, and there, out there on the tractor, was his son, tall, and straight and strong with a family of his own. He was a man that could take the hardness of the world. The old man smiled, thinking that he had had something to do with that.

But at what price? The warm wind whispered Mary’s voice into his ear.

The price doesn’t matter. He looked up at the leaves rustling in the old cottonwood.

Doesn’t it?

No! I did what I had to do, to make him tough. It was my duty to do that.

Was it?

Yes!

And if he never talks to you?

Then, that’s the price.

The price?

Yes, the price...for doing what I had to do.

You’re wrong.

Maybe, but it is too late now. He’s grown and what is done is done.

The whispers faded with the dying wind as if Mary had turned away. The leaves in the cottonwood ceased their rustling. He wanted to call out to her to stay, to whisper to him about happier things, not to leave him today. He liked having her with him in the wind. He didn’t want to be alone today. But she was gone now and the day became hot and still.

He turned in the rocker, watching his son on the tractor. His visits were infrequent, but regular depending on the chores to be done around the old place. He wondered about that. The boy had hated the chores so much, but now, the man came. Not often, but whenever they needed doing, he was there.

Always, the old man watched from the rocker while his son worked on hot summer days or frosty winter ones. Unable to do the work any longer, he could do that, at least...stay out in the weather and watch from the porch. It was his duty, now.

The tractor bumped out of the pasture. His son pulled a lever and raised the brush hog at the rear as he bumped across the yard to the barn and then disappeared through the cavernous door into the dark interior.

A few minutes later, he came out, squinting into the sun, a tool belt around his waist. Taking some planks from a stack beside the barn, he began repairing the big wide door where some of the wood had rotted.

He worked quickly, methodical and competent. The hammer swung in wide arcs. He couldn’t remember teaching the boy to use a hammer like that. Then he remembered.

It was the summer job, with old man Fielding working construction. He had hired on as a laborer, carrying lumber, handling the wheelbarrows and shovels and, in time, Fielding had made him a nail driver and then an apprentice carpenter. The boy had enjoyed the work, different from the chores. He would work from sunup to dark with Fielding or his crew and never complain. Remind him to mow the grass and he would show the sarcastic smirk and plod to the barn for the mower, sullen and not speaking.

Why was that, the old man wondered. Mowing was the easier work. But there it was, always the little half raised grin, laughing at him.

He shook his head, driving away the memory, not wanting to think about it as he watched his son swing the hammer. Each blow sent the big sixteen penny nails deep into the lumber. There was never a miss. His son was a much better carpenter than he was. That thought made him smile.

Why are you smiling? The breeze whispered ever so softly in his ear.

Look at him.

He felt Mary’s smile in the gentle air stirring against his cheek. He was happy that she had come back.

Yes, but why does he make you smile?

You know why.

Say it.

Stop. Why do you go on so? He’s our son. You know why.

Say it.

I won’t just because you tell me to.

The wind gusted, and she laughed. Just like always.

He smiled, and you too, Mary. Just like always..

The breeze skittered away leaving her laughter and soft taunting in his ear. Say it.

He felt warmed by her laughter, even at him. He never minded much when Mary laughed at him.

The afternoon grew hot. After the barn door, came the mowing, and then the weeding. His son never stopped, moving smoothly from one chore to the next, knowing what had to be done and simply doing it without the need to think or plan it.

Finally, he walked across the yard from the barn. Cicadas buzzed in the cottonwood. Off to the southwest a thunderstorm brewed, rising high into the sky, the first faint rumbles of thunder echoing in from the horizon.

He turned and sat his backside on the porch, his feet on the ground. Reaching into the ice chest, he pulled out two cans. He opened one and sat it on the planks beside the old man’s rocker. Then, pulling the tab on the other, he lifted it and held his head back drinking half of the beer in one long swallow.

His eyes roamed over the old place. Think that’s about it for now. I’ll be working on the old chicken coop next time. He took a sip from the beer and looked at the rocker with the lopsided grin. Even though there aren’t any chickens and haven’t been for as long as I can remember.

The old man