Brethren Hollows: One 'n Done #3

By Bill Hemmig

Tucked away in a corner of the idyllic Brethren Hollow development sits an unkempt wooded field. Hardly big enough to be considered a forest, and ignored by many as just a forgettable eyesore, this patch of woods is home to secrets that few know exist. 

After a friendly party for Brethren Hollow's newest resident

• Language: English
• Publisher: Read Furiously
• Release date: Jan 1, 2023
• ISBN: 9798986809793

Book preview

1

Title Page

One ‘n Done #3

Brethren Hollow

By

Bill Hemmig

Published by 

Read Furiously

2

Copyright Page

Copyright 2020 Bill Hemmig

All rights reserved.

Published by Read Furiously. First Edition.

In accordance with the U.S. Copyright Act of 1979, the scanning, uploading, and electronic sharing of any part of this book without the permission of the publisher or creator is forbidden.

For more information on the One ‘n Done series, Brethren Hollow, or Read Furiously, please visit readfuriously.com.

For inquiries, please contact [e-mail].

Edited by Samantha Atzeni

3

Read Often, Read Well

Read (v): The act of interpreting and understanding the written word.

Furiously (adv): To engage in an activity with passion and excitement.

Read Often. Read Well.

Read Furiously

4

Brethren Hollow

About a year before the 2008 recession Dustin and Rebecca Haas bought their first home in a brand new development called Brethren Hollow. This was a hundred or so houses, in beige siding and brick, scattered inside a wide, bowl-like depression in Lenape Township, New Jersey. It was totally what they wanted except for this undisturbed wooded area at the bottom of the bowl behind their property that had to have been many decades older than the development: tall, weedy trees with shrubs gone wild and who knew what else, in an area about the size of the footprint of a convenience store. The sales agent explained that the wood was smaller than any of the building lots and occasionally wet— but no worries, they spray for mosquitoes— and that’s why it had been left there. And, as a bonus, they’d only have neighbors on two sides. Dustin’s only remaining concern going in was that the name Brethren Hollow might put people off, thinking it sounded too religious or, worse, sexist.

Armed with contributions from both sets of parents and a sweet mortgage, they moved in at the beginning of June and Dustin began to stop on his way to work for a latte at the Starbucks that sat just beyond the rim of the bowl. The line was always long and since he always stopped at the same time of morning it was always the same people in the line. One of them was a dull-looking guy of maybe sixty or so who always talked loudly to whatever person was next to him and one morning Dustin was right behind him and the guy turned around and stopped short. Dustin knew why. Everybody else on the line was in a suit or at least business casual and groomed accordingly. Dustin, who worked as a technician for an IT networking consultant, looked more like a Starbucks employee than a customer, with his thick-framed eyeglasses, long sideburns, soul patch, Hawaiian shirt untucked, skinny cropped pants, the tattoo of the USB trident on his left calf, cheap flip-flops—well at least it all served as a shield against having to talk to people pre-latte. But this tool must have decided that Dustin was worth the risk because he spoke. And soon they were trading professions, the inevitable opening conversation. The tool, whose name Dustin immediately forgot, was a corporate accountant and, he added quickly, a freelance tax preparer, which explained his interest in friending everyone in sight. Dustin’s job always ensured a predictable conversation: tell people you’re in IT and they’ll either want to impress you with how much they know or go on and on about how ignorant they are. Tax Guy was one of the latter which Dustin preferred. It turned out that Dustin and Rebecca lived just two culs-de-sac away from him and his wife. Over the next few weeks it occurred to Dustin that he was probably in the market for a tax guy, now that he was a mortgage holder, and how well, anyway, do you really have to like your tax guy. By the time July arrived Mark Rosner—the name finally sank in hearing him introduce himself to a month’s worth of Starbucks patrons—started to hint that a dinner invitation might be coming and before the month ended it came: Mark and his wife were having their next-door neighbors to dinner and would Dustin and Rebecca like to join them.

Mark’s wife, a thin woman with long gray hair tied back and wearing what looked like several layers of color-saturated gauze, greeted them at the door. Dustin, as he usually did with strangers, went blank, thrusting a bottle of wine in her direction. Rebecca quickly complimented her necklace, a construction of huge painted beads that definitely wasn’t Becca’s taste at all. Dustin liked this not only because she jumped in to fill the blank, but because it had been a while since they’d shared a secret insincerity and he thought it was fun. The woman led them through the entry hall, past the living and dining rooms and through the family room. The house was identical to theirs although they were coming at it from opposite places: while Dustin and Rebecca considered theirs a starter home, the Rosners, she told them, saw theirs as a final downsizing after the departure of the last of their three children. And the similarity ended with the architecture. Dustin and Rebecca’s house, outfitted in a mix of Pottery Barn, Restoration Hardware and Ikea and with a few personal touches like the wall covered with old forty-fives in the first-floor powder room, was meant to project casual maturity and an edgy sense of fun. The Rosners’ house looked like a third-world country exploded in it. The furniture spanned the last two centuries and most of the continents and was half-buried under African-looking fabrics and rainbow-colored pillows with metallic threads. Creepy wooden sculptures sat on tables, faded depictions of Indian deities hung on the walls and the entire fireplace wall was painted scarlet. Even the deck, when she waved them out onto it, was shaded by an awning from some North African market stall, the table was set with loud, mismatched ceramics and the smoky air smelled of hot spices.

The other couple was already there. Mark, dressed unexotically in cargo shorts and a polo shirt, turned from the grill and introduced everybody. The next-door neighbors, maybe a few years older than Dustin and Rebecca, had just moved to Brethren Hollow a few weeks before. They were Indian or Pakistani. The husband was the shortest person in the