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First Night in Jennings Grove
A "Guest Quarters" Story
By
Jeff Parish

Vernon's grip tightened on the steering wheel. Vinyl creaked in protest. He tried to ignore the sound, with better success than his attempts to block out his wife's nagging, infant son's screaming and the CD of children's songs playing on the stereo for the tenth time. The sun hung just above the horizon, making him squint through the windshield to make anything out.

"Vern, slow down!" Cheryl yelled as he slalomed through yet another curve on Farm-to-Market Road 197.

He bit his tongue and just stopped himself from stomping on the brake pedal, although he did tap it hard enough that his wife's seatbelt locked as the station wagon lurched to a more moderate speed. Alexis laughed and clapped her hands. Raymond's screams continued unabated.

"Five minutes ago, you were telling me to go faster," he muttered.

"What was that?"

"Nothing." He sighed and ran a hand across his head. His fingers traveled halfway down the back of his skull before encountering a fringe of brown hair. "Can't you do anything about Ray?"

"He's hungry, and he wants out of his car seat. If you'll pull over, I can feed him..."

"No. We've been in this stupid car for seven hours already, and we've stopped three times. We're nearly there; he can just wait."

An exasperated glottal hiss escaped from the back of Cheryl's throat, and she turned up the volume on the radio. "Down by the Station" was starting again. Vernon just knew little puffer bellies all in a row would haunt his every waking moment for the next week. The sacrifice was worth it, he guessed; Alexis had remained fairly quiet the whole trip, aside from complaining of hunger or a need to "go potty." Given the four-year-old's usual demeanor on road trips, that qualified as a minor miracle.

"Chug, chug, toot, toot, here we go!" his daughter belted, off-key as usual. Any other time, it would be cute. Now, it was just irritating. Vern turned the radio on. Static assaulted his ears, and he hit the scan button. Snippets of country music joined the attack.

"Daddy, I want kid songs!"

"Honey, I want to hear the radio for a while. You can listen to your kid songs later when you go to the store with Mommy."

"But I want it now!" She started to cry.

"Now, Vern, turn the CD back on. There's no need for this."

"Everybody, just shut up! I've had enough of your griping and your whining." Man, what I wouldn't give right now to wake up in the morning and be single again.

He punched the eject button on the stereo. He grabbed the offending disc and flung it to the back of the car like a Frisbee. Alexis' cry rose to a wail, which inspired her brother to even greater vocal feats. Vernon sniffed. Ray had dirtied his diaper. Figures, he thought. Cheryl folded her arms and glared at him through her oval-framed glasses. His right foot slowly pressed down, and the car picked up speed once more as he ground his teeth.

A metal building flashed by in a blur; he barely had time to register the words "Chicota Volunteer Fire Department." A sign pointing to County Road 36850 zipped past just as fast.

This time, he did slam on the brakes -- which promptly locked up.

The station wagon, its rear loaded down with boxes, swerved and slid across the road. Trees spun past the windshield like an autumnal kaleidoscope. The Camry whipped around and skidded into a shallow ditch on the opposite side of the highway. It tilted slightly to the right before dropping back onto all four wheels amid a chorus of squeaks from the suspension. Inside, the car was deathly quiet. Then everyone started yelling at once.

Raymond, of course, resumed his screaming. He could barely hear Alexis saying, "That was cool, Daddy! I want to do it again!"

"Vernon Edward Hamilton, what on earth were you thinking?" Cheryl shouted. "You could have killed all of us!"

He slowly relaxed his death grip from the steering wheel, put the transmission into park and rubbed his eyes with trembling hands. He sat there, breathing in ragged gasps for several minutes. He turned to his daughter.

"Sweetie, please hush." Turning, he leveled a warning finger at his wife. "Nobody's dead. No one's even hurt. The car's running fine. Yeah, it was stupid, but until something actually happens, keep your comments to yourself."

He glanced at the dashboard clock. "Look, it's nearly six. These people will be getting out of church soon. Let's get home and try to calm down so we don't make a bad impression on our new neighbors."

He dropped the car into drive and eased back out on the asphalt. Black lines showed the path of his car's wild ride. Waiting at the intersection for a couple of battered pickups to go by, he offered a silent prayer of thanks that no one had been hurt. This move was hard enough on everyone as it was; he didn't need to add injuries to the stress.

Vernon had been quite happy in his previous job at a small plastics company on the Texas Gulf Coast. Everyone in the shop worked hard, often performing the duties of two or three people because the owner didn't want the expense of adding to his headcount. Vernon didn't mind. It made for long hours but decent pay and a fair measure of job security. Or so he thought until Herb Franklin announced he was bankrupt, the company was shutting its doors for good, and he planned to move to South America with his secretary and all the money he could squeeze out of his business -- including, they found out later, the pension fund.

In the last six months, the Hamilton family had been forced to sell their home and move into a two-bedroom rat hole of an apartment while Vernon looked for another job and his wife bore their second child. With his experience, Houston should have been an easy place to land something. But, as Vernon gradually discovered, Franklin was not the most ethical of businessmen. Prospective employers took one look at his resume and moved on to the next candidate. The only consolation, small though it might be, was that his former coworkers were having similar difficulties.

As their money dwindled, they moved to a smaller rat hole and finally an efficiency that even rats turned their noses up at. Vernon started to wonder if their next home might be under an overpass when he got the call.

Ethan Roodschild, an old supervisor, had found work near the Oklahoma border at a place called Paris Industries. They made plastic swimming pools and fake Christmas trees. Ethan could use a good man on his crew.

"The pay's not as much as you're used to, but the cost of living is a lot lower up here," Ethan had said. "Are you interested?"

Vernon agreed to it on the spot. He'd start in three weeks, at the beginning of October. Cheryl wasn't thrilled, but she agreed they had to leave. It was only a matter of time before one of the gunshots they routinely heard at night put a bullet through their window. Ethan helped them find an old, two-bedroom farmhouse they could lease for only $300 a month. He even paid the deposit and first month's rent. Judging from the photos he sent, it wasn't much, but at least they had managed to take a step in the right direction.

Driving down this county road, Vernon listened to gravel crunching under his tires, smelled the dust his car kicked up and glanced sideways at his wife in the passenger seat. She chewed on a lock of her curly auburn hair, a sure sign of anxiety. The stress of the last half-year had taken its toll. A tall woman, she had always been thin and pale, but these days, Cheryl hovered on the verge of gaunt. Her usually penetrating stare had become a hollow-eyed gaze. She had her feet up on her seat, hugging her knees close to her chest as she hunched away from the screaming behind her.

I probably don't look any better, he thought. He had lost quite a bit of weight himself, but unlike his wife, his short, stocky frame had plenty to spare.

He reached over and patted her knee. "It'll be all right," he said softly. She shot a withering look at him. "Look, I'm sorry. I overreacted. You're right to be mad, and I'm a big, stupid jerk." Her face relaxed slightly, and she turned her frown back out the window. How long has it been since I've seen her smile?  He wondered.

They crested a hill and got their first look at their new home.

The community sat on the Red River, a collection of roughly a dozen homes and a small church tucked away on the northernmost point of Lamar County. The houses formed a large semicircle with Jennings Grove Primitive Baptist Church at its apex.

Vernon followed the looping road to the left, driving slowly as he looked for their house. Each residence had a large yard, at least an acre or more apiece. Alexis'll love that, he thought. A few sported tricycles, swing sets and other signs of children, but he couldn't see any people. This place looks like a ghost town, he thought and shivered. He pushed a switch on his door handle, and the window hummed as it rolled down.

Only the church showed signs of life. Stained-glass windows glowed with various saints and biblical scenes as twilight approached. As he cocked his head out the window, Vernon made out muffled strains of "In the Sweet By and By." A sign out front proclaimed this week's message as "The Outer Darkness, Where there is Weeping and Gnashing of Teeth." Well, now isn't that just cheerful?

"There it is," Cheryl said, pointing past his ear. He nodded and pulled into a driveway just past the church.

Knuckling his back as he climbed out of the car, he looked at the white house and grunted. The porch had been rebuilt recently, and some of the windows replaced, but no amount of cosmetics could hide the fact that this was an old broad of a house.

"The pictures didn't do this place justice. I'll bet it's at least sixty years old. They should be paying us to live here."

His wife barked a laugh, pulled Raymond from his car seat and wrapped him in a yellow-and-blue-striped blanket.

"I've got to feed him," she said, bouncing him on her shoulder. "Can you get Alexis and start unloading this stuff?"

"Sure." He opened his daughter's door and pushed the lever on her seatbelt. She squirmed in his grip. "Be still."

"I want Mommy," Alexis replied, arms folded and her bottom lip pooched out.

"Not right now. She's got to feed the baby."

"Aww, man." That was one of her new favorite phrases. "Can I go play on the swing?"

"What swing?"

"Over there, silly." She pointed behind the house, to the northwest corner of the property. Two ropes suspended a board from a branch of the biggest pecan tree he had ever seen. Even knowing it was there, he found the swing hard to pick out. The tree cast a nearly impenetrable shade in the dying daylight. I bet that thing's great for sitting under in the summer.

"Sure, sweetie. Just don't go anywhere else, and come up to the house if we call you, OK?"

"OK, daddy." She grabbed his leg in a bear hug before tearing across the yard to the tree and calling over her shoulder, "I love you."

"I love you, too."

When he got back to the house with an armload of books from the back of the car, Cheryl was sitting on the porch in a rocking chair, breastfeeding the baby.

"Cheryl, cover up or go inside. There's a church next door, for crying out loud."

"When someone complains, I'll cover up. There's no one around, Vern."

"Yeah, I noticed that. Kinda creepy, isn't it?"

"A little. Look, it's going to be dark soon. Could you hurry up and get that stuff out of the car?"

Shaking his head, Vernon walked up the porch. At least Cheryl had propped the door open and turned the lights on.

Floorboards creaked as he walked through the living room, only slightly muffled by a threadbare, green carpet. He could feel the hardened pad crumbling as he stepped. He wrinkled his nose at the dust and a musty odor that permeated the house, as if it has been shut up too long. Boxes and furniture covered most of the floor, often right in his path. He navigated the obstacle course and stepped through a curtained doorway on the far side of the room.

Pale yellow linoleum squeaked as he stepped into the kitchen. This room was slightly less cluttered, although several boxes marked "dishes" sat on the counter. He found a clear spot on the table and set his books down. He opened the refrigerator with some trepidation. The light came on and cold air drifted out, but as he suspected, it was empty. As he shut the fridge, its compressor kicked on, and the lights flickered.

What kind of wiring do they have in this place?

After the lights steadied, he noticed a cracked window between the fridge and stove that looked out onto another room. Puzzled, he walked in.

Someone had enclosed the back porch. Their washer and dryer sat in one corner, while their blue sleeper sofa and a desk bearing a TV and VCR occupied the far side. A door near the laundry area led into their only bathroom. A soft hiss and fwoomp made him jump. He turned to face a propane water heater in the near corner. Drawing a deep breath, he tried to steady himself. He blew sharply through his nose at the dull odor. It smelled like exhaust fumes he remembered from sitting on one of Houston's six-lane parking lots during rush hour.

He threaded his way through the two bedrooms that took up the rest of the house. Their beds had been set up and made, their dressers pushed against the wall, and boxes haphazardly perched on every flat surface available.

Ray slept in his mother's arms when Vernon walked back out on the porch.

"Don't spend any more time than you have to in the bathroom," he said. "The water heater's not venting right. I'll call the landlord tomorrow."

"Wonderful." She sighed, leaned back in her chair and closed her eyes.

He scratched his head. "Look, Cheryl, it was real nice of your brothers to load our stuff up and move it for us, but don't you think they could have been a little more careful about putting it up? And they ate everything we had in the fridge."

"You're right," she replied sharply. "It was nice of them. They didn't ask for any money, and if they want to take a little food, well, I think..."

What she thought remained a mystery as the bang of an opening door and a babble of voices cut her off. He glanced at his watch, which showed six.

"Church dismissed," he said. "You want to go meet the neighbors?"

"You go ahead, Vern. I'm tired, and I don't want to wake Ray up. I can meet them later."

"It's all right. I understand -- neither one of us has gotten any sleep lately. I'll join you in a little bit." He walked down the gravel driveway and glanced over his shoulder. Cheryl had resumed rocking, and Alexis was still swinging, hair and red skirt flying as she moved through the air. He smiled.

The congregation hadn't wasted any time in dispersing. A few had already passed his house by the time he reached the road. He watched the people as they headed home. Senior citizens looked to account for most of the Jennings Grove's residents, with younger couples making up maybe a third. Regardless of age, everyone moved with the same brisk stride while eyeing the setting sun.

A man and woman in their mid-thirties strode by, the husband carrying a girl about Alexis' age. Vernon waved.

"Hey, how you doing? My name's Vern Hamilton. My wife and I just moved in." He turned and waved at the porch. "What's your daughter's name? We've got a little girl about her age." When he turned back, the couple had already moved on.

He waved at another pair walking with a sullen teenage boy in tow. The woman waved back, and her husband nodded in a friendly fashion, but neither halted or even slowed.

Four more people passed without even glancing his way. That's it. I'm through being polite. When a middle-aged man in a suit and fedora walked by his driveway, Vernon snagged his arm and spun him around.

"What is the meaning of this?" he demanded. "Release me at once. Can't you see how late it is?"

"Look, man, I'm sorry to be rude, but we just moved in and no one will so much as talk to me. I had heard this was a friendly little place, but so far, everyone's acting like we've got the plague or something."

"Ah, the new family -- the Hamiltons, wasn't it?" His expression softened, and he smoothed his graying mustache with a thumb and forefinger. "My name is Travis Ware. I'm sort of the unofficial mayor around here. I'd be more than happy to speak with you in the morning, but I really must get inside. I suggest you do the same. It's almost dark, you know." He put a special emphasis on the last. Vernon frowned, released Travis' arm and watched him disappear into the deepening murk.

The breeze grew as he walked back up the driveway. It sighed in his ears, almost seeming to form words. The hair on the back of his neck tried to stand. Something's not right.

"Alexis!" he bellowed. "Get in the house now!"

She didn't answer. He ran up the driveway and into the house. Cheryl sat on their bed, Raymond cradled in her arms. "Do you know where a flashlight is?" he asked.

"That big one of yours is on the kitchen counter. Why?"

"I gotta go get Alexis," he called as he made his way to the kitchen. "She wouldn't come when I called. I guess she's having too much fun on that swing."

What she called his big flashlight was nearly a hand-held spotlight. He pointed it upward and clicked it on. Even with the lights on in the house, the flashlight threatened to blind him. Forgot I put new batteries in it before we moved.

Rubbing his eyes, he stormed out of the house and over to the tree.

"Alexis Nichole, you get in that house right now or so help me..."

She wasn't there.

He slapped a hand down on the plank, stopping it in mid-swing. The wood still felt warm.

"Alexis?" he whispered.

Wind gusted. Branches creaked overhead with a sound like a menacing chuckle. He swished the light back and forth. The beam sliced through darkness, but seemed reluctant to illuminate anything. He should have been able to see the house clearly, but his light fell short, offering only the barest hint of bushes underneath bedroom windows that glowed in the twilight.

The breeze dwindled and died, trailing off with a faint sigh. "Bye-bye, Daddy."

Vernon broke into a run, swinging his flashlight in wild arcs that offered glimpses of his new yard. Dashing behind the house, he barely turned in time to avoid a barbed wire fence. His foot caught on concrete stairs, and he fell against a silver beast hunkering against the fence, light skittering off to one side and landed in the grass to shine on the steps. His body draped itself over cool metal, and his head smacked down with a hollow bong.

Turning over, he slid down the propane tank and sat on the ground, his head banging the side once more. He winced at the bolt of pain that stabbed through his temples. A sob ripped free of his chest as he groped for the flashlight. His fingers brushed plastic, pushing the light away. He froze. Something glowed softly just beyond the light splashed on the wall in front of him. It looked like a pair of legs incased in white hose.

"Alexis? Honey, you scared me." A faint titter of laughter floated on the night.

He grabbed the flashlight and turned it toward her. A flurry of movement resolved itself into a crepe myrtle, its pale branches dancing in the breeze.

"Alexis! You stop this right now!"

Laughter answered him once more.

He started to turn, then jumped to face the other way at a shuddering thump. He jogged around the corner as the sound turned into a steady hum emanating from a window in the back room. He relaxed. Why is she running one of those air conditioners? It's not hot out here. Is she trying to waste electricity?

Light dimmed, flickered and died. Vernon shook his head. A blown fuse? Well, she'll have to deal with it for now. He turned the light away from the window and started back to the front porch. Maybe Alexis went this way.

Cheryl screamed as Raymond started to wail. He froze, turning his head from porch to window and back. He ventured a half-step toward the front when his wife screamed again.

Cursing, he spun on one heel and ran back to the steps. The knob turned, but the door wouldn't move when he pushed. He threw his shoulder at it, stumbling into the house as the door opened with a sharp creak. He turned his flashlight toward the TV. In his panic, Vernon thought it looked as though the darkness resisted the beam before it grudgingly parted to show his wife crouched on the floor, her body curled around the still-screaming baby. Her shirt hung tattered on her back. She sat as he approached, turning to face the light. A long scratch ran down her cheek.

"I w-w-wanted t-to see if the air conditioner worked, but when I turned it on, the lights went out." Her voice rose to a shriek. "Something tried to grab Ray!" Her voice cracked. She began to sob hysterically and rock back and forth.

"Sweetie, settle down. You probably just jumped when the circuit breaker tripped and nearly dropped him. I bet you tried to catch him, fell and ripped your shirt and scratched your face. There's nothing in here to grab the baby. Look, I'll go find the breaker box, and we'll get these lights back on."

She sniffed and nodded. Vernon turned and played the light along the walls. He knew that box was around here somewhere. Had he seen it in the bathroom? He took perhaps a half-dozen steps before his wife started yelling again. He whirled and pointed his light back in the corner.

This time, there was no doubt about it. Shadows visibly retreated from the light, uncoiling tendrils of darkness that retreated beyond the edges of the beam, dragging yellow and blue cloth with them. He thought he heard a faint growl. His eyes bulged. That was Ray's baby blanket! What is going on here?

He strode back to his wife. "Are you all right?"

She nodded and clutched at his pants leg. "You can't leave us again. Promise you won't leave us!"

"I promise," he said.

He pulled her hand free and pushed her back into a corner. He placed the flashlight on the desk and wedged it in place with the television so that the light made a pool around them. He sat next to his wife and drew his knees to his chest. Got to stay in the light, he thought. As he squirmed into place, Cheryl's head snapped up and her eyes widened in panic.

"Where's Alexis? Where's my little girl?"

"I don't know," he replied grimly. "I couldn't find her. Unless you want to go out there and look" -- she whipped her head side to side in denial -- "we're just going to have to hope for the best and wait 'til morning. We won't do her any good if we let whatever's out there get us."

She huddled in closer and continued rocking the baby. Ray eventually quieted and drifted off to sleep. Vernon realized Cheryl had done the same as her trembling stilled and her breathing evened. He waited several moments, then pushed her upright. Crouching, he reached out along the wall and tried to stand. Something cold and implacable grabbed his wrist and jerked him off balance. Vernon pulled back, his mouth drawn in a grimace as the grip bit into his flesh. He heaved and fell over as his watch band broke, landing on top of Cheryl, who bolted upright and grabbed his shirt.

"What are you doing? You promised you wouldn't leave!"

"I was going to try to find Alexis..."

"She's fine. You said she'd be fine until we could find her in the morning. You can't leave us here alone!"

"All right, all right," Vernon said, making gentle shushing noises. Cheryl gradually calmed and slid back into a fitful sleep.

He wrapped his arms around what remained of his family. Trying to ignore the pain in his bleeding wrist, he glared at the darkness. I never realized how bright Houston was. Light was everywhere in the city. Even at midnight, streetlights glowed, cars drove by and a few neighbors remained awake. But out here, light only remained while you created it. Darkness reined supreme everywhere else. Why do people always want to leave the city and come out here?

Vernon began to see patterns as the darkness writhed around them. It flowed like a river of night that created alien alphabets and pictures in its whirls and eddies. He even saw faces in that blackness, but looked away hurriedly, afraid of seeing a small, familiar visage looking back at him. Occasionally, tendrils of shadow ventured toward them, only to whip back from the light.

Afterward, he could never pinpoint the moment he drifted off to sleep. One minute, he was listening to the slow, steady breathing of his wife and son while gazing at the midnight kaleidoscope around them, and the next, he was jerking his cheek off his wife's hair to look at the ring of light, certain it had grown smaller while they dozed. But everyone was still here. He leaned back and gazed at Cheryl. The light created a halo around her, outlining the edges of her body in a soft glow. His eyes followed the line from her head down her shoulder to her arm, which rested on one hip that led down her leg and to her foot...

Vernon's eyes widened. Her foot was gone, slipped into the shadows.

Slowly reaching across her, he grabbed Cheryl's knee and pulled. She stirred and murmured, but didn't awake. Sweat beaded on his forehead. Her foot wouldn't budge. With a grunt of effort, he pulled as hard as he could. He caught a glimpse of her ankle before her leg snapped straight and disappeared to the calf.

Eyes popping open, Cheryl screamed. She clutched Ray, muffling his own cries against her chest. Her leg sawed back and forth, dragging her a little further into the darkness with each pass. It twisted, and she flopped over onto her belly. She started sliding faster. She extended her arms, pushing the baby toward him. Arms wrapped around his torso, Vernon shook his head in mute denial.

"Take him! Take Raymond!" She jerked back until darkness hid everything below her armpits. "Don't let it get him! Take your son!"

His gaze flickered between his wife's anguished face and the squealing infant in her outstretched hands. He unclenched one fist gripping his shirt and hesitantly reached for Raymond. She slid back to her neck, and he jerked his hand back. She kept screaming for him to take his son. Raymond squalled. Vernon started to reach out again and froze as the night claimed its prize and wrenched her from sight. Her screams cut short.

Tears screaming down his cheeks, Vernon groped in his pool of light until a tiny hand grabbed his finger. He snatched his son against his chest and rocked until Ray's cries subsided.

"You got her!" he yelled. His voice cracked. "Isn't that enough? Leave us alone!"

The darkness, apparently unmoved, and still not sated, continued its black dance, circling his illuminating shelter like coyotes circling a campfire.

***

They came for him just after dawn, once the sun made it safe again.

Travis Ware and a group of men, all still dressed in their Sunday finest, poured in through the open back door. They stood in silence, staring at Vernon, who sat with the sleeping infant in one hand and the weakening flashlight clutched in the other.

"There, I told you at least one of them would make it," Travis said. "Congratulations, Mr. Hamilton. You survived your first night in Jennings Grove. Few who move here do."

One of the men -- the one with the sullen teenager -- stepped forward, hand extended. Vernon remained motionless until the man touched him. He swung the flashlight into his nose, which collapsed with a crunch, and lifted the light above his head once more. The man clutched his ruined nose with one hand and balled the other into a fist. Travis gripped his arm.

"Now, now, Brother Marvin, that's no way to welcome a new neighbor. I believe a little understanding is in order. Remember the state we found you in after your first night?" Marvin nodded and stepped back. "Now, Mr. Hamilton, you can put that down. It's dawn. There's nothing to harm you now."

He slowly lowered the flashlight to the floor and stood, blinking, as he gazed at the men gathered around him.

"How? Why?" his voice trailed off, but Travis seemed to understand.

"Everyone asks that, but I doubt anyone really knows. Myself, I think this is just one of those places in the world where man hasn't tamed the darkness." He shrugged. "The night has always been a source of terror. The Bible speaks of 'outer darkness;' Shakespeare mentioned a 'wild night.' Here, we see the truth of it."

"But why do you stay?"

"Why, because it's home." He seemed genuinely shocked. "Where else would we go?"

Vernon nodded. He looked down at the boy sleeping in his arms. Home. Having lost everything else, it might be nice to at least have that. "Will I..." He swallowed. "Will I ever see my wife and daughter again?"

"Probably, but it's best to ignore them.

"Look, Mr. Hamilton, you need to clean up and get some rest. I understand you work the night shift, and tonight will be your first on the job."

He ushered all the men out and turned to shut the door. "Mr. Hamilton, we will have an official celebration tomorrow at noon -- it's so seldom we get people who can live here -- but I want to be the first to welcome you to Jennings Grove."

END

Jeff Parish is a 30-something native Texan. He and his wife have a girl and two boys. He has been writing since middle school, where he concentrated mostly on (bad) fantasy tales and (even worse) poetry. His writing skills developed over time, much to his delight and the relief of everyone he forced to read his work, and he gravitated to prose over poetry. He even decided to make a living as a writer, starting work at a small newspaper in Greenville, Texas, nearly a decade ago. Since then, he's worked at several papers of varying sizes, including the Dallas Morning News, Galveston County Daily News and three years at The Paris News. His last newspaper job was as managing editor of two weeklies in Rockwall County. His newspaper career was suffocated in its sleep in February 2006 after he realized journalism might be a noble profession, but slowly starving his family to death was not. He took a job in internal communications for a helicopter manufacturer in the Dallas area, where his primary responsibility is still writing -- and editing -- an internal newspaper. The best thing about his job (aside from a healthy paycheck) is that it gives him time to write things like "First Night in Jennings Grove," something the erratic schedule of a newspaper doesn't allow.

Story by Jeff Parish, Copyright 2006
Photo by Rory Clark, Stopped Motion Photography, Copyright 2006