Gary V. Powell, Author

Miller's Deer

by

Gary V. Powell

Copyright 2009 Gary V. Powell. All rights reserved.

(This story was runner-up for the 2007 Thomas Wolfe Fiction Prize. It originally appeared in the 2008 edition of the Thomas Wolfe Review.)

Wayne Szerbiak mashed out his cigarette and gave me the sneer he usually reserved for courtroom adversaries. As the junior named partner at Miller and Szerbiak, the office non-smoking policy didn’t apply to him. “Just shoot a friggin’ deer,” he said.

“I don’t want to shoot a deer.”

“But you want to make partner, right?”

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On Horicon Marsh

by

Gary V. Powell

Copyright Gary V. Powell 2008. All rights reserved.

(This story originally appeared in Moonshine Review.)

Except for the singing of its tires over the highway, the minivan is suddenly quiet. His voice laced with anger, Mitchell Weber has just told his wife Marijoe she doesn’t understand anything, anything at all.

This is in the company of their best and oldest friends, Jake and Janet Miller, the Miller’s six-year old Sara, and the Weber’s two daughters, five-year old Heather and fourteen-year old Cari. The red burn firing Mitchell’s cheeks betrays the embarrassment his outburst has caused him.

“Well, you’re right.” Marijoe says, “I don’t understand. If we moved up here, you could handle drunk drivers and divorces. Help decide who gets the chickens and who gets the cows.”

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Delivering the Goods

by

Gary V. Powell

(Copyright 2005 Gary V. Powell. All Rights Reserved.)

(This story orignally appeared on Amarillo Bay.)

“So what do you think?” Sandra gave me that look.

She was a tall, fair-skinned brunette worked the counter at Jim’s Diner. Harley and me stopped for breakfast every time we had a delivery up this way. Sandra and me had been flirting for awhile. I might have started it.

“About what?” I could be a real fox when I wanted to be.

“I think you know.”

She looked good in that short skirt. Her knees were driving me crazy. As hard as I tried not to, I thought about her knees all the time.

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Boat to Build

By

Gary V. Powell

Copyright Gary V. Powell 2006. All Rights Reserved.

(This story was a finalist in the Briar Cliff Review 2006 Fiction Contest. It originally appeared in the 2007 Spring Edition of the Briar Cliff Review. It is a sequel to "Delivering the Goods").

Harley was laid off last week. I’ve come to see him today, because for years we drove truck together and I’m worried about him. Two years ago his wife left to join a Wicca commune in New Mexico. Now he's lost his job. Who knows how that combination might affect a man.

He lives up near the lake, off of Highway 115. God's Blue Bird Lane. It sounds strange, but all the roads have names like that. Resurrection Way. Peace in the Valley Road. Blood of the Lamb Court. The Southern Baptists and Evangelicals are not to be denied up here. It's been a while since I've visited and I miss my turn. I drive ahead a quarter mile and make a “Y” in some good old boy’s yard. The dogs, three big-mouthed hounds, bay like I’m prey on the run.

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Red on Red

by

Gary V. Powell

Copyright Gary V. Powell 2008. All rights reserved.

The guys at the Nomad RV factory arrived early. They checked their tools, took a crap, and strapped on their belts.  They sat out front in the heat and haze of the rising sun, smoked cigarettes, drank coffee, and waited for the buzzer to sound.

I ran set-up for a roofer named Red who ran with a woman they also called Red. She dropped him at the factory every morning, before driving off to enjoy her day. The men called her a looker. They watched over the top of their thermoses when her long legs unwound from that red 'Vette he’d bought her to drive. The two of them pawed the ground and kissed like teenagers, but they were thirty five if they were a day.

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