Mr. Pearson lived with his eldest daughter in a worn down, white washed house on the corner of Mason Street where it intersected with CR 208. In the evenings after she’d made him dinner, Mr. Pearson would sit on the porch swing and wave at the passing cars. Usually he was in bed by nightfall, but one late October day, with the wind blowing in from the north, cooling the humid air and chasing off the mosquitoes, Mr. Pearson stayed on the poach well past his bedtime and dozed while reminiscing about his younger days, when cigarettes were an easy enjoyment every adult participated in without justification.

Later, Mr. Pearson never specified if it was his own snoring or the squeal of rubber tires that work him. Either way, Mr. Pearson was the only witness to a red, low slung sports car that barely managed to scream its way through the Mason Road turn, only to over correct and somersault three times, two on the ground and once in mid-air, before landing in the arms of the large grandfather oak tree half a mile down the road.

The county sheriff arrived first, followed closely by the ambulance and fire truck, but by that time Mr. Pearson had helped the car’s only passenger, a young woman, out of the driver’s seat and a safe distance away from the smoking and growling vehicle. Police and paramedics quickly realized the young woman was more drunk than hurt. After loudly losing her liquid dinner, dessert, after-dinner drinks, and nightcap behind the ambulance, she became less drunk but more ill-tempered. Voices raised, threats came out, and after a brief visit to the hospital Maëlle Thierry Bellany was booked in county jail under much duress. Only Mr. Pearson watched the tow truck and firefighter crew pry the disfigured car from the ancient oak. We can also presume that it is Mr. Pearson who related the story to Madeline Gabrielle Martel when she arrived later to inspect the injured tree, though it is entirely possible the tree related the story itself.

Next Chapter: Chapter 1