Solcar - 1. Avalon 2005

Colton felt drawn to the little bookstore with the beautifully carved, hand-painted wood sign above the door. It was near his apartment in Chelsea, and he must have walked by it hundreds of times before without really noticing it. But he had never experienced the strange feeling that now enveloped him and compelled him to enter the place. He stepped inside, drawn by some energy that tugged him towards a table marked ―Under $10.00― the deep discount stuff. Mostly trashy romance novels, self-help paperbacks, and Book-of-the-Month cardboard cover editions. But amidst the jumbled contents on the wood surface, one small, leather-bound book drew his attention.

Gently picking it up and opening it to a random page, the attractive young man experienced a sense of déjà vu. The story was taken from his past: it was the tale of Cameron Scott, the story of a lanky, blond fourteen-year-old on the verge of manhood. The recounting of a childhood family trip, of warm sand and blue waters, and a little girl building a sand castle next to the boy. As he read the page in front of him, he realized it recounted in minute detail the events of that fateful summer day.

Intrigued, he decided to buy the book. After stopping at the Starbucks next door for a latte, he crossed the street, walking towards the small urban park and playground around the corner. The bench faced inwards, towards the vegetation somehow thriving amidst the concrete jungle surrounding it. Opening the small leather-bound book again, he read of the day at the beach.

•••

“Cam, can we go get some ice cream before we leave?” the pretty five-year-old girl asked her big brother.

‘Sure thing, Princess, I’ll take you now if you’re done with your sand castle. Mom, Dad, we’re heading over to Buccaneer’s to get some ice cream, okay? Can you pick us up there when you’re ready to go?”

“Are you guys riding back to Philly in your bathing suits? You don’t want to stop at the beach house to clean up?” Their mother raised an eyebrow to punctuate her question.

“Nah, we’ll take our shirts and towels and rinse at the outdoor shower by the Lifeguard Station.”

“Sweetheart, you listen to your brother, okay?”

“Yes, Mommy.”

The fourteen-year-old kid held his little sister’s hand as they walked to the boardwalk shower to rinse the sand off their bodies. After patting themselves down with their beach towels, they walked the four blocks to the ice cream parlor. The warm sun and the slight afternoon breeze had them pretty dry by the time they reached their destination.

“What do you want today, Princess? Your usual?”

The little girl gazed at her brother with her big blue eyes wide open and a smile on her face. She nodded.

“You got it! Hi, could we please have a small cup of vanilla bean with peanut butter topping and two scoops of Pirate Praline on a sugar cone?”

“Coming right up, handsome.” The older teenage girl behind the counter winked at him. Her comment and her flirty smile made the boy blush.

“Yummy! Thank you, Cam! I love you.”

“I love you too, Princess; let’s sit on the bench outside and wait for Mom and Dad.”

The ride home on Black Horse Pike was almost twice as long as it would have been on the Atlantic City Expressway; Cameron’s father liked the secondary road twisting through Southern New Jersey, so that was always their route. The boy sat up front in the passenger seat while his sister had fallen asleep with her head on their mother’s lap in the back.

“Hun, we need gas; I’m going to stop and fill up the tank in May’s Landing. We can take a bathroom…”

The father never finished his sentence. He had turned around to look at his wife, missed the stop at the intersection with US Highway 40, and an eighteen-wheeler broadsided the car.

Cameron woke up sweating and with tears streaming down his face. He had experienced the nightmare again: the crunching of metal, the blood, the emergency personnel, and the sound of sirens. He had woken up in a hospital bed, and the doctor assured him he was fine, not even a broken bone. As always in the dream, Granpa was holding his hand. When he asked where he was and where his sister was, the man seemed to grow older in front of him.

“They are gone, Cam. All three died in the accident.”

•••

By the time he finished the two pages covering Cameron’s day by the ocean, the attractive man was softly crying. He would never get used to the tears; water leaking from the eyes seemed like such a strange thing.

Slowly fanning through the book while experiencing tightness in his chest, he stopped at one closer to the front cover. This time the tale was about a young man fighting in Persia under Alexander, a man who resembled Colton’s current appearance. Tall, blonde, muscular, and hairy chested. He skimmed the tale and tried a different page. When the third and fourth readings revealed additional scenes of the lives of other young men, Colton closed the book and his eyes.

The tears streamed down his face undeterred.

It had been so long since Solcar had been found guilty by the Council and punishment had been pronounced ―he now realized the end was near. His five thousand-year sentence was almost over. The sentence was coming to an end. The small leather-bound book recounted that sentence in detail, and he knew once he had read it in its entirety, the High Lords would finally accept him back into the ruling council.