END OF THE ROAD EXCERPT

End Of The Road

Enjoy An Excerpt From The First Book of The Series Before Purchase!

Latty began to see what looked like a shadow perched atop the arch of the bridge. As she got closer to the end of the street, she could hear running water underneath her. There was more silver cobblestone on the left and right of the sidewalks. She crossed over to the left side, being that there were no cars coming, and hopped onto the left sidewalk. Peeking over the rail, the gleaming water was visible but it was difficult to see which way it was going. She inhaled her blunt and held it in as she pushed herself back up into a standing position. Now that she was closer, Latty could see the shadow on top of the arch more clearly. Under the street light and standing on top of the stone wall was a woman.

Latty exhaled the smoke and tapped out the burning piece remaining between her fingers. She tossed it over into the water and shouted in her soft voice to the woman, “Hey?”

The woman looked slightly to the left and leaned forward towards the rumbling waters. 

Latty attempted to speak again, this time with a little more force and moving up to the curb, “HEY!!!”

The woman peered to the left corner of her eyes and yelled, “DON’T COME ANY CLOSER! I KNOW WHO I AM AND WHAT I DID! I KNOW WHY YOU’RE HERE, TO TRY AND STOP ME!” 

 Thinking she could go unnoticed, Latty began to talk as she crept off the curb and onto the street. Still not a car in sight. “Listen, I know how you feel. I just want to help-”

The woman’s voice lowered as she began to cry. “I said stay where the fuck you are! And you don’t know shit about how I feel!”

Listening to the accent in her voice, Latty could hear a familiar tone. This woman was not from around here. “Hey, where are you from?”

The woman on the cobblestoned arch snapped furiously, “D.C. What fucking difference does that make?”

“Well that’s where I’m from! Let’s just talk a little bit.” Latty couldn’t help but to step a little closer hoping to get close enough to stop the woman from jumping. It looks like she wants to jump. “My name’s Latty. What about you?”

The Washantonian avoided the question about giving her name. Her arms were at her side. Something gold was shining and glistening from her fingers and showing in the palm of her hand. “I have friends in D.C. …and I love them.”

The look in Latty’s eyes gave a feeling of understanding. Wondering where they were, she felt compelled to ask, “Why aren’t they here with you?”

Tilting her head down to the left to see that Latty’s position had not moved forward, she did not mind telling her story. “We’re not friends anymore.” She paused and looked forward and down into the water. “You see, I was so angry at her upbringing. She was given so much and she didn’t appreciate it, you know?”

Latty’s look of understanding then changed to interest and nostalgia. She began to remember her beginning feelings about Stacy during the first several years of getting to know her. And oh how that rearing of the monster’s ugly little head was there but not visible. The protection of her friend was always followed by an underlying hard breath or a roll of the eyes. But that one little girl that Temp couldn’t get close enough to protect Stacy, not the same lunch or the same gym class, not even the same passing in the hallway…but Latrice Walker did. Little eight year old Latrice Dianne Walker in the third grade sat directly behind one Constance S’Quoia Carter who liked to punch Anastacia Eunice Warrell in the library when their classes somehow interlocked after lunchtime. Stacy always confided in her friends during afternoons, weekends and sleepovers, Ms. Constance, not keeping her hands to herself behind the bookcases, one of the calmest rooms in the school, came up in conversation. And while Temp had zero access, Latty had plenty! One afternoon when old Connie got up to get a worksheet, Latty had just sat down from sharpening her Care Bear pencils. Latty absolutely loved The Care Bears. As ‘Connie Couldn’t Keep Her Hands To Herself Carter’, the new name given to her after the incident, came back to her seat, Latty stuck her hand under the seat, pencil pointing upward. Connie drops down into the seat, the pencil jabbing her right bottom cheek to the shaved pink Cheer Bear, causing her to jump back up and cry her little eyes out. The teacher, Mrs. Barton ran to her aid to ask what was wrong, but Latty had already pulled the sharpened Bears out of her butt meat and threw it in her pencil sack. Everyone saw what happened. Constance was taken to the nurses office and her parents were called to take her to the hospital. She didn’t tattle on Latrice Walker and neither did the other children. But when she came back to school several days later, she saw Latrice with Anastacia and never put her hands on another student again.

Latty stepped further into the street trying to get a better visual of her face, while the woman, now looking like she was on the ledge, continued to talk.