Three Odd Tales

By George Thomas S.

Welcome to Creelyville: Slick Rick was on the run. Police were on the hunt for him after a failed robbery attempt. After racing through Pidgeon Forge and Gatlinburg, Tennessee, he needed to get off the main road and followed an old, half-hidden road that

• Language: English
• Publisher: Tiny Dog Publishing
• Release date: Jun 7, 2023
• ISBN: 9781998104048

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Three Odd Tales

By: George Thomas S.

Copyright © 2022  by  George Thomas S,

All rights reserved. No portion of this book may be reproduced in any form without permission from the publisher, except as permitted by U.S. copyright law.

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

ISBN 9798414481799

By George Thomas S.

                                    Tinydogpublishing.com

1 Welcome to Creellyville

2.                                The Failure

3.     The Counselor

Welcome To Creelyville

By: George Thomas S.

A swirling cloud of dust and gravel flew up for fifty yards behind the silver Taurus sedan as it sped down Creelyville Road, heading anywhere but the main highway.  Ricky Slick Rick Sanders was behind the wheel, pedal to the metal, and on the run. It would be hard to imagine that anyone would ever apply the nickname Slick to this hapless failure, and, in truth, they hadn't. He had coined that moniker himself after becoming tired of the one he was usually labeled with by those who knew his ineptitude well. Thick Rick, they called him. 

At barely five feet eight inches tall and slight of build, he was a completely unimposing figure. About three years previous, his dark brown hair had been worn in an out-of-style, fifties-era, slicked-back ducktail that was somewhat out of sync with the twenty-first century. Now it was shoulder-length and generally unwashed. He had a face that would be forgettable if not for the scruffy beard combined with pockmarks from a childhood bout of chickenpox and a broken nose suffered in sixth grade for failing to turn over his lunch money in a timely fashion. His brown, slightly crossed eyes had that faraway look that you just knew meant he wasn't all that bright. His normal facial expression could best be described as...Duh?

The reason for Rick's mad dash to 'anywhere' was yet another failed attempt at a bank robbery. In three attempted heists, he had succeeded only once, assuming you can call one hundred and twenty-three dollars and a lump on his forehead delivered by an umbrella-wielding senior citizen in a floral print sack dress a success.  That experience came after a previous effort that had been even more pathetic in nature.  It was less than two years ago that Rick had decided on his life of crime. In the wake of losing one job after another for various reasons, including being caught in the stock room of the local supermarket 'servicing' his urges over the pages of the lingerie section of their flier, he decided that he just wasn't cut out for regular work. Robbing banks seemed like it would be so much easier. 

On a Friday, just before closing, he entered the tiny Winthrop Bank brandishing a somewhat realistic-looking plastic gun he had purchased at Toys-R-Us for eleven dollars and seventy-two cents, tax included.  His first venture into a life of crime was doomed from the minute he walked in the door.  Friday was payday for the local police department, and three officers in their street clothes were standing in line to cash their paychecks. Mere seconds after the words 'this is a robbery' had exited Rick's mouth, he was staring down the barrels of three Glock automatics and leaving a puddle of urine on the floor at his feet. 

After his arrest, arraignment, and quick guilty plea, a lenient Judge sentenced him to two years in prison. During his prison stint, he let his hair grow to shoulder length and developed his scraggly beard. He had the opinion that it would give him a more imposing appearance. All it really accomplished was to make him look like an unkempt bum. Besides, the Winnie the Pooh tattoo on his forearm tended to belie any possibility of toughness. Remarkably, he was released eighteen months later on good behavior.  A mere two weeks after gaining his freedom, enter the senior citizen in the floral print sack dress and her trusty umbrella. 

As Rick sped away from that encounter with his minimal haul of cash, he figured it was time to try another State before he ended up in front of a more severe Judge in his home state of Kentucky. Tennessee wasn't far, and that