Presenting: A Josh Crowley Original Series *Revised Edition*

When I was writing part 1 of my original series, my plan was to go back and add more detail, proofread, make better word selections, etc. However, my sister needed the computer RIGHT NOW!!! So I didn't, but I'm going to now, probably more for my sake than yours, but hey.

Rick Somner swung open his front door and inhaled deeply the heavy, pre-storm air.

"Perfect timing." he thought.

He slipped on a sweatshirt and some just-a-little-too-short shorts, in hopes that Kylie, his incredibly attractive next-door neighbor might glance out the window as he jogged in the lukewarm rain.

He stepped out the door and felt the first raindrops fall on his nose and eyelashes,

"Why do I love this so much?" he questioned, for as long as he could remember he had loved running through the cemetary in the cool, thick fall air of a rainstorm. Something to do with the heavy, wet-asphault smell and the colored leaves that fell as he jogged by absorbed him.

As Rick jogged through the cemetary, he thought about life. He enjoyed school, couldn't wait to date, and appreciated things most teenagers didn't. He had worked for the first time over the summer and was still enjoying the all-powerful feeling of his strengthened muscles. He loved sports and soaked up a good game like a sponge. Soccer encompassed him, (see, this is already becoming a narrative about my life) and felt that soccer in a way defined him. Unique and fascinating, soccer took a completely different mindset from most other sports. Yet it was so simple, put the ball in the goal.

As he rounded his lap around the cemetary, he crossed the street and grabbed a ball from his backyard. He lifted the ball to his face and, for just a second, stood and smelled the ball and the grass and the rain.

Back in the cemetary, he took a couple juggles of the ball to warm his legs. When he felt his muscles get warm and stretched out, he trapped the ball with immense precision on the asphault in front of him. He envisioned his opponent and took a touch forward. He faked right and went left, going full speed, he popped the ball up with his foot, took a touch off his thigh and WHAM! he smashed the ball into a vine-covered fence, across the cemetary.

"Hey! You 'bout gave me heart attack. You're going to put a whole in my fence you little terd! I'll call the cops on you if you ever slam a ball into my fence again!" said an deep, old voice behind the vines.

"I'm so sorry!" Rick replied, scared half to death.

"Ya you better be" replied the old man.

Rick scampered off, wishing he hadn't kicked the ball and cursing the old man under his breath.

"It's a freakin' chain-link fence" he thought "I mean, I can see that I scared him, but come on! What a loser." As he gave the incident more thought than it deserved, he noticed a plywood board laying in an empty part of the cemetary.

"That's weird" he thought. He remembered a time when a funeral had been delayed a couple of hours on a rainy day and they had layed a board over the hole. He had assumed at the time that they just didn't want the soil muddy. But today, it was already 5:00, they wouldn't be doing a funeral tonight.

"It must have been planned for today, but postponed till tomorrow" he figured. "Wait a minute, tomorrow is Sunday, surely there won't be a funeral tomorrow." Out of curiosity, he went and lifted up the plywood to see if there was anything underneath.

The clouds had blocked out most of the light and he had to lift the board off the hole to see inside. He saw the corner of something sticking out of the dirt at the bottom of the hole. He jumped in and moved some dirt around with his foot.

His heart stopped at what he had uncovered.

An old knife and a muddy picture.