New Novel "Red Written" Short Excerpt.
Here is a short excerpt of my new book, "Red Written", an urban dark fantasy/thriller, which should be available on kindle very shortly. I hope you enjoy reading it.
"Red Written"
by P.T. Mayes
This excerpt Copyright © 2013 by P.T. Mayes
This story is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either products of the author's imagination or used fictitiously. Any resemble to actual events, locales of persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental. No part of the publication can be reproduced of transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, without written permission from P.T. Mayes.
I just drove and drove, and with every mile the craziness around me grew. What was going on behind the curtained windows and closed doors I passed I dreaded to think, so I decided to not think at all. I popped the creamy iPod earpbuds into my ears, put the music on full blast and focussed my attention on the road ahead of me. After an hour or so I became aware that I’d unconsciously had a destination in mind all along -- I was heading south west down a spookily empty M3, and had no memory of the M25 at all, which rather shook me. I turned off before hitting Basingstoke and drove south. Some ten miles later I found myself in a series of long, narrow country lanes, lined on both sides by tall hedges, black like walls, and trees that shivered darkly for miles on end. The Lanes were dangerous at the best of times. Many cars travelling down them faster than was prudent often met an oncoming car on a sharp bend and the spots of such collisions were marked with scatterings of broken coloured glass and sad little bunches of dead flowers. Almost as if to prove my point a van burst out of nowhere and came straight at me. Without thinking I jerked the steering wheel to the left. Headlights streaked past me like the flashing eyes of a hunting tiger, missing the mini by less than an inch. For a second -- a split second -- I caught sight of the driver; a small man leaning forward as if trying to steer with his shoulders. He had wound a thick woollen scarf so many times around his neck he looked not unlike the Michelin Man. The only part of him that I could see was his eyes, and they had the sunken, dead quality of a haunted man. A loud crack was swiftly followed by the sound of metal hitting an expanse of dense shrubbery, the scream of a thousand branches tearing at the van’s side. But the van did not stop; it did not even slow. In a shower of broken twigs and fluttering leaves it swerved back onto the road and roared off. Another inch to the left and I would have been lying dead in the middle of the road, surrounded by twisted metal, rolling hubcaps and burning petrol. Strange how easily we shrug off such near misses.
When I finally emerged from the Lanes into a village high street, two men were fighting in the middle of the road; well, not exactly fighting, but tussling like two amateur wrestlers. They were pushing each other back and forth, hands grasping at shoulders, T-shirts and coat lapels, feet constantly searching to get in a trip. They didn’t even notice me as I drove past them, so wrapped up were they in their little private war, but I saw their faces, and the red marks spread across their skin like they’d fallen asleep with their heads lying against newspapers full of bad news. What those marks said I could not tell at such a distance, but my photographer’s instincts was telling me that this was one image I could not allow to get away. Without thinking I slammed my foot down on the brake and brought the car to a jolting stop. Camera in hand – it practically jumped out of the case and into my hand like it was attached to my wrist by a piece of elastic – I was out of the door in a flash and as my feet hit the Tarmac the eyepiece was at my eye and I was back in that black-bordered world that instantly felt so comfortable and natural to me. The world trapped in a box.
Lazy? I'd show them.
The feuding men were too busy trying to get each other in a head-lock to notice a little Chinese girl advancing on them, snapping them like a pro with her second-hand Leica rangefinder, an 18th birthday present from my father. In two steps I had already made four exposures, my left hand adjusting the focus ring while my right busily clicked the button. One man went sprawling in the gutter – I got him with his legs in the air as his enemy stood over him, triumphant. I was a little disappointed he didn’t beat his puffed-out chest with his fists like a silverback gorilla.
It was then that he noticed me.
"Red Written"
by P.T. Mayes
This excerpt Copyright © 2013 by P.T. Mayes
This story is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either products of the author's imagination or used fictitiously. Any resemble to actual events, locales of persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental. No part of the publication can be reproduced of transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, without written permission from P.T. Mayes.
I just drove and drove, and with every mile the craziness around me grew. What was going on behind the curtained windows and closed doors I passed I dreaded to think, so I decided to not think at all. I popped the creamy iPod earpbuds into my ears, put the music on full blast and focussed my attention on the road ahead of me. After an hour or so I became aware that I’d unconsciously had a destination in mind all along -- I was heading south west down a spookily empty M3, and had no memory of the M25 at all, which rather shook me. I turned off before hitting Basingstoke and drove south. Some ten miles later I found myself in a series of long, narrow country lanes, lined on both sides by tall hedges, black like walls, and trees that shivered darkly for miles on end. The Lanes were dangerous at the best of times. Many cars travelling down them faster than was prudent often met an oncoming car on a sharp bend and the spots of such collisions were marked with scatterings of broken coloured glass and sad little bunches of dead flowers. Almost as if to prove my point a van burst out of nowhere and came straight at me. Without thinking I jerked the steering wheel to the left. Headlights streaked past me like the flashing eyes of a hunting tiger, missing the mini by less than an inch. For a second -- a split second -- I caught sight of the driver; a small man leaning forward as if trying to steer with his shoulders. He had wound a thick woollen scarf so many times around his neck he looked not unlike the Michelin Man. The only part of him that I could see was his eyes, and they had the sunken, dead quality of a haunted man. A loud crack was swiftly followed by the sound of metal hitting an expanse of dense shrubbery, the scream of a thousand branches tearing at the van’s side. But the van did not stop; it did not even slow. In a shower of broken twigs and fluttering leaves it swerved back onto the road and roared off. Another inch to the left and I would have been lying dead in the middle of the road, surrounded by twisted metal, rolling hubcaps and burning petrol. Strange how easily we shrug off such near misses.
When I finally emerged from the Lanes into a village high street, two men were fighting in the middle of the road; well, not exactly fighting, but tussling like two amateur wrestlers. They were pushing each other back and forth, hands grasping at shoulders, T-shirts and coat lapels, feet constantly searching to get in a trip. They didn’t even notice me as I drove past them, so wrapped up were they in their little private war, but I saw their faces, and the red marks spread across their skin like they’d fallen asleep with their heads lying against newspapers full of bad news. What those marks said I could not tell at such a distance, but my photographer’s instincts was telling me that this was one image I could not allow to get away. Without thinking I slammed my foot down on the brake and brought the car to a jolting stop. Camera in hand – it practically jumped out of the case and into my hand like it was attached to my wrist by a piece of elastic – I was out of the door in a flash and as my feet hit the Tarmac the eyepiece was at my eye and I was back in that black-bordered world that instantly felt so comfortable and natural to me. The world trapped in a box.
Lazy? I'd show them.
The feuding men were too busy trying to get each other in a head-lock to notice a little Chinese girl advancing on them, snapping them like a pro with her second-hand Leica rangefinder, an 18th birthday present from my father. In two steps I had already made four exposures, my left hand adjusting the focus ring while my right busily clicked the button. One man went sprawling in the gutter – I got him with his legs in the air as his enemy stood over him, triumphant. I was a little disappointed he didn’t beat his puffed-out chest with his fists like a silverback gorilla.
It was then that he noticed me.
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