Wednesday, January 28, 2015

Horn Pond

Flash Frenzy – Round  52 
1/24/15 – due by 1/25/15 – 6:00 PM MST
360 words  or less - Actual word count - 359
Story Posted Here


Before pale men swarmed from wooden ships in Boston Harbor, the Salmon Falls River flowed uninhibited from Great East Lake through rocky ravines and low depression marshland to the Gulf of Maine. 

To satiate their voracious appetites, these white men of God harvested the King’s Pines overlooking it, mined silver near its banks, and built mills of every kind beside it.  To ensure a reliable flow, dams were constructed.  One dam created the 227 acre body of water known as Horn Pond.

Franklin stood on his dock and looked out across Horn Pond.  He loved this pond.  It had been part of his life since he could remember.  He learned to swim in this pond.  He learned to fish, paddle a canoe, and water ski on its surface.

It was below the pond’s rippling surface Franklin found true bliss.  His father had given him snorkeling gear one summer.   Franklin spent countless hours exploring the shallow quiet depths along its shores.  He learned where the big fish hid among the ledge filled crevices of the north end.  The summer he turned 13, he found the old silver mine and let his darker side take over his soul. 

This would be the summer of his first kill.  Many bodies, many years later Franklin smiled, amazed that he had not been caught when that obnoxious brat from across the lake awakened in the canoe and began screaming.  He realized as he swung the paddle, his plan had only covered the murder, not the disposal. Panic ridden moments passed until he remembered the old silver mine buried under 25 feet of water.

Franklin turned to look up the north end of the pond.  Bouncing on the turbulent surface under darkening skies, a knot of emergency craft floated directly over the mine.

Cutting off some of the mooring line to the Ski-Nautique, he tied two cinder blocks to it, tied the other end around his neck,  and climbed into the boat.  Moments later, over the deepest part of Horn Pond, Franklin held the blocks close and jumped into the lake.

The next day eight year old Melissa across the pond killed her first Loon.
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Image courtesy of Ashwin Rao

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