Daniel McShane
Bio
Pirate by day, writer by night. Arr!
Stories (12/0)
My Father's Tree
Time and tide wait for no man, and that sucks. This is a proverb attributed to Geoffrey Chaucer (well, I added the last bit) but it is likely much older, perhaps from Greek origins. When reviewing this week's Vocal Summer Fiction Series challenge, this is the first thing that popped into my head, and now an uncomfortable emotion is driving me to explore that thought on the blank page. To expunge from my mind, as it were. You see, I'm almost exactly the same age my father was when he died, he wasn't very old, and I am finding more triggers to the subjects and relevance of age and time passage than I ever have before. I suppose everyone that is living gets one day older every day. We share that. And I wonder if the apex of life comes when you remember your own mortality more regularly? Maybe it's all downhill from here? I hope not. I'm perfectly healthy, though I seem to have a love / hate relationship with pizza (maybe another commonality we all have). I have goals, and plenty of dreams to work towards. I love, and feel loved. It could be that I just really miss my Dad.
By Daniel McShane3 years ago in Families
The Castro Diamonds, part 7
(...continued from The Castro Diamonds, part 6) "Jack Ruby killed Lee Harvey Oswald, that much is certain," began the fourth newspaper article found in the little brown box. It was the first line after the signature greeting "My Dear Reader" which began all of famed crime reporter Doris Killian's articles. This one was dated November 5th, 1964.
By Daniel McShane3 years ago in Fiction
The Castro Diamonds, part 6
(...continued from The Castro Diamonds, part 5) Two light bulbs, one red and one green, were installed above the door of the second floor conference room. The red one glowed for hours and days at a time during nine months of meetings by The President's Commission on the Assassination of President Kennedy inside the National Archives building in Washington D.C. It indicated that the Warren Commission, as it was unofficially known, was conducting a "closed" hearing in order to collect evidence in the matter of the assassination. That was an important distinction that the members of the commission, led by Chief Justice Earl Warren, made. Over the months of investigation, many commission members would remind the press that these sessions were "closed" and not "secret," the key difference being that, while the public could not attend the hearings, the witnesses that were brought in to provide testimony were free to share the same testimony with whomever they chose, including the media. It was an attempt to reassure the rest of the world that the U.S. Government was conducting a thorough and open, if yet sensitive, review of the available evidence in this most tragic event. So the red light burned above the door as the commission conducted its business.
By Daniel McShane3 years ago in Fiction
The Castro Diamonds, part 5
…Continued from The Castro Diamonds, part 4… All but one of the newspaper clippings were by the same journalist, Doris Killian. The first one in chronological order was titled “Nation Shocked: President Kennedy Assassinated in Texas” and was dated November 23rd, 1963. It read:
By Daniel McShane3 years ago in Fiction
The Castro Diamonds, part 4
(...continued from The Castro Diamonds, part 3: Brown Paper Box) Later that night, Will sat at the small fold-down table in his trailer and stared at the aged pocket watch in front of him. He had discovered it in an old cardboard box wrapped in brown paper amongst his deceased mother’s few belongings that had been unceremoniously stored in the attic of the hangar barn he used for his crop-dusting business. Photocopies of five newspaper articles and three letters rested beside it. The originals had been found in the box as well, but Will had somewhat begrudgingly been compelled to hand them over to the FBI because they had references to an ongoing case they were building on. It was an unsolved case from the 1960’s holding his father and grandfather responsible for a diamond theft that had consequences of "national interest." After a whole lot of legal mumbo-jumbo extolled over the course of three hours in a cramped interview room at their Monterey field office, and knowing he had copies, his lawyer Stella advised him to capitulate, but it was clear she liked the idea less than he did. So, in exchange for a receipt and assurances of return, he handed over the sparse contents of the box. Except for the watch.
By Daniel McShane3 years ago in Fiction
The Castro Diamonds, part 3
(...continued from The Castro Diamonds: Death By Chocolate) Will was late to the field office the next morning, having spent the prior evening in the barn’s loft space looking through crates of his deceased mother’s old belongings. Never before being terribly interested in the old clothes that smelled faintly of elderly woman, or the bits of furniture and housewares that had accompanied her to The Retirement Village at Greenlawn, he had shoved everything up into the second-floor space to be dealt with later. It was later now, he supposed. Increasingly curious about this burgeoning mystery, and with a stomach mildly turning from anticipation, or possibly too much chocolate cake, Will plodded through packing containers of the aforementioned old lady stuff; two plastic crates of loose pictures awaiting placement in an album; and an old steamer trunk filled with knickknacks and various lifetime debris hidden beneath a musty brown mink stole that made him jump for safety upon opening the vintage kit. The steamer also held a suspicious package wrapped in brown paper. It was this small cardboard box that would occupy Will’s attention over the mostly sleepless night.
By Daniel McShane3 years ago in Fiction
The Castro Diamonds
Wilson Pratchett robbed banks. His grandson, Wilson Pratchett III, did not. Yet the younger Pratchett was still denied entry into FBI training at Quantico, and if one asked why, he would tell you it was because of his family legacy. It was a great story to tell at parties, of his grandfather’s daring and meticulously planned exploits that would eventually involve his father as well, and of their eventual capture and punishment just after young Will was born. The truth is most of it was made up. Will didn’t actually know any of the details, and if his mother Angela did, she kept them from him. He was never allowed to meet or even to know his father and grandfather, even after their prison deaths when Will was three. And they were never spoken of without receiving a strong rebuke in return.
By Daniel McShane3 years ago in Fiction
Big Papa's Guitar
I learned to play the guitar in prison. When I was seven. In the 1970’s, my father was the administrator of a minimum-security correctional facility called Camp Greene in Charlotte, North Carolina. Named for the Continental Army Revolutionary War General Nathanael Greene, it originally opened as an Army training camp in 1917 for troops deploying to fight in World War One. It closed as such in 1919 and later was deeded to the state. The old Army barracks were rejuvenated, and the camp became an installation to hold low risk male prisoners, many of whom were trustees and allowed to participate in a work-release program.
By Daniel McShane3 years ago in Beat
The Golden Lily
A gold bar. 10oz of fine, pure gold at 999.9. Charlie Huston didn’t really know what those numbers meant, but the lawyer said it would be worth at least $20,000 with a reputable exchange-traded funds dealer. He barely knew his great-uncle either. The man had been very private, though most of the rest of the family assumed he had been rich. Charlie was excited but wondered aloud in the empty room, “Why give this to me?” Time for some homework.
By Daniel McShane3 years ago in Families