Cleve Taylor
Bio
Published author of three books: Ricky Pardue US Marshal, A Collection of Cleve's Short Stories and Poems, and Johnny Duwell and the Silver Coins, all available in paperback and e-books on Amazon. Over 160 Vocal.media stories and poems.
Stories (164)
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Eye For an Eye
Eye For an Eye Sheryl and Royce were living the good life in the cabin they called home on the East Bank of Toledo Bend lake. Sheryl has a business of making and selling homemade jams and jellies using recipes handed down to her by her grandmother. Her blackberry, muscadine, and mayhaw jams, cooked down and put into eight ounce Bell jars, carried her own private label complete with a drawing she had made of a crawfish opening one of her jam jars.
By Cleve Taylor 4 years ago in Fiction
Ransomware Consequences
Ransomware Consequences Judith once referred to Wade as a Paladin, which Wade took as a compliment, although the label did not really apply to him. Historically Paladins served only the Holy Roman Emperor, Charlemagne, while at the moment, Wade served only himself and his passions. He once had served at the pleasure of his country, but today he was more like Richard Boone's character in the old TV series "Have Gun Will Travel" except Wade's gun was not for hire to just anyone, and Paladin was not his name.
By Cleve Taylor 4 years ago in Fiction
The Green Light Inn
Green Light Inn Damn, it's still here. The namesake green light blinked to catch the attention of passing traffic, but with Interstate 81 carrying most of the North South traffic in the Shenandoah Valley, US 11, and the smaller state and county roads mostly served as feeders carrying local farmers and other residents to settlements and villages never heard of by the long haulers driving on the Interstate down in the valley. The Green Light Inn sat on one of those feeder roads leading to the village of Ingersol in the foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains.
By Cleve Taylor 4 years ago in Fiction
Rabbit Stew
Rabbit Stew Locals and weathermen all said that this year was the coldest on record for Cleveland and the surrounding area. Teresa had no trouble believing that as she carefully maneuvered through fresh snow, knee deep in places, as she followed rabbit tracks, hoping to capture the cottontail as it flailed in the soft snow. She had read somewhere that rabbits lost most of their maneuverability in fresh snow over six inches deep, and the forested snowscape in front of her certainly qualified. If successful at capturing it by hand, Teresa planned to surprise her invalid grandmother with rabbit stew.
By Cleve Taylor 4 years ago in Fiction
To Each His Own
To Each His Own Everyone has need of a quiet place. Whether figurative or real, there comes a time when enough little things pile on that one needs a quiet place that allows those accumulated small burdens to sort themselves out, get organized, prioritized, diminished and mostly discarded.
By Cleve Taylor 4 years ago in Humans
Shark Bait
Shark Bait Garrett sat at the red light on Bel Pre Road, waiting for a green light so he could turn right on Georgia Avenue to pick up the Inter County Connector, a half mile to the north. As he waited, the radio aired Bobby Darin’s oldie, “Mack the Knife''. The lines, “Oh the shark dear, has such teeth dear, and he keeps them pearly white,” brought a smile to his lips. “How appropriate,” he thought, “We predators need to stick together. There’s a Great White Shark on his way to West Virginia with a big surprise for a bully boy.”
By Cleve Taylor 4 years ago in Fiction
Cash Stash, Part 2 of Doppelganger
Cash Stash, Part 2 of Doppelganger After giving Marjorie her father's cash stash of $37,360 which I had been given by a friend of her late father who had mistook me for him because I was his doppelganger, or he was mine, whichever, I became curious as to how her father had come upon that money and why it had been secreted away. How I came to be in possession of the money I described in my journal under the heading Doppelganger, and won't repeat myself here.
By Cleve Taylor 4 years ago in Fiction
Doppelganger
Doppelganger I have always heard that everyone has a doppelganger, that is someone who looks just like them, someone who would be mistaken for you if seen by someone who knew you well. However I had never thought of it as a flipped idea, that is, that I was the doppelganger of someone else. I guess that is normal, since people in general think in terms of the things around them, not in terms of the things they are around.
By Cleve Taylor 4 years ago in Fiction
Uncovered
Uncovered For the past several weeks Faith had felt ill at ease, her sixth sense working overtime, telling her that someone was watching her. She hadn’t had these feelings since Hurricane Katrina had interrupted her undercover stint at the Charity Hospital in New Orleans where she was developing evidence against highly placed hospital officials in a fraud and corruption case involving millions of misdirected stolen dollars. Katrina interrupted that case just as it interrupted the lives of all the inhabitants of New Orleans.
By Cleve Taylor 4 years ago in Fiction
Mrs. Frye's Pear Tree
Mrs. Frye's Pear Tree Mrs. Frye's pear tree was exactly three blocks from my home on my route to school. I remember well walking down the street, often with my nose in a book or doing multiplication tables in my head, taking a left on Marshall Street for one block, turning right on McIntyre Street at Homer's, the neighborhood store where cokes, Butterfingers, and Big Chief writing tablets cost a nickel apiece. Comic books were a dime, but the owner would let us display and trade our comic books on his front steps.
By Cleve Taylor 4 years ago in Fiction
