Short Stories by William S. James

a short story by William S. James

Polished black boots marched across the South Commons in a sharp, steady, stride. The sound they made with each step was drowned into silence by the howling January wind. The wearer of those boots bore evidence to their quickening pace and the frigid night air, with smoky puffs of air that blew out from the mouth hole of his black and orange ski mask. The puffs were in cadence with each step of his left boot.

Follow up:

Across the Commons, and at the rear of Georgian style, red brick, Adams Hall, Jack Donnelly kissed his wife Melanie on the cheek as she opened her car door to go out into the cold night air. The winter air blasted into the toasty car, a sharp contrast to the warmth he felt from Melanie’s cheek.

“I should be done by about eight, no later than eight-fifteen.” She said, and turned back to give him one more quick one-armed hug around the neck and a peck on the lips before she slid off the front seat and closed the car door with a thud.

The car’s heater fan blew warm air back into the cruiser as Jack watched her in the lamp lit cold. Melanie hurried up the steps, motivated by the stiffening cold, disappearing into the warmth and safety of the building. He checked his watch. He would have to be back here in about an hour and fifteen minutes, and contemplated just sitting and waiting. He could even catch up on some paperwork. The radio was quiet tonight, and he sat for a minute or two, just enjoying the silence and warmth of his car.

On the opposite side of the building, Black Boots had just reached the small concrete square at the front of Adams Hall, and could see the inviting warm glow coming through the massive paned-glass double-doors of the Adams Hall main entrance.

Melanie Donnelly hung her faux fur coat on the hook in her office and checked her curled long red hair in the small wall mirror to make sure the hood hadn’t done too much damage to her relaxed hairstyle. She pulled her forest green wool skirt down with a slight adjustment, and straightened the bottom hem of her pale, yellow plaid cashmere turtleneck sweater. She gave one last approving glance in the mirror, and then checked the wall clock. She had five minutes to get there, and get set up. She grabbed her prepared notes on “Eastern philosophy’s influences on contemporary Western society”, and closing the door behind her, headed for Lecture Hall B.

Black Boots paused at the bottom of the front steps, and watched a kid in a Navy Pea coat hold the door open for a pretty girl as she rushed to get into the warmth of the building. Black Boots’ hands were in the side pockets of his camouflage print parka, but they didn’t find warmth there, only hard cold ice. His pause wasn’t conscious, and it wasn’t contemplative, it was simply a pause. The pace of the cloudy puffs from his exhalations had slowed to longer steady breaths.

Jack Donnelly’s scanner broke the silence with a report of a local traffic stop on Maple Street. He decided he might as well get his early evening rounds out of the way. If all was quiet, he’d be back in this same spot before the hour was up.

Melanie entered the lecture hall from the east podium level door and saw about thirty students in the small stadium-style elevated seating area. Each seat had a small writing desktop. It was a room of very early twentieth century with some faux nineteenth century decorative features. To her right was the Western podium door that led to the West exit foyer, out the door, and about forty yards to the Big Woods.

At two minutes after seven o’clock, about ten more students had entered and were settling into their seats. Melanie was doing a two word sound check with Steve the sound guy, who set the mike levels on the small sound board to her left. A short squeal of feedback escaped, but Steve was quick to adjust down.

Pages: 1 · 2 · 3 · 4 · 5 · 6 · 7 · 8 · 9