Here is the first page of a novel draft...it is one of the few things I am working on:)
The Float
Fog hovered over the flat salt water of HeronBay. Dawn pushed light through the moister as it bounced off the silhouette of a heavy man sitting in a decaying aluminum framed lawn chair.Blood trickled down his hairy neck, soaked into his collar, and bled through his hickory shirt.The excess dripped off of his wrist like misaligned vinyl gutters and pooled around a pyramid of empty Olympia Beer cans.It worked its way through the rough sawn planks of the loading dock into the dark, still salt water.All was quiet.
A tall man stumbled up to the gangway, assessed the angle at which the tide dropped the dock, and lunged for the handrail.He took two steps and tripped over the first rounded anti-trip strip.A raven circled and landed behind the man as he forced himself up.The raven shook its wings and refolded them tightly against its breast.It pointed its beak into the air and called, “Ahhh, ahhh, ah.”The man swung around, swore, and fell down backwards closer to the dock. The raven jumped off of the rail and flew away.He pushed against the ground, stood, and shrugged his left shoulder.One suspender hung off his jeans as he finished his descent.He paused near three buckets of neglected halibut gear.The man pulled a stretch of line from the thrid bucket and a trail of knots and rusted hooks followed.He shook the line and pulled a knife from his pocket, cutting off two arm lengths.He tied a half hitch around the lifeless body’s left ankle.The man stood up and reached his hands into the air with a long yawn.He stepped over the blood and bumped one of the beer cans with his foot. The sound skipped off of the water, away from the dock towards something solid.He stepped down into the hull of a 24-foot work skiff, tied the line to the starboard stern cleat, and started the brand new 4-stroke motor.The skiff quickly pulled away from the loading dock into the fog.The pale body jerked off of the chair and skipped away.
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