The Redemption of Michael Hollister

by Shawn Inmon

  And now, Michael was here—August 22, the same day he had hanged himself in his cell in the Oregon State Penitentiary.

  A long time ago, Dominick asked me if I believe in ghosts. I think that the me who hanged himself was the ghost, not this me. I don’t even know who that person was. I only know I never want to feel that way again.

  He closed his eyes.

  Thank you for second chances.

  He opened his eyes, focused on the folder that lay open on the desk in front of him, and went back to work.

  Postscript One

  Carrie watched Michael as he sat at his desk, working. The frame surrounding the picture was a quiet gray. His days are so often quiet, now, and for him, that’s a good thing. Maybe it doesn’t help me feed the Machine, but what are they going to do? They can’t kill me; I have eternal life.

  She made an adjustment to her pyxis and Dominick Davidner appeared, driving a red convertible down a country dirt road. The top of the car was down, the music from the radio was up, and he had one arm slung over the door. He was singing along to the music, loudly and off-key. The frame around him was white.

  He’s always happiest when he’s on the move.

  She flipped through the rest of her charges, one at a time. Where she could, she made small adjustments to help each of them. To the universe, all emotion might be the same. Carrie had never mastered the art of detachment, though, and she did what she could to bring happiness into their lives. That translated into contentment in her own life, which also fed the Machine.

  She blew a puff of breath straight up to shoo her bangs out of her eyes and focused on a young woman named Emily, who was lying on her bed, reading a book and daydreaming. Carrie switched back and forth between Dominick and Emily, Emily and Dominick. She spun the pyxis ahead rapidly, then feathered it to a stop.

  “Just as I thought,” she said to herself. “I knew they belonged together. Oh. There’s tragedy ahead.” She peered into the instrument, looking for a way to help.

  Chapter One

  The Death and Life of Dominick Davidner

  Dimension AG54298-M25735

  1999

  “Hey, old girl,” Dominick said, laying his hand on Emily’s shoulder. “You’re going to be late for class if you keep snoozing.”

  Without opening her eyes, Emily mumbled, “I’m the teacher. I can’t be late, cuz they can’t start without me.” She rolled toward him, a smile parting her lips. She opened one eye. “And what the heck is this ‘old girl’ stuff? I am still but a child, taken advantage of by an older, lecherous predator.”

  “Six months. I am six months older than you. That is not exactly robbing the cradle.” He brushed her blond hair away from her eyes and kissed her. “Happy anniversary, Mrs. Davidner.”

  “Oh, please. You know I’m diabetic and can’t handle this much sugar in the morning.” She groaned as she rolled out of bed and slipped her feet into her slippers. “Maybe you were right the first time. I am an old girl.”

  An hour later, Dominick kissed her goodbye, standing in the driveway. “Tonight. Dining. Dancing. Maybe even some of that hootchie kootchie I hear the kids talk about.”

  “Promises, promises,” Emily said, then they got into their cars—her Mazda was four years newer than his Subaru, and neither was new—and headed in opposite directions.

  LATER THAT AFTERNOON, Dominick sat in the teachers’ lounge at Middle Falls High School. “You don’t want to handle this last period for me, do you Zack?”

  Zack Weaver, the PE teacher and track coach, was in his early forties, but looked younger. He laughed and put his feet up on the table, his hands behind his head. “Me? I’m gonna spend sixth period in my office, getting ready to go home. You are suffering from the weariness of being a real teacher.” He winked at Dominick. “This is what you get for being an English teacher instead of a track coach. You’ve got to actually teach the little buggers.”

  “Ah, I love ’em, I admit it.” He looked sharply at Zack. “Even your twins, who might be just a little too smart for their own good.”

  Zack shrugged. “Any smarts they got came from Jennifer, not me.”

  “But,” Dominick continued, as though Zack hadn’t interrupted, “I want to get out of here early enough that Emily and I might have a shot at beating the traffic in Portland.”

  “Driving all the way to the big city, huh? Nice.”

  “Ten years. Ten years she’s put up with me. She deserves more than one nice night out in the city, but on two teacher’s salaries, that’s all she’s getting.”

  Dominick glanced at the clock in the teacher’s lounge.

  2:03. I better hustle.

  “Gotta run,” he said over his shoulder to Zack.

  He slipped through the door and quick-stepped down the hall to his classroom. He closed the door behind him just as the bell rang.

  He smiled at the small class. There were only six students in sixth period AP English. There weren’t many kids interested in taking the toughest advanced English class.

  “So. Let’s continue our discussion of Lord of the Flies. Now, where were we?” He flipped his own copy open to the bookmark. “Ah. Right. We were talking about how both Ralph and Simon are perceived as ‘good’ characters, but—”

  CRACK! CRACK! CRACK!

  Three sharp reports from down the hall.

  Dominick stopped, held his hand up, and listened.

  There were two more reports. Louder. Closer.

  Gunshots?

  School shootings in Jonesboro, Arkansas; Springfield, Oregon; and Columbine High School had put safety issues at the front of many teachers’ minds, but there was no security in place at Middle Falls High, and no locks on the classroom doors yet.

  Dominick ran to the light switch and turned the overheads off.

  We went over this at the safety meeting. Pull the shades. Turn the lights off. Keep the students in the room.

  He turned to the class. Adrenaline rushed through him, but he kept his voice calm.

  “Not sure what’s happening, but let’s take proper precautions. Doug, pull the shades down. Let’s make it as dark as possible in here. Everyone else, let’s get you into the closet.”

  He ran to the locked closet at the back and fumbled for his keys. His hands were sweaty and the adrenaline made his hands shake. He got the closet open and hustled the five girls inside. He saw that Doug was pulling the last shade down.

  “Hustle up, Doug. Let’s see if we can get all of us in the closet.”

  The classroom door burst open.

  Gerald Fleischer, a boy Dominick had taught in an English class the year before, strode in. He had two pistols in his hand, which he held horizontal to the ground, like tough guys do in movies.

  Dominick glanced to his right. Doug had frozen in place. The closet door was still open.

  Michelle Landry made a small “Eek!” of terror, but reached out and slammed the door shut.

  The color ran out of Doug’s face. Nowhere to run to, nowhere to hide.

  Dominick willed his legs to take one tentative step toward Gerald Fleischer.

  Gerald swung both guns to bear on Dominick.

  “Oh, hey, Mr. D.,” Gerald giggled. “Sorry to fuck with your class schedule. You were a good teacher. I’m not gonna kill you. But,” he waggled the gun in his left hand at Doug, “this guy’s gotta go.”

  Without a thought, Dominick launched himself.

  Time slowed.

  Dominick had run track in high school. That had been more than twenty years ago.

  As Dominick dived toward Gerald, arms outstretched, the shooter’s head turned, eyes wide. He jumped in surprise, which caused him to pull both triggers simultaneously. The bullet from the gun in his left hand ripped through the blinds, shattering the window. The bullet from the right slammed into Dominick’s throat.

  Dominick jerked in a half-circle, a crimson spray arcing across the room.

  “Goddamn it, Mr. D! I told you I didn’t want to fuck with you!”


  Dominick lay face-down on the cool linoleum. A pool of blood spread toward his eye, but he couldn’t move.

  As consciousness faded, his last words were, “I’m so sorry, Em ...”

  Coming Soon:

  The Death and Life of Dominick Davidner

  Preorder Available Now

  Author’s Note

  I want to make a confession. There were times I wished I had never chosen to write this book. And, an update: Now that it’s completed, I am so glad I did.

  This story began, as so many of mine do, as I was walking my Chocolate Labs, Sadie and Hershey. Dawn and I were living in the bucolic town of Orting, Washington, at the time. In front of our house was a small, man-made lake. It was perfect for late night jaunts with the pups. One night, just as I was finishing the first book in this series—The Unusual Second Life of Thomas Weaver—I was walking the dogs around the lake and a phrase popped into my head: The redemption of Michael Hollister.

  I actually laughed out loud at the idea my subconscious was putting forward. It was ridiculous. I had just spent seventy-thousand odd words creating Michael Hollister as a horrible human being. The last thing I wanted to do was spend more time with him. I knew how I was going to deal with him in that book, and I wasn’t unhappy to put him in my rear view mirror.

  But then, there’s the issue of ignoring your muse. The idea wouldn’t leave me alone. When I woke up in the morning, the first thing that popped into my head was those five words: the redemption of Michael Hollister.

  So, I cast caution to the wind, and on a whim, I put a brief teaser at the end of Thomas Weaver, and then the fateful words: “Coming Soon: The Redemption of Michael Hollister.”

  I was committed. At that point, I had to write it. The problem was, I had no idea how to even begin to redeem Michael. I didn’t just dislike him, I hated him. He had killed my favorite character—Carrie Copeland—from that first book. Even worse, I didn’t know how to redeem him believably. I couldn’t see a path to transitioning from an animal-torturing, murderer to a decent human being.

  So, I didn’t start on it immediately. Instead, I took my bride, threw a few suitcases in our car and drove all the way around the United States. That book, I knew how to write, and I did: A Lap Around America. Happily, when that book came out, it sold very well.

  That was just the excuse I needed to put off writing about Michael Hollister. I took another nice long drive—this time across The Alaska Highway—and wrote a book about it as well, called A Lap Around Alaska.

  And then, I was out of excuses, and I still had no idea how to help Michael find redemption. I did the only thing I knew to do. I sat down and just began to write.

  Somehow, my subconscious, which had been whispering that title to me for a year at that point, came to my rescue, and Michael’s story unfolded, one small piece at a time. When I started the book, I still didn’t have any idea where it was going to go, or what Michael’s redemption might look like.

  Since I’m assuming you’ve just read that book, you know now that all my dithering was for nothing. I got there. You know what? In the end, I think Michael is my favorite character I’ve ever written. I’m sure there are lessons in here for me, and eventually, I will figure out what they are.

  Now, to the important business of thanking all of the people who helped me bring this book to fruition.

  First, is my beautiful bride, Dawn Adele. Many writers thank their spouses, but often, it’s just because said spouses left them alone long enough to get the book done. Dawn did so much more than that for me on this book. Every time I was stuck, she and I would talk the situation over, and she would have an excellent idea. For instance, that crisis at the end of the second act, where it looks like Michael is going to have to stay away from Hartfield Academy? All Dawn. She saved my bacon at many turns, and many blind alleys in this book. It’s as she often says herself, “It’s like I’m practically writing the whole book for you.” She’s funny that way.

  This is the third book I’ve worked on with my talented editor, Doreen Martens. People think of an editor as someone who corrects grammar, but Doreen does so much for me. For instance, at one point in the manuscript, I had Michael waking up in 1968, instead of 1966. So, when Michael turned the television on in the tree house, I had him seeing an Archies cartoon. Doreen is thorough enough to notice that Michael couldn’t have been watching that show in 1966 and saved me from embarrassing myself. She also tirelessly corrects my grammar, too. Especially that whole lay/laid/lying thing, which I can never keep straight. I truly enjoy working with Doreen, and I love that she makes me look like a better writer than I actually am.

  The cover for the book was designed by Maria Navillo Saravio from BeauteBook. She also designed the cover for Thomas Weaver, and so she is responsible for much of the branding of this series, which I happen to love. She is also infinitely patient with me as I suggest minor tweaks and changes that no one but me would ever notice.

  My proofreader on this book, my last set of eyes, if you will, was Debra Galvan, who has been with me so long, she is now a certified part of my publishing family. When I give her a book to look over, I think it is perfect. When she gives it back to me, it is always closer to that elusive goal.

  I dedicated this book to my writing friend Terry Schott, who serves as the first set of eyes on everything I write. When I doubted I would ever finish this book, he was telling me it was good, and worthwhile. I owe him so much for his support.

  I also had a wonderful team of beta readers, including Jeff Hunter, John Draper, Dianne Raymond, Terry Vickers, Laura Heilman, and, I know others, who I am forgetting. I apologize. I always intend to keep a better list, and then forget. Mea culpa.

  I almost forgot. Would you like to get a free ebook from me? I am happy to send you one if you sign up for my New Release Newsletter here: http://bit.ly/1cU1iS0. I only send emails out when I have a new book coming out, so you’ll hear from me four or five times a year. Of course, you can drop off the list at any time. Just for joining, though, I’ll send you a free copy of my novel, Rock ‘n Roll Heaven, about a small time rocker who dies and goes to the title place and meets his idols, including Buddy Holly, Elvis Presley, Janis Joplin, Roy Orbison, and more. It’s a fun story, and I would love to send it to you.

  Up next, is The Death and Life of Dominick Davidner. I am looking forward to getting that out to you, as well. If you liked this story, please click over to the next page, and I’ll tell you a bit about a few of my other books.

  If you’d really like to help me, please go here and leave an honest review. It doesn’t matter how long, or what the star ranking is, every review helps.

  More than anything, I want to thank you for being a reader. You are what lets me live my dream of being a writer.

  Shawn Inmon

  Seaview, Washington

  October, 2017

  Feels Like the First Time – Shawn’s first book, about falling in love with the girl next door in the 1970’s, losing her for 30 years, and miraculously finding her again. It is filled with nostalgia for a bygone era of high school dances, first love, and making out in the backseat of a Chevy Vega.

  Both Sides Now – It’s the same story as Feels Like the First Time, but told from Dawn’s perspective. It will surprise no one that first love and loss feels very different to a young girl than it did for a young boy.

  Rock ‘n Roll Heaven – Small-time guitarist Jimmy “Guitar” Velvet dies and ends up in Rock ‘n Roll Heaven, where he meets Elvis Presley, Buddy Holly, Jim Morrison, and many other icons. To his great surprise, he learns that heaven might need him more than he needs it.

  Second Chance Love – Steve and Elizabeth were best friends in high school and college, but were separated by a family tragedy before either could confess that they were in love with the other. A chance meeting on a Christmas tree lot twenty years later gives them a second chance.

  Life is Short – A collection of all of Shawn’s short writings. Thirteen stories, rangin
g from short memoirs about summers in Alaska, to the satire of obsessed fans.

  A Lap Around America – Shawn and Dawn quit good jobs and set out to see America. They saved you a spot in the car, so come along and visit national parks, tourist traps, and more than 13,000 miles of the back roads of America, all without leaving your easy chair.

  A Lap Around Alaska – Have you ever wanted to drive the Alaska Highway across Canada, then make a lap around central Alaska? Here’s your chance! Includes 100 photographs!

  The Unusual Second Life of Thomas Weaver – Book one of the Middle Falls Time Travel Series. Thomas Weaver led a wasted life, but divine intervention gives him a chance to do it all over again. What would you do, if you could do it all again?

  The Death and Life of Dominick Davidner – Book Three of the Middle Falls Time Travel Series. Dominick Davidner gambles with his life and loses. When he opens his eyes again, he is in his eight year old body, but the pain of losing Emily, the love of his life, is strong. What can an eight year old boy in love do when his future wife is a thousand miles away, and has no idea who he is?