Tuesday Tales-Black Diamond Hearts are the Most Difficult

Tuesday Tales

Welcome Fellow Fathomers to this weeks' edition of Tuesday Tales. A group of writers getting together to share their WIP on a common theme. The theme for today is baseball...take a look at my contribution:

"The drought left the pasture as dusty, dirt colored cement.  Huge cracks revealing a depth of at least a couple of feet spread here and there across the barren surface.  However, Matthew Hughes would be successful, no matter the difficulty, as he prepared for his grim mission.  He looked out upon the barren meadow and blinked back a few tears.

He normally enjoyed his visits back to the family ranch in Oklahoma. Although, Matthew’s parents raised him in the grandeur of the Rockies-granola hippies who loved the crisp smell of the evergreens and bluebird days on the fluffy slopes of snow.  He enjoyed the best of both worlds as his grandparents and various aunts and uncles lived in Oklahoma from birth on. They maintained the family legacy of ranching established many years before his time.

He still lived full time in Colorado with his successful career as a ski racing instructor, yet, in many ways, Oklahoma would always be home.  He wanted his best friend buried close to his home roots, so, he made the trek back to the family ranch for the solemn occasion. No other place would do.

This type of thing was happening too often, it already made an indelible mark upon his psyche, and he was unsure he would ever recover from the events of the past few years.  Life was making him hard and untrusting.  He refused to call it fear, as his feelings were truly not born out of terror.  Bravery is actually one of his strongest traits.  Being brave is sometimes synonymous with being fearful, if the person is also wise-, which he is.

In the past few years, he lost two friends in a horrific skiing accident, three in car crashes, and one to cancer.  Of the six, five were easily avoidable.  It was this fact that gave him increased heartache. Being young and carefree does not mean young and careless. If only they had checked the snow conditions, if only they had answered that text later, if only they remembered just how treacherous hairpin turns actually were-they all might still be here.  No, damn it, they would all definitely still be here. Their untroubled lives, feigning fledgling responsibility for their actions, ended at fourteen, the culmination being the Little League World Series baseball tournament in Omaha, Nebraska. Beyond that amazing sporting event, it had been time to grow up and learn about the real world and how to be successful."

Now that you've read something from my upcoming book, please venture over to our Tuesday Tales blog for more from other contributing authors-
Tuesday Tales Blogspot