About Splash
by KIL Kenny
102 pages / 21200 words
ISBN: 978-1-61040-089-3
Ebook zipped file contains -
html, lit, Adobe and Sony optimized pdf, prc, epub
Alex wants to spend one more season on the family farm before he's forced to sell the property and move on. What was supposed to be a reflective time is turned delightfully upside down by Jordan, the beautiful, laughing spirit Alex finds living in the cow pond. Needless to say, a pond is not Jordan's usual hangout, and as the autumn wears on, it's clear that Alex will have to find a way to get Jordan home before the first New England freeze. But if he succeeds, what will be left for Alex?
Review
Stephanie Vaughan, author of the Off World novels, writes: Alternately
playful and sober, “Splash” took all of my romance expectations and
turned them inside-out. In Kenny’s deft and knowing hands, genre
conventions are fair game for twists, adaptations, and even complete
reimaginings. Filled with details and location descriptions, I was with
Alex every step of the way as he falls not only for Jordan, but also his
grandfather‘s farm.
An unconventional romance tale, “Splash” is as slyly charming and sexy
as the creature at its center. Prepare to be captivated -- and
challenged -- when you sit down with this enchanting story.
Sample
Saturday was unproductive.
Alex knew there was a rational explanation for what he'd seen.
Phosphorescent algae, say. Not that there'd ever been any such thing in
Ezekiel's cow pond before, but invasive foreign species were everywhere
these days. You never knew what those developers were dumping.
Or maybe commuters had tossed some weird trash. He kept one of those
swimming pool skimmers handy for exactly that kind of thing -- disgusting,
the number of plastic bags and Dunkin' Donuts coffee cups that came blowing
off the road.
It could have been anything. He hadn't stayed put long enough to study the
phenomenon, after all.
At about that point in his thought process, he'd get mad all over again and
stomp down to the pond to show his weenie-ass self that there was nothing,
absolutely nothing, scary about a cow pond. Not in sunlight. Not in cloud.
Not in the morning, nor yet after lunch. A cow pond.
He even dunked the skimmer in a few times and caught a soda can, two
sandwich wrappers, and a bunch of leaves. Then he went back to the house and
put more arnica on his aching elbow. Eyes in the pond; right. Obviously, the
ten-hour workdays were already getting to him.
Still, at sunset he went down the path again. He told himself it was in the
spirit of good scientific inquiry. He would reproduce the exact conditions
as nearly as possible, and really prove to himself that it had been a
one-time, fluke thing. So to speak.
At first, he hung over the ledge, staring until he had a headache, even
poking a finger in to see if anything poked back. But then he thought maybe
that was frightening the thing away. He'd been sitting back the first time,
and whatever-it-was hadn't been able to see him. So then he sat back,
bracing himself on the arm with the good elbow, and strained his ears
instead.
Plip.
Aw, shit.
He could see the ripple bobbing away into the pond, just like before.
Mocking him with its merry up and down. Gritting his teeth, he inched
forward again and looked.
There, that irregular blob of silty something. And like before, he couldn't
make sense of it, no matter how he looked. He realized he was holding his
breath.
The eyes opened. Well, not exactly that. It was just… one minute there was
nothing, and the next, there they were. No nose or anything, no face. Eyes.
Alex realized he was trying to dig his nails into solid fieldstone, and took
a sobbing gasp of a breath. The pupils in the eyes swiveled to follow his
movement, and he sobbed again. But he stayed.
They were fish eyes, is what they were. Staring and expressionless,
perfectly round. He couldn't remember if any kind of local fish had bright
blue irises like that, but probably. If they were fish eyes, though, why
were they side by side, like human eyes? And where was the fish? Even Alex
knew that the eyes were the first thing to go on a dead fish. You didn't
just find disembodied fish eyes floating around.
Especially disembodied fish eyes that were over an inch across.
Especially disembodied, one-inch-plus fish eyes that were very definitely
looking at you.
He had to. He had to scramble back and get away. But this time he heard a
second 'plip,' which he hadn't before, and knew that that meant there would
be nothing there when he looked again.
And there wasn't.