Sing a Song

By Doris West

Sing a Song is written in simple language and easily comprehendible for all age groups except children. The story is relatable to most of us as the protagonists display common human feelings and emotions. It is full of thrill and excitement built on a strong plot that is not only appealing, but the reader will also share feelings of fear and pity with the protagonists.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lulu.com
• Release date: Feb 1, 2023
• ISBN: 9781365237935

Book preview

Sing a Song

Doris West

Copyright © 2022 by Doris West

All rights reserved

Published by: Writers of the West

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced distributed or transmitted in any form or by any means including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods without the prior written permission of the author.

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

Trademarks: This book identifies product names, places and services known to be trademarks, or service marks of their respective holders. The author acknowledges the trademarked status and trademark owners of all products and places referenced in this work of fiction. The publication and use of these trademarks is not authorized, associated with, or sponsored by the trademark owners.

[e-mail]

Jeffersonville, Indiana

Printed in the United States of America

First Printing – November 2022

To Pat and Don

Table of Contents

1 The Dawn Of Terror

2 The Perilous Journey Ahead

3 Meeting An Unexpected Stranger

4 The Beginning of The Investigation

5 Finding Distant Family

6 Resurrection

7 The New Beginning

8 The New Challenges

9 The Disappearance

10 Back to Trail

11 The Search Operation

12 The Last Trail

13 The Killer Treasury

14 New Family

1

The Dawn of Terror

I

ran faster than my legs could carry me. My throat ached from crying and being tired. I could see blood all over my white flannel nightgown and tasted the salty taste of blood and tears mixed running into my mouth as my older sister and I ran for our lives, barefooted, with just our night clothes which were all that we had.

It was just before the sun came up, not dark but not light either, a cool morning, just the beginning of summer or the ending of spring. I thought about what happened back there. I was awakened that morning in the little bedroom that me and my sister shared with our two other younger sisters. I heard voices I was sort of familiar with; they were coming from the living room; it sounded like my dad and some other male voice. I couldn’t tell if they were arguing or having a heated conversation. As I dozed off back to sleep, I heard a loud bang that startled me awake again. It sounded like a gun; then, it was completely silent. In my mom’s room, I heard another loud voice, two loud bangs in my brother's bedroom, and the same sound. I tried to wake up as much as possible when my bedroom door opened, and I heard two loud bangs.

Everything was flying around into the air, and I felt the bed move, and everything went silent. I lay frozen for what seemed like hours. I didn’t know what had happened; I just knew something terrible had happened. I did not hear a sound; there was complete silence, I had fallen asleep in my little sister's bed last night as my oldest sister read us a story, and we all fell asleep.

I was next to my youngest sister now, I couldn’t hear her breathing, and she wasn’t moving, and my baby sister wasn’t crying or moving. I could hear something dripping, like the sound of water, but then someone was breathing. I thought it must be her. She was still alive, then the sound of the bedroom door closing, and just footsteps leading into the living room, then all I could hear were these same voices. I could tell they were leaving; as they went out the front door from the living room, a car engine was all I could hear, and they drove away from the house.

I lay there for what seemed like forever before I moved. Then I couldn’t hold the tears any longer and started to cry silently under my breath, but I could tell I was shaking the whole bed. My body was convulsing, and then I heard a sound that sounded like my mom, but it was my elder sister saying, shh- shh. I was relieved a little to hear any sound as my sister quietly got out of bed and told me to get up, don’t look around, and meet me at the back door.

As I tiptoed out of the house, I tried not to look at the body on the floor in the living room. He was not moving, and blood was in a pool around him. I thought it was my dad, but I didn’t stop to look to see if that was him. I knew whoever it was dead because there was blood everywhere.

I walked through the living room, the kitchen, and out the back door into the cool morning, barefoot and in my favorite nightgown my mom had made for me. Directly behind me, my sister walked hurriedly out the back door and pulled it close without closing it. We started to walk fast into the morning without a word. I could hear a car on the gravel road. I couldn’t tell if someone was coming or going away because sound travels far early in the silent morning.

My sister looked back at me and said, hurry, and then we started running down a familiar path into the woods. We ran, and I was crying and trying to stay with her as I ran. We had to go deep into the woods before those men returned. They had just killed everyone, I thought. They will look for us as soon as they find out we didn’t die. These thoughts helped me run even faster.

When we finally slowed down to catch our breath, my sister said, I recognized one of the guys doing the shooting. He is the local sheriff, someone our dad knew well. They had some kind of deal with bootleg whiskey, our dad would go pick it up in another county and bring it home. Some of it he kept in the barn, and some he poured into fruit jars or sold to some of the neighbors. The sheriff would come and give our dad money for the bottles he had brought home. I didn’t know what that was all about, but some people called it ‘bootleg.’ I never knew my dad was making the sheriff mad enough to kill our whole family. My mind was racing with all of these things as I ran for my life. We tried to put the house and everything behind us until we felt safe.

I ran as far as I could. I had to sit down. I knew we were safe; at least, that was my thinking, and my sister agreed. We would be safe for a little while, but we couldn’t stay there, so we walked away from the path we knew and sat beside the pond to catch our breath. We both cried silently; my sister moved over, sat beside me, and put her arm around me. She started to hum a song I had heard my mom sing so many times, Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound, while I shook violently all over and sobbed.

We sat for some time, just crying and in shock. Then my sister said, listen to me; if we are going to survive, you have got to listen to me and do exactly as I tell you to do. Do you hear me? I shook my head yes. As I spoke to her, I could hear the words coming from her mouth, but nothing registered. I just shook my head and nodded to whatever she was saying. Whatever I needed to do, I would do it. I didn’t want to end up like my two youngest sisters, mom, dad, and two brothers. I would do whatever she said, first thing, you have got to get tough and stop crying. There will be time to grieve when we are safe, but we have to make a plan right now. Not a soul can know we are alive. If they do, that would not be good, so we have to survive doing whatever we need to do. I agreed with her by just nodding my head.

I didn’t think I could speak at that time, even if I wanted to. My mind was going in circles, and voices and noises we ringing in my ears. We walked most of the day that day. My feet were hurting and sore from walking with no shoes, but I just kept telling myself I could go a little farther. I was still in shock, which numbed my pain on the outside and inside. Then we came to a familiar place, but I thought my sister knew it well. This is where we will be staying until everything is better. That may be for a year or two; who knows?

It was a small ledge that hung over into a cave-like structure, just enough to keep us dry and warm, away from the weather. On a hill surrounded by different species of trees was a nice little stream of water with a small waterfall with a rushing water sound. It was comfortable to hear the sound of rushing water. It helped drown out the sound that kept ringing in my ears. The pop-pop sound of the gunfire echoed in my bedroom that morning and throughout the house. I thought maybe I would never lose that sound, maybe it was meant to be that way, and it would always be with me until it was a permanent fixture in my brain. Then we just sat there for some time. I thought we were both in shock. After we sat for a few minutes in a daze, I asked, what happened?

My sister said, come on, we have things to do. I followed her like a shadow with no feelings, just doing what she did. She never answered my question about what really happened back at the house, and I didn’t know if she knew for sure either.

We gathered firewood so we could start a fire. I didn’t think I was much help to my sister. I just followed her, but I thought she must have wiped all of that stuff that happened out of her mind. She didn’t act like anything was bothering her. She had her mind set on something and went for it and got it done no matter what it was. I wondered if we really needed a fire, but for some reason, she wanted a fire, so a fire was what we had. I didn’t know why because it was just a little cool, not cold, although my feet were cold and I needed a bath. After she had a little blaze going, it felt safe and comfortable.

Come with me. We have got to get these clothes clean, she said. I got up, still numb, and we walked over the hill to the small stream that flowed gently into a small little basin just big enough to take a short swim. I sat there and let the cold water wash over me, hoping it would wash away everything, even me as I knew myself, and make me into someone else. As I stepped out of my nightgown and threw it into the cold water, I could see the blood turning to water as it came out of the gown and washed away downstream. Sara took the nightgown and scrubbed it on a large rock to try and get the blood stain out, and then she beat the clothes out on a rock until most of the stain came out of my clothes. We could come out of the clothes, but how would I get this out of my mind? I kept thinking about the horror of what just happened back at the house as we walked back to the ledge in our wet underwear and hung the wet clothes to dry on a limb by the fireside. I was shivering, and my teeth were chattering, mostly from nervousness and some because it was cold.

We sat by the fireside; I realized why my sister had built a fire at that time. She was thinking about how cold it would be when we had a bath. I knew my sister was smart; I guessed I just really didn’t know how smart she was. Sara talked about what we were going to do, so again, I asked, what happened? Did he shoot our family or just our dad and sisters?

I had to know this before my mind could settle down enough to breathe. Yes, everyone back there is dead. Now we have got to think about us and what we should do to survive, she said, and besides, there is nobody to tell. We didn’t have many next of kin; if we did, I doubted if they even knew me and my sister existed or cared if they did. I thought my mom had a brother somewhere in Boston. I had never met him and didn’t really care to. My uncle never married and never had kids because he didn’t like them anyway. At least, that is what my mom always said about him. But I didn’t care about my uncle and didn’t want to think about him right now.

My nightgown finally dried, and I put it back on. This time, it smelled much better than it did when I was taking it off. It was cleaner but still had yellow circles where the blood had been. My feet were sore and hurting but not stinging. My face felt clean, and the dried blood and little pieces of flesh and hair were gone, washed away in the cool water from my face but not from my heart and mind as I tried to understand that day; I could not, not for the life of me. I wondered if I would always remember that day or if it would fade away when I got older.

My sister was talking to me, but I didn’t hear her words. She said, Hey, are you listening? Did you hear what I said? she repeated what she had told me, I said, tomorrow I will have to leave you here, by yourself, and walk back to the house and get some things we need. Now I was really scared! I was thinking about the people who had just killed my family, what I would do if they came here and I was by myself. The good thing was that I was good at hiding and would find a place to hide if anyone came looking for me.

I was glad to see the evening come; I wasn’t hungry, even though I hadn’t eaten all day. Food was the farthest thing from our minds right now. Before we went to sleep that night, Sara walked me to a large tree with low branches. Tomorrow, when I am gone, I want you to climb up into this tree and stay there, do not come down under any circumstances. Are you listening to me? I answered yes and meant it at the time. But at that moment, it was hard for me to concentrate on anything, we had just been through the most horrible nightmare ever, and I wondered how we could ever make it without our parents. What would we do? What would we eat? Where would we sleep? Who would I go to when I got hurt? Could we stay here forever? And what would we turn into if we stayed here? All these things circled my brain; I still thought about my family even when I slept. Would I ever see them again, or were they just lost in some space? Would I never visit, and would they soon be washed from my memory just like the blood in my nightgown, as if I never even knew who they were?

I didn’t want to lose my family; my mom was all I needed to get by. Sara could never take my mother’s place, no matter how hard she tried. I would never tell her that because I knew Sara was really trying right now. I needed her now like I did my mom. I hoped she didn’t leave me and stay with me for eternity. I was just scared and tired and wanted to go to sleep and sleep for a long, long time, but I didn’t know if I could even sleep again. All the thoughts of the home ran through my head. I thought about my little sisters, laughing and crying. I could hear my mom singing while cooking and ironing. My dad would sing too, but not as much as my mom did. I guessed it was because my mother was really happy. I liked to think she was, especially now that her life was cut short and taken away from us by the hands of an evil man. I tried not to think about that man because if I did, I would not like to think of all the bad things. Someday we would know why he did what he did to our family; all these thoughts floated around in my head.

I tried to sleep; everything was quiet around us, and in the distance, I could hear the sounds of a barking dog, which made me uneasy. Sara reassured me that the evil man was far away and didn’t know where we were and that he wasn’t barking at us, it was probably another dog or some harmless animal, so I never gave it another thought. I felt comfortable there on the pile of leaves and close to my sister, and I could feel myself drifting off to sleep.

When I awoke early in the morning, Sara was gone. I knew she had a long journey ahead of her that day. I remembered how long we had walked the day before to get here. She had already told me what to do to stay safe. I lay there for a while in the leaves as I listened to the snaps and pops of the dried leaves under my head. I will lay here until daylight comes; then, I will know exactly what to do, I told myself. I wasn’t scared now; I felt safe for some reason. I could hear my stomach rumbling and growling,