The Secret of the Stones by Ernest Dempsey (reading fiction .TXT) 📕

He and Allyson got out and looked around; the neighborhood was completely lifeless save for the stereotypical random dog barking in the distance. Even for a Thursday, it was unusually inactive. Sean supposed the outrageous late-night board games would have to wait for the weekend for the suburbanites. It was not a life he’d been interested in pursuing.

Most of his friends from college had made such a life change. The endless parties and sleepless lifestyle had been traded in for minivans with soccer balls on the back window and family nights watching wholesome television. For people who had, at one point, been persuaded to take a spur-of-the-moment trip to the beach, six hours away, spontaneity now represented itself in an all-expenses-paid venture to the local fast food playground. On nights of true exhilaration, the couple might be allowed a quick visit to the local video store to rent a movie, though with the advent of Netflix, that inconvenience had been remedied, removing the necessity to pack up the car with the kids and go out.

Sean saw some of those people on the rare occasion when they could find a babysitter. They would always pester him with the same questions: “When are you going to settle down? Don’t you want kids? Isn’t it time for you to be getting married?”

His responses had always been to the point and not the least bit sensitive. Though he was not a mean person or in any way cruel, marriage and family was a topic that simply annoyed Sean. He was always quick to point out that if he wanted to go to a movie, he simply looked up the show times online and went. If he wanted to go out for dinner, he just got in his car and drove to whichever restaurant he chose. Freedom, he always explained, was far better than changing diapers or watching those annoying kids’ TV shows.

There was always the same counterargument, too. “Don’t you want to carry on your name?” they would say. To which he would always assure them that there were plenty of Wyatts in the world to take care of that problem.

He wasn’t a loner, just an island of sorts. Maybe he just hadn’t met the right girl. Among the primary annoyers was his father, constantly nagging about the injustice Sean was doing to his parents by not giving them any grandchildren. This, though bothersome, always made him laugh a little bit. His father’s accusation was that he was too selfish, to which Sean wholeheartedly admitted. Ironically, his dad would always say, “Don’t you want any kids so that when you are older you will have someone to take care of you?”

Sean didn’t feel the need to point out the ironic absurdity in that argument. The conversations always ended with his father not understanding and Sean being content to let the older man remain frustrated. The need to procreate was something the younger Wyatt did not possess or simply ignored.

Now, he stood in the middle of what surely must have been the capital of the nuclear family. It was like an updated version of something out of a 1950s TV show. Allyson interrupted his thoughts. “This the place?” she asked and pointed to a two-story ranch-style home that stuck out like a sore thumb in the midst of cookie cutter urban development.

“Yeah.” He left the car and strode purposefully up the walkway toward the front door. Allyson followed less confidently behind.

Lights were still on in what he assumed to be the living room and in a few other windows upstairs. As he approached the porch, he could see a television on inside. “Looks like she’s awake,” Allyson observed.

“She probably won’t sleep well for a while,” he empathized.

As the two stepped up to the door, a cat appeared in the glass partition of the doorframe. The animal looked at the visitors as if he were a butler receiving guests. Sean rang the doorbell, and a few moments later, the door cracked open slightly. A woman, probably in her midfifties, judging by the streaks of gray in her thick brown hair, peeked around the corner just below a latched chain.

“Yes?”  Her voice strained like it was an effort to speak, much less be cordial.

“Mrs. Borringer, my name is Sean Wyatt, and I was an associate of your husband’s. Would it be all right if my colleague and I came in for a minute?”

“You were a friend of Frank’s?” Her question came from a suspicious face.

“No, ma’am,” he answered. “I wouldn’t lie to you and say I was. I met him a few times and referred to him for a few questions on occasion. I work for the IAA.”

“I know who you work for, Mr. Wyatt. My husband had a great deal of respect for you. I’d hoped you would come by eventually. Please, do come in.” Her slight English accent had become more prevalent since her mood seemed to have lifted slightly.

She unlatched the chain on the door and opened it wide for the two of them to enter. “Please excuse the mess; quite a lot of things to do the last week or so since the incident.”

Mrs. Borringer stood to the side to let the two visitors in. She was casually dressed, wearing a pair of khaki pants and an Atlanta Braves sweater. The woman must have been a neat freak. There were a few boxes lying about, a small stack of letters on the table, and a small array of baking pans filled with various foods, presumably brought over by well-wishers and mourners. Hardly in disorder, though.

“Please, come in.” She closed the door and locked it behind them, ushering the newcomers to a sitting room near a