Alma's Will

Read Alma's Will Online

Authors: Anel Viz

Tags: #Contemporary gay family political

What Other Authors Say About Anel Viz:

 

"I can tell everyone absolutely Anel Viz pays not the slightest attention to any 'rules' and certainly none to any advice from me. I can also tell you that he always makes it work. I've yet to read anything of his (and everything is entirely unique) that wasn't absolutely first-rate. When you are as good as he is, you don't need anyone telling you how to do it."

— Victor Banis

"[Anel Viz] is far more than a competent writer, and the more you read his work the more you recognize the wry, even ironic smile lurking behind the professionalism. It is a kind, if somewhat amused or even skeptical view of people who struggle through their lives."

— Nan Hawthorne

"[Anel Viz] has a way with words that I truly admire, digging them up for the correct meaning of his sentence, which can lead a writer deeply astray. But Anel knows when to stop, when the meaning is perfectly clear."

— Mykola Dementiuk

"[Anel Viz] writes about the psychological connections that draw beings together more than the physical and emotional connections. … As a result he is able to draw strong reactions to his work."

— Marie Bishop

"… although Mr. Viz is literary, [he] does not dwell on descriptions or slow the story down
at all
. He writes straight to the point, but the prose is flowing, and fun."

— Erika Pike

A Silver Publishing Book

 

Alma's Will

Copyright © 2013 by Anel Viz

E-book ISBN: 9781614959359

 

First E-book Publication: May 2013

 

Cover design by Reese Dante

Editor: Nina Smith

Logo copyright © 2012 by Silver Publishing

Licensed material is being used for illustrative purposes only. Any person depicted in the licensed material is a model.

 

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED:
This literary work may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, including electronic or photographic reproduction, in whole or in part, without express written permission. This book cannot be copied in any format, sold, or otherwise transferred from your computer to another through upload to a file sharing peer to peer program, for free or for a fee, or as a prize in any contest. Such action is illegal and in violation of the U.S. Copyright Law. Distribution of this e-book, in whole or in part, online, offline, in print or in any way or any other method currently known or yet to be invented, is forbidden.

 

All characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any resemblance to actual persons living or dead is strictly coincidental.

 

If you see "free shares" offered or cut-rate sales of this title on pirate sites, you can report the offending entry to [email protected].

 

This book is written in US English.

 

PUBLISHER

www.SPSilverPublishing.com

Note from the Publisher

 

Dear Reader,

 

Thank you for your purchase of this title. The authors and staff of Silver Publishing hope you enjoy this read and that we will have a long and happy association together.

 

Please remember that the only money authors make from writing comes from the sales of their books. If you like their work, spread the word and tell others about the books, but please refrain from sharing this book in any form. Authors depend on sales and sales only to support their families.

 

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Lodewyk Deysel

Publisher

Silver Publishing

http://www.spsilverpublishing.com

Dedication

In a world where few will think twice before casting the first stone,

are not we all more sinned against than sinning?

Part I: The House

 

Ronnie

A house where cats outnumber the humans, no matter how clean, has a distinctive smell. Alma Enslik lived alone with eight cats but, cats being cats, most of them paid her little attention, though they liked being in the same room with her. Powder acknowledged her existence by bringing her mice after he'd killed them and eaten the liver and kidneys. The others would rub up against her legs sometimes, but to pet them she had to take the initiative and pick them up. Only Ronnie, the black, came of her own accord to lie in her lap when she sat in the armchair by the sunny corner window.

Alma had never kept pets before her husband's death. Bill loathed animals, except, as he used to joke, on his dinner plate, and since he was a loner, she had never made close friends with her neighbors, though she stayed on cordial, "good morning" terms with them. So except for her cats, she lived alone.

Liv, her daughter, a working mother of three, lived in another state. She may as well have lived on another continent. She called every two or three weeks to check up on her and sent photos, but hadn't even come when her father was dying. Of course, Liv's twin girls were squalling babies then and would certainly have annoyed Bill no end. He never was fond of young children. Alma was, though, and she'd offered to take the kids when Liv and Eric went on one of their weeklong get-away vacations, but Livvie felt they would be too much for her and farmed them out elsewhere.

They hadn't been to see her in over two and a half years, the visit when Liv gave her an angry stare when she heard her call the black cat "Ronnie". Alma noticed, and pursed her lips and said, "Short for Veronica." What right did Livvie have to hold anything against him? Did she even remember him? She was only four years old when it happened. Her Ronnie. What would Jay and Baron say if they knew about him?

Jay and Baron—the boys in the house next to hers. How solicitous they were, always coming over to help when they saw her carrying bags of groceries into the house, mowing her lawn in summer, pruning the shrubbery in front, doing a few minor home repairs when needed. Such nice boys, Jay and Baron, sweet and considerate. She thought of them as boys, though Baron had to be over thirty and Jay just a few years younger.

Oh, she knew exactly what their relationship was. That's what you were supposed to call it now, a relationship. Times certainly had changed. To think how Bill would have heckled them when he was alive disgusted her. Back then, of course, she also believed homosexuality was evil. Funny she found it so easy now to overlook, although it still seemed unnatural and she avoided thinking about what they must do together. What a start it gave her, the time she caught them kissing in their back yard, but she pretended not to notice. She worried about their openness, their daring. It made them so vulnerable. Even if people were no longer openly hostile, surely they didn't approve of it, did they?

She said something of the sort when they told her they'd booked a fifteen-day Caribbean cruise, how they should be careful and not too obvious. Jay said not to worry; a gay organization was sponsoring the cruise with only gay men on board. She'd never heard either of them say "gay" before, and she immediately pictured hundreds of naked men doing unimaginable things on a boat. The thought troubled her, and she said, "But you two will be together all the time, won't you?"

Jay gave her a peck on the cheek. "Shame on you, Miz Enslik! What could you be thinking?"

She blushed, and went back into the house. The implication of orgies on the open sea had turned her thoughts to Ronnie, in ways she didn't like to think of him. He was only fifteen when he left, and she hadn't heard from him since. Did he think she hated him too, that she hadn't suffered when Bill threw him out of the house? Was he angry that she hadn't spoken a word in protest, hadn't come to his defense? What could she have said to defend him? Bill was right to call it an abomination. She still considered it one, yet "abominations" no longer offended her as they once had.

She went to sit in her favorite corner chair, and the black cat jumped into her lap. Where was Ronnie now? He'd be about ten years older than Baron next door if he were alive. Such a sensitive boy, though, and so young. How could he have survived on the streets? "As a male whore," Bill had said, "which is what he is." That was nearly twenty-five years ago, just before the AIDS epidemic. Surely that had killed him, and he'd died years ago in an alley or some hospice. Alone, as she would die one day.

* * * *

Jay and Baron got back late Sunday night and didn't notice the mail that had piled up in Mrs. Enslik's box and the fliers lying on her front lawn until after work the next afternoon. They knocked, and no one answered. They asked around. None of the neighbors had seen her in nearly two weeks; no one by that name had checked into the hospital. They phoned the police and were there with them when they broke down the door.

Alma was sitting in the corner, dead—for over a week, the coroner said. A famished black cat, the one she called Ronnie, lay curled up in her lap. The others had survived by biting small chunks out of the legs they'd used to rub against. The black cat hissed and spit when Baron went to pick her up, and struggled till he got her home. Both boys felt that the least they could do for their neighbor was adopt her Ronnie.

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