To make things even more strange for me, I plotted this one out. *gasp* I'm like a whole new Erica. :) It's at just under 8,000 words so obviously I have some work to do, but it's fun work, of course!
Let me know what you think and if you've ever experimented in a new genre - and how it worked out for you. Have fun reading it, I know I'm having fun writing it! (disclaimer: this is a first draft and unedited)
Chapter One, Page 1 1/2: On the Water:
The
old guy who owned the bed-and-breakfast Kendall checked into twenty minutes ago
did not seem pressed to leave. He kept rattling on about the good fishing in
the area, the coffee house he owned across the street, and his wife's biscuits
and gravy recipe handed down to her from generations of women in her family.
I know about the fishing, I already spotted
three coffee places, and keep the heart-attack-on-a-plate to yourself, Kendall
thought, checking her phone for the tenth time in hope he would finally notice
and leave her alone. She needed a nap and a shower. Although her next
destination was the local fish-and-float, so maybe she'd skip the shower until
later.
"So will your husband be
joining you yet this afternoon?"
She
must have missed something. Her husband? "Excuse me? No, no husband, I'm
here for work."
"Oh,"
he said, rubbing his chin and looking uncomfortable. "My wife, she said to
put you in the big room so it would give you and your husband some space.
Excuse me for a moment, I'll give her a call and see if I need to move you over
one."
Kendall
looked around her. This was considered the big room? There was a loveseat-sized
couch, one chair, and a bookshelf on one side of the room with a small
kitchenette along the opposite wall. She peeked into the second room that Mr.
Lowenstein had gone into and saw what appeared to be a queen-sized bed with a
dresser and TV across from it. He was talking on an old rotary-phone plugged
into the wall behind the bed. There was no bathroom anywhere within sight.
Seriously, this was the big room?
He
set down the phone receiver and looked toward where she stood next to the loveseat.
Kendall felt a little ridiculous, like she had gotten caught peeping into
someone else's bedroom.
"Never
mind then, miss. My mistake. It seems the gentleman who reserved your room was
your boss, not your husband. The only other guest we have this week is a single
gentleman, so this arrangement will work just fine. What kind of work are you
here for?"
"Oh,
good, I'm glad it all worked out. I'm doing an article on the fishing float for
Wisconsin Today magazine."
His
eyes openly viewed Kendall from top to bottom and back up. She knew what he was
thinking and he was right - she was a
city girl and she didn't belong with
a bunch of old guys on a huge boat, er, float, in the middle of the Mississippi
River. What he didn't know is that she was on thin ice at work and didn't dare
to turn down an assignment during the foreseeable future.
"Well,
then, you're at the right place. The man staying in the other room that I
referred to a moment ago is filling in for the Captain these days. With all the
chaos on the float this week, maybe you could get an interview with him
tomorrow. Perhaps over those biscuits I've been talking about."
