No Pistol Tastes the Same
by Jacob Paul Patchen
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GENRE: Suspense (Military/PTSD)
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BLURB:
JP’s pistol tastes like bourbon.
Sergeant JP Grimm didn’t pull the trigger. Now his Marine brothers are dead. All victims of a child in a suicide vest…a child that resembled Sgt. Grimm’s very own. But how are you supposed to take a child’s life? How can you kill someone that looks just like your own son?
Those same hazel eyes he saw in his scope continue to haunt him long after he left the desert death lands as he tries to reconnect with his son, Adin. JP battles another war at home against PTSD and the worthless, dejected thoughts that he is the reason his friends are dead. His wife, Lisa, struggles to let her stubborn husband work it out on his own terms. She does all she can to give him space, support, and strength—but her love can only go so far.
As the world shows signs of impending doom from a weakening magnetic field and flaring sun, JP, too, shows signs of his own impending doom. After pushing everyone away, JP must face his nightmares to restore his relationship with his son, save his marriage, and save himself before the modern world burns out in a fiery, electromagnetic disaster.
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EXCERPTS:
Ya know, I can do this. I can hang out with my son. No big deal. I got this.
“Dad, you’re a marine. You’ll know what to do,” Adin said, pulling away from his father’s hand and stretching out to try to mess up his father’s short, sandy hair.
JP leaned toward the window, just out of his son’s reach. “Hey now! Don’t be messin’ with my fro!”
Adin laughed. “That’s not a fro, Dad. You barely have anything there.”
“Gee, thanks. I love you too, son,” he tittered.
JP focused back on the curvy road. Up ahead, loose trash piled beside the ditch. His heart jumped as he squeezed the wheel. Without any thought, he swerved sharply to avoid it, making Adin grab hold of the armrest to steady himself.
They rounded the next pot-holed curve in the road, and JP’s eyes grew large at all the trash scattered along the right-hand side. Black and white bags, beer cans, and tires tainted the ditch and roadside. It was like spilled paint on a scenic country painting, a scar on the landscape, a black-and-white gash in the beautiful crimson-and-gold carpet that lined their country drive.
His head snapped to the right as he sucked in the dusty wind around him. His boot tapped the brake before mashing down the accelerator, squealing the back tires. The truck swerved sharply to the other lane, speeding toward the cluster of garbage that littered their rustic corridor in a loud cloud of engine and smoke.
“Whoa!” Adin gasped, grabbing hold of the armrest again as his body swayed back and forth.
His father continued accelerating, the exhaust revving as he clung to the left edge of the road. Up ahead, a white plastic bag, stuffed full of something, leaned just into the gravel at the edge of the road. JP whipped the wheel again, sending his mud tires down into the shallow ditch. They bumped through the trench, JP stiff in his seat and focused, Adin with each hand on an armrest, bracing himself the best he could.
As soon as they cleared the trash, JP tugged the wheel and swerved his truck back onto the pebbled road. He decelerated both the truck and his heart. His grip on the wheel loosened, as he swallowed the tension in his throat, and took in a breath. But, JP didn’t say a thing. He just continued on as if nothing out of the ordinary had happened.
Adin, still clinging to the armrest, took a couple of deep breaths. “Dad, are you drunk!”
JP looked at his son, slightly confused. “What, Bud?”
“Are you drunk? You’re swerving all over the road!”
His father’s eyes showed a glimpse of panic as he realized what he had just done. That reaction was routine in the world of war he had just come from. But here, at home, there were no IEDs or roadside bombs for one to swerve around. At home, there was no kill zone to accelerate through.
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AUTHOR Bio and Links:
Jacob Paul Patchen is an award-winning author and poet of inciting fiction and provocative poetry.
Jacob earns his inspiration through experience and believes every book has a purpose. He writes powerful, emotional, and thrilling stories about mental health, war, social stigmas, and other taboo subjects in order to bring awareness, change, and hope to those who need it.
Raised in Southeast Ohio, he’s a sucker for fast workouts, long laughter, and power naps. Snacks are his love language, and he thinks he’s a Pisces. Check him out and join his newsletter at Jacobpaulpatchen.com.
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