Quicksilver

By Lee Conrad

A near future dystopian story. Jackson and Belinda, two political radicals from the sixties meet again after 55 years. Society is in chaos and people are on the run. They have been through this before but the stakes are much higher. A country and democracy are in peril.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lee Conrad
• Release date: Dec 7, 2022
• ISBN: 9798215567609

Lee Conrad

Lee Conrad lives in upstate New York with his longtime love and their three rescue cats. His stories have appeared in Fiction on the Web, Literally Stories, Ariel Chart, Sundial Magazine, The London Reader, Books ‘N Pieces, Blood and Bourbon, Written Tales and The Blue Lake Review.

Book preview

The wood-frame house, a century old, but in decent shape, dominated the hilltop. Near it, a barn, in disuse for years, struggled to keep from collapsing. A large white peace sign on the back side had faded, but Belinda knew it was there. She helped paint it.

Across the dirt road, a field radiated golden as the rays of the sun dipped behind the huge maple trees at its edge. Belinda sat on the porch and waited for the first of the stars to become visible, a mug of herbal tea on the table next to her, and a cat in her lap. She looked towards the woods at the edge of the field to the path, now overgrown with brush. She tried to remember the people she and James, her late husband, had helped along the path on their way across the border into Canada.

Like the peace sign on the barn, Belinda knew her life was fading. Bad enough that her body failed her occasionally, she thought, but once my mind is gone, well that’s it isn’t it? It amazed her that yesterday's goings-on were quickly forgotten but something that took place in the '60s or early '70s seemed to be as vivid as if it just happened.

She could see James walking towards the farmhouse with a young man, long hair blowing in the wind, a couple holding hands, or even someone with a military haircut, trudging next to him. Rucksacks with a few possessions, maybe a sleeping bag, were all many had with them. They were on the run. The ones with the short hair were AWOL soldiers, soon to be labeled deserters, drafted into a war they hated. Others were political radicals, one step ahead of the law. She remembered the long discussions about the war and the state of the country as she, James and the new arrivals would sit at the kitchen table talking until the time came to move them across the border.

Belinda put the cat down,

Time for you to go hunting, and time for me to call it a night, She looked out at her view of the field, said goodnight to James and went into the house.

The morning broke sunny and Belinda, listening to a Canadian radio station while she cooked her eggs, jumped at the knock on