Five Novellas

By Marilyn Keeton

I-5 Corridor
There were two explosive chemicals that should never get together, but due to odd circumstances, they do. In the worst possible place where over one hundred thousand people live, thousands are killed in an instant. Survival and love are intertwined in the story.

She Wore a Yellow Ribbon
Two young sisters are abandoned and left to fend for themselves. The older takes on the responsibility to care for her younger sister who is mentally ill. She has no idea it would be for almost twenty years. Love and determination helps her to fulfill her commitment.

Internet Romance
Is it safe or dangerous? Prom night and everyone is drinking. A terrible accident happens to Bethany and all her friends, leaving Bethany physically handicapped. After years of hiding away in her bedroom for years, she is given a computer with internet. What happens when she gets online? Will she find scoundrels or friends? Abuse or love?

Whispering Pines
At a rehab home high in the Trinity Mountainsfresh air, trees, wild animals, and therapypeople can find peace and help from their addictions. But a dangerous element has entered the peace of Whispering Pines and brings with it mystery and murder. Why? Who?

Agnes and Blanch
Two women who become friends decide to travel to see friends and family they hadnt seen in some time. One must say goodbye, and one must say hello.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Sep 19, 2017
• ISBN: 9781543449556

Marilyn Keeton

Marilyn Keeton lives in the mountains of Shasta Co. writing fiction. She parallels her professional life with her personal one, she is a Certified Graphologist. She has 5 children, 8 grandchildren, and 1 great grandson. She lives in the pines, under the shadow of a volcano, near many rivers, and not far from Hatchet Mountain and Mt. Lassen. She has been a compulsive writer for some 60 years. She loves the quote by Stephen Vincent Benet, regarding short stories; ‘Something that can be read in an hour and remembered for a lifetime.’

Book preview

Copyright © 2017 by Marilyn Keeton.

ISBN:                        Softcover                        978-1-5434-4954-9

                                   eBook                             978-1-5434-4955-6

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

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

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Thinkstock.

Rev. date: 09/11/2017

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Contents

A Catastrophe on I-5 Corridor

She wore a Yellow Ribbon

Internet Romance

Whispering Pines

A Time And A Place For Agnes And Blanch

Previous books by Marilyn Keeton

The Adventures of Gilda and Gwendolyn

Quest for Forgiveness

A Compilation of Shorts

A Compilation of Shorts / Volume 2

Acknowledgements

To all my family, friends and my editor Bonnie Cox who helped me along the way with kindness, encouragement and corrections.

I write because I have so many stories in me they sometimes come flowing out, at 3 a.m. Makes me remember something my mother said, ‘You have to write, but why at 3 in the morning!’

I’m working on my next book right now. And, I want to give a special ‘thank you’ to Xlibris Publishing Co. for publishing my work and helping me work out a few kinks.

Photo of front cover designed by Marilyn Keeton

Pictures done inside by Marilyn Keeton

Picture of me on back cover done by Debbie Jones Photography

Picture of Danny in Agnes and Blanch was done by Danny Ellison

All characters or events are entirely fictional and any resemblance to real people, or events, are the product of the author’s imagination.

A Catastrophe on I-5 Corridor

Foreword

It couldn’t happen, he said. My friend Ernie and I had been talking about something that I thought would make a great story. That’s what the Big Shots say, anyway, those who know about chemicals, he spoke as he sipped on his cup of black coffee. "You know they even tried a few years ago to outlaw certain chemicals from coming down the I-5 corridor, because of that very thing, an ‘accident’, but you know the chemical companies won out. They say it’s timed so that they can never come into contact with each other." The I-5 highway runs North and South, the length of California, from Oregon down to LA, but the I-5 Corridor is seen as from State Dept. as being from Lakehead to Williams due to many varying and different circumstances.

This story is fictional, but it could happen. I continued talking with my dear friend Ernie, who is not only a hobby chemist but he’s a trucker and our conversation went to this idea, could it? I asked about the kinds of chemicals that are transported on the highway and what kinds of chemicals would be dangerous if they came in contact with each other, and how many people would be affected if they did.

Well, science says that sodium, potassium, lithium are elements that are known as alkali metals, and all of them are extremely reactive. The violent reaction of the NaK amalgam with water in a bowl placed on the ground is definitely a sight to behold. Just think of it, a small bowl of NaK and three drops of water, Kaboom! NaK + H2o equals a huge explosion! I wouldn’t want to be around if a semi carrying 40 thousand pounds of NaK came into contact with water! Wow, what that could do! Also, I imagine that everything within a good 60 mile radius of ground zero might be gone in an instant; 100 thousand dead within a second or two, depending on where ground zero was, that is. He just sat there shaking his head, no, no, no. ‘And remember what the atom did? An atom of uranium is very small in the grand scale of nature, but the forces binding its particles together are truly stupendous. Break that bond, and you release an incredible amount of energy."

Wow! I thought 100 thousand people dead at least, then with all the fall out carried by the wind, maybe another 25 thousand. I couldn’t grasp it at first, but I knew, if it did happen, it would be devastating.

Marilyn Keeton

Chapter 1

Max walked slowly along to the office, Max was just 5’7" but muscular. When he was young he had a head of beautiful wavy brown hair and muscles on top of muscles. He was a wrestler in high school. When he got older he lost his hair and got a limp, from Vietnam. He was just 17 when he joined the Marine Corps, spent eight years in, and did two tours in Vietnam. When he got home; he married, had two daughters, and raised cows. He had been driving long hauls for thirty some years. Now that he was almost 61 he’d been thinking about retiring. He still had the shape of a burly man, overweight though. He had a broad jaw, high cheek boned, the muscles smooth and hard as the burl of a tree, and his skin dark from being in the sun daily. He wore his faded jeans and a striped shirt and his penetrating brown eyes were sharp.

Max was born Maximillian Funk and hated his last name so he dropped it. Along with ‘Maximillian’ for which he was made fun of by class mates all his school years. So, he shortened it to just Max.

The air was clear and sharp. Max liked that about his home, Klamath Falls, Oregon. The city was still asleep except for the children playing in yards, not even a breath of wind had even disturbed the trees. The sound of chain saws echoed across the fields where the forestry workers were cleaning the debris of fallen trees from a wind storm they had a few nights ago. A pale blue sky stretched overhead and the sun was a hazy yellow, as the summer got warmer his thoughts went to fishing, later this week, he thought.

At first Max was upset for being called in to work, he hadn’t been feeling well at all, the doctor said it was just indigestion and gave him some pills, what do they know? He had a bad pain in his chest; he was always cold and sweating and he didn’t have any energy, the doctors made him feel that he was just getting old. He sat and took three of the pills the doctor had given him for his heart burn. They didn’t work, but maybe in time they would, or so he thought. He hated the idea of working on his one day off, but they said they needed him ASAP. The office in Klamath Falls needed him for an emergency trip to Travis AF base. Short haul, a one day trip and he’d be home late this evening. By the time he got to the yard he was ready to leave, had his manifest, log book, papers and lunch and his route. Annie said ‘remember Max it’s important not to take I-5 South due to the new state law NB1003 which was specific saying ‘no NaK can go through Redding area’ so you would have to go down the coast on a ship then transport it to Benicia and on down to Travis.

‘Yea, yea’ he said not listening to anything Annie said of-course he just wanted to get there and get back as soon as possible. He also didn’t hear what Annie said about the chemical NaK.

‘Your truck is filled with NaK, Max; it’s filled with two containers and is on lot #3, each container has 20 thousand pounds of NaK in them.’

‘Yea, yea’ he held his chest and took a deep breath.

‘Hey Max,’ Annie said, ‘you don’t look too good, are you ok?"

‘Yea, yea, just heart burn the doc says.’

She wasn’t so sure and walked over to him. She gently put her hand on his forehead and said, ‘well you’re kind of clammy and your coloring is gray, maybe you should take a sick day, like you wanted to?’

Right then the phone rang and the secretary ran to answer it…. She came back and told Max he had a short reprieve because Major Callihan was on his way with the other drivers and you will all go together, just wait ½ an hour. Max liked that idea and went to rest in the men’s locker room.

After a half hour rest Max felt better and went out, Annie accompanied him outside for a cigarette, ‘how do you feel now Max?’ He said he was fine and spit a wad of chewing tobacco out which just missed another trucker’s foot. Max looked at Annie and asked, ‘what’s with all the military semi- trailers out in the yard?’

Don’t know, can’t ask. All I know is Major Callihan dropped um off earlier this morning and said they were waiting for an escort.

‘Escort huh? Secret mission, must be something really explosive then, hmmm?’

‘Now Max, don’t let your imagination run wild, after all, you’re driving one of those semi’s to Travis.’

Max did some calculating in his head and, if 5 semi’s held 40 thousand pounds each of NaK that would mean 200 thousand pounds of that chemical going down the freeway, that’s an awful lot of explosive material where it shouldn’t be. All this ran through Max’s head in a second, but didn’t say anything. All he did say was, "Yea?’

‘Yes, I gather one of their drivers got really ill and they said they needed the best trucker we had, and… that’s you. Oh Max, I made you some oatmeal cookies for your trip, be safe.’

‘Yea, yea.’ he busily picked up his coffee, his cookies, his log book and his manifest.

‘Remember you’re to do everything the Major wants, no questions. Got it?’

… Yea, yea…

After a brief update, the major walked over to meet Max and was impressed with his character, his career and his service to the USMC and said to all his drivers, ‘ok listen up. I’ll be Eagle 1, Billy will be 2, Max here will be 3, and Daniel will be 4 and Mike you bring up the rear will be 5. Remember ½ a mile apart and don’t do something stupid. Be alert and I’ll keep in contact with each of you by phone. Now, let’s hit the road.’ The drivers all got into one of the semi’s, with only one thing changed, the route.

The major didn’t stick with protocol; he said Klamath Falls to Redding was two hours shorter and straight down I-5. It’d be okay this one time, besides his escort would be an hour late and he wanted to get on the road, he rationalized. The escort would catch up with them by the time they got to Mt. Shasta.

He was supposed to go to the coast, catch a ship down to Benicia and make their way to Travis AF base, but he ignored protocol and so in turn that choice set into motion a chain of events which would lead to a catastrophe on the I-5 Corridor.

Chapter 2

Jose Martinez was born in the USA but his parents had emigrated from Mexico about 6 weeks before Jose was born. They had settled in the Sacramento valley and Jose was raised with his cousins, and two brothers in Willows. His schooling impressed on him to; do the best he could, stand for something or you’d fall for anything, and take care of his family and to be an honorable person.

Jose was 5’8" with a square pleasant face and had a shock of black curly hair and dark brown eyes that sparkled like the stars. He had a mustache and a goatee which covered a jagged scar he had on his chin that he had gotten in high school during a fight. He always had a joke and a laugh for his fellow workers. At 26 he married a beautiful girl with long dark hair, slender and her name was Maria. They had just had their 3rd anniversary and his son, Anthony or Tony for short was 9 months old, fat and chubby and was just starting to laugh at his daddy. Jose was also a volunteer fireman and when he wasn’t on the fire line he drove the water trucks. A call had gone out for water trucks, due to all the fires in Shasta and the Trinities. So Jose volunteered to drive his old 81 Kenworth, which held a 4000 gallon tank of water, the doors had flames painted on each fender and was silver. The name ‘Sweet Pea’ was printed on the back right passenger side door.

Jose and Maria had just finished breakfast and Maria was cleaning up the kitchen while their son Anthony, had fallen asleep with his fingers, hands and face in his oatmeal. She looked up and saw Jose go into the living room with another cup of coffee to sit in front of the family wall. He sat staring at the family tree his wife had painted on their wall, a tall oak tree with many limbs. At the very top were individual pictures of Jose’s family and Marie’s family as children, then there were two young people in high school, and then their wedding picture. Birds, butterflies flew around the tree and their wedding certificate and five frames on five different limbs. One frame had a picture of their first child, Tony. It was a picture of Jose holding his son in the hospital, he was all of 30 minutes old and the picture showed Jose with a smile on his face that reached from ear to ear, he was so proud of his son. There were more pictures frames on other limbs but they were empty. Those were going to be for his future children and or special events. Jose looked with admiration at the beautiful job his wife did and then looked at all she had accomplished. He loved her so much. It was at that moment Jose stood up and picked up his guitar and went outside to sit on the porch. Maria had herbs all over the yard, for when the wind blew the smell of mint, thyme, yarrow and rosemary blew and wafted thru the air. It was a refreshing scent to relax with.

After Maria had cleaned up the baby and put him into the car carrier they went out to join Jose on the porch. Jose was singing her favorite song in his most beautiful tenor voice… ‘My Maria, by B.W. Stevenson’ It was a song of love, endurance, trials and happiness. He always sang it to her, for he loved his wife more than life itself.

My Maria there were some blue and sorrow times

Just my thoughts about you bring back my piece of mind…….

…and Jose sang the whole song which made Maria cry. It brought strength to Jose for his wife’s endearing love and Maria loved the sound of Jose’ melodic voice, and especially when he sang that particular song.

Jose was strumming the guitar, his voice was musical. He turned and smiled at his beautiful wife, she knew what was coming. ‘You’re leaving aren’t you?’

‘Yes, my lovely Maria. The call went out a few days ago for water trucks. There are over 29 fires in the Trinities and in Shasta counties, they need me. I won’t be more than a few days, maybe a week or more, but you know me… I’ll be back.’

Whenever Jose went on these water runs for the fire department sometimes it was days before he got home, but they needed the money and Jose loved what he did, Maria worried anyway. The two of them enjoyed the moment, sitting on the porch, holding hands and just enjoying each other and their son and their love.

About ten a.m. Jose packed his gear, stored it in the cab and turned around and looked at his beautiful wife Maria, standing there waving. ‘Adios, my Maria’, and then he blew her a kiss and jumped into the water truck and when he got to the road he turned North towards all the fires.

Chapter 3

In another part of Willows was a small almond orchard owned by Dick Nelson and his wife Sandy. He had been born in 1928, did a stint in WW2 and married shortly after getting out. He had several children; two boys and two daughters. In time one of his grandsons; Mathew came to work the orchard with him. They had started late this morning for Dicks wife of 57 years had made a special breakfast for their grandson; he had been home for about two months, home from Afghanistan. Mathew was such a fine young man, tall, thin, energetic and most honorable. This was a special day, in more ways than they would ever know.

It was going to be a hot day for in July it’s always hot. Dick wiped his forehead with his kerchief and looked out over his almond orchard, while holding on to his cane and bent with arthritis. His orchard was small but it was his and now his grandson was going to be a part of it, he was so proud of him. A young man who went off to join the Army, sent to Afghanistan and came home wounded in heart and soul. They stood on a small hill that overlooked Willows and I-5 looking north. Mathew walked up to his grand dad and put his hand on his shoulder and smiled up at him.

Mathew was happy to be home, happy to be in one piece and yet, he felt guilty for that, he made it but some of his friends didn’t.

There were ugly things that happened in Afghanistan that he found hard to talk about, thinking no one would understand. Many of his buddies came back with parts of their bodies missing, but he served and was getting therapy for his PTSD. He loved being with his grandparents and working in the orchard with ‘grandpa.’ They had had a wonderful breakfast, after that, his grandmother and one of his sisters, Angelica had gone into Redding for a doctor’s appointment.

Redding is the largest city North of Sacramento, maybe 100 thousand people, including all the little burgs around the city. Redding was big, loud, 4 lane hi-ways and a tourist attraction, what with; lakes, rivers, salmon fishing, ten miles to Shasta Dam, Turtle Bay and dozens of places to camp, people loved Redding. One of the favorite restaurants was Hometown Buffet in central Redding, right off Cypress, with easy access. No matter when you went in there, there was a line almost to the front door, but it was fast, efficient, and so worth the wait.

Samantha, Sammie for short, usually wore blue cotton shirt dresses, as blue as her eyes, but today was different. The shining bell of her hair fell on either side of her calm face. She had gotten some platinum streaks down her blond hair, and what a difference it made, it certainly brightened up her face. She was beautiful; 5’9", with a splendid figure. She looked good in hip hugging jeans or a cashmere sweater and short skirts, high cheek bones and a perfect mouth. She had peaches and cream complexion and not a visible wrinkle on her oval face. Lines appeared when she laughed or frowned, but then seemed to disappear instantly when she was being serious. Of-course, the fact that she was only 35 had something to do with it.

After being escorted to her table she sat down and crossed a pair of excellent long legs. Today she was clothed in a blue business suit, a silk pink blouse with a short skirt two inches above her knees to show off her long legs and black heals.

She had just given a presentation for the Redding Rotary Club on the importance of cursive writing and its benefits, and was waiting for her 11:00 appointment, with a lawyer. Once Sammie had been an airline hostess and traveled the world, but now she was a graphologist who worked for; lawyers, the police, employers, doctors and did comparative analysis for clients and red flagged children’s handwriting for violent tendencies in many schools. She taught graphology at colleges in Humboldt and Shasta County. She never thought it would be her profession but her mother was a well-known graphologist and so she too wanted to follow in her mother’s footsteps.

As Sammie sat sipping on her iced tea she looked around at others dining at Hometown Buffet.

At one table there were two elderly ladies chatting and laughing and eating at the same time. Genevieve, the youngest, all of 70 years of age, had taught ball room dancing for 39 years and the other, Shirley, who was in her early 80’s, had been teaching progressive ballroom dancing for over 45 years and between the two of them, they had almost 85 years of teaching dancing. They had been dear friends for some 50 years of teaching; Argentine tangos, rumba, mambos, waltz, foxtrots, paso dobles, cha cha, samba, quick step, swing and the jive. Shirley was finally retiring and Genevieve was treating her to a long lunch at Hometown Buffet. They were laughing at the list of; How to maintain a healthy level of insanity in Retirement. Genevieve said: do you remember that on our check stubs we’re supposed to write, ‘for marijuana’, they howled with laughter. And then Shirley said, ‘when the money comes out of the ATM, scream, ‘I Won! I Won!’ They were spurting water and laughing so hard they were getting attention from others. ‘Ooh, I love this one’ Genevieve said, ‘when leaving the Zoo, start running towards the car park, yelling, ‘run for your lives! They’re loose!’ ha ha ha and Shirley almost peed her pants. They ate for a few minutes and gabbed about the good old times and then she said, remember this one? ‘Tell your children over dinner, ‘due to the economy, we are going to have to let one of you go….’ Oh did they laugh. Genevieve filled her plate for a second time and Shirley got her seven desserts. Genevieve spoke up saying, ‘remember when we go to a department store’s fitting room, drop your duds to your ankles and yell out, ‘there’s no paper in here!’ They laughed and were now getting everyone else to laugh and listen to these two crazy old ladies. And finally Shirley said, ‘I’ve always liked this one, ‘at lunch time, sit in your parked car with sunglasses on, point a hair dryer at passing cars, and watch them slow down!’ Too funny now, everyone was howling with laughter.

Jenny, which was short for Genevieve said, ‘I’d like to see the youth of today take up dancing, it’s such good exercise.’ Most of her students were dead and Shirley’s students were all gone. ‘Well, what can you expect, when they are in their 90’s?’ Shirley said. ‘But, dancing keeps you vibrant, alive and some have energy to last forever.’

‘Yes, I don’t think the kids today could dance the jive for eight hours, then cha cha and tango in the same evening, do you?’ Shirley just shook her head.

At one table there was a family of 5; father, mother and three unruly children; loud, obnoxious, running around throwing food and being belligerent and disrespectful of others.

Genevieve couldn’t understand why parents tolerated such bad behavior. She said or mumbled to Shirley, ‘I’d take that brat to the bathroom and spank that kid till he couldn’t sit!’

‘Sush, Honey, you can’t do that today, you’d be the one arrested for abuse. Let’s finish and go shopping.’

‘Ok, but let me go to the ladies room first.’ Genevieve stood up and walked out of the dining area.

Chapter 4

Back at Sammie’s table she noticed Mr. Andrews walking in. He wore a dark grey suit and talking to a stout woman next to him in line. He was of medium height with a paunch hanging over the waistline of his pants. He wore a light green bow tie, and when he pushed back the side of his jacket to pull a handkerchief from his pocket, she spotted a set of black suspenders with little diamonds embroidered on them. He walked up to Sammie and they had lunch, then discussed the will.

Sammie brought out her camera snapped a few pictures of the signature and other samples, she knew she couldn’t take the original with her so made lots of notes and Mr. Andrews had many copies of the handwriting besides. The attorney looked at Samantha and smiled and asked, ‘I don’t suppose you could give me a thumbs up or down on this signature?’ using his right thumb up or down. ‘It’s just that I’m on my way to Weaverville for the week-end and …..’

‘You thought you could get a start on your papers. Right?’

‘Well, guess I’m a little obvious.’ He emphasized little with his thumb and right finger half an inch in between them.

Well, Sammie held her