"I am my mother's uncle," Ron Kearney said by way of introduction, nodding congenially as he spoke, showing every bit of his trademark politeness that had won him scores of friends and lovers throughout his fifty-eight years of life. He stood in the foyer of his home, wearing colorful cartoon boxer shorts and a threadbare undershirt. Having always been one to favor bright colors and the absurd, his shorts depicted hundreds of colorful marshmallow shapes with the words "Magically Delicious" emblazoned over the back side.

In the kitchen, Trish set her packages down on the table and then rushed over to give her best friend a quick peck on the cheek.

"Yeah, he's out by the front door." She lowered her voice, casting a quick glance over her shoulder. "He's wearing those same boxer shorts he was wearing last time. He must really like them!"

"They are his favorite," Dee sighed, putting away the last of the dishes.
"He's got dozens of pairs of undershorts but he really does like that particular pair. But you know my Ron-the more colorful and wild, the better. It's just so … so him. And I hope he doesn't lose that any time soon."

"Yeah," Trish said, digging into the bags she'd placed on the table. "It really is cute. I know my Howard is such a bore when it comes to that kind of-"

A loud stomping sound from the doorway startled them and Trish looked up sharply, drawing in a breath. Ron stood in the doorway. With his arms spread and a hand on each jamb, he occupied much of that space, though he wasn't particularly tall, nor was he more than just a few pounds overweight. He was very red, however-obviously upset.

Stomping again, once with each foot, he glared at Trisha, his face continuing to darken as if his heart pumped blood up through arteries in his neck but he lacked the veins necessary to cycle it back. If that were the case he would have fallen dead on the spot, of course, but Dee worried that he could possibly have a heart-related problem if he didn't calm down. It had been several weeks since she'd last seen him this worked up and now she really had to wonder about the so-called progress his doctor had reported only yesterday.

"Ron," Dee started, setting the dishtowel down on the counter. "You need to calm down, honey. What's-"

"When I introduce myself to a guest in my home," Ron said loudly, and with authority, "I expect the same courtesy in return."

He relaxed somewhat and turned toward his wife, pointing toward Trish with his left hand. "I won't have a strange woman barging in and disrespecting me, disrespecting you and disrespecting our house."

"Oh, Ron," Dee said, walking across the room to grab his hand. "This isn't a stranger. This is my best friend, Trish. Trisha Kettel. Howard's wife. You remember Howard, right? You are fishing buddies. He has that little Dodge truck and you're always reminding him that yours is bigger."

She tried to guide him to the table, but Ron stood firm. The dark hue of his face had been replaced by a look of confusion, and both women could almost see the gears turning in his head.

"Howard?" he asked finally, paying no further attention to Trish. "Howard is here?"

"No, dear. Trish is here. Howard is working. Now let's go over to the table and have a seat. Trish went to some factory outlet stores and wants to show us some of what she found there. I'll put some coffee on."

Once again, he resisted, but it was clear that his mind had already moved from the perceived insult and on to something else. To what was anyone's best guess but Dee suspected she wouldn't have to wait long to find out.

That's just how it seemed to go lately. His normally stable mood she had enjoyed throughout the past twenty-eight years of marriage had been steadily replaced by an unstable, unpredictable temper that could only be described as such even in periods of relative calm. It was there, always, often hidden beneath a calm, congenial personality that could be swept aside in an instant and with no apparent provocation. Like a malignant tumor, it grew steadily-often unnoticed, but always growing, always feeding on its host. This incident between him and Trish had been rather benign compared to some outbursts in recent memory.

When it became apparent that Ron had no interest in the shopping bags on the table, both women fell into their comfortable roles as friends. Trish lived to shop and shopped to live, as the saying went, and Dee always enjoyed combing through the bags with her friend, knowing that the last item would always be a very thoughtful gift from Trish. Nothing she bought was ever expensive; she took pride in her frugality and spent countless hours shopping in many different places in order to find only the very best products at shockingly low prices. While Trish enjoyed showing the bounty to Dee, her main satisfaction came in seeing the disbelief on her friend's face when she revealed the cost of each item. It had become a game between the two and Trish ended up going to sometimes dubious extremes in her quest to show maximum value for minimal expense. The fact that it oftentimes cost her more in fuel or in time to find the item than it did to actually buy the item was usually never mentioned, especially to Howard.

To Dee, it just gave her a break from the realities of her new life with Ron. Five years ago, things had been perfect, as things always had been since the day they met. A "storybook couple" from the start, they never had struggled with many of the problems that typically affected married couples. Sex had always been fulfilling, financial disagreements had been easily resolved and compromise in every other area, when required, had always been offered by one or the other. Love truly was unconditional and the two were truly happy together, so much so that they often were the topic of conversation in their circle of peers, though that went on largely behind closed doors in locations throughout the city. "Why can't you treat me like Ron treats Dee?" and "Why do the Kearney's always seem so happy together?" and "If you could make me half as happy as Ron seems to make Dee…" were all common questions and musings in the homes of their friends and acquaintances. True, they never had taken vacations to Hawaii, they shared a sensible four-door sedan, their home was a modest fifteen-year-old ranch style home with a failing roof and their holidays spending fell well short of what might be expected from their specific demographic, but they shared something far more valuable-a deep and lasting love. Everything else was incidental.

But all that started to change when Dee had found the pitcher of orange juice in the cupboard. Ron always had been meticulous about putting things back in their designated spots, so much so that if something did not have a designated spot, Ron always assigned one. His behavior could never have been described as obsessive-compulsive; Dee found him to be considerate, respectful and orderly but without any underlying psychosis. True, he could be a "neat freak" at times but Dee was all too aware that she had landed what some of her friends had called a real "keeper," and she'd always been conscientious to thank her husband, to reaffirm her love for him and to make sure he always knew how much she respected and appreciated him for his many outstanding virtues.

The pitcher had obviously been there a while. Large beads of water had formed over the smooth glass sides and one occasionally broke, tracing a winding path down to the shelf paper below. There, a large ring of water had collected around the pitcher's base, soaking through the paper and into the oak cabinetry. Ron, the proverbial "Mr. Coaster" man himself would never have stood for it and would have either: 1) placed the orange juice in the refrigerator or, 2) put a plate or some other sort of collection device beneath the pitcher. But unless a prowler had forced his way into the house and taken interest in nothing other than the orange juice pitcher, only one conclusion could be drawn: Ron had, uncharacteristically, put the orange juice in the cupboard.

And that, the first crack in the dam, marked the moment that things flowed downhill from there.

I think it's only fair that since I spend so much time there, I might as well use the setting in a new project. See you at the park.

Selina Charlotte "Charlie" Brooks brought the small cellular telephone closer, turning it a bit to remove some of the glare reflected back from an overhead streetlight. In the dark, the telephone's small screen was surprisingly bright, a brilliant candy-white square that her relatives only one or two generations back would have considered magical, if not other-worldly. Its light reflected now from her nose and cheeks as she read the line of text, her lips moving soundlessly as she read silently from left to right.

Yes, she had read it correctly but now, the second time through, still made no sense. What frogs? What did it mean?

This piece was coauthored by Dr. Charles E. Brooks, as part of a writing project with Jim W. Coleman.

Here, on the side of a dark road at nearly ten-dark-thirty at night was not the place to go having hysterics or getting all worked up. Home was just up the block and around the corner—not far, really; she had walked this same route night after night for nearly a year without incident and never once had been alarmed or in fear for her safety. If Port Poplin was anything, it was safe. And while that's part of what made it so damn boring, it was a boon to young ladies who had to walk home from work in the middle of the night.

The phone vibrated again but she was ready for it this time—waiting for it, in fact. It meant that a new text message had been received, but had not yet been read. It also established a pattern of reminders that would continue until she read the message or until the phone's battery died, whichever came first. But to Charlie Brooks, it went beyond that. It meant that despite her apprehension a few moments ago, all was well with the world. There was a certain order to things and that the physical order was being followed. The first text message, weird as it was, had been the equivalent of a wrong number and this, the as-of-yet unread message, would be a short, impersonal and apologetic phrase from that same hapless individual who had so innocently and inadvertently disrupted her quiet walk home with all that gobble-de-gook about the frogs. And just to put a fine point on that notion of cosmic order and progression, Charlie decided to wait until the phone vibrated again before reading the message.

Should be any time now. Charlie frequently played these little games in her mind while walking the quarter mile from the coffee shop to her apartment. It helped pass the time and make each night different from the last. One night she counted how many steps she had to take from the coffee shop to her front door. Another night, she counted how many times she could sing Queen's "Bohemian Rhapsody" through from start to finish if she kept her footsteps in synch with the beat: I'm (step) just a poor (step) boy no(step)body loves(step) me… And just last night, she'd tried to walk all the way home swinging her arms with her stride as opposed to against her stride, as most people normally walk.

Tonight, she would wait until the phone vibrated again before reading the message. It had to be coming within the next ten footsteps. Though Charlie never had timed the interval between the phone's message reminders, they always had seemed to come after no more than a minute had lapsed.

…eight…(step)…nine…(step)…ten…(step)…eleven…

Charlie stopped. Something was wrong. Had the battery died? That didn't make sense; she kept it on the charger at work and had all five bars when her shift ended at ten. The phone's LCD screen was dark but that was normal; it shut off after a few seconds to conserve power. One touch to any of the phone's buttons would activate the light and she did it by rote, without conscious thought. After a full year, Charlie knew her phone intimately and could, if necessary, go through all of its functions while blindfolded.

Here, because her eyes were now accustomed to the dark, the telephone's LCD panel was bright enough to be used as a flashlight. Squinting, she read the display:

NEW MESSAGE
-DUPLICATE-

Duplicate? That didn't make sense, and could only mean one thing. Instead of the Sorry, I meant that for someone else message she had expected, someone had pinged her again with the frog message. She pressed any key and sure enough, there it was again:

The frogs are
making quite
the ruckus.

And now there was something else that made no sense. Normally, the sender's telephone number would appear beneath the text message, along with the time that it had been sent. But in this case, as in the first iteration of the cryptic message, no identifying information appeared.

"Now that's just too weird," Charlie breathed, puzzled, tapping the LCD panel lightly with a nail as if she thought that act might procure more information from the recalcitrant device.

"It's got to be a joke," she said finally. "It's Sharon or Hattie. They're getting me back for the Justin Timberlake thing."

Satisfied with this, she started walking again but didn't get far before stopping cold. With her first step, she'd pressed "Enter" to reply. By her second step, she should have been able to scroll down twice, accepting the defaults, to begin forming her reply with a practiced succession of nimble moves over the keypad. And by her third step, she'd finally look down at the phone to make sure she hadn't lost her sense of touch or her familiarity with the device. But when she did bring the phone up to double-check her spelling, she saw only this:

The frogs are
making quite
the ruckus.

"Damn it!" Charlie cried out in frustration while pressing the END button to shut off the phone or, at the very least, clear the screen. Nothing happened.

What had started fifteen minutes earlier as a routine walk from the coffee shop on Beach Drive to her apartment up on Knob Hill had now transformed into a maddening one-on-one struggle between herself and her cell phone. It clearly had malfunctioned and that was something Charlie took very personally; she had never had one indication of trouble with the phone and had, in fact, enthusiastically recommended the model to several of her friends over the past year. But now, not only could she not turn off the phone, she couldn't even clear that unsolicited and now somewhat alarming message from the screen:

The frogs are
making quite
the ruckus.

Eventually, Charlie did make it safely home to storm through the front door of the apartment and throw her purse onto the couch. Her cat, sensing the mood, avoided any potential conflict by retiring immediately to a safe spot beneath her bed, but did listen for some time as Charlie stormed about the room searching for the user's manual that had come with the phone. And later, when she finally succumbed to exhaustion and fell into a fitful sleep, the cat ventured out to make sure his food and water bowl was still where he always expected it to be. It was.

The only thing different was the glow in the room. It came from Charlie's cell phone, resting on top of the dining table. Having never malfunctioned before, it did so now with a maddening finality, its bright front panel blazing unerringly, framing that same puzzling message, until winking out suddenly in the wee hours of morning with its battery depleted and its purpose served.

In time, the cat found its way back to the bedroom and slept until two the following afternoon.

His pocket pager vibrated noisily and nudged him from sleep, dislodging troubled dreams to bring an unfamiliar setting into focus. Lifting his head from an oversized pillow he stared at the dark, heavy curtains, blinking two or three times until both eyes finally worked together.

...What would you rather do? Wake up beside me or to the sight of three smelly guys in your hotel room?

A warm hand brushed his bare buttocks and then slid up his back. A thousand points of tiny, tingling shivers crawled over him and he shivered involuntarily as if to cast them away. Throwing the covers aside, he rolled out and onto his feet while pulling the large pillow up to cover his nakedness.

"Good morning," Sheila said sleepily, propping her head up on one arm. The bed covers curled up over one breast, leaving the other exposed. "You shy all the sudden, Chief Collins?"

She giggled. Her breast quivered in an interesting, provocative way. It took a bit but Daryl finally looked away from it-from her.

Ah, come on, Chief. I'll behave. If not, you can lock me up.

"I like it in the morning," Sheila said coyly, obviously shrugging off sleep very quickly.

"Like what?"

"I think you know, Chief," she answered, reaching out across his side of the bed to what the pillow once had covered.

He stepped back in the nick of time, but did feel that familiar, heavy swelling sensation down where her eyes were now fixed.

Damn it! DamnitDamnitDamnit!

Daryl had thrown many men into the slammer during his long career in law enforcement, and always with some feeling of derision and blame. They had screwed up and they would pay. The familiar clang of the gate and the snick of the lock had always given him a sense of accomplishment-one more low-life scum out of society, even if only for a night or two. But now, standing beside what had been a cold bed in what was still a foreign, dangerous bedroom, he could almost hear that clang and that snick as an enormous guilt blossomed deep within. It made the blood pound in his head; his entire body was acutely aware of the blood throbbing through his veins, energized in the arteries by the pressures of inexorable sadness and regret.

Still, though, the very sight of her thrilled him in ways he knew he could explain but was reluctant to. There she was, naked and ready, ripe for harvest. The thought that since he'd already screwed up, one more quick plunder of her inner treasures wouldn't hurt did cross his mind, and his swelling hardened.

The pocket pager vibrated again, rocking back and forth on the nightstand so long that Daryl thought it might fall off onto the floor. That would have been fine by him. As it spun from right to left on the polished oak tabletop, he'd spotted enough numbers on the LED panel to recognize his home telephone number.

"That her?" Sheila asked, shifting her position on the bed. She now was fully exposed from her belly-button on up. She looked over silently at the pager and then back at him. He stood for a moment, nearly fully erect, waiting for the inevitable, recurring beep cycle. He didn't have to wait long.

"That's Stella," he answered, his passions deflating. "That's my wife, Sheila. Her name is Stella. And I've made a terrible mistake."

Sheila rolled over onto her back, sighing heavily. Daryl took advantage of the moment to locate his pants, now halfway beneath the foot of the bed. There was no sign of his underwear or his shirt.

"I knew I would hear that word sooner or later," she said, shaking her head. "But you never hear it until morning. It's funny how that works. It's always a mistake."

Daryl could tell by the tone of her voice that she really thought it was anything but funny.

The pager beeped again to remind him of the page. That, and also to pound another nail into his heart. He didn't sit on the bed to pull on his pants but did it while standing, afraid of what might happen should he come anywhere near the woman lying prone before him. He could put on underwear later. What was important now was to get out of there and back to his team. Certainly, Stella wasn't the only one wondering where he was.

A new, terrifying thought washed through his mind. What if Stella had called the hotel room? One of his three temporary roommates would surely have answered the telephone to tell her that Collins had not returned from Baroni's the night before. He paused, still working his zipper with care. Had any of the three been to Baroni's? Had they spotted him with Sheila? The possibilities and likely repercussions were terrifying, and Daryl realized that he now was damaged goods so far as the manhunt was concerned. To be effective, his full attention should be on capturing Cliff Rilek, not preoccupied with what might or might not happen as a result of his infidelity. Out there-outside the window to his right-a "hundred year storm" raged, filling the river basin with snow and piling dangerous levels of frozen precipitation over steep mountain slopes throughout the area. And now, yet another distraction would inhibit his efforts-covering up the fact that he already struggled with a personal, potentially relationship-ending dilemma. Now, every step would be into unfamiliar territory and he would have to scrutinize every face-not wondering if they had any vital information about Cliff or the manhunt but if they had seen him with Sheila at Baroni's or knew that he hadn't returned to his hotel room or-

Stop it!

Sheila moved to the side and was on her feet before Daryl's busy mind even registered that fact that the scenery had changed. She, too, searched the floor for her personal items, bending down to retrieve her panties.

"It's not like we did anything technically wrong," she said, pulling that brief bit of clothing up to cover herself. "Everybody plays with a buddy once in a while."

She smiled and looked up, hope shining in her eyes.

"I was your little fuck-buddy, Chief. That's all. Two ships passing. Blew your horn, life goes on."

Daryl, realizing that he had stared at her delightfully shaped and meticulously groomed private area longer than what was appropriate, turned away, but couldn't stop himself from keeping her in his peripheral vision. That, more than anything, scared him. Apparently, the guilt had not drilled deep enough.

One last look…and then another…

He turned back toward her after she pulled on a loose, colorful t-shirt.

"Look, Sheila," he said with an unsteady voice. "I don't really remember what happened here. We had a few drinks; I got a bit tipsy. I remember you inviting me here and I remember accepting. Please tell me that we didn't…well, you know."

"You don't remember us playing that drinking game last night?"

"No." It was an honest answer. He'd had three or four whiskey drinks at Baroni's and could remember all of those, but there was no memory of any drinking after they'd left the bar together. No, take that back. She had offered him a beer when they'd arrived at her home and walked into the kitchen. He remembered that because it was a microbrew he'd never heard of and hadn't particularly liked.

"We started out with beer," she said. "You had a few. And then we moved to the hard stuff."

Daryl caught her gaze move down to his groin as those words left her mouth.

"Very hard stuff."

There they stood on opposite sides of the bed, both half-undressed, but one at a definite disadvantage.

…the hard stuff…fuck-buddy…oh god…

"But no," she said facetiously, chuckling. "We didn't do it. So don't go getting your little imaginations running wild, Mr. Policeman. I wanted to and would have if I could have, but you were too polite. That, or you were too drunk. I had to buckle you into the Jeep when we left the bar, so you already had several sheets flapping out there in the wind before we even got here."

She stared down at the bed, shaking her head sadly.

"You really don't remember going to bed with me?"

Daryl tried, but drew a blank. He wanted to remember-more than anything-but couldn't. It was vital that he remember. Otherwise, it was her word against his.

Sheriff Bounds glared back at him from a portrait on her wall, directly over her shoulder. It was a signed portrait. There was a stain on the sheriff's shirt, about two inches over the belt line, six to eight inches to the left of where his bellybutton would be if it could be seen. Didn't look like a coffee stain, more like a drip from breakfast or a dollop of catsup from a lunchtime sandwich.

It was just a simple case of human nature, to avoid the question and focus on something else. Without realizing it, he'd focused on the Sheriff's promotional photo. His mind had registered all those tiny details in only a few seconds. He'd likely walked past that picture a dozen times in the last twenty-four hours and not even seen it, but now he'd seen the stain.

Wrong word. He didn't want to think about stains.

"I undressed you," she said. "Actually, you were already mostly undressed."

She looked directly at him and he looked back at her, away from the stain.

"I just finished the job."

Looking to the side, Daryl spotted his shirt, draped over a chair beside her dresser. As he finished dressing, she sat back down on the bed, still covered only by her panties and the t-shirt.

"You don't remember me…waking you?"

He didn't acknowledge her, working with grim determination but with a muddled focus. Two more buttons. Or three. Then, he could find his shoes and socks and get the hell out of there. But damn, the pain in his head and the ringing in his ears made it tough to go through the motions. More than anything, he wanted to excuse himself to go throw up in the bathroom. But that would just move more chips to her side of the table if it came down to her word against his. Nothing really mattered now, outside of getting out with some dignity. With a silent, long-drawn prayer into the wind that none of this would blow up in his face down the road, he tucked his shirt into his pants and took a step toward the door.

"You crashed almost immediately. There I was, hoping for some attention from you but you were gone, Chief, snoring up a storm. I was able to bring you around, though. You woke up for a little while. Long enough to shoot, long enough to push my head away-long enough to mistake me for your wife and to thank her for the little chore."

Daryl stood, frozen in place. She wiped her lips with the back of her hand, leaving no doubt as to the act she described.

"Look," he said finally, sadness and regret stitching his words together into one tight, short sentence. "I'm sorry."

"Me, too," she sighed. "You were trigger happy, Chief. I did all the work. And now, I'm hearing this big guilt trip from you. Last night, we were two responsible, consenting adults. Today, I wake up responsible and consenting but you…you are just another man. Another married man. It's funny how a good night's sleep can make that wedding ring magically appear on the finger overnight."

Listening to her, Daryl stared down at the carpet, using his big toe to turn over a piece of tree bark that had been carried in one someone's shoe. His, most likely.

"Time to go, Chief," she said, cocking her head toward the door. "Please. You can come back, but leave that granite slab you carry on your back outside the door next time."

He stood, still rooted to the floor.

"Go. Get your shoes and socks and get back to work."

He did, realizing that the granite slab she described might likely be the tombstone over his marriage-a union that had, until last night, been unblemished and mutually exclusive.

Though his motel room was only several blocks away at the bottom of a steep hill, it took about ten minutes to make the drive. The hill hadn't been plowed overnight and snow had pretty much drifted over several cars that had been parked or stalled since yesterday. One of them sat at a forty-five degree angle but because the snow was too deep, it was impossible to tell if it rested against the curb or out in the middle of the street. Beyond that, an evergreen tree leaned far over and into the roadway, driven down by an immense weight of snow that had accumulated in its branches. Its pointed top curved toward the ground and was only a foot or two above the smooth, concealing blanket of snow. There was no way to tell where the street ended and the sidewalk began. In all likelihood, the plow driver had decided against plowing the road until it was reasonably clear of vehicles and all other obstructions.

Streets on the other side of the block had been plowed, but were very slick. Because of the way they'd been laid out, Daryl had to go around, cross the main road and then double back a ways to get to the motel. There were no other cars on the road at present; it wouldn't have been hard to imagine that he was the only soul around.

That, come to think of it, was exactly how he felt, too. He had made a terrible mistake and though Stella was none the wiser, he felt as if she were already gone. True, any other man might be able to go home, look his wife in the eye and carry on with life as though nothing had happened but not him-not Daryl. Even that realization was futile in this instance-there was no guarantee that Stella didn't already know what had transpired in Sheila's home. Though his omens and premonitions frequently came with greater clarity than hers, his usually faded quickly. They bloomed as a brief ejaculation of intense, vivid color and drama, to be followed by a rapid, inevitable deflation that required a recharge of his energies before manifesting themselves again. In contrast, Stella's visions came more in shades of gray. They came into focus slowly and faded away with no spectacular climax but were, more often than not, sustained over a longer period of time and usually more developed with regard to fine details. Stella had seen his daughter, ShellyLynn, in a boat, out on the surface of Roosevelt Lake. He had seen pumpkins-bright, fiercely hued, inexplicably radiant orbs of orange. He had seen ice cream cones; she had seen the monster, Cliff Rilek.

Last night, while he'd seen the patterns on the ceiling over Sheila's bed, Stella may well have seen more, much more. Too much more.

And that's probably why she had paged him so urgently this morning. Once again, he hoped that she hadn't called the hotel room, hadn't spoken with his temporary roommates and hadn't inquired with the front desk.

Passing Baroni's, he eased his foot off the gas as the motel was just ahead and to the right. The bar's parking lot was empty but in his mind

…not like a cupcake…

it was still full

…but like the frosting on a cupcake…

and he was stumbling out with Sheila, laughing at himself as she helped him into the front seat of the Jeep Cherokee, fastening the seat belt over his lap and sliding her wrist and hand over what had been hard most of the evening.

…someone's gonna get one hell of a lickin', Chief…

Already, the vivid images of her naked body were moving back to front and center in his mind, battling for dominance with the feeling of shame that occupied most of his being. It frustrated and troubled him to realize that although his guilt and regret were overwhelmingly tangible, the mere recollection of his time with her could cause that type of mental short-circuit, and could reverse the polarity in his mind. One moment, he was crushed beneath the weight of his regret but with one thought or triggering event, the remorse was moved to the background as lust and desire moved forward to displace it.

Good cop…bad cop…good cop…bad cop…

Now back at the motel, Daryl was relieved to find his room empty. It was 9:15 in the morning on a Saturday and, because of the storm blowing in, the manhunt had been called off for the day. So where were his roommates? There had been no footprints in the snow outside the door, so perhaps they never made it home from Baronis the previous evening. Maybe they, too, were out sleeping off hangovers and regret.

The message light blinked on the telephone and Daryl worked to calm himself, more certain now that Stella had not made contact with anyone who had seen him with Sheila at Baroni's and that his secret was safe. Wasting no time, he went through the steps to retrieve the voicemail, referring to the little card taped to the motel phone. Press 9. Press your room number. Press 3 to continue. Press 1 to listen to your messages. It was all so complicated.

The first message was for Cal Blunstone. Press 7 to save this message and continue to the next, or 3 to delete.

He pressed 7.

And then, finally, he heard Stella's voice.

"Hi honey. I'm up early today and had a real bad night so I thought I would call to tell you that I love you. I didn't hear from you last night so I figured that maybe you all were out searching late or that there was some kind of development. You know, it's really weird; I couldn't get to sleep so I stayed up until after midnight, working in the kitchen. You know that's so not me, Daryl, but you would have been proud of me. For some reason, I was craving cupcakes. Cupcakes of all things! I made four dozen of them. It was like I couldn't stop baking them. To tell you the truth, it scared me a bit, Daryl. I don't bake and I certainly don't bake cupcakes. But for some reason, I couldn't stop. I even drove over to Pat's Pantry to buy more muffin pans and cups. Then I went to Saar's Marketplace to buy frosting.

"Do you think it's an omen? Is it just a fluke or is there any significance there?"

Falling back into his bed, Daryl listened to the rest of the message but didn't hear a word she said. After a few moments of thought, he sat back up on the bed and reached out for the telephone, determined to call Stella and set her mind at ease. Damage control, when truly effective, must be done earlier rather than later.

But as his hand made contact with the headset, he noticed something missing, and his breath caught high up in his throat.

Somewhere, somehow, he had lost his wedding ring.

But through it all, this core blog of mine, the "Author's Blog" rarely gets updated. And many of you have asked "Why not?"

The answer is simple: Things have been a'rumblin'. I've been so busy writing and going in so many directions that there just hasn't been time to sit and try to put it all together here.

Ever had bad gas? It just kinda roils around in your intestines, hurting you on one bend (end?) or another and giving you that overall crampy feeling ... right? Well, that's where I've been for a while. I have two books to publish in 2007, and they've been churning around in my guts for the better part of a year.

Now, they're being written. And like gas, they're really coming out when I least expect it, and raising quite a ruckus. Stay tuned to my website and watch as I'm previewing some of the latest.

And please, ALWAYS comment when you see/read something you like, or something you don't like. I'm always holding back, not knowing how far to push things. Stephen King could get away with it, I can't. Not yet. But give it time ...

Dominic Englund Montessori carried his bride, Jacqueline, over the threshhold and, after nearly tripping on a loose piece of carpeting, set her down awkwardly on the floor of their new home.

"Welcome to your new house, Jacqueline Alexandria Wintersteen-Montessori," he beamed, using his wife's full name for effect. Though he would never admit it, there was a bit of spite there; Jacqueline insisted that he use her first and middle names when addressing her: Jacqueline Alexandria. It was a constant flash point between them and occasionally, he used all four names to ridicule what he perceived to be her pretensious, shallow nature. This time, she missed the barb.

"I love you, Dominic," she said, pulling him close to kiss him properly on the cheek. "We're going to be so happy here."

Looking around the room, a look of disgust settled over her face to be quickly replaced with a look of dismay.

"Well," she corrected, looking back toward him, "we'll be happy once you get this place cleaned up."

Jacqueline Alexandria didn't look so sure as she walked into the kitchen and poked the corner of an upturned linoleum piece with the toe of her designer pumps.

"I'm just worried about what our friends will think," she said, eyeing the old, avocado-colored appliances. This house is like a trip back to the seventies. We deserve better."

"And we'll have better," Dominic promised, confident that he could make it happen in two years rather than three. He told her as much.

"What about these old appliances?"

"Year one," Dominic answered, calculating dollar amounts in his head. With the current economic climate, the cost of new carpet, the cost of paint and the cost of appliances, he knew that his assurances were not realistic but life was a crap shoot. He'd just buy more lottery tickets and hope to hit the big one, or, in a worst case scenerio, open yet another line of credit.

"Besides," he continued. "It's not like these appliances don't work. They'll hold us for a while. And some of the major items look brand new. Did you see the heat pump out by the driveway?"

She nodded, still preoccupied with the poor condition of her new kitchen.

"That's a Westerford heat pump, hon. Top of the line. And it looks pretty new. None of the other houses in our price range have come with a heat pump. This is something we can really get in to."

"The home inspector said it was brand new," she said absently. "It's just a black box to me. I'm more worried about the kitchen. I can throw rugs over the carpet--I want this kitchen done first, Dominic."

"Okay. Fine, then. I'll do the kitchen first. Would having it done by three o'clock tomorrow be fine, Jacqueline Alexandria, your wifeliness?"

»» Read the original story, "The Heat Pump" in Jim W. Coleman's book, Level Heads XE: The Deluxe Edition

This morning, after pulling my car into my parking space at work, I stepped out of the car and walked around to the other side to get my laptop computer out of the back seat. As I was opening the door, I saw a black guy running across the parking lot. He was dressed in blue jeans and a white t-shirt and was probably in his late forties or early fifties - certainly no older. He looked like a shipyard worker who was trying to catch a bus.

Sure enough, he called over, "I'm just tryin' to get that number six bus!" and he ran past. I pulled the laptop from the car and turned, hearing some noise behind me. The black gentleman was running up behind me and I instinctively pulled the laptop bag closer and stepped around the car door, placing it between myself and the man.

"You see a lot clearer when your ego's deflated," he said, out of breath.

"Ayup," I said politely.

"That's what I tell the brothers and the sisters when they ask. You see a lot clearer when your ego's deflated."

He nodded and I didn't know what to say.

"You're probably right," I said, sensing there was no danger at this point. I closed the car door.

The man stepped closer and said, with great conviction: "Remember this. You see a lot clearer when your ego's deflated."

And he ran off to catch his bus.

Al Aseltine woke up. It wasn’t really that big a deal, as it was the seventh or eighth time that he’d bolted upright from a fitful sleep since midnight. On the other hand, it was a big deal, if only to himself. Today was June 17, 2007. It was today, on this day, that he was supposed to die from drinking.

It was a quarter after seven in the morning and Al was exhausted. He could remember checking his well-being at 1, 2:30, 3:15, 4:10, 4:58, 6:17 and 6:58 a.m., but he wasn’t really sure about the 6:58 check. His tired but overworked brain may have cloned an artificial copy of that event from the 4:58 rousing or, just as likely, it may have been falsely registered in memory by tired, blurry eyes. Not that it mattered anyway, really. Though it was Thursday, he wasn’t going to work today and had no plans. On a day when one was destined to have the big ticket punched, work and other obligations were reduced to mere trivialities.

At first, Al hadn’t planned on calling in sick. For years, he’d just assumed that by going to work, he would be surrounded and protected by his coworkers. People didn’t really die at work, did they? Until last month, he’d never heard of such a thing.

But then Tim, the clerk from Relational Arbitrations, told him a story about an experience at his prior job. He described an event that occurred during a quarterly staff meeting, where the Production director had keeled over, dead on the spot, in front of one hundred eighty-some-odd people.

Keeled over is not the way I’d put it, Tim had said. No, he was sitting at a table alongside his fellow directors when BOOM! – without any warning whatsoever – he just fell face forward into a glazed doughnut on a plate in front of him. I mean, no shit. His nose went right into the hole, a perfect bulls-eye. We all noticed right away, of course. But the CFO kept talking about how the company really wasn’t dying on the vine and how the stock market wasn’t a real indicator of profitability. He didn’t notice what was going on until turning to ask Dean to verify some production numbers and whoa—no Dean! I mean, Christ! Can you imagine dying with a doughnut around your nose? I’m just surprised the C-Fucking-O didn’t catch on sooner. You know, you might think that he would have seen our eyes glaze over. Get it?

Al got it. He wasn’t going to die at work. There was no way he was going to end up in a story. Of course, he didn’t really think he was going to die, but he wasn’t taking any chances. Twenty-one years had passed since the prediction had been made and now, in hindsight, he was amazed at how what basically equated to a quarter-century had elapsed since then as if on fast-forward.

Back then, 2007 wasn’t a real year and wasn’t even on the calendar. Back then, in 1986, people were talking about the space shuttle Challenger explosion, worrying about seven-percent unemployment and wondering how in hell the song “We are the World” had won a Grammy. The FOX television network was created that year, The Oprah Winfrey show debuted and some people were watching “The Color of Money” in the theaters. Those who weren’t might have been watching “Platoon” or listening to Survivor, Paul Simon, Robert Palmer or Bananarama on the FM dial. To really put things in perspective, the first 80386 computer chip was introduced back in 1986. Anyone who realizes the significance of that gets the point and the following one as well: 2007 meant nothing back then.

But it had meant something to a sideshow psychic outside of Apache Junction, Arizona—a middle-aged bag of a woman who had exhaled noxious cigarette smoke though each of the ten words used to foretell one climactic event.

“You’re going to die of drinking on June 17, 2007,” was what she’d said. And then, after catching a then-young Al’s blank stare, she made yet one more prophetic statement: “Now beat it, kid. There’s a long line of people just dyin’ out there to get in here to see me.”

That was it. One shattering prophesy, ten cut-to-the-point words. No “I see you marrying a lovely little princess.” No “you’re going to be rich beyond your wildest dreams.” And not even one casual attempt to bolster his self-confidence with a promise of good looks or success on any point of time in his life.

You are going to die of drinking on June 17, 2007…

Now up and on his feet,

…people just dyin’ to get in here to see me…

he went into the bathroom to empty his bladder, paying more attention than usual to the color and odor of his pee. It all looked normal but that didn’t soothe him; there still were seventeen empty hours to fill before the day slid into the history books. It could be a slip on the bathroom floor, a fall in the kitchen, an accident with the lawn mower, an unfortunate incident while doing laundry, or any one of a hundred other things.

The fact that the psychic had specified the cause of death (of drinking) in her prediction gave him no comfort; he normally conducted most all of the aforementioned activities while drinking. The coasters on top of his toilet bowl and scattered elsewhere throughout the house were there for a reason but now, they made a mockery of this day. Al picked up six of them on his way from the bathroom to the kitchen and once there, he dropped them into the wastebasket.

Yesterday, he’d disposed of all liquor, beer and other spirits in the house. Though he’d originally intended to empty the bottles and cans out in the far back corner of his yard, he’d eventually succumbed to the siren call of the spirits and disposed of them in a more natural way.

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It was a dark and stormy night, the kind that seemed to flex with each lick of lighting and every subsequent roar of thunder. I felt every vibration in my foot as thunder roared to each side, assaulting my vehicle with waves of sound as real and damaging as a pounding surf.

I had no idea that I was on a one-way street until I saw the dual orbs of light approaching far ahead but fortunately, there was time to pull over and turn back.

But still, my destination was to the south, deep in the heart of the storm. And now, after realizing my error, I was headed north.

Pulling into a Chevron station, I turned the key to silence the engine, wishing I could do the same to that pounding engine in my chest, the one that ensured my survival by pumping blood to my every extremity, the one that bore the weight of my sorrow and the anticipation of what the night might hold in store.

Though I would never vocalize or in any other way acknowledge it, I knew that not only was I headed into the loins of a tempest night, I also was headed into the danger zone.

And after collecting my thoughts I started the car and pulled back out onto Main Street to resume my sojourn to the south.

I had a date with destiny and that was her name ... Destiny McFetters. As I activated my right turn signal to head back into the storm, I breathed a silent prayer of thanks that my wife of thirteen years was safe in Atlanta, far from the storm. Far from the danger zone.

And I was racing headlong into the very heart of it.

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The new book is not set in Safford, Arizona, as was "Omens." As a matter of fact, the new book is not set anywhere near Arizona. That's about all I can give you right now.

Originally, of my four books, "Omens" was the slowest to move through Amazon.com. Now, thanks to some favorable reviews and good publicity, the book has outpaced all the others. I would encourage you to buy a copy today. It will whet your appetite for things yet to come.

Read the review here.

However, after listening to the song, I fell in love with it, and still consider it as one of my favorite songs. There, I learned to take the Kinkster with a grain of salt and to relish his sardonic humor.

"Scuse me while I whip this out" offers behind-the-scenes views into the lives of many noteworthy celebrities, and some not-so-noteworthy. It's almost voyeuristic at times, but every bit as enjoyable as voyeurism should be. I suspect that the lines between fact, hearsay and embellishment are a bit blurred but that doesn't matter; if those lines, indeed, are blurred, it still makes for a damn good read.

I highly recommend the book - but if you have a hang-up with the word "Kinky," it'll probably take you up to 20 pages to get into the book. But by then, you'll be a Kinkster fan.

Your job as an author or marketer is to get the crowd there. Whether or not they buy books is secondary - you worry about that during the event. But it's critical to draw a crowd. Crowds are dynamic, like rolling snowballs. People will come in just to see what the ruckus is all about.

For this targeted e-mail campaign, I used a company called Echomail, facilitated by the local newspaper. It's important that you don't "spam" people - this was a list of people who had opted in to receive advertising coupons via email. And with that type of e-mail campaign, you can drill down to those who like books or who tend to read X number of books a month.

Of course, it's also important to run concurrent advertising in other media. When this e-mail campaign was delivered, I also had print ads running in the local newspaper. And guess what? The targeted e-mail brought in the majority of the crowd!