Fourth installment to Chatham Cove:

By 7:30 A.M. Wilcox had showered, dressed, flipped through all eight of the travel magazines that were fanned out on his bedside table and again tried to gather up some remorse for his father but failing. After having opened the curtains at 6 o’clock he realized that the storm that he had hoped would merely ‘blow over,’ would be doing no such thing. Any thoughts of taking a walk were swept from his mind when he looked out of the small bay window and saw the destruction that the storm had already created. Halves of trees that had been struck down were either laying vertical against the rocky cliff down to the ocean or else were being ripped apart by the vicious waves. The clouds, still black in the sky, were seething and spraying rain, the wind picking it up and throwing it forcefully against the small white inn. Lawrence was rarely frightened of storms when he was a child, often enchanted with the aftermath that provided; the clear skies and calm waters. However, this storm seemed different from any he had seen, the ominous feeling that began in the back of his mind crept down his spine, nestling in the root of his back, quivering, waiting.

                Finally, the smaller of the two hands on his watch crept closer to 9 o’clock. At 8:45 A.M., Lawrence made his way down to the main lobby in which Tara Daley had checked him in, the previous night. He passed the reception desk and opened two dark cherry wood French doors with a sign posted above, in the same font as the decorative sign above the front door that read DINING HALL. A long table made of a rich oak with matching chairs greeted him. The table, meant to seat twelve, was set with six place mats, plates, napkins and silver wear, crystal glasses sitting directly above the knives. There was already a man, close to his own age he guessed, sitting adjacent to the head of the table, reading the London Evening Standard. To this man’s right sat a young girl, pretty and almost whimsical, no older than 25, to be sure. When Wilcox closed the doors to the dining hall, both heads glanced upward, their reactions unique from each other. The man glanced down at his newspaper yet again and, while still with his eyes focused on the page, said in a noticeably Irish accent, “You’ll be the bloke from London, then?”

                Before Wilcox could say so much as a “yes,” the young woman shot the newspaper reading man a look and said in a voice delicate as a whisper, “Are you finding the inn to your liking, Mr. Wilcox? It is so beautiful when the sun is out. This storm is just awful. Breakfast should be out any minute, so just grab a seat,” All of this was said very quickly and Lawrence had to breathe a moment to take it all in.

                The first to register in his mind was that the young woman knew his name. This struck him as odd, this being the first time he had met any of the other guests in the bed and breakfast. The realization that he was still standing and the placid stare from the deep green eyes of the black haired girl forced him to take the seat opposite her. Through this the man with the newspaper never said another word.

                Soon the doors opened again, this time no one looked up, as an elderly woman with a three-pronged cane each with a tennis ball on the end crept into the hall, taking the seat to Wilcox’s right. Less than five minutes later Mrs. Daley came in through a side door pushing a trolley. A top the trolley was a plethora of food: a large plate of scrambled, two bowls of meat, one sausage and one bacon, a plate with pancakes and another with waffles, hash browns and multiple plates of toast. Jellies and jams, syrups and gravies and multiple plates of butter laden down the second level of the breakfast trolley. Tara Daley placed plate after plate on the table along with the many condiments, finally sitting down next to the black haired girl with the green eyes.

                “This looks marvelous, Tara,” the old woman sitting to Lawrence’s right spoke for the first time.

                “Thank you, ma dear, just a little extra time in the kitchen this morning, I had a difficult time falling asleep last night.”

                “Again?” chimed in the youthful girl.

                “Aye, my arthritis in my fingers is getting’ on towards worse I’m afraid,” said Mrs. Daley shaking her head, and then, “Have you all introduced yourselves to our newcomer yet?” and everyone’s head turned to look at Lawrence, who was just cutting up his sausage. There was a short pause, until finally Mrs. Daley was unable to stand the silence. She pointed to each person as she said their name as if they could not hear her, “To your right is Collette Montel, then across from her is Taylor Michelson and next to him is the lovely Meredith Cartwright,” she finished beaming around the room. “Oh and of course our in house judge, James Cameron ,but he hasn’t been down since the day before yesterday. Says he’s working on a large case and does not wished to be disturbed. Very important man in America, you see?”

                The final name pricked at the back of his mind, he was sure he had heard that name before, but where? After all, he had only been to America once and that had been when he was a boy. Instead of saying any of this he nodded and smiled at each of the guests as they were introduced. It seemed perfunctory, as if everyone already knew his name, but nonetheless he said, “It’s nice to meet you all, my name is Lawrence Wilcox.”

xoxo,

The Blonde and the Bullshit 

Installment number three of Chatham Cove:

The sharp whistle of the wind slithered and slinked through the branches of the empty trees outside as rain thrashed against the window. The waves below the small cliff, upon which the little inn stood, were relinquishing the terror they had promised the day before. The storm, as predicted by meteorologists, was in full tilt at three in the morning of March 27. The waves that normally lapped at the rocks below, were today like the damned reaching their long, white, foamy fingers up from hell.

Lawrence Wilcox awoke as thunder screamed across the sky, lightening framing his face as it struck a nearby tree that cascaded down the rocky slope and into the ocean. It took him a moment to take in his surroundings, having to remind himself where he was. His bizarre sleep schedule was due to the upsetting events of the night before, which had taken place at a very unfortunate hour.

In the very early hours of the morning previous, Lawrence was awaken by the ringing of his flat telephone in Sutton, London. An urgent voice spoke very quickly, alerting him that his father had fallen down his short staircase after having suffered yet another heart attack. Without haste, Lawrence had risen, haphazardly packed and taken a flight from London to Dublin. One short bus ride later, he found himself at one of city’s large hospitals. His father, who lived in Blackrock, a small suburb of Dublin, had had two previous heart attacks. Each time, Lawrence had flown over, staying in his father’s home and visiting him in the hospital.

Neither of his eldest brothers was ever bothered to visit their dad, in hospital or otherwise. In fact for the past eighteen months the only times Lawrence had seen his father was when he had had a heart attack. The family had never been close. After their mother had passed away, when the boys were all still in grade school, their father, always addressed as ‘Sir,’ became married to the bottle. Their childhood was bitter and cruel; Lawrence did not blame his brothers for never visiting. Lawrence had a difficult time betraying his father, no matter what he had done, and so, for the third time, he made his way over to Ireland to care for his father.

When he arrived at the Dublin hospital where his father was being cared for it was to discover an empty hospital bed, a will on the bedside table and a repossessed house. With no planes flying out due to the countless predictions of, the now dubbed “Devil Storm,” Lawrence had gone into Dublin proper in search of a place to stay. After two useless information desks and eight booked hotels without vacancy, he saw a small sign on a corkboard in town advertising a, six-bedroom bed and breakfast in a place named Chatham Cove.

Now, Lawrence lay on his back, just as he had fallen asleep. He lay awake, still in his dress shirt, now crumpled and creased, partially tucked into his still buckled pants, red patterned socks barely hanging on his feet. He looked at his watch, still belted to his left wrist, which told him it was 3:19 A.M. For a moment, he laid unmoving, gathering his thoughts and trying to find some sadness in him. Although his father was not great, nor did he love, Lawrence had begun to think, in the trips he made to visit him in the hospital, that they had a shot at recreating their relationship. Even so, Lawrence could not find any fragment in him that mourned his father’s death. With this realization, he sat up in bed swinging his legs to the ground, standing up and walking into the bathroom with the sole purpose of taking a long, steaming shower. Never once did he open the curtains of his small window to reveal the madness that was the Devil Storm outside. 

Love,

The Blonde and the Bullshit

Installment number two of Chatham Cove:

After more than an hour’s walk from Blackrock’s small hospital, Lawrence Wilcox made his way up the winding, gravel front drive of a little white, wooden bed and breakfast, coyly named Chatham Cove. Wilcox stopped short of the steps leading up to the black mat that lay before the door. Adorned with hunter green shutters, six windows, three on each floor, looked out onto the front drive. A faded blue plaque hung above the door with CHATHAM COVE decoratively scrawled in white paint. The front door was a black, complimentary to the ripening sky above him. Lawrence had been worried that he would not make it to his destination before the storm broke, for meteorologists’ across Ireland were calling for possibly the worst storm in a century.

He made his way up the two steps that preceded the door, his eyes coming level with a brass boar’s head with a ring as a knocker, coming through the animal’s snout. He stepped forward and gave the knocker two firm hits. The door flung open on its hinges as though on a pendulum. A small woman, with dark auburn hair graying at the roots stood before him in navy straight leg pants, a white hand-knitted sweater and soft pink house slippers.

Both subjects looked surprisingly at each other, neither saying a word. After a short pause, the man at the door broke the odd silence, “Err, hello. My father suggested I stay here as it is, apparently, the only place to stay in town.”

“Oh,” a slight frown came across her brow and an inkling of distrust in her eyes.

Her reaction to his statement seemed odd and so he said, “Do you happen to have an open room? It’s just that I’m not permitted to sleep at the hospital and I’m not from around here, ya see?”

“Oh, Oh! Of course we can get you in a room, lad, so sorry, it’s just I thought you were somebody else but that’s no matter now,” her thick Irish brogue made his ears slow in picking out her words.

She opened the door wider for him and Lawrence Wilcox took in the front hall as the small woman walked forward to a reception desk, calling over her shoulder, “The name’s Tara Daley ma dear, but everyone just calls me Mrs. Daley”. The hall flooring as well as the staircase to his right was a deep cherry wood. In fact, most of the furnishings he saw were made of cherry wood, all except the driftwood mounted above the reception desk. It was twisted and gnarled into a horizontal figure eight that did not seem to have a beginning or an end.

Wilcox was torn from his thoughts when the little old woman said, “You’re just in luck, ma dear, a man checked out of his room, this morning. Much too early I thought, had to check him out in my dressing gown, can you imagine?” She rambled a little more of the ailments of having to help her guests when she finally said, “You’ll be in room 201 dear, first door at the top o’ the stairs,” and she handed him a small silver key with a wooden plate attached to it with Chatham Cove 201 engraved onto the front.

He picked up his small suitcase and the khaki trench coat he had shedded on the walk up and made for the stairs. Just before he reached the second floor landing, he heard a shuffling below him and the little old housekeeper called up to him, “By the way Mr. Wilcox, breakfast is served at nine if you want to eat and if you need anything else I am in room 203.”

He smiled his thanks, turned and took the last few steps to his room. The door, just as the wooden palate attached to his key ring, was engraved with the name of the inn and his room number. Lawrence Wilcox inserted the key into the lock, twisted it and stepped into the room. He was automatically struck by the blueness of it. The window was covered in soft, linen, baby blue curtains that hid a view of the ocean. The hardwood floors of the landing outside his room had given way to a forget me not blue opulent carpet. His bed covers were white with eyelet lace sewn in on top with a cerulean blue sheet folded down and a matching pillow above. A small white lamp stood on the bedside table, also white. The soft glow lightened the room as he walked forward, closed the door and set down his suitcase, laying his jacket over the desk chair. With a sigh, he sat on the edge of the bed, slid off his oxfords without untying them and swung his legs onto the bed, his hands over his eyes.

xoxo,

The Blonde and the Bullshit

So because I am stuck on an island this summer, I am on a writing streak so here is take two for the day. This is something that (hopefully procrastination won't hold me back ) will hopefully turn into a complete story. I always seem to have a bit of a hard time with that unless it has a due date. So here is the first segment of Chatham Cove.

CHATHAM COVE

The sky hung in the air, thick and melancholy with a certain tension that made the trees quiver. The clouds entangled themselves in each other, purple and clotted. The wind had picked up from the afternoon, whistling through the empty branches of the trees encircling the house. The slice of the waning moon glinted off the waves as they tormented the rocks crashing over and over, with the promise of a vicious storm. Every few of the windows of Chatham Cove were alight and glowing, contrasting contemporarily to the cruel tone of the dusk outside.

Nathaniel O’Donoghue peered out his small second floor window into the tempest storm, hoping for a clear morning. His train was due in the exceptionally small and, in his opinion, very sorry station, at 6:25 A.M.. Thus, with an air of finality, Nathaniel O’Donoghue snapped his blinds shut, muffling the brewing storm outside. Directly above Nathaniel’s room, on the third floor the curtains remained ajar, letting a soft light emanate from the room. A figure passed the window and back again, pacing the short expanse of their room.

Collette Montel’s room was located on the third floor on the opposite side of the small inn, a single room dividing her and the pacing figure. She was gazing at the lighthouse that sat alone atop the jumble of rocks that supported its base, briefly off the coast of Chatham Cove. The elderly women leaned her elbows on the window sill, rocking her chair forward to watch as the spotlight highlighted the white caps of the ocean, illuminating the fast approaching storm.

The room that stood between the continuous pacer and the aging French woman lost in thought, was dark. The curtains lay open as if it were still day, but no figure was visible from the window, the occupant must have fallen asleep.

But James E. Cameron was not asleep. A puncture in his throat, once having started as a small pin hole was ripping and tearing through his tissue every time he gasped for breath. The blood gurgled out of his neck and mouth, like a twisted impersonation of a fountain. His right hand shook just above the ground, his head barely on the pillow. His body was seizing so violently that, in his last few moments, he tumbled from his bed, landing face down on the periwinkle blue, plush carpet. His eyes rolling back into his skull and his body stilled to that of a sleeping man.

Which is what Taylor Michelson was until a sudden shake of the ceiling above woke him. The stiff, frigid air that gnawed at his face led his eyes to the window that he had left cracked. It had flown against the wooden side of the tiny inn, letting rain trickle onto the floor. In a semi-awake state, he fumbled with the latch on the window, finally managing to secure it and clamber back into his queen sized bed.

Tara Daley lay in her bed in that last room on the second floor. She looked the part of someone who ought to be asleep; she was in her nightgown and her long, graying hair was braided. Her eyes lay closed and her hands placed on her heart, which was beating, as it had not done in years. Her breathing was ragged as she tried to calm herself by repeating Hail Mary’s in her head, lines tumbling over each other in her fear, like the waves cascading upon the rocks below.

Love from,

The Blonde and the Bullshit

Alright so maybe I've been denial or something but I am pretty certain I have had (what I have called) writer's block. In reality I just haven't taken the time to write. So after far too long an with one follower in tow I am going to write and with the bitter hope that someone stumbles upon this while Googling ways to make their hair blonder and for myself. So here's the beginning of story that I wrote in my second semester of my first year of college. I have no idea where it's going, but I'm not too worried about it. It's title in Word is In the Beginning. 

It was a dark, dank room. A window sat high on the left grubby, mossy wall, the light from the day outside highlighting the scraped and molded mahogany floors; once beautiful. The glass of the window was scattered with cracks and a few shattered holes. Ripped rags and torn cloths were squeezed into the openings, in some vain hope that this would keep out the bitter, torturous wind. Misshapen rocks and broken bits of brick were crammed into every open orifice in the surrounding walls. The wind slipped like a serpent through the crevasses, hissing and slithering, bringing with it it’s sense of dread, pity and despair into the devastated house. With that, he turned his back and shut the door on the past.

More soon,

The Blonde and the Bullshit