That Summer

I grew up in the deep south; the deep, deep south as in the place that should practically be declared its own country because it’s so different than the rest of the US of A. Down there, in Alabama to be exact, typically either one of two things happened to a person as they were growing up: they either knew right from the start that the moment that high school diploma was put in their hand they were outta there forever, for good (except maybe returning for a holiday or two)
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I live in Montgomery, AL and you are dead on. I'm haulin' ass the moment i graduate high school. :angelic:

Summers in the south are like summers no place else. For starters, the air is thick with humidity, so thick that it feels like the meringue atop a lemon pie; it feels like you can’t even move through it. The air sticks to your skin along with your shirt and pants causing you to always feel as though you need a shower, even if you just took one.
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That is sooo true. :lol: :lol:

great chapter i can't wait to see what happens.
 
I really like this subtle sad and angsty feeling behind Michael's words. It makes this different, serious. And I still can't shake the feeling that Sydney is a memory now.

Is he still living at his home town now, at sixty-something years old?
 
It's surprising he decided to stay throughout his entire life. You'd think that once his father was out of the picture, Michael would leave- taking his mama with him.

I wonder what brings Sydney back to Liberty?

Chris
 
I live in a small country town in South Australia, Kangarilla to be exact and I can tell you right now I never want to leave but it's different because I only live 40 minutes from the capital city of our State and 15 mins from what you'd call civilisation. But I love it here!! there were only 120 people at my school and I know everyone who lives here I go to Uni now but it's only 20 mins away thanks to a few country roads that you can do 140km/h

Anyway Interesting story!! I love it!!
 
I can't imagine living in a small town where nothing happens, and there are something like 4000 plp living there :lol: . So I can't understand why Vaughn didn't leave his town and went somewhere else to start a new life away from the bad memories and took his mother with him. It would have been better for him, well that's what I think, but then I might be wrong ;)
 
Catpin said:
Is he still living at his home town now, at sixty-something years old?
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you'll see ;)


ChrisM said:
I wonder what brings Sydney back to Liberty?
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you'll see that in the next chapter ;)


Chapter 2
In college, I majored in journalism and creative writing. I’m really not quite sure how I fell into that either. I mean, in high school, I hated English class, but I think that may have just been because we had to read boring books and all that Shakespeare felgercarb. I hated Shakespeare, but I loved journalism, which, I guess, worked out for me rather well. I never really excelled in any particular field of study. My math grades were alright, but is there really a career in that besides a teacher? Trust me I’d make a horrible teacher. Science classes and me didn’t go well together at all; same with history so that left me with journalism.

I had a problem, though. A bachelor’s degree in journalism was all well and good, but how exactly would I make a living doing that? Sure, I could have written for a newspaper in a larger city, maybe, but Liberty didn’t have a newspaper and I had to go back to Liberty.

You see, my mama had diabetes all her life and for the most part she managed it well. She was almost forty by the time I was born, so by the time I graduated college she was sixty years old and, for some reason, her diabetes was affecting her whole body. The doctors weren’t sure why, either. They told her to go see specialists who might be able to help her, but she refused. She always hated doctors. She said it was enough that she had to give herself insulin injections every day; she didn’t need to be poked or prodded by anyone else. This, of course, wasn’t exactly conducive to her health improving, so I had to return to Liberty to take care of her.

Luckily, by that time Liberty was slowly beginning to come into the modern world meaning we were opened up to the wonderful world of the internet. Sure, the stubborn people marched themselves straight to church, praying for God to save them from the devil’s intervention that was the internet, but for me it was a gift. That way, I could find a job that would let me write articles and email them (albeit through dial-up, but that was better than nothing), thus enabling me to make enough money to support myself and my mama.

I got a job, well two jobs actually. One job was a once-a-month column in a magazine for teens encouraging them to major in journalism. That didn’t pay much, but it was fun. The other job was a bi-weekly column about a subject my editor gave me. Usually, I could write the column after doing a bit of research using the internet and I was set. Some would call it a cake job, but it was actually a lot more work that it appeared to be. It wasn’t overly time consuming though, so it allowed me to be able to help my mama the best I could.

For years my mama and I lived that way and it worked for us. Some people wondered if I wasn’t bored or lonely or ‘a loser’ for staying with my mama, but those people just didn’t realize that we were all each other had. We stayed that way until a few weeks before my twenty-seventh birthday, when she passed away in her sleep. Complications from her diabetes, the doctors told me.

That was hard. I have to tell you, it was probably the hardest thing in my life. For nearly twenty-seven years she had been there and suddenly she was gone and I was alone… well, not exactly alone. That’s one of the benefits (and sometimes a curse) of a small town like Liberty. The moment word of her death got out I had more people showing up to help me than I knew what to do with. They all volunteered to help me with funeral preparations and everything; I didn’t have to do a thing, which was good, because I doubt I was in much of a state to make important decisions.

The drawback, however, to letting them take over, was that they planned my mama’s funeral to take place in Liberty Baptist Church. Like I mentioned before, I’d never set foot in a church in my entire life, neither had my mother (at least not in her adult life). We never talked about God or the Bible or nothing like that, so, let me tell you, it was a big shock when that preacher came up to me and told me how my mama was in heaven with all the other angels. Luckily he could see that I really wasn’t in any state for a Bible lesson or a lecture on the sin of not attending church. After that day, though, I never went back; never had a reason to.


Now, you see, I’m to the part where this story really begins. After mama’s funeral, I was sort of lost with myself. Looking back, I see that my problem was that I was waiting for something to happen, as if some switch would be flicked and everything would fall into place. However, that was not the case. I didn’t know what to do with myself. There I was in Liberty, thinking I had to stay, but really I didn’t. Then, to my horror I realized that the town had gotten under my skin like it does and I was trapped there. I begrudgingly came to realize that I enjoyed recognizing the faces of those who I passed on the street. I enjoyed (albeit some days more than others) that I couldn’t simply go into Dobson’s and buy my groceries without having a twenty five minute conversation with Mrs. Dobson and whomever else was in the store at the time. Mostly, though, I doubted I’d be able to survive any place else. For twenty-seven years, I’ve had the snail-paced way of life from the deep south engrained within me; ridding myself of it would be near impossible.

So, there I was, walking down Main Street on my way to Dobson’s to pick up some food for the weekend when I saw her. Her brown hair floated out behind her, carried by the light breeze blowing, as she walked down the street towards me and though she was wearing large, oversized sunglasses and dressed in clothing far too warm for the temperature outside, I knew it was her. Sydney Bristow had returned to Liberty, but the question was… why?
 
I bet she is/was in an abusive relationship.... hence the big sun glasses and over warm clothing...
Am i a freack for thinking this way???
 
hmm..

ok. i still dont know what to think of this fic yet.

it's very... different. slow. like heavy molasses. (is that a good southerner reference? lil miss new york is taking a guess.. haha)

maybe i'll have more of an opinion or commentary tomorrow.
 
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