My Books
SUMMER IN THE CITY
(A story inspired by true events)
The city is Chicago, the summer is 1966. It’s an eventful time in America and Corey Mack, a delivery boy for the corner drug store, finds himself suffering from teenage angst, sexual discovery, and the responsibilities that come with being self-reliant as two of the 20th century’s greatest crimes reach out to scorch his unsuspecting young life: a notorious bank heist, and the Holocaust. While other 14-year-old boys enjoy summer camp or fun at the beach, Corey is busy working at two jobs to provide for himself while his absent and alcoholic mother swears him to a secret. Little does he know that unseen eyes are watching and tracking his movements, but for what purpose, and by whom? Corey is taught that life is like a shit sandwich and seriously considers his measure of portion control. Only when his reality finds context can he finally hope to see beyond the metaphors we all inhabit.
BOOK EXCERPT
Mr. Schwab was at the far end of the raised drug counter compounding what looked like caramel and vanilla frosting using a big flat butter knife. He was a tall man stooped with hunched shoulders, short wavy hair gone gray, and always dressed in black trousers wearing a white pharmacy coat that was constantly stained from syrups and other medicinal concoctions. Corey had the Chicago Tribune spread out on the counter, engrossed in reading some article, when he casually asked, “Do we have any LSD here?” The pharmacist stopped his compounding and slowly turned toward the boy. The question should have taken him by surprise, but he knew how inquiring Corey could be sometimes.
“I believe we’re out at the present time. Planning on a trip somewhere, are we?”
“Says here this guy from Harvard, a Doctor O’Leary, recommends everybody should take the stuff to ‘experience space-time dimensions and higher levels of consciousness,’ that LSD is some kind of chemical key which opens the mind. Did you ever do anything like that before, Mr. Schwab?”
“College opened my mind and after I got married my wife slammed it shut.”
“Do you think LSD can really make you experience time travel, like what Einstein said in relativity? Just imagine if that was possible.” Corey looked intrigued by the idea as he stared off into an imagined abyss of possibilities.
“You are the most precocious boy I know,” exclaimed the pharmacist. “Maybe delivering drugs isn’t the best job for you after all.”
“Gosh, I wouldn’t think to take drugs without first being sick. I don’t even smoke cigarettes. Think I wanna be like some mop-headed hipster? Besides,” he offered, “I’m the best delivery boy you got.”
“My swell-headed innocent. You are my ONLY delivery boy,” the pharmacist corrected. “And my ONLY mop-in-hand boy too, but I see no mop in your hand right now. Did you clean the backroom, stock the candy rack up front, or the magazine rack, or the ……”
“OK, I’m going,” relenting to higher authority. “But would you do me a favor first, please?” Mr. Schwab gave him a serious look.
“What.”
“Write that word ‘precocious’ so I can look it up. Sounds like something I ain’t.”
“Isn’t! I mean am not. Now beat it!” Youth is such a frustrating age.
