"Stuart Hughes - Clock's Runnin, Mister" - читать интересную книгу автора (Hughes Stuart)

Sometimes, when I'm really wild these aren't enough to hold me.
The crazy warning didn't seem so crazy now.
Promise me you'll get the hell out.
"WWRRROOOOONN!" Louder this time, but just as distorted. It sounded
something like "run". She wasn't sure, but it was damn good advice anyway.

She ran.

She ran five, six blocks before stopping, out of breath, her heart
jammering in her chest. She bent double, hands on her knees, gasping for
air. For the first time, since that first occasion she had had sex with a
man for money, she found herself at a loss what to do. She was frightened,
physically exhausted, and cold and wet from the rain.
Her response to the situation she found herself in came more from a gut
reaction than through any deliberation or thought. She was scared out of
her wits. If she hadn't been so frantic, or if she'd had time to think
about it, she probably never would have done it.
There was a payphone a few feet away. She went to it, dialled the
operator, and asked for a collect call to Phoenix, Arizona.
"Name?" the operator asked.
"Hollie," she said. "Hollie Grant."
The line hissed for a while, then she found herself listening to an
excited voice on the other end of the line. A voice she not only knew, but
as the tears glistening in her eyes revealed, a voice she also loved.
"Hollie? Is that you, Hollie?"
"Yeah, Dad. It's me."
"I'm glad you called, Hollie. How are you?"
"Daddy," she said, her voice choked with tears. "I want to come home."

й Stuart Hughes 1996, 1998
'Clock's Runnin, Mister' first appeared in Peeping Tom (1996)