Laurels Literary Magazine Spring 2014 | Page 19

from money, and she lives in a big house that ran in his family for generations. She said that, as for cash, he sends her what he can and she’s able to get by.’ “It didn’t take me long to figure out what kind of story I was going to use. Here we have a lonely woman. She’s been without her sucker husband for two years. She’s lying just to impress me. She’s begging for a good story; so, I gave it to her. I told her I was an artist. A writer. I asked if she’d heard of me. Jeepers creepers and holy cow I even said I was friends with Frank Baum. I told her times had been tough. My first book did real well and I’d made a mint, but that was a while ago and my well was running dry. I’d been struggling, but I finished my latest novel and the page was turning. It was scheduled to get published in the next couple months. It was already getting noticed. The publisher said I was gonna make a bigger splash F