Not that Cleve bought into that stuff, but hell, he had to admit that any building that had been around as long as this one had to have the spirits of hundreds of souls seeped into its brick and mortar. It wasn't exactly a bastion of evil, but this place was bad in the sense of all the life that it had sucked out of its workers – their energy, their vibrancy, the essence in men that make life pleasurable and happy.
Maybe that was it, Cleve thought, as he made his way back home in the dark.
The old mill site was a place of misery, of hands worked until they were worn out and useless, of childhoods stolen, years spent in the drudgery of spinning, weaving, and carding – an unending piece of knotted yarn composed of blood, sweat, and back-breaking toil.
Cleve's own family had been employed here, dating back to the time when the mill owners of the north had moved south to take advantage of the cheaper labor force.
His great-grandfather, grandfather, father, and even Cleve himself. But unlike those before him, Cleve had not found community within the walls. Leaving high school in the tenth grade, Cleve had been employed by the factory for seven years before it closed.
And with the shutting of those big doors, hard times came to his life with all the force of a runaway eighteen wheeler. His employment ran out quickly and having lost his job in the midst of an economic downturn, he'd had many sympathetic people wish him well, but none had offered the drop out a job.
He'd even applied at the local burger joints, applied to bag groceries, but no luck. He turned to petty crime to keep grub in his gut and a roof over his head.
Now, he'd sunk to his lowest point. Hooking up with that scumbag Bobby Crowe.
Cleve's phone rang.
"Hey," he said. "Uh-huh. No, man. I was there. I swear. Okay. Gotcha. Yeah. Later."
Whoa.
Cleve couldn't believe it.
He hit the wall hard with a clenched fist.
And all he'd got for that was a sore hand.
He'd mixed up the dates.
He'd have to waste another night waiting for that excuse of a butt crack to show up.
YOU ARE READING
Love Songs: The Wrong Note - A Collection of Short Stories
General FictionA second volume of short stories in the Love Songs collection. Many of the stories in this collection focus on the theme of love and how it sometimes goes wrong. A large collection of stories that run the gamut from humorous to tragic. 1. Love Songs...
