Driven

By Will Hallewell

Good or bad, money can be a major factor in everyone’s lives. In the lives of Charlie Shaw and his family, however, it’s what makes them happy and what makes them popular.

When they move into the small town of Falls Creek, divisions of people who have known each other for years begin to occur, and the town becomes spl

• Language: English
• Publisher: Kingston Publishing Company
• Release date: Jul 18, 2019
• ISBN: 9781645331667

Will Hallewell

I have been writing for 20+ years. Currently you can find two of my books available on Amazon: "Dudes With Guns" and "God's Enchanted Rose".I live in Salem, OH with my wife and two daughters.

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Copyright

Driven is a work of fiction. All names, characters, locations, and incidents are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

DRIVEN: A NOVEL

Copyright © 2019 by Will Hallewell

All rights reserved.

Editing by KP Editing

Cover design by KP Designs

Published by Kingston Publishing Company

The uploading, scanning, and distribution of this book in any form or by any means—including but not limited to electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise—without the permission of the copyright holder is illegal and punishable by law. Please purchase only authorized editions of this work, and do not participate in or encourage electronic piracy of copyrighted materials. Your support of the author’s rights is appreciated.

Table of Contents

Copyright

Table of Contents

Dedication

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

About the Author

About the Publisher

Dedication

The majority of this book was written while flying from Ohio to Pflugerville, TX for a new job, so I'd like to thank all of the people and new friends I met during that time.

To Coach Terry Smith, football coach at Penn State, who when I asked if a Buckeye fan could sit between two Nittany Lions, gave me the subtitle and a very important part of this book, No Hate in the Heart, brother. Words to live by for sure.

To the amazing flight attendants on Southwest Airlines, who kept me refreshed with Diet Coke and many pretzels.

To the very friendly staff at the Courtyard by Marriott in Pflugerville, who are the epitome of professional, and to the baristas at Starbucks – Miranda, and Chris – who took good care of me every morning. Venti, Americano, leave room for cream!

To my new friends and colleagues at EOS North America: Hugo, Brad (yes, the same Brad in the book), Noha, Sarah, Brandi and Moe for their kindness and hospitality. You sure know how to make people feel welcome.

To my new friends and co-workers at Fitz Frames who made all of this crazy travel possible: Gabe, Katie, Jess, and Heidi.

To Michelle Edrington and CK Green, the wonderful and amazing women who run Kingston Publishing Company. Thanks for asking me to even write this book.  It was a fun challenge.

To my son, Cullen, who helped me with the idea for this story and filled me in on some of the workings of high school baseball. Thanks for being Coach K!  Maybe someday you'll get to be a coach.  I think you'll be as strong and as fair as him.

To my brother-in-law, Sean Mackie, fellow baseball lover, who is the nefarious Coach Mackie in this story. Sorry, someone has to be the bad guy, even a great guy like you!

To Big Al Campana who really does exist.  He was a teacher at Struthers High School in Ohio back in the day, played for the Chicago Bears, and was a very frightening man when kids chose to act up. If he had a paddle in his hand, you didn't want to hear the words, Assume the position. Still makes me cringe.

And for my beautiful wife, Hollie, who got me through all of this travel and kept things going strong at home. You are an amazing woman. I love you!

Chapter 1

Pregame

The crack of a bat, the smell of late spring air, and the possibility of new beginnings were what Gabe loved most about baseball. A sport that was more than anything, a real family to him.  It was, however, starting to feel like the only thing that Gabe had going for him in his small hometown of Falls Creek—a place where trouble now loomed over the heads of half the people who lived there. 

Cut through by the actual creek that bore the town’s name, the town consisted of approximately 16,000 men, women, boys, and girls who had grown up together generation after generation and had managed – almost as a duty to the town’s heritage - to stay there, just to keep the quaintness and history of Falls Creek alive.  With the exception of a few outsiders, the residents of Falls Creek had been born there, raised there, and were now raising their families there. 

Once, in a simpler day and age, most of the people who were now parents, had not only grown up together, but had worked together and enjoyed the ups and downs and ins and outs of life together.  Now, however, the actual Falls Creek that wound its way lazily through town had become a dividing line of sorts between those who lived and worked close to the almost century-old bicycle factory, and those who lived closer to the town and worked elsewhere.  It was a line of division that not only separated the two classes of families, but a financial division as well.

The quaintness of the historic downtown area, with its brick-lined roads and freshly paved sidewalks, was the main reason that the shift from small coffee and local hardware shops had trended toward higher-end stores.  And, it was the appeal of those stores that brought more money into the town. Slowly, those who lived north of the town’s center began to separate themselves from those who lived on the south side of town; the rural side.  Not only financially, but socially as well.  Falls Creek had quickly become mixed with those who had money and those who did not.  And a situation like that was always the catalyst for bad things to happen.

It was the arrival of Charlie Shaw and his family, however, which grew the divide in the town even greater.

Charlie Shaw was the blonde-haired, blue-eyed founder and self-proclaimed king of Shaw's Motors, and he had no qualms about letting anyone he met know it.  His family modeled themselves as the epitome of class, someone that everyone would want to be around, and they revolved their behavior around Charlie and his boisterous lifestyle.

Charlie’s wife, Elaine, was also very good looking, so it only stood to reason that their daughter, Ivy, would share Charlie and Elaine’s beauty genes and narcissistic tendencies.  Along with her mother, young Ivy, who was in the seventh grade, took to the social scene of Falls Creek in attempt to rule it as a mother and daughter team; the women of falls creek falling all over themselves to be a part of their high-end lifestyle.  They may have loved the attention even more than Charlie.

Charlie’s son, Nate, was as equally good-looking as his father, sharing his blonde hair and blue eyes. And as a freshman at Falls Creek High School, Nate took the high-school world by storm.  No one in Falls Creek had ever seen anyone who had Nate’s looks and charm, or his money.

Along with his car dealership, Charlie had also opened a drugstore in the small downtown and had renovated and updated the local movie theater to show HD quality movies.  Charlie Shaw had a great deal of money, and he liked to throw his influence around to everyone who wanted to latch onto him.

With his arrival, the people who lived on the north side of town where Shaw Motors was located, did all they could to associate with Charlie and the Shaw family’s misguided appeal, but the biggest benefactor of that association became Charlie's son, Nathan.

In the three years since their arrival, through middle school and now as a freshman in high school, Nathan Shaw had been granted special treatment by the coaches at Falls Creek. It was a natural trap to fall into; catering to those who had money, who could help boost the team’s bottom line, and Nathan’s coaches fell right into it. Of course, they tried to be discreet about everything they were doing for Nathan, but in the end, it was very obvious to the rest of the townspeople, and especially the team, who was getting the special treatment and who wasn't.

On the south side of town, in a seemingly different part of the world, where the Shaw’s influence didn’t exist, and the factory stood, people began to lament to one another that Falls Creek should be changed to Shaw Creek, because that's really what divided the town;  the Shaw family. Those on the south side of the creek had no love or need for Charlie Shaw, so their kids became unwitting rivals to the Shaw influence; both in school and in whatever sports Nathan happened to play.

When the layoffs at the factory on the south side began due to a growth in automation, the Shaw divide begins to grow greater, and baseball season was in full swing.

Chapter 2

Top of the First Inning

Gabe liked to think that the chatter of teammates ribbing each other about girls and their exploits, as well as the general air of happiness, made every day of practice special to everyone who was present on the field, but he knew better.

This was his senior season, and like a few other players on his team who were looking to move further on in the sport into college, he figured that a scholarship was going to be his ticket.  The layoffs at the factory where his father worked had taxed not just them, but a lot of the town south of the creek, so money was tight.  Getting into college on his own, well… that was not much of an option. 

Instead, Gabe had his sights set on the region’s end of year tournament, where college scouts would watch the seniors display their talents and judge them according to their skill.  He had placed all of his hopes and dreams on that one game, driven to let nothing get in the way of his chances, except him.  If he was going to fail being accepted into college through a baseball scholarship, then he was going to do it on his terms.

The gloominess of winter had finally been washed away deep into the baseball season, and spring was on its way to being replaced as well.  Those cold, teeth chattering spring games that seemed to last forever, were now being replaced by warmer days that were much more pleasant and easier to tolerate. They rejuvenated Gabe on the field, allowing him to forget what was going on at home.  And with the plant layoffs, he supposed that it was the same for quite a few of the kids on the team, even if they didn’t talk so much about it.

Instead, as they tossed the ball around to loosen up and wait for the coach to arrive, they talked about things that normal high school boys talked about; sports, cars, movies, and girls.  Of course, girls.  And the one thing on the freshman boy’s mind was Nathan Shaw’s twin sister, Ivy.  A real looker, or a real pretender if you asked some of the other boys, quite a few in the freshman class wanted to date her and didn’t hold back on their comments.  This angered Nate to some degree, mostly on the inside, but he let the comments slide as if he didn’t really care.

Gabe had been working hard all offseason on everything he thought he needed to do to get himself ready for a college try out.  From his fielding to his batting, he hadn’t skimped on anything that he thought would help make him a more rounded player, and that included running at morning and at night, and coming out