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18 pages

English

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THE BRAIDING OF DIVERSE LIVES: The Story of Mitsy Fisher focuses on friendship, loneliness, loss and love.At the storys outset, Luke looks on as a culmination of Mitsys lifelong dream, her refuge for homeless, abused, and orphaned children, goes up in flames. Luke recalls his relationship with Mitsy and these streets during his adolescence.Now, Mitsy is gravely injured when she rushes back inside the burning building to save her beloved dog, Blackie. As she lies in a hospital bed in a medically induced coma, her future uncertain, her current boyfriend, Andy, revisits her past, reading to Mitsy from a series of notebooks and journals she has been keeping since she was a young girl. As Andy reveals more and more of Mitsys past-the death of her mother and brother when Mitsy was young, her complicated relationship with her father, the scholarship that took her to a special school in New York City as a teenager, the harrowing experience that tested her love of music, and her unyielding faith. He can only hope that the difficult life shes lead will give her the strength to recover. Will Mitsy succumb to her injuries, or will love and faith carry her through, as they always have before?

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Publié par	eBookIt.com
Date de parution	07 novembre 2017
Nombre de lectures	0
EAN13	9781456629526
Langue	English

Informations légales : prix de location à la page 0,0300€. Cette information est donnée uniquement à titre indicatif conformément à la législation en vigueur.

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THE BRAIDING OF DIVERSE LIVES
The Story of Mitsy Fisher

A Novel

MARTI EICHOLZ

Copyright 2020 Marti Eicholz,
All rights reserved.

Published by eBookIt.com

ISBN-13: 978-1-4566-2952-6

No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the author. The only exception is by a reviewer, who may quote short excerpts in a review.

THIS IS ADULT FICTION.

It deals with human experience, imaginary characters and events.

It is based part on the author’s experience but embellished by imagination rather than facts.
TABLE OF CONTENTS

CHAPTER ONE
A STAGGERING BEGINNING
CHAPTER TWO
THE EARLY DAYS
CHAPTER THREE
THE STORIES UNFOLD
CHAPTER FOUR
CALAMITY
CHAPTER FIVE
TRIP TO THE WOODLANDS
CHAPTER SIX
QUEST TO FIND MOTHER
CHAPTER SEVEN
THE SURPRISE
CHAPTER EIGHT
VENTURING OUT
CHAPTER NINE
THE MUSIC FADES
CHAPTER TEN
MAGICAL FORCES OF LOVE
CHAPTER ELEVEN
WHEREVER I AM, LOVE IS.
CHAPTER TWELVE
A COMPLICATED MAN
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
A DELICIOUS ROMANCE
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
A PERSONAL SEARCH
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
NURTURING A SEED
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
RESTORATION

CHAPTER ONE
A STAGGERING BEGINNING

The streetlamps with their graceful bowed necks lit the smooth, gray-stoned pavement. These quaint country town streets were etched in Luke’s head as if scored deep with a knife like some strange work of art.
These were the streets where the old schoolhouse stood, where the good kids went to school, where Mitsy, the preacher’s daughter, and her friends made music in the square every Saturday.
Mitsy was the kind of girl that everyone wanted but nobody could have. Luke stood and thought I never talked to her until one Saturday she asked me how my day was going. I gave a typical response of “Good.” She introduced herself and asked for my name. I decided right then from the position of the sun in the sky creating a perfect reflection of shine in her emerald eyes that this girl was the perfect human being. The way she walked and the way she talked with a sense of warmth made me feel comforted and secure.
Everywhere I went I saw her. She was the first on the scene to help clean up. If a fight arose, she was the one to break through the crowd to stop the skirmishing. She was a peacemaker. She was the one everyone adored and praised. I began to resent her because I was jealous. I wanted to be adored and praised. I wanted approval. I wanted to be appreciated. I wanted love.
In the wee hours of morning as Luke strolled the streets, the air became thick and hazy with a rich oaky smell of fire. Luke turned, hearing smoke detectors go off and deafening fire alarms blare. Wisps of acrid smoke curled and danced through the quarters of the old schoolhouse, newly renovated by Mitsy Fisher, the preacher’s daughter, Luke’s childhood first love.
A wail of sirens from fire engines resonated through the quiet street.
Tendrils of smoke leapt into the sky as if trying to escape the blazing hot golden flames engulfing everything in its path, which sent black smoke billowing into the heated air and flooding the community with its distinctive aroma.
A dazed Luke stood in disbelief thinking this children’s home Mitsy ran was the culmination of a lifelong dream. Everyone knew Mitsy Fisher. She was the area’s star, viewing the world as bright and full of flowers and friends and opportunities.
After going to school in New York City, pursuing a career in music and teaching, Mitsy returned to her historic little hometown—one known for its beautiful scenery, mild climate, and Maryland charm—to meticulously create the framework for her life’s dream, The Roberts’ Home for Children.
Mitsy shared the residence with fifty homeless, abused, and orphaned children.
The home was dynamic and vibrant and recognized as a place where children were loved and secure. Opportunities abounded so each child could accomplish great endeavors, build memories, and the freedom to enjoy the riches of the great countryside. This is the kind of place I would have loved and been able to express my truest self.
Luke gaped at the firefighters rushing in and thinking t his is ludicrous. This is an inferno fueled by the gallons of accelerant in the warehouse.
Capping his ears to avoid hearing the screams of pain echoing into the night as pajama-clad children stumbled out into the streets. He crunched down. Coughing children watched the flowing embers leap and twirl in a fiery dance, twinkling like stars in the hot swirling air before cascading to earth.
Within minutes, the flames engulfed entire rooms. As Mitsy’s home burned, the night was alive in a sea of glowing red, yellow, and orange lights.
The children coughed and their cries echoed into the night as they watched the flames rip their way through the building where they lived.
Anxious neighbors and startled onlookers showed up, passing by a stunned Luke. They ambled, wondering through the streets in a daze, some looking on with curiosity and others with horror as the flames snarled and bit at what remained, spouting from various openings, as if a fire-breathing dragon was inside puffing away viciously. They could smell the distinctive aroma flooding the community. And they could feel the radiating heat on their faces.
Luke listened to the night sounds, all the time keeping a watchful eye on his leader, who was not your stereotypical drug dealer. He was tall and white, with a calm and witty demeanor about him. His wavy hair was shaggy around the edges, imitated below his chin by the wispy beard that framed his face. He dresses in black, or jeans and a hoodie, listens to heavy metal and loves to drive.
At this moment, he was resting against a lamppost with a facial expression of utter nonchalance as he held an apple in his hand. His muscular body wasn’t slumped at all; yet, it was just as relaxed as his face. He was almost smiling as he crunched his apple and looked tauntingly at Luke.
He swaggered up to Luke, who was unable to lock eyes with him, let alone cross him. Luke’s heart pounded as if it were about to crack a rib. Every color was brighter, every noise louder, and every moment a cause to make his heartbeat more fiercely still, witnessing the deep red and amber, almost vivid purple. Orange flames blew out the windows, cascading glistening shards of glass and sending horizontal jets of flame out ten feet or more.
Standing stiff and erect Luke thought no one gets to be a leader without having the morals of a sewer rat. The only one who counts is the most barbaric scumbag. Be loyal or be more savage—that’s the way it is. After years of paying “protection money” to the dominant one, it looks like it’s time to call him on it . Unbelievable!
All who were present could feel the radiating heat on their faces even from across the street. With the assistance of the hall monitors Mitsy accounted for all the house’s residents. But where was Blackie, her beloved dog?
As Mitsy dashed into the burning home, firefighters shouted, “Is a child inside?”
“No, it’s the dog.” Groans and screams swept the area. Everyone watched as fresh embers jumped and spread ever higher until the entire structure was engulfed in a blazing, explosive inferno. A crash brought down the ceiling, which crumbled piece by piece, and then the roof collapsed.
The fire had grown out of control, and the firefighters evacuated the street. Everyone could see, feel, and hear the violent flames consuming what had once been a fine home and reducing it to a pile of rubble that stood black and ugly. Empty openings that had been doors and windows were jagged but too stubborn to fall just yet. A putrid smell overwhelmed the whole community like a barbeque gone horribly wrong. It would take weeks for the smell to dissipate.
Several minutes after the burning roof caved in, Mitsy was still missing. Search crews were activated.
Tears flowed. Children cried and shouted, “Where is Mitsy?” “Where is Blackie?” “Someone, please help!” Please God, help!” “Mitsy is missing?” Quick thinking neighbors and staff members huddled the children into small groups to control the outbursts of panic that had gone wild. They knelt to pray in their own way.
Shining through the clouds, the moon illuminated the flames. Shadows danced against tree trunks, reminding Luke of his dances with Mary.
Luke jarred himself out of his daydream about his days with Mary. This was no time to think of Mary. Mitsy was his first love. He sat on a concrete bench alone, crying, shaking, and feeling conflicted, thinking almost from my start, words were a part of my tiny life. I painted pictures of love just like Mitsy. I wanted the kind of love that surrounded Mitsy. Every day, I tried to prove the words were true and the love was there.
Now I am haunted by the memory that these were the streets where the good kids went to school, where Mitsy and her friends made music in the square every Saturday. I watched and listened from my father’s farmer market booth, selling eggs, cheese, milk, and produce. These were the streets and the people I wanted to associate with. I felt calm and at home here where the days always seemed beautiful and sunny. Where the birds sang and young children rode their bikes around town, ideal. My family lived across the railroad tracks. We were members of a separate community and I was bused from our farmhouse to a school in the city near an underground cesspool threatening to one day poison what most people considered a safe environment. The threat was none other than the illegal drug industry.
My school district had not adopted a set of standards based around three simple words, “Pride, Honor, and Respect”.
Sadly, I discovered that words, not words of love but simple sounds uttered carelessly from the mouth—could crush confide