Read Online End of the Road by Jacques Antoine - Free Book Online

classifieds when the bell over the
door tinkled. Putting the paper down in anticipation, he refused to
glance over to see who had entered. He listened as Sallie Mae and
her mother chatted with the newcomer, then he heard the approaching
footsteps.
    A deep voice asked, "Gary?" and he glanced
up. The newspaper slid to the floor as he stared at the man in
front of him. The face seemed very familiar. He stood to shake
hands and as Eddy smiled Gary realized why. It was true, he and
Eddy were brothers. In fact, they were twins.
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    Photo copyright Kate Ramsey
    Donna B. McNicol retired
after 30+ years in the IT industry. In 1996 she started
moonlighting in freelance writing; she spent the next ten years
writing for such online sites as The Mining Company, Suite101,
BellaOnline and About.com.
    In January 2012 she started
dabbling with flash fiction and before the year was out had
published several compilations, two short stories and was included
in an anthology. In early 2013 she published her first two novels,
Home Again - a contemporary romance, and Not a Whisper - the first
in the Klondike Mystery Series.
    Donna currently lives and
travels full-time with her husband, Stu, and their pup, Sadie,
along with their two Harley-Davidson motorcycles in a 41' fifth
wheel toy hauler trailer pulled by their medium duty
Freightliner.
    http://donnamcnicol.com ~ http://facebook.com/mywritespot ~ Twitter: @dbmcnicol

 
    Chapter 7
    One More Mile
    By Dale Roberts
    It’s funny, the things that go through a
person’s mind at a time like this. As I lie here on my bed, I have
little else to do but think… and remember.
    Right now, it’s lyrics from an old Bee Gees
song
    The preacher talked to me and he smiled
    Said, come walk with me, come and walk one
more mile
    I don’t have a clock, but I can tell what
time it is by the height of the tall, narrow light as it makes its
slow accent up the wall as the afternoon sun, ever falling toward
the horizon, shines through a narrow westward window… my only
window. It’s close to the top. The sun is about to set. It will be
my final one. In two hours they will come for me.
    You know how they say that right before you
die, your life flashes before your eyes? Don’t believe it. It isn’t
true. It doesn’t happen on its own. You have to work at it.
    I think back and try to see my earliest
memory. I was a child, no more than three. My father carried me,
wrapped in a blanket to our car. I can’t see the car, nor can I
remember where we were going, but I can feel the warmth of his body
as he holds me close, protecting me from the cold. …I never saw him
again.
    I think about my grandfather, the noble, yet
humble man who raised me and taught me the most important lessons
in life: nothing makes a man feel more like a man than an honest
day’s work; always give more than you take: and most important,
always be honest with those you love, especially yourself.
    He taught me to fish and how to play
checkers and how to snap green beans from the garden. He taught me
to ride a horse and milk a cow. He taught me to be the man that
people could respect.
    I think about the night he died. I was
seventeen and I am not ashamed to say that I cried.
    I think about my grandmother, the sweetest
angel God ever put on the earth and how she lost part of herself
that night. Her partner of fifty-six years, the only life she had
ever known was gone. She was afraid. How I wished I could take her
pain.
    My life, like every other, has had its ups
and downs, joy and pain, failure and triumph. I look back and
smile, seeing my little boy hook his first fish, squealing with
excitement when it wiggled on the end of his line as he tried to
free it from the hook. I see him cry at the sight of a dead
squirrel on the side of the road. I see him beaming with pride as
he walks across the stage to take his high school diploma.
    I look back and my eyes fill with tears as I
remember our last moment together.
    “ Be careful and keep an