The Death of 1977 (Book 3)

"No, Dougie!" Lynnette screamed herself awake.

Breathing so heavy that she had to sit up on her mattress and catch her breath, the woman clutched her heaving chest and waited. The image of the little boy in her nightmare still remained, so much so that her own stomach began gurgling. Lynnette looked all over the tiny, dark space in which she was resting to find only herself. The instant she reclaimed her bearings she immediately dropped her body back down onto the sweaty mattress and laid there.

From her face all the way down to her naked toes she was layered in her own sweat. Lynnette couldn't stop breathing so rapidly. The dream was so intense and realistic that she had to shut her eyes repeatedly just to make sure she was still awake.

She rolled over onto her left side and reached for a wristwatch that was lying on the floor next to her bible. Lynnette held the watch up to the moonlight that was shining into her room to see the time that read 2:42 a.m.

From there she dropped the watch and laid back down again. With her eyes penetrating the ceiling above her she struggled with the thought of getting up, but her body had other reservations. It desired only to lie motionless on the clammy mattress and sulk. However, the longer Lynnette rested the more intense her ramblings seized her to the point where she had to actually force her own body to move from its quiet comfort zone.

She leaned over and reached for her bible that was lying next to her on the floor. There was a bookmark within the pages. With her flashlight she turned directly to Joshua 1:9 and read carefully before placing the book back onto the floor.

With as much energy and bravery that she could muster, the young woman got up, put on a white tank-top shirt, a pair of torn blue jean shorts and a pair of sandals. She walked over to the foot of the mattress and picked up a heavy duffle bag from off the floor before sneaking her way out of both her room and the shack altogether.

Making sure to shut the door behind her as quietly and securely as she could Lynnette turned and ventured down the steps only to inadvertently bump into a little boy who was already seated on the stairs.

Gasping for air, Lynnette looked down. "Leo, what are you doing out here, boy?" She sat down next to the child.

Leo couldn't have been any more than nine or ten years old. Even in the darkness Lynnette could see his shady image that appeared more troubled and bored than anything else.

"Are you going out again?" Leo asked with his head resting on his right arm.

the matter? Why are you out here at this time of

away, he just sighed before looking up at Lynnette. "My mama is

the road. The reeking smell of Ganga was more belligerent after midnight than any other time of the day. But there was something keeping the little boy out of his own house that early morning, and Lynnette realized right away that it had nothing to do with a nightmare; she

patting Leo on the back and saying, "Don't worry, honey, your mother

comes by."

boy in the most sorrowful manner, as if she were in his shoes. "You know that your mother

at Lynnette. He began to sniff. The very last thing she wanted was to see

to Cusha's and take a nap until

head before Lynnette

should be back before dawn." She

"Do you promise?"

ground where she turned a corner to see a bike leaning up against a wall. She then lanced her duffle bag on the

before finally coming to a grinding halt right in the middle. The moon was half full that evening, but the moon's phases wasn't anything that interested her. All she did was stand and watch as the shimmering waves rolled in and out just a couple

solitude was the sea. For that matter, before August, she had never been to a beach in her life. On most nights, all she would do was stare out at the water ever

the most. Shaking her head, Lynnette reached into her duffle bag and pulled out both a piece of paper and her

the paper back into her bag she rooted around until her hand connected with something warm and hard. She pulled out a sawed off shotgun. With her own sweaty hands she checked the chamber before climbing off of her bike and skittishly

to neither her surroundings nor her duty, and as luck would have had it, as slowly as she was walking, the forest drew

back at the forest's opening like it was an unshakable bad habit. She couldn't believe that she was actually skulking about in the dark with