Chapter 29 by Matt Wall
“I know, Mother.” Billy said, rolling his eyes. He held his cell phone to his ear, while he sat in the break room, stirring a cup of coffee. “So, I don’t have much time on my break. Are we going to have lunch together or not?”
“I’m clear on the other side of town, doing some shopping,” she said. “Why don’t we push until tomorrow.”
Billy smiled. “Sounds good, Mom. Love you.”
A voice startled him from behind. “It’s nice that you love your mother.”
He spun around and was happy to see Eden. “Hey! Are you on break? You wanna grab some lunch?”
“I am on break,” she said, shyly.
“My date just cancelled on me.”
“Your mother?” Eden giggled.
“Yes,” Billy laughed. “I swear it is not a reflection on my manners.”
She laughed as well. “I didn’t think it would be.” She sat down across from him.
“Look, we have been trying to get together for a while now. And I would really love it if we could…”
At the sound of a text message on Eden’s phone, the conversation was halted. “Give me one second. Sorry.”
“No worries.”
Her faced changed from happy and carefree to sadness and disappointment. “I’m really sorry, Billy, but I have to go.”
“What is it?”
“I can’t talk about it. Not now.” She stood up and was half way out the door.
“But, wait…” Billy said as she disappeared around the corner. “That’s just great.” He finished his coffee and walked into the hallway. At the sight of his step-father and boss, Ed Gold, Billy turned to the nearest counter and pretended to look at patient charts, but was still locked on Ed out of the corner of his eye.
Ed was rushing around and putting on his blazer. He was flustered. Then he yelled at his secretary, “I won’t be in for the rest of the day. What part of that don’t you understand? Clear my schedule, now!” And with those words, Ed was in an elevator, heading to the parking garage.
Billy knew that this was his chance to get inside Ed’s office and hopefully find something incriminating.
Lol is this a full out novel?
How many words is this in total?
I have never written it as a novel. It was more of an experiment in a Daily serial to see if people liked the format. It’s pretty soap opera-ish. I have another one that I will be putting up here starting Friday that will be every two weeks and is much more pulpy. I’ll see how that one does and then decide if I want to continue doing stuff like this.