Brett
By Kathryn Atkins, Long Beach Branch
“Damn!” Brett pulled the cold mayonnaise jar from the refrigerator. His busted hand screamed with remembered pain. The brawl had ended badly: Brett broke his right hand in three places on someone’s face. The other guy looked like a distorted fun-house face with teeth and hair in all the wrong places. Closing the fridge door, he saw his eight-year-old son standing with his phone in one hand and his damned Teddy bear in the other.
“What?” Brett scowled, eyeing his son’s stuffed sissy toy, bereft of fiber and missing both eyes.
The boy looked at his dad whose face was swollen, and whose left eye was puffy and almost shut. He saw tiny chips of dried blood still stuck to his dad’s shower-damp beard. He said nothing. He watched.
“I gotta get to work. Where’s the ham?” Brett had pulled bread and cheese and mustard out, wincing at each passing. Brett’s son pointed to the meat drawer. “Thanks.” Brett said as he pulled the package out. Taking six slices of bread out of the loaf, he made three quick sandwiches, stuffed them into a plastic grocery sack, and then into a red and white Igloo ice chest. He tossed in a whole bag of Sun Chips, a cold pack, two apples, a sleeve of Oreos and three beers. He winked at his son. “Gotta stay big and strong.” Slamming the sandwich fixings back into the refrigerator, he hefted the ice chest, scooped three huge muffins into another plastic bag, tucked his thermos in a gaping jacket pocket and started toward the garage door. “I’m late.”
“Bye Dad. Love you.”
Brett stopped. He put his Igloo cooler on the stool and strode back. Crouching down, he kissed his son’s forehead, looked him straight in the eyes and said, “Don’t turn out like me.”
Following a very successful launch party (see “Eight Steps for a Successful Book Launch” under the April 2018 “Craft” tab),
Kathryn Atkins’ new Giving My Self to the Wind
is available and has received high praise.
Read more about the book and its creator
Kathryn Atkins at kathrynatkins.com.