Splinters

I was practising flash backs and flash forwards...

Where was he? He wasn’t sure. It was dark, very dark, and cold. He was lying face down. Pavement? Pavement. How had he got here? He couldn’t remember. A flash in the distance, red light turning green. Green...

 

It was Christmas soon. He was standing in the penthouse, watching the lights on the tree: green, fresh, smelling of pine, flicker and dance. He and Jeanette had been together for six months now. It was a strange match: a recently divorced young woman, the heir to a fortune, together with a down-to-earth, barely-scraping-by teacher. He was finally being introduced to her fancy friends. It was the socialites’ party that evening. Jeanette had asked him to go as her official ‘date’.

 

The ground around him was wet, shining with frost. The ground underneath where he had been lying was completely dry, so he must have been there a while. He picked himself up. He hurt all over, as though he’d been sky diving and the parachute had failed to open. Glancing down, he saw blood on his knuckles. He was in a smart suit, although his collar was ripped and shirt sleeve torn. In a daze he walked through a deserted park. It struck four somewhere, and the streetlights cast pools of gold over the pavement. Gold…

 

It had taken two hours, but Jeanette finally decided she was ready to take on the painstaking rules and expectations of social networking, be they unwritten or not. She opened her door and stepped out. She lit up the room. She was gorgeous, long reddish-brown hair curled into a French knot, diamonds glittering on her pale neck and a beautiful light orange satin dress that looked gold from an oblique angle and floated around her ankles as light as air.

“How on earth did I end up with you?” he teased. She was way out of his league.

“You’re the only one that didn’t laugh when I passed out in the frozen peas at the supermarket,” Jeanette reminded him with a beaming smile.

“Oh yes, that’s how,” he laughed and leaned in for a kiss.

 

He passed an underage young couple, necking on a bench behind the trees. They were getting closer and closer, but the girl let out a yelp of horror and yanked her tee-shirt back down when they saw him. The two of them scampered up, looking like baby deer caught in headlights. He needed to work out where he was, but he was having a hard time standing. Blood was streaked down his shirt and he ran his tongue over at least two teeth that were missing. He thought he could vaguely recall a fight, but still was uncertain. If he could find a street sign somewhere he could try to work out his location. Turning down a side alley, a cat ran across in front of him, sending a metal can crashing to the ground. He jumped as the cat rummaged through the rubbish, sticking its head into a dark red noodle box. Red...

 

They had been there for a while; the whole time Jeanette had been smiling and laughing with the girls, complimenting the hostess on the dark red and green decor that most people couldn’t pull off, but he could tell she was nervous. Her abusive ex-husband and his cronies were bound to be somewhere; they still had to move in the same circles and the waiting was the worst thing. He watched her dark blue eyes dart around whenever they were alone, searching, dreading. He put a protective arm around her shoulders. He could read her like a book. He could read most people like a book. Spending your days trying to drill knowledge into teenage brains which would rather be anywhere but there got you used to understanding body language and things that were implied but never made overt by words.

Three hours in and there was a sudden increase of murmuring and shifty glances coming their way. Everyone was so frantic not to fall silent that the atmosphere changed to one of awkwardness where there had been camaraderie, false fronts where there had been friendship. He was here. Julian Hart, the fat cat who got the cream every time and commanded more or less the whole city, simply because they were afraid of him. He was a lawyer, a good lawyer. He could get anyone arrested, just because he didn’t like them, or ruin somebody’s life by severing their ties. He had tried to do that with Jeanette. She had tensed, like a frightened animal about to attack.

 

It was coming back to him slowly. It was like he had been drugged or drunk, or both. His head pounded; he had cuts and scrapes all over his body that were sore and stinging and his hair was all over the place. As people went by he knew what they were thinking, such as a hopeless drunk caught in a nasty bar fight. They either felt sorry for him or scorned him. Their expressions, the way they sped up to pass him or crossed the road, said everything without words. A flashy blue car drove passed blaring music. Blue...

 

Julian was tall and broad, with receding black hair and icy grey eyes. He had a custom made Italian suit on and a blue tie. He was surrounded by three security guards: big, beefy, all in black, silent. He was giving Jeanette that nasty, supposedly charming smile as he approached them. The body guards sized him up as he kept close to her, aware of silent support ebbing at his back.

“Jeanette, sweetheart, long time no see,” He said pleasantly

“Julian, how are you doing?”

“Oh, same old, same old, keeping on my toes,” Julian turned around and stared at his ex-wife’s escort, “And this is?”

“Nathan - Nathan Kingston.”

Julian offered a hand and Nathan shook it, each one trying to dominate the hold. It was a fairly even match. Afterwards everything went down without too much hassle at least until the end of the night

 

He was remembering everything now. It was getting colder as he sat on the curb, and it started sleeting. He thought it had been strange that Julian had brought him a drink, but he didn’t want to cause offence and start something, so he had drunk it. A boy in a black hooded top passed him, clicking everything into place. Black...

 

He had walked Jeanette home .She didn’t stay long after the party, and she thanked him profusely for sticking to her side the entire evening. He had declined to go in, thinking she needed some time to breathe.

“You’re my guardian angel,” Jeanette smiled. ”Goodnight, Nate.”

They jumped him when he was walking homeL all of Julian’s bulky ‘guards’. They started off threatening him, warning him away from Jeanette, but he refused to back down and let their boss ruin her life. That was when they decided to knock some sense in to him. He fought back, hard, but he was outnumbered and his drink had been spiked, making him more sluggish than usual. He was only aware of the fists, plunging into his stomach, and he blacked out.

 

He had been semi-conscious, but he remembered now. The thugs had threatened to show Jeanette a thing or two after dealing with him. Ignoring both sharp and nagging pain, he leapt up and started to run like the very wind.

 

Author's Note

I wouldn't be surprised if some of my grammar is not brilliant, but I'm working on it.

Reviews

[Lauren Marie]

I am a grammar detective, and I didn't notice any incorrect grammar. Kudos to you.

This story was brilliant. You did good on the flash back and flash forward, although I kind of saw something like that ending coming. I loved the way you caused to color to spark a memory ... that was ingenious.

This was a great read!
~Lauren

[Sadie Grace]

Loved this, it gave me shivers even though I knew where the story was going! That might be my only nit... the reader knows exactly where the story is going almost from the very beginning. I love the way you worked the timelines though. It kept me on my toes as I was reading it.

cheers :)

[Julio Angel Ortiz]

Again, nicely done. I liked the use of flashbacks; it had me hooked until the end. The story ends just right, too; leaving you wanting more. My only criticism would be some of the wording; cliches like "deer caught in headlights" and "fat cat", or a redundant phrasing like "underage young couple." You could probably fill the story in a little more; give us a little more background on their relationship. Broaden the scope of the story, because it sounds like we are given the essentials but that there's more of a stage to work with.

But again, nice job.